'America's Next Top Model' Recap: Hold Me Closer, Whiny Dancer
Meghan Carlson
Meghan Carlson
Senior Writer, BuddyTV
The universe has realigned itself. America's Next Top Model is back to one-hour episodes. We're back to the normal and harmonious pattern of challenge-photo shoot-elimination. Tyra has taken back her place as chief of sass in the judging panel. And someone attempting to become a model decided it was a good idea to wear a swimsuit to judging panel.

We're BACK!

I'll have you know that my Elton John-inspired headline up there is not just a hollow, clever pun. (Though it is SO clever.) It's also a beautifully concise summary of what tonight's America's Next Top Model episode (which was merely episode 3, though I, like Ren, "feel like I've been here for months") was all about: whining and dancing. More specifically, given the show's overall premise--a premise which the show itself often forgets for long spans of time--how whining and dancing affect one's modeling. Important issues that definitely needed delving into.

So here's what happened during America's Next Top Model cycle 14 episode 3, "Let's Dance":

America's Next Top Model is available on Amazon Prime.

Model Challenge:
Toccara Jones (ANTM cycle 3) joined the 11 remaining models on the "Fab Bus..."

What? You didn't hear me? I SAID SHE JOINED THE MODELS ON THE ...

fab-bus.jpg... which is approximately Top Model's answer to Cash Cab.

On Cash Cab, random New Yorkers win money for answering increasingly challenging trivia questions on a variety of topics, whereas on "Fab Bus," the models win gift cards to BLUEFLY.COM for answering questions about BLUEFLY.COM (and some about modeling). The winning team gets a go-see at BLUEFLY.COM, and the winner of the go-see gets a $2500 gift card and fashion spread on BLUUUUUUE-MOTHER-EFFIN-FLYYYYY.com/gratuitious-advertising.ugh. (Great site, be sure to look it up!)

So, what adjective would you use to describe that prize?
 fierceprize.jpgWait, but ... can you add an adverb to that description, just for clarity's sake?

Great, thanks.

On "Fab Bus," the two teams answered important "modeling industry" questions that everyone needs to know in order to be successful in the field. Definitely NOT useless questions about a megalomaniac that literally anyone could have found out from a Wikipedia page:

tyra-fabbus-question.jpgAnyway, (too) long story short (even though it was pretty short as-is), at first the Red team was ahead, but then Brenda was born, so they lost. The Blue team (Go Union! Down with the Confederacy!) won the day, so the Blue(fly) team headed down to BLUUUUUEFLY.COM for their go-see.

There, we learned what physicists call "The Angelea Equation":

angelea-equation.jpgThe Bluefly brunettes spent some time judging Raina, Krista, Simone, Jessica, Alexandra and the aforementioned unfortunate "interesting" Angelea, and deemed Simone the winner of their FIERCE MEGA PRIZE. And she was all like:

simone-wins-bluefly.jpg"Yaaaaaaaaay ... "
"Yaaaaaay" is right, Simone! I hope your $2500 gift card for discounted designer clothes makes up to your parents the fact that you ditched out on $25,000 in tuition at college to be on a reality TV show and shaved half of your head. Choices! Sometimes they're too easy, you know?

Meanwhile: the losers of the "Fab Bus" had to do (dun dun DUUUUUN...) inventory (nooooo!) with the less attractive employees at Bluefly.com (a.k.a. "the writers," a.k.a. "my people").

And Ren was like, "Is my sanity and happiness worth all of this?" And we were all like, "No! Please go away and save all our brains from your yammering on!" But it turns out that the only reason Ren even decided to be ON this show is so her mom would pay attention to her and love her, which is tragic in so many ways that I don't even want to get into it. So let's move on to ...

The Photo Shoot:
Jay and the models talked about "inspiration" while a random guy worked out his groin kinks in the background, because flexible man-thighs in tights are clearly Jay Manuel's favorite source of inspiration:

jay-dancephotoshoot-stretchingguy.jpgBut then it turned out that the stretching guy was there to show different genres of dance to the models, who would each need to pose with one genre as her "inspiration," so things scaled back from "MEGA FIERCE(LY CREEPY)" to "fiercely low-budget, unplanned and awkward." And we're used to that.

Each model received a type of dance that made everyone look at their calendars and exclaim, "Oh, I can't believe I forgot ... it's OPPOSITE DAY!" Which led to varying levels of visual bizarreness, as well as humorous descriptive subtitles that the girls would never, ever see again in this life or the next:

brenda-african.jpgAfter seeing her first two photo shoots (and after meeting her and hearing the crazy stuff that her brain comes up with and decides are "thoughts") everyone expected Alasia to fail, but she interpreted the SH*T out of "interpretative dance," and got an A+++ from Jay Manuel for doing a lot of motions like this, sometimes on a trampoline:

alasia-interpretive.jpgPRAISE BE TO TYRA!

And, at this point, I decided that a GREAT reality show could be made out of competitive interpretive dance, because that's a great oxymoron if ever I heard one, and also, haha, what is this, even?

At some point before or after the photo shoot (who knows/cares?) Brenda put on her mom jeans and told her roommates they needed to have lights out in 30 minutes.

So Krista was like, "Listen here, Geppetto ... " (Literally, she said that, and at that moment we became FRIENDS!) and then some of the other girls sat around and talked about how ugly Brenda was behind her back:

chucky-brenda.jpgWhich wasn't even an insult. It was just a friendly comparison:

brenda-chucky-spotthedifference.jpgAt which point, Ren "So Sick of the Drama" Whatever-Her-Last-Name-Is ran downstairs and told Brenda everything (a.k.a. "tattletaled," a.k.a. CREATED MORE DRAMA):

ren-brenda-gossip-miranda.jpgOH NO SHE DIDN'T!

At which point, Brenda was like, "Then Alexandra can go tell Tyra that the makeover she gave me makes me look like STUPID UGLY MIRANDA!"

And Miranda texted Carrie, and was like:

miranda-ugly-text.jpgAnd then Anslee and Brenda got in a fight because neither of them can possibly conceive of a scenario in which they might be wrong. You know how MOMS can get! (Seriously, they're both moms? Hiiii, kids! Hope you've started weaving, because Mommy's Mother's Day lanyard should be extra-special this year!)

Alasia showed up wearing a silver swimsuit. No, I wasn't kidding:

alasia-swimsuit1.jpgThe dancing photo shoot was a big fat "MEH," which made for a rather boring judging panel discussion. Everyone did okay. (For more of this type of IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS, check back for my actual Photo Shoot Performance Rankings tomorrow. Seriously.) The judges were mostly pleased in general, but only one girl wowed them:

alasia-winner-ep3.jpgINTERPRET THIS, BITCHES!

So ALASIA went from the butt of our jokes to the best photo winner. Good job, Alasia! ANGELEA was her runner-up for her deft portrayal of a mosher as "pained."

Then it came down to the bottom two: REN and BRENDA.

ren-brenda-bottom2.jpgBefore the commercial break, Tyra asked Ren, "Do you want to stay or go?" and Ren said, "I want to stay." But now, after the commercial break, when she's about to be eliminated anyway, Ren decides it's better to quit than get fired, so she says, "I'm here for the wrong reasons, I'm doing it for my mom because she loves this show [ed. note: Hi, Ren's Mom! You must be so proud, etc.] so I think I'll just leave now. K thx bai."

But Tyra gets the last laugh by revealing that she was holding Brenda's picture anyway, so this was a mutual break-up between Ren and the show.

And, guess what! SURPRISE BONUS: Tyra heard that Brenda's haircut makes her look like that stain on the nation's TV screens, that insult to the word "beauty," that offense to all eyes that look upon her--otherwise known as successful red-headed actress Cynthia Nixon--so very soon Brenda's "doorbell will be ringing, and another transformation is going to take place!"

As she leaves the Top Model house, Ren says she's happy, because now her mother will "actually finally shut up about how I never do anything good." Yeah, you showed her! Shut UP, Mom! I LOVE you, Mom!

Next Week: The models are going to pose as vampires, because of freaking course they are going to pose as vampires. This is America, and America = vampires, Justin Bieber and Jersey Shore. (Read The Constitution. It's in there.) And those last two would put this show waaaay over budget. So ... vampires!

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