Dates
Sept-Dec 2021 (13 weeks plus launch show, 15 couples).
That time period in context
So this was Covid (year 2) with more lockdowns announced in January (in England and Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland were still locked down from December). The dominant variant in the UK was Delta from mid 2021. On 6 January the Capitol Attack in Washington DC saw Trump’s supporting mob trying to “save America” because he had lost the election. In August in Afghanistan the Taliban captured Kabul and took control of the country as US and UK troops were withdrawing. In autumn COP 26 took place in Glasgow. Emma Raducanu won the tennis US Open in September aged 18. The hugely successful TV series It’s a Sin was shown on C4 in Jan/Feb 2021 and the brilliant comedy We Are Lady Parts in May. The South Korean show Squid Game was huge on Netflix in September. Disney’s Encanto came out in the November (and you might well ask the question – is its hit song We Don’t Talk About Bruno a reference to Signor Tonioli’s seemingly eternal stint on the US show Dancing with the Stars?).
Judges
Shirley Ballas (head judge), Anton du Beke (new judge), Motsi Mabuse and Craig Revel Horwood.
Presenters
Tess Daly and Claudia Winkleman (main and results shows).
Rylan and Janette Manrara (It Takes Two). Janette was a new presenter for ITT this year and the first pro dancer to be given this role (pic below).
Addition to format
Again, there was no Blackpool visit.
The Couple’s Choice category was made more flexible – not restricted to a few styles as before.
This time it was Luba Mushtuk and 2 new pros, Cameron Lombard (pic below) and Jowita Przystał, who didn’t get a celebrity partner.
Dancers
(celebrities first, professional partners second; couples listed in order of elimination with winners last)
Nina Wadia and Neil Jones
Katie McGlynn and Gorka Márquez
Robert Webb and Dianne Buswell (withdrew)
Greg Wise and Karen Hauer
Ugo Monye and Oti Mabuse
Judi Love and Graziano Di Prima
Adam Peaty and Katya Jones
Sara Davies and Aljaž Škorjanec
Tom Fletcher and Amy Dowden
Tilly Ramsay and Nikita Kuzmin (new pro)
Dan Walker and Nadiya Bychkova
Rhys Stephenson and Nancy Xu
AJ Odudu and Kai Widdrington (new pro)
John Whaite and Johannes Radebe
Rose Ayling-Ellis and Giovanni Pernice
Celebrities we had heard of before the series (and how we knew them)
Nina Wadia (actor, Goodness Gracious Me), Robert Webb (comedian, Mitchell and Webb/Peep Show), Greg Wise (actor, Sense and Sensibility), Judi Love (comedian/presenter, Celebrity Gogglebox), Adam Peaty (swimmer), Tom Fletcher (didn’t know his name but knew his face as McFly front man, mainly because they were in the Lindsay Lohan film Just My Luck and Heather was a big Lindsay fan in her tween/teens), Dan Walker (BBC presenter).
Who did we vote for?
TV presenter AJ and new pro Kai for the most part (pic below). AJ was brilliant and it was clear from quite early on that actor Rose and Giovanni were probably going to win so I didn’t think they needed our vote too. We liked both couples equally but AJ danced like she was on fire and I loved it.
Celebrities we liked more after the series
Rugby player Ugo was fun and charming (pic above with Oti), Judi Love was fun and funny (pic below with Graziano).
We’ve never watched Bake Off so we didn’t know John Whaite at all (he won that show in 2012) but he was really lovely and we were glad he and Johannes did so well. Rhys was a sweetheart and it was great that Nancy got such a good start with her first partner (pic of them below).
AJ, as already mentioned, was fabulous and funny and a force of all the good things. And of course Rose was magnificent and such an individual – she did the show just the way she wanted to. She was the first deaf person to take part and she was gorgeous in every way – strong, delicate, fierce and hilarious.
Was it obvious who was going to win?
Yes. Rose and Giovanni didn’t always get the best scores but they were magical to watch and they were getting good scores as early as week 3. I think most of the viewers, indeed the country, fell a bit in love with Rose (or at least wanted to be her best friend). Here are Rose and Gio (and also at the top of the post).
Were there articles in the papers moaning about one of the celebrities being good because they’d danced before?
Not that I remember. They were taken up with romance stories again I think (some of them way off course).
Did it matter?
Nope.
Was there an obvious “shouldn’t stay in long but did” contestant?
Dan Walker, I suppose (pic below with Nadiya). A section of the audience kept supporting him for the “he hasn’t danced before and he’s trying really hard” storyline. I didn’t mind him (and it was nice for his pro Nadiya to get a good run) but there were others I would have preferred to stay in.
Shock exit?
Nina Wadia (pic below with pro Neil). She was the first to go out which was a real shame as she started well and would have been a great contestant. Unusually for Strictly (I think) she was quite open about being fed up to get kicked off early and I found that honesty admirable. She questioned the judges’ marking (hardly the first person to do that – especially some of Craig’s wilder low scores) and in doing so made herself look like a bit of “bad sport”, pretty brave considering the obsession with being a “good sport” in some quarters of the UK and that much of the UK press don’t need much encouraging to target a woman of colour with negative stories (we talked about that back at Series 15). People are allowed to be disappointed, to feel they’d put themselves into an intimidating format and not been given the best chance (we don’t have to agree with them, but they can say it, it’s their life and public image after all). Unless you are already confident in the activity in question (dancing, ice skating etc.), going on these shows is pretty courageous in the first place (especially for a woman over a certain age) and I think showing an honest, human reaction is fair enough. Nina even talked about the show negatively affecting her mental health (here) and I do think some judges might keep that in mind when making their comments and giving scores. It might be hilarious to have a dig but how deep can you go before it’s too far? Maybe her words have had some effect as I would say there have been less catty comments in the 2022 series. Or maybe that’s just Motsi’s good influence on the other judges.
The story of the series
Everything about Rose. Also the series taught hearing people that many of them know very little about deafness or deaf people.
John and Johannes being the first same sex couple in the final was a big milestone (pic below). They were accepted by the audience, loved and supported, why had it taken so long?
AJ was fabulous in every way but unfortunately, due to an injury, she couldn’t dance in the final. There’s always something to make you cry in the final but this time, for me, it was AJ’s story.
And our family - what was going on with us at the time?
Covid-19 still dominated everything and we were still much more home-based than before the pandemic. We were still using Zoom/Teams for work (and more) and we enjoyed lots of online events like the Glasgow music festival Celtic Connections in January and, for Heather, the Janette and Aljaž Oscars show later that year (she’d had tickets for the live show but that was cancelled, like so many things). Heather and I rewatched some favourite TV shows like Mum and Fosse/Verdon to get through the (very snowy) winter. I also did another Fun A Day Dundee writing project in January to help me with dark winter days. This time I wrote a poem/post a day about every place I’ve ever lived (called 31 Postcodes, first one here).
At the end of March, Mark and I got our first Covid vaccinations at the huge Caird Hall in town. It was like a social event (if one mainly for people in their 50s, all a couple of metres apart and not allowed to use their phones).
In April Heather turned 21 and the best we could manage was turning the car into some kind of disco (fairy lights and all) and driving her round for a couple of outside visits, pizza by the sea and so on. Luckily her now very favourite public person (the actor/comedian Andy Samberg, pic above on what was left of her cake) had a new film on streaming that week (suitably enough the time-loop Palm Springs) so that was definitely a happy birthday treat for her. She first met (and fell for) Samberg in the sitcom Brooklyn Nine-Nine which she watched in the first lockdown in 2020, though in fact the first series went out originally in 2013. In 2021 Brooklyn Nine-Nine showed its final episode (to much sadness in this house). Strictly, on the other hand, rolls on for another year…
Much of the year (socially) was spent outside, avoiding variants. We had trips to England (especially Mark as his Mum was back in hospital in Yorkshire, various times, and then in a care home by the end of the year, though she never caught Covid). When he wasn’t doing that he rediscovered a love of being on the water from his youthful scouting days (kayaking, rowing, anything boaty).
I hadn’t been doing a lot of poetry stuff in lockdowns but I had two commissions that summer that were a bit special (2 wedding poems for siblings that were getting married the same year, both after a few postponements). The irony is never lost on me that my most successful moments in poetry have nearly all been wedding-related (I’ve never been married, never wanted to be married, find the whole business pretty baffling to be honest – I’m all for love but marriage has never appealed). One of my other love poems is even listed on various wedding sites (in amongst Burns and other obscure folk). Both of this summer’s wedding poems ended up being so moving that they even made me cry. I’m wasted on this blog business, you know.
If you want to read any of the previous posts just click Older Post below till you get to the one you want. Or use these links: Series 1, Series 2, Series 3, Series 4, Series 5, Series 6, Series 7, Series 8, our Dancing with the Stars interlude, Series 9, Series 10, Series 11, Series 12, Series 13, Series 14, Series 15, Series 16, Series 17 and Series 18.
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