There is only so much I can procrastinate when talking about people who cover reality TV in online media. To Saskatoon we go!
NOTE: There are four Amazing Race Canada recap blogs that are ranked based upon arbitrary criteria. The highest scorer for each week scores four points. Second place receives three points while third place gets two points. The lowest scorer earns just one point.
STANDINGS AT THE END OF WEEK SIX
—
GORD AND WAYNE: 21 pts
SUE’S REALITY CANADA: 19 pts
RHAP: 13 pts
YOUR REALITY RECAPS: 6 pts
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For those of you chronologically confused, this is a ranking of the recaps for the Saskatoon episode. Somebody (*cough* Jess *cough*) waited over a week to do their recap and threw off my whole schedule.
Thankfully, my Sunday is boring and I will have the Kolkata recaps ranked by the end of tonight as well.
1) RHAP
Likes:
– Acknowledging people will quit a task if they think it will take them longer to complete than serving a penalty.
– Robb Zbacnik reference.
– Not telling producers to make tasks in TAR Canada easier.
– When penalties were really long, it really was just like quitting the race.
– Explaining why the Roadblock penalty was probably changed.
– “In his cheery little Jon voice”
– Acknowledging the number of athletes on this season and using semantics to their advantage.
Dislikes:
– TARdy with uploading her own post.
– The stat about TAR Asia 1 featuring the highest number of task quits is a little misleading. Nearly all of them came from the infamous Bali beach digging challenge. It took several teams hours and hours to find the tiny surfboard. Infinti Presents TAR China 2 currently has six task quitting penalties as well.
– I think saying a team “straight-up don’t feel like doing the task” is a bit harsh. Some tasks like the iPhone paintings in the Halifax library is just downright cruel for a cast full of athletes and type ‘A’ personalities.
– Equalizers in early TAR seasons were definitely prevalent after TAR 1. Look at the second half of TAR 3 or the majority of TAR 6. Remember TAR 4 with the Roadblock in the second round where everybody checked in the span of forty minutes?
– For the 100th time everyone, I highly doubt Rob convinced anyone to quit. A 70 year old man isn’t going to eat that big plate of meat, and neither was Deana. Did anybody honestly think Meredith and Deana would have completed it without Rob’s presence?
– I think the Roadblock penalty rule from the US version was still alive after season 7. It’s just that nobody quit a Roadblock for a long time after that unless they were already in last.
– Dissing ice hocky.
– Changing Monty’s semantics will likely not alter how teams appraoch the penalty. I think the only change that really needs to be made is increasing the length of penalties on active route infos, then we’re good.
– Don’t suggest Monty to become increasingly like Probst.
– You talk about Allan Wu, but not a single pwun to be found. 😦
– Why wasn’t anything about this episode discussed? Trampolines, beers, Brian & Cynthia, DuJean & Leilani still finishing in 3rd anyway, or Nick & Matt’s baby blue outfits? How lame Saskatoon is and if it is lamer than Sudbury?
2) Gord and Wayne
Likes:
– Dissing After the Race, and James Duthie indirectly.
– Albertan political joke
– Making fun of Nick’s lack of geographic and math skills despite being a teacher.
– Referencing Rob & Amber’s penalty, but without the stupid “Rob convinced Meredith and Deana to quit” addition.
– The VoldeMussolinis have “some smarts”. Not a lot, but some.
– “And man I love hoop dancing.” may be my favourite sentence in their blog yet. I hear Alvin does too.
– But seriously, appreciating First Nations culture is a plus.
– Appreciating the drums and singing, but not afraid to make fun of the sheer number of dance tasks thus far.
– Brian & Cynthia’s “Punch it, Chewy” callback.
– Hmmm. I never thought of that before. Nick & Matt’s rivalry with the VoldeMussolinis is one-sided. If only Wayne watched Survivor and could say “just like Shambo and Laura Morett’s rivalry”.
– Praising Ope’s relaxed attitude and not worrying about other teams’ concerns for the VoldeMussolinis. Just do your thing, Ope.
– They talked about me again!!!!!!!
– Gord accidentally quotes Brooke (TAR 25) with the line “How is that even possible?” by accident.
– Gord acknowledges trampolines have nothing do with Saskatoons. Teams should have had to eat a bowl of Saskatoons in Saskatoon.
– Gord knows which one is Brent and which one is Sean.
– Almost vindicating Rex & Bob. Almost.
– Disses Nick’s attempt to ask the VoldeMussolinis to hang out.
Dislikes:
– K-R-I-S-T-I-N.
– Wayne could have said “Brent & Sean try to stay ahead of the six-pack” when discussing the beer task.
– I don’t care if Wayne’s memory sucks because of a late night. Just discuss the damn episode.
– Wasn’t it Sean who was barfing and not Brent?
– What’s a twoonie, Gord? Is that different from the three dollar coin known as the Spoonie?
– Gord mentions Diefenbaker airport, but doesn’t make a joke about the guy.
– Again, K-R-I-S-T-I-N. It’s always Kristine or Kristen with you guys.
– Why does Gord dislike Brian & Cynthia?
– Gord talks about the VoldeMussolinis in too much detail.
– Too many references to the number of attempts a team took at the Detour tasks.
– How many vacations does Gord go on in the summer?
3) YOUR REALITY RECAPS
Likes:
– Wrote an opening line that is unique compare to previous blogs.
– She referenced TAR 21? Holy crap. This is their first reference to the US TAR.
– Acknowledges that we initially thought the beer cap challenge would be time consuming.
– A couple of decent screencaps.
– Points out the transition from “Native Indian” culture to “South East Asian Indian” culture.
Dislikes:
– Phrased certain events in a weird way in contrast to previous weeks.
– Are time zones even that crazy? Again, I host online versions of competitive reality shows and have done time zone/flight path challenges. Players rarely screwed up.
– K-R-I-S-T-I-N. My word.
4) SUE REALITY CANADA
Likes:
– Saskatoon is indeed a mid-season yawner.
– Geez. The VoldeMussolinis gained a huge advantage with their FF last week, but then it’s an equalzier anyway.
– I like a good John Nash reference.
– Very elaborate joke regarding Brian not being able to count to 10 without taking his shoes off and not liking the smell of his own Racer’s Feet.
– Calling out casual fans on the “Canadians are so nice to each other” BS.
– Striking out the line of Nick’s sandwich joke. Greenwich Sandwich Mean Time, I believe.
– “Damn metric-time!”
– Acknowledging once again that a task like the trampoline Roadblock would be an amateur TAR or team-building exercise at work.
– Heh. I didn’t even notice it was all men who did this Roadblock.
– I have seen Strange Brew too many times. Steamrollerrrrrr.
– Re-posting the full GIF of Sean’s entrance.
It reminds me of what I looked like when going for my first walk thinking I had fully recovered from my wisdom teeth extraction.
– “Maybe just a good old bitch-slapping might be in order” made me giggle.
– She knows how to spell Kristin’s name without making a mistake.
– Nick & Matt’s hoop dreams.
– Making fun of Monty incorrectly stating Simi & Ope are 7th along with the graphic.
– The Sean Vom Count and discussing a task that was edited out.
Dislikes:
– Sue references The Guess Who at the beginning of the blog. I’ve had enough of those pinball wizards and spiders named Morris, personally.
– How was everything boring in the 70s? You had disco, The Bee Gees, Welcome Back Kotter, and The Godfather movies. Funk was even finding life.
John Travolta was famous because Welcome Back, Kotter was awesome.
– Ew. The Big Bang Theory reference.
– The number is 55, 318, 008 upside-down, Sue.
– Were the Hulk GIFs necessary?
– You know the story by now. Grammar and spelling errors. Lack of analysis and opinions.
– Missed out on saying “Simi and Ope who opeted out” pun.
– There is one really long sentence without any form of punctuation. Nearly impossible to follow as a reader.
– Do the dancing exes fight as much as you think?
– Too much focus on Brent & Sean.
– Who would have a home turf advantage in India?
***
WEEK 7 RESULTS
One recapper was bound to finish in third place this week, but a key move made all of the difference.
FIRST PLACE: GORD AND WAYNE
Sue and Jess may have written stronger recaps for this week, but they missed out on a crucial opportunity to integrate my presence into their posts.
Wayne, however, performed his good deed which will help boost his karma heading into the India legs. All it takes is a simple gesture of goodwill, and sadly it is a concept only Wayne understands.
In all seriousness, if they butcher the spelling of my name as much as they do with Kristin, I’ll be pissed.
SECOND PLACE: SUE’S REALITY CANADA
You can’t go wrong with a week which references John Travolta, Strange Brew (I wrote a short essay about it in my Canadian Film Studies course in university!), and that band named after a popular board game.
I appreciated the time elapsed between when teams started out the round to demonstrate how rational it is to take the two hour penalty at active route info tasks.
Including a GIF of Sean had me laughing, casual fans were dissed, and a recap with witty commentary would have given her the gold medal for this week.
But sadly, Sue doesn’t like me as much as Wayne does. ;(
THIRD PLACE: RHAP
The analysis regarding the attitude and atmosphere surrounding penalties in TAR Canada was great. I also appreciated multiple shoutouts to TAR Asia and Allan Wu in all of his grewutness.
However, very little content of the actual episode was covered. Was Sean’s vomity entrance even mentioned?
LAST PLACE: YOUR REALITY RECAPS
It was their strongest week yet, but the recap still needs a lot of work to reach the quality of the three crews ahead of her.
***
Here are the updated standings after seven weeks of competition:
GORD AND WAYNE: 25 pts
SUE’S REALITY CANADA: 22 pts
RHAP: 15 pts
YOUR REALITY RECAPS: 7 pts
RHAP may be ten points behind Gord And Wayne, but with a bit of work and sucking up to me they could easily be overtaken by the end of the season.
If you have a soul, you will listen to the weekly podcast I help co-host about The Amazing Race each week for YATNcast. Click her to listen.