SYTYCD Season 10: Meet the Top 20 – Thoughts

This is something that I haven’t thought that I would actually create… a thoughts / power rankings post. Considering that I am swamped with RL and all, but I will do what I can to clarify what I noticed.

Disclaimer: These are just my (as in Marianya’s) opinions, and does not reflect the opinions of any of the bloggers on the site.

HIP HOP
I am a little disappointed to not be able to see Emilio in the Top 20. If you recall he is the fanboy that eventually was asked to be a part of Phillip Chbeeb’s crew (I.aM.mE). However, since he is injured he could not participate in the competition.

As for the Hip Hop routine between Fik-Shun and Mariah… we haven’t seen too much of Mariah during Season 10 except in a few montage sequences, however we did get a chance to see her full audition during Season 9. Whileas Fik-Shun we have had an eye-full of throughout the season thus far.

Knowing this much, I felt that Mariah was far more engaging and drew my attention much more than Fik-Shun did during this routine. True Fik-Shun has a very strong personality, but until he could find a way to shine even more next to other dancers (like Mariah) I am afraid he could get lost in the shuffle.

CONTEMPORARY (Round 1)
We have had decent exposure with the four contemporary dancers of the first contemporary dance of the night. However, when watching this particular routine choreographed by Stacey Tookey the men appeared to be evenly matched whileas between the women I found myself drawn more towards Jasmine as opposed to Makenzie.

TAP
Wow, just wow. I really like this mix of tappers far more than in previous seasons. The female is probably stronger than the males at the moment, however… I find that I enjoy Aaron over Curtis, but that is my opinion.

I would be interested to see how Aaron fares in the Top 10 Guys and whether he would exceed expectations or is just cannon fodder? I am seriously hoping for the former a la Benji Schwimmer from Season 2.

ANIMATION
Between the two, Jade appears to be the stronger dancer with a more outward personality. “BluPrint” though strong as well appears to have a bit of an emotional wall during the routine… well in comparison to that of Jade.

However, Jade had a harder time during Vegas week as opposed to “BluPrint” so it would be interesting to see how they fair in the upcoming weeks.

CONTEMPORARY (Round 2)
Three for contemporary dancers, one of which has had a lot of screen time whileas the other two received passing mentions.

Unlike the previous Contemporary routine, the dancers of this one choreographed by Mia Michaels were much more evenly matched for they have all drawn my attention equally. I loved the piece for each individual dancer as well as a whole.

Because of this, I feel that the two unknowns in this piece might actually strike a cord with the audience in time depending on the routines and partners in the upcoming weeks.

BALLROOM / LATIN
Love that Paul is part of the group, however I find it disheartening that Alan was chosen over his brother Gene… Why? When watching this particular routine I found myself drawn more to Paul over Alan… whilas the girls drew my focus evenly (much like the first contemporary routine).

It will be interesting to see how the ballroom dancers fare this time around.

JAZZ
This is probably the strongest dance of the night. If only for the fact that the dancers are not only evenly matched but incredibly strong independently too. But their personalities shown for different reasons and as thus both excelled in this piece as well.

IN CONCLUSION
Interesting that already in the “Meet the Top 20” episode there are already dancers that I personally see as weaker than others in their groups. If this is the case, I will be interested to see how they fare come the first performance episode next week when the pairings are made and they are (hopefully) dancing styles that would challenge them.