I Skipped American Idol – And Lived To Tell About It

Photo from Fox

I actually did it. I got through the entire season without watching one – NOT ONE – episode of American Idol. And I lived to tell about it.

Our local Fox station provided highlights of each show ad nauseam, so it only took two minutes to get an idea of the contestants’ abilities. In addition, other shows like the morning infotainment shows like the Today Show, Good Morning America, and The View often also provided coverage. Why bother to sit though hours and hours of marginal singing if someone else can just provide a condensed version? There are so many other better shows on television these days that American Idol just doesn’t warrant such an investment of my time.

Of course, when I turned on the news this morning, I heard that Kris Allen won in an upset over Adam Lambert. Since I didn’t spend one second of my valuable time dialing in to vote, or spend any of my valuable money sending text messages to vote, the news didn’t bother me. In fact, I chuckled a little inside at the AI judges who seemed so sure Adam would win as they fawned over him week after week, and at the press that had already provided Adam with his picture on the cover of magazines, apparently crowning him as king somewhat prematurely.

I have to admit that I cringed when our local Fox station played the song, “"No Boundaries” that both contestants had to sing in their final sing-off that AI judge Kara DioGuardi had a hand in writing. Not only was it unlistenable, it apparently was unsingable as it was reported that both contestants sounded awful.

So, I’m glad I missed all of it. It sounds like I didn’t miss much. It’s been reported by many sources that with each year, American Idol continues to lose viewers. I suspect that with each passing year, viewers realize that there really is more to television – and to life – than obsessing about a bunch of wanna-be stars who may or may not be able to carry a tune.

And that’s all I have to say on the subject – until next season, of course!



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Fringe Returns – American Idol Botches It

I was planning on writing a review of last night’s episode of Fringe (Fox) “Inner Child” but I won’t be doing that today. That’s because I didn’t get to SEE the whole episode of Fringe. Why? Well, it seems that Fox had completely lost control of the time on American Idol, and the show ran over a full 8 minutes. This created a cascading DVR nightmare. You see, the DVR doesn’t automatically adjust for those overruns, so it cuts off anything that airs after the show was originally scheduled to end. What makes it worse is that even if I wanted to manually set the DVR timer to compensate for the overrun, it was already recording two HD programs at 10:00 PM – Law & Order SVU and Without A Trace. Since I don't think they haven’t invented a DVR that can record more that two HD programs at once, or automatically adjust for a show's incompetence in controlling its time, viewers will continue to be shut out when shows unexpectedly run over.

It’s really too bad, because Fringe was setting up to be a very interesting episode. While demolition people were readying a building for implosion, they discover and underground room, and in it, what seems to be a young boy who has been in there a long time, since the area had been sealed off for 70 years. He looks like a boy, but they really weren’t sure of his age, he could have been older. While he can’t speak, he can write upside down, and he also seems to be able to be able to tap in to events dealing with a murder case on which Olivia (Anna Torv) is working. After that, I can’t tell you much since sleep came over me – this wasn’t the show’s fault, I was just really tired last night. I suppose I will have to watch the episode with my husband on-line later on.

Let me now vent my annoyance with American Idol. I find it completely inexcusable that a show like this can run over so long. Usually this far into the process I’ve started watching the show, I usually wait until they whittle it down to 8 contestants or less. I haven't seen anything yet in clips from the show to make me want to watch as yet. But from snippets that I HAVE seen, it seems that the new judge Kara DioGuardi (I had to look up her name, I had no idea who she was) is causing them to run over. I did see one segment with her a few weeks ago, and she just went on and on and on and…well, you get the idea. I’ve also heard that the judges take so much time on their critiques in the first half of the show that it causes them to rush in the second half To me, this is completely disrespectful of the contestants. But for a one-hour show to run 8 minutes over – well, there is just no excuse for such poor time management for any show, even a live one.

The overrun gave me a chance to see clips of all the remaining contestants. Let me add that the local Fox News station shows clips of American Idol on their newscasts ad nauseam, so I have seen them all before, but the clips they showed last night was like fingernails on a chalkboard to my ears. I cringed at every one. I did get to see the last contestant (Adam Lambert) perform his rendition of “Mad World” - not the original “Tears for Fears” version, but the haunting Gary Jules version. I thought Lambert's performance was absolutely horrid, it was wobbly, and it was off key in places. Yet Simon stood up and announced that words were unnecessary and he was giving him a standing ovation. That's when I made my decision – if that’s the kind of singing that he thinks deserves a standing ovation, it truly is a “Mad World” – and American Idol is off my viewing list this year.

Adam Lambert “Mad World” – Listen at Your Own Risk


“Mad World” Gary Jules Version – Excellent


The Original Tears For Fears “Mad World” Version – Great for is time



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NCIS and The Mentalist, and Why I Don’t Watch American Idol – Yet

I don’t watch American Idol when the season first starts. In the few times I had watched the show early on, I found the negativity overbearing and the bad singing intolerable. But there is another reason why I don’t bother. It’s because the media covers almost every single cringe worthy part of the show the next day. The show is covered in the newspapers, on the morning shows, on talk shows, everywhere. Why waste my time in spending two hours watching something that frankly isn’t entertaining to me?

I’d rather spend my time watching CBS’s NCIS (CBS) and even The Mentalist. I’m still on the fence on The Mentalist, and I admit that I haven’t watched last night’s episode - “Red Rum” – yet. The title alone made me think of poor little Danny in the Stephen King book and movie, whose little inner personality (Tony) kept saying “Redrum”, which read a “murder” when viewed in a mirror.

NCIS delivered a fine episode in ‘Broken Bird” – the story was a bit of a stretch mind you – but it gave David McCallum a chance to show his acting chops by playing the troubled Dr. “Ducky” Mallard. Ducky was carrying years of guilt with him about a death that occurred at his hands while he was in the military. Ducky also had just suffered injuries from a knife attack by a woman who also blamed Ducky for this same death. You just knew things were going to be OK for Ducky when a bird, which flew down his chimney into his home, turned out to have survived rather than died. I am very familiar with the omen about finding a dead bird in one’s home, which is supposed to mean that someone in the house will soon die. My mother told us about it after it happened when we were young and a bird got in the basement and my youngest sister died suddenly a few weeks later. Needless to say we were spooked. And when a starling somehow got into my basement a few years ago – we are still not sure how it got in, as the chimney damper was closed – I took great care to get the bird with a net and release it outside, very much alive. So when Ducky had a bird fly into his living room, and when he thought it had died, I felt a bit of foreboding for him. I was glad to see the bird was fine, just so I could get that silly old wives tale out of my head. But I digress. David McCallum is one of my favorites from years past – I just loved him when I was a kid watching The Man From Uncle – so I was glad to see him given such a central story line. I was also glad when Abby (Pauley Perette) finally seemed to acknowledge her overload with worrying about her teammates by taking a very subdued approach to Ducky’s dilemma. It’s almost like they heard my comments from last week.

I find that "reality" shows like American Idol just don’t offer enough brain stimulation for me, at least at this stage of the game, in order to warrant any investment of my time. When it gets down to the last 10 contestants or so, I will likely record the show so I can watch the performances and feedback segments only. I usually don’t watch it live until they are down to maybe the last 5 people or so. When if there is something better available, I’ll record AI on my DVR to zip past the boring parts. I’m a big music lover, and I just can’t tolerate cringe-worthy performances, much less Ryan Seacrest and the rest of the Idol panel.

So if you’re looking here for weekly American Idol commentary, this is one place where you won’t get it. There is already too much of it out there as it is.



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American Idol Needs Improvement

American Idol is one of those shows that I watch, but only after they’ve gone through the process of eliminating the people who can’t sing. Well, at least one hopes they did. It seems that after they clear out the ones that have zero talent, we’re still left with a group of 12 contestants, some of which really aren’t all that great. I always find it hard to believe that after auditioning many thousands of people, that the group of 12 left is the best they can do.

Inevitably as the process moves along, the singer’s weaknesses and talents become more obvious. This season, the clear star seems to be David Cook, who even if he were to not win, should have a stellar career. The man is clearly talented and a versatile singer, with the style that seems relevant and intriguing to all ages. (I’m in my early 50s and have really enjoyed his performance.) As far as I am concerned, everyone else pales by comparison, but the judges seem to clearly be pumping up the status of a few marginal contestants – and tearing down others - to at least make it seem interesting.

This seemed to backfire on them when, late week, Carly Smithson was voted off the show. Granted, I don’t think Carly could have gone the distance and won, but I think she had a much more solid singing voice than does the breathy Jason Castro. But, Simon Cowell seemed to voice to many concerns about Carly – and he and the rest of the judges (Randy Jackson and Paula Abdul) didn’t work hard enough to be seriously critical of Castro. So here we are, left with Jason Castro in the top 4, and he has shown virtually no growth, range, or depth in his breathy, wispy singing style.

Raising the question of the judgment of the judges was flung into the spotlight when, this past week, Paula Abdul, while providing a brief critique of Jason Castro, commented on a performance that he hadn’t even done yet. Randy tried to explain it away, Ryan Seacrest tried to joke around it, but it sat there like a giant elephant. The next day, Paula tried to explain it away again, and Ryan Seacrest said on the show, “Just for the record: The rumors -- they're not true. She's part of our family, and we love her." Of course, he never said what those rumors were, but I assume that it was either that she was getting fired or she has some sort of chemical dependency problem.

The situation has, in my opinion, intensified the need for this show to undergo some changes. Nothing radical, mind you, just something to bring new life into it.

First, they do need to get rid of Paula Abdul. It’s getting to be embarrassing and even uncomfortable watching here, every week, blather nonsense to the contestants, rarely offering any serious criticism. She seems to frequently say things like “you are you” or “you show who you are” etc., and I find myself scratching my head wondering just what she is trying to telling them. And for her to get so confused to rate a performance that didn’t even happen not only shows how bubble-headed she is, but was an insult to the performer and probably grossly unfair to him as well. Granted, Jason Castro is awful but he doesn’t deserve to be humiliated in such a fashion.

Second, they need to change the judging a bit. My suggestion is that until they get to the final 4, the judges should have some sort of veto power over the popular vote. I’m thinking that of the bottom two vote getters, if the judges think that the voters got the one with the least votes wrong, they should be able to take, for example, the second to the bottom and eliminate them instead. Something like this could have saved Chris Daughtry in a previous season. It could have saved Carly Smithson this season, after all Brook White and Jason Castro were far worse than her.

Bottom line is American Idol is getting a little tiresome and a little too complacent. I’ve read reports (LA Times Article example) that viewship, while still strong and impressive for American Idol, is dipping down. The show is still a huge draw, but clearly it is showing a slow leak. I assume that AI's core demographic is the 18-49 age group, but it seems like the voting is coming from the 11-16 year old age group (considering Jason Castro and David Archuleta are still there). Either they need to find another way for people to vote (via Internet maybe) or they need to raise the level of talent so more adults will participate. The show may be losing the older viewers who may not be inclined to vote via phone, or who may be becoming disgusted with the immature talent. AI also needs to work harder to find the best talent and get it to the top. I think America’s disillusionment is also showing in lackluster record sales for many of the winners, some being dropped by record labels as soon as they can legally do so. The show needs to do something to plug the hole and bring some respectability, and credibility to the show.

And firing Paula Abdul may be the first step to that process.

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