Mainly Strictly
I’ve seen the Downton Abbey: A New Era teaser trailer,and it seems that Fellowes’s bright idea was to send them all to the south of France, and that Maggie Smith said ‘oh, all right then’ so Violet is around to let them know she has a Mysterious Past. Don’t know if Violet madkes it to the south of France. Was it to film more outdoors? Or just…taking advantage of the fact they could go film in the south of France? I don’t know when it’s out and I haven’t been to the cinema since March 2020 and I don’t know when I will return. (You now need a COVID pass to go t the cinema in these parts, and I was dithering over whether that made me feel safer and now there’s Omicron-related uncertainty…)
Also, I’m glad JRR Tolkien never knew they names a storm after Arwen.
Strictly Week 10
Found out on Friday that Cynthia would be back as a replacement judge but in a different seat because Motsi had a COVID contact/wrong vaccine/lives in Germany but Craig would be back.
I really liked the revolving from training room to training room in the opening VT (if they have done it before, I’d missed it.
Tess wore a pink dress of an unoffending shape, Claudia wore a white jacket over black, loved Shirley’s blue green gown, Cynthia was in a tight red dress, Anton was in a gold jacket (which makes a welcome change) and Craig was BACK.
Lots of empty spaces between the couples.
I don’t know if this was an issue because of my connection me thing or more general, but there was a sort of skip and a repeat of the past few seconds in Rose’s VT and more worryingly her dance., which cut actoss the flow and meant I missed some bits. It would happen again during the show, definitely during the final dance. Here, I’d just started thinking ‘What a weird take on California Dreaming, why not just get a more paso-suitable song?’ Then the blip happened, and I never really connected to the dance. There was something off, possibly that she wasn’t strong enough (although the lighting wasn’t very helpful for me,) and you could hear her apologising fr a stumble towards the end. The judges’ comments didn’t help me much.
After genuinely sexy Giovanni, we had an attempt to be sexy because it’s the rumba Dan. Didn’t work. As for the dance, yes, I can see his improvement, and his timing was great, as Shirley said, and he was there for Nadiya, but he wasn’t there as a dancer. He’s too tall for the rumba and he wasn’t finishing his arms at the beginning. I was staggered by Cynthia giving him a 9, after spatting with Craig as if the seat demanded it.
In her mandatory couples choice life story VT, AJ made the really valid point that Craig’s comment that it was a shame that she hadn’t learned to dance earlier cut because her parents simply didn’t have the wherewithal to get her dance lesons and spoke for a whole lot of less well- off/geographically unfortunate kids.
ANYWAY, talking about sexy: AJ got the best coour of the lady celebs, and Kai was working his hat. We started off with ye olde tableography, but as promised, they styled it out, and there were a couple of highlights in the routine that made me squeal. THIS is what a couples choice is all about, (still bitter with Ajiaz): showcasing your celeb’s strengths. Yes, there were bits where Kai was sharper/better than AJ, so it took Cynthia giving it a 9 when she’d given Dan a 9 (possibly because she’s more familiar with this style than rumba) for me to welcme Shirley’s 10.
Lovely waltz from Rhys, a real connection between him and Nancy, and I loved how it built up into going into hold and staying there until the final beats. The lighting and music battled against Rhys’s wish for it to be gentle. He proceeded to burst into tears after it was over, which made Tess infantilise him, which was weird. Claudia was, as ever, far more human in pre-emptively apologising for the family message that would bring back his sobbing.
By this point, the marking felt really weird, probably because Cynthia was so unpredictable, while it felt like Craig had felt they were all far too generous last week. If Rhys stays out of the dance off, it might be considered a breakthrough, but it’s uncertain, although the routine pulled me in.
Perhaps because of the colouring, I found the fringing of the top half of Tilly’s outfit cringey. This was the best lady celelb samba we’ve had all series: it looked more like one than anyone else has managed. Sure, she could have done with more polish, but it’s a toughie. Nonetheless, the scoring placed her bottom.
John really can’t grumble that his partner is heavy when he asled for a male partner, can he? Anyway, DOUBLE HATS. I hated the side-by-side bit where they were doing the same moves for the same reasons I’ve expounded on in the past, but I think they were doing contrasting moves for the rest of the dance (there was a blip in this routine too.) They totally tried to force a Strictlyesque narrative that judges’ words had made John Believe In Himself, for Johannes getting over his injury and their having more time to rehearse a dance that suited him better. Whatever, show.
Having said that, Dan getting a 9 made me vote for four couples and once more for AJ because I loved that routine the most.
This entry was originally posted at https://shallowness.dreamwidth.org/478226.html.
Also, I’m glad JRR Tolkien never knew they names a storm after Arwen.
Strictly Week 10
Found out on Friday that Cynthia would be back as a replacement judge but in a different seat because Motsi had a COVID contact/wrong vaccine/lives in Germany but Craig would be back.
I really liked the revolving from training room to training room in the opening VT (if they have done it before, I’d missed it.
Tess wore a pink dress of an unoffending shape, Claudia wore a white jacket over black, loved Shirley’s blue green gown, Cynthia was in a tight red dress, Anton was in a gold jacket (which makes a welcome change) and Craig was BACK.
Lots of empty spaces between the couples.
I don’t know if this was an issue because of my connection me thing or more general, but there was a sort of skip and a repeat of the past few seconds in Rose’s VT and more worryingly her dance., which cut actoss the flow and meant I missed some bits. It would happen again during the show, definitely during the final dance. Here, I’d just started thinking ‘What a weird take on California Dreaming, why not just get a more paso-suitable song?’ Then the blip happened, and I never really connected to the dance. There was something off, possibly that she wasn’t strong enough (although the lighting wasn’t very helpful for me,) and you could hear her apologising fr a stumble towards the end. The judges’ comments didn’t help me much.
After genuinely sexy Giovanni, we had an attempt to be sexy because it’s the rumba Dan. Didn’t work. As for the dance, yes, I can see his improvement, and his timing was great, as Shirley said, and he was there for Nadiya, but he wasn’t there as a dancer. He’s too tall for the rumba and he wasn’t finishing his arms at the beginning. I was staggered by Cynthia giving him a 9, after spatting with Craig as if the seat demanded it.
In her mandatory couples choice life story VT, AJ made the really valid point that Craig’s comment that it was a shame that she hadn’t learned to dance earlier cut because her parents simply didn’t have the wherewithal to get her dance lesons and spoke for a whole lot of less well- off/geographically unfortunate kids.
ANYWAY, talking about sexy: AJ got the best coour of the lady celebs, and Kai was working his hat. We started off with ye olde tableography, but as promised, they styled it out, and there were a couple of highlights in the routine that made me squeal. THIS is what a couples choice is all about, (still bitter with Ajiaz): showcasing your celeb’s strengths. Yes, there were bits where Kai was sharper/better than AJ, so it took Cynthia giving it a 9 when she’d given Dan a 9 (possibly because she’s more familiar with this style than rumba) for me to welcme Shirley’s 10.
Lovely waltz from Rhys, a real connection between him and Nancy, and I loved how it built up into going into hold and staying there until the final beats. The lighting and music battled against Rhys’s wish for it to be gentle. He proceeded to burst into tears after it was over, which made Tess infantilise him, which was weird. Claudia was, as ever, far more human in pre-emptively apologising for the family message that would bring back his sobbing.
By this point, the marking felt really weird, probably because Cynthia was so unpredictable, while it felt like Craig had felt they were all far too generous last week. If Rhys stays out of the dance off, it might be considered a breakthrough, but it’s uncertain, although the routine pulled me in.
Perhaps because of the colouring, I found the fringing of the top half of Tilly’s outfit cringey. This was the best lady celelb samba we’ve had all series: it looked more like one than anyone else has managed. Sure, she could have done with more polish, but it’s a toughie. Nonetheless, the scoring placed her bottom.
John really can’t grumble that his partner is heavy when he asled for a male partner, can he? Anyway, DOUBLE HATS. I hated the side-by-side bit where they were doing the same moves for the same reasons I’ve expounded on in the past, but I think they were doing contrasting moves for the rest of the dance (there was a blip in this routine too.) They totally tried to force a Strictlyesque narrative that judges’ words had made John Believe In Himself, for Johannes getting over his injury and their having more time to rehearse a dance that suited him better. Whatever, show.
Having said that, Dan getting a 9 made me vote for four couples and once more for AJ because I loved that routine the most.
This entry was originally posted at https://shallowness.dreamwidth.org/478226.html.