America’s Next Top Model 10: Recapping Cycle 10

For those of you who tuned into Idol Gives Back last week, you missed out on all the commotion and fun with America’s Next Top Model. Who’d have thought that there was so much excitement left to show? Since there is so much we’ve already seen, I’ll stick mainly to the footage that’s new, with the few things that are really funny thrown in.

Remember the first week of the show when the girls weren’t down to the final contestants yet? They all started out going by back to school. What we weren’t shown was a class held by Jay Manuel on facial expressions and how to make a face like you just ate a lemon. There are a few comical moments, wrapped up by a long-haired Dominique telling us how important it is to understand how to pose. Wow, that’s mind-blowing, Dom! Snort!

What is interesting is to see once again how the girls looked before the makeovers. They’ve all changed so much, it’s strange to see them in their old forms. We get a recap of a few of the girls as they visit the panel the last time before they are all picked to be on the show. They reshow the footage of Stacy-Ann giving a lap dance to Jay M. Yes, sweet little Stacy-Ann did that. It must’ve helped her because she was one of 13 selected before the judges decided to toss Dominique in to round out their numbers.

The next exciting moment flushes out quickly. As the models head to New York City and scout out their new home for the next 12 weeks, they find out that their apartment comes with a bidet. I laugh to myself as I remember a great scene from the ‘80s movie Crocodile Dundee, in which the main character from the Outback of Australia tries to figure out how the bidet is used. Stacy-Ann calls it a “boday” while Lauren wonders why you’d drink from it.

Next up, the girls get to meet Paulina Poriskova for the first time and get to hear how quickly she can cut someone to the core. Amis has bad skin, Claire looks like her haircut was done after she fell asleep on the lawnmower, and the best line of the day is when she tells Dominique that she looks like a transvestite version of actress Robin Penn. Snort! I loved that the first time it was shown.

Next up is the first photo shoot where the girls posed with some homeless women. Kim decided at panel that she didn’t want to be a model after all (for which a Hall of Shame article will be coming soon) and left the show. This disgusted the panel and frustrated the girls who knew there were other models that wanted to be there and were cut. In the end, Amis and Atalya were in the bottom two, with Atalya going home for just “being pretty.”

In some new video, we get a glimpse of what eating disorders look like. Allison is eating Jell-O. Now, that might seem fairly normal to the rest of us, until she decides to top it off with a few shakes of A1 sauce. Yes, that’s the stuff some people put on bad steaks. Yikes! She also has issues with constantly working out and measuring herself. She said that she fought anorexia at one time, but I suspect it’s still very much an issue she has to deal with.

While still on the subject of food, we move to new video of Claire and her regular connection to the breast pump. She again drinks the milk for the cameras. That has to be tough being away from a little one like that, yet still thinking about her every day while she slowly dries up.

As we’ve seen in weeks past, Dominique is a great source of entertainment, if only because she talks a lot. I can only imagine how long it takes for her confessionals and for the editors to whittle it all down to something succinct. The best quote through all her ramblings in this piece is, “I wanna be like freakin’ Mother Teresa, but in a diva kind of way, okay?” It just doesn’t get any better than that, folks.

Amis is a nut; an ungraceful nut. She trips over furniture, breaks lamps, and even managed to not make it out the door without making a mess when she was sent home. Whitney says that Amis could be tied to a tree and argue with it. Whoa, now that’s a freak! At least she was entertaining in her short time in the house.

Marvita is another one who was comfortable with herself. She ran around the house naked regularly, which upsets several of the girls. Stacy-Ann goes so far as to cover her face when Marvita streaks.

Speaking of hot, next up is some footage we didn’t get to see in the walking lesson located in one of the NYC fire departments. The girls all had their turn, then there were the firemen themselves! It’s a riot to see these guys strutting their stuff in full gear; posing at the end. Good on them for not taking things too seriously!

After a hard day’s work, the girls go out to dinner and had a few drinks. A few drinks lead to none other than World Model Wrestling. Sheets are stripped from the giant bed; next thing you know there is full-on wresting happening with some of them. Lauren plows Marvita, surprisingly, and then Claire trounces Dominique in the baby-mama wars. I wouldn’t be surprised if the few guys stuck watching this with their girlfriends or wives didn’t have them stop to rewind this scene a few times.

Next week we meet Marvita the masseuse. She hustles the girls for change as she passed out back rubs.

They probably needed back rubs after a pose-off lesson from Benny Ninja. After that pose-off challenge, the girls were inspired to do more back at the apartment. Fatima has a Polaroid camera which the girls use to capture some of their fierce poses. The great part about it isn’t the girls, but Anya, who channels every loud, crazy, strangely accented photographer ever seen on the show. I only wish the editors were able to translate more of what she says. She’s a hoot!

There’s a recap of the alarm incident between Dominique and the rest of the house. She and Claire go at it pretty intensely, when Lauren decides to kick in. Of course, Dominique tells us how good she is and how she is going to win this season.

We get a recap of the day when Tyra taught the girls to walk. Each gets an individual lesson. She even tries hard to take the awkwardness out of Lauren’s walk. I don’t know if she can ever do it. That girl walks like a 12-year-old boy with size-14 shoes. There is just nothing graceful or pretty about it.

My favorite girl, Whitney, gets a little highlight as she is the only one in the house who doesn’t have any problem eating. In fact, she doesn’t need to worry about it, as she gets to celebrate her curves. Fatima even says that she’s trying to get everyone fat so that she (Whitney) can be the only skinny one in the house. Snort! But in the end, Whitney tells us that she wants to change the face of the fashion industry as a plus-sized model.

After watching this show, I have to wonder if the editors and producers are trying to set us up for Dominique to be the comeback kid. She started out as the last girl picked, turned into a soccer mom at her first edition of her makeover, and she gets a ton of face time. It sort of scares me, as I think there are much better models who have gone home and are remaining. Maybe it’s just that she’s such a huge personality that she gets all the camera time, but the editing seems to be telling us that she could be the eventual winner. What do you think?

If you haven’t already, be sure to check out these other recent America’s Next Top Model 10 articles on RealityNewsOnline:

Kari’s favorite photos are taken spontaneously in photo booths. Which were your favorite girls for the week? You can send her comments at flystorms2@yahoo.com.

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