FOX's Glee Has Lost Its Way

In 2009 there was a pilot episode on iTunes for this new show about
high school and fitting in. The twist was it was going to have musical
performances by the cast in conjunction with their high school's glee
club performances. The pilot was genius. Strong characters, great
dialog, and and interesting group of actors portraying both students
and teachers. After the first of many viewings the excitement grew for
me as to what I thought would be one if the best new shows to hit the
small screen in a long time. Glee was born as was my becoming a
"Gleek".

Glee finishing up their second season soon my nostalgic side went back
to watch the pilot again. To my surprise it made me realize that the
show has strayed so far from that initial episode that it feels the
Ryan Murphy has cheated us from some elements that were never used.
Let me give you some examples. Also, if you haven't watched the pilot
take a moment to, as then you will understand this point-of-view
better.

The Cheerios. This was "the" team of the fictitious McKinley High
School. The multi-national champions were headed by the manically
driven Sue Sylvester played brilliantly by Jane Lynch. In the pilot
the opening scene was a performance by the cheerleaders. Then, they
disappeared. No awesome choreographed performances or musically
driven feats of acrobatics. They have even gone so far as to disband
the group and to make the coach "Loser Of The Year". Why deny us a
sort of competition to see who is better in front of the crowd?
Cheerios or New Directions? At this point we may never know.

The football team. For being part of the ruling class in all the
episodes post-pilot they have made them the worst sports team since
The Washington Nationals. The show could have had so many
possibilities if they would have made them the championship level they
seemed to be in the pilot. Remember when Finn saved Artie from the
port-a-pottie flipping in the pilot? He said to his football teammates
"You can't win without me". This ended up being a fallacy as the later
episodes made them to be such losers they needed gimmicks to win. So
many potential story lines lost.

Rachel's Parents. We know she has two gay dads. We met mom. Why not
the parents of the child they have raised to be a star? Not once at
any performance. Too bad as this could have made for some interesting
story lines.

Lastly, and what I feel is one of the most important things robbed
from the story lines, is the "Landscape Guy". In the pilot he was a
major part of the character building of Finn's love of music and
singing. It was also the reason Journey was brought in because of the
inspiration and memories from Finn's childhood.

Even with missing these Ryan Murphy has still made a fantastic show
and has approached many tough issues from bullying, child pregnancy,
and teenage sexuality with humor and class. Sometimes it does seem to
run more on gimmicks instead of the strong character dialogue they
began with. Each episode appears to be based on how to work in a
potential iTunes recording instead of telling the story.

You've made a great show Ryan Murphy. Trust that enough to remember
how hard your team worked on the pilot. Let's get back to the story
and let the music compliment it instead of drive it.

Posted via email from Sweet John's posterous