Wednesday, August 15, 2007

So You Think You Can Dance: Top Six

Ameriker! I lost my C: Drive! This recap is late! Still, I wanted to get this out before the finale two parter. I'll decide last minute if I'll run it. This week we have two perfomances for each couple and a solo before the end of the show! The guest Jidge for this week is Debbie Allen and all I hear is blah blah blah Fame costs bitches!
Our first couple reveal for the night is Pasha who will be paired up with Lacey. They draw one card with two dances types which is supposed to prove that the routine choices aren't predetermined. Oh yeah, like they haven't measured Lacey's head for her tiara...


Their first style tonight is Hip-Hop by Dave Scott. He warns us that there will be some acting involved in this joint right here-ah. The "plot" is Pasha is trying to revive, Lacey, who will be playing a manequin. Hey, it's just like that movie about that manequin who dances around...you know the one...with that chick...Showgirls!

We start up with Pasha sporting the paperboy and nerd glasses. Which is brilliant because if he looks like a dopey white guy breakin it down, they can attribute it to being in "character". So we start out the routine with Pasha spazzing out and lacey doing her best Cattral. Then things get a little interesting


The key to reviving a manequin is apparently taking it from behind. Um kay. The routine is pretty good and for all the shit talking I do about the faux-ho, Lacey does a pretty good job. Pasha ...looks like a geeky white guy doing hip-hop, so I guess it's all good. The judges are all full of compliments...it was a fun way to start the show.

Now we get our first solo and it's Sabra doing her thing to "Rock Your Soul" by Elisa. Sabra just flows with an elegance and a great energy. She's probably my favorite out of the remaining dancers.


Our next duo is Danny and Lauren. So we've got Snotty Snotterson and Toothy Mc I-can't-stand-you-if-I-had-a-time-machine-I-would-have-voted-for-Sara-a-million-times-to-eliminate-your-stupid-hammy-face!

Mia Micheals serves up a routine where the two play aliens, because aliens are cool, I guess. If they were going for cool I would have picked secret agents with amnesia. That's teh hotness right there. So they dance to Celine Dion and dressed in all black they look more like Bananna Republic employees than aliens. I keep looking for something alien-y but really, it's just dancing. At least with the Hip Hop routine you don't need to be told the storyline. You should get it. Without the intro the story might as well be The Bourne Ultimatum.

For the second week in a row, Lauren sucks face with her partner and I swear I thought Danny was going to do a spit take and make a sour puss face. The routine takes them all over the stage up the stairs, through the crowd, and finally on the balcony.

These are two of the chosen ones so Nigel is about to explode with praise. Mary screams her head off. I'm zoning her out now. Debbie Allen calls them a choreographer's dream and scoffs that this show should be getting Oscars for this performance. She might as well have said a Nobel Prize, since they don't give awards for cheesy ass dance shows either. Patience wearing thin.

Next solo and it's Pasha in the spotlight. The chorus to "Total Eclipse of the Heart" starts and things just get really weird. Since there is no video backstory let me fill in the blanks. This is the sequel to the hip-hop manequin routine. It's the night of their 10th Anniversary and the manequin has been decapitated and lost it's arms in a tragic dry humping accident. Pasha is either dancing to lament or to magically make her head and arms grow back. Apparently in the future tuxedo jackets with no shirt on underneath is in style. I think I'ma start rockin that look yo!

Next up it's Sabra and Neil. Well at least they'll be likable and peppy! Mandy Moore, who has been an awesome addition to this year's dance taskmasters, is gonna jazz it up with an 80's power lunch. Where they'll be negotiating...through dance. Neil says the only 80's he remembers is the Karate Kid and threatens to wax Sabra in the negotiation. Omigod, I thought for a second he said he was gonna wax dat ass.

It's "Sweet Dreams" by the Eurythmics and again it's a plot that doesn't need explaination. The pair are dressed in charcoal and cobalt blue and they're wrestling around and and over a table, Neil has his Ricky Schroeder haircut...it makes sense.

It's just fun to watch and a different flavor for this show. It's gonna be hard to top this one. Nigel is thrilled and admits that Neil has become a dancer and Sabra dances from the heart every time. Mary...F-her. Debbie is all "We like it like that".

Lauren dances to a sad desperate song called "Sorry" by Maria Mena. Still, there she goes toothin up the joint like she's dancing to "Shake Your Love". Please. Go. Now.

Round two starts off with Pasha and Lacey doing the Smooth Waltz. Hunter Johnson calls it the Rolls-Royce of ballroom dance. Lacey calls it the most difficult thing she's ever done in this competion. Wait, doesn't she have awards in partner dancing? Latin can't be as far removed from the waltz as something ike crump, can it? Shut the front door Lacey!
So the dance was a waltz and ...it was smooth? Really, I got nothing to say when it's stuff like this. This is why I don't watch "Dancing with the Stars"

Apparently, it was good. Nigel said so. He said Lacey's hands were terrible at one point. Mary is chill, so I'll listen. She actually gets technical with a compliment for Pasha's fallaway slip pivot double reverse spin over spin. Wow. it reminded me of Hee Haw when one of the bimbos in the tied shirt and Daisy Dukes would explain science or something. I actually like this version of Mary. Debbie felt like she was watching "Love Story". If only it had the same ending. She also adds that Pasha had a "mack move" during the routine. Wow! Calm, rational, technical, critiquing of a routine...maybe they should do more smooth waltzes on this show. It also goes to show that anything short of that level of critique means that the jidges are talking out of their asses.

Neil flips around to Dave Mattheew's "Out of My Hands" and he's not wearing sambas and a beat up baseball cap with the rim bent like an asshole. I though that was required wearing for dancing to Dave Matthews. Anyway, it had a near flip off the stage and girls screamed.

Disco time is next and Doriana Sanchez is back...and so is the disco ruler! They talk about a move called the death drop (I wish) and that Disco is hard. "Disco is no joke" says Doriana. I guess she doesn't remember the 80's when everyone except my old roommate denied disco's very existence.

There's something so talent show-esue abou this routine. The dancing was okay, but this version of "Don't Leave Me This Way" has an extended piano solo and it just seemed so junior high to see them disco dance to it. Also, the disco ruler only measured a 3 and 3 quarters on their death drop and their transition into a big lift was clunky. Still, it's the two of the teflon trio and I'll bet it escapes the jidges scrutiny, even though the execution was sub-par to what we've seen tonight.

Nigel thought it was a tough routine and they were incredible and points out that Lauren has bruises all over her legs. Mary thought it was FUN! She compliments Lauren's looks. Sigh. Debbie calls the the perfect Doo-OH and says they reinvented disco. The disco ruler calls bullshit!

Lacey is back with another shitty solo. This time she shakes her ass towards the camera alot. At this point, does it really matter what she does on stage anymore?

I'm going to skip the results show, but there was a moment in the recap montage where Lacey tried the innocent and embarassed act with, "I think my bum was in some cameras". If you replaced "think my bum was" with "purposely stuck my bum" you would have had the real deal. Moments like this make me wish I didn't watch the show.


Neil and Sabra close the duo performances with a paso doble. Honestly, wasn't all that but they ended with a cool move where Neil held Sabra over his head while she clutched her heeels behind her back.

She then slowly fell to the floor as she would a cape unhooked from a matadors shoulders. It's one of the coolest moves I've seen on this show.

Here's another reason why my hate for this show grows with every passing week. Nigel gives this spiel about how at the beginning of the show if you had said Neil or Sabra had a chance of winning this competiton he wouldn't have believed it, but he does now. From a viewer a comment like this would be acceptable. From a producer/ judge who designs the show, it's reprehensible. Shouldn't a top 20 that HE helped choose all have an equal probability at winning the show? Is the talent pool so shallow that they only have four or five dancers who could win while the other dancers are just filler? How biased is it that he would think from the beginning that only certain dancers could win the competition? HATE! Mary gives Neil his first trip on the hot tamale train. Debbie was relieved that this wasn't just another shitty paso doble.


Danny gets the pimp spot ...still looking like a Bananna Republic alien.

He had the best solo of the night, but as Rizzle puts it he's got phony written all over him.

So yeah I had a massive computer problem on Monday so this didn't get out that morning and I was reinstalling Windows while the results show was going on. Cause that's how a dude with a failed hard drive rolls suckas!

Results: We lost Lauren (Excellent!) and Pasha (Bogus). I'll have the finale recap up for y'all Friday.

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