Globalvision Season 17

The 17th season of the Globalvision Song Contest, named as The Globalvision Spectacular, which started on the 20th of December 2020 with its official thread being opened 2 days prior that date with no previous announcement. The first songs were revealed on the 29th of that month, followed by other 3 separate release days (instead of 8 release days like in the previous season), bringing back the random draw selection and also the reveal of songs made by the host instead of participants themselves.

Initially, 38 entries are expected to take part, although the number went down to 37 after the first day of song reveals. Despite being an African country the current winner and host of this season, there's no country from Africa participating. It's also the first time that the winning country of the previous season isn't represented.

Another 5 new countries debuted in this season, those being Bosnia & Herzegovina, China, Georgia, Northern Ireland and Thailand. Also Belize was meant to debut for a second time, but it got replaced by Switzerland. Meanwhile, 4 new participants made their appearance in the contest, @chromatic puzea, @FameMonster01, @Pharamon and @HoneyB, being the latter already a jury member in the previous season.

For the first time the trophy went to Asia. It was South Korea the country who achieved the victory, thanks to @Dutch who got his 6th victory overall. He chose the girl group EVERGLOW and their song LA DI DA to represent the asian nation. They got an impressive margin of 92 points of the second place, breaking the previous record.

Theme
The theme chosen for this contest was a cabaret spectacle. The visuals used during the season featured curtains and shapes of female cabaret dancers. This time all images where gifs, even the logo contained sparkling letters (although can't be seen in animated form on the wiki due to server restrictions). Below can be seen how the visuals for votes looked like.

Location
On the day of the start of the season, @Archie announced the final venue for the contest, just like the previous winners did in the previous two contests. He chose the Gran Teatro Cervantes in Tangier, Morocco; an old spanish theater under reconstruction. Other considered venues were not revealed.

Returning artists
Sevdaliza was the first returning artist announced during this season. She previously appeared during season 14 representing the Netherlands, so the fact that she was chosen to represent Iran this time, brought some controversy. K3 made another appearance after the original belgian entry got disqualified, being this their 3rd participation as a group. The last entry announced was also a returning artist, Áine already appeared representing Ireland in s10.

Final
Serbia was meant to participate at 25th place before withdrawing. United States was placed at 9th place in the draw, with its original entry being revealed on the first day, but due to a red flag disqualification, the new song of that country was revealed at the end of the second day.

Belize was meant to appear in 11th spot, represented by Aluna and her song Envious, but was disqualified and replaced with Switzerland. The new entry was revealed as the first one of day 3, although it remeans placed on its original draw spot.

Uniqueness Award
For the full list of recipients of the award, see Uniqueness Award Once again the Uniqueness Award went to a debuting country, China, represented by Wang Rong and her fun song 小雞小雞 (Chick Chick). The user that took the award was @Debithius who returned to the game after being absent for 14 seasons.

Other participants
@Doot got banned on the forum shortly after season 16 took place, meaning that his next participations are unlikely to happen.

@kvnrp once again decided to participate as a jury member, as he couldn't get his main options to participate.

@SamanthaC is also expected to participate as a jury member.

@Aleks withdrew from the game for personal reasons, despite confirming initial participation. He was meant to represent Serbia once again.

Unathorized Wiki Editing
To be written, whenever I feel like doin it.

Iran
The first entry to be revealed during this season instantly became a controversial one, not for the song itself, but for the artist. Sevdaliza already appeared representing the Netherlands back in season 14, so the fact that she was back representing another country wasn't received very well. Although this situation has happened before with another artist (Mon Laferte represented both Mexico and Chile in different occasions) it still gained a few yellow flags, but the number was not enough so it didn't get disqualified or replaced.

United States
The country was meant to be represented by Victoria Monét with Khalid and SG Lewis and their song Experience. It instantly brought controversy for the artists chosen, as two of them were considered too known in the forum or famous overall. There were users that chose to publicly give it a red flag, but due to some insecurities about the red flag system, the voting was made secretly bringing more red flag votes and finally disqualifying the entry. It's the second case of disqualification by popular demand, being the first one the season 11 Austrian entry, although in this case there was a real voting behind the decision.

Belize
On the second day of releases, Belize became the most controversional of the entries as the artist chosen to represent the country, Aluna, had very little connection with the country, as only her mother was from Belize. She was born in England and has english nationality, having that in mind she should rather represent England instead. The decision of disqualifying the entry seems both by yellow flag voting and own decision of the participant. In the end, Belize was replaced by Switzerland, having its debut postponed for a second time.

Belgium
The third day of releases also brought a controversial entry. Belgian artist Angèle got attention for being frequently mentioned as a potential choice for the country, but also was considered a bit too famous for the contest for some others for her big career in french speaking european countries. A red flag was announced publicly, a few more were added secretly leading to a disqualification of the belgian entry, although the artist was still allowed to participate with a less known entry. Discussions kept ongoing for a longer while, which even made some users revoke their red flags, although that was still not enough to keep the entry partcipating.