We kicked off with a supremely awkward group number (what else is new?) in which the final 12 performed Lady Gaga's "The Edge of Glory" with no discernable sense of timing or harmony. Thankfully, some enterprising individual backstage made certain that Lakoda Rayne's microphones were turned down, but there was no disguising how shaky Chris Rene sounded and Rachel Crow pretty much shouted her lines. An inauspicious start, to say the least.
After two weeks of painfully uncomfortable "X Factor" results shows -- replete with a child crying hysterically and death threats against Nicole Scherzinger -- this week's elimination seemed poised to offer a little satisfaction for the outraged fans of Rachel Crow and Drew. But did Marcus manage to escape the chopping block for a fourth week, with no "save me" performance to pull him back from the brink?