Idol Finale

Well, as you've no doubt heard by now, Adam Lambert came in second tonight on American Idol. I'm a little disappointed that the chance to have an openly gay Idol winner slipped through our fingers (and the fact that some bigots, such as Bill O'Reilly, were stirring up homophobia in an effort to make sure Adam didn't win makes it worse), but I have to say that I honestly wasn't that upset at all to see Kris win. I'll probably even buy his CD.

If it had been Danny Gokey standing there with confetti falling all over him, I wouldn't have been able to stand it. But Kris is such a nice guy and a really good singer, and I honestly felt like just having him and Adam both make it to the finale was the real victory. In fact, Kris & Adam's duet tonight, Queen's We Are The Champions, really sort of summed it all up perfectly.

My first thought when Kris was announced as the winner was actually a positive one: Adam doesn't have to be tied to an Idol contract or that God awful single Kara wrote; he can truly be himself and make his own music. I can't wait to see what he does! I will be buying his album the day it comes out and will be at the first Adam Lambert concert that is within three states of me.

The finale itself was really excellent. Until the other day, when I saw some of the names of the musicians expected to appear on the show, I had no idea that the finale was such an all out event. I really enjoyed it a lot.

Seeing Adam perform with KISS was wild and so much fun. Kris's duet with Keith Urban was really enjoyable, and I completely loved Allison Iraheta's duet with Cyndi Lauper on Time after Time! I adore Cyndi and Alison was my second favorite singer of the season, so I was pretty much in heaven.

Having the whole Top 13 back was interesting and even though the group sings were never my favorite part of this season, I still liked seeing them all doing Pink's So What. I also really enjoyed all the guys doing If You Think I'm Sexy, though I wish they'd had more close ups during the number! Adam's face is always so expressive and I would have loved to see it during that song. I'm sure he had his sexiest snarl on.

I'm a total loser for even admitting this next part, but the final Ford commercial, which was an homage to the other 11 members of the Top 13 and all the commercials they'd done, set to Adam & Kris singing I Will Remember You, actually made me feel kind of emotional!

I think I had more fun watching the finale than I did during most of the rest of the season, not counting Adam's performances. It almost made me want to tune in next year all over again, though I don't think I could sit through an Idol episode without Adam.

What a strange ride this has been! After seven seasons of resolutely ignoring this show, I watched every episode from Hollywood Week on, and all because I happened to turn on the television during Adam's audition! Had I been a few minutes earlier or later, I could probably have gone to my grave one day still proudly proclaiming that I'd never seen an episode of the show.

And yet, having experienced it, I have to say I found it kind of endearing in its own way. I'm certainly grateful to the show for having given Adam Lambert the platform upon which he became a star. I've become a lifelong fan of his and I know countless others have as well.

As I watched Kris embracing his wife in the final moments of the season, I thought about how nice it would have been if it were Adam embracing a boyfriend on live television. Still, I think he's blown the door wide open for future LGBT contestants on Idol and perhaps changed even more than just this one show.

This was just the warm up. The best of Adam is yet to come.