...but here's what I posted on a Project FOX forum about this season of American Idol:
I've been watching Idol since the first episode of the first season. I've run an Idol pool for years (strictly for fun; no money changes hands). You might say I'm a fan. :-)Posted by Shmuel at May 6, 2009 9:07 PMThis season is still well worth watching, but I will grant that it has not been one of the better ones. Some of this is luck of the draw, some of it isn't. Zipping through the issues...
The semifinals portion of the show has always been the weakest segment of the season, but the producers hit on an approach that worked well in seasons 4 through 7, gradually whittling down the top 12 boys and top 12 girls to 6 apiece over the course of three weeks. This had a few effects: it let us get to know the finalists better, having watched them for three weeks before the finals got underway; it let them get more practice; and perhaps most importantly, it made it possible for a more diverse group to get in. When only 3 people are selected from a group of 12 in one shot, you're probably going to get only those who are most solidly mainstream. Which helps explain why this time around we ended up with a group rather boringly dominated by white males.
(On the whole, I'd say http://blogs.usatoday.com/idolchatter/2009/03/the-real-proble.html got this right.)
The fourth judge. I have nothing against Kara. While I don't think it will happen, I would not be terribly upset if she ended up replacing the one judge she makes superfluous, by which I mean Randy. But there have been time and pacing issues all season long [including this past week's top 5 snoozefest; apparently they didn't have time for each contestant to sing 2 songs, so they dragged the hour out with only 5 total] because hearing from the whole panel takes so much time. Unless the show itself is going to be lengthened to compensate, she probably has to go.
As an aside, Paula and Simon remain the two most important judges, which has only been reinforced by the seating arrangement this year: you've got the lesser duo up against the greater one. I don't think either of them are replaceable.
The judges' save was an interesting idea, but I don't think it served the show well. I'd prefer it be jettisoned, but it's not a huge deal one way or the other.
The season itself hasn't been as interesting as those past, which I think comes down to two factors: (1) Adam Lambert is so much better than the rest of the pack that the show's really become a competition for second place. (2) The rest of the pack doesn't have anybody totally (or entertainingly) out of their league, but none of them have anything particularly setting themselves apart, either. Ultimately, I think the semifinals process helped create both of these factors. As I said above, it made for less diversity and fewer oddballs... and both serve to add texture to the show and unsettle the overall rankings.
Finally... this is a very minor point in the overall scheme of things, but that cake-fighting sequence in the top 5 results show was just horrifying. In these troubled economic times, I am not entertained by watching people waste perfectly good pastry!
Anyway, I'm still a fan of the show -- one which has produced many, many successful artists, not just Kelly and Carrie -- and I'll look forward to next season. But I do hope they restore the semifinals to the previous format.