New at BOP: Review: Matrix Resurrections Movie Review: Moonfall Movie Reviews: Scream The #1 Movie in America November Forecast The Many Saints of Newark October Forecast New Trivia Question All site updates Share & Save   Tweet Print this column

Sadly, my hopes of Marie faltering on this task are unfulfilled because the exes are the first ones out of the Detour. The next clue points teams to a location that leads them to the thing Vienna is likely most famous for. No, it’s not Arnold Schwarzenegger. No, it’s not the delicious little Vienna sausages. It's the Vienna Boys Choir.

While the evil exes unsuccessfully hail cabs on the street corner outside of the Detour, all the other teams except for the MIA Jason & Amy are finishing the Detour. Most impressively, the only ones to actually finish Masquerade the fastest are the Ice girls, who are the last ones of the non-Fast Forward-seeking teams to arrive but find the masks on the first try. I was as surprised as you are because while Ally & Ashley aren't as “dumb blonde” as I expected, they also aren't Race experts.

A shunning by the Vienna taxi drivers’ union toward Tim & Marie is all it takes for them to slip from first to sixth en route to the next clue. Jason & Amy get a sense of doom as they arrive at Masquerade and see nary a familiar face and the pressure is starting to show in their “short” interactions with each other. It’s nothing on the scale of how Marie speaks to people in general, but much less affectionate than this couple typically is. They are securely in last place but don’t use up too much time on the Detour.

The Afghanimals and the Ice girls are the first to arrive at the next location and the teams will be faced with this leg’s Roadblock. The chosen teammate will have to get in touch with their “inner choir boy” for what has the makings of being one of the most difficult challenges the Amazing Race has ever given us. Here is what they have to do: One of the team members must sing a passage from Shubert’s Die Forelle and they are judged on pronunciation of the German lyrics and the musicality of their performance. I don't think any of these people are classically trained (or even recreational) singers, so this is going to be ugly. And by ugly, I mean earsplittingly bad.

For a leg that had the prospect of a team gaining a huge lead with the Fast Forward, this leg has been anything but a foregone conclusion in how these teams end up. It doesn’t seem to matter who gets to the tasks first because the task will squash the team’s lead. So which team members are we going to be subjected to listening to singing very poorly in front the Vienna Boys Choir? We'll have Ally for the Ice girls, Jamal for the Afghanimals, Nicky for the baseball wives, both Tims from the Okies and the exes and Travis for the doctors. Everyone at this point just assumes that the New Englanders are chilling with Phil at the Pitstop.

Of course, that changes when Jason strolls into the place and takes a seat while Amy is rehearsing with her vocal coach. The others are gleeful that not only did they not jump to the front but that there is a chance that a strong team will be eliminated.

With a glimpse into the "process" of coaching these novice singers, we can see that this is going to be a long, difficult challenge for team members and a well-earned payday for the coaches themselves. No one seems especially confident in their abilities, with the exception of possibly Travis. He explains that he sings at work all the time and to his kids, as well as actually plays multiple instruments. This could work in his favor as long as one of those instruments is his voice.

The most notable of the singers, and not in a good way, are baseball wife Nicky and OK-Tim. Nicky feels good with the pronunciation part of the task because her father is Czech, so she is familiar with German but the singing…not-so-much. Her supportive team mate compares her to Cameron Diaz in My Best Friend’s Wedding or the hot girl with a horrible voice. Sadly, the oil field worker is going to have an even harder time with this task and he knows it. “Deer in the headlights” is about the only way to accurately describe his face when practicing with his coach. I really feel sorry for this guy. There is no amount of physical or mental preparation that could be done to make someone more capable with this challenge. You can’t blame not being good at puzzles or not being strong enough for floundering here.

Continued:       1       2       3       4       5