After the commercial, the couples are finally lined up for the start of the bottom-three-revealing process. The first three couples step forward, and hey, it's only 13 minutes into the show! Not bad. Oh, wait, I spoke to soon. Cat is verbally rehashing the performances and judges' comments again, even though we just showed clips of them five minutes ago. By the time anything actually happens, it's 14 minutes in.

First up are "Jessicker and James." That's Cat's pronunciation. A note about James/Jaymz/Jamyz/Mr. Cool/Mr. Tool. Three different people have told me that his name is spelled Jaymz, not Jamyz. Now, it would make me very happy if this were true, because it would at least be pronounceable, and it would restore the natural order of the universe. However, I got "Jamyz" from the caption they show over him on the screen (which you can see in my performance-show recap), so until I see some hard evidence to the contrary, I'm going to stick with that. Not that it matters - he deserves to be mocked mercilessly either way.

Jamyz and Jessica are safe. Remember, they did the foxtrot. Ben and Ashley are also safe; they did the "Great Balls of Fire" routine. Dmitry and Joy are not safe, to the surprise of exactly zero people watching.

The next three couples come up onto the chopping block. Martha seems to have forgotten to wear pants - that just looks weird, the way that outfit cuts her off. Musa has his hands on Natalie's waist, as always. Travis and Martha, Benji and Donyelle, and Musa and Natalie are all safe. Finally the last three couples are up. Jason and Aleksandra are not safe. Ivan and Allison are safe. Ryan and Heidi are not safe.

Note the locations of everyone's hands.

So we have a bottom three of Dmitry/Joy (the brutal excoriation by Mia), Jason/Aleks (the white girl who couldn't dance hip-hop), and Ryan/Heidi (the "pop" routine set to Kelly Clarkson). In my opinion, based on last night's performance, Ryan and Heidi do not belong in this group. However, Shane, who was Ryan and Heidi's big supporter last night, now backpedals and says that they were nowhere as good as he initially thought they were. Maybe not, but they were still better than that "Great Balls of Fire" crap, and I also thought they were better than Ivan and Allison's ultra-slow hip-hop routine.

Now comes the good part, in which the six bottom-feeders have to "dance for their lives." (How great would it be if they literally had to dance for their lives? I would watch that show.) One by one, they come out and dance for a short time - maybe a minute? - in whatever style they want. First up is Joy, whom I have pegged as solidly the worst. Oh, my God. She does a slow, bikini-clad, interpretive-type dance that I don't think would have gotten her past the initial round of auditions. When she does her post-dance interview, she sounds exactly like Kellie Pickler, complete with cutesy facial tics.

Pick Pickler!

Next Dmitry comes out ... WEARING A DRESS. I am not lying. He is wearing something that looks like a black tank top and gigantic ankle-length black culottes. He does a matator/paso doble-type routine, but the outfit also has a little bit of a samurai feel. When he starts to dance, I see that it's actually a long split skirt over a pair of pants. I also see that his tank top is more of a ladies' camisole. It's all kind of awesome, but the bottom line is that he is wearing a DRESS. Claps for being comfortable with yourself, Dmitry. His dance underwhelms me. In his interview, Cat asks him if he was disappointed in Joy last night. There is a long silence during which I balance my checkbook, feed my cat, and learn Portuguese. Finally he answers no. Very subtle!

Oh my God, that dress is so cute! Where did you get it?

Heidi really rocks her dance for her life, doing a super fast and tight salsa routine. She is all bubbly in her interview. She is really growing on me - she has a great attitude, and she also happens to be a great dancer. Ryan is next. His dance is very fluid and balletic. Again, I really don't think this couple is among the weaker contestants, but apparently Ryan disagrees. He is disturbingly self-deprecating in his interview. Bad idea jeans, Ryan.

Aleks comes out in a baggy black shirt and no pants, with her hair in her face, and engages in some weird hopping around. She is so nervous that she can't even speak to Cat afterward. She looks like she's on her way to the electric chair during the interview. Jason is last and he does a hip-hop dance that is totally competent, but more importantly, he acts like he thinks he belongs there. Just based on contestant body language, Aleks and Ryan should go home. But Joy is a worse dancer than Aleks. Really, I thought Heidi was the only one of the six who did great during this segment. The judges go backstage to deliberate, which I think is weird - what are they doing that we can't be allowed to see? They are so having a cigarette break right now.

Aleks found this shirt in the dumpster behind the methadone clinic. Obviously, it flunks the sniff test.

It looks like we're all on the same page about how well that went.

Rihanna performs. I like the song, but she lip-syncs it badly. Why is that necessary? I wasn't all that impressed by Nelly Furtado and Timbaland last week, but they did not lip-sync. I don't see why you would need to do that for a one-song performance on a crappy TV show, unless you flat out CAN'T SING. I pray for an Ashlee Simpson-type humiliating incident, but nothing happens.

Posted by Amanda on June 23, 2006 4:30 PM