‘So You Think You Can Dance’ adds Maddie Ziegler to season 13 judging panel

The upcoming 13th season of “So You Think You Can Dance” is getting more surprising by the second.

Today, it was announced that none other than 13-year old dancing wunderkind Maddie Ziegler has signed up for a panel that already includes the likes of executive producer Nigel Lythgoe, Paula Abdul, and pop singer Jason Derulo.

To all of you out there that are asking one important question in “why,” remember this: One of the themes for this season is that this is the next generation, and we’re dealing with contestants who are in the 8-13 age range. Ziegler, who is famous for “Dance Moms” and then also all of her work with Sia, is perfectly suited to understand and relate to that market. She has found fame at a very early age, but it’s to be seen if she can articulate how she feels about the routines in a way suitable for TV. (We already have felt that Derulo and Abdul have had some problems with that on this show.)

Also, our concern is that four judges is simply too many … but that’s one of many concerns that we have right now with this season. We don’t want to hammer the same point home time and time again, but the reality here is that we don’t quite see how watching young children deal with the rigors of this competition is entertaining. Sure, maybe there’s an inspirational angle to it, but watching kids cry when they don’t make it to the next round is simply not our idea of fun. We wish that we still had something a bit more in line with the series we have come to love.

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