Fridays, 9.30pm
TV3
2/5
It's a presumptuous title, really – Glee – but for many of the show’s weekly viewers it amounts to exactly that. Why? The answer is at once both obvious and unfathomable, depending on where you stand. The show is immediately engaging, to those so inclined, because of its setting (an American high school), its cast (a singing, dancing ensemble of young people and the TV version of older people, i.e. slightly less obviously young people), and its storylines (the rollercoaster rides of young love, popularity, searches for identity and so on). It is immediately repugnant, to those not so inclined, for the very same reasons. So right away, in the eyes and minds (and ears?) of many viewers it becomes not so much a question of what Glee is about (insofar as it is discernibly about anything) so much as it has become about what Glee represents to we snobbish and opinionated Dunedinites. Am I for cheesy, pop-culture inundation set to a soundtrack consisting of classic rock yawners and show tunes? Or would I rather ingest sulfuric acid in mass quantities than endure one minute more?
There is no middle ground, which is a key factor when considering the show. By polarising audiences so effectively it ensures its continued popularity. There are certain segments of their target demographic that were never going to watch a weekly musical (for this is indeed what Glee is) no matter how cleverly you dressed it up in hip, relatable glitz. The writers and executives understand this and instead go for the other ones with determined, almost predatory, gusto. (The ones who will watch any musical, at any time, any place. No matter how campy and cheese-drenched it is.) They are very shrewd, those writers and executives, and even determined anti-Gleeks should give these particular devils their due. By zeroing in on the ‘common’ television viewer’s need for escapism and frivolity, they bypass any need for media street cred or ‘substance’. In this case substance is the enemy – it’s exactly what the audience doesn't want.
What the audience does want, evidently, are the songs. The bright and bubbly peak of the happy clappy pop realm. True to the time-tested musical aesthetic, Glee works the various covers into the plot-lines (most commonly as "performances" in the context of the episode) as devices to further whichever dreamy, misty-eyed narrative is being worked through at any given time. They often involve the endlessly fascinating boy-girl dynamic or, failing that ... something where personal virtue/conviction takes on an establishment/a clique/the ‘Man,’ and wins out to the boisterous sounds of earnest young people singing and emoting with their subtlety starved hearts on their fashionable sleeves. Not really, my nor many of my friends and family's, cup of tea, needless to say.
Having said that though, and bearing all the glittering, glaring flaws in our collective critical mind, even this decidedly snobbish reviewer can't deny the appeal of the show sometimes. Every dark television cloud has its brief and precious silver lining. When they're on, they're really on, as they say. The female antagonist coach Sue Sylvester (Jane Lynch) has some truly inspiring rants, whatever the context might be. Also, I’ve rarely enjoyed stupidity more than I do in the blonde cheerleader character. Did you know dolphins are really just gay sharks? Intriguing, blonde cheerleader character. Intriguing.
2/5. One point for the coach and one for dolphin girl. Call me Mother Teresa.
Glee
