The opening moment is ten times more dramatic than ever before, with shots of one microphone with a white spotlight juxtaposed against various dramatic statements by the Judgery. It's "true genius," as Paula would say, or "artistry" as Kara would. Mostly it's just very, very good television. Also good television? The fact that tonight's guest stars are Lady Gaga and David Cook. If you want the kids on this show to look into the prostitution eightball and see what magical fates await, that really is the dilemma, isn't it? Lady Gaga is the burnt-out sex-theme park robot creature this show wants, and David is the naïve, compromised artist to which the show pretends to aspire in its better moments.
Randy says the incredibly sensible fact that maybe giving these kids the theme of "Anything Or Whatever" might have been a tad ambitious for everybody concerned, and Ryan does some cleanup as far as the idiots that yelled at Kara last night. (Main idiot was supposedly Megan Joy's brother. -- Angel) She gives yet another canned speech, this time about how getting heckled is actually a sign that she's a part of the family and doing her job and being the hardass that she so continually tries to be. To lots of boos, ironically. Kara, don't sweat it. Getting booed even ten percent of Simon's boos means you're fifty times better than the other two. Paula says something about conviction and enthusiasm and does the cleanup thing after her particular love of Adam last night, saying that all of them are super great. Ryan asks Simon who should be worried: Anoop, Matt, and Megan. And he'll stop there, because that's ... all he needed to say.
I get a lot of letters about how smart or funny something was, when really it's just about echoing back whatever the reader wants to hear. Always. If I diss on Danny Gokey I get love from people who hate him, and hate from people who love him, and these things are nominally about my writing, but it never seems to make the jump to "Maybe I only think that was [funny/brilliant/shitty/poorly written] because it happened to [agree/disagree] with what I was already thinking." It's rarely if ever about me, with which I am superfine: I read the Huffington Post once a week at most, because I already know what it's like to agree with me, because like any other human being I know I'm right; I'm more interested in finding out about people that don't. I am way more interested in what Coulter or Fox News is saying, but I have noticed that most of my friends are all about Common Dreams and whatever, because it's nice to have your shit echoed back to you. And yeah, sometimes it is, and that's good. It's good to have facts to back your shit up, for example.
So at this point I'm barely sure that I actually admire Simon Cowell, because he always says what I'm thinking, and to say that he is brilliant on those accounts is to say some not-so-flattering things about myself. On the other hand, what if he is always right like I think he is? You would not believe how many emails I get on a daily basis that start, "I don't always agree with what you say..." Like, why the fuck would you? I am nothing special; certainly not an expert about anything beyond my endlessly fascinating self. I'm hopefully funny, that's about as high as I care to reach. But my neuroses, for once, will have to be put on hold because mostly I am just curious: Do I love Simon because he's always right, or because he says what I think, or because he says things I was about to think? After sixteen billion years, am I a good judge of Idolness or just a good judge of what Simon's going to say, or are we both fairly decent guessers of what the voters will do? And are any of these things really skills I needed to develop in myself? Is there a way I could ever legitimately spin that into bank, especially in today's economy?
I think I just love him, I don't think it's that complicated actually, but it's good to keep yourself on your toes. Anyway, what the fuck is this happening now? The nine people going all Ugly Betty on each other's faces, flipbook style, singing some crappy song while it's Adam's girly eyes over Lil's sort of manly mouth, Matt's stubble under Megan's eyes etc. Not quite as horrifying as the time they were puppets but pretty much just as ill-advised.
The group song is one of my all-times, "Don't Stop Believing," which I experienced live last summer thanks to my friend Joelene, who took me to Journey at the Backyard and pretty much changed my life. It seems less lip-synchy right now than it has weeks past, which is nice... Oh, except for Scott, who makes it very clear indeed that they are lipsynching. Well, it was nice to believe for one moment. I don't care to care, because this song is great and it's not in any way interesting as an arrangement: here's nine people singing in chorus a wonderful song, with people taking various lines for their solo. Thought they were doing it live, had to stop believing. Directly contradicting the song. ( Randy was supposedly in Journey, for a hot minute, or so he constantly claims. Why didn't they let him play with the kids and show off these bass skills he's always bragging about? -- AC)
Allison and Gokey are pretty much the standouts, along with obviously Lambert doing his whole deal, so that's nice. Then lots of fists in the air, because don't stop believing, and it's over. Way to pair the most awfullest pimpmercial with the best group sing in a really long time, show. Wednesday really is learning. And there's a nasty Mickey Avalon part of me that is sort of dying to see Lady Gaga, and what she's wearing or not wearing. Whoever decided, I know I keep talking about this, but whoever decided that Results Night needed to be jacked up with fifty stupid crazy things is my hero.
Man, I've been watching these April Fools things on Fox all night, seems like a year. You know what's not funny? Watching the dicks at Fox trick Dekker into gaying out. Seeing Dushku go into total stoner mode about a douche in a bearsuit. The perfectly perfect Olivia Wilde, Brian Austin Green and Summer Glau separately going, "What? This was already irritating. Where the eff is craft services, since apparently this take was worthless? Momma needs a pastry." I have never seen anybody as annoyed as the cast of Sarah Connor when that stupid spot got blown. Ugh. I don't need to see somebody's digestion system in action to understand how food works, and I don't need to see the tiny House sets poking me with how he's not real, and I really don't need to see Eliza doing a worse job at pretending to be a human being than she already does every week on that suddenly awesome show of hers. It's April, and the only fool is Fox, but we knew that already and I tell you what, if anybody pulls that shit on Ryan I will cut a bitch. He is a busy boy.
Ryan asks the kids if they are dead yet and talks about how crazy their lives are now, and then they do that exciting thing they do each year about how "This is what their week is like." ...Except they don't actually tell you that, but just kind of do a bunch of soundbites in no order: Allison blabbing, Kris being sexy from a multitude of angles, Lil Rounds and her dreams and kids. They talk about photo shoots, which Scott loves and Anoop of course is too good for, and then they all sing together not that we'll never really hear it. Matt does awesome impressions of everybody apparently -- which Ryan loves -- but the money shot is Danny with one hand on his chin giggling "He does me better than I do myself!" Because God forbid anybody outshine his divalicious ass. There's a chef that comes three times a week, which makes Adam feel like a Princess of Bel-Air, and printed menus. Their chef looks like Steven Segal with white hair. Basically, it's like an ad for how they all live in this awesome mansion with a staff, but without the actual interesting part of how they live in a mansion with a staff.
Back onstage, Danny does an "impression" of Matt singing Coldplay that is straight-up nasty and goaty and mean; Anoop does some yelly stupidness about Kris; Allison does a sexy breathy joke about Danny doing "PYT" that is unrelated, and then Danny begs her to sing "Jesus Take The Wheel" like he does it, because he can't handle being out of the shot for even one second, and she obligingly sings it, again just like herself. Ryan's like, "You guys get along so much better than years past," apparently because they can be dickholes while laughing instead of just doing it, but I don't see how any of this is A) relevant or interesting or B) not about Danny. Some more. What an exceedingly ugly, tacky little moment for everybody. I think the point is how fun they are, but that isn't fun, that's just icky. Nobody's a winner in this moment. (I'd rather have this than the viewer calls though. -- AC)
Megan stands up and then Matt alongside her, then Kris. So that's a good spectrum of Not Going Anywhere, Hidden Awesomeness, and Abomination. The second trio is Adam, Lil, and Allison. None of whom should be going anywhere, except maybe Allison just for not always bringing it, and because I worry. Ryan, are you doing that thing where the person has to pick? Isn't that seven people? Anyway, Scott, Danny and Anoop are group three, who I think are all pretty much safe and don't deserve it. So Ryan says one of these groups could be the B3, after David Cook sings.
So obviously the bottom three is Megan who sucks taint, Matt who should win this shit but never will, and Kris who is too many things happening at once, very softly, to ever matter. And I would say based on the fact that they are secretly awesome that they are both safe but in the bottom three, and it's Megan that's gone. But then, I got spoiled and know the facts, so I will only privately pat myself on the back. Because obviously Adam and Lil are okay, so Allison is fine, and Scott and Danny save Anoop by being with him, so either it's Megan or it's my actual favorite, Matt, or my Stephenie Meyers hormonal fantasy boyfriend (and secretly legit) favorite Kris, either of which would cause me to flip out, and they already did that last night, so there you go. Which means in two weeks we'll get to see Danny Gokey do his spin on the "Which group is safe?" thing, which would make even a non-douche look like one. I am frothing for it.
Anyway, now it's David Cook singing Danny Gokey's song for week "Please Come Back To Me." How's Cook doing? Well, he's got dumb chains hanging from all his places like Anoop last night, which is annoying. His melon, it has not smallened any. He looks eerily the same, actually, down to the facial hair. He's wearing the Seacrest black-on-black suit that I always love, and his voice is either exactly as perfect or slightly more perfect as it was last year, and his stage manner is either just as annoying and sexy or slightly more of these things. If we learned anything from last year it's that I couldn't pull a sentence together about David Cook if I even tried, and the best thing about him is the complete disinterest you get in trying. I love him, I don't particularly like him, I don't know what's more important, and somehow I think that's key to pop music. The song is perfectly performed, of course, which almost distracts from the innate shittiness of the song, which is only there because like the Qu'ran there must always be something wrong with David Cook or else we shunt to a Day After Tomorrow scenario where California is buried in feral shrieking internet-troll panties.
At a very fake-ass "we love you" from a group of grown-ass audience women, he gives the same answer he's been giving for a year -- "Not as much as I love you," not that I've been watching it on YouTube for the last year or anything -- and it's still totally fake, or gets as much screaming and approval as it always does, and then David says that he's really lucky to have performed for the troops and Hillary Clinton and blah blah he's still in the bubble of thinking his career has become real. Then Ryan brings out a platinum record from 19E and Virgin, which disproves that I guess, and he cries.
David tells a story about how his solo record before the show sold a grand total of 1000 copies in a year, and now after this circus it's wild to sell a million copies in three months. Which yes, is exciting, but also has just as little to do with David Cook, the man, as that absurd eyeliner they keep scrawling across his lovely face whenever they get the yen. Success is good, keeping your wits is better, and I'm still wondering what's going to happen. Needs hugs, send now.
Kris/Megan/Matt. Kris's "Sunshine" was clever and cool if you're new to the concept of covers, but was legitimately his best performance to date, even though that's still not half of what he's capable of. After the vote and the screaming, he's safe. Matt's "You Found Me" was judged soundalike, but Kara and I agree that he needs to stay here because he's my favorite. This week, he's once again supposed to take a seat... On the couch, because April Fool he's safe. Which leaves Megan, whose "Turn The Lights" was boring, indulgent and monotonous. Paula imagined she has a softer side she can show, and Megan straight up tells Simon she doesn't give a fuck what he says. Simon, wisely, explains that this is not true. But how sweet it is about to get.
Ryan sends Megan to the stools as the first of the B3, and she... Caws her way there, just like the spazzy weird trash she is determined to be. Flapping her arms and ducking her head and acting like she has literally never been in public before. My God, just go home to whatever hell it is you've created for yourself. I thought I was done and then you installed a secret basement level of Go Fuck Yourself. How awful do you have to be before the blonde/giant boobs thing reveals itself as a joke and you just actually become as unattractive as you are? Caw, caw, caw? Right about then? Go get a tattoo of yourself acting like a jackass and we'll talk.
Adam/Lil/Allison. Lil's "I Surrender" was pretty much boring and not even trying, but of course she's safe -- and looking fabulous! -- even though Simon looks like he's about to start secret cutting. Allison looked retarded and pretended to be fake and stupid, but it was not really pretending, and she will keep doing that shit, and I will keep loving her regardless. She's actually in the B3! So it's stupid hair, stupid tats, and I really hope stupid Anoop to come. Adam was compared to Jagger and Jesus and all the other rockstars of history, and is safe.
Scott/Danny/Anoop. Out of every one of the thirty thousand songs available in this non-category of "songs that happened one time," Gokey chose to sing Rascal Flatt's "My Wife Is Dead So My Singing Is Irrelevant." It just happened that way, who knows why. And this gave the judges goosebumps, unreal expectations, and excitation, so he's safe. He treats the other safe people as his personal dogpound, sucking every second of attention out of the live show once again. Scott was just like himself, but slightly less boring; Anoop sang a stupid song stupidly, and then acted stupid. Randy says out of the two of them, Anoop was shitty and Scott was slightly more awesome than he was boring; Anoop agrees that he deserves to go over Scott, and Ryan puts Scott down on the couches, so Anoop is on the stools.
So that is the B3, but let's ignore that for a billion years so Lady Gaga can play docent to her own vagina and Ryan can stretch out the two safe people for awhile before one person is going home, but not really because what if they're safe. Except they won't be, because Allison did not get less votes than the other two, and neither of the other two is worth saving. So it's going to be the Megan show, which would be bad enough, after the Gaga show, which is going to be monstrous, and then the judges will say she's going home, which we knew about halfway through last night, so what a waste of time all of this will once again turn out to be.
Ryan takes a while spitting out the "great" part of "great performance for you" introducing "Poker Face," with Lady Gaga in her same space hooker outfit playing a piano like she's having a spastic attack and singing in a way that's at least as weird as Megan. And you know what, she's not even cute. She's an ugly girl in pretty-girl drag. And so after some spazzy preliminaries, those hugely gay dudes from the "Vogue" video come out and act like dicks, and then ugly ass Lady Gaga comes out and does this robot-dancing "Thriller" video with smoke and claws in the air. Gross me out. Even when it gets to the part of the song that is awesome -- because make no mistake, I fucking love her music -- and the dancing clears itself up, it's still sounding horrible and gross. Here you go, Idols: this is the best you can hope for. week, the Pussycat Dolls. Still interested in being on this show? Still keeping that lunch down? Then you're going to win.
Lady Gaga talks, and "sings," and talk-sings, like one of Meadow's ugly friends from The Sopranos. She always performs like it's a dead-eyed Bar Mitzvah favor to somebody her uncle knows that feels sorry for her and wants to bone her, and in the end they all freeze and she's got a black leather zippered thing over her left eyeball and she's staring at the camera like she just did something worth doing, and it was so hardcore can you even handle it. And no. It was cheesy and gross, because she is gross and cheesy and this show is so totally effortlessly gross and cheesy, and there's not a huge difference between Lady Gaga and Heidi Montag besides Fake Jesus, and it makes me want to barf when I have to watch it happen.
On the other hand, it was not as gross as I thought it was going to be, because Lady Gaga is an algebra problem where X = whore and Y = weird and how many miles do you have to paddle per hour to get up the stream to where actual artistry occurs when the crosswinds are this direct and contradictory and you have the native intelligence of an in-heat Siamese with a lobotomy. I don't care how silly Jordin Sparks is, or how boring Mariah Carey is, I would rather leave my daughter with them for the day then ever let her see Lady Gaga doing this shit without having earned any of it. She's like a Deep House Dish guest on SNL but without any irony whatsoever, which is pretty much like telling third wave feminism she shouldn't have dressed like that. It hurts every part of me. And twenty minutes from now, you can bet I'll be saying she's awesome and revolutionary and crap like "If U Seek Amy" is a phoenix rising from the thing, but right now? Shit makes me tired and hateful.
So the bottom three are Anoop, Megan and Allison. I can handle that. Allison is safe, which I can definitely handle, and then the B2 are exactly who they should be, because way to not even slightly try this week. Megan tells us that it's "okay" when she's eliminated, because yeah, it is. Somebody caws out in the audience, quite loud, and then Simon goes, "You don't care? We don't care. We're not even going to pretend to care or think about giving you the PoV, so enjoy singing your horrible song, horribly, for no reason whatsoever." Whoa.
She goes Hell Yeah, and then gets after it, turning up every tic and weird enunciation and tribble-throated awfulness and wing-flaps and ugly phrasing and strange pointy-poses and completely lack of range or ability to sing on key, all these things turned up to eleven. Which is awesome, because it affords us the opportunity to picture her toddling off into the distance, nobble knees shaking, stupid cork wedgies turning under her ankles, gross tattoos and weird ill-fitting clothes hugging her like a big stupid blanket.
We may never understand why she was here, or made it into the Top 9 or the tour, and we can assume she doesn't either, but we can at least always think of Megan this way: warbling and cawing and shaking and vibrating and swinging her boobs around like delightful hula hoops. Acting like a TV movie of somebody moving out of the home to make it on her own: I know that's how I'd like to remember her. XOXO.