Archive for April 18, 2012

You’re All A Bunch Of Lying Animals!

April 18, 2012 sabrina Dance Moms: Miami
Victor Dance Moms Miami

What did I get myself into?

When Dance Moms: Miami began last night, you just knew the peace and tranquility between the moms was going to be short lived.  It was strange watching them act all… hmm what’s the word I’m looking for…. oh, right… “nice” to each other.  Aside from Susan looking like she was about to shoot laser beams at Victor and Angel when Jessi was still near the bottom of “the list”, the moms were relaxed and ready for an easy week.  Right?  Wrong.

Out of nowhere, the moms started to pile on Abby (Sammy’s mom), and I don’t mean that in a Cinemax after-dark type of way.  This was bordering crazy, unless there is a side to Abby that we’ve yet to see because of editing.  So far, DMM has portrayed Abby as a drama free Jill, someone who just wants what’s best for her daughter by coming to a new school.   That’s entirely possible, but to see the way the moms have been treating her either means there is some “behind the scenes” stuff we’re not seeing, or competitive dancing is named more for the moms than the dancers.

Debi (Hannah’s mom) has had a history with Abby at a former school, and from what Susan and Brigette said, has been trying real hard to sabotage Abby and Sammy’s welcome into the studio.  It sounds a little Melrose Place for me, and felt the moms were exaggerating a little, until Abby pulled Victor and Angel to the side and confronted them on the issue.  Victor all but confirmed that Debi did indeed approach him on trying to sabotage Sammy’s choreography.  Wild stuff.  (side note, I don’t  believe, nor does Abby, that Victor or Angel would actually go along with that. Their reputation and careers are on the line, and not going to sacrifice that for some petty issues)

I thought it was pretty ruthless when Melissa took the guy out to lunch in L.A. to try and secure a better spot in the music video for Maddy, but if Debi is really trying to sabotage another dancers future, she should be ashamed and hopefully learns from this.   I’m in the camp that you do what you have to in order to push your child further, but not at the expense of knocking someone else back.  What Melissa did was a little sneaky, but fine.. what Debi did was not so fine.

Would you like a mint?

Aside from the drama, it was actually a pretty light episode.  The teachers showed compassion and a sense of humor this week by first sitting all the kids down and talking about their insecurities, and then having some fun by making them act like their moms.  The funniest part was when little Kimmy acted like her mom, Ani, by offering a mint.  I can totally picture Ani just sitting back trying to remain drama free by offering mints to everyone.

Lucas, Kimmy and Sammy topped the list and were rewarded with solos this week, and the team was headed back to L.A. to Starbound to compete against more than 2x the amount of dancers as last week.  Sadly, despite dancing pretty well, neither Lucas or Sammy even placed, however Kimmy managed to finish 2nd overall!

The group number fell kind of flat, as it didn’t send the message the instructors were trying to put out there.  Sure, they finished 5th, but it was definitely a bit sloppy and probably could have taken 1st overall with some more work.  Victor and Angel were not too happy with the results, so expect some harder training next week.  Also, based on the results, I’m expecting Lucas and Sammy to fall a bit, likely allowing solos by Jessi and/or Hannah in the next episode.

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Dance Moms Miami – Behind The Scenes Video

April 11, 2012 sabrina Dance Mom Videos

I like these type of videos, and will probably be posting more from both shows (even though Dance Moms season is over).  Editing really can only show so much in about 45 mins of airtime, so a lot of good stuff gets left on the cutting room floor.  Lifetime posts a lot of these videos to their site, and I’ll be watching them and posting what I feel are the interesting ones.

In this video, it’s what happens after Susan pulls Jessi from the dance class after she had her hissy fit about her daughter being on the bottom of the list.  Angel and Victor pull the remaining 4 to the side, explain the situation and encourage the children to push their mothers not to act that way. We often see kids on both shows getting pulled from their class from angry moms, so this shows a little of the after effect of that.

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Dance Moms: Miami – Therapy Edition

April 10, 2012 sabrina Dance Moms: Miami

dance moms miami therapy sessionWeek 2 of Dance Moms: Miami is in the books, and I’m not really sure what to make of it this week.  Personalities are starting to show a bit more, Angel is apparently more of a drama queen than I thought, and for some reason Hannah takes a ton of abuse.

Let’s talk about Susan first, as she was the driving force behind a lot of the drama tonight.  First, at the beginning of the episode, she had a hissy fit when she saw that Jessi was pushed to the bottom of the list due to the trophy incident last week.  After screaming at Debi (Hannah’s mother) for a bit, she pulled Jessi from the class and apparently in those few minutes, had a complete change of heart.  In the hallway, she demanded Jessi apologize and not act like that again, which is hard to do considering she’s watching her mother act in a worse behavior.

Then, right before the group dance number at the end, she walks up to Victor and says that Jessi is the best dancer in the class (in front of everyone), and asks for a last minute solo routine.  Seriously?   Look, I understand you want what’s best for your child, but putting her out there to potentially embarrass herself with a improvised dance is probably not the best thing for her.

Out of nowhere, Victor’s mother, I believe her name was Myra, started making more appearances and took over where Susan left off.  She kept praising Jessi and even gave Hannah a back-handed compliment by saying “.. even Hannah did well”, but didn’t understand what was wrong with that statement.  I’m going to say it now, hopefully less air time for Myra the better.

On to Angel…. the first few minutes of the episode, I was actually thinking how refreshing it was to watch Angel and Victor together. Both seem very professional, and while Angel comes off as kind of mean, it’s a respectful mean.  He knows what he wants, and is just blunt.. unlike Abby who knows what she wants too, but sounds awful trying to say it.   Out of nowhere, Angel starts acting all crazy and threatening to pull the entire group number, and yelling at Victor about random things.  He continues to talk about the “crazy moms”, but I think he may be a bit on the crazy side himself.

Finally, you have Hannah. As mentioned above, last week after the girls got the trophy for their group dance, Hannah returned back to the group to deal with Jessi pulling it away.  That’s fine and all, water under the bridge.  However, this week the Hannah bashing continued from really all sides.  You have Abby (Sammy’s mother) taking random shots, Victor’s mother, and then even Lucas’s mother at the end.  You don’t really notice the moms criticizing the girls dancing on the regular Dance Moms as you do them bashing each other (and Abby)… however, on this one, it appears nobody is off limits.

Anyway, to recap the rest of the episode…

  • Lucas and Kimmy were at the top of the list because of their duo last week.
  • Solo dances were awarded to Lucas, Sammy and Hannah.  They didn’t feel Kimmy was quite ready for a solo yet.
  • The group number was focused around Lucas and the girls playing as backup dancers to him.
  • Solo awards were as followed:  Sammy (1st), Lucas (2nd), Hannah (4th).
  • The group number finished 1st

Overall it was a good episode, I am starting to enjoy the show the more I get to know the characters, but tonight bothered me a little.  It was mostly the behavior of Victor’s mother and Angel, and hopefully we’ll see less of that in the future.

What did you think of the episode?

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Dance Moms: Miami – In Like A Lion

April 4, 2012 sabrina Dance Moms: Miami

Jessi and Susan Kennedy Dance Moms MiamiLike I posted in my Dance Moms finale thread, I was busy, so I know this recap on Dance Moms: Miami is super late, but it was worth it.  I have to say, where Dance Moms left off, Miami picked it up.  You have the talented dancers, obsessed Dance Moms, and extremely entertaining instructors.  In some ways, Miami topped Pittsburgh, especially in the instructor department.

I must say, it was refreshing to see teachers who don’t treat their students like kids lucky enough to be in their presence.  Don’t get me wrong, Abby Lee is a great teacher, but Victor and Angel prove you can be a great teacher while not having an ego as big as Miami’s nightlife.  Angel is the more stern teacher who watches from afar, similar to Abby, but doesn’t yell at anything that walks.  Victor is more of the relaxed, easy going choreographer who apparently is so dedicated, he still went to the competition despite puking before getting on a bus.  I am such a baby when it comes to that.  If I puke once, I’m cancelling anything I had planned for the next 2 weeks.

The mothers, let me use a word to easily describe them… FIERCE.  For what is missing with Abby Lees fire, the Miami moms easily make up for it.  Susan (pictured above) is super competitive Dance Mom who has her daughter Jessi working non stop to be a perfectionist. Apparently it is working because Jessi was top of the list heading into the week, and looked to stay on top with her solo at the Hollywood Vibe competition the team was headed to that weekend.  (Side note: Jessi’s grandmother Bertha still has some moves too!)

Abby Small was the newcomer to the group, as I mentioned in Sammy’s bio page. Apparently, she did have a history with Hannah’s mother, Debi, who didn’t appear to be very thrilled to see Abby walking through the door.  In fact, she threatened to walk out the back door if that happened, but I’m guessing they don’t have a back door because Debi wisely stayed.  I’m glad she did because her daughter, Hannah, seems like a super sweet girl who is the type that has the talent, but doesn’t take it as serious, so you won’t see her freaking out over minor things.

The final two mothers are from the duo pair of Kimmy and Lucas, who were put together to do the tango.  As far as the moms go, Ani (Kimmy’s mom) and Brigette (Lucas’s mom) didn’t have a very eventful episode.  That’s probably a good thing after the crazy arguments on display by Debi, Victor, and Susan (not all together). The tango moms had to watch in horror as Lucas was trying to hold Kimmy up, but pretty much dropped her in practice.  I think Lucas needs to start lifting the 10lb weights for next week!  Seriously though, both dancers were super cute and did fantastic in the competition.

The entire episode was pretty much geared around getting to know the dancers more, featuring little segments on each one and their personal lives.  That was pretty cool to see the ‘other’ side of each person.  It wasn’t an episode full of yelling, swearing and lawsuits.  I am looking forward to the rest of the season, and hope it lives up to the solid first episode.

Before I stop, here are the overall results from the Hollywood Vibe competition:

1st place duo – Lucas and Kimmy
2nd place teen solo – Jessi
1st place small group – All the dancers doing a Jazz / Funk routine

Well done, and I’ll hopefully be live tweeting the episode next week!

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Dance Moms Finale – Abby Makes It About Herself, Of Course

April 4, 2012 sabrina Dance Moms
Abby lee crying - Dance Moms

I can't believe my season is over! Who am I going to yell at next week?

I know this recap is a bit late, but I wasn’t home during Dance Moms last night, so I wasn’t able to live tweet or give an instant recap. That also goes the same for Dance Moms: Miami, which is sad considering I was looking forward to that.  Luckily with the magic of DVR, I was able to watch Dance Moms today, and will watch Miami tonight.

The girls were still preparing for their audition to the Joffrey Ballet School this week, while Abby decided to bite off more than she could chew (no pun intended) by also attending the Starbound Dance Competition.  Why not, right?  I mean it’s normal to have 9-10 year olds memorize three completely new dances a week… nothing could go wrong!

Before Starbound, the crew made it to NY for the Joffrey audition, and no episode would be complete without Cathy making her appearance.  I understand the show needs drama to keep people watching, but I think the Cathy aspect is getting a little old. The only redeeming quality of showing Candy Apples is that Kendall still makes appearances (until she re-joins Abby Lee, which I believe happened at some point after this season ended).

At the Joffrey audition, it basically went like this:

  • Cathy shows up, decides to act younger than any dancer on the show and start nagging Abby within minutes.
  • The judges were not at all impressed by the “tricks” the girls can do.  It’s understandable, I’m sure no ballet school cares about hand stands and flips. Just different styles.  Needless to say, that immediately eliminated all the girls except Chloe and Maddie.
  • Candy Apples also auditioned, and I did get a kick out of the judge asking why the girl had on so much makeup for an audition.  I thought I was the only one who noticed how much makeup those girls pack on.
  • All the mothers, Abby Lee, and Cathy completely embarrassed both dance studios and themselves by arguing in the hall right outside the audition.  One of the judges had to come outside to tell them to stop.  Completely disgraceful and selfish, they should be ashamed after re-watching how foolish they looked.

After all that drama, it came down to one person receiving a summer scholarship to Joffrey, and that is…

Chloe!

A huge congrats to Chloe, and hopefully she has a fantastic summer.

Naturally that didn’t sit well with the usually poised Maddie, who threw a little tantrum inside the Starbound rehearsals. This resulted in Melissa taking away her phone for 10 days, and Mackenzie cracking up over it.

Of course, Christi probably could have taken the call in private, let alone put it on speaker so the entire room can be disappointed.  I know she was excited, but minutes before a competition is probably not the greatest time to crush the dreams of all the girls in the room.  This probably hurt Maddie the most because she felt she had a really good chance at also getting a scholarship, and it clearly had an effect on her solo routine.

Maddie after forgetting her dance

It's always painful to see one of the dancers upset

Right in the middle of her routine, Maddie forgot what she was doing, turned around and ran off stage.  Right away she knew she messed up and begged to go back on, but unlike the competition in Florida with Nia, she was not allowed to do-over, and it’s precisely the message Abby was trying to drill into the girls.

Abby then decided to clearly show her favoritism by crying non stop over this, which really upset the mothers.  She didn’t congratulate Chloe on her first place finish, or the scholarship (that we seen), and just sat there in silence as the mothers drilled into her about being a hypocrite and showing favoritism.  Then, Abby decided to take her ball and go home.  At the end of the episode, we were left to believe that Abby was done teaching and the girls were left on their own.   Hint: They’re not.  Abby was just being an attention w**re and wanted everything focused on her.  Whatever.  It was a good season finale, and I will be announcing a Dance Moms season 3 as soon as I hear about it!

Follow my facebook or twitter as it will be announced there first!

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