So we’re now two episodes in to the 2014 season of Masterchef here in the US and I’m just about ready to give up. I just spent the last two months watching a delightful series of Masterchef UK with no stupid competitive games, sniping between contestants, or douchey judges. Okay, maybe John can be a bit annoying, but not like these three. Why do producers of shows in America think that this is a more entertaining format than the UK version? I’m not expecting 2.5 hours a week but they could at least have pleasant people to watch and none of this stupid, predictable editing.
Well, hopefully The Great British Bake-Off will be starting soon.
Because Joe Lunchpail and Sally Soapopera think it’s more entertaining - especially with the editing to make it look like the “chosen one” needs to win as she has invested everything into this. Of course, they never do mention when a past winner doesn’t get the promised book deal, any more than when Hell’s Kitchen doesn’t mention the two times the winner didn’t get the promised job as “head chef” at a major restaurant (not including the one where Gordon offered the winner an alternative on the air).
No, it isn’t getting worse, it’s always been horrible. But Gordon Ramsay has actually apologized twice for being nasty, and Joe hasn’t even attacked anybody’s integrity yet.
I used to watch Masterchef because there were occasional moments when Ramsay would actually act as a mentor to the cooks instead of browbeating them. I remember in season three when he showed them how to filet a salmon, and there was that great moment last year when he taught them all how to prepare a sea urchin, even taking Christine Ha’s hand to show her how to make the cut. But those occasions are few and far between next to all the bluster and cattiness from the chefs, as well as Ramsay’s dumb abuse (does this man not realize how unfunny he is?) and Joe’s tedious steely-eyed death stare. And Ramsay’s lame fake-outs drive me fucking bonkers. (“Bobby, take off your apron … and then put it back on and join the other chefs upstairs, because you’re staying!”) I don’t think it’s getting worse; I think I finally just had my fill of it.
Any citation or articles about this? Hadn’t heard this one before.
I’m not watching Masterchef this season (I watched S4 and the last Junior one), just because I don’t find it all that terribly interesting … too much fluff, for one thing. But I think people like snarky judges, at least to a certain extent. I don’t think American Idol would’ve had nearly the same lasting powers had Simon Cowell not been involved as the “bad guy.”
The Hell’s Kitchen Season 7 winner was promised a job at the Savoy Grill in London, but was told after the season ended that they couldn’t get her a work visa. She blames Ramsay, but I think it was a change mandated by the British Parliament where work visas would not be granted to foreigners if the job could be done by someone from within the UK, with exceptions made for “celebrities” (e.g. if a movie production wants to include, say, Harrison Ford, they’re not going to force the producers to replace him with a British actor).