The most lighthearted round of America's Got Talent competition in Season 16 came to an end with the conclusion of the auditions, and the stakes will be higher than ever when the show returns for the quarterfinals. Unfortunately for fans still buzzing off of the high of seeing the spellbinding performance by dance duo Pasha and Aliona and all the others from the final auditions episode, AGT is going on a break while NBC focuses on the 2021 Tokyo Olympics in primetime. The good news? The return date has already been announced, and there's a lot to look forward to.
America's Got Talent will return with the live first episode of the on Tuesday, August 10 at 8 p.m. ET on NBC, so there are still a couple of weeks of Olympics action left before the network goes back to regularly-scheduled programming and AGT gets its time slot back. Thanks to the golden buzzers from the four judges and host Terry Crews (plus the bonus golden buzzer they all broke the rules for), we already know six of the acts who will appear in the live shows, but there are also a lot of unanswered questions for which we only have clues.
Judges Simon Cowell, Howie Mandel, Heidi Klum, and Sofia Vergara were tasked at the end of auditions with narrowing down the group of talented acts even more. The live shows would last a very long time if everybody who got enough votes forward in the auditions round actually got to keep going, and the judges had to choose 36 from the 150+ acts that had moved forward. Fans will find out about some cuts that had to be made when the show returns. Bad news for Sethward's dreams of the $1 million prize?
Of course, there are already six slots accounted for thanks to the golden buzzers that guarantee Jimmie Herrod, Northwell Health Nurse Choir, Léa Kyle, Victory Brinker, World Taekwondo Demonstration Team, and Nightbirde will all have another shot to show why they deserve the $1 million prize and show in Las Vegas. With 30 vacancies left, which acts will get another chance at stardom, and which of the vast majority will be cut ahead of the quarterfinals? Some, like Sethward and Bini the Bunny (as much as the bunny is downright adorable) are more likely to be cut than others, but only time will tell who the judges decided to keep and who they decided to cut.
Few things are ever fully guaranteed when it comes to winners and losers of America's Got Talent, and voters from home don't always go for the same kind of acts from year to year. The past five winners have all been quite different with unique talents, particularly Darci Lynne Farmer with her ventriloquist puppets, Shin Lim with his mind-blowing magic, and Brandon Leake with his history-making spoken word performances.
The game is anybody's to lose at this point, so be sure to check out America's Got Talent when it returns for the Season 16 quarterfinals on NBC. If you need some additional viewing options as the weather starts to cool down, our 2021 fall TV premiere schedule should help you out.
