Masked Singer Recap: Contestant Walks Off Set After Shocking Audience Vote -- Emmy Winner Unmasked

There may be ten more masks we’ve not seen yet, but we’re going to have to wait a bit before they make their debuts. For now, we’re sticking with Cyclops, Firefly, Ram, and Thingamabob. They outlasted McTerrier last week, but tonight’s challenge was even greater.

After the first round of singing, the audience and panel voted two of them directly into next week’s show, while the other two had to face off in a head-to-head battle. Let’s just say, one of them did not take this news well and actually stormed off the stage, jeopardizing the whole episode.

After last week’s messy beginning, with McTerrier’s mask falling off after his performance and before his official unmasking, and Firefly having to stop due to choking, it’s no surprise that things went a bit off the rails again this week.

At least the singers stepped up their game, giving us much stronger overall performances than we saw last week. Maybe they wanted to impressed guest panelist, and “Domino Masters” host, Eric Stonestreet.

We'll also be sharing some of the internet's guesses, too, so if you don't want to be potentially spoiled (because they are very good at this), you may want to skip past the guesses sections.

Let’s jump right in with this week’s masks. And don’t worry, before we get to the shocking unmasking, we're going to make you power through the terrible (and occasionally good) guesses made by our illustrious panel of Robin Thicke, Jenny McCarthy, Ken Jeong and Nicole Scherzinger first. We do this because we love ... to torture you.

(“P.Y.T. (Pretty Young Thing), “Michael Jackson) Firefly is a consummate professional and extremely comfortable on that stage. She’s got moves that tell us she could really break it down if she weren’t encumbered in that giant head and tail. And she’s got a nice voice, settling smoothly into a lower register for most female singers. It doesn’t have tremendous range, but it has quality and a very listenable sound.

Guesses: “She got the MJ pose, she ain’t moved yet,” Nick Cannon said on coming out, and her obvious laughing reaction to that, where she rested a hand on his shoulder, certainly made it look like she and Nick know one another.

In lieu of a regular clue package, the contestants instead offered up a “Mega Clue” to help use narrow down our list of suspects. For Firefly, this “game-changing” clue was a giant torn-up picture of Pharrell.

“Pharrell is one of the major keys of my career,” said Firefly, which immediately had the panel clearly thinking about Alicia Keys -- but that’s not her voice. It’s also not Aisha Tyler, Eric, because Aisha is mega-taller than that! Aisha and Nick are both 6’0” and Firefly is not the same height as Nick!

Robin’s theory, wrapping through the original clue package showing Tyler Perry. She did a couple of songs for one of his films and has worked with Pharrell, so he wondered if maybe this was Keyshia Cole.

Nicole went out on a dream limb by guessing that it was Pharrell’s inspiration, Lauryn Hill, but why would the notoriously quiet and low-key Hill come out for this show? Sure, anything is possible -- but maybe not that.

Of course, anyone who’s been playing the guessing game online knows that Twitter has been all over this mask since the premiere, feeling super-confident that they “know exactly who this is!”

They've even started gathering the receipts to prove it. There were a few other guesses, too, with even La Toya Jackson getting in on the fun:

(“Suspicious Minds,” Elvis Presley) Cyclops had a smooth ease in his delivery, but we also heard hints of a possible Southern accent in his delivery. Once again, he chose a song with a limited range, but that kept him in the pocket of his talent. We got some real tenderness in the breakdown, but even there it was emotionally flat. We don’t think this is a professional lead singer, but we could see someone who usually accompanies.

Guesses: Cyclops’ “Mega-Clue” was a supposed meteorite that “crashed to earth in 1998.” “Legend has it, that this meteorite was found in a nook in Ken’s backyard from a galaxy far, far away.” Is the ‘88 a clue to the age of the contestant, who also has a connection to Ken?

Ken took the “Galaxy” clue to “Guardians of the Galaxy,” tying it into the comic book clue from his initial clue package, to Chris Pratt. Adding a little more credence to the possibility is that Peter Quill was abducted from Earth in 1988. We know Pratt is down for a good time, and he’s a big guy, so it’s possible. Plus, the pandemic made some people more available than they otherwise might have been.

Eric put a lot of faith in John Lithgow’s strength in guessing that perhaps the meteorite ties to his “3rd Rock from the Sun” starring role, but Nicole thinks the meteorite is a rock as in rock star, so maybe it’s Rob Matthews.

She took the overnight nature of the original clue package to Matchbox Twenty’s “3 a.m.,” and the SE on the compass to their home base of Orlando, FL. Is that a bit of a stretch? No one online has figured this one out yet, so … maybe?

Even though it goes against what was reported (that he was voted of "first"), fans are still ready to throw Rudy Giuliani out as a possibility for Cyclops. Mainly because they were not fans of this performance.

But there were some solid guesses, including one for Michael Rooker, who starred in "GotG" with Pratt. There were also a few Phil Collins guesses, but he's in too frail of condition now, per reports and recent show performances, to possibly carry such a heavy costume.

(“Learn to Fly,” Foo Fighters) Ram delivered a pretty simple and straightforward vocal this week, but it was a night-and-day improvement over last week’s massive misfire. He was far more in key, though we’re still not fooled into believing this is someone who sings at all. He also has a bit of a Southern twang around the corners of his enunciation while singing, which is interesting.

Guesses: Ram kicked off his performance with a strong gesture, pointing right at the panel -- and possibly right at Eric. For his part, Eric felt like he knew even the posture and stance that Ram was holding in that moment

By the end of the performance he was on his feet with a lot of confidence that he and Ram knew each other. In response, Ram quipped a thank you to the panel, including “Old E.”

His “Mega-Clue” came out in a fancy envelope. Nick revealed it by saying, “And the Emmy goes to Ram.” That’s a pretty big clue, which could be another connection he has with Emmy-winner Eric -- especially when he said he would add this “Emmy” to his “collection.”

Last week’s clues were all about sports, with a heavy emphasis on football. So is this a former football player who moved on to Emmy-winning success on the small screen? Or is this an Emmy-winning sportscaster who’s covered a lot of football?

Eric played the “Fan Coach” for an AT&T commercial series that ran during college football games years back, so maybe there’s a connection there? He’s also a huge Chiefs fan, and catches games at Kansas State, his alma mater.

On the baseball side, Eric is now part of the Royals ownership group, and Royals all-star George Brett once appeared on “Modern Family.” Could it be George? We got a bonus clue with some words of encouragement from Kate Hudson, so there’s another connection.

Ken’s guess took football across the pond, where he found a terrible guess in “Ted Lasso” star Jason Sudeikis, who definitely does not sound like Ram. Eric, though, wondered if it was his “Modern Family” star, and Rams fan, Ty Burrell.

The piggy bank from the clue package had Jenny thinking of Jason Biggs’ game show “Cash at Your Door,” but Biggs is 5’9” and Ram is at least as tall as Nick. Plus, he shot that theory down himself, telling her, “I'm not dissing on Biggs, but he couldn’t fill this out!”

Fans were still confused on this one, parroting a lot of guesses from the panel these past two weeks like Ty Burrell, Matthew Stafford -- but some new names started to emerge as well, including sports-related TV personalities like Joe Buck, Michael Strahan and even WWE Superstar The Undertaker. Now we might be getting warmer.

(“Perfect,” Ed Sheeran) Thingamabob has a beautiful voice, and if you were to just listen to him, you might think he was a professional singer. But we still think this is an incredible secret talent that is not the main focus of what this man does. It’s in his body language as he performs and some of the vocal choices he makes, which tell us he’s untrained and unseasoned -- but incredibly gifted.

Guesses: After the panel gushed over the performance, the Men in Black gallped out with fake shields. “I left my trident backstage, but I still wanted to rock these shields to show America I’m ready for battle.”

Based on his surprise singing voice in “Moana,” Jenny wondered if maybe this could be The Rock. She tied the shield to a specific WWE matchup, but Thingamabob’s body language seemed to suggest he wasn’t feeling this guess at all.

As for Eric, he again thought that he might know this person, and thinks it’s someone he high-fived at Dodger Stadium. He thinks it could be Omar Benson Miller, the 6’6” actor. As for Robin, he connected the trident to a fishing tackle box and “Hotel California” from the first clue package to the most obvious guess, Jason Momoa. “His trident turns into a shield,” Robin concluded.

Could it be that big of a star? Twitter doesn't think so, at least not in that sense. Instead, they've been guessing Eagles offensive tackle Jordan Mailata since the premiere. They did appreciate The Rock, though, with a hilarious example of his quality singing voice from WWE.

Only two would compete in this head-to-head competition, with the top two vote-getters earning automatic safety into the next round. Everyone stepped it up this week, with more solid vocals across the board than we expected.

Last week, we said there was only one real singing talent on the show, but we’ll amend that to add Thingamabob as an unseasoned talent next to consummate professional Firefly. As such, those were our two picks to survive the night untested. But would the audience agree and send Cyclops and Ram for a head-to-head battle?

Apparently, this audience is tone deaf at best, though, as they put Ram and Firefly in the duel. How on earth could the best singer in this grouping be fighting for their very survival in the competition? We were ready to really sweat it out over Ram and Cyclops who were equally just okay, but now this!?

Apparently, we weren’t the only one upset by this result, as Firefly stormed off the stage even as Nick was still telling Thingamabob and Cyclops that they were safe. We’re still pretty sure she’s the only one here who’s an actual singer, so that does have to sting a lot to see the audience not step up and support her talent.

After a commercial break where she presumably worked through everything, Firefly did return to the stage to face off against Ram.

Nevertheless, these results -- and that reaction -- got a huge response from social media (especially as they're so confident on Firefly's identity), with some of them calling for Firefly to be eliminated even without knowing why she left the stage.

(“Take Me Home, Country Roads,” John Denver) Ram said “Please, take me home!” in the middle of this performance. Was he asking the voting audience to send him home? This was a middling vocal performance at best, so we think he did everything he needed to do to, in fact, go home.

(“God Is a Woman,” Ariana Grande) Firefly delivered the chorus of Grande’s hit and “Yeah” a few times, but we’d have really liked to see her punch it a little more. Her range was again very limited, despite taking on Ariana. We love the timbre of her voice, but maybe this is why she’s failing to connect with the audience.

Firefly was still stronger than Ram overall in her performance, and certainly has been through the season. That bit of gravel in her voice is very enjoyable to hear, but it also seems to betray a more limited vocal range than singing competition audiences are used to seeing or rewarding.

As such, it seems obvious for us -- but it also seemed obvious for us that Firefly not wind up here to begin with. She wouldn’t try to sabotage her own duel out of frustration at even being in it to leave the show, would she? We were still rooting for her to stay, and pretty confident she would.

Nick only asked the panel to judge, which if that is the case, then things should get back on track and go the way they should have gone to begin with. Maybe the audience lost their voting privileges. Serves them right.

In the end, Ram got his in-song wish and he will be sent home tonight, once everyone gets their final guesses as to just who it might be under that mask.

• Robin Thicke: Joe Buck
• Jenny McCarthy: Jason Biggs
• Ken Jeong: Jason Sudeikis
• Nicole Scherzinger: Kelly Slater
• Eric Stonestreet: Joe Buck

Eric started thinking about his time with sports broadcaster Joe Buck, and the fact that Ram appeared to fake kick him from the stage had him thinking of how Joe throws it back to him on “Domino Masters,” as well. Robin then thought of the tiny horse (and horses buck) to jump on board.

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In the last minute, Eric pulled it out with a correct guess, as eight-time Emmy-winner Joe Buck was the guy underneath the Rams costume. We also love that the “kick it” gesture wasn’t a clue at all, but just Joe trying to “look alive” out there.

Is it just coincidence that the “Domino Masters” announcer was unmasked on an episode when the show’s host was a guest panelist -- and the show airs right after “The Masked Singer”? More than likely it is, but when it comes to promotional opportunities, things couldn’t have lined up better for Fox.

Next week, we’re sticking with this crew but the stakes couldn’t be higher. There are only three masks remaining and they’re facing a double elimination! That’s right, only one of them will survive to move on to the season finale to battle it out for the title and trophy.

“The Masked Singer” crowns its winner next Wednesday at 8 p.m. ET on Fox.