Runways and Chopping Blocks

There was so much promise with last night's episode of ANTM. A refugee scrambling for travel documents? A punk chopping her thumb off? Anya posing nude for more photos, despite recent protests against her earlier nude shoot? Does it get any better than this?

I hope so, because this season of ANTM has been ho-hum,and last night's episode was kinda hummmmmmm (that's the sound the machine makes when you die).

The episode opens with Stacy-Ann eating an apple with two hands like it's a half-rack of ribs. I guess in the model world a whole apple is the equivalent of a meat platter.

Paulina shows up at the loft to teach the girls how to schmooze at parties and conduct themselves in interviews. This amounts to her insulting every one's personality and leaving.

Left to her own devices (and a sharp knife) Lauren slices off the tip of her thumb and is taken to the hospital. Meanwhile, Fatima is on the phone with one of the show's producers, trying to find out if the consulate will give her the traveller's documents she needs to be able to leave the country (the girls seem to be aware that they are heading abroad soon).

That night, with Lauren freshly bandaged, the girls are dressed in Jay Godfrey dresses and asked to work the 'green' carpet at a rebranding party for 7-Up (hey, it's all natural lime and lemon flavours now!)

Shockingly, Anya Zoolander is the most articulate and poised one of the bunch. Yes, feel free to re-read that last sentence.

Whitney comes across as both obnoxious and airheaded, Stacy-Ann isn't half as natural as a can of 7-Up, and none of the other girls really get camera time. Oh, except for Dominique, who on the green carpet, tells the cameras that she is wearing a dress by designer "Jay...Georgio."

For Anya's schmoozing, she gets to model in a new 7-Up ad, naked except for a bunch of citrus laid across her. She also gets paid $10,000 for the gig. Damn.

Back at the loft, the girls quickly dismiss Anya's fortune, and focus on packing their bags. The Tyra Ticker has told them to be packed and ready first thing in the morning. At the same time, Fatima get a call that she is to be at the consulate at 9am to meet about her traveller's documents.

Before the sun is up, the girls are zipping off in a limo to the airport. They're all packed and pumped to find out where they're going. But surprise! Mr. Jay is waiting in front of a private jet to let them know that they aren't flying to warmer climes, they're posing all day on the windy cold-ass tarmac. Nice!

Fatima confesses to Mr. Jay that she has to head back into the city to go to the consulate and Jay acts shocked, as if none of the producers were at all privy to this meeting that was set up...by the producers. As Fatima slinks off, the remaining girls get outfitted in 40s travel outfits and take turns each being the 'lead' model in round after round of photos.

At the end of the day, the frozen models stagger into a hangar and are amazed to find the judging panel set up and waiting for them. Turns out there is going to be an immediate elimination.

Fatima rushes in breathless, and again, Tyra acts mortified and utterly shocked that Fatima was off getting travel documents that were arranged by the show for her to get.

But perhaps the most perplexing part of the judging panel is that despite posing for 6 hours and taking turns stepping out front and centre for the camera, the girls are all ultimately judged on the basis of how they appear in two photos. I mean, Tyra pretends they're different pictures by announcing gravely to each girl, "This was your best shot" but the same damn photo keeps getting shown. And it's actually a crap photo. And how did it get developed so quickly. Is there a one-hour photo place at La Guardia?

Tyra criticizes the girls for their lack of social skills at the lame-ass 7-Up party, and mimics Whitney's pageantry airs by giggling "I'm Miss America. I want to save the world and the Iraq." Hehe.

Since Fatima has no photo she is judged on the basis of her body of work. And her and Stacy-Ann are in the bottom. And even without a photo, Fatima stays and Stacy-Ann goes.

With abject cruelty, Tyra tells the remaining girls that they're going to Rome. (Sorry Stacy-Ann). Oh, but that private jet behind Tyra? That's just for the judging panel because they're famous and the girls? Well, not so much. Tyra cackles as she lets them know they'll be flying "commercial." Ciao.

Next Week: Dominique proves as inept in Italian as she is in English.