Glee: 2.20 "Prom Queen" (open spoilers)

Cafe Society
41

I’m close to giving up on glee. I just don’t get excited by it anymore. There are a few funny one-liners, some good songs here and there, but the story seems to have run its course. Rolling in the Deep was amazing, and Friday was better than it had any right to be, but I don’t find myself caring about the characters anymore or who they end up with, or if they win their competitions.

It seems the show can’t decide if Glee club is loved or hated by the other students. They’re supposed to be “The underdogs” who no one would pay to see except to heckle, but here they are singing at prom. All the popular kids that picked on them have either become part of the club (Quinn, Santana, Puck), or been neutered (Karofsky), or are constant jokes (Jacob Ben-Israel). One week, the club is fracturing because of the break-ups and relationship reshuffles, the next they are banding together behind Sam or Kurt, or whoever needs it.

Aside from the big black guy and Karofsky, the stars of the football team are all part of Glee. All the former “mean girl” cheerleaders are part of glee and dating the “losers” of the club. Becky as Sue’s sidekick is endearing, not threatening. Even Sue seems to have no bite anymore, with her loser league of lackeys.

It’s all just very uneven, and instead of the songs fitting the plot, it seems like the plot now bends to hang songs on it. Maybe the formula has run its course.

ETA: I had separate Junior and Senior proms at my school in early 90’s upstate NY. The junior one was in the Gym, the senior one at a hotel. Don’t remember at all who the king and queen were or if we had them. Much as I love Figgins, that scene would have played better with some bitchy head-of-the-prom-committee cheerio character making the announcement (and laughing, so that Kurt’s reaction would have seemed more justified). Too bad all the bitchy cheerios now love Kurt.

42

Also would have been a good time to show Sue get furious. She bullies people herself but doesn’t like it when others do unless it’s on her orders; I can see her having a fit over the prom queen. (Better yet: have them elect Sue prom queen.)

In some ways I still like GLEE, but I’ll admit it’s becoming more like the sexy stuck-up girlfriend that doesn’t put out.

43

The way I think about Glee is that it has its moments, and I mean that literally. There are moments – sometimes just a few seconds long, sometimes whole scenes lasting several minutes – that I’d consider among the best on network television. But these moments are mixed in with a lot of other material that is definitely not the best stuff on television. Some of it is entertaining, some of it is weird, and some of it is just plain bad.

For me, the best moments are still good enough to make me willing to put up with the worst moments. But I can easily understand someone else being fed up with the show, and the longer it goes on the more likely it is that the best moments will no longer seem worth it to me. I think the writers should use the already-ordered third season to wrap things up and end Glee with the graduation of the current club members.