Dear Tina,
On tonight’s episode of Glee, Rachel lost her voice to tonsilitis, Puck lost his mohawk to his dermatologist, and Kurt lost his first kiss to Brittany. How can we possibly connect these dots to form one cohesive episode? By asking the question we all dread from the time we enter adolescence until the age we start wearing leisure suits out to dinner and have clearly given up on solving the complexities of the meaning of life: what defines who you are? Rachel bribes a student from the AV room to bug the choir room so she can figure out who in the glee club is not participating during rehearsal. When she brings the list of underachievers to Mr. Schuester’s attention, their faithful leader is horrified by the lack of effort and prepares an assignment for each member to find a song that “best represents how you see yourself [and] where you are in your lives right now.” What ensued was one of the strongest episodes, musically speaking, to date.
Immediately after Mr. Schuester announces the assignment, Rachel has come up with the song that defines her, requesting to perform at that very moment Miley Cyrus’s “The Climb.” A song that defines her struggle to overcome the mediocrity of the glee club. A song that also defined Miley Cyrus as not that talented. If the embarrassed looks on her peers’ faces were not enough of a clue, Mr. Schuester breaks the news to Rachel that she seems to have lost her voice. Finn takes Rachel to a throat doctor, since her boyfriend Jesse was regrettably absent from the episode, and the doctor diagnoses Rachel with severe tonsilitis that may require the removal of her tonsils–a surgery that could cause permanent damage to her singing voice. Rachel’s insistence that the inability to sing would ruin her entire life, “I’m like Tinkerbell Finn. I need applause TO LIVE!”, Finn takes Rachel to see an old football friend of his, Sean Frathole. Upon meeting him, Rachel discovers that this former football star is now paralyzed from the chest down. Though the terror in Rachel’s eyes during this encounter and her near begging of Finn to let her leave felt a bit overdramatic and inappropriate even for Rachel, the lesson was blunt. We are not defined by our most prized talent.
Nor are we defined by our most prized hairstyle. When Puck’s mom thought she detected a mole on his scalp, she sends him to the dermatologist to have it checked. There, the doctor shaves his mohawk in order to have a better look only to discover that it was nothing more than a freckle. Puck doesn’t realize the extent of what he’s lost until he returns to school and the fear he once evoked in his fellow students has dissolved and now he is on the receiving end of such mockery and dumpster tosses. Rather than use this as an opportunity to right his past wrongs, he decides to go after Mercedes to boost his popularity. Though the show never really established Mercedes growing popularity since joining the Cheerios, it was still fun to watch Puck figure out how to incorporate her curves into his seduction. When Quinn tells Mercedes that Puck is just using her, she replies quite honestly, “I know he’s using me but in a way it’s even better. I’m not you. I’ve never had a guy like me for anything but now I’m such a steaming mug of hot chocolate that one of the studliest guys in school wants to use me to harvest some mojo.” Sometimes I think Mercedes is the only girl I know willing to admit to the more shameful side of female behavior. At some point haven’t we all paid too much attention to a man’s superficial courting? Because sometimes, no matter who it comes from or how sincere it is, it’s just nice to hear the compliment.
After Mercedes and Santana song-battle it out for Puck’s affection via Brandy and Monica’s “The Boy Is Mine,” Mercedes admits to herself that whatever Puck is striving to regain, she doesn’t want to be the vehicle he uses to get there. She drops out of the Cheerios and rediscovers her self-worth.
Kurt sees his dad at school, and unbeknownst to Kurt, he’s there to get Finn and take him out to lunch to use the coupon for a free Hoagie Finn won at the baseball game they went to together. Could you throw more heterosexual darts at this poor kid’s heart? Sue approaches a vulnerable Kurt in the hallway and pontificates the ridiculousness of a label like “gay” for someone his age when he hasn’t kissed anyone yet. While I would argue that someone doesn’t have to experience something intimate like kissing in order to know their sexual preference, I do agree that we have become a culture that insists people establish their sexual orientation at an often inappropriately young age. Kurt clings to the hope that maybe he’s not gay after all and after a horrendously butch performance of John Mellencamp’s “Pink Houses”, has even managed to snag the affection of Brittany. When Kurt’s dad Burt catches him in the basement making out with Brittany, he is more confused than ever and seeks clarity from Kurt as to what his preference is exactly. It’s easy to hate the parent who rejects his son because he can’t accept the so-called burden of a gay child. But in this case, there is no such villain. Burt is trying to figure out the best way to relate to his son and Kurt is quick to write-off this gray area as a dismissal. Brimming with hurt and anger, Kurt explodes through song and releases every ounce of his identity into the ultimate Broadway ballad “Rose’s Turn” from Gypsy. Kurt knows who he is but after that tearful exposition of the truth, it becomes clearer that it may be his own unhappiness that he is projecting onto his father.
At the conclusion was a full stage production number of U2‘s “One” juxtaposed with shots of Rachel and Sean singing the song a cappella in his bedroom during a private singing lesson. I imagine that critics of the show find song selections such as this one too pointed at the moral, but tonight I felt that the writing had enough wit to balance the conventionalism. The story arc believably transformed these students into a more vulnerable and humble group and that was portrayed tenderly in the closing number. The series has finally found the right blend of drama, comedy, absurdity, and music to develop these characters beyond the greatest cover band of all time.
Brittany Line of the NIght:
This was hard because Brittany was dropping great one-liners from start to finish, but the one that had me laughing for an extended period of time, despite seeing it repeatedly in the previews, was her response to Puck entering the choir room sans mohawk:
Who is that guy?
Song of the Night:
Jessie’s Girl by Rick Springfield.
This was also a tough decision because “Rose’s Turn” was such a phenomenal number and by far Kurt’s best performance to date. It also required, how do you say…acting, which usually rests on the back burner during the show’s musical numbers. But Finn singing “Jessie’s Girl” to Rachel (who, remember, is dating Jesse for those that can’t keep up) was not only painfully romantic but also defines for me the show’s success. It takes a song we could all stand to never hear again and reinvents it as a plot device used to sell the audience on having an opinion about these relationships. Not to mention it was the first time I ever thought those lyrics were capable of conveying an emotion other than giddiness as depicted by a multitude of college a cappella groups. Sometimes you have to see past the obviously skilled and give credence to a performance that just tickled you. How do you think Marisa Tomei got an Oscar?
30 Rock Quote of the Day:
Liz: Handle a presentation? Jack, I put on a live show every week, unless there’s wrestling. I’m on it.
Dear Tina 