American Idol - Season 10 (1 Viewer)

Big news on the judging and producing front. Nigel Lythgoe is back as the producer of American Idol, and it looks like he's cleaning house like he said he would from the sidelines.


Jennifer Lopez is in, Ellen is out. Kara is rumored to have been fired already (crosses fingers).


http://www.deadline.com/2010/07/breaking-ellen-out-of-idol/


It's official!


http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/07/30/kara-dioguardi-fired-off-_n_664895.html


Steven Tyler appears to have been tapped for the third judge spot.


And it looks like Randy is staying?

While I liked Ellen, it just ended up not being a good fit. She was the Dennis Miller of Idol; funny, but out of place. I always liked Kara. But I don't really care that she's not coming back. I'm not a big fan of J Lo, but she should do fine. Steven Tyler should be great also.


I would have liked them to get rid of Randy too, but maybe that would have just been too much change for them. Of course they don't seem to be too shy about changes for this coming season! Probably the change I'm looking forward to the most is going back to three judges. I never thought four judges worked for Idol at all.


Now that they are done shuffling the judges, it will be interesting to see if they make any changes to the format (ie voting).

I also liked Kara. I didn't like Ellen on AI. I don't see being a big fan of J.Lo as a judge, but as I think about it, she has as much pedigree to be there as Paula ever did. More so. Steven Tyler? I'm ambivalent about that one. At least it's not Jessica Simpson because I was seriously on the verge of tuning out this season if they announced JS as the new judge. You can't ask an audience to take a program seriously if the producers themselves don't.


w/b Nigel. Though you probably should stop saying "American Idol" when you're judging So You Think You Can Dance.


EDIT: Typos

If nothing else, all this drama should help generate some interest in the show again. I read somewhere that Nigel wanted to completely clean house but Randy has a year left on his contract. Maybe Ellen can host and they can give Ryan the boot!

Kara was criminally redundant. I can count on one hand the number of times her opinion differed from what Randy or Paula/Ellen had to say. A complete waste of airtime.

Kara was completely worthless. When it came time for her to speak I hit the 30sec skip on my remote and went straight to Simon.


As for Lopez... true she has just as much a pedigree to be there as Paula. But she's one of those I can't stand. Her acting and movies stink, her singing stinks... she's one of those who never seems to go away and I have no idea who her fans are.


I saw a news story on the Idol changes the other day and they were saying the producers were blaming Ellen on the low ratings. We enjoyed Ellen (not that she had much to offer). I think the producers are forgetting the crappy contestants they had. If the contestants suck there's no reason to tune in just to hear what Simon might say.


Anyway, we'll be skipping AI this year. Unless there's some must-see talent; then we'll just skip over JLo.

Ellen was the only entertaining judge last season, although the Dennis Miller analogy is good (then again, I liked him on MNF).


Jennifer Lopez at least has some charisma and screen presence, which is more than one can say for Kara. Steven Tyler has some personality too. We'll see what happens, I suppose.

Bumping for Tony's sake. I'm not watching, meself.

I enjoyed the show tonight ... didn't miss Simon or whatserface(s)...... thought it was as good as any other season first show - perhaps a bit better talentwise.

We have an Opera Girl sighting, I am surprised more don't keep trying that flamed out in Hollywood.


I didn't miss Simon at all either, I thought Tyler was very funny and Lopez was as good as any of the other women that has been on the show; JLo didn't realize how hard it would be to say no to some of these contestants. I thought they let people in that they shouldn't of but who really cares, they will be weeded out soon enough in Hollywood and they might be entertaining.


The Transformer guy was LMFAO hillarious when they showed him transform into the car.


I think this season will be as good or better then some past AI seasons.

I didn't hold out my hope without Simon, but I'm now optomistic.

Tyler giving the hotties a once-over is one of the things that's been missing from this process, unfortunately, they'll need to keep it in check for the under-18 contestants, or it'll get a little more uncomfortable, I suppose.


A lot of "loud" singers who didn't really sound melodic got yellow tickets to Hollywood, but they should get cut during Hollywood week unless they can bring something else to the table. I didn't think the paralyze guy sounded all that great.

I really enjoyed Simon in the first few seasons of Idol, but the past couple seasons he was so detached and had such a shit attitude he was ruining the show for me. Along with drunk Paula, Kara, and Ellen. I really thought this show was doomed, but last nights show gave me new hope for Idol. When I started watching last night I was ready to hate Steven and J-lo as judges.............................but to my surprise I really liked both of them. They have brought new life to the show. It was nice to see people sitting at the judges table that actually cared about being there, and not having to watch Simon behave like a spoiled two year old.

The judges were pretty entertaining last night. Unfortunately I missed most of it because I couldn't tear myself away from that new Nova spinoff about preparing a mission to Mars.


Oh, on an Idol-related note, Lucy and I went to see the traveling company of Rock of Ages, starring Constantine Maroulis (6th place, season 4), a few weeks ago. It was awesome!!! He was nominated for the Tony award for the original Broadway production.

Originally Posted by Aaron Silverman

The judges were pretty entertaining last night. Unfortunately I missed most of it because I couldn't tear myself away from that new Nova spinoff about preparing a mission to Mars.

Click to expand...

Pffft. Priorities these days are so screwed up.


I agree with Robbie -- I walked into Idol this season ready to give it the quick hook, but it's actually much better than I expected. I was hoping that the absence of Kara would make the judging better, and while that is true, the absence of Simon has also made the judging better. No more rushing and interruptions. And no more fighting with auditioners -- some of these people obviously came in looking to start a fight with Simon. And no more Kara trying to be Simon Jr. I don't think the word "artistry" was invoked all night. Hallelujah!

The talent level? Uh... this may still be a problem.


But I'm much more willing to give the show more rope now than I did before the season began.

Hanson, you stole the post I was going to make! Steven Tyler was WAY better (and entertaining) than I ever would have expected. I think I'll keep watching to see how this all plays out...although the rating this season got off to a rough start.

Tyler is raunchy and funny "You know what they say about a little hat ... it's good for a little head"... LMAO ... You'd never hear that outta Simon.

What was the rhyme Tyler said at the beginning of the show - the one that got bleeped?

"Well hellfire, save matches, f*ck a duck and see what hatches!"


I dunno what human/duck hybrids have to do with Idol, but then again Steven's a bit of a nutter.


I've decided to forgo hosting the AI Blog this year because it was a pain maintaining the pages. So I've opened a Wordpress account:


http://hanson68.wordpress.com/


The first batch of SAB's and chops are up right now.

I wasn't as prepared as most to string the show up because of Simon's exit so I slipped into the spirit of things rather easily and so far I really like what I'm seeing.


One of the best things about J. Lo is how attentive she is when someone really gets her ear, she also gets emotional in a way that's sincere rather than fruity like Abdul used to get lol.


Tyler needs...to......be...care.........ful with his comments to the younger ones but other than that I'm loving him, he's honest, knows how to critique and is above all things funny.


Congrats, FOX, I think you pulled this thing off.