too much effort was expended here today.
dayzdark and I watched the second-to-last disc of Doctor Who season 4 the other night. While watching the preview that followed "Midnight" I noted that the line "It's not as if things can get any worse" was immediately followed by shots of Rose. I LAUGHED THROUGH BITTER TEARS OF IRONY.
That said, I found "Midnight" and the two-parter that preceded it to be excellent, head and shoulders above what I usually see on New Who. So let's talk about Professor River Song, Mary Sue of the week. Despite initial protestations that I could never like a character named River, I am forced to admit that although she is indeed a Sue she is a fantastic Sue. I thought her interactions with Ten were really interesting, and although I remain decidedly unconvinced that Time Lords can in fact have sex, if they were going to throw anyone at the Doctor I'd want it to be her, probably because the power discrepancy that I find so squicky about Ten/Rose was apparently all but absent from their relationship. I would kind of like it if the show would be understated enough to just leave it where it is right now, but being as though we are about to get All Steven Moffat All The Time I suspect we will be seeing much more of her in the future, and that I will grow to hate her as much as I hate all companions who aren't Martha Jones. I also liked that the monster was so completely punk rock that they could just put a plastic skull on a stick inside a spacesuit and make some poor stuntperson lurch around carrying it, rather than, you know, spending money or being scary or something. I am really not being sarcastic about this though it may come off that way in text.
Those of you with sharp eyes, then, have probably already figured out that this means that dayzdark and I have nearly finished our New Who journey. We need suggestions from all you Whovians about where we go next. For the record, I greatly prefer Doctor Who when it's "wacky travels with your crazy uncle" to when it's "teh lonely g0d omgz0rz" (though dayzdark's preference is the opposite), I think Daleks and Cybermen are weak and lame but I would very much like to see more of the Master in his past incarnations, and my favorite episode is still "Love And Monsters" so...yeah, take what the normal New Who fan apparently likes and I like the opposite of that. The most important thing to know about dayzdark is that he has a giant man-crush on Ten, and he has this incredibly perverse sense of humor that is several shades darker than pitch black, so I'm sure he would love to see things that inspire maniacal laughter. We'd both like to check out some of the "must see" serials from the past to be versed in the cosmology or lack thereof, as well as anything you would identify as particularly stand-out. And if we can watch it on Netflix on demand, more's the better.
Anyway, apart from that, have an overly complicated meme that I've been poking at over the course of the past few days. I stole this from fandom_memes. In this meme, you put ten characters in a reality show and see what happens when they battle to win!
First, pick your reality show. What's the premise? It's probably not in the exact spirit of the meme to do it this way, but I have to go with The Amazing Race: Fandom Edition.
Who hosts it? If somebody other than Phil Keoghan can host TAR I have yet to hear about it.
Who are the judges? Irrelevant in this case.
Now, pick your 10 contestants. (well, teams in this case, as well as the way TAR would have to identify their relationship)
1) Mal and Zoe, Business Partners (Firefly)
2) John and Aeryn, Married Parents (Farscape)
3) Londo and G'Kar, Frenemies (Babylon 5)
4) Fox and Dana, Friends / FBI Agents (The X-Files)
5) Julian and Miles, Best Friends (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine)
6) Willow and Tara, Life Partners (Buffy the Vampire Slayer)
7) Danielle and Alex, Mother / Daughter (Lost)
8) The Doctor and Rose, Traveling Companions (Doctor Who)
9) Kara and Lee, Formerly Dating (Battlestar Galactica)
10) Sam and Dean, Brothers (Supernatural)
You should also know that I am enough of a nerd to be really, really bothered at how some of these questions didn't match up to the way The Amazing Race actually works. I've made small modifications to the wording accordingly.
Episode 1 - A Two Hour Premiere Episode
Choose three of your teams and excerpt their introductions to us via the 'confessional.'
[Dramatic orchestral music. Aerial shots of a rocky, icy surface and Jupiter in the background, zooming in finally on Phil who is wearing a spacesuit.]
Phil: I'm standing on the surface of Ganymede, the largest moon in Earth's solar system and the starting line for a raceacrosstheuniverse. Ten teams are arriving here as we speak to begin the adventure of a lifetime. This is The Amazing Race: Fandom Edition.
[The caption reads "Willow and Tara - Life Partners"]
Phil V/O: Willow and Tara, life partners from Sunnydale, California.
Willow: Well, Tara and I met each other in college and it felt so right, you know? Same interests, same religion, saved each other's lives a few times, all that Sunnydale-y stuff. And we've been together ever since. We've had a lot of adventures together already and this is going to be the biggest one yet.
[Shots of Willow and Tara conducting a Wiccan ritual together.]
Tara: I definitely think that people will underestimate us on the race, but we're here to win like everyone else. They think we're the nice sweet gay girls, but they've never seen the lengths Will will go to in a game of Scrabble.
Willow: (embarrassed) It's not like it's cheating if we're both witches.
[The caption reads "Danielle and Alex - Mother / Daughter"]
Phil V/O: Danielle and Alex, mother and daughter from an undisclosed location in the Pacific Ocean.
Alex: My mom and I spent most of our lives separated from each other so I think the race is gonna be our chance to reconnect. I'm looking forward to getting to know her better.
[Shots of Danielle and Alex hiking through a jungle, looking sweaty and determined.]
Danielle: I am hoping for challenges about wilderness survival and setting and baiting traps for humans. We can win those.
[Awkward silence.]
[The caption reads "Kara and Lee - Formerly Dating"]
Phil V/O: Kara and Lee, a former couple from Caprica City.
Lee: Kara and I go way back so it's not surprising that we would have dated for a while. It was a hard breakup and we both ended up marrying other people-
Kara: -But it's fine now.
Lee: Yeah. Fine.
[Shots of Kara and Lee playing pyramid. Lee's getting stomped.]
Kara: The past is the past and both of us know that. We're here to win this frakking thing whatever it takes.
Lee: Can we say "frak" here?
Kara: I guess we'll find out.
[I wanted to write a thing about the Doctor and Rose here with the classic "let's fake our way through this thing we are doing even though we have no idea what it is" motif, but as it turns out I can't get either of their voices right, so blah.]
Someone decides before the competition even begins that they're not into this after all and quits. Who is it and what's their goodbye-cruel-world speech?
Londo and G'Kar, who start their bickering right out of the gate and just...never...stop. They don't exactly quit, but they certainly don't hustle on their way to the first pit stop at Olympus Mons, and come in last by a handy margin. On the mat, they alternately both blame the other, and the heartless money-grubbers at ISN who thought it would be good for post-war unity and propaganda purposes to put a Narn and a Centauri on a reality show together.
Next question irrelevant (where would they live? everywhere)
There are three bedrooms with three beds each. How does the process of choosing rooms go? Who sleeps where?
At the pit stop, Team Firefly bonds right away with John/Aeryn, and they grab the first room along with the Julian and Miles duo. All of them have a great time gabbing about their respective spouses, kids, and spaceships. The present-day Earth contingent - Sam and Dean, Fox and Dana, and Willow and Tara - also hit it off and decide to share. That leaves the final room for Danielle and Alex, the Doctor and Rose, and Kara and Lee. Team Lost spends the evening studying maps and preparing, and Team Galactica stew a bit in the confessional about feeling rejected by the others, while Rose and the Doctor are too busy playing around with diminished Martian gravity to really notice or care that they're among the outsiders.
There's still an elimination - that one team who it's obvious from the start is fooling themselves to think they even stood a chance. Who is it?
Fox and Dana land on the mat last at the second pit stop in Cape Canaveral. Though they certainly deal with a lot of weird stuff in their jobs, they both have to admit that all of this interstellar travel is beyond the scope of even the strangest X-file.
Episode 2 - The First Challenge
The first challenge is something that everyone there ought to be good at already. What is it, and who's the best at it?
This leg of the race takes place in present-day America, with the teams taking part in traditional activities of the 21st century United States. The Detour is a choice between racing hybrid cars around a track or completing one pass in an American football game against high school players, while the Roadblock involves setting up a computer and then performing a Google search for the obscure website that will point the crew to their next destination. Pit stop is the site of Neil Armstrong's moon landing. The winners are Sam and Dean, who get far enough ahead thanks to their impeccable driving and Sam's computer skills that it doesn't even matter when Dean balks at the flight to the moon.
Who's the one team who's just awful and horrible and ought to be sent home right now?
Julian and Miles. Julian is incredibly charming and Miles is just a flat-out nice guy, but they're...well...not very good at anything. Leaving aside the fact that they behave like total aliens and weird everybody out whenever they have to interact with the locals, they have to switch Detours multiple times due to Miles driving like someone's grandpa and being unable to catch a football. To make matters worse, when they slow down to help Mal and Zoe figure out how to operate the hybrid car, they get left in the dust by John and Aeryn who have already decided not to wait around for the slower members of their alleged alliance. Julian spends some time bitching to the camera about how he's pulling all the weight on their team, only to have his overconfidence bite him in the ass when he can't figure out that the computer at the Roadblock isn't voice-activated. They come in second to last.
Who's the fair-to-middling team who gets sent home instead in a terrible miscarriage of justice?
Mal and Zoe. Being on real actual Earth-That-Was blows their minds pretty hard, and while it's fun and touching to watch them gawk at the local landmarks they've only heard about, it also means their head's not in the game.
What's their bitchy parting shot to the confessional camera?
They're pretty gracious, but all the Mandarin speakers in the audience chortle at some of the things the censors let slip after they come out of Mal's mouth.
Episode 3 - Speaking of Bitchy...
Who's the arrogant, self-centered asswipe in the house and who is that asswipe rubbing the wrong way?
The Doctor and Rose are already getting on just about everyone's nerves. They've done so well in the first few legs that some teams are beginning to suspect them of cheating, what with that rumor going around about the Doctor being from the future and all. A lot of people also think that their friendliness is just an act. The take-no-prisoners approach espoused by Kara and Lee is also rubbing the more laid-back competitors in a very wrong way.
To everyone's chagrin, the asswipes win the next challenge. What is it and how on earth does that team pull off a win?
The teams leave the solar system for a leg on Centauri Prime with the Doctor and Rose already near the front of the pack. They adjust more quickly to the confusing and regimented Centauri culture than anyone else in the race, and pull off an easy win thanks to extensive help from the locals. Adding insult to injury is the fact that Kara and Lee win the Fast Forward (in which each team member must butcher, cook, and eat a serving of Spoo) but still come in second place.
A snippet from the confessional of one of the jealous contenders:
John: See, the thing about Rose and the Doctor is that they act like [bad British accent] "Oops, sorry, team number one again! Was that me? Can't help it, we're just so British!" but if you turn your back on them for too long they will stab you in the back without a second thought.
Aeryn, reaching for a gun that isn't there: Then I'll take the first watch.
John: ...Figure of speech. Anyway, Rose we can handle, but the Doctor seems like the kind of guy who wouldn't hesitate to blow thousands of people up if they got in the way of justice. And I know from blowing thousands of people up. (Aeryn gives him a look like "Don't talk about that here") Well, I'm just saying.
Who does the worst in that challenge and goes home?
Danielle and Alex. They struggle big-time with leaving the solar system, and being in an urban setting on Centauri Prime just makes it harder. Alex's inability to read a map causes the team to fall behind at the Roadblock and they never make up their lost ground.
Episode 4 - Party Time
The remaining six teams go out to dinner. Who...
...dances on the table? Rose gets it started and soon drags others into it along with her.
....kisses another contestant? Dean and Kara get drunk together and have an extreme makeout session right there in front of everyone.
...can't hold their liquor? That would be Willow. Tara spends the night holding her hair in the bathroom and looking concerned.
...sits on the sidelines looking annoyed? Aeryn has just about had it with her immature fellow contestants and is not afraid to tell them so as she stalks off to bed. Lee is also Mr. Extreme Crankypants over the Kara/Dean situation.
Surprise double elimination: One of the teams gets thrown out for embarrassing the competition's good name. Who is it?
The Doctor and Rose for unauthorized use of a TARDIS on their way between Detour options. As it turns out, time travel is not a valid method of transportation on The Amazing Race and they are disqualified for attempting to change the outcome of their Detour.
Who else gets the ax this week?
Willow and Tara, who are far too nice and functional as a couple to ever win The Amazing Race.
Episode 5 - Gettin' Down
With only four teams left, things are roomier in the house, but you couldn't tell it to these two. Who's joined at the hips and steaming it up in the hot tub every night?
Of course it must be Kara and Lee. Of course. The sparks that flew between Kara and Dean make this quite a surprise, but the real scandal is those non-matching wedding rings they wear...
How do the others feel about that?
John and Aeryn pretty much decide that it's not their business and focus on the game. Miles is taken aback by their behavior and lets his sense of moral rectitude take over, so he marches right up to the hot tub and tells them off for their unfaithfulness, with plenty of references to how he could never do something like that to Keiko, Molly, and Kirayoshi thrown in. Julian has to break it up before things come to blows after Miles tells Lee that a real man would never cheat. Dean gives a snarky confessional about how he's glad now that he didn't stick it in the crazy while Sam rolls his eyes in the background.
Who has a personal crisis and is eliminated after turning in a lackluster performance because they're preoccupied with *gasp* real life?
John and Aeryn. It's been clear that they've had their minds on little D'Argo back at home ever since the race began, and it only gets worse when the ever popular "the contestants get phone calls from home" segment reveals that Scorpius has been called upon to babysit in their absence. Totally distracted, they make several major mistakes and shed no tears on the mat. It's a damn shame, too, since they ran an almost perfect race up until this point.
Episode 6 - Three's Company
It's down to three. Which two gang up on the third, and why? What do they do?
Team Galactica and Team DS9 gang up on Team Winchester. Ever the strategist, Lee knows that he'd rather go against the hit-and-miss Julian and Miles in the finals than the consistently strong Team Winchester. At the Pit Stop he makes a deal with Julian and Miles that if either of them is the first to the Yield that they all know is coming, they'll use it on Sam and Dean.
An excerpt from the confessional cam of that contestant crying into their Cheerios about being victimized:
[Dean and Sam high-five, rip a clue open on the starting mat, read it with Dean horrendously and hilariously mangling the word "Raxacoricofallapatorius," and run off.]
Sam: Yeah, I think the other teams are gunning for us. Dean and I have won a lot of legs so the other teams probably don't want us in the finals with them. But this isn't a popularity contest. We're not on American Idol here. The only thing that matters is who crosses the finish line first, and that's gonna be us.
Dean: You watch American Idol?
Sam: ...Shut up, Dean.
Does the victim survive the next elimination, breaking up the Dynamic Duo, or do they go home, pitting former friends against each other?
It's unfortunate for Team Galactica that although Sam and Dean aren't all there in the strategy department, they're just plain fastest this time around. They arrive at the Yield mat first and Yield Team Galactica with no deliberation. Lee and Kara can't make up the time and are eliminated. On the mat there are tears and recriminations and maybe some punching. Good times.
Episode 7 - Grand Finale
How do the final two contestants feel about their chances to win?
Sam and Dean are confident about their chances, but not annoyingly so. Julian and Miles are much more laid-back in a "whatever happens, we had a great adventure together" way, and seem not to be expecting to win.
What's the big shocker of the final competition?
Team Winchester actually spends most of the last leg trailing. One of the final tasks involves performing stunt maneuvers in an X-wing fighter, and Dean's fear of flying holds the Winchesters up big-time, forcing them to play catch-up all the way to the mat.
What's the factor that puts the winner over the top, or does the loser have a totally embarrassing moment that ruins their chances? Finally, announce the winner and tell them what they've won!
In the end, it comes down to a footrace to the finish line, located at the top of the Jedi Academy temple on Yavin IV. It's a nail-biter that is only narrowly won by Sam and Dean. "Twenty-three days, eleven planets, and almost 40,000 light-years...Sam and Dean, you are the official winners of The Amazing Race: Fandom Edition!" They babble a little about how much a million dollars will aid them in their demon hunting efforts, then man-hug on the mat for, like, a year.
That was way too much effort to put into a meme, but once I realized that Starbuck and Apollo : Battlestar Galactica :: Flo and Zach : The Amazing Race, I was consumed with the need to do it anyway. I really hope this was funny to someone apart from me.
That said, I found "Midnight" and the two-parter that preceded it to be excellent, head and shoulders above what I usually see on New Who. So let's talk about Professor River Song, Mary Sue of the week. Despite initial protestations that I could never like a character named River, I am forced to admit that although she is indeed a Sue she is a fantastic Sue. I thought her interactions with Ten were really interesting, and although I remain decidedly unconvinced that Time Lords can in fact have sex, if they were going to throw anyone at the Doctor I'd want it to be her, probably because the power discrepancy that I find so squicky about Ten/Rose was apparently all but absent from their relationship. I would kind of like it if the show would be understated enough to just leave it where it is right now, but being as though we are about to get All Steven Moffat All The Time I suspect we will be seeing much more of her in the future, and that I will grow to hate her as much as I hate all companions who aren't Martha Jones. I also liked that the monster was so completely punk rock that they could just put a plastic skull on a stick inside a spacesuit and make some poor stuntperson lurch around carrying it, rather than, you know, spending money or being scary or something. I am really not being sarcastic about this though it may come off that way in text.
Those of you with sharp eyes, then, have probably already figured out that this means that dayzdark and I have nearly finished our New Who journey. We need suggestions from all you Whovians about where we go next. For the record, I greatly prefer Doctor Who when it's "wacky travels with your crazy uncle" to when it's "teh lonely g0d omgz0rz" (though dayzdark's preference is the opposite), I think Daleks and Cybermen are weak and lame but I would very much like to see more of the Master in his past incarnations, and my favorite episode is still "Love And Monsters" so...yeah, take what the normal New Who fan apparently likes and I like the opposite of that. The most important thing to know about dayzdark is that he has a giant man-crush on Ten, and he has this incredibly perverse sense of humor that is several shades darker than pitch black, so I'm sure he would love to see things that inspire maniacal laughter. We'd both like to check out some of the "must see" serials from the past to be versed in the cosmology or lack thereof, as well as anything you would identify as particularly stand-out. And if we can watch it on Netflix on demand, more's the better.
Anyway, apart from that, have an overly complicated meme that I've been poking at over the course of the past few days. I stole this from fandom_memes. In this meme, you put ten characters in a reality show and see what happens when they battle to win!
First, pick your reality show. What's the premise? It's probably not in the exact spirit of the meme to do it this way, but I have to go with The Amazing Race: Fandom Edition.
Who hosts it? If somebody other than Phil Keoghan can host TAR I have yet to hear about it.
Who are the judges? Irrelevant in this case.
Now, pick your 10 contestants. (well, teams in this case, as well as the way TAR would have to identify their relationship)
1) Mal and Zoe, Business Partners (Firefly)
2) John and Aeryn, Married Parents (Farscape)
3) Londo and G'Kar, Frenemies (Babylon 5)
4) Fox and Dana, Friends / FBI Agents (The X-Files)
5) Julian and Miles, Best Friends (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine)
6) Willow and Tara, Life Partners (Buffy the Vampire Slayer)
7) Danielle and Alex, Mother / Daughter (Lost)
8) The Doctor and Rose, Traveling Companions (Doctor Who)
9) Kara and Lee, Formerly Dating (Battlestar Galactica)
10) Sam and Dean, Brothers (Supernatural)
You should also know that I am enough of a nerd to be really, really bothered at how some of these questions didn't match up to the way The Amazing Race actually works. I've made small modifications to the wording accordingly.
Episode 1 - A Two Hour Premiere Episode
Choose three of your teams and excerpt their introductions to us via the 'confessional.'
[Dramatic orchestral music. Aerial shots of a rocky, icy surface and Jupiter in the background, zooming in finally on Phil who is wearing a spacesuit.]
Phil: I'm standing on the surface of Ganymede, the largest moon in Earth's solar system and the starting line for a raceacrosstheuniverse. Ten teams are arriving here as we speak to begin the adventure of a lifetime. This is The Amazing Race: Fandom Edition.
[The caption reads "Willow and Tara - Life Partners"]
Phil V/O: Willow and Tara, life partners from Sunnydale, California.
Willow: Well, Tara and I met each other in college and it felt so right, you know? Same interests, same religion, saved each other's lives a few times, all that Sunnydale-y stuff. And we've been together ever since. We've had a lot of adventures together already and this is going to be the biggest one yet.
[Shots of Willow and Tara conducting a Wiccan ritual together.]
Tara: I definitely think that people will underestimate us on the race, but we're here to win like everyone else. They think we're the nice sweet gay girls, but they've never seen the lengths Will will go to in a game of Scrabble.
Willow: (embarrassed) It's not like it's cheating if we're both witches.
[The caption reads "Danielle and Alex - Mother / Daughter"]
Phil V/O: Danielle and Alex, mother and daughter from an undisclosed location in the Pacific Ocean.
Alex: My mom and I spent most of our lives separated from each other so I think the race is gonna be our chance to reconnect. I'm looking forward to getting to know her better.
[Shots of Danielle and Alex hiking through a jungle, looking sweaty and determined.]
Danielle: I am hoping for challenges about wilderness survival and setting and baiting traps for humans. We can win those.
[Awkward silence.]
[The caption reads "Kara and Lee - Formerly Dating"]
Phil V/O: Kara and Lee, a former couple from Caprica City.
Lee: Kara and I go way back so it's not surprising that we would have dated for a while. It was a hard breakup and we both ended up marrying other people-
Kara: -But it's fine now.
Lee: Yeah. Fine.
[Shots of Kara and Lee playing pyramid. Lee's getting stomped.]
Kara: The past is the past and both of us know that. We're here to win this frakking thing whatever it takes.
Lee: Can we say "frak" here?
Kara: I guess we'll find out.
[I wanted to write a thing about the Doctor and Rose here with the classic "let's fake our way through this thing we are doing even though we have no idea what it is" motif, but as it turns out I can't get either of their voices right, so blah.]
Someone decides before the competition even begins that they're not into this after all and quits. Who is it and what's their goodbye-cruel-world speech?
Londo and G'Kar, who start their bickering right out of the gate and just...never...stop. They don't exactly quit, but they certainly don't hustle on their way to the first pit stop at Olympus Mons, and come in last by a handy margin. On the mat, they alternately both blame the other, and the heartless money-grubbers at ISN who thought it would be good for post-war unity and propaganda purposes to put a Narn and a Centauri on a reality show together.
Next question irrelevant (where would they live? everywhere)
There are three bedrooms with three beds each. How does the process of choosing rooms go? Who sleeps where?
At the pit stop, Team Firefly bonds right away with John/Aeryn, and they grab the first room along with the Julian and Miles duo. All of them have a great time gabbing about their respective spouses, kids, and spaceships. The present-day Earth contingent - Sam and Dean, Fox and Dana, and Willow and Tara - also hit it off and decide to share. That leaves the final room for Danielle and Alex, the Doctor and Rose, and Kara and Lee. Team Lost spends the evening studying maps and preparing, and Team Galactica stew a bit in the confessional about feeling rejected by the others, while Rose and the Doctor are too busy playing around with diminished Martian gravity to really notice or care that they're among the outsiders.
There's still an elimination - that one team who it's obvious from the start is fooling themselves to think they even stood a chance. Who is it?
Fox and Dana land on the mat last at the second pit stop in Cape Canaveral. Though they certainly deal with a lot of weird stuff in their jobs, they both have to admit that all of this interstellar travel is beyond the scope of even the strangest X-file.
Episode 2 - The First Challenge
The first challenge is something that everyone there ought to be good at already. What is it, and who's the best at it?
This leg of the race takes place in present-day America, with the teams taking part in traditional activities of the 21st century United States. The Detour is a choice between racing hybrid cars around a track or completing one pass in an American football game against high school players, while the Roadblock involves setting up a computer and then performing a Google search for the obscure website that will point the crew to their next destination. Pit stop is the site of Neil Armstrong's moon landing. The winners are Sam and Dean, who get far enough ahead thanks to their impeccable driving and Sam's computer skills that it doesn't even matter when Dean balks at the flight to the moon.
Who's the one team who's just awful and horrible and ought to be sent home right now?
Julian and Miles. Julian is incredibly charming and Miles is just a flat-out nice guy, but they're...well...not very good at anything. Leaving aside the fact that they behave like total aliens and weird everybody out whenever they have to interact with the locals, they have to switch Detours multiple times due to Miles driving like someone's grandpa and being unable to catch a football. To make matters worse, when they slow down to help Mal and Zoe figure out how to operate the hybrid car, they get left in the dust by John and Aeryn who have already decided not to wait around for the slower members of their alleged alliance. Julian spends some time bitching to the camera about how he's pulling all the weight on their team, only to have his overconfidence bite him in the ass when he can't figure out that the computer at the Roadblock isn't voice-activated. They come in second to last.
Who's the fair-to-middling team who gets sent home instead in a terrible miscarriage of justice?
Mal and Zoe. Being on real actual Earth-That-Was blows their minds pretty hard, and while it's fun and touching to watch them gawk at the local landmarks they've only heard about, it also means their head's not in the game.
What's their bitchy parting shot to the confessional camera?
They're pretty gracious, but all the Mandarin speakers in the audience chortle at some of the things the censors let slip after they come out of Mal's mouth.
Episode 3 - Speaking of Bitchy...
Who's the arrogant, self-centered asswipe in the house and who is that asswipe rubbing the wrong way?
The Doctor and Rose are already getting on just about everyone's nerves. They've done so well in the first few legs that some teams are beginning to suspect them of cheating, what with that rumor going around about the Doctor being from the future and all. A lot of people also think that their friendliness is just an act. The take-no-prisoners approach espoused by Kara and Lee is also rubbing the more laid-back competitors in a very wrong way.
To everyone's chagrin, the asswipes win the next challenge. What is it and how on earth does that team pull off a win?
The teams leave the solar system for a leg on Centauri Prime with the Doctor and Rose already near the front of the pack. They adjust more quickly to the confusing and regimented Centauri culture than anyone else in the race, and pull off an easy win thanks to extensive help from the locals. Adding insult to injury is the fact that Kara and Lee win the Fast Forward (in which each team member must butcher, cook, and eat a serving of Spoo) but still come in second place.
A snippet from the confessional of one of the jealous contenders:
John: See, the thing about Rose and the Doctor is that they act like [bad British accent] "Oops, sorry, team number one again! Was that me? Can't help it, we're just so British!" but if you turn your back on them for too long they will stab you in the back without a second thought.
Aeryn, reaching for a gun that isn't there: Then I'll take the first watch.
John: ...Figure of speech. Anyway, Rose we can handle, but the Doctor seems like the kind of guy who wouldn't hesitate to blow thousands of people up if they got in the way of justice. And I know from blowing thousands of people up. (Aeryn gives him a look like "Don't talk about that here") Well, I'm just saying.
Who does the worst in that challenge and goes home?
Danielle and Alex. They struggle big-time with leaving the solar system, and being in an urban setting on Centauri Prime just makes it harder. Alex's inability to read a map causes the team to fall behind at the Roadblock and they never make up their lost ground.
Episode 4 - Party Time
The remaining six teams go out to dinner. Who...
...dances on the table? Rose gets it started and soon drags others into it along with her.
....kisses another contestant? Dean and Kara get drunk together and have an extreme makeout session right there in front of everyone.
...can't hold their liquor? That would be Willow. Tara spends the night holding her hair in the bathroom and looking concerned.
...sits on the sidelines looking annoyed? Aeryn has just about had it with her immature fellow contestants and is not afraid to tell them so as she stalks off to bed. Lee is also Mr. Extreme Crankypants over the Kara/Dean situation.
Surprise double elimination: One of the teams gets thrown out for embarrassing the competition's good name. Who is it?
The Doctor and Rose for unauthorized use of a TARDIS on their way between Detour options. As it turns out, time travel is not a valid method of transportation on The Amazing Race and they are disqualified for attempting to change the outcome of their Detour.
Who else gets the ax this week?
Willow and Tara, who are far too nice and functional as a couple to ever win The Amazing Race.
Episode 5 - Gettin' Down
With only four teams left, things are roomier in the house, but you couldn't tell it to these two. Who's joined at the hips and steaming it up in the hot tub every night?
Of course it must be Kara and Lee. Of course. The sparks that flew between Kara and Dean make this quite a surprise, but the real scandal is those non-matching wedding rings they wear...
How do the others feel about that?
John and Aeryn pretty much decide that it's not their business and focus on the game. Miles is taken aback by their behavior and lets his sense of moral rectitude take over, so he marches right up to the hot tub and tells them off for their unfaithfulness, with plenty of references to how he could never do something like that to Keiko, Molly, and Kirayoshi thrown in. Julian has to break it up before things come to blows after Miles tells Lee that a real man would never cheat. Dean gives a snarky confessional about how he's glad now that he didn't stick it in the crazy while Sam rolls his eyes in the background.
Who has a personal crisis and is eliminated after turning in a lackluster performance because they're preoccupied with *gasp* real life?
John and Aeryn. It's been clear that they've had their minds on little D'Argo back at home ever since the race began, and it only gets worse when the ever popular "the contestants get phone calls from home" segment reveals that Scorpius has been called upon to babysit in their absence. Totally distracted, they make several major mistakes and shed no tears on the mat. It's a damn shame, too, since they ran an almost perfect race up until this point.
Episode 6 - Three's Company
It's down to three. Which two gang up on the third, and why? What do they do?
Team Galactica and Team DS9 gang up on Team Winchester. Ever the strategist, Lee knows that he'd rather go against the hit-and-miss Julian and Miles in the finals than the consistently strong Team Winchester. At the Pit Stop he makes a deal with Julian and Miles that if either of them is the first to the Yield that they all know is coming, they'll use it on Sam and Dean.
An excerpt from the confessional cam of that contestant crying into their Cheerios about being victimized:
[Dean and Sam high-five, rip a clue open on the starting mat, read it with Dean horrendously and hilariously mangling the word "Raxacoricofallapatorius," and run off.]
Sam: Yeah, I think the other teams are gunning for us. Dean and I have won a lot of legs so the other teams probably don't want us in the finals with them. But this isn't a popularity contest. We're not on American Idol here. The only thing that matters is who crosses the finish line first, and that's gonna be us.
Dean: You watch American Idol?
Sam: ...Shut up, Dean.
Does the victim survive the next elimination, breaking up the Dynamic Duo, or do they go home, pitting former friends against each other?
It's unfortunate for Team Galactica that although Sam and Dean aren't all there in the strategy department, they're just plain fastest this time around. They arrive at the Yield mat first and Yield Team Galactica with no deliberation. Lee and Kara can't make up the time and are eliminated. On the mat there are tears and recriminations and maybe some punching. Good times.
Episode 7 - Grand Finale
How do the final two contestants feel about their chances to win?
Sam and Dean are confident about their chances, but not annoyingly so. Julian and Miles are much more laid-back in a "whatever happens, we had a great adventure together" way, and seem not to be expecting to win.
What's the big shocker of the final competition?
Team Winchester actually spends most of the last leg trailing. One of the final tasks involves performing stunt maneuvers in an X-wing fighter, and Dean's fear of flying holds the Winchesters up big-time, forcing them to play catch-up all the way to the mat.
What's the factor that puts the winner over the top, or does the loser have a totally embarrassing moment that ruins their chances? Finally, announce the winner and tell them what they've won!
In the end, it comes down to a footrace to the finish line, located at the top of the Jedi Academy temple on Yavin IV. It's a nail-biter that is only narrowly won by Sam and Dean. "Twenty-three days, eleven planets, and almost 40,000 light-years...Sam and Dean, you are the official winners of The Amazing Race: Fandom Edition!" They babble a little about how much a million dollars will aid them in their demon hunting efforts, then man-hug on the mat for, like, a year.
That was way too much effort to put into a meme, but once I realized that Starbuck and Apollo : Battlestar Galactica :: Flo and Zach : The Amazing Race, I was consumed with the need to do it anyway. I really hope this was funny to someone apart from me.