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Which characters from other shows would you have wanted to see on Glee?

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Tdb rewatch: Bash

Little story: My girls used to have difficulties pronouncing NYADA, and so they always said Ninja-Da. From which of course we made up a story in which (unbeknownst to Rachel) NYADA is in fact a school for Ninjas that for some reason poses as a performing arts school. My son even made art for it. In this episode, when Rachel quits NYADA, they said, “She can’t! She isn’t a real Ninja yet!”

Anyway, “German” title: Bashing. Don’t ask me. I have no idea. I mean we don’t really have a word for that, so even in the episode, “Gay bashing” was called “Gay bashing”, but...whatever.

This is a fine episode if you don’t pay too much attention to it. If you do, though, it’s a jumbled mess that tries to balance too many storylines that don’t really have a lot to do with each other, and so many things I don’t understand oh my God.

So, starting with Kurt’s storyline: This is the one that works best for me. Even though I don’t understand why you would hold a vigil for someone who’s still alive (I’m not superstitious, but that seems kind of...bad luck?), and I don’t understand why there wasn’t a single line dropped about Blaine having been gay-bashed, or why it would be hard for Kurt to go back to the vigil-place in the end. Also, if I might get into that a little: the beatings, that of the guy they hold he vigil for as well as that of the guy Kurt goes to help, are framed as gay-bashing, but at the same time it is said that the perpetrators are unknown people who just jump out of a car. How does that work. Do they go by looks? Do they drive around and say, That one looks gay, let’s beat him up? Or do they ask? Or what? Anyway, Kurt has never been one to stand by when others get bullied, and, as we know, he tends to be a little...reckless when confronting a bully. So him going to that guy’s help is very in character for him (he even yells, I’m not afraid of you, which is very reminiscent of the way he dealt with Karofsky to me), but I wonder if it also had to do with Rachel calling him a coward before. The kids (my son again watched this episode with us) are very angry at Burt, because he is so angry at Kurt and doesn’t comfort him or anything. I tried to explain to them that it came from a place of fear, but I don’t think I convinced them. So the image of Burt as the best TV dad of all time is tarnished for my kids now. I adore the music in this arc. I love the version of Not While I’m Around where they all sing, but I’m glad they made it a Blaine solo in the episode.

So. Then there is Sam and Mercedes’s storyline. I love them as a couple. But. I’m white and German on top of that, so I’m not going to comment on the black/white part. They say it’s a thing, so fine, I believe them. But looking at their whole arc, in Sam’s place I’d have lost patience with her long ago. She is more emotionally mature than him and less prone to just give things a go, and that is her prerogative, but she changes her mind so often about them being in a relationship or not, in Sam’s place, I’d have said, okay I would want to be with someone who knows they want to be with me and not have every little thing change their mind. I’m not just talking about this episode, but their whole arc together, in which he is always the one who wants to be with her and she can’t decide or they’re together and then she finds a reason they shouldn’t be.

Also, and this is what my girls really got indignant about: she’s wearing this gorgeous faux fur coat, which she then throws in the river (and this is pollution! Where is the lady telling people they can’t throw things in the river now?), and even though she is wearing a jacket underneath (?) and Sam is only wearing a shirt, she takes Sam’s jacket, and then sends Sam home only to promptly throw his jacket on the ground to sing a song on a carousel. ;) Her songs are weird here as well. I mean I like them individually, although the second one (which is from Amber’s album, I think?) is too long in my opinion and the scene is boring, but since she’s the only one not singing Sondheim, it feels all the more like her storyline has nothing at all to do with the rest. We agreed that she looked very nice, though. Sam is, of course, very very embarrassing here, and if she’d decided to not date him because she could never take him anywhere public, I’d have understood that. I don’t like when they do this. He is perhaps not the most sensitive person, but his charm has always been that he is about as free of prejudice as is possible, and I don’t like when they let him come across as racist or sexist for laughs.

Then there’s Rachel. I think I’m less harsh to her than most, because I think it is a difficult decision she has to make, assuming she has spoken to her producer about somehow being able to do the second midwinter critique and he declined. Having to decide between NYADA and Fanny, I’d have picked Fanny as well. But she should have done it in a different way, and in no way in hell, in no way ever ever ever ever, should Mme Tibideaux taken her in again later. And, of course, she should never never never have insulted Kurt in that way. Or at all, really, though I let that speak for her that she is able to admit she was wrong and apologize to him.

I wonder, however, how it could come to that misunderstanding about the performance in the first place. Did Carmen make it clear that it was to be a solo performance, or did she take for granted that everyone knew? I can imagine Rachel just not listening, but Blaine? The songs are great, though, and I’m glad Carmen took that into consideration and gave them a second chance. I also agree with her assessment of Rachel - she needs school to learn discipline and to give her a solid background, but I’d still have decided like Rachel.

I love Kurt’s performance of I’m Still Here. I can’t believe it’s his last solo in the series, but at least it’s a great one.

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