DWTS All Stars, Week 9 – The Cheesecake Awards!!

Courtney and I were much too lazy to worry about screencaps and gifs this week, so you’ll have to live without them. Well, I was too lazy. Courtney’s actually been sick. Boo. Anyway, on with the show.

The Award for a Metaphor FAIL (a.k.a The Master of the Mixed Metaphor Award): Len Goodman for “That dynamite was fantastic!!” Referring to Shawn and Derek’s Bhangra

Heidi: Um, say what?? 🙂 And yes, I tried to mix the metaphor in the Award title too, just in case you were wondering. Anyway, Len really let loose and lost control. He was freakin’ giddy giving them that 10 and then his whole “SHUT UP! Shut the front door and call me Mary..” thing was pretty funny. And confusing. Is this an English thing?? 🙂

Courtney: Hehe…you can definitely tell when Len goes off-script, because he makes absolutely no sense.  No cheesy “more bounce for the ounce!” or “what was on the label wasn’t in the tin” organized comments – it’s like he gets Tourette’s Syndrome when he actually likes a dance 😛

The Award for Best Audience Wrangling/Stage Direction: Tom Bergeron for telling the audience members in front of him “You can stop clapping, this isn’t exciting” and then telling them to keep clapping when something was good.

Heidi: Geez, the muppets could take some lessons from Tom. “How to chastise an Audience Member in a humorous way.” I wonder what he would have done if he had seen the chick in the short skirt bent over last week? “Hey, honey, it’s a bit early for the moon in LA.”

Courtney: I have to wonder if Tom gets as fed up with the nonsense of the show as we do sometimes 😛

The Award the Least Amount of Rhythm in the Strangest Place: The Green Suited Guy in The Wanted.

Heidi: I thought if you were in a boy/man band, you had to be able to dance. That dude moved like a three-year old copying his very white mom and dad. “Move one foot forward behind the beat, then sporadically jerk your arms.” I now see why they kept him in the back until the end of the song.

Courtney: Y’know, I was telling Mama Spence the other night during the results show, “This is why the NKOTB, the Backsteet Boys, and NSYNC will forever be superior to The Wanted & One Direction – they actually danced!!!” This new breed of British boy band is beyond lame – just like Heidi said, “one step forward, one step to the side, purposeless swatting hand gesture, pretend to strain to hit the high note, vaguely gangsta hand movement, repeat as necessary”.  I blame Simon Cowell, the whitest, most uptight, unhip man on the planet, for bringing us sorry excuses like this.  I mean c’mon, these dorks aren’t even following the formula – you need to have one boy next door (ok, maybe two), one “bad boy”, one exotic-looking one, one “mature” one, and at least one that can actually sing.  The members of The Wanted all look like Armenian gangsters to me…and half the time, the members of One Direction look more like they’re going to a barn raising than the clubs.  Somebody please call Donnie Wahlberg and give these clowns Boyband 101 classes…because let’s face it: even the worst dancers in MY era’s boybands (namely Lance Bass, Kevin Richardson, and Jonathan Knight) could STILL dance circles around Green Suit Guy from The Wanted.

The Top of the “Class” (and Grace) Award: Apolo Ohno and Emmitt Smith

Heidi: These two guys could give a couple of our male pros lessons in class, grace and humility. Very nice and very grown up. Nuff said from me. 😉

Courtney: No self-pity parties, no wordy explanations for why they didn’t do better, no-nonsense, and no excessive aloofness, either – just graciousness and thanks given for their time on the show.

The “OMG They Actually Pulled it OFF” Award for Cool Production Tricks: The production staff and Paula Abdul and Derek Hough for their respective results show dances

Heidi: Okay, credit where due. We give the production staff so much crap for all the stuff that goes wrong, it’s only fair that we give them props for pulling off the creative vision for both Paula and Derek.  Yes, Paula was lip syncing songs that are 500 years old (but which I like anyway), but I have to confess that I was marveling at the production tricks for that dance. I’m assuming a variety of green screen-type projection shots on the floor (you could see a special material they laid out over it) and the back curtain – that took some vision to pull off and the concept was cute too. All kinds of random stuff that you see in dreams. The little dog was my favorite part. 🙂  What appeared to be much simpler, but was likely much harder, was the slow motion in Derek’s live dance. I have no freakin’ clue how you do that during a live performance.  And just think of the careful timing that Derek and the ladies had to employ to make it appear like it did on-screen. They had to choreograph pauses of some set duration into the dance so the cameras could catch up to where they were. Loved the staging at the beginning too, all the black with white light flashes.

Courtney: Hehe…if Conrad were wise, he should have been up in the production booth with a gun to the Muppets’ head, threatening to pull the trigger if they “ruined the show’s only chance at an Emmy nod/win next year!!!” Who knows, maybe he was wise enough to do it – and the fear of God kept the Muppets from fucking up an epic performance 😛 As for Paula’s performance – it was indeed cute, but I have to wonder if it was less about the Muppets bungling it up…and more about Paula needing take after take to get it right 😛

The Carly Simon Award (a.k.a. The “You’re so Vain, I bet you think this song is about you” Award):  Val Chmerkovskiy and his Over Inflated Speedo Pride; (Dis)Honorable Mention to Kelly Monaco for Believing that her Surfer Flamenco was the most difficult of the bunch AND believing that they intentionally left it for her because they are threatened by her.

Heidi: Dude…you ain’t all that.  And it ain’t that cold in the studio. People think Derek uses gimmicks?? HA!! That right there was the biggest (er, smallest?) gimmick of the season so far. 😀  As for Kelly….whuuut?? You really think that they intentionally gave you the worst dance of the bunch with the worst theme because they’re threatened by you?? Hmmm….let’s take this one step at a time. You think Surfer Flamenco (which is EXTREMELY close to a Paso which is a dance you’ve already done) is actually a worse choice than Big Top Jazz or Knight Rider Bhangra?? Are you on CRACK?? A flamenco is at least close to standard ballroom. Jazz and Bhangra are NOT. Add in the themes those two dances had and it’s a miracle they were pulled off as well as they were. You should be kissing some serious Cheryl ass that she gave the Bhangra to Derek and Shawn because any dance that winds Shawn would KILL you.  Next step: they are all threatened by you??  They saved it for you on purpose?? Um…why?? From where I sit they did you a FAVOR and were trying to screw over Shawn and Apolo.  Delusional, dearie. You ain’t scary. Your fans might be, but you are not.

Courtney: I’m just shocked that Princess Blase & Aloof of Monaco actually managed to get upset about something and vocalize it 😛 Normally she’s just so “whatever” that half the time I don’t even think she cares whether she does great or does horrible.  Apparently her cage has been sufficiently rattled that she actually feels the need to say silly things like that…methink the lady doth protest too much.  As for Val? Somebody’s smuggling gym socks…and delusions of grandeur.

 The Cognitive Dissonance Award for Week 9: Kelly Monaco for Saying that she’ll be so Spray Tanned for the Finale that they’ll have no choice but to give her a 10.

Heidi: Ummm….WHUT? She must have been dizzy after dancing. She said that she’s never spray tanned before, but if they make it through she’ll spray tan so much that she’ll be so orange they’ll have no choice but to give her 10s.  Ummm….whut?? I’m not following.  Even as a joke….don’t get it. So…you haven’t gotten 10s cuz you’re not orange??

Courtney: Let’s see…we have a short, dark-haired, Latina tv personality, with an over-inflated sense of self-importance and who’s telling us that she’s going to spray tan a lot.  I didn’t know Snooki was on this season…

Best Hair Extension of Week 9: Tony Dovolani for his Caveman Hustle Hair Extensions, complete with bones

Heidi: Hilarious. Tony seemed to have a lot of fun with it and I admire a man who isn’t afraid to look a little silly. I also loved Derek pretending to braid it. 🙂  And just think – his hair extensions were dry and stringy ON PURPOSE. 😀

Courtney: Unlike a certain blonde-haired member of the troupe who shall remain nameless…

 The Cheesiest Cheese that Ever Cheesed, Week 9: The CGI Dinosaur from Tony/Melissa’s Caveman Hustle that was So Bad it was Good

Heidi: That was just ridiculously bad/good – but I would love to know how they did that as well. Kinda funny – when you watch it again, it clearly gets to a certain point and then they hit “rewind” to get him to go back off stage. 😀

Courtney: One of the Muppets was having wayyyy too much fun with the editing software…and probably watched Jurassic Park a few too many times as a kid.  😛

Tom Bergeron Line O’ the Night:  “Tony, don’t worry. You’re not the only one in Hollywood who has a lot of injections in their body.”

Heidi: Bwahahahaha….what more is there to say?? The truth hurts. Don’t look at the judges table when you say that, though. Word to the wise. 🙂

Courtney: Won’t matter – those who’ve had said injections have only one facial expression.  Won’t be able to tell if they’re upset or not 😛

Pro Dancer Least Likely to Get an Endorsement Deal out of Monday Night: Derek Hough for “Forget Zumba. Bhangra.”

Heidi: Derek, bad move. They’ll never give you a deal after that crack. 🙂

Courtney: Pssssh, Zumba’s so two-thousand and LATE, anyway…

The “Devil’s in the Details” Award: Cheryl and Emmitt’s Espionage Lindy Hop – the announcer announcing their dance in a hushed golf commentator voice. 

Heidi:  I think that’s the first time the announcer has played along in a dance isn’t it?? I didn’t even catch it the first time I saw the show and almost missed it in the replay.  The other fun little details was the actual lighting of a fuse on the mirror ball and then throwing it at Harold Wheeler and it subsequently blowing up.  A great by-product was CAI turning into Elmer Fudd after the judges talking about the cartoonishness of the dance. And not on purpose either. 🙂

Courtney: Too bad all the things you mentioned were more memorable than the dance itself. 😛

Heidi: :::sigh::: Too true. Probably the only reason I caught them. 😉