It was originally supposed to be an MKR version so not so surprising. This spin-off seems to be half MKR and half Masterchef.
Urgh itās really not goodā¦ Iāve given it a good 45 minutes before commentingā¦ it has such a āseven slickā to the production which just really isnāt my vibeā¦ it feels like every āseven studiosā reality theyāve ever done.
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I agree that the MKR feel is irritating me.
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They could at least change the fonts and graphics to make it seem less like MKR.
Is it like the MKR this year or last?
Nowhere near as bitchy as recent years. A few critical comments but not outright nasty. So maybe MKR from 5 years ago. 
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Its crap.
There was potential here to distance itself from MKR.
Hereās my critique:
1). Why is it two v two only? Isnāt this what they did with rivals?
2). Poor camera angles, due to the terrible design of the āworld class kitchenā. The shots did not look good and they were unable to get good shots of the food and process. People in the way of shots.
3). The ākitchenā is crap.
4). Why are they cooking so many dishes for so many people? The other teams do not score and ultimately only the judges need to be fed. 23 dishes is unnecessary.
5). I donāt like the MKR dining timeā¦ This isnāt MKR. Given they are not scoring itās clear it is there to have some drama between contestants.
6). Token bad guys in the French team.
7). Overall production is just not feeling right and looks and feels cheap.
8). When MasterChef starts every year, the first episode grabs me - hits me in the feels and just feels so grand. This felt empty.
9). Its too slow. Lose the main + dessert concept.
Overall Iām still unclear on how the format works in terms of eliminations and how long the show goes for.
How I would have done POO:
Sunday and Monday: All teams cook there respective country, judges then decide on two weakest teams who then go into an elimination. These could be themed by particular ingredients, cuisine type (sweet, savoury) etc.
Tuesday: Four bottom teams cook, one team is eliminated. Repeat.
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Widen everything and give people more room! Let the cameras get angles that look good and design a proper kitchen.
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No bad guys just let food and culture speak for itself - judges to be more active and moving around.
PS:. Where is the social distancing?
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Iām only just starting but interesting that they are talking so much about Masterchef, and that Manu was almost the 3rd judge. But they didnāt love his French accent.
Wait, are you saying theyāre explicitly plugging MKR on POO? I thought Seven would like to distance themselves from that flop this year.
MKR isnāt referenced, but itās exactly the same thing as MKR in that they all sit down and eat eachothers dishes together. Only this time, they donāt judge or score the dishes. So itās absolutely pointless.
Still sounds like a pointless addition. If only Seven produced this show as a world class cooking competition style rather than a tamer MKR spinoff.
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I remind you that Gary M says that its the best food heās ever tasted āin my lifeā. Makes you doubt every bit of praise he ever gave on MasterChef.
Thatās where the Masterchef component comes in. The point of the other contestants is to make some critical comments that the judges are too nice to do.
LOL they almost seemed like caricatures 
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Just watching this now and agree with the other members that this has MKR written all over it, except with Gary and Matt lol.
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Youāre misquoting Gary. In the clip he says itās āthe best Iāve tasted in my lifeā. Heās referring to an individual version of a dishā¦ he doesnāt say āthe best foodā.
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Iām not watching this, but checking out Twitter, is it true Mike Goldman is doing voiceovers?
Not credited.
Tonightās premiere wasnāt too bad, it has a lot of MKR vibe plus a bit of banter between the judges.
You can see the opening was heavily edited. We only got a brief glimpse of the 10 teams entering the estate and missed out on Manu lighting the flame and saying ālet the flames beginā.
The first segment went for 32 minutes before the ad break.
I think the eight teams which were not cooking each shared a dish, so thereās eight dishes. Add to the dishes for the judges, so each team only had to cook 11 dishes. But itās still a lot.
Obviously intended to exploit Sevenās Olympic glow, which sadly never happened.
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