We start our week with confessionals: Brittney is sad because she is just too damned pretty, and not high fashion. This is a trial for her, because she hates it when people call her pretty, and they do, all the damned time. Analeigh thinks that she needs more personality. This may be true, because I didn’t know who the hell was whining.
And then, just like in a fairy tale, Tyra appears in the living room of the hamster house. She has ordered pizza (which looks to be very old and very cold) and there are goodie bags and plastic tiaras all around, which is exactly the sort of party every gang of women over the age of, oh, say, six wants. Needless to say, TyTy has a giant tiara, and it’s probably real. The hamsters have little baby princess tiaras. Tyra tells the girls how when she started to grow booty, her mama ordered pizza and refused to let her starve herself skinny. Instead, they reinvented her career from runway to cheesecake Victoria’s Secret model.
What follows is an embarrassment to everyone involved: hamsters, the Two Jays, Tyra, the camera crew and editors, and us, the poor viewing public. I refuse to acknowledge the scene. Suffice to say that Number Three Surrogate Daughter and I marked the calendar as the Day ANTM Officially Jumped the Shark. Hell, they didn’t just jump it, they beat it to death.
The next day, the girls go to the salon to find out what Tyra’s vision has decreed for their new looks. It has to be a surprise for all involved, so the mirrors are covered. Marjorie loses her Agnyes Deyn and goes chestnut brown. She’s still cute. Joslyn gets a wavy weave. Elina gets the Ruh-Roh edit as she confessionalizes that she is very careful about her image. Drab, uber-serious animal liberation activists are Serious like that. Samantha gets a short blonde boy-cut. Hannah gets straight bangs and a bob. She’s no Anna Wintour. Clark gets dark brown hair and LaurenBrie goes blonder. Sheena gets highlights like Tyra. Analeigh gets blonde layers. Elina says that she doesn’t want any sort of drastic changes. Ruh-roh. Foreshadowing, thy name is ANTM. Elina says she’s skerred, and Miss Jay says she should be. Then he tries to comfort her by telling her that the Weave Master of the known universe is here to work on her head, and says that this is the Most Dramatic Makeover Ever in Top Model History. It’s a giant red Bozo weave, and it looks a lot like Brittney-Who-Had-Brain-Damage. Remember her? She lost it on go-sees and cursed like a longshoreman?
M’Key gets an awesome short, black do. Isis gets long Cher hair. Brittney, who is just too catalog, gets a heavy, wavy black weave. She cries to Miss Jay that she hates being too pretty. He tells her to try harder. Yeah. See, people who don’t get called “pretty” day in and day out, we don’t have sympathy for the hard life of those who do. Go cry on someone else, bitch.
The hamsters arrive home, only to discover Tyra mail, telling them that they’re going to have to work the night shift. At Wal-Mart. They are met by Big Whitney’s Cover Girl display, Sutan and Mrs. Nigel Barker. Mrs Nigel is on hand to give them instructions: they’ll have to ad-lib a 30 second commercial for Cover Girl right after they do their own make up. The commercials range from merely mediocre to dismal. Hannah wins, inexplicably. For her troubles, she’ll get a $1 thousand dollar gift card for Wal-Mart (you can get rifles and plaid flannel there) and have her ad on the Wal-Mart web site.
Back to the Hamster House, where Tyra Mail asks “Who’s suited to be America’s Next Top Model.” There is debate as to whether this means swim suits or business suits. Nobody asks about the possibility of birthday suits. We then cut to Elina talking to Brittney and Joslyn about how much she hates her mother, because she was a bad mother. Brittney asks Elina where she lives. With her mother. Who feed you? My mother. Brittney rightly calls Elina an ungrateful little bitch, and we head to another Big Whitney commercial.
When we return, Analeigh is having a hard time posing in front of a mirror. The other girls try to help her. I think typing those two sentences just lowered my I.Q. In any event, the girls are hauled off in the bio-bus to a huge beach house in Malibu. It looks like it will be the swimsuit edition. Russel James (who shot Tyra’s famous Sports Illustrated Swimsuit cover) will be shooting. “Supermodel” Susan Holmes (I never heard of her) is also a super swimsuit designer, and it’s her suits the girls will be in. Mr. Jay leaves the hamsters in the capable hands of Russel and Susan, who will art direct this shoot.
Analeigh can’t pose any better in the water than she can in front of the mirror. Hannah has crazy eyes. Brittney is stressing over being pretty and shows no range. Samantha is beautiful. Elina is gorgeous, and not your typical swimsuit model. (Partly because of all of her tats, I guess) Marjorie is flawless, and Isis is difficult to shoot. All too soon we are back at the Casa De Marmotas where Analeigh is nervous about the morrow’s judging.
In the judging room, Susan Holmes is the guest judge. Tyra imparts this wisdom to the little model-ettes: You must master the swimsuit. Meh, it’s no “short, shiny and tight is the fastest way to look cheap”, but then Tyra is no NinaGarcia.
Sheena tells the judges that she was “smiling with her eyes.” This means that she’s watched an episode or two. Analeigh’s arms are scary. Clark has a skinny mouth, and needs to remember to keep them soft. Hannah is European sexy, to Nigel, but she only has one pose. Tyra thinks Lauren Brie looks like CariDee. But without the dread heartbreak of psoriasis. Brittney is absent in her photos and M’Key looks like Linda Evangalista. Hot!! Isis gets mixed reviews, Marjorie didn’t do enough, and Samantha was pretty good. Elina gets all sorts of raves, and Paulina tells her that body tats are bad for modeling, but then the photo they choose for her is just a head shot. Which is bullshit, because everyone else is being judged on a full-body pose.
The girls are dismissed and the judges rip them up: Sheena was too soft (which I guess is an improvement over too hoochie). Analeigh is too dull. Clark is not photogenic, and she’s a bitch. Lauren Brie photographs well. Brittney is just pretty, and not a model. Samantha is loved by the judges and the cameras. Hannah needs to get messy. Isis is stuck. M’Key is amazing. As they debate the pros and cons of the hamsters, I realize that Susan Holmes looks like the illegitimate love child of Janice Dickenson’s second face and Hillary Swank. That’s a lot of jawline, is all I’m saying.
And Elina gets the first photo. See? Bullshit. There’s no bathing suit anywhere in the shot: it’s all face. Photos are handed out to the rest of the girls in order: Lauren Brie, Samantha, M’Key, Sheena, Joslyn, Majorie (who is no longer getting the cheesy accordian music, at least), Clark, Isis and Hannah.
Analeigh and Brittney are left waiting for the other spike heel to drop. Brittney is pretty, but she just doesn’t photograph well. Analeigh used to be a figure skater, and so should know how to pose, (I don’t know, I thought figure skaters moved, but what the heck do I know) but is sort of blah. Who goes? Who do you think? The pretty girl, who is still whining about being pretty as she leaves the Casa des Marmotas.
Next week? The cat walk. Let’s see who’s never had on a pair of heels before. My money is on Hannah. I bet Isis can work it.