Britney Spears' Gilded Cage Revealed Live

The success of latter-day Britney Spears, particularly when it comes to her live tours, truly baffles some people.

She doesn't sing live and, in fact, barely puts any effort into her lip synching now. Her dancing is childishly basic. Her shows employ elaborate sets and a cabal of talented back-up dancers (and, in the case of this tour, circus performers) to distract from the fact that she brings very little to the table as a pop star. While all of these criticisms are true, they fail to state a very simple fact: some people just don't care about substance.

For some, the concept of substance versus spectacle has probably never even presented itself. The idea of a real live concert, with "real" performances by someone with "real" emotion has probably never occurred to them, and likely wouldn't appeal to them if it did. These were the kind of people at the Air Canada Centre last night.

This first became apparent during the opening set by the Pussycat Dolls. The five remaining Dolls were a very well-oiled machine. They worked their relatively small stage and bare bones set (sort of like Rent if it was set in a strip club and was about nothing of any consequence whatsoever), sent shout-outs to the crowd and put on a slick, shiny and professional performance.

The crowd ate it all up, but there was a clear hierarchy for what earned their high-pitched squeals. When main Doll Nicole Scherzinger hit a high note, it was met with moderate cheering, but when she stood on a platform and it started to rise, lifting her a few feet from the rest of the set, fans went absolutely crazy.

To an audience where the appearance of "singing" means less to you than a simple stunt, Britney Spears' Circus tour is a downright amazing experience. It's filled with acrobatics, incredible sets, cool-looking carny and peepshow-inspired videos, dancing and pyro. There's never a dull moment in any of the three rings that make up her stage. On the absolute surface, Britney and crew put on one hell of a show that's worth every cent.

Unfortunately, if you scratch below the surface, things get downright troublesome. Much like the album of the same name, Circus is a confusingly exploitative affair that doesn't treat its top star very well.

Despite all of the lyrical posturing about being in the centre of the ring — and the military-themed segue that involves Britney leading her dancers in drills and barking, "I don't know what you've been told, this mama is in control" — Britney couldn't be more of a pawn in the whole thing.

It's evident in her body language on stage. Say what you will about the Pussycat Dolls (four of them are essentially useless, their songs are mostly sexist crap with a pandering nod to female empowerment and they're positive proof the evil cylons are right and humanity doesn't deserve to survive), at least they're willingly exploiting themselves. They strut around the stage grinding with an air of self-possession. They, for lack of a better term, at least own it.

Britney, by contrast, has a far more tentative strut. She nervously fixes her (useless) mic, regularly smoothes her hand over her hair and moves through her rudimentary dance moves with little visible feeling for, or understanding of, the material she's performing. She is, in essence, a child pageant contestant trapped in a grown woman's body.

It's also apparent in the staging and choreography of many numbers. Throughout the numbers in Circus, Britney rarely moves around the stage of her own volition. Sometimes she's led around by her dancers. Sometimes she's moved around by them while she poses on various pieces of furniture and apparatuses (a cage in "Piece Of Me," a circus-themed pole in "Radar," bikes in "Boys"). Sometimes she's lifted in the air (sitting on an umbrella for "Everytime," straddling two men in "Touch Of My Hand," floating above fire during "I'm A Slave 4 U"). Almost every moment in the show is done to her, not by her.

But none of this is obvious to Britney or her core fans, and it probably isn't worth the effort to try to reach them or explain it to them. A large portion of the truly faithful — the ones who shelled out hundreds of dollars to be on the floor in the "VIP section" — didn't even watch the show with their own eyes, and chose instead to film the whole thing. They spent hundreds of dollars to watch the show through a lens so they could have footage of the concert instead of putting the damned thing down and watching their idol, mere feet away from them, in the flesh.

People have different values, even when it comes to pop culture. It might not make sense to someone who would rather see a band tear up the tiny stage at the Horseshoe Tavern or someone who wants to see The Boss bust his ass for three hours, but Britney fans, at least the unironic ones, prefer the superficiality and the sparkly spectacle. And if that's what truly makes them happy, then perhaps it's best to let them share that gilded cage with their idol.