‘The Anonymous’ Recap: ‘New Handle, New Me’

Written by John Edward Betancourt

THE ANONYMOUS -- "New Handle, New Me" Episode 104 -- Pictured: (l-r) Nina Twine, Dillian Frelow, Andy King -- (Photo by: Rico Torres/USA Network)

Caution: This article contains spoilers for Episode Four of ‘The Anonymous’. To revisit the Series Premiere, click here.
​
Normally when it comes to reality competition shows, big twists and changes to the competition arrive late in the season, and rightfully so. Because at that point, you have but a handful of contestants left, who have likely figured out the game and have a plan as to how secure their victory. So, there is no better time to throw a wrench in the machine and mix things up, and well… we love that. Because it does ensure that the ending isn’t stale for the audience or the folks battling it out, and we’ve grown used to this being the norm. Which is why, the new series, The Anonymous, on USA Network took all of us by surprise last night. Simply, it decided to shake the competition up… big time… in its fourth episode no less.

That is of course, after handling some unpleasant business in ‘New Handle, New Me’. After all, someone still had to go home, and someone was The Anonymous and that turned out to be Xavier. Courtesy of his plan to deflect and attack and well, that prompted him to remove Tyrenna from the board. Completing his plan and bringing the field down to eight and well, that’s when DANI started dropping all of those game-changing surprises. Simply because, with everyone starting to figure out handles, and with only eight competitors left, in the playing field… DANI deemed that a handle refresh was in order. To keep things lively, and to keep people guessing. But that wasn’t the only shocker she had up her digital sleeve for the contestants.

Because they all noticed that when the refresh was over, that twelve avatars were present and that was due to the fact, that three new contestants entered the digital ring: Bismah, Wayne, and Victoria. All of whom had dynamic backgrounds that could serve them well in this game and just like that… the addition of three new contestants, brought about all kinds of new dynamics to the game. Since all three of them quickly went to work, and started assembling alliances and executing plans, and a little romance bloomed since Victoria and Christopher quickly found one another and flirted it up, and the arrival of this new group of competitors also brought some genuine drama in the match. Because this time around, the chat was quite brutal.

In part because it got back to Dillian about how some (well, Christopher,) had concerns about Dillian’s contributions to the group and that, combined with some new strategies brought about one brutal chat session. Wherein everyone took some big swings for the fences to be the Anonymous and that led to some hard frustrations, some hard words and more unique strategies. The kind that saw some folks go up for elimination that weren’t happy about it, and some explosive drama after the chat as well. Because Dillian, was in fact, furious over what Christopher had to say. So, there was a heated confrontation and a promise that when Dillian’s time comes to be the Anonymous, Christopher’s time would be up. 

All of which made… for a jaw dropping episode. Because we really did get comfortable, and we believed that patterns were going to emerge, that the alliance was going to be strengthened. But nope. This show blew everything up and took it in a vastly different direction, and just like that, we are back in undiscovered country and well, that brought forth… one amazing episode. Because it takes guts for a show to offer up this kind of twist, four episodes in. But this one did it, because it really does want to stand out and offer something new and well, it’s established now that we should expect the unexpected with this series, and it will be interesting to see what surprises await us as season one of this dynamic new show continues along. Until next time.

---

​Watch ‘The Anonymous’

Powered by JustWatch