episode: project runway, ep. 1

The first episode of reality shows are always hard to judge because you're basically judging people on stereotypes and intentional editing. The editors only have so much time they can allot to each designer and, in that small amount of time, they develop and create characters for the designer. There's always the rocker character ("Stella Trashbags" is this season's), and there's always a juxtaposing sensitive character. In past seasons, this binary has mostly been between males, so it's interesting to see these two conflicting personalities in women. And because the designers have not been able to showcase their individuality, I can only judge this episode on the designs for the supermarket challenge (above, click on it to enlarge) and the sound bites. And as a friend told me, "I haven't picked out who I like yet. Hatorade first, love second."


It's pretty much unanimous that everyone hates CitrusTan. ("I'm obsessed with tanning. If anyone wants to talk about tanning...") He even named his design (bottom row, fourth from the right) -- "Girlicious" no less. He'll be gone soon enough. And half of the other designers used table clothes and fabric for their outfits, which is cheating. So anyone who lacked the inspiration doesn't get a second glance from me. Also, Carrie Bradshaw (who is actually a male but wore a ridiculously large flower in his breast pocket) was creative with the plastic cups, and I appreciated that he melted the plastic in order to sculpt it, but that cocktail dress silhouette (bottom row, fourth from the left) was completely boring and it didn't fit his model in the bust. I know there are some people who wanted him to win, but he was not nearly as bold or innovate as Kelli Martin (no cute nickname because I actually like her), who made a dress out of coffee filters and vacuum cleaner bags (see very top). I'm glad she won. But Norman Bates was kicked off, and I think everyone viewer could foresee that because Bravo is guilty of blatant foreshadowing. Norman Bates, who created a raincoat/serial killer outfit (bottom, third from the right) out of a shower curtain, mentioned how embarrassing it would be to be auf'd in the first episode and not have the opportunity to develop a style on the show. And everyone knows what that means -- he's out!

And after watching previews for the upcoming season, I think everyone is excited for the challenge where Tim Gunn says, "This looks like a pterodactyl from a gay Jurassic Park." Oh, Tim.

These images were provided by Blogging Project Runway.