Topic: Karma is on the finish line for 'Race'

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Karma is on the finish line for 'Race'
By Robert Bianco, USA TODAY
Win or lose, it's Rob and Amber's Race.
 
  In Istanbul: Rob and Amber have given The Amazing Race a burst of star power, but at what cost? 
CBS

And that's the whole problem.

There's no denying that Survivor transplants Rob and Amber have brought a sharper edge and energy to The Amazing Race, which sprints to the finish line Tuesday night with a two-hour finale (CBS, 9 ET/PT). From the opening episode, they've been the team to beat and the team everyone wants to beat.

Like it or not — and I can't say that I do — in the reality world, Rob and Amber are stars. And like many stars, they've done more than just attract fans and detractors. They have reshaped the show in their image.

In the short term, that's fine. Ratings are up for this Emmy-winning series, long the best of the reality crop, and the show has never been a hotter topic. But if the change is permanent, watch out. Even if you love them, do you really want to see an entire Race contingent made up of mini-Robs and Ambers?

What Rob and Amber did was transplant to Race the tactics, strategies and snippy attitudes they used on Survivor. This around-the-world Race has always attracted competitive people; races are, after all, competitions. But where previous racers mainly focused on finding a way to win, Rob and Amber devoted considerable energy to making other teams lose. That particular form of bad-sport ugliness is their gift to the Race. My fear is that it's a gift that will keep on giving.

The flaw in their approach is that many of their more blatant efforts to undermine the other players — fiddling with bus doors, tying up computers, planting seeds of doubt — used up more time than they gained. Some of their tricks were even counterproductive, which is the price karma extracts for deviousness.

Oddly enough, they were far more successful when they just sat back and relied on the kindness of star-struck strangers, who either recognized them from Survivor or were drawn to the cameras and offered their services as guides and aides. We can question whether the show should have allowed them to take such help, but we can't blame them for accepting it.

We can, however, blame them for the dismissive insults they hurled at their helpers behind their backs. And that behavior illustrates the danger of contestants drawing on the reality-TV well once too often: Eventually, we're going to see more of them than we like.

Yet somewhat to my surprise, the show's virtues as a game and as a travelogue have managed to compensate for newfound flaws, particularly in the home-stretch scramble from India to Istanbul to London. And after all, Rob and Amber isn't the only team left.

True, we've lost Meredith and Gretchen, a delightful older couple who, given the chance to make a wrong choice or turn the wrong way, invariably did so. But we still have Ron and Kelly, who were responsible for one of the season's most amusing "What can you be thinking?" moments: her insistence that his stint as a POW somehow reflects poorly on his ability to commit.

Best of all, we have the married couple Uchenna and Joyce, who have taken great joy from the race and brought amazing grace to it. I'm hoping they win, but even if they don't, they may prove that it is possible to make it through the Race without embarrassing yourself or annoying a watching nation.

That's a victory right there.

link~
http://www.usatoday.com/life/television/news/2005-05-09-amazing-race_x.htm
article found through Jokersupdates /Dreamer

[Lucy325]

I am reminded of the famous quote by Will in Big Brother....spoken to the mean twin....."if Karma was a boom-ur-rang" :<(  So long to Rob and Amber

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Three couples battle it out tonight for the big prize in the finale of Amazing Race 7.
STEVE TILLEY, Special to The Free Press    2005-05-10 02:22:40   
 
 
When it comes to reality TV, the Amazing Race is the show you can watch without feeling like you need to shower afterward.

It's a semi-genuine, pseudo-educational and consistently entertaining mix of travelogue, soap opera and game show and viewers have responded (particularly in Canada, where the galloping globetrotters routinely finish near the top of the ratings).

Season 7 of the Amazing Race, wrapping up its run tonight at 9 p.m. on CTV and CBS, sees Survivor alumni Rob and Amber leading the final three teams sprinting for the finish. The Romber's good fortunes might seem a little suspicious, given that CBS's clever bit of stunt-casting has made this one of the most talked-about seasons of the Amazing Race, but their continued success could simply be because they're the only ones actually playing the game.

Or are they? All it will take for bickering couple Ron and Kelly and down-on-their-luck spouses Uchenna and Joyce to slip past the chowderhead and his blushing bride is one small mistake, one lucky break or one bit of divine intervention on behalf of the producers.

Not that anyone would ever accuse a reality TV show of being open to behind-the-scenes manipulation.

As the teams shoulder their packs and prepare to leave London on the leg's last race, all eyes are on the final three. Who will win? Who deserves to win?

* * *

Rob Mariano, 29 ; Amber Brkich, 26

Engaged Survivor alumni who married post-race in a soon-to-be-televised ceremony.

Position: 1st

Why they entered: Because CBS asked them to. And why not? Survivor: All Stars' million-dollar winner Amber and her runner-up beau have turned the spotlight on this season's race in a big way, with viewers divided between those who want to see them repeat their Survivor success and those who want the smirking Robfather and his dimply doll to go down in flames.

Why they'll win: They're the one team that has truly played this race like a game. Deception, bribery, milking their fame to get help from the locals . . . no tactic has been too underhanded for the Romber.

Why they won't: Because they already have a million bucks from Survivor and way more than their 15 minutes of fame. And because there's a fine line between playing well and being a pair of obnoxious cheaters.

Defining moment: Rob's back-to-back bribes in Santiago, Chile, where he first paid a local to keep quiet about an earlier bus leaving the airport and then paid the bus driver to only open the front doors so Rob and Amber could get a head start on the other teams.

Odds: 3-2

* * *

Ron Young, 28 ; Kelly McCorkle, 26

Dating couple in the early stages of their relationship.

Position: 2nd

Why they entered: The former Iraq PoW and his Miss Carolina 2002 honeypie figured the race would allow them to spend a lot of time together under stressful circumstances and determine whether their relationship could work. I think we have the answer.

Why they'll win: Ron deserves to win simply for putting up with his cranky girlfriend for this entire globe-spanning trek.

Why they won't: They're neither the strongest of the final three (that would be Rob and Amber) nor the most genuinely deserving (Uchenna and Joyce). Considering how poorly they function as a team and as a couple, it's amazing they've even made it this far.

Defining moment: When Kelly took Ron to task for his lack of commitment to anything, citing the example of how he managed to get out of the army by being taken prisoner in Iraq. Wow. Just . . . wow.

Odds: 4-1

* * *

Uchenna Agu, 40 ; Joyce Agu, 44

Married couple who have fallen on hard times, financially and emotionally.

Position: 3rd

Why they entered: They clearly figured their luck was in need of a drastic turnaround. Uchenna worked for Enron, Joyce worked for WorldCom, and several attempts at having children, including through in vitro fertilization, have failed. What's the worst that could happen?

Why they'll win: Of the remaining teams, they're the most deserving, both for their situation outside the realm of the race and for their generally upstanding behaviour during it. And let's not forget that interesting news item that broke just before the race began. If you don't know what we're talking about, you don't want to. Yet.

Why they won't: There's really no reason why they shouldn't win, except that they've occasionally allowed their soft hearts to slow them down, like lending a hand to struggling seniors Meredith and Gretchen. Also, they enter the final leg of the race in last place.

Defining moment: Arriving at a Fast Forward challenge in India, only to learn it involved both team members shaving their heads. The already smooth-pated Uchenna comforted his distraught but determined wife as she bit the bullet and allowed her lengthy locks to be shorn.

Odds: 2-1

IF YOU WATCH

What: The Amazing Race finale

When: Tonight, 9 p.m.

Where: CBS, CTV

 http://www.canoe.ca/NewsStand/LondonFreePress/Today/2005/05/10/1032899-sun.html

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'The Amazing Race' Win or lose, the game is up for Amber and Rob
Scott Tady, Times Entertainment Writer
05/10/2005


Some 13 million people will tune in to tonight's two-hour finale of CBS's "The Amazing Race," where they will learn whether Amber Brkich and Rob Mariano have become millionaires twofold.

For many "Amazing Race" fans, Brkich and Mariano aren't the show's sentimental favorites: That would be Uchenna and Joyce Agu, the bald Houston couple who have played the game hard without offending their opponents.

By contrast, Mariano's willingness to lie and bribe his way toward the $1 million race's finish line angered several competitors and alienated some "Amazing Race" fans, who also accuse Brkich of being guilty by association.

"I can't stand 'Boston' Rob Mariano and his wimpy assistant/fiancee Amber Brkich," grumbled Seattle Post-Intelligencer TV critic Melanie McFarland. "Rob is a disgusting slug who has represented the lowest qualities of Americans to people across the globe, (while) Amber, his spineless, acquiescent partner, shares his guilt by cheering him on dastardly deed after dastardly deed."

Advertisement

 
USA Today and Entertainment Weekly writers also have sniped about "Amazing Race's" overexposure of the Brighton Township native and her Bostonian husband, who already won $1.25 million on last year's "Survivor: All-Stars."

The New York Times labeled Brkich and Mariano "reality television's premiere villains," though quickly added that the dynamic duo has brought "Amazing Race" its best ratings in years.

"They are good TV," the show's host, Phil Keoggh, told The New York Times.

And love them or hate them, they are great competitors.

With "Survivor"-style panache, Brkich, 26, and Mariano, 29, outwitted, outplayed and outlasted seven other two-person teams. The couple - whom wags have dubbed "Romber" - won four preliminary legs of the 'round-the-world race, for which they earned prizes including a free entertainment center and trips to London, the French Riviera and the Bahamas, where they secretly got married on April 16.

Thanks to "Amazing Race," the twosome have enjoyed an unforgettable experience, savoring the sights of South America, Africa, India, Turkey and England.

But along the way, their win-at-all-costs efforts stirred up resentment.

"None of the other teams liked them," contestant Lynn Warren told The Associated Press after he and boyfriend Alex Ali were eliminated from the race. Added Ali: "We were just more vocal about it. Amber and Rob had a bad attitude. They were terrible."

Brkich and Mariano, who are in New York tonight for an "Amazing Race" party, soon will get to respond to their critics. CBS lifts its restriction on media interviews once reality show contestants are eliminated from competition or after the show they are on ends.

CBS certainly isn't done publicizing and making money off Brkich and Mariano.

On May 24, the network will air "Rob and Amber Get Married," a two-hour sweeps program chronicling the couple's Bahamian wedding.

The competition

Two teams are racing Amber Brkich and Rob Mariano to a $1 million finish line in tonight's finale of "The Amazing Race 7."

Those teams:

Uchenna Agu, 40, and Joyce Agu, 44.

Hometown: Houston.

Status: Married couple.

Occupations: He's an energy broker who worked at Enron; she's a sales manager who worked at WorldCom.

Best known on "The Amazing Race" for: Joyce shaved her head bald to win a competition that gave the couple a temporary lead.

Ron Young, 28, and Kelly McCorkle, 26.

Hometowns: Villa Rica, Ga., and Greenville, S.C.

Status: Dating.

Occupations: He's a motivational speaker who talks of his experiences as a Iraqi War POW. She's a former Miss South Carolina who is now a legislative consultant.

Best known on "The Amazing Race" for: Kelly's whining and nagging of her boyfriend.

Scott Tady can be reached online at stady@timesonline.com.

http://www.timesonline.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=14497796&BRD=2305&PAG=461&dept_id=478564&rfi=6

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Jonathan Storm | Three duos race down to the wire

By Jonathan Storm

Inquirer Columnist


If the race is amazing, its leaders are unbelievable.

Heirs apparent before The Amazing Race 7 began in winter on CBS, Survivor's Rob Mariano and Amber Brkich have become the King and Queen of Reality TV, as they've flown, trained, bused, cycled, cabbed, driven, jitneyed and just plain run from Long Beach, Calif., to London via Santiago, Chile; Lucknow, India; Istanbul, Turkey; and points between.

They've helped to raise ratings of the series to their highest levels, but they have not raced alone, and they face formidable competition as TV's most entertaining reality show speeds to another finish in a two-hour finale tonight beginning at 9.

Uchenna and Joyce Agu, Houstonians adrift after the collapse of Enron (he, 40, was an energy broker) and WorldCom (she, 44, was a sales manager), need the money. They've been consistently in the top group since Joyce agreed to have her beautiful locks shaved off in a Hindu ritual, to try to gain an advantage on their foes. They are committed to each other and to the competition, and nearly half the voters in a CBS online poll pick them to win.

Ah, but that's different from whom the viewers want to win. In a realitytv.about.com poll, more than 70 percent of voters say they're rooting for Rob and Amber.

Running way behind both couples in popularity and apparent skill: former P.O.W. Ron Young, 28, and his beauty-queen maybe girlfriend, Kelly McCorkle, 26. Their constant bickering seems to have provoked both dislike and a lack of confidence in their abilities. Of an initial field of 11 teams, only the three couples remain.

TV

The Amazing Race 7 finale

Tonight at 9 on CBS.
 
 
The Amazing Race is the reality competition show for people who don't like reality shows, providing constantly changing geographical and cultural backgrounds. Widely diverse two-person teams race around the world, struggling with exotic languages and customs as they try to work together to meet inventive challenges based on daily life in their home-of-the-moment.

Arrive last on a particular leg of the race, and you go directly home. Win at the end, take home $1 million.

The course is carefully plotted so that no one can get too big a lead. An incompetent taxi driver or a decrepit cab can often mean doom. "In the race, luck is probably one of the important things," Amber told host Phil Keoghan.

But Rob and Amber, two people who complement and augment each other better than perhaps any other reality TV couple in the last five years, seem to manufacture luck.

They are the end point of reality-TV evolution. Engaged while the show was taped, married on April 16, with a slam-bang wedding special scheduled for CBS on May 24, the couple met on Survivor: All-Stars. She won by one vote, beating him out of $1 million. He proposed during the finale, and got her and the cash.

Their fame is worldwide. Declaring that she was a huge fan, a South African woman raced up to Amber in Soweto Township and guided her through a marketplace maze. But they encounter many natives who volunteer assistance just because Rob and Amber are attractive and pleasant. Once the King and Queen hook up a helper, they keep him or her on the string as long as possible, trying to ensure other contestants get no extra help.

Some people think their hard-core competitiveness makes Rob and Amber villains. Hello? It's a race.

Others have a more heartfelt gripe that casting the King and Queen, who already have pocketed way more than $1 million in reality lucre, may deprive less well-off contestants of a big prize.

Don't denigrate the darlings. Long ago, Hunter S. Thompson said what anybody can observe about American TV. It's a cruel and shallow money pit. Since when do the deserving get a break?

Jonathan Storm |

TV

The Amazing Race 7 finale

Tonight at 9 on CBS

 
http://www.philly.com/mld/philly/news/11605992.htm

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Based on this year's bickering finalists, LEAH McLAREN offers some tips on coming up with the perfect Amazing Race partner
Tonight is the two-hour finale of The Amazing Race and relationship tensions are running high. The competition is fierce and so is the bickering.The three couples left in the game couldn't be more distinct. In first place are Joyce and Uchenna, a married couple from Houston, Texas, who came on the show hoping to re-ignite their flagging relationship after several failed in-vitro attempts. Hot on their heels are the notoriously crafty former Survivor-All Star winners and famously engaged, Rob and Amber.

Bringing up the rear are Ron and Kelly, the former POW and his beauty pageant queen girlfriend from the American South who have been dating long distance ever since they met on a televised Miss South Carolina event.

Joyce and Uchenna appear to have a heartfelt bond. And Rob and Amber support each other in their own sociopath way. Ron and Kelly, however, are headed for a major relationship meltdown. Ever since Kelly accused her beau of purposely crashing his helicopter and being taken prisoner in Iraq so he could get out of being in the army (apparently all part of his larger commitment issues), the hostility between the couple has been painful (and fascinating) to watch.

What bearing does the health of one's relationship have on a couple's performance in the Race? Judging from seasons past, the answer is none at all. Past finalists have included couples in partnerships so toxic they verged on abusive. One famously hateful pair even ended up hashing it out on Dr. Phil.



"As long as they can suck it up and put out the effort when they need to, the fighting doesn't seem to hurt their chances," says Emily Young Lee, manager of programming communications for CTV and an avid Amazing Race spectator. "I think the key is to pick someone who balances you and has complementary skills to your own."

After a close scrutiny of the recent reality-TV season, here are a few guidelines for picking the perfect Amazing Race partner:

1. Don't choose someone you're related to.

Of the original 11 contestants in the Race, only two were blood relations. While Brian and Greg, the handsome California bartender/bouncer brothers, managed to make moderate headway, Susan and Patrick, a mother-son team from Ohio wiped out early on. Confronted with the task of eating almost two kilograms of steaming bovine innards, Patrick degenerated in a tantrum-mode, at one point threatening not to complete the challenge just to spite his mother.

As if the spectacle of a grown man tearfully choking down his dinner under his mother's supervision wasn't humiliating enough, the two were eliminated in the next leg.

"I think unconditional love is a dangerous thing where competition is concerned," says Young Lee. "Your family has to love you so you can tell them exactly how you feel. Particularly between siblings, there's a competitive edge.

"If I tried to push my sister, she'd just push back. It would be like, 'I see your double-decker bus ride and raise you eating two worms.' Not good."

2. Don't pick a friend.

Close friends might be handy to have around in the real world, but in the world of reality television, they stink. For all their supportive, sisterly hugging and hand-holding, Debbie and Bianca couldn't navigate a rental car to the airport.

Remember Ryan and Chuck, the hefty hillbillies from South Carolina? With the combined body weight of an average family, those two good buddies didn't have a hope on the physical portions of the challenge.

3. Don't pick someone of the same sex.

Someone has to drive while the other person rolls down the window to ask for directions. This is the key to why opposite-sex couples in romantic relationships do so much better at the Race.

4. Don't pick someone who physically resembles you.

Megan and Heidi, the Barbie twin roomies from Oak Park, Calif., may have used their flaxen locks and perfect smiles to get ahead in life, but in the Race, look-alikes don't count. Much to the disappointment of the Smith brothers, they were one of the first teams to be eliminated.

5. Do pick someone you're sleeping with.

While it seems unlikely that many of the contestants have the time or energy for sex during the competition, it's impossible to ignore the fact that all of the finalists are in romantic relationships. Whether they're getting any on the road or not, sexual chemistry appears to be a competitive edge.

6. Do pick someone who's not afraid to yell.

All the finalists are very shouty. Their constant cries of "Hurry up babe!" and "Go! Go! Go!" seem to have an encouraging effect. And when the cheers degenerate into abuse (like the moment Kelly called Ron a "white-trash hick") it makes for great TV. Too bad about the relationship.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/ArticleNews/TPStory/LAC/20050510/RACE10/TPEntertainment/TopStories