Commentary: Nicki Minaj and Britney Spears 'Toxic' for 'American Idol' and ... - OSU - The Lantern

I’ve had enough of music reality shows like “American Idol” and “The X Factor” and their new judges.

The shows continue to cycle through new judges hoping to entice new viewers, thinking personalities are enough to keep people captivated. But it’s still the same tired act year after year â€" especially for “American Idol,” which begins its 12th season in January.

There are weirdos that still come on and are awful to listen to, which somehow people like. Then there are the inspirational stories of the person who is still singing despite adversity (but doesn’t make it past the second or third round). It’s boring, predictable and old. And new judges are not the answer.

Mariah Carey and Keith Urban, new “American Idol” judges, are musically irrelevant. I know they have both had hits, but has there really been anything recent from them that established them as people who can judge others’ talent? I would have to Google them just to look up a name of one of their hits. Perhaps Carey was just tired of her husband Nick Cannon somehow being more popular than her.

Demi Lovato. I don’t think I even have to say anything about this new judge on “The X Factor,” so I won’t.

The real problem is, however, that “American Idol’s” Nicki Minaj and “The X Factor’s” Britney Spears are train wrecks of people.

Minaj, who was a pretty decent rapper, has seemed to reproduce the same-sounding song for the last year, yelling in her angry woman voice about as often as Pitbull says “dale.” Which, for those who don’t know, is way too often.

I wouldn’t want her judging my talents if I were on the show. Let’s put it this way, when Minaj tweeted April 6 she would soon visit Brazil, Brazil’s tourism twitter account @VisitBrasil even tweeted at Minaj saying “no thanks ... really, stay wherever it is you are.”

And while Spears looks more sane in comparison, I wouldn’t want to take advice from someone who went crazy, shaved her head and slept with her back-up dancer.

Where is the credibility in having Spears as a judge? Based on her wacky past, I’m having a hard time finding it. Is she supposed to inspire the contestants to sleep with and then marry a Federline-type? One of Spears’ marriages lasted only 55 hours. That’s 1,673 hours shorter than the current standard of short-lived weddings set by Kim Kardashian and Kris Humphries.

What great role models these shows have picked out.

It seems like “American Idol” has realized the only time it gets attention is when there ARE train wrecks, and it’s certainly running with it.

With the idiots Simon Cowell would rip apart, Paula Abdul appearing as high as a kite or being rumored to have affairs with contestants and William Hung being so bad that people listen to him, “American Idol” is desperate for controversy â€" so much so that last season it pushed Steven Tyler to be meaner, according to a July issue of Rolling Stone.

None of those tactics worked, with all three of those judges having moved on and William Hung having faded back into obscurity.

It seemed like Cowell got smart and left because of the “Idol” antics, but bringing Spears aboard his new show just puts “The X Factor” right back in the same company as “American Idol.”

With shows such as “The Voice” doing things completely different in a good way, it’s obvious feeding the flames of ridiculousness is not the answer. These shows need to re-evaluate from the ground up where they want to go because right now it looks like they only want to go down in a ball of flaming trashiness.