So the audition tour is over, which means there won't be any more of the truly awful, but we're in Vegas, which means a lot of backbiting, bitchiness and infighting. There are a hundred and seventy-two dancers here for Vegas Week, which means a hundred and fifty-two broken-hearted dancers will be leaving here. Cat is using the megaphone to tell these dancers that somewhere in the crowd is America's favorite dancer. Could it be that guy? Or that girl? Could be. But odds are not. Look at all the judges! Mia Michaels, Lil' C, Adam Shankman and Debbie Allen are here. Nigel urges the dancers to "enjoy however long you're here." Which will be hard when later on Mia is ripping the dancers new assholes.
So we're going to see some solos now so the dancers can remind us, and the judges, why they're here. Or, perhaps, to make the judges wonder if they were drunk at the time they picked particular contestants. First up is Alex Wong, a ballet dancer in Miami, originally from Vancouver, B.C. He whirls around to some jungle rhythms. Apparently Mia wants to have sex with him, and Nigel makes a joke about how she's woken up. Mia's mouth literally hangs open, and she jokingly uses her hand to close it. This is what Mia likes about the contestants: she keeps getting older and they stay the same age. The judges aren't offering feedback for these solos, which is nice in that maybe it means we're just going to watch some good dancing.
Hip-hopper Tony Bellissimo, 20, of Buffalo is annoyed because he can't get his briefcase open, and it's apparently a prop in his act. But then I guess he does? He's nattily dressed in a suit, and he pops and locks to Rockwell's "Somebody's Watchin' Me," so I automatically give him an A, and the paranoia in the song is reflected by planted pictures of Nigel -- in his newspaper, in his briefcase, in his suit jacket. That's who's watching Tony! The other judges think it's a riot -- and it pretty much is -- and Nigel pretends to be irritated. He asks that Adam be included time Tony does something, because Adam gets jealous.
Montage of good dancing, the only dancer whose name I can remember right now is Phillip Chbeeb, but I will rectify that as soon as I possibly can. The solos wrap up by five, and then all the dancers are called up on stage, where Nigel frankly tells them that after bringing all the dancers from their respective cities and seeing what they have to offer, it's clear the dancers aren't as good as the judges thought they were (let's remember this for a couple of episodes from now when we start getting told that this season's talent is the best ever). Nigel says he was asked if any dancers would be cut after that day's solos, and he said he didn't know. It was probably a lie when he said that; at any rate, he says some of them will be going home now. But if any one of the judges wanted to keep a particular dancer, he or she will be staying.
So let the bloodbath begin! Taylor Costa? You're gone. Erica Ray? Done. Erica says it's hard, and Taylor says it's tough because her whole high school is watching. You're not going to do interviews for every two dancers, right? Because we're going to be here all night! Tony Bellissimo? "You've got great ideas. You've got to bring your dancing up to meet them." Nigel tells him to sit his ass back down. In all, forty-four dancers are cut, including Travis Prokop, the football coach's son; widow Thalia Rickerts, and hiphopper Chimeze Razu.
But day one's not over. Those who've survived the culling are in for some hip-hop choreography with Taboleon. "The bottom line in Vegas, you've gotta shine or you're out the door," says Napoleon.
We watch Gabi Rojas struggle with choreography, and flash back to Nigel saying he'll be surprised if she's not in the Top 20. She has trouble keeping up, and Mary's not shy about pointing it out. The judges deliberate (about all the dancers). "I like him." "I like her." "Get rid of her." Mia bitchily announces that she loves cutting, because she loves seeing people who aren't good at what they do go home. Well, if these dancers are so shitty, then maybe the JUDGES WHO FUCKING PICKED THEM TO BE HERE IN THE FIRST PLACE should be going home. Damn! Gabi Rojas is asked to step forward, and Nigel tells her that her unique solo is the only reason she's being asked to stay, because her choreography was not good. Well, so much for being required to shine in Vegas. One dancer, Sarah, from her group is cut.
We get a montage of good hip-hoppers. Cute blonde one makes it! Saucy brunette makes it! But thirty-seven other dancers are cut, including one positive-thinker who announces that "excuses are the tools of the incompetent, and I will not use them." I guess it's better than thinking, "I suck, and Mia hates me, and Mia's glad I'm going home." And by the time Day 1 ends with only ninety-six dancers left to face the day.
The day's first challenge is ballroom dancing with Jean-Marc Genereux and France. Well, make that the second challenge after disposing of Mia Michaels' body. Crazy-armed popper Phillip Chbeeb and his partner Ariel Coker are having trouble with it. They've been inseparable since arriving in Vegas but have to perform with different partners. Adam points out that Phillip can't stop popping even as he's extending his arms. Strictly ballroom, Phillip! Afterwards, Phillip's called forward, and Mia tells him that his energy carries him through, even that was rough, and they know he's going to bust his ass. So again: we already like you, so even though you weren't good, we're going to keep you.
Ariel's up in her group now, and Phillip makes comments about being disappointed in a couple of girls and pointing out that a couple of the other girls are nice. So which is it for Ariel? She's cut.
Unsurprisingly, the trained ballroom dancers Maxim Kaptinanikova, Aska Condo and Ricky Sun (jarringly, these scenes are set to one of my favorite songs of all time, the first one I ever heard by Elliott Smith). Kayla? You're very good! Priscilla! Absolutely beautiful.
Popper Nabuya Nagahama is hoping to transcend his genre. He's been having the time of his life in Vegas. The judges watch him closely throughout the routine. Mary tells him they were all very impressed by him. She's surprised by his arm movements and the way he took on the character of the dance. In fact their whole group was really impressive, she says. Afterwards, Nabuya breaks down in tears and explains that he's taken five months of classes to be here, and gives all the credit to his teachers: "I couldn't make it by myself."
Sixteen more dancers are sent home by the end of the ballroom round, which finishes mid-afternoon of Day 2, and now it's time to "jazz things up with Sonya," which is another way of saying "hit the fast-forward button." Phillip says it's not really his thing so he's just going to let loose and see what happens. We watch a bunch of dancers struggling with fatigue and injuries due to all the intensity, but Brandon Ryan and Natalie Reid seem to be doing just fine, and in fact get singled out by Sonya to show the other dancers how to roll.
Natalie's in the first group, and although I can't discern any difference, the consensus of the judges is that she seems to be just off. Afterwards, Mary told her that after her solo, the judges all thought she would be through to the Top 20, and they were all pulling for her. But they can't keep pulling: "I'm sorry, Natalie, but this is the end of the journey for you." Well, great. It'd be nice if the judges could make up their damn minds as to whether or not a great solo is enough to keep a talented competitor alive after a week choreographed performance or not. Natalie thanks them and smiles and walks off. Aw. I liked her. A dancer in the audience calls it unbelievable: "If she got cut, then anybody could get cut." Natalie says she did her best and thought she did it well, but the judges weren't happy with it. She's bummed because she feels like she let them down. Brandon is crying and saying he's doing it for Natalie now, because she deserved it.
Looks like the other half of the pair whom Sonya singled out for particular praise isn't impressing the judges either. Lil' C tells Brandon that he hasn't been impressed. And Mia agrees, because she's been told that Brandon is brilliant and she hasn't seen it. Maybe Mia could explain why Sonya should go home, since she choreographed these guys and held Natalie and Brandon up as amazing. Or maybe it's a little bit of "I'll decide who's brilliant or not!" Nigel sticks up for Brandon and the "brilliant" tag and says everything he's seen Brandon do has been fantastic, and he's one of the best dancers he's ever seen on this show. He wants Brandon to have confidence in himself, and not lose confidence based on what's been said. At any rate, he's through. Afterwards he gets all teary-eyed again about seeing Natalie go. Man, suck it up. Jesus -- at some point one or the other of you was going to go farther than the other.
Then the jazz round hits a hot streak and all the people who weren't as good as Natalie are now better than Natalie are sent through. By 7:30, there's just one group left, and it features Gabi, and it's left to Debbie Allen to lower the boom and also lecture her on what a disappointment she turned out to be. "And it hurts us, to be that wrong," says Debbie. Ouch. The other three girls are through. Gabi's not. But unlike the other ones who have been cut, she gets to dance for her life now? What kind of bullshit is this? Are the judges making this up as they go along?
So she does her solo, and it's good, and the judges all vote for her. How ridiculous is this? They already know she can dance well solo, so obviously they're just engineering this so they can justify putting her through. "Thank you for reminding us who you really are, and remind yourself who are you every time you step on that stage," says Debbie Allen. Oh god, put a cork in it, Debbie. However, seven other dancers have been cut, including popper Sammy Ramirez, so they're down to seventy-three. And they're not going to rest, because they're being put in groups and randomly assigned music and have to work up a routine to be performed first thing in the morning. There is some applause from the dancers, who are keen to show that they're so into dancing that can't wait for sleep deprivation and exhaustion. They'll be sorry...
Day 3 dawns, and we get the briefest of montages of the dancers practicing last night. That's it? No fighting? No scenes of groups arguing about choreography? No dancer hitting the sack early while her fellow dancers work through the night? Where are the shenanigans?
In the morning, Nigel sternly tells the group that "A lot of people think today doesn't mean anything." Oh, come off it, Nigel. I'm so sure that a lot of the dancers here think that. Nigel knocks his straw man over by warning them that they will still be cut if they're not good enough.
The first group to take the stage features tap-dancer Eric "Silky" Moore. Last night, we see that he had trouble with his group. Oh, yay! Here's the fighting! Eric says the group was really different, so there were a lot of clashes of style. They finally call it a day at 2:30 in the morning, and plan to come in early and work things out. Eric has a backup plan: to be amazing when he has to dance for his life.
Anyway, the group takes the stage and dances to some swing music, and they're dressed in white shirts and they all kind of do their own things and it looks awful. You could know nothing about dance and watch this and still feel uneasy, and you don't need all the disgusted reaction shots of the judges to be able to tell. Nigel tells them it was a poor start to the morning: "It was horrific. It stank." Debbie chews them out, Adam sounds disappointed, and Mary says it's clear they can't work together. Mia wants to know if they went to bed secure in their routine, and when they admit they weren't, she gives them hell for giving up. As much as I can't stand Mia, she's not exactly wrong here, and a tearful Paula should probably stifle the tears. Lil' C axes a couple of the dancers (Meghan and Erin) and tells Eric that he'll be dancing for his life). As for Paula? He tells her that she shouldn't have gone to bed, or let her teammates go to bed. Having said that, she's a strong dancer and she'll be staying with them. Great. Maybe she can turn off Niagara Falls then -- she's crying again, this time tears of joy. There was another guy in the group, but I think he got to stay.
But like happens around this point of a Behind The Music, things get worse. We watch some horrific dancing, like if high school cheerleaders earnestly did a dance routine in lieu of an essay on To Kill a Mockingbird for English class or something. Adam says, "That was so convention 101, like barf," to some particularly reeky group. Mia chews out another group. "Congratulations. That is the worst routine we've seen this morning. The. Worst," Nigel tells a group of spastic dingbats.
Then Brandon Ryan's group comes out and kicks some ass, with some moves involving some pushing and pulling in a hand-holding circle. A lot of spins and kicks. Mary calls it a lot of fun, but says Brandon needs to worry about himself more and quit looking at the others. Mia says Brandon's looking her way because he knows she's a cutter. Thanks for oversharing, Mia. She also gives him shit for smiling. You're right, Mia. He should get despondent because you've decided that a dancer isn't good until you say they are, no matter what your colleagues say. Nigel says there was no one who stuck out as bad, which is good, and Adam says it's the first group he saw that was fighting to stay, and Mary puts the whole group through.
And as usual, this is the start of a streak for the groups. Why is that? Why is it that it's always a bunch of good dancers in a row or a bunch of bad ones? Has Cat ever said, "That marked a turning point, after which there was a succession of dancers with wild variations in quality"? Debbie praises a red-and-black group of hip-hoppers, and Adam says another group got a "touchdown," and he calls a dancer named Jason "so So You Think You Can Dance."
One of the Kasprzaks? I think? Is part of the final group, which says their routine is about "nerdography," which is about what happens when nerds simultaneously hear a sweet tune and see a hot girl. That sounds horrible!
Oh, no, wait. What that really means is they dance entertaining hip-hop whilst wearing mismatched patterns and glasses. But they're pretty good. All the judges love them. "I welled up, because you guys made me miss dancing." Nigel mocks him, and Adam's all, "Don't make fun of me, you English bastard!" All of them get sent through.
In all, sixty-eight dancers are moving on. So only five have been cut? After all that bullshit was up on stage? No, not even, because a couple of dancers are dancing for their lives, so when Nigel said it's not true that this day doesn't matter, he was kinda wrong, wasn't he?
Silky's up to dance for his life, now. He needs to convince three judges that he should stay. So tappa tappa tappa. It's a good tap routine that wraps up with a backflip that lands him (purposely) lying on his stomach. Mia doesn't vote for him. Neither does Nigel. Debbie says no too, so just one more vote will cut him, and it's Lil' C who drops the hammer. Silky says the fire was in him, but he just didn't let the judges see it.
The dancers now have to face their most difficult challenge yet: eating baked beans, and then dancing Mia Michaels' contemporary choreography. "Do not give me empty steps! Because that is when my horns will come out!" she bellows at the dancers.
Tony Bellissimo's been doing well -- we watch a montage of all the praise he gets as he breezes through ballroom, hip-hop, jazz and swing -- so how's he going to fare against Mia Michaels? No one beats Mia Michaels. You can only hope to survive her. And does Tony survive? Well, no. Mary says he's got to bring the dancing up, because they love him. Is he dancing for his life? Uh, no. He's going to dance the contemporary over again. Huh?
But first, Amanda, the cute blonde, gets cut, with Adam encouraging her to come back again. Nabuya's really talented, and they hope he continues -- just not here. He's cut. He promises to never stop. "Thank you, Vegas! See you year!" he yells.
The Kinney sisters are coming up, after we're told that it's a "bloodbath" so far during the contemporary round. First up is Megan. Her group dances, and the judges deliberate. Shouldn't Mia sit out the judging for this round, since she choreographed the routine? Nigel tells Megan that while he was on the fence about her, a lot of the other judges like her, and she's through. Caitlin dances (and I'm already sick of the wuss-rock music that this piece is set to) and Nigel tells her that she didn't get enough votes to go through. Not that she's cut, mind you. I'm guessing Nigel has invoked the well-known But She's A Stacked Blonde rule. She's dancing for her life right now! Well, not right now. After a commercial break.
So she dances solo to that cover of "To Make You Feel My Love" (well, at least it's not the Garth Brooks cover) and she seems as good to me as any contemporary dancer. Nigel says her solo is old-fashioned, whilst Mia's routine is of the current period (because Mia is unquestionably awesome and we all bow down), but he gives her a yes. Debbie Allen gives her a yes. Mia? Mia says no, as does Lil' C, and Adam. So it's up to Mary, who says she knows how hard Caitlin has fought, but her solo was not that great. But Mary sees potential in her, so it's a yes. My god, what a lot of arbitrary horseshit this is turning out to be. Was it like this last year? To sum up: you have to earn enough votes to advance. Caitlin didn't earn enough votes. But that's OK, because she's hot, so she can dance for her life. Oh, it wasn't great? I vote yes for you anyway! Yay! Having said that, I like her. I think some of these votes are manufactured just to cause drama. Certainly the order in which the judges give their opinion jumps around enough to suggest some staging.
Anyway.
So the sisters get to stay together. How about the Kasprzak brothers from Memphis? They've been sailing through the choreography rounds. Even Mia called them "so adorable." Ryan's group is up first, and Mary tries to pretend like she's softening him up for a letdown, but then abandons the con and puts him right through. Then Evan comes up, does his thing, and Mia asks him to do a fleet hop, and he does, and she makes him do it right around the stage and off, because he's through. And now I know the name of the fleet hop! Which I will forget by episode.
More dancers are put through. Paris? Jason? I can't tell if we've seen these dancers before or not. I promise everyone I will get names and spellings straight once we get into the Top 20.
What of Tony Belissimo, and the odd "go ahead, try it again" second chance? Cat gives him a little pep talk and makes him smile. God, I love her. I would try out for this show just to hug her. So he goes on again with the final group of the day. For the critique, a tearful Tony hangs on the blatherings of Debbie Allen, who lectures him about letting them down, but he brings joy and personality, and blah blah blah. Yep. It's a "you have to dance for your life, so it better be good! Oh, wait, it wasn't good. Well, that's OK, because we like you and you pass" speech. Best of all, more hugs from Cat, who squeals with delight over Tony's tears, because she loves it when full-grown men cry. Either Cat is sweetly sincere in how she hangs on the triumphs and failures of the contests, or she's an amazing actress.
With thirteen more cut, we're down to fifty-four dancers. You know, I think the math is dropping a dancer every now then.
Final day of performances! We look at dancers in pain, full of bruises, nervously awaiting what they presume is a Tyce Diorio Broadway routine (the Kasprzaks saw him in the elevator). Nigel tells the dancers, filling the stage, that they're going to do a guys' routine and a girls' routine. He says that although they're in Vegas, they're going to pretend its Broadway. Sure enough, Tasty Oreo comes out to tell them they're doing a West Side Story routine, and he tells us that dancers need to have some knowledge of a classic like that, otherwise it's a little "sketchy."
So while the women work, the men get to hang out poolside. Wacky pool hijinks, intense dance rehearsal. Tyce tells us that Debbie Allen played Anita herself, so the dancers can't come before her all fake or phoney or they're going home. Well, unless they suck, in which case they can stay if they do a great job dancing for their lives. Unless they suck at that, in which case they can stay if the judges like them.
Bianca Revels -- who Nigel called the "consummate tap dancer" -- has done well with choreography, and is in the first group for West Side Story. I hate to disappoint Tyce, but I've never seen it, but maybe I should. The girls seem to have a lot of fun with it. This time, the judges wait for all the groups to perform before making their cuts. Sireka, Noelle, Alexa, Bianca, Megan Nicholson? Thank you for all your hard work, but this is the end of the road, Nigel tells them. He says he hopes they all continue to work and improve, because the judges would love to see them again. Bianca says she thinks they made a mistake, and dishearteningly tells us that she's not coming back year, because she's not one to keep trying year after year without knowing why she didn't make it the first two years.
More cuts: Megan Campbell, Megan Davis, Chelsea, Sarah James, Gabi Rojas, Priscilla, Megan Kinney: all gone. Megan Kinney's sister Caitlin bawls in the seats. Gabi's devastated but grateful for this show pushing her more than she ever had. Megan Kinney's upset but still hopes her sister moves on. She does, as one of the top sixteen. Nigel advises them to start getting their solos ready. "Caitlin, stop crying, for god's sake." The sisters hug and say their goodbyes.
So the men and women switch places, with the women gladly partaking in chicken fights and tanning competitions by the pool as the men work their arses off. They're split into two groups, with the Kasprzaks in the first group. They do the dance-fight stuff with the finger-snapping that's familiar even to people like me who haven't seen the musical. The judges deliberate over the men, while the men wait anxiously.
Nigel calls up Joe Gonzalez, Antoine Hart, Brian Johnson (the lead singer of AC/DC?), Dorsey Brown, Pavel Steppenchuk.... oh, my god the names, I've lost control. Anyway, there's a bunch cut, none of whom I'm familiar with, really. All the other guys come back on stage and stand in a straight line. "Gentlemen, you have got ten minutes to get yourselves together. Good luck all of you," he says.
Six men and six women have yet to be cut to whittle the group down to the Top 20, and that's what the solos are for. Ryan Kasprzak gets a little worried when he almost ruptures his whoopie cushion. We run through a montage of the solos, which seem to mostly be the dancers reprising their audition solos. The judges deliberate, and Cat comes backstage to tell the dancers it's the moment of truth. Jeannette's up first, and she does the long walk out to face the judges, but we're going to have to wait for tomorrow night.