One thing that struck me was the editing on Dave. Up til now he’s been pretty much the White Knight – nothing but praise from Ramsay for his work ethic, and he’s been handling working in the cast with apparently little effort/pain.
This time, there’s the big ‘horrible pain’ bit, which then seems to vanish from the story even though there’s no sign he received any treatment. Pain pills, maybe? More noticeable was the revelation that Dave wasn’t above ‘playing the game’, as in, admiting that he wanted to nominate Ariel instead of Van, because Ariel was the stronger cook and he was more confident of going against the weaker Van.
And, of course, having Tennille throw him under the bus later on …
Anyway, it makes me wonder if the editors are setting the audience up for his going out soon, either for medical reasons OR because he pulls some maneuver (possibly an action against Tennille?) that causes Ramsay to dump him.
Also, I fully understand Ramsay’s frustration with Suzanne and Van, but the only thing I noticed against Ariel was leaving one pan of lettuce on the stove and it burning. That seems more like an accident – it didn’t seem to hold up any meals, so likely the pan was prepped and waiting for that to be called for – than bad cooking.
Finally – Suzanne is dead. You’re trying out for a head chef job, and not only don’t you step up and make an effort, you REFUSE to take any responsibility when your team asks you to??? Worthless. You’re a line cook, nothing more. Probably ever.
As much as Tennille yells and swears at the camera, she has some qualities that I like. Aside from generally being consistent and on task in the kitchen (and she did a good job keeping the kitchen going after Ramsay walked out), I also like how honest she is with the other players. She doesn’t connive behind anyone’s back, she’s not two-faced, she doesn’t strategize. She just goes right up to whoever sucks and says “I’m picking YOU because you fucking SUCK.” It’s never personal either. Her reasons are never based on anything other than performance.
I had kind of liked Dave up to this point, but last night he started to lose me just a little with the first signs of gamesmanship I’ve seen from him, and with his promo-ed anger with Tennille for being honest with Ramsay.
Clearly Van was in over his head and needed to go. Maybe he can try again after he finishes kindergarten.
Yes. Sometimes I think Ramsay’s histrionics ratchet up the pressure several notches. I’m not sure if that’s by design, so he can see how people perform under pressure. As soon as he left, it was like everyone took a deep breath and focused. I wonder why he can’t seem to make that happen when he is in the room.
I also noticed that none of the dishes came back to the kitchen after Ramsay left, which means the cooking was all spot-on.
Oh, yeah. I was sooooo tired of his constant “I’m a man! You can’t treat me like a bitch! I’m not a bitch, I’m a man!” repeat repeat repeat. :rolleyes:
It’s especially nice that his final disaster came on the fish station. Mister “I am a master of fish” Cook at a Fish House couldn’t cook halibut. Ha!
I was happy to bee Sabrina go. Hated her for a long time.
Was surprised to see Van go. As stated earlier in the thread, I thought he was going to go pretty damn far. He did go far, just not as far as I was expecting.
So who is left? In order of who I think is mostly likely to win and whom I remember:
[ul]
[li]Dave[/li][li]Tennille[/li][li]Kevin[/li][li]Suzanne[/ul][/li]
Is that it? Really?
I like Dave and Kevin, won’t be sad if either one wins. I don’t like Tennille and will not be happy if she wins. Suzanne I kind of have a thing for and I’m don’t know why. Her face isn’t anything special (face matters a lot to me when it comes to attractiveness) and she has a funny half-lisp type thing. Maybe it’s the tongue piercing that is endearing her to me? I don’t know.
Count me in as someone slightly rooting for Suzanne. I don’t think she has a chance in the world of winning- but what I see out of her is just social cluelessness. She’s shown several times that she can cook pretty well (far too well to be considered, I think in Dave’s words “the weakest member of the team”. Her personality gets in the way of her skill, but I can sympathize as someone who has a personality others have issues with (I’m working on it!). Although it was a little brash for her to repeat Ramsey’s “It was the passionfruit” I didn’t think it was such a big sin that Dave should publically admonish her for it. I think she was just happy to win on that point, it didn’t come across to me like she was rubbing it in that time.
I do have to admit all of this is true. If my TV would automatically turn the volume down a little bit when she does her camera “confessions” I’d be happy.
Besides Van and his “bitch” thing, Suzanne and Ariel were being seriously whiny. Suzanne was “I’m not putting my name on that” over freaking garnishes?! Just flippin’ garnish the thing and send it out, it’s better to send people food that isn’t exactly perfect than to send no food. And Ariel with her “I needed help, a break” when it should have been obvious that Tennille was trying to keep things going? Christ.
Oh yeah! I had a very strong feeling there was one more but couldn’t remember. I didn’t even have a face or voice or even general look of the last person that I couldn’t remember.
Ariel I am “meh” on. She’ll probably get booted after Suzanne.
Lesse…I like Kevin, even if he is a tad pushy. But you need that type of pushiness in a kitchen, not to mention the chops (I don’t think he’s had a bad service yet, has he?) He forgot to cover his accent during the last episode at one point – AHA, he’s from my neck of the woods, so that’s another reason to root for him.
Dave? Like him too, solid cook, he gets extra points for working through his arm issues, I’m beginning not to mind the “stoner” thing so much. I hope he doesn’t suddenly crash and burn, but I don’t know…something tells me he won’t be in the top 3, but I could be wrong.
Tennille reminds me of a lot of a particular type of woman I’ve worked with off and on during my entire food-related career: Loud, brassy, blunt, has a certain talent but would rather flap her mouth than actually work. I think Tennille’s amusing, but only in small doses. I also can’t see her making it into the final 3.
Suzanne is totally out of her league. If she becomes one of the final 3 I’ll keel over.
…hey, what about Ariel?
I think Ariel has a shot. She’s the type (like Danny from last year) who quietly comes up through the ranks. The burnt lettuce has been her only faux pas IIRC. She’s not particularly compelling to watch, but she’s got the heart and determination.
I feel pretty much the same way. I also identify with being somewhat socially awkward. I review the shows with some friends the day after and I refer to Suzanne as “my girlfriend.” Not a bad rack, either.
Probably not, certainly not on her own merits, but there’s always the one in a googol chance the rest could do something to royally fuck themselves over and give her the win by default.
True true. May I suggest you shave half of each eyebrow and down the middle if Suzanne wins? You obviously would have to provide pictures.
Where is the fun of betting on such a huge longshot if you’re not going to actually risk something? Hell, you could even do the above, take the pics then shave them completely. See? It’s win-win.
I take it no one watched this week? I don’t know if I should be happy because I didn’t either and thus no chance for spoilage or if I should be sad because my thread is dying.
[spoiler]Editors from Bon Appetit come in to judge their best dishes, which they have 45 minutes to create. Ariel and Kevin get picked as top two on the basis of visual appeal, and then Ramsay and the editor say they can’t choose between the two in taste. Kevin starts in early with his “scheming” edit, lots of commentary from him this episode (when in the ‘confession room’) about what he has to do to beat the competition. Ariel and Kevin get to go for a photo shoot for the magazine, and their dishes are used that night. The others dress up in jumpsuits, get on a prison-style bus, and go pick up litter, then clean in the restaurant. Tennille gets shouty about how much it sucks. Surprise. Dave’s arm flares up after all the work he puts in, and as he’s laying around with a major ice pack, Kevin tells him about how he’s got to think about his future. Dave quietly rolls his eyes.
Dinner service boils down to: everyone sucked, Ramsay shouts a lot. Suzanne has issues cooking the meat, including uneven scallop cooking and raw chicken, plus she grouches at Tennille for not communicating about when to drop scallops. Ariel botches the lamb a few times - undercooking, even putting out poorly-cut, ragged-looking chops that lead him to haul her out in front of the crowd and ask if they would be acceptable at his “prize” restaurant that’s being dangled in front of them as a goal. Tennille screws up risotto twice by overcooking, and then it turns out the problem was Kevin screwed up and overcooked the rice when he did prep, while Tennille didn’t recognize where the problem was really happening. I forget if Dave did anything bad - probably, there was lots of yelling. Ramsay sends out plates of food in incomplete orders just to get some people fed while chaos reigns in the kitchen.
Ramsay tells them to go back and pick two people. Grouching at each other follows, of course no one’s nominating themselves, and Suzanne seems especially defensive, claiming she did well. Finally they’re called back out and Kevin is told to speak up. He nominates Ariel and Suzanne - the latter partially because of her apparent inability to admit she screwed up at all. Suzanne continues with this in her defense speech, talking about focus on technique and stuff. Ariel’s speech was pretty normal, IIRC, the ‘I can do this please let me prove it’ thing. Ramsay kicks Suzanne out. She says something at the end about how she thinks that not making connections with her teammates hurt her.[/spoiler]
