Well, I have to confess to being no expert, but compared to some of the ATs that I have seen from others in earlier series', that looked very lacklustre.

He has all the charisma of a bag of wet washing.

Exactly my impression. Basically what Craig said.

Ah yes. *nods sagely* The leg cock.

I'm with you there. I kept waiting for a proper kick, but there was only one, as Len (I think it was him) said. Seemed to be mostly posturing, minus the leg intertwining. Low on content. And there was little of the down-and-dirty "street" feel that an AT should have.

Bruno might have been more subdued tonight, but he spoke more rubbish than usual. I don't mind the other judges and thought Len finally remembered tonight that he was the judge with the technical knowledge (apart from the AT and Charleston natch), but Bruno is a waste of time. He rarely says anything useful these days.

I don't mind him. But I would rather they didn't spread misinformation about gauchos on the pampas and all that twaddling, IT clearly has an impact or would seem to from the thngs viewers say about what they expect from an AT.

To be fair to Kristina, she only did when she had a duffer - when she had Simon she put together some great choreography.

Jay is supposed to be red hot favourite to win, yet Aliona did her darndest to keep him out of sight in that AT. It was absolutely OK by me though - she was terrific!

Biggest thing missing possibly was any lead from Jay, whilst Aliona was dancing around like she was overcompensating for this lack.

Oh I mean't no disservice to Kristina. In fact crediting her with the technique to distract from a poor celeb is something of a compliment.

He does often seem to string random words together in lieu of giving an actual critique

I don't dance AT so wouldn't want to comment on technique - good, bad, or lack of!

But what I would say is that last year Simon and Kristina's AT seemed to show great chemistry between the 2 of them, and passion.

Jay, on the other hand, looked to me as if he couldn't get the 'feel' of the dance. Almost as if he was too embarrassed to try and show the sort of chemistry & passion Simon & Kristina had. I realise he isn't an actor, so that side of dancing doesn't come easily to him, but Simon wasn't an actor either!

Probably his worst performance for me, but that is his high standards. A much needed kick up the backside if he thinks he has this in the bag !

... and as soon as he did that then the tabloids would have a field day as it would "prove" they were right all along.

That being said, he does need to work on the "performance" side of things. Fingers crossed Aliona will pick it up this week

Neither was Mark Ramprakash - he wasn't even a performer. Remember the problems he initially had with emoting, yet he managed to brood his way through one of the very earliest SCD Argentine Tangos when the dance didn't even have any hinterland in the show to draw upon.

I don't think Jay is embarrassed, it's just that he's about as sexy as a stick of celery - a limp one at that.

And there you have it summed up in one post all that's wrong about what viewers of SCD think an Argentine Tango should be.

It's not down and dirty, it's not all about the ganchos. I'm no Argentine Tango expert, not like AT and Sofakat, but I've watched a fair few and there's massively more to the dance that Len's claim it should about sweaty men off the Pampas picking up ladies of the night or the assertion it should be full of kicks.

I have been biting my hand on that point since last night. But what you say is right the public have been fed some very rhum misinformation about what to expect from an AT. Hey ho - its worse for salsa in my opinion.

But for the record any lead (man) that kicks me intentionally during an AT is going to get his face very firmly slapped.

len didn't actually mention the pampas or the ladies of the night or the other nonsense he sometimes goes on about AT.

jays was no better or worse in terms of content / choreography than many others, but he didn't perform it particularly well (a bit of the helen balletic feel to his legs and body stance - all wrong for the dance) and absolutely failed to deliver the mood. someone described it as having the feel of him delivering a parcel , and that perfectly sums up my feelings about him

I couldn't agree more. Visually Simon and Kristina's AT was elecric. It had passion, drama, great story teliing. It was visually exciting to watch. I'm no expert by any stretch of the imagination and I've enjoyed reading the comments of those on this thread who have dance experience, I enjoyed Jay's AT but for me not of the standard of Simon's because he did not 'act ' out the dance. I didn't see the passion or drama. It was just the steps and footwork. It' was like listening to a singer, singing a sad love song but not hearing any emotion in their voice so you don't believe the words their singing.

Of course.
Thinking about it,laser guided missiles such as "mavericks" or "hellfires" (as opposed to laser guided freefall bombs) are usually fired at armoured vehicles,thus hitting the ground would mean inaccuracy.

He didn't have to mention it tonight, it's been drilled into the viewers that that's what the AT is all about over the years it's been performed on the show. They used Flavia & Vincent to introduce the dance the year before it became a regular performance dance on SCD and they were Argentine Tango Show Dance experts which is vastly different, so since the off the viewers of SCD have been given something utterly different.

While Jay didn't "sell" the AT and struggled a bit with the walk which gives the dance its stylistic feel (where the feet hardly leave the floor except for the "special effect moves" like the ganchos, what he did produce was a dance which had plenty of AT steps in it.


It doesn't need always need to be passionate and dramatic though, that's kind of the point various people who do have expertise in the AT have been making

The big "make a splash" ATs we've see on Strictly over the years bare little resemblance to the actual dance but are very much Argentine Tango Show dances so they make the audience gasp.

yes, agreed, i have no problem with the content/choreography.