.Last night's episode of Fox's continually frustrating bubblerama Glee was not a terrible episode -- there were good songs, a few genuine laughs, and a happy ending. But still, something about it sealed the deal: We're done with this show for a while.
Saying goodbye permanently is a bit extreme, especially when there was a fairly good episode so recently, but aside from Big Episodes about Big Things (like sex!), the basic stuff of Glee has gotten so week-in, week-out boring that it feels like a little break is in order.
It's become increasingly hard to care about any of the show's basic plot elements. Quinn's vague transformation from bad girl to good girl to good/bad girl and maybe now to good girl again has been muddled and a little nonsensical. The Mike Chang disagreement with his father over medical school has been trite and almost offensively stereotypical. The whole Will/Emma romance has gotten a bit gross. Rachel and Finn are where now? And now all of a sudden we're supposed to care about the Chord Overstreet character even though he was so easily dismissed when the producers thought he wasn't coming back earlier this season? None of it adds up.
Or rather it all adds up, just not to a lot. And last night, and last week and the week before that too, it was just so hard to keep paying attention, to not let our eyes wander to Words With Friends or whatever else, looking up only to catch a glimpse of a musical number, which themselves have begun to all look the same, with the same bouncy choreography, the same bright light, the same mouths moving just this much out of sync with the heavily scrubbed and polished studio recording. Everything else just feels so empty, so inconsequential. Why care about any one particular plot? It'll be atonally pushed to the side or hastily resolved or just plain forgotten about in a few episodes anyway.
Last night, for example, saw lots of storylines speedily concluded for no apparent reason. This isn't even a midseason finale! (A term that, separate of Glee even, needs to be locked in a drawer.) Mike Chang's dad suddenly and rather magically saw the light and not only said "It's OK to dance," but also "Go to the best dance school in the country." Yes because his character expects the best, OK yes "character" blah blah, but also apparently he is secretly a dance scout who is capable of judging who is great at dance, like professional-ready dance. And his son, Mike Chang, after seeing him perform exactly once (and he didn't even do that much dancing!), is that person, he's decided. It was so sloppily done.
As was the whole Quinn evil family destroyer thing, with her plot to get Idina Menzel fired and have her child taken away. Quinn wildly oscillating between being sweet and surprisingly soulful and being a complete nightmare monster doesn't just happen within a few episodes anymore, it's now intra episode. After one sensitive hallway chat with Rachel, Quinn decided to not only not screw over Idina, but she also became awesome besties with all the girls again? As did the cruel Santana, giving dopey smiley hugs to Rachel and Finn in the final song of the episode? Who? What? Why? When? It's all a dumb jumble.
Maybe some of you out there can follow these thin, frayed strings better than we can, but for our part we're checking out for a while. We'll probably catch up on Hulu some hungover Sunday afternoon, but this ain't appointment television anymore, that's for sure. The increasingly frequent feeling of each episode is: What's the point? And our precious TV time is too important to waste on that. So sorry, kids. See you at nationals, maybe.