American Idol 2010 -- And Then There Were 20

Well, this was certainly a mixed bag of results tonight, wasn't it? I was right about two of the eliminations, one of which I was okay with (Janell Wheeler) and one of which I wasn't (Joe Muñoz), and the two I was wrong about were also split between the okay (Ashley Rodriguez) and the not okay (Tyler Grady). Although I must say I wasn't quite as disappointed as I thought I'd be in Tyler's departure ... though I was a bit ticked that they cut his farewell performance short.

I was delighted to see that Alex Lambert is getting another chance, but I was nothing short of dumbfounded that the singer I felt was the worst of the entire Top 24, Tim Urban, was voted through. And it certainly doesn't soften the blow that, as I was writing my play-by-play last night, I kept seeing texts tick by with a really great defense for Tim Urban: "but he's, like, soooooo cute!"

Yeah, that's what counts in a singing competition -- cute. I'll confess, I sometimes vote for the cute one (David Archuleta being the most obvious example), but I voted for him because he could sing like nobody's business. It doesn't matter how cute a contestant is -- if they can't sing, I don't think they deserve to continue. Joe Muñoz, while not necessarily the cutest, had both a voice and a stage presence far better than Tim, and he should have remained in the running.

I've never been so sorely tempted to just stop watching "Idol" altogether ... but I'm going to keep watching in spite of the travesty that happened tonight. It's probably a good thing I wasn't watching "Idol" during the Sanjaya season, 'cause from what I hear about how long he remained in the competition, and how allegedly undeserved it was, that probably would have gotten me fed up with the show back then.

Besides, with Simon taking off after this year, I have a feeling this will be my last go-round for "Idol", unless they get someone really good to succeed him.