Hell's Kitchen: Scene Stealers

Last night's "Hell's Kitchen" finale was actually a surprisingly filler-free and entertaining hour which heavily spotlighted (for better or worse) two of the show's most colorful personalities.

As an added bonus, the show even found time to crown a winner!

If I had one complaint about Tuesday's finale is that WAY too much of the fourth season's final hour became "The Matt and Jen Try to Outcrazy Each Other" show instead of a contest between two mostly likable and somewhat capable cooks. I mean last week's cliffhanger and the first few minutes of this week's finale were built entirely around the whole "who would get stuck with who" angle, as Petrozza prepared to make his final pick.

Then again, whether you love them or hate them, (who am I kidding — no one could love either of these two) they delivered the goods. And by "goods", I mean unintentional laughs and outrageous comments.

Right before Petrozza picked Jen, I told my girl Erica that I would probably pick Jen because there was a better chance she'd perform well (if only to try to impress Ramsay and show up one of the finalists). As a result, I agreed with Petrozza's choice. That was until Jen opened her big mouth about how she was chosen second to last because Trezzie and Christina were threatened by her. Ugh! That voice. I instantly regretted my theoretical decision.

Meanwhile, Christina thanked the lord and set about expertly manipulating, I mean, winning over Matt, who claimed she'd have to work hard to earn his respect. Of course, all it took was Christina giving him some BS about how he was the inspiration for her risotto (which also resulted in two more classic Matt the Eagle faces).

Despite the fact that Matt and Jen were on them, I actually think the teams worked out perfectly. Petrozza got to work with his boys Bobby and Ben, and I believe he was able to handle Jen a little better than Christina would have. Christina, on the other hand, got to work with Corey, who was also reunited with her totally random/fake HK boyfriend Louross. She also showed that she knew how to handle Matt. Sort of — more on the monkfish fiasco later.

While Christina was busy pulling on Matt's strings, Petrozza's team was questioning the finalist about his preparedness and his messy notes. Ok, it wasn't really Petrozza's team questioning him so much as it was Jen — she likened being on the sloppy chef's team to playing violin on the Titanic. I might've actually laughed if the sound of Jen's voice didn't shred a little piece of my soul every time she said something.

While Petrozza and Christina inspected their kitchen's construction (Christina's looked considerably better, while Petrozza's still looked like it was designed by a straight guy trying to be tasteful), Jen went on to cement her title as the worst person ever. She asked Chef Ramsay for a letter of recommendation. Ramsay shook his head and Corey summed things up in the second most accurately succinct statement of the evening — "I hate her." Me too, Corey. Me too.

Ramsay took a quick look at the finalists' menus and restaurant décor and appeared to be considerably more impressed with Petrozza's more ambitious menu and classy design than he was with Christina's more simple food offerings.

However, during the dinner service, the fact that Christina's menu had stuff that could be more easily cooked worked to her advantage. It meant there was a small chance Matt wouldn't completely screw the pooch. It also meant Bobby struggled early on with Petrozza's more complicated lobster strudel (ick) appetizers.

Fortunately, the appetizer struggles in the blue kitchen would soon come to an end because Trezzie didn't properly prep and he ran out of ingredients for two of his appetizers. Oh wait, that's not good either.

The red kitchen caught up to the blue in terms of sucktitude when Louross fell a bit behind with his salads and had to ask Matt for help. Unfortunately, Matt was moving even slower than usual and had to ask help in making what appeared to be a basic salad, leading Louross to make the most accurately succinct statement of the evening — "Matt sucks." Louross didn't say much last night, but he said it all.

But Matt wasn't done, as he undercooked monkfish twice setting back Christina's kitchen. Fortunately, Christina handled the situation properly, putting enough pressure on Matt so that he did a good job, but not too much that he would completely melt down. In fact, if we're to believe this tricky show's editing, Matt was REALLY getting pissed at Ramsay, repeatedly muttering for the Brit to "shut up and let him cook" under his breath. Again, I'm not really sure all of Matt's comments went down the way they were presented. Then again, Ramsay DID call him a "f---face," causing me to laugh hysterically and to believe Ramsay WAS actually hearing what Matt was saying.

Personally, I'm not sure I could've cooked a monkfish any better than Matt (ok, I probably could have), but I KNOW I could've cooked a single onion ring in less time than it appeared to take Jen. Though he handled himself decently, Petrozza appeared more flustered than Christina in the kitchen when things went south.

The service ended with more highs than lows and Ramsay was off with his customer comment cards to make his "difficult" decision.

He called Trezzie and Christina to his office and had each stand in front of a door. One would open to confetti and a champagne shower, and the other would, um, not open, meaning the person behind the second door would have to use the winner's door to get to the confetti and champagne shower.

Lo and behold, Christina actually won this thing! I was legitimately surprised. Ramsay REALLY seemed a lot more impressed with Petrozza's menu and design. Also, he was just such a nice guy and had paid his dues.

Then I thought about it, and I remembered that Christina had won an insane amount of challenges (including an unprecedented three individual challenges in a row). She's also at the start of her career and probably has more potential — plus, whoever is REALLY in charge of the restaurant she'll pretend to be running will have a much easier time telling her what to do.

Also, just last year, Ramsay had chosen the more experienced chef over the blond upstart (Rock over Bonnie) and methinks reality shows try to avoid repeating themselves whenever they can.

Anyway, that was the conclusion of the very entertaining fourth season of "Hell's Kitchen" and the first season of this HK recap. Thanks for reading my nonsense and I hope I see you here next summer.

So what'd you think of the finale? Did the right person win? (Not according to the poll on my blog.) Did Ben contribute ANYTHING to last night's episode? (I was secretly hoping Ramsay would torture him, just a little, for old time's sake.) Finally, you've had about a month to think about this — is there ANYONE worse than Jen?