Posted by Andrew Unterberger on 05/08/2012 at 1:18 PM News

The Popdust Files: adam levine, christina aguilera, feuds, ten things that happened, the voice, tony lucca, tv recaps

That’s it—it’s all in the books, all come and gone, and now that all that remains is for America to decide on a winner. Well, that, and a couple performances from Flo Rida and Hall & Oates tonight. Well, that, a couple performances from Flo Rida and Hall & Oates, and the Popdust article on ten things that happened on the show last night. We mostly covered the performances themselves with our instant reviews last night, so I’m mostly gonna touch on the extraneous stuff here—but is anything ever really extraneous on The Voice? Let’s find out.

1. Didn’t take long for Carson to snipe at Blake. Less than five minutes into the show, actually. It started out as a compliment—”You’re one of the biggest country stars on planet earth”—but then Blake made some smart-ass “That’s right, you know it” type gesture that reminded Carson how much he hates the Voice country rep, forcing him to tack on the addendum “Unfortunately, it’s true.” Oh, how we’re gonna miss the banter between these two.

2. How come Cee Lo and Blake never get “WE LOVE YOU ____!!!!” fan chants? All season long, Adam and Christina have had to pause their artist analyses while pockets fans of shout “WE LOVE YOU ADAM/CHRISTINA!!!” from the crowd—and both did last night—but Blake and Cee Lo never seem to get shown that kind of love. It’s just disrespectful, guys. Show some crazy fan love for the Ladykiller and the Biggest Country Star on Planet Earth (One Of).

3. “It’s a Man’s, Man’s, Man’s, Man’s World” was in a commercial. Can’t even remember for what, but I hope Juliet Simms and Cee Lo are getting some kind of percentage for that.

4. This graphic came on the screen during the emotional peak of Christina and Chris Mann’s duet.

Subtle, NBC.

5. Shit just got real between Adam, Christina and Tony Lucca. Christina has been sticking pins in her Tony Lucca voodoo doll all season, but last night it reached new heights when she called out Tony and Adam for choosing a song (Jay-Z’s “99 Problems,” as reinterpreted by singer/songwriter Hugo) that was “derogatory towards women,” what with the word “bitch” and all. Christina and Adam bickered about it on the set, which was apparently nothing compared to what went on backstage, as sources told Perez Hilton that Adam “went right up to Christina and said ‘you’re the biggest f***ing c***” over the disagreement, and Christina demanded he be fired. (Meanwhile, Tony also vented about Xtina to US Weekly after the show: “How convenient that she waits the whole season to talk about all things classy…It’s just so transparent at this point and pathetic.”)

We look forward to the whole story behind this Christina vs. Tony-Adam blood feud coming out at some point—assuming it doesn’t wreck the entire show in the process, anyway.

6. At the very least, Adam tried to make the peace by wearing this t-shirt.

Or maybe this was just yet another dig at Xtina? Such a fine line between tribute and callout on this show.

7. Cee Lo just wants to make more Godfather references. The man just can’t stop with the Brando-ish “Tony Luccaaaaa….” utterances, to the point where even Lucca himself was making the “Godfather” hand motion as soon as Cee Lo started talking about him. He also tried to increase the peace (or maybe just brag about his lack of involvement in the drama) by wearing this shirt:

Later, he explained “With Juliet Simms on my team…I have…no problems.” Not so sure about that, Cee, but more on that in a minute.

8. Chris Mann called Christina Aguilera “Mom.” Or maybe “Mama?” Either way, it was pretty weird, especially coming after a confusing sequence in which Christina insisted that Mann was a “Real Man,” likely taking another shot at the “bitch”-hurling Adam/Tony duo (or possibly just making a terrible pun off Chris’ last name). What is going on with behind the scenes of this weird-ass television program?

9. We got to meet Blake “Shuffling” Shelton. Blake doesn’t want to get mixed up in all this noise, either—he just wants to dance. More specifically, he wants to dance with his team finalist Jermaine Paul, with whom he’s developed a fairly good chemistry, during their duet of “Soul Man.” (The man love on this show makes Troy and Abed on Community look uncommitted.) Blake explained that they call him “Blake ‘Shuffling’ Shelton,” which Carson certainly seemed to get a kick out of, and the man is indeed fairly light on his feet for a thirty-something troubadour. Maybe Adam will let him in his and Tony’s Britney Spears cover band if neither Jermaine or Tony end up winning.

10. By the way…did Tony Lucca just win this thing? It seems almost incredible to think about, considering that Tony might not even have been one of the 20 most talented contestants on the show this season. But he’s building all this buzz with his cover choices (the “99 Problems” cover, which wasn’t really even a “99 Problems” cover the way people think, was about the smartest choice of song he could have made for last night), he’s doing the best of anybody on iTunes (both his “99 Problems” and “Yesterday” covers are in the top ten right now), and all this Christina feuding might only be helping his cause.

Meanwhile…Juliet Simms didn’t exactly seal the deal with her performance last night. Her “Born to Be Wild” duet with Cee Lo was weird and not particularly complimentary to her or her skill set, and her “Free Bird” cover…it was a solid performance, but if it was us up there, we certainly wouldn’t risk our chances of winning on a song most famous for its vocal-free five-minute guitar solo section. Everything had to break just right for Tony to even have a chance of winning this season, and it has. Now, even though he’s not the best singer in the competition (Juliet) and he wasn’t the best singer last night (Jermaine), and in fact his tribute performance of Maroon 5′s “Harder to Breathe” had us thinking “Wow, this guy is no Adam Levine” (not a great sign)…he just might take it anyway. If we had to rank, we’d say the four contestants deserve to win in this order:

1. Juliet
2. Jermaine
3. Chris
4. Tony

And they’re most likely to win in this order:

1. Juliet
2. Tony
3. Jermaine
4. Chris

I’m still giving Juliet the edge because…well, she’s just better, by a margin that I feel can’t be ignored. But if it was the 36-year-old ex-MMCer that ended up taking top honors, I can’t say I’d be that surprised. And if he wins season two with that great a talent disparity, then Adam Levine is officially the Gregg Popovich of The Voice.