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After Terence and Sarah have a stupid argument about his possessive neediness, the race heads to Fortaleza, the second Brazilian city in as many legs. The airport drama takes the form of Tina claiming credit for getting the airline to switch to a bigger plane, allowing all ten teams to get on a previously full flight. Terence is a total bitch about it (probably due to the massive, debilitating head wound he claims to have), but Ken manages to disarm him handily. Advantage: Ken.
In Fortaleza, the Detour is a choice between logrolling boats across the beach and using computers to locate a specific shipping container in a giant shipyard. The Geeks steal the lead by being the only team to select the latter option (not counting the Southern Belles, who picked the computers but ended up at the boats by being dumb), and one of the few to actually read the clue and pay attention. After the Detour, Terence and Sarah outsmart themselves looking for a taxi, blowing most of their lead until Toni and Dallas take pity on them. And Terence's heart grew three sizes that day.
Then the needle/haystack-style Detour requires players to find the destination on a hundred-foot billboard covered in Portuguese text. Ken and Tina win the leg, and a pair of ATVs, by passing the Geeks right before the Pit Stop. Terence|Sarah, Toni|Dallas, and Aja|Ty arrive in a near tie, while the other teams turn it into a race for the bottom. Nick offers to partner with Sarah, then rudely blows her off and screws over Andrew; Kelly and Christy fail to read their clue for the second time in the episode and thus end up abandoned by their cab; and the Frat Boys, Belles, and Team Tick-Tock end up just being too dim to manage it. Thus it's the end of the race for Anthony and Stephanie, but at least he still has his looks. His words, not mine.
Want more? The full recap starts right below!Previously on The Amazing Race: Phil apparently agreed to call Dan and Andrew "Team Superbad," and part of me dies inside. Ten teams remain, and none of them is "Superbad," if you ask me.
We pick up moments after we left off last week, at the first Pit Stop on Forte Sao Marcelo in Salvador, Brazil, the "Capital of Joy." Why they let Terence in is beyond me. Because even before they get to leave the morning, we see a tense moment between Terence and Sarah from right after they arrived at the Pit Stop: "I do want to be with you, I just don't want to not speak to another single person," she tells him tearfully. "Which I think is the only thing that's going to make you feel like I want to be with you." Terence just walks away to go to the bathroom, but she protests that they don't have a resolution. Here is where a gentleman would say, "I'd like to resolve this with you, but I have yet to pee since we've been on this side of the Equator and I'll be right back." Terence says, "There is no resolution" and walks away, grinning toolishly. Sarah's left to finish pleading her case to a cameraman, who is probably more sympathetic than Terence is anyway.
Nick and Starr leave precisely twelve hours after they arrived, at 4:07 a.m. It's full-on dark, of course. I don't care what anyone says: the hardest part of the Race for me would be getting up and being ready before the sun comes up, regardless of time zone. The clue tells them to fly to Fortaleza, Brazil, 640 miles up the Atlantic coast. From there, they'll taxi to Cumboco, specifically Plaza Del Cumboco. In their taxi to the airport, Starr is nervous because their cabdriver is going too fast. Nick interviews that it's generally his job to calm her down in stressful situations. Which, from what I can tell about Starr, would seem to apply to all situations. No wonder they live in different time zones. By the way, I need to make a correction: in last week's recap, I assumed for some reason that Nick was gay, and then later read that he has a girlfriend named Monica. So, my bad. Still, we'll be seeing later on that he knows some pretty good dick moves.
Ken and Tina leave at 4:13 a.m., seven minutes behind the leaders, and reveal that everyone's getting $125 for the leg. In their cab, Tina is haranguing the driver for a cell phone. Ken tries unsuccessfully to get a word in edgewise, which leads to an interview clip where he says, "As far as the relationship, we made a decision before we ever got on this race that it's gonna be yes or it's gonna be no." How is that a decision? But they do agree that neither of them wants a life sentence with the other. Well, that sounds like an easily solved problem to me.
Terence and Sarah leave third, at 4:18 a.m. And I continue to have to make a conscious effort not to refer to them as Terence and Philip. Somehow the corner of the tailgate on their hatchback taxi clips Terence on the forehead as the driver swings it up for their luggage, and Terence acts like it took off half his skull. "Do you not see me bleeding?" he demands of Sarah. "I don't see you bleeding," she responds. That's because he isn't. "Okay, I am," he insists. He still isn't. In the back of the cab en route to the airport, Terence turns her into his field medic, up to and including making her blow on it and put a tiny little band-aid on it. Sarah interviews that Terence is a "ball of emotion." That's one word for it. Her plan for dealing with it? Do whatever he wants her to. I wonder if Terence helped her come up with that plan.
The Geeks, Mark and Bill, are leaving at 4:24 a.m. They interview about the advantage they have over the other teams: "You can't really snap at the woman you're dating. You always gotta go like, 'at the end of the day, I gotta go home and I gotta live with this person.'" Which is not the case for the Geeks. They get to go home to their separate mothers.
Nick and Starr are the first to the airport, asking a ticket agent for the earliest flight to "Fort Atelza." The agent says there's nothing until 11:30, which will leave enough time for even the Southern Belles and Team Tick-Tock to arrive. Kenny and Tina are learning the same thing from the departure board. After the siblings call them over, the four of them go running off in search of another counter. It's almost like a little nuclear family, except for how "Mom and Dad" met their "kids" just a few days ago and also are on the verge of divorce at any second.
Kelly and Christy (Team Divorced), are leaving fifth at 4:44 a.m. They interview that they were smart enough to get out of their bad relationships, so they should be able to deal with any challenges the race throws at them. As we'll see later, it's not the challenges per se that give them problems.
At the second ticket counter, the first foursome is getting good news and bad news: there's a flight leaving at 6:45, but it's only got one seat left. "At least there's no sign of Terence and Sarah," Nick mutters to Starr. As if by magic, Terence and Sarah are just leaving their cab and entering the terminal. This time it's Sarah who just wants to check the boards, while now Terence wants to talk to someone. Oh, make up your mind.
Tina is getting her, Ken, and the siblings onto standby for the 6:45 flight. "So important. We're desperate," she overstates to the ticket agent. And why not? It's not like it ever backfires. Terence and Sarah arrive behind them and are studiously and deliberately ignored. So maybe there is something going on there on both sides. Hmm.
Toni and Dallas are just leaving, at 4:57 a.m. They have a sweet little interview: "It makes me happy every day just to have fun with my mom," he says. "I love you," she says. "I love you too," he responds. Or did I just transcribe a conversation between my wife Trash and my son M. Edium, who turns four this weekend? You be the judge.
Back at the airport, the leaders have had a stroke of luck: the airline switched to a larger plane, which means there are now seats available. Ken and Tina even make the agent high-five them. Tina interviews that it was all thanks to her persistence. "Tina has the unique ability to make the person on the other side of the counter think they're working for her," Ken chuckles appreciatively. Translation: people cross the Scary Eyebrow Lady at their peril. Meanwhile, Terence and Sarah are talking to the agent at the terminal over, as Tina tells their agents to make sure they reap the benefits of getting there first. Terence complains quietly to his team's camera, "Nick and Starr and Ken and Tina are in a complete alliance. It's not two teams, it's one team." As though there's a rule against this. But it gets even better when Sarah adds huffily, "And they didn't even say hi to us!" Tina cracks up as though she heard them. And she loudly says, as Terence and Sarah secure their own seats on the 6:45 flight, "They can thank us." Even if that were true, there aren't that many people in the world with less overlap than Terence in their "can/should/will" Venn diagrams.
As Mark and Bill arrive at the counter, they get word of the newly capacious early-morning flight, and Ken and Tina want assurances from the agent that they'll get to sit in the front of the plane. On the pilot's lap, preferably. And if that's a problem, just switch to a plane with a bigger cockpit. The agent tells Tina that it's "free seating," but assures them that they can board first. I don't know how she proposes to enforce that from her post. Perhaps it's just Tina's equally unique ability to make the person on the other end of the counter say anything to get rid of her.
Andrew and Dan (sporting matching yellow bandannas around their heads to show they have a team color after all) are leaving at 5:03, in seventh place, with Aja and Ty close behind at 5:05. Dan yammers that they have "a small, small lead on the bottom pack." Lest you think he's resting on his paltry laurels, he assures us that they're going to try and do better than "not last" from now on. "Minimalists don't get anywhere in life," he says. Yes, ask any architect. In the cab right behind them, Aja is learning a few things. One is that being with Ty in person is "much more real" than their typical long-distance arrangement, and the other is that apparently cabbies just run red lights at night. "I'm not mad at him," Ty remarks.
Kelly and Christy arrive at the airport, just as the leading four teams head toward the gate. Tina sends Ken off to exchange some cash, on the assumption that they'll both get to be first on the plane whether they both arrive first at the gate or not. I'm sure the other racers will be only too happy to agree. After all, the ticket agent said so.
Stephanie and Anthony take off from the Pit Stop at 5:11, with the sky turning dark blue in the background. The first cab they find is literally being pushed by its driver. They get in it anyway, because the last-place team, Brooke and Marisa, is leaving only two minutes behind them. So of course they just want to get going as soon as possible, rather than holding out for a car in better condition and stranding the other team with a broken one. Anthony figures, "It's a beater for a reason," by which I guess he assumes that the cabbie drives the hell out of it at all times. Interesting logic. Stephanie is of course thinking further ahead than that, interviewing that -- wait for it -- she wants to get married, and all they're missing right now is financial stability. Well, that and a groom. Anthony says he wants to be a good provider, "as a man," so winning a million dollars should help with that. Whereas (although he doesn't mention this) if they lose, he doesn't have to marry her. He's in a win-win situation, really.
Meanwhile, the "Southern Belles" are learning that the race is hard. "We definitely need to be a little bit more aggressive, be sneakier, and work a lot harder," one of them interviews. And breaking into the occasional jog probably couldn't hurt, either.
While Kelly and Christy wait for their tickets at the airport, Tina comes up and drapes a motherly arm over Kelly's (the dark-haired one) shoulder and reports, "We got them to switch the plane to a bigger plane, so we'll all be on the same flight." As Tina scampers off to rejoin Ken, the divorcees rapidly assess the actual situation: "She's full of it."
Toni|Dallas, the Frat Boys, and Ty|Aja are arriving at about the same time, but all going to different ticket counters. What this means in practical terms is that Tina has trouble finding all of them to tell them about her magnanimous, magical superpowers over South American airlines that are benefiting every team in the race, so Team Long-Distance is the only one we see getting the news. They pretend to agree that they owe her for that, but scoff at the very idea the minute she's gone. "Like this isn't a competition," Aja says. Arriving in a ticket line, Anthony promises "A whole new race" from now on. Given the outcome of this leg, I really can't see why Stephanie's in such a hurry to exchange vows with him.
So everyone's on the 6:45 flight, which means that one available seat on a plane turned into at least forty (ten teams and their camera/sound crews). That must have been a much bigger plane. Or the original flight was on a helicopter. One of the Belles decides to reward her ticket agent with some sweets, like he's in kindergarten or something. She interviews, "A cute smile, candy...bribery never hurts." "You like American candy?" she asks the guy at the terminal, handing over a couple of mints or something. He just laughs at them, and the awkwardness of the gesture. As well he should.
At the gate, waiting to board, Tina's got her face pressed up against the cracked-open jet way door, talking to an unseen airline employee about how the agent said they could get on first. For some reason, Mark is objecting to this from a few spots behind her in line, insisting, "No way, dude. No way." Tina insists that "what's fair is fair," and then claims that no one would even be on the plane if she hadn't gotten them to change it. Terence takes exception to this, and damn him for making me agree with him. Ken, behind Terence for some reason, backs Tina up, and Terence basically calls them both liars. Further back in line, Starr reports to Dallas, "Terence is being an ass to Tina." Things get quietly tense between Terence and Ken, enough to justify a commercial break. Honestly, can we get some kind of ruling on whether this could have actually been Tina's doing? Maybe if only one of the racers a) had ever worked in the airline industry, and b) felt like making himself useful.
Back from the ads, Tina assures the people behind her that she isn't going to fight anyone over a seat, since it isn't worth it. Still, she's not about to give up her place at the head of the line. She remarks to someone of Terence, "He bumped his head, that's why he's a little crazy." She pats his arm mock-sympathetically, but he takes her at face value and apologizes to Ken for raising his voice at his wife. As opposed to apologizing to the person he raised his voice at. But even that is one of those weaselly non-apology apologies, in the form of "I apologize if that offended you in any way." Rather than pressing the issue, Ken responds, "No, I apologize, honey," and kisses Terence on the cheek, completely breaking all the tension in the line. Which is, I must confess, rather awesome of him. "You got me to blush," Terence says through a sheepish grin, and Ken says he's just happy to have made him smile. "I actually smile a lot, people just don't realize it," Terence says. Well, then, maybe you're doing it wrong.
It's a fairly short Amazing Yellow Line that cuts across the east corner of Brazil up to Fortaleza on the north coast. At the airport there, they all trot down the concourse in a big knot, then a bunch of them take a wrong turn and fetch up at International Arrivals instead of the taxi stand. Terence and Sarah get their cab first, and Sarah describes the mad scene in the airport after the fact: "Guys carrying all the girls' bags. Except for us." Heh. Kelly and Christy, Team Divorced, are in the second-place cab, and the Frat Boys are in third, thanks to being slow enough not to take the wrong turn that the leaders took. I have to give them points for not following the pack for once. Toni and Dallas are in fourth, pulling out while Stephanie and Anthony's driver is still trying to get his cab started. I'm beginning to think that picking broken-down cabs is Anthony's superpower. Aja and Ty are out in fifth, lamenting the lead they lost by following people in the wrong direction. Meanwhile, Anthony has decided to help get his and Stephanie's cab started by pushing it, yelling at the driver to pop the clutch. They also have a cameraman with a fogged-up lens, which may or may not be some kind of sign. The Belles pull out in sixth, with the Geeks in seventh, as Stephanie finally, angrily, prevails on Anthony to give up on their cab and get their luggage out of the trunk. Nick and Starr are in eighth, he trying to calm her down, as always. Tina and Ken are in ninth, after all that gate silliness. That leaves Anthony and Stephanie in last place, while Anthony bitches about how "everything is broken in this country." Funny, none of the other teams seem to keep insisting on getting into cabs that don't work.
Terence and Sarah arrive at the clue box in Cumboco. Phil explains that the teams will now have to pick one of the yellow dune buggies waiting nearby to take them to a place called Barraca D Manoel to get their clue from a vendor. They quickly find them, followed by Team Divorced and Toni|Dallas, who pass the Frat Boys in their taxi somewhere along the way. Unfortunately, when they get to the beach, the racers have to just jump on the backs of the buggies instead of getting to drive themselves, which might have resulted in some fairly spectacular wipeouts. Aja and Ty have trouble finding the clue box when they arrive, so Mark|Bill and Marisa|Brooke find it before they do. We also get to see the phrase "Marisa & Brooke, Currently in fifth place," which I'm sure we'll never see again until after at least five more eliminations. Terence and Sarah are off on their dune buggy, having a great time. "It started raining. It was like God showering us with love and joy," Terence interviews afterwards. Behind them, Team Divorced and Toni|Dallas are having a similarly good time, but without being tools about it.
In their cab at the back of the pack, Anthony and Stephanie are having a culturally sensitive moment, looking out at the seemingly dilapidated neighborhoods zipping past their window and saying, "It makes you really appreciate what you have." But then Anthony blows it by snarking, "If they'd learn how to fix a car, they'd probably make it rich."
Mark and Bill board their dune buggy, leaving Ty and Aja to wonder where they found the clue box. The Frat Boys aren't much help when they join them. So Starr and Nick take sixth place at the clue box, with Ken and Tina in seventh. The Belles encounter the lost Aja and Ty on the beach to the dune buggies and send them "back where we started." The siblings hop on their buggy, and as the Belles get on theirs, one of them says, "We're gonna get tan." "Yay, tan," the other one sings out vapidly. Some guy on the beach moons them as they zoom past. Now that's a quick judge of character. The Frat Boys have fallen to eighth place, with Aja and Ty behind them, and Team Tick-Tock seemingly right behind them. Poor Stephanie. She's in a hurry to marry someone who's never in a hurry for anything.
Terence and Sarah are the first to get the clue: it's a Detour. In keeping with the "coastal community," Phil names the choices "Beach It" and "Docket." "Beach It" requires teams to get back on their dune buggies and ride to a beach where 440-pound fishing boats are waiting to the water along with two-man crews. They'll have to use "local methods" to transport their boat 100 yards across the beach to an inlet behind them, "local methods" being heavy logs that one places under the boat's hull to roll it along. With the help of the crews, of course, who presumably have done this before. Phil promises, "Teams with the right combination of muscle and mental acuity could finish fast." Describing "Docket," Phil is transported to a shipyard full of shipping containers. He bangs on one of them expectantly, then elaborates that the teams need to use one of the computers in the shipyard's office building to match a serial number to the one in their clue. The correct container has a clue box waiting inside. "The task is not physical, but teams without an eye for detail could find themselves stuck here for a long time." So Kelly and Christy should avoid this one, not that it's going to do them any good.
Terence|Sarah and Kelly|Christy both choose "Beach It." One of the divorcees assures us, "We may be women, but we're freakin' tough." Unfortunately, its not their toughness that's about to be called into question. Toni and Dallas make the same choice, and run to their boats. Mark and Bill, predictably, can't resist "the computer thing." Down on the beach, Team Divorced has opened up a lead against Terence and Sarah, with Toni and Dallas holding steady in third.
The Geeks find the "Administraçao" building at the Port of Pecem and quickly find the computer lab that's been set up for the racers' use. Apparently they're required to put on hardhats, which they not only plunk down over their fedoras, but Bill gets the front of his brim caught under his hardhat somehow. And that's why they're geeks. Never mind; they're quickly in front of a terminal, with Mark driving and Bill copiloting. "There's a lot of containers here," Bill realizes as numbers start flashing across the screen.
Back at the beach, Nick and Starr choose "Beach It," while the Belles decide to go with "Docket." "We're not strong at all," one of them interviews proudly. But they're also not smart, either, as they tell their driver to follow Nick and Starr without bothering to find out which option the siblings have chosen.
An uncertain Tina agrees to attempt the "Beach It" option with Ken. Meanwhile, Nick also directs their driver to "Beach It" when they get to the signs pointing the way to each of the two Detours, and the Belles just instruct their driver to follow the siblings, rather than bothering to READ A GODDAMN SIGN. Even the driver tries to confirm with them: "Playa?" he asks. "Yeah, go," they insist. Easier than paying attention. Yay, tan!
Dan talks Andrew into doing "Beach It." "We're big guys. Let's do it. It's a guy test." That almost makes me want to see them take it. After Aja and Ty finally secure their clue, in ninth place, we see the Frat Boys interviewing, "Me and him lift all the time, so it's not like we'd pull a muscle." Ah, hmm.
Nick and Starr arrive at the beach and run toward the boats. Behind them, at a leisurely walk, one of the Belles reads from the clue, "Choose a computer and use it to locate a specific container and its destination." And then -- not until then, I shit you not -- they look up and see not computers sitting on the sand in front of them, but boats, and realize they're in the wrong place. They decide to go ahead since they're already there. And it's not like they can follow anyone to the computers at this point.
In the computer room, Mark and Bill have come up with a system: Mark scrolls quickly while Bill chants, "No...no...no..." Finally they get a hit. Mark interviews, "There's no possible way you're going to sit us down at a computer and we're not just gonna tear it up." Then Bill quotes Yoda, with a big ol' grin. I wish he wouldn't do that. It just got a lot harder to make the case that the Geeks are secretly the coolest team in the race.
Back at the beach, Kelly and Christy notice that Terence and Sarah are passing them. Not easily, though; Sarah is saying she's tired. Terence yells at her for doing push-ups in the morning. "You hear me?" he pushes. "I'm not deaf!" she snaps back. Hearing this, the divorcees interview that Sarah shouldn't let Terence yell at her like that. "It kind of reminds me of my ex-husband. He used to yell at me and control me." Did he also wear his hair so that his head looked like an onion?
Nick and Starr are catching up with Toni and Dallas, and Nick suggests that Starr kiss each of their crewmen on the cheek as incentive. Yes, pimping out your sister is always a classy move. At least he stops short of asking her to rub her parts on them. The Belles are struggling with their rolling logs, as are Ken and Tina. And the Geeks have just arrived at the shipyard, confronted with a veritable city of shipping containers stretching out before them all the way to the horizon. The view of which is blocked by shipping containers. Somehow they fail to make an Indiana Jones reference. They should have their fedoras repossessed just for that.
Anthony and Stephanie have arrived at the detour, and quickly decide to Beach It. Glad to see them doing something quickly. Meanwhile, the Frat Boys run to their boats. Dan, arriving first, jumps up on the deck and stands there like something's going to happen. "Dude, are you kidding?" Andrew asks. Aja and Ty? Right behind them.
The Geeks have discovered a section of trailers marked "Hamburg Süd," which tells them they're at least in the right section, large as it is. They just hope the other teams are having more trouble than they are.
Terence and Sarah aren't -- yet. They get their boat in the water and get their clue. It tells them to grab one of the taxis WAITING in the PARKING LOT RIGHT UP the HILL and travel to Parque de Vaquejada for their clue. So Terence starts leading them further down the beach. "Babe, where do you propose we get a taxi?" Sarah asks reasonably. Terence says it's either straight ahead on level ground or they run up the hill. Guess which one they don't do?
Nick and Starr pass Team Divorced and finish second. Wisely, they walk back up the beach and spot an Amazing Arrow sign planted in the sand. Whereupon they begin looking for the Amazing Arrow. So much for not FedExing the teams around the world this season. Meanwhile, Terence and Sarah are jogging off in the opposite direction. "Further run, but no hill," Terence reasons. This is the kind of logic that leads drunks to search for their car keys under the street light instead of in the alley where they dropped them, and superpowers to get bogged down in countries that didn't attack them. The hill doesn't seem to deter Nick and Starr, drawn by the sign up top reading "Taxi Parking." "There's a sign that I can read!" Nick crows. Literacy is a wonderful thing.
Kelly and Christy get their boat in the water, but all is not well, because Christy realizes, "We didn't get our unmarked container." Yes, that would be the unmarked container that Bill and Mark are currently searching for. With the benefit of hindsight, they interview that they were confused by "a note that pertained to the other Detour that we didn't choose." But they don't know that on the beach, so they start wondering where the hell their container is supposed to be. Maybe it's so unmarked it's invisible.
Not far away, Mark and Bill aren't having that problem at all. They find their container, open it up, and find their clue. And week, somebody in Hamburg is going to find the other nine clues and be like, Was ist das?
Terence is still leading Sarah on a wild goose chase, having spotted a village straight ahead. "I'm following you," Sarah reports. "Nobody's behind us. That's either good news or bad news." Well, which has it been so far? And do you guys really think that the Race is going to literally send you on foot to the town to catch a taxi? That would be Amazing in a whole new way.
Mark and Bill end up being the first to get a taxi, putting them in the lead. Nick and Starr hop into theirs and secure second place, while Terence and Sarah are now looking around their quaint little village for "Un taxi."
Believe it or not, that isn't even the dumbest thing happening right now, because Kelly and Christy have discovered a tiny little Amazing Flag sticking out of the sand at their feet and start digging in that spot for the container they still think they need. I really hope they're visualizing a little Tupperware box or something and not the boxcar-sized thing Mark and Bill found. Meanwhile, Toni and Dallas have sailed their boat, as have Ken and Tina. Seeing them leave, Kelly and Christy are wondering if the other teams are just giving up on their container. And in the TOWN, Terence is starting to get frustrated. Toni|Dallas and Ken|Tina have to ford a somewhat swampy area to get to the taxi lot, and Ken kind of snaps at Tina to follow behind him when she objects to getting her feet wet. "Just quit yelling. You yell again, and I will go totally in a different direction," she "threatens." He tells her to listen, and she bitches back, "You don't ever listen to me." Well, from the twenty-odd minutes of their lives together that I've seen, that doesn't appear to be the case at all. She interviews later, "I get to a point, I shut down." Ken kids her about taking a few swings first, and she agrees, "I'm not gonna go out too quietly." Yes, why should she go out differently from the way she does everything else? They reach their cab, sweaty and breathless, in third place. Toni and Dallas are in fourth.
And somewhere up the road, Terence suggests getting an ice cream. I'm not sure if he's actually serious or not. "Yeah, babe, 'cause we're sightseeing," Sarah says tartly, without looking up from her map. Just then, they see Mark and Bill's cab go by. "I don't think they needed us to stop," Bill cracks from the comfort of his seat. Sarah swears she will literally tear her hair out if another team passes them (one will, and she won't). They try to flag down the taxi, and it slows, but inside it Ken insists the driver go on without them, overruling Tina's protests that they need help. "What if we're ever broken down and we need someone to help us? You need to think about that," Tina lectures. Ken just sighs. I assume that means he's thinking. As he and Sarah wait frustratedly for another taxi to show up, Toni and Dallas pull up in their color-coded red cab. Dallas hops out and gives them directions before he and his mom proceed on their way. "Such a class act," Terence says. So he and Sarah start the long jog back up the road, apparently having been unable to figure out for themselves that taxis live in the direction that the taxis have been coming from. Sarah offers to let Terence carry her bag. "I want a taxi," he pants. "I know, honey," she responds. "Something I can control." "Your love for me?" he whines. Oh, I think if she could control that, they'd be done now.
Back on the beach, Anthony and Stephanie are rushing to catch up, while the Belles are whining and looking near tears at having to do something physical. Ty encourages Aja to help him pass the girls. "They're tired, we're not tired. I can see it all over her face," he tells Aja, not bothering to keep his voice down. "Ty was talking mess to the blondes," Aja interviews, as though Marisa and Brooke's misery isn't visible from space. Ty adds that their faces were flushed and red. "Our faces don't get red," Aja quips.
But it's the Frat Boys who finish and start plodding to their taxi. The divorcees finally decide that they should do the same, abandoning their imaginary "container" before they've dug it out, because hey, that's what everyone else is doing. No, ladies, everyone else is reading their clues. They're in their sixth-place cab when Christy finally realizes that they were acting on a note that pertains to the Detour they weren't doing. Well, that must be a relief, at least. In the seventh-place cab, Aja and Ty spot Terence and Sarah running to meet them on their way back to the taxi stand. "Aw, hell," Aja says. Ty is less sympathetic, and rightly so.
The Belles and Team Tick-Tock are almost finished when Terence and Sarah finally spot the taxis. But it's Marisa and Brooke who don't finish last, congratulating themselves on how tough they are now. Anthony and Stephanie finish shortly thereafter, Anthony reading the clue as "Travel by taxi to Parque de Vacayalalalalah." They still get to their cab after Terence and Sarah get to theirs, having fallen from first to ninth just by being stupid. In the last cab, Anthony reads out loud, "Once you arrive at Parque de Vacajada, you should have your taxi wait." This immediately tells me, and every other viewer, that someone will fail to have their taxi wait.
It's not Mark and Bill, however, as they arrive first and tell their driver to wait. The clue box turns out to contain a Road Block. Phil tells us that this is a task that only one person can perform. "In this Road Block, that person has to search for a clue hidden in plain sight." In fact, the clue is written on the wall that serves as the backdrop for this sequence. It's a six-hundred-foot long white wall, with Portuguese text covering just about every square foot of it, and somewhere on it is the name of their destination. The camera draws our attention to a list of sixteen or so places, with "Cidade Da Criança" among them and highlighted by the camera. Phil explains that the secret to this task is to "embrace the laid-back local beach culture and resist the urge to overthink the numerous Portuguese ads surrounding it." Uh-huh. They have to guess the correct destination and tell it to the local painter waiting nearby, and he'll give them their clue. And enjoy his moment in the process, I might add.
Bill takes this one for the Geeks, and starts walking along the length of the wall methodically, taking notes like he's in a museum. Meanwhile, the siblings' cabdriver is stopping and asking random people along the road for directions. Bill has found a list of what looks like sixteen destinations, and heads back to the painter to guess "Casa De José de Alencar." Wrong. He heads back, just as Tina and Ken are arriving and she starts on the task. Finding him at the end of the wall scribbling furiously, she asks him, "Are you just writing everything down like I know you are?" "Why would I do that?" Bill responds unconvincingly. Afterwards, Bill admits that he ended up helping Tina out. "I'm kind of a reflexively honest guy," he says. Mark slaps him upside the head for it. So there's a clue as to how this is going to turn out for them.
Nick and Starr are still lost, and he tries to calm her down after they have to ask directions from a bus driver. "We're in this situation. Crying and freaking out's not going to help anything." She doesn't seem to appreciate his philosophical attitude.
Toni is taking this Road Block for her and Dallas, and she runs off while Bill returns to the painter with his list. He starts reading them off patiently while the painter keeps responding "No" with equal patience.
The Frat Boys arrive fourth, and Andrew's taking this one. He dashes off along the wall as Bill continues reading and Tina starts heading back to the painter with her own list. But he gets to the right one before she arrives, causing the painter to produce a clue from under his painter's smock with a loud "Yes!" And with that, the Geeks are off to the Pit Stop, Cidade Da Criança (but you already knew that). It was "built as an oasis for the city's children," Phil explains as he slips through the narrow spaces between a columned monument, "but we've kicked them all out for the day so we can use it to shoot an American game show. Brazilian children are noisy, dudes." Although he pronounces that last part as "the last team to check in may be eliminated." The Geeks are underway in their cab when Tina finally hits the right one in her list. Way down the wall, Toni hears her histrionic cheering and spits, "Oh, for God's sake." Heh. Nice to see she's not completely sweet.
Ken and Tina's taxi catches up with the Geeks' in the street. When they're both stopped side by side at a red light, Mark calls out to Ken, "Let the fat boys have one!" "I gotta make mama happy," Ken calls back good-naturedly. When the light changes, Ken and Tina's cab takes off much more quickly, and just like that, they're in the lead.
Nick and Starr arrive at the Road Block, Nick telling the cabdriver to wait before taking the Road Block for them. Remember that. The divorcees are also en route. "We Have Learned To Read The Clue," they chant in red-faced unison. Remember that also. Aja and Ty's taxi passes that of Team Divorced on the road, so they get there sixth. Kelly and Christy are standing at the clue box when Kelly lets loose a curse as they realize their taxi just left, since they didn't ask it to wait. Surprisingly, they don't chant in unison, "We Have Learned Fuck-All."
In the second-place taxi, Bill comments, "I'm so glad we're in a footrace against the ex-professional football player." He means the opposite, in case that's not clear. Both teams get out of their cabs at the same time, but somehow the Geeks are in the lead as they race for the one (poorly marked) entrance to the walled-in park. But Mark has to stop. "My pack just ripped!" he yells. There's some confusing editing, and then Tina and Ken arrive at the mat first, Ken carrying both backpacks. "welcome to Fortaleza," says their aging, behatted greeter. Phil tells them they've won the leg, and also an off-road vehicle for each of them. Bill and Mark walk up to join them on the mat, and get high-fives from Tina. She's always generous with those when things are going her way. Phil asks Ken why they're there, and Ken says, "We're here because we want to put our marriage back together." Tina interviews that they still have communication problems, but winning the leg made everything better. Mark magnanimously tells them that if this helped their marriage, "Well, then screw the ATVs." Tina hugs them gratefully, but doesn't offer them the ATVs.
The Southern Belles and Terence|Sarah arrive at the Detour in quick succession. Sarah takes it for her team, and it doesn't really matter which blonde is taking it for theirs, as far as I can tell. Terence insists on kissing Sarah and telling her to calm down before she rushes off. "That kiss was so emblematic of the difference in our personalities," Sarah interviews, with Terence sitting to her. "Mister Sensitivo with his emotions, wants to, like, take in the moment, and I'm like, dude, we're behind!" Anthony and Stephanie arrive last, with that water droplet of doom still stuck in their camera lens.
There's a knot of racers standing and transcribing that section of wall. Nick suddenly turns to Sarah and whispers, "Let's start working together, all right?" But upon realizing she just got there, he says, "All right, screw it," and runs right over to Andrew to compare notes. "I think it's a color-coding thing," he whispers. So much for not overthinking. Sarah complains about the dissing to her camera. "What a jerk," she says, not slowing down her jotting one jot.
The Divorcees are the to finish, but there's still the question of taxi transportation. Maybe Kelly should have made use of the time arranging a backup taxi, but she didn't, so now they have to figure out their move. Nick is saying to Andrew, "I don't think you can just jot down that whole list and then rattle them off," as Aja, Sarah, and Toni run off to do just that. Aja gets her and Ty's clue in fourth and Andrew tells Nick, "Dude, whatshername just got it." Team long-distance is off to the Pit Stop, while Team Divorced is standing by the road and literally yelling "Taxi!" at every car that goes by, whether it's a taxi or not. Sarah finishes , putting her and Terence back in fifth place with Toni and Dallas close behind. All three of those teams head out past Team Divorced, who are now begging Jesus for help. Jesus is like, what more do you want from Me? Back at the wall, Nick is bringing his overthinking to the level, wondering if you have to cut up bits of text and put it back together. The Belles are also struggling. "I don't know Spanish!" "You don't have to know Spanish!" "It's all Spanish!" I wonder how many days in Brazil it will take them to learn that people speak Portuguese. Also, I really can't wait for them to start trying to understand Spanish in, like, Asia. We leave the four remaining teams in their varying degrees of frustration and cluelessness.
Back from the ads, Kelly and Christy are berating themselves for failing to read the clue for the second time running, and Starr and Stephanie are yelling instructions at their frustrated partners. "I'm looking at a bunch of Pig Latin," Anthony complains in another moment of cultural sensitivity. Andrew tries something that ends in "eliminada," and is flummoxed when the painter shoots him down. "Dude, people were saying longer stuff than that," Dan mutters after him. Maybe he should try saying it again, but slower.
Terence and Sarah find the park and get out of their cab at a dead run. Toni|Dallas and Aja|Ty are also arriving, and it's a three-way footrace. In the end, it's Terence and Sarah who arrive at the mat seconds in front of the other teams, followed by Dallas, then Aja and Ty, and Toni. Not a backpack to be seen among them, by the way. Phil looks at the six people arrayed before him and welcomes them as "teams number three, four, and five." The cameraman managed to get all six of them in the shot, meaning some chyron producer had to stay late putting three subtitles on the screen. For the record, Aja and Ty came in fourth and Toni and Dallas came in fifth. High-fives all around. Phil asks about the love he's seeing, and Sarah tells him about how Dallas and Toni pulled over to offer their help. Terence interviews that "At first we were like, we're not gonna work with anybody, but other people, their beauty shined through today, so you know something? It's all class act going forward." "I'm just a mom," Toni says on the mat, as though she and not Dallas was the one to stop the cabdriver, get out, and give directions. Thank God, I finally have something to call these two on. I was getting worried.
And Team Divorced is still standing by the side of the road, wondering if their cab went into the yard where the other cabs went. At the wall, Nick, for no reason, tells Andrew -- in fact, he swears to God -- that he'll share with Andrew whatever he comes up with. "I would do the same for you," Andrew says, and then stands and watches Nick as he runs off, promising to come back. As he runs back to a very excited and yelling Starr, he says, "I'm going to ask you once, I'm going to ask you calmly, I don't need any more shouting, thanks." Wow, he's kind of a dick. Nick reads off his list to the painter, who's getting into his role as he dispenses their clue to them. And they're in their cab. "Where did he go?" Andrew is left wondering. Nick explains himself in an interview: "Andrew had nothing to offer me. I don't mind playing dirty as long as I'm the one who benefits from it." Starr gives a defiant little smirk. See, I don't see how he helped himself at all, except to make an enemy for no reason. Let me be clear: I have no issue with Nick abandoning Andrew to his own meager devices. I just don't see what he achieved by going out of his way to convince Andrew that he was going to do otherwise, other than making sure the Frat Boys will never trust them again and are likely to complain about them to the other teams (for whatever that's worth). It's a little early in the race for that, even if Andrew and Dan don't have more than a couple more legs in them.
Team Divorced notices that all the cabs are coming out of the same yard, so they decide to go check and see if their cab is still there by some miracle. And it's there. Been there the whole time. It's like they're inventing new ways to fall behind. On the road, they vow, "Today sucked in the arena of clue reading, but we gonna fix that tomorrow. We're gonna be bad A.B.s." Rule number one: if you can't make yourself say "Bad-ass bitches," you don't get to be one. Wait, that's rule number two. Rule number one is READ THE FUCKING CLUE.
A defeated Andrew returns to the painter to start reading off his transcription of the wall, and he and Dan are very excited when they finally get to leave in eighth place. Then one of the Belles attempts to do the same, apparently not having overheard Andrew. She ventures, "Casa de Jose de..." "Alencar?" asks the painter. "Yes," she says. "No," he says. This guy is cracking me up. But she gets to the right answer before Anthony comes plodding back with his list. "Now we're in last place," Stephanie says, as though this is news. In their cabs, the Belles talk about how this proves that girls from South Carolina are not stupid, which is probably a reference to that brainfarting beauty pageant contestant. But I don't believe anyone ever said that all girls from South Carolina are stupid. In fact, I only know of three.
Anthony is reading his list to the painter (while Nick and Starr arrive at the mat in sixth place). Once he's done, he and Stephanie aren't too happy to learn that they're off to the Pit Stop from here. I guess that means they're stuck with a functioning cab, unless Anthony wants to get under the hood and start yanking on shit.
Kelly and Christy arrive at the Pit Stop, hoping for sixth place, and Phil gently tells them they're seventh. The Frat Boys' cab is pulling up to the park, and the Belles are right behind them, recognizing Andrew's poufy hair through the back window of the cab he's sharing with Dan. Both teams disembark, with the Belles following the Frat Boys in search of the park. Because following teams has worked out so well for them today. Meanwhile, in last place, Anthony is trying to stay positive. "We're not going to be eliminated," he assures Stephanie. Well, no, not until you get there. The Frat Boys and the Belles are both circling the park looking for an entrance, while a local is trying to quietly wave the girls in the right direction. We're meant to think that Anthony and Stephanie are arriving at just about the same time, but the to run to the mat are fact the Frat Boys, with the Belles showing up -to-last again. It can't be that close, because the mat is clear when Anthony and Stephanie arrive and get Philiminated.
They're both philosophical about the experience. In separate interviews, Stephanie says they'll have a future together "and hopefully financially be able to get back on track." Dude, I hope they didn't go into debt to come here. She talks about the perspective gained from driving around Brazil. Translation: after seeing that it's possible to get on with your life without very much money, Anthony has one less excuse not to marry her. In a separate interview, Anthony tells us what he's thankful for: "I have my health, I have my parents, I have, you know, my looks [self-deprecating laugh], and I have Stephanie." Thanks for listing those in descending order of importance.
week: Tina cheers for Ken when he slips into some tights and get into a wrestling ring with a woman. Talk about your mixed signals.
M. Giant is a Minneapolis-based writer with a wife, a son, and a number of cats that seems to have settled at around two. Learn waaaay too much about him at Velcrometer, or just e-mail him at M.Giant[at]gmail.com
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