On The Amazing Race 38 episode 3, the teams drove themselves, and drove me nuts—well, more than spending 90 minutes with Big Brother players usually does.
That’s because of the carryover of the train delays into a leg not designed for such disparity, but mostly because of how many times people yelled “let’s go!”
In the first two episodes, I heard it but didn’t notice it. Then y’all pointed it out, and now I cannot stop noticing!
For instance, when Jas and Jag arrived first at the brewery, one of them yelled, “Let’s go! Let’s go!” You’re already there, nowhere to go!
Though Jag and Jas tend to say it a lot in the same moment, it’s not just them:
- Natalie: “Let’s go baby, let’s go baby.”
- Izzy: “Let’s go, let’s go!”
- Eric: “Let’s go, Tucker!”
- Matt: “The first thing I did quick—let’s go!”
- Chelsie’s dad Jack said “let’s go” once that sounded actually like let us move with alacrity! and another time that came off like yeah we’re not not in last place even though I am several centuries older than everyone else here!
“Let’s go” is used as encouragement, as celebration, and as just a placeholder for silence. These teams are saying it so much I imagine explanations such as an off-camera crew member holding a sign that says SAY: LET’S GO and someone else counting to ensure they meet their quota for Expedia’s product integration of their forthcoming campaign: Let’s Go See if We Can Get People to Still Use Our Website Even Though It’s Not 2002.
This is an actual transcript of less than 20 seconds from The Amazing Race 38 episode 3, starting as Adam got the judge’s approval for finishing the beer Roadblock, and Izzy and Paige learned they’d only have one crate to fill:
Joseph: “Yes, yes, let’s go Adam!”
Adam: “Let’s go! Let’s go! Let’s go! Let’s go! All right, brother!”
Adam or Joseph: “Let’s go guys, we’ll see you! Catch you guys outside.”
Tucker: “All right, Eric! Come on baby!”
Joseph: “Izzy, Paige—woo! Go in there, you’re filling up beer bottles.”
Izzy: “Okay. One crate, baby! Let’s go!”
Paige: “Let’s go ladies!”
Izzy: “Let’s go!”
That’s nine instances of “let’s go,” about one every 2.2 seconds, and just counting those made me go completely insane, so I stopped there.
But I couldn’t stop noticing. Tucker told Eric, “knock it out of the park,” and Eric did a mock swing of a bat, and then they said “let’s go!” Stephanie ran toward a challenge saying, “Team Train Wreck, let’s go!”
If they cannot find another way to express enthusiasm—this request is, after all, months too late since they’ve already filmed—could we request that every let’s go be bleeped? That’d actually be funnier:
Joseph: “Yes, yes, BLEEP Adam!”
Adam: “BLEEP BLEEP BLEEP BLEEP All right, brother!”
Stephanie: “Team Train Wreck, BLEEP“
Speaking of trainwrecks: this leg, oof! The major problem was the second leg and its spectacular delays, which bled over into a leg that was not designed to have teams more than six hours apart.
Yes, the timestamps, bless them for those of us who love these sorts of nerdy details, showed that Jas and Jag left at 5:14 a.m., while Megan and Matt left at 11:36 a.m. Even though the first challenge didn’t open for a full two hours after the first three teams arrived, no one else even started by that time.
Kat and Alex left almost a full hour earlier, at 10:44 a.m., but neither they nor Megan and Matt appeared until after 35 minutes of the 90-minute episode elapsed.
So it’s no wonder Phil Keoghan got to give them a Phil Special™ in the middle of a field, leg up on a plow, telling them the rest of the teams were already done running the entire race and back in the Big Brother house, that’s how long it took them.
Phil was already a bit cranky when the penultimate team, Kat and Alex, arrived: “You want to leave me waiting here all day?” he joked. And he still had time to beat Matt and Megan to the plowing challenge—or is it ploughing because we’re in the EU?
Matt and Megan were so far behind Phil beat them to the plowing challenge.
That challenge, like the others, was not complicated enough to allow for a six-hour difference. While one team mentioned this would be a needle-in-haystack situation, it was more of a clue-in-obvious-same-spot-for-all-teams situation.
The hockey challenge—one of two Roadblocks—definitely tripped up some teams, though others breezed through, like Kristine hitting a goal on her first attempt.
That Roadblock’s clue card read, “Who wants to light the lamp?” and for the rest of the episode I couldn’t get this out of my head:
I also couldn’t get out of my head how annoying it is that three strong teams, including two teams of young men/brothers, have formed an alliance so tight it means they delay themselves to help each other. On a race!
Jag told us, “This is not Big Brother,” which I knew because the game doesn’t appear to be produced by a group of rabid squirrels, but the players are acting as if they’re on Big Brother.
For one, as Joseph said, “The Big Brother twist of this game is clearly showing right now because everyone is trying to make a move without being the face of the move.”
That was referring to the Driver’s Seat, which returned along with a flashback to that awful Jonathan from TAR 37. Of the three teams who arrived first—the newly christened “Train Wreck Alliance,” at least according to my subtitles which made trainwreck into two words—no one wanted the responsibility.
Jag and Jas were worried people would view them as even more of a threat. So what? You’re winning each leg easily. No one’s voting you out.
Natalie and Stephanie ended up taking the Driver’s Seat, and assuming that they were assigning tasks based on physical labor. Nope! Turns out that Roadblock was about precision and patience, not brute force or speed.
Kudos to the challenge producers for creating a challenge that made Big Brother players feel right at home: if they filled the beer bottle incorrectly, it ejaculated foam all over them.
After that, I’m sure they all smelled like a frat house.
There were missteps—Adam and Joseph lost their car keys in the field (!), Kristine and Rubina missed the turn to the field and saw the finish line first, Tucker and Eric pulled ahead of Adam and Joseph. (Question about Adam’s pants: are they painted on or what?)
But none of that was enough to create movement in this spread-apart pack. Jas and Jag arrived at the pit stop first for the third episode in a row, but decided they’d let Natalie and Stephanie take the win.
That’s annoying. They’re doing well: take the win! Their argument, in the post-leg interview, was that it takes heat off of them. Um, no: Everyone will know you stood aside and let another team go ahead, which at the very least seems over-confident.
What was most funny/frustrating about that moment was they decided to let Natalie win, but before they could even offer, Natalie suggested it!
“You guys want to give us first so that you don’t…?” she said, and then found out they were giving her an early birthday present, which changed her tune. “I love you both! You’re really giving this to me for my birthday?”
The birthday gift: $2,500 each that they can enjoy after the race, i.e. roll around it naked, as one does with cash.
On the mat, Phil said, “It’s your birthday today?” and Natalie said, “tomorrow,” at which point I wish Phil would have been like, The fuck? What are you all doing here? This is The Amazing Race. A RACE. LET’S GO PEOPLE LET’S GO!!!
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