ANTM and Hopefully Not ANTP/VP

That's right. It's back. The Models have returned with a vengeance of a two hour premiere to kick off the season known for beautiful cat fights and drama, amazing photography and creative shoots, whirling dervish trips and go-sees and the inevitable bevy of unreal comments. It fit nicely right behind the Republican National Convention that I watched for both horror and comedic genre purposes. Some good quotes from some of those folks after the Model jump. The first episode narrowed from 33 to 20 and then they bounced to 14. Hard to believe that this is Cycle 11. At any rate, on with the hilariousness, and seriousness, that is ANTM.

- Elina, 18, Seattle, WA. She's a vegan, just above shoulder length dark hair, more on the pale side with a tattoo across her stomach. Quite experienced and comfortable with her sexuality encompassing both genders, she's told other girls already (in the first half hour of the episode) that she has a crush on Clark. She states, "I'm starting to develop a crush on Clark. I love taking girls over to my side. It's my sport. It really is." Interesting.

- Clark comes out of Pawleys Island, SC (someone Google that for me) and she might not be looking around for romance. She's a self-proclaimed bitch who says she will use that bitchiness to be competitive. I love the cut throat style here...she says she'll stomp a girl if she has to. Although, what I don't love is her self-obsession. "I've always seen myself as exceptional to other people." Gag me. Then she gets Bureucracy as the theme for her photo shoot, but she's not sure what that is.

- Sheena from Harlem is this Hipster Asian girl who speaks either Japanese or Korean (she said she was both and one of the hosts started speaking a foreign language with her. I don't speak either, so I don't know which) She tells the camera, "Sheen is Sheena." Boom! then imagine a thick Harlem accent as she practically licks her lips upon Nigel Barker's entrance, "Out pops Nigel. Are you kidding me?! He looks like a Ken doll!" I'm going to save this on Tivo just to watch this part again.

- In the great comments about the hosts section, we have Nikeysha from Bronx, NY upon hearing that she's made it into the competition..."Oh my God! Take me aboard the mothership with these hot aliens!"

- Joslyn has auditioned in at least two cities for every cycle of ANTM. I think that means she's auditioned 22 times. She finally gets on, so she means it when she says, "When I say I want something, I will pray and pray and I will get off my butt and go and get it done." That's someone who believes that God helps those who help themselves.

- Samantha, 18 from Woodland Hills, CA. She's cute in that SoCal sorta way, but, um, she's bummed out that she's missing prom, and her first statement on the show is that she wants to change the industry and make it her own...then she couldn't name a a single model working in the industry, proving to the judges that she wanted to change what she didn't understand. So I don't understand why they took her on the program.

- I love one of the hairstylists...he's in every season and is a very nice constant. With every different model in every season who says, "this is so exciting," the guy is a sport and acts like it's the first time he's heard it. Trooper.

- ANTM is nothing without the innocent girl from the middle of nowhere. This year we have Hannah, 18, from Fairbanks, Alaska. She's a trailblazer, like Palin, who has struck out from the wilds of the wilderness where she grew up without heat, power or hot water, and was once chased on her paper delivery route by a moose. In the first photo shoot, they're supposed to take on a voting theme for the election. She tells us, "My topic was nuclear weapons. Obviously I understand that they have damaging effects, but I'm not sure how I feel about them." Well, at least she's honest. She greets her acceptance onto the show with, "I'm from Alaska. We don't even have billboards, like, this is so cool!"

- In an interesting development, we have Isis from Prince George's County, MD. If that's not a Wire city, I don't know what is. Nigel says about her, "Isis, I think she's actually the only one that really knew her stuff. But, that being said, there's something about Isis that's unusual." What Nigel couldn't pin, the other girls did in the first episode, and they were not happy...Isis is transgender. It was intriguing to watch the reaction as they found out. Some of the girls were typical in their naivete and prejudice, others were very supportive, and then you had the third group...they didn't really care either way, they just didn't get why they had to compete with someone who was still carrying male parts. She took fantastic photographs though, and got through to the next round.

- Finally, I have some gems of wisdom from the RNC....the Governor of Hawaii said it best..."Mere words, no matter how eloquently delivered, will never replace the decisive actions..." Someone should tell the speech writer that the clause after "mere words" turns the "will never" into a double negative. Nothing like speaking grammatically incorrectly when talking about the eloquent delivery of words.

- Mike Huckabee. Ah, Mike Huckabee. How's this for a quote: "I'm not a Republican because I grew up rich. I'm a Republican because I didn't want to spend the rest of my life poor, waiting for the government to rescue me." Ya, because THAT'S what all those Democrats are doing. Wow.