Iron Chef America

Started catching up on Iron Chef America (ICA) this week after a couple of missed seasons. I didn't know there were TWO new Iron Chefs now - Iron Chefs Garges and Forgione, who won their respective seasons of The Next Iron Chef (which I've also not seen since its first season). 

What can I say - after missing a few seasons of ICA, I still think it's pretty damn entertaining and hilarious, like the sound effects used, particularly during the challenger's entrance and whenever the Chairman moves his head. You know the ones. Hearing those sounds always cracks me up.

I've gotten over the common-ness of the "secret" ingredient and the behind the scenes stuff - it's still a fun show to watch and still one of my favourite Food Network shows after Good Eats.

AJ Cook back on Criminal Minds

Read it here that AJ Cook is coming back to Criminal Minds for two years as series regular, which apparently first came out via Twitter here. All thanks to the fans, apparently. After all the hoopla about her being fired from the show not too long ago, I guess this would count as a hurrah if you're a fan of her character, JJ. As I'm not (really), all I can say is good on her.

It should be interesting to see how they'll squeeze her back into the show after all that; the most ridiculous thing I could think of is that she comes back to the BAU as liaison between them and the Pentagon (as her character was ordered to take the Pentagon job), or she pulled some string high up in the Pentagon hierarchy to come back to the BAU. If I'm right, it either means that I watch way too much TV (which I can't deny), or the writers ran out of ideas, too.

While we're on the subject of the show, I don't understand the hate on Rachel Nichols (as Seaver), with the show's history of cast comings and goings: In case no one remembered, Mantegna was brought in to replace Mandy Patinkin and Paget Brewster replaced Lola Glaudini (who only lasted ONE season). Did anyone complained about that then? Sometimes you need to change things up. People should just deal with it.

Am I the only person that wondered how Seaver got into the FBI academy with her serial killer dad? We all knew that she changed her last name to her mother's maiden name, but still - you would think that the FBI has the resources to do a deep enough background check on candidates. Or perhaps there was an interview component that she passed with flying colours? 

Anyway, it can't be that hard to work her back into the opening credits and into the huge group shot in the end, no? It's just one of the things I like to watch out for whenever there's news about the cast.

Related articles

• A.J. Cook Officially Returning to 'Criminal Minds' As Series Regular (tvsquad.com)

Comments about this week's Top Chef Masters

"Everything Old Is New Again"

1. Did anyone else knew Kelis was a "trained chef"? Neither did I.
2. I should be glad that it wasn't a MILKSHAKE quickfire challenge - that would be groan- and cringe-worthy.
3. Having never seen Body of Proof or Mad Men.... holy shit, he's married to her?! REALLY? The lucky schmuck. Okay, okay - I know I'm not the first person to say or think it, but it bears repeating.

Related articles

• Top Chef Masters: Christina Hendricks, Kelis and Not Enough Duck à l'Orange (eonline.com)

No more Hetty? *GASP*

The NCIS: LA fandom was abuzz when the news broke that Claire Forlani will be joining the show in the near future as their new operations manager, where some fans have speculated (perhaps), to possibly replace Linda Hunt. 

I don't how they'll write this one - is Linda Hunt's contract up, or wants out, or getting written out? Will Claire Forlani be keeping her English accent, or be American? So many questions.


Related articles

• Claire Forlani cast as 'NCIS: LA' operations manager: Is Hetty heading out? - EXCLUSIVE (insidetv.ew.com)

Top Chef Masters, Revamped

Image via Wikipedia

Caught the latest season of Top Chef Masters (TCM), with the format revamped from previous seasons. It's now more like Top Chef and Top Chef: Just Desserts, where one chef is eliminated on a weekly basis with the usual Top Chef-esque challenges. 

Frankly, I didn't really find anything wrong with the old TCM format; I just thought that it was differently refreshing from the rest of the Top Chef franchise. But if they want to standardise the format, then fine.

As part of the revamp, Curtis Stone took over hosting duties from Kelly Choi (who? heh heh). I guess this is NBC Universal (who owns the Bravo)'s way of addressing the issue :P But also in line with Bravo's thing of having non-American (born) minor celebrities host their reality-competition shows. When I first heard that Curtis Stone is hosting this season of TCM, my only question was "Why?" Never mind that I liked the guy from before he was on American TV screens, but now with his judgvestor gig on America's Next Great Restaurant (also an NBC Universal thing) and between his previous shows like Surfing the Menu, My Restaurant Rules and the occasional episode of Take Home Chef, it's Curtis Stone overload for me.

Not being an American foodie, I didn't recognise most of the contestants this season - if I'm not wrong, Traci Des Jardins was a contestant back in the first season, but got the boot pretty early, so it was nice that they brought her back for a another shot at this. I'm gonna take a guess and say that these are the chefs that don't have to the time to appear as judges on Top Chef? Am I the only one that's glad Wylie Dusfrene is not back a THIRD time? Oy.

One of the things I like about the first Quickfire is to see who didn't finish in time. Crappy ingredients like marshmallow, licorice, canned corn beef were the mystery box ingredients. Three unfortunate cheftestants got disqualified for not done plating on time, which was a bit anticlimatic as they were competing in pairs and it means that the other person won by default.

Since it is TCM after all, it's only fitting that they get Restaurant Wars as their first elimination challenge - which I don't think it's that big a deal since most of them have opened restaurants before, so it wasn't terribly chaotic until service started. I think the only reason why diners preferred Leela over Mosaic was because they didn't have to wait too long to be seated. To wait too long for food is one thing, to be standing there waiting to be seated is another.

Critic-wise, the only constant since the first season is James Oseland, the guy from Saveur.

Related articles

• Who Is Curtis Stone Anyway? (huffingtonpost.com)