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    Post-Game Analysis

    Root for the home team: A couple of Texans have a good game — on The Amazing Race

    Tarra Gaines
    Sep 29, 2013 | 11:20 pm

     Aaaand they’re off!

     

    Usually my Sunday night appointment television consists of vampires, dragons, and quippy dowager countesses. But when reality television’s closest proximity to sports, The Amazing Race, fields a hometown team, I have to get out my virtual pom poms and watch.

     

    This year, The Amazing Race producers have chosen a Houston team who knows a thing or two about sports and playing well with others, former Texans teammates from 2006-2009, Chester Pitts II and Ephraim Salaam. Will all their experience help them win a million dollars, and even more importantly, help them avoid looking like ugly American idiots while milking a goat in outer Mongolia?

     

     

      Considering some of the bizarre challenges The Amazing Race has thrown at racers in the past, Pitt’s talented oboe playing might come in handy more than any tackling skills. 

     
     

     The Amazing Race is the one television competition where the ability to feign rapport with taxi drivers is sometimes a much more valued asset than brains, brawn, or speed. Considering some of the bizarre challenges The Amazing Race has thrown at racers in the past, Pitt’s talented oboe playing might come in handy more than any tackling skills.

     

    Over the years, viewers have discovered there are four general, unwritten rules every Amazing Racer should memorize before ever applying.

     

    1. Never race if you can’t drive a stick shift
    2. Never race if you’re afraid of heights
    3. Never race if reading comprehension is not your forte
    4. Unless you want the whole Internet acting as your judgmental and gossipy armchair couples therapist, never ever use the race as a way to work on your troubled relationship with your partner.

     

    So how did Chester and Ephraim do this first episode and what does that tell us about their odds for the season? Let’s play armchair team manager for some post-game analysis.

     

     First off the mark

     

    For no discernible reason, the race begins at an old western movie ranch in California. Team Texans are profiled first, and we learn how Ephraim brought Chester to the football field at San Diego State, though no mention of Chester’s oboe mastery is given. Is being introduced first a good or bad sign from The Amazing Race editors? Only time will tell.

     

    The first leg calls for the racers to fly to Iquique, Chile. With little drama, Team Texans manages to get on the first plane and once landed they make their way by taxi to cliffs high above the port city, arriving second to the roadblock. A roadblock is a challenge that only one of the pair can perform and this one calls for one team member to paraglide down to the beach below. After a slight confusion with the wording of the instructions, Chester ends up paragliding while Ephraim must follow him on the ground and navigate with their taxi driver.

     
     

      There appeared to be only two real points to this challenge,: Getting the very big Chester into a very small, unstable boat and getting host Phil Keoghan to use the word “fishmonger” in a sentence. 

     

     

    After a requisite scream of joyous terror, Chester immediately endears himself, to me at least, by taking a few moments for sheer amazement and appreciation of the view as he soars.

     

    They finish second, but lose time on the way to the second roadblock, ending up at the harbor area in fifth place. The twist of this challenge is that the paragliding partner has do the work again, this time taking a rickety rowboat out onto the bay to find one of three designated fishing boats amid what looked to be a hundred boats. The team member then has to to collect five fish from a fisherman and row his catch back ashore.

     

    There appeared to be only two real points to this challenge: Getting the very big Chester into a very small, unstable boat and getting host Phil Keoghan to use the word “fishmonger” in a sentence.

     

    As amused Chilean workers look on from the dock, Chester finds one of the fishing boats quickly, but by that time it only has four fish left. He’s off to search for one of the other boats in order to complete his fish run.

     

    With breakneck speed, probably helped along by the Amazing editors who have many other teams to highlight, Chester finds the next boat, grabs his fish and rows back to the docks. The guys run to the pitstop, Chilean national monument Teatro Municipal de Iquique, arriving in fourth place.

     

    Fourth is none to shabby, but how well did they do in accordance to our racer rules?

     

    1. Stick Shift
    They weren’t required to drive in Chile, so I’ll give them a pass.

     

    2. Heights
    Both Chester and Ephraim were ready and willing to jump off a cliff. They passed the heights test with gliding colors.

     

    3. Clue reading abilities
    Four of the 11 teams burned time, and one team team even suffered a 30-minute penalty, all because they didn’t read the clues correctly. Team Texans had no problems.

     

    4. Team dynamics
    Chester and Ephraim appear to thoroughly enjoy each others’ company and any intra-team ragging, like Ephraim telling Chester he looked like a “military grade jeep” landing on the beach, seemed to be received with affection. Chester’s reply, “I’m comfortable with my width,” was one of the funniest moments of the episode.

     

    Could this be the year the Texans go all the way? And by all the way, I mean representing Houston admirably while they milk a goat in outer Mongolia.

     

    Start planning your Amazing Race tailgating parties now because Team Texans is looking good.

     
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    Movie review

    New movie Eddington confronts the chaos of early pandemic life

    Alex Bentley
    Jul 18, 2025 | 3:30 pm
    Joaquin Phoenix and Pedro Pascal in Eddington
    Photo courtesy of A24
    Joaquin Phoenix and Pedro Pascal in Eddington.

    The coronavirus pandemic had a profound impact on the entire world, one that has been shown in various ways by movies and TV shows. However, even though a number of productions have attempted to show what life was like during the early days of the pandemic, few have tried to truly reckon with the way lockdowns and restrictions changed people.

    Filmmaker provocateur Ari Aster does just that in Eddington, set in a fictional small town in New Mexico in early 2020 that proves to be a microcosm of the debates taking place worldwide at that time. Sheriff Joe Cross (Joaquin Phoenix) is not a fan of mask mandates or other restrictions imposed by the government, while mayor Ted Garcia (Pedro Pascal) tries to lead by example in an effort to keep his community safe.

    The men butt heads not just on how to deal with the pandemic, but also over a personal history involving Joe’s wife, Louise (Emma Stone). When news of the murder of George Floyd in Minnesota makes its way to town, it starts a slow simmer among the town’s youth population, putting even more stress on Joe and his small department. Conspiracy theories, white guilt, partisan politics, cults, and more combine to make the community into a powder keg that threatens to explode at the slightest provocation.

    Aster (Midsommar, Beau is Afraid) takes aim at all sides in a film that’s part satire and part thriller. No matter how each viewer reacted to the pandemic, the film offers at least a character or two that will come close to representing their viewpoint. Although opinions may differ, it seems clear that Aster is not portraying one side as “right” or more righteous than the other. What he is doing is demonstrating just how much was happening in a short period of time, and how those things could negatively affect anyone.

    On the flip side, the film also challenges viewers with viewpoints that may not match their own, which can make for an uncomfortable experience at times. The reactions various characters have to certain events range from rational to wholly unexpected, and Aster seems to delight in keeping the audience on their toes the entire time. This is especially true when violence rears its ugly head, resulting in some intense and upsetting scenes.

    Not everything in the film lands, though. A subplot involving Louise and Vernon (Austin Butler), a cult leader who preys on her fears, feels tacked on, with no relation to the film as a whole. In fact, the character of Louise is a misfire in general, one whose purpose makes little sense. Aster also lets (asks?) some actors speak in almost inaudible tones at various points in the film, a frustrating experience in a film as dialogue-heavy as this one.

    Phoenix loves to dig into off-kilter characters, and this one ranks high on that scale. Even if you don’t enjoy what his character does, it’s hard to fault the performance that brings him to life. Most of Pascal’s scenes are with Phoenix, and while he matches Phoenix’s energy, the lower key nature of his character leaves him overshadowed. The nature of the film means few others make an impact, although Deidre O’Connell as Joe’s passive-aggressive mother-in-law and William Belleau as Officer Jiminiz Butterfly stand out in their scenes.

    Few of us would volunteer to go back to the baffling days of early 2020, but Eddington does a great job of examining what was happening at the time and how events united some and divided others. It’s not a feel-good film, but it is one that will make viewers re-examine their reactions at the time and how those influenced the current reality.

    ---

    Eddington is now playing in theaters.

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