The Idol Guy

My, what a difference a year makes. Last year, the Idol franchise was not exactly in the best of shape. Jordin Sparks had not exactly been a hit, the tour was disappointing, and ratings were not quite where they ought to be. Thanks almost entirely to the efforts of the two Davids, things look a lot healthier now. David Cook represents a legitimate, undisputed out-of-the-box success that Idol has not really been able to generate since Chris Daughtry.

However, that’s not to say everything is alright now. The last season still left an Idolsphere that wasn’t quite happy with the Idol Powers That Be. There was only one possible answer, and it borrowed from the American mood. Idol no longer resides on Earth; it now belongs to Planet Hopeychangula. The last time we saw this much change from one season to the next was all the way back in Season Four… and, ironically enough, many of the changes undo what they did back then. That’s not a good sign.

More != Better

Idol as a franchise had regained credibility at the end of last season thanks to the artistry of David Cook, but the same could not be said of its judges. In between Randy being in the tank for David Archuleta all season long and Paula taking a leaf out of Miss Cleo’s book, the credibility of the judging panel was in tatters. Something had to be done, and TPTB brought in Kara DioGuardi to remedy this supposed deficiency.

We have no problems with Kara herself. So far, she appears to be reasonably sensible, although her reaction to Bikini Girl seemed a bit… overly dramatic. (Some would argue that just makes her all the more suited for AI, and it’s a fair point to say.) She’s certainly not any worse than Paula or Randy most of the time.

The trouble is, however, Idol entered uncharted waters with the new four-judge panel. I’m sure some game theory expert could give us the details, but what we’re seeing isn’t pretty. Instead of just one judge willing to engage in dramatic “battles” with Simon, we now have two. Oh boy. This is a formula only for increased drama – and, contrary to popular belief, Idol does not get any better with more of that. (More on that topic later.)

As I said at the start, some change was necessary – but this isn’t quite what I had in mind. The preliminary verdict isn’t good, and to quote Han Solo: I’ve got a bad feeling about this.

Hollywood? More like Hollyweird

One of the few changes that I thought I would like going into the season was the increased number of Hollywood episodes. Given that we, the Idol-viewing audience, would only have one (or two) episodes in the semis before the finals really begins, I hoped that the Hollywood week would serve as a good “preview” of who the eventual semifinalists. Unfortunately, that’s not quite how things turned out.

The less said about Group Night, the better. In between the Divas and Tatiana del Toro’s two groups, the vast amount of TV time was focused on about ten people, if that. This was when there were still about a hundred people left – so instead of music, all we got was a drama-fest.

And then, of course, we have the waiting-in-the-room segments, along with the hour long waste of time where we find out who made the top 36. In an ideal world, the Hollywood week would be used to find out more about who’d end up competing for America’s votes. As it is, though, for the vast majority of them we don’t know much more than a brief audition clip – and those we do know a lot about aren’t always any good. (See: Tatiana del Toro.)

This was not the Hollywood week we were looking for.

The Group of Death returns

The biggest change in the competition itself, though, is the return of the group rounds. As everyone knows, the 36 semifinalists will be divided into three groups of twelve, with the best guy, and the best girl, and the best remaining singer of either gender all automatically advancing.

There are good reasons why the top 24 semifinal format is in my opinion better, among them the fact that we get to see each contestant appear every week. It’s a reasonably fair system. The same cannot be said of the group system – we viewers will not have seen the first group for a month by the time the finals begin in earnest. At the very least, it’s an advantage for those in the later groups, or maybe even for those in the wildcard.

The only way the group rounds are better is it makes for better TV, maybe. Ryan Seacrest is sure to play up the angle that “only three people will survive tonight!”

The question has to be: why? This was not what the Idolsphere asked for. The answer is obvious upon closer inspection, but leads to plenty of uncomfortable questions. Here’s what we do know, though: this is unlikely to give us better contestants.

What really gives us pause, however, is the sheer amount of manipulation that this method allows the producers. There are two ways manipulation can come into play: one is determining who gets into what group; depending on whether a contestant is TBP (that’s To Be Promoted), they could end up as cannon fodder in a Group of Death like Season 2′s Group 2, which ended up producing the entire top three of the season – or, alternately, they could end up in something like Season 3′s Group 2, where just being decent was enough to advance.

And that’s before we get to the wildcard. Does anyone really believe that the judges – and the producers – will pick the best of the night? If anyone believes that, I have a bridge to sell you. Unless there is someone who is so good that not putting her through would be a complete and utter travesty, you can bet their criteria for deciding the three wildcards will be the same one for the top 36: commercial appeal, TV drama, competitive balance, etc. Singing may not be a big factor. This is the group that put Leah LaBelle in as a wildcard, after all.

A Tale of Two Idols

There are two things that drive Idol‘s success: the music, and the drama. There’s something of an uneasy truce between the two, as too much of either one would be a bad thing. Television, as a format, does call for at least some drama, but without good music – and thus, artistic credibility – Idol would not receive the kind of attention it does today.

While most of the Idolsphere approved of David Cook as winner, they were not nearly as approving of the process that had made him winner. As I titled my last article for Season Seven, it was a Rocky Road to Eden. The complaints were largely about the music; too many times it was dated, poorly done, or unflattering to the singer. When there were complaints about the drama or Idol purely as a TV show, it was generally that there was too much: Paula’s too-often bouts of insanity; Randy Jackson’s ever-shrinking vocabulary; these were things the I would have been pretty happy to see less off.

It should have been obvious to anyone with an IQ above their age that the problems with Season Seven had to do with the music. Our #1 prescription was clear: ditch the old and irrelevant themes. However, for some reason or another, the Idol Powers That Be have that we have had the opposite problem. Instead of fixing the music, what needed fixing was the drama.

Taken in that light, everything about the changes made in the offseason, how the shows have been edited so far – all of it makes sense. Bad judging panel? Kara might be better than the other judges (save Simon), but bringing her in while keeping everyone else is sure to cause even more dramatic judging and taking even more time away from the singing. But it would be good TV, so let’s do it!

What about the auditions and Hollywood? After the Paula Goodspeed fiasco, they couldn’t do the auditions the usual way. So they did cut down on the auditions of the mentally ill – but they more than made up for it with the dreadful, terrible editing of Hollywood week.

I doubt the actual week was more or less dramatic than previous seasons. It was simply edited in such a way that what stuck with us viewers, more than previous seasons, was the drama and the fighting. Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you my evidence: Bikini Girl and Tatiana del Toro. The amount of airtime that got focused on those two was simply remarkable… and not in a good way.

Even the “elevator” episode went through the Drama Machine. They went from a simple auditorium, with an elevator that’s not too different from the one most people in office buildings use, to this absolutely ridiculous mansion where the word restraint doesn’t seem to exist. Oh, and the sing-offs? Unlike on So You Think You Can Dance (where they probably stole this Sing-For-Your-Life idea from) where the idea actually works, here it just seems unnecessarily cruel.

The Idol PTB have put in a fair amount of Change, and you can bet there’s a lot of Hope for a “better” season in the halls of 19E as well. However, the wishes of the latest inhabitants of Planet Hopeychangula will all go to naught if they didn’t think about why they needed Hope and Change in the first place.

It’s clear that they didn’t. They never sat down and figured out what exactly was wrong. Instead, their fixes will only raise the “drama” and “tension” involved. It’s enough to make you wonder if Vince McMahon is hanging out with Simon Cowell.

Let’s take a closer look at least year. Setting aside the semi-finals (which are always a mixed bag, at best), Season 7 ran into rough water when the music – because of the themes – was bad. Neil Diamond and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as themes tested the patience of the Idolsphere – and it’s no coincidence I chose the latter week to first explore song age, which I believe is absolutely pivotal to the proper understanding of the success (or not) of Idol seasons.

However, I have heard nothing that makes me believe that they have addressed the situation. None. Let’s look at this list of the changes. How many concern the music? Three. One doesn’t even qualify as a “change”, as it just states we’ll have a Motown theme night – which is not exactly news, as we’ve had that very same theme before. Another one is a promise not to have last year’s narrow themes – but really, I don’t trust how extensive a list of songs “drawn from” Billboard Hot 100 songs will be.

Then we come up to the topic of “mentors”. Ken Warwick has said they’d bring in younger mentors. Well, just about anyone would be younger than Dolly Parton, Neil Diamond, or Andrew Lloyd Webber. However, the trouble with the idea of “mentors” in general is that good singers don’t necessarily make good teachers.

It’s no coincidence that the better mentors – Barry Manilow, Andrew Lloyd Webber (yes, he did the best job he could, but he had no business being on anyway) – have strong production backgrounds. Off the top of our heads, the biggest “current” names to appear as mentors would be Gwen Stefani, Jennifer Lopez, and Mariah Carey. None of them exactly distinguished themselves, and Stefani as particularly bad. If younger mentors turn out to bring younger songs, that’ll be a good thing – but that’s not guaranteed.

By contrast, we can be guaranteed that there will be more drama in the coming season. Judging time might well turn out to be more about the judges squabbling like children among themselves – especially with Kara added to the mix. We can expect, too, other particularly cruel “twists” and eliminations, even by traditional Idol standards.

I’ll be blunt: I am pretty much expecting that this season, the music will almost be overshadowed by the drama. Note that I said almost. Things have a funny way of working things out in the end. One of the things I love to say is that Idol is successful in spite of its producers, not because of them. It’s going to be another ride with many ups and downs – but, hopefully, in the end, the music wins out.

Coming up…

I just had to steal Ryan Seacrest’s line, didn’t I? Well, I do have something to tease. If you’ve been with us for the past two years, you know that in the past I’ve stuck to a weekly article. Well, since I don’t work for FoRT anymore, that doesn’t apply. Sometime before the top 36, I’ll put out what I call the Idolmetrics Manifesto: a detailed explanation of the what it’s all about, why I came up with it, and how can we all use it.

That’ll be the way things go from now on as well. Instead of one long article that was, to be honest, possibly a little too much to digest in one sitting, we’ll divide it into easily digestible chunks. One for each performance night, and one (maybe two) longer analysis pieces. Follow us on Twitter or RSS so you can keep track of everything I write here.