AI Season 10- Finale Performance, 05-24-11

Well, here we are- months and months of singing and snark, and we're finally down to two kids. We get clips of Carrie at age eight, and then winning. And then David Cook as a kid, and then winning. I'm ready to see Ruben, Fantasia, Kelly, Kris, Lee, Jordin, and Taylor's old home movies too, but no such luck. Then we see clips of Lauren and Scotty as adorable kids.

Randy is in a gold and black houndstooth jacket with extremely wide black satin lapels. Steven is in a lizardy jacket and hair feathers,- in other words, same old same old. JLo is playing ice princess in a green sequined dress with filmy sleeves.

Ryan is natty in a tux. He explains just how young Lauren and Scotty are, as if we've had even one minute to forget that. He also calls a doctor out to explain that Lauren blew a vocal chord in rehearsal. Her voice may be iffy tonight, not that it isn't iffy every night.

Tonight they're singing three rounds, and doing it in the space of an hour. It took them all year to figure out how to fit everything into 60 minutes, I guess. Scotty won the coin toss, and like a gentleman, he let Lauren choose the singing order. Lauren is not a gentleman- she's going last.

Round 1 is songs they've performed already.

#1. Scotty is singing Gone. He's wearing a gray print tee shirt and a black leather jacket. He's mumbling a bit. Actually, he's mumbling a lot- I can't understand any of the lyrics. He's trying, but every once in awhile, that other hand goes to the mike. He sounds exactly the way he always does, and the crowd goes wild.

#2. Lauren is singing Flat on the Floor. She's in all black and silver- a sparkly silver jacket with wide lapels, sparkly striped skirt, and black leggings, and a huge butterfly ring. Her voice is holding up, and she's performing confidently, though she bobbled on the staircase.

Round 2 is songs chosen by the kids' Idols.

#3. Scotty's song was chosen by George Strait, though I did not catch the title. Scotty is in red plaid. Again. And he's playing the guitar. I note that when his hands are both occupied, his eyebrows go crazy. The song is fine and the audience goes wild. Again.

#4. Carrie Underwood chose Lauren's song, which has something to do with Memphis. Lauren is wearing a strapless, gold dress with a bubble overskirt and a tulle underskirt, cowboy boots, and a necklace that consists of boots and bows. Her performance is confident and she's looking good, but the song is a non-entity.

Ryan asks for the judges' opinions. Randy babbles forever and says nothing. JLo tries to compliment every moment of every performance. Steven makes no sense whatsoever. None of them understand that judge is not just a noun.

Evidently there was a song that everyone got to help write. And it's going to be sung by some guy named Taio Cruise (and I must thank Bee Girl for the name and the spelling- I've never heard of this guy)(is anyone surprised?). Taio wears big sunglasses and he has robotic drummers who use lighted sticks. The song is called Positive, so I assume that the community-written lyrics are uplifting, but I can't understand a word. It's probably for the best.

Camryn Mannheim is in the audience. Have I ever mentioned that once upon a time, for a teeny tiny little moment, Camryn Mannheim sort of considered the Tory books as a TV series. Nothing came of it, but it was fun to dream. David Archuletta is in the audience too, and he hasn't aged a day since his season.

Round 3 consists of the Coronation Singles, the first song that The Winner will release (don't kid yourself, both of these songs will be inflicted on the public). I hope that just once the singles will be something other than climb the mountain/beat adversity/chase the rainbow/love the puppydogs dreck that the coronation songs always are. What are the chances of that happening, do you think?

#5. Jimmy Iovine chose the songs, and he waxes poetic about Scotty's big song for his big voice. The song, lord help me, is I Love You This Big. No, I'm not kidding. Scotty is wearing a nice gray suit jacket, and clips of his AI Journey play on the screen as he sings this horrible song. Remember in the movie Dave, when Kevin Kline  runs the robotic arms and says something about once catching a fish that was this big? That's what Scotty does at the end of this song- he extends his arms and loves us all, this big. His Mama cries, and Randy says that Jimmy was finally right, whatever the hell that means.

#6. Lauren is wearing a white prom dress with a floral border. There are more movies on the screen as she sings. Man, this song is even worse than Scotty's. I think it's called Like My Mother, and cross my heart- I could not make this up: it's all about how wonderful mothers are. Seriously. Lauren's mama is falling apart, JLo is falling apart, Lauren is falling apart, and Randy is more annoying and incoherent than ever.

The judges do their best to convince us that Lauren is ahead tonight, and that this is a real contest. They're working really really hard at it, and they may have almost sort of convinced themselves. The only one who isn't faking it is Steven- though his preference for Lauren likely has nothing to do with her singing ability.

For a minute, I think that we're actually coming in under time, but no- David Cook is playing them off. He's singing Don't You Forget About Me to clips of the good, the bad, and the batshit crazy from Season 10. All three categories are overflowing.

They've done everything they can to convince us that this is a real contest, but I still think that Scotty is going to walk away with the crown. We'll know tomorrow night.