Strictly Come Dancing--am I on my own here?

I don't like this meeting up bit. It's like one of those awful charity auctions.

It's a bit cheesy. Matt Baker in equal measure terrified and excited.

Erin a good match for Shilts though.

Robin, Artem, and Jared. The sons Noah didn't talk about.

Going to stick my neck out and predict that Brendan will get Patsy Kensit.

Michelle is partnered with Brendan.

Frankie Say Strictly...

Jesus, I'm already sick of looking at Gavin Henson's chest. If he was a woman, this kind of talk would not be acceptable.

He's on ITV1 in a bit in some kind of "celebs journey into the Arctic Circle", and you can bet that even in sub-zero temperatures the director will still find a way of showing Hewson's chest.

Well that was a bit of an anticlimax and a half, wasn't it? And now we have to wait three weeks while they learn to dance. Borang.

Yeah I don't understand why they did that. The BBC really taking advantage of the non-compete agreement with X Factor.

Non-compete agreement? Whazzat then? I didn't hear about that.

BBC and ITV have agreed to schedule Strictly and X Factor so that they don't clash.
http://www.metro.co.uk/news/839954-x-factor-and-strictly-come-dancing-agree-scheduling-deal

You would think that would have made the BBC cock about with the show less, not more. Oh well. We'll see how it shapes up. And at least Claude will be doing the results show with Tess, instead of Bruce doing it. That's got to be good.

Actually the BBC have cocked about with the show even more - the first episode was last night (Friday) at 9PM. I didn't even know it was on, expecting it to be tonight (Saturday), and it isn't available on iPlayer. Strictly must be one of the BBC's biggest draws this season, yet they're shifting it's scheduling all over the place like it was a BBC3 sitcom.

It's on iPlayer now. Michelle Williams - not good. Also really annoying. Gavin Henson and Pamela Stephenson pretty nifty round the old floor. Judges wuv Kara Tointon.

Whole bunch of undeserved 8s before Matt danced. Based on previous scores, he should have got at least one 9, which would have been ridonk. Craig's score is the only one that counts these days.

Michelle's 8 from Alesha was the daftest one. You can't just give someone 8s because you love them in their real job!

I didn't know Gavin Henson was on this. Has he forgotten that he's a current professional athlete who you'd think has other things to be doing with his time?

He is a plank of wood.

And MAtt Baker is wearing a funnee 'tache - wot larks Pip, wot larks, etc..

Oh God, Peter Shilton doing the Charleston is nothing I ever want to see again. Alesha is on crack if she thinks that was worth a 6.

I seriously LOVE Pamela Stephenson on this so much.

I'm picking her as the winner, even at this early stage. None of the other couples are really anywhere close.

Scott Maslen and Matt Baker are pretty good as well, to be fair, and Kara Tointon seems to have a decent shout at it as well. But outside that four, there's nothing much there. Widdecombe and Shilton have to go next, in that order. At least Shilton can make a fist of ballroom, so for that alone he deserves to stay longer than her.

Also James is my favourite out of the male pro dancers - none of this wacky personality nonsense like there is with Vincent, although he has dialled it down a bit.

Unicycle!

That was pretty good fun!

Very very good but verging on Blue Peter style gag dancing.

Is tricky not to do gag dancing jazzhands stupidity doing a Charleston, tbf.

Michelle Williams has been uniformly rubbish this series, so hoping Ian Waite can make her better than Brendan has managed so far...

no, still stiff and gangly and in danger of snapping/falling over, being dragged all over the place, but I still think it's better than Brendan would have managed to do with her.

"The woman is supposed to follow the man" oh SHUT UP Craig

A bit better this week but still stiff. It sort of, er, kills me that 'Killer' is used for this - is this what happens to 20 year old records? But it could have worked with a more focused dynamic performance.

Yeah, agree with Len on Kara's charleston. Technically really really good, but too slow and not showy enough.

Widdecombe annoys me about a billion times more than John Sargent ever did.

I am now in the really unfortunate position of actually feeling sorry for Anne Widdecombe. Audible laughter throughout, wall-to-wall gimmickry, but in there there were actually a couple of decent steps and maybe teaching her to dance rather than making up ways to twat everything up to the max might have possibly been a better idea? This kind of "hilarity" will keep her in, won't it?

oh fuck off judges. really. just fuck off.

How much of it is people wanting to see these 'hilarious' antics and how much of it is Anton's fanatical fans? I wonder who the genius was who decided to pair them.

I worry that Jimi Mistry might go tonight - totally undermarked and in that really dangerous part of the leaderboard. Though I reckon it's got to be Shilton or Widdecombe.

^ OK, I was a couple of weeks out, but :-(

That phase of feeling sorry for Anne Widdecombe has passed, btw. I hate them with a passion. I did hate that she was being criticised for her age and weight, but fuck it, it's a dance show. Do some fucking dancing.

never watched this show but i've seen shows using the same format in other countries and there's something fairly great about watching those. the celebrities are always such national celebrities, and even then sometimes somewhat niche or faded, that it just seems like it's just people dancing badly.

There are people dancing very well. Anne Widdecombe is not one of them.

Can I be the first one to make the Pamela/Brendan Bradford & Bingley joke?

If you mean Pamela/James, then yes (just watching now).

Stupid gimmicky dances annoy me. If you can't tell the story of the dance without gimmickly props, then tell a different story!

Brief revive to say the following:

• fuck whoever out there is voting for Widdecombe
• woah shit!!! at Matt Baker backflip

Yes and yes. Really liked Pamela and James's waltz too.

God yeah, voting for Ann is just so wrong. The whole thing is just so set for non-existent laughs - pairing her with a guy a good foot taller than her who is entirely made of cheese, ffs. The fact that people are buying it is completely bizarre to me, it's not even a comedy protest vote, is it?

Matt's gymnastics are great. Didn't people get really arsey about Gaby Logan being an ex-gymnast, but Matt seems to get a free pass with it.

Three nights of Strictly next week, and I'll be at ATP. Trishyb, we must find some way of iPlayering it and watching together!

oh, and I really really don't give a shit about the Kara and Artem love story. At all.

Trishyb, we must find some way of iPlayering it and watching together!

Does Butlins have free wifi yet? I will have my laptop with me.

Jolly good. I have my spies investigating the wifi situation right now (would it be sad if we were to take your laptop on a trip to find wifi and download it off the iplayer site?)

The singers are fucking atrocious tonight, btw. They've been not too bad this series, but that Abba medley was painful.

I loved Kara's dress from last night, btw. This Anton and Erin dance is rather nice.