Indeed, if you'd like to watch the episode in question, feel free to drop by the CBS website...you can watch the episodes there. I'd also like to point you to the Wikipedia page which has an excellent breakdown of the history and mechanics of the show. It makes for a great reference if you're unfamiliar with the show.
SPOILERS for Episode 1 follow.
The world is waiting...for SPOILERS!
The first episode of a large cast reality show like this is always tough. First of all you've got to introduce the mechanics of the show to first time viewers, but you've also got to introduce all the contestants, and make the episode interesting enough that people come back next week! It's a tall order, indeed.
From a veteran viewer's perspective, there are a couple of different things I'm looking at. I'm looking at likability of the teams, which generally determines how much I'm rooting for them, and there's survivability, which indicates what I think of their chances to actually win the Race.
This year's teams are as follows (names given according to the picture, so first name is the person on the left):
Blonde Rachel and Dave
In an improbable bit of casting there are two Rachels racing this season. Hopefully one team or the other will go out soon, preferably the team with the other Rachel in it, so that I can quit having to distinguish between them. This early on there hasn't been enough screen time for either team to really get a good feel for them, so I'm resorting to distinguishing them by hair color.
Dave's chopper pilot for the Army, while Blonde Rachel is in administration for hospitals. They're married, and that usually (but not always) is better for your team's chances than merely being a couple. You'd tend to think that since Dave's been away at war, that would apply more stress to their relationship than a few weeks on the road would, so from a relationship standpoint they should do well. Physically, they seem in good shape which is important both for winning sprints and for surviving the grueling later legs. They also seem pretty on the ball which keeps you from getting lost and helps when trying to figure out what's the best flight to take. Survivibility: High.
They've been pretty friendly to the other teams and haven't displayed the kind of jerky behavior that gets one villain status on the show, so I'm giving them Likability: High.
Dave's chopper pilot for the Army, while Blonde Rachel is in administration for hospitals. They're married, and that usually (but not always) is better for your team's chances than merely being a couple. You'd tend to think that since Dave's been away at war, that would apply more stress to their relationship than a few weeks on the road would, so from a relationship standpoint they should do well. Physically, they seem in good shape which is important both for winning sprints and for surviving the grueling later legs. They also seem pretty on the ball which keeps you from getting lost and helps when trying to figure out what's the best flight to take. Survivibility: High.
They've been pretty friendly to the other teams and haven't displayed the kind of jerky behavior that gets one villain status on the show, so I'm giving them Likability: High.
Bopper and Mark
Best friends from Kentucky, Mark and Bopper are refreshingly honest about why they're on the Race. It's not the bullshit that you get from other teams about "seeing the world" or "testing the strength of our relationship." Nope, Bopper and Mark want the money. Bopper's seven year old daughter has some kind of health problem, and a one in eleven chance at half a million dollars seems like the best odds they could come up with to get that kind of cash quickly. That puts them on a semi-heroic level and increases my desire to root for them. Of course, the downside of it is if, as is likely, they eventually get eliminated, that failure will be that much more poignant because of the sick little girl factor. Likability: High.
Unusually, there's no designated Old Team on Amazing Race 20. Ever since Dave & Margerita in the very first Amazing Race there's almost always been one team that was in their fifties or sixties. Granted, those teams usually wiped out by mid-season because of endurance problems, but they were usually included. Not this time. This time, Mark checks in as the oldest Racer at 45. It's hard to say how smart they are or aren't since they really didn't get much screen time, but I'm going to ding them for maybe running out of gas in the late stages of the Race. Survivability: Medium.
Nary and Jamie
Virtually every season there's a hot girl team. Usually they're introduced while frolicking in bikinis. And virtually every season, said hot girl team is one of the first teams gone, since they lack much in the way of skills, smarts, or endurance. I've even seen teams that lacked all three! Surprisingly enough, though, Nary and Jamie aren't that team. No, they're DEA agents instead. So rather than watching them frolic, you see them stalking through a firing range with M-16s. Which is a pity, as I do enjoy a good frolic, but does make Nary and Jamie much more interesting than just another hot girl team would have been. That said, they didn't get much screen time in the first episode so it's hard to judge their personalities just yet. But I'll give them the attractive to me bonus points and bump them to Likability: High. Your mileage may vary, of course.
As far as performance goes, they're DEA agents in their early thirties. They're in shape and I'm going to assume the DEA training includes things like map reading, basic navigation, and the like, so I wouldn't be at all surprised to see them in the final three racing to the end. Survivibility: High.
Brendon and Red Rachel
Brendon and Red Rachel are engaged. That's a bad idea on the Race, because, unlike most married couples, an engaged couple may not have been through truly difficult times together yet. Ever since the tragic tale of Lenny and Karyn in Amazing Race 1, it's almost received truth that being on the Race without a strong relationship can break that relationship. Lenny and Karyn were the first, but they were not the last. That said, though, there is another factor. You see, Brendon and Red Rachel were contestants on one of CBS' other reality shows, Big Brother. In fact, Red Rachel won the season she was on. Personally, I hate that. She's already got a pile of cash and some pseudo-celebrity because of Big Brother, why does she need to be taking up a spot on The Amazing Race too? And can you think of a worse scenario than Brendon and Rachel winning to add to their cash pile while Bopper's little girl gets nothing? I hate the practice, I hate the idea, and that hate makes Brendon and Red Rachel the first team I'm actively rooting against. Likability: Low.
However, they have both survived a reality show. Red Rachel even won one. That means that things that can fluster newer teams like constant camera exposure and the pace of shooting day in and day out are things this pair have already learned to deal with. And pretty often, the transfers from other shows do rather well for just those reasons. Thus I am sadly force to rate them as Survivibilty: High.
Joey "Fitness" and Danny
Right. These guys. They're self proclaimed "Guidos" who met on the Jersey Shore. I can see why they chose to play themselves up that way, as it almost certainly helped them get on the show in the first place, but that doesn't mean I have to like it. Call me shallow for disliking them because of their gimmick, but it's not like I've got much else to judge them on so far. Likability: Low.
Traditionally teams made up of two young men have done pretty well. Teams that fit that description won the first two Races, and six of the eighteen that it was possible for them to win. (Amazing Race 8 was the ill-advised "family edition" that included teams of four parents and children.) On the other hand, the Jersey Boys don't seem all that bright, and you need to be smart to progress very far. I'll call it a cautious Survivibility: Medium.
Misa and Maiya
Misa and Maiya are sisters of Japanese descent from San Diego, seem to be friendly and cheerful, and look pretty good in bikinis. That all works for me. Likability: High.
However, do you remember what I said about the doomed hot girl team? This is that team. I appreciate that they had the Asian-American team as the cheesecake as a nod towards racial equality, but that doesn't change the fact that almost always if they show you cavorting in a bikini, you aren't making it all the way around the world. It was some decent cavorting, at least. Survivibility: Low.
Dave and Cherie
Another gimmick team like the Jersey Boys, this is a couple of married professional clowns. I honestly haven't got much in the way of a feel for them yet, either positive or negative. Maybe they're funny when not under stress, but through one episode they weren't really standing out for me one way or the other. Likability: Medium.
That said, they're both in their forties like Bopper and Mike, and they appear to be more out of shape than the Kentucky Boys too. I'm guessing they won't make it all that far. Survivbility: Low
Elliot and Andrew
Unlike Misa and Maiya who seem to have gone out of their way to dress similarly and wear their hair similarly to make it as hard as possible to figure out who's who as they run past the camera, twins Elliot and Andrew had the decency to wear their hair different lengths. Elliot's a musician and Andrew plays professional soccer. Didn't see much of them and don't have much of an opinion on them as people yet. Likability: Medium.
Twins who are both in good shape? That's a pretty solid basis for a team in my book. Survivibility: High.
Kerri and Stacy
Thirty year old cousins from Mississippi, Kerry and Stacy didn't leave much of an impression on me. Part of that was because they ran a perfectly serviceable leg without any major mishaps or feats of brilliance. They seem pleasant enough, so I don't dislike them, but neither did they really win me over. Likability: Medium.
Traditionally, though, all women teams have not done well. In fact, there has only been one all female winning team, and that was on Amazing Race 18: Unfinished Business where popular losers from previous seasons came back for a second try at the Race. So when Kisha and Jen won, it was something they'd had some idea of what they were getting into. I'm not sure that Kerri and Stacy have that here, so until I see more of them I'm going with the numbers. Survivbility: Low.
Vanessa and Ralph
I'll be honest, until I saw their pictures on the website, I hadn't remembered that Vanessa and Ralph were even on the show! Couples are the most common team format, and there are several every year. So many, in fact, that they start to blend together after a time. For me, Vanessa and Ralph have vanished into the same morass that most other couples have. Maybe they'll do something to distinguish themselves later, but for now Likability: Medium.
I should note, however, that while young men teams dominated the early years of the Race, recently it's mostly been about various couples. So a team like Vanessa and Ralph perfectly fits the model of the kind of team that has won for the last few years, so I have to say Survivibilty: High.
Art and JJ
A couple of Border Patrol agents rounds out this year's cast, making it the highest percentage of people working for the government with guns this show's ever had. Honestly, Art and JJ struck me as a couple of meatballs, which is fine after a fashion, but not very endearing overall. Likability: Medium
On one hand they've got Border Patrol skills, which have to have some benefit while travelling. On the other hand they the third team in their forties, trying to out run people a decade younger than them some of whom have similar training. Put it all together and I say Survivibilty: Medium.
So those are our teams for Amazing Race 20. Come back tomorrow for my analysis of the actual events of the first episode!
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