The popular Reality TV series has just aired its 37th season in the US, and now some of Australia’s biggest and best reality contestants will get in on the action.
The US’ Paramount+ streaming platform has announced that a global-competition series of MTV’s popular sport/reality show The Challenge, will make its way down under and feature some of Australia’s various former Reality TV contestants.
The series, titled The Challenge: War of the Worlds, will see four countries produce their own local version of The Challenge (named as Part 1), with the winners from each local version then competing against each other in the final (Part 2).
The four countries competing are Australia, the US, the UK, and Argentina.
Paramount+ will screen the entire War of the Worlds series, and exclusively Part 2, but it appears each local version will also air on the major broadcaster Paramount+ is associated with in each respective country.
In Australia, that’s Channel 10.
The narrator in the promo for the series said the unscripted competition series is where sports and reality collide – and now it’s going global.
“It’s The Challenge: War of the Worlds, a two-part worldwide tournament with new series’ in four different countries.
“Where the biggest reality athletes battle it out to be named their country’s champion. And it’s all on Paramount+ and our four biggest broadcasters around the world.
“Then the winners in each country advance to part two, streaming exclusively on Paramount+, all to crown the first ever Challenge world champion.
“The next evolution of global reality competition is here!”
Watch the full promo from the US Paramount+ Twitter account below.
The contestants on The Challenge typically compete against one another in various extreme challenges to avoid being sent into elimination. Those who manage to survive through their physicality or skill compete to make their way to the final of the competition, with winner(s) enjoying a cash prize.
While the brutal physical games and competitions are a large part of the program, the show incorporates much of the same strategy and social gameplay seen in Survivor or Big Brother. Contestants also live in the same quarters as one another.
It is unknown any major details of the new War of the Worlds series, including when it will air or who exactly will be cast on any of the local editions.
The mainline series in the US currently features a cast made up of Reality TV stars from various programs, such as The Real World, Road Rules, Are You The One?, Big Brother, Survivor, Love Island, Ex on the Beach and many more.
What’s more, The Challenge doesn’t limit how many times a participant is able to compete, instead featuring a rotating cast of contestants every season, with a handful of new players inserted each time. This casting format should be expected if War of the Worlds were to produce more than one season.
International Reality TV stars have appeared on the main version too, with representatives from shows in the UK, Turkey, Romania, Sweden, Germany and many more all featured on the show.
Only one Australian has ever competed on The Challenge – Dee Nguyen, a former Geordie Shore alum who appeared on the show when it was filmed in Bondi in Australia. Dee competed on three back-to-back seasons on the show, winning her second time around and claiming US$250,000 in prize money. Following controversial comments in relation to the Black Lives Matter movement, MTV cut ties with Dee and largely edited her out of her final season on the show.
So can we expect some of our biggest Reality TV stars from Australian Survivor, Big Brother, Married at First Sight, Love Island or Australian Ninja Warrior (among others) to compete on the show? I’m sure we’ll find out soon enough.
Also announced today was the commissioning of NCIS: Sydney, the first international edition of the hit NCIS franchise, set to film against the iconic backdrop of New South Wales.
