Rrrhumba

Hehe, I remember that. "Julius Caesar was a Roman...pretty cool dude." I think she had her dates way off there as well. Shawn, Nastia and Laurie all share the same agent so that's probably why the older two have been featured. FWIW, there's no way Laurie's parents/chaperones aren't present and wouldn't step in if need be. I do think that sometimes Val may lack a bit of flexibility in approach, he tends to be the serious "teacher," something I noticed in the early weeks was Laurie looking up at him for notes with exactly the same body language as if she were receiving corrections from her gymnastics coach. He is actually a drily funny guy but he struggles when choreographing fun routines. That's when we tend to see "messing about" because I'm not sure he knows how to choreograph joy and humour through the dance in the same way as say an Emma, Lindsay or Mark can. He can do a "bit" but I always get the impression the dance itself is deeply serious for Val - he competed well into his 20s and I think he's had a harder time letting the competition world go than some of the other pros. In his wheelhouse of dark/brooding he does quite well but he's not naturally a comic whereas Laurie is. As much as I think Sasha is the perfect pro for Terra, I still wish they'd given him Laurie. I think she'd be enjoying the process much more with him.

In her autobiography, Shawn spoke to how much a challenge doing the show in S8 was for her. Not only the dancing and performing (and stalker!) aspect but also the fact that because she'd stopped full time gymnastics training, she experienced changes to her body that she had to deal with as well. Top level gymnasts are training 6-8hrs a day, with a huge amount of conditioning involved. Although the dancing is an aerobic workout, it'll be nowhere near the energy expenditure Laurie is used to. The poor girl is trying to do parts of a gymnastics tour, cope with Val's intense teaching style, deal with the inevitable no-longer-training-elite weight gain and she also hasn't had a break all year. Although she's naturally embullient, she's got to be hitting the point of all-out exhaustion. Val is excited because he's got such a talent, but he would be better off to simplify the routines a bit, give Laurie some breathing room and allow her to be herself, not "Val's partner." This is the difference between the way he treated Zendaya vs. most of his other partners, for me. Zendaya came in with a brand of her own that he had to work to, everybody else he just seems to see as an extension of himself.

Mark also choreographed several group numbers for the Utah Vibe kids when they've been on the show. I find a lot of his group choreo has more of a traditional formation feel than a lot of the other pros and especially Mandy Moore, which I personally enjoy. He's also proved with those Vibe dances that you can combine traditional Latin formation with contemporary moves and production value. The one that he and Chelsie did to Sia's "She Wolf" is a case in point.

Well, Lindsay's married so I hope it doesn't go the Kym/Robert route! I'm inclined to agree his run to the finale will depend on the Latin dances but what he's got going for him is that he's arguably a more masculine presence than Carlos, Hayes or Andy so will be getting the "hot guy" votes, the "American hero" votes and the "not a bad dancer" votes. If he was a conservative Christian I'd say he'd have this thing sewn up. There's also a big group of fans who are glad Lindsay has gotten another chance at pro, so he'll be getting the benefit of vote splits where fans of the established pros may be voting for their favourite but throwing Lindsay a vote or two as well. I definitely have Alek as top 6 and I think Andy and one or more of Carlos/Tamar/Alexa will go before him. Nick and Bindi are finals bound I think and I don't know about Hayes - traditionally the young uns haven't fared well with the votes but he's getting the YouTube hits so who knows?

There's not really the appetite anymore in the media for blanket DWTS coverage. Remember when Ellen used to have one couple on every week? I've noticed for a few seasons now that only the stars (and pros) with the big personal publicists get any kind of buzz. And the train wrecks like Zolciak. Bindi is on every magazine cover in Australia, where the show doesn't even air ffs! It's all just a PR machine and her mama could rival Kris Jenner in wanting to have her kid front and center. I'm inclined to give Terri half a pass as ostensibly it's to build "conservation awareness" or whatever, but it still seems incredibly exploitative. Eh. I'll admit I'm biased against Bindi as to me she's always (even before dwts) been a little bit off. I apologise if this comes across badly and I don't mean to offend anybody but she's always reminded me of one of those homeschooled kids that are just a bit too precocious and into their causes/interests. It's cute for a bit but becomes grating quickly and you get the sense they don't really know how to relate when it's not about them. It's been toned down for DWTS but I grew up in Oz and had to suffer the commercials for her "kid fit" videos etc. She was like The Wiggles on uppers. I was a teenager at the time, so maybe that influences why I think of her as just annoying. Her partner doesn't help either - I literally googled Derek's name, each of his partner's names and "injured" and it came up with hits for practically every season. I'm not inclined to give Derek's partners injury sympathy anymore as it's a card played literally every year. He's either pushing too hard and injuring them or he's using it for votes.

It seems like a lot of the couples got screwed with song clearance this week. Apparently Mark and Alexa were supposed to do a Flintstones theme charleston. I would assume that given Flintstones is Hanna-Barbera like the Jetsons, that they got switched around the same time asBindi and Derek. The fact they did so well with the new style probably speaks to the different approaches to choreo - Mark said on Afterbuzz that he keeps a notebook with all his ideas. Given he's a huge Breaking Bad fan he's probably been kicking the concept around for a while. Derek choreographs on the fly, so with less time he wasn't able to produce something that was as fully formed.

Everything is a major challenge that Derek miraculously overcomes. i'm beginning to think both he and his sister have major victim complexes. Any who... This dance was BAD. Bindi's frame was all over the place and she has seen Mark's mugging and raised him some lip syncing to go along with it. The cutesy ending made me want to throw up in my mouth a little. It'll be interesting to see who she gets in the switch, that's for sure. I hope they'll make me like her better. And I'm not a perve but I hope they put her in a costume that supports her 'girls' a bit better, some of that looked painful!

My father had a stroke and Drs later found a hole in his heart. There's no definitive link (many people are walking around with a hole in the heart just fine) but he did opt to have it fixed. It was a day in hospital (not even overnight), the procedure itself only took about an hour. It was definitely painful for a few days and he absolutely wasn't in dancing shape - I seem to recall that they went In through the groin! So the heart thing doesn't seem strange to me. EKG's etc are fairly standard and 'procedure' might just equal 'test.' If Kim's been telling the truth though, there's no way she's dancing tonight. Guess we'll find out soon...

Well... You could hardly call Bindi's 'waltz' a waltz really, could you? Given that there was very little discernible waltz content in there, it's more likely that she'll actually get to do 2 'contemporaries'over the course of the season. I'm sure with Derek there's little difference between a foxtrot and a quickstep either. If in doubt, he'll grap her in a vice like hold, faff about with some props (a table setting, or if things are really going badly the full living room suite), pump in some smoke so no one can see her feet and Bob's your uncle! 10! Best choreographer ever! I actually think the producers differentiate by "slow dance" or "fast dance" and that's the most thought they put into any assignments. For a dance show, the folks at the helm seem completely uneducated about the art form. The pros are often given a dance and then told to choreograph it to a song in the wrong time signature, for example.

I'm not a fan of the Hough's at all but their story is interesting. Apparently Shirley and Corky would often go to Utah to teach at Center Stage. Derek was an eager beaver that slipped into their classes despite being too young (in his book he said he would wait outside to greet Shirley, bring her gifts etc, literally apple for the teacher stuff). Then the Hough parents separated, the kids were split up (Derek and one sister with the Dad, Julianne with the Mom) and apparently Derek went off the rails. The next time the Ballases came back to teach, they noticed Derek's absence and made enquiries. That's when he wound up going to England, it was a way of escaping the fallout of the breakdown of his family - Corky and Shirley offered to take him for 3 months training. Towards the end of the spell, he decided he wanted to stay and convinced his parents to let him. Julianne wound up over there after Mark's partner grew too tall for him. Derek suggested his sister, who apparently had already relocated to Florida at one stage for a dance partner (despite being all of 9/10yrs old). Obviously the closeness between Derek and Shirley relative to Julianne also has much to do with the fact that Derek stayed in London after the breakdown of the Ballas marriage. As I understand it, C&S split in 2002/2003, Julianne moved back to the U.S. that summer and then later on in the same year was when Mark's uncle committed suicide. As I rationalise it, that sequence of events would be more than enough to explain Derek's closeness to and protectiveness of Shirley... Crazy life for sure.

I fully believe that the Emmy win was politicized through for the Hough's so that the show can add the tag in front of 'head judge' Julianne's name. Ugh. They can both disappear. So sick of seeing Derek's soulless cookie cutter choreography and it makes it worse that he's paired with Bindi, who's already getting some tabloid press in Australia for being a diva behind the scenes. Apparently there have been wardrobe tantrums already. I have a feeling that at least half the people in this cast will overstay their welcome. I'm rooting for Alek.

I'm going to chime in even though so far I've only seen the freestyles on YouTube. Based solely on freestyle, I would have to vote for Noah. Sharna's choreo was stunning and although I really don't like some of the pandering that's gone on this season, I don't feel there was any in those scores - Noah actually did dance and well. There have been plenty of footballers who've taken the same route this far into the competition. Rumer's was a good Argentine tango. For me it just underscored Val's frailties as a choreographer, she's so good and she deserved so much better than that. For what it's worth, she did dance it well but it could have been done any other week in the competition. It just wasn't special enough for me. Alison and Riker's freestyle just came across as a bad reinterpretation of the scene from one of the Step Up movies where Moose and Camille dance to what sounded like the same remix of that song. I know most of the show's demo would have never seen that movie but it turned me off. I also found the troupe distracting and slightly superfluous.

Okay, I am starting the campaign for Sasha and Sasha - Cohen, the Olympic figure skater. She's pretty tiny. She'd be up there in terms of ringerdom but she is exquisite and I'd love to see a ringer with someone other than Val or Derek.

I think the most connection I've seen from Nastia was when she was hugging on Mark and Willow after the team dance. Being in LA the whole week this week should help her be a bit looser, especially with prankster Sasha training her. I missed Anna too. I don't always agree with her but I appreciate her insights and that she's not afraid to speak her mind. Darvina went to performing arts school with Mark and Derek - I would assume her training is more in the realm of jazz/musical theatre, I don't think she's ballroom trained.

Hmm... Looks like Derek is ensuring that he'll still come out smelling like roses no matter what happens. Boy is the son of a politician after all.