Episode One: Audition Our heroes are euphoric following their performance at Sectionals. You know, where they came third. Out of three. They’re soon brought down to earth when they realise that they’re still bottom of the social ladder, thanks to a video depicting them as losers created by that creepy Jewish stereotype character. In other news, the black guy who only had one line in the entire first series has been sacrificed to appease the Goddess of Unnecessary Characters, leaving New Directions one mute ethnic minority short of a silent protest. In order to be eligible for whatever competition they plan on entering this season, they need to find a replacement. Finn and Rachel hunt down new students Sam (of the thunderingly large lips and rock hard abs) and Concubine. Or Sunshine. I can’t really remember her name, it was several months ago. Following a Lady Gaga sing-off in the toilets, Rachel feels threatened by Concubine, so she sends her to a crack house rather than the auditorium. Concubine is rescued by Vocal Adrenaline’s new coach, who whisks her away to Rivalry High to be Rachel’s nemesis. Meanwhile, Sam puts in an “impressive” audition of objectively awful song Billionaire, but refuses to join the club because everyone will think he’s a big pansy.
The B-Plot revolves around Schuester and Sue calling off their truce when Schue realises they’re being dicks to new football coach Ms Bieste, who is something of a hefty bird. Oh, and Tina dumped Artie for Mike Chang’s abs. We’re meant to care, I think.
Episode Two: Brittany/Britney
Emma’s new boyfriend, Carl the Dentist, stops by to lecture the Gleesters on oral hygiene, and discovers that Britney, Rachel and Artie apparently have awful teeth. I don’t trust his credentials. Anyone who thinks a bunch of people on American television have poor teeth clearly can’t be trusted. This convoluted set-up is the writer’s way of shoe-horning Britney Spears into the episode; so she can appear in Our Brittany’s nitrous-oxide induced hallucinations. For you see, Our Brittany has spent her entire life living in the shadow of The Other Britney, because her full name is Brittany S. Pierce. However, the power of hallucination leads her to discover her inner awesome, with a little help from The Other Britney. Our Brittany celebrates her newfound love of La Spears by inviting Santana to Carl the Dentist’s for a shared hallucination wherein they recreate the video to Me Against the Music and it is absolutely ludicrous and makes no sense at all but is completely awesome and totally hot. Brittany and Santana have more sexual chemistry than any of the legitimate couples on this show.
Having overcome her Britneyphobia, Our Brittany is ready to let go of her objection to the Gleesters performing the greatest hits of Ms Spears, leading to an awful take on Toxic with Schue on lead for some inexplicable reason. This leads to Annoying Jewish Stereotype having an orgasm and inciting the other students to a Sex Riot. Luckily, Ms. Sue Sylvester is there to pour cold water on it and deliver an amazing tirade on the truth behind the 1968 Democratic Convention: Hippies put acid in everyone’s bourbon; and when an updraft revealed Lady Bird Johnson’s tramp stamp and tattoos above her ovaries, Mayor Richard J. Daly became so incensed with sexual rage that he punched his own wife in the face, and spent the next hour screaming, “Sex party! Sex party!” into the microphones of all three major networks. I love you, Jane Lynch.
There’s also a Rachel/Finn plot in there somewhere that involves Lea Michele murdering Baby One More Time, but we won’t talk about that. What we will talk about is how the episode ends with Paramore’s mawkish whine-fest The Only Exception, presumably because of a bizarre contractual stipulation that says 75% of Glee episodes must end with Rachel singing a ballad regardless of the content of the episode.
Episode 3: Grilled Cheesus
The Gleesters want to do a bunch of religious songs but Kurt is having none of it because as a gay he hates God and religion. So he sashays into Sue’s office to get her support in preventing the dimwits from performing any holy numbers in a public school. Kurt’s dad has a heart attack when he sees his credit card bill from Kurt’s recent purchase of a mink-lined diamond studded fashion scarf, so the dimwits rally to his aid with various suggestions like “Let’s sing a hymn!” and “Let’s pray!” which goes down with Kurt about as well as suggesting that he consider missing an episode of America’s Next Top Model. Chris Colfer gets to demonstrate his power-of-acting in a Genuinely Touching™ scene where he sings a mournful rendition of I Want to Hold Your Hand over flashbacks of his childhood with Dad featuring an amazingly well-cast mini-Kurt. Kurt relaxes his anti-religion stance when Mercedes explains that their prayers come from a place of love or something equally Oprah-ish, and then he goes to Church with her and has a fabulous time because those sermons with the black gospel choirs are so damn fun when compared to your run of the mill Protestantism. Then his Dad wakes up.
The B-Plot is some horrendously awful attempt to balance the sombre tone of the Kurt plot with farce that completely misfires. Finn sees Jesus’ face in a grilled cheese sandwich and starts praying to it for favours. This eventually results in Rachel singing the Weekly Rachel Ballad, which is all the proof we need that God doesn’t exist.
Episode 4: Duets
Puck has been sent to Juvie so that 29 year old Mark Salling can spend a few weeks promoting his album rather than pretend to be 15. But despair not, Puck-lovers, as he’s being replaced by Thunderlips Sam who apparently is no longer afraid of people thinking he’s a bit fruity. Kurt makes a bet with Mercedes that Sam is a bit fruity based on his hairstyle. So nice that oft-misunderstood Kurt is so willing to accept diversity and avoid stereotyping.
The writers show us that they sometimes remember what happened in previous episodes by having Kurt’s Dad chastise him for being all creepy with Finn in the first series. Anyone hoping for Kurt to ever get called out for unreasonable behaviour again should not hold their breath given how the rest of the season transpires. Kurt realises he’s projecting his own loneliness onto Thunderlips, and sets him free to duet with Quinn. Because that’s Schue’s assignment of the week: sing a duet. Brittany bonks Artie, Rachel and Finn are obnoxious, Kurt is a martyr to loneliness, and Santana and Mercedes bring the awesome with their version of River Deep, Mountain High. So obviously, the offensively Aryan duo of Thunderlips and Quinn end up winning rather than the Latin American/African American explosion of sassiness.
Episode 5: Rocky Horror Glee Show
Schuester doesn’t like the fact that Emma is slowly making progress in dealing with her OCD and finding happiness with an understanding, patient and caring man, so he attempts to woo her by proving he’s an even bigger Rocky Horror fan than Doctor Dentist in a sort of poorly realised pissing competition.
Schue’s attempts to stage a sanitised version of the musical result in Mercedes, as Frank-N-Furter, singing about how (s)he is a “Sweet transvestite from sensational Transylvania” because apparently transsexual is a naughty word but transvestite is okay. What an awesome awareness of gender politics they have going on at the 20th Century Fox Censorship playpen. The Gleesters generally murder most of the Rocky Horror classics, although Emma’s Touch-a Touch-a Touch-a Touch Me isn’t too bad, aside from the knot in my stomach that seeing a shirtless Schuester causes. I just cannot reconcile that body with that head, dammit. Speaking of man-torso, Thundelips is awfully proud of his, which leads to the discovery that Finn has body issues, which he resolves by walking through the hallway in his underwear. Damn, these Finn plotlines are so challenging. Still, more tolerable than a Finn plotline involving Rachel. Or any plotline involving Rachel, to be honest.
In the end, Schue learns a valuable lesson about using the Glee club to woo Emma, which he will have forgotten by the next episode, and the kids give a horrible rendition of Time Warp.
Episode 6: I Wish The Glee Writers Put More Effort Into Episode Titles
The first of the Blessed Martyr Kurt episodes! Yay! BMK is displeased with Schue assigning a Girls vs Boys competition, because he feels more comfortable with the girls. So Schue adds a twist to placate the Blessed Martyr: the boys must sing songs by female artists, and vice versa. The boys quickly tire of Kurt’s plans for their performance, and send him to The All Gay, All Boys School for Gay Boys to spy on “The Warblers”, a group they’ll be competing against in Sectionals. Kurt is amazed by the culture of tolerance and diversity at the All Gay, All Boys School for Gay Boys, which has a zero-tolerance bullying policy because 90% of the students are the biggest queers who ever queered. Kurt immediately crushes on Blaine, who is gay, way out of his league and a Warbler. Blaine encourages Kurt to deal with a bullying problem he’s been having, which he does, prompting Meathead McBully to plant a wet one on The Lips Of The Blessed Martyr in a plot twist that no one saw coming. Meathead then threatens to kill the Blessed Martyr.
In the few minutes of this show dedicated to people who aren’t Kurt, we learn that the students of Fuckwit High have taken to imagining Coach Bieste in various states of undress in order to prevent them getting too carried away when indulging in some heavy petting of the adolescent kind. Bieste learns of this and is sad, until Schuester patronises her by going on about how it’s what’s on the inside that counts. Considering that the writers give us about three sequences in which we’re meant to derive humour from the ugliness of Bieste, I think they might want to consider whether they’re sending us some mixed messages.
Oh, and Puck returns and befriends Wheels, who rekindles his romance with Brittany.
Episode 7: Gwyneth Paltrow Saves Us All
Schue has the flu, so we get the delightful Gwyneth Paltrow instead. Yay! While Schuester is busy getting his sickly freak on with his ex-wife in an eye-ball disintegratingly horrific scene that involves Vicks Vapo-Rub, Schue’s hairy chest and baby-talk (yes, really), Gwynnie is stealing the hearts of the Gleesters by demonstrating her appreciation of songs written in the past 5 years. She even manages to win Rachel around by allowing her to be the centre of attention. Who knew that’s all it would take to make Rachel happy? Mrs Chris Martin encourages a culture of Do Your Own Thang, which prompts Mercedes to vandalise Principal Sue’s car to the tune of $17,000 as part of an ongoing dispute over Her Sylvesterness’s banning of “Tator Tots” which I presume are some kind of fat-tabulous US fast food. Principal Sue, I say? Why yes, I do. For La Sylvester is the source of the flu outbreak that incapacitated Schue as well as Principal Figgins, into whose shoes Sue selflessly steps. Such is the popularity of her reign of terror amongst parents that Figgins is fired and Sue declared Monarch of the School. As it should be.
Alas, Gwynnie suffers a crisis as a result of the Mercedes/Sue spat and is unable to continue teaching, as she’s a bit flaky and tends to run for the hills when the going gets tough. She helps reinstate Schue, and he enlists her assistance in modernising his song selections for the Glee club. At least until the writers decide that Schue being out of touch musically is a plot point they want to touch on for the 5th time.
Meanwhile, Blessed Martyr Kurt is threatened by Meathead McSecretlyGay again.
Episode 8: Furt. It's short for "Fuckwit Kurt"
Oh lord, this episode of the Blessed Martyr Kurt cycle is painful. Kurt’s dad and Finn’s mom decide to get married, and just like any normal wedding, both the ceremony and reception revolve entirely around how awesome their gay son is. Rachel witnesses Meathead threatening Kurt, and tries to have Finn use his influence with the football team to get them to beat the snot out of Meathead. Finn refuses because he doesn’t want to be too closely associated with the Blessed Martyr. Papa Kurt finds Kurt’s Hannah Montana Electronic Diary, and discovers the torment he’s been suffering from Meathead. He brings the situation to the attention of Principal Sue, who expels Meathead.
The wedding goes according to plan, and Finn, feeling bad for not defending Kurt, spends much of his best man’s speech telling us how wonderful Kurt is. He then proceedings to sing Bruno Mars’s Just the Way You Are. To Kurt. With unchanged lyrics. So we get a verging-on-orgasmically-pleased Kurt standing in the middle of the dancefloor as Finn croons “Girl you’re amazing, just the way you are.” I hate you, show. But seriously, Ryan Murphy (Glee creator and writer of this particular episode) needs to stop using the Kurt character as a proxy for working through whatever issues he has left over from his no doubt troubled high school years. Having everyone fawn over Kurt and tell him how fantastic he is just makes me wish Meathead would kill him.
Speaking of Meathead, his expulsion is overturned due to a lack of evidence and the threat of legal action, which causes Sue to resign the post of Principal in protest. But not before she marries herself, because the only person good enough for Sue Sylvester is Sue Sylvester. And, as it turns out, the only person good enough to officiate at the ceremony joining Sue Sylvester to Sue Sylvester, is Sue Sylvester. I just like typing Sue Sylvester. Sue Sylvester. Meathead’s return leads to Papa Kurt and Step-Mama-Kurt deciding to forego a honeymoon in Hawaii in favour of paying the tuition fees to send the Blessed Martyr Kurt to the All Gay All Boys School for Gay Boys, where there is a slight possibility he might just fit in.
Episode 9: Special Education
Now that the Blessed Martyr Kurt has ascended corporeally into Heaven, the Gleesters are yet again down one member, and with Sectionals upon them , having mysteriously moved from May (as in the first series) to November (as in this episode) desperate times call for desperate measures. So hefty bird Lauren is convinced to join the club via the magic of Puck’s lips and a few tonnes of free treats. One crisis averted, another arises in the shape of Schue’s predictable set-list. Emma convinces him to ditch the Finn/Rachel-oriented 80s soft-rock retinue he had intended having the kids perform in favour of some Quinn/Thunderlips crooning, and Santana having a solo-run on Valerie accompanied by Mike Chang and Brittany’s awesome dance-skillz.
Meanwhile, at the All Gay All Boys School for Gay Boys, Kurt is discovering that the price you pay for a life free of terror is the loss of your individuality, as he finds himself subsumed into the All Gay Hive-mind, stripped of his hipster-lite couture stylings and frowned at for not knowing his place within the Warblers. The Warbler philosophy seems to be that you do your time, support the status quo and get rewarded, sort of like how Irish political parties work. Unfortunately, this leaves Kurt at the bottom of the musical pyramid. Blaine tries to get him to perk up, but that’s easy for Blaine to say when he’s at the apex of said pyramid and thus gets a Big Gay Solo all to himself at the competition. The Gleesters and Warblers draw, and both move on to the next stage of the competition, which they probably won’t mention again until the second-last episode.
All is not well in Rachel and Finn land, as the former discovers the latter’s dalliance with Santana Lopez from the first series (ah, writers, with this awareness of previous events you are truly spoiling us) and is very much displeased. She decides to suck face with Puck as revenge, but Finn doesn’t quite see it as getting even, given that he and Rachel weren’t together when he lost his V-Plates to the luscious Ms Lopez. Finn and Rachel break up. No one cares in the slightest. The episode ends with a somewhat tolerable cover of Florence and the Machine’s Dog Days Are Over, lead by Asian Tina. That’s right, Asian Tina got to sing lead vocals for possibly the first time ever, in the 31st episode of the show. Oh, and Emma and Doctor Dentist get married.
Episode Ten: A Very Glee Christmas
The teachers of Fuckwit High hold a Secret Santa, which is rigged by one Sue Sylvester so she receives all the gifts. Schue visits Kurt at the AGABS4GB to enquire of a gay what gift one would get for a Grinch like Sue. Kurt, as he is a gay, is of course deeply knowledgeable in the mystical art of shopping, and is able to tell Schue exactly what to get her, before confiding in Schue that he has fallen in love with Blaine. Shock.
Rachel stalks Finn in an attempt to rekindle their romance. For some reason she thinks that singing Last Christmas by Wham! will help her in this endeavour. Alas, it only drives them further apart, as any fool could have told her. You never try to repair a relationship with the music of George Michael, you stupid woman.
Meanwhile, Brittany still believes in Santa Claus, and Artie, finding this worrying display of delusion endearing, concocts a plot to ensure her belief in Santa survives another year, so he and the Gleesters escort Brit-Brit to Santa’s Grotto so they can overhear what she wants for Xmas. Unfortunately, what she wants for Xmas is for Artie to be able to walk again. Brittany is spared having to face the cold reality of a world without St Nick however, thanks to the intervention of Coach Bieste, who spends around $700,000 buying a pair of these experimental, unreleased robo-crutches, so that Artie can begin the journey to becoming an android. In other news, Sue predictably discovers the meaning of Christmas so the audience can have warm fuzzies, and Hefty Lauren is still in the club. Yay! DON’T COME BACK, Kurt.
