I’m not going to lie…. I’m totally excited! I wish they had their own TV show…

FIND OUT WHO IT IS!

Two new TV shows premiered last night. First, TLC’s highly promoted Sister Wives and second, CBS’s award-winning Amazing Race. I caught them both, let’s talk about them after the jump!

SPOILERS AHEAD!

First, I tuned into TLC’s new show, Sister Wives, which is a new reality show on a polygamist family living in Salt Lake City. With Big Love not airing right now, Sister Wives definitely fills that polygamist void. I have been fascinated with polygamy for a while (it started with Big Love, not gonna lie). I’ve read two books on polygamy, both from past sister wives (first was Favorite Wife, second was Shattered Dreams. I HIGHLY recommend both!). I was completely captivated by what it means to really be a sister wife. The books I read painted a VERY different picture than TLC’s new reality show. In the books I read, the women talked about how heartbreaking it is to be a sister wife. How lonely, and sad they really were.

That’s not the impression we got last night during the one hour premiere of Sister Wives. We meet Kody Brown, an advertising exec who has three wives. He is technically married to his first wife, Meri, but has two other “spiritual” wives, Janelle and Christine.

They look and act happy. Maybe they really are? I don’t know, I found the premiere to be very showy. Like – “See! Look how happy and in love we all are!” I found the most interesting part of the show came during the last couple minutes, when Kody Brown announced to his family that he was courting a fourth wife. You could see a little bit of that jealousy I was talking about earlier. I want to know what the wives REALLY think, and how they REALLY feel.

I thought it was awesome. I loved every minute of it – and I cannot wait for next week!! Tune in Sunday’s on TLC at 10:00PM!

Amazing Race was back last night for the season premiere with a whopping 11 million viewers!

Can I start off by saying – HOW IN THE WORLD IS AMAZING RACE NOT FILMED IN HD!? I mean for the love of peet, we get crap like (ok, I still watch it) in HD, and not Real WorldAmazing Race!? AR has won how many Emmys (answer: 8 – consecutively!). Eight Emmys and we still cannot film in HD? Annoying, that’s all I’m gonna say about that.

I love Amazing Race. Love it! So glad it’s back. It’s pure entertainment, as the video below shows. The video below has already been viewed on You Tube 10 million times. 10 million!!

In the video, contestant Claire Champlin gets slapped in the face by a flying watermelon. She spoke with EW about the incident:

“Honestly, I thought I was a lot more injured than I was, and then CBS gave me the go ahead (to continue),” says Champlin, who was particularly grateful that the medical staff was only seconds away. In fact, less than 15 minutes went by between the time Champlin was hurt and when she decided to resume the competition. ”If I was ever going to be hit by a watermelon, that was the place to be. The whole staff is top of the line, I was grateful they were right there by my side.”

“I just think it was a freak accident,” Champlin continued. “Everybody said if I tried to do it again, there is no possible way I could. I’m not even going to attempt it. I thought I was going to go down in history for so many other things. But if the watermelon is my claim to fame, I guess I’m just going to take it and run with it. A watermelon, it can’t hold me back.”

The former Big Brother 11 contestants and couple are back at it again on The Amazing Race 16, and not much has changed because she still can’t tell time. “There were moments like my asking what time we have to be there and her refusing to learn what ‘a quarter till’ is,” says Jeff Schroeder. “A third grader knows what ‘a quarter till’ is. Can you learn it? Maybe in the next couple of days?” And the two of them aren’t doing much on-camera canoodling. “We’re not being so lovey-dovey, which is what everybody wants us to be,” says Jordan Lloyd. “There was one point when I was mad at him and he was mad at me. He was ready to strangle me.”

The couple can’t give discuss specifics, though Lloyd recalls having some concerns about the show’s physical demands. “I don’t like to work out. Everybody knows that. If I work out one day, I want to see results and so yeah I was worried,” she says. “Though I was more so worried about having to eat a bug or something. I would rather Jeff eat a bug than me.” When asked if the two ever got hurt, Schroeder would only say, “We are in perfect health right now.”

And apparently, so is their relationship. Though the couple definitely had their share of spats on the course, Schroeder insists their bond remains strong. “To throw a couple into a stressful situation like this, you are going to see different sides to both people,” says Schroeder. “We definitely didn’t stray from who we are. We got along, we got through it and we’re still together. It made us stronger, I think.” And now their goal is to eventually end up in the same state. “This is the longest we’ve gone without being together,” says Schroeder. “One of us has to move … I’m not saying anyone’s getting engaged though, anything like that.”

Source

CBS announced the 11 returning teams for the next season of The Amazing Race on Tuesday morning, a group that includes only a single former winner: Joyce and Uchenna Agu, who took the million dollars home after Season 7. Among the interesting twists is the mixed team of Eric Sanchez and Danielle “Dee” Turner. Although they competed on separate teams in Season 9 (he finished second, while she was in seventh), they met and have been dating since soon after. The show debuts Feb. 18 at 8 p.m. ET.

How did Race challenge contestants who knew the drill? “We had to throw them curveball after curveball, because they all thought they knew what we were doing again,” Van Munster says. So the 45,000-mile, 28-day race, which ended Dec. 19, sent them “from extreme cold to extreme heat,” a desert in northern Chile to “borderline South Pole” in Antarctica. Despite producers’ all-star “reservations,” Van Munster says the season resulted in “a lot of friction right off the bat. … I’m confident we laid something on the table that will be very unexpected, and story-wise, there were plenty of fireworks.” 

GO HERE TO FIND OUT WHO MADE THE CUT!

11 TEAMS WILL BE: 

Names: Dustin Seltzer and Kandice Pelletier
Ages: both 25
Occupations: Former beauty queens, current students
Relationship: Best friends
Previous results: Season 10, 4th place

Names: Joe Baldassare and Bill Bartek (“Team Guido”)
Ages: 56, 53
Occupations: Owns Mineral Trading Company, Realtor
Relationship: Life Partners
Previous results: Season 1, 3rd place

Names: Kevin O’Connor and Drew Feinberg
Ages: 40, 41
Occupations: Forensic Accountant, Senior Court Officer
Relationship: Lifelong friends
Previous results: Season 1, 4th Place

Names: Ozwald Mendez and Danilo Jimenez (“Team Cha-Cha-Cha”)
Ages: 36, 41
Occupations: Advertising, Paralegal
Relationship: Best friends
Previous results: Season 2, 4th Place

Names: John Vito Pietanza and Jill Aquilino
Ages: 32, 29
Occupations: Trader, Product Controller
Relationship: Formerly dating
Previous results: Season 3, 5th Place

Names: Uchenna Agu and Joyce Agu
Ages: 42, 46
Occupations: Land Developer, Sales
Relationship: Married
Previous results: Season 7 winners

Names: David Conley, Jr. and Mary Conley
Ages: 33, 32
Occupations: Coal Miner, Homemaker
Relationship: Married
Previous results: Season 10, 6th Place

Names: Charla Baklayan Faddoul and Mirna Hindoyan
Ages: both 30
Occupations: Real Estate Investor, Attorney
Relationship: Cousins
Previous results: Season 5, 6th Place

Names: Rob Mariano and Amber Mariano
Ages: 30, 28
Occupations: TV Personalities
Relationship: Married
Previous results: Season 7, 2nd Place

Names: Teri Pollack and Ian Pollack
Ages: 53, 54
Occupations: Homemaker, Private Investigator
Relationship: Married parents
Previous results: Season 3, 2nd Place

Names: Eric Sanchez and Danielle Turner
Ages: 28, 23
Occupations: Waiter, Bartender
Relationship: Dating
Previous results: Season 9, 2nd Place and 7th Place