Why I Detest Glee

Beneath its 'massive musical set pieces,' it's 'empty and vapid'
By Evann Gastaldo,  Newser Staff
Posted Sep 30, 2010 9:03 AM CDT
Glee Is Not Good: Why One Blogger Hates the Hit TV Show
Front row from left: Dijon Talton, Lea Michele, Amber Riley, Jenna Ushkowitz, and Chris Colfer perform in "The Power of Madonna" episode of "Glee," which aired Tuesday, April 20, 2010 on Fox.   (AP Photo/Fox, Michael Yarish, FILE)

Based on the 13.3 million viewers who watched this week’s much-anticipated “Britney Spears episode,” everyone loves Glee—everyone, that is, except Jace Lacob. “As the show piles on the musical numbers, gimmicky guest stars, and theme episodes,” he writes in the Daily Beast, “plot, characterization, and logic fly out the window.” Forget “serialization,” “three-dimensional characters,” or “a consistent narrative experience:” Glee is simply “a music single-delivery mechanism … the very definition of mass-produced entertainment that’s intended to distract even as it asks you to hit download on iTunes.”

Its “characters are still little more than archetypes”—sometimes offensively so, as in the case of one Jewish supporting character whose characterization “borders on the anti-Semitic.” The “massive musical set pieces” that distract you from the lack of character or plot development “seem like coldly calculated viral videos, designed to rapidly spread across the Internet.” But that’s probably why people love Glee, with its never-ending covers of songs that are “part of the pop-culture lexicon already.” To Lacob, it’s just “a cottage industry of mass-produced knockoffs.” (If, after reading this, you're still obsessed with all things Glee, check out Lea Michele's near-topless photo shoot for Marie Claire.)

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