The Challenge: Ride or Dies premiere recently aired, with all sorts of early drama and alliances forming. As expected, host TJ Lavin also introduced several twists and turns for the competitors along the way.
In The Challenge, the biggest surprises and twists often arrive before or after eliminations. That was the case in the premiere episode as TJ surprised cast members and viewers with several.
There was the surprising departure of one team before the first daily challenge, which brought two new teams into the game.
Another surprise was the reveal of Johnny Bananas, and Nany Gonzalez, who fans already knew would be on the season as a pair. They showed up after the elimination event was over.
However, a few big twists regarding the season’s format arrived at The Zone, the venue where eliminations will take place after each daily challenge. One twist featured several rookies having to make an early game decision on the spot.
This report will contain some of The Challenge 38 spoilers from the first episode of the season, including how eliminations work and who was involved.
Rookie told lie before Season 38 elimination events
In The Challenge: Ride or Dies, Episode 1, viewers met the various teams, including newcomers Colleen Schneider and Kim Tranka. Colleen started her rookie season off with a lie to castmate Fessy Shafaat. While Fessy chatted her up in the hot tub, she said she’d been on a Love Island Germany show.
In reality, Colleen’s TV show was The Mole, where one cast member was lying and manipulating the whole season. Colleen felt it would be best to keep that from castmates, but it was public information already, and her fellow rookie Jakk Maddox did some research before going into The Challenge Season 38.
That came into play later because the daily challenge winners, Johnny Middlebrooks and Ravyn Rochelle, got to pick four teams to interrogate before choosing one later to go into elimination. Those teams were Colleen and Kim, Tori Deal and Devin Walker, Kailah Casillas and Sam Bird, and Jakk with Laurel Stucky.
During interrogations, Kim and Colleen told Johnny and Ravyn they were interested in teaming up with other rookies as part of an alliance.
When Laurel and Jakk got interrogated, Jakk spilled the tea to Johnny and Ravyn about Colleen lying about her reality TV show. Jakk suggested that might not be a team they want to trust going forward.
TJ introduced The Draw twist for eliminations
Later on, the cast assembled at The Zone for the elimination event. TJ brought out all four of the teams that Johnny and Ravyn interrogated. He asked them to select one team to go into elimination, and they chose Kailah with her husband, Sam, to make a big move early.
They’d need opponents, though. For that, TJ introduced The Draw. There was a large rock inside the elimination venue with three daggers, but only their black handles were visible.
Each team drew a dagger from the rock. Tori and Devin drew a clean blade, as did Laurel and Jakk. However, Colleen and Kim pulled a dagger labeled “Safe.”
TJ revealed the twist that they were safe from elimination. In addition, they could choose one of the other two teams to save from elimination. Due to Jakk being a rookie, they saved Jakk and Laurel, which put Devin and Tori into elimination.
Ultimately that helped send home another seasoned vet, Kailah, as Devin and Tori came through with the elimination win.
Colleen comments after seeing premiere episode
With each episode of The Challenge Season 38, cast members see other events and conversations unfold on screen that they may not have known about. That may have included Colleen seeing Jakk expose her lying about her show to Johnny and Ravyn.
Colleen took to her Instagram Story to ask her fans and followers how they liked the premiere. She replied to @thechallenge_news, based on the screenshot below, on whether or not she might change her decision at The Draw after seeing what Jakk did.
“No I would definitely do the same, because they are both vets and so there was a chance to get closer with Laurel and Jakk,” Colleen shared.
It’s always possible things were smoothed out later after Colleen’s secret got exposed or that this was the first time she’d heard about it. That said, she seems to be OK with it.
The rookie move made sense for Colleen as she attempted to build early alliances and gain castmates’ trust. Viewers also saw Laurel telling castmate Ravyn, another rookie, that she doesn’t arrive at The Challenge with any pre-made alliances.
In addition to gaining early allies, Colleen may have ensured that she and Kim get saved if Laurel and Jakk had the save option at a future elimination event.
The Challenge: Ride or Dies airs Wednesdays at 8/7c on MTV.