Things I Missed from Glee's Season 1 (Part 2)

Despite my time constraints, I still find time (usually during sembreaks) to watch Glee even if a lot of people tell me not to. Even the person who introduced me to Glee has stopped watching it. That's how bad it got. The story may have taken a wrong turn somewhere along the way but the songs and the singers have gotten, in my simple not musically inclined opinion, better.

Whenever I don't get a story line, which is very frequent, I always chalked it up to the writers' failure (deliberate or involuntary) to make stories connect or make one cohesive story. But as I Google-d the episode titles to rename my files (yes I'm OC like that), I discovered that I did miss 9 episodes from  Glee's first season. Maybe that's the reason (or at least one of the reasons) why I didn't get Mr. Schue when he said Mercedes helped Quinn during her pregnancy or that Santana got Finn to lose his virginity to her or that Jesse was once a member of New Directions.

Since I missed 9 episodes--which, I realize, is a lot--I'll divide the list into three, with three episodes per article.


So Here's What I Missed in Glee's "Bad Reputation", "Laryngitis" and "Dream On":

1. MR. SCHUE RAPS. WTF. "Ice Ice Baby" was better left alone, Mr. Schue. No need to ruin it even more.

You give rap a bad name, Mr. Schue.

2. That boy from Chuck. I don't know his name but he's in almost everything.

One of the Buy More-ons goes to school in McKinley High.

3. Sue and Olivia Newton-John get physical. Their Physical video was so awesome, the Glee kids had to watch it again. Mercedes saying, "Again again again," after watching the video was really funny.

They look like sisters.

4. Brittana Angels. Need I say more?

Oh take me to heaven now.

5. Quinn's GList. Creating the a list of the sluttiest/meanest/naughtiest people in Glee, and their corresponding points, to propel herself to better status was a rather shallow story slant for a main character like Quinn but I'd take it over the Crazy Mother story arc she was in most part of Season 3.

Quinn's number one on her GList. Of course.

6. Rachel has three boys and flaunts it in a video called "Bad Reputation". This is worth mentioning because Rachel rarely, if ever, has more than a boy at a time. Jonathan Groff's (who plays Jesse St. James) facial expressions are wonderful.

Puck's, Finn's and Jesse's Angel: Rachel

7. Kurtanny. Aside from doing mash-ups really well, I am amazed at how Glee has managed to make everyone hook up with everyone else despite the utter lack of chemistry, story and sense. I always thought I could make a diagram of six degrees of Glee and it would show everyone connected to everyone else by one or two degrees of romantic relationships. Seeing Kurtanny aka the Weirdest of All Hook-Ups (okay, maybe they're second to Artanna) happen in the "lost" part of Season 1 convinced me that it is true: Everyone in Glee is romantically connected to everyone else.

I will definitely be a Kurtanny shipper!

8. Mercedes vs. Santana. This storyline is as old and as useless as it sounds. I'm glad it's over and Mercedes and Santana are now killing Adele mash-ups and duets.

Remember when Mercedes and Santana were both in Cheerios and into Puck?

9. Puckcedes. I guess Season 1 was all about trying out different pairings to see what works and what doesn't. What we got from the failed Puckcedes outing was that Mercedes liked her men with good arms and good vocal combination with her. Trouty Mouth fits the bill. I don't know if the writers remembered these details or everything just fell into place.

Puck likes his woman with curves.

10. RAJIV!!!! Seeing Rajiv of Outsourced be Rachel's throat doctor acting all strict and sarcastic ("At least start by taking these antibiotics unless you think they're going to adversely affect your dance moves.") is really funny. I never imagined Outsourced and Glee doing a crossover episode but I guess here's a peek into that impossibility. I can just imagine Bollywood and Showtunes ruling (or, for some, ruining) our TV sets coupled with Santana going all-Lima-Heights-Adjacent on a clueless Gupta.

Doctor Rajiv in Ohio, America. Beat that, Todd Dempsey.

11. Lauren Zizes. It turns out she's not a random character made up to be another warm body in the New Directions in Season 2. She is the President of the AV Club--A long shot away from the AV Club boys of Freaks and Geeks--and a member of Old Maids Club.

Zizes!

12. Kurt got solos! I thought Kurt was exaggerating when he said he used to get the solos before Alpha-male Blaine got in New Directions. But he did get solos in Season 1. Case in point, see photo below.

KURT in bright, big letters.

13. NEIL PATRICK HARRIS. In season 3's "Saturday Night Glee-ver", when Sue said Glee kids all wanted swag (aka prizes) and a flashback of NPH holding a jean jacket is shown, I went, "Oh what the *uck was that." I checked, and NPH is Mr. Bryan Ryan, Mr. Schue's archenemy in high school and a new member of McKinley High School board. Mr. Ryan is like Barney (with all the nice hair, nice voice, and magic tricks) without the playbook. He even gave out free stuff and took it back Barney Stinson style.

BRYAN RYAN THE KILLER OF DREAMS.

14. Artie flash mob-dancing in a mall! Seeing Artie dance with Mike and Brittany and look good while doing so makes me regret the writers' (or producers) decision to give the wheelchair role to Kevin McHale. Seeing Kevin McHale dance in "Dream On" made me wish Cory Monteith got the Artie role. I noticed where they danced in the mall is exactly the same part where Kurt and the gang danced during Rachel's Barbra Streisand Intervention.

Finn is such a bad dancer that a boy in a wheelchair dances better than him.

15. Rachelby. All this while I thought Rachel's mom Shelby just came out of nowhere in Season 3 and became the vocal coach of Troubletones. It turns out she has been present since season 1 and they even had an imaginary duet in "Dream On". I wonder why they forgot about this in Season 2--along with Quinn-having-a-baby-then-giving-it-up-for-adoption story line.

Like mother, like daughter.

16. The Start of the Changs. It was an afterthought and a little bit racist to pair up the two Asians in the show but, hey, Season 1 was about pairing up everyone with each other to see what works. I guess the Changs did work. Or the writers just didn't know what to do with these two.

Mr. Schue: You got a dance partner? Tina: Mika Chang. And the rest is history.

Afterthought: I think it would be funny (epic-ly funny) if Tina's dad turn out to be (drumroll, please) Senor Chang of Community. There should be an episode that brings all their parents together and Senor Chang would come out of the airconditioning vent with Annie's Boobs. Haha But then again, that would be too much Community-ish and less Glee-ky.