The Amazing Race 8 - Episode 1 Summary

'Jumping The Shark' By idiotcowboy

Phil Keoghan: So do you really think this is a good idea?
Bertram van Munster: Absolutely, Jer and I both agree we need to spice things up.
Phil Keoghan: But…
Bertram van Munster: Probst would do it.
Phil Keoghan: Okay, but I don’t swim that well
Bertram van Munster: Man breasts float Phil, you’ll be fine!
Phil Keoghan: [Glare]

Bertram van Munster : Anyway we have this special vest just for you, it’s XXXL .
Phil Keoghan: Is this leather?!?
Bertram van Munster: Genuine imported hand dyed black leather.
Phil Keoghan: Do leather and water really work together? [shakes head]
Bertram van Munster: Not really but it looks great on TV, plus black makes things look smaller if you know what I mean. Oh and just in case it doesn’t hold up well, we need to make it on one take, you ready?
Phil Keoghan: Okay Bertram, but I got some serious reservations.

[Speedboat zips up]

Jerry Bruckheimer: Get a move on the camera crew is ready and I didn’t rent this boat for the whole day!
Phil Keoghan: Umm, not rea…
Bertram van Munster: Great lets go! [hands Phil a pair of skies]

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Phil Keoghan: These things look awfully thin are you positive they will take that ramp?
Jerry Bruckheimer: Only two of them broke in our test run.
Phil Keoghan: How many did you do?
Jerry Bruckheimer: One.

Bertram van Munster: We need to go or we’ll miss the sun.
Phil Keoghan: Guys I’m not sur…
Jerry Bruckheimer: Bert, you have Probst number?
Phil Keoghan: [Glares] Lets get this over with.
Bertram van Munster : Ok we’ll let you get your balance, pick up speed, and then head for the jump. If for any reason you need us to stop give us the thumbs up sign.

[PHIL on dock looking nervous, with Bertram and Jerry in the boat]

Bertram van Munster: Hit it Jerry!

[The boat takes off and a wobbly Phil rights himself]

Jerry Bruckheimer: He did better than I thought.
Bertram van Munster: Weebles!
Jerry Bruckheimer: Let’s do this [Increases the speed]
Bertram van Munster: Hey look he’s waving, is that a thumb?
Jerry Bruckheimer: [Glancing back] Leather jacket, thumb up, ski ramp ahead, perfect!
Bertram van Munster: What if he doesn’t make it?
Jerry Bruckheimer: Well Anderson Cooper needs to come back to reality.

Bertram van Munster: Oww, that looks like it hurt.
Jerry Bruckheimer: He’ll be fine; it’s a good thing we didn’t actually get that shark though.
Bertram van Munster: So what now, that family thing?
Jerry Bruckheimer: I guess we’ll have too [Shrugs]

We start in New York City where ten teams of four people who are related by blood, marriage, carnal knowledge, or some combination thereof descend upon some park under the Brooklyn Bridge. The Families consist of the following:

Family Gaghan, aka Team Little White Kids, is a typical family unit with your average white Mom (Tammy), your average white Dad (Bill), and two average white sneaky marathon running kids (Carissa age 9 and Billy age 12)

Family Godlewski, aka Team White Chicks in Pink Shirts, is a team of four white sistas (Tricia, Christine, Sharon, Michelle) who want people to think they are dumb and blond, because, well, they are.

Family Linz, aka Team Smelly White Siblings, is a team of four white siblings (Tommy, Megan, Nick, Alex) who want to be the “fun” team because they like to crack white jokes and smelly farts around each other.

Family Paolo, aka Team Bickering White Immigrants, is a family whose white Dad (Tony) came from one of those old white countries, along with his white screw wife (Marion) and their two disrespectful white kids (DJ and Brian age 16), who feel they are living the American dream because their kids don’t have to walk uphill in the snow both ways to school like they did.

Family Schroeder, aka Team Smartass White Cajun, is a homeless family from New Orleans with Dad (Mark) trying to do his best Jonathon impression, cajun white evil (aren’t they always) step mom (Char) and two handicapped, due to their father, white teens (Stassi age 16, and Hunter age 14), who need to win in case someday a hurricane destroys their home as well as the rest of the state of Louisiana.

Family Weaver, aka Team Hard-luck God-fearing Redneck White Trash, whose patriarch was killed in a tragic accident during a racing event around an oval which propelled his widow (Linda) to enter herself and their white teenangsters (Rachel age 16, Rebecca age 19, Rolly age 14) in a racing event around the world, good luck with all that.

Family Rogers, aka Team Non-Descript White Family, white Mom (Renee), white Dad (Denny), two white kids (Brock, Brittney), yawn… next.

Family Black, aka Team Cute Kids, which includes a normal mom and dad (Kim and Reggie), and their two cute karate kick’n kids (Kenneth age 11, Austin age 8), who feel their strength will be that other teams will underestimate them because they are nice and their kids are cute, good strategy, I hope they win!

Family Aiello, aka Team You Did WHAT With My Lilly White Daughter, a team which consists of a white Dad (Tony) and three white guys (David, Matt, Kevin) who like to have sex with his white daughter(s?) and now wants to spoon his white ass… hey at least they want to keep it in the family.

Family Bransen, aka Team Sugar White Daddy, a team that consists of a white dad (Walter) and his three little white girls (Elizabeth, Lauren, Lindsay), who aren’t that little anymore, and no I did not just call them fat, but I did call them white.

Tired of the white jokes yet??? Me too… I promise I’ll stop now, or at least soon… just don’t hold me to it.

Cut to Phil, explaining the rules very very slowly this time, in order to make sure that everyone knows that even if you drag your two cute adorably precious little kids with you, when you’re the last team to get to the mat, you will eliminated and be asked to leave the tribal council area immediately. Then raising his arm up high, and his eyebrow even higher, the race is on. It is at this point that it becomes painfully obvious at least one of the problems with the family format, that being instead of 22 full sized adults running like a bunch of lemming towards the edge of the cliff we instead have 40 ficken people many of which are only slightly larger than Mirna running like a bunch of lemming towards the edge of the cliff on slick wet grass. Fortunately for the producers it appears only the old and relatively fit fail miserably at this juncture and the little kids are not in fact stampeded to their death, which is good since until they start talking, in about 5 minutes from now or roughly one paragraph from here, they looked really cute and I’m sure trampling little cute non-talking kids would be a ratings downer... at least this week.

Upon getting to their stuff they are instructed to get into their super sized SUV’s and go to the airp… strike that, they are directed to go to Soho. That’s right the first destination in our trip around the world is some sporting goods store in Soho, to get camping gear. Humm, I wonder that they will use that for. Hilarity of course ensues as the various teams pile into their various vehicles after stowing their various junk that they will lug along with them for however far they wind up going. Plus the fun it always is watching people in a hurry drive in a large city where there is little patience for stupid drivers, and with this cast at least, and at this point in the race they are ALL stupid drivers. It also however, gives us a glimpse into why this season and its “stunt” casting may not in fact be the end of this franchises success. The kids after all, are cute, and the interaction with the parents is comical. From the Paolo’s, who are New Yorker’s getting lost in their own town with their teenager sons horror, to one of the Black kids saying Soho is a nice place, he thinks, to the cute little girl asking her dad about all the spray paint on the building walls, to the Schroeder dad bemoaning the fact he doesn’t have crippled children so they could use that to push themselves ahead, this may well be an interesting dynamic that in fact adds to the show.

They all eventually make it to the sporting goods store, and get their gear. In an effort to allow the store to remain standing upon their completion of this event they have placed all the items that the teams need with a nice little placard and their name on top of it so as to cause the least amount of disturbance as possible. Not that some of the teams appear to be able to actually read mind you, and of course at least one display completely unrelated to the show or the activities is completely crashed to the ground without the offending team even bothering to act like they were going to put it back in place or ask if it would be helpful if they even tried to for that matter, but hey, the store did try and at least in this case we have proof that you don’t have to be in a foreign country to be an ugly American.

Upon getting their gear, a task completed by relatively all the teams at the same time (at least for every team without a home field advantage that is), they are told to find a specific hot dog vendor in a different part of the city to get their next clue. These vendors of course don’t actually sell hotdogs, they are in fact only there to dispense clues. Either that or fate has not worked that well for the fan favorite previous racers known affectionately as the Festers in an unaccredited cameo appearance, something race aficionados are sure to look for in future episodes in case this is something more than a one time event. At the hotdog stand they are then directed to leave New York and head for Pennsylvania, which was amazingly identified by some as possibly, maybe, being a state in and of itself... as if!

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