Ever since American Idol, competition based TV shows have come and gone, but America’s Best Dance Crew (MTV 9PM Sundays) holds something special to me. Dance crews have been pretty prevalent growing up in Southern California, from High School and College Hip Hop Dance teams, to a bunch of B-Boys who like to hang out and decided to stick it out. In its past 3 seasons, the upper echelon of teams have seemingly been dominated by the West Region - Season 1 Winners JabbaWockeez were based in San Diego, Season 2 Winners Sup3r Cr3w hailed from Las Vegas, and last season’s winners Quest Crew were from Los Angeles. Let’s see if anything this season can break out from the domination.
This Week’s Challenge: Crew’s Choice Challenge - Crew’s choose their own song. Judges determine the Bottom 3 Crews that will go to Sudden Death and the eliminated crew. Here is an intro to the new 9 crews:
Beat Ya Feet Kings - Washington DC - Song: Backyard Band’s “Skillet” - Very intricate footwork style called Gogo - 5 members. Haven’t really seen this style before but it definitely looks difficult and solid first performance.
Fr3sh - Matawan, NJ - Song: “Ante up” by MOP - Friends, predominately Asian - 7 members. Spray Props were iite… not sure if they had something that made them stand out or put them on equal level with Kaba Modern or SoReal Cru.
Artistry in Motion - North Hollywood - Song: “SFM” by Basement Jax - Mix of contemporary, lyrcal dancing with Hip Hop - 7 members. liked the tempo change, lot of transitions and movement between dancers.
Afroborike -Las Vegas, NV - Cuban/Puerto Rico - Song: Marc Anthony - “Aguanile” - Latin influenced Hip Hop. 6 members. “Latin” section was good, and “Hip Hop” section was ok.
Rhythm City - Bronx, NY - Song: “Life of a Star” by Mims - Incorporate various styles from the Bronx. 7 members. Pretty solid routine and clean. They might be able to take it all the way.
Southern Movement - Nashville, TN - Song: Dierks Bently’s “Sideways” - “Hick Hop” and Country influenced. 7 members. Personal Favorite. Great attitude and entertaining to watch. Southern style can work, but will the country moves integrate?
Massive Monkees - Seattle, WA - Song: “Kill Joy” by N.E.R.D. - Breakers. 5 members. Easily one of the Voter Favorites. Some of their stunts were pretty clever, and quickly separated themselves from the other B-Boy Crews of yore.
We are Heroes - Los Angeles CA - Song: “Waters of Nazareth” - Justice - Specialize in Pop n’ Locking. . 5 members. Clean, Song choice worked well for them.
Vogue Evolution - New York City, NY - Song: “Took the Night” By Chelley - Voguing dancing style based on underground homosexual culture in New York. 5 members. Pretty intense routine. Personal Favorite.
The Sudden Death Round- 30 Second Routine to BEP’s “Boom Boom Pow” - Results (SPOILER ALERT WARNING) and the eliminated crew:
Beat Ya Feet Kings - good levels, control, nice use of gogo near the end, best Sudden Death Routine.
Southern Movement - The entrance, and ground work at the end were the highlights for this one.
Fr3sh - [ELIMINATED] - Haha, liked the martial arts bow in the beginning… other than that it was pretty a standard routine.
Closing Thoughts: Is it just me, or are the crews smaller in size this time around? I know Boogie Bots and Dynamic Edition were pretty small with 5 members, but they were in seasons with crews of 7-8 members. Massive Monkees and Rhythm City will probably make it to the end, with Rhythm City taking it all, judging from this episode. Artistry in Motion and Southern Movement I see having a hard time getting votes, and will have to battle quite often. Vogue Evolution may also get voted to the bottom, but the judges seem to like them, and they could take on maybe half of the current contestant crews. Totally agree with the Elimination tonight - Fr3sh is good, but by ABDC standards their routines and the dance style in general have gone stale, and Fr3sh didn’t quite have their identity established like the other crews outside of “We’re Asian!”.
Next Week’s Challenge - Beyonce Challenge. I see Vogue Evolution getting “All the Single Ladies” and knocking this challenge out of the park, and Southern Movement getting the boot. Tune in here next week to read Commentary and the Breakdown!
