Episode Report Card M. Giant: B- | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT The Couch Trip
By M. Giant | Season 18 | Episode 8 | Aired on 04.17.2011
It's starting to get light outside as Kent and Vyxsin are the next to find the courtyard, which Kent pronounces "special." As for Kent's reaction to his first sight of Chick From Harry Potter from a distance, he excitedly says, "Look, there's a special man! Let's go visit him! He looks nice!" Not that he's the first Amazing Racer to misidentify the gender of someone he meets on the race. Jen and Kisha have caught up to the Goths by the time they reach "him" and get their books, and have outright passed them by the time they get back to their cars and take off. It's almost fully light when the Globetrotters arrive and get their clue. Gary and Mallory (who is "really excited to see a castle") see them when they come down the hill. Gary and Mallory get their clue, still in fifth place. Then Jet and Cord arrive and get their clue, still in last place and still knowing it. In the car on the way back to Vienna, Cord says they've been making a habit of starting in last. "You can't survive and win the million dollars," he warns them both.
Kent and Vyxsin are having some communication difficulties, as he misses a turn. "I just need to you to quit acting like a chick and maybe just go like into problem-solving mode and not, like, emotional, mean, blaming mode, okay?" What do you even say to something like that, which is almost perfectly calculated to make you feel mean, emotional, and blaming? Chicks, man.
Back in Vienna, Zev and Justin are arriving at the library, which is quite an impressive edifice, possibly even bigger than the castle. They run inside. After we see Jen and Kisha arriving outside, we get a look at the interior of the place, which is like the Beauty and the Beast library on steroids. I'm not sure the library is even open this early in the morning, but Zev and Justin find a dude who's wearing a book-rack strapped to his back and show him the clue in the front of their book. From the stacks, he pulls a clue envelope and hands it over. Zev and Justin are in first place as they open the Detour clue presenting the choice of "A Long, Hard Walk" or "A Quick and Easy Meal." Well, I know which one I'd go with based on the name, at least.
Now here's Phil, telling us, "The people of Vienna have made countless contributions to almost every aspect of European culture." Including rap? I kid, because VNA's debut jam was seminal. Now Phil says the teams will experience "two things Vienna is famous for." Well, some of them will. For "Long, Hard Walk," they'll go to the Freud Museum, which used to be the home and office of the father of modern psychology. Then they'll carry an analyst's couch a mile to the University of Vienna, where Freud was apparently both a student and lecturer, although at different times. For "Quick & Easy Meal," they go to the Wiener Riesenrad, the giant Ferris wheel from The Third Man. Phil doesn't mention that it was also in The Living Daylights, even though we know the race can't resist a good James Bond location. Once there, they'll go to the cafeteria to get two "local meals" -- a big plate of fried wiener schnitzel and a thick wedge of chocolate cake for each of them -- carry them to one of the Ferris wheel's "dining cars," and endeavor to eat the entire thing during one revolution, which is a mere twelve minutes, to get their next clue. Zev and Justin decide to eat. They meet Jen and Kisha coming out, and the sisters make the same call, Kisha overriding Jen's concerns over the size of the meal. "We got twelve minutes to eat," she insists, as though twelve minutes is enough time to eat anything.