How Glee became unbearable in 10 uneasy steps...Part 2: "Special Guests"

Oh, man. First off, thanks to everyone who found their way here and spread the word via Tumblr, Twitter, and Gleeforum. You all are the best!

Yesterday I took just one of the ways Glee has descended into madness and went from one of the most promising groundswell phenomenons to a pandering product Disney would be proud of. I feel once the initial ratings success came in, either from ambition of Ryan Murphy or pressure from Fox, episodes that once weaved storylines became shiny bright ratings-grabbers. And nothing signaled that more than the abuse of the "special guest".

One of the biggest things that drew me to the show at first was its fresh and talented cast, with six young actors that not only could sing but could carry off witty scripts naturally. And while Matthew Morrison and Lea Michele had Broadway experience, they both were green to television. The only real big name of the cast was Jane Lynch, and even she was an inspired choice and had a underground fanbase. I think this helped allowing the audience to focus on the characters and not the actors, and it worked beautifully.

Season one of Glee was very frugal on the use of "celebrity" casting. Although the first "big-name" guest appearance came as early as the second regular-first-season episode, it was only a cameo stint from Josh Groban, as himself as a plot device and comedic punchline (in "Acafellas"). He didn't sing, and didn't portray a fictional character, so it was nothing really distracting or offbase - in fact, it drove the Acafellas plotline. The show did the same later in the season with Olivia Newton-John, though with a more contrived premise and cheesier results. The two later would appear as judges in Regionals.

The first real featured role came when Kristen Chenoweth appeared in the role of April Rhodes in "The Rhodes Not Taken". But like Morrison, she was a Broadway star instead of TV (of course a giant star of the stage), and she's such a great comedic actress that she fit in seamlessly. Now she did sing on half the musical numbers, however #1) her character was part of the New Directions group, #2) all her numbers with either duets with Will or Rachel or the group stage performance, and #3) she can sang. Her storyline tidied up nicely by the end of the episode. Her stint proved to be a critical and ratings success, and the show brought her back later in the season (on "Home"), where she seemed more of a recurring character than a guest role (though her songs were by now more detached from the ND kids). It was when she was brought back for the stunt-episode built around the Fleetwood Mac Rumours album (stunt-eps a whole other step I'm covering later) that her character was airlifted into the chaos and really wasn't necessary to the show (unless you count the whole contrived "will Mr. Shue go to Broadway" subplot). As much as I love Kristin, I feel any more showing now will do nothing for the show, and April should remain in the sunset. It seemed like more of a "reunion" episode than anything, and there's no need for that on a show in its second season at the time.

 
The first non-singing guest appearance comes with a caveat - it was rapper Eve, who I guess does have musical cred (though none exhibited here), and did have a sitcom of her own for experience. Opinion? Harmless.

The biggest guest role of the first season, however, was another Broadway star, singer and Chenoweth's Wicked co-star Idina Menzel as Rachel's mother. If you put aside the fact that they're featuring Berry's mom without even an appearance from either of her adoptive fathers, even at any of their performances, Menzel's Shelby Corcoran, like Chenoweth's Rhodes, simply used a great actress with amazing singing ability to their best ability. Sadly though, like Rhodes, Corcoran's return in season three dropped in into a tornado of unneeded and convoluted plots (the creation of the Troubletones) and inappropriate trysts (with the seduction by Puck).

Saturday Night Live's Molly Shannon appeared briefly as a teacher, but while she was funny, her character was exiled unceremoniously (which is another Glee-pas).  The same episode that brought her on also introduced Jonathan Groff as a rival glee club kid, which with Rachel was the first guest shipper (and a big one at that) in the fanbase. Like Menzel, he had an important part of the story, and as a mostly stage actor he wasn't there for anything more than his talent. And like Menzel and Chenoweth, felt a little too forced when he returned for the second season prom episode.

The last big name, and only big name that wasn't a primary singer, was Neil Patrick Harris, who played a rival of Mr. Shue's, and even impressed enough to win an Emmy for guest star. He of course can get a pass because he's got singing chops, and held his own even though it was the first glimpse of "this is Neil Patrick Harris, not a character" role that would seep into season two and complete infect season three.

And that's season one. Notice how few and far between these cameos are, and then it's easy to see why Glee's character development and plot consistency was so together that season.

and then there was Gwyneth.

Personally, I have nothing against Gwyneth Paltrow. She's an accomplished actress who won an Oscar for her comedic turn in Shakespeare In Love. Of course she can bring laughs. But in no way, shape, or form, did her recurring role on the show do anything but subconsciously give me "this is Gwyneth Paltrow teaching". At least John Stamos (brought in around the same time at the start of the second season) tried his best to assimillate into the cast as the boyfriend of guidance counselor Emma, but his distinctive look brings me right back to Full House. With Paltrow, the whole media spectacle of publicizing her appearance, and her hijacking of every episode she was on from what should be the focus (the kids), this was the first time than it really felt like the whole cast was supporting the Paltrow show, and not the other way around (I fault the writers and producers with this). And while she can carry a note, her performances were, um, a bit "overproduced", if you will. I'm still pissed with the show with giving her "Landslide" which should have been all Santana's. And her in "Sexy" was particularly cringeworthy.

Besides Gwyneth, Carol Burnett was wheeled on as Sue's mother, and while she wasn't by any means as interfering as Paltrow's character, it really was a time-suck and another unnecessary musical number that could have been doled out to someone else (Tina? Santana? KAROFSKY?)

That's pretty much it for season two, though having Kathy Griffin and Loretta Devine portray relative nobodies judging Regionals after Groban and Newton-John did season one, seems weird.

Well, if the previous season had guests taking over, season three was the whole ambush. At this point, I guess stemming on the buzz around Paltrow's gig and reaching for ratings points (which naturally have dipped), RIB+6 get to the point of just screwing the New Directions and writing episodes around what star they were able to procure (or who needed the publicity). Ricky Martin was glittered in as the Spanish teacher. John Schneider was put in as Sam's Dad. Whoopi Goldberg was Whoopi Goldberg without saying she was Whoopi freaking Goldberg. Matt Bomer came in and had to be Autotuned into oblivion to carry off Gotye's "Somebody That I Used To Know". But the worse was making the faithful Glee audience go on Men In Black amnesia made to cast Jeff Goldblum and Brian Stokes Mitchell as Rachel's dads (even after a campaign to cast the actual and available actors from the picture in season 1). And finally, Murphy trolls reality TV in casting NeNe Leakes (whose name sounds like an oozing vagina term to me) as a coach (while completely ignoring Coach Beiste's character for months until the recent abuse storyline fiasco). And while Leakes may have comedic timing skills, the fact is the producers and writers are blatantly and consciously ignoring more worthy cast members on their roster. It's like the Yankees hiring Kim Kardashian to pitch.

And it's getting worse. Gloria Estefan is supposed to be coming soon as Santana's mom. Did they get in a room and say "who's the biggest Latina celebrity we can afford"? And the worst of all worsts, lowering the bar to bring in Lindsay Lohan as a judge at Regionals (is this negotiated payback for their truthful jabs at her before?) along with media spectacle Perez Hilton. I really hope the rumors are true that she was tardy and horrendous on the set. The deserve that (not the cast, the producers).

With this revolving door of celebrities, the show felt less of an underdog musical comedy and more of a variety show with which A, B or C listers Murphy likes hanging around with. And as I fault a chunk of rabid young girls for the shitshow that is Klaine, there's a big influence on this travesty from the gay base. Between constant support for trainwreck celebrities like the Housewives franchise, the myriad of dysfunctional reality shows, and pretty much anything currently on the Bravo network, gives the impression that as a majority we are more concerned about flash than substance, scandal than talent. And this stuntcasting has overtaken the need for any sort of plot consistency (another one of the steps) making Glee more of a "who will be on their next" than "what will happen next". And the expense of such great characters (Lauren, Karofsky, hell, even Jacob) and the disappearance of major characters like Quinn, Tina, and Puck for giant chunks of time like this is Pinochet's Chile are a recipe why Glee's numbers, and future, look bleak unless they get back to basics (like Murphy said they would this season) and forget this celebrity circus (which again Murphy apparently trolled us into believing wasn't happening this season).

At this point I'm expecting Casey Anthony and George Zimmerman in a very special episode on season four at this point.

Next time: Ryan and all start praying to the god of iTunes.