The Challenge 32: Final Reckoning

[Xno Kappa]

Killah Kam!!!

[Byrd]

Scoring after three episodes:
Vil 195 2
Byrd 190 3
Xno Kappa 120 4
Valisk 105 4
Moss 80 4
Headspace 60 3

Contestants this Week:
Faith 45
Angela 25
Kyle 25
Kam 20
Kayleigh 20
Chuck 10

Contestants to Date:
Kailah 95 VIL HOME
Melissa 95 BYRD HOME
Faith 55 VALISK GAME
Kyle 50 VIL GAME
Angela 45 BYRD GAME
Kam 30 XNO GAME
Kayleigh 30 XNO GAME
Amanda 30 XNO GAME
Shane 30 MOSS GAME
Brad 25 BYRD GAME
Zach 25 HEAD GAME

Scoring Notes for the Week:
Just noticed that last week, TJ told Faith and Angela they killed it (20)
Kyle and Faith coitus points (20)
Britni screaming at Chuck (5)
Chuck punched a wall (10)
Kam and Kayleigh won elimination (15)

[Moss]

Derrick quote of the season so far: "There are times when she's talking to me and I'm like... shut up you cheated on me. I don't want to hear your voice right now."

Natalie "Um, I actually need this money!" LOLgtfo

Marie's fake lips are terrible

Goddddd Cara's a dumbfuck.

Hellll yes MTV might've just nailed this voting/elimination system.

Glad Kam won but that shit wasn't fair lol

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[Byrd]

Did they overdo the handicap with those cords or what? As I've said after the premiere, I'm not watching this show expecting things to be perfectly fair, but my curiosity is if that's the sort of handicap they'll use when it's male vs. female in a physical thing, if they made it tougher for the team with a rookie, or if they just didn't really calibrate that right. Kam was able to casually stand pretty close to the cage while Paulie seemed to be killing himself to get near it. Considering there are MM, FF, and MF teams, I figured that a lot of things might be a crapshoot this season, so we'll see.

It looks like they tried to even the playing field with the cords, and failed miserably. Admittedly, Paulie is one of the smaller guys and Kam is one of the bigger girls, but the difference was obvious and glaring. It looks like they way overcompensated.

I'm liking this format for deciding who goes into elimination. I don't think it'll necessarily stop teams from throwing away their votes at times, but it's kind of risky there because they're revealing which teams got votes, and at least sometimes, people will know when you don't come through with your vote.

I'm really liking this elimination format. It won't work as well from this point forward, since people know how it works, but it's great. It certainly encourages people who are the weaker teams to not just follow the strongest teams' lead, because they'll be the ones picked for elimination. If I'm, let's say, Jozea and Da'Vonne, there's no way I want to be in a voting block with Bananas/Tony, Zach/Amanda, CT/Veronica, and Brad/Kyle because I know damn well whoever gets nominated for elimination is going to pick me.

It also might lead to some unpredictable votes as a number of teams switch their votes thinking they'll get picked if they vote the party line, and end up on someone very unsuspecting.

My DVR usually cuts off during the preview and I wasn't really paying attention, but it looks like something going on with Redemption next week? Or was it just the explanation of the rules for it?

It looks like there's something going on with Redemption next week, yes. Double-crosses of some sort and then TJ says "Two teams will be fighting their way back into the house." I hope that doesn't mean two teams are randomly eliminated for good, and the other two compete, because that would be shitty.

Goddddd Cara's a dumbfuck.

She has been my least favorite player on this season, by far. It's middle school hallway drama all over again. She accuses Marie of playing a bad political game, and then goes out and does exactly that. What the hell.

[Moss]

It looks like they tried to even the playing field with the cords, and failed miserably. Admittedly, Paulie is one of the smaller guys and Kam is one of the bigger girls, but the difference was obvious and glaring. It looks like they way overcompensated.

Yeah... it makes sense to give them some handicap but they didn't test it well enough. It will be tough for MTV to handle properly, but having MM/MF/FF teams will create some interesting possibilities as you can see Kam/Kay will be at a disadvantage in most challenges but may actually have an advantage in the eliminations. In that sense, Paulie might have had a better chance against Zach team or Joss team.

I'm really liking this elimination format. It won't work as well from this point forward, since people know how it works, but it's great. It certainly encourages people who are the weaker teams to not just follow the strongest teams' lead, because they'll be the ones picked for elimination. If I'm, let's say, Jozea and Da'Vonne, there's no way I want to be in a voting block with Bananas/Tony, Zach/Amanda, CT/Veronica, and Brad/Kyle because I know damn well whoever gets nominated for elimination is going to pick me.

It also might lead to some unpredictable votes as a number of teams switch their votes thinking they'll get picked if they vote the party line, and end up on someone very unsuspecting.

I'm trying not to overreact but I think it's fucking brilliant. Strong teams can pretty much pick whomever, although it's risky to pick another strong team if they're feeling ballsy. Weak teams are probably best off trying to "hide" their vote. Really interesting as it it's effectively partially anonymous.

She has been my least favorite player on this season, by far. It's middle school hallway drama all over again. She accuses Marie of playing a bad political game, and then goes out and does exactly that. What the hell.

Like, I totally get that it would suck to see your ex bf (or whatever they were) hooking up with someone else. I even get trying to hook up with someone else to make them jealous. Immature but I get it. But the flirting with Paulie is SO CRINGE on both of their parts.

The Marie thing is as dumb as shit as I've seen on the show. Even Cara is normally better than that - I feel like the Kyle stuff has fucked her mentally. It was pathetic because it was Cara trying to get cool-points with Tori and whoever else it was. But you're literally trashing your own team...

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[Xno Kappa]

The Cara shit was cringe personified. She’s exponentially getting worse with each and every season.

[Byrd]

Scoring this week:

Zach and Jenna kissed at Armageddon (5)
Brad and Britni kissed at Armageddon (5)
Jozea and Da'Vonne win elimination (15)
Paulie, Kyle, Zach yelling (5)
Paulie causing production to be on camera (5)

Standings to Date:

Vil 245 3
Byrd 210 3
Xno Kappa 140 4
Valisk 130 4
Moss 120 5
Headspace 90 3

Contestant Scores to Date:

Kailah 95 VIL
Melissa 95 BYRD
Faith 60 VALISK
Kyle 60 VIL
Angela 50 BYRD
Zach 40 HEAD

[Vil]

This season is so weird. Last week they finally get to the format for the season and it seems pretty cool/good potential. When are we going to see that play out again? At least it was entertaining and some actual new drama rather than just recycling the same stuff that's been on there for years.

Congrats to Paulie. See you the next 10 seasons after that showing this episode.

Not really how I expected them to use the double cross this season, but oh well. That's a lot of power and weirdly no risk, but they've had tons of luck keeping people alive in the past seasons.

[Moss]

Paulie is a raging tool but god is he a perfect rabble-rouser for the show. Calling out Zach and Brad was dumb as hell but hilarious. Shame they didn't come through in the elimination, that would've been hype

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[Byrd]

Paulie is a raging tool but god is he a perfect rabble-rouser for the show. Calling out Zach and Brad was dumb as hell but hilarious. Shame they didn't come through in the elimination, that would've been hype

Paulie's not playing to win this season. He's playing to be on the next 5 seasons.

That's the only way his strategy makes sense. Poor Natalie's just along for the ride.

[Moss]

Paulie's not playing to win this season. He's playing to be on the next 5 seasons.

That's the only way his strategy makes sense. Poor Natalie's just along for the ride.

Which really does make sense since there was a VERY slim chance they would be winning this season. However he's going to be a marked man in future seasons too depending on who returns

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[Moss]

Also forgot to mention the lulz of Zach calling out Bananas for using the exact same lines on Angela(?) that he used on Natalie last season

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[Byrd]

Scoring for the Week:

Spoiler: show

Standings:

Vil 295 3
Byrd 265 2
Valisk 185 3
Xno Kappa 165 4
Moss 145 5
Headspace 125 3

Point Leaders:
Kailah 95 VIL
Kyle 95 VIL
Melissa 95 BYRD
Brad 70 BYRD
Faith 65 VALISK
Angela 60 BYRD
Bananas 50 VALISK

Scoring for this week:
Angela and Bananas kissing (5)
Brad, Kyle, Tony, Bananas killed it as per TJ (20)
Kyle and Brad won challenge (10)
CT kicked a stool (10)
CT and Veronica yelling at each other (5)
Veronica crying (5)
Kayleigh screaming at Nelson (5)

[Vil]

I finally got around to seeing the episode a little earlier.

I am tired of these challenges where the design is so that 80% will fail, 50% will be lucky to make it to the first rope/platform/whatever and they're relying on "funny" falls. That's just played out. I'm not asking for something that a mediocre team will breeze through. This is The Challenge where they just take crappy challenges and put a crane in it. I don't care for these when it's last place goes into elimination, but using it for a purge? Whatever.

Since they ended with like 15 minutes back at the houses/bar, I figure next episode ought to probably start off with a challenge early enough to have time for at least the vote if not the elimination as well.

Right, we have to get the Brad/Britni stuff too. They played that up a bunch on that episode and did a cliffhanger on THAT? lol

[Byrd]

They played that up a bunch on that episode and did a cliffhanger on THAT? lol

Of course they did. Although, to be honest, I'd rather them do that cliffhanger than a competition cliffhanger. I hate those a lot more.

Overall, I'm losing some of my enthusiasm for the show. We've been through five episodes and had literally one elimination so far. The Redemption House takes a lot of the impact of losing Eliminations, and things like the purge are just shitty. Chuck and Jemmye literally never got to do anything in this game other than lie in a grave and wait around in a house for a week waiting for their fate to be determined out of the game. They didn't dig, they didn't pull a double-cross, they didn't get to participate in an elimination. I hate that. I hate that a lot.

Ongoing issues with cliffhangers in the middle of eliminations, both before ads and at the end of episodes. Repeating 15 seconds of what happened just before the ad right after the ad. There's also the whole dragging the reveal of the winner out through two episodes of a reunion show.

These are cheap parlor tricks designed to force people to watch TV they don't want to. While I understand the spacing is going to be a little more at the beginning of the season than at the end since you have so many more warm bodies to try to get air-time, I am finding it more and more tedious to watch a season. I'm not ready to give up on the show (or the fantasy league) yet, but if they don't improve the format of the show's production, I don't know how many more seasons I have in me.

[Byrd]

This clip looks hilarious.

Lots of points going to be awarded tonight, it would appear.

[Vil]

I really don't like that they've had 3 full episodes without an elimination, but at least two of the episodes were pretty good. It's just last week's with the purge and whatever other boring shit that was absolutely terrible, while the Redemption return episode and this one were fine.

This mess with the votes is what I expected to happen at some point, but I didn't think it'd be this early. Ok, teams are chickenshit and/or not trusting their partners, but at least half of the teams probably have a team that is both:
1. one that they shouldn't be afraid of in a duel
2. a team that they should be at least ok with voting for one reason or another

I'm also totally fine with the possibility of voting being a shitshow this season.

Unlike the stupid facetime thing, they actually did a cliffhanger where it makes me want to find out what happens next. I don't know that I'll go so far as to say I'm glad that they cut it off before they even headed to Armageddon or whatever, but I'm fine with it.

[Byrd]

Scoring for the Week:

Spoiler: show

Standings to Date:

Vil 345 3
Byrd 275 2
Valisk 240 3
Xno Kappa 225 4
Moss 195 5
Headspace 150 3
UFA 0 0
Scoring this Week:

Kyle and Faith coitus (20)
Kayleigh and Nelson coitus (20)
Joss and Amanda coitus (20)
Kyle blurcle getting out of bed (5)
Joss blurcle getting out of bed (5)
Cara crying because Kyle (5)
Zach and Amanda win challenge (10)
Contestant Standings to Date:

Kyle 125 VIL
Kailah 95 VIL
Melissa 95 BYRD
Faith 90 VALISK
Brad 75 BYRD
Kayleigh 70 XNO
Amanda 65 XNO
Angela 65 BYRD

Looks like we might get an elimination next week? Woohooo - two in seven episodes, I can't wait. Sigh.

[Moss]

I agree with your criticisms Byrd. Personally the new voting system cures a lot of ills because it makes the voting 10000x more interesting. You hate when you can see how things will go from day 1, i.e. rookies get ganged up on and voted out first, people in weak alliances next, then finally the strong people competing.

I found it hilarious that every team is like "yo we should throw away our vote" with seemingly NO idea that every other team could and would do the same thing? Be careful who you waste that vote on.

Derrick is terribad at these challenges. I don't know if he never played any sports besides running track or something, but it's like he has no awareness of his body. I actually feel bad for him because he keeps sucking and Tori is just berating him constantly. She was already the asshole since she cheated on him, and she thinks she's hot shit since she did well in a challenge and bullies him relentlessly. It's also fucking stupid strategy since the guy obviously has no confidence and it isn't going to improve if you keep telling him he's terrible.

Cara's "I have a lot of girls looking up to me back home" made me puke and was nicely bookended by her jumping into Kyle's lap. Have some self-respect, damn.

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[Byrd]

I agree with your criticisms Byrd. Personally the new voting system cures a lot of ills because it makes the voting 10000x more interesting. You hate when you can see how things will go from day 1, i.e. rookies get ganged up on and voted out first, people in weak alliances next, then finally the strong people competing.

I love the possible repercussions of the new voting system. I'm just annoyed that we're six episodes in, we've only seen one vote through to completion.