SYTYCD Season 11 Auditions - Chicago & Los Angeles

It's week two of this summer's So You Think You Can Dance! Do you have any standout favorites quite yet? It's always hard to tell until we get to the week of callbacks, but sometimes there are some that truly make an impression at this stage. I do believe I pointed out Melanie and Eliana back in these early days. I'm not sure if I have anyone quite like that yet, but I did enjoy the tapping girl Valerie tonight. She's just dang cute! And the little pop and locker Jaja was fun as well. We'll see if they make it very far!

Anyway, let's get on with it...

First up... Day 2 in Chicago

Nigel and Mary are joined by Fabrice Calmels, ballet dancer and choreographer who we've never met before on the show.

Paul "The Puppet" Brushaber - He has some crazy good moves. Kind of a mix of animation and fluidity to make himself look like a puppet. Mary wants him to go straight through to the next round, but the other two aren't quite sure. They give him a ticket.

Emily James - Auditioned twice before. Contemporary. She's decent, I'm not sure she's super amazing. Dance seemed pretty planned out, though maybe too planned out. Fabrice calls it solid, and I agree, it is solid, but not sure it had that wow factor. She gets straight through.

Franchesca Bass - Girl with alopecia. Contemporary with a quirky factor.  She has a very strong style to her dancing, could use a little work on her transitions (or I don't know what I'm talking about). Very athletic feeling. She goes through.

Jenna Scaccia - Ballet dancer. She seems a bit smiley for the intense score that she chose. But generally she is pretty flowy and clean. The judges are all pretty effusive, she gets a ticket.

James Thomas - Popper, specializing in contortion and bopping, whatever that is. Eeek those contortion moves are freaky. When he mentions he's had other training, they send him through to choreography, but it's a bit too much for him to handle and he bows out.

And then.... Day 1 in Los Angeles...

Joining Nigel and Mary this time is frequent SYTYCD judge and actress Christina Applegate.

Jessica Richens - She likes being sexy on stage? Oh gosh, Nigel will love it. She's actually pretty good, tough, despite the flailing about on the ground and hair dancing. The judges all love it and give her a ticket without even talking at all really.

Valerie Rockey - Tapper. She's got a very sunshine quality about her, and some fast feet when she gets into it. The crowd claps for her for quite a long time. Nigel is always a huge fan of tap, though he does have a couple of criticisms. They send her to choreography. She makes it through to the next round.

Jana "Jaja" Vankova - Animation and krump. Wow, you don't see girls do this very often, so it makes me immediately like her. And she has the chops to match, gets the judges on their feet, and they immediately give her a ticket.

Kyle Taylor - Popping. May be his first time dancing in front of people. He doesn't hit quite hard enough, but does have a fluidity to his legs. He has a lot of spirit despite being a little goofy. They bring up Cyrus, Fik-Shun and Legacy for a kind of battle thing. He's not as good as them, but definitely holds his own. He goes to choreography. He can't quite do it, so he bows out.

Justine Lutz - Contemporary. She's really quite beautiful. Has an almost tribal vibe to some of her moves that I really like. They give her a ticket straightaway as well.

Mauricio Vera and Deise Mendoca - Ballet dancers. The thing about male ballet dancers is that they almost seem like background for the women to shine in front of. I suppose if she looks that good then he must be pretty good too. They make it through, of course.

Hailee Payne - Jazz funk, which basically means that she's got full on quirk in the style of Sonya. She definitely has some charisma to her that makes her beg to be seen, but could get old if she's a little too over the top. She gets a ticket.

Sebastian Serra - Returning contestant, almost made it to the end last year. He's got a strong kind of ballet contemporary combo thing. Of course he goes on to the next round, you kidding? Sheesh.

Dani Platz - Wow they give her a lot of backstory stuff about her eating disorder and treatment. Obviously she must actually be pretty good or they wouldn't be spending this amount of time. And, yes, she's pretty good, very emotional. They send her to choreography. She makes it through to the next round.

Marie Bonnevay aka "Mary Poppins" - Popping. She has this weird kind of lounge music for her dance, which is so unexpected for popping. Fik-Shun comes up and starts dancing with her when she heads up to the judges table, and it's actually quite heartwarming and cute. She goes through to the next round.

Well, that's it for this week! I have to say, it was nice to see some of the old favorites Fik-Shun, Cyrus and Legacy get up on stage and do their thing as well. Looks like we may be seeing a lot of Fik-Shun as an all-star in the upcoming season too, just judging based on the opening credits and this. He is definitely featured more than Amy even though they were co-winners. ANYway! You'll notice I did not really talk about the certain Canadian's reappearance this week, and that's how it shall remain. Until next week, I bid thee adieu!

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