Coming first for the judges is the one consolation to Denise and Ian for coming second again (knocking the spots off N&B and - sadly - A & L).

In the end the public vote is only a popularity poll, and if you are in (or very recently in) EastEnders, then the result can be predicted easily.

Having said that, I hope the publicity does a lot of good for Ian Waite, who worked wonders with Denise. His new studio should be overflowing with applications.

I also hope the competition will open up many new avenues for Denise once she retires from sporting competition (she has a few years in her yet). It is really hard for a track athlete to acquire the kind of grace that Denise did - after loads of hard work - and she should be congratulated on her achievement.

Finally, the judges were over the moon with the raised standard of performance. The next edition will have to look for really worthy candidates - but could they please leave soap stars out of it? It falsifies the final public vote. Stick to presenters & athletes.

Denise is fantastic i agree.

I voted for Jill because i like her and i think she is extremely talented. not because she's in a soap... i don't even watch eastenders!!
maybe she just won the hearts of the public.

they were all fantastic last night, it was a great show.

No, I'm not against Jill as such - and she did dance well enough to get into Chicago, so bully for her.
But last year, Christopher Park (Spencer Moon in EE) got voted into the final for being popular rather than being talented. this year, Julian Clary got surprisingly into the final, but he danced well enough to merit these votes.

That's debatable, for me he did improve markedly, but he wasn't dancing even by the final.

I don't watch Eastenders either and had never heard of Jill before the series, but was bowled over by her ability and charm. That said, last night, Denise and Ian were easily the best in every way and they ought to have won .... still we know why she didn't, don't we?

Ian and Denise have had the toughest ride to the top and fully deserved to be in the final two last night - personally I think they should have won! They were a delightful couple and a joy to watch

Public votes are never going to be totally fair - fan bases will vary tremendously!

I really, really like Jill but i have been voting Denise, i do think Denise and Ian should have won but im glad they made the top 2 as all the papers and everybody was saying it was going to be in betwen Natasha and Jill, well done Denise.

I doubt Jill had a huge fanbase before the show. she's not been in eastenders alot for the past year.
she has a fanbase cos she's good. she probably just has a larger fanbase than Denise, who is equally as good, or more of Jill's fans actually pick up the phone and vote for her. do you know what I mean??

Like Lenny Goodman said on the original finals, "The best two couples are in the finals". Better to be second than to have been knocked out by Natasha and Brendan (How did he get that job as Prince Charming btw, bit of a misnomer I would have thought. ) Seriously, Jill and Darren were tops in this household, glad they won again.

I voted for Jill and I don't watch Eastenders. I voted for her because she could dance and danced very well.

What WASN'T made a big issue of was that Denise also had dance lessons when she was younger, the difference is that you couldn't tell. Her feet were awful, she was stiff and her knees were permanently bent, her arms and hands were appalling. Yes, she 'sold' the dance but it wasn't good, it wasn't good at all.