--- description: Breaking news and analysis from time.com. Politics, world news, photos, video, tech reviews, health, science, and entertainment news. title: American Idol image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt7af5ab548fcdce2a/69869f07cd68484162095ff9/t100_tv_american-idol1.jpg?branch=production&width=2400&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 --- Aug 14, 2014 # _American Idol_ by [TIME Staff](/author/time-staff/) ## TIME Staff Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close  Everett Let’s be clear: this is not the [All-Time 100 Best Music](http://time.com/time/specials/packages/0,28757,1955625,00.html "undefined") list—any crimes against your ears and radio this show has committed are beyond my responsibility. But as a TV show, for all its cheese, filler and loopiness, _Idol_ has done something rather amazing: it’s taken musical performance and criticism and turned it into a sporting event second only to the Super Bowl. Ed Sullivan was about taste handed down to America (and if you’re gonna give Ed credit for the Beatles, you’ve gotta remember Topo Gigio too). _Idol_ is about America’s taste percolating up. The fact that that taste, in a given year, is reliably pretty lousy is beside the point; turning aesthetic debate—Why Is This Thing Better Than That Thing—into America’s single remaining mass weekly entertainment is good in itself. Now if someone could just figure out how to do that for politics. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"Article","@id":"https://time.com/collections/all-time-100-tv-shows/3100877/american-idol/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/collections/all-time-100-tv-shows/3100877/american-idol/"},"headline":"American Idol","datePublished":"2014-08-14T19:06:35.000Z","dateModified":"2026-03-02T23:02:08.024Z","description":"","url":"https://time.com/collections/all-time-100-tv-shows/3100877/american-idol/","keywords":["American Idol"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt7af5ab548fcdce2a/69869f07cd68484162095ff9/t100_tv_american-idol1.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"TIME Staff","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/time-staff/"}],"creator":"TIME Staff","articleSection":"","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt7af5ab548fcdce2a/69869f07cd68484162095ff9/t100_tv_american-idol1.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/collections/all-time-100-tv-shows/3100877/american-idol/","name":"American Idol"}}]},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"VideoObject","name":"American Idol","description":"For all its cheese, filler and loopiness, Idol has done something rather amazing: it's taken musical performance and criticism and turned it into a sporting event second only to the Super Bowl.","thumbnailUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/v2/media/Gt59ZYfi/poster.jpg?width=720","uploadDate":"2007-09-05T14:32:42.000Z","contentUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/Gt59ZYfi.m3u8","embedUrl":"https://time.com/collections/all-time-100-tv-shows/3100877/american-idol/","duration":"PT33S","potentialAction":{"@type":"SeekToAction","target":"https://time.com/collections/all-time-100-tv-shows/3100877/american-idol/?jw_start={seek_to_second_number}","startOffset-input":"required name=seek_to_second_number"}}] ```