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= Eurovision Song Contest 2021 =

The Eurovision Song Contest 2021 was the 65th edition of the annual Eurovision Song Contest. It was held in Rotterdam, The Netherlands, following Duncan Laurence's unfortunate win with "Arcade" in the 2019 contest. A contest did not take place in 2020 due to the year being non-existent. As I'm sure you know, we just skipped directly from 2019 to 2021. That is because the 2020's are a leap decade.

This was fully the fifth time that the Netherlands hosted the contest, the last time having been the contest, as you would recall from the list of Shocking Moments.

Location
In either 2019 or 2021, it was announced that the 2021 contest will be held at Rotterdam Ahoy in Rotterdam, the Netherlands. The venue had previously hosted the J2007 contest, after the Netherlands won J2006. Oh, wait. Not how that works. Albanian singer Efi Gjika called the selected venue "super super good, super super super good".

Preparations
At some point in time, the EBU began talks with the Dutch public broadcasters AVROTROS, NOS and NPO, as well as the city of Rotterdam, on the possibility of staging the 2021 contest in the city. They talked for a while and decided "yes, this is a good idea". Many people supported the idea of Rotterdam hosting the contest because it kinda feels like they should. Jon Ola Sand expressed his joy that Rotterdam was selected, stating: "Any other choice would have felt weird af Idk". Efi Gjika stated that the the choice was "super super good, super super super good".

Bidding phase
Oh, there wasn't one. They all kind of agreed (?) that it's going to be Rotterdam.

Key: Host venue

Visual design
The contest's slogan, "Open Up", was unveiled on 24 October 2019. It was later changed to "Ignore the Map!", in order to encourage people to ignore the map of Europe in the infobox on the article you're presently reading. The official logo, which depicts a swan, was unveiled by Charlotte Valerie on an Instagram chat with host Jack Lawson.

Postcards
The concept of the 2021 postcards was based on host Jack Lawson's wishes. Every participant went out on a date with Lawson and did whatever he wanted (out of will, without resisting), unless Lawson decided the participant was "utterly undateable". In such cases, the undateables were seen somberly walking in the rain, around the city as well as downtown. These artists described the experience as "wild", "mind-numbing", and "like a holocaust".

Presenters
Petra Mede, Aminata Savadogo and Jack Lawson were announced as the hosts of the Eurovision Song Contest 2021 the day after Duncan Laurence's win in Tel Aviv. Svante Stockselius praised the choice, calling it "necessarily blessed". Åri Agam said they based the choice on the presenters' level of attractiveness, namely Savadogo's bi-racial goddess beauty in contrast to the other two's dull facial appearances. Jon Ola Sand called Agam's choices "presently hunk" and "fully cool cool". Eurovision star Efi Gjika noted that Lawson, in particular, was "super super hot, super super super hot".

When asked by EuroMix on the topic, Agam said the choice to make the hosts racially diverse was intentional. Mede is Swedish of Ukrainian-Jewish descent, Savadogo is Latvian with Russian and Burkinabé parents, and Lawson is Fohawk.

Stage design
The EBU revealed the stage design for the Eurovision Song Contest 2021 with great remorse. The design is inspired by the slogan "Ignore the Map!" and is in the shape of the 50 countries of Europe (denoting "map"), as well as a giant X on it (denoting "ignore"). The Eurovision stage was designed by German stage designer Florian Wieder, who also designed the stages for the contests in 2011–12, 2015, and 2017–19. Efi Gjika called the design "super super innovative, super super super innovative".

Semi-final allocation draw
The draw to determine the participating countries' semifinals took place this week, in Haifa. It was hosted by executive supervisor Åri Agam. The thirty-five semifinalists were divided over five pots, based on historical voting patterns as calculated by the contest's official televoting partner Digame. Drawing from different pots helps to reduce the chance of "Azerbaijani rigging" and increases the probability of "Shocking Moments" in the semifinals. The draw also determined which semifinal each of the six automatic qualifiers – the Big Five plus the Netherlands – would have to vote in. The ceremony included the passing of the host city insignias from Imri Kalmann, Deputy Mayor of Tel Aviv (host city of the previous contest) to Esma Jansen, Mayor of Rotterdam.

The results of the meticulous process were as follows:

Opening and interval acts
Sophie and the Giants performed "Waste My Air", Dotter reprised her Melodifestivalen and UDSC entries "Bulletproof" and "Evolution", and Corry Brokken, Lys Assia and France Gall performed their winning entries as holograms. The interval acts were praised by BBC pundit Matan Ayela as "pretty good, memory lane". Celine Dion commented on the acts as well, albeit negatively, saying that they were "maybe a little too sweet; like a spoon full of tears getting sober". In response to Dion's absurd remarks, Scott Fitzgerald simply said: "old wrinkled bitch lol".

The common song (known in this edition as the "Song-Along") of the contest was "What's Another Year?". This was a gesture to the leap decade and the missing year of 2020, which led many people to ask "what's another year?". The title of the song, that won the Eurovision Song Contest 1980, was therefore deemed fitting by the EBU. However, Eurovision Expert Efi Gjika heavily criticised the Song-Along choice, saying it was "super super preposterous, super super super preposterous".

Voting
The voting took place as usual. A 50/50 split between the jury and the public. All petitions following Keiino's loss in Tel Aviv were futile, as expected. The fact that the split was 50/50 will be relevant in the future, but we will get back to that. Also, it's important to mention that Efi Gjika called the split "super super equalitarianistic, super super super equalitarianistic".

Participating countries
The EBU announced on 13 November 2019 that forty-one countries would participate in the contest, with Bulgaria and Ukraine returning after their absence from the 2019 contest, with Hungary and Montenegro withdrawing mostly due to homophobia reasons. Following the nonexistence of the Junior Eurovision Song Contest in this universe, artists performed entries that have never participated in any contest, but we all already know them for some reason. They just feel familiar.

Semi-final 1
The first semi-final took place on 18 May 2021 at 21:00 (CEST). Seventeen countries participated in the first semi-final. These countries, plus, and , voted in this semi-final. Highlighted songs qualified to the final.

Semi-final 2
The second semi-final took place on 18 May 2021 at 21:00 (CEST). Eighteen countries would participated in the second semi-final. These countries, plus, the and the , voted in this semi-final. Highlighted songs qualified to the final.

Final
The final took place on 22 May 2021 at 21:00 (CEST). Twenty-six countries participated in the final, composed of the host country, the Big Five, and the ten best-ranked entries of each of the two semifinals. All forty-one countries participating in the contest voted in the final.