Glee, 1x22, “Journey”

Episode Title: Journey
Writer: Brad Falchuck
Director: Brad Falchuk
Originally Aired: 06/08/2010
Grade: A-

The season finale wasn’t as bad as I expected given the poor quality of the previous two episodes, but it also didn’t do much to make me excited for next season. I’m thrilled that they managed to pull most of the plots together and tell a straightforward, coherent story, but that doesn’t erase the fact that most of the post-hiatus material that came before it sucked.

I understand, and even enjoy, the show’s absurdity well enough to suspend disbelief about Sue being a judge despite working for one of the participating schools. I could even deal with Quinn conveniently (and quickly!) delivering her baby during Vocal Adrenaline’s performance of “Bohemian Rhapsody.” And yet, when it came to Shelby adopting little Beth, I had to fanwank that she actually started the adoption process at least a couple of episodes ago.

I also had a hard time believing that the club was able to pull the Journey medley out of thin air at the last minute, and that’s the show’s biggest structural flaw. The club spent most of the season trying to find the right songs for sectionals and regionals, only to throw it all out the window at the last minute both times and put on a great performance of songs they’d barely even rehearsed. I think the Journey medley, and the show’s title, means that the writers think that these characters have been on a journey, both individually and collectively, but the characterizations and storylines have been so slapdash that it doesn’t really feel like it. Between that and the fact that most of the songs they practiced weren’t ultimately used in competition, I ended up feeling like most of the season was a waste of time. This entire story could have been told more effectively in 13 episodes, and maybe that sort of restriction would have done Murphy’s ADD storytelling tendencies some good.

The episodes twists were also pretty predictable. I knew Sue would do something to save the glee club, because what would she do without her nemesis? She’d be so bored! I also picked up that Quinn holding Beth was supposed to recall Shelby’s story about not getting to hold Rachel when she was born, so the adoption wasn’t exactly surprising.

Most of the things I did like in this episode were minor (except the Quinn part, which is major):

-I loved the shot of Will dorkily rockin’ out on the sidelines to “Don’t Stop Believin.’”

-I was thrilled to see Quinn finally push that baby out into the world. She hasn’t always been the nicest person, and she’s been somewhat neglected post-hiatus, but she’s one of the few characters whose growth felt both tangible and somewhat believable to me. She had a pretty rough transition from girl to woman, and I grew to like her in spite of her flaws. While I don’t think everything’s going to be sunshine and roses for Quinn now that Beth has been born and adopted, I’m glad that she can finally reclaim her body and her sexuality.

-Puck’s reaction to watching the birth of his daughter was perfect—horror, disbelief, respect, joy, and wonder, all in one singular expression. Nicely-played, Mark Salling. Seeing Quinn give birth to their child seems to have helped him view Quinn in a new light. She’s not just a pretty incubator for this offspring anymore, but a fierce, beautiful woman who deserves his respect. Of course, this is Puck, and any “growth” he experiences is always canceled out by the writers’ next harebrained idea for him. I’m not holding my breath.

Ultimately, as fun as the musical numbers and one-liners are, I thrive on character, and none of these characters got enough development to truly satisfy me. Most of the characterization and plotting is half-assed and feels dictated by the music, rather than the other way around. Some viewers may not care about this at all, or be able to overlook it, but overall, it’s not working for me. I had such high hopes for this show when it premiered (though many of the flaws I noted there are still in evidence 21 episodes later, which actually surprised me), but while Chuck took three seasons to wear out its welcome, Glee managed to do it in one season. Re-watching the episodes feels like a chore, and the blogs just turn into rants about what I don’t like. I’m not sure if I’ll be watching the show next season, but I do know I won’t be blogging about it either way, at least not consistently. When it comes to Glee (and Chuck, for that matter), from now on I’m sticking to that old adage, “If you can’t say anything nice, don’t say anything at all.”

Glee, 1x20, “Funk”

Episode Title: Funk
Writer: Ian Brennan
Director: Elodie Keene
Originally Aired: 06/01/2010
Grade: D

The previous, out-of-order episode had me feeling pretty frustrated with Glee, and this episode did nothing to change that feeling. Aside from Vocal Adrenaline’s “Another One Bites the Dust,” I couldn’t even find anything to like.

Jesse’s defection back to Vocal Adrenaline came out of nowhere, and that can’t really be blamed on the episode switcheroo. In fact, airing in the correct order might have made his about-face feel even more abrupt. This episode was supposed to come right on the heels of “Dream On,” in which Jesse and Rachel reunited after her music video debacle. Jesse spent most of that episode being a supportive boyfriend and even told Shelby that he liked Rachel and didn’t want her to get hurt. I saw absolutely no signs in “Dream On” that he was completely full of shit and on the verge of going back to his old team. Even the plot structure indicates that Jesse would have to stick around, since Shelby said that Rachel had to come to her, and he might need to lean on Rachel some more to make that happen. It’s no wonder so many viewers were completely baffled by Jesse not only going back to Vocal Adrenaline, but also going along with bullying Rachel.

Even his “I loved you” before cracking an egg on her head made little sense because Groff’s delivery was accusatory, as if Rachel had done something to deserve his betrayal, except that she hadn’t (maybe just a rare bad acting choice from Groff, but the director should have caught it). If this had come immediately after the music video incident, it might have made more sense. It’s like the writers had their plot points written down on Post-Its stuck to the wall, and some of them fell off and were stuck back on in the wrong order.

There’s also the fact that switching the episodes means that chronologically-speaking, the Vocal Adrenaline kids knew Rachel was their coach’s daughter when they harassed New Directions and pelted Rachel with eggs. She seemed like a pretty intimidating coach from what we saw, so I can’t imagine that her students would risk crossing her like that. And of course, anything in “Theatricality” that involved Jesse had to be cut for continuity, which might have cost us a few lines, or even a scene, that would retroactively shed some light on Jesse’s sudden about-face. I can only hope that the DVDs have both episodes intact and in the correct order. I probably won’t buy them myself, but I’m sure anyone who’s still a fan of the show would appreciate it.

Aside from the afore-mentioned “Another One Bites the Dust,” even the music was pretty unimpressive. New Directions best number was “Good Vibrations,” which is just sad. The Beck song was okay for sentimental reasons, but it sounded just like the original. And Quinn’s performance, like most of this episode, didn’t even make sense. What was the point of the pregnant girls? First of all, Quinn could have carried the “anger” in that song perfectly well without trying to make some bizarre statement about unfairly ostracized and angry pregnant teenagers, and second of all, the direction made it seem like they were trying to sensualize the pregnant female body using fake baby bumps. Maybe it was supposed to be absurdly, ironically funny, but I was rolling my eyes through the whole thing.

Glee, 1x21, “Theatricality”

Episode Title: Theatricality
Writer: Ryan Murphy
Director: Ryan Murphy
Originally Aired: 05/25/2010
Grade: C+

I have to admit that I find the current frenzy over Lady GaGa baffling, but even if I didn’t, I still think she hasn’t been around long enough to earn the praise showered on her by Ryan Murphy via Kurt. She’s no Madonna. I assumed that Murphy and co. wanted to do a tribute to Madonna, and Madonna obliged by giving them a sweet deal on using so many of her songs, because that episode was essentially free-advertising and full of heaping praise for the Material Girl. This episode, however, felt like product placement cooked up by Lady GaGa’s publicists. Seriously, did her PR people write Kurt's GaGa-praising monologue?

I know this episode and the next one were switched on FOX’s orders, and having seen the “following” episode before writing this, I know that any Jesse-related scenes had to be cut, which subtracts some major points. The episode shuffling also caused some continuity issues, at least for me, because I didn’t believe that Rachel would be brave enough to confront her mother so soon after discovering her identity, especially considering how hard Jesse had to push Rachel into making that discovery.

Kurt’s relationship with his father is one of the few storylines the show has managed to stick with and handle consistently well, but they really dropped the ball here with how they handled Kurt and Finn. I’ve never found Finn to be particularly homophobic, and he’s always been pretty patient when it came to Kurt’s obvious crush on him, but I could understand how being forced to move in and share a bedroom with a male who is attracted to him, combined with the bullying at school, could send Finn over the edge.

Yes, using the other f-word was going too far, but everything that Finn said about Kurt up until that point was true. Kurt does stare, and he does flirt. He engineered their parents’ relationship because he thought it would mean spending more time with Finn (and he changed his mind about it because he felt threatened by the way his father related to Finn, rather than because the two of them weren’t a good match). It was also pretty heavily implied that Kurt engineered Finn and his mom moving in.

Kurt coyly pursued and manipulated someone that he knew wasn’t interested, and Kurt was subtle enough about it to be able to play innocent if he was called on it. It sucks. Yes, it’s hard for Kurt to make love connections at his Midwestern high school, but that doesn’t excuse his behavior. And obviously Burt is protective of his son, and he may not have heard the entire conversation, but it’s completely unfair that Finn was berated and kicked out of the house and learned A Very Important Lesson About Tolerance, while Kurt didn’t have to face any consequences for his inappropriate actions.

The whole thing left me incredibly confused as to what Murphy was ultimately trying to say, because he allowed Finn to make valid points and then completely threw those points out the window in favor of taking a stand on hate speech. Which is important—I’m not denying that—but Finn losing his temper and saying some nasty things doesn’t cancel out Kurt’s stalker-lite behavior. Kurt being a complete snot to Finn, who obviously felt bad and wanted to talk about it, didn’t help in the least.

Other Stuff

-As if the things I listed above weren’t bad enough, I also thought Kurt was smarter than to take a perfectly acceptable gray, modern, relatively androgynous interior design scheme and turn it into colorful, fruity nonsense with the aim of pleasing a straight guy. Kurt is nowhere near that clueless. It was an obvious example of the character serving the plot rather than the other way around.

-The plot involving Figgins thinking that vampires are real and Tina might turn into one was ridiculous, but also cute and funny and a highlight of an otherwise sketchy episode.

-Casting Idina Menzel as Rachel’s mom may have been fan service, but the fans were right on this one. Not only is she a wonderful physical match for Lea, but she’s also done very well with the role. (I also had no idea she was married to Taye Diggs until I poked around on her IMDb page—neat!)

-Was Puck changing the baby’s name from “Jack Daniels” to “Jackie Daniels” a Whip It reference, or just a coincidence?

-Not only did the KISS number trump “Bad Romance,” but Puck also totally went for it and completely nailed the KISS aesthetic—theatrical and sexual without being fruity. I never thought I’d see Mark Salling stomp around in red lipstick and platform boots…

-That “Poker Face” duet is probably a love it or hate, and I’m definitely in the hate it camp. It made absolutely no contextual sense.

Quotes

Figgins: “For several years in my early twenties, I dressed up as Elvis. But he was Christian, Will! And he did not possess the ability to transform into a bat!”