Glee-Mash Off

Oh Glee Glee Glee; the light, bright, breezy (and insane) cover girl aspects of your character were back with a vengeance this week. Within the first 5 minutes we had a rendition of "Hot For Teacher" by Puck, the first half of which was terrible. It was done like a scene from the Breakfast Club on crack. There was a lot of glitter, sunglasses and pink tiger print. As I type that, it sounds awesome but it was such an abrupt contrast from the relatively still composure of last week that I found it all a bit too much. I felt like a hungover 80 year old being dropped in Times Square on New Years Eve. Total sensory overload. Luckily half way through it switched to a choir room performance, which involved Mike and Blaine doing hilarious Jarvis Cocker-esque things with their legs, so it's all good.

Gah, this episode has everything I didn't miss about last week. Loads of Will, loads of Quinn being deeply unpleasant and selfish and loads of Puck trying to seduce Shelby. Also a whole lot of Finn being a total dickwad. I know he's always been the de facto male leader of the group, but can we re-evaluate why that is again? What are his qualifications again? He doesn't have the best voice of the lot and he isn't the best dancer. Granted he always seems to come up with the ideas, but I'm sure the others have ideas. Is it because he's the tallest? Is that all it takes to be leader of a club; height and being able to shout over everyones ideas? If so, get me a pair of Manolo Blahnik's and a plane ticket to that school and I could be the leader in 6 minutes. It's a good comparison because I can neither sing nor dance and also I'm a total dickward. Although I'm not so much of one that I would have done what he did to Santana. Although she wasn't exactly a paragon of niceness or an example of the generally accepted way to treat people. The end slap was deeply satisfying even if Finn had, in fact, been saying nice things.

I don't have the energy to talk about the Quinn/Puck story lines because my opinions haven't changed. They've ruined her and he is just being creepy. End of. Well there is almost certainly more to talk about but, as I say, I just can't be bothered.

The two mash-ups were good though. Say what you like about Glee it can do one hell of a mash up. I enjoyed New Directions because a) their songs were good but b) (and this is much more important) we saw Puck, Mike, Blaine and Artie wearing Hall and Oats wigs, moustaches and outfits. Which was without a doubt the best things ever. I can't help but feel they should all look like that; it would make the whole school about 8 times more fun. As for The Trouble Tones *shudders*; their Adele mash up was great. Although we've had 4 Adele songs in the last 8 months which, when the show wasn't on air for 3 and half months, seems excessive. I mean I like Adele as much as the next person (well maybe not that much, because the next person seems to be REALLY into her) but can we please stop with Adele covers. We get it- she makes great songs but, maybe, lets give ourselves a break.

I've gone on record saying I don't like this Sue-Burt-runs-for-office-thing (though I did love Sue's videos even if they we're a little too close to the truth for absolute comfort.) Also, why must William be involved in all this- he ruins everything!

The issue of Kurt and Rachel fighting was sorted out this week. I hadn't realised how serious this apparently was; I thought it was minor annoyance not a 'block each other out of our lives' issue. Should pay more attention. Also, do we remember when Mercedes and Kurt where friends? When did this stop happening; it seems like it was years and years ago. Was there a reason for it? Again- should pay more attention. As you can tell; this episode reminded us just how 'stop-start' the character developments are on this show.

So now all the ephemeral issues about this weeks episode are out of the way, lets get serious for just a second. And I mean lets really, all jokes aside, talk about something that I brought up a couple of weeks ago and clearly requires some deep thought. In many ways it was actually the main theme of this week...

Kurt's hats.

I mean, for serious- what the hell! Tonight was like a stupid hat parade. I decided it was worth my time to go through the episode and screenshot all the ridiculous things he had on his head. The definition of "worth" barely phoning it in during that last sentence. 

Tragically the last one is clearly the best by a steady mile. But, he took it off to make a serious impassioned speech whereas he thought that wearing a riding hat was totally ok attire in a choir room scenario. Is this suddenly a Two Broke Girls episode and Chestnut is going to walk in? Also, that blue thing makes him look like he's wearing part of the cuppa soup monster's costume. All that said, winner of this weeks Stupid-Shit-The-Costume-Team-Put-On-Chris-Colfer's-Head award goes to number two. For two very crucial reasons:

1. It's the worst thing I've ever seen.
2. It's teamed with that hipster, vaguely middle east chic scarf thing, which is the third worst thing I've ever seen.

What's the second worst thing I ever seen, I hear you shout. The cuppa soup hug monster, obviously. That shit haunts my dreams.  

“As your friend, I respect your strange aversion to fun”- The First Time, Glee

In this episode, we saw Will Shuester once, for 30 seconds, and he had a total of one line. It was also the best episode of Glee in a very long time. I don't think these two things are unrelated.

I'm not sure where to begin, this is an odd moment for me because The First Time was like, good, and I genuinely mean actually good. Yes, there were a couple of odd moments and it completely dropped a lot of plots brought up last week but none of that mattered in quite the same way. What happened Glee? Where did this subtle, considered, well plotted and, at times, really moving show come from? I don't remember this version of Glee since some sections of the Prom episode. I was almost annoyed at it for being as sensible and normal as it was. Which I realise is stupid, because tonight Glee showed just what it could be and what it should be celebrated for; for being able to wade through the showmanship it gets bogged down in and find its heart.

Lets start at the very beginning, a very good place to start, and by that I mean sex. I support any show that shows teen sex as something that is a) positive b) normal c) has no negative repercussions and d) fun. These are elements of teen sex that are rarely ever shown on TV; especially teen sex between same sex couples. So its obviously really great that we're finally getting to see things like this. Also good is that they didn't change the time slot to 9pm as I had heard they were going to; it would have been ridiculous to have done so. We saw no gratuitous sex scenes and nothing inappropriate to the time slot or the age range. Just sweet pre (possibly post) -coital shots. Well I hope they were pre/post cos Kurt and Blaine were still fully dressed. Hint- kids, if everyone's still wearing their clothes, you're doing it wrong. Yes I did laugh at the firelight glow of both the rooms; has any one ever lost their virginity in front of an open fire? No, well not since the invention of central heating. I loved Tina's description of her first time and that attitude should be voiced more often on TV; especially by female characters.

It was also interesting to see the different reasons for having sex. In many ways Finn and Rachel's sex could be seen as the beginning of the end for them. Not because of the sex, obviously, but more that they behaved throughout the episode as couple naturally growing apart to a certain extent. Sex was just a point on their road to breaking up. On the other hand, Kurt and Blaine just grew stronger and more in tune throughout the episode so for them, sex was shown as obvious cementing of their affection and respect for each other. The scene on the stage after after the show was very touching and I also enjoyed the scene in Blaine's bedroom. Although, this was mainly linked to the fact his room looks like it's from the set of Twin Peaks. What 17 year old boy's room looks like that- it felt like an anti-chamber to the Black Lodge? Also, Kurt's outfit was insane even by his crazy-arse standards. He looked like he was wearing a meta take on a leopard print cat suit. God knows what was going on. Also, who wears a tie to sit on your boyfriends bed and listen to Roxy Music?

The Beiste story line was also great (apart from the Artie aspect). Her love interests speech about wanting a woman not a girl was moving and wonderfully done. It was everything the first time Beiste's insecurities were brought up wasn't. It wasn't patronising or demeaning or confusing in it's message. I just wish he wasn't called Mr Cooter; I realise it an “hilarious” joke but well, I employed sarcasm quotes for a reason.

Another reason this episode worked above and beyond the normal Glee episodes was that the music fitted in with the episode. The songs made sense in the context, not because most of them were musical numbers, but because they had managed to make them fit in with the story and felt believable. Even the, frankly quite cheesy, UpTown Girls rendition at Dalton worked. It was fun and boppy and I loved the whole crazy thing even though I didn't understand two things about it:

1. Why was the stupidly hot and sexually available teacher reading a book call Learn French? Shouldn't she be reading a book called Teach French?
2. Why was Blaine dressed like a old man in a black and white film? Did he wake up that morning and decide he was incapable of wearing any clothes that weren't on the grey scale?

Back to point I started with; this episode showed no Will. He wasn't missed. Like even a little. I actually didn't really notice we hadn't seen him until half way through. His role has no substance, he's just a universally bad person and teacher. I have no investment in him. This is problematic as the adults, in many ways, need to be the grounding on this show if it wants to sustain itself long term. To maintain some semblance of reality the kids are the going to need to come and go, like students do, and the adults (teachers I believe they're called) have to stay and "hold the fort", as it where. So we have to have some kind of attachment to them. They only thing I want to see attached to Will is a machete.

What the episode also didn't show was the Trouble Tones (my soul dies a little every time I type that) and the Quinn/Shelby/Puck story line. Normally I would have a go at them for just dropping all that stuff for the message of the week: "This weeks Glee was bought to you by Teen Sex!" but I'm not, because the message story lines were better written, more involving and less inappropriate or tedious than the others. Glee often tries to do too much in terms of story and ends up not doing enough, or sometimes nothing at all, with them. This episode went minimalist and it paid off- they had time to do it all justice. Learn from this Glee. Less is more.

Things I didn't like:

- Artie was fundamentally creepy as hell in this episode. Why did no one say “Oh Artie, you're a 17 year old boy; talking to your middle-aged virgin PE teacher about her love life and trying to get her laid is the stuff of court cases”? Like in what school does this kind of shit go on? NEVER TALK TO YOUR TEACHERS ABOUT THEIR SEX LIVES. It's pretty basic.

- I ain't in love with Sebastian Smythe, not because he's causing hypothetical trouble with K&B, just because he was kind of dull and creepy (but not in a fun way).

- I was kind of (and by that I mean a lot) weirded out by the fact that Brittany was essentially raped and we thought it was ok to laugh this away because she thought it was an alien. I know they have this whole 'aint Brittany kooky' thing going on but there is a different between dim and mentally handicapped. Sometimes I worry which side we're meant to think Brittany is on.

So yes it wasn't a completely perfect episode of Glee but the things that bugged me didn't bug me as much as they usually do. This was because they were either not there (WILLIAM SHUESTER) or minor bits of scum on a sea of genuine, touching and well-advised water. Hmmm... do you know what wasn't well advised? That metaphor!

Final point: The fact we didn't get to see Kurt's Officer Krumpke is the biggest let down since us not getting to see him do a cheerleading routine while singing Celine Dion in French. 

Glee-Pot O'Gold

“Everyone's dreams are going to come true this year”. Did this line really happen? Blerg, it took the rest of the episode for me to try and get the taste of sick out of my mouth.

So on to actual stuff. Firstly, they've Irished up Damien no end haven't they? I don't ever remember his accent being that strong. Also for his first song to be “it's not easy being Green”? Gah, ok, I get it he's Irish and wearing a lots of green. Sure great idea, not naff at all. That said, despite his awkwardly cartoon Irishness, I didn't hate him; especially by the end of the episode. He seems quite nice- a quality often lacking in the halls of Mckinley High. Not sure what they're going to do with him after this, but we'll see.

On to the main event. I can't stand this Quinn story; what Quinn was trying to do is, straight up, deeply unpleasant. Yes Puck, jail does seem a little extreme- you're right. I'm all for the continuity thing Glee is doing this season. And I'm totally up for addressing Quinn's (and Puck's) feelings about giving a child up and then having it still in their life but does it have to be this way? Her behaviour tonight was not thinking in the interests of the only perfect thing she's ever done, it's completely selfish. Also, she doesn't seem to have thought about it at all. It'll take more than two weeks for them to get back the child, even if her plan worked, and in that time she'll be in foster care they'll be significant uprooting and distress. This isn't, for want of a better phrase, child's play. The consequences of the actions she took would, if they went according to her plan, are immense. Given that this won't actually happen, the more significant issue for the character is we can't un-see this. Quinn will always be a character capable of these actions. You can't sing a song and make this fact go away, although I look forward to watching them try. They have ruined her without seeming to notice.

I obviously find the rival show choirs idea tedious but that said, Shelby seems to be helping the kids sing better. Wow; what a novel idea for the Glee Club coach to help the kids vocally. Will's always seemed to assume standing at the side looking creepy is enough to improve their voices, apparently it's not. Why is anyone surprised they didn't win Nationals again? A feat that Shelby has managed multiple times; hmmm... maybe this story should end with them all going over to the Trouble Tones. By the by, that name has to go, like it should have been gone last year. You know its bad when the name New Directions seems golden in comparison. Although Shelby clearly can't stick around because of that kiss which, if we remember from my first review, I was not so keen on happening. But yeah, no- they went there. Less than fucking impressed. Yes, Puck looks 45 but he's not. He's her student, and the baby of her adopted daughter. No way that them kissing isn't wildly inappropriate.

More on Will's general lack of anything like sense or reason. His idea of having 20-30 adverts in the program; how long is this program going to be? Surely at that rate it'd be all ads with one half page with the cast list on? That's going to look good and professional. Luckily Burt Hummel saved the day, because he's fucking great in every way. Although him running against Sue is a bit odd; would he really just decide to running for Congress with little more than a 'how you do'. But sure what ever if it means we get more of him, I'm all for it. I did enjoy that Will is too busy to direct the school musical but he's not too busy to be Burt Hummel's campaign manager. FOR CONGRESS, like actual Congress. Is he insane? How much work is this shitting musical going to be? Also, in regard to the debate between arts vs special ed., it's obviously an important, or at least relevant, one especially in this economy but I feel it would sit better if they didn't so clearly have a side. It doesn't feel like a discussion, it feels like a lesson we're all meant to take. No one likes to be preached to Glee, no one.

Finn was oddly insufferable this episode, although I loved the “old brochure dude” remark about the America Dream idea Rory was working with. But why does he still think he's in charge of this shit? That man has such a hero complex its ridiculous. Is he only one that's allowed to make a point and sort everything out? That said, I feel a little bad that his parents are assuming that Kurt's going to get into college but seem much more unsure about Finn. I mean it's possibly fair, he does sometimes seem thick as pig shit but still, need we be so open about it? Poor dear.

Do you know what I remembered this episode, having forgotten momentarily? God I hate Rachel. She's just so self involved. Does anyone remember the episode where she got a crush on Will? Well I think they should revisit this idea, because the two are perfect for each other; both selfish as fuck. Note to writers: please don't actually let that happen. Although clearly you're ok with student teacher romantic relationships, but a) you shouldn't be and b) that would mean we'd have to sit through loads of scenes of just them. That would be the worst.

Final point. Why does Kurt always wear hats?  

Hey, Girl you're on TV.

Looking at the list of new shows this autumn, it seems that there is a significant increase in the number of shows with main female protagonist.Not only this but many of the first lot to have a full season order are members of this new bunch. Side note one of the first to be cancelled was The Play Boy Club. But probably best not to read gender into this given it was straight up just terrible television.

This summer Bridesmaid's significant box office success was heralded as a sign that media (specifically comedy) with a female slant can make money. This idea has apparently been adopted by television. Looking at a shows like New Girl and 2 Broke Girls and their commercial success I'm conflicted about what it suggests about representation of women in entertainment.

I don't hate either of the shows, but I'm not sure that their depiction of females speak to any real progress.

Firstly 2BG, which lets be honest is an odd (and by odd I mean bad) show. I jump from half liking it, to not being able to believe that it's actually getting made. Yes I laugh every now and again, mainly thanks to Kat Dennings putting more effort in than the scripts deserves. But she can't do anything to make up for the fact the show does spend most of its time being casually racist and throwing in more rape jokes than seem absolutely necessary. Which is obviously less than ideal. Although the women do have actual conversations about things that don't involve men, they also spend a lot of it conform to the typical gender conventions. Yes they talk about vagina's, sex and the like. The delivery of which, even though its been 13 years since Sex and the City started showing, still feels weird and forced. Its written and performed like they want every time they say it to be subtitled with See What We Did There, Look How Avant-Garde We Are. Not that I'm saying SATC a beacon of progressive gender but still 13 years later is this stuff meant to be shocking or worth noting. Surely it would indicate progress if vagina wasn't still a punch line. Although this comparison to SATC does link to one of my favourite things about 2BG is the fact that Caroline is continually wearing the same clothes and necklace. In the last episode we even saw her wear the pair of shorts she bought in an earlier episode. This kind of continuity and the fact a women who is meant to be broke has a limited wardrobe is nice to see. If she had a different outfit each week it would be going against the ethos of the show. Not that their insanely large apartment in Brooklyn really goes with idea of broke-ness. Seriously it has a back yard, one that a horse can walk about it. That said it's not really shown to be big enough that I don't believe keeping Chestnut there is anything other than animal cruelty. What's the American equivalent of the NSPCA, because I feel it warrants a call.

On to New Girl, which although I haven't posted about since the pilot I've have been watching. The awkward reality is that I keep on wanting to write about it, but then I think to do that I really need to re-watch the episodes before I do. But I can never be bothered to get around to watch them. This isn't a good sign is it? The main issue was the awkward simultaneous occurrences of me watching the pilot and reading an article in the New Yorker by Mindy Kaling about women in film. In it she presented various stock females characters. Here is one, which I'm loath to quote because it will show why Kaling writes for the office and I don't. But that said I can't possibly begin to describe this in any funnier or better way. So I won't.

“The Klutz.

When a beautiful actress is cast in a movie, executives rack their brains to find some kind of flaw in the character she plays that will still allow her to be palatable. She can’t be overweight or not perfect-looking, because who would pay to see that? A female who is not one hundred per cent perfect-looking in every way? You might as well film a dead squid decaying on a beach somewhere for two hours.
So they make her a Klutz. The hundred-per-cent-perfect-looking female is perfect in every way except that she constantly bonks her head on things. She trips and falls and spills soup on her affable date (Josh Lucas. Is that his name? I know it’s two first names. Josh George? Brad Mike? Fred Tom? Yes, it’s Fred Tom). The Klutz clangs into stop signs while riding her bike and knocks over giant displays of fine china in department stores. Despite being five feet nine and weighing a hundred and ten pounds, she is basically like a drunk buffalo who has never been a part of human society. But Fred Tom loves her anyway.”

That is essentially Jess, word for word. Well as long as you replace Fred Tom with her 3 roommates and whatever romantic interest gets added later. Obviously whoever he is, he will have a much less awesome name. So now watching New Girl all I can hear is Mindy's words dancing round my head, crashing into china as it goes. Sometimes is seems so completely accurate and well timed that I wonder whether its all a big meta ploy. I'm just waiting for them to announce that New Girl is just people playing on the Klutz convention and they know how ridiculous and played out this kind of female character is. If this happened my affection for the show would increase by a solid 34%. I won't hold my breath.

When you acknowledge the fact that both these shows are consistently getting better ratings than 30 Rock and Parks and Recreation, its a little disheartening. Especially since both of the latter shows are better written, funnier and more engaging. They are also both shows have female lead characters than are more interesting, developed, real depictions of women hood in the 21^st century than any show with girl in the title. At the beginning of this current season, for example, we saw Leslie Knope break up with Ben because it would make her running for office problematic. This kind of non-man related thinking and taking control over ones own life in a pragmatic way is often rare, even in shows with lead female characters. It seems that to a certain extent we, as a television audience, are wiling to watch prime time sitcoms with women as long as they aren't too clever or deviate too severely from the expected ways women are meant to behave. Baby steps I guess.

Season 3 of Community (so far)

I have an tendency to get into television shows by random and oddly timed ways. How I Met Your Mother, Community, Doctor Who, Archer, Psyche, Parks and Recreation and Bones are all shows that I have heard about a particular episode and decided to watch it for kicks. Which then invariably leads on to watching ALL the episodes. This is ok for things like Archer and Community, which I found half way through season 2 both times. Less ok for HIMYM which I didn't discover till almost the beginning of season 5. So much back log. Seriously I caught myself up to it during a particularly cold December weekend when I was alone in a poorly insulated house with no central heating, where I did nothing else really but watch it and refill my hot water bottle. Totally worth it though especially this season as HIMYM seems to be really going for broke in the awesome categories. But more on that later maybe.

Back to Community. I don't actually remember what the first episode I watched was, maybe the Dungeons and Dragon episode? What ever it was I loved it a lot. And so the whole catch up cycle began. There are so many things that make Community one of favourite shows. But my favourite thing is probably the fact it doesn't take itself at all seriously. The writers have realised that you don't need be to be serious to be deep and effecting.This can be seen perfectly in the opening musical number of Biology 101. Although I desperately hope that their promise to be more normal, less crazy and less weird than the first two years combined where empty threats because I would not be ok with that. The whole number is just like the show, the right side of meta, self aware without being smug (see Jeff and Annie's “We're going to sleep together”). I've just heard that there is going to be a musical episode for the Christmas special. I'm pretty excited about this. 

What's great about Community is the deep effect ion I feel for all the characters. I love the Dean, so much and his Dean based puns. Although if he keeps wearing that suit I for one will be very Changry. I loved watching him crumble under John Goodman's Vice Dean. It's also good to see that Pan Sexual Imp being added to the opening credits, because he deserves to be after all the work he's put in over the last couple of years.Troy, Troy, Troy, Troy. I have a significant love affair with Donald Glover. What I love about him is even in episodes that about aren't about him directly he still just manages to be hilarious during every little exchange he gets. His hand slipping in from the side and taking the lid of the cup when Annie was freaking out was perfectly done. Also his doing a Georgian accent despite knowing that its the country not the state, was great. But the MVP for moment of subtle awesomeness goes to the moment involving the candy cigarette in Remedial Chaos Theory. Such a small delightful moment.

His and Abed living together can only bring spectacular things. Also I'm significantly looking forward to see what Annie being added to the mix is going to bring. Abed's freak out about not having a new favourite TV show was almost as good as Troy's Levar Burton freak out in Season Two. Well not really because that was so good it hurts a little inside. Although's the study groups reaction and attempts to help was brilliant to see.

My only complaint in the first episode was the continued discussion of whether Pierce should be in the group or not. Are we still talking about this, although it did seem to be settled in the second episode. This used to be an issue with Chang, but now he has a job as Security guard complete with badge saying- “Hows my Smile?” But the after that the episodes seem to have put these issues to bed. Which is good to see this development.

That said the only bit of Geography of Global Conflict that I didn't totally love was the whole Britta story line with Chang. It just didn't make me laugh in the way the rest of the episode did. Also it was odd that it was mainly completely separate from the rest of the action. It felt like every time we went to that story line we had to take a step back. I realise that it's good to see her tackle the issues of who she used to be and who she's going to be. It suggests that this season is going to be one of growth for the gang, as do lots of whats happened over these first two episodes. The third episode could perhaps be seen to go against that idea. It may have shown them as having grown into a group but there was still a level of internal bickering what seems a little unnecessary or a back step. The forth episode however got us right back on track. I think I'll wait to the end to go into a full discussion of the forth such are the strength of my feelings for it.

The third episode was a bit of an odd one. I found it funny but it seemed a little disjointed. This was kind of explained Dan Harmon's post explaining that it was meant to be the forth but given the extra time the original third one needed to produce they had to swap the running order. Although I laughed a lot at their mistreatment of Todd the final shot was slighting heartbreaking. That ending added a cruel tinge to the episode as a whole that was a bit disconcerting.

The Annie and Jeff romance is an interesting one. It's been suggested and referenced a fair bit throughout the two seasons. I'm not sure whether they've managed to make it stay on the right side of creepy. That said I'm a sucker for televised romance so I'm up for it. I'm really hoping that they are actually going to work through some of the issues that have been presented between these too. I'm totally aware that at least some of the reason for this is the damage done to me by Hollywood. Without romantic resolution there is a part of me that is not fully satisfied. Also Troy and Britta? Oh yeah I can see that happening. This could also be seen in Remedial Chaos Theory when with the moments in a couple of the timelines. I thought Martin Starr totally owned it as the model UN teacher. His locket which he eventually took out and talked too was great. Also that joke about knowing the actual name of the person who first set up model UN completely reminded me of the joke in Archer the other day "Who am I? Carl Lannsteiner? Discoverer of blood groups?". Side note I love that Archer joke more than I can say. It might be my favourite joke of the entire television season.

Now to the forth episode. I'm going to find it hard to talk about this without just shouting about my love from the rooftops. In many ways this is my problem with reviewing Community in general. I like it just a little bit too much. I find it slightly hard to see through my love and affection for the thing as a whole. The way the time lines shifted the relationships and when stuff works and when it works was wonderfully done and a joy to watch. It was interesting to see that Troy seems most integral to the group, if he goes all hell quite literally breaks loose. Was the message meant to be, be nice to people and let them sing Police hits if they want to? We should always let people sing Roxanne if wanted. That said I'd be sad to think, we were meant to assume Jeff is the cause of all the conflict in the group. He's just got furthest to go in accepting himself. What was great about the episode was it got funnier and better as it went on. Each time Pierce referenced Eartha Kitt was funnier than the last, because of all that went before. The repetition and replaying of ideas were so well done that it made the episode build and build until the end, which I genuinely found moving. It totally made up to the mean edge to the group from the episode before which is why I think it makes more sense in this order to a certain extent. Although they really should have taken out Pierce's Eartha Kitts reference. But apart from that if this had been before I think I would have really hated Biology 101 as it would have seen as such a step down in quality and development.

The end point is, and I think will always be for Community reviews, god damn I love this show.

Characters the heart of the show or show heart of the characters?

 One of my favourite TV reviewers Todd VanDerWerff at the AV club reviews both Glee and Community. We don't always agree (see his rather positive review of Asian F) but what we do share is a love of comparing Glee and Community. In fact he got me started on it, I say that like it's a class A drug, although it is fun. Here is a section of his review of the Community season 2 finale For a Few Paintballs More-

“I’m not going to argue that Leonard, say, is as well-developed a character as any of the main seven (or even as well developed as, say, theDean), but it’s also sort of clear that the writers COULD do a whole episode about Leonard and Vicki teaming up to solve mysteries with Quendra as their quirky secretary who speaks exclusively in rhyme. They’ve clearly got a lot of affection for everybody that exists in this universe, and the finale is the best expression of that so far. The main character here isn’t Jeff or Britta or Annie or even Greendale itself; it’s the student body and how it comes together to face an external threat. Community is a show that’s endlessly inventive, sure, but unlike other pop culture mash-up shows, it’s also open to all points-of-view and deeply humane. The jokes are great, sure, but the show—even at its clunkiest—really believes that every person that goes to Greendale, even if they seem to exclusively say “Pop pop!” is worthy of our time and attention. When I say the show has “heart,” I don’t mean that it shoehorns in a little speech from the characters about what they learned at the end of each episode; I mean that it really does seem to view all of these people as equals, as potential leads to their own stories.”

When I first read this I immediately thought how different that was to the way Glee treats it's characters. Most of the time it feels like the characters on Glee are used as methods to further illustrate the message of the show, rather than people in their own right. This is especially true for secondary and guest characters. People like Holly Holliday are only there to further Wills progression or teach the kids something that will make them more empowered. Did anyone else snort when I said Will's progression I know I did. That man has no progression. I do realise that this complaint (if it is one, more on that later) could perhaps be levelled at Community in terms of guest stars, John Goodman was there to develop the Dean's storyline (that and be hilarious). But Todd's right that it really isn't true in regards to the regulars and background characters at Greendale. Whereas this applies quite strongly in some respects to lots of the main members of New Directions. While Kurt and to a certain extent Finn have back stories that we know about and understand that further develop their characters others mainly don't. I was going to put Rachel in the list of people but then I thought that actually no her character doesn't have anything much outside the “I WANT TO BE A STAR” motivation. And even when they do try you can't help but think it isn't going to change anything. Example will our new knowledge of Mike's back story going add much to him? Doubtful. Many character arcs are mainly about the replaying the message about the importance of the arts and how they help you accept yourself. Obviously it's a great message but it's the only one Glee has. Sure it's got different varieties of it. Music helps you accept your sexuality, music helps you face the reality that you're a pregnant at 16, music helps you realise you are beautiful. It even helps your parent accept you want to be a Dancer. Wow is there anything music and musical theatre can't do...sort out Greece's financial crisis? Again I'm not disputing musics importance in people lives but it's not the be all and end all of the human experience.

But I'm getting distracted. Back to characters. I think it's true that if we had a episode of Community about Magnitude or Star Burns I'd totally buy it. But even having like a third of an episode about Mike (a character thats been in the main group since the beginning) I didn't feel like we a) learnt anything or b)it really worked and perhaps more importantly I don't totally believe that it'll ever be mentioned again. When development does happen, even to the main group, more often than not things are then dropped for weeks, sometimes seasons, sometimes forever. Seriously how many times have we had Emma admit she needs help and look like she's going to start down the road to recovery, fecking loads thats how many. How many times have we got further than this step, never. Even in Archer, a show that in many ways relies on the fact that at the the end of most episodes the setting goes back to zero, manages better continuity than Glee lots of the time. This seeming refusal to remember things like what the characters did, where motivated by and decided episode to episode shows a distinct lack of interest in treating them like actual humans. It might sound stupid but that perhaps is the main difference. Glee treats its characters like just that characters whereas Community treats then like people. People have thoughts, ideas going on that we the audience don't see but it bleeds into what we do see happening. With Glee it's all on the surface, sometimes it feels like some of the characters don't have a thought we don't find out about. When they're not on camera they cease to exist. We hardly ever see Star Burns but I completely can see him and his everyday life. What does Artie do when he's not sitting in the choir room, I'm less sure. According to Tina he making short films, also I vaguely remember that once he talked about video games. That's it, what does Finn do come to that. Talk to sandwiches? Does that fill his hours?

This sounds like a negative thing because surely the idea of a narrative show is that it should be based on well rounded developed characters. But in many ways main characters with too much depth and individuality goes against what Glee is trying to do or the role it is trying to play in it audiences lives. A role which is utterly different to what I imagine the writes of Community are trying to do. Glee to a certain extent is a show designed to help the audience live vicariously through its characters. So they are meant to be a base for the audience to add their own sense of self too. Obviously all art forms should aim to create characters the audience can connect to but there is a difference between connecting with and living through. The reason Glee has such ardent fans and people love it so strongly is because it pulls them in. They live through the characters and yes perhaps sometimes do come closer to accepting them selves. If it helps anyone do this then surely that's a great thing even if it means that sometimes the characters come across a little lacking in depth. The audience brings the depth. Community on the other hand doesn't have an overriding message and it's aims are less overt other than to have fun. Not that it's all fluff but its very self aware and smart (smart-arse might be a better phrasing). Perhaps that's it's message -“Look how smart I am!”. Could you get a more self conscious half an hour of television than Paradigms Of Human Memory- it might be difficult. Spoiler alert, though, I loved that episode because I love smart arsery and wanky self aware humour. But with this idea at your core if you didn't have characters with heart (to steal Todd's word choice) a show would fall flat and be meaningless. Glee doesn't need all its characters to have heart, the show and its the ideological basis is the heart.

To develop this idea of self awareness and the comparisons to the two shows I'm going to start with a line from Community that I think demonstrates this really well. In Applied Anthropology and Culinary Arts, Fat Neil's girlfriend says (or near as damn it) as Shirley goes into labour

“To think we almost got through a whole class that wasn't about them”

This is of course the principle layer of acceptance the audience needs to make with any television show let in a large institution. With all shows centred around schools or similar you only ever get to know a small group of people and the rest become an amorphous blob. So everything that ever happens at the school happens through the eyes of the group. In reality of course life is like this. At school or university your complete frame of reference is you and your social group but of course you know that all the other students are living their own lives and having their own adventures. With Community we get glimpses of this, when we discover in the same episode that in a previous episode Abed had helped delivered a baby on campus. Life goes on outside that study group and the writers of Community know it. Glee again never mentions this. I really want to there to be an episode of Glee that plays on this idea. In my head it would start with a song by the glee club at a school and a student would say something similar to Fat Neil's girlfriend and then the rest of the episode would be about their school experience maybe now and again see glimpses of the New Directions members or as the random walked past the choir room we would hear a snippet of a song. Glee portrays high school as difficult but only really for the ones we see. Other students we get introduced to could be struggling with issues (or clearly are). But we never really acknowledge that properly or see them deal with them. An admission that high school is difficult for everyone would be nice. If Community did a show where we spent time with random's at Greendale, I would love it and I think they'd do a really good job at it.They've proven they are good at gimmick episodes e.g. Paradigms Of Human Memory (did I mentioned that I loved that episode?) But it doesn't feel as necessary as it does for Glee. Partly because I think Glee needs at least a little self awareness and humility to make it a slightly more endearing as show. It needs to admit that everyone is fighting their own kinds of battles and not everyone deals with that through music and thats ok. Sometimes it feels like its suggesting that the arts cure all and everything should go to hell, that's not true and I'd like it say that just once. Obviously I'm not suggesting it should show everyone all the time that would be stupid and you'd never have enough time to do it justice.

I'm aware that this reads like I'm saying Community's great and Glee sucks. I'm really not Glee's aim is a good one and it does help people but it's needs to gets its head out of its own arse. Glee is a statement show with a blatant agenda and message. This is a completely legitimate thing for a show to have but Glee needs to balance it better It's painfully obviously smug about its agenda lots of the time but also I think if you'd asked it (personifying the show momentarily) it would claim ignorance. If people said Community should also take its head out of it own arse and stop being so pleased with its self, it would be hard to argue. So yes both are smug, but why I forgive Community more than I do Glee is what I think Community knows its a smug git of a show. This admission should make it worse but personally I like that about it (The hipster in me talking perhaps). Glee pretends it better than the rest of us but it's not, not even a little bit. 

Glee-Asian F

This was hyped as the BEST EPISODE OF GLEE EVER. It obviously wasn't, but I imagine many people liked it a whole lot. If you were willing to watch and think very little then it was an hour of well produced, well staged, and well performed television. My main issue with it was the fact that the four main storylines weren't really designed for me to ever love it but still, I don't think it's entirely my fault. Lets go through the reasons one-by-one, just to try and keep my ideas vaguely contained thematically.

A) Rachel vs Mercedes.

My disliking of storyline is, at least in part, linked to my hated of ambition and competition- I am never going to enjoy a Diva-off. This I realise more my issue than everyone else's but Mercedes not accepting the double casting just seemed petty and stupid. Yes it's always been the Rachel Berry Show but just suck it up. A year ago you wouldn't have even got this far. Yes Mercedes, one day you can give Rachel the (metaphorical) kicking she probably deserves but not right now. I obviously approve of Mercedes having more confidence, but the difference between confidence and arrogance seems lost on the writers. You can believe in yourself and not be a total bitch (I thought we learnt this in Night of Neglect-apparently not).
Even with Rachel's very high bar, Mercedes won the biggest bitch of the night. Side note- did this new arrogant cow persona need to be instigated by a boyfriend (whose name I still don't know); can't women ever become confident by their own means?

Her joining Shelby's 'reject Glee' also seemed a bit of a tired routine. People have been leaving New Directions because of disagreements with Will, and others, so often that it beggers belief the writers think they can still get away with it. Example: Santana's back this week with only the most throw-away comment to her being very dramatically told to leave in 3x01. I feel like we should have grown out of this petty bullshit at this point in the show; why can't half these people stop being so flighty and tempremental? Is this meant to be what teenagers are like? Maybe they are; I hope I wasn't, although it really wasn't at all that long ago that I was one. I can't ever remember behaving like these kids do most of the time. This continual infernal bickering was wearing thin last season, I really can't face much more of it.

The whole Dream Girls role play thing was bloody weird wasn't it? By the end of it I was kind of into it, but I did spend the first half of it being like “wait what, really?” Maybe it would have made more sense if I'd seen Dream Girls.

B) Mike's Dad getting Changry (sorry being watching a lot of Community recently).

I like Mike getting some back story and it's always fun to see him dance. His audition for Riff, with help from the rest of the team, was great. That said, this whole "my parents don't understand my art thing" is also tired as hell. But it was nicely done. Although it again suggested that being a dancer would be the only way he could feel special. For the second time in as many weeks we have had the idea that working in the arts is the best thing ever and that everything else is shit and not special and for losers. How is being a doctor not special? You can save lives- that's pretty fucking special. This awkward entertainment elitism has always popped up in Glee but they seem to doing an even worse a job at hiding it. At least pretend you give a shit about anything else. Also I'm calling bullshit on the idea that Harvard would consider Glee club  detrimental in the application process. I don't buy that even a little a bit.

Also, was anyone else kind of concerned about Mike's mental health after Tina egging him on turned out to be a hallucination? Is he hydrating enough? While we're on the subject of Tina, surely her talking about Principle Figgins and his “Spicy Curry Blood” is like 8 levels of offensive and racist? Like for serious, what the hell- that is just straight up not ok. It also seemed totally unnecessary. I imagine that it was decided that it was there for humour, but the humour from that scene was linked to the fact Figgins thinks vampires are real. That's humour enough- we don't need random racism to make it funnier. I like close to the knuckle humour, but Glee isn't set up in the kind of way so it doesn't work. Especially with a character like Tina, if Sue had said it that would much better because she's generally pretty offensive to most people, and her statements are never meant to be anything other than funny jokes. Tina isn't that character at all; it doesn't make sense that she would joke about that so it's just offensive.

C) Ginger Pride.

Look, I just don't like Will; simple as that. He's not a good teacher and he's not a good person most of the time. He's crazily self involved; he really does think that everything revolves around him. If you're girlfriend is massively repressed and OCD surely it's a relatively safe bet that she has a difficult relationship with her parents. Also bearing in mind that she was not subtle about her love for him throughout the previous seasons, why would you automatically assume she was ashamed of you? Fix You would have worked for this storyline if it had just been Will singing it to Emma in their bed room, but the whole of Glee club doing it in clichéd white clothing thing did not work- talk about hammering the message home. Christ it was as awkward as the end song of High School Musical 2.

Also how weird was it him showing her his porn collection which he seems to hide in a weird wicker basket with a fold out lid? What person has EVER had a specific wicker box thing to put their porn in? No person- that's who. What was the point? just to yet again remind her that they haven't had sex? To let her know his sexual kinks for when they do? “Oh you subscribe to Nipple Clamps Weekly good to know!”.  Also, I'm not loving the fact that the women has a secret wedding stash and the man has the porn; women like weddings men like sex, when will these stereotypes die? That said, prizes for storyline that upset my feminist principles the most goes to....

D) Girls Run the World?

The more I think about this, the angrier I am about it all. In theory I should love this, I'm a women and I'm all about empowerment. But if this is empowerment, then frankly women kind should send patriarchy a post card saying “Well Done you win! Now we're off to make you dinner”. Sure, the song is fine in its message, but watch it with the sound off and it's just another dance routine seemingly designed to turn men on; the moves and the clothing are totally geared to the heteronormative male audience. How was this empowerment? How was I meant to come away from this with anything other than a sense of dread about the state of the world? Its basic message seemed to be "girls if you want a job in politics you need to sell your body and sexuality" (and I mean female sexuality through a completely straight male frame of reference) because that's all you have to offer. What are Britney's ideas about how to change the school other than have a women leader? No idea? A fact that apparently doesn't matter.

Female strength is equated to women accepting sexual objectification of themselves. It's admitting that the oppressors of women have been right all along, and the we can't beat them so we might as well join them. I notice how most of the crowd shots during this scene are filled with a much higher number of women than normal. It's like they've realised the flaw in the routine, tried to compensate and failed miserably; watching all the women dance along just made me more sad. The greatest trick the Devil ever pulled was convincing women that this dance (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p80pq_2iKCk) counts as empowerment and women taking control of their own sexual self.

Also, it's not equality if women are only voted in because they are women and men have fucked up so far. Having a uterus doesn't mean you are automatically going to be a better leader. Equality means gender should not be a feature; women should be respected and treated the same as men. Yes, I would like more women in roles of political influence but I'm never going to vote for a women purely because she's a women; that's also doing us a disservice. Brittany's campaign manifesto of "vote for me because I'm a (hot)women" is meaningless and her victory would be shallow unless she had actual policies and had won on an intellectual playing field. Given the three options of Kurt, Rachel and Britney. I would clearly vote for Kurt, not because I believe in male supremacy over women, because he is a) sentient b) a good person, most of the time.

On a different note, I didn't spend the whole hour shouting at the computer- there were some bits that I genuinely loved. Seeing Kurt grow enough to admit Blaine will be a better Tony, the flower zig zag scene was very sweet. That said, it was nice and realistic that during the scene where everyone found out their roles while he congratulated Blaine he was still every so slightly visibly disappointed. I actually loved that whole bit, each character was completely believable in their reaction and that little bit was probably my favourite contained scene in the whole episode. When it comes to best lines/character, there was a clear winner- Beiste, because well knock me for six if she wasn't the best thing in this whole episode. If I was going to do a list of quotes I loved, they would all be her! This character is really coming into her own with a consistency in her warmth and subtle depth which sometimes seems awkwardly rare on this show. She seems to be one of the few genuinely nice characters and easily in the top three I would want to spend time with. It would be great we could eat delicious creamy pasta and talk about the tragedy of Ace of Cakes being cancelled.

Also, I didn't notice until the promo for the next episode came on that we hadn't seen Sue throughout. She was not missed. Don't get me wrong I have some serious love for Jane Lynch but Sue has slipped into farcical caricature. Her hatred of Will, Glee and now the arts in general have been run into the ground. Just stop; let Jane Lynch go onto other things. Speaking of that promo- was it trying to suggest that Shelby and Puck might be a thing, that better not the fuck happen. If it does, wow, I can't describe how much I don't want that.

When I first finished this episode I quite liked it, now after thinking about it and writing this I kind of hate it. I do realise that there is distinct chance I'm taking this way to seriously. But then sometimes I think Glee asks us to take it that seriously and then when it fucks up it try to dismiss it by being like “well it's only a fun singing show” It can't be both, well it could, but right now it seems incapable of doing so.