America's Next Top Recap: Bottom 2 Much

So after reading the part of my cable system's description for last night's episode of "Top Model" that said "One of the models screams at the judges during elimination," my girlfriend Erica and I tried to figure out which one of our final five that could possibly be.

Then a few minutes later we realized it was more than likely a fake out and the judges would probably ask either Elina or Marjorie to scream at them to break out of their shells.

The fact that we figured this out so easily illustrates just how predictable and tiresome Elina (pictured, right) and Marjorie have become.

Their respective issues (Elina is too controlled, Marjorie is too awkward and nervous) were amped up last night for the go-see episode. By that same token, we continued to see the rise and improvement, in different ways, of the remaining three, non-European contestants.

When the awesome Frederick Koster — I could listen to this guy berate models in his Dutch accent all day, the same way I enjoy watching Steve Wilkos berate bad parents and child molesters — announced the models would be taking (unbelievably slow) boats on their go-sees, I was a bit disappointed. Sure, we're told that the point of the go-sees is to find out if the finalists are able to book jobs with designers, but we all know it's really a competition to see which girl can do the best job of not getting lost while wandering around a foreign country. Now they were taking that away by having the girls taken to their destinations by boats?

Happily, the girls still found a few opportunities to get themselves lost. And by "the girls", I really mean Marjorie who got SO lost and got insider her own brain so much that I wouldn't have been surprised if her head actually exploded in the middle of that Dutch square. When she finally saw two designers and failed to book any jobs, she packed it up and boated home early.

The rest of the girls fared considerably better. The best was definitely McKey, who booked all four jobs she went to. While Samantha and Analeigh have to fight the dreaded c-word (no, not THAT one — not THAT one either — I mean, "commercial") McKey is, by far, the most high-fashion girl left. Well, Marjorie is also has fashion, but has the disadvantage of being a complete basket case.

Victory seemed assured for McKey until the part where she decided to blankly sightsee and arrived a few minutes late (much to the scornful delight of Fredrick Koster). That meant Analeigh won the prize (by default), despite (sweaty, tattooed) Elina complaining that she should've won. Whatever, Elina. As a reward, Analeigh won a piece from each of the designers' works. Meanwhile, McKey stared blankly (she seems to do this a lot).

With Sheena gone, there wasn't anything interesting going on in the house. Unless you count Marjorie bathing in front of Analeigh again (you have to be European to get it) and fretting that her presence in the competition was a hoax. Then again, I stopped considering any of Marjorie's fretting interesting about a month ago. Still, at certain points last night, her complaining got so intense that I actually felt sad for her for a moment. Then I snapped out of it and went back to my exaggerated eye-rolling.

This week's photo shoot was actually a clever idea. The girls would be photographed in black and white displaying their more natural, casual looks before taking an additional, glammed-up photograph. Oh yeah, the photographer was also Tyra.

Samantha was crowned the best of the bunch, due to her Calvin Klein-esque casual shot, (which obscured her underrated glam shot). One thing that's vexing about this show (out of many) is watching the judges fawn over a shot like Samantha's one week and then rip her a new one the following week for being too commercial. Holy mixed messages, Batman!

McKey had another strong showing, and Paulina brought up a point that I hadn't really considered — McKey's come a long way since the girl in the first week of this cycle that had no idea how to pose and had to rely on her boxing skills. Analeigh's casual photo was a disappointment, but she made up for it thanks to her busted legs in her glam shot.

The bottom two, predictably, was Elina and Marjorie. Elina, unsurprisingly, had trouble letting go during the photo shoot, especially when Tyra implored her to act crazy. Meanwhile, Tyra said she was unenthusiastic about shooting Marjorie, which is surprising because the one thing Marjorie does well is perform well in her photo shoots. Then I reread what I wrote a few paragraphs ago about how Marjorie makes me roll my eyes and feel sad and I understood.

While Marjorie appears to be in the midst of a nervous breakdown and performed worse than Elina this week, I agree with the judges' decision to send Elina home. You can't be in the bottom two three weeks in a row and stick around without it seeming obvious the judges want you to win (the show pushed these limits with Whitney last year). Here's hoping Marjorie finds a nice Dutch therapist, or some decent Dutch anti-depressants to settle her down for the home stretch in this competition because she can actually win this damn thing.

So what'd you think of this episode? Why does Tyra always find a way to lie down on the ground for the photo shoot? Did you notice that "Tyra Mail" became "Tyra Post" after the move to Europe? Have tattoos and long nails always been a big deal or are they only a big deal when you want to cut Elina loose? Finally, do you either of the commercial girls (Samantha, Analeigh) can beat out their high-fashion counterparts.