You know how Tyra always tells the wannabes that modeling is about taking it from here (insert Tyra face here) to HERE (insert slightly different Tyra face here)? This episode needed to take it from here to HERE, in everything from guest stars to photo-shoot concept to judging. Pretty much the only thing that made it worthwhile was listening to Dionne. Who knew she had a mouth like a Teamster?

The final two comes down to eloquent but generic Whitney or memorable but marble-mouthed Jael. This not being the spokesmodel portion of the season, they keep Jael around for at least one more week. (Please, PLEASE keep her until spokesmodel week!)Boy, this recap is going to be short — and not just because I wasted an hour watching the "Pussycat Dolls" reality show that airs right after "ANTM." (Which I totally did.) There’s just not really a lot that we haven’t heard of in previous episodes — or, as it turns out, previous cycles — of the show.

At a theater, the girls greet Tia Mowry — one of the "Sister, Sister" twins — with squeals and glee. Me, I couldn’t even tell you which sister it was (although only Tia appears on the CW program "The Game"). Tia tells them that models have embody different characters "through voice and movement," which will be great for those STILL PHOTOS THEY TAKE EVERY WEEK.

Anyway, the girls run to pick different hats — from witch to crown to bonnet — and then basically each goes into character to say why she should be America’s next top model. Each girl is pretty over-the-top, and Tia does a lot of, "That’s good!" Which proves she’s a really good actress.

Then they learn that they’ve got two hours to memorize a script in which they’ll segue from crybaby-sensitive to superdiva to perky-bubblicious, and when they’re lining up all I can think is, why does every single one of them have a knit hat and scarf on? Is one of the girls really bored? But it goes unremarked — instead, actor Efren Ramirez walks out onstage and Whitney screams "PEDRO!" at the top of her lungs. And I’ve got to say, that guy is screwed. I was watching a repeat of "Mad TV" where he was the guest star, and my reaction was the same as Whitney’s, albeit much quieter and less gleeful. He’s gonna be Pedro from "Napoleon Dynamite" forever. Maybe he can pull a Fred Grandy and become a senator in a few decades, but for now, no matter if he tries to change his look or act in different films, people are gonna say, "Dude, that’s the guy from ‘Napoleon Dynamite.’ "

The girls will be acting against him. (Remember when they used to get, say, Taye Diggs?) Renee does really well and wins the challenge. She gets to pick a friend. This is a challenge for her in and of itself, since she has no friends in the house, but she selects Dionne, who seems pretty enthused but wary about the whole deal. As their prize, they get … shirts that say "I voted for Renee" and "I voted for Dionne." In an interview, Dionne’s head is wagging from side to side as she says, "A T-shairt? What you gonna do with a T-shairt?" It cuts to the girls back onstage and Dionne saying, very weakly, "This is cute." Which proves she’s a really bad actress. But Renee is so happy she won a challenge, she’s even happy with the T-shirt. And really, she’s glowing.

Of course this is not the real prize, and when the girls get home, it turns out Renee and Dionne’s families are there: Dionne’s mom, sister and daughter and Renee’s husband and son. Dionne explains that her mother is in a wheelchair because years ago she was shot by a man who was jealous she was marrying another guy. She also explains that because her sister only has sons, she doesn’t know how to do girls’ hair: "What the (bad word) with my baby’s hair? She (bad word)ed my baby’s hair," she says. Soon she’s combing out her daughter’s do: Really, between the dentistry and hairstyling, if Dionne would just get an aesthetician’s license, she could do everything head-related. Who the (badword) needs Top Model, anyway?

All these moms and their kids! Natasha was hoping it was mother/child reunion day and not, say, the reward for a challenge, and so was greatly disappointed when her own baby was nowhere to be found. She’s crushed and can’t sleep the whole night because she’s so down.

I think it’s right about here Brittany gets her weave taken out. They don’t do anything to fix her old hair, they just cut the weave out.

The next morning the girls show up for their photo shoot and Jay Manuel says it must be getting tough and that Natasha’s a gloomy girl. She just shoots him death rays.

And here is the conceit of the photo shoot. They’ll be portraying specific characters from past cycles of "ANTM." And shilling Payless shoes. I think they actually refer to them as "famous" characters, which is a little conceited. And after each girl watches the video of her "inspiration," the real live girl shows up to participate in the shoot. Surprise! Could it be coincidental that in the "My Life As a Cover Girl" commercial, CariDee also is paired with past winners Naima and Dani(elle), in a photo shoot by Nigel Barker? I can’t wait to never see that commercial aired!

As always, click on the thumbnail to see the whole photo.

Jaslene gets "who stole my granola bars?" Bre, who seems pretty good-spirited about the whole "I went crazy" thing.

Natasha, meanwhile, is still mooning over the lack of her child. But then, distracted like a shiny penny, she meets "flesh eating bacteria" Michelle, and suddenly she’s all smiles and grins, and rocks the photo shoot. Seriously, she has the attention span of a 2-year-old herself. We don’t hear about her missing her kid for the rest of the episode.

Whitney is "I can’t be nude" Shannon and gives a kind of lackluster performance. She really does have only one look, the one-eyebrow cocked, vaguely-sexy thing she used in the "Mean Girl" shoot.

Jael gets "fainting" Rebecca, who looks supercute. Jael has a push-up bra on, which is even more evident when she’s lying down and her breasts are being pushed out like pancakes. She doesn’t seem to get the concept of the shoot.

Brittany is with twins Amanda and Michelle. If they’re supposed to be triplets, why don’t the all have the same shoes on? They’re wearing the same stretchy dress. …

Renee gets Joanie, who got her snaggletooth yanked and veneers, and poses as the patient while dentitrix Joanie lurks with various tools. It would seem this would have been a good one for Dionne, no?

No, because Dionne actually gets lesbian Kim, who made out with a fellow contestant in the car. For a second there I thought this was going to be the uncomfortably homophobic shoot in which I turn around and hate Dionne, since she says, "holy crap!" watching the original footage and interviews, "I’m not no (badword)ing lesbo." My sweat is for naught, though, because although at first she’s "That kissing (badword)? I don’t even kiss my own damn boyfriend" (which makes me feel sorry for her boyfriend, whoever he may be), but by the end she’s very comfortable and "I’m actually enjoying this!" (Note to guys looking for girl-on-girl action: No actual kissing.)

After the shoot, they’re all standing around and I was looking at the different girls and I thought, "Whitney. What was her shoot again?" Not a good sign, since it happened about four minutes ago. I wonder who could be going home?

At judging, Tyra’s head wrap has now consumed all of her weave, and she spends the entire first portion of the session standing in an exaggerated pose — one hand on the back of Nigel’s chair, the other on her hip, which is jutted out under a big black belt that looks like it’s straining to hold in all that is Tyra. Seriously, it reminded me of someone who has a really bad back problem and is stuck in one position. She’s talking, she’s talking, she’s talking, she’s not moving from that position, and I flash back to when my back hurt for like two weeks and I realized I was standing weird with one hip higher than the other, and the doctor told me I had degenerative disc disease, and I’m wondering: Is that belt a truss? Can she not move?

Then there’s a badly overdubbed moment where she explains that they decided to do the photos comic-book style "because we know ANTM can be comical." And lame. Where’s the week where the photos are bandaged?

Brittany’s lower lip looks weird in her photo — extra wide this week or something. Tyra says what she likes about Natasha is that she gets a note, and then corrects the (mis)behavior in time for the next shoot. It gives her "75 percent more pictures to choose from." What, that means seven photos out of 50 frames, instead of four?

They say Dionne’s top looks "dumpy" because there’s too much fabric. (Tyra just hates it when other girls aren’t filling out every inch of their tops, too!) "I’ll hold it then," Dionne says, and pulls it back and fastens it. "You became my favorite girl of the day," says photographer Matthew George Smith. Get in line, mister. When Renee walks out wearing a babydoll dress and cowboy boots I wait for them to rip her outfit, too, and her helmet hair with bobbypins on the side, but … it … doesn’t … come. They’re talking about her photo and — finally, they say her hairstyle makes her look old. I was worried they were throwing in another distracting red herring, like the hats and scarves, and the (single, saffron-colored this week) head wrap.

When they’re giving out the photos, Tyra still insists on referring to some of them with their superselves nickname, so it’s still "Brown," not Dionne or — dammit! — Wholahay. Everyone gets a photo but Britney and Jael. They get the "each of you has what the other person needs" speech but Jael sticks around another week, and when she turns to hug Whitney I can see that the tattoo on the back of her neck says "Manifest." I wonder what that’s about, especially since it’s in a place she can’t see it.

"I think you learned a lot here," Tyra starts off her annoying "I told you so" speech to Whitney, and I zone out until I hear Whitney’s incredibly articulate, tears-free summation of her time in the house. And with one last flick of the weave, she’s out the door.

Next week, the girls learn which country they’ll be going to. They’ve already been to (in order): France, Italy, Japan, South Africa, Britain, Thailand and Spain. What’s left? Why, (highlight text if you want the spoiler) Australia, of course!

Posted in: ANTM |

You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.