Thursday, May 22, 2008

HELLO. IS IT ME YOU'RE LOOKING FOR? When I think about this season, I'm reminded of something I said two years ago: "the goal of the show is not to produce the next great superstar. (If that happens, great, but it's not necessary from Fox's or 19Entertainment's perspective.) The goal of the show is to get you to watch the next episode. So from their perspective, unpredictability is good."

But there's good unpredictability and bad unpredictability. The bad kind is when people like Scott Savol and Nikki McKibbin outlast folks who are much more worthy, and the feeling of injustice taints one's enjoyment of the show (and has, in the past, made me quit watching seasons due to frustration). The good kind was this season, where even though we had a pretty good general sense as to how things would shake out, we cared enough about the performers to be invested in their ultimate order of elimination -- and that order ended up being pretty satisfying, from a dramatic perspective.

This season, we had twelve talented and truly distinct finalists who were often saddled with lame theme weeks, so the singing wasn't as impressive as what we've seen in the past. But the drama was pretty compelling, and whatever little steps the producers took this season to get us to know the finalists a bit better, they worked.

I have no idea whether David Cook is going to be a successful recording artist in this marketplace. All I know is that the past three months of television have persuaded me to root for him to succeed, and that's more than I can say for most seasons of the show. Well done, 19E.

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