S35.E10: Everyone Loves a Comeback Story

[Whimsy]

Quote

Teams travel 1,000 miles from Slovenia to Sweden where they must face their fears and skydive from 10,000 feet over the Baltic sea, recreate a midsummer tradition, and sort through recyclable items.

Original airdate 11/29/23

[mojoween]

Definitely would have swapped Todd and Ashlie for the girl who is actively trying to kill her father.

But man, the other three teams?  Love them all.  

[Fake Jan Brady]

Awww, that moment when John, Garret and Todd started dancing together.

Dammit, if only Rob & Corey didn’t tell Anna Leigh & Steve that a bus wasn’t a subway…

I would love to be served in a restaurant [or anywhere] by John, who is a total dreamboat.

I really thought Todd & Chelsea’s "amazing comeback" was going to come about by Anna Leigh berating Steve into a heart attack.

This was the tensest leg in a long time.

[hendersonrocks]

4 minutes ago, mojoween said:

But man, the other three teams?  Love them all.

LOVE. They would be such a satisfying final three!

This episode reminded me of why I’m glad I am no longer with an ex who - among other things - was a dick about me being slower than him. I know Steve can’t and won’t leave his daughter but I certainly wish him, his lungs, and his eardrums peace.

[Ellaria]

2 minutes ago, Fake Jan Brady said:

Dammit, if only Rob & Corey didn’t tell Anna Leigh & Steve that a bus wasn’t a subway…

I laughed out loud at this comment. Yes…R&C should have stayed silent so I didn’t have to hear “Come on, Dad” throughout the rest of the episode. Anna Leigh is a strong racer but she is tiresome.

[Netfoot]

I enjoyed the episode but I will make only a few comments. 

The Express Pass was played a little quickly. Sure, this was the last day for use and they were looking for an excuse to play it, but it would have made more sense to look at the task (which turned out to be pretty easy) before playing it. An Express Pass would have helped with the menus more.

(He: "They are in French!" Me: <Smacks Forehead>)

As said above, Steve is probably not going to make it to the end of the race. But I don't really blame AL for riding him hard. Some horses need a jockey and he seems to be one. I was pleasantly surprised at how well she interacted with other teams. 

I thought Todd & Ashlie were well out of it, but while they were eliminated, the finish was very close!

Nice to see Team Hirsute take the #1 spot. Some good ups & downs in placement again.

They pulled numbers to do the sky dive, but instead of a delay between flights they packed all 20 jumpers on the plane like sardines. (The Twin Otter has a passenger capacity of 20.)

Was the Greeter to be seen at several places along the route today? Or was it just me? Personally I'd have been happy with the violin player as a Greeter and I think Todd agrees with me.

[vousviou]

I really enjoyed the scene early when the brothers looped back after missing the numbers, and one of Team Facial Hair said "we'd love to help you out, but we're not going to because you're too strong" and the brothers just took it in stride. They all seemed to understand the situation.

I'm glad Team ZZ Top won, and they were clearly helped by not being a part of the pack at the finish. It shows how sometimes you're gambling when you join up with someone else -- you may all be dragged down together.

[mertensia]

Who would have thought that one last subway stop would be such a stumper?

I, too, wish Corey hadn't alerted them that a bus is not a subway.

This was such a city-centered leg after the last couple.

 

[Jodithgrace]

I was in Stockholm a few years ago, and though we walked all over the city, we never thought to take the subway. Looks like we missed out on something worth seeing. 
I keep telling myself that if somebody actually died during the filming of TAR, like Steven as he huffs and puffs behind AL, we would have heard about it before the season even started. But he does worry me.

 The brothers impress me the way they approach every task. They always have a plan, and never panic, even when they make a mistake like running past the sign up numbers.  They enjoy every thing, and have we ever seen them fight?

 

[dancingdreamer]

Excellent  episode,  I really wanted to reach for the duct tape, and have AL stfu . Come on dad x 30. What's the matter  with her? He looked like he was ready to keel over, I thought Todd and his wife just might beat them, sadly no.. Please let them go out 1st in the F4.

 3 pretty good teams are beaten by the beards, I loved that part, and they had no idea they were 1st. Happy dance! 

[SDVegas]

I thought the dining task was much easier than it should have been. Seems to me that it would have / should have been: look at the menu and commit all 12 dishes to memory, then get the food and present it to the diners. John even went back to check the menu board in the middle of getting dishes for one of the courses. There wasn’t much memory required in that memory task. 

[Browncoat]

I wonder how close the finish actually was, and how much of it was the Amazing editors.  Did we see Ashlie and Todd at the same time as Steve and AL? 

4 hours ago, SDVegas said:

I thought the dining task was much easier than it should have been. Seems to me that it would have / should have been: look at the menu and commit all 12 dishes to memory, then get the food and present it to the diners. John even went back to check the menu board in the middle of getting dishes for one of the courses. There wasn’t much memory required in that memory task. 

But he also had to remember which dish was which, and who got which one.  There were lots of places to stumble.  He was smart to assign each diner/year a number and keep the numbers/dishes in order.

[Lamb18]

I was in Stockholm last year and we went to the City Hall where the Nobel dinner detour was. We were in that big room. It's used for lots of occasions, like state dinners, and yes, the Nobel Prize award banquets.

[SDVegas]

2 hours ago, Browncoat said:

 

But he also had to remember which dish was which, and who got which one.  There were lots of places to stumble.  He was smart to assign each diner/year a number and keep the numbers/dishes in order.

Yes and they had cards with their years in front of them on the table. So he just had to go in chronological order and easily serve them. It just wasn’t complicated. 

[Seelouis]

I never thought I’d be routing for an all male final, but here we are. I wonder if Anna Leigh is watching this now realizing just how her dad was struggling. Compare to Corey and Rob, where Corey never berates his dad and seems to be thrilled to be sharing this adventure with him. 

[Shermie]

10 hours ago, mojoween said:

Definitely would have swapped Todd and Ashlie for the girl who is actively trying to kill her father.

10 hours ago, Fake Jan Brady said:

I really thought Todd & Chelsea’s "amazing comeback" was going to come about by Anna Leigh berating Steve into a heart attack.

9 hours ago, Jodithgrace said:

I keep telling myself that if somebody actually died during the filming of TAR, like Steven as he huffs and puffs behind AL, we would have heard about it before the season even started. But he does worry me.

I hate that people think it’s Anna Leigh’s fault that her father is physically challenged by the race. HE signed up for it; he could have said no. She wants to win, duh. It’s a race. In this leg, it was very close, getting to the end as fast as possible meant avoiding elimination. 

If anyone is “trying to kill her father”, blame the race designers. Although I don’t, because he knew what he was signing up for. I’m his age, and would never to TAR because I know my limits.

And good grief, just because someone is huffing and puffing with exhaustion it doesn’t mean they’re at death’s door. People get tired, and yes, older people get tired faster. He’s not 90 years old; he’s not going to drop dead from a heart attack just because he’s winded. And even some 90 year olds wouldn’t. 

I’m going to root for them just because of all the negativity Anna Leigh is getting for wanting to win a damn race they both signed up for.

[bunnyface]

27 minutes ago, SDVegas said:

Yes and they had cards with their years in front of them on the table. So he just had to go in chronological order and easily serve them. It just wasn’t complicated. 

Okay, well, I don't know what it says about me then, because I'd still be there right now instead of typing this.  The brother's ability with French was a great key.  I thought it was a reasonably complicated task.  I've never waited tables before, so I wouldn't have gotten it together quickly like they did.

I don't know which brother is which (sorry but I like them both) but the one who was finding the dishes and spoke French told the other brother that the last words of the dish were the most important but at the next course, the runner said "nope, we're doing first words now."  I was also impressed with how the brother actually "waited" on the people and was pleasant with them, instead of just slinging their food at them, which we've seen before. 

[shura]

48 minutes ago, SDVegas said:

Yes and they had cards with their years in front of them on the table. So he just had to go in chronological order and easily serve them. It just wasn’t complicated. 

Well, he almost tried to make it more complicated by switching from the last word to the first word of the dish's name.  It could have been potentially problematic if there had been, say, three different beef dishes. "Give me a bœuf!" - and Greg hands him the first random "bœuf" he sees on the table.  I was almost waiting for that to happen.  On the other hand, they are so good that Greg would probably have noticed that there are several beefs there and asked John to specify which one.

I loved how everybody on the street was giving the racers wrong directions to the subway.  "It's over there", "It's that way" (in what looked like a small woodland?), "Yes, the subway is right here, hop on" (thank you, bus driver!), "It's in Germany".  See, this is why banning smartphone use would be a disaster - nobody knows anything without them anymore.

So let me see.  We just saw Slovenia showcased by absolutely stunning scenery and natural wonders of all kinds. And now they give us... trash recycling?  Huh.

Edited November 30, 2023 by shura

[chaifan]

4 hours ago, Browncoat said:

I wonder how close the finish actually was, and how much of it was the Amazing editors.  Did we see Ashlie and Todd at the same time as Steve and AL? 

I thought when they were on the bridge AL said that she could see Ashlie and Todd, so it sounded close.  For all the "come on dad", it got them into the final 4.  I don't think they would be there if AL wasn't pushing Steve so much. 

I think a lot of people are bothered by all the "come on/run" because it seems so rude from child to parent.  I think we'd feel the same way if this was a married/dating male/female team and it was the man constantly saying it.  But if it was one beard bro to the next, or Greg to John, or sister to sister, we probably would all be like "yeah, the guy is slow, he needs to move his ass". 

Also, for everyone saying "Corey doesn't treat Rob that way!".  um, yeah.  Why would Corey constantly say "come on, dad" to Rob?  He's not as slow as Steve, and could Rob hear it if he did?  (I don't know the extent of his hearing loss.)

bus vs. subway:  I may need to rewatch, but I think AL asked the bus driver where the subway stop was, he probably didn't understand they were looking for the subway stop (or that it mattered), his bus was going there, and he said to get on.  They thought the bus was going to the subway stop, not so much confusing the bus for the subway.  I've been in big cities where google maps tells me to take a bus/tram to a subway stop, so that didn't seem odd to me.

I am really confused about the timing of the skydiving.  It was daylight when they got there, but there was an HOO to 5am.  So did they have to all camp out overnight in the hangar?  Or was this filmed the time of year where it's daylight 20 hours/day?  Also, what was the time gap between team jumps?  It seemed that for all the time Greg & John spent trying to find the numbers, it really didn't matter much in the end.  First team may have had 5-10 minutes over last, but each team seemed to go within a minute or 2 of each other. 

Oh, and kudos to the unseen, but obviously there, skydiving camera people!

I was disappointed in the maypole task.  Just too easy.  They should have had to learn the dance or the song, or make the wreath more precise.  Did AL count the flowers, or did she just luck out? 

I'm glad there was foot navigation, and problems that resulted, because otherwise, for the episode going down to the final 4, it was pretty easy.

 

Edited November 30, 2023 by chaifan

[proserpina65]

And the AL who lambasts her father is back.  Ugh.  I was hoping that Todd and Ashlie would catch up and pass AL & S. Oh well.  At least Cory & Robb and the Beard Guys were safe.  I was afraid that C&R would end up getting eliminated when they had so much trouble finding the entrance at the symphony hall.  So glad they worked it out.

10 hours ago, Netfoot said:

(He: "They are in French!" Me: <Smacks Forehead>)

I imagine he expected them to be in Swedish.  I know I did.

7 hours ago, SDVegas said:

I thought the dining task was much easier than it should have been. Seems to me that it would have / should have been: look at the menu and commit all 12 dishes to memory, then get the food and present it to the diners. John even went back to check the menu board in the middle of getting dishes for one of the courses. There wasn’t much memory required in that memory task. 

I think it would've been much more difficult if he and Greg didn't speak French.

3 hours ago, Browncoat said:

But he also had to remember which dish was which, and who got which one.  There were lots of places to stumble.  He was smart to assign each diner/year a number and keep the numbers/dishes in order.

He really used his waiter experience well on that task.

35 minutes ago, SDVegas said:

Yes and they had cards with their years in front of them on the table. So he just had to go in chronological order and easily serve them. It just wasn’t complicated. 

Actually it was still pretty complicated.  Most of us would've screwed that task up at least once.  It was the combination of familiarity with French and experience waiting tables which made it work so well for them.

22 minutes ago, Shermie said:

I hate that people think it’s Anna Leigh’s fault that her father is physically challenged by the race.

It's not her fault that the Race is physically challenging for Steve.  It IS her fault that she keeps yelling and berating him knowing damned well that he's doing his best.

 

[choclatechip45]

Anna-Leigh has grown on me her dad signed up for the race. The c'mon was annoying but it was a close finish. 

[Netfoot]

10 minutes ago, choclatechip45 said:

Anna-Leigh has grown on me her dad signed up for the race. The c'mon was annoying but it was a close finish. 

And I don't care who my race partner is. In a footrace to the mat when you are this close to the finale? When all remaining teams are within site? sight? If you are 6 inches behind me, my "Move your a$$" is going to be at 103 decibels, non stop. And if I am 6 inches behind you, I expect the same from you!

Edited November 30, 2023 by Netfoot

[PhD-Purgatory15]

Please tell me at the Maypole roadblock, somebody made a snarky comment regarding Midsommar the horror movie and the Amazing Editors "chose" to leave it out of the episode..

If anything, I think the Recycling challenge could've been a lot harder. It seemed like all the workers at the facility were not going to let the racers fail. Perhaps, because that would've meant more work for them..

Honestly, Ana Leigh should've raced with her husband/fiance (or maybe a female friend). You have to simultaneously understand what your partner (Dad) is capable of and still try and push him to his absolute limit (especially when it's down to a footrace. Kudos to her on the Maypole task. That's not the first RB she's taken and absolutely crushed to make up some time (that her Dad can then use when they are running around a giant city)..

I was of the mindset that once you had a bunch coming into Stockholm, whatever was first (RB or Detour) Rob and Corey should've played that Express Pass to get the lead & get a cushion in case they picked the impossible side of the Detour and needed to switch. PhD Mom thought differently, and it ended up where she was right. In hindsight, they should've watched for a minute or to to see how (relatively) easily that RB played out and then they could've used it at the Detour and most likely cruised to a win..

 

[iMonrey]

1 hour ago, Shermie said:

I’m going to root for them just because of all the negativity Anna Leigh is getting for wanting to win a damn race they both signed up for.

The negativity isn't because Anna Leigh wants to win. It's because of her behavior overall. They all want to win. But we have never, ever seen the other three final teams argue, whine and bicker the way Anna Leigh and Steve do. And it's not just "c'mon dad, hurry dad," it's fighting and arguing and whining in the car. Whenever Anna Leigh gets lost or falls behind she loses her shit. Rob & Corey, Greg & John, Joel & Garrett - they've all made mistakes and they've all fallen behind, but they have never lost their cool and started yelling or bickering at each other. 

Look, I don't hate Anna Leigh, but she and her father are the least pleasant to each other of the four left. I'd be happy with any of the other three winning, but not them. 

I really dislike the pointless "first come first serve" time wasters like sky diving. I'm sure it's thrilling to do and yes, visually stunning to watch, but it doesn't really affect the race in any meaningful way. Joel and Garrett and Todd and Ashlie were the first two out of the plane but the last two out of the Roadblock.

I noted with interest that Rob and Corey were only about 10 minutes behind Steve and Anna Leigh at the end of the last leg, per their start time here. Which means they must have finished that Detour awfully fast because they were only just starting it when S&AL were leaving it. Also, Todd and Ashlie were a full two hours behind fourth place. The lucked out with the bunching, not that it did them much good.

I can't believe how invested I am in this season, it's kind of nerve wracking.

Question: Corey. Cuter with glasses or without? Vote now.

[bunnyface]

2 hours ago, shura said:

So let me see.  We just saw Slovenia showcased by absolutely stunning scenery and natural wonders of all kinds. And now they give us... trash recycling?  Huh.

Well, to be fair is was some stunningly clean trash and trash facility.  I've never seen trash that neat in my life.  Plus the stunning subways.  

[chaifan]

1 minute ago, bunnyface said:

Well, to be fair is was some stunningly clean trash and trash facility.  I've never seen trash that neat in my life. 

I noticed that one of the recycling bins had a lot of flatboard/pressboard type of furniture going into it.  Not exactly the best commercial for IKEA in a Sweden leg...  just sayin'... 

36 minutes ago, iMonrey said:

Look, I don't hate Anna Leigh, but she and her father are the least pleasant to each other of the four left. I'd be happy with any of the other three winning, but not them. 

That's where I'm at, too.  I just think AL gets a bit of a harsh edit and takes a lot of heat on this forum, where, as you pointed out, both she and Steve bicker, but she seems to get the blame.  She's a really good racer, pounds out tasks and even helps other racers.  To me, they have a pretty typical parent/child relationship, so none of the bickering really bothers me.  (Rob and Corey come across more peer-to-peer, definitely a more adult-to-adult relationship than most young adults have with their parents.)

44 minutes ago, iMonrey said:

Question: Corey. Cuter with glasses or without? Vote now.

Oh, part of me wants to say Stop Objectifying Racers!  But the other part of me wants to say, without.  Definitely without.  😁  (I also prefer Race clean cut Corey vs. his YouTube recap look.) 

[bunnyface]

I went and looked because I didn't know they were on YouTube and yes, clean cut Korey is much better.  I like a good beard (not any beard, a good beard) but I don't think it does him any favors.  #Imshallowlikethat

 

[shura]

2 minutes ago, chaifan said:

15 minutes ago, bunnyface said:

Well, to be fair is was some stunningly clean trash and trash facility.  I've never seen trash that neat in my life. 

I noticed that one of the recycling bins had a lot of flatboard/pressboard type of furniture going into it.  Not exactly the best commercial for IKEA in a Sweden leg...  just sayin'... 

I didn’t notice that specifically, but that place did feel like an IKEA somehow. Maybe the Swedes buy things there and immediately recycle them, bypassing actually using them.  It’s the next level of environmentalism.

[grawlix]

2 hours ago, chaifan said:

I thought when they were on the bridge AL said that she could see Ashlie and Todd, so it sounded close.  For all the "come on dad", it got them into the final 4.  I don't think they would be there if AL wasn't pushing Steve so much. 

i suspect that the finish wasn't all that close.  The groups ahead would have still been on the mat if it was.  Also, usually the camera man would have shown them on the bridge if they were there.  I think Anna Leigh only said that as part of her cajoling her father to move faster.

[sugarbaker design]

 

2 hours ago, chaifan said:

I thought when they were on the bridge AL said that she could see Ashlie and Todd, so it sounded close.

I believe AL might've fibbed to incentivize Pops to go faster.

[illdoc]

3 hours ago, chaifan said:

bus vs. subway:  I may need to rewatch, but I think AL asked the bus driver where the subway stop was, he probably didn't understand they were looking for the subway stop (or that it mattered), his bus was going there, and he said to get on.  They thought the bus was going to the subway stop, not so much confusing the bus for the subway.

Actually, when R&C told her "you need to take the subway", she said to the driver "you mean this isn't the subway? Is this the subway?". I was wondering how she could mistake a bus for a subway, since I would think everyone knows what a subway is! It's not like it said "take the Snork" and no one knows what the "Snork" is and she got on the bus thinking it was the "Snork" (ftr, "snork" is a made-up name I am pretending is Swedish for "subway").

I know that people were hoping R&C didn't inform her about the bus/subway error, but AL didn't have to tell them "this is the main entrance. this is how you find the violinist". R&C had been in the building, couldn't find where to go, left, went around the building and saw AL&Dad leaving. She could have blown them off or said "we couldn't find it" or whatever. So I consider the "this is a bus, you need to take the subway" as payback (kindness for kindness).

[Giuseppe]

RE: Anna Leigh and her comment re: Ashlie and Todd when they were racing to the mat, I think she said something like "I swear to god, if we see Todd and Ashlie...", but I don't think Todd and Ashlie even got on the same train. The editing tried to make it look like they did, but we never got any visual confirmation on that. I suspect Todd and Ashlie were on the next train, or maybe even two trains behind. Tha still would've been close if they were running every 7 minutes as someone pointed out.

Really enjoying Joel and Garrett. Joel (he has the beard, right?) makes me smile. He has the kindest looking face and twinkly eyes and always seems so jovial. Dude would make a great Santa Claus.

Still loving this season, but just a bit disappointed at the minimal airport drama we've had. I think Phil overstated a bit at the beginning of the season when he said airports were back in play, lol. I don't mind too much, though, because we've had other travel drama with missed trains and wrong ferries and such. Those are the aspects that really make the race for me.

Also, I still wish some tasks were a bit more challenging and diabolical. LIke it was pretty easy to find the violin player (Rob and Corey's main entrance issues notwithstanding). I almost wish they'd put her in a small room somewhere that was harder to find and difficult to pinpoint where the sound was coming from. And instead of the Maypole (someone up-thread brought up the Midsommar horro-movie, and yep, I was thinking that as well) a cool roadblock would have been to have given the racers a picture of the art installations in the various subway stations and make them figure out which station they had to go to based on that picture, and collect something at each station before returning to their partner. But I'll take off my wannabe task-designer hat now, and just reiterate how much I'm enjoying this season!

Edited November 30, 2023 by Giuseppe

[Silver-hyren]

3 hours ago, bunnyface said:

 Plus the stunning subways.  

I was so jealous of the subway stations.  The ones in my city are grimy and literally crumbling apart from years of neglect.  The transit authority had a whole publicity push a few years back about doing deep cleaning on the walls and replacing lightbulbs (a hilarious attempt to distract from unreliable service and an unpopular fare hike).  

3 hours ago, chaifan said:

That's where I'm at, too.  I just think AL gets a bit of a harsh edit and takes a lot of heat on this forum, where, as you pointed out, both she and Steve bicker, but she seems to get the blame.  She's a really good racer, pounds out tasks and even helps other racers.  To me, they have a pretty typical parent/child relationship, so none of the bickering really bothers me. 

Agree. Yes the constant "c'mon dad!!" grates, but it's no different than couple racers from previous seasons saying "c'mon babe!" nonstop.  Have to give her credit for being a powerhouse competitor, and second that she would have been better off racing with someone else.  I felt for both her and Steve during the footrace - him because he's winded and about to pass out, her because it had to be so frustrating to be able to see the Pit Stop (which I think the "I see them comment" was referring to, that she could see the three other teams they'd been running with already checked in) but because she has to stay within a certain distance from her dad per Race rules she just. can't. get. there.

[Shermie]

6 hours ago, proserpina65 said:

And the AL who lambasts her father is back.  Ugh.  I was hoping that Todd and Ashlie would catch up and pass AL & S. Oh well. 

She wasn’t lambasting him, she was telling him to hurry up. Because it’s a race. That he signed up for. Hey, she doesn’t want to lose because it means elimination; I don’t blame her for telling her racing partner to move his ass. 

The recycling place was hella organized, which I love, but it seemed they were recycling perfectly good things that could be reused (which should be done before recycling). Stuff like book shelves, wooden chairs, a porcelain sink; these items all looked in good shape. (Like it bugs me on HGTV when they sledgehammer perfectly good cabinets that could go to ReStore). At least they’re recycling 95% or some such.

[mertensia]

3 hours ago, illdoc said:

Actually, when R&C told her "you need to take the subway", she said to the driver "you mean this isn't the subway? Is this the subway?". I was wondering how she could mistake a bus for a subway, since I would think everyone knows what a subway is! It's not like it said "take the Snork" and no one knows what the "Snork" is and she got on the bus thinking it was the "Snork" (ftr, "snork" is a made-up name I am pretending is Swedish for "subway").

I know that people were hoping R&C didn't inform her about the bus/subway error, but AL didn't have to tell them "this is the main entrance. this is how you find the violinist". R&C had been in the building, couldn't find where to go, left, went around the building and saw AL&Dad leaving. She could have blown them off or said "we couldn't find it" or whatever. So I consider the "this is a bus, you need to take the subway" as payback (kindness for kindness).

Snork: https://moomin.fandom.com/wiki/Snork

[J-Man]

7 hours ago, proserpina65 said:

He really used his waiter experience well on that task.

Maybe I misheard, but I thought John specifically said that he'd never worked as a server but that he was really enjoying the "hospitality aspect" of the task.

If the three-team bunch hadn't got misdirected at the end, it's likely the brothers would have come in first yet again, since they were first among the bunch to arrive at the mat.

[Lola82]

I’ll take a million “come on dad!”s over one “Twinnie!!!” any day.

I adore the 3 male teams. The brothers seem like beautiful people inside and out. John took so much care in serving everything in a pleasant matter that I thought that must have been part of the task, but no, he was just being a pleasant person. 

 

[aradia22]

Am I getting tired of the season or was this a boring episode? I don't think I'm over it because I was excited to sit down and watch. Partially it was the gloomy weather in Sweden, which the producers can't do anything about. But it also felt repetitive and like there was too much bunching so the tasks were not difficult enough or they were exactly the same amount of difficult for everyone. 

Greg and John running past the clue box even though they got their first was a bad mistake but it's impressive they still ended up second to the mat. 

I'm sure the racers had fun but skydiving was not exciting for me to watch. It's just difficult to get good footage. And it was very repetitive. The maypole was deeply awkward to me. It didn't seem that difficult to assemble the wreath and then... you know the less said about the singing and dancing, the better.

Rob and Corey bailed pretty quickly with the express pass, but aside from using it for the detour, I don't really see a good place for them to skip. Again, too much bunching. 

Credit to Anna Leigh for racing thing through the maypole roadblock so their boat got back right after Rob and Corey. I don't love the top two teams working together but I get that to some extent, it's going to feel awkward going in the same direction and being super competitive about getting there minutes before another team. When you're on foot and taking public transportation, you're not really going to get that far ahead so you might as well be nice if you're going to be following each other anyway.

Did they know the recycling signs would be in Swedish. Weird they all chose the physical task. I would have taken the Serve task with memorizing the menus and like Greg and John, I speak enough French it would have been simple enough. Also, there's the hidden advantage of being comfortable inside while the other teams are running around cold in the rain doing a physical challenge.

I didn't understand how Stromparterren was a museum from Phil's description. How did they lose track of a 16th century town within the last 50 years? 

Then we had the slow, chaotic race to the mat with a lot of pointless running around. It didn't show the Swedish metro to any advantage. Of course, working together messed up the initial top 3 and Joel and Garrett got to the mat first. No tension because I figured Todd and Ashlie would be out unless those three actually got on the wrong train and went somewhere else. 

Those departing comments at the mat from Todd about how five or six years ago they were not as secure in their marriage and "God restored our relationship" makes me think there was a lot of stuff the editors cut out. I am glad that the editors suddenly deciding we should learn Garrett's daughter didn't mean they were going home. 

[aradia22]

Quote

I would love to be served in a restaurant [or anywhere] by John, who is a total dreamboat.

I don't think the world needs more influencers but if he somehow ended up being on camera more after this... maybe hosting educational videos or a children's program... I wouldn't hate it. 

Also, random but was the food real for the Serve task? Or was it prop food?

Quote

Was the Greeter to be seen at several places along the route today? Or was it just me? Personally I'd have been happy with the violin player as a Greeter and I think Todd agrees with me.

I remember her at the maypole and at the mat.

Quote

The brothers impress me the way they approach every task. They always have a plan, and never panic, even when they make a mistake like running past the sign up numbers.  They enjoy every thing, and have we ever seen them fight?

I think sometimes people go on TV conscious of how they present themselves... but then emotion gets the best of them. I don't think that's happened with Greg and John. Of course, they might be getting a favorable edit. But Greg fell in the water at the pomelo task (I think because John moved or because John didn't reach out to help steady him) and if they fought, that didn't make the edit. They might get mildly frustrated at taxi drivers but we haven't seen a bad mood linger even when they aren't at the front of the pack. It doesn't seem like they're repressing feelings but instead they manage to keep everything in perspective. It's admirable.

Quote

I loved how everybody on the street was giving the racers wrong directions to the subway.  "It's over there", "It's that way" (in what looked like a small woodland?)

It made me not want to visit Sweden. Because apparently the subway stations are difficult to find and no one knows how to give directions.

Quote

Question: Corey. Cuter with glasses or without? Vote now.

More handsome? Without glasses. Cuter? With glasses. But I have a Clark Kent thing so I like the glasses.

[Netfoot]

27 minutes ago, aradia22 said:

Rob and Corey bailed pretty quickly with the express pass, but aside from using it for the detour, I don't really see a good place for them to skip. Again, too much bunching.

I just think that it would have been a good tactic to spend a few minutes on the Roadblock. If it turned out to be quick and easy (as it was), they could have saved the XP for the Detour. If, after a few minutes they concluded that the Roadblock was arduous, they could still have whipped out the XP and moved on, hoping that the Detour was an easy challenge to complete.

[Roccos Brother]

All I could think about were those poor tables that didn't get to eat in the restaurant challenge; or at least if they did, they certainly had to wait a long time. That food looked so good and could not have been cheap. There was that one lady who looked up when the clue was being handed... she looked so sad and hungry. 😢

Edited December 1, 2023 by Roccos Brother

[Netfoot]

20 minutes ago, Roccos Brother said:

There was that one lady who looked up when the clue was being handed... she looked so sad and hungry. 😢

LOL! The downside of participating as part of a TAR challenge. Waiting all afternoon for someone to pick your side of the Detour, with your tummy grumbling the whole time!

But seriously, there sure was a ton of grub there. I certainly hope the diners were allowed to eat as much as they wanted (once the challenge was ended), rather than waste it all!

[Lantern7]

Not much to say about this episode that hasn't already been said. Stockholm looked beautiful, and the Racers came to play. Okay, we had Anna Leigh yelling at her father, and we had to wonder if Steve was going to keel over at some point . . . but that's minor compared to the positives. Anna Leigh is a minor annoyance compared to the other folks I make myself watch. On the other hand, I wondered if she was shouting for her partner to fall faster during the freefall task.

Greg & John are awesome. I kept waiting for an inevitable screw-up on the serving Detour, but it didn't happen. The execution was beautiful, and it was a bit of a fluke that Joel & Garrett got to the Pit Stop before them. The brothers were so close to tying Justin & Diana's record for most consecutive legs won.

I think Rob & Corey used their Express Pass too early. The Roadblock looked easy once you knew how to arrange the flowers. After that, all you had to do was raise a pole and do a little dance. I liked the three guys waiting for their partners with impromptu dancing. Nicer surprising moment than Survivor showing the remaining guys having fun without the women around.

Edited December 1, 2023 by Lantern7

[PhD-Purgatory15]

aradia22, your comment made me think back to the Social Media season and Burnie/Ashley (the married couple from RoosterTeeth). That theme about being cognizant of how they would portray themselves on reality tv for posterity came up over and over again in their "inside baseball" recaps/podcasts during and after that season.

I even thought all the way back to Real World: San Diego and the last two contestants ever who approached that show with even a thought to their own dignity, a guy named Jahquise and future respectable actress Jamie Chung. The following season in Hawaii had Ruthie & Teck skinnydipping in the pool in the first 5 minutes of the very first episode lol..

I also think Todd and Ashlie didn't end up making the Subway train that teams 2,3, & 4 did. I think the editing was to make it seem like Ana Leigh was seeing Todd & Ashlie, when actually she was seeing the other three teams (including the Beardos) on the Pit Stop Mat basically waiting for them to finish up.

[aradia22]

Quote

I just think that it would have been a good tactic to spend a few minutes on the Roadblock. If it turned out to be quick and easy (as it was), they could have saved the XP for the Detour. If, after a few minutes they concluded that the Roadblock was arduous, they could still have whipped out the XP and moved on, hoping that the Detour was an easy challenge to complete.

Just conjecture but I wonder if past roadblocks like the lotus bouquets made the teams nervous. Basically everyone (except Ashlie, I think) commented on how they were less precious about the task after seeing Anna Leigh tear through it. You don't know how harshly it's going to be judged until people start getting checks. If I remember correctly, Rob, Ashlie, Greg, Steve, and Joel were the ones doing the lotus task on their teams. That means Ashlie and Greg were the only ones who chose to do both tasks. 

I do think it comes down to challenge design. Everyone shouldn't be completing the tasks in roughly the same amount of time. The intermediary tasks to find clues (e.g. find the violinist, go up a spiral staircase) just seem like time wasters and there isn't enough skill or chance involved in the detours and roadblocks to be all that interesting. It feels like it's been like this since they got to Europe. Maybe production thinks it makes the teams look more competitive when there's a lot of bunching but I find it dull... especially on the last leg.

[kitkat343]

 

 

It would have been a better use of her energy for Anna Leigh to carry her dad's pack instead of screeching.

 

 

 

 

6 hours ago, aradia22 said:

 

It made me not want to visit Sweden. Because apparently the subway stations are difficult to find and no one knows how to give directions.

We went on a Baltic cruise and had one day in Stockholm, where we briefly visited 5 musuems/palaces and traversed the city via train, buses, trams and subways.  In Stockholm, like Helsinki, people were incredibly helpful and kind, but couldn't understand my butchering their language.  I had a sheet of paper for each city that had key information written on it, and when I pointed to words I couldn't pronounce in Swedish like the name of a train station or museum they happily and clearly gave me directions.  I have a higher pitched voice and speak quickly like Anna Leigh, so it is hard for even good nonnative English speakers (which most people in Stockholm are) to understand me.  You'd be fine traveling there (and it is a spectacularly beautiful city when you aren't visiting their recycling centers which were super impressive for recycling centers but not as gorgeous as a canal cruise through the archipelago or visit to Vassa), but you should use written directions or your smartphone to ask for help.

Edited December 1, 2023 by kitkat343

[PurpleTentacle]

 

[Skooma]

On 11/29/2023 at 11:17 PM, Netfoot said:

As said above, Steve is probably not going to make it to the end of the race. But I don't really blame AL for riding him hard. Some horses need a jockey and he seems to be one

He isn't a horse and he was running as fast as he could.  His face was totally red and he was ready to collapse.  He was pushing himself totally and was about to have a heart attack and she didn't seem to care a fig. 

She should have, at the very least, gone back and taken his backpack.  That is what a lot of Racers over the years have done when one had maxed out their limits and needed help.  But no, she just shouted and screamed at him.  Not cool!

19 hours ago, Shermie said:

I hate that people think it’s Anna Leigh’s fault that her father is physically challenged by the race. HE signed up for it; he could have said no. She wants to win, duh. It’s a race. In this leg, it was very close, getting to the end as fast as possible meant avoiding elimination. 

If anyone is “trying to kill her father”, blame the race designers. Although I don’t, because he knew what he was signing up for. I’m his age, and would never to TAR because I know my limits.

Then you would miss the chance of an experience of a lifetime if that was your only reason not to apply.  That would be sad.

I am totally against only 20-something athletic types being on The Amazing Race.  That would be totally boring.  This is the AMAZING race - not some track and field event - and is for all people of all ages and types.  Not just for alpha males and 20-something beauty queens only.  And thank God for that!

And no, he was not physically challenged in any way I could see.  He was running as fast as the other Dad (Deaf Dad) and doing a damn fine job.  You didn't hear Deaf Dad's son yelling and screaming at him.

Edited December 1, 2023 by Skooma

[aghst]

Looks like AL was the only one to count flowers for the wreath.  She crushed it while Ashlie was talking about layers and seemed to be more deliberate but maybe slower.  I don’t think they recovered from that but at least she enjoyed the skydive.

Rob and Corey seemed stunned that AL and Steve caught up and passed them because they couldn’t find the violinist in the opera house so that is probably why they asked AL and Steve why they were in the bus, because they weren’t confident in their navigation.

AL was of course begging the bus driver to leave before Rob and Corey came into the bus.  They were too shaken to play it cool and just go look for the subway.

Serve task was less physically demanding but the teams enjoyed smashing things at the sort recyclables task.  But the server brother saw the pattern or order or the prize winners and just looked for unique identifier in the dish names, as programmers do.

They would have won if they had the correct directions but they figured they would just outrun the other teams.

 

[PurpleTentacle]

When exactly was this shot? It did look pretty dark for 5am in the middle of summer in sweden. Around the summer solstice that's how it looks like at 4am in central germany and sweden is significantly further north.

Were we getting into September here? Did not know they shot it this close to airing.

19 hours ago, SDVegas said:

Yes and they had cards with their years in front of them on the table. So he just had to go in chronological order and easily serve them. It just wasn’t complicated. 

Yeah, maybe if their "nobel prizes" with their names and the year on it had hung on the wall and they only had their names in front of them on the table and didn't sit in order. That would have been more of a challange.

But the race, not always, but usually, tries to balance both detours and it seemed both took about the same amount of time if you did them well. So I can't fault the designers for this not being harder. Maybe it even was harder to begin with and in testing they noticed that it took too long.

On 11/30/2023 at 5:17 AM, Netfoot said:

The Express Pass was played a little quickly. Sure, this was the last day for use and they were looking for an excuse to play it, but it would have made more sense to look at the task (which turned out to be pretty easy) before playing it. An Express Pass would have helped with the menus more.

Thing is, if you stay there for a while, you are wasting time. At first glance it did look like something very detail oriented and they were there very, very early in the morning, so you might reason that the race has very difficult tasks for you, so the leg takes till the evening. It just turned out that you only had to put the right amount of flowers and you were good. Maybe the producers got the weather report and wanted teams to get out of there before it started raining, so made it easier.

19 hours ago, bunnyface said:

The brother's ability with French was a great key.  I thought it was a reasonably complicated task.

It really wasn't. The names on the menue were the same as on the cards. There was no translation required. You could have just said them how you thought they sounded in english and that would have worked.

19 hours ago, chaifan said:

I thought when they were on the bridge AL said that she could see Ashlie and Todd, so it sounded close.  For all the "come on dad", it got them into the final 4.  I don't think they would be there if AL wasn't pushing Steve so much. 

But there was nobody on the mat when they got there. Phil usually takes a while to debrief, especially if there are three teams in front of him at the same time. So it can't have been that close.

19 hours ago, chaifan said:

Also, for everyone saying "Corey doesn't treat Rob that way!".  um, yeah.  Why would Corey constantly say "come on, dad" to Rob?  He's not as slow as Steve, and could Rob hear it if he did?  (I don't know the extent of his hearing loss.)

I mean still. When Corey and Rob were going for the express pass, Corey stayed behind Rob and asked if he was okay at some point. Contrast that with AL, who ran ahead up the stairs, while her father was basically only half up and then screamed down at him to hurry up, while he was clearly already going as fast as he could.

19 hours ago, chaifan said:

bus vs. subway:  I may need to rewatch, but I think AL asked the bus driver where the subway stop was

She said "go, please don't let them on." Meaning she tried to actually take the bus, which would have been a rules violation.

19 hours ago, chaifan said:

They thought the bus was going to the subway stop, not so much confusing the bus for the subway.  I've been in big cities where google maps tells me to take a bus/tram to a subway stop, so that didn't seem odd to me.

Did you have a clue that told you "take the subway"? If a clue tells you "take the subway", you take the subway and nothing else. If the race wanted you to take a bus and the subway, it would have said "travel by bus and subway" or "travel via public transport".

19 hours ago, chaifan said:

I am really confused about the timing of the skydiving.  It was daylight when they got there, but there was an HOO to 5am.  So did they have to all camp out overnight in the hangar?

Usually teams have to rough it to wait for HOO. A nice hanger in the summer in sweden seems like a better option than on the side of the road in india (yeah that has happened).

12 hours ago, J-Man said:

Maybe I misheard, but I thought John specifically said that he'd never worked as a server but that he was really enjoying the "hospitality aspect" of the task.

Yeah. Considering his family is rich, I doubt he ever waited tables.

8 hours ago, aradia22 said:

It made me not want to visit Sweden. Because apparently the subway stations are difficult to find and no one knows how to give directions.

I mean they gave directions to the nearest public transport, a bus station, which probably would have taken them to the subway station. People in sweden can't be expected to know that on the amazing race you are only allowed to take the transportation that is on the clue and nothing else.