Project Runway Season Eleven, Episode Eight: Thunder Down Under!

This ain't one body's Tell. It's the Tell of us all. We got it mouth to mouth. You got to listen it and 'member. 'Cause what you hears today you got to tell the birthed tomorrow. I's looking behind us now, across the count of time, down the long haul, into history back. I sees the end what were the start. It's Pockaclipse, full of pain. And out of it were birthed crackling dust and fearsome time. It were full-on winter and Mr. Dead chasing them all. But one he couldn't catch. That were Tim Gunn. He gathers up a gang of designers, takes to the air and flies to the sky. So they left their homes, said bidey-bye to the high-scrapers and what were left of the knowing they left behind. Some say the wind just stoppered. Others reckon it were a gang called Turbulence. And after the wreck some had been jumped by Mr. Auf Wiedersehen but some had got the luck, and it leads them here. One look and they's got the hots for it. They word it Parsons the New School and they says, "We don't need the knowing. We can live here." Time counts and keeps counting. They gets missing what they had. They get so lonely for the high-scrapers and the video. And they does the pictures so they'd 'member all the knowing that they lost. 'Member this? Tomorrow-morrow Land! 'Member this? The River of Light! 'Member this? The Lord and Taylor accessory wall! Then Tim Gunn picked them of an age and good for a long haul. They counted eight designers, and that were them. The great leaving. They said bidey-bye to them what they'd birthed. And from the nothing they looked back and Tim Gunn hollered, "Wait; one of us will come."

Our hero, Tim Gunn wanders into Bartertown. He has just had all his worldly possessions stolen by a man in a little airplane and he’s trying to get back what is rightfully his. He’s dragged before Heidi Klum, ruler of Bartertown:

Your host, Heidi Klum

Heidi: “Why did you bring me this raggedy man?”

Tim: “I beg your pardon? I’ll have you know this is a bespoke suit!”

Heidi: “Come with me. Look around. All this I built. Up to my armpits in thread and hair gel. Where there was desert, now there's a design room. Where there was robbery, there are hair and makeup people. Where there was despair, now there's even more despair. It's civilization. I'll do anything to protect it. Today it's necessary to send a designer home. What do you say?”

Tim: “What do I have to do?”

Heidi: “You have to go to the place we call the Underworld. It’s the power source for this episode of Project Runway.”

Tim: “Oil? Natural gas?”

Heidi: “No. This episode is powered entirely on methane from pig manure. The lights, the sewing machines, the HP touchpads -- all of it pig manure.”

Tim: “I thought I smelled chaos and bedlam, but now I realize it’s the manure. But how do I get down there? I don’t know anything about methane.”

Heidi: “You can shovel shit, can’t you?”

Tim: “We’ve been doing it for years!”

I'VE HAD ENOUGH! I'VE SUFFERED THROUGH ENOUGH OF THIS EPISODE! I DEMAND JUSTICE! I DEMAND THUNDERDOME!

Heidi: “You know the law. Two teams enter, one designer leaves.”

THUNDERDOME! THUNDERDOME!

Heidi: “Then it's your choice. Welcome to another edition of Thunderdome! Listen on! Listen on! This is the truth of it. Fighting leads to killing, and killing gets to warring. And that was damn near the death of us all. Look at us now, busted up and everyone talking about tear-away pants. But we've learned by the dust of them all. Bartertown learned. Now when teams get to competing, it happens here and it finishes here. Two teams enter, one designer leaves. And right now, I've got two teams. Two teams with guts full of fear. Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, runway time's here! First up is Team Slick and Hip. They’re ball crackers; death on foot; you know them; you love them; they’re Richard, Layana, Samantha, and Amanda.”

Team Slick and Hip

Heidi: “The challengers are Team Shades of Gray, direct from out of the Wasteland. They’re beautiful; they’re crazy; they’re Patricia, Daniel, Michelle, and Stanley.”

Team Shades of Gray

Heidi: “Thunderdome's simple. Get to Mood, get materials, and use them any way you can. I know you won't break the rules. There aren't any! Remember where you are. This is Thunderdome! Death is listening, and will take the first designer that screams. Prepare! Two teams enter, one designer leaves! You know the law! This is Thunderdome!”

Let me get this straight. Are you saying I know the law? And that this is Thunderdome?

Heidi: “JUST GET ON WITH IT!”

The designers are attached to bunjee cords and they jump around in a cage, trying to grab sewing machines and steamers and chainsaws. They are fighting to the death and it’s not pretty to watch. Finally, it’s over:

Heidi: “That was terrible! I’m sending everyone home this week.”

TWO TEAMS ENTER, ONE DESIGNER LEAVES! TWO TEAMS ENTER, ONE DESIGNER LEAVES!

Heidi: “What’s this?! Do you think I don’t know the law?! Wasn’t it me who wrote it?! These designers made a deal to create decent looks and they broke that deal. And the law says, Bust a deal, face the wheel!”

BUST A DEAL, FACE THE WHEEL! BUST A DEAL, FACE THE...wait...why am I chanting that?

The designers play the post-apocalyptic version of Wheel of Fortune. Amanda lands on ‘Gulag’ and is tied to the back of a horse and sent out into the desert. Sorry, Amanda!

Tim leads the remaining seven designers to safety. He commandeers the plane from the thief who stole all his belongings at the beginning of the episode. They start to fly away, with the bloodthirsty gang of Project Runway judges in hot pursuit, but there is just one problem:

Pilot: “Not enough runway.”

Tim: “We don’t have any choice.”

Pilot: “Between them and us, there’s not enough runway.”

Tim: “This is Project Runway! How can there not be enough runway?!”

HURRY! HEIDI'S GAINING ON YOU!

Tim drives his truck directly into the judges, leaving just enough runway for the plane to take off, saving the designers for one more week.

This you knows. The years travel fast. And week after week I've done the Tell. But this ain't one body's Tell. It's the Tell of us all. And you got to listen it and 'member. 'Cause what you hears today, you got to tell the birthed tomorrow. I's looking behind us now, into history back. I sees those designers that got the luck and made the show watchable. It lead us here and we was heartful 'cause we seen what there once was. One look, and we knewed we'd got it straight. Those what had gone before had knowing of things beyond our reckoning, even beyond our dreaming. Time counts and keeps counting. And we knows now finding the trick of what's been and lost ain't no easy ride. But that's our track. We got to travel it. And there ain't nobody knows where it's gonna lead. Still and all, every week we does the Tell so that we 'member who we was and what Project Runway used to be. But most of all we 'members the designers who finded us and made us heartful of the show in history back. And we turns on our televisions. Not just for those designers but for all of them that are still out there. 'Cause we knows there'll come a night when they sees the distant light and they'll be coming home.