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Dancing With the Stars, 2010


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Contestants for the new season are announced. Evan Lysacek will bring his special brand of arm flailing artistry to the dance floor. This should be truly too much for television. I hope Aldrin doesn't break a hip or something.

A few novel inclusions are astronaut Buzz Aldrin, the 80-year old moonwalker, as well as newly minted Olympic men's figure skating gold medalist Evan Lysacek.
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Do they really make double-sided sticky tape strong enough to hold Pamela Anderson's uh....assets?

I think Evan who is paired with Anna T. :wink: will be the one to beat. And Anna gets a contender! Yay!!

Who did Tony D. kill in another life to get stuck with Kate Gosselin as a partner? Talk about bad karma.

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Evan Lysacek will bring his special brand of arm flailing artistry to the dance floor.

Ouch!

Not my favorite skater. :wink:

Of course, with a partner Evan will not be able to waggle his limbs in the uninhibited semaphore to which we have become accustomed. I think perky is right, he immediately becomes the favorite.

Johnny Weir was on Larry King last night and King broke the news to him that it was going to be Lysacek on DWTS. I suspect this may have been a deliberate attempt to harsh Weir's mellow on the air, but Johnny took it well, bless him.

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Johnny Weir was on Larry King last night and King broke the news to him that it was going to be Lysacek on DWTS. I suspect this may have been a deliberate attempt to harsh Weir's mellow on the air, but Johnny took it well, bless him.

Interesting, because Lysacek had already signed up for DWTS before the Olympics:

http://www.usatoday.com/life/television/ne...online_ST_N.htm

although Cheryl Burke Twittered about him joining the show after he won gold:

http://www.icenetwork.com/news/article.jsp...p;vkey=ice_news

I'm just bummed they picked Aiden Turner from "All My Children" instead of Michael E. Knight ("Tad the Cad" Martin).

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Johnny Weir was on Larry King last night and King broke the news to him that it was going to be Lysacek on DWTS. I suspect this may have been a deliberate attempt to harsh Weir's mellow on the air, but Johnny took it well, bless him.

Interesting, because Lysacek had already signed up for DWTS before the Olympics:

http://www.usatoday.com/life/television/ne...online_ST_N.htm

That's what the latest report says, but apparently the news hadn't gotten around.

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I think Evan who is paired with Anna T. will be the one to beat. And Anna gets a contender! Yay!!

Who did Tony D. kill in another life to get stuck with Kate Gosselin as a partner? Talk about bad karma.

Anna T. is the best dancer on both sides (Ballroom and Latin) out of all of the pros, but I think she's a terrible teacher and choreographer. I'm afraid we're stuck with Evan's flailing limbs for the course of the show. I was hoping Evan would get Anna D. since she's tall enough and a much better teacher (but then that's most of the other pros).

I think the Plus 8 are still in Pennsylvania. If Kate Gosselin is training out of the East Coast, I think Tony Dovolani is the only male pro tall enough based on the East Coast. Jonathan Roberts is based in San Francisco and Alec is also based out of the Bay Area.

ETA: I'm pretty sure Miss Anderson's assets are already bolted on. I'm not too worried about them needing any extra strapping down, anymore than some of the other surgically enhanced celebs or pros have in past seasons.

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From the USAToday article:

Stars averaged 18.2 million viewers last season, a 13% drop from Season 8's 20.2 million, hurt by a lackluster cast and Fox rival So You Think You Can Dance. "We learned some lessons," says executive producer Conrad Green. "This is definitely up there with the strongest casts ever."

Huh??? :thumbsup:

Well, how they'll costume Pamela Anderson will be a point of interest, but frankly, no one on this list particularly interests me. I do, however, look forward to seeing Derek Hough again. He's grown on me over time. I didn't like him at first, but either I've been able to overcome my initial resistance, or he has grown enormously over the past several seasons.

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You are right, sidwich: the cast members and pros are now listed on the official site:

http://abc.go.com/shows/dancing-with-the-s...st-announcement

Aiden Turner and Edyta Sliwinska

Buzz Alden and Ashly Costa

Chad Ochocinco and Cheryl Burke

Erin Andrews and Maksim Chmerkovskiy

Evan Lysacek and Anna Trebunskaya

Jake Pavelka and Chelsie Hightower

Kate Gosselin and Toni Dovolani

Nicole Scherzinger and Derek Hough

Niecy Nash and Louis Van Amstel

Pamela Anderson and Damian Whitewood

Shannen Doherty and Mark Ballas

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I think Weir would be particularly beautiful to watch in the Standard dances. Not just in his lines or quality of movement but the care and attention he would give his partner.

The Latin dances would suit him as well because although the men put on a facade of masculinity, it's a peacock form of masculinity.

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Does no one learn on this show--ie. how to dance better? When I found out Lysecek was going to be on the program, I was hoping a good instructor/choreographer would get him to use his line better, and yes, stop semaphoring without meaning.

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I fear Lysacek's a hopeless case, although he has worked very hard on his presentation over the years. Who knows, he may do better on dry land - as Weir was saying on the telly the other night, dancing is very different from skating.

miliosr, any thoughts on the lineup?

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miliosr, any thoughts on the lineup?

Well, for starters, I'm happy ABC cut the number of celebrities back to 11. I boycotted the last season because it had become bloated in terms of the number of dancers (and in everything else, really.)

As far as the actual casting, I feel like the show is in a bit of a rut. This will be the third season with contestants from 90210, All My Children and The Bachelor. This will also be the sixth season (at least) with a contestant from the National Football League and the fourth season (at least) with an Olympic medal winner. So, to my mind, the casting has grown stale.

Based on fan base, I would handicap Evan Lysacek as the early favorite -- Anna Trebunskaya would have to be just terrible as a coach and a choreographer to screw up the fan base advantage. Buzz Aldrin will get votes for awhile because, well, he's the astronaut with the coolest name in the history of astronauts. Shannen Doherty might be able to challenge Lysacek because she has legions of 90210 fans to this very day. (And she'll be an entertaining contestant because she's just as likely to belt Mark Ballas as work with him.)

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Does no one learn on this show--ie. how to dance better? When I found out Lysecek was going to be on the program, I was hoping a good instructor/choreographer would get him to use his line better, and yes, stop semaphoring without meaning.

No, of course, some people learn how to dance on the show. A fair number actually come out the other side with some actual dance skills.

The pros that I think actually have a good track record of actually teaching their celebrities how to dance pretty consistently are the following: Cheryl Burke, Kym Johnson, Louis Van Amstel, Jonathan Roberts, and the Wonder Triplets (Julianne Hough, Derek Hough and Mark Ballas). Allowances have to be made for the individual celebrity's physical abilities, talent, background and attitude, but most of their celebs show pretty clear improvement from Week 1 until they leave the show.

The pros that really seem to have variable results based on the celeb are Maksim Chmerkovsky and Karina Smirnoff. I think they can teach some students, but it really seems to depend on whether they "click" or not.

The pros that tend to have minimal success in actually teaching their celebs are the following: Anna Trebunskaya, Alec Mazo, Edyta Sliwinska, and Tony Dovolani. I very rarely see any real improvement in their celebrities from week to week.

I do think Anna might work out with Evan Lysacek, though. He's not my favorite skater, but he is obviously athletically-talented, hard-working and used to being coached. Anna's teaching seems to consist mainly of the "Do this!" *demonstration* method, which doesn't work with most beginners because it they have little to no ability to imitate the demonstration, and it doesn't give beginners any idea where to start. Evan may actually be talented enough and well-trained enough to recreate Anna's movements with his body even if he doesn't have the concepts explained to him. For example, Evan's actually getting bend in his knees and real push in his steps, which most of Anna's celebs never accomplish (Jerry Rice never got this even after months), and I would guess it's because he can see Anna do it and mimic it even though she doesn't articulate it.

I don't know if it will work with the concepts of leading/following, but that is pretty invisible to most laypeople even if it would never work in real competition or the social dance floor.

I think Evan will have a harder time keeping his arms under control on the Latin/Rhythm side, though.

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It looks as if Anna/Evan have the Jive next week.

Really liked Nicole/Derek. I like when beautiful people let their dork flag fly. In that regard she's a cute match with Derek who can be a bit of spaz sometimes. She has lovely lines and can seemingly handle Derek's choreography well.

I surprised myself by how much I like Pam Anderson! Most celebrities are a bit tentative/stiff on the first dance. She let loose with all the momentum of a freight

train which made it a fun dance to watch. If she can tighten up on the wildness and get serious with the technique she actually might be a contender.

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Round One - Week Two:

Scores:

01 28pts Nicole/Derek (jive)

02 24pts Evan/Anna (jive)

03 23pts Erin/Maksim (foxtrot)

04 22pts Pamela/Damian (foxtrot)

05 21pts Niecy/Louis (foxtrot)

06 20pts Shannen/Mark (jive)

06 20pts Jake/Chelsie (jive)

08 19pts Aiden/Edyta (foxtrot)

09 16pts Chad/Cheryl (foxtrot)

10 15pts Kate/Tony (jive)

11 12pts Buzz/Ashly (foxtrot)

(Sorry, I don't have the scores from last week so I can't give combined totals for the two performances.)

General Thoughts:

1) New season, same old Mark Ballas -- he can never bring himself to tone down his performance so that it matches up more cleanly with the performance of his celebrity amateur, can he? Watching poor Shannen try to keep pace with him last night was painful. Better for him to simplify things so that his partner looks better which, after all, is the point of the competition. (During a commercial break last night, I rewatched Mark and Shawn's freestyle from Season 8 and it was the same thing -- poor Shawn was struggling to keep pace.)

2) Oh Louis! Listening to him drone on about "being the mirror" and "being the truth" for Niecy gave me flashbacks to poor Monique, who he turned into a psychological mess by the end of her season. As for Niecy, her personality is a lot like Marissa's -- she will divide the audience like Moses parting the Red Sea.

3) Against all odds, I am enjoying Pamela and Damian the most. Unlike most everyone else, she is good at portraying a character in whatever dance she is performing. It was a little odd, though, how she stayed in character as "Marilyn" during the post-dance interview with Brooke Burke.

4) I'm all for bringing back obscure words into common usage but Len Goodman was probably ill-advised to use "titivate" to describe Pamela's performance.

5) I can't be objective about Kate Gosselin. ("Kids, Mommy has a new reality program on ABC. Take care of each other while I'm gone!") And yes, I know I'm being unfair -- deal with it!!!!!

Who's Going:

My guess is Buzz goes. His scores are so low that I don't know if any fan base could save him. (And, if Dial Idol is correct, I most definitely overestimated the size of his fan base.)

Still, the first elimination is always an odd one because often it is a middle-of-the-packer (in terms of judges' scores) who goes. We'll see tonight!

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Result for Round One:

Wow.

Shannen and Mark join Pamela and Damian in the Bottom Two with Shannen and Mark going.

The result is a travesty (based on actual dancing) BUT not a completely unexplainable travesty. Shannen and Mark never generated much excitement and, so, they got lost in the pack. And, since the 90210 fans obviously didn't show up for the vote, less deserving celebrities like Aiden, Buzz and Kate live to dance another day.

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You know I probably would have been more upset by Kate Gosselin surviving this week's elimination if I hadn't already been emotionally gobsmacked by Emmanuel Pierre-Antoine's story prior to his Macys Stars of Dance bit. I've always loved his dancing in American Rhythm competitions. He imbues his steps with an infectious joy. So I was at first excited to see him on my T.V. screen last night. But then they showed a picture of his adorable 2 year old son who was in Haiti when the earthquake hit and I literally yelled No! at the screen before he confirmed that his son had been killed in the quake.

So..... Kate Gosselin still staying on this show, while annoying and slightly nausea inducing is nowhere near enough to be a tragedy and I'm sure she'll be gone soon. :cool:

I really like Pamela Anderson! I like having my preconceptions about people proven wrong now and again. It keeps you on your toes.

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Week Three - Round Two:

01 26pts Evan/Anna (quickstep)

02 23pts Erin/Maks (waltz)

02 23pts Nicole/Derek (quickstep)

04 21pts Jake/Chelsie (quickstep)

04 21pts Niecy/Louis (waltz)

04 21pts Pamela/Damian (paso doble)

07 20pts Aiden/Edyta (quickstep)

07 20pts Chad/Cheryl (paso doble)

09 15pts Kate/Tony (paso doble)

10 13pts Buzz/Ashly (waltz)

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