Because it’s so important to teach our children about emotional manipulation and the advertising industry. Also because Sesame Street is pretty awesome these days.

I still have a few reservations and concerns, but I have to say, Glee has been thoroughly enjoyable so far. My primary worry has been that the show wouldn’t be able to step outside the standard high school narratives, and to some extent that’s been true. Five episodes in, the end goal looks exactly the same as it looked in the first episode, and the few forays into significant plotting have detracted from the overall impact. Let’s be honest, it is going to take several implausible steps before the entire football team dances to “Single Ladies” in the middle of a game, but the way we get to that place is not the reason we want to watch Glee. Who cares about the impossible rationale – I just want to watch those football players dance like Beyonce.

Once the football players do dance like Beyonce, we just want the board to be reset by the end of the episode so we can start all over again. Although I continue to hope that further development will be on the way, Glee is really about briefly upsetting and then reinstating the status quo. Mr. Shuester joins and then abandons the Acafellas, his wife is pregnant but not really so never mind, Quinn actually is pregnant, but the father is Puck, so Finn and Rachel can still end up together. I would love for it to move outside that oscillating conflict/resolution scheme, but even as it is, there’s space to do things like…

…have Kristen Chenoweth crash the party and blow everyone away for an episode. Obviously she couldn’t work as a series regular (the show could barely afford to have Kristen Chenoweth and Jane Lynch in the same episode), but she worked perfectly as an outside force that appears, shakes things up, and then leaves with everything a little better than it was before she came in. And the music! Without a structure of interesting plots, my experience watching Glee is mostly about me just waiting for someone to start singing again. Some of the character development has also been rewarding, particularly in moments like those between Kurt and his father from last week. But the pregnancy plots both feel tired, and red herrings like the musical are so obviously ruses from the beginning that they don’t draw any emotional investment. So I sit, patiently biding my time until the music swells in the background and a spotlight appears from nowhere.

This random bartender from the bowling alley appears to share my feelings

Agreed, Jayma Mays.

There’s unrealized potential here, and I’m still feeling like Glee has yet to become as awesome as it could be. After the episode’s done, I fret about high school and its preset plot conventions, and the fact that I can barely remember stuttering girl’s name bothers me. In the middle of the show, though, I thrill when Kristen Chenoweth starts singing “Maybe This Time,” and then when I realize she and Lea Michele are going to sing it together? I am a big giant sucker. And I love it.

P.S. While checking out the Glee wikipedia page, I noticed Glee: Volume 1 is being released as an album of several songs on the show so far, and the list includes a few songs that haven’t aired yet. The last of those songs is “Defying Gravity.” And then I keeled over from cliché musical nerd ecstasy.