“Nailed It!” Nails Its First Season

To the surprise of some people, cooking shows have become a major form of entertainment on a number of networks, pitting skilled chefs against each other for some semblance of a prize.

Netflix’s Nailed It! follows a completely different formula. Instead, Nailed It! is a competition where contestants have no idea how to actually cook. Once I heard about it from my sister, this idea immediately caught my attention, and I got to thinking about just how much of a hilarious train wreck such a situation could be.

In typical Netflix fashion, the show was posted as one on-demand season with six episodes. Each episode features three contestants who vie for various prizes and “soon-to-be-collectible trophy.”

Judges Nicole Byer and Jacques Torres. He is a famous chocolatier, while she is at best, an unqualified judge, but completely hilarious.  Both are accompanied by surprise guests throughout the season. [Sorry, no spoilers here.]

The contestants range from having a little skill to being absolutely horrible in the kitchen. You never know what to expect. Honestly, the episodes with the worst contestants are absolutely the best, with some contestants not even following the recipe at all. 

There are two rounds in each episode, with the winner of the first round getting a cooking-themed prize as well as a golden chef’s hat, and the winner of the second round getting $10,000.

I’ve always found cooking shows appealing to watch, and watching people fail in this show is really the best part since Nailed It! is literally a show of failures.

For me, Nailed It! gets an easy 9 Frosted Tips* out of 10.

*Every episode features “Frosted Tips,” snarky remarks aimed at the contestants.