2021 Finlandia Trophy: Women's Free Skate

[Skatesocs]

Offensive to who?

Stereotypical, and therefore an offensive parody.

I would have no problem if she'd gone out of her way to learn to actually belly dance and put that in her skating. But mind you belly dance isn't supposed to be all sexy in the first place.

 

[yume]

I love armography though, surely I'm not the only one? Although I often feel that way.

To me there's nothing worse than a skater that doesn't consider their arms. I know Dick Button hated armography with a passion, but in his day skaters had airplane arms and looked as stiff as boards.

Not sure what people's excuses these days are.

Also Liza is an adult, it's one thing when Alina Z did that tiger suit exhibition at 15 which was one of the most uncomfortable things I've ever seen, I was cringing from second hand embarrassment, but if a nearly 25 year old wants to show her belly button I don't think that should be declared offensive and a crime.

ETA: To me armography doesn't just mean Egyptian hands or whatever. She's a junior but look how Sofia Murareva uses her arms in her programs. It's beautiful.

The armography looks better when your skates do the job too.
Satoko Miyahara is a skater with pronounced armography. But she rarely needs to pose or skate in straight line to do it.

Many Eteri's student at a point got a cringey EX. Zagitova with tiger, Medvedeva with Madonna, Tsurskaya and Trusova with those EX whom i forgot the name. The only one who escaped is Shcherbakova. Seems that this pattern changed, thankfully.

You an be 25 and wearing something inappropriate for some people. Age doesn't change the outfit.

 

[anonymoose_au]

You an be 25 and wearing something inappropriate for some people. Age don't change the outfit.

But is it inappropriate? And if so why? Is it because (general) you has a fixed idea of what a "proper" woman should wear? Are (general) you as offended by Yuzu's "Let Me Entertain You" leather extravaganza or Guillaume Cizeron's deep V-necks?

If so that's fine, because you're consistent, but if not, (general) you might need to consider whether you're being sexist.

 

[Skatesocs]

You an be 25 and wearing something inappropriate for some people. Age doesn't change the outfit.

Eh, I don't see comments about her outfit on here. As long as it's fine with the rules, it will be fine. People love that Chock Snake dance, so it's not about sexuality either. If people are reacting to it a certain way, then it must be something else, or we are focusing on singular comments which don't make an entire narrative. Personally I'd point to the parody she's doing, and her lacking skating quality.

 

[Skater Boy]

God I love Karen’s program so much. It suits her beautifully.

She always takes these moments to feel her music.

It was gorgeous, what are rotations I don’t know them! I only know Karen Chen goddess of spirals and layback spins!

Karen maybe the best complete skater if she did not underrotate her jumps. She is most like Michelle Kwan, Lu Chen, Jill Trenary, Caryn Kadavy,, Kristi Yamaguchi - pretty, feminine skating.

 

[solani]

Uuh ... let's face it. People who are offened by Tuktamysheva's fashion choices just don't like her body type.
Thin men in a suit get away with the crudest jokes. Thin women are allowed to wear the most revealing clothes.

Tuktamysheva is doing exactly what she likes and needs to do. She knows that she has to be seen in order to stay relevant. How many times has she participated in the Finlandia trophy? 7 times? That's her crowd.
And that crowd's reaction is something that the Russian Fed will not be able to ignore completely.

I admire her an her coach, that they don't focus in her weight, but on her technique and power. And she's improved many aspects oh her skating in the last couple of months. Her spins are much improved and she's clearly watched Kostner in training and copied some moves.

In all honestly, I find this Bolero program offensive. I think of the great Bolero programs and this is just a meh overloaded mess. This ist not the Olympic winning program. My bet is on Trusova. That program is at least genuine and a real effort from an artistic point of view.

 

[yume]

But is it inappropriate? And if so why? Is it because (general) you has a fixed idea of what a "proper" woman should wear? Are (general) you as offended by Yuzu's "Let Me Entertain You" leather extravaganza or Guillaume Cizeron's deep V-necks?

If so that's fine, because you're consistent, but if not, (general) you might need to consider whether you're being sexist.

You like calling names don't you? And searching where there is not.

I was explaining a general point of view that can exist, not even directly in relation with Liza. And i didn't say i had an issue with her outfit, i said that some people can have, because of their taste.

Litteraly i wasn't even the one who questioned her program in first, i just replied. But you likes making things personal. I better hold my mouth, or rather my fingers, next time.

 

[Skatesocs]

Some can't, honey

 

[eppen]

Her jumps aren't the strength, it's the unexpected choreo and interpretation (and performance, and some transitions when she does them). Like that expression at the end you mention. Some of the LP sags due to the jump set ups and jump quality itself, but it's okay, she more than makes up for it, for me.

The thing would be to find a good balance between the two. The move from the bits when she is interpreting to the jump set-ups happens pretty abruptly, like she is in character 100% in one second and then 0% the next. I think the set-ups could be masked and blended better into the whole to make it really a complete performance. But I still love her to bits.

E

 

[anonymoose_au]

You like calling names don't you? And searching where there is not.

I was explaining a general point of view that can exist, not even directly in relation with Liza. And i didn't say i had an issue with her outfit, i said that some people can have, because of their taste.

Litteraly i wasn't even the one who questioned her program in first, i just replied. But you likes making things personal. I better hold my mouth, or rather my fingers, next time.

Maybe take your own advice next time. I CLEARLY stated that it was a (general) you.

But thanks for the patronising gif, much appreciated.

And don't bother holding back your fingers. I will since I'm so obviously wrong.

 

[LadyB]

LadyB—you are starting to sound like 4everchan

I take that as a compliment! @4everchan

 

[yume]

Maybe take your own advice next time. I CLEARLY stated that it was a (general) you.

But thanks for the patronising gif, much appreciated.

And don't bother holding back you fingers. I will since I'm so obviously wrong.

Yes you are.

If you hadn't let your emotions take over you, you would have seen that @Skatesocs said that Liza's program was offensive. And pardon my simple brain, i thought he/she was talking about her outfits or her suggestives moves. I didn't know that predictable moves could be offensive, like he/she explained later.
The sociologist in me jumped out and a bit too high, then i explained why it wasn't offensive and even normal with age to do that kind of program. I explained too why some can find a revealing outfit inappropriate, no matter the age. That's all. And i won't make the parallel with men and start talking about some men's redefiition of deep V because with you it will end on another road.

 

[viennaskater]

Where on earth should she get more points??

Her PCS are HIGH here. And as for technical ability how can you say that positively for Liza and negatively for Kamila? Bit of a double standard...

As for the skinny comment...I don't even feel like justifying that with comment. What on earth does anyone's body have to do with anything??

Because it is a women's event and she does not look like a woman. And I don't believe in forcing young girls to do loads of quads just to rack up points. For me, something characterful and artistic is missing from the performance.

 

[solani]

As mentioned previously I don't like the way Kamila skates, but she does so I'm not going to demand she skate to AC/DC and wear a unitard because I think that would be awesome.

Nice idea. Kamila skating to AC/DC in a unitard would be an improvement imo.

I must say, I start to hate those long skirts. They are meh and boring. Zagitova at least wore those tutus. There's no need to make those girls look older than they are. Lipnitskaya was also presented age appropriate. Now everyone gets or wants this same boring washover by Team T. Except Trusova. That can only tell us, that Eteri thinks that Trusova will be the next Olympic Champ.

 

[eppen]

Interesting to read the discussion on Tuk and how her free can be perceived. First of all, the theme is a fairly traditional oriental/Arabic/Egyptian thingy that has been done in skating for decades in different variations - Loena Hendrickx had one just before Tuk. Both have the usual choreo cliches in the armography, but Tuk adds body movement which gives a more sensuous feel for her performance. She did a similar theme back in 2014-5 when she was about 19. In a way, I think this choreo is a natural development that shows she has become an adult and is probably comfortable with expressing sexuality. There was nothing awkward or weird about it in the end, I think I have seen worse attempts at "sexy" over the years.

We don't get a lot of "sexy" choreo in figure skating, maybe already because many of them are very, very young. Most women particularly are still teenagers at the top of their careers and 20-somethings are in general a rarity. It would probably be rather awkward to see them perform overtly sexualized choreography (and even in pairs and ice dance where many are clearly adults, it is not that common). Every now and then we get the older skaters who might venture into that area and be comfortable doing it.

Carolina Kostner's Bolero from 2013-4 has been mentioned and she was whopping 27 years old at that time. The choreo was inspired by Maurice Bejart's ballet choreography which made it part of a rite with erotic tension between male and female dancers (this I found in descriptions of the choreo - check the links in this Finnish blog on it for what the dance looks like). Caro really gets it down perfectly IMO and manages to be easily sensuous without being tackily sexy. The fact that it was combined with Ave Maria as the SP was an inspired choice, because she looks like a saint in that one...

Another skater doing sexy easily is Katarina Witt, back in the distant 80s. She was in her early 20s for her greatest years 1984 to 1988. The Carmen she does in 1988 is definitely one of the most overtly sexual ones ever, but again, I think she gets away with it and it feels natural and easy.

I tried to think of men, but without much luck apart from my obvious choice, Javier Fernández. He first ventured into this with Black Betty in 2014-5 and he was 23 at the time. I guess they were aiming at swagger, sort of a bad boy feel. It did work ok with a bit of cuteness still in his movement, but David Wilson has said they (Jeffrey Buttle collaborated) were not sure if he could get it right, but it worked in the end. When he does it now in shows, there is a whole lot more overt sexyness put into it. Two years later, the Fever section in Elvis was a natural continuation of that and Javi is just completely at ease with it. However, the choreos do not repeat cliched sexy movement which is great.

Returning to Tuk, the theme as possibly culturally offensive/inappropriate is perhaps an even more difficult question. Lots of popular themes are fairly questionable either culturally or because of the storyline. I don't really know how these could be done in an accetable way in skating which operates very much with stereotypes and cliched imagery and characters.

E

 

[Skatesocs]

Returning to Tuk, the theme as possibly culturally offensive/inappropriate is perhaps an even more difficult question. Lots of popular themes are fairly questionable either culturally or because of the storyline. I don't really know how these could be done in an accetable way in skating which operates very much with stereotypes and cliched imagery and characters.

My problem isn't necessarily the cliche arm movements and choreography. It's that these body movements are reduced to the stereotype of exaggerated sexuality that they often are in popular (western) culture. So it's more that Tuktamysheva's team seems to have thought "Tukt is sexy and an adult! Let's make her do Egyptian arms and body rolls to emphasise that!". There have been better "Middle Eastern" themed programs that avoided that, while still keeping the stereotypical moves, like Kwan's Salome, and Grishuk/Platov's Feeling Begins. Kwan's Feeling Begins didn't even have such stereotypical moves These are all "sexual" programs too that didn't fall into that cliche (Kwan's Salome means there was Dance of the Seven Veils in it, and I'm frankly happy they didn't make her do anything like that, she was 15!). I think you'll be able to get what I'm trying to write here, but I'm not sure I made it clear. Tukt = sexy so do egyptian arms. The rest = middle eastern theme/concept that happened to portray some sexuality even if it contained some egyptian arms.

And why not pick something like Shcheherazade and do that genuinely sexual dance instead? It's athletically more challenging, too. This is half baked, and barely takes any effort.

It was similar in that "Japanese" LP. Whatever stereotype exists, use it to portray her as "sexy". Actually, I'm even more offended that this barely had any choreography. How was she supposed to be sexy, labouring across the ice, barely doing anything else? Was it just the kanji for "love" she'd put on her costume, lol? Apparently, it was choreographed by someone from Mariinsky. Well, OK.

If you put the time to learn your material, then no problem. If Tuktamysheva had learned to actually belly dance, then fine. But she didn't. And if she had, she'd have known it's not supposed to be some sexy dance anyway.

 

[eppen]

If you put the time to learn your material, then no problem. If Tuktamysheva had learned to actually belly dance, then fine. But she didn't. And if she had, she'd have known it's not supposed to be some sexy dance anyway.

I think I get your point but I have a question - is this related to how you feel about Tuk in general? Would you think it not good if someone else took the same route? I think she can use sexy as her selling point and as something that sets her apart from the 15- to 17-year-olds. She also seems perfectly ok with it, she does not seem uncomfortable doing it. Though that might be a risk in front of the judges who might also not like the choice. This program is combined to a very different SP which was just great showing that she is able to pull off that kind of melancholy longing and it managed to avoid her mannerisms. Tuk has in my opinion a very limited repertoire of performance skills, so she has to use what she has, and if it is sex, then be it. Most skaters are in general strictly one trick ponies in what they can do performance-wise, there are not that many Josefin Taljegårds out there...

The non-sexy "Middle-Eastern" programs are still based on the same stereotypical movement, so it does not really matter IMO if you add the sexy aspect to it. The common base is enough to make them all equally suspicious.

E

 

[Skatesocs]

I think I get your point but I have a question - is this related to how you feel about Tuk in general? Would you think it not good if someone else took the same route? I think she can use sexy as her selling point and as something that sets her apart from the 15- to 17-year-olds.

I think I didn't separate them well enough. So here it is - Tuktamysheva wants to do middle eastern and be sexy to separate herself from 15 year olds? Do a fully baked choreography, like in Shcheherezade; it's harder and actual choreography instead of what she's doing. Tuktamysheva just wants to be sexy? Don't use this stereotypical nonsense; goes for everyone, not just her (her tangos hilariously tend to have little in terms of sex appeal and passion usually). Tuktamysheva wants to do middle eastern? Still wish she would do actual choreography and that goes for everyone; but somewhat more acceptable for me since it's not the full assault of offensive stereotypes, for small mercies.

Agree that she's a one trick pony with little in terms of repertoire. She's being scored as if she's one of the best skaters ever in terms of PCS, which is a joke. Sex appeal is fine in order to gain that advantage is fine. But what she's doing takes little effort, is plain bad - yet not scored as such, and the judges seem to think it's "maturity". At least try to learn and do something better than this, but this is all she's been doing for multiple seasons (while giving interviews about "improvements"). Makes a farce of the effort that others are putting in.

The non-sexy "Middle-Eastern" programs are still based on the same stereotypical movement, so it does not really matter IMO if you add the sexy aspect to it. The common base is enough to make them all equally suspicious.

Non-sexy still gotta go. Still based on stunted thinking and lack of research. As said, do your research, learn the actual moves. But at least not going for the fully fledged offense.

 

[Paulipau]

Agree that she's a one trick pony with little in terms of repertoire. She's being scored as if she's one of the best skaters ever in terms of PCS, which is a joke. Sex appeal is fine in order to gain that advantage is fine. But what she's doing takes little effort, is plain bad - yet not scored as such, and the judges seem to think it's "maturity". At least try to learn and do something better than this, but this is all she's been doing for multiple seasons (while giving interviews about "improvements"). Makes a farce of the effort that others are putting in.

Ow, I'm afraid that you are dangerously close to sounding like a hater.
As @eppen wrote most of the skaters are one trick ponies, they all have their style that works (more or less) and just keep going at it throughout all their careers. Maybe it takes little effort and maybe it does not? As a woman I think that it takes a lot of self-confidence and courage to perform like that, not even mentioning being okay with all these people talking sh*t about you.

Whether is is bad or not is a individual matter, in my opinion it is not.

She got the best PCS first (and probably last) time in her life, I think we all agree that the panel on this competition was quite bad.
These days fed support and reputation plays a big role in PCS, Liza is from Russia and she is a reigning World's number 2. She skated cleanly and other medalist did not, this helped her as well.
Should it be like that? No
Should we be blaming Liza for that? No

And lastly, Liza has made huge improvements, she has been upping her tech for few seasons now, her spins got visibly better this season.
if you can't see that then you are being ignorant.

Not everyone can be Kostornaia, recently even Kostornaia has problems with being her old self, so maybe we cut Liza some slack?

 

[eppen]

Paulipau's point about it taking extra courage for a woman to present yourself as Tuk does, is a good one, especially in this context where it is not common at all. It might have worked with this panel and with the next one maybe not so good.

I find it funny that I have always really disliked Tuk and here I am defending her in this instance She is at best adequate in many things, with all the problems Skatesocs mentioned, but she really did good for herself in this competition. I maybe disagree strongly with the high scores in SS and TR, but she was up there with the others in the other categories especially in the SP, but also in the FS. Valieva was technically good, but even blind judges could see that she had no sense of the music esp. in the FS. Kostornaia sleepwalked through utterly nondescript programs, she really did not deserve much higher than what she got (and this really breaks my heart coz I love her). And so on. Plus I think there is a lot of positive opinions about her just because she has survived and is hanging on at her age. All this works in her favour.

It will take a long time before the popular themes based on horrible old stereotypes have been eradicated from skating. They are rooted very deeply into the traditions of this sport. And because of that they are still easy choices and get done with varying success even these days. The current fads for selecting music (pop songs, modern classical, minimalist movie soundtracks) have been doing some good, but I do think they will keep popping up every now and then. Someone does a good take on an old theme and everyone wants to imitate them the next season and so it goes.

E