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The Amazing Race - Season 13, Episode 2

Previously on The Amazing Race: Eleven teams burst forth from the starting line to Salvador, Brazil. Well, ten teams burst. Arthur and Anita kind of strolled. Nick and Starr made an "alliance" with Ken and Tina at the airport, at which point both teams promptly went about their own business and ignored each other for the rest of the leg. Terence saved his creepy boyfriend behavior until the teams were out of the United States, as it's more difficult to flee your clingy, passive-aggressive mate when you're abroad. Ken vowed to prove his love to Tina, despite her eyebrows. Nick and Starr hustled their way to first place, and though the Detour gave the Fratties trouble (I refuse to refer to them as Team Superbad, as Phil does), Arthur and Anita fell victim to their languid style of racing, and were eliminated. Ten teams remain. Who will be eliminated next?

Opening credits. Dallas and Toni prove once again that due to some strange law on the books at CBS, every opening credit sequence must have someone engaging in basketball.

Salvador, Brazil. Phil tells us that it is known as "The Capital of Joy". Naturally, centers of joy must be well-guarded, so we get another shot of the picturesque fortress that served as the first pitstop. Not so joyous are Terence and Sarah, who spent the mandatory rest period fighting over whether she should be allowed to talk to other people. I know he's the fitness coach, but run, Sarah. Run for your life. Nick and Starr are first off the mat at 4:07 AM. Rrrrrrrip! The clue tells them to fly more than 600 miles to Fortaleza, Brazil. Once there, teams must travel by taxi to the plaza in the small town of Cumbuco, where the next clue awaits. Their taxi vrooms to the airport, which you'd think would make them happy, but Starr worries about crashing. Ken and Tina are off the mat at 4:13 AM, and we learn that teams will be getting $125 for this leg. Blah blah relationship.

Terence and Sarah share a small smooch before leaving at 4:18 AM. Oh, I guess they've worked through all their differences. As they pack their things into the trunk of the cab, the driver brings it down a little early, and smacks Terence in the forehead. Maybe the driver saw the first episode, and couldn't let such a golden opportunity pass. Oddly, Terence chooses to take out his frustrations on Sarah instead of the driver, snapping at her to bandage his boo-boo and blow on it. She interviews with a gentle smile that Terence is a ball of emotion, as if that were some delightful quirk instead of the biggest red flag since the Chinese Olympics. Mark and Bill leave the matt at 4:24 AM. I'm curious to know what Mark's tattoo says. He says that it's fortunate that he and Bill have an easy friendship instead of a tense relationship. That's true. I've certainly seen emotional baggage sink more than one team.

Nick/Starr/Ken/Tina arrive at the airport, and much Spanish is thrown around. Yes, we're still in Brazil, which is still a Portuguese-speaking nation, but even knowing this doesn't slow down the flow of "Rapido" and "Gracias" and "Hola". An airline agent tells Nick and Starr that the next flight to Fortaleza is at 11:30 AM. The two teams decide to hunt for something better. Kelly and Christy leave the mat at 4:44 AM. Hey, did you know that the two of them were in relationships that didn't work out? I know I'd like to continue hearing that every forty-three seconds! Tina finds an airline with a 6:45 AM flight to Fortaleza, but it's only got one available seat, so no teams would be able to book it. Terence and Sarah arrive at the airport, and are already bickering. That didn't take long. Tina implores the agent to work something out for the 6:45 AM flight. Dallas and Toni are off the mat at 4:57 AM. Just in case you haven't heard, there's a naked picture of Dallas flying around the internet. It keeps getting squashed, as he was supposedly underaged when he took it, but I managed to get a glimpse before it disappeared. Yowsa. The image in my mind of his dick flopping around somewhat mars the tender family moment of he and Toni exchanging heartfelt expressions of love.

The airline agent somehow wrangles the 6:45 AM flight onto a larger plane, which makes no sense to me, but whatever. As a result of this, instead of there being room for no teams on the plane, there is now room for all of them. Tina and Ken celebrate their own airport prowess, while Terence and Sarah sulk in the corner that the other teams didn't say hello to them when they got to the airport. Maybe I'm wrong about Sarah running for her life. Maybe these two deserve each other. You can try and own some silly us-against-the-world attitude, or you can be peeved that others won't extend friendly greetings to you. Not both. Mark and Bill arrive as the agent informs Tina that the flight doesn't have seat assignments. She says that Ken and Tina may go first once they're at the gate, though she doesn't seem to do anything that would make this enforceable.

Andrew and Dan leave the mat at 5:03 AM, with Aja and Ty right behind them at 5:05 AM. Dan wants to espouse a we're-going-to-come-in-first attitude, rather than a let's-just-not-be-last attitude, because "minimalists don't get anywhere in life". This despite the fact that the Bickersons certainly held the former attitude, and didn't come in first in a single leg, while TK and Rachel held the latter attitude and won the whole race. Aja and Ty are pleased, both with the time they're getting to spend with each other and with their cab driver, who runs red lights with impunity. Kelly and Christy arrive at the airport, as Terence/Sarah/Mark/Bill go to start a line at the gate. Ken and Tina, secure in the knowledge that some lady gave them verbal permission to get on the plane first, go to exchange money instead.

Anthony and Stephanie leave the mat at 5:11 AM, and immediately run to a cab that has obvious mechanical issues. Good thinking, guys! Marisa and Brooke are right on their heels, leaving last at 5:13 AM. In their ride to the airport, Stephanie interviews that she really wants to head towards marriage (well, "mahwwage"), but that the only thing that's holding them back is financial stability. Anthony doesn't make enough to take care of her, and it's important that he be able to, because after all, this is 1955 and it would be improper for her to have a job. Heaven forfend she actually contribute to the family income. Marisa and Brooke want to break out of last place, sighing that the race is a lot harder than they thought it'd be. Yeah, it's official. They are now Interchangeable Blond #3 (IB#3) and Interchangeable Blond #4 (IB#4). Be sure to wake me up and tell me if they ever acquire actual personalities.

Meanwhile, Tina is wandering around the airport trying to get other teams to thank her (and in Aja and Ty's case, telling them they owe her a favor) for getting everyone onto the earlier flight. Er...Tina? I've got a question for you, not unlike one you'd find on a high school standardized test. Ready? Turning a ten-way tie at 11:30 AM into a ten-way tie at 6:45 AM is:

A) A stroke of genius.
B) Benevolent and kind.
C) Possibly helpful in terms of getting to tasks earlier in the day, but otherwise pointless.
D) Seriously, the answer is C.

Nobody is helped by this maneuver. Nobody is hindered by this maneuver. Aja and Ty completely blow her off, which is kind of awesome. The lagging teams arrive and get tickets, whereupon IB#3 gives us the titular quote. Passing around food to strangers in the airport would probably get them tossed into Guantanamo if they were still in Los Angeles, but the good folks in the Capital of Joy don't seem to mind.

Drama erupts at the gate when Ken and Tina assert their right to go first, so that they can sit near the front of the plane. It would be silly to get into many details of the shouting match that follows, because none of the teams seem to get that it doesn't matter. Sure it might matter if one team was in the front row, and one team was in the back. Might. It probably wouldn't, as the team order is naturally going to shift the second anyone comes up against customs or getting a taxi. In this case, it's especially pointless, because all the teams are lined up together in a free-seating situation. The space difference between the lead team and the last team wouldn't be more than fifteen feet. Anyhow, Mark bitches a bit, and Terence snarks that he doesn't believe Tina got an entire airline to switch planes just for her. Tina once again brings out her trump card of how nobody would even be on this plane if it weren't for her, once again overlooking the fact that NOBODY INCLUDES HER. Ken and Terence getting into a pissing match, and both desperately need to shut the fuck up.

Commercials. Wow, a new crime procedural on CBS that appears to be an exact clone of all the other crime procedurals on CBS. I'll be sure to check that out.

Everyone makes up and it's all hearts and flowers now. They still need to shut the fuck up. The plane takes off, lands in Fortaleza, and the second everyone deplanes, the team order is shuffled. Go figure. Stephanie barks some more Spanish at her cab driver, who's driving an even worse jalopy than the one in Salvador. A flat tire or two, and they may catch up to RoKi in the bad car luck department. Rather than just getting another cab, Anthony decides to get out and push his to try and get it going. These two are terrible racers, and not particularly interesting people. How did they get cast? They finally ditch to find another cab, but not before all the other teams have left. Ken and Tina are currently in ninth place. Wow, getting on first in Salvador sure helped them out!

The Fratties' cab is slow, so Terence/Sarah are first to the cluebox. Rrrrrrrip! The clue tells them to choose a dune buggy to take them down the beach to a vendor who will hand over the next clue. Wait, that's it? They don't even have to drive the dune buggies themselves? Lame. A bunch of other teams soon show up, and we're treated to shots of them streaming down the beach in their buggies. It looks fun to do, but it's not much fun to watch. Anthony and Stephanie are struck by the living conditions around them, though we don't really see anything that bad. I mean, relatively. I'm not packing up and moving to Fortaleza, but it's certainly nothing like the piles of garbage on the side of the roads. Anthony and Stephanie vow to be more thankful for what they have. Aja/Ty/Andrew/Dan miss the cluebox and fall behind. A guy on the beach moons the IBs.

Terence and Sarah reach the vendor, who hands over the next clue. Rrrrrrrip! Detour! The choice is Beach It or Docket. In Beach It, teams take another dune buggy ride to another section of the beach, where they'll choose a two-man crew to help them roll a 440-pound boat 100 yards to the water by moving the heavy logs it rests on back-to-front. In Docket, teams ride a buggy to the port, where several shipping containers are kept. Once they get there, they choose a computer and comb through several serial numbers until they find one that matches their clue. The number will be matched with a certain section of the shipyard, and when the team locates the correct shipping container, they'll find their next clue inside. Interesting choice. Terence and Sarah unsurprisingly choose Beach It, as do Kelly/Christy/Toni/Dallas, who are right behind them. Mark and Bill play to their strengths by choosing Docket. The three lead teams get started on hauling their logs, and Mark and Bill are soon at the shipyard administration building, searching for their serial number.

Nick and Starr choose Beach It, while the IBs opt for Docket. Having done that, they proceed to instruct their dune buggy driver to follow Nick and Starr, because the muscly young kids are sure to choose the computer task, right? Ken wants to Beach It, and Tina reluctantly agrees. Andrew/Dan/Aja/Ty all easily settle on Beach It. Andrew is confident, saying that he and Dan lift weights all the time. When will it start showing? Nick and Starr arrive at the beach, and it takes the IBs a good five seconds or so to realize that this isn't the shipyard. They decide to just go ahead and do the Beach It Detour. Mark and Bill find their serial number, which is as good an excuse as any for Bill to whip out his Yoda impersonation. As they move logs, Terence yells at Sarah for doing push-ups that morning, because now she's tired. In his estimation, that is. She hasn't slowed down on moving the logs at all. Ass.

LabRat: "I hope she's getting a good, long look at her future."

It pisses Kelly off as well, because her ex-husband had similar abusive behavior. Oh, you hadn't heard? Kelly is divorced. That is the only thing that has ever happened to her. Other teams roll their logs, with varying degrees of success.

Mark and Bill search the shipyard. Anthony and Stephanie are only now just arriving at the Detour clue, and choose Beach It. Andrew and Dan arrive at the Beach It site, where Dan hopes that jumping onto the boat itself will somehow help complete the task. He needs to start lifting his brain. Mark and Bill find the correct area of the shipyard. Terence and Sarah get their boat into the water, and receive the next clue. Rrrrrrrip! Teams must now go to the nearby taxis and take one to the Parque de Vaquejada, where they'll find the next clue. Terence and Sarah discuss where to get their taxi, somehow missing that they're right below them, with arrows pointing the way. Nick and Starr finish, and have no such issue. They head for the taxis, as Terence suggests running all the way down the beach to avoid walking up a single hill. Kelly and Christy do an impressive job on the boat, but a far less impressive job reading the clue in their hands. They get the impression that they've got to find their "unmarked container", which are instructions from the Docket Detour. Even the phrase "in the yard" fails to tip them off.

Speaking of containers, Mark and Bill find the correct one, and are off to the Parque de Vaquejada. Terence and Sarah head for a little village. Sarah realizes that there's nobody behind them, which is not necessarily good news. Mark and Bill somehow get a taxi before Nick and Starr, so they take the lead. Terence and Sarah wander around the village, wondering why they can't get a cab. Kelly and Christy, instead of taking thirty seconds to read and comprehend their clue, decide to start digging in the sand to find their container. Fools. I get that they're in race mode, but this is just idiotic. Toni and Dallas finish Beach It, and as Dallas reads the clue, it sounds an awful lot like they're headed for the "Parque de Rocky Horror". Ken and Tina are finished, as well. Even though Kelly and Christy saw none of the other teams pawing at the sand before they left, they continue digging, hoping that they'll randomly stumble across the next clue.

Terence and Sarah still can't find a cab, and Terence's suggestion to stop and enjoy an ice cream cone doesn't offer much promise of finding one. Ken and Tina bicker about nothing. Cabs with teams on the way to Parque de Vaquejada pass by Terence and Sarah, which ought to give them a heads-up about where they went wrong. They'd rather stand in the village and complain. Tina tells Ken he ought to think about a situation in which they're broken down and need to ask another team for help. Eh. I see what she means, but I think she'd do better to concentrate on racing, rather than what she's done for other teams and what they can do for her. Terence groans in frustration, though not to the point where he actually heads for the cabs or anything.

Commercials. I like this take-charge ad demanding cleaner energy. Not that anyone in Washington is actually listening, but it's a good first step.

Toni and Dallas stop in the village to tell Terence and Sarah where the cabs are. Again, that's nice of them, but they'll have only themselves to blame if at some point, Terence and Sarah come roaring past and get Toni and Dallas eliminated. Ty notices the flushed, exhausted faces of the IBs, which gets him pumped up about finishing the Detour. Aja cracks that their faces don't get red. Heh. Andrew and Dan finish, and head for the taxis. Kelly and Christy finally decide to stop digging. Aja and Ty finish hauling their boat. Once they get to their taxi, Kelly and Christy actually take a minute to read the clue (imagine that), and figure out where they went wrong. The IBs finish the Detour, though they look completely wiped. Anthony and Stephanie finish as well. Terence and Sarah reach the cabs, having fallen eight places during their little adventure. Anthony and Stephanie are still behind them, though Anthony does one thing right in that he spends the ride reading the clue to make sure he understands everything. We hear a bit about how teams should ask their taxi to wait once they get to Parque de Vaquejada, so we know that'll be significant soon.

Mark and Bill arrive, ask their driver to wait, and rush to the next cluebox. Rrrrrrrip! Roadblock! As you know, a Roadblock is a task that only one team member may perform. In this Roadblock, the chosen team member has to study a wall with a bunch of ads, signs, and other things written in Portuguese for their next destination, Cidade da Crianca. Once they give the correct destination to a clue-wrangler, they'll get the next clue. It seems to be a simple matter of writing down everything that looks significant and just reciting it until you get it correct. That's even lamer than the get-driven-a-short-distance-in-a-dune-buggy task. At least that one had pretty scenery. Bill takes it on. He writes a couple of things down, neither of which are the correct answer. Ken and Tina show up, and Tina takes the Roadblock. Bill figures out what to do, and Tina soon figures it out by observing what he's doing and asking him if he's just writing everything down. He sighs that he's just reflexively honest, but I believe it wouldn't have taken Tina long to figure this one out, anyway.

Nick and Starr's driver doesn't know where to go, and they stop to get directions by yelling up to the driver of a huge semi. Starr begins to freak out a bit, but Nick manages to pull her back from the brink. Toni and Dallas arrive at the Roadblock, and assign it to Toni. Andrew takes it for the Fratties. Mark reads off the correct location, and the clue-wrangler hands over the next clue. It directs them to take their waiting taxi to the pitstop at Cidade da Crianca, which is a beautiful park with some interesting architecture, built as "an oasis for the city's children". Weird. Mark and Bill are off, more Spanish being thrown around. Tina reads off her scribblings to the clue-wrangler, who is plainly bored out of his gourd. I don't blame him. This task kind of blows. She reads off the correct location, so she and Ken easily catch up to Mark and Bill at a red light. There's some good-natured joshing back and forth about letting the "fat boys" win one, but nothing doing. Ken and Tina's cab guns it when the light turns green, leaving the Geeks in the dust.

Nick and Starr arrive at the Roadblock, and give it to Nick. Kelly and Christy are chanting in unison "We. Have. Learned. To. Read. The. Clue." They both roll their eyes. Aja and Ty pass them, and are next to the Roadblock, where Aja takes it on. Kelly and Christy, in their hurry to get started on the task, don't ask their taxi to wait, and it drives off. Ha! That strong resolve to read their clues sure lasted a long time. Mark and Bill laugh about how they've now got to beat the ex-professional football player in a footrace. Heh. Both teams arrive at about the same time, and neither can quite figure out where to enter.

Ken and Tina edge Mark and Bill out to the mat, and celebrate when Phil tells them they're team number one. They win one of those crappy pitstop prizes, a pair of off-road vehicles, which will be so handy in the streets of Tampa. Mark and Bill check in as team number two. Phil asks Ken why it's so important to be here, and he and Tina make a strange analogy between winning a leg and putting their marriage back together. I don't begrudge them the win (I still find them far less annoying than I planned to), but that's pretty weak. Mark says that if coming in first helps them repair their marriage even a degree, then screw the ATVs. Heh, he just knows he wouldn't have any use for them. It was still sweet, and Tina gives him and Bill a hug.

The IBs and Terence/Sarah reach the Roadblock, where IB#3 and Sarah take it on. Terence wants to get smoochy-faced, but Sarah's like "Have you noticed that there's this race and we're not doing so well right now?" Nick mutters to Sarah that they should work together, but when he learns that she just got there and doesn't have much helpful information, completely abandons her to go confer with Andrew. Cold. Christy reads off the correct location, so she and Kelly have vaulted back to third place. They rush out to the road to try and flag down another taxi. Aja gets the correct location. Sarah and Toni are right behind her. Kelly outright asks Christy if she thinks the taxi may have just gone to hang out with the others, and Christy immediately dismisses the idea, though this is exactly what has happened. Nick/Andrew/IB#3/Anthony are all being idiotically obtuse about the Roadblock. Kelly and Christy sing a chorus of "Poor Us, We're Out of It".

Commercials. Hey, KFC? The public's issue with you isn't that your "chicken" isn't cheap. We know it is. The problem is that your chicken tastes like barber shop sweepings.

The Roadblock teams continue to struggle. The other knot of teams arrives at the pitstop at the same time, and check in together as teams three (Terence/Sarah), four (Aja/Ty), and five (Toni/Dallas). Terence and Sarah take the opportunity to say that though they didn't plan to work with anyone on the race, that all changed when they got some unsolicited advice. Kelly and Christy still can't find their taxi. Nick swears to God that he'll share the answer with Andrew when he finds it, then proceeds to abandon him as abruptly as he did Sarah. I don't mind teams not helping each other, but this purposeful misdirection doesn't accomplish anything but engendering ill will. Again, Kelly and Christy finally do what they should have done to begin with, and check the group of remaining taxis, whereupon they discover that theirs has been there the whole time. I'm beginning to see why the marriages didn't work out. "Honey, I thought you were going to make dinner." "Oh, the food's in the refrigerator!?!?"

Andrew gets the right answer, and Dan jumps in celebration. So much for not being happy with a let's-not-come-in-last attitude. The IBs get it as well, causing Stephanie to grouse that "now we're in last place". Now? Honey, you've been in last place since the word "Go". They eventually get the correct answer, but not before Nick and Starr check in as team six. Kelly and Christy are disappointed to hear that they're team seven. They're lucky they're not still digging up the beach. Andrew/Dan/IBs have similar issues getting into the park as earlier teams, but it's not like it makes a huge difference who finds it first. The Fratties are team eight, and the IBs once again roll in second-to-last. Anthony and Stephanie run up to the mat, are greeted, and eliminated. I fail to rend my clothes in twain. Stephanie says they had a great time together, and hope they can get their act together enough to get married. Anthony's not worried about that. He says he's thankful that he has "my health, my parents, my looks [snerk], and I have Stephanie". Well, the order of that little list is pretty telling. I hope Stephanie hasn't booked the church yet.

Next week on The Amazing Race: The teams are struck with altitude sickness. Ken impresses Tina by flinging himself around in Mexican wrestling gear. Er...OK.

Overall Grade: C+