American Idol: The Haves And The Have Nots

I haven’t written anything about this season’s American Idol, but it’s certainly been interesting so far. To date we’ve had:

- The Antonella Barba photographs story.

- Rosie O’Donell calling the show racist and “weightist” (gotta love those made up words) despite the fact that Lakisha Jones is both black and overweight and she’ll finish no lower than number two.

- A huge disparity in talent between the top two or three contestants and everyone else.

It’s pretty obvious that there will probably be no guys in the final three. I suppose one of them may make it to the final four, but if the public is not clueless (no guarantee of that) it should be either Lakisha Jones or Melinda Doolittle that walk away with the title. Of course regardless of whether either of those super-talented ladies win, their lives are already changed forever since they will get recording contracts either way.

What’s been fascinating to me this season is just how far and above Lakisha and Melinda are over the rest of the competition in singing talent. Overall the women are smokin’ this season and are making the guys look like chumps. Jordin Sparks and Stephanie Edwards are pretty close behind the top two for talent, and if I had to throw a couple of the guys names in there I’d have to say that Chris Sligh has a great voice and although I think Blake Lewis is talented his style isn’t my cup of tea. The problem with Chris is that he just doesn’t have much charisma and that’s going to do him in. Phil Stacey is good, but not great.

But of course the name that’s in the news lately is Sanjaya Malakar.

How in the heck is this guy hanging in there?

Yes, he’s only 17 and I truly think that he’s a nice kid (remember back to his reaction the day he got through and his sister didn’t), but his singing is WEAK. The dude actually creeps me out with his “softness”… the guy is giving me Michael Jackson flashbacks. If I ever had to be in a room with him to hear him talk in that soft voice I think I’d have to leave immediately to stop myself from getting a complete case of the willies or smacking him in the head to get him to talk like he had testosterone somewhere in his body.

He must be getting votes because he’s nice and because girls like his hair. I’ve heard the idea floated that there’s a conspiracy to keep him there since it’s so obvious which contestants are going to make it to the end, and the network wants people to tune in to see if he survives yet another week. I don’t buy it, I think it’s just the hair and the niceness.