Hell’s Kitchen-Season Two
The Basic infoAired-2006
Winner- Heather
Runner Up- Virginia
Sous Chef- MaryAnn, Scott
Maitre d’- Jean-Philippe
Episodes- 10
Contestants- 12
Season two is where Hell’s Kitchen really set its stride. The first season was something different to recent seasons. Seasons 2 and 3 helped transition to the later seasons formats. Season 2 showed that Ramsey canned the whole “No interfering with nominations” and eliminated Gabe right away pretty early in the season. Season two is also one of my personal favorite seasons because of the characters that really moved the season. As much as I love the “talent” shown in the show if you can’t be a fun character than why even bother? Luckily, I will say that HK has done an amazing job showcasing their winners.
Before I drone on about the merits of this fine season, I will say that season 2 more or less established practices that continue on to this day. The split between men and women, the coat hanger and burning picture, quite a few popular challenges (Talking about the relay, taste it now make it, and the 100 portions challenge) and the more traditional confessional animation. The editing was better as well in the fact that they showed off more flaws in the eventual winner than Michael. Heather was never put up for eliminated yet she still had her moments of inconsistency and this was a huge plot in the mid episodes while she was on the blue team. In fact, it looked like that if the blue team didn’t win that she would be in very real danger of leaving, something that NEVER happened to Michael aside from the “Back up your claims of experience” that was mostly a “Previously On..” thing.
Season Two of Hell’s Kitchen also has a little known fact attached to it, practically with the winner, Heather West. From the usually scouting of opinions I gather that Heather is one of the most popular Hell’s Kitchen winners that has been on the show, along with Dave. Heather was also the first open lesbian winner of a reality TV show. I found this fact interesting, yet no one seems to bring this up. Richard Hatch was the first openly gay winner of a Reality TV show and since 2000 the representation of gays in the media has certainly changed since then. The only time you really get tipped off on Heather’s sexual ordination was when Sara said that her and Rachel were making eyes at each other. She never had a huge subplot featuring who she dated nor was she the first lesbian on the show (Jessica from season 1) but she was the first one to win a Reality TV show, something Survivor has yet to do. Fact is, that if you are writing a piece of Representation of LGBT contestants in Reality TV, if Heather isn’t mentioned at all in said piece than I will not take you seriously.
The other important thing that I will point out is Sara. Sara is the best Hell’s Kitchen villain that they ever done. Elise? Season 4 Jen? Lacey? They don’t hold a candle to the original. Sara was basically every negative element on a RTV person that doesn’t social rights things. She was immature, a liar, mediocre chef, yet she made the top four. (my sweetspot for the season villain is they are out on the third to last episode at least. My Season 9 episode write up will explain why this hurts Elise) It’s a fun moment whenever Sara’s around. She started this one sided feud with Heather about the leadership on the red team, then moved to Rachel, and then sabotaged Virginia then got away with it. Without her Season two would have been boring. Sara’s fall was perfect karma. She sabotaged Virginia early on, she gets sent home directly because of Virginia not wanting to quit.
Unlike season one that relayed on more of the cooking and strategy, season two broadened these characters. Michael wasn’t as dynamic as Heather for example. Heather was an adorkable yet determined chef. Virginia was dealing with the internal struggle of her existence in the game. Keith was a confidant chef with an ego problem. Sara was immature yet she did have a softer side. Finally Garrett the prison chef that was actually a giant softie. The Black jacket group was a strong one this season, and personally this season has my favorite final two of Virginia and Heather. In season five they related the match up to the “Perfectionist” Heather vs the “Creative” Virginia. The two were almost complete opposite, with Heather being strong on the line and Virginia being a strong challenge performer.
Another extremely important character this season was Rachel. Rachel was hinted as a strong chef and a leader. However every season since this one a strong person at the beginning slowly fall down in skill. Rachel’s decline could be pinpoint to when Heather was moved to the blue kitchen. This fall was shocking and from then on usually there is someone in every season that does this, though season three is really when this is noticeable. Rachel herself is rather noteworthy of this season also because of the supposed relationship with Heather. At first the two both denied taking the relationship further (For RuPaul’s Drag Race fans, think of how the Ivy/Jinkx thing was like) but after Rachel committed suicide around a year later, Heather had that regret in later interview. It’s an interesting “what if” for sure. As for the suicide, a big question about if it was because of the show. My thoughts are that it sure didn’t help, but an interview with Heather hinted that she didn’t really communicate with anyone. It’s odd for sure, but I don’t think that it had anything to do with the show.
Mirabel wasn’t extremely noteworthy in this season. She missed her family thus she turned into a mess. She’s one of those reality subtexts, and she didn’t even show up for the finale. She was spent, and sometime that happens to contestants on a RTV show. She wasn’t that good either, but mostly stayed because of Polly and Rachel being worse than her. Gabe is kinda in the same boat. Gabe was nominated through Ramsey making that a first, and a message. Giacammo had a strong signature dish but completely failing to figure out that the gas wasn’t on sealed his fate. And last in this line up is Polly. Polly was presented as a kind of an Elsie copy (mother of six, inexperience) but ended up not being able to serve appetizers for around 90 minutes and getting her station replaced by Heather.
The last player that I haven’t got to cover yet is Tom. Tom is someone who was seen as sexist and someone who just can’t get away with nothing. When sexist contestants come up, usually the winner is a female. (averted with season 6, but season 6 had the two winning female contestants appeared in the season at some point so it works in that case) Tom was really the first time it had happened. With this shows first female winner and divide by sex I have no doubt that that was there for a reason. Tom himself was widely incompetent. It was a wonder how he lasted that long.
So I’ve been trying this whole write up to not completely gush on this season and Heather. Heather is defiantly in my top five favorite RTV winners. She’s not my favorite contestant but she’s a huge favorite of mine of course. Season 2 is also in my group of my favorite seasons, as well as being my first season that I saw all the way though. Also this isn’t the last time we’ll talk about Heather or Sara or Virginia. Sara’s character template and Heather and Virginia’s lasting legacy are important in later seasons. So file this all away!
Sorry for the wait on this- Next Week we will visit another favorite season of mine. The tale of Hell’s Bitches, a Waffle House Cook, and a guy named Rock. Also an added bonus of gushing over a certain Pastry Chef.
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