Pure AGT Season 12 Auditions Episode 1: Live Bog

Hey all! I’m back! I took some time off but will be covering the entirety of Season 12, and am looking forward to it! So far the format and judges have remained the same from last year, but now we have America’s Next Top Model‘s own Tyra Banks as our new host! I’m especially interested to see how she does.

I’ve decided to change up the format over here a bit. Looking over my posts from last season, I’m feeling like the audition ones were very awkward and disjointed, so this time I’m going to try liveblogging these episodes instead! So check back throughout the episode for updates!

I enjoyed the chicken act, but I feel like the novelty might wear off soon, and I definitely don’t see it advancing past the next round. I LOVED the comedian, though, and it would certainly be nice to see a contender from that world this year.

Oh great, a singer with an inspiring backstory. She seems like a nice girl, but I’d prefer the bulk of the vocalists stick to The Voice or the soon-to-be-revamped Idol. Okay, she’s pretty good…why are they stopping her? Glad they’re giving her another shot, and Tyra helping her “let her hair down” was cute. Aaaaand nailed it! No surprise. Based on this edit, I see her easily making the live shows.

Ooo, an escape artist! Haven’t seen one of those on the show in awhile! Nice to see Tyra playing along, but the judges don’t seem that into it. Four X’s…and a costume change? Okay, that part was actually pretty neat, and Simon and Mel retract their X’s into yes’s! Unfortunately, Howie and Heidi do not, meaning he’s out. Nice to see Tyra doing a good job with the “comforting” part of this show so far, both with this act and he montage of other rejects that is now following it.

A brother-sister Salsa duo! Much like with the singers, I’d prefer the dancers stick to the designated dance shows for the most part, especially now that we have two mainstream dance competition shows in So You Think You Can Dance and World of Dance (I also love Dancing With the Stars, but that’s an entirely different can of worms.)

These two are good, but again, I think this act would have been better suited for World of Dance. Then again, the routine we saw mostly consisted of spinning, so that might not have gone over as well over there. But of course they go through on here.

I wonder what this next guy is going to do? Oh, he’s our first magician of the season! Nice intro, with a very impressive trick to boot! (I’m with Mel B on my brain having to “catch up” in order to understand what was going on!) Unanimously through, and I bet he makes it to the live shows too!

Oh dear. A Trump impersonator? He’s pretty good, but I think I’m hoping he gets rejected. I don’t want to see politics mixed into this show, and when they did get brought up last season the response was naturally pretty divisive.

HE’S SINGING BRUNO MARS???? Okay, I might actually be on board with this now. He’s through, but I don’t see him making it to the live shows.

Next up is…a dance about a suicidal robot? Pretty neat, actually. This kid is actually a very good physical storyteller. I wonder if he sang the song as well? Either way, I’m glad he got through, since this was very creative and an example of a dance performance that probably wouldn’t suit SYTYCD or WOD.

And now we have a sad silent clown named Puddles. This guy is already reminding me of Tape Face from last season. Hmmm….

Oh, turns out he’s a singer! And a pretty good one at that! Glad he went in a different direction than I was expecting. Even Simon-who is known to be afraid of clowns-loves it, and he gets four yes’s!

Another escape act! Hopefully this goes over better than the one we saw earlier tonight. Apparently it has high stakes-like, life-threatening stakes. It’s one of those ones where it looks like he didn’t escape in time, but then turned into one of the people “saving” him from the danger. Great job from him, and of course he advances!

Okay, so it’s 9:52 pm, we’re talking about the “X” buzzers, and we’ve seen in the “coming up” clips that Mel hits her Golden Buzzer tonight. This must be the lucky girl. And she’s a ventriloquist! A SINGING one at that! Much like Merrick (the robot dancing boy) I’m okay with this kind of vocalist act on this show, because it’s one that doesn’t belong on your typical televised signing competition.

And there’s the Golden Buzzer! Well deserved! Great example of the type of act this show was made for. The only downside is it means we won’t be seeing this adorable duo again for awhile, since the Golden Buzzer sends an act straight to the Quarter-Finals in the live show round!

Thanks for dropping in here tonight, and if you’re sticking around for the World of Dance series premiere, head on over to our sister site Pure World of Dance to check out their liveblog!