Call me conspiratorial if you will, but..
We sat down to enjoy Strictly Come Dancing Final last night, and a few things dawned upon us. For the past few weeks one particular contestant seems to be have been consistently marked a little higher by the judges than his dancing actually merited, this was most obviously the case in the Argentine Tango last week when he was, in our opinion the second best dancer, not the first. We also note that the judges words can be just as choreographed as the dancing and can be designed to lead the voting public. The editing of the programme can be used by the makers to install a subliminal view, for example in two films by supporters of each dancers, if the volume used by the maker was a little louder for one dancer than the other, that would have an effect on your interpretation. I could go on and on but wont, to us the whole thing smacked of manipulation and took the shine off it. For these reasons I would not vote.
My views on the final three contestants are :
Emma should have been in the final, but wasn't, possibly due to the above. Great shame.
Matt Dawson has come on the most, has improved the most, has danced the most entertainingly and fully deserved to be in the final. Lillya Kopilova (forgive spelling please) is just the most beautiful and talented partner and was perfect for Matt, there seemed real chemistry between them.
Mark Ramprakash has improved, his Latin dances were very good, but I think (despite the views above) that Karen Hardy won it for Mark. If you watch her performances, she really sells them, she manages to keep herself facing the judges and between her partner and the judges far more than Lillya did, (thus keeping the focus on the professional not amateur dancer) and she smiled and sang and danced with gusto and cheered the audience along - great, great tactics. I can see why, in addition to her great talent, she wins so much. Consumate professionalism.
I am not carping about the result, that would be churlish, I think Matt was the better celebrity and Karen the better professional, either couple therefore could be viewed as worthy winners.