The Amazing Race Season 20 Recap
The Amazing Race Season 20 Recap
By Daron Aldridge
April 23, 2012
BoxOfficeProphets.com
That ridiculous display by Border Patrol likely stemmed from the guys’ own poor decision on the Water Supply over Air Supply Detour. Either way, that re-shapes my power rankings.
Army of Two Rachel & Dave - Once again last week, Blonde Rachel & Dave proved that whatever marital discord they have going on, it is making them work better as an Amazing Race team. I don’t understand it but for some reason they aren’t hindered on the race by the name-calling, arguing and more name-calling. Distance (while Dave was deployed) may not have made the heart grow fonder but it sure taught them to see something through. Also, I am convinced that Rachel intentionally let Team Justified claim its sole first place finish.
Team Border Patrol Art & JJ - Two weeks in a row, the former flawless team on the race slipped up and that’s the main reason that I can see for JJ’s irrational lashing out at Army of Two. I said it last time but I don’t think that the married couple was any more wrong for NOT U-Turning a team than Border Patrol (or anyone else) is wrong for using the U-Turn. JJ took this decision as an unforgiveable affront to their alliance, which is at minimum a gross exaggeration. In the face of their bad legs, it’s just a convenient scapegoat for JJ to use in case they are eliminated. Because there is no way these guys’ pride and arrogance will let them admit they were outraced. Any loss will be because of what someone else did. That’s just my opinion but I also think they will still be around to the end.
Bopper & Mark - Poor lame Team Justified. That’s lame meaning injured and not a personality assessment. Bopper’s bum knee will be the reason these Kentucky boys will not win the race. While injuries befall Survivor contestants seasonally and cause them to quit the game, I don’t recall being able to pinpoint a specific injury for why a team doesn’t win Amazing Race. Yeah, Mel’s (of Mel & Mike) age got the better of them the second time around but being honest, they weren’t really in contention. On the other hand, Bopper & Mark have moved up the ranks to position them as a threat, if not for the fact that a six-year-old could likely outrun Bopper at this point. They should still make it to the final three, unlike…
Big Brother’s Brendon & Rachel - Bear with me: The teams I usually root against prosper (i.e. last season’s champs and reprehensible team of Ernie & Cindy). It’s some weird variation on Murphy’s Law. Trust me. Anyway, if I truly believe such a team (i.e. Big Brother) won’t be eliminated, and then maybe they will. Brendon & Bad Rachel have made more enemies on the race than legs completed and plus thousands more at home rooting against them. Too bad it’s all for naught, because they consistently eke by from elimination. That dumb luck is probably what will have them outlast…
Anti-Big Brother divorcees Vanessa & Ralph - The team I picked to win it all has shown on a few occasions how wrong I was in overestimating their race skills. Without a Speed Bump-saddled team behind them and with their recurring inability to see clues in front of them, I just can’ see them making it past elimination again. The Double U-Turn is the easy thing to blame for theirs and Brendon & Rachel’s placement but even without the extra task; they would have still ended up in fourth and fifth place.
Let’s check back in with Phil and see what happens when our teams invade India as last week’s preview teased.
During the pitstop, Bopper gets a semi-"all clear" from a doctor for his knee problems. The doctor claims that with a leg brace, he should be fine and that’s good enough for them to remain optimistic. Mark understands that the injury will place the running burden on him for the rest of the race but if that’s what has to be done, then he will do it.
So in what new and exciting place will he be carrying Bopper this leg? Cochin, India. Nearly 3,000 miles from Tanzania, in Cochin, they have to head to a bus depot and then head to Sacred Heart College for their clue.
Team Justified leaves in first but is only one minute ahead of Rachel & Dave. Both teams are at the travel agent and find out that the first flight doesn’t leave until the following evening. Dave acknowledges that the Art & JJ are angry but says that that agreement was simply because Border Patrol wanted someone else to do their dirty work for them.
As they are working on their reservations, we get a recap of the supposed transgression imposed upon them. Surprisingly, Art is the one singing the bitter tune and not JJ but he uses the exact wording that JJ repeated during the previous leg. Maybe Art was just trying to make JJ look less bad.
Anyway…at the travel agent, Border Patrol intentionally doesn’t even acknowledge that Army of Two is there, yet gets their panties in a bunch that Dave didn’t say anything to them, either. I guess they really thought that they deserved and would get an apology of some sort. Even Bopper & Mark (who earlier were given $5,000 by Art & JJ) sum up Border Patrol’s attitude as acting like babies. When someone who you have essentially paid off still can’t get on your side, then you just might be in the wrong. Just a thought.
Either way, Rachel & Dave and Art & JJ proclaim that they will do better by just racing on their own. Their supposed common U-Turn target Brendon & Rachel leave and say they are actually "over" what Art & JJ did because they feel them completing the U-Turn and being in fourth (out of only six teams, mind you) proves they deserve to be there. I disagree with that way of thinking just as I have disagreed with 92% of anything this team has said or the ways they have chosen to act.
Anti-Big Brother Vanessa & Ralph are living up to their new name by telling us that they will happily return the U-Turn favor on Big Brother if given the chance. This has me thinking that there is still possibility for yet another non-elimination leg this season. I thought we were done with that but I now fear that not only is there another one looming but that this will be it since there are only five teams left.
Sorry, back to the travel agent. Vanessa & Ralph decide to do their own research for flights instead of relying on the travel agents themselves. Lo and behold, they find another connecting flight through Nairobi that puts them about 30 minutes ahead of the other teams. For a team that left the pitstop nearly five hours after the leading duo, Vanessa & Ralph may have just gotten a much needed boost…
Never mind. The second flight lands as the divorcees are trying to get information about the bus schedules to Thevara. Bopper’s injury costs Team Justified almost immediately as they are the last ones to get to the depot and have to wait on a bus, whereas all the others have already left with Rachel & Dave in the front.
And Army of Two is the first team at the clue at the college. It’s "Lights... camera... dancing" for this Roadblock as one of the team members has to learn a Bollywood choreography routine and perform is satisfactorily before getting their clue. Dave is happy to hand this one over to Rachel. Dave is thrilled that the clue alluded to dancing, so he didn’t get tricked into volunteering for this one.
Right behind them, as Blonde Rachel gets changed for the task, are Border Patrol, Anti-Big Brother and Big Brother. We have JJ (who gets the nod by default since Art did the previous "dance routine" task with the wine bottles in South America), Vanessa and Bad Rachel, who is excited about the “fun outfits and sparkles”. Meanwhile, Ralph thinks that Vanessa will be all right since “she has a little Puerto Rican in her.” Yes, my mind immediately meant to the gutter when I heard this spoken and immediately felt bad about it.
India marks the return of an old favorite – Mark’s perpetual motion sickness. But he explains that as long as he has his barf bag, he’s good. The same can’t be said for me, if I have to be subjected to another round of him retching in a cab or bus.
(Side note: Producers, unless such action impacts their race performance, please just edit out anything along those lines. We really don’t need to hear it and I’m not sure it adds anything to the show. Thanks, Daron)
As you could have predicted, JJ is having the worst time with learning the routine as the girls seem to have picked up on the overall tempo of the choreography. The bitter JJ has at least redirected his bitterness as this point to Art, who is trying to encourage him but is only distracting him.
Meanwhile, Mark is sicker than ever but there is no way Bopper’s knee would allow him to do the Roadblock; so the dance routine falls onto the quite recently nauseous one. Bopper laments his knee injury because apparently he is better dancer of the two but he supportively tells Brendon that Mark has plenty of heart (which probably won’t mean much or anything to the judge.)
JJ is the first one to take the stage for his routine run through. If you saw his dance moves during their rehearsal, you also wouldn’t be surprised to see JJ get the thumbs down on his routine.
Blonde Rachel is all smiles and energy as she takes the stage and hops, shakes and dances her way to completing the Roadblock with an enthusiastic “Perfect” from the judge/choreographer. The clue points them to the Indian Coffee House and Army of Two is officially in first place with one task behind them.
Vanessa gets her chance at center stage and apparently, there is less Puerto Rican in her than Ralph estimated because she gets the JJ treatment and is sent back to rehearse more. Her mistake apparently was left turn instead of a right turn. Bad Rachel has a similar fate as she jumps at the wrong time. So, as of now, teams are one-for-four on attempts. To add insult to injury for the others, Rachel & Dave are already at the next clue, which is a Detour. This time it’s between Cricket or Clutch It. For Cricket, they have to each hit a ball past a specific line to get their clue. For Clutch It, they have to learn to drive a motor rickshaw around a training course. Personally, I am on the fence with these. Both appear simple but are probably not so much.
For the Detour, Dave defers to Rachel to pick and she goes with Clutch It (even though he later says that he would’ve preferred Cricket). The Clutch It training course is ripe with arguing possibilities for these two as Rachel goes first and begins laughing each time she messes up. You guessed it... Dave isn’t exactly happy about that. So they switch seats and let Dave try it.
Speaking of retrying…JJ has failed his second Bollywood dance attempt, as does Bad Rachel, who jumps off the stage, when she is denied. As Art observes, “Rachel looked like the girl that didn’t make cheerleader but kept on trying.” For a guy who is at the mercy of his uncoordinated partner’s dance ability, I don’t know if he needs to be reveling in someone else’s failure.
At the Detour, Dave completes the course on his second run through and it’s now up to Blonde Rachel, who proclaims herself “the crazy one.”
An exhausted and possibly near-dehydrated Mark can’t quite get it right and fails his first dance attempt but Vanessa is officially the second one to complete it on her third go-round. Bad Rachel is just good enough on her third attempt as the charitable judge accepts her performance. From where I was sitting, though, she had way more mistakes than Blonde Rachel and Vanessa combined but I’m not the one handing out clues. So Anti-Big Brother and Big Brother are on the way to the coffee house.
For this fourth attempt, JJ gets the seal of approval and Border Patrol is saved from even being in last place temporarily. The same can’t be said for Team Justified as Mark continues to struggle with not only dancing but not passing out.
Back at Clutch It, Blonde Rachel completes her course as Dave literally turns into a backseat driver. They are now heading to the pitstop at Bulgatty Palace. And then Phil says those dreaded words, “the last team to check in MAY be eliminated.” Great, we are nearly guaranteed a nonelimination. It’s probably an act of mercy since Mark may still be at the Roadblock by the time Rachel & Dave leave for the next leg.
Anti-Big Brother go with Clutch It, which doesn’t make too much sense in light of the list of things that Vanessa says that she has hit when driving in San Antonio – cars, trees, the Alamo. AND she says that she failed her driving test. Again, not sure this is the task for them. Big Brother goes with Cricket, as do one of their 58 sworn enemies Art & JJ. After his dancing debacle, JJ proclaims that this task will be easy. Both swing and miss or fail to make hard enough contact to get past the mark.
Mark gets the split screen treatment as he racks up attempts number four, five and six, which equal three more failed attempts. On the opposite end of the success spectrum, Blonde Rachel & Dave are staring at Phil across the Pitstop mat as team number one again.
At the Cricket field, JJ is keeping his overly aggressive side front and center as he is repeatedly denied his hit. Finally, both he and Brendon have done it for their team, so it’s down to Bad Rachel and Art. But that still puts both of them with more progress on the Detour than Vanessa & Ralph, who are struggling with driving course.
Back at the Roadblock, Mark shoots down Bopper’s suggestion of taking the penalty, which is something that I personally would have suggested as soon as JJ got his clue. But being a proud man, Mark gets on stage for his seventh and eighth time.
At the Detour, according to JJ, Rachel emasculates Art by completing the task before him and Big Brother races off to the Pitstop. Art finally connects and Ralph completes the course, so it’s a toss-up for second, third, and fourth place because we all know that Team Justified has had last place sewn up since they left the airport. Big Brother is officially checked in as number two.
After 11 attempts, Mark is finally ready to give in and take a penalty. While I hope I am wrong about this being a non-elimination leg, they'd better pray that I am right. Mark is physically exhausted and actually feels like his health and life on the line here. After a well-placed commercial break, Bopper and his choreographer convince him to try it one more time.
With Border Patrol and Anti-Big Brother checked in as numbers three and four, Mark’s successful 12th attempt was probably charity on the judge’s part but it did boost Mark’s spirits. The friends are resigned to elimination and are pleased that they raced hard the entire time. We get to see clips of them doing Clutch It and highlights from their experiences so far.
On the mat and in last place, Phil lets them essentially eulogize their Amazing Race time and Bopper explains that everyone could use more money but he can’t replace his friend. Phil then tells them that they will have to muster up enough strength to keep going because this is a non-elimination leg.
On tap for next week, we have an injured Vanessa laying in a street with a bum ankle, a conflicted Rachel faced with a head shaving challenge (I assume a Fast Forward) and Team Justified’s Speed Bump. See you then and have a good week.