Squid Game The Challenge Season 2 Interview - Nick (086), Matthew (098), and August (111) - Reality After Show

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
What's going on? We are back with Squid Game the
Challenge season to coverage here and whoa do we have
an interview here today? I'm with August player and eleven.
We have Nick player eighty six, and we have Matthew
player ninety eight, as well as a season one alone
Dan player two o four. How is everybody today?

Speaker 2 (00:21):
Are you doing good?

Speaker 3 (00:22):
And I'm doing that amazing? It's awesome. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (00:25):
We we're trying to stay together as much as possible.
You know, we know the finales coming around the corner
and after that instead of just you know, separating and
go separate ways, where we're trying to stay together. We
know we're like a family.

Speaker 1 (00:38):
Absolutely. I love to see it. I love to hear.
Let's just jump right into this. Why squid for y'all?

Speaker 4 (00:43):
What made it?

Speaker 1 (00:45):
Y'all want to play this game so badly?

Speaker 3 (00:49):
Well, we want to go first.

Speaker 5 (00:51):
I get sorry. So I'm a big fan of reality TV.
You know, Survivor has always been right the dam and
I'm like, you know what, let me just apply for
some other see if I can get on, because I
just I'm very competitive. My family has always told me,
you're very social, You're very athletic. You know, reality TV
is something you could excel at. So I applied, not
thinking i'd getting into actually applied. When I came home

(01:14):
from a bar, I was hungover. It was six am.
I'm like, I just spend like one hundred dollars a night.
I'm too broke for this. Let me apply to squid
Game and see if something can happen. Next thing I know,
I'm getting phone calls. I'm getting you know, zoom interviews,
and I'm like, oh shit, this might actually happen. I
need to put everything I have into it to see
if I can make this into something. And then a

(01:35):
few months down the line, I'm in a dorm with
four hundred and fifty five other people.

Speaker 3 (01:38):
It's insane.

Speaker 6 (01:41):
Nick, Yeah, No, I was just I was a big
fan of the drama. I thought the show was amazing,
and then I didn't even know they're doing a reality
show for season one, and then you see it come
out and I'm watching it. I'm like, me, I, you know,
I think most people do this as you're watching this
type of show, but I would just like I can
do that.

Speaker 4 (01:59):
I could I can win this. I could do that.

Speaker 6 (02:02):
So then after watching season one, watching Dead and everybody
just you know, trying to see like what kind of
strategies they had. I see the thing pop up at
the end that it's like, I think you have what
it takes to be on season two.

Speaker 4 (02:14):
So I was just like, I'm gonna do it, like
I'll just apply. I didn't think I think it was
gonna come from it.

Speaker 6 (02:18):
I figured like it was going to be one hundred
and two hundred thousand people applying.

Speaker 4 (02:21):
What are the odds I'm gonna get picked?

Speaker 6 (02:23):
And then I got the phone call and just from
there it started rolling and same thing like allugust, I'm
just competitive. That was like my gameplay. I know they
can't show everyone's story. There was four hundred and fifty
six stories, but I was I was.

Speaker 4 (02:38):
There to win.

Speaker 6 (02:39):
I wasn't there to you know, try to clog up
the screen time or anything like that.

Speaker 4 (02:43):
I was. I was there to be there till the end.

Speaker 6 (02:45):
And you know, I did pretty good, but you know, always, yeah,
you know, maybe next time.

Speaker 4 (02:50):
I don't know. For me.

Speaker 2 (02:53):
The greatest gift one individual individual can give to another
is opportunity. And when an opportunity presents itself where you
could win four point five six million dollars and change
the life of yourself, your family, your friends, all the
ones that have touched you in your lifetime. Was something special,
you know. So I took the opportunity to just apply

(03:15):
like everybody else, thinking I had no shot. And then
after months going by and not hearing anything, I finally
received a phone call and they started talking to me
about it, and the process started to become more real.
You know, at first you have like over one hundred
thousand applicants or putting in for it, but then the
realism of it is that four hundred and fifty six
was selected, and then the opportunity becomes even greater because

(03:36):
once you're in the game and you have the mindset
of someone, especially from New York, you know you can't
tame a lion forever. And you put a lion inside
a dorm with four walls, eventually, someone like me, their
balk becomes too loud and it could hurt you. So
it's been a learning experience for me. But the reason
why I did it was because you know, four point

(03:57):
five six million dollars can change a lot of people's lives.

Speaker 1 (04:01):
Absolutely, Dan, I want to go to you because I
want your perspective. You played season one, now you're sitting
at home watching season two. What do you think about it?

Speaker 7 (04:09):
So the production of season two, you know, it pains
me in my heart to say it. The production is
way better. They highlighted a lot of people this time,
which I really liked that we can get into it.
The first game. Don't even get me started on that garbage.

Speaker 3 (04:29):
The fact that people went.

Speaker 7 (04:30):
All the way out there and didn't even have a
chance to do anything. That's a little I think, and
maybe I'm biased. Red Light green Light should be a
write of passage for anybody that wants to play Squid
Game to challenge. Oh and before I forget, tell your
cash makes when they're making their posts. It's not Squid Games.
There's no ass so horrible. But anyway, I love the show.

(04:54):
I'm really into it. A couple of times I may
or may not have tried it. Will not admit that
on camera, Algie, you may have been involved in one
of my tearful moments. I'm not gonna say, but yeah,
I like it. I want to be able to say
it stinks, you know, because I want us to be better,
But it doesn't.

Speaker 3 (05:11):
It's really good.

Speaker 6 (05:13):
Yeah, I'll say, uh, I agree with you Dan with
the production standpoint, like the way they added frontman for us,
the way they added the like the frontman in his office,
if you will, whatever it was, like that was all awesome.
But I will give I will give season one that props.
I think you guys had a lot more like storm
time and like building up the relationships. Like and this

(05:34):
could be just from our point of view, because like
we were in the show and like we know, we
knew everything that was happening, but like ours felt I
feel like a little bit kind of rushed. I mean
right from the bat obviously, like you said, we in
the first thirteen minutes, we lost half the people, so uh,
whether that was like shock factor for the show itself,
but like we just felt completely like I felt like

(05:56):
it was like a little bit rushed, and we could
have spent a little more time like you guys did
with dorm and building relationships and talking to people.

Speaker 4 (06:02):
Like our season was very like here's the game, let's play.

Speaker 2 (06:05):
Well, I think some.

Speaker 3 (06:06):
Of that, just get this out.

Speaker 7 (06:09):
Some of that, And again I'm hearing from certain people
the fact that you guys were allowed to talk to
each other and you aid in groups, and you made
teams basically before you got in there. If I'm production
the first time Augie and Matt talk, I want to
get that on screen. I want to see that. So
I think that may have added to why they glossed
over some of it.

Speaker 3 (06:29):
I can I can guess.

Speaker 7 (06:30):
I don't know, but I want to see the first
interaction from every single person, and if I can work
that into the story, I'm going to do that. So
I don't know if that played a role. Maybe I'm
not sure.

Speaker 2 (06:40):
Yeah, I mean they kept us quiet in the hotels
for a long time and durn takes. We weren't allowed
to say anything. That's why we had to build things
like socks and make them tennis bulls. So there, you know,
but they tried to hold that. But I think it's
important for the viewers and the and the fans at
home to see relationships building and get to learn somebody's character.

(07:00):
Is a lot of people leave empty handed and feeling
empty as well that they never got to showcase who
they really were, you know, So for that, you know,
it's unfortunate. There's also a story to be told about
August and the Edits didn't really do it much justice,
But as more of these interviews come out, what he
really did was very noble and honorable, and he deserves

(07:21):
a lot of credit because he saved a lot of
people that made it to the final and August deserves
a pad in the back for that.

Speaker 5 (07:28):
Thank you, Matt and Mike talk girl. Like the production side,
I'm a big reality TV fan, So when I think
of one, Season one will always be historic.

Speaker 3 (07:36):
You know. Season one is the first.

Speaker 5 (07:37):
Time anyone's ever done a game show with that many
people in the way that Good Games did it. You know,
there was so many things that have never been done before.
And as the seasons go on, I mean we all
know Season three is about the film in a couple
of months. Hopefully they do, you know, even more seasons
after season three. As more seasons go on, the better
they get at, you know, producing it. But season one

(07:59):
will always be one of the best seasons of reality
TV in my mind, simply because it is historic. They
have never done anything like that before, and so it's
like they're trying a lot of things out, and I
think part of the reason why it feels the rest
for us a season one was ten episodes. Our season
is only nine episodes, so a lot of that, like bonding,
they did have to cut out, and maybe some of

(08:21):
it was because we bonded at the hotel, but I
think they wanted us to go in having some sort
of relationship because they kept on telling us interact, but
then when we got into the dorms, they said, actuals
if we've never met each other. But they did tell
us to interact before the games began, and part of
me believes that they wanted us to have those relationships.

Speaker 3 (08:40):
So right off the bat, there.

Speaker 5 (08:41):
Was an emotional mistake into losing the game, or of
seeing your buddies lose the game.

Speaker 6 (08:45):
But that was that was confusing too because obviously I
don't know what August and Matt did, but prior to
going to London to film this, I did, you know
so much research like what you guys then did on
season one, like which I'll tell you stay at like
what prep was like that, so I know you guys
were like under strict lockdown like we were like when
we were in like the hotel hallways, like there was

(09:08):
like people getting screamed at, like don't talk. But then
they're like come down for breakfast and there's three hundred
of us eating breakfast together and.

Speaker 4 (09:15):
Like they're not really policing us, So it's like, do
you not want to school? Do you want us to talk?

Speaker 8 (09:19):
Like?

Speaker 6 (09:19):
So they were like very they just like at times
they cared and times they didn't.

Speaker 4 (09:26):
So it was like, should be like should we save
this camera? Should be not?

Speaker 6 (09:29):
And then of course, like you know you're going this
as a player, You're like, I'm gonna do whatever I
can to like make an alliance now obviously, but you
didn't want that to also like showing the screen that
like you already kind of know these people, but it
really it wasn't that bad, like you really didn't know
anyone from the hotel. But we definitely had like a
little advantage from season one.

Speaker 2 (09:47):
I think, yeah, for.

Speaker 1 (09:49):
Sure, it's difficult when they do that because it then
goes wishy washy in the sense of do you want
us to do this? Do you not want to sue us?
It's gets confusing, But not to gloss over the first game,
but we are a little bit here because y'all all
picked dex, you were safe, you survived. What I really
want to dive into is the pentathlon where you're talking
about groupings here they tell you to get in a
group of ten, and your mindset probably is going, all

(10:11):
ten of us are going to be playing together, but
oh no, it's five B five. What was y'all's mindset
going into that? And then how did you feel when
they did chop y'all in half and it was five
B five.

Speaker 2 (10:21):
Yeah, So we didn't really know what we were getting
involved with. You know, we started just picking people that
we thought would be good to play with. We weren't
sure if we were going to play together. We came
together and found a few players that we had a
relationship with, like, for instance, Me, Nick and Katie we
were posting the hotel. We were the same cohort, we

(10:43):
had the same colors. So we stuck together and a
few attachments along the way. Zoe wanted to break up
with her father. She came out way right before the
game started. Me Nick, we started to suggest maybe a
little bit of a strategy, and as we were talking
about the strategy, we looked up on the screen in
the white room and by accident, they put on they

(11:04):
were adjusting the camera and they put on the game.
So we had an idea of what we were playing.
We didn't know if that was a set up or not.

Speaker 4 (11:11):
We saw like we saw the Rainbow Road.

Speaker 2 (11:13):
We saw the Rainbow Road and the camera, so we're.

Speaker 6 (11:16):
Like, this is the game and then we were like,
wait is this wanted to think this is the game,
but like.

Speaker 2 (11:20):
Yeah, exactly, so you know, you know. But then right
before after we knew that, I said to Nick, I
said to a couple other plays, let's do boy girl
browy boy girl, you know, And that's before we saw
the screens. I just try to have some type of
logic that would probably make sense. So the way it
fell out is that it was ended up being me, Nick, Liz, Zoe,
and Kate and we had five other strong players on

(11:42):
the other team as well, and it was going to
be a difficult test to to get by.

Speaker 6 (11:47):
But and going off that, like if if your mind
went towards that's the game we're playing. Because the production
kind of had an accident in showing us, we automatically,
at least I did. I went to show and I
was like, if this is the game, it's gonna be
just a timed event. So it doesn't matter who your
ten is. Like, we're like, we're not playing each other,

(12:07):
like we're gonna be on the same team. We're gonna
be rooting for each other, and it's gonna be a
ten minute limit, and if we both pass, we're in.
And then obviously we get in there and God kind
of just splits us, and it's like, oh, like this
it kind of mattered where you sat in the room
kind of.

Speaker 5 (12:20):
Yeah, yeah, kind of like going off of that, I
saw season one five times total before going on to
play season two. I love season one so much. I
always rewatch it with my buddies. But I know, I
know after seeing season one so many times. Semantics is
a big part of squid Game. How they phrase stuff

(12:41):
is a massive part. They never said get into a
team of ten. They said get into a group of
ten right off the bat. I'm like, they said group
not team. Something is up. We're not gonna be playing
all ten together. So I tried convincing my friends and
we need to split up. No one listens to me,
No one listens to me at all. But I'm like,
they said, group not a team, we should spread out,

(13:02):
but all my friends are like, no, we need to
stay together. So they kind of forced us, like my
group to stay into like a group of ten and
the moment we walked in and they split us down
the middle, I'm like, great, I'm about to lose five
of my best friends in the game because they wouldn't
listen to me when I said they said groups of ten,
not teams of ten, and they literally just like they
just split you right down the middle.

Speaker 3 (13:24):
And I was in the middle.

Speaker 5 (13:25):
So it was me and a girl named Tabitha that
they just went right down the middle and split us
in half. And I'm like, man, had I like stood
one dot over, I would have been on the losing team.
And that just kind of shows you how real it is.
Like if you're standing two feet to the left, you're
on the other team and you're home. You're home within
two days of starting the game. So it's so much

(13:46):
luck is involved, but if you pay attention to what
they're saying, capitalize on the good luck and minimize the
bad luck.

Speaker 2 (13:53):
So, just to piggy book back off, that one thing
that we used to our advantage, and this Dan could
probably verify as well, is that before you go to
the games, there's a time where adjudicator comes out and
she goes over all the rules with you, and what
leads us to an advantage with that is that we
have so many people asking so many questions that one
person was able to say this time matter and she

(14:13):
had to stop and poise and look at producers and say, well,
time matters, but not here while you're in the race.
So we understood that time was going to play effect
later down the line, we just didn't know how, and
it ended up being that whoever was the slowest person
in each game got put up for elimination. So it's
good to always ask questions.

Speaker 1 (14:31):
Definitely, you have to ask those questions in August to
piggyback off of what you said as well, one little
thing matters. You could have been on the opposite side.
And we'll get into this ball when we get to mingle.
But it's the same thing for Vanessa, that close to
being eliminated and you're calling for that twelfth player and
Vanessa gets in and look, Vanessa's in the final five.

Speaker 4 (14:48):
Now.

Speaker 1 (14:49):
It's just crazy how these games work. But going into
the Pentathlon, I was shocked with the game they chose
to keep in Because Dan and I talked about this
covered the drama. I did not think they were going
to keep going gi in. Did not think that was
going to stay. We thought another game would have stayed in.
But what did y'all think of the games that you

(15:10):
had to play?

Speaker 5 (15:12):
I think they were a lot of fun. I was
very surprised. I thought Ganzi was going to be gone
for sure, But I think they realized that everyone going
in would assume Ganzhi would be in there.

Speaker 3 (15:23):
Somewhere like nine on the ten.

Speaker 5 (15:25):
People once they started, you know, going through the cast
and processes, bought Ganzi on Amazon. So like almost almost
every group had someone who had practiced Ganzi at home before,
and so like I almost going to throw about someone
who was able to fly through it ended up being
House of Cards ended up being the difficult ones because
no one thought House of Cards would be in there.
And House of Cards is like something that looks easy

(15:47):
on the outside, but when you're like, the cards are
like so thin, they fall over so easily. But also
if you're if you have any kind of anxiety in
that moment and you're heavy breathing, the slightest breath can
knock your tower over. That's what happened to me. I
had House of Cards, I got it set up. They
have a stand up for three seconds. One second instant
my tower standing up, I breathed too heavily and then

(16:09):
knocked them over. It was insane. It made me so upset.
I'm like, okay, I'm dead. I'm dead.

Speaker 4 (16:15):
Yea.

Speaker 6 (16:17):
I figured Gongghe would still be in it going into
the show. I never practiced it. I saw the game,
I knew the rules. I said to myself, I was like,
you know what if I'm if I make it to Cataplon,
I was like, I'm gonna do it no matter what,
because I'm not gonna trust someone who never did it.
And I was like, at least if I do it
and lose, I could say I lost because of me.

(16:38):
But then when our team was forming up me, Matt, Zoe, Katie,
and Lizzie, Lizzy was like, I've been I've been practicing this.
I've been practicing this for months. So I was like,
I was like, you know what, Like that's a sign.
Like she kind of her and Zoe came to our
team very late in the white room. We were like
scrambling for two more people and she was just like,
I got this, and I was like, you know what.

(16:59):
I was like that that's a sign. Let that happen,
and then pretty much I was the last one to pick.
I was just like what everyone else comfortable with. Katie
was like, I could do ball the Cup. Matt was like,
I could do flying Stone. I remember telling him. I
was like, you guys got a first try. You have
to do it first try. We had to get a
big lead. And they both did it first try. So
we had that nice lead and then all of a

(17:20):
sudden they come back, but the backtrack a little bit.
I was like, I'll do I could do Jaggie. I
could just you know, played sports my whole life. I'm
not a big hacky sack guy, which is like similar,
I guess, but I was like, I could do it.
But I had a feeling Ganji was gonna be still
in it and later on, now that we know, when
the show came out, Catatlon took two days to film,

(17:41):
and I think Ganji was a big reason. Like I'm
hearing some people, it took like over an hour to
complete that. So that was definitely, you know, the House
of Cards was definitely tough. But I don't know if
you never played Ganji. Like I'm playing I'm playing out
of work with some guys at my fire house and
They're just like, who did this?

Speaker 4 (17:58):
How did they do this? And like, sit, that's not possible,
and it's a game.

Speaker 2 (18:02):
Yeah, Like the one thing that probably wants Nick today
is the words that come out of my mouth, which
which is what is it? I didn't know any games
going in there. I watched the show once. I don't
know about anything what we're playing. Every time I went
into a white room with Nick, I'm like, what is it?
What is it? You hit me on the show. They
must have said it to me. I'm you hear me
saying it about ten or twelve times. What is it?

(18:23):
What is it? Nick's like, should get shut up already?
I'm like, dude, I don't know what it is.

Speaker 9 (18:26):
But you know when you was it was probably going
in for I think, well maybe I don't know, yeah,
whatever game it was, but like it was, we were
in the in the we were in the show enough
at this point where like it was like an accelerated
friendship and he's like, what's this mean?

Speaker 4 (18:42):
What does you mean? And I just turned the mat.
I was like, Matt, I.

Speaker 6 (18:45):
Didn't write this show. I'm seeing this for the first time.
I was like, I don't know. Stop asking me. Like,
but that was like our band, Like, you know, I
didn't you know, I love this game. So it's just like,
you know, when you just stuck in those type quotas
all day, you just like if I hear him say
what is it?

Speaker 4 (18:58):
One more time, it's like I'm gonna.

Speaker 2 (19:00):
H you got annoy people once in a while. I mean, look,
the stone wasn't easy too. On camera it looks a
lot closer, but it's about fifteen feet. August will tell
you the numbers. He's done a numbers guy. About fifteen
feet and it's a diangle. It's to the right, so
you know it's not easy. But this stone is long.
So what I did is I flipped the stone this
way so that it was in length this way, and
that's how I held it when I threw it. Now
you know we're playing this game. I'm sure someone like

(19:22):
Dan from the outside have to watching it. You got
to be like you want to be back in those
games right there, and you have to be like they
look a lot more fun than you, guys. What you
guys had.

Speaker 7 (19:31):
Listen, I'll tell you every episode when they play the
wake up song, which is by the way, still my
alarm clock and still my ring tone it will always be.
I was like my inside, it was like a visceral response.
When I'm watching the Dorm and I'm watching you guys
go through this and watching you guys get upset when
you're losing people like it, I felt like I was
back there again. So that's I think production did a

(19:54):
good job because I literally felt when people were going home,
I'm like, oh man, that reminded me so much of
when Doc and Steven went home, or or when I
beat Marcus, and like, it was so surreal to watch
you guys play man and know, like, as a fan
and Augie, I'm a way bigger Survivor fan than you,
will challenge you. We'll talk about this later.

Speaker 2 (20:13):
I don't know about that game, Dan Dan.

Speaker 8 (20:19):
A year since two thousand and one, every year since
two thousand and one, I've watched every episode of every
season ten times anyway, But to watch you guys go
through it, and as a fan who's never played, wow,
that's really cool.

Speaker 2 (20:32):
Wow, look how sad?

Speaker 7 (20:33):
No, but if you actually did it and you can
feel those same emotions that you guys were feeling and
knowing how gutting and how horrible it was to leave
that game. I knew what every one of you was feeling,
so I felt it every single time.

Speaker 4 (20:47):
I must saying that.

Speaker 6 (20:48):
I'm seeing that a lot now on social media, Like
people are obviously posting about the show and they're.

Speaker 4 (20:51):
Just like everyone's crying, and I'll do an listen. I
was that guy I was leaving for London.

Speaker 6 (20:57):
I was like, listen, my mother could show up and
I'm voting her out to win this money.

Speaker 4 (21:02):
But it really is until you get there.

Speaker 6 (21:04):
Like you start, it's it's the whole you know, trauma
blinding thing where like you become friends with these people
at like an accelerated pace. And there was a time,
and I will say this, I was never gonna do
it because I still stuck my guns, but I was like,
what if I just sacrificed myself in this game?

Speaker 4 (21:18):
Like I like these people.

Speaker 6 (21:20):
Like sometimes you hear these stories like no one is
above my kids, my wife, my family. But you hear
some of these stories and you're just like, oh, man,
like you know, I got a pretty I got a
pretty good life.

Speaker 4 (21:32):
You know.

Speaker 6 (21:32):
Would it be nice to have for million, of course,
but would it be a lot nicer for this person
in their story to have the for million you talk
thinking like that, and like you don't think you're gonna
think like that going into it, but it's it's real,
like you just something something changes in there when you're
stuck in a room with two hundred three hundred people
for you know, one two weeks. It's just it's unless

(21:55):
you unless you do it, you can't explain it.

Speaker 3 (21:57):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (21:59):
Absolutely, I want to dive into some of the twists
that they had on this season because what I enjoy
is nothing was like season one. They had the scratch offs,
they brought in the boiler room. Let's start there. What
were you all thoughts on that?

Speaker 2 (22:14):
Yeah, so.

Speaker 3 (22:16):
The sprats offs there was something they kind of cut out.

Speaker 5 (22:18):
I'm a big fan of gambling, and that may sound bad,
but I went to college in Oklahoma.

Speaker 3 (22:23):
In Oklahoma, the minimum aids to go to the casinos eighteen.

Speaker 5 (22:27):
So the moment, you know, I get to college, I'm
going to casinos like every other weekend. You know, I
joined a fraternity my you know, you know fraternity guys
the casinos. We love it, right, So I'm going to
the casino every other weekend, always gambling.

Speaker 3 (22:39):
I've always been lucky. You know.

Speaker 5 (22:41):
One time I said you know what I need, you know,
like a lot of money for the weekend. Let me
buy a scratch off. I won like two hundred dollars
off of it, simply because I was like, I feel
lucky about this one. So when it came to the
sprats off and the bread, I was this close to
picking the sprats off and actually Sam, the girl with
pink hair, so and I were super close. We go
up there and I'm like, I'm always lucky, and she

(23:03):
goes but I'm always lucky, and we're like, okay.

Speaker 3 (23:05):
Well, only one of us can be lucky.

Speaker 5 (23:07):
And so we came to the conclusion that only one
of us can actually stay in the line and get
a lottery ticket. So I put one on one hand
and then two fingers on the other hand, and I
had to mount my back so she couldn't tell, and
I had her pick a hand. If she picked the one,
I would say and do the lottery. She would get food.
If she picked the two, she would say and do
the lottery, and I would get food. And I said,

(23:29):
we're both lucky. Only one of us can be lucky.
You don't know what's hand as what's number? Pick a
hand whatever that hand is is what you and I
will do. One of us will get lottery, one of
us will get bread, and we'll go from there. So
she ended up picking the right hand where she stayed
and did the lottery, and then I stayed and did
the bread. And I'm like, okay, well, something really good's
gonna happen to you, something really bad's gonna happen to me.

Speaker 3 (23:50):
But that's okay.

Speaker 5 (23:51):
But ended up being the opposite because the next game
was catch and I ended up being able to skip
the game, but she ended up having a disadvantage in
the game.

Speaker 3 (23:58):
So I ended up being lucky. Anyways, Yeah, and.

Speaker 2 (24:03):
Then the vending machine in the boiler room that was
that was just like mouth ordering. Everybody saw a vending machine.
It had snacks, but they threw it through it to
a twist. Some people looking for ten coins to go
and get snacks and share it with their alliances. But
then someone like Ashley Natalie sorry Natalie, goes inside and
they tell her, you know, you can't get a snack,

(24:23):
you have to eliminate somebody. So look, they always have
some type of twist they're gonna and I think it's
all who who picks, who gets who gets that little doll.
If it's somebody else, maybe they turn the scenario around
to something totally different. They gave it to Natalie. Natalie
went in there and she had a certain type of
character they were making, I guess portraying her to be,
and she ended up getting stuck with, you know, a

(24:44):
short end of the stick where she had to boat
somebody off.

Speaker 7 (24:46):
So I have a question about the coins what I
thought there was gonna be once they introduced that.

Speaker 3 (24:51):
I'm like, Wow, this is really cool.

Speaker 7 (24:53):
It reminds me of Survivor, right, you know? So did
they do was there more going on with the coins
that they never showed becau? I would have loved to
have seen more people getting coins, having to do things
to get coins, eliminating people like what was the deal
with the coins?

Speaker 4 (25:07):
There were?

Speaker 6 (25:08):
But I feel like when they first introduced the coin,
we were like, this is gonna be a big part
of the show. This is gonna be coins all over
the dorm people are, people are searching in pillowcases under
the mattress.

Speaker 4 (25:19):
It never went that way.

Speaker 6 (25:21):
People would people would either do chores and get a
coin and they wouldn't tell you about it. So I'm sure,
like that happened a bunch, but then some people say,
like I just cleaned three hundred guards boots and like
they gave us a coin, but like it was never
it wasn't as big as we thought it was gonna be.
Like we thought ten coins would be flying all over
the place, and like elimination elimination, it didn't go it

(25:43):
didn't go that far. One thing I will say, you know,
we're gonna jump forward a little bit. The episode, uh,
Surcle of Trust, Vanessa when she got selected to go
through the doors of Slide and Ladders, she got a
ten coin for that, and they don't really show that
in the show. So she had that ten coin during
Circle of Trust, which is why she says no one

(26:04):
really put a box on her desk because they didn't
know what that meant, like if she can use the
ten coin back on somebody, So they kind of cut
that out. I'm sure they cut.

Speaker 2 (26:13):
Out told everybody about the coin. Yeah, she's totally interviewed.

Speaker 4 (26:16):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, show it obviously.

Speaker 6 (26:19):
But I guess I guess they picked and shoot, Like
I guess maybe like she could have used it and
like they would have went another way with the story.

Speaker 4 (26:26):
But like she ended up pulling onto it. But the
same thing, like there was probably people.

Speaker 6 (26:30):
In there that were like poarding some coins, and like
we didn't know about it, but we thought it was
gonna be that.

Speaker 4 (26:34):
I thought it was gonna be a bigger part of
the shelf. But we didn't really come to fruition with that.

Speaker 2 (26:38):
So now went behind the scene things that I'll tell
you guys about. First time, I'm saying it the nesting doll.
You guys remember the nesting doll?

Speaker 4 (26:46):
Oh yeah, so I found it.

Speaker 2 (26:48):
Yeah, So Nick woke up, he found it. I ended
up doing in that morning, and I came back and
I missed out on grabbing it the first time. I
didn't understand the rules. A lot of people didn't understand
what the rules were. It was opened up on the
first time and august Austin got it, and it was
a disadvantage. I immediately took it and I opened it up.
I thought you could once you hear these sounds or

(27:09):
the music, you could just start opening it. I thought
you could open up the second one right away. That's
what my instinct was telling me. When I opened it up,
it was a ten coin, so I'm thinking, oh man,
I'm gonna buy snaps from me and ten nine of
the people, and you know, uh, you know, I'm gonna
look good. You know, it's gonna help me. Uh. They
came out and said, look, that's not what we want
you to do. So they took the nesting doll back
and they changed what was going to be inside. And

(27:31):
after that, I just left it alone.

Speaker 6 (27:32):
You know slify when he says he opened it, he
savagely ripped this thing opened. The thing flew all over,
thirty dollars fell out of.

Speaker 4 (27:40):
It, and they they ended up taking the doll back
at least for like an hour or two.

Speaker 2 (27:45):
Like it was just like they had to change it.

Speaker 4 (27:46):
They had to change everything.

Speaker 6 (27:47):
And then it came back and they then they explained
the rules, but like to his uh you know what
he was saying, they didn't explain it when it first
came out.

Speaker 4 (27:56):
Yeah, it then opened me so like the first person,
which was awesome.

Speaker 2 (28:01):
Then like Lucas really wanted it, but then all of
a sudden he had to move about, so he went
into the bathroom.

Speaker 5 (28:07):
He comes back and then he changed his mind again.
So about the doll, I tried, they cut this everything out.
I tried every time trying to get the doll, and
every time something came up. When Austin got the doll
and he gave it to I think, who did you
give it to? Was it Greg or was it right?

Speaker 2 (28:26):
Yeah?

Speaker 5 (28:27):
When when he gave it to Greg, I was I
was off doing something. But Greg and I talked and
I was like, I want it, So he told me
to give it to me if I came up and
found him. When it was Greg's tarting to give it away,
I was talky over to him, but then someone pulled
me aside because they heard I had a little crush
on someone in the dorms, so Dmitri and Emily pulled
me over to talk to me about that. Naturally, I

(28:47):
got over excited about my little dorm crush, so I
ended up spending fifteen minutes talking about that. But we
were deep in the bunk beds, so Greg didn't find me,
so he gave it to someone else. They gave it
to h I think Isaiah was next, and then I
say it Isaiah and I talked. Isaiah promised me he'd
give me the doll. Melissa one ten kept on talking
to him, trying to convince him and give me the doll,

(29:09):
and he said he would give me the doll, but
then I was in the bathroom. Then the music went
off and he gave it to Natalie when I was
in the bathroom. So I was so upset. And then
Natalie is one of my number one allies. I tried
all day trying to convince her to give me the doll,
but she goes no, I have a bad feeling about
this doll. I don't want to be the reason to
go home. So despite me begging for the dolls, she
gives it to Shelley. So I'm like, okay, well let

(29:30):
me try again. So I'm talking to Shelley. I convinced
sheoli to give me the doll. Sholey actually gives me
the doll, and I think Matt can.

Speaker 3 (29:36):
Attest to this. Shelley gave me the doll before she
gave it to Matt.

Speaker 5 (29:39):
But then I got a bad feeling and even though
I was breaking the rules, I was beginning to open
the doll and I go wait, I think this is
the last doll. So I close the doll give it
back to her and I'm like, I can't take this.
I'm sorry, Shelley. I know I promised to you, I
can't take this. Lizzy goes give it a ninety eight.
I'm like, yeah, there, and that's that's why I on

(30:02):
the show. You see me up there with Kelley kind
of all in Matt's face, and I'm like, take it,
take it, take it, take it. You hear me saying
take it, take it, take it, take it, because production
actually like came over the microphone going players over her
mind and that if you're handed the doll, you can't
refuse it. So in my mind, I'm like, ninety eight, Matt,
I need you to take it. I need you to
take it. Otherwise I'm gonna be forced to take it.

(30:22):
And I mean, I'm Matt can kind of test that,
you know, Production O, hey, yeah.

Speaker 2 (30:27):
You know it is what it is. What am I
gonna do? I'm gonna get put in the boiler room
to say that he broke the rules, and then they're
gonna go out and switch us that I'd be a
dead duck. So it's God, the God. It was intended
for me and I had I had the right number
in minds and it worked out. Survivor guy, there's no
you don't do a showmance man.

Speaker 5 (30:43):
Come on, show man, I just had like a little
dorm press on some like from Ireland and it was
the accident.

Speaker 3 (30:52):
I was like, oh my god. I was like I
was in love.

Speaker 7 (30:57):
But I got a question for you guys. So Matt
brought up in he went for a mive. Did they
change the way they did the mives? Because in my
season certain people were getting pulled out blatantly in front
of everyone. And if you think I wasn't watching who
was getting pulled out, you know, that's to me that
kind of handcuffed somebody's games. Steven the mullet guy in

(31:19):
my season, he must have gone for four million moves
every day and I'm like, well, I know I'm gonna
stay next to this guy because he's gonna be part
of the show. Also, that put a target on him
with other people, and if I was against him, he
would have been my first choice to go if I
had a chance, because obviously this guy he may have
gotten an advantage while he's out there.

Speaker 2 (31:38):
I don't know what's going on.

Speaker 7 (31:39):
Did they try to kind of hide the way people
were going for mives or just ripped you right out
in front of everybody.

Speaker 2 (31:44):
Again, they think.

Speaker 6 (31:45):
They were I think they were doing pretty much the same.
But I think this time, from my point of view,
I could be wrong. I think they were covering it
up a lot with like we're gonna go take a break,
like we're gonna go outside. So and then that turned
into like, you know, you see them come back three
hours later.

Speaker 4 (31:59):
You're not talking three hours and they were like, uh yeah,
we're like fucking lie, like you were doing mives or whatever.

Speaker 6 (32:05):
Myself, we knew like when people left, we were like,
I haven't seen you in two hours. We were like,
all right, this guys, you know, he's the storyline, he's
the star or whatever.

Speaker 3 (32:14):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (32:15):
I was pulled out two or three times a day,
like every day, and it would always be with a
group of people, you know, having fun, and then you know,
a producer would come in and be like, uh, player one,
one one, we need you to come with us right now,
and I'm like, oh god. And so they pulled me out.
And every single time i'd come back, whoever I was
with was waiting. They were eyeing the door like a hawk.

(32:35):
So the moment I came back in, they immediately like
pulled me over, like what did they ask you about?
What did you talk about? Like, well, what was like,
you know, you clearly did a move. What was the
topic of the mid Because they thought that by me
doing a move, I would have more information, you know,
they thought that they would be asking me questions I'd
alluded to what's next or what's going on? So they
thought I would be able to help their game by

(32:57):
being given information through a move. And I'm like, I'm like,
Gody just asked me why I'm trying, Like like they
were asking me who. They asked me about my dorm
fresh they asked me why I'm trying. I'm like, I
don't have any extra information. But I definitely felt like
I had a target on my back because like when
they pull you out as many times a day as
they did some people, it's like people notice that. You know,

(33:17):
when you're gone, People notice you're gone. Especially as the
numbers go smaller, it's so easy to pick up when
someone's gone, you know, like going in a mingle, there
was only seventy four people left or seventy teen people left,
and on that day, like when they're pulling people out,
you see like, oh, this person's clearly going to you
a myth. Something's going on with them. You know it

(33:38):
made me feel like people were watching me. It made
me paranoid. I'm like, oh God, people are going to
come after me.

Speaker 2 (33:43):
Now.

Speaker 1 (33:45):
You have to be watching though, That's what it is.
If you're aware of what's going on, you know that
person's going to be shown.

Speaker 2 (33:50):
All right.

Speaker 1 (33:51):
I need to link up with them a little bit
here and there, but I want to dive in to
catch real quick, because we have some worthy moments here,
especially with you, Matthew. I mean, by golly, and I
know people say this, They're like, why is he screaming everybody?
I would have done the same thing too. I would
have been so pissed off, like you are completely in

(34:12):
the right there, You're getting screwed over. Just throw me
the damn ball. I'm right there.

Speaker 6 (34:16):
I want to say I'll say two things about Katherine
matt So one thing is a generality of Matt, not
just catch. We're from New York, specifically we're from Brooklyn.
We have a way of talking. Matt is a little
bit more like aggressive. But I always say I'm trying
to tell people this, especially like after the show, I
was like a passionate New Yorker comes off as like

(34:39):
an aggressive Midwesterner and like if you don't understand that,
like you're like this guy's aggressive, he's rude and stuff
like that, but he's just passionate.

Speaker 4 (34:47):
So he was there too. You know.

Speaker 6 (34:49):
We came up with that plan to uh, which ended
up working out. But when it was I forget which
twin it was Jacob Barrowell. When he was deciding not
to throw the mat, I kind of get where he
was coming from, Like, you guys are falling, You're still
going to be there. But what people don't really, what
people weren't thinking about is we made that line specifically

(35:10):
because we trusted the person in front of us to throw,
and we trusted the person and back of us to
catch it. If you now leave that line, which was
what Matt was getting all hyped up about, we might
not get a catch for another two hours, and I
may get a catch from someone thirty four feet further
that doesn't have to throw a ball, and now I'm
out because they couldn't throw a ball. So Matten was

(35:32):
totally right in that decision to kind of like go
after him a little bit. But yeah, that was our
plan ended up working out, which is fine, But then
definitely the twins on the back after that.

Speaker 3 (35:44):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (35:44):
So the bottom line is, look, when you go into
a game like this, and this is the first time
I'm telling him my how my mind works, and it
can be complicated, but it's I think it's beyond this future,
and I'm glad I'm doing it for the first time
with someone like Dan, because Dan is the man, and
he is the one that as the seasons go on,
he's gonna be the coordinator, he's gonna be the main guy.
So it's important for me to say the story through

(36:06):
the eyes of me and how my mind took it in. Right,
So you want to stay quiet when you're go in
this game. You want to be so quiet you can
hear a pin drop. You want to make it all
the way to the end. Right, something happened with me
and Nick right, and August can can testify to this.
We're in the white room. We're sitting down for hours
and filming is going on. We're not allowed to use

(36:27):
the bathroom, any comfort, bathroom breaks, We're not allowed to move,
don't talk, and as time's going by, we have the
guards standing up and their knees are locked. Okay, if
you're any ardent guard member, anybody in the military, for
a law enforcement will tell you if you're standing out
of attention for too long and your knees are locked,
your blood circulate gets cut off and you fall, You

(36:48):
pass out, you hit the ground. There was a lot
of commotion and I looked up. All the way in
the front of the room. There was a guard starting
to move around like this, right looked like he was
gonna pass out. I looked up and nobody was moving,
and I saw him raise his hands. My initial thought,
being a first responder, is to get up and help.
As soon as I got up and started running, Nick

(37:10):
did the same thing, and literally we caught him before
he fell down, and we gave him first aid. We
gave him a drink. You know. We did what we
had to do. And not to just mention that story,
just to mention the story, but when we turned around,
everybody saw my number. Everybody saw a Nick's number, and
they gave us a little bit of around the applause,
but the harm was done. They saw our number. They

(37:31):
know who we were. You know, So going into the
game of catch, I obviously still want to try to
redeem myself and keep quiet, but that's not who I am.
It's not my nature. We went in a huddle together,
we formed a team, and we came out with this
plan that we were going to put the good people
in the front, the very good people in the middle,

(37:51):
and the worst people in the back, and we were
going to throw it to each other until we got
to the worst part, and we were gonna cut that
line off, give the ball to another side, and let
them use all the bulls until the bulls are gone,
and hopefully save out people that were in the back
out of nowhere, you know, oh, play four three one.

(38:12):
As he's getting to go, he starts saying, mate, I
gotta throw it to somebody else, And in my mind,
I'm thinking, oh no, oh no, there's no way he's
doing this to me. What do you mean? What do
you mean? We're four feet away, I know, but the
person's right next to me. I'm like, dude, are you
kidding me? And it's getting me and the worst. It's
getting worse because not only am I in Life TV,
everybody in there has no idea what's going on except

(38:33):
for my team mallons are not gonna understand it. And
I started to get a little harsh. I'm like, dude,
are you kidding me. You made a plan, you have
to stick with the plan, and I have to explain
myself to him. And after realizing that it's not being
timed as I talked to him, I started to come
down off my high and I'm like, look, let me
just explain it to you. And I tried to explain

(38:54):
it to the best I could, and eventually he finally
got it and he was like, all right, I'm gonna
throw you the ball. So in my mind I felt
like I did the right thing. Like you know, for me,
I want to I want my family to have a
better life. I want the four point five to six
million dollars. I don't want that being that bull being
thrown by someone like Dalton where he has no idea
where he's throwing a bull. So I got a little harsh,

(39:17):
you know, and we're good buddies now. I hold nothing
against anybody. Of course, it's a big game changer for
me because it put a big target on my back.
If I stay quiet the rest of the way, I
feel like it's cream cheese, and I think I would
have really made the top ten. But it was a
big pivotal point for me and to change my game.

Speaker 7 (39:37):
If you don't make that, if you don't stand up
right there though, who knows how the rest of that
game goes.

Speaker 2 (39:42):
That changed the entire game.

Speaker 7 (39:44):
Could have been bad too, but it wasn't.

Speaker 3 (39:45):
It was good.

Speaker 7 (39:46):
So if you don't do that and step up right there,
you're you never know every every decision, August you can
you can swear to this from a Survivor fan. Every
decision builds on what happens the rest of the time.
And if you don't make that move, dude, who knows
how the rest of that game goes.

Speaker 2 (40:01):
Yeah, So, I mean I I I feel like if
I had to do it again, and this is just
the honest answer. Even if I knew what the results
were going to be, me being eliminated, it's just my
nature to stand up for myself and my team, and
I just felt like it had to be done. And
then no time limit.

Speaker 7 (40:18):
There was no time placed on the public to make
a decision.

Speaker 3 (40:21):
There, you guys must have been there every Yeah.

Speaker 2 (40:26):
No time limit. The only rules wall is keep your
foot in the circle until you release the ball and
don't catch the ball and until the balls released.

Speaker 7 (40:33):
So the catcher obviously was I don't know they should
have to make it harder. The catcher should have had
to have a foot on their circle.

Speaker 2 (40:39):
The whole time. But I saw they were allowed to
run fifteen feet to catch the ball.

Speaker 6 (40:43):
Yeah, you weren't allowed to leave yours. As a thrower,
you always had to have at least one foot in
the circle. As the catcher, you had to be in
the circle at least one foot until the ball was
in flight. Gotcha, I think, you know, so when they
when our team went, you'll say, obviously they started playing
that's all easy street because I I'll throw and catch
and throw and catch, and we were doing with wit ease.

(41:05):
I think if they if they made that rule you
had to stay in your circle to catch, I don't
think that game would have been as half as long
as it was, because there was there were some bad throws,
but the ability to leave your circle and go catch it,
like especially for the long throws like we were. You know,
we were helping people too, like me, me and Matt.
We were like one of the first six to go,
So we were on the bench for we probably had

(41:26):
three hours.

Speaker 4 (41:26):
Like in the life.

Speaker 6 (41:28):
We were telling people like if you're not confident, we
were like, just toss it. As high as you can,
and then the person catching just run, like, just run
to it, like it doesn't have to be this home
run throw or anything like that, Like you.

Speaker 4 (41:38):
Can run to like a high arc ball. So we
were the most body.

Speaker 2 (41:42):
The most important thing about outline that you guys don't
know is that four three one and four three two
ral own Jacob. They put themselves in the front of
the line and the first circle, and at the last
minute somebody turned around and said, you know, Vanessa was
standing behind me zero one seven, and they said, just
let Vanessa go first. She's you know, she's a female.
Let her go first. It might be more diff And
we put it first, and they said the way they

(42:03):
were going to determine who gets the ball first is
probably whoever has the lowest number on the circle, and
Vanessa had zero one seven, so we got to have
the bull first.

Speaker 1 (42:13):
Yeh see a huge advantage right there. I mean, you
want the ball first because you want to be confident
with who is throwing you the ball. And that's exactly
where I even made the point. But the whole viper
situation of it all, don should one viper to throw
him the ball, because viper is capable of doing that.
You don't know who else is going to be going
next to be throwing the ball, and that entire situation
just pissed me off in general.

Speaker 6 (42:34):
And how John Py picked Viper the most dramatic throw
is we didn't know what was happening at the time,
but when we got back to the dorm, I remember
turning to people. I was just like, I was like,
I can totally understand why. People were like, oh, this
is scripted and they made it, but it like we've
watched it all happen live. I mean some of them throws,
some of the people were sliding catching it. Bop the
kid Tommy went to four, he bobbed it when walks

(42:55):
through it to him, I was like, you could almost
only write this, but like we were watching happened live,
and I was just like, no one's gonna believe, Like
no one gave us any direction, but like like you know,
they came in to tell us the rules, but then
once they stopped filming, that was all us.

Speaker 4 (43:08):
Like no one told us.

Speaker 6 (43:09):
How to catch, no one told us how to you know, throw,
And then like I said, John p picking Piper, which
was the most dramatic one, like.

Speaker 4 (43:16):
That they did.

Speaker 6 (43:17):
That throw with Viper wasn't edited to be dramatic. That
was dramatic. It was happening. We were like, and they
cut it out. They cut out a lot of that too,
because uh, there was a lot of back and forth
with Dalton and the benches because you know, screaming back
and forth in some name calling. I think they edited
it right for his sake, because it got kind of
nasty that like, yeah, i'd be I'd be the same

(43:38):
way I told media like this is this is scripted,
and like they may seem to know that we walked
it all the down and the.

Speaker 2 (43:43):
Only thing that that we couldn't we couldn't do, and
a lot of people at home the vieways don't understand
that is we had to catch you with our hands.
You couldn't use your chest.

Speaker 4 (43:51):
Yeah.

Speaker 7 (43:52):
I know you said you played baseball, mat I played
minor league baseball, and you all three of you were athletes.
I would have I would have had no like, I
would have loved that game, like you guys were probably like,
I don't care if I'll be last throwing I could again,
but I will tell you this, it was scary because
we didn't know the bulls we were getting so we
were like, what if the bulls get big?

Speaker 2 (44:11):
Or as we go along, so your mind you stopped
playing tricks on you.

Speaker 6 (44:16):
And then once finally, like Matt said, once the tennis
balls came in, I was like, I'm in the dorm.

Speaker 4 (44:21):
I'm good.

Speaker 6 (44:22):
That was like here anything sports related for me, especially
like baseball, tennis, you know whatever. I was like, this
was like it was a blessing. I was like, I
wasn't even concerned. I was like, I'm already back in
the dorm. I was like, I'm good. So you know,
like you said, let me.

Speaker 2 (44:35):
Tell you something, August. August is smart in this sense.
He knows that really players are not going to be
eliminated for no reason whatsoever. So August not picking a
circle and playing in that game, he knew he's a mastermind.

Speaker 4 (44:46):
He knew.

Speaker 2 (44:47):
He was like, they're not just gonna send me home.
So August, I mean, you played it smart by not,
you know, not putting on a circle.

Speaker 3 (44:53):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (44:53):
So like once we get into the white room, you know,
I really count the dots. I'm like, okay, three people
are gonna be left over, you know, I'm like the
way squid game works is you get eliminated either by
failing a game or by someone else phoning you out.
No one ever gets eliminated just randomly before a game begins.
So I'm like, three people are gonna be left out,
but they're not gonna be eliminated, and something my gut

(45:14):
told me to stand in the middle. I was the
first one to go, I'm staying in the middle. I'm
putting my foot down. I'm not gonna pick a dot.
I'm gonna be here in the middle. I can convinced
Jaunty to stand in the middle with me, and then
after a while we got Heath to be number three.
And my god, I'm like, we're not gonna be eliminated.
But we ended up standing in the middle for like
over half an hour. You know, they're getting camera angles

(45:35):
from every angle, they're getting cameras from above us, they're
getting someone coming in filming us up close. So we
spend like half an hour in the middle. Everyone's on
their dots. You hear people whispering, Oh they're dead. Oh
they're so cooked. They're gonna get eliminated. And then this
doubt begins to creep in because you hear people whispering
who you get just in the middle.

Speaker 3 (45:52):
You can't do anything.

Speaker 5 (45:53):
But then they say to you, guys pass and they're like, hell, yeah,
you know I made the right decision. We don't have
to play the game. But then they come and they
but you have to pick someone. And here's the thing.
We didn't know what the game was. The moment the
last person left the room, the moment the door closed
on the board, everyone's faces pop up and they're like, yo,
what the hell is going on? And then then say

(46:13):
you have to pick someone to play on your behalf.
If they get eliminated, you're eliminated. If they pass, you're safe.
We don't know what the game is. We don't know
how the game is going to work. We don't know
exactly what the rules are. We just know that we
have to pick someone represents blindly, and that's all we
have to go off of. That's why that's why Auntie
picked Viper. We're all like, is strategic, athletic, and social.

(46:38):
He has every single part covered. If it's a stratesic game,
Vibry's gonna get it. If it's an athletic game, Vibry's
gonna get it. If it's socially related, Vibru's gonna get its.
Auntie picked Viper. I picked four to three seven in
Karim because I thought Karim was going. You know, people
told me Karam has been trying to get me out.
People told me the last couple of days, Karam has
been bad talking me. Karam has been going after me,

(47:00):
trying to like get me eliminated. Like well, that shows
me that he's a bit of a snake and that
he's gonna do whatever it takes to survive. So I'm like, Karim,
well do whatever it takes to survive, no matter who.

Speaker 3 (47:11):
It's free.

Speaker 5 (47:12):
But that's exactly the kind of player I need to
represent me, So I knowefully.

Speaker 1 (47:21):
Definitely that's a smart way to go. You have to
pick who you think in that moment, because, as you said,
you don't know what the game is. You're going with
your gut instinct of what you've seen thus far in
the game. But I do want to dive into Mingle because,
by golly, I think people were very excited to play
this one and then oh boy, we're not so excited
anymore once the game goes on.

Speaker 4 (47:40):
Yeah now we.

Speaker 6 (47:43):
Yeah, we all walked in and we so walking into
the game we're all like, is it Mingle?

Speaker 4 (47:48):
Is it something else?

Speaker 6 (47:49):
And then Matt and Augus will remember like I remember,
we looked up and we saw the lights going off
and we saw smoke coming, and so we were like,
it's Mingle and we walk in and it's in this
ghost Hermy said too, especially Mingle, it is like it's
not even like oh, like the shade of color on
the curtains a little off.

Speaker 4 (48:06):
Like it was like you were in the show.

Speaker 6 (48:08):
And for me, throughout the whole the whole show, I
really I didn't take all his risks.

Speaker 4 (48:15):
Like like all I said, like I know you weren't
gonna get eliminated for like sitting on a.

Speaker 6 (48:19):
Game, but like I wanted to win the whole thing,
but I also wanted to experience the whole thing, so
like the.

Speaker 4 (48:24):
Whole like community from Mingle.

Speaker 6 (48:25):
I was happy I didn't get that because I wanted
to play it like like I always say it, like
it's it's funny to think like take away the actual
drama like that was obviously scripted.

Speaker 4 (48:35):
I was like, there's only seventy two of us.

Speaker 6 (48:37):
In the whole world that could say we played Mingle
like no scripts, just straight up Mingles, I got a
little aggressive where they had to not the show too
because people were, you know, getting a little too physical.

Speaker 4 (48:49):
But those sets were those sets were unbelievable. Mingle was.

Speaker 6 (48:52):
And then honestly too, I keep hearing about people reaching out.
They were like I was on the edge of my seat.
I had so much anxiety, and I was like, coming
from us that we were in the game, I was
like that was toned down a lot, like it was
worse than that.

Speaker 2 (49:06):
Yeah, ming it was no joke, let me tell you that.
And to just fast forward into Mingle. And there was
a time where we were going to get eliminated, and
August was in the room with us, and the time
was going down. I remember looking at the time. There
was twenty two seconds left, and August made a conscious decision.
He looked at all of us, and at that time
he already knew us personally, he knew our family, he

(49:28):
knew why we were there and how much the money
would mean to us, and he said something about each
one of us, and then he made the ultimate sacrifice
and he said, I'm going to step out, you guys.
The money's more points to you guys. And if it
wasn't for him, a lot of us would have been out,
So August, I still commend you for that, buddy.

Speaker 4 (49:46):
Yeah, it was.

Speaker 5 (49:47):
You know, people always ask me if I regret stepping out,
and I will never regret stepping out because I knew
everyone very personally. I mean, A and Daza and I
had been super close since day one. You know, like
Natalie was like one of my best friends. In the
show faith my hands get dry so easily, so like
every day my hands were cracked and bleeding. Faith In

(50:09):
and check on me this season, nurse and but like
what like chapstick on my hands, make sure I'm okay.

Speaker 3 (50:15):
You know.

Speaker 5 (50:16):
I talked to Matt, I talked to Nick, I talked
to Kevin, talk to Steve. I know, you know, I
knew all about their families, and I'm like, I'm twenty four.
If I win the money, I'm probably gonna blow it
on like casinos or parties or whatnot. And as well
as I I mean, at the time, I was working
two jobs. You know, I still work two jobs, but
at the time, I was working sixty five to seventy

(50:37):
hours a week every week just to get by, right,
and I'm young, so it's not that hard. For me
to do that. But in my mind, I'm like, man,
it would be nice if I have to work all
the time. You know, I had a social life. I
could barely see my family. I'd get a paycheck and
it was gone the next week because of bills, and
so that's one of the reason I went in. But I'm like,

(50:57):
but also knowing me, I would spend a lot of
money on like the partying lifestyle that I like to do.
But all these people in the room had families relying
on them. They had kids, or they had kids coming,
you know, they had parents to take care of. And
I'm like, I have no one at home that relies
on me the way people relied on people in this room.
And if I stay in the room, I'm dead. We
all get eliminated. If I leave the room, I'm dead.

(51:19):
Either way, I'm dead. But I love reality TV. I
can really get someone and go This person is made
for reality TV. This person has what it takes to
go far. So I'm like, if I step out now,
I'm dead either way. But if I step out now,
it's going to give these people a chance to keep fighting,
to go further in the game, and maybe someone who

(51:39):
really needs money. But you know, someone who's got kids
that did take care of, someone who's got parents to
take care of, they can you know, really use the money.

Speaker 3 (51:47):
I said, you know, and look at our room.

Speaker 6 (51:49):
My room had we had Asia the circle of trust.
That was Steve Steve, So we had we had three
people in circle of trust. And now two of them
that were in our Mingo room are in the final five. Yeah,
and that's what I'm sorry three, but that's our room.
Our room was full of final ten times.

Speaker 2 (52:09):
Yeah. Look Duram Mingo, me and Nick being from New
York and when we're probably not number of guys right,
people are calling numbers out there, going to different circles
and saying I have nine, you have seven, if eight,
will give you one. When you heard the class and
sounds whatever you guys just talked about is out the window,
they start running trampling over people.

Speaker 6 (52:29):
So I was Steve, Steve August and Kevin Flour two
were our number of guys. Like all right, if it's
if it's fine, three of us are gonna break off.
Blah blah, it's not. They were all talking. And then
right before the classes went off, I would just go
up to like August, Steve or Kevin just be like
what room we're run into and he would go room.

Speaker 4 (52:46):
Room, the first one there. It's like, you're not gonna
have the person out because it is what it is,
and that you couldn't figure to do with those numbers.
They were, they were good at it. I was letting
them do it.

Speaker 2 (52:55):
Dan. The worst part, Dan, let me let me know
if this happened to you. We're on like our fifth
round and thinking it's over and they tell us intermission,
we're going to have meal. Are you kidding me? We're
going to have a meal? Are you kidding?

Speaker 6 (53:09):
That was the most awkward meal too, because they don't
really they hint on this a little bit.

Speaker 4 (53:14):
With Natalie.

Speaker 6 (53:16):
Natalie was in our group and right before the intermission, Uh,
she was kind of like she was losing a little
bit and she was getting nervous about getting out, and
we're starting to like, you know, see that maybe she's
not gonna stick around with our group because like we're
pretty tight the whole time, like in Mingle, like we
were a good group. No one was kind of backstading
each other. So I ended up telling her. I was

(53:37):
like I was like, Nat was like your strong player.
I was like, to stay with us, trust us. It's
this is gonna work, and we'll let them break down
first all these other groups. So then right before the intermission,
we do one final round and they don't show this,
but she looks at me and she goes like this
room four, like below her neck, right. So I run
to room four and that was the part where she

(53:58):
was about to come in, and then he runs to
the other room. So then that's where I kind of
blew up to Natalie, and you know, we were like
we can't trust.

Speaker 4 (54:05):
Her and stuff like that. And then I believe it
was the.

Speaker 6 (54:06):
Next round where she got out and we were just
like all right, like you know, let's regroup.

Speaker 4 (54:10):
We need to like trust each other again, all of us,
and we.

Speaker 2 (54:14):
Love you, Natalie. Look, everybody has a game plan. They
want to keep certain people in. We understand.

Speaker 4 (54:18):
I know she reached out.

Speaker 2 (54:21):
We went dead. Yeah, she told us four and she
went right to two.

Speaker 6 (54:25):
In the moment, I was like, she can she get
out of the game. I don't care, she's not helping us.
I've reached out to her recently. I know, like you know,
online is online. She's gonna get some hate she's gonna
get some love. And I was just like, we haven't
talked since then. I was just like, I hope everything's
going good. I don't want to see anyone get hate online.
But she didn't really, you know, Listen, she was trying

(54:45):
to win herself, do anything wrong. Like we tried to
like persuade her to stay with us, but you know,
she was feeling the pressure.

Speaker 4 (54:53):
And like I get the longer you.

Speaker 2 (54:54):
Stay that game, got it. The longer you stay in
that game, you know, the people you really really would
be okay with winning that mon, you know what I'm saying.
And there were closer relationships than others. And I'm sure
she had her closer relationships, but me, you know, if
I think about people getting back on that show, the
three people that stand out to me is someone like
August Mark and the Viper. You know, those are those

(55:14):
are people that I feel like just didn't get there
there right end of the bargain, you know, And I
you know, I feel bad, I really do.

Speaker 7 (55:20):
Yeah, we certainly didn't have any any meals in the
middle of doing a whole game, but we had meals
for marbles. We were in there forever for a warship.
We were in there forever and we did have a
meal and while we're waiting, But everybody thinks, hell is
this black hole. Nope, hell is a white room with
no corners that we can see that you see in

(55:41):
for fifteen hours, that white room.

Speaker 2 (55:43):
Hell, that's for sure.

Speaker 4 (55:44):
Oh you walk out of it with a headache.

Speaker 6 (55:46):
You're just like you know when you walk from outside
sunny to like a building, and like you can't see
that walking out of the room. Every day it was
just like I feel like, how like did an hour pass?
Or did thirteen hours pass?

Speaker 4 (55:57):
It was the worst crazy.

Speaker 1 (56:00):
It's just incredible the bonds that you make when you
go on a show such as this because you're with
each other twenty four to seven. You get to know
everyone's storylines about their families, and it's just incredible to
watch too, because this is what makes reality TV so good,
because if you're just thinking these are strangers, they're not
strangers anymore. After a day or two, it's not the same.

(56:22):
It's way different.

Speaker 2 (56:23):
It was nights that August would come and tuck me in,
you know, I.

Speaker 5 (56:25):
Mean they don't show those ponds. Yeah, well I did
the math the other day because I was talking about it.
You know, there was five hundred and four hours of
being in that dorms condensed into nine hours of TV,
which means there's nine or there's four hundred and ninety
five hours that just aren't shown, four hundred and ninety
five hours of relationship building, bonding and emotional connections that

(56:49):
just aren't shown in the nine hours They two is
the show. So people always go, why are you guys
crying and people get eliminated and people think you're crying
over nothing. Yeah, on the show, it may look like
they're crying over nothing, but the nothing is something major
that's in the four hundred and ninety five hours I've
weren't shown, and they just don't highlight it in the
nine hours that are shown. You know, you're in there
at twenty four to seven, no electronics, no phones, no

(57:12):
communication with the outside. You don't know what time it is,
you don't know what day it is. You have no
idea what's going on with your family or the outside world.
You can contact anyone, you know, so you only have
each other to rely on. And when you're disconnected in
the way you are on the show, you begin opening up.
You know, our phones are like a wall that prevents
us from being as open as we should with each

(57:35):
other because it's so easy to go onto your phone,
go on TikTok, Instagram, Snapchat, and forget the emotional integrity
of relationships. When you're in there, there is no phone.
All you have are the stories you tell, and you
open up. You begin telling these strangers things you never
felt comfortable telling people you know in your regular home life,

(57:55):
because you have nothing other to do, nothing else to
do other than talk to each other, and you know,
you build these bonds are so strong that when someone
does get eliminated, it really does feel like you're losing
a part of who you are because you are you know,
they are saying they built you up when you're upset
and you're retired.

Speaker 3 (58:17):
Now they're gone.

Speaker 1 (58:20):
Yeah it was, Oh, I bet for sure. I want
to touch on real quick because I know we're about
to hit the hour mark. I still want to get
y'all's perspective on Marbles because obviously we see a lot
of people are very close with a duo that they're
matched up with. So I want to hear from you,
Matt and Nick, how you felt going into that.

Speaker 2 (58:43):
So Marbles I think it's gonna get harder as the
seasons go on, if there's more shows, because the people
that have relationships are going to eventually get smart and
stay away from each other, you know. But this time
they threw us for a loop. Look, I got lucky.
I probably was. I was Nick all the time in
our minds. We stuck together during the games, we uplifted

(59:04):
one another, and I thought I was gonna end up
with Nick, And at the last second, Pete and Kareem
ended up coming in our room. And that was the
last time Pete was just next to me. So I
slept like a baby because Pete was okay with playing
an athletic game, and I'm good at baseball and throwing
and you know, so for me, strategically, I just I
was able to sleep good at night because I had

(59:25):
I felt like I had an advantage. Whereas for Nick
going up against Kevin, I knew it was gonna be
a little bit more difficult, I thought.

Speaker 4 (59:31):
For you anyways, yeah, no, going up against so like this.

Speaker 6 (59:37):
This is the thing that actually at that point of
the show, no one in the dorm pretty much knew this,
and the show didn't find out until actually the day
of Marbles, Me and Kevin know each other, like the
show didn't know that. Like when we got casted, like
all these people came in, family members, brother, sister, husband, wife,

(59:57):
whoever was there.

Speaker 4 (59:59):
We know each other. We graduated the fire Academy together.

Speaker 6 (01:00:02):
So you know, Kevin has talked about it, like when
we found out we were both on the show and
no one knew, like that was like ace in the pocket.
So our plan the whole time was just like keep separate,
we'll build our alliances and then like I'll be good
with his alliance through him and vice versa. And then
the plan was like not to cause too much truckus

(01:00:23):
and make it to like basically circle of trust. And
then at that point, you know, if me and Matt,
who we were cool, we were in circle of trust,
I was I was turning on Matt and Kevin was
turning on his because then we were going to solidify
ourselves in the final Hopefully.

Speaker 4 (01:00:37):
Didn't come that way.

Speaker 6 (01:00:37):
And yeah, when we when I picked, uh, when me
and Kevin picked each other for Marbles, not knowing it
was Marbles, just knowing who he is, He's an athlete
also a firefighter, Like, yeah, I did sleep in that night,
and that was like, I was like, I have to
I have to bring my a game.

Speaker 4 (01:00:52):
Uh. And they ended up not showing our marbles for
whatever reason. I get it.

Speaker 6 (01:00:55):
They can't show everything. I was like, I was kind
a little upset. I was like, you at lease show
picture disappearing like eliminated.

Speaker 4 (01:01:02):
But I didn't get that.

Speaker 6 (01:01:02):
So I I had Actually I had more calls asking
me about are you still on the show than I
had people texting me, hey, I saw you on the show,
because like people were so confused, and like I was
confused too. But uh, just just a touch on our game.
We did a simple We waited for like the clock
to basically go all the way down. We sat on
the steps. We had ten marbles each took some shots.

(01:01:24):
He hit two, I hit zero.

Speaker 4 (01:01:27):
Just wasn't my day.

Speaker 6 (01:01:28):
I actually I hit the rim, it bounced off the
back wall, hit the same spot on the rim again
and then didn't go in. That was like my third shot,
and I just looked at him. I was like, if
that didn't go in, I was like, I'm not winning this.
So uh, that was that was a tough one.

Speaker 4 (01:01:42):
I will say. We actually just me mad and Kevin.

Speaker 6 (01:01:44):
We went out to dinner, what two weeks ago, three
weeks ago at this point, went out to a bar afterwards.
I saw a bucket, a beer bucket, sitting on the
floor with some rocks, and I said, we got to
replay this.

Speaker 4 (01:01:53):
Let you know, I did win, so I just had.

Speaker 1 (01:02:00):
No it's tough. As you said, we don't we can't.
We can't see it all. And that's why we bring
y'all on these podcasts and then you can explain your story.
We love hearing all these storylines. Is anything that y'all
want to add before we wrap this up?

Speaker 2 (01:02:12):
Look, I may have not won the money, and I
will say this, I can't believe how close we are
as a family now. I've made friends for life. I'm
on a show like this is a life changer. You
meet some incredible people from all around the world. I'm
close with people in Dubai, China, all over the place. Right,
It's just meaningful. It's it's not just about the money.

(01:02:32):
You you were able to realize and go back to
the nineties where you don't have to rely on your
electronics anymore, that you can get out, you know, actually
get to know somebody and hear their story. And live
their life through them. So I just want to say
I'm appreciative for the what I'm getting to take away
from it, and which is, uh, these these friendships, you know,
and I'm sorry for some people like Dan that gosh
who unded a stick on how he ended up going out,

(01:02:53):
but he still makes a connection that keeps us all together.
So I'm forever.

Speaker 4 (01:02:57):
Grateful, damn.

Speaker 6 (01:02:58):
And like a good thing too is like I found
out actually like before the show weel started, when we're
in the hotel, is that lives basically two blocks away
from my in laws, So like Matt said it to be,
like but I we even even if I wanted to,
we can't get rid of each other. So like I'm
gonna be seeing that for years to come. Obviously Aucus
is in Saint Louis. Anytime one of us is in

(01:03:20):
each other's city, like definitely going to hit each other out.
And that's that's the you know, going into the show,
you know statistically you're not gonna win the money, like
it's just the odds are against you. So if you
could just take away from this like the experience and
like I always think about him, like whatever, the number.

Speaker 4 (01:03:37):
Is four hundred and fifty six times two nine hundreds.

Speaker 6 (01:03:39):
There's only nine hundred people that like had gone through
this experience. And then it's even less than that because
I'm like our show, like, you know, half of them
were only there for like two hours, so like there's
only a couple hundred of us that went through this experience.
And it's like, it's a cool thought to think about
when you kind of like zoom out of the whole thing.

Speaker 3 (01:03:59):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (01:04:00):
Yeah, Well, this has been like one of the best
experiences of my life. I mean, going in, I thought
I wouldn't get that close to people. I mean I
text Matt all the time. Now I FaceTime like Nick
and some other people, like almost every day. And I
have been a big fan of reality TV for so long.
I've wanted to compete for so long, but I've always

(01:04:20):
thought I would never get on you know TV. I
always thought this is never gonna happen to me. You know,
it's a dream that's always going to stay I dream
and never come true. And then I didn't get the
call until five days before filming begins, you know, five
days before folming begins, I get the call, Hey, you're
flying out in two days from now. Get ready, pack
your bags, tell work you're leaving and going in. I

(01:04:42):
had massive imposter syndrome. I'm like, I'm not supposed to
be here. I only got on last minute. I'm like,
I'm not made for reality TV. I'm not even supposed
to be here right now. But that gave me the
opportunity to, you know, play go balls to the wall
and like play my heart out, and it ended up
being on the best experiences of my life. You know,
being on TV, it's probably gonna be like a once
in a lifetime opportunity and something I get to share

(01:05:05):
with these amazing guys like Mad and Nick, and it's
truly a dream come true.

Speaker 3 (01:05:11):
You know, I don't know then I'm blessed, you know.

Speaker 2 (01:05:14):
Yep, for sure. We appreciate you letting us tell our story.

Speaker 1 (01:05:18):
Absolutely, I'm so happy that y'all came on and to
play your heart at all y'all did. It was incredible
to watch and just an honor that y'all came on
this podcast because we get the deep dive, We get
to know the true storyline, what happens behind the scenes.
So once again, August, Nick, Matt Dan always a pleasure
and with that, everyone else you take care.

Speaker 2 (01:05:42):
Bye bye

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Squid Game The Challenge Season 2 Interview - Nick (086), Matthew (098), and August (111)

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Squid Game The Challenge Season 2 Interview - Nick (086), Matthew (098), and August (111)