History YMMV / EurovisionSongContest2021

* MemeticMutation: [[MemeticMutation/EurovisionSongContest See the Contest's dedicated page.]]

%% Per Administrivia/NoRecentExamplesPlease: Please do not add any Overshadowed By Controversy entries until at least six months after the date of the finale.

* MemeticMutation:
** Music/FloRida or No Rida? [[labelnote:Explanation]]San Marino's participation was ''a ride''. To recap, when Senhit's song "Adrenalina" was first released in March 2021 the fans were positively shocked at it being a well-crafted banger, with a polished music video and featuring a verse from American rapper Flo Rida of all people. The unexpected awesomeness of it all, from a country which is usually the ButtMonkey of the contest, led to San Marino shoot upwards in the odds, including being the favourite to win it all for a short while. Later on, the question became whether Flo would be joining Senhit on stage in May, given the COVID-19-related travel restrictions. Senhit and the Sammarinese delegation refused to either confirm or deny his participation until the last minute, teasing the fans with vague answers and including stickers of Flo Rida with question marks on her costume during the rehearsals (with a stand-in singer delivering the rap verse). At last, the answer was confirmed to be '''yes''' when Flo Rida arrived in Rotterdam two days before San Marino's semi-final. To top it off, the reason for which Flo couldn't have been in Rotterdam for the initial rehearsals was that he was judging a ''[[SkewedPriorities bikini contest]]'' in Miami.[[/labelnote]]
** Cyprus is Head and Shoulders above the competition [[labelnote:Explanation]]The music video for "El Diablo" featured a couple of shots with blatant ProductPlacement, including Elena Tsagrinou using a Head & Shoulders shampoo bottle. The product placement was removed from the version of the video uploaded on the official Eurovision channels.[[/labelnote]]
** Broccoli [[labelnote:Explanation]]It's practically impossible to talk about the Dutch entry without someone claiming that it's about broccoli.[[/labelnote]]
** In Russia, dress wears you. [[labelnote:Explanation]]The Russian performance had Manizha in an oversized traditional dress that moved against her wishes, as a metaphor for the treatment of women. RussianReversal jokes were quick to spring out.[[/labelnote]]
*** Manizha is [[WesternAnimation/{{Futurama}} Mom]] [[labelnote:Explanation]]Manizha eventually freeing herself from the dress by opening a panel in the front and stepping out was widely compared to ''Futurama'' character "Mom" removing her grandmotherly fat suit in a similar way.[[/labelnote]]
** Greece's song is ''VideoGame/JustDance'' [[labelnote:Explanation]]Greece's stage show for "Last Dance" included dancers in green suits, so that Stefania appeared to be dancing along invisible men and/or autonomous articles of clothing in front of a neon cityscape. The song title and the final presentation immediately drew comparisons to the famous dancing video game.[[/labelnote]]
** Gjon bopping [[labelnote:Explanation]]In the preview clip of Gjon's Tears second rehearsal for "Tout l'univers", he appears to be dancing in a way that doesn't really fit the style of the song. Thus the many edits where the clip was paired with audio from a hip-hop song or a similar genre.[[/labelnote]]
** Natalia's note [[labelnote:Explanation]]At the end of "Sugar", Natalia Gordienko (Moldova) holds an incredibly long but also incredibly flat note, which was compared to everything from a mosquito buzzing around a room to a refrigerator running. Her stiff pose only invited even more humour.[[/labelnote]]
** Damiano's press conference antics [[labelnote:Explanation]]Referring to Måneskin's lead singer Damiano David during the winner's press conference, obviously high on the excitement from the win and somewhat sloshed on the complimentary refreshments, like [[https://www.spettacolo.eu/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/Maneskin-Damiano-David-risponde-alle-accuse-in-conferenza-vincitori-Eurovision-Song-Contest-2021.jpg him screaming into a microphone]] or [[https://pbs.twimg.com/media/E2B5KNuWUAE7r1w.jpg raising his bare leg]]. One of the most common uses of the second image was to superimpose the leg over a map of Italy, which happens to be in the vague shape of a high-heeled boot.[[/labelnote]]

** The Cypriot entry, "El Diablo", is a dance-pop track sung by a Greek MsFanservice with a GratuitousSpanish title and references to fire and burning as metaphors for love. [[Music/EleniFoureira Now, where have we heard this before?]]

* HypeBacklash: One theory for why Malta got hit with such CriticalDissonance. After "Je me casse" was pegged as an early favorite to win the Maltese delegation went overboard advertising the song online. By the time the final arrived the public were tired of the song which led to it receiving a televote score of only 47 compared to the 208 she received from the Juries. The backlash got even stronger when allegations arose about Malta spending up to €650,000 of public funds for Destiny's entry and participation, with the Maltese government demanding an audit of the expense (for comparison, Spain in 2019 spent a total of €508,862, of which €238,125 were the Big Five-level participation fee, and that was a record-breaking sum for a country which is much, much bigger and populous than Malta).

* HypeBacklash: One theory for why Malta got hit with such CriticalDissonance. After "Je me casse" was pegged as an early favorite to win the Maltese delegation went overboard advertising the song online. By the time the final arrived the public were tired of the song which led to it receiving a televote score of only 47. The backlash got even stronger when allegations arose about Malta spending up to €650,000 of public funds for Destiny's entry and participation, with the Maltese government demanding an audit of the expense (for comparison, Spain in 2019 spent a total of €508,862, of which €238,125 were the Big Five-level participation fee, and that was a record-breaking sum for a country which is much, much bigger and populous than Malta).

* SpecialEffectsFailure: The staging for "Last Dance" by [[UsefulNotes/{{Greece}} Stefania]] featured extensive greenscreening to make the dancers appear partially invisible. There were a few shots where the lighting didn't work correctly and left shadows on the parts of the dancers that weren't supposed to be visible.

** Still less pronounced than other years, as all but three songs each finished in both the jury's and televote's respective top tens[[note]]Bulgaria, Malta, and Portugal with the juries; Finland, Lithuania, and Serbia with the televote[[/note]] and three out of their respective top five songs were the same [[note]]Italy (1st with televote, 4th with juries), France (3rd with televote, 2nd with juries), and Iceland (5th with both) - jury winner Switzerland finished 6th with the televote, which still isn't that far off comparatively[[/note]]. Compared to 2019, where neither the jury winner[[note]]North Macedonia[[/note]] nor the televote winner[[note]]Norway[[/note]] even made the other party's top ten, they actually weren't as far off from each other has they have been in recent years.
* HypeBacklash: One theory for why Malta got hit with such CriticalDissonance. After "Je me casse" was pegged as an early favorite to win the Maltese delegation went overboard advertising the song online. By the time the final arrived the public were tired of the song which led to it receiving a televote score of only 47.

** Damiano's leg [[labelnote:Explanation]]Referring to [[https://pbs.twimg.com/media/E2B5KNuWUAE7r1w.jpg this picture]] of Måneskin's lead singer Damiano David during the winner's press conference. One of the most common uses of the image was to superimpose the limb over a map of Italy, which happens to be in the vague shape of a high-heeled boot.[[/labelnote]]

** Broccoli [[labelnote:Explanation]]As detailed under {{Mondegreen}}, it's practically impossible to talk about the Dutch entry without someone claiming that it's about broccoli.[[/labelnote]]

* OvershadowedByControversy: Italy's victory was marred by rapidly-spreading allegations that Måneskin's lead singer Damiano David was caught on camera snorting cocaine in the Green Room during the voting procedure. The (admittedly weak) evidence was a piece of footage showing him crouching down towards the table, with his face obscured by the ice bucket. In the winner's press conference, David maintained that he was instead looking down at a glass that was accidentally smashed on the floor by bandmate Thomas (a broken glass was indeed visible in other images). The allegations quickly died down when David voluntarily undertook a drug test on his return to Italy and it came back negative.

** Still less pronounced than other years, as all but three songs each finished in both the jury's and televote's respective top tens[[note]]Bulgaria, Malta, and Portugal with the juries; Finland, Lithuania, and Serbia with the televote[[/note]] and three out of their respective top five songs were the same [[note]]Italy (1st with televote, 4th with juries), France (3rd with televote, 2nd with juries), and Iceland (5th with both)[[/note]]. Compared to 2019, where neither the jury winner[[note]]North Macedonia[[/note]] nor the televote winner[[note]]Norway[[/note]] even made the other party's top ten, they actually weren't as far off from each other has they have been in recent years.

** Damiano's leg [[labelnote:Explanation]]Referring to [[https://pbs.twimg.com/media/E2B5KNuWUAE7r1w.jpg this picture]] of Måneskin's lead singer Damiano David during the winner's press conference. One of the most common uses of the image was to superimpose the limb over a map of Italy, which happens to be in the vague shape of a high-heeled boot.[[/labelnote]]

*** Manizha is [[WesternAnimation/{{Futurama}} Mom]] [[labelnote:Explanation]]Manizha eventually freeing herself from the dress by opening a panel in the front and stepping out was widely compared to ''Futurama'' character "Mom" removing her grandmotherly fat suit in a similar way.[[/labelnote]]