James Weir recaps SAS Australia 2020 finale | Ripped off: SAS star stripped of victory

A brutal blow is dealt in the final seconds of SAS Australia when one star is stripped of his victory. James Weir recaps.

After enduring brutal torture and making it to the finish line of SAS Australia, one star is stripped of victory and rejected on the spot at the top of a mountain — an act we kinda wish happened to Honey Badger just so we could have a beautiful full-circle moment reminiscent of the time he dumped both those chicks on The Bachelor finale for no reason.

Alas, it does not happen to him. Boo. He robbed us of a love story two years ago and now he robs us of synchronicity. You’ll pay for this, Nicholas H. B. Cummins.

Olympic swimmer James Magnussen is the recruit stripped of his title. And he doesn’t even get a consolation prize. When Chrissie Swan lost Big Brother to Reggie, at least she got a PT Cruiser. James really deserves a PT Cruiser.

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It’s the final 24 hours and our five remaining celebrities are about to be tortured one last time before selection. Who the hell’s left? Oh, these yahoos.

This is identical to the feature wall in my living room.

This finale is kinda disappointing because there are no more scandals to dredge up. And the only celebrities left are boring sports people and Rosso’s mate.

So with nary a toilet tryst to uncover, what’s left to do? Physical activity. Ugh. It’s about as interesting as watching a Barry’s Bootcamp live stream. There’s a lot of running, jumping and carrying heavy things in weirdly-dark lighting. Half the episode’s filmed in night vision.

The celebs are captured and held hostage in a weird location. Then they break free and make a run for it in the dark. The escape is a complete mess.

Stealth.

Then they’re broken up into two teams.

Alpha: Merrick, Molly and Nick.

Bravo: Sabrina and James.

Each group is given a compass and a map that directs them to a rendezvous point (RV). Explaining all this convoluted information makes me want to find the producers and inflict on them military torture tactics I’ve learnt from this program.

The instructions are simple: hike down to the river and follow it until they reach the meeting location.

Easy breezy!

Team Bravo go just slightly off track.

An accurate depiction of Bravo’s route.

Honestly, it’s the SAS soldiers’ fault. Why’d they give the recruits old-timey maps and compasses? They should’ve just dropped a pin on Google Maps.

But that’s hindsight for you. Bravo gets captured.

And just when it looks like Alpha has safely arrived at their RV, they make the dumb mistake of jumping into a random 4WD as if it’s a waiting Uber.

It’s a trap and it leads to their capture as well as a mild car bombing.

It was nice knowing youse!

Now with all the bozos held hostage again, it’s time to kick the torture up a notch.

“They’ll be subjected to techniques not permitted by the British or Australian military,” the voiceover guy tells us.

And he’s right. One of the torture techniques? The celebs are forced to listen to the old dial-up internet noise from the ‘90s on loop. The horror! Make it stop! I’ll tell you anything!

Dial-up PTSD is a serious condition. I have a recurring nightmare that my Netflix stream is lagging so I go to reset the router and find it has been replaced with dial-up. Then I wake up screaming.

That rally car driver Molly Taylor can’t handle the flashbacks and quits the competition on the spot.

No man, woman or child should be forced to re-live dial-up.

Then they’re each dragged into an interrogation room and asked questions about their mission by Captor One and Captor Two — roles that I can say with 97 per cent certainty are played by two background extras from Home And Away.

It all falls apart when the captors find a map on James Magnussen and quiz him.

“What’s this point?” Captor One glares.

“It’s … where we pick up rations,” he stutters.

“What’s RV stand for?”

James takes a second to think. “Rations … and … various?”

Anyway, they somehow outsmart the Home And Away extras and get released which leads us to a bleak expanse of rocky terrain where we witness the final stage, dubbed The Sickener.

It’s just another confusing task that involves lots of running and jumping and lifting heavy things for miles and miles. And then, just as the celebs make it to the extraction point where they’re supposed to be rescued by a helicopter, the soldiers decide it has taken too long — so the chopper craps off and leaves them stranded.

See ya!

Right now, the show is running out of gas and the rules and instructions are being made up second by second. Producers need an ending so they tell the final four celebs to just run up a hill and call it the finish line.

They all make it! They’ve passed SAS selection! Oh, except you James.

“It’s just not your time. Just wasn’t enough,” the soldiers shrug as they demand the swimmer hand over his number.

The guy just finished the course with the others and yet he doesn’t get the glory? What a rip off. A PT Cruiser is definitely in order as compensation.

Honey Badger, Sabrina and Merrick are too busy celebrating their victory and barely even notice James slump off down the mountain alone.

And with that, the soldiers bid farewell to these clowns with some sage words.

“F**kin’ maggots.”

Twitter, Facebook: @hellojamesweir

Bye maggots!