The Gleecap: “Hold On to Sixteen”

The Gleecap is a brand new column dedicated to recap and review the zany antics that occur in each episode of the television show Glee. Blog posts will be released each Wednesday following an episode. Beware, there will be spoilers.

I am so mad at myself for wasting the Tina picture on last week’s Gleecap. I just assumed she would never again get lines. Little did I know that she’d get entire scenes like she was a character the writers actually cared about!

Story Overview

With Sectionals breathing down the necks of the McKinley High kids, this week’s episode turned everyone desperate.

Finn Hudson, desperate to secure yet another Sectionals win for New Directions, makes a four hour trip with Rachel to Kentucky in order to hunt down the Trouty Mouth himself, Sam Evans. He may not be working at Dairy Queen anymore, but he sure is serving customers as “White Chocolate,” a high school-age male stripper. After some convincing, Sam packs up his g-string and moves back to McKinley to help out the glee club.

Finn, following his heroic friendship crusade from last week, also decides to make amends with Blaine.

Next on the list of desperation is Miss Quinn Fabray. Right after learning from Puck that he and Ms. Corcoran slept together, Quinn, to no one’s surprise, makes the decision to spill the beans on the affair. Quinn, caught up in her villainous hubris, tells Rachel about her scheme to get Ms. Corcoran fired, and Rachel responds by pointing out Shelby’s firing would possibly ruin Beth’s life.

Quinn then unhinges her jaw and devours Rachel whole is not amused.

Mike, again out of desperation, cancels all of his plans to attend dance school to appease his father. Emboldened by a sudden burst of characterization, Tina decides that she will have none of that decision. She promptly hauls herself over to the Chang residence and calls out Mike’s father for being so unsupportive.

Finally, Sectionals happens. The Unitards (Harmony’s group) sing Broadway, The Troubletones break out Destiny’s Child and disco, and New Directions turns into the Jackson family. And, in the wildest twist of the season, New Directions wins.

The episode concludes with two major changes of heart. Quinn finally decides to listen to the wise words of Ms. Corcoran and Rachel. She apologizes for her recent bout of crazy, and touchingly convinces the Troubletones to merge with New Directions.

Thanks to Tina’s intervention and the Sectionals performance, Mr. Chang finally gives his blessing to his son’s dancing career. But wait! Application deadlines for Mike’s dance schools have already passed!

No worries, Tina’s got it covered. She already sent in Mike’s applications before it was too late.

Characters

Blaine – Loyal followers of The Gleecap know how much I loathe the writing of one Mr. Blaine Anderson. Too often he’s flawless and cutesy in every single way. In this episode, he finally gained legitimate dimension. He was really angry at Finn and Sam for being so unsupportive. He justifiably frustrated and mean towards Sam. Seeing Blaine with insecurities, punch, and some bite was beautiful. Even if his sudden aversion to “sexy” is undermined by the episode “Sexy” last season.

Quinn – This episode made me enormously happy for one very specific reason. Ding dong, the Wicked Witch is dead. Her bizarre, psychotic drive to ruin everyone’s lives is now finally over. She’s now back to the kind, glowing, mature Quinn we saw glimpses of in past seasons. I’m glad to have her back.

Tina – In the history of Glee, I’m not sure Tina has ever seen so much spotlight. And boy, am I glad that she did. Shy, emotional Tina channeled all of her heart and soul to become an absolute superhero this week. Not only did she put Mr. Chang in his place, but she also defied Mike’s wishes for her to stop helping him. Holy resilience, Batman.

Rachel – She seriously needs to start channeling her ruthless ambition towards her friends more often. She fixed Quinn. Had she not done that, I’d be fairly certain Quinn would have torched Shelby’s house by now. For that, Rachel deserves a Nobel Peace Prize.

Sam – I don’t like this direction for him. The male stripper felt like just another reason for the writers to get Sam shirtless. I’m also disconcerted about how much pelvic thrusting he wants to incorporate into choreography.

She saved the day without needing to sing. Talk about an "unsung" hero. | Photo courtesy of FoxTV

“Red Solo Cup” by Toby Keith: This song did not involve much actual singing. It just felt like some ploy to bring in yet another recent Top 40 song into the mix. Sam has decent vocals that are well-suited for country, but I do not think they were done justice in this song.

“Buenos Aires” from Evita: Harmony’s voice is always impressive and it functioned reasonably within the confines of the song. The song was fun, the acting was well-done, but I find myself wishing there was a real power note involved.

“Survivor/I Will Survive” by Destiny’s Child/Gloria Gaynor: Just the power vocal you’d expect from Santana and Mercedes. It was loud, proud, and filled to the brim with interesting, epileptic, exercise-video dancing. An excellent and relevant mash-up of disco and 90s music. Very clever.

“ABC” by The Jackson 5: New Directions had a difficult job with all of their power vocals missing (Mercedes, Santana, and Rachel). This song, however, excellently handled the voices of the remaining members. Tina carried the song very well with the assistance of both Kurt and Mike. The fast beat and legitimate dancing further improved it.

“Control” by Janet Jackson: My favorite part of this song was Quinn’s opening. It felt controlled and evil, much like Quinn was at that point in time. Unfortunately, that’s all I liked. Artie and Blaine did not seem to actually be singing. In a choir competition, things like harmonizing and power should matter. This song failed to showcase that.

“Man in the Mirror” by Michael Jackson: This one also left me feeling like the last one did. It’s an iconic song that loses that feeling in this performance. Finn’s vocals were mediocre. It doesn’t showcase talent at all.

“We Are Young” by fun: This, although not as impressive as earlier songs, sounded so much better because Rachel let some power into singing it. New Directions sounds so much better when they’re all united instead of apart. Hm, maybe that’s the moral of this story.

One Liners

“I don’t like your smirky, little meerkat face.” – Kurt Hummel

“You smell of Craigslist.” – Kurt

“Oh god no.” – Rachel Berry about Sam stripping. I had the same thoughts.

“Girls smell better than ham.” – Rory Flanagan. (He may not have said “ham,” but I couldn’t hear anything else through that brogue.)

Overall Score

For the past couple episodes, I have felt like the musical selection has been a buoy that helped to raise each episode’s score in contrast with some downright offensive plot moments. This week, the musical selection turned into more of an anchor that weighed down the episode. “Red Solo Cup,” “Control,” and “Man in the Mirror” did not involve much singing. “Buenos Aires” and “We are Young” were only reasonably entertaining.

Fortunately, profoundly heroic moments from both Tina and Rachel coupled with a multi-faceted Blaine Anderson and a pacified, elegant Quinn made for some excellent character moments this week. For once, I wish there had been more story and less song.

“Hold On to Sixteen:” B

About Jon Erik Christianson

Jon Christianson (COM/CAS '14) is the zany, misunderstood cousin of The Quad family. His superpowers include talking at the speed of light, tripping over walls, and defying ComiQuad deadlines with the greatest of ease. His lovely copyeditors don't appreciate that last one. If for some reason you hunger for more of his nonsense, follow him at @HonestlyJon on Twitter or contact him at jchristianson@buquad.com!

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