Hall Brawl is back! The Challenge: World Championship fans react to comp's return

Yes and Troy battle during the “Hall Brawl” challenge in THE CHALLENGE: WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP, season 1, episode 11 streaming on Paramount+
Yes and Troy on The Challenge: World Championship (Image credit: Jonne Roriz/Paramount+)

The time has come: Hall Brawl has finally made its long-awaited appearance on The Challenge: World Championship

The elimination challenge is one of the most famous of The Challenge franchise, and for good reason: the brutally physical comp has two competitors having to run from two opposite ends through an incredibly narrow hallway, wresting and wrenching their way past the other player to ring a bell at the other end. The player who rings their bell first in the best two out of three heats wins the elimination.

The Challenge host T.J. Lavin has previously called Hall Brawl his "all-time favorite game" from the competition series, and it's a hit (pun intended) with longtime viewers as well. With this week's elimination being the last one before the big final, it was the perfect time for producers to roll out the Brawl to narrow The Challenge: World Championship cast down to the four final teams of the season.

On the May 10 episode, Team Australia competitors Troy and Kaycee are sent into elimination early on after being sabotaged by Yes and Emily. However, that move comes back to bite them in the butt when a house stalemate seemingly gives the nomination vote to this week's winning team, Sarah and Theo. That is, until T.J. unleashes yet another twist: given that Sarah and Theo are automatically in the final due to their win this week, the nomination vote will instead go to the bottom team, Troy and Kaycee. 

Unsurprisingly, they decide to exact revenge and choose Emily and Yes to join them in the Hall Brawl. "Day one, she's been against Australia," Troy says of Emily. "If you want to get us out, come down here and do it yourself. That's the stage I'm at, I'm over it... this is karma."

Yes believes he has the advantage over Troy when it comes to height and weight, but the Aussie has got fight in him: "I'm only 5-foot 7, I only weigh 60 kilos. Everybody's like, 'Oh, he's so small.' I'm just do driven to prove everybody wrong, to show that size isn't everything." And he did exactly that, beating Yes to the bell in the Brawl's first round. 

The women were up next, with Emily taking the win in the second set, leaving a tense tie-breaker for the final round. A coin toss decides that the women will brawl a second time. After a literal smackdown between the two, Kaycee scrambled to her bell for a spot at the finals, leaving Emily sobbing on the ground. "It doesn't get much closer than that," T.J. says upon Kaycee and Troy's win. 

"I don't know what's running through Emily's head right now but I know she's sour. But stuff her, we won, this is what you get. Get stuffed!" Troy proclaims, Kaycee adding: "It's just the cherry on top. Mwah!"

Hopefully they can keep up that adrenaline, because T.J. announced that the final challenge would begin right then and there. "Banged up and bruised, going straight into a final. No rest!" Troy yells. 

The Challenge fans react to the return of Hall Brawl:

The Challenge: World Championship releases new episodes every Wednesday exclusively on Paramount Plus.

Christina Izzo

Christina Izzo is the Deputy Editor of My Imperfect Life. More generally, she is a writer-editor covering food and drink, travel, lifestyle and culture in New York City. She was previously the Features Editor at Rachael Ray In Season and Reveal, as well as the Food & Drink Editor and chief restaurant critic at Time Out New York. 

When she’s not doing all that, she can probably be found eating cheese somewhere.