And just like that, both #1 seeds get a first round exit. When was the last time this happened? I'm not surprised to see the Titans lose. They weren't really a deserving #1 seed. They have a talented defense, but Ryan Tannehill sucks in the playoffs and Derrick Henry was not 100% healthy. I'm actually surprised to see the Packers lose though. The 49ers barely sneaked into the playoffs and are a pretty beat up team. I guess Rodgers' couldn't overcome his winless record against the 49ers in playoffs.

As a Raven fan, I personally don't mind the Bengals advanced to AFCCG. I used to hate them 5 or so years ago, but now that Andy Dalton and AJ Green is gone, I don't mind them too much... yet. I definitely want to see the Bills be the AFC representative this year.

Now we just need the Bucs and Chiefs to lose for the perfect playoff match-ups in a long time.

LOL @ the NFC East. Can we please ban this division from the league? Not only are we subjected to their prime time games every year, but they are a waste of a playoff spot. I'm not surprised to see Cowboys lose at all. 

It looks like the AFCDS is set:

Bengals @ Titans
Bills @ Chiefs

I think the Bengals can beat the Titans if Derrick Henry is not playing. I really hope the Chiefs don't make it to the Super Bowl again. The Bills already beat the Chiefs this season, but I don't think KC falls twice to the Bills in one season. I hope I'm wrong though.

I have a feeling we will have a Packers vs. Chiefs Super Bowl like PP319 predicted. 

So, I finally watched the entire Pearl Necklace of Rama episode. This is first episode of the Reboot that I've watched all the way through. My thoughts on the Reboot and every round of the episode are below. Overall, this was a pretty enjoyable episode and has motivated me to watch the previous episodes. I do have some complaints about the new format of the show which I will list below:

- Moat: Interesting decision to reduce the number of teams from 6 to 4 in the moat round. Not that it matters, since 2 teams ultimately make it to the temple games anyways. It does kind of suck not all 6 teams are present at once. I like how the moat in the Reboot involves a more extensive type of challenge instead of simply having two players trying to make it across without falling in. I always found the moat round in the original show to be uninteresting. I also like how teams receive an introduction, whereas in the OG it was just during the temple games. Although the constant cutting away to get the contestants' commentary might get annoying after watching the show for a while.

The moat round in this episode was pretty entertaining. The Orange Iguanas and Blue Barracudas were neck-and-neck. The Silver Snakes struggled pretty bad with trying to stay afloat. I liked the introduction for Nick and Josh and the flashback to the original show. Although they could've done better with the flashback instead of post a couple of Nick GAS screenshots.  Josh looks like the same in the face from his original episode, but I would've never guessed that was Nick. I guess not wearing his glasses makes him look like a different person. I wonder if they known each other for a long time? Maybe Nick was the one that got Josh interested in competing on the OG show?

- SOK: Not much has changed about this round. It looks like they are sticking with a cartoony artstyle for the stories. I do like how they kept the original chime for the SOK. Since this show is geared towards an older audience, they can get away with more violence in the legends. Orange Iguanas and Blue Barracudas pretty much dominated this round. LOL @ Nick frantically trying to step on the step markings in order to chime in. 

- Temple Games: I'm not a fan of this format of temple games. The teams are pretty much guaranteed to go to the temple with 2 Pendants. In the original show, the more Pendants that you earned meant the more likely you will be safe for all 3 guards. With this new format, the third temple guard is essentially worthless.

- Temple Run: I will admit that I had some major doubts about the temple, but the temple looks great so far. I like the objectives for all the new rooms featured in this episode. It will take some time to get use to them though. I also like how they brought back some old rooms like the Pit of Despair, Dark Forest, and of course the iconic Shrine. I also like the "just assemble the damn monkey" line by Olmec during the temple rundown. It made me chuckle.  The temple runner's contestant POV angle is a nice addition too. I do wish they kept the temple run theme from the original show.

As for the temple run in this episode, I agree with PP319 that Kirk was to blame for Josh and Nick losing. Was there a reason to interrupt the temple run for the Kirk cameo? They could've at least halted the clock while Nick and Josh were talking to Kirk. What if Nick and Josh never made it to the temple? How would they treat Kirk's cameo then? Although Nick wasting time in the Pit of Despair trying to open the door directly leading to the artifact did waste some time. You should know better, Nick. 

Overall, this was a good episode and it was nice seeing a couple of former contestant's return to the Reboot. I liked how Nick knows that he's famous among the fanbase for his jump out of the temple.  I hope they feature more former contestants in future episodes.

I don't think Kristen's weight had anything to do with her performance. She just wasn't really an athletic person. The talent pool in Season 1 was pretty bad too and the producers pretty much allowed any contestant that signed up for the show to compete. That's why you see moat rejects from earlier episodes appear again on the last episode of each production day in Season 1. Kristen and Jim were even moat rejects from the Geronimo episode. I feel that most of the comments about Kristen's weight are supposed to be tongue-in-cheek comments and not taken seriously. Monica from Bifocal Monocle was skinny, but she struggled immensely in climbing the wall in the Pit of the Pendulum. Also, Garrett from Mata Hari is another contestant that received comments about his weight as welll. But he did a pretty good job in the temple except the Holes of Python (which caused a lot of contestants trouble).

Quote from: The Mandarin Hand on November 03, 2021, 04:39:46 PM

Who cares about that shit?

Kirk's coming back.

Let's not ignore this detail, too  :

Quote

Fogg’s appearance on Sunday will also mark another reunion, as this week’s episode will feature contestants who first appeared on the original ’90s Nickelodeon version of the show.

Obviously no idea who, but it'll certainly be neat seeing some OG contestants again (and hopefully they limited it to only those who made it to the temple).

Wow, that's awesome! I really haven't had a chance yet to watch the 2021 version yet, but I will definitely watch the Sunday episode to see who the former contestant will be along with Kirk Fogg's return. I know there was a winning team from the David Ruprecht era of Supermarket Sweep that returned to compete on the Leslie Jones version of Supermarket Sweep last year.

I think Season 2 is probably liked the most due to being the most balanced season. No particular team really dominated this season (unlike Red Jaguars/Silver Snaks in Season 1 and Green Monkeys in Season 3) and the temple rooms were changed up a reasonable amount of times. Most of the likable rooms and temple games were also introduced during this season and were later brought back to Season 3. I don't have any issues with this season except for the stuff you mentioned. I wasn't a fan of the dubbed over temple runs. Especially when all the great runs had this terrible dubbing (Nose Ring, Priceless Portrait, Billy the Kid, and Lucky Pillow).

Season 1 had too many bad teams and temple runs. The temple layouts were either piss easy or extremely difficult. The temple was also changed too many times and more than half of the rooms were lame. The talent pool in this season was pretty bad, but it's too be expected since the entire season was taped before being aired. Kirk Fogg was also pretty boring this season as well, mostly because he was narrating too many of the rounds. One of the best decisions of Season 2 was give Olmec more narrating responsibilities. There were a handful of great episodes in Season 1, but overall this was the weakest season.

Season 3 was great and improved on Season 2 in some ways. I wasn't really a fan of how the temple remained static for all 40 episodes. They could've switched some of the temple rooms up like the Tomb of the Headless Kings and Pit of the Pendulum. There were too many hard layouts and too much Green Monkeys domination. The talent pool this season was amazing though.

I really hope no one thinks the criticism towards temple runners equates to their real life IQ. Most of the criticism I've seen is towards the contestants' temple performance rather than them personally. Admittedly, some of the comments towards contestants over the years have been harsh. Especially towards John and Tia. In fact, I found an article a couple years ago written by Sabrina for her company about her experience on the show. She seems to know that her episode is ridiculed a lot by the fanbase. As for temple runners feeling bullied, I doubt most of them care too much about their temple performance. Most of the contestants are in their late 30s/early 40s now. A lot of them found their experience on the show to be awkward (like Nick from Great Seal and Keeli from Stone Marker) and probably laugh about it. Also, some of the comments towards their temple performance is more tongue-in-cheek and shouldn't be taken seriously.

https://www.merkleinc.com/blog/what-legends-hidden-temple-taught-me-about-analytics-solution-design

Good find! I definitely agree that Shea from Get the Picture is the same one from the Great Seal episode. It looks like we've been spelling her name wrong all these years. Speaking of the spelling of her name, the iTunes store description for the Great Seal episode also spells her name as "Shea". So I definitely think they are one and the same.