Strictly Come Dancing: Viewers conflicted over Tom Fletcher and Amy Dowden’s paso doble

Strictly Come Dancing viewers were left divided by Tom Fletcher and Amy Dowden’s paso doble.

After struggling with his Halloween week tango, McFly star Fletcher returned to the dance floor on Saturday (6 November) night with a traditional paso.

The judges were wowed by the performance, with Craig Revel Horwood saying that he had never seen such a “convincing” paso by a male celebrity on Strictly.

Shirley Ballas, meanwhile, praised Fletcher’s Spanish line and said that she enjoyed seeing a rendition of the dance that was less “aggressive” and more “classical and balletic”.

Fletcher and Dowden received 38 points, including two 10s from Motsi Mabuse and Shirley Ballas, making it their highest score of the series.

However, viewers at home were less sure of the performance – while some loved it, others felt it lacked flow and was “overmarked”.

“I give Tom and Amy 9 out of 10. This was incredible! Pretty much every line was struck beautifully. The cape work was also excellent! I did see some tiny issues, but WOAH!” one viewer wrote.

“A sensational Paso Doble from Tom. His best dance to date in my view. Amy is absolutely amazing,” another Twitter user added.

“Enjoyed that paso,” one viewer wrote. “Proper music helps so much. Tom’s very much an improver.”

On the other side, one viewer called Fletcher and Dowden’s routine a “mixed bag”, writing: “Needs to arch back more and be less balletic and flappy. A real lack of sharpness. Needs to walk as if through deep soft sand. Needs more tension throughout. Great pirouettes, but needs to be darker,” one tweet read.

Another said: “How the hell did Tom get 10s and Rose [Ayling-Ellis] and Gio [Pernice] only 8s? Tom just stood, walked a bit and waved his arms around. He didn’t even dance!! Should’ve been 6s at most. Ridiculous!”

One Twitter user argued: “To begin with, I wasn’t enjoying that routine but as the dance got going I started to really enjoy it. I feel as though Tom made some mistakes throughout and for me it felt a little rigid in parts but I did enjoy it.”

Former Strictly pro and Dancing on Ice champion James Jordan said that he would have given the routine a score of eight, tweeting: “Traditional Paso which i would usually be jumping 4 joy but I just didn’t feel it overall. I wasn’t a fan of the look but that’s personal He did however dance it very well apart from the Cape work which was weak.”

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