Okay, before we get to the meat of last night’s episode, we have a question. What is this “for real” business? At first it was just the shirts some dancers wore that said “IV REAL” which, we will admit, we pronounced as “ivy real.” And then it was the weird hand-on-shoulder sign. And now even Cat is saying it. But what is it? Is it like…a cause of some kind? Or an inside joke? Is it like those Inspi(red) shirts? These questions are driving us crazy.
Anyway. Was it just us, or was last night’s show a bit…sexy? Obviously any show with gyrating twenty-year-olds with exquisite bodies in skimpy outfits will be at least a bit hot, but there was a definite air of naughtiness. Not only was there an angry/sexy kiss between Twitch and Katee at the start of their number, but we once again found Nigel discussing his bedroom antics (with…Mary Murphy. And voyeurism. Please take a moment and vomit.) and in-depth discussions of long legs (Chelsea’s) and entrancing backsides (Joshua’s). And even though Will was wearing a shirt, it was see-through mesh, which hardly counts.
Maybe the sexiness had to do with the fact that the dancing was so much more fun this week? Out of eight routines, seven were great (and once we tell you that Mark and Comfort had to do the foxtrot, we think you should be able to figure out which one wasn’t good). Our favorite was probably Mia Michaels’ dance for Twitch and Katee, involving a spurned woman and a prop door. The only thing that distracted us was the constant slamming of said door, which had us screaming out, “FINGERS! WATCH YOUR FINGERS!” Because, apparently, we have turned into our grandmother.
Since we’re down to only eight dancers, we needed some filler in the form of clips of each contestant explaining how they got started with dance. Since most of them said they started dancing at three, it didn’t really do much for us. Unless the story is something like, “I got into dance because I was sold to the circus at a young age and learned to love performing,” then we don’t care. Also not impressing us was guest judge Toni Basil, she of “Hey Mickey” fame, who looks decidedly cat-like. We won’t lie – we TiVo’d through her comments. And Mary Murphy referenced Ashton Kutcher and Punk’d, which filled us with unexpected rage. It’s been a wonderfully long time since we had to think about Mr. Kutcher and we’ll be damned if Mary Murphy somehow brings him back (don’t say his name three times! He’ll suddenly appear!).
NOTE: through the magic of Google, we found out that the “IV REAL” thing is an inside joke (because it’s season four and they are so very real this time around). We love that, because it fuels our fantasies about all the dancers being best friends and having slumber parties and CALL US because we want to join.
-- James Ryan