The Next Step

The A- and B-Troupe dancers audition to earn a place in A-Troupe. We learn that to be in A-Troupe, dancers have to earn their place. When the fourth group of dancers are about to start their audition, an unknown dancer named Michelle who just moved from Madison, Wisconsin comes in. By this unexpected twist, last year's Dance Captain, Emily feels threatened by Michelle. Kate talks to Michelle in her office and tells her she would be happy to audition. Meanwhile, Emily's best friend, Stephanie, volunteers to go eavesdrop on Michelle and Kate, the studio owner, but Emily wants to go herself. An odd relationship is formed with Eldon and Emily but she doesn't like him, but Eldon asks her out every day before and after rehearsals for over 5 years. We then learn about the E-Girls. They are a clique that had all the girls from A-Troupe from last year. Emily is the leader, Tiffany, Stephanie, Giselle, and Emily's younger sister Riley. Stephanie finds searches for information about Michelle on her phone, and everyone learns that Michelle was once named Miss National Soloist. The E-Girls are impressed, but Emily just calls her a diva and returns the phone after viewing it for proof. Michelle says in a confession later that she does not want anyone to know about this, as she wants to just be accepted for who she is and wants to be treated like everyone else. Emily does not agree and thinks she's a show off.

Giselle unfortunately does not make it into A-Troupe. Giselle is later removed from the E-girls for not being in A-Troupe, as the rules are that all E-girls must be in A-Troupe. Emily promises to get Giselle back in A-troupe, and kick Michelle out. Chloe later becomes part of the E-Girls. Stephanie tells Michelle before their first dance rehearsal is in Studio B but, Giselle, who is on her way to B-Troupe tells her that A-Troupe is always in Studio A. Stephanie tells us in a confessional she did this so Michelle would be late, and get a bad reputation in A-Troupe. It is said by people in A-Troupe and as well in a confession done by James was that James has dated many girls before, including Beth who is now in B-Troupe,and Amanda, who was at Elite. He uses dancing as an "unfair" advantage to get girls. It is said as well that E-girls is named by Emily, whose name starts with the letter "E" so that's why they are called the E-Girls. Also the E-girls have over 100 rules, the main one being that you always look out for fellow E-Girls, also they have a fairly simple hand shake, creating an "E" with their hand, linking it with another E-girl to create an "E" on the top and a "G" on the bottom.

Kate and Chris give Michelle a chance to be dance captain considering her being dance captain at her last studio. Each dance captain had to split into a group of 5. But when Chris chooses the groups, Emily is split with Stephanie, her best friend, and Stephanie has to mess up the dance moves to Michelle's dance. Riley feels that Emily and Stephanie's idea shows that Emily is feeling too threatened towards Michelle. Kate yells at Michelle for deciding that their dance was ready, where Michelle argues saying that Stephanie agreed that she was ready. Emily was once again dance captain. Meanwhile, James is about to get kicked out of the studio for failing math. Chris says that he will help James and his mom gives him a second chance. West tries to befriend James by randomly putting on dance offs in public. Everyone in A-Troupe starts arguing over who should be dance captain, Kate panics and Chris throws ping pong balls for everyone to clean up. Until West starts dancing in front of James, James starts dancing in response meaning West has won his respect. Eventually everyone starts dancing together, forgetting about the dance captain situation. They realize they are here to dance, not to complain.

A dance competition is coming up this weekend so Kate and Chris think they should decide the dance line positions. Emily persuades them to let her make the decision, which leads her to putting Michelle in the back row. After Riley finds out that Emily lied to A-Troupe about having the list reviewed by Kate and Chris, she approaches James and asks him if he thinks her being in the front over Michelle is fair, he gives her honest opinion and tells her that it is not. So she switches her front line position with Michelle in the middle of a rehearsal. Emily is outraged that her sister betrayed her, and the E-Girls vote to kick Riley out of their clique. Also, Daniel choreographs a routine for J-troupe, while Tiffany uses J-Troupe to mess with him.

The A-Troupe members go to the beach for a day off while the E-Girls run Dance Camp for the little kids. At the beach, Riley loses Emily's necklace and the group has to find it before they leave the beach. Meanwhile, one of the little kids at dance camp gets lost and the E-Girls have to find her before dance camp is over. At the end, Riley finds Emily's necklace and the E-girls find the little girl.

The A-Troupe takes a visit to the Elite studio to see what they're doing for Regionals. West and Daniel stay at the studio and dance while the rest go to Elite. Riley asks James to go along to keep an eye for Michelle as he is the only one she feels she can trust to keep Emily from hurting Michelle . Michelle gets caught at Elite while filming their routine and the rest of the group leave her there, where she pretends to audition as a cover up. Elite consider recruiting her. Meanwhile, Daniel & West choreograph a duet together. The episode ends as Michelle worries in a confessional. When Kate realizes Michelle was late, she called her over to have a chat about what she overheard the dancers saying. She then tells Emily that Michelle may leave the studio because of how unhappy she was, although Michelle said that it was purely to spy.

Michelle is still at the Elite studio, frightened to be in front of the Elite group. She is so embarrassed to be caught in front of the whole Elite group. Michelle volunteered to film some of Elite's dancing to try to gain a friendship with Emily. Meanwhile James is worrying because Riley had asked him to make sure Michelle doesn't get caught because of Emily . Riley discovers Emily's plan to push Michelle out of the studio. Riley and James make a plan to replace Emily as dance captain with Michelle by making a new better dance to throw over Emily. Michelle has feelings for Eldon and he likes her. In rehearsals Michelle suggests that she and Eldon should do a duet together to try to gain some time to be alone and get to know him better. Kate decides that it is a good idea and they go and practice in studio B.

Eldon realized that he has both feelings for Emily and Michelle but wants to go with Michelle because after practicing their duet he realized that Michelle is a great person.

Brighter Brightest is coming to make a music video with the A-Troupe dancers featured in the video. Meanwhile, Riley is such a huge fan of the band Brighter Brightest that she stammers when trying the talk to the band. Leading the band to think she's a foreign girl who doesn't know how to speak English. James and Riley are caught bickering and told they have a lot of chemistry and are going to be the center of the music video. The female and male dancers split up after arguments where the boys are making animal noises and acting childishly. Eventually they join back together creating a great dance. James admits to having feelings for Riley in an interview while Riley denies it, by the end of the episode you can see that Riley is starting to develop some feelings for James after James gets an autograph from the band as a gift for Riley.

Kate tells Riley to go downtown and pick up the sample costumes for Regionals and James insists on going solely to spend time with her, so he begs Riley to stop and get shawarmas. But, when they get back on the bus, James doesn't have a transfer. So when Riley presents her transfer to the bus driver, James rips her transfer in order to stay together. So now they have to take a shortcut through the park where they meet James's "kooky" aunt. When they finally arrive at the shop, it is closed and Riley goes off at James, resulting in her giving him advice on how to master a dance move. In the end, when they're heading back to the studio in the bus, Riley and James hold hands. And James and Riley do get the costumes in time when they impress the owners by dancing. Meanwhile, Stephanie takes photo shoots for her dream of being a "triple threat", which doesn't go well at first, but when she starts dancing it goes really well.

The A-Troupe auditions for soloists begin. When Daniel earns the solo, he gets an injury and keeps it a secret from everyone. Michelle figures out Chloe has a job. But, when Chloe is late for soloist auditions, Michelle stands up to Emily for Chloe, giving a speech about how Emily is being a bully before walking out that gives the impression that she is going to Elite. But, when Riley and James find her in Squeezed, she announces to them that she decided that she would finally overthrow Emily's position as dance captain in order to show Emily how mean she really is.

Michelle, Riley and James start planning their dance to overthrow Emily as dance captain. As they create a dance to overthrow her, they get West, and Daniel to join in the dance as they think Michelle would be a much better captain. When the group is late for rehearsals, Emily suspects something is up. After Emily rejects Chloe's dance move, Michelle, Riley, James, West, and Daniel show Chloe the dance, and ask her if she wants to join. Chloe immediately says no, and leaves upset at them for trying to overthrow Emily, her fellow E-Girl. During the episode, Emily and Eldon start to get closer, they talk about their families, and hold hands in the juice bar, which makes Michelle upset for an "unknown" reason. Also, Stephanie gets help from Tiffany on her acting capabilities, and when Kate and Stephanie get back from meeting with an agent, Stephanie gets a phone call after she auditions for an acting agent, and gets her first agent.

Emily tries to figure out what Michelle's group is doing. Chloe also joins Michelle's group. Eldon tries to prove to the A-Troupe dancers that he and Emily are serious. His plan did not go over well and he ended up ruining all the chances he had with Emily. At the same time he even created more humiliation for himself. Emily apologizes to Eldon after she was harsh to him. Michelle's group decides to invite Eldon into their dance. While they were performing the dance for him, Stephanie finds out about Michelle's dance and tells Emily.

In the summer finale, the E-Girls finds out about Michelle's routine. They take Michelle's phone and send mean texts to Emily's phone to get Michelle kicked out. Riley sees them and she hides Michelle's phone. After Emily tells Kate about it, the truth about Michelle's dance routine is revealed and to settle it, Kate asks for Michelle's group to show their dance routine. Kate and Chris like their dance, and then Michelle becomes Captain after each person votes for the new dance captain. But Stephanie and Emily leave.

Emily and Stephanie struggle with Michelle as the new dance captain. Michelle tries to be friends with Emily since Michelle doesn't want a bad relationship with Emily, but Emily rejects her. James gets pulled out of the studio but Michelle convinces James' mom that he focuses on his studies for two weeks to improve his grades in Math with the help from the team. Riley is upset; Riley makes a deal with James that if he gets 70% or higher on his Math exam, she would go on a date with him; James is overjoyed. The E-Girls are now broken up. Emily rejects Michelle again by not participating in any of the dance rehearsals. Riley and Emily's relationship has hit rock bottom when Emily tells her that they are no longer sisters. Riley is very upset after Emily says they are not sisters.

Michelle's captaincy gets praised by the dancers once again. Everybody gets mad at Emily for being a drama queen and not trying at all. Emily confesses her feelings to Kate about no longer being Dance Captain. Kate says Emily will have to work hard so she can still be a part of the team. James is studying hard for math to improve his grades. Eldon is still mad at Emily for how she treated him when he made his grand gesture, but offers to help her with the moves after she confesses she doesn't know them. It is revealed by Emily that she has been a bad dance captain because her moves are the only ones that she knows. Emily is starting to have feelings for Eldon. Emily changes her heart about Michelle as dance captain, finally accepting her. Stephanie decides to act like Emily forgetting Michelle. Michelle decides to change the line positions for the routine so everyone re-auditions for their spots and Emily does really well but Michelle still puts in the back row, which angers Eldon.

Emily confronts Michelle for her placement in the back row, saying Michelle put her in the back row because Michelle has a enormous crush on Eldon. Michelle denies this but later admits in the confessional that she does have a "little" crush on him. Eldon comforts Emily and after they talk a little, they share a kiss. Eldon talks to Michelle about Emily's line placement and Michelle promises she will switch Emily and Eldon's positions. Meanwhile, Stephanie auditions for a commercial and the director likes her but says behind her back that he hated her; Stephanie overhears this and is embarrassed. Riley begins to make math cue cards for James, but states that they're just friends when confronted by Tiffany. Michelle reveals she will switch Emily and Eldon and everyone disagrees but they let her do it anyway. Then Riley runs in and tells everyone that Emily and Stephanie are leaving the studio, shocking and angering everyone just as the episode ends.

A-Troupe decides to hold auditions for two new dancers to replace Emily and Stephanie. They let B-Troupe members audition and Giselle is desperate to make it in. Emily and Stephanie go to audition for Elite. Riley goes to James' school to teach him Michelle's routine and sees he's stressed out about his upcoming math test. Riley tests him and he gets all of the answers right. When she asks for a high five to congratulate him, he pulls her in for a hug instead. She then teaches the routine and they dance together. It is later revealed that James feels like anything is possible with Riley and is happy that she sticks by him and believes in him. Eldon goes to Elite to see how Emily is doing and she promises that even if they are at different studios, they will always be together. But just as Kate and Chris are about to reveal the two new A-Troupe dancers, Stephanie comes back and asks if she can audition for A-Troupe because she did not make it to Elite but Emily did, leaving her behind, betraying her and ruining their friendship.

Stephanie is allowed to audition for A-Troupe despite how angry everyone is with her. Despite that, she is let in and cries happy tears when she makes it. Later James walks in to see Riley dancing a solo to a song called "Where Did Everybody Go?", and it stirs him up a little. He re-joins A-Troupe after he passes his math test with a B+, earning him his A-Troupe spot and a date with Riley. Giselle rejoins A-Troupe as well. Michelle and Stephanie agree to create a new Regionals routine as Emily might share A-Troupes ideas with the people at Elite. After choreographing it, Daniel begins to mark the routine, Kate tells him he needs to work harder or his solo will be taken away. Daniel practices alone and states that his injury is much better now. Michelle and Eldon choreograph a duet together for the Regionals routine and Michelle believes there is something between them. James and Riley go on their first date at the studio where they have food from many different countries, they eat, dance and kiss at the end.

Riley tries to make her relationship with Emily as sisters work out. Emily disagrees at first but later on agrees to try to make things right between them. Meanwhile, Eldon takes Emily on a date, but Emily doesn't like the food he brings, so they decide to talk. That makes Eldon like Michelle a bit more. Emily was in the back row at Elite, but in the end, Amanda and Lucien agree she can be in the middle row after she improves. While Emily and Riley talk, Riley tells Emily she went on a date with James, and she needs advice to know if whether they're in a relationship or not. Emily tells her to be straight up with him and ask. In the end of the episode, while Eldon dances their duet with Michelle, Riley arrives and reminds him he's supposed to be at a date with Emily. After, he knows he's in love with Michelle. At the very end, Riley pulls James from the group, so she can ask him if they're in a relationship or not, she says she would like to be and then he runs and hugs her. Riley and James are officially in a relationship.

Giselle and Daniel want to do an overhead lift in the routine called "The Helicopter" but Kate says no because it is too risky. They talk to Michelle and she lets them show it to her. They do and Michelle loves it and lets them do it. Meanwhile, Stephanie gets a role on a television show, only to find out it is filming the same weekend as Regionals. Also, West runs into a member from his former dance crew, Marcel, and he doesn't want Marcel to know that he is in A-Troupe since West left the crew without telling Marcel. At practice when Daniel and Giselle do the helicopter, Daniel badly sprains his ankle and has to leave A-Troupe and will be out indefinitely, not being able to take part in Regionals. He is devastated.

Michelle tells the A-Troupe members that they need to get Emily to rejoin the studio; they disagree at first but later on agree so they go to Elite to convince her to rejoin but she refuses. Amanda and Lucien move Emily up to the front row of their routine. While leaving, Amanda says "hi" to James which earns him a light slap on the arm from a sad Riley. Riley admits it is hard to be dating someone who dated lots of girls in the dance community. James has the Regionals solo now that Daniel is gone and he just can't get it right, and his math grades begin to slip again. Riley warns him about it but he doesn't care about his grades. Eventually James tells Kate he can't dance the solo anymore and Kate understands so she tries to give it to West, who refuses it. Later Emily overhears Amanda and Lucien plotting to kick her out of Elite when Regionals come and she leaves. Eldon confesses to Michelle that he wants to be with her, but then Emily comes back and her and Eldon hug but Eldon still wants to be with Michelle who now thinks her and Eldon are not meant to be.

A-Troupe assembles a dance battle with "Seeds", West's dance crew. Emily and Stephanie finally make up and become friends again. When Seeds arrive at the studio, everyone finds out that West dances with Seeds and he is forced to pick a crew, and he picks A-Troupe. When Emily begins to show true captaincy to the team, Michelle thinks that Emily should be her co-captain. Michelle begins to avoid Eldon because he is dating Emily and she is back now. Ultimately, A-Troupe loses the battle against Seeds and they are very upset. Back at the studio, Emily takes a stand saying she is happy they lost because now they what they are competing against at Regionals since Seeds will be going to Regionals and she offers to buy everyone juice which they accept. Michelle tells Emily she wants Emily to be her co-captain and Emily is very shocked.

Emily accepts Michelle's offer to be her co-captain and they agree that they need to create a new Regionals routine. Chloe's financial problems finally boil over when she is late for a payment again and she confesses to Kate that she has a job. Chloe decides it would be best for her to leave A-Troupe. Co-Captains Michelle and Emily decide to work together and encourage the team to help Chloe. The team goes to the restaurant Chloe works in to give her huge tips, in which she uses to pay for A-Troupe.

It starts off with the troupe practicing the routine then Emily says the energy was great so we can all go home then Chris and Kate inform them that since they all worked so hard they should have a fun night where they hang out as friends not team mates so they all come and play a fun game called machine then play truth or dare where Riley asks West what's his biggest secret. Which he says is witnessing a robbery then West dares Stephanie to order a juice with Tiffany being the hands but when they all go Tiffany puts lipstick on Stephanie then they all come back and Kate wants to put a movie on so they have to dance to pick and James wins but gives his choice to Riley then after the movie they play truth or dare. Tiffany dares James to kiss Riley then James dare's Emily to do the salteen cracker challenge then Emily dares Michelle which guy does she like she said West then later Eldon went up to Michelle and says he wants to break up with Emily and Michelle says if you break up with her now it will tear the team apart then they tell ghost stories girls against boys whoever gets freaked out has to pay. First Stephanie tells a story which the guys have heard of and then west tells a story about chickens which Riley is frightened of and then James pops out in a chicken costume and scares Riley then the girls prank the guys by putting hot sauce on the pizza which the boys figured out. Then a cop comes and arrests James. The girls then reveal it was a joke. The guys were shocked that they were double pranked. The cop was actually Giselle's uncle and Kate was part of the prank.

Excitement turns to worry when the dancers receive the wrong costumes for Regionals. They try on other costumes from studio B, where James puts a chicken costume on and scares Riley, who is scared of chickens. Riley later says that he defiantly lost brownie points on that joke. They also try on costumes Giselle picks up but they don't turn out well. Stephanie reveals that she got the part she auditioned for in Break Stuff, but that it films the same week as Regionals. Michelle finally confesses to Eldon that she has feelings for him and wants to be with him, Eldon says he has moved, upsetting Michelle very much. Stephanie ultimately decides to give up the TV show and go to the Regionals. A-Troupe is ready to go to Regionals.

A-Troupe does their first Regionals routine and they manage to advance to the next round and the third. But in the third round, One of Riley's gloves gets caught in a feather on her bow and their performance goes awry. The Next Step ends up getting eliminated and they are all heartbroken, especially Riley who blames herself for it but everyone else tells her not to. Then James reminds them that they could be given the wild-card spot that will allow them to return, exciting everyone. When they are called back onstage later with two other dance troupes, the announcer announces that The Next Step is the wild-card group and they will return to the competition and everyone is ecstatic. ConfiDance, Annex Dance Academy, Art and Soul and more are all real dance studios in the Ontario area.

Regionals are finally here and the competition is heating up. Before A-Troupe leaves, J-Troupe play them a song on instruments to wish them good luck at Regionals. Daniel appears as well. Once they arrive, so do Elite who get the skip the register line since they won last year. Amanda attempts to break A-Troupe apart but fails. When West realizes that Seeds is missing a member from their crew, he wants to join them. Everyone in A-Troupe and Marcel, the leader of Seeds, say no. But after a bit convincing, West is allowed to perform with Seeds. Seeds end up scoring 88 out of 100 points from the judges. Just when A-Troupe are about to perform, West arrives and says he hurt his ankle dancing with"Seeds, but he was only joking. As soon as A-Troupe go on stage to perform, the episode ends.

The Next Step competes in the semifinals against Seeds. Elite won against Dance Inc. The Next Step's performance is flawless which gets them a score of 93/100, beating Seeds' score of 91/100. Amanda starts to make fun of Emily, who walks away with Riley, forcing Eldon to follow her since she is his girlfriend. Eldon and Emily talk it through and when Emily goes to kiss Eldon he moves away. James gets on Riley's nerves while joking around so Riley yells at him in front of the whole group. After Riley pulls James aside and apologizes for yelling at him. They learn that Riley gets stressed more and James is more calm and relaxed in situations. They both agree to try and be more respectful and supportive of the way the other person is. Emily is starting to notice more about Eldon and Michelle's feelings for each other, when Emily mention Elite will have a plane that's a prop. The Next Step votes to retaliate with Eldon and Michelle's duet in their last performance against Elite.

The Next Step face off against Elite in the finals of Regionals. Eldon reveals to Michelle that he wants to be with her and he lied when he said he had moved on, he promises he will tell Emily after regionals. Just before they perform, Emily begs Eldon to tell her whats going on between him and Michelle and Eldon confesses that he wants to be with Michelle causing him and Emily break up and Emily is upset. Also, Riley and James are talking, while Riley notices Beth. James confronts her on why she's there and she tells him she still loves him. James leaves using the excuse he has to perform. When Riley asks what was said he tells her that she just came to see him perform. James states in an interview he didn't tell Riley about Beth saying she loves him because it would jinx her out and she wouldn't be focused on the routine. They perform their Regionals routine, which was Romeo and Juliet themed, with Michelle and Eldon as Romeo and Juliet. The Next Step wins against Elite Studio and are proclaimed as Regionals winners. Michelle and Emily's relationship remains unknown after Emily gives Michelle the cold stare. Riley jumps into James' arms and hugs her and he spins her around in his arms and they kiss on stage in front of everybody including Beth.