The X Factor on FOX HD - Page 2

I hear many affiliates are bombarding the network about the uselessness of the guy showing his junk. Seems that the producers may found that was a bad idea in hindsight.

AI didn't debut to stellar numbers either.

Yes, but AI, being the first of it's genre, had no expectations and gradually built an audience. X Factor had enormous expectations, which it failed to live up to.

Maybe I'm just rapidly approaching burnout on the whole singing competition thing, but it seemed to me that X Factor really brought nothing new to the table. You can still tell by the tone of the lead-in story if the singer is going to be good or not. The wider age range? America's got Talent has that covered.

I DID think the musical tracks sounded good, and the mixing was good; some of the acts sounded better than they deserved to. Which leads to my contention; I was underwhelmed by the talent. The Young Singers were good for young singers, the Singers Overcoming Adversity were inspiring examples of people overcoming adversity, but none of them were great singers.

For me, there's only one singing competition that's showing true vocal excellence without all the hype, and that's The Sing-Off. Sing Off has the added benefit of having the best judging trio in the genre anchored by Ben Folds, who is just terrific. Watch that one if you want to see people who have REALLY worked hard at their craft.

While I will be watching this, and will stick with it, there is nothing new about it, nothing to stand out from all the other singing shows. I too think I am getting close to singing show overload.

That's a good way of putting it. I'm not easily offended but I thought it was just so unnecessary, and I found myself offended. More by the thought that this guy had to be screened to make it to the live audience and the producers had to know what was going to transpire.

On AI, I get a kick out of watching some of the "bad" singers during the auditions in front of the judges. Putting those same type of performances in front of a live audience somehow takes the fun out of it for me.

I got a kick out of the 13 year old that auditioned first. Over the top personality without being obnoxious and a great song pick with a voice to match to start it off. Absolutely loved the women who performed Natural Woman.

People find it legitimate to compare the ratings for Idol and X Factor. But if people are burned out on this type of show...what does that say about Idol's chances come January? I believe this is a very bad sign for the next season of Idol, considering that it'll offer nothing new, and it'll have The Voice airing during the same weeks.

Since American Idol aired first in the U.S. (and has aired for many years), it's possible some people saw promos for X Factor, thought it looked just like Idol and decided to wait until January to watch the "original," so to speak.

It will be interesting to see the ratings for the next few audition shows.

8:00 FOX The X Factor (Series Premiere) 4.0/12 11.72
CBS Survivor: South Pacific 3.1/9 10.36
ABC The Middle (Season Premiere, 1 Hour) 3.0/9 9.64
NBC Up All Night 2.3/7 6.04
CW H8R 0.4/1 1.09

8:30 NBC Free Agents 1.3/4 3.86

9:00 ABC Modern Family (Season Premiere, 1 Hour) 6.0/15 14.29
FOX The X Factor (Series Premiere) 4.4/11 12.56
CBS Criminal Minds (Season Premiere) 4.1/10 14.07
NBC Harry's Law (Season Premiere) 1.2/3 7.30
CW America's Next Top Model 0.7/2 1.56

10:00 ABC Revenge (Series Premiere) 3.4/9 10.15
CBS CSI (Season Premiere) 3.1/8 12.59
NBC Law & Order: SVU (Season Premiere) 2.3/6 7.60

It was ok, not great, for me. I agree with everyone that the guy who dropped trou was ridiculous - mostly because they allowed him to continue and watched with jaws agape as though they were powerless to stop him. Please. They quickly cut off a couple of performers before him just because they were bad. This guy was outright offensive (though I don't buy Paula being sick either). That they continued to allow him to 'perform' and actually had a discussion with him at the end leads me to believe they allowed it for the shock value/ratings potential. Shame on them.

I also liked that L.A. Reid stood his ground so firmly against Simon. I really thought they were setting that initial disagreement up so that Simon convinces him to accept that first singer they didn't agree on. But, the guy stood firm, said "not for me" and I'm glad he did. Paula remains useless and Nicole is too early to call - though on The Singoff she was kind of like Paula-lite.

Wow, not only did X Factor not come close to matching Idol, or win the week, or win the night - it didn't even win the time slot. It could improve, but this doesn't look to be the massive hit, let alone the ratings black hole that Idol became.

In contrast, the premier of DWTS in its 13th season beat it both in the key demo and by a large margin for total viewers, and that was with its lowest premier ratings and losing first place opposite what was possibly the most anticipated show of the season.

While not a failure, it must be a huge disappointment to all involved. It must have come in far short of what the sponsers expected.

Maybe viewers aren't as interested in Simon Says.

Watched it, didn't like it. Didn't think much of the performers (with the exception of the rapper who wrote his own stuff).

I thought the whole idea of the show was that whole bands could perform? How come we only saw trios and vocal groups with no instruments? There must be a ton of bands out there who play their own instruments who'd audition for a show like this...

X-Factor did build at the show went on though. That's promising.

What is up with the audio? Terrible mix on the 5.1 audio and the bass is just not there at all.

DWTS beat Idol last season a few times in total viewers, but got crushed every week in the coveted 18-49 numbers.

2010-11 Season: Series Ranking In Adults 18-49

1 AMERICAN IDOL-WEDNESDAY FOX 8.8
2 NBC SUNDAY NIGHT FOOTBALL NBC 8.0
3 AMERICAN IDOL-THURSDAY FOX 7.7
4 THE VOICE NBC 5.4
5 MODERN FAMILY ABC 4.8
5 DANCING WITH THE STARS ABC 4.8
...
13 DANCING W/STARS RESULTS ABC 3.9
http://www.deadline.com/2011/05/full...eries-rankers/

I didnt understand why nobody was escorting him off

I didn't watch last night, just watched about 17 minutes, got bored and turned it off.

Same thing on day 2. I checked my sub to make sure it was working properly because of the lack of bass, but the most bothersome thing is that during the actual auditions they show, the background music drowns out the vocals. I don't even want the background music AT ALL (like AI auditions, I like that set up better), let alone dominating the auditions. Ridiculous.

Tonight at least had a couple people that COULD be stars. It still wasn't great and I had to FF through half of it but it was a little better. I hate all the setup and over long performances of the horrible performers. It just makes me cringe. I'll watch the show but for now it's on my viewing back burner.

Terrible. Show over substance. Have Simon swearing for the first time in 11 years, and choose to disaply contestant that swears and is beeeeeped throughout the whole song. Than the "Ken Doll"comes on, wows the audience and three of the four judges, and then change their minde when Simon speaks....turn the channel.

I missed that but the whole show is shock TV, and very overdone. Boring.

Last night's show was produced VERY similar to Idol, with more montage segments and before and after segments. Hardly any innovation at all.

Your last comment must be a joke. Do you remember the top 5 last season? Ugh. The best singer so far appears to be the woman who sang the Beyonce song. The singers for this show SHOULD be better because the judges have more to choose from, both because of the age range and the bigger prize money. That being said, isn't the talent pool dwindling?

There is no reason for X Factor to not be getting the same audience as Idol, because so far it has been almost identical. This tells me that, yes, people are tired of the format, or Fox just didn't market the show correctly.

I think I will wait to pass judgement until the actual competition part starts. That is when we will really be able to see what the show is about, and how the judges and mentors work on camera. With these first few shows, well, auditions are auditions - there really isn't a whole lot that you can do differently from other singing competitions.

One thing that has definitely surprised me though, is how X Factor is definitely going for a more shlocky sentimentallity than idol does in the early rounds.

I checked my speakers too, by changing channels over to ABC and NBC. That's how I knew the audio was weak. No surrounds, and weak center channel. On a show like this, I expect a lot better.

I've given "The Sing Off" a shot this season and I agree Folds is a good judge .. although he seems to like to throw out the word ass just to appear to be .. I guess he's the Steven Tyler of Sing Off .. ??

And yes, the work involved with ensemble singing is substantial .. much more so than a single vocalist .. I guess with the popularity of "Glee", there is a proliferation of these groups these days .. or maybe they were always there and I just did not know .. I have enjoyed acapella since the days of the Gregorian chant ..

May God bless the DVR .. so much filler and fluff .. and that empty stage is huge .. I would almost guess they build it out that way to intimidate the contestants .. probably also a gradual build up from bare empty stage to full blown production to help illustrate some sort of progression ..

I have to echo some others on the thread .. I must be suffering from singing talent show burn out .. the Pepsi glass placement was funny, I thought, since Simon seemed to be the only judge that actually took a drink .. must be a contractual thing in order for him to get a check ..

The Pepsi commercial montage was kind of nice .. better than a large portion of the show itself, actually ..

Throw in a few good performances / toss in a few buffoons / fill it up with side stories and sad life histories / mix it up with 4 judge panel that Simon is obviously positioned as the Supreme Judge on (although L.A. might prove to be interesting as time goes by) .. and it's just a bit ho hum to me .. I'll DVR a few more and see what happens .. but at this point, I don't see this as the mega hit and Idol slayer it was expected to be ..