Bed, Bath, and Way Beyond

Thursday night's episode of Beauty and the Geek began as the villainous Chris and his partner, Tristin, rejoined the rest of the cast after surviving the first elimination round. While Tristin was enthusiastically welcomed back, no one was in a rush to greet Chris.

Since the team Cher sent into the elimination round, Brandon & Amanda, didn't win, she apologized to Chris & Tristin for rooting against them. Actually she just apologized for the phrasing she used and didn't take back the sentiment. Tristin was stunned at Cher's hostility toward her team, and took it as a warning that she'd need to beat Cher if she hoped to stick around.

For this week's challenges, the geeks had to master interior design, and the beauties needed to understand computers. While the ladies crammed for their challenge, the guys left the mansion on an overnight mission. Their challenge was to shop in a Bed, Bath, and Beyond store for items to decorate a bedroom. Each guy had $1500 to spend, which seemed like a lot of money since the rooms already contained a bed frame and mattress, a dresser, and a night stand. But it's easy to blow $1500 when you don't know what you're doing.

Back at the mansion, the girls were happy to have the place to themselves. They stayed up gossiping and eating ice cream sundaes -- all that was missing was a pillow fight.

Cher was the only one who didn't participate, choosing instead to spend the night studying. She seems to take the competition aspect of the show way more seriously than anyone else, at the expense of the camaraderie the other participants are enjoying. Whether it's the allure of the $250,000 grand prize, or just the satisfaction of beating the other teams, her obsession with winning is turning unhealthy fast.

The guys spent their night hanging pictures and arranging candles. Wes made a bizarre last minute decision to write the phrase "Time stands still when I am with you" on his wall in red paint. The end result looked like it was written in blood.

Without knowing which geek was responsible for each room, the beauties rated the rooms from best to worst. Jennipher was the only girl to correctly identify the room her partner had decorated. The vote resulted in a tie for first between Joe and Karl. Joe's purple and pink scheme had more first place votes and won the tie break over Karl's red velvet, Dungeons and Dragons-appropriate room.

The girls' challenge immediately followed the guys' challenge. Each girl was required to properly hook up a computer, connect to the internet, download a song, burn it to a CD, and play the CD in a CD player. Each girl was allowed to ask her partner one yes-or-no question, but that was all the help they could get. Cher and Tristin quickly completed each task, with Cher narrowly eking out the win. Despite a pitiful performance, Jennipher vowed to take apart her own computer and put it back together once the show was over, just so she wouldn't have to feel so dependent upon other people.

Upon returning to the mansion, Cher lit into Josh, criticizing him for not sticking with the interior design plan they'd developed. While he passively withstood her bullying, he admitted later that he's gathering the courage to stand up to her.

While Cher and Josh they talked, Tristin interrupted to ask the name of the host of Extreme Makeover: Home Edition. Josh told her it was Ty Pennington. As soon as Tristin left, Cher berated Josh for helping the enemy.

The two victorious teams, Joe & Brittany and Josh & Cher, worked together to pick which teams would fight to avoid elimination. Josh approached the decision differently than the rest, thinking not about strategy but about who would benefit the most from their time in the house. But he wasn't unable to convince his cohorts that Wes didn't need the experience as badly as some other cast members. Instead, Chris & Tristin were sent back again, this time to battle Tyson & Thais.

The girls answered questions about computers in the first round of questions. Fueled by her desire for revenge upon Cher, Tristin aced all three of her questions. Tyson entered the guys' round two points behind after Thais only answered one question correctly. Both Chris and Tyson got their first questions right, but Chris left the door open after missing question number two. Tyson answered his second question correctly but couldn't save his team when Chris aced his last question: "Who is the host of Extreme Makeover: Home Edition?"

Tyson and Thais left the house with no regrets, agreeing that their new friendship made their experience on the show worthwhile. We'll see if Cher feels the same about her partner after she learns that Josh's casual answer is what allowed Chris & Tristin to win.

Next episode, the guys are made over in preparation for a date. But Chris makes a blunder on the date that could ruin his partnership with Tristin.