For the second to last time (Ben is back from Burning Man, but is currently trekking across the wild west and has no time to partake in MasterChef), hello, Starr-struck citizens of the internet! I am doing a temporary takeover of his blog in order to write the MasterChef recaps that so many of you are so fond of. He will be back to blog for the finale, so don’t you worry you will have your beloved Starr back soon enough! But for now, you are stuck with this scrub again.
For those of you that don’t know me, my name is Michael Chen, and I was part of the top 18 during Season 3 of MasterChef. Please follow me on my Facebook, Twitter, as well as my website at www.mc3michael.com! Let’s get the usual legal disclaimer out of the way: (PLEASE NOTE: This blog contains the crazed rants of a former MasterChef survivor who has practically no inside knowledge of how this season was produced. It’s not fit to be read by anyone.)
After a highly engineered elimination that saw poor James get the axe, this episode proves to be just as engineered and dramatic with the previews showing Krissi and Jessie getting into a huge catfight. It’s easy to see why Krissi’s and Jessie’s personalities clash. In a high school context (which strangely, was only about two years ago for me. feels like forever!!), Jessie is like a varsity cheerleader, gorgeous, popular, always smiling, while Krissi is the girl way down on the social ladder, loud, brassy, a little rough around the edges, not afraid to show her emotions. It’s a clash of personalities that promises a high school cafeteria-esque cat fight.
The episodes start and it’s revealed that while in the last episode, what was normally a “team challenge” was individual, this time what is usually an individual pressure test will become a “team challenge”. An odd choice, and I can’t help but think that they are doing this to build up the catfight that will inevitably unfold. Once again, Joe’s exaggerated acting and writhing face muscles crack me up. Luca gets to pick first, and exclaims that it’s the biggest advantage that he’s ever had. I personally think that winning a mystery box, earning immunity, and getting to assign stuff to your contestants is a much bigger advantage. Luca’s penchant for being extremely exaggerated and somewhat dramatic is probably what enhances his appeal to both the producers and audience, which combined with his cooking skills is what has gotten him so far in this “competition.”
Luca picks Natasha first, which isn’t a surprise to me. He clearly values her cooking abilities over any disagreements they may have had in the past. I honestly think that Natasha is the strongest cook in the whole competition. She and Adrien Nieto, of MasterChef Season 2, recently did a pop up, and looking at some of the instagram photos and descriptions of the dishes, what they put out was absolutely incredible. Way more stunningly sophisticated and creative than anything that I’ve seen out of the other three contestants, and possibly any contestant EVER in the history of MasterChef (aside from “freak genius” Alvin Schultz, also of Season 2). The menu that they put out could easily have been in some of the best restaurants in the country, and the $75 that they asked for it. If you ever have the chance to attend one of their pop-ups, don’t miss out!
That leaves Krissi and Jessie as a team. No surprise there. I can already foresee what is going to happen. They will start struggling as a team, get into a HUGE fight, cause the MULTITUDES of people that hate Krissi to hate her even more intensely, they will lose the challenge, go into the pressure test, where Jessie will beat Krissi, and 95% of the people watching MasterChef will do huge fist pumps and set off fireworks in celebration of the satisfaction of seeing Krissi get eliminated after being such a huge “asshole” this season and particularly in this episode through the fight with darling Jessie. Sound about right? Keep in mind that I am only about 3 minutes into this episode at the time of writing this paragraph. Hahaha.
Continue reading the rest of this post on my website at www.mc3michael.com!
What do y’all think? Are you happy Krissi went home? Which three course meal would YOU have eaten? Which chocolate dessert is YOUR favorite? Let me know down below….