Steve tries to do a remote interview with the semi-finalists and the judges, who are all backstage. The problem is that Paula keeps wandering off and blocking the camera to kiss everyone. "Paula, get out of my shot!" Steve mock-snaps at her, and tries to direct a question to L.A. about how smug he must be feeling as the only judge with two singers left, but he has to repeat it twice because L.A. isn't paying attention either. It loses what little spontaneity it had on the third go. And since L.A. and Paula burned up all the time for that segment, we have to go straight to Florence + The Machine. Steve says it's the premiere of a new song called "Spectrum," which starts out so low and quiet it doesn't seem to have a melody at all. Eventually it picks up, and the dancers do this Martha Graham thing, and as well as Florence sings it, it's just not that great a song. Steve plugs her new album, but unless the other songs on it are better I have a feeling the dog days may not be all that's over for Florence + The Machine.

Time for some filler, with a clip/interview segment about the judges' opinions of each of the final four. Marcus is the guy who keeps coming back without whining, and is the entertainer. Chris is the most original contestant with the most heart, and somehow they don't bring up his recovery. Josh has the voice and the emotion (and the crazy eyes) and Melanie has the amazing technical voice and provides Simon his constant justification for telling us how awesome he is for fixing his early mistake with her. As for the final four, they all agree that it's anyone's game.

Finally, we're back onstage and Steve claims it's time to find out who went through to the finals. He brings them out once again: Nicole and Josh; L.A., Marcus and Chris; and Simon and Melanie. Steve recites the magic words "no particular order," and takes his sweet time before saying Chris Rene is in the finals. Chris is pretty happy about that, and so are Marcus and L.A. The second safe one is Melanie. She and Simon hug happily, and we leave Josh and Marcus waiting to see which of them is leaving. Will Marcus go down, or will he toss another popular corpse on his growing pile of them?