Episode 'American Idol' Season 10, Episode 36 - Winner Announced (Finale) Recap

The show opens with Seacrest caught in some kind of netherworld, with no light, surrounded by teenagers. Oh, he teleports to the stage. Don't worry guys, he's okay. He informs us that there were 122 million votes. By the way, that's how many votes were cast in the 2004 election. Granted, people can vote multiple times here, but still. Way to go, America.

Randy is getting into the finale spirit tonight by wearing his own tuxedo. If you want to call that a tuxedo. You could also call it a glitterbomb.

Actually, I take that back. Lauren is wearing a glitterbomb. Really, Scotty and Lauren look like characters from a 1970's sci-fi movie who are supposed to be from the future.

The top 13 are here to sing "Born This Way," complete with awkward Gaga-esque choreography. That explains the FutureOutfits. Somehow, these kids actually blend better as 13 singers than they do as four. Anyone who heard that rendition of "The Sound of Silence" a few weeks back can attest to that. Well, it was considerate of them to wait a good month after "Glee" did that song. I think the Surgeon General released a warning about overexposure to "Born This Way."

The next performance puts James Durbin together with Judas Priest. James looks a little closer to the Village People than Judas Priest. Oh good, he ditched the hat. Hey, did anyone see his mouth when he hit the high note? Was he eating Lemonheads backstage or something? Should I be talking about James Durbin's tongue? Probably not. Someone please make this stop.

Seacrest take a moment to talk about the judges and how they worked so hard this season. Yeah. It's tough work, sitting at a table and complimenting people. There's a big montage of Randy Jackson saying the same thing over and over again. That's a bad idea, showing everyone that your judge has no creativity.

Jacob Lusk comes out with Kirk Franklin to sing "I Smile." Correction: Jacob comes out and over-sings "I Smile." Gladys Knight comes in, thank goodness, and takes over. Franklin throws in a weird shout-out to tornado victims, and the screen flashes a notice for people to donate to the Red Cross. I'll be willing to bet that 122 million people don't do that.

No intro back from commercial...just straight into Casey Abrahms and Jack Black singing "Fat-Bottomed Girls." The two have a little scat battle in the middle while a set of, I suppose, fat-bottomed girls dance in the background. That was awkward. So was Casey's face at the end. Anyway, go see Kung Fu Panda.

The girls are out to sing a Beyoncé medley, starting with "Single Ladies" and going into "Irreplaceable," then moving on to "Get Me Bodied," and then into "If I Were A Boy." The mood really changes on a dime here. Can't we just pick one or two songs? This is a marathon. Good to see Pia back up there. I mean really, is this not infinitely more entertaining than more damn country ballads? Beyoncé herself shows up, and it's nice of her to simplify the choreography down to just walking so the other girls can keep up.

Time for the Steven Tyler medley. He's a loose cannon. Which is to say, he swears a lot.

Haley is up next to perform with Tony Bennett, who is still alive? Enough to do a spin on the stage. More awkward choreography. I think that's the theme of the show here.

Now Jennifer's medley is up, which involves a compilation of creepy contestants hitting on her...and, of course, the Casey kiss and the almost-wardrobe malfunction. Good to know she has a defining feature of her personality.

Lil' Jon is here to perform with...TLC? Seriously, the two surviving members of TLC are here to sing, seemingly by themselves. Ah, wait, here are the contestants. Boy, I was afraid we were going to have a really irrelevant performance there for a second! Whew! Bullet dodged!

Scotty is up next with Tim McGraw to sing "Live Like You're Dying," which is a fitting sentiment considering a bunch of people just did that because of the supposed Rapture. Of course, most of them maxed out their credit cards, sold their homes and quit their jobs. Scotty looks like he's cowering away as if McGraw is going to sucker punch him in the gut at any second.

Well, we're at the halfway point. Everybody still awake? Everybody still alive? Good. Enjoy this medley of people humiliating themselves on camera. Uh, quick question: these people stand in line for hours so they can have the chance to sing on television, then they get mad when the cameras follow them around after they get rejected? You're trying out for reality TV, what did you expect? This is the medium that brought us "Wipeout." It's all about humiliation.

Marc Anthony, who never would have gotten this gig if he wasn't married to J.Lo, starts off the next number, which of course J.Lo joins...all too late. I'm already bored. Do you think this is what every Wednesday night is like in the Anthony/Lopez household? I imagine it's pretty close. Aw man, Seacrest just made that same joke. Now I feel like less of a person.

The next sequence has Casey and James arguing about whose elimination was more shocking, until Pia steps in. Who wrote that amazing sketch?

The top 13 guys are up to sing their own medley, starting with with Stephano leading "Kiss," which by the way he sings it would lead you to think they're doing a Prince medley. Wrong! It's a Tom Jones medley! Silly you, you thought they were covering an artist that made sense in this context!

The very last Ford Music Video features Lauren and Scotty singing in front of a green screen showing a montage of Ford Music Videos past. Hang on, I'm trying to think...yeah, this is the most ridiculous thing I've seen on this show this season. This is followed up by Scotty and Lauren's teachers from high school getting their own brand new Ford Focuses. Ford Foci?

Lady Gaga is back to premiere her new single "The Edge of Glory." More like "The Edge of Infringing on Madonna's Copyright." Amirite? I'm on the edge of fast-forwarding through this boring song. Once that guy gets up on the mountain and starts manhandling Gaga, though, things get a little more interesting. Oh, and they commit suicide at the end! How fun!

Back from commercial (which included a "The X Factor" spot in which Simon Cowell basically says that his show is the most important thing to ever happen in the history of the universe), Lauren sings "Before He Cheats" with Carrie Underwood. This song always bothered me. Not because I think her behavior is unwarranted, only that she carves her name into the leather seats, leaving evidence that she totally vandalized her ex-boyfriend's property. She could go to jail for that. Or at least pay for the damages. Maybe next time you'll think before you destroy someone's car, Carrie.

I think Jennifer Love Hewitt is in the audience, right next to Seacrest, being totally ignored. He instead intros a video with the eliminated contestants talking about how young the finalists are. Casey is actually pretty funny in it: "They're just leaning cursive."

Beyoncé is out--again--to debut her new single "One Plus One." Or do you spell it "1+1"? Beyoncé is nice enough to ask if we don't mind singing to us for a second. If only she could hear me yelling "Yes I do! This show is too long already!"

Reeve Carney, who stars in the Spider-Man musical "Turn Off the Dark," performs a song from the show along with U2. A stunt Spidey flies in on rigging from the back of the audience, and doesn't break any bones! That puts the score at "American Idol" with one point, "Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark" with zero. Is this the music you have to sit through if you see this musical? Yikes.

The end of the song brings Spidey in from the ceiling, hanging upside-down, to arrive in front of J.Lo, who is presumably supposed to take off his mask and kiss him. Instead, she pokes him on the nose and says "Boop!" I'm so glad they went to all of that trouble rigging him up so that she could chicken out.

Before we get to the results, we have one more performance. One. More. Performance. We're almost there, people. The nightmare is almost over. Steven Tyler has to perform first. He sings maybe half of "Dream On." Do you think they cut him short due to time constraints? Goodness, I hope so.

Final Results:

No messing around now, Seacrest gets right to the results...and it's Scotty who wins it all. Not too surprising, although there might have been a chance than Lauren could have eked it out.

Scotty ends the season by singing his (awful) single again, amid tears...or laughs. It's hard to tell with him. Yep, it's tears. He ends the song by sobbing while the other Idols crowd around him...then he stands up and tries to catch confetti on his tongue? Man. That was a weird move.

Well, it's hard to argue that he doesn't deserve to win it. Technically, he was probably the best singer of the group. Congratulations, Scotty. May you never hunger for confetti again.

Winner: Scotty McCreery