Glee Fic: The Good Life

[tracevincente]

Title: The Good Life
Rating: PG
Word count: 745
Genre: Future fic
Inspired by: Episode 3x14, On My Way
Notes: This episode produced a lot of tears and sadness, though Dave's part of the story ended with a small, bright spot of hope. I thought I would build on that with this happy little ficlet. :)

Comments

[ibshafer]

For a "Pirate," he's such a diplomat. One of the many reasons why he's so flawless... :)

I like that idea, that they could take this chance to build the relationship slowly and carefully so that it makes sense, which, btw, is how it would have gone if a few things hadn't happened... I heard that the Dalton transfer came about b/c Chris asked for a lighter workload in S3 so he could write the script for SBL and Ryan said he couldn't spare Chris then b/c Nationals and graduation/college storylines. So instead, he offered to let him go right away and we got Dalton and Chris had, maybe, a scene per ep... I know I've heard this somewhere before and I don't know how true it is, but in the beginning Kurtofsky was *always* end game (Ryan is said to have helped then dated his high school bully...) and whether we get *back* to that now, or just get a nice friendship, well, I guess we'll see, huh? I do think they overplayed the DC card and it hasn't worked well for them.

I also love that you're hearing people responding more kindly to Dave. I have a friend who used to argue with me all the time - she hated him so much ("Mean ppl suck. He needs to GO!") and last week she told me she wept through the entire episode, that her heart was breaking for him, and that she'd actually started to really like him in ♥. :D Always a good thing when Dave/Max wins ppl over. :)

And yeah, Ryan changes his mind as quickly as the wind shifts. I trust not a single thing he says...

[tracevincente]

I know I've heard this somewhere before and I don't know how true it is, but in the beginning Kurtofsky was *always* end game (Ryan is said to have helped then dated his high school bully...) and whether we get *back* to that now, or just get a nice friendship, well, I guess we'll see, huh? I do think they overplayed the DC card and it hasn't worked well for them.

I've heard that, too - that Kurtofsky was originally the plan for Kurt - and I vaguely remember the spoilery talk back then that alluded to it. I had not heard that about Ryan helping/dating his high school bully! That actually gives me a lot of hope that they might get back to the original plan.

To me, it seems so clear that the reason Klaine is lackluster and going nowhere while every interaction between Kurt and Dave is just electric, is because one of those story lines was planned meticulously and the other was thrown together, last minute, because of fan reaction. Well, and also, Max is just a stronger actor than DC. :)

[ibshafer]

IA. I had wondered at the way they've handled Klaine - giving it to the screaming horde (who were, indeed, screaming) and then pulling back from it, showing non of the "depth" and "caring" in the relationship that the fans read into it, wondering if they DID pull back to keep from losing advertisers and angering conservatives. As though they were saying, 'you can have your gay relationship, as long as we don't have to see it...'

But I also think DC didn't have the acting chops to keep up with Chris. (Look at their scenes in Prom Queen. Chris is on fire and Darren looks like he's anemic. I didn't even buy the "I got bashed" backstory - he didn't look all that affected by the trauma.) That might be why they use him for performance numbers primarily, and not dialogue. They haven't given him much more than a line or two here and there, other than that awful "argument" he had with Finn in the gym. (See icon...)

So I agree part of it is his ability. This coming Anderson-aganza is probably supposed to give him all sorts of back story, but I'll be curious to see how and if he pulls it off. Using other characters to provide backstory for a character does not give him depth. That can only come from his performance, something Max gives in spades...

And that Ryan forgave, helped and fell in love with his bully is an argument I've used on the haters from time to time... :)

[tracevincente]

Look at their scenes in Prom Queen. Chris is on fire and Darren looks like he's anemic.

It's kind of funny that you use the word 'anemic' -- at the end of the 'New York' episode, in the Lima Bean and during the infamous " **looooong pause** Love you, too" scene, I was watching Darren Criss and I told the friend watching with me, 'Oh, Blaine is sick. Watch, I bet you!' (I have this annoying habit of trying to predict plot points before they happen, lol.) I was convinced for a good month after that episode that we were going to find out in S3 that Blaine had leukemia or something, based on his droopy, flat manner:



When I re-watch that scene, I'm still a little surprised that there was never any explanation for why he seemed half asleep and bored; at some point, I realized that it's just DC's acting, though I'm still unclear on what, exactly, he was trying to portray there. But then, he does become more animated (jazz hands!) - when he starts talking about his audition for Six Flags. I do wonder sometimes if that's exactly what we're supposed to be seeing -- that he can tolerate not being the center of attention for a while, but that he has to get the focus back on himself fairly quickly - in that scene, when Kurt starts talking about the musical he's planning to write over the summer, Blaine, looking at Sam and Mercedes, rolls his eyes. If that's what they're doing with both the writing and DC's performance, it's actually very subtle and nuanced. So subtle that Blaine stans are missing it entirely. ;)