America's Next Top Model Episode 13 (Finale)

Last week on Shame On You For Getting Hypothermia:
Girls flamenco-ed. Eugena won the dancing challenge and she and Amanda got expensive clothing. Melrose had a breakdown and it was awesome. They had to be ethereal nymphs in pairs, shooting in a pool with cold water. Caridee literally froze, which means she's not as special as Tyra, who's never done a cold shoot in her life. Top Model broke up with Amanda and sent her home.



This week on The Episode Where CariDee Becomes America's Next Top Model:
We begin with the question, "Who will be America's Next Top Model?" Will it be Eugena, the girl who should have gone home weeks ago when she was in the bottom two with Brooke? Will it be Melrose, the annoying bipolar brown-nosing perfectionist with bug eyes and fish lips in all of her photos? Or will it be CariDee, the girl who is the perfect mix or talent, natural beauty, bubbliness, craziness, and determination? Hmmm..

Since this is the finale and they've decided to cram it into a one hour show, everything seems really rushed, especially the first half leading to the last elimination. We enter this episode immediately at a Covergirl commercial and photoshoot. And Dani(elle), last season's winner, is the special guest. She looks excited because this is probably the biggest job she's landed since winning.. a spot as a guest on Top Model! That must have been hard to bag.

They bring up the fact that it's now Dani, not Danielle, and as she's talking, I see the lightbulb go on in Eugena's head. Dani's the most recent winner. Dani's black. Dani was much better on the show than Eugena. Hmmm. They've never had a blonde winner before. Looks like somebody might be sent home soon.

As they've getting make-up and hair for the commercial, Melrose is practicing her lines really loudly and it's bothering Cari. She says she's got to stop listening to Melrose and Melrose says, "Then stop listening to me, ho." Classy. Eugena lets us know that she and Cari want it to be the two of them in the final two because Melrose sucks balls.

Caridee starts off rough and can't get her lines straight. She lets loose and goes a little crazy for a bit and then does a great job with the commercial.

Eugena is stiff. Surprise! She's bland and looks and sounds pretty dead. And with that lipstick on there? Her lips look huge. Somehow she pulls off a better performance eventually.

Melrose is nervous and messes up her lines. Then she gets all aggressive and tries to force the product to the viewers. Jay tells her that there's time for one more and she wants a hundred more because she wants to be perfect. Ugh. Jay tells her he doesn't wnt fake energy from her. She does a decent job on the last go around.

Then she proceeds to mini-freak out and the hair guy has to tell her to calm down and focus on the photoshoot. In the photoshoot, her lips are quivering. She's too tense throughout and her expression comes out looking forced.

Cari tries to look relaxed and blissful and she looks a lot like the shot of her in the intro. Occasionally, her eyes go a little crazy, but on film, I'm sure everything came out great. She looks amazing.

Eugena doesn't want Tyra to tell her she has dead eyes anymore. The clip of her doing her shoot is really short because, you know, you have to cut down the episode somewhere.

Then they have to do a scene in the commercial where they're all together. And they have gorgeous dresses on, by the way. When they say "Covergirl," they're supposed to all fall back onto a couch and Caridee totally flashes the camera.

TyraMail: Final 3 Judging

Tyra is wearing a red dress with black at the top of the bust, which makes it look like she wore a bra that was too big for the dress. Cari looks like a model. She's dressed really model-y. Melrose is either wearing black pants that have a weird shine to them or she's wear shear leggings. It's weird.

They watch the commercial, which is pretty good. It's cute at least. Tyra thinks it's good and Cari responds with one of her open-mouthed big laughs.

Melrose is up first. They don't like her photo. Tyra says maybe Melrose isn't a natural beauty shot girl. Which is basically saying maybe she's not actually beautiful. Which is mean and funny. Haha.

Eugena might have some personality, judging from the commercial. Her beauty shot is good, too, but the judges wonder why she's still here. I think they suddenly realized, "We've gotten rid of ten girls and this one's still around?"

Cari is over the top in her commercial. They point out what I didn't see the first go around. Cari frowns every once in awhile during the commercial and it's very slight, but I think it's related to how in the Spanish commercial, her eyes were all crazy. When she thinks, she can't control her facial expressions. It's really interesting. Just barely noticeable, though. And her film is incredible, apparently. Her shot is gorgeous and they say she blew the other two away.

Judgement: Miss J says "it's the CariDee mystery." Melrose isn't a natural. Eugena doesn't want it enough.

Cari is called first, which means she joins Naima as one of only two girls who have been called first in final 3 judging and gone on to win the competition. Then, Tyra calls Melrose and CariDee makes this awesome face that's all "wtf?" As Tyra's talking to Melrose about how her photo sucked, Eugena looks back at Cari and Cari shakes her head slightly.

Then, in the best scene ever, Cari and Eugena are in the middle of this huge hug and Melrose tries to intercept it. Like, "Oh, we're in front of the judges. Pretend that they like me. Just pretend." I kinda wish Eugena would've said to Melrose, "Stop pretending. Nobody likes you." That would've been classy. Cari says to Eugena that she'll win it for her.

Now, on The Battle of the Blondes:
Eugena has written a letter for CariDee and we see her reading it as she and Melrose return to the loft. Eugena says it's about time that a natural blonde wins this. I totally agree. I would have been happy with either Brooke or CariDee.

TyraMail on the window of a car. When Tyra first came to Paris to begin modeling, she was only SEVENTEEN years old. Because remember, this show is all about Tyra.

The girls are shooting for Seventeen, the shot that will be the cover of the magazine. We get the pleasure of meeting the ever-so-scary Atoosa Rubenstein, the resident HBIC, as New York would say. By the way, if anyone hasn't watched that Ladies in Reality 06 video clip yet, scroll down a couple entries and watch the second video. New York and Deelishis both look really different. And our girls from this Top Model, Brooke, Jaeda, and AJ are there, along with Furonda and Joanie.

Let's take a moment and talk about that. Of course some excellent girls from Top Model were there, but for some other shows, it was so obvious that the girl there was like the seventh on the list of who they wanted. Courtney Marit from Survivor? The dress was slamming, but that chick is a little rough around the edges. And Melissa McGhee from Idol? I have a feeling people thought it was Katherine McPhee when she first came out. Definitely wasn't their first choice. Janelle looked great and Erika didn't look hoochie. Kristin Key was funny. I bet they had to offer all sorts of stuff to get anyone from LCS to come. Yolanda looked gorgeous. Who was that with her? Monica? I couldn't tell. The Deal or No Deal ladies were the ones I expected.. Tamika, Anja, and Claudia (former Barker's Beauty). Was that Tammy from The Apprentice? Looked very Apprentice-like. And Donyelle was ridiculous. She wasn't wearing a dress that seemed fancy enough for the event and then she proceeded to make ridiculous hand gestures. Awesome. And Wire, Tiger, and Red Oyster were Flav-alicious. Especially Red Oyster, being on her phone and all.

Furonda was fabulously Furonda-like as usual. Brooke looked cute and I wonder when this was shot because Brooke is back to blonde. It must have been fairly soon after the show ended, but then there's Jaeda's hair. It's considerably longer and if I do say so, looks amazing. I'm really glad that Jaeda looked so comfortable out there for all the times in the competition that she looked so uncomfortable. She was working it and looked really cute. AJ on the other hand, was just standing there looking awkward. I'm so glad Brookie and Jaeda were there. And Furonda. I miss her. Miss J at the end was ridiculous yet fabulous as always.

Anyway, so at the Seventeen shoot, there's also Beau Quillian, of Top Model Cycle 1 judging table, and George Holz, their photographer.

There's an awesome shot of Cari from the side with one arm over her head. I hope they use that one on the magazine and not the weird one with the yellow lollipop? What was that? Besides weird. What's funny is, Melrose is seen rinsing off the lollipop thing in the sink and I wonder if they made them use the same one. Because that would be amazing.

Melrose also uses this weird heart thing over her mouth. Atoosa says Melrose is really unique looking. Just like you, Atoosa. Just like you. Melrose also talks some bull about finding herself again. Did you look in the area where all the berets and fake tears were? Because that's where I would've looked. And then they left the shoot with large lollipops, so that must be some new theme of Seventeen?

TyraMail: Melrose pretends there are other people around and call out TyraMail a couple times, just being obnoxious and emphasizing the point that she's still there and other people aren't. TyraMail says something about not every couch is a modeling couch?

The girls meet with Tyra and Dr. Michelle, a life coach. They're probably hinting at the fact that Cari was once suicidal and want to make sure no relapse of that will occur. Well, here's how you ensure that, TyTy. Give her the title like she deserves. So basically, Cari is real in the interview and Melrose says some crap about how she's trying to find herself.

Runway Show! They get to be ghostly brides in one of the more ridiculous and also more excellent final runway shows of the series. I also liked the water one from Cycle 4. Dani is rejoining this episode to lead off the runway show. The first runway show she's done since her cycle ended, I'm guessing. Awww, poor sad non-supermodels these past winners have been. They have to pimp them out there by putting them back on the show.

So in the runway show, they have three walks, each one becoming more and more theatrical. The last one, they have to tear around the corner like crazed lunatics. Speaking of which, Miss J comes tearing around the corner to get prepared himself.

Dani reassured CariDee because even Dani knows who's gonna win. Tyra comes clomping in and makes her version of a crazy face. Then she wants to talk to the little girls that will be at the beginning of the show. They're adorable and Tyra's intention is to look like she's this nice supermodel that's good with kids. And it's true, it's a cute interaction because the kids are really cute.

So they start walking. Melrose has her serious face on. CariDee starts walking and I'm saying, "Don't fall, don't fall, please don't fall." They didn't cover up her tattoo. In walk number 2, they have to stop and stare down the model on the other side of the runway as they pass. So obviously, Melrose and CariDee will have to stare down each other. Nice.

So CariDee goes out first. On her way back and as Melrose is walking the other way, they stare down each other and Melrose does this weird lean-in thing where she stretches her neck out all strangely. Then Cari and the karma fairy decide that Melrose's train is too long and Cari accidentally steps on it and rips it. This is awesome because it obviously freaks Melrose out and she still has to go around the entire way. Then Miss J leaves to get all fashioned up for his entrance.

Melrose then proceeds to piss and whine. Like she cries a river, drinks it all up, and pisses on everybody's parade. Stupid Melrose. She's so annoying, even when Cari apologizes.

Miss J starts off the crazy scene with his running around hysterically. Then he goes into classic runway walk and it's pretty awesome. Melrose walks and holds up her dress a bit. Remember this when we go to judging later. Then Cari comes out and goes totally apeshit on us like CariDee is bound to do. It's wonderful in a ridiculous way.

Then it's the final walk down. As Dani is walking, Tyra actually stands up and motions for her to put her hands on her hips. While it's nice that Tyra's still invested in these girls after they leave, it's also kinda sad. Both because Tyra wants everybody to know that she's the best supermodel ever and also because Dani doesn't know how to do it right yet.

Backstage, we have the best moment ever. Melrose is sitting down and people are fanning her all over the place. In fact, so much so that one woman is taking her dress and fanning her with that. Hahahahaha. Because that's really what Melrose wants to be seeing and smelling right about now.

Final Two Judgement.. Tyra is wearing a yellow dress with a green waist band. It's not as hideous as other outfits, but it's a little Joy from So You Think You Can Dance when she wore that Big Bird dress. Tyra says, "Who would've guessed it would be Melrose and CariDee in the final two." Ummm.. me? I've been guessing it since like week four. And so have many other people. Haha.

As a sidenote, I love Cari's outfit. I love the dress, love the hair, and especially LOVE the shoes. So the judges liked Melrose's walk. They liked her crazy scene. They didn't like Cari's walk. I agree that her face was contorted horribly and it wasn't model-y. However, then Tyra proceeds to blow smoke about how Cari was holding the dress up too much and nobody could tell what the dress looked like. Well, like I said earlier, Melrose holds the dress up too and the only reason it looked better when she did it was because the dress that she was wearing was poofier.

They go through their old shots. Cari had a fabulous first shot. You know, she was called second that first week. Too bad it wasn't first. Then we could say she was first to begin with and first to end with. Whatever. Melrose sucked when she began and still sucks now. Mr. Jay then proceeds to stroke Tyra's ego. This is why he should never be on panel. Stop it. Then the matador shot? Nigel says it's one of his favorite shots of the entire thing. Either he's stroking his own ego or he's forgotten about how they dissed her that week.

In judgement, they talk about how Cari is a loose cannon and Melrose isn't likeable. Then Mr. Jay says that everybody on the panel is unpredictable and Tyra says, "Please. I'm not unpredictable. You know I'm gonna have a hair weave, lots of makeup on, and a dress cinched at the waist." Hahaha. So true. I'm glad she at least acknowledges once in awhile how ridiculous she is.

Tyra asks the girls what the competition has meant to them as they walk back out and CariDee thanks them for believing in her and gives a true answer. She's crying a little and then Melrose says, "You're going to make me cry," and tries to force out the tears. But we see no tears.



Tyra announces that this cycle's winner is CariDee and it's wonderful. It's really just great. Except they spelled it Caridee instead of CariDee. Oh well. This is one of the best Top Model finales ever! Yay CariDee! I'm gonna be on the look out for that issue of Seventeen.



And our reigning champ is now CariDee English! Until next cycle..