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Project Runway<\/a><\/p>\n In It to Win It<\/p>\n \n Season 22<\/p>\n Episode 3\n <\/p>\n \n Editor\u2019s Rating<\/p>\n 3 stars<\/p>\n ***\n <\/p>\n \n An NFL-inspired challenge for Project Runway tears apart this season\u2019s first clique. The thing about being in a cool-kid clique and acting like you\u2019re better than others is that eventually that self-elevation will come back to bite you in the ass. I\u2019ve seen John Hughes movies; I know the deal. Hence, the dissolution of Andriy and Bobby, the Ukrainian and Russian duo who already glommed on to each other in the first two episodes of this season of Project Runway and in this episode collapse fully and phenomenally. Andriy is a bad leader. Bobby is an inarticulate communicator. Both of them were wrong, but if I had to pick sides \u2014 and of course I\u2019m going to pick sides, this is a reality show \u2014 I am going to sympathize more with Bobby. She wanted to be team leader the most, and that probably put a chip on her shoulder. But Andriy\u2019s idea for their NFL-inspired collection (more on that awful sequence of words later) was underwhelming; he offered no advice (that we saw) in the workroom about how Bobby could edit or improve her look, and I personally think it\u2019s crappy to watch someone you claimed to be your friend sob next to you and do nothing at all. Bad form!<\/a><\/p>\n Let\u2019s go back to the words NFL-inspired collection. I understand from the recap comments that the strategic-voting element of last week\u2019s episode<\/a> was not wholly embraced, but to me, this is more a reflection of the current, somewhat compromised era of Project Runway than any tweaked gameplay. An NFL collection? The NFL and its many<\/a>, many<\/a> frustrating<\/a> qualities are already an inescapable monocultural element of our lives, and now I have to think about all that while watching my little fashion show? This is, of course, a challenge because Disney owns ABC, which is going to air the Super Bowl next year. Synergy, baby! But even aside from the flatness of the \u201cpush the boundaries of what NFL fandom looks like\u201d challenge, this felt to me like the perfect opportunity for a menswear challenge. NFL players have become more and more fashionable over the years; what about designing an outfit for a player to wear when arriving at a game? Or an outfit for an NFL player to wear to a post\u2013Super Bowl celebration? Past seasons of Project Runway have done similar challenges tied to the Olympics. I just don\u2019t think this was very creative.<\/p>\n Anyway, the challenge gets explained to the contestants after the reveal of the who-gets-to-stay vote, and it\u2019s Bi! Bao and Dani also get some votes, but Yangyang and Octavius get none, which is sad. Of course, Bryan immediately takes credit for Bi sticking around \u2014 though I think in reality, the contestants who were voting based on the work itself were probably impressed by Bi\u2019s technical skill \u2014 and I am sure this will be another irritating thing Bryan will harp on for episodes to come. Christian and Heidi then lay out this week\u2019s challenge: The 12 contestants will form four fashion houses to create looks inspired by NFL teams. Each three-person team will have a captain, and Bobby, a die-hard Eagles fan, volunteers first; sadly, when five people volunteer and Heidi and Christian pull names out of a bag, she\u2019s the only one left behind. Joseph McRae, Andriy, Jeffrey, and Bryan all end up as team leaders, and they choose their teams: Joseph picks Naheim and Aaron; Andriy picks Bobby and Jude; Jeffrey picks Chloe and Anna; and Bryan picks Bi and Elizabeth. They then pick football teams based on their logos: Joseph\u2019s team picks the Carolina Panthers<\/a>, Andriy picks the Philadelphia Eagles<\/a>, Jeffrey picks the New York Giants<\/a>, and Bryan picks the Atlanta Falcons<\/a>. The team\u2019s colors, location, and logo can all serve as inspiration for the designers, and the three outfits need to complement one another while also being \u201cwearable art.\u201d<\/p>\n Oh, and it\u2019s a double-elimination challenge that will get the 12 contestants down to ten. The head of the winning house, meanwhile, will get immunity for next week.<\/p>\n The teams get some time to plan, and they\u2019re inspired by their NFL colors (Joseph\u2019s team will structure its collection around various shades of blue) and discussing ways to add avant-garde flourishes to their outfits (Jeffrey\u2019s team wants to incorporate corsetry). Everyone seems to be getting along except for Andriy and Bobby, who are already butting heads with Jude caught in the middle. Andriy says he wants their clothes to appeal to \u201cfemale fans of football teams\u201d and \u201cstick to classic\u201d looks; Bobby is contemptuous and, I think correctly, says playing it safe doesn\u2019t meet the spirit of the challenge. When Christian tours the workroom after the teams have shopped at Mood, his reaction to Andriy\u2019s team seems to align with Bobby\u2019s. Andriy is making a cropped jacket with a brown glove, Jude is making an asymmetrical moto jacket, and Christian calls everything \u201cfamiliar.\u201d \u201cNFL, sports, shape, sculpture,\u201d he admonishes the team, and Jude says in a talking-head interview that he agrees with Christian \u2014 but we don\u2019t see him say anything to Andriy to take Bobby\u2019s side. Not great, Jude!<\/p>\n On Joseph\u2019s team, Aaron says the Gullah Geechee<\/a> people and their deftness with indigo dye are guiding the designers\u2019 shades of blue. On Jeffrey\u2019s team, Chloe is really struggling to merge her boho aesthetic with the challenge; she\u2019s trying to make a huge ball gown work, but I agree with Christian\u2019s doubtful \u201cI don\u2019t know what that is.\u201d Bryan\u2019s team, taking inspiration from the design of the Atlanta Falcons\u2019 wings and centering pleating into the designs, feels the most cohesive so far. I\u2019m a big fan of Elizabeth\u2019s weird woven-pleather dress. \u201cThis is the tightest team I think I\u2019ve ever seen,\u201d Christian says to Bryan, Bi, and Elizabeth, and that\u2019s big praise!<\/p>\n Meanwhile, the situation with Bobby and Andriy reaches rock bottom. Bobby thinks Andriy is insulting her personality, and she sews her outfit incorrectly because she\u2019s so keyed up. Andriy is withdrawing into a judgmental, aloof posture, and when he tries to offer some emotional support to Bobby by saying it will take her only an hour to fix her mistake, it feels dismissive. Andriy simply isn\u2019t a good leader \u2014 neither empathetic nor precise with his advice for Bobby \u2014 but then again, Bobby is also clearly in her feelings. It\u2019s all very melodramatic and obviously a setup for disaster. To be fair, over on Jeffrey\u2019s team, he\u2019s not doing a good job helping Chloe, either. She\u2019s crying too because she\u2019s struggling so much (I think what\u2019s being unsaid here is that Chloe doesn\u2019t know how to dress a non\u2013size 0 body), and Jeffrey gives her somewhat generic \u201cyou can do this\u201d advice rather than specific feedback on her design. It\u2019s clear these two teams will be in the bottom.<\/p>\n Runway time! Ciara, who has been married to former NFL quarterback Russell Wilson for a decade and before then soundtracked my college experience with her<\/a> bops<\/a>, is the guest judge filling in for Nina. Joseph\u2019s team\u2019s collection has a lot of interesting separates, including a cropped leather jacket from Naheim with exaggerated shoulders. From Jeffrey\u2019s team, Chloe\u2019s remade dress, with an off-the-shoulder top and an awful mesh corset patch tied with a blue ribbon, is universally hated by the judges. \u201cSomething must have gone wrong,\u201d Heidi says, and yes, that\u2019s correct. Bryan\u2019s look for his team, with a gigantic blood-red latex skirt, looks like something straight out of The Cell<\/a>, which I respect. And Andriy\u2019s team is just a mess. His white sculpted top is too small on the model. Jude\u2019s moto jacket and diagonal-hem skirt are very nice but look like something you\u2019d find at Ann Taylor. And Bobby\u2019s huge quilted crop top and wrap skirt show clear signs of being sewn and then taken apart and resewn. Law\u2019s \u201cThe fuck is happening?\u201d is genuinely confused, and I get it.<\/p>\n Jeffrey\u2019s and Bryan\u2019s teams are on top, and I\u2019m disappointed that we don\u2019t get any judges\u2019 feedback about their looks; we just learn that Joseph wins the challenge and gets immunity and tickets to the Super Bowl. He takes this with his customary humbleness; do we need to start considering the possibility of Joseph McRae winning this season? The losing teams do come back out for more conversation. Jeffrey\u2019s team isn\u2019t that bad: Ciara says she would wear his corseted red outfit, and Anna\u2019s sculptural all-white one is praised (I loved Law\u2019s exaggerated delivery of \u201crich\u201d to describe it). But there\u2019s no way to justify Chloe\u2019s work \u2014 it has the same mistake as Bobby\u2019s with weird patches in the back suggesting neither woman knew how to dress her curvy models. Did anyone else think Andriy and Bobby\u2019s explanation of what happened in the workroom felt patchy too? If I hadn\u2019t watched the rest of the episode, I wouldn\u2019t have understood how catastrophic their fallout was, and I\u2019m curious how much of their conversation with the judges might have been left on the cutting-room floor. When all the contestants are dismissed and the judges are chatting alone, it sure seems like Chloe and Bobby are going to get axed \u2014 until Law says of Andriy and Bobby, \u201cFor me, they could both go.\u201d Send both members of the cool-kid clique home at the same time? Chloe doesn\u2019t deserve to be safe, but that double elimination sure would shake things up.<\/p>\n \u2022 Kudos to Christian for keeping a straight face when he says the NFL has a \u201crich tradition of collaborating with fashion.\u201d Does it, though? Is that even possible when its official fashion partner is Abercrombie & Fitch?<\/p>\n \u2022 Heidi says the winning looks will \u201cpartake in Super Bowl Week.\u201d What do we think this means?<\/p>\n \u2022 I\u2019m ready to submit Bryan and Andriy as this season\u2019s villains but am willing to consider other suggestions.<\/p>\n \u2022 I thought the most amusing thing Christian would do in this episode was fail over and over to catch a football, but then he said to Chloe when she was so happy about putting boning in her dress, \u201cI\u2019m so proud of you. You learned how to make clothes,\u201d and you could never make me hate this man.<\/p>\n Sign Up for the Vulture Newsletter<\/p>\n Entertainment news, for the pop-culture obsessed.<\/p>\n Vox Media, LLC Terms and Privacy Notice<\/p>\n
\n Photo: Patrick Harbron\/Disney\n <\/p>\n