The dating athletes from SoCal.

I think I'm gonna hate these two. Or at least Nathan. Jennifer doesn't seem too bad, but I have this bad feeling I could be wrong.

Hate, especially for him. If you want us to watch you work on your relationship issues, take it to Dr. Phil, just leave your dynsfunctional angst bullshit off this show, because this is so not the place for it. If she kicks him to the curb on air, a la Sarah, she'll score points with me. He may describe himself simply as “one cool dude”, but I describe him as "one massive douchebag".

And we have our Bickersons for Season 12.

This team is going to go downhill verty quickly.

Dear people with failing or rocky relationships:

PLEASE stop coming on the Amazing Race to test your relationship. It's been done before. Pay a therapist to help you work out your problems.

I do not have high hopes for liking this team.

Ew. Very few couples who put their relationship to the test have turned out to not be painful to watch (Frank/Margarita, Rob/Kim and Kelly/Jon at times). Also? Calling one's self dude is analogus to calling one's self alternative - it's probably not true.

Oh, dear. Now we just have to work out if they'll be a sort of tolerable arguing couple (Romberley) or a nasty vindictive arguing couple (MoJo).

After reading this bio, the first former team that popped to my mind was Ray & Deana, in Season 7. They've broken up several times in their relationship, just like Ray/Deana dated on and off in theres. I hope Nathan won't be pulling out any "Suck it up!" rally cries, anytime soon.

I'm just hoping Jennifer doesn't cry at every slight disappoint like Monica did.

I hope they turn out like Romberley and have a series of massively entertaining breakdowns. (In both senses of 'breakdown'.)

At least I know who my least favorite team is going to be right off the bat.

"dominant personalities" Check.
"very stubborn" Check.
"broken up several times" Check-a-roo-nee
"put their relationship to the test" Check and double check
self-described as "one cool dude" Check and Mate.

Congratulations, you two, you've just qualified for a loan from the First National Bank of Shutthefuckup.

I find the fact that she's described herself as "thrilling" far more amusing than him calling himself "one cool dude". There's at least a possibility that he could be being ironic or cutesy-corny (please God...) but "thrilling". When would you ever describe another human being as "thrilling" let alone yourself?

"Hey, you know Jennifer, how would you describe her?"

"She's short, blonde, disorganised, and totally thrilling".

Snigger.

I can't imagine how many "babes" will come out of their mouths. I smell actor/model potential even though that's not what their bios say.

They'll either be boring as hell or so obnoxious they'll need to get off my tv ASAFP.

I vote the latter, although with my luck, they'll make like All-Stars's Eric & Danielle and be nasty as hell and win, which would suck.

Translation: He's overbearing and she puts up with it.

Already know who I'm gonna hate the most it's this team. I always seem to get bored with "athletic teams". Hope they go home fast. I hope the fact that they didn't get very much airtime on the commercials is a good sign, a fair ammount of the teams who didn't get much airtime on the commercials get eliminated quickly.

On the other hand, they're the only one of the young bland male-female teams who got profiled in the very first promo.

That's probably because they have a vaguely interesting backstory - him cheating on her, which might pull the viewers - unlike the other mactor teams.

Was it Nathan who's shown with the broken donkey in the preview on the front page of the TAR website?

Yes, that's Nathan freaking out.

There needs to be a moratorium on breaking animals during The Amazing Race. And maybe on blond couples working on their relationship issues.

After reading through the team bios, this is definitely my least favorite. In a field that has Ari/Staella and Lorena/Jason (my pick for f3 villian team), that's a feat.

Hopefully, Jennifer & Nathan will be the Peter-Sarah/TAR4Russell-Cindy/Ray-Deena of TAR12, in that they get eliminated at the halfway point. Already, I'm rooting for Lorena/Jason to beat J/N in a footrace to the Amazing Bathmat.



Isiscloud, I think broken animals + Intense!Guys = TV Comedy Gold (YMMV, of course).
Especially if the donkey delays Jennifer/Nathan to the point that they get eliminated.

ETA I'm with you Isiscloud on your proposed moratorium on

blond couples working on their relationship issues

In their pre-race interview with Buddy TV, they admitted to not liking Rob & Amber, so they won a few points from me . . . right before losing them when I remembered they admitted to wanting to emulate Eric & Danielle.

Dead. To. Me.

A CBS preview video that I linked to in another thread shows Jen/Nath arguing stridently about god only knows what. Nath uses the particularly constructive line "You are the worst person I have ever met". Which is great, considering that they "want to show other couples that they can have hope in their relationships for those that might also be struggling". (Location spoilers for episode 1 contained in the first link.)

I'm kinda loving them based on all the TAR ads I've seen so far. All that fighting is so funny to me for some reason.

Hm. So is it the relationship style of Eric and Danielle they want to emulate? In other words, nearly complete indifference interspersed with bitching? They'd do much better to "emulate" Rob and Amber; they worked well together.

I don't mind the occasional quibbling team--but it does get really old really fast.

Between "All the other girls are faster!", "Freaks ahead of us!" and "GOOOOOOSH", the hate is strong already.

Fortunately, I will have the memory of their donkey to cherish for every episode they manage to cling on this season. Whenever they do something stupid or annoying, I'll just think of happy thoughts: "Hee-haaaaaw! Hee-haaaaw!"

Is it too much I kinda wanted Ari & Staella to get their donkey moving a little bit sooner? If it hadn't been so stubborn, we could've said goodbye to these two first.

Horrid people, the both of them. I can't remember another racer breaking out the derogatory terminology for other teams quite so quickly.

How I hope the 10th place finish isn't an aberration.

Wow. Just wow. First leg in, and they are already arguing with each other, and Nathan even said he disliked/hate Jennifer. Those two actually made me look at Lorena and Jason, in a favorable light.

And I already hate how they insult teams, just for no reason. So far, I've heard them say something negative about the Goths, the ministers, and the blondes. But since they survived, I guess we'll get to see who they insult next.

The thing I couldn't believe about the donkey is when they said they'd tried "everything" to get the donkey to move and then tried pushing it. Really? It took you THAT LONG to realize that if pulling and begging aren't working, maybe you should give it a push? That bodes ill for their fortunes in the race, I think. Of course, I don't really care for either of them so that's not exactly unwelcome news for me.

These two are really insufferable, yet oddly entertaining. Can we please call them "Team GOOOOOOSH"?

They insulted Kate & Pat?! What on Earth did they say about them?!

Please do not air your dirty relationship laundry on my precious TAR, dumbasses. HATE.

All I can say is that the donkey wasn't the only ass Jennifer had to deal with in this episode.

Why does TAR have to cast these assholes? Every season we get these vile people who are nasty to each other and everyone around them. What an awful human being she is to refer to kindly middle-aged women as "bitches" as soon as she meets them. Then she's shrieking throughout the episode.

She had that bitchface on in her intro shots and everything went downhill from there. At first I thought, "No wonder he cheated on her," but he's no prize himself.

Then they drove their poor donkey so hard he was clearly sick.

They're horrible, horrible people.

Knowing TAR's track record, they'll win.

Is it just me, or do they look really old for 23 and 24? This looks like one of those teams where they'll hate each other and I'll hate both of them. He's a douche, and she's pretty slow for an "athlete."

Man, my first instinct says the new Tara and Wil. Annoying.

ETA: They're seriously 23 and 24?! I thought they were 10 years older than that!

Traveler224, that clip is wonderful!

The Amazing Editors have made it look like the braying jackass is Nathan!!


Oh, wait. That's sort of redundant.

I hope I'm not the only one who yelled at the tv, "haha, your donkey is broken!"

You definitely are not.

They really were every bit as bad as I feared.

My friend was cheated on once, and if she had ever made the effort to reconcile with her boyfriend, if said boyfriend had ever said to her "The girl I cheated on you with was faster than this!", even under TAR conditions, she would have torn his testicles off right on the spot. The fact that Jennifer did not knock Nathan senseless and instead was all huggy with him shortly afterwards at the ferry check-in was just... gross. They can't be eliminated fast enough.

Wait...did he actually say this? I didn't hear it and I thought the first poster who quoted that was joking. If he really said that-he sucks.

Heh, whoops. I'm pretty certain they didn't say that, I just made it up for exaggeration in the episode thread.

What he did yell about was something like "Every other girl is faster!" and she replied with "Don't compare me to other girls!"

Oh, ok. I heard that part and I thought that was a lame enough thing to say. Way to go, Coach.

That's a sentence with some uncomfortable layers to it, there. I hope that's not a recurring theme with these two.

"Were you comparing me with her, or her or her or her or her... WELL, WERE YOU?!?"

I. Hate. This. Couple.

Classic abusive relationship. He berates her and then tells her how much he loves her. TAR really needs to stop casting these types of people. I will revel in schaudenfreude every time something truly crappy happens to them.

Ok, will one of you techno-wizards tell me how I get that donkey as my new ringtone?

I think they should get some sort of special prize because, unless I confused him with the other couple-guy who isn't awesome TK, they both managed to declare two different tasks the "hardest thing [they've] ever done", in the very first leg.
This is why it's not good to coddle your children, people - they need to experience difficulties in order to prepare them for reality shows!

Ok, these 2 dweebs can't be gone fast enough for me. Was kinda hoping they would be eliminated first but next week is good too.

They are just hateful to each other and really, really don't need a relationship fixed...it's tanked already.

Good Lord, which of your Fave Five are you going to saddle that sound up to?