Project Runway, Season 1
It was a pretty good marathon, since I watched episodes 5 - 11, include the massive bitchfest that was the Reunion Show.
My thoughts here are very disorganized, I’m afraid.
I gotta say that reunion show and the finale really changed my attitudes about some of the contestants, but overall I grew to appreciate Jay more and more and I’m really glad he won.
I started out liking Kara Saun a lot, and continued to right up until the Shoe Incident. I don’t really mind that she tried something to get ahead, but her continued belaboring of Wendy’s gamesmanship and denial of her own got to be a wee bit obnoxious. I still really like her work, though.
I had looked a little ahead at recaps, so I knew Wendy made it to the final. I do not think she deserved to be there, nor did I enjoy most of her collection. I am a little annoyed with Tim Gunn for helping her out in the last challenge. Yes, her designs were dowdy in most previous challenges. I even think her winning Banana Republic dress was frumpy, dowdy and badly designed. And most of her collection in the last episode was dowdy and frumpy, as well. They looked exactly like clothes a seamstress working out of her basement in Virginia would make for her friends. Some of them, especially the ballgowns, were pretty. But they were nothing new or particularly interesting. I honestly believe that Tim’s guidance was the only reason she won that final challenge. He never intervened to quite that extent with any of the others, and I thought it was completely unfair that he did so with Wendy. He did the same thing on his home visit to her. I did notice he gave Kara Saun a little advice, but it was nothing to the extent that he gave Wendy. I guess he had some sort of weird liking for her, and that sort of stomped a bit on my Tim love. Boo.
In addition to creating boring, frumpy clothes, she also was truly delusional. I loved it when Jay said, “This isn’t Survivor!” to her. I really hate it when competitors on shows like this and Hell’s Kitchen try to bring gamesmanship into the competition to cover for their lack of talent. I loathed it when the winner of the first season of HK did that, and lost a lot of respect for the show because of it and I loathe it even more in Project Runway. Blargh.
Some of the Wendy stuff was actually funny, especially her facial expressions when people called her out on her bs, but I’m still in rant mode over her, despite thinking there was some funny there. Much of what’s fueling my rantage is that I would much rather have seen an Austin Scarlett collection than a Wendy Pepper collection. Austin’s would have been interesting, and had more clothes I relate to and we would have been spared Wendy’s defensiveness and had Austin’s beauteousness, instead.
And then there was Vanessa. Oh boy was she a giant bitch! There is no way she did not know she was being interviewed and her anger and resentment at being cut because of her own screwup was apparently driving all of that awful behavior. It’s too bad, really, because I liked her before that. However, it’s been two years since that episode aired and I can’t find any new, fresh info on Vanessa. Her company’s website has a brief slideshow with some attractive outfits, but this is followed by “coming soon.” She’s not exactly doing a very good job of capitalizing on the exposure the show gave her, so that’s yet another reason to have less sympathy for her. Also from other people’s posts I’ve read, a lot of her defensive blather in the reunion show was flat out lying.
The rest of the Reunion show didn’t really hold many surprises, though it served to emphasize what an annoying sycophant Daniel was, how vapid and bland Alexandra was, and how much Nora will probably rock once she grows up a little.
As for episodes 5 - 9, I hated the “futuristic” collection, but I felt kind of bad for Kevin for getting stuck with being the leader on it. He was never very exciting, and I think he went out at the right point, but he didn’t go out in the right way. That was annoying.
The bathing suit episode was another that showed off Alexandra’s blandness. She came off as just a pretty, not very bright or even outgoing blonde chick to me, with not much to back it up. Most of her designs were too floppy for me to like much and she kept doing the same thing over and over.
I actually liked Nora’s wedding dress. I don’t care if it wasn’t edgy, she understood the challenge the same way I did, and frankly the same criticism that was made of her dress (that it was too traditional and could have been purchased off the rack, anywhere) could have been made of Wendy’s, Alexandra’s, Robert’s, Kevin’s, and I think even of Kara Saun’s. In fact, it could probably have been made of everyone’s except Austin’s and maybe Jay’s!
I loved Austin’s swimsuit best of all of them. Jay’s was nice, as well, but Austin’s stood out by far and I’m glad he won that challenge.
I liked Austin and Kara Saun’s grammy outfits best by far, but I did love Jay’s skirt. Wendy’s was, IMO, quite obnoxious. But then I only like that intense, bright orange for slipsheets in notebooks and files. I do understand the dilemma and that none of the designers did a great job. Still, there is no way on earth Wendy’s was best. No freaking way!
Okay, this is long enough, even for covering 6 episodes. I am looking forward to seasons 2, but It will probably be a while before I get to it, because Heroes comes out on DVD on 8/28 and I am going to try to catch up on it before the season premier on 9/24. And I have a lot of movies to watch. Wish me luck!
My final comment - all those skirts that came out last season with the little bit of tulle on the hem? Now we now where they originated!
