Shawn Johnson East is pulling back the curtain on her and husband Andrew East’s upcoming stint on Special Forces: World’s Toughest Test season 4.
“OK, we’ve been keeping a secret, and it’s out,” Shawn, 33, began via her Instagram Story on Wednesday, August 6. “You all wanted us to do Special Forces, both Andrew and I did. Highly recommend you watch.”
The couple are part of the 18 recruits trying their hand at the grueling challenges. Rounding out the cast is Teresa Giudice, Gia Giudice, Brittany Cartwright, Kody Brown, Jessie James Decker, Eric Decker, Mark Estes, Brianna “Chickenfry” LaPaglia, Jussie Smollett, Eva Marcille, Randall Cobb, Chanel Iman, Johnny Manziel, Ravi V. Patel, Christie Pearce Rampone and Nick Young.
“There’s so much to unpack here,” Shawn said in a separate video. “So you guys have been going absolutely crazy over the whole workout regimen. Now you understand. I didn’t want to die. Yes, Andrew and I did it together. Yes, so many things happened including getting my face beaten. [The] cast is amazing, we’re literally all bonded for life.”
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While Shawn noted that she “can’t answer” all of the questions fans had about her and Andrew’s time on the show, she promised to fill in followers on “absolutely everything” as the season aired.
Shawn explained that she and Andrew filmed the series while pretending to be on a long vacation in Japan with their family. While the family was in Japan, Singapore and Dubai for two weeks, Shawn noted that she and Andrew actually went to film season 4 of Special Forces while still releasing content from their travels online.
“Remember when it seemed like we were in Japan for FOREVERRRRRRR. Well, yeah, half of that we jumped to another country haha,” she wrote, adding in a separate video that she couldn’t tell followers how long she and Andrew were filming Special Forces.
Shawn noted that all five members of her family — she and Andrew share three children — traveled to Japan for six days, Singapore for five days and Dubai for five days before all flying home.
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“Grandma, Grandpa and Nana all came in and took over,” she explained. “We flew out to start [the] show 24 hours later.”
When asked how “scripted” Special Forces was as a reality TV show, Shawn assured fans that the series was completely real.
“OK, I can’t even tell you guys. I’ve done The Apprentice, Dancing With the Stars, The Challenge, Adventure Capitalist, all these shows. On a scale of 1-10 scripted, 10 being the most scripted, 1 being completely unscripted, this show is completely unscripted. It is, like, the real freaking thing. We wore a mic around us and then all the cameras were security cameras,” she said. “There’s no scripting to it, you’re just hanging on for dear life trying not to die legitimately. Zero scriptedness.”
In a separate post, Shawn relayed that it is “WAY more real then they even show on the show.” She added, “Like for real for real. No extra help. No, like, ‘OK, we’re done for the night,’ or like, ‘Here’s what’s next.’ You are TRULY in a course 100000 percent of the time from when day 1 starts. You even get assigned a psychiatrist when you leave haha because like…. It’s real.”
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As for her relationship with other contestants, Shawn weighed in on whether it was “fun” being with the Deckers. “YES!!” she wrote, alongside a selfie of her, Jessie and Andrew on a plane. “We are all so close now!!! Bonded for life.”
While fans might imagine that Shawn and Andrew were protective over each other on the course, the former Olympian explained that the pair rooted for each other — but weren’t worried when it came to physical tests, including fighting other contestants.
“It’s kind of the odd thing between Andrew and I’s relationship is like we both know what we are capable of, like, what each other is capable of, so it’s weird for me to say it didn’t bother us, but it didn’t bother us,” she said. “I was like, ‘Yeah, go babe. Go babe.’ If someone would get a punch in, I’d be like, ‘Get em back. You got it.’”
Andrew, for his part, had a similar take. “You don’t want to fight Shawn. I’ve known that for years, but now other people know … Blood does not win or lose a fight,” he said, adding that it was “dope” seeing her in that position and didn’t bother him. She added, “I felt the same way when I watched you.”
Special Forces season 4 premieres on Thursday, September 25, at 9 p.m. ET on Fox.
