Britain's Got Talent series 6

The sixth series of British talent competition programme Britain's Got Talent was broadcast on ITV, from 24 March to 12 May 2012. The sixth series saw Simon Cowell resume a full commitment to the programme following the previous series, yet neither David Hasselhoff and Michael McIntyre returned to take part in the new series, leading to them being replaced by Alesha Dixon and David Walliams. Because of her pregnancy during filming of the auditions, Amanda Holden was required to miss a number of sessions, leading to producers asking Carmen Electra to step in as a guest judge in her place.
The sixth series of the programme saw a full commitment of incorporating a panel of four judges throughout every stage of the competition. The prize money offered by Britain's Got Talent was increased to £500,000 for this series only, the highest amount offered in the programme's history. In addition, the format of the programme saw a number of changes, including nine semi-finalists in each semi-final, the establishment of a Wildcard format similar to that used in America's Got Talent - in which the judges could appoint a single place in the final to any eliminated semi-finalist they favoured the most - and the incorporation of a mobile voting app, which functioned differently to the system used on The X Factor.
The sixth series was won by dancing dog act Ashleigh and Pudsey, with opera duo Jonathan and Charlotte finishing in second place and choir Only Boys Aloud third. Many of the semi-finalists that took part in the competition were considered some of the best in the programme's history by 2012. During its broadcast, the series averaged around 10.6 million viewers. The programme faced controversy concerning two auditions and a mishap with the new voting system, of which Ofcom had to investigate ITV's handling in regards to two of these incidents that viewers raised complaints against.

Series overview

Following open auditions held the previous year, the Judges' auditions were held during January and February 2012, within Manchester, Blackpool, Cardiff, London, Edinburgh and Birmingham. Like the previous series, a number of acts were invited to audition between 6 and 22 January, after being found via their videos on YouTube. Twenty-five participants from this were picked by the producers and revealed by Britain's Got More Talent host Stephen Mulhern via a live YouTube stream from backstage at the London auditions, in which the YouTube community voted on their favourites between 6 and 13 February, with the winning acts later performing before the judges after the results of the vote on 18 February. Between 25 and 31 January, the sponsors of the show for this series, Virgin Media, ran addition auditions for the show via videos made on YouTube and/or Vimeo, which, while adhering to the same rules, were restricted to only Virgin Media customer, with the five winning acts later performing for the judges during the Birmingham auditions.
Following the previous series, both David Hasselhoff and Michael McIntyre announced that they wouldn't be returning for another year of the competition. Their decision led to the producers seeking out their replacements, after deciding to maintain the use of four judges in the programme following Cowell's announcement in December 2011 that he would be returning to oversee auditions for the sixth series. Both Hasselhoff and McIntyre were eventually replaced by comedian David Walliams, and singer and TV presenter Alesha Dixon, the latter having previously been a judge on BBC's Strictly Come Dancing. Owing to her pregnancy entering its late stages, Holden was forced to be absent from the London and Blackpool auditions. Therefore, the Blackpool auditions were a 3-judge panel with only Dixon, Cowell and Walliams. For the London auditions, the production team brought in American actress and model Carmen Electra as a guest judge to oversee London auditions in her place. Holden was cleared by doctors to return to overseeing the remainder of the auditions by the time the Edinburgh auditions rolled around. Apart from a change in the judging panel, the producers decided to increase the prize money offered to the winner of the series to £500,000, with Cowell pledging half of the prize money being offered to the winner.
Of the participants that took part, only forty five made it past this stage and into the five live semi-finals, with nine appearing in each one; this was a significant change after the last four series of the programme. In a change with the format, the live final featured ten acts that made it through the semi-finals, and one additional act dubbed "the Judges' wildcard" - if a semi-finalist was eliminated in their semi-final, they became eligible to be picked as a wildcard act for the final by the judges, with the choice made prior to the live final's broadcast. The wildcard for this series was boyband The Mend, after they lost out in the tied Judges' vote in the first semi-final. The following below lists the results of each participant's overall performance in this series:

Participant	Age	Genre	Performance Type	Semi-final	Result
Analiza Ching	29	Music	Violinist	1
Aquabatique	21–28	Variety	Synchronised Swimmers	5	'
Area 51	23–44	Dance	Pyrotechnic Dance Group	3
Ashleigh and Pudsey	17 & 6	Animals	Dog Act	1	'
Ashley Elliot	16	Music	Xylophonist	3
Be Minor	13–14	Singing	Girl Band	4
Beatrix von Bourbon	27	Dance	Burlesque Dancer	4
Billy George	20	Acrobatics	Cyr Wheel Acrobat	5
Brynolf & Ljung	35 & 36	Magic	Magic Duo	4
Callum Oakley	16	Comedy	Stand Up Comedian	5
Cascade	22–35	Acrobatics	Martial Arts Team	2
Chica Latina	44	Singing	Singer	4
Dennis Egel	41	Singing	Singer	3
Face Team	19–28	Acrobatics	Basketball Stunt Team	5
Fish on Percussion	24	Music	Percussionist	2
Four Corners	17–25	Dance	Dance Group	2
Gatis Kandis	31	Comedy	Stand Up Comedian	4
Graham Blackledge	42	Singing / Music	Singer & Organist	2
Greig Stewart	27	Music	Laser Harpist	5
Honey Shazad	21	Singing	Singer	3
Hope Murphy	16	Singing	Singer	5
Jonathan and Charlotte	17 & 16	Singing	Opera Singing Duo	2	'
Kai & Natalia	15 & 16	Dance	Ballroom Dance Duo	2	'
Karizma Krew	14–38	Dance	Street Dance Group	2
Lauren Thalia	12	Singing / Music	Singer & Guitarist	1
Loveable Rogues	18–20	Singing / Music	Acoustic Trio	3	'
Lucky	26	Acrobatics	Contortionist	3
Malaki Paul	9	Singing	Singer	4
Martyn Crofts	42	Singing	Rapping Dalek Impersonator	5
Molly Rainford	11	Singing	Singer	3	'
Nu Sxool	10–17	Dance	Dance Group	4	'
Only Boys Aloud	14–19	Singing	Choir	1	Third Place
Paige Turley	14	Singing	Singer	2
Rachel Knowland	25	Singing	Singer	1
Ryan O'Shaughnessy	19	Singing / Music	Singer & Guitarist	5	'
Sam Kelly	19	Singing / Music	Singer & Guitarist	4	'
Strictly Wheels	39 & 41	Dance	Dance Duo	5
The Jive Aces	34–49	Music	Jazz Band	1
The Mend	21–22	Singing	Boy Band	1	'
The Showbears	34–53	Singing	Entertainers	2
The Sugar Dandies	40 & 40	Dance	Ballroom Dance Duo	4
The Zimmers	66–88	Singing	Rap Group	3
Twist and Pulse Dance Company	12–20	Dance	Street Dance Group	3
United We Stand	17–25	Dance	Street Dance Group	1
Zipparah Tafari	49	Singing	Rapper	1

Ages denoted for a participant, pertain to their final performance for this series.
Due to the nature of Aquabatique's performance, their live round performances had to be performed outside of the studio, with the judges and studio audience watching via screens.
The latter value pertains to the age of the dog, as disclosed by its owner.