For those of you who happened to read my first column encouraging you to give Glee a chance in its second season, I think I take it back. As of now I think it’s been long enough to see where this season is going. It appears that the story is going nowhere. And if it is going somewhere, it seems like it will be a while before it gets there. After watching five episodes, I feel as though the season has yet to begin. It doesn’t provide much of the social commentary that contributed to its entertainment value last season. Development of plot and characters is minimal and I have trouble even carving out time on the weekend to get on Hulu and watch the show that aired 4 days before.
My original reasons for checking out this fall’s new episodes were threefold. The first was essentially a projection of my own anticipation and curiosity about the addition of John Stamos to the Glee cast. The second was because the music in the show—if anything like that of Season 1—would be worthwhile, and the third that the show had thus far provided some interesting social commentary.
My own expectations for Stamos weren’t met. Until the Rocky Horror-themed episode, his contribution (at least on air) was minimal, and when he finally got a lead vocal role, he gave a disappointing performance. His voice was weak especially in comparison to that of other cast members like Lea Michele and Matthew Morrison.
As far as music goes, the best was probably Britney Spears while the rest have just been average, doing very little to showcase the talent we saw last fall and spring. It gets lost in the hype over the musical theme of the show. For example Mr. Schuester’s obsession with Emma Pillsbury—the overarching romance of Season 1—has not changed or advanced. He still is pining for her and she still has a boyfriend during the Rocky Horror Picture Show episode, even though he was supposed to have come to terms with this in the Britney Spears episode.
This brings me to a more important issue I’ve had with the show. Originally I was attracted by its ability to combine social commentary with quality entertainment, but now it seems incredibly superficial. Glee has overemphasized entertainment, and thus worsened in terms of quality. Plot and character development have come second, which makes the series hard to follow and diminishes the audience’s desire to faithfully tune in every Tuesday.
There are a lot of characters, but the audience has gotten very little face time with them individually. The development of each of their stories is moving slowly as well. Rachel and Finn’s relationship is static and uninteresting. The brief drama in Kurt Hummel’s life lasted only an episode and has not been brought up again.
It’s hard to care about lives (even fake ones) that you know nothing about, and quality music can be found in a number of places. It contributes almost nothing to my intellect, which makes it something that could easily be substituted by time on Facebook.
My friends who started out as Glee fans haven’t necessarily stopped watching it, but they too are finding that it won’t take much to move on. Glee surprised me last year, and every week I looked forward to seeing a story unfold from a new social angle. Now I go to it with the slim hopes that it will better than the one before it and that it will give me a reason to get excited for the next.