DC ExtraTime: An AYTO'er Gets "Lip Locked"

BY DC CUEVA                        

■ @DC408DXTR  @ IG/YT/SC/TB

For the past few years, MTV has taken advantage of its YouTube/MTV channel to provide sneak peeks and additional content surrounding all of its franchise shows to help drive up TV viewership, and last month they went a step further and gave all of them their own channels. And concurrent with the linear channel's increased ratings and exposure, the MTV Studios unit has also spiked up production of short-form and regular series that can only be seen on the net's biggest video site.

Last year, MTV went into the vaults and offered an update of its '90s afternoon hit Singled Out, which saw two members of last year's Are You The One? cast - Kwasi and Daniel - look for another chance at love... this time with singles being dwindled down from 50 to 1 and a date to the winner, just as when Carmen Electra, Chris Hardwick and Jenny McCarthy hosted the show 25 years ago. And the buzz surrounding YouTube power couple Jake Paul and Tana Mongeau can be attributed to her reality show No Filter: Tana Takes 21, which followed her all the way to their wedding night.

Amidst the mania surrounding Jake & Tana, and during MTV's summer of love of AYTO and Ex On The Beach, there was another romantic reality show... but this time, it's different from handing out roses, going into the Truth Booth or even dreading a trip to the Shack of Secrets. This series is called Lip Locked, and the title simply says what the show is all about: people kissing each other... and like Singled Out, Justina Valentine from Wild 'N Out is the show's host.

The objective of Lip Locked is bringing couples together for the ultimate test of trust: can they successfully identify their partner from just the kiss of him or her, of their partner or someone else?  During this short-form series, couples ranging from newlyweds to longtime friends and gay couples have had the chance over this summer to test how much they know each other just by one of the five senses of touch. One member of the couple joins two others to be the three kiss'ees, and the other half has to do this blindfolded... and it's only after the kisses are all done that the person chooses who he or she kissed and to see if they are correct. And yes, this is a hard task for everyone going onto here.

For the lead-up to this story, we have to rewind back to Are You The One? Season 6 - which was introduced to everyone two years ago this weekend. While the love triangle of Nurys, Malcolm & Diandra, and the romance of Geles & Anthony was dominating the buzz that fall - and then brought them to Ex On The Beach, another key romance in New Orleans was that of South Carolinan Alivia Hunter and New Jersey model Kareem Fathalla. They were together for much of the time in the AYTO house and continued after they left the Big Easy until broke up after over a year together.

For here, Kareem has been hired as one of the two guys picked as decoys to the couple who joins Justina in this episode of Lip Locked: Jeffrey and Rose have been dating for three years, and he says that she is a good kisser... and she can tell who she's kissing just by another of our senses of smell... and that could be an advantage for her going in. Jeff's goal is to try and stay calm while Rose is kissing all three men... below, see if she can pass this test... And we may not be done with more AYTO crossovers into MTV YouTube series... we'll let you in on yet another appearance for "Mr. Chocolate" later during this cuffing season.

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