A couple of days late, a few bucks short; it's the latest recap of The Amazing Race, brought to you by your (least) favourite (un)faithful blogger. Ech. I just referred to myself as a blogger. Then again, I think you actually have to blog to be considered one of those, so maybe I'm in the clear.
Right, The Amazing Race. When we last left our faithful contestants, they were SHOCKED AND AMAZED to discover that they were not done racing, because of an ANNOYING TWIST: the episode was a TWO-PARTER! That's right, instead of giving us any sort of satisfaction, the wonderful minds behind TAR left us hanging. Would the Cowboys ever catch up? I hoped so, because they were my pick to win, and I don't want to lose to my roommate (again) in our Amazing Race Prize-Free Betting Pool of Two People.
Cord finally figured out the clue he'd been missing ("I am between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea"), and Team Oh My Gravy was finally on their way. They looked like they had far more trouble with the sailing challenge than any of the other teams did, but eventually they finished it, got their clue from Phil, and continued trying to catch up to the other teams.
The clue from Phil was another puzzle: teams had to find "To Sail To Stop", which was a phrase engraved on a giant anchor statue outside Sydney Town Hall. Obviously none of the teams knew this right away, but I was shocked (SHOCKED!) at the number of teams that didn't immediately find an Internet cafe or someone with a smart phone to look it up. It's 2011 here, people (well, probably 2010 when this was filming, but the point still holds); information is not that hard to come across. Instead, the teams wandered up and down the street, got in cabs and ran up to random people asking "Do you know where 'To Sink To Swim' is?" Again, obviously this wasn't common knowledge (although there was at least one guy who immediately replied "That's town hall, mate!"), and the teams ended up stalled. And so began The Amazing Race's first official Team-Up-athon. Although my knowledge of this show is far from exhaustive, I've never seen so many teams decide to join forces on a challenge (and it wasn't just this challenge; the teaming up recurred throughout the episode). Zev and Justin teamed up with Kisha and Jen (ugh), Margie and Luke once again joined with Jamie and Cara (double ugh), and Gary and Mallory, Ron and Christina, and Amanda and Kris ran around together, futilely trying to find the next clue.
At Town Hall, there was a sign-up sheet, and the first six teams would get on an earlier flight to the Australian Outback. On a ferry back to Sydney, Mel suddenly developed a CRIPPLING LEG CRAMP, and Mike's natural reaction was to CRY LIKE A BABY, because that helps in EVERY SITUATION. I actually really like this team, but moments like this are reminders why it might not be the best idea to take your 70-year-old father on a race around the world. Then again, Mike is a relatively famous Hollywood writer, so it's probably a safe bet that he doesn't exactly need the million dollar prize.
All the teams eventually made it to the statue (although it was night by the time the Cowboys finally got there), and the next morning the teams flew into the Outback, where they had to drive to Living Desert Reserve. Here we saw our first Detour: Spirit World or Natural World. Spirit World involved teams building a traditional Aboriginal mosaic out of stones and then dancing on it, while Natural World had teams spraying paint out of their moths onto their hands to make silhouette images on a piece of slate. Every single team chose Spirit World (although Natural World apparently ended up being a much faster challenge). We saw a fair bit of stupidity, as Ron kept berating Christina even though she was doing fine, and Kent and Vyxsin (I seriously want to throw something every time I type that stupid goddamn name) couldn't figure out that "Dance on your mosaic" means "Dance on your mosaic", and instead chose to gather up some local bewildered children and dance around their mosaic. Why, you ask? WHO KNOWS? Even when every other team was dancing on their mosaic, they continued to dance around theirs. Eventually all of the teams finished the challenge, although Kris and Amanda had to do both sides of the Detour thanks to the U-Turn they'd received in the first leg.
After this, teams had to find "the Home of the Magpies", a local football club, dress up like Kangaroos (why? BECAUSE WE'RE IN AUSTRALIA! GET IT?!), and figure out that the highlighted elements on the periodic table they were given were leading them to the intersection of Mercury and Bismuth Streets. I get that The Amazing Race is responding to criticism that the Race has become too straightforward, but I'm starting to think that they may have gone overboard on the whole puzzle thing. Find this OBSCURE QUOTE! Recognize this UNRECOGNIZABLE LOCAL CUSTOM! Run to the nearest ACRONYM THAT YOU HAVE TO FIGURE OUT ON YOUR OWN! We get it, Amazing Race, you can do puzzles just fine. We always knew that, it's just that you went like 10 seasons without exercising that ability.
The challenge ended up stumping quite a few teams, as no one actually knew the elements (except for Kent, who immediately knew that they were looking for Mercury and Bismuth BECAUSE HE GOT AN 'A' IN CHEMISTRY! He also got an 'A' in LOOKING LIKE A JACKASS). Margie almost screwed her team over by losing part of her costume when a foot pad fell off, but luckily Mel was nice enough to pick it up and give it to her when she came back looking for it (another profoundly stupid move; you're in a race for a million dollars here, Mel. It's not really the time to be doing favours).
In the end, Zev and Justin came in first, followed by the Globetrotters and the Cowboys (turns out that once they got to non-puzzle challenges, the Cowboys were able to make up a lot of the time they'd lost). Unfortunately for Amanda and Kris, the U-Turn was just too much for them to overcome, and they were eliminated, which must be incredibly frustrating given that they were eliminated by a U-Turn the first time they ran the Race.
The season is really promising so far, with strong challenges and entertaining teams. Next week they're going to Japan (unless I'm remembering the preview wrong), and someone (I need to start doing this sooner after the episode airs) suffers "a game-changing setback". WHO WILL IT BE? WHO CARES?!
Stay tuned.
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