Well, it took eight episodes, but The Challenge Battle of the Seasons finally had a good, solid challenge that was both interesting and a bit of a nail biter. I’m not talking about the food eating challenge that made up the middle of this episode, though that wasn’t too bad I guess (I was glad to see it wasn’t all gross food), but the Arena which had two heavyweight contenders playing the game that Big Easy sent Wes home on back in the first episode (now that I think about it, that was a pretty riveting challenge too).

Anyway, the episode also dealt with some of the fall out from the previous episode which saw one-time show runners San Diego falling apart thanks to Frank and Zach’s inability to be supportive of Sam and Frank’s sneaky nature bothering Zach as the former weaseled out of doing the finale leaving Zach to clean up his mess. A night out. Frank says he hasn’t talked to Zach yet since the last episode. Zach says his only goal now is to make Frank miserable. Frank says he can lead them all to victory if they would just let him.

Oh man, Jonna’s boyfriend got rid of all her stuff after she broke up with him on the phone in the first or second episode.

Boom, right into the challenge which is a weird eating contest thing. Bleh. At least you can’t really throw this mission, not that I think they’re looking to do that anymore.

TJ looks awesome in 70s talk show gear.

Hunger Games. Eating contest. Each team says how much of a certain food amount they can eat in a certain amount of time. If you do it, you chose which team goes into the losers round. If you fail, your team goes into the losers round, same if you puke.

San Diego is already fighting while they’re waiting for the first round.

Round One: Baklava in four minutes. Vegas says 30 so did Brooklyn, Cancun said 51. So it’s Cancun and they dive in. Oof, doesn’t look good for them, there’s a lot of baklava still on the plate. Ah, we don’t know how much was on the plate. Man, they really think these moments are cliffhangers, I’m not so sure…

They were off by two, ouch. Jonna says that Jasmine didn’t pull her weight.

Brooklyn bids 35. Looks like they’re murdering this. They ate 47! Winner’s round! They send San Diego to go into the loser’s round.

Round three is chili peppers. St. Thomas says they can eat 18. Damn. Marie is a maniac with these things. Robb’s struggling though. Why don’t they divvy up the peppers ahead of time so they know how many they need to eat? They ate 25! Damn. Vegas is automatically out.

Now it’s Brooklyn versus St. Thomas eating cooked cow liver. They have two minutes, whoever eats the most wins Power Couple.

This is tough on Marie and Rob because they’re only two people. OH, Marie horns and they automatically lose. Brooklyn wins!

Cancun versus San Diego for testicles and intestines. Zach is freaking out. Gross, they’re cold. Everyone’s really struggling not to throw up with a minute left. Everyone jumps into these guts, the horn blows and no one’s thrown up yet. I’m impressed.

It was a close race with San Diego losing and going into the Arena. Huh, it’ll be interesting to see who Brooklyn sends into the Arena.

San Diego has a meeting. Frank says if they don’t trust him, throw him into the Arena. Haha, Frank tells his teammates he hates them all and didn’t do anything wrong. Hahaha.

Now Frank’s freaking out in a room throwing things around and saying “I’m not going to be made to look like a crazy person.” BWAHAHAHA.

At the throwing in ceremony Brooklyn Devyn is wig-less and rocking an afro thanks to a bet she had about winning twice. She also gets up and says they decided to throw Cancun in because they’ve never gone in before. Seems fair.

The game is Physical.

CJ’s having a talk. He says he wants to go in and wants to go in with Jonna because he thinks she’s the strongest. Jonna sys that she thinks she deserves to stay there, but doesn’t want to do anything for it.

Jasmine’s talking to Zach now. He feels bad because she’s been struggling so much this season and he says he’s been handed everything.

Jasmine says she doesn’t want to leave partially because of Zach, but also because she wants to compete in the game. But, isn’t going into The Arena competing in the game?

San Diego’s sending Sam in because they don’t think Ashley could get mean enough for the physical challenge (that gauntlet hallway thingy that Easy beat Wes at in the first episode). Jasmine steps in for Cancun, she’s doing this for Jonna. I got give her that one.

Zach and CJ are going in.

Hall Brawl. Get past each other in the hall, ring the bell on the other side.

Man, Zach’s obviously big, but I bet CJ’s pretty fast. Between Jasmine and Sam, it’s a toss up.

Oh man, everyone else is talking trash about Jonna not going in and being trashy and sneaky.

Sam vs Jasmine Round One. Sam plows into Jasmine first and gets to the bell first. Point San Diego.

Roung Two: pretty much the exact same thing, Sam wins it. Jasmine got the air knocked out of her.

Zach vs CJ Round One: Man, they smash into each other in the middle. CJ goes low, Zach goes high and they’re stuck in the center. CJ gets Zach’s legs out from under him and gets the first point!

This is surprisingly intense. San Diego’s going to be weak as hell and a huge target  on their backs.

Round Two: Much less of a battle this time, CJ blows past Zach and hits the bell first. See ya Zach and Sam. Now it’s a coin toss between who decides this. It lands on guys again.

There’s still 10 minutes left?!

Final Round Part 1. CJ goes low and actually flips Zach over so Zach grabs onto CJ’s legs. CJ practically drags Zach out of the hall and hits the bell first.

Final Round Part 2: CJ goes low again, Zach hurdles over him and hits the bell first. TIE!

Final Round Part 3: We see them smash together in the middle once again and then cut to a commercial. Back at it. They hit and Zach forces CJ all the way out of the hall and into the bell practically. Man, that was pretty good.

Man, I would keep Cancun around just to stomp their asses later or in the finale. On the other hand, everyone else seems to think Jonna is super shady, so she’ll probably get bounced as soon as possible.

These San Diego kids are an emotional roller coaster. They love each other, they hate each other, they completely forget all the terrible shit they say to each other.