-DARREN CRISS and Teenage Dream. It was a little lame how the other boys in the school were fist-pumping and dancing while watching it, but the rest of it was flawless. We loved Kurt’s face reacting to the performance. This just goes to show that we need more a cappella group singing in this show. Darren Criss is going to be a star; you just watch. We think we are in love with him.
-Every musical number, except for the Puck/Artie one, because compared to the others, it was just “meh.” We know that many people dig Puck and Artie’s voices, but one of us doesn’t. Puck has a nice tone, but no power or ability to hold notes out. Artie just sounds autotuned and cartoonish.
Things of which we repent (at least for this week):
-We gave Glee crap for just being a big PSA about gay people by focusing too much on Kurt. It was becoming the Kurt show and a place for gay Ryan Murphy to work out his childhood issues, rather than an entertaining and poignant show. But everything in the gay rights storyline worked this time and was truly timely and touching. We teared up at Kurt’s plight and love love love the new character Blaine. We DO hope that the show will lay off of Kurt’s issues for a while. You don’t want to beat us over the head with it, show. Just develop his relationship with Blaine, please, and let another character’s issues step into the splotlight.
Things we hated:
-The fact that Kurt tried to join the girls’ team again. We assume it’s because the girls are more accepting, but sometimes it comes across as “Kurt thinks he is a girl.” Gay guys are still men, Kurt.
-The Kiss. You know of what we speak. We love Coach Beiste though.
Recap:
Kurt has stood up for himself and fought against the homophobic football bully, Karofsky, for a long time. But this episode, Karofsky’s aggression was starting to wear Kurt down and break his spirit. Will noticed this and tried to help, but he couldn’t. Kurt went to “spy” on a rival Glee club, the Dalton Warblers, who go to an all-boy academy where the Glee Club is actually cool. There, Kurt found a safer place for gay students where everyone is accepted and a new mentor: Blaine. Blaine is a confident, super-cute, gay high-schooler who is out of the closet. He told Kurt that he ran from his old school rather than face his bullies with courage and that he regretted his decision to let bullies chase him off. Kurt confronted Karofsky, and we all held our breaths. Then, American Beauty style, Karofsky kissed Kurt. Depressingly, it was Kurt’s first kiss from a guy. Poor Kurt; that’s awful. We don’t know if we approve of the cliché, easy, “it’s because he’s secretly gay” revelation, but it’s a one-hour episode. We’re not going to delve deep into the minds of a wide variety of gay-haters right now.
There was also a big Coach Beiste storyline that started out nice and interesting. The boys in New Directions, along with Tina, were having trouble “cooling down” during hot make-out sessions where they didn’t want to go too far or…you know. So, they would imagine Coach Beiste in strange and compromising positions, because Coach Beiste is not hot. The practice came out into the public sphere and Coach Beiste quit after Will explained what was happening to Beiste. Oh Will, you dumb dumb. You should have just said, “The students privately confided the issue to me, and I can’t betray your trust, because like you said, I’m trustworthy. Believe me when I say it’s temporary, not a big deal, the kids respect you, and I have taken care of it.” Because of course she was going to take offense to that. Sue’s reaction to Beiste’s resignation was nothing short of magical. Her confetti cannons and evil laugh as they shot into the air made us collapse laughing. This was easily the best part of this storyline. Will came to Beiste’s locker room to convince her to stay. She moaned to him that guys don’t like her and that she has never been kissed. So Will kissed her. It was disgusting. It was like when the old lady in Minority Report kissed Tom Cruise. At this moment, Ern texted Leeard, “What the &*^% was that?” Keep in mind that Leeard and Ern hadn’t spoken at all yesterday. Leeard, without missing a beat, texted back, “Seriously. That was condescending.” And it was. Will doesn’t really like Beiste. The message to Beiste was that she was beautiful. But is this really true? In a way. In a “God loves everyone/beauty is in the eye of the beholder way.” But was Will attracted to her? No. Glee could have handled this issue better by showing that there is someone for everyone. Maybe the show could have had an unattractive person find love with an average-looking person. This happens all the time. We once saw a show about the world’s fattest man, and he had a wife. The better message could have been that even if you’ve been waiting a long time, there is still hope. Not “if no one likes you, Will can kiss you, even though he doesn’t really like you.” Ugh, whatever.
The third major storyline involved Puck and Artie. Puck came back from juvie, sporting a Mohawk (we're very glad it's back), and started hanging with Artie as part of his “help a cripple community service.” Artie wanted Brittany back, so Puck got him a date with her at Breadstix. But then Puck wanted to dine and ditch, and Artie wasn’t cool with that, so the pair experienced a rift. Then, we found out that Puck had actually felt scared and lonely in juvie, and he wasn’t as tough as he pretended to be. (“They kept taking my waffles.”) Artie promised to teach Puck how to be good so he could stay out of trouble.
This was the annual boys against the girls mashup episode. In our opinion, the boys were a little better, even though we liked the girls. However, we don’t think we heard Will announce the winner. Lame. This episode centered on the boys though, mostly, so let's call them the winners.
Episode grade: A- (the minus is for the Coach Beiste kiss. Awful. Just awful. Without that, it would have been a perfect episode to us.)
Watch it here: http://www.hulu.com/watch/188956/glee-never-been-kissed#s-p1-so-i0
or here: http://www.megavideo.com/?d=01YY2NG4
Oh, and also, Teenage Dream is a song that we previously wished Glee would do. Ha. http://becausewewatchtoomuchtv.blogspot.com/2010/10/glee-favorites.html
Ok I did my own rant about The Kiss, so I won't waste your space with my own anger on it. Glad we agree though :)
ReplyDeleteI disagree that the boys were better! I thought their song choice as about as exciting as the girls' last year. The girl mashup was 9823489723 times better. They picked awesome songs and rocked it out, whereas the boys picked ok songs and jazz-hands'ed it around the room. Lame.
The Dalton Warblers stole the show though. I will admit I totally teared up at their song and Kurt's face. Blaine = precious and confident and cuter than cupcakes. I'm so jazzed for this plotline.
P.S. don't expect the bullying thing to go away. Chris Colfer said Tuesday's was the first in 3.
You know, the girls' mashup is getting more play on our ipods than the guys', so maybe you are right. However, you might just hate the boys' because it was tarnished by the awful storyline for it. The blogger who wrote the post likes the song "Free Your Mind" much better than "Livin on a Prayer," which could have influenced our preference for the guys.
ReplyDeleteWe don't mind the bullying plotline. There is a lot of promise there, but the show needs to lay off the gay stuff every once in a while. Not all outcasts are gay. Let's see the show return to other outcasts.
I feel the same way about the show becoming too Kurt-centric. While I think it's admirable that the show tries to be so frank about his struggle with being gay in high school, it's gotten so soapbox-y this season! It's my one big complaint for this season, actually, which I've loved on the whole. I agree that this episode was a cut above, though. Kurt's expression after the bully kissed him (which, let's be honest here, who didn't see that one coming?) was heartbreaking. Now that Kurt has expressed his displeasure (over and over and over...) with discrimination at McKinley, I'm glad to see him (hopefully) be happy with Hottie McHandsome Blaine ("Teenage Dream" was FANTASTIC!).
ReplyDeleteOn that note, we are in need of a Mercedes episode ASAP. She's been way low-key this season, but I think she and Lea have the best voices in the group. Where's Mercedes' love interest, Ryan Murphy?
On another note, why does Will continue to get douchier and douchier?? What kind of person would preface telling Coach Beiste that the kids are using her as a cold shower by saying, "don't take this personally, but..."? And don't even get me started on him "deigning" to kiss her! He sucks so bad.
YES
ReplyDeleteWish list:
1) A love interest for Mercedes, even though she is curvy and a dark-skinned black girl on supposedly equality-centered TV.
2) WILL SCHUESTER MUST DIE.