Mostly spent the weekly on a) writing the Green Archer pieces–although of course I didn’t get ahead on them like I should of, b) watched Season 2 of Community, and c) finished the weekend watching The Amazing Race and Next Iron Chef Superstars.
Community really upped its game the second year, and it was great the first year. I especially liked the parody of the ‘clip show episode,’ those sitcom money savers where half the action is clips from previous episodes. (Community also had a parody of a ‘bottle show,’ to boot.) The gag was that the clips were from episodes that never actually happened, so all the material was new, but themselves parodies of standard sitcom situations, like the gang visiting a ghost town.
More impressive was the year-long thread of Chevy Chase’s character becoming an appalling dick throughout the season. As nasty as he got, they actually made it work that the group would just barely tolerate his hanging with them. Who hasn’t had a group of friends where one guy is always on the verge of getting kicked out because he’s an asshole, but always manages to ride the line and stay in?
Anyway, a great ensemble show. I know it never has gotten great ratings, so I fear the current third season may be it’s last. Ah, well. Also, the cast and crew commentaries on every episode (!) are consistently pretty good, although I had to return the set to the library before I could burn through all of those.
(SPOILERS) Next Iron Chef Superstars (SPOILERS)
Shockingly, Robert Irvine got popped last night, the second chef booted off the show. I’ve always liked Irvine and felt sorry for him being perennially beaten on various other shows by Anne Burell, another contestant on this show. Well, he won’t have to worry about losing directly to her again, because he’s gone.
The level of the superstars competition is so great that Irvine was basically whacked because of two minor issues; his entree had flawed radish chips in an otherwise spectacular entry, which put him in the bottom two. He then lost the direct competition (the two people who did the most poorly in the main competition face off one-on-one in an Iron Chef match) because the only element of the dish he made that wasn’t terrific was a “slightly gummy” sauce. That was enough.
Host Alton Brown brought the other chefs in to emphasize exactly that last point. This is how good the competition is, that event the slightest shortcoming can knock out even a world class chef. This is actually one of the elements I find so intriguing about the show. Brown has a nice guy persona on his show Good Eats and on Iron Chef, but on Next Iron Chef he’s always let it be known that he’s not there to be anyone’s friend. Indeed, he can be a borderline prick sometimes, which is really interesting, more so this time around when the contestants are his Food Network peers and all really well-known chefs.
Anyway, what did you guys do.
