Walberg then briefs the girls, repeating the speech verbatim while unconsciously signing the international symbol for "very large breasts" over and over again.

A lone sea-bird croaks twice, flaps its wings and flies away.

- - - - - - - - - - - -

After the commercial break, the camera swoops downward onto a dwarfed Walberg, whose thankless job it has been to put an educational spin on the debauchery.

"As we've said from the beginning," he says, rubbing his hands together, "the journey for our couples has been about choices. Choices that they hope would provide answers to the questions that lie deep within their hearts."

Questions like: If I were on an island populated solely by fantasy swingles in bathing suits, how many of them would sleep with me?

"Tonight -- here -- they will make their most important choice: whether to continue their lives together as couples, or leave Temptation Island alone."

"Leave me alone," we can almost hear the island praying. But Andy comes to the bonfire nonetheless.

"We're down to the wire, man," says Walberg dramatically, "and I just wanted to ask you some questions about your experiences."

"It was more challenging than I anticipated it being," Andy says. "I thought I was going to come down here and brush off the ladies ..."

Huh?

"And cruise through it. And that wasn't necessarily the case."

"Yeah," smiles Walberg, feigning understanding of what the boy is talking about.

Andy explains that it was hard getting "emotionally close" to Megan.

"It was kind of deep, pretty deep. And she got pretty torn up there when she left, I don't know if you saw that ..."

We saw that. But the way we remember it, she was crying over Kaya.

"Shannon and I will go home and we'll disclose everything that happened," Andy says in response to Walberg's question about whether he's worried about what Shannon's been up to.

"Assuming you guys both go home together," Walberg whips back.

The drums, meanwhile, are going crazy. We wonder if the Blue Man Group is lurking in the shadows somewhere. Or maybe Stomp.

"You seem pretty confident," Walberg says.

Andy twitches.

"I'm trying to be."

So Shannon sets out across the sand to meet her destiny. Alas, it's only Walberg. He asks her, hoping beyond hope that she'll spill the beans about Tom, what the best part of the whole experience has been. (Apart from benefiting from his many life lessons, of course.)

"I think, if I had to pinpoint something, it would be hanging out at Monte Chica." She's talking about the first days on the island, when the (then) four women were hanging out with the original 13 hunky party boys. "Those guys -- they were our lifeline."

Wait. Isn't that another show?

"When we came to the bonfire we knew we would be OK because we were going back to them."

Frustrated, Walberg smiles pseudo-warmly and asks how Tom felt about it.

Again, Shannon foils him.

"We feel an extraordinary bond and extraordinarily fortunate that we had this encounter."

Walberg stares. He nods. Then he says "Hmm."

There goes his bonus!

"Will you miss Tom?" he asks, trying again.

"I'm hoping that I won't have to miss Tom. I think our story -- Tom's and my story -- is an important one for me to maintain."

Walberg smiles, satisfied, and it's time for Andy to come out.

He asks Shannon whether she wants to hear the good news or the bad news.

"Bad news."

Now playing: Read all the recent movie reviews by Salon's critics