GLEE 1.3 - "Acafellas"

[SPOILERS] Having neatly built the premise that a youthful teacher is going to put his heart and soul into making his high school's once-successful "glee club" into a competitive force again, it struck me as very odd that Will (Matthew Morrison) was so easily distracted into forming an all-male a capella troupe of fellow teachers, the eponymous "Acafellas"...

The reason for Will's bruised ego and divided attention was Rachel's (Lea Michele) criticism that his choreography's not up to scratch, which in turns prompts the glee club into trying to hire renowned dance coach Dakota Stanley (Whit Hertford) after some persuasion by Quinn (Diana Agron), who's still working undercover for hateful gym teacher Sue Sylvester (Jane Lynch). Lynch doesn't get much to do this week, but her facial expressions as rotten-hearted Sue are superb.

Will's parents were also told of their daughter-in-law Terri's (Jessalyn Gilsig) pregnancy, with everyone unaware that Terri's lying about her condition, but is now determined to get pregnant for real so her deception isn't exposed. There was also a nice thread running through this episode about masculinity being all about having the "guts" to strive for your dreams , as Will's father (Victor Garber*) reveals he never had the balls to go to law school, and this fear of unfulfilled ambition was also behind Will's decision to try and get famous with his own boy man band.

Clearly you have to swallow a lot of silliness if you're going to enjoy Glee, as so much of this episode didn't strike me as very plausible, or even consistent to its own recent history. Would the Acafellas really become famous in the local community so quickly, enough to sellout their CDs after a gig? I guess Glee exists in the same reality bubble The Simpsons inhabits, with "Acafellas" comparable to that animation's classic "Barbershop Quartet" episode.

I suppose you just have to go with the idea that Ken Tanaka (Patrick Gallagher), Howard (Kent Avenido) and Sandy (Stephen Tobolowsky) would have the voices and physicality to not fall flat on their faces when they teamed up with Will. It feels like every character on Glee is a potential Broadway star, basically. Even resident bully Puck (Mark Salling), who spat venom at fellow jock Finn (Cory Monteith) joining glee club recently, joined Acafellas (to bag himself some "cougars") and proved to have hidden song-n'-dance talent! Are they putting something in the water...?

The songs weren't as great this week, although it was amusing to see Acafellas update some cheesy boy band classics from the '90s ("Poison", "This Is How We Do It"), and I enjoyed the perfect rendition of Duffy's "Mercy" - which was immediately savaged by tyrannical tutor Dakota ("Get off my stage!") It was also interesting to see the show isn't averse to giving us pure fantasy sequences, too, with Mercedes (Amber Riley) belting out Jazmine Sullivan's "Bust Your Windows" after smashing Kurt's (Chris Colfer) windscreen, which was presented as her daydream of an all-out "music video"-style performance with lithe cheerleaders** as impromptu dancers.

Overall, "Acafellas" was a diverting hour of silliness, but nowhere near as joyous as the previous episodes. It perhaps didn't help that my awareness of celebrity guest-star Josh Groban is infinitesimal, either. I'm perhaps going to have to adjust my tolerance for Glee's approach to plausibility and consistence, too. If macho bullies and inelegant-looking teachers can become successful performers overnight, we're clearly in a more fantastical realm than I was first expecting a Freaks & Geeks-meets-High School Musical show to be.


18 January 2010
E4, 9pm

written by: Ryan Murphy directed by: John Scott starring: Matthew Morrison (Will Scheuster), Lea Michele (Rachel), Amber Riley (Mercedes), Chris Colfer (Kurt), Kevin McHale (Artie), Cory Monteith (Finn), Mark Salling (Puck), Jessalyn Gilsig (Terri), Jayma Mays (Emma), Iqbal Theba (Principal Figgins), Patrick Gallagher (Ken Tanaka), Jane Lynch (Sue Sylvester), Diana Agron (Quinn), Jenna Ushkowitz (Tina Cohen-Chang), Josh Groban (Himself), Stephen Tobolowsky (Sandy Ryerson), Debra Monk (Will's Mother), John Lloyd John (Henri St. Pierre), Whit Hertford (Dakota Stanley), Naya Rivera (Santana Lopez), Heather Morris (Brittany), Kent Avenido (Howard Bamboo), Clint Culp (Teamster), Victor Garber (Will's Father), Marie Caldare (Mrs. Holloway), Maxine English (Mrs. Robinson), Greg Hinton (Flex), Brooke Newton (Leggy Blonde), Vivian Nixon (Andrea Cohen) & Shelby Rabara (Shoshandra)

* So far, it seems strange that Alias' Victor Garber, who has a theatre background and has appeared on Broadway, isn't being utilized for any of the songs. As Will's dad, wouldn't it make sense that he'd be similarly gifted and perhaps should have joined Acafellas?

** Incidentally, as my only knowledge of US high school life is through the likes of Ferris Bueller's Day Off, Election and Glee, is it true that cheerleaders can, and do, wear their costumes around school all day?