FoxMercedes and Santana get their "Glee" on. This week, in the "Glee" Quality Watch: Tuesday night's episode was a welcome return to a plot focusing on the kids and their relationships, and the songs were an eccentric collection of unpredictable gems, not a playlist seemingly plucked to boost iTunes downloads. And it managed to do all that even without Sue Sylvester!
Ian Brennan's script had a typical "Glee" setup: Mr. Schue (who's been so far in the back seat this season, he might as well be on vacation) tells the gang that Puck is in juvie for crashing his mom's car into a convenience store and driving away with the ATM. Hmmm. What's up with that? Did Fox put Mark Salling in detention? Anyway, new kid Sam will be stepping up for this week's assignment, pairing everybody off to sing duets.
It's not the most rock-solid foundation for an episode, but things take off nicely. What Brennan does so well is keep things in perspective: the kids are competing for a gift certificate to dinner at Breadsticks, the show's spin on an Olive Garden-style restaurant. The complete down-to-earthness of the prize is refreshing, and so are the little grace notes the characters all get. And yes, it's utterly ridiculous that these kids are able to mount ambitious production numbers in mere moments, but hey, "Glee" has apparently decided to embrace the logic of musicals -- i.e., anybody can burst into full-throated song at any time.
In fact, there's more to chew on in this episode than in the bottomless breadstick baskets at their restaurant of choice. Kurt wrangles in a realistic, sensitively portrayed way with being the only openly gay student at McKinley High; Rachel and Finn scheme to boost Sam's chances and do a jaw-droppingly terrible duet of their own to hide their normal awesomeness; Sam turns out to be likably nerdy, prone to speaking in N'avi, the Pandora language from "Avatar"; and Brittany and Artie have an unlikely hookup that leaves them both feeling sad.
And the numbers include that great barn-burner, "River Deep, Mountain High," the Phil Spector-produced (back when he was the great "Wall of Sound" guy, not the insane murderer) number originally done by Ike and Tina Turner. You can never hear this song enough, in my opinion, and Santana and Mercedes gave it a rousing rendition.
There were other highlights (Mike Chang sings! Kurt and Rachel do Barbra and Judy!) too numerous to mention. Maybe the much-touted Oct. 26 "Rocky Horror Picture Show" episode will be as much fun as it sounds. And maybe, after the not-too-great early episodes, this second season of "Glee" is finding its groove.
-- Kristi Turnquist
No comments:
Post a Comment