Another point from the week - Fox not learning from Millionaire where American Idol is concerned.

In the 8 hours of prime-time programming from Monday to Thursday last week, 5 of those hours were Idol-related. The final results show this Wednesday will be 2 hours, suggesting a level of padding not seen since Clorette DePasto's bra.

On the plus side for Fox, I don't think we're going to see much of the show after this week. So it's understandable on some level that they want to wring as much out of it as possible. On the other hand, this season's seen a dangerous trend in the amount of filler material shown. All we need are a couple of Fox shows to crap out (which is pretty much a given) before we get Idol specials every Monday next season.

I can't say I'd weep for Fox if they ran the show into the ground - for all my regular recaps, it's a pretty dismal exercise in both TV and music - but I fear that they'd replace it with something worse. And don't you think that they can't do it.