Glee Review: Three Rings and a Swimming Number

Glee returned from winter hiatus last night in an episode that brought us two new celebrity cameos and three couples taking the next step. Sam dishes to the guys about his summer fling with Mercedes, while she laments to the girls it has to be behind her now that she’s got a new man. Will struggles with how and when to propose to Emma, while Artie gets shot down by Sugar and becomes the object of Becky’s infatuations, and Finn revisits his plans for life after high school.

The Good

Sam and Mercedes get a storyline!

“Without You”

Santana’s follow-up comments

The return of father/son Will/Finn

Sue/Becky moments

Synchronized swimming as a varsity sport

One of my favorite moments from season two was watching Mercedes and Sam walk secretly hand-in-hand during the finale. When Chord Overstreet left the show, I thought well there goes Mercedes getting an ample storyline for the next season. But now he’s back, and things start to get interesting when she realizes she’s not exactly over their summer fling, and he desperately wants her back.

How does he go about trying to get her back? That’s easy, he needs a status symbol—a varsity letter. Being the middle of the school year, only one team is still taking members—synchronized swimming, coached by Real Housewife NeNe Leakes. While it seems like just an excuse to get Overstreet’s shirt off for a few minutes, Leakes fits in nicely as part of the ever-expanding quirky faculty at McKinley High. There’s even a big number at the end, where the glee club (plus some random folk) help Will propose to Emma. Synchronized swimming must be a required class for all of them to have those skills, but let’s overlook that for now.

Something I’ve missed from the first season is Will’s place as a father figure and mentor in Finn’s life. Sure, he’s got Burt now too, but the Finn/Will relationship was something different I always thought the series would explore further. More often than not now, Will seems kind of hapless in his role as mentor to any of the glee club, and an authority figure to Emma at home, which makes for some awkward moments. But last night, when he asked Finn to be his best man, and took him to help pick out an engagement ring, I had hope those moments were back.

The Bad

“Moves Like Jagger”

Finn wanting to enlist

Kurt’s hat during “Without You”

Artie wheeling himself into the pool

Sudden revelations about Finn’s dad

The entire “Summer Nights” sequence

Finn’s anticlimactic proposal

Is it just me, or is the creative team desperate to give Finn something to do. Just when I thought he’d settled on future plans of staying in Lima after graduation, after showing no real interest in his father since the pilot, has (off-camera) decided to enlist in the army to honor his dad’s memory. Will, somewhat surprised at the uncharacteristic twist, brings Burt and Finn’s mom in to discuss it. That’s where we get the revelation that time in Iraq changed his dad, and his mother hid a secret addiction and death from overdose. While perfectly logical, cramming that all into one episode without any build up or major impact on his life seems like it’s a story the writers wanted to tell, but didn’t have a place for. It would’ve been a great multi-episode arc for the plot-thin second season that could’ve added a little gravitas to the Hudson/Hummel family union.

Every episode there’s at least one indulgent song that’s thrown in just because it’s popular. This week, it’s “Moves Like Jagger,” and I don’t really want to talk about it. Moving on, as mentioned above, I’m really happy to see a Sam/Mercedes storyline with actual progression, but the Grease number wasn’t fun, new, or enticing to watch. I’m not a huge fan of Grease to begin with, and would’ve rather watched the sultry Naya Rivera belt out “Worse Things I Could Do,” but I’m not wishing for an entire tribute episode. Though, I’d clear my schedule for a Grease 2 homage in the future.

I’m not trying to make a blanket statement about marriage, engagement, or the act of doing so while still in high school, but COME ON, Glee! Mind you, there’s not one, not two, but three marriage revelations this week. But, the most unnecessary comes in the last minutes when Finn, in cliffhanger fashion, pulls out a ring and proposes to Rachel. I’ll reserve full commentary on the matter until I see how the story plays out next week.

Does it feel weird to anyone else that this is only the tenth episode of the season? Most shows are past their halfway mark, and we haven’t reached Glee’s yet.

The Helen Mirren

Glee takes a lot of hits for the number of guest stars in any given episode, most of whom pop up for only a moment or two. Example: Kristin Chenoweth last season in her terrible subplot about launching an autobiographical Broadway show. These kinds of vanity roles often add little (case in point, Idina Menzel returning for the first few episodes of the season) to the overall episode, but aren’t always unfortunate moments (case in point, Gwyneth Paltrow).

When it was announced that Academy Award-winning actress Helen Mirren was set to guest star, I was among those that groaned. Who could she play? School nurse? History teacher? Wise old janitor? It couldn’t be as bad as Molly Shannon’s forgettable badminton coach, could it? Well, turns out it wasn’t. Mirren appears in voiceover as the internal monologue of Cheerios co-captain Becky Jackson (Lauren Potter), funny for its completely unexpected nature, and touching because of the eloquence the character cannot verbally express on her own. It wasn’t flashy or supported in promos like many of the other guest stars, and casual viewers may have missed it altogether. The stunt toed the fine line glee often walks between satire and offensive, but worked for me as a viewer. It was a great gimmick, and it didn’t even require a song.

Though hardly back to form, this week’s episode had some nice highs to enjoy. What did you think?

For more on this episode, check out Ringing In the New Year by Inisia Lewis.

Season 3, Episode 10: “Yes/No” (Original airdate January 17, 2012)

Glee airs Tuesdays at 8/7c on FOX.

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