The new cast has been announced.
Top WTF name: Tom DeLay. :eek:
Former teen idols: Donny Osmond, Aaron Carter
Older woman, still gorgeous: Kathy Ireland (joined by another model I don’t know, Joanna Krupa)
Jock, pro: Michael Irvin
Jock, Olympic: Natalie Coughlin (swimmer)
Jock, non-mainstream: Louie Vito (snowboarder), Mark Dascasos (martial artist)
Several other singers/actresses/reality stars.
Partnerships will be announced a week from today.
Mark Dascasos also happens to be “The Chairman” on Iron Chef America.
I don’t watch that show, so that didn’t mean anything to me. Should we put him in “reality stars, miscellaneous”? 
Tom DeLay? Man, they are sorely testing my dedication to this show.
Perhaps the producers are trying to re-create the magic that was Tucker Carlson.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h8eABb32An4
I assume DeLay is going to be dancing a pas-DeeDeeTee-deux…
They should have gone all the way and gotten W. I mean, he’s not doin’ nuthin, anyhow.
It appears that they will finally be putting in some safety rules for practicing.
I still think they should be paying for a personal trainer for a couple of weeks before contestants even meet their dance partners, but this is a step in the right direction.
Won’t somebody think of the celebrities?
Just kidding – after last season, when they lost two before the first show, they obviously had to rethink things. Wonder how badly the pros are chafing – you know that a lot of the uber-competitive energy is coming from them.
The pairings have been announced. I only paid attention to a few, because I only care about a few of the pro dancers. They’re definitely looking to break up the Ballas-Hough-Burke champion thing. Reigning champ Mark Ballas drew Melissa Joan Hart, Derek Hough got Joanna Krupa and Cheryl Burke is saddled with DeLay. And it looks like Julianne Hough isn’t dancing this season.
Other pairings I recall are Dmitri Chaplin with Mya (my bet to win) and Louis von Amstel with Kelly Osborne. I’m not sure if she couldn’t have happened to a nicer guy, or if he couldn’t have happened to a nicer girl.
Where’d you see the list? I thought it wasn’t being released till tomorrow.
She was supposed to skip last season, and only came back because they paired her with her boyfriend.
Mya’s a ringer. She was in the American version of Shall We Dance? (admittedly, a bit part, but she danced) and one of the Cell Block Tango dancers in Chicago, for Pete’s sake!
Actually, I picked up most of it from Twitter. Like last season with Team Shark, Mark Ballas has already named his pairing with Melissa Joan Hart - Team Malarkey.
Oh, that’s right, I forgot about that. I think she’s definitely trying to focus on her music now.
That kind of experience doesn’t necessarily translate to being a ringer, and definitely not a short-fire winner. Marissa Jaret Winokur was a Tony award winner for a show that had a great deal of dancing, Mel B., Joey Fatone and Lance Bass (and to a smaller extent Nick Lachey and Joey McIntyre) all had long histories of dance as well as music. She knows how to conform to choreography. So did Tia Carrere, Jane Seymour and several others. It’s not a sure-fire thing. How well someone clicks with their pro seems to be a huge part of success on this show. (And some pros, mainly the ones who’ve won over and over, seem to be far more successful at teaching and motivating than certain others, like Louis Von Amstel or Anna Trebunskaya, good as they may be on the floor.) If her small bit of pro dance experience makes her a ringer, Kelly Osborne is, too. She did Chicago live in the West End.
You young people and your wacky technology!
Here’s a story with the official pairings.
Debi Mazar scored Maks, lucky girl.
ETA: Mya is downplaying her advantages – apparently she’s concerned about a foot she fractured last year.
I still want to know what producer Cheryl refused to sleep with that she’s been saddled with DeLay. Poor woman. Or maybe she really wanted a long vacation?
Is Ashley Hamilton the first offspring of a former competitor to appear? And is Donny the first sibling?
I think they’ve been trying to stick Cheryl with losers for a while, just to keep her (and Julianne) from dominating this thing. I think Gilles was a total surprise to the producers, who probably expected him to sink like a stone due to his limited fan base.
I want to know if Chuck Liddell got Anna T because he was the only one not terrified of her. 
Mark Dacascos used to be really pretty. Debi Mazar is hot in general.
Tom DeLay? Oh, yeah, that’s going to go well. I wonder how the “refuse to watch because the great thief is on it” losses will measure against the “watch it out of sick curiosity” gains–& how long the “watch it hoping (I mean really hoping) for a train wreck (or you know, a broken bone or twenty)” will last.
I’d guess that the number of people who either will or won’t watch specifically because of DeLay will be relatively small.