Reddit's Dream Cast For MasterChef Season 12 Is Everything Fans Want

In a typical season of "MasterChef," 20 amateur cooks compete in various challenges for the coveted title and a grand prize of $250,000 (via FOX). This past season (Season 11), they switched up the format slightly, which fans didn't love. However, there's another surprise in store for Season 12. Although the judging panel of Gordon Ramsay, Aarón Sánchez, and Joe Bastianich was already intimidating enough, the show turned up the heat a bit for Season 11 when they brought in all-star guest judges like Emeril Lagasse and Masaharu Morimoto.

This year, the show is changing up the format once again and for the first time ever, past contestants of the show will have their shot at redemption (via Parade). This historic season will premiere on FOX on Wednesday, May 25, 2022 at 8/7c. The show has not announced the all-star lineup yet, but they did release a trailer for Season 12 that shows some of the contestants. And as we've come to expect of Reddit, one user did some detective work and put together who they think the top 20 cast is based on the preview, and fans hope that they got it right.

In the preview for Season 12 of "MasterChef," it's revealed that there will be contestants to represent every season of the show, going all the way back to Season 1 (via YouTube). The 40-second clip gives a few glimpses of the contestants for the season, and one Redditor, who is clearly an avid watcher of the show, was able to throw out an educated guess of the top 20 that will compete. The top of the post is a grid of the potential contestants' headshots (pictured above), and their names are listed further down the thread for reference.

Redditors on the thread were overall pleased with the lineup, with a few people chiming in about who should be included. "I would say all in all it's a pretty likable cast. No one too villain-y like in Hell's Kitchen all stars," said one Redditor. "I'm actually really excited Bri and Fred get to compete together again!! I remember they were close buds on their season," commented @happinessisawarmspud. 

The comments on the thread are overall positive, though a couple people felt their favorite contestants were overlooked. "No disrespect to Alejandro but Autumn or Suu would have been much better returnees over him," said one user. Keep in mind that although the author of this post said they "practically dissected and examined the three previews," this is just a guess until the lineup is revealed on Wednesday, May 25.