American Idol Picks Its Top 3!

Tuesday on American Idol, the top four contestants performed songs from Hollywood movies like Caddyshack and Free Willy. Wednesday on Idol, one of them was eliminated. The others will continue on the road to the finale, stopping in their hometowns along the way.

So it was bye bye, Big Mike.

Michael Lynche, the physical trainer with the torso of a colossus and a voice built on a similar scale, was rescued from elimination by the judges’ save earlier in the season, but he had trouble escaping voters’ indifference ever since. It was going to be either him this week or Casey James — and Casey was proclaimed safe 20 minutes into the show.

Mike was always very assured on stage: He seemed to have a pretty strong sense of what sort of music he liked and what sort of performing style he preferred. This could come across as either heroic confidence, fueled in the early weeks by the fact that he’d just become a father, or polished smarminess, and it varied from week to week.

He may also have commited a tactical error — caught by Ellen DeGeneres — by telling Ryan that he’d originally aspired to be in the top three, instead of hoping to go all the way to the top.

Casey, after all, is just as — if not even more — predictable than Mike, and his performance of “Mrs. Robinson” this week was both too modest and too earnest. But he probably cuts a more exciting figure in the dreams of young girls with cell phones.

So, in the end, after Casey and then Lee DeWyze had officially advanced into the final three, Michael was left standing on stage next to Crystal Bowersox and smiling rather sadly. In old France you would have described him as being “in the shadow of the guillotine.” He took his loss very well.

The finalists’ families were seated onstage for the glory and the shame of it all — and it added a small dramatic jolt when Crystal was declared safe and Mike declared gone. His wife, crying, craded their baby while he reprised Free Willy‘s “Will You Be There.”

American Idol Final Four Face-Off Tonight!

American Idol is heading into the final weeks with early front-runner Crystal Bowersox squaring off against a trio of guys: Lee DeWyze, Michael Lynche and Casey James.

Tonight’s competition is crucial and the pressure is on. But this talented quartet tells TVGuide they remain thick as thieves:

You guys have had plenty of time to bond, but where’s the fine line between camaraderie and competition? Clearly, you each want to win this.

Casey James: We’re not competing with each other. Everybody’s so different. It’s like apples and oranges, one’s not the other. Each one of us has our own sound and people that are voting for Mike aren’t gonna vote for me or for Crystal. It’s not like that. It’s not like I’m setting out to beat them. I’m just setting out to do what I do, and hopefully do it well enough that it’s accepted and appreciated in a manner that people are gonna vote for you. Really, one has nothing to do with the other. You’re just gonna try and do the best you can do so that doesn’t bother me, personally, at all.

Lee DeWyze: I do think that there is somewhat of a line. We’re all friends and that’s not gonna change anything. But as far as the show, at the end of the day all of us do want to win. That’s why we’re here. We all want that number one spot. But I don’t think that we look at it as ‘I wanna take it from Michael. Michael’s taking it from me,’ or ‘Crystal…’ It’s not like that. It’s more that we all want that number one spot for ourselves, not because we don’t want anyone else to win. If any one of these guys were to win, I’m sure we’d all be happy for each other. But at the end of the day we have to sit there and work on our songs, make them the best they can be, and do whatever we can to have the best performance on any given night. So us being friends isn’t gonna change. We all want to win, but that doesn’t change how we feel about each other.

Crystal Bowersox: We’re all definitely friends and then the line between friend and competitor is – I don’t know, for me, it doesn’t really exist.

Michael Lynche: Doesn’t exist.

I predict Crystal Bowersox and Lee DeWyze will be the final two, and hopefully Lee will win this year's Idol. We'll have to stay tuned to see what happens.

Another Singer Heads Home on American Idol

The journey ended for another American Idol contestant Wednesday, following performances by the top five of Frank Sinatra songs on a night mentored by Harry Connick Jr.

Young Blue Eyes is gone.

Aaron Kelly, who went from 16 to 17 in the course of this season, was the one sent home. I’m not sure why voters finally decided against him — or at least not in favor of him — although having to perform an old standard like “Fly Me to the Moon” for Sinatra Week couldn’t have been an advantage. He might as well been dressed as a monk and made to sing Gregorian chant.

But I also never understood how he lasted as long as he did. Boyish likability may have sustained him, as Simon observed Tuesday, while better performers like Siobhan Magnus and even Katie Stevens fell away.

Along with boyish likability was a boyish vulnerability or sadness. Siobhan and Katie never seemed vulnerably sad, either.

Aaron was joined in the bottom two by Michael Lynche, a big, talented performer who nonetheless is slightly smarmy (and was once saved by the judges). That spot probably should have been occupied by Casey James. His performance Tuesday of “Blue Skies,” played without his handy guitar, was probably a season lowpoint. Yet voters rescued him this week, after almost rejecting him last week for a much better performance.

Then again, non-musical factors are always a major Idol element: Michael is punished for being slickly perfect, Casey is rewarded for his sincere, aw-shucks blunder.

For now, Lee DeWyze seems like the clear frontrunner. This seems sensible enough, but it’s not altogether satisfactory: It will make for a very odd finale if he faces off against Crystal Bowersox. You’ll have two good singers who nonetheless act as if they’re ashamed to have gotten their break participating on a show like Idol.

The one highpoint of the long hour was the return of Lady Gaga for a performance of “Alejandro.” Costumed to look like a lacey vampiress (or a moth in couture) and surrounded by writhing male couples, it was another unique performance.

Next week, the Top 4 will be performing songs from the movies with Jamie Foxx doing the mentoring.

American Idol Results Night Shocker!

The votes are in on Idol! After the best night of performances so far this season, the top 9 faced America’s decision on Tuesday — and the results were shocking.

Ryan Seacrest, at the start of the hour, informed the audience that “the judges have told me there are shocking surprises.”

Not only did Michael Lynche land in the bottom two for the first time — he was the bottom one, period, while Andrew Garcia was the one to escape to safety.

But Michael happens to be one of the singers most consistently favored by the judges. In fact, they unanimously voted him back into the competition using their one save of the season.

So what did the guy do wrong? Well, he definitely had an off night Tuesday, singing an overblown “Eleanor Rigby” — a contradiction in terms, really, and not of much interest to viewers more captivated by the mop top adorableness of Tim Urban, who avoided the bottom three altogether, for once. It might be a good idea, in fact, never to sing “Eleanor Rigby” on Idol.

But what did Michael do right? He reprised one of his most heartfelt performances, singing “This Woman’s Work” to his wife (and mother of his infant daughter) as she sobbed in the audience. Michael put the song across with soul and just a hint of fighting defiance. He definitely deserved to be saved.

Andrew would not have been saved. And there is no doubt that the judges would have reached out to Aaron Kelly, who was the third singer in the circle of doom this week.

All three women — Crystal Bowersox, Siobhan Magnus and Katie Stevens — were declared safe at the start of the hour. Ellen had correctly predicted Katie would finally be liberated from the bottom three, thanks to her cover of “Let It Be.” Katie revealed that she’d sung it for her grandmother.

Rihanna performed “Rockstar 101” and looked amazing. David Archuleta sang “Imagine,” as he did when he was a contestant.

Adam Lambert is next week’s mentor. Should be wild — only not this wild. No word on next week's theme.