Hollywood Group Rounds - I <3 Tatiana

Either I’m completely wasted, or these past few Idol episodes have been some of the best ever. The producers must love us to put so many entertaining train wrecks on one stage for us! The groups have always brought on the drama, and here we go again. Everyone’s yawning and falling asleep because they’ve been forced to watch the show while waiting to perform. Carly Smithson blogged that she and Michael Johns were mentors for tonight’s group rounds, but smartly, the show cut them out. Probably because even though the contestants this year are uglier, no one scares little children like Carly. But the show is delivering the drama in the best way with a fresh batch of VFTW victories each night.

Of course the biggest VFTW victory of the evening was Tatiana Del Toro. Initially she didn’t have a group, but she somehow managed to fit in on Team Diva. Tatiana then delivered line after line of gold all night. First she told her group that if they go off key, they’re bad singers, and she hates excuses. Then she has a meltdown when she cries about how she’s been through hell and back to get here. The other girls call her Satan, so she joins Kristen, Nathaniel, and Nancy’s group (more on that later). After 10 minutes, she decides she was wrong again and rejoins her group. Her group takes her back, which leads them all to fight about choreography. One girl says the group has no talent right now and Tatiana shoots back, “don’t ever say that about me,” leading her group to call her psycho again.

Pause. I love Tatiana. So much. She is exactly the reason I am warming up to this season. She brings the drama and also makes people hate her for absolutely no reason. If her group can’t stand her, the frauen and tweenies won’t be able to stand her either.

When Tatiana’s group takes center stage, no one else matters besides fabulous T. Apparently there is someone named Muna Hiluf in her group. Who cares! She’s not Tatiana. The group sings “One More Chance” and after it’s over, Tatiana continues to sing. Then she sings, “I wanna get through,” making the judges scold her for her bravery. They’re just jealous of her, and it shows. Tatiana is too fabulous for words. When the entire group gets that one chance and makes it to the next day, Tatiana breaks down into prayer. “Thank you Jesus, thank you so much, thank you God, I love you so much, even the guy holding the sound thing, I love you so much, I will take each and every one of you into my heart for the rest of my life.”

See, folks? That’s how it’s done. Tatiana secures my love and also a spot on my potential Worsters pick because she’s what? Entertaining. She makes this show watchable. The rest of you should try that sometime.

The other big story of the night was the group of bitchy women: Kristen McNamara, Nancy Wilson, and Nathaniel Marshall. They call themselves Team Compromise from the get-go, but they’re anything but willing to compromise when they all have such big egos. Yay! First, Tatiana wanders over to their group and tries to join. But once Tatiana realizes that she can’t be the shining star in this diva bunch, she wisely heads back to her group of nobodies so she can take center stage. This coming and going triggers the domino effect of drama that eventually makes Team Compromise crash to the ground. So not only does Tatiana bring the love in her own group, she also makes the other groups fight and then walks away. This girl is one of the best people to EVER appear on this show. I am I love with her.

Once Tatiana walks off, Nancy is pissed. She screams because Tatiana came over crying and begging to join the group. Tatiana admits she was wrong, a wise tactic to get Team Compromise to walk away and implode in another room. As Nathaniel says that the team should chill out and have a good time, the ticking time bomb says otherwise.

Something as simple as Kristen sitting down to take a break causes Nancy to flare up and get incredibly angry again. The two start to argue over work ethic, leading Kristen to say Nancy has been nothing but drama. Nope, Tatiana was the drama, and you bitches fell for it. Team Tatiana! Nathaniel is upset that he’s not involved. So he starts to cry and scream that he’s trying his hardest to make the girls get along. This guy is a whiner. He cries more than Josiah and Sundance put together. Tatiana pushes the self-destruct button on Nate’s jacket to start his epic meltdown, where he screams to Nancy that she needs to get over herself and realize that this is about other people. With that, he runs off in tears. And I am loving that group night is back. Fabulous!

When Seacrest asks the group who caused the drama, Kristen points to Nathaniel and Nancy. It’s clearly not her fault, she was too busy being boring and trying to sleep. I agree, she needs to get the boot because although she pisses people off, she’s incredibly tedious to watch. When it comes time for Team Compromise to sing, Nathaniel prays to God that he’ll watch over their group. God replies, “No one cares about your stupid group. I’m saving orphans and puppies. Seriously, some people…” The group sucks horribly with Nathaniel camping it up to full effect, Nancy forgetting the words, and Kristen screeching out some high notes. After the train wreck, the damage is done, but Nancy makes it worse by refusing to hold Kristen’s hand. To be fair, Kristen does have scaly looking monster hands. I wouldn’t touch them either. Luckily, 2 of the 3 make it through, but Nancy doesn’t. This sends her into a rage where she screams, “Fuck you” at Kristen and cries that after spending 2 years running for her dream, she let someone get the best of her. If she’s willing to give up after just this… well, then I’m sad she didn’t make it because she’d be an awesome VFTW pick!

Not much other drama could compare to the two stories of the night, but Team Diva with Katrina “Bikini Girl” Darrell was sort of fun. Tranny Jasmine Murray and dirty hippy Rose Flack are in her group, as well as some stripper looking girl named Lauren Barnes. Rose hates her group because all they care about is being cute. Katrina hates her group because she is tired and wants to sleep. Jasmine hates her group because they are natural born women and she is jealous. And Lauren doesn’t talk much.

Rose claims that the group will look awful, especially since Katrina has apparently decided to quit. When the group tries to get Katrina to come down, her roommate says that she doesn’t want to see anyone. Katrina plays it up like the amazing diva we know she is. But no, she can’t quit. Where there’s a camera, there’s Katrina. She decides to give it one more shot. Thatta girl! As the group performs, I would liken them to a bunch of drunken monkeys. Awesome drunken monkeys! Rose jumps around the stage like a fool and forgets the words. Perfect! Katrina’s notes barely resemble singing. Oustanding! Jasmine hits some decent notes, but I haven’t forgotten how terrible she’s been every other time we’ve seen her.

When it comes time for the judges to critique, Kara goes for the jugular with Katrina again because she’s obviously jealous. Katrina cries that she was sore from being in high heels all day, but the judges show no sympathy. Being beautiful has its price I guess. Only Jasmine survives, and Kara calls Katrina a bitch as she leaves. Classy, Kara. Your insecurity is showing, and it wants some plastic surgery, stat. The other girls try to reconcile with Katrina, but Katrina is smart and knows it’s all for the camera so she doesn’t oblige. Katrina calls them all fake girls and says they meant nothing to her… and neither did that night with the producers. Rose cries that she hated her group so much. I don’t know how, but my guess is Tatiana had something to do with this. Love it!

So what else happened besides the drama? Who cares! The producers are clearly playing to VFTW this year, so only the drama and entertainment matters.

India Morrison, Justin Williams, Kris Allen, and Matt Giraud call themselves White Chocolate and they don’t sing well but are saved by India’s fun rapping. Justin is pretty awful and has an obnoxious boy band voice and Matt is terrible as always. Kris is decent. They all move on.

Julissa Veloz forgets the words and she’s out. What? That’s it! You cut Julissa just like that? You bastards! She had so much entertainment left in her.

Action Squad, comprised of annoyingly long named Alex Wagner-Trugman, Anne Marie Boskovich, Emily Wynne-Hughes, and Ryan… Pinkston (well 3 out of 4), also makes their mark by shitting all over the stage. They all have the words wrong and dance around the stage in manic fashion, as if the other members of their group aren’t there. It’s a total train wreck. Alex and Anne Marie move on, but Emily is finally sent home (as is Ryan, but no one knows who he is). Emily says her heart is broken because this is the only thing she knows how to do. Well then why don’t you go back to the band you were already in before you tried out for Idol, you moron? Oh boo hoo I’m so sad, I get to go on a European tour now. Shut up and get out. Ryan is pissed and says he feels manipulated and insulted. Ryan, Ryan, Ryan. Have you never read this website? The show is a fraud. You should know this by now. Ryan also saw evil in Paula’s eyes. That wasn’t evil. Her corneas are made of vodka now.

Danny Gokey’s group calls themselves The Rainbow Coalition. Barf. It’s Danny, Jamar Rogers, Taylor Vaifanua, and someone else. Danny’s singing makes me want to find a cat in heat, strangle it, then record it, play it back for Danny, and tell him that even this obnoxious noise is not as painful as the tripe he calls singing. Von is the Queen of Melisma, you can only be the Undertaker. They all make it through.

Adam Lambert is shown screaming a lot, as is Michael Sarver and Matt Breitzke. Adam camps it up a bit, which is nice to see, because maybe he’ll bring some of his YouTube, flamboyant charm to the show. Kara calls Adam an incredible singer, because she’s not sure what else to say when she knows she stands no chance with a guy.

Also luckily, we kill 2 birds with one stone, as David Osmond and Austin Sisneros are both cut in the group round. That’ll save me from having to read letters from 40 year old fat women wetting their panties over them. Nasty.

75 people made it to the final day of Hollywood and we’ll get to see them sing solo again next Tuesday. Then we cut down to 36 on Wednesday, but since VFTW already posted the list of who makes it, the show will be boring. Except when we get to see the reaction from the idiot Idol fans when people like Tatiana make the top 36 and they get incredibly pissed. Stay tuned!