‘The Amazing Race 22’ review: Did David & Connor’s Cinderella story end?

In many ways, Sunday night’s new episode of “The Amazing Race 22” had it all: action, alliances, drama between the teams, and a showcase of culture. Sadly, there were also some problems: one of the Detours was literally all about making a shopping list. There was also a major strategy flaw with the Blind Double U-Turn, but we will get to that in moment.

But first, what exactly was going on when it came to Dave & Connor in Vietnam? These guys decided to keep running for a couple of legs despite the ACL injury, but they made the move to quit just a quarter of the way through this one. So what in the world was going on here? Really, we think it just comes down to proving a point. Dave & Connor wanted to show that they could still compete, and they won themselves some prizes. Unfortunately, this did sap out the drama from most of the episode, since there was no way that Phil Keoghan was going to eliminate two teams in an episode.

Nonetheless, let’s talk how the rest of the teams finished.

1. Pam & Winnie – First of all, a great job of racing by these two: they’re one of the most interesting all-female teams in recent memory, and they look like they will be competitive for quite a long time. However, why go for the U-Turn here? You know that you are in first place, and you also know that David & Connor are bowing out. In going after Team YouTube, you’re putting a target on yourself for no reason.

2. Max & Katie – These two spent the vast majority of the episode proclaiming that they were going to do terrible things, but then had enough other teams do the terrible things for them that all they really had to do was coast. We can’t really say we hate them, though, mostly because everything that Max said about Jessica & John’s performance was valid. (We just would’ve have kept it to ourselves.)

3. Mona & Beth – Roller Derby Moms were afraid of the U-Turn, but they were spared at the expense of another team in their alliance. There’s not much else to say here.

4. Bates & Anthony – These two guys are racing a solid race, but at the same time we almost expected them to be a little bit more dominant. Do they have another gear, and if so, will we see it soon?

5. Caroline & Jennifer – These two ladies get themselves broken down far too easily, as they struggled with the chess part of the Detour. However, so many teams made far worse mistakes while out on the course.

6. Joey & Meghan – Did the YouTubers purposefully make their photo sad so that they would see it in the event of a U-Turn? If so, that’s kind of hilarious. We may have hated this, but the move to U-Turn Chuck & Wynona was brilliant. While they did not go after a strong team to try and hurt them, they picked a team that they knew they could beat. Despite their variety of miscues, including the dreaded bad taxi, they avoided any sort of penalty.

7. Chuck & Wynona – For the second straight week, Team Mullet Man saw themselves bailed out by another team; thanks to David & Connor saying goodbye, they have yet another chance. But let’s be real: they are not going to be winning this race. As a matter of fact, we expect them gone by this time next week.

Overall, what did you think about this episode? If you want to back and read our chronicle of how Jessica & John made the dumbest move in the history of the show, you can do so over at the link here.

Photo: CBS