Hairography: whizzing hair to distract from inadequate dance skills and so-so vocals. Works best when acting like being tasered. Moving head around in a spazzing manner. Like cool epilepsy.

Jane Adams glee club performs at McKinley and demonstrates the art of hairography. Their rendition of bootylicious is all but school appropriate. This sparks quite a nervous bug in Mr. Will and causes him to jump on the hairography bandwagon.

The school of the blind’s glee club comes to McKinley for a scrimmage. McKinley shows off their newly adopted hairography skills with a combination performance of crazy in love and some song about being obsessed with hair. The school of the blind performs imagine. McKinley joins in for a very corny but moving duet, replacing their hairography obsession with their true values. McKinley transfer from hairography to no gimmicks, no false theatricalities. Awe.

Terri’s pregnancy and Quinn’s “pregnancy” get a little more complicated. Terri is all freaked out, as she should be, about lying to Will about her being pregnant. Quinn juggles back and forth with the idea of keeping her baby.

photo courtesy of sugarslam.com

Terri’s sisters bright idea is to have Quinn babysit her kids to scare her enough to give up her baby. This idea backfires when Quinn takes Puck along and they’re glee club skills make them quite successful babysitters. However, it backfires in an unexpected way when Quinn finds out that Puck was sexting (sexy texting) some cheerleader the whole time. Puck is so genuinely sweet by saying he will only sext the hot girls at school, not the ugly ones. He’s going to be a dad, but he’s not going to stop being him to do it. Puck, you’re a punk. Quinn stops wrestling with the idea and decides to give her baby to Terri.

As para Quinn’s idea, Kurt gives Rachel a makeover so she can attract Finn. He agrees because “makeovers are like crack to [him]” He sets her up, making her very Sandy in Grease esq when Finn is really attracted to girls that dress like 5th graders and grandmas all rolled into one.

photo courtesy of tvfanatic.com

Why would Kurt do such a thing? Because he is in love with Finn too, of course! Finn says he is so in love with Quinn, blah, blah, but he really acts more in love with Rachel. My prediction: as soon as the baby is gone, Rachel’s in. Sorry Kurt.

photo courtesy of thepostgameshow.com

Sue continues elaborating her scheme to bring down the glee club by leaking McKinley’s set list to the other competing schools. Will they take the bait?

Watch The Full Episode

This ain’t a song for the brokenhearted
No silent prayer for the faith departed
And I ain’t gonna be just a face in the crowd
You’re gonna hear my voice when I shout it out loud

It’s my life!

It’s now or never
I ain’t gonna live forever
I just wanna live while I’m alive

It’s my life!

These are my confessions
Just when I thought I said all I could say
My chick on the side said she got one on the way

These are my confessions
If I’m gonna tell it then I gotta tell it all
and damn near cried when I got that phone call
I’m so thrown, I don’t know what to do
But to give part two, oh my

Better stand tall
When they’re calling you out
Don’t bend, don’t break
Baby, don’t back down

These are my confessions
It’s now or never
I ain’t gonna live forever

These are my confessions
I just wanna live while I’m alive

It’s my life

Just when I thought I said all I can say
My chick on the side said she got one on the way

These are my confessions
I just wanna live while I’m alive

It’s my life!

picture by LiGado em Série/Flickr.com

Dear Show,

I really, really love you. I do. Your cast is both talented and diverse, you have lots of music that I love and you say that you’re all about breaking down stereotypes. Also, you have Puck. What’s not to love?

Except.

I am getting really, really tired of seeing you not actually break down these stereotypes at all. When you had Mercedes say, “I’m a strong, black woman… but that’s not all I am,” I practically cheered. That is a fantastic line, and exactly what I want to see. But that’s what you told me, not what I see.

Why are the kids from the “trouble-making” school mostly black? Did you seriously name that girl Aphasia? Aphasia, as in: “an acquired language disorder in which there is an impairment of any language modality… [which] may include difficulty in producing or comprehending spoken or written language.” Do you think it’s ironic and clever to give a character who doesn’t speak “proper English” a name that means a language disorder? Because I don’t.

And this “all women are crazy” theme you’ve got going on? I’m not a fan. I’m not sure why the female characters on this show have to be in competition with one another, and catty, and shrill, and deceitful, and so on. Last week, I was hugely uncomfortable by the whole Mr. Schue/Rachel storyline. Not just because I don’t like the teacher/student thing, or the fact that Rachel just jumped from Finn to Puck to Will, thus portraying the flighty teenage girl to perfection, but also because she really just seemed to be there to move his storyline forward. That seems to happen a lot. Where’s Ms. Pillsbury, if she’s not interacting with/thinking about/pining for Mr. Schue? Nowhere. Why doesn’t Rachel ever interact with the members of Glee who she isn’t interested in dating? (Except for Kurt, and this whole pitting the divas against each other thing is pretty lame, too). And when the women do interact, why is it never in a supportive way. Why is Santana calling her pregnant “friend” Tubbers and sexting Puck, who she only seems to want because Quinn wants him?

Show, sometimes you do beautiful, amazing things. Like the performance of “Imagine” tonight, which was touching and lovely. Or giving people who aren’t Rachel or Finn (Artie! Mercedes!! Tina!!!) solos. You have lessons like, you don’t need to be anything more than yourself to succeed. You have beautiful moments between parents and their kids, moments that feel real and how I wish life really was all at the same time (Kurt coming out to his dad, Finn telling his mom about Quinn’s pregnancy). You give otherwise unlikable characters moments that make them more 3D (Puck’s apology to Rachel, Sue’s—admittedly heavy-handed—interactions with her sister) and mostly likable characters a chance to mess up and then learn from their mistakes (Mr. Schue realizing they don’t need over-the-top hairography to shine). The scene where Quinn and Finn talk to her parents after they learn about her pregnancy? Heartbreaking, and so well-done.

There are lots of reasons for me to love you. But show, you really have to work on these stereotypes. I get what you’re trying to do, this “being subversive” thing you want to have going on. It’s just not working. Mostly it doesn’t work in annoying, little ways. Sometimes it doesn’t work in big, race-fail and gender-fail ways. Either way, it’s not working. I watch you because you make me laugh, and sometimes get a little teary, and you have great songs and a really talented cast. But if I keep getting smacked in the face with sketchy race and gender portrayals, there might come a time when those things aren’t enough.

Think about it.

Love,
Stacy

In this week’s FUNday, we put down our already dog-eared copies of Sarah Palin’s memoir for a few moments to return to an old favorite, the zany gag magazine, What The-?!, in which two Alphans appear in cameo.

What The-?! #2
Sep 1988

The Marvel Mag of Mirth and Mayhem! That’s the tag line and the best way to describe this irresistibly silly humor book that lacked all boundaries. Filled with short parody pieces, fake ads, fake letter pages and fake bullpen bulletins, this series relentlessly tore apart anything that wasn’t nailed down while at the same time showcasing the best and most popular creators of the time.

In this issue, Puck appears tiny in the first story in one panel. Also, Shaman (as Talisman) appears in another panel in the fourth story.

The first of four 8-page parody pieces, “Superbman vs. The Fantastical Four” is written and drawn by John Byrne, the most suitable artist for such a piece.  In a back alley near the headquarters building of the Fantastical Four, Doctor Bloom’s elaborate twenty-nine phase plan unravels as Rex Ruthless out-elaborates his logic and precision with an incomprensible, rambling explanation.

As Doctor Bloom gives up, a tiny Puck can be seen holding an “Alan Thicke Fan Club” sign, a shout-out from Byrne to fellow Canadian Alan Thicke, a TV actor who was widely popular as Dr. Jason Seaver on Growing Pains, an ABC sitcom that ran from 1985 to 1991, and was at the height of its popularity in its third season, airing right around the time this issue was published.  Note Puck’s red costume, which may be a miscoloring, as Byrne never had him in red. Puck wouldn’t put on a red costume until Alpha Flight #104 and this issue was concurrent with Alpha Flight #62.

In the fourth story, “Doctor Deranged”, written by Peter Gillis and illustrated by Phil Foglio, Shaman appears in one panel chanting, “Hail to the Sorcerer Supreme!” as he and various other mystics surround [and thoroughly irritate] Doctor Deranged in his Sanctum Sancyouverymuch.  At the time, Shaman was going by Talisman, and can be seen wearing his black and white fur costume.

In the fake Checklist, Alpha Flight is listed as “Alfalfa Flight”, a recycled joke from the previous issue.

Well, that’s all for this week’s FUNday and don’t forget to include this issue as a John Byrne Alpha Flight issue the next time it comes up in an Alpha Flight trivia game!

Thanksgiving is just around the corner!  As we Americans count our many blessings, I think it’s only fitting that we also pause to note just how blessed we are to have Glee in our lives.

Perhaps nothing sums up why the show makes us squeal with delight more than this glowing review by Slate’s Troy Patterson.  He writes:

At its best, Glee is not just entertaining but elating, dramatizing Breakfast Club-quality teen angst with the aid of tight production numbers covering new and classic popular songs. How can you fail to love a show featuring songs from great American writing teams including Bernstein-Sondheim, Kander-Ebb, Lerner-Loewe, Holland-Dozier-Holland, the dudes behind “The Thong Song,” and Steve Perry and his fellow power-balladeers in Journey? The cast covered “Don’t Stop Believin’ ” for the charismatic finale of the series pilot, a scene that will convert any reasonable person to the show’s effusive charm.”

So tell me, when it comes to the show, what are you most thankful – er, Glee-ful – about this year?  Take the time to answer my poll, below. NOTE: Write-in’s are welcome, and encouraged.  In fact, I’ll feature the best answers in an upcoming post.

So start counting those blessings!

What about Glee Are You Most Thankful For?

(polls)

Two sneak peek videos for this week’s episode “Hairography” have been released, one introducing us to one of the competing school’s glee instructors (played by Eve), and one giving us a taste of what Puck and Quinn would be like as parents…and oh yeah, Quinn rocks out to a rather appropriate Madonna hit in the second one, too. You go, girl!

And to help you all end your weekend rather, well, Glee-fully, here’s a grab bag of other goodies!

• For those of you who, like me, think that Jenna Ushkowitz is adorable and underrated, I found a couple of cute interviews with her this week to share. Not only is Jenna hoping for Tina and Artie to get back together, but she’s also hoping to see Tina do something crazy like…join the Cheerios? Check out a video interview with her on Zap 2 It and a Q&A in the New York Post.
• Yahoo! Music recently posted a fantastic short video interview with Lea Michele, Mark Salling, Chris Colfer, Jenna Ushkowitz, and Kevin McHale. Along with the usual talk of how they can’t believe that celebrities they idolize now watch them on TV every week, there are quite a few great moments in this video where they talk about Glee’s role in supporting the underdog and how the show shines a light onto the fact that the majority of people in high school don’t really fit in.
• Cory Monteith, Mark Salling, and Matthew Morrison have jointly gained a position on People magazine’s “Sexiest Men Alive 2009″ list. I’m not disagreeing with that title one itty-bitty bit, but I do wish that the mag had deigned to give them all their own spot. Regardless, watch the photo shoot’s accompanying video, hilariously titled “Glee’s Sexiest ‘Dorks.’”
• Us Weekly has named Glee “Cast of the Year,” and although I can’t read the text on this scan of the article, I still love it because of how ridiculous Kevin McHale looks:

My cousins daughter is the closest thing I have to a niece.  There’s enough difference in our ages; that’s how I think of her.  She too has inherited the family magpie gene.

T-shirts from Targét, to which I added a little more sparkle.  Her favorite colors are lime green and electric blue (thank goodness she’s out of the pink phase!) so I did my best to follow that with the green shirt.

The shirts are not decorated with crystals, but something called rhinestuds.  They are faceted metal, and also hot fix.  Not quite as sparkly as true crystals, but much less expensive, and more prone to staying affixed through multiple washes. Sewing for teenagers is, at best, a temporary thing as their tastes change so frequently.  Decorating something already assembled seemed a much better, and easier way to go.

I am sorely tempted to keep the grey shirt for myself, since it is very much my colors: silver and purple.  So, we shall see what the holidays bring. Maybe she’ll get it, and maybe, she won’t!

Mojo Update: still missing!

Puck scales new heights!

He is so cute as Puck and that is all I know. He can sing to me as much as he wants even though he looks like her brings the douchebaggery often. Honestly he’s hot sex…and that’s all I know. This 20 something can recreate high school memories anytime with me!

I am really glad that GLEE is on the air, and that Fox has picked up the back nine, giving it a full season of 22 episodes.

GLEE is generating a lot of positive buzz and good ratings because the stories tend to be edgy and raunchy, often addressing the ugly realities of real teen issues like popularity, and sexual and religious identity. Sure, the cast looks politically correct (There’s a guy in a wheelchair, as well as various ethnic minorities!), but the way the kids are treated is so not PC. Artie’s (Kevin McHale) wheelchair was wedged into a portable toilet by “pranksters,” for example. This week’s episode, in which cool kids Finn (Cory Monteith) and Quinn (Dianna Agron) were knocked to the bottom of the social totem pole because of their association with glee club, was hilarious. From quarterback and head cheerleader to objects of ridicule and slushie attacks overnight!

Of course the songs are always a highlight, but I have to give special props to Puck’s (Mark Salling) rendition of “Sweet Caroline,” which was possibly better than Neil Diamond himself, and will make you forget every time you had to suffer through some drunken rendition of it at karaoke night. Will (Matthew Morrison, ex-Adam, ATWT) busted a move like Young MC, and Emma (HEROES’ Jayma Mays) finally got to strut her vocal stuff. I could have watched all night…

“I don’t know why I find his stupidity charming… I mean, he’s cheating off a girl who thinks the square root of four is rainbows.  I guess that’s love for you.”

– Kurt

Mr. Shue announces that there’s a new rule at Sectionals this year: everyone has to sing a ballad.  Consequently he wants the glee club to pair off and practice singing ballads with emotion.  He makes the glee club draw names to figure out who their ballad partners are, with hilarious results.  (Finn draws Kurt, whose eyes sparkle.)  Rachel is stuck with Mr. Shue, to his chagrin.  They sing an awkward but beautiful rendition of “Endless Love” and weird things start to happen in Rachel’s head.

Quinn gets ready for the Chastity Ball with her mom, who seems perplexed by her weight gain.  Her parents are obviously the last people on earth who don’t know she’s preggo, and they’re hilarious!  (“Honey, Glenn Beck is on!”)

Rachel oddly develops a crush on Mr. Shue, which creeps him out.  He seeks advice from Emma, who tells him to sing to Rachel how he feels.  (Of COURSE.)  He sings her a mashup version of “Don’t Stand So Close to Me” and “Young Girl” which, frankly, I could live without, but which makes Rachel (and Emma) crush harder.

In a big development, Finn’s mom walks in on him singing (a lovely version of the Pretenders’ “I’ll Stand by You”) to the baby via computer sonogram (notice the wonderful Mac product placement!).  And voila!  Finn’s mom now knows.

Kurt, madly crushing on Finn, tries to help him with his baby daddy problems.  (Interesting aside: They discover they have something in common: both of them have lost a parent.)  Kurt advises Finn to sing an explanation about the situation to the Fabrays when he dines with them and Quinn before the Chastity Ball.  In a scene reminiscent of the worst nightmare one could imagine, he has a panic attack in the guest bathroom, calls Kurt for motivation (“OK, I have to go now; they’ll think I’m pooping”) and serenades Quinn with “Havin’ My Baby” as her incredulous parents look on.

Mr. Shue is surprised at home by Rachel, who has charmed her way into the Shue household in an attempt to get closer to him.  (Will: “You are not allowed to turn her into your slave because you have this irrational fear of me leaving you!” Terri: “Why not, if it’s a win-win for everyone?  She’s a really good cook!”)

What was at first humorous quickly turns horrifying as Quinn’s parents, enraged, throw both Finn and Quinn out of their house.  In a touching moment, Finn’s mom welcomes her to stay with them “for as long as you need to, honey.”

Another huge development is dropped in our laps as Puck, in a fit of frustration, blurts out to Mercedes that HE is the real Baby Daddy.  Shocked, she then gives him a bit of advice: to leave Quinn alone, since by choosing to acknowledge Finn as the father, she has made it clear that she wants nothing to do with him.  (Can’t wait to see how this one plays out…)

Rachel receives advice from an unexpected source about the perils of pursuing an older, unavailable man like Mr. Shue, and promptly comes to her senses.

The episode ends as the glee gang cheers up Quinn and Finn with a glorious performance of “Lean on Me”.

“Ballad”

November 18th, 2009

If you were to go back to the pilot, you would believe that Rachel Berry was the heart and soul of Glee. At that point, she was the person who most believed in Glee club, who saw it as the only place where she wasn’t the subject of ridicule and where she could express herself in the way she most desired.

But since that point, Rachel has become almost heartless. She turned her back on Glee club to join Sandy Ryerson’s musical, and she’s generally judgmental and frustrating before she’s caring or supportive. And yet, because Rachel is the strongest soloist (only Mercedes) on Glee, she’s remained at the centre of storylines and the club itself even while she seems convinced it’s actually holding her back from something better. It’s created a scenario where Rachel isn’t actually likeable, which is somewhat problematic if she’s supposed to be our heroine.

“Ballad” is a continuation of this theme, as a Glee Club exercise has everyone singing emotional ballads that bring out their deepest insecurities (in pretty uniformly effective ways) while Rachel is stuck in a “Hot for Teacher” scenario that never successfully bridges the comic and the dramatic (tears aside). I’m all for the show integrating more comedy than last week’s more emotional episode, and parts of this week’s entry nicely balance the two even with a lot of musical numbers involved, but Rachel’s storyline is effectively emotion-free, something that’s going to grow more and more problematic as we move forward.

There’s a moment at the end of Rachel’s storyline where Susie Pepper (played with verve by Sarah Drew) tells it like it is to Rachel, arguing that her crush on Will is all an attempt to boost her deflated self esteem. In that moment the episode tries to argue that Rachel’s craziness is, in fact, character development, and that all of her mean-spirited behaviour and insanity should be viewed as self doubt and insecurity. However, one of the problems that Glee has is that it sometimes goes too far with its comedy for me to buy such a tidy conclusion: while other characters in the episode get detailed sequences where they are able to confide in friends or confront their families about their problems, Rachel is left to be psycho-analyzed by a crazy girl caricature. Glee is fully capable of earning substantial character development with these teenagers, but tacking on rushed self-realization to an almost farcical story isn’t cutting it.

It’s not that dissimilar, in some ways, to what Brad Falchuk (who wrote and directed the episode) did with “The Rhodes Not Taken,” which introduced April Rhodes as a sort of “Look what Rachel could become in the future” story. Even there, though, Falchuk didn’t seem to know how to really connect the two characters through anything but song, and here the connection between Susie Pepper and Rachel never really goes beyond their shared insanity. Rachel has yet to have a legitimate personal connection with any character but Finn on this show, and it’s turning her into an island. I thought that Lea Michele did a great job with the comic elements of this week’s story, especially her “performance” during “Endless Love” as she descended into crazy eyes in a slow and hilarious fashion. And she also nailed the emotional moment she was given with Will at the end, so it’s not as if there was an issue of execution here. Instead, it was simply that the rest of the episode around her had emotional moments that felt infinitely more genuine, and which the show took infinitely more seriously, creating a gap that the vanity of both this week’s episode and the Rachel of previous weeks kept her from overcoming.

The real problem, of course, is how strong the material was for the other major storyline of the episode, as Quinn and Finn end up telling their respective parents that they’re having a baby in highly inappropriate ways. The show struggled a bit here, too, in terms of balancing comedy and drama, considering that Finn singing to a sonogram was enormously creepy and Finn announcing her pregnancy at the dinner table in front of her paranoid parents was the sort of inappropriate thing that even Finn, who has been labeled stupid by the show, should have realized was a terrible, terrible idea. And yet, the difference between this story and the Rachel story is that the emotional conclusion felt earned, delivered with both subtle acceptance (Finn’s mother) and outright rage (Quinn’s father).

The scene with Finn and Quinn sitting there as her father berates them was a powerhouse piece of acting from Dianna Agron, who has really come into her own once they got her out of the cheerleading uniform. Gregg Henry was bringing everything he had as her unaccepting father, the Indians game story all but ripping Quinn’s heart out, and Quinn giving it right back and attacking her Mother for not saying something even when she clearly knew something was up was effective and powerful. While some criticized the show for becoming too dramatic last week, and for falling too heavily into melodramatic storylines like “Fake Baby” and “Not Really Finn’s Baby,” these are the sorts of scenes that remind you that the show is fully capable of delivering on the dramatic storylines when it wants to. While the hyperactive nature of the universe meant that the scene was a bit shinier and glossier, the quality of the scene was closer to something like Friday Night Lights than it was to something schlockier, and that’s obviously a high compliment.

I also thought this storyline was solid because it never stopped being comic leading up to that moment. While the “Fake Baby” scenario has all but poisoned Terri as a character (the one mention we got of it here made me shiver), this storyline has brought out some great shades of Quinn and Finn both. When Finn goes into the bathroom to call Kurt to figure out what he should do, and he ends the call quickly because “they’ll think I’m pooping,” it’s a funny line that immediately moves into a more dramatic sequence. While Rachel’s character has lost its heart, a character like Finn has been able to remain charming through his naivete and relative stupidity, and there’s never a doubt that he is being earnest with his efforts to provide for Quinn and this child (even if he should be less earnest when singing to Sonograms – seriously, creeped me the hell out). And while Quinn may have started out as a cold-hearted cheerleader, moments like last week’s flirtation with Puck and this week’s scene with her Mother have made her arguably an even warmer character than Rachel, even with her angry side. These two are trapped in what could be a downright terrible storyline, but “Ballad” shows that the writers aren’t interested in delaying the inevitable (informing the parents sooner rather than later) and making the same mistakes they made with Terri’s fake baby.

In terms of the other storylines running throughout the episode, I thought that Puck telling Mercedes about being the father of the baby was an intriguing moment, if only because it throws another secret into the mix and it starts to involve characters who aren’t pregnant/virile into the whole mess. However, as much as I enjoy the general principle of adding new characters into the storyline to make it more relevant, I will admit that Kurt’s love affair with Finn is sort of fizzling out for me. Yes, Kurt had some great one-liners, and the idea of him flirting with Finn (and Finn not really knowing what to do with it) is funny, but to have him legitimately fall in love with him (which is only going to end in heartbreak) is pretty much the same as Rachel falling in love with Will, and yet the show treats one as crazy and the other as almost romantic.

I think Kurt deserves to find love, but the show placing Kurt in the On Deck circle waiting for Quinn to strike out creates the sort of scenario that feels like a waste of the character (kind of like Mercedes convincing herself that she was in love with Kurt, for that matter). The show needs to introduce another gay character into the mix so that Kurt can truly fall in love, as pining after a straight dude is funny when it’s played for comedy but less productive when played for drama. On the other hand, conversely, Puck’s little moment singing to Quinn at the end is the sort of relationship that’s great to have under the surface because the romantic tension is both dramatic (the love triangle) and legitimate (as seen in last week’s food fight). I don’t see why Finn and Kurt can’t just be friends, as it maintains great scenes like Kurt helping Finn pick a song or a suit but without the futile romantic undertones. The scene in Finn’s basement was about two people bonding over parents who left them, and it reminded us that Finn needs a father right now, and that Kurt can relate to the loss of a parent and what that means for them. To add the awkward touching to the scene isn’t serving any real purpose, and if anything strains their charming and enjoyable friendship in a way which complicates without improving.

And while that covers most of the character notes, I want to talk about the rather extensive use of music in the episode. “Lean on Me” fits into the usual pattern of an uplifting final song bringing all of the other characters together (See “Somebody to Love,” “Keep Me Holding On,” “Proud Mary,” etc.), but many others were played out within the context of the episode itself. Turning the music into a sort of Glee Club homework assignment didn’t work as well in “Vitamin D,” where it seemed to overcomplicate the episode, but here the episode used “Endless Love” to start the Rachel/Will storyline and then complicated it with the “Young Girl/Don’t Stand So Close To Me” mashup, while using “I’ll Stand By You” and “(You’re) Having My Baby” to give Finn a voice in the episode. Overall, the music was a nice thematic fit for the various sequences, although I have two nitpicks.

First, I’m tired of mashups: they’re not nearly as great as the show things they are, and while they’re almost always well put together I’d have much rather had Will just sing “Don’t Stand So Close to Me” for the sake of the show resisting the Mashup trend. Second, and more problematically, the overproduction of the numbers got in the way here. It’s one thing when it’s the entire Glee Club performing “Lean on Me,” or something taking place in an auditorium (or meant to be played up as dramatic like “Endless Love”). But Finn’s performance in front of Quinn’s parents would have been far more genuine if he had been singing it live, with imperfections and nervousness and actual character. The production effectively strips the character out of these numbers, and while Matthew Morrison, Lea Michele and extensive voiceover work made “Endless Love” more personal, Finn had none of the same and I thought the number was weak as a result. The show would be infinitely more effective if it started to differentiate between these elements, as it would make both types of performance stand out that much more.

Overall, though, a solid episode: it has the trademark unevenness in places, sure, but it was inoffensive in terms of the problematic storylines and had a number of strong dramatic storylines while not failing to bring the funny either (I’ll get to jokes in the bullets).

Cultural Observations

• An entire episode without Sue Sylvester, which was good for the sake of the episode (she wasn’t needed), but always a bit of a disappointment.
• However, Brittany has really developed into a great comic talent. There was nothing elegant about Brittany’s jokes in the opening sequence, but her belief that “ballad” was a word for a male duck (that’s a mallard, Brittany) was really just a bit of foreshadowing for her hushed “I bet the duck’s in the hat” when Will goes to draw names. Just a really fun little comic bit, and the kind of clever humour I like the see the show go for over broader comedy.
• Charlotte Ross and Gregg Henry were great casting for Quinn’s parents, as was Sarah Drew for Susie Pepper – part of me feels as if Glee could pull a Freaks and Geeks/Friday Night Lights and pick up an Emmy for Best Casting, as it’s really been across the board great (plus the casting agents are always given credit for finding good young talent).
• Both Terri and Emma had hints of their past storylines with Will in the episode (Terri’s bloody puss evasion, and Emma being just as sucked in by Will’s song and dance as Rachel was), but the episode wasn’t about them and so it didn’t bother going into them. This is a good development, as Jayma Mays was allowed to remain charming without being turned into a homewrecker and there were even a few moments where I remembered how potentially interesting Terri was (being crazy but in an ultimately sane way) before the hysterical pregnancy.
• I saw a few people on Twitter mention this, but the cameraman during the dinner table sequence at Quinn’s house was having a seizure: the show’s had some bad shaky cam in the past, but this was perhaps the worst we’ve seen, and it made no sense in the context of the scene. I know I compared it to Friday Night Lights above, but this is not actually that show, and it doesn’t work for me.

]]> http://alphaflightcollector.wordpress.com/2009/11/16/happy-canada-day-or-is-it-funday/ Tue, 17 Nov 2009 04:07:38 +0000 rplass http://alphaflightcollector.wordpress.com/2009/11/16/happy-canada-day-or-is-it-funday/

This week is FUNday’s 8th weekly post and possibly one of the longest, since I decided to transcribe large portions of text from this week’s issue. How is typing out all those words so much fun? No, that’s not fun, that’s work! Right, uh, except no one pays me for this, therefore it’s fun!

Marvel Age #31
Oct 1985

Marvel Age was a monthly series featuring previews of upcoming comics, news articles about various subjects, advertisements, humorous pieces, and the occasional interview with creators and Marvel staff. Long removed from the Internet age, it was a great way (sometimes the ONLY way) to get news about what was going on in the world of Marvel Comics. This issue has a few Alpha Flight images, two interviews and cartoon Puck on the back.

In Marvel Age #29, Jim Salicrup included a Top Ten list for Marvel Sales on the inside front cover, where Alpha Flight ranked #6. Unfortunately, that data was aggregated over a few months, likely so he could put Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars at number one. In this issue, the list is just the top ten best-selling Direct Sales titles for April 1985.  Individual issues are listed, not titles:

1. Secret Wars II #2
2. X-Men #196
3. New Mutants #30
4. Alpha Flight #25
5. Web of Spider-Man #5
6. Elfquest #1
7. Fantastic Four #281
8. Amazing Spider-Man #267
9. Iron Man #197
10. Thor #358

Alpha Flight moves up in the ranks to #4! For the record, in Marvel Age #30, Alpha Flight #24 was in the #5 position of the Top Ten titles sold only through Direct Sales outlets (not including newsstand nor subscription figures). So in 3 months, Alpha Flight moved from #6 to #5 to #4!

This issue was concurrent with Alpha Flight #27 and solicited issue #28 in the section, “Marvel Coming Attractions” with text set inside its own yellow highlighted block:

ALPHA FLIGHT #28 – The Beyonder! Alpha Flight! Omega Flight! And all of them are against the Hulk! You’ll never believe how this saga ends! You’ll never believe how this saga begins! But whatever you do, you’ll never forgive yourself if you miss “Cross-Over” written and drawn by John Byrne with an inking assist by Keith Williams. 65¢.

On the bottom of the page, a panel taken from Alpha Flight #28 is shown with Mister Jeffries’ hand in the foreground and the caption, “ALPHA FLIGHT meets THE INCREDIBLE HULK – the hard way!” Notice how the figure on the screen is colored green in the solicit but neutrally colored in the actual comic. Not as if it weren’t known who the figure was supposed to be, especially after the interviews below, but the neutral color sustains a bit more suspense for both the reader and the characters in the story for the ending of Alpha Flight #28. There’s just a completely different reaction to a green figure (oh, that’s the Hulk) than the neutral one (gee I wonder, who or what is that?), and I’m glad the actual version was published that way. Both panels are shown below for your viewing pleasure.

Marvel Age #31 version: Oh, that's the Hulk

Alpha Flight #28 version : Gee I wonder, who or what is that?

Two interviews regarding the Alpha Flight/Hulk creative team switch follow, a 3-page John Byrne piece by Dwight Jon Zimmerman and a 1-page Bill Mantlo piece by Kurt Busiek. Here is the portion of the John Byrne interview pertaining to Alpha Flight:

     How did the HULK/ALPHA FLIGHT cross-over come about?
     It started with me realizing that I was fast approaching the end of my Alpha Flight stories. You see, I had a specific number of stories in mind when I started ALPHA FLIGHT. As it turned out, a couple of those stories, when they were produced, generated other tales, so I actually remained with ALPHA FLIGHT longer than I anticipated. Even so, I realized a couple of months back that I was reaching that cut-off point for me, after which I’d have no more Alpha Flight stories to tell. So I started asking myself what I wanted to do after ALPHA FLIGHT? At one time, I would have said THOR. But THOR is in really good hands with Walt Simonson right now.
     Then I remembered the Hulk. I was lying on my bed staring at the ceiling and wondering what I would do with the Hulk. And it was as if someone had knocked over a domino in my head. Suddenly I had about fourteen issues worth of stories formulated. I soon started hounding HULK editor Carl Potts, asking him if Bill Mantlo was tired of writing the Hulk yet. Bill, of course, wasn’t. But Carl jokingly suggested that I call up Bill and ask him if he wanted to trade THE INCREDIBLE HULK for ALPHA FLIGHT. That’s what I did. After Bill got over the surprise, he called me back and told me that both he and Mike Mignola, the Hulk’s penciler, would love to swap.
     As the plans started to firm up, we decided to make everything a literal cross-over of characters, creative and editorial teams.
     Is the cross-over going to be double-sized?
     No, it will appear in two regular-sized issues. One of THE INCREDIBLE HULK and one of ALPHA FLIGHT. We will show two sides of the same story that month. Basically it’s a fishing story where the Alpha Flight crew is fishing around in an alien dimension trying to find a new body for Langkowski and they hook something. What they hook is the Hulk. So in THE INCREDIBLE HULK #313, we get his side of the story about his being hooked, and in ALPHA FLIGHT #28, we get Alpha Flight’s side of things as they do the hooking.
     It must have taken some pretty close plot coordination.
     Pretty close, yes. It was lucky, really, because we happened to hit a time for both Bill and myself when we were able to slip this scenario into our continuities. Unconsciously, our storylines were actually all in position, so we didn’t have to spend hours burning the midnight oil to try and fit everything together. It was one of those Marvel serendipity things where once it was conceived, it fell right into place.
     With ALPHA FLIGHT, what are the major plot threads that you’ll be finishing?
     Actually, I’ll be doing less wrapping up than I will be dangling story threads that Bill wants me to dangle. I’ve pretty much tied up everything I wanted to do. Bill told me a few things that he would like to have happen that he wanted to pick up on. So I started to add those elements in. Anything that has a Bill Mantlo plot twist in the ALPHA FLIGHT stories I’ve done also has a Bill Mantlo plot credit.
     Could you give us any examples?
     Bill wants to concentrate more on Shaman than Talisman. So we concocted a way of taking care of Shaman and Talisman at the same time. Bill also wanted me to bring Snowbird back. I had originally intended to leave her out for a while, so I changed plans there.
     What will happen to Talisman?
     What happens to Talisman will be tied into the SECRET WARS II continuity. My last issue of ALPHA FLIGHT is also the SECRET WARS II cross-over. I will say this, Talisman won’t be killed. There has been enough death in Alpha Flight during my tenure. I’ll let Bill handle any new killing.

On the following page, the Alpha Flight title block and four title box floating heads appear: Heather, Aurora, Talisman and Box (who was occupied by Walter in the concurrent issue #27 and part of the solicited issue #28 until Roger Bochs jumped in and Walter jumped out into the fishing line, so it’s not clear which Box’s head that is). Ironically, the floating heads were drawn by John Byrne on the Bill Mantlo page. Byrne’s floating heads would continue to appear in the title box through Alpha Flight #31.

Here is the full Bill Mantlo interview:

     One of the biggest surprises of the year is that Bill Mantlo and Mike Mignola, the creative team on THE INCREDIBLE HULK, and John Byrne, writer / artist of ALPHA FLIGHT, are switching assignments. Starting with HULK #313 and ALPHA FLIGHT #28, John will be bringing you the adventures of Marvel’s anti-social green goliath and Bill and Mike will be chronicling the exploits of Canada’s greatest heroes. We collared Bill Mantlo in the offices one Monday afternoon shortly after we heard the news, to find out what’s in store for the northern stars.
     I know it’s a little soon for you to have worked out all your plans, Bill, but can you tell us anything about what’s coming up in ALPHA FLIGHT?
     We have a lot of ideas. We’re not sure exactly how soon eadh [sic] idea is going to be put into the process. Essentially, my feeling about ALPHA FLIGHT is that John did a spectacular job. That’s straight from the shoulder – I think it’s some of the finest writing I’ve read in a long time. But I think you had to read it consecutively. You had to sit down as I did, and read ALPHA FLIGHT #1-20, in order to get a grasp on the organic maturation of his characters. It was extremely difficult to follow what he was doing on ALPHA FLIGHT from issue to issue, because he never really concentrated on the team. He concentrated on individual members and their problems. And after awhile, even I, who read it religiously, lost track completely of who was in the book and who was a member of ALPHA FLIGHT, and what the team was.
     Our first job is going to be to pull the team together, to give them a reason for existence, a location, a headquarters. Probably they will be funded by the government. Whether that is a generous gesture on the part of the government, or whether there is some subterfuge involved in forming this team again, is something that we’re going to develop.
     Once they’re held together as a team, they will act as a team. If one of them has a problem, that problem will involve the whole team, instead of specific individual adventures as you’ve seen in the first two years of ALPHA FLIGHT. The whole team will go solve Snowbird’s problem, or find out what Snowbird’s problem is. The whole team will go on a Puck adventure, instead of Puck going off and leaving the team at home.
     Some characters will remain, some charcters [sic] will go. I think John has already dealt with Sasquatch – he will not be returning. Northstar will probably meet his demise, as something from his past surfaces. Snowbird is going to think that she’s dying, but that’s actually a prelude to some major changes in her life and character. A major villain, tentatively called Pestilence at this point, is going to be introduced. I don’t think the book has had a major villain except for the Master. We’re not sure what to do bout Marrina. We’ve got a lot for plans for Box, the robotic member of Beta Flight. He’s going to be reintroduced.
     I want to deal with Beta and Gamma Flight, and Omega Flight, find out who these people are, and . . . Where is the government raising these people with bizarre powers, and what is it raising them for, and what does it mean that now they’re re-funding Alpha Flight? Is it because they’re using Alpha Flight as a control group, or do they want to study Alpha Flight and find the secret to their powers and create new super heroes, or what? We don’t know. That’s all stuff we want to find out.
     They will become more closely linked to the Marvel Universe, in that there will be a few cross-overs. There’s already an ALPHA FLIGHT / X-MEN project in the works that Chris Claremont and John Byrne did. We will pick up on elements of that, and may have them meet other Marvel heroes, although not too many.
     There’ll be an international sense. The book has been predominantly located in Canada so far, with one or two trips to the United States. But Canada is closer to, say, the Soviet Union or Greenland or Europe than we are, in many ways. You go right over the top of Canada to shoot an ICBM from the United States to the Soviet Union. We’ll probably do stories that deal with that notion of pan-globalism, and how Canada’s tied up with the international scene.
     So there’s a lot of ideas – we just haven’t put them into specific stories yet. Guardian will be back, in some form. Not the Guardian you know and love, but . . .
     That’ll be a big development certainly.
     I think that’s where we’re going. In fact, we’re here today to discuss the nuts and bolts of what happens now, to discuss the cross-over where John and Mike and I will actually switch titles, our first issue of ALPHA FLIGHT will hit. Apparently the book is doing remarkably well, and has a loyal following. I’d like to win back people who bought a team book, and then saw it devolve into indivdual [sic] stories, and I’d like to win new readers who might not like super hero books, but are going to find that this is a different kind of super-team book. It’s not THE AVENGERS or THE FANTASTIC FOUR or THE X-MEN. It’s a completely different slant towards telling super hero stories.

And now, the moment you’ve been waiting for, the FUN part of today’s FUNday post! The calendar! The back pages of many Marvel Age issues featured a comical calendar with staff birthdays, one-liner jokes and parodies of various Marvel characters. The back cover of this issue had a calendar for July 1985 featuring cartoon Puck on the 1st, celebrating Canada Day, which is, uh, the day Canada signed the Magna Carta and Quebec became independent from France in 1492, or something like that, whatever. I really should have waited until it were July 1 to post this, but I’m pretty sure that in modern times, Canada Day got moved to some other date after the Queen conquered the Duke of Calgary in the Battle of Halifax in 1776, so it doesn’t matter. Credits for the calendar are w-Jim Salicrup, a-Ron Zalme and c-Andy Yanchus.

Every goalie wants to be the hero. Every goalie wants to be the best ever. No goalie ever wants to feel humiliated on the ice. How does one achieve that? Wouldn’t all of us goalies like to know?

Well, I’ve been goaltending for about four years in recreational leagues now and I realistically know I will never be a professional. But I’ve gone from being a train wreck between the pipes to even-tempered and calm in the face of distress. And in the process I have learned to enjoy the game more and not get frazzled whether I’m one minute of game play away from achieving the S word (shhh, we can’t say it until we actually get it) or if my team is getting slammed 5 to nothing in the first.

Goaltending can be the most challenging and rewarding of all positions in the wonderful sport of hockey. But it’s no fun if your ego is constantly getting in the way. That’s what Zennin’ is all about. It’s staying in the present and focusing on the puck that’s in front of you instead of the ten behind you.

How does one actualize this mindfulness and just play for the moment? You may be able to have an occasional game where everything seems to go your way and you appear to be in the zone, but it takes a lot of practice to be able to do this consistently. The good news is that it is achievable and you can practice Zennin’ wherever you are and with whatever you are doing. Take notice every time throughout the day that you are far away in your brain from where you physically are. It’s like when you are driving and you check out for ten minutes and finally come to and wonder how you didn’t crash because you were not even aware that you were driving. That’s kind of like what can happen when you get scored on. For that quick second in a blink of an eye, you lose sight of the puck because of all that psychological muck in your head and in goes the frozen rubber.

I personally feel that a goalie’s mental game is more important than his or her physical game. Case in point. I had to face a penalty shot from a guy who could have picked any corner that he wanted to score on me. What did I do? Well, I didn’t freak out. That’s what I didn’t do.  Instead I attempted to make my five foot two, 135 pound body look as big as possible and came out of my net with confidence.  I didn’t budge when the player tried to deke me and instead stayed centered on the puck. And what did he do? The dude lost the puck and didn’t even get a shot off.

I challenge you to think of the worst game you’ve ever played in net and consider what kind of thoughts were going through your head. Were you telling yourself, “I suck! I give up!” and obsessing about the last goal that you should have stopped? Or maybe you were thinking, “My defense sucks!” That’s possible, too. But either way, you weren’t focusing on the puck. You weren’t present and aware of your surroundings. You were living in your head instead of in the game.

When I first started playing goalie I was a whack job. I  only felt as good as my last game. If I had a great game with some great saves, I felt like a bad ass. But then if I had a horrible swiss cheese game, I felt so small and stupid and would convince myself that I was the worst human being ever. Goalies, you know it. The life of goaltending can be such an emotional rollercoaster. But it doesn’t have to be. Not if you’re Zennin’.

I am way more serene with my play now. And because I am more collected and less invested in the outcome of the score, as a goalie I perform much better. Consequently, I also derive more pleasure from the game itself.  The last game I goaltended I was on the losing end of a 9 to 0 game. But I came out of it with a smile on my face. I played the best game I could, I didn’t give up, and I didn’t take myself so seriously. (Instead I chuckled to myself when my teammates played like spazzes on the ice, whiffing at the pucks and falling flat on their faces. It was quite entertaining. I’ll have to tell you about this game in full detail another time so you don’t think I’m a schmuck for laughing at my players’ expenses.)

So, stay tuned for masses of puckstopping enlightenment on how to be an exceptional goalie by staying present and appreciating the game no matter what the score. Just remember. It’s all about the Zen!

“Being different made me stronger… at the end of the day, it’s what’s gonna get me out of this cow town.”

- Kurt

“Wheels” opens with Quinn glumly watching the Cheerios practice.  She frets to Finn about the expenses accompanying the pregnancy (she’s been hiding the bills from her parents) and asks him when he’s going to man up and support her.

Meanwhile Mr. Shue begs Principal Figgins for money to pay for a bus to properly transport Artie (and the rest of the kids) to sectionals, but Figgins says it’s a no-go due to budget cuts.  The glee club has to raise money to pay for the bus, Shue announces at practice, but everyone balks.  Consequently Artie stays behind after classes change and breaks into a heart-stopping rendition of “Dancing With Myself.”

Tensions grow as competitors line up to earn rights to sing “Defying Gravity,” the Wicked hit selected as the solo for sectionals … and which Mr. Shue has earmarked for Rachel, clueless about the favoritism he’s displaying.  Kurt professes his plans to Mr. Shue at practice.  Shue brushes him off, saying, “Kurt, there’s a high F in it.”  Kurt confidently responds that it’s “well within my range.”

Kurt confides in his dad (so refreshing that he is okay with Kurt’s gayness!) about his disappointment at not being allowed to compete for a girl’s part.  His dad offers encouraging words (“You sing like a girl … in a good way.”)  Kurt’s dad complains to the school – it’s discrimination after all.  Shue owns up to the unfairness of it all and agrees to let Rachel and Kurt duke it out.

Disheartened by the glee club’s insensitivity toward Artie’s plight, Shue forces every member to use a wheelchair for at least three hours of the day and announces that they’ll also do a wheelchair number. The glee clubbers soon come to empathize the challenges Artie faces every day.  Later, in a priceless scene with Tina the Stutterer, we finally learn how Artie came to be in a wheelchair after all (car accident) and he provides the best line of the night (sorry, you’ll have to watch it on DVR).

Puck slips Quinn some money, saying” I was getting that you kind of need money, for our kid.”  But Quinn brushes him off, saying: “I don’t care if that baby comes out with a Mohawk; I will go to my grave swearing it’s Finn’s.”  However, the scene ends with a seductive and flirty egg-and-flour fight between the parental units in the Home Ec room, which Finn intercepts.  Eyebrows rise.

Principal Figgins is so inspired by Shue’s wheelchair mandate that he orders Coach Sylvester to do something similarly bold with the Cheerios auditions: opening them to the public.  She storms off in a huff.

Puck and Finn come to blows after Finn complains one too many times about being picked on by Quinn for being too poor to support the baby on the way.  (Seems Finn is a little too dense to wonder why Puck is taking such an interest.)  Determined to help out his baby mama pay the bills, Puck decides to add a little somethin’ somethin’ to the glee club’s bake sale cupcakes: weed, scored from the always-colorful Sandy Ryerson in a brilliant exchange. (Wheelchair-bound Puck: “The doctors say the shark fractured my spinal cord!”  Sandy, empathizing: “This is why I don’t go to the aquarium!”)  Like clockwork, cupcake sales soar.

Puck offers Quinn the cupcake money to show her that “family comes first.”  Touched, she compliments him for his efforts but says he’s too good a person to take money from a friend in a wheelchair.  Another flirtatious moment passes as Finn approaches with news he’s got a job, thanks to Rachel encouraging a local restaurant to hire him (“My friend Finn is handi-capable… My dads are gay, and unless you want the full force of the American Civil Liberties Union coming down on you… I’d work something out.”)

The Diva Off results in heartbreak, as Kurt purposely blunders the high F out of worry that his dad is getting harassed because of him (in the form of anonymous calls at work).

“That’s enough for the short bus AND two cases of Natty Light for the ride home!” says Puck as he presents the bake sale money to Artie on behalf of the glee club.  But Artie turns it down, asking that instead it be used for a handicapped ramp in the auditorium to benefit all of the kids with disabilities in the school.  He and Tina later share a romantic kiss – and some poignant words – but the moment quickly turns sour.

Coach Sylvester, following Figgins’ orders, carries out a seemingly nefarious plot to select a “special needs” cheerleader at her forced open auditions.  To Shue, it looks like she’s only doing it to prove a point about the pointlessness of political correctness.  Later, she mysteriously donates a large chunk of money to pay for the handicapped bus, to the consternation of Mr. Shue and Principal Figgins, who are convinced she’s up to no good.  But in a moment that brought me to tears (yes, I’m emotional and high on cold meds, but still…) we found out that Sue’s got an older sister with Downs Syndrome – and a soft side.

The episode culminates with some truly powerful scenes, including a confrontation between Kurt and his dad, who is upset to learn that he blew the auditions and let Rachel get the solo.  But when Kurt explains, touchingly, that he loves his father more than he loves being the star, we have to hold back tears yet again as we see the gratitude and love creep across his dad’s face: “You are your [late] mother… she was always the strong one.”

We get jolted out of our melancholy funk with another Glee-tastic number: the gang, wheelchairs a-spinnin’, belts out “Rollin’ on the River” with Mercedes and Artie taking the lead.

Photo credit: SpoilerTV

“Wheels”

November 11th, 2009

There’s a moment in “Wheels” where we fear the worst of Sue Sylvester, testing our ability to see past what we expect her character to do (something offensive and mean-spirited) to what she could potentially do (something transformative). And, in some ways, “Wheels” is very much the same sort of proposition. Ever since I learned ahead of time that “Wheels” was written by Ryan Murphy (as the writers appear to be cycling the scripts between the three of them), I have been fearful of when his worst habits (like his penchant for Terri and the more outlandish storylines) would emerge.

So, I spent most of the episode waiting for the episode to take some sort of turn, to go from being charming and funny and resonant to become outlandish and overbearing. I kept thinking that any scene which felt the least bit emotional would suddenly become undercut by something mean or cruel, and that this was all some sort of Sue Sylvester-like trick.

However, it appears that Murphy has been inspired by his fellow writers, because “Wheels” works in ways that Murphy’s previous episodes simply have not. The episode isn’t perfect, trying to do a few too many things at once, but each and every one of those elements manage to connect at som level. It is an episode that more than any other thus far feels as if it works because of, rather than in spite of, the show’s recurring storylines.

This isn’t to say that everything’s rosy, but it is to say that “Wheels” was certainly a watermark for Murphy’s work on the series, and easily the most starkly dramatic hour yet.

The scene I refer to with Sue Sylvester above is perhaps not as ambiguous as I made it out to be, considering that I don’t think even Sue Sylvester would in any way disparage or humiliate someone who has Down Syndrome. And, as it turns out, she was seeing part of her own life in young Becky, as she has a sister who has a disability and who she doesn’t visit as often as she might like. The scene of them together, Sue reading from Little Red Riding Hood and delivering a pom pom, is so blindly dramatic that I was admittedly taken aback: what happened to Ryan Murphy to turn him from the broad comedy of “Vitamin D” or the lightning fast pacing of “Acafellas” to something this emotional and methodical?

The episode is in some ways a greatest hits of sorts, taking some of the strongest elements from previous strong episodes and building an episode around them. Kurt’s relationship with his father was a highlight in “Preggers,” as was a more humanizing look at Quinn’s pregnancy and in particular Finn and Puck’s roles therein. And rather than filling the rest of the episode with love triangles or hysterical pregnancies (both Emma and Terri are completely absent from the episode), the show maintains thematic consistency by bringing Artie to the forefront in much the same way Kurt rose in “Preggers,” giving him a story of his own that also gets turned into a broader theme for the entire episode. The sort of manic pacing that seemed to plague Murphy’s earlier episodes was entirely absent here, letting these types of characters moments shine through.

What worked about the episode was how much of its emotional resonance came through scenes that were almost shockingly normal. The baking goods fight between Quinn and Puck was one of those moments that felt more genuine that many of the other “romantic” scenes that the show has done before, and it was a huge contribution to the eventual sense that we feel bad for Puck. He’s someone who wants to be a father to this baby, and while he may be stealing from a friend in a wheelchair he doesn’t want anyone to think he’s a deadbeat dad. He and Quinn had legitimate chemistry during that fight, and while the scene ends with Finn walking in as is wont to happen in this cliche it allows us as the viewer to see all sides of their conflict. In “Preggers,” this story worked because it gave new depth to these characters, but here it worked even better because previous episodes have given them depth: out of her cheer uniform Quinn is far more nuanced, and now that he had a reformative experience (to some extent) with Rachel Puck seems like his bad boy act is, in fact, just an act.

The episode was similarly strong when it came to Artie’s story, who has been entirely ignored to this point in the series. Ever since the pilot, Kevin McHale has been sitting in that wheelchair for no reason, and the lack of development for his character has always seemed somewhat strange. The show has risked turning him into a stereotype, which is still a problem for most of the Glee club members but seemed particularly problematic for Artie. Here, however, Artie turns into a human being who has feelings (which are hurt when the club refuses to rally around him for a wheelchair accessible bus), urges (an attraction to Tina, who he feels is somewhat like him with her stutter), and a past (where he remembers being able to walk, having only been in the chair for half of his life following a serious car accident).

Notice how these elements are all introduced in different ways. The show uses song, in the form of a lounge version of Billy Idol’s “Dancing with Myself,” to first really bring Artie to the surface of the series, and then by putting everyone else in wheelchairs demonstrates that his life would be hard for anyone else to live. Then it picks up on Artie’s flirtations with Tina and has them have an enormously charming conversation where she asks him about the accident, which is emotional and resonant and then hilariously broken up by Artie ensuring that she knows his man parts are fully functional. It’s a line that’s very in-your-face, very overt, but yet felt like the perfect way to break the tension of that scene: Artie likes this girl, and is still an awkward teenage kid wheelchair or no wheelchair, so he says something stupid that, conveniently for the show, is hilarious for the audience.

And what works perhaps best of all is that Artie and Tina aren’t given a happy ending. While I thought the scene was perhaps a bit over the top with the theme that those going through something can’t possibly relate to those who aren’t (Finn unable to relate with Quinn, Glee being unable to relate with Artie), Tina’s honesty about her stuttering nicely reminded us that not everything goes smoothly, and that although Tina thought she was doing the right thing she hit a nerve with Artie that wasn’t something he could do. Note how, in the scene, Artie wheels away and Tina stands to go after him: it’s not the most subtle thing you could imagine, but it points out that these people are different, and that these sorts of differences don’t just go away due to a high school crush or anything else. It’s the same lesson Puck learns when he discovers that money isn’t enough for Quinn to view him as a potential father for her child, and that Finn’s earnest efforts are what she has decided should be her child’s future, and although it’s not exactly rocket science it’s something that resonates through the characters on a fairly human level.

As far as the other major storyline in the episode goes, with Kurt and Rachel squaring off on “Defying Gravity,” I think it has one major problem. That problem is that Rachel, although part of major storylines and central to many episodes, is not actually a developed character. In a situation like this one, she does become a Diva, in the sense that you can’t foresee a scenario where you would want her to beat Kurt, who is trying to prove himself worthy and who is trying to make his father proud. For the storyline to completely work, we needed to see why Rachel would want to win that solo outside of being selfish and desiring to be a star. There was a scene where Rachel notes that she doesn’t like being at the whim of Will’s quests for fairness, and I think that’s a valid argument, but the show never really lets Rachel make it nor does it give her anyone to really back her up.

The Kurt side of the story, as it was in Preggers, was legitimately great. Scenes like Kurt standing alone at the piano trying to hit the High F nicely captured his internal struggle, while his conversations with his father maintained the tone from the end of “Preggers” where his father only wants to see him be happy and to try to honour his wife’s memory by doing right by their son. The father is still wonderfully skeptical about it all, but he’s so earnest (an important quality for this show, overall) about it that you can’t help but smile. When Kurt eventually loses the part in the “Diva Off” after failing to hit the high note in question, it is perhaps a bit too predictably to keep his father from getting even more flack about his sexuality, but the scene hit so well emotionally that I’ll take it.

And yet, through all of this, the episode also had the gall to try to personalize one of the other Cheerios in Glee Club. Brittany got to be both a friend of Becky’s, buying her a cupcake and introducing her into the story, and someone who doesn’t know her right from her left. No, it’s not the most complex character development of all, but the episode was really interesting in that it really did seem to focus on a lot of side character. The final “Proud Mary” number was a fine example of this, as the bulk of the sung was performed by Mercedes (which made the most sense for the song), Artie (which made sense considering the chosen mode of transportation for the song) and Tina (which makes less sense, but works considering she was an important part of the episode). No, it’s not new to have Mercedes central, but this is one of the first “big” numbers that got a fairly lengthy run time which had no Rachel or Finn, which I think is nice to see in general.

Sure, the episode had a few faults: Finn getting a job due to being in a wheelchair promises to extend the wheelchair gimmick beyond its welcome, and the Principal seemed a wee bit too impulsive to justify some of the story leaps. But there was no moment where it seemed like characters were acting like caricatures, and more importantly there was no moment where one element of the show felt like it was fighting around rather than working with the others. Now, this is in an episode that sidelined all of Will’s drama, even in places (like Terri’s offer to pay Quinn’s bills) which the show has implied were its domain in the past. While Murphy claims that this is the kind of tone he wants to strike going forward, this was a very isolated example that can’t be recreated every week without turning into a cliche of its own, albeit one I enjoy when it’s well-executed.

But it was an episode that fits into what I most enjoy about Glee: a story of high school kids trying to find themselves, told through a somewhat fantastical but ultimately grounded perspective punctuated by musical numbers. The episode hit all of these beats without feels as if it was drumming incessantly on one of them over the others, striking a balance that Murphy (and perhaps the show as a whole) has not achieved in the past. As to where this goes from here, I’m not entirely sure, but I do know that I’d take more episodes like this any day.

Cultural Observations

• The director of this episode, Paris Barclay, also directed last night’s amazing episode of Sons of Anarchy, and he seemed like a good fit for the more dramatic material.
• I definitely think there’s more room for the show to do broadway numbers: I’ve had some discussions with Dave Chen in the past about how we’re not sure where the show’s broadway sensibilities (and stars, like Michele) go from here within the world of television, and I think exposing more of the show’s young viewers to Broadway would be a great way to use the show for the power of good (and, let’s face it, as a marketing tool: FOX is going to milk this for all it’s worth, and get away with it).
• I liked that Puck’s initial offering to Quinn was $18, which was the amount remaining from his pool cleaning after purchasing dip (I presume of the chewing tobacco variety as opposed to french onion) and nunchuks. Mainly, I just like that the show, even in humanizing the character, still makes him the kid of guy who owns nunchuks.
• The news that Sue once tried out for Baywatch felt like a Party Down shout-out to me for some reason.
• Good use of Stephen Tobolowsky this week: Sandy’s too broad a character to dominate an episode, but his cameo here made the fairly predictable weed cupcake storyline hit more effectively.
• It may have been rote, but I was still jazzed about Puck and Finn’s wheelchair fight: blame Murderball.

This weekend I got to do something that I never have done before. I got to take some awesome action shot of some awesome boys, doing what they love to do. Might I add that these are a bunch of tough kids!

This week’s Monday FUNday is just off of Hallowe’en but we can still fit in some zombies (and apes).

Marvel Zombies: Evil Evolution #1
Jan 2010

This one-shot is a crossover between the Marvel Zombies and Marvel Apes. Following a convoluted series of inter-dimensional travels, a massive battle erupts between forces from the two universes. Ape Alpha Flight, consisting of ape versions of Snowbird, Northstar, Aurora, Shaman (named Shamonk) and Puck (named Pook) appears in two panels.

Ape Snowbird calls out to Shamonk and Pook as Zombie Quicksilver uses his super-speed to bite each of them before they can fight back. Then the rest of them either die as infected zombies or are eaten by other zombies as “Can-ape-ian bacon” as Zombie Quicksilver runs off with a big chunk of Ape Snowbird’s neck in his mouth.

The battle takes place far from Canada, so it’s likely that Ape Snowbird had previously obtained a mystical blessing from the Northern Ape Gods to venture beyond the borders.

Zombie Guardian also appears, first biting off the Vulture’s shoulder in flashback to an unspecified battle between the Zombies and non-Ape superpowered humans, and later in one panel about to battle Ape Captain America, who gets eaten by Zombie Colonel America. It’s not clear if Zombie Guardian ate any brains in this issue.

Well, there’s just about enough severed limbs, maggots, and goopy bloody guts everywhere for any zombie fan and plenty of monkey humor for the ape fan. We’re lucky enough to get both, but it does invoke a broad sense of bewilderment how such an issue could even exist in the first place.

On Wednsday, November 4, 2009, the cast of the Fox tv show “Glee” made an appearance in Paramus, New Jersey to sign copies of their brand new CD.  Thanks to some amazing people, I was able to work myself in and grab a press pass!  I spent the night interviewing people, watching the cast sign CD’s and snapping photos.  Here are  some of my pictures below.  Click the picture to view the video!

Click to view "Glee" video!

On Wednsday, November 4, 2009, the cast of the Fox tv show “Glee” made an appearance in Paramus, New Jersey to sign copies of their brand new CD.  Thanks to some amazing people, I was able to work myself in and grab a press pass!  I spent the night interviewing people, watching the cast sign CD’s and snapping photos.  Here are  some of my pictures below.  Click any of the pictures to see the complete set!

Glee - Click for More Pictures

Glee - Click for more Pictures!

Glee- Click for more Pictures!

Marvel Holiday Spectacular Magazine
2009

Note: The format for this comic is a square-bound magazine. No issue number nor month of publication is indicated except for its manufacturing date between 9/28/09 and 10/16/09. It was released on 10/28/09, the Wednesday before Hallowe’en, which qualifies as Christmas creep in my book.

Reprinting previously released material and some original filler pieces, this issue is the first paper printing of the Marvel Digital Holiday Special from 2008, which was a free digital comic available at the Marvel website for a short time in December of 2008 and still available to paid subscribers. The second feature (of fourteen!) in this printed version is the first story from the digital version: the X-Men in “If the Fates Allow”, with cameo appearances from Northstar and Persuasion.

Having recently moved to San Francisco in Uncanny X-Men #500, the X-Men gather warmly with friends and family for a holiday celebration and a bit of a memorial to Kitty Pryde, recently presumed lost. As they set up a giant Christmas tree and an inappropriately gigantic Hanukiah, Northstar can be seen shaking hands with a young man, and Persuasion can be seen sharing a gift in a large 2pg spread.

These holiday books remind us of the odd relationship between comic book time and real time. Events that unfold over four issues might be a few days while in our time, three months have passed. Characters introduced as kids 30 years ago are still young-ish while world events, fashion and technology depicted in the comics catch up to modern times. So when a holiday issue comic comes out, can we place it into our character’s chronology or just suspend time for one issue to enjoy the merriment without worrying about all that? In this case, the situation is simplified… this was Northstar’s first appearance since Secret Invasion: X-Men #2, which took place in San Francisco, and his next appearance after this would also be in California when he was recruited in Uncanny X-Men #508, so placing him in San Francisco for this issue makes sense. Of course, he can fly at super-speed so he could get anywhere he wants to nearly instantly, but for continuity’s sake, it’s appealing.

Persuasion hadn’t been seen since the end of volume 1, with the exception of an entry in X-Men: The 198 Files in 2006 where it was indicated she retained her powers following M-day. Her appearance in this issue is the real surprise, and a nice treat for Alpha Flight fans. What she was doing there (besides for the obvious holiday celebration) or why she hasn’t been seen since, even in cameo during Utopia, is a bit puzzling. Anyway, good job, Jim McCann (the writer) for picking up the 198 Files and seeing which mutants might be gathering for the holidays that year.

The eighth feature in this magazine is a reprint of Uncanny X-Men #365 which contains a small Puck appearance. Note: once that issue has its own post, the bolded text will link to it and this note will be edited.

Note: this issue has a 50:50 variant cover with the Spider-Man balloon, a long-standing tradition from the Macy*s Thanksgiving Day Parade here in NYC. Removed from the usual cast of characters since the late 1990s, it returns in 2009. Here is an excerpt of a press release from Macy*s dated November 2, 2009:

SPIDER-MAN
MARVEL ENTERTAINMENT
Millions of New Yorkers will feel their Spider-senses tingling on Thanksgiving morning when New York’s own neighborhood Super Hero(TM), Marvel’s Spider-Man, makes a triumphant return to the skies over Manhattan to ensnare a new generation of fans. After a decade, the legendary crime-fighting web-slinger returns to the Parade line-up in celebration of Marvel’s 70th Anniversary. Spider-Man made his Macy’s Parade debut in 1987, becoming an instant classic. The new, more modern and muscular Spidey is in full crawling mode with one hand set to release his web. On Parade day, the Spider-Man balloon will measure 78-feet long, 37.8-feet wide and 29.1-feet tall and will be filled with 11,800 cubic feet of helium.

Sort of off-topic but hey, I live here!

Marvel Holiday Spectacular Magazine – Spider-Man balloon variant