The American public voted. For a change, they seemed to THINK before they did, unexpectedly crowning David Cook as the newest American Idol. The little pipsqueak, David Archuleta, seemed befuddled and crushed, as just about all the pundits, including this Turkey, had predicted a pipsqueak victory. Justice is thus properly served and the better performer did, in fact, win.
I don’t know who looked the more surprised, Archuleta or Cook.
The Ãœberhypefest was typical of Idol finales, with lots of performances by the finalists, by former Idols, and by guest stars. There were lots of commercials and promos for Fox TV shows and motion pictures. Headliners were the Joshua Brothers, ZZ Top, Carrie Underwood, Donna Summer, Graham Nash, a couple of duds, and the biggest dud of them all, George Michael, who is not aging well, to say the least. Besides, he could never sing. Nevertheless, he occupied the featured surprise guest slot. The much ballyhooed appearance by tweenzy sensation Miley Cyrus never materialize, being the product of yet another stupid Internet rumor that infected the blogosphere yesterday.
Michael’s was a weird guest selection if the Idol producers were trying to cater to their prime audience. An 80s has-been ain’t gonna get them many young viewers. My best guess is that it was a cheapo deal, with Michael wanting to promote his tour or whatever.
The vote wasn’t even close. Cook’s margin was 12 million votes. The percentages were 56% to 44%, out of a total of 97.5 million votes. The dialing programs must have been burning up the CPU cycles.
Simon Cowell must have felt like crap about declaring Archuleta the winner on Tuesday night. He apologized to the contestants before the vast audience for his hasty judgment. To paraphrase Simon’s words on Tuesday, which were then directed at David Archuleta, we witnessed a knockout alright, but Simon had the wrong boxer hitting the canvas. It was Cook who scored the knockout.
There’s not much more to say except congratulations to David Cook and consolations to David Archuleta. Perhaps the latter can go back to school and be a doctor or something.
Until next year, peace out!
