sabretooth

Same. If they wanted to do racing, what's wrong with go-karts? However, Robby Gordon looked like he was having a ball with Chris Harrison. Never really thought of Arie Jr as the Kardashian-esque rich kid before. He just had the dumb luck to be coming up in Indycar as the series went thru a ridiculous management civil war that effectively destroyed its US fanbase and made ride-buying a much more likely way of getting a seat rather than pure driving talent.

Teej talks with Entertainment Weekly about keeping the Dirty 30 prize secret, why he wasn't at the finale and why he loves the trivia challenge. http://ew.com/tv/2017/12/30/tj-lavin-the-challenge-xxx-2017/

Johnny seriously needed some cheese to go with that whine. I've seen 5 year olds act better. However, giant foosball looked like fun. I wish that would have been a gym class game when I was in school.

Cory's a father?! http://people.com/babies/cory-wharton-cheyenne-floyd-reveal-child-together-mtv-the-challenge-baby/

I liked the little shoutout to the excellent skiing in Cattaraugus County NY (someone did their homework!), but this WNYer is going to nitpick DEA Agent lady's pronunciation of the county name. It's Catta-raw-gus, not Catta-rag-us.

I am surprised that they didn't make Jenna go to the hospital right away just for liability reasons. I know these knuckleheads sign away their lives and their firstborn children when they go on the Challenge, but I was still a little stunned that the paramedics just gave her ice & elevation and sent her on her merry, ankle-swelling way. I did get a small laugh out of Johnny's comment that him chasing TO around the course was either going to be his finest moment or a TO's Backpack moment. Johnny Bananas Backpack in any form will never not be funny.

I caught that, too. I wonder if its a CYOA for MTV, like they caught flack for *only* giving $1000 to each week's winner. Also, whomever designed the uniforms for this season seriously miscalculated. The shiny font on the shirts is hard to read and the all-red (which is more bright salmon) and all aqua is flattering to no one. Yes. The exterior sign of the hotel was product placed several times. They also weren't working hard to hide the hotel feel when Camilla was melting down or when Cory was talking with the WWE-lady after Bananas insulted her.

Yep. My first thought upon hearing that Jordan and Tori hooked up was that Jordan was strategizing for an Exes partner. (Though if a hookup happens off camera does it really happen?) Between his Tori hookup and his Cara Maria fights, he's set himself up quite nicely for future themed seasons. What was the point of Teej being there if they were just going to have him sit in the 'VIP Section' and stand in for Camilla during the winner announcement. I'd love to hear his thoughts about some of the shenanigans he sees. The Bachelor/ette has the Tell All episodes. Why can't we have a Teej Tells All? I realize my fuddy duddy side may now be showing, but what was up with the wardrobe on this episode? One of the girls was showing quite a bit of underboob, Corey had on a Knicks jersey, ripped leggings and a denim jacket and Miz was wearing a velour t-shirt under his suitcoat. Meanwhile Bananas and CT are dressed like its a Sunday and they're kicking back watching football and Derrick K has on a freaking tie! What the heck?

That was awesome. He left Camilla to stew and just got the hell out. I'm still wondering whether TJ's MIA status was a planned thing or an unexpected production hiccup.

I had serious Semi-Ho flashbacks with those beans. All that was missing from Ree's recipe was several shots of bourbon!

I know the photo came up in one of the 'Tony's background' episodes, but darned if I can remember which one. I know that it would have been really hard to pull off, but I would have loved if the McGee photo had been a Thackery Binx photo.

Manufactured, calculated and annoying AF, is what it is. One very nice moment was Derrick acting like an adult and congratulating the winners of the challenge, pointing out that he coaches kids sports and the first thing they teach is sportsmanship. It was an excellent contrast with Camilla acting like an overgrown five-year-old when she couldn't complete the puzzle fast enough. For both the redemption challenge and the challenge puzzles, I would have put screens or dividers between each person so the challengers could not see what their neighbors were working on. Both puzzles could be copied fairly easily.

I was thinking how icky it was to put a roll of quarters inside a jar of unwrapped M&Ms.

At least they gave the Challengers goggles for the paint scraping / glass breaking part. But they probably should have had gloves. And long sleeves and long paints. Hell, put them in underarmour branded coveralls! They were lucky that there wasn't as much bleeding as there was. Either Jordan is really lucky or he's figured out that the top of the Double Cross Thingy has a different paint job or a scratch at the top or something. Pulling the double cross that many times is just crazy.

The minute Amy said she was making a jacket and pants from the denim, I was like 'holy socks, she's making a Canadian tuxedo. This is not going to end well.' Wasn't one of the twins reminding the other twin that this was a Fall challenge and the other twin was not having it?

And Derrick vaulted himself over the back of the couch to escape that ruckus. That was a nice case of self preservation. Lost in all the ruckus this episode was how much Leroy kicked ass at that Challenge. To have a significant fear of heights and be able to make it all the way thru that course was impressive.

I thought CT making a cake was really sweet but I'm pretty sure The Barefoot Contessa would not approve of his butter softening technique. (But it was pretty funny!) Johnny making Tony look like the ass-end of a toucan had me laughing fairly hard. I'm surprised that he didn't wake up! I also find still funny that they all come packed with costumes in their suitcase. Because lord knows when I go to a foreign country I bring a blond wig, glue and a bag of craft-store feathers! I feel like we're missing a giant piece of why the rest of the house is mad at Aneesa. Their treatment of her isn't adding up with what we've been shown.

I think trivia came at the wrong point in the season. With so many hamsters left in the game, it went on for way too long. However, it is always a delight to see how much Teej enjoys the trivia challenges.

I was laughing right along with Teej as Camilla was crashing repeatedly into that pole. (I'm a horrible person.) Another great quote of the night was Veronica saying that her first Challenge was in 2000, followed with perfect timing by Dario saying he graduated high school in 2011. If looks could kill, Dario would have been toast.

I swear, this show and Big Brother illustrate that common sense housekeeping skills are not high on the list of desirable cast qualities. The houses/kitchens on both shows are trashed fairly quickly and then everyone wonders where the critters come from. The challenges this episode reminded me a lot of something they would do on Survivor, but I'm truly thankful that Teej is a much more subtle, chill host than Probst.

My jaw about hit the damn floor when I realized MTV was using Ave Maria as background music for that Tony-as-a-dad montage. It's probably the first time Schubert's ever been played on MTV!

I'm kind of glad that Discovery didn't do The Bait this year because I think the other captains might have given Sean grief over his Danny Tanner-esque lecture, responding with how a real captain would either not step in or handle it by hollering so loudly that the residents of Dutch could hear him. Being a leader isn't always about screaming how you're the leader, but acting like the leader. Sean did the latter.

And how many people can afford to hack up a rib roast for "breakfast steaks?" And I sort of (barely) get adding sugar to a spice rub to help with caramelization, but it seems like the amount of sugar added was nearly equal to the amount of spices. The ratio seems off and you'd probably end up with a super sweet steak. While the apple dumplings were super Semi-Ho, Aunt Sandy would have figured out a way to get apple brandy into the recipe to enhance the apple flavor.

I got a kick out of how chill Sean and Zach were handling the Brenna A's generator issues. No yelling, just a calm discussion about the problem and how to proceed. This show needs a mellow boat to balance out the other intense personalities.

But...but...'Merica! (Seriously though, that was a big old history fail.) Yep. The quick baking is supposed to set the merengue. Her waving that tiny kitchen torch in the direction of the merengue did nothing to set anything below the immediate surface of the "baked" Alaska. It was whipped-cream gloopy when she set that cut piece on the plate.