American Idol 7 - Top 24 - Mega Analysis and Poll
Now that the American Idol Top 24 has been announced, the show has officially started! Yay!
But first, thanks to some people on the Internet who have made covering American Idol so much easier:
1. Mila from Joe's Place for the "biggest security breach in American Idol history" spoiler list.
2. The Worsters from Vote for the Worst for some great investigative research and insight on the contestants. They uncovered Carly Smithson early, and in a nice twist, if Carly Smithson decides to scream every song on the show -- she might actually be the VFTW pick this year!
3. MJ from MJ's BigBlog for being on top of things. Really.
Some thoughts on the American Idol Top 24:
Again, such a shame that 4 guys had absolutely zero exposure leading up to the live singing and viewer voting. Garrett Haley in particular seems destined to be eliminated next week. Josiah Leming had more exposure than Garrett Haley will ever get -- how is he supposed to launch his career when he inevitably gets the boot? We didn't even hear his VOICE. That's how bad it was. Jason Castro, Luke Menard and Jason Yeager also had almost zero exposure, and they will have a tough battle ahead if they want to make it to the Top 12.
There were rumors that some of the contestants violated some rules, and this was the basis for their elimination. That's theoretically possible. Brandon Green, Drew Poppelreiter and Colton Swon were "featured" before the Top 24 were chosen, and they made it all the way to the Top 24 selection. Fox could have made a big deal of their journey like Kyle and Josiah, but they didn't. It could also be that the auditions of these zero-exposure guys were just so horrible we're not allowed to see it on television.
Nevertheless, these guys are filler, since all the ones that the producers want to make it to the Top 12 were pimped to the hilt: Michael Johns, David Archuleta, David Hernandez (late, but still given star treatment), David Cook, Robbie Carrico and Danny Noriega. I don't see Chikezie Eze and Colton Berry making Top 12.
For the girls, it's a similar story, except that all of the Top 12 got featured during the auditions. Unfortunately, the generics will be booted early: Alaina Whitaker (notice the lack of blog investment on my part -- I just deleted her video and didn't bother), Amy Davis (another waste but I have it) and Alexandrea Lushington. They will pretty much have to duke it out on who doesn't get eliminated on week 1.
Week 2 is a bit more interesting since I think Asia'h Epperson, JoAnne Borgella and Kady Malloy have a shot in making the Top 12. These girls are going to have to give performances of their lives since they were not as pimped as these girls, arguably the girls American Idol wants in the Top 12: Carly Smithson (obviously), Kristy Lee Cook, Amanda Overmyer, Filipino-American Ramiele Malubay, Syesha Mercado and Brooke White. The pimping of Ramiele, Syesha and Brooke cannot be overlooked, but who knows, they can still choke like Sundance Head from last year.
So there you have it, your Top 24 American Idols for season 7. Who's your favorite?
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