Project Runway All Stars 10/31/13--"Bitten by the Fashion Bug" summary

Previously on Project Runway: the All-Stars made punk clothing, and sewed in Mood for no reason. Elena won, because she never won a challenge in her original season. You know that’s why. Ari went home for making clothes that were too perfect, which was fine with her. (click for more)

Top Chef 10/30/13--"Lea Michele's Halloween Bash" summary

Previously on “Top Chef”: no Quickfire, just an Elimination challenge that involved teams and also Vietnamese food. Also a bus around town so people could eat Vietnamese for the first time (Carlos) or brag about how much they knew about Vietnam (Travis). Travis is pretty much an arrogant jerk for the whole episode, up to and including saying guest judge Eddie Huang doesn’t know anything about Vietnamese food because he’s from Taiwan. Did we mention Travis is white? Yes. Justin noticed all Travis’s team’s problems but did absolutely nothing, preferring to let them hang themselves which is a strategy I approve of. Anyhow, Shirley won because she made shrimp with a ton of butter, which is what the fishermen told her to do. It looked like Travis might go home but instead Janine’s poorly cooked shrimp did her in. (click for more)

TAR23, Recap Leg 5, 10/27/13

Welcome to Leg 5! Last time, on Get Your Express Pass Here!, teams raced from Lisbon to the top of the world.  There were tasks with fish, and Nicky and Kim managed to wedge themselves into last place.  However, since there was no time before the next leg, they were not eliminated and instead kept racing.  Tim and Marie leveraged the Express Pass for information from Nicole and Travis, and ended up finding the Pit Stop.  (Toyouke: “Shut up, Marie. I'm sure I'm going to be saying that a lot.”)  Who will be eliminated. . . next? (click for more)

Project Runway All Stars 10/24/13--"You Got Punked!" summary

Previously on Project Runway: Anthony Ryan won the last All-Stars season. This season there are previous winners, which I find weird. Isn’t the point of All-Stars to reward people who should have won the first time around? Who knows. (click for more)

Project Runway 10/24/13--"Reunion" summary

Previously on Project Runway: Dom won! And there were a bunch of people who maybe shouldn’t have cleared the psych evaluation that they supposedly do before casting! So let’s see how crazy this gets. (click for more)

Top Chef 10/23/13--"Captain Vietnam" summary

Previously on “Top Chef”: The Quickfire involved cooking for Dana Cowin and convincing her that trends are not all evil. Shirley won by making rice porridge with a shirred egg, which I would totally order if I saw it in a restaurant. Aaron’s dish ended up too salty so he was sent home. Then everyone went to Commander’s Palace to recreate classic dishes just from taste. They told them before they ate, though, which was nice. Justin made perfect beignets and won. Bret didn’t get grill space, so his chops were not cooked well and he was eliminated. (click for more)

TAR23, Recap Leg 4, 10/20/13

Welcome to Leg 4! Last time, on How Not To Fly To Portugal, teams from Santiago to Lisbon.  Nicole and Travis and Jason and Amy team up and breeze through the tasks in Portugal, while Tim and Marie barely make it onto the next leg due to an airline blunder by Chester and Ephraim, who don’t even get to run the leg, as they are eliminated in Lisbon Airport.  Who will be eliminated. . . next? (click for more)

Project Runway 10/17/13--"Finale Part 2" summary

Previously on Project Runway: Bradon and Dom don’t even have to do anything, because they’re already in the finale, so the runway show is just Justin, Alexandria, and Helen. Justin has a fantastic gown made of plastic test tubes. He also doesn’t have any color, but for some reason everyone ignores that to slam Alexandria for not having any color. She gets to stay, though, and Helen is sent home. (click for more)

Top Chef 10/16/13--"Commander's Palace" summary

Previously on “Top Chef”: the Quickfire involved making gumbo, which most people are not familiar with so we ended up with a lot of fusion dishes. However Carrie made a fusion gumbo and won, so what do I know? Jason was one of the ones on the bottom and cursed about it. The Elimination challenge involved being in a food truck and making lunch for Habitat for Humanity volunteers. For some reason one team pre-made a bunch of their food, so it suffered. I’m not sure why because they did it so they could schmooze everyone, but the judges didn’t say the volunteers were voting or anything. Jason’s dish suffered the worst so he was sent home. Carrie won again because the dough for her team’s empanadas was perfect. (click for more)

TAR23, Recap Leg 3, 10/14/13

Welcome to Leg 3! Last time, on Make Sure to Tetris Your Shoeshine Cart, teams raced through Chile.  Tim and Marie piss everyone off by not giving up the Express Pass.  Leo and Jamal can’t seem to figure out how to pay a taxi cab, so Chester and Ephraim finish first, after zip lining, apparently.  And Rowan and Shane, who can’t read the directions, are eliminated.  Who will be eliminated. . . next? (click for more)

Project Runway 10/10/13--"Finale Part 1" summary

Previously on Project Runway: the traditional “everyone make something super impressive and beautiful before we kick you out to make collections” challenge. It was not super exciting, so then the producers got the bright idea to make everyone “fix” an outfit that sent someone home. I don’t mind either of those challenges, actually, because “can you make this outfit not suck but still resemble the original” is not a bad challenge. But I suspect that once Tim’s Save appeared they planned on doing this so whoever got saved could have the chance to take the outfit that eliminated them in the first place. Which is exactly what happened with Justin. I just think maybe not do two challenges at once. Bradon won, and Dom also did well but the other three have to “compete” for the chance to “show” at Fashion Week, even though they all already did. So it was a waste of 90 minutes. Sometimes I read “finale” and I hear “finally”. (click for more)

Top Chef 10/10/13--"Rebuilding New Orleans" summary

Previously on “Top Chef”: we began the new season in New Orleans with many, many people. No one made a huge impression on me because there were just too many people. It’s the usual variety of cocky jerks and snarky people and people who are competent. Everyone had to make either frog legs, alligator, or turtle in the swamp somewhere. Nina (who is from St. Lucia and is the former prime minister’s daughter) won by making curried turtle meatballs. Ramon made dashi, but in order to cool it down quickly he just put straight ice in it, so it got watered down and bland. He was sent…away…because of course Last Chance Kitchen still exists. Now that it’s won an Emmy or whatever they’ll never get rid of it. (click for more)

TAR23, Recap Leg 2, 10/7/13

Welcome to Leg 2! Last time, on Row Row Row Your Boat To Get Yourselves Some Fish, teams raced from Los Angeles to Iquique Chile.  We find out the winning team of the leg gets two Express Passes, one to use and one to give away.  Tim and Marie win the leg after Nicole and Travis pulled a Heave and were penalized.  (Auburnium0513: “You know, this just occurred to me, shouldn't the ER doctors be super careful about what they read since if you mis-read a chart, you could kill a patient?”)  Naina and Hoskote were eliminated for being slow.  Who will be eliminated. . . next? (click for more)

Project Runway 10/3/13--"Butterfly Effect" summary

Previously on Project Runway: the “make your own print” challenge happened, supposedly inspired by various people who do good things. The inspiration was a little fuzzy, but that’s what always happens with these things. Dom won, finally, which was nice. Randomly Heidi/whoever decided they would have a double elimination, so both Kate and Alexander were sent home. Kate declared that they had done it just to get rid of her. On the one hand, they had the “Tim’s Save” thing so of course they would need a double elimination at some point to get back on track. On the other hand, the producers would totally make up something like that to get rid of a designer they were tired of. On the third hand, Kate’s dress was pretty fugly so she might still have gone home. She and Helen spent all of the episode live-tweeting about what a bitch Alexandria was and how she sucked so much and should have gone home. Then Helen took offense to people saying the fabrics were ugly and suddenly everyone was a horrible person because the designers work so hard and it’s so terrible to say anything bad about their work. Yeah! I know! (click for more)

Top Chef 10/2/13--"Soiree in the Swamp" summary

Previously on “Top Chef”: there was actually a decent season, culminating in Kristen becoming the second female Top Chef which is pretty cool. I liked the “Iron Chef”-style finale, but apparently no one else did so that won’t be happening again. Also there’s some competition online? “Padma’s Picks”? I guess some people were competing for the last spot on the show and Padma got to pick. I haven’t watched any of them, because I tried to watch the first one and I made it about 3 minutes in before I got bored. Did anyone watch them? Were they worth it? (click for more)