#antm2

9. Mercedes’ high fashion beauty shot

General Thoughts

Averages

Top 10 Performances

Bottom 10 Performances

JJ Awards

Contestant Commentary

Call-out Orders:

Week 1: Garden of Eden

Week 2: Steve Madden Shoes

Week 3: Laundry by Shelli Segal 

Week 4: Celebrity Icon Portrayal

Week 5: Quench Underwater Nymphs

Week 6: Black & White Beauty Shots & Rollitos Commercial

Week 7: Shake Your Body Music Video

Week 8: Solstice Sunglasses

Week 9: Nude Pairs

Week 10: High Fashion Beauty Shots

01. April Wilkner

I bet you guys saw this one coming. April is in my eyes the undeniable winner of Cycle 2, and this season wouldn’t have been the same without her.

The second April stepped into the show I knew that she would be one of my favourite contestants. With her racially abiguous beauty, she got me quickly intrigued by her, and looking forwards to see her produce great pictures in the various photoshoots. But I wasn’t expecting to be as strong and talented as she really was. She knocked down the competition with her very first photo, and she keep slaying week after week. She was able to pull off a great variety of concept : commercial (Steve Madden advert), high fashion (garden of Eden, Quench underwater), natural photoshoots (Black and white beauty shot), she ha dit all in the bag. And she was great in motion too, as her performance in the rollitos chips commercial was a brilliant one and the only one really memorable and worth to watch. I mean, for 8 weeks (out of 9) she remained in my top 3, receiving 4 first call out from me. And her runway walk, despite not being the best of the cycle, was a really solid one.

So you might wonder ; how a model that good was eliminated before the finale ? Well I don’t have the answer. April’s elimination is one of the most fucked up one I’ve ever seen. The judges kept praising her during all cycle, always gave her mostly good feedback, good call outs and eventually a first call out. But once it was down to the final 4, it seemed like judges suddenly turned off on her. She was shown struggling during the shoot, but so was Mercedes and she offered as many great poses as her , and unlike Mercedes she was fully invested in the shoot. But then they chose deliberatly one of the photos where she didn’t look great only to justify saving Mercedes over her. They just get rid of April at top 4, even with a bad photo she should have stayed, her performance was absolutely faultless to that point. Yes, I understand why she could be seen as « too intellectual » at times, but at the end of the day, only the results matter and hers were consistently stellar so why does it matter ?

April wasn’t only an excellent model, she also was a sincerely nice person. She never got confrontational or rude to anyone, she was always handling the situations with class and professionalism. When she forgot to wake up Jenascia she considered going back into the house to do so but the other girls said that she wouldn’t be back in time, so she did the right thing when she got into the car, as she had to think about herself first in this situation. I also love the way she always was analysing various things, like when Shandi cheated in Italy, there was something hilarious in the way she stated how fucked up irrational the situation was.

02. Yoanna House

The winner of cycle 2, as well as one of the most successful winner post show. Even if she’s not my choice for the top contestant of this season, I’m inclined to say that Yoanna was very deserving of her win.

Yoann ais that type of contestants that makes you feel like you’ve been on a journey with her all cycle (similar to Adrianne and Eva). She had a true passion for the modeling industry and was a person really determined to accomplish her goals (she had a quite impressive weight loss to enter the show for example, and it only continued after she won the cycle as you can tell by her post show work). She also improved a lot during the cycle, as she was inclined to progress and always kicked her ass off to do so. So if she started at the lower middle of the pack, she quickly rose to the top and became a real threat in the competion.

It’s especially evident when you take a look at her portfolio. Her worst photo is her first one and her best is her last one (I don’t consider her nude shot as her stronger individual performance even if it’s my favourite shot of the cycle, but it was towards the end anyway so it only would have confirmed her improvement). She practically always took better photos than the week before, and ended up taking photos that made antm history in the last few weeks. That’s why I think we all agree on the fact that she was one the stronger photo models of her cycle, and arguably the best. And let’s not forget that her face was naturally divine and that she managed to make this amazing asset her biggest strenght in her photos (the picture above speaks for itself). However her photo abilities weren’t the only area where she progressed a lot through the competition, her walk improved a lot as well, being one of the weaker in the beginning and a solid one towards the end.

Her confidence might be her weak point on this show. They were several times when she let her nerves get the best out of her, like when she had a meltdown after the go see client criticized her body, or during all the finale, when she randomly cut her hair at the middle of the photoshoot, or messed up the runway walk in panel (which was sad because she had a good walk in the end). There also was her rivalry with Camille, which was to me kind of an insecurity in regards of Camille’s overconfidence. But hopefully she didn’t let the stress drag her down all the time, as evident by her overall extremely strong performance.

03. Catie Anderson

Catie was an early fan favourite of mine when I first watch the cycle. And after rewatching it, she certainly didn’t disapoint my expectations of her.

The show tried to portray Catie as a constant crier who always react to numerous situations in an immature way. While she was 18 and probably less mature than the other girls, I don’t found her as problematic as they wanted us to believe. She may overeacted to her makeover (and it’s so sad because I think she looked truly stunning with it), but she wasn’t playing the victim when she was terrified about being suspended above giant holes and rightfully called out Xiomara for looking for excuses. And for all the crying that came after that episode ? Well, the show really did her dirty if you asked me.

The judges, and the differents person who appeared on the show basically hated on Catie and always found a way to bully her. When a designer said she looked like a hooker because of the outfit she chose, I totally understand where her frustration came from. It’s not like he could have said in an appropriate way, like, « your look is too provocative », and give a constructive critiscism. She might was a sensitive person, but it seems like itw as just an attempt to break her down deliberatly in order to create drama for TV. And let’s not forget that the judges always gave her bullshit low call outs past week 2, like if they were suddenly turned off by her at that point.

Consequently, everyone seemed to think of her as an average model from her season. But Catie was one of the most talented contestant of cycle 2. Her look certainly helped a lot, but she pulled off amazing photos, some of them being top 10 photos of the cycle worthy and was ridiculously eliminated when she was getting better and better. She ended up with a crazy high call out average and never fell below top 5 in my rankings. I genuinely think she was robbed of competing in the finale. And her runway walk ? She was the stronger walker only second to Mercedes, so she had the whole package. I could see them sending her home for being to sensitive and not ready to handle the criticism, but they were overly harsh on her, so it’s still a bullshit elimination.