‘The X Factor’ USA preview: Tim Olstad shakes up Paulina Rubio; plus, Panda Ross!

Tonight marks the beginning of “The X Factor” USA’s new much-hyped “four chair challenge,” which is both an exciting and rather cruel twist introduced to the show this year. We hate the fact that judges’ houses (our favorite part of the season) is gone, and we’re left with this one segment instead of bootcamp to determine who are the most worthy of moving into the live shows.

In case you missed the rules or you’re not reading our reviews of the UK version of the show, the competition basically goes like this: Each contestant will go up and perform, and if the judges like what they hear, they will place them in one of four chairs. When those four chairs are filled, they will have to replace a singer with someone else, ensuring that there will be a maximum amount of heartbreak for the contestants. While this is a cruel and unusual punishment for singers to take the dream away from someone else, let’s not pretend like “The Voice” does not do something similar with both the Knockout and the Battle Rounds. It just does it with a smile.

The video below shows off Tim Olstad seemingly doing enough to impress Paulina Rubio, but in the process, she has to try and figure out who she wants to get rid of. To us, the biggest surprise here is that the preview actually more or less gives away who some of the favorites are. This to us either means two things: The show isn’t that concerned with hyping the guys this year, or they feel like explaining the twist is so important that it is okay to spoil.

Also, we’ve included here for fun some video proof that Panda Ross (remember her?) was actually a part of this season at one point, and she even had a new look to boot. Sadly, we know already that she and her Simon Cowell-worshipping ways are not in the competition tonight.

Photo: Fox