American Idol Recap

British Invasion week. First off, Lulu RAWKS! I want to go out drinking with her. Peter Noone, not so much.

Haley goes first with "Tell Him" (Ally McBeal's "theme song") She has the dreaded first spot, which basically means the producers think she's overstayed her welcome so they stick her there hoping viewers will forget about her by the end of the show. But Haley is awesome and fights back with an armor of hot pants, a halter, and lots of plastic jewelry (we will soon learn that diamonds are for divas). I've never been to South Beach, but I'd imagine hookers there look like Haley did last night. She does these flirty, sexy dance moves to the judges and people in the audience (I think she may have even given one guy a lap dance--I'll have to check) Some people would call this desperate --I call it smart. She has a lot to compete with so why not use her best assets, everyone else is: Blake's using his "vocal entendres," Stephanie's using her Beyonceness, Sanjay's using his hair and his suckiness, Phil is using his Weekly World News fame. So anyway, GO GIRL! Spoil the producers' evil plot. Shake that ass, watch yourself!

Chris Timberlake sat on a stool and some guy played guitar. I took a quick nap.

Stephanie pretended to be Beyonce some more. (for a better version of the song, check this out).

Blake, oh, my boyfriend Blake. I haven't gotten off that much at the phrase "Who's your daddy?" since Game One of the 2004 American League playoffs. You're my daddy Blake!! You're my daddy!! But please be my daddy in different clothes because you actually look like my daddy on golf day. The plaid pants kind of ruined that whole fuck-me thing he was going for. He dresses so much better on results nights and I want to see the rest of his tattoos. Ryan sure wants Blake to be his daddy and repeatedly touches him then attempts to dance and beatbox. It was frightening. I was embarrassed for him and jealous for Simon.

I think it's around this time that our friend Ashley makes her debut. She's sitting there blubbering and Ryan looks at her funny (good acting job, pretending she wasn't a plant) and asks "Those are tears of joy right?" She sobs and nods.

Who's next, Lakisha? Ok, so homegirl's all decked out in this emerald green dress and 1 MILLION DOLLARS (Dr. Evil? Anyone? I know, played out, sorry) worth of diamonds. She sang the James Bond theme"Diamonds Are Forever" and it was so over-the-top it was awesome. The diamonds, the lights, I was just waiting for the silhouettes of naked ladies to go swimming by.(they could have done it--they've got Haley right there.) Simon said it was too old for her, but he seemed more concerned about the diamonds, insisting they weren't worth 1 million dollars because he purchased them himself to later give to Ryan.

Phil was next. He attempted to rock out with Tobacco Road and failed miserably, but you could tell he really studied the Chris Daughtry and Bo Bice handbooks.

Jordin sang a really sad song about how she doesn't have diamonds--I think she was pissed at Lakisha. Yeah, I'm just rushing along to get to...

The duet of Sanjaya and Ashley!! Unless you are a dead celebrity waiting to be buried you know how this went down. I've gotta hand it to Sanjaya though, he really went for it. Sick of being the butt of everyone's jokes, he figured if he was gonna go out, he was gonna go out with a bang so he headed straight to the American Idol library in search of help to attain that one, groundbreaking performance. Since the Daughtry and Bo Bice handbooks were both checked out by Phil, Sanjaya got the Constantine Maroulis handbook and studied it intently. Devil horns, tongue wagging, pelvis-thrusting, the whole thing. His song choice: "You Really Got Me". And it was strangely.....awesome and entertaining!! One of his balls actually dropped during that performance--and then he shoved it in Paula's face. (thanks daq!) He was off-key the entire time, but it was so bizarre and hilarious, so what? Ok, so on top of all this awesome weirdness is our friend Ashley who's bawling her eyes out like someone stole her bike and then ran her puppy over with it. The camera director's all "Cut to another close-up of the crying girl!! Cut back to that strange boy. Now back the the crying girl again!!" It was so spastic I had to look away at times. I didn't feel so bad about skipping my ab workout that night because I got more exercise from the convulsions of laughter than I ever did from Tamilee Webb. I could actually hear everyone in America laughing right along. It was one of those moments, like Jerri getting voted off Survivor or Omarosa getting fired.

Ok, so poor Gina's got to follow that. She does a decent enough job on "Paint it Black" that Tommy Lee would make a sexually inappropriate comment to her on Rock Star Supernova, however here on Idol, that shit don't fly because it's about the singing (except when Blake Lewis is involved). She angrily throws her Ryan Starr handbook at the wall as she realizes that Sanjaya managed to outrock her.

Are we done yet? Um, ok, Chris Sligh walks through the crowd and someone holds up a sign that says "Bringing Chubby Back." Which is a way better catchphrase for Chris than "Fro-Patrol" which is not sticking no matter how hard he tries.

Here comes the headliner Melinda!!! She sings another selection out of the Nadia Turner handbook - that song from Oliver that Nancy sings right before her boyfriend kills her--are we still in British Invasion week? She's wonderful of course. Show's over, but not until they bring Ashley up on stage to cry some more. Then a shot of some other little girl that's all "Damn, I should have cried like a little bitch." Bye Ashley, see you in the finale!

America makes their phone calls.

Matthew Knowles makes a phone call.

Wednesday night - Ha! Haley's plan worked and the producers' evil scheme is foiled yet again! Stephanie's out.

Oh and Clay Aiken hurt some girl in the audience.