Or was he fired? Either way, Randy Jackson plans to make this 12th season his last.
“Yo! Yo! Yo! To put all of the speculation to the rest, after 12 years of judging on American Idol I have decided it is time to leave after this season,” he told E. “I am very proud of how we forever changed television and the music industry. It’s been a life changing opportunity but I am looking forward to focusing on my company Dream Merchant 21 and other business ventures.”
Many people thought American Idol would come crumbling down when Simon left, but it managed a respectable performance last year. It wasn’t until now that the whole thing fell apart. Although it is still one of the top shows on TV, its double digit percentage audience loss has been painful and does not bode well for any of the judges keeping their jobs.
As easy as it is to blame anything Fox has done, I think we can more easily assign blame to singing show fatigue. Fox’s X Factor kicked things off with a fall show, but NBC really got the death spiral going with The Voice twice a year. They may have a hit on their hands for now (though The Voice did finally drop below Idol on Wednesday, down to a 2.8 from season highs over 5), but people are going to get as sick of this as they did Deal or No Deal and Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? I for one gave up Idol this year, and I gave up The Voice as soon as NBC cancelled The Biggest Loser’s fall season.