Outlaw Josie wails
Top Chef Seattle hits the roller derby, where nice guys finish last
You can spot the members of the roller derby team by their green hoodies.Photo courtesy of Bravo
Tesar reminisces about his boyhood days in the Hamptons when he ate oysters forbreakfast, lunch and dinner.
Episode eight of Top Chef Seattle sets up its premise pretty quickly: Tough-talking tomboy cheftestant Josie is a boor. OMG she talks so much. Talk talk talk. She's so obnoxious, so rude.
But will she go home? Nope. The nice guy goes home, and Josie stays — and we get punk'd by Top Chef again.
We get punk'd because Bravo does what Bravo does: It cherry-picks scenes to prod you into piling all over Josie until you realize you're being goaded into hating on a woman for being unfeminine, and the icky misogyny of it all makes you feel a little sick.
When the chefs break into teams, nobody wants to be Josie's partner, so sweet, easygoing Bart falls on the sword. But he pays the price.
Mud bugs
The episode begins with another slimy commercial for a car. It has a touch screen! And a steering wheel. It is like a chariot of the gods that transports the chefs to a shellfish farm. Hmm, shellfish — must be clams, Josh Valentine surmises.
Close, Josh. It's oysters. The chefs don rubber boots and are set free like crabs on a sandy bog to forage for oysters, which they will have to prepare for mole-like judge Emeril Lagasse.
Tesar does classic Tesar: "I have a lot of experience with oysters," he declares, before cutting one open and slurping it from the shell, with the camera cocked at an angle to make him look heroic. The others stir from the mud to ape his behavior: cracking open shells, smacking their lips, waxing about how it can't get any fresher than this.
But Josie's boots get stuck and she can't move; Micah has to pull her out. What an aggravating dunce she is. If only they could leave her in the mud. Then all their problems would be solved.
Roller girls
For the elimination challenge, the chefs must cook for one of Seattle's top "sports" teams. The "sports team" — wink, wink — turns out to be a women's roller derby team. That can't be right, can it?
After that shticky revelation, the show's interest level drops off a cliff. There's some fancy roller derby shots taken with a camera strapped to a skate, but otherwise, all that's left is to flog Josie.
She whoops at the roller rink. She spills her beer. She reveals that she played professional football. Her loudness offends Josh Valentine, who sniffs disapprovingly, and we know how refined he is.
When the chefs break into teams, nobody wants to be Josie's partner, so sweet, easygoing Bart falls on the sword. But he pays the price. When their team comes out on the bottom for underseasoned, overcooked rice, he gets the axe, not Josie.
The show sheepishly acknowledges that he has a tendency to under-salt but nonetheless allows the malevolent implication to linger, that somehow Josie is the one who should have gone home. For shame, Bravo, for shame.
