Inferno 2: Preview

Lala wraps the show up, thanking the guests for coming over, and telling us that Return to the Inferno starts up on March 7. In fact, once I got online and looked on MTV.com, the new page was already up. All I know is that I’ll have my work cut out for me. The girls might not have had Ayanna’s back, but I got yours. I’ll be focusing on other stuff in the next few weeks, including hoping that Kris & Jon plow through the competition on The Amazing Race. If you’re coming to TARCon this Tuesday, you might run into me. But I’ll be ready by the end of the month, because these people are not going to snark on themselves.

That was the last thing I ever wrote for a leading recapping web site. Nobody got to read that, since the editor cut it up and subsequently fired me for reasons I do not wish to rehash here. The rules might have changed, but the game remains the same. There’s a new Real World/Road Rules Challenge on the horizon, and I’m still recapping it. Once again: I got your backs.

The Premise

It’s the usual deal: former cast members from The Real World and Road Rules compete for big bucks. This year brings us thirteen RW alumni to RR’s seven, the first time the sides have been uneven. For the second straight season, we stray from the "RW vs. RR" format. This time, the teams have been divided into "good" and "bad," with the classifications allegedly determined by an MTV.com poll. Yeah, I don’t believe it, either...and once you see the teams, neither will you.

Teams compete in sixteen missions. The first fifteen are worth $10,000 to the winning team, and the sixteenth yields $150,000. The catch? Only those players still in the game for the final mission get the money. After the first mission, both teams pick somebody on the opposite team to go into the Inferno. In the next mission, the best player wins the Life Shield. Should either Inferno-bound player win the Life Shield, that person gets to pick somebody from their team to take their place. There is no word from MTV.com about alternative gender during the vote.

The Inferno

The Inferno premise is simple: two players go in, one player comes out. In the first Inferno, players had to:

• Stick their heads in "bug helmets" (boxes full of roaches and crickets)
  
• Eat hot peppers for one hour.
  
• Hold candles out and try not to lower arms.
  
• Stand on boxes and listen to loud sounds for two hours (tiebreaker: listen to loud sounds while balancing on one leg atop a small block)
  
• Eat cookies, drink whole milk, spin on a contraption, and try not to throw up.
  
• Get coated in itching powder and walk on a treadmill for three hours (tiebreaker: jump rope without screwing up)
  
• Carry bricks across a beam for three and a half hours wins.
  
• Lay in a tub, get coated in gross stuff for four hours (tiebreaker: hold breath underneath gross stuff)

Needless to say, I was not a fan of the format. Out of those eight Infernos, there were only two truly heroic moments: CT taking David’s place and humiliating Shane, and Katie holding her breath longer than David. Maybe BMP got the notion that this isn’t Fear Factor, and made things a lot less messy. I doubt it, though.

The Teams

As mentioned, the teams are made up of "Bad Asses" and "Good Guys," and the lineups determined by fan vote. I’ll go over the teams in more detail later on.

Bad Asses: Abram Boise & Tina Barta (Road Rules: South Pacific), Beth Stolarczyk (Real World: Los Angeles), Chris "CT" Tamburello (RW: Paris), Dan Renzi (RW: Miami), Derrick Kosinski (RR: X-Treme), Karamo Brown (RW: Philladelphia), Rachel Robinson (RR: Campus Crawl), Tonya Cooley (RW: Chicago), and Veronica Portillo (RR: Semester at Sea)

Good Guys: Brad Fiorenza, Jamie Chung & Robin Hibbard (RW: San Diego), Darrell Tayler (RR: Campus Crawl), Jodi Weatherton (RR: X-Treme), Jon Brennan (RW: Los Angeles), Julie Stoffer (RW: New Orleans), Landon Lueck & Shavonda Billingslea (RW: Philladelphia), and Mike Mizanin (RW: Back to New York)

The Host

I have good news and bad news. The good news? We’re rid of Jonny Moseley and his tired ways. The bad news? Dave Mirra returns for his second Inferno season. After watching Dave perform in Acapulco, I was dying to see Jonny again. Dave might be able to ride a BMX bike on water and do tricks we could barely imagine, but the guy has zero personality. A plank of wood can entertain better than Dave. Hey, BMP! Ever think of going with an ex-cast member? Or did Mark Long and Eric Nies cohosting Battle of the Seasons forever ruin that idea for you?

The Inferno 2 kicks off on Monday, March 7, at 10 p.m. A preview show is expected to air a week earlier, on February 28.