Yahoo Lifestyle 
Dancing With The Stars fans call out 'unfair' detail in 2024 grand finale: 'Strange'
EXCLUSIVE: Samantha Jade has shared her honest thoughts on Helen Richey's controversial judging style.
Dancing With The Stars Australia came to a show-stopping end on Monday night with Lisa McCune, Samantha Jade and Ant Middleton battling it out for the coveted Mirror Ball Trophy. Each of the three finalists had to perform a freestyle dance followed by a reprise of their favourite dance from earlier in the season, with the judges’ scores combined with the audience vote to determine the winner.
After giving it her all on the dance floor, Lisa McCune was announced as this year’s winner and took home the coveted Mirror Ball Trophy. The four-time Gold Logie was also awarded $20,000 for her chosen charities, the RCD Foundation and the Harrison Reidel Foundation.
While Lisa was consistently one of the best performers in the competition and received enormous praise following her win, several fans have complained about an “unfair” detail in the finale surrounding runner-up Samantha Jade - who has since spoken to Yahoo Lifestyle about the incident.
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Not only was the pop star given the task of opening up the show with her Burlesque-inspired freestyle number, but she was also the first performer in round two. Because of this position - which she had no control over - judge Helen Richey scored her a nine out of ten even though she gave an incredible performance.
“This is the grand final, and we really do have to be tough,” she explained. “I think I gave you the maximum score the last time, but because you’re the first one out I have to give myself space to either be able to put someone above you or below you.
“So please don’t be offended by that because it doesn’t mean that I don’t think you’ve done a great job.”
'Very strange and unfair'
Samantha ended up receiving a total score of 38 from the judges for round two, which put her in the second spot on the leaderboard below Lisa who had received 39 points. Viewers subsequently took to social media to question why Samantha was “disadvantaged” by being the first contestant to perform.
“In fairness to Sam and Gustavo, the order for this round should've been fixed up so that they weren't out 1st again. And if they deserved a 10 they should've been given a 10,” one person commented.
“Exactly! That wasn’t fair what Helen said. If they deserved a 10 they should have been given a 10. Never has that been mentioned before about the scoring,” someone else shared.
“Samantha [was the] best from start to finish, unfair to mark her on being first, such a stupid comment from a ‘head’ judge,” a different user replied, followed by another who added, “So glad Lisa won but a very odd comment from Helen about her way of scoring Sam. Very strange and unfair. Judge by the performance, SIMPLE!”.
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Following the episode, Samantha admits to Yahoo Lifestyle that she didn’t give much thought to Helen’s comment until she watched it back on Monday night.
“I guess like, if you go first, it's not your choice. We get told who goes first,” she shares. “If you go first it’s always a little tough because you do have to set the benchmark. But you know what, it is what it is. It’s written, it happened, and all I can say is I gave it my all, and all I can do is know that.
“I would’ve hated to have sat back and been like, I could’ve tried harder or I couldn’t done that better. I left it all out there on the dance floor, and Gustavo as well, we gave it our all.
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