American Idol: Bring Back Tatiana!
When yesterday we called for the immediate dismissal of American Idol's Tatiana Del Toro, we didn't want it to be like this. We knew that last night only three contestants could make it through to the top twelve, but, naturally, we figured if Tatiana went home, that meant deserving contestants Danny Gokey, Alexis Grace, and Anoop Desai would advance. Sadly, we were only two-thirds right.
Danny and Alexis became finalists, but, for some completely inexplicable reason, Anoop lost his spot — by just 20,000 votes, according to Ryan Seacrest — to Michael Sarver, the flat-singing oil-rig worker who performed that crappy Gavin Degraw song on Tuesday night's episode. Sure, we'd probably feel a little bad about America ending Sarver's pop-star dreams and sending him back to one of the world's deadliest jobs — if only he weren't totally boring. Truthfully, we'd forgotten he'd even sung on Monday until Seacrest called him up to deliver the good news.
Yes, Tatiana is obnoxious, annoying, and combines the worst parts of every bad contestant who's ever appeared on the show in its entire history, and her very presence made us want to shove our television out a window. But, as it stands right now, Idol's 2009 top twelve contains three okay-ish singers and not one likable, or even dislikable, personality. Anoop would've been a good enough choice, and at least given us someone to root for. But after seeing Tatiana's elimination (not quite as awesomely tearful as we'd hoped!), and watching dull Michael Sarver's boring celebration of his stupid, baffling victory, we're wondering if we haven't just lost the greatest-ever Idol contestant to root against.
This year's top twelve has three slots open for wild-card contestants. Considering his narrow margin of defeat, one of those will surely go to Anoop. But we sort of hope another one goes to Tatiana.
