Little Mix win the X Factor 2011

Little Mix win the X Factor 2011. Sofabet heartily congratulates Leigh-Anne, Jade, Jesy and Perrie. They may have beaten our pre-live show selection Marcus Collins in the final, but we can’t begrudge the girls a victory that is the best result for the franchise and one of the few bright spots in a rather tawdry series.

The full phone vote results are released soon after the show ends. When they are we will post within the hour a quick initial analysis here on Sofabet. If you can hold on with your comments on them until this is done, then we can debate them in the same thread.

In the final, relevance and a sense of freshness trumped the middle-of-the-road, more old-fashioned candidate. This was particularly clear on Sunday, with Marcus’s choice from the live shows of ‘Higher and Higher’ by Jackie Wilson against Little Mix looking far more contemporary with En Vogue’s ‘Don’t Let Go’.

Back in early October, we really struggled to pick who to tip in our 1-16 preview because all the acts had weaknesses. The fact that they all had weaknesses allowed producers to pick them off and let Little Mix sluice through on the inside rail.

We repeat that the first group, and a girlband at that, is great news for the show. However, there is a desperate need to reboot the franchise after the rather unseemly and increasingly obvious way that many of their rivals were put to the sword by producers.

The list of victims is a long one. In fact almost every eliminee, whilst often not helping themselves, was treated in a shoddy way that helped guarantee their demise when it happened. Nu Vibe, Sami, Sophie, Johnny, Kitty, Craig, Janet and Amelia were all thrown under the bus at certain points, whilst Misha was walking wounded from bullygate onwards.

There really needs to be a greater sense of fairness about the way that each act is presented next year if cynicism isn’t going to destroy the show. We will be presenting our own ideas of how producers can go about this. Look out too for a review of the 2011 series, just as we picked the bones from the 2010 series. We will also compile our favourite ten Sofabet posts, just as we did for 2010.

And there are many more reasons to return to Sofabet over the coming weeks. Coming up we have the Strictly Come Dancing final, followed by the X-Factor US final. And in the new year, the Eurovision season begins in earnest. Sofabet is nothing without its loyal and insightful commenters, who got so much right this year, not least the Little Mix steamroller. Many thanks and long may it continue. Let us know what you think about Sunday’s show below.

Print Friendly, PDF & Email

86 comments to Little Mix win the X Factor 2011

  • Jake

    Big congratulations to Little Mix fans 😀

    And its nice Marcus went out on a high. His version of Cannonball was brilliant. Little Mix were much better vocally but his had much more emotion.

  • Jack

    Congrats to LM backers, really. Disappointed for Marcus, but to call him as the winner before the live shows was a brilliant call.

    I’ll hold off analysis util the voting results are posted. Watching Xtra Factor now, so awaiting who wins every week.

  • Kate

    I find it hard to believe that Little Mix was Plan A until comparatively late in the game. My feeling is that they caught some lucky breaks as weaknesses in the other categories exposed themselves. The 3 key breaks were –

    1) Kelly mishandling the girls: losing Amelia in week 1, failing to gel with Janet, and hitching all her fortunes to the lost cause of Misha. That left the pro-girl vote needing an outlet;

    2) The Frankie implosion: clearly intended as the show’s Alpha Male, the producers severely overestimated his appeal to the audience and the show was left without a heavyweight boy in the competition. Marcus might have stood a better chance if he hadn’t been niched into the 50s showtune box before Frankie was expelled; and

    3) The loss of the Risk: it was a big break for LM that the Risk’s previously unnoticed weakness revealed itself in the week where the lowest-scoring act was automatically eliminated. Otherwise, they would almost certainly have survived a sing-off with Johnny or Kitty, and despite their bottom 2 placing they would have remained in pole position among the groups.

    They also benefitted a great deal from having Tulisa as their mentor. The other judges would, I think, have treated them as canon fodder.

    But set against all this is my sense that they genuinely caught a wave and rode it to the best of their abilities. None of the factors above would have counted for anything if they weren’t likeable, if they didn’t have chemistry, and if they weren’t able to pull off at least a couple of great performances.

    And the perennial group problem – that there were too many of them to have a proper narrative “journey” – was actually a strength. Their narrative was the story of their progress through the X Factor. The traditional drawback of being put together at bootcamp was, this time, a strength: we saw their birth, we saw them grow, we saw a creative development, we saw that they weren’t perfect but we saw them improving and adapting. And that was, ultimately, a much more powerful narrative than the usual X Factor tearjerk back-stories.

  • shoulders

    Janet topped the vote every single week until the week when Amelia came back, that has got to be the biggest stitch up in the entire history of the show, unbelievable, surely the papers will be on this, the show is doomed next year if they don’t change

    • shoulders

      they had to stop Janet ( before they couldn’t) doing a Matt Cardle, to insure Little Mix could win, there can be no reason for putting down an act week on week that was clearly the publics favourite, the show really has reached an all time low, hope the papers pick up on this

    • Donald

      That is really unbelivable.

  • Jack

    Btw, there were the results:

    Week 2 Winner: Janet Devlin
    Week 2 Runner-up: The Risk
    Week 3 Winner: Janet Devlin
    Week 3 Runner-up: Johnny Robinson
    Week 4 Winner: Janet Devlin
    Week 4 Runner-up: Little Mix
    Week 5 Winner: Janet Devlin
    Week 5 Runner-up: Marcus Collins
    Week 6 Winner: Amelia Lily
    Week 6 Runner-up: Janet Devlin
    Week 7 Winner: Little Mix
    Week 7 Runner-up: Misha B
    Week 8 Winner: Amelia Lily
    Week 8 Runner-up: Little Mix
    Week 9 Winner: Little Mix
    Week 9 Runner-up: Marcus Collins
    The Final Part 1 Winner: Little Mix
    The Final Part 1 Runner-up: Marcus Collins
    The Final 2 Winner: Little Mix
    The Final 2 Runner-up: Marcus Collins

    Voting statistics released later.

    • Curtis

      Biggest surprise in this to me is Amelia winning the week 8 vote. I didn’t think her sympathy bounce would be enough to topple the Little Mix steamroller at that stage. Again, suggests a close vote.

      • Highlighted

        Yeah thats my biggest surprise too. Showed how hard they wanted Janet out right then though. With Misha B in 2nd the week before, a huge Amelia bounce (which they gave) was the icing to get rid of Janet. Would like to know who came bottom of week 8. Janet or Misha?

    • Licking my lips for the detailed breakdown now; I had them almost all right, and when I didn’t (e.g. Little Mix 2nd week 4) I had them very close.

      But….Amelia winning week 8 was a big big miss, I had her only just ahead of Janet.

      • Highlighted

        Sorry to reply to myself, but also week 6 Janet was still runner-up to the returning Amelia. Week 7 she fell out of top 2. Week 7 was the week of Kiss Me, where the judges were ‘nice’, but didnt exactly rave about it, despite the performance being very good IMO. I think that was to get away from the Janet fans who were probably voting to keep her in inspite of the judges, so week 7 they softened the votes, then week 8 they went in for the kill, unfortunately Janet helped them with the huge slip up (meaning even many of her avid fans didn’t vote almost thinking she was better off out of the show, thats how I felt in week 8)

    • Jack

      Seems like Don’t Let Go was something of a Listen style gamechanger for LM.

    • sam

      going on that i really(i mean really) want to know why they hated janet so much top in weeks 2-5,they must of really hated her in the true sence on a personal level not profesional/business,no other act toped so much ,did janet scare them that much by being independant ,cant believe they were prepaired to sacrifice the whole show just to get rid of 1 act,even they must of known going on those stats she was good for the show itself.

  • Highlighted

    Johnny Robinson runner up week 3. Do you think production panicked right then?

    • Jack

      Yep, thats why softened him in Week 4, then delivered the killer blow with a double elimination in Week 5.

      • Curtis

        Yeah, like I said at the time, their treatment in the weeks after week 3 of Johnny would be reflective of how good his vote was that week. His treatment was bad, so that clearly meant that he had a great vote week 3. What with Janet who they also didn’t want at the top, the producer’s were probably really anxious.

  • taichou

    so basically they carried Marcus through with the pimping just because he was bloke?

  • shoulders

    and what about Tulisa banging the table saying Little Mix are really not safe and need your votes, surely this was making their fans vote again, generating more income for the show, is this breaking ofcom rules???

    • taichou

      shoulders, yeah think so they were just trying to milk more money as the ratings are terrible this year…

    • Kate

      If that was the cause there would have be an Ofcom investigation years ago, because it’s not Tulisa is the first mentor to urge viewers to vote.

      I seriously doubt that Tulisa – or any of the judges – would be allowed to do that if Talkback’s legal department thought there was the slightest danger that it breached Ofcom guidelines.

      • taichou

        yeah but ratings werent so bad couple of years back, the raitings were terrible plus they were saying VOTE not only for littlemix Kelly said many times vote for marcus as well i dont see other point as only milking more money:)

        • Kate

          In ratings terms, this has been the second most successful series of The X Factor.

          I also don’t see a connection between ratings and exhortations to vote. Nor would it make much difference to Ofcom. I’m sure that TPTB engage in all kinds of nudges to get the outcome they want but the notions that they’d openly flaunt broadcasting regulations in the hope that no one would notice isn’t one that would be entertained by anyone with the slightest idea of how TV production works.

          But if you want to put it to the test there’s nothing to stop anyone on here from contacting Ofcom themselves. I don’t think they’d get very far, but I look forward to being proved wrong.

          • taichou

            i think the best way would be to compare the voting numbers if they release those… maybe the acts were so bad that not many ppl voted for them?:)

  • taichou

    now its no wonder why Wembley cheered for Janet more than for any other act lol:))

    • sam

      yep.lv it(at this time im sticking my middle finger up to to shows producers),even the winning song was ment for her,just goes to show the show itself is the real looser this year not janet,the little muffins are only rhe substitute

      • taichou

        i dont know actually i think they thought that she will get into the final but then she messed up (in my opinion on purpose) and they saw an opportunity to get rid of her, but she stitched them up for good as well: the coldplay thing, winners song

        • sam

          your right ,at the time she fluffed on umm bopp,i did think it was a bit sus,and when she came out after she left and said about not wanting to be there i,i had a rhy smile to myself.shes got brains as well as tallent.good thinking janet.
          the coldplay thing is the best thing i heared all series, 1 band,1 stipulation,1 act its her or nobody and comeing from a very respected act like cold play must have made the shows producers cack themselves thats why they had had to duet with there (so called) mentors,after all the show had done for years to get coldplay to perform and they refused to duet with anyone but janet.RESPECT to coldplay.

        • R

          I think Janet was way ahead in weeks 2-4. Week 4 was the “Every Little Breath” which is when I thought the show turned on her, but I’ve read so many positive comments that I may have to revise my thoughts. Week 5 was the week she first forgot her words and she still came top. Maybe this was the point TPTB realised they had to take her down big time.
          I’m surprised she wasn’t top 2 with “Kiss Me”.

          • Highlighted

            The Kiss Me stuff was all tactical in my view. All a little lighter on her, but not exactly saying her performance was anything great. Just all rather decent in a way, which firstly brings down her huge fanbase and secondly doesnt allow for any new fans given that they never actually raved about the performance. While in the VT still used the whole boring, weird stuff, ‘im not the stereotypical pop artist’ as Janet called herself in the VT that week, then followed by her not allowing the stylist to style her. Took her down a notch without infuriating her fanbase like in week 5 and 6. So then the following week in week 8 they were going to go in for the kill. Janet helped them (either intentionally or not) by fluffing the lyrics. However her follow on performance with Under The Brudge was top class, one of the game changers, but judges quickly put the blanket over that by saying it was average, not good song choice. That is my take on Janet week 6 to 8.

          • sam

            i was just getting over the whole janet thing ,putting it to rest ,moving on etc,but after looking at jacks poll on week by week stats its got me wound up again,little mix not even in the running untill week 7,how sad is that for the people who think this “NEXT BIG THING” girl band are the realwinners of this show,im not slateing them at all they won and i dont have a problem with that they were the best on the night but the only reason they won is because the act that was most popular in the show was kicked off,and i think lots of people just got on the whole little muffins band wagon and were being led like sheep just for the hell of it and dont really care about their music,style or future status at all,i know some will (yes pete D you believed in them all the way congrats to you on that,we may descuse later) but the rest simply played follow the leader.

          • Highlighted

            That is what the show do sam, what happens when little girls or adults for that matter go to school or work during the week? Did you see that Little Mix performance? Was great? (people in question only think its great because Gary Barlow or some celebrity endorsing these acts said so) alot of people who watch this show are led by sheep and the production are spectacular at leading this cause. Janet got no such help after week 2. No celebrity endorsements. Very few race reviews from judges. Just the whole boring, weird, awkward stuff and word of mouth got round on these issues. Exactly what producers wanted.

          • sam

            highlighted,i do get what the show does and yes they were quite good tonigh i actually enjoyed there inpluged performane much more than i thought i would,my problem though is how many people in this country will go out and buy this band records,”they are not the next big thing”they not different enough or tallented enough to make such a big difference in the fickle world of the music industry,by hyping this girl group up so so much over the last few weeks it going to be almost impossible to live up to those expectations that people like tusila make about them,they are after all still to young to fully grasp what is to come,look at all the previous winners of this show and what happens when you dont go on to make what the people who voted for you think you are going to make,i will leave me full judgement on them untill i hear their first album ,i might be surprised or i might stick to my origianal synopsis.
            you can lead the sheep to water but you cant make them drink

        • Pauline

          Taichou. Interestingly, she did mess up after having spent some time at home in Ireland with her family. The savage verbal attacks on her were becoming hard to watch, it must have been very hard on Janet herself and she clearly was very unhappy. Maybe not consciously, but at a subconscious level, she could have had enough. Anyway, Janet is better out of it. She, after the concert, will have the freedom to choose what she wants to do and choose whom she wants to associate with. She appears to have great strength of character. I’m sure she will she choose wisely. By the cheering last night, she was, obviously, the favourite of the crowd. I must say, when Xtra Factor gave Barlow the voting figures, he, momentarily, looked decidedly uncomfortable. I’m so happy Syco have lost her.

    • Lux Lisbon

      @highlighted – soooo true. It’s called ‘Group Think’ and people in this country are so sleepy, so malleable, and so easy to hoodwink.

      It’s like a cat toying with a mouse.

      • Kate

        If your favourite loses it’s ‘group think’. If your favourite wins it’s ‘natural justice’.

        No one would deny that TPTB have their favourites and their methods, but I’m not sure that this thread represents a serious contribution towards their analysis.

        • Highlighted

          I think it has to be said that in the end each act still needs to perform. Janet is my fave but as much as production killed her slowly, forgetting the words a 2nd time was the final wound. Little Mix rode the wave but bought some good performances at key times.

      • Pete D

        Lux. Well I am truly ‘DE-lighted’ with my own ‘single think’ and astute ‘wide awake’ judgement, and in my country’s STEAMROLLING landslide voting.

        LITTLE MIX backers are now actually ‘winking’ around their own hood’ tonight BECAUSE it was soooo easy (just like the cat that got the cream).

        • Pete D

          So sorry to ‘toy’ with you (too), but you but make it rather easy. Cats eyes are most commonly ‘green’.

          (and this is the Wiki for the rest…) Cats, like dogs and many other animals, have a tapetum lucidum, which is a reflective layer behind the retina that sends light that passes through the retina back into the eye.

          [1] While this improves the ability to see in darkness, it appears to REDUCE net visual acuity, thus detracting when LITTLE MIX light is abundant. In very bright light, the slit-like iris closes very ‘narrowly’ over the eye (JUST LIKE AMELIA’s), reducing the amount of light on the sensitive retina, and improving depth of field (but NOT the ‘big picture).

  • annie

    I just had a wow moment and realised what helped LM to get more granny and older lady votes. For a few weeks now they kept mentioning their moms and grandmas. Even today was all about how they love their moms, weeks ago they said the first they would do if they win would be taking their moms on a trip. They kept bringing their lovely moms once in a while. I think that helped.

    • annie

      I had this revelation during the xtra factor (after I had a few glasses of healthy wine during the sow…)when they said that one of the things they learned during the show is to appreciate their moms more, cause they learned to do the washing. :)))

  • Kev

    Looking forward to seeing the top 10 posts. Number 1 is a no brainer for me.

  • taichou

    well if janet would have won i would have made about 30% more profit… feel kinda robbed 🙁

    • Curtis

      Yeah, it’s clear she would’ve walked it had she have been given the chance. That’s life unfortunately!

      • annie

        janet was completely screwed. she did brilliantly even after being given bad treatment and bad bad running orders. The funny thing is canonball wuld have suited her the best. WHYYYYYYYYYY were they so kean on killin her off, that shall remain the eternal mistery of xf 2011.

  • taichou

    btw just watching x factor( cant watch live) i must say winner song is really bad at least live.. maybe after recording its gonna be better…god Devlin would kill the charts with it..

  • Lux Lisbon

    I knew it, I just knew it, I knew that the public loved Janet and it was the judges and the producers who wanted rid.

    The saddest thing in the world, is when somebody cannot see something special when it’s right there under their nose.

    For her to be top for all those weeks, and then be stitched up like that is an utterly shameful.

    How can anybody sleep with that on their conscience?

    A full-blown, copper-bottomed, 24-carat disgrace.

    Still, the way she acted with class and integrity and humbleness made me love that girl even more.

    That’s being classy, in my book.

    • mark

      i got my fingers burnt when i bet janet to the xfactor.thats life we get on with it.

    • sam

      lux, the GBP loved miss D and still do,did you hear them in the audience tonigh when she sang,but the shows mafia bosses hated her in the true sence of the word,she had what they did not want her or any of the acts to have to have “a mind of her own”,thats why they put the boot in so much and kicked her out,they wanted a act they could control week by week ,and they eventually found it tonight.

      • Lux Lisbon

        Of course you’re right, superstar. I didn’t have a single guinea on any act, but it irritates the life out of me when I see any kind of injustice.

        For the love of god, Janet’s just a kid. To have them all gang up on her like that – now THAT should have been the true ‘Bullygate’

        • sam

          i think shes alot stronger both in body and mind than we think,iv watched her interviews and some of the others as well after they leave this show and she stands out the most by having a strong will and mind,i think shes knows what she wants and soon enough she will get it,shame though shes still going to be tied in to syco(x-factor) for 6 months or so on the tour,but then who knows.
          i read she may well have a record contract in the pipe line through on of the dragons den peoples lables,if this is true then its only a matter of time we have to wait,its not if but when.

  • Lux Lisbon

    Of course, my friend, but if I place my hard-earned money on an act, a horse, a football team and they get beat fair and square, then I’ll take it on the chin.

    But what I won’t take, what I won’t just shrug my shoulders at, what I won’t just lie down and accept, is when a competition, a race, or a match has been fudged, manipulated, tinkered with just so whoever was in charge got the result they wanted.

    Remember, this is not an egg and spoon race on sport’s day at the local nursery school.

    Money is being made by all sorts of people based on the result of this competition.

    Who knows, the people who MAY have had access to the weekly voting results may have been placing bets themselves. WE don’t know.

    Questions need to be asked AND answered, and there needs to be some transparency.

  • Chatterbox5200

    In light of the results of who topped the public votes each week (do they usually reveal the percentage share of the votes?) it would appear that JANET was a clear winner from the beginning.

    Many people have questioned why the show decided that she should be killed off, without any inside knowledge and only speculating based ont he various posts on this site, it seems as those this decision was made because she was independent and may not have been as easy to shape into the popstar the show wanted.

    She is reported as saying that she would like contestants to be able to perform their own material and quoted saying “I do wish that we would get more of an opportunity to be musicians and express our artistship”.

    JANET regularly mentioned the type of music that she was influenced by, and would like to record, and this would not have been the type of music that Syco wanted to release.
    They want an act that appeals to the mass market, and will be a commercial success, rather than be respected for their musical ability. In LITTLE MIX they have got what they wanted.

  • Lux Lisbon

    Boyyyyyy, I’m angry!

    • Pauline

      Lux, don’t be angry, be happy that Janet has escaped being tied to Syco. My feeling is that, she herself, is happy. Janet can now do what she wants to do. She needs to just enjoy the show she is contracted to do, with the friends she has made and then go on to greater things. For me, they have lost more than they gained. I will never forget Janet’s lovely, little face when Barlow started to savage her. I must admit I do get angry when I think of that. I too hate injustice.

      ‘Cannonball’ by Janet. Now that would pull at the heartstrings. Such a loss for Syco. I’m so glad.

  • Looks like it’ll be a late night in team sofabet if you are waiting to produce an article based on the voting percentages.

    Getting jittery, have they ever promised to release them? Just supposing that Janet had getting on for 3 times as many votes as any of the others at the start (as suggested by a certain graph) would it be to their benefit not to release this? Would be an awful shame for us, but might they keep schtum?

    • taichou

      well either way after she’s been voted off by judges being in b2 against ant act who was there for the 3rd time is bad in public eyes…

    • Andrew

      Hi tpfkar, I don’t think they ever promise to release them, as such – they just quietly slip them out on the website, or at least they have done in previous years. I assume the reasons they’ve had for releasing them in previous years will hold for this year, too…

      They’ve certainly released them a lot earlier than this in the past!

  • mark

    little mix will be around for about 3 years then it will go pear shaped ,
    now onto marcuss gary made a right mess up here,pimping frankie more than any other acts he had,from seeing marcuss from his very first audition ,i thought to myself we have a cheeky chappie here ,a
    bubble person with a great personality who can actually sing and dance at the same time.now the debate will be can marcuss sing a song!!!!!his cannonball song proved actually he can sing a song which is current, do it with style passion and emotion.he had everyone eating out of the palms of his arms..
    marcuss cannonball was 100% better than little mix!!!!
    i am glad now marcuss has not won the xfactor..he can go away and record his style of music he wants to do….
    unlike little mix marcuss will be around for at least the next 10 years.
    he will be a massive hit on broadway thats for sure hopefully he will smash the usa market doing this aswell,
    he is a little olly muirs robbie williams.a born entertainer,will pull the crowds in making a really big name for himself..

  • Rob

    okay, okay as gamblers we need to drop the janet thang (okay lux you are coming from the point of view of taste not gambling and i respect that), except from the point of view of learning lessons. i myself lost money on her so i understand the pain…

    glad i saw the LM switch and came out with a profit and respect to those who saw it even earlier. thanks to everyone here who gave some sort of insight.

    i did learnt some things tonight:
    the judges are NOT in the loop of producer thinking. none of them predicted the winners or even came close. also that goes for the presenters who got it wrong also!

    janet WAS stitched up, but so was misha. it was clear from some of her later positions that she had the potential to make the final if the bullygate week hadn’t been so damaging. however, i’m not sure either of them could have won in the ‘mass market’ final…

    marcus was the yella paint act (i said it at the start). no weekly wins. identify this and it can be hugely profitable.

    • taichou

      yeah so he was there just because he was a bloke..

      • mark

        marcuss could sing, no-one i know has a bad word to say about him.marcuss a yellow paint act i dont think so.marcuss will put bums on seats…

        • Rob

          hi mark, not knocking the guy except in regards to originality. i liked him and he had the broadest spectrum of supporters, hence the yellow paint tag. i just think that the show missed moving to another level by dampening acts to his advantage. from a gambling point of view he appears to have been gold dust…

          • mark

            hi rob
            gary made a right balls up with him,giving him the wrong song choices,the week 5 show was his best and proved he could dance and actually sing aswell,i dont think the show gave him the best shot.frankie was garys fav,hence marcuss not been noticed till week 5.

    • Highlighted

      Janet similar to Diana Vickers even in that she was surely most popular to begin with. Truth is, Janet is still a marmite act, I knew this from boot camp when already a few had hated her yodel style singing. In the end we need to learn tmwho marmite acts are and that they will never win XF even if having a big fan base. Will not get enough floating votes and producers will eventually not want them to win.

      • Curtis

        Diana wasn’t the most popular to begin with. The only week Diana won in the vote was the vote immediately after she missed a week due to illness (a week in which she was rubbish). Diana did not haave the raw popularity of Janet.

      • Lux Lisbon

        I don’t see how anybody can call her a ‘Marmite’ act, when she scored the most votes in the first four weeks and was second in the fifth.

        To me, that meant she was well-loved.

        • Kate

          She was marmite in the sense that she was well-loved but wasn’t able to pick up second choice votes from supporters of eliminated acts. Something similar is apparent with Diana, though I keep stressing that they’re actually quite dissimilar performers.

  • Lux Lisbon

    I agree taichou, but I really don’t think people notice these things or remember these things.

    They snooze through these programmes – they make tea, they chat, they’re Facebooking and they’re texting friends, and the programme with it’s noise and it’s visuals almost blows you away and every week seems exactly the same as the last.

    I’ve got friends and relations who watch this programme EVERY week and, when I’ve pointed out things that the admirable posters on here have highlighted, the people I know were amazed.

    People cannot see what is going on under their noses.

  • Tim

    Are taichou’s suspicions right and Janet really did mess up intentionally? She mentions some medicine she didn’t take that made her nauseous but that she wanted to compete against producers advice. She’s also admitted forgetting words on one occasion but at other times says it was either stop singing or be sick live (horrors!). Doesn’t really add up to me, too casual. If you were that sick you shouldn’t be on but would that mean auto elimination ? Phew. At the end of the day I think her big public support demonstrates her potential, and yes, combined with the ability of the XF to build up an act in the early rounds.

    • taichou

      yeah i think so, because song choice aint the best, plus she always posts on fb or twitter after each performance with video to ask for votes and she didnt done that particular week, plus look how happy she was when she was eliminated, even Biscuit boy who allready knew he was a goner was much more pissed:)

      • Tim

        Which is why Sofabet is such fun – some right some wrong. The “right” bits, I think, are about the producers manipulation which has been tawdry this year. From the gambling angle, if you think Janet was happy to throw in the towel in her last week, there’s also the need to consider whether an act really wants to sacrifice all to win. The acts all say they want to win at the time but maybe that’s contractual. Don’t think anyone realised how indifferent she became to it either because of being ground down or to be freer from Syco’s clutches.

        • annemarie

          I believe it was at the Twilight premier that Janet stated ‘Not everything in life is about winning’ Perhaps the signs were already there.

  • geoff

    well janet is the real winner in my eyes. to win all of those weeks with the treatment she was getting says it all
    whats the betting misha was bottom of the vote everytime she was in the bottom 2
    x factors too fixed i feel like lil mix only won because the show wanted them too

    • mark

      looks like that way geoff.after the cannonball song i knew little mix would win.marcuss song 100% better on the song but started to cry when singing it.was marcuss aware he had lost before he started to sing the song.then on the advert littlemix replace Amelia wtf why did marks and sparks put them on.
      fixed springs to mind. its not a talent show anymore….

  • The full voting percentages have just been released here.

    As requested by our landlords let’s leave discussion to the next thread, but I’ll get a comparison with how well it matches my predictions – my gut feel is that Week 7 aside it’s an incredibly close match.

  • mark

    the 3 judges ramming down peoples to vote little mix has won the day.3 times they sang and 3 of them ramming it down after the songs vote little mix.marcus was once with gary then with 2 other judges 1 time.
    i wonder what would have happened if the said the same 3 times about marcuss!!!!!

  • Dannyboy

    I have followed this site all series and love all the work that goes into the articles and the comments from regular readers.
    I know its helpful for regualer readers in a betting sense that lots of people dont look for the same things we do but i really want any major newspaper to go through this site and publish they’re own thoughts!
    Things like the act singing second in singoffs nearly always being saved.
    The effect of pimp slots.
    Only twice in the last 2 years now has the act that finished bottom been voted off that week by the judges.
    And everything else that goes on…
    I wasnt the biggest fan of janet but i want everyone to know exactly how she got treated on the show!

    Just a quick cheers to all the guys behind the site and look forward to your series reviews!

  • twilsob

    I’ve done the data analysis for the vote percentages proportional to the mean – make of this what you will!

    ACT 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 SEMI FINAL 1 FINAL 2 AVERAGE
    LM 104.4 66 137 107.1 107.1 156.6 112 137.6 117 106.04 115.08
    Marcus 81.6 123.2 101 144 90.3 86.4 105 96 103.5 93.96 102.5
    Amelia 191.8 67.8 119 85.6 79.5 108.74
    Misha B 93.6 129.8 51 109.8 56 135 72.5 80.8 91.06
    Janet 283.2 189.2 147 162 121.8 88.8 91.5 154.79
    Craig 82.8 66 130 90.9 74.2 65.4 84.88
    Kitty 70.8 55 129 68.4 58.8 76.4
    Frankie 62.4 66 57 78.3 65.93
    Johnny 78 188.1 122 74.7 115.7
    Risk 130.8 91.3 72 64.8 89.73
    Sophie 106.8 63.8 54 74.87
    Sami 7.44 61.6 34.52
    Nu Vibe 3.12 3.12

    For those after it in graph form: http://img560.imageshack.us/img560/4469/screenshot20111212at012.png

    Quite interesting, in that Little Mix consistently outperformed the average and were generally always quite popular – also showing that, as expected, Week 4 (not just E.T., but the Jesy online bullies VT), Week 7 (Don’t Let Go) and the semis were their big performances. The big losers of the series were Janet, Johnny and The Risk, whilst Misha was easily the biggest gainer. Frankie was the standard Wagner/Jedward-style contestant, bumping along and only just tending to avoid elimination.

  • twilsob

    Blah, the HTML coding didn’t work! This should hopefully be a bit cleaner and easier to understand with the averages taken out:

    ACT 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 SEMI FINAL 1 FINAL 2
    LM 104.4 66 137 107.1 107.1 156.6 112 137.6 117 106.04
    Marcus 81.6 123.2 101 144 90.3 86.4 105 96 103.5 93.96
    Amelia 191.8 67.8 119 85.6 79.5
    Misha B 93.6 129.8 51 109.8 56 135 72.5 80.8
    Janet 283.2 189.2 147 162 121.8 88.8 91.5
    Craig 82.8 66 130 90.9 74.2 65.4
    Kitty 70.8 55 129 68.4 58.8
    Frankie 62.4 66 57 78.3
    Johnny 78 188.1 122 74.7
    Risk 130.8 91.3 72 64.8
    Sophie 106.8 63.8 54
    Sami 7.44 61.6
    Nu Vibe 3.12

    Averages:

    LM: 115.08
    Marcus: 102.5
    Amelia: 108.74
    Misha B: 91.06
    Janet: 154.79
    Craig: 84.88
    Kitty: 76.4
    Frankie: 65.93
    Johnny: 115.7
    The Risk: 89.73
    Sophie: 74.87
    Sami: 34.52
    Nu Vibe: 3.12

  • Donald

    Well the steamroller passed the goodship, obviously happy but I must say it is absolutely disgracefull what was done to Jannet.

    This show does not deserve any further public or ITV money really, but as someone said above Janet is lucky, they have stepped to a new low though!

    Thanks to Daniel and Andrew and all on here for making the series interesting and enjoyable, Happy Xmas everyone and good luck for 2012.

    Any betting on The Grammy’s Daniel??

  • EM

    Could one of those social media guru types do a comparison between the Twitter predictions and the actual results? It’d be really interesting to see how they compare.

    Also very interesting how it more often than not wasn’t the act with the fewest votes that went each week but it was always the favourite with the bookies… people know how it works now.

  • Pauline

    Janet’s the true winner here. She didn’t sell her soul. She kept her integrity, took what they dished out to her with courage and dignity. For such a young girl, she handled things admirably and should be proud of herself. She is a very decent girl, from a decent family and should now forward, using the platform the X Factor has provided to go on to better and greater things. Things with bit more depth to them. She is a talented, intelligent, lovely girl, with youth on her side. It’s all there for her. A bright, bright future doing what she chooses to do. Good luck Janet.

  • Highlighted

    Just on the topic of Janet. Week 8 was the one. Despite her poor first performance, despite Amelia purposely being pimped to high heaven, despite Little Mix’s waterworks, despite Gary calling Marcus’ Lately by Stevie wonder the game changer, the voting percentages were oh so close. Janet was actually just 5.5% away from Amelia in first and 2.7% from Marcus suggesting to me that had Janet Escaped that week like she could have won it all still.

    That said like all winning wouldn’t have done her any good and I can’t be too sure as production sucked any chance of floating votes out of her by that point. If she never sang MMMbop and was given a proper song for her guilty pleasure (didn’t she sing Cee-Lo Green on her YouTube?) she possibly would have gone through week 8 aswell.

    That week decided it for Little Mix in hindsight though I’m surprised week 9 they finished so far ahead given the shaky performances. Though I know most Janet fans did vote either LM or Misha and not Amelia.

Leave a Reply

You can use these HTML tags

<a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <s> <strike> <strong>