Oh Glee, are you really trying anymore? Personally, you’re making me feel like you just care about making money off your iTunes sales versus actually caring about the product you’re putting out.
So, the big elephant in the room is obviously the death of Cory Monteith and how the show is going to handle it. In case you weren’t aware (which, from internet chatter, was apparently WAY more people than I expected), the “two-part” premiere was written back in April/May, and Cory did not play a major role in the episodes to begin with. I’ve seen a lot of people enraged that they didn’t do the tribute episode first. Here’s the issue with that: Cory passed less than a month before they were scheduled to go back into production. This was a very sudden and shocking death, so it’s to be expected that there would be a certain degree of shock in addition to the normal mourning. It takes a little bit to get back after the death of someone close to you to get back into your proper headspace. Could they have probably patched together an episode? Sure. Would it have been something worthy of the show, Finn, Cory, and the fans? Most likely not. And then you would a lot of people complaining about the immediate jump into happy, shiny Beatles land. By having these already planned episodes first, it gave everyone a bit of a breather in coming back to work, allowed the writers enough time to put together a proper episode, and lets the fans ride that episode into the baseball hiatus, which should flow better.
Now let’s get back to the premiere. Glee has a tradition of going a bit overboard on their tribute episodes as far as the ratio of storyline to production numbers (Madonna, Britney, Gaga, etc.), and this week was no exception. There were many times I felt like I was just watching a big production number with some occasional dialogue strewn in for good measure.
Which brings me to what I probably took issue with more than anything in this episode: continuity. Glee has never been known for being strong in this area, but this week took the cake. There were so many glaring issues. First, Ryder told everyone that he was quitting after Regionals due to the Catfishing incident. Well, he certainly seemed happy to be there this episode. Obviously, with Blake Jenner being promoted to regular you knew he would stay in the choir room, but is it too much to take a measly sentence and have him say that he had a change of heart? Secondly, when Becky wanted to come clean after the gun incident and Sue wouldn’t let her, Sue said she did not want to come back to McKinley. Now she’s not only back, she schemed her way to interim principal? I understand Sue doesn’t really work as the villain if she’s not at McKinley but maybe it’s time to give Sue a villain of her own instead of being the foil for the glee club. Next, Tina didn’t get dumped; she did the dumping. You shouldn’t be bitter when you do it to yourself. Lastly, Burt seemed much less hardcore in his stance against teen marriage. It’s admittedly not the most glaring error but for all his telling Blaine last season that he thought it was a bad idea, he definitely seemed to have a different tune when it came to him and his late wife.
Some other developments from this episode:
Rachel had her Funny Girl chemistry read (which means her audition in the finale obviously went well), although the producers are worried about her age and inexperience. So what is Rachel Berry to do? Perform a rousing song and dance number at her new job to prove just how much of a star she is. Cause that would work for the rest of us……
Artie and Kitty are officially a thing now. I don’t hate them together, but I feel like this is a continued effort by the writers to try and redeem her after the bulimia issue from last season.
I'm going to conclude every week with my musical pick (or picks when the mood strikes me) for that week's episode. This week's pick is “Yesterday”. This was hauntingly beautiful. Lea has such an amazing voice but I felt like there was so much more emotion in her vocal, especially in a few particular lines. It almost broke my heart knowing what’s to come.
