I'm a baseball fan.  There's no getting around it.  It's a big, long, six-month commitment with games nearly every day.  In any given season, I'll watch part or all of roughly eighty percent of the games the Seattle Mariners play.  Always, mid-season, I get the same feeling – How did I ever live without baseball?  It seems unreasonable not to have a game every day to pay attention to, the routine of it all, the constant ebbs and flows of the season.  Then, once the season has been over for a few weeks, it becomes mostly an afterthought.  I marvel at how such a significant part of my life was ever tied up in such a long, time-consuming affair. 

Last year was my first with American Idol, and the parallels with how fans take in Idol and how I ingest baseball are readily apparent.  Without Idol, people go about their daily lives just fine, with nary a thought about un-famous teenage singers.  Then, once January hits and the five month odyssey of American Idol begins, it is all Idol, all the time.  Fan or not, one must admit that American Idol has become a transcendent part of our culture, though not in a way that's easy to make sense of.

Before I covered American Idol full time for BuddyTV, I thought nothing of what seemed a simple talent show.  I scoffed at its popularity and never considered the possibility of becoming a fan.  Once I was charged with the task of Idol-ing it up, the popularity finally made sense, and a lot of it has to do with just how massive an enterprise the whole thing is. 

American Idol cannot be judged in a vacuum. It is a communal event, and the show's continued success will be dependent upon that fact.  The vast landscape of opinion and fan feedback is the life force of the franchise.  The sheer audacity of Idol's epic-ness is awe inspiring.  The month long audition episodes, paring down thousands to fifty is a inherently attractive process that allows America to slowly and effectively become invested in what, on the surface, is merely a talent show, and a contrived one at that.  But, as I said, it can't be considered in a vacuum.  If you believe that watching Idol alone, without discussing it with friends or on line, would be near as enjoyable as it is with those things, you are sorely mistaken.  Most of the fun of Idol comes from the subjective reactions from you and me.  The variables involved (genre preference, style preference, voice preference, ability to forgive minor inadequacies, the relative merits of originality and straight-forward execution, the importance of personality, the weight of the judges' opinions); these things are all arguable.  And they are all argued, vehemently and endlessly. 

This, I did not comprehend until I was immersed into the Idol culture.  The five month long journey, which can bridge parents and children, along with strangers on the street, gains its unprecedented popularity from its unprecedented popularity.  That paradox is a testament to FOX's perfect packaging and execution of the series.  It's impossible to explain, which is why it's impossible to stop. 

Like when baseball season is rapidly approaching, I am now in deep anticipation mode for American Idol.  I know, in two weeks, when the first audition episodes hit, Idol will be omnipresent in my life for five months.  There's no getting away from it.  It's scary, it's daunting, and it's exciting.  I'm ready if you are.


-Oscar Dahl, BuddyTV Senior Writer 
(Image Courtesy of FOX)