Megan Joy was revealed to be the fifth finalist eliminated from American Idol's eighth season during last night's live results show broadcast on Fox.
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Joy, a 23-year-old divorced mother from Taylorsville, UT who currently resides in Sandy, UT, was sent home from Idol's eighth season based on the 36 million home viewer votes that were cast immediately following Tuesday night's live performance episode broadcast that saw the Top 9 finalists perform songs that were top sellers on iTunes, one of the show's primary sponsors.
Prior to Joy's elimination, Anoop Desai, a 22-year-old from Chapel Hill, NC, and Allison Iraheta, a 16-year-old who currently resides in Downey, CA, were revealed to be the other members of this week's bottom three vote-getters.
Joy -- who began Idol's eighth season as Megan Corkrey and then switched to Megan Joy Corkrey before settling on Megan Joy, her middle name, in recent weeks -- had sung Bob Marley's "Turn Your Lights Down Low" during Tuesday night's live performance show.
American Idol judge Kara DioGuardi had criticized Joy's song choice and said that the song she had sung had made her voice "irritating for the first time."
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"Megan. I really like you but I think you're in trouble," she warned Joy.
Judge Paula Abdul was also critical of the song choice and said that Joy needed to expand her performances in new directions if she wanted to continue in the competition.
"I think at this stage in the competition you really need to take us by surprise and maybe dig really deep to an area that might not be comfortable, but that's where beauty develops," Abdul said in an urging tone.
Judge Simon Cowell was -- as per usual -- quite blunt in his assessment of the performance, which he did not like at all.
"The problem was is that the song was boring. It was indulgent, it was monotonous and all the things we all liked about you are fading," Cowell said. "You are actually becoming indulgent, and nobody's gonna like that song -- It was just so boring."
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Judge Randy Jackson was the last one to pile on Joy, saying that her performance was like "watching paint dry" and that she should not have chosen the song simply because she liked it.
Before being revealed to be in the bottom three, Joy had some choice words for Cowell after American Idol host Ryan Seacrest read back the judge's comments from Tuesday night.
"I love you Simon, but I don't really care," Joy said.
Cowell opted to return the favor after Joy was revealed as the week's lowest vote-getter and Seacrest asked the judges if they would consider using their new "The Judges' Save" ability to save her from elimination.
"Megan, with the greatest of respect, when you said you don't care, nor do we. So I'm not gonna pretend that we're gonna contemplate saving you. So this is your swan song, enjoy it," Cowell said.
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"Okay," a smiling Joy said after Cowell's comments.
Joy became the first departing eighth-season Idol finalist to learn her "The Judges' Dave' fate without getting a chance to sway the judges' decision with an encore of their most recent performance show song.
Instead, Joy simply encored "Turn Your Lights Down Low" as departing Idol contestants had traditionally done on earlier seasons.
After her brief encore -- during which she seemed to still spend a great deal of time singing directly the judges -- Joy became more emotional.
"I'd just like to say a couple things," Joy said. "One, thank you everybody that works on Idol. The contestants, you guys are the best. The judges, I love you. America, I love you.
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"And baby, I'm comin' home baby. I'm coming home" she added, referring to her two-year-old son as she broke into tears and turned away from the crowd.
In addition to Joy's elimination, the results show also featured a group performance of Journey's "Don't Stop Believing" by the Top 9 finalists, seventh-season Idol champion David Cook performing his new "Come Back To Me" single, and Lady Gaga performing her "Poker Face" single.
In addition to his "Come Back To Me" performance, the results show also featured Cook being presented with a plaque commemorating the recent platinum sales certification of his self-titled debut album.
"Thank you man," Cook said after Seacrest presented the plaque to him. "I always cry on this stage for some reason... that's a trip. Thank you everybody. This is -- I'll tell you what, I put out a solo record in '06, before all this, and I sold a thousand copies in one year. And to go platinum in three months is uh.... yeah."
Idol's Top 8 eighth-season finalists -- Danny Gokey, Kris Allen, Allison Iraheta, Adam Lambert, Lil Rounds, Scott MacIntyre, Anoop Desai and Matt Giraud -- will all take the stage and perform during next week's performance episode on Tuesday, April 7 at 8PM ET/PT.
On Wednesday, another finalist will be eliminated -- unless "The Judges' Save" is utilized -- from the competition based on home viewer votes, revealing the season's Top 7.
(Photo credit Michael Becker/FOX)
About The Author: John Bracchitta