America's Next Top Model - "The Girl Deals with a Pervert"

After back-to-back awesome "I laughed I cried" episodes, this one in particular was a relative dud that was otherwise unmemorable because of, I suspect, its focus on the two most boring girls deprived the episode of dramatic urgency.

Clearly, the producers chose to spotlight Kesse and Shannon, both of whom are among the most intellectually vacant girls on the show (although, given the mask-like and blank impassivity of their faces, Robin joins these two as the Banal Trinity), and in the case of Shannon (whom finally warrants the effort to come up with a nickname, and that she shall henceforth be known as the Shark for her rows and rows of teeth) possibly the most uninteresting character in all the reality shows that I watch, since the positive aspects of her personality remain entirely on the physical level (though as far as mental density goes, the guy from Joe Millionaire 2 is the all-time turkey). (Insert polemics about certain strands of Christianity (typically fundamentalist-leaning) and the subsequent tendency to deny individual and critical thought.)

As for Kesse, the producers try to build her up as a complex character by positioning her as an in-betweener, able to cross comfortably from the Nones (geddit Nones-NUNS LOL OMG ROFFLE) into Elyse and Pokey's room (and remembering the extremity of her donk donk dance from a few episodes back, though the only girl who didn't participate was Our Favorite Indieist). Unfortunately, she squanders whatever credibility she might've earned as a transcendent figure with an apparent lack of common sense. Getting suckered in to browse les baumes français and then brushing it off as an insignificant trifle is a total n00b move.

Now for the new obligatory What Robin Did This Time part of this entry: after wondering aloud about the lack ofVenetiann gondoliers and canals in Paris, she then pulls aside a French pedestrian and in with broad, uncommunicative gestures, decides to pay him to guide her around the city and remarks, "This is how we do things in America." Translation: Americans can't be bothered to abide by the cultural mores of other nations, so they buy off the locals to do it for them. A truly beautiful moment.

(Other horrible "Ugh, zese Américain touristes" moments include two of the dumb (surprise!) girls, Kesse and Shannon, cooing about the beauty of the Parisian Eyesore.)

And I can't forget the part where Pokey was deliberately saying off-color things like, "How do you say 'how bad does your cooch smell?'" and Robin obliviously responding, "When Adrianne says things that are inappropriate, I might look at her, in the way a teacher would look at you if you did something inappropriate in class." Her out of touch patronizing OH MY GOD SHE MAKES ME WANT TO KILL.

Oh oh and she was as subtle as a bulldozer setting Shark up on a date with that rock of a model...!

I shall try to regain my sanity by getting on to ELYSE CONTENT STARTS HERE. Really wasn't much, however, just a reiteration of her role as a hybridized reality tv viewer/participant when she admitted to delighting in the watching the sparks Pokey caused with Robin.

Addenda: Really it was quite a great Robin episode. Also, I was delighted to see that they finally put table cloth onto the judge's table so I didn't have to see their legs all crammed uner it.