(no subject)
Okay, so I got to go see the Glee Live 3D movie last night at midnight. With my mother. Which was an interesting experience, to say the least. (My mother is an unapologetic Blaine fangirl at age 58, incidentally, so it's sometimes very funny to watch her reactions to things like the Mini-Warbler, XD)
I was still kind of meh on the emphasis on fan anecdotes, but it wasn't as bad as I feared. They didn't butcher down all the songs, at least -- as far as I could tell they were all full length or close to it. If anyone saw the 'Raise Your Glass' sneak peak that got posted online, that is NOT how it is in the movie; they run it straight through without random shots of ND, and they don't crop out the entire middle of the song. They do sort of intersperse fan stuff, playing the songs in chunks of 2-3 at a time, and they focus on three fans in particular; honestly, if they'd left out the three primary fans, it wouldn't have been that fan heavy at all, just little quick cuts of things like who's your favorite character, who are you most like, etc. (I suppose technically you could count the Mini-Warbler as a fourth fan focus, but he only gets the one tiny little segment that bleeds into 'Teenage Dream' and intros the Warblers, he doesn't get the 3-4 segments the other three get -- although he did get the biggest laughs from our small theater audience.)
Kurt was by far the best part, IMO. There were several occasions in which he was doing something in the background that made me laugh; as usual, I ended up looking for him in any and all group numbers. He was conspicuously absent when 'Forget You' started, for example, but then he popped up to dance with Gwyneth and Mom started cracking up. Also, he's ridiculously adorable in his duet with Rachel, and visibly trying not to giggle at the fans' reactions during 'I Want To Hold Your Hand', :)
The Warblers were pretty awesome, too, but Blaine suffered a bit from the filming techniques they were using during the 'Silly Love Songs' crowd walk-through -- the only time the 3D got REALLY distracting was when they focused in on someone moving head-on and close up, and they seemed to do that a lot with Blaine and Rachel, for some reason, so it made me sad (it was slightly worse with Rachel because she'd stare STRAIGHT into the camera and it was a little creepy). They did have a bit of behind the scenes with the Warblers that made me smile; Riker/Jeff was all, 'it's a little discouraging that I've gone up against this guy six times for solos', and the other guys are like, 'but we LOVE Blaine, he's awesome, what can you do?' and Darren's down there in the corner like, 'you guys are so full of shit', XD
I thought the behind the scenes in-character stuff was kind of cute, because we got little bits like Rachel flipping out at the thought of Barbra Streisand in the audience, and Blaine shamelessly exaggerating Brittany stalking him onstage for the 5 seconds we got of the Klaine skit, and Santana being Santana and her hair/make-up lady being a little afraid of her, and Kurt just sitting silently in the make-up chair and judging everyone in profile. I could have done without all the fan reaction stuff, but the behind the scenes snippets actually amused me, :)
Overall, needs less fan focus, even though it wasn't as bad as I was afraid it would be. We DID get to watch most of the concert with a few cuts to audience reactions, but at least the songs weren't cut way down for time. I knew going in that there would be no 'Friday', no 'Single Ladies', minimal Klaine skit and between-songs filler, that 'Somebody To Love' was after the credits, which we didn't stay for (couldn't handle being slushied in 3D, *shudder*), and 'Dog Days Are Over' was cut entirely and shows up on the soundtrack as a bonus track, so I suppose that's how they had time to add in the fan stuff. Coming out of the theater, Mom's gut reaction was 'Quinn got shafted, she only had the one song and had to share it with Sam', but then I pointed out that Sam was the same, Tina only got her 'Born This Way' parts, and Puck doesn't get much to do outside of 'Fat Bottomed Girls', not to mention Lauren didn't even get to talk, much less sing. It's heaviest on Rachel and Finn singing leads, Mercedes and Santana after them (with a fair bit of Artie, too, in hindsight), Brittany and Kurt (they're both fan-story focuses), and Blaine mostly because he's the Warblers' lead and obviously a fan favorite in spite of the Blaine-hate that seems to exist in parts of fandom.
TL;DR - heavier on the fan testimonials than I'd have preferred, and 3D was not necessary, but still fun to watch everyone on stage, :D
I was still kind of meh on the emphasis on fan anecdotes, but it wasn't as bad as I feared. They didn't butcher down all the songs, at least -- as far as I could tell they were all full length or close to it. If anyone saw the 'Raise Your Glass' sneak peak that got posted online, that is NOT how it is in the movie; they run it straight through without random shots of ND, and they don't crop out the entire middle of the song. They do sort of intersperse fan stuff, playing the songs in chunks of 2-3 at a time, and they focus on three fans in particular; honestly, if they'd left out the three primary fans, it wouldn't have been that fan heavy at all, just little quick cuts of things like who's your favorite character, who are you most like, etc. (I suppose technically you could count the Mini-Warbler as a fourth fan focus, but he only gets the one tiny little segment that bleeds into 'Teenage Dream' and intros the Warblers, he doesn't get the 3-4 segments the other three get -- although he did get the biggest laughs from our small theater audience.)
Kurt was by far the best part, IMO. There were several occasions in which he was doing something in the background that made me laugh; as usual, I ended up looking for him in any and all group numbers. He was conspicuously absent when 'Forget You' started, for example, but then he popped up to dance with Gwyneth and Mom started cracking up. Also, he's ridiculously adorable in his duet with Rachel, and visibly trying not to giggle at the fans' reactions during 'I Want To Hold Your Hand', :)
The Warblers were pretty awesome, too, but Blaine suffered a bit from the filming techniques they were using during the 'Silly Love Songs' crowd walk-through -- the only time the 3D got REALLY distracting was when they focused in on someone moving head-on and close up, and they seemed to do that a lot with Blaine and Rachel, for some reason, so it made me sad (it was slightly worse with Rachel because she'd stare STRAIGHT into the camera and it was a little creepy). They did have a bit of behind the scenes with the Warblers that made me smile; Riker/Jeff was all, 'it's a little discouraging that I've gone up against this guy six times for solos', and the other guys are like, 'but we LOVE Blaine, he's awesome, what can you do?' and Darren's down there in the corner like, 'you guys are so full of shit', XD
I thought the behind the scenes in-character stuff was kind of cute, because we got little bits like Rachel flipping out at the thought of Barbra Streisand in the audience, and Blaine shamelessly exaggerating Brittany stalking him onstage for the 5 seconds we got of the Klaine skit, and Santana being Santana and her hair/make-up lady being a little afraid of her, and Kurt just sitting silently in the make-up chair and judging everyone in profile. I could have done without all the fan reaction stuff, but the behind the scenes snippets actually amused me, :)
Overall, needs less fan focus, even though it wasn't as bad as I was afraid it would be. We DID get to watch most of the concert with a few cuts to audience reactions, but at least the songs weren't cut way down for time. I knew going in that there would be no 'Friday', no 'Single Ladies', minimal Klaine skit and between-songs filler, that 'Somebody To Love' was after the credits, which we didn't stay for (couldn't handle being slushied in 3D, *shudder*), and 'Dog Days Are Over' was cut entirely and shows up on the soundtrack as a bonus track, so I suppose that's how they had time to add in the fan stuff. Coming out of the theater, Mom's gut reaction was 'Quinn got shafted, she only had the one song and had to share it with Sam', but then I pointed out that Sam was the same, Tina only got her 'Born This Way' parts, and Puck doesn't get much to do outside of 'Fat Bottomed Girls', not to mention Lauren didn't even get to talk, much less sing. It's heaviest on Rachel and Finn singing leads, Mercedes and Santana after them (with a fair bit of Artie, too, in hindsight), Brittany and Kurt (they're both fan-story focuses), and Blaine mostly because he's the Warblers' lead and obviously a fan favorite in spite of the Blaine-hate that seems to exist in parts of fandom.
TL;DR - heavier on the fan testimonials than I'd have preferred, and 3D was not necessary, but still fun to watch everyone on stage, :D