Thoughts watching the second season of The Taste (ABC)

Second season finale of The Taste is coming!

It was sad to hear that Malarkey wasn't continuing on the show and replaced by Marcus Samuelsson as fourth mentor and judge, but whatever it takes to make things exciting. 

• At least this year the judges are taking more time to decide instead of going by snap judgment followed by bitter regret after meeting the person who made the spoon. The double-edged sword that is blind tasting. 
• The mentor's personalised trailers where they meet their teams at the start of the day is a charming touch. Show got more money now. 
• Having the guest judge serve as mentor in the individual challenge for the winners of the team challenge is also not a bad idea. 
• They've tweaked things around a little bit: Losing mentor having to send their weakest link home right after the team challenge is pretty brutal, but also to great effect when Nigella loses half her team in one episode early on when they lost both team and solo challenges.
• At least the judges table is only on a slightly higher level than the cooking area than the first season, so there isn't any weird door and elevator footage like they did last season? 
• Of course they want the home cook to be in the finale. But also sad that Nigella and Marcus are already out of the competition before the finale.
• Who wants crazy dragon lady Marina to take the title?