Michael Becker / FOXIs the fat lady about to sing?
Thursday night's broadcast of American Idol hit an all-time ratings low. The Fox musical competition slumped to a mere 2.4 out of 7—the lowest number in the series' history, and down 20 percent from last Thursday's semi-finalist reveal.
This week, Idol debuted their first ever "Rush Week," an expedited elimination process that started off with 30 singing hopefuls and cut more than a third of their talented group in just three days. Despite revealing this season's top 13 finalists, only 9.2 million viewers tuned in to last night's hour-long broadcast.
Throughout the week, many Idol fans claimed that with the new rush week formatting, the judges unfairly cut some of their favorites from the competition. E! Online was present at the competition's season 13 finalists party in L.A., last night, where executive producer, Ryan Seacrest, revealed that he is happy with the new elimination shake-ups.
"I think it made it fun. It was tough for some of the contestants because they came and they worked in rehearsals and they didn't get the chance, they didn't make the cut to perform," the long-time host said. "The biggest challenge for me is remembering all the new rules sometimes, because I'm so used to doing it one way, that you have to think through, 'Oh yeah, this season we're doing it a little differently.'"