MasterChef premiered its 17th season on Monday night but fans weren’t happy with how they kicked things off.

MasterChef Australia - Gordon Ramsay

MasterChef fans have slammed the 2025 season premiere for making what they see as a major ‘mistake’. Photo: Ten

MasterChef fans have slammed the 2025 season premiere for making what they see as a major “mistake” right off the bat. Season 17 is a Back to Win format, with former contestants fighting to win the crown again.

Fan favourites such as Callum Hann, Laura Sharrad, and more have returned to take their shot at winning the title. Usually, the start of a season is a little more relaxed, but this year, the contestants were immediately faced with a service challenge, and fans weren’t all that happy with it.

Celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay was on hand to tell the group that they would be splitting into three groups to cook for front-line workers, with Callum’s Green Team taking out the win.

Viewers took to Reddit to share their annoyance at the premiere, with one person kicking off the conversation by writing, “Did anybody feel like nothing tonight? Like I was excited beforehand but I legit felt nothing during or after the episode.”

“Starting off with a service challenge wasn’t the best I don’t think,” one person responded.

“Yeah, I thought it was just me, but it all felt very manufactured,” another responded. “All the dramatic beats felt very artificial and edited. I think it was a mistake for the first episode.

“Better to ease in more drama-free with individual dishes where we get to know each contestant. Team challenges are more fun later in the season when they’ve been filming together a bit longer and have more chemistry.”

“I think the producers wanted to kick the season off in dramatic fashion, however they seem to have forgotten that half the charm with the AU series is the way we get to know the contestants and the way they get to know each other and support each other,” a third agreed. “Pitting them against each other from the get-go (including singling out the three ‘leaders’) with barely even any intros is not the way to do things.”

MasterChef Back to Win cast 2025

This year’s Back to Win contestants. Photo: Ten
“Service challenges are always my least fave, so not a great start for me,” someone else said.

Many said it was too much pressure for the first episode, adding that Laura “didn’t know most of her crew members’ names”.

Others defended the episode, with one user writing, “What do you expect? The contestants have already appeared on MasterChef, and some have participated multiple times. Most of them have likely gained professional cooking skills since their last appearance, and in my opinion, they can no longer be considered home cooks, which I believe is what MasterChef was originally designed for.

“At this point, it seems like the show is just trying to generate views with past contestants and create drama.”

One Instagram user also shared their thoughts, writing, “MasterChef is one of the few shows that can get me watching commercial TV – I realised tonight that I haven’t watch TV for months. But I never miss an episode of MasterChef… Love seeing lots of my favourites back on TV.”

What do you think?