Are ‘Great British Baking Show’ Judges Paul and Prue Playing Favorites with Tasha and Dan?

A reality competition series like The Great British Baking Show on Netflix only works if the judges are treating contestants fairly. One sniff of favoritism and the audience’s trust in the show’s results is out the window. Which is why it’s becoming increasingly troubling that it seems, yeah, judges Paul Hollywood and Prue Leith might be playing favorites with at least one contestant during the 2023 season of The Great British Baking Show.

While some Great British Baking Show fans are still miffed that Abbi Lawson got cut from “Bread Week” over previous Star Baker Dan Hunter’s raw Showstopper, I found Paul Hollywood’s insistence that Tasha Stones was in line for Star Baker during “Botanical Week” to be rather wild. Not only did Tasha come in last on the Technical, but she also had a sloppy looking Showstopper. So what’s going on? Are Paul Hollywood and Prue Leith playing favorites with the bakers in The Great British Baking Show? And should fans of the Netflix hit be concerned about what this means as we hurtle ever closer to the final episodes of the season?

The Great British Baking Show is no stranger to controversies surrounding favoritism of the bakers. While, Paul and Prue’s decisions typically make sense, there have been the occasional decisions that boggle the mind. Consider when German-born Jürgen Strauss was graded on a harder curve than his cohorts on “German Week” or when Paul Hollywood literally helped Maxi with her custard last season!!! Paul, in particular, is so notorious for showing ever so slight favoritism towards the young and female bakers that a joke about his flirtatious habits had to be cut from the West End musical version of the show. So is it happening again? Are Paul and Prue breaking the most sacred rule of judging a reality show? Are they playing favorites and being unfair to the bakers working their proverbial buns off in the tent? Like I said, I believe one of them is and it’s not Prue Leith.

Let’s dig into the two most egregious examples of so-called favoritism on The Great British Baking Show to date this season. The first is when Week 1 Star Baker Dan Hunter struggled during the all-important “Bread Week.” He tried making five separate plaited breads that would spell “PIZZA” but ran out of dough and time. What he wound up presenting was a mess. In order to have all letters assembled, he relied on dead dough to save him, but it didn’t bake in time, coming out raw. The two main wreaths also had issues, but Prue noted that they had the makings of really good loaves. She also noted that Dan’s issues were “so unlike” him.

The bottom three bakers that week were Dan, Abbi, and Rowan Claughton, who coincidentally received some of the meanest critiques from the judges all season. I thought Rowan would be eliminated, just based purely on those “hideous” and “monstrous” comments. However, Abbi was the one to go home. Why? Especially when she had, like Dan, hitherto been a consistently strong competitor. And the fact Dan came in last on the Technical? Well, I think it’s because Abbi’s Signature bake, her cottage loaf, was a flat, flavorless failure. Meanwhile, Rowan at least had a loaf with rise and Dan’s cottage loaf was great except for distribution of pesto. I think Dan’s cottage loaf saved him more than his past success did. It may not be what fans wanted, but it does add up.

But you know what’s wild, however? The bizarre amount of favoritism Paul showed Tasha in The Great British Baking Show “Botanical Week.”

There’s no doubt that Paul and Prue are fans of the two-time Star Baker winner, but for Paul to argue that Tasha was in line for Star Baker this week felt like a stretch. It was Josh Smalley’s to win by a landslide. After all, he was great in the Signature, second in the Technical, and phenomenal in the Showstopper. But how did Tasha do? Well, sort of slightly above middling by my maths*.

*That’s “math” in British.

Yes, Tasha did really well in her Signature. I’m not going to dispute that. The lady knows her Christmas bakes and that’s what she went to for this. However, she came in last place in the Technical. I want you to remember that: Tasha was last in Technical. LAST!!! Why is that important? Because Paul Hollywood, while making the case for her to be Star Baker, conveniently framed her performance as “Seventh Place.” Seventh place out of seven bakers isn’t good, though!

Of course, Technical Challenges aren’t the most importantly weighted part of any episode of Great British Baking Show. The Showstopper is. So let’s look at what blew Paul away:

I’ll say this: I believe Paul and Prue that it tasted great. Prue called the flavor of it all “a triumph.” The design on the sponge collar is divine and the jelly didn’t split. However, there is a gap — which was a point of huge critique hurled at Josh — and both Josh and Saku’s gel flower designs were far more elegant. When I originally saw Tasha’s design pop up earlier this week on my Instagram feed, I worried that she was going to be eliminated for this. That is how rough and ready it looked to my eye! And yet, Paul cooed over it. “I love the look of this. It’s so professional looking.” Huh?

I’m not saying Tasha should have been on the bottom. Far from it. As I said, she was above the middle. And I get that she had quite the ambitious Showstopper, but there’s no way she should have been in the same conversation as Josh this week. So what gives? Well, Paul clearly is playing favorites with Tasha. That’s what gives.

Tasha is the most conventionally attractive female baker left in the tent this year, which means she is exactly the demographic Paul adores. I’m not saying Mr. Hollywood is flirting with her, but it’s clear he might be harboring a tiny Bake Off crush. (He literally said, “You understand bread and I like that about you” weeks prior!)

What’s disappointing about Paul’s favoritism isn’t just that it casts his and Prue’s choices into question, but it undercuts what Tasha is accomplishing here as the first deaf baker in Great British Baking Show history. If viewers see Paul going easy on Tasha, they may make the wrong assumption it’s on account of her deafness. Meanwhile, I’m 99.99% sure it’s because she’s an attractive twenty-something woman who gets bread, aka Paul’s type!

Paul’s favoritism is a huge problem because it makes The Great British Baking Show unfair for everyone involved, including Tasha. It’s not right if she is baked on a different curve, better or worse, than everyone else there. Here’s hoping production caught this craziness behind-the-scenes before the results of future episodes could be called into question…