What’s Hot On TV Tonight - Absolutely No Reruns!
With basketball, March, and Madness nearly over, tonight is filled with not a single repeat to be found on any of the major networks. We continue to have more injuries, as well as kidnapping scares on Dancing With the Stars, so it’ll be interesting to see how tonight’s show pans out, as they’ll surely have ambulances and the FBI at the ready.
1. Regis and Kelly. Hugh Laurie will guest, as well as Michael Sarver, eliminated from American Idol last week. Syndicated, check local listings.
2. Must Love Dogs. A lonely couple meet up with each other through a computer dating site. It doesn’t have as much to do with dogs as it sounds, but is still a cute movie. 9:00 AM CT TBS
3. The Ellen DeGeneres Show. David Spade guests along with Cheryl Burke and Gilles Marini from Dancing With the Stars. 3:00 PM CT NBC
4. Perfect Stranger. Psychological thriller with Halle Berry out to prove Bruce Willis is a cold-blooded murderer. Note: Balki is nowhere to be found here. 6:10 PM CT Starz 2
American Idol - Performance Order Snaps at the Top 10
It’s the second week in a row of perplexing results on American Idol. Allison Iraheta has been burning up the stage, and Matt Giraud has been building in popularity after a great start. Since the final 13, Allison has been the only consistently good female, and Matt has been one of the top males. So how do those two both end up in the bottom three the past few weeks? Is it performance order?
Let’s examine the bottom three/four the past three weeks. The bottom four the first week of finals were Jasmine Murray, Anoop Desai, Jorge Nunez, and Megan Joy. They sang in the positions of fifth, eighth, ninth, and tenth, respectively. These folks couldn’t have been more mired in the middle, and the contestants in the fifth and ninth place went home.
The following week, we had a bottom three of Michael Sarver, Allison Iraheta, and Alexis Grace. They sang in the positions of first, second and seventh, it came down to the people in first and seventh, and the person in the seventh position went home. It seems the people that performed in the beginning were forgotten about, and then the person that was mired in the middle again went home.
American Idol - Motown Update
Reports have been coming in throughout the day of the top 10 on American Idol traveling to Detroit. With the theme of Motown next week, they traveled to the birth of Motown, Hitsville USA, in Detroit and met up with Berry Gordy, Jr. and Smokey Robinson who will act as this week’s mentors.
Hitsville USA is quite an amazing place. It was just a little storefront that Gordy used to begin Motown, starting it from scratch in 1959. I read his autobiography several years ago, and it was a fascinating read, as he recalled all the people that had passed through those doors and became stars.
The only two Idols to not make the trip to Detroit are Megan Joy and Michael Sarver, who are now both sick, and too sick to travel at that. I’m not sure how Michael got sick now, and if he ended up catching Megan’s flu, but he has to be thinking his luck has to improve after this, after nearly getting voted off, then catching a bad flu preempting him from leaving LA to meet up with such legends as Gordy and Robinson. I’m guessing she’s still pulling her Phoebe routine, and is probably licking Michael’s drinking glasses trying to remain sick in order to keep helping out her performances.
Matt Giraud was even more happy to travel to Detroit, being a Michigan native. How cool would it be to leave the state as a dueling piano player from a club and return an American Idol?
It’s kind of funny watching the video, as with six guys and just two girls traveling, it just seems very testosterone heavy. Now it’s time to start guessing. Which Motown songs do you think we’ll hear next week?
Photo courtesy of Fox
For more information on American Idol, see Reality Shack, SirLinksalot: American Idol and American Idol Headlines.
American Idol - How Quickly We Turn
If you would have told me a few weeks ago that Alexis Grace wouldn’t make the top 10, I would have laughed in your face. After week one, she was our darling, and leading into the top 13, she was widely thought of as either the top female or at least sharing that spot with Lil Rounds. Yet, she had one questionable performance, and she was taken out without another chance.
To counter this, last week Anoop Desai could have easily gone home after a similarly questionable performance. He had a similar fan base, yet hadn’t even gotten voted through by us, making it be the skin of his teeth as an “extra” wild card. He was in the bottom four last week, but survived, and this week he had such a phenomenal performance, He came back and made it all up to us, making us forget last week all together.
Yet with Alexis, she wasn’t afforded that opportunity. She had no second chance, even though she was one of our darlings leading into this. She had one bad performance, and we cut her off at the knees. I was glad Michael Sarver stayed, as he’s been a favorite of mine, yet I was surprised he did. He didn’t seem to have the same fan base leading into this. The fact that Allison Iraheta rounded out the bottom three was a complete shock. I had her rated as my top female this week.
For some reason, though, at this point in the competition, it’s usually not those at the bottom of our heap that leave. It’s usually those at the bottom of the middle. The ones that we forget about that are neither really bad or really good, They just aren’t great that week and are forgotten about, meaning actually it could have been either Alexis or Michael. He wasn’t bad at all this week, and did have a fun song, but by the end we certainly didn’t remember it anymore since he went first. By contrast, Alexis went towards the end, and we remembered that. She also committed the cardinal sin of singing a song done just last year by an American Idol. It was all too easy to make comparisons between her bad performance and Brooke White’s good one.
We have to now look at the odds, too, and realize there were just four girls left at this point, compared to seven guys. For two of those four to appear in the bottom three, and for one of them to leave, that is astounding. That means six of the guys received more votes than two of the girls, and all seven guys received more votes than one of the girls. Kara DioGuardi had tipped us off that it was going to be a guys season, and she couldn’t have been more right.
Finally, what has happened to our Carrie Underwood? It’s as if once she joined the Grad Ole Opry, they figured instead of wearing Minnie Pearl’s hat, they could just slap any monstrosity on her head, then give her a bouffant ‘do and make her look like a Mandrell sister.
Photo courtesy of Fox
For more information on American Idol, see Reality Shack, SirLinksalot: American Idol and American Idol Headlines.
American Idol – Our Memorable Top 3
We have our first three of the American Idol finalists, Alexis Grace, Michael Sarver, and Danny Gokey. Most fans are happy with Alexis and Danny, but not everyone is happy to see Michael making it through, as they would have preferred Ricky Braddy or Anoop Desai, and while it’s true they showed better voices on Tuesday night, sometimes it comes down to more than that.
Alexis Grace really didn’t have much competition for top female of the night. She showed personality and voice. She had a lot wrapped up in that small package, unlike her first audition. Her voice back then was pretty good, but not memorable, and her look was especially not memorable. They told her to dirty it up a little, and it’s probably the best advice she’s ever gotten. She became memorable, and at the same time she’s relatable. She picked a song we could relate to and showed ample personality in her voice, outfit, and performance. My 12-year-old daughter related to Stevie Wright, based on age, and Alexis, based on probably appearance and personality. None of the other females had stellar performances, nor that total package.
Danny Gokey is another easy pick. He was memorable to us for two reasons, his story of his wife passing away just before the auditions, and his best friend, Jamar Rogers, that joined him in Hollywood and stayed close, all the way to the final 36. When he didn’t make it through, fans of theirs were pissed. Danny was always seen as the better talent anyway, and now fans sympathized with him over his wife, and now his friend as well. In addition, Danny didn’t disappoint with song choice, performance, or story. He also brought the emotion into it, as he always does, and we could feel it. He was a lock.