Watching and writing about television is a pretty painless experience in the grand scheme of things. But disregarding the world’s real problems for a moment, watching and writing about Glee can be fairly traumatic, you guys. Every time I think the series has lost its way for good, it pulls me back in with a … Continue reading Review: Glee, “On My Way”
Tag: Dianna Agron
Showrunner Series: Ryan Murphy = Matthew Weiner (Except, you know, awful)
I received the book Prime Time, Prime Movers for Christmas and have been plowing through it over the last week or so. As these things go, reading a book about the big individual creative forces in television history has me thinking about contemporary writer/producers. Therefore, today, I debut a new occasional feature where I will discuss … Continue reading Showrunner Series: Ryan Murphy = Matthew Weiner (Except, you know, awful)
Review: Glee, “Hold on to Sixteen”
At this point, there are so many problems with Glee that is much easier to just say “it sucks!” and move on. Fortunately (or more likely, unfortunately) for you folks, I am much more verbose than that, and I am also so intrigued by the reasons that Glee has so many problems that I cannot … Continue reading Review: Glee, “Hold on to Sixteen”
Review: Glee, “I Kissed A Girl”
Despite all its issues, Glee has had a lot of success with exploring the challenges of being gay. I have some issues with how and why Kurt jumped to Dalton last year, but the only good part of season two was his season-long journey to coming out and self-acceptance. The series took Kurt’s challenges and … Continue reading Review: Glee, “I Kissed A Girl”
Review: Glee, “Mash Off”
Glee has never been a consistent series. Even in the now-halcyon days of the first 13 episodes, the series stumbled on a fairly consistent basis, it just happened to get the raw, emotionally wrenching moments right more often. One of the biggest problems with season two was its wild inconsistency, not across episodes, but within … Continue reading Review: Glee, “Mash Off”
Review: Glee, “The First Time”
When I read sometime last month that Glee would be doing an episode centered on Rachel and Kurt losing their respective virginities, I shuddered. A few times. Even though this season of Glee has been relatively solid (let’s just pretend last week’s episode never, ever happened OK?), I am always worried when the series decides … Continue reading Review: Glee, “The First Time”
Review: Glee, “Pot O’Gold”
Well, I guess there was no way that could last. It’s been a while, but when the first three episodes of Glee’s third season aired nine months ago, it was somewhat staggering that all of them were pretty solid, with the last aired episode “Asian F” being one of my favorites in a very long … Continue reading Review: Glee, “Pot O’Gold”
Review: Glee, “Asian F”
In my review of the Glee season three premiere a few weeks ago, I spent some time talking about how formulaic the series’ has tended to be. For some reason, instead of trying new things with the characters, the production staff loves to have them repeat similar or near-exact stories that worked (and worked better) … Continue reading Review: Glee, “Asian F”
Review: Glee, “I Am Unicorn”
If Will Schuester runs for public office against Sue Sylvester I will burn down Fox Television Studios, never watch television again and quit Twitter. Glee has had some terrible ideas in its first two-plus years on the air, but the political campaign portion of season three is already at the top of the list. Having … Continue reading Review: Glee, “I Am Unicorn”
Season Premiere review — Glee, “The Purple Piano Project”
Glee is a formulaic series. For all its insanity, uneven character work and ridiculous logic, we pretty much know exactly what to expect from the series on a weekly basis. Ryan Murphy and company have pin-pointed a few things that they think the audience enjoys and they just keep hammering away with them. This isn’t … Continue reading Season Premiere review — Glee, “The Purple Piano Project”
2010-2011 season wrap: Ranking the episodes of Glee’s second season
The other day, I mentioned that ranking the episodes of Community's second season was one of the most difficult lists I had ever done. Doing a similar list of Glee's second season was, well, less difficult. I wrote about Glee a lot this season and realized that I would really just be repeating myself if … Continue reading 2010-2011 season wrap: Ranking the episodes of Glee’s second season
Season Finale — Glee, “New York”
Earlier this year, The A.V. Club's Todd Van Der Werff wrote a great piece with an unfortunate, yet completely valid headline. It reads, "Community and Glee are pretty much the same show." Obviously, the headline alone was enough to send the AVC community into a tizzy, but Todd's piece is basically completely on-point. The first … Continue reading Season Finale — Glee, “New York”
Glee, “Prom Queen”
I don't really hate spoilers. In today's internet- and social media-powered landscape, spoilers are bound to happen. During the early seasons of Lost, I used to read spoilers on a regular basis until I realized that I was completely ruining my viewing experience. But Lost is a series that preyed so much on our lack of understanding … Continue reading Glee, “Prom Queen”
Glee, “Rumours”
Before "Rumours" aired last night, I tweeted that I had this weird feeling that the final string of episodes was going to be pretty strong. Despite my issues with the length (and the subsequent Kurt lovefest that resulted because of it), I thought last week's episode was very good and it set up a number … Continue reading Glee, “Rumours”
Glee, “Born This Way”
When it was announced a month or so ago, I just assumed a 90-minute episode of Glee would be one of the worst things ever. Some of the episodes from this season have felt extremely long within the 42 minute structure, so I couldn't even really imagine having to deal with another 20 minutes. Ultimately, … Continue reading Glee, “Born This Way”