Shout-out to Chris, who e-mailed me to tell me that my "theory" about the Seal of Tsathoggua is similar of a plot to a little-known animated feature from 1983 called Rock & Rule. If somebody on the show sings a Blondie song, mankind is doomed.
Tuesday. Ryan "Pretty Fly For A White Guy" Seacrest, dressed in a ratty old T-shirt that probably cost $250 at a West Hollywood "thrift" store and jeans with those faded fronts, greets us with this week's performers atop the Seal of Tsathoggua. He looks exactly like a desperate guy trying to stave off the aging process by dressing young. If you want to stave off the aging process, cut down on the tanning, dude. And eat something. These kids are gonna sing. You're gonna vote for them. Got it? Good.
Credits. Incidentally, in Lovecraftian mythos, Tsathoggua is served in his underground caverns by a horde of formless, shape-shifting spawn. Doesn't it give the opening credits a whole new meaning?
Ryan greets us again atop the Seal, sans contestants. His shirt reads, "Life is a jungle." I guess he must be trying to stay so skinny so that predators won't have any interest in him. He blathers on about the voting some more and tells us all that Charles Grigsby and Julia DeMato were voted on to the finals last week. They spelled Julia's name right this week. But don't pat yourselves on the back, yet, guys. I sense a pending call from your geography teachers.
Ryan heads over and introduces us again to Randy "Papa Was A Rolling Stone" Jackson, Paula "Holding Back The Years" Abdul, and Simon "Hell-Bent For Leather" Cowell. He also points out that the judges got all their predictions wrong last week. They shrug off their own irrelevancy, knowing that they're at least more important than the judges on Are You Hot?
And though we don't have time to have the kids sing more that a minute of music, we still have time to tease Simon. A tabloid newspaper snagged some pictures of Simon as a younger man in the '80s. At least I'm guessing it's the '80s, because when they show us the pictures, it's all metal hair. I think perhaps Simon's misguided attempt to emulate Freddie Mercury may have played some role in his seeming discomfort around all the gay stuff. Nice muscles, though. Oh, and there's one of him in a blue Speedo. Randy is way too excited about the picture. Ryan and Paula tease him, pointing out that he's "put on few" as he's gotten older. Paula's the last person who should be teasing somebody about the ravages of age.
Ryan heads over to Pimp Central, while at the same time pimping the [product-placed wireless service] that's offering the blah blah text-message-cakes. The kids are here. The families are here, too. I bet they gave them booze this week in the hopes of inspiring a fight. Ryan asks the kids if it's tougher to perform for the camera or for the judges. They all say judges. Of course they say judges. You can't be a fame whore if you're afraid of cameras.
Our first contestant this evening is Clay Aiken, who seems to have developed quite the following despite the fact (or perhaps because) he looks like a cross between Alan Cummings and a troll doll. In a taped interview, Clay reminds us that the judges loved Clay's voice, but thought he was an ugly geek. He tries on a variety of colorful shirts for us, and says he hopes we like his look better than the judges do. The post count on his thread in the forums would seem to indicate a big "yes" on that one.
Clay heads out to the Seal of Tsathoggua wearing a celery-colored shirt and black suit. He will be singing Journey's "Open Arms" as though it's been adapted for a Broadway musical, or perhaps Moulin Rouge 2: Nicole Kidman Dies Of A Cough Again. He gets crashing waves at sunset as a cheesy background. He's voice is good, but he over-enunciates everything. He doesn't inspire much of a response from me. You're all free to worship at the altar of Clay as you choose, but I go, "Meh."
Judges. Paula loves his voice and his whole "vibe." I think by "vibe," Paula means "Y-chromosome." Randy marvels again at Clay's voice. It's really not that unusual of a voice, honestly. I'm amused by their confusion that he can sing well. They're just really generally shocked when it turns out that unattractive people have musical skills. Randy name-drops that he toured with Journey, and says it was a "very nice" performance. Simon blathers on about how he doesn't think Clay looks like an idol, but will leave it to the public to decide. Paula says she thinks Clay is adorable. Simon snarkily responds that Paula just asked Clay out on a date. But Paula goes for it and asks Clay out. Clay says yes. Didn't she learn from Gil? I hope she gets stood up again.
Clay heads back to Pimp Central. For some reason, Clay's mom and brother aren't allowed on the couch with him this week. None of the relatives are, except for one, but only for "comedy" purposes. Ryan asks Clay about his look. Clay blathers that people in Atlanta helped with his look, but the judges didn't like it, so he created his own look for the semi-finals and blah blah blah blah spiked hair-cakes. And blah blah blah blah text-message-cakes. Ryan warns people that if you misdial, you could end up getting directed to some 900 number or something. Heh. Serves them right.
Commercials. up is Candice Coleman. In her interviews, she tells us she's excited to be in the semi-finals for American Idol because she "pretty much sucks" at everything else. Including getting new material, it seems. You already used that line, sweetie. There's a great shot of the vocal coach (I think it's Debra Byrd again) widening her eyes in surprise as Candice shrieks out a note. We see shots of Candice crying as she tells us that she's used to singing with a guitar, not a piano. And that's why you should pick a song that goes well with the piano, not a guitar. Sigh. I'd say that the pianist and vocal coach should say something to her, but I read in an interview last season that Debra's only allowed to coach them on what they choose, not try to influence their decisions one way or another.
Candice heads out to the Seal of Tsathoggua wearing some rags that she used to wash her car earlier. Her green shirt has holes in it, but not for the purpose of showing off cleavage or anything. They're just holes. And she's wearing a scrap of denim as a mini-skirt. Candice's song choice is "Piece Of My Heart," and I would have said that I couldn't imagine a worse song to sing with just a pianist, but then I remember our final performer for the evening. I couldn't even recognize the song at first, because it doesn't sound at all right as a lounge number. Candice has a good, smoky voice for the song, but any positive qualities she may give off in this performance are totally overwhelmed by the way this song just does not work. Nikki couldn't even pull it off with backing music and vocals. Candice doesn't stand a chance. The chorus sounds ridiculous as a solo. Her background graphic features these strange pulsing flashes of light that look like magic effects on a Playstation role-playing game. And now you know what I'm doing when I'm not recapping.
Judges. Paula praises Candice's deep voice. Randy likes the voice, but isn't happy with the song choice. Simon likes Candice's voice, but says she needs to "perform" a bit better. She heads back to Pimp Central, where the captions identify a young woman among the families as "Candice's Friend." No name or anything. Just a friend. Candice blathers to Ryan about how hard it is to sing to a "screen" rather than to an actual audience. Ryan gives the blah blah blah text-message-cakes.
up is Rebecca Bond, 22, from Phoenix. In an interview, Rebecca tells us she won some "Arizona Idol" title and a $5,000 shopping spree, which she declares is "every girl's dream." As opposed to guys, who I guess don't like to buy anything, ever. Then she whines because Simon said she sounded like a cabaret singer. We see a clip within a clip of Simon telling Rebecca that she sounds like Shirley Bassey. Rebecca tells us, "I don't even know who Shirley Bassey is." Sigh. You could have at least Googled her name after the initial auditions so you could at least learn rather than wallowing in your own ignorance. I wonder if she's even aware that she just made a fool of herself. Probably not; fame-whoring requires a certain level of personal obliviousness.
Rebecca hits the Seal wearing a black skirt and a wrap with those tiny mirrors sewn on. That's the best outfit of the night, anyway. But whoever out there in the cosmetics industry is convincing women to blend their eye shadow all the way up until it reaches the eyebrows, please stop. It does not look good. She sings "Caught Up In The Rapture," and is not all that good. Her phrasing is awful and there's no flow. I can't even understand the lyrics at some points. I wasn't very familiar with this song (yeah, I know. But I'm not auditioning to be in the contest, either), and I had the hardest time trying to track down the name of it because I couldn't make out the word "rapture" in the lyrics. I thought it was "caught up in the rafters of love." Well, there have been dumber lyrics, you know. It could have been possible. Anyway, her performance is blah. She gets rippling water for a background.
Judges. Simon says Rebecca has a "smoky, bluesy, cabaret" type of voice, but he doesn't think she's right for the competition. Rebecca begs to diffah. She says she's studied many women like Ella Fitzgerald and Aretha Franklin, and she seems to think that her voice is just as distinctive. Oh, she did not just say that, did she? Aretha and her lawyers compose a legal document that states, for the record, "NOT!" Paula says that Rebecca was a bit "pitchy," but she liked her as a performer. Randy agrees with Simon, and tells Rebecca that she didn't pick a good song and it wasn't as good a performance as from her rounds.
Rebecca heads back to Pimp Central and plops down. Ryan asks her if she would have changed anything about her song choices based on the criticism. Rebecca disagrees with Simon and says that what they call an "older voice," she calls a "more developed voice," and HA! HA! HA! HA! HA! Oh, I'm sorry. I just couldn't continue. A "more developed" voice would require us to understand what you were singing. Unless you're Bob Dylan. Ryan gives the blah blah blah text-message-cakes.
Commercials. Did anybody actually think Kiefer would really kill a little boy? Come on.
When we return, it's time for Jacob Smalley, who is suddenly going by the name Jacob John. These kids and their names. It really shows how misguided they are when they spend more time playing with their stage names than practicing. We see Jacob's two cousins over with the family. Each of them has the same creepy shit-eating grin as Jacob. In his interview, he tells us that he's studying psychology, and reminds us all that he forgot the lyrics during the group auditions in "Hollywood." We see clips of him responding to his mistake by singing about how great Barry Manilow is. That's just to establish that he responds to problems by kissing up.
He heads out to the Seal in a wide-collared rust-red shirt and black pants. His song choice is "Anytime," which I'm sure would have been a good choice for this round if it had been sung by somebody who could, you know, sing. He's off-key from the very first note all the way through the song to the end. I think he's always sharp, but don't quote me on that. And he keeps licking his lips and leering at me. Stop it, dude! You're turning the eye-fucking into something dirty and wrong! He gets a sunset as a background graphic, symbolizing that his time in this competition is rapidly approaching its end with each and every second. He flutters his hand out once like an elderly person with palsy. I'm not sure if he did that on purpose or if he's about to crap his pants with nervousness. Perhaps he knows he's tanking. His performance limps along to a dismal end. Tsathoggua begins to wonder if consuming the world would really be considered an act of evil.
Judges. Paula loves Jacob's penis… er, "performance." She seriously did not hear a single note. She was just imagining the sex. Randy, fortunately, picked up that Jacob was off-key and seems to think he was flat. Okay, he was flat then. Never mind that stuff I said about being sharp. Jacob falls all over himself telling Randy that he appreciates the constructive criticism. He all but offers to get the hairbrush and drape himself across Randy's knee as punishment for his less than stellar performance. There's grace under fire, and then there's submissive obsequiousness. See, you're supposed to pretend in public that there was nothing wrong at all and then go back and fix it in private when nobody else is looking. It's the American way! Simon tells Jacob that he has a nice voice and looks good and girls will love him (which does not seem to be the case), but his performance tonight was simply not good enough. He tells Jacob he needs to "raise the game," and I am so sick of that phrase. Anyway, Jacob sucks.
Back in Pimp Central, Ryan blathers on some more about what "raising the game" means to Jacob. I think Ryan has a tattoo on his right arm. There's a bit of it visible out of the bottom of his sleeve. And let me make it clear that I'm not looking at Ryan's arms. I'm not. It was just really obvious. Anyway, Jacob offers to do "anything" anybody wants, because he's a big fame whore and he will cease to exist if he's not on television anymore. Ryan gives the blah blah blah text-message-cakes.
Commercials. When we return, it's time for Hadas, 21, from Woodland Hills, California. In an interview, Hadas tells us that she loves her dad. Of course, this didn't stop her from dropping her family name as if it were a burning bag of dog poo. Hadas is into fashion and loves to shop. What a fascinating and original young woman she is. She also says people think she looks like Sandra Bullock, and she does. She jokes that perhaps one day people will mistake Sandra for her. Well, with Sandra's career trajectory, that's always a possibility.
Hadas hits the Seal wearing a denim jacket, white thigh boots, and a black skirt made of tattered rags to sing "You Light Up My Life." Auuuuuugh! Oh, the horrific memories that song inspires. In every single crappy chorus recital I either had to attend or [shudder] participate in as a child, the girl with the best voice sang this song. I should specify that "best" doesn't automatically equate to "good." Year after year after year I heard various awful renditions of it. It finally stopped by around seventh grade, but here I am again, listening to this song that I just can't stand. I imagine that most folks born in the late '60s and early '70s had the same reaction. She sounds pretty good, but that song. Aaaaaah! She oversings some of the held notes and is a little too loud. She is also so obsessed with singing directly into the camera that I'm afraid she might fall over as she constantly turns to face and sing into whichever camera happens to be on. The cameramen could play evil tricks on her and put the sky-cam directly over her head, forcing her to sing with her face tilted directly upwards. She gets drifting clouds as her background graphic.
Judges. Paula loved the song and Hadas's rendition of it. Randy thought it was good, but still hasn't been "blown away." Randy says something to Paula, and Paula says, "Yo," causing everybody to laugh at her idiocy. Simon says he's somewhere between Randy and Paula. He tells her that he thinks she's better than some of the "singers" (and yes, he does the air quotes) they had in the top ten last year, but he's not sure if that's good enough to get her to the round. Hell, some of the people in the semifinals last year were better than the top ten. There was this whole big deal about it.
Hadas heads back to Pimp Central, where Ryan tells her that half a compliment from Simon is like two compliments from somebody else. Of course, a full compliment from Simon is generally grounds for sexual harassment from somebody else. Ryan asks Hadas how she prepared. She practiced. Another brilliant interview. Hadas's dad declares that even if she's not the American Idol, she's going to be a superstar. Blah blah blah text-message-cakes.
up is Ruben Studdard. The captioning reveals that he's from "Burmingham [sic], AL." Well, at least they got the state abbreviation right. Ruben explains that he got shirts made with his area code (205) on it along with the non-word "flava," for reasons that bore me into unconsciousness.
He heads out to the Seal, wearing one of his special shirts. For some reason the number 2 is bigger than the 05, giving the appearance that he's giving a shout-out to two to the fifth power. Give it up for thirty-two, people! He's chosen to sing Luther Vandross's cover of "Superstar" again. Ooh, he gets pretty sparkly lights as a background graphic. They're totally favoring him. Honestly, I find Ruben's voice to be just a bit too breathy, and he warbles a little too much. If Charles projected a bit more, I think he'd be a better singer than Ruben. And the stage presence. He's got to figure out something to do other than to reach out to the camera. For variety, he occasionally changes hands.
Judges. Randy gives Ruben a standing ovation. Oh, please. He's not that good by a long shot. He tells Ruben that finally somebody has come in and sung with passion and in tune and blah blah blah exaggeration-cakes. They're building him up like they did Justin last year, and if it's going to turn out that he's not as good as they hoped, they're going to do the same revisionist history type thing like Kelly was the front-runner all along. Paula just wants a hug. When she stands up, we see that she's wearing pleather pants. That's just sick and wrong. Ruben comes over and obliges. After Ruben heads back to the Seal, Simon tells him that he's what this competition is all about. I think that's the mark of death, right there. Not yet, but eventually. And…why? I mean his voice is okay, but I'm not sure why there's this belief that he's somehow more charismatic and personable than the others. He smiles and is blandly nice. So are most of the others.
Ruben heads back to Pimp Central and sits down on the couch, pinning Ryan between his own body and that of his equally large brother. The brother's shirt is giving a shout-out to the square root of 8,836. Ryan pretends that it's uncomfortable being shoved between two large men. Or at least the timing's wrong. That's usually on his schedule for Saturday nights. Ruben says that Simon's comments take a load off his shoulders, and repeats how he's representin' for the 205.
Commercials. The only thing that would "blow my mind" about the Joe Millionaire finale would be if it turned out that everybody involved with the show had unwittingly agreed in their contracts to be sterilized at the end of the series.
When we return, it's time for Kimberley Locke. In her clip show, they repeat Simon's backhanded insult that the competition this year will be about "vocals" versus "image." Because Kimberley is fat. Except she's not. She's not much bigger than Kelly (Eeeeeee!) was in the early rounds last year. But since Simon doesn't want to sleep with Kimberley, she must have a bad "image." Kimberley tells the anonymous show stylist that she has to wear black because she's been put in the fat girl category. The stylist from last year is gone. I'd say she's been laughed out of the industry, but given fashion, I don't think that's possible. She's probably got her own line of clothing now.
Okay, see, if you're going to wear black because you're afraid you're going to look fat, you don't wear a see-through black blouse. Kimberly hits the Seal wearing such a blouse, which really doesn't do her arms any favors. She's wearing a black belly shirt underneath it, and black slacks. If the blouse weren't see-through, she'd look fine. It wouldn't really even need to be black, because the only thing that's noticeably large about her are her hips. Anyway, she's singing "Somewhere Over The Rainbow" for the third time in these auditions. She sounds pleasant enough. Her pacing isn't the best, and some of her held notes are just a little too too, if you catch what I mean. She's drawing a little too much attention to the fact that she can sing. But she's good. She gets a waterfall as a background.
Judges. Randy gives Kimberley a standing O as well. Paula joins him. Randy praises her control and says it was like a "master class" of singing for him. Somebody's been drinking from Simon's well of hyperbole. Perhaps that's why he looks so pissy right now. Paula says she was "blown away" and "mesmerized." And Kimberley doesn't even have a Y-chromosome, so that's quite a compliment from her. Simon says he's not getting the same "buzz" that he got from Ruben. He says that Kimberley was the best singer this round so far, but he thinks that her "personality" is going to be judged if she makes it to the finals, and he rates her personality as a 4.5 on personality, while Ruben was a 10. What? What? First of all, we've hardly seen these people, and second of all, neither of them has shown much of a personality. I'd give them both 4.5s myself. Of course, it's abundantly obvious that when Simon is rating Kimberley's "personality," he's actually rating her "fuckability" on a rather personal scale. Kimberley begs to diffah and likes her personality just fine. Paula and Randy disagree with Simon and milk a fight between him and Kimberley. Randy asks Kimberley to rate Simon's personality. She gives him a zero. Now, now -- "self-absorbed, narcissistic asshole" is a personality. The scale doesn't measure good or bad. Just how much. I'm sure Genghis Khan would score rather high on the personality scale, but I wouldn't want to hang around with him either. Simon laughs. He insists that he complimented Kimberley. Kimberley shoots back that people that criticize other people are usually unhappy with themselves. I guess that means everybody's unhappy. Yeah, that seems about right. Oh, and they say that people who are unable to take criticism become stagnant black holes of mediocrity. Just ask Aaron Sorkin. Simon snarks back that he is unhappy, and points out that those photos at the start of the show indicate what a traumatic childhood he had. Then he snarks that he'll upgrade Kimberley's "personality" score to 5.5 because she's got some "spunk." She says she'd say "thanks," but she can't seem to "find it" or whatever. Paula offers up a high-five at the "dig." Kimberley runs up and obliges. Then she high-fives Simon as well (?) and tells him she used to think he's sexy, but now she thinks he sucks. As she heads out, Simon offers her a six for "personality," now that he's gotten a closer look at her boobs.
Kimberley heads back to Pimp Central to celebrate sinking to Simon's level. Way to go! She declares, "I wasn't going to law school for nothing!" She does realize that if she talks to those judges the way she talked to Simon, she's going to be cooling her heels in a jail cell, doesn't she? "Your Honor, I object on the grounds that you suck." Ryan asks Kimberly how important it is for her to advance to the round. It's really important. Let's give it up for Ryan's mad interview skillz! Ryan has Kimberly give the blah blah blah text-message-cakes.
And now it's time for the [product-placed cola] clip show, featuring the kids exercising and pretending to pull pranks on each other. Why are they pretending to pull pranks on each other when we all know it's completely staged? Why are we being insulted so? They pretend to box with some dummies that have Simon's picture attached to them. Clay rips his off and stomps on it. I thought elves chose violence only as a last resort?
Commercials. I'm not at all surprised at the idea that Courteney Cox loves [product-placed cola] more than she loves David Arquette. Who doesn't?
When we return, it's time for Jennifer Fuentes, who has a rather unfortunate resemblance to Julia DeMato. Hee. They've got captions on the bottom of the screen warning about that 900 number misdialing thing. In her interview, Jennifer tells us she couldn't decide between a slow or fast song. They show clips of her tormenting Schroeder and Debra, who probably want to shriek, "Pick the slow song!" at her, if only they were allowed. But they aren't, so she picks "I Wanna Dance With Somebody" instead. No, really. Really! She tells us, "I just really hope I made the right song choice." I don't think we can call this foreshadowing, because everybody except for Jennifer knows how this is going to turn out.
Jennifer heads to the Seal wearing a black lace-up shirt and matching flared pants. So years ago, my friend Sushi and were fooling around by coming up with experiences that could cause you to instantly lose your mind. I imagine this all ties into the Lovecraft thing as well, but the circumstances have faded. Together, we came up with a concept: you find yourself wandering through an open field at night, when you're suddenly surrounded by strange little aliens with large, glowing eyes. They peer at you and whisper among themselves and jabber nonsensically for several minutes, making you wonder whether or not they're going to take you away and vivisect you or what. Suddenly, they all stop, turn, and stare at you, and burst into an otherworldly, nasal rendition of "Mr. Bojangles" while swaying back and forth. Instant insanity. This is a lot like that. Talk about a song that's not meant to be sung with a solo piano. I can't even judge her singing abilities because this is just so wrong. She's loud and…loud. She tries to work in all the "Wooooo!"s that Whitney sang during the instrumental breaks. In the funniest moment ever in the semi-final rounds, she even turns to the judges and pronounces, "Dance!" at the appropriate moment toward the end of the song. You know, that part where it's normally some guy with some sort of tech filter or whatever. She just turns her head to the judges and goes, "Dance!" Heeeee hee hee! She gets a nighttime cityscape with cars moving in time-lapse as a very busy background. She finally "Wooooo!"s her way to the end as Tsathoggua hunkers down in his cave, fearing that a more-powerful, rival dark god had arrived to torture mankind.
Judges. It's the "Bad Song Choice" anthem. We all know the words, so I won't get into it too much. Jennifer says it was an upbeat song that got her here, so she thought she should stick with that. Randy and Paula give vague criticism, and Simon says he thinks they're being too polite. He tells her that after hearing Ruben and Kimberley, the best thing Jennifer could have done would be to have stayed in that room. Paula turns and smacks him on the arm, quite hard. I'd be all, "Excuse me? If you smack me on the arm again, I'll take a blowtorch and melt off all your plastic surgery." Jennifer declares, "That was mean!" Well, it wasn't nearly as cruel as subjecting us to that singing in the first place, so you can just suck it up. They bicker a bit, but nobody cares.
Jennifer heads back to Pimp Central. She and Ryan blather about song choice. Jennifer hopes we could tell how much fun she was having when she sang. Well, we were having fun, too, sort of. We were laughing, anyway. Let's just leave it at that. Ryan gives the blah blah blah text-message-cakes. Following a recap of the performances (they show the part of Jennifer's performance where she's just going "Woooooo!" Hee!), Ryan reminds us to vote and watch tomorrow and blah. Dance!
Wednesday. A reader has informed me that the Melodramatic Announcer is indeed the same one as last year, and told me that he does the weather for L.A.'s Fox affiliate. I'll have to watch, just to see if he's just as melodramatic: "Today in Los Angeles, who will be able to handle highs in the mid-eighties, and who will have to ask the secretary to crank up the AC?"
Anyway, the kids stand in darkness on the Seal of Tsathoggua as Melodramatic Announcer reminds us that only two will move on tonight. The others will be diced up and pushed through the gratings to feed their dark toad lord.
Credits. Ryan greets us from atop the Seal wearing a black tracksuit from the mid-'80s when teal was considered a fashionable accent color. Ryan tells us all that eleven million votes were cast, rather than saying that there were eleven million voters, and I'll take that as a shout-out. The kids are hanging out on the benches. Ruben is wearing the same 205 shirt, in a different color. Ryan introduces us to the judges, and it seems that Simon is only present as a talking head on a monitor. Perhaps it's product placement for flat-screen televisions? No, it's not. The brand name is actually taped over. Heh. Simon snarks that he's gone into hiding as a result of the pictures they showed of him yesterday. He adds that Ryan's outfit looks good, though I think he's being sarcastic. Ryan tries to suggest that Simon's wearing Speedos again. Whatever. The families and friends are here, too, not that they actually say or do anything of interest during the show. A producer makes a note to offer even more booze week.
Ryan plops down on the sofa to ask Candice and Ruben how they feel. They're fine and/or cool. Candice is dressed like a stewardess from the '70s. It's still an improvement over last night's "outfit." Clay, wearing a plum-colored shirt, says he's gone to the bathroom fifteen times today. He probably had to, with all the [product-placed cola] they're trying to pump into these kids.
We get our time-filling clip show. Oh, it's now a [product-placed car] time-filling clip show titled, "…Look Again." Anyway, I assume you've read the s, so you don't need me to recap the recap. This time they have a screening party at an actual screening room on the lot, because nobody in this group has a home that belongs to any presidential descendents. They watch themselves. Kimberley stands up and cheers to her own really lame comebacks to Simon. How sad. Back at the stage, Ryan asks Hadas if she was comfortable watching herself. Of course she was. She's a fame whore. They drink that shit up like [product-placed cola]. Ryan uses Kimberley's "I thought you were sexy but you suck" dig against Simon for an impromptu [product-placed wireless service] phone vote to be revealed at the end of the episode. Whatever. Everybody chuckles at the poll for some reason. Ryan says, "I know what everybody is thinking in the room." They're thinking that when it comes to Simon, Ryan's the one who sucks? I'm just guessing.
Commercials. When we return, Ryan reminds us that Simon's in a box. Simon reminds us that Ryan is dressed like a moron. Are we all caught up now? Simon says he's in New York, but won't say anything more about what he's up to. My money's on liposuction.
The judges chatter until Ryan hushes them so that he can proceed to tell the semifinalists which ones suck too much to move on. He starts with Jennifer. The judges hated her, and the public agreed. No barstool for Jennifer. Jennifer responds with a sudden gasp of painful shock. She looks like somebody jabbed her with a needle right as Ryan was giving the bad news. How could she not know? It was so bad. She starts bawling, and Candice has to comfort her, which is awkward because Candice is really tiny and Jennifer is practically crushing her as she cries on her shoulder. For Candice, the judges thought she was just okay. The public agreed. She's not moving on. Ruben was treated like a god among men, and the public agreed. He's one of the top three. Rebecca thought attitude was an adequate replacement for enunciation. She was wrong. She's not in the top three. Simon told Clay he sounded like an American Idol, but didn't look like one. But "sounds like" is close enough. He's in the top three. Jacob knows that he's not in the top three because Kimberley and Hadas are sitting to his right and everybody knows that one of the last two have made it. So he sits politely and nods while Ryan reads all the judges' comments, even though they don't matter because everybody knows that Jacob didn't make it. Ryan tells him he didn't make it. Yes, we all know. That leaves Kimberley and Hadas. Then Ryan says, "Hadas, I'm sorry…" She looks at him, confused, no doubt expecting him to throw it to commercial. Then Ryan says, "You're gonna have to wait until after the commercial break to find out who moves on." I have to wonder if Ryan started to give the information before realizing he had to go to a commercial first. Or if he's just being really, really cruel.
Commercials. When we return, Ryan "jokes" that Clay asked to go pee three times in the commercial break. Back to Kimberley and Hadas. Ryan repeats his line from before the commercial break, pretty much indicating that he pretty much nearly did give it away by accident. Kimberley's the final member of the top three, and heads over to the stools to hug the other two. Oh, and Kimberly, black is only slimming if you don't wear shiny pants that are two sizes too small and show off your panty line.
Ryan cues up the pre-recorded judges' predictions. Everybody picked Ruben and Kimberley. Paula refuses to settle on two, and insists on declaring that it will be Ruben, Kimberley, and Clay. Well, they did a better job this week than last week, didn't they? Anyway, Ryan finally reveals the first person to win a slot in the finals. It's Ruben, of course. Ruben comes over to hug Ryan, and then the camera cuts away to the families for just a second and we hear a crunch sound. When we cut back, we see Ryan being crushed in a Studdard sandwich between Ruben and his brother, who has run out onstage. Seriously, you can't even see Ryan for a second. He's encased entirely in manflesh. Ryan finally makes his way out of the hug and declares that's exactly how he wants to die. Not really. But I bet he'll write that in his journal. Actually, he declares that the flesh collision split his lip open. Ruben whispers something in Ryan's ear, apparently telling him that the producers told them to do that. Ryan's all, "Don't blame the producers." Oh, quit whining. You got your damned three-way. So it hurt a little. The pain makes the pleasure all the more intense.
He sends Ruben out to sing "Superstar" again. He sings. He reaches out to the camera. Oh, he points when he sings the word "you," so there's a bit of improvement in the stage presence. When he's done, Ryan brings up Clay and Kimberley and whines some more about his split lip. Waaah! You should see the stuff Jeff Probst has had to do. Quit being such a pussy.
Before we go to commercials, we get the crop of contestants: Rickey Smith, Equoia, Jordan Segundo, Samantha Cohen, Lou Gazzara, Kimberly Kelsey, George Trice, and Vanessa Olivarez. So it's about fifty-fifty on the people who have gotten screen time versus the ones who didn't.
Commercials. When we return, Ryan tells us that Ruben applied a little pressure to Ryan's lip. I don't even want to know. Finally, time to reveal the results of their stupid [product-placed wireless service] poll. Ugh. The people who called in think Simon sucks. Nobody cares. There were probably twelve whole votes. Who the hell is going to take the effort to send in a text message response to such a stupid question? Simon starts blathering about how American got it wrong again and blah blah blah, and after a lot of prodding from Ryan, Paula pulls the plug on the monitor. She waves the plug around, celebrating the fact that she remembered not to read the stage directions out loud and just do what they said.
So now that we're actually past the thirty-minute mark (and thank God I set my VCR to tape until five minutes after the show ends just in case), let's reveal the second contestant for the finals. It's Kimberley. She gives Clay and Ruben hugs. Ryan reminds Clay that he could be in the running for a wild card slot, then gives Kimberly a microphone to sing "Somewhere Over The Rainbow" again. By this point, we're so far over the rainbow that everybody looks like a munchkin. She sings some more, and since we're so far over today, we don't get to hear Clay sing us out. Oh, well.
See you week. And don't forget: Dance!