iMonrey

Finally, some real placement shake-ups. Well, except for Ricky and Cesar. One good thing about this season is all the self-navigating. It's proving to be as important as the challenges. Yeah but the water looks filthy.

OMG Yvonne and Melissa cannot sing at all.

I think Amber and Vinny might be toast. They look completely defeated in their talking heads. I would have to do the singing. I have zero rhythm.

Amber and Vinny seem totally over each other in their interview segments. I can't see that relationship lasting much longer after the race is over.

Well that's too bad, but I could tell Hunter wasn't going to go far. We just weren't seeing enough of him, especially with Q sucking all the oxygen out of the room. Editing made it pretty clear he was destined to be an also-ran. Plus he was an idiot not to play his idol. You could see it coming all through tribal with his constant polling for reassurance. I might be done with this season. I just cannot stand one more week of The Q Show. I can't remember the last time I was this sick of a single player.

Hunter and Tiff are the obvious targets and both have idols. If neither goes home with an idol in their pocket this is going to be one boring vote.

Wow I'll be damned. But Hunter has an idol so . . .

I doubt Charlie or Maria have practiced this at home as much as Hunter.

I'm fine with bland if it means the end of The Q Show every damn week.

Wow what a shock, Hunter's team won. Now, I wonder which one of the three left will win. Hmmm. Such a puzzle. I can't figure it out.

Hunter, Maria and Charlie are objectively the strongest team.

See . . . they already see Q as the perfect F3 goat because nobody will give him their vote. We're stuck with this idiot until the bitter end. I don't know if I can take it.

At least we're getting to hear the others say what an idiot Q is. I'm sorry but I never thought he was very bright. He's had an over-inflated sense of self-worth and self-importance since Day 1. And I fear we're stuck with him until the bitter end. The editors seems to love him, anyway.

I mostly agree, and I think it's peculiar to American sitcoms that there has to be romantic pairings. You can look at just about any ensemble sitcom in America and find the same thing. I guess networks and/or American sitcom writers think American audiences expect and demand it. But if I were to rationalize, I'd point out that through most of the history we know about, Jay and Sam are the first romantic couple to own Woodstone. Previous owners were single or in unhappy marriages. So having a young couple actually in love might have given the ghosts ideas - especially since they are able to communicate with a living for the first time in their ghostly existence. I also like to think that their newfound ability to communicate with a living has given the ghosts a sort of "awakening." The kind that will eventually lead to them finding out what they need in order to be sucked off. That has to be the end game for a show like this.

Huh? I never expressed interest in seeing either of those things happen. Or, are you implying that anyone who thinks collaboration or alliances on the Race wants it to be more like Survivor? I think scorning Race fans who think alliances are OK is rather uncalled for. Anyone who wasn't especially bothered by Amber's action isn't a lesser or inferior fan of the show.

Yeah, it was sad when he choked up about being homeless. But he's apparently too young to know what Samsonite Luggage is! Young whipper-snapper. Anyone from my generation would know that from any given prize on any given game show!

Yeah, I get that, but then don't just go ahead and try serving regular (pork) bacon anyway when the primary specified she doesn't eat pork! That's what's so frustrating, it's a pretty straight-forward request. Fraser did in fact go over every single dish with Anthony. We saw him asking "what about this person, what about this person, what about this person?" For anyone complaining Fraser should have been helping more, or helping to plan meals, he definitely stood there and tried to make sure everyone's preferences were being met when they were going over what Anthony was going to make. What more was he supposed to do, help cook the food too? Of course I feel bad for Anthony, he's a sweetie, and when he broke down and cried after being fired it broke my heart. But his failures are his own.

Wasn't he an attorney?

I really like Pete Holmes. I'm not the biggest fan of his stand-up but his last special was actually pretty good, and he's good on this show. I also liked the AI game. I'd like to see them settle on some games that really work and stick to those, as I posted earlier.

For some reason my DVR will not record the Monday shows with Jon Stewart. It's odd. I have it set for series record and when I try to manually schedule the Monday show to record it says it's already scheduled to record but then it doesn't record it. It records all the rest of the week's shows. Just not Monday's. There must be some special designation with the Monday shows the DVR sees as not being part of the regular show. I don't know, I don't get it.

"Near universally panned?" I'd call that a pretty wild exaggeration. Yes, some fans don't like it when teams help each other. Some fans don't care, some fans see the wisdom in the strategy and sometimes the strategy backfires. It's all part of the race. The issue specific to this episode seems to be that Amber virtually did Angie's puzzle for her, which is about as far as one can go in terms of helping another team. I can't think of another instance where that's happened before to that degree, but again, if it's not against the rules it's not against the rules. I'm not the type to watch a show for 36 seasons wishing it was a different show, buy hey. To each his (or her) own.

No, and there's nothing wrong with being cynical. It's a "reality" show, after all. But you seem convinced that every little thing is fake, scripted, b.s., etc. It's all made up, they're all actors, nothing is really happening, everything is pre-determined. So I ask again . . . why do you even bother watching this? I've done a deep dive, as much as is possible for a show like this, and am reasonably convinced that production does not interfere with the day-to-day goings on to the extent you seem convinced that they do. I've read and watched interviews with crew members like Captain Lee, Captain Glenn, stew Aesha, engineer Colin, and unless they are lying through their teeth - which I hate to think they are - then nothing is made up or "scripted." There have been countless crew members fired, made to look the fool, look awful, etc., and not once has anyone come forward to claim it was all just an act directed by the producers. And these are people no longer associated with Bravo. If I came across looking half as bad as some of these people, believe me, I'd find a way to get word out there that it wasn't real and I was just being ordered to do something. Do they hire people they know are incompetent because they want them to cause trouble? Sure. That's what they did with Anthony. They knew there was a good chance, at least, he wouldn't be able to hack it. Same with Cat, probably. Do they suggest theme parties and beach picnics to the charter guests? Sure. They want to simulate what an actual charter with spoiled, rich guests is like for a crew as much as possible. But once they turn them all loose on the boat, everyone is on their own. The primary on this charter definitely knew what was on his preference sheet, and made it known to Fraser. I'm sure some of the guests forget what they even put down, who knows how long ago they filled the damn things out. That doesn't mean producers are actually filling these things out for the guests and then telling them to pretend they don't like vegetables or are vegan or won't eat fish or are gluten free. None of these people are good enough actors to pull that off.

Either that or he's too stubborn to change what he calls things once he's learned them. He wouldn't have known a prior description of Facetime or the latest iOS. But if he started calling cars "land ships" the first time he ever saw one, he might be too stubborn to change.

Teams deciding to help each other is called strategy. It doesn't transform the race into a social game. It's still a race. The Amazing Race isn't purely long distance running. There's all kinds of strategy involved, including which Detour to choose, or deciding which team member should do the Roadblock. Deciding to work with another team to insure you stay ahead of other teams is simply another one of those strategic choices. I'm sorry if that ruins the whole show for you but I honestly don't know how this choice was so heinous it garnered this level of grievance. We're talking about one team helping another team.

Agreed. Too often the topics seem somewhat irrelevant when one considers the more pressing issues facing us at the moment - the war in Gaza, the upcoming election, etc., and the main topic is student loans or Medicaid or food apps. None of which affect me, frankly. If the show is going to do less pressing topics anyway at least this one was of general interest for anyone.