YOU EITHER GET GLEE OR YOU DON'T. AND HEAVEN HELP YOU IF YOU DON'T!Last week I mentioned that one of the things I was most looking forward to this month was the return of Glee. Well, the gods at Fox must've been listening to me, because what should turn up on my desk this week but the first three episodes of Glee, including the Madonna episode which has the greatest Glee song ever.
But more on that later. So what did I think of the first three episodes?
***Warning*** Minor spoilers ahead!
While I've always thought Glee does some things really well, there are other aspects I haven't been so wild about. And after watching the first three eps, I can say that pretty much nothing has changed. The plots can still seem ridiculously contrived and characters can behave wildly inconsistently in a way that requires some pretty serious looking the other way.
But you don't really care about that, do you. You want to hear the good stuff. Okay, so here is what does work about the new season of Glee.
1) The musical numbers.
Glee has never been terribly strong when it comes to the actual writing. Things happen that make no sense or that are completely out of character. I mean were we really supposed to believe that Schue was so clueless that Terri could pretend to be pregnant for months without his noticing?
But then along comes a musical number that does what the writing too often fails to do — convincingly convey what a character is thinking or feeling. Past examples that worked brilliantly include Artie's rendition of "Dancing With Myself" in "Wheels" that so movingly demonstrated his feelings of isolation as well as Kurt's "Mr. Cellophane" in the pilot episode.
The first three episodes of the new season include several examples of this with the standout quite possibly being from "The Power of Madonna" episode when Emma, Rachel and Finn all sing "Like a Virgin" for rather surprising and not very plausible reasons. And yet, when they sing the song with the scenes jumping from one to the other, it's actually quite moving and you stop caring that you don't buy that, um, nevermind. Let's just say it works.
"Episode three is called "Home"and includes another terrific example of this when Mercedes performs Christina Aguilera's "Beautiful," a song which, well, beautifully illustrates what her character has gone through that episode. (To be fair, her actual storyline in that ep is done pretty well, but the song really drives the point home.)"
Other Glee songs are simply showstoppers that set Glee apart from pretty much any other television show that has tried to include music. Examples include Episode One's version of Amy Winehouse's "Rehab" which is probably the song that first put Glee on the map and critics on notice that this show was something truly different. Other Glee showstoppers have included Kurt's rendition of Beyonce's "Single Ladies" and New Direction's "Don't Stop Believing."
But they all pale in comparison when put up against Sue Sylvester's performance of "Vogue" in "The Power of Madonna." After watching it the first time, I tweeted that it was going to be one of the 2010's top pop culture moments and after watching it another half dozen times, I'm more convinced of that than ever. Visually, it's amazing and it even holds up musically. I dare you to watch it and not grin from ear to ear, especially since some of the lyrics have been rewritten specifically for Sue.
Source: AfterElton
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