In the premiere episode of its second season, gymnastics/girl empowerment drama "Make It or Break It" showed very little real gymnastics, but lots of sitting around and talking about the politics of gymnastics. That being said, it's good entertainment if you're 13 and maybe also if you're 25...and don't talk too much about watching the show.
The show opens with the Rock girls all glammed up in a sort of gymnastics-vixen-biker-chic look following their success against the Chinese team in Denver. The shoot, ostensibly for the cover of the U.S.'s top gymnastics magazine, features Lauren, Emily and Kaylie in shiny black and gunmetal gray leotards, with smoky eyes and huge teased-up hairstyles.
Emily, wearing fishnets, shows a full-twisting double back off bars. Lauren mounts beam with a cool switch leap to immediate Gainer layout combo that I'd love to see someone actually do in competition. In another corner of the gym, Payson struggles to land her Tsuk Arabian vault, but remains confident that she'll get her skills back.
If gymnastics was what you were watching to see, you could basically have stopped here. But of course you don't.
The party is interrupted by Ellen Beals, who arrives to announce that the Rock girls are suspended from the national team for breaking the rules and competing against China and won't be heading to the big meet in Paris, the precursor to the World Championships. This is especially bad news for Emily, who loses her scholarship (and half her family's income) for this act of rebellion.
Sasha urges the girls to relax about the suspension and assures them that they'll be picked for the France meet. He talks about not living under the yoke of Ellen Beals and proving that if you're good enough, she'll be forced to take them. Payson announces plans to petition onto the national team, which means performing before the entire national committee. And gymnasts are only allowed to do this sort of thing once. Ever.
Kaylie confronts Carter at the pizza shack about why he didn't show up in her room that night. Like the sensitive, original man that he is, Carter tells her it's too late for them to revive their relationship and feeds her the "I think we're better as friends...and only friends" line, then shoos Lauren ,who's come for a surprise visit wearing nothing but her underwear and a trench coat, out the back door with a bag of garbage for the dumpster.
Lauren meanwhile does not understand why she has to choose between her friendship with Kaylie and her relationship with Carter. "Why can't I have both?" she asks him innocently, then proceeds to comfort the distraught Kaylie while simultaneously making plans to meet Carter later at her place.
Emily, meanwhile, arrives home to find that her mother is going on a date with Lauren's father. When Chloe insinuates that Steve might be willing to help out with living expenses, Emily vehemently shoots down the idea. "It'll be a cold day in hell before my family takes as much as a postage stamp from your father," she tells Lauren.
On her date, Chloe tells Steve that all the Kmetkos want is his respect, then lets it slip that the girls have been suspended from the national team.
Payson, wondering why she isn't magically able to do all of her skills, is "measured" (read: not weighed) by Sasha, and is horrified to discover that not only has she grown an inch, but -- gasp -- she's becoming a woman. Her mom doesn't help the situation by noticing that she's developed breasts during her time out of the gym. "You're 16 years old," Kim tells her. "You shouldn't have the body of a nine-year-old."
"I'm not a fashion model, I'm an elite gymnast," Payson wails in dispair. "I have the rest of my life to be a woman, but right now I want to be a gymnast." Here comes the eating disorder...
Lauren quizzes Carter in bed about why he "chose her" and Carter talks about how she was there for him when he had nobody and nothing, how she did his laundry and gave him a place to stay and lists a string of adjectives from sexy to bitchy. Lauren whines that Kaylie gets everything without even having to fight for it, as though her life as a daddy's girl is so difficult. They make arrangements to tell Kaylie about their "hooking up" but only after the France meet, because a transatlantic flight with Kaylie's rage in the cabin would be too much for Lauren to bear.
Later, Lauren arrives chez Kaylie with the news that the national team practiced in Denver that day without them, which brings it home to everyone that they're really suspended and not going to France, unless they take action. So, egged on by the traitorous Lauren, they make arrangements to meet with Ellen Beals and apologize for their behavior and beg for their spots back.
Ellen, who is pretty for someone approaching 40, briefly talks about her days as an elite gymnast and how she trained and worked harder than everyone else but still didn't make the Olympic team, then casts herself as the good witch by saying how she's so happy that in her job she can make other people's Olympic dreams come true. In a super awkward moment of autocraticism, she makes each of the girls pledge their allegiance to the national gymnastics organization, then denies to reinstate Emily's scholarship because she "broke the rules" by having a job.
Back at the Rock, the girls feel like they've betrayed Sasha, who is jubilant when Ellen Beals comes to announce that Kaylie will go to France as team captain, that Emily is currently ranked third and that Payson will perform for the national team committee in Paris. For Lauren, however, the news is less awesome -- she's not currently in the top six, and will be staying home. Lauren loses it and rails in front of everyone how unfair it is that she was the impetus that made the girls go to Ellen Beals and beg for mercy behind Sasha's back and she doesn't get included on the team.
Lauren's mood is not brightened when the proof of the cover shot of the gymnastics magazine arrives and Kaylie alone is featured on the cover. As Kaylie tries to comfort her in the parking lot, Lauren tells her where Carter was the night Kaylie called him -- "sleeping with me," as though Kaylie might be dim enough not to draw that conclusion.
Sasha takes Payson aside and tells her point blank that she's not ready to perform for the national committee in a week. Payson, however, remains super confident that she can be ready.
The episode ends with Steve Tanner meeting Ellen Beals for a drink and wheeling and dealing to get Lauren on the team that goes to Paris. "The girls kissed your ring," he says. The noxious Ellen makes a little speech about "obedience and respect for authority," then agrees to take Lauren as an alternate. Her price: that Sasha is driven from The Rock and his gymnasts controlled by the national committee. Steve also agrees to sponsor Emily through an anonymous "private sports endowment," which relieves her of pizza duty for the time being.
Emily, who doesn't know where Damon is, is thrilled to learn that he'll be playing a concert in Paris at the same time she'll be there. Ooh la la...stay tuned for next week!
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