It’s going on 10 seasons of The Challenge since former cast member Thomas Buell was a part of the MTV show. However, the former Real Worlder says he got contacted for several recent seasons.
Buell, appearing on a recent episode of Mike Lewis Podcast, spoke about what he’s been up to in recent years since he’s been away from reality television.
He mentioned that he’d been busy working and recently got engaged. However, he also revealed that he was ready to go back on The Challenge for a recent season and spoke a bit about an interesting concept for the show he knew about that never happened.
Thomas Buell talks about getting contacted for The Challenge
Reality TV fans first saw Thomas Buell on The Real World: Ex-Plosion, which also featured Jenna Compono, Cory Wharton, and Ashley Mitchell in the cast. All of them appeared on The Challenge with a varying amount of success and number of seasons.
Buell moved on to MTV’s competition series, with his debut coming on Battle of the Exes II, where he was teamed up with his Real World: Ex-Plosion ex, Hailey Chivers.
He appeared in two more seasons, including Battle of the Bloodlines and Rivals III, but then stopped appearing on the show.
While talking with Mike Lewis on his YouTube podcast, Buell shared that he hadn’t got many calls after Rivals III or any “feelers for All Stars” but received calls for two recent MTV seasons.
“I have had feelers out there for just the normal one. Just whichever last two seasons that they did that were normal, and it didn’t go anywhere, obviously. It is what it is,” Buell said.
The past two seasons for MTV’s show were Double Agents and Spies, Lies & Allies. Based on Buell’s comments, he received an initial text about Double Agents and told them, “not this time.”
He shared that he received another call asking if he’d be open to doing The Challenge again, presumably for Season 37. While Buell said he told them he would be open to it, he said he never got a second call for it.
Thomas teamed up with his brother Stephen Buell for The Challenge: Battle of the Bloodlines and Simone Kelly on Rivals III. His rivalry with Simone was from a previous season where he and Simone got into a brief argument, and she started throwing drinks at him.
His most infamous moment in Challenge history involved his hooking up with Cara Maria Sorbello during Rivals III, which Thomas said he swears to this day was only “making out.”
That caused issues back home with his then-girlfriend. At one point, she ended up in the hospital with seizures and other medical issues, so even though Thomas and Simone had got voted into the Episode 6 elimination, he had to quit to go home and check on his girlfriend of the time.
Buell spoke about Challenge season theme that didn’t happen
During his chat with Mike Lewis, Buell mentioned a season concept for The Challenge that the showrunners discussed but never materialized.
According to Buell, it was called The Challenge: Homewrecker and would’ve featured Challenge regulars with others who hadn’t ever been on the show before.
“They were thinking about making a Challenge season, speculatively called ‘Homewrecker,’ and they were gonna have me and my girlfriend at that time, El, on there together, and they were gonna bring like Cara and Abe, and they were gonna have different partners. They were gonna have some new people, and obviously other people that have been on it, and people that have dated and cheated on other people,” Buell explained.
He called the concept “super interesting” because it involved an “intricate web.” Buell explained that the show concept was in discussion when MTV didn’t have Real World anymore, so they were looking for ways to bring in new cast members to The Challenge.
He said his Real World: Ex-Plosion castmate Cory Wharton was also among the potential cast members. With the season’s theme, Thomas said his ex, El, would’ve been teamed up with Cara, based on Thomas cheating with her.
Unfortunately, that season never happened, but based on how Thomas described it, fans probably would’ve enjoyed all the drama and fallout from the theme.
The Challenge Season 38 is currently TBA on MTV. The Challenge: All Stars 3 premieres on May 11 on Paramount Plus.