Tuesday, March 28, 2006
Some of America's last top models
VINTAGE! America's Next Top Model, Living TV, 6.00pm
There's a bit of a shortage of truly LOWCULTURE programming to recommend today, but we couldn't let this one slip by as it's one of our all-time favourite editions of this programme. "Cycle" two, for us, was really where America's Next Top Model hit its stride - when they already had one successful run under their belt, so they had an evidently much bigger budget and it was back in the time where Tyra and co still cared about creating top high fashion models, rather than having lots of heart-to-hearts with Tyra 'n' Mama until someone eventually gave Tyra her own talkshow, or before the producers decided to stop bothering looking for pretty girls with modelling potential and started to look for crazy homeschooled girls who pee in diapers and have exploding faces.
Aaanyway, season two makeover episode. Hurrah! The makeover episode is always one of the best episodes of the season, because there is always somebody who utterly hates her new look. Remember, in the cycle currently airing on Living TV (that's cycle five to you and me), how Cassandra cried when Tyra wanted to cut off Cassandra's long, brown, multi-pageant-winning locks and turn them into a short blonde Mia Farrow do? And how Cassandra then cried a bit more? And then continued to cry, and eventually quit because she missed her hair so much? Well, it's not quite as dramatic, but Catie in this cycle was the Cassandra prototype. If we remember correctly, we had the obligatory pre-makeover confessional going "I don't care what Tyra does to my hair, I'm sure I'll look great" and then a post-makeover shot of Catie sitting crying in a chair with very little hair left, looking like Peter Pan. And she cries and cries, and then one of the girls reveals that Catie's totally faking it and can turn the tears on or off at the drop of a hat. It is so. EFFING. AWESOME.
Anyway, for those of you who like your reality TV a little less deceitful (how do you work that, exactly?), this is also a chance to see one of the entire series' most successful makeovers. Many of us were slightly 404 when we saw Shandi turn up on the show, given that she looked like Avril Lavigne's dorkier older sister, and we wondered how on earth they were going to make an edgy high-fashion model out of her. And yet they take her away, bleach her hair blond and replace her glasses with contact lenses, and suddenly you start to think that all of those movies where the woman takes off her glasses and lets down her hair and is suddenly beautiful might not be entirely bullshit after all, because suddenly Shandi looks stunning. It's actually quite life-affirming, honest. It's also the exact kind of makeover they tried to give Michelle in cycle four, only for it to backfire horribly. That was fun in an entirely different way (see above).
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3 Comments:
Lowculture should have an America's Next Top Model mini-site with screen grabs and story boards. I've never had the oppertunity to see the show but I'm intrigued.
By 
, at
12:59 pm
amazing write up! I remember this episode, and hope to catch it on living tonight.
-ddt-
By , at
1:58 pm
Re: "Lowculture should have an America's Next Top Model mini-site with screen grabs and story boards. I've never had the oppertunity to see the show but I'm intrigued."
I'm so loving that idea... largely due to needing to see lots of kinky shots of Janice looking all lickable and Janicelike I grant you but am loving it all the same!
By , at
2:30 pm
