Friday Night TV Binge

Often (ok usually) on Friday nights I will spend some time catching up on tv, because I'm tired from the work week and...I don't have much of a life.  Tonight I thought that I'd share some thoughts on (some) of the shows that I watched during my binge.

1.  Top Chef

We open the episode with Bruce finding out that he's a new dad.  He and his wife are adopting a baby, and the birth mom just went into labor.  He's sad that he can't be at home to meet his new son, but all of the contestants stay up late in their fancy reality tv house to celebrate.  Of course Padma and last season's winner Brooke knock on the door at 6am the next morning announcing that it's time for their next challenge.  How does Padma look so gorgeous early in the morning?  How early did she have to wake up to become so tv-ready?  These are important questions that need answers.  As for the contestants, they are tasked with making a breakfast dish featuring Nutella, while still in their pajamas.  They fight over limited kitchen space, and Carrie wins with an egg dish that includes Nutella (?).  It looks weird, but if Padma says it was delicious then I'll go with it.  Next the chefs find out their main challenge, an Olympics inspired head-to-head battle between three teams of three (for gold, silver, and bronze medals of course).  The all-male trio sweeps with three gold medals, and Tanya and Claudette end up in the bottom 2 after fighting over having to help each other during the challenge.  They're really both to blame, but Tanya ends up going home after the judges determine that even though her dish tasted better, her knife skills were weaker (Tanya's portion of the battle was specifically about precision knife work).  I was on Tanya's side until she yelled at the guys for celebrating their win too loudly and told Carrie that she's too privileged and needs to get "Woke" (umm ok).

2.  Catfish

This show has been a guilty pleasure of mine for a while now.  Super charming Nev and much less-charming sidekick Max help (usually) trashy people meet their online loves in person, and they almost always turn out to be completely different than expected (surprise).  And this season Nev's super adorable wife appears via Skype to give her thoughts, with their super adorable baby daughter sometimes appearing in the background.  In this episode weird girl Kim wants to meet her online emo boyfriend Matt, and she's introduced to Nev and Max by her ex-boyfriend (?).  At the beginning of the episode I couldn't quite put my finger on who Kim reminded me of, but soon I realized that she is clearly a grown-up version of the creepy girl from The Ring.  She even creepily covered her face with her hair several times during the episode.  The team does their typical hardcore investigating (Googling phone numbers and looking up online profiles) and discover that Matt seems to be who he says.  They meet with Kim to share their (mostly) positive findings, and she reacts by walking outside, bending over, and burying her head (only her head) in the backyard hammock.  Nev is very confused, as am I, but it turns out that this is her reaction to being overwhelmed with excitement.  Nev calls Matt, and he agrees to come meet Kim the next day.  But before the meeting we discover that Kim has a not-at-all-cute 2-year-old daughter who she's been keeping secret from Matt, because he doesn't like kids.  The meeting is super uncomfortable for everyone.  Kim keeps hunching her shoulders and turning away from Matt nervously, and at one point decides to go for an awkward run down the block.  Matt is upset that Kim lied about having a daughter and decides that he just wants to be friends.  But he brings the kid a stuffed animal (aww).  Clearly it's not about the kid; he just doesn't want to be around this weirdo.  The update at the end of the episode reveals that Kim is dating someone (God help him), but she and Matt are still really close.  She'll be traveling from California to Florida to visit him soon (did he agree to this?).  The End.

3.  Scandal

This show has been off the air since November (ugh midseason breaks are the worst).  This final season has really been all over the place.  Olivia has changed from a hardcore political operator with a heart to an evil bitch that kills people to get her way.  Not cool.  The show left viewers on a cliffhanger after it seemed that (SPOILER ALERT) Olivia's evil father Rowan had shot and killed Liv's bestie and right-hand woman Quinn (on her wedding day while pregnant no less).  We open the episode to find Rowan burning a body (whose face we can't see) in the trunk of a car.  The rest of the episode is all about Liv and company grieving over their friend.  At one point Huck discovers that an antique hairpin was discovered on the body, and he doesn't remember Quinn wearing a hairpin when she was dressed for her wedding and disappeared a few days ago.  With everything crazy that has happened on this show, it's pretty odd that nobody seems to question that the body may not have even been Quinn.  Huck suspects Liv of the murder at one point, which unfortunately this season would be a logical assumption.  Liv knows but hasn't told anyone that her dad is the killer (I guess because he has some dirt on her, like the fact that she kills people too).  The grieving scenes continue, and the ashes are turned into bullets per Quinn's wishes ("so I can be fired at my enemies", I like how she thinks).  The acting was pretty top notch in this episode, especially from Kerry Washington as Liv, but it all seems kind of pointless because I really don't believe that Quinn is actually dead.  The actress (Katie Lowes) is on maternity leave, and I suspect that Quinn will be back with her friends before the show wraps this spring.  The episode ends with each of Quinn's friends firing a bullet of her remains (?!) at the ground as they remember her, as we're shown scenes of Quinn with them from earlier episodes.  All in all this was a decent episode, but I think it will end up being pretty worthless in terms of plot.  I'll eat my white hat if I'm wrong and Quinn is actually dead.