April 19, 2006

"American Idol" -- the results.

NOTE: To read about the most recent "Amercian Idol" results show, click on the "Althouse" banner above and scroll down to the top "results" post.

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I must confess that I adore Ryan Seacrest! He perfectly manages our excitement and makes sure the cruelty is just enough that we feel good about it. Tonight, he creates two groups of three: Elliott, Kellie, and Katharine on one side, and Chris, Paris, and Ace on the other. Then, Taylor -- told he's safe -- is asked to go join the group that he thinks is the bottom three. But first a commercial. TiVo...

Taylor chooses correctly, joining the Elliott set. Then Paris is told she's safe. Surely, Ace is leaving. But if my Chrissy goes... Oh, no! ...

Ah, but it is Ace who is leaving... Which is exactly what we expected. He deserves it.

Aw, Ace, you should never have pulled back your lustrous curls!

Oh, and Rod Stewart sang. He kind of sang badly, but I still have a lot of love for Rod. Take me back, carry me back, down to gasoline alley where I started from.

ADDED: Did you have a vague memory of a show a while back where they used the seventh person the way they used Taylor tonight? I did. I dug out the old post from April 2004:
American Idol: The Outrage. What the hell happened? That was the worst thing ever on American Idol. See my post from this morning for how I read the show last night: I thought Jennifer was the best. I thought the three Divas would be the final three. They were the bottom three! How could that happen? Jennifer was my original favorite, from the first audition. I can only think that the strong praise for the Divas caused people to think they didn't need help, and people speed dialed for two hours for favorites they believed were in danger. I must say they really revealed the results dramatically, telling George to join the safe group, causing him to walk over to the Divas (forming a group that was my predicted final four: George and the Divas), then telling him he'd joined the wrong group. Oh, the outrage!
But Jennifer Hudson is now starring in the movie "Dream Girls." So that worked out rather well.

YET MORE: The final 7 results were also done this way in 2005. Here's my post:
The results will be revealed by bringing everyone on stage into one of two groups and then saying which is the bottom group. We saw this last season in the shocking results show where the three black female singers were grouped and, to our amazement, told they were the bottom. (One of them, Fantasia, went on to win the contest.) So I'm expecting that the group that looks safe will be the bottom, but I can't see how that can happen with these contestants, since clearly Bo and Constantine will not be in the bottom group. Vonzell too. Vonzell goes to the left, Anthony to the right. The right must be bad. Anwar joins Anthony. Okay, then there is no question. Right is bad. Constantine joins Vonzell. What scintilla of suspense can there be? Carrie goes to the left. Scott goes to the right. What about Bo? The groups are even. So he's just told he's safe and then he's asked to join the group he thinks is the top. He goes to the middle. He's not playing games. Why should he take orders?

After the break, we're told what we already know. The Scott, Anthony, Anwar group is at risk. And the loser, as I, and many others, predicted, is Anwar.

32 comments:

Irene Done said...

I think last year when they revealed the results this way, Bo refused to join a group, didn't he?

Jennifer said...

Chris, Paris and Ace were the bottom three? Wow, DialIdol was right on this week!

irene: I vaguely recall Bo going to stand in the middle of the stage and making it into one big group. I think you're right.

mrscotter said...

"Taylor chooses correctly"... You mean INCORRECTLY right?

Jennifer said...

I think she meant he correctly chose the safe group.

Ann Althouse said...

Irene: I've dug out the 2005 version. You were right.

Taylor was trying to drag out his moment with a fake choice of what was obviously the bottom group (because it had Ace in it). Ryan started to tell him he was wrong and he moved, but I think he was on his (slow) way to the Elliott group all along.

Ruth Anne Adams said...

I'm not so sure Taylor was being coy. Kellie was in the "safe group" and she herself admitted "Ah butchered it!" last night. This is Chris's first bottom three and Ace had praise from Simon last night. Taylor really chose wrong, I think and Seacrest directed him to the proper group.

Ann Althouse said...

Now the show gets really interesting. All 6 who are left are really good. I expect to lose Paris and Elliott in the next 2 weeks. I think Katharine, Kellie, Taylor, and Chris are a really strong final four. But the only one I'd bet on to make it to the finale is Taylor. They've never had a finale with 2 guys. I don't believe that will happen. I think the final will be Kellie and Taylor. But Katharine is gaining strength. At the auditions stage she was my favorite... But now she bugs me. Paris bugs me too. Oh, hell, they all bug me. Except my dear, sweet Chris...

Jennifer said...

Oh, hell, they all bug me. Except my dear, sweet Chris...

LOL. There must be a lot of us who feel this way!

LoafingOaf said...

I was with you Anne, "notmyChrisnotmyChrispleasepleasenotmyChris".

What can you possinly like about Chris?? I saw him doing "What A Wonderful World" last night and it was an absolutely lame and boring performance of a song that's so great it seems hard to make so lame.

In general Chris comes off as a completely generic hard rock singer.

Ruth Anne Adams said...

Wasn't there a final with Reuben and Clay? Doesn't that count as "two guys"?

Laura Reynolds said...

The classic love song theme next week could really help someone like Katharine and maybe Paris as well. I think Taylor and Chris are very strong for the final four and maybe final two. Kellie can not afford a "New Attitude" moment, she got one pass by being honest. Katharine I still think has the most potential.

BTW I wonder what Rod's going to cover in his 70s Rock Classic Album he mentioned

Troy said...

Katharine is the most talented. I like Chris, though not in the way Ann seems to (or with the passion). Elliot's Stevie Wonder things makes me like him. My sister-in-law downloaded Taylor's album of covers and it was painfully boring. He entertains on the show, but the CD was gawdawful. I'm glad Ace went and am sure we will see him hosting MTV News sometime soon -- or perhaps he can replace Tara Reid on E!

Simon said...

"The classic love song theme next week could really help someone like Katharine"

No doubt. I suspect having someone with eyes like hers singing a love song to the camera might be enough to have even someone with my contempt for the show phone in a vote for her. Good God, I'm in danger of getting suckered in to this business...

Laura Reynolds said...

Simon,

At some point, I'll admit to watching, just see her sing. Sometime right after the audition..which was actually as good as anyone has sounded on an audition show.

Hecla Ma said...

Taylor chose correctly. I think his magnanimous shaking of Chris' hand was a way to play both sides...and also to acknowledge that Chris is his biggest competition.

I just figured out what I don't like about Taylor. He reminds me of Bill Clinton.

Jinnmabe said...

Simon, just give in to the McPheever. No shame needed. There's a long and glorious American tradition of liking someone just because they're totally beautiful.

Maxine Weiss said...

Too bad you're not as enthusiastic about Desperate Housewives, as you are about American Idol.

Peace, Maxine

Kurt said...

Amusing comments, Jim H. I feel exactly as you do about Taylor.

But I do know people who vote for him--or at least who would, if they vote, which I'm not sure they do. They're two people in my office, and from what I can tell they don't vote the way I do on most other things, either.

I'm afraid Ann is right and that Paris and Elliot will be the next two to go. They're my two favorites at this point. Among the other four, the best one, in my book, is definitely Chris. I'll be interested to see how long Katherine and Kellie remain in the running though.

Emily said...

Ann, I just want to thank you for posting these updates. I badly mismanaged my schedule this spring from an AI-viewing perspective, with evening obligations on Tuesdays and Wednesdays. So I come here first thing the next morning, and the way you write things up makes me feel like I didn't miss it at all.

Ann Althouse said...

Emily, you're welcome. I'm amazed at the traffic I get because of these "results" posts. Google "instalanches" me every Wednesday night. Not that I wouldn't do the "results" post just for the hell of it...

Ann Althouse said...

Hey! Don't avoid the blog! I don't put the news of the ousted person in the post title. Just don't read the "results" post.

Ruth Anne Adams said...

Tim:
I guess you'll have to vote as you see breast. I mean best.

Simon said...

jinnmabe said...
"just give in to the McPheever."

Good grief, they coined a term for it now? LOL. Finding something worthwhile and watchable on AI seems to me like finding a little gem of a floor statement in a statute's legislative history, one which would seem to not only strengthen your case, but make it - yet, even while reading this gem, you know that citing legislative history is the forbidden fruit...

Simon said...

Uh...Yes, I think I did just compare Katharine McPhee to legislative history and statutory interpretation. What? Law can't be sexy? Tell it to Kozinski!

Ann Althouse said...

Larry: That's a very persuasive argument. I agree!

vbspurs said...

I must confess that I adore Ryan Seacrest!

Blech.

Although recently I did find out he was a pudgester, when young, so that might explain his metrosexual good-looks.

Also, I cannot get Kathy Griffin's Bravo channel show out of my mind...

...when she recounted how his antics at an Awards Show, where he cupped her boobs or tore off her dress, or some such, left her mortified.

What a dweeb.

P.S.: Last Idol show I saw was "She bangs! She bangs!" which I've been told, isn't even the real show, just the prelims. I am thus not one of the 80 million Americans who seems to be engrossed by this show -- although fair play to all who are.

Cheers,
Victoria

tjl said...

I think everybody undervalues Paris. Her performance of "Those Foolish Things" proved that she has the ability to build and shape a musical phrase in an accomplished way. Of course at her age, she couldn't have had the life experiences that would allow her to connect with the content of what she is singing, but her future should be promising.

Lonesome Payne said...

Don't understimate Kellie. She clearly has a huge base of guys voting for her. To not even be in the bottom three after that performance: amazing. And like I said yesterday, her audition long ago domonstrated she has a great voice in there somewhere. If she could suddenly harness that, well, she could make a run from the outside on the backstretch. And I do believe she's a natural comedian.

Ruth Anne Adams said...

Paulfrommpls: Your Kellie theory reminds me of that episode of "Partridge Family" where Keith [David Cassidy] hired a woman to sing with the band who couldn't sing at all. He was blinded by her beauty and only realized his mistake when the tape was played back to him.

Art [or, in this case, Pop Art] imitates life [on a TV sit-com].

Lonesome Payne said...

But Ruth Anne - after her audition, I thought "My God, this woman sings a whole lot better than Carrie Underwood!" (who I never liked that much). Haven't heard it since. It may have been an easy song; don't remember what it was. But it's like the return of King Arthur: I retain faith that it just may happen...

And again, the fact that she has never been in the bottom three despite sucking or nearly sucking week after week: some group is clearly mesmerized by her.

Laura Reynolds said...

However talented Kellie may or may be she has a certain charm that gives her an advantage. She seems to react to pressure in an appealing way, whereas Ace reacted by being creepy. How do they say it, "she's comfortable in her own skin."

I too thought her audition (like Katharine's) was better than anything since, possibly because it was a capella without the over production of the band, etc. and shorter. Perhaps they were songs they had sung a thousand times not just for a week or two in rehearsal

vbspurs said...

Are you sure Kathy Griffin was talking about Ryan Seacrest cupping breasts on the red carpet?

Hey! I never mentioned anything about red carpet. ;)

No, I remember catching that D-List show of hers on Bravo, when she said that Ryan Seacrest (who I thought was some quarterback, at the time...!) had humiliated her on the podium during an awards ceremony.

Here is the event, as per anedoctage.com:

Kathy Griffin: Ryan See Breast

During the 2003 American Music Awards, "American Idol" host Ryan Seacrest gave the audience a surprise presaging Janet Jackson's 2004 Super Bowl shocker - by ripping co-presenter Kathy Griffin's blouse open on stage to expose a frilly, black lace bra. Unfortunately, Griffin was equally surprised. "Ryan Seacrest physically assaulted me," she later complained. "Follow me to the precinct, he's going down! Look, maybe I did walk up the freaking stairs like Shania, but Ryan Seacrest took my top off! That would never happen to Shania."

...what made it cool is that Ludacris, or another rapper, I forget, was presenting the next award, and as he passed her on the podium, he genuinely looked stunned, and asked her, "Girl, you okay?".

I'm not even sure Ryan would be all that into breasts........

I think it's pretty much unanimous, with this comment, Corinna.

I don't think one person I have met who has spoken about Ryan, doesn't think he's not effeminate, at least.

And you know, ripping off the blouse of a woman in public seems something a man does who is either (a) a frat boy (b) wants people to think he's really macho.

Cheers,
Victoria