Hee. (1) I suspect they all live in the same house for weeks at a time, their only contact with the outside world being Julie Chen. (2) I’m already taken, but if I ever run into commitment problems, like Ron seems to have with the military, I’ll let you know.
Yeah; it sure was edited to look like Uchenna and Joyce barely made it to the Pit Stop ahead of Ron and Kelly. Granted, they frittered away some time looking for the FF, but, to my mind, the FF should, by definition, be fast. That’s one of the assumptions you make when going for it. By rights, Uchenna and Joyce oughta be well ahead.
That might be part of the reason (and the TARflies FAQ bears you out), but I suspect that time credits and penalties are relatively rare, despite what the FAQ claims. We’ve seen teams arrive at the mat simultaneously, multiple times (Ron/Kelly and Rob/Amber just this week, for example), and I never recall these teams being seperated by any length of time at the start of the next episode. So my suspicion is that these time credits happen, but only a handful of times. It’s in the producer’s best interest to limit credits, after all.
I have a feeling that, since the producers want to make every episode as exciting as possible, that arrival times aren’t shown so that you never know how much time elapses between the second-to-last team and the eliminated team (which won’t show up in the start times next ep). It would be rather anti-climactic to find out that an ending where two teams had been edited to look close turns out to have the two seperated by a wide margin.
Not necessarily–and judging by a particular patch of clouds on the horizon that didn’t change, I’d guess that Unchenna and Joyce are no more than an hour ahead, and I wouldn’t be surprised if it was less (if it’s more than an hour, I’ll happily admit that the evil editors fooled me good! :p). Anyway, the FF is not a guarantee that you’ll come in first–or even win the leg: there was that asshole gay kid (“My mom’s dying–let me have an emergency flight!”. Did I mention that I thought that particular tactic should be grounds for instant disqualification and a kneecapping?) who was a cheerleader and his neo-Nazi(?) dad fucked up (IIRC) the FF so badly (or were so far behind…I forget which, but I hope the former) that even with the FF they came in a full day behind the other teams.
IIRC, there was a second time that happened as well.
I forgot to mention… the crazy dwarf (Sharla? Mirna? I didn’t really watch much of that race) from two races back is doing a commercial in Baltimore. For $29.99 Tennis Shoe Wearhouse.
Actually, Dad-And-Gay-Son kicked ass at the FF (navigating a tank through an obstacle course, did it on the first try) and got a limo ride directly to the pit stop – however, they were so far behind that they wound up last anyway. (Indeed, it seemed like they were given a limousine at the last minute, just so they wouldn’t hold up production longer than necessary!)
The second time you mentioned was in TAR1 when evil Team Guido won the FF in Thailand, but wasted a whole day by kicking back in a hotel and taking a slow bus to the pit stop. As a result, they finished last…but were saved by a 24-hour penalty given to another team who skipped a Detour. (Under the new 4-hour penalty rule, they would have been eliminated.)
There’s only one other time where a team was eliminated due to a time penalty – in TAR3, the bitchy lawyer girls misread the clue and took a taxi to the pit stop instead of walking. They arrived first, but were penalized 37 minutes which dropped them to last place. I can’t think of a single team who arrived last but was saved due to a time credit – the closest would be Lenny & Karyn, who missed a train in Italy due to a production delay, and arrived last in a non-elimination round. (This was before the “mugged by Phil” rule, so they lost nothing.) Also in TAR2, Tara & Wil missed a first-place pit stop by one minute when their cameraman insisted on getting an extra shot of them driving up; they appealed, and were awarded a first-place tie, so both teams won a trip to Cozumel or Antigua or wherever.
Typically, penalties are only shown if it affects the order of the teams. For instance, Zach & Flo were penalized after Flo’s infamous breakdown in Vietnam, where Zach had to recruit the help of some locals to paddle his hysterical partner across a river. Since they needed help with the task, they were penalized…but since they arrived last in an NEL, the penalty was not shown on TV. Also, last season, there was a pit stop where Hayden & Aaron arrived only a minute after Jonathan & Victoria (J. even saw them coming) but on the next leg, H&A’s departure time was 31 minutes after J&V – obviously, another unshown penalty.
To clarify, they did not change the penalty, so far as we know. The other team you’re talking about in S1 didn’t even start their Detour (which they would have by either finding a bus or a private car – they stopped before they found either, and took a taxi). Rob started, then quit on a Roadblock.
I remember that Don & MJ got a 30-minute penalty in TAR6, because they took the wrong car (Adam & Rebecca’s) at one point. They did show that penalty, because it affected the order they left the Pit Stop.
This reminds me of something. I thought for sure that Meredith and Gretchen would be penalized because she grabbed onto Lynn and Alex’s elephant in an effort to try to slow them down. I thought that sort of thing was verboten. If Lynn and Alex really did finish only 10 or 15 minutes behind, a penalty could have changed things quite a bit.
That was Team Momily (Nancy and Emily). I would argue that they did as much of their Detour as Rob did of his Roadblock. They tried to find the car, like Rob tried to eat the meat. They decided that they couldn’t find it, like Rob decided he couldn’t eat it. They took the penalty, like Rob took his penalty. Unlike Rob, who was only assessed four hours, they were penalized twenty-four hours.
I like this line of thought, it’s more consistent with what Phil said on the radio here when he was interviewed by some morning DJs.
They asked him if he got to enjoy the sights in all of these locations while the racers were frantically missing everything interesting in the drive to be first. He said no, he’s just as tired as they are (slight overstatement I’d wager but…) because he has to be the first one to the country and the last one to leave every time because he has to greet everyone as they come in. I would guess they shuttle him around filming the little blurbs while the racers are running the early part of each leg.
Team POW: “you can’t commit.”
“You mean like joining the military, going to war and becoming a POW?”
“See how you got out of that commitment?”
“Gee, you’re right. Take one guess which commitment I’m getting out of next.”
Team Gay: They look around the horizon. They see two castles. They get in a cab. “Take us to the castle!” Why oh why was one of them not constantly waving the name of the castle in the face of the driver and saying, “arewegoingtothisonearewegoingtothisonearewegoingtothisonearewegoingtothisone???”
Geriteam: What can I say? I’d like to say, “older and wiser beats younger and faster.” But it just ain’t true. You’re older, but you sure ain’t wiser. It’s just another team is always stupider. What the hell was she thinking? “It looks like there’s a seat up there on that elephant, so if there’s a seat, the lady should naturally get in, take a ride and shriek the whole time ‘go faster, go faster!’ while the man naturally pushes his ass off and burns another three years off his ticker.” She did seem kinda mortified afterwards though.
Team Asshole: Gee, is it any surprise this episode should have been a non-elim but wasn’t? “Holy Canoli Phil, we didn’t need it to be “luckily” a non-elim round! We’re the luckiest team evah!” ::wink, wink::
Team "They seem so… nice:" Yes, that’s right, I just can’t think of what else to call them. They just seem so… nice. Big points for Joyce knowing the whole damn time, “it’s a head shaving. I know it’s a head shaving thing. They’re going to shave our heads.” And sure enough, you were right. Good for you going ahead and doing it. Who cares about hair? It’s a materialistic, narcissistic trapping! Wear that sexy bald head proudly sister!
I disagree that they started the Detour. Thet completely ignored what they had to do on it. The equivalent for what Rob did would be if they found the car or the bus and still decided to take a taxi. But there’s still the fundamental difference between the Detours and the Roadblocks.
Lynn and Alex said on the Early Show that they gave the guy a map with the castle circled in red, asked him if he knew where it was, and he said he did know it.
So they circled the wrong castle in red, or Indian drivers are notoriously bad with directions? And we’re out-sourcing our customer service to them? (note to self for future reference)
If they had time to get frustrated by searching for the car, that means they really were searching for the car and had therefore initiated the Detour. Finally, Phil says:
So they did indeed start the Detour, and it seems they spent more time at it than Rob did at his Roadblock. Don’t forget that Momily had previously attempted the Fast Forward but were beaten by Team Guido. So they had actually tried to do two tasks, while Rob had barely done one.
Keep in mind, it wasn’t actually possible to quit that Detour once you found either the car or the bus, which is what I would call the equivalent to what Rob did, or the point of starting the Detour. It’s not a good one to compare for this reason. Say on this most recent one, where if Meredith & Gretchen had jumped off the elephant and went on (there’s the problem of not knowing where to go, which they’ve been better about not revealing before a task is completed now, but work with me), or if they’d just not found either spot and went on. One would be quitting, the other not starting it. The Detour has a choice, remember, and you can switch at any point. So unless you’ve actually committed to a Detour choice, you haven’t started it, IMO.
The FF attempt is irrelevant. It’s a gamble you take in the show. The time they spent looking for either the car or the bus is irrelevant. Phil’s VO is a fair comment, but there’s still a big difference between a Detour and a Roadblock. They have two choices on the Detour for a reason.
if either team Romber or POW had chosen the fast forward, would they have done it? that would have been a sweet test for Rob’s relationship, no way he’d be as gentleman as Uchenna. as for the POW, i would guess Ron would not be a factor to Kelly’s decision to cut or not.
Kelly knows more about Ron than what the producers want us to see.
We already know that Ron didn’t audition to be on TAR. A former girlfriend of Ron who made it past the interviews was told to find another partner. When she mentioned Ron the POW, the producers were very interested. However, Ron wouldn’t appear on TAR with the ex-girlfriend. He’d only appear if it was someone of his choosing.
Producers cave in hoping they can play the POW angle. He chose Kelly a girl he only dated for a month and not years like its be depicted on TAR.
Me thinks the producers realize he wasn’t the big hero POW he’s made out to be, an angle they were hoping to play-off of. The whole Beauty Queen/POW war hero angle was Ron’s idea of putting himself in the limelight.
