“You just ripped my shirt in front of the f—ing cameras!” – Mandi
While it’s been over two years since Tanya Cooley has participated in a Real World/Road Rules Challenge, her presence was felt on last night’s shocking (too strong?) episode, “What’s Love Got To Do With It?” Last fall Tanya, whom we first met on Real World: Chicago in 2002, filed a lawsuit against MTV and the producers of The Challenge. According to an E! story from October, Tanya, an eight-time veteran of The Challenge series, accused producers of fostering an environment in which “male contestants… were encouraged to mistreat the females.” Specifically, she claimed that fellow cast members Kenny and Evan sexually assaulted her with a toothbrush.
I don’t know the specifics of MTV’s production schedule, but it’s likely that Battle of The Exes is the first Challenge to be filmed after the Tanya lawsuit. Given the negative publicity that the toothbrush story garnered for MTV and Bunim/Murray (the production company that created The Challenge), it’s no shock that producers were on high alert and ready to react to any instance of sexual impropriety among the cast.
This sensitivity to overly aggressive or unwanted sexual touching made last night’s turn of events both less and more surprising. What I mean is this: it’s no surprise that producers kicked Vinny off the show for ripping Mandi’s top off and exposing her breast. What is surprising is Vinny’s level of stupidity. Unfortunately, Vinny’s actions affected not only himself and Mandi, but also Vinny’s partner Sarah. While I knew the instant Vinny’s hand touched Mandi’s shirt, he was going home, it wasn’t clear until the following day what the fate of his partner would be. Airing on the side of caution, as well as probably trying to send a message to the cast, the producers decided that Sarah would have to leave the show as well.
The incident with Vinny and Mandi was –aside from being disturbing — actually quite interesting. During the incident and its aftermath, cast members broke the all-important fourth wall, and since the event was so major, producers were forced to leave in scenes that otherwise would have probably wound up on the cutting room floor. First, immediately after Vinny exposed Mandi on the dance floor of a nightclub Mandi screamed, “You just ripped my shirt in front of the f—ing cameras!” Producers bleeped two words in that particular sentence: “f—ing” and “cameras.” Then the next day as cast members were discussing the incident and speculating on the fallout, Mark said something to the effect of, “He’s got to go home. Everyone knows you can’t do stuff like that on the show these days.” I’m paraphrasing here, but I got the distinct impression that the cast was already aware of the producers’ lowered tolerance for unwanted sexual touching prior to Vinny’s actions.
Lost in all of this stupidity and childishness is the fact that even without the Vinny incident, “What’s Love Got To Do With It?” was an extremely strong episode of The Challenge. “The Hook Up Challenge” was, well, challenging for the contestants and created a level of drama rarely seen outside of elimination rounds. Ironically, Sarah and Vinny won the “Hook Up Challenge” and were in a prime position when he decided to screw things up for both of them. Leroy and Naomi (my favorite contestants and my dark-horse pick to win it all) did poorly in the initial round, landing themselves a spot in The Dome. Before being sent home, Sarah and Vinny had time to vote Wes and Mandi into the elimination round.
The Dome challenge, called “X-Bar”, was an absolute classic. Elimination rounds are the best when they are at their simplest, and “X-Bar” was nothing if not simple. Both contestants grip a piece of steel fashioned into the shape of an “X” and attempt to rip it out of the other person’s hands. Honestly, I was worried for Leroy. In past challenges, Wes has shown an extraordinary amount of strength and athleticism in these kind of events. Wes brought his A-game, but Leroy was simply too big and too powerful to be defeated.
This review originally appeared on TV Geek Army.