Bare Essentuals "Star Treatment" review

Everyone is going cuckoo for rose gold, bronze and olive greens lately. Along 
with the success of Urban Decay's "Naked Palette" earth and fleshtone with a 
hint of pearl or shimmer are definitely on peoples radar.
For Christmas I got a giftcard and logged onto Sephora and got to shopping. 
There were quite a few palettes on sale, plus I had a code for an extra 20% off. 
My steal of the month was the "Star Treatment" palette from Bare Essentuals, 
originally $35 but after discounts was $20!
The palette comes with 8 highly pigmented metallic earth tones, as well as a 
mini version of Bare Essentuals "Prime Time" primer.
Let's talk about the primer. I am used to creamier eye primers like "Aquatique" 
from Lancome and "Painterly" from MAC. "Prime Time" is more of a gel consistency 
and gives more of a sheer coverage to the lids. I have darker lids that need to 
be evened out, so the sheerty (yes, you read that right!) my first gripe. 
My second gripe is how shadows apply and do not move! Now, I'm sure you're 
thinking, "Duh, that's the point". Sorry sis, but unless you are only applying 
one color, this is a fail. A big fail. Mama needs time to blend her shadows! 
This is not any paint by numbers bullshit!
You know what else is bullshit? The texture of the shadows. The lighter shades 
are really scaly and powdery. My eyelid looked like a prune. Couple that with 
the irritation of not being able to blend without working up a sweat is leading 
me into negative Nancy territory. Now I'm beginning to think there was a reason 
this was put on deep discount.
Ugh I need to eat some protein, just remembering this makes me low energy!

After applying Kudos, a light green taupe shade , all over the lid, I applied a 
bit of the chocolate shade, Ritzy, into the crease. This is where the blending 
show was shut down. I tried to take the rose-gold shade, Bragging Rights, and 
apply to the center of the lid and blend into the crease. Didn't happen how I 
hoped. This is the beginnings of the prune. 

I was able to correct it by using the onyx shade, since the majority of the 
prune action was on the lid near the lashline.

For the 5th and final time, I attempted to blend the shadows. This time I wised 
up and used a clean cheek brush and went to town on my eyes and to my surprise I 
was able to get something resembling decent makeup. Shock. 
Bottom line, I don't think it's the shadows themselves to blame for how they 
look, apply and blend, it's that damn Prime Time. Prime Time, you need to check 
yo'self!

The overall look came out lovely with a bit of highlight, coral blush and lips. 
This is a definite go to look, once I can figure out an appropriate shadow base 
that is. It normally takes me 5 minutes to do my eye shadow. This took about 20, 
no shade!

Grade with Prime Time primer: D
Grade without Prime Time Primer: B