Amazing Race 15: Episode 1, Part 2
By Daron Aldridge
October 5, 2009
BoxOfficeProphets.com
Let's see how it unfolds after their mandatory 12-hour rest period.
The interviews edited into the departures give a better glimpse at what is driving the teams.
In the top spot, Meghan and Cheyne leave the shrine after reading the clue, which tells them they are already leaving Japan and heading to Vietnamese village of Cai Be via Ho Chi Minh City. Meghan gives us a glimpse into the seat-of-his-pants strategy that Cheyne prefers – "We'll figure it out when we get there." That free-wheeling attitude works less often than not.
So, when given the choice between going to the airport to see what flights are available or using the hotel's Internet to book the flights ahead of time, Cheyne and Meghan go with the airport.
Next are Zev and Justin. Courtesy of Justin, we learn that they have taken the opposite approach of other teams who are lying and intentionally told people that Zev has Asperger's. Why? Justin thinks that other teams will underestimate Zev and he feels confident with his teammate.
Mr. Street Lawyer Lance and Keri leave just a few minutes after Zev and Justin and all four prefer the Web to ticket counter. In restating the glaringly obvious, Lance admits that they bicker and get passed but that he isn't here to find himself. To affirm this claim, he ratchets up his self-absorption a notch by actually looking down at himself and saying "Look I just found myself." Pardon my internal monologue: {This guy is a complete tool.} He is giving street lawyers everywhere a bad name. Oh wait, I think he's the only one of this completely fictional subset of barristers.
The next four teams all leave within five minutes of each other with Marcy and Ron (our resident elder statespeople) and our good friends the Globetrotters, Flight Time and Big Easy and father and son Gary and Matt follow married Ericka and Brian directly to the airport.
Brothers Sam and Dan finally acknowledge what I just assumed in part one. They are going to keep their sexuality a secret to let them flirt with the girls for an advantage. It's just a variation on the ol' "Don't ask, don't tell" and it just might work. The sexually pure (Mika's words not mine), CMT couple of Mika and Canaan are looking at overcoming a second to last place finish this time around. Unsurprisingly, the Internet teams, including these two teams, find and book the earliest flight, which leaves Toyko at 10:30 a.m.
The two hour penalty that Phil placed on poker players Maria and Tiffany for muffing up the last challenge puts the girls waiting to leave at 3:22 a.m., or two and a half hours behind the others. They reiterate their plan of lying about their job because people don't want to help the "rich, successful poker chicks" but will help non-profit workers. While probably true, why not just downplay the level of success you had at playing poker. It's just an idea. Oh yeah, we are treated to how Tiffany breaks down their team dynamic by saying that she's the brawn and Maria is the brains and the boobs. These may be...umm...assets at the poker table, but they will not be too interesting to the brothers.
At the airport, things unfold as expected. The teams that opted for the airport terminal over the computer terminal are on the receiving end of bad news from the flu virus-deflecting ticket agent that the 10:30 economy seats are full. Since one the cardinal rules on the race is that they must sit in economy, this could be seriously hamstring those teams.
Fortunately for Maria and Tiffany, this situation has been unfolding for the awhile as the two hour penalty is for naught. The girls show up at airport and jump at the chance to piggyback on Brian's efforts to persuade the ticket agent to sell them business tickets but to let them sit in economy. After all these seasons, I didn't know that was an option and I am impressed that Brian suggested a creative work around. The girls' "we want to do that too" game play ruffles everyone's feathers, because that makes four teams they are trying to get an exception made for. The plan works and all the teams are now on the same flight. Airports remain the great equalizer in the Amazing Race.
In case you forgot, Lance tells us again that he's a lawyer. Now he adds that he's cutthroat and that will help them in the race, as well as on an island with Matthew Modine and Geena Davis. All right, that last bit was me and not him. Even though it's part of the game, Lance is mad that Tiffany and Maria weren't sent home and just given a Speed bump.
After Brian's seat reassignment worked, Tiffany thanked him for begging but then muttered to Maria, "Getting plane tickets is a piece of cake." It sure is when you let others carry you. Matt correctly asserts to his dad that "those two are shady." The girls are settling nicely into their role as villains. Problem is, we don't love to hate them, just hate them. Based upon just these first 15 minutes, I have to recant my impression that Tiffany is the more likable one of this pair. It's a dead heat.
Now for the "Oh what a tangled web we weave" portion of the show. In an effort to legitmately prepare for the next leg, Maria asks another non-racing passenger how to pronounce the destination's name. He helps them and then hurts them. He asks Tiffany if she plays poker and she admits to the stranger that she got in the "top 15" (whatever that is). This guy says he knows who she is and in a crowded Japanese airport, they ask probably the one schlub for help that is also a poker dork and can blow their cover story. To make matters worse, their tag teammates of Sam and Dan overhear the conversation. Will the brothers keep it to themselves or sell them out to the others? We shall see.
As they join up with Sam and Dan at the ticket counter, the girls comment on the matching orange passport holders that Sam and Dan have and Tiffany jokingly/flirtingly says that "they were just trying to figure out if they were gay or not." The brothers play it off saying their sister bought them for the guys to use on the race. Tiffany and Maria are smitten with the brothers. So far, the brothers' subterfuge is more successful than the girls. Well played, boys.
In rain-soaked Vietnam, the brothers and girls share a van to a bus terminal that will take them to Cai Be village. As the board the van, Dan says "poker, poker, poker, poker," to the girls in a joking and dorky way. The girls just giggle and say "you're cute." Maybe Tiffany and Maria are possessed by Lloyd Bridges circa the Airplane movies.
Ho Chi Minh City is essentially flooded and mopeds are driving in and out of traffic in about a foot of water. This gives producers plenty of gasps, winces and cringes from the teams' point of view as their taxis narrowly miss several other motorists. Please wait a second while I make a mental note: Find out when they filmed in Vietnam and do not visit unless an entire suitcase is dedicated to slickers and galoshes. All right, I'm back.
Apparently, Flight Time and Big Easy heard (we assume from the poker groupie) on the plane that Tiffany and Maria aren't the selfless non-profit workers they claimed. Any sympathy this cover story might have curried from the Globetrotters is gone.
At the bus station, the girls and brothers on the next bus to leave for Cai Be at 3:30 p.m. As Flight and Easy, then Ron and Marcy, and Mika and Canaan board the bus, Tiffany keeps declaring that there is no room for anyone else. This first bus leaves Ho Chi Minh City with only these five teams, so there very well could be a gap.
As the remaining teams arrive at the station, they discover that their bus at 4:45 p.m. puts them trailing the others by more than an hour. Check out the big brain on Brian. He suggests paying the bus driver more to get them to leave and Garrett fleshes this plan out more by saying they should just buy the rest of the tickets. First the seat swap on the plane and now this. Brian may have choked (yeah, I said it) in Sushi Roulette but he seems to be thinking really well on his feet to come up with unconventional solutions.
And it's another successful finagling as they get to leave early. During the course of the bus ride, a guy with no jacket in the middle of this downpour gets on. Zev takes note of the situation and gives him his jacket. He explains it matter-of-factly as "he probably needs it a little more than me." Ericka gushes about the gesture. Way to go, Zev, Miss America is impressed with you.
The second clumping in a row at a challenge is on tap. The first bus arrives but the designated dock doesn't open until the morning so the other bus will assuredly catch up. The sad thing is that those teams spent the extra money unnecessarily but that is the gamble they had to take. I will make an amendment to the previous statement: Airports and hours of operation remain the great equalizers in the Amazing Race.
It's time for a multi-team camp out, social evening. Here are the pearls of wisdom that result.
Garrett thinks about marriage with Jessica because she is loyal, loving and caring. But you keep breaking up so there is something amiss there. Probably because later in the episode he says that she is very difficult to deal with and has a short fuse when it doesn't go her way.
Tiffany boasts that as poker players they pick up information about people and observe to get a read on them. How are those skills working with your race "boyfriends", ladies? The Mentalist and Psych's Shawn Spencer have nothing to worry about. Tiffany says they like Justin and Zev the least of all the teams because she hasn't gotten warm vibe from them.
Zev counters in his interview, "They told us they work with homeless kids but I don't see that being true at all. They don't give off that ‘loving, let you help you out' vibe". Touché.
Lance is the leading candidate for being the first to come down with Ugly Americanism this season. He complains about the rain and everything being wet. Then he proclaims that he doesn't want a vacation home here. I'm sure the Vietnamese people are grateful for this.
Tiffany and Maria continue to size up the other teams through their keen powers of observation and say they don't think that Lance is a lawyer. I guess figuring out information about people playing cards is their forte because they don't have a good batting average with their opponents here.
The dock is open and the teams rush to the clues that instruct them to take a boat to a farm with mud pits and cover a tree's roots with said mud to a set height. Tiffany and Maria (who has been pleasantly quiet this leg) will have to wait for their delta cruise because the Speed bump is here. And it is pretty lame and simple.
They are given five ingredients that must be mixed together to create a traditional Vietnamese soup. Maria excitedly admits that she loves this particular type of soup and makes it often. How convenient? Producer-tainted challenge, anyone?
On the way to the challenge via boat, Mika admits that she just recently started to learn to swim and is very nervous at that point in the middle of the delta. Given that water and swimming figure into multiple legs in every season, that ill-preparation would be like a person applying for America's Next Top Model and then deciding to learn to walk in high heels before the show starts.
It's time for a challenge that will involve many shots of locals laughing as the teams slip and fall. America's Funniest Home Videos, Charlie Chaplin and Buster Keaton must be huge in Vietnam.
With no clear frontrunner, all the teams are there at the same time except the girls, who are blowing through the sad excuse for a Speedbump.
One by one the teams finish the challenge with Meghan and Cheyne still in first place like when they left Tokyo. The last three teams left at the challenge are Zev and Justin, Mika and Canaan and Tiffany and Maria. In the midst of the challenge, our quote dispenser Tiffany declares without much jest that "girls and mud are so sexy" as she is elbow deep in the stuff. Maybe she is deceitfully playing the hetero card too. Exhibit A, this comment and exhibit B: her admiration of Maria's endowments, which are honestly not necessarily in need of so much praise.
As Zev and Justin finish, Justin slips and takes a header into the river. Again, the locals and the viewer can't help but laugh at clumsiness. It's a universal form of comedy. As it turns out, Justin's pratfall made their clue fall in the river. After searching on their boat that is en route, Justin and Zev have to return to the challenge to find the clue, which was stuck on the side of the boat that was the scene of Justin's Dick van Dyke impression. This backtracking helps Mika and Canaan pass them with Tiffany and Maria close behind.
Do you feel like a Roadblock? Good, because it's about that time. This Roadblock's theme is Who's feeling just ducky? The selected contestant has to lead a flock of 150 ducks over a bridge and back to their pens using only flags. And it has to be done in only ten minutes. If they fail, they have to wait for another course to open up.
A trio of ladies (Meghan, Jessica and Ericka) are the first to give duck herding a shot. Sadly, all three need to remove such a job from their search criteria on CareerBuilder, as they all fail on the first attempt. Matt, Sam, Flight, Marcy, Mika, Keri, Zev and Tiffany are next.
Sam fares significantly better and puts him and Dan as the first to finish the Roadblock and head to meet Mr. Keoghan. Then, Matt draws upon his animal herding experiences in Montana, which puts them in a very close second. Next, Flight and Keri make short work of the Roadblock and are off as well.
While waiting for his turn, Zev notices the frustration coming from the others as their teammates struggle and takes a calm and calculated approach. Zev breezes through the challenge and is dubbed the Duck Whisperer because he expended little effort in getting the ducks to go where he wanted. For Tiffany, this Roadblock seems as easy as getting plane tickets, except this time she actually has to do the work. And she does so quickly. Meghan and Mika finally finish after multiple attempts. Despite being the first ones at the Roadblock, Cheyne and Meghan will clearly not be repeating as first place finishers this time. Marcy similarly doesn't have as much difficulty as some of the others and gets it done.
Thanks to jockeying for the leadership role, Sam and Dan get passed by Gary and Matt to the pit stop. The father and son are supportive of each of other and Gary praises his son for doing the Roadblock effortlessly. As a result they are the first, followed in a photo finish by Sam and Dan and Flight Time and Big Easy. The basketball players haven't shown much in the area of disharmony yet, probably because they are used to working as a team, which is a huge advantage in this race.
The two remaining girls are still struggling. Jessica and Ericka were the second and third teams to start the Roadblock and are the only ones left. During one of her attempts, Ericka even forgets to close the gate when she goes to get the rest and they of course get out. The pressure of the game and the shouts of encouragement masked as anger coming from their teammates are getting to them. With only one duck straggling behind, Ericka excitedly ushers it to the pen and places her order for supper, "I am eating duck tonight." I wonder what's on the menu – Donald, Daffy, Howard, or Jon Cryer. There is no time to wait for her order to be placed, as Jessica also finishes only seconds apart.
Fourth goes to Lance, Keri and Lance's primal scream of approval. Zev and Justin sidestep the "lost clue" landmine from earlier, coupled with Zev at the Roadblock, and they are team number five. Down five spots from the last leg, Meghan and Cheyne settle for sixth. Conversely, Tiffany and Maria are strong this leg, jumping from 11th to seventh with the extra task. Mika and Canaan outpace Marcy and Ron for eighth and ninth place respectively.
This race to the finish turns out to actually be a footrace to the end. It is very close, with no need for manufactured suspense and Garret ups the drama by plowing over a guy on a stopped moped. The tenth team to arrive is...Ericka and Brian. This means that Garrett and Jessica are the last team to arrive and Phil is sorry to tell that they have been eliminated from the race.
Garrett closes out the show with touching words to America and Jessica, "We're stronger than what our placement shows. I don't know if we are closer to marriage." With that uplifting note, see you next week for more racing, arguing and hopefully more pratfalls.