This week - take a character from the Wizard of Oz and transport them to Wonderland. Exciting, colorful, fun.
Self picked teams, but someone gets to be the left overs, and that ends up being Jason and Sasha.
Results:
Drew and George, with the Wicked Witch of the West: They had a concept where the witch gets caught in a tornado and ends up in Wonderland. They come up with a green witch in a black dress and hat. They wanted to do a big twirled hairdo under the hat, but the hat they got didn’t have room, so the ended up with wispy gray hairs on a big green dome of a head. As Glenn says, “Very Wizard of Oz, not very Wonderland”. They claim her features got exaggerated by Wonderland, but that doesn’t show up. The only concession to Wonderland seems to be shiny stuff on her dress. The face sculpt is good, but they made a big domed head that was going to support the hair but didn’t so it looks goofy. And the neck bulges weirdly and, as Glenn said, it looks like the makeup ends at the neck of the dress. She doesn’t look like the shoulders continue under the clothes. Ve is here this week, and she says they should have changed the color and not made her green. Lois said they could have done something big with the hair to bring in the whimsy. They ended up Safe for the week.
Damien and Cig, the Scarecrow: Their Scarecrow got sucked into Wonderland and embraced the crazy. He was destuffed and restuffed and made up of patches and repairs. They had a good concept, but they overdid it. They made the face up as if the burlap bag had been patched and repaired, and they threw everything at it. In the end, they had a cluttered mess where the face wasn’t distinct from the costume. Lois points out one of the best bits they use is metal, and they hide that under the hat. Also, they tried to pull off a dropping head gag by building up the shoulders, but that falls flat. The outfit is such a cluttered mess, it isn’t visible. They were in Bottom looks for poor choices in execution.
Stella and Dina, a Flying Monkey: Their concept is that the Flying Monkey ends up in Wonderland, where the Queen of Hearts decides to make it her jester. So they sculpted a monkey face and turned the ears and top of the head into the jester cap, and used playing cards for the wings. It’s got a creepy look with the right dash of color. The judges love it, and call it the best mash up of the two worlds. They get Top looks.
Jason and Sasha, the Cowardly Lion: This was a fuck up, right from the get go. The problem is that Jason right off the bat wants to do creepy instead of whimsical. He says “we did whimsical last time, I want to do creepy.” Hey dipshit, you have to do the challenge you are given, not the one you want to do. But he’s paired up with Sasha, who knows it needs to be whimsical and fun, but “doesn’t like confrontation”, so she doesn’t argue very hard for what they need to do. That happened last time she got with a partner who didn’t want to do the challenge they were given. She goes along, but then gets upset because it’s her “dream challenge”, but she doesn’t have the confidence and gumption to stand up for the idea.
So Jason is sculpting a bland dull lion for a Cowardly Lion put into the queen’s guard, and he’s beaten and starved to make him comply. Then Mr. Westmore sees it, and hammers them hard for not being whimsical, and being dull, and not looking like a lion. And all the time Sasha is quiet while Jason is surprised. And I’m thinking “See, I told you”. They try to incorporate stripes from the Cheshire Cat, but they don’t really have a concept for the paint and colors. Sasha tries a technique to avoid having the baggy funfur suit, so she tries to transfer fur to a body stocking, which seems to work but on stage is shedding pretty bad.
The judges say it lacked direction, the face looks stiff and masklike, the colors were horrible, the ears should have been bigger (which Sasha wanted but Jason said make them smaller), it needed a giant mane and afro, and pretty much they failed the concept. They were Bottom looks for sure.
Rachael and Keaghlan, the Tin Woodsman: They say the Woodsman was drafted into the army by the Queen, and he realizes he has a heart when he won’t be her executioner. Good story. They have a very good sculpt and great paint job to accentuate it. The sculpt is very symmetrical, which they realized it needed to be, and the judges note that. It’s got good lines that are highlighted by the paint job. A very solid result and Top Looks.
In the end, the winning team is Stella and Dina for their Flying Monkey. It was the best mesh of the two universes, and a beautiful job. They give the Win to Dina for her idea to make the flesh blend to the shapes of the jester’s hat and collar.
The losing team goes to Jason and Sasha for their Cowardly Lion. The Scarecrow had some bad decisions in execution, but was a decent idea and had some good elements. The Cowardly Lion did not have a good concept and did not fit the challenge at all, and the face was pretty bad. The loser was Jason, because it was his concept and largely his direction.
I really expected them to say something to Sasha about needing to be stronger in her opinions. This was the second time she let herself get railroaded and ended up in bottom looks because of it. But I think they made the right call.
Next week, they have a special Face Off challenge; it’s judge’s week, where Glenn, Ve, and Neville will compete against each other with some of the favorites from previous seasons to assist them. This should be interesting, and definitely different. We get to see how the pro’s do things.