Abigail M. Schilling

[ANTM spoilers]

Doahleigh asked for my Top Model thoughts and the truth is I have the exact same thoughts about ANTM that I do about AI. It's gimmicky, yes. And also, I like it.

I was pretty sure Whitney was going to win on account of Tyra kissing her ass to the maximum extreme and then once they went abroad there were a ton of rumors that she was the winner and I've been watching this show for long enough that I deserve spoilers okay? So I was fairly confident in the Whitney Win. Anya did cast some good doubt on the rumors with her awesomeness, but Tyra hates nice people. Tyra loves bitches. Figures. Ha!

(But wasn't Anya so nice? I doubt she's even dumb, PAULINA. CW website has all these deleted-scenes-type videos and all of Anya is like kittens and flowers and sound advice and encouraging words. Seriously, go watch. "I'm proud of myself. And I know my family is proud of me. And that's all I can ask for. I'm so thankful." LOVE.)

(Did you go to that link? Did you get lost in the videos? Did hours pass by before you realized you were using waking hours on The CW website? No? Just me? Okay.)

What was I saying?

Whitney was going to win from the beginning. BECAUSE there are stories. Have you guys heard them? Rewind til last cycle when Saleisha won. There were stories about her because a) she was a in a nationwide commercial, b) she was in a fashion show on the Tyra Show, c) she was in Tyra's camp thing when she was a kid, and d) her and Tyra were BFF and it was totes shady. The theory was that ANTM was tired of getting a bad rap for having winners not be top models and so they planted someone who had "star potential" into the competition so she could beat all the other girls, take the crown, and legitimize America's Next Top Model. I don't recall any sort of statement from the network explaining why it was so shady and really, they can break their own rules so I don't think it matters. But everyone was all DRAMA about it.

It's happening again. Here's why: Whitney has previous modeling experience, and she was model-skinny when she was a previous model. The theory goes that she was scouted, asked to put on weight, be confident, and she'd be guaranteed to make it pretty far. If you want to believe this story it's fairly easy to find it inside of the cycle. Whitney never getting booted even though she was in the bottom two all the time. Whitney being accused of "being fake" and "acting" and her saying that is exactly who she is. (Watch the CW deleted videos of her and she does seem really actress-y no matter what she's talking about. And not in a bad way. In a way that makes me want to watch her in Gossip Girl. But, uh, also, Whitney, are you a cheater pants?)

I liked Whitney mostly. I thought she was funny at first. Then I thought she was annoying and a hater. Then I liked her. Then I didn't. Whatevs. I didn't like Anya at first and then I did. And my hate/hate less relationship with Fats made me think too hard. I didn't care about anyone in this cycle very much (although I was curious about Kat because I thought it was funny when she called out Tyra for pronouncing her name wrong and also they NEVER showed her so I thought maybe out of nowhere she'd win after some big revelatory chat with Tyra that forced her out of her shell or whatever. Oh well). So, just like Idol I don't care who won. I'm excited to watch Whitney's My Life as a Covergirl segments next cycle because she does the role well, and I don't really care what else she does with her time.

And I don't think most Top Model viewers care how successful the models are post-show. Sometimes people like to throw around information and talk about how runner-ups are more successful than winners or whatever (see: Idol, again) but truly, CW, I swear, nobody cares. We don't even understand fashion really. ANTM viewers aren't buying designer clothes which is why fashion is never really spotlighted in the show. So why do you care so much to have a famous model?

But maybe people are mad about the skinny thing. And so I get the political Whitney win. Because if you're not going to worry about fashion or high fashion or whatever then you should worry about being a role model and models are too skinny. So, good on you, Tyra. My roommate (a teacher) says all her young impressionable students watch the show and if they have time between their Tyra mockings to dwell on other things, they might be wondering if they should lose weight to get on the show and win. And that's too bad.

They shouldn't get too fat though. Just model fat.