Dressed in a semi-barbed wire outfit that seemed to augment one breast and completely hide another, Giselle looked oddly reminiscent of the Prince of Persia in drag on this fine evening. She announced that she was going to unleash her "inner Rosarita," which apparently meant revealing her midriff for all of America to take in. And yes, it's now official: Giselle Fernandez has the best abs in the news. Moments later, she performed a standing split, moving me to declare her the most flexible woman in the news as well, but then I realized I was being hasty. Let's not forget about the triple threat of Greta Van Sustren, Cokie Roberts, and Judy Woodruff. Grrrrowl!

Well, Giselle's mission to unleash Rosarita led to a sexy rumba, ultimately causing Carrie Ann to say "I think you're a contender for the title." Strong words, Carrie Ann INABA!! All three judges awarded our spicy journalist 8s for a total of 24 points, good enough for third place. Samantha Harris then intercepted Giselle and her "toy boy" (as Bruno called him) Jonathan and asked them about the performance. Giselle immediately let her Rosarita cup runneth over as she launched into a brief yet intense Latina monologue. As for her competition, Giselle had a mighty strategy: "I think we have to do some leg choppin'." So did Giselle Fernandez just threaten to sever Stacy Keibler's legs? That hardly seems fair.

As the night drew to a close, Tom and Samantha gathered all the luminous stars out on the floor again to announce who had the highest and lowest scores. After each couple's names were announced, the audience erupted in applause -- well, except for with Tia Carrere. Maybe people were bored with her or maybe they simply resented her recent weight gain, but when Tom called out "Tia and Maksim," there was nothing but pure, mortifying silence in the room. I mean, the backup singers in the band get more applause than Tia did at that moment. C'mon people. Give Tia some love.

The Results Show

Well, flash forward to the next night, and we have the ever exciting results show. The hour began with the disarming image of a business casual Tom Bergeron quietly roaming the empty ballroom floor. Whaa? Where is everyone? What's happened? Will we see our results?? Fear not. This was a pre-taped segment, and Tom calmly told us that the live portion of the hour would be starting in a mere twenty minutes. Until then, we'd get to relive all those wonderful dance moments from the night before. Oh. Great.

And so we were stuck with the rumbas and quicksteps all over again and in their entirety. On the plus side, we had nuggets of new footage between dances as we took brief glimpses of the stars in the post-ballroom confessional. "They put the nervous girl first," complained a peppy Lisa Rinna. "I mean, HELLO! I am the most nervous of anybody, and they put me first! What do you expect?!?!" I don't know. Maybe your face to fall off?

Tia Carrere also appeared stressed out in the confessional, saying how one little error can plague you incessantly. "I think I need a martini," she eventually concluded. You know, watching this show with a dirty martini is not a bad idea. But there's something amazingly pathetic about that too. I'll just move on.

We soon came upon an emotionally distraught Tatum O'Neal who explained the torture of having excelled so much the first week. "Everybody started calling me after the first show and going 'Whoaaa Tatum! You're like a professional dancer!' which I'm not!" She then added, "Anyhoo, pass the vicodin please."

Later, Jerry Rice issued an odd challenge, saying, "Master P, bring it on. Bring it on. I like competition." Um, this is like Mike Tyson picking a fight with Bea Arthur. Exactly how does Master P constitute a challenge?

Speaking of Master P, he was in good spirits as he sat with Ashly in front of the cameras. "I'm the Scarface of ballroom dancing," he said. Hmmm... I was going to suggest the Stephen Hawking of ballroom dancing, except less mobile.

Well, at long last, we finally went live, which meant we could see Samantha Harris's new Elvira Mistress of the Dark hairstyle. It was splendid, but hardly made up for the lame misdirection she offered up by saying "We'll have a live peformance by a man named McCartney." Now, it's not to say that I was anxiously waiting for a Sir Paul performance, but honestly, don't sully the poor guy's name by piggybacking onto it, JESSE MCCARTNEY. You see, Jesse McCartney is a pop singer who you may recognize from being AWFUL. Or at least, that's how I anticipated he'd be. I hadn't actually heard any of his music at that point. My only exposure to him had been via sidewalk posters and the occasional Disney Radio billboard. I had to admit that a morbid curiosity had crept over me. I knew Jesse had to be bad, but just how bad?

Tommy B and Elvira.

Before I could discover the extent of J. Mac's putrid warbling skills, we then had to sit through another recap of all the dancing. Wow, it's almost like this is what I just saw for the past TWENTY MINUTES. Thankfully, the dancing clips were kept short, but still -- a recap of the recap? C'mon now. What's next? A recap of all the Samantha Harris flubs? Actually, I'd like to see that.

Anyway, the new and improved recap was dotted with even more backstage moments as we then got to see Master P announce, "I ain't taking my lucky shoes off for no one, not even the judges." Well, what about... the podiatrist? Will you take them off then? You know, Master P, if you love your shoes so much, why don't you just marry them? Gotcha!

Posted by B-side on January 16, 2006 2:18 PM