Dances are like donuts. Some are good. Some are bad. Some I’ve almost choked on.
Cougar Rule #1: Mama should never shake what her Mama gave her. Ever.
Drop it like it’s Hot. Because I’m Nia, and that’s how we do. Mmmkay?
Oh. Hell. No. Bitch stole my moves? And my wig?
Seriously. Shouldn’t there be a red light on the camera or something? Where is everybody?
Two things you can always count on.
Abby Lee Miller loves her Bare Minerals pearlized eye shadows…and Countdown Lists.
Seems like we just had an OMG Moment or two a few weeks ago, and now Ms. Miller was already back to check off her grocery list of dances ranging from stellar to sloppy.
Disguised as a rundown of Abby’s least to most favorite dance numbers over the past season or two, it was actually just a perfect opportunity to kick back in that crazy Liberace closet and talk smack about all the Moms while they were out of the room.
And she brought her notes.
Now if only she could find the camera.
Let’s just get this one out in the open right now, and then we can get to the good stuff.
I’m not trying to be any meaner than normal, but there are two things that…umm…substantially big boned people should know by the time they reach 3rd grade.
No horizontal stripes. And no profile shots on camera. Ever. You should have figured it out on class picture day, honey. It is what it is.
Those artsy side angle shots might work for MasterCard commercials or if you’re half in the bag on The Jersey Shore, but otherwise, please look at me when you’re talking.
Girlfriend might as well have been texting a take out order on her Sidekick it was so distracting. I kept snapping my fingers to get her attention.
Ok. Got that off my chest. Here we go…
10. Pin Up Girls Gone Blind.
I don’t really think this one was the worst dance ever in the history of the ALDC, but Abby hated it…and she’s in charge.
Chloe, Maddie and Paige were happily jumping all over the stage wearing headbands large enough to soak up flood waters when Chloe started to go blind.
Now before you panic and start Googling…it wasn’t the medical seizure kind of blindness. It would definitely make for a more exciting paragraph, but I wouldn’t wish that on any little dancer.
According to Abby, Mom Christi had been so busy sucking down brewskis at the bar across the street that she had neglected to sew the headband into Chloe’s skull.
Therefore, through the Laws of Physics, it started to slip down over her line of vision until she looked like that statue they always show on Law & Order.
We all know what a cutie patootie Chloe is, but it’s been well documented that her little eyeballs are kinda, sorta close together. Having a gigantic piece of spandex slide down over your sockets is probably not something that you want to happen in the middle of a crosswalk, much less during a dance competition.
Instead of yanking it down around her neck, Chloe just kept on dancing and somehow made it through the number without falling off the stage. I’m going to assume that somehow she suddenly acquired the same heightened sight impaired radar that Daredevil had in the movies, because he never bumped into anything either.
9. Vivi-Anne Catches A Buzz.
This one just made you realize how much you miss the Candy Apples Dancers.
Cathy’s Spaztastic little girl Vivi-Anne was decked out in Vick’s VapoRub and that infamous bumble bee costume, back before everyone evacuated to Ohio to begin plotting revenge with the League of Evil Soccer Moms Gone Bad.
I think it was pretty clear to all of us early on, that Vivi-Anne will probably never be allowed to operate heavy machinery of any kind due to whatever condition it is that makes her so stuffed up.
I know it can’t just be me. Between the age-inappropriate (…not to mention early in the morning inappropriateness of it all, thank you…) glitter eye shadow and Where Am I attitude, that poor kid really needs to just wait until Cathy takes some turkey jerky and a People magazine into the tub one night and then run like the wind in the opposite direction until she can’t see street lights in the rear view.
For the Dance of the Bee, Cathy had secretly taught Vivi-Anne a completely different number than Abby had originally choreographed (…more than likely done subliminally while the poor kid was blacked out from cough medicine…) and then sent her out on stage. Needless to say, by the time Vivi-Anne combined the two routines into one big hot bee mess, it didn’t go well.
Afterwards, as Abby began pounding down on Cathy, her nerves got the best of her and Cathy appeared to break into a little vaudeville routine which I swear was set to the theme song from The Jeffersons. For realz. She was all like “Can we just move on…move on? Moving on up…moving on up…” with Soul Train locomotive arms.
It was sort of like that singing frog on Bugs Bunny, too. Hello, my baby.
8. Juvenile Detention And Jazz Hands.
In a tribute to Bob Fosse, the girls all got their Chicago on, in a jazzy jailbird routine.
Pushing around the rolling barricades that you always see at the top of a broken mall escalator (…though these had been turned into makeshift jail bars through the magic of elastic strapping…) the girls just couldn’t quite get it together.
Between one jailbird getting tangled in the bungee bars and then another jailbird kicking her jail wall halfway across the stage by mistake, Abby was not a happy warden.
I didn’t think the dance was bad enough to get inked with a permanent #8, but then again I’ve never been to a fabulously gay Bob Fosse jailhouse so I don’t really have a benchmark upon which to judge this dance.
But Melissa seemed to really enjoy it, because she was getting all down with the music like a BET video vixen. Holly on the other hand, looked like she was in the process of passing a stone. I think the nerves got the best of her on this one, combined with the free sour balls in that bowl at the check-in desk.
BONUS MONTAGE: I should be dancing, right?
Abby then tossed in a quick uncomfortably awkward retrospective showing Paige, Chloe, Maddie and Nia all forgetting their routines on stage. Before I even had time to feel bad and give them all a hug, Abby told the girls to use their brains and freakin’ do something when you draw a blank on stage.
Geezis. Don’t just stand there and cry. Dance!
And whatever you do…do NOT run off the stage and cry like a baby. Everyone knows the Pee Wee Dance, right?
Tequila, bitch.
7. An apple a day guarantees Cirque du Soleil.
Gumby flexible Brooke owned the stage on this one as she contorted herself every which way but loose, all while holding a sequined apple from the Garden of Eden.
Even Abby didn’t have anything bad to say about the number. She believes that Brooke is strong and flexible enough to someday ride a foam core unicycle suspended over Celine Dion’s head in Vegas.
Of course, she couldn’t let the number go without a few zings. The only thing holding Brooke back right now are hormones and Mom Kelly.
And not to be outdone by a lousy Cirque clown, Abby busted out her own mime drinking straight vodka out of a bottle routine every time she mentioned Kelly for the rest of the episode.
6. Halleloo to you.
Drag queen Shangela and Nia’s Death Drop. Need I say more?
That bitch is F-I-E-R-C-E. And not just the boy bitch. Hell. No.
Love me some Nia.
She was born to do jazz funk, even though the dance did flash back to an earlier time when Abby still insisted that afro wig-wearing Nia would never work in this town again unless she legally changed her name to Great Googlie Ooglie.
That sentence is so wrong in so many ways.
BONUS MESS: The Mom Dance. Don’t break a hip.
Cathy hogging the stage during the infamous Mom Dance. A surprise attack. And yet, no surprise.
Long before the two skinny boys in wife beaters sashayed out with a hook to drag Cathy off stage, we could see where Vivi-Anne got her motor skills.
No wonder husband Mike jerks it.
5. Chloe gets a Star on her report card.
The final five were the best of the best, so Abby didn’t have much snark left in her by the time we got to Chloe.
With her little Wonder Woman halter top and obnoxious Hollywood Dance Competition backdrop, Chloe nailed the Dream On A Star number.
Even Christi had to take a break from her seemingness endless face making artistry to just put on a Proud Mom face and enjoy the moment.
Honestly, I swear that Chloe’s legs grew longer somewhere in the middle of that dance.
That kid was born for this.
4. Grandma would be Proud, Maddie.
Maddie’s tribute to her late Grandmother wasn’t even hindered by the video game backdrop that Starpower always likes to plaster across every stage they sponsor.
Now I get the whole branding thing, but some of these back walls are so glaring that the girls might as well just dance in front of that moving Coke bottle in Times Square. I was waiting for laser beams or explosions or something to bust out of the logo while tiny Maddie was flitting around the stage like a little angel.
Dial it down a little. Can’t they just give out Starpower super soakers or frisbees or something?
The girl did some mad spins at the end. Crazy mad. Grandma and Charlie would be proud of that Angel.
BONUS: Paige and Mackenzie get their moments.
We finally got to see Paige just dance. No distracting group numbers or trios or nothing.
Not even the distraction of that way too old for her head haircut that makes Paige kind of look like that girl we all knew in school who curled and teased herself into a stupor until she looked old enough to sneak into a bar to see her first cover band, and then missed the whole show because she was throwing up in the bathroom after two sips of a White Russian.
You know who I’m talking about. We all do.
Attention Lifetime Makeup Dept: There’s no doubt that Paige is going to be a looker when she grows up. Just let her get there on her own time. Thank you for your attention to this important matter.
Mackenzie’s solo was back when she had even fewer teeth, but she boinked around the stage so fast you barely noticed. She is a human jumping bean. And so perky you want to just slap the person next to you for no reason.
3. Once you go Black Swan…
Another Chloe and Maddie production. Good vs. Evil in the Ballet World. Nailed it.
2. Objects in mirror are larger than they appear.
The National Title winning dance! Hand held mirrors and no f*** ups helped the ALDC team bring home the trophy. Abby was positively giddy.
BONUS FOSHIZZLE IN THE HIZZLE: Nia werks it, girl.
The full length LaQuifa What? dance. Afro and all.
Just a little slice of Fierceness that made me want to put on my Chess King satin, lace up my Thom McAn platforms and pick my hair till the cows come home.
Followed up by the gold lamé James Bond Secret Agent dance, complete with matching artillery accessories. Guns make the outfit. Duh.
1. And the winner is…
The Number One best dance, at least as far as Abby was concerned, was the somber ode to missing children.
I know, right?
Bummer. From its creepy coffee shop open mic nite intro to the children disappearing one by one from the stage, it was a bit of a downer for the audience and the judges.
Abby likes her edgy routines, and you could certainly file this one under that description.
Luckily, to lighten the mood a little, we had Vivi-Anne completely oblivious to her surroundings, swinging back and forth on a swing set like someone had forgotten their sack of potatoes at the playground after abducting the other kids.
Nobody quite knew what to think of the number, but it did what it was supposed to do, and sometimes you just gotta think out of the box if you want to fill that trophy case.
Abby did her drunk mime routine one more time, stuck it to the Moms again and then it was over.
The worst to the best…so far.
But it ain’t over until the fat lady sings.
Or dances.
