Totally agree. From this point they have to earn the right to stay.
I got a feeling Mark will pull out his secret weapon to get Chelsea the win. I expect to see a very technical and traditional dance from them next week. That may get them the seasons first triple 10’s.
Chelsea is a very good dancer. She would have dominated this season if Mark showcased her instead of himself.
Still think Ralph can win it all if he does great next week and proves his leg is ok. He’s got a big fan base.
Oh Man. This doesn’t look Good. Kym Johnson rushed to the hospital after an accident at rehearsal.
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/11133/1146372-100-0.stm
This one says it’s the leg. But, that pic in the link above shows her in a neck brace and strapped down to a back board. 
Sure hope she’s ok.
http://www.thehollywoodgossip.com/2011/05/kym-johnson-hospitalized-after-dancing-with-the-stars-rehearsal/
Whew!!! Didn’t know Hines played tackle. 
Trying to sneak in on the sympathy votes!
Just kidding… mostly.
I gave Ralph two votes tonight – but the other three went to Hines.
Twenty years of dance muscle saved Kym Friday. Without those shoulder/neck muscles she probably would have a spinal cord injury. That was a close one.
Totally enjoying tonights dances. Everyone is doing a fantastic job.
Nothing like Ballet Stuffing to give the fans the finger.
They made darn sure the Golden Boy and his massive ego is in the final.
Is the final top three or two this time? Pretty sure Hines has the votes. Is there a third slot?
It might be that I find Mark particularly awful and off-putting this season, but I really didn’t like the cha-cha challenge.
It’s a popularity contest, it always has been. If someone doesn’t have the fan votes, they shouldn’t get saved. And Chelsea isn’t so wonderful that she should be the exception. Especially with that as her partner. The whole thing was a bad decision. A much worse outcome than just letting a unpopular, but good dancer get voted off.
That said, he did a good job with their rumba (unlike their cha-chas where he was back to his obnoxious self). Hines is just genuinely likeable and doing rather well and I like watching him dance. I really want him to win and so I voted for him & Kym.
The numbers don’t look good for Ralph.
I checked and Kirstie has 826,656 followers. Nearly a million strong. :eek:
Ralph has 59,532 followers. :smack: Even Mr Miyagi can’t beat those numbers. Based on her Twitter numbers Kirstie may win this thing.
Hines has the Steeler Nation and an injured female partner. I also thought he had the best dances tonight regardless of what the judges said. He should pull some strong votes.
The Cha Cha challenge was designed to force Chelsea and Mark into the final. For me she’ll have an asterisk by her name if she wins. This sort of manipulation by the show and judges is deplorable.
The thing about the cha-cha challenge is that it favors the female stars, because to come up with a dance on the fly like that, you have to rely on the male partner’s ability to lead. Obviously a pro is going to do better leading on an improvised dance than an amateur will.
I’m sorry, but I think you folks are nuts. Chelsea and Mark were exemplary last night. Their Argentine Tango was perfect, and I think should have taken the trip-10s, rather than their rumba, which was very beautiful, but didn’t seem all that much of a rumba to me (more like an interpretive modern dance for two based on a sensuous theme). Mark did precisely what aceplace57 said he should/would do in post 161 - didn’t show-boat himself at all, and demonstrated that Chelsea dances beautifully.
Hines and Kym were excellent, but that first trip-10 was a sentiment-based score. Both had shown such enormous courage; if I’d been Hines, I would have been terrified to touch her, and if I’d been Kym, I’d just have been terrified. But their Argentine Tango wasn’t as good as Chelsea’s and Mark’s, IMHO.
There’s no fix in, no secret cabal dedicated to ensuring that Chelsea and Mark would win. Chelsea has been technically the best dancer from the start, and has been several times under-marked because of Mark’s choice of off-beat choreography. Hines has been a very solid dancer, but he hasn’t been all that. He reminds me a lot of Emmit Smith, another charming, easy-going football player on the dance floor, but really not quite the dancer, IMHO, that Joey Lawrence or Mario Lopez was.
As for Kirstie, someone earlier in the thread said she was a lot like Bristol Palin. I disagree. There is some resemblence in that each tended/s to have rather precise footwork, but Kirstie has done what Bristol never managed - she got the emotional content. How she and Maks managed to dance a Paso to half of White Room is beyond me. You have to wonder what the hell the music choosers are thinking sometimes.
Poor Ralph. I liked his dances, but whether because of his injury or just innate ability, he is a bit out of his league.
My call: Ralph goes down tonight. Kirstie comes in third, Chelsea second, and Hines will take the mirror ball.
I see what you did there
Could not agree more with all this. It’s felt like Chelsea is being overlooked and underscored because of Mark’s goofiness the entire season, and she just doesn’t have the base of fans to call on that Kirstie and Hines do. She’s the best dancer by far, and she won’t win because of “ballot stuffing” by the Steeler Nation and people who loved Cheers and Look Who’s Talking - ballot stuffing is NOT in her favor.
They as much as said that they did the instant dance to make sure that the best dancer is at least ONE of the final three.
DWTS is all about that tension between the audience voting for their favorites and the judges going with the best dancers. It would hurt the final if Chelsea was on the sidelines while Kristi and Ralph were the finalists along with Hines.
I’d wager they went ahead and did the instant dance this year was because last year’s final show got (relatively) poor ratings and they assumed the reason was that Brandi got the boot before clearly inferior dancers.
[spoiler]No surprise. Ralph knew it when he tweeted last night about being run over by two bus tires. I don’t get the judge hate towards Ralph. Every time they shorted him a couple points for dances just as good as most of the others. Last night Karina commented that everyone wears padding. She was wearing a padded bra. So, why bring up the padding for Ralph in his package? Why the diaper joke? Cheap shots that do nothing but demean and belittle the guy. These performers bust their asses 7 to 10 hours a day in rehearsals only to get cheap jokes and biased judging?
I’ll watch next week for Hines and then I’m done. I can’t watch this anymore. I don’t mind seeing a favorite eliminated. But when the show loses it’s integrity then I can’t respect it. [/spoiler]
My last post was a bit too negative. Didn’t realize how frustrated I’ve become with the shows direction. The songs and themes that aren’t appropriate for the dances have hurt the show a lot. Looking back at dances on youtube the difference is very apparent. A real Cha Cha song goes a long way towards a good Cha Cha dance.
Probably is time to move on and forget this show. I can’t see them going back to traditional ballroom and latin dance music next season.
There have always been really bizarre musical choices in this show – it’s part of the show’s crazy charm. Except when it gets annoying, as it has several times every season.
Sorry to see Ralph go, but it was him or Kirstie, and I’m fine with it being him. He had a great run and was a good addition to the season, but didn’t deserve to be in the final.
Wish he hadn’t agreed to the padded butt, though. That was just weird.
Maks shouldn’t’ve gone for the samba rolls – they made it clear that Kirstie’s technique is the weakest of the final three.
Kirstie must have set a record for the biggest body transformation they’ve had on dwts. Not just losing the weight, but also getting her energy and overall fitness way up. Hard to believe she’s 60. I thought Maks made a mistake going for routine a little too similar to Marks. They can’t really compete in that area.
Kym and Hines were smart and did something very unique. It could have gone horribly wrong (like Marie’s doll dance). But, they pulled it off and got three 10’s. Probably never see another marching band type dance again on dwts.
It’ll be interesting to see how the votes go. Clearly Chelsea is the best dancer. But, I think Hines beats her in performance and entertainment. Considering his complete lack of dance experience he’s pretty impressive.
I didn’t really like any of the freestyles. Not voting tonight – I don’t care enough about any of the three to open another tab in Firefox.