Something doesn't make sense:

In order to be in the bottom two, Denise & Ian must have come last in the viewer vote (again):

4 from judges plus 1 from viewers = 5 points for Denise & Ian.

In order not to be in the bottom two, Julian & Erin must have come first in the viewer vote:

1 from judges plus 4 from viewers = 5 points for Julian & Erin.

This is where it gets weird:

Aled & Lilia and Jill & Darren also scored 5 points, but in order to be placed lower than Jill & Darren (i.e. in the bottom two), they had to recieve less viewer votes than them...

Aled & Lilia got 2 points from the judges, which means they must have got 3 points from the viewers:

2 from judges plus 3 from viewers = 5 points for Aled & Lilia

Which means that Jill & Darren must have got TWO points from the viewers:

3 points from judges plus 2 from viewers = 5 points for Jill & Darren.

If all couples scored 5 points, then the result should have been:

Julian & Erin 1st
Aled & Lilia 2nd
Jill & Darren 3rd - bottom two
Ian & Denise 4th - bottom two & out.

If the viewers vote didn't take priority, then the result would have been as follows:

Ian & Denise 1st
Jill & Darren 2nd
Aled & Lilia 3rd - bottom two
Julian & Erin 4th - bottom two & out.

Can someone tell me where I have gone wrong? I'm not unhappy with the result, but it doesn't make any sense?!

(If tonight's bottom two weren't the real bottom two (e.g. the loser plus one of the favourites for dramatic effect), then it might make sense... because the starting point for my calculations would have been wrong)

I didn't see the show where they announced the bottom two and who was being kicked off. Did they say during that show that all four couples had 5 points then?

Just worked it out now... found exactly the same. Impossible??

How do we know that they all got 5 points? I'd assumed that Aled and Lila got 2 points from the viewers (and so a total of 4) and Jill and Darren got 3 (and a total of 6).

Couldn't Jill have got six points and Aled four points, with Denise and Julian getting five points each but Julian being in the top two as he got four points from the audience and that takes priority.

Oops.. my mistake.. thx folks.

yep, mine too! Shows how good my maths is!

I'm confused. This is how it went on the night:
Denise and Ian 4
Jill and Darren 3
Aled and Lilia 2
Julian and Erin 1

Now viewer votes
Denise and Ian 6 (4 +2)
Jill and Darren 7 (3 + 4)
Aled and Lilia 3 (2 +1)
Julian and Erin 5 (1 + 4)

Now according to that shouldnt it have been Julian and Erin and Aled and Lilia in the final two or am I being blonde.......again?

Actually your right now I'm confussed....

Heh - no need to be confused; those who said that Jill & Darren for 3 + 3 with Aled & Lilia getting 2+2 are right.

I just wrongly assumed that it was 3 + 2 and 2 + 3 because Julian & Erin and Ian & Denise had to end up with 5 points (with the viewer bias in Julian & Erin's score putting them ahead of Ian & Denise)

This is annoying me now......

RIGHT!

JUDGES VOTE
Denise and Ian 4
Jill and Darren 3
Aled and Lilia 2
Julian and Erin 1

VIEWER VOTES
Denise and Ian 1 (4 +1)=5
Jill and Darren 3 (3 + 3)=6
Aled and Lilia 2 (2 +2)=4
Julian and Erin 4 (1 + 4)=5

So what would they have done???? Lowest number of phone calls?

Hmmm interesting. I'm not even going to begin to comprehend this maths thing, not my forte.

Is it "da rules" that the two with the actual lowest votes have to be in the final two, or can it be 'the loser' and any of the other couples (as it's in no particular order) ? If so that might explain why Denise was there as it was certainly good TV to wonder if the joint/second best dancer was going home. I wouldn't put it past the Beeb to play it that way, but it all depends on the rules.

If the rules are the two lowest, then goodness knows !

Correct - when the combined scores are tied, the couple with the lower amount of viewer votes gets the lower place, e.g. Ian & Denise being lower than Julian & Erin because Julian got the most phone votes whereas Denise got the least.

Next week do the judges still make up 50% of the vote for the final?

Here's how it worked...

Judges
Denise and Ian 4
Jill and Darren 3
Aled and Lilia 2
Julian and Erin 1

Now viewer votes
Denise and Ian 5 (4 +1) lowest viewer vote
Jill and Darren 6 (3 + 3)
Aled and Lilia 4 (2 +2)
Julian and Erin 5 (1 + 4) but with higher viewer vote

Taking the scoring theme a bit further, in the last series I thought it was inevitable that Chris Parker would win as his fan base would have placed him first in the final. What probably happened was that all of the fans of the better dancers throughout the series must have voted for Natasha (unless the BBC cheated!!!). With three in the final this time, it looks as if Julian's fans might still vote for him thus guaranteeing him first place in the audience vote. If the other votes split for Jill and Denise the way they have been (more for Jill) then Denise cannot win. Either Jill will win with 3+2 votes or Julian will win a three way tie.

The judges have a say in the final then? If they do, I think it's fairly inevitable that Jill and Darren will win:

Judges:

Jill and Darren = 3 (They will dance their hearts out)
Denise and Ian = 2 (Think they got max this time to try and save them)
Julian and Erin = 1 (Face it, it's inevitable)

Viewer vote:

Denise and Ian = 1 (Most probably, seeing how the vote's gone these last few weeks)
Julian and Erin and Jill and Darren = 2 or 3. Whichever one Jill and Darren get, they still win.

Assuming that the scoring system remains the same (add judge & viewer ranking, viewer ranking takes precedence to resolve ties), that the viewer ranking remains the same (Julian = 3, Jill = 2, Denise = 1), and that Julian is last with the judges, then there are two possibilities:

Jill ranks 3 with the judges, in which case Jill wins, Denise last
Jill ranks 2 with the judges, in which case Julian wins, Denise last

I think the judges are entirely aware of the system and how their placing will affect the final outcome. Lets face it, the only way Denise was able to get into the final was if she was in 1st place after the judges vote last week. Any other position and she would have been out.

This week, the judges know that Jill has to be in 1st place after the judges vote to guarantee her win. As people have already calculated, in 2nd place she is likely to lose out to Julian based on his greater popularity with the viewers.

I predict that Denise will get her usual 8 and 9 points, but Jill will be awarded at least 1 (maybe 2 10’s) to ensure her points score is higher than Denise after the second dance.

Do we know for sure that they won't kick one couple out then reopen the voting - perhaps with another dance for the final two couples? The second part of the show is 50 minutes long so it's quite possible

I assume there will be three dances, a freestyle one was added to the last final. If so, I would expect Denise to win the ballroom dance, Jill to win the latin dance, and then its up to the judges. If they are aware of the situation and don't want Julian to win they must ensure Jill wins the dancing part. Actually, I can't remember if the judges marked the freestyle dance last time. Does anyone remember? Its strange to think that in a 3 way competition, before it starts, one couple cannot win no matter how the judges mark it.

In whcih case she has no chance in hell of winning. Its a travesty I cry!

I will look out for that and then I can be sure whether this show was a fix from beginning to end.

Well from ITT tonite Roger "I'm a gold medallist" Black said sumthing about he and Camilla performing two dances on Saturday and then Camilla laughed in his face saying how hes been going around telling every1 about it cos he's soooo excited. What a freak.

I imagine it will go as follows: 1st show (1 hour long) – 2 dances from each couple, voting lines open. Lots of filler (how they got here, celebrity fan messages, a la the ITT show this week) kind of things. The second show (45 mins) will be the first big dance number from the other couples and possibly a final twirl (free dance not marked by judges obviously?) for all three whilst we are exhorted to vote ‘cos it’s incredibly close’! I wonder if there’ll be a performance from Brucie as well? Then they’ll close the voting lines and there’ll be one more big number.

Oh, then Jill will win – yay!!!