‘Idol’ threats

LIKE NOSFERATU SUCKING AT the throats of couch potatoes everywhere, “American Idol” cannot be killed using conventional weapons. Rival networks have tried starving it with reality programs, stabbing it with sitcoms, shooting it with dramas and firebombing it with award shows. “Idol” just shrugs them off, pulling in record viewership for the Fox network. Its season finale in May was the most-watched TV show of the year except for the Super Bowl and the Academy Awards. Simon Cowell’s mocking laughter haunts the dreams of executives from every other network.

So over the next few months rivals are rolling out a plan they think will ram a stake through the show’s heart once and for all: They are imitating it.

No less than six talent competitions are flooding our screens this summer and fall, all of them seeking the attention of the same minions Cowell & Co. have placed under their spell. Naturally, all the networks would be thrilled if their show morphed into even a duke of darkness next to Cowell’s prince. But one network executive admitted to Variety that there is also a strategic method to the talent-show madness: Fox’s rivals aim to hit viewers with so many cheap contest shows that they become thoroughly sick of the entire genre, thus finally ending “Idol’s” reign of terror.

The entries include NBC’s “America’s Got Talent,” produced by none other than Cowell (if you can’t beat them, sign them to a 13-episode production deal), and “Last Comic Standing,” a revival of a show that died in 2004; “The One” on ABC, an adaptation of a Spanish-language show; and “Rock Star,” soon to start its second season on CBS. Fox is even rolling out “Duets” this fall, another Cowell extravaganza that teams celebrity crooners with amateurs.

Very few people in the TV business doubt that “American Idol” is a fad. It simply surpasses belief that a glorified karaoke contest featuring bad pop music and worse hairstyles could possibly last. Remember “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire”? It was once a monster hit too; now it’s pre-prime-time road kill. And yet, beyond all reason, “Idol” has lasted five seasons and gotten stronger with each one.

With any luck, these shows will cannibalize each other until there’s nothing left but bones. And then America can get on with the serious business of watching the next mindless TV fad.