All-Star Cast Analysis: Season 2

A normal season of Top Shot has sixteen contestants. I was hoping for this season that would mean four contestants from each season, but unfortunately that did not turn out to be the case. Seasons 1 and 4 are each represented with five contestants, while Seasons 2 and 3 each shore up three. This distribution could prove interesting when it comes to seeing where loyalties lie as numbers begin to dwindle. Today I'll walk through what to expect from the Season 2 contestants.

Season 2

Jamie Franks
Unjustly maligned by his fellow competitors in Season 2, it will be interesting to see how Franks fits into the dynamic of this all-star cast. His performance could go one of two ways based on the perception his new competition has of him. He will either gel with the rest of the cast, easing his stress and improving his performance, or his experience with elimination challenges will paint a target on his back to get him out early. Either way I expect to see a very different Jamie Franks than the one of Season 2.

Joe Serafini
Serafini has a laid back personality that embodies everything this show should be about. He just wants to come out and test his mettle through some shooting contests. Although, this personality though may lend itself better to team play than individual competition. Finishing fourth in Season 2 means he's no slouch when it comes to shooting, but this season leaves a lot of questions about how the lone wolf approach is going to affect contestants' mental games.

Brian Zins
Zins was put in a tough spot during the Season 2 finale. He had to sit by and watch as the person he believed he would be going up against in the final contest decided to change the game and let Chris Reed take his spot (more or less, I could debate what really happened in that challenge forever if I had to, but I'm going to try and stay focused on the present). Zins gets to wipe the slate clean and begin working his way up from the bottom again. Whether or not he has what it takes to get to reach the final stage again remains to be seen.

I would rather see: George Reinas and Jay Lim. Part of the issue with this all-star season is the lack of personality. This is a television show, and shows need characters. Not only were Jay and George great shots, they made the show fun to watch each week. Keep an eye on how this season is edited, and compare the personalities from the contestants' original season to the current one. 

Come back tomorrow for a look at who is showing up from Season 3. 

Tony's Take: Top Shot Season 2

Tony continues to work his way through Top Shot on Netflix, this time sharing his thoughts on Season 2.

What it is, yo?  I’d first like to wish the happiest of Mondays to TCG’s legions of readers around the globe.  Then I’d like to bring four hours of pain to your early-afternoon reading time. I’ve never been a believer in Monday being a hard day. Monday Night Raw is on Mondays. Monday Night Football is on Mondays. Domino’s has that sweet three-topping carryout deal for $8 on Mondays. On top of that it’s easy to carry on a conversation without giving a crap just by asking what that person did over their weekend. It’s the easiest day of the week in my book. However, since I started watching Season 4 of Top Shot I’ve noticed my left eye starts twitching and I interject nervous laughter and panic screams into conversation by about 3 p.m. on Mondays. I’ve got a Top Shot jones worse than Charles Barkley in Space Jam. I have to assume I’m not the only one who feels that way, so here’s hoping this post will calm your symptoms a little bit so you can be a functional member of society for another 24 hours.

Similar to my critically acclaimed Season 1 recap, this Season 2 recap just goes over my favorite contestants and what I viewed to be the key moments of the season.

My 3 Heroes

Jay Lim seemed to be the star of Season 2 immediately. On first impression everything about him made me want to cheer for him in this competition. The competitors all seemed to be elite military shooters (who ended up dominating the season… spoiler alert) or elite competitive shooters. Then in walks Jay Lim – golf instructor. It wasn’t until later on in the season that I realized he was also an Olympic qualifier as an archer. However, by that point he seemed to be already established as the underdog. This season essentially boiled down to military vs. civilians, and the perceived tension between Jay and George seemed to be the most tangible example of the chasm. It is very clear that Jay is an instructor, as he gave willing advice on nearly every weapon whenever his team was practicing. Unfortunately that seemed to rub people in the house the wrong way, leading to an exceptionally entertaining conversation between Jay and the Red Team’s Chris Reed (“You just tried to tell Gunny how to butter his toast”). It seemed like Jay was always on the chopping block for one reason or another, but he showed his versatility coming through time and time again. He ended up being the last civilian remaining amongst a cast filled with highly trained military members. I still haven’t seen Season 3 yet, but of Seasons 1, 2 and 4 Jay has to be the most intriguing (and polarizing) character of the bunch.  He was the face of Season 2, and even though he finished 7 out of 16, there is no way the season would have been as entertaining without him.

George Reinas was the contestant that appeared to get the short end of the stick when the show’s editing came into play. He is definitely the most outspoken contestant I’ve seen, and his willingness to put his opinions bluntly gave the show some talking heads that may have rubbed fans the wrong way. Despite George seemingly trying to play the role of the villain on the show it was apparent that he got along with most of the house members, and especially his teammates. For some weird reason I always am intrigued by the characters’ farewells to their teammates when they get eliminated from the show. The interaction between one member who just suffered a humbling blow to their ego and another member who is one step closer to victory is some real-life drama that is best left unscripted. While most characters shake hands softly and exchange two word pleasantries, George seemed to master the 5-second bear hug despite never having to even consider what life would be like after elimination. There was just something interesting about the sympathy he showed the other members of the household, and that finally shone through when he blew the shot to let Chris Reed stay alive in the competition. On top of that all, if you don’t think that hitting the first shot from 1,000 yards away is the most bad-ass thing caught on camera then you can shut up.

Chris Reed is everything right with the competition, and everything wrong with the show. There’s something inspiring about a guy winning when he seems like he just climbed out of a deer stand and wandered onto the show. There’s something heart-warming about the $100,000 prize going toward his daughter’s education. However, we never heard that Chris Reed required brain surgery not too long ago.  Even after hearing it I’m still a little hazy towards the details of his situation. That seems like a detail that might be important enough to mention sometime in the first 10 episodes. If the producers of the show knew Chris Reed won before the first episode aired, perhaps it’s a wise idea to involve his activities in the house in some aspect over the course of the season so the fans can start rooting for him before the last episode. I understood he was a calm, likable presence in the house but it wasn’t really until George threw away his chance at victory just so Chris would win that we realized how beloved Chris is. He was largely ignored during the season. This leads to the biggest problem I have with the show. When half the show is dedicated to the losing team’s process for choosing who they eliminate, the characters who are the early fan-favorites are inherently going to be eliminated within the first five episodes.  The same thing occurred during Season 4. The blue team seemed to have my favorite personalities, but after Terry and Dylan were eliminated I’m down to about two shooters who I’m cheering for to win just because the red team is such a mystery to me. I don’t know how to fix this problem, but I guess the point is that Chris Reed was an amazing contestant and Top Shot blew their ability to have him receive the most exposure.

3 Zany Moments That Made Me Wonder What The Hell’s Going On?

Tommy Gun: This moment wasn’t necessarily important in terms of the progress of the season. It was an early challenge between two contestants whom I never really believed had any chance at winning the competition. However the imagery of Athena holding that huge frickin’ gun was worth the price of admission. It was also something of a sad practice. There’s no way she could handle that thing. There’s no way I could handle that thing. This world class shooter looked like a child when shooting that ridiculous thing. I’ve cheered every season for the women to compete valiantly, but it’s challenges like this one that just make the competition seem to be unfairly skewed against women. The gun looked to be about half her size, and it was apparent that she’d be eliminated when she struggled to simply grip the gun. While it was extremely entertaining watching her spray all over the course and pray to precisely hit the target in a perfect line, it was also sort of painful to watch. It was apparent that for a female contestant to perform admirably in that challenge she’d have to be built like Chyna from Degeneration X in the 1990s. (second pro wrestling reference of the day. Note it!)

The Entirety of the Third Episode: I wouldn’t question a person’s toughness for dropping out or forfeiting based on injury for any sport. I especially wouldn’t do it when talking about people who can shoot a gun sufficiently. However, I was really confused when John quit the way that he did. He put his team at a huge disadvantage by walking away before the competition. I understand he wouldn’t be able to move the way History Channel wanted him to (which leads me to believe there was some outside pressure for him to formally quit rather than sabotage the competition), but if I’m in his shoes why not just talk with the team and basically plan on losing. He could have walked through the competition, and missed his shots in the elimination challenge to make sure he was the only red member eliminated. Instead he put a teammate at risk by quitting before, putting the team at a disadvantage.   The team would have certainly lost too if Jermaine didn’t do the most boneheaded thing I’ve seen in the show’s history.

Jermaine’s gaffe really deserves its own paragraph. I’ve done a lot of really dumb things in my life. I’m not going to claim to be intelligent. I just don’t understand how Jermaine could have done it twice in a matter of minutes. Jermaine was supposed to wait with the gun after hitting the target in order for his teammates to take the gun from him and go to the next station.  Instead he ran off with the gun himself. He couldn’t hear his teammates yelling at him to come back, so he wasted what seemed to be 20 seconds just running with the gun on his own. That would be understandable if he didn’t do it again 5 minutes later. My memory is a little hazy, but if I recall correctly he wasn’t even involved in the action the second time it happened. One of the stupidest sports moments in NFL history is when Jim Marshall returned a fumble to the wrong endzone for a safety for the other team. Jermaine made a mistake of similar magnitude the first time around, but the second time would have been like if Jim Marshall ran off the sidelines to intercept a pass and return it to the wrong endzone in the next quarter. He wasted near a minute of time total, and considering the competition came down to the wire at the end there is almost no doubt the blue team would have won without that mistake. It would have changed the course of the show. Blue team would have been up seven contestants to five, which means the blue team would have had to rattle off five straight victories in order to have the same resulting individual competitors. Because Jermaine was one of the stronger shooters in the competition, it seems unlikely that the red team would have achieved that. In an alternate universe Jay Lim may well have been the most unlikely winner of Top Shot ever, and the only difference could have been Jermaine’s critical error on this episode

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GEORGE PULLED THE SHOT: This was the most shocking moment of the entire series to me. I don’t even know what to say about it anymore, so I’ll just keep it short. I knew George was a good guy, but I’d have never thought he would do something that drastic. He was the strongest shooter all season and with his long distance skill he had a very clear advantage when it got to the final seven-station challenge. Instead he chose to just punt it so Chris would win. Bravo to George for making a huge decision based on what he thought was right, but it seemed insane at the time and the shock still hasn’t worn off.

Season 2 was my favorite so far, and I left out a lot of really good action and really good contestants. In the time it took to read this blog post you probably could have just watched the entire season on Netflix. Oh well, some people require words to learn I guess. I don’t really know any concluding sentiments to end this post with, so I’m just going to stop typing and hope it’s sufficient.

And so it is, follow Tony on Twitter @thREALtonybader

Top Shot Recap: S4 E9 "The Longest Shot"

I learned two things while watching last night's episode of Top Shot:

1. It is very important that if you are watching the encore episode that airs at 11/10 central, that you do not change the channel to History until 10:01 p.m., otherwise you end up seeing who was eliminated and ruining the entire episode.

2. While it is fun to watch Top Shot with a large group of friends, they sometimes talk over the contestants, making it difficult to follow everything that happened.

I bring this up because this recap, at least as I am planning it right now in my head as I simultaneously write this line, may be a little bare-bones. Not to worry, all the important stuff is here, but it probably isn't as in depth as either of us would like.

We begin, as we always do, with the return of Littlejohn and the nailing of poor Terry Vaughan's plaque on the bulls eye board (it still stings...), this time, thankfully, sans friendship speech.

This was followed by the reveal of this season's hidden plotline, the unexpected, but I would not say unwelcome, flirtatious relationship between Chee Kwan and Gabby Franco. Most of the focus this season has focused on red as a team, so there hasn't been much room for individual plot points, as there was with the divided blue team. It was an odd choice to throw in at this point of the competition, but I'll talk more about that tomorrow.

At the practice range Colby kept the surprises coming. Not only were the contestants informed that they had made it into the individual portion of the competition, they also found out they would be going from British weapons, to serious long range rifles, namely the Accuracy International AX338. To top it off,  they would be helped by two of Top Shot's most famous riflemen, Season 1's Kelly Bachand, and Season 2's George Reinas. We also learned that Littlejohn and Reinas had been stationed in Iraq together for six months (fun facts are the best facts!). Franco seemed to have the best handle on the gun, shooting a tight row from the top of the target down to the bulls eye.

The first individual challenge would feature the longest shot in Top Shot history. Using the Accuracy International, contestants would fire at a thirty inch target, 1500 yards down range. It's a distance that is skewed by the cameras, until contestants started popping off shots. The wait between the trigger pull and seeing the dust cloud was excruciatingly long. Shooters would go up one by one; the shooter who took the longest amount of time to hit the target would be automatically eliminated, shooters 1-4 would be safe, and shooters 5-7 would be up for elimination.

It was a tough episode to gauge how well contestants were doing, the amount of time it took a shot to travel down range, coupled with the editing of the episode, pretty much made it impossible to know how a shooter did until Colby read off the time.

I won't go through who shot what exactly, you can watch that for yourself, if you haven't already, and just skip to the end. By the time it got down to the final three shooters, one thing was for certain, Chris Cheng was either going to be out of the contest or be up for elimination. Then Franco came up and lost whatever magic she had found on the range, taking well over two minutes to hit the target, and putting her at the bottom of the pile. Kwan was the final shooter, and as each contestant was asked to step away until it was their turn to shoot he had no idea where everyone else was in the challenge. He went up and took his shot, but in turn he eliminated Franco from the competition. There was an emotional goodbye between the two, with Kwan tearing up during his one-on-one.

With Franco gone, there was still a decision to make about who to nominate for elimination. The bottom three consisted of Cheng, Kyle Sumpter and William Bethards. It appeared as though Sumpter wanted to continue the team meeting strategy by deciding who would be in the challenge before the going to the nomination range. While he seemed pretty set on having himself and Cheng be in the elimination because they were the two worst shooters, Cheng wasn't convinced this was the best strategy.

The nomination range started out on an even keel with votes going to Cheng and Sumpter. Cheng then seemed to be feeling the influence of two his former teammates, namely Tim Trefren and Sumpter. Bethards made a few comments on the range that rubbed Cheng the wrong way, much in the same way his own comments had rubbed Trefren the wrong way. And much like Sumpter, who threw his teammates a curveball when he decided not to vote for Kwan to go up against Cheng in the atlatl challenge, Cheng decided he was going to throw his own curveball by voting for Bethards. Cheng was in with three votes, but his competitor was tied between Sumpter and Bethards with two votes apiece. This season implemented a new tie-breaking strategy. Instead of drawing a bullet out of an ammo box, the tied competitors would take aim at a target, the closest shot to the bulls eye would be safe from elimination. Bethards went first, and Mr. Hey Diddle Diddle couldn't quite hit the middle, shooting just above and to the right of the bulls eye, leaving just enough room for Sumpter to sneak in and stay out of the elimination challenge.

Bethards and Cheng were introduced to the Henry rifle...not much else to say really except more George and Kelly, woo!

The elimination challenge featured five targets placed at progressively farther distances down range.  Each target had two metal rings and a center bulls eye. Using the Henry rifle, Cheng and Bethards would have to hit all three rings on each target before moving onto the next one, however they could hit the rings of the individual target in any order. Bethards got out to an early lead that he hung onto to for most of the challenge, with Cheng trying desperately to keep pace next to him. But then... something happened, and I'm not quite sure how to describe it because I don't really understand it. By all accounts, Bethards was going to run away with this challenge, but then he had trouble with the mechanics of the weapon, unintentionally shooting of  two shots while he worked the lever of the rifle. This small error seemed enough to let Cheng regain his footing and tie up the challenge. In the end, a hard fought victory was handed over to Cheng, and Bethards was sent packing.

What did you think of last night's episode? How would you feel about a Top Shot style dating show where instead of roses, the bachelor or bachelorette shot the targets of the suitors they wanted to send home? Glad  Bethards went home, or would you have rather seen Mr. Van Helsing get staked?

Come back tomorrow for my breakdown of "The Longest Shot" where we'll have some fun with the Kwan Franco flirtation.

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