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It’s been a strange season of The Voice — and not just because of Gwen Stefani’s penchant for pairing torturous heels with tights.

But despite the almost constant shift in contestant momentum and often head-scratching results (Damien over Toia Jones in the Knockouts? Ryan Sill in the Top 8?), something kind of miraculous occurred during tonight’s performance finale: NBC’s reality singing behemoth finally took on its most obvious shortcoming — that it’s never produced an American Idol-level superstar — and did something that may very well obliterate all those “what’s the point of all this, anyway?” criticisms.

Where are the Spice Girls when you need ‘em?

No, that’s not me throwing shade at Taylor Swift’s performance of “Blank Space” on tonight’s Top 10 results telecast of The Voice. It’s just that Season 7 of NBC’s reality-singing juggernaut could use a quintuple dose of girl power, rather than just the single shot brought by The Pop MegaSeller Formerly Known as Country.

I mean, how many talented chicas have fallen by the wayside — Toia Jones, Maiya Sykes, Amanda Lee Peers, Brittany Butler, Alessandra Castronovo and Jean Kelley, just to name a few — in the past three months,...

Gwen Stefani was the only coach left with a steal on Tuesday night’s The Voice final battle rounds, using it to snatch up Team Adam's Beth Spangler.

Team Pharrell: Brittany Butler vs. Ricky Manning

Pharrell Williams paired Brittany Butler and Ricky Manning with a jazzy take on “On Broadway,” and, while they did put a jazz spin on the song, neither Brittany nor Ricky were particularly at ease with the song. In rehearsals, Pharrell advised both Brittany and Ricky to try to find a way to be themselves with the song. “You’re, like, trying out for the X-men. There’s no reason to hold back,” Pharrell said.

Gwen loved both Brittany and Ricky, commending them for their stage presence, but Adam Levine gave the battle to Ricky because of his improvement from the blind auditions. Pharrell was torn, but in the end he declared Ricky the winner.

Gwen Stefani is one sly stealer.

The No Doubt frontwoman was the only Voice coach to have a steal going into the final night of the battle rounds Tuesday – and she used it with aplomb to steal one of two "divas" who performed a commanding rendition of the Christina Aguilera hit "I Turn to You."

Coach Adam Levine paired four-chair-turning Beth Spangler, 30, an X-ray technician from Aiken, South Carolina, against fellow four-chairer Mia Pfirrman, 19, of Temple City, California, because "there's only room for one belter on my team," he said during rehearsal.

But their powerful performance left the veteran coach with a difficult decision,...

Gwen Stefani is one sly stealer. The No Doubt frontwoman was the only Voice coach to have a steal going into the final night of the battle rounds Tuesday - and she used it with aplomb to steal one of two "divas" who performed a commanding rendition of the Christina Aguilera hit "I Turn to You." Coach Adam Levine paired four-chair-turning Beth Spangler, 30, an X-ray technician from Aiken, South Carolina, against fellow four-chairer Mia Pfirrman, 19, of Temple City, California, because "there's only room for one belter on my team," he said during rehearsal. But their powerful performance left the veteran coach with a difficult decision,...

The only coach with a steal remaining on Tuesday's "The Voice" was newcomer Gwen Stefani. Did she make a rookie mistake by stealing the wrong artist? 'The Voice' recap: Battle for the ages (10/13/14) -Break- Battle rounds concluded after four nights over the past two weeks. The other three coaches -- Adam Levine, Blake Shelton, and Pharrell Williams -- had already used up their steals, so that left Stefani with a lot of power. There were only three battles actually seen by the home audience out of six that were conducted (the other three were relegated to montages only). The best of those was for Team Pharrell between Brittany Butler and Ricky Manning on the George Benson classic "On Broadway." Coach/judge Williams chose to keep Manning, but Stefani completely passed on obtaining Butler for her team. The second battle of the evening for Team Blake had him choosing...

Heaven help me, I’ve taken to using lyrics from the Broadway musical Chicago in my recap headlines for The Voice. (Sample comment from my husband, reading over my shoulder, “I don’t get that reference. At all.” #GayCardRevoked)

But I swear, there’s good reason for my flight of fancy. After all, Season 7’s Blind Auditions yielded exactly one promising jazz vocalist — and yet after a Battle Rounds process that whittled the field from 48 down to 32 contestants, that chica is as extinct as the dodo emu, as defunct as the Walkman in your “shame-shame closet,” as mopped up as...

Season 7 of The Voice turned a competitive corner Monday in the fifth and final night of the show's blind auditions.

Adam Levine, a veteran coach and two-time winner, showed he was still in it to win it, snagging the night's most mature contestant and the evening's only four-chair turn with Aiken, South Carolina, radiology technician Beth Spangler, 30.

Maybe it was her black leather overalls, or sassy haircut, or sunshine smile. But likely it was Spangler's sparkling vocal range and her ease in helming Beyoncé's "Best Thing I Never Had" that had the coaches in a full-on fight for her attention...

Season 7 of The Voice turned a competitive corner Monday in the fifth and final night of the show's blind auditions. Adam Levine, a veteran coach and two-time winner, showed he was still in it to win it, snagging the night's most mature contestant and the evening's only four-chair turn with Aiken, South Carolina, radiology technician Beth Spangler, 30. Maybe it was her black leather overalls, or sassy haircut, or sunshine smile. But likely it was Spangler's sparkling vocal range and her ease in helming Beyoncé's "Best Thing I Never Had" that had the coaches in a full-on fight for her attention...

Season 7 of The Voice turned a competitive corner Monday in the fifth and final night of the show's blind auditions. Adam Levine, a veteran coach and two-time winner, showed he was still in it to win it, snagging the night's most mature contestant and the evening's only four-chair turn with Aiken, South Carolina, radiology technician Beth Spangler, 30. Maybe it was her black leather overalls, or sassy haircut, or sunshine smile. But likely it was Spangler's sparkling vocal range and her ease in helming Beyoncé's "Best Thing I Never Had" that had the coaches in a full-on fight for her attention...