The Junior Eurovision Review

  Hosted in: Tbilisi, Georgia Won by: France - Ce monde by Lou Deleuze This is sixth part of the French monopoly saga: Oh no, oh no, oh no, oh no… After Georgia claimed the title of most JESC wins outright in 2024 with what is still the greatest JESC entry ever, at the expense of the ever-so-dominant France, they are back to host the contest in 2025. In Tbilisi, just in a different gymnasium. After the many controversies of last year’s contest, the contest was finally back where it should belong: No AI (even if Armenia’s and Malta’s used one during their respective music videos), back to the same old voting procedure (unfortunately), contested by 16 countries and one looming problem. Since the start of this decade, France has been the mark to beat in this contest, being beaten only twice up until this point since their first win in 2020 : 2021 and 2024. Yes, may I remind you that they have won back to back before, and no they refused to host 2024. Their entry this year was a b...

Hosted in: Madrid, Spain Won by: Georgia – To my mom by Andria Putkaradze This is the fifth part of the "French monopoly" saga: While most of us expect for France to repeat what Poland did in 2019 and 2020 , the country, shockingly, decided against hosting. Actually it wasn’t shocking. This past decade, La France have dominated this field, except for one edition that is 2021 , but even then France was leading at some point. However, their broadcaster has argued it was a little too much, calling it “a French monopoly on Junior Eurovision” (which is what I named the 2020-23 saga after). And so, it is reasonable for runners-up Spain to host the 2024 contest, exactly 20 years, if you can believe it, since Maria Isabel won the contest with her song “Antes muerta que sencilla”. Don’t worry, Maria is alright. Also, in an equally shocking move, the United Kingdom have decided against participating this year. This is quite surprising given that they have respectable results in the ...

Hosted in: Nice, France Won by: France – Coeur by Zoe Clauzure UK entry: Back to Life by Stand Uniqu3 This is the fourth part of the “French monopoly” saga: With the return of Germany, this is the first, and so far only, time in the contest’s history that all members of the “Big Five” – the biggest financial contributors to the EBU – competed together. This is surprising given that they had regular appearances in the adult contest, receiving a bye to the grand final every year. Speaking of one of the members of the big five, after a successful plot revenge in 2022 , The contest returned to France for the second time in three years, this time in a city with a very nice name - Nice. Organizers responsible for selecting the French entry on home soil this year have decided to slow things down. Slightly. VEEEEEEEERY slightly. Their representative, Zoe Clauzure, who had started her career by singing covers of popular songs on YouTube, sang “Coeur”, an emotionally resonant tune with an anti...