Dangerous Logic

It Ain't "My Ox Is Broken!"-Quality Yet, But It's Getting There

Episode 3 of The Amazing Race: Family Edition was last night, and several previously-identified instances of watering down the Race idea have been dealt with. For instance, they went back to a 12-hour pit stop (the teams' departure times ranged from 2:26 AM to 3:05 AM), and that really took a toll on a few teams, especially the Weavers. I don't think I've ever seen Killer Fatigue hit so early, especially in such a lightweight Race. The Waffle House Breakdown will be recorded in TAR lore.

About that breakdown - the Weavers are the team who constantly ask God or Jesus for help in whatever task they're performing (I counted 3 Gratiuitous Weaver God References(tm) last night), which kind of bugs me. Do you need Jesus' help to read a map? Maybe the Rogerses did, but that was last week. Anyway, when the Weavers were in the bathroom of the Waffle House, and one of the daughters was having a breakdown, I was expecting Mom to circle the wagons and lead the family in a prayer. It would actually have made a lot of sense for her to do that, but she didn't! You ask God to help you in the race (which, objectively, means He would be hurting the other racers), but you don't ask His help when it looks like you could really use it? Strange.

Other stuff:

• Apparently Mr. Gaghan refers to Mrs. Gaghan as 'Mommy' - when he's talking to her! I reckon I could have gone my whole life without knowing that, and been happy about it.
• I think we're seeing a Redemption Subplot with the Paolos, as they're edited as being less argumentative than last week (which, in turn, was less argumentative than the week before).
• The Linz sister pronouncing Dulles 'dulls' and one of the Bransen daughters pronouncing it 'dull-aez.'
• I really hated the setup of the Roadblock as a team spacer; it sure looked like it was guaranteed to put at least 15 minutes between each team since it could only handle one team at a time. Running only a mile after that, then a short distance from the museum to the pit stop, basically guaranteed that whoever got to the RB last would be Philiminated.
• And speaking of that, I was a bit surprised that last night was an elimination leg, meaning they've used three of their seven elimination legs already. If they have the standard 13-week season, either every other leg from here out will be non-elim (predictable), or they'll have to do two non-elims in a row (yuck).

Amazing Editing Moments:

• Char, right after leaving: "Even though the kids are my stepkids, I'm their friend but I'm happy that they think of me that way, instead of, ooh, the stepmom (finger quotes), in that negative connotation . . .." Hunter, about ten seconds later: eyeroll and muttered "Whatever." Hunter about ten minutes later: "She's a bitch."
• Megan Linz: "I definitely get frustrated when my brothers aren't listening to me . . ." then finally getting her brothers to listen to her when she spots the sign to the shrimp place.
• Matt (not) Aiello: "I think we've been a little too business, let's be a little lighter and have fun with this." followed by sixteen million tries at the mud run.

Wow! Moment: The Gaghans (third week in a row), for making the mud run their bitch on the first try.

Key Play: The Bransens hustling off the second plane. Hustling to the Visitors' Center to catch the early bus. Hustling, hustling, hustling. Gives hope to us middle-aged fat men, it does.

It Was Over When: The Aiellos hesitated aboutthislong before checking in at the Roadblock, pulling the last ticket. See above as to why this killed them.

Next week: One of the 4UnfortunatelyNotNonBlondes comes out of transmit-only mode long enough to take offense at something. The other three, still locked in transmit-only, fail to notice. Also, the Weavers (recall that Mr. was killed in an accident during a race at (I think) Daytona) have to go to Talledaga for a task. flower_goddess thought this was horrible; I think I'll really like it.

Posted by Chris at October 12, 2005 12:23 PM

Category: Reality TV