After the Nation-Wide Vote, Simon Wins

by Mordant Monkey

Danny Gokey had to wait until after the break to find out that he had made the final 12 instead of Tatiana Del Toro.

“Is your favorite through? Take nothing for granted,” Ryan warns us as he walks past the darkened line of the twelve who performed last night. We are live, and Ryan announces that the show got an unprecedented amount of votes: 24 million, which is almost 10 million more than at this point in the show the previous year.

“Who did you like?” Ryan asks the crowd, and there are a lot of screams, mostly “Danneeeeee!” The twelve are sitting off to the left, and off to the right are the judges, whom Ryan introduces to us. And then things start to get weird.

Randy gives us a peace sign, and Kara has a freakish permagrin on her face. Paula looks tousled, and Simon has a big smile. Randy says that the show last night was a good one, while Kara admits to us that she was disappointed with several of the performers, mainly Stevie, Casey, Stephen, and Simon. Paula and Randy agree that they were disappointed with Simon, and then Ryan pipes up with, “We’re not talking about after the show, guys—during the telecast!” The judges “oooh” and the audience “ooohs” and I groan because I can see this is going to be a long, drawn-out, and painful exchange. The judges look embarrassed, and Ryan just can’t keep a straight face throughout. Randy reminds Ryan that this is a PG program, and Ryan exclaims, “Dinner!” and then starts the shit all over again by asking how the judges would rate Kara’s performance last night. As in, nudge nudge wink wink know what you mean know what you mean. Now it’s just straight uncomfortable, and Kara screeches, “Oh god Ryan, what are you trying to do here?” and Simon just doesn’t seem to get it, because he says, “What, at dinner?” in a typically English way. Kara shouts that they didn’t go to dinner, and then Simon finally catches on and gives her a look, and then Kara gives him a look, and once that’s over with, Simon says that Kara was amazing and unprecedented. And then they remembered that there were twelve people waiting to hear would they be staying or going and got back to the actual point of the show, which was to give the results. Jesus H.

They spend some time showing each of the twelve’s journey as such, and then onto the group sing number, which is “I’m Yours” by Jason Mraz. At least they gave them something contemporary to sing. Michael Sarver, Brent Keith, and Anoop Desai are in the first group. Michael and Brent could be brothers, honestly. One of them, Michael I think, is moving awkwardly, and then Danny, Stephen, and Ricky are up, with Danny’s staring eyes that are somewhat freaky.

The girls move up to the front, and of course there’s Tatiana undulating grotesquely in a silver sequined dress and everyone else looking normal. Jackie is making rap-like moves with her spare hand, Alexis Grace is wearing Von Smith’s hat, and all of the girls are screaming, not blending. Then there’s dancing, or at least a sort of dancing, Danny and Stevie being cute toward one another, Anoop being awesome, and they’re eventually done.

“A little anxious?” Ryan dickishly asks the group, because you know they’re all dying. Then there’s a rehashing of the performances: Jackie spazzing out all over the place, Ricky being smooth and cool, Michael murdering Gavin DeGraw, Stevie sucking it up but being cute with it all the same, Casey sucking even worse and with horrid faces to go with it and then crying afterward, Stephen not forgetting the words to “Rock With You” but making us wish he had, Brent singing a wretched country song, Tatiana not sucking, Anoop rocking us, Ann Marie feeling like a natural deer in headlights, Alexis wearing a slip and her mother’s pearls, and then Danny being a hero and inspiring us to have hope.

Ryan asks Jackie how she would rate her performance, and she bravely gives it a 91. Out of, like, 100? Seriously? Ryan then focuses on Anoop, who says that everyone is really relaxed about getting the results and that it’s no big deal, and Ryan must be watching Lie to Me because he totally calls his bluff, and Anoop then says, “I am the most nervous I’ve ever been,” adorably. Ryan pats him on the shoulder and says, “God bless you.”

Tatiana and her horrible day-glo pink lipstick and yellow teeth say that they’re all humbled to be here, and Ryan says, “I know you are. I know you are,” in that particular tone of voice one uses to calm feral animals and rabid children. She’s still wearing Paula’s jewelry, and she repeats her dream for America and then gnashes her yellow teeth again. Ugh.

Stevie tells us that she is confused because at first she sang an old song and got killed for it by the judges, who told her to sing a younger song, which she did, but the judges didn’t like that, either, so now what the hell? Ryan winningly points out that it’s like being in a relationship. Maybe like a relationship with someone who’s manic depressive.

Casey is called to center stage first and has a resigned look on her face. She knows what’s coming as well as we do. She admits that she should’ve picked a different song, but she had fun. Randy praises her for being smart enough to agree with the ever-so-intelligent judges, and … I want to vomit, but Randy also says he doesn’t think she should stay on the show. Which she doesn’t.

Stephen is next in the hot seat. After shaking his hand, Ryan notices that it’s soaking wet. Ryan goes over how truly horrible “Rock With You” was, and Stephen just looks stoned. Ryan asks Kara if Stephen did enough to stay in, and she says no. And Stephen is not in the top twelve, either. Shocker!

And then Alexis! Who, besides Tatiana, had the best vocals the night before, and I’m thinking she made it. At least she has a way better chance than the previous two. Ryan chatters with her for a minute and then asks Paula if Alexis came out of her shell enough, and Paula says, “Oh yeah!” And Alexis has made it—she’s our first top-twelver. She bends over and puts her hands to her mouth and looks blown away, which is cool, and then Ryan tells her, “You could be the next American Idol!” and she replies, “I know!” which was kind of weird, but okay. Then she sings her song again, and her parents kiss each other, and that was cute.

Ryan now brings up Ricky and Jackie, and they hold hands as they wait for the ax to fall. I have a bad feeling Ricky will be leaving us. Jackie says she thinks she did great and that she disagrees with Simon 100%. Ominously, Simon intones, “We’ll see.” Heh. The crowd “oohs” and then all of the sudden Ricky is out without getting even a single word in, which sucks. Then Ryan tells Jackie, “After the nation-wide vote, Simon wins.” Heh again.

Anoop and Michael come up with their arms around each other. Uh oh. I have a bad feeling. Kara and Randy say they like Michael even though they didn’t like the song, and then Michael is asked to describe what it’s like being up there, and he says that his heart is pounding out of his chest. Anoop is rubbing his palm on his pantleg and admits he’s nervous again, and the person going through is … Michael, who literally collapses on the ground and cries, and his wife cries, and his mom cries, and then Michael tells Ryan that the guys at work back home either think he’s a sissy or they’re proud of him. Michael sings his song again. Sigh.

Well, with two out of three spots being filled and we know Danny has the third, I can see the show doing a Danny-Tatiana face-off and her losing and then coming back as a wild card, because you know we couldn’t be lucky enough to never hear that horrible cackle again, right?

Ryan hawks the new American Idol Experience at Disneyworld in Florida, and then for some strange reason Carly Smithson and Michael Johns are back from last season to sing “The Letter.” Why? Why, in god’s name? Carly looks like a young Elvira, Michael Johns looks like an Australian undertaker, and the song is so old-fashioned that I’m just confused to hell why they’re performing it. We were doing so well with Jason Mraz, I thought.

Anyway, the two ghosts of seasons past finally finish up and get the hell off the stage, and Ryan has Ann Marie, Brent, and Stevie stand up. Briefly he explains the many ways in which they sucked it up all over the place the night before and then asks Randy to size up these three. Randy says “neither” of them will make it through, which … I didn’t need any more ammunition to prove that Randy and the English language are at odds with each other, but if I did …

Well, we’re down to Danny and Tatiana now, predictably. Danny is cool, for now at least, and Tatiana is almost losing her shit for real and can’t speak or answer Ryan in English. Paula says Danny deserves to be in over Tatiana, which pretty much sums it up, and then Ryan says that we’ll find out … after the break! There’s an absolutely priceless look on Danny’s face that clearly says, Oh give me an effing break, Seacrest, while Tatiana continues to fall apart in a million tiny and different and exquisite ways.

When we come back, Tatiana rambles on for a bit about things being up to god and faith and psychics and then Danny literally tells Ryan that all he wants in the effing world is to find out the results so can we just get on with it already. Ryan announces that Danny will be staying, which is no surprise to anyone, perhaps, but Tatiana and her psychic. Tatiana hides her horrible yellow snaggleteeth in Ryan’s coat, and then Danny sings again, and all the camera does is focus on Tatiana, who’s now back with the group but is officially wigging out, sobbing hysterically. Well, it’s just a damn shame, because you know she’s coming back as a wild card.

Next week’s shows are Wednesday and Thursday evenings at 8 p.m. in deference to the State of the Union address. We’ll get to see Megan Corkrey, Adam “Wicked” Lambert, and my boy Norman Gentle, along with nine others we’ll probably never see or hear from again.