With issue I mean entertainer v dancer. The cries of no public vote, or the creation of a 'serious show'. Has it always been there, building momentum, or is it reasonably new?

It's been there since series 1, when the final was between Natasha and Chris (one of the worst dancers ever to grace the Strictly dancefloor).

Oh. Did the series die the moment Chris got to the final?

Some of us (ie me) would say it began when BOTH Natasha and Chris beat Claire Sweeney, who was miles better than either of them, because the latter was on a sympathy vote and the former on a showmance.

Although really I think the proper whinging began around the end of series 3. Might just be my perspective. It wasn't really an issue in series 4, came back with a VENGEANCE in series 5 & 6, and really has been comparitively mild this year, only because the "purity of dahnce" whingers have had to move from Joe to Jo to Craig to Chris in quick succession and are only really coalescing around one target now.

To start an argument here lol () Claire only beat Natasha once in the judge's vote - week 3, where she scored 34 to Natasha's 26. Otherwise:

Week 1: Natasha 27, Claire 27
Week 2: Natasha 31, Claire 26
Week 3: Natasha 26, Claire 34
Week 4: Natasha 35, Claire 31
Week 5: Natasha 37, Claire 32

So in regards to the judges, Claire wasn't miles better - indeed Natasha was usually rated higher.

Ah yes, but we all know that Claire had previous!

But I agree with alexgr that Chris Parker is one of the worst celebs ever to have been on the show - he is a nice guy though!

I'd say the entertainer v dancer argument has been around since that first final, but only Chris Parker couldn't dance - even Julian Clary could dance a little bit!

PS I voted for Natasha!

He wasn't a dancer but a joker. What made me dislike him so much was he did not even try to learn any dance, just mess about.
At least JS tried his hardest, sweated buckets and lost weight trying to learn.

Must have been that BBC presenter bias again! (insert winking smillie of "I'm not being serious" here)

I'll never forgive Claire for grinning through her tango.

Aw I think he did try, at least at the beginning - but he was truly a hopeless case.

Of course. How foolish of me to discount that.

omg - who could forget his Batman act with the cape as he raced around the dance floor in the paso.

Not me!

IIRC he tried really hard with the Waltz and did the group VW at double speed to everyone else too! And his Jive and Tango!

PS I'm smiling now, but I wasn't at the time!

That Batman dance had me laughing my head off - joker yes, dancer no.

I don't remember it being a huge issue until John Sergeant. Then it suddenly became a huge thing here and then in Dancing on Ice re Coleen Nolan. For this year's SCD, it's faded back to something closer to its usual levels.

Loving the fact that some of you are still holding grudges from series one

It's why Chris Parker avoids radio interviews. Someone always rings in and tells him he buggered up their Saturday night seven years ago and hope he's ashamed of himself.

Strictly Injustice: A Brief History (as I recall it )

S1 - Probably the biggest dance/entertainment incongruity in any series thus far. Chris Parker was almost certainly getting through on the "I love that cute little Eastenders guy" factor rather than anything that pretended to be related to dance talent. He certainly attracted an amount of "Lesley Garrett was robbed and you is rubbish" comments but it was the first series, there were only eight couples and, while Lesley was light years ahead of Chris P, she wasn't that amazing.

S2 - Julian Clary reaching the final ahead of Aled Jones caused a fair amount of consternation. Julian was not quite the unco-ordinated, ability free zone that Chris P was but by the time the semi final came round, the gulf in talent between him and the other three was really quite pronounced indeed. Were people voting for him because of the entertainment factor? Very possibly but I think there was also a fair amount of "Let's p*ss the judges off" votes as well, particularly in that semi final. Once in the final, his vote dwindled; anyone who was just making a point relaxed and those who had voted for entertainment realised that voting further would not bring them any more of it.

S3 - Entertainment certainly played a part in Darren Gough's win. He wasn't the best dancer - he was at least a step behind Colin Jackson and Zoe Ball - but he came a lot further than anyone expected him to. It was entertaining seeing a big bloke from cricket discover that he could actually move rather well and get some decent scores. Those who wanted the show to be based purely around quality of dance (Craig and Arlene included) were still dubious about his triumph but he had done the unexpected, he'd achieved a pretty decent standard, he was the first bloke to win and, in the main, he came through unscathed.

S4 - Entertainment for entertainment's sake took a back seat here. Matt Dawson was the fall guy for getting through ahead of more talented celebs but nobody could really say people were just going for entertainment. Matt had become a really proficient ballroom dancer and, while his Latin was still relatively pants, he pulled out some bloody good performances.

S5 - Kate Garraway was the early culprit in this series. She produced some woeful dances but kept being kept in. Was it for entertainment? Well, the entertainment of seeing the panel go up like Vesuvius certainly. She passed the baton to Kenny Logan who really wasn't all that entertaining but had the Ola factor and made the final five. However, his missus had departed ages before, Kelly Brook had withdrawn and nobody else who went before him was really that brilliant.

S6 - Two words - John Segeant. This really was entertainment over talent. The guy was something of a comedy act on the floor; people voted to see what he would do next (and to pee off the judges). How far would they have gone? Who knows, but some viewers were setting off their own smoke alarms and Mr S decided to quit before there was a national emergency.

And now we have Chris Hollins. Slightly less talented than Darren Gough but significantly better than any of the others mentioned. Sure he's not nearly as good as his competition but people genuinely find his dancing entertaining (as opposed to the reasons above). There has been uproar before but the story hasn't quite been told this way. Thing is, Chris isn't anything like as talented as his opposition but he's not anything like bad enough to be a joke candidate. This hasn't happened before; the opposition haven't captivated so the partnership that connects and, therefore, lights the lights (no muppet show gags please) has gone all the way.

Nobody's going to read this tome but I enjoyed straightening things out in my mind anyway.

Nice summary. Not sure about Chris being that close to Darren - on marks he isn't. He's also got a worse record at the point they went than Nat, Zoe, Jade (not his fault) Phil, Ricky W and Ali. In that sense he is much worse off than Darren who only had two people better than him.

The problem in series 1 is that someone hopeless gets to the final and makes it one sided. That problem as you say pops up again and again though its potential finaists who go early rather than a hopeless case getting there. The other problem that comes in from series 3 is that a good female can't get the votes over a weaker male who is within reach ability wise. Zoe is the first victim. She's soon joined by Emma, possibly Louisa, Gaby, Kelly, Lisa, Rachel, Zoe and Ali. You might ask too if Nat is that much worse than Chris to deserve going first too. Somewhere in there more entertaining becomes tied up in meaning to male.

If you look at votes on the shows where we have been given them over the last couple of years there are patterns across shows. IAC 2009, DOI 2009 and X factor 2009 all have all their younger females sharing about 20% of the votes. The only females to compete have been much older but even then Kym only gets about that in the IAC final. X factor 2008, DO1 2009, SCD 2008 also had 40%+ of the votes going to the people who bottomed the leaderboard - or were only as good as Eoghan - much of the time . It looks like a hopeless or "entertaining" candidate can get 40% of the vote and if the males are any good they will get at least 40% of the vote too. The interesting question is how any females actually win and the few recent examples like Suzanne Shaw, Leona or Alesha suggest you have to be better and or have the big story and you have to be a particular type of female.

Even more worrying it may be that in a field where there are lots of reasonably good attractive males the sex of the winner is decided early. X factor 2008 didn't have many good solo males and its won by Alex whose percentage vote goes up as the other girls leave. The girls have half the vote and she can build within that. This X factor series with plenty of attractive male singers the males seem to have collared 80% of the vote and the girls fought for the remaining 20%

It wouldn't be at all surprising if the earlier leaks of the SCD were right with a 60-20-20 split then in favour of Chris over Ricky and Ali. That would fit the trend for girls to get a low ceiling on their votes and for the males and "entertaining" males to get the rest.

I read the "tome" and the reply. Very interesting, thanks.

That's not the issue...at least not for me. I would characterise it more as talent vs personality...with, if I'm honest, an underlying bias for physical attractiveness (Strictly is a spectacle after all). As far as the celebs are concerned, I'm not too bothered with all the soapy stuff...storylines, roles, journeys etc.

In simple terms, those 3 factors add up to 'entertainment value'...albeit they don't have equal weighting. Viewed in isolation, good dancing is more entertaining than bad dancing; an interesting and attractive personality is more entertaining than a dull and charmless one; in terms of this kind of show, a nice looker is more entertaining than a plain-jane. Ultimately it's how these factors come together as a package that determines the worth of a contestant.

I tend to place a much higher value on talent. The consequence is that unless a couple is one of the elite group in that category, it's very unlikely that I will judge them to be the most entertaining. In a way, considerations of personality / attractiveness are mostly a means of helping to decide between dancers of comparable ability.

Of course it's possible to sub-divide the categories: talent can be seen as a function of technique and performance and 'personality' has many facets that can be considered separately...as does physical attractiveness for that matter. Also there is some overlap, obviously.

I enjoyed the tome and was interested by the initial question.

I'd have said that it didn't become a major issue until John Sergeant - but I'd forgotten the bricks and abuse I hurled at the TV set over the poor little me that was Chris Parker.

There have been plenty of pants dancers, and they can't ALL got out the first week, so some get farther than their ability warrants but are usually stuck in the DO with a far superior couple and easily culled.

I've never participated in SCD DS fora before, so don't know whether people are always this irritated by it all.

Julian in series 2 always gives me mixed feelings. I don't think it was particularly it was an 'anti-judge' vote as such. Yes, Aled should have been top three (and I have the 'Aled wuz robbed' t-shirt to prove it ) but in terms of the show then Julian was possibly the orginal 'journey' contestant - even before Darren Gough.

Erin worked wonders with him ... he was so nervous when he started he would make Ali look over confident - so, looking back which is always easier - from that point of view he actually deserved his place.

**Waits for earth tremor**

I think what really irks me about Chris is the feeling that actually he should be a damn sight more technically proficient than he has turned out.

The combination of his early loss in confidence and having Ola - not renowned for her choreographic brilliance - as a partner means he's not really improved the way he should have done.

He's also suffered slightly from the same thing that Natalie Cassidy suffered from - being told how entertaining he was every week, and thus not making enough effort with the technical pointers (like THOSE hands) given to him.

It wasn't as if he didn't have examples from this series to look at either. Look what wonders Katya worked with Phil's hands - he was ten times better when he got knocked out than he was when he started.

I don't mind Chris being in the final at all, but I do mind the nagging feeling that says he could have been fighting with Ricky on technical merit, given a different combination of circumstances.

It's also interesting that - apart from series 3 - the lowest place the winner has come from on the week one leaderboard to win is 4th, which would actually be the case this year if Chris did win.

Natasha was joint second, Jill was actually third, Darren only scored 19 first week out but the second week scored 30 and was about second placed, and then only dipped below 30 (with a 28 &29) twice the whole series. Mark top scored Alehsa was second and Tom 4th.