Hell’s Kitchen Season Finale

October 14th, 2009

Hell's Kitchen

Hell’s Kitchen is over, and all turned out as predicted a while back. In the last few episodes, Suzanne and Tenille were toast, then Ariel, leaving Dave and Kevin in the final two. And the “one armed bandit” took home the grand prize.

However, I don’t give myself much credit for predicting the winner. On further thought,the show is intentionally predictable, when one understands the message it’s trying to get across.

Hell’s Kitchen is promotion for Gordon Ramsay. He’s the hero. The hook is that he’s a hot-tempered out of control chef. But there’s reason behind the madness; he wants to run a great restaurant, and the route to serving great food are common-sense values of passion, hard work, leadership, being a team player, and basic competence. Slightly more nuanced are the values of improvement over time, and potential over experience.

So Ramsay is always going to pick a winner who demonstrates these values. And his choice must make sense to us as viewers, because Ramsay has to look good. He won’t be shown making a bad decision.

Even if, hypothetically, Ramsay lost his mind and handed the grand prize to a total imbecile, the show – safely recorded well in advance – would surely be edited to make that person seem deserving of the prize. So basically, no matter who Ramsay chooses, it’s going to seem like the right one – and in turn, be predictable – because Ramsay’s sense of values must be maintained.

That said, the show’s predictability doesn’t make for boring viewing. Most of the drama comes from the shock of contestants so out of line with Ramsay’s values, and the satisfaction when those people are eliminated. When Ramsay makes decisions we agree with, it feels good – justice is served.

An entire season of Hell’s Kitchen tells the same story told in a single episode of Kitchen Nightmares. At the start, everything is in chaos. The hot-tempered but amazingly competent Ramsay arrives to identify problems and set everything straight. Then there is always a happy ending. Part of that ending is the reaffirmation that Ramsay knows what the heck he’s doing by handing the prize to a deserving winner.

So while Dave was the winner last night, the ultimate winner of this whole spectacle is the perpetually pissed-off Ramsay, who by weeding out the incompetents, looks smarter and smarter every season. Intentionally.

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