The Challenge: Australia Episode 7 and 8 Recap — Winners & Losers

8 min readDec 6, 2022

Welcome back to another Australian version of Winners & Losers! After another double episode we’re down to just eight competitors and are one week away from the Final. Did that fly by or what? Inside this edition: Lolo has company, we discuss the film Speed, Ciarran proves that money buys happiness, and much much more…

Winner: Ostracized Olympians

After spending the last few episodes either being attacked by the house verbally during a barbecue, or being sent into elimination, Emily the Olympian is officially in the “fuck it” stage of her game this season.

Upon return to the house after being victorious in said elimination, she immediately makes a piece of toast, microwaves some popcorn, changes into her PJ’s, and gets under the covers.

Like the opposite of what Lolo did when she was similarly ostracized by the group.

This is how you handle things when you’re an Olympian in a Challenge house. Victories, microwave popcorn, and silk pajamas.

Loser: Slip and Slides In The Grass

Slip and slides are overrated. Yeah I said it. It just hurts to jump on the ground like that. Plus you get all grassy-toed and then you drag that shit into the shower and then the bathroom smells like mulch…it’s just not worth it. Keep the water sports in the pool where they belong.

Was that the most curmudgeony thing I’ve ever typed on this blog?

Winner: The Allure Of Greed

So here inside of Barney’s esophagus, Ciarran takes a phone call from his partner back home. Apparently, spoilers are as rampant for the Australian version as they here for the flagship, because Ruby has apparently received a message from someone claiming that Ciarran has been acting uncouth as far as fidelity is concerned.

This prompts as swift apology from Ciarran. What she accused him of and what he fessed up to are both sort of yada yada’d, but the show itself reminds us all of his shower hook-up with Audrey in Horacio’s shower many Challenge moons ago.

Regardless, you know what he says to get out of it?

He tells her he’s going to win this 200,000 dollarydoos and give it all to her. That’s right, folks. He doesn’t care and is going to give her all of it. And like any Hot Guy out there, he gets away with it scot-free.

Winner: The Australian Pyro Union

It’s good to see that in these capitalistic times where workers rights are being eroded by corporate greed all the time, it’s good to see the the Australian Pyro Union is still standing strong and guaranteeing work for their proud members.

Winner: Good Solid Simple Actions Movies With No CGI

I love the movie Speed. Love it. The worst part about re-watching Speed, which I do any time it pops up onto (insert random streaming service here), is that it’s a movie that would never be made today. Or, I guess, by made in the same way.

Nowadays Speed would be filmed against a green screen with a fake bus in some giant studio in Atlanta. Also instead of Keanu Reeves just being a regular ass cop, he’d have some sort of either power or destiny strapped to him. Also Sandra Bullock would be a lot more badass and important, rather than just a regular girl going through her day as a citizen of Los Angeles.

Pop quiz hot shot: You know what sounds awful? That movie.

Speed rules. Speed was simple. Bomb on a bus and the bus can’t slow down. Boom. That’s it. It’s not the greatest movie ever made, or the most spectacular, or the most bombastic. But it’s not setting out to be those things. It’s just a silly action movie taking place in under two hours.

Good times. Brb, I’m gonna go smoke a cigarette.

Loser: The Participants of This Daily Challenge

So unfortunately, inside of that bus was not Keanu Reeves, Sandra Bullock, and Cameron from Ferris Buehller’s Day Off. Instead, we had a bunch of Australian reality television people competing to find a sequence of colored lines on all of these balls while the bus whipped around obstacles in the road, swerving from on-coming traffic, and plowing right through exploding idle vehicles.

It led to a lot of this…

Whoops wrong link…

It seems like not only difficult, but also miserable.

Hilarious on our end though, absolutely hilarious and I cannot wait until they do this on Ride or Dies because watching Nany get tossed around is going to be possibly the pinnacle of my existence.

Winner: Being Weirdly Good At The Challenge

So for those of you not watching and just following along with these recaps, this is Troy.

He’s from American Ninja Warrior. He’s got a bad haircut. His nickname is ‘Dirt’. He’s super well-liked. He’s the shortest guy in the house. He’s like if Jordan and Ninja were combined into an Aussie with a bad haircut, but wasn’t annoying like Ninja and had a molecule sized ego compared to Jordan.

And he fucking rocks at The Challenge. Every daily, this guy has done it better than everyone else. Even in a losing effort, such as this one finishing second to last, he’s able to look impressive. I wouldn’t necessarily call him cool, but he’s more enjoyable to watch perform than anyone else on the cast. I don’t know if he ends up winning the whole thing or not (he’s definitely my pick though), but I want him to migrate over to main show ASAP Rocky. Unless he found himself in a Hall Brawl or some other overtly physical elimination, he could probably, maybe not smoke, but hang with and possibly beat anyone left on the main show in any sort of Challengey type game. That’s probably hyperbolic, but he’s impressing me that much.

Gotta get a haircut though. It’s just gotta happen. Jordan’s mullet/whatever it is now is one thing. This is a whole different ballgame of terrible.

Loser: The Reputation of Olympians On The Challenge

This is a screenshot of a door.

Behind that door is a sobbing Olympic Gold Medalist.

She’s just found out that she’s been put into elimination again.

Which is it? Is The Challenge harder than we think or are the Olympics easier than we think? Or is two former Olympic athletes too small of a sample size to determine either way?

Loser: Olympians

Emily the Olympian and Marley The Barely Shown were dispatched during the same elimination round that Sam and Kailah lost to Devin and Tori in (that feels like a hundred years ago), furthering the disappointment we all now feel paying any attention at all the The Olympics.

Greatest athletes in the world my ass. Have you ever met Conor from Top Chef: Australia?!

Winner: Money. Always Money.

Looks like Ciarran’s partner thought it over for a few days and concluded that “yes, I’ll stay with you for the low price of two hundred thousand dollarydoos”.

True love is hard to find. Hold on to it while you got it. Just like Ciarran did.

Winner: What’s In A Name, Really?

Just a couple’a Brookes cuttin it up.

Loser: Ice Baths

Have you ever taken an ice bath? It’s the worst. I’d rather jump out of an airplane with the guy Jordan was strapped to in the Dirty 30 Final and land in a pit filled with used needles buried under actual dog poop than do this ice bath challenge.

Sorry Brihony, in fact yes I am a quitter.

Winner: Troy

This is now the second time these two have been paired up and the second time they came together in a victorious embrace.

Ya’ll think I’m playing with this Troy talk. I’m most certainly not. And I’m definitely not playing about the haircut thing either. Get it right, get it tight, Troy.