DWTS5: Not Saving The Best For Last

What has arguably been the highest quality season of DWTS in terms of dancing and depth, not so arguably had the worse finale of any previous season. 

Here's where the couples stand point and %-wise going into tonight's finale:

Mel & Maks - 55 (35.48%)
Helio & Julianne - 54 (34.84%)
Marie & Jonathan - 46 (29.68%)

So Marie has a bit more work cut out for her... a 5-6% gap, so slightly more challenging than the 1-2% gaps of previous weeks.  Can she do it?  Absolutely!

My prediction is that Helio easily passes Mel for the lead and Marie has enough support to pass Mel.  At this point, I would hope that Helio would have enough to win... and the judges do have one more chance to massage the scores tonight.

I don't agree with it.  I think Mel has been a lot of fun and is certainly the best dancer this season (well, woulda coulda shoulda re: Sabrina)... but I think the Osmond juggernaut too strong and you just want to eat up Helio and Julianne.  So Mel comes in third because, ironically enough, she is too good... and they don't have the as bright and bubbly of a personality as her opponents (and while Maks is certainly lovely to look out, he does come across surly, arrogant, an ass, etc.).

As far as the final dances, I thought Helio and Julianne won the night.  I'll have to believe the judges that Helio seriously messed up his steps on the jive, because I don't know enough to be able to spot it (nor the rest of the voting public).  And while, I did notice a mess-up coming out of one lift in their free-style... it wins by default for having excitement and not being weird/creepy.

Technically, Mel and Maks probably had the best dance with their cha cha cha... but their freestyle, barring their lifts (and not many of those), was a big disappointment.  My guess is that Mel finally ran out of steam when it came to keeping up with all her other commitments.  But I did love Carrie Ann "giving the hand" to the booing Spice Girls... Fly Girl/Spice Girl smackdown!!   (I'm guessing that would probably be more entertaining than the upcoming Bruno vs. Carrie Ann show... coming this January!)

And what can be said about Marie and Jonathan.  I was still afraid that Marie was going to do a repeat of her post-samba pass-out (she was fading there for a moment)... but who knew the hot, steaming mess that lie ahead with their freestyle.  Ok, I get the whole doll thing... but I was kinda expecting the doll to... ummm... dance... after she was "wound up" and not continue to be dragged around the dance floor like a... well... ummm... ragdoll for the entire routine.   

But EW worked the puns into overtime... "A Raggedy Night," "Hell No! Dolly," and "Never A Doll Moment".. and compared her to an Oompa Loompa when she started going ballistic over the criticism and scores.

We'll find out the winner tonight... though it'll take 1 hour and 56 minutes to get there.