Dancing with the Stars: All-Stars, Week 10 — The Winner is… 

And the winner is…..WAIT! Before we get to that there are a few things to discuss! To begin with, this was the first time it was an all-female finale! You go girls! (Who still says that? Apparently anyone stuck in the 90s.) What I loved about these final performances is that they were all so different. I’m not even going to discuss the first dances because we all know that it comes down to the Freestyle. (Or did it?)  Since it was an all-star season, the freestyle couldn’t just be any freestyle; it had to be a “Super” Freestyle. The difference being that they could have other dancers in the number as well as any crazy props! Here’s how it broke down in my opinion:

• Kelly and Val – Not only did Val play the violin, but Kelly did aerial work by herself. Then you realize it was a tribute to the final scene in Dirty Dancing! (How could you not love that? Nobody puts Kelly in a corner. Wow, I’m sounding a bit corny.) I thought this was the perfect ending for this pair because the question remains: Are they really a couple or not? No one had the chemistry that these two had. The best part was that finally these crazy kids got their first 10s of the season! Good timing.

•  Melissa and Tony – They did a contemporary dance, which was something they had not done before. I thought it was really good, but I thought it might hurt them in the end. The reason I say this is because all of the champions in the past that had won, had upbeat dances. But they were in first place at the end of the night with two perfect scores.

•  Shawn and Derek – They had the Fab five! You know who I’m talking about right? If you watch this show you must watch gymnastics at the Summer Olympics. Hello gold medal-winning Women’s gymnastics team! Talk about pulling all the stops. (Side bar: I do have to say that Derek and Shawn took a risk on their first dance, because they broke the rules, so their scores put them in 3^rd place. They did get perfect 10s on the 2^nd dance. Just saying….) Anyway, I saw one of the most amazing stunts I have ever seen done on this show. Shawn stands on Derek’s shoulder and they start to fall forward and end it in somersaults totally in sync with each other.

Now Tuesday night all three finalists had to do one more dance. Here’s the kicker: they wouldn’t know the dance or song until it was told to them live on the air and they would have about 45 minutes to work on it and then perform it. They had 3 dances to choose from. All three couples practiced the night before so they would be prepared to dance all three of them.

And they did a great job: Kelly and Val, along with Melissa and Tony earned all 9.5 scores from the judges. Shawn and Derek got perfect 10s. At this time anyone of them could have won because the voting was so close.

SPOILER ALERT:

• It was first announced that Kelly and Val were in 3^rd place.  They were both grateful and Kelly stated that she felt like they all won.

•  Drum roll please:  The Dancing with the Stars: All-Star Winners were:  Melissa and Tony! (I think Tony can say he is even with the producers for giving him Kate Gosselin as a partner.)

Well the first All-Star season is done! Were you happy with the results? I’ll see you back in the spring and see who the new crops of dancers are!