Mark my words, this is a jump-the-shark moment for the show.

Kara, the obvious pseudo-Paula, has proven herself more clueless than the departing Straight Up girl. Paula’s weakness is overly praising contestants, but she’s not without a clue, somewhere down deep, and at least she’s honest in her daffiness. Kara is simply hopeless, and downright unlikeable. Plus she embarrassed the show with the “No Boundaries” crapfest that was eventually dropped from the Idol tour.

Idol’s immediate answer? Guest judges. Now, I like me some guest judges, but the first two they’re rolling out are Katy Perry and Posh Spice. Katy… okay, she’s interesting because she’s got some relatively current hits, but let’s be honest, she’s not especially talented (she’s benefited from a couple of catchy/controversial songs, but had anybody actually listened to a live performance, beyond the pin-up girl act?) and Posh opens the season as the Who-The-F-even-cares front runner for the entire Fox season.

Posh Spice? Really?

That sound you hear is Seacrest making sure his checks cash before the show tanks.

Paula, meanwhile, has a weird spray of white feathers cascading down her neck, making her look like she’s been moonlighting as the target for the chicken cannon from Mythbusters.

Ryan asks the judges for some advice before the season begins. Randy suggests the contestants “bring it hard.” Kara says that she’s likely to be tougher on the contestants now, since “One or two or three… will end up on the radio” and she feels a responsibility to make sure they’re the best. (If you’re in the mood for a chuckle after that sentence, go read Kara’s discography and judge her standards of “the best” for yourself.) Paula warns the Idols to now let “the stage consume you.”

The Idols are introduced, and other than Megan, Adam, and Alexis it’s striking how little eye candy there is for us this season.

Tonight is Michael Jackson night… not sure what to say about it. Michael was bad-ass back in the day, but he’s obviously turned into a creepy parody of himself. Hopefully the contestants will channel a bit of the earlier version rather than the burqa-wearing Mike.

First up is Lil Rounds, a mother of three coming to the show from Memphis. Her family was displaced by a storm and they’ve been living in an extended stay hotel, so she’s got some hopes riding on the competition. She gives us The Way You Make Me Feel… her vocals are adequate, but the arrangement drags, and I don’t get an honest feel out of it. This is a calculated, rather than inspired, performance. Randy disagrees: “This is the way we kick off season 8! …. You made the song new again!” Kara says Lil just scared the other contestants, and calls her “great.” Paula complements Lil’s clothes, and says “you’re the force to be reckoned with… it’s like angels singing.” Simon thought it was good, but “a lazy song choice…. and I hate what you’re wearing.”

Scott MacIntyre goes next, and we get a bit of history of the visual impairment which helped fuel his interest in music. That interest will be displayed for America in the form of Keep The Faith, with Scott playing the piano as well as singing. Odd song choice, with Mike’s extensive catalog to choose from, but whatever. Scott does all right, but basically ends up sounding like a run-of-the-mill Christian Contemporary artist. Kara liked his “hopeful message” and that he was “true to himself” although he wasn’t “dynamic.” Paula calls it a “lovely performance.” Simon “hated the song…. because nobody knows it.” Simon then acknowledges the elephant in the Idol room: “it’s all right to be artistic, just not on this show.”

Danny Gokey follows with P. Y. T., and all of a sudden it’s like Taylor is back on the show: good voice and terrible dancing. But it actually works pretty well. Paula tells him she thinks “you’re on the way to the final.” Simon “thought the vocals were brilliant… you remind me of Michael Mcdonald, you’re a white guy with soul.” Randy “loved it all.”

Michael Sarver is next, visiting his old oil rig coworkers and giving us an “aw, shucks” kind of interview… which I actually don’t buy. Not to alienate America, but I’m getting a dark side vibe off of him… I hope I’m wrong. He’ll sing You Are Not Alone. There’s nothing remarkable about the performance at all. Michael goes for a much bigger vocal than he’s ready for, and the performance feels like he’s forcing it through a straw. I didn’t like it one bit. Simon says “You’re not the best singer in the competition… but you made up for it with passion and heart.” I disagree, he didn’t make up for the bad singing at all, and the other stuff is an act. Randy really disagrees with me “you’re doing what you were born to do right here.” Kara thought “you proved you can sing.” Paula thought he “sounded really lovely tonight.” Sorry, the judges are all wrong on this one, he wasn’t good.

A commercial, and then we see Jasmine Murray’s interview segment, which contains very little of interest… hopefully her performance of I’ll Be There will be better. Turns out it’s okay… but kind of forgettable, which may be partially due to the song… it’s the kind of number that makes you feel like you’re coming out of a fever. Jasmine better watch the low notes, though, those clearly aren’t her thing. Randy takes an aside to plug his relationship with Mariah Carey, and calls Jasmin’s performance “not that bad,” which is faint praise indeed. Kara wishes she’d done it “a half-key down,” but thinks Jasmine has “great stage presence.” Paula thinks it was a mixed performance, while Simon thought “you made a good attempt, big notes are always going to trouble you, and a little bit robotic at times.”

Kris Allen, perhaps the least well-known person on the show this season, is our next contestant, playing the guitar and singing Remember The Time. Not much to say here… he really tries to work it the best he can, but it’s just not happening for Kris. Kara says “the girls love you” and compliments Kris for taking time during the week to help the other contestants. Paula calls him “adorable-sexy,” whatever that means. Simon thought “I wouldn’t have brought the wife out so early,” which is both funny and good advice. Randy thought it was “Jason Mraz-ie.”

Allison Iraheta sings Give In To Me. Her interview segment was really terrible, showing her singing to a crowd of about 30 in some kind of warehouse store, but her performance tonight is quite good, although her voice gurgles a bit on the extremes. Still, it’s a very solid performance, giving us perhaps the first decent rock-chick vocal in all of Idol history. Well done. Paula calls it “mind boggling… stay authentic.” Simon “thought it was a good performance” but wishes she’d lighten up a bit, to which Allison replies “I’m not, like, cutting myself” which probably makes the network people do a collective facepalm. Randy and Kara liked it as well.

Anoop Desai gives us a bit of Thriller-dance going into commercial. He unfortunately doesn’t follow through with that, but he does bring out a big Michael Jackson gun with Beat It. He makes the mistake a couple of times of starting to do some dance moves, but quickly talks some sense into himself and pulls back. It’s a bad song choice for Anoop; he should have gone for something more emotional, because the funky street thing isn’t working for him. Vocals weren’t great, either. Too bad, I like Anoop, but… Paula says that she doesn’t think anyone buy Mike can do the song, while Simon thought it was “horrible… there was no aggression. It actually looked a bit stupid.” Randy says “it was just the wrong choice… you’ve got a bit more than that.” Kara says the biggest problem was that “we didn’t get to see any variation… for the first time we felt disconnected from you as a performer.”

Jorge Nunez will sing Never Can Say Goodbye. We all ended up loving him coming out of the last rounds, I hope he holds up. The camera loves him, and again his voice is good, but it’s an awful, awful song choice… lounge act type material. Jorge didn’t do himself any favors with this one, unfortunately. Randy says “I got mad love for you… but this isn’t the song I would have chosen for you” thinking it made it seem old-fashioned. Kara “didn’t feel” the emotional connection. Paula also has “mad love” for Jorge, but doesn’t feel “like you were yourself” Jorge says “I wasn’t going to sing Bad” to which Simon says “you sort of did.” Simon “couldn’t wait for it to end” and thought the arrangement was awful (and it was.)

Megan Corkrey somehow decides on Rockin’ Robin for her song, which is one strike against her as far as I’m concerned. What an awful song. She’s got a good sound, I think she’s hot, aand I’m predisposed to like her tattooed-self so it’s hard for me to say anything negative, but I didn’t like anything about this performance. Kara liked it, Paula “felt disconnected,” by which she means she’s out of original things to say and felt the need to parrot Kara’s comments from earlier. Simon: “what a stupid song. The whole performance was just clumsy and awkward.” Gordon Ramsey also has an opinion, but he doesn’t have a microphone and we have no idea what it is.

Adam Lambert is up next, and if anyone can save the show tonight it’s him. Let’s see what he can do with Black or White. The Idol folks clearly want him to do well, since they give him a rather better graphic and effect package than the other contestants got. The performance is sort of youth-center-up-with-people quality until the bridge, and then it gets rather better when Adam basically stops worrying about control so much. Best of the night – by far. Simon says it “was in a totally different league” than anything tonight. Randy says “you’re the most current… you could make a record right now. If you’ve got it, you’ve got it… and baby, you’ve got it.” Kara “hopes Michael Jackson is watching tonight.” I’d be willing to bed he is… what else can he get away with doing these days?

Matt Giraud is in the unenviable position of following Adam. He’ll do so by playing Human Nature on the piano. He does a passable job in parts, but gets a bit self-indulgent with the runs, and if this was the first time you’d heard the song you’d forget it. He also doesn’t go for a big finish, which is a mistake. Randy compares him to Justin Timberlake, while Kara calls him “a talented guy.” For her part, Paula is “blown away,” and Simon thought it was a solid, “meat and potatoes” kind of performance.

Alexis Grace closes the show with Dirty Diana, and as soon as they announce the song choice I’m thinking it’s going to kill. Alexis certainly looks awesome tonight, working the platinum hair and the short black dress. Her vocals are lost in the bigness of the song and her moves consist of stalking around the stage and occasionally bobbing into a squat, but it doesn’t really matter because it holds up as a performance, and this one was all about throwing heat, not the finer points of singing. Kara says “you’re a naughty girl and I liked it” while Paula says to “watch your oversinging.” Simon says “not as good as you thought it was.” Not as good as Adam and Allison, but good enough for tonight.

So there you have it:

Best of the night: Adam Lambert and Allison Iraheta, by a large margin.

Worst of the night: Anoop Desai and Michael Sarver. Jorge didn’t do himself any favors, either.

Results tomorrow night, along with performances by Kanye West and Kelly Clarkson. If the fates are kind, Kanye will be rapping and not singing. Cross your fingers. See you then.

Let’s start with the good: the set was beautiful, and having the audience so close to the stage gave the night an intimate feel. Also, going for classic Hollywood is always a good idea, so let’s acknowledge that.

Kudos, too, for Hugh Jackman. He did a good job, for what he was asked to do. He wasn’t an MC in the style of Johnny Carson or Bob Hope or even Steve Martin, but he wasn’t supposed to be. Loved the dance moves, too.

But the bad: basically everything else about the broadcast.

Particularly grating was the music that played through category introductions. Thankfully someone must have told the orchestra to back off before the night was over.

Queen Latifah’s rendition of I’ll Be Seeing You during the memorial clip was lovely… but the jerky camera work was completely inappropriate. Those of us at home couldn’t make out the screen half the time… whoever directed that segment should be invited to never return. Also, it seemed to me they cut the length this year… we got the big names (RIP Paul Newman) but we didn’t get the usual barrage of screenwriters and sound engineers. If it was just a slow year for the grim reaper, good, but otherwise those folks deserve their ten seconds of screen time.

The salute to Hollywood musicals was likewise hideous, both in design and execution. Baz Luhrmann tried to throw the lyrical kitchen sink into the show, but the result was an exhibition that never settled into a groove. This is the American Songbook, here… all the compositions deserved more than the half-sentence of time they got. The performers were poorly chosen as well… I’d much rather have seen Anne Hathaway reprising her earlier appearance (is there a more beautiful actress working today? Had she been called, Anne might have even channeled a bit of Audrey Hepburn into the number) than Beyonce’s heavy-legged clogging.

And on the subject of music, Peter Gabriel was right. Bring back the full performances of the nominated songs. Medleys are never a good idea.

The presentations themselves were stilted and just plain weird. The whole event suffered terribly from a lack of clips of the performances in question – don’t just talk about how good someone was, films are a visual medium… show us something! It was nice to see a collection of winners, but it also proved how poorly some of Hollywood’s best actors do when reading a teleprompter. Some of them were downright embarrassing.

Fewer presenters (or presentation events, I guess, since some of the categories had as many as five presenters) also didn’t seem to do much… the show ran long again (which is okay! They always worry far too much about that) but it cut down on the anticipation of seeing who would come out next. Half the fun of the Oscars is to watch everyone show off, and the Academy did their stars and their audience a disservice by not giving more of them some time in the spotlight.

The whole show was an experiment that failed. Here’s hoping they put things back the way they were.

Ryan thanks us for our tremendous support, telling us that there were over 24 million votes last night. Asked if they were pleased by the first show, Randy said “Uh, yeah, some people stepped up to the plate.” Kara and Paula also thought things went well. They must’ve been watching a different show than the rest of us were.

The group number comes at 4 minutes into the hour… tonight it’s I’m Yours by Jason Mraz. It’s on par with all the other Idol group-sings; it’s passable, but all in all you’d rather have heard the original version. Big reaction from the audience, though.

Ryan tells us the show was “raw” last night, and they launch into a highlight reel showing performance clips. It isn’t any better in retrospect than it was during the first viewing. They also change up the order of the clips to group the especially weak stuff together and try to paint Tatiana as “the one who turned it all around.” They’re seriously pushing her out to the front this year.

A little banter with the contestants is next. Jackie gives her performance a 91; Anoop says he’s “the most nervous he’s ever been.” Ryan eventually brings Casey out to center stage and she says that she’s just “really lucky to be here.” Randy says Casey shouldn’t be in the competition based on her performance last night… and America agrees. She’s history.

Stephen is up next, saying he was out to “show a different side of himself… you can’t say I sounded bad” bringing snickers from the audience. Apparently America did think he sounded bad, and it’s goodbye to him.

Alexis Grace is up third… and she makes it into the top twelve. That’s one correct decision America. Alexis gives us a reprise of her song from last night. She’s choked up and it starts out rocky, but she gets on track. I like Alexis, but I’m wondering if she’s going to keep it up long term… there have been a lot of one night, flash-in-the-pan performances on Idol. Hopefully she won’t turn out to be one of them.

Ricky and Jackie come out next. Jackie “didn’t think I blew it at all” and disagrees with Simon “one hundred percent.” Simon responds “we’ll see.” We do see indeed, and Jackie’s gone. For his part, Ricky doesn’t even get the courtesy of an interview question before Ryan tells him to take a hike.

Ryan brings Anoop and Michael Sarver out. Ryan prompts: “Michael, I know this means a lot to you…” which would be cruel except for the fact that he quickly follows up by telling Michael he’s safe. Anoop, on the other hand, is out. Michael gets another chance to sing, and he actually does better than he did last night, probably because the pressure is temporarily off. The backup singers are no less annoying tonight, however. Ryan tells us that only 20,000 votes separated Michael from Anoop.

The show takes a moment to plug the new American Idol Experience at the Walt Disney World Resort, which could be fun if you’re into theme parks (I am.) That leads to an appearance by Carly Smithson and Michael Johns from last season… they perform The Letter, and the whole thing serves to remind us why they didn’t make it to the finals. Michael tells us that he has an album coming out soon. Carly appears to be turning into Elizabeth Taylor.

Ann Marie, Brent, and Stevie don’t even get to take center stage… Ryan has them stand in place and unceremoniously gives them all the axe. Good riddance, they all sucked last night.

That leaves us Danny Gokey and Tatiana Del Toro… by bringing them out together, Idol is clearly trying to fuel public outrage with either possible departure. Ryan asks Paula who deserves the top spot: “With this show, it’s hard to say” which doesn’t answer Ryan’s question at all. She finally forces the word “Danny” between her teeth, which is of course the right decision. Does it really matter, though? I’m betting the odd one out gets a wildcard slot anyway, so it may only be a temporary setback. The show cuts to a commercial to build suspense.

Out of the break, a little meaningless banter, and Danny gets the vote. Tatiana’s out – for now – and Danny gets to go through, which is the right decision. Tatiana stumbles around a bit before the other Idols shepherd her back to the seats. Danny gets to sing Hero again, and similarly to Alexis he starts out rough before getting on track, although his performance is all in all worse than the one last night.

Tatiana cries her way through the performance… and unlike past scenes, she doesn’t seem to be getting a lot of comfort from her fellow Idols.

So, to sum up, going through to the next round: Alexis Grace, Michael Sarver, Danny Gokey.

And that’s it. On to the second group of twelve next week. See you then.

Jackie Tohn kicks off the season 8 voting rounds, with Elvis Presley’s A Little Less Conversation and some shiny black satin pants. She looks a bit like a caricature of the way you’d see a hooker dress in a 1980s rated-PG movie, and she lurches around the stage doing more shouting than singing. For his part, Randy says “way to start season 8 off… I don’t know that I was blown away by the vocals, but it was all good on the entertainment side.” Kara thinks “You can work a stage!” and Randy kicks off a much-too-long conversation between himself, Jackie, and and Kara about Jackie’s trousers. Paula didn’t “think it was a perfect performance, but perfect sometimes is boring.” Yep, we don’t want perfection on this show. Simon pretty much nailed it, though, saying “You played the clown tonight. The performance was ungainly.” Jackie defends her effort by saying “everyone here is a bangin’ singer” – explaining, perhaps, why she sounded like she was being banged throughout the performance – and she wanted to show she was more of an entertainer.

Ricky Braddy’s offering is Leon Russell’s A Song For You. The vocal is good, but the arrangement is drifty adult contemporary and won’t help Ricky out at all… especially going second, this is the sort of performance you forget. Randy, however, loved it. Kara says “You killed that… it was amazing.” She goes on to add “you have incredible gift,” which is a bit over the top seeing that its only his first real performance of the year. Not to be outdone in the crazy talk contest, Paula adds that “you deserve to go very deep in this competition.” Simon: “Very, very good… I’m not jumping out of my chair as much as you three are” but believes Ricky’s problem is that at the moment “you don’t have any star quality… you need to start believing in yourself.” So Simon’s assessment is the same as mine.

Alexis Grace, who looks a bit like a more attractive Molly Ringwald, goes next with Never Loved A Man by Aretha Franklin. If Ricky had no star quality, Alexis makes up for it, taking the stage in a tiny black lacy number that shows off her pale skin and blonde hair to maximum advantage. She can sing some blues, too, even though it’s just a bit at odds with they way she looks. Randy thinks “You done found the dirt!” while Kara says “The genie is out of the bottle” and thinks it’s been nice to see her come out of her shell. Paula babbles for a while and says nothing meaningful at all. Simon says that she’s the best contestant so far “by a mile” … and agrees with me that she’s made his star-quality point to Ricky. He also says that Alexis reminds him of Kelly Clarkson’s emergence at the same place in the competition.

Neil Patrick Harris is in the audience. We also get a peak at Alexis’ parents, which immediately brings up the adoption question. Yikes. Sometimes the leaf falls very far indeed.

Idol has a bad technical moment as they try to roll Brent Keith’s interview tape, leaving Ryan to flounder for a bit, but they finally get everything on track. The whole ordeal leads up to what Brent calls “a good rockin’ country song,” namely Hicktown, which Brent sings because he wants to show people who he really is. And as it turns out… I apparently don’t like who he really is. I’m not anti-country at all, but I hate it from the first syllable. If this was one of those chicken wire bars, people would be throwing bottles. Awful, awful, awful. Randy likes it, saying very nice things. Kara says it wasn’t “rangy enough” for her. Paula wants “America to remember your auditions” – in other words the performance sucked. Paula says “I can see you as a country artist… remember what happened Josh Gracin and Bucky Covington,” to which Simon snarkily replies “what did happen to Bucky Covington?” and properly trashes the whole experience. Brent’s wife greets him backstage, sending the FOX audio guy ripping his headphones off with her jangly bracelets. Brent is unapologetic, saying that he doesn’t think country fans will forget his performance, and that – God help us all – that this is the sort of song he wants to put out as a recording artist. The interview tells me all I need to know, Brent isn’t in this to win, he came in with the intention of grabbing enough attention to get himself on the county fair circuit and that’s it. Hopefully he’s got it now and we can go on to more interesting contestants.

Perhaps Stevie Wright will offer us a bit of a palate cleanser, although her promise of a Taylor Swift song doesn’t leave me hopeful. And Stevie promptly fails to live up to even that weakest of promises. Her vocals are shaky, anemic, off-key, and weak. It’s completely, utterly hideous. Randy says “Yo, Stevie, man, wow, wow, wow… I wasn’t feeling that, man. If I’d seen that before, I don’t know if you’d be standing there right now.” Kara says “you have an identity crisis right now” – she also a singing crisis, Kara. Paula says it “wasn’t the right song for you” and that she couldn’t hit the low ranges. Simon says the other three were being too polite and that it was “terrible…. there’s zero chance of you making it through to the next round after that.” Stevie’s mom complains that the judges said her last song made her seem too old, but they didn’t like the teeny-bopper song, which was “confusing.” As if the judges said “hey, it might be a good idea to come out and suck next week!”

The last two songs were perhaps the worst one-two punch in Idol history, and that’s saying something.

Anoop Desai is up next, and I’m predicting good things. I think he’s good… we’ll see. He sings Angel of Mine, by Monica, which is a song I’m not exactly crazy about. Maybe the mix has gotten off tonight, because Anoop’s voice sounds weak, too. His performance is… okay. He doesn’t live up to my expectations, but he doesn’t stink, either. He shows good range and control, but I sure wish he’d picked a better song. Randy thinks “Ummmmmmm… interesting song choice, I got mad love for you, but you never quite settled.” Kara’s “got to agree with Randy… I’m not sure you had the capability to nail it the way it had to be nailed, but I feel connected with you when they’re up there.” Paula says “you have that Brian McKnight feel to your voice.” Simon thinks it was “a bit too grown up… too serious” but thinks Anoop has “massive likability.”

Michael Sarver, of oil-rig fame comes up next. I’m betting he’ll do country, and I also expect it to be better than Brent’s effort… after all, it could scarcely be worst. “I don’t wnat to be anything other than who I am right now.” Brent fools me and goes with Gavin DeGraw’s I Don’t Wanna Be. The performance is adiquate, but nothing special. Randy says “I might like you better with a little soul thing.” Kara thinks “that’s wasn’t the best,” but Paula thinks it was “a real good job.” Simon “hopes America picks up the phone and gives you another shot.”

Ann Marie Boskovich tells us she works as a waitress and a demo singer… we’ll see what she can do with Natural Woman, another song I hate…. it always makes me think the performer needs to go backstage and seek out a Mach 3 razor. Ann Marie, who I liked up until now, has a stage presence something like the the ghost of Kellie Pickler but never really shows off the voice required for the song. Kara suggests another song, to which Ann Marie responds “you mean one not as good?” Funny. I like it. Put her through. But then Simon says that the performance would have been quite good “if we were searching for the best hotel singer in California.”

Stephen Fowler, of walking-off-the-stage fame, follows Ann Marie. His song is Michael Jackson’s Rock With You, which could be awesome, particularly since they give him the classic Jackson video green laser effects in the background. Unfortunately, it’s far from it, as Stephen cracks a bit in the high parts – if you’re going to do Mike, you’ve gotta have the high parts – and otherwise does a very ordinary, forgettable job. It’s only halfway decent in comparison with the REALLY terrible performances we had tonight. Randy: “I don’t know what’s going on… it wasn’t good. AHHH! I don’t like this part.” Kara pines for the day when Stephen forgot the lyrics. Paula says “its such a rare opportunity to get a second chance like you did… but singing Rock With You is like the kiss of death.” Simon says “I actually wish you had forgotten the lyrics, it was so pointless… with that arrangement, the awful keyboard, it was corny.” Simon’s right, the arrangements have sucked tonight.

Ryan tells us that Tatiana Del Toro is coming up after the break – and even he has a problem not snickering as he does so. Is there anyone who wants to see her on the show other than for the potential trainwreck value? Tatiana tells us she’s “not going to let anyone get in the way of her dreams” and her weapon tonight will be Whitney Houston’s Saving All My Love For You, as well as a hideous pink and orange sundress. She’s okay – barely – in the high parts, but her lows sound like the homely chick from A League of Their Own. Nothing special here, but she has the good fortune to be singing on perhaps the worst Idol night ever. Randy was afraid she was “going to rough this thing up,” but “there were moments.” Kara says “it’s like a roller coaster ride with you,” much like Tatiana’s emotional stability. Paula thinks “you’re probably the most talked about contestant on the show so far” and talks out of her head for a few more seconds. Simon says “you are a complete and utter drama queen” which Tatiana takes offense at despite the obvious truth of the statement. Simon thinks she’s desperate to be famous (and he’s right) but that the whole thing was surprisingly not bad. The performance closes with all of the judges mocking Tatiana’s now-famous nasal laugh, which is a fun touch.

Simon suggests that Tatiana be less demure in the future. Women of America, take note… that’s good advice.

Danny Gokey closes a dreadful two hours. He’s somone else I like… please Danny, redeem this evening for us all! He’ll try to do so by singing Mariah Carey’s Hero… okay, an instant strike one, but lets see what he can do with it. It’s a fairly boring, but otherwise competent performance. Not redemptive, but decent enough to carry the night for the guys, especially since he’s going in the always-memorable last slot. The room explodes into applause… that’s what water will do to a crowd after they’ve been through a desert. Randy must be reading the blog because he throws out my word, saying of Danny: “He’s the redeemer!” Paula suggests that sold-out arenas are in his future… insert your own Idol sell-out joke here. Simon “thought it was good… not fantastic, good.” The others accuse Simon of being heartless, but he’s right again. On any average night, this would have been just another performance.

So, there you have it. My thoughts:

Very Good:
Alexis Grace

Decent Enough:
Danny Gokey
Ricky Braddy
Tatiana Del Toro

Meh:
Anoop Desai
Michael Sarver
Stephen Fowler

Merely Bad:
Jackie Tohn
Ann Marie Boskovich

Icepick-to-the-eardrums-awful:
Brent Keith
Stevie Wright
Casey Carlson

Best of the night: Alexis Grace, by a large, large, margin.
Worst of the night: Stevie Wright. Casey Carlson came close.

There you have it. Let’s see how the voting plays out. See you tomorrow! In the mean time, feel free to enter your own comments below.

Across the way, Tatiana Del Toro is shrieking at her group: “THIS IS EVERYTHING TO ME! YOU DON’T UNDERSTAND WHAT I’VE BEEN THROUGH TO BE HERE! I’VE BEEN THROUGH HELL AND BACK” One of her team-mates pipes up with a sarcastic “have you ever met Satan?” making me instantly like her. Tatiana is toxic, and eventually leaves her group and gloms on to one containing Nate Marshall, Nancy Wilson, and Kristin McNamara. They let her try it for a while, though Nate is (wisely) against it. Tatiana eventually dumps them too, and heads tries to make peace with her original group. Nancy, looking a bit like an animatronic escaping from Disney’s Haunted Mansion, stalks over and confronts Tatiana, but nothing terribly interesting happens other than Nancy leaving after delivering a passive-aggressive “You have a blessed day!”

Nancy’s group, meanwhile, is also in disarray, as Kristin goes off to sit by herself, saying “I just need to be away from the noise,” which is an odd statement for someone who apparently hopes for a career featuring a lot of amplifiers and electric guitars. The group fractures, Nancy yelling at Kristen and then Nate in turn.

Katrina, meanwhile, has had enough, and leaves her group to go to bed crying, but unfortunately not in a fit of sudden self-realization about the banality of her own life. She’s still there in the morning as her group comes to check on her, refusing to come out from under the covers. Rose and the others write her off and go down to the auditions, but a peppy Katrina shows up as if nothing happened, cheerily telling everyone “I’m HEEEERE!” Rose, who for some unfathomable reason is wearing her contestant ID clipped to her hair, and the other girls walk away from Katrina in disgust. Rose’s prediction is that “we’re going to be that group that gets up there and it’s just an absolute train wreck.”

The singing begins with a warning from Simon: “I’m only going to say this once: forget the words, you’re out.”

First up is a group calling themselves White Chocolate, consisting of India Morrison, Matt Giraud, Kris Allen, and Justin Williams, with their version of the Jackson 5’s One More Chance. They start out with a little doo wop and then mix in a little rap, which makes me initially think the performance will suck – Idol contestants often resort to that sort of thing when they don’t have the pipes – but my fears are unfounded in this case. The harmonies are tight and all four hold up well enough during the individual bits. They all get to stick around, with Ryan telling us that the other groups are cheering, but secretly thinking “damn, I wish we were that good.”

Next up is Action Squad, composed of Alex Wagner-Trugman, Ryan Pinkston, Anne Marie Boskovich and Emily Wynne-Hughes. The group spent an inordinate amount of time practicing their cool Action Squad secret handshake and the lack of actual singing practice shows up as they perform Fleetwood Mac’s Don’t Stop. Emily, in particular, screws up royally, forgetting the words and generally not singing very well. Paula’s reaction: “I’m speechless” … and if Paula can come up with a meaningless bromide for the occasion, you must have sucked pretty bad. Of the four, only Alex and Anne Marie make it through. Emily tearfully tells us that “this is really the only thing that I know how to do!” which is too bad, because she wasn’t very good at that. Ryan Pinkston, for his part, says he “saw a side of Paula that I didn’t know was there… I saw an EVIL in her eyes.” Perhaps she was the one tormenting Tatiana in her trip to hell, who knows.

Likewise the next group, made up of Jeremy Michael Sarver, Adam Lambert, Matt Breitzke, and Jesse Langseth. They receive a “terrific… really, really good” for their rendition of Some Kind Of Wonderful.

That brings us to Team Diva. The members are Lauren Barnes, Katrina Darrell, Rose Flack, and Jasmine Murray, and they don’t like each other one bit. There song is completely uncoordinated, and nobody really does well at all. Bikini Girl’s line is “got me on my knees,” which offers a glimpse of her most likely path to success in her future endeavors. Rose hops around stupidly and forgets the lyrics to her song. Simon can tell the group is on edge, and encourages them to identify the poison apple, saying: “Forget this PC rubbish… name names.” It’s obvious that Katrina is the culprit, and she tries to get a little sympathy: “I’d been in heels since five AM! I have scoliosis!” The ploy doesn’t work, and all but Jasmine get the axe. Katrina laughably tags the other three as “fake girls” and refuses to make nice. Katrina doesn’t really care, though, because her real purpose – getting exposure – has been accomplished. She has a bright future posing for tricked-out car magazines, I’m sure.

All day standing in heels? Tell that to Seacrest, see how much sympathy you get. Bitch.

As Katrina stalks out, Kara remarks that “I guess she’s ready for her close up” which is a reference to a great line from a great movie, and its delivery almost makes me like Kara for half a second.

We get a couple of clips of other people we’ve met getting cut, including David Osmond and that Austin-Aruchleta-Clone guy.

Tatiana’s group is next, and I hate the lot of them. Their performance is borderline and Tatiana knows it, trying to sell out her teammates by adding a little of her own “I wanna get throoooogh-ooooo” vocals after the main performance is over. Randy warns her: “none of that today,” but the entire bunch gets to stick around. Tatiana tearfully thanks both Jesus and the guy holding the “sound stick.”

Last up is Team Compromise, made up of Nathaniel Marshall, Nancy Wilson, and Kristin McNamara, singing Duffy’s Mercy. Kristen and Nate aren’t too bad; Nancy isn’t good. Again fishing for controversy, Simon says “so you all won’t be having dinner tonight,” prompting a confused Kristen to say “Me and you?” Or maybe she’s not confused, because she’s got a look in her eye that says she’d totally go there if Simon would. The judges say “one of you girls is safe, and one isn’t” which doesn’t do anything to reduce the odds, since the group on stage consists of two females and a gay guy. Tension builds – Simon accuses them of purposely sabotaging each other by singing poor background vocals – and Nancy and Kristen glare daggers at each other, leading Paula to say “it’s not nice to see what’s up on stage right now” … which is apparently code for looking at Nancy, because they kick her off the show. Nate goes to give her a conciliatory hug and Nance completely freezes him out. I’m glad she’s gone.

And that’s it for Hollywood night two. Tonight was the first really enjoyable show of season 8… Group week is always good for entertainment, but this episode was particularly thick with people I couldn’t wait to see go under the guillotine. Some talent starting to show up, too.

More Hollywood episodes next week… lets hope they live up to tonight’s show. See you then!

Hi everyone, and welcome to the live blog of the first Hollywood night of American Idol Season 8. The preliminary shows this season were pretty weak coming into tonight… hopefully the producers were holding something back. Perhaps we might even find out what point there is in having Kara on the show. We’ll see.

Ryan tell us that of 100,000 auditions, the best 140 are here at the Kodak theater for five days of eliminations. The lead-in clips show us the usual assortment of cursing, crying, and judge comments. From Simon: “I am confident that we’re going to find someone great.”

The show opens with Ryan’s usual “THIS is AMERICAN IDOL.” He sells it a bit too hard tonight. Paula follows up a weird hand-over-hand rolling gesture, promising us Paula-lunacy to come sometime this season. She was bottled up for the early shows… perhaps because she couldn’t find a drink in Salt Lake City. Maybe back in L.A., she’ll finally cut loose.

We see a twist right off the bat, as the contestants get mini makeovers before the show, or as one contestant explains it, “I feel like my manhood is being taken from me!” Keeping with the manhood theme, Barry Manilow comes in to give the potential Idols some tips: “Make the song your own,” is apparently the best insight he’s gleaned in forty years of show business.

Lil Rounds is the first singer up, to glowing comments from Kara despite delivering a rendition of I Will Always Love You that sent America searching for an ice pick to apply to their eardrums. That eventually leads to the first round of cuts, which Kara gets to do… the new hire always gets the crappy job, right?

Dennis provides the first real entertainment of the night as he’s cut, whining his way out the door with a clever “thas’ y’all’s decision, y’all suck as judges” and criticizes Simon’s shirt on the way out. Sorry, Dennis, he can’t go wrong with a basic black number. Dennis offers the parting thought that America will be outraged that he’s been cut. Well, America, let’s hear it… sound of crickets… sorry, D.

We see a short clip of Simon telling Frankie that she “way overcooked” a song. I’d have gone with “baked,” given her Amy Winehouse impression, but you get the point.

Facial piercing Nathaniel either has music in his blood or the DTs, telling the judges that every time he gets on stage, he gets the sensation of things crawling all over his skin. His audition wasn’t good but he gets through, for now.

Anoop gets his turn and kills again, just like he did in the audition. The kid is money.

Kara says Jasmine Murray has a lot of raw natural talent. I still think she’s overrated.

We get a clip of Rose Flack rehearsing where she loses it and seems like she’s headed for a nervous breakdown… she gets through, but any bets on whether we see this again? Yep, you guessed it. Figure on some version of this story every week Rose is here. Obviously, she’s been through more than she deserves, but she doesn’t give off what you might call the mental stability vibe. Other Idols, be warned, lest she end up locked tearfully in your bathroom when you need your hair brush.

Looks like the Michael Castro kid gets through too… that ought to be good for a few cringes down the line.

Nick “Norman Gentle” Mitchell comes out to give us “a little honesty,” but it’s just a big stupid trick; he’s looking for exposure, and unfortunately, he’s got it now. Simon tells him that without the silly outfit he’s just a “boring person,” but with it he’s “a joke.” Never the less, the judges like him enough to bring him back for another week. Winehouse-Frankie also makes the cut.

The mid-hour break, and we get the second half of the auditions, as well as the first gratuitous Ford logo of the season.

Rocker chick Jackie Tohn gravel-voices her way through her audition and does well enough to stick around, along with some other people that the show doesn’t bother to name.

Jamar Rogers sings California Dreamin’ … nothing special, and he kind of bottoms out on the low notes, but Randy likes him. Meanwhile Danny Gokey serves up Kiss From A Rose and does a rather better job, showing a few pacing and over enunciation problems, but we can forgive him for that since he’s probably pretty damn nervous. Paula says Danny is “ready to record records,” and sure enough, he makes it through. Jamar hangs around, too.

Katrina “Bikini Girl” Darrell offers the insight that “I am the next American Idol… because I am.” She sings Faith Hill’s Breathe and nobody cares. Kara calls Katrina a “beautiful girl” … must be the glare of the lights. Simon makes cat claws as Kara criticizes Katrina… its easy to roll your eyes at the gesture, but he’s right, Kara clearly dislikes Katrina for reasons that go far beyond her lack of talent.

Katrina’s the sort of girl I could have fantasies about… they’d probably involve closing her face in a waffle iron, but they ARE fantasies, none the less.

Jessica Furney gets kicked out… I’m sorry about that, I was looking forward to developing a crush on her later in the season.

Next up, Randy thinks Jeremy Michael Sarver is “one of the best” he’s heard so far. He advances, but Jesus Valenzuela isn’t so lucky… he leaves looking for an early flight to Sacramento.

Emily Wynne-Hughes abandons her practiced song (I Put A Spell On You) at the last minute, instead going with No Doubt’s Excuse Me, Mister, and she pretty much sucks… but she gets to continue on in the competition anyway. David Osmond also gets the nod.

Erika Wesley doesn’t impress the judges and is asked to leave. She tries a bit of begging, but to no avail. She’s history.

And that’s it for the first Hollywood night. Ryan tells us that there are 104 people left… down from 140. Really? All that, and they only eliminated 36? Seems like light work.

Tomorrow is group audition night, which is always fun. Ryan promises that while we’ve “seen drama before” it was “never like this.” I hope he’s right, because this show was, to use a favorite phrase of Simon’s, entirely forgettable.

See you tomorrow night.

Angels and Demons – Looks okay, if you like plodding, overblown drama.
Fast and the Furious – Why anyone would be interested in any of the movies in this series is beyond me.
GI Joe – Horrid.
Land of the Lost – Looks fun. Not for the ages, but fun.
Monsters v. Aliens – Completely derivative story. Should be competent and workmanlike, but that’s it.
Star Trek – Looks mixed… I see aspects I like, but I’m afraid they’re throwing in too much Big Action Movie.
Transformers – No, no, a thousand times, no.
Up – Has potential.
Year One – I love me some Jack Black, but this looks stupid.
Witch Mountain – This looks surprisingly good, for what it is.

So, can you judge a book by it’s cover? Once these come out it’ll be interesting to see what the final results are, but for now… it looks like a bleak year at the movies, based on these choices.

But hey, this is a pop culture site. What about the commercials? Here’s my rundown. I’ve got four categories: Best, Decent, Fail, Worst, and perhaps most the most damnable of all – “Meh,” for commercials that weren’t worthy of notice one way or another. All-in-all, an average year. Some cute ones, but nothing for the ages. Note I did the movie ads as a separate post.

On with the ratings!

Best – These ads were the best of the bunch:

• Bridgestone – Hot Item (Jump Around) Astronauts have their moon buggy stripped by aliens, complete with a soundtrack courtesy of House of Pain. Funny and catchy.
• Budweiser – Horse Love / Horse Circus - Sappy, but beautiful.
• Careerbuilder.com – Tips – Signs you need a new job; woman screaming, guy in a blue speedo. My pick for the best ad of the night.
• Etrade – Talking Baby (Broken Wings) - just when we thought the talking baby thing was played out, they drop Mr. Mister on us.
• Miller High Life – One Second Commercials – It’ll never work again, and lets hope they don’t try. But for tonight? Simply perfect. HIGH LIFE!
• Pedigree – Crazy Pets - This one gets the nod for the old woman chasing the ostrich.
• Teleflora – Talking Flowers - Made a point that I’m not sure needed to be made to any thinking person – don’t send flowers in a box – but we’ve all wanted to say the things the flowers said.

Decent Ads – Not hall of fame stuff, but amusing enough to be worth note:

• Bud Light – Conan Swedish Commercial - How could this NOT be funny?
• Budweiser – Horse Fetch – dog fetches a stick, Clydesdale fetches a tree branch.
• Budweiser – Generations – A story of a Scottish horse immigrant. This one had a chance at greatness, but somehow missed.
• Cash4Gold – Ed McMahon and MC Hammer - Wonderful casting, funny script with McMahon selling his gold hip replacement. Suffers from being a bit of a depressing product, slapping people back to the reality of an economy that’s in the toilet during a couple hours when a lot of people were managing to forget.
• Cheetos – Bird Attack - Any commercial that suggests revenge on the loud person on the cell phone at the adjacent table is okay by me.
• Coke – Avatars -Aren’t we all starting to think of our friends as their online personas on some level?
• Conan – Funny people – “If your Conan lasts more than three hours, see a doctor.”
• Doritos – Power of the Crunch – Guy crunches Doritos and blows off a woman’s dress and makes an ATM spit out cash. Had a chance at the “best” category by they had to soften it up by showing the guy live after being hit by the bus at the end.
• Firestone -Mr. Potato Head - A classic icon in a situation we’ve all dreamed of.
• GE – Scarecrow – Any Wizard of Oz reference is okay with me. As this ad was telling us all about how GE will solve our energy needs, we’ll ignore the part in the original movie where a main character was jonesing for a can of oil.
• Hyundai – Angry Bosses – you can’t go wrong with people screaming in Japanese and German.
• NFL – Usama – Loved the part where Usama told his snow cone boss he didn’t want his crap job anyway.
• Pepsi – I’m Good – Life-threatening accidents from the America’s Funniest Home Videos school of comedy.
• Priceline – Shatner in the Van - Points off for it not being a fresh commercial, but hey… it’s Shatner. In a van.

Meh – Commercials that commit the sin of being completely forgettable

• Arbys – Goat Marriage – Whatever.
• Audi – Chase – a fun trip through the decades, but ultimately… who cares?
• Bud Light – Drinkability, Boss Flying Out The Window – Shrug.
• Bud Light Lime – Summer State of Mind – It’s a beer. With lime. If you used a fresh lime, it would be called Corona.
• Castrol – Edge Monkeys - Monkeys, cool, but this commercial was utterly lacking charm.
• Coca-Cola – Heist / Bugs – Nice Peter and the Wolf soundtrack, but this one said nothing.
• Denny’s – Thugs - Real mobsters don’t eat at places with sticky tables. Unless it’s from the blood.
  
• Doritos – Crystal Ball – Ooo, nutshot. Hilarious.
• GoDaddy.com – Danica Shower and Enhanced – Not to discourage companies from putting hot chicks on TV, but… yawn.
• Hardees Chicken Parm – It’s fast food.
• Monster – Fandemonium – ONLY remotely interesting because the prizes are cool.
• Monster.com – Moose Head - Remember when Monster had the must-watch commercial of the Super Bowl?
• NBC – LMAO – actually, NBC does have the funniest network sitcoms right now, but…
• Pepsi – Anthem / Forever Young - Pepsi continues to have a better ad agency than Coke. I can’t say the same about the product.
• Sprint – Roadies – this would have been a category higher if it hadn’t been all over TV during the weeks leading up to the SB, but the shot of the plane taking off with the fireworks is money.
• Taco Bell – Overrated – Taco Bell makes a decent late night fast food burrito, and they should stick to that message. Attempts to make it look sexy or romantic or upscale will always, always, fail.
• Vizio – Take A Look - Maybe when I stop seeing ads about the DTV transition I’ll detox and suddenly care about consumer electronics again.

Fail – These commercials were just bad:

• Avon - Why? Why?
• Budweiser – Drinkability / Guy Drawing in the Air - Completely uninteresting and unfunny.
• Cars.com – David Abernathy, Boy Genius – The unlikable boy genius freezes up when buying a car.
• Coke Zero – Mean Troy – All right, I’m probably the only person in the country who will rate this a failure. It’s obviously a play on the old Mean Joe Greene commercial, but that one was poingnant and heartwarming. Coke had a chance to do a meaningful update, but instead went for cynicism and slapstick. It was completely unworthy of the original.
• Gatorade – Tiger/That’s G – perhaps the most innane slogan/promo in recent memory. Perhaps the “G” stands for “garbage.”
• H&R Block – Death and Taxes - just not very interesting.
• Heroes – Football people – Probably looked good on paper. How much do you want to bet none of the football guys have seen the show?
  
• Kelloggs Frosted Frakes – Plant A Seed - one of those here’s-how-spiffy-corporate-America is things. Maybe building athletic fields will help American kids exercise off all those high fructose corn syrup calories.
• Leno – Driving. – Actually, Leno is a car guy, so the imagery was nice. But if you didn’t already know about Jay’s time slot move, did this commercial clue you in?
• NFL Network – Football Season Never Ends (Darren McFadden) - A pale imitation of the Ladanian/Polomalu commercial that ran during the season.
• Pepsi – Pepsuber – the Macgruber SNL skits were funny until now. They premiered the Pepsi sell-out angle on last night’s episode, and it was funny because it represented the sleazy practice of product placement. Now that it turned into nothing more than a sellout itself… I like Will Forte, but he should be ashamed of himself.
• Sobe – Lizard Lake 2D/3D – Timberlake’s SNL sketch with Beyonce did this, and much better.
• Toyota Camry - completely uninteresting.
• Toyota Tundra – Killer Heat – notably mostly for the use of the word “tranny” twice.

Worst: These commercials managed to sink below all the other offerings:

• Toyota Venza – Faces – Big budget and utterly forgettable.
• Overstock – Bling and Boozer – A person of marginal celebrity at best coupled with a dot com holdover that’s mostly an afterthought. Who cares?

There’s my take. What did you think? Comment below.

Sure enough, here’s the show, opening up by reminding us of the Archuleta Angle. Let’s see what else the town has for us.

Ah. The opening song for tonight is Shiny Happy People… this is a bad omen. I love me some REM, but how about a little Gardening at Night instead?

Tara Matthews is up next, a redhead sporting an affected pseudo-goth get-up complete with opera gloves and black garter stockings that look a bit too small for her. Ryan asks if she’s playing a character, and Tara responds that it’s just how she likes to dress, and oh-by-the-way-I-have-ESP. Whatever. I love the goth look myself but it’s as much attitude as anything, and this chick doesn’t have it. She sings One Day I’ll Fly Away and it’s reminiscent of the sound you get when you Windex a piece of glass a bit too vigorously. “Horrendous,” Simon says, and she’s gone with a parting comment of “I’ll just leave now since you obviously didn’t like it.” We didn’t. Next.

Next up is a compilation clip of rejects including Alesha Turner, Katie Sullivan, and Rich Kagel, the latter looking a bit like the long lost love child of an affair between Christopher Lambert and Ted Nugent.

As if that wasn’t bad enough, the show follows up with Chris Kirkham, accompanied by his friend Greg the Rabbit – a big bearded guy in a pink bunny suit of the sort most recently seen in A Christmas Story. Chris starts to launch into a twangy version of Roll to Me, but the judges can’t take him seriously after the bunny thing and he’s out the door.

Ryan takes a second to give some advice to the holding room: go in confidently. Makes sense to me. What kind of Idol grovels at the judges’ feet?

Frankie Jordan comes in after the commercial. Idol had previously run a teaser asking “Have we found the next Amy Winehouse?” Oddly enough, Frankie’s baby is dressed in a cute little prison stripe outfit, which plays right in to the Winehouse story; Frankie completes the act by singing Amy’s You Know I’m No Good. Frankie has a good voice but projects a hot-stuff vibe that makes me not like her… the judges seem more tolerant than me, though. Simon offers “I quite like you. I quite like your voice and you’ve got a cute little face.” Frankie gets four quick yes votes, and she’s on her way, or as Ryan puts it “Frankie goes to Hollywood.”

Megan Corkrey follows. She’s an attractive girl with a fairly cool looking sleeve tattoo – thank you Gina and Carly for opening the show up to this kind of look. She’s been through a recent divorce, and has a young son named Ryder. Megan enters the room and Kara gives her one of those jealous-chick-up-and-down scans… bitch. Megan sings Can’t Help Loving That Man of Mine. She rushes a bit, but has a decent voice, although her range seems limited. She gives off none of the attitude I hated about Frankie. I like her. The judges agree, Randy saying “I kinda like you, man… that’s something new, while Paula says that she’s “bordering on loving you Simon calls it “one of my favorite auditions.” Kara gives in to peer pressure and says Megan is an “interesting girl, you have a glow about you, you have an incredible face.” So Megan’s off to Hollywood.

Taylor Vaifanua auditions next, coming to us from Utah by way of Samoa. Her pre-audition interview is all about how tall she is (5′ 11″) which leads me to believe she doesn’t have much interesting to say, She offers up Joyful, Joyful. Kara is “impressed with her, because I saw her in the bathroom … practicing!” I assume Kara meant she was practicing her singing. Randy thinks it was one of best vocals so far this season. In short, they love her. I didn’t.

Last tonight is Rose Flack. Keeping with the theme of the season, the last contestant has a sob story. So if you’re planning on auditioning next season, try to get their early lest tragedy strike you. Rose’s story is sad, though, having lost her parents within two years of each other, and being taken in by friends. Simon greets her with “Hello Rose Flack,” making the name sound like a moniker one of the kids from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory might have had. Asked to say something interesting about herself, Rose tells us “I’m charming.” She sings I Feel The Earth Move by Carol King. The song doesn’t suit her… but her voice isn’t strong enough for this, and she didn’t seem to have many notes at her command. Something softer suiting her hippie vibe would have probably been okay. I say she goes through, but ultimately she’s not Idol material. Paula tells her “you’ve got such a beautiful face, a beautiful aura… got to work on the vocals, though,” while Simon “didn’t think it was the best song choice ” but thinks Rose has “something about her.” Two more yes votes from Kara and Randy and Rose on her way to the next round.

So, to sum up, going through tonight:

David Osmond – meh.
Frankie Jordan – good voice, didn’t like her.
Megan Corkrey – liked.
Austin Sisneros – meh.
Taylor Vaifanua – didn’t like.
Rose Flack – meh.

And there you have it. We get a Thursday show tomorrow, two house with the highlights of the New York and Puerto Rico auditions. See you then! What do you think? Add your comments below.