S12: Talk

[Whimsy]

Since some older seasons are available to view on different platforms, we are starting all episodes threads for each season.

[ApprenticeFan]

The first post-All-Stars TAR, half of the race are newly visited countries: (Independent) Ireland, the "two" African "countries" teams did not understand the words: Burkina Faso, Lithuania, Croatia and Taiwan.

Moments of the Race including the manual transmission trouble of Kent (then known as Kynt) & Vyxsin in Italy, Ron's hernia pain, the domination of Azaria & Hendekea in the early legs and Nathan and Jennifer's bickering argument in Taiwan.

The final leg, which is first Amazing Race franchise would took place directly to the final city rather than the intermediate destination (Alaska, Hawaii and Canada in earlier seasons).

Edited January 14, 2016 by ApprenticeFan

[Supay]

The aphorism "quality over quantity" has never rung truer: two fewer legs than before plus a NEL/TBC sequence as punishing as Season 3's and 4's ensured a fast pace to this season, albeit robbing the sixth and fifth place teams of well-earned spots in the finale.

 

Thankfully, the penultimate episode restored the balance by booting an exasperatingly griping girl (and her boytoy) on her very birthday; as much flack as the winners get for being milquetoast - especially over the clearly legendary runner-ups who would hold onto the record of "highest-placing parent/child" for a half-decade until the birth of TAR Canada - one must give props to the solver of the finest finale RB to date.

 

(Bonus points for being the first non-sucky season to host an opening round in Europe!)

[Star Aristille]

Every year, it gets to this date, and every year, I fail to acknowledge it.

I know it's random, but today, November 4, is the eleventh anniversary of the TAR12 premiere, which I only bring up because to this day, I watch it on occasion to enjoy one of the craziest, most awesome, most deserved first elimination ever (or at least until TAR14 and possibly even TAR20 came along): Ari & Staella's donkey-inflicted boot in Ireland!

Sadly, YouTube has no vids with which to reminisce over that glorious bit of comeuppance they got.:(

[Star Aristille]

16 hours ago, Geenee said:

Naysayers be damned, the hippie couple are the most likable co-ed winners in that early-teen seasonal stretch: certainly more so than the faux returnees or either subsequent sibling pair (though Tamara is great by herself).

T.K. & Rachel were probably the most likable coed winners of that general era, but not exactly the most interesting.  It's been nearly ten years since their win aired, and I still don't think we learned much about them at all other than that Rachel used to be a florist.  Which is the only reason why I'd actually take the dating (but now married) couple who came after both sibling team winners over them, as well, since at least Meghan & Cheyne were interesting.

And Tamara?  Was that Tammy's real name?

[Roccos Brother]

I'm wearing a black veil today over the fact that Ron and Christina did not win. They had the perfect redemption/bonding storyline and were a good competitive team overall.

[Star Aristille]

12 hours ago, Roccos Brother said:

I'm wearing a black veil today over the fact that Ron and Christina did not win. They had the perfect redemption/bonding storyline and were a good competitive team overall.

Ronald & Christina totally would've deserved that win.  And if Christina hadn't choked on that final Roadblock, she would've.

[Roccos Brother]

I was also surprised and saddened when the siblings left early. I honestly thought they were one of the strongest teams.

This was a good season overall.

I especially loved that they went to gorgeous King's Landing, Croatia.

Edited December 19, 2017 by Roccos Brother

[dgpolo]

Finally a re-watch where I didn't cringe through the finale. I liked all the top teams and was happy for the winners. Rachel was truly amazing especially when she did the knots and hauled the furniture up in the Netherlands, she's so tiny! I don't know how she did that. And figuring out that final challenge was incredible.

I loved Kynt and Vyxin's dynamic and they were doing well until Italy.

Ron was horrible to begin with but managed to change enough to support Christina. I loved when he said they knew what a catamaran was after the previous season where Charla and Mirna said they didn't know what that was when they won one. If the producers had only waited until after this season they would have had a much better couple team that met on the Race, Christina and Azaria married after this race, I would have loved to see them race as a couple. I don't think Christina would have put up with his controlling streak as much as his sister did.

Nate and Jen were ridiculous, kept saying it wasn't fair when other teams caught up to them or passed them. Did she think people would just step aside for them? She actually told A & H that they had already come in first several times and it wasn't -fair- that they beat her to the mat. Delusional.

Lorena's meltdown milking the camel was funny. 'there's no more millllkkkk!'

This was the season with the first U-Turn and first Speedbump. I really wonder how the U-Turn would have worked in previous seasons. Can you imagine Flo having to do both Detours in Vietnam? and Charla- they were really good at picking the ones Charla could do, what if she had to do one involving a bicycle? or driving that front loader?

This was a great season to see after the last one.

[green]

I have absolutely zero memory of this season even though I have watched every episode of every season of this show. 

I think this is the season that marked the start for me where the seasons just kind of started to melt together into a big blob of forgetfulness.  

Only a few teams remain in my memory post All Stars like the Kentucky girl and her father and the Harlem Globetrotters and there were Cowboys for awhile too I think and the candy scientists and Team Fun and the Afganibles.  But I didn't remember who Tyler & Whatshisname were until this past season started.  And none of them were on TAR12 I take it.

I just think after awhile all these races become pretty repetitious.  This past season I will remember better because teams came back and I certainly remember pre-TAR12 teams well so I won't forget about Colin & Christie. 

Maybe I will remember certain happening when someone mentions them here but the Race as a whole?  Nope.

Edited July 23, 2019 by green

[limecoke]

Just finished my first rewatch of this season since it originally aired.  Amazed at how much I enjoyed seeing this again and it's (mostly) tolerable pairings. This season's winners are among my top three all-time TAR winners so that was fun to see again.  

Highlights include, the first elimination - so very satisfying.  Grandpa's underpants.  The patient and long-suffering grandson, Nick.  Ron's hernia and impressive Arc of Redemption in his treatment of Christine.  Two older gentlemen among the finalists for the million dollar prize.  Don't think that happened before or since.  Two of the most deserving winners I can remember.  Even with all their mistakes were was no screaming, no fighting, no drama and it certainly paid off.  To top it all off, (even though we didn't know at the time), two racers from different teams were destined to fall in love and marry.  Ahhhhhh...

The only two low points for me were the early departure of A & H and the totally ridiculous and thoroughly awful Nate & Jen.  

[limecoke]

Just now, limecoke said:

Just finished my first rewatch of this season since it originally aired.  Amazed at how much I enjoyed seeing this again and it's (mostly) tolerable pairings. This season's winners are among my top three all-time TAR winners so that was fun to see again.  

Highlights include, the first elimination - so very satisfying.  Grandpa's underpants.  The patient and long-suffering grandson, Nick.  Kynt & Vyxsin who, at first, I thought would irritate me but I ended up liking very much.  Ron's hernia and impressive Arc of Redemption in his treatment of Christine.  Having two older gentlemen among the finalists for the million dollar prize.  Don't think that's happened before or since.  Two of the most deserving winners I can remember.  Even with all their mistakes were was no screaming, no fighting, no drama and it certainly paid off.  To top it all off, (even though we didn't know at the time), two racers from different teams were destined to fall in love and marry.  Ahhhhhh...

The only two low points for me were the early departure of A & H and the totally ridiculous and thoroughly awful Nate & Jen.  

Just now, limecoke said:

3 minutes ago, limecoke said:

Just finished my first rewatch of this season since it originally aired.  Amazed at how much I enjoyed seeing this again and it's (mostly) tolerable pairings. This season's winners are among my top three all-time TAR winners so that was fun to see again.  

Highlights include, the first elimination - so very satisfying.  Who can forget Grandpa's underpants? The patient and long-suffering grandson, Nick.  Kynt & Vyxsin who, at first, I thought would irritate me but I ended up liking very much.  Ron's hernia and impressive Arc of Redemption in his treatment of Christine.  Having two older gentlemen among the finalists for the million dollar prize.  Don't think that's happened before or since.  Two of the most deserving winners I can remember.  Even with all their mistakes were was no screaming, no fighting, no drama and it certainly paid off.  To top it all off, (even though we didn't know at the time), two racers from different teams were destined to fall in love and marry.  Ahhhhhh...

The only two low points for me were the early departure of A & H and the totally ridiculous and thoroughly awful Nate & Jen.  

1 minute ago, limecoke said:

2 minutes ago, limecoke said:

5 minutes ago, limecoke said:

Just finished my first rewatch of this season since it originally aired.  Amazed at how much I enjoyed seeing this again and it's (mostly) tolerable pairings. This season's winners are among my top three all-time TAR winners so that was fun to see again.  

Highlights include, the first elimination - so very satisfying.  Grandpa's underpants.  The patient and long-suffering grandson, Nick.  Ron's hernia and impressive Arc of Redemption in his treatment of Christine.  Two older gentlemen among the finalists for the million dollar prize.  Don't think that happened before or since.  Two of the most deserving winners I can remember.  Even with all their mistakes there was no screaming, no fighting, no drama and it certainly paid off.  To top it all off, (even though we didn't know at the time), two racers from different teams were destined to fall in love and marry.  Ahhhhhh...

The only two low points for me were the early departure of A & H and the totally ridiculous and thoroughly awful Nate & Jen.  

[limecoke]

6 minutes ago, limecoke said:

Never mind.

I need to apologize.  I don't know how all these multiple posts happened and I can't seem to fix it.  So sorry!!

[MartyQui]

Rewatching this, and horrified by Shana and Jennifer on the train in Burkina Faso.  I’ve never enjoyed an elimination more, and wished it had happened sooner.

[SVNBob]

Now that we're well and truly in the CBS reality hiatus (until Tough as Nails 2 drops), my mother and I are now watching this season. 

To preface, this is right around the time I dropped off of TAR due to it getting moved to Sundays and thus an unfixed timeslot thanks to football.  My mother was picking up TAR about this time, but she doesn't really retain lots of details about shows in the way I do.  So it's more or less "new" to both of us.

That said, I do recognize these teams to a degree, and to different degrees for different teams.  I mean, Kynt and Vyxsin are truly visually iconic Racers, so they're hard to forget.  But others like Ron and Christina, and Ari and Stella are/were better at tickling my memory than others like this season's Blondes and TK, who looks like every alternative pseudo-stoner from the '00s.

We watched the first 3 episodes and here's a few highlights of our discussions:

The first Roadblock was pedaling a bicycle across a high wire over a Irish valley, while the other teammate was seated on a pole dangling below the bike.  The male/female teams pretty much all had the male doing the pedaling, except for the perky goths.  Vyxsin said she was the better cyclist, and given that Kynt was a willowier dude at the time, both those factors played well into her being the one to do the Roadblock.  She did pretty well too; only seeming to have difficulties right near the end (which I think would have been a slight incline anyway, if my understanding of physics is correct).  But I also think she probably had the second hardest time of the women that did this Roadblock, with Kate of the married lesbian ministers probably having a harder time due to her age and both her and Pat having larger builds as compared to all the other women, Kynt, and even Gramps.

Additionally, Ari and Staella unnecessarily* stole the cab A & H reserved for Ron and Christine, and the cabbie found out he had the wrong people in his cab.   Lo and behold, they get donkey on TAR that becomes impossible to work with and thus the agent of Kab Karma.  My mother said that karma hit them quickly, and I said that it bit them in the ass.

*To be fair, they didn't know that the cab ride led to an Equalizer ferry.  All they knew was they needed to catch a ferry to get to the next marker.  But since all the teams, from both initial flights, caught the same ferry, it was indeed unnecessary.

2nd leg was in Amsterdam.  And I was thoroughly expecting some form of weed-innuendo comment about that from TK.  But if he did say anything, the Amazing Editors kept it off air.  The Detour here was interesting; a double Needle in a Haystack (finding two specific marked bikes among hundreds), versus hauling 5 heavy and/or awkward pieces of furniture into an apartment via the window pulley.  TK apparently took several attempts to get their first item, a CRT TV, tied up without any success.  This led me to ask three questions. 1) Why didn't he switch to another item, like the chair, or baby carriage?  Those might have been a lot easier to figure out.  (Vyxsin and Kynt started with the carriage for that very reason.)   2) Why didn't he and Rachel switch positions sooner?  They saw other teams do so and leave the task long before they ever switched out.  3) Why didn't they Bald-Snark it after a while?  If he was having that big a problem with the one side of the Detour, you'd think they'd discuss changing tasks.  Eventually Rachel did take over on the ground, leading to a cute moment where she climbed up the 3 stairs of the stoop in order to jump off the top to help her haul the rope better.

This leg was the first time that TAR featured the ditch vaulting, which my mother did recall seeing before (from TAR30 is my guess, since that was the most recent time it was Switchbacked.)   Of course, the big moment here was Gramps stripping down to his underwear after some unsuccessful attempts, because his clothes were getting weighed down with mud.  Logical.  Also logical was Nicholas and him hanging back at the cluebox to watch other teams attempt this before deciding who would take this Roadblock.

This is also the leg that Ron went way overboard on berating both Christina and Nicholas.  My mother thought Ron was going to be a good guy based on Leg 1, but this leg soured her on him.  I pointed out that when Christina finally snapped at him, he at least became aware that there was an issue with how he was acting, and there was lots of Race left for him to get better.

In the start of Leg 3, Vyxsin had a TH where she said that in her relationship with Kynt, she sometimes took on more "traditional masculine" roles.  My mother opined that this meant that both of them were gender-fluid.  While I didn't totally discount that possibility, I said it was more that they just didn't fall into stereotypical gender roles, as evidenced in the first Roadblock as I stated above.  As far as I know, Kynt identifies as male, and Vyxsin as female.  But it's not like it matters one whit if either or both of them identify in another way.  Then this led into a conversation about language that is better served by the Grammar Police thread elsewhere in the forums, not the least of why is because I was referring to said thread throughout the conversation.

This was the Burkina Faso leg where Lorena got locked into a panic spiral because of a camel teat.  The Roadblock involved milking a camel to a certain volume, then drinking the milk to get the clue.  Everyone who was calm and/or had experience with farm animals did quick work.  Lorena was not in this group, and her camel could tell.  She seemed so nervous to even touch the camel, that when she did, the camel jerked its knee and knocked the bowl Lorena was gathering milk in.  This made Lorena more nervous...and the spiral began.  What she needed was something outside the spiral to knock her out.  Unfortunately, since this was a Roadblock, it couldn't be her partner Jason.  All he could do was watch and say non-specific encouraging words.  (And props to him for handling that well.  He never shouted at her throughout the ordeal, and heaped tons of praise on her once she did finish.)  It took Julia of the sisters to break Lorena out of the cycle, by giving her advice on which camel to switch to (now that she was allowed to by the rules.)  Unfortunately, that bit of advice allowed Lorena and Jason to catch up to and eventually pass the sisters at the Detour just before the Pit Stop.  Which meant that a moment of kindness led to the sisters getting Philiminated.  An honorable way to go out though.

Some trivia I learned after the fact (because I always look at the TAR wiki after a team is eliminated to see "where are they now"): TK, Rachel, Stella, and Nathan (this season's Huge in the HugeTiny team) apparently all attended the same high school.  Not necessarily at the same time (although I'd wager TK and Rachel did, given their relationship), but that connection does exist.  When I told my mother this, she thought it was a bit unusual.  But then I mentioned that those 3 teams were all from LA, so it made a bit more sense and seemed less conspiratorial.  I also learned that while billed as "married", the ministers weren't actually married until a few months after the show originally aired.  We agreed that that was more to do with the legality of it, and not Kate and Pat's commitments to each other.

[SVNBob]

Over the last couple weeks, we have continued on with our watch of this season.  There wasn't too much to post about in the two episodes from last week, except the debut of the U-Turn.

I think I've made my stance on this clear in other threads, but since this season is the first time it was used, I should opine here as well.  When this season first aired, I did not like the U-Turn.  As with the Yield, I am not necessarily a fan of mechanics in TAR that allow for one team to interfere with another.  (I still espouse TAR Maxim #1: Run Your OWN Race.)  However, over time, I've come around a little on both.  I may not like either, but I don't think they're "unfair", as they are parts of the Race, and I admit that there are circumstances where I could see myself using them; mainly by delaying another team in a race to avoid last place.

Which is what the Blondies thought they were doing when they used the U-Turn.  They saw another team while headed to the U-turn, and thought it was the last-place but generally strong Lorena and Jason (when in reality it was TK and Rachel).   Thinking they were that far behind, they used the U-Turn.  Taking into account the mistaken identity, it was a decent use of the U-turn.  And a successful use, since it did contribute to the Philimination of Lorena and Jason.   (Still, Karma and their lack of team cohesion stemming from the U-turn usage slapped them down in the next leg.)

This week, though, we mainly talked about airport drama.  There was lots of it in the flights from Lithuania to Croatia.  Some teams making reservations over the phone versus waiting at the airport until ticket counters and travel agencies open.  Some connecting flights getting delayed leading to secondary scrambling.  And the major issue, Azaria and Hendekia purchasing business class tickets, when the rules state they can only purchase economy tickets.  (Getting upgraded at no additional cost is fine, as that's on the airline.)  All of this was interesting and drama-filled to watch, and we lament that things like this can't happen anymore with the changes to the structure of TAR.  We get the logic of why the changes have happened, but we still miss the drama.  However, we do also acknowledge that sometimes, this drama does lead to foregone conclusions of the team in last place, as it did in this case.

The other big thing we talked about was the Fast Forward in Italy.  The infamous "go to this studio, only to learn there that it's a tattoo parlor, and you have to get permanently inked to claim the FF" FF.  An FF technically worse than the head-shaving ones.  But I had the same reactions as I had on first airing.  To begin with, TAR picked a tasteful and relatively small design for this tattoo; a pair of Fs (for Fast Forward) in a nice script font.  And I recall originally thinking about what I would do to alter it after the Race, namely filling in the gaps in each F with yellow and red.  My mother was thinking about how it could be altered to be our initials, which is possible.  I also said, on top of this being a relatively tame tattoo, it is one that comes with a story, so it has an added cool factor.  

Additionally, I opined on which teams would and would not have done this FF.  Other than Nick and Don who did, I said that Kynt and Vyxsin and TK and Rachel were the teams most likely to do it.  Ron would probably object to Christina getting a tattoo, and Jenn wouldn't do it and blame Nate for even bringing her to the FF location (as opposed to her bitching about not doing the FF while waiting for him to do the Roadblock.)

We ended our viewing with Kynt and Vyxsin arriving in last place after a bad self-driving leg in Italy, but getting saved by the NEL.  And then getting told about the other new mechanic this season: the Speed Bump.  After we watch the next episode, I'll have more to say about that, but again, I'm pretty sure I've made my stance on that clear in other threads around here.

[lilabennet]

Yay! Paramount+ finally posted Season 12!  Perfect Thanksgiving present for me.