American Idol 15: The Farewell Season

When the news broke last May that American Idol will end by Season 15, I just had to stop and gather my thoughts and emotions and, essentially, myself together. It's the end of an era, at least, to me and up to this point, it has not sunk in yet.

You see, I've been watching this cheese fest for fourteen long years. It's become a part of my life in such a way that worries and concerns me. Haha. I literally spend close to half of a year around a karaoke competition highly invested in the long term survival and possibly a lifetime career of a boy or girl I've NEVER met. I'm a 29-year-old man who is blogging about American Idol since Season 6 with such veracity and fury that I spend time actually defending myself to total strangers on this blog. 

If you really stop and think about it, that's some sad stuff right there, but American Idol has become an essential part of me and clearly, DAM NATION wouldn't even exist if not for this show. 

American Idol is the craziest spectacle to ever grace my television screen and it has always been a great piece of entertainment that prided itself on it's inherent cheese factor, which I totally love, and mostly for the fact that the show allows the viewers to become part of the contestants' lives (and vice versa) and be thoroughly invested in a way that The Voice will never be able to do. Oh yes, I went there.

The show, admittedly, lost its luster along the way, but American Idol has quite a history and those emotional moments where you feel cheated when Kris Allen won over Adam Lambert or betrayed when America eliminated Jennifer Hudson or vindicated when Carrie Underwood sold a lot of records, should be celebrated and not denigrated. 

Last year, we all saw the birth of the 14th American Idol, Nick Fradiani, and in a couple of days, we begin our search for that Final Idol. 

I'm a self-confessed fan boy, and things will be ugly emotional. Bet on that. 

Watch this nostalgic documentary about American Idol.