whirlingdervish
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Posts posted by whirlingdervish
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On the premiere night, I thought that the woman was largely sidelined not because she was a woman, but because she was a weak panelist. She really bungled her stat (really? 93-94% of black people kill other black people? Are you sure that's what you mean?), and I think glossing over that and moving on was really the only way to handle that if Larry wasn't going to straight up call her out on that. I've only seen the one episode so far, but I'd bet my bippy that Kathleen Madigan and Soledad O'Brien ain't getting ignored.
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I have to respectfully disagree. If she couldn't tell the difference between the two then she shouldn't have been there to begin with. I'm not a chef and I know the difference. I see it everything Thanksgiving with the turkey. I doubt Vanessa is that weak when after her "breakdown" she was laughing at how her strategy saved her. If Vanessa was that weak she should not have been in the competition but that was her game plan to play the weak card. The team is throwing me under the bus, they are mean to me, etc. Her weakness in the second round showed when Anthony wasn't there to help her and it was someone else failing worse that saved her. Anthony saved her several times and her waterworks were a given after every challenge. Why else would people mention it on the show and in posts.
Sure, I can see that. I don't necessarily think that getting flustered and flurried in that kind of pressure cooker situation is a sign of weakness, personally...when I commented earlier, I was thinking of a couple of people I work with who would have completely gotten flustered in that situation, especially if they hadn't been able to get centered first. I don't think of either of these coworkers as being weak--I respect the hell out of them and they're near and dear to me--but I could definitely see one of them getting to that place. The other one would probably just shut down. Also, I know that I've sometimes said head-slappingly nonsensical things in fast, high-stakes pressure situations that later I think, "Dag, that was ridiculous"....so I tend to cut others a lot of slack in this area. Not saying that's where Vanessa's headspace was, but saying that I could understand it if that's the case.
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3.. Not knowing a chicken neck from a chicken liver? Was she just overwrought and having a mental breakdown?
I think it was actually a chicken heart and a chicken liver [ETA: Since I wrote this post, I've been corrected that it was both a chicken neck and a chicken heart that she grabbed, thanks!]...and I'm inclined to give her a break on that one since her mind was in a million places and she had people shouting at her while she was trying to concentrate. That's tough on anyone, and Vanessa looks like the kind of person who needs a little bit of quiet headspace to focus--which she didn't get beforehand, since Jen was shouting at her and demanding that Vanessa gear up for a taste-off the way Jen would. BE LIKE ME!!! BE LIKE MEEE!! WHY AREN'T YOU DOING WHAT I WOULD DO??? ARRRRRRRRRRR! Damn, Jen. Not everyone is you. [Thank God.]
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Seriously, Erik should not take his Taste-off win as any kind of validation for his cooking or his worthiness of being there. All he proved was that he can follow instructions...and that Benjamin knows how to put a recipe together.
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Getting a little tired of the asshole thief being the answer to the problem of the week based on his intrinsic assholishness.
Or at least dial it down a notch with the consummate, unrelenting assholery.
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Does Bourdain have an unfair advantage with the guest judges like Symon and Rippert (and some others as well)? He has shared so many meals with these guys through the years and absolutely knows what they do and don't like and can guide his team accordingly.
I've never had dinner with Symon and I knew that he's a "big egg slut" and likes pasta...I figure if I can pick up stuff like that from seeing him on the odd cooking show, four professional chefs on a TV show who know he's coming on for the NYE challenge can do a little research and figure it out. All the chefs who've come on so far as mentors are well known, with well known ideas about food. You've just got to be familiar with what they are, and target that accordingly (I'm looking at you, NIGELLA).
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PK showed a lot of class. I think it was pretty clear as she walked through the kitchen that she was pretty pissed, though (quietly pissed, but still pissed). Did you see how fast those cuts/edits were when she was in the kitchen getting ready to leave? Kinda looks like they had to patch it together. Heh.
I would have been pissed, too, and I was deeply impressed with her keeping it cool in response to Nigella's ridiculous feedback to let her passion roar. Definitely points for class and restraint.
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You know, I wonder if Nigella has just gone up a size, and didn't quite realize it until she's now seen the video back? That happened to me this year, and I just HATE photos and video of myself. Ugh! I kinda feel for her, because she really is a betty, but just needs one size up. Or, it could be that her stuff is more-or-less the right size, but it's pulling in unflattering ways because of the mic pack and stuff she's got to wear.
I think I missed why Dan was spared the Taste Off...can anyone please remind me? Having said that, I do think it was Natasha's time to go. Didn't Ludo discreetly spit her food out during the team challenge?
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I am not in love with any of the monickers. My suggestion would be "Nigella Bites" based on the title of her book.
I love this.
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Nigella has a philosophy that food is to be enjoyed with family and friends. The problem is that she is sitting as a mentor to a team that has to compete with judges who hold different ideas about food (not saying good or bad, but different).
Yes, plus she has to please the palates of guest mentors whose ideas about food are closer to those of her colleagues. To make things worse, Nigella doesn't often try to please the tastes of those guest mentors/judges when she's dictating what her team cooks for the team challenge. Instead, she says thinks like [paraphrasing here] 'I know that Naomi is a savory chef, but holidays are about baking and desserts so that's what I'm going to do.' Then she pretty much dictates what her cheflettes should make, so instead of four different spoons to choose from (like the other mentors have), she has two or three versions of the one dish she let them make. She's coming from a different perspective, doesn't consider her target audience, and then limits her available options...of course she's going to lose more than she wins. I'm surprised that she's surprised when she loses.
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I dunno, I agree there is a lot of emotionally-fueled questionable judgment, but I think Clark shows an impressive level of analysis and problem-solving skills--especially given that she's a teenager thrust into a series of seriously extreme situations, starting with being shot down to earth to live or die with 99 other jailbird teenagers who've all spent their lives in space. She's certainly doing better than I would in that situation, and I'm a grown ass woman.
While she does have her special snowflake qualities like a lot of YA protagonists, I wouldn't say she's as much of a Mary Sue as, say, Bella [special blood and general schmoopiness], or Tris [divergent], or Rose ["shadow-kissed"]. To me Clark's "specialness" is not because of who or what she is, but because the skills she has and the way she works to process and influence the world around her. And I really dig that.
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I prefer seasons 1 - 5, too, for a lot of the same reasons as everyone else. I kinda wish we could have had a season with Fin AND Jeffreys....that one interchange those two characters had (Jeffreys was on her way off the squad and met Fin, who was there to replace her) so made me wish there could be more! I would have totally watched a show with Munch, Cassidy, Jeffreys and Fin: Four SVU detectives getting the job done while taking turns rolling their eyes at each other and breaking into heated discussions about privilege or Munch's latest conspiracy theory. Every so often, Benson and Stabler would dramatically sweep into the office getting waaay to invested in each other and taking! everything! personally! The other four sit quietly at their desks, keeping a low profile, eating their Chinese takeout, and looking at each other all "WTF with these two?" Then once Benson and Stabler swept out of the squadroom on their hurricane of angst, the others go back to good-naturedly giving each other grief and solving rape cases (with Munch and Jeffries having to pause every so often to explain a deviant behavior to Fin or coach Cassidy on how to say "vagina" without blushing).
Uhhh...sorry. I might have gotten carried away there. I definitely prefer the early seasonsThe Benson and Stabler drama overwhelmed the series for me in the midseasons, especially once I didn't have Alex Cabot to distract me from the soapiness of it all.
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The second I saw Stephen King as one of the authors, I thought "Whoever takes that one is going home."
I know Katsuji wasn't going to win, but I feel he got a little screwed here by 1) reeeeeally putting the author's book visually on the plate as instructed; 2) the judges' reluctance to part with Gregory; 3) George's unfortunate immunity in this challenge . So because of that, the guy who really totally embraced the challenge goes home over two chefs who half-assed the theme on the challenge. Boo.
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I thought that whole spacewalk thing was dumb when every crime on the Ark is punishable by death. Aw, it's so romantic, giving your girlfriend a gift she could die for! And I guess losing three months of oxygen ended up killing a bunch of extra people down the road, too. If they were trying to paint Finn in a noble, sympathetic light, I didn't quite feel it.
Agreed. It did, though, paint really clearly why Raven felt like she owed Finn her life, and why she was ready to save him at all costs, and I thought the flashbacks were really effective from that front.
I'm really enjoying how we get to see that no one wears a halo in this show, and everyone's got some darkness in them. I have to keep telling myself that sometimes, because good lord, some of these characters seriously grate with their innate sense of privilege.
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I miss Josh.
Color me confused as to what the entire purpose of the first tattooing was for, other than to send Cleen to the finale, which . . DUH. Mark's tattoo was hideous and he did not follow orders, so to speak, but had absolutely no ramifications for it. Excuse me? He didn't get a verbal ass whipping, he wasn't told to pack his machine. Just ridiculous.
My guess is that they had originally planned to send the top two straight to the finale, with the bottom two facing off in a head-to-head tattoo...and they just didn't have a clear-cut 2nd place tattoo.
I really hated this idea that a Japanese pin-up HAS to be a hackneyed geisha (or, for that matter, this idea that any Japanese woman in a kimono is automatically a geisha, JASON). There's lots of beautiful Japanese imagery of beautiful women in various states of dress without trafficking in that geisha stereotype. Learn a little about the culture in whose art you claim to specialize, bro. Or, at the very least, if you're going to traffic in stereotype, at least to a good job of it...that thing had not one ounce of sensuality or charm...it looked like my obaasan wiping her mouth with the sleeve of her kimono after eating an overly ripe persimmon.
As far as the finale, I would much rather the finalists just get to do their very best full-back tattoo interpretation of something a client asks for, like they did on Best Ink. Let's see these artists at their best, already. Gawd knows we've seen plenty of their worst.
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I was Team Lindsey all the way in that Nigella vs. Lindsey situation. Yeah, her comments were a bit much when she was called to talk about her teammates, but I think she had clearly had it by this point. The other mentors are encouraging the chefs to think for themselves and put their own spin on things, and then Nigella comes down on Lindsey because she wants to make miso nabe with monkfish instead of clams. What? Not only is that pretty common (example, this nice recipe for misonabe with monkfish here), but Nigella shot it down in such a snide and disrespectful way, like it was baffling that she should do such a thing. And then Nigella made is so clear in her voice and body language throughout the cook that she did. not. like. Lindsey. And so Lindsey shuts her out and gets bottled up until she finally has an opportunity to vent. What does Nigella expect? I have to mentor adults in my field all the time, and I can't imagine expecting anyone to learn--or even want to learn-- if I treated grown-ass professional adults like that. No one learns when they feel belittled and disrespected. No one. They're too busy stewing and hating you to learn anything except that they hate you and they hate the thing you're telling them to do. I really think Nigella reaped what she sowed there.
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I would love it if they did away with tattooers assigning the human canvasses; it seems to really set those canvasses up for potentially terrible tattoos. I could also do with a good deal less petty pissy bitchery.
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I get rules are rules, and liability must be huge for the show in terms of potentially allowing someone under the influence tattooing people. And yet...so many hissyfits and clutching of the pearls! I'm surprised someone didn't gasp, "Well, I nevah!" and faint dead away. The whiny horror of the contestants over the matter was just so OTT ridiculous, and so transparent. What a bunch of whiny little punks.
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The bestest thing about Richard and Padma being paired together was that Gail and Tom were positively a breath of fresh air afterwards. I don't think I've ever looked forward to seeing Tom in a challenge so much.
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Happens more than you think. I know two couples where both spouses have the same name. For one of them, they hyphenated their names when they got married, so they use their middle initials to differentiate themselves. So for me, the Kevin-Kevin thing was pretty charming, since it rang true to me.
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I'm just imagining the rude awakening the Chuck Wagon folks would have if they won, and then went back to Texas and tried to serve fish for $40 and bland quesadillas for $15. HAH. Good luck with that, pardner.
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Graham's keeping crazy AshLee makes sense once he was sure that Michelle was safe. Assuming the women are handing out roses next week, Michelle will be safe. AshLee is 100% keeping Graham next week. So they're both guaranteed to make it to at least "week" 3.
If that's the reason Graham gave AshLee the rose, then it's really too bad that he didn't know how many women were actually interested before AshLee peed on him. With AshLee out of the picture, Graham would have probably done just fine next week. Otherwise, this rose ceremony was the best way to get AshLee out of his hair right from the beginning...He doesn't give AshLee the rose, it's a guarantee none of the other guys are going to give AshLee a rose, because she's a) cray, and b) obsessed with Graham, so then AshLee leaves. Done! That was a real opportunity wasted, just to get a bye to week 3. Especially when you know that the first three weeks are going to be a misery anyway.
Edit to Add: Uhh, okay, now I don't know what to think. Legit or no? If so, then it's sad the way it played out. Bachelor in Paradise: Which Former Contestant Did Graham Bunn Join the Cast to Meet? http://okmagazine.com/get-scoop/ok-originals/bachelor-in-paradise-graham-bunn-interview/
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You know, I thought that, too, for a bit. But then I think about how Bananas has gone to all of these places I've never seen, and done things (like climb a volcano) that I'm not gonna do, and I figure...hey, if you want to structure your life like that, and you're happy doing it, and you're good at it, more power to you. Especially if you can be smart enough to manage and maybe invest your winnings so you can have money to live off of down the road. I mean, his winnings from this season alone is my annual income a few times over, and he only worked what? A month or so? While I'm working pretty much 24-7-365. So hey, maybe he's got something going over me after all. :-)
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S26.E03: Love Sick
in The Challenge
I had the same set of thoughts. On the one hand, I've watched television before, so I know what hubris in Act I means...on the other hand, if Sarah can play this close to the chest and keep level, she could pull it off. The X-factor to me is her wild-card partner. What happens when Jordan gets mouthy, or his ego starts rampaging? I could see this plan busting up because Jordan spills the beans and goes down in flames (or just pisses off too many people and then goes down in flames). Sarah has been annoying sometimes in the past, but at the end of the day, it's never Sarah that's the problem in any of her teams.