By Frederic Germay
After the incredibly premature dismissal of Julia, only three chefs remained -- Rock, Bonnie, and Jen. Rock has shown consistency in excellence and his failures are few and far between. However, his attitude, nasty temper, and overlarge ego seem to be his main weaknesses. Bonnie has shown aptitude in practically nothing except the palette test. However, she seems to have transformed remarkably overnight, and immediately justified Chef Ramsay decision to prolong her existence in this competition. On the other hand, Jen has remained in the background for quite a bit of this season. It was only until her biggest mistake (garbage spaghetti) that she gained attention. Ever since then she has been making considerable improvements each episode until she gradually progressed into a force worth worrying about.
At the start of the episode, it seemed as though the touching departure of the lovable Julia left everyone (including Rock) rather emotional. Rock seems to have slightly redeemed himself by apparently apologizing to Jen. Watching him cry over the loss of Julia, and his harsh verbal attacks toward Jen proved that there is some genuine regret left in him.
However, Hell's Kitchen never leaves much time for one to dwell on one emotion (except fear). Fortunately, the contestants were subjected to a pleasant surprise. Gordon Ramsay introduced his shockingly kind mother to the final three chefs, and presented them with a challenge -- transform a classic simple dish into something more contemporary and classy. Jen chose fried chicken, Rock selected spaghetti and meatballs (thankfully Jen avoided that one), and whiny Bonnie got stuck with franks n' beans. While I'm completely clueless as to why Bonnie accused her dish of being "British," I did realize that she had a point concerning the relationship between hotdogs and beans -- I never eat hotdogs and beans! The mere mention of it makes me want to gag. Then again, I've been told that I'm quite the oddball....
Once everyone had prepared their dish, they were presented with a truly remarkable reward (please note my sarcasm). The contestants were reunited with their mothers, and their mothers were to judge which of the dishes was the best. All three of the mothers picked Jen's dish as the best, and she was rewarded by spending special time with Chef Ramsay, his mom, and her mom. Was it just me, or did that look suspiciously like a date? I highly doubt that Ramsay would've rewarded Rock the exact same way. Oh, I can almost visualize them right now....so much fun!
Meanwhile, Rock and Bonnie were tasked with cleaning the dorms and all that lovely stuff. Once again, I found myself wondering what exactly did Bonnie does for a living. Since she used to be a nanny, I, like Rock, would have assumed that she would have mastered a little more than simply 'making the bed.' I completely understood and even appreciated Rock's exasperation and wonderfully contained remarks. All Bonnie did was whine, whine, and whine. I suppose even if everything went swimmingly, Bonnie would still whine about how good things were. She might even give Melissa a run for her money in the 'annoying' category!
Once again, the dinner service was heralded as the most 'important' service yet. Seriously, how many times have we heard that line before? Anyways, this time the service had a little twist attached to it -- the chefs would be taking turns running the kitchen. As with the previous seasons, Chef attempted to sabotage...er...test their abilities by sending up sub par food. Jen missed the absence of crab in one of her dishes, yet she was quite apt at barking out orders. Perhaps wary of the mistakes that Jen made, both Rock and Bonnie were able to point out the defects in their dishes. However, they both performed rather dismally in managing to deliver clear, authoritative, and coherent orders out to the rest of the team.
In the end, Ramsay allowed them to prepare a persuasive argument on their behalf to justify their prolonged existence on the show. Ramsay ended up choosing Jen to go home, and therefore placing Bonnie and Rock in the final two (and ensuring that serving spaghetti would no longer be a potential health hazard). Due to the actions and inactions of both of the finalists, I find myself no longer voting for any specific contestant. However, judging from experience, I believe that Rock will easily beat Bonnie.
I would like to take a moment in time to recount those who will probably be returning for the season finale; Josh, Julia, Vinnie, Melissa, Brad, maybe Eddie or Joanna, and hopefully....Aaron! On that note, I would like to add that this episode wasn't as good as its predecessors, but never-the-less entertaining. I give this eppie a 7/10
