By Fred Topel | Image property of respective holders
American Gladiators: Toa
Toa is pure intimidation when the contestants face the Polynesian warrior, but in real life he's just a fun guy. A former stuntman and cousin to Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson, Toa still wants to be a good guy to kids. It's just the grown-ups trying to win money who have a problem.
Toa Returns to American Gladiators
"I’ve been in the movie industry for 14 years as a stunt man for the Rock," said Toa. "Now people are like, 'That’s Toa, that’s Toa.' It is pretty cool. I was in Europe when this show aired the first season and I missed all the local airings. When I came to the airport and landed, I didn’t see it on TV and I didn’t know how big it looked on TV and these kids came running up to me in the airport, 'Oh Toa!' and I hadn’t even seen one episode yet. It was pretty cool."
Toa is back for season two, with some new surprises in store. "New gladiators, new events, new arena. It is huge, it is the LA Sports Arena and they dedicated it to us so it is our Gladiator home. It is a lot bigger than the other one. The games are everywhere. We are using every element from the floor to the water to the sky. We are flying all over this arena. The rafters. All the events from last year are bigger as well. The wall is about 20 feet higher. Way more difficult than last year."
One of the new events is called Rocket Ball. "I’m not sure if you’ve heard about that game yet, it is like basketball in outer space. We are racheting up into the rafters and we have to defend against these contenders and we are going toward the same basket in the middle, it is just like basketball, but they are trying to go up there to make a basket and we are going up there to try and collide or knock the ball out of their hand, hopefully collide. When they come back down and run back in push the buttons and do it over again. So the whole time there are four people flying up and down and it is really visually stimulating."
The gladiators have not had that much more time to adjust to the new events than new contestants will have. "We had a week or two to rehearse the new games and get familiar with them, which is not a lot of time because once you step in and play the game, it is new to us again, because we didn’t get to practice a lot. The new events are really exciting and they are going to be revealed per episode."
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