Laurel and Darrell asserted their dominance and nothing else happened. (Challenge Invasion Episode 10)
Eliminations: We picked up this week with the elimination of Darrell/Bananas, and with no surprise Bananas loses to Darrell as the ball slips out of his hands. It was clear the previous week that Darrell was just beating Bananas down, and Johnny needed that point just to force a sudden death round. I don’t like Bananas, but I appreciated him stirring the pot this season, and he lost like a man, so it’s weirdly a little bittersweet to watch him go home. Then again, I love to watch him lose, so that was pretty cool.
In the Laurel vs Cara Maria round, it looked good for Cara on Laurel’s first attempt to score when she got low and took her to the ground. It was on Cara’s first offensive round that we quickly learned that she would be losing. She gets clobbered by Laurel and has no shot at the basket. Defense is the much easier portion of the elimination; Cara worked her ass off to take down Laurel, but Laurel brought down Cara easy. The game goes and Laurel proceeds to beat Cara with a score of 2–0. A lot of people online talked about how Cara played poorly by not hitting Laurel low while on defense, but even if she did that, I don’t think she ever would have been able to score on Laurel. It was a sad loss for Cara Maria. She’s become a beast in recent seasons and has worked so hard in order to be an elite competitor, but she just can’t get over the high hurdle that is Laurel. It was just sad to watch her go home when you know that she wants to win.
On the bright side, Laurel is still around and portrayed a true level of dominance by extending her elimination streak to 9 in a row without a loss! She holds 9–0 record, and nobody has ever done that in Challenge history! Wes started 8–0, but now it’s Laurel with the greatest start and the greatest elimination record ever. She has one more elimination to do, and hopefully she goes for a perfect 10.
Club/House stuff: We see Laurel dancing and she goes on to grind up on Hunter, which is disgusting. It is not gross because he is a rookie, but it is gross because Laurel usually has higher standards when it comes to the guys she flirts with(Jordan, CT). Those are beautiful male specimens, while Hunter is a Smurf mixed with Hulk DNA. Nicole gets jealous, but tries to act like she’s not. Camila and Cory are off being dumb with each other.
After being about 5 or 6 drinks in, Shane decides to go in on Hunter, he talks shit about Hunter using Ashley to get himself farther in the game and that he is just a dirt-bag. All of this is probably true, but Shane did this as his attempt to make Hunter public enemy number 1. In his mind, he knows Nelson has been loyal to Amanda/Ashley, so it would be tough to have them not vote Shane instead of Nelson. However, with Hunter’s relationship with the girls going downhill, Shane saw this as his opportunity to possibly take out his biggest physical competition. Shane most likely also believes that he can beat Cory as he has done it consistently, and the worst case scenario would be Nelson or Hunter going up against Cory and taking him out. It blew up in Shane’s face as the girls just saw it as unnecessary. Shane sees the finish line, and with him never making it to a final before, he knows what’s at stake with the final eliminations coming up.
The best scenes of the night were when Shane and Darrell had a bedtime talk where Shane went at all his teammates, roasting how dumb they were. He even points out that he isn’t even smart, just miles ahead of the kids. The best compliment he gives is when calling Amanda/Ashley semi-smart.
The other great scene of the night was in the bus during the Hunter-Shane argument, where Hunter begins to yell “WHO CAN BEAT ME?” CT, like the God he is, raises his hand and points to himself. Never leave us, CT.
The Daily Challenge: TJ drops the news that the daily challenge will be worth 30k and that there will not be an underdog elimination. Cute, but we know that there’s a twist, and it might not involve Sarah Rice, but it will be a twist.
This challenge was a bore as it was coed pairing hopping from tubes on opposite sides on water and getting to the end tube while a boat is driving. At the end tube there is a rope where they have to pull themselves in, and grab a flag.
Shane and Nicole go as the first pairing, Shane does a good job as always, while Nicole gets to the end, but is unable to get the flag and times out at 3 minutes. Everyone is surprised as Nicole is supposed to be a strong girl. The next pair is Darrell and Laurel, they both prove to be beasts and get the job done. They are followed up by Nelson and Amanda, where Nelson smacks Amanda in the face before he almost falls, but he grabs her by the inner thing and stays on the tube. Nelson gets the flag, while Amanda cannot pull it in(Camila makes fun of her for it). Hunter and Ashley go next, Hunter gets the flag, while Ashley goes too fast for her own good and falls into the water giving the team a score of 3 minutes.
The next pairing is Camila and CT, and Camila gets to the other side faster than anyone(including all the guys), but she’s unable to pull herself in, and neither is CT. My theory, is that they went too fast and were pulling at the same time. No pairing was ever pulling the flag at the same time and was successful, thus their weight kept each other from getting the flags. Ironic though, as Camila was not able to do what she made fun of Amanda for. We finish up with Jenna and Cory. Cory almost falls on the first jump, but ends up having his best finish on a Challenge all season as he blazes the other male competitor. Jenna finishes inches away from the flag, but times out.
Because of the size difference, the Underdogs win the Challenge and TJ announces they will be getting a house party. Yay!
Next week: At the party, TJ comes to the house and tells them that the house party it is a going away party for the Underdogs. The Underdogs were told to pack their bags for the next challenge, and the way the trailer looked, it seems like whoever finishes in last in the next daily challenge for the Underdogs will be going home. Then they will be having the first ever 3 person free for all elimination where two people will make it to the final. I tried to slow down the tape, and it was too blurry to tell who the 3 people in the final elimination are, but I did notice that the Champs were the only people in the rafters watching, which probably means someone goes home in the daily challenge. This is EXCITING.
