So this season began with the team members hanging out and drinking some champagne left out for them. Then they had to wake up super early the next morning to bake bread. Jessica was still a bit drunk so she slept for most of it. Then they had to make souffles. Ralph's was declared the best, though Gordon Ramsay found fault with all of them; so he was allowed to pick which of three entrees (beef, chicken, or tuna) he wanted to prepare. He chose beef, with Michael cooking tuna and Jessica chicken.

For the main dining competition, the families of the contestants showed up to Hell's Kitchen (they got to hang out with them a bit at the end of the episode). In general, Ralph's dish was the most popular and Michael's the least; but the families liked Michael's the best. Meanwhile, Jessica seemed to struggle for most of the night and had to have tons of help from her teammates. As a result of all this, she was the one who ended up being eliminated. It's kind of a shame as for a while I'd thought she would win, as she looks like the underdog compared to the two men who don't always take her seriously. But, nothing about her performance these past few episodes has made it seem like she has a handle on running a professional kitchen (which is, after all, the ultimate aim of the show), and even if the producers of the show had wanted to shape her into a winner, they can only do so much. So now I hope Ralph will win, because Michael hasn't been sympathetic at all for at least the past two episodes if not longer.

With all that being said, I've decided to take a detour from the first season and watch some episodes from some of the later seasons, mostly because the last episode of this season is over an hour long (I'll probably watch it over the weekend when I have a bit more time). Already, just from watching short clips of some of the later seasons I've seen things that would make the contestants and situations of the first season, at their most unceremonious, seem downright dignified by comparison!

 In this episode, the contestants stopped being two separate teams and each became one team, with the understanding that it was everyone for themselves. The first challenge involved learning to make a flambe dessert. Jimmy won the challenge, much to everyone's surprise, and so he got invited on a helicopter date with Gordon Ramsay (shhh...!). He invited Michael to come along, seemingly to pay him back for not eliminating him earlier when he had the chance. However, Elsie somewhat cynically remarks that Michael only passed over Jimmy for elimination in favor of Chris because he knew Chris was his biggest threat. And I have to wonder a little bit if Jimmy knew this, and that's the real reason why he chose Michael--to protect himself from Michael if he's ever in a position to eliminate him again.

This dinner challenge was the first time they were cooking without the help of the sous-chefs, so it was pretty hard going. Elsie was relegated to the dining room, preparing salads and flambe desserts for the diners. She struggled a bit at first but eventually got the hang of it. Meanwhile, both Jessica and Jimmy got into fights with Gordon Ramsay because he was dissatisfied with their performance. As such, when Gordon Ramsay called upon Ralph to pick people for elimination he picked Jimmy and Jessica, with Jimmy being the one who got eliminated. I wasn't terribly surprised, but his departure was genuinely heartwarming, with a reflection on how much he's grown as a chef, and how Gordon Ramsay really is proud of him for getting that far.

Interestingly, Elsie displays some signs of flagging, and has begun to question whether this is something she really wants. She even asked Ralph to put her up for elimination at one point! I guess, realistically, she doesn't have much of a chance of winning either, seeing as she already has a job and kids to worry about.

I also can't help but wonder if the show is trying to ship some of the contestants a little bit. I'm sure it's all pretend, but it's pretty funny to see Michael and Jimmy going on a helicopter date together, complete with champagne (for example). Jessica also has a conversation with Michael while the contestants are waiting for Ralph to select people for elimination, in which Michael seems to question what Jessica's relationship with Ralph actually is (she insists he's just a mentor, of course). I wonder just how much of that is deliberate, but I can see it adding another layer of drama if it's ever played up at any point.

Speaking of Michael, it's implied (but never outright stated) that he hid some steaks Jessica was supposed to cook, which slowed her up and caused her to get in trouble with Gordon Ramsay. They really do seem to be setting him up as a villain, don't they? Between the group psychology of the game and the fact that audience members don't like players who turn on or sabotage their teammates, I wouldn't be surprised if Michael ends up eliminated the second he drops the ball (if indeed he does).

 So in this episode Gordon Ramsay changed up the menus so that all the contestants had to serve pasta dishes. First he challenged them to make pasta. The Red Team made more, so they won that competition. That evening, the teams each took it in turns to cook dinner and serve it to the guests. The Blue Team won the main challenge, despite Red's attempts to sabotage them by encouraging the guests to order the most difficult menu item, although I can't remember if it was for food or service. Michael was the best of the worst on the Red Team this time around, so he had to choose people to eliminate--and he took the opportunity to throw out Chris, the other professional chef on his team, passing over Jimmy, who appeared to have struggled the most with the tasks at hand.

I should say that I'm not actually terribly surprised by this. Chris was established pretty early on as a strong contender. At first, when everyone had to work as a team, this was a good thing, but as the number of players dwindles and it becomes more and more apparent that only one person can win, the most aggressive players are the ones who become the biggest targets the fastest. I can't help but notice that I don't think Michael has ever been in the position of eliminating someone before, and I wonder if he partly planned it that way so as not to make enemies early on. I wouldn't be surprised if later Michael gets thrown out at the first opportunity, now that he's signaled that HE'S a threat. Of course, that might not be for a while, as I suspect the show is hoping he becomes an interesting villain.

What this all means is that a player like Jessica, for example, might have a pretty good chance of winning, because it's not immediately obvious that she's a threat. Jimmy and Elsie don't seem like threats either, but once again, they seem out of their element enough that it probably wouldn't be believable if they won. It's hard for me to see Andrew winning either, but to his credit he did become more sympathetic this episode, as he seemed to be making a conscious effort not to be such a loudmouth (although he did have another shouting match with Ralph), and acted pretty nice to Elsie on one occasion. 

This episode began with the teams cleaning and preparing squid to Gordon Ramsay's specifications. The Red Team won, with Dewberry putting forth especially good work. As a result, when it came time for the main challenge (serving the people in the restaurant, again), the Blue Team were forced to cook with no air conditioning (Gordon Ramsay apparently got the idea from his own experience cooking in a kitchen with a broken air conditioner)! However, ultimately the Blue Team still won because (evidently) both Jeff and Dewberry slowed things up again (I didn't see that part because I couldn't find that piece of episode). So Dewberry was eliminated.

I'm noticing a theme here: so far, the focus has been more on whether the team members can work as a team than whether they can cook well. Both of the people who have been eliminated so far were good enough cooks but got eliminated because they couldn't be team players. Furthermore, Jeff, who was slated for elimination as well, highlighted his willingness to work as part of a team while trying to convince Gordon Ramsay to let him stay.

Jeff apparently suffered from kidney stones during this episode. I'm not sure whether I think that was real or fake, but I think it easily could have been real since kidney stones, to my knowledge, are more painful than actually dangerous. I'm a little more suspicious of the other contestants' reactions, none of which seemed to show much or any compassion for him at all. They were on the opposing team, so I'm wondering if that was an attempt to antagonize him?

It's also occurred to me that there's two contestants in particular that I think we're meant to dislike: Chris on Red and Andrew on Blue. Chris, at least, appears to have partly redeemed himself this episode by helping out his teammates, but Andrew is mostly just annoying and stuck up. Jessica, on Blue, isn't particularly sympathetic either. I'll be interested to see what becomes of them as the show goes on.

 So I've decided I won't visit the dining hall at all this upcoming week, but will cook as many of my meals as possible in my house. I probably won't do this every week because I want to make my meal plan count, but I just want to see if I can do it this one week. Mostly because I've noticed several times now that my housemates will look into what appears to me to be a well-stocked refrigerator and insist we're running low on food. So, I decided to see if I can keep myself fed for a week on nothing but the food that the house buys, just to see if we really ARE running out of food, or if they're just being uncreative and whiny.

I miss my UK flat....