Blog Archives
America’s Got Talent Goes to Austin
America’s Got Talent held auditions Austin, Texas. The first thing that struck me was that there were very few dance acts and that this season seems to be more positive than past ones.
Sebastian De la Cruz and his mariachi band were the first act of the night. Despite only being 10-years-old, De la Cruz was charming and a perfect gentleman as well as extremely talented. He also dressed the part, which only added to his preciousness. (Seriously, the number of times Sharon Osbourne and the Internet have used that word to describe De la Cruz is not going to do him any favors in high school.)
Time for the bad act montage! That would be great if any of the acts were remotely memorable. There was a sideshow act, which I barely remember because all sideshow acts make me sick. Well, except this one. The Tinderbox Circus Sideshow appeared to solely exist so that the members can staple paper to each others chests. It was very tame compared to the sideshow from earlier in the season that had one of its members pick up a brick with his eye sockets.
What Not to Wear Changes Format
What Not to Wear got a makeover this season. The new season premiered this past Tuesday with a live studio audience. This completely changed the feel of the show and not for the better. Someone at TLC fixed what wasn’t broken.
The show used to be sort of a documentary about one woman’s clothing journey. Clinton Kelly and Stacy London would throw out all of the woman’s old clothes and spend the week boosting her confidence and giving her a new look. Now with the live studio audience, What Not to Wear has turned into a highbrow point-and-laugh show.
While the part of What Not to Wear where a secret camera follows the unwitting participant was always creepy, the show never went into cruel and unusual punishment territory until this season. Even though the first person made over, Ana, looked like a teenaged hooker with her sort skirts and dead Muppet vests, she did not deserve the meanness that comes with the new format. You could hear the audience laughing at her as soon as she walked through the door. With the old format, you might have been laughing at the badly dressed woman at home, but at least it wasn’t to her face.
America’s Got Talent Visits St. Louis
Issac Brian Brown
I had some faith that Tuesday’s episode of AGT would be better than Monday night’s, simply because the odds are they would start to find better talent. I was mostly right. They had never visited St. Louis prior to this season, which sort of surprised me. Regardless, St. Louis’ first audition show two weeks ago was also a good showing. It makes some sense that this show would be good too.
America’s Got Talent begins every episode with a feature story. It’s normally a tossup as to whether it would be a terrible act that happens to be entertaining or an act of genuine talent. When “Imagination” from “Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory” started playing at the beginning of the guy’s feature, I knew that this wasn’t going to be a good act. When the contestant said he was a puppeteer, I was positive it wasn’t going to be good. Aside from the fact that this type of act is immensely unlikely to be worthy of 1 million dollars, the viewer quickly discovered he wasn’t even a good puppeteer. Nick Cannon promptly turned to the camera with a sock puppet in his hand and said, “I’m a better puppeteer than this dude.” Despite the complete lack of potential this act had, I was still entertained. The contestant had very high energy and the judges’ spirits seemed very high. This was going to be a captivating hour.
Wait! What's A Dial? 