Agree. It was cool that she won a monetary prize, though!
I liked the “where are they now” segment – I’m tickled that so many former contestants have good careers in dance.
I was amazed seeing the judges dance! Nigel’s hoofing was amazing.
I always feel a little bad for the loser of the Final 2, because they never get a retrospective montage. Twitch was more than deserving of one, despite the fact that my choice was Joshua (that’s 2-for-2 now, bitches!)
I suspect that there’s probably a lot of rehearsing favorite crowd-pleasing dances, because those numbers are the ones that will be part of the travelling roadshow repertoire. Still, Twitch, Katee, and Courtney had their work cut out for them, performing three numbers each last night (not including the larger group numbers).
It was funny how quickly some of those early cast-offs had evaporated from my memory. A couple of times I asked–“Who the heck is that?” And I didn’t catch the first season, but is this the first time either Mary or Nigel performed? I know they have histories in the industry, but it was nice to see they still have the goods (though her skirt was still a bit shorter than made me comfortable).
We have the last two months saved on the DVR–my wife loves the show and will probably be spending endless weekends hosting her own mini-marathons. I assume this thread will die soon, but I will bump it when I see the roadshow performance at the end of September.
It was really nice to see the dancers from the other seasons, and get an update on their lives.
Loved the group dance, and it was cool to see Ivan again. I would have enjoyed seeing him in the breaking group spinning on the floor.
It was a good show. Nice ending.
I believe this was the first time in my reality-show-watching history that I have picked a winner from the auditions. There was something about Joshua from the very beginning that convinced me that he had the goods to go all the way. I was very pleased that he won, although I agree that any of the top three would have deserved it.
I expected Mary to be able to dance, but seeing Nigel out there was a lot of fun. I only wish that they had repeated my favorite routine of the season, Joshua in the Pasa Doble. All-in-all, one of the best reality show seasons in a long time.
This was my first season watching this show, but that was my only real complaint about the finale. Neither the first or second place winner gets the nice retrospective. Personally, I’d rather they replace some of the jibber-jabber during the show with extra time to show the retrospectives of both of the top two finalists before they make the final presentation.
I was delighted to see Joshua win; I voted for him several times Wednesday night. As others have said, though, I wouldn’t have been angry at any of them winning (though I think Courtney was a tad less deserving than the others.) I, too, was impressed with just how darned likeable all of the finalists were. Part of the reason I voted for Joshua was that I thought he was just such a sweetheart.
I thought Twitch was a VERY classy guy at the finish, holding up Joshua’s hands in the victory pose, and leading the crowd in carrying him off on their shoulders.
I like the way Nigel runs the show. I liked the process in which they winnowed down the talent until the audience was left with a talented group of people to choose between each week. I liked his commentary very much — although he was booed by the audience whenever he offered genuine criticism, it was never they snarky bile that Simon Cowell would spew — it was genuine well-considered criticism that would benefit the dancers down the line. He did tend to pimp things just a bit at time (I don’t think the story about Joshua’s story of having done odd-jobs around the dance studio in order to get lesson time quite jibed with Nigel’s repeated amazement at his “No classical training at all!”, and there was a bit much choreographer worship for some ho-hum choreography at times), but in general I think it’s a well done show.
If Will couldn’t win it, I’m glad that Joshua did. Though I was also rooting for Katee. 
That’s what that story was! Thank you! I didn’t start watching the show until a few weeks ago – whenever Chelsie and Mark first did the Bleeding Love routine (which is partly what got me hooked) – so I missed that one the first time around. I could not for the life of me figure out what could have been in that letter!
I was really glad that they reprised some of the favorite numbers, because it gave me a chance to see things from earlier in the season that I’d missed – and, of course, a chance to see some favorites a second time. But I was really glad when it turned out that they were doing the numbers again, instead of just replaying the original performances. How awesome for Will and Katee that they had a chance to do the pas de deux again and get that lift/spin right!
I do think that they could improve on the finale by giving the winner and runner-up 10 minutes or so to absorb the news and respond.
It was fun to see Mary and Nigel dancing.
I don’t think it’s really fair to have a female vs. male finale. Katee was an incredible dancer, but how do you compare her vs. a guy who can hang ten in mid-air with those incredible leaps? You can’t.
I really liked all the dancers this year. The final 4 especially seemed like really nice, grounded kids.