And Then There Were Four, And It Was Good

We're the kinda betting person who will say something in March, like, "We'll bet you the final four contestants on American Idol will be Melinda, Blake, Jordin, and Lakisha," but we won't put any money on it. Then, when that's exactly what happens (as it did last night), we'll be all, "Gah! Why didn't we put money on it?" Maybe we should just go ahead right now and say we'll put ten bucks on Melinda taking it all? Anyone in?

Seacrest promised a show with "no filler," but that was about as substantial as his promise last week that it would be "the most shocking Idol results show ever." He didn't deliver last week, and this week was full of flashbacks to last week, complete with a 20-minute synopsis of that two-hour show. 20 minutes. Enough already! Couldn't they find some completely unrelated artist to come out and entertain us? Let Gina back on the stage with her grrl band for a little rock-and-roll week performance? We hear Britney Spears is looking for places to perform again. Even that would've been better than 20 minutes of last week.

Finally, he called out Melinda, Phil, and Lakisha. Lakisha's safe, and although we were a little surprised, we knew in our hearts that meant it was Phil's time to go. He went down "in a blaze of glory," though, quite literally, and we woke up this morning with that damn song still in our head. Thank you, Phil "I'm going to kiss everyone in the audience now that I'm rejected" Stacey.

Then more filler, more flashbacks to last week. More "exciting" (??) moments when the previous Idol winners did an awful job of reading cheesey lines off cue cards in robotically over-happy voices ("You believed in me, America, now believe in someone else"). Then Seacrest made Jordin, Blake and Chris stand up. Our heart sunk into our throat (as we said yesterday) but he immediately told Jordin to sit down. She and we took a huge collective sigh of relief.

Which left Blake and Chris, who took a few minutes to profess their undying BFF status, followed by a chorus of "Awww" from the crowd. This was a no-brainer. Blake actually genuinely looked like he wasn't sure for a second who was going home. We thought he was smarter than that, but then Chris said he and his BFF "would go home for each other." Blake said, "We still get to tour together," and then they held hands. Insert homoerotic joke here, and let the comments about us being homophobic ensue, despite the fact that we're a lesbian.

Chris sang his song--"Wanted Dead or Alive"--worse than he did last night, sealing the fact that, once and for all, despite all the messed-up twists and turns along the way, justice has been served on American Idol. The four best singers, hands down, are in the final four. And no matter what the buzz was about Seattle having no talent during auditions, a Seattleite remains, the only man left standing in a sea of women with big diva voices.

Can he survive? Can he beatbox his way through the Jungle of Diva, outlasting KiKi and JSparks? We doubt it. Lakisha will probably go next week, but the top two will still be Jordin and Melinda. As much as we'd love to see him come in second, we'll put money on a Third Place Blake, or as we'll call him from now on Blake the Bronze.