Finale Recap

Wow. That was some show. I have about five pages worth of notes to incorporate into one recap. Let's see if I can get it all done in time to get to bed at a decent hour. Oh, who am I kidding? I'll be up late tonight. A blogger's work is never done!

Ryan tells us that 97.5 million votes came in last night, and that there was a 56-44 split between the winner and the runner-up.

They have Mikalah Gordon covering David Cook's hometown rally in Kansas City and Matt Rogers covering David Archuleta's hometown rally in Salt Lake City. Those 11th Placers sure make good hosts, don't they? Next year let's have Kevin Covais covering one of these things. He's an aspiring journalist, isn't he?

We open the show with the Top 12 singing The Temptations' "Get Ready" surrounded by the "So You Think You Can Dance" dancers. My sister is actually watching with us tonight, and she comments that the choreography reminds her of The Brady Bunch. Amanda Overmyer looks thrilled to be doing this, and I can distinctly hear Chikezie's voice amidst the rest of the crowd. Such a great, underappreciated talent, that Chikezie. It's hard being his only fan.

The Top 2 duet is Chad Kroeger's "Hero". This is a boring post-grunge song that's better suited for Cook. It's not too much fun.

There's a goofy promo segment for the new Mike Myers movie "The Love Guru". Apparently the Davids got to watch a special screening of it, and they even get to meet "Guru Pitka" himself! The guru tells Cook to shave, as it's not the 90's anymore, and he tells Archie some stuff about growing up which is probably totally embarrassing to the kid. At the end the Davids are talking and the guru appears out of thin air to put some shaving cream on Cook's face, which makes him crack up. It's good that Cook doesn't seem have too much of an ego to enjoy the cheesiness of this whole thing.

We're "treated" to a duet between Syesha Mercado and Seal with the song "Waiting For You". Even though Seal's voice seems to be going he still sounds better and more soulful than Syesha. Boring.

The next performance is Jason Castro doing "Hallelujah" again. I've always felt that this song and Jason's performance of it were overrated, but I guess it's one of those moments everyone will remember him for. Hey, Melinda Doolittle is in the audience!

We get to see the final Ford commercial, which features Sam Cooke's "Good Times" listed as "Let the Good Times Roll". As usual it's just a montage of clips and outtakes from the previous Ford commercials this year. It's OK, but nothing special.

The Davids both get their own Escape Hybrids! Lucky dogs!

The Top 6 Girls perform a Donna Summer medley. It includes "She Works Hard For the Money", "Hot Stuff" and "Bad Girls". I can't stop watching Amanda and how unenthusiastic she is. It's hilarious. Suddenly Donna Summer herself somes out to sing her new single "Stamp Your Feet". What? Donna Summer is still around making music? After promoting her song that will only be played in dance clubs she finishes the medley with the familiar "Last Dance". I'm still trying to get my head around the fact that Donna Summer is still out there trying to stay current.

Ryan then talks about shocking eliminations and how two contestants "left before their time". Oh great, I just know he's talking about...Michael Johns and Carly Smithson! Singing a crappy new arrangement of The Box Tops' "The Letter"! If "left before their time" means "overstayed their welcome" I agree with Ryan. I wish they'd stop shoving these two down our throats as if they were good or something. Chikezie better get his own performance if I have to sit through this. Now there's a contestant who left before his time.

They bring out Jimmy Kimmel to roast the show again. He makes a joke about Sanjaya, who's in the audience tonight. He also shows us that Ryan looks like Chris Sligh without being made up and that Simon's comments can be set to music. It's a nice little diversion.

The Top 6 Guys get their turn to medley it up now. They start with Bryan Adams' "Summer of '69". It leads into Bryan Adams' "Heaven". Oh no, is this a Bryan Adams medley? I guess after all the Bryan Adams stuff we heard in Hollywood it was only appropriate to honor him at the finale. In all honesty though, Bryan Adams is a talented guy. The man himself (has Bryan Adams ever been referred to as such?) comes out to sing "I Thought I'd Seen Everything" and the guys join him for "Somebody". It's an odd choice of artist to honor with a medley, but it works.

So far this finale is better than last year's. They aren't focusing on boring guests no one cares about like Green Day or Bette Midler. They're giving the contestants the attention. They also aren't doing those dumb bad audition awards. Those were awful.

Jordin Sparks talks about a new attraction at Walt Disney World called "American Idol Experience". Wow. So you can see what it's like to be a contestant? Do you just get to experience the adulation of hundreds of fans on a red carpet or do you get to perform on stage and be de-pimped by Simon?

David Cook gets to perform "Sharp Dressed Man" with ZZ Top. Wow. Now there's a pairing I wouldn't have expected. A grunge voice backed by a blues rock band. I actually love it though. Cook does a funny dance during the guitar solo which reminds us that he's not as cool as a lot of people would like to think he is. Keep waving the nerd flag, Cookie! How many songs did our final two have to learn for this week? They're both going to need some serious rest after all this is over.

We go back to Kansas City with Mikalah. She talks to David Cook's old music teacher, Ms. Gentry. She's proud of her former student and thinks he's going to win. Awesome.

Now we get the best duet of the night. Graham Nash and Brooke White perform "Teach Your Children". Just beautiful. That's all I can say. This season was infinitely better for having had Brooke in it.

Hey, during the break there's a Guitar Hero commercial with David Cook in it! That's crazy! When did this guy have time to sleep this past week?

The Jonas Brothers perform. Finally I can pause the tape for something. I guess this is where all the cheesy guests that have nothing to do with "Idol" come in. The first half of the show was good while it lasted.

We see a montage video of some of the more memorable bad auditions. Why are they showing Alexis Cohen? She wasn't funny. Auditions like hers need to be removed from the show next year. The last one in the montage is the now-immortal Renaldo Lapuz, who then comes out on stage to sing "We're Brothers Forever" for the Nokia Theater crowd. The USC marching band and cheerleaders accompany his performance, which is awesome. After the popularity of his audition you kind of figured they'd do something like this for the finale. At least I did, and I thought it was cool.

OneRepublic is here to perform their single "Apologize". Great, I can pause the tape again. Hey, David Archuleta comes out to duet with the Gary Sinise lookalike playing the piano! I have to unpause the tape now! Now I have to tape all the guests in case one of the Idols suddenly joins them!

We go back to Salt Lake City with Matt. He talks to both sets of David Archuleta's grandparents. They both think his musical talent comes from their side of the family. Awesome.

Jordin Sparks is back live to perform a song for us called "One Step at a Time". It's as generic as everything else I've heard from her, but it's cool. Oh no, Blake Lewis is in the audience lip-synching along! Get the hobbit (thanks, Vote For the Worst!) off my screen!

They show us an "unseen audition tape" for The Pips, which has Ben Stiller, Jack Black and Robert Downey Jr. backing Gladys Knight on "Midnight Train to Georgia". It's not that funny. Gladys performed this song live on the finale last year. That one was much better.

Carrie Underwood is here to perform her single "Last Name". My mother hates this song and I'm not too fond of it either. Kristy Lee Cook doesn't come out to join her, but there is a backup singer off to the side who kind of looks like her.

During the break there's a repeat of the Guitar Hero commercial with Archuleta in it instead of Cook. It's actually funnier because of the fact that Cook resembles a rock star and Archuleta doesn't. Hilarity.

We get one final medley from the entire Top 12. It starts with George Michael's "Faith" by the girls. The next song is "Father Figure" done by the guys. A George Michael medley? Why George Michael of all people? Does this mean he's going to come out (no pun intended) and perform with them? Wow, they actually gave David Hernandez the line about being "naked". Oh, the subtle humor. You just know someone out there was having fun at his expense. The last song in the medley is "Freedom 90" before (yep, I was right) George Michael is introduced and sings "Praying For Time". Can we get Luke Menard back to sing "Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go?" I'll admit that George Michael is a talented guy, but do we really care about him right now? He looks creepy and sings for way too long. After it's finally over Ryan mentions that old Georgie is going on his first American tour in 17 years. Oh, so that's what it is. He's plugging his tour. I won't be there.

Finally, finally, finally...it's time for the results. Randy and Paula say their usual fluff, and Simon apologizes to Cook for being disrespectful to him the night before. He says that after watching it back the match may not have been as one-sided as he'd thought. I'm glad someone besides me thought it was pretty even.

After all this chatter and a special delivery from some guy who monitored the results we finally find out that the winner of "American Idol" is...David Cook!

Cook is overcome with emotion, and Archuleta handles second place with more grace than some people thought he would. I didn't expect it a few months ago, but I'm actually happy for the guy. Cook's sing-out is some song called "The Time of My Life". Huh? What's this song? I thought they chose their own winner's singles? Whatever. As soon as I hear a lyric about a "magic rainbow" I can't help but laugh. Good luck trying to sell this song that no one heard until they were busy processing the fact that David Cook was the new American Idol. Add this one to the long list of songs he had to learn for this week. Get some rest, dude!

Well, I'm not planning to buy anything David Cook releases, but I'm glad he won. Now that they've gotten a "rocker" Idol I hope the producers and judges will cut back on the boring post-grungers in future "Idol" seasons. We don't need a hundred Nickelback clones out there.

My mother is disappointed. She wanted Archuleta to win because she thought he did better last night and wanted to win more than Cook did. Oh well. In the long run no one will complain about Cook's win. He'll be the first male winner not to be outsold by another male contestant from his season and "Idol" will have another feather in their cap. Archuleta's diehard fans will be able to enjoy him as long as he's able to handle the pressure of being a teen idol, so everybody wins.

Well, it was a long and disappointing season, but there was some good to come out of it. Hopefully next year will be more interesting and there won't be two contenders with the same first name. It was annoying having to type out "Archuleta" over and over.

Check back over the next few days as I compile a few lists for Season 7! I also wanted to give some recognition to Ramiele Malubay, as she was the only finalist I never mentioned in this recap.