Project Runway Season 21, Episode 3
"Boring to Brilliant"
Director: Ramy Romany
Host: Heidi Klum
Mentor: Christian Siriano
Judges: Law Roach, Sara Foster
Cast: Belania Daley, Antonio Estrada, Jesus Estrada, Veejay Floresca, Yuchen Han, JosephMcRae, Joan Madison, Madeline Malenfant, Ethan Mundt, Angelo Rosa
Now this is more like it. After being a bit harsh in my assessment of last week's premiere, I'm feeling a little less Law Roach and a little more guest-judge-who's-just-there-to-have-fun this week. Episode 3, "Boring to Brilliant," sees the latest iteration of a brand-new Project Runway, on steadier ground. If this trajectory continues, I think we're in good shape. But before I get into the recap, I still have some gripes! Oh, looks like she is Law Roaching just a little!
First: the music. Bargain bin soundalike pop songs have reached Project Runway, and that sound is not a good look. It's the Selling Sunset-ification of reality TV, where instead of just ... playing some music ... we hear a snippet of a song that doesn't actually exist, where the vibe is always, "I'm a bad bitch here to make money, haters stay out of my way." Maybe my brain is broken by being part of the next-to-last MTV micro-generation and I can remember when every show had needle drops of actual songs that added real context and flavor to moments (Daria and Jane trudging through a paintball excursion to the Beastie Boys' "Looking Down the Barrel of a Gun" has stuck with me for decades now). These prefab bops have no cultural cache. They only exist because they're affordable. They are a bummer.
It also doesn't help that Project Runway held on to pretty much all of its original music cues for 20 seasons, throughout all of the network changes. I miss them.
As worked up as I am about that, I'm even more annoyed by the shift in episode structure that pushes the elimination to the top of next week's episode. I get why this is being done: it creates a cliffhanger that makes viewers tune-in next week or keep their binge going. This is a format shift that breaks with 25 years of tradition — and I'm honestly shocked it's taken this long to happen. I'm trying to think of why this annoys me so, when scripted TV shows have been doing this for 70 years, since the days of Lassie. Even reality TV, non-competition series, do this. What makes the reality-competition show different?
To me, the reality-competition show structure as we know it, as pioneered by America's Next Top Model and, well, Project Runway, is more akin to a song structure than a TV format. There is a rhythm to it, one that's been perfected over the years down to a science. Y'know, we're talking some Phil Spector to Benny & Björn to Diane Warren and Max Martin level scientific precision. Cutting episodes off right before the elimination is like cutting off a Kim Petras single before she jumps an octave, or a Carly Rae Jepsen song before she hammers that hook one last time. It just feels wrong. And from a storytelling perspective, it feels cheap. I'm sure there's a sports version of this metaphor, like if a football game cut off with 30 seconds left on the clock and you had to wait a week to see the final kick or something, but I'm gay and I will use a Kim and Carly Rae metaphor instead.
And that's how this episode starts, with Alex Foxworth's elimination for a look that I saw walk down the runway last week, a look that I'm having to dig through my brain archives to recall. I don't feel much emotional attachment to this elimination, because all of the stakes — Alex's bond with Ethan/Utica, which we saw a glimpse of — have a week of my life piled on top of them. Bye, Alex!
This week's challenge: take boring fabric and turn it into something brilliant. As far as challenges go, it's not that inventive. It's, dare I say, boring. The most inventive part of the challenge is the Rube Goldberg-ian way Heidi connects the challenge to PNC Bank, of all sponsors, because PNC Bank knows that "actions that seem boring create brilliant results." Later during the design portion of the episode, Ethan fully pumps the brakes on all the storylines to say, "I love this FriXion pen, luckily they're erasable, a lifesaver!" At least Pilot's FriXion pens are visible on screen and have a tangential connection to the world of fashion design. PNC Bank, did you really get what you paid for with that throwaway shoutout?
Ethan and Jesus are named head of households, meaning they get to pick their teams. This has me a little concerned that we're having a do-over of Season 11, the cursed all-teams season. Please let the designers stand on their own next week ... Ethan wants no "firecrackers" on his team, so he picks Yuchen, Angelo, and Joan (who have yet to make an impression) and Josephmcrae — who, despite having the sassiest entrance of the bunch last week, has actually proven to be pretty even-keeled in the edit. The twins are taking up all the allotted sass screentime, and of course they form the foundation of the other house (Jesus, Antonio, Veejay, Madeline, and last-picked Belania).
House of Ethan (or H.O.E., as Ethan says with all the glee of a church kid knowing they're saying a "bad word") gets to work with denim; House of Jesus gets gray wool. As is wont to happen, the team that we're initially led to believe will be a disaster actually gets into the groove first. After learning that the winning design will be worn by Sofía Vergara, Jesus chooses the Catalina flower as his house's inspiration. This initially frustrates Veejay, who has no idea what they're talking about; Madeline doesn't know either, but it's Veejay who's most shady about it (I think I am living for Veejay). But, miraculously, once Jesus and Antonio demonstrate a draping, cascading ruffle technique, everyone in the house gets it.
Smash cut to the H.O.E. Ethan's first, most obvious mistake (to me, the viewer) is intentionally choosing a team under a "no firecrackers" ethos — and then telling them that their theme is going to be "showstoppers." Not that a designer has to be a firecracker to stop a show, but the energy just felt off immediately. And that's forgetting that Sofía Vergara has to wear the winning design — which is a fact that everyone, from the designers to Christian to even the show, forgets until she shows up again as a judge. Ethan is making a full-on avant-garde pair of jeans with a massive hoop for a top, like a life-size Christmas ornament, for Sofía Vergara to wear on a random step-and-repeat.
Christian's walk-through goes as well as you'd expect. He looks at poor Joan's dress, and I loved the exasperation on his face when he sees that it's going to be a "frayed-edge denim dress," something that he says literally every Project Runway designer has done before (I feel like Kini Zamora built his entire finale show around frayed fringe denim?). This is the magic of Christian Siriano: he gives the most blunt critiques, but you never doubt his empathy. He's being catty because he cares, and no amount of performative bitchiness can hide his genuine affection for fashion designers and the art of it all.
In a misguided but well-intentioned move, Ethan decides to bring Utica Queen to the main stage of Project Runway for this challenge. She says it's because Utica is light and she wants to cheer up her teammates but ... I think it's because she knows Utica has to make an appearance and surviving another runway isn't guaranteed this week. This also marks Ethan-as-Utica breaking an essential rule of Project Runway, #6: Always look worse than your model. (Sidenote: despite a Wordpress glitch indicating otherwise, I did write that list solo)
Time for the runway! First, the House of Jesus. Madeline's look is a clean, 2040s-by-way-of-1940s, professional woman look. Veejay gives a hot gown with some pelvic cutouts that she accurately describes as "dangerous." Belania shuts it down with a hot as hell tailored-to-perfection pair of trousers and vest complete with peplum and cascading scarf/collar.
Jesus serves a solid coat/dress with a beautiful ruffle collar, although it looks boxy IMO. And Antonio gives us a mermaid gown with the most show-stopping, intricate interpretation of the Catalina flower on the bust.
And then, H.O.E. time. Ethan/Utica presents a pair of fringey-frayed jeans with a huge denim ankh looping from the waist, over the bust and over the model's head. Joan gives us Storm at the rodeo, with a huge denim cape and fringe flying everywhere, topped with ... head rings? Angelo shows a youthful denim jacket (that's immediately removed) and miniskirt combo with some offputting-ly pointy hips. Josephmcrae gives his best look to date, a cinched torso with massively puffy and voluminous sleeves and legs. And Yuchen, who had to turn out a look in six hours after abandoning his initial idea, sends his model down the runway in a bandeau top and micro-miniskirt and a flowing denim cape.
House of Jesus wins, hands down. Jesus, Antonio, and Belania earn top spots (although I'd personally switch out Jesus for Veejay). And Belania wins, earning the highest praise from Law when Law says he'd put Zendaya in her look. "This I will never forget, ever," he says, thus making me a #TeamBelania ride or die now. This is the magic of this show, when a designer can go from "who?" to "I would die for them, not literally" with just one challenge.
And on the bottom, we have Ethan, Joan, and Angelo — rightfully so. Ethan gets the harshest critique of the episode: "The cervix is dilated and she is crowning." Not the crown Utica Queen is after! And — I don't know who goes home. Wow, the recap really hits a brick wall here at the end, doesn't it?
Or actually I do know who goes home because you can clearly see two of the three bottom designers pictured in promotional stills for next week's episode, stills that are just readily available if you Google "freeform press site" and poke around. Come on, guys. There's a reason why the formula exists!
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