Glee – Season 1, Episode 10: “Ballads” – review

Okay, I have something sad to report here: “Ballads” was the worst Glee episode yet. It was corny and predictable and stereotypical and, most importantly, boring. And it had the worst musical choices yet. So there’s that. But it doesn’t matter.

Y’see, young’uns, I’m old enough to remember life without the Internet. So I remember a time when people watched their favorite TV shows to be entertained, rather than declaring shows “dead” if a particular episode didn’t bring the classic thrills and/or lolz. Sometimes, a show has to do some work to keep all its flaming chainsaws in the air; and Glee has a lot of stuff in the air right now. Doesn’t quite excuse the episode being weak, but I’m not gonna run around talking about how this bodes ill for the future like some people I could mention.

Every episode of this program has an underlying theme, and this week’s theme seemed to be “secrets.” I mean, sure, EVERY episode is about secrets, but this week particularly. Not only did we get one of the show’s big secrets out there finally–the preggo reveal to Finn’s mom and Quinn’s ‘rents–but we are also privy to an unprecedented amount of inner monologues from a number of different perspectives. This begins very early on, with Kurt and Puck and Finn all chattering away in their minds, while Mr. Shue and Rachel sing “Endless Love” to each other.

Honestly, I didn’t blame the boys, as you can see this storyline coming a mile away–Student Crushing on Teacher is one of the ho-hummiest ho-hums around. It makes sense for Rachel to like Will, but the plotline was bogus for four reasons: (a) the whole cartoony “clean my craft room” take from Terri; (b) dragging poor Emma Pillsbury into it all during the mashup of “Young Girl” and “Don’t Stand So Close to Me”; (c) the mashup of “Young Girl” and “Don’t Stand So Close to Me” itself, what the eff with all the mashups on this show, and singing one’s feelings never works out really; (d) the complete and total lack of any tension going the other way. Come on, Shue, you saying you would never even think about Rachel like that? If so, you’re a weird neuter and no wonder your life sucks.

No, this entire plotline was only good for one thing and one thing only: the Susie Pepper Incident. The awesome Sarah Drew (who was even good on that horrid Everwood show and now provides the facial hair for poor gay Sal on Mad Men) was excellent as obsessive student Susie, even managing to drop mad knowledge to Rachel while using the phrase “esophagus transplant” with a straight face. Her speech telling Rachel to get some self-esteem and stop chasing unchaseable men was a solid payoff…but Susie was fun in flashback too. But poor Lea Michele: I guess all actresses have to end up saying “I’m such an idiot” at some point, but WHY?

The other main plotline I liked was kind of in spite of itself. Everything about the Quinn thing was wrong and unrealistic–don’t the producers know that super-Christian people now LOVE their teenaged daughters to get pregnant?–and you really have to be pretty horrible at drama to get through a sour-ass pregnancy reveal without the viewer being sad at all. But I do like the idea of Quinn and Finn now living in Finn’s basement–THAT is truthful, and will lead to awesome stuff later I hope, I hope, I hope.

As for the Kurt-long-game-long-shot-seduction-of-Finn thing…uh, it wasn’t working for me this week. Overall, sure, whatever. But it’s starting to seem desperate and (dare I say it) stereotypical. Chris Colfer can sure throw the smoldering gazes around, but I don’t love the implication that gay guys always fall tragically in love with straight ones. Meh. Also, I know we’re in Ohio, but there is no way Finn or Kurt know relatively obscure (and boring!) Pretenders songs like that.

But yeah, this is the biggest problem I had with the episode: horrible music throughout. The mashup was awful, the ending song was contrived and obvious and not even very good–although with some wonderful singing moments from Artie and Mercedes–and I’m going to call Amnesty International about this show exposing the children of America to “Having My Baby.” Come on, Fox, have you no shame? (Wait, don’t bother answering that.) The most memorable moment was the meta-est, with Shue cutting Rachel off right before her number even got started.

But there was a lot of goodness here tonight, from “the square root of four is rainbows” to Puck bragging in his own mind about “going commando.” So make like your gentle Boomer and post-Boomer friends, and don’t hit the panic button yet.

About Matt Cibula

Matt Cibula has written for some pretty big and pretty small websites and printed sources, including the Village Voice, PopMatters.com, AllAboutJazz, Vibe Magazine, Seattle Weekly, The Isthmus, Metal Edge, and his own website, Cave17.com