Monday, February 9, 2026

Gen X does its turn on the catwalk.

It's '90s night and both the songs and the drones are flying.

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• "We begin with high drama on the curling sheet," says Mike Tirico. Look, I like curling, but I don't know if I could call any of it high drama. But Team USA beat Italy to advance to the finals, so maybe that’s what he’s talking about. Italians love drama.
• To the mountains, for the Men's Team Combined ski event. The first part is the downhill. You know, the crazy guys.
• "Marco Odermatt is the undisputed best skier in the world." Is he? He didn't win just two days ago! But he skis so fast today that the drone can barely keep up. Maybe they're right. He's followed by Italy's Giovanni Franzoni, who beats his time. Again, Odermatt isn't even the best skier in the last 10 minutes!
• Is Sam Raimi running the drone? Every time NBC cuts to the drone, it starts off like it's just an ordinary camera in the trees, but then it swoops down to chase the skier down the mountain Evil-Dead-style. When Franjo Von Allmen comes down the course, the drone flies past a bunch of spectators who climbed up a giant pine tree to get a better view of the course. Cool.
• Picabo Street is trying to teach Snoop how to ski. He needs some work.
• Hey! There is an American in this race. Kyle Negomir started fast, but almost lost it in the middle of the run and it cost him some speed. Probably won’t be seeing his partner later.
• Time for a Lindsey Vonn update. Mike says she has a complex tibia fracture. Ouch. He also tells us that she said her torn ACL had nothing to do with hitting the gate with her arm and crashing. I said pretty much that same thing yesterday but I’m glad to hear her confirm it. It still stinks, though.
• Who wants some ice dancing? NBC does! It's '90s night, so everyone will be ice dancing to some Gen X music. First up: Laurence Fournier Beaudry and Guillaume Cizeron will be Vogue-ing for France. Johnny says with Madonna it would be easy to get campy. Isn't all ice dancing kind of campy? Anyway, they score well.
• Americans Emilea Zingas and Vadym Kolesnik hit up Bel Biv Devoe for "Poison" and "Something In Your Eyes." It's drivin' me out of my mind! I can't get it out of my head! Second place!
• Do you still feel young? Let's fix that. NBC makes all the American ice dancers talk about the '90s, since that is tonight's theme. Only Chock and Bates were even born then. Everyone else was born in this millennium. But they all know how to do the Macarena. Well, kind of, anyway. These kids today.
• Around the Games! The US Women's hockey team beat Switzerland earlier today, and now Canada will be coming up soon. That’s right, Canada. SOON!
• Back on the mountain for the slalom portion of the Men's Team Combined. Whereas the downhill is full of crazy people risking life and limb, slalom skiers are emotionless Vulcans, focusing on repetitive precision. And speaking of repetition, thanks to his precise slaloming teammate, Switzerland's Franjo Von Allmen now has his second gold medal, whereas Marco Odermatt, the supposed "best skier in the world" has finished third behind him AGAIN. Maybe we need to rethink this "best skier" title.
• Drones everywhere! Now we're at speed skating for the Women's 1000M race, where American Erin Jackson is being chased down the backstretch by a tiny flying aircraft. She finishes in first for now. But not for long. The next race is 37-year-old Brittany Bowe of the US and Femke Kok from the Netherlands. Kok sets a Olympic record and Bowe is currently second. The last race features Jutta Leerdam who breaks Kok's short-lived record and wins gold. Bowe finishes fourth.
• It's time to pay the bills with NBC's "Event of the Night," the ice dancing rhythm dance. Madison Chock and Evan Bates are warming up trying to win their first individual medal. Chock is dressed in a sparkly, zebra-striped mini-dress. Bates looks like he just came from the garage. Couldn’t he at least have put some sequins on that wife-beater shirt?
• The first dancers up on '90s night are Canada's pair of Piper Gilles and Paul Poirier, and what '90s song are they skating to? "I'm Too Sexy" by Right Said Fred. Excellent choice, G & P! You must have known the theme of the Rockwood Olympic Watch in advance. They move into second place. Might they indeed be too sexy for Milan?
• Italian skaters Charlene Buignard and Marco Fabbri are channeling the Backstreet Boys. They skate well, but they only finish in fourth place. The crowd did not want it that way.
• It's Chock and Bates time, starting with "American Woman," the Lenny Kravitz version. I'm voting for them just because of the Kravitz connection. They follow that with "Fly Away," "My Mama Said," and "Are You Gonna Go My Way" on their way to the top score. But no! Is this the invisible points again? They had more points, but now they don't. There's still one more dance to go, so they can still win. Johnny Weir explains in detail what happened – something about the edge of Chock’s skate turning at the wrong time – but even when watching the replay I don't know how anyone could have caught it.
• Back to the mountain, where the Women's Slopestyle features notable traitor Eileen Gu, representing China, versus Mathilde Gremaud from Switzerland.
• Eileen Gu fluff. She studies for her Stanford classes while riding a the gondola up the mountain to train. She gets hair and makeup done at the top of the mountain for her Vogue photoshoot. Then she trains for the Olympics. And last but not least, she sells out her country for a buck as she Benedict Arnolds her way to the Olympics. There isn't a real American we could do fluff on instead, NBC?
• NBC has decided that the only skiers who matter here are Gu and Gremaud. Well, Gu blows her next run and Gremaud doesn't, so now the loyal citizen of Switzerland is in the lead and the traitor falls to second.
• Hold on! On the third run, NBC is going to show us some other skiers. That usually means someone is going to fall out of the top two. Let's find out. Great Britain's Kirsty Muir gets fourth. So… no, not her. Now Gu is up. OHHH! NOW GU IS DOWN! She falls on the first obstacle, so no gold for the traitor. Gremaud skis down in victory with the Swiss flag wrapped around her neck like a cape. It's a good day on the slopes of freedom!
• Back in Milan, Stanley Tucci is having dinner with select members of the US Women's Hockey team. They talk about food, their hatred of Team Canada, and more food. Finally the team gives him a jersey which he ties around his neck. Very dapper, Stanley! Still fluff, though.
• And that’s it for the night… WAIT! Is this a Marvel movie? I was just about to turn the TV off because I thought tonight's coverage was over, then the screen went white and "Macarena" started playing. In a continuation of the earlier fluff piece, the American ice dancers are still dancing to Los Del Rio's only hit song, and now they're joined by Johnny, Tara, Andrea, and – most hilariously – Terry Gannon. He dances exactly like you'd think he would. This is fantastic. I hope they do something like this every night.

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Heeeeey Macarena! I wasn't expecting that. I also wasn't expecting that tonight's fluff... wasn't that bad? The Macarena, Snoop skiing, Stanley Tucci eating... the only bad one was Eileen Gu, because I don't see why NBC is so intent on promoting her. But if she keeps losing maybe they'll get over it. We'll find out tomorrow. See you then!       

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