Shane Raines had an incredible 3 episode run on Battle of the Bloodlines. As Tony’s gay brother who made an appearance while visiting on RW Skeletons, Shane came with Tony to compete as teammates. In the first episode they got into a fight and Shane dropped some of the best lines ever said in the last 5 years of this show.

The video quality isn’t the best, grateful it is online though. Here are some Shane Raines lines from his FIRST episode of the Challenge. Not a veteran, this is someone on their first episode ever:

“You about the drama brah! You about the drama right now! Going home cause of you brah!”

“But I’m gonna kick my motherfucking ass in that pit, Diggin that pit, Whipping that pit, ’cause of you!”

[when proving he is sober]: “I’ll walk three straight lines. Bam, bam, bam, bam, bam. I’ll vogue on the shit, c’mon.”

You can see why they brought back this bloodline who was only around for three episodes. Shane Landrum had the running joke that they called the wrong gay Shane. I love them both, Shane L. a little more, but this Shane is good for so many other reasons.

7 reasons why Shane is awesome:

He’s hilarious. Strong gay character. Stylish. Great eyebrows. Becomes your best friend. Will drop a Madonna reference as fast as he will toss fists. Quietly in great shape.

It saddens me that Shane is entering the season not single, would have been fun if he was open to hooking up or being extra crazy. Shane is a natural conversationalist and is the type of person that kills all his interviews and segments. Might not be a major athletic threat, however, sometimes you need fun people in the house (Knight, Isaac, Preston).

Now here’s a review of Tony as a competitor, as well as his social media handles for reference:

Skills & Physical Strength: As a cosmetologist, Shane works a job where looking good is the profession. He looks great without his shirt, and is the model body. Not all of them are as much athlete muscles, more glamour muscles than anything. If he has to carry 100 lbs of weight, he will struggle. He does not have the body type to carry weight, he does have the body type where he can hang on a pull up bar 50 ft over water for longer than 80% of guys.

Shane has good height weight proportion in terms of core strength. It’s hard to gauge his height as he always stands next to Tony (who is a a giant). If I had to guesstimate, Shane is, I’m guessing 5'11 and 155 lbs. Hard to tell as most pics are next to his gargantuan brother. Much different body-type from most of the meatheads in the game. We did not get to see him compete much on Bloodlines, only 2 missions really. He is competent, it seems.

Social & Mental Game: This is where Shane might excel most. On Bloodlines, the girls loved and adored him. Early on, people love to keep around the guys that can make you laugh and turn up the overall happiness level of the house. It’s why they went for Adam/Brittany instead of JJ/Simone. The house loved JJ, he was their house comedian, it was sad when he had to leave. Shane getting the free pass for a couple episodes could help him out. In the new format there will be something called the double kill card, where if someone pulls they can choose someone to go into elimination. Shane could be an easy target for those.

There is a tiny bit of game bias where gay male competitors get tossed into elimination due to preconceived notions of being “weaker”. It’s a bit bullshit, but it still happens. Need proof? Gay males who have been nominated for the eliminations: Davis Mallory on Rivals 1 and Inferno 3 (life-shielded by Alton), Derek Chavez on Rivals 2 and Cutthroat, Ryan Kehoe on Duel 2, Tyler Duckworth on the Duel, etc. And that’s only the first elimination of the season, a good amount considering we usually get 1 gay male most seasons, 3 at the most.

Eliminations: Shane should try to avoid eliminations at all costs. When it comes to the classical build of what make you successful at eliminations, Shane is not that. He is a scrapper who will fight and claw his way to a win, he’s never going to dominate. Being a scrapper is a good thing until you get hit by a Mach Truck.

Final Potenital & Endurance: He really needs to ride alliances and friendships in order to make it to the final. Luckily, he has a brother in the game who can play with. That might be a detriment to them as people may seem them as a pair that should be broken up. The goal for Shane is to have a fun time and avoid eliminations. If he can do that, then we can begin talking about how he would do in a final.

Final Score: 68/100