Dorothy semi final

A very amateur start to the show, bland song and I was regretting the loss of the cheery and talented Jenny and loopy Jessica last week, those remaining being excellent musicians but, with the possible exception of Sophie, lacking that instant appeal I would have thought the role would need. Steph seems to oscillate between very appealing, surprised to be there still and a little overbearing, trying too hard. Danielle is fabulous and hopefully her performances later will make up for the sad start. Lauren, well, Lauren can sing so well but do we want to watch her, or will make-up and stylists help?

Sophie 8
Easy on the eye, some star quality and nice voice but the 'who I yam' bits jarred and I'm sure some notes were different to what the orchestra were playing. She made up for that with the tremendous performance in the duet.

Steph 7½
Much better choice of song which everyone could hum along too and maybe not notice the poor diction and off notes at the end of lines.She seemed to be determined to smile throughout the whole song which didn't look too good close up. Nice job in the duet but Sophie had the edge on her, vocally as well as acting-wise this time.

Lauren 10/10 for the vocal but 7 for this role
As ever, brilliant voice and control, no faults but rather over acted, unnecessarily so. It's the square mouth that does it, reminding me of Cherie Blair. Excellent in the duet but, again, beaten by Danielle.

Danielle 15
Showing the others just how to present a song without trying, just naturally. She has been so consistent and is head and shoulders over the others but still not absolutely sure she is Dorothy. Sophie and Steph have the 'character' edge at the moment. Danielle possibly combines everything best, though, with a spotless vocal.

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More embarrassing group performances to kick off the results show, including a totally wrong Umbrella which no one seemed happy with apart from the male dancers at one point. Individually, these girls are pretty good (although matching a later wonderful few minutes from a current leading lady, Sierra, would be challenging) but together they don't blend well at all.

Then we get some silly stuff about choosing a dog which would be better at children's tv time. Enough said about that.

Lauren was saved by Lord Andrew and probably rightly as she did the last song extremely professionally. I had half expected Steph to be saved as Lauren might well suit a different type of show than Dorothy which Steph could have handled. However, seeing Danielle and Sophie sail through to the final was encouraging and, to my mind, they're the two best suited with Danielle my choice by quite a margin at the moment.