Starry-Eyed

Watched the first episode and all the stuff with the teens is super wholesome and cute, and makes me wish this a vacation experience I could book. The story stuff without them seems rather overwritten and melodramatic, but hopefully that will lessen now that we know the premise. I find the royal family pretty obnoxious right now (minus the king from the beginning)

And the real actual scoop on whether Carolyn threatened FN with legal action over the whole timer incident or what

Obviously, we as the audience understand Colin meant because he doesn't see her romantically (which of course is what Penelope is primarily hurt by) but his words are VERY poorly judged in general for a time when women lived and died by their reputation, and mostly needed to marry SOMEONE to have a decent life. How many of the men he was talking to heard "Colin sees Penelope as a sister" and not "Colin, scion of the influential Bridgerton family, does not see Penelope Featherington as worthy of marriage"?

I think what a lot of people, including Eloise, haven't considered about Pen/LW's "betrayal" in the second season is what would have happened if Pen WASN'T LW? Eloise is angry about LW revealing her outings to the print shop, and acts as though no one would have found out if Pen didn't betray her confidence... but the Queen already knew about them. Pen also didn't cause that situation at all, and even tried on multiple occasions to stop Eloise from going. If LW had been a rando who did not know or care about Eloise and the Queen suspecting her, and so doesn't write something calculated to be too damning to be self-resported but not damning enough to actually ruin Eloise, then this is what happens in my view: Eloise tries to pass herself off as Whistledown to the Queen, possibly even publishing a column announcing that she is Whistledown. This inevitably fails when the real LW writes a response. The Queen becomes infuriated, taking her rage at being foiled by LW once again and mixing it with justifiable outrage at Eloise lying to her queen (aaaawfully close to actual treason), and retaliates at Eloise and her family. There is absolutely zero chance in this scenario that the Queen keeps Eloise's real scandalous secret of visiting the print shop. The BEST case that Eloise can hope for is that the Queen makes that public and people draw their own conclusions - which will mostly be harsher that the interpretation Pen as LW puts on them. The worst case is that Eloise is charged with an actual crime against the crown. The somewhere in between that is most likely is that the Queen actively works against the entire Bridgerton family. Anthony and Daphne, already holding their titles, one male and the other married, can probably whether the storm in a a decade or so. The younger brothers MIGHT recover in time if the Bridgertons make smart recovery choices. All the futures of the unmarried daughters are completely destroyed. Did Pen do the kindest, most ethical thing for her best friend? Absolutely not. The real kind, selfless thing to do would have been to unmask herself. But the only reason that option was even on the table is because LW WAS Eloise's best friend. Can you imagine someone like Madame Delacroix or Lady Danbury even considering subjecting themselves to that to rescue Eloise out of her own mess? Let alone someone actually mean-spirited like Cressida Cowper. Pen had a choice. She could do absolutely nothing and let her best friend destroy her own life and that of her whole family. She could sacrifice her own future - her reputation, her hard-won financial security, the only outlet that makes her feel seen and worthwhile - to fix a problem she had nothing to do with the making of. Or she could find a middle road that caused the person who created the situation to suffer, but to suffer much less than she could have done.

There was a show by the same name and concept that was on Netflix a few years back. I really enjoyed it, and I'm glad to see it coming back. Casting teenagers is an interesting choice

I was really confused in this episode why Rachel's card didn't work when she was attempting to pay for scammy house tour. There wasn't any indication that Anna had been using Rachel's card... was she just already so low on funds that it was declined?

When they announced the challenge, I was really surprised, because a float cake sounds like a semi-finals or finals challenge with a lot of time given so the bakers can do fine details. Maybe the reason the judges didn't focus much on the decorating was because they realized the whole concept was a half-baked idea.

I think I could deal with how over-the-top perky Molly is if it didn't feel like the show revolved around her. I know it's always a bit jarring whenever there's a new host or judge, but none of the previous hosts were this intrusive to my memory. Their names weren't plastered on the title cards, they didn't have multi-minute intro clips played for their first episode, their likes and backgrounds were practically never relevant to the episode's challenge. Even the previous ones that weren't my favorite weren't that hard to ignore. But the show seems to be pushing Molly SO HARD. It all seems more about her than about the judges or the contestants we've barely gotten a chance to know.

I was confident they weren't going to eliminate Ellora when Lucia had struggled in previous weeks, but she still had an off week, and I do think she deserved to be in bottom two. It was a hard week because everyone did a pretty good job and no one did a runaway amazing job. I agree that I probably would have picked Summer's over Sarah's, but Sarah definitely had more striking looking stripes. There's also a big difference between straining blackberry seeds - an absolute must - and straining raspberry seeds - most people would prefer it, but there's an argument either way. Summer's cake was the cutest on the outside, imo, though. I actually really liked the stylized zebra face they called a panda - it looked like a cute, minimalist zebra to me.

Just because everyone did a good job, though. Bad flavor combinations are usually not judged as harshly as technical errors in KBC. I think the judges realize that few kids have the flavor palate of an adult and don't have the experience to judge how everything will go, so they are more forgiving of weird mishmashes of flavor when everything is prepared correctly. It was just a good week for everyone, so smaller mistakes were the deciding factor. It actually seemed like the judges were considering not eliminating anyone. I would have actually loved that, even if they had to send two kids home next week, Now that Ben's gone, I am really enjoying the group of kids.

Totally agree that Joseph seemed in trouble, but I just love him so much I was really glad he squeaked through. He definitely needs to step it up next round, though. It's so nice when they have these simpler challenges and the kids bring their own creativity and spin to it. The twist was a good one, too.

That was EXACTLY what I assumed they were referencing when I first saw the scene.

Oh, I wasn't in any way trying to imply that a kid who cries over losing is a bad loser or has been poorly parented. I think that's completely appropriate and fine. Heck, crying over a math worksheet can be normal and appropriate at that age. I was more trying to say that it's ultimately the parents' responsibility to evaluate whether their child can handle something like that, and as long as the producers aren't exploitative, it's not really their fault that losing on tv might be hard for kids. Yeah, I think Val and Duff only step in when it's clear the kid can't really handle it on their own. When the kid is coping fine or other kid contestants are helping, they usually don't.

Ideally, their parents wouldn't allow them to be in a televised competition like this unless they'd already done a fair bit of learning how to be a graceful loser and move on instead of being crushed by defeat... but the world is unfortunately not full of ideal parenting.

If Ava-Leigh had flipped her cake halves like she intended, it wouldn't have been beautiful and perfectly sculpted,(or even close to some of the actual competent cakes like Ellora's) but it would have been recognizably a butterfly. Both their cakes had other problems, but was not flipping the cake halves REALLY a bigger error than pouring a fourth of a cup of sanding sugar on top on that mess?

I HAVE to believe that the producers ordered them to keep Ben around, because there is no other justification. He is the kind of obnoxious that people who don't deal much with kids think is "cute" and "funny" at first, but is really just bratty, disrespectful, and irritating.

She went out of her way to make it Christmassy, though, by putting the little santa hats on the bees. I felt like it had a good balance of uniqueness while still being clearly for Christmas and not some other occassion. Just plain generic holiday trappings that everyone uses get old after a while

The actress did a fine job, but the writing was all over the place on her (as it usually is on Hallmark child characters). She has a singer-songwriter arc like an older teen character (which fits her casting), but she wants to play with toys like a 9 - 10 year old and suggests her aunt get married to a man she's not even dating like a 1st or 2nd grader might

Wish I had taken the time to read this. Oh, this movie made me SO mad! The guy was absolutely ridiculous for all the reasons you said.

I didn't think she was that bad in Santa Stakeout, but I agree she tends to rub me the wrong way for some reason. It was the guy who turned me off in that one, though. He was so obnoxious I didn't get why she would ever fall for him.

A Kiss Before Christmas was SO good! I was legitimately blown away by how enjoyable the movie was and how charming the two leads were. It was held back by it's Hallmark-y-ness a bit (are they really "just getting by" when they live in such a nice home?), but I both laughed and cried at times. It was genuinely touching and very well done.

Our kitchen gets decorated. Maybe not to the nines the way on some Hallmark movies, but nutcrackers (my aunt used to send us nutcrackers every year and now we all have loads) get set up on top of the cupboards, a poinsetta goes behind the sink, and usually there's either a little Nativity scene or a snowglobe or some other decorative knick-knacks on the sill of the kitchen window. All pretty far away from oven and stove, and I don't think kitchen smells have ever been a problem.

She's also in Once Upon a Christmas Miracle, which is a super-favorite of mine ever since it aired two or three years ago. I thought she and the dad really carried this movie, which was a mixed bag of some really charming and genuine moments and the usual Hallmark Christmas schlock.

I love that one. I try to catch it every Christmas. There's just something about it that seems much more natural and less contrived than most.

Yeah, I was amazed by the gift of the car, too. I kinda got the vibe that maybe the production company actually arranged and paid for the "gift" though