The X Factor live shows Week Five – as it happened

21.40

And that's the end of the Gender War, and tonight's shorter episode. For me, the pick is 5 After Midnight, while Saaro Alto is in trouble. But don't pay any attention to me, I've been wrong 100% of the time. Let's bung up the last of the performances and call it a night.

21.36

21.31

"Every great group, they can't be puppets."

Simon has a puppet fixation tonight.

21.28

Well, time to eat humble pie. That is a tight harmony from 5 After Midnight. Nicely done.

21.27

5 After Midnight pull an all nighter to find the right song, and end up on...Say You'll Be There by the Spice Girls.

Eureka.

21.20

Nicole says 'You don't know you're beautiful/that's what makes you beautiful' is a beautiful message for Emily's mother and all the women out there. It's not. It's like a logic trap for self-loathing robots.

21.18

21.15

Middlemas singing 'That's What Makes You Beautiful' slowly, because that's how emotions work.

21.13

The way Emily Middlemas says 'judj-gees' makes me intensely nostalgic for home, so I officially award her All of the Points.™

21.12

21.10

20.31

20.25

Goddamn the X Factor social media team are impressive. Here's Matt Terry's opening performance.

20:24

REVIEW: both singers thus far were yeah.

20.22

20.15

20.07

Matt Terry up first with a Wham classic. Let's just leave the jokes, because none of them can be printed in Radio Times.

20.07

Nicole Scherzingers insta comments are just full of snakes and gift emojis lmaooo #XFactor #Gifty pic.twitter.com/7X0habuTND

— Jacobㅤ (@jacobedwardsz) October 30, 2016

Some on Twitter seemed personally disappointed in the judges, deeming Gifty’s surprise send off a betrayal.

Gifty’s nonplussed reaction to being sent off became an instant meme, and while some fans took things too far, it seems the reptilian-responses might have been inspired by Gifty herself.

She had previously expressed her hatred for the venomous creatures (snakes, not judges) on Twitter.

The X Factor continues Saturday 8pm on ITV1

7.20

So as an experiment and because I’m bored on a Saturday, let’s see how easy it is to write an article out of literally nothing. I have no idea what it’s going to be yet, but I bet you £100 I’ll have it written and published here in 10 minutes. Start the clock.

7.18

7.17

As a new viewer and live blogger, this ecosystem is what’s fascinated me the most – the shows themselves are pretty entertaining, but X Factor is all about the extra material. It’s hard to believe it has been running for so many years, because it seems custom designed for the age of Twitter.

7.15

Moving on to this week’s Backstage Nonsense Roundup.™

Simon’s slip of the tongue led some to claim the fix was in. Because journalism is dead, these tweets were immediately turned into clickbait articles on other sites. (I won’t link to them because I am a coward and want to keep working in this terrible industry.)

Nevertheless, this makes a good point about why X Factor is so perfect for modern media. (Hi Google!) Speaking as a hack journalist myself, it’s a useful mix of story-able elements: famous judges with big personalities, pathos (sob stories) and bathos (Honey G) and a mass audience reacting in real time on Twitter.

The show’s military-grade press team release a regular stream of information throughout the week (who’s singing what, who’s duetting with whom) and, like professional wrestling, the show creates its own storylines (Ryan and Emily). There’s also a ton of embeddable content (press pack photos, memes, YouTube clips, gifs and the like) that helps fill out an article and means I don’t have to do any research or write any words. It’s the perfect story!

7.10

Before I forget, this week’s theme is Boys vs Girls, inspired by the imminent US election. (Not really.)

Here’s what they’re singing this week.

Boys

Matt Terry: Wham! - I’m Your Man

Ryan Lawrie - The Beatles - Twist & Shout

Girls

Emily Middlemas: One Direction - What Makes You Beautiful

Sam Lavery: Girls Aloud - I’ll Stand By You

Overs

Honey G: Kris Kross – Jump

Saara Aalto: Girls Aloud - Sound of The Underground

Groups

5 After Midnight: Spice Girls - Say You'll Be There

Four of Diamonds: Wilson Phillips - Hold On

7.05

Gifty looked angry enough to became a meme. Which is just as good as winning the competition, right?

Oh no, wait, it isn’t, because social media is a dehumanisation factory, where we boil strangers down to screengrabs, stamp them with a hashtag then move on.

7.02

Last week Gifty was sent home, which displeased Gifty.

And Simon said the wrong thing.

7.00

Hello, I’m Jonathan Holmes, and welcome to my fifth week of X Factor Live Blogging, and fifth week of watching X Factor in my entire life. So far it’s been a voyage of discovery, but quite a painful, migraine filled one, like those guys who stumble on The Nameless City in H.P. Lovecraft. Other people order Dominos for X Factor, I stock up on Neurofen.