It’s baaaaaack! First episode airs tonight.
All I know so far is that a woman will be blown up in a limo. Wow!
Thanks for posting this since I wouldn’t have remembered to tune in otherwise!
This has always been the one and only competition based reality show (And really only one of like, two, overall) that I watch
Can’t wait!
I had no idea either until the promo aired last night during American Ninja Warrior. 
I suppose we’ll watch it, we always have, although last season wasn’t nearly as much fun as earlier seasons. I blame it on the two Howards. They are both incredibly annoying, especially Stern.
Some really good acts last night.
Piff the Magic Dragon was great. One half comedian, one half magician and one half amusing character… wait. Anyway he was great.
Siro A was amazing. There were moments where I was wondering just how many of them there were. They could really go far.
David Lynch was funny but I’m not sure he’s funny enough to go really far.
And well that was about it for me last night.
Interesting. I’ve seen Piff before, pretty much the same act so he’ll need to follow up with better stuff. The tattooed singing guy seemed to really get over with the audience, that’s his real talent. Nobody really struck me as a potential winner, but it’s early, the acts just need to grab attention in the first round.
Yes, we liked Piff and Siro A. Most of the acts they sent on we thought were good enough to go on, but were not winners.
The two dancing kids were fairly good dancers, but mostly they got sent on because they were cute. Note to the ‘judges’: ‘cute’ is not a talent!
And once again the director is doing something that pisses me right the hell off;
When I’m watching an act perform, I want to see the PERFORMER(S), not the judges reaction! Leave the camera on the performance,
and no cutsey camera angles either. Sheesh!
I agree completely.
No one has mentioned the hypnotist yet. I’m usually skeptical about most things, but that seemed pretty legit. I’m curious what else he can do to sustain the act and keep it interesting.
I thought the hypnotist was cruel. I hope Howie Xs him immediately the next time he comes out.
I agree! And I think Howie has every right to be POed at his fellow judges, too
C’mon, you know a ‘friend’ is being maneuvered into doing something that he finds repugnant, that he’d never ordinarily do – and you sit there and laugh? And join in?
What if it was you? I’m guessing you’d find the idea of eating shit repugnant. What if the guy hypnotized you, and convinced you that a bowl of shit was yummy chocolate pudding? Would you find it as laughable? Join in so he can eat your shit, too?
Sure, Howie’s fear of contamination is not normal. So what? His emotions are genuine. Friends should respect each others boundaries.
Exactly. Howie was on the show “What Would You Do?” doing a bit on how people would react to mysophobia and a lot of people seemed to really get that, much to his surprise.
I don’t like the idea of the judges participating in the acts at all (or Nick), it gives the contestant and advantage that not all of them can take advantage of. But in this case it was necessary for a hypnotist to convince us that he wasn’t using a confederate. I don’t know how this act will work out over time, it’s an interesting change of pace for the show, but he’ll have to do more than get Howie to shake hands to move ahead.
I thought it was so stupid that they wouldn’t show the whole “hypnotism” deal on TV so as not to hypnotize us. What a load of crap. And the only person who got hypnotized in the audience was clearly a plant.
I thought Piff was OK, but I would like to see him lose the dragon suite.
I feel bad for Johnny Shelton losing his son to cancer, but that didn’t make me think he should have gone through. I could barely understand a word he was singing.
SIRO-A - When I first noticed similar acts on AGT a few years ago, I loved them (or in the case of kenichi, him). But I’ve seen so many similar acts now, I found it hard to get behind this one. I’m clearly burnt out on this type of mixed media dancing.
And I was shocked that the cuddle lady got through. I’m wondering if she was surprised too. That’s not really a million dollar act. Although it was fairly amusing.
Uh oh, I killed the thread. :eek:
Anyway, unlike last week I loved this episode.
DM Nation - Damn good! I was getting burnt out on dance troops, but these women were awesome!
Stevie Star - I’ve seen him on TV a couple of times before. Like, over 20 years ago. He did everything I saw him do before, so I wonder how he’ll be able to step up his act.
Ronnie the Dancer - I knew he’d get four Xs, but I did get a good laugh out of him.
Shirley Claire - I couldn’t decide if she’d be good or horrible. Turns out she did pretty good, especially for an 87 year old. Although I’m wondering just how much further she can go.
It was nice, but strange to see an OK video in the middle of the show. 
The roller skater dancers (I didn’t catch their name) were very good.
Alicia Michilli - I knew something was off, but it took Mel and Howie saying it was her pitch know exactly what it was. But like them I still liked it anyway.
Derek Hughes - I had all sorts of mixed emotions about his act. My only criticism would be maybe to speed it up a little to get to the good parts. Anyway, with is act I knew for sure that Howard would like it.
Freckled Sky - Totally awesome. So it turns out I’m not burnt out on mixed media dancing. I guess I just totally disliked SIRO-A last week.
For me, DM Nation and Freckled Sky were the best competitors last night for me last night. I think the other acts that were sent through for the deserved it, I just don’t think they’ll go far. I did like the magician as well, I forget his name, but disappearing card, even if you pull it out of your underwear is a little… old. Hopefully he can step it up for the next round. He was kind of funny.
Speaking of going through / not going through. One think I like about AGT, compared to say American Idol, is that they don’t focus very much on the ones that don’t go through. And rarely (if ever) in a humiliating way. Take Ronnie the Dancer, he didn’t go through, but they had a lot of fun with him, not at him.
With the people rejected from American Idol, I always felt we were supposed to be laughing at their pain of being told that they really can’t sing.
Note, I only started watching AGT a couple of seasons ago so if this was done in earlier seasons I am not aware of it.
They use to focus more on failures and people they wanted us to laugh at, but it seems like in the past couple seasons or so they stopped doing that.
Did anybody else think that the two guy singing duo (the someone-someone band) who sang “This is a Man’s World” were lip synching?
I rarely, if ever, think that on the show when it comes to singers, but the sound was juuuuuust a little too perfect for me
I didn’t think they were at the time but now that you mention it, it did look that way.
I’m pretty sure it would be announced if they were lip synching.
I saw this and wondered about the hypnotist. Is there a general consensus around the Dope that this sort of thing is real? I guess I’d have thought not, but I haven’t yet tried to search for past threads about it.
Regarding the AGT act, did you notice that just before he exited the stage he again shook Howie’s hand? By then he had “woken him up” unless I missed something he said, or maybe I don’t understand how hypnotism is supposed to work. Like, after you wake up should you supposedly still believe whatever you were told while “under”? In this case, that the hypnotist was wearing gloves, which would explain why Howie reflexively shook his hand again as he exited?
I may have the chronology of the putting under and waking up wrong or something, but in the moment it confused me because I thought Howie was supposed to be awake and therefore back to his germophobe self. When he was shaking the other judges’ hands down at the table, he’d again been put under, I think? If anybody saw something I missed to explain the “exit” handshake, please share!
Freelusion - Really good. Although I feel bad for all of the multimedia dancers. There’s a lot of them. They’re all really good, but since it is crowded most will be eliminated.
Paul Zerdin - He was funny. Not sure he’s a winning act, but I was entertained.
Alondro Santos - Wow. Amazing. I didn’t even know I liked mariachi singing until now. 
Scott Heierman - Extremely funny. If it gets to America Votes he’s doomed.
Michael John - I adore magic! I don’t even want to know how they do the tricks. However, his first trick was really obvious even to somebody not even trying to know how he did it. Second trick I’m not so sure and that’s good. Overall, he was alright, but there have been better magicians.
Kids band (I didn’t catch the name) - Really good.
Tumblers - Great from what we saw.
Leroy Patterson - No.
Duo Vladimir - Seriously good. Makes me miss the Kristef Brothers.
Sharon Irving - She can definitely sing. Bravo!