The Dogg Zzone by 1900HOTDOG - Dogg Zzone 9000 - Episode 76, WB Superstar with Jamie Kelly!

Episode Date: June 1, 2022

Seanbaby continues cataloguing the downfall of western society through the metric of 2000s reality shows. Joining him in this research are the esteemed Dr. Brockway and special guest, Jamie Kelly PhD, PhD. Up today: WB Superstar, the singing contest that was secretly an evil prank on the mentally ill.

One nine hundred hot dog. One nine hundred hot dog. Our podcast slams with maximum hype. Say hot dog podcast work. Yeah. When you taste that nitrate power, You're in the dog zone for an hour. Come on.

You know the number. One nine hundred. One nine hundred hot dog. One nine hundred hot dog. One nine hundred. One nine hundred hot dog. One nine zero zero zero. Yeah.

Nine thousand. Welcome to the Dog Zone Nine Thousand. The official podcast of one nine hundred hot dog.com Supported entirely by Patreon. I'm enduring Internet icon Sean Baby with my co-host, the new Robert Cheese stuffed crust Brockway. Delicious.

I'm Robert Brockway. Here's a Brockway fact. I've done karaoke three times in my life. One time caused a bar brawl. One actually physically destroyed part of the bar. And the other went fine. Any follow up questions? Several.

No follow up questions. Damn it. Well, today we're joined again by our own audio engineer. She's a musician and award-winning adult film star. This smoke show formerly known as Jamie French. It's Jamie Kelly. You guys have refused to assume my actual noble name. Oh, really?

Oh, Lady Baron. Jamie Kelly. There you go. The Baroness. There it goes. Okay. You own a significant portion of Germany. And thus you are a true Baroness.

And, and a Lady J. Yes. And Lady J in the sheets. Or wait, you wanted the opposite, huh? Yeah. I think you want the Baroness in the sheets. Yeah. You want the Baroness in the sheets.

Yeah. Well, this week we are talking about a forgotten but important reality show from 2004 called the WB's Superstar USA. And I say it's important because this is where we, as terrible Americans, discovered our maximum capacity for televised humiliation. I feel like this, they put this show out and everyone's like, nope, that's too far. Stop it. Go back.

If you're not familiar with the show, it was some maniacs at WB saw American Idol and they thought, I like the part where they make fun of the shitty singers. Why don't we make a whole show about just that? It's very, it's like getting a whole cake made out of frosting or making all your sex entirely out of the penis biting if you'd prefer to be put that way. So here's the thing. I guess we talked about this a little before the show, but we were all monsters in 2004. It's hard to look upon what we did and talked about with the same context of today.

It looks like hate crimes, of course. Yes. Being shitty was the only way to be. That was how we knew how to communicate. And we were, to be fair, we were shitty people, but also the tone of the world was different. There was something about, we still had some irony left we hadn't used up. Like you could be a shitty person and sort of wink like, you know, but not really. We used that up, obviously.

But here at this time, we were bullies and psychopaths and American Idol, however, the thing they stole from, it tempered its cruelty with a bit of storytelling. So they didn't just mock idiots. There was a lot of success stories. And when they did make fun of the idiots, whether they did this subconsciously or very subconsciously, you would see sort of their delusion and the arrogance collide against reality. And it's sort of like, okay, they deserve to get made fun of because they came in here

talking like they're hot shit. Like I'm the greatest singer in the entire world. And then you get to watch that asshole learn that they suck. And you're just like, that's sort of a license to make fun of a person. And WB Superstar is missing almost all of that. Like there's no context that allows this to be okay. It's not designed without all of that intentionally designed so that every part misses all of the good parts or any mitigation of the cruelty of it.

This is just evil. It's cynicism on top of cynicism on top of an additional layer of cynicism. This is, yeah, this is going to be tough to beat. Like our series has been, and we've done with American Inventor with Megan once a million years ago. It's just like the wrongheaded and cruel evilness of early to mid to 2000s reality TV. I do know at least one other show we're looking into to cover for this. I think this is over.

I think this is going to be tough to beat this one. Yes. There was a moment three years after the show aired and we all kind of agreed. Okay, we got to shift gears. There was a 2007 season of American Idol where they were in Seattle. And there was two kids in line next to each other. And this went pretty viral back at a time when the internet was obviously big. And it was like one chubby kid and then like a nerdy kid.

And they were sitting next to each other and they made like best friends. And they were both super weirdos. And the first guy comes in and he couldn't sing or dance. And he had like this real phony positive attitude. And then Simon Cowell is like, you look like a fucking bush baby. Just like your face is fucked up. Huck your bone structure. And I'm daringly born that way, child.

He couldn't sing or dance. But 80% of the criticism Simon Cowell had for this guy was his face. He probably, you know, his astigmatism or whatever was wrong with the guy's eyes. And then the next guy had a weight problem and he comes in and he's like, Simon's like, Hey, you're wearing Randy's pants. So he's making a fat joke about two people in the room. Including one of his ostensibly co-workers and friends. Yes.

And so anyway, they kicked both these kids out, but they put it on TV. And they both probably had learning disabilities. I'm trying to put it in a nice way, but like these kids, it was not okay to make fun of these people. And everyone saw this and it was just like, okay, no, fuck you. And then American Idol made a pretty hard shift away from humiliation. They still did it sometimes. But they were much more careful about editing it to look like the good guys. Right.

There was a gleefulness about the first five or six episodes of American Idol every season where it's just like, Oh, here come the shitty singers. And like that's no longer a thing. So that show combined with WB Superstar really helped either get it out of our system or use it all up however you want to put it. But we just, we don't do it anymore. But to be clear, the entire premise of WB Superstar was they get the bad singers and then they tell them, oh my God, you're so good. And then they pick 12 of them and then they take those 12 people and they like pamper them like Hollywood stars as if like, you're going to be the next American Idol and then have like an elimination tournament to their eyes in their experience.

It's just American Idol. Yeah, I'd like to elaborate on that a little bit because it's not just the overall premise of this show that I find so offensive. It's the little things that they do. Like it's a reverse American Idol where they're competing to find the worst one, right? But they don't just like tell the bad singers they're great. They also invite good ones on and tell them their pieces of shit in like no uncertain terms. They crush their self-esteem and dreams and then just send them away. And they keep these deluded ones that can never be on the bit.

And then they hire a crew of hundreds, if not thousands, like the audience members, the crew, to fully deceive this person. They give them like a personal staff and coaches and consultants so that they think, oh, you're spending a lot of money on me. This is my career. And then they, I didn't see the episode. But in the little pre-roll, they were like, and then we're going to take them shopping for multi-million dollar mansions and expensive cars to show them the life they could have. It's just, it's a Truman Show thing, but like designed to build domestic terrorists. Is this not just a goof on the audience? Or is this actually, is this actually as sad as it seems to be on the surface level?

I think it could be both things. I think it could be underestimating the intelligence of the audience and mocking them for it and also be genuinely sad and cruel. I feel like what they wanted, what they wanted to produce was a show entirely out of the American Idol rejects. Like all William Hung's that we could sort of enjoy making fun of, but have like something about it is intriguing. Like they're going for Tim and Eric, but they kind of missed and hit like, you know, dicks. They just a bunch of dicks. So their best case scenario was finding people with like a fun failure and they edited the show deceptively however you want to put it to get there as best they could. And so I don't think the show is super honest, but I feel like they're honest in what they're trying to make.

And just like any reality producer, they'll kind of splice it together to push it in that direction. When you say they're honest in what they're trying to make, we're talking about a flavor for the time that it came out. And that like really perks up my ears about like we are all the same age, right? And where were we when we were seeing the show? I thought it would be my favorite show. I watched several episodes of this thinking my favorite part of American Idol is watching people get humiliated. And then I saw this and I'm like, wait, this takes all the joy out of that. That takes all the license out of that.

This is super mean. And it's not the first time in my life I said, oh wait, I'm a bad person for wanting to hurt someone. I'm very naturally my instincts are bully like you might know this from my writing, but I've edited a couple of things. But like, yeah, and then you got to temper that with, you know, as much kindness as you can. You got to pick your targets, I guess. And I haven't always been good about that. And I feel like this show failed harder than I ever did. But the premise of this show was let's pick all the wrong targets.

Yes. Let's exclusively bring in people who have dreams to crush them. I know. I do I wrote down in my notes like kind of a all the contestants as they appear because there's some that I definitely want to talk about. And some that are real indicative of what Brock was saying about how like, hey, this person came in here with talent and then they're like, hey, you fucking suck. Get the fuck out of here in like real canned ways. Like one guy's like, he's like, hey, knock, knock. And the get the singers like who's there who just did a great song.

He's like, who's there thinking he's going to hear something nice. He goes, you suck. And then he's just like heartbroken. Just to complete the crest fallen. They wrote all purpose lines for like, here's how to be shitty if somebody's good. And then you just consult the line. I do want to talk about the the hosts. So it's hosted by a guy named Brian McFadden.

And it seems like that's what he did and what he's perfect for this. You could not design a better 2003 bully like this. This is the guy stuffing everybody into a toilet in 2003 and every single movie you saw in 2003. He's writing on the rage. Okay. Picture that guy picture. No, I'm just saying picture that guy and that's spot on. Yes.

He seemed like he'd been watching Ryan Seacrest for like 10 years, being like, oh, that could be fucking me. Like he just came into this role with a lot of like, like rage behind his eyes. Like he seems like, did you notice he would hug a lot of the contestants and then like look at the camera, like look at this fucking pathetic idiot hugging me. Yes. Like, yes, he had so much casual cruelty in him. Yes. They could not have cast this better though. Like if you were casting this, that guy just, I think he lived and breathed this exact premise of like, I'm going to be disingenuous to idiots.

And I'll be really shitty about it. So I don't think he even had to audition. I think he just came in and was himself. And again, like it's hard to be genuine and a TV host like Ryan Seacrest doesn't give a shit about these people. But he had has like that patch sajik type of smartness where you're like, okay, for the for the broadcast, it looks like he's friendly. This guy does not have that. This guy's just like, yeah, like he's got like a Craig Kilbourne thing where you're like, dude, should you be making fun of these people? Yeah, it's not really your job here, buddy.

But the guest judges, the celebrity judges are Vitamin C, who of course everyone knows is number 74 on Maxim's Hot 100 Women of 2001. And Tone Locke, who knows a little something about deceit after drugging and sexually assaulting all those people and dogs in the hit song Funky Cole Medina. I like how he broke it down for us when they got to Tone Locke's section. He misunderstood the direction of like talk about the show and he just said, the good singers are wack and the wack singers are good. You know what I mean? And that was his part. Yeah, let's do it. That was his part.

It wasn't going to do the voice. The other is Briggs and he is going for like Simon Cowell. Just Briggs. Yeah, just Briggs. Just a fucking edgelord nerd. Jamie, you might have uncovered this in your research, but can you name the movie series he helped produce? He's got a little IMDB credits. So for Briggs, I actually did do this.

Can I guess first? Yeah, let's rock with a guess. Briggs, the scary movies. Yes. The scary movie series. Am I right? Yeah, you got it. He did a scary movie.

The one I thought was most telling was he was a producer on Hostel. Hostel 2 and Hostel 3. That's a little too on the nose. I wouldn't have guessed that. Yes, it's too on the nose. That would have been my joke. It's super on the nose. Yeah, it's everything that is like the worst impulses of trying to create entertainment.

He was going for this that sort of detached cruelty that Simon Cowell has. But Simon Cowell, most people hate him, I suppose. But he has a charisma and he has a lot of wit. And so someone will come in and he'll destroy them. But you're like, that's kind of funny. And then sometimes you're even like, also they suck. So maybe they deserved it. I think it's also that he has any small amount of musical expertise.

Right. He also is a pretty decent judge of talent. Yeah. Which Briggs does not. Has absolutely nothing. His only skill is I'm a white dickhead. Yeah. He pulls the legs off of insects.

Absolutely. And babies. So some guy comes in and sings White Who Fools Fall in Love in full falsetto. Like Chipmunk High, single note, just sings like a teapot. And Briggs is like, do you have both your testicles? So like that's the level of joke he's coming in with. I think the next girl comes in and does Whitney Houston and she sings like the same line 400 times. And it's so weird.

Like something, I watched it twice because I'm like, did they edit this? And I don't think they did. I think her brain just broke and she just repeated the line like for five minutes straight. Anyway, my note here says it's super not fun. Like the audio is bad in the studio. So they're not just bad singers, but it's also it seems like they're, you know, I was also the one with kind of a thick accent. Yeah.

And they specifically mocked her for it saying, but like didn't want to say it. He said, we liked how you made words sound different. Like just really sarcastically. Yeah. So like, like, like shit that you might not catch if you're like a really nervous American Idol contestant, but like it's way too obvious to be clever. Like you're not hiding. They'll think about it later and be like, oh, that fucking asshole's making fun of how I talk.

I really liked the next guy who was like an aging theater nerd and a sparkly shirt. Came in with this rhinestone chain mail. His name was Lance. He's saying just, yeah, theater nerd all the way. Lance did his best and then he left and they, they got, I think they got Brian because of his delivery when he says that tight shirt is cool in just the bulliest way. Yeah. Lance has no option.

He knows, but he has no option but to be like, thanks. Thanks man. Yeah. Yeah. I'll give you the benefit of the doubt, but fuck you dude. For me, I feel like once you've gone to the place where you're expressing yourself publicly and creating art, you've put it out there for criticism and part of the fun is when that sucks. Like you say, hey, here's the thing I've made.

I think it's great. Everyone's like, well, this totally sucks. There's a, I find that fun. Some people don't like, I remember Dan O'Brien once said like, how dare, why would someone get mad at you for trying to make art? I don't agree with that sentiment because if we just allow, right, of course, but I think if you just allow bad art to exist, like suddenly nothing means anything, you know, like there has to be a difference between good and bad art and part of policing that is making fun of extremely bad art.

Here's where the like, here's where the, where they really fucked up. Like there's a way to do this show that is still reprehensible for sure, but you see where they're coming from. And I think it's the, I might be skipping one or two, but I think it's the next guest, Jamie, who's the very, very plastic one, plastic blonde who comes in and she has a huge ego about how great she is. And she wrote the lyrics to the song on her hand and keeps just very visibly checking it. Yeah, fantastic. And like there is nothing you could have ever said, even if they hated her,

if she was on American Idol, that would ever make a dent in like her opinion of herself and her abilities. And that's the people, you can see them do it. That's the people they want to keep and make fun of, but they only find out of all of this, it seems like three or four out of the episodes we watched anyway, they only find like genuinely entirely there, but just extremely narcissistic and deluded people because then it's punching down. Then it's like, yeah, this person needs to learn a lesson, but they staff the rest of the show with people who have something,

I don't know, a public way to say it, who you are not allowed to make fun of. I think I have a way to put it. They all have someone in their life that would be very happy to explain to you why it's not okay to make fun of this. They each have a caretaker that would be happy to explain. Yes, it is eight of those people and then like four genuine shit bags. So we are sticking it to a couple of people in here that's like, that's okay, but you're just machine gunning out into the general morass of humanity and hoping you hit shitheads. Yes, you're throwing a grenade at an orphanage and hoping one of those kids sucks.

Yes. I love that like we kind of all took a minute to just try to explain the concept of the show again after Lance, because I liked Lance. Like when Lance came on and started singing his theater nerd voice, I was like, this dude sucks hard, but I don't want him to know. Like I really like Lance. There's actually a bunch of those in this. Yeah, I would not want him in my musical if I was making a musical, which of course, you know, I would want him in my musical.

I was going to say there's a lot to be said about like what someone has to offer. And I feel like someone like Jamie Foss doesn't have a ton to offer. And I don't think she would claim to. Like I think she wants to be famous. And I think she probably thinks she's a good singer. But like if you're like, what do you want to express? Like what are the, I don't know, like what are the songs you've written? What are the things you want to tell with your art?

Whatever. Like I just don't think that's there. And something about the shallowness of that is maybe makes it a okay target. Right. That's what they're trying to find. And they do find a few of and then. Yes. So like 80% of the runtime of the show is not about those people.

It's about something. Nobody told them that line and they were just like, yeah, let's throw everybody in there. And for their, for their part in Jamie herself, especially vitamin C, who is famous for something. She might be the coolest because she'll pick something they're weak at and like needle them and say like to Jamie, she says, I encourage you to be more sexual. And it's just like saying that that make, make that your whole personality now because I want to see you embarrass yourself more like that in a way that might not even be natural to you.

And I do have good instincts for this. She can't fuck. Okay. I'll cut that out. Cause you disagree. Briggs to her, how they reject her. Briggs says, uh, you have very large breasts. So I wasn't paying attention.

I love that. Hear this. I'm actually a bit embarrassed. Oh, here we go. I have to be honest. I don't know if you know this, Jamie. Um, you have very large breasts. Um, they are real.

Okay. I'm not kidding. The problem is I was distracted and I didn't pay attention to your singing voice. So I'm going to have to leave this, the decision to, to YouTube. And that's, that's his running gag is just direct, no punchline sexual harassment. I liked that she was, um, she deflected it. I think all, all women who look like her have a natural ability to sort of deflect like when they get constantly tried to, when guys try to bone them all day, but like, she was

so like down for it where he's like, your breasts, I can't even concentrate because of your breasts. And she's like, okay, no, I'm cool talking about my tits for a little bit. She's just like, okay. Like just bounces right off of her. In a way that he does to many other contestants and it does not bounce off. Yes. I let's, let's talk about that because a few singers later, uh, a girl named Teresa

comes who was kind of a hottie and he says, Oh, here's the bad news. You're not a strong singer, but the good news is you're hot. I'd love to take you to dinner. And she does not like this. And that's not the first time he fucking does exactly that. They show it several times. They show him do it again at least, at least once in this episode, line for line word for word.

And if I know anything about like editing these shows, that means he did it a hundred times. Yes. That's a nightmare. And like, I'm going to say, I'm going to go ahead and say, uh, if one of them said, yes, he would take that date. I mean, ironically, just, you know, for the light, he would take that date. I bet he would tell her that he could get a job in Hollywood.

Yes. He would absolutely angle his, his tiny position into casual sex. A hundred percent. I think he wouldn't even think it was a bad thing to do. He would bring to the very side about it. Somebody is into it. And then it's not ironic for it. Man, Briggs is so lucky this show came out.

What the fuck else could he have ever done? Like this is his one talent is like just being a shit head liar to talented people and being a disingenuous complimenter to the, the sucky. Yeah. He just kind of a bully Quentin Tarantino and just there's no other slot for that guy in society. This is it. There was a Briggs shaped hole in this show and that's the only use we had for it.

I think, I think there's a level that's worse than this too, because it's exemplified by the next singer, Doreen, who shows up and she's very good. And she says, she says she spent her savings or whatever to travel from Canada for this. And Briggs has a line where he tells her he's sick of Canadians stealing American superstar jobs. And like, that's okay. That's an all right gag. If the punchline wasn't that you've just pleaded the savings and destroyed the dreams of a

talented young woman. Right. Like she might not have that ever again. That might have been, you know, it. Right. She'll go home eventually and see that the show, what the premise was, maybe hopefully and realize, okay, I was too good for this show. But for, I don't know, six, seven weeks, she was like, maybe I'm not very good.

And even if she shrugged that off entirely, like the money to travel for the show, which they made a point of, if you're not in a great position, maybe that's the money you use to take that shot and you're, you don't have that money again. Yep. It's, it's. There's some deep evil in this. Yeah. It's, it's super bad.

I liked the next guy. There was another good singer who comes and he's like, I'm just a white boy with soul. What can I say? And he sort of sucked, but like he was a good singer and they kick him out and they humiliate him. And this, this felt really strange to me because he did deserve to get a little humiliated because coming in with like, yeah, I'm the white boy with soul. You can't ever say that.

Yeah. Like what a fucking to work. Like, yes. And you know, low key racist, whatever. But it just felt like a failure by the show in a, in a way that was really, really hard for me to put into words, like, like they fundamentally don't understand what was funny about making fun of American Idol singers and fundamentally don't understand why you should make fun of a person like this.

And they basically are like, Hey, you don't know how to sing by. And he's like, Oh, that hurts my feelings. But it's like, no, no, no, he should feel like a, a dork for saying the dorky stuff. Yes. You should actually make fun of the thing worth making fun of. But the very premise of the show is we're not going to do that. Right. Premises.

We're not going to make fun of the thing we should. And the next guy was like this weird old science teacher who read Huey Lewis's heart and soul, like awful piece of paper. That's a spoken word performer. That guy shouldn't be left alone. Like that's a full maniac. And they're like, yeah, it's pretty good, buddy. They had a manic pixie weirdo come on and he's saying, um, all out of love, uh, based

on me and Jamie's Bruce Willislaw. Uh, and it's like, it's not as good as our version, but it's, it's pretty good. And then Brian's fine. And like mistakes him for a girl. And that was really, That's why he was through. I guarantee you that's what they thought was funny about that. Right.

He was kind of non-binary. And they're like, isn't that what a zany character? Uh, and like, okay, for the time, I mean, I guess they would have done that. Yeah. So they would have done that exact same joke on American Idol. If this person showed up, if Ross showed up, they would have done that same thing. But then when he actually sang really decent, they would have been like, oh, okay. You're through.

Thank you. They were even hinting at that in when Briggs was like, I only have one question for you. I think it's on everyone's mind. And you're like, oh my God, are they going to, are they going to ask him? And then instead of asking, are you a boy or a girl? He says, like, uh, where'd you get that voice? It's fantastic or something. Like it was pretty dark.

Uh, anyway. And in 2004, I'm saying like American Idol would have made that same joke, which sucks. It sucks. It sucks now. But they would have at least respected that that Ross was then, then went on to be at least okay. I mean, right. I do think that Simon Cowell would have like, like tactlessly just asked.

Yeah, they would have been shitting about it, but it would have been sincere gotten through. Whereas here, it's like your ability is meaningless. We're going to keep you around cause this is hilarious. Uh, in my notes, I have the, the next white guy comes in and seems like he has been training like all afternoon to try to sound black, to talk to Tom Locke. And that's just all that happens. He's like, yo, what I'm saying, Tom Locke is good.

Yo, how I been, you know, just, I, I, no idea. I don't recognize the lingo anywhere. Like Tom Locke visibly hated that. He was, he was looking to either side. Like, can one of you help? Is one of you going to step in? I agree. And that's part of what's fucked up about the show is Tom Locke is supposed to humor

the bad people. And this guy was definitely a bad person. So Tom Locke's supposed to pretend like this guy's awesome, but also he should probably tell him, like, you know, why are you talking like this? You're going to get killed. You're going to go outside and get killed. So there's a falseness, but like nobody has their footing. Even the people doing the fucking with, they don't cut, they don't get.

Tom Locke was the only one I felt bad for. Like he didn't seem to approach this with as much zeal as vitamin C and, and Briggs. Briggs. He definitely would, he would be like, yeah, that's no good or whatever. Like it was just very chill doing the minimum to get away with it. Like, I don't, I would believe it if they didn't fully explain. They're like, we're doing an American Idol thing. And then they got him on.

We're like, okay, here's the deal. Tom Locke was just like, all right, I need the money. Sure. I'll take it. A magician comes in. He does like a Scatman Crothers song while doing magic tricks while doing like a Louis Armstrong impression while also doing tap dancing while also doing stage magic. I was fully on board.

That's a, I was 100% put that guy through, but he again, it's really wrong for the tone of this show. Like I, you'd see as a street performer and, and like be fascinated with for a minute and a half. But like, but you wouldn't make fun of him. You wouldn't be like, could you believe that? He's like, he's like a genuine weirdo. Like that's a Tim and Eric character.

As was the next dude. Yes. The spooky mind master. This guy, um, he sang Glory, Glory, Hallelujah. Uh, in my notes, I put he, he sings it like a Damon Wayans character in a, like a church sketch. Like someone who's an over enthusiastic choir member. We're getting catty about the voices.

We're no better. Well, I meant he was singing it too big. I think his voice was bad. Sure. But, uh, I'm not a super great judge of that. But I like that he Briggs told him he's like sexual voodoo and he was nowhere near as offended by it as he should have been. Like that should have been a fist fight right there.

Agreed. Uh, he did come in saying that he had mind powers though and he can get inside any, he can infiltrate minds through the eyes. Right. Again though, there's a caretaker that will politely usher him away and say like, yeah, I'm really sorry. Uh, can we not make a big deal of this? Right.

Well, the next one after the mind master was, uh, the girl Kelly who's obviously like a local dancer and she just gets fully nude really awkwardly and sings a, not a terrible Cindy Lauper, but, uh, there are some people that will get naked in like a scenario and they will. Right. Present it to you as a problem. Like they, here you are, you deal with this, right? You did.

It's not like a free thing. Like I, I don't understand this or this is natural. It's like, I know this is a problem for you. Yes. Here you are. And she was very confrontationally nude. Uh, I'm not sure there's anyone left in part one worth talking about. I really like the boot scoot and boogie guy who came in at just a sheer panic.

He was so nervous. Of stage fright and talking about his, you're bragging about his confidence. And this is a, a great example of, um, how these people aren't actually themselves. Like they come on the show and I'm sure they're told by producers, we want confidence. We want larger than life. We want superstar and, and here's this guy is like trying to be this thing. He's like never worked on, uh, and he hit vitamin C after he's done with his extremely nervous boot scoot and boogie with his voice quavering the whole time.

Vitamin C looks him straight in the eye and says, I find you very sexy. And like that's the exact moment she is damned to hell forever. Like that's, that's just plain evil. That guy will try to recreate that for the rest of his life, the way he's also going to see that, like that, that's a joke about him. And just, yeah, like he's going to murder you for your feet and nobody will prosecute. It'll be allowed. Yeah.

You could show that to a jury and then be like, she kind of had it come and we can cut that. Jamie. Go ahead and cut that. Don't worry. I'll make everything sound nice. Don't worry. Most of this is cut.

Don't worry. I loved Jojo who had, he had a little hat when, and he had the balls to sing swing, swing lows with chariot straight to tone low like looking tone low specifically in the eye. Like this is for you. Hey, do you like slave spirituals? I guess that's not a crime. Like I guess, I mean, it feels like a crime, but nobody prosecutes.

I do want to talk about the next one right after him because a woman comes in and she's a pretty excellent singer, especially for this show. And vitamin C just gets up and leaves. And then tone low goes after her and she's, Briggs just tells her to go away. And so she's confused and hurt. And whatever they were trying to do with this bit did not land. And yeah, they were trying to do it like what you've done is so offensive. You've driven us out of the room and it's best.

We don't even talk about it. But it was more just deeply disrespected Gladys Knight. Oh, that's the next girl like, Oh shit, you're right. She's very young. She's, I want to say 1617 seems like very sweet down to earth and is actually really good. And they stop her immediately and be like, yeah, that's disrespectful. Yeah.

And that made her cry. And that's the moment Briggs is damned to hell forever. Yeah. They all agree they went too far for that. Like all it took is, he's probably, he's probably been before that. There was like a bad night at the quarry. I did really like the strangeness of the next guy who came in and sang war. Do you remember this one?

Yeah, I actually put this guy on the soundboard because I truly don't know how to describe it. I can't play. And again, I can't hear this. All right. Let's do it. Yeah. Yeah.

What is it good for? Absolutely nothing. Yeah. What is it good for? Absolutely nothing. Say it again. Yeah. Look out.

What is it good? I'm probably the worst person to be doing this episode because I have no idea. I have so little musical ability that if anybody like sings confidently, I'm like, hey, that's pretty good. Right. Like he's leading a parade with the song specifically written not to lead a parade with. It's just like his choice. It's a really weird choice.

I can, even I can spot the choice of doing the song war, but has kind of like a show tune thing is a crazy thing to do. But if you asked me to like, if this show is based on the quality of his voice or singing, I did like half of these people, I'm like, huh, all right. Yeah. I agree. And I think like the fact that he kind of looks like he came from a hockey game and he's kind of got like a like a bro smirk on his face while he sings it like a real like cocky

guy kind of thing. I'm like, this is this is a good kind of Tim and Eric crazy. And the show didn't know what to do with him. This show was looking for William Hung and it gets like a truly indescribable strange man. We got to cover Mario. Mario is another of these people that you, I mean, you can't make fun. There's a very good reason.

I don't know what it is. I don't know his life experience, but it's not really okay. He does a doctor out there with a good reason. Yeah. Clearly know and understand that even by 2004 terms, as he does a very low confidence version of celebration, and then they stand up to dance just to like mockingly dance for him, which is seems exceedingly cruel. Briggs takes that opportunity to get a little too close to vitamin C for her comfort.

Yeah. Definitely mine. And as he leaves, as as Mario leaves, Brian just straight bullies him with a, you got a good look to you. And he's, I mean, he's very small. He's a very small, very skinny, very, you know, introverted young man. And there's, there's a few, is there anybody else you really need to cover? Because otherwise I think we can skip to the end.

I think so. Let me go through my notes. I went through them one by one because I did note that some of them would have been really funny on an American Idol audition. And yeah, they do. There were so many on this that like, God, there was one girl like her name was Lori. I don't know if you remember her, but she was not very confident. And she was way too close to just a not very good singer for this type of abuse.

Like she wasn't a shit show. She had nothing like weird about her. Yeah. They find more of those. And yeah. So like, so when they're like, Hey, you're so good. Oh my God, you're so good. Like, and then she goes home and she sees this, like this will be heartbreaking.

This will be so damaging. Whereas I think a lot of the other people, I mean, it's hard to like get inside the head of all these strangers, but like, I don't know, like I don't think Mario interfaces with the world in the same way as Lori does. I guess it's my point. I think that's those are the few that they're looking to find where like you are grounded and generally just kind of narcissistic and out of touch. So it's going to be more okay for us to make fun of you, but they don't find that many.

And so we get to the finale, which we didn't watch. We didn't watch the whole show. We watched these, the two part pilot where they found like all of the people that actually made it to the finale. And then they exploited and ruined those people for like six more episodes apparently before they get to the. I did watch some of those. I want to do a quick recap.

The kind of things they do is they would be like, Hey, we're going to go out and do like a superstar photo shoot. So they like dress them all up and they like rent a mansion or rent a car. And then they like feed them really embarrassing lines like, yeah, the Ferrari is real Mario. And then they're like, it's so mean spirited. It's just like fucking worse than the auditions. You know what this is? Because this is okay.

Has anybody seen God, this is a deep cut. Has anybody seen Michael Douglas is the game? Of course. Moving. Yes. Yes. Really? Both of you.

Deep, deep cut. We're like, nobody knows. Nobody knows what I'm talking about when I talk about that. Deep cut. Normal human beings apparently. This is like a reverse the game. This is, this is a vast conspiracy bespoke designed just ultimately at the end to make one person realize that life is not worth living.

Like it is because there's all these little fuck yous along the ways where they're like, we'll do the audition. Fuck you. Fuck you. It's the winner. Because it comes down to the winner alone on stage and it's saying, hey, here's the big moment. Like, like at the end of the game, he jumps off and it's fine.

He lands in a stunt bag or whatever. Yeah. They trick Michael Douglas into suicide. Yeah. But here they would trick you into suicide and then just like right before you hit the ground, you see each shit written on the asphalt. It's just a one specific fuck you that they spent like half a million dollars and six weeks making to nobody, to nobody that deserved it.

To literally ruin an industry that gave a lot of people joy. So here we are at the finals and I guess let's talk about like the reveal, which I think demonstrates the worst lack of foresight. It was like, I think if I sat in a writer's room, yeah, if I was in a writer's room, hey guys, I have an idea, American Idol, but just the bad people. Now if I'm with a bunch of psychopaths or even just like people who are like, maybe we can make this work. That starts as kind of a funny idea.

I think most people would talk you out of the idea after like five minutes or like, yeah, but without a foil for that, like that's just going to see me. Right. Let's think about that moment of the reveal. Shall we? Yes. But yeah, like more obviously, how are you going to reveal it? How will that be funny to say, ha ha, it's been weeks, your whole life's a life fuck you.

And sure enough, it's very awkward. Yeah, you even see, I feel like even Brian like discovered a little cricket on his shoulder that was like, maybe this is bad, like halfway through because he, I hadn't seen him stumble in his words at all. And then this finale, it comes down to Jamie and Mario, who we've already covered. And they very cruelly dressed Mario up ironically in like a huge leather jacket and tried to make him a bad boy thing. And it's just, yeah, it is complete 80s fucking style bullying.

So it's between the two and they go with Jamie for the winner, which is I had slightly wiser choice because the very beautiful white girl will be able to take it, I guess. But Mario even still storms off. The show had to issue an apology several days after this aired because they told the crowd that these were make-a-wish kids. They paid the crowd to be there. Oh my God. Then they said, hey, these are make-a-wish kids.

It's their dream to be singers. So pretend they're awesome singers. Oh, I'm so glad you brought this up. So, wow. So I feel like it's at least honest enough to those two. God, how do you even describe the deceit here? What they're presenting to us is. When you get to hell, the devil is going to give you double finger guns.

Just this guy. This is my guy. Jamie and Mario are experiencing this as presented, I think. Like they don't know it's a prank yet. They think they're winning an American Idol knockoff. And I don't think that the crowd is fake. I mean, they're fake in the way I mentioned. Yeah, in the way that it is.

They're insincere. Yeah, it's all gamed. But again, it's hard to say what counts as real, what that word even means. But I don't think this is all just like bad actors pretending to be on stage. To me, it doesn't matter, though. It doesn't matter if they had gamed this whole thing and they're bad actors or whatever. Because this is still the story they want to present. Like it's not that's almost worse because it's not an accident that you come to this

moment in your life. Oh, wait, this whole thing we fucked up. We didn't think about this moment. I want to talk about the clip. They show they play a clip package and they show Jamie watching it and she sees herself singing and you could see her face like, ooh, I sound like shit in that. Yeah, but like she's shaking it off because every everything else is telling her that like, hey, that's just a weird moment.

Don't worry about it. Like if you're right now listening, think you would know they wouldn't know weird moments. Yeah, like you'd have no idea that I think just the falseness of Hollywood in general combined with the intentional deceit of everyone around her for weeks. Like there's no way you'd know. Like this is a prank anyone could have fallen for. And that's like nobody is frustrating, right? She's just like whatever she did before.

She's she's a TV salesman or something. Why would they put spend hundreds of thousands of dollars just to punk me at this moment? Why would they spend weeks in all of these people's lives? You could never possibly suspect if it is, you know, real life. Who would what would they have to gain? So I did write down everything McFade and said were because what you're looking for, say you are a sadist and you want this like punchy ending. They don't they don't give it to you.

He says they're looking for someone with an unconditional belief in themselves that nothing could stop them, not even allows. He's singing voice and she reacts to that. She's like, what? But he keeps going and she's like, OK, I must have misheard him. Her wheels are turning, but she's there's no way she could get it. And he says we weren't looking for America's best singer. We were looking for someone who thought they were America's best singer.

Jamie, we lied to you when we said you were a great singer, but we didn't lie to you about how much this audience loves you right now. Ironically, he leaves out ironically, which is like the important part, which I was incorrect about because they love you, because they think you're a make a wish kid. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, that's the only thing I apologize for into a script. The only reason they apologized is because they like named a foundation. Like they say, hey, this we named a specific foundation.

We should have. I don't think they cared about the morality of saying pretend this person is good at singing because they're dying. Like if they would have just not said make a wish, they wouldn't have occurred to them to apologize. So and then after all that, like after just as gently as possible, trying to break it to her that they hey, this is a prank, but it's OK. We want to get out of this without you breaking down, though you really should.

I have one question for you, Jamie. Are you willing to put in the effort and do whatever it takes to become a true superstar? And, you know, whatever, God bless her. She goes, um, yeah, she has to say yes. Now, there's only the illusion of choice because what what they also reveal to her is that you win you win 50, a hundred thousand dollars, except she doesn't.

She wins a recording contract with an advance of a hundred thousand dollars. So she has to do the work now, knowing that she's humiliating herself for this or she gets enough. She can't say no at this point. And come away with anything. And here's the thing is William Hung existed at this point in history. Like he was the guy on American Idol. He was a terrible singer, but like in a way people liked.

And so he put out an album and people like knew who William Hung was. She said in an interview after the show, she did not want to be a William Hung. Like she had no interest in being like a novelty, terrible singer. I never presented herself as such. Yes. So she's confused, but not even embarrassed. It's kind of a nice moment in a dark way because they give her a bunch of money. It's like a seed is cock tease.

Those like coercion stated intent of the show has been derailed. And I guess most people would do more humiliating things for less money. But it's just a gentle nice ending to a psychopath's unbaked idea. And they hug. She high fives the crowd. It's like presented as a happy ending to just a failure of a terrible prank. It's so fucked up. It's such that such coercion, that contract thing is really.

It's just like didn't go to jail for this for exactly this. Probably it does seem like fraud in some ways. Just angle them off a balcony. It's morally more correct. But they they also tell Mario that, hey, we're looking for the worst singer, fuck you. And they give him $10,000. So he's like, oh, yeah, I don't care.

I got attention. I found the real inner me. I'm like this crazy, aggressive rock star guy, which again, that's a bad lesson for this individual to learn. That's some damage down the road. And the next one I really liked because they told the third place girl, her name was Rosa, they gave her $5,000. And she's like, oh, you're looking for the worst singer. It doesn't surprise me that Jamie won.

And she's just like, no, no, no, don't take the lesson that you should be cruel to others. Like she was still being catty, like I'm only the third worst singer. Bitch. Anyway, Jamie's narcissism is undeterred. She says she signed the first of millions of autographs and she's been practicing writing autographs her whole life. Her only dream was being famous and she is.

So she just doesn't care. And this attitude did not change after the show. I found an interview with her weeks later and she was like, yeah, totally. Like it's it's fun. I, you know, I it's a little embarrassing. But like I didn't practice any of those songs. It's like nothing broke her confidence. She's like when I sang at church and at birthdays and funerals, these that's there's a real place that she is sang before.

She's like, I practice a lot. So I sound really good on TV. I didn't nobody learned anything. And we are all worse for having experienced this. May God have mercy on us all. Love is in the air tonight at 60. Count of 60 is swinging singles by for the attention of one lovely mate. Takes a king to rule a country, but only love rules supreme. It's love supreme. Let's meet our competitors.

Three finger Louis. Aaron Crosston, Adrian H. Aidan Moat likes long walks on the beach. Oh, hook that one early. Step up your game. Singles, Alpha Sciences, Java, Andreas Larsen, Armando Nava likes short walks on the beach. A big swing. Benjamin Siranum, Finn Tolson, Brandon Garla, Ryan Saylor likes running on the beach.

Hey, all right. Brianne Whitney, Brockway loves the meat millie. Yes, he does. Zero, Rev, Chase McPherson likes medium length beach drives. OK, yeah, all right. Get that one. Chris Brower, Curious Glare, Dan B. D. Costello, Donald Finney.

Dr. Awkward likes horseback riding on the beach. See, that's how you do it, Chase McPherson. That's how you do it. We got Eric Spalding, Fancy Shark, Jell-O-Hope, Ham Bone, Booking Loves the Beach. Their words, their emphasis. Haraka, Hot Fart. Jacob Thornberg would make a love to the beach if only society would allow it.

OK, John Dean, John McCammond, John Minkoff, Josh S. Ken Paisley is the beach. Not following on that one, Ken. Oh, he's doing a beach impression now. That's actually really good. K&M, Laziest Man on Mars. Mark, Matt Riley races the beach to the horizon every night and will do so until he catches her.

Hey, that's beautiful, Matt. Michael Lair, Michael Wells, Mike Stiles, Mojoo, N.D. Neil Bailey writes, if you cut me, do I not bleed sand? He's cutting himself now. Good Lord, it is sand, masterfully played. Nia Schaefer, Nick Ralston, Nick H, Ozzy Olin. Patrick Herbst has just legally changed his name to Beach McSlop. I get beach.

Is there a significance to McSlop? No, he's shaking his head, no. Rain Vargas, Rhiannon, Rich Joslin, Zarkowski. Spotting reception just bought the beach and no other contestants are allowed on it. Baby, if you like the beach, there is one game in town. Ted H has just murdered spotty reception and stolen the beach team.

Looking back, this one was inevitable. Tim Ilehi, Toasty God has dynamite and a dream. Won't you make a new beach together? If that doesn't work on them, Toasty God, it worked on me. Tom Segula, Tommy G, Yosaria, and our stunning star, the center of all this attention and deserves every bit of it. The gorgeous, the talented, Jayber Al Aiden, whose turnoffs include the beach.

Oh, but wait, turn-ons, dynamite. We got a match. Let's love Supreme, folks.