A Very VOMITROCIOUS Christmas

Oh my god, that was possibly the worst episode of Glee I've ever seen. I really think that this time I might be done for good.

Two weeks ago was the Santana debacle, which I can't even go into because it was SO BAD, and the student election BS, which was such an unbelievable plot manipulation that it doesn't even merit talking about because I can guarantee no one on this show will ever mention it again. Last week was sectionals, which was remarkably boring and predictable and the music was all my least favorite kind of Glee music, the note-for-note karaoke cover. Look, karaoke is great, I love it and it is totally the best. But watching professional singers do covers of songs that do not alter the arrangement in any way is flat-out boring. My favorite Glee songs are the ones they've put their own spin on - "Dancing With Myself", "Borderline/Open Your Heart", "Toxic", etc. - and if I do like a straight-up cover, it's because I haven't heard the original enough. But "I Will Survive" was a snooze, and even though I love me some MJ and I liked how everyone got a chance to shine in their medley, it was super dull. I know what "Man In The Mirror" sounds like! And it sounds better when Mark Salling keeps his mouth shut.

Anyway, that's all just to say that Glee has been losing me for a while now. Where are the jokes? Where is the edge? I wish this show had just died a quiet death at the end of Season 1. But sadly, it did not, and last night's episode still exists as a blight on the world.

"Because of the layers?"

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It's Not Easy Being Glee

Glee is back! This season has been really interesting so far, because it has gotten both better and worse at the same time. Better because there are actual character arcs and storylines that carry through from week to week instead of plots just shoehorned in to whatever that episode's theme is; and worse because some of those storylines are kind of dull and the music selection has been mostly bleh. Sometimes it's not even the selection, but the execution - "It's Not Easy Being Green" is actually a beautiful, poignant song that I love, but putting the Irish kid in a bunch of ugly green shirts and then having him warble (not particularly well, I might add) along to a tinny backing track and totally, gruesomely murder my favorite line ("And green can be cool and friendly-like") is not the way to win me back after three weeks of an excess of musical theater numbers. In fact, I might as well be upfront and say that the only song worth anything (and the first song this season I've thought about downloading) was the Troubletones' "Candyman". That shit was fantastic, and I really like where that storyline is going. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

"Yes I Can!"

So I actually don't have that much to say about Glee. It was inoffensive, not especially funny, but wrapped up some of the loose ends from last season and introduced the themes for this one. The problem is I couldn't sum up the energy to care about most of them. My favorite characters were mostly in the background, even Finn. I don't even know why they're trying to get us scared about Sue shutting down the arts or whatever because that is such an unbelievable plot point it is just ridiculous. I get that it's probably supposed to be hyperbolic political satire, but it just isn't really working. So, you know. Quin has pink hair. Santana is already Big Lesbian Bitch (called it). Tina is a junior. Blaine wears dumb sunglasses. Rachel and Kurt are not as great as they thought they were. Bieste is the best. But tragically, Zizes is gone! It was just a so-so episode that even the fun ending of "You Can't Stop The Beat" couldn't inject with any real passion. I mean seriously, you can't do a Hairspray number and stick the fat girl in an ugly-ass t-shirt and motherfucking jeans. I guess I should just not expect too much from this show, then I won't be as disappointed when it inevitably sucks.

Notes & Quotes

"Pithy banter like "Why does the T-Rex eat the Jew?"

"Me And My Hag"

"What about toast? Bread's already been baked, I don't see why you have to cook it again." (BTW I am firmly pro-toast, it is delicious sometimes I eat too much of it covered in blackberry jam.)

"My erotic tattoo of Ryan Seacrest"

"Sue just passed 'Undecided' and 'Anyone White' in the polls"

That flame at the end of "Anything Goes" and Kurt's little yelp

"Gay high-5"

Image via Hollywood Reporter

The Nude Erections

Oh, fine. I'll see you in the fall, Glee. Have a great summer touring. :( Seriously, those kids are worked hella hard, I'd like to see what their paycheck is. I'm pretty sure it's disproportionate to the amount of money the show brings in, especially now that they're polluting the world with these fucking terrible original songs. But we'll get to that in a minute. Overall, the finale was much like the season – partly awful and partly great, but the great parts were pretty wonderful.

The Gershwin opening was lovely, as were the Gershwin themes that ran through other parts of the show. Rachel's coat (well, everyone's clothes, really) was fanfuckingtastic. And it was fun to watch them galavanting about New York, even if the song left something to be desired. I enjoyed parts of the Finchel storyline - it was certainly the most captivating part of the show. But, like always, there was a whole lot of fluff in between that I still feel obligated to mention.

Let's see. Mr. Schue is a terrible teacher, obviously, and so he abandons his class and says, hey teenagers! You have to write two amazing, prize-winning songs, and you have one single day. See ya! Maybe if you're good, I'll bring you pizza in 17 hours. Mr. Schue, this is not Project Runway, and you are not Tim Gunn. You don't just get to leave the set and go off and be fabulous somewhere because you feel like it. Also, you may just be the opposite of Tim Gunn. Ugh, I really hate Matthew Morrison and his vests and his gargoyle face. I wish he was just one big set of abs. ANYway, he goes and sings an awful song (really, does he sing any other kind?) and then some guy wanders by and is all, You're gonna be a staaaaar, m'boy! *old-timey jazz hands*

"Like that's any less gay"

Man, when Glee is good, it's very, very good. I mean we all know that when it's bad, it's horrid, but "Born This Way" really was a step up, even from last week. There was a lot of negative feedback from blogland for "A Night Of Neglect" (still the worst title ever), but not in these parts. Oh, sure, it wasn't the best, had too much Gwyneth and was kind of cobbled together, but I'm grading on a curve and it was a hell of a lot better than most of the episodes this season. Additionally, 1 Steven Tobolowsky + 1 Cheyenne Jackson = 0 Gwyneth Paltrows. Anyway, tonight managed to be even better.

CAVEAT: I am still profoundly angry and irritated the way the writers decided to ignore Santana's possibly bisexuality despite her many occasions of professed sexual attraction for men (go back and watch the Britney episode and tell me she's not hot for Dr. Carl). However, since this show is THE WORST at character consistency and has a proven history of biphobia, I'm just going to suck it up and accept that Santana is now a total 'mo, a full-on Kinsey 6, and hope that maybe they can discover some non-hateful nuance when it comes to Britttany ("I think I might be bi-curious"? ARRRRGH. Bi-sexual. If you like or have liked having sex/being in love with boys AND girls you are what is called bisexual. Just. Say. It.). Moving on to the parts that don't make me want to scream epithets at my computer.

"Let me cut to the sexy chase"

Fuck yeah, Glee! I loved tonight's return to form. Oh, I know it won't last, and I'll be back to bitching about it in a week or two, but "A Night Of Neglect" (terrible title for anything) really was awesome.

Let's start with Mercedes FINALLY getting her due. It took goddamn long enough! But it was great how Zizes inspired her to demand the respect she deserved. More of Team Big Girls, please! But I thought that Rachel schooling Mercedes on Aretha was hella condescending and weird. However, WHO THE FUCK CARES because that rendition of "Ain't No Way" was fanfuckingtastic, one of the best songs the show has ever done, and really just straight up awesome. Although Glee can be infuriating and shitty, they do tend to listen to their audience for very short periods of time, and I know that it wasn't just me complaining about the lack of Mercedes this season. Hopefully she won't be allowed to fade away into the background again. The title of the episode (and benefit) was an interesting but obvious tie in to Mercedes herself being the neglected artist, and I think after that, the characters but also the show as a whole are going to have to give her the respect and recognition she deserves.

Seriously - that song. KILLED it.

"Tina Cohen-Loser"

Ok. Glee and me. We're making it work.

Obviously I wasn't going to stop watching, even if last week was the worst episode ever. A girl's gotta have an informed opinion. And I'm glad I didn't, because this week gave us, if not a great episode, certainly the best in a long time.

First, let's get the songs out of the way. The opening number was, properly, something we've heard a thousand times before from Blaine & The Pips. I thought Kurt's "Blackbird" was beautiful, and I totally understand it triggering Blaine's lightbulb moment. One of the best things about a lot of this episode was they not only played to certain cast members' vocal strengths, but the autotuning for the most part took a back seat. Santana's "Trouty Mouth" and Puck's "Big-Ass Heart" brought some nice comedy (Mercedes' "Hell No" had an obnoxious, oft-repeating catch phrase and too clearly showcased that the ONLY storyline she has had this season revolved around tater tots. So. No.), but like, FOR REALSIES, none of these kids could have written (AND ARRANGED, is that jazz band made up of musical leprechauns or some shit that are always available and know every song ever, even ones just written by a dumb-ass high school student? Way to be way serious on "Trouty Mouth". I'm looking at you, drums.) any of these songs in the time allotted, except for the two sung at regionals. We'll get to that.

I want to say that this episode really delivered on something it's been missing for a while: the heartfelt emotions and moments of pure, helplessly un-hip joy. That being said, the really awful shit that the past few episodes hath wrought (a no-fun, psychopathic Sue; a no-fun, man-hating Santana; too much Blaine) was still there in full force. Sue punched a woman for no discernible reason. In the face. To the ground. Like, what? Moving on, there was thank you oh my dear unbelievable lord in the sky only the tiniest amount of Schue this week. The best was Santana telling him to stop touching her. We really all want you to stop touching anybody at all, Mr. Schue. Oh, that reminds me, the worst was Holly Holliday calling him in the middle of effing class to talk about her yoga retreat. Barf. Wait, sorry, the WORST was him then telling his students that the person he was just being gross with on the phone is another teacher. No.

"You just got Zized"

Ok, Glee. W. T. F?

Last night I watched Glee with two of my friends. There was me, the jaded critic; Alia, the long-time fan; and Kristen, someone who had only watched a few recent episodes. Three people with three very different perspectives with one thing in common when it comes to Glee: we all really want to like the show. I was especially glad to have the two of them around, then, when "Sexy" started going off the rails and they could assure me it wasn't just me who thought this was the worst, poorly organized, most perplexing episode of the entire series.

Glee has been facing criticism for character consistency since the second season began. The show's writers have responded by removing any lingering ounce of character consistency and instead focusing on picking truly terrible songs to compliment the spectacularly awful and empty plots we have to plod through each week. Some critics have given up yelling into the void and are now defending the lack of consistency, saying, "That's just how Glee is!" But I refuse to give up. I will yell into the void for as long as I have lungs and people continue to stand by this crap. Why? Because I remember what 3/4 of the first season was like. It was inspiring. Uplifting. Joyful. It was not afraid to be uncool, or silly, or flamboyant. It presented an incredibly wide range of music in interesting and beautifully-sung ways. Now the show seems to exist solely to sell iTunes singles. The writers and producers are unconcerned with plot or pure musicality or character development or, well, quality, because they are making a bajillion dollars. And guess what? It shows.

I'm going to try to summarize with bullet points because there is too much to go over and none of it is presented linearly. I haven't read any other bloggers' thoughts about "Sexy", but I don't see how there's any way they can't agree that this is where Glee went off the rails and belly-flopped over that shark.

A Christmas-Themed Movie Snack

Oh Frabjous Day, calloo, callay! How I Met Your Mother is back in top form. Maybe not Hot-Sister-Carols form, but "False Positive" is pretty awesome nonetheless.

"That's exactly the element of whimsy this celebration of love needs!"

"Music and cookies and liquor and trees, that's what Christmas is for"

I know that three days is SO LATE in the internet game, but sorry internet, I have a life and right now it is CRAZY and it's been all I can do to maintain my sanity, much less write blog posts. But I took notes so that I could write something once things died down a little. SO.........

Abed's Uncontrollable Christmas review starts now! Well, a few paragraphs from now.

Let me begin by explaining a little about my family and our Christmas celebrations and my relationship to Christmas pop culture. My dad does not like Christmas, a fact that made known to me once he deemed me old enough, which was around my 10th birthday. My sister and mom were a little indifferent to the whole thing, and then there was me. I LOVE Christmas - well, I love MY version of Christmas. I love picking out the perfect gifts and hanging stockings and cooking with my family and singing carols and unwrapping presents and the rainy weather and lights and the smell of the tree and pretty much anything Christmas that doesn't have to do with Jesus. My sister celebrates Chanukah and my grandfather celebrates the solstice; this year, due to a fortuitous typo, we've decided to refer to our December 25th holiday celebration as Xams, so as to remove it as far from Christ as possible. Because my family are atheists and agnostics and one converted Jew, we tend to avoid stuff about angels and pageants and miracles and the weirdness of worshiping a baby, and focus on the good stuff: eating and giving. Carols were always one of my favorites because I love to sing, but they drove my dad crazy and I've had to find good, non-annoying versions of my favorite Christmas songs to fill up my awesome winter playlist.

But this meant that I didn't watch a lot of Christmas movies/specials when I was a kid, partly by choice and partly because my dad would not give the TV up for that stuff. Rudolph and The Nightmare Before Christmas creeped me out, Charlie Brown didn't really captivate me, Miracle On 34th St. was boring, and I still, to this day, have never seen It's A Wonderful Life. Oh, sure, I watched The Grinch and Home Alone, but the holiday movie I probably saw the most was the animated version of The Snowman (quiet and nondenominational and thus inoffensive to my dad). As I got a little older, I started watching Friends and their holiday episodes became some of my favorites - and some of the best, with moments I can still instantly recall. Friends handled the holidays awesomely by either making a classic bottle episode, or by putting the Friends into stressful, emotional, and/or drunk situations. Always pitch-perfect. As I got even older, I started making my own traditions and found my trio of current all-time favorite holiday movies: Die Hard. Lord Of The Rings. Elf.

Two Beavers Are Better Than One...

...But three Robin Sparkles videos may be too many.

To begin with, I was wrong. Barney and Robin aren't getting married (this season), stupid Punchy is. LAME. No one cares about Punchy, the turnaround from him being a stupid jerk to being awesome was ridiculous, and did I mention that no one cares about Punchy?

Before I get to the main event, let me just say that this episode was one of the better ones this season (no Jennifer Morrison), but it still didn't live up to my high standards. There was so much shoved into one episode that the disparate storylines, even though they all had moments I enjoyed, felt stilted and forced. There wasn't enough room for the jokes to breathe or the plot to develop.

So, Glitter. Did the repeated use of Glitter make anyone think of Mariah Carey? Because when I hear Glitter as a name or a title, I think of Mariah Carey in an airbrushed shirt on TRL, making Carson Daly uncomfortable and handing out ice cream and generally having a mental breakdown in front of a live studio audience. I definitely don't think of a random girl with a terribly fake Canadian accent.

Let's go back a little. The original Robin Sparkles video, "Let's Go To The Mall", was hilarious in that it was actually a rather accurate parody of Tiffany and other similar pop stars. It was explained that "The 80's didn't come to Canada until 1992" and the song had great lines like "He's got hair like Gretzky and does jumps on his skateboard" and "I'm gonna rock your body 'til Canada Day". And, of course, "Let's Go To The Mall" originates the slap bet with its porniness.