‘The X Factor’ UK: Gary Barlow on format changes, ‘flash voting’ during live shows

Saturday marks the beginning of the “X Factor” UK live voting shows, which to us mostly means one thing: A chance for people to freak out more than ever while watching the performance shows. Basically, the format here is simple: The contestants will all perform, but at the end of the night, the contestant with the lowest vote total will be a part of the bottom two the next day with another artist.

The purpose of this seems to be to get more people watching live to see the contestants perform on Saturdays, but we also hate it for one reason: It totally eliminates the drama over who was the person with the lowest votes, which has always been one of the best parts of the previous system. That kept there from being any bias when the judges were voting and that was something we feel was an important part of the show.

One other person who doesn’t like it? Mentor Gary Barlow, who told Metro that he’s not altogether fond of something that is going to make his job so much more stressful:

“I always enjoyed Saturday nights because there were no decisions … I guess the idea is to make it worth watching because I know a lot of [people] record it and watch an hour later or the next day. I definitely think it will give people a reason to tune in now. It’s definitely going to add to the drama on a Saturday night.”

As for who is going to be favored going into the shows this weekend, we’re going to have some more on that soon courtesy of our contestant rankings, so be sure to check back for more on that.

For now, we advise you to click here. Why? That’s where you can see all of the “makeover” photos for the contestants on the live shows this season.

Photo: ITV