LOS ANGELES – Jackson Olson’s run on Dancing with the Stars ended Tuesday even though his two-night judges’ total was higher than those of two couples who survived. Tyler Cameron also went home in the October 27 double elimination, reducing the Season 35 field from ten couples to eight.
Olson and professional partner Emma Slater were eliminated alongside Cameron and Sharna Burgess. Their departures followed last week’s Dedication Night, when all ten couples stayed in the competition and the scores carried forward into Horror Movie Night.
That carryover matters when reading the result. Tuesday’s performances were not a standalone test: the relevant judges’ leaderboard combined two nights, and audience voting also counted toward the elimination. Even that combined leaderboard could not, by itself, identify the two couples who would leave.
Olson earned 35 out of 40 for a Joker-inspired contemporary routine to Frank Sinatra’s “That’s Life.” According to ABC’s episode recap, Carrie Ann Inaba called the performance “weird in a good way,” while Derek Hough praised his commitment to the character. The four marks were 9, 9, 8 and 9.
His combined total was 67, level with Maura Higgins and Mark Ballas. It was five points above Julia Stiles and Ezra Sosa’s 62 and seven above Tatyana Ali and Jan Ravnik’s 60. Higgins, Stiles and Ali all advanced. Olson’s exit therefore cannot be explained simply as the judges sending home their two lowest-scoring couples.
Cameron’s position was different. His Viennese waltz, inspired by Bram Stoker’s Dracula, received 26 out of 40, leaving him last on the combined judges’ leaderboard with 58. The network’s results report confirmed that he and Olson were the celebrities eliminated.
At the other end of the competition, Harry Shum Jr. and Jenna Johnson received the season’s first perfect score. Their Saw-inspired contemporary to 2WEI’s “Toxic” earned four tens, giving them 40 for the evening and a two-night total of 76. The routine combined the horror theme with a performance the entire panel rewarded equally.
Shum and Johnson finished two points ahead of the nearest couples on the combined judges’ table. Amber Glenn and Pasha Pashkov had 74, as did Jenna Dewan and Val Chmerkovskiy. The narrow gap described their position with the panel, not a published ranking of their audience support.
Guest judge Shirley Ballas joined Inaba, Hough and Bruno Tonioli for the horror-themed episode. Her marks also showed how differently the panel could read a performance: Ali received three eights and a four, while Stiles received two sevens, a four and an eight. Both remained in the competition.
Glenn’s Argentine tango drew on Black Swan and earned 36, with all four judges giving nines. Dewan’s zombie-themed Argentine tango scored 37. Those individual-night marks were different, but their carried-over scores left the two couples tied across the combined judging period.
Connor Wood and Rylee Arnold also scored 37, performing a contemporary inspired by Annabelle: Creation. Their two-night total was 69. Ezra Frech and Daniella Karagach earned 35 for a jazz routine based on The Invisible Man and reached 72 combined. Wood outscored Frech on Tuesday while remaining behind him across the two nights.
Higgins and Ballas received 32 for their Lost Boys-inspired contemporary to “Cry Little Sister.” They finished the judging period level with Olson and Slater despite earning three fewer points on Horror Movie Night. Their different elimination outcomes were another reason not to treat a tie in judges’ marks as a tie in the final result.
For Julia Stiles, the episode followed a Dedication Night performance honoring Heath Ledger. Her Omen-inspired Argentine tango scored 26, the same Tuesday mark as Cameron’s waltz, but she entered the combined result four judges’ points ahead of him. Ali’s Sinners-inspired paso doble scored 28.
The surviving Season 35 cast now includes Shum and Johnson, Glenn and Pashkov, Dewan and Chmerkovskiy, and Frech and Karagach. Wood and Arnold, Higgins and Ballas, Stiles and Sosa, and Ali and Ravnik complete the eight returning couples.
Their next appearance comes on a different night. Disney Night will air Monday, November 2, rather than in the show’s usual Tuesday slot, with Cynthia Erivo as the special guest judge. Viewers following the remaining couples will need to account for that schedule change after the double elimination.
The judges’ totals establish how the panel assessed the dances and how the carryover changed the standings. They do not reveal the audience-vote margins separating the couples who advanced from those who left. Without those individual vote totals, Olson’s five-point judging advantage over Stiles cannot be translated into the size of the gap that ended his competition.
