American Idolatry :: It's over!

It's over!

The most dreadful season of Idol is over. Wednesday, May 26, was a two-hour spectacle to reveal our next American Idol - filled with bad music, celebrity collaboration and a fond farewell to Simon.

It's always cool to see the celebrity collaborations each year. But this year I strongly suspect that Idol selected its list of entertainers from the Celebrity Death Pool. Quite frankly, I thought most of the celebrities Idol wheeled out were dead already.

Did you know Alice Cooper, Berry Gibb, Robin Gibb, Michael McDonald, Daryl Hall, John Oats, Joe Cocker, the group Chicago and Kris Allen were all amongst the living? It was a surprised to me.

The top pick on everybody's Celebrity Death Pool 2010 list showed up - Bret Michaels, who in the past three months had a brain hemorrhage, a hole in his heart and a mini-stroke. I actually endured his duet with Casey James because I though he was going to keel over. What a waste of time; he seems perfectly fine.

Meet Morticia Jackson?

I am assuming Idol wanted to make this year's cast look hip and current by pairing them with artists who are barely recognizable and are on death's doorstep. For the most part, the experiment failed: The old timers could sing, making Season 9 contestants look even more pathetic.

I did recognize one of these senior serenaders - Joe Cocker. I pass Joe every day on the way to my gym and from time to time toss him some spare change. Joe Cocker is the homeless person living on my street. Joe has a huge beer belly, bald spot, missing teeth and gravelly voice.

The sight of Joe Cocker singing with Crystal and Lee was the most bizarre sight I have ever seen. He looked like some drunken bum grunting out some gibberish. It's impossible to explain, you just have to watch the clip - it's genuinely shocking.

What's even more shocking is that the Top 12 got to do a group number with Janet Jackson. Not really a group number; the idol hopefuls got to sing some of her songs but as soon as Janet made her entrance, the idols immediately stopped singing.

Janet breezed passed the idols barely acknowledging their existence or making eye contact. Who can blame her? She is a star and we will all forget most of the idol hopefuls in a few weeks, anyway.

Janet starts out singing some slow song no one knows while sporting her new ultra-short haircut, wearing a Morticia Addams-style dress and some odd contraption around her head. After we suffer through the new stuff, we get the hot classic Janet we love.

She disappears behind screen and we see a shadow of her disrobing. Out pops Janet singing "Nasty" in a catsuit with fishnet strips running up her body tastefully baring some skin and still looking hot. To distract us from her lip-syncing, she has a gaggle of male backup dancers ripping off their shirts so we barley notice her lips are in sync with the track.

Janet might want to consider mentoring both Lee and Crystal. I would imagine she would say, "You're both mediocre singers, lack charisma, can't dance, boring and dull. You can borrow my backup dancer and hopefully their talent, hotness and energy will distract your fans from noticing that you are dull and dreary performers."

That might work, Janet; but to be sure, make sure they pass out a dosage of Paula Abdul's daily meds at the concert to seal the deal.

A triumphant Paula

Speaking of Paula Abdul, she made her triumphant return to American Idol to give her final farewell to Simon Cowell. Paula had an extra kick in her step after just signing up to do a new show with CBS next fall called "Got to Dance."

It was nice to see the entire audience and judges give her a standing ovation. We got one more chance to hear Paula babble and see some clips of the good times when she and Simon would go at it.

What we loved about Paula is she had passion for the contestants and delivered it in her own unique whacky way. Paula and Simon had chemistry that was legendary - pure television gold.

The past contestants felt her passion and loved her for it. In an interview I did with Blake Lewis, he talked about Paula. "She was the mom and she made everyone feel good," he told me. "She wanted to make everyone have a good time" (check out the full As the season wore on it became clear to all that Paula" s="" contribution="" to="" the="" show="" was="" sorely="" missed.="" The="" loss="" of="" Paula="" was="" also="" a="" damper="" on="" the="" rating.="" Everyone="" is="" asking,="" "Will="" Simon's="" departure="" be="" the="" final="" nail="" in="" the="" coffin="" for="" Idol?"="" The="" simple="" answer="" is,="" "No."
Without Paula this season, Simon was quite boring and predictable. We missed the chemistry between Paula and Simon. Simon himself admitted on Oprah the ratings went down because Paula wasn't there.

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Watch Paula Abdul's return to American Idol, May 26, 2010:

Watch Janet Jackson perform on American Idol, May 26, 2010: