The Amazing Race -- This Alliance Needs To End
Original Airing: April 22, 2013
This was the episode this alliance between the Country Girls and Bates and Anthony really needed to end. They’re only five teams left. The time has come to start racing for yourselves, and if you don’t want to do that, do the other racers a favor and resign from the race. Only one team can occupy the winner circle. When you start questioning if you should wait for another team while doing tasks, that’s when you need to cut the apron strings to the other team and start racing for yourself.
The first destination on this leg of the race was Dresden, Germany. This leg the teams were giving a couple of trivia tests so this could be called the Trivia Leg of the race. Once teams landed in Dresden they were to go to the Ministry of Finance to choose a Ford Fusion to drive. This was also the episode sponsored by Ford Fusion.
The car has some built-in texting thing that Ford Fusion wants to show off so racers have to use it to answer three trivia questions before they can be told their next destination. There’s a big thing about not texting while driving. If laws are past outlawing it, Ford Fusion is going to have a problem.
Anyway, the Brandenburg Gate is the next destination. It’s the sight of Ronald Reagan’s famous speech to bring down the Berlin Wall.
On the way to Dresden, Bates bag was stolen on the plane. Lucky for him he’s carrying his passport on him. I couldn’t help wondering if it wasn’t Mona and Beth who stole it. They were saying earlier how they see them as a big threat and wanted them out of the race. After last season when James and Abba got their money stolen we know The Amazing Race would sanction such actions, but this time they’d be smart enough not to show the theft on camera so another brouhaha from the viewers wouldn’t arise. Bates decided to look at it as a blessing in disguise that would help him move faster.
Interesting enough that when Bates and Anthony couldn’t find the clue at the Brandenburg Gate, it was Mona and Beth who told them where it was. Kind of strange when they said they wanted them gone that they actually help them. Could it be guilt inspired? Yeah, I know I have a suspicious mind, but if I wanted someone gone, and was complaining about the Country Girls helping to keep them in the race, the last thing I would have done was to help them.
From the Brandenburg Gate they needed to go to the top of the Park Inn. It’s the tallest building in Berlin at 37 stories and both team members have to jump off it to get their next clue.
Detour – Train Trials or Font Follies
In Train Trials you have to build an elaborate train track and your toy train has to make one full circuit around it without falling off. It’s not as easy as it sounds. It took Joey and Meghan 7 tries to get past this detour and Bates and Anthony 9 times.
In Font Follies you have to transport these huge neon letters to Bushstaben Museum. If you drop your letter you have to go back and start from scratch. Bates and Anthony dropped one of their letters and broke it and that’s how they went and did the train detour instead. Max and Katie actually used some strategy in picking their letters. They chose letters they could carry around their neck.
It was Bates and Anthony having to go and do the train detour that finally broke-up the Country Girl/Bates and Anthony alliance for this leg. One of the girls actually asked if Bates and Anthony wanted them to go back with them as they went and got another letter. That’s crazy. You’re going to give up a potential lead for this silly alliance you started on a show you shouldn’t make alliances on?
The next destination is the Salon Zur Wilden. Once there a team member has to go through a glorified fun house to find the room that contains their next clue. Max had Katie do it, again. He’d better start divvying up these tasks and do some himself, because near the end of the race he’s going to have to do every task and if it’s something he can’t do, it’s going to cost them. That’s why teams keep track of these tasks and try to alternate who does them, so just such a situation doesn’t arrive.
Anyway, before you can enter this freaky underground speakeasy you have to answer another trivia question, this one in German. Luckily for the racers that patrons at the bar know the answer and tell the teams the answer. Once you go in you find yourself in a pitch black maze only lit by weird flashing neon signs. You have to make it through the maze to find a white room with the next clue stuck on the wall.
I could understand Katie being freaked out about the place. When I was a kid my father took me in one of those funhouse tunnels and during one point I thought someone put a bag over my head and then I went with a friend through a haunted house and I was traumatized for weeks after. I kept having nightmares and even when I was awake I kept imagining the witch from the haunted house was standing behind me.
After getting through what Phil described as an evocative experience, teams were directed to the next Pit Stop, The Fifth Avenue of Berlin. Teams checked in as follows:
- Max and Katie who each won a Ford Fusion
- Joey and Meghan
- Caroline and Jennifer
- Bates and Anthony
- Mona and Beth – but it was a non-elimination
Mona and Beth got lost on the way to Salon Zur Wilden and it allowed Bates and Anthony to catch up with them. They ended up doing the Roadblock together and ended up in a footrace to the Pit Stop, which Bates and Anthony won.
Next week there’s going to be a Double U-Turn. Last time this happened most of the teams ganged up on Joey and Meghan and Mona Beth wanting to get rid of them. Will they do it again? If they U-Turn Mona and Beth they’ll not only have to do a Speed Bump and both tasks and elimination would seem a certainty. If Mona and Beth can somehow get ahead of the pack, they’d most likely U-Turn Bates and Anthony because they feel they’re the biggest threat to winning the race. And if Max and Katie can keep their first place lead, I could see them U-Turning Joey and Meghan, since they seem to not be able to stand Joey and Meghan. So next week it seems very likely the Double U-Turn will be used, again. Last time it didn’t help give the boot to the people targeted, because the father and son team resigned from the race, so no one got eliminated. This time that situation won’t exist and someone whose been U-Turned will most likely be going home.
Who would I like to see go home? Joey and Meghan. I’m as bad as Mad Max. I just find the two very annoying. I do think they’ll use the Double U-Turn on someone. I don’t know if the old alliance they had with Mona and Beth is still active, but I could see them targeting either Bates and Anthony or the Country Girls. Everyone knows about that alliance. Bates and Anthony seem to have come in first place in more legs than the rest of the players, so I imagine they’ll have a big target on their back.
Of the remaining racers, I really have no preference or anyone I rooting for. It’s been a strange season. I usually have a couple of favorites. I liked the father and son and Wynona and Chuck, but I’m not really passionate about any of the teams.
The thing that Pam and Winnie proved is anyone can be eliminated. Didn’t they go from first place to eliminated? So it could be any of the remaining who get eliminated next week. Even Max and Katie, who are currently in first place.
