The Challenge: All Stars will feature plenty of OGs from the days of The Real World, Road Rules, and Fresh Meat on MTV. However, three competitors synonymous with The Challenge won’t be featured on the spinoff season.
They are seven-time winner Johnny Bananas, three-time winner Chris “CT” Tamburello, and two-time winner Wes Bergmann.
With many fans asking why they weren’t included in the All Stars cast, The Challenge OG Mark Long recently commented about them not appearing on the show.
Mark Long addresses Bananas, CT, and Wes’ absences
While there will be 22 OG cast members from the various seasons of MTV’s The Challenge on the All Stars spinoff season, a lot of fans are bringing up some of the big-name cast members that aren’t there.
During an US Magazine podcast interview, head OG Mark Long spoke with Emily Longeretta about the upcoming show, The Challenge: All Stars, including its cast full of OGs. He addressed the fact that a lot of fans keep pointing out that Wes, Johnny Bananas, and CT aren’t included in the All Stars cast.
“A lot of people throw out the names, like ‘Why wasn’t Johnny, Wes and CT on?’” the former Challenge winner said.
“Hey listen, there’s a place and time for those guys to come on the show, but you know, they’re so recent. CT’s on The Challenge right now. Wes was on The Challenge right now. Johnny was on last year. So, I wanted to give people the true OGs of people and All Stars they haven’t seen in a while,” he explained.
While Long’s reply makes sense, The Challenge: All Stars didn’t go without bringing in a few of the Double Agents cast members. Season 36 cast members Aneesa Ferreira and Darrell Taylor are included amongst the 22 All Stars competitors.
“I’ve since talked to Johnny and Wes, and I’d love to have them on. I can see them if this thing goes multiple seasons, they’ll be on,” Mark shared, which should give fans a chance to see the multiple-time champions in the future.
All Stars cast options limited by pandemic
The Challenge: Double Agents and All Stars reality shows were both able to film despite having the COVID-19 pandemic going on. However, it made casting a bit more difficult for All Stars.
“I mean, let’s be honest. I think the net would’ve been a little wider if we weren’t going through the pandemic because one of the things that you had to be available for obviously was quarantining.” Mark shared, adding the 10 day quarantine period was a lot of time to ask of someone.
He mentioned that there were discussions with former Real World and Road Rules stars like Mike “The Miz” Mizanin or Mark’s castmate Kit Hoover to come by and be a guest host on All Stars. However, it was tough to get them away from their busy schedules for a “one-off” appearance like that.
Other former competitors who were unable to appear but contacted included Evelyn Smith because she was working with the democratic primary election and Landon Lueck because he was also unable to get away from work.
However, Mark said that he believes they could be potential cast members in the future, along with the other stars such as Wes, CT, and Bananas.
He added that people will be excited to see the competitors they do have, though. That includes Yes Duffy, who hasn’t appeared on The Challenge in 17 years, Teck “Money” Holmes, Jisela Delgado, and many other OGs from The Challenge history.
The Challenge: All Stars premieres on Thursday, April 1 on Paramount+.
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