Latin Fever

So here we are again, SCD two nights in a row. The BBC are really spoiling us this year! After the graceful and not-so-graceful ballroom of last night we now kick off the latin!

Jade and Ian

Well, if you have to go first then you might as well do it in the spangliest, bestest dress of the night! Also a fabulous song choice from Ian, she seemed really into the whole thing. Plus the splits at the end made me gasp, how do people do that in Week 1 without doing themselves an injury?! Obviously it wasn't perfect, but really glad to see her going at it so early on.

Ali and Brian

After last night's beautiful performance, the Barbie and Ken of the ballroom (I mean that in a good way) had a lot to live up to, but never underestimate the power of a fringed frock. Was really impressed to see Ali looking confident out of hold so she really does have potential. Not sure about the whole posing vs non-posing debate - to me you can't have a rumba without posing!

Lynda and Darren

Sleeves, sleeves, sleeves! For heaven's sake am I going to have to spend the whole series going on about the unnecessary use of sleeves again? Thankfully a genius song choice from Darren, but it couldn't jolly along the whole thing along for me. Seriously though, she got a whole series of steps wrong. As lovely as she is, she shouldn't stay in for weeks on end just for being Lynda.

Rav and Aliona

After being unfairly battered last night I really had my fingers crossed for Rav's rumba, especially as it is so hard for the men. I was not disappointed and I am glad Len came to his rescue after Craig having one of his marathon moans. Too bad about the random scoring from the judges. I also think I am quite liking Aliona with her song choices and choreography. And yes, hurrah for fun facts about waist-thigh ratios!

Chris and Ola

Personally, I could not see what the fuss was about with the tango last night, but wow I was impressed by this rumba. Whoever thought a sports presenter could act a rumba like that in week 1! Ola didn't even need to be half-naked for it, although I did waste some time pondering what percentage of her bum was on show (about 60%?). Either way this is now the surprise team to watch for the next few weeks.

Joe and Kristina

Ask yourselves dear viewer, is it worth your licence fee to watch Joe Calzaghe walking around a dancefloor? Rigor mortis was a bit harsh, but I am missing this potential Len seems to be seeing. I don't want to be mean and I am sure Joe is trying really hard, but I am starting to wonder why he signed up for this.

Martina and Matthew

Oh the alliteration; it's so much fun and sounds like an 80s pop group. Anyway, still not too sure about Martina but I can't quite put my finger on why. I thought she looked a bit stiff but other than that there doesn't seem much to say. Rather disappointing...no idea why Alesha got that 7 out.

Ricky and Erin

Oh my word look at Erin's outfit, it's like the Flintstones meets Austin Powers and yet I somehow love it! I was really hoping Erin would play on his cheeky-chappie reputation and I think they stayed just on the right side of comedy. The most entertaining routine of the night by far and glad to see the judges appreciated it. In the words of a recent post of ours, Ricky has well and truly embraced the sparkle!

Just as an aside, I totally LOVED the Sweet Charity Medly, it's such an under-rated musical and the pros were on fire. I hope the new format of the shows means we get more treats like that throughout the series. Plus, got to love Camilla and Tom's showdance, especially for Camilla's mad dancing faces that I am going to miss so much this series (along with Karen's, I hope some of the new female dancers are crazy face-pullers!).

Dance-off

As ever, the two worst people are not in the dance-off for week 1. Craig was right that both couples improved during the dance-off, but very glad that Rav stayed. As you can see above I was not particularly excited about Martina and both Rav and Aliona seem to have so much to give. Well this has got everything off to a very exciting start!