AGT: All-Stars premiere: Terry Fator, Berywam eliminated?

AGT: All-Stars season 1

We had a feeling that the AGT: All-Stars premiere was going to have some polarizing eliminations, but we never saw this coming.

Before we get too far into this, let’s start off by saying that Light Balance Kids got the Golden Buzzer from none other than Howie Mandel and honestly, we understand that. Just consider for a moment everything that they’ve gone through and how powerful their story is. It’s tough to make an argument here that they are anything other than deserving.

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However, the nature of this particular show makes it that only a couple of acts from each episode move forward, and that meant that the superfans were left to choose the other person moving on. Who did they eventually opt to go for? The Bello Sisters! The three acrobat / strength artists made it through over Berywam, who have one of the most-watched auditions ever, and Terry Fator, who is easily the most financially successful act we’ve ever seen on this show. This is without even mentioning Alan Silva, who was sensational from start to finish.

Were the Bello Sisters great? Absolutely, but this is still a hard result to process no matter how you slice it. If the idea was to get the most notable acts into the next round, we didn’t see that happen here. Meanwhile, it feels like this decision exposes further the real issue with this format. There is no real transparency on who the superfans are who are voting, and with only two acts moving on you lose a lot of variance. We assume it’s easier schedule-wise and cheaper for this entire show to be pre-taped, but not having it be live really does cause us to lose a big chunk of what makes this franchise special. The stakes are different and beyond just that, some of the decisions make a little bit less sense overall.

What did you think about the big eliminations tonight on AGT: All-Stars?

Be sure to share right away in the attached comments! After you do just that, stick around for some other updates you don’t want to miss.

Photo: NBC

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