[Z]

I'm not surprised Craig went out this weekend, though it is a shame on him that he went at this stage. In any other year, (and please forgive me for being so blunt, I'm only doing so in terms of what the X Factor presents) the fat boy with the good voice would be perceived as a novelty act of sorts and he'd make it mid way (or, well, about as far as he actually did) without being considered a favourite. He's picking up 'cute' votes that would otherwise go to a Lloyd Daniels type of contestant. Frankie sort of had that fan base covered, but he's actually not very good looking so I guess a lot of that got siphoned off onto Craig. Marcus, though not bad looking, doesn't really fit the role of the cute, boyish one either, and he's actually a very good singer. Usually you have the teenage male eye candy contestant who makes it quite far, but not this year, which is why I think Craig managed to go as far as he did. Although it was his first time in the bottom two and nobody knows what his support was like, it would have been a stretch of the imagination to call him a favourite to win at any point.

Amelia's been shot in the foot by the X Factor. It's not her fault that Kelly Rowland put her out, it's not her fault that Frankie took cocaine, it's not her fault that she was contractually obliged to reappear on the X Factor (I assume she was obliged to anyway?!) and be put up for the public vote to return, and it's not her fault that she's starting out again way behind all of the other contestants. Gary accused her of shouting - while I think he was just fighting dirty, it does raise a good point that Amelia's had way less time to acclimatise to performing live, week in, week out. She's facing the naysayers who think it's unfair she's even in the competition, which is not her fault. If the judges had put her out, it would have been yet another blow to the poor girl, again through no fault of her own, and it would have made the show look ridiculous for putting her back in, just to put her back out again. If she stayed (which she did), it's unfair on whoever goes out (Craig) and she's likely to receive some of the backlash by association. She can literally do nothing right, because of the producers, and considering how good a singer she is, that's just not right at all. If she reaches the final, she and the show look like a joke - if she goes out, it's a waste of everybody's time.

Janet was bigged up as the early favourite and I think the judges have been doing their absolute best to undermine her. Kelly Rowland is doing her best at a sabotage job, doing exactly what Cheryl did to Rebecca Ferguson last year, she can't see the wood for the trees and is entirely neglecting her only realistic hope of winning the show. Janet's been mistreated throughout the competition and she'll be lucky to salvage the victory through all of this mishandling. I kind of hope she doesn't win it though, I think she'd only continue to be abused through SyCo and it would leave her highly depressed, she seems like a very introverted person and I don't think she could handle it at all well.

Misha's bad attitude is not appealing to the public and, while I do think Kelly's faith in her is justifiable, I don't think there's much point in trying to big her up any more. Ideally, Amelia will finish in 5th place and Misha will crash out in 4th - high enough up to give her a launch pad onto a further career - Cher Lloyd's managing it so far. Misha is very talented and the effort she's put into her performances so far show that she could feasibly be a pop star. Plenty of pop stars are assholes, but most of them mask it when they're in the public eye. Misha doesn't have the luxury of being able to let her mask slip while she's on the X Factor, and unfortunately for her, she didn't even try to hide her bad traits to begin with, and so by the time it got criticised on the live shows, it was far too late for her to turn it around. I noticed it straight away on live show 1, and I think it was show 2 that Tulisa called her out on it, and I really do think that the judges can sway public perception a ridiculous amount. It'd be a farce if Kelly cheated Misha into the final, so my sincere hope is that they don't do a Cher/Mary situation again this year. I hate the idea of Marcus, Little Mix or Janet missing out because of Kelly Rowland's weird obsession with Misha.

Marcus is, IMO, taking the Alexandra Burke route through the votes. He probably started out mid-table and, as the weeks went by, consistently put in good performances and so consistently did well in the votes. He was probably around 7th in week 1 and is probably hitting 2nd/3rd most weeks now. If he finally pulls an incredible, performance of the night performance out of the bag - his timing will be impeccable and he might go on to steal the win. He's being downplayed as the dark horse and rightly so - he's inoffensive but consistently good. I just worry that that has Joe McElderry stamped all over it. But, then again, Marcus is evidently a good dancer and has been putting on fairly impressive performances, he's not been standing there giving an impeccable vocal and not much else every week.

Little Mix are constantly worrying me. Just because of the track record of groups on the X Factor, I'm convinced they'll dip into the bottom two and be kicked out by Kelly Rowland/the show's fix for Misha, but they've reached the top 5 without hitting the bottom two once and I think it would be an absolute outrage if they went out now. I've long said that Simon Cowell wants to launch a girl group off the back of the X Factor. The way he kept pushing Hope down our throats several years ago says as much, to me. Little Mix's success, IMO, can be attributed to the fact that girls don't see them as threatening (not coming out dressed like hookers, having a slightly bigger one who's been getting mean comments in the press and the others consoling her and telling her she's pretty too blah blah - they're not bitches, basically, and are being portrayed as a tight unit), the fact they've gotten their act together pretty quickly while plenty of other acts in the competition have spent weeks trying to get it right (Janet, Craig, Kitty...) and the fact that nobody else has been shining week in, week out. The playing field is pretty much level (Janet misfiring, Marcus being good but not great, Craig being boring, Misha being undermined by being perceived as a bitch, Amelia having the controversy of returning surrounding her) and so Little Mix are perhaps the first group since JLS to have a real shot at winning this whole thing. I really, really hope they go on and do it, they would benefit the most from winning the X Factor!