Episode Review: GLEE, "Hell-O"

After more than four months of waiting for a new episode of Glee, FOX's musical dramedy gave us a barely OK episode. Add to that the fact that I had wait almost a half-hour thanks to the sucky American Idol, which meant I only got to see the first half of LOST, which made me an unhappy camper.

The musical numbers on Glee were pretty good, and I liked how they all incorporated the "hello" theme, but the story lines fell flat because they were too wrapped up in angsty, teen love triangle garbage, some of which involved grown ass adults. Now, love triangles are nothing new, and watching young adults dwell on their love lives is to be expected on a show about high school glee clubbers, but the thought processes behind the angst was annoying.

Finn breaks up with Rachel (whom he wasn't quite sure he was dating in the first place) to embrace his rockstar lifestyle by going on a three-way date with Santana & Brittany. Then he realizes that he wants to be with Rachel because he doesn't feel alone when he's around her while she's off getting cozy with the star of the rival glee club. The whole time the rest of New Directions is forcing Rachel to dump her new boy for the good of the team while Sue is telling her otherwise to destroy the glee club (OK, that part kind of worked).

While Finn's actions were pretty weak, Will's were even lamer because he essentially went from being married, to being separated, to dating Emma, to making out with Elphaba in a matter of seconds. Of course Idina and Emma called him out, and he realized that he's been too busy being in a couple for the majority of his life, and now he needs to be alone to find himself. Pretty standard stuff, but for some reason it just didn't work for me tonight. I just didn't find myself caring about Will or his love life. Emma on the other hand had some heartbreaking moments.

We went through five different couplings in a less than an hour, and unfortunately what makes the show work, the music and comedy, were pushed to the side for the relationship stuff. Again, most of the musical numbers were fun, but they just felt a little uneven since they were peppered in amongst all of the boyfriend/girlfriend fluff. We did get a few good lines, especially from Brittany, put the laughs were too few and far between. Tonight's Glee just wasn't able to pick up where it left off in December. With that being said, I'm still a fan and I'm excited for next week's Madonna-centric episode. Maybe it'll give the show the chance to go back to its roots.

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