Strictly Come Dancing Week 4
Found out this morning that the fic series I'd been reading over the last couple of days (so at least it was short) was an abandoned WIP. Grr.
The theme of last week’s It Takes Two was that they’re dropping like flies! Ugo is dropping out for a week in protest at Rylan making him and Oti believe the Rock had a message for them on ITT (it was half-plausible, although if it had been for real, they’d have saved it for the show proper not shown it on ITT.) Seriously, I hope his back gets better soon, although that doesn’t sound like a part of the body that can cope with a lot of styles of dance. Before that, Robert had pulled out more permanently as his cardiac health wasn’t up to it. I bet the producers must be hoping nobody else gets COVID or anything else or I dunno…Tom might win by default in November.
So, I prepared myself for the slump of the week after movie week. Minor variations in what Tess wore - a wine-coloured dress, covering arms, showing off legs, but with a smaller slit, Shirley calming down from previous off the one-shoulder dresses in a pale yellow, I don’t even know how to describe Motsi’s look, but it fell within her usual parameters, as did Claudia and the men’s. As the sharply reduced in number couples came on, the impression was of an overall dark palate.
Sassy cha cha from Rose (I think her trousers beat Karen’s.) The judges said her Latin was improving, but she’d made mistakes and marked accordingly. I find her altogether charming (and I really hope she and Gio could meet and dance for deaf/hard of hearing children.)
I’m going to presume that losing two couples made the traditional slot o’doom meaningless, and we had our first of many purity of the dance VTs, perhaps as a corrective after movie week. Big anticipation for Tom’s first ballroom, and Amy showed she had a lot of faith in him with what she gave him to do and that it was mostly deserved in a promising, elegant foxtrot.
I thought Tilly’s paso was quite good, certainly strong, but lacking in dynamism. Motsi raised the fact that it was tough to do a paso after last week. I really wasn’t expecting 9s, and thought this was the most overmarked dance of the night, but I’ve also realised that I personally can’t get enthusiastic about these two.
I said ‘oh dear’ quite a lot during Greg’s Macarena samba (and it appeared even worse when repeated in slo mo as they got to the Clauditorium.) Deservedly bottom of the leaderboard, and he should look at the dance-off as a chance to cut out the mistakes. Also, why do so many people call him Craig?
So, maybe all male pros should experience what it’s like to be lifted? The start of John’s American Smooth was ’eh’, but he got into it. The judges’ consensus seemed to be that he was better out of hold than in it, although Craig did that thing where he was critiquing the choreography more than judging the dance (as he often did through the night), and I thought Johannes was led by the song, really, but also, if I were him, I’d be giving John leaps in every possible routine. Nobody expected him to repeat the three 10s (except possibly Tess)…and he didn’t.
I thought Rhys’s samba featured such good body movement, though it didn’t quite look improvised, but honestly, how many Strictly salsas do? As ever, I find him an exciting dancer.
Then followed the BEE-YOO-TIFUL classic/traditional tango from Sara. Aljiaz has clearly worked out how to teach her and she’s proved ballroom is for her. It was so good that the gimmick of opening with the colours toned down felt unnecessary. I wondered if she quite managed the gear change required when the music sped up, but she throroughly deserved to be top of the heap.
Dan and Nadiya’s hair’s Hammer cha cha won the novelty song routine competition. His light footendness came into play again, he cut out the mistakes of last week, and I loved the accents and Hammer time references of the choreography.
While I was worried Judi’s VT might have set her off before she started dancing, I acknowledge that her grief is genuine and that I can’t see where else they could have gone with that song, maybe I’m cynical, but I thought the choreography was calculated and having a couples choice-esque VT worked to block the judges from criticising her dancing, although Anton and Motsi tried, which is one way to respond to being in the dance-off last week, I suppose. There were things wrong that even I could spot, although she achieved a level of grace that probably would have surprised her going into the competition. Also, I liked her skirt!
I was more apprehensive about Adam doing the Argentine tango now than excited, but it was much better than the past two routines, and more like the Adam we expected after week one, especially the lifts. Katya mentioned changes to how he learned the routine on ITT and he out and out said he a visual learner, so maybe they’ve cracked that it’s how they use the hours, not how many there are. His mother’s candour was hilarious.
And then we got AJ and her samba, and while my excitement fizzled out - I thought it was good, not great - this was the first time the judges stomped all over her heart. Not a good night for the sambas, and a bit of an anticlimactic ending.
Because we’d lost two couples, I felt motivated to vote, and for what it’s worth, voted for Rose, who needed it and Rhys in case (partly a reaction to Tilly being above him.) I thought Sara was the best, as I said,but she didn’t need my vote.
And Craig and Mosti had a running spat all show.
This entry was originally posted at https://shallowness.dreamwidth.org/473791.html.
The theme of last week’s It Takes Two was that they’re dropping like flies! Ugo is dropping out for a week in protest at Rylan making him and Oti believe the Rock had a message for them on ITT (it was half-plausible, although if it had been for real, they’d have saved it for the show proper not shown it on ITT.) Seriously, I hope his back gets better soon, although that doesn’t sound like a part of the body that can cope with a lot of styles of dance. Before that, Robert had pulled out more permanently as his cardiac health wasn’t up to it. I bet the producers must be hoping nobody else gets COVID or anything else or I dunno…Tom might win by default in November.
So, I prepared myself for the slump of the week after movie week. Minor variations in what Tess wore - a wine-coloured dress, covering arms, showing off legs, but with a smaller slit, Shirley calming down from previous off the one-shoulder dresses in a pale yellow, I don’t even know how to describe Motsi’s look, but it fell within her usual parameters, as did Claudia and the men’s. As the sharply reduced in number couples came on, the impression was of an overall dark palate.
Sassy cha cha from Rose (I think her trousers beat Karen’s.) The judges said her Latin was improving, but she’d made mistakes and marked accordingly. I find her altogether charming (and I really hope she and Gio could meet and dance for deaf/hard of hearing children.)
I’m going to presume that losing two couples made the traditional slot o’doom meaningless, and we had our first of many purity of the dance VTs, perhaps as a corrective after movie week. Big anticipation for Tom’s first ballroom, and Amy showed she had a lot of faith in him with what she gave him to do and that it was mostly deserved in a promising, elegant foxtrot.
I thought Tilly’s paso was quite good, certainly strong, but lacking in dynamism. Motsi raised the fact that it was tough to do a paso after last week. I really wasn’t expecting 9s, and thought this was the most overmarked dance of the night, but I’ve also realised that I personally can’t get enthusiastic about these two.
I said ‘oh dear’ quite a lot during Greg’s Macarena samba (and it appeared even worse when repeated in slo mo as they got to the Clauditorium.) Deservedly bottom of the leaderboard, and he should look at the dance-off as a chance to cut out the mistakes. Also, why do so many people call him Craig?
So, maybe all male pros should experience what it’s like to be lifted? The start of John’s American Smooth was ’eh’, but he got into it. The judges’ consensus seemed to be that he was better out of hold than in it, although Craig did that thing where he was critiquing the choreography more than judging the dance (as he often did through the night), and I thought Johannes was led by the song, really, but also, if I were him, I’d be giving John leaps in every possible routine. Nobody expected him to repeat the three 10s (except possibly Tess)…and he didn’t.
I thought Rhys’s samba featured such good body movement, though it didn’t quite look improvised, but honestly, how many Strictly salsas do? As ever, I find him an exciting dancer.
Then followed the BEE-YOO-TIFUL classic/traditional tango from Sara. Aljiaz has clearly worked out how to teach her and she’s proved ballroom is for her. It was so good that the gimmick of opening with the colours toned down felt unnecessary. I wondered if she quite managed the gear change required when the music sped up, but she throroughly deserved to be top of the heap.
Dan and Nadiya’s hair’s Hammer cha cha won the novelty song routine competition. His light footendness came into play again, he cut out the mistakes of last week, and I loved the accents and Hammer time references of the choreography.
While I was worried Judi’s VT might have set her off before she started dancing, I acknowledge that her grief is genuine and that I can’t see where else they could have gone with that song, maybe I’m cynical, but I thought the choreography was calculated and having a couples choice-esque VT worked to block the judges from criticising her dancing, although Anton and Motsi tried, which is one way to respond to being in the dance-off last week, I suppose. There were things wrong that even I could spot, although she achieved a level of grace that probably would have surprised her going into the competition. Also, I liked her skirt!
I was more apprehensive about Adam doing the Argentine tango now than excited, but it was much better than the past two routines, and more like the Adam we expected after week one, especially the lifts. Katya mentioned changes to how he learned the routine on ITT and he out and out said he a visual learner, so maybe they’ve cracked that it’s how they use the hours, not how many there are. His mother’s candour was hilarious.
And then we got AJ and her samba, and while my excitement fizzled out - I thought it was good, not great - this was the first time the judges stomped all over her heart. Not a good night for the sambas, and a bit of an anticlimactic ending.
Because we’d lost two couples, I felt motivated to vote, and for what it’s worth, voted for Rose, who needed it and Rhys in case (partly a reaction to Tilly being above him.) I thought Sara was the best, as I said,but she didn’t need my vote.
And Craig and Mosti had a running spat all show.
This entry was originally posted at https://shallowness.dreamwidth.org/473791.html.