America's Next Top Model: The Goddesses Must Be Crazy

Hello, fierce readers! Welcome to a brand-new session of the Tyra Banks Appreciation Society, otherwise known as The Glaminator’s weekly Top Model blog. My, how time has flown by! Doesn’t it seem like just yesterday that we were celebrating the triumph of… um… Actually, I can’t for the life of me remember the name of the girl who won last cycle. I could look it up, I suppose, but we’ve got no time to waste on the past, because there’s two hours of J/ays, Tyra and shrieking girls (OH GOD the shrieking) to get through, and it’s not going to be pretty! It could be ugly pretty, though.

So here we are in Las Vegas, fashion capital of Nevada, and there are 34 lovely semi-finalists, and it’s the usual assemblage of the deluded, the desperate, and the batshit crazy. Oh, okay, a few of them seem decent. All right, girls, you know the first-episode drill: put on a bikini; parade in front of the judges; tell them some tiresomely quirky fact about yourself and/or story of personal triumph over adversity. And, go! First up is Sandra from Kenya, who’s stunning, and also an insane bitch. Next is London, who’s a “street preacher,” which appears to mean that she stands on corners ranting about Jesus. Maybe she could pray to Him for help with her assy fashion sense. Aren’t we’re off to a good start? There’s Celia, whom I like immediately because she seems smart and normal and she’s wearing a cute, refreshingly non-skanky outfit. She’s also 25, which means she can expect to be sent home in approximately six episodes for being a dried-up old hag. There’s Aminat, who is very tall and has a spectacular afro—like, Erykah Badu in “Block Party” proportions. And Tahlia, whose body is covered with burn scars due to an unfortunate childhood incident involving a neglectful mother and a hot pot of coffee. Yikes. Tahlia is very pretty, but she might have better luck if her burn-scarred body didn’t also fall in that unfortunate modelling nether region between sizes 2 and 12. Others, in no particular order: a “Blaxican” hippie who calls herself “Fo”; a busty plus-sizer whose major achievement in life is dating Dale Earnhardt; a blonde who looks exactly like the girl from “Wings”; and a girl whose best attempt at impressing the judges is telling them how wealthy and spoiled she is. Oh yeah, everyone’s gonna root for the spoiled rich girl to win.

And there’s more! I had to start a new paragraph, that’s how many girls there are. There’s Jessica and Nijah, who are both flat-out gorgeous and otherwise entirely unmemorable. Fragile Kathryn, who shows up in front of the judges with her lame novelty-pen collection and cries for no reason. Teyona, a tomboy who grew up in a chicken coop, or something, and who has “wind-tunnel face,” according to Tyra and the J/ays, which seems to be a compliment. Angelea, who if I didn’t know any better I’d swear was this season’s tranny, whose back story includes sleeping in bus terminals and a dead daughter. God. Now I’m not going to have any fun mocking her ridiculous fingernails. There’s also Allison, whose pale face, saucer eyes and general air of being a demonic child in a horror movie are impossible not to remark upon. She looks like a sugar glider. Tiresomely quirky tidbit: Allison has never had a nosebleed, and dreams of one day having one, because she’s obsessed with blood. Well, it’s good to have goals! Frankly, I’m shocked that no one has yet offered to give Allison a nosebleed. And last and craziest, there’s Monique, a conspiracy theorist who’s into guns and who likes to lecture people about how they’re sheep deceived by the mainstream media and the corrupt government. Oh, shut up and go watch “Zeitgeist” again, nutbar.

But you didn’t come here just for the gaggle of model wannabes, did you? Oh no; you’re waiting for some inspired/insane theatrics from the real star of the show, the Great Foreheaded One herself. Because we’re in Caesar’s Palace in Las Vegas, there’s some sort of Roman Goddess theme, and so the girls get all betogaed and besandaled and gather round the pool in preparation for what is possibly the grandest Tyra entrance of all time. A bunch of Spartan warriors in helmet-and-shield regalia (“big, staunchy dudes,” in the words of one model with a creative sense of vocabulary) march out carrying torches, escorting a very big-haired, gold-wrapped Tyra. In full-on Dramatic Tyra mode, she declaims that she is the Goddess of Fierce (of course!), and she is there to choose her successor. We’ve met Tyra’s acting coach before, right? That woman should really be fired. Or possibly given a raise. Anyway, the whole thing is extremely campy and embarrassing and fairly amusing. It’s no Glaminator, but I’ll take it.

So, after the judges have “gotten to know” all the girls (i.e., seen what they look like in a bikini), the first cuts are made, from 34 down to 21. Monique the conspiracy theorist gets sent back to Colorado to start her own militia, and maybe pose for the cover of “Guns & Ammo” magazine. A bunch of other girls who didn’t even get the dignity of camera time go home, too. Then, we have a goddess-inspired photo shoot, wherein the remaining semi-finalists have to pose as such well-known deities as the Goddess of Success, the Goddess of Friendliness, and the Goddess of Quality Footwear. (I might be making that last one up.) Sandra and Angelea get in a nasty squabble and end up insulting each other’s feet, culminating in the immortal line, “Bitch, you got ugly-ass corns.” Ah, this show; it just gives and gives.

And now, at last, it’s time to find out our thirteen finalists and stop wasting camera time on these failed fame whores we’ll never see again, including Angelea of the Long Talons and Kathryn of the Many Stupid Pens. So long, girls! As for you lucky thirteen, don’t look so pleased with yourselves; I’ll deal with you later.

Stay tuned for part two of the first episode, coming soon!

Photo courtesy zap2it.com