TAR All Stars Finale

Last night's finale of The Amazing Race: All Stars was an appropriate end to the season. I was glad to see Eric & Danielle win, but the whole thing was just kind of blah.

The major criticism that I have had (and most who blog about this sort of thing) with the season is that it was not "all star" caliber. In fact, everything seemed easier. Remember back to when we were discussing which teams should be included, and what sort of amazing places they would go? And everyone was wondering what sort of fantastic tasks they would have to do? We didn't get any of that. Some of the best teams to run the race were excluded, the locations weren't overly exciting, and the tasks were dull. There were very few physical tasks, and most of the teams were eliminated because of transportation and bad luck. It's such a bummer for a show that has been consistently one of the best on television.

The last leg itself wasn't horrible. Being on Lanai was gorgeous, and I loved the task with them kayaking out to the shipwreck. But there were only two flights on the final leg (it was like that last season as well; in previous seasons there were a lot of flights which leave a lot up to the great airport equalizer). And the producers had to know that there were limited flights from Hawaii back to Oakland that day (and did the teams figure out that it was better to fly in to Oakland or were they told to do that?). I also liked the final task in the vault (though I don't understand why there wasn't a final roadblock), but I wish they had given them unlimited time to do it. I know, they needed the drama at the end of such a close finish. But it would have been fun to watch the timer on the girls at the end and see how long it would take them to match their partners.

In the end, it was Eric & Danielle to cross the finish line first. I was pulling for the Beauty Queens, but it was really impressive that Eric & Danielle won (they were yielded twice and marked for elimination once). And of course, I was glad to see Shmirna finish third. And I'm hoping both that TAR gets picked up for another season and they go back to the difficulty that the show is famous for.

One last note - I don't have any idea what happened to the last week and a half or so of blogs. I thought I uploaded some of them, but I guess not. And it seems silly at this point to try and recreate them. They're floating in cyberspace somewhere...here's hoping they show up somewhere sometime!