PureDWTS DWTS Jr. Internet Watch – Interesting Things on Twitter & Instagram

Ok, since my DM’s on Twitter have been blowing up with questions of “Did you see who [insert pro here] followed?!” or “OMG [insert celebrity child here] loves slime and [insert pro here] just posted a picture with slime!!! Are they paired up???”, I figured now was the time to pull the trigger on what I will call an “internet watch” post. This is going to be the place where you find all of the interesting, peculiar, curious, and suspicious goings-on between the pros, junior pros, potential kid celebs, etc. on Twitter and Instagram (and maybe Facebook, if anyone actually still uses it anymore) that aren’t necessarily concrete enough to elicit their own post, but are food-for-thought nonetheless.

First, a bit of a disclaimer: I’ve kind of said this already on Twitter, but DWTS Jr. is going to be different than DWTS (because these are kids, not adults), and thus I feel like I need to approach it differently; with that being said, I’m not sure spoiling anything that isn’t already somewhat common knowledge (i.e. the kids posting on social media, or anything other media outlets have already leaked) feels…ethical. Source has told me just how excited the kids are, and want everyone to be surprised at the cast announcement – and that gives me pause, because I don’t want the junior pros/their celeb partners to be disappointed. So with that being said, I’ve decided not to spoil any celeb names that haven’t already been hinted at or leaked by others – I’ll speculate along with you guys on things you see, but I’ve gotten a few of the kid celeb names, and they’re names that NOBODY is talking about; I’m going to keep ’em to myself unless some other outlet spoils them…and knowing this show, someone will eventually. Be patient 🙂

So now that we’ve got that out of the way, let’s address the Honey Boo-Boo in the room: yes, Alanna Thompson (aka “Honey Boo Boo” from Here Comes Honey Boo Boo) has started following (and is being followed) by some interesting people. Recent follows include the @DancingABC official account, Alan, & Elliana.  She’s also recently been followed by Artyon, and thanks to @haykambright & @fisharnolds on Twitter, we have proof she’s currently in L.A. for what appears to be more than just a short vacay. So what do I think it means? I think it means she’s likely on the show (she’s the right age, and the right kind of celeb), but I’m not sure how much else you can infer with confidence. Artyon’s mom manages his Instagram account, so the fact that he followed Alanna gives me pause – whereas a kid probably follows whoever they want and doesn’t give it much thought, I think his mom probably is more careful (and knows that all the kids have probably been instructed not to let too much slip on social media). It sounds like the kids are all kind of mingling together, and their pro mentors as well – so Alanna may have just met and taken a shine to Alan (he is good with kids, y’know) or he might be her mentor.  WHO KNOWS – this is all brand new since we’ve never had a cast made entirely of kids before.  Discuss 🙂

Moving on – the second most talked-about potential celeb appears to be Miles Brown, and part of me isn’t sure if it’s just because he was on my wishlist of celebs from a year ago (exactly) and I’m just being optimistic or what, but there appears to be some compelling evidence that he might be one of the junior celebs…and he might be paired with Rylee 🙂 I posted yesterday about Lindsay playing in the celebrity charity basketball game – and she was on a team with Miles.  To my knowledge – they aren’t old friends, and they aren’t following each other; so to me, it was rather interesting that Miles posted the picture below, with both Lindsay AND Rylee (it’s the 4th pic in the series, use the arrow on the right to toggle through):

I had also heard murmurings that Miles’ dad was sitting by Rylee and Mindy (Mama Arnold) at the game, and was cheering for Lindsay.  Miles also posted this picture with a rather interesting caption a few days ago…

I’m feeling pretty optimistic about him being a part of the cast – but what do YOU think?

Two other less obvious names being murmured are Stella McDermott (Tori Spelling & Dean McDermott’s 10-year-old daughter) and Mandla Morris (Stevie Wonder’s 13-year-old son). The former apparently runs an Instagram slime account (side note: WTF is with this slime that these kids seem so obsessed with? Is this like Gak(TM) or Floam(TM) that we had as kids???), and after Emma posted a Snap with some slime that “she” brought her, and some people assumed it was Stella due to similarities in the slime Emma got and some that Stella posted – but since Emma’s mentee is Elliana (and my source says that nearly all the kids in the cast are obsessed with slime), I think we can safely assume it’s not Stella. Neither Stella nor mom Tori appears to be following anyone from DWTS, but Stella is the right age and the right kind of celeb for DWTS Jr…so who knows.

As for Mandla – I’m told he followed Brightyn & her sister on Instagram, but doesn’t appear to be following them anymore; he was also spotted outside the studio about a week ago…thank you @haykambright for the smoking gun studio pix from a scheisty-looking Russian website 😛 First they tampered with the election, now they’ve set their eyes on DWTS…

Update #1: If you haven’t already seen, Alana & Miles have been confirmed as being part of the cast. And we’ve got 2 new interesting things happening on Instagram: Addison Osta Smith, Masterchef: Junior season 4 champion, has recently been followed by Lev & his mother, and she has started following Alana, Mandla, Gleb, Sasha, and Keo in the past week.  I’m beginning to think these kids don’t care much about keeping things secret 😛 Perhaps even more interesting: why was Kim Kardashian posting on her IG from the DWTS studio??? Kim’s kids are too young for DWTS Jr. – her oldest, North, is only 5; however, Kourtney’s oldest, Mason, is 8…which wouldn’t be a stretch if he was paired with 9-year-old Kamri, and given that he comes up past 5’0″ mom Kourtney’s shoulders, he may be about the right height as well.  Witney follows both Kourtney & Scott on Instagram, but I feel like I remember her saying in the past that she’s a fan of Keeping up with The Kardashians…thoughts? Thanks to @haykambright & Lex for the heads-up. Funny thing is, I think I actually joked about Mason doing DWTS back in season 13 when he was in the audience for Rob…gonna have to go dig up that post…UPDATE: Found it 😛

Update #2: Scratch Mason Disick – according to the sketchy Russian pap site, Kim was at the studio to visit Sophia Pippen, the daughter of NBA legend Scottie Pippen and Kim’s friend, Larsa (one of the former Real Housewives of Miami). Mandla is following Sophia on Instagram, and Sophia looked to be tooling around L.A. in activewear yesterday, according to her mom’s IG story. Thanks again to @haykambright for pointing this out, while I was in a meeting…

Update #3: Apparently there’s been quite a bit of activity on Instagram today – enough that I had to set aside my econ & marketing homework to update this post 😛 It has been pointed out to me that General Hospital actor Hudson West started following Kami on Instagram – and for reasons I can’t really get into, I’m going to go ahead and confirm that YES, he’s part of the cast, and his partner is, indeed, Kami. It also looks like JT started following Tripp Palin, Bristol’s 9-year-old son, and sister Piper started following @dwtsjunior on IG.  Also worth noting: Brandon followed Disney star Ariana Greenblatt, and I’ve had 5-6 people message me about a bunch of the pros/junior pros following Kenzie Ziegler (younger sis of Maddie Ziegler, and also a Dance Moms alum). I would venture a guess that’s she’s probably part of the show, but NOT as a celeb – more likely as troupe member, host, or judge (although I’m skeptical that they’d let Kenzie judge one of her Dance Moms contemporaries – Elliana).  I don’t really have the time (or energy) for screen shots right now, but I might later…discuss. Thank you to everyone who pointed this stuff out, there’s too many of you to name…

Update #4: Two interesting things (and one not-so-interesting thing) have been pointed out to me over the last 48 hours.  First, 10-year-old surfer/skater Sky Brown started following/being followed by a bunch of the confirmed DWTS Jr. cast members.  Second, Frankie Muniz tweeted something awfully interesting about heading to L.A. – keep in mind, the first camera blocking is tomorrow, and while I don’t think they necessarily need the judges for that, they do need the hosts 😎 The third thing (which, admittedly, some of you were driving me a bit nuts about) was former SYTYCD contestant/Danish ballroom competitor Malene Ostergaard following Kami & Hudson on Twitter.  I’m not sure what significance everyone thought she had, but source confirmed my suspicions that she was simply assisting with choreography – she’s not a host, she’s not a judge, she’s not going to be a permanent fixture on the show.  Literally just there to help Hayley with choreography.

Anyone else notice anything interesting on Twitter/Instagram? I’ll try to keep this post updated with anything that seems curious as we wait for the new season to start 😉