Starsweep to Lima, where the Left Behind Club is officially the creepiest thing I’ve ever heard of. Kitty thinks the End of Times is coming and has somehow built a club around that. I don’t know about you, but my high school didn’t allow religious clubs. I dunno, I guess we were just old fashioned about “separation of church and state” or something.
THIS FLYER LOOKS LIKE SOMETHING WE WOULD ASK AN INTERN TO MAKE AS A JOKE FOR THE WEBSITE
The club meets after school at Breadsticks where, despite it being the school week again, Santana tags along to see what crazy misadventure Brittany has gotten herself into.
IT IS LEGALLY A CRIME THAT THOSE LIPS AREN’T BEING USED FOR MUFF DIVING
The club meeting actually, technically includes tricking a girl who’s “on the fence” about the whole Rapture Thing into believing she’s actually been left behind by staging a whole faux-rapture. See, as it turns out, Kitty isn’t just a rehashed version of Quinn. Instead of being self-absorbed and obsessed with small town success, she’s actually just batshit crazy. I have to applaud whomever came up with this idea, as long as it was originally written as a creative TV show bit and not as something the kids are actually doing these days.
TWO FINGERS. YOU’RE DOING IT WRONG.
Completely unimpressed, Santana says she and Brittany should leave, suggesting that perhaps this whole End of the World thing isn’t good for Brittany. But Brittany doesn’t want to leave the club because… um she doesn’t want to get left behind in the rapture because it hurt so much when Santana left her behind and went to college…? Yeah the logic here was a bit flawed. But regardless Santana realizes how upset Brittany has been about her leaving.
ALSO POTENTIALLY DOING IT WRONG, POSSIBLY TOO MANY FINGERS
Back over at McKinley, it’s either later in the day or the next day — who the fuck knows. Potato Head wanders into Mr. Schue’s office and Will reacts like we give a shit about either of these characters. And Finn starts to cry just like he did that time he thought he’d knocked Quinn up. Statistically speaking there are 1,302 things I’d rather see on Glee than this brofest. Side note: why isn’t Potato Head crying into his mother’s arms? Or his step-father’s arms? Remember all that time spent building up those characters who I like a gagillion times better? Let’s use those characters.
CHECK OUT THOSE VENEERS
So obviously instead of utilizing any of those characters, Finn just sits in on Glee Club rehearsal.
THAT AWKWARD MOMENT WHEN YOU REALIZE YOU’VE BOTH COLOR COORDINATED WITH THE SOUND EQUIPMENT.
Finn: Why did you do that to him?
Blaine: I don’t know. There’s no excuse.
And here I think Blaine’s character is realer than ever. In high school shit just happens. Every girl you cheat on. Every girl you don’t call for weeks and weeks. Every girl you breakup with for no reason and regret it immediately. In high school it just happens. Things fall away from you and you’re too young to know why and you’re too inexperienced to know how to fix it. In high school, unlike the rest of your life, I think that’s actually okay. We’re allowed to do a few shitty things while we’re still learning who we are.
But Finn isn’t in high school anymore. So why the hell is he ignoring his girlfriend like a child and hanging around in the choir room?
PROOF THAT USING YOUR IPHONE WHILE TAKING A CRAP IS JUST NOT THAT BIG OF A DEAL
So what is Glee Club doing today? Preparing for Sectionals right? Shit no! They’re planning the Fall Musical, which they somehow commandeered from the rest of the school. Obviously Finn saves everyone from everything ever by suggesting they do Grease. Do I lie and say I don’t love Grease? Nope! I totally do! Besides, nothing says Glee like a musical that was originally about working class kids in Chicago dealing with budding sexuality, rock music and religion/class conflict being watered down time and time again until all that’s left is upbeat music strung together by a drivel-thin G-rated plot line. I think it’ll be great.
If Santana doesn’t sing “There Are Worse Things I Could Do” then I quit.
REALLY DUDE? YOU WANT US TO DO A MUSICAL THAT TRADITIONALLY FEATURES ALL WHITE PEOPLE? CLASSY.
Later that night, Will comes home and announces to Emma he’s won some arts thing he wanted and now he’s going to go to DC for a little while. Will wants Emma to come because they’re engaged and apparently she has some sort of imaginary High School tenure at her job. Instead of having a remotely mature conversation that you might expect out of two engaged grown-ass people, they get in a huge fight that makes no sense. I get when the kids act like kids, but I can’t care about the adults if they’re also going to act like kids.
DOES HER SHIRT HAVE A FLAMINGO CARRYING A SET OF KEYS ON IT?
Elsewhere, in New York, Kurt receives flowers from Blaine and dramatically drops the note in the trash in slow-mo. It’s a metaphor.
I GO BACK TO DECEMBER ALL THE TIME
Back at McKinley, Santana still hasn’t returned to college for some reason. Instead, she sings Brittany a Taylor Swift song. For a second, I thought that this was going to be Satana’s big moment to be the big ‘ol lezzy she is and say that the two of them need to always care about each other because they’re each other’s one true love. But, um, then it started raining all over their faces and shit turned kind of dark.
JUST SAW THE EPISODE WHERE DANA DIES
Brittany: Sad songs make me really sad and I don’t want to be sad.
So instead of proclaiming her eternal love, Satana breaks up with Brittany.
That’s right.
+
Santana and Brittany break up.
NOTHING WILL EVER BE OKAY AGAIN
At least it’s like the most mature break-up ever. Ever. I don’t think I had a break-up that was this mature until I was twenty-four. Actually, I want to revise that: I’ve never had a breakup this mature. Obviously I sobbed.
WHERE DO I SIGN UP TO HOLD BRITTANY’S HAND FOREVER?
Santana: I haven’t been a good girlfriend to you. I can’t come home on the weekends and pretend things are the same as they were because they aren’t. And I don’t want to be like all those other long distance relationships [read: everyone else on this show] that hang in there for a few months and then break up when someone eventually cheats and then things get weird.
Then Santana explains that she had what she actually calls an “energy transfer” with a girl who looks basically a ton like Paige from Pretty Little Liars.
IS READING UP ON WICCA AND/OR HOW TO EFFECTIVELY STORE HER EXTENSIVE HAT COLLECTIONS
+
IS CONSIDERING BOILING HER DILDO AND/OR BUYING 100 CATS
Santana: I had an attraction. And you may have had one [read: last week with Sam] or you might have one and… that happens. Let’s just do the mature thing here, okay? This is not an official break up, but let’s just be honest. Long distance relationships are almost impossible to maintain because both people are rarely getting what they need. Especially at our age.
I want to write that down somewhere and read it every time I have to break off a relationship because someone is moving. Excuse me while I go sob for another minute or thirty.
Back over with the new characters we don’t care about, Boring Punk breaks up with Psycho Quinn but still doesn’t want to be with Oak Tag Personality.
PLEASE TRY HARDER TO HAVE ANY PERSONALITY WHATSOEVER
Back over with the old characters we don’t care about, Rachel shows up to Lima to confront Finn on the McKinley High stage. My first thought was, “Holy shit, she fucking flew all the way to see him and drove around town trying to find him? That’s ridiculous.” As it turns out Rachel had the same thought.
IS DRESSED FOR HER NEW PUPPETEER PROFESSION
Rachel: Yeah I would have just come here first, if you would have picked up your phone or answered my text messages. Instead I had to get on a plane and then drive around town looking for you like an idiot.
Rachel explains that when Finn left originally, she thought that by having her go to New York he was setting her up to have the big fulfilling life she always deserved. Rachel uses the phrase “This is how a man loves” about the whole situation, but that makes me want to find the nearest trashcan and heave. Instead, Finn was a childish little baby , and Rachel tells him so. She tells him she doesn’t need him to protect her from things or save her from things or help her make choices; that’s she’s a grown woman.
NOTICE HOW I’M INTENTIONALLY ONLY SHOWING SHOTS OF RACHEL DURING THIS CONVO?
Rachel: We’re done.
And it’s brilliant. It’s like the old Rachel is back, but instead of being driven about what solos she should get and what titles she deserves, she’s driven about what she deserves in a partner. Yeah I said partner. It was that real.
Cue Coldplay’s “The Scientist” for instant emotions and relationship flashbacks.
I LOVE HOW SANTANA IS THE ONLY ONE WHO ISN’T WEARING BLACK AND SOMEHOW IS ALSO APPEARS TO BE WEARING A LEOTARD.
So basically everyone broke up, except maybe the grownups who are just acting like children for a hot minute. Part of me wants all TV high school couples to be together forever, but a big chunk of me wants to grab them all by the shoulders and shake them. I want to shake them until their relationships physically fall apart from my shaking, because that’s what they need. Because in their new big cities and jobs and colleges– even in their old high school– they need to live every day. They need to meet new people and forget about other people and discover things about themselves they never knew were there. There is so much life after 18, and you can’t get a fresh start or even a fresh ending waiting by the phone, feeling incomplete and refusing to meet anyone new.
Maybe people can live their lives that way, but it sure makes for shitty TV. The reason this season has felt so goddamn stale is that the five characters I give a shit about are paralyzed by their relationships.
ALL THE FEELINGS
Even though I specifically hate hate hate that I was just dragged through Brittana’s breakup, it will be okay if Glee rewards us with Santana finding a new hot college girlfriend. Yes it’s important for us to see a hot girl-girl high school couple in a loving committed relationship, but it’s also important for everyone to remember that you don’t have to stay with your first love. Your high school girlfriend doesn’t need to be your wife just because you met her first. You will meet other girls and they will be amazing beautiful shiny stars whose hair smells like lemons, too. Or maybe pomegranates.
HOW COME ONLY BRITTANY IS LIT HERE?!?!? NOOO.
So while this all sucked, at least now the show can move forward. Blaine can get into some fraternizing with the enemy Sebastian and cause some major drama with New Directions. Kurt and Rachel can hit every gay bar in New York as they live their own little mini Sex and the City show-within-a-show. Finn can be the useless and directionless potato we already know he is, to make up for all that time we had to watch while he gave everyone advice like a fucking putsy know-it-all. Santana can bang faux-Paige from Pretty Little Liars and maybe even get an alternative lifestyle haircut. Who knows, maybe we’ll have some new characters to obsess over. And Brittany, sadly, will probably go back to one-liners in the back of the class.
But we can always hope for better.
I MISS THEM ALREADY.
As for this week, my keen nose for obvious plot lines says Finn is going to direct the musical under the guise of helping out, which will either lead to him being a complete control freak and breaking down about his failed life or inspire him to become a music teacher.
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I’m free! I am no longer trapped by Glee’s evil grip! Screw you Ryan Murphy!
I know that’s how I felt, it was like “Yay now I don’t have to watch Glee anymore!”
But really I haven’t watched Glee since midway through the last season, I’ve just read Autostraddle and the A.V. Club’s recaps.
I like the new guy, but I miss Todd :(
Yeah, I agree. The new guy is good but no one is as good as Todd…
Not only is Left Behind a real thing, but you should all go read Fred Clark’s epic multi-year-long blog deconstructing the series: http://www.patheos.com/blogs/slacktivist/tag/left-behind/
I love that blog!
See, I always wanted to read the Left Behind books just out of morbid curiosity (my dad is a pastor and even though his church is liberal and totally dismisses that “end times” bullshit, there’s always that one weirdo in the congregation who feels the need to donate the entire LB series to the church library). And so when I found that blog I was like “Yay! I don’t have to!” And the more I read it the more I’m glad because god they sound awful. Like, Twilight books would be Nobel Prize contenders by comparison.
I think my favorite was when he mentioned the “inspirational” speech the Anti-Christ/UN Secretary General dude gave that was basically just reciting every single country that was in the UN. WTF.
Yeah, that’s my feeling about it, too. I can’t justify the time and effort to read shitty books just to satisfy my morbid curiosity, when there are so many non-shitty books out there to read. But I can read the blog and get most of the books’ content along with educational commentary on the books, the authors, and the kind of people who believe this shit. Everybody wins. Well, except for the authors of the Left Behind series, who don’t deserve to win anything except possibly a large box in which to bury anything they write in the future so nobody ever has to read it.
Glee has been not good for a long time or possibly from the beginning, yet I keep watching.
Where is Mercedes?
Or Quinn?
But seriously it’s also like, they’re trying to set up Sam with Brittany (I think) and it’s like he completely forgot that he has his own girlfriend in LA. (I think they’re officially together? I don’t know? I haven’t watched this show regularly in a while.)
when i was in middle school or something, i accidentally checked out one of those left behind books from the library and was super confused but read the entire thing. my mom was really afraid i’d become a born again christian at 11.
While I’m happy Rachel and Finn are no longer together, I feel a net loss since Finn seems to be back for the long term and I all I want is for him to just go away! He’s like a chronic migraine, or seasonal allergies all year long.
God, I hope his new sad-sack role puts a cork in the mansplaining. I hope, but I don’t expect.
ugh but his sad sack role right now is like “rachel why you gotta be so successful while I’m a big nothing”
And while I hate Finn, I think this is behavior is out-of-character for him. He was always very proud of Rachel’s successes even when he looked like the zero he was by comparison.
I did put this on twitter, but I feel as though I should repeat it here. I really, really hate the way recaps on here always refer to Finn as either a sack of potatoes or Mr. Potato Head. It’s fine to dislike a character, and it’s fine to make jokes, but the constant jokes about his appearance don’t settle well with me and I don’t imagine they contribute to anyone’s confidence who maybe already worries about their body and their appearance. I love Autostraddle recaps, but those comments are seriously making me want to turn away.
see I always thought it was because he had the personality of a potato
It’s not about his appearance as much as it is about him being useless and stupid as fuck.
Brittana is endgame. That is all
Ok how exactly do you tell someone you’re “letting them go” or “setting them free” or wtfever Finn said to Rachel in the season 3 finale and not speak to them for months and then act like they’re “cheating” when they come to the very understandable conclusion that it’s time to move on and cuddle with other people?
Seriously, Finn fails at relationships even for a character that is supposed to be 18 years old.
That is basically how grindr works, pretty much.
Unless you enjoy putting fake beefcake pictures up there and trolling your gay boy friends, in which case, instead of going to their house for sexytimes, you take screenshots of your friends attempts at sexy talk and tease them endlessly about it later.
And I like how the avatar for Blaine’s hookup is a tower, because *obvious*.
So I assumed the tower was a metaphor for an erection. Am I reading too much into this and expecting way too much from Glee?
I’m so glad that Finn appears to have dyed his hoodie green. Now I can rock my maroon hoodie without shame again. Fall can now continue as scheduled.
Sorry, but Demi Lovato sang her song 100% better than Lea Michelle and what’s his face. I was so excited when they said they were going to cover Give Your Heart a Break but they totally massacred the song. :/
True Life: I own the first six books in the Left Behind series.
::wraps up in snuggie and self-loathing::
When I was younger, I got the entire teen version of the series for Christmas. I think I still have 1, 4, and 9. However, my father owns the entire series and the movie…
Although it’d be great if santana started banging away collegiate style, the truth is they couldn’t even have her show any physical affection for someone she was in an actual relationship with, so I doubt she’s going to be having hot makeout sessions with any new strangers. So, now we can look forward to absolutley no lesbian anything on glee. Which I think defeats the purpose for many of us.
I can’t even think about their stupid horrible kisses during this episode. Are these actors that homophobic? What’s the deal?
Someone explain this to me in a positive light so I can stop feeling like shit about it.
I really don’t think the lack of physical intimacy/lady sexytimes is because of the actors being squeamish about kissing girls; the writing/directing is more likely the root cause of this.
Consider that in ultra right-wing conservative “family first and the good lawd help us, for the gayz are SCARY/LUSTY/EVIL” land, girl+girl, boy+boy, gender nonconforming being+kitten hand-holding is tantamount to hardcore hetero pornography and must not be seen or mentioned EVAR! Think of the children!
(Hyperbole, but still.)
i get what you’re saying, and that’s also true. believe me, i know, we’ve been subjected to it since the first season. but it is obvious that there is more to it.
take for example, kurt and blaine, who had no trouble displaying a “normal” physical interaction (kiss), this past episode. while santana leans in from across the room with an unconvincing duck face. so i think it does mostly come to down to the actor’s choice.
Actually, it is down to the actresses. HeMo and Naya said in an interview that it’s their choice how long they kiss for, and how often. People really need to do their research, it’s embarrassing how many of these comments are completely retarded.
great comment!
I was all ready to upvote you for truths. Then you called us retarded.
I think it’s the actors. I think Naya is okay with it, but I remember reading somewhere that Heather Morris was less comfortable with it.
Also, we have to remember these actresses are extremely close to one another. BFFL status and for one, it’s her first big acting role (Heather.) Maybe they haven’t figured out a way to play their lesbian roles without it affecting their IRL relationship? I don’t know.
I have an idea. Just get Shay Mitchell to be the hot girl Santana meets when she finally takes her abuela’s money and moves to NYC. That way you have two actors with a willingness to make out big time on screen. Shay Mitchell has proven herself a goddess in that regard lol.
if shay mitchell and naya rivera were making out in character.. I don’t know what I would do with myself. I would keel over and die from over-saturation of pure awesomeness. Dream pairing
Your recaps are excellent and so, so hilarious. LOLed at “But then again, who am I to say what a potato enjoys for a road trip.”
And yes, there’s definitely a lot of fucked-up shit underlying the difference in portrayal of gay males and gay females in this ep (and all eps of everything ryan murphy has ever written ever, let’s be real), but I’ve spent such a ridiculous amount of time analyzing and critiquing this show, I just can’t anymore.
Super unpopular opinion:
I never really liked Brittana.
I know I am probably one of five lesbians in the world that felt that way, but I just. Never liked it that much. Maybe I couldn’t relate to it because I wasn’t what exactly popular or socially competent or date-worthy in high school so I never had a high school romance, maybe I felt like Santana was manipulating Brittany too much early on and refused to move on from that, I don’t really know, but it just never worked in my head.
Weirdly… their break-up, which I thought was the best one, kind of made me like it. Don’t know what that says about me.
Me neither. Their relationship has always felt like contrived fanservice to me. And I always felt like Quinn was originally written to be the repressed lesbian, and that her and Rachel have far better chemistry. But, you know. Lesbian quota and all.
I agree completely!! I love Santana and I enjoyed following a lesbian relationship story line but Brittany?!? She is so clueless and gullible and naive and it all just seems like she randomly ended up in this relationship with Santana. I think this is why she never had a big coming out story line and why I’m not even surprised that they’re pushing her towards Sam. I NEVER felt like she was an equal match for Santana. I feel like they were best friends and Santana was into her and Brittany was just a sparkly happy emotional little unicorn that went with it because, sure, why not?
Santana needs to get a hot college girlfriend that is an equal match for her. And she needs to be on the show more!! I am surprised at how much I like the New York parts of the show… Santana and Quinn should probably move there and get an apartment or something. ;)
I agree, other than it being the only lesbian action we get on the show. Mostly because Santana was intelligent and cunning, and I couldn’t see someone with her personality being actually happy with someone with Brittany’s personality. Like was said – it seemed like a contrivance. It was believable when it was Santana fooling around figuring herself out, but their love story…eh. Especially since they’re only allowed to have friendly half-kisses on screen.
“But then again, who am I to say what a potato enjoys for a road trip”
All of these potato references had me DYING.
Also super glad that Rachel is back.
loved that line as well
Even Glee knows that we have to break up. Long distance relationships are exhausting and sad and I don’t know why I’ve let it go on this long :/
I knew a ton of people who loved those Left Behind books. I am SO GLAD Rachel is going to move on up, but I’m so sad about Britana. The only right spot of this episode for me was when when Santana said she was pretty sure the other girl was a lesbian based on the large stack of Virginia Woolf books.
So, wow, I can’t believe Ryan Murphy actually broke up the most popular couplings. Is he trying to start a fandom riot? Really? Jesus Christ. I hope that yellow hat is bullet-proof.
That being said, I’m…actually not that upset with the way they broke up? Like, they made sense? Except I’m disappointed that Finn didn’t get more permanent damage despite shooting himself in the leg (yes, that was my hope that he’d get shot and then just…go away.)
Also – WELCOME BACK, RACHEL FUCKING BERRY. We missed you. Quinn misses you. Get on that.
God, I wish people would stop comparing Finn to a potato. It’s an insult to potatoes. GLaDOS turned out just fine.
…Spoiler-and-nerd-alert?
This [comment] was a triumph.
True. I love me some potatoes.
When Heather Morris cried, my heart broke in a million pieces. I felt like she MADE that scene. Am I the only one?
No, I 100% agree. The way her voice broke on the “too” when she said “I love you, too” to Santana, my heart died.
I’m just looking at the pictures here and on Tumblr… did the show’s lighting get even darker? Did someone on the cast or crew get mad because they broke up all the couples and smash all the lights or something?
I felt like the lighting was much better on this episode, specially on the Give Your Heart A Break scene and the final one in the auditorium. It was generally a dark episode but i felt like for once it was done on purpose.
“If Santana doesn’t sing “There Are Worse Things I Could Do” then I quit.”
Amen, sister.
I’m just waiting for Santana to move to NYC so her and Rachel can be awesome together. Bring on the fan-pandering subtext!
Seriously though, I’m so glad the real Rachel Berry is back because I missed her. Also Sarah Jessica Parker turned Rachel Berry into Lea Michele with her magical makeover and I am not complaining one bit. More blazers please and thank you.
This was so sad and hard this week. My girlfriend broke up with me a month ago because she is spending her first semester of college abroad, while I’m going to our state school, 20 minutes from home. I know that she did the responsible and mature thing by doing this while we still loved and respected eachother but I miss her so badly. Our conversation was exactly like Brittana’s. I guess I just want to say that it helps knowing that people think it’s the right thing to do. Thanks, AS.
Haha, I refuse to watch this episode because my international girlfriend is very depressed, very overworked, and consequently currently not speaking to me or anyone else in America.
That being said, if you really love someone (and okay, we’re not in high school and have graduated from college so I guess it’s different) I do not think the responsible thing is ALWAYS to break up. If you are committed to making it work, time apart can be managed. Sometimes you’ve gotta fucking take chances. I can honestly not understand why being apart from someone would be worse than not being with them at all (another thing is that neither of us has a desire to sleep with other people/casual date)? I know it’s different for everyone but it makes me sad to have so many people not on my side. Also, I’m moving there in January, so I guess we have an end date to the distance, but still. It’s just so scary.
Wrong.
Once again, I think Glee was trying to get pass a mature and relevant message, but in a not-so-mature and under-developed way.
The Santana and Brittany break-up was mature and the acting was spot-on, but what was missing was everything that was supposed to happen before this outcome.
I’ve invested myself in Glee because of the general idea of the history and going-on’s of this couple that they only gave the viewers in snippets and dropped hints about.
I get that long distance relationships are hard, hell, relationships are hard even when she is in the next classroom. I also get that high school relationships may end, mine did, because things change, that is life.
But I just wish they gave us more context, much was devoted in the process of Santana coming out and showing her love for Brittany. But what about after the let’s-be-girlfriends-in-a-real-relationship?? There was so much potential plot that could be explored.
And that is the main reason I was so sad and depressed about the break-up. Their relationship simply did not get the respect and efforts that it deserved from the producers.
all i can say is NYADADADADADADADABATMAN
Nice article, but could do without the Blaine apologism.