The Amazing Race 24: All-Stars - Episode 2

The Amazing Race 24: All-Stars - Episode 2

By Daron Aldridge

March 4, 2014

Poor Bopper.

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This fast and furious leg keeps on chugging along with team after team delivering the toy and opting for Featherball. I hope that the producers didn’t pay too much money to the people manning the China Cups task.

Back at the Roadblock, Meghan has finished her assembly but John is still stuck. In a bit of questionable Race judgment but overall human decency, Meghan helps John identify his problem, despite fighting for last place.

As they are leaving the Roadblock, the feuding Kentuckians are back and have retrieved the forgotten bag. Mark’s frustration is growing because Mallory now refuses to listen to him at all. The beginning of the end for a team that just began is what we are seeing here.

Flooding the park now one team at a time with a cameraperson in tow, the Detour quickly becomes a repeat of the Roadblock as each team has opted to try their foot at Featherball. The only teams missing are John & Jessica and Meghan & Joey, who should be arriving soon.

No one, and I mean not a single team, is having an easy time with this task. Footage (pun intended, of course) of so many failed attempts is proof that they are in for a long afternoon. Guess who is still upset and arguing? No, not Team Fetch, who have been surprisingly supportive of one another this season (but it’s still early). I am talking about New Kentucky. Mallory doesn’t want to hear Mark talk any more and Mark calls her out for being rude and dismissive, which he says is not the way people from Kentucky act. This just pisses her off even more, like that was the most insulting thing anyone could ever say to her.

Recapping hacky sack-esque mishaps is not really that effective. So I will just leave you with the image of flailing limbs, racers falling over and overall pathetic displays of foot prowess that would make '80s college students weep onto their Birkenstocks.

And the order with which they eventually complete the Detour is inconsequential, because they all seem to finish it within a matter of minutes if not seconds, which has Margie & Luke as first and Leo & Jamal as number seven, with all but Mark & Mallory in between. The teams are converging upon the Shamian Island Promenade.




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All seven teams are at the promenade at the same time and it’s a footrace to the mat for first. Despite being in the lead, Margie & Luke are lapped by Brendon & Rachel, who claim their first ever first place finish on a leg.

In an Amazing Race first, the teams overwhelm an unsuspecting Phil, who can’t even go through the formality of telling Team Fetch their prize for first place, because teams keep running up. He even gets flustered and messes up the ranking. So, in the span of less than five minutes, Phil checks in Team Fetch as number one, Margie & Luke as number two, the singers as number three, Team Murphy’s Law as number four, the Globetrotters as number five, the cowboys as number six and the Afghanimals as number seven.

Whew…that’s exhausting.

Back at Featherball, the allied tandem of John & Jessica and Meghan & Joey kick their way past New Kentucky and head to Phil. Before those teams are checked in as numbers eight and nine, Mark & Mallory are now foolishly debating switching tasks. This was suggested by Mallory and it is the height of ridiculousness. They are in last, they know it and should just try to finish as soon as possible, all the while praying it is a non-elimination. Well, I guess I was wrong in assuming that the producers wouldn’t give away the ending to this leg in last week’s previews.

Well, it’s not a non-elimination. Given the unique makeup of this team and the circumstances around its formation, all the other teams are standing behind Phil when he breaks the news to them. Tears are shed and Mark makes the observation that maybe he's just not meant to travel the world without his best friend Bopper.

Another leg down and next week takes the teams river rafting with shots of Brendon & Rachel capsizing. Those of us that are not fans of the Big Brother alums will have to wait anxiously to see how that shakes out.


Continued:       1       2       3       4       5

     


 
 

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