On episode 9 of Vets & New Threats, we saw Broken Dreams. TJ told the cast this was the mini final, and it was supposed to be an impactful one. It was an individual game that would have allowed competitors one last chance to boost their scores before picking their partners, and this was a big opportunity for some people.
Most of the competitors were eager to do well, but some people were too eager. Most notably, at the eating portion (checkpoint 2), many people just threw full vegetables into the bushes and moved onto the next checkpoint.
Approximately half the cast struggled to eat their veggies. Michaela then noticed the garden in the bushes, and she realized many people were dashing but not dining. By that point, there wasn’t a whole lot to be done about this.
As a viewer, we don’t know everyone who cheated. We saw the clip of Dee tossing an onion and we have a confessional from Sydney where she said she ate like 95% of her plate. We also saw Jonna quit, but she knowingly threw her vegetables and accepted the penalty. Further, Will addressed the cheating at the dinner table. From the responses to his comments, we can surmise people like Theo and Nany threw some vegetables.
Based on TJ’s commentary after the challenge, we know there’s evidence of cheating. So, why couldn’t a punishment only be applied to the people who cheated?
Likely, there’s some missing footage, and production can’t identify every cheater. This is hidden in plain sight, but there are judges on these competitions — this is why we see people turn to the cameras, open their mouths, and ask for a check. Clearly, the judges didn’t do a good job catching the cheaters.
Depending on who you ask, there was more cheating in this challenge. Will, who seemed to take issue with the vegetable flingers, received his share of help during broken dreams. At checkpoint 1, we can see Justin giving him the code to his box. Then, CT told him the scrambled word on checkpoint 5.
The overall winner of the challenge, Turbo, was also told the checkpoint 5 mystery word by Sydney. Granted, his English isn’t great, so some people may see this as excusable, but his victory wasn’t truly individual in a challenge that was said to be individual.
Theo went online and talked about the mini final, and he stated that CT should have been the true winner because he ate all of his vegetables. Assuming this is true, CT still isn’t super innocent. He fed the checkpoint 5 answer to Will, which artificially widens the gap between him and other competitors. This would have allowed him to get a greater point boost in the scoring system.
Of course, it would have been great to see rule violators get penalized, but this would have been very messy due to the number of cheaters and helpers.
Needless to say, this was a very disappointing showing for The Challenge. It made the competitors look weak, and it made the judging look even worse. This is probably the biggest let down we’ve ever seen on the show — or at least the biggest disappointment we’ve seen since the Gauntlet 2 final.
Stop Being Polite 