DC FORUM: 2020 - The Year of DC, The Content Creator

A Word from the Editor

BY DC CUEVA                        

■ @DC408DXTR  @ IG/YT/SC/TB/TK

And so, we have finally made it: three-hundred sixty-six days ago tonight, we were anticipating the start of the decade of the twenties in the twenty-first century. But then, reality set in... and obviously, you don't need to be reminded of the loads of depressing, negative and decisive headlines that have plagued this year of 2020. In the true spirit of the message that this person has been preaching since spring of this year in this bring "The Escape You Deserve," we will spare you the expense of making even one small mention of any of those.

   However in this brief retrospective of the year that will soon be history in a few hours from now here in the United States, if there is something that I can take away from this year it's that I have made great strides in my hobby of being one now considers himself a content creator. The almost nine months that I have spent at my own house has allowed me to take advantage of the ample amount of time of being in lockdown and in quarantine to further my standing in the social universe as not just a great blogger and writer, but now in being a part-time YouTuber too.

As I wrote here on New Year's Eve last year, I have worked tremendously hard over the course of what's now seven & a-half years of perfecting this very DCBLOG site. It is something I take a great deal of pride in having now posted over 1,300 posts and devoting the lions' share of that to going Inside MTV Reality... with occasional posts on my other passions of sports, music and the culture of Las Vegas. And this remains a big part of my identity to most of you, and my biggest contribution to the fandom of The Challenge and other aspects of TV's most-talked about reality programming.

   Despite two of the major series I cover not airing this year because of the ongoing pandemic, this is the fourth straight year that I have published over two-hundred blog posts in a single year, and I launched a Twitter promotion campaign to help bring more users to the outstanding content this site provides - the 'Pulse of the episodes, the stories behind the story that ExtraTime offers, and other things. Despite the expansion of internet coverage of the likes of the fifth major pro sport and Siesta Key to other blogs and to most especially the audio medium of podcasts, I continue to look at my baby as the gold standard... and we are looking forward to continuing this great tradition in the new year with new shows & seasons, compelling stories and much more.

But something that has also kept me from devoting the same amount of time and effort to putting this site together this year has been my progression in creating original videos for YouTube. When just relaxing, I have the pleasure of watching a lot of content on there not only encompassing my biggest passions in reality TV, sports, music and Vegas, but also many other things such as local newscasts, tours of million-dollar homes, theme park live streams, and slot play -- something I got to do before I won on the slots last year and for which now my parents have been obsessed with this year.

   It's from watching all of those that inspired me to post not one, but well over 1000 videos of eight of my travels to Las Vegas and from a 2008 trip I took to New York City. With just a few reposts of my own live streams from last year's trip to Sin City, most of my DC Vegas and DC Coast to Coast vlogs are all post-produced by me with broadcast-quality graphics, ambient audio and other enhancements to give it a different & distinctive feel compared to most other original YouTube content. And there are still plenty of good videos from the Big Apple and Disneyland that will be up very soon

As for what's next: as many of us have done most of our holiday shopping online, this month my parents were brave enough to go the traditional route and drive to the store to buy two awesome gifts that makes this Christmas a good one for yours truly. First, I got a much-needed upgrade to a new iPhone in retiring the first model SE I've been using for four years in favor of an iPhone 11 - a move that I can equate from going from the age of The Flintstones to flying with The Jetsons. And second, they gave me my very first laptop so I that I don't have to worry about queueing for the upstairs computer when my mom is checking her stocks or when my kids come over to play around with Minecraft.

   As much as we're ready to finally put 2020 out of its misery shortly, I'm most looking forward to 2021 like many of you, but not just for that we hope this year will bring us hope, health, happiness and humanity to this world. It's also that I'm looking forward to what the future brings with having those two toys along with the tablets and other gadgets I have. When we drive over to my sisters' for a weekend, instead of cramming all of those before we drive there the next day, I can now have some time to work on blog posts like these around quality family time and dealing with their new puppy.

   But I'm most especially anxious for the big one: when the time finally comes to go back to Sin City once it's safe to fly there and when things get back to a sense of normalcy, I plan on taking the DC Vegas YouTube experience to the next level. I'll be able to post new videos while I'm in town and on the same day instead of waiting to fly home & edit those later, just like Vegas vlogger Matt Bridger does when he flies in from the UK. I can offer better live streaming and cinema-quality videos of my walkthroughs on the Strip with my gimbal & vlogging camera in hand... and those are just a couple ideas.

But that's what the future brings... and we hope this will come sooner rather than later. But here in the final hours of this chaotic year, I can look at 2020 as the year that I became more than just a blogger, but now as a Content Creator on both the written and the visual side of things. And may we wish you all a safe, peaceful and a very Happy New Year.

- I AM DC

#DCBLOG

DC ExtraTime: The Caucus Challenge Goes to Camp and to Beantown

*** CAUTION: Certain Videos Embedded Below Contain Adult Language & Situations Not Intended for a Younger Audience. Parental Guidance is Suggested. ***

BY DC CUEVA                        

■ @DC408DXTR  @ IG/YT/SC/TB/TK

IG @TheAndresRodriguez

As we are finally into the final 48 hours of 2020 and anxious to ring in 2021 tomorrow night, those who we've been thinking about right now and a lot during the holidays are our family and friends. For many of us, we have not spent much time in person with either or both of them this year because of the pandemic and whose only contact have been through virtual parties on Zoom or digitally. But for those of you who have been healthy and being extremely aware of this reality we are in now, then you have gotten to cherish that quality time... that includes the subjects of this year's last ExtraTime.

Ever since we first introduced them three years ago, Andres Rodriguez and his tight-knit group of friends from Secaucus, NJ have been regulars of this DCBLOG site. It's for that we have chronicled the entirety of his signature series for his YouTube channel, The Caucus Challenge, and its Real World-inspired spinoff The Life We Live. Yes, it's likely that you have been obsessed with watching those new MTV Challenge and Are You The One seasons that they have on Netflix and CBS All Access all this month, but this clique has also forged their own identity for great television in creating ten Caucus Challenges and three prior seasons of TLWL before this year.

In a perfect world, we would be enjoying watching the eleventh & twelfth seasons of Caucus by now... but of course there were other plans. So instead, what the franchise's creator & host had in mind earlier this summer was something different and something familiar. And on a night where Double Agents is taking this rare Challenge Wednesday off for the New Year's holiday, we'd thought we'd give you a suggestion for what to watch, and share you how Dre & Friends spent their Lost Summer of 2020.

Inside MTV Reality: A Big Brother Gets Catfished?

BY DC CUEVA                        

■ @DC408DXTR  @ IG/YT/SC/TB/TK

Two years ago if you're lucky enough to follow the whole palette of what MTV has to offer, you may recall what happened during Final Reckoning when a guy who knows a couple Agents of this season got a surprise phone call from a surprise person on another MTV show. We're talking about the moment on Catfish in 2018 when Jay G. -- who was a roomie of Cory and Ashley's on his Real World season and who you remember for what happened on Exes 2 -- got a phone call from Max Joseph during his last investigation. It aired during the week of the ladder invading South Africa as a mercenary en route to becoming a millionaire and during that breakout year for the former as he got used to daddy life.

   This year marks the tenth anniversary of the original Catfish documentary film that inspired the TV series of the same name which, of course, centers around what happened to show host Nev Schulman. He has had quite a bit more attention of late thanks to having being one of those lucky handful chosen for this year's installment of Dancing with the Stars and narrowing missing winning the coveted Crystal Ball. Usually, he would crisscross America to meet those who've fallen in online love and has been witness to his fair share of memorable moments ever since. But as it has been doing this year of a pandemic, Nev & Max's replacement, Miss Teen USA 2010 Kamie Crawford, have been doing all their investigations at home and being connected to each other and their subjects through video-chat... same goes for their Ghosted counterparts Rachel Lindsay and Travis Mills.

   A year ago this month saw Viacom and CBS complete their re-merger and as it was during their first corporate marriage, there's been plenty of cross promotion in the expanded company with plenty of familiar names to Challenge Nation making appearances on shows across the entire company -- and that includes what goes down in daytime today on the Eye, which we will cover later this week. Also, there's Nickelodeon producing a kid-friendly simulcast of one of the Eye's upcoming slate of NFL playoff games in the run-up to the network airing Super Bowl LV.

DC SocialPulse: The Challenge Double Agents - "Enemy of the State"

*** Advisory: #DCSocialPulse contains adult language, objectionable content & spoilers for some readers. Viewer Discretion is Advised. Due to its length, take frequent eye breaks if you're viewing this top to bottom... you do need those, after all. ***

BY DC CUEVA                        

■ @DC408DXTR  @ IG/YT/SC/TB/TK

Hello again everyone and Happy Holidays to you... we hope that you & yours are safe and healthy as the Christmas festivities continue on this last weekend of 2020 as we at DCBLOG bring you on into our final SocialPulse post of the year, and Week 3 of The Challenge: Double Agents.

The first two weeks of this Challenge season has seen plenty of twists being revealed that will set the tone for the rest of this winter, and last week saw the full nature of this cutthroat game be unveiled after the first paired mission, which saw players tackle the icy cold waters and saw politics get exposed. There was no change to who were the Double Agents as Aneesa & Fessy remained in the top position, but at night's end he would find himself in the line of fire as him deciding to not gamble to get a red skull may hurt him later on in this game, as he watched our last ExtraTime subject Joseph get beaten handily by Kyle after trying to go after Wes.

After the icy cold nature of last week's daily, this week the focus shifts to the wide open road for something much more different: going wresting on top of a speeding truck and through a line of explosives -- and without wearing harnesses. Thanks to the changes in teams at the end of last week, six challengers will be re-paired with new partners, which also sees consequences for Fessy in bringing the secrets of the secret vote out into the open. And an Agent who's has a tendency to be an emotional firecracker going back to when he was king of his original season is at it again when it comes to pushing the buttons of some of the other players.

After the break, it's the 'Pulse of Episode 3 of Double Agents, plus we begin with the reaction to the big news last week of the partner of this week's main subject from his first Challenge & co-parent of baby number 1 expecting #2. Thanks for joining along and wrapping your holiday weekend with us...

DC ExtraTime Flashback: Are You The One? - Reflection from the Originals

This Post is Dedicated in Memory of One of AYTO's Beloved Castmates, Alexis Eddy, Who Died Back in January of This Year.

BY DC CUEVA                        

■ @DC408DXTR  @ IG/YT/SC/TB/TK

The story of MTV Reality represents the history of the non-scripted genre as it is recognized by fans and the industry, encompassing almost three decades of some of TV's most unique programming. During these coming months in addition to weekly coverage of The Challenge: Double Agents, DCBLOG ExtraTime is proud to offer a special Flashback series as we look back at some of the most memorable moments, greatest shows and incredible personalities that has shaped this entire genre.

During a year we will finally put to rest in less than a week from now, a recent trend in the land of social media has been of users on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and the like to compare themselves from when they started doing something and how it's evolved greatly to this moment in their lives. In the case of yours truly, my "How It Began, How It's Going" moment doesn't really apply to being posted on those apps, but on this page you're viewing right now.

   In my first cycle of blogging on MTV matters on this DCBLOG site in the summer of 2013, that first summer consisted of less than twenty posts covering just the season-ending reunion of Season 28 of The Real World in Portland and the entirety of the ensuing Rivals II Challenge, with a few supplementary posts on the side which ultimately evolved these posts known as the ExtraTime series. What I didn't know going into the next wave of programming the following winter was that my beat would begin to gradually expand to the point where it's now a year-round activity that doesn't just cover the fifth major pro sport and the show that began reality TV.

   I've been a lifelong MTV fan going back over two decades well before I decided to take my fandom into social media in joining Twitter in the summer of 2012 and then to the blogosphere a year later. As one who has a lot of memories of watching a wide range of shows reflecting the joy of being young, in what this very post is the 1300th on this site I not only covered those two aforementioned shows, but also everything from the fun and drama of two different sets of cliques who call Florida home, to tabloid-friendly series, one-hit wonders and the list goes on.

But, there's one show that helped pave the way for helping expanding my horizons in this world: seven years ago next month, that show came along in combining the elements of what MTV does best in this genre of the big-time drama we come to expect from reality TV, the high-stakes of The Challenge and incredibly young & hot people... with a thing my parents have been fans of for a long time: Bachelor Nation and romantic reality dating shows. The show was given the gymnastic name of Perfect 10 to begin with, but it evolved into Are You The One? -- known just by the acronym AYTO.

   It's safe to say that I was hooked from the very beginning, and I can also be one of the small handful who can lay claim to being a Day-1'er. I have followed this ride from the start and from even before the buzz began to take shape: someone from that original group liking my pictures on Instagram helped break the ice. And it has continued through the Season 3 cast and the incredible resume they've chalked up since, the ultimate heartbreak that Season 5 had to go through in the Caribbean, the comeback of the decade Season 6 pulled off in New Orleans, and its most recent chapter in giving the LGBT community their chance to look for love.

   And we at this site have gotten to follow the entire journey of these eight seasons: we've taken the 'Pulse of every episode, told the backstories of many of those who've gone for love on AYTO, and done our best to sort things out when it comes to cracking the code of the perfect matches like what NBC's Steve Kornacki has done in becoming an icon and making his khaki pants a hot Christmas gift in sorting out the Path to the White House through analytics during this year's election and now, the NFL playoffs.

It may not be MTV's first foray into this genre after its 90s hit Singled Out and its first collaboration with Jersey Shore executive producer Sally-Ann Salsano in A Shot at Love... but this is by far its most unique and successful when it comes to the many facets of what the game is about, and how it has brought that recipe for success into a genre that's now the hottest trend in the non-scripted space. But in a year that had no new season of it airing this year due to the pandemic, as we began cuffing season we got the next best thing that's just as good: so many flashbacks... thanks to it joining the biggest player in the battle for streaming supremacy.

   Earlier this month, MTV's Are You The One? joined Netflix when the first two seasons of the show was made available on the platform, and by week's end it was in the top 10 list of most viewed shows there. And this gave reason for the series' first two casts to get together to do something they didn't get to do much when it aired back in 2014 but is something recent casts have gotten to enjoy: spilling the tea on social media and on YouTube. We're sure you're gonna have the feels and the flashbacks going back down memory lane as you check this out on this Christmas Day...

DC ExtraTime: Another One for Chey Not Shy...

BY DC CUEVA                        

■ @DC408DXTR  @ IG/YT/SC/TB/TK

Instagram @CheyNotShy

Three years ago on the pre-Christmas weekend in mid-December, the tight-knit MTV Reality family was sent for a tailspin by one stunning announcement from a man who had just came back from filming two back to back seasons in two different locales. Then two-time Challenger and Real World alum Cory Wharton returned from a social media hiatus of filming Vendettas in Europe and flying straight to Hawaii for the first American season of Ex On The Beach to announce that a paternity test taken in fall 2017 revealed that he is a father much to everyone's surprise. And exactly two years later, it was deja vu all over again: before going out to compete on Total Madness, he and the girl he met on that first Ex season there in Hawaii revealed that were expecting, and he would become a father to two kids.

The second time around was no surprise when it was announced in October of last year, but Cory and Taylor Selfridge had to adjust to having to give birth to and raise their new kid Mila Mae during the midst of this unprecedented pandemic, just as so many others both in the MTV inner circle and out have had to grapple with during this crazy time. But we never forget that first one, which brought into focus the brief relationship he had with Are You The One Season 3's Cheyenne Floyd on The Challenge: Rivals III in 2016, and helped to bring the flag of Challenge Nation into uncharted waters: joining the Teen Mom OG sorority when Ryder K. was still a 1-year-old. Of course, this gave reason for the MTV King to be given have a channel logo as a tattoo for being on four different series.

In seeing Chey's Instagram photos in the last few months gave her followers and the Teen Mom fans some idea or hints of what might be happening, but last week saw it be confirmed in a social post. And last Thursday and almost three years to the day of Cory's daddy reveal, she posted the following:

DC ExtraTime: Before They Were MTV Stars - Joseph's Golden Moment

BY DC CUEVA                        

■ @DC408DXTR  @ IG/YT/SC/TB/TK

   ESTIMATED READING TIME: 16 Mins.

The year that will soon pass us by of 2020 has been quite a memorable one in the one section of our American society that sees people like you be the stars of their own TV show. But earlier this summer while you were probably busy following the serious business of the last MTV Challenge season of Total Madness, if you happen to be an overall reality TV fan besides just watching this show you might've spotted someone familiar on one of the biggest shows in the non-scripted universe.

All AGT Photos Courtesy
Trae Patton/NBCUniversal

Kaycee Clark was perhaps nowhere to be seen outside of competing under the radar in the Czech Republic, getting into that huge blow-up with Bayleigh Dayton in the bunker last season, or briefly flirting with Nany Gonzalez in that Prague club. But thanks to some alert viewers who always keep an eye out for whenever people from Team MTV invade other networks' shows -- something we feature a lot on here, the Big Brother 20 champion was spotted in the audience of a show that airs on a different network not related to their newly expanded company. But Kaycee would have absolutely no idea that her sophomore Challenge season that she is on right now would feature someone from that very show that's so much different from being put into that ringer of competing against houseguests in the summer house, or being trapped with other challengers in a war-style bunker... and where that show she was on is all about performing in front of a large audience, and where it's been a launchpad to some incredible careers and a venue for some amazing & inspiring moments.

Last week, we saw a second representative of a series airing on a competing traditional TV outlet outside of the ViacomCBS walls be the first rookie to bite the dust on The Challenge: Double Agents. But while it's the manner of which he was sent home that had us talking at night's end, the latest person to make the ride from the Peacock at 30 Rock down to this cable TV icon based in Times Square from is one who, a year ago this summer, provided viewers with a great performance that proved that you can inspire anyone to follow their dreams and become an overnight sensation. And that golden moment Joseph Allen went though is the focus of this edition of Before They Were MTV Stars.

DC ExtraTime: Idris in the Ring

BY DC CUEVA                        

■ @DC408DXTR  @ IG/YT/SC/TB/TK

For fans of the sweet science, 2020 in boxing has largely been devoid of the big-name competitive fights featuring those in their prime that they've come to expect. But in a sport that HBO's Larry Merchant refers to as "the theatre of the unexpected," there have been a couple notable headlines this year from the weird file: the emergence of the Paul brothers - Logan and Jake as legit boxers in addition to being YouTube's most notorious siblings, and the big fight between legends Mike Tyson and Roy Jones.

To salvage whatever was left of this lost year, this pre-Christmas weekend has some weekend for boxing fans: last night saw Kazakhstan's Gennady "GGG" Golovkin score a TKO win over Poland's Kamil Szeremeta to retain his IBF middleweight belt, and his 36th victory by knockout. And tonight, the man who beat him two years ago in a rematch of their disputed drawn first fight, Mexico's Saul "Canelo" Alvarez, will takes to the ring to face Britain's Callum Smith in defense of his two 168 lbs. titles.

Those in Challenge Nation who have been following this franchise over the past two decades know that Darrell Taylor was an amateur boxer prior to going onto Road Rules Campus Crawl and then winning his first Challenges. And another fighter who has made his way from the ring into the fifth major pro sport is one who comes from the current epicenter of the heavyweight division: Idris Virgo was part of last year's War of the Worlds 2 rookie class two years after he was a latecomer on the 2018 season of Love Island UK, and made it to the halfway point in what became a weekly British elimination festival until the very end.

When we profiled Idris in the WOTW2 edition of our Who Are These Newbies? series in fall 2019, some notable tidbits about the man from Birmingham in the West Midlands of England included choosing over eventual Winter Ex On The Beach single Georgia Steel for his first date after arriving midway through the season, winning a challenge while wearing a fireman's outfit, and a Twitter user sharing some of his cringy pick-up lines. But outside of reality TV, Idris is a boxer having begun fighting professionally just months before going the Love Island casa. He won his first three bouts, drew the fourth just before going onto The Challenge, and after our post went to press on fight #5 he beat a journeyman club fighter with 100+ losses, followed by another unanimous decision.

In Britain, the pandemic forced matches in the Premier League and other action across the English football pyramid to being played behind closed doors without fans in the grounds. But like its UFC counterparts, boxing was one of the first sports to pick back up following the sports shutdown, and once he was able to compete again Virgo signed with independent promoter Hennessey Sports - who helped launch the career of world heavyweight champion Tyson Fury. And since the promoter has a deal with ViacomCBS sibling Channel 5, it has meant that his bouts are shown free-to-air in all of the UK instead of on pay-per-view or a streaming platform along the lines of DAZN.