By Jennifer Larson

After putting in all that effort and playing nice with the younger kids, Greg failed to win the gold star, in last week’s episode of KID NATION. This week, we see his displeasure at being passed over so callously. He doesn’t seem to understand that even the 8-year-olds can see right through him. I mean you don’t go from being the town bully to being everything for everyone without people noticing. Besides, Michael has proven himself to be such a standup little guy that it would have been a serious miscarriage of justice not to bestow the $20,000 prize on him. But those petty disagreements had to be put on hold – at least for now – because Bonanza City has been hit with a nasty dust storm. But that storm is nothing compared to the one that is brewing over some unpopular decisions being made by the town-council members.

With all the stress of starting up a new society, leaving their parents and killing a chicken, the kids needed to blow off a little steam. What’s better than a mug of root beer, candy and good friends to unwind? But there is nothing worse than being woken up by a 15-year-old with an attitude, after a night of partying. Greg is really bitter about losing that gold star, and he’s making sure everybody feels his pain. Smashing pots and pans over the other kid’s heads was brutal and mean, but proved that these children still need a curfew. And somebody needs to give Greg a good talking to. Seriously, a 15-year-old should know better than to intimidate, physically threaten and verbally abuse smaller kids. You just know this kid is the bully on the playground back home. The one good thing is the fact that there is a mix of children with different backgrounds and ages, so when one becomes a problem another one can step in and smooth over the situation.


But, it will take a lot of smoothing over to pacify the kids, when the town council enforces a 9:30 p.m. curfew. You have to figure that one of the attractions of leaving their parents and homes is the fact that they would receive a bit more freedom. With a bedtime, a bully and a cooking staff with a bad attitude and lazy work ethic to deal with, I wouldn’t be surprised if we begin to see more children choose to leave Bonanza City. But there’s always hope, because the weekly challenges allow the kids to win higher positions in the town, and possibly garner them a group prize. The goal of tonight’s challenge was to coral some sheep. With thoughts of dirty dishes and bad food on their minds, most of the kids just wanted to knock the yellow team out of the kitchen. And when the yellow team, which by the way is the youngest team in the town, won the challenge and became the upper class workers, most of the kids were just happy to see another team get the chance to cook up some edible food.

One would think that winning a group prize would be a good thing, but when given the choice between a microwave and pizza, the town almost blew apart. And let me tell you, that little Taylor is a force to be reckoned with. She’s a scrappy little thing, with a motto that says it all, “deal with it.” I think that attitude may came back to haunt her, if she’s not careful. All that power seems to be going to her head, and now that she’s won the weekly competition, she may be even more of a pill to deal with. But all that had to be set aside, when a powerful windstorm blew in. This would be the point I would be crying for my mommy, but these kids are pretty tough and not only bared through the storm but also did a good job of cleaning up afterward. In fact, they all did such a good job that it was difficult for the town council to choose whom to give the gold star to.


When the town council convened for their weekly meeting, Taylor was the subject of much debate. Apparently, none of the kids are taking too kindly to her bossy attitude and lack of desire to work. After a few tears, Taylor promised to shape up and all was forgiven … for now. Then it was on to who would get the gold star, and in a touching moment, 9-year-old Mallory got the most expensive birthday gift of her life. And so ends another week of KID NATION, and it looks like this show is here to stay. So, whether you love it or hate, you can’t say it isn’t captivating to watch.