Player 58, Jack McKenna, pulled a sneaky move to ensure he didn’t lose the cubes challenge in Beast Games Season 2, and it’s sparked a debate over allegations of “cheating”.
The second chapter of MrBeast’s Prime Video competition series changed the format from the very beginning. Instead of 1,000 contestants, it kicked off with 100 strong and 100 smart players, seeing which trait would come out on top.
Only one person will take home the $5 million prize, although there are plenty of other ways to make money along the way – ask Ian Weber, aka Player 148, who bagged himself a $1.8 million island.
In the latest Beast Games challenge, teams of three contestants entered a giant cube and weren’t allowed to leave until one player self-eliminated. Jack, a member of the smart team, decided to use his intelligence to trick his teammate and make it through to the next round.
How Player 58 Jack McKenna won Beast Games Season 2 challenge
In Beast Games Season 2 Episode 5, Jack switches out the deck of cards so that Player 91 (Sue) draws the lowest one, and it works – in the end, she agrees to self-eliminate.
You see, Player 58 (Jack), Player 91 (Sue), and Player 167 (Tyler) choose to be in a team together. It’s up to each group to decide how they’re going to figure out who goes home and who moves on to the next round.
They decide to leave it up to chance… at least, in theory. Each of them picks a downward facing card and flips it over at the same time – the contestant with the lowest number will eliminate themselves.
Jack gets a king, Tyler gets an eight, and Sue gets a six, and so she handcuffs herself to the cube, allowing her fellow teammates to head back into Beast City. They all share an earnest moment of reflection, with Sue – a former Survivor contestant – tearfully admitting she visualized herself making it to the end.
Jack and Tyler are comforted by the other players when they leave the cube. However, as we saw earlier, Jack secretly switched out the deck of cards.
Once they’re out, he elaborates on this in a chat with MrBeast, saying, “When we walked into that room, I realized my best odds of getting out of that was to outwit a Survivor player…
“Took a deck of cards, ordered it two through ace, and I had an idea to kind of frontload the deck and understand where the highest cards were.”
Sue seemingly caught wind of what he was doing and so she shuffled the deck a couple of times. But Jack was one step ahead, having pre-prepared another deck to work in his and Tyler’s favor – when she was looking at the money, he switched them out.
When MrBeast asks why he picked Tyler over Sue, Jack replies, “I love Sue, but at the same time Tyler and I have been together for so much longer, and that bond was too strong that I couldn’t break it.”
Tyler admits that while he knew about the first compromised deck, he didn’t know about the second one. “I got lucky with my pick,” he says. “He’s on a smart team for a reason so without him I wouldn’t be here.”
Secretly manipulating the cards would be considered cheating in most traditional competitions, but the cubes challenge places no restrictions on how teams decide who self-eliminates. That being said, his approach has divided the opinion of viewers at home.
Beast Games viewers debate where Jack made “fatal mistake”
Ultimately, the debate comes down to whether Jack was morally wrong or right, but some viewers think he may have messed up his chances of winning Beast Games Season 2 – and it all comes down to trust.
Taking to Reddit, one wrote, “Jack made one FATAL mistake, that will prevent him from winning. No, it wasn’t scheming and tricking the woman into getting eliminated. That was actually a fairly smart move.
“The fatal mistake that Jack made was telling the Beast Crew, along with telling the big buff guy who was also in the pod. Jack should have kept his mouth shut and kept his plan to himself. Here’s why.
“Eventually, word is going to get out that Jack betrayed the woman in the pod. When that happens, the other contestants will either dislike him or not want to work with him out of fear that he’ll betray them too.
“Because of this, if [in] any of the next games, players are eliminated based on their level of popularity, then Jack is in HUGE trouble. And considering this is Beast Games, a game like this will likely take place. Therefore, Jack just ultimately screwed himself out of winning.
“While screwing people over left and right may seem like a good strategy in the short term, doing it too much and too obviously actually hurts your chances in the long term. Just ask the Habibi brothers.”
The Habibi brothers used manipulative tactics to win the cube challenge in Season 1, only to be eliminated after. Multiple fans agree that a similar situation could unfold with Jack.
“Exactly! Now, I don’t think there is any way Jack could have pulled off a cheat with the amount of cameras they have in there. And it’s possible the producers goaded him into revealing and talking about it ‘FoR ThE cOnTenT,’” said one.
“But yeah, even so, Jack may have won the battle but there is no way he wins the war. Especially as one of the few remaining ‘smarts’, his head will roll. And good riddance!”
Another commented, “Yeah I agree. It probably would have come out eventually, it being caught on camera and everything. But I’m not convinced that revealing it himself and letting it spread through gossip was the best move.
“I think he wanted to feel ‘smart’. Wasn’t he the only (or one of the only) smarts not to make it to the island? He seemed pretty broken up about that, like his confidence was shaken.
“I got the feeling that by telling what he did immediately he was looking for reassurance about his intelligence/craftiness.”
While some believe Jack’s made a fatal mistake, others are praising him for his quick thinking. “It’s not cheating if anyone’s allowed to pull it off,” wrote one on Instagram, while another quipped, “Can’t hate the player, hate the game.”
A third agreed, “Smart vs strong, literally the whole point of the show. What Jack did was smart.” And a fourth chimed in, “I have to say, it doesn’t seem to be against the rules. That’s good television.”
Who is Jack McKenna?
Jack is Player 58 and a member of the smart team in Beast Games Season 2. Prior to joining the show, he graduated from Albany’s Christian Brothers Academy (CBA) – a private Catholic high school – in 2023.
Jack spoke with CBA about his experience on the Prime Video series, saying that he only applied “mostly as a joke.” Two months later, he was packing his bags and getting ready to fly out to Las Vegas.
“Think of the craziest competition show you’ve ever seen, and then put steroids into it,” he said. “It was excitement throughout the application process.
“But the moment that acceptance email came through, reality hit. I had to put my money where my mouth is. I couldn’t say ‘would have, could have, should have’ anymore. I had to go compete.”
Jack went on to say, “There’s been so many times where I decided not to take an adventurous leap because I was scared of what would happen if I failed. This was one of the first times I decided, ‘Why not see what I’m capable of?’
“For the 1,999 people that could have had my specific spot, what would they do? They wouldn’t give up. So I decided to pull up my pants and give it everything I got.”
According to his Instagram account, he is studying at Purdue University, with the college itself confirming he’s an electrical computer engineering junior.
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