‘The Amazing Race 28’ episode 5 review: A dive in the French Alps

Friday night’s new new episode of “The Amazing Race” was certainly exciting and eventful … even if it was also not the sort of leg design we really love. The entirety of it was extremely physical rather than strategic, and there wasn’t really much of a chance for some of the less-gifted teams in terms of speed and strength.

Also, this was the sort of leg where there is not much of a margin of error, and this is precisely what happened to Erin & Joslyn. Team Clevver made a few smaller mistakes (including Erin struggling to get down the hill for the paragliding task), and that was enough to doom them since they weren’t the strongest team in the world. There were only so many things that they could do, and unfortunately they just couldn’t get it together in time.

As a matter of fact, there was no real way for the show to cultivate much drama here once Erin failed to get down the hill. Burnie & Ashley struggled and probably choose the wrong Detour in the snow, but they did enough still to surge ahead. Meanwhile, a last-minute push at the Roadblock allowed Tyler & Korey to get ahead of Brodie & Kurt in first place. The only real funny moment for most of the teams during the leg was having to bring “lunch” while in the Alps working on some of the tasks.

Visually, this was a gorgeous episode. We don’t always see teams in this sort of extreme winter weather, and the tasks were among the most dangerous ones that we’ve seen. It’s a shame that this entire leg really only felt like it lasted for a few hours. We just want something that gives you more culture, and a little less extreme sports moving forward. Episode Grade: C+.

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