Britain's Got Talent series 9

The ninth series of the British talent competition programme Britain's Got Talent was broadcast on ITV, from 11 April to 31 May 2015. The series saw the "Wildcard" format introduced in the sixth series being modified in this series to include a "Public Wildcard" – like the "Judges' Wildcard" any act eliminated in the semi-finals, primarily those that lost out in the Judges' vote, could be reinstated by the public, based on the one that received the most votes from them before the final. Although speculations and rumours began to emerge after the previous series ended, claiming that some of the judges would be leaving before the ninth series, these were later dismissed as being unfounded by ITV, on 16 January 2015.
The ninth series was won by dog tricks duo Jules O'Dwyer & Matisse, with magician Jamie Raven finishing in second place and Welsh choir Côr Glanaethwy third. During its broadcast, the series averaged around 9.9 million viewers. The ninth series saw the programme have to answer allegations of animal cruelty against a ventriloquist, while the producers caused controversy over the handling of O'Dwyer's performance in the final that Ofcom later ruled to have been misleading following complaints by viewers.

Series overview

Following open auditions held the previous year between October and December, the Judges' auditions took place between January and February 2015, within Edinburgh, Manchester, Birmingham and London., Unlike previous years, where a guest judge had to stand-in for another, no issues occurred that caused a member of the judging panel to be absent. The auditions were held in a more standard manner for this year, though with the "Golden Buzzer" format remaining part of them since its introduction to the show in the previous series.
Of the participants that took part, forty-five made it past this stage and into the five live semi-finals – of these acts, dance troupe Boyband, singer Calum Scott, choir Revelation Avenue, dance act Entity Allstars, and comedy singer Lorraine Bowen, each received a golden buzzer during their auditions – with nine appearing in each one. In a minor change to the show's "Wildcard act" format, the series saw the introduction of the "Public Wildcard". Like the "Judges' wildcard", if a semi-finalist was eliminated in their semi-final at the Judges' vote, they became eligible to be picked as a wildcard act by the public, who would vote on which one they would like to reinstate into the final once all the semi-finals had been aired, with their choice being the one to have received the most votes by the time the final was due to be aired. While the Public Wildcard was extreme martial artist Jesse-Jane McParland, who lost out in the tied Judges' vote in the final semi-final, the Judges' Wildcard for this series was dance troupe Boyband, who lost the Judges' vote in the fourth semi-final. As a result, it led to a total of twelve acts taking part in the series' final.
The below lists the results of each participant's overall performance in this series:

Participant	Age	Genre	Performance Type	Semi-final	Result
Alison Jiear	50	Singing	Singer	2
Andrew Fleming	51	Comedy	Impressionist	1
Beat Brothers	19–23	Dance	Tap Dance Group	5
Becky O'Brien	34	Singing	Singer	1
Billy & Emily England	28 & 25	Danger	Rollerskating Duo	1
Bonetics	17	Acrobatics / Dance	Contortionist Dancer	2
Boyband	17–19	Dance	Dance Group	4	'
Calum Scott	26	Singing	Singer	5	'
Chloe Louise Crawford	27	Magic	Illusionist	5
Côr Glanaethwy	7–65	Singing	Choir	1	Third Place
Danny Posthill	28	Comedy	Impressionist	5	'
Dylan Byrd	17	Dance	Hip Hop Dancer	3
Ella Shaw	18	Singing	Singer	3
Emma Jones	23	Singing	Opera Singer	5
Entity Allstars	10–15	Dance	Street Dance Group	1	'
Gracie	11	Singing	Singer	3
Groove Thing	7–11	Dance	80’s Dance Group	2
Henry Gallagher	12	Singing / Music	Singer & Guitarist	1
IMD Legion	9–17	Dance	Street Dance Group	3
Isaac Waddington	15	Singing / Music	Singer & Pianist	4	'
Jamie Raven	31	Magic	Magician	3	'
Jeffrey Drayton	73	Magic	Entertainer	4
Jesse-Jane McParland	9	Acrobatics	Martial Artist	5	'
Jonathan Lutwyche	15	Dance	Contemporary Dancer	5
Jules O'Dwyer & Matisse	49 & 7	Animals	Dog Act	2	'
Lisa Sampson	35	Variety	Hula Hoop Artist	4
Lorraine Bowen	53	Singing / Music	Singer & Keyboardist	1
Luca Calò	23	Singing / Dance	Singer & Dancer	2
Maia Gough	13	Singing	Singer	4
Marc Métral	61	Comedy / Animals	Ventriloquist & Dog Act	4
Michael Late	44	Magic	Illusionist	2
Misstasia	22–24	Singing	Girl Group	5
Mitch & Cally the Wonderdog	42 & 10	Animals	Record Breaking Dog Act	1
Narinder Dhani	43	Music	Comb Musician	3
OK Worldwide	19–28	Acrobatics	Acrobatic Group	4
Old Men Grooving	40–60	Dance	Dance Group	2	'
Peter Lambert	32	Variety	Circus Performer	5
Revelation Avenue	20–30	Singing	Gospel Choir	2
Ruby Red Performers	25–64	Dance	Burlesque Dance Group	1
The Honeybuns	22–33	Singing	Girl Group	2
The Kanneh-Masons	9–18	Music	Classical Musicians	4
The Kingdom Tenors	21–31	Singing	Vocal Harmony Group	3
The Neales	24–59	Singing	Vocal Group	4	'
The Sakyi Five	10–20	Singing	Boy Band	3
UDI	19-32	Dance	Electronic Dance Group	3

Ages denoted for a participant, pertain to their final performance for this series.
The age of the dogs used by Jules O'Dwyer, other than Matisse, and that of the dog used by Marc Metral, were not disclosed during their time on the programme.
The latter value denotes the age of the dog, as disclosed by its owner.

Semi-finals summary

Semi-final 1 (25 May)

Guest performance: Ricky Martin

Semi-final 2 (26 May)

Guest performance: Jack Pack

Semi-final 3 (27 May)

Guest performance: Alesha Dixon

Semi-final 4 (28 May)

Guest performance: Olly Murs
Boyband were later sent through to the final as the judges' wildcard.

Semi-final 5 (29 May)

Guest performance: Collabro
Jesse-Jane McParland was later sent through to the final as the public's wildcard.

Final (31 May)

Guest performances: Andrea Bocelli & The Cast Of Michael Flatley's Lord of the Dance

Finalist	Order	Performance Type	Percentage	Finished
Entity Allstars	1	Street Dance Group	1.7%	11th
UDI	2	Electronic Dance Group	1.9%	10th
The Neales	3	Vocal Group	3.6%	9th
Boyband	4	Dance Group	1.5%	12th
Jesse-Jane McParland	5	Martial Artist	4.2%	8th
Danny Posthill	6	Impressionist	5.3%	7th
Calum Scott	7	Singer	8.2%	6th
Côr Glanaethwy	8	Choir	10.7%	3rd
Old Men Grooving	9	Dance Group	10.2%	4th
Jamie Raven	10	Close Up Magician	20.4%	2nd
Isaac Waddington	11	Singer & Pianist	9.7%	5th
Jules O'Dwyer & Matisse	12	Dog Act	22.6%	1st

Ratings

Episode	Date	Total viewers	Weekly rank	Share
Auditions 1	11 April	11.25	1	43.2
Auditions 2	18 April	11.47	1	44.1
Auditions 3	25 April	11.87	1	46.3
Auditions 4	2 May	11.73	1	45.0
Auditions 5	9 May	11.64	1	45.1
Auditions 6	16 May	11.55	1	47.0
Auditions 7	23 May	9.35	1	35.2
Semi-final 1	25 May	10.18	3	37.8
Semi-final 1 results	25 May	7.74	15	28.7
Semi-final 2	26 May	9.34	10	36.8
Semi-final 2 results	26 May	7.60	16	31.1
Semi-final 3	27 May	9.48	6	38.8
Semi-final 3 results	27 May	8.09	13	31.7
Semi-final 4	28 May	9.26	11	37.2
Semi-final 4 results	28 May	7.87	12	34.5
Semi-final 5	29 May	9.51	8	39.2
Semi-final 5 results	29 May	7.91	14	32.1
Live final	31 May	12.75	1	46.6

Criticism & controversies

Marc Métral ventriloquism act

In April 2015, following the audition of Marc Métral, several animal rights groups raised complaints that his performance, involving the use of a dog, purported to portraying a form of animal cruelty on television. The routine he used involved his dog wearing a specially designed "ventriloquist mask" – a special device used by ventriloquists on human volunteers, in order to make them into special dummy character for their routines - and was conducted in a similar manner to that of a participant on the seventh series of America's Got Talent in 2012. Métral refuted the claims by stating that he cared deeply for the well-being of his dog, while Simon Cowell refuted the claims a month later, owing to his involvement in dog charities, defending the broadcast of the footage on Twitter by explaining that the audition was allowed to be shown because both himself and the production staff had involved the RSPCA to oversee the welfare of Métral's dog before, during, and after his performance.

Misleading dog act

The ninth series became notable for the controversy surrounding the performance of Jules O'Dwyer, and in particular the routine of her dog tricks act in the final. The nature of the complaint focused on the fact that while O'Dwyer had been clear that her occupation involved training and use multiple dogs for her routines, she hadn't disclosed the fact that she had to use two dogs with similar appearances for the final, as her main dog Matisse was unable to perform a trick involving a tightrope section. When this came to light in an interview the morning after the final on 1 June 2015, Ofcom were forced to launch an investigation after 1,000 complaints were raised by viewers who felt misled by the performance's broadcast.
Although no formal action was taken by the programme against O'Dwyer and producers, after Cowell launched his own investigation into the incident, an apology had to be issued for the confusion caused by the failure not to disclose this detail as clearly as possible. However, on 17 August, Ofcom found in their investigation that while there had been no intention to deceive viewers, both the production staff and ITV were responsible for allowing Britain's Got Talent to mislead people, and ruled that they had breached broadcasting codes that require television and radio programmes to not be misleading and present facts as accurately as possible.