Let me say upfront, I've never watched this show before. That's right, I said it. I'm not sure why – a show featuring a gaggle of beautiful women wearing very little sounds good to me. I have no problem objectifying women. What's better than when a really hot shampoo girl leans into you as she applies the conditioner? Don't pretend you don't know what I'm talking about. That reminds me, I need a hair cut.

Models. Yeah. Do I really need to know about the behind-the-scenes machinations, witness the constant obsession with hair, posture, clothes and what one's neck looks like at any given moment? Maybe it's the same reason I don't want to see how sausage is made.

That said, I'm going to give this show a chance. Let's go into the sausage factory, shall we?

Tyra Banks has brought together a new group of contestants who are all predictably tall, thin and under 25 years old. They have names like Jaeda, Evita, CariDee, Melrose, Jaslene, Eugena, Leangela, and Anchal. I can't believe I have to add these names to my custom dictionary.

There's a couple of generic white girls from the heartland whom I can't tell apart from each other, a few African-Americans, one Indian and a set of identical twins who might be Chloe Sevigny's poor relations, but really, they're just spooky looking. I always wondered what happened to the twins from The Shining.

Some of the girls are greeted at the airport by J. Alexander, the runway trainer, but you can call him Miss J. Miss J is wearing a drag queen's interpretation of a flight attendant's uniform, complete with a model airplane glued to the top of his hat.

Before they even leaves the grounds at LAX, Miss J tells the girls they have to do a shoot right there on Level 5 of the parking garage, because he explains, real models are used to “getting off a plane, going straight to location.” As he says this, he's doing the stewardess hand gesture thing and wearing an airplane life vest over his flight attendant uniform. Awesome.

Each girl gets a set of pictures taken against a blue backdrop that's taped to the wall, which I think is really unfair – no one looks their best after a long plane ride. Headrest head is not a “look.”

Their first morning, the girls are sitting down to a rooftop breakfast when the Aswirl twins from cycle 6, Ron and Richard Harris, come out from behind the some panels and starting twirling like big gay dervishes.

From between the spinning brothers emerges Tyra Banks, who does a turn or two of her own, and the girls go wild at the very sight of her. I love that these women squeal with delight and excitement for another woman, because there isn't enough of that in the world. “This is my favorite part of Top Model,” Tyra exclaims, as some of the girls wipe away tears of joy. She gives them a welcome speech in which she cheers: “I want you to be yourselves, because that's what got you here. And if you come into that room and you're nervous, I want you to say, ‘Tyra! I'm nervous!'”