Episode Report Card M. Giant: A- | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Lanced
By M. Giant | Season 15 | Episode 4 | Aired on 10.18.2009
area and find the clue box. Detour!Walking a beach with the Gulf in the background, Phil narrates, "Sheltered from the scorching sun of Dubai's endless summer, teams will discover an unusual phenomenon." And then suddenly he's in winter gear, tossing mittens full of snow and saying, "A desert snowstorm"! Then he's skiing competently along while adding, "Here they'll need to decide which frozen folly they'd like to take on: build a snowman or find a snowman." Building a snowman requires them to haul snow from the inside to the outside, where it's 130 degrees in the shade. Or at least that's what a hand-colored thermometer poster says the temperature is, and who am I to argue with a hand-colored thermometer poster? They'll have to build a snowman under these conditions, complete with all the accessories. For "Find a Snowman," they ride a chairlift, then sled down to some snow mounds, there to dig for a tiny stuffed-animal snowman about the size of the palm of your hand. Then they're supposed to give it to the creepy-ass polar bear furry waiting nearby and get their next clue from him. I'm not sure it's worth it.
Gary and Matt decide to Find, probably because they haven't gotten a load of that polar bear yet. They hop on the chair lift, and Matt marvels, "Can you believe it? We're in the middle of the desert on a ski slope." A splitscreen transition reminds us that it's 28 F inside and 120 F outside, back at the Desert Reserve. "No quit," Lance pants to himself, because he doesn't have the strength for grammar right now, and he interviews about the "hellish" heat. Canaan finally finds an urn with water and fills his bag, while Lance finds another dry one. Canaan returns to Mika and lets her read the clue while he falls to his knees and pants theatrically. Meanwhile, up on the crest of a dune, Lance is conserving his flagging energy by bellowing and hurling an empty urn down to shatter on the sand. No quit, maybe, but no class, either.
Gary and Matt find the waiting sleds, which are only sleds in the loosest sense of the word. They look more like short-handled beach shovels, where you plunk your ass onto the blade and then hold onto the handle protruding between your legs. Matt claims to have sledded in his boxers in Montana. Of course he does. Gary and Matt enjoy the ride down and get digging, with no idea what a Dubai snowman looks like. "Hopefully it's not white," Gary says. Well, keep hope alive.
Brian and Ericka are just now arriving, just ahead of Team Two Pair. The Globetrotters are closing in as well. They all put on gloves that I guess are supplied, and all agree to do the sledding and digging. At which Gary and Matt are still getting nowhere.
This is also true of Lance, who's getting frustrated with the number of empty urns he's finding "I'll do the Amazing Race, yeah, yeah, no problem," he snarks bitterly to himself. Okay, heh.
Looking at her speedometer as she drives, Mika wonders how it can be that 120 feels like 60 in Dubai. Canaan explains to her about kilometers and miles. You learn something every day, don't you? Especially when you're Mika.
Lance has finally found an urn with actual water in it, and is spooning it out while beating himself up. "I disappointed Keri 'cause I kind of screwed it up for us." He says he's not a quitter, and then leaves the half-full urn upended to spill its contents in the sand so he can huff back to where Keri is waiting. Which would be kind of a dick move, if not actually penalty-worthy, if there were still any teams behind him. He throws his equipment down on the ground in front of the Bedouin, saying, "Have a spoon, have a ladle, have a nice life" before jogging off. The Bedouin must be like, "He breaks my urns and dumps my water, and I'm the asshole?" Lance jokingly brags to Keri, "I'd go another lap, but we gotta go to the next clue." he says. A camel groans, "Whatever."
Team Two Pair plus Team Miss America all slide down the hill, Ericka laughing like she's never sledded before. All of them get to work on the snow pile, working together, as the Globetrotters arrive and decide on the same Detour option. And all of them quickly get frustrated with the search. "Gosh, so much for our lead," Gary grumbles. The polar bear looks even creepier from a distance, watching and waiting motionlessly from behind a fence. Did David Lynch direct this episode?
In the car back to Dubai, Lance is telling us they came to win, and that he's kicking himself. This is unfortunately not literal, which I thought I should mention considering how much we know he likes kicking. He says he doesn't want to be out. "It's too soon." Not for me.
Ericka is the first to find the snowman at the Detour, and she holds it up for everyone else to see what they're looking for before following Brian over to the polar bear. They're now in second place, according to the subtitles. Except the subtitles also tell us that they are Meghan and Cheyne, so who knows whom to trust at this point? Ericka screams with excitement upon learning that they're going to a Pit Stop.
Once again, Phil tells us that teams have to go to Souk Madinat Jumeirah, although now they have to drive themselves. In keeping with the show's tradition, I've reserved my description of it for the approach of the non-Fast Forward racers. It's quite impressive, with the aforementioned pond surrounded by old-style desert buildings on all sides, almost like a UAE area at EPCOT. "With its old Arabian style, it is a stark contrast to the surrounding buildings in this modern and ever-growing city," Phil says. Especially with the top of the famous Burj al Arab tower, that sail-shaped skyscraper, poking over the buildings behind him. "The last team to check in here may be eliminated," he warns.
And not to get ahead of ourselves, but here's that team: Lance and Keri, who can't seem to decide which way to go at a roundabout.
As the Globetrotters sled down the hill towards the snow mound, Team Inside Straight makes an executive decision to switch to snowman-building. The Globetrotters are still coming (and now it's Flight Time endangering bystanders by throwing his sled in the air) as Gary and Matt make the same decision. Dan wants to do the same, but Sam refuses to quit. Even with Globetrotters squishing down the top of the pile?
Lance and Keri are going the wrong way again, and he manages to blame her without screaming at her. "I'm just saying, I think you made a mistake," he whines. After the ads, they decide to turn around.
At Ski Dubai, the brothers are arguing about whether to switch tasks while the Globetrotters continue to punch at the snow. "The teams could be done with Build already," Dan complains.
Then we're outside, in a little astroturfed courtyard, Gary and Matt carry out a sled (a real sled this time, one of those lightweight deals like a plastic stretcher) full of snow and dump it out on one of the white circles set up there. Now they're at least glad to be warm again, as is Team Inside Straight.
Canaan tells Mika to change lanes. She doesn't, and tells him to stop yelling at her. "I'm not stupid," she says. "I didn't say you were," he responds. Not out loud.
Lance and Keri seem to feel like they're going the right way again. "Every one of our decisions cost us like a half an hour," he says. "They're just poor, bad, awful, despicable." They laugh about being directionally challenged as they finally reach a sign pointing them to Dubai.