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The Masked Singer recap: Giraffe ousted and revealed as former teen heartthrob

Michael Becker/FOX

Warning: This article contains spoilers about The Masked Singer season 4 episode 3.

Last week was a Masked Singer first, with Gremlin unmasking himself midshow as Oscar nominee Mickey Rourke.

While no self-elimination happened tonight, Wednesday's Group A playoffs proved to be a kooky episode nonetheless. An aristocratic Giraffe was eliminated, plus we saw a Robin Thicke impersonator, drones, and Urkel, oh my!

At the top of the show, the real Robin Thicke and fellow panelists Jenny McCarthy, Ken Jeong, and Nicole Scherzinger, as well as host Nick Cannon were serenaded on stage with "Blurred Lines" by a Robin impersonator, who turned out to be .... honorary fifth judge and Jeong's nemesis Joel McHale. The people at Netflix must've paid him handsomely for hosting the Tiger King special because that was one sparkly suit.

As for the actual contestants, the ladies shined tonight, with the judges particularly impressed with Popcorn's cover of Harry Styles' "Falling" and Sun's fantastic rendition of Kesha's "Praying." Scherzinger even dubbed Sun her “favorite female vocal I’ve ever heard” throughout all four seasons of the show. The Pussycat Dolls singer tends to dole out as many compliments as Shen Yun puts up billboards (how are they paying for all of them??), but in this case, we think the praise was deserved. Sun was that good.

The show's first singing duo, Snow Owls, also did a great job with Meghan Trainor and John Legend's "Like I'm Gonna Lose You." We had no idea how much the show was missing duets until they arrived and moved us with A Great Big World's "Say Something" in the premiere. Based on these performances, we think they absolutely have a shot at cracking the final three.

Tonight TMS also added some socially distanced fun to the proceedings with on-stage clues delivered via drone. Jeong had a riot with the clue packages, leading to his pièce de résistance — yammering on about Giraffe's clues so long that the long-necked contestant went to lie down on the stage and McCarthy put on her travel pillow and took a nap.

Unfortunately, that might've been Giraffe's highlight of the night, as his cover of Kool and the Gang's "Get Down on It" wasn't able to stand out among the competition. Giraffe was informed he was the one to be sent home and he took off his mask to reveal ... Beverly Hills, 90210 star Brian Austin Green!

In the first episode, Giraffe had lots of carnival clues, mentioned that music is in his blood but he "took a gigantic risk and became the butt of everyone's jokes," and there was a reference to knots. Both of Green's parents were musicians and he even had a brief (and not well-received) rap career that saw him producing one album titled One Stop Carnival. Additionally, he appeared on the soap opera Knots Landing as a teen.

And tonight, Giraffe's clue package teased foxes, peaches, "the blink of an eye," and a domino. And guess what? Green was married to Megan Fox and the network Fox was home to 90210, the Peach Pit was the main characters' hangout in the '90s teen drama, and he appeared in the movies Don't Blink and Domino.

The panelists, all of whom (except Jeong) have racked up one correct first impressions guess, struck out this episode. Jeong had will.i.am, Scherzinger named Dale Earnhardt Jr., McCarthy wrote Travis Barker, and Thicke guessed Jaleel White, who famously portrayed Steve Urkel on Family Matters. It's a rare and special day when someone beats out Jeong for worst guess, and Thicke certainly did that tonight. McHale was actually the closest, as he predicted Giraffe was Jason Priestley, Green's 90210 costar. Green's other costar — and onscreen girlfriend — Tori Spelling competed as the Unicorn on season 1.

After his elimination, Green told EW he couldn't believe Thicke, his longtime friend, didn't guess his identity. "No disrespect to him, because he's a super-nice guy, but he sucks at this. He's terrible. I told the producers early on, if there's anybody on this panel that's going to guess me, it's him because we know each other so well. He knows the way that I speak, and the timbre of my voice. For three years, we were best friends — we were at each other's house every day."

Next week we'll see the return of Seahorse, Baby Alien, Serpent, Crocodile, and Whatchamacallit for the Group B playoffs. Masked Singer airs Wednesdays at 8 p.m. ET/PT.

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