The final two haven’t even been announced yet, but outspoken judge Simon Cowell has already made clear who he thinks should be crowned “American Idol” next week.

“Probably David Cook,” Cowell told Blender.com in an interview when asked who he thought most deserved to win.

 ”I think he’s done more to deserve it over the eleven weeks. He’s taken more risks, he’s done things with certain songs that have been more interesting. If I’m gonna base it on who has done the best performances over the live shows, David Cook deserves to win,” Cowell said.

For most Idol fans,  it’s been a foregone conclusion for weeks that the two Davids — rocker Cook and baby-faced Archuleta — would meet in the final showdown on May 20.

But the winner will be chosen not by the three judges, but by the 25 million or so viewers of the show. What will you base your decision on? Talent, good looks, likeability, or most deserving?

Not many “American Idol” viewers expected to see Syesha Mercado make it past this week. Let’s face it, a face-off between the two Davids, Archuleta and Cook, has been considered a foregone conclusion for weeks now.

But notwithstanding the near certainty of a David showdown, it was still a shock to see Paula Abdul administer Mercado’s death sentence on Tuesday night’s episode.

The perennial “good cop” judge, who at least tells the contestant that they “look beautiful”when she doesn’t have anything nice to say about a performance, told Mercado at the end of her third performance of the night that she was probably not going to make it to the show’s finale next week.

“I don’t know if it’s going to be good enough to get into the finals of “American Idol,” Abdul said of Mercado’s rendition of Gia Farrell’s “Hit Me Up” from the movie “Happy Feet.”

Abdul tried to atone for her comment afterwards, adding: “I love you, though.”

Mercado’s second performance of the night, a cabaret-inspired version of “Fever,” was also uniformly panned by the judges, with Simon Cowell saying she missed her chance to prove that she can be a contemporary recording artist and would probably regret choosing that song tomorrow.

Oh well, hopefully Syesha will be taking comfort in the fact that Paula loves her while she packs her bags tonight.

Truth be told, the night wasn’t stellar for the Davids, either. Cowell said Dan Fogelberg’s “Longer,” which the show’s producers chose for David Archuleta to sing, was “something you would choose for like a 90-year-old,” while the 17-year-old’s performance of Chris Brown’s “With You” was “a little bit like a chihuahua trying to be a tiger.”

David Cook, meanwhile, got lukewarm reviews from Randy Jackson on all three of his performances. Cowell and Abdul were kinder, with Cowell declaring at the end of the show that “David Cook wins the night.”

That may be true, but the season’s biggest battle is still to come. Davids, it’s time to step it up.

In seven seasons of “American Idol,” Paula Abdul has definitely had her moments.

But her gaffe on Tuesday night’s episode was either the “Kookiest Paula Moment Ever” or a sign of the judges’ apparently not-so-spontaneous evaluations of contestants’ performances.

Abdul on Wednesday sought to explain the blunder as a simple misunderstanding. “We all just screwed up everything,” she told Entertainment Tonight.

It was Neil Diamond night, and after each of the show’s five remaining contestants sang their first of two songs for the evening, the judges were asked to comment on their performances.

Randy Jackson quickly rattled off his impressions, and then Abdul launched into a lengthy analysis of contestant Jason Castro’s two performances. Yes, that’s right. Abdul remembered TWO performances. When Castro, and all of the other contestants, had only performed ONCE.

“Oh my God, I thought you sang twice,” a flustered Abdul said when Jackson gently pointed out that Castro had only performed one song so far. She added: “This is hard!”

“You’re seein’ the future baby, you’re seein’ the future!” host Ryan Seacrest said.

Abdul tried to cover for the mistake by saying she had been reading her notes from both Castro’s performance and contestant David Cook’s performances.

The flub was enough to convince some fans that Abdul must have prepared her notes on both songs before the live performance.

On the “Idol” forums, some fans pondered whether the judges’ comments were a function of who the show’s producers want to win rather than the content of the performances. Others gave the show the benefit of the doubt, saying Abdul must have taken notes at the dress rehearsals

Abdul explained on Wednesday that Idol producers had thrown the judges a last minute curveball during the show.  “I am feverishly trying to write notes for every performance,” she recounted, saying her notes got mixed up.

“I was just trying to give my critique for Jason Castro, and scribbled Jason’s name, and that was David (Cook)’s. “This is live television. This is fun!,” she said.

It must have been conceived as some sort of cruel joke.

For seven seasons now, the judges of “American Idol” have repeatedly told contestants to steer clear of singing songs by Mariah Carey, ostensibly because the singing competition’s up-and-coming star wannabes could never hope to measure up to one of the great voices of pop music.

So, let’s just say it was a little strange to find Carey as the guest judge on Tuesday night’s show. Because you know what that means: the contestants were allowed to perform an old Mariah song, a new Mariah song, or any other Mariah song of their choosing.

As judge Simon Cowell predicted at the beginning of the show, the night indeed turned out to be lackluster one for the girls because of the unavoidable comparisons between them and the great Carey herself. That didn’t stop Cowell from delivering his usual barbs, however.

“It was a bit like ordering a hamburger and only getting the bun,” Cowell told Brooke White after her performance of “Hero.” “In other words the vital ingredient, the bit in the middle, was missing.”

Ouch.

The other girls — Syesha Mercado, Kristy Lee Cook, and Carly Smithson — emerged without being compared to fast food, but they didn’t get any overwhelming love from the judges.

The remaining three boys, however, put the judges in a festive mood. A leather pants-clad David Archuleta’s performance of “When You Believe” was declared the evening’s benchmark by Cowell, and David Cook’s rock take on “Always Be My Baby” received a standing ovation from judge Randy Jackson.

Later, Jackson likened Jason Castro’s take on “I Don’t Wanna Cry” to “a weird beach luau,” but Paula Abdul said it was a luau that she would “love to be at.” Cowell agreed with Abdul, saying that “the guys completely won the night.”

Oh no he didn’t.  Unfortunately, oh yes he did.

Rocker David Cook bombed on “American Idol” Tuesday night with an unfamiliar song and cocky performance that made it seem like he believed he had already wrapped up the competition.

Cook chose “Innocent,” a song by Canadian alternative rock band Our Lady Peace, to sing on a night when contestants were told to choose music that inspires them. The night’s theme was intended as a preview for “Idol Gives Back,” the show’s charity special that airs on Wednesday.

Cook, wearing a white military-style jacket, strutted around without his signature guitar, finally sauntering through the audience while he sang. But judges Randy Jackson and Simon Cowell were decidedly uninspired, with Cowell calling it “a teensy weensy bit pompous.” Only Paula Abdul liked it.

To make a bad performance even worse — cringe-worthy, in fact – Cook ended it by raising a palm scrawled with the words “give back” up to the cameras. The judges praised him for that move, but Cook already appeared completely deflated after their criticisms of the performance.

It was clearly a rude awakening for Cook, who has become a favorite with the show’s fans in the last few weeks.

Another weak performance was Irish diva Carly Smithson’s take on Queen’s “The Show Must Go On.”

Smithson, who had a stellar run on the show at the beginning of the season, is clearly struggling. Cowell, who called her performance “angry,” said she may even be vulnerable to elimination this week. If that does happen, Smithson would be going home before Kristy Lee Cook, the leggy blonde country singer who has narrowly escaped the hatchet for several weeks running.

Never is “American Idol” better than when seemingly second-rate contestants emerge from the shadows to blow the annointed frontrunners out of the water.

Rocker David Cook has managed to pull that off a few times this season already, most memorably with his rock take on Lionel Richie’s “Hello” before he even made it into the Top 12. Still, the 25-year-old hasn’t garnered anywhere near the attention seen by babyfaced teen David Archuleta or Irish diva Carly Smithson.

But on Tuesday night, Cook may have shed the “dark horse” mantle once and for all. His gutsy transformation of “Billie Jean” into a rock ballad prompted judge Randy Jackson to call him “the most original, the most bold contestant we’ve ever had… dude, you might be the one to win the whole lot.”

Archuleta, on the other hand, got mixed reviews for his performance of “You’re the Voice,” with Simon Cowell telling him it reminded him of a theme park performance.

Still, on the “Idol” forums, Cook lags Archuleta in the number of posts viewers have written about him. After Tuesday’s show, hoever, at least one die-hard “Archie” came out to give Cook a hand:

“He’s showing that my second favorite (him) isn’t too far behind my first (David Archuleta, obviously)”

Keep going, David (Cook). One more week and you just might take over that other David once and for all.