"Glee" Super Bowl episode

"Glee" Super Bowl episode

Television Review

By our guest blogger, Catherine Fuentes

For "Glee"’s big post-Super Bowl return, they promised their biggest episode yet, and I think they might have delivered.

The show started with a firework bang or two, as the Cheerios practiced their routine to Katy Perry’s hit “California Gurls” while wearing blue wigs, bikini tops and fire sparklers on their bikinis. It sure was attention grabbing, but most of all, it introduced Sue Sylvester as a key player in this episode. She was bored by a totally un-boring performance, and since she wanted her Cheerios to win the big cheerleading competition, she needed to think of something bolder than fire-shooting bras and BMX bikers on ramps. She needed to shoot the lovably dimwitted Brittany out of a human cannon.

The back-and-forth between the two funniest characters on "Glee" was priceless. Brittany rightly feared for her life (she doesn’t want to die before the cancellation of “One Tree Hill”), and Sue had to get on Brittany’s level to reason with her. Think lots of handwritten notes in crayons from the cannon to Brittany, and ploys to make Brittany feel like she was preventing the cannon from providing for its ill cannon offspring. Finally, Sue convinces Brittany to sign the consent form and allow herself to be shot out of the cannon, only before my favorite moment of recent “Glee” history: Brittany being unable to figure out how to sign her name, and Sue brashly telling her to sign an X.

Well done, Sue.

My favorite musical performance was the entirely random, and seemingly out of place rendition of “Bills, Bills, Bills” by the Dalton Academy Warblers. I’m not quite sure why this song was featured in this football and McKinley High centered episode, but I liked it. As always, Blaine and the boys were vocally amazing, and had a fun, energetic, casual performance. I like the Warblers a lot. I like their song choices, I like the fact that they always look like they’re having fun--I don’t like the fact that they’re not always relevant.

I have mixed feelings on the big halftime show performance, where the glee club and the football team dressed like zombies and performed a mash-up of Michael Jackson’s “Thriller” and The Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ “Heads Will Roll.” I love both songs. I appreciate new slants on Michael Jackson classics, and The Yeah Yeah Yeahs are one of my favorite bands, so hearing their hit on such a mainstream show was pretty cool, but musically, it just didn’t do it for me. I’ve been worried about this number since I heard which two songs would be mashed up a few weeks ago, and I was still a little let down.

Don’t get me wrong, I think it was really amazing for Artie to be singing the lead on the Michael Jackson track, because he never really gets to take center stage on anything, especially something this big. Vocally, I thought he was pretty great, and hope that he gets more lead vocals on songs soon. My issues are more with the arrangement of “Heads Will Roll.” That’s such a good song, and Karen O has such a unique voice, and such an outrageous stage presence, that I don’t think anyone can come close to doing justice to one of her tracks. Good try, "Glee," for taking such a cool song choice, but I just wish it had been done better. The dancing and zombie makeup in the halftime show, however, was incredible.

Like with the “Bills, Bills, Bills” performance, I felt the rest of the music didn’t seem to fit in well with such a plot and character heavy episode. All of our favorites and not-so-favorites – I’m looking at you, Karofsky – were in this episode. The Cheerios interacted with New Directions, who interacted with the football team (and Coach Beiste!), who battled with the hockey team. And to me, this is what made this episode so special. Everyone was there – even Burt Hummel, one of my favorites, had a cameo in the stands at the big football game – and there even was a cameo from Katie Couric, interviewing Sue for her “Losers of the Year” television segment.

I’m very over the played out Lady Antebellum hit “Need You Now,” but Rachel and Puck’s duet sounded eerily like the original – in a good way. And while musically, I wasn’t too excited by the football team singing the Zombies’ hit “She’s Not There,” I very much enjoyed seeing all of the guys sing and dance together.