Having a team Challenge for the first time in ages is bound to introduce some changes. But, there is one element to the War of the Worlds 2 format that doesn’t seem to make sense: the Tribunal.
Similar to the Tribunal on the first War of the Worlds or the Troika on Vendettas, the Tribunal has the power of picking a competitor for elimination. Unlike those two seasons, the Tribunal isn’t an earned position. In what may be the dumbest formatting decisions of the season, the “speaker” gets to pick the Tribunal members and guarantee them security. Episode 1 we see Jordan speak up as speaker, episode 2 was see Kam assume the role. After that, we see most debate of who receives the title.
From a drama standpoint, I can see the appeal of the Tribunal. Look episode 3. A small minority on the team wanted to send Wes into the Proving Ground. Well, all Laurel had to do was convince one person and Wes was in the Proving Ground. That’s it. A similar move was played by Paulie and Cara Maria on episode 5. A minority can shake the house thanks to the Tribunal.
The hard part: there’s no merit to the position. The loudest voice and assume the role (*cough*Kam*cough*), and this makes the role having minimal incentive. We’re now at the point in the season where people are throwing challenge. The Tribunal does not help deter this. Perhaps if the strongest competitor earns the role of speaker fewer people would be throwing challenges. Instead, there’s no real reason to perform well and losing can be more beneficial for competitors.
The Tribunal seems like an oversight. A fairly useless element of the game designed for drama and to loosely tie War of the Worlds 1 to the current season. Of course, it has brought some drama. So it has been successful, but it doesn’t give people a reason to compete. This is the biggest flaw with this season. People need to want to win daily Challenges. Otherwise we have a 90 minute episode where the elimination is the only competition that matters.
Stop Being Polite 