<http://schema.org/articleBody>
"So You Think You Can Dance kicked off its two-night finale for season eight with Katie Holmes and Kenny Ortega serving as special guest judges alongside Nigel Lythgoe and Mary Murphy, as our finalists Melanie Moore, Sasha Mallory, Tadd Gadduang and Marko Germar performed once more. Melanie, Sasha, Tadd and Marko each performed a solo, a routine with each other, and then another routine with an All-Star in the hopes of taking home the $250,000 prize and being crowned America&amp;#039;s Favorite Dancer during the Thursday results show.  &amp;gt; So You Think You Can Dance&amp;#039;s Mary Murphy talks Top 4 Melanie and Marko - Disco Dance: The first disco routine of the season, choreographed by Doriana Sanchez, requires Melanie and Marko to be &amp;quot;human mirrorballs&amp;quot; bursting with passion and smiles.  Kenny says they looked like they jumped out of the screen of Saturday Night Fever, calling it &amp;quot;fun, electric, sizzling and great&amp;quot;. Katie also loved it, calling them &amp;quot;strong and beautiful&amp;quot; and says their energy makes her want to dance. Mary adores them but thinks some of the lifts were a struggle for them. Nigel agrees that it&amp;#039;s great to have disco back but they were a bit uncomfortable in the style. However, he praises Marko for using his sheer strength during a bit where he struggled with the lift.   Sasha and All-Star Mark - Contemporary Dance: This contemporary piece from Sonya Tayeh is an &amp;quot;ode to Sasha&amp;quot; and how she has fought in her life. Mark represents the obstacles in her life. The piece ends with Sasha striking Mark down.  Katie says it was a &amp;quot;powerful number&amp;quot; and she saw the grace and integrity Sonya wanted to bring out of Sasha. She adds it&amp;#039;s a pleasure to watch Sasha dance: &amp;quot;I loved everything about this.&amp;quot; After screaming with excitement, Mary says Sasha looked just as mature and seasoned as Mark and really showed her determination to be champion and a star. Nigel notes they called Sasha a warrior from the beginning and she&amp;#039;s proved that. He jokes: &amp;quot;You realise you&amp;#039;ve just beaten up Lady GaGa&amp;#039;s principle dancer?!&amp;quot; Kenny notes that Sasha was battling an injury and a powerful dancer but she was still a warrior princess.   Tadd and All-Star Joshua - Hip-hop Dance: Lil C&amp;#039;s piece is &amp;quot;all about the hustle&amp;quot;. He thinks pairing Tadd with Joshua will just make him hustle harder. Mary notes that Tadd has a &amp;quot;sweetie pie factor&amp;quot; but still nailed a solid hip-hop number: &amp;quot;You have been hustling hard ever since you started this show. Every week is outside your genre and I&amp;#039;m so proud of you.&amp;quot; Nigel says Tadd coped well with the routine but he found him a bit too sweet for it: &amp;quot;Not a bad job but still not as strong as I would like it.&amp;quot; Kenny says the All-Stars have elevated the show and this pairing was perfect. Finally, Katie says his hustling was terrific and she loves his refreshing smile and sweetness.   Melanie and All-Star Robert - Contemporary  Dance: Stacey Tookey&amp;#039;s contemporary routine is about unrequited love. Melanie is in love with Robert but he can&amp;#039;t return that love in the same way, so to save herself, she has to say goodbye.  Nigel says that Sasha threw down the gauntlet in her routine but Melanie has accepted the challenge. Kenny again praises the All-Stars and the great partnering here. He would push himself to the front of the line for the chance to work with Melanie because she brings theatre, emotion, technique, drama and skill to everything. Katie says Melanie is magical and blows her away with how she creates and tells stories. Mary says Melanie has the ability to draw people in from first second of a performance: &amp;quot;You&amp;#039;re in a class of your own.&amp;quot;  &amp;gt; Nigel Lythgoe predicts female winner on So You Think You Can Dance &amp;gt; Cat Deeley on Emmy nomination: &amp;#039;I couldn&amp;#039;t believe it&amp;#039; Sasha and Marko - Broadway Dance: Spencer Liff&amp;#039;s Broadway routine takes place late at night in a fancy restaurant. Marko is the waiter and Sasha is the elegant woman dining alone but interested in ordering something not on the menu.  Kenny calls it a great fun routine and admits he didn&amp;#039;t even recognise Marko. He praises them both on their transformations in this routine, particularly Sasha who has gone from warrior princess to sophisticated lady. Katie tells Sasha she is a stunning woman and she admires her, while Marko is an incredible dancer. Mary notes that adding acting to the dancing isn&amp;#039;t easy and agrees with Kenny that Marko was practically unrecognisable. Nigel, however, wasn&amp;#039;t &amp;quot;knocked out&amp;quot; by the dance. He thinks Sasha makes a better warrior princess than vamp and Marko needed more character in the dance.   Melanie&amp;#039;s Solo       Marko&amp;#039;s Solo      Sasha and Tadd - Cha Cha Dance: Mark Ballas choreographs the cha cha, which he says has a &amp;quot;cool, modern edge&amp;quot;. It has to be sexy, sassy and hard-hitting.  Katie says it&amp;#039;s been a pleasure watching both of them in the competition and they looked terrific. Mary, however, doesn&amp;#039;t think the dance really worked tonight, noting they missed connections. She thinks Sasha fared better than Tadd, who was struggling, but this routine wasn&amp;#039;t her favourite. Nigel agrees. He says it felt uncomfortable watching Tadd, who couldn&amp;#039;t cope, but it wasn&amp;#039;t good for Sasha either considering it&amp;#039;s the finale. Kenny says America knows what they can do and advises them to let it go and blow them away with the next performance.   Marko and All-Star Lauren - Contemporary Dance: This contemporary routine by Tessandra Chavez is about a failed love story where two people are drawn to each other but can&amp;#039;t make their relationship work. Mary says Marko &amp;quot;just thrust greatness&amp;quot; upon himself by living in every single moment of the routine: &amp;quot;Your honest communication, your soul, the real person you are, we can feel that over here.&amp;quot; Nigel admits he was slightly disappointed until this point but Marko has just joined in the finale with a fantastic performance. Kenny says Marko and Lauren were made for each other and Marko swept him away and took him to another place and time. Katie says it was an amazing routine and she&amp;#039;s so grateful she got to see it live.  Tadd&amp;#039;s Solo      Melanie and Tadd - Jazz Dance: This routine by Ray Leeper is about a guy who has cheated on his girlfriend and she catches him in the act. It all ends up with Tadd losing his clothes (and revealing some heart patterned boxers).  Nigel praises Melanie for being able to show off her entire character just from the way she stood before the dance even began, while Tadd has &amp;quot;totally redeemed&amp;quot; itself with a great performance. Kenny agrees he was gripped before Melanie even started and praises their chemistry. Katie is equally enthusiastic, calling it a &amp;quot;fun breath of fresh air&amp;quot;. She praises them both for delivering great acting performances that were believable. Mary says that Tadd brought sexy back (except his socks) and agrees he&amp;#039;s redeemed himself.   Sasha&amp;#039;s Solo      Melanie and Sasha - Contemporary Dance: Stacey Tookey&amp;#039;s piece is about two suppressed, isolated and lonely housewives in the 1950s who want to know what is outside the home. They come together to find the strength to break free from behind their white picket fences. Kenny calls Melanie and Sasha &amp;quot;two actresses who can dance&amp;quot;. He says the white picket fences on stage made him feel hopeless because he wanted to reach in and break them free. It also made him curious about where they were going. Katie loved seeing them dance together and explore friendship. Mary says she enjoyed every single second of the piece and no matter who wins the show, both Melanie and Sasha are loved and amazing. Nigel points out that off camera the girls hugged and wished each other luck. He thinks both would make an amazing addition to any dance company in the country.   Marko and Tadd - Hip-Hop Dance: Chuck Maldonado teaches them gumboot stepping which came from South Africa when the gold miners used it to communicate with each other in the mines. The piece has a miner theme.  Katie says Marko and Tadd are great and she loves everything they&amp;#039;ve done in the competition, adding that they were both strong and athletic in the routine. Mary says the routine was &amp;quot;absolute solid gold&amp;quot; for her and the whole concept and miner outfits were very cute. Nigel says Marko and Tadd have done as well as they can with the routines and talent they have, but he&amp;#039;s thought a girl will win since the show began and he hasn&amp;#039;t changed his mind. Kenny agrees they both did their job and wishes all four finalists good luck.   So You Think You Can Dance will crown its winner on Thursday from 8/7c on Fox. The results show will feature Jesse Tyler Ferguson, Robin Antin, Lil&amp;#039; C, Tyce Diorio and Sonya Tayeh as guest judges &amp;gt; Read Digital Spy&amp;#039;s full So You Think You Can Dance headlines All images: Copyright: Fox "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.digitalspy.com/tv/so-you-think-you-can-dance-usa/news/a334477/so-you-think-you-can-dance-finale-recap-katie-holmes-judges/>