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Another Will Smith project has been put on the back burner. Although, this time it’s not because of The Slap. Entirely. Smith’s upcoming action drama movie, Emancipation, is reportedly being pushed into 2023. Apple had hoped to release the film directed by Antoine Fuqua during this year’s fall festival circuit, but sources inside the streaming company say that plan is now out the window.

While Smith slapping Chris Rock at the Oscars is definitely a “prominent consideration,” the film was already suffering production problems that made it unlikely Fuqua would have it finished in time. Via Variety:

Multiple sources shared that Fuqua is still deep in post-production and may not be ready in time for a 2022 bow. The film suffered numerous delays due to moving the production from Georgia to Louisiana in protest of the state’s voting restrictions laws, the destruction caused by Hurricane Ida and the pause due to COVID cases in August 2021.

Apple also has a full schedule for later in the year that it plans to push for awards, and Smith’s performance in Emancipation is reportedly so good that the streamer wants to make sure it gets a fair shake. Prior to his Oscar win for King Richard, an insider who saw early footage of the Fuqua film told Variety, “Will’s going to win back-to-back.” Of course, that was before Smith slapped Rock on stage in front of millions of viewers and was banned from Academy events for the next 10 years, so the actor scoring another nom is probably firmly in the long-shot category right now.

(Via Variety)

While Stranger Things is set to return this month, actor Caleb McLaughlin is looking to remind the world that he’s multi-faceted with the new “Soul Travel” visual. The 20-year-old wrote, performed, and produced the upbeat love song, asking his lover to get away from the city with him as his life is moving too fast. Throughout the video, you’ll see McLaughlin riding in between women in the car or spending time with his friends. With such a demanding life, his desire to leave it all behind and focus on who he cares about the most is sensible.

This is just the second track that Caleb has ever released, following 2021’s “Neighborhood.” He told Complex that “Soul Travel,” despite being done before “Neighborhood,” is actually a continuation of that song’s story. “‘Neighborhood’ tells the story of a teenager meeting a girl and bringing her to my neighborhood, and then in ‘Soul Travel’ I am talking about going away while driving in the video.”

You can find Caleb playing Lucas Sinclair in Strangers Things’ penultimate season kicking off this month, before closing off for good in Season 5. The show has been running since 2016 and received favorable reviews from fans and critics alike.

I do even want to be around anymore, because Tim Robinson’s sketch series I Think You Should Leave is coming back.

Sam Richardson, the Detroiters star who has appeared in some of the funniest I Think You Should Leave sketches with his “best pal” (including “Baby of the Year”), told Variety that the writers are working on season three. “I’m not sure when they’ll start filming,” he said. “But there are funny sketches coming already, I can tell you that much.”

The future of I Think You Should Leave was in doubt after it was announced that Robinson and co-creator Zach Kanin were writing a comedy pilot for HBO Max. Computer School is described as being about a “recent high school grad and his uncle [who] attend the same computer class in suburban Michigan,” with Robinson playing the uncle. That sounds pretty great, but more I Think You Should Leave sounds even better.

“We’ve worked together for almost two decades, so we’d certainly break each other,” Richardson said about working with Robinson (even their last names are similar). “But we also know each other’s comedic moves and know how to respond to them. It’s so rare to find someone who understands and complements your comedic style and voice like that.”

In honor of the season three news, first round of sloppy steaks is on me, boys!

(Via Variety)

Dave Chappelle would like to make one thing clear: Busta Rhymes was not the one who folded Isaiah Lee like a pretzel backstage after Lee tackled him during his show at the Hollywood Bowl on Wednesday. Reaching out to TMZ via his publicist Carla Sims, Dave insisted that his statements in the immediate aftermath of the attack were just jokes.

After shrugging off Lee’s initial tackle, Chappelle had returned to the stage — along with Jamie Foxx, and later, Chris Rock — to address the bizarre incident, saying, “I been doing this 35 years, I just stomped a n**** backstage,” joked. “I seen Busta Rhymes, he was like, ‘That’s how you do it, god.’” He claimed that Foxx and even fellow comedian Jon Stewart jumped in.

But perhaps worried that any legal counsel Lee pursued could use the statements as evidence in a civil case against the comedian and his security, he made sure to point out that none of the entertainers he mentioned had laid a finger on Lee. Considering his state as he was loaded into an ambulance later, they probably didn’t even need to.

Meanwhile, Chappelle has been joking about the situation ever since, as well as revealing Lee’s reason for accosting him in the first place (sorry, 50 Cent, it had nothing to do with Chappelle’s trans comments). As for Lee, he’s been charged with four misdemeanors, so hopefully, he feels it was worth both the pain — again, did you guys see his ARM!?!? — and potential jail time for the attention his attack got for his displaced grandmother and/or struggling rap career.

Investing in whiskey might sound like a joke to a lot of people, but it’s very real. It’s also a little less straightforward than, say, buying a gold bar. Though not by much. Whiskey is a commodity like any other — artwork, classic cars, crypto — that can appreciate or depreciate over the years, with a sale value that rises or declines based on the whims of the people who buy it. It’s a very real market with a lively trade.

In fact it’s not uncommon these days to see headlines like “Liquid Assets: Why Now Is The Time To Start Investing In Whiskey,” “Investing in maturing Scotch whisky can achieve high returns” or “Drink up! Whiskey investing brings huge returns.” Moreover, Forbes reported just last December that the “benchmark index of rare whiskies” recorded a whopping 564% increase over the last decade. Gold, on the other hand, increased by a mere 360% over the same time period, and you can’t even drink it.

Look, we get it, that’s a lot of intangible myth-making and throwing around of numbers for a product that was originally designed to just pour down your throat. But in reality, there’s a massive market for both bottles and barrels that are pretty much created for investment/collecting to turn a profit in the near or distant future. Certainly you can just drink this rare and expensive stuff too, but you might literally be pissing away a year’s college tuition in 2040.

To help us figure all of this out, I consulted a good friend of mine who’s also one of the foremost investment whisk(e)y experts in the entire world, Nate Gana. Gana and I judged at the San Francisco World Spirits Competition this year and have traded a bottle or two over the years. More importantly, Gana is on the cutting edge of who’s buying what, and which brands are making the spirits, barrels, and bottles that are actually going to be worth something two, five, 10, 20, or 50 years from now.

So let Gana and I guide you through getting into whiskey investing with a few, well eight, tips for the whiskey-investing curious.

“Dusties” Are Complicated

One of the first terms you are probably going to hear once you take your first step into this world is “dusties.” One part of that is that they’re talked about on all the whiskey podcasts and coveted by newbies. Another part of it is that shops like Justins’ House of Bourbon in Louisville and Lexington or online shops like The Whisky Exchange have done a great job curating collections of rare old bottles you can actually buy off the shelf right now.

But just because a cool old bottle is on The Whisky Exchange’s webstore or on the shelf at Justins’ doesn’t mean it’s a must-buy for an investor.

“Dusties are complicated,” Gana says. “Or at least they can be. Some dusties don’t necessarily appreciate too quickly in value.”

Gana offers an example, “Finding an old Glenmorangie oftentimes is more fun than valuable because the liquid is fantastic … but it’s not really one of those bottles that appreciates too quickly on the aftermarket.”

And there’s the rub. Fancy old bottles feel like a no-brainer but you have to be careful. One tactic I take, which I learned from Gana early, was to look for the bottles that are still open at high-end whiskey bars. If some bar in New York, Seattle, Louisville, or Glasgow are opening and pouring vintage whisk(e)y, that means there’s an ever diminishing stock of that vintage/bottle in the world. For instance, there are only so many Pappy Van Winkle’s left in existence that were made from barrels before the move to Buffalo Trace. They moved in 2002 and release 10, 12, 13, 15, 20, and 23-year-old expressions (and a 25 back in the day, but good luck there). Do that math. Finding a Pappy, in general, is one of those always sunny investments, but finding a pre-Buffalo Trace dusty is a play to make.

Naturally, there’s more to these dusties than just old Pappy. Gana has some tips, “There are some universal brands that are always hot like Macallan, Yamazaki, Hibiki, Pappy, Willett, Michter’s, Springbank, and Balvenie.”

You’re Going To Need To Stand In A Line (Maybe Overnight)

Standing in line overnight at a state-run liquor store is a right of passage for a lot of collectors and investors. State-run shops in places like Ohio and Virginia will put their allocations on the shelf at MSRP — or extremely near to — on a first-come, first-serve basis. Hell, I’ve heard of people who have distillery delivery truck times and routes in a spreadsheet from each of the main Kentucky distilleries mapped out so they know exactly when those bottles are hitting shelves.

That’s because lining up for a rare release is where you can make serious money down the road. But Gana warns that while it absolutely can be profitable, “it all depends on the release.” A good litmus is to look at how many bottles are being released, how often the release happens, and whether people are actually excited about it or not.

Another tactic Gana suggests are distillery-only releases. “A better bet nowadays is lining up for distillery exclusives at the distillery itself.”

He continues with a big tip, “Take the Bardstown Collection, for example, five unique releases within two days, at specific release times, to complete an incredibly rare set.”

Granted, to actually get that release you’d have to be in or near Bardstown with a lot of time to kill, but we may never see the Bardstown Collection again, or at least not that version. I know people who book rooms across the street from a distillery experience on Whiskey Row in Louisville to watch the bottle shop from their room’s window for when a line forms. That way they know when to run down and grab whatever special release is dropping. Why? Becasue it’ll be there at MSRP and not marked up.

Lastly, new Pappy releases (the line is released every year around October/November) usually don’t even make it to liquor store shelves. They’re released via a lottery to, well, avoid the chaos of people lining up for them. As for the lottery systems, Gana says this, “It’s always worth putting your name in the hat!”

Build Relationships At Local Liquor Stores

So how do you even know when to go line up at your local liquor store for that special release? You’ll need to talk to the people who run those stores, sign up for loyalty programs so that you receive store news, and, most importantly, focus on locally owned and run stores.

Gana is emphatic about this last point. “If it is a mom and pop shop, it’s very important to build a close relationship. Extremely important. I can’t stress this enough. The flip side is there is little to no loyalty at your local big-box store.”

As with so much in life, it’s about the relationships you make. That’s especially true when it comes to finding rare bottles at fair prices.

Build A Community For Buying, Trading, and Selling Bottles

So you found a few bottles. Now what? This was something that always vexed me too. I would see some release and know that it was meant for investment but I had no contacts in that world. And there’s no stock exchange. There aren’t shops downtown I could just pop into like gold or silver exchanges. That means it is on you to research, reach out, and do a little digging.

Though it has become far easier than even five years ago, much less 10. “This part is becoming easier,” Gana says. “But it still is not common knowledge. Your best bet is to send bottles to the UK auction houses, or to Sotheby’s in NYC.”

Gana warns though that different brokerage houses will “charge different commissions on both ends for the buyer and seller.”

Beyond that, this really is about who you know, where you are, and what the market is looking for in relation to what you have. That said, I’ve bought and sold bottles to/from bars before, to private collectors, and just between friends. But that was after years in the industry and building those relationships.

Barrel Pick Vs. Buying A New Barrel

Beyond dusties and rare or limited releases, there are also barrels. This generally falls into two categories. A barrel pick means you’ll get 150 to 250 bottles from a barrel you pick that you then make some cash off via a charity or your business or selling via a whiskey club back home.

Then there’s buying a new-fill barrel that’ll be on the market in four, six, 10, 20, or 50 years from now. With both processes, each distillery will have its own team and rules for how they do both of these things.

These are two very different prospects though. For one, everyone is doing barrel picks these days. Bars, restaurants, every random whiskey club around the world, all the podcasters, influencers, stay-at-home dad clubs, music stars … everyone. Distilleries will roll out four to 10 barrels, you can go in with the team, do a pick, have lunch with the distiller after a tour, sign your barrel, and wait for delivery of your bottles. The thing is, those barrels will be barrels the distillery want to sell. And that’s fine because there’ll be at least one that you’ll fall in love with.

Still, Gana notes that there’s a “massive difference” between the two offerings. He breaks it down like this, “I don’t find a lot of value in buying barrels for today [barrel picks] unless you want to make $1,500-$2,000 after everything is sold. I’m not knocking that, but you would need to do several of those per year to make it worth the time. Aging [investing in new fill barrels] is always on your side, as we know that patience pays big time in this game!”

Investing in a new fill barrel is all about playing the long game. It’s also a little more of a gamble, we’re not going to deny that. The angel’s share is real, with anywhere from two to five or even six percent disappearing out of that barrel every year (depending on where it’s resting). Then you have to be savvy enough to know when it’s time to bottle it or risk having to blend it out with other barrels that you may not have. The good part is that you can spend the years while the whiskey is aging gaining all that knowledge to make sure you sell/bottle at the right time.

But the long game is about more than letting your new barrel of whiskey come to age, which leads us to…

Where Do You Even Find These Barrels?

This is another facet of whiskey investing that left me scratching my head at first. Surely you can’t just walk into Buffalo Trace and buy a barrel of Weller, right? Yes, you can. Moreover, how do you know what’s going to actually be a good financial investment in two or 20 years from now?

I’m going to let Gana answer this one!

“Most of the barrels that would make the most are ones that the general public cannot pick anymore. Brands like Michter’s, Macallan, or Springbank would generally never — or very rarely — let you buy a barrel, aged or new.” Gana continues, “Buffalo Trace has a lot of quick flip upside to barreling and selling for a bar program, restaurant, or even club. Four roses recently limited its buying program to a select few, which I think was a great move for the brand to make it even more coveted than it already is.”

The best way to find barrel picks or which distillers are letting you invest in bottles is, again, research. Sometimes that research is as easy as Googling “Jack Daniel’s Barrel Pick.” Sometimes it’s about creating a relationship with the brand team by following their brand ambassadors on IG (or just whiskey influencers), going to the distillery often, and following the news about them.

It’s not all cloak and daggers though. Gana has some more tips. “Brands that are long-term winners are good American single malt whiskies like Virginia Distillery, Westward, or Balcones. Bardstown Bourbon Company is another good place to start.” Gana then turns to Scotland. “Rare aged statement brands from Diageo scotch under their Casks of Distinction program are a good bet, and most certainly Gordon and Macphail!”

Beware Of Fakes

How do you spot a fake? Even Gana says that this is a hard question. Fakes are everywhere these days. Brands like Buffalo Trace, which makes Pappy, have been fighting it with tech. But even then, there’s still an inherent risk with tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars on the line.

Gana’s advice is straightforward, “Usually, my private purchases are from people I trust the most who also have good reputations in the industry.” He continues, “I rarely buy from someone I don’t know. I have seen a ton of people get screwed before.”

I’ve been lucky enough to have heard this advice early and heed it with every transaction I make. Still, even the best of us get hoodwinked from time to time. So this once again goes back to building that community of people you know and more importantly truly trust. Damn, this is starting to sound like you need to build a whiskey mafia to invest in this stuff!

What’s Hot Now?

So where do you start? That’s always the biggest question, isn’t it? Well, you already have started if you’re reading this. The next step is to follow Gana on IG and start following other whiskey folks and brands too. But then you actually have to start investing at some point.

Is it worth paying $6,000 for a bottle of Pappy 23 on the aftermarket right now and waiting for it to hit 10k in a few years? Maybe. But what you really want to do is get a bottle of Pappy via a local state-run liquor store lottery at $299.99. That way you’ve made $5,700 when you walk out that door, which means a lot more in your account when it does hit $10,000 in a few years. That applies to any bottle in that range from Kentucky, Scotland, Japan, or wherever.

Still, there are sectors that Gana is excited about more than others. “Bourbon bottles are by far the most intriguing to me right now,” Gana says.

A big part of that is that bourbon has a long, long way to go to catch up with Scotch and Japanese whisky when it comes to investment ceilings. “Following that,” Gana continues, “it is American single malt barrels and private barrels of Scotch whisky from independent bottlers.”

While we’re not going to hold your hand, you just got a lot of great keywords to get yourself into this right now in that last sentence alone, much less all the ones above it. You have Google in your hand right now. Get started. And good luck!

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Pusha T reached a milestone this past week, with It’s Almost Dry going No. 1 on the Billboard 200 chart. In a recent interview with GQ, readers learned that the G.O.O.D Music President was looking to lyrically spar with a fellow chart-topper by the name of Kendrick Lamar on the album.

Having previously worked together on 2013’s fan-favorite “Nosetalgia,” this would surely be a welcome reunion for supporters of both. Unfortunately, the impact of “Nosetalgia” lead to this potential collaboration’s undoing as Push said he “couldn’t find a song that differed enough.” Clearly, Pusha T isn’t too torn up about it, riding a huge wave of momentum and soaking in all the positivity from those who have heard his album. He put out a post on Instagram this past week thanking all who were involved.

Luckily, Kendrick Lamar fans won’t have to wait much longer for new K Dot music either as he is set to release Mr. Morale And The Big Steppers, his final TDE album, on May 13. There is currently no single, tracklist, or inkling of who will appear on the album. The rumors of it being a rock-influenced album haven’t been revisited either, so this is truly a game of wait and see.

Jersey Shore star Pauly D recently appeared on Jesse Watters Primetime where the DJ and tanning enthusiast was asked about his thoughts on inflation because nothing is real anymore. While the interview took place almost a week ago, it only just now started making the rounds on Twitter after a screencap of Pauly D’s appearance went viral thanks to hilariously surreal chyron that reads “DJ Pauly D On Inflation.”

For the record, the interview is real, which we confirmed by tracking down the video of DJ Pauly D talking inflation with Watters on Fox News’ website. According to the video description, the reality star shared his thoughts on “parents financially supporting their adult children, inflation and the latest tanning trends” during the five minute long segment. (For those curious, DJ Pauly D is deeply concerned about how much his “pool guy” is charging these days. Of course.)

Obviously, probing the mind of Jersey Shore cast members for their insights on the economy doesn’t happen every day as you can see by the reactions on social media below. As one Twitter user wondered, is CNN going to ask Snooki about peace in the Middle East next?

In a more on-brand moment, Watters made sure to ask Pauly D on testicle tanning, which was brought to light thanks to fellow Fox News personality Tucker Carlson. Pauly D surprisingly didn’t knock the new trend because he read it raises your testosterone “something like 200%.” That said, it’s not for him.

“I put a sock down there when I tan,” the DJ admitted.

(Via Justin Whang on Twitter)

Saturday night’s main event at UFC 274 got thrown a major curveball during weigh-ins on Friday afternoon. Charles Oliveira, the promotion’s lightweight champion, failed to make weight in the lead-up to his highly-anticipated bout against Justin Gaethje, and as a result, he was stripped of the title that he’s held for nearly a year.

Oliveira’s first attempt to make weight saw him come in at 155.5 pounds, a half-pound above the maximum weight for a featherweight. After being an hour to try and drop that little bit of weight, Do Bronx attempted to weight in again but saw the scale read 155.5 pounds once again.

As Aaron Bronsteter explained in his tweet, this means that Oliveira has been stripped of his title, giving him the unfortunate distinction of being the first champion in UFC history to lose their title because of an inability to make weight. The fight will go on as planned, but Oliveira is not able to win back his belt. Gaethje, however, is still able to win the title in the event that he’s able to win the fight — Gaethje has ever been UFC’s undisputed lightweight champion, but did hold the interim championship in 2020 before losing to Khabib Nurmagomedov in the final fight of his career.

Oliveira is the favorite to win Saturday night’s fight, coming in at -165. Gaethje hold +140 odds to pull the upset.

Festival season is in full swing, with events happening everywhere from Mexico to Miami to the Caribbean. This past weekend, on April 28 through May 2, festival-goers flocked to Lake Perris, California for the Desert Hearts Festival.

Tucked in the Southern California desert beneath a picturesque mountain landscape, less than two hours from both Los Angeles and San Diego, Lake Perris provides an open canvas for nonstop dancing and galavanting. The venue also includes useful amenities like premium campsites, bathrooms with showers, and daytime access to the nearby beach and lake.

Celebrating its 10-year anniversary, Desert Hearts inspired vibrant ensembles, a circus-like ambiance, and downright good vibes. “PLUR” was the central theme of the weekend. The event featured renowned electronic music acts including Carl Craig, Omar S, DJ Harvey, Danny Daze, Robag Wruhme, Kenny Larkin, Township Rebellion, Juan MacLean, Doc Martin, Anja Schneider, Francesa Lombardo, Yulia Niko, Latmun, and many more.

These epic performances combined with rambunctious attendees dressed in their wackiest festive attire made for a weekend to remember. If you’re in need of a serotonin boost and some stylish weirdness, the 55 Desert Hearts Festival photos below are sure to do the trick.

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It’s week 10 and we’re down to just six chefs on Top Chef Houston. Which is a shame — I feel like things are just (finally?) heating up. I’m hoping that by the time the finale rolls around, that Jurassic Park episode will seem like a distant memory. Maybe that was by design, and that’s why they stuck it in the middle like that. Maybe these producers are smarter than I’ve been giving them credit for.

Hey, I get it, sometimes you have to do things you don’t want to for the money. Just ask my editor’s mom.

Aaaanyway, this week’s episode took the contestants first to Houston’s historic Farmer’s Market for a fajita challenge, to be judged by Claudette Zepeda-Wilkins and her fancy eyeglass frames. She explained that the word “fajita” comes from the word for skirt, or girdle (just like my editor’s mom wears to hold her gut in), which originally referred to the skirt steaks that people grilled in the market stalls.

Each contestant would scour the market and create their own little girdles for Padma and Claudette to eat, with the winner receiving $10,000 courtesy of Chipotle. Mmm, that’s a lotta girdles. In exchange for the sponsorship, Chipotle received one or two fairly low-key mentions and a plug for their humanely sourced meats or whatever. Which was… nice, actually. The product was relevant to the challenge and no one had to dress up in a guacamole costume or whatever.

See? Product placement can work.

At the mention of the 10 grand, the chefs all wondered aloud if “The Mississippi Baker,” Chef Nick, would win yet another cash prize. He’s called “The Mississippi Baker,” we learned, because he always “gets his bread,” having won the two previous cash Quickfires, in episodes five and six. Hey, fuckers, knock it off, I’m the one giving the nicknames around here.

After that, it was time for a SPACE CHALLENGE. That’s right, Houston, you might remember, is the city astronauts are talking to when they say things like, “Houston, we have a problem.”

Kudos to the Top Chef producers, judges, and contestants, by the way, for making it all the way through a space-based Top Chef episode set in Houston without ever going for a “Houston, we have a problem” pun. Amazing job. Clearly, I lack that kind of restraint. The challenge was introduced by guest judge Marcus Samuelsson, who arrived dressed like this:

Let’s see… brimmed hat, stars on the jacket, some sort of bovine camouflage pattern on the pants… Oh, “Space Cowboy!” I get it.

Samuelsson was there to introduce the space-food challenge, after which the contestants all headed off to NASA to meet some astronauts and chit-chat about zero Gs and Tang and whatnot. Melissa King was there, to challenge Marcus Samuelsson to a “who looks better in a patterned blazer and Aloha shirt” contest.

I have to give Melissa King the edge here, not that I wouldn’t absolutely brain a guy at Dan Flashes for Samuelsson’s fish shirt, because I would. Is there a lady version of “Big Dick Energy?” Melissa King has it.

Anyway, the judges tasked the contestants with preparing some food fit for space, to be judged by two astronauts, whose names I don’t feel like looking up but suffice to say neither of whom were the famous astronaut diaper lady. The winning dish would “become the basis for a dish that would be served on the space station,” and the only stipulations were that the dishes should be free of crumbs and liquid. Turns out, the delicate space equipment hates crumbs and liquid.

Honestly, “no crumbs or liquid” seemed a little wishy-washy, as guidelines go. How crumb and liquid free are we talking here? Nothing but nougat?

In practice, “liquid” ended up being something of a relative term, with most of the chefs adding a roux or parsnips or okra or whatever to make their stews and braises extra thicc. And thus, presumably, not legally considered a “liquid.” I wonder if that would fly at the airport. I love to imagine myself pleading with the TSA agent, “What’s the problem officer? As you can see, I clearly thickened this Gatorade with a nice oxtail roux.” If they really wanted to control for liquidity, they should’ve had the diaper lady judge. Each chefs gets extra points for however long she’s able to drive afterward without peeing. Call me, producers, I have many ideas.

For the most part, the results shook out exactly how you might expect, had you been reading these columns. That is, with one notable exception.

RESULTS

Quickfire Top: Nick, Buddha, Evelyn.
Quickfire Bottom: Damarr, Ashleigh, Jae.

Elimination Challenge Top: Nick, Buddha*, Evelyn.
Elimination Challenge Bottom: Damarr, Ashleigh, Jae**.

*Winner.
**Eliminated.

6. (-1) ((Eliminated)) Jae Jung

AKA: Noodles. Jae West. Hilaria. Dr. Hibbert.

Elimination Challenge Dish: Bulgogi with gochujang barley.

Critiques: “I wasn’t sure what the texture was supposed to be.” “The barley was undercooked.” “Beef was very mushy.” “The carrots were the best part.”

Ah, Jae. What will we do without her? (And that is a sadly definitive “without her” this time, my screener came late this week so I actually got to watch Last Chance Kitchen before submitting this piece this week, and SPOILER ALERT, Jae didn’t win).

Jae was… kinda weird. Weird-cool? Sure. We shall miss her constant laughter and huskily voiced paeans to cheese. She was always weirdly horny for cheese.

It seemed like Jae was back on the right track after last week’s win, but as always, she seemed much more thrown by the challenge guidelines than anyone else. She made bulgogi as her take on comfort food, but thickened it with parsnips to keep it from being too liquidy, and paired it with barley for some reason, and she ended up with mushy meat over undercooked barley, the same texture as my editor’s mother’s… fine, fine, too much of this joke, I get it.

5. (+1) Ashleigh Shanti

AKA: Moonjuice. Sugar Hillcountry.

Elimination Challenge: Marinated tuna and shrimp with sweet potato slaw

Critiques: “I think there was too much of a focus on presentation, and it lacked a bit on flavor.” “It was a big piece of tuna and it was very bland.”

It was the same three chefs on top and on bottom for both challenges this week, which makes these rankings even easier than usual. If Jae’s kryptonite is not quite understanding challenge rules, Ashleigh’s is overthinking them.

Ashleigh this week took the space food challenge maybe a little too literally, serving the chefs poached tuna in a can with a bag of herbs served with a scissor. It felt like rather than cooking a dish that reminded astronauts of Earth, she was trying to make the Earth judges feel like they were in space. Look, Ashleigh, if I want to feel like I’m in space I’ll pee my pants.

The bigger problem (a weirdly pervasive one for Ashleigh) was cutting her meat too thick, as well as poaching it (not long enough) in a liquid that was insufficiently fatty (coconut water). Uncharacteristically for Ashleigh, this dish kinda looked and sounded bad to boot. Luckily for her Jae decided to make baby food beef with a side of barley starch so Ashleigh gets to stick around for another week.

4. (-1) Evelyn Garcia

AKA: Cuddles.

Elimination Challenge Dish: Guiso Rojo

Critiques: “Had so much depth of flavor.” “Really well-rounded.”

Perhaps not surprisingly, the Hispanic native Houstonian did well in the fajita challenge. But then she kept it going in the elimination challenge. Like I said last week, Evelyn and Nick are so neck and neck that it’s hard to rank them. But Nick won the quickfire this week, so I guess I have to give him the slight edge. If this elimination challenge had been a menu, I would’ve been torn between Evelyn’s guiso rojo and Nick’s gumbo.

Whereas Nick’s point of view seemed pretty much fully-formed from the beginning, it feels like Evelyn is only just now learning to lean into Mexican food with Southeast Asian influences (she marinated her fajita meat in fish sauce, something something my editor’s mom). It seems to be working for her. I don’t know if that gives her the advantage because she’s peaking at the right time or puts her behind Nick by having to make up for lost time. My expert opinion is that her food looks very good and I would eat it.

3. (+1) Nick Wallace

AKA: Domingo. Chocolate Mormon. The Count. The Mississippi Baker (I can’t deny a good nickname, even if I didn’t coin it).

Elimination Challenge Dish: Mississippi Gumbo

Critiques: “Really delicious.” “Mississippi God damn!”

The Chocolate Mormon was the only chef who made fresh tortillas for the fajita challenge, a move that won him both $10,000 and my heart. For the elimination challenge, he made a “Mississippi Gumbo,” with black-eyed peas, chicken, okra, butter beans, and rice, something he said he lifted from his own menu at the Civil Rights Museum. Seems a little weird that we’re only just finding out that Nick is the chef at the Civil Rights Museum, kinda like having to find out that Sarah grew up in Jamaica from Last Chance Kitchen.

Spoiler alert, Sarah won Last Chance Kitchen, so she’ll be returning to the competition. Hopefully, she has learned to stop talking with her eyes closed.

I digress. Whatever happens, Nick has already earned himself thirty grand and created buzz for Nick’s 26, so it feels like he’s already a winner. Nick doesn’t need a win, he needs an agent.

2. (-1) Damarr Brown

AKA: Catchphrase. James Beard. Screech.

Elimination Challenge Dish: Rice with chicken gravy and hot pickled peppers.

Critiques: “The rice is very overcooked.” “Wasn’t a lot of flavor.” “I guess I was looking for something a little more.” “Underwhelming.”

Obviously the big story this week was Damarr falling off after he’s been running neck and neck with Buddha the same way Evelyn and Nick are. The judges always claim to be judging based solely on the challenge at hand, but it felt like Damarr would’ve been the one to go home, for his overcooked rice with bland gravy, if he hadn’t built up so much goodwill up until this point. Which is good, Damarr going home would’ve sucked.

Maybe I’m just overvaluing Damarr because he seems like one of the most genuine human beings ever to appear on a reality show, but I’m going to give him the benefit of the doubt here and predict that he’s still a favorite.

1. (+1) Buddha Lo

AKA: Buddha. Mr. International. Big Pun. Asian Ben Mendelsohn. The Salad Nazi. Arnold Schwarzenegger. The Terminator.

Elimination Challenge Dish: “Pavlova 14.”

Critiques: “It was interactive and fun and playful.” “He told a great story. And it was fun.”

Last week I made the point that Buddha seems to be at his best when he does the opposite of comfort food. You probably couldn’t invent a challenge more tailor-made for Buddha’s particular set of skills than “cook food fit for space” and not surprisingly he rose to the occasion. With a dessert made of pavlova and white chocolate meant to evoke Alan Shepard’s golf ball on the moon during Apollo 14, which Buddha named “Pavlova 14.”

Remember when I nicknamed Buddha “Big Pun” in Week One? Remember?? VALIDATE MEEEE.

Buddha even dropped a “that’s a lotta masa” after the $10,000 prize was announced in the quickfire, and it’s exactly that kind of cleverness that tends to leaven Buddha’s otherwise Michael Jordan-esque level of single-minded, borderline psychotic competitiveness. Watching him put avocados in a food processor during the quickfire challenge hurt my soul a little bit, but for the most part, I can’t help but love a cuddly Australian with a lisp named “Buddha” who is actually a food assassin.

For as comparatively lacking in compelling personalities as this season has occasionally been, the finale shaping up as a battle between soulful comfort food savant Damarr and brilliant flawless space food scientist Buddha is pretty hard to beat, as narratives go. It’s like a classic striker vs. grappler matchup in MMA.

Will Buddha choke out Damarr with a rear-naked foam?? Or will Damarr knock Buddha into next week with a thundering right ham hock?? Time will tell. All I know is that I’m going to be watching the shit out of it, possibly with JUST BRAISE painted on my chest while I flex so hard I fart a little.

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Read the rest of our Top Chef Power Rankings here. Vince Mancini is on Twitter.