'Hell's Kitchen' Finale: The old winners return and a new one revealed
In last week's poll I asked you to pick the winner of "Hell's Kitchen." I went with Danny, but you guys overwhelmingly chose Paula -- let's discuss who won.
You'll actually find no gloating here that I was right about the winner being Danny, I think that Ramsay's two final choices this season were both good -- they were possibly two of the strongest candidates he's had in the finals. I honestly think the whole thing could have gone either way. Plus, perhaps I was a little wrong last week about Lacey not being able to hurt Paula's chances all that much, I do think Lacey hurt Paula tonight.
However, I'm sure that it didn't have to be that way. Paula spent way too much time focusing on Lacey and Lacey's incompetence prior to the final service. She tried to eliminate Lacey as a factor by putting the "chef" on desserts during prep, but Paula then focused too much of her time and energy making sure that Lacey was doing everything right. Lacey, of course, wasn't doing everything right and never would -- she's Lacey and more interested in whining about the unfairness of life than in doing something about it.
I did find it interesting though that once Paula walked away after telling Lacey that Lacey had messed up the crème brulee during prep, Lacey gave this sly little smile. I couldn't decide whether Lacey was oblivious to what she had done wrong, happy that it had wound up wrong, or had done it wrong on purpose. I tend to think that she was just happy it had gone wrong -- Lacey messing up on purpose has a pretty good chance of making the dish come out correctly -- but I'm not sure.
During service though it wasn't Lacey who hurt her team the most. Everyone expected her to mess up and so when she did they were all ready to pitch in and fix the problem. No, Paula's biggest problem during service wasn't Lacey, it was Andrea. Andrea had no idea how to cook the halibut and messed up more than one.
To the camera, Andrea said that she had never cooked halibut and didn't know the right way to go about it. Now that I do blame on Paula -- Paula should have been sure that everyone at every station knew what they were doing before service started. I have to imagine that if Paula had checked in about the halibut ahead of time and Andrea had said she knew what she was doing, we would have seen it. It would have made for great television to show Andrea saying one thing to Paula and then another to the camera. Because we didn't see that I'm think Paula didn't make sure Andrea was good to go.
On Danny's side, Giovanni made the fact that he didn't care about any of it very clear, but his not caring only caused minor problems compared to Andrea and Lacey's work. The issues on Danny's side getting good food out were just not as serious tonight as they were in Paula's kitchen -- Danny definitely won this week's dinner service.
One service though does not a winner make -- tonight's meal was going to be an important factor, but there was no way that Ramsay was going to base his entire decision on it. According to Ramsay then, why did Danny win? It was because Danny grew more over the season than anyone else. I'm guessing the unstated bit there was that while both finalists are good now, Danny has the skills to reach higher highs than Paula.
I don't always think Ramsay is right, but because he did tonight what I've been saying for weeks he should do -- declare Danny the winner -- I'm willing to accept his logic this time out.
Quick bites:
- Even Chef Gloria didn't hide the fact tonight that she dislikes Lacey. That's not a good thing for Lacey, clearly Gloria's supposed to act impartial on camera.
- Why did the show bother with that fake reveal of the winner right after service? We all knew that they weren't going to give us the result at that moment.
- I don't know about you, but I liked that they brought back the previous winners tonight. The wall of fame was a little silly, but I liked seeing the old folks come back, even if their appearance was brief.
The TV and Film Guy's Reviews - wait... we were right?
Lacy clearly was the reason that Paula lost. Danny clearly had all the motivation to win.
I don't think there will ever be a more annoying contestant in Hell's Kitchen that Lacy. The only person that comes close though is Jen from season 4.
In ranking the seasons i say this how it would go season 3, season 1, Season 5, Season 2, and Season 4
I figured danny would win anyways. He has grown so much over the season. Both were good finalists. Probably better than most. And omg i wish lacey would have been the first one kicked off. I do wish robert would have made a cameo or something too. I was pulling for him all along.
Agreed, Lacy is extremely annoying! The only reason she was on the show was her character. Stupid people make good television (the network producers think so at least). My wife and I were thinking she was just a miserable human being!
Danny was my pick from the start. 2 key factors:
1) In one of the first services Ramsey said something like, "Danny that lamb's cooked nicely" then Scott commented that Danny's cooking was "spot on."
2) The code has been cracked...Last year during the theme song, Christina was the 9th chef to be named. This year, Danny was the 9th. Think about it.
I'm not sure Lacey was why Paula lost. I would LIKE to think that, in a way. Because I truly thought Paula should have won over Danny.
But, Ramsey is supposed to be a professional. He should be looking at how good they do overall, INCLUDING, in the case that they have bad ppl under them and HOW they guide them.
Maybe he saw more potential in how Danny dealt with bad apples than he did with Paula? IDK. I wish Paula had won. But, Danny was my second favorite, so.... Congrats, Danny!!!!!!!!
Ramsey didn't choose Paula, because he wants her for himself. He kept kissing her and eye balling her throughout the show. I can't say I can blame him, she's so definitely HOT..Paula just needs some breast implants to be drop dead gorgeous.
Wow Rocco,
What a horribly undermining, sexist, arrogant, pig-headed thing to say. I guess you really really really must respect women.
Even to a guy like me, that's cold.
Ha ha hA ha Ha HA ha HA hA ha
It's been clear for some weeks that GR wanted to choose Danny. Atlantic City is a tough place, and he was looking for someone like himself who could really push his staff. (Although in the 3-way, I think Andrea actually did the best job as a GR-style b*ll-buster!)
GR also seems to have wanted a protege, not necessarily an accomplished chef.
The final challenge IMNSHO was a bit rigged. This important challenge most definitely should have been a blind test. Maybe Danny's food would still have won if they weren't face to face, but quite possibly not. Recall that in the *real* chef's challenge, Paula's dishes got 75% approval and Danny's got 75% negative rating. I thought it was instructive that the one Borgata chef who chose Paula's dish chose "this one" while the other chef and the GM chose "Danny's." Hmmmm.
Yes, Lacey was most definitely happy that she had submarined Paula. But Lacey clearly didn't care enough to even try to do things right. That girl has a rough life ahead of her with her attitudes.
Unfortunately, with the line-up of staff choices, it was obvious from the beginning that Paula was going to be stuck with Lacey. (She wasn't going to pick Carol after choosing Andrea.) It wouldn't surprise me if GR engineered it that way deliberately.
I imagine that some of the better contestants will be offered jobs either by Danny or at other GR enterprises.
Memo to Danny and GR: Lose the Long John Silver fast-food look. Paula's design was easily the best in the history of HK. Gorgeous! And looking at the lineup of restos currently at Borgata, I think they're safe from being burdened with the childish name Danny chose for his place.
In the limo on the way to the TV studio Paula and Jean Pierre seemed to be connecting. Wouldn't mind seeing that develop! (JP is straight, isn't he? He seems like a decent guy.)
Finally, my original pick for winner was either Ji or Giovanni. Both started out very strong and clear. It was really sad that Ji had to leave, and even sadder that Giovanni let the pressure get to him and simply gave up. Clearly he isn't executive material.
Have a good summer, everyone, and looking forward to p*ssing and moaning with y'all next fall!
Is anyone else wondering why they didn't reveal the results of the comment cards or did I miss it? I didn't see anything in the recap about it.
I liked both Paula and Danny, but thought that Paula was consistently one of the top. He said Danny grew the most. If Danny's grew past Paula at the end I can get that. Like if he started as a 7 (this is just an example to prove my point I'm not actually rating them) and became a 9 while Paul's always been an 8. But if Paula was an 8 the whole time and Danny goes from 6-8 I think it is unfairly punishing Paula for always being strong. She was consistently good, shouldn't she be rewarded for that?
I thought it was funny that GR made it seem like he was going to reveal the winner right after the service. Watching, we knew it was too early (there were 15-20 min left) but Paula and Danny really looked like they thought it was coming. They don't know how much time is left (though they should've known the door thing). Ha ha
i think gordon already knows who he's going to pick way before the final challenge--they were both worthy and i was happy danny won---it was great watching his reaction.