Given the somewhat irrational marking and apparent favouritism from the judges this series, I feel a little nervous about the swingathon.

This will give them the chance to get together and discuss the exact order they want on the leaderboard. It wouldn't surprise me in the least if there were some kind of direction from the producers to advantage those contestants getting the fewest public votes.

Even if this is not the case, I think the standard of judging has been so bizarre this series, I really don't trust them to be objective in their decisions.

Of course they did it last year when they did that waltz thing, ali and brian crashed into two couples but came out top?

However I think Len is marking it.

I wouldnt be suprised if Scott and Pamela are the final 2 in the swingathon though

It's only an entertainment show!

Everyone has their favourites, even us normal folk who just watch the show and whose only dance knowledge is from watching SCD since episode one.

Enjoy it and vote for your favourite. If they go out it's because others prefer other couples.

PS I would not be saying the above if Ann/Anton were still in! I'm now blissfully happy and all is right with the world....

Craig said as much last night on ITT...

He said all the judges will confer and eliminate each couple one by one. Claudia asked how will that work then because you will all argue? Craig said well as Head Judge, Len will get the final say... and then Claudia had to move on. IIRC.

So that probably means Pamela will win it.

I had thought exactly the same.

I am really looking forward to the Swingathon, but I can see where the OP is coming from if the marathons on DWTS are anything to go by.

On DWTS the results are so predictable. Even if a less able dancer starts off well, they still get tapped on the shoulder early.

However, on DWTS there are usually more couples left when they do a marathon, so it will be interesting to see what happens on Sunday because we have only five couples left and at least 3 very good dancers.

I think Kara or Matt will win it.

An don't forget there are two other dances to add to the overall scores - a ballroom and a latin. Not sure when the Swingathon is taking place. If it's on Friday night then the judges won't know who does the best dance on Saturday so it will be difficult to manipulate the results. Obviously if it's after the couples have done both dances then they can discuss amongst themselves who they want to make top of the leaderboard, but don't forget half of the scores still come from the voting public.

Reading this, it looks like the Swingathon is on Friday night, after everyone has danced. The public vote is after the Saturday performances as usual and I think this will make it harder to manipulate the scores.

I've seen this idea a few times on this forum, I don't get why this would be either useful or logical to anyone. Surely if a couple isn't popular with the public then what possible reason could the BBC have to promote it ?

I think it has disaster written all over it.

Funny enough I thought that as well.

I predict many threads shoutlng fix after it is done

In fairness, very little. I don't really buy into conspiracy theories and there have always been controversial decisions from the judges. It's just that this year's marking has struck me as being particularly odd and I think there are really only two causes of this:
1) The judge's standards have slipped.
2) They are being given some kind of direction.

Option 1 strikes me as most likely but option 2 wouldn't suprise me. And either option gives us a biased swingathon!

The judges will have Gavin off first I'm as sure as anyone can be at this stage.

Sadly, I fear this is true.

Let's hope Katya has choreographed something dramatic to open up with, so at least if Gav goes early, he goes down in style!

Totally agee with this BH. I know nothing about dancing but even I can see the judging has been weirdly erratic this series. Goodness only knows what they'll do to the Swingathon.

... I agree. Although it may be 'entertaining' to see the whole shebang degenerate into a big besequined game of British Bull Dog!

Or a dance marathon (was the film They Shoot Horses Don't They?) - make them dance until they drop. Last celeb standing wins. All the others get honorable, but sadly posthumous, mentions.

Added bonus of shortening the s*dding results show as well.

Well Gav would be in with a chance - he's as fit as they come!

If this is how its going to work its another crap idea from DWTS. Craig and Len have many times disagreed about the interpretation and marking of a dance so if Len has the last word his marks should prevail . As for Alesha and Bruno, who knows what criteria they use to award marks.

Just another gimmick to annoy a lot of regular viewers.

Yep you can bet there will be many unhappy hard core viewers. Lets just grit our teeth and try and get through it.

This^^^

If the swingathon is in the middle, how can the scores be manipulated?

I think the scores can be manipulated wherever it occurs.

Let's say hypothetically that a judge's favourite stumbles in the first dance but Gavin dances well and is a point or two ahead. If the judges throw Gavin out of the swingathon first and keep their favourite in until the later stages, the favourite can go into Saturday on level pegging or point or two ahead.

I'm not suggesting this WILL happen... it's just that I wouldn't be the least bit surprised if it did!

Exactly.

Last year, they marked the group VW according to their current leaderboard that night except it swapped 3rd and 4th placed out of 5 couples.

They have all jived this series - does that help or hinder them?

In order of marks given for the Jive:

Scott
Matt
Kara
Pamela
Gavin

It'll be interesting to see how they mark for the Swingathon.

I had to giggle when Len talked about a Swingathon with five couples on the floor. Not sure I'd trust myself.. wahaay.

It's a Swingathon. The dance equivilant of scrapping your nails down a blackboard of course the scoring is going to be suspect. I think they should just do Musical Chairs and be done with it.