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After an interminable wait, America’s Best Dance Crew is finally back! I have been on the lookout for what seems like years (ok, months) but premiere night has finally come! As always, the invisible “Randy Jackson” was pulled out to do an introduction only to be put away in the American Idol drawer until the final episode where he will present the trophy and everyone can wonder “Who is that?” again.

In any case, some of the changes this season include focusing on a particular artist per week. This week was Lil Wayne and we’ve been promised Ke$ha (thankfully, that is the the first time I’m ever typing that), Katy Perry, and Justin Bieber among others. This year’s guest judge is Dominick Sandoval from Quest Crew (and So You Think You Can Dance), one of my personal favorites. Now, I’m not going to profess to be a dance expert or anything but I sure enjoy the hell out of this show as well as SYTYCD. And, I’ve been known to take a class or two myself, just enough to know that I suck but can appreciate how hard it is to do any of that stuff.

This episode focused on the first five crews: I aM Me (Houston, TX), Eclectic Gentlemen (North Hollywood, CA), Request Dance Crew (Auckland, New Zealand), Phunk Phenomenon (Boston, MA), and Street Kingdom (Los Angeles, CA).

First up was I aM Me crew, which stands for Inspire, Motivate and Energize. Watching the intro, I noticed one guy who looked familiar and holy crap, is that Phillip Chbeeb from SYTYCD season 5? Awesome! I always love it when I see familiar faces. This guy was amazing in his popping and he was able to stick it out for quite a bit on that show through many styles until the ill-fated Russian folk dancing experiment in week 5 where they just kinda whirled around a lot. But, Phillip is a much better dancer than that and this group did a really great performance to “Right Above It” to kick off the season. Sharp, inventive, and their strength was in their intricate hand movements. One of the highlights was a tutting section that felt very kaleidoscope-like. Dominick said that this was the way to open the season.

Next up was Phunk Phenomenon, a group whose style is self-described “organized chaos”. One of the defining points of this group is that there are three brothers who ended up losing their father before they were able to be on the show which as everyone knows in reality tv, this means that they might go home. Cute group. I thought they were sharp and danced their asses off. The song was “A Milli”.

On to the group from New Zealand, Request Crew. Nice to see that ABDC is opening itself up to the world. These girls are all of Polynesian background and have nicknamed their style “Polyswag” which was out in full force during the song “Knockout”. They were ok. They’ll probably stick around for a bit and I’m looking forward to seeing more although for some reason they made me nostalgic for Beat Freaks from season 3.

Now for some elegance from the sexy guys in bow ties, Eclectic Gentlemen from North Hollywood, CA dancing to “Fireman”. They also got on my watch list for ones who might go home since more crying was involved during the intro. During the critique, the first words that came out from D-trix were “Ya’ll making this waaaaaayyyy tooo hard” and I was like uh oh, that doesn’t sound promising. I also thought he was gonna call them out for dressing like Quest Crew during one of their final performances. It didn’t get any better with L’il Mama’s observation that they went from smooth to hard-hitting and that by being on the show they already knew what it is and that they should just “keep pressing forward and not let anyone stop them from being what they want to be”. Okay,…got it. Trying to say something without really saying anything, gotcha. JC Chasez did get into some choreo critique and said that they seemed stiff. Ok, I bet it’s them that go.

And finally Street Kingdom from LA. Now THIS was getting amazing. Raised on the inner streets of South Central and being from quite difficult backgrounds, this group has found fellowship in the church. Ceasare “Tight-Eyez” Willis is one of the original members of krumping which is an aggressive style of dance and was born out of trying to channel negative circumstances into positive expression. If you haven’t, definitely go and Netflix “Rize”, which Willis is in and was shot by David LaChapelle. It’s a very interesting look at the origins of krump and clowning – its predecessor – and what role it has played in its community. Some of the visuals are just stunning. So, of course they are my favorites and I am very curious to see how they do. I impress easily but I’m so impressed that they are on this show. They have more members than life itself anyways – 10 at last count. Obviously they are not in this for the prize money.

So in the end, of course Street Kingdom just aced through to the next week, followed by Phunk Phenomenon. I aM Me made it which brought it down to the girls and the Gentlemen. In the end, it was the Gentlemen that had to go home, as expected. Overall, it looks like an extremely promising season. There was no group that I could just say that I hated or just visibly sucked, so that was a relief. Who are your favorites? Anything stand out to you?