The Amazing Race is actually a pretty good watch for Survivor fans

The Amazing Race and Survivor might not be the exact same show, but there’s more appeal than just seeing the same people on each.

Over the past week, yours truly has been looking at the shared history ofSurvivorandThe Amazing Racein terms of the four people who have played on both shows:Rob and Amber Mariano, andNatalie and Nadiya Anderson. In those articles, I recommended that you watch those two teams’ first appearances onTAR, because their second appearances were both during all-star seasons.

You see,Survivoris not unique among the CBS reality shows for bringing people back for a repeat appearance. It might not even be the most obnoxious about it, since that’s an argument thatBig Brothercan also make. How many seasons has Jessie Godderz made a cameo on in a row?

But enough ofBig Brother. That’s going to beDaniel George’s purview, not mine. This is aboutThe Amazing Race, and where it might appeal to aSurvivorfan.

LikeSurvivor,TARoften ends up showing people at their worst. Granted, they’re traveling around the world, stuck with the same person, have to do tasks like bungee jump or milk animals or other things, and also in a competition for a million dollars. The pressure’s high! It’s not the exact same as living on a beach for 39 days with periodic bursts of strategy, but the idea of “putting normal people under stress by virtue of being in an unfamiliar situation” is right there inTAR, too.

More fromSurviving Tribal

• Survivor winners: Ranking all 42 Sole Survivors by season
• Survivor Season 42: Way too early power rankings
• Survivor Season 42 is coming in 2022 (find out what we know so far)
• Survivor Season 41 episode 12 power rankings
• Survivor Season 41 episode 11 power rankings

Of course, there are also opportunities for strategy, as I’ve mentioned in my discussions of both Natalie and Nadiya as well as Rob and Amber’s time on theRace. They’re not the only ones, either; if you look, you can find strategy in almost every season, even if it just boils down to helping one team you like versus not helping another team at all. There’s less room for alliances inThe Amazing Race, but they certainly exist. A good social game can keep a team not good at tasks around. A good social game is also a boost for a strong team, though, in that they’re less likely to be the targets of things like the U-Turn, which forces them to complete two tasks to everyone else’s one.

However, physicality plays a bigger role inTARthan it usually does inSurvivor. InTAR, having the ability to outrun another team or quickly get through a physical task means that you can help build up a lead. It’s not the most consistent need, probably coming second to quick thinking (and some familiarity with countries also doesn’t hurt), but it does matter.

InSurvivor, it’s possible to engineer it so that you don’t have to win individual challenges or be particularly good at them to make it to the end. It helps immensely, but it doesn’t need to be done. Sandra Diaz-Twine didn’t win an individual challenge in either of her winning seasons, and yet she’s the only two-time winner.

Finally, though, the two shows share some excellent cinematography. Whether it’s the gorgeous beaches of Fiji on recentSurvivorseasons or Seoul, South Korea at night inThe Amazing Race‘s most recently completed season, these shows are just pretty to look at.

Next: Big Brother 19: Pre-show notes from a Survivor fan's perspective

Much likeSurvivor, your best bets for watchingTARincludeAmazon PrimeandHulu. It appearsCBS All Accessonly has the most recent season.

But if you ever grow tired of the beach (but not people competing for money),The Amazing Raceis a great watch.

Add us as a preferred source onGoogle

Follow