S27: Justin & Diana

[jah1986]

I am not sure about the rest, but clearly you don't need some sort of unusual occurrence to qualify for UB.

Yes, you're right. I guess I'm just hoping we never have to see Justin and Diana again.

[scrb]

I had to Google their names again to remember.

Yeah he was really insufferable.

But a good sign that you can forget some of these loons in a year or two.

[hincandenza]

On 3/3/2017 at 4:44 PM, Geenee said:

Fingers crossed for a divorce-free future...and maybe even one without domestic violence:

Honestly, that's a bit much to say; we don't know these people personally, and there's no sign on the race they were anything more than a regular couple in a stressful situation.  For my money the legendary Beauty Queens were my favorite team of all time, and were a pillar of healthy relationship techniques and non-negative criticism (and sadly, did not ever win).  Most people- myself included- are more prone to things said in haste we later regret.  In S27, I saw far more negativity between James Earl and Denise early on, or Chris and Logan from start to finish (hoo boy!) than I did between Justin and Diana.

 

I just finished watching S27 belatedly on Hulu (it finally showed up there, as I cut the cable cord years ago although I think the episodes are free to stream with ads on CBS's site), and I didn't find much wrong with Justin and Diana.  They were competitive, but they didn't really (to me) engage in anything unforgivably ugly and as mentioned in a comment earlier their interactions with locals were generally appreciative and polite.  I'm definitely of the category that watches this show for the locales and clever challenges, and otherwise thinks of the racers "Well... RACE.".  Other racers aren't your friends, and any alliances/deals are worth all the paper they are printed on.

I tend to care mostly about quality of racing and how they behave as unofficial ambassadors of the USA , and in their season they were overall better than everyone else.  Even when they were bunched, they pulled ahead on challenges and navigation time and again.  The penultimate episode, that was dumb of them to not a) double check the location before racing off, and b) not making sure their taxi driver spoke English.  I gotta think in Hong Kong you could wait a couple of minutes and get a different cabbie who they could communicate with, and is perpetually a shoot-in-the-foot move for racers to not measure twice and cut once when it comes to transportation.  That dumb mistake robbed them of what would have been their easy 8th win leading into the finale, and nearly a place in the finale.

As for the finale, one of my perpetual gripes is taxi luck playing too big a part in any leg's outcome.  If the race is designed to send them to a remote place via taxi that doesn't have easy taxi service back out, it's basically putting the entire leg onto whether one random cab driver feels like waiting- with or without a bribe.  Indeed, it was Chris and Logan's cab driver who, after denying Justin and Diana a ride, just decided to leave altogether and ultimately denied two teams a cab away from the fire training complex; that single cab driver may have completely shuffled the finishing order.  If the concern is that especially in the final leg the racers can't be trusted to drive without racing down city streets like madmen, then the show should give them an assigned driver for the city with the caveat that they, not s/he, must determine and say all driving directions.  It would add to the navigation challenge without making it cabbie knowledge dependent.

[JustLilOlMe]

Since it's the editors who put together the bits of these people and the only horrid relationship I saw on this was Chris and Logan.  And apparently the editors felt Justin was giving them more to work with then the others, who when they were a rather rah rah about themselves when they gave their remarks about themselves.  I can't hate a person from an edited show, and a radio personality would fit the style of boisterous behavior Justin seems to have.  Congrats on the wedding,

Just watched again and all I could remember from the first time was how much  I hope we wouldn't see tv announcers doing their gimmick throughout the series funny I can't recalled what if anything I though of Justin during the original run, and I didn't have time to really follow the forums at that time.  I really can get annoyed if editors show to much screaming --- the twinnies., nasty rude behavior --- Colin or boo hoo whine cry ... Rachel of big brother. **

Edited July 28, 2017 by JustLilOlMe

[Libby]

I started watching this season on Prime Video. I got half way through episode 4 and had to stop. Justin's personality was so offputting, that I gave up on the season.

I switched to season 25. I think that the cast of season 25 is much more enjoyable to watch.

[Hera]

Their loss was deeply satisfying, since it was spread out over the final two episodes, but yeah, it's a slog to get there. In general, I think this season was pretty weak in terms of both the cast and the tasks. Season 25 is definitely better.