Make It Or Break It: As The Giant Swings

As our girls gear up for their big finale, it is only appropriate that I get my ass into gear and discuss the d-r-a-m-a of the past few episodes. Even for this sometimes corny show, the drama is impressive and has me wondering how it will all go down during tonight's summer finale.

Let's break it down, girl by girl.

Payson

Oh yes, big girls have dreams too. Payson is in the midst of becoming an 'artistic gymnast' and has been overwhelmingly inspired by Coach Sasha Belov. My third arm was feeling a bit inspired when I saw him at the ballet bar in tights, so I can understand Payson's crush. But poor Payson...she has his photo on her wall, wears his gold medal to bed, brings him dinner and even kisses him during practice. I get that he exudes the confidence of a well-endowed man, but Ms. Keeler needs to tone it down a notch. She is becoming borderline Fatal Attraction (or Swim Fan for some of the less cultured readers), or is posting John Mayer lyrics in her facebook status at the very least.

Ridding herself of her inner P.E. teacher hasn't been all that simple for Pay. Sasha has had to work overtime with this one to teach her how to walk in heels. While she is in desperate need of a few Sex And The City DVDs to tap her inner fabulousness, Sasha came up with the curious idea of having Payson close her eyes, hold bottles of paint and create a painting based on her feelings. It was perhaps the most cringe-worthy scene in the series that we've witnessed in a while. Of course, Payson's canvas was supposedly inspired and rife with color. In reality, it looked like one of those paintings made by an autistic child that would sell for thousands of dollars at some yuppie benefit.

Payson's mom ran for President of the Rock but was defeated by the evil Lord Voldemort (Steve Tanner.) It is yet to see how the Keelers will respond to this, as Payson's Olympic dream is hanging on by a thread.

Emily

The girl from the other side of the tracks has been getting in touch with her issues lately. We've seen her stubborn "I don't take no charity" attitude come through after Ellen Biels plotted to make sure she found out that the ''business group" funding her charity was actually Steve Tanner. Emily forced Steve Tanner to take her money from "the shack" and the family now can't even pay their electric bill. It is amazing how quickly the Kmetkos are always able to fall on hard times.

Being the goodie two shoes bad ass that she is, Emily stole two pills to combat her brother's seizure, even though she left the money for them. Our girl was arrested and has been trying to keep it on the D.L., but you know Lauren will get her hands on that mugshot any second.

Lately, we've seen Chloe getting dressed up for her "new office job" that somehow has evening hours. While I do have dreams of seeing her walk on the corner or work a pole, we'll probably see her singing atop a counter at some '50s theme restaurant. Will Steve come to the family's rescue and represent Emily? Is he a lawyer? WTF DOES he do?

Because this is Emily, men have been barging into her life lately. The Rocker (Damon, I think, I'm giving up on the names) returned despite having some pact not to see each other for two years. Teenagers just take those things so seriously. He returned for some obvious product placement for an anti-smoking PSA and visited Emily. Razor led him to believe something was going on with him and Emily and trailer trash was too dumb to open her mouth and tell him otherwise. She is capable of robbing a store yet never can open her mouth when she needs to. The Y+R fan in me likes to imagine that Emily robbed the pharmacist at gun point and then raped him, but this is a family show. World Trials are coming up and surely her legal troubles will play a role.

Lauren

The Danielle Staub of the series has been raising hell all over the place. After terrorizing Chloe, her father's girlfriend stupidly decided to cut her a break and gave her the option of telling him she was having sex or else she herself would. Lauren, always "misunderstood," took the opportunity to have Summer tell her father for her and make him think that Chloe knew about it all along. Steve summarily dumped Chloe after being unable to forgive her, even though she forgave him for having a psychotic daughter, lying to her family and being a selfish asshole.

Lauren dumped Carter after convincing herself that all her cared about was not getting kicked out of the Rock, but she appears to be over it. We did learn that Lauren's mother has been trying to see her, but was scared off by Steve. It is unclear whether we're supposed to feel bad for Lauren now that her mother died in a car crash.

Ms. Evil saw a tape of Payson kissing Sasha and sent a screen grab to Ellen Biels. It is unclear why Lauren hates Sasha, but she wants him out of the Rock because it will somehow help her make the Olympics. Realistically, she just wanted to humiliate Payson and raise hell.

While we haven't seen her have any apparent interest in her own career, Lauren is desperate for 'control of the rock.' Now that Steve is present, he, Lauren and Ellen should become the perfect trifecta of bitch. It is only a matter of time before they become one happy family.

Kaylie

Kaylie's eating disorder is SERIOUS. She hasn't actually lost any weight, but Kaylie has been hiding all of her meals in her gym bag. While her illness hasn't quite lived up to the frenzy of Jesse Spano's caffeine pill addiction, we have seen her become quite testy over being offered food. Hungry and bitchy. Hungry and bitchy.

Kaylie was ready to bitchslap Sasha when he actually took a few minutes to coach her. Of course, Ellen Biels, the only realistic elite coach, told her that her diet and body are perfection.

The was one delicious moment to open last week's show when Kaylie said "Mom, I'm flipping eight hours a day. Does that really sound like someone who has an eating disorder?" Apparently Kaylie isn't familiar with any of the World or Olympic Champions over the last forty years.

For an added incentive to watch tonight's finale: there will be all sorts of revisionist history where Bela Karolyi is always positive and never yelling at his gymnasts for being fat or lazy. Hell, we'll probably even see him feeding Kaylie mac and cheese.. This is one episode NOT to be missed.