Home, James

Week 2: 15 Couples Results - 29 September 2019

We begin with the much-anticipated specialist flamenco number, which opens with Flamenco Oti sauntering into the studio and whooping, at which point Gorka (leaning out of a window with his nips out, nothing unusual here) stops talking to Nancy and immediately only has eyes for her. Oti continues to saunter around the room, bewitching every man that she passes with her flamencocity (and Katya's "ohhh, this bitch" reaction to it all is truly delightful) and making them all be her dance bitches as the band do a John Lewis-ified renditon of 'Gotta Get Thru This'. Gorka runs out to grab her attention but Oti has also noticed Graziano, and despite Gorka's flamenciest moves, Oti keeps straying out of his arms and into Graziano's and Gorka is sad about it. As promised, professional flamenco dancer Pablo Fraile appears as a manifestation of Gorka's inner torment while Graziano dances with Oti, and then the music segues into 'El Tango De Roxanne' as Gorka squares off against Graziano in an attempt to win her back, and it ends either with Gorka triumphing as Oti lies supine on the floor in front of him, or Gorka maybe going too far and killing her in the process. I'm assuming the former as it's Sunday teatime, but it looks quite menacing however you slice it. Also it ends with Graziano staring at Gorka's arse, which is the most relatable Graziano has ever been.

Zero(ual) sum game

Week 2: 15 Couples Perform - 28 September 2019

Last week! The series began in earnest and 15 couples, per Tess's voiceover, "exploded onto the Strictly dancefloor". I'd say James Cracknell was more of an implosion, but I appreciate we're just going for metaphor here. This week: the pressure is on because we get to vote for the first time and someone's going home this weekend. The contestants all read from the exact same script, stating that they are ready to fight for the place and show the judges that they are here to win. That's quite a bold direction, considering that there's still a weird very British resistance to the idea of people wanting to win (especially this early in the proceedings), presumably because it's not modest enough or some such nonsense. Still, I guess making everyone say it is quite a handy leveller, since the audience can't take against the entire cast. Or...can they?

This week on It Takes Two, we have learnt...

- 45 minutes is entirely too long for this show (Except on Fridays when it's a nice relief).
- Rylan's dance moves suggest he would have been a contender if he'd ever been a contestant on this show.
- There's a funky new set for this show, but it reminds me of The Circle.
- Kelvin was quite shy when they first met, and Oti wasn't sure whether to "give him all of Oti". (Yes, that's a direct quote.)
- Oti thinks Kelvin is 'quite intelligent'.
- Kelvin and Oti weren't sure if their samba was any good because no one else had seen it, but then they did their studio rehearsal and Kevin Clifton absolutely lost his shit over how good it was.
- Kelvin has never done a samba before but he likes to shake his hips at parties.
- Zoe still likes to do impressions of Iveta.
- Zoe thinks Kelvin's dance was 'fast and furious'.  Now there's a movie week theme yet to be exploited.

Cha-cha-challenge Anneka

Week 1: 15 Couples Perform - 22 October 2019

It's the moment we've all been waiting for - the Ru-veal of the first proper trailer for RuPaul's Drag Race UK! Oh, and also the first live performance show of Strictly Come Dancing 2019. We open with a VT that captures Jeremy Vine on the radio talking about the rumours of who might be doing the show this year. Incredibly, he manages to do so without ever (a) mentioning that HE DID STRICTLY ONCE YOU KNOW, HE WAS A FAN FAVOURITE, PEOPLE LOVED ME, GOT ALL THE WAY TO... WELL, NOT TO BLACKPOOL BUT HA HA HA, GOSH THEY LOVED ME (b) asking the Queen to intervene and tell us who's doing it. And then they revealed names like Saffron Barker, Karim Zeroual and Will Bayley and we still wondered who was doing it, and I promise that will be the absolute last joke I will make about the C-list nature of a significant portion of this year's cast, honest. Anyway, the celebs were revealed, we had the launch show, it took over a week for it to be actually broadcast in which time one of this year's cast was eliminated on medical grounds, everyone went into training, they turned up for studio rehearsals and now they're all here, so we segue into a (presumably) live shot of the cast of 2019 doing an Ellen-at-the-Oscars group shot, taken by Catherine.

So Laing, (hello and) Farewell

Launch show: 7 September 2019

The nights are drawing in, Ikea is full of students and their parents buying duvets and tealights, you’re contemplating whether the summer duvet is still sufficient, and that guy you went to school with twenty-five years ago is posting nonsense on Facebook about it being too soon for the supermarkets to sell tubs of Celebrations for a fiver. Yes, for the umpteenth year running, September is back. Which also means Brand! New! Strictly Come Dancing! With a Brand! New! Judge! A Brand! New! Professional Dancer! And a host of Brand! New! Celebrities! (seriously, many of them are brand new to this celebrity lark, don’t pretend you’d heard of Emma Weymouth or the table tennis dude before a few weeks ago). [I actually had heard of Emma Weymouth! But only because I went to Longleat about a month before she was announced. - Steve]

The Strictly launch show this year has landed at an interesting moment, given:

a) the absolute clusterfuck of our country’s political situation which probably means half the pros could get kicked out of the country mid-series because I dunno how a Brexit works but given the shower in charge of it I’m going to assume the worst. (And also I am a little scared about how the scriptwriters are going to work our country’s ever crumbling democracy into gags.  And how Tess is going to deliver said jokes)

b) the fact that we all know Jamie Laing got injured in between this show’s filming and broadcast, which has overshadowed proceedings a lot.

c) poor Giovanni being mugged the other day (hope you recover well, Gio. And I hope this is the last of scumbags attacking the pros because it should not be a trend), and

d) lots of grumbling about the less-than-stellar cast (it was perhaps a wise move that the trailers focused on the pro dancers instead of the celebs this year).

Taking all of that into account, if the show hopes to be the national pick-me-up it always presents itself as, then it’s got more work to do than usual to make that happen. 

Anyway.  We have an hour and a half of this to go, and it better include at least half an hour of Kylie because otherwise I can’t see what possible reason they have for stringing it out so long. Speaking of Kylie, I don’t have long to wait, because this year they’re straying further away from the surrealist madness of the old opening VTs and going straight into her guest slot. [Fnar. - Steve] We’re at some anonymous stage somewhere (on a later watch I think it’s the big stage they set-up outside Television Centre), and the pros dancing around energetically in front of a big gold mirrorball that spins to reveal Kylie singing ‘Love at First Sight’ (the noughties one, not the eighties one) wearing an unfortunate white fringed dress that looks like it came out of Tess’s cast-off bin (were it not for the fact that Tess is twice the size of Kylie). Poor Kylie. I like the triangle earrings she’s wearing though.  We’re then taken into a medley – a generic party dance to ‘Better the Devil You Know’ a rumba-contempowaft to ‘All the Lovers’ which is a massive missed opportunity for the pros to recreate the (semi)naked polysexual pile-on from the video and I would like to request my licence fee back please. 

Then it’s into ‘Dancing’ which must be the last track worraswizz, no Johannes and Luba showing off their perfect physiques to ‘Made in Heaven’, no contempowaft in which Anton murders the Spirit of Dahnce to ‘Where the Wild Roses Grow’ and no poppers-o-clock group dance to ‘Your Disco Needs You’ (which I’ll forgive if they eventually make that into the big BLACKPOOL number it deserves to be). They quickly wheel the celebs on stage, hide them at the back, then bring in a load of prop dancers to do the routine with Kylie and hide the fact that the pros can’t line dance. Jamie Laing is very happy with that Kylie performance, what a surprise. I’m kind of a bit disappointed he’s not doing it?  I feel like he could have been quite fun in a post-BLACKPOOL boot kind of way? Maybe they’ll bring him back next year. [Yeah, I did wonder if he's basically got a standing invite for 2020, like when Eureka crocked herself on RuPaul's Drag Race. - Steve]

Anyway, because the timing of this show is all kinds of backwards, we cut from Kylie to the (now) traditional outside bit where the celebs first meet the public, and this isn’t filmed as some big reveal where they all come on, but as a clip show of Motsi being rushed on in a fabulous voluminous skirt as the new judge with no real introduction as to who she is for the audience (which I assume will come later?), then a barrage of talking heads from the celebs. Weirdly, we’re not welcomed by the more familiar faces like Anneka Rice or David James, but by the least famous ones (The ‘Viscountess’, that BBC Chris Hollinsy one, some sportsy people, the YouTube one, maybe the comedian I think? The show didn’t bother captioning them or introducing them so I can’t tell for sure) It’s all over very quickly – presumably because they put out a seven-minute version of this on iPlayer last week although I don’t know how many people would actually be aware of it.

We then cut to later in the day, on the stage outside Television Centre, as the pros run around to a ridiculously sped-up segment of ‘Crazy in Love’, before we zoom in on Graziano (he lives!  This is probably the most we’ll see of him outside of It Takes Two all series!) and Dianne dancing against a purple background and… zoom out to the studio. As transitions from the outside bit to the inside bit go, this was one of the lamest so far.

They are on a podium dancing to ‘Giant’ and joined by Johannes and Luba and Neil and Katya.  These two get a decent amount of camera time which seems deliberate, to show that they might have split up but they’re still dancing together and want to get beyond the tabloid scandals – like Kevin and Karen last year.  And can someone please look after Janette and Aljaž this series because I think we’re all over The So-Called Strictly Curse thank you very much.  The other pros arrive and Luba swaps Johannes for Anton which is really going from one extreme to the other.  The dance is very much one of those ‘bit of this, bit of that’ routines rather than being in a specific genre, though it features a lot of air punching, and it does have a quick sequence where New Pro Nancy is thrown around by the men, before the music segues back into ‘Crazy in Love’ and then it ends.  

Tess and Claudia enter – Tess in a blue velvet curtain thing which is half-short, half-long and has enormous shoulder pads (wardrobe undoing the semi-decent work they’ve put in here over the past couple of years), and Claudia in a red mac.  Guess she didn’t get the memo that only the first bit would be outside. They welcome us and Davearch and tell us that Stacey and Kevin will be back to do their winners’ dance (unlike some people, Joe McFadden) to their most ‘dramatic’ routine.  Claudia hopes it’s their Minions routine, but Kevin gotta Kevin so of course it’s going to be the paso.

The judges enter – Bruno (in a black suit with a white shirt unbuttoned to Simon Cowell levels of uncomfortable viewing), Shirley in a blue dress with what looks like a piece of 3D-printed white plastic over it, Craig in a dark aubergine coloured suit and with much less fake-tan on than usual, meaning he looks the best he has in years, and then Motsi, in the voluminous red skirt we saw briefly earlier – and it’s massive – like it could easily be hiding Susannah hiding Anton. And honestly, until I looked for that clip, a) I thought it was Ruth that had done that, and b) I’d forgotten that Susannah did this show. Only last year.

So on Motsi’s casting.  I am sure she’ll be great, not least as she has experience from judging in Germany anyway. I don’t think she’ll favour Oti – if anything, it’ll be the reverse. But I am a bit sad that the days of all the judges being older than me are over (even though Alesha isn’t much older, it still counts). Anyway, farewell Darcey, you did grow on me – and farewell to our beautiful Pasha, of course (SOB), the unexpected casualty of the show realising it had way too many male pros. Motsi says she loves being here and already feels part of the family and she has the SAME VOICE as Oti which might prove tricky for the visually impaired.  

And now it’s time to see whose agents have got them the best CV-glow-up (beyond the elevation to ‘celebrity’ in the first place etc. I’m not going to go on about the bargain-basement casting too much more because it’s all everyone’s talked about for weeks as it is. There are still some classic Strictly signings among the ‘eclectic’ choices and the most interesting contestants aren’t always the ones you know most about anyway).

This year’s cast are: Former England goalkeeper David James; From EastEnders Emma Barton; Comedian Chris Ramsey; Model and Chef Viscountess Emma Weymouth (I can’t help but think that ‘celebs with titles’ is now one of their key categories – we went from ‘Judge’ to Reverend to Doctor to Viscountess.  I can’t wait to see who they get next year. *crosses fingers for Baron Greenback*); Radio One DJ Dev Griffin; Social media star Saffron Barker; From BBC Breakfast Mike Bushell; Singer and TV judge Michelle Visage (I’m a little surprised she’s not From RuPaul’s Drag Race UK given how the BBC likes to brand its stars but I suppose that might be a little confusing given it hasn’t started yet); Paralympic gold medallist Will Bayley (not a table-tennis-ist?  Shame on you BBC - be proud enough of the minority sports to name them if you’re casting from them); actress Catherine Tyldesley; TV personality Jamie Laing; Lioness and Match of the Day pundit Alex Scott (I’d comment on David James being described as an England goalkeeper whilst Alex is a ‘Lioness’ rather than an England ‘right-back’ or-whatever-that-means-in-laypersons-language-I-speak-minimal-sport but I don’t need a load of misogynists @ing me on Twitter… although I use it once in a blue moon these days so if they do, it’d be the digital equivalent of pissing in the wind); CBBC star Karim Zeroual; TV and Radio presenter Anneka Rice and Olympic Rowing Legend James Cracknell. Jamie is the one most enthusiastically dancing to the theme tune.

Claudia tells us we have a BRAND NEW Glitterball trophy. Tess points out it looks like the old one – although I think the Perspex logo looks a bit less crappy? Claudia says it has a double plinth, presumably to fit more names on. At least I’m assuming they retired the other one because it was full, not because Stacey and/or Kevin broke it? [I forget who it was but one of the former winners said you only get a tiny facsimile of the real trophy to take home anyway. WHAT A SWIZZ. - Steve]

Shirley tells the celebrities to listen to their pros, and to leave their egos at the door and pick them up when they leave. I hope this is shade at Danny John Jules. Bruno says he wants excitement, for them to give him and show him everything they’ve got. Bruno’s still living in hope that this show will recreate that naked routine from DWTS Argentina, I see. The show’s not even embraced same-sex pairings yet, Bruno, it might take some time before they cast, let’s say Kinga from Big Brother, she’d probably do it, to run around with no clothes on. Craig says it’s a good sign that no-one’s fallen down the stairs yet. This feels kind of awkward, now we know Jamie’s going to injure himself. Motsi says they have to have fun, connect with the audience and ‘live the moment’.

Catherine Tyldesley is first, which feels only fair given that she’s been waiting to be on this show for what seems like several years. We see clips of her time in Coronation Street which mostly involve making people wet by pushing them into fountains or chucking pints over their head, and she says her only dance move is ‘jazz hands’, which is more than ample requirement for Chicago at least, the dirty ringer. 

Saffron Barker is 19 and a YouTuber who looks like Louise and Sharon from EastEnders spliced together, so Keanu’s dream woman, in other words (shout out to the two people in the country still watching EastEnders). Her most distinguishing feature seems to be a nose ring which she presumably won’t be able to dance in? She’s apparently been vlogging since she was fifteen. In 2015. Yes, the children of the millennium have officially arrived to make us all feel old. And I know she’ll get AJ but I just so desperately want her to get Anton. 

Michelle Visage tells us she’s best known as the ‘tough judge’, the ‘honest judge’ on Drag Race, and I’m not sure where she gets that from because I’ve seen every series of that show and she is most known for having a magnificent bosom and hating green, but hey, maybe she’s going for a rebrand for Drag Race UK. Although I will concede occasionally when she gets a hate-on for a contestant she can go a bit Sharon-Osbourne-going-after-Steve-Brookstein. We then see lots of clips of her with incoming Greatest Dancer judge Todrick Hall and she tells us a little bit about what Drag Race is and that the UK version is coming, so there’s your inhouse promo machine working well. 

Alex next, and she’s forced to toss a football about between her hands uncomfortably for ages in her VT, but otherwise, it’s your standard sportsperson ‘nervous, awkward, parent-dancing etc’ reel. 

Onto the pairings. The male pros are all introduced by their various championships… and Anton is ‘King of the Ballroom’. Bets on Janette being ‘Latin sensation’ again? Catherine’s paired with Johannes, which seems like a partnership with potential. Saffron is with AJ because the show STILL won’t give AJ the older woman he so desperately needs to give him a new bit of personality. Michelle is paired with Giovanni and she’s happy that the ‘two Italians’ are together although she clarifies that she’s a ‘New York Italian’ and he’s ‘an Italian Italian’. God I’m already imagining the themed-up-the-wazoo ‘Be Italian’ tango the show’s got lined up for them. Maybe in movie week and they can recreate the spaghetti scene from Lady and the Tramp (insert obvious joke about which one’s the tramp here if you like, I’m too classy for such things).  

Tess tells Alex that footballers have never won, so could she be the first? Alex says that being the first female footballer is probably enough. But here’s another first… the first celebrity partner for Poor Neil. They bond that they’re both ‘reds’ [except for different teams, and please let this not be a banter storyline for the entire series - Steve] and the nation hopes this means Neil will be kept too busy to bring back Nell de Jaunse.

In our first Clauditorium of the series, Claudia asks Neil which football team he supports - ‘the red ones’ and Saffron says she was four when the first series of Strictly aired. She was actually three, just to rub salt in that collective wound.  (She turned four in between s1 and 2). Claudia asks who Catherine’s like on the dancefloor, and she says Mr Bean.

The judges give their take. Shirley says she thinks Catherine will bring performance, Michelle will bring sass and give Craig a hard time, Saffron will bring energy and being adorable, and Alex will bring stamina and power. Tess asks Motsi what she will bring to the show, given Craig is ‘cruel to be kind’, Shirley’s ‘about technique’ and Bruno ‘is…’ (she missed the obvious gag of ‘falls of his chair’ there). Motsi says she knows how they feel so she’ll give them encouragement and empathy.

We then get a VT about Motsi and she shows that she’s won a bunch of international competitions, has judged the German show for eight years and she wants people to bring ‘fire’. 

Next is a pros-and-judges routine which opens with some samba from Oti, Nadiya and New Girl Nancy all in green; the most milquetoast Party Latin partner-swap routine you can imagine featuring Shirley with AJ, Kevin, Neil, Gorka and Anton all dressed in orange; some sexy hanging about on the stairs from Aljaž, Graziano, Giovanni and Johannes; Bruno shimmying with an even more uncomfortable than before amount of chest showing, accompanied by blue-clad Karen, Luba, Janette, Amy and Katya (who’s wearing formal trousers and I’m not agin the way they’ve been masc-ing up the female pros this year – as with Karen in the promo trailer. Perhaps it’s gentle softening up of the audience towards same-sex pairings?). Craig is then boogying with Oti, Nadiya, Nancy and Dianne, whose long green dress and bright red hair make her look EXACTLY like Poison Ivy, and I can’t believe they haven’t dressed her as such for Halloween or Movie Week yet. We then see all of them dancing on a split-stage to ‘La Vida Loca’. Then Motsi emerges to salsa with the sexy staircase stallions to ‘Shape of You’ and I don’t care for Ed Sheeran but at least it’s brief. Overall, I think that was quite a fun segment? I mean, we don’t need extra content in this show, but at least it’s dance content.

Time for the first of the men. James says he hasn’t wanted to do a proper job since retiring as an athlete, so he’s been hanging out in the desert and the arctic, but then he needed to pay his mortgage rather than dicking about on an endless gap year a new challenge, so here he is. Karim next, and he is tiny, so I think we all know where he’s headed. He’s known for presenting CBBC and I know people scoffed at him being not famous, but it’s not his fault that kids’ programmes are no longer on the main channels. Had Strictly been on in the 80s and 90s, I guarantee we’d have seen a pre-Going Live Philip Schofield, Andy Crane, Emma Forbes, Yvette Fielding and Kirsten O’Brien on this show (and Gaz Top claiming he was too edgy to do it to hide the fact he hadn’t been asked because he was on the other channel). Sadly, we’d also have had to endure Andi Peters being as insufferably smug as he was on Celebrity Masterchef - and we still might one day, so be careful about wishing for people you’ve heard of. Anyway, the point is that ‘CBBC presenter’ is so obvious a BBC niche that I’m shocked it hasn’t been done before. And no I hadn’t heard of him either before this but that’s not the point. He says he’s used to working with a puppet that’s seen better days (insert joke about Tess/Anton/Janette/etc here) and the chaos of live TV so he feels prepared. He likes to dance when he’s cleaning and he claims he doesn’t know ‘too much’ about the Strictly styles, ‘just the salsa, the cha-cha-cha’. Ringer.

Chris Ramsey is next, filling our now-annual comedian requirements. There’s not much to say about this one, sorry. He’s a Geordie so maybe Cheryl will pop in? Then David James, aka this year’s ‘you mean he hasn’t already done this show?’ contestant, and if, like me, you were fooled by those promo pics of him looking like he’s been drinking from the fountain of youth and thinking you’d maybe underestimated his attractiveness, get ready to feel even older than you did a few minutes ago with Saffron, as he tells us he has TWO GRANDCHILDREN. 

So, time to see which SPORTSMAN Nadiya will get, who’s getting the comedian this time around, and how they’ll introduce Janette! Which is kind of hilarious – ‘two times Strictly Christmas champion’. Yes, let’s remember that time First Boot Melvin won because all his castmates were in the studio audience. New Girl Nancy is missing from the line-up, so I guess she’s relegated to the sidelines with Gorka and Graziano, which makes sense given she was a last-minute addition.

James tells Tess that rowing is ‘mostly sitting down’ and, for those of you on ringer watch, that’s what Denise Van Outen said about being in Chicago. [I was watching Fosse/Verdon last night and discovered that Roxie does not sit down that much in the original Fosse choreography? This has come as quite a shock. - Steve] He’s paired with Luba, for a solid sportsmanlike introduction to the competition for her. There are no boybanders or Holby City stars this year so she can wait another year for her ringer, I guess. Karim next, and he says he wants to take the training seriously.  He’s paired with… Amy? She’s taller than him, which is an unusual choice, but he seems like a sweetheart and that’s probably what she needs after the last series, and maybe he’s a secret ringer? When Chris comes forward, the camera lingers on Katya for a slightly meanspirited tease, although she laughs it off. He’s paired with Karen (and is anyone else digging her new cropped do?  If only for it being so rare for lady pros not to have short hair). Nadiya therefore gets David James and between this group of men there seem to be several options for the official male Komedy Kontestant and it’ll be interesting to see if Nadiya or Luba can cope with that if the mantle falls on one of the SPORTSMEN. (Also, poor Len, three SPORTSMEN in a series and he’s not here.  Wonder if he’s already put his name in the hat for when Bruno has his week off).

Bruno says it’s hard for men to lead (drink!) and to perform ballroom with style, elegance and grace, as it has to look easy, but in fact it’s so hard, and they need to focus on telling a story as that will help them relax which… seems like actual dance advice from Bruno, I’m confused.

Another super special guest performance (the very length of this show, le sigh. Can I blame bloody Chris Chibnall and his epic breaks between Doctor Who series?), this time from Mark Ronson and Yebba , whom I’ve never heard of but looks a little like Masterchef and Big Finish goddess and possible future Strictly star (because voiceover artist is a niche they could still explore) India Fisher. They’re performing ‘Don’t Forget Me’ as the Dance Troupe (Graziano, Gorka and New Girl Nancy – and I know they don’t ‘officially’ call it that any more, but come on, it’s exactly the same thing) plus Karen dance around in front of them – it’s an odd routine, part rumba, part robot, but it does fit the changing tempos of the song, and I’ve seen worse.

Now we come to the annual game of ‘which car full of pros would you want to be in on the way to meet the celebs?’. Also, in what I’m assuming is a trial run for the next revamp of Top Gear, they’re all in different, distinctive, vehicles. Claudia is driving Tess in one of those little Twizy cars and I’m surprised there’s even room for Tess’s legs in that thing. As for the dancers, in car one (sparkly blue mini) Neil is driving all the G-boys (Gorka, Giovanni and Graziano). In car two (orange VW campervan), we have Oti driving Karen, Janette and Nadiya. Car three (light blue vintage thing) has Amy driving Luba, Dianne and Katya. Kevin is driving Aljaž in a vintage Beetle and Anton’s driving Nancy in a blue sports car, which he says is veteran’s privilege. Then we see AJ and Johannes in a plastic kids’ car.  Poor Johannes having to be part of a classic joke on AJ. Nancy gets no lines except ‘yeah’ when Anton says he thinks she’s ready for the show. At least that’s good prep for being in the background all year. Welcome to Strictly, Nancy.

Then it’s onto meeting the celebs – in a dance studio rather than a big country house for a change.  We don’t get much of a sense of how good they’ll be from this, but it does feature Johannes spinning Anneka around in his arms and her looking like she’s having the time of her life, which you would.

We come to the rest of the women now. Emma B says her character Honey is lovely but ‘a few pies short of a picnic’ and she’s got NERVES but is also our dedicated superfan and she’s afraid of falling down the stairs and taking everyone out. Emma W (why cast two people with the same name in one series, that’s just a mess waiting to happen) [although we did survive having two Rickys in series 7 - Steve] says she works VERY HARD being a Viscountess, cleaning out animals at Longleat and also cooking on Saturday morning TV AND working in fashion, modelling and having two sons. She says her dance style is ‘clapping to music’ but she wants to get Bruno to jump out of his seat as ‘that’s when you know you’ve made it’. I love that that’s her bar of success. And now Anneka Rice, who surely must have been asked for this before and it’s nice to have her finally here. If her performance on Celebrity Hunted is anything to go by, she still has a lot of energy and determination.

Emma B is first and she’s paired with… Anton? Anton is overjoyed and says ‘so this is what it feels like, book me in til Christmas’ because he’s apparently already forgotten that he made the final with Katie Derham. Emma, for her part, looks a bit less thrilled but says she’s over the moon and her mum is going to be very happy. Emma W grabs Tess round the waist while she waits, because she hasn’t learned that you don’t grapple Tess, Tess grapples you. She is given Aljaž, and I can see her coping well with a patented Aljaž lovely waltz and less well with a Aljaž car crash samba. This means tall Anneka is paired with tiny Kevin. The height pairers are drunk this year.  She says she’s never danced and she’s actually terrified of it, and that she can’t even clap in time.

In the Clauditorium, Anton is still babbling about how he’s finally got someone good, and we ran this storyline just four years ago, so reliving it isn’t going to be at all tedious.

Tess asks Craig what he thinks of the pairings and he says Giovanni is going to have his hands full with Michelle but he’s most excited about Karim and Amy and he expects fantastic things from them. The male cast seems quite weak this series, so he could well be the one to watch, especially as a lot of people are rooting for Amy.

Fresh from his partnering up, Kevin’s back with Stacey. They remind us that they’re a couple now, and that last year Kevin took on the mantle of pro who goes a bit nuts when the glitterball’s in sight and becomes an unholy mess when they win (hello Camilla, Flavia etc) and that she kind of liked winning a bit but not as much as him. Let’s see if actually going out with her dance partner means she hasn’t lost it quite as much as returning winners usually do. It’s a kind of ‘ish’ attempt – she can still perform and her timing and body movement are pretty good, but her shaping and precision are lacking quite a bit.  he tells the contestants to enjoy it because ‘you only do Strictly once and then it’s done’. Apart from Christmas specials. And the tour. And Sport Relief/Comic Relief. And if they ever do an ‘All Stars’ (20th anniversary perhaps?). And if you end up on the circuit of regular ITT contributors. Etc. [I refuse to let them ever do a returnee series because you just know Jeremy Fucking Vine would be in there like a shot. - Steve]

And now, finally, we’re meeting the last celebs.  Mike says he’s a sports presenter whose niche is being rubbish at trying out minority sports (so can we expect a VT with the table tennis player?) and falling over. Oh, and he also likes Trance music, which was the most surprising revelation of this entire show, not gonna lie. I’m kind of intrigued now, and I’d just had him down as budget Chris Hollins up until this point. He then gets to head the ball Alex played with earlier. 

Will is next and bounces some glittery table tennis balls around. He explains that his disability, arthrogryposis, causes problems with his joints and he’s had it since birth. He says the dance that will least suit him is Argentine Tango because he can’t do sexy-face, although unless he turns out to be a contender, he probably doesn’t have to worry about that too much.

Dev is next, marking our return to Radio One for stars after a few series’ absence. He says he is a ‘blank canvas’ when it comes to dancing, and I remember him saying he was similarly hopeless at cooking and he ended up in the Celebrity MasterChef final, so he could be one to watch. Jamie says Made in Chelsea is ‘about a group of young people who live in London’, rather than ‘gawping at a bunch of deluded aristos’. Also, did anyone else notice that the press were all ‘ooh they’ve let him in and they don’t normally do reality stars’ when we already had that exact storyline with Mark Wright five years ago? [And that Alison Hammond had been on just about every reality show prior to her appearance? - Steve] The collective amnesia around this year’s show is quite something.

Tess says Mike is the most excited celebrity and he says he feels like a dog off a lead leaping round with excitement and he’s very excited about the jive because his ‘signature move’ is a jump. It looks like he and Will are both super-tiny, so where will they deploy Janette? Not here – they’re giving Katya what, on paper, looks like a return to the Ed Balls days, which is probably a sensible option after the rollercoaster highs and lows of her last two series. They both do a jump kick and squeal their way up to the Clauditorium.

Will gives Tess a big hug and she points out that he’s had a spray tan (and how. It’s the most Ronseal of the lot). He says he and his family are massive Bruno fans, and I’m kind of loving all the random Bruno stanning among this cast. He goes and gives Bruno a hug and Bruno looks genuinely touched that he has fans. D’aww. He is paired with Janette, obviously. 

Tess tells Dev that he’s a DJ so he must be able to dance (has she forgotten the track record of DJs on this show?) and he says he has one move, which is basically the ‘knees’ bit from ‘Heads, Shoulders, Knees and Toes’, so that’s the Charleston sorted. He’s paired with Dianne. And finally, it’s ‘heir to a biscuit empire’, Jamie, paired with Oti.

In the Clauditorium, we learn that Jamie and Karim have invented a special bro handshake, and having seen it, I might miss Jamie a little bit less. We also learn that Will’s about to take part in the European championships, so they give him a sparkly bat as a present.

Shirley says she’s looking for great technique, but also great entertainment and great personality, and she thinks we’ll get a bit of everything. Tess tells Motsi to fasten her seatbelt for her first celebrity car crash group dance and asks her advice. Motsi tells them to enjoy it because after tonight it gets serious and they can forget about having fun. Such a Mabuse, I love it.

Claudia says ‘whatever happens next’ they’ve had a good evening, the foreshadowing of it all. As usual with the group dance, you can barely see what’s going on, but nobody looks to acquit themselves that well, to be honest. The men are all terrible (although Karim seems to have a bit more potential than the others) and from what we see of the women, they’re quite hesitant and lumpen, especially Alex and Saffron, whom I thought had dancing in her background but seems to be more the new Vick Hope. Anneka seems to be MIA. Catherine seems to have a better grasp than everyone else I think?

And we then come to our bitter epilogue… the car crash group dance has officially claimed its first victim. Jamie went over on his ankle and the MRI shows so much damage that he has to wear a boot on his foot for eight weeks. For some reason, we don’t then get introduced to his replacement (Kelvin Fletcher from Emmerdale, who seems like the hunk material this casting was lacking but I don’t know much about him [his Instagram has all the information you'll need, you're welcome - Steve]) – but we end on everyone else being very excited to be here.

And there we have it!  We didn’t learn much about Nancy, we didn’t get a good look at the dancing skills of many of the stars, we didn’t get as many Kylie deep cuts as I would have liked (justice for Crystallize etc), but we DID get Motsi in a massive skirt and that’s the most important thing.

In two weeks’ time, we get this show properly on the road, so join Steve then!

(And I don’t want to become one of those blog wankers who always promotes their other projects, so I promise I will only mention this now and when it’s released, but I have a book about reality TV coming out in November, which you can pre-order now either direct from my publisher, or from Amazon – so that’s your Christmas shopping sorted.)