Underneath my yellow skin

Tag Archives: Netflix

Imitation without innovation is irritation

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I like TV shows that I call gentle competition shows. It started with the OG Great British Baking Show or whatever it was called when Mel and Sue were hosting it. I adored them because they had an obvious synergy (you can’t fake it, and they had been friends for decades), and the format was fresh and new at the time. I really loved that they would cuss or start mentioning brand names whenver a competitor was having a bad moment (melting down, crying, etc.) so that it could not be used in the show. I loved that bit of information when I read it (they were protecting the competitors), and I was so upset when they were fucked over by…the BBC? Is that who owns the show?

I hated the new people and never watched the show again. Luckily for me, the show spawned a spate of imitators, a few that were good, but most of them were middling to utter horseshit. Why? I’ll get to that in a second.

I like the gentle competition shows because they showcase creativity in a way that is competitive, but not cutthroat. I prefer when they highlight the creative art itself and not just throw around tired old jokes and try to make the task outrageous.

One of my favorite of these shows is Blown Away, which is about glass art. In the last season, though, they made a few big changes that made me lift an eyebrow. They got rid of the host who I lked a great deal and replaced him with Hunter March, who used to host Sugar Rush (another one of these shows. This probably means that game isn’t coming back).

Here’s the thing. I love Hunter March. I think he is one of the better hosts of these kind of shows, even though some of the things he says is cringy. I don’t blame him because I’m sure it’s the scriptwriters’ fault.

Side note: That is one of my big criticisms about these shows. The humor is way too forced. I don’t need slapdash and five jokes a second. I would rather they just CTFO and let the contestants do their thing in relative peace. I know that’s not good TV, but it would do more for my nerves and my brain. I also don’t understand why they often have a comedian as the host, but I have accepted that this is just the way it’ll be.

The other thing I didn’t like about the last season of Blown Away was that they placed an emphasis on making everything bigger, grander, and more explosive (metaphorically). They went more for the wow factor and less about the actual art (which I think is why they got rid of the last host). It felt rather shallow and didn’t have the same heft as it did in the previous seasons. It’s not Taylor’s fault as he’s as good as he ever is. Katherine Gray, the head judge is phenomenal. It’s just felt that the powers-that-be were more focused on the numbers rather than the show itself.


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Not blown away by Blown Away Season 4

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As I have written about before, I am a big fan of the genre of TV shows I call ‘cozy competitions’, such as Sugar Rush, the original The Great British Bake Off (with  Mel and Sue), and Crazy Delicious. I don’t like the ones that are designed to make the contestants look mean or hate each other. I liked the first three seasons of Blown Away, a Netflix original about glass blowers. The host, Nick Uhas, was one of the least-cringeworthy out there (I have had a contiunal issue with the shows that they hire comedians as the emcees and have them say very insipid and sometimes wince-inducing lines).

Netflix sent me the notice for the fourth season, and I frowned as I watched the intro to the first episode (which is also the trailer, apparently. I have included it below). The voice was not the same as before, but I recognized it. It turned out to be Hunter March, who was the host for Sugar Rush. Which might possibly be my favorite of the shows–but he did have a few really bad lines he had to say on the show. His teeth are so white. So. White. But he’s a handsome lad, and from some pics of him I saw on his FB when I Googled all this just now, he has abs for day.

The trailer had a vibe to it I didn’t like. One thing I liked about the show wsa that it was very technical, but also low-key. This trailer had that PUMP IT UP! feel to it that I did not appreciate. The word epic was uttered. I don’t want epic. I want the work to speak for itself. I liked the show because it was nerdy and geeked out about blowing glass. I know nothing about glass-blowing, but I could appreciate a good geek-out.

Plus, and this is something that I will always notie about the show I’m watching–the contestants were much more homogeneous than before. In prenvious seasons, there were Asian people, queer people, nonbinary people, and other visible minorities. In this season, there was one black guy. That was it. It felt like a deliberate choice, by the way. The decision to make it less diverse.

In the first few episodes, there was so much harping on how everything was going to be EXTREME!!!! This was the biggest season ever!!!!! And, yes, there was a heavy emphasis on size. The prize was the biggest ever, too, and every day, there was a really good prize given away to the first place winner (of the day).

I was disappointed that Hunter March was the new host for two reasons. One, I liked Nick and thought he did well on the show. Not to say that Hunter wouldn’t because as I said, he had hosted my favorite show in this genre. But that was the other reason I was disappointed–this probably meant no more Sugar Rush. I mean, there was no sign it was coming back, and it’s been three-and-a-half years, but I was holding out hope.


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Drink Masters: an underrated gem

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In the past few years, I’ve been gorging on what I’ve termed gentle competitions (TV shows). Of coruse, the grande dame is The Great British Baking Show, wmich I used to watch when it  was The Great British Bake Off with Sue and Mel. Once they were pushed out, I was done. I felt it was sleazy and of course Paul Hollywood stayed because that’s the kind of man he is. I lost all interest once they were gone, but that sparked my love of competitive reality shows.

Here’s the  thing, though. I don’t like the ones where people are nasty to each other or snippy behind each other’s back. I used to watch Chopped, and while I liked it in general, I started to beccome aware of the pattern that made it easy to gues swho was going to win. Not only who was going to win, but who was going to be cut after each challenge. If someone said they were confident they were going to win, they were gone. Anyone who exceptionally nasty was gone. But, on the other hand, anyone who was mildly brutish stayed. It got boring by the end, if I’m to be honest.

K and I were talking about these shows because she enjoys them, too. She mentioned that she started watching them once the pandemic hit because she  just wanted comfort and warmth. I agreed with her vigorously. With the world being what it was, there was nothing better with hunkering down and bingeing a competition show. I preferred British over American for the most part.

I have watched so many of them, and now I know what I like and what I don’t like in a show. I will note that it’s different for different situations. If I’m working on something else, then I want a show that is lowkey. That means one that has a set amount of competitors each episode and then just whittles them down a la Chopped. One of my favorites in that genre is Sugar Rush. It’s the epitome of comfort food. You can consume it without much thought, and it’ll keep you satiated for an hour or so. There is nothing brilliant about the show, but it’s just a delight to watch.

The other way to do these shows is to have a group of contestants who last for the whole season. I confess, I prefer this to the different contestants per episode format because I can actually develop opinions and feelings for the contestants.

I will also say that when I see a bunch of diverse people on the show, I’m immediately boosted. It’s become the norm, which makes me happy. It shouldn’t even be a factor, but, sadly, it still is. What do I mean when I sy diversity? POC, obviously, but also gender in the competitions considered masculine (which, sadly, are most of them. Even cooking shows are considered masculine because–patriarchy), sexual orientation, gender orientation, and even age.


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Going Down the Netflix Rabbit Hole

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cuff 'em and stuff 'em!
You have the right to remain silent.

When I finished binge-watching Poirot episodes, I struggled to find another crime series to watch. I gave a half dozen a try, but I didn’t like any of them. The gritty, realistic ones were trying to hard, and the quirky one was too twee for my taste. The latter wasn’t bad, and I might revisit it, but it didn’t really hold my interest. Before I went on the Poirot rampage, I had been watching Criminal Minds. I stopped during Season Four when I hit the ‘that darn internet’ episode, but out of desperation, I started watching it again from where I left off. Let me be clear. I think Criminal Minds is a mediocre-to-competent program. Production is slick, and the acting is competent for the most part, but it’s basically the fast food of TV shows. Comforting, deep-fried, and unthinkingly consumed. It’s especially noticeable when you binge-watch the show and see how same-y every episode is. Horrific crime shown in the first five minutes. Obvious suspect introduced within the next ten. The team flies out and is often greeted with hostility. The case touches one of them in a personal way, and they have conflict over how to deal with it. Then, after more gruesome scenes, they figure out who the real culprit is and arrest him/her. The suspect rarely escapes, unless it’s one of the nemesis enemies.

The episode that caused me to stop watching the show actually turned out to be OK. It wasn’t an indictment on the internet as much as it was an indictment on the twisted individual who was using the internet to wreak mayhem and destruction. I started watching again, and I plowed through the whole series.* I noticed that as the seasons progressed, they started running out of ideas. That’s not uncommon with a long-running series, and it’s even more apparent when you watch the episodes back-to-back-to-back in a fairly short amount of time. I would say that when Paget Brewster was written off the show was the time it went off the rails. She was never my favorite character because she was too good at everything, but the team chemistry did take a hit once she was gone.

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