S17.E03: Strokes of Genius

[JTMacc99]

On 4/2/2020 at 11:17 PM, anniebird said:

If Kevin had joined a different group she would still have been on the bottom so his immunity didn't affect her at all- Kevin could only affect the best of the group, not the worst.

When she was going on about how it was Kevin's fault she was on the bottom, it brought back to the front of my mind one of my Top Chef truths (according to JTMacc99, you can make up your own Top Chef truths):

• Top Chef Truth: Sometimes super talented chefs get eliminated well before their time because they don't understand the competition side of it. And the flip side is also true: Sometimes less talented chefs last well longer than they should, because they are very good at playing the game.

So, in this case, having the chef with immunity join your group could ONLY have a material impact on who was going to be considered for the winning dish. That is the one difference between having that chef in your group or not having a chef in your group. Every group had a worst dish (excluding any immune chefs.) Only one group had to worry about having an immune chef having taking away the win.

NOW, had this been a team competition where the entire losing team was up for elimination, that's an entirely different scenario. Because in that case, if an immune chef shows up and makes turds on toast, directly contributing to a team loss, and then the second worst dish goes home... that's when having the immune chef in your group makes a difference to the bottom person.

Karen is an excellent chef. If she lets herself get caught up emotionally in the game without even understanding how it works, she's going to find herself going home before she should.

[Macbeth]

On 4/3/2020 at 3:54 PM, biakbiak said:

Malarkey got fired and replaced by Marcus Samuelson on that show so I wouldn’t use that as an example of how successful he is.

Yea that's what I thought at first when he mentioned he was on the Taste.  But he was replaced by Marcus who is in a completely different sphere of a famous chef.  

The show was cancelled after 3 seasons and they brought in a chef with more name recognition.  I don't think of that as failing. 

[Macbeth]

6 hours ago, seltzer3 said:

 

Also, glad that Melissa won this challenge, total vengence for her past sucky elimination.

For those of you guys that didn't remember.  Top Chef Boston had a F4 elimination challenge.  The challenge was to be paired up with an artist, and visually represent (color/shape) of their artwork.  All of the other chefs got paired artists who were pretty straightforward.  Like this.

 

Melissa, on the other hand?  Got paired up with this aloof artist, who liked to paint abstract things, as well as bright blue and bright pink (which doesn't exist in natural food).  The artist didn't even seem to understand that he was supposed to collaborate with Melissa.

So to the surprise of no one, Melissa gets criticized by the judges for her food not replicating the artist(she made a tortellini, lol).  Then gets eliminated in probably one of the most bull**** ways, because there is no real way of her replicating this artwork .  Which is saying a lot with a lot of messed up results on Top Chef.

 

This is why I am on Team Melissa.

[Fostersmom]

On 4/3/2020 at 3:17 PM, cameron said:

Might be the only one here, but I do find Ludo to be one attractive man minus the arm tats, and facial piercings.

He’s very attractive. I don’t mind the tats, but the nose ring did throw me for a loop. 

[Lois Sandborne]

I'm not understanding the immunity debate. Kevin's immunity was the only factor that kept him from being placed in the bottom instead of Karen. Padma took special time out of the judging panel to make a prim speech saying that very thing. Why should Karen not have been upset about the risk of this exact thing happening, or it actually happening?

An immune chef joining the group only affects your chances of winning if you presume not everyone is trying to achieve the win each time, and also that winning one week necessarily means you've got the goods to consistently keep winning. Anyone who's watched this show and seen the whims of these judges knows that isn't the case. Losing is probably a much more potent worry to all these chefs than not winning, since it definitely means you're out and have to fight your way back in.

[Christina]

54 minutes ago, Lois Sandborne said:

Why should Karen not have been upset about the risk of this exact thing happening, or it actually happening?

Because if Kevin was on a different team, her dish would still have been the worst on her team. His immunity didn't put her at risk, her cooking did. He was ultimately a non-factor to weather or not her dish was the worse.

If he didn't have immunity, was on her team, and chose to make the same dish, he would have been worse and she would have been safe, but that isn't what was going on.

Smurf village clip:

 

[BlackberryJam]

Karen had a 33.33% chance of being in the bottom if Kevin joined her group. Karen had a 33.33% chance of being in the bottom if Kevin did not join her group. Exactly the same.

Kevin joining left her with only a 25% chance of winning instead of a 33.33% chance.

 

[Rambler]

Leanne is having trouble finishing her plates so she asks Jen to help her finish up (kudos to Jen for helping her out btw). Meanwhile Jamie is also having trouble finishing his plates, so why wouldn't he ask someone to help him finish? That seems kinda dumb. Maybe it ties back to the conversation between Nini, Stephanie and Karen where it seems the women will have each other's backs and the men are seemingly gonna fly solo. Anyways Jamie's sacrifice is much appreciated because at least we got to see the look of horror on Ludo's face when he found out that there would be no Jus. It must have really bummed Ludo out too because he had a look of disgust plastered on his face even when they were talking about the other plates in the group.

[raven]

On 4/3/2020 at 10:49 PM, ProudMary said:

Padma's quote from that night on WWHL with Tom and Gail was, "He's probably richer than the three of us." 😄

I had no idea.  I always found him annoying but hey, good for him.

I like most of the people that I remember - oddly, I have no memory of Melissa, who made a gorgeous plate of food this week - so am just enjoying this.   I'm probably rooting most for Kevin, whom I've always liked and made me laugh with his "wiener" comments. 

I also really like Lee Anne; maybe she is just not cut out for these competitions.  Randall Park name dropped her restaurant, yay!

I thought Ali Wong was fun.

[Ashforth]

16 hours ago, kirklandia said:

I like these art-themed challenges (Project Runway does them as well), although I know they can be problematic.  When I used to read the Wall Street Journal, I enjoyed the Flower School feature (do they still run this?) where floral designer Lindsey Taylor does an arrangement inspired by a work of art.  Her arrangements were beautiful without being too literal.

I think that art-themed challenges are well suited to fashion design competitions, but not so much for food. Then again, making wonderful food is an art, so it isn't an unreasonable challenge, just a difficult one.

Maybe they could have each cheftestant choose his or her favorite artist (no restrictions on who - from cartoons to fine art) and make a dish based on their work. What would you bet that Jackson Pollack would reign supreme? Splatter plates everywhere!

In other news, I really like Melissa and I thought her dish looked and sounded amazing. But it drives me nuts that she's constantly shown running her bare fingers through her hair while she's cooking and then carrying on with touching the food. Girl! Wear a hat! Same with Eric and wiping his face and head with a kitchen towel that he appears to continue to use. I think some of the other men have been shown doing the same, but can't think of who. Maybe Kevin.

[Quilt Fairy]

On 4/5/2020 at 7:40 AM, BlackberryJam said:

Karen had a 33.33% chance of being in the bottom if Kevin joined her group. Karen had a 33.33% chance of being in the bottom if Kevin did not join her group. Exactly the same.

Not the same at all.  With Kevin in her group (and with immunity), Karen had a 1 in 3 chance of being up for elimination even if she did not have the worst dish in her group.  She could have had, in theory, the 3rd best dish overall, and still been in the bottom.  It's not fair, but it is Top Chef. 

[Chyromaniac]

The only way this scenario was unfair to anyone is if Kevin actually had the worst dish of the night.  And in that case, it would have been Jamie who got hosed- not Karen.

[BlackberryJam]

1 hour ago, Quilt Fairy said:

Not the same at all.  With Kevin in her group (and with immunity), Karen had a 1 in 3 chance of being up for elimination even if she did not have the worst dish in her group.  She could have had, in theory, the 3rd best dish overall, and still been in the bottom.  It's not fair, but it is Top Chef. 

That doesn't matter. She had exactly the same chance as people in groups of three. If Kevin hadn't chosen her group, she still would have been in the bottom. Kevin choosing her group didn't put her there.

Edited April 7, 2020 by BlackberryJam

[Rai]

On 4/4/2020 at 12:33 PM, seltzer3 said:

 

Also, glad that Melissa won this challenge, total vengence for her past sucky elimination.

[...]

Melissa, on the other hand?  Got paired up with this aloof artist, who liked to paint abstract things, as well as bright blue and bright pink (which doesn't exist in natural food).  The artist didn't even seem to understand that he was supposed to collaborate with Melissa.

 

Two things:

1. I ended up in San Miguel Allende after this season aired and saw this exact painting in one of the galleries, and got dorkily excited about it. It was like a celeb sighting.

2. I actually forgot this was the concept of the challenge that sent Melissa packing because I remembered her doing really well with a different abstract concept challenge -- the New England literature one, where she had Nathaniel Hawthorne and served up a baller dish that nearly won her the challenge. So in my mind, I had her pegged as someone who does great with inspiration challenges! Heh.

I will say that wonton soup looked INCREDIBLE.

[carrps]

12 hours ago, BlackberryJam said:

That doesn't matter. She had exactly the same chance as people in groups of three. If Kevin hadn't chosen her group, she still would have been in the bottom. Kevin choosing her group didn't put her there.

Yeah, but the way Padma called Kevin out, it seems that he did have the worst dish in the group. Karen would not have been up for elimination in that case, if he didn't have immunity.

[dleighg]

2 minutes ago, carrps said:

Yeah, but the way Padma called Kevin out, it seems that he did have the worst dish in the group. Karen would not have been up for elimination in that case, if he didn't have immunity.

I don't think they would have done a knife-draw division of people (which led to even teams plus an immunity person) UNLESS they had a special (immunity) person to be the plus one.

[dgpolo]

2 minutes ago, carrps said:

Yeah, but the way Padma called Kevin out, it seems that he did have the worst dish in the group.

I wouldn't go by that, I'm sure Padma would play up any immune chef's bad dish into something worse just for the drama.

[biakbiak]

24 minutes ago, dgpolo said:

I wouldn't go by that, I'm sure Padma would play up any immune chef's bad dish into something worse just for the drama.

The comments when they were discussing Kevin’s dish also seemed to support that.

I thought Karen’s comments were basically aimed at herself not winning the QF because her dish was in the top and highly praised more than Kevin himself.

[Bastet]

1 hour ago, carrps said:

Yeah, but the way Padma called Kevin out, it seems that he did have the worst dish in the group. Karen would not have been up for elimination in that case, if he didn't have immunity.

Yes, Padma straight-up told Kevin that Karen wouldn't be up there if he didn't have immunity, but he does, so she is.  When she got to Karen, in talking with each chef on the bottom about their dish, she said, "I want to get to your dish, but before I do," and then addressed Kevin:  "It's a good thing you have immunity, because otherwise Karen wouldn't be up here."

While not a team challenge, they picked the best dish from each art group and the worst dish from each art group in determining who was eligible for the win and who was eligible for elimination.  It's not like they picked the worst four out of the whole lot, and Karen was one of them.  The picked the worst of each group.  His was the worst from their group, but he had immunity, so, since she had the second-worst, she was the one up for elimination.

It's not like he made an awful dish, she made a good one, but because of immunity, she was on the chopping block.  There were substantial problems with her dish; if he'd picked another team, she'd still have been up there.  So it's not some tragedy that she didn't get to skate by, and I never heard her treat it that way.  But it's inaccurate to say Kevin having immunity didn't have any bearing on her being on the bottom.

[Ashforth]

15 hours ago, Bastet said:

Yes, Padma straight-up told Kevin that Karen wouldn't be up there if he didn't have immunity, but he does, so she is.  When she got to Karen, in talking with each chef on the bottom about their dish, she said, "I want to get to your dish, but before I do," and then addressed Kevin:  "It's a good thing you have immunity, because otherwise Karen wouldn't be up here."

While not a team challenge, they picked the best dish from each art group and the worst dish from each art group in determining who was eligible for the win and who was eligible for elimination.  It's not like they picked the worst four out of the whole lot, and Karen was one of them.  The picked the worst of each group.  His was the worst from their group, but he had immunity, so, since she had the second-worst, she was the one up for elimination.

It's not like he made an awful dish, she made a good one, but because of immunity, she was on the chopping block.  There were substantial problems with her dish; if he'd picked another team, she'd still have been up there.  So it's not some tragedy that she didn't get to skate by, and I never heard her treat it that way.  But it's inaccurate to say Kevin having immunity didn't have any bearing on her being on the bottom.

Yet another reason that I hate team challenges in what is really an individual competition. 

[BlackberryJam]

It doesn't bother me because the worst dish (unless by the person with immunity, hi NICK) is always going to go home. I enjoy seeing them in small cluster groups with different inspiration. I also enjoy that little bit extra bit of competition. I mean, you put Michael V, Bryan V, Jen C and Kevin G in a group and have them compete against each other, you're going to get a lot of great food rather than having them in four different groups phoning it in against the lesser chefs. 

[biakbiak]

1 hour ago, LucindaWalsh said:

Karen's mistake was even thinking about Kevin because he was a non player in the whole thing with his immunity. She put herself there at the bottom and he had no input on that part. She was only competing against the other two on her team and she failed. 

She mentioned it in an after the fact talking head in relation to how she herself didn’t win immunity.

[FinnishViewer]

Quote

It's not like he made an awful dish, she made a good one, but because of immunity, she was on the chopping block

Wouldn't she have been on the chopping block even if Kevin was not in the group?

[Babalu]

I don’t think it matters at all what group Kevin was in except Karen had to undergo the stress/stigma of being on the bottom group at Judges Table.

His immunity MAY have made a difference, but only if his dish was worse than Jamie’s. But I don’t think his dish would have been worse than Jamie’s or Karen’s if he hadn’t had immunity and tried something new and unsuccessful.

Of course, this perspective is based on what we know now. Still, I don’t think Karen had any reason to worry about which group Kevin chose. The only way Kevin could have affected her would be if Kevin made the worst dish among all the contestants and she made the second worst dish and got eliminated instead of him. Or if he made the best dish and she made the second best dish of all, it could have robbed her of being in the top at Judges Table, but Kevin would have still won the challenge.

[dleighg]

All of this pondering on Kevin vs Karen reminds me of the famous Monty Hall debate back in the day!