YMMV / Kitchen Nightmares S 5 E 6 Burger Kitchen Part 1

• Crosses the Line Twice: Played for Drama. During the episode, the owners are an elderly couple and their adult son Daniel. Over the course of the episode, it is revealed that the restaurant was opened after Daniel's grandfather (Alan's father) had passed away, leaving a sizable inheritance to his son and grandson. The grandfather had left his grandson's portion of the inheritance in a trust which the son used as start-up capital for the restaurant, without his own son's knowledge or permission. Basically, Daniel was presented with a fait accompli and felt he had no choice but to go along with it, despite not having any interest in being a restaurateur, taking on a job as a kitchen manager. On top of that, the restaurant itself was in dire financial straits, with his parents constantly coming to him for further funds to meet payroll, not keeping accurate books as far as his initial and continuing contributions to the restaurant fund, belittling his fiancée when she volunteers her time to help him out, and constantly stonewalling him when he comes to them wanting official documentation about his 50% share in the business. The best they do is a handmade document printed from a home computer that looks like the legal equivalent of an I.O.U. written on a cocktail napkin. The overall situation, and resulting discord, was so great that the result became one of the few two-part episodes in the entire series.
• Ensemble Dark Horse:
  • Wendy, Daniel's girlfriend, fit this for being the only one supporting him and calling his parents out on their abusive behavior.
  • Also from the episode is David Blaine, the head chef for the first part. He is abrasive, rude and on the verge of losing his sanity... but he's also completely and 100% right throughout the whole episode. In the context of the utter insanity of the restaurant, his outbursts are downright cathartic, and the fans love him for it. Also, being able to make a dish Ramsay enjoyed definitely contributes.
• Jerkass Woobie: David Blaine, the (initial) head chef. While he engaged in some major Jerkass behavior, such as repeatedly accusing one of the owners of being bipolar and then semi-seriously threatening to hit one of the others (resulting in him being fired midway through the two-parter), it was clear that he was a pretty talented chef who had been hamstrung by the owners' obsession with using frozen Wagyu burgers, and had been working for several months without pay. He was also the tenth chef that had left Burger Kitchen. Despite his nastiness, many of the points he made about the family's inability to run a restaurant were correct. The fact that he'd gone unpaid (working on the "promise of being paid", according to Alan) for all his work helps make him further sympathetic.
  • From the same episode there's Daniel: his own bad attitude makes it hard to feel sorry for him when David threatens him; but when one remembers he was forced into a job he didn't want after his father stole $250,000 from him, it's hard to blame him for being so bitter.
• The Woobie: Daniel, a young adult who had come into a large inheritance from his recently deceased grandfather only to see his parents withdraw his entire trust fund so they could establish their restaurant. Not even having a stake in the family business, Daniel still does his damnedest to support his parents despite the trust that they no longer have, and is constantly stressed by the toxic atmosphere in the kitchen as well as their open disdain for his girlfriend. It's such a bad situation that Gordon is determined to set it right for Daniel's sake.

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