The Voice

I'm officially in love.

Remember when I was in high school and I thought I was in love with American Idol? Me too. Oh how young I was back then. And foolish. And naive. I hadn't lived yet, really. ..hadn't really experienced enough to be able to consider myself to be 'in love' with a reality talent show. Ultimately, I'm grateful that my lack of cable television finally forced us apart because here's the thing: I just found my true love. And it's on Hulu.

It's indescribably beautiful and far superior to any other vocal competition show ever, ever, ever for the following reasons:

The talent is broader:

One of the defining moments of this show for me so far was the folk duet "Elenowen" who literally blew my mind when they sang one of my all-time favorite songs from "Once". I'm not gonna lie to you people, I cried. But, I digress. The point is that this competition draws some of the most diverse talent of any other show of it's kind. You know how American Idol singers all end up sounding the same by the end of the hour? That is highly unlikely to happen in this show which attracts in equal parts rockers, country singers, folk singers and pop singers. I wasn't bored once during the auditions and not a single performer was forgettable.

The judges/coaches are legitimately famous people:

Do you know how to pronounce the name Kara Dioguardi? Me neither. But once upon a time, she was a judge on American Idol. Had you ever heard of Simon Cowell before American Idol? Oh. Me neither. How about Randy Jackson? Kay. So one thing I enjoy immensely about this show is the caliber of celebrities they have involved with this show. The show also earns gold stars by having opened with an incredible performance by all four of the artists which show-cased just how deserving they are of being as ridiculously famous as they are. Say what you will about Christina Agulera, but that woman has got some serious pipes.

Competition amongst the coaches:

The selling point of this show lies in the competition between the judges to be the coach who finds 'the voice'. They each build a team of eight talented singers and their teams go head-to-head against one another. It's such an original lay-out. And it's highly entertaining to watch the judges fight over which singer they want to join their team.

Blind auditions:

This is an obvious selling point for the show and it's what initially at

tracted me to it. This concept works on an even bigger level than I'd anticipated. One of my favorite acts was a 22 year old guy who had one of THE most beautiful voices I have ever heard. Ever. I was blown away. When they introduced him to the at home audience at first, though, I knew that if he'd been auditioning for Star Search or American Idol, he wouldn't have made it far because of his appearance. It was so empowering to watch that over-weight man blow each and every judge away and then fight to have him on their team. This show is highly successful at making it be entirely about the voice. Which I love.

To Advance, you only need one vote of confidence from the judges:

You're automatically on someone's team as soon as one of the judges chooses you.

Blake Shelton:

He's already one of my all-time favorite country singers, so I was super excited when I found out he was one of the four judges. He opens a venue for country singers on this show which I find exciting, being as I'm a huge fan of country music. And to top it all off, he's absolutely hilarious.

You get to look at Adam Levine from Maroon Five.

Yeah.

They have already found legitimately talented people and you don't have to sit through the excruciating audition process where they weed out the weirdos.

Don't get me wrong. I'm all about the hilarious and sometimes painful American Idol auditions, but there's just something refreshing about knowing that the person on stage is probably going to blow your mind and that they probably aren't wearing a chicken costume.

The rejections hurt, but not in the "I'm going to wet my pants and then stab a potato repeatedly to relieve the tension" kind of way.

When the none of the judges want a singer on their team, it's really, really awkward, but nowhere near as awkward as some American Idol rejections I've witnessed over the years. That Simon sure knows how to let 'em down easy.

On top of all of this, on tonight's episode, they pulled a blind at-home-audience moment (which means that they're going to let you hear the singer before you see what he/she looks like) where a guy said his family was Mormon and then they showed videos of his very Mormon-looking parents. When he started singing, they continued to hide his face and my initial thought was, "Dang. That white guy's got a black guy's voice. That is awesome." And then...they unveiled him. Black as night. WITH an afro. And one of the best voices of the night. This show is just exceptionally well structured. I gasped, pleaded, cried, got chills and laughed out loud several times. It was just pure entertainment.

I am well pleased. And I highly recommend it to any and all who enjoy televised talent competitions. Well done, NBC. Well done.