The Challenge 40: Battle of the Eras Episode 9 Recap: 10 Biggest Takeaways
The 9th episode of The Challenge 40: Battle of the Eras is in the books. You probably have some thoughts, so let’s compare. Instead of giving a simple summary, I decided to focus on the 10 Biggest moments/takeaways from Episode 9.
If you prefer audio/video, my podcast recap can be found above/below:
10 The Daily Challenge Could’ve Been Great
Sometimes, simpler is better. I don’t think the math equation part of the daily challenge was necessary. Yes, it was funny to see Cara Maria look like she saw an alien when production put a Square Root problem rather than a typical addition/subtraction problem. As someone good at myself, I get a chuckle out of seeing people struggle with math, but for this daily challenge, all the equations slowed down the flow of the episode. While I agreed with Laurel’s statement that most adults should be able to do addition & subtraction, Laurel also said she’s gotten 100% in every math class she’s ever taken, including Calculus. Which I think that’s a bold-faced lie. I’ve coached and tutored multiple high school students who have gotten between 750–800 (perfect scores) on their math SAT, and even though they ace every math test and do all their homework, they probably still end up with a final grade that’s like a 96.7 or a 98.3%. I’d believe if someone said they got 100% in a math class one year, but to do it in every single class for all those years sounds unreal. What if you forgot to turn in your homework one day? Then you’re at 99.8%. If Laurel said she got an A in every math class, I wouldn’t blink. 100%? Nah.
Back to my problems with the daily challenge — I didn’t like that all the teams went at different times. Whatever teams went first were at a slight disadvantage as the other teams could have a gauge on how long they needed to stay up. For the excitement factor and entertainment purposes, they should have had a bigger cargo bin and all players going simultaneously with the same amount of pegs (scrub the math portion). It would’ve been much more satisfying to see one player as the last person standing (hanging on).
In terms of performance, Nehemiah, Devin, and Kaycee were standouts — Nehemiah in particular, as he kicked ass and probably saved his team from elimination despite not even being a target himself. Meanwhile, Rachel got carried by her team to victory.
9 An Army Of One
Two things can be true. The first is that this daily challenge was formatted to ensure Rachel won. The second is that Rachel crushed this daily challenge, and if a team deserved to get thrown a bone, it’s ERA 1, specifically after everything they’ve been through, including last week’s daily challenge where they essentially had zero shot of winning.
After two elimination wins and now a daily challenge win, Rachel has excellent momentum, and the edit feels behind her. Being on a team by yourself is not a great situation on paper. From a storyline perspective, being put in that “underdog” role is what turns players into legends (Rachel already is). Derrick having to go into all those eliminations on The Gauntlet 2 is a major reason why he is revered today. Cara Maria breaking her hand on Free Agents and continuing to compete made her someone people wanted to root for and turned her into the face of the franchise. There are so many more examples I could list. If Rachel wins after being the only person left from her ERA, then she will have the fandom eating out of the palm of her hand, and there will be talk about her as the greatest female competitor ever.
8 The Unspoken Alliance
Rachel has not been a fan of Laurel’s actions throughout this season and sees her as a threat in this game. There was a real chance that Kaycee could have been able to make a proper deal to save herself from elimination with Rachel. Instead, at the bar, Kaycee told Rachel that because of Rachel’s connection with Josh, they’ve had an unspoken alliance this entire game. It was a preposterous moment, and you could tell that Rachel felt insulted. An unspoken alliance for someone you have never done a season with prior is such a bullshit thing to say, especially when Rachel has gone in multiple eliminations and seen her Era get picked apart. That unspoken alliance would’ve come in handy so many weeks prior, yet now it exists when Kaycee’s ass is on the line.
The worst part about this scene was knowing that if Kaycee used that line on some rookie international player, like on Spies, Lies & Allies, it would work. Luckily, Rachel knows how to play this game and let Kaycee solidify her spot in the arena with Tori. Credit to Laurel for keeping herself safe, as her conversation with Rachel seemed to be productive.
7 Everyone Blames Josh
Despite having a close bond with Rachel, Josh did not put up much of a fight to save Kaycee. It was a bit shocking to see, not just because they’re the “Vacation Alliance” but because even before the VA existed, Kaycee had always been one of Josh’s closest allies, and he even once yelled at CT in her defense. At the same time, Rachel and ERA 1 have faced an uphill battle this entire game; it would have been a lot for Josh to get her to change her decision the first time she’s had any real power. Did Josh sell his alliance out a bit? Yeah, he did. He didn’t want to negatively affect his relationship with Rachel and assumed his alliance wouldn’t be mad at him. Except they are. Devin and Kaycee kept blaming Josh for the elimination match-ups being what they were, and to me, that’s unfair. While Josh did not give 110% for them — it’s not his fault that they all self-nominated. It’s not Josh’s fault that Devin has been an egotistical puppet master who rubs Rachel the wrong way. It’s not Josh’s fault that Kaycee told Rachel they had an unspoken alliance.
Maybe instead of pointing the finger at Josh, they should take ownership of the game they’ve played. Kaycee said before the daily challenge that she felt comfortable self-nominating, knowing that Devin & Tori would save her if they won the daily challenge — yet their alliance never considered that they could get pitted against each other. I’m not going to be mad at Josh for playing the game for himself, and also, as much as the Vacation Alliance has helped Josh, he’s never made a Final while working with them, so ultimately, he should look out for himself.
Even with my “defense” of Josh, I’ll acknowledge that he will have trouble playing in future seasons, and if I were a player in this game, he would not be someone I’d be able to trust.
6 Devin Stunk Up The Joint
Throughout the past few years, I’ve given Devin so much props for how much he’s improved as a competitor from a physical standpoint and how he mentally takes apart challenges. Hell, we saw him show so much heart in this episode’s daily challenge. Then, in this elimination, he was an absolute dud on all fronts. Devin trying to “outsmart” the elimination by trying to grab the right plugs before untangling them was ludicrous, and his rejecting advice from the crowd, even when he was clearly losing, was stubborn and arrogant. I genuinely don’t know if Kyland crushed this elimination because of how poorly Devin performed. I’m sure Kyland did well; it just sucks to see Devin put up such an awful performance when he’s supposed to be a Champ and contender to win. Truthfully, these are the eliminations that you expect Devin to thrive in as once again, product managed to give him an elimination that wasn’t super physical.
Devin doesn’t wear deodorant, pounds beers, and can’t untangle wires — I just know he had the most disgusting college dorm room ever. With the elimination win, Kyland is now 7–2 (including USA) and has four wins over champions (Devin, Brad, Darrell 2x).
5 A Boring Buzzer Beater
Even with Tori and Kaycee’s elimination going down to the wire and having a photo finish, it was still boring. Watching people untangle wires is not the most exciting elimination; seeing them do it twice is infinitely worse. It would’ve been awesome to see these two women duke it in a physical game. Instead, Tori takes the win, and it is impressive how calm Tori stayed, considering she lost eliminations on Total Madness/Double Agents because she didn’t properly strategize and execute.
Although the elimination was underwhelming, it was a big win for Tori as Kaycee was a career 7–2 in eliminations entering this match-up, with both losses coming while tethered to her brother. Including USA 2, Tori is now 7–3 in eliminations herself, and she’s got multiple impressive wins under her belt: Jenny, Kaycee, Georgia, Jonna, etc.
4 Solo Game Men’s Power Rankings
It’s a solo game, finally! We’re down to 9 men and 9 women; some remaining players are a bit shocking, some aren’t. For the next two takeaways, I will quickly power rank the men and women on who has the best chance of winning based on both abilities and how the show itself is going.
1 Jordan
He was the favorite before the season, and now he’s gotten to the Final 9 without seeing an elimination. Jordan also has multiple women in, Tori, Laurel, and Nia, who have his back.
2 Bananas
The 7x Champ does not have the same fastball, but he’s still got some curveballs.
3 Cory
The edit feels behind him, and he’s come close so many times.
4 Kyland
People in the house keep hyping up his abilities. He’s hungry and in great shape, still, he’s never competed in a Final.
5 & 6 Theo & Nehemiah
They are both strong players who do not have the edit behind them.
7 Derek
Derek’s mostly been wallpaper this season and the only Final he’s been to, he got purged out immediately.
8 Josh
He’s never been to a Final and probably doesn’t have the puzzle skills.
9 Ryan
Nope.
3 Solo Game Women’s Power Rankings
T1 Cara Maria &Rachel
It’s a big coin flip between Cara and Rachel for me at this point.
Any season Cara Maria is on, she feels like a top contender because she is the female face. Cara has more experience in Finals than any other woman; at the same time, nobody has lost more Finals than her.
She hasn’t competed in a Final since The Duel 2, and her puzzle skills feel a bit hit or miss. That said, the edit feels really behind her at this point.
3 Laurel
Laurel won All-Stars 4 and seems to be killing everything even though she continues to act like a worse and worse person.
4 Tori
Including USA 2 & World Championships, Tori’s gone to 4 straight Finals entering this season, and after her elimination win this week, she’s got momentum.
5 Jenny
Before the season, Jenny was my pick to win. After her asthma attack/poor performance against Aneesa, I wonder if she has the cardio to win.
6 Michele
I like Michele, but she’s the only woman left on this cast who has never made a Final. Meanwhile, 6/9 of the remaining women have won before.
7 Aviv
Now that the game has gone individual, Aviv will not be able to hide among ERA 2, and she’ll be an easy vote-in based on lack of connections.
8 Olivia
Even with her showmance with Theo, Olivia’s been non-existent this season.
9 Nia
Besides eliminations, Nia has not proven to be a strong competitor.
2 The Targets Twist Won’t Die
While I was not shocked that the game moved into an individual format, I was taken aback by their continuing with the Targets twist. I don’t know if a formatting choice has ever had me more divided than the Targets concept. When it first began, I mentioned how there would be a downside in that most of the cast could fly under the radar/coast whenever they aren’t targets. We’re down to 9 men and 9 women and it feels like there’s multiple people left who haven’t done anything of consequence yet this season. So, does that make this format bad and boring?
Well, I’m not entirely sure about that. Legitimately, while we’ve had some underwhelming weeks, the targeting has forced big-name players to battle for their lives in the game much earlier than they typically do. In the process, we’ve lost big name contenders like CT, Emily, Horacio, and now Devin & Kaycee. We’ve also seen players like Jordan, Laurel, and Bananas play the game strategically to save themselves and go after others with this format.
The Challenge is not a purely physical game, and this targeting twist has allowed players to survive by playing under-the-radar games — which is not my favorite form of TV. Still, it’s given players multiple avenues to win. It is funny that Tori decided to take a big shot at Bananas in retaliation against Bananas to avenge Devin — except the shot she took was some B.B. gun pellets, as she also nominated Derek and Ryan. If you go after Bananas, you should probably stack the deck with opponents who might beat him. From a TV perspective, we have a 2/3 shot next week of seeing Bananas & Ryan’s “rivalry” come to a head with them facing each other or best friends Ryan & Derek facing off. On the women’s side of the game, Kyland nominated Rachel for voting him into elimination and then went with the two least connected women by putting up Aviv and Jenny.
1 Karma Police
We once again got reminded of the existence of Karma Points and their importance, except MTV refuses to give us a weekly update on how many points were distributed and to whom. Even if not on the show, they should post it on social media to get fans buzzing and so that there will be suspicion about them once we see them come into play. Karma Points are a looming shadow that may destroy the way we view this season.
