Election (1999)

According to reviews I read after the fact…

Election isn’t your typical high school movie.

Apparently it was designed to be a satire of our political system… a message I didn’t expect and didn’t personally get out of it. Except for maybe the end when the protagonist is seen with a senator in Washington D.C.
Clearly a reference to Monica Lewinsky and Bill Clinton with the only difference being that it was a Republican senator instead of a Democratic president.
I kinda want to joke Alexander Payne outed himself as a Democrat… except 99% of Hollywood is so it’s not that surprising.


Speaking of Alexander Payne…

This is my 4th Alexander Payne movie and I didn’t fully realize until now that satire is his thing.
I mean, Sideways was a commentary on the snotty business of wine tasting in Napa Valley… at least I think it was. The R-rating being capped off with a scene involving full frontal nudity wiped out every other memory of that movie except for “no effing Merlot!”
And The Holdovers (which I will review later this year!) was a critique of private schools favoring deep pocketed donors over making sure the students actually pass their classes.
The Descendants is the movie where I first learned the name of this writer/director because it was up for a ton of awards. I hadn’t seen it in years so I don’t know if it’s a satire or not. But I’d love to see it again, especially since we saw some of its locations (and ate at one) in Kauai last year.


What is it with high school movies…

…not actually being about high school.

I don’t know how long I’ve had this pet peeve but it’s gotten more prevalent in recent years.
Of all the high school movies out there, how many actually have to do with school? Being in class, taking exams… that sort of stuff. The typical formula is that high school movies focus mostly on extracurricular activities or having fun outside of the classroom. If there’s any classroom footage, it’s usually just one class with one specific teacher.
The only exception to this is those “beloved teachers” movies I love so much. Because they have to show off why they’re beloved and it’s about what they do in the classroom. Or going above and beyond for certain students outside normal hours- Mr Holland’s Opus is probably the best example. He was teaching stuff outside the classroom but at least he was teaching.

The easy answer to this is that classrooms are dull and boring and it’s not something people want to go back to in a movie. All the fun and excitement (and character development) happens outside the classroom.
And maybe that’s just me being selfish and wanting to see my high school experience reflected in a movie. When I wasn’t in class stressing about grades, I was in performing arts stuff as a background person or an audience member. And I did 2 dances with concert choir and senior prom.
I never spent time with anyone outside school because I had no close friends. And the one person I did want to hang out with (cuz I had a crush on him), he always had some other activity he was doing. Being involved in community service or whatever else…


Further impressions

I came into “Election” with the following impressions. Reese Witherspoon (Tracy Flick) and Matthew Broderick (Mr. McAllister) are in it. He plays a teacher that, for some reason, does not want her to win said election.

I’ve seen a bunch of their movies and they’re both very likable people. So I figured it’d be a win-win.
…in the movie, both wound up playing very UN-likable people. Yet I still wanted them to succeed for some reason. Maybe that old loyalty was hard to overcome. I might have also felt different if these roles were played by people I didn’t know or already found unlikable.

And before I get ahead of myself and forget… this wasn’t a good movie. I’d even add that it would be classified as one of those “movies that did not age well”.
At the same time, it’s morally ambiguous and offers some interesting talking points for discussion. Hence me writing this post…

Speaking of morals, the movie opens with a question in class (one of maybe 2 scenes that actually involve classroom stuff) that’s never properly answered. Although the movie pretty much goes to show neither of these characters have morals or ethics. If they did, this was thrown out the window by the end of the movie.

The question was- what’s the difference between morals and ethics?

Morals are an individual’s sense of right and wrong while ethics is what a body of government or a board of trustees determines to be right and wrong as they oversee a group of people ranking beneath them.
Thought I’d Google this in case anyone else didn’t know. Or they were equally as annoyed as I was that they never answered the question.
As soon as Tracy was allowed to give her answer, the bell rang.

One thing about this movie I found kinda jarring and lamenting “well that was a choice…”
All the main characters have inner monologue, which is fine. But it’s annoying to have the movie completely stop while someone narrates. And it freezes their faces in often unflattering ways. I get that that’s meant to make a point but to have it happen so many times where the movie just stops… not a fan.

So I came into this movie with one question- why doesn’t Mr. McAllister want Tracy to win the election?
Just based off that first scene- yeah, she’s a Hermione Granger know-it-all. Why let her succeed, right?

Then we find out his reasoning… and it was the last thing I ever would have expected because I never expect students fooling around with their teachers.
She got his work friend fired because they "fell in love". It seemed like it was mutual until her mom found out and she lodged a formal complaint.

(This actor looked kinda familiar and it wasn't until I looked him up I realized why... he played Caltech Dean Dr. Gablehauser in "The Big Bang Theory")

Now he wants to sabotage her because he doesn’t want the same thing to happen to him… i.e. she comes onto him because he's the teacher overseeing the student council.
But the more you watch, it becomes clear he’s afraid HE will develop feelings for her and it’ll ruin his life like he did his friend.

Call it what you want- it’s gross and inappropriate. One review I read nailed it by saying pedophilia should never be done for laughs, consenual or not.
This movie was R rated for adult content and language. No nudity but definitely sex. One scene is him and his wife and he winds up fantasizing his friend’s ex-wife and Tracy talking dirty to him in her place.
At least that was the intent. I wouldn’t know anything about this since I have literally no experience… but none of this talking dirty comes off as sexy.

The first manner of sabotage is finding someone to run against her because nobody else is. And he picks a dumb jock who recently broke his leg… the guy is clueless but he was very likable and easygoing.
It gets even more interesting when his sister joins the race, mostly to get back at him for stealing her girlfriend. A rare inclusion of a gay/lesbian character in a 90's movie. The only other one I'm aware of is Christian in "Clueless". Of course this is way more common in media nowadays.
Tammy was your typical unapologetic angry teenager but she’s still pretty cool. At her campaign speech, she said stuff like “vote for me or don’t” and how she’ll abolish the student government if elected so they won’t have to sit through any more of these “stupid assemblies again”.

I’d expected this movie to be a little more like Mean Girls where Tracy is the queen bee asserting her dominance in why she should win. 
She’s not even popular, which the question of how she thinks she'll get the votes if she doesn't regularly hang out with people. Her whole thing is being involved in everything to put together the perfect resume. Not necessarily because she enjoys what she does. But the downside is no time for friends. A fact she’s a little sad about but it’s not enough to make her change her trajectory.

Part of me did decide to see this movie because the premise sounded like good research for something I’m working.
I’m making an old project a little more high school oriented (with actual classroom content) and one of the ideas I was kicking around was student council.
This movie didn’t exactly give me the inspiration I wanted but I didn’t mind too much. It’s kinda refreshing that Tracy Flick wasn’t a queen bee type of character or the world’s biggest nerd or do-gooder. She’s ambitious for the sake of it. Maybe not the most likable thing a person can be but at least it’s something that speaks to her and motivates her. And maybe the fact she didn’t have friends was something that spoke to me.
I graduated high school 20 years ago this year… and now that I’m thinking about it, I literally have no idea who was on our student council and what they actually did.

Oddly for a high school movie, there's very little student-to-student interaction. In fact, it's more about Mr. McAllister's feeable attempts to undermine her campaign as well as contemplating an affair with his friend's ex-wife. All of this culminates in a bit of clever foreshadowing... a far-off shot of bees flying around a fruit tree in her background. I asked myself  "ok, what's that all about?" Let's just say he deserved what he got.

The results of the actual election… well, what fun would that be if I gave that away? 

Another kind of nice thing about this movie was that we got an epilogue. Just in case some people watching were left wondering what became of these characters.
It wasn’t the best movie but I liked how they did it. And everyone pretty much got what they wanted in the end.
I wish more movies did this because I often find myself wanting to see what happens after the story ends or at least get a glimpse into the future of these characters.

One final thing- the janitor is like the cook from “hunt for red October”… trust me, it’ll make sense later.

The most interesting part of this whole experience... I kinda knew going in this movie wasn't going to be good. But I think that freed me up to enjoy it for what it was. 

Tommy (1975)

When someone uses “it was a product of its time” to describe something, what comes to mind?

A) it’s from a psychedelic or surreal decade like the 60s and 70s so it feels like a drug trip, or
B) this phrase is specifically designed to excuse something later generations would consider offensive but “back in the day” it was considered normal or commonplace

At face value, Tommy felt like the first option but the more I thought about it afterwards, the latter also seemed to apply.

Going into it, I knew nothing about it or The Who. Except for Roger Daltrey, they set the record for being the loudest band in the world and their most famous song is Pinball Wizard.
And that this movie existed…

So some initial thoughts after seeing it...

Am I glad I watched it?
Kinda…

Would I see it again?
Probably not- I’d classify this as one of those movies where seeing them once is good enough

Would I recommend it?
Eh… I don’t know. It would depend on the person? Maybe if you like trippy movies or 70s cult films like Rocky Horror, I could recommend this and obviously if you’re well acquainted with The Who. But that’s it.

TCM is a fun channel because they’ll have someone talk about the background information and other trivia before and after a movie airs.
I don’t know what happened on New Year’s Day but that didn’t happen. Would I have liked this movie better if it did?
Maybe… I still think it would’ve been helpful to know what I was getting into beforehand.

Which begs the question how I’d describe this movie to someone like me who has no idea what to expect.

For starters, it would’ve been helpful to know that this is a MUSICAL where 99.9% of the dialogue was singing.
I don’t hate the genre like most people who claim to hate people “randomly breaking into song”… but in this case it was so bizarre that it was like this. The first 5-10 minutes was all instrumental and when they started singing, I was grateful for actual words… until it dawned on me it was all going to be sung.
Second- it’s a rock opera (which I already kinda knew about this album- it invented the genre before Queen did it in 1975). But the long translation of this would be “you’re getting a movie where ‘plot’ is very loosely written around the music.”

Prince did the rock opera thing with his symbol album (aka the last album he released before he temporarily changed his name to said symbol) in 1992. He got grief from fans for numerous reasons over how it turned out but one notable one was the storyline not making sense. Particularly noting it made more sense before he added one shiny new song and removed some segue tracks to make room for it.
Any fan who has the right connections most likely had heard the “removed footage” and can confirm- the story still doesn’t make complete sense but the added context would’ve been helpful.
The “opera” is mostly a love story between him and the girl who’d later become his first wife. Some songs fit in the context of the opera and some don’t. What suffers the most is the anthem “3 chains o gold”- the original story is that he’s given these chains to protect from the assassins who killer her father and he’s later corrupted by their power. But without the removed footage, this very dramatic moment in the album comes out of nowhere, makes no sense and anyone who doesn’t know better would relegate it to be a “bohemian rhapsody knockoff”.

After seeing Tommy… hey, at least Prince sorta had a story even if it wasn’t explained very well.

Tommy sorta had a story too. It just wasn’t an enjoyable one- for the most part.

I’ll come back to part B of my initial comment.
I’m no expert but am I correct in assuming “blind deaf and dumb” is one of those phrases that’ve been outmoded because it’s now considered a slur? Similar to how “retarded” had been used since I was a kid in the 90s and it was outmoded in the mid 2000s for not just being politically incorrect but offensive. Through that lens I see some people from more recent generations taking exception to this movie on that alone.

But beyond the nonstop singing, my biggest problem was that Tommy was basically gaslit by his family for most of the movie. Then when he finally amounts to something of worth, he’s taken advantage of so his family can live a richer lifestyle.

He’s made the way he is because he was abused by various family members and his stepfather kills his actual father and he and his mom lie to him about it.
One could argue whether or not Tommy’s father (presumed to have died in the war) was actually there when his stepfather killed him. It could just as easily have been a metaphor for “Tommy saw his mom and stepfather sleeping together and it scarred him for life”. But the fact his mother seems to go along with her new boyfriend more than her own son after this happens is probably the most messed up part of this whole thing.

And yeah they both seem guilty about the whole thing so they keep trying methods to fix him. His stepfather takes him to Tina Turner, a prostitute known as the acid queen. And his mother takes him to what appears to be a cult that worships Marilyn Monroe, a scene ending with him kissing her feet like the parishioners before him and the statue breaks.
Both have imagery that can only be described as fucking bizarre. Particularly the Iron Maiden being injected with red fluid from syringes. And one time it opens and you see a skeleton being ravaged by snakes.
I’m generally ok with snakes but I’m not ok with needles so this scene was pretty disturbing.
This movie wasn’t quite the acid trip the Oliver Stone Doors movie was but it came close at times like that.

In our house, we use “this is spinal tap” as a punchline a lot. Mostly comparing other movies to it saying they weren’t as bad.
Spinal Tap was easier to handle but there’s barely one scene I’d consider memorable other than “crank it up to 11” and the album signing nobody came to.

Tommy is worth seeing for the Pinball Wizard scene alone… but very little else.
Elton John has a really cool cameo as the soon to be former pinball champ. Especially those shoes. They reminded me of a Prince quote (from a remix of the 1985 B-Side “Hello”) where he says “I wish you could stand in my shoes but they’re so high you’d probably fall over and die”. Those shoes were that huge, haha

So Tommy finds the one thing he’s good at and everyone loves him for it.
Somehow his senses are completely cured and he’s a normal person again… as if his childhood trauma was the one thing holding him back all these years and he could’ve seen, heard and spoke but simply chose not to.
Then for whatever reason, he gains a literal cult following. His family takes advantage of all that the same way certain religious leaders over the years have conned people out of money. (This movie came out before that whole affair with Tammy Faye and her husband but it’s hard not to see some parallels). Then in the end his followers turn on him, murder his family and he’s free to do whatever he wants.
That’s the one other bright spot in this movie- Tommy gets to find happiness after everything he’d been through and that’s what matters the most.
That’s why this movie was mostly a slog until Pinball Wizard- if you can get through the singing and “story”, you see a protagonist who deserves better. Once things start to get more upbeat and positive for him, it was more enjoyable.


But I can’t help but wonder what could’ve been if the writing had more common sense behind it, particularly the second half of the movie.
Maybe this is me overthinking things but I had two thoughts when Tommy got some autonomy back,
A) that he’d suddenly lose his pinball talents because his missing senses aided his ability to excel… not that I wanted that to happen but I half expected it and that would be why he suddenly lost his cult following
And B) something I hoped would happen but didn’t… him denouncing his family once he got his senses back. They’re the whole reason he was that way to begin with and he shouldn’t have forgiven them so easily

One final thing to note- there’s a little too much repetition with the songs. My mom will often complain about songs like “I could’ve danced all night” having too many choruses and going on forever.
This movie had one or two songs that did that- the final one in particular because half of its length played out in the end credits.
The other- “see me, feel me” and whatever else… ugh! Enough already, just stop! That song comes up at least two or three times in the whole movie.

And want to know the most ironic thing?
Earlier that day I looked up reviews on a movie playing on hbo that night. Google gave it 2 out of 5 stars and comments were vastly “I want that time back” and “I kept waiting for to get better and it never got any better”. So I passed on it.
In hindsight I probably should’ve looked this one up while I was at it, just to see what I was getting into. I don’t think it would’ve changed the fact that it’s probably going to be another movie that’ll stick with me for the wrong reasons. At least I can say it did get better as it went on. I just wouldn’t sit through it again.


One final edit after reading reviews:

• Glad to see I’m not alone in not getting this movie...
• More reviews need to mention all the singing and lack of dialogue
• Some people like it and one even said “you’re dead or at least comatose” if you don’t get what they got out of this movie. People should be feel like what they like but also respect those who don’t feel the same way. It’s like a quote I read somewhere “if they don’t get it, the journey wasn’t meant for them”
• It’s funny to me in times like these when I read comments berating the director for being “overindulgent”. It’s kinda up there about movies being too sentimental. Both are complaints I’ll read but I don’t see them myself. Still don’t get how being too sentimental as a bad thing…
• One funny comment that also reads true- “maybe someone from the 70s can explain it to me”- agreed but after all this reflection, I’m done and ready to move onto something better.

My 2024 in Movies and In Memorium

I'd been keeping track of how many movies I'd seen in my life and, more relevant to this post, how many new movies I'd seen each year since 2011.

There've been 39 movies I saw for the first time in 2024. One of the lowest totals in the time since I started keeping track of this stuff. For theaterial trips, there'd only been 4 for me all year. 

1. Kung Fu Panda 4
2. Deadpool and Wolverine
3. Wicked [part 1]
4. Sonic the Hedgehog 3

Honestly there hadn't been that many movies I'd wanted to personally go out and see. A lot of people feel this way, though, so it's not just me.

I still don't have a streaming account anywhere so it's not as if Netflix (Amazon, Disney+, etc.) is stealing my business away from movie theaters. If I'm seeing any new movies anymore, it's either on HBO, TCM or (mainly in December) some Hallmark type movie. 
All four theatrical trips were enjoyable. The latest Deadpool is probably my favorite of the 4 and the new Sonic movie is my sister's (after all, it was her idea).

She and my mom also went out to see the new Beetlejuice movie with friends. I waited until it came to HBO and it was a lot of fun. The humor is probably closer to the campiness of the animated series than that of the original 1988 movie, but as far as long-awaited sequels to 80's movies, it was really well done. 
Which reminds me- I need to do a post on the Top Gun sequel and Oppenheimer...

As for other movie highlights this year (some occasional spoilers are sprinkled in so be warned):

Monkey Business and Horse Feathers

-TCM was doing a marathon so I saw these two back to back. I fell asleep during the second one so I guess I didn't like it quite as much

-At some point, Duck Soup will have to come as well since that's the most famous one.

Fences

- I'd been curious about it since the whole "Hidden Fences" Oscar fiasco and it lived up to the hype for sure. I'd been a fan of Viola's since "How to get away with murder" so it was great seeing her win for this.

A Streetcar Named Desire

-I'd wanted to see this for years I'm still glad I did, but I didn't like it enough to want to see it again

-Stanley really wasn't a likeable guy, the climax between him and Blanche was unsettling (mostly because whatever happened between them, you had to guess at because it wasn't clearly spelled out). The ending where Stella finally leaves him was very fitting. .

For animated movies:

Soul was really good. It's a cool concept but also makes you think about some deep stuff. Like being brave enough to make an effort in your life since you only get one. And how sometimes we'll work towards something and it may not be everything you expected.

Raya the Last Dragon was also pretty cool, although I couldn't help but feel it was another of those recent efforts by Disney to try to shoe-horn some big socio-political lesson into a movie.

Awkafina was Raya as well as Po's new frenemy in the latest Kung Fu Panda. I read one headline shortly after that movie came out, essentially someone asking movies to stop casting Awkafina and get REAL voice actors. I didn't bother reading further because I just didn't agree with the sentiment. I hadn't seen everything she's done but she's never disappointed.

Chris Pratt, on the other hand, has put in almost as much work doing voiceovers as he'd done in his Jurassic and Marvel movies. But does he bring anything special to his roles in the Lego Movies or as Mario or (more recently) Garfield? ...not really. He fills in the roles fine but now I can't help but wonder if studios are getting lazy using him all the time.

Trolls: Band Together... I really don't want to give Justin Timberlake any slack, especially after the year he's had and stuff that'd come out about him in Britney's memoir. But this was a really fun movie. Probably my favorite of the 3 troll movies cuz I'm always a sucker for a boyband storyline. Also the two villains wanting to steal the talents of the troll boyband to up their own street cred- it's not wholly original but I liked how they incorporated the social media/internet famous angle into it.

Minions and the Rise of Gru was a lot of fun as well. Although there was one scene from the trailers they cut out...  considering I saw it on an airplane, I can kinda understand why. 

Some movies I didn't like quite as much:

The Producers

- I was literally lost for the first 10 minutes.I didn't know if that over-the-top acting was a play or it was reality, but it made no sense

- the only time I laughed the entire movie was Gene Wilder falling on the ground and he deadpan remarks "I fell on my keys"... don't know why that made me laugh, maybe because it came out of nowhere

The Zone of Interest

-I did a whole post on this movie where I went into all the reasons I didn't like it so I won't take too long. I'll just say that I might have gotten more out of it if it didn't go in that bizarre European art film direction. Long periods of time where the screen is all red or all white and literaly nothing happens for 5 minutes but eerie background music. 

The Great Escape

- Ugh... I'm still mad about this one. The title says ESCAPE... you'd think that would translate to "they escaped and actually got away"... instead, it was "the great escape ATTEMPT". Almost everyone got recaptured, so what was even the point? 

Road House

- first off, way more sex and nudity that I expected so I wan't a fan of that

-second, the storyline was not what I'd expected. I thought the movie was about him straightening up the rowdy patrons of this bar. I didn't think it was going to be about him waging war with this inscrupulous rich guy who owns more than half the town. 
-the one good thing was that the ending justified most of that second bullet point... basically the bad guy gets killed and nobody in town is willing to fess up to the authorities who was responsible... so they basically get away with murder because the jerk deserved it

The Wolf of Wall Street

-pretty much all the things I hated about this movie, see the "first off" section from Road House and add in a plethora of profanity. I assume it still holds the record for the most F-bombs per minute of any movie. With all those things, it was way too fast-paced and overstimulating. It was too much and it's a LONG movie.

-the one part I'll always remember because it was hilarious... Leo being whacked out of his mind on drugs and barely able to get into his car... and later he finds out he didn't get to his destination in one piece

yeah... Leo DiCaprio is a good looking guy and it seems like a lot of his characters get away with stuff because of that charm and his good looks. But I don't think I've liked ANY of the characters he'd played. "Catch me if you can" and "The Great Gatsby" are probably the two expections of movies I'd liked him in. And maybe "Inception," but he's secondary when compared to the other reasons I did enjoy it. 

Some more highlights:

Fantastic Voyage

-really cool efforts and it was cool to see the movie that inspired episodes in some of my favorite cartoons

-the only thing missing for me: did the patient make a full recovery at the end? They showed as far as the mission being successful, but I could've used a few more minutes to see how successful it actually was

Save the Last Dance

-this movie was one of my early favorites for the year. I love these high school movies, no matter how predictable they can be at times

-probably my favorite thing was the music. I've had "Crazy" by K-Ci and Jo-Jo and "Get it on tonite" by Montell Jordan in my collection for 20 years (from NOW 6 and 4 respectively) so it was really cool seeing them brought to life on screen. And now my memories of enjoying this movie will come to mind whenever I listen to them in the future

Young Adult

-not the best movie by any means. The whole concept of a woman lusting after her ex-boyfriend (who's married AND has a new baby) is ridiculous and Charlize Theron doesn't play a particularly likeable protagonist. 

-Although for me, it became one of those movies where I was glad I stuck around for the whole thing. I might not have gotten as much out of it as I did if I hadn't been invested in Tara Lipinski's podcast about her infertility journey. A lot of the things I'd learned from it and experienced with her and some of the guests that'd been a part of it came to mind watching this movie.

-Even with its flaws, this movie did give me one great little reference that'll probably live rent-free in my head for years: KenTacoHut. I'd known for years that KFC, Taco Bell and Pizza Hut were owned by the same company but her acronym to address all of them being inside the same building in this movie: absolute genius!

Mike and Dave Need Wedding Dates

-there's been so many comedies like this lately that have a lot of ridiculous over-the-top shenagians that happen. And characters that are nearly impossible to save from their own stupidity. Strangely enough, this movie did as much wrong as it did right, and I came away with it actually having fun with it. And I'd be open for seeing it again... assuming there's nothing else on that I'd rather watch

-Mike and Dave are idiots that screw up a lot of family parties in epic ways. And if it's at all possible, they manage to find two girls to be their wedding dates who are more screwed up than them. Aubrey Plaza had been getting a lot of momentum lately because The White Lotus series and here, it's easy to see why she's gotten so much hype as a comedic actress. 

The Holdovers and American Fiction have two big things in common
1) They were both nominated for a bunch of Oscars this past year, but only won a couple

2) They were among my in-flight movies to Hawaii this past May

And both movies were really good. It's easy to see why they got all that award-hype. As good as Cillian Murphy was as Oppenheimer, I'd still pick Jeffrey Wright for Best Actor.

I liked "The Holdovers" so much I got it for Christmas... and will most likely do a blog post sometime in the future.
It's another of those teacher dramas I really enjoy. Except this one is almost quirky like a Wes Anderson movie with some of the jokes and camera direction. Paul Giamatti plays a teacher at a prep school who's in charge of the students left behind on Christmas break. It takes a while to get going, but some of the hilarity that ensues... omg, I thought it was a blast.

"American Fiction" was fascinating for a lot of reasons. There's been so much talk lately about there being a need for more original black storytelling in movies. The movie does that and does it really well.

Jeffrey Wright plays a writer in pursuit of success. The only problem is that the general public isn't interested in the kind of black fiction he wants to write. Stuff that doesn't revolve around absentee fathers, drugs and gang violence. Then as a joke, he anonymously pens a book about all of these things. It's meant to be a satire and it actually becomes a success story. And he's left with the struggle of what to do next. There's some funny moments sprinkled amongst all the drama.
My one little gripe is the ending... or should I say endings. Because the book is adapted into a movie and the director (played by Seth Cohen from The O.C.) keeps rejecting his ideas for the ending. And it looks like the one that gets chosen is the most ridiculous, over-the-top and insensitive... but like the book itself, it's what "the people" want so that's ultimately what the end result is.

In Memorium

This wasn't a huge year in terms of losses, but some of the losses felt bigger than ours.

Easily the most notable was James Earl Jones. In a similar fashion to Angela Lansbury the previous year, he was one of those people who'd played notable roles that hold a special place for different generations. And if you're lucky, you'll have known them for multiple things because your family or friends introduced you to them.
For my mom's generation, he was Darth Vadar. Star Wars is also one of her favorite movies and that's why I'm also a fan. 
Then for my generation, he was in Coming to America, The Sand Lot, but even more notable, Mufasa in The Lion King. Easily one of those voices that are so synonymous with a character that they'll never be replicated.
He also had a really funny cameo on The Big Bang Theory where he hung out with Sheldon for a day. Aside from the Carrie Fisher scene,  the funniest part is when they're hanging out at the top of the Ferris Wheel.
Sheldon shouts to all of Pasadena how he's up there with him "and he's nicer than you think."
And James shouts back "I am!" with the biggest smile on his face.

Bob Newhart, who'd had a long storied career anyway, I didn't get to know until seeing him as Professor Proton on Big Bang. Now I guess I'll have to add his show to my list of TVLand old-time TV shows I still need to see. A list that includes Gilligan's Island, The Munsters and The Addams Family (saw some movies, but never saw the original).

For me and the rest of us who grew up with Pokémon, the loss of Rachael Lillis (after a rough fight with breast cancer) still feels fresh. 

Cat Glover was a dancer that worked with Prince frequently in the later part of the 80's. She'd had her share of health issues in recent years so it's good that she'd finally found her peace. It couldn't have been easy. I don't know her as well as some of his other associates over the years, but the little I do know, she was a fierce friend.

Two losses from movies I frequently watch that I didn't even know had passed away until I was compiling this list: John Ashton (Sgt. Taggart from the Beverly Hills Cop films) and Ken Page (who did the voice of Oogie Boogie from The Nightmare Before Christmas)

Maggie Smith is another Harry Potter alum who'd recently joined Hogwarts in the great beyond. A couple of the actors made cameos on the Wizards of Baking competition on Food Network last month and before they all came back for the finale, I half expected someone else to show up and it kinda hit me how many we'd since lost. Both Dumbledores, Snape, Hagrid... and the list is only going to grow as the years go by.
Also, another more recent role that left a notable impact was her role on Downton Abbey. Or as SNL put it, "the chicken lady." (There was a really funny sketch where they made fun of the show, but those who are better versed with it than I am would probably say "yeah, that's accurate").

Teri Garr- the annoucement of her loss was shocking because of the timing more than anything else. We were watching Young Frankenstein, as we often do in October, and were thinking about the fact most of the cast had since passed away. Except her... a few weeks later, that changed. Now that's pretty much all of the main cast.

Chita Rivera- years ago we saw a farce at the local theater where they made fun of all the Broadway musicals. One of them was two girls doing "America" but their lines were "my name is Rita and not Chita" (and vice versa when the other girl sang). She and Rita Moreno (who :knock wood: is still with us) made this role famous in the Broadway show and the movie adaptation and therefore equally worthy of recognition.

Carl Weathers- best known for being Apollo Creed in the Rocky movies. Also Predator, which we watch every year or so.

Liam Payne- I'm not really a big One Direction fan, but it's hard not to be sad about his tragic death. Especially since last I heard, the circumstances surrounding it have gotten more nefarious. Not to the extent of Matthew Perry (I'm still wrapping my head around this one...), but it's not under the circumstances. 

Martin Mull- saw him a few times on Hollywood Squares, but I remember him years ago being a major character on Sabrina the Teenage Witch.

Donald Sutherland- to olders generation, he was many things. Including the one cool teacher in "Animal House". For mine, he was President Snow in the Hunger Games series. A person you loved to hate, but he played him well extremely.

Theatrical Review: Sonic the Hedgehog 3

Date: Sunday, December 22 2024
Time: 10:30am
Party: 2 (my sister and I)

(Shadow's the first hedgehog I've drawn... and he won't be the last ;) )

Review:

(includes some minor spoilers)

The two of us have seen all of the Sonic movies thus far, but all on DVD. The mini-series "Knuckles," which had previously been exclusive to streaming, was shown over the course of a week on Nickelodeon earlier this year.
So needless to say, there was a lot of anticipation for this theater trip. And it was absolutely worth the trip. My sister really enjoyed it, calling it by far the best of the three movies.
Me, I don't remember Sonic 2 as well because we only watched it once so far, but I've been pleased with all the movies so far. Including this one.

If you'd seen all of the movies so far, you pretty much know what you're going to get. Lots of fast-paced action sequences, sometimes ending with big explosions. Heartfelt sentimental moments. The occasional dramatic backstory. And plenty of laughs to be had in between. Most of them from the comedic genius of Jim Carrey. As if it wasn't already inherently obvious, he has a line in the movie that shatters the 4th wall into oblivion. Something about "two characters being played by the same character".

Yeah, we'd been doing this self-aware meta humor for so long we're not even trying to hide it anymore. But in this instance, the movie poking fun at this move was well-played.
Jim Carrey plays double-duty as the Dr. Ivo Robotnik we've come to know from the previous films as well as his grandfather, Dr. Gerald Robotnik. Both equally zany and entertaining to watch.

For the most part, this movie is about the characters and the jokes. The story moves the plot, obviously, but the characters are why you stick around to see how it unfolds. This isn't the type of movie where it's important for the plot to make complete sense, but it kinda bugs me that some of it didn't make sense.
Particularly with this govt agency, GUN, and their connection with Shadow. He arrived on Earth inside a meteor 50 years ago and they were running experiments with him. He was particularly close with elder Dr. Robotnik and his granddaughter Maria. Then the trio makes for an escape sometime later, which results in Maria getting killed and the other two imprisoned. All of that makes sense plus the fact Shadow was too powerful for them to trust out in the world. 
Maybe this is me overthinking things, but I kept waiting for someone to spell out some elaborate plot for GUN to seize world domination with Shadow's powers. Or that it was an Area 51 thing and they didn't want their secrets to become known to the public.

Anyway, I was having a hard time figuring out who the bad guy was supposed to be in this movie until the giant laser was activated and launched into space. And elder Dr. Robotnik revealed what he really wanted to do with it. A much bigger act of revenge than simply destroying the agency's headquarters in London. 

Again, these movies really are about the characters, getting to know their different personalities and quirks, and seeing how they interact with one another.
Sonic, Tails and Knuckles all had their moments to shine. Which I appreciated a lot because in my limited memory of the second movie, Tails was out of commission for a fair chunk of it so he didn't get as much screen time in his theatrical debut.

Keanu as Shadow-- the most genius casting choice since Jim Carrey as Robotnik. I'm not as well acquainted with him as my sister (who'd seen the 4Kids Sonic series and more YouTube videos of this franchise than I have) but it's easy to see why the fanbase has fallen in love with him. He's got a tragic backstory, which has unfortunately warped his judgement, but you still root for him and want to see him succeed. Just maybe not at the cost of the whole planet getting blown up like Alderaan.
The flashback scenes with him and Maria were sweet and from the little I'd seen on YouTube, they felt pretty close to the original canon. The only difference was that the govt base where they lived had been in space and she had some fatal uncurable disease. Otherwise the plots felt very similar and Shadow's role to play at the end of it fit his character perfectly.

Minus the Robotniks, most of the human characters are minor and secondary to the plot. But they still had fun little moments. The best for Tom and Maddie (aka Donut Lord and Pretzel Lady) was the mountain of hobbies they'd amassed in the short amount of time the trio was working for GUN. Not sure which was funnier- Tom's humorous attempt at ventriloquism or Maddie's knitting (where she actually croqueted a sweater for him that says "Donut Lord" with little croqueted donuts sewn into it)... 
Tom also gives a nice speech early in the movie where he talks to Sonic about how he didn't let his past (losing his mentor before coming to Earth) change his heart... although it's one of those speeches that sounds like it was tailor-made for a movie with its not-so-subtle foreshadowing. Shadow's whole thing is that he and Sonic look like they could be twins, but the big difference between them is how they handle their past traumas. Using it to be better hedgehogs or fuel for revenge.

And Robotnik's assistant, Agent Stone, he got to have a mix of humorous and sentimental moments. The dynamic between him and Robotnik are still there, but the introduction of elder Robotnik throws a wrench into that and suddenly he's the third wheel and feels less than appreciated as a result.
I'm not sure all Sonic fans feel the same, but for the two of us, we'd been fans of Agent Stone from his first appearance. (The scene in the first movie where Robotnik does a dance break and is interrupted when Stone brings him a latte- comedy gold!). As a minion, he's extremely loyal, but he's become so much more than a minion through the course of these movies.

... and yeah, it should be noted that there is a mid-credits scene hinting at the next movie. And yet another new character is introduced. Which begs the question, at least from me, how many movies are they planning to make? How many characters are we going to introduce? Because at some point, surely, they're going to run out of new characters, right? 
From the little I've seen of Sonic X, there's a sizeable cast so we might be here a while.

Grade: A- 

Trailers:

• Dogman

According to my sister, this character came from the same author as the "Captain Underpants" series... to me, a dog's head being attached to a cop's body kinda says Hollywood's run out of ideas

• Captain Amerca- Brave New World

It's been a while since I forgot they were making this movie. Looks like it'll be impressive so it might be enough to bring me back to the theater for a Marvel movie. (I'd seen at least 2 Marvel movies in theaters since Endgame and a few more on DVD. But since I'm not running out to see every single movie anymore for fear of missing out on a crucial story element, I'm clearly not as involved as I used to be)

• Lilo & Stitch (which they showed twice for some weird reason)

We saw the poster on the way in. And as far as teaser trailers go, it's pretty good. CGI Stitch looks so realistic. 
But why the heck did the theater show this twice? Not sure if that was on purpose or not. Hopefully not...

• Elio

Pixar's latest movie. Not really sure what to make of it just based on the trailer. There's a lot of bright colors. A kid who spends more time staring at the stars than with other people gets abducted by aliens and he has adventures. The funniest part was when he says one area is beautiful and someone tells him "um, this is the toilet" and they get flushed and it's like an amusement ride.

• Karate Kid Legends

This trailer starts circulating a few days ago and it's literally everywhere now. It brings together Jackie Chan and Ralph Macchio, who come together to help Jackie Chan's newest student.
I hadn't seen any of the newer movies or Cobra Kai. One is streaming and we don't stream. And the other... the original Karate Kid is perfect. I didn't want to see it remade.
I just hope this sequel bringing everything together lives up to the hype because I might see it at some point, whether it's in a theater or HBO.

• The Legend of Ochi

Saw the same trailer during "Wicked"... It doesn't hold any interest for me so I have no further comment

• Superman

With James Gunn from "Guardians of the Galaxy" fame at the helm of this, hopefully we finally break the streak of inferior non-Christopher Reeves Superman movies. 
But I'm not one to talk because I'd only seen the original 1978 film and the widely panned Justice League movie.
Based on the trailer, this looks REALLY good but I'm sure the fans won't be shy telling everyone who'll listen their unfiltered thoughts.

• Mission Impossible: The Final Reckoning

Whether or not this will be the final Mission Impossible movie EVER, it's hard to be sure. I'm sure Tom Cruise will continue to make them as long as he's alive. 
I saw the original so long ago I have no memory of it and I think I saw Shadow Protocol because Jeremy Renner was in it. I've had no incentive to see any of the others, but who knows? There's a chance one day I might sit down and watch the rest of them. It's a lot more likely than seeing a single Fast & Furious movie... all of them are car chases and explosions, anyway.

Speaking of movies I might get around to seeing one day... I haven't seen a single John Wick movie and I really should see at least the first one. The trick is finding it on cable, preferably without commercials.

Saturday Night Live Christmas over the years

I started thinking about my favorite moments from this yearly rehash (and the few I want to see burn up in a literal dumpster fire). Then I reached the inevitable conclusion of “oh crap I guess I gotta do a blog post on it”

So here I am writing said post.
It’s become a staple the last several years (probably been over a decade by this point, lol) that all of us gather around the tv to watch. The best part is that they have sketches going as far back as season one while sprinkling in more recent highlights.

This year had 2 new ones I hadn’t seen before but made all of us laugh.

The first was a tv infomercial for ABBA Christmas which saw the return of Kate McKinnon and BFFs Kristin Wiig and Maya Rudolph. (I assume the one guy is a newer cast member because I didn’t recognize him).
But all the snippets of performances were either ABBA songs rehashed as Christmas songs or new Christmas songs that had the musical trademarks of their music. I don’t know if the whole gag was for them to be unintelligible because they’re from Sweden but it still kinda bugged me I couldn’t understand a word. The funniest part of course was them singing super close to each other and seeing who breaks first. Kate McKinnon is just crazy good enough to be able to stay in character but even she has a moment where she cracks.
Best comment was the MC explaining the contents of the CD, which ends with “Christmas covers of all 86 of their songs”. Something like that but even as huge Mamma Mia fans, we laughed so hard.

The other new one was a white elephant party where Austin Butler (fresh off his “Elvis” promo tour) played a disgruntled guest because his beloved catch-all ashtray got stolen by another guest.
In the end he gets what he wants when he happens to open another one but in black.
Never seen someone so happy to get an ashtray in their lives, haha

Most of the same sketches return every year and we all have our favorites.
However, I do have one in particular I NEVER want to see again. In recent years, it’s just been in the first hour and I happen to be watching something else at the time. Previous to that, I find an excuse to just leave the room for 2 minutes.
I’m talking, of course, about the Will Ferrell vomit sketch. Where they’re playing “it’s the most wonderful time of the year”, he’s on a spinning platform and he gets motion sick everywhere.
In general I’m not a huge Will Ferrell fan in general. Ron Burgundy (first movie only) is great but he mostly plays an overgrown man child. “Elf” has one or two good lines but I cannot stand that movie because of him.
I’m not a fan of toilet humor in general but vomit is NEVER going to be funny. Especially for someone like me who had sensitive stomach problems as a kid that participated some unspeakably embarrassing moments. Just find the master tapes and the negatives and burn them…

Another sketch I’ve seen a little less in recent years but would get rid of one or two parts of.
The Michael Buble Christmas duets infomercial. Some of the impressions like Taran Killen as Scotty McCreery are really good and lady Gaga just being a glammed up Christmas tree with googly eyes is well played.
But Kristin Wiig being Taylor Swift- not cool! Her whole bit was doing her surprised face and not singing a single note. It’s a good impression, but omg, stop making her look like a complete airhead and sing!
Jimmy Fallon’s Justin Bieber impression is no better. No singing at all but I have to admit his goofy face and dance moves were pretty funny. And this is me speaking as someone who didn’t like Justin at all until he outgrew that heartthrob phase- his music got a lot more enjoyable after that although I still wouldn’t consider myself a huge fan.

Another quick pet peeve before moving on to the good stuff.
The shortened segments leading to commercial breaks. I’m going to YouTube just so I can see the entirety of the Mr Robinson’s neighborhood sketch. What happens besides the eviction notice?! You’d think they’d someday treat us to the full sketch.

...after seeing the whole thing, I can kinda see why they might not show the whole thing. He talks about breaking into people's houses and taking stuff (opposed to Santa who gives stuff). Plus two schemes that are kinda troubling but also entertaining. One is pretending to collect for the Salvation Army (complete with bucket and bell) when he's really giving money to himself. But the best part has to be him selling knock-off Cabbage Patch Dolls to stupid children- where he beheads a doll and gives it a head of lettuce. This was probably done in the midst of the mania of that fad so it was probably cathartic for a lot of people.

I’d love for them to bring back the “it’s a wonderful life” sketch where Dana Carvey is a perfect Jimmy Stewart, uncle Billy remembers Mr Potter has the money and the whole town gives him his much needed comeuppance after they find out he’s not even a cripple.
The one thing that movie was missing… and also George Bailey finally getting to travel outside Bedford Falls.
But instead we’re stuck with the pointless “leave me alone, please go away!” riff on Carol of the Bells… saw the rest of the sketch on YouTube. Not missing too much. But it ends with a number for 1-800-Get-Help... I know they're dysfunctional, but dang!


The following are sketches the season would be incomplete without:


Candice Bergen's consumer probe


What’s Christmas without Johnny switchblade or, my personal favorite, bag of glass?


D*ck in the box


This came out when I was in college and so many people loved it.
It took me a little extra time to warm up to the idea but it is pretty fun. The one part I always remember is the steps. And what was with that stupid flower he was rubbing all over her face?

(I’m not a fan of Justin Timberlake by any means but he’s always great on SNL holidays. Particularly when he’s dressed as a cup of soup, does a little dance and ends with “give it all to Homelessville!”)


The Hanukkah Song

If you’re sensing a pattern here, it’s not your imagination.
I’m not a huge Adam Sandler fan either (see Will Ferrell man-child comment) but this is a really fun staple where you pick out new things every year or you’ve memorized more of it despite only seeing it once a year.
It’s at the point where my sister and I will anticipate and shout our favorite lines.
Best line is spinning the dreidel with Captain Kirk and Mr Spock (BOTH JEWISH!!)
Followed by “OJ Simpson… not a Jew” and “so many Jews in show biz. Tom Cruise isn’t but I think his agent is.”
The best part is that he almost goes off the rails laughing multiple times yet he keeps it together to the very end.

Heck, the Californians Thanksgiving sketch is the stupidest thing ever but it’s funny because they break character constantly and still manage to get through it.
(My favorite thanksgiving sketch is with Anne Hathaway working at a soup kitchen and slowly losing her sanity because Kristin Wiig kept one upping her on everything… which shows off Kristin’s amazing improv skills because she built up everything Anne said in the same order she said- it kinda blew my mind)


Sweddy Balls on NPR radio


Nothing will make me out to be a bigger hypocrite than my feelings on Alec Baldwin.

I’ve wanted him to be cancelled for ages because of his terrible Donald Trump impression… this is a whole rant but I’ll spare the extraneous details.
But the fact, accident or not, he literally killed someone on the “Rust” set and got away with it because the prosecution didn’t follow procedure… that’s straight up reprehensible and he should be held accountable for the rest of his life.

All that being said… I may not like the guy (or any of his movies except maybe rock of ages) but I don’t want them to stop airing this sketch.

Again, I’m a massive hypocrite but in this day and age, who isn’t?

I made comments about not liking toilet humor but when it comes to playful cheeky innuendos, bring them on!
The whole joke is that this is meant to be radio so you don’t see what’s actually going on but it’s still funny at face value. Molly Shannon and Ana Gasteyer are perfect together and we find new favorite lines to say with them every year.
Funnels are great for funneling and Molly Shannon lowkey has an excessive rat problem.
This year we counted- they said “balls” 24 times, lol

Not sure if it was inspired by this or it’s just a reflection of our love of cocktails in this house but one recipe we like to make every year is fudgy chocolate bourbon balls. No baking required so they are boozy and have a small serving size compared to most of our other holiday desserts.

Another Alec Baldwin sketch that’s gotten traction in recent years is him being an elf from the home office. The worker elves are complaining about weak tools and wanting more pay and stuff. He’s very strict about keeping them as they are and threatens to fire them if they don’t stop complaining. But it’s a fun sketch for two reasons.

1- he reads an acronym off Always Be Cobbling but completely misreads cobbling as Cable multiple times before correcting himself… the smile he cracks after the fact is hilarious, not to mention the fact he’d torn into them about cobbling a number of times before the this

And 2- he ends his tirade with “you’re all getting bonuses, it’s still Christmas” and everyone rejoices!


I wish it was Christmas today

This is one I look forward to every year but this year it felt extra special.

We’ve been listening to Jimmy Fallon’s Christmas channel on Sirius all month and it’s been a blast. Best part is the variety- it’s rare you hear the same song (or artist) more than once in the same hour. A huge plus this time of year when some songs are done to death.
But we not only learned about coquitos from him (they are GOOD- definitely recommend- basically a Puerto Rican riff on egg nog) but he gave us the backstory of this particular sketch.

This song arose from a late night spontaneous jam session and the next day the dude who plays the guitar came up with lyrics. Jimmy called it one of the dumbest sketches he’s been a part of but a band called The Strokes did a full version that’s played on the channel a couple times.

The sketch itself- yeah it’s kinda lame. Only the guitar guy is doing any real work. Jimmy will sing some backing vocals but he spends most of his time messing with the keyboard. It’s actually providing the drumbeat but it looks like he’s either pressing random buttons or wiping fake snow off it.
But it’s better than Chris Kattan holding the keyboard and just shaking his head back and forth (how does that not make him dizzy?) or Tracy Morgan just jogging in place.
But it still has some charm to it and I enjoy it anyway. The one little part where Jimmy Fallon repeats “I wish it was Christmas today” and he and guitar guy bop back and forth— that lives rent free in my head all year and I unconsciously do it when I hear certain songs. Although not as frequently as I imagine Molly Ringwald (Ala the breakfast club) dancing to some of my favorite songs— one day I’ll compile a list cuz there’s a bunch of them.

Honorable Mentions (I had no other place to talk about)

They only played it a few times but there’s one memorable sketch with Kate McKinnon.
There’s a homely couple being interviewed along with her about their Christmas Eve. They had fun with Santa, got to go to the North Pole and have cocoa and cookies. Kate is a red neck stereotype talking about Santa’s helper Krinklemaus and her bizarre night. She gets taken to the reindeer shed and gets roped into deworming the reindeer with Shart, the deranged Gollum-like elf who works there. All the while, she lost her pants in transit so she alludes to the fact numerous times that she's rocking no pants.

She’s so unbelievably weird and unhinged at her best, so this is right in her wheelhouse.

They didn't show it this year, but I remember a YouTube video in the other room of someone playing Jennifer Coolidge and her talking about Christmas stuff. The actual video, once I finally saw it, wasn't quite as funny as just hearing the audio.
Best part is someone playing Jingle Bells.
She says "that's really good, did you write that?" 
He pauses "did I write Jingle Bells?... no..."
"Then who?"
"I don't know, some guy"

That freaking killed me :P 

One final one that doesn't get played as much anymore. Molly Shannon is in character as Mary Catherine Gallagher and Whitney Houston has a cameo as a classmate. Both are singing "Sleigh Ride," trying to one up each other and it ends with Molly Shannon falling over in spectucular style.

Of course the grand finale always involved a musical guest. For years it was Bruce Springsteen and in recent years, Paul McCartney got the final spot.
It’s on the back of a sketch where he’s in a duo with an overbearing Martin Short… not a fan of that part but the performance on the SNL stage is great.
I get the feeling those will become extra special when these legends are no longer with us and we’re left to reminisce about the one time “he was a big star but not so big he didn’t mind taking the time to play on SNL.” Both look like they had the best time up there and we all feel the same watching them.

HELL'S KITCHEN- the starting point of Gordon Ramsay's TV empire

Now for the big enchilada- the one that started it all- Hell’s Kitchen

speaking from personal experience...

I’ve been fortunate enough to have gone to two Gordon Ramsay restaurants in my life, both in Atlantic City.
The pub we did for lunch in 2016 (it was January, before any of the bad stuff associated with that year happened) and we got to meet season 13 winner La Tasha She spent maybe 90 seconds with us and she was really nice. Not sure if she’s still there but she and Meghan, the winner from season 14 worked there on different shifts.
I had my first lobster roll and crispy skin salmon there and both were amazing. 

Then the previous year we went to the new Hell’s Kitchen for my birthday. Aside from the tvs flashing all kinds of scenes from the series and the dimmer lighting, it was exactly like being on the show. It was Alex’s weekend off so we didn’t meet him but from what we gathered from the staff we talked to, he sounds like a great boss and he’s settling in really well.

The only real negative of the experience- shaved truffle. An add-on our server pushed but kinda forgot to mention was $30 extra. We found this out when we got the check, which would’ve been pricey regardless, but a heads up would’ve been appreciated. Between the 4 of us, I think all of us had ordered truffles with one of our dishes so that's an extra $100 we didn't plan for.

That aside, the rest of the experience was overwhelmingly positive.
It was my birthday and they made me feel like a rock star in a classy understated way. Up to being handed a peanut butter cheesecake with one candle in it from the guy who got us our drinks.
My mom ordered their signature smoky Manhattan and it was a really cool presentation. It was inside an olde English lantern lantern and smoke billowed out as soon as you opened it. I think I ordered a blueberry cocktail with the Queen's name in the title- enjoyed that as well.

All the food was excellent. Kitchen was a tight ship as expected and they did not disappoint.
Lobster risotto (plus truffles), really good. And more crispy skin salmon although that charred broccoli on the side- one of Alex’s signatures from the menu- omg, SO good! Almost stole the spotlight.

Of course nothing beats the view from the stairs on the way out where you can see all of the kitchen action below.
Seeing all of this on tv is one thing but actually being there to see it with your own eyes (and smelling and tasting it)… it’s something else and something I’ll never forget.

Par for the [main] course

For the show itself, it’s stayed mostly the same over the years. Occasionally they’ll change up the theme to keep it interesting. This year they’re doing head chefs only. They’ve done at least one all star season and the previous season was about the American dream (the eventual winner was originally from Cork, Ireland).

Every season pretty much begins and ends the same way. We have the signature dish challenge that sets the tone- although I couldn’t tell you how many people who dazzled this early wound up actually winning in the end. There’s a red and blue team with women vs men. Eventually the two brigades are narrowed down to one- the highly coveted black jackets.
Then we have the final two who make up their own menu, choose their brigades from previous contestants, run their kitchen for a service and whoever’s door opens off Gordon’s office is declared the winner.

With everything in between, the mileage varies.

There’s challenges- some are mainstays that happen more frequently but mostly they’re different games that ultimately determine the ingredients certain people cook with. This concludes with rewards for the winners and punishments for the losers.
There’s dinner service where anything can and will go wrong, people get yelled at and whole teams get thrown out when Gordon loses patience with the mistakes made.
And at the end, two people from the losing team(s) get nominated to defend their place on the show and someone is eliminated.

Some decisions for elimination are easier than others and some are straight up petty- people just don’t like certain people and keep trying to send them home. One time they got creative and put someone up they wanted to get rid of along with someone who’d been so consistent that there’s no way Gordon would chose them to go home. (I’m pretty sure this gamble worked but I’m not positive).

One person infamously marched up to Gordon to give him a piece of his mind and security swarmed in to keep things civil. Joe did not return, needless to say.

This isn’t full proof but when you’re up for elimination, you have a good chance of surviving if you fight for your place. Gordon appreciates people who do that. What he doesn’t appreciate is people who tell him they volunteered to put themselves up. I’ve seen this play out multiple times on another reality series— would-be bosses don’t want to hear that their would-be employees are quitters. It eliminates whatever confidence they have in you and that essentially eliminates you from consideration.
There’s a fine line between accepting responsibility and throwing yourself down on your own sword.

Some of the regular challenges include:

The infamous blind taste test

• it’s a lot harder than it looks and it’s incredibly rare for anyone to correctly identify all 4 of their ingredients
• I’ve heard rumors that the kitchen is made to smell like bacon so it completely throws off people’s sense of smell but I can’t find anything to confirm this
• I DID find that the headphones they wear actually play music so that adds difficulty. Plus everything is cut into smaller pieces, unseasoned or otherwise altered from the way you’d typically come across it
• It’s rare but there have been a couple people over the years to get 4/4 correct. One of them won the entire competition in the end
• One thing a lot of fans have noticed over the years… so many of these contestants smoke. There was actually one year Gordon said to them the day prior to stop smoking for a while because it ruins their taste buds and this challenge was around the corner.

Seriously, why do so many people on this show smoke? I do not understand this… but I also never understood the concept of smoking at all. There's no incentive to start, no benefit and you have to fight like hell to quit...

Taste it then make it

• sometimes when this comes up, Gordon will make a dish at random and offer it to everyone to taste… waiting until afterwards to mention “oh by the way you have to recreate it”. But in later years, the chefs are usually mindful enough to know this is coming up
• There’s usually 4 categories. The protein, the vegetable, the starch and the sauce and whoever is the closest wins the challenge
• I haven't seen this in years... not sure if they've retired this or not but it was an interesting challenge nonetheless

As far as dinner service goes, every station has its difficulties and it’s hard to be sure which is the hardest. Sometimes fish will drive the ticket and sometimes it’s garnish. But it’s always crucial to taste everything. Meat is always cooked medium rare. (The same goes for Masterchef- the ideal cook for steak is always medium rare, which I never fully understood because I prefer a less bloody medium cook on mine).
Appetizers are commonly risotto and scallops with the occasional pizza/flatbread.

We’ve made risotto at home once… it’s EXTREMELY labor intensive. I’m pretty sure they parboil the Arborio rice ahead of time so they can turn out portions faster but it’s insane. You definitely build up arm muscle with all that stirring. If we ever do it again, it's gotta be for a larger gathering so more people are available to take turns stirring.
Time and again, risotto gets rejected at the pass either due to lack of seasoning or not enough of the liquid is reduced.

Salmon and halibut can be difficult, come entree time, and hurt you if you bring up raw fish. But it’s probably much worse to have seafood for a risotto and you’re the reason the risotto is held back.
As for scallops, they’re pan-fried and it takes a total of 90 seconds.

This doesn’t happen as frequently anymore but there’ll be instances where Gordon gets so mad at someone that they’re thrown out of the kitchen. Once, the chef in question was ready to leave the premises and the matri’d Jean-Philippe talked to them, saying “don’t go, he’s testing you and wants you to fight back.”

It might sound crazy but there is a method to all this madness. All of the cursing and yelling you see on the show- yeah, it’s over the top and more insane than the average person is equipped to handle but it’s hard to argue with the results.

How to run (and not run) a kitchen

The biggest thing that sinks dinner services isn’t proteins and risottos being cooked incorrectly. It’s lack of communication. Sometimes there will be entire challenges dedicated to this, whether chefs have recipes written on their backs and other people have to read it to them or there’s a tag team challenge. Where chefs are taken out one at a time and their teammates have to instruct them what’s left to be done and what the next step is for their dishes.

A well run kitchen is always the one that’s the loudest. People calling out “how long” and replying that they need however many minutes they need to finish. All of the pans and ovens are usually screaming hot so it’s rare to hear a time longer than 7 minutes. And with things like scallops, those are usually fired when there’s 2 minutes left before the rest of the ticket comes up. How all this works, I never figured out. Are they all wearing watches? Is there a clock on the wall? All of them have a concept of how long certain things take to cook but from the perspective of a viewer, how these times work just looks random and they somehow know how much longer.

One thing that’s pretty much guaranteed is that everyone will struggle in this place. Experience means nothing. This recent season, the head chefs had a really rough start despite their pedigrees. Even having black jackets isn’t enough sometimes.

Because this is a high profile chef, celebrities make regular appearances although some of them are shameless self promotion for Fox. Sometimes they’re at chefs’ tables but in recent years, they’ve become part of one of the more pivotal dinner service challenges.

Charity Night- where there’s two tables of 12 or so with a notable celebrity founder/contributor at the head. Each chef runs a course and the most important thing is that both kitchens coordinate to serve all of the diners at the same time. Attention to detail is just as important as communication here and the pressure that comes with all that is immense.

After all those hurdles, though, comes probably my favorite of the hurdles and it determines the finalists.

Each of the final 4 chefs take a turn running the pass and doing Gordon Ramsay’s job of calling tickets and expediting orders. It’s fun just seeing who’s able to rise to the occasion and handle all of the curveballs thrown at them.
And there are MANY curveballs, which get more creative each season. They’re always thinking of new and exciting ways to trip people up. Usually the sabotage will come from the sous chef running their old station in their place. A classic example is using orzo instead of rice in a risotto or their Wellington is something other than beef. But in recent years, the sabotage is the actual ticket and having the wrong number of plates. Sometimes from Gordon Ramsay himself
If you watch the show for enough years, you have a good idea of what to expect so it’s exciting any time you get something new you wouldn’t have expected otherwise.

Gordon Ramsay over the years

The environment is still a major pressure cooker but Gordon has definitely mellowed out over the years.

It used to be that he’s such a hard ass that the only time you see him being “normal” is on a reward. Some dinner at some place where he spends time with the chefs and they get personal time with him. It’s a good time to make an impression but also to pick his brain and learn from him. Even for people who don’t make it far, I’m sure most can say they came away from it stronger or at least more knowledgeable than when they entered.

He doesn’t call people “donkey” or “fat cow” like he did but he’ll still throw an entire team in the pantry to give them hell if they’re struggling with service. One thing he does regularly and it annoys me as much as “someone is going home, make sure it’s not you” (it’s a pet peeve because he says this almost EVERY week on Masterchef), he’ll complain about a bad service and say “you’ve given up, you don’t care”… it’s probably some reverse psychology thing but it’s frustrating when he says this while the chefs are clearly struggling and working their butts off and the food just isn’t coming out right.

But he’s showing his sympathetic side a lot more in recent years. Sometimes when he sees someone having a hard time, he’ll take them aside and say “talk to me” and they work through what’s going on. This year has been especially hard for whatever reason- a number of chefs have gotten homesick and wanted to quit because of it and he’d talk them down.

Memorable chefs- the best and the worst

I don’t have much more to add as far as contestants go or my favorite winners. Only because it’s been around so long and there’s so many.

One of my favorite winners was Christina who became the sous chef in the red kitchen for several years after. I knew from day one she’d be a front runner. Probably called her winning too but I can’t be sure because most of the time I call winners for anything, I’m wrong. I’ll always remember her winning Hell’s Kitchen the same year Christine Ha won masterchef.

Most of the time on the finale, the also-ran takes it in stride and is really gracious for the experience. I’ve only seen one exception to this and it was season 8 where Russell lost to Nona. He was a front runner for much of the competition and she gained momentum as it went on but he was such a sore loser afterwards I lost whatever respect I had for him. (Re-reading his comments in the Wikipedia article, he said his brigade helped him lose and he'd blackball them to ruin their careers... it's even worse than I remembered, yikes)
Finale dinner services have their difficulties but one of the biggest tests a budding executive chef can face is dealing with a strong personality.

In typical reality show fashion, troublemakers and attitude problems are kept around longer than they should for the sake of drama. And often they play a role in the final dinner service and it's up to the finalist to contain their mistakes or throw them off the team altogether.
It’s par for the course but omg, I hate it so much. Gordon likes arrogance and respects it when there’s skill to back it up but he’s also like Judge Judy in the sense that his voice is the final say and he doesn’t like people talking over him or challenging him when something is sent back at the pass.

Two of my all-time worst contestants who were kept longer than they should’ve- Elise (season 9) and Jason (from the American Dream season prior to this current one).
It’d be interesting to see them as the final 2 of the same season and me trying to decide which I’d rather win, assuming I’m able to choose a conclusion I can live with. (I hate the Cowboys as an Eagles fan but I can cheer them on to beat Tom Brady… which they did on his final season before he finally stayed retired)
But their seasons for me were all about waiting for them to get kicked off the show… and it was a LONG wait in both cases.

Jason was an arrogant jerk who got along with no one (because, apparently, this show isn’t about making friends) and the feeling was mutual. Physical altercations almost broke out a couple times but I was almost begging them to smother him with a pillow while he slept. The most reprehensible thing he did a number of times- he took shortcuts and flouted procedure. Hell’s Kitchen is run a certain way and you don’t effing mess with that! He may have had more experience than most of the contestants but he certainly didn’t have any Michelin stars to back up his “improvements” on a long proven formula. On the other hand, he did show solidarity for the finalists he cooked for in the final service. Putting your own feelings aside to help someone else win is always a good thing.

Elise is easily the worst of the two because she’d been on the show TWICE. And clearly she learned nothing from her previous season because she would not stop shouting at everyone who dared stand up to her.  Just in general, people like her are very hard for me to stomach being around. I can see myself getting the brunt of her fury until I break down and surrender saying “you were right, you win” when I’m clearly in the right… I’ll just surrender just to make the shouting stop.
She also had that reality TV attitude I hate where she refused to take accountability and when she was nominated, it was because "people are intimidated by me" or some arrogant bullshit... ugh!!

The one consolation I got from her being on the all star season (aside from falling short of black jackets)… the winner had been a regular target of her bullying. I don’t understand her whole vendetta against Michelle or why she constantly said in confession that she wasn’t good enough to stay in the competition. But her subdued, almost broken reaction to Michelle being crowned the winner… I could go on and on about how that’s proof karma is an even bigger bitch than she is. But really, I felt bad and it made me hope she learned from the experience just to be a better person.
Michelle is now the new sous chef in the red kitchen so I doubt she’ll want anything more to do with the series for the rest of her life.

I mean, I get it. You can’t go through life or work your way up certain industries being a doormat. I’m sure several of these people had to grow a thicker skin to get to where they are. But if you’re professing arrogance, you better have the skill to back it up. And even if you do have a sizable skill set, if you want people to work for you and respect, you have to give them that in return.
Of course this logic isn’t as airtight as I’d like it to be. There are plenty of arrogant CEOs and politicians out there and they don’t always get there just by playing nice.

This doesn’t happen often but it’s always interesting when there’s crossover between Hell’s Kitchen and Food Network. At least 3 chefs had gone onto Chopped (Dana, Roshni and Sakari) and Roshni went on to become a chopped champion.

In terms of success stories after the show, it’s a mixed bag but more chefs have probably found more success working for Gordon Ramsay than restaurants have benefited from kitchen nightmares… although there’s a much bigger sample size for the latter.

The bigger successes I can attest to are Heather, Christina and Michelle because they became sous chefs on the tv show. Plus Jay (notable for his blue hair and his showmance with Holli until learning she was married) who finished second and became the sous chef of the blue kitchen.

I’ll have to look up Rock’s time after winning but considering he appeared on one of Gordon’s “restaurant saving” shows, they’re still on speaking terms.
According to Wikipedia, he worked at the Gordon Ramsay restaurant for a year before branching out into other opportunities. One gig was being the National Celebrity Chef for March of Dimes. So he seems to be doing well even now. And his appearance was on 24 hours to hell and back for a Virginia restaurant, Halterman's Eatery.

One or two I remember reading that they turned down the job after the fact and have a successful restaurant in their own right. Holli, who won season 7 and was set to work at the Savoy in London- she lost out on the restaurant due to issues getting a work visa. A few others wound up turning down head chef roles after winning for family reasons, which is completely understandable. Just going off this recent season, it’s a rough gig and being away from your support system makes it harder.

 

Gordon Ramsay's TV empire: Masterchef

Opening comments

This show’s been around for a number of years and it’s been a lot of fun. It still is, although I’m not enjoying the team format they’ve been using these past few seasons. It sorta reeks of “we’re running out of ideas” or “we have to keep things fresh or we’ll get cancelled”. Plus, as I’d said previously, if the same team wins all the time, it’s not as fun.

Last season was generations— I realize this is a big thing on social media now, the diff generations criticizing each other constantly. Older generations not being with the times and impeding progress and newer generations being so inexperienced that their opinions are invalid. I’m one generation and most of the family I’m close with is an older one and I feel like I agree with more of their values than the ones my gen gets criticized for. It was another good season but I hated the idea of banking on generational angst… America is already divided enough without having a tv show using it for entertainment value.

Masterchef is a global phenomenon with a different edition in almost every country. There’s also a junior edition with kids ages 8-13 and they’re exceptional!

It’s the antithesis of Hell’s Kitchen where the contestants aren’t professional chefs but home cooks put through a gauntlet of challenges to challenge them at a professional level.

Are some of these challenges crazy and over the top? Yes. It wouldn’t be a Gordon Ramsay show if it wasn’t.


Judges past and present


One key thing that separates this from Hell’s Kitchen- Gordon is no longer the meanest judge on his own show. When previews came out, they made a huge deal about the new mean judge in town- Joe Bastianch. He’s a restauranteur (also a regular judge on the Italian edition of the series) and his mom is Lydia Bastianch, one of the original cooking show hosts going back to Julia Child’s time.

Joe has mellowed out a bit over the years the same way Gordon has but he’s still not someone you want to get the wrong side of. He doesn’t mince words. If he doesn’t like something, he’ll either say a zinging insult or promptly throw the plate in the garbage with a straight face. People who try to BS their way out of things or cut corners, he doesn’t let them get away with it. As terrifying as he can be at times, I like him a lot because you can trust on him to be honest. Although sometimes he’ll play off Gordon to make himself come out on top. Particularly during auditions where Gordon says no to someone and Joe will say yes just to come off as the good guy. But there’s still the caveat where he’ll sometimes say “don’t make me regret this.” Most make good on that promise but not always

There was a short lived CNBC show called Restaurant Startup where Joe and chef Tim Love would listen to pitches for food businesses, chose one to do a trial run with and in the end, they’re decide whether or not to invest (individually or as a joint effort). It was a really interesting show I enjoyed a lot and still miss sometimes.

For the third judge it’s changed over the years. It was Graham Elliott the first several seasons. Later, baker Christina Tosi became a semi regular judge, usually taking Joe’s place while he handled masterchef Italy.

Then when Joe became a regular again, Aaron Sanchez (whom we know from Food Network) took over and he’d been in every season since.

For the junior edition, Daphne Oz (daughter of Dr. Oz but was also on the short lived ABC food show The Chew along with Carla Hall, who has since become a food network judge on most baking competitions and the now disgraced iron chef Mario Batali) was a regular judge. And in general, all the judges are really good with the kids. They’re all prodigies, clearly, but they’re always looked after when the pressure mounts up. My one little issue is that Daphne has done at least two seasons in the middle of her second or third trimester. She’s still a good judge, but I just find it distracting. It almost felt like Family Guy when Bonnie Swanson had this huge belly for six years until she had her baby. One season is fine but when she shows up for multiple seasons with this large belly, it just makes me think she and her husband have the worst timing.

It did, however, lead to one critical teachable moment in a team challenge. It’s not uncommon in these challenges for food to be sent back because it’s raw or underdone. Daphne was unable to judge a plate of food because it had underdone seafood on it. All the more reason it’s vital to teach kids (and all cooks for that matter) the importance of proper cooking techniques.


Formats and challenges
(Also a fair bit of me longing for the good old days)

Masterchef used to run a lot longer than it does now. They used to have auditions, followed by mini challenges to whittle down the top 50 down to the top 20. Things like coring/slicing apples and dicing onions.
(Fun fact- I learned how to dice an onion from this show).

Nowadays, we either cut out auditions and go right to the top 20 or we do auditions over a few weeks and there’s no subsequent stages beyond that.

The weeks would alternate between mystery box challenges and team challenges. They did away with this but in the earlier years, mystery boxes were followed by elimination tests and team challenges were followed by pressure tests. Now, the mystery box and team challenges would take up the entire hour. Man, I miss the old days…

Mystery box- anyone who’s seen Chopped knows about this concept. The only difference is that for a masterchef mystery box, you’re not required to use EVERY ingredient and the ingredients aren’t quite as weird. Unless of course the whole challenge is weird- a mystery box of offal animal parts, for example.

The top 3 are selected and for the elimination test, they have control over what other people get to cook.
Example- deciding which people get canned crab vs a live crab. It’s always interesting to see which people manage to elevate canned goods to the point you can’t tell the difference or they screw up their live product so badly you’d reduced it to inferior canned quality. It’s one of those chances to put extra pressure on a competitor you consider a rival or you just don’t like very much. Sometimes they’re successful but often times the effort backfires and their target overcomes adversity.

Team challenges- always stressful but fun to watch. Usually it’s the one time people get to leave the kitchen and cook for a group of first responders. One time, they cooked for the cast of Glee (it was Cory Monteith’s last tv appearance before he unexpectedly died of an overdose in 2013). This is where things get super heated. Team captains have expectations placed on their shoulders and they don’t always rise to the challenge. If they don’t make sure people are doing their jobs or they don’t pivot when people are falling short, they often end up being the ones to go home. And again, for those who criticize the leadership but do nothing to alleviate the situation, they’re part of the problem.

Then after team challenges comes the “infamous” (their words, not mine) pressure test. The losing team (or select members of it) have to cook a particular dish, often times a dessert and whoever is the least successful goes home.
It’s interesting when only a few team members have to compete and the captain has to choose. Sometimes they’re given the option to save someone and if they decide to save themselves… oh boy… people do not like that very much. You go down with your ship if you sink it. Then at least once they went to commercial break when the captain was asked who they’d save or have compete, we came back to the show and Gordon or Joe said something like “we appreciate your opinion but it’s not up to you” and they decide who participates.
Most of these involve making a difficult dessert like a soufflé. Or, even better, each of the three judges requests a different dessert and they have to make all three in the time allotted.

Then later in the season, the final 6 do a restaurant takeover at one of Gordon’s restaurants. One time I think it was even Joe’s. They’re each shown how to make 2 appetizers and 2 entrees and Gordon dons his chef’s jacket and does his typical Hell’s Kitchen expediting. Usually they rise to the challenge well but there’s always a few hiccups.
And if anyone so much as forgets where they are and does or says something that disrespects the restaurant, Gordon lets them have it. It’s a little over the top, of course. I’ve seen him flip because one of the chefs mishandled a plate and got fingerprints on it. Usually two chefs cook and the third does plating and is the last line of defense for quality control.

What has since taken the place of elimination and pressure tests is a series of challenges that have since become notorious for the series. The person who wins the previous challenge gets to pick the teams or sometimes has immunity so they don’t have to compete at all.

First- the tag team challenge. Only one chef cooks at a time while the other instructs them on what the next step is. It’s very loud and chaotic. Fun to watch but sometimes just as stressful to watch as it would be to participate.
Usually it’s a platter of food. Whether it’s sushi or street food or three parts of a typical Hell’s Kitchen menu (scallops, beef Wellington and toffee pudding).
Tag team, I’m pretty sure, has been a thing since season 5 so it’s been around for a long time.

Slightly more recent but gaining notoriety all the same- The Wall challenge. Where team mates are separated from each other and they have to coordinate in a way so the judges open their cloches and the plates underneath look identical down to the tiniest details.

Then the final hurdle before making the finale these past few seasons- Cook Alongside Gordon Ramsay.
It’s every bit as terrifying as it sounds. Any time you see him do some sort of cooking demonstration on any of his shows- it’s a thrill to watch. It’s a fine mix of skill, finesse and multitasking.
The two biggest lessons you can learn from any Gordon Ramsay cooking show is communication (which is a topic best saved for the Hell’s Kitchen discussion) and multitasking.
Obviously this takes years of practice and memorizing cooking times… but after playing through Pikmin 4, a franchise where the key to success is mastering the Japanese art of Dandori, I have a better understanding of how difficult that can be. Thankfully in video games there’s a reset button but in real life, organizing your tasks in such a manner where you complete them all proficiently in a limited amount of time, it’s hard. And of course Gordon is so experienced he makes it look like an art form. Some contestants have compared it to seeing Picasso (or some other artist) paint.

With the cook along, people keep up well in the beginning but there’s always a slip up somewhere. The rule is that once Gordon finishes, you have 30 seconds to put the final touches on your plate. Very little room for error. Last season, I think I saw the worst performance of this challenge because it went sideways really quickly. It was a fish dish that had a side that was flambéed to burn off wine. All but one accidentally put the alcohol in the pan with the fish and flambéed their fish.

Then the finale has a three course meal and we have a winner. It used to be a two person finale but since season 7 or 8, there are 3 people in the finale.

Why they made that change- I don’t know but I hate it. A proper finale should always be Mano e Mano, one on one.

Thankfully Hell’s Kitchen only has two kitchens so they can’t pull this nonsense there.


Memorable contestants (for better or worse)


One thing that sorta set masterchef apart from Hell’s Kitchen is that the contestants got along better. Typically. There’s still a few contestants over the years that’ve gotten under my skin and made the show almost unwatchable.

Season three had Krissi- a heavy set woman from Philly- was easily my least favorite in the whole series. Every time she was interviewed in the confessional, she was badmouthing other contestants. Bri was one she picked on a lot. Once she did cook from a wholesome perspective (a vegetarian dish about the mushrooms of the forest) and Krissi rolled her eyes and demanded “oh, give me a break!” She also made a passing comment how she used to eat girls like her “for breakfast” and beat them up in high school. Which pretty much shows you all you need to know about her character. Karma almost did a complete 180 when they had a blind taste test to being someone back and Bri came back but she was still eliminated before Krissi.

I’m aware that people from Philly have a reputation and we all laugh about how they burn down the city when their sports teams lose (or win for that matter). But as someone who grew up in a Philly suburb it’s hard not to feel that people like her give the rest of us a bad name. She was also the single mom of a 10 year old- talk about setting a bad example.

One duo that butted heads for weeks and actually wound up becoming friends were Leslie and Ahran. In retrospect, it was almost a preview of the recent “generations” season because they butted heads over this reason, without all the insults you see on social media nowadays when people attack other generations over opinions they don’t agree with.

But Leslie was genuinely sad when Ahran got eliminated in a later episode because they’d come to a mutual understanding. His attitude about being better than everyone else mellowed out through the course of that season and I went from a hater to a fan after he came around. (He finished in 3rd)

There’ve been few other people over the years who just think they’re better than everyone else… even worse when they’re kept on the show, seemingly, for good tv.

Elizabeth, who finished second to Courtney in season 5 (now she’s a girl from Philly I can behind), wasn’t bad on the show although my sister didn’t like something about her attitude. Courtney’s occupation when she was on the show was “aerial dancer”… apparently this was code for stripper because photos of her from a day on the job circulated on Twitter. And apparently Elizabeth and her husband were among the people circulating these photos and perpetuating online bullying. It was really fucked up. And these were the days BEFORE Elon Musk took over.

The prize the winner received for the show was a trophy, a suitcase of money and their own cookbook. I’m not sure if they’re still doing the cookbook but it was a cool thing back then.

I got Courtney’s and have made some things from it. Including a great barbecue sauce and pasta salad. Since we’d been working a bit more with yeast in recent years, I’d like to try her pizza recipe one of these days.

(I'd also made season one winner, Whitney's chicken parm meatball recipe a couple times... each time, they've come out perfect)

In terms of winners, a lot of my favorites over the years have won but not all of them.

My one favorite who didn’t win and I’m not the only fan incensed by this was Derrick. He was even brought back for an all star season and we were all convinced this was all designed to rectify the fact he didn’t win season 6.

I can’t fault the winner because Dara deserved to be the winner in the first season of the junior edition as much as the actual winner. She was incredible.

But poor Derrick- he’s doing well with his various business ventures (all involving food and I think he’s doing a podcast now). But I’ll still stand by him being the rightful winner of season 6.
If it was a popularity contest, I’m pretty sure Derrick would’ve won hands down. But all of us were also convinced that Chris Daughtry was supposed to win American Idol and he didn’t…. I still have no idea how Taylor Hicks won that year.

One sad story that came out years after his season ending was finalist Josh. A tall black guy around my age with a big heart and a lot of talent. In 2013 he killed himself and had apparently struggled with mental illness his whole life.
Mental illness is such a difficult thing but it’s even more difficult in the black community. (The series “a million little things” discussed this in great detail with one of their characters). I’m still processing Twitch’s suicide- easily one of the last people on this planet I’d expect to read that headline about.

The two winners I remember the most were Luca (a man from Italy who missed out on season 3 and was the series’s first male winner in season 4) and Christine.

Joe’s blatant favoritism for Luca as a fellow Italian might be frowned upon nowadays but it made for good tv back then. I forget which dish it was but once Luca made a mistake and Joe took him aside and whispered “what are you’re doing? This is embarrassing.” If I had to guess it had to do with pasta and Italians take that stuff seriously.

That just reminded me of one thing- Joe doesn’t cook typically and I thought maybe he just didn’t because he’s more of a business man. But he did demonstrate how to make egg yolk ravioli one time. Just goes to show any Italian worth their salt should know how to make pasta from scratch.

A couple challenges over the years had been about making pasta. One, if I remember right, was an elimination challenge where certain contestants were kept out of the room so they wouldn’t see the demonstration on how to make it. And it was one of the trickier pasta shapes- yikes!

I’m pretty sure even casual fans of the series know who Christine is because she’d been brought back numerous times to set challenges and be a guest judge.

She’s a remarkable Vietnamese cook who’s blind. And yeah, the show probably did bank heavily on this narrative for the sake of making good TV but if you saw her overcome everything thrown at her, you’d be too impressed to care.

The greatest challenge she overcame was an apple pie pressure test. She was so genuinely nervous because this was the one thing she couldn’t control. She could only go by the timer and smell. I don’t know if she won the challenge but she received some sweet reassurance from the judges that her pie looked cooked when it came out of the oven.

She also has a great sense of humor. One time as a guest judge she did a mystery box and added “open the drawer and you’ll find a blindfold.” Gordon let this go on for a minute before he stopped the clock and essentially said “take off your blindfolds, we’re not that crazy.”

I think he’d tried this trick again after he showed them how to cut up a chicken blindfolded and decided not to subject them to that. Probably best when there’s a risk of not only them cutting themselves but also salmonella.