Hallelujah!  The season premiere of America’s Next Top Model kicked off in high gear this week with Tyra Banks making personal phone calls to the thirty-three Cycle 9 semi-finalists.  After traveling to San Juan, Puerto Rico, the ladies were blindfolded and shuttled to a secret location.  Once there, they found Miss J (dressed up as The Love Boat’s Captain Stubing) standing in front of a large cruise ship.  That’s right—those lucky bastards were getting a free luxury trip right off the bat.

They all got on board and were immediately thrown into work.  The lesson of the day?  Learning how to ‘work it’ with what you got.  The terrified novices were forced to demonstrate their unpolished runway walk—while wearing a burdensome life jacket.  To make matters worse, they had to stumble past gawking cruise passengers lounging in their chairs.

Having completed their first crash course, the ladies got a chance to sit down for dinner.  As a bonus, a little theater entertainment was thrown in with their meal—Tyra dancing and singing like a Vegas showgirl.  As per usual, one glimpse of the supermodel got the girls a-screaming.  Someone please tell me why they always do that.  Banks explained to the ladies the significance of their Caribbean tour.  If they were chosen the next ANTM winner, they could be working many shoots in the same exotic locales.

One by one, the ladies were called in for their meet and greet with the three judges:  Tyra, Miss J and Jay Manuel.  While there seemed to be a wide variety of personalities, those familiar with the show have seen versions of these same girls before:  the Girl Who Tries to Intimidate (Ebony); the Girl Who Thinks She Has ‘Talent Extraordinaire’ (Sabrina); the Girl Who Wants to Represent the Nerds (Victoria); the Girl With the Really Strange Name (Spontaniouse);  the Girl With the Hard Luck Story (Marvita), etc.

Later, the cruise ship docked in Antigua where the ladies interrupted a beach photo shoot in progress.  Jaslene, winner of ANTM/Cycle 8, was (surprise!) there to welcome the newbies.  She proved to the vocally-challenged candidates (e.g. Jennifer/ the Girl with the Horribly Thick Boston Accent) that it was possible to sound nasal and be a CoverGirl model at the same time.

After the introductions, the hopefuls then followed Jaslene’s lead and took their turns in front of the camera.  Those bikini pics would then lead them into the first cut of the show.  The thirty-three were whittled down to just twenty—and Sabrina (the Girl Who Thinks She Has ‘Talent Extraordinaire’) was left stunned in Antigua.  She absolutely believed she deserved to go on.

After the first round of tears, Tyra met with the remaining ladies for one more round of cheers.  She challenged them to give their best pageant speech explaining why they should be the Next Top Model.  No—there really wasn’t any point.  We all know the b****y one will make it to the Finals anyway.  Tyra, J and Jay then gathered to determine the Final 13.  Would they pick Ambreal who’s tall but looks short?  How about Sarah who’s too big to be your typical model but too small to be a plus-sized one?  And what were they going to do with Victoria, the quirky girl with the loooong face?

Drum roll, please.  Here are the 13 names you’ll be seeing a lot of over the next few weeks:

• Ambreal
• Bianca
• Chantal
• Ebony—the Girl Who Tries to Intimidate
• Heather
• Lisa
• Janet
• Jenah
• Kimberly
• Mila
• Saliesha
• Sarah
• Victoria—the Girl Who Wants to Represent the Nerds

(You can read next week’s episode here.)