Glee S01E10: Can We All AGLEE to Kill Ourselves If This Shit Doesn't Turn Around Quick?
[Gabe Liedman is a stand-up comedian, and one half of the Gabe and Jenny comedy team with Jenny Slate. But at the top of that resume it states that he is Videogum's Official Expert on this season of Glee.]
Okay, Glee, I'm not trying to be a dick here, and you know I'm all about supporting your fucking retarded mission to gay-up primetime and ruin people's taste in music (ALL about it), but, you're making it awfully hard for me right now. I mean--this week? 4REALZIEZ? Ugh. HOW FUCKING HARD IS IT TO SING A DESTINY'S CHILD SONG, MAKE A PUSSY JOKE, AND ROLL CREDITS?! Why are you trying to make me sit through an hour with NO upbeat songs, NO Sue Sylvester, and NO ONE getting hit in the head with anything (other than EMOTIONS (and NOT the Destiny's Child/Bee-Gees cover, which is perfection))?! JESUS CHRIST, GLEE, it's getting pretty fucking difficult to defend your candy ass, when my mouth is always stuffed to capacity with your lame-tarded BULLSHIT. GAH. Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaand, I feel a little bit better. Sorry. NO I'M NOT, but I can pretend to be.
This week's episode was all about being honest, in song-form. The glee club has to sing ballads, because they do. Someone told them they had to. Someone from Sectionals was like "this week you guys have to do a TV show about ballads" and then everyone in glee club was like "oh, okay, I guess we have to," and then they did.
Mr. Schue breaks the club up into pairs, for ballad-times, and the pairs are kind of funny: Puck and Mercedes, Quinn and Artie, Finn and Kurt, and Rachel is stuck with Schue because some random guy named Matt is in the hospital because he has a spider in his ear (HOUSE M.D. CROSS-OVER EPISODE!!!!!!!!!!). To demonstrate what a ballad is, Rachel and Schue sing "Endless Love" from Happy Gilmore, and Rachel realizes that Schue's douche-vibez make her Tzitzit twitch. Natch, nothing funny happens as a result of the hilarious ballad-pairings--just drama. Rachel's soaking wet for Schue, Kurt's soaking wet for Finn, Mercedes and Puck have one conversation and they are both dry as a bone...
The Quinn/Finn baby drama unfolds some more this week. We meet their parents--Quinn's parents are drunk blondes who <3 Glenn Beck (good call, actually), and Finn's got a widow-mom with brown hair and a gorgeous collection of denim vests (his dad died in Desert Storm (LOLOLOLOL, U SLAY ME GLEE! KEEP IT UP YA GOOF)). Finn kind of loses his mind for a second, and sings The Pretenders' "I'll Stand By You" to a Quicktime of Quinn's sonogram on his laptop:
And when his mom catches him doing that, he spills the beans about Quinn's ...situation. Finn's got a good mom, and she gives him exactly what a boy in his situation needs--a suffocating moment crammed in real close to his mommy's denim vest:
Back to Rachel and Mr. Schue--turns out Rachel's not the first blind/deaf student who's fallen in love with him. There was a girl named Susie Pepper who loved him so much that when he refused to give her a ride on his conductor's baton (u know that's EXACTLY what it looks like), she ate the hottest pepper in the world, which burnt up her esophagus and put her in a coma. Lucky bitch.
So, Schue decides to be honest with Rachel, and let her down easy--by singing a mash-up of "Young Girl" by Gary Puckett and Police's "Don't Stand So Close to Me." As you just imagined--it was the worst, but Rachel ate up the doucheformance with relish, and ignored the super-obv message punching her in the Punim.
Then, crazy Rachel shows up at Schue's house after school, and cooks a gourmet venison casserole for him and his cunt wife Terry, who's been M.I.A. for a coupla weeks (doing push-upz):
Schue's not having it, because he hates touching, seeing, smelling, and thinking about naked women. The very thought of young, tight Rachel bouncing up and down in his lap, singing a Funny Girl medley is too much for him to bare, so he drives her ass home.
Finn and Kurt do some quality bonding:
Kurt gives Finn the ballz to tell Quinn's parents about their fetus project. Just like a normal person in real life, Finn goes over to Quinn's house, and in the middle of dinner, sings Paul Anka's "You're Having My Baby." Even though Quinn's parents are drunk, blonde Glenn Beck perverts, even they pick up on the song's super subtle lyrical message.
They kick Quinn the fuck out of their mansion, and she goes to live with Finn and his mom.
Rachel gets a self-esteem lesson from Susie Pepper in the ladies' room, and then apologizes to Schue for being deaf/blind enough to have a crush on him.
The episode ends with the glee club singing a cheesy "Lean On Me" at Quinn's and Finn's faces. It's saccharine, and weak, and while that IS how I like my coffee, it is not how I like my musical finales.
Again, Mercedes' "chocolate thunder" is relegated to the final minutes of the shitisode, although she did have a moment toward the beginning of act 3 where she explained to Puck the difference between a Baby Daddy and a Father. Whatevz.
Basically, this episode was boring, sappy, sad, and sucked. The only way for Glee to redeem itself after this one is for next week's episode to just be an hour-long monologue by Sue Sylvester about what is wrong with her genitals, interrupted three times for a frame-by-frame recreation of this video, starring Mercedes and Kurt as Beyonce and Gaga:
Sorry to get all Hard Gabe on your asses, but c'mon you guys. Even I know this week wasn't good, and that means it was technically terrible. Because I think shit's great when it's okay, good when it's bad, and okay when it's the worst.
THE END ☹ ☹ ☹ ☹
Posted by Gabe Liedman at 11:30 AM in Recaps
Tags: Amber Riley | Cory Monteith | Dianna Agron | Glee | Jane Lynch | Lea Michele | Mark Salling | Matthew Morrison
The entire Rachel/Schue plotline made zero sense. Rachel goes from hating him for always ruining for life, to loving him because of reasons that still aren't clear to me? I thought the sequence where she cooks dinner was going to be some sort of nightmare/daymare thing, but it was just a real thing she decided to do? Nope, writers! No! Sorry!
BUT -- I enjoyed the fact that we are at least moving forward with this whole "secret pregnancy" thing. That drama has been stagnant for far too long. Next step: Will Finn find out the baby is not his? I AM ACTUALLY KIND OF EXCITED FOR THAT TO HAPPEN.
Score = 7
She loves him because of how great they harmonize together! And how nice his eyes are. Perfectly legitimate reasons to fall in love.
I can't decide who's singing face I hate more, Rachel's or Schue.
Score = 3
The reasons are proximity.
Score = 3
It was just another aspect of the nonsense machine that is the non-singing aspects of the show. (Lots of love, though, Glee!)
Score = 2
I'm hoping that the Finn baby drama will happen in the same week that the most idiotic husband of a fake pregnant wife ever, Mr. Schue, finds out about the non-baby. Can't wait.
Score = 3
The music sucked & there was no Sue (WHAT) & i refuse to believe that many girls are crushing on a terrble fake-rapper with ridiculous hair who is stupid enough to believe his "pregnant" wife can't be touched bc she has some kind of infection on her stomach, but I thought Quinn's speech to her parents was touching.
Also this
Score = 19
I have to go, they'll think I'm taking a poop.
Score = 25
that one and when Tina pulled "other asian" from the hat.
Score = 17
"He's cheating off a girl who thinks the square root of 4 is rainbows" Kurt zings are good zings.
Score = 0
Wasn't it great how Mercedes' advice was like the WORST ADVICE IN THE WHOLE WORLD? And yet delivered as complete sense that must be obeyed? "Quinn's picked Finn to be the babydaddy ... by tricking him ... when he hasn't even boned her ... and therefore it's her choice to ruin his life forEVS ... and step back son!" And Puck (mmmm PUCK!) is like oh, yeah, cool, LYING. Awesome great thanks.
Score = 8
You realize that now next week will be TERRIBLE, because no matter what happens or how entertaining it might be, it can't top Mercedes and Kurt as Beyonce and Gaga. It just can't.
Score = 9
I would have really liked to have seen the term "Gleetarded" used in here.
Score = 6
Good post, Soft Gabe!
Score = 13
Ahah, I love "other asian's expression in this!
Score = 7
other asian is my favorite. they need to give him a line every once in a while (or ever).
Score = 2
I think Mercedes should just have her own spin-off show. ALL CHOCOLATE ALL THE TIME.
Score = 5
You got hard, Gabe, on our asses?
Oh, you got Hard (no comma) Gabe (no comma) on our asses.
Phew. Awkward mo averted.
Score = 5
Mo-mo, mo like.
Score = 2
am i the only person who liked last night's episode? of course it was unbelievable, nothing on this whole fucking show is believable! it's one of the most spastic shows i have ever seen, the tone is all over the place, it feels like it was written by people who are based on 5 different continents. but it always has some funny lines, the kids are awesome (i can't be the only one who adores lea michele, can i? spring awakening!) and i just plain enjoy it without expecting too much from it. also i have listened to "defying gravity" from last week about 30 times, so...maybe it's affected my judgement?
Score = 13
Yeah... I diverge. Last night was lovely. Sue needs to find her center after going full retard (too much heart! must rest) and they didn't pour Schue's whiteboy rap into my eyes, so I was very, very happy for that. Very happy. And I don't love everything about Kurt's thing with Finn, but I do love it, and will leave it at that for now.
Secret pregnancy NEEDED to move forward, and Quinn's parents were kind of perfect. I am very excited to see Finn throw himself bodily at Puck when he finds out his child will have a mohawk and no foreskin (that's how it works right?).
Score = 8
So we all now agree that Glenn Beck jokes are as lazy as Speidi jokes right?
Score = 2
And just as called-for.
Score = 2
COMPLETELY NON RELATED
but a corollary of sorts to the dread lock fun from yesterday.
Thank you peopleofwalmart.com
Score = -7
OH GOD is he growing his own mattress?!
Score = 0
Quinn is the worst. i think she might be an even worst actor than Finn. I hope Fox pays these people in pebbles or sheets of butcher paper because they do not deserve money.
Score = -10
I was excited to read your comment( yeah, I get excited pretty easily) because of that rad avatar.
But your comment is wrong, they deserve money, all the kids on the show are extremely talented.
Score = 7
we will just have to agree to disagree. because i don't think finn (who is 27 and not a kid by any stretch of hte imaination) or Quinn are talented singers/actors. quinn might be a god dancer, can't really tell.
Score = -2
Eh, I kind of buy the fact that Finn and Quinn (aw, how cute) aren't great singers or dancers. It seems realistic to me. I did theater in high school (tech, okay), and you only had a handful of kids each year that could really sing or were taking voice lessons. The rest were pretty amateur but could at least hold a tune and sound pretty okay. We had our Rachel and Mercedes, but we also had our Finn. Maybe they'll get better over the course of the show, which would also be realistic to me.
Score = 1
according to the show quinn should be a really good dancer. i don't mind her singing. it's her acting that hurts.
Score = -1
we will just have to agree to disagree. because i don't think Finn (who is 27 and not a kid by any stretch of the imagination) or Quinn are talented singers/actors. Quinn might be a god dancer, can't really tell.
Score = -2
Two points. The first is that whenever I watch Glee, I am struck by how well Quinn is played. She adds a lot to the role of "pretty blonde". Secondly, please, for the love of god, slow that avatar down. It makes it really hard to read anything in the vicinity.
Score = 3
Lady Gaga slows down for no man.
Score = 4
Score = 16
Sir you are KILLINGIT
Score = 1
I'm a lady :D but thanks!
Score = 0
LADY UR KILLINGIT
Score = 0
But, ZOMG, Jenny Pepper = Kitty Romano!!! She is bad at choosing the mens, you guys!
Score = 7
She (Sarah Drew) was also on that one Wonderfalls episode "Karma Chameleons" where that girl wanted to be that other girl so much that she'd kill for it. KILL FOR IT!
"Grease?"
"Single White Female!"
because you guys know what wonderfalls is right? right? of course.
Score = 5
Finn's so very, very sincere rendition of "Having My Baby" was pretty fucking funny.
Score = 3
Songs were great but episode was depressing. Thank you other Gabe for telling it like it is. My boyfriend watched this with me for the first time and he was like 'i thought this show was supposed to be fun and happy' GLEE (?) I did like the taking a poop line that was classic.
Score = 1
Needs more Kurt.
Score = 0
5 things i learned from this show
1. mercedes voice makes everything better, even sappy cliches
2. i hate schue
3. i really like the way diana agron plays her role, she adds a lot of depth to the character
4. if jane lynch ever leaves the show, i will have no reason to watch it.
5. watching people sing to sonograms is awkward and akin to walking in on someone masturbating
Score = 2
i fully support your ridiculously high standards for this show
Score = 0