The Challenge: Total Madness | Season 35 Episode 13 - "Victim of Love"

Spoiler Alert!

Hello everyone.

So... Excuse me for anything that I don't talk about in this rant but I'm not feeling 100% so this might not 'feel' like my usual rants. I'm going to try and write like I normally do but... Just a warning.

With that said, let's talk about the episode. I can't say that this one was a big surprise, but I was still surprised at some stuff. By now I had already figured out that everyone is going to be able to have a chance at a red skull (it is even more obvious in the end of this episode and in the preview for the next one). As per usual, I was expecting to see Dee again down in Purgatory but as soon as the challenge of the week started, I knew that wasn't the case. The challenge was a Team one - two Teams with seven people and the winning Team would be the Tribunal, all of them. And even if Dee's team lost, which they did, by the way, I was sure that she wasn't going to be the Tribunal vote. There was no way she was going to be the house vote - it was either Bayleigh or Melissa - and Nany was int he Tribunal so I knew she was going into Purgatory this time. I mean, I hope she would, with everything that she has been saying she had too. And well, I was right. Nany did end up going into Purgatory against Melissa. Yes, Melissa was the house vote and that was a huge part of the episode.

This was the Kaycee/Nany/Bayleigh triangle episode and the whole drama revolved around them. Not only Bayleigh was all by herself now, but the last drop was when Kaycee voted for Melissa - basically because Nany said that she would prefer to go against Melissa instead of Bayleigh. Well, I guess that bite her in the ass.

I did now care much about that whole drama, and it's way too much for me to talk about in this post so let's just jump straight into the elimination.

It wasn't the wall thing (that is going to be the Dee one) and it was the one that we saw in last week's preview for the rest of the season. I had a feeling Melissa would do that one, where they had to grab red skull's from their opponents. I was also rooting for Melissa, to be honest. Nany has been pretty annoying this season and I'm not over the fact that she waiting till now to go into purgatory so yeah, I was rooting for Melissa and... Guess what?! Melissa won and I'm pretty happy about that. I feel like Melissa is also pretty underestimated so I love to see the underdogs winning.

As for this episode, that was it. We did see a preview where not only they say that it's going to be a double elimination but it also looks like there's going to be some type of purge. My prediction is that the week's challenge will be to take out someone's red skull (not eliminate them, just take out their red skull) and that will be for either just one person or for a girl and a guy. Then, there will be a double elimination - Kyle against Josh and Dee against Bayleigh, most likely. I might be wrong but we saw that both Kyle and Dee are going in so... Let's see who their opponents are.

And, that's it for this week's review.

Let me know what you thought of this episode and what are your predictions for the next one and I'll talk to you next week (hopefully feeling better).

Love,

Daniela.

The Challenge: Total Madness | Season 35 Episode 12 - "Pictures of You"

Spoiler Alert!

Hello everybody!

Wow! This episode really took me by surprise! I guess I was wrong this time... (I also have a few new predictions, but I'll leave that for the end).

So, let's talk about the elephant in the room. This had already happened last week, but this time MTV really let us know and had a 'warning' type of thing in the beginning letting us know about the whole Dee situation. And if it wasn't obvious last week, this week was really obvious that they tried to cut her out of the episode as much as possible. Unfortunately, she has been winning and stuff so it was harder for production to cut her out but... I guess they did a good job. It was obvious, but now we know.

Now, let's talk about where my predictions went wrong. I said (and I've been saying this for a while) that this week it would be Cory against Kyle, and I was almost right. I thought Kyle would be the one to win the challenge and he almost did. Can we talk about that for a moment? This week's challenge looked pretty hard, but pretty cool at the same time, and it must have taken them hours to fill those tanks. And, to everyone's surprise, the two teams to move to the second part of the challenge were the ones with two girls in the team. Who would've thought, huh?! Guys are nothing without the girls... Anyway, unfortunately, Kyle, Aneesa and Jenny lost against Fessy, Bayleigh and Dee and... Well, it was pretty obvious that Swaggy was going in as the Tribunal pick. They tried to trick us though, but he did go into purgatory in the end. As for the house vote, unlike my prediction, it was between Cory and Kyle (instead of Josh and Kyle) and, unfortunately, Cory got the majority of the votes. Right away I felt really sad and bad for Kyle because, in my mind, this would be the last guys elimination. (But I'm doubting that now).

Before I get into my final predictions, let's talk about the elimination. It was a pretty fair one - Cory against Swaggy C. And I wasn't necessarily rooting for either of them so... I guess I was fine either way. Cory won in the end, which is fine by me and now... Well, I guess there's more to this season than meets the eye.

This week we didn't have a Preview for next week. Instead, we had another of those previews for the rest of the season and it looks like there will be more eliminations than the one next week. We knew there would be another girls elimination because we saw Dee going into one of those wall eliminations so we knew that. We also knew that Kyle was going and, with this preview, it's even more clear that he's going so, right now, I feel like everyone is going to have a chance to get their red skull, which is kind of shame because I would love to see their faces when TJ tells them that they wouldn't even be able to get a chance at that. Although, I'm happy that, at least, Kyle can fight for it. Well, but not only that. I feel like even after everyone has a red skull, there will be some type of Purge were a bunch of people, already with red skulls, will be eliminated and then it will be the final.

I'm just happy because, as of now, it looks like it's an easy win for Bananas. I don't want to be that hopeful and jinx it but, considering the competition, Bananas has a pretty good shot at winning this season, and I'm going to be rooting for him (obviously).

And I guess that's it for my predictions and this week's post. Let me know what you thought of the episode and which are your predictions and I'll see you next week with a brand new rant!

Love,

Daniela.

The Challenge: Total Madness | Season 35 Episode 11 - "You Ain't Right"

Spoiler Alert!

Hello everybody!
So, this was a short one. However, we have a lot to talk about so let's get into it.

First of, let's talk about the actual running time of the episode. You might have noticed that it was way shorter than the previous episodes, and I think I know why. I don't know if you're up to the news but Dee was recently fired from The Challenge due to racist comments. The show did tweet that they were going to keep airing the episodes because of the fans but I'm pretty sure they tried to cut as much as they could from her in this specific episode. And because she was a big part of it, the episode turned out shorter than usual. You might have not noticed her 'absence' but if you go back and re-watch the episode, it's pretty clear that she 'should've' been more permanent (mainly with the whole Tribunal thing - that was pretty obvious, in my opinion).

Apart from that, well, it looks like I was half right. My prediction last week was that there were going to be two more eliminations - a girls one, in this episode, and a guys one in the next. Well, I don't think that anymore. I'm pretty sure there will be one more girls elimination. Not only because, this way, the girls will be outnumbered but also because I remember vividly Dee's elimination (which was that wall thing) and that wasn't the elimination this episode so, I'm getting ahead of myself (as usual) and I predict that Dee is going in again. Because yes, that's right, she did go in this week but she came back.

However, I was right about Mattie going in. I mean, I think I said that Bayleigh was most likely but I wanted Mattie. Not only because I like Mattie but also because I thought the could take out Dee on that wall elimination. Well, turns out that wasn't the elimination and so Mattie lost. I pretty sure if it was a more physical one Mattie would nail it but... Oh well, at least Bananas is still in the game.

Well, I don't know if there's a lot more that I need to talk about. There wasn't much drama in this episode (for obvious reasons) and the actual challenge was pretty cool and not a lot happened. I mean, a bunch of people were disqualified because they 'cheated', there's that. And because of it, it was easier to pick the people for the Tribunal - which ended up being Melissa and Josh (who won the challenge) and Bananas, who they picked. I'm having a feeling this might be Bananas' come back and he might have a good shot at winning this season (I mean, look at the people that already have a Red Skull - they're not much of a competition for Bananas. Maybe Fessy and Jenny but I don't know how they are in a final with eating challenges involved and endurance so, they might not do great in those things) but I don't want to jinx it so I'm just keep rooting for him.

Next week is a guys elimination and the preview didn't give us much. However, I do know that Kyle and Cory both go into elimination so, I still think they're going against each other and this is going to be the last guys elimination. The preview did show Cory with some sort of injury so I don't know how that's going to work but... Let's see... Maybe it's nothing really serious and he can still get it. The only think really relevant that the preview showed was Melissa and Josh arguing (obviously about the whole Dee thing that happened in this episode) so my bet is that both Josh and Kyle will want to be the house vote and so the house will have to vote which one of the two is going in. Hence why Melissa is yelling basically saying that she's not going to vote for him.

And I guess that's it from in this week.

Let me know what you thought of the episode and what you think of this whole Dee thing (her being fired and what not) and I'll see you next week with a brand new rant!

Love,

Daniela.

The Challenge: Total Madness | Season 35 Episode 10 - "The Final Countdown"

Spoiler Alert!

Hello everybody!

OMG! What an episode! Unfortunately, I got it spoiled for me in two different occasions...

Anyway, first of all, I'm sorry I'm posting this later than usual. I had a bit of trouble finding the episode online and that's one of the reasons why I had the episode spoiled for me. Not only I couldn't find it anywhere and I kept seeing articles about what happened in the episode but then, when I finally found an episode online, they messed it up. For some reason the episode that I found started with the elimination and so yeah... I basically saw the whole thing backwards. It was a bit of a bummer but I kind of already knew not only from the spoilers before but also from the preview that Bananas was going to be involved in the elimination somehow and... Yeah, let's talk about it.

Because that was the way I saw it, I'm going to start with the actual elimination. Bananas vs Wes. Well, let's be real, who didn't think this was going to happen?! After watching the elimination and watching the events knowing what happened, it was so obvious that they were setting it up. Still, it was huge. Although I don't know why people kept saying that this was long overdue because they went to an elimination against each other in Champs vs Stars so...  I don't know. It's now really their first time. Anyway, needless to say that I'm so excited about the result! After having Jay go home, and then Jenna, I really didn't want Bananas to go home as well so have him beat Wes was the cherry on top. It was sweet though, then having them hug and being real with each other. It made me like Wes a bit more and well, now that Bananas stopped hating Wes, I can stop as well.

As for the elimination itself, I think it was a bit unfair. Yes, it relied a bit on strength and endurance, but it was also 50% luck and I just don't think those eliminations are fair. It's not like a hand-to-hand fight or a puzzle, something that relies solely on yourself... But well, Bananas won so I'm fine...

Now that we got that out of the way, let's talk about the beginning of the episode and then talk about predictions because I have a lot (and I'm 80% sure that I'm right).

So, it looks like now everyone wants to go in. We see a bunch of guys and even girls say that they have to go in, and one of those people is Bananas. Wes also mentions that to Nany so that's where some tension starts 'bubbling'.

Then, we got my favorite challenge - Trivia. This one wasn't as good, I must say. They didn't answer that many questions and some people, including Bananas, just gave up and yeah, that was a bit lame. In the end, Wes, Dee and Rogan formed the Tribunal. Because of that, Wes thinks that this is his time. However, Bananas has his mind set that the wants to be the house vote and so he asks everyone to vote for him. When it's time to vote, Cory is basically the only one that doesn't want to give this one easy to Bananas but he eventually does and yes, Bananas is the house vote and he even jokes around when he puts Wes' name next to his (another overshadowing of the events that come next).

Learning that, Wes gets a bit conflicted. He thought this was his time and it can still be but because of the alliance with Bananas (and because it is Bananas) he doesn't really want to go against him... That creates a kind of argument between them (but an healthy one, I would say) where Wes 'complains' that he thought now was his time to get the red skull. And I get both sides. Bananas was playing his game and he did what he thought was best for him. Wes tried to get into the Tribunal to 'run' the game and have his red skull. Well, there should have been a bit more communication between the too but, in the end, it is an individual game so you can't blame either for doing what they think is best for themselves without telling the other.

Well, we know what happened next. The Tribunal nominated Kyle, Swaggy and Cory but, ultimately, Wes went against Bananas.

I guess now it's the time to talk about predictions. So we know that the Final is really near and I think there will only be two more episodes/eliminations before the final. The next one is a girls elimination and then a guys elimination. That way there will be 4/5 girls and 4/5 guys (depending how those eliminations end). From a previous preview, we know that Dee, Kyle and Cory go into an elimination so my prediction is that Dee is going against one of the girls (probably Mattie or Bayleigh) next week. My money is on Bayleigh, as the house vote and then the Tribunal sends in Dee. Who wins I don't know, but to be honest, I would rather have Mattie against Dee and Mattie winning. Anyway, as for the guys, it's going to be Kyle against Cory, and that's it. I hope Kyle wins because he's other of my favorites right now, to be honest. After that TJ will probably let them think that there will be more eliminations but no... That's the end and whoever doesn't have a red skull will go home instantly. I can't wait to see their faces when they realize that! It's going to be priceless.

So yeah, this was an intense episode! Unfortunately it was kind of ruined for me but at least Bananas won and I'm happy about that.

Let me know what you thought of the episode and who were you rooting for - Bananas or Wes? And who do you think is going in against Dee next week? Tell me everything and I'll see you next week with a brand new rant!

Love,

Daniela.