So happy that our Plushy is back! Of course he's still far from his top condition and the jumps are not all perfect yet, but remember everything that has happened this year, how only three months ago some "medical expert" nearly destroyed his knee with his botched injection, and how he was still in rehab by late September, how he only began to get his quad back a few days before the competition started....I can only agree with Tarasova, "this is a phenomeon".
I have been watching the SP a few more times, and I love the music for it more and moe, especially the fact that the first part is so different from the second. The spins and footwork are better than before and have new elements to them. Their levels still can be increased, but from what Plushy said after the competition, I believe this will happen. (One thing I want to mention is that I remember in an old interview, from maybe 05 or 06, Plushy once said that he felt serpentine sequences were under-appreciated under the new COP system, and he would like to see elements of it more in programs.)
I have seen some people criticize this program for having all three jumps in the first part. It is true that nowadays, it's considered "better" to have everything "spaced out evenly" in programs. So maybe this is a technical flaw, but I am starting to think that "evenness" is not necessarily the right thing for this particular program, if only from an artistic point of view (though I don't know how much "art" is worth in judges' eyes). It seems to me the climax of the program, the actual "storm", is still in the second part, in the footwork sequence, so to me, the program does not feel front-loaded.
Perhaps I am over-interpreting things, but if we really see the program as a storm, then there is a difference between how it feels before the storm--the sense of pressure and heaviness in the air, the rising wind, the feeling of expectation. Then the real storm comes in an outburst of fury and passion, and the tension is released. To my own ears, I think something of this is reflected in the music for the program. So maybe it makes sense that the first part of the program is so different from the second part, in terms of the types of elements it contains, and in terms of rhythm and feeling. And jumps (including the long strokes leading up to them) have a different rhythm compared to spins and footwork. What I am vaguely feeling is that while having all three jumps in the first part is generally considered a flaw in a SP program, it can be argued that in this case, there is a certain aesthetic justification for it, which I actually find extremely interesting.
Of course, I don't want to interpret any of Plushy's programs too literally. Again, this is probably just my own mind making things up, but such themes and feelings remind me of the "Sturm und Drang"--Storm and Stress--of Romanticism. Performance-wise, I get the sense Plushy is also not yet at 100%: after all, he himself said how he needed to overcome the big psychological barrier of competing again. But the beauty of his movements, the aristocratic aura, and the sense of passion are in full force alreay And of course, the combination of grace and power, and also of charisma.
If I were to nitpick the SP performace, based on nothing but my personal notions and tastes, maybe I could even say that possibly there was actually a little bit too much charisma for this program. Partly this was from comparison with the practice video from before the SP, but somehow I get the suspicion that the blown kiss before the step sequence was not actually in the choreography.... And he also replaced the ending pose with a fist pump and another blown kiss. I am of two minds about it. On one hand it is clear that Plushy was just returning again for the first time, he was in love with competition and the audience and he's happy, and that makes me happy. On the other hand, I got the sense it did "break character" somewhat, and just for my own tastes, I felt it broke the tension a little. Just for this particular program, I wonder what it would look like if he made it a little more...not colder exactly, but a little more alone, perhaps. (Of course, I am not saying he should do things one way or another, or that others need to interpret things similarly as me. I am absolutely certain that every artistic choice he makes is his own. But I am a bit curious.)
Once again, I apologize for yet another terribly long post....I know all of this nonsense--based on no more than my own overactive imagination--do not necessarily make it fit into the strict mold of the likes of Lori Nichol would consider a "good" program, but somehow I can't help going on about it....(as usual)