I read something once that said that while Glee is completely fantastical and works very little like high school in its practicalities, what it is extremely good at is presenting what high school feels like.
I tend to agree, at least when the show is at its best. From a literary genre point of view, the show is a romance rather than a novel -- a romance in the sense that Hawthorne talked about: concerned less with realism than with "the truth of the human heart." Of course, that's exactly why I get so frustrated on those occasions when the show ignores or sells out the emotional truths that it has previously established.
Music has always been the fast track to my heart, and the show often uses music really well -- and even when the music isn't to my personal taste (which is fairly often), it frequently manages to sell me on the idea that the music means something to the characters, and that's usually enough for me, narratively speaking. The music itself matters less than the role that music plays in their lives. I don't much care which songs Kurt and Blaine sing to each other in the car; what matters to me is that that's something they do. ♥
...though I also have thoughts about Glee and genre and how I wish it were actually more of a traditional musical than it is. But that is a separate post. :D
I tend to agree, at least when the show is at its best. From a literary genre point of view, the show is a romance rather than a novel -- a romance in the sense that Hawthorne talked about: concerned less with realism than with "the truth of the human heart." Of course, that's exactly why I get so frustrated on those occasions when the show ignores or sells out the emotional truths that it has previously established.
Music has always been the fast track to my heart, and the show often uses music really well -- and even when the music isn't to my personal taste (which is fairly often), it frequently manages to sell me on the idea that the music means something to the characters, and that's usually enough for me, narratively speaking. The music itself matters less than the role that music plays in their lives. I don't much care which songs Kurt and Blaine sing to each other in the car; what matters to me is that that's something they do. ♥
...though I also have thoughts about Glee and genre and how I wish it were actually more of a traditional musical than it is. But that is a separate post. :D
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