Amazing Race All Stars Ep. 2: "Beauty Is Sometimes Skin Deep"

New Race tonight. Hooray! Hopefully it won’t start late – doesn’t look like it (at least here in my time zone), but we can never tell. Always with the questions: Where are we off to next? What cool tasks will our teams have to do? What fetching outfit(s) will Phil be wearing today? Any chance that we might have a sighting of the Travelocity gnome? Who will come in first, and who will be eliminated … tonight?

Recap of last week’s episode here. Also, if you’re interested, a link to CBS’s new Amazing Race Wiki here. (Note: Wiki includes info from this season only – no spoilers.)

Episode details from CBS.com:

[spoiler]* A roadside confrontation causes one Team to give another Team an ultimatum. Is this the end of their alliance?

  • Racing to avoid elimination, four Teams conduct a mad dash in 4x4s across the desert. Who will make it?
  • One the way to the Pit Stop, one Team misreads a clue and falls further and further behind. Is this the end for them?[/spoiler]
    And from TVGuide.com:

The 10 remaining teams begin the second leg of the race in Ecuador and then travel to Chile where they must change a tire on a huge truck used at a copper mine. Later, they race across a desert in 4x4s to the pit stop where one team is eliminated. Phil Keoghan is the host.

Also from TVGuide.com, this article about our beloved Phil. Key quote:

So when we complain about what Phil is wearing? We have no one to blame but Phil. Based on this info, I’m going to assume that he is deliberately trying not too look to sexy for the Mat.

The show is on schedule. Hop on!

Wow – two teams got stuck in the mud getting out of the nature preserve, and only one was able to get help.

I think this leg may be cursed. :o

That Roadblock puzzle was evil and awesome and I loved it! More like that, please, Challenge Producers!

My god, these people are stupid.

I hate Mary. I hate Drew (or Kevin, one of 'em). Mirna is beyond insane.

Drew is a pansy-ass. He can’t even wait for Phil to give him the results before he goes for his hat?! What a waste of a team.

Mary’s complaining about “friends” stabbing them? Then get a clue lady, don’t trust people!

The ads for next week show Danielle freaking out, while all wet. Based on how the promos are edited, I think she’ll win.

Holy crap, looking at the previews for next week? Danielle is a giant puss and I’d like to punch her in the nose.

Are Charla and Mirna prone to draaaaaaahma? I didn’t see their first race.

I can’t say I see the appeal of Kevin and Drew.

You have NO idea…

And, can I just say that I loved Mary and David last season. But “Go right because it has more words” is possibly the stupidest thing anyone has ever said on this show?

Edited because it’s not fair to leave Gingy’s answer at that. What you saw tonight happened about every other leg in Mirna and Schmirna’s original season. Mirna had an incredible girlie hardon for Colin (of Colin & Christie) and passed up NO opportunity to get in his face.

Oh yeah. Mirna is the craziest person I think they’ve ever had.

My husband hated her and still randomly yells in a high pitched voice “Run, Charla, run!”

I missed last week. I can’t say that I’m happy to see the Queen of the Harpies back (that being Mary, of course). I loved how David pointed out that it appeared to matter how the washers were put on the truck tires, and her response is “Whatever!” Then, as they have to redo nearly all of their work, her contribution is to go on about which teams are finishing and leaving. She did offer some words of encouragement for David, though, so I do give her some credit for that.

Drew had to go. He wasn’t functioning physically or mentally. I thought for a moment he was going to drag Kevin along in that harness and run him over. And when every other team passes you because you’re going 40 miles an hour, it’s simply time to rethink your strategy.

Apart from Uchenna and Joyce, I can’t think of any of these teams I’d like to see win.

As jayjay said, you have NO idea. They annoyed the crap out of me the first time they were on. Every little thing that happened was perceived as some personal attack on them. :rolleyes:

You know they’re from Baltimore, right?

Ohmygod, you have NO IDEA. Mirna is completely batshit insane – this is only the beginning. She brings The Crazy, and it tends to increase exponentially on each leg. For reference, please refer to the threads from when Charla and Mirna were on Season 5, which can be found here, here, here, here, here, here, and here. (There are other threads for that season, some of which are pretty good, including this one, which references the best episode ever of this show, not to mention the best moment in the history of ever … although, I am kind of partial to this thread, too.) But anyway: Yes, Mirna and Charla are always like that. Mostly Mirna. There is no killswitch for that one. I think she’s an evil robot from the Planet Zod or something, and she needs WD-40 for that horrible squeaking sound that comes out of her mouth.

Is Mama Tiger around? She always seems to have the inside scoop. What’s Drew’s deal? Those two were so awesome last time, and it’s like Drew is a shell of his former self, and the pressure to pick up the slack seems to have killed (or at least seriously maimed) Kevin’s soul. The Race is definitely different in execution than it used to be, but it’s still the same Race in spirit, and it’s really sad to see those two hurting so profoundly.

Yeah, count me in with those who were sorry to see Drew and Kevin fare so poorly, and therefore relieved that they were the team which ended up coming in last and therefore will not be forced to compete in any further legs.

And with those who liked the roadblock–though I wanted to slap at least one teammate waiting impatiently in the hall “How hard can it be?”–pretty hard, it seems.

I can’t believe Mary has gotten this far in the race, for the second time, and not yet figured out that helping people is generally not something which will be immediately rewarded, and teams frequently pass any team they can get away with passing, unless they hope to follow the other team to the destination.

I agree, he had checked out of the race before it even started. Too bad, since they were such fun the first time around! I’m glad to see them go because he looked so pained to be there, I didn’t even want to see them!

I think this line should be added to the TAR Tip List.

I agree, but it should probably include “… or re-read your clue (jackass)*.” Because didn’t everyone else say that they were able to go over 40 kmph once they got outside the Valley of the Moon?

  • The optional “jackass” can be added in honor of and in memory of Kevin & Drew from Season 1.

Oh, there were some fun “READ THE F’ING CLUE” moments tonight, too. The Guidos not taking turns on the front-end loader, Kevin & Drew with the 40 kph well after they had to, and I THOUGHT Teri & Ian were pulling one when they got back into the taxi…didn’t realize they were looking for the marked vehicles.

I just loved the continuing saga of the Mirna Language School’s Theory of Accented English as a method of international communication…

And, just because it needs to be repeated, was “Turn right because it has more words” not the stupidest thing ever said on this show, like, ever?

Thus spake me:

In the discussion of my TAR Tips, someone suggested to take as much as 5 minutes, if that’s what you need to do the task right.

I expected Drew and/or Kevin to hit the mat, tell (well, gripe to) Phil “These teams all broke the speed limit restriction,” and be smacked down with “You were in a 50 kmph zone, what’s YOUR problem?”

Added on edit: As I recall, the 40 kph and 50 kph speed limits weren’t in the clue, they were in the instructions from the gatekeepers at the Valley of the Moon entrance. This doesn’t fall under RTF Clue, it falls under RTF Road Sign.

And why is Mary totally unable to remember people’s names??? She kept calling her Mina all through the show! I was yelling at the TV.

I’m glad to see Drew go, too. He just had a bad attitude, for ok reasons, I guess, but still…

I am utterly mystified by the altercation between Mirna & Charla and Dustin & Kandice on the dirt road.

Why did they all stop? Why was the cabbie drawing a map? What did M&C want from the beauty queens? Why were they so angry with them?

Before reading this thread I suspected M&C were the ones in the wrong, but I still don’t understand just what was going on there.