At this point in the competition, we knew the eliminations were only going to get harder. After Haley Reinhart's bad attitude on Wednesday's performance show, we predicted she would be the one packing her bags and walking away from the Idol stage.
So you can imagine how shocked we were while sitting in the Idol dome and it was annouced that it wasn't Haley, but James Durbin heading home. Sitting behind the judges' table, we felt like we had time warped back to Chris Daughtry's unexpected elimination in season five. While many expected James to make it to the finals and go home with the title of American Idol, like Chris, his time was cut short, leaving the studio audience stunned.
So how did James react to his elimination after the show? And was it really his elimination that brought Scotty McCreery to tears?
After Haley was deemed safe, she ran into the excited arms of Lauren Alaina. The show cut to commercial, and James immediately looked stressed out. While Scotty was drinking water and keeping his cool, James was in need of a reassuring arm across his shoulders, which Scotty provided. As the two remaining guys sat on the couch, James was hunched over with his head in his hand. He gulped down a bottle of water, talked to Scotty for a second, then stared off into space looking like he was about to break down.
After Ryan Seacrest announced that Scotty was the final member of the top three, James couldn't stand still to watch his farewell video package. He was walking in circles, jumping up and down and even walked close to the large video screen onstage when his fiancée, Heidi, and their son, Hunter, were shown. James sang his final song, during which Haley turned to Scotty and said "I'm gonna cry."
After the cameras turned off, James was immediately surrounded by the contestants and judges. James and Scotty shared and extra-long hug and Scotty pulled away crying. He looked, dare we say, guilty that he had made it to the final three and James had not.
While James was comforted by Randy Jackson, Haley, Lauren and Steven Tyler pep talked Scotty in an attempt to convince him that he deserved to still be in the competition. The studio audience was obviously bummed and refused to leave their seats. We all watched as Heidi took the stage, talked with the judges and then embraced James for a long time while everyone screamed words of support and cheered for his hard work on Idol.
Like, Pia Toscano, fans' overconfidence that James would go all the way could have affected the number of votes he received after Wednesday's performance. Because he was so popular, it doesn't really make sense that he's out of the competition!
Only one more round before the finale! Are you happy with the final three? Will you still watch Idol now that James is off the show? Who do you think is going to win? Let us know in the comments!
(Originally published May 12, 2011, at 9 p.m. PT)