With no little irony, Movie Week – the third week of the 2025 edition of Strictly Come Dancing – saw “Hollywood” Ross King eliminated after the Sunday night dance-off. ITV breakfast television’s veteran Los Angeles correspondent jetted back to Blighty just to take part in the show, but his time home has been – inevitably, mercifully – brief.
After Thomas Skinner’s departure last week, it is safe to say that the worst two dancers have been sent home. Not always the case at this stage of proceedings.
The big surprise of the night was the inclusion of EastEnders actress Balvinder Sopal, along with her professional partner Julian Caillon, in the dance-off. After a ropey Week One, Sopal showed huge improvement and promise last week, scoring 30 for her Charleston, though this week she dipped to 26 for her Fred and Ginger-inspired foxtrot.
Of the 13 celebrities to dance, only Sopal and actress Alex Kingston had lower scores than Week Two. Even so, it was a shock – especially to Sopal, who looked crestfallen.
While the judges enjoyed Sopal’s elegance and class, head judge Shirley Ballas was hypercritical, pulling the actress up on many different parts of her technique in a schoolma’am dressing down. It’s likely that these harsh words will have cost Sopal votes. Long-memoried Strictly viewers may also have recalled Sunetra Sarker’s 2014 routine to the same song and film combo – The Way You Look Tonight from Swing Time – for which she scored a perfect 40.
In Ballas’s defence, when judge Craig Revel Horwood announced he would save Sopal and Caillon, he said it was because of their “style and musicality”. In other words, the technique just isn’t there. Sopal, however, has at least one more week to make amends.
King, truly, never stood a chance. His Thunderbirds-themed paso doble – all puffed out chest, pursed lips and rigor-mortis marching – was comical for the wrong reasons. Worst of all, King didn’t look like he was enjoying himself. The judges were always going to send him home.
The only person he might have bettered in the dance-off was former England rugby captain Chris Robshaw, though Robshaw has shown marked improvement over three weeks (and, crucially, looks like he’s enjoying it).
What relegated Sopal to the dance-off is probably Robshaw’s impressive biceps, which were on full show in his Thor costume. Robshaw, alongside the returning Stefan Dennis, will be feeling the heat next week. Less Thor’s Hammer, more Sword of Damocles.
Overall, it’s been a curious series thus far, dominated by the luridness of the Thomas Skinner affair, and continuing with this week’s slightly hysterical Movie Week (the hallucinatory nature of it was continued on Sunday by the pros’ routine based on the execrable A Minecraft Movie).
Jowita and Ross exited the show following a dance off against Balvinder Sopal and Julian Caillon (right) – Guy Levy/BBC
The presence of “guest mentor” Cynthia Erivo had everyone overexcited, while the judges swung between acting like pussycats and tigers. Perhaps with the series’ two clodhoppers – Skinner and King – dispensed with, things will feel a little more settled next week.
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