T. Green
The Challenge: Rivals II
As viewers of the recent Real World: Portland show know, Marlon has had sexual experiences with men and women. He was still a bit confused then, but on The Challenge this week, he became more comfortable with his sexuality, as he finally admitted to being bisexual.
Marlon took that newfound sexual freedom and proceeded to hookup with Derek in private outside. In the house, Marlon’s partner Jordan was fielding questions from everyone under the sun who wanted to ascertain Marlon’s sexual orientation.
Most people seemed to support Marlon, but things soon got ugly when the house did a game of impersonating each other. Knight, always one to go for the low blow, pretended to perform oral sex as his imitation of Marlon. Marlon took offense and went after Knight, but the fight got broken up quickly.
Later on, Aneesa offered some support for Marlon, citing her own experiences struggling with her sexuality. Trishelle, apparently annoyed by the conversation, took some swipes at Aneesa about her ethnicity and past as a stripper. Aneesa confronted Trishelle, trying to get a straight answer as to why she was taking jabs at her. We even got a “Trashelle” name-drop for old times’ sake.
For some unknown reason, Trishelle got so upset by the fight SHE started that she decided to leave the house. T.J. arrived to acknowledge that Trishelle left the house, putting her on his shit-list forever (because as we all know, T.J. HATES quitters). He also delivered the bad news to Sarah that she would have to go home because her partner quit (as opposed to Cooke getting a new partner because her old one left for family reasons). Just as with Vinny on Exes, Sarah again has a partner who costs her the chance to continue in the competition.
For the daily challenge, we got yet another one suspended over water. The teams have to go up a shaky ladder, scoot across a pair of ropes, and climb on a platform to ring a bell. Unlike many other challenges, if a team falls off, they can start over, but there is a ten-minute time limit.
Because CT & Wes and Preston & Knight quit the previous challenge, they had to go first and get a 30-second penalty. Paula and Emily won again for the girls, establishing themselves as the team to beat on that side. Zach and Trey made a good run at a third-consecutive victory, but Frank and Johnny managed to edge them out, winning immunity.
(On a side note, Frank and Johnny were the only team to participate in a heat alone, making it either easier because they could focus on time instead of their opponents, or harder because they had no one to push themselves against.)
The girls send Rob and Derek to the Jungle again to face Knight and Preston. This Jungle was called Snapper, where one player from each team went one-on-one inside a circle blindfolded with bells tied to their ankles. The object of the game is to break a stick over an opponent. Best two out of three wins.
In round one, Preston came out the gate with some fancy ninja moves but got unceremoniously beaten by Robb. Next round, Knight and Preston concocted the code word “NOLA”, meaning that Knight would get low to the ground. He used that strategy to break his stick across Derek’s legs. In the final round for all the marbles, Knight successfully employed the same tactic to defeat Robb and remain in the game.
Back at the house, Knight apologized to Marlon. However, Knight acknowledged he would go to that well again if he needed to. Meanwhile, Marlon took a ride to the female side and hooked up with Nany.
Aftershow
Former Challenge host Johnny Moseley takes the reigns as Aftershow host and addresses a number of topics on this episode.
Derek and Marlon come out (no pun intended) first and debate over who made the first move when they got together in the house. Knight comes out afterwards and does some Knight things, freely admitting he’s an asshole, but still taking a shot or two at Marlon.
Sarah and Aneesa come on the show later to talk about the Trishelle situation. Trishelle declined her invitation to be on the show. That was just as well, because no one else came to her defense, plus they showed a video montage of all her meltdowns.
Johnny points out Sarah’s bad luck with partners, highlighting a graphic of her past Challenge partners. That list included: Casey, Shauvon, Katelynn, Vinny, Devyn and Trishelle. Some of them are among the worst competitors ever, while a couple others got themselves and Sarah DQ’ed from the game as previously stated.
A bit of a surprising debate occurred about whether Sarah did enough to try and keep Trishelle from leaving. Sarah’s belief was that if Trishelle was gonna get mad about petty stuff, she wasn’t going to sacrifice her integrity to keep her around.
The Aftershow ends with a clip of Marlon hinting at a third challenge hookup, this one with Cooke. Marlon admits it was just a makeout session. However, Cooke comes to the stage and doesn’t even give Marlon that much credit, saying there was no tongue involved and comparing it to a kindergarten kiss (ouch!).
