Project Runway: All Stars (Season 2)

Starring: Carolyn Murphy, Georgina Chapman, Isaac Mizrahi, Joanna Coles

Creator: Eli Holzman

Genre: Reality, Competition, Fashion

Rating: B-

I have to confess that while I do really enjoy Project Runway, I have more mixed feelings regarding Project Runway: All Stars.  While I still like the contestants - although I do kind of question just how some of them made it onto Project Runway in the first place let alone the All Stars installment - I really miss the chore people of the original series - Heidi Klum, Tim Gunn, Michael Kors, and Nina Garcia.  Nothing against the people that they bring in for the All Stars, but we just don't love them as much.

Season 2 of All Stars features cast members from every season of Project Runway up to season 9, with the exception of season 4.  What I did like about this is that they had four runner ups this season, although they also had people who came in 10th and 11th on their original season, which contributes to some of the begging the question as to how some of these people are All Stars.  Despite that, though, as the season progressed I really started to like all of the remaining contestants.  I didn't know all, or really most, of them from their original season, but once the weaker designers were weeded out I really came to enjoy most of them and their esthetic.

I have kind of mixed feelings about the finale.  I really liked two of the designers who made it to the final three, but I wasn't really a fan of the third designer.  In the end, while I did like the person who won, it wasn't necessarily the person who I wanted to win.  I also kind of questioned the way they rated the first and second runner up, as I really thought that the person who came in third probably should have won, and the person who won should have come in second.

I did like the overall challenges of this season, with my favourites being the avant-garde androgynous look and the graffiti art challenges.  I was a bit disappointed by the overall celebrity judges.  There were a couple that I thought were great, but overall it seemed a bit subpar for the series.  A bit of a disappointment, really.

Project Runway Australia (Season 4)

Starring: Megan Gale, Alex Perry, Claudia Navone, Peter Morrissey

Creator: Eli Holzman

Genre: Reality, Competition, Fashion

Rating: C+

The fourth season of Project Runway Australia  is, much like all seasons of instalments in the Project Runway franchise, follows a number of designers - primarily from Australia (although two contestants came to Australia from elsewhere, one from San Francisco and one from London), and primarily in their early-to-mid twenties - as they compete to be titled the best designer.

Um., so yeah.  While I really enjoy the American instalments in the Project Runway franchise I wasn't a huge fan of the Australian one.  There was a general culture issue - the big names in celebrity guest judges were names that I had almost entirely never heard of before, and thus was never really wowed or amazed by - nor did I make the link between the challenge and the guest judge, although that's my fault and not the show's.

The season's biggest flaw, in my opinion, was the general unlikeability of the contestants.  There were a few that I did like and found myself rooting for, but for the most part they were all whiny, annoying individuals who seemed to be just out of fashion school.  They often seemed to be either amateurs or costume designers, and as such watching them week after week after awhile got rather dull.  I also disagreed with the winner, whose collection overall I thought was probably the weakest.  In all, I doubt I'll watch the next season (if there is one) of Project Runway Australia.

Face Off (Season 3)

Starring: McKenzie Westmore, Ve Neill, Glenn Hetrick, Neville Page, Patrick Tatopoulos

Genre: Reality, Competition

Rating: B

Face Off is a Project Runway-esque show on the SyFy channel about special effects makeup artists.  Each week contestants are given a challenge to create something original - covering everything from a character that could belong in the universe of Star Wars to video game characters to zombies based on Alice's Wonderland.  Some of the things that they create are absolutely awesome, some of the things that they create are absolutely horrid.  At the end of each episode, one person is sent home, and at the end of the season one person wins it all.

Know what my favourite part about this season of Face Off was?  The almost complete lack of inter-contestant drama.  I really hate competition shows that are based on what a contestant can produce and yet still spend half the show focused on the contestants bickering with each other or badmouthing the creations of other contestants.  More so than in just about any other competition based reality show, this season of Face Off was just about the actual work being created.  Sure there was a little bit of drama in the first episode and a bit in the last two, and there was definitely some poor crafting, but for the most part the contestants at least pretended to get along.  Heck, they even helped each other out, which is something you almost never seem to see in these shows.

The second thing that I really liked about this season was the sheer skill of the competitors and the fact that almost everyone seemed to go home right when they deserved it.  There was one elimination where I didn't agree with who went home, not because I thought that they hadn't done poorly but because I thought that someone else had done worse.  Early on I picked a favourite, and by midway through I picked a second, then a third, and when my first favourite was eliminated I was actually happy - not because I didn't still love that person's work or because I wanted someone else to win more, but because based on that challenge I really thought that my favourite was the person who deserved to go home the most.

The only thing I didn't like about this season was the fact that the final winner was determined not by the judges but by an audience vote in.  I don't really agree with audience vote ins for a few reasons.  In Survivor-esque shows, I think there's a lot that goes into the editing of the final show that can manipulate the way the cast is portrayed and, as such, the way that the public is going to vote.  The same thing can happen in shows like Face Off or Project Runway where the editing portrays the contestants in a certain way.  Furthermore, in a show like Face Off or So You Think You Can Dance a huge part of the competition is based on some skill that the viewing audience isn't all that likely to be an expertise in.  I can vote for something I liked to see or watch, but when you look at things closer or from a more technical standpoint I have no clue.  The judges, however, do.  There are a lot of dancers in SYTCD who appear to progress simply because they're fan favourites, but it's people like the judges who will give them a job.  It's the same thing with Face Off - the fans aren't the ones who know the technical stuff, nor do we get to really see things close up, but the judges do.  I'd rather see them pick a winner than America pick one.

Project Runway (Season 10)

Starring: Heidi Klum, Tim Gunn, Michael Kors, Nina Garcia

Creator: Eli Holzman

Genre: Reality, Competition, Fashion

Rating: B

I really enjoyed the designers on the 10th regular season of Project Runway, even if I also absolutely hated some of them.  If you're not familiar with the show, the series takes a group of aspiring designers (this year 16), puts them through a series of tasks (this year 12), eliminating designers along the way.  At the end of it all, the top designers are given the opportunity to create a collection for Fashion Week with the best collection winning and presumably pushing forward the careers of the winning designer.  Along the way there are a vast number of celebrity guests judges, ranging from people in the fashion industry, to famous business owners, to actors and singers.

This year's guests judges included Lauren Graham, Krysten Ritter, Hayden Panettiere, Debra Messing, Hilary Duff, Zoe Saldana, and Jennifer Hudson.  The thing that I really like about this show is that the guest judges are more than just random celebrities come to promote their newest project; they're usually people who are somehow involved in the fashion industry, if only because they have an interest in clothes, and the tasks that they judge on are often somehow tied to their personal life.  As such, they're not typically sitting there gushing about how awesome the designers are; often they can be as critical and harsh as the regular judges.

The designers this season were not all really good designers, nor would I say they were all necessarily sane.  The first few episodes of this show is always about weeding out the weak, and I was really happy to see that the designers who I thought were the weakest overall were weeded out fairly quickly.  Sure there were a few whose personalities I liked, but you could tell that they weren't as strong as some of the others.  Granted, there were a few designers who carried on whose personalities I didn't like, but I did have to admit that they were skilled.

That's actually exactly how I felt about this season's winner.  I really didn't like the person, I hated their attitude although I didn't mind their aesthetic.  I understood why they won, and when it came down to it I have to admit that they did present the best (and most cohesive) show, even if going into the finale I had listed who I wanted to win most in order, and the person who won was at the bottom of that list.  Actually, my list ended up being the exact opposite of how the results went down, but I admit I know nothing about fashion and had based that list entirely on who I liked as a person most.  While I wasn't a fan, the right person probably won, which doesn't often happen in reality tv shows.

So You Think You Can Dance (Season 9)

Starring: Nigel Lythgoe, Mary Murphy, Cat Deeley

Creator: Nigel Lythgoe and Simon Fuller

Genre: Reality, Dance, Competition

Rating: C

I was rather disappointed by this season of So You Think You Can Dance.  I haven't been a fan of the show for long - this is only the third season that I've watched as it airs - but I've always previously enjoyed it.  I had my favourites in season 7 (the first season I watched), and loved the dances in season 8 even if I knew who was going to win for a long time.  This time round... the judging and eliminations in general seemed so at random that I really didn't know who to root for.  It seemed like I would pick new favourites each week only to have them eliminated the next week.

The biggest problem with the season, which related rather nicely to the above critique, is the airing.  Things moved really fast but at the same time really slow; the season seemed to go on forever (especially in the try-out period, which lasted for four weeks because of the elimination of the second weekly episode) and was repeatedly delayed in airing - the Olympics and the Fourth of July both did the show a disservice.  Rather than just have the show go on longer, things were changed by doing double eliminations, to the great disservice to the dancers.

Because of the removal of the results episode the eliminations took place at the end of each episode. I'm not really sure how I feel about this; for one it made the episode feel even more cramped, especially as they also tried to add in performances by various dance companies.  I enjoy the showcase and understand why the show does it, but I felt like this really did a lot to prevent us from getting to know the dancers.  It wasn't until near the end of the season that I really felt like the show began to invest in showcasing the dancer's personalities - which is sad, because it does a lot for helping them get votes.  In years past I've always known the names of everyone that makes it onto the show, this time round I didn't really know everyone until the top 10.

There were some amazing moments in the show and some amazing dancers in it.  Even the ones who weren't as diverse were still amazing at what they did and I really did enjoy watching the dance.  I just rather felt that throughout the whole season it was this poorly guided last hurrah for the series.  Between the way it was treated while it aired and the fact that Fox eliminated the Results show I wouldn't be surprised if this was the last season of So You Think You Can Dance.  Which is sad, it'll be a part of my summer TV that I'll miss.  I won't, however, miss Nigel Lythgoe being a creepy perv when judging the young, attractive dancers.