Winners All Around

So the last of the big shows wrapped up this week in a flurry of excitement. No big surprises, but a few good shows to end the season.

First was the final rose on The Bachelor: Officer and a Gentleman. Andy took both girls home to meet his parents in Pennsylvania. You just knew that Tessa would get the final rose after Bevin told his grandparents that she does research on the sexual dysfunction of menopausal women. She also let his conservative family that she was raised in the Bahai faith. At this point she was toast. And after Andy told both girls that he loved them (can you imagine how he explained this to Tessa Tuesday?) he dumped Bevin and proposed to Tessa. It might be the first time that the girl I wanted to get the final rose actually got it. Supposedly she's moving out to Hawaii to be with him; I give it six months.

Next was the finale of Dancing With the Stars. It was actually higher rated than Idol, which is pretty crazy, except for the fact that the finale was good. (more on why Idol's wasn't later) I'm pretty bummed that it's over, but ecstatic that Apolo won. He's such a good dancer, and completely deserved it.

Finally, there was the two hour love-fest that was the Idol finale. So much of it was actually un-watchable. If they want to be more relevant, having Bette Midler and Tony Bennett perform does little to achieve that goal. And while I enjoyed the Beatles medleys, I wonder how many of the teenagers watching actually recognized the songs. They dragged it out for two hours before they even started to get to the results. And this was where anyone who was watching on tivo (insert your name here) got screwed. The result was read exactly 2 hours and 4 minutes in to the show. The show was supposed to be two hours long. That's right - they kissed their own behinds for so long that they nearly didn't get to the actual point of the show, leaving many to not hear the anti-climatic finish where Jordin was crowned the winner. (and we saw Blake look rather relieved)

This is one of the many reasons the ratings were down this season. This, and the fact that compared to last year, the talent wasn't nearly as good. For this, I have to blame the judges. There were such talented performers that we saw in the early rounds who seemingly disappeared during the Hollywood round. I also think they need to look at the voting process, especially in the first round of voting. They went to the guys and girls format a few years ago, and I don't think it produces the best possible top 12. I think they would be better served by going back to how they did it the first few seasons, where the top 24 were divided into three groups. Each group sang once, and two or three were voted through to the next round. Then there was a final week where the judges brought a few back to sing again (including some who had been originally cut in Hollywood), and each judge put a singer through (plus a singer or two voted on by the fans). And I understand that they will never go to a voting system like So You Think You Can Dance? or Dancing With the Stars where the judges votes get combined with the viewers, but they need to do something (maybe limit how many votes each phone line gets?).

With that, I'm off for a few weeks. I'll be back once the summer replacement shows get going (or earlier if I have a lot to say!)...enjoy your Memorial Day weekend and GO RED SOX!