All’s Fair; The Great British Bake Off

“I did not know it was still possible to make television this bad. I assumed that there was some sort of baseline, some inescapable bedrock knowledge of how to do it that now prevents any entry into the art form from falling below a certain standard. But I was wrong. The new series from Ryan Murphy, All’s Fair – starring Kim Kardashian, Naomi Watts and Niecy Nash as the founders of an all-female law firm delivering divorce-y justice to incredibly rich but slightly unlucky women under the azure skies of California – is terrible. Fascinatingly, incomprehensibly, existentially terrible.”
Lucy Mangan, The Guardian

“All’s Fair is so bad, it’s not even enjoyably so. It thinks it’s a feminist fable about spirited lawyers getting their own back on cruel rich men but is in fact a tacky and revolting monument to the same greed, vanity and avarice it supposedly targets. All scripted, it feels, by a toddler who couldn’t write ‘bum’ on a wall.”
Ben Dowell, The Times

“All’s Fair is without question one of the worst things Murphy has ever done. Among its many crimes, it squanders an A-list cast that includes not only Kim Kardashian but genuine greats such as Naomi Watts, Glenn Close and Sarah Paulson. The acting is awful. Somehow Murphy and his co-creators Jon Robin Baitz and Joe Baken make Oscar-nominated talents such as Watts and Close look like they would be doing well to bag a recurring role on Emmerdale.”
Ed Power, The Telegraph

“Naturally we got the same old lame gags from the presenters Noel Fielding and Alison Hammond, and the familiar phrases — will Hollywood ever stop talking about ’hero flavours’? — that were trotted out like old friends. But the competition was thrilling, especially as the final stages saw Mother Nature do her bit, with teeming rain and a thunderclap intensifying the drama. For those who suspect that God is a Bake Off fan, here, perhaps, was proof.”
Ben Dowell, The Times

“Its mix of joy, warmth and camaraderie, topped with a delightful dose of silliness, retains some magic. We were treated to colossal cakes, just enough jeopardy and the right winner. I’ll raise a large cup of tea and an even larger slice of cake to that.”
Michael Hogan, The Telegraph

“You have to hand it to Paul Hollywood, Prue Leith, Noel Fielding and Alison Hammond. The final had a forgone conclusion, yet they truly tried their best to make it somewhat suspenseful… But with no tension, no underdog to root for and no prizes for guessing the winner everything tasted a bit bland. I love Bake Off, but it needs to whip up some changes next series, or the batter-ed show could collapse faster than a badly made soufflé.”
Tilly Pearce, The i