TAR10: Double Philimination!

Apologies for the late entry on last nigh's premiere of The Amazing Race 10... believe me I'd much rather be blogging, but work has just been crrrrrr-azy today and promises not to lighten up this week... so don't worry about me if I miss a day or two (ahhh... blogger's ego strikes again!  there I go thinking people actually care about all this drivel!).

Here are my first impressions...

But, holey moley... what about the double Philimination?!  And who exactly does the Philiminator think he is with this "expect the unexpected" stuff... he is definitely infringing on some of the Chebot's Big Brother trademarked lines.  But first!   So much for this "most diverse" TAR cast ever... umm, the producers might have wanted give that line a second thought when they were promoting this season... when the first ever American-Muslim team and the first ever American-Indian team don't even get past the first pit stop!!  That certainly explains why there was one more team than normal at the start of the Race.

I would have loved to have seen more of both teams... it was interesting to see Bilal and Sa'eed deal with their religious obligations/traditions (the praying, can't touch women) as they proceeded on with the Race.  And Vipul and Arti seemed like fun (heck, I even predicted a long run for them) ... so much for them being well-traveled and multi-lingual!  But what fun is it when the Racers are able to speak the language of the country they are visiting... after all this episode was titled... "Real Fast! Quack! Quack!"... ah, the universal language of... a duck?!?!

Ok... I am mightly confused between the cheerleaders and the beauty scholarship pageant queens... we have Kellie and Jaime and Dustin and Kandice... ok, one of the teams has a brunette (the first)... but both pairings are unbelievably friendly and perky... give me another week (or two) to tell them apart....

Tom & Terry... faaaabulous!  I am guessing if I ever want to get on TAR I would have to flame it up... well, I probably wouldn't have to, but Todd would... it appears that TAR likes its viewers to know the gay couple the moment they bound onto the screen and/or open their mouths.  Not that there's anything wrong with that?!

Speaking of gay,  I have to say my mouth dropped in the team intros when dad Duke broke down and said he was disappointed (??? not sure if that was the word) that his daughter Lauren is a lesbian.  Wow, we have certainly had parents with issues about it on before... but never quite coming right out and saying that from the get-go on national television!   But so far, so good Race-wise... hopefully this will help their relationship... and while I like my gay boy teams, it is nice to have an out lesbian racing for the first time.

Speaking of dysfunctional relationships, I see our "problem couple" and their names are... Rob and Kimberly.  They had a scratch even before getting to the first airport and Rob later mentioned that another little "tone" change was the 1% of what he hated about his relationship. Well Rob, I am here to tell you that that little 1% is going to probably be like 76% on the Race.  Good luck!

One "minority first ever" team that did manage to stick around were Asian-American brothers Erwin & Godwin... though it didn't look like would... I am guessing they weren't too far removed from the first surprise Philimination.  We'll see if they are able to pick it up... and Godwin is quite the hunk... between him and a couple of guys on the Asian tribe on Survivor... in the immortal words of Rachael Ray... yum-o!

And speaking of hunks, we have Tyler & James... who were unorignally asked to play basketball shirtless for their TAR open montage sequence... didn't Eric & Jeremy just do that last season?!  But who am I to complain... now this whole ex-drug addict angle is certainly an interesting new angle.  Nice to know the modeling world is a safe employment haven.

Then we head to the South... with Lyn and Karlyn... "Alabama" seems friendly and harmless enough... but they are definitely being upstaged by "Kentucky" ... coalminer David and wife Mary... most certainly our comic relief in the first episode... though we didn't get any evidence that the couple was welcomed with open arms in China thanks to their Forrest Gump-ness.

And lastly (whew!) we have Peter and Sarah... or Charla and Mirna V2.0... the "I can do anything" team, but I'll use my physical challenge to my advantage if it'll help me get ahead in the Race.  I was surprised how quickly the other teams were having issues with that!  Though it was hard justify why Sarah needed to pre-board on the first flight.. it's not like that gets you a better seat... right?  And I have to admit being not too comfortable having to watch Sarah try to scale the Great Wall... incredible that she did it... but those first attempts were tough.

So that's all... what did you think?!

Comments

[Gail]

Once again you've summed it all up pretty well. I was very sad about Vipul and Arti. They were so sweet to each other and friendly to the other teams. Wait a minute! We can't have that on a reality show! Pleasant surprises were the married Kentucky couple, the single moms, and the cheerleaders, who I find more likeable than the beauty queens--not sure why. Love the Cho Bros! Hope they pick it up. Model boys are more subtle than "Frat Boys". I'm also not sure how I feel about Peter and Sarah. I'll reserve judgement on those last 2 teams.

[monette]

I had been questioning why they had started with 12 teams instead of 11, but they really evened that out right away. We knew something was up as soon as we saw it said "Last Team" instead of a time slot. Other bits I noticed:

-The Philiminator never said how many legs the race would be, only "8 of many" would be elimination rounds.
-Also, is this the first time they've started from the West Coast of the US and gone to China? I'm trying to remember if the usual track was going east to Europe, but I can't remember.
-I do hate how cliche those little intro clips of the teams are; I realize they all have to have a "catch", but there's got to be something else to show.

The Kentuck's sound the most like my parents- arguing, yelling, and then pulling through. I like them, also the single moms from Alabama ("This is nothin' compared to Child Birth!" I wonder how many times that will be said over the season). I haven't decided my feelings about the Druggies yet, they seem they could be strong competitors, yet I feel like it's the "same" team every year, which is the cute, athletic, actor/model/whatever guys. Boring! I am most disappointed by the loss of the Muslim team and the Indian team, which could have been two of the more interesting teams.

My top three (pre-show) were Peter and Sarah, Vipul and Arti, and Duke and Lauren. I'm still liking D&L, but I'm not so sure of the overall strength of P&S considering "the leaky knee" thing. I wonder how that is covered under the race guidelines.