Dancing With the Stars Review: My Calls Won’t Go Through

Thank. Goodness. I actually tried to vote this time around and couldn’t get through, so I stopped trying and watched Real Housewives of Beverly Hills to better occupy my time.

But all is well in the world of Dancing with the Stars and now people CALM THE HELL DOWN. I know that I have been pretty impassioned over the past few weeks, between Brandy and Bristol and my love of Rick Fox, but things got weird over the past few days of competition. After watching Sarah Palin’s Alaska (someone have me committed) and legitimizing my feelings for Bristol, I still think people need to get a grip.

Even though this competition got oddly politically heated, it is still a dancing competition. Done and done. Since it is about who is the best at dancing ,  the right person won. Clearly. Jennifer Grey is butter on the dance floor. She was so perfect and passionate about what she was doing (and really wanted to be there) that no one else could have won. Even though she may have been on pills to power through the pain in last night’s finale, she was untouchable. Keep in mind she is 50. So much joy. I feel like her performance really came full circle and a win meant more to her than it would have to Kyle or Bristol. I also may have cried thinking about how she may have been thinking about Patrick Swayze when she won. This season’s finale was weird when you consider how someone who has pretty consistently gotten 10′s and a standing ovation from Len could be facing off against two teenagers, but I guess it makes for good TV when people go a little bit psycho.

Kyle was great in the finale. His redemption dance was great (I want him and Lacey to be dating), his freestyle was awesome, his instant tango was too fun — he really was the most charismatic of the season. Sidenote: I love in the results episodes how they play back what the partners were saying to one another right before the performances. Speaking of….

OK let’s just talk about Bristol because everyone loves Kyle and Jennifer and BPalin was the wild card this season blablabla. In terms of the mic/eavesdropping thing, I can’t get over how ironic it is that Bristol touts being an abstinence activist when her partner’s words of motivation before a performance are “just give me sex for a minute and 37 seconds.” That’s what she said? Aside from that, because I do feel like I am going straight to hell for picking apart every action of a teen mom, Bristol was just all wrong here. I don’t care if she made the most progress. She is not a performer and it gave the competition a weird vibe. If Brandy had been there, it would have been exciting to see who came away with the mirror ball. Here, all I felt was relief when Bristol lost. It was weird. I wasn’t into it. I wanted Tom Bergeron to comfort me.

Bristol “don’t retreat, reload” man-hater Palin had no place in the finale. She had no musicality, didn’t deserve 9′s from Len, and more importantly, had a bad attitude. This dancing show isn’t about “haters” out there rooting against you, and your motivation for winning shouldn’t be to give a “huge middle finger to all the people out there who hate my mom and hate me.” Bristol, help me help you. Don’t bring up your mom, and don’t be snarky. She got to where she was based on popularity, not on talent or qualifications. I’m still talking about Bristol here. I just didn’t get the voting process no matter how many times Tom explained it, and I didn’t get the judges’ never-ending praise. Why was Carrie Ann giving her so much credit for dancing in a cage during Cell Block Tango? It’s not like she built that cage with her mama grizzly hands, and it seemed like she would rather be anywhere else in the world, but she would be damned if she let the haters win by not dancing in a cage.  I get that she’s a kid and is way out of her comfort zone, but it just didn’t make any sense for her to be there. She didn’t deserve it. Even Bruno was like, uhh you are in the effing finals, act like you care. Sort of.

I don’t want to be crazy and talk about Bristol any more. She played her part and it is what it is. The right woman won and Derek won his third mirror ball in a row. Pretty impressive and well-deserved. Now let’s all get over it, watch Dirty Dancing for the 203948th time, and see Burlesque because Xtina still has one of the best voices ever. Count it.

Need more Dancing With The Stars?  Read Kelley Lynn‘s opinion, “On the Grand Finale of “Dancing With the Stars,” it’s the 4th Quarter, the Bases are Loaded, and it’s the Last Dance …” here.   

Season 11, Week 10: Season Finale and Winner Announced (originally aired November 22 and 23, 2010)

For more on Dancing with the Stars, click here.

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Photographs courtesy of ABC, Adam Larkey

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