Very well said !!

It isn't that we don't have any respect for Robin. He is merely another pawn in ITV's quest to give maximum 'entertainment' in whatever form. Whether it be shock, controversy or speculation, it all creates some response and columns in the red tops, and as they say, 'any story is better than no story'.

I wouldn't put it past the producers to create that scenario, whether Robin was aware of it or not.

I think in the whole production our respect for Robin in unwavering. He knows his skating and all the complexities, and is not a man of silly gimmicks, however he is under contract and what ITV wants, ITV gets.


Remember, what you see on the tv, is in the main not always as it appears.

I didn't say not any, I said so little.

And nothing above little respect for him is consistent with thinking he changed his mark because the producers told him to or because of the crowd response. If he did that, he would be utterly lacking in professionalism and integrity as a judge.

It's a game show not professional competition. I very much doubt that Robin would do that voluntarily, but the producers are always in control.

DOI is driven by wanting to instigate a bit of excitement, even if it be an injury to one of the contestant, which it particularly loves!!


This wrong score scenario has happened before, perhaps they should revert to the Strictly paddles, surely they can't mess up with that. Ohhh hang on Louie got his upside down, he meant 6 but put up a 9. Call me cynical!

Firstly I take the app with a pinch of salt, fans will vote for their favorite regardless. Without knowing how app users voting looks in relation to final leaderboard ranking it's a bit of a worthless statistic.

Anyway, regarding Jorgies routine.

It's interesting that people are not remembering much of Jorgies routine, that actually says something about it.

I'm a massive fan of Jorgie and all I really remember about the routine is her skating around the rink with a ribbon and a single lift where she is twirling the ribbon.

I don't remember much of it than that, and what I remember was, while elegant, so basic looking it was boring. It didn't seem to go anywhere and I was waiting to see it go somewhere, I was waiting for her to put it down and do something a bit more visually pleasing and exciting.


Maybe it was because Jorgie was overwhelmed by the difficulty of using the ribbon, maybe T&D struggled to find ways to incorporate the ribbon, maybe the ribbon got in the way of any real dance.

I don't know, but the net result is that the ribbon lead to a very dull and forgettable performance.



He isn't infallible, he is a judge on a reality tv show, a hired hand, he isn't a judge in the Olympics.

The judges scoring is always delivered with a double standard, letting things slip for some and roasting for others. Which is of course due to the production team behind the scenes orchestrating everything.

Even the routines, they give the ones they don't want to keep either naff routines or routines that the celeb cannot execute well, they give their stars more impressive content.

That doesn't make any difference to what I said. The judges should still be giving genuine and properly supported views, not pandering to the crowd of marking as the producers tell them to, especially when phone voting is involved.

If the judges are marking as the producers tell them to, and that ever comes out, it will be the end of DOI and rightly so.

This is why you should never take any reality tv show too seriously and just enjoy the ride.

With any TV show there is an army of producers, that army of producers exist to ensure the TV show draws ratings so the station can generate advertising revenue, that is after-all the shows reason for being.

All of these shows are heavily stage managed, while I believe the judges on these shows roughly give their opinions, the producers will be stage managing things behind the scenes.


Actually as I think about it, it would not surprise me, given the shows ratings decline, the "twist" every 2 weeks and the criticism Louie is getting from some fractions for not being Jason that this event may have been planned and executed perfectly (from a foolery point of view).

It's more than possible.

........ and you don't think any manipulation occurs on X Factor and Britain's Got Talent?


Why do you think the 'double points' weeks was instigated? It was hardly fair to double the points just on the judges whim. Doubtless it was to get rid of the useless guy from Corrie, who probably was getting a lot of votes due to him being in Corrie.

so did i was quite shocked

I haven't said anything about that.


That's different from the judges not giving their genuine and properly supported views, and the judges didn't decide to double points, so it was not on their "whim".


I think the emboldened parts are the only ones that really matter for what I've been saying, which has been about the judges and whether they are behaving in an honest and professional manner that shows integrity or are instead pandering to the crowd or letting the producers tell them what marks to give.

The app isn't a reeliable guide to what the whole audience thinks, but it's likely to at least include more people than are commenting in this forum, and the app users haven't always given Jorgie such high marks.


They remember, just incorrectly. If someone's reason for thinking it was dull was that they didn't remember (so that it must not have been memorable), then that's what they'd say (rather like you do). Instead, they make confident and definite claims that happen not to be true.

We saw something similar in the BB forum recently, when there wasn't a question of how interesting or dull the incident was. There were frequent claims about what happened that simply weren't true, and (as with the DOI routines), there was a recording that people could watch if they had any doubts. (It's therefore reasonable to conclude that the people posting the mistaken accounts didn't have doubts but were confident that they remembered correctly.)

I don't know about all of that, I felt the performance was too basic and lacked everything that's made Jorgie great up until now.

It felt too much like skating around in circles with a ribbon waving around. It had a few moves in it, not enough real footwork or dance steps, the few moves she did we've seen early in the competition, things we know she can do perfectly and on their own aren't impressive.

I felt it would have been better if it had more content within it. It could have been a great performance but it seemed to be the same thing throughout with a few fairly basic moves and a lift.

Yes, really! Cousins challenged it immediately - why else would the producers change the display?

But since you've asked...here's a transcript..
(booing from audience)

Schofield: Do you know what? We're going to straight to the judges because I do not understand that at all.

Bleakley: Robin I'll come to you first

Cousins (speaking over Bleakley): 8.5 from me (despite 5.5 displayed)

Spence: Mine's right

Cousins: Mine's 8.5

Bleakley: Robin should be 8.5

At this point, both Witt & Cousins look off-stage and gesture at the production team.

Yes I am aware what happened, but as per your quote could you actually 'hear the production crew scrambling in the background to correct it'?.

When Schofield said 'Do you know what? We're going to straight to the judges because I do not understand that at all', do you think that as totally off his own bat or do you think the director was shouting in his ear to go to the judges. As the show it totally controlled by what Pip hears in his ear it really wan't his call.

Of course none of us can say for definite how it happened but there is always something going on during each programme to create a reaction or drama, that is apart from the skating.

Robin is the most creditable person on that show, in no way would I accuse him of any jiggery pokery or in fact punching in the wrong score., if you see what I am getting at. It was a production 'error' we have to summise.

It shows nothing about Jorgie's skating. In your analogy, she was given a low impact, possibly low tariff, or not, routine, while everyone else got something with a story and easy vote pleasing potential . In diving, the diver would be responsible for picking a routine with enough potential to score as high, or better, than anyone else. In DOI the contestants have no say over their content or lack of it. Jorgie could easily have done the other female celeb routines, whilst its not that clear they could do hers. She didn't get those routines, and did the one she did get.

The judges have had a problem marking T and D's choregraphy for some time - they repeatedly get into trouble by marking the T and D plan, not the performance. This week Louie, whose marking is suspect anyway, just made a bigger than usual mess of it. You either have to have tariffs on their routines, agreed probably by Robin, to reflect difficulty, and make T and D avoid weak routines , or you allow the pros to make sure their performer gets a competitive routine. If you don't act to make T and D get it right more often, by this stage, you have to instruct the judges to mark how well T and D's routine is done, as coached by T and D , and not to mark what they think should have been done, or how they would have done it .

Matt is quite right to imply that Louie just can't cope with that sort of marking calculation.

I was amazed to hear Matt talk back to the judges. Usually the pros keep quiet and bite their tongue - I know that must be difficult at times. I'm not keen on Jorgie and don't think she is as good as she thinks she is (going on the impression I get through my telly) - but I love Matt. From the little I remember of the routine it was tedious just a lot of going round in circles and twirling a ribbon round, even the back throw to Matt of the ribbon got a big round of applause!! - to me, that says it all.

The only pro I've known to challenge the judges is Frankie

I actually liked the fact that Matt spoke back - at the end of the day, his question was valid and I think it shows a nice partnership between Jorgie and himself seeing him speak out for her.

Good on him...that's all I'm saying

If Robin bottled it and altered his 5.5, why would he go THREE MARKS higher? Why would he go from lowest of the judges to highest? Surely he'd knock it up to 6.5, 7, 7.5 or even 8 to match Katarina.

The look on Matt's face was like one of Karen's 'I don't agree' looks

Indeed. it was obviously an error but those who do not like Jorgie are quite happy to say he meant to score her 5.5 and not 8.5, which is ridiculous.

Agree

Maria had a bit of a whinge backstage this year with Andys scores

if he knows Louie has given a daft distorting score he might go somewhere a bit higher to counter it - but he can't fully do that by going even further. its more likely though he's just hit the button one row too high, or he stalled working out what a proper mark could be.