Canadian Idol - compelling or is it just me (being Cdn)?

I will likely tune in again when I return from Berlin, because the last five weeks or so of Canadian Idol is about all the Ben Mulroney I can stand.

Ok, who's more obnoxious: Ben Mulroney or Justin Trudeau?

What about Joe Clark's daughter? Catherine? Christine?

That famous Mulroney charisma, of course. Does Chretien have any annoying kids?

Chrétien's sons are too old and too Chrétien-y to ever be TV-friendly.

I went to high schoool (a few grades ahead) with one of the (now-departed) Idols. She had a different name then, and I think I might have been cruel to her. I have no regrets.

RC.

also - which PM sprog is in Iraq - i always say its ben mulroney but im sure that can't be right, surely?

old canadian joke:

how do you empty a pool of 60 cnaadians in 15 seconds? say "would you please get out of the pool? PLEASE?"

ahhh - that's a classic.

Who was the Canadian Idol winner on World Idol who looked like a cutely incompetant NY cafe waiter?

That's the problem, no one is really sure who he is. But he may have slept with Sass to win.

I don't know if Cdn Idol is a "major deal" but it's part of a broader phenomenon sweeping the globe! But second time around I'm noticing distinctly Cdn trends, notably that a little bit of nuttiness is favourable (see: Jenny Gear last year, Kaleb this year.)

(Last year's winner was Ryan Malcolm. From Kingston. Oh, the useless information my mind holds. Originally I wrote: He's cute in that boring ex-boyfriend way. Then I saw Huck's post - haha. I just mean he reminds me of cute guys who are doing interesting things but are actually boring when you get down to it. xpost.)

and is there an Iraq Idol? Then again, the last thing they need is a show that will only further rip the country apart through 1-900 voting.

If there's a quebecer i will - of course - support him/her unreservedly till they lose when i will blame english canada and mutter darkly about the plains of abraham.

Speaking of which it suddenly occurs to me that there was a French Language show Called Star Academie. i guess that was Quebec idol. You can ignore para#3.

Yes, finally it's going to be over. I was well and truly sucked in and ended up watching every week (or at least had the tv on in the other room so I could hear it, but still, I was *aware* and hooked.) I'm sure that Kalan will win, but the top six will get recording contracts of one sort or another. It's kinda like meh, "winner", whatever. Yet I will watch...

Theresa's first performance was SO FUCKING BAD I was literally cringing in my seat. Her pitch was awful, the entire delivery was roadkill-level dead, the chorus had no punch or power, the low notes couldn't possibly bore me or put me to sleep because the intonation was so bad that I was literally getting those bad sorts of shivers like the kind you get when you rub a balloon on a wool sweater for five minutes. And her dress was shlumpy, it hung off her body like a drape whose hooks have been fastened in the wrong order on the line. And this was her BEST outfit of the night. Who told her to wear those high black socks with her second dress? And the third outfit -- head down to Queen Street (for all you Torontonians), walk blindfolded into a second hand store such as Black Market, pick out any five random items of clothing and you'd have an ensemble that had ten times the fashion sense of that sub-bohemian sludge-outfit she wore.

And then came the most OMMFMFMFMFMFMFG!!!!!!! TV moment of the year -- the JUDGES PRAISED THIS DRIVEL!!!

As everyone already knows, Theresa's voice is nothing special. She can sing lounge-lite Norah Jones songs and nothing more.

Kalan is good -- certainly far from great -- but he's obviously got greater star power than the bland, made-for-elevators Theresa. He's got this 1993 Damon Albarn boyish mod thing going on, except of course he's a billion times cuter.

Overall though, for a final week performance, this was pitiful compared to the American counterparts. These two were timid, hideously unpolished, and the levels of fallibility and mediocrity just reeked of "high school talent show". I'm embarrassed for Canada.

Yeah, re: highschool talent show: neither Kalan or Theresa are very secure with themselves and it shows, but hey, they're young and I'm sure are suffering from some kind of Cdn Idol shell shock (which I think is different from American Idol shell shock in that it doesn't instill enough Fear. And fear-related Glam.) Still, yeah, a bit embarrassing that this show is as popular as it is, but then, whatever, tv is full of embarrassment for individuals, nations, culture, generations, etc.

Nothing could have been worse than the "Instant St@r" tv movie that came on after Idol though. It took all of 3 minutes for the pain to set in and for the tv to go off.