Past Seasons Thread

[Asp Burger]

We saw them taking so many photos at that shoot that I was expecting a coffee-table book to be published within the year. Nothing ever followed, to the best of my knowledge. Some of the groupings we saw them photographing were weird and random.

Puck, of course, was being "Puck on 9," as he might put it. He got into separate squabbles with Nathan and Kameelah. We didn't hear what was said in either case, but people were having to hold Kameelah back. She was really going to go after him.

Then Puck was going to pout off, but his mother was there, and she gave him a sip of beer and told him to get his picture taken. I couldn't make this up.

[Hiyo]

There quite a few people missing from that group pic. From what I can see:

New York - Julie

LA - Dom, Aaron, and Tami

San Francisco - Rachel

London - Jay and Jacinda

Miami - Melissa

Boston - Montana, Sean, and Genesis

Seattle - Irene and Janet

Hawaii - Tek, Colin, and Matt

There were people at the reunion though who for whatever reason never ended up that group picture, like Rachel. Can't remember who else was there but didn't join the group photo.

[Asp Burger]

That 2001 special was very scattered and had so many pieces joined together. There was the photo shoot. There were small-group discussions in a studio (Jon, Elka, and New Orleans Julie made up a "Christian virgins" panel; Kevin, Neil, and Kameelah made up, I guess, a "smart, argumentative people" panel). Puck was getting a lot of solo time to talk about what he thought of each season, and they were showing clips while he was talking. Then there was a "red carpet" segment of arrivals to a club, with Miami Dan as emcee, and that was followed by a dance party with Dan going around interviewing people. They had a confessional set up at the club for the Real World alumni (some of whom were getting smashed) to go in and say whatever was on their minds to the camera. We had segments with Eric and New Orleans Melissa doing a countdown of the greatest RW moments, as well as a preview of the Back to New York season. Plus John Norris as "anchor" in the studio, providing newsy narration of the show's history and obvious highlights (e.g., Pedro's influence). 

I think the party segments were cut for re-airings. 

All these parts obviously had been filmed at different times, because people had different looks. Neil had black hair when he was talking to Kevin and Kameelah, then his familiar white-blond look when he was being interviewed by Dan in the red carpet/party portion. 

All of this is a roundabout way of saying it's hard for me to say who was there, because I'll remember people attending, but maybe they were at the party but not the photo shoot, or vice versa.  

There were definitely people who missed every part of it. New York Julie. Dom and Aaron. Irene and Janet. Colin and Matt. Jay came to the party but not the photo shoot. Jacinda, I think, was a total absentee. 

Edited May 29, 2022 by Asp Burger

[choclatechip45]

Sarah from Philly was on The Mike Lewis Podcast

Some highlights

Spoke to MJ before Real World Philly started filming they had mutual friends who connected them 

Wanted to be on The Real World she had studied the books and would look at the casting applications in the books and what producers were looking for

Her Trishelle line from the casting special was the result of pregaming for Maroon 5 and in her words a cocky 22 year old thing to say.

Is in a group chat with Shavonda, Melanie, Karamo and MJ, but they just send voice messages.

Snuck a cell phone on to the show and used it because Shavonda was on the phone so much fighting with her ex boyfriend at the time who is now her husband

She is now a partner at a law firm and has told them she would do a homecoming season if asked since she can get 2 weeks off from work and they paycheck is nice. She wasn't sure if Karamo would do it since he is so busy, Mike told her he has said he would and she goes she didn't want to bring it up to him and have him think she had ulterior motives or pressure him to do it. 

She does not speak to Willie anymore, he had a falling out with her former roommate and a bunch of RW/RR people. Said her former roommate has joked she would visit the homecoming house to confront him. Last sighting she heard was one of their mutual friends from Philly saw Willie on a subway in 2017 and he ignored the friend. 

Her former roommate went to college with someone on Road Rules so she met most of the Real World/Road Rules people she knows through her not because she was on the show. 

Said no to two challenges.

Last saw Melanie in 2019 and said they are very close even though they drove each other crazy in the house. 

Knows Lindsay from Summer House they went to UF together and lived together one summer. 

Edited June 22, 2022 by choclatechip45

[moonchild81]

jon and norman were invited to sean and rachels daughter's wedding / jon is singing he posted on instagram

[Lantern7]

4 hours ago, moonchild81 said:

jon and norman were invited to sean and rachels daughter's wedding / jon is singing he posted on instagram

Lets see . . . I'm going to assume this is the oldest daughter. I remember when Sean & Rachel brought her to the Reunion and Ruthie wrote her name on the kid's foot. That was in 1999, so I'll assume she was born in '98. That would make her 23-24 years old.

Why do I have to be good at math? Shit!

And I really need to watch the NOLA Homecoming season, but the stuff I've heard about it keeps warding me off. I did hear Melissa is awesome, and her parents showed up, but I can't bring myself to give any of it a look.

[jsm1125]

10 hours ago, Lantern7 said:

Lets see . . . I'm going to assume this is the oldest daughter. I remember when Sean & Rachel brought her to the Reunion and Ruthie wrote her name on the kid's foot. That was in 1999, so I'll assume she was born in '98. That would make her 23-24 years old.

Why do I have to be good at math? Shit!

And I really need to watch the NOLA Homecoming season, but the stuff I've heard about it keeps warding me off. I did hear Melissa is awesome, and her parents showed up, but I can't bring myself to give any of it a look.

I do think the NOLA was quite good, if you can overlook the amount of airtime Julie gets.

[Lantern7]

12 hours ago, jsm1125 said:

I do think the NOLA was quite good, if you can overlook the amount of airtime Julie gets.

That's a bit of an obstacle for me. I understand some of the others have problems, but Julie sticking with the same on-camera attitude she had since Extreme Challenge? No thanks.

Actually, I haven't seen any of the Homecoming seasons. Does anyone else feel weird about seeing those? For me, the concept is offputting, and I can't put it into words.

I'm guessing there will be a few more seasons. Any guesses on what casts will be used? I think the frontrunners are Miami and Austin.

[Asp Burger]

On 6/25/2022 at 12:16 AM, Lantern7 said:

Lets see . . . I'm going to assume this is the oldest daughter. I remember when Sean & Rachel brought her to the Reunion and Ruthie wrote her name on the kid's foot. That was in 1999, so I'll assume she was born in '98. That would make her 23-24 years old.

The reunion for seasons 5-8 in which various Real Worlders took turns babysitting Evita was in 2000.

Evita was born in October 1999. Rachel said the baby was five months old at the time of that reunion. So, it was taped in March 2000 for airing in May.  

Evita would be 22 now. And yes, she was the one who just got married.

Quote

Actually, I haven't seen any of the Homecoming seasons. Does anyone else feel weird about seeing those? For me, the concept is offputting, and I can't put it into words.

Kind of, but they're not as unpleasant as the later Challenges that I saw in the '00s. Those were super-toxic. At least these Homecomings make some feints at constructive things, even if there's a lot of bad with the good.

New Orleans is the best of the three.

Edited June 27, 2022 by Asp Burger

[moonchild81]

donald trump was at evita's wedding 😲

https://twitter.com/evitaduffy_1/status/1541952754104651780/photo/2

Edited June 29, 2022 by moonchild81

[SilverLake0315]

According to Amaya from Hawaii, additional seasons of Homecoming may not happen 😞

[Lantern7]

Probably for the best. I think the only ones from her season people would want to see are Ruthie and Teck . .. and we'd be reminded that she was a mess that endangered herself and others. Also...would you want to see Matt for any reason? Maybe to see if he's still not capable of blinking?

Edited June 29, 2022 by Lantern7

[ljenkins782]

On 6/29/2022 at 10:01 AM, moonchild81 said:

donald trump was at evita's wedding 😲

https://twitter.com/evitaduffy_1/status/1541952754104651780/photo/2

That's so bizarre. He has time to go to some random Congressman's daughter's wedding? Is it the reality TV connection that drew him there or what? 

Also, their daughter is such an exact mixture of the two of them, it's spooky. She has Rachel's wide eyed smile-y look while simultaneously having semi-squinty eyes like Sean.
 

Quote

Last week Evers ordered a special election to be held Jan. 27 to replace Sean Duffy, the Wausau Republican who resigned from Congress because his wife is about to have a baby with severe health problems.

That's very sad about the baby, but Rachel has got to be close to 50 if she's not already and this is her 9th child, the odds of severe complications were so high. 

Quote

According to Amaya from Hawaii, additional seasons of Homecoming may not happen 😞

I wish they would relax the standards just enough to get one or two more old school seasons in. Would have loved to see Seattle and would be perfectly fine if both Stephen and Irene were missing, despite them having arguably one of the biggest moments in RW history. I'd be fine with the others just speaking about it and the many other things that they all went through. Stephen brings such a weird energy with him and Irene is obviously a nonstarter, so I think the others could actually have a really nice time together. But I think Janet would be the other holdout and 3 missing people would be too many.

My fear is that because of these holdouts in the earlier seasons, they're going to start bombarding us with the crappy years. Like we'll get a LV reunion for the 2nd time and then an Austin/Denver/Philly/worse casts that I didn't even watch.

Even the good seasons, like original San Diego, probably couldn't happen because Jamie is very successful now and Robin is the opposite, reportedly homeless and addicted to drugs. :( 

[BelleBrit]

37 minutes ago, ljenkins782 said:

I wish they would relax the standards just enough to get one or two more old school seasons in. Would have loved to see Seattle and would be perfectly fine if both Stephen and Irene were missing, despite them having arguably one of the biggest moments in RW history. I'd be fine with the others just speaking about it and the many other things that they all went through. Stephen brings such a weird energy with him and Irene is obviously a nonstarter, so I think the others could actually have a really nice time together. But I think Janet would be the other holdout and 3 missing people would be too many.

Nathan has said in interviews that he talks to Irene and that she would be down to do a Homecoming. He did not know the status of what Stephen, Janet, and Lindsey were doing these days-he said that some people refused to communicate, and that he was surprised because they were people who he  thought would be down for a Seattle Homecoming. He fell out of touch with David for a while but he talks with him again now, and he got re-connected with Rebecca through discussions about doing a Homecoming.

So I'm guessing that no cast members from the Boston season were at Sean and Rachel's daughter's wedding. Syrus gave an interview recently that I watched on YouTube, he referred to Sean as "Ex congressman, ex friend", and when the interviewer asked him about that, Syrus said "We don't talk." He said that he was the one who introduced Sean and Rachel and at that time, he thought that she was more Republican than he was. And he said that at the end of the day, unless someone can stand for basic human rights, he can't eff with them. I think that he ended it by saying that if he saw Sean hopefully it would be cordial and that they wouldn't need to have that conversation, but at the same time, he wants to have that conversation.

[ljenkins782]

1 minute ago, BelleBrit said:

Nathan has said in interviews that he talks to Irene and that she would be down to do a Homecoming. He did not know the status of what Stephen, Janet, and Lindsey were doing these days-he said that some people refused to communicate, and that he was surprised because they were people who he  thought would be down for a Seattle Homecoming. He fell out of touch with David for a while but he talks with him again now, and he got re-connected with Rebecca through discussions about doing a Homecoming.

So I'm guessing that no cast members from the Boston season were at Sean and Rachel's daughter's wedding. Syrus gave an interview recently that I watched on YouTube, he referred to Sean as "Ex congressman, ex friend", and when the interviewer asked him about that, Syrus said "We don't talk." He said that he was the one who introduced Sean and Rachel and at that time, he thought that she was more Republican than he was. And he said that at the end of the day, unless someone can stand for basic human rights, he can't eff with them. I think that he ended it by saying that if he saw Sean hopefully it would be cordial and that they wouldn't need to have that conversation, but at the same time, he wants to have that conversation.

Really?? Man, Irene would be the coup of the century, reunion-wise. Sad that some of the others wouldn't be down for it. I'm guessing Janet and Lindsay are the ones refusing to communicate, since it would hardly be surprising that Stephen wouldn't be down to revisit this time of his life. Bummer.

Good for Syrus. And I have no doubt that Sean would be the Becky of the house if he were to do a reunion, which we know he wouldn't. Looking back on the Boston season, Sean was definitely not the conservative he's become. He and Montana would never have gotten along if he'd presented himself the way he does now. 

But I'd love to get him in a room with Syrus and Kameelah and see him try to defend his positions to their faces. 

[choclatechip45]

1 hour ago, ljenkins782 said:

That's so bizarre. He has time to go to some random Congressman's daughter's wedding? Is it the reality TV connection that drew him there or what? 

Also, their daughter is such an exact mixture of the two of them, it's spooky. She has Rachel's wide eyed smile-y look while simultaneously having semi-squinty eyes like Sean.
 

That's very sad about the baby, but Rachel has got to be close to 50 if she's not already and this is her 9th child, the odds of severe complications were so high. 

I wish they would relax the standards just enough to get one or two more old school seasons in. Would have loved to see Seattle and would be perfectly fine if both Stephen and Irene were missing, despite them having arguably one of the biggest moments in RW history. I'd be fine with the others just speaking about it and the many other things that they all went through. Stephen brings such a weird energy with him and Irene is obviously a nonstarter, so I think the others could actually have a really nice time together. But I think Janet would be the other holdout and 3 missing people would be too many.

My fear is that because of these holdouts in the earlier seasons, they're going to start bombarding us with the crappy years. Like we'll get a LV reunion for the 2nd time and then an Austin/Denver/Philly/worse casts that I didn't even watch.

Even the good seasons, like original San Diego, probably couldn't happen because Jamie is very successful now and Robin is the opposite, reportedly homeless and addicted to drugs. :( 

The wedding was at The Trump National Golf Course in Bedminster NJ so he was probably already there anyway. Jamie has said she would do it. 

1 hour ago, BelleBrit said:

Nathan has said in interviews that he talks to Irene and that she would be down to do a Homecoming. He did not know the status of what Stephen, Janet, and Lindsey were doing these days-he said that some people refused to communicate, and that he was surprised because they were people who he  thought would be down for a Seattle Homecoming. He fell out of touch with David for a while but he talks with him again now, and he got re-connected with Rebecca through discussions about doing a Homecoming.

So I'm guessing that no cast members from the Boston season were at Sean and Rachel's daughter's wedding. Syrus gave an interview recently that I watched on YouTube, he referred to Sean as "Ex congressman, ex friend", and when the interviewer asked him about that, Syrus said "We don't talk." He said that he was the one who introduced Sean and Rachel and at that time, he thought that she was more Republican than he was. And he said that at the end of the day, unless someone can stand for basic human rights, he can't eff with them. I think that he ended it by saying that if he saw Sean hopefully it would be cordial and that they wouldn't need to have that conversation, but at the same time, he wants to have that conversation.

Wow. Interesting about Syrus. I asked him during his AMA on reddit  during All Stars 1 about Sean and he said Sean was his friend even though they always different world views but would always be his friend. They must have had a falling out somewhat recently or Syrus has had a change of heart. 

I saw Jon Brennan and Norman were at the wedding.

Edited June 30, 2022 by choclatechip45

[Tatum]

On 6/27/2022 at 4:26 AM, Asp Burger said:

Evita was born in October 1999.

Is Evita the first child born to someone on the Real World? Some of the NYC and LA cast members would be early 30s by 1999 but I can't think of anyone else who had kids before 1999.

If Evita is anything like her parents (and I know we should not assume anything about her) Sean and Rachel will probably be grandparents soon. I believe the oldest RW cast members were born in 1966 so 55-56 right now, but no grandparents on the roster so far, right?

[choclatechip45]

52 minutes ago, Tatum said:

Is Evita the first child born to someone on the Real World? Some of the NYC and LA cast members would be early 30s by 1999 but I can't think of anyone else who had kids before 1999.

If Evita is anything like her parents (and I know we should not assume anything about her) Sean and Rachel will probably be grandparents soon. I believe the oldest RW cast members were born in 1966 so 55-56 right now, but no grandparents on the roster so far, right?

Wikipedia says Tami's kids were born in 94 and 96. David's daughter is around one of Tami's daughters age.

Also I just googled Evita and she appears on Fox News all the time and writes a column for the Federalist so at the moment her views seem very similar to her parents. 

Edited June 30, 2022 by choclatechip45

[BelleBrit]

1 hour ago, choclatechip45 said:

The wedding was at The Trump National Golf Course in Bedminster NJ so he was probably already there anyway. Jamie has said she would do it. 

Wow. Interesting about Syrus. I asked him during his AMA on reddit  during All Stars 1 about Sean and he said Sean was his friend even though they always different world views but would always be his friend. They must have had a falling out somewhat recently or Syrus has had a change of heart. 

I saw Jon Brennan and Norman were at the wedding.

I was a little surprised too, since most of the cast members always seemed to have love for Sean even though they acknowledged his political views were different than most of theirs. I didn't get a sense that there was a falling out per se when he said "ex friend", just that there didn't seem to be much contact/much of a relationship. It wasn't all negative. He does say that on their first night in Boston when he asked everyone if they wanted to go out, Sean's was the only arm that went up.

Edited June 30, 2022 by BelleBrit

[choclatechip45]

38 minutes ago, BelleBrit said:

I was a little surprised too, since most of the cast members always seemed to have love for Sean even thought they acknowledged his political views were different than most of theirs. I didn't get a sense that there was a falling out per se when he said "ex friend", just that there didn't seem to be much contact/much of a relationship. It wasn't all negative. He does say that on their first night in Boston when he asked everyone if they wanted to go out, Sean's was the only arm that went up.

Interesting I'll check it out. 

[Asp Burger]

Syrus is better-looking in that current photo than he was on Real World Boston or the Challenge.

On 6/29/2022 at 3:24 PM, Lantern7 said:

I think the only ones from her season people would want to see are Ruthie and Teck . .. and we'd be reminded that she was a mess that endangered herself and others. Also...would you want to see Matt for any reason? Maybe to see if he's still not capable of blinking?

I'd watch a Homecoming for Hawaii. I strongly disliked most of them in 1999, and even the ones I didn't mind so much did things that weren't cool, but I found them entertaining. For a Real World cast, they have an impressive record of accomplishment in the grown-up world since 1999, so they'd have a lot to talk about. 

Re: Matt, my sense is that once he got the "working in movies/TV" bug out of his system, or realized he wasn't headed straight for the top in it, he found a way to channel his irksome big-brother-who-knows-best tendencies in a more constructive direction with his teaching career.

8 hours ago, ljenkins782 said:

Rachel has got to be close to 50 if she's not already

She turned 50 this past October. 

7 hours ago, BelleBrit said:

Syrus said "We don't talk." He said that he was the one who introduced Sean and Rachel

Huh. I thought we had seen their first meeting on television, when they both did Road Rules All-Stars. They definitely played it that way, but maybe it was for show. 

I can't think about that season without remembering the song they wrote and recorded. "We've got Cyn Dawg from Miami and Jon from LA / We've got Rachel comin' down from the Frisco Bay / We've got Eric from New York and Sean from Beantown / We've packed up all our things and we're ON OUR WAY NOW." I'll still be able to sing that when I'm in the home. Poor Eric kept flubbing his line at the end and having to do it over.

6 hours ago, choclatechip45 said:

I just googled Evita and she appears on Fox News all the time and writes a column for the Federalist so at the moment her views seem very similar to her parents. 

Yes, I looked at her Instagram the other day. Nothing on it surprised me, given her origins. Suffice to say, she's definitely not one of those kids who rebel against their parents' views.

[racked]

Really surprised Irene would be open to a reunion. In her many articles on The subject, she’s made it clear she has zero trust in reality tv producers. 

[BelleBrit]

11 hours ago, Asp Burger said:

Huh. I thought we had seen their first meeting on television, when they both did Road Rules All-Stars. They definitely played it that way, but maybe it was for show. 

I had thought so too. Syrus said in the interview that they were at a party and Sean was really nervous to go talk to Rachel, so he introduced them since they (Syrus and Rachel) were already friends.

[Giuseppe]

21 hours ago, ljenkins782 said:

My fear is that because of these holdouts in the earlier seasons, they're going to start bombarding us with the crappy years. Like we'll get a LV reunion for the 2nd time and then an Austin/Denver/Philly/worse casts that I didn't even watch.

Yeah, I know I for one am not really interested in any Homecomings for any season beyond the first ten, excepting maybe Chicago (though I've seen enough of Aneesa in various challenges to last me a lifetime). Definitely don't need to see Vegas again. I don't think any season past Vegas really had as much of a cultural impact as those early seasons.

[ljenkins782]

14 hours ago, Asp Burger said:

Re: Matt, my sense is that once he got the "working in movies/TV" bug out of his system, or realized he wasn't headed straight for the top in it, he found a way to channel his irksome big-brother-who-knows-best tendencies in a more constructive direction with his teaching career.

LOLOL. That sounds about right. I can totally see him wanting to be the cool teacher, the "arrange your desks in a circle and call me by my first name" teacher, at least in the beginning of his teaching career.

Quote

Huh. I thought we had seen their first meeting on television, when they both did Road Rules All-Stars. They definitely played it that way, but maybe it was for show. 

I can't think about that season without remembering the song they wrote and recorded. "We've got Cyn Dawg from Miami and Jon from LA / We've got Rachel comin' down from the Frisco Bay / We've got Eric from New York and Sean from Beantown / We've packed up all our things and we're ON OUR WAY NOW." I'll still be able to sing that when I'm in the home. Poor Eric kept flubbing his line at the end and having to do it over.

Well, now I've got it in my head too. 

Interesting that Sean and Rachel apparently met earlier, they played up their "meeting" on the show well. Another random line lodged in my brain forever is Sean's "she's very bubbly and spirited" in his thick Wisconsin accent.

Quote

Yes, I looked at her Instagram the other day. Nothing on it surprised me, given her origins. Suffice to say, she's definitely not one of those kids who rebel against their parents' views.

It's usually not the oldest who breaks from the pack, but with all those kids, at least one of them, if not more, is going to break hard from such a rigid point of view. And Rachel will probably react exactly like her mother did when she got her tattoos and acted "trashy" on TV, lol.

[Black Knight]

12 hours ago, racked said:

Really surprised Irene would be open to a reunion. In her many articles on The subject, she’s made it clear she has zero trust in reality tv producers. 

My guess is that's exactly why. She wants to go on a Homecoming and talk about everything and see how much of it actually makes it to air and what editing hijinks are pulled. Then she can give interviews and write articles about what was done with Homecoming. She's covered her original season pretty thoroughly at this point.

And as Tami said long ago, they can only use what you give them. Irene probably feels like she can avoid giving them anything that would be personally damaging to her. What went wrong for her on the original season is that she got sick and it's hard to be mindful of such things when feeling so crappy.

[Hiyo]

I thought Heather said that, not Tami?

[moonchild81]

50 minutes ago, Hiyo said:

I thought Heather said that, not Tami?

heather said something like that on the first reunion with the first 4 seasons

[Hiyo]

Yes, and funny enough, I remember her saying to Tami, no?

[ljenkins782]

1 hour ago, Hiyo said:

Yes, and funny enough, I remember her saying to Tami, no?

Exactly. Tami was rattling on about the editing and Heather cut her dead with "they can only use what you gave them!" And Tami had to take it, Heather was the one person Tami wasn't going toe-to-toe (or head up in this m-fer) with. 

Quote

My guess is that's exactly why. She wants to go on a Homecoming and talk about everything and see how much of it actually makes it to air and what editing hijinks are pulled. Then she can give interviews and write articles about what was done with Homecoming. She's covered her original season pretty thoroughly at this point.

And as Tami said long ago, they can only use what you give them. Irene probably feels like she can avoid giving them anything that would be personally damaging to her. What went wrong for her on the original season is that she got sick and it's hard to be mindful of such things when feeling so crappy.

I have to disagree a bit with Heather though, she's not wrong in the most technical sense of "what you gave them," but they can certainly play with timelines and use what you gave them completely out of context, which I'm sure is part of what happened with Irene. 

She gave them the moment of outing Stephen on TV and I'm sure had her crabby moments and times when she was legitimately ill, but the last few episodes with her looked like they were stitched together as a montage of her worst moments and overlaid with an "Irene is crazy" narration with soundbites from other castmates that could have been from anytime and meant in any number of ways. See also: Justin from Hawaii, who received a similar treatment when he left early.

[choclatechip45]

I watched the interview Syrus said while they were on the first challenge the cast was in LA and told Sean he had no game and set that up (his words). I like Syrus, but he's probably giving himself more credit for that relationship than he might deserve. 

[BelleBrit]

6 hours ago, choclatechip45 said:

I watched the interview Syrus said while they were on the first challenge the cast was in LA and told Sean he had no game and set that up (his words). I like Syrus, but he's probably giving himself more credit for that relationship than he might deserve. 

Ah, ok, that makes a lot more sense then, since I had sworn that there was reference to them thereafter (at a reunion?) having their first meeting captured on camera. I must have missed the part where he said that they were in LA for the Challenge and that Syrus was just egging Sean on. I agree then that Syrus is definitely giving himself more credit than deserved re: getting them together-I don't think that I've watched that first season of the Challenge since it was first on the air, but I remember that Sean did NOT seem shy with Rachel ortalking about his crush on her on the show.

[Bastet]

I don't know why anyone would want to take credit for that union.

[choclatechip45]

On 7/1/2022 at 9:50 PM, BelleBrit said:

Ah, ok, that makes a lot more sense then, since I had sworn that there was reference to them thereafter (at a reunion?) having their first meeting captured on camera. I must have missed the part where he said that they were in LA for the Challenge and that Syrus was just egging Sean on. I agree then that Syrus is definitely giving himself more credit than deserved re: getting them together-I don't think that I've watched that first season of the Challenge since it was first on the air, but I remember that Sean did NOT seem shy with Rachel ortalking about his crush on her on the show.

Yup and by the time they got to LA it was clear he was into Rachel and she was into him. Rachel wouldn't wear the hot dog suit because Sean was there. Also I'm pretty sure they ended the Challenge in LA so the party part makes sense. 

Edited July 3, 2022 by choclatechip45

[Tatum]

On 7/1/2022 at 1:30 PM, ljenkins782 said:

Exactly. Tami was rattling on about the editing and Heather cut her dead with "they can only use what you gave them!" And Tami had to take it, Heather was the one person Tami wasn't going toe-to-toe (or head up in this m-fer) with. 

I have to disagree a bit with Heather though, she's not wrong in the most technical sense of "what you gave them," but they can certainly play with timelines and use what you gave them completely out of context, which I'm sure is part of what happened with Irene.

That's exactly how I feel. Yes, they can't show you doing something you did not do, but they have thousands of hours of video tape, only roughly 10 of which is ever going to be used. If you did something twice over the course of six months of filming (whether that one thing is have a meltdown, pick your nose, mispronounce a word, hook up with someone at a bar, etc), and each instance makes it into an episode, it's going to look like you are "always" doing that to the viewers. And it is very hard to make it through 6 months of 24/7 filming without ever appearing ignorant or irrational or something negative. Editing could make anyone look like an asshole or an idiot if they really wanted to. And they have definitely done things like panning back and forth between roommates to make it look like Person 1 is looking longingly (or angrily) at Person 2, only to find out the two roommates weren't even in the same room. Things like that. Granted, I am not sure in the early days of B/M they were that interested in manufactured drama, but the option was there. 

[moonchild81]

they did dan from road rules northern trail dirty on the early challenges he did with heather, kat , mike(miami) and others

they made it seem like something was going on between him and holly but he had a girlfriend back home in minnesota and she was interested in david from real world seattle

[ljenkins782]

On 7/7/2022 at 7:27 AM, moonchild81 said:

they did dan from road rules northern trail dirty on the early challenges he did with heather, kat , mike(miami) and others

they made it seem like something was going on between him and holly but he had a girlfriend back home in minnesota and she was interested in david from real world seattle

Yeah, I remember when they both appeared on Battle of the Seasons only a later or so later, people were confused why they barely seemed to acknowledge each other and then Dan was asked at the reunion and he said the Holly relationship was a fabrication.

I hadn't heard the part about Seattle David, but that's pretty funny to me, one of my favorite end tag scenes is Holly talking to David where he's saying he thinks she and Dan are perfect for each other, Mr and Mrs America. The way he said it was classic David, it was hilarious.

[Asp Burger]

I know Dan has said that Holly's feelings for him were a complete fabrication, but I dunno. A lot of Holly's emotional testimonials to him during that Challenge were not edited. We could both hear and see her saying "Dan" in on-camera interviews. One example came at the end of the season, when she was crying and talking about how she wasn't going to see Dan anymore now that everyone was going home. And she did seem absolutely glued to his side. 

It's possible she was just really into him as a friend rather than romantically. If the producers grossly misled us, I think it was more doing Holly dirty. She was the one viewers were calling a stalker and worse. Dan was portrayed as resolute not to get involved with anyone, because he had the girlfriend back home.

Both Teck and Seattle David claimed in the Challenge 2000 section of one of the RW books that Holly really was into Dan. But Teck adds that she was just as much into David. David doesn't say a word about that. 

On 7/6/2022 at 11:22 AM, Tatum said:

Granted, I am not sure in the early days of B/M they were that interested in manufactured drama, but the option was there. 

This is one thing that I think the New York cast couldn't really relate to. Their season was almost a practice run, compared to later ones. The time the castmates were living together was shorter. There were fewer episodes. The producers and editors were still figuring their format out. So their season was more authentic and less manipulated than any later one (although it was still manipulated -- there were a few "We all decided to..." group things that I'm sure the producers fed them, like the prank on Kevin). They just didn't have the same experience that, say, the Hawaii cast had. 

I like Heather and dislike Tami, but they were both right. You have to take responsibility for how you behave on camera, knowing it's very likely to be part of the finished product, but the producers can make anyone look better or worse in the edit.  And it does shape viewers' idea of you.

If over five months, I talk about a particular topic six times, maybe that isn't an overwhelming amount of attention to one topic in the big picture of everything I say. But if every time I bring it up, it goes in the show, a viewer will reasonably conclude I'm obsessed with that topic. Especially if there's zero coverage of numerous other things I talk about.

[Bastet]

I really like Heather (and Tami), but it was a silly thing to say, especially after four seasons had already aired, because even of her own season she complained about how producers chose to focus on Eric and Julie when they edited the show together for broadcast.  So she knows very well they take what you gave them and do with it what they want.  Focusing on certain characteristics, to shape how people are portrayed, is no different than focusing on certain people to shape the overall show.  And who's more vulnerable to a particular edit than a Black woman, so it just was not a good look to interrupt and dismiss Tami's experience.

Edited July 11, 2022 by Bastet

[choclatechip45]

13 hours ago, Asp Burger said:

I know Dan has said that Holly's feelings for him were a complete fabrication, but I dunno. A lot of Holly's emotional testimonials to him during that Challenge were not edited. We could both hear and see her saying "Dan" in on-camera interviews. One example came at the end of the season, when she was crying and talking about how she wasn't going to see Dan anymore now that everyone was going home. And she did seem absolutely glued to his side. 

It's possible she was just really into him as a friend rather than romantically. If the producers grossly misled us, I think it was more doing Holly dirty. She was the one viewers were calling a stalker and worse. Dan was portrayed as resolute not to get involved with anyone, because he had the girlfriend back home.

Both Teck and Seattle David claimed in the Challenge 2000 section of one of the RW books that Holly really was into Dan. But Teck adds that she was just as much into David. David doesn't say a word about that. 

This is one thing that I think the New York cast couldn't really relate to. Their season was almost a practice run, compared to later ones. The time the castmates were living together was shorter. There were fewer episodes. The producers and editors were still figuring their format out. So their season was more authentic and less manipulated than any later one (although it was still manipulated -- there were a few "We all decided to..." group things that I'm sure the producers fed them, like the prank on Kevin). They just didn't have the same experience that, say, the Hawaii cast had. 

I like Heather and dislike Tami, but they were both right. You have to take responsibility for how you behave on camera, knowing it's very likely to be part of the finished product, but the producers can make anyone look better or worse in the edit.  And it does shape viewers' idea of you.

If over five months, I talk about a particular topic six times, maybe that isn't an overwhelming amount of attention to one topic in the big picture of everything I say. But if every time I bring it up, it goes in the show, a viewer will reasonably conclude I'm obsessed with that topic. Especially if there's zero coverage of numerous other things I talk about.

I listened to an interview with Holly that took place I think around in 2018 and she was still describing Dan as a soulmate figure in her life but not romantically. She did say Dan was freaked out by the whole thing. 

Personally I think she had feelings for him. 

[SilverLake0315]

On 6/30/2022 at 12:07 PM, BelleBrit said:

And he said that at the end of the day, unless someone can stand for basic human rights, he can't eff with them. I think that he ended it by saying that if he saw Sean hopefully it would be cordial and that they wouldn't need to have that conversation, but at the same time, he wants to have that conversation.

Honestly just fell a little in love with Syrus 👏

[moonchild81]

On 7/8/2022 at 3:23 PM, ljenkins782 said:

Yeah, I remember when they both appeared on Battle of the Seasons only a later or so later, people were confused why they barely seemed to acknowledge each other and then Dan was asked at the reunion and he said the Holly relationship was a fabrication.

I hadn't heard the part about Seattle David, but that's pretty funny to me, one of my favorite end tag scenes is Holly talking to David where he's saying he thinks she and Dan are perfect for each other, Mr and Mrs America. The way he said it was classic David, it was hilarious.

does anyone know where the youtube clip is with blair and veronica talking about all the hookups that have happened on the challenges? I can't find it , but it used to be on there . 

[Tatum]

I feel like in the early seasons of RW, up until Hawaii when there actually was a sho-mance, the editing always jumped on any mild flirtation between two roommates and exaggerated it to the point where it was misleading to the viewers.

I remember when Seattle was airing, and they leaked it that David would be involved with "someone from the show" and two of the episodes seemed to foreshadow a David/Rebecca hook up. While David/Kira definitely let them get their money's worth in drama, I felt cheated as a viewer. A largely offscreen romance between a roommate and someone working behind the scenes was not the same thing as two roommates actually entering a relationship.

And then in Boston, all the sudden, after like 10 episodes,  Kameelah and Jason are acting like a couple, and in the book Jason says he had a crush on Kameelah from Day 1. I was like, what? I distinctly remember him mocking her (in a way that probably wouldn't fly today, as it would seem both racist and misogynistic based on the way he's imitating her voice) multiple times in the first two episodes, behind her back. 

[millennium]

I'm watching Brooklyn right now and can't believe how tedious it is.   Baya, JD and Scott are seat-fillers, Chet is a total douche but there's no other alpha douche in the house to mix it up with him, Sarah is a wallflower mostly, Katelynn is infuriating because she whines about how she has no money but in all of New York City the only paying job she can find is a temporary go-go dancer for a fly-by-night DJ?    She's an IT specialist!   After the show ended, she was hired as an IT specialist for the University of Montana.   Devon is boring, except for that laughable audition she did in an early episode.   The jobs/career angle of this season reeks of scripted.   Chet just wanders into the MTV studios and gets an audition.  Baya wants to get into a dance academy so she auditions, gets cut, then goes home and gets a phone call that she's been accepted.   Devon wants to audition for a Broadway producer, immediately gets the audition.  Devon wants to work at Jovani, so she not only gets an interview but meets Mr. Jovani and is given a job on the spot.  Ryan thinks it would be cool to cut an album of his Iraq campfire ditties and in the blink of an eye gets a sit-down with a record producer (who pretty much tells him "maybe you should just play these songs for your friends").   And they have the nerve to call this show THE REAL WORLD!  It's like they were all asked to name their top dream jobs and MTV just made it all happen.   Other casts have had to work at thankless jobs, like Pizza Schmizza.   It all seems so fixed that I'm starting to suspect MTV had a hand in getting Ryan called back to Iraq, just to get one good dramatic scene before the season ended.

Edited September 6, 2022 by millennium

[Hiyo]

This show stopped being Real-ish probably after London.