Recap: The Amazing Race Canada 9, Episode 9 – “Mim-see-saw a lop wick wack zurf zum jee.”

Recap: The Amazing Race Canada 9, Episode 9 – Light the Candle

To start the Penultimate Leg, teams must first fly to Montreal and then head to the Montreal Central Station where they must purchase tickets for one of two trains to Toronto at the marked ViaRail counter. The trains depart one and half hours apart.

Teams hop into taxis out of Montreal Airport and teams run all around Montreal Central Station. Tyler & Kayleen and Ben & Anwar, who arrived at the station later, get on the first train. Ty & Kat and Deven & Amanda end up on the second train.

All the other teams make sure they will target Ty & Kat this Leg.

Upon arrival in Toronto in the evening, teams must head to the Toronto Stock Exchange where they will wait until tomorrow morning to ring the opening bell with Jon.

Teams will depart from the TSX in the order they arrived last night. And the first clue in the morning is a Road Block: Who’s feeling artistic?

For this Road Block, teams will head to OCAD University where they will ascend up one of the legs of the tabletop building in order to grab a clue. Their partners can only help them get started up the line and hold on to the rope for them.

Tyler starts the Road Block first with Ben close behind. Ty and Deven decide to do the Road Block and both teams decide to run to OCAD University.

All four teams are at the Road Block and it is Ben who gets up to the clue first. And that clue reveals a Face Off. For this Face Off, teams must head to the 10XTO athletic club on the grounds of Exhibition Place where they will play tennis in a best of five match.

Deven finishes the Road Block next with Tyler close behind. It’s a race to who can get a taxi and it is Tyler & Kayleen who get to the club to Face Off with Ben & Anwar first.

Ty struggles with the Road Block, but remembers the tragedy he had experienced and why he has joined the Race. That powers him to finally finish the Road Block and he and Kat hurry to catch up.

Tyler & Kayleen win against Ben & Anwar 3-1 who defeat Deven & Amanda 3-1 who defeat Ty & Kat 3-1.

After the Face Off, teams will head to the Immersion Room, a state of the art soundstage. Here, they will memorize a script in an alien language and then film a movie with an alien. When the director approves of their performance and they take a selfie with the alien by waving their hand at the Samsung Galaxy ZFlip 4, they’ll get the next clue.

Tyler & Kayleen get started with memorizing lines and go for an attempt in order to get a feel for how the filming works. As the other two teams head to Immersion Room, Ty & Kat have to wait out their Face Off penalty.

TO BE CONTINUED.

Episode Thoughts

A two-episode Penultimate Leg? Umm…okay?

I feel like TAR Canada just likes to do horrible Penultimate Legs. I mean, they love Final Four Face Offs for whatever reason. And that Face Off usually contributes to a horribly designed, linear Penultimate Leg. This Leg seems to follow suit very well.

But the episode itself felt quite long and draggy. Which makes the decision to spread it across two episodes even funnier.

First off, of all the equalizing Hours of Operation this season, this one has to be the most absurd. There was absolutely no point to all that running around for the train. It wasted about five minutes of the episode just to have teams bunched up in the morning and departing at basically the same time anyway.

Was the final four really spoiled at the opening bell like that? lol

The Road Block was fine. Ascenders are always physically challenging. So it was good to see teams really work hard during this task. Funny enough though it really left like it dragged on too long. I guess part of trying to spread things out over two episodes. But they really spent a lot of time on people struggling to pull themselves up. Which isn’t necessarily the most gripping of television.

And again, all to have teams bunched up at the Face Off.

I really hate TARC insisting on Face Offs in the Penultimate Leg. There’s really no reason for it. A waste of time and nothing to add to competition or drama. It really only works to potentially screw over a team. And that’s no fun for a viewer, I think.

Of course it had to be another sports Face Off of course. And tennis! The way they had to explain what tennis is and then have every match finish in the exact same way was not exciting at all. The tennis took up most of the episode even.

Then from one linear, processional task to another. The bloop blergh bop whatever task is fine. But not for a Penultimate Leg. And not when teams have to get in line for a change on stage.

Overall, a weird episode that’s par for the course for TARC with their Penultimate Legs. Why not just have a regular Leg instead of stretching out one Leg over two eps?

Team Thoughts

Really wonderful to watch a Leg and episode without a certain team running around threatening to quit again.

All the four teams are fine. But this episode definitely tried to set-up Ty & Kat as the underdogs now. I think they might still survive though next week. If I had to guess, I think Deven & Amanda will be eliminated only because of the three, they have been the most inconsistent, I think. Ben & Anwar are peaking at the right time. And Tyler & Kayleen continue to do well.