The Challenge: USA 2 's first eliminated champ speaks: 'Now I know I picked the wrong side'
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Warning: This article contains spoilers for the two-part season premiere of The Challenge: USA 2.
Jonna Stephens (formerly Mannion) was the first champion to exit The Challenge: USA 2, and she already knows exactly where she went wrong.
After walking into the house with five other MTV vets against 18 other CBS reality stars, she knew the deck was stacked against her. But instead of allying herself with the Survivor alums, who play a social game similar to her own, she cast a rogue vote on Michele Fitzgerald that led to her loss against Tori Deal in a physical elimination.
"I should have just listened to myself and left on top," two-time champion Stephens tells EW about her recent back-to-back wins on All Stars. "Now here I am, so now I have to do another Challenge season because I can't leave on going home second. Until the next win, you guys have got me."
Below, Stephens breaks down what went wrong and how she's going to majorly change up her strategy moving forward.
Jonne Roriz/Paramount Jonna Mannion (Stephens)
ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: So what happened?
JONNA STEPHENS: The funny thing is, the goal was to get Tori out of the game. It was an indirect thing. Everyone wanted Tori out and the only other choice was Jonna. I'm bummed it happened but everything happens for a reason. I'm trying to hold onto the silver lining. At least I got to show up and look cool for a little bit.
Your last two seasons have ended early, first when your partner was medically DQed on World Championships, and now this.
So here's the thing: I left All Stars and now I wanted to test Jonna 2.0 — I want to do the flagship but the timing [is too long], so the Global Championship and USA were my opportunities to test myself against these hardcore players. It just didn't work out this time.
At least it must feel good knowing that despite how it ended, you've been the first-round draft pick these last two seasons.
Yeah, I need to remember that and start believing that when I walk in. A long time ago Wes said to me, "You play a different game than I do. I walk into a house and people already hate me." Now, I feel like that. I have to take note and figure out how to navigate a game where I already am a target walking in. I still haven't figured that out yet. Probably a big part of the reason why I won All Stars 3 is because nobody had seen All Stars 2.
Before, my game was to fly under the radar, not be seen as a threat, and then they throw me in this game. The six of us [MTV vets] were so over TJ. First of all, he put us six against 18. Cool. Then we ride in on jet skis — they already hate us and we're crashing their party. Then I'm first-round draft pick, again. The target is just getting bigger. And then they make us carry statues of us! I'm like, "Come on, bro, this is not helping!" And then coming off back-to-back wins, if any of these Survivor or Big Brother people haven't watched The Challenge, what are they going to do? They're going to turn on Paramount+, watch the last seasons, and they'll see this girl winning back-to-back, being the first round draft pick on Global Championships… I've never had to navigate this game with such a huge target. I didn't know how to convince these people that I'm terrible. But hey, going home second might actually help. Like, I won the geriatric Challenge and then I also went home second, so I'm terrible.
How are you feeling after seeing last night's episode? Did anything surprise you that you didn't already know before watching?
What did surprise me was the Green team nomination. It was good to see that, even though we were outnumbered, Wes still did try to have my back. In a game, you get so paranoid because people say they have your back and they don't. Same thing with Tiffany — she was like, "I have your back," and I was like, "Do you?" So it was nice to see that they did. I wasn't surprised to see Michele convince a group of people to vote me in without her having to vote me in. I knew this about Michele — I hadn't seen her [winning] season [of Survivor], but just from meeting her and watching her interact with people, we are so similar in the sense of social play. I knew that, down the road, she was going to be an obstacle based on the relationships she had were the same kind of people I was working with. But this is my fatal flaw, when my back is against the wall, which it was this season, I tend to get in my own head and self-implode. But Michele was a smart move and I don't regret the decision, but I do regret doing it in episode 1. It should have been like episode 6.
Going into this I had only seen Danny's season of Survivor, season 41, but since I went home so early, I had all this time on my hands and I started watching all these seasons of Survivor with people from [this season], and I'm kicking myself. How Survivor and Big Brother people play is how I usually play The Challenge. I should have done my homework. Usually you only have a handful of strategic people like Wes or whoever. What's so interesting about USA is that there are 24 strategic people, and 18 of them know how to count votes, know who's voting for who, and I did not take that into consideration.
I have to be more on my toes. I have to realize it's a 24/7 game. Like when they had the Red team meeting after the elimination, someone was like, "Where's Jonna?" I was asleep. [Laughs] It was like three in the morning after we got home from the elimination! Tiffany knocked and was like, "We're having a Red team meeting," and I was like, "No, goodnight!" That's the moment I need to go show face at the meeting and be like, "I don't know who voted for Michele."
Jonne Roriz/Paramount Paulie Calafiore, Johnny "Bananas" Devenanzio, Dusty Harris, Josh Martinez, Tiffany Mitchell, Jonna Mannion (Stephens), Michele Fitzgerald, Chanelle Howell
Do you think not being at that meeting is how Michele figured out it was you?
No, I think it took a little bit of time. Maybe it was the meeting? But she's just smart. She's very good at reading people, as am I. I just saw her on Friday, and she was like, "I don't know where we went wrong." Her and I talked about it and we're going to be on the same page next time. Instead of being so freaked out and paranoid, if I would have taken it day by day, I would have not dug my own grave.
Now that you've seen a lot of Survivor seasons, you know how social players like yourself and Michele are actually the most dangerous in these games. I'd love to see you and Michele working together and not against each other — you could do some real damage.
Yes, absolutely. She is just as lethal as I was. And rather than banding together and taking everyone else out, which is what I should have done, I was like, "This is my one chance to make a big move and I need to take out someone who is very similar to me." But I knew I liked those Survivor people. I knew they were my people. Tori and I walked into this house and were trying to make up a gameplan where she was like, "Most of my team is Survivor, so I'm going to work with them," and I was like, "Most of the people in my room are Big Brother so I'll work with them, and then we'll meet in the middle." Now I know I picked the wrong side simply because I am more like-minded with them. That's how my brain works, I think too far ahead to my own detriment. I play chess when everyone else plays checkers. But I know now and I'll take that into the future. I'm ready, since I've now seen all of their seasons. And now I'm like, did I sign up for the wrong game? Should I have done Survivor like 10 years ago? But there's zero percent chance I could do that today. If I didn't eat or sleep, I would be terrible.
What was it like competing against Tori in that elimination?
Worst-case scenario. If I got to pick my opponent, Tori is the last person I would ever choose to go against. She was so bummed. She was like, "You're probably one of my only real allies here. You left your family for this. What do we do?" But I was like, "Tori, I'm a champ, you're a champ. This is what they wanted. You've got to go all in. You better go balls to the wall because that's what I'm going to do." I'm no longer afraid of eliminations, I'm confident in myself, but the cards I was dealt this time, it just wasn't my game. Nobody wanted to see that! It would have been so much better to see Bananas vs. Paulie!
But it was hard. Something that did happen that I noticed was a ball would come down, she would run, and I think people were trying to help me by shouting, "Silver ball!" So she knew when the silver balls were coming and would come back faster. Had there been no voices, that would have been my only chance to get an upper hand on her because I was only going for the silver ones. So that kind of sucked.
What didn't we see in the episodes that you want fans to know about?
With Tori after the elimination, there was a moment where she was very upset and I was like, "Use this as fuel. Go light the house on fire." And then she gave this speech giving me props saying, "You guys just took out one of the baddest competitors and she has a heart of gold. Amanda, this all got f---ed up. She was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. It shouldn't have been her, it should have been me." And then I also had so much fun while I was there. I was in a room with Cory, Fessy, and Chris. And let me just tell you this: I had to fight for mirror time. [Laughs] You know exactly what I'm saying! Fighting for the mirror with these big ass guys, but I love them.
This interview has been edited and condensed for length and clarity.
The Challenge: USA season 2 airs Thursdays at 10 p.m. ET/PT and Sundays at 9 p.m. ET/PT on CBS and streaming on Paramount+.
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