All or Nothing

Last night's season finale of Glee was a bit of an improvement over recent episodes. The story threads were more compelling than things have been of late, but the hour was still overstuffed.

First of all, there was Rachel's audition, which took place so early in the episode that you almost totally forgot that it was probably meant to be one of the episode's big cliffhangers for the summer.

Then there was the matter of Blaine's potential proposal to Kurt, which apparently wasn't put to bed after all in last week's episode. I couldn't decide whether it was odd or sweet that the majority of this storyline seemed not devoted to the guys themselves, but instead to the older lesbian couple Blaine happened to meet in the process of shopping for an engagement ring.

The catfishing storyline for Ryder was finally resolved. After a brief bait-and-switch in which Marley claimed responsibility, it was revealed that Unique was the person behind "Katie." Ultimately, I think I liked this particular twist, because for once it seemed to reveal a bit of advanced story planning on the part of the writers. Several episodes back, when there was a bizarre subplot about Ryder having trouble interacting with Unique, I noted that the sudden change in his behavior seemed unearned. It still does... but at least now it appears that it was done to add stakes to this reveal at the end of the season.

Brittany's MIT freakout was a strange but funny way of apparently covering for the actress' real-life pregnancy. If they should need to write her out for the beginning of the next season, they certainly have it covered. She can be missing in action, much like Mercedes and Chang for the bulk of this season.

After the big runaway bride episode of months ago, Glee couldn't do another big wedding moment for Will and Emma. I get that. Still, I thought it added to the rushed atmosphere of the episode to wedge their vows in at the end in the choir room.

Of course, all these threads had to be worked around performances, because it was another competition episode for Glee. That means an entire act of no real plot, and this time the songs themselves weren't the best. The vocals were noticeably processed in the first two numbers, enough to make me question (cattily) whether the competition has rules against that sort of thing.

I've said it too much lately, but I'll say it again: I'm tired of Glee right now. Some of my readers, I suspect, are tired of my write-ups about them. Well, we can all breathe a sigh of relief, because this is it for at least a few months. (And even if I come back in the fall, my regular reviews of new episodes may not.) I'd say this hour gets a B-. In a time when I was enjoying the show more, that would represent just a small bump in the road. The way things have been lately, it's sadly more of an "is that the best you can do?"

Wonder-ful

Well, Glee, that was better. But it wasn't quite "good."

This week's episode certainly brought some of the fun back to the show. Most of the musical performances were high energy, toe-tapping numbers that made you smile. There were good vocal performances, great choreography, and as much as I do like many of the newer characters (and actors) on the show, it was just plain good to see Mercedes and Mike performing again.

It's also a guaranteed win every time you have Kurt's father on, thanks to Mike O'Malley. This actually wasn't one of the strongest Burt episodes, but the scene where Burt handled Blaine was still worth the trip. Blaine had a full head of Glee steam this week, ready to launch off into an unearned subplot without set-up and planning to propose to Kurt. Burt was like a Glee fan, there to slap down that nonsense and say "you are a child; and did you not watch last season?" in a very nice, soft-gloved way. Maybe someday the Best Father on TV will be the Best Father-in-Law on TV as well, but he made it clear that it should not be today.

But... I'm not so sure about the rest of the episode. Blaine wasn't the only one thinking of marriage. After all the back-and-forth of Will and Emma this season, Will casually drops in the beginning that their marriage is back on. Everything was somehow smoothed out -- OFF-CAMERA -- and we're ready to throw that into the season finale or something. Weak.

The Rachel-Cassandra plot was a mixed bag. I guess I can accept Cassandra finally rallying around Rachel for her audition, because that's what a good teacher would do. But it also seemed like a long journey for one episode (and really only half of one episode) for Cass to make, given how terrible she's been to Rachel all season long.

It was cool to have Katey Sagal on as Artie's mom... but disappointing for her one scene to be so short. (And a bit mystifying why Kitty suddenly cared so much about Artie this week, even with her speech that basically said, "I'm a Glee character; who knows what I'm going to think this week?!")

And to me, the weirdest thing of all was how Schu arrived at the theme this week. He gets a call from Rachel, who has "wonderful" news, and thinks, "I've got it; Wonder-ful news! Get it!" So, if Schu had been thinking while sitting on the toilet, would it have been Elton John theme week?

I'd say the pure joy of the performances elevated the episode to a B-. But like I said: better, not quite good. I remain ready for Glee to check out for the summer. Then we'll see if a few months away helps reset my attitude on it.

Lights Out

This week's Glee was a largely dull affair, marked by the writers' tendency to get bored with their own ongoing storylines. Yes, we did check in on Ryder's catfishing plot, and Sue's post-school career... but both of those elements received fairly short shrift.

Instead, a brand new Ryder subplot was the focus of the school scenes, as he confessed a past molestation experience. In other words, put a pin in everything else, because Ryan Murphy wants to do a child molestation PSA this week. Blake Jenner sold it fairly well with his acting, as did Becca Tobin in her performance as Kitty... but the whole thing felt like it only looked skin deep in a subject matter that, if examined at all, deserved something much more profound.

The Sue subplot seemed worthy of a deeper look too. We got a hint of the real feelings she had behind the mask, but we are talking about a powerfully driven career woman forced to suddenly reinvent her life. Even for a caricature like Sue often is, that could be potent stuff. Instead, since they probably have to get her back to work by the end of the season (and since there are only two episodes left this season after this), things are on a rushed timetable.

Sadly, the thing the episode spent the most time on was by far the least deserving. The dreary ballet storyline culminated in an uncut, five-minute-plus performance of "At the Ballet" from A Chorus Line. The scene was one of the most drawn-out, boring things Glee has presented all season. A dull waste of precious screen time. At least the vocal performances were decent.

The same could not be said of most of the other numbers in the episode. The Stomp-esque take on Queen's "We Will Rock You" was quite bad for a New Directions ensemble number, and the arrangement of Billy Joel's "For the Longest Time" was lacking too (the a cappella numbers should be left to the Warblers, I guess). The one number I truly enjoyed this week was "Little Girls," though I think that had more to do with how rare it is we get to see Jane Lynch sing on the show than anything else. And even then, the whole thing felt like an inside joke, acknowledging that Lynch will be playing in the musical Annie on Broadway this summer.

A truly weak effort for the show, coming in the middle of a run of weak efforts. I give it a D+. It was just announced last week that Glee has been renewed for two more seasons, but I'm certainly ready for this season to end. I think Glee and I could use a break.

Sweet Dreams

It's always a double-edged sword whenever Glee does an episode that calls back the early days of the show in some way. Last night's episode, featuring Rachel's audition for the Broadway production of Funny Girl, was a perfect example.

On the one hand, that audition scene was very moving -- the most powerful moment in the episode for certain. Even sensing what would be coming as Rachel started her solo rendition of "Don't Stop Believin'", it was still a thrill to see the original New Directions members appear as her backup. On the other hand, it was putting up a giant neon sign saying "remember how consistent and better this show used to be?" We've come a long way since that pilot episode that ended with Glee's most iconic performance, and while there have certainly been high points along the way, the journey has been downhill overall.

That one scene brought another big question to my mind: "where's Mercedes been?" The episode really brought to the forefront the problems of Glee's "separate and follow the graduates" format. On the one hand, you could have it like Puck, who awkwardly showed up at Finn's college for absolutely no good reason, just to get the character back on the show and into the mix. On the other hand, you could have it like Mercedes, used only organically in the story of the show... which is to say, hardly used at all. Neither extreme is very palatable.

Also unpalatable was Schu's sudden dictatorial attitude toward the Glee club. Sure, Glee has a long history of making characters suddenly behave in a completely out-of-character way to grease some particular plot point, but it seemed especially off-putting this time. Everybody at McKinley is coming off a sort of brush with death. You could understand how this has pushed wallflower Marley to want to share her songs, or maybe even use that to explain Sam's completely nonsensical "I have a twin" subplot. But the idea that Schu would suddenly be pushing his students away like this, so soon after an event that brought them all together? Too tough to buy.

So, in trying to grade the episode, I'm essentially faced with the question: does one good scene make an episode? Because that's essentially what last night was -- one good scene. I'm going to say "no," even though that one scene was really good. I give "Sweet Dreams" a C+.

Shooting Star

When last night's Glee episode began with a viewer discretion warning and absolutely no recap of recent episode developments, you knew we were in for a Very Special Episode. Glee has done that before successfully, with the early second season episode about Kurt's father having a heart attack, for example. But I felt like this attempt fell far short of that.

First, there were major tonal problems. I found it really hard to take the gun threat seriously when, just a few minutes earlier, we were watching Brittany lead the whole Glee club in a love song to her cat. And the subplot of Coach Bieste making a play for Schu was both implausible and cringe-worthy. Are we really to believe that she would try to swoop in to ask him out just weeks after he was left at the altar?

I thought there was too much "ripped from the headlines" in play here. I'm not talking about the depiction of school shootings in and of itself, though some would certainly want to debate whether this was "too soon" for such a storyline. (I myself don't much believe there's such a thing; I think fiction can be a cathartic way of exploring feelings surrounding real life events, and a helpful part of the coping process.) But I did feel like cramming the "catfishing" of Ryder into the same episode as the gun plot smacked way too much of "Ryan Murphy was reading the newspaper this morning..."

Curious to see whether my less-than-enthusiastic reception of the episode was typical among Glee viewers this week, I browsed a couple of comment threads on entertainment web sites and discovered another complaint that hadn't even really dawned on me: the fact that Becky was revealed as the shooter. Some people have argued that after four seasons of treating her as a well-rounded depiction of Downs Syndrome on television, they threw her under the bus as "too stupid to know what she was doing was wrong" on this occasion. Like I said, I didn't see this angle, but I can understand interpreting it that way.

I did see a different problem in putting Becky at the hub of the story, however. Though the episode seemed to position itself as a story about school violence (that's what the disclaimer promised), there wasn't actually any violence at all. It was all that build up for, basically, an accident. And not an accident that even had much in the way of serious consequences. Yes, Sue lost her job, but you'd better believe there's no way they're actually writing her off the show. (I expect a confession of the truth from Becky before the end of the season.) Glee's big statement on gun violence ended up not being bold or even ambiguous in a way to make the audience reflect. It was simply, "guns are dangerous." Duh.

But while the script was really a mess, the episode wasn't a total loss. That's thanks to the outstanding effort of the actors. Nearly everyone had a solid moment, but I thought there were real standout performances from (as usual) Heather Morris, and newcomers Melissa Benoit and Glee Project winner Blake Jenner. And of course, Jane Lynch. But really, everyone nailed their "cell phone confessional" moments.

The few musical numbers were also decent -- again thanks to the fairly strong performances, his time vocally (because the arrangements and staging didn't really bring much to the table that the original versions didn't have). Again, the ill-conceived ode to Lord Tubbington of "More Than Words" was too much of a clash with the rest of the episode, but the song would be perfectly fine out of that context.

I think I'd put the episode around the C+ range. Maybe a B-, if I'm being generous on account of the actors who really poured their hearts into it. But it was certainly not the momentous episode I think the writers believed they were creating.

Guily Pleasures

Sorry Glee, but this week was a bit of a mess.

Was in production necessity or narrative necessity to have Schu sick off-camera this week? Was Matthew Morrison only contracted for half the episodes this year, and his long absence at the middle of the year wasn't quite long enough? Or was it that Schu would never have come up with the "guilty pleasures" theme week, having essentially already done the same lesson, songs with a "bad reputation," back in season one? (I suspect the latter, hence why two characters who weren't around in season one were the ones to come up with it.)

If Schu was going to be out for the week, why not bring in one of the established guest star teachers who have taught a glee club? Sure, on any given week, you might not be able to get Gwyneth Paltrow, Idina Menzel, or Ricky Martin to guest star. But were none of them free this week?

Then there was the song selection. Is it even possible to have a guilty pleasure song from before you were born? Or even from before you were, say, five years old or so? Isn't the whole premise of a guilty pleasure song, "I used to like this (at a time when everybody used to like this), but I'm ashamed to admit it now"? For a bunch of teenage students, I could maybe see the premise being "I'm ashamed to admit I like this song my parents like," except wouldn't the reaction of a fellow student probably be "I've never even heard of that song?" (I know, I know, why am I questioning the encyclopedic musical knowledge of the kids now, after all this time?)

How is Sam mocking Tina for her impossible crush on Blaine at the top of the hour, but sweetly comforting Blaine for his impossible crush on himself at the end of the hour?

Who the hell thought the lonely stalker vibe of "Creep" would make a good duet? (Not to mention that, transposed into a higher key as it was, it actually sounded downright cheerful!)

Some of the songs this week had a nice toe-tapping quality to them. And there was that brilliant quick cutaway to the glee band's drummer, who seemed bored to tears playing "Wannabe" in the choir room. There was even a particularly interesting plot thread, but it was given disappointingly short treatment: I think it's a very compelling question, whether it's okay to support the work of an artist when the artist himself is reprehensible. (I was just having the very discussion in the last week or two, in regards to writer Orson Scott Card.)

Like I said, a bit of a mess this week, Glee. I give it a D+.

Feud

Glee returned to form this week... that classic form where the behavior of the characters stretch to fit the needs of the plot that works with the songs they've licensed. This week's theme was feuds, and they needed to manufacture enough to fill out an hour.

Suddenly, Ryder -- who has interacted with Unique for months without any problems -- is uncomfortable with her transgender identity. Suddenly, Sue needs Blaine to pick up his commitment to the Cheerios -- despite acknowledging that she's let his absence go for months. At least the episode was rounded out with two feuds that had been brewing for an episode or two: Finn and Schu, and Santana and Brody.

The feuds weren't the only story lines revolving in and out of the show. Hello, Ryder's mysterious online girlfriend. Goodbye, Rachel's brief pregnancy scare. Hello, Brody the escort. MIA: Emma and Brittany. The result of all this was a bit of a jumbled mess.

But the performances were pretty strong all around. The choreographed dance of the escorts for "How to Be a Heartbreaker" made for a strong opening. Santana's performance of "Cold Hearted" really was (as she claimed) one of the best things NYADA had seen. Jane Lynch tore it up performing Nikki Minaj in one of her rare musical performances. Even the N'Sync/Backstreet Boys mash-up was fun to watch (though the songs of two 90s boy bands made it absolutely impossible to take the emotional context of Finn and Schu's dispute seriously).

So, what to make of it? In my book, I'd say a B-. I really do hate when Glee throws character consistency to the wind, but I have to acknowledge that at least they did some fun things this week.

Girls (and Boys) on Film

This week's new Glee was a reversal. Typically, when they have a "mixed bag" episode, the song performances are fairly entertaining while the plot and characterization suffers. This time, I felt that the story developments worked better than the songs, which were mostly lacking.

The problem for me musically was the premise of performing songs from movies. Too often, Glee was trying to trade on moments and performances that were much stronger in the original movies they were aping. Numbers like "Shout" and "Footloose" had partly original staging, at least... but recreating the iconic scene of Say Anything with Peter Gabriel's "In Your Eyes" fell well short of the original. The Fred Astaire dance number from Royal Wedding (however skillfully performed in one take by Matthew Morrison and Jayma Mays) was clearly limited by the television budget. The pottery scene from Ghost has been ruined for me forever by the hilarious parody in one of the Naked Gun sequels. And as for Moulin Rouge? (Which they went to not once, but twice!) It's one of my very favorite movies; no recreation of it was going to pass muster for me.

Alright, so the "Danger Zone / Old Time Rock and Roll" mash-up was fairly clever in both concept and presentation. But why say the episode is going to feature mash-ups when that was the only one? ("Diamonds Are a Girl's Best Friend" doesn't count. They threw in only a few seconds of Madonna, and the entire performance was exactly as performed in Moulin Rouge, right down to the shouting of character names from that movie. Huh?)

But there were some interesting plot developments. Finn spurring Schu to pursue his runaway bride out of a secret sense of guilt (which he finally confessed in the end) was a nice thread. Santana's sleuthing certainty that Brody is a drug dealer is an interesting wrinkle, even if it seems like that should have been set up a bit more than one episode in advance. Even better was seeing Santana's prickly exterior immediately melt away the instant she realized how much that Rachel truly needed her friendship.

The episode was fun to a point, but dwelled within the shadow of most of the movies it name-checked along the way. I give it a B-.

I Do

Glee took advantage of this year's Valentine's Day falling on Thursday to do the big Will-Emma wedding episode... except that the writers chose to leave out the actual wedding.

I don't know that I've ever been as invested in the Will and Emma relationship as I was back during the first season, when I was certainly in anybody-but-pregnancy-faking-psychopath-Teri mode. There have been other good moments here and there since then, but I think I was ready for them to stop playing "will they, won't they" with the couple and have the wedding they were talking about this time last season.

On the other hand, Glee probably served up its greatest dose of realism in a long time by having things unfold the way they did. Will has been gone for what, three months now? And he left his OCD bride during that time to suffer the mental torture of planning the wedding on her own? Yeah, that certainly seems like something is seriously wrong in the relationship. Following through on that by having Emma run out on the wedding seems like a reasonable plot development when examined through that lens. (And it led to Jayma Mays and Amber Riley absolutely killing it on the song from the musical Company.)

There were other good developments this week too. They seem to have finally put the Tina-chasing-Blaine story to bed once and for all, so hooray for that. Seeing Ali Stroker from season 2 of The Glee Project turn up was a nice treat as well; while I definitely thought Blake was the best fit for Glee of those contestants, Ali certainly made a stronger impact than either of the "co-winners" from season 1. I hope they continue her story with Artie a bit and bring her back for another episode or two.

Other stories were a bit of a mixed bag. When it came to the Jake-Marley-Ryder story, the Cyrano tale has been done to death, and hanging a bell on it by referencing it directly on screen doesn't really save it. But while it was kind of boring on paper, it helped that it had some good acting. Blake Jenner was particularly strong as Ryder, showing in my opinion why he was the right pick to win The Glee Project.

But finally bringing Schu back to the show, only to barely feature him in his return episode? Huh? Santana and Quinn having a one-night hookup? Huh? Blaine and Kurt getting back together only for Kurt to insist they aren't back together? Huh? Sue in the duplicate wedding dress, willing to let someone with a mental disorder get caught in the crossfire of her revenge plan (despite the sensitivity she should have to such matters)? Huh? Rachel possibly pregnant, and in a way that's apparently setting us up for a who's-the-father storyline? Ugh.

The vocal performances themselves seemed quite strong to me this week, though nearly all the songs were presented (in whole or in large part) as "on stage" performances, which as always isn't my favorite thing. I still prefer the songs to be a bit more integrated, which is why my favorite moments were "Getting Married Today" (as I mentioned earlier) and the tale end of "We've Got Tonite."

I think all told, I'd call this episode a B. And apparently, that will have to tide Glee fans over for a couple weeks here until the next new installment.

Diva

This week's Glee wasn't exactly bad, but I did think it was a bit of a tough one to love if you haven't really believed in some of the character choices the writers have been making lately. I do give them credit for sticking to their guns and having a little consistency from week to week; that's something I think Glee was really bad at for a long stretch. Still...

The whole Tina-Blaine relationship kind of feels like watching a car crash in progress. It's just uncomfortable that those most significant storyline Tina has received in more than a year has her doggedly pursuing an unattainable guy. Normally, I'd think Finn kissing Emma would be the most uncomfortable moment in an episode, except that we watched the whole creepy VapoRub scene. (Speaking of which, the Finn and Emma moment seemed like such a contrived wrinkle for just one week before we're supposed to see the big wedding.)

The Brittany-Sam relationship is somewhat easier to watch, but bringing in Santana for the love triangle felt like replaying a beat already covered earlier this season. Santana already went through the "if you love someone, set them free" moment, and yet still teleported back from New York (great commentary from Sue Sylvester on that) briefly before deciding to relocate there.

The aspect that worked best for me in the episode was Kurt and Rachel's Diva-off. I think Rachel's suddenly sky high confidence would have played better this week if we hadn't seen her doubting herself with the nude scene just a week ago, but it was still nice to call back to the first season's "Defying Gravity" episode. I was led to expect that Rachel would somehow realize she should throw this competition as Kurt threw that last one, and was pleasantly surprised that they went another route instead.

As for the songs this week, I thought they were pretty good. Though I didn't feel like any of them had truly strong emotional relevance to the story, the performances were nevertheless effective across the board. Santana's numbers were particularly powerful, both in the vocals and (in the choir room number) the choreography.

All told, I'd give this one a B-.

Naked

Glee picked up a bit this week, but in part just because it wasn't hard to top last week's mess. Writer Ryan Murphy seemed to have come up with this episode mainly as an excuse to make eye candy of his male cast members, but a few moments of brain candy snuck in too.

At first I wasn't quite feeling the conceit of Rachel literally talking to herself, but then the double diva rendition of "Torn" turned out to be one of the better numbers on the show in a while. It had creative staging, and it was fun to compare "college style Rachel" and "high school style Rachel."

I also wasn't really going with the Sam plot this week at first. I feel like I remember a time when the show didn't play him as being dumb like a male Brittany, but at least they've now gotten some decent material out of going all the way down that road. It was nice to see Emma back for a bit, having a moment on screen that didn't have to do with Will, and doing some actually counseling of a student that didn't involve a jokey pamphlet. Plus, the video montage Blaine assembled for him was sweet (even if the three seconds of Mercedes did make me think it's been far too long since we've seen her on the show in any meaningful capacity).

Of course, Rachel wasn't going to go through with the nude scene, and of course she had to make a big diva scene in deciding to back down. That all would have been a total yawn for me, except for the fact that the subplot brought Santana and Quinn to New York. I haven't missed the latter much, though I've certainly missed the former. And it seems like they were setting up for her to relocate to New York, and hopefully become a more regular fixture on the show again.

The rest of the episode was pretty lightweight, but it was an enjoyable enough kind of fluffy once you overlooked the fact that Sue was actually probably right on this occasion -- it didn't seem quite right for Finn to be pushing the sale of a calendar of shirtless pictures of students.

I'd call this one a B-.

Sadie Hawkins

Last night, Glee returned from its winter break with a new episode. Unfortunately, it was the weakest one of the season. Where to begin?

The episode's talk about how Sadie Hawkins was all about female empowerment really felt like just that: talk. It was a loose framework to make girls pine for men, and sing torch songs that felt anything but empowering. "I Don't Know How to Love Him"? And I'm not sure even Ally McBeal ever convinced me to hear "Tell Him" as a girl-power anthem.

Then there's Finn. Sure, he's just a fill-in, not an actual teacher. And his character isn't exactly the brightest bulb in the box. But his lesson plan to force the girls to sing to the guys they wanted to take to the dance? On how many levels was that terrible? What if the girls don't want to go to the dance? What if the guy they want to ask isn't in Glee club? What if -- exactly what happened to Tina -- they get rejected and humiliated in front of the whole group?

Speaking of poor Tina, the character hasn't had a plot line in ages, and now she gets saddled with a crush on an unattainable guy. I suppose at least that's a high-school-authentic story, but it's sad that Tina has only ever been defined by either the man she's with or the shadow she's under (playing second fiddle to Rachel). Though maybe it took the sting off it a bit to put Blaine in the same boat, pining for an unattainable guy himself.

Nothing could take the sting off the horrible Puck-Kitty pairing. As bad as last season's "Puck's Hot for Teacher" story with an older woman was, at least that wasn't potential statutory rape played for comedy.

And doping Warblers? Finishing the rest of the season without competition was just too good to be true, I guess.

All this bad writing, and it's topped off with a snub of geek-rock-god Jonathan Coulton. The episode featured a performance of Sir Mixalot's famous "Baby Got Back," but quirkily altered from a rap song into a slow bluegrass jam. This interpretation was a knockoff of a recording made by Jonathan Coulton. Obviously, the song was not originally his, so any actual copyright permission to use that version on Glee didn't have to be sought from him. But again, the song was a rap originally. In creating his version, Coulton wrote his own melody and practically created a brand new song. Glee could have at least given him the heads up: "We like your take, we're gonna use it." Coulton's a cool guy, he probably would have said "great!" But instead, he found out last week with everyone else, when the Glee songs of the week went up for sale on iTunes. He was not pleased, and I can't blame him. Sure, what Glee did was almost certainly legal, but a little courtesy would have been nice.

So... buried under all this bad stuff, we had a sprinkling of good jokes, a couple of decent performances ("No Scrubs" and "Locked Out of Heaven" -- maybe "I Only Have Eyes For You" as well, but we hardly heard any of it)... and not much else. It's probably generous to grade the episode a D. Unfortunately, it was the worst Glee has been in a long, long while.

Glee, Actually

Tonight's installment of Glee, with its mini-story structure and wall-to-wall Christmas music, is likely to polarize the show's fan base. (Much like this season itself.) But in my view, this was not just the Christmas themed episode Glee has ever done, but was probably the best episode yet of this much-improved season.

My only real criticism of the hour would be that I think the stories weren't told in the right order. I think it's too fashionable to adopt a chronologically jumbled narrative these days. Granted, it didn't really matter which order you took each of the parts in here. But I think they burned up the most emotionally potent stories early in the episode.

Sure, the Puckerman brothers' L.A. excursion culminated in a more tender family reunion at Breadstix, but it was generally a lightweight affair. The Brittany and Sam storyline would be too dopey to enjoy, if Glee hadn't already paved a clear "just go with it" trail when it comes to the intelligence of those characters.

But I think I would have preferred those two stories as a warm-up to the more profound material. Sue's "Christmas miracle" for Marley and her mother, though reliant on the ever-fluctuating sentiments of Sue, still managed to be sweet. Artie's "It's a Wonderful Life" segment was great on several fronts: it served up several funny jokes with the characters, gave a reason to bring back some old Glee stars for nice cameos, and had moments that effectively tugged at the heartstrings.

But most powerful of all was the Kurt segment. The awkwardness of the reunion with Blaine was interesting, but the best material was in the latest appearance by The Best Father on Television, Burt Hummel. After a few wonderful scenes that reminded us why Burt holds that title, he then dropped the bombshell of his cancer diagnosis. And despite his optimism, any long time fan of Glee had to feel their heart sink. It was a perfectly executed vignette that played on the one character relationship on the show that's been consistent from day one.

I suppose I could also quibble a bit about the song choices. Christmas songs can be a bit cloying to start with, and Glee has already used up many of the best ones. Several of the second string choices tonight had particularly repetitive lyrics. (Oh, from the bottom of your heart? Well, thank you then!) Still, the performances themselves were all pretty great.

I'd give the episode an A-. It was a nice note to break on for a few weeks.

Swan Song

Glee has been forging new territory this season with its attempt to juggle a new cast of McKinley students and the post-graduation lives of the established characters. Tonight, the writers continued the trend of challenging the conventions of the series, by having New Directions lose Sectionals. Barring some weird redemption or reversal (always possible on Glee, I suppose), the competition element of the series is now off the table for the rest of the season.

I for one am thrilled with this development. Without the Macguffin of prepping for competition, the show can make time for other stories. Without the need to produce "Regionals" and "Nationals" episodes stuffed full of stage performances, the show can focus on songs that have more emotional weight behind them.

Ironically enough, we got both elements tonight, with half the episode's songs being stage performances... but crammed-to-bursting with emotional context for the characters of Rachel and Kurt. Rachel finally got her moment to shine after being beaten down in her first semester of NYADA, while Kurt got his second chance to audition for entry... and nailed it.

As their fortunes rose, fortunes plummeted for the gang back in Ohio. Kicked out of its own choir room, the Glee club scattered to other activities, as Finn and Marley in particular struggled with feeling responsible. While I'm glad the episode put enough time into the Rachel/Kurt storyline to make it land effectively, that did cost time that might have been used to explore Finn and Marley's sense of loss here. Or the sense of responsibility Kitty ought to feel in all this. But perhaps that's still to come. I mean, glee club is literally not going anywhere for the rest of the school year, right? I guess I'm just saying that the immediate fallout of the moment was glossed over a bit too quickly; Schu and Santana appeared only for half a minute each, while all the other characters who were around last episode -- Quinn, Puck, Mercedes, Mike -- all just vanished without a trace.

Further crowding out that aspect of the plot was the developing romance between Sam and Brittany. I enjoyed how a lot of the dialogue seemed pitched straight at the audience, anticipating the backlash of Brittany moving into the relationship. Still, I would rather have seen this all put on hold to deal with the more immediate story.

In any case, the song performances were pretty solid. The duet between Sam and Brittany was solid, with their voices blending well in the harmonies. The very Fosse-like treatment of "All That Jazz" was entertaining. I've already mentioned how the trio of songs on the NYADA stage were well-informed by the emotions of the characters.

And then there was the finale. This episode cheated its way into my heart, perhaps, with the selection of Crowded House's "Don't Dream It's Over." This has always been one of my very favorite songs. The lyrics and even the music itself do this perfect dance back and forth between melancholy and hopefulness. I've always felt that, depending on the circumstances, the song can bring a tear to your eye or a smile to your face. Or both. And Glee served up a nice version of it too, not radically altering the original arrangement, while not performing it as a straight cover either. For me, it was an instant Glee favorite.

Despite the episode being a bit crowded, the elements that were given space to breathe landed strongly. All told, I'd give it an A-.

Thanksgiving

Because I went to see some Star Trek: The Next Generation episodes at the movie theater last night, I didn't get to comment on last night's new episode of Glee. Then again, the episode itself was even more behind schedule than I was, since "Thanksgiving" was airing a week after the holiday itself.

There were hits and misses within the hour. On the plus side, I feel like over the years, the show really has improved its approach to the "competition episodes." They used to offer about 15 minutes of plot and 30 minutes of "reality singing show," and always felt lacking to me for that. They've come around to reversing that formula, allowing at least some space to tell a story.

I'm still not quite believing the bulimia storyline for Marley -- not that she'd be so stupid to be duped by Kitty, nor that Kitty would be so evil to continue encouraging the behavior even after they'd supposedly become friends. But I at least appreciate the effort at character continuity between episodes. I guess I'm saying that if the choice is between a completely new story and schizophrenic characters each week (as it was for Glee for a long stretch), and a storyline I'm not crazy about that at least maintains continuity over several episodes? I'll take the latter.

The return of the graduates to help the glee club was a mixed bag for me. Sure, I'm glad to have the old gang back. But it kind of made you wish the old gang had never left. And more to the point, it wasn't really that big a moment, since all of them (save Quinn) had not only been on the show earlier this season, but had actually returned to McKinley for their stories.

The Kurt and Blaine story served up the best moment of the episode in their tearful phone call near the end. It's not that they're necessarily the "best couple" on the show, but I think they probably are the couple on the show featuring two actors of matching ability. They moved me with a two minute scene, more than some of the other couple storylines have done for me in whole episodes.

Usually the true performance numbers are among my least favorite songs on Glee, but I thought this week the weakest numbers were actually the "it's not supposed to be a staged performance, but it totally looks like one" songs. The graduates' opening mash-up, the cheerleaders' Supremes number, and the Thanksgiving dinner "turkey lurkey kiki" all felt too fake to me. But we got not one but two awesome Warblers numbers. And "Gangnam Style" (in all its kitschy glory/stupidity) was a great finale, with loads of great choreography and Tina (yay!) getting the lead vocal.

I suppose I'd grade the episode a B-. Not stellar, but at least a welcome step up from the previous week.

Dynamic Duets

While most TV shows were in re-runs last week for Thanksgiving, Glee actually ran a new episode on the day itself. (And strangely, not even their Thanksgiving themed episode. Apparently, that's coming this week.)

The episode they ran felt to me more like a parody of Glee than an actual episode. In Glee style, it took a random theme (not unlike the weak "Funk" and "Night of Neglect" installments mentioned in the episode itself) and presented a bizarre narrative to accommodate it. But the parody part came in the way that theme felt like Glee turned up to 11, refusing to take itself even slightly seriously as all the characters decided to dress as superheroes for no particular reason. Sure, there was some fun kitsch factor in the Batman-esque stings throughout the episode, but the situation was too ridiculous.

But worse were the missed opportunities. If you're going to do the superhero episode, how do you not have Sue Sylvester in it? This is the character who actually dressed up as the Grinch in a Christmas episode. Yet we got neither Sue as a super-villain nor Sue's own warped take on herself as superhero. And it's harder still to understand her absence this week given where things left off in the previous episode. She'd declared all-out war against Finn as glee club teacher, but was nowhere to be seen for the first actual week in which he assumed the job full time?

The set-ups for the songs were stretched far even by Glee standards, but at least the numbers themselves were strong. The whole "one more song with the Warblers" moment was completely silly, but I do love me some Warblers a cappella. "Holding Out for a Hero" was fun if only for the whip-as-fan moment, though Kitty in a catsuit was sure to win some fans. And the "Some Nights" finale was another good New Directions rendition of a song by the band fun.

The one solid element of the episode for me was the dyslexia storyline for Ryder Lynn. Blake from the Glee Project continues to shine on the series, and in my opinion has fast become the most interesting of the still-insufficiently-developed cast of new students at McKinley. The writing was a touch after-school special in moments, but the acting was still solid.

For good songs in an otherwise nonsensical episode, I'll average out to a C grade. For me, it was the first real stumble of season four.

Glease

Tonight, Glee took on the musical Grease with mixed-to-good results.

Rachel's storyline, involving her continued rivalry with Cassandra, was a bit mixed in Cassandra's crazed machinations; it's hard to believe that that someone so easily rattled by a young student would still be teaching, as she'd surely have had a career ending meltdown before this. (She had one in her past career, after all.) But the story was good in that it was about toughening up Rachel some more, forcing her to face how condescending she comes off at times, and moving her closer toward the end of defining herself in terms of the man she's with.

The Marley storyline was mixed in the way Kitty's villainy was as extreme as Cassandra, Sue Sylvester, and anything Quinn ever did, all rolled into one. Yes, I suppose there really are teenagers in the world who would try to drive a rival to bulimia as a way of getting revenge, but what misfortune is going to have to befall Kitty down the road to redeem the character and pull her back from the brink?

The small storyline for Wade/Unique was mixed and good for the same reason. After several seasons of seeing Burt Hummel, "Best Dad on Television," in his interactions with Kurt, here we got another texture of parents who were trying to be supportive, but lacking the courage of their own child. It's too bad these characters were weaker in their convictions, but it's also true and interesting. Whether to give in to fear when you have a legitimate reason to be fearful is a moral conundrum that could have easily filled more screen time. I hope the show will explore it more.

The musical numbers themselves were also mixed-to-good. Some were staged exactly as they were in the film version of Grease, and that made them rather boring and uninspired in my book. "Greased Lightnin'" at least had some energy, but as Blaine was supposed to be wallowing in depression, "Beauty School Dropout" was pretty boring. But by contrast, the final two songs of the show, "There Are Worse Things I Could Do" and "You're the One That I Want," were quite interesting. These songs blended multiple singers, multiple locations, dream sequences, multiple storylines for each of the characters -- and solid vocal performances too. And the episode's plot didn't feel too distorted just to get the songs to fit, as is often the case when Glee does a theme week.

Overall, I'd call this episode a B+, right about the respectable bar Glee's been reaching recently. I'll leave with this one parting thought. Grease is really a pretty poor musical for a high school to perform, when you think about it. Besides the fact that more puritanical minds would object to the depiction of teen sex (I have no qualms there), I think it sends a really bizarre message in its grand finale, the transformation of Sandy into leather-clad vixen. It seems to me the musical is saying: change everything about who you are and what you dream to become the fantasy of the man you think you want. That feels to me like a message that should be left behind in the decade this musical uses as its setting.

I don't think Danny and Sandy lived happily ever after.

The Role You Were Born to Play

I finally got caught up with this week's new Glee, and for the most part, I found it worth the wait. There were a few missteps, but I felt the show maintained the creative resurgence that has kept it well ahead of the spotty place it was in previous seasons.

First, what worked. I'm glad the writers have realized that not every episode of Glee has to have Rachel and Kurt in it. I thought the four episodes that kicked off this season did a pretty good job of juggling the New York and Ohio storylines, but I also think that sooner or later, there would come an episode where one plot felt overly distorted to match the other. Instead, they've embraced the approach that Lost came to use in its later seasons, with its divided cast -- some episodes, one of the groups is just going to have the week off.

Blake Jenner is definitely going to work well on this show. I never watched the first season of The Glee Project, but I did catch every episode of the second. It didn't take long for it to become clear to me, Blake was the one who should win it. Watching one of the first season's "winners" smile in the background as Rory throughout season 3 of Glee, the mistake that was clear to me was that Ryan Murphy and company never made sure their choice could act. Yeah, he had a great voice, and a different personal story unlike any of the other characters on Glee (he was from Ireland), but he couldn't act. I assumed Blake, though most deserving, would lose season 2 of The Glee Project -- he was rock solid in every performance, but had no big personal backstory to serve as a short cut for Murphy having to actually think up a character of his own. But I was pleasantly surprised that the Power(s) That Be on Glee made the right choice this time.

I was just as pleasantly surprised to see that choice then shine in his first episode on the show. The character that they created for him isn't exactly fantastic -- I guess they think the show just has to have a "Finn" -- but he was busting out dance moves better than anything he ever showed on the Glee Project, nailing his first big song (the "classic rock" song, ahem, Jukebox Hero), and in my opinion acting the part of "Finn" better than Cory Monteith ever did.

What didn't work quite so well for me was yet another unexplained (and unexplainable) contortion of Sue Sylvester into crazed villainy. Right there in this very episode, she reminded all of us what a supporter she was of Kurt, making it all the more peculiar how she reacted when dealing with someone who identifies as transgender. She was extra regressive in her attitudes, extra mean in her behavior, extra nasty in her insults. It really came to a head in for me in the moment where Finn reflexively insulted Sue's child. His slur was offensive, absolutely... and yet why, when we're meant to take that moment as awful, should we treat any of the equally awful things Sue was doing in the episode as humorous?

Still other parts of the episode fell into a middle ground for me. I'm glad to get more of the old cast back into the show, though I groan at the contrivance of Mercedes and Mike coming back from whatever lives they were trying to start to assist on a high school musical. I'm glad to have Finn in a plot that doesn't involve Rachel, but it's pretty ridiculous that he could just show up and teach glee club, that simple. I'm glad that we got a taste of Mike and Tina trying to work together after their break-up, but disappointed that we didn't see how they got through it; we just jumped straight to her being cast in the musical. I'm glad we saw Blaine still wallowing in the misery of his mistake, but the writing of it (and Darren Criss' performance) were a bit extreme. (Or maybe authentic high school?) I'm glad we saw Will and Emma resolve their differences without dragging out their problems for weeks, but mystified about their use of Coach Bieste as their "counselor."


Great musical performances this week. The gender reversal and slo-mo fun of "Hopelessly Devoted to You" was a good opener. (And seriously, go back and look at some of the things happening around Blaine on the football field. Hilarious!) Unique and Marley's treatment of Pink's newest single seriously rocked; no callback should have been necessary. As mentioned, "Jukebox Hero" was a solid introduction for Blake. The duet on "Everybody Talks" by Jake and Kitty had some seriously impressive dance moves. And "Born to Hand Jive," though ridiculous in Grease, and kind of silly its "dance off" presentation here, was still kinda stupid-fun anyway.

Overall, I'd call this week's episode a B+. Glee always asks some pretty big buys of its audience when it comes to plot developments. At least this time, it went to making a mostly fun episode.

The Break-Up

It's October on FOX, which means a baseball-enforced hiatus for most of its TV series. That includes Glee, which tonight ran only its fourth episode of the season. But if it's going away for a while, at least it ended with a strong episode.

There was a couple misfires in the episode. I was distracted by the bizarre split-screen moments that popped up throughout, as though it was an episode of 24. They were particularly bad in the otherwise excellent "Don't Speak."

The Left Behind Club also didn't work for me. It seemed both too light and comedic compared to the rest of the story arcs, and also just too light in general, considering how cruelly another character was being treated. (I don't question that a group of high school students could conspire to be that mean, but that doesn't mean the show needed to take such an "isn't it funny the way she's sitting there rocking and moaning?" attitude about it.)

But I thought the rest was great. I don't think the Rachel/Finn breakup scene quite matched the intensity of the one in the third season finale, but Lea Michele certainly gave it her all. I also appreciated that the script gave her an actual scene to play here, rather than falling back on the emotional cry-singing they often give her character. Don't get me wrong, she does that well, but it was nice to see something different here.

Besides, other actors had emotional singing covered in spades this week. Naya Rivera was fantastic in her choir room break-up scene (as was Heather Morris), and Darren Criss gave his best performance ever on the show in his edge-of-breakdown acoustic "Teenage Dream."

The song selections were rock solid. I've already mentioned the effectiveness of "Don't Speak" (powerful despite the photography) and the revisiting of "Teenage Dream." "Barely Breathing" was also a good performance (the first ever Blaine/Finn duet?). And the staging of the final number, "The Scientist," was great -- particularly the final shot that pushed in on Finn from the whole group, then pulled out in the same single take to reveal an empty stage.

The best episode of the season so far, I'd give it an A-. I think I'll be looking forward to the return of new Glee episodes more than I have for a long time now.

Makeover

I thought tonight's new episode of Glee was the weakest of three so far this season, though still more enjoyable than some of the scattershot messes we were getting last year. There were plenty of pieces working well this week; they just didn't blend together quite as neatly as things in the first two season 4 hours.

The best element for me this week -- and it almost shocks me to say this -- was Sue Sylvester. She was caustic without being overly nasty, adversarial without being villainous. And she was funny as hell. Her pep talk to Schu, astute analysis of the teachers in the faculty lounge, annoyed participation in the debate, and snarky reading of the results -- any one of those scenes would have been the funniest moment of an episode.

Funny though she was, however, what she had to say about the class president storyline (and the nonsensical addition of vice presidential candidates) was essentially spot on. The plot was recycled from last year and even less interesting than it was then. At least it was resolved in one episode. And at least it was the grease in setting up what might be a good friendship between Blaine and Sam.

What it all meant for Blaine and Kurt was interesting too. I am the sort of person who likes to see some realism and sometimes unhappiness for the characters in the shows I watch. I don't necessarily want to see all the established couples break up, but I think it's a truthful thing to show that long distance relationships are hard, and that high school relationships rarely last. (And I'm a big fan of getting Blaine to take off the bow ties.) We'll see how this one plays out.

The relationship between Rachel and Brody continued to develop, leading to the moment we all knew would come -- the return of Finn. Personally, I'm looking at that comparison and not seeing any way Brody isn't a major upgrade. Maybe this is how people end up being on "Team [Somebody]." Dammit, Glee, for making me care about such things!

Sarah Jessica Parker's introduction to the show was a bit strange. It strained credibility to have her so quickly open up to Kurt and confide her wishy-washiness in him, though I do think it's an interesting storyline for Kurt to have him realize that maybe his big Broadway dream isn't really what he's meant to end up doing. There's another interesting and truthful story -- to be so sure of something, only to find out that something else is a better fit. I'm interested. (Though to proclaim Kurt a leader of fashion in the same week that he wears his weirdest ever outfit -- that wolf shirt with tail hanging off the belt -- was wild.)

As for Schu's storyline, applying for a temporary position outside the high school? Not sure what to make of this one. It felt like it might just be a way of making artificial conflict down the road for Will and Emma. Then again, it might be a vehicle by which Gwyneth Paltrow or Idina Menzel comes back for a guest spot later as substitute teacher. I'd be okay with that.

The songs this week were mostly drab, I thought. "Everybody Wants to Rule the World" was one of Darren Criss weaker performances, and the staging was full of total weirdness including a bizarre LARPing/miniatures hybrid. "Celebrity Hole" had some awesome choreography (especially with the flags), but the song choice seemed a weak stretch to fit the plot. "The Way You Look Tonight / You're Never Fully Dressed Without a Smile" felt awkward; singing all the lyrics of one song, then inserting the last line of a chorus from another, doesn't come across as a true mashup. "A Change Will Do You Good" was probably the winner of the night for me, though the steamy dancing was far more effective than the stuff outside the dance studio -- particularly the creepy old guy taking photos.

I'd call this episode a B. Not bad, but Glee has me expecting better these days (I'm happy to say).