Why Glee is a Fannish Goldmine.
What a friggin' genius way to visually portray character representation.
Glee and all it's mess of issues is actually a perfect example of what makes a show popular to fannish audiences. It's a fun show, it has miles of potential to do really interesting and creative things, and to take on very pressing social issues. It's characters are easy to relate to, it's cast is fun and approachable, and the premise of the show (High School Musical for those of us who weren't popular in high school, made into a TV show) is the kind of thing that when you first hear about it you think "That's either going to be tragic or amazing. Either way, it should be fun to watch."
The reality of the show is that it isn't perfect. It has poignant and touching moments, and other times it pokes around the edge of "amazing" and then shies away. It touches on or implies very significant social issues, but frequently doesn't resolve them. It stays surface on many of the issues that most need in depth exploration, but it keeps trying. So we cheer for it, we urge it to keep going, get it right this time, watch it walk a tightrope between challenging and perpetuating stereotypes, and we pray it doesn't fall to the wrong side.
Those moments of doubt in the show, those times the show gets it wrong and we're angry but we keep watching, those are the moments that make the show a popular topic of conversation. Those are the moments that inspire fannish creativity. We fill in the gaps, we fix the things we love. Whether the show makes us want to bang our head on the table because of a piece characterization that has hugely important and frightening implications that the show glosses over or treats as justified (see: Will's terrifying physical threatening of Terri when he discovers she's not actually pregnant), or a narrative arc that wasn't satisfactorily resolved (see: Artie and Tina's short-lived romance), there are things about the show we need to fix, we need to talk about. A show like Glee can generate discourse because of the mistakes that it makes. A show with no flaws is a show where there's nothing to discuss.
Glee makes its fair share of mistakes, but it has it's successes as well. We love the show because it does get things right now and then, it does tug our heartstrings. I talked before about how moved I was by Kurt's relationship with his father, for instance. (You can read my tl;dr thoughts on that episode right here) That balance, the mixture of loving a show and wanting to fix it, that's what propels us forward and makes us passionate about media.
Glee and all it's mess of issues is actually a perfect example of what makes a show popular to fannish audiences. It's a fun show, it has miles of potential to do really interesting and creative things, and to take on very pressing social issues. It's characters are easy to relate to, it's cast is fun and approachable, and the premise of the show (High School Musical for those of us who weren't popular in high school, made into a TV show) is the kind of thing that when you first hear about it you think "That's either going to be tragic or amazing. Either way, it should be fun to watch."
The reality of the show is that it isn't perfect. It has poignant and touching moments, and other times it pokes around the edge of "amazing" and then shies away. It touches on or implies very significant social issues, but frequently doesn't resolve them. It stays surface on many of the issues that most need in depth exploration, but it keeps trying. So we cheer for it, we urge it to keep going, get it right this time, watch it walk a tightrope between challenging and perpetuating stereotypes, and we pray it doesn't fall to the wrong side.
Those moments of doubt in the show, those times the show gets it wrong and we're angry but we keep watching, those are the moments that make the show a popular topic of conversation. Those are the moments that inspire fannish creativity. We fill in the gaps, we fix the things we love. Whether the show makes us want to bang our head on the table because of a piece characterization that has hugely important and frightening implications that the show glosses over or treats as justified (see: Will's terrifying physical threatening of Terri when he discovers she's not actually pregnant), or a narrative arc that wasn't satisfactorily resolved (see: Artie and Tina's short-lived romance), there are things about the show we need to fix, we need to talk about. A show like Glee can generate discourse because of the mistakes that it makes. A show with no flaws is a show where there's nothing to discuss.
Glee makes its fair share of mistakes, but it has it's successes as well. We love the show because it does get things right now and then, it does tug our heartstrings. I talked before about how moved I was by Kurt's relationship with his father, for instance. (You can read my tl;dr thoughts on that episode right here) That balance, the mixture of loving a show and wanting to fix it, that's what propels us forward and makes us passionate about media.