Hell's Kitchen/YMMV: Difference between revisions
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* [[Big Beautiful Woman]]: Kimmie from
** On the male side, you also have
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* [[Creator's Pet]]: Ramsay has been accused of showing blatant favoritism towards certain contestants. Probably the most notable example was Virginia from Season 2, who looked certain to be eliminated after a horrendous performance in the third-last service, but was saved after Ramsay conveniently re-instated the immunity she had lost partway through the service and eliminated Sara, who had been less than stellar but not nearly as bad as Virginia. Then in the following service, Virginia's performance wasn't much better, but Ramsay eliminated Keith instead, which led Keith to openly accuse Ramsay of having "a hard-on for Virginia."
** Also Nona from Season 8, toward whom Ramsay started showing very obvious favoritism after she aced the "palate test" challenge -- this was exemplified in the following service, where Nona insulted Ramsay to his face and he responded by taking her to one side and ''calmly explaining that she was being rude''. It may actually have been justified somewhat in Nona's case, since she was without much doubt the best contestant from that season (the only real competition being from Jillian, who wasn't a very good leader, and Russell, who was a total douchebag).
** Of course, he only took Nona to one side after having thrown her out of the kitchen, the only one on the red team to get thrown out that night.
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** Season 8 had Raj, who spent a large portion of the first two episodes wandering around as if in a daze, and kept getting into fights with his teammates. His seeming incompetence bothered his teammates so much that Vinny, who was acting as waiter on the second episode, warned customers not to order side dishes because he didn't think Raj would get them out in time
** Season 9's had Elise. She's a decent but not stand-out chef, and has made several glaring errors. Where she ''does'' stand-out is her absolutely toxic attitude--no one on her team can stand her because of how arrogant and loud she is, she argues with them constantly, made a point of declaring her intent to get her [[Arch Enemy]] Carrie thrown out, always blames others for her mistakes, and claims that any other chef who dislikes her is just threatened by her talent. Furthermore, when the team wins a challenge she makes sure to let them know it was thanks to her--if they lose, she refuses to help them with the prep work or other penalty, invoking "[[I'm a Doctor, Not a Placeholder|I'm A Chef, Not A Placeholder]]" to justify why she feels she doesn't have to help. It's obvious that she won't win (even if she somehow makes the final two, she's alienated the other players so much that they'd all probably walk off the line rather than cook for her), so the the goal is now to keep her in as many episodes as is humanly possible without it looking overt.
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*** Also, watch out for chefs with great palates. Chef Ramsay has stated that a great palate is one of the most important things a chef can possess, noting that while he can teach nearly anyone to be a great cook, a good palate is something you're born with and an indicator of a chef's true potential. Chefs who have been noted to have great palates and who do well in the inevitable "blind taste test" challenge, which usually takes place just before or just after the teams merge, have almost always done far better than they would've been expected otherwise. Cases in point: Virginia in
*** There's actually a pretty consistent pattern in how Ramsay eliminates contestants. Chefs who are outright incompetent are the first to go; they might last a bit longer if they show some passion and enthusiasm, but not beyond the first few episodes. The next contestants to be eliminated are the ones who are consistently average, and never put in a truly good performance. After that, we get to the traditional Elimination Houdinis -- chefs who put in a lot of unremarkable or outright bad performances, but also one or two good performances along the way, which gives Ramsay more of a reason to keep them in than the ones who are okay but never excel. Once they're gone, we're finally left with the genuinely good contestants. Ultimately, there are usually ''two'' major Elimination Houdinis per season, the absolutely awful chef who somehow stumbles through the first few episodes before being eliminated somewhere between episodes 3-5, and the chef who either has a bad attitude throughout the season and/or dramatically improves throughout the season (they might also have a good palette). This chef usually gets to at least the final six, and sometimes (as was the case with Virginia and Bonnie) even the final two.
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** Notice how much [[Handicapped Badass|Dave]] of Season 6 is mentioned?
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* [[Jerkass Has a Point]]: For some bizarre reason, the contestants in Season 8 all seemed to believe that Melissa was by far one of the best chefs in that season's line-up, even in the face of her constant, massive screw-ups. The only person who actually called her out on her mistakes? Sabrina, who was continually ignored since the others just thought she being a bitch whenever she did so.
* [[Jerkass Woobie]]: It's easy to assume that Ramsay's just a bitter, foul-tempered asshole. When you see what he has to put up with from some of the contestants, he becomes a lot more sympathetic.
** This is pretty much
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** Chef Ramsay himself proved to be this in the first episode of the seventh season and again at the first episode of the ninth season. Just look and you'll see.
* [[Memetic Badass]]: Chef Ramsay.
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** In Season 8, when {{spoiler|Jillian's}} family came into Hell's Kitchen, {{spoiler|her}} son asked "Did he call you a donkey?".
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{{quote|'''Chef Ramsay:''' [[Crowning Moment of Funny|I'm nobody's bitch!]]}}
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** '''<big> IT'S RAAAAAAAAAAAWWWW!</big>'''
** [[Hell's Kitchen/Memes|Now has its own page.]]
* [[Most Annoying Sound]]: Every time Sara in
** Elise's constant [[Never My Fault]] tendencies.
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* [[The Problem with Licensed Games]]: The show received a PC game adaptation which is considerably milder than the show. Ramsay looks very odd ([[The Spoony Experiment|Spoony]]'s description was that he looks like he's made of Play-Doh) and doesn't swear or even really raise his voice unless you deliberately screw up repeatedly. There is no competition factor, and ''seating people'' is one of the challenges. The game isn't really ''bad'' per se -- as Spoony pointed out, it would be pretty decent for an iOS app or a free flash game -- but it isn't worth the $30 asking price.
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* [[Shocking Elimination]]: Brad from Season 3; he had been the only consistently decent performer out of the men (apart from eventual winner Rock), but after two below-par services, Chef Ramsay surprisingly chose to eliminate him over the consistently terrible Josh.
* [[Small Name, Big Ego]]: Roughly a quarter to half of the competitors on any given season. Despite the fact that the highest most of them have ever climbed to is a position as line chef, many have no problems ranting about how wrong Chef Ramsay is, how he doesn't know anything, and he'd best just give them their restaurant now and forget about the rest of the competition.▼
** In fairness, when Brad was bad, he was really bad. (i.e. trying to scrape the bottom of a burnt wellington only to be caught by Ramsay and giving Ramsay an extra risotto when it wasn't ordered).
** Joseph from Season 6, full stop. Not only did he mouth off in episode 1, he spent episode 2's reward challenge being a total [[Jerkass]] for no other reason than he felt like it. He then lost it when Gordon asked him for the nominees, culminating in {{spoiler|him asking Gordon "Do you want to take this outside?", told the other contestants to fuck off when they told him to chill out, and he was eliminated for a total lack of respect.}}▼
*** Plus, Brad's elimination was partly due to the fact that he had deliberately tried to screw Josh over during that service, by refusing to help him when he was screwing up on the meat station. If Brad hadn't done that, then chances are it would have been Bonnie or Josh who was eliminated.
** Ben from Season 5, despite putting an amazing number of dishes in the bin for being inedible and constantly getting a deer in headlights look when it picked up, took offense to Danny calling himself the best chef on the Blue team and ranted how Danny 'couldn't even cook his cock.' Point of reference, {{spoiler|''Danny was the winner of that season''.}} Also a master of the [[Long Speech Tea Time]].▼
** Wil from Season 5. His performance in the service was decidedly less than stellar, but he was still far better than Seth. Moreover, Wil admitted he had been a bad performer, whereas Seth seemed totally unaware of what he'd done wrong. However, Chef Ramsay decided that Wil's decision to nominate himself proved that his heart wasn't really in the competition and eliminated him, an act which shocked even the other chefs.
** Louie from Season 6, a diner owner who served Gordon sausage gravy with biscuits and was so utterly clueless that Gordon kicked him off the show part way through ''the first dinner service''. ▼
*** Also in that season, Charlie, again when he was put up for elimination against Seth. Despite Seth having been involved in the aforementioned filet butchering incident that week, Charlie was seemingly eliminated for being a bad ''waiter'' rather than having made any fatal mistakes in the kitchen.
** Andrea from Season 5, despite being a consistently terrible performer constantly belittled other people for the tiniest mistakes and acted like her shit didn't stink despite being a constant bane of sending food out. Her egotism ran wild and she often yelled the loudest for no better reason than to do it.▼
*** Basically any time in season five when the elimination came down between Seth or Lacey and someone else and the person that wasn't Seth or Lacey stayed. Both contestants were useless; Seth consistently messed everything up and set the blue team back in multiple instances. Lacey was lazy, skipped her team's punishment on at least one instance, and was generally irresponsible and a terrible cook. She inexplicably started doing a lot better for a couple episodes after {{spoiler|she was switched from the red team to the blue team and the blue team actually started ''winning'' with her}}, but then went back to being terrible shortly thereafter.
** Jen from Season 4, who was basically a combination of S5's Andrea and Ben, but louder. She actually had the audacity to ask Ramsay for a letter of recommendation when she was brought back in the finale to help the finalists, and honestly believed that if she performed well enough Gordon would change his mind and name her the winner.▼
*** Seth was probably kept on as a Ratings Hook via [[Executive Meddling]]. People would continue to watch to see just how low Seth would sink and how much of a kiss-ass he would act toward Ramsay.
*** She also liked to proclaim that Chef Ramsay is wrong whenever he disapproved of her cooking and that he didn't know what he was talking about, or who he was talking to.▼
** Also from Season 5, when Carol, Andrea and LA were called up for elimination, LA was eliminated, even though Carol and Andrea had far worse performances than her.
** Seth from Season 5. He came across as a stalker for Chef Ramsay (knowing all of his personal information), and thought that if he read his books and visited his restaurants, he could cook just like him. In fact, he served Chef Ramsay ratatouille with honey in it, and was a consistently terrible performer in services, eventually being eliminated quite early on.▼
** Arguably Jim from Season 6. He had never been an especially impressive performer, but he generally wasn't too bad either, so it came as something of a shock when Ramsay suddenly eliminated him for being too laid-back, even though he hadn't been nominated that week.
** Tennille from Season 6. Though she started strong being one of only two women whose signature dish Gordon liked (though Tek had been chucked, so it isn't quite the badge of honor), she went on to fall straight through the floor. She screamed in her confessionals like it made up for not saying it to the person, and underperformed on a consistent basis. When confronted about her mistakes and shortcomings, she flipped out like someone dropped a racial slur on her, even going so far to cuss out Gordon despite her miscues messing everything. Needless to say, if she cooked as well as she gabbed, she'd be the best chef in the universe. ▼
*** A shame, since he was one of the [[Deadpan Snarker|funniest contestants]] to appear on the show.
*** In the same season, Suzanne also shaped up to be an egomaniac, though more oblivious and/or in denial and not claiming to be the best chef. Despite her being yelled at the most in her team when it comes to screwing up in dinner service and despite her team openly telling Ramsay (several times) in front of Suzanne that she sucked and was not a team player, Suzanne just acted like they didn't know what they were talking about or insisted that she could cook well, despite her screwing up the most. On one occasion, she even openly challenged Ramsay's decision to name the Blue Team the winners, despite the fact that they had fewer chefs and still finished well over a minute ahead of the Red Team.▼
** Also, Shayna from Season 4. That very episode, Rosann sent raw steak to the birthday girl while Matt sent dried fish to the birthday girl's mom and gets his station replaced by Bobby. During elimination, all three were nominated. After a heated exchange with Ramsay, Matt concludes that he would rather work with the red team because the whole blue team hates him. Shayna was eventually eliminated for just being slow. [[It Got Worse|And then Ramsay agreed with Matt and put him on the red team, much to the surprise of Corey]].
** Keith from Season 2. In a slight subversion he was actually a very good chef, easily as good as that season's winner, Heather. Unfortunately his terrible attitude killed off any chance he had of winning, as he constantly mouthed off to Ramsay during services, and when Ramsay chose to put Virginia through to the final instead of him, Keith exploded, accused Ramsay of having a hard-on for Virginia and told him to go fuck himself. To be fair, most of the viewing audience were thinking the same thing as Keith, but he was a ''real'' dick about it, even considering the circumstances.▼
*** This was probably [[Executive Meddling]]. The producers probably wanted to milk the Matt vs. Ben conflict for all it was worth. Shayna was pretty much invisible during the season.
** Scott in season 7. He had "experience" compared to the rest of the line and constantly used this as a crutch on why he should never be eliminated, despite his screw ups. Every time Scott botched something, either he stayed quiet or passed the blame to someone else, yet he was very eager to run his mouth whenever someone else on the team was messing up. The rest of the red team (which he was punted to) eventually snapped and let him know that all he did was talk about how good he was, but never actually showed it. Ramsay finally had enough of Scott's "my shit don't stink" attitude and eliminated him.▼
*** And from that very season, Bobby, who was in the chopping block only ''once'', was eliminated instead of Jen, who was in the chopping block more times than Bobby and had a much worse service than him. Strangely enough, this is the second time someone is eliminated through Ramsay asking the person nominating the two on who should be eliminated. Christina preferred Jen to go home, but Ramsay disagrees.
*** To a lesser extent, Fran from the same season. While she wasn't as egotistical as Scott, she constantly complained about her teammates not performing up to scratch, yet refused to ever accept any responsibility for her failings as a cook, constantly blaming either the fact that she's a kosher chef, or her team-mates for not telling her what to do properly (even when we're talking simple stuff like carving chicken). Even after she was nominated for elimination more times than anyone else in the history of the show, she refused to take the hint.▼
*** Similarly, the first time this happened, Petrozza was asked whether he wants Louross or Jen to be out. Petrozza chose fan-favorite Louross to be out because he screwed up on meat that night (this is only Louross's ''second'' bad service, by the way). Ramsay agrees, meaning that Jen, again, was safe.
*** Ben as well in season 7. He loved to act like as if his experience automatically made him the better cook, but when it came to working with the others, he pretty much shuts down and focuses only on himself, pissing off everyone else.▼
** Raj from Season Eight. Eliminated out of the blue despite his team winning. In fairness, he ''was'' a complete lunatic who got on with no one, couldn't follow simple instructions and almost provoked a brawl during prep.
** Raj acted this way in season 8, partly because he was older than the other contestants (nearly 50), but he was up for elimination in both of the first two episodes and never really did contribute meaningfully, so his posturing about being "THE BEST!" was ridiculous. Upping the [[Narm]] factor, while doing said posturing at the end of the second episode, he actually fell and hit the [[Confession Cam]]. It wasn't very surprising when he was axed the following week.▼
** Arguably Mary-Ellen's elimination over Andrew in Season 1. Granted, Mary-Ellen's performance in her final service ranks as one of the worst in the entire history of the show, but prior to that she had actually been the blue team's most consistently good performer after Michael and Ralph, the two professional chefs. Moreover, she was put up against Andrew, who had been both consistently bad in the services and repeatedly disrespectful towards Chef Ramsay.
*** Also in season 8 was Sabrina, who was the youngest contestant (only 22) and frequently the most clueless. She also managed to alienate pretty nearly everyone around her with her attitude and ego; she constantly told the [[Confession Cam]] how she was so much better than everyone else and they were just jealous and out to get her. She also claimed on numerous occasions that the pre-service prep work was beneath her... despite the fact that her day-to-day job is as a ''prep chef''. Adding together the numerous mistakes (she was nominated for elimination more times than anyone else in the whole season), her poisonous attitude, and her constant attempts to manipulate Ramsay and the other chefs in her favor, it was quite astonishing that she made it to the final six.▼
** {{spoiler|Jamie}} being eliminated over {{spoiler|Carrie and Elise}} in Season 9. {{spoiler|Jamie}} had some early struggle during service, burning a garnish and having a hair in the food, but was able to fight back. {{spoiler|Carrie and Elise had both}} been bad enough to be sent up to the dorms, {{spoiler|Carrie}} even having the gall to talk back to Ramsay before leaving. The rest of the team were clear on the nomination, pointing out to Ramsay how {{spoiler|Carrie and Elise}} were bad for the team in general. {{spoiler|Elise}} could at least truthfully claim being a better cook than {{spoiler|Carrie}}, who had been consistently terrible for several challenges and services... {{spoiler|only for Ramsay to send them both back in line, and to the shock of everyone throw out Jamie, claiming she was in over her head despite that being far more applicable to Carrie}}. [[Executive Meddling]], the producers wanting to milk {{spoiler|Carrie and Elise fighting for all it's worth}}, is the ''only'' way to explain this one.
** One must always take into account that Chef Ramsey despises people that don't fight back. One of the worst things to be seen doing is remaining mute in the face of adversity. {{spoiler|both Carrie and Elise vehemently defend themselves versus Jamie who sulked and hung her head in shame. See also Elizabeth's elimination when both Jennifer and Elise argue with one another. Ramsey despises quiet people}}.
*** {{spoiler|Natalie}} being eliminated over {{spoiler|Elise}}, especially after it was proven that {{spoiler|Elise has a terrible attitude that makes her unsuitable for any leadership position, much less a head chef}}. True, {{spoiler|Natalie}} was clearly struggling under the pressure at that point in the competition, but {{spoiler|Elise}} outright lied to Ramsay's face and he called her on it. This was an offense that got Brendan kicked off the very same episode in which he tried it. Instead, {{spoiler|Elise}} gets to stay to compete for another day. For many fans complaining about the show being plagued with [[Executive Meddling]], this episode was the final nail in the coffin.
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▲** Raj acted this way in
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*** Russell managed a late claim to this status in Season 8, in the final episode. {{spoiler|Despite turning in probably the worst performance of any finalist in the show's history and completely destroying the morale of his team during the service, he actually had the gall to blame his team-members after Nona was unsurprisingly named the winner over him, and actually vowed to ''destroy their careers'' in retribution}}.
** Season 9's Brendan was a short-lived version of this. After the blue team was taken to Palm Springs for winning a challenge, Ramsay invited each of them to tell him about their long-term ambitions. Brendan talked at length about how much his family loved his cooking and how he had a hereditary 'tradition of greatness' to live up to. {{spoiler|He then screwed himself over royally in the ensuing dinner service by trying to send out a bass that Ramsay had deemed unfit, then lying to Ramsay's face and claiming it was a new one. When Ramsay eliminated him, he even said that the only thing bigger than Brendan's ego was his lies
** Also from season 9: Elise, so very much.
* [[They Changed It, Now It Sucks]]: Jean-Philippe not returning to the show for
** Unofficial word is that Jean-Philippe may eventually be back - he was called away to deal with a situation in one of Ramsay's restaurants in Africa. However, as of
*** Ramsay has now stated via [http://twitter.com/#!/GordonRamsay01/status/105048040959774720 his Twitter] that [[And the Fandom Rejoiced|JP will be back for
**** Subverted, it would seem, as James is still Maitre'd as of
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** Antonia was eliminated in the first episode of
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* [[Wangst]]: Lacey from Season 5, who had a tendency to start whining and crying after performing poorly, and would frequently complain about how her teammates hated her (in reality, it was this that was the cause of most of it).
** Elise from Season 9 would immediately start to cry if her team lost a challenge, or if it looked like she might be eliminated. Because of this, you'd usually see her tear up at least once an episode.
* [[What an Idiot!]]: Season 6's Joseph during his [[Elimination Statement]], saying that anyone would be proud to hire him...immediately after he blew up on national television, displaying a horrendous temper and an inability to follow instructions
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* [[The Woobie]]: In
** Season 10's Barbie is this in the eyes of some fans, and only two episodes in, no less. At least one third of the red team (ESPECIALLY Tiffany) absolutely ''explodes'' anytime she does something. Barbie is not the best chef by any means, but her mistakes aren't any worse than the rest of the red team's mistakes.
*** Though many would argue the rest of the team has good reason to dislike Barbie, as her [[I'm Not Here to Make Friends]] attitude was counter-productive to the rest of the team and certainly didn't help them much during service, and Ramsey has repeatedly stressed that working as a team is VERY important if you want to do well and that trying to be a lone wolf won't get you very far, so it's not at all surprising she was put up for elimination.
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