STRICTLY COME DANCING: THE QUARTER FINALS!

This week it's 100% wholesome Mark goodness...

It’s down to the last four couples and “no one wants to go home at this stage!” I like the way that Alesha always dances along to the title music at the start of the show.

BOOBWATCH
For the main show, Tess wears a black dress with a strangely quilted front like a sleeping bag. I am so entranced by this that I fail to notice her boobs

For the results show she has a shorter black skirt, red sash and an asymmetrical white top with a strange square front section like a pillowcase.

GETHIN:
Gethin is all excited after getting good marks last week. He is dancing the American Smooth and the Jive (both crowd pleasers) this week and Camilla now trusts him enough to incorporate lifts into the routine.

His American Smooth is pretty good, and indeed he does flip Camilla onto his shoulder and spin her around for a bit. It is hard to think of different ways to describe these ballroom dances when they are done well as they are all so samey. He gets 2 9s and 2 10s.

They both look raring to go for their jive, which they dance to “Knock on Wood”. It is also very good, with Gethin being all fun and bouncy like he was with his latin last week. He jumps off the steps, slides along on his knees (melting his nylon trousers in the process!) etc and so on. Bruce makes a vaguely amusing remark about a judge throwing knickers onto the stage, which is not about Arlene but Craig. The judges all love it but say his kicks should have been kickier, or something. 3 9s and a 10, to give him the top score of the evening!

ALESHA:
Apparently Alesha has the best marks ever from all the series to date. Matthew makes some comments about how it is not fair that Gethin is suddenly really good and that he should “go back to where he came from”. Wales? The Blue Peter Garden?

They will be dancing the Viennese Waltz and the Paso Doble, both of which are hard to make look good and get good marks for (compared to Gethin’s dances tonight, for example).

For her waltz, Alesha wears a germolene pink sparkly dress and has those stupid dance hankies stuck to her arms. They dance to Memoriessssss!! from Cats (and we later learn that Elaine Paige is in the audience. Woo). The choreography is quite good and there is a fab bit in the middle where the rousing instrumental bit swells up and they start spinning round like maniacs. Len says that if she doesn’t get 4 10’s that he will go and pickle his walnuts. Get pickling, Len! She only gets 2 9s and 2 10s again.

For her Paso Doble she wears a shorter green dress with lots of ruffly bits around the hem and they dance to that famous Fugue thing that was a pop hit in the 70s (maybe?). It is quite good I suppose. The judges say she wasn’t quite stampy enough and that they also appeared to make a mistake. Alesha says that the last 20 seconds was completely made up as they went along – but I wouldn’t have noticed as she carried on dancing rather than standing there looking hapless, MATT. Later on, her and Matthew do a funny, made-up-on-the-spot Paso whilst beign interviewed in the corridor. She gets 3 9s and a 10 from Bruno, to put her one point lower than Gethin. Gasp!

LETITIA:
After being all poorly last time, Letitia is completely better this week and seems to be really enjoying herself for the first time ever. She will be dancing the standard Waltz and the Jive (ruh roh, not easy for people over 30 to do well).

She wears a light blue ballgown for the waltz, which would be very pretty if it had less nude effect flesh coloured bits on it. She is very elegant and the waltz is very good. Afterwards the judges compliment her but say she should lift her shoulders more, leading to much hilarity when Letitia points out that its hard to lift your shoulders when you’ve got giant boobs. 8s and 9s for a decent overall mark.

They dance the Jive to “Dead Ringer”, which is a good choice. It’s um, energetic and Shazza looks like she’s enjoying herself but her footwork isn’t great. Still, she doesn’t just jiggle around looking vaguely hapless, MATT. The judges kindly say that it wasn’t her dance but she gave it her best shot. Letitia jokes that there’s no chance of getting a ten then, and Bruce adds that she might get two 5s. Heh. She gets 7s and 8s, which is not bad and her best latin score EVAH, apparently. She is 3rd out of 4 at the end of the show.

MATT:
Oh Matt. I have had it with you after this poor showing. His two dances are the foxtrot and the samba. He talks about how he is determined to get to the final for Flavia’s sake.

The foxtrot starts with Flavia and Matt sitting on the steps and flirting like love sick children. Blech. They stand up eventually and start dancing around and at some point in the middle it all goes pear shaped and become really stiff and clunky. By the end, when they return to the naughty step, Matt is blatantly not dancing any more! There is some talk that he pulled a muscle or something but it seems to be mainly nerves. All the judges say that everyone can get nervous and forget the steps, but then it’s a matter of how they cover it up. He gets 4 (ouch) from Craig, 6 from Arlene (fair enough, I think) and 8s from the overmark twins Len and Bruno – that was only one point worse than Alesha, was it? O RLY???

For the samba, Matt wears a black outfit with an orange sparkly sash and Flavia wears some sort of lacy trouser suit ensemble. They dance to the Jackson song “Blame it on the boogie” and I think it is tempting fate a bit to dance to a song that includes the line “I just can’t control my feet”. The exact same thing happens again! It starts out OK and then goes all pear shaped half way through again and he clearly forgets what to do.

In the judging section, Craig is quite harsh and Len has an annoying hissy fit, going on about how Matt is only 20 yrs old. What’s that go to do with it? Davetta last year was even younger and she remembered her steps – if he can’t perform then he should leave the competition. He gets 6s to 8s anyway and is bottom of the leader board.

I really think Matt should go home after this week – even when he has been good he has tripped or messed up, and still looks terrified half the time. I wonder what would happen if he had to dance off vs Letitia.

I also try and work out which dances the celebs have yet to do. Has Alesha done a quickstep yet? That should be fun.

RESULTS SHOW
Lots of filler as always. Flavia and Vincent do an Argentine tango (next week the celebs have to do that as well as their latin and ballroom) which seems a bit over complicated and contrived to me.

For more dance fun, a load of shiny german dancers come on and do a synchronised latin routine. It rather descends into lite entertainment hell at this point, esp with the hideous musak style pop medley they dance to.

Finally, Cliff sodding Richard sings a cover version while Anton and Erin and Brendon and Nicole waltz around aimlessly. At one point, Nicole and Erin join Cliff on stage for a bit of dance themed, three way action. I think he would have preferred it if the boys had gone up there, to be honest.

Results time finally and the first through is… Matt! Oh FFS. How you disappoint me, Great British Public. Next is … Gethin. WTF? Alesha is in the dance off? Travesty. Also, buh bye Letitia. Alesha seems more upset than Letitia as they prepare to Dance Off. They both do their highest scored dances – the waltzes – and are both very good again (the lady singing Memories – not so much). Of course Letitia goes and she seems very gracious and resigned to leaving. I am amazed she did this well and really warmed to her (once she stopped snivelling all the time…). Well done, Letitia!