No One Likes a Smart Cactus

There are few guarantees in life but here is one of them: If an ANTM episode starts by giving camera-time to a slightly whiny contestant, that girl is a goner. I dare you to review the tapes. In every episode, the first or second girl interviewed ALWAYS falls in the bottom two that week.

So, spoiler be damned, it is Victoria who is our first interview this episode. If you didn't know already, Victoria is really smart. And we all know how well smart plays on reality TV.

So, back to the interesting stuff: makeovers! At the Ken Paves salon, Tyra makes what is this season turning out to be a rare appearance. I guess the allure of sobbing, bald models was too enticing to miss. This cycle, a morphing computer-generated image shows the girls what they will look like with new hair. Surprise! They all look...photo shopped.

Victoria, upon learning she will be receiving blond highlights, claims, "I'm going to be a smart blond." Bianca, seeing her Beyonce golden locks, complains (or brags?), "Blond on black? I'm gonna look like a street walker."

Unfortunately, Bianca's popsicle pink hair is so dead it needs to be shaved, making Bianca this cycle's make-over victim. At least Ken Paves is kind enough to give her a 'medical' wig. Miss J. laughs at Bianca's tears and all seems right in the ANTM universe.

Back at the house, the girls are confused by the Tyra Mail, which mentions something about going through a "back door." Chantal seems particularly nervous, leading me to believe she may know more about back doors than her innocent baby-blues suggest. Turns out the girls are being taken to Nigel and (screech of brakes) his wife, retired model and fashion photographer, Crissy.

Nigel tries to hold a smile while he whores Cover Girl products but he appears as comfortable as a cat in the spin cycle. I actually felt bad for him. Of course, minutes later he is peeking over the racks as the girls race to throw on their dresses, his lecherous glee at catching flashes of tiny tits momentarily relieving his discomfort with his scripted lines.

Sarah wins the make-up challenge for her risky "winged eyes" which is what every woman in her small town has been doing to their upper lids since 1952.

Cut to our weekly Jaslene fake Cover Girl commercial: This week Jaslene lends her support to fighting domestic violence, explaining she herself was a victim. Her admission makes me think she is even braver and cooler than I previously believed and it makes me long for the cycles when there were more interesting, adult women competing.

Back to the show. The photo challenge is all about flower power. Asperger's Heather gets creepy in weeds, Chantal looks like a sun burnt version of Baby Spice in Baby's Breath, Saleisha looks like Rihana if she held her breath for five minutes, and Victoria complains, "I just want to go to the library." (Read: I am really smart, for those of us who are not Victoria.) Chantal has a meltdown, which is exaggerated in comical fashion by her painted pink face and Tammy Faye lashes, and Heather rocks it.

The judging panel starts with a shot of bald Tyra, which is pretty much the ugliest pic I have ever seen of her and reminds me just how awesome her new bangs are. However, Tyra finally confirms what I predicted in my second post of the season: Miss J. is in fact growing his Afro an inch for every week of judging. It is like Miss J. and I share the same brilliant, Afroed brain.

Pretty much every one's photo sort of sucks, with the exception of Jenah, who is now two for two, and my prediction for the final three (along with Heather and ??) Ebony is dressed down by the panel for being too awkward (why pick on the awkward black girl but not the awkward white girl Heather?) Ebony is a self-admitted cheek-biter and as a cheek-biter myself let me tell you: it is just as much a disease as Asperger's. And if you smoke, it can lead to face cancer which, unlike Asperger's, doesn't bode well for a modelling career.
So back off, Tyra. Girl's got problems. 'Nuff said.

In the end, surprise!, it is "I am not a prickly pear" Victoria versus Saleisha for the final cut. Victoria, after a right proper dress down from the panel on her stinky behaviour (i.e., she talks back, does not except model truisms as facts, and corrects incorrect assumptions about herself without acute revelations of low self-esteem) is let go.

At the house she notes, "I'd rather go home than take some other girl's dream" and for the first time, I kind of like her. Of course, who needs modelling when you've got a B.A.? Seriously, models make what? $5,000 an hour? And undergrads can be like, coffee shop girls, or secretaries, or publishing assistants and they make, um, like $5 an hour. Oh, Victoria, you silly too smart for modelling school Yalie.

Next week: How to instill vertigo and abject terror into the hearts of beautiful young women.