Well, folks, it's finally here: The Final Six Smackdown! Flanders, Fishballs and their fellow first-round winners are back — and they're packing knives and taking names!

I'm trying to drum up a little interest here, can you tell? The truth is, most of these "master" cheftestants (unlike the traditional, no-name variety) have been disappointingly polite, respectful and boring so far. But I think things will take a big turn for the better starting tonight, because — for the remaining episodes — the show will revert to the traditional format we know and love: One chef will be eliminated per week (not three), and the rest will return and hang around long enough to (hopefully) get on each other's nerves — and also long enough for us to get to know them properly. And by "properly," I mean well enough for us to better ridicule and demean them, and call them silly names (more on that below).

So, as we tremble in giddy anticipation of the new thrills that await us tonight (at 10 Eastern, on Bravo), I'll quickly run through a few highlights from last week's live blog:

  • Jonathan Waxman told us that the word "sabotage" is not in a master chef's vocabulary. But apparently the word "hypocrisy" is, because he went on to sabotage fish specialist Michael Cimarusti by forcing him to pick his ingredients from a great big box full of no fish.
  • We all hated on the spacey new-age Palm Pre woman, who is obviously some kind of cyborg or replicant. Where's that Blade Runner dude when you need him?
  • Art Smith won, which is probably good because — love him or hate him — you have to admit he's like a character straight out of "Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil." And this finalist group needs all the character it can get, since it already includes Suzanne Tracht and Anita Lo — who are like characters straight out of "Midnight in the Poppy Garden of the Living Dead."
  • Commenter DahlELama aptly narrated the final scene thusly: "Oh my good Lord, is he really crying? And did Roy just say 'we're going to be friends forever?' Did my TV accidentally switch over to The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 3?"

As for this week's episode, I don't have my usual "here are tonight's chefs" rundown to do, because we've met them all before. So instead, I'll just list the six finalists along with the nicknames we've come up with for them so far:

  • Hubert Keller: Gandalf
  • Rick Bayless: Ned Flanders
  • Suzanne Tracht: The Undead Chef, or Botox Lady
  • Anita Lo: Lo-Energy, or Undead Chef 2
  • Michael Chiarello: Fishballs
  • Art Smith: Fart Smith

So as we live-blog tonight, I suggest we think about how improve and finalize this list. But first, why not grab yourself a piece of cheesecake? Today is National Cheesecake Day, after all. Go ahead, it's patriotic! I'll meet you back here in the comments section at 10.