FTA-TV The Amazing Race Australia

[HeathySure]

Slightly disappointed the girls didnt win but the cowboys were decent winners. Amanda was BOG though, she was a machine right throughout the race and not casting bimbo at all. Would love to see her in survivor, she would be great i reckon.

 

[dales.girl38]

On the series as a whole - I didn't hate that they were contained to Australia. For me, I've not been a regular watcher of the Amazing Race for years, I was only watching this cos it was in Australia (and I had a mate who worked on it). I find it so much more relatable when you recognise the places.

I've long thought the most successful reality tv shows - Masterchef /MKR (cooking), Survivor/Big Brother (being likeable but smart and sneaky), Idol/* Got Talent/DWTS (singing/dancing) - succeed because so many of us think that, if we just committed ourselves to it, that could be us.

An Amazing Race in Australia sort of lends itself to that. They go to places like Tasmania, Cairns and Canberra (sadly they couldn't come to Melbourne) and I'm like "sh*t, I'd have such an advantage here!!"

With that said though - I think if they're going to contain it to Australia (and maybe one other nearby country like NZ, PNG, a Pacific Island country), and save a sh*t-ton of cash in doing so... a quarter of a mil doesn't seem much in the context of other reality shows.

I'm probably less harsh on the 3-night, repeated NEL format. I bumped into my mate at the dog park yesterday and got chatting - he says they were making this up as they went.

They knew they were starting in Qld, they thought when they started that most of the series would end up being in Qld (hence why they'd set stuff up to go back there), and they wanted to finish their all-Aust series at Kosciuszko, but had a contingency in Brisbane. A whole bunch of other stuff was being made up as they went, which is why there was a bit of repetition in the challenges. They (the shows producers), according to my mate, thought repetition of challenges was better than repetition of locations ie. they preferred 4 different eating challenges in 4 different states than doing 4 original challenges in the same location.

My mate told me - and this checks out when you look back on how state's treated their borders during COVID - they legitimately had no idea where they'd be able to go when they started, and they originally planned a race around Qld. The NT/SA ended up working out for them, NSW only worked out cos of the order of locations they went to, but Tassie fell into their lap and was planned within days of them going, as was the ACT.

One of the major problems I'm told they had, along with border closures, was that a lot of the "touristy" stuff wasn't open. And where it was open, they were literally manufacturing challenges on a couple of days notice by the end. (The challenge in Tassie where they were dropping the ball into the net was apparently manufactured less than 24 hours before it took place.)

When I ran into my mate yesterday he said "I'll text you tomorrow night during the show" (he didn't want to spoil anything.) What he wanted to tell me in "live time" was that they slip and slide was hokey as fu**, and it was (according to him) a contingency on a contingency on a contingency.

That's not ideal - the final episode, and the slip and slide was apparently something they manufactured the day before when 3 other things fell through.

Really interesting insights! It was very impressive that they pulled all of that together during covid.

Since you don't see any of the flight travel anyway, I'd personally have preferred more challenge diversity than locations for sure. 2 egg eating challenges was a bit much, and several of them were clearly rushed - that slippery slide one and I'd say the spaghetti one too was a bit silly. All up though pretty impressive and some really cool challenges, like the car racing one with the fish tank.

The thing that bothered me the most was the number of challenges where only 1 team could compete at a time, particularly the number of times they were the final challenge before the pitstop. Made for some very boring races to the pitstop.

 

[SugarShane]

I'm probably less harsh on the 3-night, repeated NEL format. I bumped into my mate at the dog park yesterday and got chatting - he says they were making this up as they went.

Not overly surprising. A fair whack of it seemed pretty chopped together.

One thing I never like in TAR is the challenges that are almost entirely procedural, ie the helicopter in this episode, the spelunking one (save for an annoying anxiety attack), etc. Challenges where, 99% of the time, all the teams take the same amount of time to do something and it just ends up being a speed hump more than anything. They're not my favourite but it's one thing I do like about the "learn and perform this thing" challenges and things like the surfboard one. But again, this season leaned so heavily on the "learn and perform" stuff. If the season is going to be this long, it needs a bit more variety than that.

 

[SugarShane]

Slightly disappointed the girls didnt win but the cowboys were decent winners. Amanda was BOG though, she was a machine right throughout the race and not casting bimbo at all. Would love to see her in survivor, she would be great i reckon.

Which is funny because the producers clearly casted them in the bimbo roles and pushed it on them early. I couldn't stand them for the first few episodes where it was all "We're going to use our looks to our advantage", "We're going to flirt to get what we want." Once they just fell back into their own personalities and started dominating it was hard not to like them. Amanda's best line was her excitement on seeing the hula hoop challenge, "Yes! I had to learn to hula hoop when I worked at Hooters!"

 

[raskolnikov]

Was barracking for the Sikhs in the last leg but any of the three teams was a worthy winner. I said to my partner that if I was racing up that hill for a quarter of a million dollars that I would have hauled my arse up there as quickly as I could and not even thought about how tired I was.

 

[dales.girl38]

I'm pretty sure in the US seasons they strip back their backpacks to the bare essentials they need for the final leg - or they just abandon their packs altogether at the end. You don't need it anymore, so just ditch it. Not sure that was allowed here, but it would have made it more of a foot race.

 

[Willo_]

probably unpopular opinion... I actually like Beau as the host as well, he isn't trying to be anyone else. He is a bit of a flog and he knows it, but i do like how he rides the bumps with the teams and genuinely is into it all.. I swear he almost teared up when it was the Cowboys that popped over that rise first

 

[rocker_oz33]

Happy with the cowboys winning I felt the right team won.
They were likeable bunch of blokes .

The girls gave me the shites .
Amanda was ok. But the other one i didn't like her.

 

[Big Bryza]

Which is funny because the producers clearly casted them in the bimbo roles and pushed it on them early. I couldn't stand them for the first few episodes where it was all "We're going to use our looks to our advantage", "We're going to flirt to get what we want." Once they just fell back into their own personalities and started dominating it was hard not to like them. Amanda's best line was her excitement on seeing the hula hoop challenge, "Yes! I had to learn to hula hoop when I worked at Hooters!"

Amandas instagram...

 

[Loonerty]

Got a bit over the season halfway through because of the ridiculous number of non elimination legs, salvage/sabotage being shithouse and stowaways existing at all but I read that there was an alliance made between a few teams that just dominated?

Sounds exactly like the latest US season. Just ruins the season.

 

[HeathySure]

Got a bit over the season halfway through because of the ridiculous number of non elimination legs, salvage/sabotage being shithouse and stowaways existing at all but I read that there was an alliance made between a few teams that just dominated?

Sounds exactly like the latest US season. Just ruins the season.

This depended on which teams was not in the alliance. In this case the ones i hated were out of it so i was all good!

 

[Peter Sidorkiewicz]

New season starts today.
Beau unfortunately back as host.

Casting of contestants already looks questionable. Last season we had a team pull out after the first leg due to mental health.

It looks like a similar situation with the father daughter team, with the daughter already refusing to do a task. I can't believe they were advanced to the next task after a modest time penalty.

 

[Crankyhawk]

The double cast/ race seems interesting presumably they will merge races

 

[Willo_]

I like Beau as host, I don't see the issue.. He is who he is, he's enthusiastic and genuine and the teams seem to love him.

2 races seems interesting
Thoughts from tonight that you could pick the team that went home instantly, the models I dismissed as morons instantly but they've been through a bit so I hope they go ok

 

[brucetiki]

Is that father/daughter team the worst team to have ever featured on any Amazing Race.

They were slow, had zero resilience and thought they could rely purely on intelligence.

Also shits me that failing to do a task in our series is a 30 minute penalty. It’s not a big enough deterrent to give up on a task.

If it was 4 hours like the US versions that would make teams seriously question taking it - and we wouldn’t have the ridiculous situation of a team half trying a road block then just giving up and taking a penalty.

 

[nobbyiscool]

Did that woman seriously just put in an attempted Moroccan accent while speaking to her driver?

The locals must love that. Shame there’s nothing to crash into in the desert.

 

[Plugger35]

That father/daughter team were hopeless, didn't complete the roadblock and had no urgency at all, not surprising they were the first team eliminated.

 

[Peter Sidorkiewicz]

Is that father/daughter team the worst team to have ever featured on any Amazing Race.

They were slow, had zero resilience and thought they could rely purely on intelligence.

Yes and to be fair to the father, it was just the daughter that was the shits. What did she seriously think when she decided to apply for the race. Did she think she was going to get a free holiday and not do anything. Who ever is in charge of casting need to do more and vett these applicants properly. Even at the final challenge, they showed zero urgency after the mulligan they just got and strolled around like they thought they had all the time in the world.

 

[Peter Sidorkiewicz]

The double cast/ race seems interesting presumably they will merge races

Channel 10 want 24 episodes. And they completely cocked up the race last year by having so many non elimination legs.
Running two races at the same time and eventually merging into one is a better solution than the non elimination leg debacle of last season.

 

[brucetiki]

Yes and to be fair to the father, it was just the daughter that was the shits. What did she seriously think when she decided to apply for the race. Did she think she was going to get a free holiday and not do anything. Who ever is in charge of casting need to do more and vett these applicants properly. Even at the final challenge, they showed zero urgency after the mulligan they just got and strolled around like they thought they had all the time in the world.

I know talent could be getting thin when you’ve got to cast 20 teams but surely it wasn’t that thin they thought, ‘Yep, she’ll be right for the show’.

 

[3rd Grade Maggy]

So I was only flicking in and out, but those teachers are clearly super christians right?

 

[Willo_]

That father/daughter team were hopeless, didn't complete the roadblock and had no urgency at all, not surprising they were the first team eliminated.

She also did the classic blaming of her team mate when she was the cause of plenty of the problems... She goes over the coals at the slowest speed known to man, then blames her old man for not wrapping her properly haha

 

[HeathySure]

Vincent, one of the Asian duo looks like Guy Pearce... .

 

[raskolnikov]

Hope the church friends get eliminated pretty quickly.

 

[raskolnikov]

Can someone tell me what is going on? They're a completely different group than last night but also going to Morocco.