This blog is simple: I will review each episode of Glee, my favourite show, from memory (since I have no interest in rewatching that show atm). And for every episode, I will add a random cat photo from the internet. I will also give a quote per episode, rank the episode on the Kinsey Scale and give you my favourite and worst song of the episde.
This is a worse version of @soup-her-naturals, my inspiration. Knowing soup recipes is more relevant in life than watching cats, I guess.
Blog run by @yuespropagandablog (or my other URL but if you know it no you don't)! Shout out to @gleenagedream for the URL.
Notes on the review under cut!
Time to get this show on the running, or as Finn says in season 2 episode 17,the show must got all over the place, or something.
And I am starting with a legenda!
Quote of the episode: Pretty self-explanatory. It's a quote of the episode that I have in my head. But remember, I am doing this all from memory. So it might happen that I (partially) misremember a quote or even misplace it. Or maybe I can't come up with one. Woops. I'm seriously committing to this whole from memory thing. I am forbidden to look anything up.
Kinsey Scale rating: "But Yuè, it's glee! It has to have at least a 3 on the Kinsey Scale for every episode!" FOOL. Some of these episodes are painfully heterosexual. Every time Will and Emma have a storyline, you can feel the rainbow dying out (although to be fair, Wemma WAS cute in the beginning, there, I said it, till it got ruined in typical glee fashion.)
Favourite/Worst songs: Also what it says on the tin. Some episodes have stellar music and some are filled to the brim with shit. Glee in a nutshell. And also, I will only be using released songs for these categories. For the ones who aren't in the know, there are two kinds of songs: released and unreleased. Once again it's pretty self-explanatory. Released songs are songs that are recorded in the studio and that then are released on CD, digital downloads, streaming services, etc. Unreleased songs are sung live in the episode and are not released. This means that epic bangers like Glitter Rock Vampire, Respect, Fondue for Two and Ride Wit Me are not eligible :(((( I did this to myself. Released songs that are, for some reason, sung live in the episode (like Not While I'm Around in season 5 episode 15), count for released and then I'll use the released version, not the episode one. Lastly, the songs are the only thing I am "cheating" on. I am not doing it from memory, but I am lifting the song choices from my Favourite song of each glee episode and Worst song of each glee episode playlists.
Cat: Cat.
Review: I have no idea how this will go. I will just start writing and see where I end up. The review for the first episode will probably start with Breaking Bad. Structure who? Idk her! And of course the usual disclaimer of, as that white woman on Vine said, "THAT IS MY OPINION!" There are certain aspects of the show that I am unreasonably thrilled about, and some I couldn't give a flying fuck about. The OP is a proud Klainer 12 and from season 2 episode 6 you will notice. This is MY version of And That's What You Really Missed. And again I am doing this from memory and I may straight-up forget something.I will also be sharing fandom memories cause the true glee is the friends we made along the way. Cringe is DEAD!
Also, I have decided that after every recap post, I will reblog one gifset/post about the episode for funsies, and so that I have an incentive to go through my 10+ year old Tumblr blog for it.
it’s so special to me that so much of fan culture is textual analysis for the love of the game. like thank god there are people in my phone who are also thinking about this thing i love so much that they are writing transformative fiction as character studies and setting clips of the show to music with theme-relevant lyrics and writing long text posts analyzing every line of dialogue like!! yay!!!
Anyway if there any other Gleeks who have been on the Hellsite since 2011 know where to find the Kurt audio that I described, please send me a link. It wasn't in my 14 year old "3x11" tag on my personal blog, but also I actually remade my blog in 2013 and cannot easily search my first blog for it since I didn't have a tag system there.
Quote of the ep: Well, you're in luck, cause auntie Snix just arrived on the bitch town express.
Rating: 4/6 on the Kinsey Scale
Best song: Smooth Criminal
Worst song: Ben
Cat:
(x) I have no clue why this photo exists on the official Michael Jackson website.
Now for the Review: “GLEE-HEE!”
Of course Glee did a Michael Jackson episode.
And yes, the cast and crew kept saying “Glee-hee” in the behind the scenes stuff. Get it? Get it? Michael’s signature “hee-hee”, but with Glee? Yeah.
So the New Directions did a lot of Jackson stuff during Sectionals, and the Troubletones missed out on that by being Troubletones. So Mercedes, Brittany and Santana insist that they do a Michael Jackson themed week, which Blaine kicks off with Wanna Be Startin’ Something, together with the 3 of them and Kurt. Yes, there was this one gifset of “gay, gay, gay, gay- oh hi Mercedes!”, although Amber Riley, who plays Mercedes, recently said she doesn’t believe that Mercedes is straight and she is so right for it.
Rachel and Quinn join them later when they’re disrupting the library. There is also another gif that I always think of, of Blaine walking through the aisle of books with the text “HAVING FUN ISN’T HARD WHEN YOU HAVE A LIBRARY CARD” at the bottom and I admit I think way too often about that gif when I am in my library.
The glee kids all perform while wearing Michael Jackson-inspired outfits (including a full leather bodysuit for Kurt) and the kids are excited!
Also, goodbye Tina! Yup, Tina just disappears. Jenna was apparently not doing well mentally and was given a mandatory week off. As Jenna later said, the stigma around mental health was still bigger, so there was no help offered to her, she was just given a break, although it did help her and she’s happy she had to leave. I suppose it was too sudden to work in the episode, unlike the Blaine thing (but more on that later).
What actually happens in this episode?
Good question.
A couple of the glee kids are at The Lima Bean, discussing their plans to do Michael Jackson songs again, but this time for Regionals. Sebastian overhears them, which pisses Kurt off, because why the fuck is Sebastian always there. Sebastian, of course, only shows interest in Blaine (“Hello Blaine, hello everyone else.”), although he is interested to hear about the New Directions’ sudden collective interest in Michael Jackson and vows to let the Warblers do Michael Jackson songs instead.
--
Anyway, I am back. I took another break.
Look, I love writing about Glee. I cannot shut the fuck up about it. But as I said before, season 3 of Glee is season 3 of Glee. Back when I was writing about season 1 and 2 I would churn out multiple of these bad boys a day, but season 3 is just not always fun to write about. Not only that, but I joined fandom, which also means I have more to say and these recaps are getting longer.
But I still love it AND unlike Rachel in season 5 episode 18, I won’t quit something I am passionate about (spoilers!) so here I am.
The New Directions and Warblers have an edgy sing-off in a parking lot to claim Michael Jackson, which is honestly a wild thing to do, but it happened. They sing Bad and there’s a lot of weird stage fighting happening. I mean, the choreo is actually pretty cool, but it also looks a bit stupid to see these people try to physically fight each other.
The Warblers are pissed and take it out on the New Directions.
Why? Well...
Now, Artie, Santana, Kurt, Blaine and Rachel were supposed to go to Dalton Academy and they were supposed to watch the Warblers perform I Want You Back from the Jackson 5. In fact, this entire thing got filmed and all that. I Want You Back is definitely one of my favourite Warblers songs. And then Blaine was supposed to refuse Sebastian’s offer to rejoin the group he abandoned by saying they have lost their class, which pissed off the Warblers. And then Sebastian was supposed to call Santana Sha-Queer-a, which I admittedly laughed at, and provoke her, only for her to diss him back. AND THEN they were supposed to leave them behind with Blaine and Santana admitting to each other that they are in trouble.
But all of this got cut.
Unlike other cut scenes, the reason for this choice has been made clear and is unfortunately a bit fair. Naya just… dipped. Don’t know why, but she just left filming and as a result there are moments in the performance without Santana present, or with a body double who’s obviously not Santana in it. You could argue that Glee has aired multiple questionable mistakes before, like using the shot of Brittany stepping down the stairs twice in a row in season 2 episode 18, or the inclusion of camera crew in many performances, including the Jackson Sectionals set in season 3 episode 8, but alas.
The guys who played the Warblers were devastated. I still remember many of them posting sad Tweets. Grant Gustin (Sebastian) was also very upset, and found it a bit ironic, since apparently Naya was the one who broke the news to him.
But now, in-universe, the rest of the storyline doesn’t make much sense, since it doesn’t explain why the Warblers are so hell-bent on teaching the New Directions a lesson. They were hurt by Blaine’s words and it damaged their pride, but that got cut. It may also explain why a group of Blaine’s (former?) friends would be so vicious and why they would agree to the next part.
Near the end of this musical brawl, some Warblers hand Sebastian a paper bag. It contains a slushie, but not any slushie. This one has rock salt in it. Sebastian plans on throwing it on Kurt, but Blaine realises it, pushes Kurt away, and takes the slushie. It lands in his eyes, which damages them and Blaine needs surgery.
Fun fact, before it was easy to read other people’s tags, I had NOTP tags on my blog and Seblaine’s NOTP tag was “notp: life’s too short to blind people with rock salt” or something.
Cause yeah, Blaine almost got blinded.
This is to explain his absence for the majority of the rest of the episode, and also the next episode. Darren had to be on Broadway for three weeks (yeah) to star in How To Succeed In Business Without Really Trying, so he couldn’t work on Glee.
His last appearance of this episode is in his room. He wears an eyepatch, since one eye got more damage. Kurt, Rachel and Finn sing Ben to support him, which is kind of stupid since it’s about a rat.
Anyway, Kurt is pissed and Santana decides to actually do something after they talk about it. She invited the Warblers to a random place with a lot of chairs and two celloists. (And this always makes me think of this Glee Crack video that used this shot with Rebecca Black singing "which seat should I taaaaake?" in the background.)
She tells them what happened, and this shocks other Warblers, who probably didn’t know that Sebastian put something in the slushie. Sebastian admits to adding rock salt, but Santana isn’t done yet. They sing a killer duet of Smooth Criminal with the celloists accompanying them. (I think Naya had worked with the celloists before on their album.)
It is really, really good, and peak mlm/wlw hostility, although it had the interesting result of many people shipping a gay man and a lesbian woman together.
Now, let’s hold this Sebastian crap on hold so we can focus on the other stuff.
Sam is still pining after Mercedes. He believes that their love is more than a summer fling and he starts serenading her with Human Nature, but it turns into a lovely duet. They kiss, which, uh oh, means that Mercedes cheated on Shawn.
At least their duet is nice. Finn and Rachel also sing a duet and I find it very boring, but that’s mostly because I couldn’t give a rat’s ass (Ben’s?) about Finchel. I assume, ASSUME, this is the moment Rachel accepts Finn’s marriage proposal, but I don’t remember it. I just assume it happened here since, spoilers, the wedding is 3 episodes away and they still needed riveting scenes about their wedding planning, like a fascinating scene about which chair to pick.
Then there’s one of my favourite scenes of the episode: Burt comes to visit Kurt at school, since he has news. Kurt’s worried it’s about Blaine, but no, Burt comes bearing an envelope from NYADA. The result of Kurt’s application came in and Burt couldn’t wait. They go to the choir room and Kurt reads it.
He did it. He tearfully tells his dad he’s a finalist. He’s allowed to audition to go to NYADA. Burt gives him a huge hug and gives him a moving fatherly speech, and it always reminds me of this audio post that got made after the episode. It was dialogue from the show about Kurt from his introduction to this moment. Basically an AMV, but audio form. It was beautifully and I actually had it downloaded on my non-smartphone so I could listen to it whenever I wanted.
Some fanworks just stick with you, man. Even 15 years later I can still hear parts of it in my head.
Back to the Warblers thing. It’s time to end this episode. Santana had taped her underboob with idk a microphone when she confronted Sebastian earlier, so they have a confession on tape. Santana suggests pressing charges or at least use this as evidence to get the Warblers disqualified. Kurt stupidly enough decides against it, and instead want to “own them” in the way they know best: through song. The Warblers are invited to the auditorium, and Sebastian can’t stand the stench of public schools, and they sing Black & White. This performance includes the face morphing from the original Michael Jackson video. It was weird.
I think the New Directions wanted to crush their opponents’ spirits, similar to how their performance of Give Up The Funk depressed Vocal Adrenaline in season 1 episode 21, but here it doesn’t seem to work. They don’t realise it and even give Sebastian the tape with evidence. I suppose it’s meant to be read as a “we are above petty shit” lesson, but it also feels stupid, especially since in a later episode they will complain that Sebastian almost blinding Blaine didn’t have consequences.
my problem is if i enjoy something enough i will be nitpicking. i Will have things to say about where and how it failed. out of nothing but love straight from my heart. unfortunately this often makes me indistinguishable from a hater who has never experienced joy or kindness. such is the amateur critic's burden.
all of my favourite things are like beautiful racehorses that trip over their own feet a hundred times. but they get back up again. and goddamn, you should see them run.
Quote of the ep: Screw it, I'm getting a whole cheesecake.
Rating: 0/6 on the Kinsey Scale
Best song: Without You
Worst song: Wedding Bell Blues
Cat:
(x) Floating around like Artie.
Now for the Review: Hullo! I am currently in Rotterdam, but no worries, again, I am not doxxing myself since I will be posting this days later. I did officially cross the border. This one space at Rotterdam Central Station counts as the UK for legal purpose, I guess. I still have time to kill before my train leaves so why not yap about another mediocre Glee episode?
This episode is all about proposals! Will and Emma really want to get married. Emma even sings a song about it with Beiste and Sue, and ends up singing it in front of Will. He's like… "Did you just propose?" and Emma runs away. Will also wants to propose to her and he knows he needs to have an amazing proposal Emma won't forget, so of course he recruits his glee kids to do the work! But how to propose?
Sam has an idea. He's joined a synchronised swimming team, coached by coach Roz Washington, played by NeNe Leaks. SIMGM called her the Black Sue, and yes. She makes some weird comments about Sam's lips (since they are huge for a white boy) and how his nipples aren't at the same height.
There's probably a lot more about this Wemma proposal storyline, but I don't remember and I do not care enough to remember. There was probably some drama. What's important is that the episode ends with the glee club and the synchronised swimming team teaming up to sing and perform We Found Love at the McKinley swimming pool. All the glee girls are wearing a cute swimsuit, red lipstick and idk victory rolls (???) and the guys wear red tops and blue swim boxers. I do not know why they went for the 50s America vintage style, but it looks popping.
This is also the episode where Artie famously wheels himself into the pool, which according to Kevin, who played him, wasn't allowed. When they came up with the idea, they were stopped because they needed a stunt double. Kevin and the crew (I guess) thought "Fuck that!" and Kevin drove himself headfirst into that water.
It ends with Mr. Schue in a white suit and top hat WALKING ON WATER before diving and swimming towards Emma to propose. She says yes.
Back to the swimming team. Sue and Roz have an instant rivalry. Why? I don't know. Sue probably isn't used to someone not being hurt by her attitude. Roz's attitude matches hers and even transcends it at times and Sue probably feels threatened. Or maybe the funding of the Cheerios got cut again in favour for the swim team.
In other news, since this is the proposal episode, this might be the moment where Beiste says that she and Cooter got married. Yeah, somewhere down the line, the love triangle ended and Beiste won Cooter's heart over Sue and then they get married off-screen. Again, don't know for sure if it is this one, but it happens at one point and it makes sense that it happens here. Their off-screen marriage may have spurred Will and Emma into action.
And now to the controversial proposal of the episode.
Finn is drifting. He has no clue what to do with his future or even his current life. He has nothing and no one, which is a wild thing to say in a restaurant with his brother and girlfriend next to him. (And this episode showed that Kurt snaps his fingers at waitstaff #cancelled.)
The sentiment stands. Finn is a bit envious of Kurt and Rachel, who are planning ahead for their lives in New York. Finn can join them in the city, but what for? What will he do? Finn's lack of plans has been a reoccurring problem this season. To support him or something, or to show that he isn't alone, Rachel sings a beautiful acoustic rendition of Without You. I am not kidding. When this episode's First Listen Friday dropped this song, people were losing their minds, especially since turning and EDM DJ hit into a romantic acoustic rendition didn't have to work so well. Trust me, we know. Wait till season 5 episode 18 for the horrid acoustic version of Aviici's Wake Me Up, also sung by Rachel.
Rachel sings this in the choir room and at one point it is as if everyone disappears except for her and Finn and that's cute and whatever, but we gotta talk about the real most memorable moment of this song. At one point, in the background, Blaine leans in towards Kurt. We don't know what happens because it got cut off and we couldn't even see their faces, only their upper bodies, but in true Klainer 12 style, we lost our shits, because people were convinced that Blaine leaned in to kiss Kurt on the cheek. THE CHEEK KLISS GOT CUT!
IS THIS HOMOPHOBIA?
Granted, we had no idea. I even remember a gif of "What I think happened" and it was Blaine just derping and Kurt being unamused, with this being depicted through true early 2010s memes. Maybe they were just goofing around. We will never know.
Y'all gotta realise we were desperate, which is why people got so upset about a possible crumb of Klaine content getting cut. We haven't really had a scene or anything between to two of them since episode 5, and spoilers, this draught will continue until episode 15. That's 10 episode without my boys interacting! No wonder we lost our damn minds.
Anyway in case it wasn't clear, the controversial proposal in question is Finn proposing to Rachel after the We Found Love performance. He asks to speak to her in private and proposes. The episode ends with this cliffhanger.
I have read rumours that Lea, who plays Rachel, got so upset that she threw the script around. Not sure if that is true, but I won't blame her. Finn, dear… I know we established that Rachel is the constant in your life and I know you feel insecure and therefore want to hold on to this one thing in your life that grounds you, namely your relationship with Rachel, but… bruh. Can't believe I'm saying this, but just eat another grilled cheese and convert to Christianity again. Not that religion is the most solid thing, but I've heard that it provides this security you crave.
Aaaaand that's it. That's all I remember. It's been a while since I wrote a shorter recap but this is all you'll get.
Being critical of your interests is sooooo fun when you have the critic gene & then you sound kind of insane to the average tv watcher when you're like "this is my favorite show, It's Racist" & then you try to clarify what you mean & get that [Speech (legendary) - FAILURE] "the racism is really interesting though"
[Speech (legendary) - SUCCESS] I find the sociopolitical context of pulpy old sci-fi born circa the civil rights movement really fascinating to analyze especially when it was progressive for its time but still reveals the writers' unexamined biases in the subtext
when you become sufficiently woke (literal meaning) your options are to always be miserable about everything forever or to find intrigue in case studies of racism as illustration of the society that made them
