The The Masked Singer post-final post

[shallowness]

I had guessed Knitting was Claire from Steps in episode 3, specifically when she got into the disco bit of ‘Enough is Enough’. (I hope she decided to take the guesses that she was Elaine Paige as a compliment.) I thought Jellyfish was the best singer from early on – her versions of ‘Alone’ and ‘You Give Love a Bad Name’ were immaculate - and was increasingly persuaded by Jonathan that she was Amber Riley.

Despite all my talk of being for the best singer, I wanted Pigeon to stay in a little longer, as she made eachsong and performance her own. But I thought it was the right last four, and if I’m honest, I would have voted Rhino off in the semis because his performances had got samey, and thus boring. At first, I thought he was Lewis Capaldi, but the judges and clues convinced me it was Charlie from Busted sounding a bit like James Arthur.

There was no guest appearance from Nicola ‘Devastatingly Good Guesser’ Roberts on the final.

First round: Rhino did his (still boring) thing, and I predicted he’d win. Fawn sang a lovely version of ‘Hopelessly Devoted To You’, Jonathan had picked up on 1 Nov being All Saints Day, which I’d picked up immediately. For me, the mention of ‘shore’ and Leonardo di Caprio only confirmed this, only I was sure it wasn’t Shaznay, and having failed to research the band all week, wasn’t sure which of the other three it was. Phoenix stuck to his MO of singing a crooner’s song, foxing the judges with a fake ending, but it was one of his best vocals. I remained flummoxed – for ages I thought he was an actor, and thought it woud be hilarious if he was one of the other Doctor Whos, and not David Tennant. He was definitely a showman.

For the duet: good call on pairing Rhino with Harlequin/Gabrielle, their voices combined nicely and ‘Show Me Your Beautiful’ was an apt song choice. Fawn went for the heartstrings some more with ‘When She Loved Me’ and her pure voice sounded better than Traffic Cone/Aled Jones’s. Phoenix duetted with Fox/Denise Van Outen on
Don’t Go Breaking My Heart’, and it was probaby the weakest duet, although he was back to singing Elton John again.

The audience voted Fawn off, which meant a man would win The Masked Singer UK for the first time. I’m counting getting Natalie Appleton – who flummoxed the judges – because I didn’t know she was Canadian, and most of her other clues were ‘member of All Saints’, but she’s really showcased her voice on this.

Rhino and Phoenix got to sing their favourite song of the series again – I think they both went for their first songs, so we got to hear Rhino’s falsetto, and both were clearly more relaxed and confident. The swing version of ‘Get Lucky’ is probably the most creative version of a song they’ve done this series, and if I’d been there I’d have voted for Phoenix, but I wasn’t, and, predictably, he was voted off, but shockingly turned out to be Ricky Wilson. In hindsight, some of the clues were guessable, but I’m no Rita Ora who worked with him, and so have less cause to be embarrassed. He admitted to having been properly possessed by the character – hats off to him.

And then the final reveal, and lo, it was the gigantic Charlie Stimpson (which means Davina was the best judge this series?) I’m inclined to believe Joel did guess him from the off because he was such a fanboy after the reveal. The man can sing, obviously, but…eh.

Anyway, if I’m being generous, I guessed five out of the twelve correctly before they were unmasked.