Episode Report Card Kim: B+ | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Season 5 Performance #2
By Kim | Season 5 | Episode 4 | Aired on 09.30.2007
Helio feels more pressure to be good on the mambo because he's Brazilian, but as a race car driver, he doesn't know how to move his hips. As they rehearse, he and Julianne knock heads more than once. Ouch. Julianne thinks Helio's charm will pull him through. They start dancing and I just stop typing and watch, because it's amazing. I see what the Eagle-Eyed Forum Posters pointed out this week, which is that Helio is actually leading, something that few male celebrities do. Carrie Ann points this out as well, and compliments Julianne's choreography. Len didn't think that Helio could top last week, but it was better, especially for the second week. Helio and Julianne are thrilled with the judges' remarks.
Backstage, Helio is very excited about the judges' comments. Helio doesn't think being Brazilian gives him an advantage in the Latin dances, and Julianne adamantly agrees. Drew tries to get Helio to name one other couple that he's worried about, but Helio won't single anyone out. Judges? 9, 9, and 9! Wow. I keep trying to figure out why Julianne looks older this season (other than the fact that she's, you know, older). I think she's lost weight, maybe?
Jennie and Derek are up next. They start rehearsing and Jennie is thrown by Derek's leg going in between her legs as part of the dance. She can't stop giggling, especially because she sees Derek as a kid. He asks her to view him as George Clooney. Jennie jokes that she has bigger muscles than him. Jennie thinks that ballroom is more natural for her, and that does seem true.
Jennie and Derek start dancing to "Suddenly I See" by KT Tunstall. At least this is a reasonably fast quickstep, and I love Jennie's pink flowy dress. Things go well, with lots of complicated footwork, until the very end. Jennie runs across the dance floor and goes to slide under Derek's legs but something happens and he wipes out, taking her down with him. They end up on the floor together and try to piece together a big finish from a seated position, which doesn't really work out. Whatever happened, the leg that Derek lost was the one away from the camera so we couldn't see it.
Len enjoyed that they started the dance right away, but asks Jennie to work on her posture. Jennie is making a lemon-sucking face, which I think is her trying not to cry. Bruno compares it to the voyage of the Titanic, which started out well, but hit a few icebergs along the way. Carrie Ann tells Jennie that dancing is like acting, in that she needs to be present and not so much in her head. That's the same criticism Ian Ziering got last year! Jennie is either really hurt or really upset or both; she's clearly fighting back tears. ["We analyzed that weird face she was making pretty intensely in my living room, and I hypothesized that it was a combination of (1) embarrassment about messing up; (2) being really secretly competitive and therefore a little mad at Derek; (3) desperately trying to disguise how hard she was panting; and (4) really, really, REALLY too much self-tanner for someone who's so fair." -- Miss Alli] Backstage, Jennie and Derek find out their scores: 7, 7, and 7. Jennie looks much happier now, so the commercial break clearly did her good. Derek explains that he caught his foot on Jennie's dress. Jennie, who has lost her voice, squeaks out that her daughters advised her to not trip. Oof. That didn't work out so great.