Montezuma's Revenge: Inside the Inferno

I know that this recap was long overdue for reposting. I just get into periods where I lose interest in putting up my older seasons. Aside from trying to find ongoing work and watching Vendettas, I haven't been doing much. Once again, I miss the straight-forward nature of The Challenge back when I was recapping it. One bright side is that Devin (assisted by Tony) successfully bounced Johnny from the game. Of course, Mr. Bananas did not take that well at all. It would have been better if Devin wasn't such a tool himself. The next batch of recaps will pose an interesting question: as bad as the current edition plays out, is it anywhere near as bad as Battle Of The Sexes 2? I cannot wait to reopen those wounds!

Airdate: May 31, 2004

Recap Published: June 4, 2004

The surviving cast members of Real World/Road Rules Challenge: The Inferno spill their guts. Who got freaky? What did Julie do to Coral's bed? And because nobody demanded it: a Road Rules preview.

 

Before I finish out this train wreck of a season, I want to congratulate Kelley Limp. The one-time Real World and Battle of the Seasons cast member married actor Scott Wolf this past weekend. While I paid more attention to the likes of Melissa and David during her season, I grew to like Kelley. On her sole Challenge, she and best friend Danny kicked ass, making it to the final round and winning the grand prize. I just hope that if she has kids, they'll have better bladder control than Julie. I'll get to that in a minute.

Opening credits: Katie screams at Veronica. Shane pukes himself off the show. Jeremy sticks his head in the Bug Helmet. Julie tugs on Veronica's harness. Rotten eggs get dumped on David. The title: Montezuma's Revenge: Inside the Inferno. Does that mean I'll lock myself in the bathroom before the first commercial?

We're at MTV headquarters on Broadway, with an actual audience. I tried to make it, but I didn't get an invite. Then again, with all the bad stuff I've written in the past three months, maybe it's for the best. Out host is the VJ known as Lala. Make your own Teletubbies joke. Our guests are the twelve remaining players: Mike, Coral, Syrus, CT, and everybody from the Road Rules team except for Shane and Jeremy. Lala thinks that RR winning again is ridiculous. Boy, there's an insight. Everybody talks at once. Lala asks why RR is so unstoppable. "Every time I see Mike," Darrell says, "I rise to the occasion a little bit to whup his ass once again." I'm sorry... how many "win or go home" games did you play, Darrell? He adds that the RR folks are used to traveling and competing, while RW people argue with each other. Christena feels like RR are the underdogs, and they have to overcompensate. Timmy picks up a basket and starts a collection for RW. I like you Timmy, but please... go to bed. Seriously, go to bed already. Mike insists that RR got lucky twice in a row. He adds, "Even a blind squirrel finds an acorn once in a while!" Syrus thinks that RW chills in a mansion, while RR is used to sleeping in a Winnebago.

Lala decides to move onto the sexy stuff. Clips time! Mike play-wrestles with Kendal. She interviews that she can't think about him without blushing. Now Mike's on the phone, discovering that Trishelle is spreading rumors about the new couple. Cut to earlier in the season, where Trishelle tells Mike that she doesn't enjoy watching him kiss other people. Slow-motion shot of Mike and Kendal kissing. Mike: "I can't help it if a girl likes me and I like her."

Back at the studio, Lala asks for an update. Timmy asks what they'll do with the baby. Pipe down, Timmy. Kendal tells us that she and Mike are better off as friends. That wouldn't happen to do with Mike's drunken tirade during Kendal's Inferno, would it? Lala asks about Trishelle ratting Mike out to his friend. Mike informs us that when Trishelle got home from the Inferno, she started rumors about Mike and Kendal doing stuff they weren't doing at the time. The audience laughs as Mike continues: a friend of his who Kendal was barely seeing got pissed off hearing the story. I'm guessing this was before Trishelle got host-slapped by Sally Jesse Raphael. [2018: Link to the final of The Surreal Life 2. Also, once again, I would not wish Sally Jesse on a lot of assholes, and Trishelle was one of them]

Lala brings up Mike dancing with Christena at the club. "Mike was trying to dip into the chocolate," Christena beams. Oh, whatever. Lala tells Mike it wouldn't be a bad idea. It would be with Christena in my opinion. Seriously, I hate her so much now. Christena says that Trishelle threatened to punch her. Mike adds that Trishelle was crying in the bathroom about how much she loved him. I'm guessing that true love involves kissing five guys in front of your ex. Katie lunges, covering Mike's mouth, saying that she doesn't wanted anybody talking about Trishelle since she's not here to defend herself. Katie, I've grown to like you over the past few months. Do yourself a favor: move away from Trishelle. If I had to be in the same apartment as Trishelle and her hook-up du jour (currently the odious Adam Larson, last I checked), I'd be as irritable as Katie. I'm sure there's another BMP alumnus who needs to split the rent with somebody.

Lala moves on to the Coral/Trishelle rivalry. Cut to the club, where Coral doesn't want Trishelle to touch her. Trishelle threatens to beat Coral's ass. Coral interviews that Trishelle causes her own drama. Coral asks Trishelle what she should have done, and Trishelle thinks Coral should have kept her mouth shut. Good luck with that. Trishelle: "I'm not going to let her walk all over me and intimidate the [bleep] after me." Suddenly, we segue to Coral vs. Julie, which is the Challenge equivalent to "Shoe vs. Ant." Julie tells Syrus that she's not willing to let Coral run things. Coral: "Do I not want to see Julie's big ugly face everyday? No, I'd rather not." Julie tells Coral to keep her mouth shut, which angers Coral. Julie calls out Coral to wrestle her. You can guess what happens next. "I don't wrestle!" Coral blurts out. "I [bleepin'] beat bitches up!"

Lala points out that drama always goes on around Coral. She replies that she only hates four people, listing Trishelle, Julie, and Slappy Stephen from RW: Seattle. Syrus asks who the fourth person is. Coral replies that she reserves the right to put somebody in there. Basically, it's an irritant to be named later. I reckon she's a lady after my cold heart. Lala asks everybody why it's hard to get along with Julie. Coral says that she hates Julie's ass. "I don't have to like everybody," Coral adds, "and everybody doesn't have to like me."

Lala introduces a new clip, much to Coral and Katie's excitement. Leah tells Coral that Julie was huffing about doing something really bad. David: "She definitely peed on your bed." Several shots of the gang trying to figure out Julie's technique. Cut to Julie telling us she pissed on Coral's bed. Coral tells Timmy, and they both laugh. Timmy: "See what happens when you don't wrestle people?" This is a clip that has to be shown to Frankie. Girl, this is what you're life is gonna be if you don't shape up.

Back in the studio, Lala asks if the cast dislikes Julie. Most of them disagree, and Coral insists it's just her. Veronica pipes up, saying that Julie almost killed her. Syrus comes in to defend Julie, saying she did a lot of growing up on TV. But he draws the line at the pissing.

Lala goes to commercial, teasing us with never-before-seen footage of Inferno and the new Road Rules season. I feel like the luckiest boy in the land. Not. We get a clip of two girls puking, and one guy throwing a fit about a mission.

Back from commercials, Lala says that RR won the cash, but there was some "serious sneakiness" going down. We start with a "Katie sucks" montage: she gets disqualified from Grope the Rope, gags on bird feed and worms during Birdfeeder, balks at doing Climbing Wall, and freaks out during Bungee Bound. Veronica interviews that Katie is holding the team back. Once again: they ended up winning all by four missions, so I'm not being the least bit sympathetic. Cut to Balcony Swing, where RR sought to give Veronica the Aztec Lifesaver in order to shove Katie into the Inferno. Abram carries on as he rappels down, humiliating Katie. She wins the Inferno, but Veronica sends her in again.

The audience bursts into applause. In my world, intense booing would have shoved Veronica out of the building entirely. Lala asks Katie about RR's backstabbing ways. She claims to have been wise to their plans, thanks to Mike, Syrus and CT. Abram doesn't buy it, but Mike confirms it. Katie says that she pretended not to know about the machinations. Lala asks Abram if he felt bad about lying to her. Abram claims to have been pushed into throwing the missions, and he says this with a straight face. I add "pathological liar" to his ever-expanding profile. CT wonders why they wanted to dump Katie if they kept winning missions. Thank you! Abram insists he didn't want to "fight the world" on this Challenge. Did he "fight the world" before or after the threesome with Veronica and Rachel during The Gauntlet? "I thought that people were too stupid to know what the [bleep] was going on," Abram continues. "I went and threw the [bleeping] missions, and it pissed me the hell off!" The audience breaks into applause, and I honestly hope they got paid for doing that. How can anybody watch this show and think Abram was being honest? He tells Katie that he didn't want to be secretive about it. Wait, wasn't he the one wearing Mike's Miz gear, lying to her face about not throwing Balcony Swing? Christena: "So you laughed in her face." Shut up, Christe-... wait, she's right. Abram yells that he was pissed at throwing the mission. Christena says that he made jokes about it, and insists Katie didn't care about it.

Lala asks Katie if she's over it. Katie answers that she thought she was over it. Lala asks Veronica what's up between her and Katie. Veronica: "Between who?" Coral: "You and the Lord." Lala asks again. Veronica: "There is no deal." Segue to clips. Veronica: "As long as I'm here, I don't want her on my team." Katie: "Screw a few more cast members, slut!" I really need that on a t-shirt. Of course, we get Katie's raging against Veronica one more time.

The audience cheers again, and I cannot blame them this time. Veronica notes that things aren't cool between her and Katie. Katie doesn't want to discuss it. Lala snipes that she has to do a show, telling them not to front like they like each other. Whatever, Lala. The feuding ladies insist they're being honest. Lala wants to know if Veronica was the mastermind behind the dumped missions. "If you want to make it so it was me that wanted to," Veronica replies, "then go ahead. But I don't think so."

Lala turns to Kendal about how she botched a thrown mission. Kendal says that nobody let her in on the plan. Lala then asks Timmy why he was afraid of going into the Inferno. Since he's a veteran reality star, Timmy dodges the question gracefully, saying that he volunteered for the first Inferno. "I would've been afraid to go up again David, for sure," he continues, talking about his would-be opponent. "David brought his C-game. I know he's got an A-game in here."

Lala turns on RW, bringing up their mission drama. Cut to clips of CT wanting to throw Leah into the Inferno. No word on how afraid Timmy would have been to have faced her. CT snipes at Leah to step up in the Inferno. To her credit, she doesn't lodge a brick in CT's ear.

Lala asks CT if he feels bad about how upset she got. He claims to have gotten mad at her insisting she deserved to be there as much as the others. "If she deserved to be there," he adds, "then I deserve a larger car." In my opinion, a doctor's note trumps everything. Leah would have taken part in the two missions she missed, so CT can shut up. Lala mentions that CT's actions got Darrell in trouble with Leah, and she asks what's going on between them. Darrell says that she's still friends with Leah. "Like they say," he continues, "what happens in Acapulco stays in Acapulco." Christena: "Unless you're being filmed." Timmy: "Unless you need a prescription to get rid of it!" Katie thinks that cast members will realize hook-ups on shows won't work. Once again: since she's near Trishelle, she would know about that.

Lala teases us with the promise of new clips, and new RR footage. Right now, we got a dune buggy flipping over. Joy.

Back from commercials, Lala tells us that with seasons of Real World, unseen footage would make it on tape. But here, this is the only place to see unaired Inferno material. Am I the only one who thinks they could be a market for Challenge DVDs? Challenge 2000 would move quickly, with Heather sitting on Teck and chastising him, the Los/Piggy fights, Amaya clotheslining Veronica in a flag football game, David running after a cow as he tries to kiss it, and Amaya running from a midget wrestler. Good times. Better that the times we get nowadays.

David tells us that CT spoons Julie and calls her, "my lil Stormin' Mormon." CT tells David that he shaved in a certain place, and he's getting a rash. Abram and Mike wrestle. Coral lies in bed, asking if we want to see her boobs. I got enough of them under tops, thank you very much. In the pool, the girls get on top of the guys' shoulders, and Coral's boobs come out. Syrus flicks food at Coral, trying to get it between her boobs. On the boat, Darrell wears the wig and teeth, telling us he's Adam from RW: Paris. That's mean. Funny, but mean. Darrell jumps on top of Leah, and she's grossed out by the teeth. Julie squirts a drink at Jeremy. I'm happy it's just a drink. At the club, David enjoys Veronica grinding on his leg. Between this and CT spooning Julie, I'm guessing playoff stress does weird things to Red Sox fans. At the Kendal/Leah Inferno, Abram calls somebody a whore, flipping the bird. Holly tells him to shut up. He continues to act like an ass. Abram: "[Bleep] you, [bleep] you!" Coral: "We saw already, Abram!” [2018: Road Rules: South Pacific episode dealing with aftermath of Abram beating up Donell]

Katie tells us the rumor about the house being haunted. She tells members of Yellowcard about it, but CT denies it. Timmy pours beer into his sneaker. He drinks from it, staggers around, and falls into a kiddie pool. During Birdfeeder, David complains that he has to go to the bathroom again. Coral tells him to go in the chicken suit. CT brags about seeing Coral’s nipples.

The crowd applauds, since everybody loves Coral’s breasts. Lala asks her if that’s her favorite body part. She they moves to Veronica, asks her about the deal with David. She insists that the clip was all that happened between them. Moving on to the ghost story, several of the players inists the phantom was real. Holly tells the story: she met a girl who grew up in Mexico City, and who spent summers in Acapulco. Apparently, two women were murdered in the house. Christena says she saw the ghost, but nobody believed her.

Lala asks Abram about his rant. He breaks out into the most incoherent rambling this side of Jerri Manthey. “It’s a show that’s meant to bring out the worst in people and, at the same time, the best. It was hard for me to deal with watching such deviousness, such hatred, such lies, everything. Just the entire situation was really hard to deal with, because everything was based to selfishness, greed and trying to [bleep] each other over. It was really hard to live for an entire month with everyone that I live with. Even Timmy, a good guy, I couldn’t trust him, because it would be stupid to trust people on the show.” If this came from Katie, I would understand. But right now? Shut up, Abram. Christena thinks that the game makes players blame themselves. Coral: “The game can’t make you anymore of a liar than you were before you got there.” Bless you, Sister Coral.

Now it’s time for Lala to pimp Road Rules: X-Treme. We start with a guy driving the RV. Players rappel under a waterfall. We meet Patrick, who hails from Park Ridge, IL. Cut to a clip of him puking. “I’m a lustful person,” he interviews. “Whenever I see girls, I see their ass.” The sad thing is that he probably has lots of girlfriends. Next is Ibis, who is from Florida. Cut to her going in a tandem bungee. She interviews about being emotional, but she tires to keep it to herself. Cut to her sobbing a little.

One of the boys has the other in a wrestling hold. Now we meet Derrick, 20, from Chicago. “If someone challenge me,” he interviews, “I’m gonna give it my all.” He argues with one of the females. “I say thing people are afraid to say.” I bet he’s a charmer. One of the girls: “Uneducated, ignorant, [bleeping] [a-hole]!” This is Kina, 18, from South Jersey. She quits during a flying mission. She interviews that she likes new experiences.

Now we meet Jodi, 22, from Richmond, VA. She has a “J” on her top, so I’m guessing she’s supposed to be Laverne 2K4. She talks about getting into a threesome. Back at the studio, you just know Veronica is writing a letter to the producers, begging them to let Jodi on the next Challenge. We see footage of a guy yelling at somebody off-camera while carrying a girl on his shoulders. I’m guessing this is Danny from Hillside, NJ. Cut to him gagging on something. Danny is the gay guy from this season, as he complains about somebody telling him “thanks” after he expressed affection. “If I say ‘I love you,’” he adds, “I expect to hear it back.” I’m sorry, but I’ve already seen one gay Danny, and this kid will not measure up.

Footage! Running from an explosion. Holding onto a pole over a river. The camera zooms out to show what appears to be a volcano. Players bungee over mountains. Attack dog training. Jumping into inner tubes. We go back to the driving footage, when a tree falls on the hood of the car. That’s not a good sign. “Road Rules: X-Treme: So bad, even the trees want to hurt them.”

The studio audience applauds, and I question their intelligence. Lala asks the players what they think of their potential teammates. Of course, everybody talks at once, and they seem happy. After the train wreck known as South Pacific, anything would be an improvement. Abram thinks they’ll do awesome. Coral is hoping for another Battle of the Sexes, since being on the RW team isn’t working for her. Syrus: “Where the brothers at on Road Rules?” Thank you! Darrell adds that all the black Challengers made it to the end of Inferno. “We like a horror clip,” he adds, “we be the first ones to go!”

Lala asks the cast for final thoughts. “Just because you guys won twice in a row,” Mike sputters, “doesn’t mean you guys are better!” Kendal covers his mouth, and Lala wraps it up. Once again: thanks for reading my recaps, and I hope to entertain you in the near future. Be cool, be safe, and stay the hell away from Veronica.

 Nice stuff here and there . . . like how the black Challengers all made it to the end. Cut to Free Agents, where Devyn Simone whispered about all the black people disappearing. Also, I more or les pegged Derrick to be the Abram for 2004. For the most part, I was wrong. In retrospect, I have to cringe about Coral being game for a battle of the sexes, given how the next season panned out for her.

That's that for The Inferno. Four months after the Reunion, I would recap Battle Of The Sexes 2 for Reality News Online. That was my final assignment for that website due to differences of opinion, which I will go over soon. Unless I obtain a job and/or life. Seriously, that was one of the worst seasons in the history of the series, and that is saying something. Why rush through the pain?