Chizzed off

Week 2 Results - Sunday 1 October

Last night! Alexandra and Debbie triumphed, whilst Charlotte had a complete nightmare and many of those in between were either underwhelming or also made a series of mistakes. Hooray for the early stages of the competition!

We open with a pro-dance to 'Everybody Needs Somebody' is set in a bowling alley - with a projected set of bowling lanes on the floor the look really good, props to the technical team. It features Gorka bowling at an angle that would certainly have got his ball in the gutter despite us having the sound effect of him hitting a bunch of pins [Gorka can fling his balls into my gutt[*COMMENT CURTAILED ON GROUNDS OF TASTE*] - Steve]; Neil being forced to carry around pins (always the bridesmaid etc); lots of Janette being flung around; Oti and Giovanni frolicking on the judges table-hinting at an Oti versus Debbie McGee fight in the future? I genuinely have no idea who I’d bet on. It gets to end with Pasha bowling a strike which (spoiler alert) is kind of them, allowing him a tiny moment of victory considering what’s about to come.

Tess and Claudia enter. Daly dress watch: a cerise pink number with some very odd asymmetrical shoulder work going on that makes it look as if she’s wearing two completely different dresses stitched together. Wasn’t that a challenge on Sewing Bee once? I miss Sewing Bee, damn you Love Productions.

Tess says it was raining nines in the ballroom last night, which is an incredibly positive spin on the number of twos, threes and fours that were being given out. Our judges enter, introduced in pairs: Shirley and Bruno, then Craig and Darcey.  Is this to cement Craig and Darcey’s position as the lesser judges to justify their lower pay?

Recap of last nights in which the following of note happens: Chizzy is sad that somebody has to leave the family (spoiler: which makes my heart break a little bit knowing what’s about to come); Richard thinks his ensemble made him look like a flamboyant farmer; there is a lot of focus on the errors in Chizzy, Charlotte and Simon’s dances and not at all on those in Aston or Joe’s; Johnny has a remarkably young looking dad; I will never stop being delighted at Susan’s wife being so prominent on prime-time BBC1 [me neither <3 - Steve]; Debbie thinks Giovanni isn’t speechless very often as if she isn’t the talker of the partnership; literally every single couple except Chizzy and Pasha are shown in a huggy or loving position at the end of the recap. Foreshadowing!

And now for our first set of results of the series. Safe: Debbie and Giovanni; Aston and Janette; Davood and Nadiya; Mollie and AJ; Johnny and Oti; Ruth and Anton. First couple in the dance off? Chizzy and Pasha. This is a somewhat surprising turn of events - I was betting on a Simon/Charlotte bottom two with the possibility of Brian or Richard turning up there due to splitting the comedy vote. I guess Chizzy is probably the least famous of everyone here, though, and the underdog votes were probably more likely to go towards people lower down the leaderboard that she was. [I think there were quite a few things working against Chizzy - she had a bit of a bad night performance-wise, but not *so* bad that it would've driven sympathy votes her way, she was on at the start of a *very* long show and wasn't terrriby memorable, she was fighting with Joe - who probably *did* get the sympathy vote drive - for the Holby vote, and that's before we even consider that being a plus-size black woman isn't a massive vote-winner on this show to begin with. - Steve] Shirley advises her to get over her standing foot so that the movement looks easier and to bring her own personality to the dance. Chizzy looks really defeated, bless her.

In the Clauditorium, Claudia calls upon Mollie to provide the standard statement about it being really nervous waiting for your name to be called out and she delivers the most rote version of that statement I’ve ever heard - but all I can focus on is the line of red jewels along her hair parting that make it look exactly as if she’s suffered a head injury and we're not even on Halloween week yet! Debbie claims to have been stunned to go through despite being top of the overall leaderboard, but I guess when you’re a mega ringer you want to work on the ‘Oh I’m so humble really’ act early, so go Debbie. The men are happy to go through and sorry to see the red light come on - they are very boring so far. Claudia and Ruth inform us that next week is movie week. Hooray?

Our special guest performer is Emily Sunday, singing something that doesn’t suit her voice or style at all and has a really annoying dance style backing track. Neil and Katya come out to dance in front of it and Katya is wearing some god-awful transparent black lace trousers, whilst Neil is dressed as a jewel thief and it’s all pretty underwhelming for our first special guest performance of the series (and I don’t even normally mind Emily Sunday). Still, it gives Neil something to do. While he’s waiting to see which will be the first to crack out of Brendan, Anton and Pasha to finally let him get a chance at being a pro.

We then come to what used to be known as Len’s Lens and now is apparently called Dance Debrief (what, no Craig’s Candid Camera? Shirl’s Twirls?) as the judges dance on to Reel 2 Reel’s ‘I like to move it’. 

They begin with Simon and Karen and Shirley looks as if she’s about to burst into tears yet again. Anyway, Shirley explained she was impressed with the vertical line with his back and the shape of his arms from the blatant emotional manipulation. Claudia asks if the spin that went drastically wrong was obvious they show it in slow mo and it looks even more horrific than it is time-it’s clear that Simon hasn’t got the faintest clue about the logistics involved, which actually endears him more to me as a fellow spatially challenged individual. Bruno laughs ‘was it obvious?!’

They briefly discuss Debbie and Giovanni with Darcey complementing how Debbie makes it look effortless (I think that’s because it is effortless for her, Darcey) and praising her doing a movement that I can’t find online but sounds like Debblique - I’ve decided in my head canon that it’s a movement Debbie made up and named after herself because that’s the kind of thing a mega ringer should do. [It's called a développé, I think. - Steve] Craig then covers how Susan couldn’t swivelling the Charleston and Ruth could only manage on 1 foot; how Susan’s facial expressions were better than Ruth’s and how neither had a sense of rippling in their bodies. He then encourages everyone else that there is no such thing as too over the top in a Charleston. I believe this is one of those statements that needs to be qualified with YMMV. [I for one would beg to fucking differ. - Steve]We end with some praise for Alexandra, Bruno waxing lyrical about she was the dance embodied in person.

And now for some people who were not the living embodiment of dance, I presume. Before we find out who’s in the bottom two, though, we have more results. Safe: Susan and Kevin; Joe and Katya; Alexandra and Gorka; Gemma and Aljaž; Simon and Karen (who is the most shocked person in the room); Charlotte and Brendan (and I can’t tell if she’s happy to be through all completely gutted to have to face another week of it). That means we are looking at either Brian or Richard in the dance off and now is the moment to find out who is the official Komedy legend…. And it’s Brian and Amy who'll be facing Chizzy and Pasha for the ignoble title of first boot. Overall, you would think that Chizzy and Pasha had the better chance, especially going on last week’s performance, which was decent enough for a week one but Brian is more well-known and Amy untested, so you can see why there might be some TV value in keeping them. Darcey looks like she’s about to burst into tears at this reveal-who knew she’d be such a Brian fan? Brian is quite philosophical about being in the bottom two and says just do what they can. Bruno tells him to keep his performance level as he did and points out that he went back on the wrong foot at one point so to try and avoid at this time. He asks Brian if he remembers that part and Brian says no. At least he’s honest.

In the Clauditorium, Joe says it’s too soon for anyone to go home this week - not for those of us recapping, it’s not Joe. We also learn that Kevin and Susan are doing the samba to the Wonder Woman theme and Susan is in a state of horrified disbelief at this so that’s clearly going to be a routine for the ages. Richard says he doesn’t mind being called last because of the biblical principle that the last shall be first. Did someone write into Points of View requesting that we need a reminder that Sunday is the Lord’s day? Alexandra Alexandras about being through, Charlotte still seems in a state of shock and Claudia attempts to engage Simon into some culinary-based humour around the salsa and he completely dodges the bullet.

As if I haven’t had enough to write about this week, here’s a trailer for next week’s movie week - they are filming some audition scenes in front of a blue screen because Tess and Claud’s casting agency is circa 1985 who’s surprised? Spotters of portents of doom take note, after Chizzy’s audition Tess gives her a ‘you’re out of here’. Also, Debbie gets the line ‘you’re [sic] gonna need a bigger boat’ and cracks up laughing. Hee.

Chizzy and Pasha are asked about their feelings towards the dance off. Chizzy says it’s going to be hard. Pasha tells her to bring some cheesy onto the dancefloor and, yes, I’m aware you could interpret that as him saying Chizzy in his accent, but again, I know what he said. Brian gives a farewell speech about all the memories he’ll have and will never forget and how wonderful Amy’s been and Tess tells him off because he can’t give a goodbye speech until he is officially going. Amy is a blubbering wreck-tears of sadness, or tears of joy - who can tell?

As for the dances, Chizzy looks defeated throughout and doesn’t dance as well as the first time round. The moment where she takes the briefcase and coat and puts a hat on at the end seems quite sad. She is still, I would say, the better dancer of the two overall, but I don’t think Brian dances while second time as he did first time either, but Amy looks a bit more bothered than Pasha about putting in some effort.

Craig reminds us that both couples were only worth three in his opinion, but says he prefers watching Chizzy and Pasha move, so saves them. Darcey praises the enthusiasm of both couples (!) but saves Brian and Amy for having more dance content [lolwut - Steve]. Bruno says both were far from perfect but he saves Brian and Amy for having better timing and popping more. Shirley then has the casting vote and says they both brought quite nice performances but saves Brian and Amy for having more musicality and contents.

Chizzy is in floods of tears and finds it hard to get out her thank you speech but she says she’s loved dancing with Pasha and she is going to continue dancing with Pasha because she’ll just go around his house and make him dance. Atta girl. Pasha says he enjoyed laughing with her and says ‘fine, come over to my house’. The male pros are rather tolerant of the stalky female celebs this year, aren’t they?

They dance off to thank you for the music and ladies and gents and those that operate outside the gender binary, we now officially have our first WUZZROBBED of the series. Now it feels like Strictly!

Next week we have the joys of Ruth pretending to be a Bond girl by doing a Welsh sounding accent, Jonnie Peacock doing a Paso Doble and Kevin and Susan trying to overcome the cringe to do a Wonder Woman themed samba. Steve will be your host for the evening - I’ll get the popcorn in.