It never fails, noodles. When Cat looks good, the show looks good. And Ms. Deeley was looking lovely in her blue frock last night, thus the kids for the most part turned it out. Everyone had at least one good to great dance, and the top three couples were all two for two. Lots of killer and little filler in this show, so let’s continue that trend in this here recap, shall we?
Once and Again
Ellenore/Ryan
Lindy Hop/Carla Heiney (I’ve Got to Be a Rug Cutter/Boilermaker Jazz Band) - These two did not take a wrong step last night. Lindy Hop is not my favorite dance for this show. It’s so fast, so intricate, so demanding, that the kids always seem to wind up looking a little sloppy. Very difficult to master so quickly, I would imagine. They did really, really well with all the insane lifts and throws. The actual dancing and connecting steps was done with great energy and verve, although to me it looked a little sloppy in places. But overall, they charmed. I adored the costumes until Ellenore started really twirling around and her skirt swirled up to reveal enormous, white granny panties (which would make an unfortunate return in Noelle/Russell’s contemporary routine). Oh, crack whores. They had a pretty good run last night, actually. But it sure started of rocky, kiddies. Anyway, this was a fun, forgettable first dance. Ellenore is as cute as a basketful of puppies.
Broadway/Spencer Liff (Razzle Dazzle/Chicago Cast Recording) – Spencer Liff is schooling Tasty on how Broadway should be done! I loved this piece more than my new purple pumps. Ellenore is amazing, kittens. I'm totally with Shankdaddy. When she whipped that leg down into a perfectly turned out first position? What? Ryan was really good here, too. He totally got the character and his technique was very, very solid. This was extremely stylized movement and he nailed it. Well done, all the way round. These two were my top couple of the night by a pretty wide margin.
Jakob/Ashleigh
Family, let me take a minute to sincerely give props to the Fug Princess. FP came to work last night. I don’t think she can ever make me fall in love with her, but credit where credit is due. She turned it out.
Lyrical Jazz/Sonya (Time Flies/Lykke Li) – Jakob is just perfection, darlings. From the leap in second to the exquisite toe point to the beautiful lifts, the extension, the ridiculous control. He’s heaven. And FP was more beautiful here than I’ve seen her in the past. Some of those positions in the lifts were quite difficult to hold. And her toe point was impressive. There was one section where she was in a hold, legs around Jakob’s waist and she did a back bend to the floor and a walk over out of the lift that was so graceful and effortless. They were really gorgeous, despite the tight purple pants.
Cha Cha/Jean Marc and France (Cha Cha Heels [Ralph Rosario Radio Edit] Rosabel feat. Jeanie Tracy) – Fug Princess owned this piece. She was gorgeous from beginning to end. Really down into the floor, great feet and ankles. The hips were sexy and sensual. She even managed to tone down the crazy ballroom faces about a million degrees from where they were during her first audition round. Remember, when she resembled Jim Carrey in The Mask? Aww, kittens. So much learning, so much growing. And she really was a help to Jakob here. He was good, but there was definitely a little contemporary creep happening. Maybe a little bit more down into the floor. Pulling up is such a hard habit for classically trained dancers to break. But he totally had the sexy swagger, which I worried a little bit about for him. He was hot and manly and . . . yeah, I liked it. Strangé, kids. You worked it out.
One Part Be My Lover, One Part Go Away
Kathryn/Legacy
Legacy should be shirtless all the time. He was born to be nekkid, noodles. Maybe bare chested-ness would have helped in the Viennese Waltz because it was kind of tired.
Jazz/Sonya (So Deep/Hot Chip) – Shirtless Legacy. Oh, yeah, and also some other stuff happened which was all kinds of fabulous. Kathryn and her legs that go on forever and some pretty nifty incorporation of Legacy’s B-Boy moves into this dance, and damn that man is fine. This was a sexy little number right here. These two have mad chemistry. I totally bought that they were lustily enamored of each other and couldn’t keep their hands to themselves. And the dancing was first rate. Unca Nigel pointed out the fantastic musicality, really from the pair of them. And I didn’t know that Kathryn could be such an athletic, almost muscular kind of dancer. This piece rocked.
Viennese Waltz/Jean Marc and France (Your Guardian Angel/Red Jumpsuit Apparatus) – Jean Marc frustrates me so, noodles! You just never know when is the next time you’ll get a Dances with Disabled Daughters out of him. Look, kiddies, we all know this was distinctly not good. Legacy’s carriage was atrocious. His shoulders were tight and up around his ears. The posture was all wrong. The feet were a horror show. There was no flow across the floor. Yuck. Now I will picture him shirtless to wipe the bad taste away. Ahhhh. All better. Kathryn gave it the old college try and many of her lines were spectacular, but Legacy . . . y’all he was just bad. I'm glad that he was moved by his own performance, but keep those tears and give me some good dancing.
Noelle/Russell
Darlings, I expect Russell to get through even if he and Noelle find their way to B3 again, and when that happens, I expect him to get a great partner. We’ll get to my longed for Top 10 week pairings anon. Just wanted to put that out there in the universe and let it marinate.
Samba/Tony and Melanie (Hips Don’t Lie/Shakira) – Was it only three seasons ago that the show was giving us Danny/Lacey choreographed by Dmitri in the best samba of all time? Kittens, I weep for days gone by. That was a hot mess up there on that stage. Noelle developed a serious case of white girl. So stiff. So little hip action. So lost and the very antithesis of sexy. Russell was better, but it really was kind of overall bad. I loved, as usual, Mary calling out all the technical aspects of the dance and giving Tony and Melanie props for their fancy choreo. Too bad these two couldn’t live up to it.
Contemporary/Tyce (A Case of You/Diana Krall) – Tasty had me with the song before the kids even danced a step. I frikkin’ love this song, kittens. As for the dance, well, that had me with that little bit of rehearsal footage. And the full on performance was sublime. Russell is just divine, y’all. The entire dance he had an airy quality to his leaps and spins and he was grounded and strong in his transition moves and in the lifts. I have to take a moment to lust appreciate. The kid is an artist. And he and Noelle finally, finally felt connected to each other, to the dance, to the music. Listen, Noelle is never gonna set the world on fire as a dancer. She doesn’t have that thing that makes you pay attention to her. But she’s a darn fine little dancer. Kind of like Randee fat face from last season. Normally, she’s a distraction from the glory that is Russell in every routine. But this time, she managed to be a complement. Some lovely, grounded work from her. This might not have been the best piece of the night, but it was my favorite. I felt it.
One Way Ticket to Loserville
Nathan/Mollee
Family, I refuse with the Can Can. I hope you understand. If you don’t, there are tons of other blogs out there. My blog is concerned with serious efforts at dancing, not kids playing around in their church rec room, no matter how many pirouettes a la seconde they can do. Also, is Lil Miss New Booty hurt? Suck it up, Soldier. Donyelle’s whole toe was falling off. By the end of S2, Natalie was practically wearing an orthopedic brace. Whippersnappers. Dancer used to be made of sterner stuff in my day.
Hip Hop/Jamal Sims (Ring-A-Ling/Black Eyed Peas) – Jamal Sims is on notice. There was much buzz and rejoicing out in the SYTYCD nation when it was announced that this fool would be joining the US version of this show. So far, to say he’s under whelmed would be a humongous understatement. The sad part, noodles, is that Nathan was tearing it up in that sorry ass number. He murdered that choreography. That MJ spin all up on his toes? That shit is not even possible. And it didn’t even matter. I hated every second of that routine. The gimmicky choreography just stuck in my craw. And the obnoxious twit sucked like a Hoover. Why won’t she go home?
Karen/Victor
AKA Cannon fodder. AKA redshirts. AKA sacrificial lambs. Take your pick, darlings. What I’m saying is, I fully expect these two to go home tonight.
Argentine Tango/Tony and Melanie (Montserrat/Orquesta del Plata) – Karen served in that piece. She was fierce. Beautiful legs. Beautiful lines. Intensity and passion. Victor looked like he needed to use the potty. Y’all, the posture. It killed me. Why was he so hunched over like that with his booty all poked out? Eewww. The choreography was nice, not as great but very good, and the look was killer. Victor just straight up didn’t deliver. So disappointing, kiddies.
Hip Hop/LaurieAnn (Moving Mountains/Usher) – BoomKat spooned up a heaping helping of crap right here. That was a horrible routine. Even if Victor and Karen had danced it flawlessly, the routine would’ve been pretty terrible. Unfortunately for them, they didn’t even dance it well. They were off the whole time – out of synch with each other; out of time with the music; just off. But Victor, once again, was egregiously bad. He was so, so bad. I could barely concentrate on Karen, who I think was doing a little bit better, because he completely pulled my focus with his loose, lackadaisical, off tempo dancing. Bleagh, I hated it.
The Lonliest Number
I fully expect to find Victor and Karen and Mollee and Nathan as two of our three B3 couples. The third denizen is a toss up between Kathryn/Legacy and Noelle/Russell. I think Noelle/Russell are slightly more likely to end up B3 because America is a sucker for crocodile tears . . . and nekkid hotties. Out of that B3, y’all know that the Tween Terrors would be my pick to go home, but I find it hard to imagine how Victor and Karen escape the boot again. Nigel and Shankdaddy might, just might, throw Noelle off in lieu of Karen because they see the start thing with her.
Who’s Got Next?
OK, have I said too much? Never, darlings. We are all family here. So here's who I'd like to see as new partners once top 10 week rolls around, assuming Victor and Karen get the boot:
Jakob/Ellenore: Heaven. Please put them together and give them a good Wade Jazz.
Russell/Kathryn: After Ellenore, she's the next strongest girl. I think they could do very well together. Maybe bring Maria Torres back and do another latin jazz, something like what Neil/Lacey got once upon a time. They could also do well with Broadway.
Legacy/Mollee: I don't want to see her in anything, but if she does scrape through, these two might actually do well together. Legacy is the oldest competitor left in the competition and he doesn't seem the goofy, laugh a minute type. He might provide her a little heft. That said, I want this trick to go home anyway, so I'd love it if they got put together and given something like the Quickstep.
Ryan/Noelle: Just because they would never put Ryan together with FP and Ryan is a full grown man. Putting him together with Mollee just would not work on any level. Creepy. And I want Kathryn and Ellenore for others, so give him Noelle. She's a serviceable partner, nothing special, but she won't bring him down. He's a strong partner, so maybe they give her a chance to redeem herself with a latin dance with someone who actually knows what he's doing.
Nathan/FP: By default. I think this would be a horrible pairing. Nathan Ellenore would serve him much better. But I'm over him and want him to go home, thus, this pairing will do just fine. What would they do? Who cares? Give them Bollywood or some other non-dance, since that's all he seems to pull.
Also, Idol!!!!! I hated seeing Judge #4 in the chair that she usurped from Paula, but dammit if they haven't sucked me back in already. Idol!!!
Wednesday, November 25, 2009
American Idol S9 Extra Bitches
They got me again. I hated seeing Judge #4 in the chair that she usurped from Paula, but damn it. It's almost back. And some fool is tearing the house down on a classic song of death, Feelin' Good. Somewhere, Leslie Hunt is smiling and nodding in approval.
I cannot WAIT! Bitches.
IIIIDDDOOOOLLLL!!!!!
We now return you to your regularly scheduled SYTYCD.
I cannot WAIT! Bitches.
IIIIDDDOOOOLLLL!!!!!
We now return you to your regularly scheduled SYTYCD.
Friday, November 20, 2009
SYTYCD S6 Finals Ep6 and 7 The Whole Kit and Caboodle
I’m recapping both performance night and results show night in one fell swoop, kittens. Took me a while to recover from being floored by the sight of shirtless Legacy. Seriously, darlings. Shirtless Legacy. DAMN! And just when I thought I’d recovered enough, I was traumatized by Cat’s attempt to turn herself into a mime or a denizen of Marie Antoinette’s court last night. What was with the white on white on white make up during the results show? The poor girl looked like she’d fallen head first into the camera monkeys’ coke stores and then wrapped herself in a couple of the yellowed ends of a craft services table cloth, pinned a rhinestone novelty tie under her neck, and wandered out onto the stage all dazed and confused.
For all that happened this week, nothing much happened, right? We lost two people who were pretty sure bets not to make top 10. Mollee and Nathan continued to suck the life out of me with their combined ability to just really be nasty pieces of work. Jakob continued being a slightly built ball of fantasticism. Who knows all the dance moves to ‘NSync’s Bye Bye Bye which is Made. Of. Awesome! But I had a hard time summoning up either enthusiasm or outrage over this week’s installment of our ongoing dance world soap opera. Everything was just uniformly good. Even Mollee/Nathan, who were bad, were bad because they were just OK. I guess we’ll just dive in and separate the Kit from the Caboodle.
Performance night: Kit
Cat looked adorable. Like a gorgeous, foil wrapped baked potato. That’s always a sure fire sign that the performances are going to be solid. And Mary and Shankdaddy were adorable as a teen and a tot respectively.
Russell/Noelle/Foxtrot/Eddie Simon (Baby [You’ve Got What It Takes]/Michael Buble) – Awww, Russell was so cute and skinny and he couldn’t sing at all. Cutest thing ever. I don’t care about Noelle at all. Kiddies, Russell getting the Foxtrot again was some bullshit. I did enjoy the introduction of yet another new choreographer. And admittedly, Noelle and Russell did very well with this. There was a particularly lovely turn sequence from Russell, some nice lifts, and Noelle had gorgeous lines. The rise and fall was not quite where it needed to be; the closed hold work could’ve been a little bit cleaner; and Russell’s shoulders were still a little stiff. But overall, that was spunky fun! And Russell and Noelle have some really good chemistry cooking, too. And you know how much I love when Mary drops the ballroom knowledge. Tracking with her feet. Hee. I don’t even know what that means, but I liked it.
Channing/Victor/Jazz/Tyce (Blackbird/Bobby McFerrin) – I don’t care about them, so I don’t care to recap who they were as kids. But I do love Tasty doing jazz. Noodles, I found this routine substantially more awesome than the judges did. The staging was clever. I enjoyed Bobby McFerrin’s version of this song almost enough to forgive him for Don’t Worry, Be Happy. And Tasty really brought an interesting quality of movement to the piece that was quietly evocative of our winged friends without being a caricature of hooting and squawking. At the same time, Channing and Victor both gave their most solid performances of the entire season. They were nicely synchronized on that series of turns and jumps. They got the rhythmical, syncopated movements just down pat. Darlings, I even felt they brought good performance quality, a feat which neither of them had quite mastered previously. And yes, it continues to be sad for us all that Channing doesn’t know how to do lifts. But on the whole, they rocked about as hard as these two can. And Tasty put his foot in that choreography. I’ll take it.
Ellenore/Ryan/Contemporary/Travis Wall (Your Ex-Lover’s Dead/Star) – Travis Wall!!!! Mmmmhmmm. Kittens, we have some perplexing questions to deal with from this pre-rehearsal footage. Why is Travis Wall all tatted up like a San Quentin inmate? Why was baby Ellenore wearing a full face of make up? Why is Ryan so ceaselessly uninteresting? Good questions all. Will we ever know the answers? Who knows, darlings? Who knows? As for the dance, it was money. Travis is turning into one of the best and most reliable choreographers this show has ever had. I don’t think he’s turned out a clunker of a piece yet, a feat which even the likes of Mia and Wade never accomplished. I don’t think this piece was Travis’ best work. But it was quietly beautiful. And Ellenore was amazing in it. Her legs and her lines and her fluidity, it was all so, so smashing. Ryan was good here, too. He really impressed me. They had lovely side by side work where they really communicated a sense of longing and connection and a whole ocean of back story solely through movements. They weren’t even looking at each other and yet you could tell that all of their attention and focus was trained on one another. Outstanding work by these two and deservedly praised.
Kathryn/Legacy/Paso Doble/Tony Meredith (Pursuit/Ka – Cirque du Soleil Cast Recording) – Usually, I dislike Tony without Melanie. He tends to get a touch too cutesy and trick heavy. But not tonight. Oh, no, kittens. Tonight, Tony brought his A game. And he gave us shirtless Legacy to which I can only say a hearty Hell Yeah! Join that navy, indeed. Shankdaddy always knows just how to put it right. But there’s more than just lust talking, noodles. These kids danced the hell out of that Paso. I think it might be my favorite Paso ever on this show. Legacy had astounding carriage and presence. And his feet pointed all the way through the pinky toe in some of those lifts? What? And Kathryn was magnificent. My god! She was sharp and fiery; smoldering might be an accurate description. Y’all, they destroyed that piece. Yes, they were a little off on the final lift sequence and pose, but I so did not care. They did so much better than they had any right to. I would like to see that again and again, wouldn’t you? Kathryn and Legacy are by far my favorite couple of the season, the only partnership with real chemistry that actually works well together (although Noelle/Russell is shaping up nicely). And who would’ve ever thought that? Go on with your bad selves. The Breaker and the High Talker were my couple of the night.
Performance night: Caboodle
Ashleigh/Jakob/Hip Hop/NappyTab (Whatcha Say/Jason Derulo) – Kittens, here’s a lesson in how distance from an event can subtly change our perceptions of what actually occurred because had I crafted this little recap directly after Tuesday’s performance show, this would’ve made my Kit list. I did not have high hopes for this pairing + hip hop, having witnessed the Dave Scott group dance last week. The two steps Dave let Ashley do she flubbed horribly, and I’m sorry, kiddies, you all know my Jakob love knows no limits, but his little dance battle with Legacy was embarrassing for him. He’s just too slight, too ethereal to be believable as a bad ass hip hop boy. So you can imagine that for the first time in a very, very long time, I was actually glad that a dancer I liked pulled NappyTab and I was praying for them to bring that watered down, non-hip hop pabulum that they do so well. Which, of course, they did. But why did it have to be a warmed over revision of Mark and Chelsie’s Bleeding Love (complete with the head thrashing that is the one moment that I flat out abhor in that number) and choreographed to a song which samples Imogen Heap’s Hide and Seek, a song that Mia Michaels and the S2 Top 6 just completely own forever and for all time on this show? What I’m saying is that the routine kind of sucked ass and Jakob and the Fug Princess were kind of not very good in it. They tried so hard to hit hard and to bring the hip hop flava that they went way, way, way over the top into cartoon character land. Especially FP. The angst faces! Darlings, kill me now. And the text messages on the screen? Why? Just Why? It all felt cheesy and inauthentic and like a total exercise in trying to hard. And my love for Jakob almost made me swallow that nasty concoction whole on Tuesday night. But in the cold light of day, I have to give a spanking to my dear, crazily talented boy. It wasn’t good. But hey, his Bye Bye Bye was awesome. There’s that.
Karen/Kevin/Broadway/Spencer Liff (If My Friends Could See Me Now/Christina Applegate-Sweet Charity Cast Recording) – So just to see if I’ve got this straight, the untrained salsa dancer studied Graham technique and the untrained krumper went to the Boston Arts Academy? Yeah, the show can move it all the way to the left with this untrained dancer hooha. I got your number. Like the last new Broadway choreographer, this new Broadway choreographer is a tenfold improvement over Tasty. See, kiddies. You can choreograph routines from Fosse shows that don’t wind up pitiful homages to Fosse. It’s not that complicated. Kevin is such a frustrating dancer because every now and again, he will pull off a move that takes your breath away. He busted out a beautiful, clean, controlled triple turn in that routine. And his kicks continue to be a revelation. But at the same time, he always looks like he’s going in front of a firing squad. Shoulders up around the ears indeed. In truth, the both of them were severely lacking in performance quality in this piece. They had all the steps down, but there was no oomph behind them. Everything needed to be bigger, broader, more pitched to the rafters and to the back of the house. They need to sell me more on the crazy joy of landing “Pow! Right in a pot of jam.” And I just didn’t feel it from them. It was a serviceable performance, but far from great. They looked like understudies up there.
Mollee and Nathan/Pop Jazz/LaurieAnn Gibson (Bad Romance/Lady Gaga) – These two are now and forever in the Caboodle section. Nathan is lost to me now. It’s like that gorgeous creature I saw in S5 auditions was just a mirage. I don’t know who this is, but whoever it is, he’s an ass. And he’s not all that as a dancer. (BTW, show. These kids don’t need “When I was young” stories. They are still infants) I actually wish BoomKat had given it to these annoying twats like I know she can. I’ve seen her break grown men and world weary whores like Aubrey O’Day on Diddy’s shows. I know she could have messed these kids up if she’d really cared to. And I, for one, would have loved it. Instead, she gave me whack ass remarks about hairs on her forearm (perhaps they escaped from her head?) and weaksauce choreography. And it was still a train wreck. I don’t know what the judges were watching, darlings, because what I saw was an unsynchronized mess of bodies in motion. And there was no feeling, no passion, no emotion, no connection to either the music or to each other. I could’ve been watching two wind up dolls out there. It was better than last week, I guess, but it could’ve hardly been worse, darlings. I really have no patience for this pair anymore. The sooner they both get sent packing, the better.
Results Night: Kit
Group Dance/Pop Jazz/Wade Robson (Aha!/Imogen Heap) – Russell turned it out again. I am loving this kid more and more. Ellenore, Jakob and Nathan were also beasts on that dance floor. The routine was quirky, fun and vaguely Mia-esque. Wade seems to be broadening his dance vocabulary. Which is a good and necessary thing. Imogen Heap needs to be given a rest on this show. I’m just saying. It was overall enjoyable, but Dave Scott’s piece last week was better. I do appreciate how Shankdaddy always remembers to shout out (or chastise) the choreographers, because as we soon came to find out with the solos, this show would be fuck all without them.
And that’s it for the kit, I’m afraid, kiddies. This week’s results show night was not the show's finest hour.
Results Night: Caboodle
Cat’s scary, scary fright make up. She looked like an undead, doily wrapped, sparkly short tie wearing crazy person. As Cat’s fashion goes, so goes the SYTYCD nation.
The judge babble. Bring back the guest judges. For the love of Debbie! I almost cried when I saw Miss Debbie Allen in the Dizzy Feet package. Why must we be punished for Paula’s whims, kittens? She was probably on her way walking to the studio when she got distracted by a shiny bottle cap. Who knows when she’ll ever make it to set? In the meantime, give me my damn guest judge because this crew is staler than three day old bread.
Newsflash: Wardrobe hos back on the crack. Trannys still angry. Film at 11:00. Noodles, what in the holy hell were these children wearing on results show night? Fug Princess is ugly enough without the hideous costuming. Who thought it was appropriate to give Victor Marcel waves? Not one, but two B3 dancers in shiny pleather leggings? And cultural differences be damned, every single person in that Bollywood number had on too much gold. I said it. What? You know, it’s kind of comforting to have the crack whores and trannys to kick around again. Aww, I’ve missed them, kittens.
Nakul Dev Mahajan and NDM Bollywood Dance Productions. I have enjoyed Nakul on many, many occasions. In general, the addition of Bollywood to the SYTYCDance pantheon has been a good thing. But that routine we saw on Wednesday night was a hot mess, no? I’ve seen my drunk uncles do that in the backyard after an afternoon spent in the sun playing dominoes and drinking too much MD 20/20. I don’t know if there were just too many of them out there or the choreography was just bad, but that looked sloppy, sloppy, seven ways sloppy. Tighten it up next time, Indian people. You have to rep harder than that.
Solos. Any of them. All of them. The contemporary kids were a festival of reaching out plaintively, flinging hair, throwing back flips and every other non-dance trick in the vilest book of all time. I wanted to hold them all close just so I could vomit down their backs. (Thank you, Sue Sylvester. A light unto us all) Karen did her best to keep up with the contempo kids in the Hair Flinging Nightmare Sweepstakes of America. And Kevin was boring. And the judges just lied to all of them, Mollee and Nathan most especially. They’ll never grow if people keep telling them their shit doesn’t stink. Noodles, I’m exhausted by that whole crew. They could’ve all gone home last night, and taken FP with them while they were at it. And wouldn’t we have been left with a much more enjoyable show if they had?
Head ‘em Up, Move ‘em Out
So Kevin and Channing are out. Both of them underperformed tremendously while on the show. I think in the real world they could both have decent careers, Kevin probably more so than Channing, who suffers from extreme personality deficit. Neither of them was I sorry to see go home, although I do lament that the judges didn’t take the opportunity to boot the odious Mollee when they had the chance. And now I think I’ll have to start calling her The Odious Mollee all the time, kiddies. She’s so, so stank. Maybe next week, Brian Friedman will come back in his crazier persona and create one of his out there routines which only I ever seem to like and she and Nathan will hit B3 again, the judges will finally realize that all of America hates her and that she is an albatross around the neck of their potential golden boy Nathan and send her silly ass home. Look how Noelle has blossomed away from her sphere of influence. A girl can dream, can’t she?
For all that happened this week, nothing much happened, right? We lost two people who were pretty sure bets not to make top 10. Mollee and Nathan continued to suck the life out of me with their combined ability to just really be nasty pieces of work. Jakob continued being a slightly built ball of fantasticism. Who knows all the dance moves to ‘NSync’s Bye Bye Bye which is Made. Of. Awesome! But I had a hard time summoning up either enthusiasm or outrage over this week’s installment of our ongoing dance world soap opera. Everything was just uniformly good. Even Mollee/Nathan, who were bad, were bad because they were just OK. I guess we’ll just dive in and separate the Kit from the Caboodle.
Performance night: Kit
Cat looked adorable. Like a gorgeous, foil wrapped baked potato. That’s always a sure fire sign that the performances are going to be solid. And Mary and Shankdaddy were adorable as a teen and a tot respectively.
Russell/Noelle/Foxtrot/Eddie Simon (Baby [You’ve Got What It Takes]/Michael Buble) – Awww, Russell was so cute and skinny and he couldn’t sing at all. Cutest thing ever. I don’t care about Noelle at all. Kiddies, Russell getting the Foxtrot again was some bullshit. I did enjoy the introduction of yet another new choreographer. And admittedly, Noelle and Russell did very well with this. There was a particularly lovely turn sequence from Russell, some nice lifts, and Noelle had gorgeous lines. The rise and fall was not quite where it needed to be; the closed hold work could’ve been a little bit cleaner; and Russell’s shoulders were still a little stiff. But overall, that was spunky fun! And Russell and Noelle have some really good chemistry cooking, too. And you know how much I love when Mary drops the ballroom knowledge. Tracking with her feet. Hee. I don’t even know what that means, but I liked it.
Channing/Victor/Jazz/Tyce (Blackbird/Bobby McFerrin) – I don’t care about them, so I don’t care to recap who they were as kids. But I do love Tasty doing jazz. Noodles, I found this routine substantially more awesome than the judges did. The staging was clever. I enjoyed Bobby McFerrin’s version of this song almost enough to forgive him for Don’t Worry, Be Happy. And Tasty really brought an interesting quality of movement to the piece that was quietly evocative of our winged friends without being a caricature of hooting and squawking. At the same time, Channing and Victor both gave their most solid performances of the entire season. They were nicely synchronized on that series of turns and jumps. They got the rhythmical, syncopated movements just down pat. Darlings, I even felt they brought good performance quality, a feat which neither of them had quite mastered previously. And yes, it continues to be sad for us all that Channing doesn’t know how to do lifts. But on the whole, they rocked about as hard as these two can. And Tasty put his foot in that choreography. I’ll take it.
Ellenore/Ryan/Contemporary/Travis Wall (Your Ex-Lover’s Dead/Star) – Travis Wall!!!! Mmmmhmmm. Kittens, we have some perplexing questions to deal with from this pre-rehearsal footage. Why is Travis Wall all tatted up like a San Quentin inmate? Why was baby Ellenore wearing a full face of make up? Why is Ryan so ceaselessly uninteresting? Good questions all. Will we ever know the answers? Who knows, darlings? Who knows? As for the dance, it was money. Travis is turning into one of the best and most reliable choreographers this show has ever had. I don’t think he’s turned out a clunker of a piece yet, a feat which even the likes of Mia and Wade never accomplished. I don’t think this piece was Travis’ best work. But it was quietly beautiful. And Ellenore was amazing in it. Her legs and her lines and her fluidity, it was all so, so smashing. Ryan was good here, too. He really impressed me. They had lovely side by side work where they really communicated a sense of longing and connection and a whole ocean of back story solely through movements. They weren’t even looking at each other and yet you could tell that all of their attention and focus was trained on one another. Outstanding work by these two and deservedly praised.
Kathryn/Legacy/Paso Doble/Tony Meredith (Pursuit/Ka – Cirque du Soleil Cast Recording) – Usually, I dislike Tony without Melanie. He tends to get a touch too cutesy and trick heavy. But not tonight. Oh, no, kittens. Tonight, Tony brought his A game. And he gave us shirtless Legacy to which I can only say a hearty Hell Yeah! Join that navy, indeed. Shankdaddy always knows just how to put it right. But there’s more than just lust talking, noodles. These kids danced the hell out of that Paso. I think it might be my favorite Paso ever on this show. Legacy had astounding carriage and presence. And his feet pointed all the way through the pinky toe in some of those lifts? What? And Kathryn was magnificent. My god! She was sharp and fiery; smoldering might be an accurate description. Y’all, they destroyed that piece. Yes, they were a little off on the final lift sequence and pose, but I so did not care. They did so much better than they had any right to. I would like to see that again and again, wouldn’t you? Kathryn and Legacy are by far my favorite couple of the season, the only partnership with real chemistry that actually works well together (although Noelle/Russell is shaping up nicely). And who would’ve ever thought that? Go on with your bad selves. The Breaker and the High Talker were my couple of the night.
Performance night: Caboodle
Ashleigh/Jakob/Hip Hop/NappyTab (Whatcha Say/Jason Derulo) – Kittens, here’s a lesson in how distance from an event can subtly change our perceptions of what actually occurred because had I crafted this little recap directly after Tuesday’s performance show, this would’ve made my Kit list. I did not have high hopes for this pairing + hip hop, having witnessed the Dave Scott group dance last week. The two steps Dave let Ashley do she flubbed horribly, and I’m sorry, kiddies, you all know my Jakob love knows no limits, but his little dance battle with Legacy was embarrassing for him. He’s just too slight, too ethereal to be believable as a bad ass hip hop boy. So you can imagine that for the first time in a very, very long time, I was actually glad that a dancer I liked pulled NappyTab and I was praying for them to bring that watered down, non-hip hop pabulum that they do so well. Which, of course, they did. But why did it have to be a warmed over revision of Mark and Chelsie’s Bleeding Love (complete with the head thrashing that is the one moment that I flat out abhor in that number) and choreographed to a song which samples Imogen Heap’s Hide and Seek, a song that Mia Michaels and the S2 Top 6 just completely own forever and for all time on this show? What I’m saying is that the routine kind of sucked ass and Jakob and the Fug Princess were kind of not very good in it. They tried so hard to hit hard and to bring the hip hop flava that they went way, way, way over the top into cartoon character land. Especially FP. The angst faces! Darlings, kill me now. And the text messages on the screen? Why? Just Why? It all felt cheesy and inauthentic and like a total exercise in trying to hard. And my love for Jakob almost made me swallow that nasty concoction whole on Tuesday night. But in the cold light of day, I have to give a spanking to my dear, crazily talented boy. It wasn’t good. But hey, his Bye Bye Bye was awesome. There’s that.
Karen/Kevin/Broadway/Spencer Liff (If My Friends Could See Me Now/Christina Applegate-Sweet Charity Cast Recording) – So just to see if I’ve got this straight, the untrained salsa dancer studied Graham technique and the untrained krumper went to the Boston Arts Academy? Yeah, the show can move it all the way to the left with this untrained dancer hooha. I got your number. Like the last new Broadway choreographer, this new Broadway choreographer is a tenfold improvement over Tasty. See, kiddies. You can choreograph routines from Fosse shows that don’t wind up pitiful homages to Fosse. It’s not that complicated. Kevin is such a frustrating dancer because every now and again, he will pull off a move that takes your breath away. He busted out a beautiful, clean, controlled triple turn in that routine. And his kicks continue to be a revelation. But at the same time, he always looks like he’s going in front of a firing squad. Shoulders up around the ears indeed. In truth, the both of them were severely lacking in performance quality in this piece. They had all the steps down, but there was no oomph behind them. Everything needed to be bigger, broader, more pitched to the rafters and to the back of the house. They need to sell me more on the crazy joy of landing “Pow! Right in a pot of jam.” And I just didn’t feel it from them. It was a serviceable performance, but far from great. They looked like understudies up there.
Mollee and Nathan/Pop Jazz/LaurieAnn Gibson (Bad Romance/Lady Gaga) – These two are now and forever in the Caboodle section. Nathan is lost to me now. It’s like that gorgeous creature I saw in S5 auditions was just a mirage. I don’t know who this is, but whoever it is, he’s an ass. And he’s not all that as a dancer. (BTW, show. These kids don’t need “When I was young” stories. They are still infants) I actually wish BoomKat had given it to these annoying twats like I know she can. I’ve seen her break grown men and world weary whores like Aubrey O’Day on Diddy’s shows. I know she could have messed these kids up if she’d really cared to. And I, for one, would have loved it. Instead, she gave me whack ass remarks about hairs on her forearm (perhaps they escaped from her head?) and weaksauce choreography. And it was still a train wreck. I don’t know what the judges were watching, darlings, because what I saw was an unsynchronized mess of bodies in motion. And there was no feeling, no passion, no emotion, no connection to either the music or to each other. I could’ve been watching two wind up dolls out there. It was better than last week, I guess, but it could’ve hardly been worse, darlings. I really have no patience for this pair anymore. The sooner they both get sent packing, the better.
Results Night: Kit
Group Dance/Pop Jazz/Wade Robson (Aha!/Imogen Heap) – Russell turned it out again. I am loving this kid more and more. Ellenore, Jakob and Nathan were also beasts on that dance floor. The routine was quirky, fun and vaguely Mia-esque. Wade seems to be broadening his dance vocabulary. Which is a good and necessary thing. Imogen Heap needs to be given a rest on this show. I’m just saying. It was overall enjoyable, but Dave Scott’s piece last week was better. I do appreciate how Shankdaddy always remembers to shout out (or chastise) the choreographers, because as we soon came to find out with the solos, this show would be fuck all without them.
And that’s it for the kit, I’m afraid, kiddies. This week’s results show night was not the show's finest hour.
Results Night: Caboodle
Cat’s scary, scary fright make up. She looked like an undead, doily wrapped, sparkly short tie wearing crazy person. As Cat’s fashion goes, so goes the SYTYCD nation.
The judge babble. Bring back the guest judges. For the love of Debbie! I almost cried when I saw Miss Debbie Allen in the Dizzy Feet package. Why must we be punished for Paula’s whims, kittens? She was probably on her way walking to the studio when she got distracted by a shiny bottle cap. Who knows when she’ll ever make it to set? In the meantime, give me my damn guest judge because this crew is staler than three day old bread.
Newsflash: Wardrobe hos back on the crack. Trannys still angry. Film at 11:00. Noodles, what in the holy hell were these children wearing on results show night? Fug Princess is ugly enough without the hideous costuming. Who thought it was appropriate to give Victor Marcel waves? Not one, but two B3 dancers in shiny pleather leggings? And cultural differences be damned, every single person in that Bollywood number had on too much gold. I said it. What? You know, it’s kind of comforting to have the crack whores and trannys to kick around again. Aww, I’ve missed them, kittens.
Nakul Dev Mahajan and NDM Bollywood Dance Productions. I have enjoyed Nakul on many, many occasions. In general, the addition of Bollywood to the SYTYCDance pantheon has been a good thing. But that routine we saw on Wednesday night was a hot mess, no? I’ve seen my drunk uncles do that in the backyard after an afternoon spent in the sun playing dominoes and drinking too much MD 20/20. I don’t know if there were just too many of them out there or the choreography was just bad, but that looked sloppy, sloppy, seven ways sloppy. Tighten it up next time, Indian people. You have to rep harder than that.
Solos. Any of them. All of them. The contemporary kids were a festival of reaching out plaintively, flinging hair, throwing back flips and every other non-dance trick in the vilest book of all time. I wanted to hold them all close just so I could vomit down their backs. (Thank you, Sue Sylvester. A light unto us all) Karen did her best to keep up with the contempo kids in the Hair Flinging Nightmare Sweepstakes of America. And Kevin was boring. And the judges just lied to all of them, Mollee and Nathan most especially. They’ll never grow if people keep telling them their shit doesn’t stink. Noodles, I’m exhausted by that whole crew. They could’ve all gone home last night, and taken FP with them while they were at it. And wouldn’t we have been left with a much more enjoyable show if they had?
Head ‘em Up, Move ‘em Out
So Kevin and Channing are out. Both of them underperformed tremendously while on the show. I think in the real world they could both have decent careers, Kevin probably more so than Channing, who suffers from extreme personality deficit. Neither of them was I sorry to see go home, although I do lament that the judges didn’t take the opportunity to boot the odious Mollee when they had the chance. And now I think I’ll have to start calling her The Odious Mollee all the time, kiddies. She’s so, so stank. Maybe next week, Brian Friedman will come back in his crazier persona and create one of his out there routines which only I ever seem to like and she and Nathan will hit B3 again, the judges will finally realize that all of America hates her and that she is an albatross around the neck of their potential golden boy Nathan and send her silly ass home. Look how Noelle has blossomed away from her sphere of influence. A girl can dream, can’t she?
Thursday, November 12, 2009
SYTYCD S6 Finals Ep5 And Send Him On His Way
Poor hula girl and her sailor. Washed away in the tide. Bye, bye Peter. So much for the year of the tapper. Bye, bye Pauline. America is slowly carrying out its campaign of ethnic cleansing for the season. I expect Karen to be the only spot of color among the ladies by the time top 10 rolls around.
Darlings, that was a more entertaining episode than it had any right to be considering that there was little suspense as the two most likely suspects actually wound up going home, the solos were severely underwhelming, the frikkin’ heart hand made its much dreaded return, and the show was mostly filler. (Ailey dancers excepted. Ailey dancers are never filler, noodles) On the positive side, Dave Scott represented with his opening group routine; Nigel cinched up his cranky pants and delivered an ass whooping to the tween terrors; and Kevin lived to dance another day.
I have to take a moment to say something I never thought I’d say. Kittens, you know mama loves her whipping boys. The camera monkeys. Judge #4. Simon Fuller and Cecile Frout-Coutaz. Any member of the Daughtry/Fivehead/Frikkin’ Gokey Heart Hand Memorial Tool Academy. And normally, the crack whores in wardrobe and the trannys in hair and make up would be right in there with that motley crew. But I must, must at this juncture shout out the trannys and crack whores for a job mostly well done. I admit there have been a few wardrobe missteps this season. The skiing bank robbers from last night leap to mind. Sonya’s tutu number for the girls on the very first Meet the Top 20 show. But honestly, things have been soooo much worse. Time was when practically every costume was just Crispy Kreme crazy. This season I can only think of a few that have pinged me as Hell to the Naw and a bunch that I've thought were really appropriate for the dance. Even the Ryan/Ellenore good angel/bad angel costumes, while kind of WTF, were appropriate for the dance. Remember the bad old days of Lacey showing her goodies in a microscopic cheerleading skirt? Comfort trying to krump while dressed as a pan of Jiffy Pop? Donyelle decked out in a big bird yellow dress that made her look like one of those creepy doll shaped toilet paper roll covers in every grandmother's guest bathroom circa 1973? The hunchback and Mischa Chan in goggles and skull caps? Or we could go way back and talk about Ashley dressed as a doll while Dmitri was some kind of pimped out Svengali who'd been attacked by an evil, sleeve stealing gang of street toughs. How I don't miss those days at all! I give credit where credit is due, kiddies. Well done, ‘hos. Well done, trannys. I reserve the right to go back to excoriating you as soon as you get back on the junk.
Moving on, noodles, let’s recap the two minutes of actual dance content we got so I can go have wildly inappropriate dreams about Puck from Glee. Hot damn!
Top 16 Group Dance/Hip Hop/Dave Scott (Warrior, Part 2/Llyod Banks) – I love that Russell was featured so prominently in this routine. Honestly, I loved that dance, at least what I could see of it for the whacked out camera work. Russell and Legacy killed it. The ladies were very nice, especially the floor work. Jakob’s two seconds of duet with Legacy made me fear for the day that he pulls hip hop out of the hat. And it was hilarious how Dave kept Ryan off the stage until the bitter end of the routine, gave him exactly one and a half steps which he managed to execute terribly, and then made him just walk downstage while the rest of the kids closed ranks in front of him to shield the audience from the horrifying sight of him feebly attempting to dance hip hop. Good times.
Ailey – Gorgeous. Enough said. None of these girls could come close to that level of artistry. For the boys, maybe Jakob could get there. If Billy were around, he could also get there. No one else is even in the same solar system. It’s always good to check my enthusiasm for the show by measuring these kids against folks who really know how to dance. Danny Tidwell is the only dancer in the show’s history who wouldn’t suffer by comparison. Reality vs. Reality TV. Watch and learn, kittens. Watch and learn.
Solos
Ellenore (Missed the song) – She has such an interesting movement quality. There were some lovely moments in there as well as some hinky points. The leap was somewhat less than graceful, no? And the heart hands? Automatic party foul.
Ryan (Jump With My Baby/Big Bad Voodoo Daddy) – This was not a bad solo for a ballroom dancer right up until the back handspring back flip at the end. Whoops. Guard your grill, Pretty Boy. Right now it’s the main thing keeping you in this competition.
Pauline (Took the Night/Chelley) – Awful. Hair flinging, booty shaking nightmare. I’m so glad Shankdaddy called out the bad, advanced level, Convention 101 dancing, darlings. And Pauline has so much more than that. I wish she’d done hip hop instead. She might’ve survived.
Peter (The rhythm of his own sweet feet) – Aww, kiddies. You know, this kid is actually a really good tapper. He’s kind of got a Gregory Hines feel to his tap. That was a fun solo. But I agreed with the judges. He’s not a star. Too cheesy.
Karen (Celia Y Tito/Celia Cruz y Tito Puente) – So the score still stands at Ballroom Ladies: 0, SYTYCD Solos: Infinity. I’ve yet to see a ballroom girl do a really great solo on this show. I’m beginning to think it can’t be done.
Kevin (I Question Mark/Wade Robson) – The slow fall back to the floor was sick. But we’ve seen way better on this stage before. I enjoyed that he kind of went for the Michael homage, but overall, it was underwhelming, no?
And then they kicked off the hula girl and her GI. As it should be, kittens. As it should be. You know, I really think the judges were all set to give the “quirky” Ellenore the boot but Pauline danced herself right off of the show. Sad that. Got the girl right but missed the guy. Kevin got saved because Nigel got pissed off by Nathan’s stank attitude. In my wildest dreams, I couldn’t have come up with that. I’m claiming victory for this week, kittens. I know you won’t mind because you love me, right?
Darlings, that was a more entertaining episode than it had any right to be considering that there was little suspense as the two most likely suspects actually wound up going home, the solos were severely underwhelming, the frikkin’ heart hand made its much dreaded return, and the show was mostly filler. (Ailey dancers excepted. Ailey dancers are never filler, noodles) On the positive side, Dave Scott represented with his opening group routine; Nigel cinched up his cranky pants and delivered an ass whooping to the tween terrors; and Kevin lived to dance another day.
I have to take a moment to say something I never thought I’d say. Kittens, you know mama loves her whipping boys. The camera monkeys. Judge #4. Simon Fuller and Cecile Frout-Coutaz. Any member of the Daughtry/Fivehead/Frikkin’ Gokey Heart Hand Memorial Tool Academy. And normally, the crack whores in wardrobe and the trannys in hair and make up would be right in there with that motley crew. But I must, must at this juncture shout out the trannys and crack whores for a job mostly well done. I admit there have been a few wardrobe missteps this season. The skiing bank robbers from last night leap to mind. Sonya’s tutu number for the girls on the very first Meet the Top 20 show. But honestly, things have been soooo much worse. Time was when practically every costume was just Crispy Kreme crazy. This season I can only think of a few that have pinged me as Hell to the Naw and a bunch that I've thought were really appropriate for the dance. Even the Ryan/Ellenore good angel/bad angel costumes, while kind of WTF, were appropriate for the dance. Remember the bad old days of Lacey showing her goodies in a microscopic cheerleading skirt? Comfort trying to krump while dressed as a pan of Jiffy Pop? Donyelle decked out in a big bird yellow dress that made her look like one of those creepy doll shaped toilet paper roll covers in every grandmother's guest bathroom circa 1973? The hunchback and Mischa Chan in goggles and skull caps? Or we could go way back and talk about Ashley dressed as a doll while Dmitri was some kind of pimped out Svengali who'd been attacked by an evil, sleeve stealing gang of street toughs. How I don't miss those days at all! I give credit where credit is due, kiddies. Well done, ‘hos. Well done, trannys. I reserve the right to go back to excoriating you as soon as you get back on the junk.
Moving on, noodles, let’s recap the two minutes of actual dance content we got so I can go have wildly inappropriate dreams about Puck from Glee. Hot damn!
Top 16 Group Dance/Hip Hop/Dave Scott (Warrior, Part 2/Llyod Banks) – I love that Russell was featured so prominently in this routine. Honestly, I loved that dance, at least what I could see of it for the whacked out camera work. Russell and Legacy killed it. The ladies were very nice, especially the floor work. Jakob’s two seconds of duet with Legacy made me fear for the day that he pulls hip hop out of the hat. And it was hilarious how Dave kept Ryan off the stage until the bitter end of the routine, gave him exactly one and a half steps which he managed to execute terribly, and then made him just walk downstage while the rest of the kids closed ranks in front of him to shield the audience from the horrifying sight of him feebly attempting to dance hip hop. Good times.
Ailey – Gorgeous. Enough said. None of these girls could come close to that level of artistry. For the boys, maybe Jakob could get there. If Billy were around, he could also get there. No one else is even in the same solar system. It’s always good to check my enthusiasm for the show by measuring these kids against folks who really know how to dance. Danny Tidwell is the only dancer in the show’s history who wouldn’t suffer by comparison. Reality vs. Reality TV. Watch and learn, kittens. Watch and learn.
Solos
Ellenore (Missed the song) – She has such an interesting movement quality. There were some lovely moments in there as well as some hinky points. The leap was somewhat less than graceful, no? And the heart hands? Automatic party foul.
Ryan (Jump With My Baby/Big Bad Voodoo Daddy) – This was not a bad solo for a ballroom dancer right up until the back handspring back flip at the end. Whoops. Guard your grill, Pretty Boy. Right now it’s the main thing keeping you in this competition.
Pauline (Took the Night/Chelley) – Awful. Hair flinging, booty shaking nightmare. I’m so glad Shankdaddy called out the bad, advanced level, Convention 101 dancing, darlings. And Pauline has so much more than that. I wish she’d done hip hop instead. She might’ve survived.
Peter (The rhythm of his own sweet feet) – Aww, kiddies. You know, this kid is actually a really good tapper. He’s kind of got a Gregory Hines feel to his tap. That was a fun solo. But I agreed with the judges. He’s not a star. Too cheesy.
Karen (Celia Y Tito/Celia Cruz y Tito Puente) – So the score still stands at Ballroom Ladies: 0, SYTYCD Solos: Infinity. I’ve yet to see a ballroom girl do a really great solo on this show. I’m beginning to think it can’t be done.
Kevin (I Question Mark/Wade Robson) – The slow fall back to the floor was sick. But we’ve seen way better on this stage before. I enjoyed that he kind of went for the Michael homage, but overall, it was underwhelming, no?
And then they kicked off the hula girl and her GI. As it should be, kittens. As it should be. You know, I really think the judges were all set to give the “quirky” Ellenore the boot but Pauline danced herself right off of the show. Sad that. Got the girl right but missed the guy. Kevin got saved because Nigel got pissed off by Nathan’s stank attitude. In my wildest dreams, I couldn’t have come up with that. I’m claiming victory for this week, kittens. I know you won’t mind because you love me, right?
Wednesday, November 11, 2009
SYTYCD S6 Finals Ep4 The Spice of Life
My, my, my, noodles. We got our lives spiced up tonight with a slew of new (or gone too long) choreographers. This was the strongest choreography night we’ve had in a good long while. Even the dances that wound up being terrible (Mollee/Nathan) appeared to have been well put together. Cat looked like a crazy, female Eraserhead, but that was bound to happen sooner or later. And as much as I love Shankdaddy, I’m ready for some fresh opinions up there on that judges panel. This is not idol, kittens. Check this week’s blog title. SYTYCD benefits from the very knowledgeable stable of judges they have at their disposal. Remember Dan Karaty? Sucked ass as a hip hop/pop choreographer, but I’ll be damned if he’s not a great judge. Clear and honest feedback, a good, critical eye. He was Shankdaddy before Shankdaddy was Shankdaddy. (Except not nearly so fabulous, no?) And honestly, through his constant presence on the judges panel, Shankdaddy is losing some of his shine anyway. I mean, let’s be honest, kiddies, he was blowing smoke up a lot of these kids asses last night, which he never would’ve done in the past. (Karen and Kevin, I’m looking at you) I sincerely hope they re-think this three permanent judge format, noodles. Familiarity breeds contempt.
Now Kittens, before we start to talk about the heart of the matter, can I just state that I, America, or at least the only part of it that really counts, don’t want to know anything about these kids except whether or not they can dance. That’s all. The show is called So You Think You Can Dance. No So You Think You Can Tell Me About Your Baby Handed Brother. Not So You Think You Can Make Me Care About Your ‘Flicted Ear. Not So You Think We Didn’t Already Know That You Are Gay and Enjoy Wearing Make Up on the Regular. Nope, not any of those things. So You. Think You. Can Dance. So make with the dancing. Sigh. All better now.
We are finally to the audience participation portion of our show, so let’s start at the top and work our way down. I enjoy that from time to time.
Top 2
Ashleigh/Jakob/Contemporary/Mandy Moore (Relax/Frankie Goes to Hollywood) –Can we just deal with the headband, noodles? What is that headband that the Fug Princess was wearing on her head? Oh, well. She really can’t make it any worse, can she? Kiddies, I love prop Mandy. Prop Mandy is excellent. I knew this was gonna be good from the jump. And the kids did not disappoint. Jakob was amazing. Look at that extension. One of my SYTYCD friends (the best kind) pointed out that he was a little bit Mark from Hawai’i in this routine and I must say I concur, kiddies. He had a very similar movement quality to Mark in both Wade and Mia’s group dances. And even better, that movement quality is all Jakob-fied, extended right through the pinky nail and polished until it fucking gleams. He really is a wonder. And I have to give it up to FP. She actually did really well. This was the first time she didn’t just completely disappear for me in a routine. They had a little slip with the cane, but that is a hard prop to master. I love it all, darlings. Loved the look as well. And Unca Nigel nailed it with the Joel Grey comparisons. Awesome.
Noelle/Russell/Afro Jazz/Sean Cheesman (Frog Dance/Mickey Hart & Planet Drum) – I don’t care what Shankdaddy says, Afro Jazz is not a thing. It’s some made up shit like “lyrical” and “Pop” that dance studios sell to folks to make more money from lessons. And while you can certainly blend African technique with jazz, which has deep roots in African traditional and tribal dance anyway, that doesn’t make it a thing. I fell quite strongly about that. Sorry to the millions of dancers affiliated with the afro jazz community. Kittens, despite the crank, I just loved this piece. Russell was showing good technique from the very beginning and can the show please, please, now leave off with the untrained dancer BS? It’s so, so tired. So anyway, Russell was marvelous. Noelle was there. She messed up on some of the African movement just there before the skirt came off, but she hung in a lot better than I thought she would. Still should’ve gone home week one, but she wasn’t the train wreck she was in the hip hop piece. And there were some truly beautiful moments in this routine: nice end over end flips, a beautiful turn with bent leg and flexed foot. All around a smashing debut for Ms. Cheesman. I hope to see much more of him.
The Soft Bigotry of Low Expectations
Karen/Kevin/Hustle/Maria Torres (Come to Me/France Joli) – I do not worry about Karen’s ability to attract a new man, kiddies, do you? She is, after all, a total sex bomb. And she continued to turn it out here. She hit gorgeous lines. And as Shankdaddy noted, she really showed a quiet command of the stage. She was soft and yet still drew you into her performance. Sadly, I thought Kevin really was not that great in this piece. His shoulders were up around his ears. He was really struggling with a lot of those lifts, not the smoothest things ever. It was pretty clear that he just doesn’t really know how to partner yet. He did have a couple of really outstanding moments,pPretty jete, pretty battement. But I honestly didn’t understand the judge’s effusiveness. I thought the two of them simply got through it.
Kathryn/Legacy/Broadway/Andy Blankenbhueler (I Wanna Be Like You/Swinging Fireballs) – See, noodles? Broadway can be fun when you keep Tasty’s grubby little fingers off of it. I thought the routine was super cute. And I continue to be pleasantly surprised by Legacy. Much of the choreo was pretty basic, but that is often true of Broadway style where you may have cast members who are not dance specialists AND everyone is trying to dance and sing and emote all the way to the back of the house at the same time they are dancing. So yeah, the routine may have been more character work than technically demanding, but still Legacy worked it out. He got the character of the dance and he hit the moves. (Though I loved Shankman’s advice about the softness in his hands. I so enjoy the increase in the quality of the feedback that Shankdaddy has brought to the kids and the other judges. He is making Mary and Nigel step up their game and actually critique these kids, not just scream about Mexican street food or ask parents to show them their asses) And what of Kathryn, who’s been on such a role these first two weeks? Well, kiddies, I see what the judges were saying to the High Talker. She could’ve brought a more grown up intensity, an anger, but with underlying love and maybe sexual frustration layering underneath that. But let’s face it, darlings. Is Kathryn really all that deep? And character is only a portion of the dance. Kathryn is a gorgeous creature. This routine gave the pair some killer moves; that one point where she dropped down to have her weight supported by his leg and then he kicked her back up into a standing position? Fantastic. And they have great chemistry. Mary. Yes, they do. I enjoyed it and felt the judges kind of threw Kathryn under the bus. Wonder what’s that all about.
Channing/Victor/Contemporary/Stacey Tookey (Be By Your Love/Rachael Yamagata) – These two came ever so close to landing in my personal B3. And not because they danced horribly. No, they were fine. Victor, as usual, had some very nice moments. They both were nice and grounded and displayed solid centers and nice lines. And it was all so very boring. There was no connection between them whatsoever. I’m beginning to think that Channing just can’t pull it off. And there was no emotional connection to the piece. And on that note, this piece was so similar to . . . well, pretty much every piece Stacey has done for the show, no? Noodles, I’m slightly worried. I enjoy Stacey’s choreography, but I hope this thing – this tortured lovers, push/pull, emo thing – is not the only thing that she has cooking, no? Because that would be unfortunate. Shankdaddy was on the monkey crack here. This was far from what these two should have been capable of delivering. The table was set for them and they kind of blew their chance. They didn’t bring it like it should be broughten by two contemporary specialists. They’re not in my B3, but I wouldn’t be at all surprised to see them in the actual B3 come tomorrow.
Bottom 3
Pauline/Peter/Quickstep/JT & Thomas (Hey Baby/Big Kahuna and the Copa Somebodys) – Dun Dun DUN. (Side note: I just want to say that there is a special hell for folks who try to capitalize on those with identified special needs for the own personal gain and if there is any justice in this world, Peter will burn in that hell forever. No. No. NO. If you do it just b/c you are such a good person, then don’t come on bragging about it) Pauline is so adorable and Peter really did catch that On The Town spirit. Nonetheless, I couldn’t help but wonder as I watched that number’s opening when they were actually going to start the Quickstep? There was precious little ballroom content in this dance. And what there was was not of the good, kiddies. Oh, my. For most of the routine, Peter looked like he was just running around. He was so heavy footed. Not light at all. Pauline was a little better, but overall that routine was so sub-par. Technically, it lacked a lot. And while I was glad to have Mary let her ballroom expert personality take over for a minute to school these fools, what was she smoking. Because, kittens, I mean, really? So basically, the dance sucked ass, but they were cute and entertaining? And for that, we should be contented? Riiiiggghht.
Ellenore/Ryan/Hip Hop/Lil C (Lost Boyiz Anthem/The Jai Squad) – Oh, we could tell this was going to be a train wreck from the bumper to commercial, no? They already looked crazy. The crack whores have been sooo much better this season, darlings. I guess they’ve been saving it all up for this one routine. And Ryan. Oh, oh, oh. Ryan. No, baby, no! Y’all, there’s not enough pretty in the world to make what he did on that stage OK. Ellenore was trying. There may have even been a moment or two where she was sort of, kind of working it out. But they never matched. They were never hitting together. Forget about hitting everything equally hard, there were many, many times when they weren’t even on beat, with the music or with each other. And once again, Shankdaddy’s need to say something nice made me have to agree with Nigel. Oh, Shankdaddy. Fight the power. And just as an aside, I believe that in the Nigel v. Shankman hip hop-ology battle, I’m gonna go with the man who has actually directed a hip hop dance movie over a snaggle toothed, Farrah haired, British man whose retrograde race/class/gender issues with regard to the genre completely compromise his opinions on what constitutes proper hip hop technique. Won’t you join me in my skepticism, noodles, and let’s all give Unca Nigel a big ol’ stink eye, shall we?
Mollee/Nathan/Salsa/Gustavo Vargas (Qimbara/Celia Cruz) – I’m glad they finally found a replacement for Alex da Rapist. And the costumes were a good look for both of them. Thus ends the complimentary portion of our review. It was painful. If I started to list everything I hated about this routine, well, I’d still be writing when it came time for me to go to work in the morning. No hip action, too stiff, bad topline, bad synchronization even in the side by side moves, lousy tricks, missed hand connections. Oof. I had to look away, kittens, like at some horrific crime scene. And just so I understand what Mary was trying to say in her critique, she could’ve gotten over the side by side nastiness, the missed connections, the hips, the footwork, if only they’d been able to sell the performance better? Horsefeathers. I know they want these kids in the top 10, but seriously, stop lying.
Bottom 3, American Style
So you know my personal bottom 3, but will that be the actual bottom 3? Not, I fear, if all of the hopped up tweens with too much time on their hands, too many hours of Disney Channel under their belts, and their pre-paid cellular phones tailor made for texting have anything to say about it. I think of my personal B3, only Ellenore/Ryan are a lock. I wouldn’t be surprised if Peter/Pauline joined them, even well done Quickstep having never proven to be a huge vote getter. The #3 spot will most likely not be Nathan/Mollee. In their absence, I think either Channing/Victor (for not being outstanding in their own styles) or Kevin/Karen (for going first and being only meh) could be in for a trip to the back of the bus.
Homeward Bound
If only we could get rid of Mollee and Peter. Alas, Nigel will not want to let go of a cute blonde, nor do I think he’ll want to rid himself of the last tapper standing. Kittens, I can see this week as the first eliminations that I might have a real problem with. I can easily see Ellenore getting the boot for being too quirky, or Pauline for being too much in the bottom already. For the guys, I’m scared they’ll let Kevin go and put all their hip hop eggs in Russell and/or Legacy's basket, should he and Karen hit B3. That would not be OK.
Here we go, kittens. Let’s see how close I am to the pulse of the people this year.
Now Kittens, before we start to talk about the heart of the matter, can I just state that I, America, or at least the only part of it that really counts, don’t want to know anything about these kids except whether or not they can dance. That’s all. The show is called So You Think You Can Dance. No So You Think You Can Tell Me About Your Baby Handed Brother. Not So You Think You Can Make Me Care About Your ‘Flicted Ear. Not So You Think We Didn’t Already Know That You Are Gay and Enjoy Wearing Make Up on the Regular. Nope, not any of those things. So You. Think You. Can Dance. So make with the dancing. Sigh. All better now.
We are finally to the audience participation portion of our show, so let’s start at the top and work our way down. I enjoy that from time to time.
Top 2
Ashleigh/Jakob/Contemporary/Mandy Moore (Relax/Frankie Goes to Hollywood) –Can we just deal with the headband, noodles? What is that headband that the Fug Princess was wearing on her head? Oh, well. She really can’t make it any worse, can she? Kiddies, I love prop Mandy. Prop Mandy is excellent. I knew this was gonna be good from the jump. And the kids did not disappoint. Jakob was amazing. Look at that extension. One of my SYTYCD friends (the best kind) pointed out that he was a little bit Mark from Hawai’i in this routine and I must say I concur, kiddies. He had a very similar movement quality to Mark in both Wade and Mia’s group dances. And even better, that movement quality is all Jakob-fied, extended right through the pinky nail and polished until it fucking gleams. He really is a wonder. And I have to give it up to FP. She actually did really well. This was the first time she didn’t just completely disappear for me in a routine. They had a little slip with the cane, but that is a hard prop to master. I love it all, darlings. Loved the look as well. And Unca Nigel nailed it with the Joel Grey comparisons. Awesome.
Noelle/Russell/Afro Jazz/Sean Cheesman (Frog Dance/Mickey Hart & Planet Drum) – I don’t care what Shankdaddy says, Afro Jazz is not a thing. It’s some made up shit like “lyrical” and “Pop” that dance studios sell to folks to make more money from lessons. And while you can certainly blend African technique with jazz, which has deep roots in African traditional and tribal dance anyway, that doesn’t make it a thing. I fell quite strongly about that. Sorry to the millions of dancers affiliated with the afro jazz community. Kittens, despite the crank, I just loved this piece. Russell was showing good technique from the very beginning and can the show please, please, now leave off with the untrained dancer BS? It’s so, so tired. So anyway, Russell was marvelous. Noelle was there. She messed up on some of the African movement just there before the skirt came off, but she hung in a lot better than I thought she would. Still should’ve gone home week one, but she wasn’t the train wreck she was in the hip hop piece. And there were some truly beautiful moments in this routine: nice end over end flips, a beautiful turn with bent leg and flexed foot. All around a smashing debut for Ms. Cheesman. I hope to see much more of him.
The Soft Bigotry of Low Expectations
Karen/Kevin/Hustle/Maria Torres (Come to Me/France Joli) – I do not worry about Karen’s ability to attract a new man, kiddies, do you? She is, after all, a total sex bomb. And she continued to turn it out here. She hit gorgeous lines. And as Shankdaddy noted, she really showed a quiet command of the stage. She was soft and yet still drew you into her performance. Sadly, I thought Kevin really was not that great in this piece. His shoulders were up around his ears. He was really struggling with a lot of those lifts, not the smoothest things ever. It was pretty clear that he just doesn’t really know how to partner yet. He did have a couple of really outstanding moments,pPretty jete, pretty battement. But I honestly didn’t understand the judge’s effusiveness. I thought the two of them simply got through it.
Kathryn/Legacy/Broadway/Andy Blankenbhueler (I Wanna Be Like You/Swinging Fireballs) – See, noodles? Broadway can be fun when you keep Tasty’s grubby little fingers off of it. I thought the routine was super cute. And I continue to be pleasantly surprised by Legacy. Much of the choreo was pretty basic, but that is often true of Broadway style where you may have cast members who are not dance specialists AND everyone is trying to dance and sing and emote all the way to the back of the house at the same time they are dancing. So yeah, the routine may have been more character work than technically demanding, but still Legacy worked it out. He got the character of the dance and he hit the moves. (Though I loved Shankman’s advice about the softness in his hands. I so enjoy the increase in the quality of the feedback that Shankdaddy has brought to the kids and the other judges. He is making Mary and Nigel step up their game and actually critique these kids, not just scream about Mexican street food or ask parents to show them their asses) And what of Kathryn, who’s been on such a role these first two weeks? Well, kiddies, I see what the judges were saying to the High Talker. She could’ve brought a more grown up intensity, an anger, but with underlying love and maybe sexual frustration layering underneath that. But let’s face it, darlings. Is Kathryn really all that deep? And character is only a portion of the dance. Kathryn is a gorgeous creature. This routine gave the pair some killer moves; that one point where she dropped down to have her weight supported by his leg and then he kicked her back up into a standing position? Fantastic. And they have great chemistry. Mary. Yes, they do. I enjoyed it and felt the judges kind of threw Kathryn under the bus. Wonder what’s that all about.
Channing/Victor/Contemporary/Stacey Tookey (Be By Your Love/Rachael Yamagata) – These two came ever so close to landing in my personal B3. And not because they danced horribly. No, they were fine. Victor, as usual, had some very nice moments. They both were nice and grounded and displayed solid centers and nice lines. And it was all so very boring. There was no connection between them whatsoever. I’m beginning to think that Channing just can’t pull it off. And there was no emotional connection to the piece. And on that note, this piece was so similar to . . . well, pretty much every piece Stacey has done for the show, no? Noodles, I’m slightly worried. I enjoy Stacey’s choreography, but I hope this thing – this tortured lovers, push/pull, emo thing – is not the only thing that she has cooking, no? Because that would be unfortunate. Shankdaddy was on the monkey crack here. This was far from what these two should have been capable of delivering. The table was set for them and they kind of blew their chance. They didn’t bring it like it should be broughten by two contemporary specialists. They’re not in my B3, but I wouldn’t be at all surprised to see them in the actual B3 come tomorrow.
Bottom 3
Pauline/Peter/Quickstep/JT & Thomas (Hey Baby/Big Kahuna and the Copa Somebodys) – Dun Dun DUN. (Side note: I just want to say that there is a special hell for folks who try to capitalize on those with identified special needs for the own personal gain and if there is any justice in this world, Peter will burn in that hell forever. No. No. NO. If you do it just b/c you are such a good person, then don’t come on bragging about it) Pauline is so adorable and Peter really did catch that On The Town spirit. Nonetheless, I couldn’t help but wonder as I watched that number’s opening when they were actually going to start the Quickstep? There was precious little ballroom content in this dance. And what there was was not of the good, kiddies. Oh, my. For most of the routine, Peter looked like he was just running around. He was so heavy footed. Not light at all. Pauline was a little better, but overall that routine was so sub-par. Technically, it lacked a lot. And while I was glad to have Mary let her ballroom expert personality take over for a minute to school these fools, what was she smoking. Because, kittens, I mean, really? So basically, the dance sucked ass, but they were cute and entertaining? And for that, we should be contented? Riiiiggghht.
Ellenore/Ryan/Hip Hop/Lil C (Lost Boyiz Anthem/The Jai Squad) – Oh, we could tell this was going to be a train wreck from the bumper to commercial, no? They already looked crazy. The crack whores have been sooo much better this season, darlings. I guess they’ve been saving it all up for this one routine. And Ryan. Oh, oh, oh. Ryan. No, baby, no! Y’all, there’s not enough pretty in the world to make what he did on that stage OK. Ellenore was trying. There may have even been a moment or two where she was sort of, kind of working it out. But they never matched. They were never hitting together. Forget about hitting everything equally hard, there were many, many times when they weren’t even on beat, with the music or with each other. And once again, Shankdaddy’s need to say something nice made me have to agree with Nigel. Oh, Shankdaddy. Fight the power. And just as an aside, I believe that in the Nigel v. Shankman hip hop-ology battle, I’m gonna go with the man who has actually directed a hip hop dance movie over a snaggle toothed, Farrah haired, British man whose retrograde race/class/gender issues with regard to the genre completely compromise his opinions on what constitutes proper hip hop technique. Won’t you join me in my skepticism, noodles, and let’s all give Unca Nigel a big ol’ stink eye, shall we?
Mollee/Nathan/Salsa/Gustavo Vargas (Qimbara/Celia Cruz) – I’m glad they finally found a replacement for Alex da Rapist. And the costumes were a good look for both of them. Thus ends the complimentary portion of our review. It was painful. If I started to list everything I hated about this routine, well, I’d still be writing when it came time for me to go to work in the morning. No hip action, too stiff, bad topline, bad synchronization even in the side by side moves, lousy tricks, missed hand connections. Oof. I had to look away, kittens, like at some horrific crime scene. And just so I understand what Mary was trying to say in her critique, she could’ve gotten over the side by side nastiness, the missed connections, the hips, the footwork, if only they’d been able to sell the performance better? Horsefeathers. I know they want these kids in the top 10, but seriously, stop lying.
Bottom 3, American Style
So you know my personal bottom 3, but will that be the actual bottom 3? Not, I fear, if all of the hopped up tweens with too much time on their hands, too many hours of Disney Channel under their belts, and their pre-paid cellular phones tailor made for texting have anything to say about it. I think of my personal B3, only Ellenore/Ryan are a lock. I wouldn’t be surprised if Peter/Pauline joined them, even well done Quickstep having never proven to be a huge vote getter. The #3 spot will most likely not be Nathan/Mollee. In their absence, I think either Channing/Victor (for not being outstanding in their own styles) or Kevin/Karen (for going first and being only meh) could be in for a trip to the back of the bus.
Homeward Bound
If only we could get rid of Mollee and Peter. Alas, Nigel will not want to let go of a cute blonde, nor do I think he’ll want to rid himself of the last tapper standing. Kittens, I can see this week as the first eliminations that I might have a real problem with. I can easily see Ellenore getting the boot for being too quirky, or Pauline for being too much in the bottom already. For the guys, I’m scared they’ll let Kevin go and put all their hip hop eggs in Russell and/or Legacy's basket, should he and Karen hit B3. That would not be OK.
Here we go, kittens. Let’s see how close I am to the pulse of the people this year.
Tuesday, November 3, 2009
SYTYCD S6 Finals Ep 3 It’s Just You and Your Hand Tonight
You Don’t Really Want to Mess with Me Tonight
Frikkin’ Gokey, kittens! I thought I’d left that devil crotched, glasses wearing menace behind when AI ended last spring, but no. Here we have all the SYTYCD kids adopting the god damn heart hands as their S6 “4 Real” symbol and I cannot take it. Someone is gonna get hurt if I have to sit through a season of frikkin’ heart hands. I see that Kevin and Russell are non-adopters which just makes me love them more. Will we never be free from this nightmarishly bad idea? Sigh.
At least Cat looked gorgeous again tonight. I’d say that she’s still on her kick to be her own stylist, but I’ll be darned if most of the kids didn’t look lovely and appropriate tonight. The whores and trannys must’ve gone to rehab or gotten religion over the very brief hiatus or something. Even the sets were on point and the camera work was less crack-tastic than usual. Let’s hear it for the production team, kiddies. Positive reinforcement and all that. (Fashion Side Note: We must make a huge exception in Mary’s case. Cubic zirconia and off the shoulder and cheap satin and ringlets and .99 cent chandelier earrings equals a whole lotta fug)
I liked the new intro routine of having each kid come out individually for their moment from the wings rather than having them all crowded around at the back of the stage and then coming upstage for their dance-ins. Russell, Jakob, Victor and Nathan? Still killing it. And did my ears deceive me or were there some boos from the audience when Ashleigh took her turn around the stage? That’s dandy! Do it, catty bitches. But on the real, the audience doesn’t even know how to say “jidges” anymore? That ain’t right.
Normally, I hate the judge patter. And at this point, I’m tired of Paula. Stop talking about her unless and until there is real news that she has agreed to come on the show. But I’ll give last night a pass for two reasons. First, Adam Shankman can pull out references to the Paula Abdul oeuvre at will and that rocks! Second, Brandon, yay! And Billy, double yay!! Although, Billy gets a pass straight through to Vegas while Brandon just gets the chance to come back and re-enter the audition process? What does that even mean? If it means that Brandon has to go all the way back to the city auditions, then fuck that noise. If I were Brandon, I’d be pissed.
Performances: Just Let Me Have My Fun Tonight, A’ight?
Noelle/Russell/Hip Hop/Jamal Sims (Move, Shake, Drop Remix/DJ Laz et. al) – I will not be recapping the partner-views. Let’s just get that out of the way right now, shall we, kiddies? These kids have known each other for a handful of days so they don’t yet know what’s good and bad about each other. It’s bad that Russell wears sunglasses? It’s awful that Noelle keeps getting hurt? Very deep thoughts. Moving on. Yay, for new choreographer blood. And in a yummy package, too. Hello, Jamal Sims. I hope to be seeing much more of you. I’m not a huge fan of prop choreography unless Mandy Moore is doing it, but this dance really worked. Noodles, I liked it tons more than the judges. Well, I liked half of it. Russell worked the hell out of the first half of that dance. Noelle was embarrassing. And I really think Russell knew that. Watch your tape back, loyal viewer. You’ll see that about halfway through the routine, Russell dials it way back to match Noelle’s intensity, or lack thereof. I think it was the right choice. He was destroying her on that stage and if he hadn’t pulled it in, the judges would’ve dinged them for “not matching” just like they did with Ariana and Peter last week. But since he did bring the intensity down, they got dinged for not being hype enough and not living up to the admittedly pretty sick choreography. Poor Russell, can’t win for losing. I would’ve loved to have seen Russell attack that routine with a partner that could hang with him. Also, no one believes that Russell in any way deserved to be B2 last week, so Nigel can bite me.
Ashleigh/Jakob/Viennese Waltz/Tony and Melanie (At Last/Etta James) – Darlings, she is so seriously fug. I didn’t realize. She looks about a million years old. And that rehearsal footage, good heavens! Even Jakob’s fake bad dancing is good. As soon as they pulled Viennese Waltz, I knew that we wouldn’t be getting rid of the Fug Princess tonight. Jakob’s magnificent carriage will stand him in good stead in any of the smooth ballroom dances. And Ashleigh, while a Latin specialist, can fake it well enough to look 100 times better than a non-ballroom trained dancer. I thought Jakob was exquisite, as always. His feet! Y’all know how I feel about good feet on a dancer, and Jakob’s are up there in the pantheon with Kayla and Chelsie. I will say that even though he is mesmerizing at every moment on stage, I loved Mary getting all technical on his ass. Mary is so, so serious as a ballroom specialist. We just forget because she spends all her time hooting and hollering and putting people on trains. I also loved Shankdaddy’s admonition to Tony and Melanie about throwing random tricks into the routine. (Would that he’d said that to Doriana) There was definitely not enough waltz in that waltz. Not enough closed hold. Not enough glide across the floor. Just not enough dance content, which happens a lot with the ballroom routines. The lifts were lovely, though. Just because the dancers can do things doesn’t mean that they should. That’s one to grow on, kittens.
Victor/Bianca/Broadway/Tasty (Maybe God Is Trying to Tell You Something/The Color Purple Cast Recording) – Darlings, can somebody please make it stop? Tasty cannot do Broadway. It turns him into the worst kind of copycat, aping his betters. Let’s just state up front that the routine was not good. Victor and Bianca went out there and did steps. They didn’t bring anything to the dance beyond “Place arm in correct position. Place leg in corresponding position. Proceed to next steps.” The judges nailed it when they said that they didn’t give in to the dance. No abandon. They didn’t inhabit the characters. All that, I acknowledge. But noodles, the dance was a piece of crap. Periodically, Tasty tries to get his Ailey on. Shankdaddy was totally on point, as always, in bringing up the shout out to Revelations. But to say that this number was a pale shadow of a shadow of an imitation of a shadow of Revelations would be kind. It was a cliché number full of over exaggerated fluff masquerading as dancing. It looked like something an after school dance coach put together to teach to his 6th graders to perform in the annual Fall Fling Pageant at school. Really, really amateurishly bad. The whole thing was a train wreck.
Mollee/Nathan/Bollywood/Nakul (Missed the song) – If these two were never allowed to speak, just dance, I would love them. And let me state that both here and in the last routine, the costumes were just perfect. Mollee looked beautiful and Nathan was a vision. And the lighting and staging for this routine were absolute perfection. That first image of Nathan silhouetted against that sun was so arresting. There were simply fabulous sections of this routine. All of their side by side work was so crisp, so clean, so sharp. And the intricate foot work. The synchronized leaps. Just wow. There was one lift in the middle section that was a little wonky, but overall it was amazing. And it was truly a showpiece for Nathan. When he did that pirouette sequence a la seconde and pulled it in to a plie with that little flexed foot he showed just astonishing amounts of control. It was positively Tidwell-ian. I thought last seasons Caitlin/Jason Bollywood was a little bit frilly and over-praised, but this one was deserving of the accolades. It looked hella difficult, too. Kudos to these two, kiddies. See how much better they are when they don’t talk?
Channing/Philip/Samba/Tony and Melanie (Maracatu Funk/The Samba Squad) – Noodles, I’m worried. Please don’t let Tony and Melanie fall into the trick trap. This routine was loaded up with so many unnecessary lifts that there was not a ton of dance content. Sadly, what dance content they did choreograph was not done well. This was bad, darlings. Bad bad. Neither one of them was down enough into the floor or had the necessary hip action to get the style of the dance, despite Mary trying to sell us on Channng’s performance. She was timid and tentative throughout. And Philip is just not a strong partner, which surprised me given his dance background. But I guess a Broadway gypsy doesn’t do a ton of ballroom style partnering. Sigh. Listen, kittens, I know that Channing is a big girl, but you can’t let the strain of the lifts and tricks show the way that these two have done the first two weeks. And yes, a lot of that is Philip. The one lift where he was in a deep plie in second and then lifted Channing up to his shoulder and flipped her over in a split to the ground, he really did look like he was hauling manure. But I don’t think Channing helped much. I’d bet as a contemporary, competition style dancer, she hasn’t done a significant amount of partner work. She seems not to know how to hold her own weight in the lifts. The judges already remarked on her challenges in working with partners, so I don’t know why they chose to soft peddle that tonight. I guess they just didn’t want to lose a cute blonde girl. Whatever, they were bad and both of them should’ve been B2.
Kevin/Karen/Hip Hop/NappyTab (Ice Cream Paint Job/Dorrough) – I loathe this song and that’s often a combo killer for me, but I’ll be damned if I didn’t enjoy the hell out of that routine. If nothing else, the injection of new blood into the hip hop choreography pool is making NappyTab up their game. That routine was fire. And Kevin and Karen just crushed it. Noodles, Karen is for real. Sex bomb. And she can dance. She was tearing it up in that routine. Booty shaking worthy of the best video ho. And Kevin brought enough swag for the whole room. He’s a sexy something. Oh also, I would like one of those jumpsuits Karen was wearing for my own personal collection. Thank you. That little move where she’s standing on his knees grinding and his head is following the movements of that ass? Yeah, I’ll be rewatching that a time or two. Sex bomb. Both of them. That routine was the hotness. Also, kiddies, I love how much Shankman loved being called a big old queen.
Legacy/Kathryn/Contemporary/Stacey Tookey (2 Steps Away/Patti Labelle) – Stacey is a savvy choreographer. I don’t think she could’ve stuffed more b-boy moves into that routine and technically had it still be considered contemporary. And the times where she was asking Legacy to stretch a little bit, she kept the movement along familiar lines for him. But as Shankdaddy pointed out (I need a macro for that), he has shown growth that I didn’t know he had in him. Lovely toe point and a couple of really nice moments. Yep, the leap around Kathryn’s waist. The crawling on the floor holding on to her ankles. And Kathryn is a revelation. That little high talker is an exquisite creature. She was lovely in this dance and so free. She commits completely to each dance she’s given. That ending as she’s pressing down on his back was heaven. I loved this piece. And I do want to see more from this couple. They are growing on me.
Peter/Pauline/Jazz/Wade (Little Green Basket/George Baker Selection) – Yeah, I’m not going to get on board with this Wade and Amanda co-choreographer foolishness until I see the bitch dance, mkay? Moving on, let me just say dammit, I love me some Wade Robson. Characters who got cut out of Van Gogh’s Starry Night and then come back to haunt his ass? Oh, Wade. Don’t ever change. And kiddies, the rehearsal footage just made me want to see him dance this piece. But Peter and Pauline did a more than respectable job. Normally, I’d agree with Nigel’s critique of Peter’s shoulders, but I’m pretty sure that hunched look was what Wade was going for. This movement was very reminiscent of the piece Wade set on Brandon and Janette last season, and there were even teensy bits of his Triplets of Belleville piece for Chuy and Sarah. In all of these pieces, Wade’s been playing around with body shapes, and there is a lot of hunched shoulders, tucked butts, hips pushed up and out. It’s an interesting style and I think Peter was dancing it as choreographed. And he really did stand out more than Pauline here, which was odd considering this is her style. He really got the character and inhabited it with gusto. I keep wanting more from Pauline. More power. More engagement. More commitment. Just more. She’s a lovely dancer, no doubt, but she lacks some oomph.
Ryan/Ellanore/Argentine Tango/Miriam and Leonardo (Violentango/Astor Piazolla) – Oh, boy, did the judges grade on a curve for this one. Kittens, I understand their praise for Ellanore keeping her cool in the face of the wardrobe malfunction. It is truly difficult, nigh unto impossible, to continue dancing with your heel stuck in your dress. And they didn’t lose focus or break character. Admirable, admirable. But the dance itself up to that point, and really throughout, was tentative, especially on Ellanore’s part. There wasn’t enough intensity. And on her part, definitely not enough command. I was aware at all times of Ryan and consciously registering him, which should not happen at all here. The lady is showcased in Tango, really in most ballroom pieces, and the gentleman is there to frame her and lead her. I should’ve been paying almost no attention to Ryan except as a toy for Ellanore to play with as she flicked sharp and whip fast ganchos through his legs or led him around on a string. They were fine and better than lots of previous tangos on the show, but I can’t help but compare this piece to Miriam and Leonardo’s Argentine Tango for Brandon and Janette last season and, well, there is no comparison. It was just alright.
Bottom Four: Keep Your Drink, Just Gimme the Money
Noelle (For A Reason/Shane) – I don’t get it. She’s a hair flinging, competition dancer. Every single contemporary girl left in the competition is better than her.
Victor (Mavras/Matrix Revolutions) – This kid is gorgeous. Nice control on those turns. He needed more power for this music, but he’s got lovely lines, nice quality. Yep. I like him.
Bianca (Tootsee Roll/69 Boyz) – Huge stink eye on the music choice. She’s a decent tapper, darlings. Pleasant, if unspectacular. I still just don’t like her.
Phillip (Almost Like Being in Love/Nat King Cole) – He, on the other hand, is a great tapper. So smooth, so rhythmical. Just a great old school tapper. Weak partner, though.
Eliminations: You Know It’s Over Before It Begins
Bianca and Philip
Two tappers up, two tappers down. The judges can still surprise, kittens. You'll never convince me that the only reason they kept Noelle was to avoid the inevitable outcry about unfairness that would have gone up had they ousted her this week. Imagine poor Ariana fans. The gnashing of teeth. The wailing. I'm quite positive that Unca Nigel did not want to let Bianca go this early after spending so much time on her story arc for the season. Hoist on his own petard. Ha! That's good for his ass. He should've just eliminated Noelle and Billy from the jump and saved us all a lot of aggravation. Oh well, she'll be gone soon.
So far, I have no problem with the judges send offs. Ariana was a teensy bit sad, but that was more about the way it happened than that it happened. I never had her pegged for top 10 anyway. Brandon, Philip and Bianca are all legit. Under other circumstances, I'd be doing cartwheels over losing Bianca and her secret stank this early in the game. And everyone that's left, with the exception of Noelle and Ashleigh (and maybe Channing) can really bring it. This is shaping up to be a good season after all, kiddies. If we could only find a way to get rid of the frikkin' heart hands. Gooooookkkeeeyyyyy!
Frikkin’ Gokey, kittens! I thought I’d left that devil crotched, glasses wearing menace behind when AI ended last spring, but no. Here we have all the SYTYCD kids adopting the god damn heart hands as their S6 “4 Real” symbol and I cannot take it. Someone is gonna get hurt if I have to sit through a season of frikkin’ heart hands. I see that Kevin and Russell are non-adopters which just makes me love them more. Will we never be free from this nightmarishly bad idea? Sigh.
At least Cat looked gorgeous again tonight. I’d say that she’s still on her kick to be her own stylist, but I’ll be darned if most of the kids didn’t look lovely and appropriate tonight. The whores and trannys must’ve gone to rehab or gotten religion over the very brief hiatus or something. Even the sets were on point and the camera work was less crack-tastic than usual. Let’s hear it for the production team, kiddies. Positive reinforcement and all that. (Fashion Side Note: We must make a huge exception in Mary’s case. Cubic zirconia and off the shoulder and cheap satin and ringlets and .99 cent chandelier earrings equals a whole lotta fug)
I liked the new intro routine of having each kid come out individually for their moment from the wings rather than having them all crowded around at the back of the stage and then coming upstage for their dance-ins. Russell, Jakob, Victor and Nathan? Still killing it. And did my ears deceive me or were there some boos from the audience when Ashleigh took her turn around the stage? That’s dandy! Do it, catty bitches. But on the real, the audience doesn’t even know how to say “jidges” anymore? That ain’t right.
Normally, I hate the judge patter. And at this point, I’m tired of Paula. Stop talking about her unless and until there is real news that she has agreed to come on the show. But I’ll give last night a pass for two reasons. First, Adam Shankman can pull out references to the Paula Abdul oeuvre at will and that rocks! Second, Brandon, yay! And Billy, double yay!! Although, Billy gets a pass straight through to Vegas while Brandon just gets the chance to come back and re-enter the audition process? What does that even mean? If it means that Brandon has to go all the way back to the city auditions, then fuck that noise. If I were Brandon, I’d be pissed.
Performances: Just Let Me Have My Fun Tonight, A’ight?
Noelle/Russell/Hip Hop/Jamal Sims (Move, Shake, Drop Remix/DJ Laz et. al) – I will not be recapping the partner-views. Let’s just get that out of the way right now, shall we, kiddies? These kids have known each other for a handful of days so they don’t yet know what’s good and bad about each other. It’s bad that Russell wears sunglasses? It’s awful that Noelle keeps getting hurt? Very deep thoughts. Moving on. Yay, for new choreographer blood. And in a yummy package, too. Hello, Jamal Sims. I hope to be seeing much more of you. I’m not a huge fan of prop choreography unless Mandy Moore is doing it, but this dance really worked. Noodles, I liked it tons more than the judges. Well, I liked half of it. Russell worked the hell out of the first half of that dance. Noelle was embarrassing. And I really think Russell knew that. Watch your tape back, loyal viewer. You’ll see that about halfway through the routine, Russell dials it way back to match Noelle’s intensity, or lack thereof. I think it was the right choice. He was destroying her on that stage and if he hadn’t pulled it in, the judges would’ve dinged them for “not matching” just like they did with Ariana and Peter last week. But since he did bring the intensity down, they got dinged for not being hype enough and not living up to the admittedly pretty sick choreography. Poor Russell, can’t win for losing. I would’ve loved to have seen Russell attack that routine with a partner that could hang with him. Also, no one believes that Russell in any way deserved to be B2 last week, so Nigel can bite me.
Ashleigh/Jakob/Viennese Waltz/Tony and Melanie (At Last/Etta James) – Darlings, she is so seriously fug. I didn’t realize. She looks about a million years old. And that rehearsal footage, good heavens! Even Jakob’s fake bad dancing is good. As soon as they pulled Viennese Waltz, I knew that we wouldn’t be getting rid of the Fug Princess tonight. Jakob’s magnificent carriage will stand him in good stead in any of the smooth ballroom dances. And Ashleigh, while a Latin specialist, can fake it well enough to look 100 times better than a non-ballroom trained dancer. I thought Jakob was exquisite, as always. His feet! Y’all know how I feel about good feet on a dancer, and Jakob’s are up there in the pantheon with Kayla and Chelsie. I will say that even though he is mesmerizing at every moment on stage, I loved Mary getting all technical on his ass. Mary is so, so serious as a ballroom specialist. We just forget because she spends all her time hooting and hollering and putting people on trains. I also loved Shankdaddy’s admonition to Tony and Melanie about throwing random tricks into the routine. (Would that he’d said that to Doriana) There was definitely not enough waltz in that waltz. Not enough closed hold. Not enough glide across the floor. Just not enough dance content, which happens a lot with the ballroom routines. The lifts were lovely, though. Just because the dancers can do things doesn’t mean that they should. That’s one to grow on, kittens.
Victor/Bianca/Broadway/Tasty (Maybe God Is Trying to Tell You Something/The Color Purple Cast Recording) – Darlings, can somebody please make it stop? Tasty cannot do Broadway. It turns him into the worst kind of copycat, aping his betters. Let’s just state up front that the routine was not good. Victor and Bianca went out there and did steps. They didn’t bring anything to the dance beyond “Place arm in correct position. Place leg in corresponding position. Proceed to next steps.” The judges nailed it when they said that they didn’t give in to the dance. No abandon. They didn’t inhabit the characters. All that, I acknowledge. But noodles, the dance was a piece of crap. Periodically, Tasty tries to get his Ailey on. Shankdaddy was totally on point, as always, in bringing up the shout out to Revelations. But to say that this number was a pale shadow of a shadow of an imitation of a shadow of Revelations would be kind. It was a cliché number full of over exaggerated fluff masquerading as dancing. It looked like something an after school dance coach put together to teach to his 6th graders to perform in the annual Fall Fling Pageant at school. Really, really amateurishly bad. The whole thing was a train wreck.
Mollee/Nathan/Bollywood/Nakul (Missed the song) – If these two were never allowed to speak, just dance, I would love them. And let me state that both here and in the last routine, the costumes were just perfect. Mollee looked beautiful and Nathan was a vision. And the lighting and staging for this routine were absolute perfection. That first image of Nathan silhouetted against that sun was so arresting. There were simply fabulous sections of this routine. All of their side by side work was so crisp, so clean, so sharp. And the intricate foot work. The synchronized leaps. Just wow. There was one lift in the middle section that was a little wonky, but overall it was amazing. And it was truly a showpiece for Nathan. When he did that pirouette sequence a la seconde and pulled it in to a plie with that little flexed foot he showed just astonishing amounts of control. It was positively Tidwell-ian. I thought last seasons Caitlin/Jason Bollywood was a little bit frilly and over-praised, but this one was deserving of the accolades. It looked hella difficult, too. Kudos to these two, kiddies. See how much better they are when they don’t talk?
Channing/Philip/Samba/Tony and Melanie (Maracatu Funk/The Samba Squad) – Noodles, I’m worried. Please don’t let Tony and Melanie fall into the trick trap. This routine was loaded up with so many unnecessary lifts that there was not a ton of dance content. Sadly, what dance content they did choreograph was not done well. This was bad, darlings. Bad bad. Neither one of them was down enough into the floor or had the necessary hip action to get the style of the dance, despite Mary trying to sell us on Channng’s performance. She was timid and tentative throughout. And Philip is just not a strong partner, which surprised me given his dance background. But I guess a Broadway gypsy doesn’t do a ton of ballroom style partnering. Sigh. Listen, kittens, I know that Channing is a big girl, but you can’t let the strain of the lifts and tricks show the way that these two have done the first two weeks. And yes, a lot of that is Philip. The one lift where he was in a deep plie in second and then lifted Channing up to his shoulder and flipped her over in a split to the ground, he really did look like he was hauling manure. But I don’t think Channing helped much. I’d bet as a contemporary, competition style dancer, she hasn’t done a significant amount of partner work. She seems not to know how to hold her own weight in the lifts. The judges already remarked on her challenges in working with partners, so I don’t know why they chose to soft peddle that tonight. I guess they just didn’t want to lose a cute blonde girl. Whatever, they were bad and both of them should’ve been B2.
Kevin/Karen/Hip Hop/NappyTab (Ice Cream Paint Job/Dorrough) – I loathe this song and that’s often a combo killer for me, but I’ll be damned if I didn’t enjoy the hell out of that routine. If nothing else, the injection of new blood into the hip hop choreography pool is making NappyTab up their game. That routine was fire. And Kevin and Karen just crushed it. Noodles, Karen is for real. Sex bomb. And she can dance. She was tearing it up in that routine. Booty shaking worthy of the best video ho. And Kevin brought enough swag for the whole room. He’s a sexy something. Oh also, I would like one of those jumpsuits Karen was wearing for my own personal collection. Thank you. That little move where she’s standing on his knees grinding and his head is following the movements of that ass? Yeah, I’ll be rewatching that a time or two. Sex bomb. Both of them. That routine was the hotness. Also, kiddies, I love how much Shankman loved being called a big old queen.
Legacy/Kathryn/Contemporary/Stacey Tookey (2 Steps Away/Patti Labelle) – Stacey is a savvy choreographer. I don’t think she could’ve stuffed more b-boy moves into that routine and technically had it still be considered contemporary. And the times where she was asking Legacy to stretch a little bit, she kept the movement along familiar lines for him. But as Shankdaddy pointed out (I need a macro for that), he has shown growth that I didn’t know he had in him. Lovely toe point and a couple of really nice moments. Yep, the leap around Kathryn’s waist. The crawling on the floor holding on to her ankles. And Kathryn is a revelation. That little high talker is an exquisite creature. She was lovely in this dance and so free. She commits completely to each dance she’s given. That ending as she’s pressing down on his back was heaven. I loved this piece. And I do want to see more from this couple. They are growing on me.
Peter/Pauline/Jazz/Wade (Little Green Basket/George Baker Selection) – Yeah, I’m not going to get on board with this Wade and Amanda co-choreographer foolishness until I see the bitch dance, mkay? Moving on, let me just say dammit, I love me some Wade Robson. Characters who got cut out of Van Gogh’s Starry Night and then come back to haunt his ass? Oh, Wade. Don’t ever change. And kiddies, the rehearsal footage just made me want to see him dance this piece. But Peter and Pauline did a more than respectable job. Normally, I’d agree with Nigel’s critique of Peter’s shoulders, but I’m pretty sure that hunched look was what Wade was going for. This movement was very reminiscent of the piece Wade set on Brandon and Janette last season, and there were even teensy bits of his Triplets of Belleville piece for Chuy and Sarah. In all of these pieces, Wade’s been playing around with body shapes, and there is a lot of hunched shoulders, tucked butts, hips pushed up and out. It’s an interesting style and I think Peter was dancing it as choreographed. And he really did stand out more than Pauline here, which was odd considering this is her style. He really got the character and inhabited it with gusto. I keep wanting more from Pauline. More power. More engagement. More commitment. Just more. She’s a lovely dancer, no doubt, but she lacks some oomph.
Ryan/Ellanore/Argentine Tango/Miriam and Leonardo (Violentango/Astor Piazolla) – Oh, boy, did the judges grade on a curve for this one. Kittens, I understand their praise for Ellanore keeping her cool in the face of the wardrobe malfunction. It is truly difficult, nigh unto impossible, to continue dancing with your heel stuck in your dress. And they didn’t lose focus or break character. Admirable, admirable. But the dance itself up to that point, and really throughout, was tentative, especially on Ellanore’s part. There wasn’t enough intensity. And on her part, definitely not enough command. I was aware at all times of Ryan and consciously registering him, which should not happen at all here. The lady is showcased in Tango, really in most ballroom pieces, and the gentleman is there to frame her and lead her. I should’ve been paying almost no attention to Ryan except as a toy for Ellanore to play with as she flicked sharp and whip fast ganchos through his legs or led him around on a string. They were fine and better than lots of previous tangos on the show, but I can’t help but compare this piece to Miriam and Leonardo’s Argentine Tango for Brandon and Janette last season and, well, there is no comparison. It was just alright.
Bottom Four: Keep Your Drink, Just Gimme the Money
Noelle (For A Reason/Shane) – I don’t get it. She’s a hair flinging, competition dancer. Every single contemporary girl left in the competition is better than her.
Victor (Mavras/Matrix Revolutions) – This kid is gorgeous. Nice control on those turns. He needed more power for this music, but he’s got lovely lines, nice quality. Yep. I like him.
Bianca (Tootsee Roll/69 Boyz) – Huge stink eye on the music choice. She’s a decent tapper, darlings. Pleasant, if unspectacular. I still just don’t like her.
Phillip (Almost Like Being in Love/Nat King Cole) – He, on the other hand, is a great tapper. So smooth, so rhythmical. Just a great old school tapper. Weak partner, though.
Eliminations: You Know It’s Over Before It Begins
Bianca and Philip
Two tappers up, two tappers down. The judges can still surprise, kittens. You'll never convince me that the only reason they kept Noelle was to avoid the inevitable outcry about unfairness that would have gone up had they ousted her this week. Imagine poor Ariana fans. The gnashing of teeth. The wailing. I'm quite positive that Unca Nigel did not want to let Bianca go this early after spending so much time on her story arc for the season. Hoist on his own petard. Ha! That's good for his ass. He should've just eliminated Noelle and Billy from the jump and saved us all a lot of aggravation. Oh well, she'll be gone soon.
So far, I have no problem with the judges send offs. Ariana was a teensy bit sad, but that was more about the way it happened than that it happened. I never had her pegged for top 10 anyway. Brandon, Philip and Bianca are all legit. Under other circumstances, I'd be doing cartwheels over losing Bianca and her secret stank this early in the game. And everyone that's left, with the exception of Noelle and Ashleigh (and maybe Channing) can really bring it. This is shaping up to be a good season after all, kiddies. If we could only find a way to get rid of the frikkin' heart hands. Gooooookkkeeeyyyyy!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
