The Amazing Race 24: All-Stars - Episode 7
The Amazing Race 24: All-Stars - Episode 7
By Daron Aldridge
April 15, 2014
BoxOfficeProphets.com
Without any other delay, we say, “See you later, Sri Lanka. Rome...sweet Rome."
When we last saw them, the Afghanimals had finally captured a first place finish that had eluded them for so long, even if it is just by a few seconds. The cryptic clue points them to the "Eternal City" and a couple different travel agents for tickets. The vagueness of the clue pointing to Rome doesn't really trip up anyone but rather serves as a way for the clue-writers to do something more than just say, "Next stop: Rome. Get a ticket and you will all be on the same flight." Because the cousins and the cowboys, who leave in second, soon find out that is indeed the case.
One flight...seven teams...and an unsuspecting Roman population. This leg must be filled to the brim with action because there is no time for footage of airport mingling or socializing. Either that or nothing interesting happened in the seven or so hours the teams waiting for their flight.
Even though the flight itself isn't providing a time advantage for teams, disembarking is. Thanks to the seat assignments, David & Connor, the Globetrotters and the cowboys are in the back of the plane and now the back of the pack. The other four teams hustle out of the plane first and bag the shuttle driver into leaving quickly.
Will the ten minute gap prove critical? Doubtful but you gotta take any edge you can get, especially Jennifer & Caroline, who don't know when their Speed Bump will pop up.
The teams are heading to Hadrian’s Bridge and John & Jessica get to it first. Before they rip into the clue, I will relay that the engaged couple reminds us that they are the ONLY team in Race history to be eliminated with an Express Pass unused. That was either foreshadowing that the cowboys may be similarly fated or merely a nice reminder at how foolish this team can be, which is why I labeled them Team Bonehead at the beginning. Please be the latter and not the former.
The clue is opened and the teams face decision time with this week’s Detour: Gladiator or Charioteer. For Gladiator, they have to perform a gladiator fight/reenactment in the shadows of the historic coliseum. After learning and performing the routine to the satisfaction of the onlooking “Roman Emperor,” they get their clue. For Charioteer, the teams have to race a remote control chariot around an oval course five times in less than a minute and a half. Easy? Nope. One person is controlling the speed and the other steers, plus the course is littered with rocks that need to be avoided. And another “plus” is that there is only course, so the more teams that participate, the more difficult it will be to navigate.
John & Jessica go with Gladiator and the cocksure part of John that has been understated lately rears its head again. I guess it’s easy to be humble when you are at the bottom, but as soon as he gets another taste of being in the front of the pack, he starts to feels full of his ability. John cites his years of martial arts as the reason why this task should be easy for him because he’s used these types of maneuvers.
Brendon & Rachel arrive next and go in the opposite direction. Unfortunately, the clue is worded just vaguely enough to mislead teams into thinking that they will be around actual horses and not toys. To her credit, she laughs off the confusion when she sees the actual task. Team Fetch also reminds us that the last time they were unleashed on the streets of Italy in season 20, Rachel had a meltdown in the midst of a task about how miserable the experience was and they were almost eliminated. While their stock and likability have risen this season, the producers have successfully reminded me why I disliked this team in the first place.
Both teams are now at their respective tasks and playing dress up, which Rachel says they “LOVE” doing. Thanks for that glimpse into your personal lives that I didn’t need.
Jennifer & Caroline excitedly show up at the bridge in third but oops…it’s time for their Speed Bump. The girls have to head to the Parthenon and pick up a typewriter, which must be deliver to the building that looks like the typewriter and even called “The Typewriter” by locals.
(ASIDE - Dear millennials: A typewriter is like an ancient smartphone that people used to send old school text messages called “letters.” Consider yourself informed. Love, Daron)
While the singers head to the Parthenon, Leo & Jamal have arrived at the bridge and gleefully head to Charioteer.
John’s confidence in his ability to perform a choreographed fight scene is shaken as he flubs the first sequence and the gladiator stays in character while yelling at him that it’s wrong. You see the first part of the routine is all sword moves and John keeps using his shield. How’s the horseplay going at the other task? About the same. Even though Team Fetch is the only one on-site so far, Rachel just isn’t giving it enough gas to make it around in time. A full lap short, in fact.
My inclination upon reading the clue would have been to do the Gladiator task and so far, there hasn’t been anything to make me question that gut decision - especially after Leo & Jamal show up at Charioteer and the traffic on the course gets a bit more difficult. If it was that hard with no one there, this could be a long day for teams.
As the singers are still lugging their typewriter around Rome, the remaining three teams have arrived and left the bridge. All three elect to go with Charioteer, with the cowboys being particularly misled by the notion of it involving actual horses. I appreciate the fact that the producers didn’t use real horses at this point because then that task would’ve been tailor-made for the cowboys.
David & Connor arrive at the Detour first and this rattles Team Fetch and the Afghanimals, who accurately assume this task is about to get exponentially more difficult. As Team Murphy’s Law joins them and clogs the lanes of traffic, Leo & Jamal waste no more time in pulling the trigger on switching tasks. The newlyweds start to debate following the cousins’ lead with Rachel pro-switch. A commercial break later, the tide has turned and now Brendon is in favor of switching but Rachel insists now that they stick it out. No idea what happened but Brendon loses on this one. Again another closer look at their relationship, methinks.
The cowboys and Globetrotters suit up and grab the controls for their horses. So as of now, there are four teams at Charioteer, one at Gladiator, one on the way to Gladiator and another team seeking out a building resembling a giant typewriter.
Speaking of them, Jennifer & Caroline are finally able to get valuable intel from a local about which building they are looking for. They have reached the site and gotten their next clue. I give credit to the producers on this Speed Bump. It was not a “gimme” like some of the more recent ones. This one actually made the team work for their lives. It was straightforward but it required effort and not just a simple task like a make bowl of soup. The girls opt for Charioteer, which with five teams all on the same course makes me nervous and I’m not even racing.
Over at Gladiator, Jessica has mastered her performance and been properly “defeated” by the gladiator but John, once again, screws up and they have to head back to practice. I wonder how much martial arts training that Jessica has had to make this look so easy. Maybe being outdone by his fiancée once was clearly enough motivation for John as the next attempt yields success. They have their clue and it’s ripe for loaded wording. The clue points teams to head to the “Piazza of John Keats’ unhappy Roman Holiday,” which is the Spanish Steps (famous from the movie Roman Holiday and adjacent to the apartment where Keats resided at the time of his death). The bugaboo in this clue is that there is a Via John Keats (or John Keats Street) in Rome. Successful interpretation depends upon how much the teams trust their cabbie at this point.
John & Jessica’s cabbie insists that they need to be heading to Via John Keats and off they go…in the wrong direction.
After many, many, many collisions and failures, Brendon & Rachel have completed the course in 1:29 and have their next clue. Their driver is more adept at deciphering Race clues and tells them they need to go to the Spanish Steps. Looks like Team Fetch is on their way to first place.
To the surprise of no one, Leo & Jamal embrace the theatrical nature of the Gladiator task but enthusiasm doesn’t translate into success as the guys should have realized by now, since I have noted this several times. Both the guys are responsible for mistakes in the routines at some point. Hilariously, the gladiator takes their failure a step further and actually kicks them in the rear as they head back to the coaches.
At the chariots, David & Connor and Jet & Cord finish back-to-back and head out to the Spanish Steps. Well, one of them heads to the steps and the other heads to the wrong location. If you picked the team that disaster seems to follow to be the one that gets misdirected, then you would be wrong. That’s right…the father/son continue to defy their Murphy’s Law namesake and get taken to the steps, while the brothers aren’t.
A guess a couple of swift kicks in the bum are what the cousins need for proper motivation because Leo & Jamal have finished playing Gladiator. With two teams heading to the right spot and two to the wrong spot, which way will the Afghanimals swing? Well, they go wrong. That means only Brendon & Rachel and David & Connor aren’t misled at this point.
Comfortably in first place, Team Fetch hits the steps and it’s a Roadblock. The team member has to count all the steps (135 is the number they are shooting for) and then add that number to the year that the steps were built. The year is inscribed in Roman numerals on a monument at the top of the steps. Then they must convert the total back into Roman numbers and present it to a couple dressed like Audrey Hepburn and Gregory Peck from the movie Roman Holiday. NOTE: The Hepburn impersonator is quite convincing…Peck? Not so much. Just an Italian guy in a bad wig. Brendon steps up for his team for the Roadblock. (Sorry, that pun was purely accidental…this time.)
With the chariot course a lot less crowded, only the Globetrotters and singers are finding more success and enlightenment, respectively. The basketball players finish not too far after the cowboys and hop in their cab to the wrong location. On the other hand, the girls feel like last place is their fate but they don’t let it bring them down. They give each other a quick “It’s been a great time” and decide to just enjoy themselves. This appears to be the best choice for them because without the pressure of beating another team out of the task and less people messing them up, the ladies finish and head to the steps. Yes, they are heading to the actual location, so last place is unlikely in their future.
Clearheaded and without another team in sight, Brendon decides to get the year number first and then tackle the steps. He gets it converted and starts stepping. Without even a single hitch and thanks to the local man for knowing his Roman numerals, Brendon completes the tasks and Team Fetch heads on foot to Phil in the Piazza del Popolo. The newlyweds hit the mat at team number one.
While the lost teams remain lost, David has busted out his handheld counter and started up the steps but he is soon joined by the country singers. Caroline explains that since the task is math-related, the numerically-challenged Jennifer will not be doing the task. Caroline immediately proposes working together with the father/son. Apparently, they have been helping one another for a couple of legs, which I interpret as David & Connor helping the girls because that’s their MO both seasons on the Race. Together they finish the Roadblock but in a move that is gentlemanly, the fellas allow the girls to hit the mat before them. David & Connor must have analyzed the situation that the girls made up ground and passed the others because they are too smart to allow a team to pass them if there was a chance they would be eliminated.
While the girls get second and raced pretty well this leg, I don’t think they have proven themselves adept at racing for the victory. They are too reliant upon other teams and that goodwill and inter-team work will not occur in the last leg, guaranteed. Team Murphy’s Law is number three.
Roaming the streets of Rome, it’s a game of who will figure out they went to the wrong place first. Well, John & Jessica do but are still staying with their same cabbie in hopes that he will figure out the right place. Meanwhile, Jet & Cord have preemptively checked with a gas station and the attendant suggests that it was the Spanish Steps…way back in the opposite direction. The brothers hop in and backtrack to the right location. A bit later, the cousins and Globetrotters get set on the right path, meaning that it’s a race for not last.
The cowboys hit the Spanish Steps first and Jet takes the reins on the Roadblock. He employs a similar method of relying upon the helpful nature of Romans for translating the numbers and he gets finished as the Globetrotters arrive. After hoofing it to Phil, Jet is thrilled to hear they are team number four. His excitement implies that they believed they just narrowly missed elimination. They feared the worst that their mistake was more egregious than it was.
At the steps, Flight Time has a similar attitude that they are probably in last of second to last because he desperately just asks people how many steps there are. The desperation prevents him from rereading the clue, which instructs them to add the steps and the year and convert it to Roman numerals. He turns in card after card after card starting with “135” and going up. Obviously, he is denied each time.
Jamal has arrived now and gives Flight a bit of insight about the need for more than one number. Working independently, both are trying their best and get a bit more relief when John & Jessica show up. John is counting for them.
Jamal completes it first and as the cousins are reading the clue. Jessica asks for them to share the answer. She is convinced that there is another team behind them. You must assume that they think that said team is Jennifer & Caroline. The cousins agree but they make the teams promise that they will not beat them to the mat this leg or U-Turn them when it shows up. Both agree.
Flight and John get the right answer and the Afghanimals are heading to Phil. Luckily, Flight had another postcard which the number had to be written on but John has to go back down to the vendor to get one. The sprint is on.
As Jamal & Leo land on the mat in front of Phil, the host doesn’t even check them in because he is fixated on the sprint between the other teams. In a shock, the Globetrotters outrun John & Jessica to claim sixth. I say “shock” because Big Easy is nicknamed that for a reason. He’s a big man and doesn’t look like it could move that fast but when it needed to be done, that man was moving.
With fifth and sixth assigned, the realization that John & Jessica are last washes all over them. Phil tries to lessen the sting of their elimination by acknowledging how tight this season has been on legs and that these teams are that strong.
That puts us down to six teams and the cowboys must use their Express Pass before the end of the next leg, so next week should be interesting.
Have a good one, all.