Dannii Minogue and Simon Cowell on The X Factor
Lest you haven't noticed the pre-publicity, The X Factor returns tomorrow. Of course, if you aren't aware of the (manufactured) feuds between the judges, the carefully-placed teaser stories in the red tops (about, among other things and in a nod to multicultural Britain, weeping Muslim contestants), or the wheeling out of new judge Danni Minogue, as though her presence will somehow restore some of the excitement that was felt way back when the format was shiny and undogged by phone vote scandals, you may actually be dead. I find The X Factor is boring, contrived, samey, trite nonsense and I haven't been able to avoid the drip-drip-drip of publicity alerting me to its return. It's been like Chinese water torture without the pleasure of knowing you're learning about another culture. So full marks, I guess, to the PR team.
Still, ITV is desperate. The show has lost any of the credibility it might have possessed when it started. It's not just that the "prize" has been discredited and therefore the judges' judgement exposed as stinky. It's not just that the feigned bickering between any permutation of Louis Walsh, Sharon Osbourne and Simon Cowell is wearying. It's not simply the formulaic nature of it all, from the auditions featuring wacky idiots/folks with mental health issues to the final eliminations during which the phrases "You've got a great career ahead of you" and "You remind me of a young Aretha Franklin" are repeated ad infinitum. It's that the whole thing reeks of cynicism. Which, I guess, is what comes of all of the above. Even trading in Kate Thorton for the altogether more credible (and cute-as-a-button) Dermot O'Leary can't save the show from itself.
Let's face it: if Danni Minogue, star of Notre Dame de Paris: the Musical, is the new weapon in your arsenal, you are in trouble.
