Team Lingerie

Project Runway - Season 2, Episode 4

Previously on Project Runway: The designers created Barbie fashion. Well, some of them did. Others just seemed to throw random bits of cloth together. Marla isn't as technically proficient as some of the others, which those others gleefully told us over and over again. Kara and Lupe snarled at each other, Nick blew the judges away, Andrae continued his streak of whining, and Raymundo went wah wah wah, all the way home. Twelve designers remain. Who will be "out" tonight?

Opening credits. Aw, look how Danzzz dances around as if he's interesting in any way, shape, or form.

Atlas. Nick celebrates his Barbie win, while Santino continues to be an ungracious prick in the background. "I lost the Barbie challenge because of you!" he whines. Well, yes. Your opponent winning often does lead to you losing. Nice catch, Santino. He also interviews that he helped Nick with his design a little bit. If he's referring to the help we saw on camera, it was minimal at best. Plus, if your input is so great, how come your design didn't win? Mull it over, General Zod.

At Parsons, the designers gather at the runway for Heidi to give them their next challenge. She tells them that they will be designing lingerie. That sounds pretty challenging on its own. Kara's excited. First, let's do the weird model pick in which last week's winning model (Tarah) has a shot of being eliminated over the losing one (Allison). As with last week, if Nick chooses neither, he can pick from the pool of others, and as with last week, this is an extremely odd system. I don't think I'm a fan of it. So of course, Nick chooses Tarah, so we'll be saying good-bye to Allison for a second time, the very week she came back. That's kind of funny in a horrific, cruel way. The designers now have thirty minutes to come up with a presentation for Heidi in which they create a line of lingerie with three looks. Heidi will pick four of them to be team leaders, and the leaders will pick other designers until each team has three people. Heidi tells them this will be a test of leadership and teamwork, and there's a lingering shot on Santino. Why, whatever could that mean? Heidi tells them that the losing team leader could be cut, or perhaps the entire losing team. Unless this is going to be an extremely short season, I'm going to call bullshit on that one, Heidi. Start sketching, bitches!

Time's up! Let's see what they've got. Danzzz has the idea of a woman scorned turning her boyfriend's clothing into her lingerie. Interesting. Lupe has barely drawn anything, but managed to find time to put a few Batmanesque "POW" and "ZAP" bubbles on the sketch pad. Um, that's great, Lupe. Andrae makes literally no sense. I mean it. I have no idea what he's talking about. Chloe's idea is clothing you could wear by itself or as a top coupled with jeans to go out in public. Fascinating, but difficult to pull off, I'd think. Santino has a line inspired by Heidi, in that it's German-style. Zulema has pretty standard ideas, and Heidi gets in an awesome dig about Zulema's crappy orange dress that left Rachael's ass hanging out in the Clothes Off Your Back challenge. Zulema takes the joke gracefully. Or sycophantically. I can't really tell which. We zoom through Kara (Boudoir Babes), Nick (Asiana Nights - which looks cool - I wish he'd have gotten picked), Marla (Sweetie Pie), and Emmett (Heidi's Hollywood Honeymoon). The next designer to get some actual screentime is Diana. Yay, Diana! Her line is called Goddess, and she says it's designed to have a lot of flowing movement. Daniel's idea is a more mature line, designed for fiancees or newlyweds, rather than...I guess slutty sorority hos. He says he thought of Heidi as he designed. There's a hilarious music cue of porn jazz. In unrelated news, there are a lot of closeups on Heidi during this segment, and damn, she's pretty.

The designers gather in the workroom. The team leaders will be Danzzz, Daniel, Diana, and Santino. Santino interviews that he's a good communicator because he's "focused, and knows what [he's] trying to achieve." What the hell does that have to do with being a good communicator? Good communication is about the ability to read other people, the ability to listen, and the ability to mold your language and mannerisms in a way that other people can relate to. In short, abilities that Santino demonstrably lacks. I don't mind him being impressed with himself, as long as he's impressed with himself about the right things. I wouldn't trust him to communicate my order at the Lion's Choice drive-thru. Chloe interviews that she didn't want to be a team leader anyway, because it'd be sticking her neck out. She's got a point, but she still manages to say it in such a way that every grape in a ten-mile radius goes instantly sour.

Tim pulls names to see who gets to pick first. It's Danzzz. He chooses Andrae. Ugh. In what universe should Andrae be picked first for anything? Daniel chooses Chloe. Santino takes Nick. Diana takes Lupe. Danzzz gets Zulema. Daniel takes Kara. Zulema interviews that Emmett and Marla are the last two because "A, they can't pattern make. Two, they're not the best sewers." Way to construct a sentence, Zulema. Maybe smarming about other people's lack of talent would have more punch if you weren't such a goddamn moron. Santino takes Emmett, and that leaves poor, piled-on Marla to be shuffled off to Diana. Marla takes this abuse, as she's taken all abuse, with gentle good humor. I like Marla. Also, note that Danzzz's team has the two biggest whiners on the show, Andrae and Zulema. I'll bet that means we'll be seeing tons of blowout scenes from that quarter. Unless, you know, Danzzz's complete boringness covers the entire team like a blanket. But that'll never happen!

The teams chat about their ideas. Emmett makes an interesting point in an interview about how Santino is very hands-on in his design, so he's wondering how the delegation of work will be handled. My guess? Poorly. Diana chats with her team, and Santino turns to Emmett and says "I think the three of them [that'd be Diana, Marla, and Lupe -- Limecrete] are so fucking lame. They haven't had sex in their life." Well, to borrow from Zulema: A) since Marla is apparently a virgin, one wonders where her son came from, and 2) unless Diana, Marla, and Lupe share one life, we've got another case of someone trying to make fun of someone else, and failing miserably because they can't speak English for shit. Here's a hint to all you would-be shit-stirrers out there. In order to denigrate someone, you have to appear superior. If you trip over your native language, you don't appear superior. You appear stupid, so the joke is turned back onto your dumb ass. Also, perhaps Santino, not quite being pinup material himself, should back off of the insults about appearance. Unless frizzy, receding hairlines are the style these days, and nobody bothered to tell me. And if that's the case? Please continue not bothering to tell me. Meanwhile, Daniel tries to explain his ideas to Kara and Chloe, and that stealth bitch we've been seeing develop in Chloe is no longer so stealthy. Before he can even fully explain his ideas, she's jumping down his throat about time constraints. At this point, I'm giving her a pass, because she's right about Daniel being over-ambitious. It's just that Chloe has this way of saying completely true things, but saying them in a tone a voice that kind of makes me want to punch her. It's an unsettling feeling.

As the commercials play, let's consider that we've seen Santino's team questioning how his leadership will go, Diana's team being attacked, and Daniel's team carping. Danzzz's team? Nowhere to be seen. But I'm sure that gigantic meltdown is just around the corner! When we return, it's time to go shopping. The teams get $200 and thirty minutes to shop, and will have until midnight to finish working. The shopping goes how you'd expect. Diana's team is really laid back, Daniel's team has problems with the time limits, Santino's team is crushed under his micro-management, and Danzzz's team is hardly shown at all.

Back in the workroom, Chloe and Kara continue interrupting Daniel by outlining several reasons why they won't have time to do what he's asking them to. I really do understand that they're nervous that they won't finish on time. Daniel certainly has that track record. But I feel like it's getting to the point where they're not refusing to do unnecessary tasks. They're refusing to listen to him at all, and that's not cool. Zulema interviews that Danzzz likes to get other people's input. Translation: Danzzz agreed with everything Zulema said (on the surface), so that she'd shut the hell up. I'll bet Danzzz is a really nice person with a calm demeanor, and that I'd probably like him a lot in real life. It just doesn't translate into compelling television. I don't want to watch twelve assholes, of course, but there has to be some kind of spark. Santino bristles at Emmett because...does it really matter? I'm sure he would have bristled over Emmett's eyebrows if there was nothing else to complain about. Emmett does seem to have some difficulty with the sewing, while Nick hangs around in the background and predicts that the outfits are going to look campy. Lederhosen lingerie? Campy? No way.

Lupe feels like Diana may be a little too conceptual in her thinking, whatever that means. In Daniel's corner, it's progressed to the point where he can hardly get a word in edgewise over Kara and Chloe's whining complaints. I almost think that's what's holding them up, rather than Daniel's perfectionism. Danzzz and Andrae agree on some design choice, and Danzzz finally gets a good line in as he says, "Isn't it weird how we keep finishing each other's...." and he and Andrae say "sentences" at the same time. Hmm. It was funnier on the show than typed out. And see? If they'd show that side of Danzzz more often, we'd be in business. Quick cuts of frantic work all over the workroom. With an hour and a half left, Tim drops in. He offers his wonderfully no-nonsense criticisms, though I don't necessarily agree with all of them. He's concerned Diana's look is too gimmicky, and renders her speechless. Lupe interviews that Diana needs to learn to communicate better. This from a woman who has daily fights about what bed she's sleeping in. Nick chats with Tim about Santino's design. I have yet to see Nick do a single iota of work. Tim tells Daniel that his outfits are looking "Joan Collins". "That bad?" Daniel asks. Ouch. Somewhere, Joan Collins is sobbing into her pillow and throwing back a bottle of Jack Daniel's. Tim, Kara, and Chloe rip Daniel for designing without adhering to a deadline. OK, we get the Daniel-has-trouble-meeting-deadlines motif, thanks.

More frantic work. Chloe threatens to kill Daniel. "Kill me after the challenge, please," he responds. Nice! Get back to work, Whiny McGee! As time starts to run out, Emmett asks Santino what he wants on the bustier. Santino, the Great Communicator: "Just...dude, I don't care at this point. Just finish it." Let's all stand in awe at his leadership. He interviews that Emmett is dead weight, and when he sees that Emmett's garment hasn't progressed as much as he'd like, starts to heave and almost bursts out crying. Yeah, whenever I'm behind in one of my projects, I find it's best to have a boss that throws infantile tantrums. That'll get the work done. Tim kicks everyone out of the workroom, as Emmett gives Santino a pep talk he doesn't deserve about how Emmett and Nick have got Santino's back. Let's take a commercial break to guess how Santino will repay Emmett for this kindness.

Day Two. Tim rips everyone a new one, saying that he could see any of the collections in their current state as being the worst. They have an hour before the models arrive. Kara snaps at Daniel to make decisions. Why should he? Every decision he's made has been met with a howl of protest. Santino adds embellishment after embellishment to his outfits, which Nick interviews as looking tacky. Hoo boy, is he right. Chloe and Kara continue to obsess over Daniel. Kara has a feeling that it's going to be team elimination (which...not), and is understandably upset over the possibility that Daniel's problem with deadlines could get her kicked off. She threatens in an interview to "cut off [his] pee-pee". I think she meant that as a joke. I hope she meant that as a joke. Plus, "pee-pee"? Chloe interviews that if she's called upon to defend their crappy outfits, she's laying the blame squarely on Daniel. Again, understandable, but how about a bit more energy put towards finishing the lingerie and a bit less put towards planning your defensive speeches? I'm trying to be objective, because it does look like it would be hell on Earth to work under Daniel. I just wish they would attempt to support him a bit more. I guess it's because he's really nice, so I hate to see people snipe at him. He interviews that although the girls don't trust his time management, they do trust in the design, and that he'll take the responsibility if the judges don't like it. Aw.

The models arrive. Pixelized boobs everywhere! Cara (the model) refuses to wear one of Diana's outfits, calling it "inappropriate". There's a lot we could say about this, but let's give Diana the first shot. "I feel like you just can't be that picky if you're a model, because your job is to achieve different looks, and if you don't want to do that, then you should probably get a different job." Yes! Thank you! Cara's not the client in this case. She doesn't get a say in what's "appropriate" (which...it's lingerie - what does she want, a schoolmarm outfit?). It's like she works at a slaughterhouse, but refuses to kill any of the cows, because she's in PETA. Cara, I'm sorry if it sounds demeaning, but you're a three-dimensional clothes hanger. Shut up and walk. Marla confides to Diana that this is not the first time she's had to deal with Cara's fits of pique. Cara sucks. Santino tells the makeup people to give the models deer-like faces. Well, actually he says "I want the three girls to look like deers in the face." I just translated into English. Diana interviews that they had to make Cara a gigantic one-piece lingerie outfit so that she'd feel more comfortable. That is complete bullshit. Nick interviews that Diana's outfits look weak. I'm going to allow myself some bias as I tell Nick that he may want to start putting some salt on those words. Good God, I just saw Shannon's ass. This episode is naughty! Tim tells everyone that time's up.

Commercials. Runway time. The judges are Nina Garcia, Cynthia Rowley (a fashion designer), and Alessandra Ambrosio (a Victoria's Secret model - with a really fake name). Let's kick it! We start with Diana's outfits. They're not impressive. Ugly Eliza has a strappy black bikini with a swath of acid green fabric going from the neck down through the hip line and out. Fucking Cara not only looks dumb because of the one-piece garment, but has a terrible runway walk. Someone kick this bitch out! Lesley actually looks pretty good. Another strappy black bikini, but this has wings of periwinkle material starting just above the elbow and making flowing sleeves that billow behind her. Santino's line. Feh. First is Tarah, wearing a white dress that foofs up around her boobs, which are covered by a dark green material. This is the first time that Tarah's looked bad. Shannon looks like a tray of cupcakes exploded all over her. Heather looks even worse. Emmett voices-over that Santino embellished to the point where sexy turned into vaudeville. He's right. Nina makes a disgusted face. Santino voices-over that he could tell that judges weren't amused and "just didn't get it." See that? Not that they don't like it. Not that they have a difference of opinion. No, the only possible way for someone to dislike Santino's creation is if they're not sophisticated enough to understand it. Gotcha.

Danzzz's line. Just like everything else he's done, his outfits are competent, but unremarkable. Rebecca is just wearing a simple black bustier and miniskirt, with shirt cuffs at the wrist. Rachael has on...yawn...another black garment with a brown fabric wrapped around the middle and a necktie. Danyelle has a black bikini on and another pair of those shirt cuffs. Daniel's line. I know I've been taking up for him this whole episode, but I really hate the black lace fabric he's chosen. Claudia, Eden, and Grace are modeling, and they all have the same ugly fabric, though it's cut into different designs. Oh, and by the way, I can totally see all of their nipples. Are we sure this is basic cable? I didn't wander onto Skinemax, did I? The judges tally their scores, and the designers step onto the runway. Danzzz's team is asked to step forward, and is then told that they have won the challenge. Fair enough. They celebrate. I thank Danzzz for keeping Andrae and Zulema pretty much off my TV this week. They leave the runway, and Santino rolls his eyes. Dude, look at the shit you made. I know you're egotistical, but you're not delusional too, are you? Diana's team steps forward and is safe as well. Whew. Although this means we can't reasonably expect to get rid of Cara anytime soon. Crap.

Santino's team and Daniel's team have the lowest scores. The models emerge. Nina tells Santino that she's disappointed. "Oh, really?" he snots. She and Heidi give very apt criticisms that there's simply too much going on with the outfits, and so they appear unfocused. Cynthia tries to soften the blow by saying that if they combined certain pieces with other (read: more attractive) pieces, then it might look better. Santino says that's not what he was trying to do, and Nina responds that it's not a question of vision - it's just that Santino's pieces are "aesthetically not pleasing". You know, I find myself agreeing with Nina an awful lot. She and I need to go get some coffee or something. Santino argues back with "lingerie is supposed to be sexy and is supposed to come off!" So he's arguing that he deliberately designed something ugly so that people couldn't wait to get out of it? I'm sure the judges will totally buy that. If they've been struck on their heads with bricks in the past two seconds. He and Nina fight some more about if he's copying other designers (which doesn't really matter...ugly is ugly). Emmett and Nick look really embarrassed. The judges ask Nick what he thinks, and he employs the artful euphemism that he "understood Santino's vision". Emmett is asked if he felt the line was too much, and he answers yes. They ask Santino to choose who would be kicked off if he had a choice, and he of course picks Emmett, throwing in some unnecessary jibes about Emmett's style. Nick also chooses Emmett. Emmett chooses Santino, saying that he should take responsibility for his line rather than trying to spread blame around.

OK, now let's eviscerate Daniel. Alessandra feels the outfits are designed for older women. So? Women Of A Certain Age aren't allowed to wear lingerie now? Nina feels the three outfits are too similar. I don't quite understand that, because I thought similarity is what a "line" of clothing is all about. Chloe, not even asked a question, spits out that she had to follow Daniel's vision. Well, nobody's asking you about the design, so shut up. That was just gratuitous ass-covering, and was really unattractive on Chloe's part. Kara gets in on the act, calling Daniel headstrong. Heidi asks Daniel who he'd choose to kick off, and he does just what he said he'd do, taking responsibility for the design himself, even after Chloe and Kara just stabbed him in the...well, not even back. They stabbed him in the front. He cries a bit. That was extremely classy, not only because it's the right thing to do, but because it makes Santino look like even more of an asshole, which is awesome. The designers leave the runway. Deliberations. Santino's line is too costumey and he's a coward for trying to pin blame on Emmett. Nina hates Santino so much. Daniel's line was not creative enough, but he owned up to his responsibility.

This week's fun trivia tidbit to avoid tiresome, repetitive show dialogue: Apparently, if you put a raisin in a glass of champagne, it will continuously float up and down in the glass. I haven't tried it, but it sounds intriguing. Give it a whirl on New Year's Eve. Amaze your friends.

Time for the elimination. Kara is in. Chloe is in. Nick is in. Emmett is in. Only the leaders are left, which makes sense. Now, if we look at this objectively, the choice seems fairly obvious. Santino made a hideous line, refused to accept responsibility for his actions, is unable to accept constructive criticism from the judges, and is an overall pain in the ass. Daniel made a line that wasn't to the judges' tastes, but at least looked wearable and sellable. He accepted the fact that his design choices were his responsibility, seems willing to evolve as a designer, and is an overall nice person. Clearly, Daniel should be in. But reality television isn't about reality at all. This isn't a merit-based competition, no matter how much they'd like us to believe it is. Nice guys aren't as much fun to watch as bratty jerks who throw snotty fits (according to the producers, not me). If Santino were to get eliminated, who would get our blood riled up week after week? I have no doubt that the judges dearly wished to eliminate Santino, but the producers intervened, and so poor Daniel is cut instead. Sigh.

Heidi states outright that she wishes Daniel could have stayed longer, and he even gets a nice sendoff from Tim backstage. Yeah, the judges really didn't want to do this. Chloe is crying and talking about what a great person Daniel is. Yeah, so great you threatened to kill him and unprovokedly attacked him on the runway. Nice try, princess. Daniel interviews that he doesn't regret coming back, and he feels he's been redeemed from the first season. He talks about how he hopes he's demonstrated respect and dignity as a designer. He's a peach. I hope he lands on his feet.

Next time on Project Runway: The designers will be creating a potty dress? Oh, I'm sorry, that's a party dress. The dress will be for a socialite. Oh, so a total waste of oxygen. Lupe thinks her dress looks like crap. Danzzz is stressed. Tim doesn't want Marla to be a copycat. Zulema pitches a fit about someone who took a form. The designers strut their stuff at a party. Man, they all have better runway walks than Cara. Fucking Cara.

Closing disclaimer: The judges considered both their scores and input from the Producers [Why is that capitalized? Don't the producers look like big enough assholes as it is this week? -- Limecrete] and Bravo in reaching their elimination decisions.

Overall Grade: B-