The Next Iron Chef may be the nail in the coffin of the competition cooking show. An obvious attempt to tap into the success of Top Chef, Hell's Kitchen, and The Food Network's own The Next Food Network Star, this awful remix of the Japanese cooking show is a failure all around.

It was bad enough when The Food Network decided to Americanize Iron Chef. Possibly tired of airing yet another rerun of this eccentric and eclectic competition (a mysterious millionaire who oversees the event, poetry for every secret ingredient, the very notion of a secret ingredient, soccer stars and art scholars judging the food….), The Food Network reached down deep and all they could come up with was Alton Brown as announcer. The competitions are boring. The show's apparatus is dry and dull, Mo Rocca is a judge. As if this failure was not enough. Now the networks wants aspiring cooks to compete to be an Iron Chef! Is Bobby Flay too bored to continue?

What makes The Next Iron Chef a real failure, however, is that the Iron Chef is supposed to be this genius, this superstar of culinary traditions, this god of the kitchen. He or she should be known to the culinary world. He or she should make everyday cooks tremble. Eel? Bonito shavings? Roe? Only the Iron Chef can turn the ingredient into a main course or an ice cream. Why do the Iron Chefs stand up on raised platforms, their image projected tall and imposing behind them? Because they are better than us. And we should bow to their cooking skills. We should be lucky to eat their squid ice cream or tuna tartar.

And who are these shmoes competing to join the ranks of the Iron Chef? I have know idea. And I'm pretty sure no one else does either. If this show makes it through one season without earning the network's lowest ratings since Bobblehead went to Italy, I'll be shocked. Food Network gets worse each year. They are scraping the barrel for the lowest common denominator. Last season, on the The Next Food Network Star, the producers were sure they would go after the untapped, Hispanic audience by pushing uneven tempered JAG to the finals and eventual victory. When someone tipped the producers off that JAG's military history was fabricated, fake Monica was brought back to beat Rory. Fake Monica? The Gourmet Next Door? Safety net, anyone?

A network about food will die by its safe moves. Food is not safe when it's good. Food, and those who promote food, must be adventurous. Unfortunately, the network's shows are getting blander and blander. The Next Iron Chef must be the blandest of all the competition shows. It is more boring than the fancy, look but don't eat, dessert competitions. And that, I have to stress, means really, really boring.