Every Season of The Challenge, Ranked: #18 — Final Reckoning

Location: Hermanus, South Africa

Host: TJ Lavin

Aired: 2018

Champions: Ashley and Hunter

Overall Thoughts: I’ve never done a 180 on a season as much as I have with Final Reckoning. Although I didn’t hate it as much as some of the fan base while it was airing, I definitely didn’t envision for it to be in the top half of my favorite seasons ever.

But Final Reckoning, like all the seasons in the so-called “trilogy”, plays so much better on a binge watch than it did live.

The majority of episodes ended on cliffhangers and non-eliminations, which was extremely annoying while watching live. This season took forever both to air and to film (I believe it’s one of the longest seasons filmed ever, if not the longest).

And it has obvious flaws, most notably with the ridiculous Redemption House format.

But when you can crank out all 20 episodes in a week or less, you start to realize this season is actually pretty damn entertaining.

MEMORABLE MOMENTS

• Kailah and Melissa getting kicked off the first night for fighting
• Angela freaking out over getting pillows thrown at her
• Paulie blowing up at the first Redemption House elimination, telling Brad that Britni cheated on him
• Kam’s plan
• Amanda telling Cara Maria she hopes her horse dies
• Shane throwing the Don’t Push Me Around mission
• The classic Think Tank elimination between Kam/Kayleigh and Jozea/Da’Vonne
• Shane/Nelson calling out Brad/Kyle
• Sylvia headbutting Marie
• Cory bodyslamming Tony over pasta
• Devin following Bananas around the house, leading to Bananas telling Devin, “I hope the apple fell far from the tree”
• Natalie holding her arm up for over five hours to beat Bananas in the Milk and Cookies elimination
• Paulie going back on his word and throwing his grenade at Joss/Sylvia in the final