"The NBC Saturday primetime broadcast used the figure skating exhibition gala as a way to provide a curtain call for their appointed Olympic protagonists. Of the five segments they aired from the event, four of them put Americans in the spotlight. Amber Glenn gave a fierce performance that further emphasized her comeback from a disappointing short program. Alysa Liu skated a victory lap after her instantly iconic gold medal-winning free skate."
"The silver-winning pair from Georgia put on a tribute to Mortal Kombat, complete with the voice that shouts "Mortal Kombat!" Niina Petrõkina pantomimed shooting Malinin during a theater-kid's dream of a skate to "Cell Block Tango." Italy's Sara Conti and Niccolò Macii performed to, in order, "Macarena," "YMCA," and "Cotton Eye Joe." And the gold-medal winning Mikhail Shaidorov topped them all by spinning around in a panda costume, making his own farewell to Milan an homage to the Jack Black animated franchise Kung Fu Panda."
NBC's Saturday primetime broadcast condensed the figure skating exhibition gala into a small set of segments that placed American skaters in prominent focus. Amber Glenn delivered a fierce comeback performance after a disappointing short program. Alysa Liu skated a celebratory victory lap following an iconic gold-medal free skate. Ilia Malinin offered an earnest on-ice interpretation of the pressure around attempting an extraordinary jump after a shocking eighth-place finish. The full gala leaned into campy, Eurovision-style theatrics with tributes ranging from Mortal Kombat and Cell Block Tango to Macarena, YMCA, Cotton Eye Joe, and a panda-costume homage to Kung Fu Panda. Media attention on Malinin's falls risked understating Mikhail Shaidorov's heroic free skate.
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