Bruno’s above comment to Karina Smirnoff comparing this season’s Mario to past season’s Mario Lopez shows that the competition has already heated up. Dancing with the Stars season six started today with a rousing dance sequence performed by this season’s professionals.  Those three minutes just may be the best dancing we see this season with “stars” like Adam Carolla, Priscilla Presley, and Penn Jillette taking part. But maybe the likes of Jason Taylor, Steve Guttenberg, Mario, Marissa Jaret Winokur, Kristi Yamaguchi will help to spice things up. 

  Episode one began with Penn and Kym Johnson dancing (and I use the term very lightly) the Cha cha cha. Penn spent the majority of the dance stomping in beat with one of his abnormally long arms in the air as Kym sashayed around him.  Every step was lead with the heel and every beat was almost literally counted on the lips that he was struggling so hard to keep from moving. Len called Penn Shrek, while Bruno referred to his hip action as “replacement hip action”, and they’ve never been more correct. Score 16/30 

Second up was NFL man of the year Jason Taylor with his partner Edyta Sliwinska.  The defensive end seemed somewhat rhythmic and poised throughout his foxtrot.  Unlike his fellow football players Jerry Rice and Emmett Smith, Taylor actually performed the dance that he was given instead of resorting to the two-step and the snake.  The judges seemed to think that he has great promise and I agree.  Score 22/30 

Cristian de la Fuente, who the heck is he? I admit, when I saw him I thought, hmm a hot Latino man, he should be able to dance.  When he said the same thing about people expect him to be good, I felt like such a racists. His and Cheryl Burke’s Cha Cha Cha was okay, but his posture was …interesting, sort of reminiscent of turtle I think that he will stick around for awhile because middle ages women (and Carrie Ann Inaba) will love and vote for him to stay. Score 21/30 

Adam Carolla and Julianne Hough are definitely the odd couple of the group.  She is young and poised; he is old, loud, and dirty.  Adam said that “he’s feeling the heat” but it didn’t show.  The foxtrot was robotic and stiff, but as I was expecting a “Kenny Mayne,” it wasn’t too bad. The judges liked his footwork, but that was about it.  Len said that Julianne has her work cut out for her, poor girl. She probably will cry herself to sleep wishing for Helio and Apollo to come back to her. Score 15/30 

Mario (no last name needed apparently) danced the Cha cha cha to the oddest song choice ever with partner Karina Smirnoff.  There is nothing worse than hearing the house band try to rap; Black Eye Peas was not a good choice.  The dancing however was great.  He moves were a lot more complicated than the other men, he was obviously comfortable on the dance floor, and the couple moved as one.  The judges seemed to like him and only put down a bit of his footwork. My only question is: why the heck was he wearing so much makeup? Score 24/30  

The last dancer to take the floor was none other than Police Academy’s own Steve Guttenberg.  Partner Anna Trebunskaya worker him hard in preparation for their foxtrot. The dance was good but not at all memorable. Steve was a lot less stiff than Adam but he was too safe and reserved.  Len thought that he was infectious, and Carrie Anne “enjoyed it”.  I think he captured the crowd with his smile while stumbling a bit through his footwork.  He was still leaps and bounds above Penn and Adam.  He should be around for a few weeks. Score 18/30 

After watching this season’s men, I am convinced that his season will be interesting. Some of the men looked they are defiantly going to bring their A game, while others… don’t know that there us a game going on.  Look for Jason Taylor to take the lead because of the “athlete vote”, Steve to stay because of his genuine charm, Mario to stay because of his obvious dancing talent, Cristian to be safe because American women secretly want hot Latin lovers, and Penn and Adam to spend weeks in the bottom two.  The women seem to be very competitive, so tomorrow’s show should be a good one; stay tuned.