Glee 103 Acafellas
Sep. 17th, 2009 11:26 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
noracharlesGlee manages to keep my attention for another episode. The first half of the episode dragged for a bit, but it was still good entertainment.
The Acafellas plot was stupid and boring. I only liked the scenes Sandy was in, because he's just awesome. I love his pastel sweater casually and elegantly draped over his shoulders - so eighties.
Will did nothing to win back my respect. He broke a promise to Terri not to tell anyone about the pregnancy, and he flounced from the glee club because he was hurt they didn't like his lame choreography. Also, he was very boring this episode, and I don't like seeing him dance "sexily", though I can forgive it if it means Puck and Finn also get to dance sexily.
Sue and Emma continue to be a lot of fun. I still love Rachel most of all.
Mercedes had a plot! She was both sweet and vulnerable, fierce and strong :-D She was a bit naive for falling for Quinn and Santana's machinations, but she was right not to just assume Kurt was gay because he's femme and into fashion, and he did go out with her. It's difficult, especially for teenagers, to come right out and say if you're going out as friends or dating, and it was brave of Mercedes to ask him if they were official or what. While she definitely should not have broken his windshield, it did mean getting to sing the best song of the episode, so yay for that! Anyway, in the end she did the right thing. She apologized sincerely, she offered to pay for the damage, and she proved to Kurt she could still be his friend and wish the best for him. Mercedes rocks!
I have just one quibble with her story: Mercedes is charismatic and beautiful, and a good dancer. Why did we have to keep looking at the back-up dancers instead of at her in her big song?
New developments:
Sandy intends to keep hanging out in the teacher's lounge! Yay, I sure hope he comes back. (Don't spoil me!)
Howard hangs out with Will and Terri outside of work, yay! I want to see more of him.
Puck likes the cougars! Yay!
Rachel, Quinn and Santana cooperated, and maybe developed some mutual respect! Quinn and Santana lost a bit of respect for machiavellian Sue! This is very promising.
Kurt has a crush on Finn! That explains why he keeps getting caught by the jocks every morning.
Old story lines being kept up:
Terri tries to get pregnant, to turn her lie into truth. Meh. I like Terri well enough.
Ken desperately tries to hang on to Emma. Eww. At first I thought Emma did the right thing by trying to get over Will by dating, but it's been weeks. She tries to treat him with respect, but her real disinterest is rather obvious, and his desperation is unappealing. She owes it to him to let him go, he owes it to himself to let her go.
Sue is still trying to sabotage glee club. Her new strategy of sowing discord promises a lot of fun to come.
Bechdel tests:
Female characters: Once again, a good percentage of female speaking roles. The main story line was the cringe-worthy and boring boyband, but the two other stories were Mercedes pursuing Kurt, and Sue and the cheerios trying to sabotage glee club, so well done show! Safe pass on the female Bechdel test. This week the dialog seemed a lot more evenly distributed. I counted 8 conversation only between female characters, and of course there were a lot of mixed gender conversations as well.
Characters of color: Mercedes had her own story line! Ken and Howard were part of the awful boyband thing, but were very much in the background compared to the white leads. There was a brief conversation between two characters of color, for the first time: Andrea and Andrea's hair-holding friend from the competing glee club talking about their coach, the sadistic, mean and uninteresting Dakota.
So it's a race Bechdel fail, but a fail on the third condition not on the second like usual. Santana talked to Mercedes, but Quinn was also part of the conversation, and it was about Kurt. Tina talked to Mercedes, but Rachel was also part of the conversation. (I'm counting Rachel as a white character, though really, she's just as likely to be black.)
Disabled characters: Artie was unfairly dismissed from glee club for being in a wheelchair, but his friends stood up for him and mentioned two disabled athletes I've never heard about, but then I don't follow sports. The moral was that being disabled is a lot like being ugly, but you can still succeed, or something.
Henri cut off his thumbs, and the accident was totally his own fault, and he should totally be mocked for it at every opportunity. (I'm talking about the moral of the show, not my opinion.)
Emma used her mental illness to aid the glee club, as Sue so poisonously pointed out, but Emma is awesome and takes no shit from anyone but Will, and only some of the time from him.
The Acafellas plot was stupid and boring. I only liked the scenes Sandy was in, because he's just awesome. I love his pastel sweater casually and elegantly draped over his shoulders - so eighties.
Will did nothing to win back my respect. He broke a promise to Terri not to tell anyone about the pregnancy, and he flounced from the glee club because he was hurt they didn't like his lame choreography. Also, he was very boring this episode, and I don't like seeing him dance "sexily", though I can forgive it if it means Puck and Finn also get to dance sexily.
Sue and Emma continue to be a lot of fun. I still love Rachel most of all.
Mercedes had a plot! She was both sweet and vulnerable, fierce and strong :-D She was a bit naive for falling for Quinn and Santana's machinations, but she was right not to just assume Kurt was gay because he's femme and into fashion, and he did go out with her. It's difficult, especially for teenagers, to come right out and say if you're going out as friends or dating, and it was brave of Mercedes to ask him if they were official or what. While she definitely should not have broken his windshield, it did mean getting to sing the best song of the episode, so yay for that! Anyway, in the end she did the right thing. She apologized sincerely, she offered to pay for the damage, and she proved to Kurt she could still be his friend and wish the best for him. Mercedes rocks!
I have just one quibble with her story: Mercedes is charismatic and beautiful, and a good dancer. Why did we have to keep looking at the back-up dancers instead of at her in her big song?
New developments:
Sandy intends to keep hanging out in the teacher's lounge! Yay, I sure hope he comes back. (Don't spoil me!)
Howard hangs out with Will and Terri outside of work, yay! I want to see more of him.
Puck likes the cougars! Yay!
Rachel, Quinn and Santana cooperated, and maybe developed some mutual respect! Quinn and Santana lost a bit of respect for machiavellian Sue! This is very promising.
Kurt has a crush on Finn! That explains why he keeps getting caught by the jocks every morning.
Old story lines being kept up:
Terri tries to get pregnant, to turn her lie into truth. Meh. I like Terri well enough.
Ken desperately tries to hang on to Emma. Eww. At first I thought Emma did the right thing by trying to get over Will by dating, but it's been weeks. She tries to treat him with respect, but her real disinterest is rather obvious, and his desperation is unappealing. She owes it to him to let him go, he owes it to himself to let her go.
Sue is still trying to sabotage glee club. Her new strategy of sowing discord promises a lot of fun to come.
Bechdel tests:
| Episode | Speaking characters | Female characters | F-Bechdel | Characters of color | R-Bechdel |
| 101 | 19 | 8 (42%) | Pass, 2 out of 3 conversations | 6 (32%) | Fail, 0 conversations |
| 102 | 21 | 11 (52%) | Pass, 6 out of 8 conversations | 6 (29%) | Fail, 0 conversations |
| 103 | 26 | 12 (46%) | Pass, 4 out of 8 conversations | 9 (35%) | Fail, 0 out of 1 conversation |
Female characters: Once again, a good percentage of female speaking roles. The main story line was the cringe-worthy and boring boyband, but the two other stories were Mercedes pursuing Kurt, and Sue and the cheerios trying to sabotage glee club, so well done show! Safe pass on the female Bechdel test. This week the dialog seemed a lot more evenly distributed. I counted 8 conversation only between female characters, and of course there were a lot of mixed gender conversations as well.
Characters of color: Mercedes had her own story line! Ken and Howard were part of the awful boyband thing, but were very much in the background compared to the white leads. There was a brief conversation between two characters of color, for the first time: Andrea and Andrea's hair-holding friend from the competing glee club talking about their coach, the sadistic, mean and uninteresting Dakota.
So it's a race Bechdel fail, but a fail on the third condition not on the second like usual. Santana talked to Mercedes, but Quinn was also part of the conversation, and it was about Kurt. Tina talked to Mercedes, but Rachel was also part of the conversation. (I'm counting Rachel as a white character, though really, she's just as likely to be black.)
Disabled characters: Artie was unfairly dismissed from glee club for being in a wheelchair, but his friends stood up for him and mentioned two disabled athletes I've never heard about, but then I don't follow sports. The moral was that being disabled is a lot like being ugly, but you can still succeed, or something.
Henri cut off his thumbs, and the accident was totally his own fault, and he should totally be mocked for it at every opportunity. (I'm talking about the moral of the show, not my opinion.)
Emma used her mental illness to aid the glee club, as Sue so poisonously pointed out, but Emma is awesome and takes no shit from anyone but Will, and only some of the time from him.
Rachel
Date: 2009-10-11 04:40 am (UTC)Re: Rachel
Date: 2009-10-11 08:01 am (UTC)