Episode Report Card M. Giant: A- | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Take Two
By M. Giant | Season 18 | Episode 1 | Aired on 02.21.2011
Soon they arrive at the harbor, and all get onto the same ferry. Once they're on board, Mallory sings, "We're so happy we're on Austrailiaaaa!" as if the Opera House is around her instead of in the background behind her.
The second flight lands, and eight teams scramble for the train. The Globetrotters, Team Asperger's, Margie/Luke, Team Go Team, and the Goths board, but the doors close before anyone else does, even though Christina had the train in sight. That leaves her and Ron, Mel/Mike, and the Cowboys stranded in the back of the pack. Man, I forget how hard it is to keep track of eleven teams on this show. Already knowing them all doesn't make it any easier, surprisingly.
The ferry with the first three teams docks at Oceanworld, and Gary and Mallory are the first to find a clue box near a crescent of beach. It's a Road Block and Mallory reads, "Who's ready to get tanked?"
Phil's in a long, glass tunnel that goes under a giant shark tank -- a million and a half gallons, he says. I should probably be more amazed by this spectacle, but it isn't the show's fault I've paid several visits to a very similar facility ten miles from my house. Phil says the first Road Block of this race is all about people's "most primal fears." Specifically, they'll be in that tank with sharks as long as sixteen feet and a stingray "as big as a queen-sized bed." And then they'll have to give them a twenty-minute oral presentation without notes? Actually, wearing scuba gear, they'll search the bottom of the tank for a "compass" (which is more like a big, deep serving platter). Then they'll bring the compass to the surface, where strings of nautical flags are fluttering in the breeze. Using the compass as a decoder ring, the person doing the Road Block will then have to translate the flags into the English phrases "MANLY 16 FT SKIFF SAILING CLUB," "FIND THE COMMODORE," and "I AM BETWEEN THE DEVIL AND THE DEEP BLUE SEA." After going to the place named in the first phrase, doing the instruction in the second phrase, and speaking the third phrase to him, the commodore will give them their next clue. Is this task actually...tricky?
Kisha is doing this, because Jen has some water issues. After a quick flashback to her panic attack at the pool in Beijing, she adds, "And not to fulfill any stereotypes because we are African American, but, no, we cannot swim."