Another season of America's Got Talent has come to an end, with competition as stiff as ever heading into the Season 19 finale in the 2024 TV schedule. After four months of auditions, applause, and even more golden buzzers than usual, host Terry Crews announced the winner of the $1 million grand prize: elementary school janitor-turned-singer Richard Goodall! There was a lot to celebrate, but also something that I wish had been different.
I for one couldn't be happier with the result, despite the fact that singers usually aren't my top picks on AGT and the Top 5 – comprised of comedian Learnmore Jonasi, human/dog dance duo Roni Sagi & Rhythm, drone light show team Sky Elements, and quick change magician Solange Kardinaly as well as Richard Goodall – was full of worthy competitors. Between his story and his singing, Goodall was just my favorite of Season 19.
Plus, he just got married, which made it all the sweeter to see him win, and he got to team up with Neal Schon and members of Journey for one last incredible performance of "Don't Stop Believin'" early in the finale.
Indeed, Richard Goodall winning isn't at all what I'd like to see change in the wake of the Season 19 finale. In fact, what I'd like to see different isn't even something that AGT did for the first time this season. For some reason, it just hit me harder this time that the finale spent almost two full hours killing time before announcing the winner, and then only giving the winner moments of the episode at the very end. It's not new, but dang it, Goodall was so overcome by emotion that I would have loved to hear more from him after he had a few seconds to take a breath.
I did want to fact check myself before I got too annoyed, though, so I went to the video and discovered that the length of Terry Crews' pause was a full 40 seconds before announcing whether Goodall or Roni Sagi & Rhythm had won. Then, the golden confetti rained, judge Heidi Klum ran up on stage to give him a hug... and another 40 seconds passed before Crews handed the mic to Klum and then closed out the episode. Take a look for yourself:
To be clear – I'm not blaming Terry Crews or Heidi Klum for Richard Goodall not getting much screentime in his own AGT victory. This has been the America's Got Talent formula for about as long as I've been watching, but something about the look on Goodall's face as the host began wrapping up the finale really made me wish the end had gone a bit differently. It really begs the question: does AGT really need about one hour and 57 minutes of finale to kill time before announcing the winner?
Honestly, even just another minute or two would be welcome, or some of those 40 seconds of delay before Terry Crews announced the winner. And sure, the performances over that one hour and 57 minutes were fun. I would just love if America's Got Talent tweaked the finale formula for future seasons to allot more time to the winner before the final credits rolled. All it would take is a very minor change, and it could make all the difference.
For now, though, we presumably have a while to wait before AGT is back. No spinoff has been announced at the time of writing for winter or midseason, so we may not see the judges back in action until Season 20 in the spring. For now, you can always revisit Season 19 streaming with a Peacock subscription.