Josh is now 2 for 2 in non-elimination late night fights that get cast members kicked off.
In Episode 13, the Emerald Cell wins again (10 points each + 5 agency points). This Emerald Team is tight on and off the field. Tori and Emmanuel hook up (20 points each for coitus, 10 points each for making out).
Josh is friendly with fellow Spanish-speaker Logan. Even though Logan is a rookie who would understand, Josh’s friendship with Logan inspires him to burn any bridge with Cory and vote Cory into the elimination. Angry Cory chooses Logan to compete against, but Logan’s surfer balance helps him win the elimination (25 points).
In Episode 14, the Emerald Team winning streak ends, as the Sapphire Team takes the W (10 points each + 5 points for Agency). An emotional Amanda wants to be chosen for the elimination so she can choose her competitor. Even though the climbing elimination is something that is a somewhat equalizer, she chooses the house consensus “easiest” girl to beat: Big T. Amanda wins the elimination (25 points).
Per Amanda’s vocal plan, she infultrates the Emerald Team, booting Tori to the Ruby squad. It is extremely appropriate for Amanda to do this because it is both good strategy and Tori has been overplaying her hand, constantly talking about how much the Emerald Team needs to stay together… Tori has essentially been tempting the rest of the house to break up the band. Thank you for doing it, Amanda.
But there’s off-screen drama we’re not privy to that looms large over this episode. Starting at deliberation, Smashley is missing. Someone mentions a team of 3… this is odd, Sapphire was a team of 4 when we saw them win the Top Gun challenge. After deliberation, Amanda oddly tells Josh that Nelson is her only friend in the house. Nelson? What about BFF Smashley?
Finally, at elimination, T.J. tells us that Smashley has been “deactivated” for breaking a rule (100 points for getting kicked off).
This is extremely unsatisfying as a viewer. What rule? What happened?
The rumors on Reddit are that Smashley and Josh got in an argument and Smashley used hateful language relating to homosexuality and/or outed Josh for being secretly gay. Perhaps MTV did not want to air the incident in order to protect Josh – unclear how much say cast members get into their portrayal, but they seem to gain status with every season they’re on and Josh has some seniority at this point, as does Smashley.
By not showing what happened, we’re solidly past the original Real World “…see what happens when people stop being polite and start getting real” mantra. We’re even past the messy Jersey Shore era trash TV. We’re trying to be better, but not by showing what hurts people and understanding who people really are by the ugly sides they show us. Now we’re left in the dark wondering how the sausage is made and why.
Nevertheless, Big T is invited back to stay (5 points for surviving the episode) and returns to the Ruby Cell.
NOTE: We will be changing the scoring for getting kicked off in the future due to this season’s weirdness surrounding off-screen/COVID/unexplained disappearances.
Officially Unofficial Challenge Fantasy League 