Alaska49
Well-known member
- Joined
- April 18, 2013
- Posts
- 2,895
what people here don't actually seem to consider is that what happened today is quite probably what EBU wanted to see from today's show, what they want the current JESC voting system to accomplish, and what every channel should be thinking about from now on. EBU has found a way to get kids invested in junior eurovision, which is allowing them to get behind their idol and vote for them massively, even in their own country. poland was simply the first country to really capitalize on it with the double victory and the multitude of fans for roxie and viki, but it's by no means an inherent advantage for poland, nor it is related to any of our old, moldy eurovision arguments such as diasporas.
poland has a successful program that they use to select the JESC artist and the fan hysteria has successfully transited from that to JESC. couple that with two genuinely great and well-staged entries, they won twice. they aren't the only ones able to do that - please remember that the first online voting winner in the new format was actually the netherlands, which once again had a very strong showing this year once they went back to that formula. netherlands is very close to hitting the same gold as poland, they just need to keep those fans around.
also, all those fans (and the show being aired at a time kids will actually watch) mean that actual kids are deciding how the result goes. when JESC was a flop airing on a saturday night, it was basically diehard eurofans like us that decided the vote, but that died basically immediately in 2017 and it's definitely six feet under now. just look at armenia and georgia, who ruled JESC with an iron fist until 2016 and their online vote results are pitiful. they are still picking entries as if things were pre-online voting - colors of your dream in particular would have 100% been top 3 before 2017, and i even thought it would achieve that now, because i am a stupid diehard eurovision fan who just expects things made for ME to do well. but while colors of your dream is aimed at US, this show isn't. after today, i probably won't fall for these same traps next year (except i will probably forget all of this and fall for it again). we as adults may not enjoy the workings of the vote, but this edition of JESC is probably a huge success in the eyes of the EBU, and the kids this show is aimed at are probably fine with it too.
as for my opinions on the entries themselves: viki is a very solid winner; i maybe like superhero as a song more than anyone i want to be but she doesn't have the neverending charisma of roxie, so pre-show i wondered if this wouldn't fall in the always looming "too adult for JESC" trap. however, poland went to work; some very colourful and age-appropriate outfits and a very impressive staging that also transformed the song in another "greta thunberg will lead us to revolution" entry successfully made superhero escape the trap and win the juries over. i am happy with its victory, specially since it was over kazakhstan's "bait the jesc juries do EVERYTHING they love like we are more georgia than georgia BAIT BAIT BAIT" entry which got more online voting than i expected too.
my favourite was other internet fan favourite bim bam toi and i thought carla was a delight and the staging work was flawless; same can be said of melani, who had an incredible song and the best staging work spain has ever delivered in its entire eurovision history, adult or junior. it's probably their best entry ever in the televote era lol? the big news of the day was of course mila moskov showing up and being all "i am doing proud by tamara except everything is better and you will give me an even better placement", which they sure did. she wasn't really on my radar before today, but she got my vote after that performance. what didn't get my vote, sadly, was russia's iconic duet between an actual malena ernman/greta thunberg clone and an mongolian immortal with an 80s albanian crooner voice, which had everything to be my favourite (seriously PROTECT DENBEREL AT ALL COSTS) but the excitement of showing up with earth's two most intriguing humans on stage meant they forgot their kidzbop hatari staging at home. tragic. that performance was so forgettable and the NF one remains the canon one for me.
ukraine's entry was too good for this fucking show and i wasn't even remotely surprised it flopped. europe doesn't deserve that entry, or that whole country in general.
portugal getting anything at all in the televote is so hilarious to me. that was 3 minutes of nothing. they got surprisingly good results for the lack of hype their entries had the last two years, too. portugal low-key cares a whole lot about eurovision and jesc, and they are fronting hard about it, and we love them for it.
poland put on an excellent show and i am glad they want to host again. given the proportions, they did a much, much better job than israel, it's almost laughable. just watch as poland mysteriously starts getting better jury results in adult eurovision because EBU now knows they can actually host just like bulgaria did lol.
poland has a successful program that they use to select the JESC artist and the fan hysteria has successfully transited from that to JESC. couple that with two genuinely great and well-staged entries, they won twice. they aren't the only ones able to do that - please remember that the first online voting winner in the new format was actually the netherlands, which once again had a very strong showing this year once they went back to that formula. netherlands is very close to hitting the same gold as poland, they just need to keep those fans around.
also, all those fans (and the show being aired at a time kids will actually watch) mean that actual kids are deciding how the result goes. when JESC was a flop airing on a saturday night, it was basically diehard eurofans like us that decided the vote, but that died basically immediately in 2017 and it's definitely six feet under now. just look at armenia and georgia, who ruled JESC with an iron fist until 2016 and their online vote results are pitiful. they are still picking entries as if things were pre-online voting - colors of your dream in particular would have 100% been top 3 before 2017, and i even thought it would achieve that now, because i am a stupid diehard eurovision fan who just expects things made for ME to do well. but while colors of your dream is aimed at US, this show isn't. after today, i probably won't fall for these same traps next year (except i will probably forget all of this and fall for it again). we as adults may not enjoy the workings of the vote, but this edition of JESC is probably a huge success in the eyes of the EBU, and the kids this show is aimed at are probably fine with it too.
as for my opinions on the entries themselves: viki is a very solid winner; i maybe like superhero as a song more than anyone i want to be but she doesn't have the neverending charisma of roxie, so pre-show i wondered if this wouldn't fall in the always looming "too adult for JESC" trap. however, poland went to work; some very colourful and age-appropriate outfits and a very impressive staging that also transformed the song in another "greta thunberg will lead us to revolution" entry successfully made superhero escape the trap and win the juries over. i am happy with its victory, specially since it was over kazakhstan's "bait the jesc juries do EVERYTHING they love like we are more georgia than georgia BAIT BAIT BAIT" entry which got more online voting than i expected too.
my favourite was other internet fan favourite bim bam toi and i thought carla was a delight and the staging work was flawless; same can be said of melani, who had an incredible song and the best staging work spain has ever delivered in its entire eurovision history, adult or junior. it's probably their best entry ever in the televote era lol? the big news of the day was of course mila moskov showing up and being all "i am doing proud by tamara except everything is better and you will give me an even better placement", which they sure did. she wasn't really on my radar before today, but she got my vote after that performance. what didn't get my vote, sadly, was russia's iconic duet between an actual malena ernman/greta thunberg clone and an mongolian immortal with an 80s albanian crooner voice, which had everything to be my favourite (seriously PROTECT DENBEREL AT ALL COSTS) but the excitement of showing up with earth's two most intriguing humans on stage meant they forgot their kidzbop hatari staging at home. tragic. that performance was so forgettable and the NF one remains the canon one for me.
ukraine's entry was too good for this fucking show and i wasn't even remotely surprised it flopped. europe doesn't deserve that entry, or that whole country in general.
portugal getting anything at all in the televote is so hilarious to me. that was 3 minutes of nothing. they got surprisingly good results for the lack of hype their entries had the last two years, too. portugal low-key cares a whole lot about eurovision and jesc, and they are fronting hard about it, and we love them for it.
poland put on an excellent show and i am glad they want to host again. given the proportions, they did a much, much better job than israel, it's almost laughable. just watch as poland mysteriously starts getting better jury results in adult eurovision because EBU now knows they can actually host just like bulgaria did lol.
