1) Attractive People - I’m sure if you enjoy the male gender, you can find one of the celebrities (George Hamilton, anyone?) or the professional partners, but for those of us that love the ladies, Dancing is a never-ending stream of hot women. Stacy Keibler broke out, but Lisa Rinna is not unattractive and all of the female partners are somewhere between “smoking hot” and that Russian hot, where you’re attracted to them, but also scared for your life at the same time.
2) Talented People - The difficulty level on some of the dances has to be considered so high. We still don’t know how they do the spinning thing, the nimbleness required for the more advanced quick-steps is insane to think about and the one time they were allowed to use lifts, Drew and Jerry were throwing Cheryl and Anna around like rag dolls – but all in a classy way. When the professionals dance together, it’s sort of like figure skating, but the chances of someone crashing into the ice are no longer there.
3) Even Judging - My sister is freaking out as she reads this, but other than the fortnight-long grudges of main heel Carrie Ann Inaba, the judges aren’t specifically broken down into an American Idol-style grouping, where Paula will always say something nice and Simon will always say something mean, then Randy is somewhere in between. Bruno, Glen and Carrie will praise to the high heavens and nitpick the minutest details. Considering the majority of us watching don’t exactly know what they’re looking for, it’s hard to argue, but at least they’re unpredictable in their personalities and moderately fair.
4) Good Music - Maybe this is just coming from the guy who has loads of Sinatraesque music on his computer, but I enjoy the big band playing classics. “Bootylicious”, “Thriller”, “Wake Me Up Before You Go Go”, Cold Cold Heart”. Norah and Wham and Michael Jackson and a whole host of classy music is danced to, and just listening to that alone would not be a bad way to spend ninety minutes of your time.
5) Tom Bergeron - Call me crazy, but I like Tom Bergeron. I think he’s just serious enough and just cheesy enough to be perfect for this show. Some people were born to host game shows, and Tom Bergeron is one of them. Chuck Woolery. Bob Barker. Pat Sajak. You can’t imagine them in another environment. This is where Tom Bergeron belongs, and he does a good job.
6) The “Celebs” Care - Other than Master P, the contestants were pouring their heart and soul into this. They always had a cheesy field trip or advisor brought into each practice, but even old men with broken ribs – my favorite, George- were giving it their all. It should have come down to Drew vs. Stacy, but there’s no doubting the amount of effort put in by Jerry, who made vast improvements over his time on the show.
(Samantha? Not so much. She has enthusiasm, so I guess that’s good.)
But that’s why I enjoyed Dancing so much and cannot wait for another season. My Thursday nights are going to be a little more empty now that it’s chitzy Hollywood faux glamour is gone.
Champions.
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Of course, thanks to the magic of television, two days after Dancing finales, both a new season of The Amazing Race and Real World will premiere. The Amazing Race is like pizza or a band at your reception (Thanks, Wedding Crashers), as it’s good even when it’s bad. When I say this Real World looks like a complete disaster from the preview show, I’m not lying. These people are insane – and then they get hit by a hurricane. Tim already has his letter penned up to MTV, telling them that they killed his roommate because they glamorized bulimia and he thought it was cool.
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Now that the total ”Eh” that were these Winter Olympics is gone, I say we start looking forward to finding a place to host them in 2014.
The Blog’s Official Choice? Hoth. Let’s see a drunken Bode wander into a wampa cave.
(Deadspin today had a great counter-point on Bode, that if it wasn’t for his ripping of other athletes, we’d probably like him, as he represents the anti-corporate, “just wanna have fun” attitude we like from our athletes. Sadly, Bode took the pass more traveled, and that has made all the difference.)
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I just want to have these in writing, as they’re Dill’s two quotes from the last few weeks on college basketball:
On Duke: ”A slam dunk to win the championship.”
On UConn: ”No chance of making the Final Four.”
Just wanted to get that out there in the open. Don’t waste your breath arguing, because he’s now came up with quantifiers for “Hustle” and “Effort” that are just completely subjective and retarded.
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So Grey’s is now into our weekend routine, with Tim getting back from home on Sunday night and Patrick getting done with mass and us all watching it at 11:30. Never mind the fact they stole the entire karma idea from Earl without even paying slight tribute to Jason Lee’s brilliance, as it’s on a rival network and I can understand the issues there, but the more I watch the show the more I realize a lot of the people on it are just completely reprehensible. Meredith whines – all the time – and is just generally just a morose person. Her love, Derek Shepard, is leading her and his wife on at the same time. This whole situation is leading poor George, a very likeable character, on.
Does anyone else feel that they’re just bad people, or is it simply the circumstances showing them an ugly light? Were they an overly good couple together, or was it always whiny?
Update: So Blogger was down, and I perusing some of my other hot spots, and the ever-trustworthy Entertainment Weekly has provided me not only with an accosting of Meredith's latest exploits, but the fact she was rated the number one worst thing on television in 2005. Beautiful.
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Good to see the Fighting Irish basketball team step up their game on Saturday. As close to a must-win as you can get before you reach the “Single Elimination Tournament” or “Mathematically Eliminated” levels, and the Irish gave up 80 points at home. Torin Francis actually came through in the first half, and they stopped going to him in the second, firing up contested threes like it was their job. Two winnable games left against DePaul and Providence, but even that only assures us the chaos of tie-breakers to make the Big East tournament, let alone the NIT or NCAA. If we lose both of these games – highly unlikely, but also possible – we won’t even qualify for the NIT.
To do that, you just have to be .500 or better, and that's in question.
Some pundits are decreeing that Big East could get eight or nine bids, but I wonder if that’s a little bit excessive. Obviously, UConn, Villanova, Pitt, WVU, Marquette and Georgetown are locks, with Seton Hall one more big win away from securing their spot, but tell me, what exactly has Cincinnati or Syracuse done to earn a bid?
Cincy beat LSU way back in December, but they’re 5-8 in their last 13 games, with those wins coming over Rutgers, South Florida, Louisville, Syracuse and Providence. Syracuse doesn’t even have the high-profile non-conference win to hang its hat on, with the West Virginia win last Monday night the only thing resembling something you’d put on a resume. Unless these teams can steal a win or two in the Big East tournament, they’re the definition of a bubble team, and I don’t think the strength of the Big East alone should get them in when they’ve done poorly against the upper echelon of the conference.
Until we get back to the tournament, Mike Brey will not receive color.
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