Grab your popcorn kiddos, because tonight Hollywood Week is going to take a turn to the dramatic. If last night was all about laughter, tonight's grueling group challenge is sure to be filled with the opposite: drama, tears, egos, and eventually a little bit of singing and dancing.

You can pretty much guarantee we'll witness all of the following: cat fights, lots and lots of crying, a diva melt down, terrible group names (White Chocolate, anyone?), at least one group performance you wish you could buy on iTunes right now, and the crumbling of no less than one pre-season front runner. (Oh wait, that happened last night....we miss you Justin Williams.) Group week all but promises to bring out the best and the worst of American Idol and tonight you'll be treated to both.

Watch along with me as we witness 96 singers vying for the title of American Idol attempt to work together, to varying degrees of success. We'll be here recapping the good, bad, and the ugly for you. So drag your TV close to your computer and watch along with me as Hollywood Week continues and we get one step closer to the Top 24 and finding the next American Idol.


A note from your American Idol recapper: please be kind and bear with me tonight if I'm not my usual charming witty self. (You guys think I'm charming and witty right?) I'm nursing a nasty flu bug, but even that can't keep me away from blogging American Idol with you. If there are more spelling errors than usual or jokes which would only seem hilarious if you had a 103 degree fever...well, that's just where I am right now.

Ryan has stopped calling this Hollywood Week and started calling it Hell Week, which definitely bodes well for the promise of drama tonight. Hopefully amidst the drama we get to see some singing though, am I right? We've seen enough drama and sob stories already this season to last a life time.

We know three group names already and they're all equally terrible: Dreamers (featuring rockin Mom Mary Powers), The Mighty Rangers (featuring notable Denver auditioners Mark Labriola and Tori Kelley), and Phoenix (featuring Jermaine Sellers). We don't yet know what songs they'll be singing, but based on all the quick cuts to people crying, people quitting, and people collapsing on stage, we do know it's about to get crazy.

We meet a couple new groups, with equally terrible names "Neopolitan" and "Destiny's Wild." Seriously...and you thought White Chocolate was bad! Both groups are doing Lady Gaga tunes, and I predict a diva off. Both groups are battling to see who can sing the loudest and who can out Gaga the other. Let the diva off begin!

Big Mike is pensively waiting on the birth of his first child, luckily he's part of Team Awesome, who are living up to their name. They've finished choreographing first, which allows Big Mike to chat with his wife who still hasn't given birth to their first born. Instead of being divas about Mike's mind being else where, Team Awesome is being, well, awesome.

While Big Mike is talking with his wife, Rockin' Mom Mary Powers is causing beef all over. Not only does her group of Dreamers hate her, the pianist and vocal coach that American Idol has brought in to work with the groups tells Mary to back the heck off. I'm telling you folks, Mary Powers is 40 miles of bad Hot Topic clad road.

We're 15 minutes in and we've heard maybe 2 minutes of singing and 13 minutes of kvetching and crying. Can we get to the singing please?

It's off to bed for everyone, where Mary Powers' group will dream of how much they hate her, before taking the stage tomorrow. It starts out as a bright sunny day but quickly becomes the drama fest we were expecting. Cue crying! Cue fighting! Cue claws! Cue more Mary Powers bitching! Cue Big Mike's wife giving birth! Team Awesome continues to live up to their name, letting Big Mike step away to talk his wife through labor as they practice dance moves. And it's a girl! Congrats to Mike Lynche, his wife, and his brand new baby girl, hopefully Papa Makes them all proud on stage.

ON TO THE ACTUAL SINGING, WE HOPE >>