After 10 weeks, tonight is the big payoff. One of the three final couples is crowned the Season 5 Dancing With The Stars Champions. They didn’t waste any time starting the festivities tonight. After a brief recap of last night’s performances, the first couple was eliminated. Looking at last night’s Leader Board it will be no surprise that Marie & Jonathon were the third place couple:

Overall Judge’s Leader Board
Mel & Maksim: 55
Helio & Julianne: 54
Marie & Jonathon: 46

I wasn’t the only one who questioned whether Marie & Jonathon belonged in the finals. Even Maks did too. Everyone has agreed that Marie always gave a great performance. She and Jonathon were fun to watch there was no doubt about that but, they were never quite in the same league as many of the other stars. For their final performance Marie & Jonathon performed their Paso Doble from week 6 which was definitely one of their best routines.

While Mel & Maks and Helio & Julianne prepared for their final performances of the season, each of the stars who had been eliminated during the season returned to perform one final time. Well most of them did. Wayne Newton wasn’t able to perform tonight because of some health issues. Floyd Mayweather also did not perform because of a sore ankle and prep for his fight on December 7th. Ten weeks is a surprisingly long time. This really hit me when the first couple of stars returned to perform. I had completely forgotten they had been on the show, it had been so long since we had seen Josie Maran or Albert Reed.

Melanie Brown & Maksim Chmerkovsky
Dance: Mambo

Mel & Maks also picked their routine from week 8. This was the Mambo that Len said was hot enough to set off the fire alarms. It was even more brilliant the second time around. The judges had nothing but good things to say, “fantastic”, “magnificent”, “you were born to do this.”
Carrie Ann Inaba: 10
Len Goodman: 10
Bruno Tonioli: 10
Total: 30

Helio Castroneves & Julianne Hough
Dance: Quickstep

Helio & Julianne chose their Quickstep from week 8. Obviously Latin Night was popular with our couples. This performance earned Helio the nickname ‘The Dancing Banana’ from Len. It also earned Helio & Julianne their first perfect score of the season. That was just as much fun to watch the second time around. Again, it was a total love fest with the judges. They loved Helio and they loved their performance.
Carrie Ann Inaba: 10
Len Goodman: 10
Bruno Tonioli: 10
Total: 30

Final Round: Judge’s Leader Board
Mel & Maksim: 30
Helio & Julianne: 30

Essentially the judges scores for tonight were a wash. It was still a nice way to finish the season though with a perfect score.

Overall Judge’s Leader Board
Mel & Maksim: 85
Helio & Julianne: 84

With only a single point dividing the judges scores for the three performances that basically puts it in the hands of the fans. The fans chose:

Helio & Julianne!

Congratulations Helio & Julianne!

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