I will protect Whitney and his facial expressions at all costs.

In a true case of Yin and Yang as 2026 starts with *gestures vaguely towards the United States* the Pottery Throwdown returns to balance out the vibes as 12 new potters arrive at the hallowed halls of Gladstone

Mecca for some, Pottery Boarding School for Magical Eugenicists to others

Emily, you and Kayleigh are on THIN ICE

you get a one place penalty in my final ranking of your main makes for every mention of a JK Rowling property. She’s not above being petty, NOR AM I. The rabbits count as -5 because it’s wild to reference Fantastic Beasts at all.

So while those two go sit on the naughty step to think about what they’ve done and read another book, here’s the cast at large!

and here they all are as their Animal Crossing counterparts because I got my 6th photo of Jingle the Reindeer this Christmas and am hyper-fixating before the new update

and I might as well address it here, Pottery Throwdown has a new theme tune and we all hate it and there’s a strong chance I could make a petition that gets enough signatures to have it discussed in Parliament.

Gorgeous Gorgeous Girls Love Soup

Once again, the first challenge of the series is a multi-piece set, this year being a more normal Soup Set consisting of a tureen with a lid with *looks to camera* a knob, a ladle and two matching bowls. On top of all that, the sets also had to be themed around the potters’ idea of a perfect winter night in. This does fall into the trap of being a challenge largely about the quality of the potters’ illustrative talents which I don’t mind for the first challenge. I think it’s a very easy way to introduce all of the potters but I don’t want it to become a series that seems like some of the potters are excelling for mostly being good at painting on very simple pieces of pottery. I want weird and wonderful! It’s a detriment to the show that nobody’s tureen was shaped like the head of their cat or dog that you ladle soup out of like you’re giving it a lobotomy! And lord knows there were enough pets to choose from! Fynn just about has enough dachshunds to share with the whole class

and two of them did feature on his set, curled up at the bottom of his soup bowls

the rest of his set was decorated with nods to boardgames and various TTRPGs WHICH ARE NOT THE SAME THINGS, MUM

Fynn wasn’t the only one doing a games themed set. He was joined in glorious nerddom with Naveed who runs a toy shop!

however, his was themed around online games which had been abstracted to scrawling binary code all over it like a psychopath writing messages all over the wall of their cell

as pure conjecture, this feels like he had a different idea and somebody said he couldn’t do it either because of rights issues or because he walked in and realised he was going toe-to-toe in a boardgame throwdown against a trans tattoo artist and not even the toyshop owner is winning tha but Naveed had bigger problem than owing Fynn 4 hotels worth of rent

as he’d thrown his tureen noticeably too small

there was a specification that they had to be able to get 4 bowls of soup in the tureen. Naveed, like the average D&D player the moment the DM gives them a new magic item, found a loophole

they did not actually specify the soup had to be wet.

What I did appreciate about Naveed’s is that he was going for a very interesting shape for his pieces and I can see the references to various dice in them

the mandatory sculpted knob maybe didn’t feel creative enough? It’s very Just A Soup Lid, especially when you had things like Emily’s daughter-shaped knob on her Scottish winter walk themed set

a theme that Kayleigh was also doing, except less Scottish and mostly relying on the giant bobble hat knob to sell the winteriness

of all the general wildlife themed pieces, I think Elham was the one most evoking a consistent vibe (maybe I’m just not emotionally attached enough to Kayleigh’s favourite pigeon)

they’re just all very cute looking storybook characters – they feel like something you’d maybe get for a small child and with the whole set being inspired by her two boys that’s perfect! I loved the story about the fox stealing her son’s shoe

it’s almost as idyllic and adorable the scene of Andrew and his husband painting and doing tapestry together that’s one cherubic child short of being a Frederick Morgan painting

Andrew works as an English teacher so his set was themed around reading Dickens books by the fire, featuring Oliver Twist specifically at the bottom of the soup tureen as though he’d wished for more gruel upon the monkey’s paw

this will feature in Andrew’s lesson on dramatic irony!

Angharad was also going for a predominantly illustrative design with a series of scenic photographs later painted in monochromatic green. But she had a cottage on the lid and that’s… neat I guess

I don’t know, it’s hardly a mosaic of biscuits

Bill and Fynn are my immediate favourites purely because I can call them Bill and Fynn the Flowerpot Men. But I also just like Bill and the fact he measures time in biscuits

down with the metric and imperial systems, embrace the Chocolate Digestive System.

While Bill had just answered the question of “How many sprigs are you using?” with a simple “yes.” Mark was just slapping one great big sprig of his hearth onto the side of his tureen

it’s called Blind Scouse because blind scouse is a vegetarian stew from Liverpool. I do like that he was painting the whole thing that warm toasty brown colour, it really makes it look a bit like a pie. Which would maybe make the reveal that it’s actually soup a bit disappointing. Personally I think Mark should’ve just made a soup set inspired by his own beard, the cosiest thing in the pottery

that’s the beard of a man that turns out to secretly be Santa at the end of a Hallmark movie. So if you’re listening Mark, I’d like an Afghan Hound, a new jawline and Costa coffee to stop raising the prices of their coffees. I’m willing to relocate to a small village to save a Christmas tree farm from bankruptcy if that’s what it takes. xoxo.

Also a bit like Bill, who was mounting his tureen atop three stacks of books, Kaz was giving her tureen little boots like The Luggage from the Discworld novels

I am also very invested in the budding romance between Kaz and Siobhan

DO THE SCENE FROM GHOST.

Kaz’s was largely themed around her pets – two dogs and a cat. An angle that Olympia was also going as she made her Husky, Solace, the star of a grand day out

my biggest worry was that her ladle didn’t read as a husky tail and looked a little more monkeyish, which I’m sure Solace would take personally and alert his people of this slight

I’ve never met anyone that enjoys living next door to a husky owner, the ASBOs of the canine world <3

Lastly we have Whitney whose set was inspired by camping out under the stars and you immediately knew he was in a bit of trouble because his set wasn’t covered in 100 bits and pieces

Whitney, you were cast almost certainly because you have an incredibly beautiful cat

WHERE IS THE BEAUTIFUL CAT-SHAPED TUREEN?

Comments from the Pottery Gallery

The first Second Challenge of the series, which I have finally grasped is not always called a Throwdown, was actually a Throwdown this time! The potters had to make as many jars as possible in only 20 minutes. The twist being that each jar had to feature an 8cm gallery to fit Rich’s lid

and yes, any jars that did not fit Rich’s lid would be karate chopped out of existence and banished into The Bucket of Doom

Kaz got on really well with the challenge even if during Keith’s Erotic Demonstration, she was pulling the exact same face as the girl I sat next to in maths when I asked her, halfway through an algebra lesson, “Why are there letters?”

I’d joined halfway through the school year and my Zimbabwean education had literally only just tackled long division. But my God, for some reason I could tell you EVERYTHING about the Montgolfier Brothers if you’d asked me! Why will nobody ask me about The Montgolfier Brothers?

Kaz ended up with a set of 8 jars

which the show clearly hadn’t anticipated anyone reaching and she’d run out of clay around about the 6th one

but she didn’t have to worry because Olympia had spent like 10 minutes throwing half a jar and gave up, opting to be the pottery’s clay dispensary insteady

don’t give away your clay for free, girl! Bargain for a jar! Even if Kaz had given away her best jar she’d have still have had double Olympia who only had two by the end of the challenge

Keith could not bring himself to kill 50% of her creations so he moved on swiftly, but somehow the pity pass hurts more than the bucketing.
Olympia wasn’t the only one to not get any of her jars destroyed though, Andrew got by on the quality of his pots

while Naveed opted for this far too erotic growl

sending Keith really mixed messages about the smashing and the passing, sir.

On average most of the potters managed about 4 or 5 passable pots, usually losing one or two to Keith’s insatiable hunger for clay. Kaz lost the most but percentage-wise she was still above a fair few of the potters – even if that did still only end up with her in 5th place on the ranking. While Elham joined Olympia, The Clay Distributing Socialist, down at the bottom and will be filing a formal complaint

hands up if you were personally victimised by The Bucket.

An Official Jar Throwdown Ranking:
1. Andrew’s Ajar Ahead
2. Emily’s Chronicles of Gladstone: The Silver Jar (I don’t know)
3. Whitney’s Great Modern Gallery
4. Bill’s Jar-ibaldi Biscuits (not all of them can be bangers)
5. Kaz’s Capitalist Clay Acquisitioning
6. Naveed’s Sexy, Sexy Jars
7. Fynn’s Chopped Throw-y
8. Angharad’s Twink Death
9. Kayleigh’s Tight Fits
10. Mark’s 2 Jar Pile-up
11. Elham’s Nonconsensual Gallerying
12. Olympia’s Pity Pair

Soup Me

With their soup sets back from their initial firing the potters had three hours to decorate and repair any firing mishaps ahead of the second firing. Kaz suffered most in the way of finicky detachments – losing both a boot and a cat’s tail

however, both were pretty simple fixes requiring a bit of transparent glaze to glue them back together. The bigger worry for Rich was the fact she was slathering the whole thing in copper oxide which has rendered many a make in the past a sort of muddy mess

however, it all came out rather fantastically with everything sticking back to where it ought to be

the paleness of the tureen does really exaggerate how egg-shaped it is and thus it does make it look a bit like Sheldon from Garfield and Friends going for a hike

I only realised seconds before publishing this that “patent ball chucker” wa a device for throwing the ball for her dog and not some sort of west country speciality soup. Somehow I was able to decipher Naveed’s unhelpful braille more easily

It’s says “Nav” or “MPN” depending on which what you read the ladle in visual binary – maybe the RAF Mount Pleasant airport needs an accessible ladle?
I do kind of love his set because it does quite frankly look insane – it’s giving “No TV and no beer make Homer goes crazy”

and the fact you get to the bottom of your soup tureen shaped like the sacred urn of the Space Pope and it says “GAME OVER” like a survival horror game does feel like I’ve only got 10 minutes to find a cure for the poison in the minestrone is delightfully threatening

granted, you can barely fit enough of the poisoned minestrone to kill anyone given how small it is. But Naveed wasn’t the only one to struggle with tureen size, as Kayleigh had the same issue

however, hers was actually for a romantic soup for two instead of Naveed’s multiplayer homebrewed soup murder mystery

I don’t know if Kayleigh’s was actually too small or if the lid was just too big because there’s a lid and then there’s a whole fucking hat

it kind of distracts from everything else and she’d spent so much time drawing her favourite pigeon and what I can only imagine is her least favourite rabbit

this horrible little gremlin is incredible important to me right now. And Rich saying this veterinarian’s textbook illustration of Shope Papilloma Virus (don’t google it) looks like a Quentin Blake illustration

when Andrew is practically his second coming made me howl

the quality of Andrew’s glaze work is phenomenal and easily the most consistent in this challenge but sadly there was the issue that he got a little reckless with the ladle which did not upset him as much as the producer rubbing their thighs wished it did

to be fair, I think Keith was doing enough crying over ladles for everyone

Rich was just happy to stand there and make the bowls smooch

I’ve read weirder fanfiction.
Mark’s was a lovely set – the effect of his sponged on layers of various shades of brown gave the whole set a really lovely inviting glow

I almost feel like the sprig was unnecessary and detracts from the elegance of the tureen’s shape but without it he’d probably be called out for being too simple like Whitney did for not overly bedecking his soup set in sentimental motifs and his favourite bumble-footed city birds

controversial yet brave opinion: this is my favourite one? I love that the bowls and ladles aren’t decorated but match the tureen while letting it be the statement piece. I do think he could’ve done a little something at the bottom of each bowl but the shapes are such a statement that the minimalism makes aesthetic sense. But maybe Elham did a better job of embracing Throwdown-friendly minimalism with her set as she left the base of her set raw

it was definitely the correct decision, that soft off-white gives the whole thing a very fun children’s nursery feel. And the little figures sleeping in the handles remind me a lot of Each Peach Pear Plum illustrations

their cuteness just about warranting the obscene proportion of the handles

oh my grandma, what big… soup handles you have!

My favourite handles were a toss-up between the little books that Andrew had done to further the literary theme

and the very fluid swoop of Emily’s that were made even better with the roosting owls between one of them

as a whole I think she had the most intelligent use of space and design with the whole thing guiding your eye very pleasantly around the whole set

also I’m just a huge fan of anything with a surprise frog situation

the glazing on the tureen was maybe a little patchy and hodge-podge in some places but overall I think it really works.

The first episode is always a baptism of fire in terms of time management. Unfortunately, Olympia got a little burnt as she seemed to over-prioritise the accuracy of Solace – who did look very good!

but when you zoom out to the big picture, the glazing is very hit and miss quality-wize

on a personal level, I think this is adorable – the movie ticket admitting 1 human and 1 good boy? One of my favourite details of the whole episode

but as a set, I just don’t know if I think it’s very cohesive – everything feels just slightly too different and removed from the other pieces – the tureen handles are rectangular, one bowl’ if’s are twisted rope, the ladle curls like a tail and the illustration style changes between pieces. Had this been more cohesive, I think Olympia might’ve been safe. I think she should’ve been safe regardless because the first episode should be a non-elimination but she did also have a pair of s-cracks

she wasn’t the only one! The only thing stopping them from handing Potter of the Week to Andrew was his own crack and the fact there’s only so sculpted you can call a lump of snow

leaving everything wide open for Fynn’s game night soup to take the honour

it’s VERY cute! I am willing to overlook the “a load of stuff drawn on some pottery” aspect because I do think there’s enough interplay between said illustrations and his sculpted pieces – the gusty knob blowing the leaves and the snake handles in particular. But it also helps that the whole thing feels full, he’s got a very good use of space. I imagine he does a wicked sleeve.

Angharad was going for a very risky use of glaze in her use of monochromatic green illustrations done with layers of the same green in various dilutions laid out before her like she was about to do shots of forbidden pistachio paste

I was expecting it all to be a bit of a muddy mess but it actually turned out really well

some of the panels worked a lot better than others, there were one or two that at least looked a little indecipherable on television. But I do think it was by far and away the most impressive use of glazes, I just wish that maybe the frames of her illustrations had been moulded onto the pieces to create a little more depth.

Lastly we have Bill’s biscuity soup

I think I want to like this more than I do – I feel like the sprigs and the shape of the bowls are in conflict and just don’t belong together. The whole idea is incredibly charming but maybe needs a little bit more biscuit-based research

it’s a tough job but someone’s got to do it.

An Unofficial Soup Set Ranking:
1. Fynn’s Cullen Ink
2. Angharad’s Pea Green Soup
3. Emily’s Skating By
4. Whitney’s Actually Very Good Set
5. Elham’s Mulliga-Tawny Owl
6. Kaz’s Soup Runner
7. Mark’s Unopenable Soup Tureen
8. Andrew’s Ironic Gruel
9. Respect The Soup Binary
10. Bill’s Bouillon Biscuits
11. Olympia’s Doggy Chow(der)
12. Kayleigh’s 5 Deductive Rowling Points

The first port of call was giving out Potter of the Week which of course went to Fynn

which was thoroughly deserved on the whole. I would like to give honourable mentions to Naveed taking a big swing with his unusual shapes, Angharad for pulling off her glazing and WHITNEY WHO DID REALLY WELL, ACTUALLY.
Then we have the business of the elimination, which I thought was going to be a fake out and they’d announce that nobody was going home. Then Siobhan punched Olympia in the gut and I was genuinely shocked

if Olympia hadn’t had those two cracks, I don’t think they would’ve sent anyone home. It’s such a strong group this year that I think they’re maybe saving the non-elimination week for a little further down the line when there’s more of a difficult decision to make. But I do feel bad for Olympia and I think they’ve done her a little dirty, I’d have liked to see if she managed to get more to grips with the show in the second episode.

And so 11, move on to Week 2!