Tour de Malakoff: A Dissenting Opinion

Two years ago, I posted Graham Stuart Thomas' glowing description of the Tour de Malakoff blossom.  He described almost ecstatically how the blooms shift in color from day to day:

Imagine my surprise to read Jack Harkness' opinion of the very same bush:

If you like to grow an arching shrub of wayward disposition and revolting colour, this is the one for you.  At least it is different from anything else.  Surely this is a Centifolia of Gallica descent, inheriting the crazy Gallica colours; it starts magenta, changes down to mauve pink, and finally meets its doom all greyed over in a proper spirit of ashes to ashes. I have written off Malakoff from my future itineraries; it must be an extraordinary place on this evidence.  This rose came form Soupert & Notting of the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg in 1856.