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Lucky 13! Last night was the premiere of your Idol season 10 finalists, the small handful of folks from which you will be forced to pick a winner. What'd you think?? Sigh, yeah, me too.

There's not a ton of preamble to be done here. It was Greatest Musical Hero night or some such nonsense, basically meaning that the contestants all sang boring old songs that no one cares about anymore. I mean, "Maybe I'm Amazed" is a good song. I think we can all agree on that. But in 2011, do we really care what some twentysomething reality show contestant brings to the "Maybe I'm Amazed" table? No, I think we do not. Nor do we need to see yet another gospel choir-backed (isn't it a little early in the game for contestants to have gospel choirs helping them?) rendition of "I Believe I Can Fly." I don't know if they did this theme because it would mostly result in older, cheaper songs (by my count, nothing except "Umbrella" was written in the last ten years), or if it just happened by accident, but man the whole thing felt creaky, didn't it? It did. I am right. Anyway.

The Good

Hm. Not much! I watched with a friend last night who is totally in the tank for Fozzie Bear (the bearded jazzcat who sings jazz) so my opinion might be a bit swayed, but yes, his "A Little Help From My Friends" was strong — fun to watch, sounded good, actually a performance. Of course there were moments during the thing when he really was just yelling instead of singing, but that song treads that border pretty heavily, so I don't blame him. Yeah, he was good. But. But! I just really don't want to see another Taylor Hicksian character advance through this competition. I know it's fun to root for the homely guy who wails like a jazzcat in a bear trap, a soul man in the body of a troll man, but y'all are never gonna buy his records after this or go to his sad concerts at Foxwoods. You just ain't. And I know this is a television show and a television experience, not some endorsement or indicator of your future musical purchases, but don't string the guy along. That's alls I'm saying. Just a help a guy out, huh?

Pia Tostada was good. She's good. She's got a crystal clear voice and she is very pretty and she's poised and I think she could be a real contender in this race. That is if her crippling boringness doesn't get in the way. "All By Myself"? Really? I know that this show is karaoke blah blah, but come on! Freshen it up! It's the nineties! Live in the now! I'm pretty sure there have been ballads written since 1975. In the last ten years even! Sure it might not fit in the category of "musical hero," but just lie. I mean honestly, just lie. It's not like they're going to run a background check on you and say "Wait a second, chief. Look at this. Beyonce isn't really her musical hero. It's Celine Dion. We should call the SWAT team." and then they arrest you. That doesn't happen. Just lie. For our sake. Please.

For that reason I am putting Naima in the good category, because darn it if the girl didn't sing a song from the late 2000s. And darn it if she didn't perform. She did dancing! And reggae rapping! On American Idol. It was truly something to behold. I don't know that I've ever actually seen someone do that kind of pop star performance before on this show. Sure she didn't really have the breath support or anything to actually keep singing and dancing semi-simultaneously, but whatever, at least she tried, which is a heck of a lot more than you can say for a bunch of other gals on this show. Naima's "Umbrella" was by no means perfect, and I'm still not sold on her vocal ability, but she sure did set herself apart last night as someone different and interesting to watch. Hopefully America, which didn't put her in the top ten, sees that too and chooses to keep her.

The Bad

Not exactly everyone else, but basically yeah, everyone else. Thia Megia was good but bland. And that jazzy up-tempo "Smile" is a hilariously bad arrangement. I'm pretty sure that's the elevator music that plays in a cruise ship's morgue.

Jacob Lusk sang the tired old spiritual rag "I Believe I Can Fly" and I just can't listen to that song without peeing all over a fifteen-year-old, so I'd like it to stop.

Ashley Rodriguez sang Selena unmemorably, which J.Lo is legally allowed to execute her for, and she was wearing a pants outfit that was last seen on a happy hour singer at the Breezes Lounge at the Ft. Lauderdale airport Radisson in 1986. Honestly, last night's stylist should be put in jail. Everyone looked awful.

Who is that girl that sang "Blue"? Did she sneak in? I've literally never seen her before. Never. She has not been on this show. She clearly sneaked in a back door some crew member had propped open to go smoke a cigarette and she found that dress and ran on stage and sang. The judges were like "Um... hi... you. You were... good? I don't..." Just a random street girl who ran in and sang a song. I have never seen her before. An Idol stowaway. Truly something.

Haha. Oh man, let's talk about Willy Whispers. What on Earth! Honestly, what is that, that's here on this Earth? If Willy Whispers is proven to not actually be a bunch or earthworms that joined together and put on clothes and pretended to be an adult man, like one kid on top of another wearing a trench coat and trying to sneak into a movie, I will be surprised. He is just the weirdest, most boneless person I've ever seen. I think he at one point was doing the ancient art of Zui Quan, all swaying and staggering around the floor. I love that he picked a Ryan Adams song, and if I were good at my job I'd look it up to see if anyone else has ever sang Ryan Adams on the show before but I'm not so I won't, and obviously "Come Pick Me Up" is a terrific song, but... not when whisper-sung by a bunch of earthworms! It is not good then. It is weird and whispery and makes me think that if you do end up in Thia Megia's cruise ship morgue, Willy Whispers is the one who's going to put you there. Just a needle-like fingernail inserted into your temple and that's all there is to it. All the while he's scratchily singing and flopping all over the place, knocking over furniture, scaring the cat (you have a cat on the cruise ship for some reason), giggling with those teeth of his. He's just the strangest. And I hope you don't think I'm knocking "strange" as a concept. I love weird! I love different. But Willy Whispers isn't good to watch, which is important on this show. He's just scary and is going to murder me and then break apart and wriggle back into the dirt. Where all of his parts will eventually eat my corpse. It's an unsettling thing to think about while trying to watch American Idol.

Ugh. Alaina. I've liked Alaina in the past. I think she's a good solid singer with a good shot at winning the damn thing and it's interesting to watch that play out. But last night she was terrible! First, she picked an awful song. My guess is about a third, tops, of the audience had heard that song before last night, and hopefully when they heard it, it was sung with a little pep and energy and not by some teenage girl schlumpfing around on stage in slippers like she was walking to the principal's office. Ugh! What is that walk that teenage girls these days do? That dumpy shuffle thing? Boys have their own version of it, but there's something particular about the girls these days who do it, this insolent, childish, lazy yet timid "I give up" plodding along. It's so unattractive and, if you're this kind of old crank, speaks volumes about what the kids are doing these days. And there it was, on stage in the American Idol finals, practiced by no less than the top seed going in. Disappointing! A boring meandering song for a boring meander.

The Conflicts

Ha. Baby Lockthemdoors. He just makes me laugh every time I see him! What is he doing on this show? It's too funny. When he was talking about his baseball team back in Garner, NC I half expected apple pie to come shooting out of his face and then Ryan would have started screaming and lemonade would pour out of his eyes and then there'd be fireworks and cheddar cheese would rain down from the ceiling and Randy would turn into a blueberry and float away. He is just the All-Americanest, this Scotty! He sang some fool Garth Brooks song that was whatever. It doesn't matter. I think he's a lock for the Top Six at least. I mean, right? He's not really a great singer, he's a novelty act, but what a novelty! I can't wait til he sings some romantic song and pulls a girl up on stage and she dies as American flags start unfurling out of her ears and he slings her over his shoulder and drives off with her in his pickup truck. That will be a true American Idol moment.

Oh let's discuss Poopcloth for a second. I mean, can we call him Poopcloth anymore? He wasn't pooping cloth last night! James Durbin was not wearing his stupid fabric tail last night and I am choosing to believe it's because he or a stylist read this site and were like "I don't want poop cloth anymore." Let's hope! Godly St. Ryan did ask Poops about the cloth and Poops laughed it off like he was embarrassed! He knows! He's got to know. Oh man is he the living worst. He sang "Maybe I'm Amazed" well and everything, but there's just something about his attitude that I just do not care for and likely never will. I just don't like the cut of his jib, I guess. Especially when that jib hanging from his butt.

Speaking of butts, let's talk about Stefano. Hahahaha. Whatever, he sang a gay fever disco version of a Stevie Wonder song, which was an interesting choice and was executed well enough, but the true moment of note with Stefano's performance was when he was done singing and talking to Ryan and he went to shake Ryan's hand and Ryan didn't see that he was doing that so Stefano was sort of left hanging, but the funny thing was that Ryan had turned or shifted a little as Stefano extended his hand so Stefano basically ended up standing there with the back of his hand pressed up against Ryan's lower stomach for a few seconds. And Ryan had the funniest look on his face — one of such panic and passion and regret and worry — that I think the season could have just ended there. Just right there. With Ryan frozen in terror and Stefano not sure what to do, not sure if he should tell anyone about what happened earlier in the day, when Ryan knocked on his dressing room door and Stefano let him in and Ryan shut the door behind him and wordlessly walked up to Stefano and hugged him, very tight, his hands moving along his back, Ryan breathing in, taking Stefano in, and Stefano just stood there for a moment before tentatively returning the hug. But as he brought his arms up Ryan pulled back and said "No, no no no. No. I'm sorry. I... I have to go. I'm sorry. I have to go." And that was it. And they didn't see each other again until all of a sudden there they were in bright, bright lights on the stage on live TV and still this strange moment hung between them like vines, this caught green minute when they were tangled in jungle. And then the hand thing and Ryan's expression and the quick readjustment and the frantic way that Stefano got off the stage.

And then Tim Urban at home, at Ryan's home, watching this on the TV, sitting on the edge of Ryan's bed as he always likes to. Not knowing, of course, about what happened in the dressing room, but knowing that particular look on Ryan's face. Remembering it from a time last season when Tim had said something dangerous and accidentally sexy and off-the-cuff during a photo shoot or something, and Ryan had been there, and heard this, and his expression grew that same darkness, fell into those same roiling shadows. With a sad anger, Tim turned off the TV and left the main house and returned to his little bungalow, the one he'd done up and gussied up and decided to stay in for a while after he and Ryan's last big fight. And when Ryan got home from work, tired and scared, he fell right into bed, not noticing until hours and hours later the empty glass of wine and the wrinkle of sheets where Tim had once been.