Man, what a week – Miss Alli’s recap for last week’s TAR episode went up a couple of days ago : Television Without Pity » The Amazing Race » Recaps & Extras » Season 5 Episode 5

And then there was tonight’s leg! Holy crap, another great, exciting, funny, sharply edited episode. Plus, the shots in Egypt at Karnak and the Great Pyramid and the other temple were really beautiful, especially the early morning sunrise shots.

So many satisfying little moments watched, so many snarky cackles to make. Also, a few bombshells: after weeks of listening to Mirna’s Desperanto (which is mostly Italian and French, supplemented by making “choo-choo” noises last week) suddenly she busts out with the Arabic and calls all their taxi drivers “habibi” (“Honey”). Plus, she utters a nasty sounding phrase and does a classic hawk-spit after a taxi-gate confrontation with Colin. The funny part is that if either of them had actually driven away in the disputed cab, they would have been going to the wrong terminal; they were already at the right departure hall for their chartered flight.

I’ll just add that once again there was a little too much spoon-fed transportation – the cabs all appeared to be marked with the little yellow-and-red flags that hang from the mirrors, denoting them “TAR friendly” or some damn thing. Also, the charter flight left at 11:30am from Cairo to Luxor (actually, it was delayed until 1:45pm, thus saving the moms, who pulled in at 11:35am). Colin and Christie got to the airport at just after 715am… and were told there were no domestic flights; there was one at 7:30 that was “closed.” Huh? It took them 90 minutes to complete a kind of scary task – climbing 350 feet down a sloping shaft in the Great Pyramid and get to the old Cairo (domestic) airport. Hmm.

And yeah, the moms have the worst taxidriver and airport karma ever – once again they get taken to the wrong airport. However, they survived….

… and the bad-tempered, grumbly, miserable, unappreciative, rude, mean, assy brothers are out. Okay, Marshall was in agony, and his brother Lance carried both packs and was very, very supportive and patient (there was no “come on Marshall! Come on Marshall!” from him). But, he also threw a goat in the boat, so I deduct style and niceness points for that, mister.

However, gutting it out all day (reserved and sympathetic kudos for Marshall) only to give up on the Roadblock and refuse to complete it, in the name of sparing an injured brother the walk to the taxi and to the pit stop to be eliminated (Laaaance!)? Well, to me it just looked like Cartman saying “screw you guys, I’m going home.”

In a typically dramatic just-before-commercial statement, Marshall said “That’s it, we’re done. Game over.” Yes, he’d been digging a while, and he was fed up. Yes, he’d counted up the number of “archeological digs” that had obviously been worked and completed, and concluded correctly that they were the last team. So, in the interests of sparing his brother further pain, he quit. Big whammy music cue! Brother sits in borrowed wicker chair and looks miserable! Commercial.

So they come back from commercial, and there’s no digging going on. There’s a strange tension in the air – something about the inactivity just looks so wrong, and the lights make it look like a body dump site (new this fall! CSI: Luxor 1250 B.C!).

Mostly the editors take a frustrated comment from a competitor and turn it into a dramatic “I quit! Again! ([b]tm Flo[/b], season 3)” moment, and it comes back on and they continue to compete (though there may still be whining and complaining).

Not this time. I was totally shocked when Phil walked into the “dig” area (it was fully dark by then, and lit by harsh floodlights) and talked to them. He seemed to me to be a little stern with them; perhaps he was hoping they would suck it up and continue, but he did say that they were physically unable to make it to the pit stop, so maybe it was the right thing to do. Or, maybe it was a graceful way of letting Lance be the supportive brother, and not the quitter brother.

Then he eliminated them. It was very weird to see this happen away from the pit stop mat, which is always placed in the most photogenic spot of the location. It’s always in a sweet zone where all the camera angles look good and it’s always at a natural focal point. To see this iconic moment of the show placed in this incongruous and unphotogenic backdrop was just weird. Also, it was partly filmed from above, using the “scarab cam.” So even the camera angles were weird and unsettling. Lance and Marshall seemed to take it in pretty good spirits. They knew they were done, and they looked a little relieved that it was over. Actually, Marshall looked a lot relieved. They both said nice things about their relationship as brothers afterwards. However, as a redemption arc, there wasn’t much “there” there. Not enough time to really build sympathy from the audience… in the third season, it took at least 3 legs for Ian’s redemption arc to raise his stock with the hard-core fans. He was still an ass at the end, but everyone had a grudging respect for him, and for his and Teri’s perseverance. He didn’t seem such an ass in Vietnam, and he started to mellow a bit in front of our shocked and disbelieving eyes. There wasn’t time for this kind of transformation for Lance (Marshall’s not so bad, it was Lance that hollered “BITCH!” at Mirna from the car in Patagonia).

I don’t know. It’s possible that in future gatherings of fans and former Racers, people will buy consolation drinks for Lance and Marshall, but somehow I think they’ll be one of those “not a bang, but a whimper” teams that just disappear from view afterwards.

It’s funny about first and last impressions: when I first saw and heard this team, I thought they’d be likeable and funny. It seemed like other teams and Phil thought they were likeable and funny (with the exception of Mirna, but then she thinks everyone is disgusting and apparently says so in Arabic). However, their every moment on camera, their every comment during the race and in voiceover interviews after each leg showed them to be unpleasant and negative people who got little to no enjoyment out of being on the show.

And so now I don’t like them very much at all. Maybe they’ll redeem themselves post-reality the way the Guidos did, who are now beloved by fans for behaving graciously and with good humor afterwards, even though they knew they weren’t popular. But I don’t think redemption is in the cards for the Brothers Grummp.

There’s a lot more from this episode… a lot more. I bet it was a lot of fun to edit, with all those yummy shots of ruins, and funny leaping goats and cantering asses (also, there were donkeys being ridden by at least one of the asses).

Finally, there’s another exclusion in the TAR Cameramen’s insurance policy – there will be no medical coverage or equipment repair coverage for:

• Getting whacked in the head by a goat’s hindparts and naughty bits

Therefore care must be taken with CBS equipment around all ruminants.