So I guess they came up with this show after Marissa Jaret Winokur won the hearts of America on Dancing With The Stars, except that I saw that season and all she really did is suck out loud and cry and guilt the audience into keeping her on the show and not Marlee Matlin. And apparently she lost some weight in the process, so now we're here. She greets us, and I hate to be mean, but if you're going to have a show with the premise that dancing can help you lose weight, shouldn't you have a host who has danced her way to a healthy weight? Because MJW is still overweight, so when she says that this will be a "life-changing experience" for our contestants, I have my doubts.
We meet our contestants! First up is Alicia, 23, from Scranton, PA! When she isn't hanging out with Jim and Pam, she's fat. At least, that's all she tells us about her background. She enters her new home, which is decorated in typical brightly-colored and IKEA-furnitured reality show style. She finds two cabinets. One is full of fruits and vegetables and the other is full of junk food, because this show is mean. Trice, 24, who pronounces her name "Tree-sha-nell" for some reason and claims to be from "Inglewo-wo-wooood!" even though her graphic says she's from Chicago so it's all very confusing, wants us to know that you can be fat and still have moves. Then why is she on a show about learning moves while losing weight? This seems contrary to everything she stands for. Miles, 28, is from Salt Lake City, and his father died at a young age from obesity but Miles didn't really learn any lessons from that so now he needs to be on this show. He gets a good workout right away when he enters the house and Trice jumps into his arms. Then there's Pinky, 29, who is even worse than Trice because she pronounces her name "Sophia Maranya Perez." I can't wait for Raymond Luxury Yacht, pronounced "Throat Warbler Mangrove." Pinky is a "street dancer" and thinks if she just lost the excess weight she'd be even better at it.
Brandon, 20, is a Type 2 diabetic and proudly holds a candy bar up in his home submission video. Shockingly, his blood sugar was so high in his pre-show physical that he almost wasn't allowed on the plane to Los Angeles. Brandon walks in the house and immediately complains about how the healthy food pantry "stunk" because it was full of fruits and vegetables. If he thinks it stinks now, wait until about a fortnight later when those fruit and vegetables are good and rotten. Also, I'm pretty sure there are like ten jars of peanut butter on the top shelf of the supposed healthy food pantry, so whatever. Brandon opens the bad food pantry, takes out a bunch of donuts, and eats them. It's not like I want anyone to go into a diabetic coma, but if I did, it would be Brandon. up is Karla, 29, and... holy shit! I'm pretty sure I used to live in the same apartment building as she did! And yet, they claim she's from Phoenix, even though she's lived in Los Angeles for years. One time, in our apartment building, the elevator went out for like five months and Karla had to hoof it up four flights of stairs to her apartment. I'd always find her slumped on the stairwell between the second and third floors. In her defense, it was really hot, because our apartment building was apparently in Phoenix, unbeknownst to me. Karla says she wants to lose weight so she can get a boyfriend. She might also want to get a mirror, because when she meets her castmates, she's amazed at how much bigger they all are than her when they're about the same size.
Angela, 24, used to be a model before gaining 55 pounds in the last two years. Yikes. That sounds like either a past or a present eating disorder to me. I don't know if dancing can really cure that. Ruben, 43, walks in shortly after her and tells us he used to be a professional dancer, so hello, Ringer. Ruben is gay and left his partner of seven years in ICU recovering from cancer to be on this show. Dance your priorities off, Ruben! Mara, 32, from Detroit, claims that diabetes runs in her family, as her brother died from it and she and her mother suffer from it. She wants to make a change. Tara, 32, from Orlando, says being a mother is her first priority unless she gets cast on a reality show, at which point she dumps the kids and seeks fortune and fame. Shayla, 27, used to be very much in shape, as her home submission video shows. Then she gained 80 pounds over ten years, which seems like a lot until you realize that it's just eight pounds a year, which is less than a pound a month, and you see how it can sneak up on you. Warren is 29 and wants to show his kids that you can be healthy as long as there's a reality show in it for you.
Now that everyone has arrived, Trice wants us to know that she's here to win, not to make friends, because there's always one reality show contestant who has to say that. MJW finally saunters in and everyone feels the need to hug her. Nobody hugs Jeff Probst like this. What the hell? Hands off the host! This isn't Dance Your Personal Space Off. Alicia says that MJW is the only "plus-sized girl" she's ever seen to make it in Hollywood. Alicia clearly doesn't get out much. It's not easy to be large and in charge, but it's not impossible, either. Please don't let MJW be your example of the most a larger woman can achieve in the entertainment business. MJW and her giant hair repeat that this competition will change everyone's life. She explains the contest: each contestant will be paired up with a professional dancer. They will also meet with Dr. Huizenga, the weight loss reality show whore. Are there no other doctors in Los Angeles to choose from besides this clown? Or maybe they're all too busy taking their careers seriously. Contestants will have a nutritionist, personal trainer, choreographer and costume designers at their disposal. And they have their own private lofts with a gym and dance rehearsal rooms door, which is very nice indeed. No military-style tackily-decorated apartments for these contestants! When MJW tells them there will be a live audience and judges watching their weekly dance routines, Ruben acts like he had no idea that was coming. The eliminated contestant will be determined by a combination of weight loss and dance scores. The winner gets $100,000. "If I win this money, I'm gonna go shopping," Mara says. Yes, that's wise. The rest of the contestants have better things to spend their money on, like college and mothers. With that, everyone gets to meet with creepy Dr. H, who scolds them for their various obesity-induced health problems, not like that's much of a motivator for these people. Brandon is diabetic and he still eats candy bars and donuts. Alicia bursts into tears for the second time in the first 10 minutes of this show and whines a lot. Dr. H tries to defend the bad food pantry, saying it's there to give the contestants the same temptations they'll face in the real world, when we all know it's just there to be mean.
With that, we go to the live studio audience (but not actually live) portion of the show. MJW is on stage while the contestants are in the back looking nervous. MJW introduces us to our judges, who are sitting in a giant sparkly egg. Mayte Garcia has been a choreographer for Prince and Britney Spears, which means she has a lot of experience with crazy people. Lisa Ann Walter was in a movie about dancing but doesn't seem to have much of a dancing background. In fact, she's a stand-up comedian who had the concept for this show and managed to convince the network to let her be a judge on it. And finally, there's our snarky British judge, choreographer Danny Teeson. MJW tells us that the contestants have already weighed in, so the last two picked to perform tonight are the ones who lost the least amount of weight. I don't see the point of revealing this information before the dancing, but I guess every little bit helps pad this baby out to almost an hour and a half.
First up to dance is Alicia. Try not to cry, Alicia. We see an unfortunate montage of her moves and learn she starts off at 257.6 pounds. Alicia wants to eat a turkey burger for lunch and dinner, but the nutritionist says no to that. Alicia bursts into tears. She meets with her dance partner, Italo, and gets fitted for her outfit. Dance time! Alicia and Italo will be dancing to Ricky Martin's "The Cup of Life," because this show blew the music rights budget on those private lofts. I have to admit, it does look a little funny to see a large woman dancing with a skinny little man, but Alicia does a pretty good job, even going down into a split. I can't do a split, so I'm pretty impressed. Mayte talks about how great Alicia's dancing was before giving her a lowly 6. But she claims it's a "good 6." Alicia's like, "I would prefer a 'good 10.'" Lisa was impressed enough by the split to give Alicia a 7. Danny has to be the nasty judge, so he says that Alicia's enthusiasm made her a bit sloppy and gives her a 6. Alicia will get an average score from those three numbers of a 6.3 as well as an awkward side-hug from MJW. Alicia does her split one more time before MJW sends her to the scale to see how much she lost this week. I like how they tell us the contestant's height during the weigh-in, by the way. I always wonder about that on these types of shows. 200 pounds looks much different on a 5' woman than a 6' man. Alicia lost 7.5 pounds this week, which is 2.91% of her body weight (this show is really specific with the numbers, huh?), which is the number they'll add to the judges' average. This gives Alicia a total score of 9.21. She goes flying to the top of the chart, which isn't very impressive since she's the only person on that chart.
up is Ruben, who began the contest at 314.3 lbs. He spent the week exercising and learning how to cook, just like Alicia and probably every other contestant except Brandon. He then meets his dance partner, Hilary, who is very pleased with his ability. Which she should be, since he was a professional dancer. Ruben says that doing the steps and the moves was hard in such an out-of-shape and heavy body. Ruben and Hilary will also be dancing to shitty '90s club music with Cher's "Believe." Also, Ruben's dance outfit is horrible. I thought they said the costume designers were there to make these people feel good about themselves. Ruben has been out of the professional dancing world for a while, it looks like. Or maybe he wasn't a very good professional dancer to start with. Mayte criticizes Ruben for anticipating his moves but then says she loves his costume, so I can't trust anything she says. She gives him a 6. Lisa accuses Mayte of being tougher on Ruben because of his dancing background before giving Ruben a 7, the same score she gave Alicia, which means she just did the same exact thing that Mayte did. Danny also thought Ruben was too in his head and not in the dancing moment, and since he's an evil English judge, the audience boos and Lisa gets all defensive on Ruben's behalf. Then Danny gives Ruben a 5. Ouch! His average score is 6. But then he loses 13.9 pounds, which is 4.42% of his body weight. His combined score is 10.42.
Shayla is the up. She meets her partner, Mario, and dances for him. She looks pretty good to me, and Mario is also pleased. During rehearsal, she realizes that her weight is keeping her from doing some of the moves she used to be able to do. But Trice says that you can be a size 18 and still dance just as well as a size 2, so Shayla must be wrong. Shayla warns us that she might get X-rated before saying most of her weight is carried in "the girls." Shayla, the show has the word "ass" in the title. Don't worry. She weighs 206.5 pounds, although she really does wear it well because she doesn't look especially huge in her underwear. Except for her boobs, of course, which are freaking massive. Shayla says that having giant boobs isn't so great, because they're large with fat and they hurt. Preach it, sister. Shayla and Mario are dancing to "Pround Mary" (the Tina Turner version, not the CCR version), so already I know this will be awesome. She does a decent job, but it's hard to tell when the choreography is so bad. Don't recycle Tina's moves, Mario. But the audience loves it, and give her a standing ovation. Mayte points out that Shayla did the entire dance in heels, which is pretty awesome of her. She gives Shayla a 7, and one guy in the audience claps enthusiastically, probably because of Shayla's boobs. Lisa gives Shayla another 7 because that's the only number she knows, apparently. Danny has praise for Shayla, although he must also say she has room for improvement because he's English. He gives her a 7, too. Shayla gets on the scale and loses 4.9 pounds, which she's thrilled about even though it's only 2.37% of her body weight. Her total score is 9.37. Go Shayla!
Warren goes . He started the show at 357.6 lbs. Whoops! He is big. The nutritionist sets him up with plenty of product placement turkey and apples, which you'll be shocked to learn is not Warren's usual diet. To demonstrate, we watch slow-motion shots of Warren eating a donut over and over again. Warren meets Sarah, his dance partner, and gives her his best white man with no moves moves. Oh dear. Warren has a lot to overcome on this show. And he and Sarah will be dancing to "Jump Around," the song for all white men with no moves. Tragically, he'll be wearing bright red shorts pulled up high with suspenders, a wife beater, and a lime green cap. Yuck. Okay, so Warren does a really good job with his dance, although there's nothing too difficult in it. But come on. He's 350 pounds and from Utah. I am impressed. Mayte is not, and criticizes Warren for not connecting enough with his partner. She does praise his running man, which I actually thought was the weakest of his moves. She gives him a 5. Lisa picks on Warren's facial expression during his dance, which is kind of unfair. It's his first week! Also, Lisa's lips are over-inflated with collagen and that is even more distracting, so she should shut up. She copies Mayte and gives him a 5. Danny has praise for Warren, saying he was impressed with his ability to memorize all of those moves and train his mind so quickly. He gives him a 6. Danny's opinion is the only one I trust on this show now. Warren's average score is a 5.3. He tells MJW that giving up bacon was harder for him than the dancing and heads for the scale. He lost 11.6 pounds, which is 3.24% of his body weight! But his overall total is 8.54, putting him in last place, thanks to Mayte and Lisa.
Trice is . She meets her partner, Jesus, and interviews that he's "so small." Jesus, on the other hand, is nice and so praises Trice for her moves in his interview. Trice can do a split. She's the third contestant out of five to be able to do this, which makes me think I need to do some serious work on my flexibility. Trice and Jesus work for seven minutes before Trice gets tired. Bad attitude. Her starting weight is 274.9 pounds. She works out and says she's looking forward to losing weight and getting a great ass. Except that if she does get a great ass, it will eventually fall off, as per the show title. Trice and Jesus get some current music for their routine, doing "Disturbia." Trice looks pretty good and shows off her split. She makes a lot of scary faces, too, although some of them might have been intentional. But if Lisa is going to pick on Warren for his faces, she'd better nail Trice, too. Mayte tells Trice to work on her arm movement, which prompts Trice to show off her not inconsiderable arm fat. Mayte will not accept this excuse, although poor Jesus is looking terrified of the slaps he is going to get from it if Trice makes it to week. Mayte gives Trice a 6, and Trice takes this as another opportunity to give Inglewood a shout-out. Lisa compliments Trice's flexibility but calls her energy "too frenetic." Trice responds to this with a lot of energy that is too frenetic, so good luck with that. Lisa gives her a 6. Danny compliments Trice's dance-ending booty-shake, although he does so by alleging that Trice could make a lot of money by selling that ass as possibly a stripper or prostitute. He gives her a 6. MJW asks Trice the burning questions: what food did she miss the most this week? "Cheesecake!" Trice says without hesitation. Then she hogs the mic and makes a speech about how she's no size 5, but she's shaking what her momma (and a shitload of cheesecake) gave her. MJW finally gets Trice on the scale. She lost 11.4 pounds this week! Wow! I guess when you take the cheesecake away, she really isn't supposed to be that heavy. That's an impressive 4.15% of her body weight for a total score of 10.15.
Angela the model is . Her starting weight is the lowest of anyone so far at 185.9 pounds. She gained all that weight in just two years, which is terrifying. She hopes this show will break the bad habits she's gotten into. She meets her partner Kenny, and then the routine begins! They'll be dancing to "Crazy Little Thing Called Love." Even I can tell that Angela is not a natural dancer and her moves are conspicuously jerky and awkward. The dance ends with a bad lift/cartwheel thing. Mayte gives her a 6 anyway, even though there's no way that was better than Warren. Lisa gives Angela a 5, and Danny says this obviously doesn't come naturally to Angela and gives her a 5. Her average is a 5.3, and she lost 3.5 pounds, which is just 1.8% of her body weight. Her total is a lowly 7.18. Yay! Warren is safe!
up is Mara, who began the show at 261.9 pounds. She and the scale lady have an awkward interaction before she meets her new partner Paul and shows off her "Afro-Caribbean-infused jazz hip-hop everything gumbo" dance. Mara even dances food. Paul claims he's impressed but doesn't sound too convincing. Mara and Paul dance to "My Humps." Mara's gumbo dance looks pretty good to me. She's so thrilled with herself that she bursts into tears when it's over. Mayte gives her a 7. Lisa does as well. And Danny "absolutely loved it," praising her for being into the dance and loving what she was doing but not going batshit crazy with the energy like, say, Alicia or Trice. He gives her an 8! Yay, Mara! Now let's see how much she lost. She lost 6.6 pounds, which is 2.52% of her body weight and a total score of 9.82. Third place for Mara! We get to see her at least one more week!
Tara goes . She weighs 237.4 pounds and reminds us that she has children and they worry that they'll end up fat like their mother, which isn't a very nice thing for children to say. Way to raise rude kids, Tara. Tara meets her partner Michael, and is immediately thrown by his complicated move of lifting one arm into the air. Uh oh. In an interview, she praises his patience (deserved) and her costume designers (not deserved), who have put her in red vinyl, fishnets, and booty short because they clearly hate her. Or they think she's a roller derby girl. Tara and Michael dance to "Let it Rock." Tara doesn't get anything impressive to work with, but she has an awesome mean/sexy face the whole time. Mayte dings her for being too focused on herself and not enough on her partner before giving her a 6. Lisa says Tara didn't commit to some of her moves and gives her a 5. Danny agrees with Lisa that Tara has potential and gives her a 6. Her average score is 5.7 and she lost 4.5 pounds, which is 1.9% of her body weight. Her overall score is 7.6, which puts her above Angela.
Ninth up is my ex-neighbor Karla! She weighs 174.9 pounds, which is a lot on a short person. Karla says she's funny and meets her partner, Jull, who is almost as short as she is. Karla shows off her moves, including the worm. Go Karla! ALSO, she is dancing to "Push It," which is my ringtone! And she does the worm during her dance! But then she goes in front of the judges, and Mayte calls it "the snake." Shut up, Mayte. She gives Karla a 7. Lisa very much enjoyed the '80s flavor of Karla's routine and Karla's energy and connection. She gives Karla a 7. Danny says the routine contained all of his favorite moves and entertained him. He gives her a 7. Karla lost 9.5 pounds this week. Holy shit! MJW can't believe it. That's 5.43% of Karla's bodyweight for a total score of 12.43 and the top of the standings. She's 2 points higher than second-place Ruben! Karla laughs and points at the board.
up is Miles, which means Pinky and, not surprisingly, Brandon, are the bottom two in weight loss. Miles began the game at 260.8 pounds with high blood pressure. He cries that he doesn't want his mother to have to bury him. She should have raised him with better eating habits, then. But Miles won me over with that one comment. Miles meets his partner Michelle and impresses her with his knowledge of swing dancing. It should come as no surprise that they'll be dancing to "Jump, Jive, An' Wail." They're pretty awesome, as Miles keeps up with all the footwork and then flips Michelle over his back. Wow. Mayte has nothing but praise for Miles, but then gives him just a 7. Lisa also loved Miles and gives him an 8. Danny says Miles looked down, although I didn't notice that, and thinks he's capable of even harder moves time. He gives Miles a 7. Miles' average score is a 7.3, which he's pretty thrilled about. On the scale, he lost 6.9 pounds, which is less than I expected. But it's 2.65% of his body weight for a total of 9.95, which is good enough for 4th place.
After the break, MJW reminds us that a hideously out-of-focus Angela is currently in last place with just two contestants left to dance. Brandon and Pinky are the bottom two weight losers, so they'll dance and get comments from the judges, but no scores until after both have danced. First up is Brandon, who weighs in at 230.4 pounds. He claims he wants to change his life here, and meets his "gorgeous" dance partner Yesenia before telling us that his weight has kept him from having the confidence to date. At 20 years old, he only had one girlfriend in 8th grade and he's still a virgin, which he's proud of. This is his first time dancing up close with a woman. Wow, Brandon is sheltered. He and Yesenia dance to "Forever." He has some trouble with a lift, but his footwork is pretty good for someone who has idea what he's doing. Honestly, all of these contestants have done a better job than I could ever do. And he nails his final move, flipping Yesenia over his knee. Mayte liked Brandon's energy but not his lack of arm movement. Lisa thought it was great, though. Danny says Brandon has a natural groove but doesn't think he put it in fifth gear or something. Brandon heads for the scale and his disappointing weight loss of 3.6 pounds, which he still seems pretty happy with. He was probably afraid he gained. That's 1.56% of his body weight.
Finally, we've got Pinky. She wants to join her skinny brothers' dance crew, but is too fat, thanks to her grandmother's home cooking. It is hard to say no to grandma. And Pinky's grandma cooks some delicious-looking food. Pinky starts at 186.9 pounds. She meets her partner, whose name is "Mr. Lucky" because he's ridiculous, and is fitted in her all-pink costume. She'll be dancing to "Just Dance." She does pretty well and is obviously a trained dancer. Mr. Lucky wipes off her head at the end of the dance for some reason. Mayte notes Pinky's obvious dance background and judges her more harshly, saying she could "do more." Lisa liked the determination in Pinky's face. Danny doesn't understand how Pinky could have had so much trouble losing weight this week with such a cardio-intensive dance routine. Maybe she ate like shit? He says he loved her dance. Pinky runs to the scale. She lost 2.4 pounds, which is 1.28% of her body weight.
After the break, it's time to reveal the loser! Brandon, Pinky, and Angela take the stage. MJW reveals the judges' scores. Pinky got 7s from Mayte and Lisa and an 8 from Danny. With an average score of 7.3, her total score is 8.58, which puts her way up in 8th place. Yay Pinky! That means it's between Brandon and Angela. Brandon got a 6 from Mayte and a 7 from Lisa. Angela seems to know she's on her way out. Danny gets a moment to say that he hopes whoever goes home tonight learned enough to do well blah blah blah Brandon gets a 7, which means it's good-bye to Angela. But Brandon is a drama queen, so he cries and walks in a circle and sobs on Angela's arms and kind of steals her moment. MJW talks to Angela, who cries that she didn't get the chance to show the world what she wanted to. Her heart is broken, but MJW doesn't let that dampen her perky spirits one bit. She kicks Angela off the stage and says week is Disco Week. We go to the credits with a big dance party of the remaining contestants.
Discuss this episode in our forums, then see what other weight-loss reality shows we'd like to see!
You can read more from Sara Morrison at L.A.me, or you can email her at saramorrison@gmail.com.