The overarching theme of Melodifestivalen's third competition, which coincided with Valentine's Day, was love - a wave Medina flawlessly rode with "Viva L'Amor". The entry was framed with a magnificent shower of red hearts and received the most votes.
DN's Matilda Källén writes that it feels like they "sneaked in some kind of activism" into the entry, referring to the fact that they sing "if everyone just gets along, we can probably handle anything."
Don't want to speculate
The performance begins with Sami Rekik standing at a podium and singing the lines that Källén refers to.
"It was SVT that came up with this whole idea and we just went for it. It looked nice to speak to the nation: listen, take your opinions, religions and political views, you know what, it's love that is 'the key'," Rekik told TT after the results show.
Medina does not want to speculate about their chances of winning the entire Melodifestivalen, but that is what others have done.
According to the betting companies, the duo is in second place - only Felicia with the entry "My system" is ahead, with two semi-finals still remaining.
Källén, who writes that she wants to believe in Medina when they sing that "everything will be okay," nevertheless has a hard time seeing the duo being crowned winners.
“So damn wonderful”
SvD's Andreas Hörmark makes the same analysis. It's third time lucky for Medina - they have finished third and second in previous finals, writes Hörmark, adding that he doubts that it will be "enough all the way just for that".
Someone who believes in Medina, however, is Korslagda's singer Ubbe Näslund - whose real name is Stefan Sjur.
Korslagda participated in the third round and were initially tipped. Then something happened. The odds increased with each passing day during the rehearsal week and the rock band ended up in fourth place.
Now Ubbe hopes that Medina will go all the way to Vienna because, according to him, the duo doesn't just spread love on stage.
"They are so damn wonderful. I love Medina. I think Europe deserves this and that we should send them all the way to Eurovision and just spread a lot of love," he says at the after-party, adding that they will hopefully make music together.
From Medina's side, the love seems to be reciprocated.
"It's going to be something," says Ali Jammali with a big smile when he arrives at the after-party a minute later.
Directly to the final:
"Long live love" with Medina
"Ain't today" with Saga Ludvigsson
For the final qualifiers:
"Selfish" with Eva Jumatate
Eliminated:
"Dusk till dawn" with Patrik Jean
"King of rock 'n' roll" with Korslagda
"Nothing" with Emilia Pantic
