So You Think You Can Dance

Tonight's So You Think You Can Dance performance show brought out an wide range of styles from two beautifully choreographed contemporary routines, a krump, and even a Bollywood dance, the first ever on So You Think You Can Dance. Each of the six remaining couples performed two routines each tonight, this last night before finding out who will be in the top 10 and get to go on tour beginning in September.

The judges were still very harsh on Comfort and Thayne, but surprisingly, they softened on Jessica. Katee and Josh got their first negative comments of the season for their first performance, but the universe got back in order for their second dance when they received glowing praise.

It was again extremely difficult to pick my favorites tonight because at this stage of the game, everyone works so hard to bring us great performances. Read on to see which couple I liked the best and which I liked the least.


1. Jessica King and William Wingfield – Contemporary

Beautiful. Amazing. Stunning. I can't say enough about it. This routine, choreographed by Tyce Diorio, depicted a scene from the Garden of Eden, and Jessica and Will really brought out the big guns. It was an amazing tableau to watch them, intertwined with each other, their bodies strong yet still soft. Will is always great, but this was also Jessica's best performance to date.


2. Chelsie Hightower and Mark Kanemura – Salsa

Chelsie is a little firecracker. She is trained as a Latin dancer, so she was expected to rock this routine, and rock she did! Mark got caught some flak from the judges for being too tight at times, but he did so many good things in a really difficult and fast routine, that you can't help but root for these two.


3. Katee Shean and Joshua Allen – Bollywood

This is the first time we've seen Bollywood on So You Think You Can Dance, and it's definitely a keeper – especially when performed by Katee and Josh. They closed the evening with an incredibly athletic piece. Their costumes were beautiful, their intricate hand motions were perfectly executed, and they had amazing knee spins as well. This put them on Mary's hot tamale train and Nigel's vindaloo express.


4. Chelsie Hightower and Mark Kanemura – Broadway

Tyce Diorio was on fire this week. First there was that beautiful contemporary routine for Jessica and Will, and now this sulty, sexy, sassy, bluesy Broadway routine. Chelsie is so sexy and morphs into character perfectly, and Mark is a great performer as well. The judges nitpicked a bit about Mark's technique, but everyone was unanimous about how much they loved this piece.


5. Courtney Galiano and Gev Manoukian – Cha cha

While this cha cha (choreographed by So You Think You Can Dance alums Anya Garnis and Pasha Kovalev) was not the most technically proficient, it was just so darn entertaining. They have so much chemistry together, this pair, and they make up for their flaws with a flair for performing.


6. Katee Shean and Joshua Allen – Viennese waltz

Katee and Josh got their first negative comments all season with this Viennese waltz. The judges uniformly thought that Josh was too bouncy, too vertical, rather than flowing. However, Katee and Josh did so many other things right that it's hard to see this as a bad routine at all. They have such a strong connection with each other, and their lifts were phenomenal.


7. Courtney Galiano and Gev Manoukian – Jazz

Courtney and Gev, Cat Deeley's favorite “pocket couple,” are so entertaining. This was a really adorable routine in which they played a couple lost in a jungle and fighting over the map. Nigel thought that it was just fun and nothing else, but Mary and I agree that there was a lot of substance and strength, as well a whole lot of entertainment value.


8. Comfort Fedoke and Thayne Jasperson – Contemporary

This Mandy Moore number was beautifully choreographed, with intricate movements that require a soft touch as well as considerable strength. The judges were very down on this routine, however, because they thought that they didn't add anything personal to the choreography.


9. Kherington Payne and Twitch Boss – Krump

Naturally, Twitch rocked this number, but the real surprise was how well Kherington did. She danced raw and ugly and gangsta, just like a krump is supposed to be. She faded toward the end and lost synchronicity with her partner, but in the first half, it was a great routine.


10. Comfort Fedoke and Thayne Jasperson – Hip hop

I thought that Comfort hit all her moves really well, precise but still kind of groovy. Thayne wasn't half bad either, despite being kind of a dorky white boy. But what they were lacking, which the judges pointed out, was their personal connection with each other. Nigel predicted another appearance in the bottom three after this routine.


11. Kherington Payne and Twitch Boss – Tango

Maybe it was because they tired themselves out in the krump earlier in the night, but Twitchington's tango lacked energy and passion and fire that define a tango. The performance was supposed to be like Mr. and Mrs. Smith, in which a man and a woman fight each other to the death, but they weren't convincing enough.


12. Jessica King and William Wingfield – Quickstep

I can't wait to see a good quickstep on So You Think You Can Dance, but tonight's isn't going to count. It was just okay. Like Nigel said, he liked everything about it except for the actual quickstep parts. It's so unfortunate that they delivered a subpar quickstep, because their Adam and Eve contemporary routine earlier in the evening was so amazing.



-Debbie Chang, BuddyTV Staff Writer
(Image courtesy of FOX)