Project Runway, Episode 4 (12/5)

Cafe Society
1

That was an interesting show. I definitely agree with the choice of winning team. All the outfits looked great (i was especially impressed by the overalls), and it really came together as a collection.

I was surprised, and a little sad, to see Chris go. I’ve sort of been rooting for him ever since seeing him huffing and puffing across Bryant Park in the first episode. I really thought it was going to be Ricky this week. He skated on thin ice last week, and was down at the bottom again this week.

Victorya annoyed the hell out of me tonight. It seemed like she wanted to be in control, to tell the others what to do, and to have everything done her way, but was also not interested in taking on the responsibility (in terms of the judging) for the team’s overall look.

Of course, if Ricky had shown a bit more direction and leadership, he might not have gotten walked all over by her.

Was anyone else at all confused by the whole model selection thing at the beginning? When Jack decided to take a different model, i thought they would parade them all out there for everyone to pick again, but instead they just took Ricky’s model and gave her to Jack, and took Jack’s model and gave her to Ricky. The same two models still ended up going home, but i thought that if the previous week’s winner decided to switch, they all thrown thrown back in for a new selection. Did i miss something?

And that Donna Karan has had some pretty scary-looking facelifts, IMO. She looks like a haggard 39, not a young 59 (which is her actual age).

2

I can’t believe Ricky is still in this. Of the four episodes shown so far, he’s been in the bottom two three times! He sucks and he needs to go; ugly stupid cap and all. I don’t think it fair that Chris screws up once and gets immediately out.

3

Jillian deserved the win. Her collection was excellent. You could see that Princess Puffysleeves, aka Christian, was upset at being the bridesmaid and not the bride again, but he’ll get his turn.

I felt bad about Chris being auf’d too. I liked his sense of humor. Ricky is such a wimpy drama queen, and his outfit looked FAR worse than Chris’. I could have parted with Ricky, no problem. Yes, VictorYa was a hugely passive-aggressive bitch, but rein her in! And on the runway, Victorya tried to defend Ricky, so props for that.

The thing is, Chris’ collection was really blah, not exciting or daring at all. At least Ricky’s was interesting, if ultimately a failure.

Looks like next week we get the Jack drama. I wonder if he’s going to be having health-related problems. I hope I’m wrong and he’s OK.

4

To me, Stephen’s outfit was the worst of the night. It wasn’t dance wear. It wasn’t cute. It made the model looks like she had gigantic hips.

I was sad to see Chris go. True, his outfit was pretty bad, but Ricky was nailed for sloppy construction just last week. And, as mentioned, he’s been in the bottom group 3 times now.

Victoria was all kinds of annoying. It was so obvious she just didn’t want the title of team leader (and the risk) but wanted to run the show.

Elisa is growing on me. Her sewing skills do seem weak for this show, but her design has been good the last couple episodes.

5

This week brought us another team challenge, always a favorite with the bitchiness and cattiness they engender. Unfortunately, there were no major team meltdowns this week. Perhaps with the growing professionalism of the contestants, we’re seeing a reduction in the major ego clashes.

The one exception, of course was Ricky’s team, where Victorya showed herself to be a passive-aggressive bitchcakes. You could tell that she ducked being team captain because she didn’t want to place herself at risk of a full if the team fucked up, and installed Ricky as leader because she thought she should push him around. Whadda ya know, but when it down to it, she couldn’t be a follower and totally undermined Ricky. As far as I could tell, the other teammate, Elisa, just did her job. I used to be a Victorya fan, thinking she might have the chops to quietly go all the way, but now she’s lost me. Ricky’s a little drama queen, but I sorta like him, and I’m glad he’s sticking around for another week at least. Elisa’s a freak, but an amusing one.

Jillian, Rami and Kevin’s team clearly won. They tried to play up the drama of Kevin’s not getting his shorts done on time, but he pulled a damn good garment out of his ass at the last second. Going down the runway, I liked everything they did, and they seemed to be cohesive and work the themes. Kevin is my favorite to win it all, not because of anything he did on the show, but because he was a bartender at Fred’s, a restaurant near me, and did a lot of work on some fundraising I was involved in. Rami’s work has been uniformly good to amazing, and I wouldn’t be surprised to win. Jillian’s neither fish nor fowl to me.

Chris, Steven and Sweet P’s collection simply wasn’t a collection. Chris’s outfit was stupid, and the other weren’t much better. They were sort of screwed because they had three things that really didn’t go together, but they should have gotten creative. I’ve decided I like Sweet P, because she really seems, well, sweet. Steven seems like a nice guy as well. Chris, on the other hand, seems to have a significant inner bitch, and not much leadership. When the two losing teams were shown, I picked him to be Auf’ed and I’m glad I was right as he just doesn’t do anything for me.

As for the fourth group, they were total non-entities this week.

All in all, I was disappointed in the lack of drama this week. I wonder what the big reveal will be next week.

6

I thought it would be Ricky going, too! I guess we all did, especially based on last week’s discussion.

And I really want to know the secret. Jack’s secret, I mean. What does Tim want him to share with everyone? Doubt it’s the HIV as he was talking about that in another episode. I hope it’s not another cheating scandal. I like Jack!

7

I think Chris’ team was awful. All three outfits had that same awful fabric which looked like drapes. I swear it reminded me of when Miss Scarlett tore down her mother’s drapery to have Mammy make her a dress. Terrible!

8

The really strange thing is that the model Jack chose walks like she’s hauling something behind her. But I didn’t mind they just did the switch instead of having all the designers re-choose.

Jillian’s collection was great.

Elisa annoys me. The spacey “I have to pick myself” was just stupid. And this time, her dress wasn’t good either.

9

Didn’t Elisa get complimented on her dress by one of the judges?

In any case, I hated that whole “collection”. The color palette was more circus than neon, and all the dresses were dead ugly.

Ricky didn’t cry as much as I thought he would, which is a little surprising. I thought for sure that once things started going badly with Victorya (who I really disliked. That was some of the most passive-agressive behavior I have seen in a long time) the waterworks would start and never stop until the show was over. He actually managed to hold it together quite a bit. I’m a little confused as to why the judges keep being shocked by his poor construction. Is there something in his background that would suggest he is a perfectionist?

Elisa is growing on me, actually. It seems like she’d be a nice, relaxing person to hang around, once you get over the initial oddness.

Why did no one mention that Kevin was a jean designer when Jillian was freaking out? I’d give him some slack, knowing that it was what he had done (and did it well, apparently) for a living.

10

Because the following doesn’t make for compelling television, and had it happened would likely be on the cutting room floor:

JILLIAN: Oh god, Kevin is so far from done. Will we ever get the line together? Will we all be humiliated and sent home? Will our families ever speak to us again? Will they shun us on the street?

RAMI: Don’t worry, Kevin’s a jeans designer, and should be able to whip up a pair of shorts in a moment.

JILLIAN: Ok, I’ll relax.

11

For once I agreed with the judges about the winning group. I thought Ricky would go home - of the three dresses, only Victoria’s looked nice, I can’t believed the judges liked the other one. I’m glad Victoria owned up to having help with her’s final fitting. And that the spitting designer had instructions “translated” into her lingo. I’m surprised Chris went home, his dress wasn’t great, but it wasn’t as bad as Ricky’s group. Except for the winning team, it didn’t seem to me like any of the groups really used their “themes” like they were supposed to.

12

It appeared to me that Ricky actually tried to be a leader, and both Victoria (begrudgingly) and Elisa reinforced this. Chris (who seems like a real nice guy) didn’t lead at all, and it was his responsibility to factor in the two essential requirements (cohesiveness, relevance) to their collection, and they didn’t even come close. I think it was one of those weeks where, ultimately, the complete failure in that particular week outweighed the cumulative demerits from previous weeks. Sorry to see Chris go, but I don’t think Ricky will be around for much longer.

I was assuming Jack’s news may be related to a family member or close friend (illness, death, etc.).

13

I was so upset about Chris. I really liked him and I’ve liked a lot of his dresses. Sob!

But at least Ricky didn’t cry! I actually liked him in this episode after rolling my eyes at him in every previous one. And I HATE his hat. But he worked really well with the spacey girl, and at least tried to stand up to Victoria (although he could have done better). But she should have gone home, not Chris.

14

I thought she was trying to be gracious. She didn’t want to pick Victorya or Ricky, pointing fingers at others and possibly engendering bad feeling, so she’d rather just point to herself, take responsibility. It was noble of her, not in the competitive spirit at all, but then again, she isn’t. I thought it was admirable and shows that she actually is a nice person. Not all that about self-preservation, but I’m guessing she cares more about feeling OK about herself than winning. Not really the ethos of someone who wins at reality TV, and maybe not even warranted in this situation, but a valid view IMO.

15

Didn’t Austin Scarlet at one point blame himself in Season one? And I do remember Daniel Franco doing that–but he was the leader of the group, and he wanted to own up, take responsibility. There were a lot of tears when he was sent home.

Who was the guest judge this time–was it Donna Karan?

16

It may be that she just rubs me the wrong way. I didn’t mind it when Franco said “myself,” there, he was legitimately part of the problem, and he was owning up to his responsibility for the team’s failings. Or if Chris or Ricky had said the same (they didn’t, but their taking the blame would have been legitimate). But her? Unless she had backed it up with “I was so incompetent that Ricky had to spend all his time helping me instead of pulling the team together, it’s my fault for the failure of the collection,” then I don’t want to hear “um, I always say myself.” I could respect “I refuse to point to anyone, everyone on the team failed” or “I think Ricky and Victorya should stay because I admire their work and I’d rather see them go on to the finals than go myself” But she didn’t. She space cadetted away from the question of what went wrong with their collection.

17

Yes, I see your point. It sounds more like a cop-out answer in this situation, as if she obviously does not want to choose one of her teammates so she’s just saying “me” to get out of pointing the finger. I do think that not pointing the finger is admirable, though, and if the judges had wanted to read something into what she was saying, they could have gotten, “They were both assholes, I can’t choose who was worse, I’ll say ‘me’ and not antagonize either of those bitches.” But that would be asking too much, and I’m probably reading more into Elisa than is there. She was probably just trying to be nice and non-confrontational in her hippie-dippie way.

18

I got the same vibe that you did. Also, since Ricky picked Victorya and Victorya picked Ricky, she didn’t want to be the one to put one over the other. I realize the judges wouldn’t go by her vote, but I’d feel that way in her situation.

She’s an odd bird, but she seems nice.

19

Did anyone notice how absolutely terrified and some adjective I can’t think of when she was on the runway for the final judging? It looked like she was about to have some sort of breakdown. I’m worried for her future stability.

For some reason none of this year’s designs are doing anything for me. It seems to me they’re all just trying desparately trying not to be noticed. Except for Christian who thinks his fingernail clippings are talented.

StG

20

Ahhh, thank you! I’ve been searching for a Christian metaphore! He always makes me laugh and grimace. He will be around for most of the season if only for entertainment value. Gotta love that hair for it’s delicious affectation.