Free SYTYCD Newsletter Want to receive the latest news on So You Think You Can Dance sent straight to your email? Join hundreds of other SYTYCD fans who subscribe to Pure SYTYCD for FREE!

Podcast: SYTYCD Season 9 – Top 14 Week

Listen to the podcasts

Episode 51 direct download

Subscribe to podcast on iTunes


Time Stamps
0:00 – Introduction: Ballet boys as judges, and Ms. Tedholm’s Facebook comment
3:31 – General thoughts about the Mia Michaels episode
5:23 – The Door routine: Cyrus & Eliana
8:44 – Hometown Glory routine: George & Tiffany
11:23 – The Butt Dance: Will & Amelia
14:02 – The Bed routine: Dareian & Janelle
15:58 – Time routine: Audrey & Matthew
18:07 – The Bench routine: Chehon & Witney
20:41 – Addiction routine: Lindsay & Cole
24:45 – Bottom 6/Elimination discussion
30:05 – Wrap-up: Thoughts about Brandon/Amber elimination from Top 16 week, and thoughts on the live shows thus far

Episode Length: 32:24

The Top 14 week of So You Think You Can Dance celebrated Mia Michaels and her iconic routines from the show. Each of the dancers were called on to recreate some of her most beloved routines. Our feelings, along with many fans, were mixed on this approach. Should these routines be performed again, or are they only meant for the original dancers? Can an alternate, yet equally valid interpretation of the routines be presented? We discuss these questions, along with our thoughts on the somewhat shocking elimination of Amelia in this podcast!

We found it very useful to compare the original performances against the new ones. In the time stamps above we’ve linked to blog posts that have both routines embedded for easy viewing.

Let us know what you think after listening to the podcast! You can leave us a comment here or on our blog, Reflections on Pop Entertainment. You can also follow us on Twitter and tweet with us. You can also visit our Facebook page, like us, and leave a comment there! We love feedback and will respond either with a comment or in our next published show.

August 22, 2012 I Written By

Over the past few years my fiancée Meghan slowly brought me into the world of television, turning me into a full-fledged fan of both scripted and reality shows. So You Think You Can Dance turned into one of my favorite reality shows as it is a competition that takes itself seriously, providing the audience with artistic choreography and talented dancers. It's certainly not something I ever expected to get emotionally invested in, but here I am! Meghan and I are very analytic when it comes to the things we enjoy. We constantly discussed and analyzed shows with each other and after doing this for a couple years, we decided that we should turn these discussions into a podcast. We created Reflections on Pop Entertainment, a podcast that provides commentary and analysis of popular entertainment as found in visual mediums, particularly television and film. So You Think You Can Dance Season 8 is the first television series we're covering with weekly podcasts and has allowed us to find our voice as well as actively contribute to the fan community. We hope that you'll enjoy our installments as they are posted to Pure So You Think You Can Dance!

Open Letter to SYTYCD Producers: How to Fix SYTYCD

Dear SYTYCD Producers,

Here at PureSYTYCD, we’ve had several conversations lately about why ratings, Internet traffic and overall enthusiasm and discussion have been sinking season by season. Margaret says it can be traced to the infamous Fall season, Season 6, when our favorite show started changing swiftly and drastically. While some of the changes have been really amazing (All-Stars), some of them have been just dreadful (yes, I’m going to say it once again – the stage).

So Fox, Nigel, here are OUR pointers for how to fix the show (and readers, please, please add your own in the comments or tell us how you feel about ours and add your voice to the open letter).

1. Keep rotating judges and guest judges – just rotate Nigel right off the panel. We loved the guest judges this season (with the notable exceptions of Carmen Electra and Katie Holmes), especially the fact that we got a rotation of our favorite choreographers on the panel. We’ve learned that static judges are annoying, no matter who they are. Whether it was Nigel, Mary, Mia or Adam, we got tired of hearing the same voices when we already knew what they were going to say. Jean-Marc is a good (pervy) example of this on the Canadian show. However, Nigel almost never rotates out,  so we’re extra tired of him. If you need guest judges to replace him, we’ll make ourselves available. Hey, why not? Fans of the show are good judges, considering the best of the celebrity guest judges were the ones who were clearly fans.

2. Speaking of Nigel, let’s talk about his producing style. While we can’t say we’ve ever produced a show and we can only imagine the numerous concerns involved, we get a little annoyed by Nigel’s heavy-handed pulling-the-puppet-strings style. While we admire that he’s always willing to try new things and some of those new things have really been excellent, the best producing is the kind that doesn’t draw attention to itself. Nigel keeps insisting on shoving the dancers and the show into this perfectly produced package. (Can we talk about how the judges kept the elimination after Top 10 and it was never acknowledged on the show? And how the girls were “beasts” slaying the boys THE WHOLE SEASON, probably to compensate for the Girl Slaughter of Season 7?) Melanie got dubbed America’s Favorite Dancer (by the judges) in the auditions and was never truly challenged or critiqued (by the judges) during the whole season. It could’ve cost Melanie the win she totally deserved if she hadn’t been so adorable and talented. We’re getting tired of Nigel deciding who’s going to win and then trying to make it so. Is it America’s Favorite Dancer or is it Nigel’s Favorite Dancer? Guess which show we’re not going to watch next season?

So how do we fix this, you might ask? John suggests that we need more charismatic dancers who are really good in one style and have to fight to conquer other styles (like Ivan and Russell, who won his season). Marianya says she misses seeing the dancers really challenged at the beginning of the show. Fans of SYTYCD love watching the unexpected partnership and the unexpected dancer struggle and then achieve, making themselves our favorites in the process.

Margaret: Part of what makes those first few weeks so interesting, besides watching partnerships that we really hook into (Melanie & Marko) is wondering how other dancers would work together. If Kayla & Max/Ashley & Kupono hadn’t been in the bottom during week 2 of season 5, Max & Ashley may not have been eliminated at the same time and we wouldn’t have gotten to see the surprisingly great partnership of Kayla & Kupono—which means we wouldn’t have gotten “Addiction” and it’s rated as one of the best numbers the show has ever had, rightly so.

So one way to fix this would be to go back to SYTYCD’s roots. We’ve had some of the most technically gifted dancers the last three seasons and sometimes we could hardly bring ourselves to care because while there was nothing “wrong” with a dancer or a routine, we just couldn’t get excited. This might mean more bad routines and bad dancing but will make us so grateful again for the truly transcendent moments. Which brings us to…

3. We need diversity in dance styles and choreographers. Doreana Sanchez is not the only person choreographing disco routines and Nakul dev Mahajan is not the only Bollywood choreographer. Go to Canada if you don’t believe me. What would happen if there were only one contemporary routine on any given show or maybe only one contemporary routine every few weeks? What if we HAD to depend on Afro Jazz, House, all of the Ballroom styles, Bollywood, Pas de Deux , etc. to fill in the episode?

And for diversity, we don’t even have to look any further than the other SYTYCD franchises. Canada and UK have phenomenal choreographers (and dancers!), as did Australia. Those are just the English-speaking franchises. What wonderful choreographers could we find if the producers imported from the Ukraine SYTYCD or the Turkish or Polish versions?

4. And speaking of one big happy family, why not create another Fall show, but make it different, perhaps a shorter super competition? What if we had SYTYCD SuperStars and all of the previous contestants from ALL of the franchises were eligible to come back and compete for the “World’s Favorite Dancer” title? Maybe this show is 2 episodes a week for only 4 weeks, just to make it special and so that it might not overlap with the World Series again? Dancers featured on SYTYCD don’t have a potential “product” like American Idol singers do when they release a cd, so anytime the producers can create a vehicle for these dancers that doesn’t overshadow the current cast, they’re helping create more of a career and presence for the dancers. The great thing about this idea is that it totally supports this next point…

5. Ditch the musical guests. Or ditch about 90% of them. Keep the 10% that are willing to use SYTYCD dancers for backup dancers (including the current cast! didn’t that happen one season?). Maybe the musical performances bring in money, or maybe you producers only think they do. The reality is, they usually suck and I’m only watching the dancers anyway. It’s like, on Dancing with the Stars, the ONLY reason I watch the musical performances is to catch the dancing that happens at the same time. I would MUCH RATHER see dance performances. It’d be a good time to show us alumni dancers re-dancing their iconic numbers as much more evolved dancers (think Kent and LoFro doing the prom number – it was only 8 months later and they’d already become such different dancers). Bring in performers from all the other SYTYCD franchises, like you did with UK’s recent winner Matt Flint. Pairing him with the all-too-soon-eliminated Nick and Jess in a tap routine that THEY choreographed? BRILLIANT. Easily one of the highlights of not just the finale, but of the season. Do it more. That’s the key to re-building your audience: when you do something we like, do it more. When you do something we don’t like, stop doing it.

6. Which means, bring back the smaller and more intimate stage. Season 8’s stage (or the camera work and lack of distracting backlights) was better than the Seasons 6 and 7 monstrosity, but only by a bit. Watching SYTYCD Canada reminds me of how amazing the original stage is and you really need to listen to us and bring it back. It was a big part of why we fell in love with the show and the Seasons 1-5 dancers. Do you know why? We were closer to them. There were more physical possibilities for the choreographers when it came to moving the dancers around the stage because it wasn’t a giant, uniform thing. When it comes down to it, the stage represents the entire SYTYCD producers vs SYTYCD audience disagreement. With this big uber stage (since S6), you are focusing on the package, the spectacle. The more intimate circle stage that we love and still mourn focuses on the dancers.

Margaret: I miss my stairs! There was something about the old stage and how it was round that made the dances feel like stories, not performances for an audience. We were able to get more closeups, feel the emotions, and the set was about enhancing the dancing, not enhancing the spectacle. My best example came from, oddly, the guy I think used the stage the best during his time with SYTYCD, Wade. With “Ruby Blue,” Brandon and Janette entered the story by popping up from behind a wall and coming down the stairs, and their ability to use the stage in that entrance played a major role in the believability of the movements. But, in Season 6, with the “inside Van Goh’s head” piece Wade did for Peter and Pauline, the ridiculous fractured painting that rotated and flipped on the projecting screen was super distracting and took away from what was actually a really well-danced piece, especially from Peter. It was a very cool routine and they danced it really well, but their technical success was overshadowed by the “overdoneness” of the set.

7. Instead of spending the money on the bigger stage and a lot of flash, we would rather that you spend the money to figure out how to release SYTYCD DVDs so we can re-watch our favorite seasons without resorting to YouTube and other means. There is a market for it, so figure it out. Whenever you focus on the dancers–current, alumni, International franchise dancers, whatever–you can’t go wrong with us. That’s the simple fact at the heart of the matter.

And now that we’ve critiqued you quite a lot, here’s a list of what we like and want you to keep.

1. The All-Stars – having them arrive at the Top 10 is the perfect marriage. Keep it up. Only, we want to see them re-dance their iconic routines and you missed a lot of opportunities to do this during Season 8. Fix that.

Margaret: Not only does this give us the chance to see dancers we love again, but use this as a way to plug their success. Allison & Ivan were All-Stars in the same week, how were they not asked to dance together?! Same with Chelsie & Mark! Those are two of the most successful partnerships, and some of the best personalities, the show has ever had, be proud of that, they are SYTYCD success to the highest degree.

2. The Meet the Top 20 performance – sheer genius. It’s been a highlight of each season you’ve done it. Especially since we get to see the dancers twice on the live show before anyone’s eliminated. Keep that.

3. We like the dancers you pick! We just want you to cut back on the contemporary/jazz and pick some dancers with different backgrounds. We want them to be challenged more and truly judged, all of them and fairly. And clearly they’re talented, because they’re going on to dance in movies, commercials, music videos, music tours, Broadway shows, Glee and DWTS.

Margaret: We also love underdogs, they’re fun to root for. Give us more Tads, Russells, Dominics, Jeanines, Evans, Nicks, even Lauren Froderman floundered her 1st week and was in danger of going home!

4. Cat is the one thing most of us can agree on. She smooths over the awkward moments and she uses her great sense of humor to keep things rolling. I love it when she gets to pick dances for the finale show.

Remember, no matter what, we love the show. We only want to like it again.

Sincerely (and xoxo),

SYTYCD Fans/PureSYTYCD writers

P.S. Sorry this is a little long – clearly we had a lot to say.

September 6, 2011 I Written By

SYTYCD rumblings

What a great show last night!! I sprinkled my thoughts here and there on other posts but overall I was really impressed. I thought I’d bring you all a smattering of SYTYCD news that I’ve seen over the past couple of weeks. Much of it comes from our friends at Entertainment Weekly

*added 6/24
I haven’t had the chance to read some of your comments about the results last night, but Kate Ward, a writer at EW.com has written an article aptly titled, “SYTYCD results make fans angry. you won’t like them when they’re angry”

I have to admit, I was pretty annoyed to see them keep Ryan after her abysmal “dance for your life”. I was watching the live feed online and it shorted out so I missed Missy’s and Iveta’s but from what I’ve heard Iveta’s was better. I saw all the guys and I thought Ricky really made his case to stay, his solo was great. Frankly, it’s not his fault Ryan seems to rather look at the camera and mug than connect with him. One of the posters recommended that they should have let all three girls and one of the boys go and kept Nick and Ricky or Nick and Wadi. I agree that Nick had a great personality and I would have loved to have seen him do contemporary with his long limbs to really see what he can do.

thoughts on this? I think it’s pretty interesting…

————

They’ve recently released their list of the 25 greatest SYTYCD performances of the past 7 seasons.

25. Kathryn and Ryan’s cha-cha (Season 6)
24. Pasha and Sara’s “Rockafella Skank” (Season 3)
23. Lauren and Twitch’s “My Chick Bad” (Season 7)
22. Lacey and Kameron Week 1 (Season 3)
21. Jakob and Ashleigh’s “Hit Me With a Hot Note” (Season 6)
20. Tranji’s “Gyrate” (Season 2)
19. Melody and Nick’s “All That Jazz”
18. Ellenore and Jakob’s “Tore My Heart”
17. Jeanine and Jason “If It Kills Me”
16. Brandon and Jeanette’s Disco
15. Katee and Joshua’s Bollywood
14. Jaimie and Hok’s “Hummingbird and the Flower”
13. Robert and Allison’s “Fix You”
12. Brandon and Jeanette’s “Ruby Blue”
11. Chelsie and Mark’s “Bleeding Love”
10. Ade and Billy’s “Mad World”
9. Danny and Lacey’s “Hip Hip Chin Chin”
8. Allison and Ivan’s “Why”
7. Kayla and Kupono’s “Addiction (Gravity)”
6. Heidi and Benji’s “Black Mambo”
5. Allison and Alex’s “Hallelujah”
4. Neil and Sabra’s “80’s Power Lunch (the table dance)”
3. Travis and Heidi’s “The Bench”
2. Katee and Joshua’s “No Air”
1. Alex and Twitch’s “Outta Your Mind”

This is a pretty stellar list, I must say, but there are a few glaring omissions. Where is Will and Katee’s spectacular pas de deux from season 4? Or Kayla and Max’s incredible WEEK 1 samba from season 5? I know this doesn’t include solos, but I don’t think anyone has topped Blake’s amazing solo from top 6 week in season 1, I’ve rewound it 100 times at least and still can’t figure out how he switches directions in his back handspring!

any other routines that didn’t make the cut?
Read more..

June 23, 2011 I Written By

SYTYCD 2011 Interviews – Lauren Gottlieb, Kent Boyd, Will Wingfield, Kupono, and Comfort Fedoke

As promised, here are some interviews that I did a few weeks ago of Lauren Gottlieb, Kent Boyd, Will Wingfield, Kupono, and Comfort Fedoke where I talk about what they’re up to and a few questions about SYTYCD 2011. The environment wasn’t the best for an interview with all the ambient noise, but luckily it got better as we went along. Either way, it’s fun to hear updates from some of our our SYTYCD favorites. I also didn’t add an intro or anything. So, we just hop into each SYTYCD interview. I hope you enjoy!

I should have probably cut off the beginning of this video with Lauren Gottlieb where her and I are just chatting. Although, the first part is too good when I talk about why I didn’t participate in the dance Lauren Gottlieb taught at the expo (scroll through the first minute if you don’t want to hear us chatting). I also don’t explain well why I hadn’t interviewed her before even though I’ve been doing this blog since season 2. Trust me. After meeting Lauren G in person, I’ll never pass up the opportunity to meet her again. I’m now definitely one of her biggest fans. She was so fantastic, warm and kind. Of all the people I met at the reality TV conference, she definitely had the most star quality. She was incredible. You’ll see when you watch the video.

P.S. I definitely would like some dance lessons from Lauren.
P.S.S. I had to kind of cut the interview off too, because the NY Times was waiting to interview her. That’s why you see the guy in the back sometimes. Good stuff!

This interview with Will and Kupono was rough from all the noise. Will had just gone and said hi to Sinbad and taken some pictures. Yes, that Sinbad. Turns out that Sinbad knew Will by name. Not sure how they know each other, but it’s cool to see that Sinbad knows the SYTYCD dancers. Now for the interviews. Wait for the end for the SYTYCD 2011 contestant spoiler (the SYTYCD 2011 Las Vegas week was the same weekend as I filmed this). Plus, check out Kupono working 2 different shoes and why he had on 2 different shoes.

I start off quick with Kent asking about the previous video I posted where I asked Kent about any romance with LoFro. He also talks about his future in dancing, what it was like to come in second place and possibly acting.

The following is the interview with SYTYCD All Star Comfort Fedoke. Hear more about Comfort’s plans for the future and possible work with Disney (cause she still looks like a child).

It was a lot of fun doing these interviews. I’ll have to do them again soon. Sorry I didn’t get Lauren Froderman’s interview. She was over signing autographs at the table before I could get her on camera. Next time!

May 26, 2011 I Written By

Just call me Charlie...but where are my angels?

What Can I Do to Prepare for the SYTYCD Audition?

Ok, so it’s a little ways off from the SYTYCD auditions, but I have the video and if I don’t post it now I’ll forget. Plus, it’s fun to get some insight on what the past SYTYCD peeps thought about their audition process since we’re about to see the auditions for SYTYCD Season 8. So, enjoy!

May 19, 2011 I Written By

Just call me Charlie...but where are my angels?

Least Favorite So You Think You Can Dance (SYTYCD) Routines – Responses from SYTYCD Dancers Panel

I told you that I had a ton of videos from SYTYCD at the Reality Rocks Expo. I think I have about a half dozen or so more. We’re nearing the end of the panel and then we’ll show them teaching a routine with audience participation. Then, some one on one interviews as well. Just watching them gets me excited for SYTYCD 2011.

These 2 videos are the SYTYCD panel discussing some of their least favorite SYTYCD routines. I liked how honest they were about not liking some of the routines. On the show, they always act like they loved the routine. I guess that makes sense when the choreographer is right there. Enjoy the SYTYCD honesty!

I thought it was done, so this video is in 2 parts:

May 4, 2011 I Written By

Just call me Charlie...but where are my angels?

How Much of SYTYCD Is Luck of the Draw – Reality Rocks Expo SYTYCD Panel

I love this question, but Will’s right that no one knows it for certain. I do love that their honest about the challenge of some of the music, choreography, etc. Kent also talks about how it’s not reasonable for him and Lauren to “get married” in their bollywood routine. Not to mention, Lauren Froderman gets outed by Kent Boyd saying she didn’t like a specific routine. Enjoy!

May 2, 2011 I Written By

Just call me Charlie...but where are my angels?

How Hard Is It Doing Other Dance Genres on SYTYCD? – Responses at Reality Rocks Expo

SYTYCD Dancers, Lauren Gottlieb, Chelsea Traille, Comfort Fedoke, Lauren Froderman, Will Wingfield, Kupono, Kent Boyd, at Reality Rocks Expo in LA talk about how hard it is to do other dance genres on So You Think You Can Dance. I guess a few of them weren’t enjoying the other styles as much as they make it seem on the show.

April 29, 2011 I Written By

Just call me Charlie...but where are my angels?

How Has SYTYCD Has Made Dance More Accessible? – Reality Rocks Panelists Reponses

I’m back with a video I recorded at the Reality Rocks Expo in LA. This was part of the SYTYCD Panel at the expo and provided some interesting answers to how SYTYCD has made dance more accessible.

The guy who was helping me at this event was surprised that middle america might not know about Krump. He grew up in LA, so I guess he’d known about it forever. I definitely didn’t know about Krump until I first saw it on SYTYCD. So, I guess I was part of the middle america that’s referred to in the video.

More videos on their way. I’ll try and post one a day until I run out of the videos. A nice way to get ready for th new season of SYTYCD.

April 28, 2011 I Written By

Just call me Charlie...but where are my angels?

Updates from SYTYCD Dancers at Reality Rocks Expo


As I mentioned and I posted some pictures, I was lucky enough to be able to go to the Reality Rocks Expo in LA. The highlight of the event was of course the chance to see, hear and talk with a number of the dancers from SYTYCD. Over the next couple weeks as we get ready for the premiere of SYTYCD, I’ll post the videos I did of the event.

My apologies for the shaky camera (I should have brought the tripod), and I didn’t spend much time editing the video either. Not to mention, it wasn’t ideal video conditions. Those things aside, I still think that many of you will really enjoy these videos. You might even get a chance to see me on camera in a few places.

First up is a video that I’m sure you’re all going to enjoy. It’s basically each of the SYTYCD dancers that were on the panel talking about what they’ve been doing since the show. My apologies to Chelsea Traille for not starting the recording when she was talking. I was still trying to figure out which parts to tape. Now on to the SYTYCD updates! I hope you enjoy.

April 22, 2011 I Written By

Just call me Charlie...but where are my angels?