Episode Report Card M. Giant: B- | 2 USERS: B YOU GRADE IT The Gods Must Be in the Tub
By M. Giant | Season 22 | Episode 6 | Aired on 03.24.2013
Bates is still pretty happy to be A) in the Kalahari and B) followed closely by Caroline and Jennifer. They're approaching an area where groups of locals in loincloths are jogging up to a fallen log that has jars containing rolled-up clues sitting on it. They each extract one of these clues with some effort and read from the Roadblock clue, "Who wants to make a new friend?" Bates volunteers, saying he wants to make new friends all the time. Phil narrates, "The Kalahari Bushmen are the earliest inhabitants of southern Africa, having survived here for tens of thousands of years." And some of them look it, too. Over footage of Bushmen going about their daily business, Phil explains that the racers will "learn a skill from these indigenous people, when they go in search of a Bushman's best friend: a scorpion." If that's true, it sounds like the Bushmen could use some new friends. Phil says this last bit as he's crouching right next to a Bushman who just dug a little yellow one out of the ground. He goes on to explain that each racer doing this Roadblock will be led to a scorpion hole, where they'll dig one out. Then the Bushman will put it in a Mason jar -- you know, like they've been doing for tens of thousands of years -- and lead the racers over to a stump where they'll find their next clue. Both Caroline and Bates go running off with a trio of Bushmen each. "I'm running through the middle of Africa," Bates reports. "Just running. Not even looking anywhere if there's a lion." He says it doesn't even cross your mind, which it clearly has. Just then one of the Bushmen fakes him out, acting like he just spotted a threat. "Quit scaring me!" Bates yelps. Ah, the international language of hazing.
Elsewhere, two of Caroline's guides suddenly drop into a half-crouch, which she gamely imitates. Spotting a lion at some distance (so far that even the Amazing Cameraman can't zoom all the way in on it, forcing the Amazing Editors to do a circular blackout of most of the screen in such a way that one expects the lion to stutter, "Th-th-that's all, folks!") they dart in the opposite direction to climb a tree. "Do you want me to climb up the tree with you?" Caroline wonders, not having seen the big cat herself. She stays on the ground until it wanders off and they come back down, but she's pretty impressed with their climbing skills. It's not really clear at what point she realized that she was ever within sight of Mufasa over there. "I just assumed I was gonna be okay," she interviews. And yes, feel free to mock, but I didn't see any camera footage taken from up in a tree either, so she wasn't the only one who stayed on the ground.