SAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAM! AND MERCEDEEEEEEEEEEEEES!!!! I am so in love, I can't even. ♥ Also, Will's faces throughout the whole episode had me rolling, especially at the end, like you said, but also his little dork-dances during the performance.
Quinn, yes. Ugh. The epic condescension towards her this ep was infuriating (esp from Sam, who usually behaves much better than this). But I was grateful (!) for the small favor of having Rachel, another girl, ultimately be the one who gets through to her. At least it wasn't "straight white dude fixes crazy girl's problems." And Rachel has a perspective that's genuinely relevant, as Shelby's bio-daughter, and the adopted daughter of parents who as a gay couple are often de facto considered unfit.
The thing that was driving me most crazy while watching the episode was the whole WE NEED TO ENJOY BEING YOUNG BECAUSE THIS IS THE BEST TIME OF OUR LIVES OMG. It's a basic fact of lit/media for/about young people that it's always by and for adults primarily, and reflects adult fantasies of what young people are/are supposed to be. And omg, it was so incredibly obvious and clunky that the characters were mouthpieces for the 40-something writers looking back with fond nostalgia at their teen years in that ep. Glee, when it's good, is usually quite smart about examining the cultural construct of "what it means to be a teenager" -- characters like Rachel and Kurt are constantly aware of how much their expectations are shaped by media narratives about teenagers and how much their realities often fail to live up to that. And RIB are also very good at not overtly idealizing the state of being a teenager -- if anything, Glee-when-it's-good is all about how much that often SUCKS. So it's major tonal dissonance (on Glee? My word!) to suddenly be all "be GRATEFUL that you're YOUNG." Because dude, that's a perspective that generally only comes with age and nostalgia. The only character I could buy that from was Sam, because he's been forced out of normative-teenagerhood into responsibilities labeled adult -- and it's almost entirely people who HAVE adult responsibilities that think teenagerhood is something to hold on to.
(One of the things I always appreciated about Will, back when he had, like, characterization and stuff, was that he had a really interesting mixture of that idealizing "best time of my life omg" thing combined with a real understanding, because he sees it every day, of how shitty teenagerhood can be, and yet he still clings to those fantasies of himself and the kids around him. It always struck me as something very real, and embodies the conflict around how we think about teenagerhood in our culture -- especially those of us adults who love and consume (and CREATE!) teen narratives. He was like a window onto those ideas, while still being a real flawed person in his own right. oh, for those glory days when Will was interesting!)
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
timeasmymeasure
no subject
Date: 2011-12-07 07:44 am (UTC)Quinn, yes. Ugh. The epic condescension towards her this ep was infuriating (esp from Sam, who usually behaves much better than this). But I was grateful (!) for the small favor of having Rachel, another girl, ultimately be the one who gets through to her. At least it wasn't "straight white dude fixes crazy girl's problems." And Rachel has a perspective that's genuinely relevant, as Shelby's bio-daughter, and the adopted daughter of parents who as a gay couple are often de facto considered unfit.
The thing that was driving me most crazy while watching the episode was the whole WE NEED TO ENJOY BEING YOUNG BECAUSE THIS IS THE BEST TIME OF OUR LIVES OMG. It's a basic fact of lit/media for/about young people that it's always by and for adults primarily, and reflects adult fantasies of what young people are/are supposed to be. And omg, it was so incredibly obvious and clunky that the characters were mouthpieces for the 40-something writers looking back with fond nostalgia at their teen years in that ep. Glee, when it's good, is usually quite smart about examining the cultural construct of "what it means to be a teenager" -- characters like Rachel and Kurt are constantly aware of how much their expectations are shaped by media narratives about teenagers and how much their realities often fail to live up to that. And RIB are also very good at not overtly idealizing the state of being a teenager -- if anything, Glee-when-it's-good is all about how much that often SUCKS. So it's major tonal dissonance (on Glee? My word!) to suddenly be all "be GRATEFUL that you're YOUNG." Because dude, that's a perspective that generally only comes with age and nostalgia. The only character I could buy that from was Sam, because he's been forced out of normative-teenagerhood into responsibilities labeled adult -- and it's almost entirely people who HAVE adult responsibilities that think teenagerhood is something to hold on to.
(One of the things I always appreciated about Will, back when he had, like, characterization and stuff, was that he had a really interesting mixture of that idealizing "best time of my life omg" thing combined with a real understanding, because he sees it every day, of how shitty teenagerhood can be, and yet he still clings to those fantasies of himself and the kids around him. It always struck me as something very real, and embodies the conflict around how we think about teenagerhood in our culture -- especially those of us adults who love and consume (and CREATE!) teen narratives. He was like a window onto those ideas, while still being a real flawed person in his own right. oh, for those glory days when Will was interesting!)