America's Next Top Model: Cycle 7 Recaps:
Episode 9 “The Girl Who Sticks Her Foot in Her Mouth" (page 3)
by D. Yueh

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Dinner for Two — Melrose's prize is a private chef cooking for her and CariDee at the house. Turns out supermodel treatment is not an eight-ball of coke and a wave-through at the hottest club in Barcelona.

The girls sit down to a gourmet meal of fresh fish while Eugena resorts to eating a banana and complaining the kitchen stinks. “It's grossing me out, so I'm glad I didn't eat anything off of that gourmet menu,” she says. Nobody invited you anyway, remember?

Tyra Mail — “Don't let the photographer bully you.” The girls immediately assume they're going bull riding. Eugena has no problem — as long as it's a mechanical bull. She likes her bulls fake. Hello? You're in Spain. This isn't Laredo, ya dumbasses. It isn't bull riding, it's bull fighting.

Ya Mess With the Bull, Ya Get the Horns — Even when she finds herself standing in an empty bull-fighting ring, CariDee says she “doesn't know what to expect.” You're there to play ping-pong, Fargo. I have no patience for her today.

Out walks Jay in a super-shiny brocade matador get-up. Liberace called. He wants his pants back.

Eugena says, “He doesn't look like a matador, he looks …” Her brain is scrambling for a good joke. “… like Mr. Jay in a matador costume.” Gah! Eugenius, you are too frigging funny! Woo! My sides hurt.

“You girls are going to be shooting with a real big bully,” Jay says. On cue, a lumbering beast known for his foul moods emerges from the shadows. It's not a four-legged bull. It's Nigel. He saunters out holding a walking stick of some kind.

Nigel and Jay lock eyes in a Clint Eastwood close-up. Jay is wearing more eyeliner than Ellen's raccoon makeup. He looks like a gay commando.

Everyone is psyched to have Nigel come out from behind the panel table and work with them on-site. CariDee says, “It makes me very nervous because he's a judge, and he has a lot of say, and there's a lot to impress.”

The final surprise, Jay reveals, is there will in fact be a real bull in the ring with them. Running for your life makes for fabulicious facial expressions, so I'm expecting great things from this exercise.

They let the bull out, and it's a feisty thing. It looks like it weighs over 1,000 pounds. It charges across the ring, and the handlers run like hell to get behind the wall. “This thing could kill me,” says Melrose. Is it better to be impaled by a bull's horns during a challenge or be suffocated in her sleep with a pillow by Eugena?

While the gang is watching the bull run around the ring, out of the blue CariDee leans over and asks Nigel, who's still holding his walking stick, “Did you just remove that from your ass from the last panel?”

Oh. My. God. You really do have a death wish, don't you? Nice knowing ya, Fargo.

“That is not how you talk to a judge; that is not how you talk to a photographer,” admonishes Jay later, after the girls have their makeup and wardrobe on.

CariDee says to the other girls, “I was totally joking. Is that totally wrong to say?” Maybe someone like Miss J. would've had a comeback like, “No, but it's going to be up yours at the next panel,” and it's over. But CariDee done messed with the wrong judge.

Melrose and the dead girl are getting big honkin' hair balloons coiffed to the sides of their heads. CariDee is worried Nigel doesn't like her. Melrose explains, “Dude, I mean, you told him to pull the thing out of his ass.” Melrose seems psyched because she knows this only helps her.

Meanwhile, Amanda has troubles of her own. In makeup she looks horridly draggy, and her costume only accentuates the fact that she's basically a living, breathing stick figure.

“If you hear the handlers yell ‘run,’ it's not meant to panic you,” Jay says to Amanda with a totally straight face. “That's your cue to go around the wall.” OK, but did you have to tell her that standing next to the ambulance? For Amanda's sake, I hope those handlers speak English.

Eugena has to go first. They hand her a stick to use as a prop because a matador's cape will be Photoshopped in later. She's got a bun on the side of her head as big as her face. Eugena's having an emotion: fear. In case of emergency, she says she's just going to run because she doesn't plan on “getting bucked by no bull.”

Nigel is ready for her and says, “This is your moment; don't freeze up on me now.” And try not to crap your pants.

Eugena strikes a few good poses by arching her back and holding the stick out in various ways. Jay sees real model potential in her because she wasn't intimated by the bull or Nigel.

Amanda, on the other hand, is terrified of both of them. Not that it matters; she's usually stiff at shoots that involve movement. The bull stamps its feet and makes like he's going to charge, and Amanda bolts for the wall. She could always just hide behind the stick she's holding.

Michelle wants to know what Amanda did wrong, but suddenly Amanda isn't interested in helping her sister and says she's talking too much. Hmm. A little sibling rivalry, finally? I am so amped up for these two to have a fight.

Nigel thinks Michelle “used her fear” and did much better than her twin. For the last 20 frames, Michelle decides she just doesn't care anymore, and that's when she does her best.

Nigel tells Melrose he wants to see “arrogant pride.” Gee, how will she ever find it in herself to show that? Melrose doesn't look right. Her nose looks ginormous in the noonday sun. Her poses are dull and listless, just like the bull, who's starting to look really bored.

CariDee goes last. She crosses herself silently as she steps out into the ring. The bull isn't the thing that's going to hurt her. Nigel, the consummate professional, reminds her to breathe. Jay thinks all her ass pouting (sticking her butt out as far as she can) makes her look like a porn star. CariDee Does Barcelona. One male model at a time.

At the end of the shoot, she apologizes to Nigel. She's probably learned her lesson, but is it too late? Does anyone care at this point?

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