Sunday, December 11, 2011
CLEARLY "RESIDENCE" DOES NOT MEAN "HOME DEPOT:" We haven't talked much about this season of TAR, largely because most of the legs have been pretty bland--filled with first in, first out challenges that spoonfed people, bunching designed to eliminate any team getting a lead, and with a single dominant team (Snowboarders for Jesus) for much of the Race. So tonight's finale was nice in that the clues and tasks were actually tricky. Of course, it promptly demonstrated why that style can be problematic, as one team found a task so tough that they had to repeat it at least 5 times before passing, and another team had difficulty deciphering a clue, sending them well out of the way. Credit to the editors for making an effort to make it seem close/competitive even at the end, when it was clear who our winners would be, but this was not the best season.
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i was super bummed last week when the snowboarders were eliminated, but at least i thought their elimination might make the final more exciting. unfortunately, i was wrong. it would have much more fun if the teams saw each other at some point during the atlanta leg. the flight simulators kept them apart even on the first task. the "trip memory" task seemed ridiculously easy this time around. i agree that it was a bit of a bland season and the finale seemed to match.
ReplyDeleteJeremy & Sandy were so bland you could have told me he was a pilot and I would have believed you. We never got to know them - being attractive is not a personality trait.
ReplyDeleteOn the other hand, I'm pretty sure Marcus played football...
The thing is that you can't blame that on the leg design or one team having a big lead. Marcus and Amani botched the flight sim task badly, and Jeremy and Cindy botched the Dump clue badly. It's part of the risk of doing non-spoon-fed clues that a team can easily build a substantial lead off relatively minor errors from the other team.
ReplyDeleteDidn't you know, as soon as everyone started talking about what an advantage Marcus and Amani had, being from Atlanta, that they were not long for the finale? That they weren't Guidoed was my only surprise.
ReplyDeleteI don't think anything is going to make me happy anymore. I complain when they're spoonfed things but on the other hand, watching someone Google something isn't all that much more interesting. I don't know what I'm asking for at this point.
ReplyDeleteAfter seeing the intense fandom for TAR on this site for a long time, I decided to give it a try this season. Guess I picked the wrong season. I really enjoyed seeing the sights from around the world, but otherwise I found it relatively boring and frustrating. Every time the race would get mildly exciting, there would be some step that would put everyone back on equal footing. (Like everyone taking different planes/routes somewhere, but arriving only to find that their next step began 11 hours later, in the morning). I found it hard to root for almost any of the teams (though I liked the older couple, Bill and Cathy), and except for the snowboarders getting eliminated before the finale, it all seemed somewhat predicatable. So I don't think I'll be back.
ReplyDeleteThey need to introduce a rule that forbids contestants from using smartphones or the Internet. At least make them have someone else do it. It's not so much a problem in the foreign legs, but watching people Google things for an entire leg when $1M is on the line isn't good television.
ReplyDeleteYep -- my thoughts exactly. [sad trombone]
ReplyDeleteAt the very least, they could employ their research team to find clues that weren't easily searchable. Searches that led to vague, contradictory, or flat-out misleading results could go a long way toward teaching teams not to let their fingers do the walking on every occasion.
ReplyDeleteIf that isn't possible, then just forget about puzzle-based navigation all together, and focus more on immediate challenges that require knowledge, skill, courage, or an utter lack of pride.
Or go in the other direction and assume that a realistic travel show includes people using smartphones in 2011, and as Squid says, keep it difficult.
ReplyDelete44 715 24 seems to at least be a somewhat tricky clue, though it's hard to say, since so many entries on the search report are talking about the finale.
ReplyDeleteI loved the lear jet simulator task. Just for the record, if you care, the reason Marcus kept crashing the plane after landing was that he was trying to steer the airplane just with the yoke, instead of the rudder pedals. The simulator was letting people put the learjet down mighty hard (nose wheel first in some cases). One might use the yoke to keep the wings from wagging and to help keep the nose on the ground, the nose wheel is controlled by the pedals. Marcus didn't seem to know that.
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