Generally, it was a pretty “meh” week. I don’t feel like anyone had any huge breakthroughs or astounding performances, and everyone was more or less in a holding pattern from the previous week. Or all the days are running together due to the pandemic, and the sense of impending doom I’m getting from the election is just dulling my senses. Both are equally plausible at this point.
As it usually happens at least once per season, Carrie Ann appointed herself the “critical” judge this week, and seemed to nitpick just about everyone, and Kaitlyn doubly. I feel like she pulls this shit right after she gets called out for giving generally dumb or just unhelpful feedback – in this case, it was her “I wasn’t feeling it” comment in response to Kaitlyn’s paso doble last week, which prompted both Artem and Val to speak up in the media about her lack of helpful feedback. It’s like she gets defensive to the point of having to prove that she’s a serious, tough dance judge with credentials, and ends up just looking petty because of the way she just reeeeeaches for stuff to pick at. It’s a not a good look, but it’s not like we haven’t know for YEARS that Carrie Ann was the least legitimate of the judges. And it did seem like Derek was trying to soften the blow after Carrie Ann went on her rampages – more often than not, he gave reassuring compliments, and was scoring a point or two higher than both Bruno & Carrie Ann. Caught a weird moment immediately after the bottom 2 were called – Derek and Bruno seemed to be gesturing towards one another as if to say “Well what do you think?” before glancing over at Carrie Ann, who seemed engrossed in a bunch of papers she was writing on and ignored them completely. WTF was she doing, filing a tax return??? The scores had long since been logged, not sure what was so important that she felt she needed to write it down before the elim…
Now with Chrishell gone, I don’t think there’s any truly crummy dancers left – which leaves us in an interesting position. One could probably argue that Nelly’s the weakest, but he’s still improving and he also appears to be quite popular, as he has yet to fall into the bottom two despite some harsh scores. On the flip side, both Johnny and Skai have been trending upward with scores in recent weeks, but both have been in the bottom 2 at least once. Then you’ve got Kaitlyn and AJ, who are good but seem to vacillate in a bit in terms of quality; and there’s Justina & Nev, who are consistent but not always super memorable to watch. Add to the mix the fact that we still don’t know how many couples are headed to the finale (I think five is a good number, as it’s the top 1/3 of contestants this season, but who knows), and I can’t really state with confidence who will be there and who won’t. I’d say this made me excited, but anymore, I’m struggling to feel passionate about this show – I’m afraid a lot of the magic died for me with Tom’s departure. Add Tyrant trying to fake cry about Jeannie for attention and I’m damn near changing the channel…ugh.
So we obviously bid farewell to Jeannie – which sucks, because she really was one of the most fun contestants to watch this season, and I loved how she vibed with Brandon. But I’ve come to learn that one’s health is nothing to trifle with, so I’m glad she caught her ailment at such a crucial point and will likely make a full recovery. If I’m being honest, I had already predicted her as one half of the double elim in last week’s rankings, so I can’t say I’m terribly surprised…although the cause of her elimination is something I definitely wouldn’t have predicted. At the very least, Brandon made it further this season than he ever has before. Then we (finally) shook the dead weight of Chrishell & Gleb loose, which I felt was long overdue. The fact that Gleb had the audacity to pull out the damn bed as a prop FOR A VIENNESE WALTZ had my blood boiling, as did the fact that he once again managed to include the minimum possible number of steps needed to be considered a Viennese waltz and somehow got he and his partner another tongue bath for it. Then there was the suspicious convenience of Carrie Ann NOT calling them out for a lift (after specifically nitpicking Kaitlyn for something similar earlier in the night), and I was downright incredulous by the end of their critique and scoring. Seriously, I wanted to smack all three judges (Derek included) for their gushing. Why did Chrishell get diplomatic immunity for most of the season??? That’s the real question. And I think I finally figured out what it was about Chrishell that grated on my nerves: she’s a perpetual victim. I think the only week she didn’t play that card was 80s week, when her package dealt with her being an NKOTB fan. The rest of the time it was “I grew up poor!”, “I got divorced!”, “I had to freeze my eggs!”, “I’m sooooo busy as a real estate agent!” I think of all the other contestants this season, and while everyone had a week or two that was sad, for the most part, their packages all netted out to be generally pretty upbeat and positive. Chrishell’s seemed to be a laundry list of trauma and ways in which her life is hard. I don’t claim to know exactly how her divorce went down, or whose fault it was (as a kid of divorce, I’ve found its usually both spouses’ fault, to some degree), but after seeing her on this season of DWTS, I do think she’s a bit of a bullshit artist and is likely fibbing a bit when she gives the “I was completely blindsided!” line with regards to her divorce. And Gleb…well, y’all know how I feel about him. Let’s just say I wasn’t exactly broken up about it when the judges opted to save Skai & Alan over Chrishell & Gleb 😉 Read more..
