By now we have had a solid hour of getting to know this year's sacrificial twelve. I can say, with confidence, this is how this shit will go down:
Lee having dropped sweetly away like the body of a rocket falling gracefully back to earth to allow the elites in the shuttle to soar to new heights of human achievement, Val must be next. a) Her cakes are characterised by the sort of slightly shonky icing that goes unnoticed in grandma's house but when Paul Hollywood is staring down at it suddenly makes you feel a gnawing pity in the depths of your soul, and b) she defines herself by liking Ed Sheeran, and no-one who willingly submits that biog deserves an airing on national television.
Val: not long for this show but may live forever
I am spectacularly uninterested in the three remaining white men in the tent. They are a really bad representation of white men in general. Tom already believes he has his own cooking show and is providing faux-expert commentary whenever the camera comes near, which would be fine except that this is the sixth season of Bake-Off and we all know everything forever about baking now, and are watching like when you watch a football match roaring advice at world class athletes while your triple chin jiggles gently. Michael is doing a kind of sub-Blumenthal thing which resulted in him serving up green sponge that tasted like grass, baffling Mary Berry almost to the point where she looked personally hurt. Both of them should, and will, leave in the first half of the competition. Andrew is a more interesting one as he is, on the face of it, the candidate most likely to become Telly Boyfriend of 2016 (soft of face and voice, clad in sensible flannels, awakener of maternal lusts), but has been thwarted by a) displaying no real character thus far and b) the presence of Selasi.
Ah, Selasi. Selasi Selasi Selasi. Anything I could say about Selasi has already been perfectly summed up by his entry in this Vice article, which was written BEFORE THE COMPETITION EVEN STARTED:
"Selasi is the boyfriend of the girl you're lowkey in love with and he's better than you in every single way. "Hi," Selasi says, his handshake tight but smooth, strong but finessed. "Selasi." The girl you are lowkey in love with – your housemate, which makes this all the more uncomfortable – suggests you two will get on. "Selasi plays football too!" You invite Selasi to play with you all on Wednesday nights and he absolutely, yet modestly, outplays you. You're panting out of your arse and you're pretty convinced you're having a coronary. "Good game, mate!" he says, then jogs off the field. At the bar afterwards, Selasi gets a round in for 15 people without even blinking. "Please, lads," he says, "don't worry about it. I just got a bonus at work, they're on me." You were going to walk home because you don't have the bus fare but Selasi gets you both a cab. "I'm heading back to see Kate anyway." That night, you lay on your bed and listen as, there in the living room/kitchenette combo, he cooks a curry from scratch, bakes a cake, then plays her a subtle and beautiful saxophone solo. Later, you hear giggling and immaculate, fulfilling-sounding intercourse. You realise in the middle of the night that you are now low-key in love with Selasi as well. Your life really is a mess."
100% Vice. A fucking star. Every single thing Selasi did resulted in a chorus of shallow intakes of breath from me and my partner, a nominally heterosexual man.
Selasi: will make a fortune on an app where he just comes over and holds you in the middle of the night
The result of which is that I am now hardcore shipping Selasi/Candice, saving each other's cakes week by week. I can only assume the end result of this will be something like the end of the first Hunger Games, where they make it all the way to the final and rather than allow a corrupt Mary and Paul to keep the populace divided by claiming a single winner, they vow to end their own lives, possibly by drowning in a vat of soggy bottomed Victoria sponges.
Speaking of which, I love Candice. I regretfully feel she may not last long in the tent but her lipstick is on point, so I just need her to last through to Week 5, by which point she will have enough Twitter followers to be answering make-up questions and eventually land an endorsement deal with Benefit.
So who does that leave? Louise, who I like but I am wise enough not to get too attached to, as she has Week 4 Exit written all over her. Rav, alas, I feel may also not make it past Week 6, though I feel sadder about this as the world is not done seeing Rav and his family whose names almost but don't quite rhyme or alliterate. Perhaps Rav's House is the next great British sit-com, and we will laugh and cry and grow together in equal measure. Perhaps not. (Probably not. The Daily Mail is a thing that exists in the world, after all.)
Benjamina. Benjamina evoked an instant, uncomfortable stab of empathy for me as she is clearly a perfectionist who will never quite believe her work to be good enough, while turning out beautiful, understated high quality work. She will get to the semi-final and then inexplicably lose out to someone like -
Well, someone like Kate. Let's talk about Kate, shall we? Kate, who owns a farm, which was referenced not once but several times in the programme. Kate, whose children will grown up in the outdoors and actually be both hale and hearty and you will look at them and not know what those words mean but know they are it. Kate, who lives a life of incredible prosperity despite genuinely believing that blue icing will make a mirror glaze. Kate, who will almost certainly make it to the final through sheer absence of controversy. Kate, who forages. Kate, who is nothing and yet inescapable. Kate, who will always, always be fine.
Kate: #blessed #byalawyerwhomanagedtocircumventinheritancetax
Let's talk about Kate being, for the next ten weeks, someone who I will loathe joyfully and religiously. There is always one, and they nearly always make it to the end. It is almost my favourite part of Bake Off. Now, I understand that there are those who claim the programme's appeal lies in it being a gentle tea-time treat, a celebration of the diversity and talent to be found the length and breadth of This Great Nation, those who look on the dizzying heart-stopping pains of near-cake-drops and sliced fingers and say, "Ooh, it's a bit tense, isn't it?"
To these people I say, Fools. If you only choose, you too can live your life in a barely contained state of emotional instability, constantly teetering on the edge of tweeting all in caps while stuffing handfuls of raw cake batter into your grateful mouth. If you only choose it, Bake-Off can become the bloodiest arena sport since man first stumbled out of the sea.
My hatred of Kate is a beautiful thing, a poetic thing, and I shall nourish my blood-baby with the fury of a dying sun; the blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere the ceremony of innocence is drowned. It lives eternally, at least until October.
Also her whole swallows thing is, like, out of control twee.
I am so glad to have you back, Bake-Off. The scent of blood and icing sugar is in my nostrils once again. Morituri te salutant.
