Glee and Fic spoilers, speculation, and call for help
Rumor has it that McKinley's musical this year is West Side Story, and though it's never really been one of my favorite musicals, I for one am excited. It's kind of a neat parallel to Will's and Shelby's two competing show choirs, and the tensions that will no doubt arise. So, who do you think is cast as whom? Rumor also has it that there's some Kurt vs. Blaine and Rachel vs. Mercedes in all this. Ooh, and best part? Emma, Coach Beiste, and Artie are co-directing.
My speculation for how this shakes out: Kurt and Blaine are fighting over the role of Tony, and Rachel and Mercedes are fighting for Maria. If one of those two pairs sang "Anything You Can Do" from Annie Get Your Gun, I would be so very, very happy. If Santana is not Anita, watch for those razor blades she's got hidden in her hair. Seriously, Santana would be Anita had she lived in that era.
I think Kurt and Blaine will both be aced out of the role of Tony--I think that's Finn. And Finn may get it because he's a good singer who can't dance, and all the other male singers in WSS have to fight-dance a lot. Plus, personally? I think Tony is a really boring role, though he does get to sing more. Blaine as Bernardo and Kurt as Riff would be way more fun.
As for the Rachel vs. Mercedes showdown, man, would I love to see Mercedes pull off an upset and win this one, which would no doubt send Rachel to Shelby's competing glee club in protest. I know Season 1 was the "Rachel Quits" show, but Mercedes winning on Rachel's Broadway turf would pay off Mercedes's one sort-of storyline this year and set up a lot of really interesting potential for Rachel to maybe question her own abilities. Ooh, and maybe Kurt could be torn about his two good friends fighting, whose side should he take? And Finn could be torn about does he stay in the play now that Rachel's very unhappily not in it, ie, does he really want to do this performing arts/NYC dream thing for himself and not just because Rachel wants it for them both?
Also, just throwing it out here, but I think Mike Chang needs to lead the gang in "Cool." It's kind of spoke-sung and very dance-y, ergo right up his alley. Ooh, and maybe he'd defect to Shelby's club because maybe her club would look better on his college resume and therefore please his super-strict parents more?
Another also, I would really like Artie and Puck to duet on Nelly's "Maria, Maria." I think that would be an excellent way to incorporate Top 40 music into a Broadway-heavy plot. Like working "Umbrella" into a "Singin' in the Rain" sort-of themed episode, only much better.
Mostly though, I want Emma and Coach Beiste to become epic BFFs. Seriously, no spoiler could have made me happier than the director spoiler.
I also have a fic question that's got me stumped. It's for that long fic set in mary_flanner's Scholars & Gentlemen 'verse.
The reason this fic has grown so huge is because I decided it needed a lot of subplots. Not really sure why, but there you go. I'm managing to pay off all of them but one, and it's pretty obviously hanging there in the wind. The big, overarching plot is this, for those of you not familiar with Scholars & Gentlemen:
In the later fics in the series, Kurt and Blaine graduate from high school and decide they're going to split up amicably, so they can be friends forever rather than have either long-distance boyfriend-hood or fuck-buddies blow up in their faces spectacularly. It doesn't work very well. They really do try, but when they see each other, they end up hooking up or almost hooking up. They drift apart, until Blaine sees on Facebook that Kurt is moving back to Ohio and transferring to OSU because Burt is sick. They get close again throughout the remainder of undergrad and beyond but still kind of weakly try to convince themselves that they're just best friends, until Kurt texts that Burt is dying and Blaine is on a plane back to Ohio immediately, without a second thought. Blaine almost manages to screw things up again by sort of backing out, but he doesn't. They get engaged, but as much as Kurt loves the idea of a wedding, it breaks his heart to think of having one without his dad there. They decide to have a guest-free wedding, then. Carole is fine with this; Blaine's mom (who is quite the wonderful character) is not. The only way they make it out of her house alive is promising that she can throw a party in the yard for them sometime later.
Here's where my fic picks up: Kurt and Blaine have been married for a few months. They're living in Philadelphia, subletting from various and sundry friends of Blaine from grad school while Blaine anxiously awaits word back from the colleges he's interviewed at for a professorship. Kurt finds out from Carole that the mechanic who took over bookkeeping at the garage when Burt got sick didn't do a good job, so Kurt decides he has to go back to Lima and sort out the garage's paperwork before he attempts to sell the business. And of course as soon as Mrs. Anderson hears they're returning to Ohio, she's setting up the not-a-wedding-reception party. Timeline-wise, my story covers Kurt and Blaine coming back to Lima for...about ten days (I'm going to have to edit my date references in the fic, I'm sure) and leads up to the not-a-wedding-reception, which is also a reunion of the New Directions gang.
Going home again brings up a lot of unresolved issues for both Kurt and Blaine. Kurt is still really struggling with his grief over Burt. He's afraid of losing anyone else, and though it's less explicit, he's trying to figure out exactly how he, Carole, and Finn fit together now that Burt isn't there to cement them together. He also just feels plain weird about coming back to Lima, a place that means a lot to him but that he never really liked--classic "you can never go home again" stuff.
Blaine is terrified he's going to be a failure and not get a job and disappoint Kurt and his mom and everyone. He's scared that he's already failed Kurt because it took him so long to accept that he wanted to be with Kurt, and that Kurt has so much grief over Burt that Blaine has no idea how to help him with. Then there's his relationship with his parents.
There's plenty of other stuff going on, too--Kurt and Blaine have communication issues, and there's a little subplot with Quinn, and a scene with Puck that I love so much--but my problem is the Blaine and his dad subplot. Mrs. Anderson is super-involved in Blaine's life and fiercely accepting of who he is. She divorced Blaine's father not long after the Sadie Hawkins incident, not because he was belligerently homophobic, but because he just kind of checked out of the issue and brushed it under the rug. He and Blaine had a relationship for a few years after the divorce, but his dad moved, and they drifted to the point of very polite estrangement. Blaine's father's absence and Kurt pushing Blaine to reconnect with him--or to at least get angry and tell his dad what a lousy job he's been doing--is something that comes up, but that storyline just kind of fizzles by the time I get to the party, where everything is supposed to get wrapped up.
I can't cut the whole storyline. Mr. Anderson is the elephant not in the room: if he's not at the party and I don't say why, readers are going to wonder. He can't be dead, because that would completely screw up the Kurt's grief/Blaine's inability to understand and help with that grief subplot that's working well. Plus, this story is a lot about parents and children, and it just feels like if I brush Mr. Anderson aside, he's going to leave a gaping hole.
But I don't want him to show up at the party, either. For one, it's overdone. For two, I haven't set up any reason for Mr. Anderson to grow. It really needs to be Blaine's move. Is something as simple as Blaine calling his dad after the party and a fade-to-black a good enough wrap-up? Or does anyone else have great ideas? :)