Every week at the start of Celebrity Poker Showdown, the two hosts (Dave Foley and Phil Gordon) make their picks for who they think will win the tournament. Every week, like clockwork, those are the first two contestants to wind up in the Loser’s Lounge.

I now know how those two feel. Sarah Mather, I hardly knew ye.

But I’m getting ahead of myself.

Welcome to the Wednesday Recap And Results show. We begin with Ryan Seacrest in a white suit that makes me think he’s going to declare 7-UP to be the “Un-Cola” at any moment. He introduces us to “the journey so far,” in which we see such places as the Washington Monument, the Golden Gate Bridge, and THE ST. LOUIS ARCH! Oh, yeah! We also see the mime “singing,” the girl holding her udders singing, and other famous notables.

40 million people voted in the first two nights. Those are, indeed, blockbuster numbers. Busy phone lines, no doubt, will be cited by many for their losses in the first few weeks. The more things change, the more they stay the same.

We go to the recap of the girls’ night, in which a brief clip of Nadia shows her out of tune again. I stand by what I said.

We narrow it down to either Janay or Melinda as the lowest vote getter. For my money, they should both be out, but one at a time. Janay is safe and Melinda is going home. Janay is as shocked as, oh, say Jasmine or John Stevens were most of last year.

This begins what can only be described as a night of cruelty. This show has never dashed dreams harder, played fast ones on contestants, or been more devilish in its staging. This is reality television at its finest. If you love watching people squirm, cry, and become enraged — you’re going to LOVE THIS ONE!

Melinda can’t speak. Ryan stalls for her as long as possible. She’s barely breathing. He asks the crowd for applause. He goes to the judges. He asks her for her comments, and after a long pause, she complains about how unfair it was that she wasn’t featured earlier in the series.

Somewhere, the producers of AMERICAN IDOL wish the show was on tape delay so they could edit that out. She’s absolutely right. She shouldn’t be whining about it, mind you. Her performance last night wasn’t all that great. Janay was much worse, but that’s the game. In the end, there could be only one. She wasn’t it. But she’s fighting mad.

Then the cruelty is turned up a notch as Ryan hands her a live microphone and asks her to sing her bad song badly again.. To her credit, she does the best she can. But you know she wanted to storm off the stage and punch a producer. Can’t say as I blame her. I’m just surprised she said out loud what many of us have been talking about on the internet in recent weeks.

The song makes for either awkward television, or car crash excitement. Your mileage may vary, and I’m sure the comments below will split a lot of people.

Onto the guys now. Bo looks like a young Meat Loaf, which unexpectedly endears him to me. The final two are Travis and Jared. For a moment, I worried that the clean cut Travis was done. Happily, America did the right thing and voted out Jared. The judges repeated everything they’ve said so far tonight about song selection and “leaving it all out on the stage,” etc. Simon literally refuses to offer anything constructive. It’s all so gloriously cruel and sadistic. Then Ryan hands Jared a mic.

A hint for future weeks: Do NOT sing a song that talks about saying good-bye. It’s like offering yourself up to the volcano to spare the village. It’ll look VERY ironic when you sing it at the end of Wednesday’s show. Jared chokes up a bit at the end and skips a line, turning his back to the audience. This has not been an easy night so far.

Why are all the contestants having a tough time of it this year? Easy. In the years past, you had four groups of eight, from which two would be voted through. In the end, you had happy celebrations, where people sang with a smile this early in the competition. The losers had to wait out the Wild Card week, but still had some hope. This year, we’re voting people OUT of these early rounds, not IN. Those who are singing are fighting back the tears of being the first voted out by America. Ouchie.

Coming back from the commercial, we have audio difficulties, but muddle through. Ryan goes to the girls, and Janay is safe again. Is she destined to be the one to get voted through every week, despite having the deer in the headlights look about her? Is she this year’s Camile Velasco? Stay tuned.

In the end, my girl Sarah Mather is out. I’m disappointed, but not surprised. She had a bad week. Others had worse, and others have less talent overall, I think, but let this be a lesson to everyone: One bad week is as good as career suicide at this point.

No pressure, though.

Sarah was a very early pick from me to go far. She has a great voice. She’s cute as a button. She has a good stage presence, and she makes it all look easy. She just picked the wrong wrong wrong song this week. It was upbeat, but all wrong.

And Janay is still in it. Sorry, that’s the one I can’t believe.

I thought Sarah deserved a second chance, but two have to leave each week for four weeks. It’s only going to get harder.

(Minor factoid: Sarah is a Canadian citizen, working towards her American citizenship.)

She sings her song with her feet planted still and the light gone from her eyes. She looks bored, just going through the motions. It’s sad. Still, she sings it remarkably well up until the end when she just gives up. It has to be mortifying. It’s like being put on center stage with a spotlight shining on you and a carnival barker yelling, “LOOK AT THE LEPER!”

That leaves us with the last of the boys to go. The producers find a new and tricky way to ditch someone, by telling the bottom row that they won’t have to do the work this time around, then bringing the top line out for the results. Of course, just because they don’t have to do the work, that doesn’t mean they’re safe. And, quick as the snap of a whip, Judd is tossed. He’s the Jon Peter Lewis wannabe. He took the chance. He sang something upbeat and got the audience going. And now he’s out, and the judges are faulting him for taking a chance on a “novelty song.” I give up.

But I won’t miss him. I didn’t think he was the strongest of the guys. And, as a recapper, I’m glad to be rid of two people with such easily confused names as “Jared” and “Judd.”

He has to sing his song again, and fails at the end, bolstered only by 10 dreamy young females crushing him with a group hug. Not a bad place to be.

So, of the four I picked to go, I got one girl right and one wrong, one guy right and one wrong. 50/50, any way you look at it.

I doubt I’ll be any better next week. Stay tuned. . .

This entry was posted on Wednesday, February 23rd, 2005 at 11:53 pm and is filed under American Idol. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.