Dancing with the Stars Season 22, Week 5 – Switch UP Live Blog!! (Spoilers)

This week’s challenge is that I’m sick AND Derek is apparently on Jane the Virgin at 9pm EST. 🙂 So, I’ll be flipping over at 9, flipping back at 9:30 and then picking up the few minutes I missed after the show. 🙂 How not fun. 😉 I’ll probably be flipping back and forth, honestly. Tivo’s are a wonderful thing.

LOVED the opening number! Very simple, but I liked the way it was laid out and I particularly liked the colors – it was very colorful.

Maks will be “just”. Okay. We’ll see.  Oh and the byplay with Erin has already started. Come on. We know.

Oh Witney, you are annoying me. You’ll make Wanya better? You hate switchup, remember.

Okay, I think Witney did well by Wanya – loved the costuming and the song. I thought it was a good tango, actually. Disagree with Len.

That was overly harsh on Wanya – and Maks, really? Someone figured out who baby bros competition is.

I love Kim…and I adore the look she gets on her face in the opening segment when Keo touches her. Gorgeous. But the choreography was too sharp and she didn’t really smooth out or finish her movements. That’s what Sasha needs to work on.

Really, Maks is trying much harder to make an impact.  Overly harsh…and a guy (and his brother) who wastes an unbelievable amount of time getting started dancing really has no room to be so critical.

I’m sorry, but I don’t watch this show to just have them crap on every dance. I sure hope they don’t save all their kind words for Val and his actual partner.

Love Peta – I think she did a good job here with Doug. Looked like a proper tango and he seemed less stiff than in previous weeks.

Heh….someone on twitter just said that Meryl is 3-4 inches taller than Kim and Maks is an inch (at least) shorter than Keo. LOL. BS as usual.

Judges very kind to Doug, yet he gets worse scores. Hmmm….

OMG…the questions section. Hilarious. Wanya!!! Dude….

You have time for another James Bay number? Hey, I like the dude, but I also like longer dances.  Incidentally, I was watching season 6 and 7 for a thing I’m doing for PureDerekHough and those dances were LONG. These celebs would never survive them. Seriously, week 1 Shannon and Derek was like a minute 30.

That “nice glass of merlot” has an Emmy Nomination.

Hey, Ginger danced a whole routine!! It started out a little weird with her top half doing some weird things, but she really found her stride about halfway through.  Much more content that last week. Better executed. But the bar was set low. Of course, they are starting to over praise her yet again – it wasn’t THAT great. It was good. It was certainly better than last week. But come ON.

Okay, time for me to switch over for a dose of Derek. I’ll be in and out and I’ll fill in anything I miss in a bit. 🙂

So I switched between JTV and DWTS like four times and the entire time they were pimping…I mean, talking to Ginger.

*****

Peeked back in to see Maks hose his brother’s biggest competition. Asshole.

****

Didn’t know Jane the Virgin is an hour long show. Peeked back in to see Von and Witney do a pretty good Jive. There was a problem in the beginning, but they pulled it together.  I notice that those who pose no threat to Val and Ginger get a much kinder Maks.  Still think he’s the least qualified former pro to be a judge. Ability to be nasty doesn’t make you qualified.

****

Nyle just blows my mind. Sharna did right by him this week and crafted a beautiful dance that he executed beautifully. I couldn’t see a thing wrong with it.  Okay…flipping back. 🙂 Oh…but man, did Sharna screw up early on in the package. Assumptions are bad, my dear.

Okay, now I’m back. So glad I could see Derek dance salsa with (amazing dancer) Gina Rodriguez tonight. Pretty much the only thing that saved the evening. Oh, and a Maks fan told me I was a Derek fan in the comments. No sh*t, sherlock!!  To think I stood up for Maks and wished him back over Val. You can forget that deal. Maks wishes he was half the judge that Julianne is. Say what you want – I had lots of gripes about her judging at times, but she was never a dick.

Antonio….I kinda liked this dance and I feel like Karina got more out of him than Sharna has. I feel like it was better than his absurdly high scored dance last week. It’s almost like the judges just found out that he wasn’t showing up for rehearsal or something.

And Karina has an amazing rocking body. Frankly, I thought those scores were a bit ridiculous. Funniest thing all night tonight is Karina’s comments on the judges. That’s how you kill with kindness, folks. 😀

I wasn’t actually crazy about Paige’s dance. She performed it well, but I have to agree that it didn’t look very rumba-y. That said….that wasn’t her fault. She performed VERY well what she was given by Sasha. This is where the judging is OTT. They (Maks, mostly) are judging the choreographer instead of the celebrity. Yes, it is absolutely a team effort and they have to be graded as a team. Yet, you hear people like MAKS bitch and moan in the past about Derek being scored high for amazing choreography – this is no different. Only worse because you’re hurting a celebs chances because of what the choreographer chooses to do. I think Maks is working through some envy issues here – and it could be directed at any number of people. It’s almost like he and Len are trying to wrest DWTS back to the strictly ballroom days.  Now, I wouldn’t have too much of a problem with that…but it’s something that should be laid out before the season starts, instead of springing it on them in the middle of the competition. Let’s face it – the good choreographers choreograph creatively to the music – and that wasn’t rumba music. Period.  There are so many problems with the judging tonight that I could go on all night. But I’ve been sick all day and right now my head hurts. 🙂

I talked about Von above but I liked his dance better the second time around. I think he could have gotten 8s and it would have been fine.

I also talked about Nyle above, too, and he’s still amazing and probably the best dance of the night so far.

So, why did Jodie get the pimp spot? Does anyone really think that the audience is on the edge of it’s seat waiting to see her reunite with Val? Beyond one fangirl in the comments, I doubt it.

Well, both Jodie and Val’s best dance of the season so far! Perhaps they got the pimp spot because Val choreographed and entire dance and they started immediately?  Jodie did a great job. My only question is why Val hasn’t given this quality of dance to Ginger so far??  All that said, I don’t think it should be higher than 3rd place for the night, after Wanya and Nyle.

As we said earlier in the week – no elimination this week. Next weeks elimination will  consist of scores and votes from tonight and last week.