Music Blogs

Every American Idol season has its unceremonious ousting of a former frontrunner, the most recent being 2008's hunky Australian rocker Michael Johns. His elimination in season 7 sent shockwaves across the blogosphere last year; servers were practically melting and megaherting under the pressure of all the angry message board stampedes.

But this was hardly the first elimination shocker in Idol history. Every year, really, some fan fave who seemed untouchable, invincible, virtually guaranteed a golden ticket straight through to the Hollywood finale...gets cut. For some of these prematurely ejected rejects, it's the end of an era, but for others it's just the beginning of a fabulous new career.

So far, Michael Johns is falling into the former category, sadly performing at Idol-themed, family-fare showcases at Disneyworld, which doesn't exact jibe with his "rocker" image. It remains to be seen if the release of his upcoming debut solo album will change that.

Anyway, such "tragedies" may be avoided in the future, starting this season, with a just-announced Idol rule called the "Judges' Save." One time--and ONLY one time--the judges will be able to save one contestant that they think deserves to escape elimination this season. It's sort of like a Get Out Of Jail Free card for the judges. They can only use it once; the decision to use it must be unanimous; and it can only be used up until the top five. But it still could drastically change the game.

Just imagine how past seasons might have panned out differently if the Judges' Save policy had been in effect the nights that contestants like Michael were on the chopping block!

So to celebrate this new policy--and honor past Idol rejects not fortunate enough to take advantage of it--here in ascending order of overall shockingness are the five biggest surprise eliminations in AmIdol history.

5) Constantine Maroulis, Season 4 - With his David Cassidy-ish teen-dream appeal, theatrical flourishes, and bedroom-eyed manner of romancing the camera, Greek god (and future soap opera star) Constantine made all the girlies swoon. Unfortunately, there was one week when he didn't make them vote, so he was shockingly sent packing--this despite the fact that he'd never previously even been in the bottom three that season. Making matters worse was that Constantine lost out to charisma-free, socially awkward Scotty "The Body" Savol, VoteForTheWorst.com's season-4 poster boy and an alleged domestic abuser to boot. Yes, this was the evening when it became clear just how much influence Vote For The Worst wielded over the disgruntled, speed-dialing masses.

4) Josiah Leming, Season 7 - This was far and away the most shocking cut NOT decided by a public vote. The judges' puzzling decision to not include Britpop-loving homeless ragamuffin Josiah--one of the most favored hopefuls in the earlier audition episodes, at least in terms of screen time--in the top 24 spurned countless outraged protest posts across American Idol message boards. Petitions to reinstate Josiah via the old "wild card" policy were politely ignored by 19 Management and Fox; however, a star-making guest appearance on Ellen DeGeneres, more Yahoo! Search queries for "Josiah Leming" than for any of the actual 24 finalists, thousands of visits to Josiah's MySpace page, and a rumored contract with Warner Bros. Records nevertheless followed.

3) Jennifer Hudson, Season 3 - On one of Idol's most controversial nights, future Academy Award-winner Jennifer was unbelievably joined in the bottom three by the season's other two African-American divas, vocal powerhouse LaToya London and eventual champion Fantasia Barrino. Meanwhile, lesser contestants like redheaded (read: Caucasian) Sinatra impressionist John Stevens were safe that evening, causing some protesters (including Elton John) to cry racism. But obviously Jen got her revenge, when she channeled all her hurt over this very public rejection into her  Effie role in Dreamgirls. Oscars and Grammys soon followed.

2) Tamyra Gray, Season 1- From the moment then-unknown Tamyra auditioned on the then-unknown Idol show, she seemed like the clear one to beat. And week after week, her octave-straddling performances like "A House Is Not A Home" left Paula Abdul in tears and the rest of America in awe. So naturally, on the elimination episode when it came down to Tamyra and the vocally limited, fuchsia-haired Nikki McKibbin, no one for a nanosecond believed that Nikki would be the one who'd stay. Even Nikki herself looked utterly dumbfounded when the vote results were read. Not since the "hanging chad" 2000 Presidential election scandal two years earlier had the public so vehemently cried out for a vote recount...but the fact is, people just didn't realize back then how crucial the voting process was to this show. This was the first real elimination shocker in Idol history, and in this case Vote For The Worst, which did not exist back then, was not to blame.

1) Chris Daughtry, Season 5 - Chris was another clear frontrunner from his very first audition, and in season 5 it looked like a rocker was finally set to win Idol. In fact, no one, not even Sylvia Brown, could have predicted that it'd be silver-haired, purple-blazered, drunk-dancing Taylor Hicks, and not Chris, who'd walk away with the season's top honors. The easily YouTubed clip of Chris receiving the stunning news of his early exit (via Ryan Seacrest's blunt and almost downright nasty delivery) has been described as a "snuff film for people who enjoy watching others' disappointment," and millions of viewers' hearts immediately went out to the rejected rocker. And millions of their dollars later went out to him as well, when Daughtry's album became the fastest-selling debut in SoundScan history and one of the overall top sellers of 2007. (This made him one of the four most successful Idols of all time, along with Carrie Underwood, Kelly Clarkson, and Clay Aiken). Meanwhile, the two contestants who actually made it to the finale in season 5, Taylor Hicks and Katharine McPhee, have since been dropped by BMG.