Kurt’s running for class president and to play Tony in West Side Story.
It’s so refreshing to have consistent narrative threads back on Glee. The mess that was Season Two becomes startlingly clear compared to the two aired episodes of Season Three that were penned by the newly staffed writer’s room. Yes, there are always going to be nutty storylines (like Shelby Corcoran being hired to teach a second glee choir of one) but it’s definitely feeling like there’s a more focused hand guiding the various storylines instead of the ADD stunting that marred last year.
The episode starts with Brittany engaging in a little hero worship for Kurt, whose has embraced his sexuality and his talents despite hostile responses from some factions at McKinley High. Obviously smarting from Santana’s inability to give into their sartorial infatuation, Brittany understandably sees a role model, even a magical unicorn metaphor if you will, in Kurt’s brave acceptance of who he is in total. Thus she offers to be his senior class president campaign manager and he accepts.
Mr. Schue tells the gleekers that he can’t focus on Nationals if he’s directing the school musical so he hands off the co-directing duties to Emma and Coach Beiste, with an insider student assist from Artie. Will then assembles a Booty Camp, led by Mike, for the rhythmically challenged in choir like Finn, Puck, and Mercedes.
It’s also revealed that Sugar’s daddy (oh, so punny!) is funding a second glee choir at McKinley to bypass his daughter’s rejection by New Directions. The recently Broadway-bound Shelby Corcoran takes the director of one job to come back to Lima to clean up the messes in her life including her relationship with daughter Rachel and with Quinn, the birth mother of her adopted daughter, Beth.
Speaking of Quinn, she’s still wearing punk clothes, smoking in the bathroom like a Motley Crue cliché and giving everyone some smoky shank eye. Sue pounces on the vulnerability and offers her former Cheerio the lead role in her anti-arts PSA so Quinn can spew her anger at the glee club that ruined her life. Quinn agrees. However it doesn’t take long for Quinn, Puck and Shelby to cross paths and there is some tension. Shelby admits she came back to town so Beth could get to know her birth parents too but she won’t have the baby exposed to Quinn’s nasty new persona.
Quinn balks but Puck tracks down Shelby at her home and says he’s cleaning up his vices so he can be in his baby girl’s life. In a genuinely tender scene, Puck looks completely bowled overlooking into the face of his daughter and presents her a hand drawn picture for the refrigerator. He tells Shelby, “I’ll do anything to be part of her life” and you believe that he means it.
Brittany presents Kurt with some really pink, glittery campaign posters and a swag bag giveaway called “Kurt’s pink fun sack” and even he knows that’s so gay Priscilla Queen of the Desert might have issue with it. He asks her to be more subtle but Brittany wants his unicorn flag to fly proudly around school. With that encouragement, Kurt auditions for the role of Tony in West Side Story to Barbra Streisand’s “I’m the Greatest Star” number from Funny Girl (with Rachel’s written permission).
It’s a knockout but with his falsetto voice and delicate build, the coaches are all unsure if Kurt can “excite the lady parts” like Tony needs to do. Kurt eavesdrops on their concerns and goes into a panic telling Brittany to take down her unicorn posters and then seeks advice from his straight-shooting Dad. Kurt enlists Rachel to do a new audition with him – the post coital scene in Romeo and Juliet – but he can’t sell studly to anyone. He finally decides to embrace his unicorn and as he watches Blaine knock his rendition of “Something’s Coming” out of the park, we see that he accepts that some parts just won’t be his to play. Now, he’s just got to convince Blaine to go out for Tony regardless.
By episode’s end, Quinn has bleached her hair back and asks to come back to New Directions. She’s welcomed back but she confides to Puck that she’s only doing it to get full custody of Beth. Uh oh!
Other highlights:
- Brittany’s deadpan decision to run for class president because only guys have won the title and now we’re in a double-dip recession.
- Shelby and Rachel’s knockout duet of “Somewhere.”
- Mr. Schue telling Quinn that he’s not taking the blame for her mistakes and that she needs to “Grow Up.” Nice tough love, Will!
Some stats and info about Glee, “I Am Unicorn”
TV SHOW – Glee
SEASON/EPISODE – Season 3, Episode 2
AIRED ON – September 27th, 2011
NETWORK/STREAMING SERVICE – FOX/Hulu
GENRE – Drama, Musicals, Comedy
CREATED BY – Ian Brennan, Brad Falchuk, Ryan Murphy
CAST – Chris Colfer, Jane Lynch, Lea Michele, Matthew Morrison, Kevin McHale, Naya Rivera, Jenna Ushkowitz, Amber Riley, Mark Salling, Heather Elizabeth Morris, Chord Overstreet, Darren Criss, Harry Shum Jr., Cory Monteith, Jayma Mays, Dianna Agron
This review originally appeared on TV Geek Army.