Intro Post

< 2022 Semifinals | 2022 Final | 2023 Semifinals >

I woke up early to finish this post because it’s nice to get this out of the way before my work day starts. After this post, I only have four left till I finish this project! Thanks to all my commenters for sticking around all this time. And don’t worry, I have a few bonus posts in mind once I finish 2024.

Introduction

Because the winner last time was a Big Five country, the grand final of Eurovision 2022 featured 25 countries instead of the usual 26. These countries all competed for the prize in Turin, Italy, and due to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, many fans saw it as a foregone conclusion that Ukraine would win, and that’s indeed what happened. They overwhelmingly won the televote with the second native-language winner in a row. The jury winner was the United Kingdom who got, after so many years of terrible results, a jaw-dropping second place. Their best ever result since 1998! Spain achieved a just as amazing third place, their best ever result since 1995, meaning that two Big Five countries had their redemption arcs this year. In fact, I was originally going to call this post “The British Redemption Arc” before I chose a title reflective of the other songs this year.

After a bunch of opening acts I don’t care much about, we finally have a flag parade as it should be: all the contestants walk on the stage waving their flags! I love seeing each of them carry their flags in a different way with a different style: some go big, some go modest, some mix in rainbow or transgender flags. I also love seeing the United Kingdom, for once, getting some of the biggest cheers in the crowd. I’m still not a big fan of these hosts, but I do love Laura Pausini’s sparkly blue suit. Maybe I just have a thing for sparkly clothes, and I never unlocked this taste till I watched Eurovision?

The postcards feature a drone robot named Leo (introduced in the opening film of semifinal 1) showing the viewers a tour of Italy, with images of the contestants projected onto the buildings. I’m not a big fan of these postcards because they show too much of Italy (lovely country though; it’s a tourist destination for good reason) and not enough of the contestants. One of many ways the production doesn’t live up to 2021.

I watched the grand final with British commentary, done by Eurovision veteran Graham Norton. I find that the more years someone has commentated Eurovision, the more entertaining their commentary gets.