The Challenge: Ride Or Dies Power Rankings — Week 1 (Pre-Season)

Welcome back to a brand new season of The Challenge and a brand new batch of Power Rankings!!! As usual, these rankings are based on…nothing really. Just buckle up and relax. Just a quick update on where I’ve been for my 19 loyal readers: I was off the grid on vacation. Then immediately had a death in the family. The Challenge USA kinda sucked. And I just didn’t have it in me to care. The Final, Episode 10, happened on my birthday! Mexican take-out, tequila, a Challenge Final. Perfect birthday. Danny summited the mountain, TJ announced him as the winner, and my girlfriend and I turned on In My Feelings by Drake and danced while singing “Kiki, do you love me?” in our living room. Great vibes all around. Moment later, I was throwing away take-out containers , I flattened them into the trash and the edge of a broken wine glass shredded my wrist, digging straight through multiple layers of muscle (did you know that some of your muscles are white? I didn’t either) and spent eight hours over night in the emergency room. For a week, my hand/wrist just simply wasn’t working right. I took it as a sign. The lesson kids, as always, is I’m an idiot. But enough of that, let’s get to the Power Rankings!!! Inside this week: We dig deeper into Nam and Lolo, Kailah and Nany hang out without Jenna there, I hop on the Kaycee bandwagon, and much much more…

34–19) Analyse, Chauncey, Colleen, Emmy, Horacio, Jakk, Johnny, Kenny, Kim, Moriah, Nurys, Olivia, Ravyn, Sam, Tamara, Tommy

Another season, another bloated batch of rookies that I’ve never met before. Welcome to the first day of the rest of your life, kids. This time, there’s even family members involved. Kaycee’s brother, Kailah’s husband, and Amber’s Hot Boyfriend. There’s a Kim, who kind of looks like the Kym from back in the day, except he’s German and a dude. I’m dying to know whether or not Jakk’s name is spelled like that on his birth certificate. I’d guess no. One woman’s named after a bird, and another guy’s last name is actually Bird. And for the second season in a row we get a guy named Tommy. We saw the last one’s dick as he washed up onto a beach pants-less and clearly concussed. So, in the great words of Michael Scott, prove it! Let’s see your penis!

And this applies to all the rookies. The last few batches haven’t exactly produced the talent that’s going to carry this franchise forward. I need this group to show me something. Not just their penis.

18) Nam

Some people might look at Nam and ask themselves, why? Why does this guy keep getting invited back? He spent his first season, Double Agents, saying basically nothing and laying in bed and then completely disappeared with nary an explanation on his second go around. Give somebody else a chance.

Those people are wrong. Nam has provided me with nothing but immense joy since the moment he walked onto the screen. Let’s dig a little deeper into the rich text that is Nam Vo.

Here we have an insanely handsome, warm, too-nice, buff and scary German guy just living his best Hot German Guy life. He gets a call for this American show called The Challenge he’d probably never heard of, but doing this is way easier than getting a real job. Plus this whole pandemic thing blows, so why not? He figured he’d give it a go. What’s the worst that could happen?

Meanwhile, back in America, that same call was going out to a former Olympian who participated in the Champs vs. Stars spin-off. A bold move that the Challenge Gods would either come to regret, or find as hilarious as me. There would be no in-between. But back to her in a bit.

A few months later, Nam shows up in Iceland, and everything’s sort of a whirlwind. So many new people to meet, so many names to learn, so much English being spoken. He meets someone named Aneesa. He meets two entirely different Amber’s. He meets Wes. He meets Lolo. Things are moving really fast. But it’s so fun! So many pretty girls! What a great decision to come here!

Nam drops his bags off at the nicest house he’s ever lived in. Sharing a room with three other strangers. But then quickly, they all have to change into their Under Armor sponsored outfits because their first Challenge is starting right away. The entire bus ride, his nerves are firing on all cylinders. He still doesn’t know what he’s got himself into, but the unknown is exciting. Nam smiles the entire bus ride.

Again, everything’s a blur. Production is scurrying everywhere, there are cameras all over the place, and he’s told where to walk and where to stand. This is really happening. He’s really doing this. Then he hears a helicopter.

The whole group cheers and jumps for joy. When the chopper lands, some well-dressed man hops out, gives the pilot some sort of hand wiggle with his thumb and pinky extended (must be an American thing, he figured) and his new friends go even wilder. This guy must be important.

Nam finds out this guy is gonna be the host, and his name is TJ. Maybe he’s related to the CT guy Nam met earlier. Again, must be an American thing to just get two letters as a name. And then, with no warning, with only a brief explanation, Nam’s competing. He’s wrestling for some sort of canister so he can get a code and put colors in the right order. Honestly, he’s not too sure of the rules still.

The game ends, Nam doesn’t win but he just realized that was the most fun he’d ever had in his entire life. Aneesa is the overall winner, which makes Nam happy. She was nice to him at the airport. And then, without warning, TJ tells everyone to pick their partner.

Nam freezes. He suddenly forgets everyone’s names. He blanks on which Amber is which, or how many Ambers there even are. Everyone’s name simply became Amber in that moment. But standing directly next to him is Lolo Jones. Call it fitness inertia, or fate, but it was mere geography that brought these two together. Nam figured this Amber was better than any others. So they joined forces.

The beginning of the end. He didn’t know it at the time, but that moment would be the final time that Nam experienced joy.

On the bus ride back to the house, Lolo explains who she is, and Nam thinks to himself that he just hit the jackpot. He’s going to be partnered with an Olympic athlete? How incredible.

When they arrived back at the house, it had now been almost sixteen hours since Nam had a shirt on. The longest he’d gone in easily over a decade. So as he unpacks, he does it shirtless. Causing a commotion. That nice girl Aneesa is staring at him holding a glass of wine, and even his partner Lolo likes what she sees. Oh yeah, this was off to a great start. He was gonna slang his sausage all over this house. Everything was coming up Nam.

But he slowly realized, over the next few weeks, that his partner Lolo Jones was unlike anyone Nam had ever met. He learned that his partner wasn’t even a human being. She was a fucking solar system.

He found himself in a sexless, chemistry wasteland of a relationship he never at any point agreed to be in. Lolo sucked the life-blood from Nam, one slow Sauerkraut IV drip at a time. She picked fights with him for no reason at all. Like a drunk girlfriend testing you early in a relationship. Except they weren’t dating. And she doesn’t drink.

She broke down mentally on every single Challenge, rendering his competitive side inert. He began dreading competing, PTSD developing dormant in his brain every time TJ blew his air horn.

No other woman in the house would dare even speak to him for fear of Lolo slicing their throats open in the night. His schnitzel was beaten into a spaetzle. Flaccid and gamey.

She broke him mentally, emotionally, and even physically. By the time she left the house, Nam was a shell of what he once was. His lower back ached from the burden of an entire galaxy gravitating around him for almost two months. He walked around the house in a state of disbelief. His face was permanently stuck like Forrest Gump watching Jenny take her bra off.

Lolo and Nam on Double Agents was the greatest love story ever told. Nothing is more hilarious to me than the nicest German in the world being paired up with an incredibly athletic, hot, virgin Dementor and then their partnership going as poorly as possible.

But wait! There’s more!

Probably feeling terrible for him, the Challenge Gods invited him back for another round. Spies, Lies & Allies was the sun rising over Berlin. Nam had new life. A new chance.

That was until only three days in, before the game had even begun, Lolo Jones snapped the necks of security, broke into the house in the middle of the night, snatched Nam from his bottom bunk, taking him home to live in her basement for the rest of eternity, ending his run on The Challenge. He became the first player in Challenge history to be kidnapped.

Yeah, I’m sure he did TJ.

I have no idea how he got out, but it’s great to have him back.

17) Michele

Unlike Nam, this is someone who I haven’t thought a single second about since the minute she walked off the screen.

Spies, Lies, and Allies was a tale of two casts. There was the group of veterans, outnumbered, but almost entirely made up of the same people who just played together on Double Agents. They quickly realized that working against each other was antithetical to survival in the game. Then there were the rookies, who lined up one by one for their turn in the guillotine. Only the blue-haired rapper from Romania managed to escape the executioner.

(Just an aside, the sentence “Only the blue-haired rapper from Romania managed to escape the executioner.” can only make sense on The Challenge. Don’t ever tell me this isn’t the greatest show in the world)

Michele wasn’t around for long, but for whatever reason, she was the only one of those rookies plucked from the bin by the Challenge Gods to continue on.

I could’ve used either of the Romanians. It would be nice to see what Kelz could do, given an equal non-Tracy-partner opportunity. Michaela only left first because she left a grocery list in her pocket, she barely even got started. Any opportunity for a shirtless Logan to appear on my screen is a win. Corey seemed eager. Hughie was hilarious. Priscilla held on as long as she could, and was the first to say YOLO and end the rookie-rookie-team-snake-eating-it’s-own-tail cycle.

But I’m wrong all the time about everything. Maybe in five years, after winning her ninth Challenge in a row and being elected President of The United States of Amazon in America, Michele will drop a bag of dog shit on my porch and light it on fire. I’ll put it out with my boot and then there will be multiple government officials there waiting to erase me from existence.

Crazier things have happened. Ya know?

16) Veronica

The older I get, the more detached I am from popular culture, the harder it is for me to relate to anyone that I see on this show.

I cannot think of, for the life of me, one single rookie from last season I could relate to. But that’s fine, I’m washed AF. It’s for the benefit of everyone people like me aren’t on the show. If they put a direct reflection of my life on The Challenge, that person would make Kaycee look like Camila after eight vodka Red Bull’s.

But the last time we saw Veronica, having her game cut short because she broke her toe rushing down a flight of stairs to get pizza, I finally after long last felt that human connection.

Veronica suffering a minor malady in the name of late-night pizza has never made me feel older and never made me feel younger at the same time. Anyone who was once cool, and is now decidedly not, broke down into their atomic state and soared above the atmosphere that night.

A living Reality Television deity, still doing it, still helping forward the franchise she once carried on her back. How can you not be romantic about The Challenge?

15) Aneesa

Do you have a favorite hoodie? I bet you do. I bet one of your hoodies has been with you for a long time. For years, you’ve turned to this hoodie. When you’re chilly, or bloated, or it’s laundry day. For whatever reason, you’ve returned over and over again to this hoodie. Each lingering scent conjuring a night to remember. Each stain reminding you of another meal enjoyed with loved ones. Each tear in the fabric representing a chapter in the story of your life. And what a wild story it’s been. You’ve been through a lot. Life’s hard. Things are tough all over, Ponyboy. And here you are. You made it. You’re alive. You can love, cry, laugh, dance, hurt, feel. You can be high, you can be low. But each day lived is a victory. You conquered another spin of the globe. And that hoodie has been with your through it all.

Aneesa is my hoodie. Aneesa burns eternal. When life is most turbulent, at it’s most unpredictable, when I am losing my grip on reality and on the verge of dropping off the cliff and falling into the void in perpetuity, Aneesa’s there to pull me up. She’s always there. And she’ll always be there. For me. For you. For us. For Challenge fans all across the world. Aneesa is our most comfortable hoodie. The hoodie that’s gotten us to where we are today. An eternal warmth on our coldest nights.

14) Nelson

Here’s a list of people who have won a daily challenge since the last time Nelson stood in front of humongous letters spelling out C-H-A-L-L-E-N-G-E and had TJ announce that he was the winner…

Brad, Kailah, Kam, Kyle, Natalie, Nicole Z., Tony, Zach, Britni, Devin, Jemmye, Amanda, Kayleigh, Ashley, Hunter, Johnny, Paulie, Joss, Sylvia, Paulie, Da’Vonne, Cara Maria, Theo, Morgan, Ninja, Ashley Cain, Turbo, Georgia, Jenna, Gus, Laurel, Faith, Jenny, Rogan, Cory, Dee, Chris, Bayleigh, CT, Aneesa, Bear, Big T, Kaycee, Josh, Jordan, Nany, Mattie, Wes, Melissa, Fessy, Leroy, Tori, Jay, Theresa, Amber B., Darrell, Gabby, Nicole Bass, Esther F., Idris, Logan, Esther A., Agent Ed, Berna, Emanuel, Emy…

Just to recap, that’s 67 (!) different people who have claimed a victory since that fateful night on Vendettas when Nelson hopped on the bus back to their house as the victor. That’s 67 different people who have had power in the game over him, leaving his life to be decided by the likes of a couple of Esthers and an Agent Ed.

We’re starting this season at a crisp 51 Daily Challenge losing streak for Nelly T on MTV. Considering some of the names on that list above, it’s quite the remarkable accomplishment.

I have a bottle of champagne I bought prior to the start of Double Agents to pop open upon the celebration of this God-forsaken curse being broken.

51 losses later, will he finally take home a victory? Or will that bottle of champagne continue taking up prime fridge real estate on the door’s bottom shelf? It’s up to you, Scuba Nelly. I have a cold glass of non-vintage champagne waiting for you.

13) Jay

It’s possible that Jay’s legacy on The Challenge will begin and end with his upset victory against an alarmingly out-of-shape CT. This victory was the direct catalyst for CT realizing his mortality, whipping himself into crazy shape, and rattling off another two dominating victories. Considering what the after-effects were, that elimination round no longer has anything to do with Jay. Despite getting the win.

Jay’s in a tough spot. Not good enough to dominate, but too good to keep around. He’s always going to be an easy target. There will never be an opportunity for him to physically dominate anyone, and his relationships with the power players are tentative at best. Add all this up, and what do you get?

I honestly have no idea. But the further he gets from that night against CT in Total Madness, the further he gets from any sort of relevancy, and the closer he gets to becoming the answer to a Challenge trivia question, Who was the last guy to beat CT head to head in an elimination?

12) Kailah

Last time we saw Kailah on a Challenge proper, her game got derailed when she ended her relationship at home by hooking up with a guy named after the football team in Chicago. A truly modern Dear John letter. Taking no chances, her new husband decided it was best if he was just tagged along this time. Smart man.

Kailah’s never been super awesome at making friends, even her relationship with Nany seems fraught. Likely, they’re friends because they’re friends with Jenna. So this season might play out for them a little like the episode of Seinfeld when George and Elaine were forced to hang out just the two of them.

She’s technically run a Final more recently than anyone else here, so she has at least some bonafides to stand on. For whatever reason, though, I feel like her honeymoon will be a quick one.

11) Mature Nany

There is no greater crime to humanity currently plaguing society than the fact that Nany’s season of The Real World isn’t on Paramount+.

I mean, what are we even doing? If we all just put our phones down, sat in front of our televisions, and watched Adam Royer run roughshod on the city of Las Vegas for a few glorious hours, I truly think that society could put its issues aside. No more war. No more conflict. No more division.

Despite the whitewashing The Challenge documentary did for Nany, I still remember. We still remember. Young Nany was a gift to reality TV. But now that she’s Mature Nany, I don’t even know what we’re doing here anymore.

The growth of these people is one of the best parts of watching this show. They’ve given a huge part of their lives to us, and for most of them we’ve seen them at their absolute worst. I’ve reached the age where most of my friends are reaching life milestones; promotions, buying houses, getting married. The warm feeling I get when I send the “Congrats!” texts to the group chat when these milestones are announced, it’s the same feeling we all subconsciously get seeing the changes in these people’s lives.

But there’s still that part of me that wishes Young Nany never left us. That we never met Mature Nany. That she continued to Peter Pan her way through life and show it to us every six or so months on a season of The Challenge.

It was less than three years ago that she threw that Cup O’ Noodles at Aneesa’s head. It feels more like three hundred years ago. Life comes at you fast.

10) Devin

This was obvious to anyone who was paying attention last season, but if the aliens landed in the Spies, Lies & Allies house and said “take me to your leader”, every single member of that cast would’ve taken them to Devin. Devin was absolutely in charge last season.

Is that weird to anyone else? I enjoy Devin, he brings a lot to the show, and I’m unsure if this will come off as anything but negative, but it just doesn’t seem correct that he would be running a Challenge house. Like the universe was off balance or something.

I better get used to it though. He’s gonna be running the show once again this season. Between Devin and Tori, their tentacles run deep in this houses social game. They have friends in every nook and cranny.

Secondly, though, and most importantly, is that they are both going to be more than willing to be the public face of decision making. Devin, especially, is more than happy to grab the reins.

Expect the two of them in the Final, whether or not they’ll win though? Well…..

9) Tori

Nobody on this cast is more desperate for a win than Tori.

She’s gone all in on being Tori from The Challenge. She’s not the first to make that choice, and there are a plethora of positives and experiences that can enhance your life stemming from that decision. But it’s also a decision that can swallow you whole. Being put into the vulnerable positions you’re subjected to in this game, over and over, stacking season after season, cannot be easy. The hyper-reality of living in a Challenge house can carry over to real life if you let it. The game can keep going, spinning you around like a washing machine. Tori’s been on a spin cycle for a while. Getting publicly engages, getting publicly divorced, feeling the pressure to put every aspect of your life on social media, turning your life into a piece of meat for the starving hyenas at home to thrash at.

And it would all be for nothing if she didn’t finally win one of these. Finally guzzle nectar from the Challenge God’s chalice. Victory, on The Challenge, is the ultimate elixir.

I also don’t know her at all. And that in reality all that bullshit I just said doesn’t affect her nor apply to her. It’s entirely possible, I’m wrong all the time. It’s also incredibly hypocritical of me to wonder if this is healthy for her while also writing this blog post and perpetuating the very machine I disdain.

C’est la vie, I guess.

8) Fessy

Did you all know that Fessy has a podcast? Well, had a podcast?

Don’t worry, I didn’t either. We didn’t miss much.

It’s called Fessy’s Fortitude (hell yeah) and it’s filed under the category “Self-help”. The irony is lighting me on fire. Here’s the description, ripped straight from Spotify, grammar mistakes and misplaced words be damned…

“What’s up guys. I’m Faysel Shafaat, aka Fessy fromBB and MTV’s The Challenge.

You may feel like you know a lot about me through tv, but I promise there’s more to me than meets the eye. On this podcast I’m going to dive deep with you all on how have have a killer mindset, remain confident through adversity, and how to be resilient. Stay tuned!”

There were four episodes. The latest was released on February 16th, 2021. Talk about resiliency. Each week in this space I’m going to review an episode and speak on how deeply each pillar of Fessy’s Fortitude (killer mindset, confidence through adversity, and how to be resilient)(I’m getting those words written onto a plaque and hanging it above my desk) is hit. And if he’s still around after Week 4, then maybe I’ll go back and re-review them. Who knows? By the time I’m done listening to them, I’ll be the most resilient bastard on the planet and I’ll be able to accomplish anything I want. Maybe I’ll even have something interesting to say. Stay tuned!

7) Darrell

Since he won four straight titles, hit Brad with one of the the cleanest two-piece combos in the history of brown-liquor fueled brawls, then got first pick on Fresh Meat 2 and left Laurel on the table leading to him being eliminated for the first time ever, Darrell returned on Invasion and decided to play the game as little as possible. To actually play The Challenge the least he could.

He might not admit it, but I feel like he’s been sandbagging Challenges ever since then. If you have power, you actually have to play. He figured his reputation could get him to where he needed to be, and if he had to fight, then so be it. He has ultimate confidence in his abilities. One of the few on this show full of preening peacocks that truly does.

But all this has done is left him out in the cold. Left him for late elimination rounds that he can’t quite win. Or leave him watching somebody else, somebody much hungrier for the win, or much luckier, pass him by in a Final Challenge. A feeling he never felt in his early Challenge days.

I say, this season, he goes the complete other way. He goes Costanza on everyone and does the opposite. I want him coming out swinging. All in. Full effort. I want him showing up on day one, winning the opening challenge, and listing off his hit list in front of the whole group, TJ, and the Challenge Gods.

Immediately, that same fear he used to elicit upon arrival would return. Nobody wants that smoke. Even Jordan. Tell him he didn’t eat any cookies this time, and he’ll gladly see him down there for a rematch. Fly Wes out to Thailand and tell him he wants that fight from The Ruins they never had. Tell them all. Grow out the Road Rules braids and side burns. Bring back the afro wig and the fake teeth. Shock the house.

Ahhh…a boy can dream.

6) Amber

Amber arrived on Double Agents, said nothing, did nothing, and walked away as a Challenge Champion while the rest of the women were left wondering what the fuck just happened.

Then, next season arrived, and she didn’t even make the cast. It wasn’t until someone named Lauren did whatever the fuck she did to get sent home, that Amber’s ticket even got called. She showed up in a car that looked so expensive I can’t even afford to Google it, shouted “The champ is here!” as she exited, her curly hair bouncing along the runway.

Then the game swallowed her up. She got her name called early, her social standing in the house, despite being one of the only champions living in it, was low enough that Fessy was willing to risk the vet alliance just to say her name for whatever reason he decided to do that. She won her way back into the house, but it was never the same. She eventually found her way in there again, and just couldn’t hang. She went home halfway through, something that should’ve happened a long time ago. But just simply didn’t. Because this is a bizarre game.

This time around, she’s on the main cast from day one and brings along her IRL boyfriend. Being a couple in the Challenge house has made people a target for votes since Eric Neis sailed the ocean blue. But if she can make the right friends, and get the right elimination game when the time does come up, she’s as much of a threat to win a Final as anyone else.

5) Turbo

War of the Worlds feels like a billion years ago. At least in Challenge time it does. So it’s easy to forget now how dominant Turbo was on one of the most competitive seasons there’s ever been. He won basically everything, putting enough fear into everyone that most people just figured making friends with him was the best course of action. So everybody was like, “Yay Turbo!” Which is all someone like Turbo wants to hear. Telling him he’s anything but amazing is a personal affront.

Likely the hardest Final there’s ever been looked like a Saturday in the Park for him. He won by a hundred miles, while his peers dropped one by one. Only Theo, a world class athlete, ever stood a chance.

But the next season proved that when taken out of the narrow hallway of a mostly individual season, and dropped into the open field of a team season, where all the shady dealings have room to hide behind various shadows, he didn’t move in quite the same Turbo-centric way.

And then Jordan had to ordacity to tell Turbo he was anything besides the greatest. And to chill out on the karate moves.

Jordan already thinks he’s the greatest. Therefore, no one else can be the greatest. It’s why he was hardest on Cara Maria and Turbo that season. The two people in the house with the highest opinion of themselves. Cara let him get to her on the surface level, but she was in full Challenge robot form and mostly remained unflappable.

Turbo, on the other hand, took the bait. Hook, line, and sinker.

This time around, after a billion years off in Challenge time, he’s going to go as far as his ego will let him. If his partner, Mrs. Turbo, who I know nothing of, can hypothetically keep up with him, then if they get to the Final it’s theirs to win. But if he’s going to allow himself to be provoked by the simplest of shit talking, then it’s always going to end the same.

Whatever weakness you have, Challenge vets will find it. There are too many sharks swimming in the waters this time around. Veronica, Johnny, Laurel, Devin, they will all take any opportunity to let Turbo beat himself. Because, more than likely, none of them can themselves.

4) Johnny

If War of the Worlds feels a like a billion years ago, Total Madness isn’t too far behind.

A lot has happened to the franchise Johnny happily found himself as the face of since he broke the curse, got his seventh championship, and faded away.

All Stars was conceived, executed, and is now on heading towards a fourth season. The Menace Yes Duffy is back in The Challenge universe and going to the VMA’s. We found out Romanian women have blue hair. Not one, but two German’s have been on a Challenge. Lolo Jones crashed landed.

And most importantly, CT has won twice in a row.

Johnny may die before he ever admits it out loud, but he absolutely cares about the championship count between him and CT. There is no doubt in my mind that it matters a whole lot to him.

And so what, it should! This guy has dedicated his life to this thing, it’s grown into an absolute monolith under his watch. He should care. I would care. You would care.

The count’s now at Johnny — 7, CT — 5. Still a comfortable lead, but not comfortable enough that the GOAT conversation is still a thing. We’re all prisoners of the moment, all of our attention spans have eroded much too far to pretend otherwise, so the CT is the best ever crowd has never been louder, or had more to stand on.

But if he gets to eight, and CT doesn’t come back, I think the conversation is kind of over. Eight won’t ever be touched. Seven may never be touched either, but don’t count CT out. He’ll be back one day, everyone will be too afraid to vote him in again, and he’ll rattle off another couple of wins. But three more? Could CT actually win three more of these?

Right now, as it stands, the GOAT conversation, if it were binary (I feel like Jordan has a lot to say about that, but that’s another conversation), I’d have to lean towards Johnny. Sure, a few of Johnny’s wins were against easier competition, but the thing is, CT was around back then too. He couldn’t stay out of his own way, which counts for something. CT’s whole career is littered with coulda-shoulda-woulda’s, but you don’t really see that on Johnny’s resume.

I don’t know. I could wake up tomorrow and change my mind. But Johnny’s back for a reason, and I just have to imagine that CT nipping at his heels has plenty to do with it.

3) Jordan

On this last season of The Bachelorette, which began the week after All Stars 3 ended, there was a particular brotestant vying for Instagram fame amongst the vast sea of brotestant’s vying for Instagram fame that caught my eye.

At that time in my life, mid-July, I had just gotten finished processing Jordan’s All-Stars 3 mullet. At first, it was a lot to handle. Jordan, former New Hot Guy, has been aggressively handsome since his Real World days. And despite his many attempts at distracting facial hair, or regrettable haircuts, or wearing outfits that even Frankenstein from Big Daddy wouldn’t have worn, nevertheless, his hotness has persisted.

But the mullet shook my foundation. I didn’t hate it, per se. It was just so distracting. Then I noticed one cool seeming high school kid getting on a train in downtown Chicago with a mullet. Then I saw a few more. And then Jordan beat Darrell in a game he never should have won, talking shit the whole time, Jordan being Jordan, and I was all the way back around. The mullet was awesome. I even considered growing one out myself. I soon would learn, though, that the mullet was only awesome because Jordan’s awesome.

On July 11th, Erich strolled onto the driveway of the Bachelor Mansion.

Erich was hot. Erich was devoid of personality. Erich was like any other generic create-a-player brotestant on The Bachelorette. And Erich had a mullet.

Another mullet, in my life, on reality television, worn unironically by an incredibly handsome man, was just too much for my feeble brain to comprehend.

A couple of notes about Erich. It’s pronounced Eric. The h is silent. But that didn’t stop me from pronouncing his name correctly and calling him Erich, hard ch, all season. Then, at every rose ceremony, without fail, I would quote Billy Madison and say “Erich! You’re gonna give the rose to Erich! He is a bad, bad man”.

But then Erich won, and walked away hand in hand with one of the two Bachelorettes. Yes there were two.

I’m not sure what point I was trying to make, really. I guess that fact that two smoking hot dudes, one I know and love, and another that I couldn’t care about any less, wore mullets and existed on my television screen for an entire summer. 2022. The Summer of Mullets.

Jordan’s mullet returns this season, although it’s been dialed back quite a bit. I’d suspect this was due to the looming variable of living with an ex-fiance. Even someone for someone as confident as Jordan, you never want to have a silly haircut when you bump into an ex.

2) Laurel

Laurel is one of America’s greatest athletes.

She’s a slightly sociopathic terminator whose only mission is to vanquish all competition. Everything else is secondary. There are a few people who change the game the minute they walk in the door. Players who bend the game to their will. Their impact reverberates through all decision-making. Laurel is unequivocally one of those people.

When she returned on War of the Worlds 2, it added another layer to the thick tension and years of built-up animosity on the USA team that makes War of the Worlds 2 my favorite season. The result was always going to be the same, play out that season with that exact group of people and it ends with them falling apart at the end every single time. But it was Laurel, weaponizing Josh’s need for attention, who lit the first match when they voted Wes into elimination.

Then she ignited all the wildfire underneath King’s Landing when she, along with an always-game Johnny who knew the numbers game was all that mattered, threw a daily challenge and orchestrated an elimination match-up against Ninja. A plan that ultimately met the same fate as The Challenger spaceship did. But this time, while the astronauts may have also died, the mission was a success.

I can’t wait to see what she does next.

1) Kaycee

The Kaycee Is Boring tracks are well-trodden. Especially in this space. You know what’s boring? Trodden tracks. And I have never hopped off them since I started this silly blog. Who’s really the boring one?

Here’s the deal, if there was any lesson to take away from The Challenge: USA, of which there are many, is how much I miss these people when they’re gone. Real Challenge people. My people. Our people.

And you know what? Maybe Kaycee hasn’t shouted obscenities in anyone’s face at four in the morning. Maybe she hasn’t wielded inanimate objects throughout the house as weapons. Maybe she hasn’t provided a lick of entertainment that wasn’t directly hooked up to the Gameplay IV.

But she doesn’t owe us that. She doesn’t owe us shit. It’s not her fault that her phone rings. She’s just answering the call. The money that they’re playing for is far too astronomical to even risk all the nonsense that made us fall in love with the show in the first place.

But God dammit, and it most likely Challenge USA fatigue that’ll eventually wear off, but when the cast list came out, and I saw Kaycee’s name, I was like “FUCK YEAH! KAYCEE!”. I was just so happy to have her, among literally every single name on this list above her, back in my life.

I fell down the Kaycee tree and hit every boring branch on the way down, and had an unexpectedly soft landing.

The fact is, you can put her on-paper resume up against anyone who’s ever played this game.

• 3 seasons. 3 Finals.
• 1 win. Got hurt in one Final and finished second to a British cyborg in her other one.
• 3–0 elimination record. Only two of those are true eliminations, the third being the mid-Final game against Nany. So in reality, only 2–0, against Kailah and Theresa, legit competition.
• And (!) that 2–0 is made even more impressive by the fact that she was only in there because of the skull twist. Meaning it was necessary for her to be in there. She politely asked to go in both of those times. Somewhere Sarah Greyson is rolling her eyes.
• 14 Daily Challenge wins. For reference, Nany (shout out) is in second during this three-season window with eight. Then Aneesa (!), Tori, CT and Fessy are tied with six. A good chunk of Nany and Tori’s wins were with Kaycee on their team. She’s been absolutely dominant.

Beyond even the numbers. She has genuinely never been in trouble. Never been the house vote. There has never once been a confessional by someone saying “It’s just Kaycee’s time”. There have never been whispers of blindsiding her. Insane. Essentially three perfect seasons in a row.

Her name’s Bennet, and she ain’t in it.

If you wanted to be a cynic you could go to spelunking for caveats and find whatever you wanted; her rookie season had more Big Brother players than usual and was the first skull season. This completely neutered the idea of voting in rookies first, allowing them to coast as the veterans scrambled to get their skulls as quickly as they could. Her built-in alliance carried through her next two seasons. Jenny hasn’t been back. Kailah was checked out for their elimination. Theresa probably was too. The voting system on Spies, Lies, and Allies was warped due to the vets all sticking together.

But you know what? If if’s and but’s were candy and nuts then names would never hurt me. Or something like that.

And what’s quite possibly the most impressive all her accomplishments, is that she’s the first person (and possibly the only human being on earth capable) who tamed Nany. A feat of humanity that scientists once deemed an impossibility.

I just purchased myself a ticket on the Kaycee Train for this season. There’s no WiFi, and the only reading material is an assortment of culture magazines from 2009. Lunch will be served at noon. One ham sandwich and four Lays potato chips and a glass of skim milk. Room temp. Nothing but flat farmland from here until the end of the trip, so don’t expect a view! All aboard!!!

Thanks for reading!!! Enjoy episode zero tonight! Be sure to check back for my Winners & Losers recap, and as always, Happy Challenge watching!!!