Here is the good news/bad news from Thursday night’s American Idol finale of a quartet of shows that resulted in 20 finalists – most of whom have no business being on the list.

First, the bad news … they sliced five more male contestants and kept five. Of the five they kept, only two deserved the accolade and of the 10 who performed … well, only three were worth listening to. So, give it up for Vincent Powell, Burnell Taylor (both of whom who made it) and for Mathenee
Treco (who didn’t).

Second, the good news … we might have heard from the eventual winner. And that would be Mr. Taylor. He sang “This Time” by John Legend and his performance was … let’s let the judges attempt to explain.

Keith Urban: “You are strikingly original and here to stay.”

Nicki Minaj: “I would pay to see your show. You deserve to get out of the ‘hood. I know what that feels like.”

Randy Jackson: “It was captivating.”

Mariah Carey: “I thought that was fantastic.”

Mr. Taylor escaped the ravages of Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans and so far as a result of his success on AI he has lost 40 pounds, has a new look and sounds like he’s been doing this sort of thing for years. But there is a long way for him to go to win, much less make the Top 10 as the show appears to be hell-bent on anointing a female winner this season.

As for Thursday night … yawn! Here are the winners and the losers with one man’s ranking on a scale of 1-to-10 on their performance.

Five who passed the test: Vincent Powell (7), Lazaro Arbos (5), Cortez Shaw (2), Burnell Taylor (7.5) and Nick Boddington (3).

Five who were sent home: David Willis (3.5), Bryant Tadeo (4), Mathenee Treco (5.5), Josh Holiday (3) and Gurpreet Singh (4).

Next week we get three evenings of AI and by week’s end we will be down to a Top 10 which will get each of the finalists a rather healthy paycheck. The big payday is winning, second is making the Top 10, getting a good bit of air-time and a spot on the lucrative AI Summer Tour.

In the meantime, AI question of the day – is it just me or does Mariah look to her left rather consistently during her comments?  And if so, why is she doing that? Just sayin’…