I have to be completely honest about The Great British Baking Show‘s latest installment, “’70s Week.” On more than one occasion, I wondered if in keeping with the Netflix show’s chosen theme, copious amounts of cocaine had been circulated around the tent. Okay, specifically, I might have wondered what dear Alison Hammond was on. From the cold open, Alison’s energy was especially piqued. She spent whole challenges eagerly trying to convince bakers to dance with her and fell over not once, but twice. First on a hoppy horse and then when she tried to pull off a dance move atop one of the empty workbenches.
Between Alison’s antics, a catastrophic cake collapse, and Prue Leith‘s out-of-character dismissal of booze in a bake, I truly felt like something was off. There was big cocaine energy in The Great British Baking Show “’70s Week” on Netflix.
**Spoilers for The Great British Baking Show “’70s Week,” now streaming on Netflix**
The Great British Baking Show has had something of a manic season this year. Since the twelfth Netflix season’s debut in September, bakers have flat out quick, fainted to the floor, and even suffered the loss of their caramel thanks to Noel Fielding’s comic bits. Last week, Prue Leith amplified the pandemonium by purposely asking the bakers to make Spotted Dick and Alison Hammond got into it about her age with Gen Z baker Dylan Bachelet. This has been the most silly and unserious season of The Great British Baking Show ever, and for the most part, I’ve been into it. Life is enough of a downer. Why not take a baking show less seriously?
But there was something a little, I don’t know, off-kilter about The Great British Baking Show “’70s Week.” It started the moment Alison hopped onto the screen during the cold open and promptly fell on her butt. There was an edge of hysteria to her hysterics, like she couldn’t hold it together for five minutes. Soon, it would lead her to her most iconically ridiculous moment on The Great British Baking Show yet!
About halfway into The Great British Baking Show “’70s Week,” Alison shimmied into the tent and announced, “I’m just gonna add a little bit of happiness in here.” She then proceeded to hop on one of the few empty work benches left in the tent. Alison tried to swing her legs around in the air like an expert dancer, but only succeeded in hurling herself to the ground.
It was outrageous, it was incredible, and it made Noel Fielding look like the responsible host in the tent. Fielding even went so far to advise Alison to not do it again!
Okay, maybe it was mostly just Alison who seemed a bit more rabidly excitable than usual, but a number of other odd things happened this week. Prue Leith found herself admonishing bakers for using — get this — too much liquor in their bakes. She specifically called out poor Christiaan for adding too much Advocaat, a Dutch booze, into his Showstopper gateau. Prue Leith, body swapped??
Of course, the most chaotic event that was not Alison Hammond-related this week had to have been when a cake totally toppled over. We didn’t get to see the exact moment Illiyin Morrison’s showstopper crumbled, as it was cooling in the fridge when disaster struck, but the wreckage was awful to behold. Illiyin needed Noel’s help to spruce up her cake for judging and eventually was sent home.
As much as I’ve been enjoying the mayhem this season, I’ve been enjoying it in moderation. Some of Alison’s overeager pleas to break out ’70s moves felt like a producer chirping in her ear to keep the silliness going strong. Well, that, or there really was some sort of illicit substance being passed around the tent in honor of the ’70s.
The Great British Baking Show remains sweet, escapist fare, but it also is walking a tightrope this season when it comes to the chaos we’ve seen in the tent. Some of these moments have felt organic, while others are starting to feel forced.
