Battleship, eh. Rihanna, huh. See, here’s the thing. Movies like 2010′s Skyline make it hard for the common viewer (that would be me) to discern what is the genuine article, a bonafide piece of Hollywood entertainment, from an imposter. When the names Spielberg and Bay roll out with a familiar franchise like Transformers, one presumes there’s been some time, money, and effort are being put behind pesky chores like script, score, etc. But Battleship was too much of a middling effort for us common folk to be sure. “Huh, Battleship, eh. Well, it’s on my Subway cup. But it looks a lot like that Skyline thing-a-ma-jigger. Those boys sure ‘aint gonna’ dupe me twice,” says average man to his wallet (me channeling my inner Tom Anderson).

reply below if you can solve this equation

Joshua Ledet. This one’s easy to call.

American Idol, is the most overtly commercial show in popular American television history. Ratings. Product. That’s what it’s all about. The way they place product promo, within product promo, within show spots, is at Matrix-level meta (Coco-Cola, anyone?). Therefore, Joshua Ledet, as with other presumptive favorites of the past, are fattened up with judge-praise like the proverbial fatted calf, only to be slaughtered right before the final-two-showdown. This, of course, is done to spike the ratings in advance of said finals. Move the needle. The formula is almost as boring as it is predictable (as it is contrived).

This does not mean that the show doesn’t like Joshua Ledet (sorry about the double-negative). They do. Music execs, and American Idol execs, alike both probably know he’s the one that has the surest shot at having a long, sustained singing career. As a result, he’d also might be the least affected by an early ouster. Who knows. Maybe Randy, Steven, and Jen just want to motivate him to keep “getting on the plane.” I remarked to my wife, this young man really, truly does remind me of a young Smokey Robinson. Joshua’s voicing is so rare, and distinctive. So, yeah. He was the best of the final three — maybe of anyone in the show’s history. We all know it.

The human brain is the divine center of all reality, perfectly midway between the gravities of quantum small, and galactic big.

- Mister Rengerz on the universe