[Editors Note: This article and all others in this column WILL contain SPOILERS. If you have not seen Episode 1 of The Amazing Race season 28, it’s highly suggested you do so before you read the below. You have been warned and may Phil Keoghan have mercy on your soul. And for a reminder of the super cool and descriptive nicknames we have for the teams, check out the coverage of Episode 1. You can also find all of our The Amazing Race recaps right here.]
So Remember That ‘Rivalry’ Thing…
Before we jump right in to the coverage of this week’s episode of the online-video-and-social-media-influencer-studded season 28 of The Amazing Race, I have to point out a prediction that I made last week about a potential rivalry brewing between Frisbee Boys and #Torey. Well…Brodie and Korey had a bit to say about that.
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@Brodiesmith21 @tubefilter @tyleroakley or maybe “a rivalry is bro-ing”
*drops mic*
— Korey Kuhl (@koreykuhl) March 2, 2016
Seriously though, Korey, that is grade A+ punning deserving of so many slow claps. And I will admit, my observation was a little off. What is happening between Frisbee Boys and #Torey isn’t so much a rivalry as it is…matchmaking.
Get It Trending
As the title of this Episode 4 clearly alludes to, a doozy of a hashtag is coming. And this week, the powers that be placed no less than three hashtags up on screen for the viewers at home throughout the course of the show. But two of said hashtags were #RoadBlock and #BenchWork (in reference to one of the Detour challenges that we’ll get into below). Those are straight up throwaway hashtags, so they’re dead to me. The true glory of this episode resided in the emergence of a hashtag of such power that it is both romantic and kind of disgusting at the same time…
#blodie 😂😂😂
— Jei R Baltazar (@superjeir) March 5, 2016
awwww #blodie 💕💕💕
— miggy (@guevarramigs) March 5, 2016
#BLODIE MAKE IT TREND HAHAHAHAHA FAVE THING EVER
— chrissy (@chrissyapilado) March 5, 2016
the next episode of @AmazingRace_CBS is called ‘Get It Trending’ who wants to bet me $10 that @tyleroakley said this about #BLODIE
— J (@xjhvn) March 4, 2016
I would not take that bet, J because I was thinking THE EXACT SAME THING. But I hope you made some cash off that prediction because yes, Tyler and really #Torey as a whole seem very very committed to the idea that #Blodie is a thing that must happen. What is a Blodie? Well, besides apparently being slang for a blond person, Blodie is the “ship” (short for “relationship” for the uninitiated) name of Brodie from Team Frisbee and Blair from Team JuicyDad07. Red Alert: Potential Showmance Ahead, People!
The Showmance is a true staple of reality television and happens when two members of the cast start being more than friends during the course of the show. It’s especially tricky in competition reality shows because it tends to put a target of the backs of those in the Showmance as the fear of the Power Couple Alliance starts to loom over the other contestants.
This fear is very real.
The most famous Power Couple in the history of reality television has to be Boston Rob and Amber (I’m sure Team Green from Season 27 of The Amazing Race would beg to differ, but c’mon, they couldn’t even pull off the win in the end). Boston Rob and Amber were each contestants on different seasons of Survivor, who then met on the first edition of Survivor: All Stars, where they managed to not only start building a relationship, but managed to make it all the way to the top two, where Amber eventually took home the title of Sole Survivor (not to be outdone, Boston Rob went on to play many other seasons of Survivor without Amber, eventually winning, appropriately enough, Redemption Island). Oh, and Rob proposed to Amber right before the votes were revealed…like you do.
After Survivor, the pair went on to do not one, but two seasons of The Amazing Race, first as an engaged couple (when they finished as a runner-up) and then as a married couple in the first All-Stars season. Heck, even their wedding was turned into a reality show! And Boston Rob wrote a strategy book on how to successfully play Survivor, which several players credit as the key to their strategy and success during their stints on the show.
Okay, I’m not insinuating that #Blodie will end up being a match for the ages, but I’m just really, really big fans of Boston Rob and Amber and wanted to give a little bit of reality show history. Let’s get back to the Race.
Switzerland: The Land of Chocolates and Sleeping Bags
Teams are told the next leg of the race will first take them to Geneva, Switzerland, where they have to find a really amazing fountain that shoots water hundreds of feet into the air. Think Old Faithful but man-made and shooting out water at a consistent rate. The teams all find themselves at the airport and they’ll all be getting on the same flight, so they’re all on equal footing again. Knowing this seems to take the pressure off all the teams and instead of having to endure the chaos of finding a flight faster than their peers, there is chaos because SO MANY INFLUENCERS IN AN AIRPORT MEANS ALL THE FANS!
So. Many. Stars. So. Many. Fans.
So many fans. So much mobbing. Also, it’s in this environment that #Blodie was born.
#blodie sounds like a pill to help relieve gas. #AmazingRace
— Mike Bloom (@AMikeBloomType) March 5, 2016
See? Romantic and disgusting at the same time. But at this point, Tyler has already volunteered to be the flower girl at the #Blodie wedding, so things are going well.
Upon their arrival in Geneva in the middle of the night, the teams first frantically look for the fountain. This leads to a lot of contestants very confused about how to cross streets in Switzerland. After the first hurdle is jumped and they find the fountain, they frantically run through the streets looking for a specific candy shop. All this frantic running ends in a complete halt because it’s the middle of the night, so the candy shop isn’t open. Everyone pulls times off a board and heads to bed. And by “bed” I mean “sleeping bags in a cave-like basement.”
#Torey is of course keeping a VERY close eye on #Blodie…and making sure that the cameras catch how um, closely, Blair and Brodie are sleeping to each other. Though, Brodie insists they were just having a very “great conversation.”Okay, Brodie. And where exactly is Blair’s father during all of this?!? Is Dad not allowed to be part of the conversation?!?!
Bench Work or Work Bench…Totally Not Confusing
The next morning, teams pick up clues out of boxes of chocolate (I hope they kept those and actually enjoyed the chocolates because Swiss chocolate, amiright?), which contain their next Detour. They have to choose between Work Bench, which is putting together a Swiss Army Knife (detailed oriented) and Bench Work, which is kind of hard to put into words but I’ll try. There is a really, really long bench in a park, some even say the world’s longest, and teams have to try to estimate how many people fit on the bench by counting it with their butts. One team member has to be on the bench at all times and they also have to hold up newspapers while they are counting and then have to write their estimate on the newspaper and present it to a judge. If their estimate is within a target range (190 – 197), they get their next clue.
Yeah, Phil did a much better job of explaining on the show, but there you go.
The bench that never ends…or ends close to 197 people long.
The teams were pretty evenly split between which task they chose, but this ended up changing when Team Models walked right by the Swiss watch shop for Work Bench and convinced Team Family Time that they couldn’t find it the location of the Detour. Both teams then swapped to Bench Work when Cole saved the day and finally spotted the other teams. Team Rooster Teeth originally had the lead coming into Bench Work, but a wrong guess on their first attempt made it so they had to start over. Frisbee Boys decided to help out and when they guessed correctly on the first try, they tell Team Rooster Teeth what number they got. Team Dancers overhears this, but just guessed wrong, so they have to go measure the bench again, even though they know what they want to “guess.” Dana, also, once again muscles her way through the challenge by insisting Matt sit on the laps of the innocent bystanders on the bench, including people trying to play chess. Television!
Back at Work Bench, we once again have a detail-oriented task that is right up #Torey‘s alley and they take it slow and steady. Zach of The Kings insists it’s “kinda like LEGOs, but much harder”. Yeah, a Swiss Army Knife is one of the most precise tools in the world with 27 pieces that all have to be placed absolutely perfectly or the entire thing won’t work…I’d say that’s a tad harder than interlocking bricks made for kids that have just learned about object permanence.
Yeah, just like LEGOs.
Some honorable mentions at this Detour: #Torey is the first to finish Work Bench, keeping up their stint as Masters of the Precision Challenge. Even though Team Family Time arrived last at Bench Work with Team Models, they end up getting ahead of Team Dancers because Cole gets in the guess range on his first try. It takes The Models five times to get in the range at Bench Work because it’s becoming very clear that if you’re in last, the other teams are not going to help you…
Here is how teams lined up after the Detour, including which activity they chose:
- Frisbee Boys – Bench Work
- Team Rooster Teeth – Bench Work
- #Torey – Work Bench
- Team Family Time – Bench Work
- Team Dancers – Bench Work
- Team Clevver – Bench Work
- The Kings – Work Bench
- Team JuicyDad07 – Work Bench
- Team Models – Bench Work
The Models are NOT Having a Banner Day
Once teams complete their Detour, the next clue tells them to get to the Broken Chair monument. They can get there however they like, but teams who choose to go on foot get there faster than those who choose to take the bus. The Broken Chair monument is just as it sounds…a big chair with one leg broken off. That’s about all we get of that. From there, the teams are off to go to the Palace of Nations where they receive their Road Block.
Okay, so if you thought the description of Bench Work was confusing, let me see if I can make this Road Block make more sense. The clue is “Who is having a banner day?” and all the teams are in a giant field of flags with all the countries in the United Nations. One team member from each team has to get a book that contains ten drawings of flags. Then there is a big grid with yellow squares on it. Team members have to identify their flags and then put them in order based on the yellow squares on the grid? Honestly, this challenge hurt my brain. The trick was figuring out that the grid with yellow squares is actually a grid of the field of flags. And then you just counted numbers on the grid to match the flags and put them in order? I think?
Yeah, it was confusing. And basically, all the teams partnered up with at least one other team just to figure it out.
That is, they all teamed up except one…Team Models is now WAY in the back of the pack when they arrive and Jessica decides she’s up for the challenge. Team Rooster Teeth, Frisbee Boys, Team Family Time (solidly staying in the front thanks to the fact that Cole was good at identifying flags because of a soccer video game he plays…see video games can get you far in life!), Team Dancers, and #Torey have already started making their way by train to the next Pit Stop, which is in the French Alps. Team JuicyDad07, Team Clevver, and The Kings are completely ignoring Jessica as she passive-aggressively complains that no one will talk to her and half-heartedly tries to get people to give her some information. (Granted, I think she was reacting this way because she was trying to hide her stress, not because she’s full of attitude). It was painful to watch.
All the teams are off to the train station to head to the Pit Stop, leaving The Models behind to finish alone.
Here are how teams stand after the Road Block and which of three trains they ended up on.
- Team Rooster Teeth – 1st Train
- Frisbee Bros – 1st Train
- Team Family Time – 1st Train
- Team Dancers – 1st Train
- #Torey – 1st Train
- Team JuicyDad07 – 2nd Train
- Team Clevver – 2nd Train
- The Kings – 2nd Train
- The Models – 3rd Train
I Know Who Got There First But Then It’s All a Blur
So, I’ve been on trains in and out of Switzerland…I’ve gotten stuck in train stations that were little more than a barn because the train ahead of us on the tracks was snowed in. Swiss trains, in my experience, are unpredictable at best and downright devastating at worst.
And two devastating things happened with this batch of Swiss trains.
First, the train the first batch of players gets on is going to require two stops and transfers to get them to where they need to go. One of the stops has an hour layover. This lets Train Two CATCH UP to the first one. Some of the teams on Train One seem to think that if they keep it quite, the other teams won’t get on the train. Other teams don’t agree, especially when Blair eats it when she slips on ice dashing from one train to the other. Burnie helps her up and on to the train.
Where were you, BRODIE?!?!
Team Models is still behind them, right? RIGHT!?
The third train pulls into the station. Now it’s Blair who seems to think the hiding and keeping quiet thing will work this time to throw off the competition. She throws herself onto the floor of her train. There is a moment of suspense, as it looks like Team Models might make it onto the train…but they miss it by mere seconds. Like, they watch it pull out of the station right as they get on the platform. Ouch.
Of course, we still have the issues of EIGHT teams on the SAME train about to go on an eight-way footrace through the snowy French Alps. I’m worried about broken limbs, while #Torey seems more concerned about if they are going to wear wigs or not. (Spoiler alert: They’re not.)
Frisbee Boys outrun the other teams to take first place and $3,000 dollars each. The rest of the teams pile onto the mat around them. There was an order to this but it went so fast I don’t even know, you guys. But no limbs were broken and a dance party ensues. Oh and more of #Torey plugging this:
#BLODIE #BLODIE #BLODIE #BLODIE #BLODIE #BLODIE
— graciela (@okcheddar54) March 5, 2016
#BLODIE 😂😂😂😂 YUUUSSSSSS
— Ahlasia…. (@YUUUSSSSS) March 5, 2016
i ship #BLODIE 👏🏻👏🏻
— annoyed alyssa//13 (@mikesanatomy) March 5, 2016
Seriously, it’s the next day as I’m writing this and more #Blodie hashtags are still coming in. See The Amazing Race, if you just let these hashtags come organically from the influencers themselves, you’re golden!
Oh, but wait, aren’t we forgetting someone? Without much fanfare and with tears they have been hiding all day, The Models are eliminated. I can’t say they were my favorite team, but it was hard to watch the other teams just kind of let them flounder. But dems the breaks on the Race. Until next time, #Blodie.
What did you think of this week’s episode? Are you Team #Blodie? Let me know in the comments below and also be sure to Tweet during future episodes and you might see your Tweet featured in a future column!
Photo Credits: CBS ©2016 CBS Broadcasting, Inc. All Rights Reserved
