Funny, because from where I was sitting Harry was executing the techniques superbly. And as far as I know he doesn't have previous ballroom experience. I wonder who taught him then!

And how do you know Harry is a gifted dancer? How do you know that the reason he is so good isn't because of the sheer number of hours they train? How do you know that Harry can handle more content? How do you know putting more content won't reduce the quality of his dancing?

And once you've answered these, I would also like to know how you can tell all these by just 1.5 min of dancing and about 10 min of VTs?

Don't hate her just frustrated with her. Each week hoping that she will do the right thing and show what her partner can really do. Everyone has said that Harry is the best dancer, Len said he was in fact the best male celeb dancer they have ever had on the show. Tonight Karen said she can inderstand Len's frustration in that they were in hold seconds and that you can't have a show dance every week.

She is setting herself up for a fall because I am sure that if she doesn't do the right thing soon she will be out of the show next year.

Can you imagine how the other professional dancers feel in that she has been given the best dancer and could win but she is not showing the judges or the audiance what he really can do. Shame because it comes across that she is making this about her and not the celeb.

The focus is always on how she's holding amazing dancers back rather than helping them become good in the first place. Quite laughable really.

Think it is obvious that he is a gifted dancer because she is allowing him to dance on his own so much. Several weeks in a row all the judges have said what a wonderful dancer Harry is and he would have had top marks from all if only Aliona would do what the others do and not make each routine a show dance. On Saturday even Craig who loves the artistic element of the dance said that they should have been more in hold. Maybe this week she will do a routine that conforms and hopefully they will receive good marks, otherwise it will be just the norm 6/7/8 and maybe a throwaway 10 of Alesha for good luck.

Lets hope there is enough Mcfly fans to keep him for as long as possible because I personally am frustrated with how random her routines are.

But he had a head start, he was good, he is good she has made him very good, but he could be amazing and get top marks if she didn't do show routines every week, I think that is where the focus is.

Karen Hardy said as much tonight.

From the level he has achieved in such a short period of time. Assuming he hasn't had any considerable dance training previously, which I presume he didn't, he's had quite an impressive progress since his first dance, so there must be some talent there involved. I can deduce based on my experience in learning to dance. Obviously I could be wrong, but I am making an educated guess based on what I saw and what I know from personal experience.


The two are not mutually exclusive. Of course he must have put a tremendous amount of training hours, but training alone is not enough, there has to be some inherent talent involved. Otherwise two people training exactly the same amount of time with the same teacher would produce the same results. But they don't. Some people are more naturally gifted in that department than others. The reason I claim that he is a gifted dancer, is because of the quality of movement he has achieved in a very short period of time. In my opinion. Others may well disagree.


Because he is actually better in hold than out of hold, and when he is dancing the technical elements he is very good at them, so it looks like he's got the basic technical ability to tackle more content, and as a drummer he's got the stamina to sustain it. Obviously we can't be sure for anything unless we are in the training room, so we can only draw conclusions from what we see on the show. I thought that goes without saying.


Well, I never claimed anything like that in any of my posts, and if I did please show me where. I cannot say what it will do to the quality of his dancing. It was the quality of the choreography I was putting into question when I raised the content matter, not Harry's dancing quality.


I can tell nothing form the VTs, but I can tell a few things from his dancing. It's down to careful observation and years of experience.

I think SCD is aimed at a wider audience than those who are dance experts, and has an element of popularity in it. The viewing audience loves to see the glitz and glamour, and the general showiness of the dance, even if it's not technically perfect, the judges are there to inform us of that. I think if Aliona was as awful as is being implied on this thread, then surely she would no longer be on the show, the fact that she is still there this season says she can't be as bad as she is painted. I enjoy the show for what it is, entertainment.

Disclaimer: as long as we don't get too many Widdes or Sargeants

Excellent post again Azla Axe.

In response to the comment about whether more content would spoil the quality of his dancing- surely this is the crux of the matter isn't it?

Everyone else is putting in the required level of content and some of the celebs are being marked for not attaining high standards in all of the dances.

Harry is not performing all of the required content as Aliona doesn't include it- so we cannot see whether his dancing is affected or not- or how his scores would be affected. He is meant to be dancing more content whether it affects his standard or not.

It is Aliona's job to ensure that he maintains his standard while including more- the same as the other pros.

This doesn't seem fair on the other celebs who are attempting the proper dances and being potentially penalised while Aliona does her own thing and gets scored highly on the 'artistic' merit raising Harry's overall score.

You may well believe every word you have posted, and you may believe that you totally understand the public better than anyone else. You may also have intimate knowledge of my extensive dance experience (do tell) but I couldn't possibly comment.

Come to think of it, I couldn't be arsed, because I have nothing to prove. Go ahead and argue amongst yourselves.

Oh not that old myth again!

Hell's bells, if I woke up one day and discovered I was Aliona I'd ring a pal and ask them to take me to a vet to put down!

But that judge was Alesha and she's made it pretty clear in her waltz comments that she's marking Harry in spite of Ailona's chereography and not because of it.

Great to read such a sane, rational and intelligent post.

Aliona's ego will be her downfall. That, and her lack of brains.

Two points:

1) most (or least a substantial part) of the audience are either female and straight or male and gay and so that would cut no ice with them whatsover

2) most of the female pros are attractive and wear revealing clothes - and most of them do proper dance steps whille they're twirling around in short skirts.

So Len, Karen Hardy, Alesha and Bruno are all wrong are they? And you know better than them? What would they know?

Interesting perception of reality

Hate Aliona? who has the energy. Would personally like to see more than 19secs of a ballroom dance in hold. Obviously she is catering to the easily pleased. Harry has a natural carriage and elegance to him that usually equates to a good mover on the dance floor, I really don't think that has much to do with her teaching. In fact if she really were a good teacher she would challenge him with more complicated routines. And a 10 from Alesha doesn't mean diddly.

No. He looked uncomfortable but I think he showed that he had inborn talent. I think his parents can take the credit for that.

Personally, I dont like James, Brendan or Anton but I would never ever dream of being as rude and personal about them as some posters have been about Aliona on this thread

Well i'm an armchair fan who has never danced in her life and while I agree that Alionas choreography is at times original I don't think it's clever and I would love to see more content in the routines. Even my 8 year old daughter (who is a massive Harry/ Mcfly fan) asked me about 20 seconds in 'when are they gonna start dancing'.


I do wish that people would stop throwing the word hate around. It only weakens their argument and makes them come across as childish. For the record, I do not hate Aliona. I don't even dislike her as a person (how could I having never met her). In fact when she rabbits on about custard on ITT she makes me laugh. I do, however dislike her choreography, and it does annoy me that she has continued to ignore the judges frequent requests for more content.


Just wanted to add that I agree with all of Azla Axes posts in this thread but i'm too lazy to go back and quote them all

To be honest I can't where many people have been rude or personal or rude personally about Aliona.

The thread, as most others have been concerning this issue, are about her choreography and the lack of actual dance content and not about her.

However some Aliona- fans have decided it is personal and will defend her do or die and are extremely obtuse about some of the answers. I don't include you in that Olivej- I haven't read the whole thread completely...

It's obvious. From, you know, watching him dance. Which, occasionally, still happens on the show. Admittedly sometimes it's difficult to find any dancing amongst the endless training-in-ghostbusting footage on the average show.


Well, it's both. Obviously. Good dancers, by definition, train a lot and work hard at it.


Because he's a gifted dancer when doing the content. There's no obvious reason why he should somehow forget routines; especially because, with his background, he's used to memorising complex routines already.


Because the evidence is that he's a good dancer?

I mean, you're posing endless hypothetical queries with no evidence, against the clear evidence that Harry is a good dancer in hold, and the even clearer evidence that Aliona is, basically, a loony.


It's called experience.

Actually, to clarify - Aliona may well be a good trainer, and a good dancer, but her choreography is loony.

she has been called stupid, an idiot, a loony and arrogent - if that isnt personal then I dont know that is

I won't comment on anyone's perception of Aliona as a person, but I just wanted to clarify one thing that I said on one of my posts. When I said that I love the fact that she is a bit bonkers I meant it in the best possible way, and not as an insult to her person. Most of the people I like are a bit bonkers.

Of course Aliona can be credited for giving Harry routines where he dances them well and enjoys the experience of doing so. It would just be even nicer to see Harry dancing these specifically named dances with more of the specific skills that are normally applied to them, as well... (then Aliona can get real credit for the improvement that we see from Harry learning the actual dance and not a watered versionof it). Right now Harry is in danger of being an all style but lack of substance type of contestant (and he's better than that). Same can sometimes go for Artem (who is sometimes similar to Aliona with leaving out content) and heck, same for some of the other Pros too that just give their celebs filler routines rather than dance routines that resemble any style.

I like Aliona, I would just like her to remember that this is Latin/Ballroom dancing show not some Contemporary dancing show.