Top Chef:

She has calmed down. She was the whackaloon in the beginning, and a little irritating, but she's chilled out and now is charmingly eccentric.

This. So much this. I think Carla is going to pull this one out. She really seems to have come away from the last few New York challenges with the confidence to do it. From what little I've seen of the last episode, she's not the least bit nervous about it, and that can make all the difference.

I have to wonder how much of Carla's personality evolution is genuine and how much of it is editing. When you have a contestant who was doing poorly in the beginning but who you know will be in the finals, it's no big stretch to give them an arc for the audience to follow.

Heh. Also this. That was probably my biggest eye opener upon working on film and TV - it's the editor's project. Principal photography is just parts manufacturing.

Tangentially related - a friend of a friend saw Watchmen. The only tidbit I've gleaned so far is that all that slo-mo in the trailers? Not in the movie. The sequences are, but they're not in slo-mo. Movie trailer editors just make shit up.

The "Project Runway" finale was evidently taped today. Writes the Associated Press:

NEW YORK — "Project Runway" taped its sixth-season finale Friday, but something was missing: the finalists. Because of a legal battle, three unknown designers sent their collections down the runway at the tents in Bryant Park on the final day of New York Fashion Week. The designers stayed hidden backstage.

The new season of "Project Runway," which aired on Bravo, has been delayed because of a legal battle involving NBC Universal, which owns Bravo; the Weinstein Co.; and the Lifetime Channel.

That must have been one weird show ...

Wow -- I didn't even know they were shooting.

Wow -- I didn't even know they were shooting.

Yeah, I've seen bits and pieces about the lawsuit on the wire, but they kept the shooting SERIOUSLY mum. I guess the season was supposed to start airing last month.

There was a large-ish article in yesterday's paper about it ... but since it's not one of the shows I follow, I kind of skimmed. Just enough to know that there were disagreements about it (would kerfuffle apply here?).

would kerfuffle apply here?

Not really. The lawsuit's a bit too major for that, I think. All told, several million dollars on the line.

TC: so happy for Carla. I hope she takes it all.

I hope I'm not the only one to watch last night's TAR! It was most excellent. Lovely scenery wonderfully photographed and appreciated by the racers, great tasks (loved the pie fight) being laughed at by the locals, hard decisions being made by the racers (Mel's waiting for the wind to change really paid off, and we got his utter enjoyment of the trip down ), and some real dumb ideas by some racers (the flight attendents looking around for wood to chop themselves? Had to be fatigue kicking in, because I'd hate to think that they are that stupid all the time ).

I'm really liking the new editing style, with the split screen and stating how long it'd been since the leg began.

The local laughing this week seemed much more genial than the local laughing last week!

They were drunker this week--they had to be completely hammered by the time Steve and Linda showed up.