AMERICAN IDOL Season 8 — Finalists from Group 2

Let’s get right to the point. The 3 who made the top 12 from this bunch were Allison Iraheta, Kris Allen and Adam Lambert. Save for the choice of Iraheta, who has an incredibly powerful voice and kinda looks like early Kelly Clarkson, I’m hugely disappointed by the results. I thought we’d get 2 girls and 1 guy since the girls were so much better last night. But no, we got 2 guys—1 white bread, 1 cheesy. Together, they couldn’t even make a sandwich because there’s no meat in their performances.

Iraheta was the first one to claim one of those coveted stools after Ryan asked her, Jesse Langseth and Matt Breitzke to come center stage and then the latter two were sent packing. I was hoping against hope that red-hot Jesse would get in but I’m absolutely okay with Iraheta. Iraheta’s got a great voice; she just comes across so unformed and awkward whereas Langseth seems to be the more ready-for-prime-time performer. I hope she comes back for the wild card round.

Next up were Kris Allen, Megan Corkrey, Matt Giraud (looking more like Justin Timberlake every day) and Jeanine Vailes, in short shorts again. That girl ain’t stupid; she knows what her best assets are. But this is American Idol, not Miss America, and her shapely gams couldn’t save her from being eliminated. She’s going home and should stay there. Matt is also gone, but we might see him again, hopefully in front of a piano.

At this point, Kris Allen and Megan Corkrey were left standing together and told that one of them was a finalist. I was thinking, “Oh, no contest. Megan’s got this in the bag.” When Ryan announced it was Kris, I thought he was on crack or maybe April Fool’s came early. To me, this was the night’s most shocking result. Kris seems like a perfectly nice kid but he’s so vanilla and nowhere near as dynamic and compelling as Megan on stage. She’s definitely coming back; I’d put money on that. They need someone unique like her in the finals so that we don’t have a bunch of cookie-cutter contestants.

At this point, there were still about 30 minutes of show left so you knew they weren’t going to reveal the third finalist any time soon. Instead, we got a performance from season 7’s top-five finalist, Brooke White, who looked gorgeous (she was my fave last year). She sang her brand new single, “Hold Up My Heart,” (available on iTunes) which had a nice, ’70s feel to it. It’s not the best song ever but the chorus was pretty catchy. I love her raspy vocals and how she still plays the piano with one bare foot to work the pedals.

OK, back to judgment time. Mishavonna Henson, Jasmine Murray, Kai Kalama, Nick/Norman and Adam Lambert were brought down. There wasn’t one ounce of surprise when Henson, Murray and Kalama were told America just didn’t give them enough love. Which left Nick/Norman and Lambert still standing. This was so gross; I wanted them both gone. But again, after no suspense whatsoever, Lambert was declared the victor and we had to experience his hideous rendition of “Satisfaction” all over again. I might need therapy after being repeatedly subjected to such heavy trauma.

Next week, group 3 will perform: Nathaniel Marshall, Kendall Beard, Taylor Vaifanua, Kristen McNamara, Von Smith, Alex Wagner-Trugman, Felicia Barton, Lil Rounds, Arianna Afsar, Scott MacIntyre, Ju’Not Joyner, and Jorge Nunez. Are you excited about any of these people? I’m not.

Did you agree with the results tonight or were you disgusted like I was? Post me some comments!