rozen

Yup, she complained constantly that she never saw the "real" Chad Michaels.

Michelle always finds something to latch on to and ride a queen the whole season with. What good does it do to nail someone every week for something they can't change? She verges on actively sabotaging some of these girls, there are so many that spent an inordinate amount of time jumping through hoops to get her off their backs that they screw up something else. How hilarious is it that she uses Chad Michaels as her shining example when she was all over him his season? Derrick probably won't break for the same reason as Chad, their reputation as professionals is much more important than giving Michelle her treasured "raw and real" moment. Willam's response to her haranguing is still my favorite, he trolled Michelle so hard. People who are Very Competent and Unique will always clash when they have to work together. I totally expected Bob, Betty, and Thorgy to clash and also turn it out, which they did. So Bob and Thorgy are the true Alphas of the NY crew, interesting *strokes chins*. Chicken Wings were GREAT! Kim Chi always gives 100%, I love it. I also love Naomi Smalls is showing all those ultra-Fish "I don't perform" supermodel queens how it's done. She will go so far. I am loving how much camaraderie there is amongst the queens this season. They are almost all confident in themselves, and there's none of the petty fragility that's plagued prior seasons. Maybe it'll get worse as the numbers dwindle, but for now I'm loving it!

Sooo, after ruining everything with her blabby mouth, Laurel feels entitled to demand that Frank divulge even more information about Lila's murder? Sorry not sorry, he had full rights to backhand her across the room, imo. I think Nate and Annalise are better together than Annalise and Eve. They are all amoral people, but Nate still has some lines he won't cross, and shows at least some awareness of the lives he's crushing, even if he proceeds to do it anyway. Eve is never phased by anything, she only expresses annoyance if she perceives the risk associated with the action as being too high. I think if Annalise stayed with Eve they would be glorious and heartless together, but what little remains of her soul would be snuffed out. I could see Nate willingly going back to visit Annalise's family, I think Eve would think the experience was cute and then never show up again until the next major funeral. Can someone just shoot Wes? He's snotty entitlement is astounding, as his utter disregard for everyone around him. He may never have met Daddy Warbucks, but clearly the family sociopathy runs in him nevertheless. I need to remember to buy popcorn for the episode Connor finds out what Oliver did. 'Cause shit's gonna go down.

I suspect because they're still trying to figure out what The Black Sky actually does.

The church's reach wasn't nearly that long back then, anyway. I think we're still within the time range where rulers regularly had multiple wives, with the previous one kind of being quietly shuffled off to the side. Aslaug hasn't been shown to be very proficient at anything other than having boys and epic RBF, so I don't know why she's on the "burn everything" train. Her solution to a strong-willed dude who doesn't listen to her is...to make googly eyes at another king-in-the-making who also won't listen to her? She's willing to overthrow her husband and disinherit her kids so she can have more power? She literally makes no sense to me right now. I guess that's the difference between her and Lagertha, she wants to be a legend and Lagertha wants to leave a legacy. Speaking of, man is Lagertha going to red eagle everyone on that holding once she finds out what happened with Bjorn. I half expect Kalf will murder Harald's son just to buy himself some time. You know everyone in that room was wondering what exactly he had done that he was willing to have Bjorn come take his wife right in front of his face without a fight. I'm kind of tired of the trope that female slave is immediately dtf the second overlord capriciously decides to give her "freedom". Hey dude who participated in the economic system that encourages wholesale slaughter and pillaging of innocent people, you left me penniless and with literally no means of returning to what I call home, you're so hot!

Pretty sure that was Joe. He spotted that she was not ok and was dogged about getting her help, ignoring the fact she was telling him not to (and slurring her words, another indicator she needed help pronto). This was entirely production's fault. They should have been hovering over every contestant and enforcing breaks when the challenge kept dragging on. Contestants should not have to be their own health advocate, or fight for each other to get proper medical attention. Debbie may have the constitution of 10000 horses, but she's still older. If they'd let her keep on like Caleb and Cydney she would have gone down harder and may never have bounced back. Peter's an ass, but I can so see him analyzing how stupidly set up the whole business was and deciding he didn't want even an inkling of liability. I doubt anyone was at full brain capacity at that point anyway. I swear there was a shot of the doctor rolling his eyes at Jeff's incessant prattling that they couldn't cut away from fast enough. Uh, he's trying to save lives dude, stfu for five minutes and dub back over it later! Caleb was going way too hard on every challenge and is exactly the kind of person who will find a way to injure themselves. He was always miles ahead of everyone else, even for challenges where everyone needed to be there for him to do anything. It sucks he had to go out like that, but I won't miss him. Looking at him made my skin crawl, especially combined with so many people still fawning over him for being pretty and ignoring the fact he's a psycho stalker. Ugh, Jason/Kyle and Scott are The Worst. Alecia pls cover yourself in ashes and curse them, Servilia of the Junii-style. They deserve it. May they taste only ashes. Ugh.

So much nerdy awesomeness this season, this is going to be great. Man, I wish Katya had been cast in this season, I think she was have benefited from queens who may have better understood the kind of kooky looks she favors and helped course correct her when necessary. Dying for Dax as Storm. Insta-fan of Kim Chi for that cowardly lion couture. Derrick's screwed, I think. Michelle is going to ride him all season for "looking like Britney" when he will probably be no more or less versatile than the standard issue pageant queens they issue every season...or Courtney Act for that matter. Between the show and Untucked, Bob seems like Bianca 2.0 in personality. I really liked his idea to critique the safe girls while they were waiting backstage. Getting feedback, any feedback, that can help you is a great idea. Chi Chi is adorable, I hope she manages despite lack of wardrobe. Didn't think much of Laila until that lip sync. I thought she killed it. Naysha did look exactly like the hip soccer mom.

I just can't bring myself to root for Claire, I really can't. If in the past three seasons she had shown some competence at advanced politicking, I would be down for her puppet-master routine. But she hasn't, she hasn't been successful at anything the entire show. And she just keeps burning the house down because she'll happily be queen of the ashes. And now Meechum's dead. Doug is totally going to snap and try to murder her before the season's out, I bet. He looked so enraged at the final press conference.

Is this supposed to make me root for Claire? Swooping down to bully a black woman out of her own freaking district so she can screw that up too? With her heinous mother making it clear that their family is All About Class and proud of it? Claire won't do a damn thing for the constituents of that district, she'll crush them and sell them as meat pies if it gives her a step up the ladder. Yea, no, she can go pound sand with her privileged and entitled bullshit.

I know it's not popular, but...I kind of don't blame Rollo in this instance? I mean, I hate his guts regardless. But the minute Earik (sp) made his report, I immediately thought "he's lying" and that most, if not all, of the camp was pro-Ragnar. And the rest would never really see their fellow Vikings as "traitors" and would turn on Rollo for executing them. At that point, clean sweep was the best option. I mean, Rollo's still dumb because he should have been separating them from each other with fiefs so they'd get drunk on the idea of being able to eat without pounding the food out of the earth with their bloody fists. And be less able to sit and brood with each other. Looks like he went gallivanting off to his fancy castle and left them holed up in the dirt with some loot, for all the good that was going to do them. How were they even eating? Poaching? Who was going engage in trade with them so they could get basic supplies?

If Aslaug wants to freaking rule solo, a lot worse is going to happen to her than a few slaps to the face when she goes Ur Asshole on someone. She might as well consider them practice licks and move on. The actress was really awesome in that scene, because you could see the exact moment she decided to go pompous windbag, and her whole face transformed into some sort of giant serpentress. It was terrifying. It kind of made her tales of supernatural ancestry believable, because she legitimately did not look human right up until Ragnar smacked her. I don't think Aslaug is ever going to get it. She keeps fixating on Ragnar's jealousy as the cause of his standoffishness when it's really the fact she endangered every one of the sons Ragnar upended his whole life to obtain. I imagine admitting to herself she happily consigned her children to death just to get laid would break Aslaug, so she'll never deal with the truth. She'll just keep slithering along, raging about how unjust the whole world is to her. I mean, it makes sense that Queen Kwenthrith has some moves, because no one survives as long as she has by just slipping poison in wine bottles. But cotdamn, she went all Bourne Identity on those guards. There is no way she's going to get the awesome ending she deserves, but I'll enjoy watching her try to claw her way towards it. Aethelwulf is going to straight up murder every one of those council members once Ecbert's dead. I find it unbelievable that none of the nobles have any inkling that Aethelwulf is 1) a legitimate warrior and 2) a little insane. At least a few of them would be in the know and trying to ingratiate themselves with him. Poor Judith. She's going to learn just enough of the game to get herself killed, and Ecbert will be giggling inside the entire time.

Sousa has eons more experience in stealth and subterfuge than Jason/Howard/Jarvis. I expect the teamwork of SSR agents is also superior to anything other combinations could pull off. That's one of the things I adore about The Americans, the whole point of spying is for no one to ever notice something's awry. If they do, you're screwed already. Imo, for this mission Super Spy Training >>>>>>>>> able-bodied amateur Judo proficiency. Especially because Whitney could just annihilate every breathing thing within a mile of the house if she were truly worried, running's not going to save anyone. When Wilkes described Zero Matter as a disease, I immediately thought of that infection that drives animals to throw themselves in front of their natural predators to be eaten, and pass along the parasite (fungus? can't remember). I think at that point, Dark Matter had 99% of Whitney's brain capacity focused on opening a rift for it to get through, I don't think there was any room left for common sense, or self-preservation. That, and she's had her intellect squashed all her life and was laying eyes on her creation that can created a stable trans-dimensional rift! She's just proven she's the best scientist in human history! Can't blame her for giving 0 craps about anything else around her. Funny (not) that Manfredi destroyed Whitney's whole world to recover a woman that never existed in the first place. All his descriptions of her sound like her mother when she was desperate to be supported, not true Whitney, who cared more about dismantling radios and working through math equations than human companionship. I think she fell back on him after killing Cal because she realized she needed muscle, no matter how much stronger Dark Matter had made her. If the Council had been even a little more prepared, Cal may have gotten the better of her and killed her, that shook her. I think Cal actually understood her best, he realized Dark Matter Frost was just her true self behind the mask, and immediately moved to eliminate it. I did not like that ending. They have characterized Thompson as being way to squirrely and untrusting to just throw open a door without even looking through the key hole. He's that guy who always has a pistol out and an eye darting to every corner. Especially because he *had to know* there were bigger fish than Vernon furious at his behavior. Have mysterious shooter roll in through the window, at least.

Pretty much. They've done a semi-decent job of showing some of the hurdles women faced because The Patriarchy, but have this weird bozo time-travel world with regards to race relations. Every time Carter and Wilkes make googly eyes at each other and no one bats an eye is laughable. Being ordered to smile was pretty much an every day occurrence the entirety of my adolescence, so this episode underestimated the sleaze factor to me. It would be totally ahistorical, but I was dying for Frost to respond at least once by holding her mouth in a smile using her middle fingers, Abi and Illana style. I love how Frost made sure she could reliably control her powers before staging a coup for command within her marriage. Of course, since her husband's an idiot, he'll probably try to knock her down to steal black matter to inject himself with. It's confusing to me that the council would have even bothered to include him, as it's pretty obvious the brains of the operation were elsewhere, and it appears they made no effort to work with Whitney behind her husband's back.

People who donate regularly aren't really the ones you're trying to snag with these events. It's people who otherwise wouldn't donate at all. It has to provide some value to them, and if run efficiently (can't say anything about this one in particular), it brings in way more than it costs. Your getting an invite is a bonus, basically. Should everyone donate as much as they can to help others without such things? Yea sure. It would also help to have a progressive tax structure and social programs to support such people whether the general population is feeling charitable or not, but thems the breaks.

How else are they supposed to fundraise? Events like this are much more efficient at extracting dollars than everyone standing around morosely watching a tragic documentary. I've run dinners like this, and the whole point is to overcharge the crap out of everyone, which is doubtless what happened here. The $6K they spent buying the food is probably a drop in the bucket compared to the proceeds brought in. If Top Chef weren't contractually obligated to Whole Foods, the price tag probably would have been even lower. A big stupid meaaaaaaaaat dinner where the cooking is rustic, and basic niceties are forgone is great penny pinching while fooling everyone into thinking they're having The Best Time Ever. I thought it was a great idea. I fail to see how giggling Padma was more obnoxious than Hugh literally taking her pork chop and chucking it into the next table. Or smug McOffal Face from Top Chef Masters snarking up a storm. I feel silly, because I always thought of pansy as a gendered slur, not a homophobic one. Though they're often related, so makes sense.

He's obnoxious, but I don't find his confusion unreasonable. Presumably, he's been cooking this way for a while, and those flavor profiles were consistently praised and rewarded by other successful chefs, to the point where he's won two other cooking competitions. Yea, I would be pretty confused to sailing into competition number three and not just have the newest batch judges quibble with my dishes, but actively shit on pretty much every element of them week after week. I'd feel like I was going crazy. At this point, competing in other shows is probably more of a hindrance than a help to him. Considering how much a studio costs in the trendy part of CA, no doubt his tv show winnings don't even make a dent in his rent and utilities bill. He's a hipster M Volt, makes good food but needs that extra sparkle to get butts in the seats.Angelina has been sacrificed just as production wanted. George challenging Gregory just made me roll my eyes, but for some reason I kind of respected Angelina deciding to go compete against one of the better chefs. If you're going to lose, lose to the best kind of thing. I have so much respect for Marjorie after that elimination challenge. How many times has "oh, I didn't set the pressure cooker/braiser/whatever properly" been the absolute death knell of a dish? And all that happened was she made a delicious dish with no beer flavor in it. I'm impressed by that. Go go, Kwame the genius prodigy. It'll be interesting to see how he takes it when he is put in the bottom because of something he actively did, rather than being tied down by a weaker teammate. Or maybe he'll go undefeated, we shall see. The judges were all kind of disgusting when pooh-poohing Catalan cuisine. Watch Catalan-Western fusion become the new thing and they'll all pretend they loved soft-on-soft textures. There are ways to say you didn't enjoy a dish without insulting an entire culture. Argue with the interpretation, not the validity of the food itself.

I felt bad for Karen. She seems like someone who is very systematic and needs to get "in the zone" when cooking, which is completely undone with Giselle yapping every two seconds "did I cut these too big, too small? Should I put more foil over the veggies?" She was clearly psyching herself out more and more every time Giselle did her passive aggressive "Well...ok. No no, it's fine." Probably even worse that she was surrounded by other chefs acting like adults, thoughtfully tasting and editing each other's dishes. And she's stuck with Chef Are These Diced Finely Enough Giselle. I would go nuts. Kwame was so star struck, it's hilarious. So happy to see he's quite the prodigy, laughed at Art Smith dangling out that potential job opportunity. And Wes going "man, let me be Sous at least." Glad the other contestants spoke up as Philip was very much trying to shove Kwame under the bus, probably feeling ok with it because they certainly wouldn't eliminate the guy they just gave the win to? Chrissy (sp?) and Isaac seemed like a failed attempt at passing the snark ball. You know? Sometimes you think someone is of your snark tribe and you engage them too early, only to find out they thought you were insane and just answered honestly and you look like an asshole. I bet if you caught Isaac off camera and asked that you'd get an absolutely filthy and hilarious response, but he was too camera-aware to engage. If the horror stories of how high-end kitchens run are true, I bet the older contestants tolerate Angelina because having that kind of bruiser personality may be what's necessary to stand up for herself in the kitchen. She can cook well, what she put out during the Quickfire was well-received. She doesn't have the repertoire and knowledge-base the other chefs do, that makes her less flexible and without a portfolio of dishes that have been worked on for years (if not decades). And John had his underpants all the way twisted round because he was high on his win and overcompensating. Angelina was just trying to engage the attendees and describe the food in a way they would understand and was fun. He could have communicated with her about not saying that when Tom showed up instead of being a total asshole about it.

Because Kylo Ren is a force user in turmoil. My impression is the whole point of The Sith was to channel their emotions to purpose. Every time Kylo was faced with an obstacle, he acted out petulantly, violently...and unproductively. His precision was impeccable when he was calm, which (imo) is kind of indicative that he should have be a light side force user in the first place. There's nothing that's going to mess with your emotions than murdering your own father and having his last action be to stroke your face in a sign of affection instead of hurling outrage at you. And having your alien uncle immediately shoot you in the leg and try to blow you up. His character is one clearly filled with inner turmoil and self-doubt, which makes Rey his natural enemy. He was at his weakest and Rey was at his strongest, so I found his loss believable. Snok (sp?) has clearly trained Kylo enough to get the job done, but not well enough that he can't be eliminated when necessary.

I dunno, I couldn't get that mad because Angelina's main issues (imho) appear to be A) not moderating herself for the camera and B) not having the mouthy fire power to deal with someone like Giselle. I was fairly irritated with Giselle just listening to her snide talking heads about Angelina during the quickfire, and her stupid pleased smirky face when the critics weren't happy with Angelina's dish during the main challenge. Dude, Blais can stfu with his "2 hrs is forever on Top Chef" critique. He complained every time and always looked like he'd stuck his finger in an electrical socket, no matter how much time he had. Omg, Wesley is just foul on every level. Watching those people have to eat his food after watching him spit bits everywhere, wipe implements on his filthy chef's jacket, etc etc is just too much.

There are plenty of scenes where Jessica's nose is lit up like Rudolph, she's slurring her words, and being cruelly flippant. Imo, sober Jessica uses cruelty like a sharp poke to keep people well away and safe. When I perceived her character as drunk, she hurts people for control and for fun. It's what made Killgrave's scene with the illusions of grandeur neighbor so scary to me. Jessica fully uninhibited would enjoy that very much and seek it out, I think. K & J would have been a terrifying duo if she gave into her messed up inclinations that weren't that deep below the surface. I expect that why Killgrave liked her so much. She was his Harley Quinn, he just never managed to break the outer shell to get at her guts.

Grayson's choice was so strange to me. Other chefs who've said they cook homey/traditional/rustic food have always had something unique to make the dish pop, even if it's an echo of some other traditional dish.Even if she'd executed it perfectly, it would have been so boring for a "show us who you are" type cooking challenge. I think she confuses staying true to herself with being stagnant. I don't think I'm going to like healthy, approachable perky chef, but damn if she didn't break down those chickens like a boss. People that perky and self-aware are a hair's breath away from coming full circle and being just sarcastic, I forsee her needling a bunch of people. Interesting the judges like the sous chef's dish, but the trendy food critics put her in the bottom (along with every other woman). At least she had immunity. It was kind of dumb to put the chicken in the oven with no hint for The Pig, but Wesley was also stupid for not checking it. There are only so many places your protein could have wandered off to, especially 10 min out from plating. Ugh, I know I've probably eaten delicious food cooked by equally filthy people, but his sloppiness was just so foul. I don't think I could have brought myself to try to food after seeing that spoon hanging out of his mouth. Man Bun is cocky, but appears to know his business, so carry on. I liked Garrett for sniping at Isabella, but he deserved to be axed if for nothing else than not saving the best bits for the judges. Top Chef has been on long enough that everyone should know that by now. Contestants have won despite enraging the crowd by cooking/serving too slowly, but making sure the judges's portions were perfect. No one's ever won screwing up the judging dishes, but pleasing the crowd.

I dunno, I fully expect for it to come around as a test for the Widow's daughter and Sunny, both. I bet the Widow was watching through some peephole, and the fact her daughter refused to cut him tells her all she needs to know. The Baron was giving Sunny all kinds of side-eye when he desperately requested to take Super-Saiyan Whinyface as a Colt. He's probably just giving Sunny enough rope for him to figure out what's going on and snatch the prize for himself. The daughter A) doesn't know what her parents did so her rage is futile and B) Sunny hasn't been exactly subtle about meeting up with her so she's probably leverage for whenever The Baron discovers Sunny's secret. I'm not hooked yet, but I love the fight scenes. Which is exactly how I felt about Spartacus until episode four or five, so I'm still down.

Now I seriously wonder if in a Bonnie-free multiverse whether Wes would have hunted down and killed Rebecca when she'd inevitably dumped him. Dude's completely unhinged, way worse than that stalker billionaire husband from last week.

Well, she's "special", so I imagine she was better able to resist, and therefore required Kilgrave to exert more control over her. I imagine his mind control was like poison, she was blasted with such a high dose for so long that she eventually built up the defenses to resist and leave him to die. Maybe the amount of effort to re-capture her mind in the first place is now way too high.

Sorry, not seeing the hidden greatness of Spencer this go round. I find it humorous that he unwittingly had half his ass out the door, only for Kass to come save him, and he still manages to give a snarky and condescending confessional about her. How about showing some gratitude that you go bailed out for no good reason, again? Tasha has been on the bottom, but she's hustled like a freaking champ, and gets half the screen time. I don't really like Kass's character, but she was smart to decide eviscerating Savage's new ties as quickly as possible was paramount. He is not the kind of guy you want going into merge with various alliance options. Also, gg Ciera and Kass for reading the Abi/Woo fracture and capitalizing on it. They've shown how much Abi hates Woo's guts for weeks, I didn't find it necessary for them to spell out why the vote went the way it did. Kaos Kass is irritating, but I've come to accept that it's actually kind of better to play that kind of obnoxious game, or unhinged like Abi, if you're a personality that's going to be on the bottom anyway. Its better to be the nuts, prospective goat, swing vote than running scared at the bottom of the alliance every week. People have shown that position can actually be quite profitable (e.g. last blood vs water where the swing votes extracted rewards from every new alliance). Savage clearly underestimated how much grunt work Tasha was putting in to keep Abi on-task, and thought those two would just be grateful to nestle under his Just-For-Men auburn wings. How shocking...not. I think he and Jeremy are going to blow up on merge, he seemed extra tweaked this episode when Jeremy just edged him out for both challenges. Bro love only goes so far when you realize the other guy doesn't realize he's supposed to be play at being a slightly-inferior-but-still-besties. Good on Jeremy for letting Adonis Joe take the heat while he quietly sheds weight, revealing more abs than I thought possible on one human torso. Val, I see why you put up with his histrionics, girl, damn. Has Keith even had a confessional this season? He's just going to coast to nothingness again, isn't he?