CW
(Season 11, Episode 7)
Oh, Tyra, Tyra, Tyra. There are no words. I always love/hate the episodes in which she plays a major role. I love it because it’s entertaining, but I hate it because it’s entertaining in a, “Wow. What has happened to her?” kind of way. The lady is crazy, is what I’m trying to say.
Despite Tyra’s ridiculousness, this week’s episode was kind of boring for me. Nobody did anything interesting in the house, and nobody screwed up too badly in the challenge or on the photo shoot. It was kind of fun watching Tyra endow “strengths” upon the girls. Lauren Brie’s strength for instance, is being awkward, while Marjorie’s is being a hunchback. We all know that Tyra loves the “model ugly” look the most because it’s the one she finds the least threatening to her, so Marjorie’s Hunchback of Notre Dame pose wins the signature pose challenge.
I kind of love how Tyra thinks that the awkwardly-named Fiercee Awards that she created for her talk show last year was such a great idea that she’s brought it back for this photo shoot. What’s even better is that the shoot has nothing at all to do with the Fiercee awards. Instead, they’re just about different award show cliches.
Since no one ends up with an especially horrific picture, the producers are really working overtime to set up the downfall of the bottom two. A lot of time is spent both with the footage in the house and the photo shoot, talking about Elisa’s inability to let go and show emotion. They spend so much time on this that throughout the episode, I’m pretty sure she’s going to get eliminated. To a lesser extent, they focus on Lauren Brie, who thinks she’s nothing special and starts packing her bags before the challenge even begins, and Analeigh, who nobody in the house sees as competition.
Even though nobody in the house thinks she looks like a model, Analeigh ends up with my favorite picture. Her “bored reporter” shot is kind of hilarious. To me, it’s the photo that looks the most like the assignment. Joclyn’s was pretty great too, which makes me happy because she’s a lot of fun and I want her to stick around.
While I liked those two photos the most, Marjorie’s was the best I’ve seen of her so far in this competition. The judges liked it so much that they declared it the best picture of the week. Here is the order in which the photos were handed out.
Marjorie (challenge winner)
Analeigh
McKey
Samantha
Elina
Joclyn
Sheena
I’m confused as to why Joclyn was so close to the bottom since the reaction to her shot was generally positive among the judges. In any case, I really thought they were going to boot Sheena, since Tyra hates the girls who are “too hoochy.” Lauren Brie, however, just proved to be too damn boring to stick around. However, her parting line is hilarious: “I’m a great person and I have tons of friends at home!”
Heh. I’m sure they’ll be glad to see you.
Clacked by Kona Gallagher 
on Oct 08, 2008 @ 21:32 EST5EDT
I cannot stand Sheena. Her wacked out “hootchie” accent and way of speech. I don’t even know what the hell hootchie is, but I now know I don’t like it. Go away Sheena.
I think they are tearing into Elina because they find her threatening. Note they chose the shot with the fake tear from the beginning of the shoot instead of any that were taking when the poor thing was actually crying.
They always choose the photo of the person that will be booted from the worst of the batch. I hate that. No actual shoot is going to choose from the worst or what they are not looking for for their final shot.
Unfortunately for Marjorie, she really IS a hunchback…she has the worst posture I have ever seen. Absolutely no confidence. Strange contestent for sure; but her photo was good.
I really like McKey (isn’t she one of the Brittany’s?)…she has such a fierce look. I’d like to see her win it.
For some reason, Tyra seems to think she can act. I don’t know why she is under this illusion. I’m always amazed when she is “teaching” a model how to act out a role or a character. Even funnier is when she chides a model for being “over the top” because that’s pretty much how she conducts herself in every aspect of this show. I loved it when Paulina judged a competition awhile back – she’s honest, real and informative – and I always like the Jays, but I pretty much cringe whenever Tyra is on doing one of her weird accents or trying to be ghetto or just generally acting strange.
Why couldn’t they have picked any shot of Elina when she was actually crying? Good or bad, it would have at least showed that she did let some true emotion come out. Instead they pick out the most emotionless shot of all for what? So they could hammer home the lack of emotion point yet again? If they had sent her home on that shot, she would have a right to be pissed.
I’m glad Marjorie is finally gaining some confidence. I think it could be her and McKey in the finals. I like Sheena and Jocylyn’s personalities, but I can’t see either of them winning. Samantha and Analeigh just seem boring compared to everyone else.
I think ANTM has singlehandedly resurrected the phrase “going abroad” (or at least they’re trying to). I look forward to seeing where they’ll send them….
I think they are blowing sunshine on Marjorie this week because she will get eliminated next week. Her posture drives me crazy and her self doubt will be her undoing.
I was surprised Lauren Brie was eliminated. Sure, her photo was horrible, but she had been solid up until that point. Sheena has been consistently ho-hum and last night was no different.
McKey had the most stunning photo of the night with Joslyn a close second. Majorie’s was not that impressive to me.
I really wish they would show us a series of their photos. The good, the bad and the ugly. Tell us why they thought this one is the best, etc. If there isn’t time during the show, then online.
That’s an excellent idea. Instead of showing just the “supposedly” best shot, show a few – the worst (and not for obvious reasons like their eyes were closed), maybe a “repeat” pose (i.e., a pose they resort to repeatedly instead of being more inventive), and a technically bad pose (not using the light properly, not showing the clothes to their best advantage). Then give each clip a few seconds of commentary so the models can learn from their mistakes.
There is SOOOOOO much (really bad) filler in this show. A three clip montage with commentary at judging would be a more instructive and interesting use of time for both the models and the audience.