So You Think You Can Pick The Top Six? Top Eight Night And Results

It’s top eight night – which means the end is getting closer and closer to the end and closer and closer to a new season of Big Brother. Sigh.

Nat is doing a Single White Female thing on Delta Goodrem this week, with long blonde hair and a vaguely Virgin Mary dress. Natalie, Natalie, Natalie … Brian McFadden is not that hot.

So the judges have some comments to start us off with, but most of them really aren’t very interesting. Jason points out that the winner of this competition will be wearing Green and Gold and representing Australia and so we should all vote for the most truly top Aussie Bloke or Sheila out there and do our country proud. Except that dancing is so Unaustralian I don’t think we have any Blokes or Sheilas left.

And then we’re into it.

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This week the boys are picking girls, and Rhys is first up and he gets Vanessa. Sigh. Sure, it will be pretty, but unless they get ‘Ballet’, it’s just going to suck. And what do you know, they don’t. They get hip-hop and broadway.

Hip-hop is first and thankfully it’s another Supple routine. Old school this time. In their package Supple is trying to get Vanessa to lose her manners. As the routine starts it’s pretty clear that he failed miserably. Can someone tell this girl that cheesy smile face has no place in the world of hip-hop?

This is Rhys’s third (fourth if you count the self-choreographed thingamy) hip-hop routine in this competition, so he’s got that whole Eminem skinny-white-boy thing down pat. It’s not his best work, I’ll admit, but it’s far from the worst routine of the night.

Matt is talking really really really fast about old school hip hip and isolations, but overall he liked it. Bonnie – god, do I have to tell you what Bonnie said? It’s so … pointless and lame. She’s very nice, but … pointless and lame. Jason is all about the unison and the beat and kicking the beat. He points out that Vanessa has done awesome considering this isn’t her genre, but that now that we’re up to top eight, there will be no more of this ‘good considering it’s not your genre’ and so it actually wasn’t that good. But that Rhys was tops.

After the break, and tonight there will be a break after every routine, just to ease us into the commercial break hell that will be tomorrow nights verdict show – it’s Jacks turn to dance with Kate, which means he’ll either be awesome or get sent home. They get Quickstep – tonight’s token ballroom effort – and hip-hop.

Their quickstep is to the Buble version of the Spiderman theme. I don’t know how quicksteppy it is but they look awesome and it’s lots of fun and kicking and I do kind of love it lots and lots, even though I can’t get ‘Spiderpig’ out of my head for the entire routine.

Predictably, the judges love it, and love how it brought quickstep into the modern day. Jaosn goes as far as to say he ached for it, which … brings all sorts of wrong images into my mind involving Jason and Jack and Kate and Dr Cox loving this moment so much he wants to have sex with it. Yah – best not go there. He takes yet another dig at Jemma by pointing out where the splits belong on stage – dude! She’s gone. Quit kicking over the gravestone, k?

Incidentally, I can’t wait until Elton joins the cast of Law & Order. I mean, it’s Elton! And sure, he was a bit of a sleaze to Cher, but – awesome!!! Although sad that there’s one more member of the Clueless cast making somethings of themselves while poor Alicia Silverstone … does nothing.

See … more ads. So many ads. And in every break, we get that weird backwards Flake ad which annoys the crap out of me. Can someone explain that ad to me? Please?

Right – back to the show. Henry picks Demi out of the hat and they’re doing House and Contemporary.

Mmmm … House.

Erm. Not that one, obviously. Unfortuately, too, because Hugh Laurie is about fifteen billion times hotter than this routine. Demi tries to smile her way through it, but Henry just … sucks. Though at least he’s covered up all his manflesh, so … small mercies.

Matt thought the unison was out. I counted five yeahs, so it must have really. Sucked. Bonnie thought that Demi made a mistake, which she admits, and then goes on and on about how if you make a mistake, you have to get over it which I thought she did - unlike some people when they make mistakes *cough* Rhiannon and JD *cough*, but it’s ok when Rhiannon stuffs up, innit Bonnie?

Jason is all about encouraging Demi not to let being the only untrained dancer left get to her – and is interrupted by Bonnie, who finds it necessary, for some reason, to angrily yell the words to ‘I am woman’ at everyone, but replacing ‘woman’ with ‘Demi’ and punctuating it with a lot of finger pointing. Jason looks at her like she’s the fruitcake she is and tries to pretend that moment of oddness never happened by bagging Henry, which is awesome. In a rare moment of consistency, Henry also gets the ‘it’s not your genre, but that’s no longer an excuse’.

Next up, Graeme gets Rhiannon … not for the first time, if you believe the rumours … and they get Burlesque and Jazz. Because it’s Graeme, and he cannot help but draw the one card out of the hat that doesn’t have ‘hip-hop’ and/or a ballroom style on it.

The burlesque routine is centered around a whip. It’s basically Jazz, but Rhiannon gets to wear a wig and tights with seams up the back. It’s not very hot. In fact, here is a list of sexier routines on this show so far: ALL OF THEM. Except maybe the ones involving Anthony, and in particular, that horrible ‘dance of forbidden love’ he made us sit through with Camilla the aptly chosen Metamucil spokeswoman.

Matt thinks they were too young to d that routine because they’ve never had the raunchy seks. Bonnie agrees. Jason starts talking and Rhiannons head falls forward as though her drugs just kicked in. I’m worries she’s going to be drooling any second. She still manages a smile when Jason tells her that he started feeling her halfway through. Again … ew. Jason needs a shag because I cannot take much more of his sexually-charged commentary.

After the break, we get the obligatory plug for the SYTYCD soundtrack. And for the finale, which I’m looking forward to and dreading all at the same time.

As far as dancing goes, Jack and Kate are next and they get Supple for their hip-hop, which means Kate and Rhys both got Supple twice, but Kate definitely got the better deal, because this routine freaking awesome. You know how I said that this show should be ‘So You Think You Can Dance Kelly Abbey Choreography?’? Well, I’m changing that to ‘So You Think You Can Dance Supple And Kelly Abbey Choereography?’

The judges are all ‘couple of the night’ and raving and ranting about the freaking awesomeness of the whole thing. Except Bonnie, who is just blathering some shit about listening to the radio. And look, I know they’re pimping Jack. I know that the they’re ignoring a couple of little unison issues. I know all that, but I still have to agree that for sheer entertainment, these guys have killed everyone else tonight.

Yes, even Rhys. Damn Vanessa. And Damn Supple. Why didn’t he give Rhys that piece of awesome instead of the better-than-Nacho-Pop-but-not-awesome thing he got?

Aaanyway, enough with the bitter. Henry and Demi have to do their contemporary next. It’s Kelly Ackers, so the judges will love the choreography but I will think it’s awesome. And … one guess as to the subject?

Yup. Twu Wuv. Or, Young Twu Wuv tonight. It’s vaguely cute, but mostly pretty boring and technically nowhere near top eight standard. Remember that lame twu wuv routine Anthony and Laura did in Top 20 week? No? Not surprising. But anyway, this is the companion piece. It’s chemistry free, technique free and way too twee.

Matt thought it was like dancing through puppies. Poor puppies. I hope they were biting them on the ankles. Bonnie sees blue sky and sunshine, which I think is the drugs, not the routine, but is about as relevant as anything she’s ever said. Jason said they matched in their lack of technique, and all the other dancers would have been better, but they both sucked equally, so it worked. Um… that’s good I suppose.

ATB (that’s shorthand), it’s Vanessa and Rhys doing Broadway. Vanessa is supposed to be a really tough Puerto Rican chicky torturing Rhys, which fills me with fear, because …. Vanessa is so not tough, or a chicky, even.

The music is weird and the whole thing just falls a bit flat, despite Rhys’s best effort. It’s well danced, but Vanessa is just … too …. Not. Sigh. Let’s hope Rhys gets someone good next week.

The judges basically agree with me. Bonnie calls Rhys ‘hot baby hot’ and talks about a Rhys inferno. Right. That’s it. Bonnie – SHUT UP!!!

Last but not least, we have Graeme and Rhiannon doing a Jazz routine with a Mr and Mrs Smith vibe, to a Madonna song. It’s going to be really tough, the package tells me – because at one point Graeme drops a glass from the top of the stairs and Rhiannon has to catch it. Wow. Tough. Most people are dealing with dangerous lifts, but, you know, that doesn’t compare to having to catch a glass.

Their performance is, somewhat ironically, hotter than their burlesque. But not by much. Graeme spends a lot of their non-dancing time chewing on Rhiannon’s head, which is way too teenage-boy horny for prime time. This show is so icky tonight. Teenagers being sexy. Jason being horny. I’m worried for ActonB and her daughters!

The judges like it. Bonnie thinks Rhiannon is still trouble. Ha! We’ll see Bonnie … we’ll see. I know who gets sent home …

And that’s it. Eight performances are a lot easier to recap than fifteen, so I’m feeling good. Especially when Jason reminds the twelve-year-old girls out there not to vote for the hottie, but for the favourite dancer. So, I’m guessing he wants Henry gone too, yeah?

Bonnie closes with ‘each show is different, and tonight is no different!’ and I really don’t think there are enough drugs in the world to make that sentence sound even remotely sensible. But, you know, what more can you expect?

And now … the results show. No waiting. Just like when we saw the US version. And I remember that I forgot to vote.

Not, er, that I do. Um. But in theory, if I did, it’s too late.

The group dance tonight is – not surprisingly, - hip-hop (I think …). But not Nacho pop hip-hop. Not Supple hip-hop either, but ok. Light and cheerful and cheeky and not purely hip-hop. And then not hip-hip at all. So what do I know what I’m talking about?

For the results show, Natalie has kicked the Delta habit, and we are all grateful. Jason tries to hurry the show along, but Natalie is not having it. Instead we have to listen to Bonnie talk about how the dancers are going to end up dancing with Celine Dion (which, I believe, actually was part of the prize for the US version, but come on! How much would hearing that make you want to run and hide if you were listening backstage!) and Matt talking about Mondays being sucky. Blergh.

And then we’re into it. It’s the girls first as usual and it’s Kate v Rhiannon. And these recaps go on for so long I’m checking my work email while I’m watching and still getting everything I need. Nat confirms that one of them is safe, and one is in the bottom four, but admits that we should all know that by now, so yay for self-awareness.

Not surprisingly, Kate is safe and Rhiannon is not. Surprisingly, if the rumours are to be believed, Graeme looks delighted by the result.

And then it’s time for an ad break, before we find out whether Demi or Vanessa will be joining her. Again, not surprisingly, Demi is safe and Vanessa is in the bottom two. Natalie goes straight to the judges for them to have a little bit of a rave about the shit dancers and pretend their opinions still matter. Matt is brave enough to say they got it right.

And then another ad break! What was that segment? Three minutes?

ATB, it’s the guys. Rhys is a sailor tonight. A sailor with an eye infection making him weap bright fluro yellow stuff. Poor boy. I’d hug him, but I don’t want to catch that.

It’s Henry v Jack first, so you just know Henry is in the bottom two, because Jack sure as hell isn’t.

Tellingly, Jack hugs Rhys first. Because last week the edit was all ‘Rhys hates Jack!’ but this week the edit is all ‘Rhys loves Jack!’ because no-one in editing really know what they’re going for with this. See, they thought that if Rhys hated Jack, maybe the public would start to hate Rhys, but that obviously didn’t happen, because we all love Rhys, and if Rhys hates Jack we’re all thinking that there must be a good reason and starting to hate Jack. So, now Rhys loves Jack, because if Rhys loves Jack, we’re all going to love Jack too. And Rhys, but they’ve accepted that nothing is going to change that.

Sooo … I’m rambling because there’s another commercial break to sit through now. This is getting ridiculous. Idol ridiculous.

After the break, it’s Rhys versus Graeme, and I have to confess I’m just a bit worried, because what if everyone just forgot to vote? Like when we all forgot to vote for Ben McKenzie? Or Ricki-Lee?

Oh, that’s right. We didn’t forget to vote for Ricki-Lee.

They both look amazingly nervous, but Rhys can’t even be happy when he gets safed because of poor Graeme. Although he regains his mojo and cartwheels off stage … to hug Jack. Yay for Rhys and Jack love. Can they dance together in the finale? Please?

The judges do a bit more pointless, irrelevant commentary, basically agreeing with Australia, with lots of shots of the Top Four – and you just KNOW they will be – hanging off the side of the stage looking sad or serious or something. Anything but gloaty, the memo said.

I fast forward the musical guest and the crappy interview afterwards. And the ad break the follows. So. Many. Ad. Breaks.

The useless solos follow. And look! Rhiannon is doing the dance from ‘If’ by Janet Jackson, just like my friends and I used to do when we were fifteen! I suppose most of the audience for this show won’t pick that routine as being straight out of the video. Or care, I suppose, given they let Demi get away with ‘Choreographing’ the dance Beyonce does to ‘Crazy In Love’ and didn’t call her out on that.

Henry brings out the hips for one last showing, and I might miss them, if it weren’t for the accompanying facial expressions which kind of make me cringe. Nat tries to be all friendly and chatty, but he basically shoots her dead with talk of fusion and wankery.

Obviously he hits the bitch button because poor Vanessa because when poor Vanessa sweetly tells her that she loves dancing after her solo, she responds with ‘we can tell you love dancing. Can’t you tell she loves dancing everybody?’ in the most snarky tone imaginable. It’s like Gretel Killeen broke into her body for a minute there. Vanessa slinks off stage, suitably humbled and humiliated, while Nat tries to regain the façade that she doesn’t think these people are all total morons.

Sadly, they’re not doing much to dispel the illusion, with Graeme choosing Michael Jackson to dance to and then following it up by singing that he’s ‘cool, calm and collected, bay-bah!’ when Nat tries to talk to him.

It’s time for another ad break, so Natalie can go punch someone out the back and regain that composure she’s so famous for.

And then it’s time to kick some people off the show. Starting with Rhiannon. And it’s about bloody time. I guess Australia didn’t want to be represented by someone from Minto.

Rhiannon is suitably devastated, which is probably why she says she wants to be a triple threat, bigger than Michael. Bigger than Janet. Of course. She’s hoping for a record deal out of this … because apparently now they give record deals to people from all sorts of random reality TV shows, even if they’ve demonstrated no ability to sing or play an instrument or anything. Except, um, not.

And you know, Nat laughing at her right now might be a bit mean, but, really – I’d be laughing too. She’s only human.

Jason says he’ll hire her. Bonnie says something about a secret and I’m just not listening any more. Matt says he’ll hire her too. Well, good then. Nat tells Michael and Janet to watch out because … yeah. Rhiannon’s going to be in Matt’s next Ricki-Lee video, donthca know?

So, enough of that.

It’s time to send Henry home. I’d tell you what Henry says in his exit interview, but to be honest, his freaking Justin Timberlake hat covers his eyes and it strikes me as so disrespectful and rude that I just can’t bring myself to give a shit.

Oi. Dufus. If you want people to listen to you, take your freaking hat off and look them in the eye, k?

Jason has a lovely stab at Bonnie by pointing out that Hurricane Henry seems to have died down. Bonnie disagrees. He’ll always be HER Hurricane Henry. And I hate to be all ‘shameful joy’, but I can’t help but feel a little bit of delight in Bonnie’s babies being sent home.

And on that nasty note, that’s the show, and the recap. There are only six left, and after next week, there will be only four. And you know what that means, don’t you?

Yep. Big Brother is just three short weeks away.