CHALLENGE 19 - DEBATE

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CHALLENGE 19 - DEBATE
Challenge: Choose your side and discuss it with fellow gleeverse members!

Specifics:

• Who doesn't love a good debate every once in a while? For this challenge, you will choose your side on the topic below. You cannot be neutral. You MUST choose one side or the other. Once you have picked your side, write a new comment explaining your

Comments

[lesoleilluna]

(Hope I'm doing this right.)

I think Glee is more successful as a comedy, because it lacks continuity. Storylines or character arcs are forgotten easily, which isn't a big problem for comedies, but sucks when it's a more dramatic arc.
Plus, most characters are close to popular stereotypes, which works better with comedy as well.

[jyusan]

Agreed on all points. Because of the continuity issues, there are not many great overarching storylines with dramatic value you can get invested in, because the characters contradict themselves all the time.
I also agree that they can get away with stereotyping as long as it's balanced in comedy, but when it comes to drama, most of the stereotyping becomes right out offensive.

[lesoleilluna]

Exactly. Most people don't bother to really get invested anymore, if they know whatever happens won't matter during the following episodes anyway.

The stereotyping is already borderline offensive at this point (e.g: the whole slut/virgin categorizing for all the females) so I'm glad they don't want us to take most of these things seriously.

[pixiestyxs]

This! It's hard to get invested in a character's more serious/dramatic storyline when the next episode they've completely forgotten it or said or done something that rendered it meaningless.

[patchsassy]

Dramatic arcs really do call for continuity. I never did see Nip/Tuck but I really hope that Ryan Murphy was much better at trying to get past stereotypes and build stronger storylines than he is on Glee. Sometimes, it's nice to see a comedy that has really strong continuity but it is definitely more prevalent in drama.

[misskitty373]

The stereotyped characters are a big reason why it's more successful as a comedy. I often wonder how the show can preach about ~equality and all that jazz when they use those stereotypes to their own expense.

[odd_one_around]

I agree with all your points. The lack of continuity is a major flaw if Glee was a drama, it makes it hard to care for a storyline if you've never going to hear of it again. The over the top characterisations of all the characters works well in a comedy, but in a drama it would never work.

[wistfulwatcher]

I agree with your points about the stereotypical characters. This argument works especially well with characters like Mercedes, Tina, and Mike, since they're all characters that haven't really had development dramatic arcs, and therefore remain more two-dimensional.