Dancing with the Stars 2015: Week 7 Performances Live Recap

The players were divided into two teams and they are to perform Halloween-themed numbers tonight. I’m quite sure this is the first time we’ve heard Marilyn Manson on the show. The judges fell all over themselves praising her but the coronation seems a bit early, particularly since she cost her Team “Who You Gonna Call” points in the team dance. They danced their freestyle dance for their team dance.

After a break, Derek tries to keep his unbeaten streak alive in the team dance. This week’s dance is done to a song that is both haunting and powerful and is well suited to an Argentine Tango. No way can this bright ray of sunshine be a threatening vampire. Bindi decides while she can’t be scary she can be fierce. It looks a little like she’s in pain with her “tough face” but it works better than smiley-faced Bindi. Carrie Ann said, “It’s like you cut off your head and just danced”, which is apparently a good thing. Carlos PenaVega and Witney Carson will be doing a paso doble as well, but theirs is to the Carl Orff song “O Fortuna (Carmina Burana)”. When has anyone ever said that?

Naturally, the judges had to point out how much the stars learned during the week and how good those harsh critiques were. And there’s a cape! Hayes stood out in this routine. “If I was the other team I would be pooping in my trousers right now, that was great”.

The first team is the #Nightmare team, which is composed of Team Captain Nick Carter and Sharna Burgess and their members Tamar Braxton and Valentin Chmerkovskiy, Andy Grammer and Allison Holker and Hayes Grier and Emma Slater. He knows the competition is tight and the only way to go now is up. They have the slow waltz, and the 15-year-old is a little intimidated by the maturity needed for the dance. Emma’s advice: think like a dancer. He channels “Teen Wolf” for his character and stays in animal-mode the whole time. So it’s no surprise that she’s crying in the rehearsal room while practicing her Edward Scissorhands-themed paso doble.

Judges: Julianne said she loves his attitude and his commitment.

Alexa Penavega and Mark Ballas: Alexa has been on a roller coaster lately, earning a string of 10s with Derek Hough during the Switch Up and then being in jeopardy last week. She’ll even forgive extra space in their holds, because of Mark’s (literal) scissor-hands.

“Honestly, one of the best team dances we’ve seen”, added Hough. Sound off in the comments! He has to fit a quick trip to New York with the Backstreet Boys but learns a few of the moves from Sharna via his phone. Bruno agrees about the mistake (more than one, actually), and says Tamar seemed “over-driven”. Val choreographs a clever foxtrot to a Doors classic, “People are unusual”. There’s another elimination on the way and DWTS fans are anxious to get a feel for who might be headed home. Alek Skarlatos – 25 out of 30; plus 28 for team dance – 53 total Alek thought he was under scored last week and was mad at the judges. Carrie Ann also liked it, but told him to be careful in anticipating the beat. We had eight Stars with very little dividing them on the leaderboard; maybe Nick Carter and Bindi Irwin were the two most-likely to make it to the finale, but the rest of the field had a ton of uncertainty going into this episode.