Unmasking The Masked Singer’s Season 4 Premier
By: Lexi Ray
Staff Writer
Many people have something they like to follow on TV, sports, news, and the like. I follow the reality competition show The Masked Singer, as it appeals to my love of dramatic costumes and preforming.
Now in its 4th season, The Masked Singer has reached new heights that the past two seasons weren’t able to. Seasons 2 and 3 were obvious examples that the show was still finding its footing in the age of streaming services taking over cable, but season 4 brought back the charm and incredible talent (both on and behind the camera) that drew me to it in the first place. This season is the television equivalent of going back home for a holiday weekend and getting to see that it became better than you remember it.
For those unfamiliar with the show’s premise and format, here is the short version:
A handful of celebrities are given over the top costumes and masks, in addition to being held to secrecy (accomplished by extremely tight security measures). The celebrities are than split up into two or more groups depending on how many contestants there are that season (these groups are in alphabetical order. ex: group a, group b, so on and so forth) and one of the contestants is unmasked at the end of the episode. The panel of judges (Ken Jeong, Jenny McCarthy, Robin Thicke, and Nicole Scherzinger) critique the performances after each contestant.
Got that? Good! Now, let’s continue!
This season has Baby Alien, Broccoli, Crocodile, Giraffe, Gremlin, Jellyfish, Lips, Mushroom, Popcorn, Seahorse, Serpent, Snowy Owls (the show’s first duo performers), Squiggly Monster, Sun, Whatchamacallit (another monster), and Dragon. And this season brought the addition of the judges having to write their initial guesses of the identity of each contestant for the first three episodes, as these episodes introduce the 4 groups of contestants this season, with the one with the most correct initial guesses winning their own trophy separate from the one given to the winner of this season (known as The Golden Mask) called The Golden Ear.
Group A (which included Sun, Giraffe, Popcorn, Dragon, and Snow Owls) was not short on talent and went ALL OUT, making them a tough act to follow. Sun gave a sensational rendition of Lizzo’s “Cuz I Love You”, Giraffe got the energy going with The Black-Eyed Peas’ “Let’s Get It Started in Here”, Popcorn lit up the stage with Pink’s “What About Us?”, Dragon fired up the crowd with LL Cool J’s “Mama Said Knock You Out”, and last but certainly not least, Snow Owls did a powerful performance of A Great Big World’s “Say Something”.
Now, I won’t spoil the results of the season premier, but all I will say Group A is one of the most interesting groups to start the season, both talent wise and costume wise. These are also some of the strongest, vocally speaking, contestants I have ever seen, and I can see the winner of this season coming from Group A, which hasn’t been the case for two seasons.
With that being said, I highly recommend this season of The Masked Singer if you enjoy a fun show that embraces its quirks just enough to be genuinely unique while also acknowledging its flaws and fixing them as needed.
