Project blogway, part fuenf

So let me get this straight (in every sense of the term): On a network whose target audience is female and that is trying to gain a foothold in younger demographics, and on a show produced by the same people responsible for The Real World, the three finalists are all women between the ages of 23 and 26? Gee, how did that work out?

Granted, the finalists on the Bravo/Magical Elves version of PR always included a flamboyant gay guy (or in Santino and Jeffrey's cases, a flamboyant omnisexual guy). But they were (usually) good! And (always) interesting! The best that can be said for Meana Irina, Blonde Althea, and CarolHannahMontanaBanana as designers is that they are competent, and as personalities is that they all have astonishing overbites. (Maybe we're setting up the new Project Orthodontics series.) Ra'mon and his mysterious apostrophe may have been a bit on the Minnesota Nice side of things, but even the Lizard Queen outfit for which he was aufed was more creative than what the final three have done. And Nicholas, though hardly the talent of Uncle Nick or Daniel V. (to say nothing of Christopher), at least had some drama about him. 

To be fair, one is always amazed that anyone can pull together anything in the day or so the contestants have here, and to say that this year's finalists suck conveniently ignores the fact that the best I could do with scissors, needles and fabric in 24 hours would come down to making a tourniquet to stop the arterial bleeding. But: This is television! Show off! Be interesting! Be funny! Even if Lifetime just wants you to be role models and Bunim/Murray just wants you to be a PG-rated Girls Gone Wild! Make a dress out of SlimJims and crack penis jokes while you're doing it! It's what Andrae would have done!

But I suspect all we're going to get in this year's finale is backstories that are noble and clothes that are wearable and Tim Gunn, looking ever more uncomfortable as he wonders if the old gig back at Parsons might be available again.