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seaguy wrote:

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Is that what it is? A dry sense of humor?

My long, rambling thoughts:

I started the evening by thinking, "why the hell is Twitch on the judging panel?" Then I realized it's his krumping doppelganger, L'il C. And I must say -- he gave more substantive critiques than Mary and Nigel combined, without the schtick and catch phrases that make it seems more like scripted perfomance than spontaneous judging. I even found his malapropisms charming, and his description about "bleeding on the floor" was much more coherent and evocative than anything Mia tries to get across. Like Dan Karaty, L'il C is a better judge than he is a choreographer.

Josh and Courtney's Bride of Frankenstein hip hop number could have been better if Courtney wasn't in it. Courtney just doesn't do enough, and I think it's because she's so self-satisfied that she stops trying hard before it's really good enough. In her initial audition, she was so sure she'd get a Mary scream but she didn't, and it seems like every week, she's surprised when she gets any criticisms. Josh was good, but without the connection he had with Katee, it was a little limp, lacking in any chemistry. Courtney looked clunky dancing next to Josh.

I think that pairing Mark and Kherington for a very fast and little known partner dance like the Two Step was a disaster waiting to happen. Mark is used to having a great partner having danced for five weeks with Chelsie, and Kherington is used to leading in her ballroom dances to cover up Twitch's atrocious partnering skills. The result was a total mess - Mark trying to lead while Kherington didn't even bother trying to dance with her partner. It didn't help that it was so sloppily executed. Mark tried really hard, affecting the carriage and posture of a C&W dancer. But Kherington appeared to have not learned the routine fully, and her slow and labored spins towards the end really makes you wonder about her conditioning. Almost the worst routine of the night.

The worst routine of the night was Twitch and Comfort's Smooth Waltz, which was not smooth in the least. So lumbering, so stiff, so lacking in footwork - Twitch dances like Frankenstein's Monster. I kept thinking about the Puttin' on the Ritz number from Young Frankenstein. Comfort couldn't take over the routine like Kherington did, and while I'm not going to kill the last big lift for being a bit tippy-toed, Twitch didn't even bother dancing or keeping with the music as he walked downstage, so, that is basically fail. This one was not Uba Duba.

I don't know what was the big deal about the Broadway routine - for one thing, I though the boat was too obvious and literal, and it also cut down so much of the space that part of the dance was just arm waving. The rest was filler as well. I think that Will and Katee are the two best technical dancers in the show, so I will blame this one on the choreographer. It was just boring.

I was pleasantly surprised at how well Chelsie danced this contemporary routine without Mark. Actually, I was friggin' impressed - she's as good as Lacey Schwimmer was in her contemporary routines (well, maybe just a hair less). She was much better here than her jazz or broadway routines, and given a lot more to do than her Mia Michaels routine. If she had done this with Mark, it would have been one of the highlights of the season. But Gev? Not so much. He has to devour the dance like Mark does, but Gev just nibbles away at it like a mouse. And he showed no real passion or heat. I think the Gev/Courtney chemistry was manufactured hype and didn't really exist. I didn't know who was to blame for it at the time, but since neither had any chemistry with their new partners, I'd say, spread the blame.

I dunno why, but I thought Josh was just ridiculously good in his rumba. There was something so passionate and caveman about it that contrasted with the lighter tone of his samba with Katee. That one was all smiles - this one was more like, "bitch, keep up with me!" Speaking of which, Courtney just can't keep up with Josh's hip action, and whenever he would hold her and lean out, she just didn't lay out enough, like she either didn't trust Josh or she thought it was "good enough". I know Katee would have been at a 45 degree angle with the floor during those movements. Courtney can dance like she did with Gev and get away with it, but with Joshua, she just looked like an amateur. It seemed like he would get waaay more extension that she did every time they stopped and posed. As Josh stretches out his arm, his chest and waist are rolling. Courtney only extends her arm. It's like two different skill levels. That last lift was a bit cocked up - I wasn't sure if Courtney was supposed to turn into it but didn't, but there was a distinct lack of momentum, and instead of whirling around onto his shoulders, she stopped as she straddled Josh's face with her crotch. He looked a bit pissed. And hey - there was a Josh personality sighting during the judging! He's a sweet guy, but he only seems to really come alive when he's dancing. Tonight, he was funny and engaging, talking about taking his shirt off to keep up with Will and Twitch.

I usually shy away from blaming choreography, but really, what the hell was that? It was just a random jumble of moves with no ideas, no purpose, and no sense. The dancing itself was good and the synchronicity was spot on most of the time, but it was like a routine made by a computer. I don't know if the judges are hell bent on getting rid of Mark and Kherington - between the Two Step and this random mess, it's like the SYTYCD Kobayashi-Maru test -- the only way they could have passed would have been to change the choreography altogether.

You might think that Comfort and Twitch doing hip hop together would be all that and a bag of chips, but you'd be wrong. There weren't really any tricks, and the dancing was repetitive. But the biggest drawback was that they didn't really interact much, and maybe it's because he's so much bigger or something, but when they danced in unison, it didn't look like they were completely in synch. Maybe I was expecting too much. That wasn't even the best hip hop routine of the season (Josh & Katee and Mark & Chelsie had way more memorable/enjoyable routines). And just when I think Twitch is going down, the judges slobber over this one excessively. So let me get this straight -- they're both great hip hop dancers? Duh!

All I can say is, that as the best routine from this season. Bar none. Bar NONE. I'd have to rummage through my memories to think of a better one from any season. This was a pas de deux from Dwight Rhoden and Desmond Richardson, although a pas de deux in name only - this essentially a contemporary dance number. And they couldn't have gotten two better dancers to execute it (in fact, they probably paired up Will and Katee this week just for this piece). The choreography was just amazing, and the helicopter lift and the last lift where she jumped and spun into his arms were the most spectacularly executed lifts I've ever seen on the program. The entire routine gave me chills. There was a bobbled split spin (in which it looked like Katee just couldn't fold up enough while maintaining the split to get under Will's arm), but in the face of the totality of the dance, it was a blip. I could watch this one over and over again - the execution was (almost) perfect and contained so much movement it demands multiple viewings. I'm still not on board the Will train like I was on the Danny train, but this was one impressive performance. And Katee was just as incredible. My only complaint was there was an awkward pause in the middle of the actual song. Which backstage clod remixed this? I found that more of a blemish than the failed spin.

I thought that the criticisms they laid on Gev for his Jive were a bit harsh considering he did as good a job in a ballroom routine as any other guy has this season other than Josh. I mean, how can they basically criticize Gev for not keeping up with a Latin Ballroom specialist like Chelsie (who, by the way, is an absolutely smoking dancer)? I can appreciate L'il C's critique about Gev concentrating too much and not having fun, but Mary and Nigel magnifying out itty bitty technical errors and making it sound like Gev failed to dance this well ended the evening on a down note. It just sounded like they wanted Gev to look bad.

I don't have much to say about the solos -- they're too short for anything to really develop unless you're breakdancing. My one note was the desperation Kherington showed, wearing boy shorts two sizes too small with her ass cheeks hanging out, which she stuck into the camera repeatedly. Her routine ended with a full on mooning. I'm no prude, but it just seemed vulgar for a high schooler to sexualize herself on national TV like that.

In the end, I'd say that while the best routine of the night was Will and Katee's pas de deux, the biggest surprise of the night was Chelsie, who rocked it in her two numbers and still flourished without Mark, who gets the prize for "missing his partner the most". Josh got by without Katee, but it's just not the same -- Courtney is at a very clearly defined level (or two) below Katee. It's like Van Halen with Sammy Hagar.