Brian Gone-ly

Week 5: Top 12 Results - 23 October 2017

Last night! The leaderboard shuffled around again as Bruno’s absence brought in a clash of scores in the middle and at the bottom, with four couples on 16, another four on 24, and a couple of couples languishing in between those (Alexandra and Gorka, Davood and Nadiya). Joe took Shirley’s second 10 of the series, whilst Debbie and Giovanni got three nines for their rumba, putting them top of the leaderboard for this week.

We open with a pro-dance set in a 60s swinging club run by Anton, Pasha and Dianne. The sign at the back of the club claims it is a speed dating event, but as speed dating wasn’t invented until the late 1990s, I call this merely a pre-watershed euphemism. It’s a poppy, jive/rock ’n’ roll type thing that’s danced to 'Too Many Fish In The Sea' and it comes across with a lot of energy-riffing off Hairspray’s The Nicest Kids in Town (if it was set in let's-say-Rotherham's answer to Studio 54). Costume-wise, we are going with primary colours for the ladies, using more of Vicky Gill’s reams of red and yellow fabric - seriously, how much of that did she buy this week? (Browns for the men mostly.) It’s silly, but it’s fun, fast and we don’t have to witness the indignity of Anton flirting with anybody, except at the end when he with Dianne get off with each other - only implied, thankfully. Poor Pasha though, ends up all on his lonesome with nothing but a drink for company. I wouldn’t blame him if he started to feel the lure of Erin Island, to be honest. [NOOOOOOOOOOO! - Steve]

Tess and Claudia enter, both in black with white shoes. I like to think they’re wearing these colours in tribute to Debbie/Giovanni last night.

Recap of last night in which the following points of note happen: Brendan welcomes us because he is totally on board and on brand despite last week, honest; Debbie loves how everyone is all hugs and kisses backstage whilst Susan says they are like the best kind of family - all a bit odd and all in love with each other. I love how the show has gone from only tentatively embracing its gay side to now full on endorsing polyamory and incest how progressive; Gorka mimes along with the welcoming voice-over (who’d have thought it would be Aljaž that did that, hands up); they are making a big deal of Gemma being a dark horse, repeating Craig’s comments last night about her and - conspiracy theorists take note - she is the only contestant to receive support from somebody outside of the judges and dancers - Gilly from Hollyoaks congratulates her on doing it for Emmerdale, Manchester and all of her friends. Forgotten his soap roots already? I mean I get how you might want to run away from a character that started out being a complete idiot and ended up being a rapist who denied his actions, but still, did Ashley Taylor Dawson suffer for nothing if the legacy of Hollyoaks and Strictly is no longer remembered? Once upon a time we even had two contenders from there on the show. [Although they pretended Ali Bastian was from The Bill. - Steve] Don't tell me Strictly has dumped the Oaks for Emmerdale, I will not have it. (It's at this point I'm getting evicted from Yorkshire, isn't it?)

Time for our first set of results. Safe: Joe and Katya; Mollie and AJ; Davood and Nadiya; Debbie and Giovanni; Aston and Janette. In the dance off? It’s Simon and Karen and they don’t appear particularly surprised by this turn of events. In terms of advice, Craig says if Simon does at least one swivel on his good leg that will make him happy.

In the Clauditorium, Joe says that he is happy to be declared safe and thanks Neil Jones for lending him a lucky Paso jacket. The idea that Neil has a lucky paso jacket tantalises me about what his own pasos might look like, particularly as Katya has delivered so well this week. [It's probably also the most demure item in his wardrobe, based on his It Takes Two appearances. - Steve] Cliftons vs Joneses battle of the Pasos 2018 let’s have at it (NB Karen will probably get another duffer again and will never even do one).

You know how often Dragon has a mind of its own about what it thinks should be going in these recaps? I quote: ‘Claudia my darkest girl and we learned they will demand the something Jonnie Peacock, Johnny and when you daddy, like tomorrow and he says he’s not bitter at his absolute ones of the week we learned that Debbie and Giovanni are friends and makes you look hot notion’. That sounds like some kind of weird incantation, does it not? [I wasn't entirely unhappy about "Jonnie and when you daddy" though. - Steve] Anyway - I think the gist of it is that Mollie is doing a cha-cha next week and she’s not really up for it, Davood’s vote is suffering not least because his own daughters are voting for Jonnie Peacock instead of him, everyone ships Debbie and Giovanni, and Aston and Janette are dancing to Nirvana for Halloween week. I’m assuming it's Smells like Teen Spirit and I’m interested to see how the singers handle that opening line.

It’s now time for our Very Special Guest Performance. This week it’s The Script, featuring Him from The Script from The Voice and several other men, also presumably called Him from The Script. Aljaž and Oti do some whirling and swirling around in front of them, with a little bit of Paso shaping and some contemporary wafting. It’s all very earnest. Him from The Script is trying to sound like Bono and Chris Martin having an arm wrestling match except if both of them were even more feeble than they actually are, imagine that. Also, it literally only consists of the words ‘my arms are open’. Call yourselves The Script? Oh hang on a minute everyone, I think we’ve found the people responsible for all of Tess’s terrible jokes. Lynch them! (I mean not literally obviously that would be a terrible thing to make a joke about et cetera et cetera)

We’re back with Claudia for 'dance debrief' and the whole sofa looks just so bare and empty without Bruno on there. We cover what a chasse is - any three steps in a row; Gemma’s neck stretching too much so that she ended up looking at the ceiling (prompting Darcey to do a Bruno and demonstrate good neck whilst spreading her arms with gay abandon across both Craig and Shirley’s chests. Quick, call Ofcom!) Claudia asks Craig now if he liked Joe’s 'double knee hoo-ha' in the Paso. Craig says he likes the double pirouettes that then went onto his knee. We then cover Craig covering Bruno and he looks a little bit embarrassed.

And now we discover who is facing Simon and Karen in the dance off .  It’s not any of these people: Gemma and Aljaž; Jonnie and Oti; Alexandra and Gorka; Susan and Kevin - who Tess calls Susanna and Kevin - leaving Ruth and Anton to face the wobble of uncertainty before it is revealed that Brian and Amy are actually the two in the dance off. 

Brian says he’s thinking 'Errr… it’s a great song'. At least pretend to be grateful for the wunnerful opportunity to do it all again, Brian. Shirley tells him how to win is to 'make no mistakes'. So let’s get this straight: all Simon has to do is swivel his leg a little bit and Brian has to make no mistakes. Harsh. But fair.

With the rest of the saved couples we learn that Jonnie only wanted to make it to week six (lol hun sure you did); Gemma has a smelly bracelet of an elephant that she uses for luck; Alexandra and Gorka have the tango next week to 'Maneater' by Nelly Furtado and that better be as amazing as it sounds; Susan will be playing…. that blonde woman from Game of Thrones who likes dragons (you try teaching voice software to say her name. It still hasn’t learned alley hash and OT after three series).

We then get a trailer for next week - HALLOWEEN! Tess and Claudia are witches casting spells over all the contestants making them fly in the air.  For some reason the pros tell them not to do that - I don’t see why not, you’d get a guaranteed 10 from Bruno at least.

Our pre-dance off chat now and Claudia says that both couples are about to 'dance their last' and then abruptly adds 'chance'. I’d be quite happy with this being a double elimination, Claud, if you think we should go for that. Karen tells Simon to swivel and smile. I’m sure that’s the kind of thing you usually say to somebody when you want them to piss off, but actually that probably is what she means. Also Brian is really annoying in this bit and I can’t be bothered to recap him, you can thank me later.

As dance offs go, this is not going to be up there with the classics. They are both worse than the first time, but not in such a way that it is entirely hilarious. Simon falls over at one point, although just about gets himself up again. However, he does seem to have forgotten large chunks of the routine and the swivel he’s been told to provide all evening is still invisible as far as I can tell. He also looks completely and utterly knackered - almost as if he’s actually shilling to go home. Perhaps he seen his costume for next week and wants out, who can say? Surely it can’t be worse than Buzz Lightyear, but you never know. As for Brian, he has even less kick in his legs than before, with his right leg barely moving at all and also seems to have forgotten chunks of the routine. He then does a really ungainly move where he appears to almost break Amy’s arms.  It's dad dancing on a level we haven’t seen since, well, Simon last week. That dance off was not a triumph for yellow, guys, it’s getting hard to justify it as my favourite colour right now.

Craig says both couples made mistakes but he’s saving Simon and Karen for a little bit of swivel - so minimal you’ll need a microscope, but let's be honest he's saving him because he's the marginally less annoying one. Darcey also saves them for having a 'more finished performance'. Shirley, of course, would have saved Simon because she's going to save him over pretty much anyone.

So Brian doesn’t make it to Halloween even though he’s been shilling for it on ITT for the last couple of weeks what a shame. He then goes on and on about how much he loves Amy, who looks vaguely uncomfortable as she has done throughout the duration of this series. He also gets in a bit about how much he loves Aston, which is still the strangest relationship I’ve known in years of this show. Darcey starts crying for some reason - I suspect tears of joy. Amy breaks down crying as well. Tess says the scarecrow was her personal favourite - yes, Tess, as in the only vaguely decent dance he ever did. They dance out to 'Don’t Dream it’s Over' and Brian does that stupid not-the-splits thing and the audience don’t even respond, which is hilarious. I also love Simon’s pass-agg tribute to him at the end where he calls him a ‘sort of close friend’ rather than the usual BEST FWENDS/FAM4LYF rhetoric we usually have post-mortem.

Next week!  Will Joe and Katya do a rubbish dance again? Will Simon have an even worse costume than in Movie week?  Will they stop pretending Gemma is a dark horse? Steve will be with you to find out!