DWTS Week 10

11.16.20

What an awful night. Nelly advances to the finals and 25% of the performances were non-ballroom. I didn’t sign up for this.

The night started out normal enough, Tyra came out and we wondered WTF is she wearing. It looked like a UFO made an emergency landing on her head. Kind of reminded me of a scene from “Earth vs. the Flying Saucers”.

The first six dances were all traditional ballroom dances. Then they imposed three (THREE) contemporaries on us and a jazz. WTF?

But I’ve hyperventilated enough about that. There was more disaster to come.

Namely, Nelly.

He’s just not that good. Yeah, he’s better than Sean Spicer or Bobby Bones, but not by much. In his paso doble redemption he looked like someone broke wind and he was smelling something bad the whole time. And the weird stiff hands thing. As for the jive. Really? They’re gonna go there? Any other dancer on the show would have been called out for that mess. Why is he held to a different standard? His moves were abbreviated, he wasn’t matching his partner and he still looks like grampa at the wedding reception hoping his truss holds up. And I can’t think of anything I look forward to less than hearing a selection of his “hits” next week. I’ll keep my finger on the mute button.

One of the good parts of the night was ditching the stick figure Disney child Skai. I have to say she nailed the cha cha as her first dance. But it still looked like a father/daughter dance (which is just plain creepy). I’m not a fan of pre-pubescent dancing. At least she was no longer making the weird faces. Her VW was much better, she maintained the emotion throughout. Still looked like a little girl playing dress up.

And how could we lose Johnny? In his salsa, OMG, talk about redemption. The side by side section gave me chills. I loved his game face and the booty work made me chuckle. He was definitely channeling the fabulous. His ‘jazz’ piece was odd. I absolutely loved the song and it did not look like jazz. It looked like contemporary. I liked it better for that reason. It was telling Johnny’s story, and he did it beautifully. Still, there are a lot of haters out there.

And Justina survived a squeaker. I didn’t feel it was a particularly good night for her other than that win. The tango with Sasha was mediocre. Tango de Roxanne is one of my favorites and I was ready for her to rock it. Didn’t happen. Sasha pulled out the most tepid choreo ever. It was like he didn’t even try. She ended up looking ungainly and smiling too much. In her contemporary I give Sasha props for lifting her, that takes muscle. Her facial expressions were more suited to the song. Her smile is beautiful.

I don’t think anyone would mistake Kaitlyn for my favorite dancer and last night was no exception. In their paso I can imagine Artem showing up for dress rehearsal and saying, “I am not wearing this.” He is so not a fringe type of guy. And paso is so his style of dance. I couldn’t take my eyes off him. So much power and aggression and sheer machismo. They said she matched him but I noticed looks of uncertainty. She needs to hold her head up. And her contemporary was shamelessly maudlin and pandering. She seems to have taken a page from Skai’s book.

Which leads us to Nev’s perfect night. 60 out of 60. I don’t think I love any dance more than foxtrot when it’s working. And that one was working. It was so working. As ethereal and light as a waltz with the escape velocity of a Viennese waltz. Some of the shaping was just sublime. I was so in awe. And their contemporary was technical perfection. The music sucked, with no real melody but they worked it. Her groin spin on his shoulder was phenomenal and way cool. I yelled.

Of the finalists, two deserve to be there, one is no surprise and then there’s Nelly. Just one more cosmic joke? I want Nev to win it all. He’s the best dancer and seems like a nice guy. It would be nice for the right guy to win for a change.