America’s Got Talent review: Michael Ketterer makes Simon Cowell cry

The third and final live America’s Got Talent quarterfinal show aired on NBC Tuesday night, and the good news right away was that the set was fixed! At least none of the acts had to deal with that in the midst of their performance.

Tonight, these acts just had to worry about putting everything on the line for the sake of seeing if they could get through to the next round — not all of them will, and this is a chance to see really who rose to the occasion and who just fell back into the fray.

At the end of the episode, these acts will be ranked from least-strongest to strongest. For more thoughts, be sure to subscribe to CarterMatt on YouTube for weekly videos and a whole lot more.

12. Joseph O’Brien – It took about an hour before this week gave us our first major disappointment, but it came via a guy in Joseph who did a lot of really good stuff in his first two performances. The song choice tonight, however, was unfortunately a little boring. He sang it well, but there was nothing about it that we’d consider memorable.

11. UDI Dance Team – We want this to be even better than it was, mostly because we love “Take On Me” as a backing song and we love video games. Yet, there wasn’t anything in here that we had not seen before in other performances over the years.

10. Hans – Hey, at least it was entertaining! There is absolutely nothing else that Hans could have brought to this performance. He’s not a good singer and he’s not a particularly good dancer, but he goes out there and brings the fire. He played the accordion, he sang, he danced, and he was a HUGE personality!

9. Christina Wells – She’s just not our cup of tea. We recognize that she is a great singer but it always feels like she’s just barely on the right side of the pitch. She was also just a little off with her timing in a few different spots on the show tonight.

8. Brian King Joseph – Brian’s performance was fantastic, and really the only reason that he is ranked here is because there were so many great people on the show as a whole tonight. The energy and the musicianship were top notch, with the one problem being that occasionally, all of the background business ended up drowning out his violin.

7. Daniel Emmet – Great opera singer, but a questionable song choice. We don’t really need to see a classic singer do an overdone Aerosmith song. We would rather him come out and just do more of a traditional opera song, or at least something that doesn’t have such a cheesy reputation to it. (Granted, the judges loved this, so what do we know?)

6. The Future Kingz – It’s not much of a shock that these dancers kicked off the show, given that this is something that the series has loved to do from the get-go over the years. They’re very fond of having a crew come out to get the night started right with a lot of energy. We said that they were the best overall crew in terms of talent this season, and with this performance, we do think that they delivered on that front.

5. Aaron Crow – It was really long, but at the same time that’s the sort of act we love to watch. It was dangerous, intense, and precisely what we watch the show for. It’s just a shame that he probably won’t get the votes just because America doesn’t like scary things. Watching someone stab themselves? Pretty scary.

4. Rob Lake – What he did wasn’t the most revolutionary magic effect that we’ve ever seen, but at the same time it was still dramatic and effective. He went from one part of the stage to the other while on a motorcycle! What’s not to like here? It was a bit expected but also very well done.

3. Michael Ketterer – He had a very strong, very emotional performance at the end of the show. It took a little while to get going but once it did, we really believed in what he was singing and also in him as a genuine threat this season — which we weren’t sure of entering the show.

2. Us the Duo – The reality here is that it’s so hard to judge two people singing a song about the baby they are expecting to a dance crew. It REALLY is apples to oranges here. Yet, this performance was lovely, meaningful, also really well-performed. America is probably going to lap this up like nobody’s business.

1. Zurcaroh – They are powerful, they are moving, and they do something that is so much stronger than we ever imagined from an act like this. We’re starting to feel like they really should be considered a real favorite to win this whole show because what they do is genuinely Las Vegas worthy NOW.

What did you think about tonight’s America’s Got Talent? Share right now in the comments below!

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