While it might seem that I have been remiss in my Glee-reviewing duties, I actually have been diligently doing my homework and going through the first half of Season 1 (I’m hoping to make both Chelsea and Bukem proud). I have to say, it’s quite different from when I started watching the show, and that in itself was reason enough for this short post.

While I did like the second half of Season 1, I like the format of the first half a whole lot better. Rather than an obvious lesson every week the second half was heavily reliant on, the first half of the season focuses a lot more on High School life, be it as a student or as part of the staff. The reflections on the episodes of the first half of Season 1 I had with fellow Glee watchers were a lot deeper than the ones based on the second half of the season. The reason we felt is quite simple: rather than have Mr. Shu point out the sometimes very obvious, we had to dig a little more; working to define the themes rather than have them spoon-fed to us made us able to go a lot further.

The other reason has to do with the fact that none of us will ever be able to join a glee club of our own without insurance to cover all the glass we are going to break. But that’s neither here or there.

Interestingly so, the songs thus were a whole lot more efficient in sharing the themes they were touching upon. In “Acafellas”, Will’s group chooses to perform Bell Biv Devoe’s song “Poison”, which makes you think immediately of his relationship with both Terri and Emma. In “The Rhodes not taken”, Glee Club’s rendition of Carrie Underwood’s “Last name” with April Rhodes as lead singer made the song all the more poignant. I found the Glee Club’s rendition of Avril Lavigne’s “Keep holding on” right after Quinn’s secret pregnancy was made public (by Sue!) a great moment too, as it seemed to define when the group started moving from club members to friends.

Of course, using the theme-per-episode that many of the episode from the second half of Glee’s first season was based on also has its pros, the most obvious of which being that each theme being extremely complex, it allows for depth in reflection on said topic.

Which leads me to believe that the best thing Glee writers could do for Seasons 2 & 3 would be to have a combination of both type of episodes scattered throughout.

Now that I am almost done with “Road to Sectionals”, stayed tuned for more reflections on the songs from the last episodes of Season 1 – and don’t forget to take a peek at Chelsea’s fantastic reviews!

First published here on Blogcritics.