Original air date: September 16, 2009
Like I said before, Acafellas is not loved by most people, due probably to the fact that it's very adult-centric, is my best guess. I actually like that because I liked all of the adult characters at this time. They were fun and interesting and despite a few borrowed jokes, I think it's a solid episode. But, don't take my word for it, let's dive right in and you can see for yourselves.
Will remarks about how nice it is to hang out with the guys and talk about their feelings. Each of them confess to things in their life that are crappy, Ken living at the YMCA and owning only one pair of long pants, Sandy having no creative outlet other than his Desperate Housewives fan fiction, Howard being afraid of his vacuum, and Will who can't dance and then Henri reminds everyone that he has no thumbs.
Sandy starts singing For He's a Jolly Good Fellow to try to cheer Henri up and the rest of them follow, harmonizing quite nicely. Will agrees and we segue into them singing This is How We Do It by Montell Jordan. They have decided to form a male hip hop a cappella group and call themselves...
They have all formed their group and given it a name, except for Sandy because it was apparently creepy with him in it so he got the boot. Terri interrupts their practice to yell at them about needing sleep otherwise she'll miscarry. She then makes an innuendo comment to Will who more happily boots the guys out.
Will then voice overs that being in a boy band totally improved his sex life. He and Terri were now having sex once a week...shocking. He also tells us that it was like she was trying to make a twin. In fact, she's just hoping to make one but with no success. I think their problem is that they only have sex once a week. Did you know that you only have a 20% chance of getting pregnant in a month? I didn't, until I started trying for a child. While some people seem to hit that 20% non-stop or extremely easily, others don't have such an easy time, so yeah, having sex once a week being an improvement on their sex lives? No wonder Terri can't get pregnant. You've got to have sex to get pregnant, lots of it.
Sorry for the sex ed lesson, I just thought that was interesting because the first time I watched this show, I was not trying to become pregnant so I thought of it as a silly joke about dull sex lives and marriage, now I just think it's stupid. How did Terri expect to get pregnant when she knew she was having trouble conceiving before?
Moving on. The next day, Rachel brings Will a plate of sugar cookies as an apology for being hard on him about the dancing thing. Will says he's not mad, he's thankful because if she weren't so hard on him, he wouldn't have had the guts to start Acafellas. Rachel says that they need him and he's missed six practices and isn't really there when he is there. Will tells her that he thinks they should hire the Dakota guy because he doesn't have time for all of glee anymore. What a tremendo-douche.
Finn is angry at Rachel for making Will not like glee club anymore. Santana and Quinn aren't concerned because with Will out of the way, they can hire Dakota. Finn tries to stand up for Will but the others vote in agreement to hire Dakota.
Finn argues with Rachel over the Dakota/Will issue and then has the gall to ask her if she's doing this because she's mad at him for the auditorium thing. What? You mean lead her on, kiss her, run away when you get an awkward boner, and then go back to your girlfriend? Why would she be mad about that? #FinniskindofaNiceGuydouche Rachel calls him out on his assholery and maintains that they are going to hire Dakota. Finn threatens to quit but Rachel holds her ground. Good for her.
Quinn and Santana fill Sue in on their progress. Sue is most pleased because she wants her full budget restored so that she can get a fog machine.
Meanwhile, Mercedes is sad panda-ing while watching various couples interact. She asks Kurt if he's ever kissed anyone and Kurt admits that he hasn't. He then tells her that they are going to see no play, being in glee club and should prepare for that. Then he cheers her up by asking her to hit the mall with him after school so that they can look fashionable when they go to check out Dakota. This is the part of Kurt's characterization that makes me sad that they made him want to perform when he really should have been in fashion.
Quinn and Santana swoop in on Mercedes after Kurt leaves and try to convince her to ask Kurt out despite the fact that it is super obvious that he is gay. I thought Mercedes knew this given her "I don't think I'm his type" comment but she actually seems to consider it.
We next cut to a restaurant or something where Will, Howard, Ken, and Henri are all singing Poison by Bel Biv DeVoe.
Anyway, they are a huge success and he's selling lots of CDs of their stuff, apparently. I don't know the logistics of this. When did Will and Terri get the money for him to record a professional CD? Also, aren't they just singing covers? I don't know the legalities of the music industry and don't care enough to look it up, but I would think that if you were making a profit with the CDs, you'd have to pay royalties to the songwriters whose songs you've used. Whatever.
We meet Will's parents who are super pumped for him. His mother is quite obviously a drunk while his father seems pretty level headed and is very proud of his son. It's nice. Figgins is also there and wants Acafellas to sing at a PTA meeting...why? I don't think there were ever live concerts at PTA meetings at my school but who knows?
The next day, Will is reading a review of their performance in the newspaper...how is this even happening? Is this a small town thing? I live in a small city and I don't think our newspaper covers amateur acts like this. Also, it praises everyone but Howard and I just want to give him all the hugs.
Sandy bursts in then and demands to be let in the group because he has connections with Josh Groban. This leads to, quite possibly, one of my favourite random moments on the show. Howard asks who Josh Groban is which leads Sandy to say:
He claims that he can get Josh Groban to see their show. Will declines Sandy's offer and says they have standards. That's pretty darn harsh but, then again, Sandy is suspected of molesting a student. But apparently those standards disappear once Sandy mentions that Groban is looking for an opening act.
The kids have gone to Vocal Adrenaline's auditorium to try and hire Dakota Stanley. Even though one of the girls from VA tries to talk them out of it because "he's a monster". Instead, he's just a short guy with anger issues. We watch VA perform Mercy by Duffy and it's pretty damn good. I miss early VA, they were fantastic. Rachel approaches Dakota and asks if he would work for them. He tells them flat out that his fee is $8,000 plus a $10,000 bonus if they place in the top three before peacing out. They wonder how they'll ever get that kind of cash.
We then cut to the choir room where Will and Ken are practicing for their PTA performance. Ken asks where everyone is and that's the cue for Howard to call and inform Will that he is dropping out of the group.
Emma then enters to tell them that Henri has relapsed and downed six bottles of cough syrup. Sandy took him to the hospital and Figgins has insisted that Henri check into rehab right away if he wants to work at the school and be around kids again. Acafellas appears to be doomed.
Later, Finn tells Will that he is quitting glee too. Will denies that he quit and tries to convince Finn to stick with glee. He then decides that it's an awesome idea to recruit a 16 year old boy into his a cappella group with grown men, one of whom is already accused of molesting a teenager. This should work out well.
We then cut to the locker room where Puck approaches Ken and asks him if he can join his a cappella group. He says he can play the guitar...um, I don't think you understand what a cappella means, Puck. But he also says he can sing, before questioning whether there will be a lot of moms at the gig. We then segue into a voice over of Puck telling us that basically, he digs cougars and I throw up in my mouth a little. Not because he likes older women, I get guys liking older women, I do, I'm throwing up over the casualness of him mentioning that he hooks up with older married women when he's supposed to be sixteen...hello? Sandy? Is it only not ok for him to do it because he's a guy? The women here are just as vile and this is reminding me too much of Pacey/Mrs. Jacobs territory where they are putting it on the teenage boy being into it, thus making it ok. IT IS NOT OK, WRITERS!!! IT IS NEVER OK!
Anyway, Ken also lets Puck join the group but threatens him to not screw things up for him because, apparently Emma gets super horny because of him being in the group. *hork* There goes my lunch again...
We then cut to Will teaching Puck and Finn the Acafella choreography. Finn is having a difficult time with the steps so Will uses some baseball analogy thing which apparently works and they're both good at the dance now.
Rachel and Tina try to talk some sense into Mercedes and her crush on Kurt. Mercedes isn't having it because she thinks Kurt likes her.
Meanwhile, the kids are doing a car wash to raise money to hire Dakota. Sue has apparently agreed to let the Cheerios help out, because she wants them to hire this guy to break the glee club up, you see.
Mercedes asks Kurt if they can make their relationship official and Kurt is taken aback saying he thought he made it clear they were just friends because he's in love with someone else. He glances at Finn but when Mercedes looks, she thinks he means Rachel. Kurt agrees that it's Rachel he loves and Mercedes loses her shit:
Anyway, the kids have apparently raised enough to hire Dakota and while I find the scene in question, funny it is basically a rip off of one of my favourite guilty pleasure movies, Bring It On. You know, where the girls hire choreographer Sparky Polastri who is crazy and mean? It's basically the same scene. The students line up, the choreographer critiques them, calls them fat, tells them to diet or whatever, insults them and they get mad. Where they differ is that in Bring It On, they put up with it, go through with his weird choreography and get burned, the glee kids get so mad that they end up firing him and being stronger for it. Set up is totally ripped off but the pay off is different enough, I guess. This scene still always reminds me that I could be watching Bring It On...
Night time and the guys are getting ready for their big PTA performance...I don't see how this is a step up from performing in a sports bar but Josh Groban apparently did show up, so there's that. They perform probably the cheesiest 90s hip hop song ever by Color Me Badd, I Wanna Sex You Up and it's glorious.
After the performance, the guys are hanging out backstage when Josh Groban comes in to congratulate them all and tell them how well they did. Everyone is super excited but then he asks for Sandy and drops the bomb that he's actually there to give him a restraining order.
Will is obviously deflated from the experience. Terri apologizes to him for not being supportive enough and tells him that he was really good. Will's father interrupts them to ask where his wife is. This leads us to the weirdest segue ever of Josh Groban hitting on Will's mom. Why?
Will's dad then asks how he's doing and Will says he's ok with everything because he's a good teacher and that's good enough for him. His father agrees and says that he inspires people, and he inspired him to finally finish law school, like he always wanted to do. It's a sweet moment that I kind of love.
We then cut to Mercedes apologizing to Kurt for busting the window out his car because it didn't mend her broken heart. I'll stop. Anyway, she offers to pay for it but Kurt says it's ok because his dad took his car away after finding his tiara collection. This does not jibe with what we later find his dad to be like but whatever. Anyway, Mercedes says that she hopes he and Rachel get together which prompts Kurt to tell her that he's gay. She asks why he didn't just tell her and I'm sitting here thinking, because it was kind of extremely obvious that he was. But ok, show, let's let him stay in the closet for now. Even though everyone else in glee already assumes that he is gay.
Sue is displeased with her minions for failing in their mission and revokes their tanning privileges. Santana is super upset but Quinn sasses that Sue taught her a valuable lesson.
Cut to the kids in the choir room, now happily learning Schuester choreography. Rachel wants to tell Will something and he looks super annoyed/terrified of being critiqued by her which is pretty hilarious. Rachel just wanted to tell him that it was really good though and everyone laughs. End of episode.
That was Acafellas. It's not a great episode but I still liked it because it was entertaining enough and the music was still really fun. It's definitely one of the weaker season 1 episodes but it is still way more enjoyable than what this show devolves into so my fondness for it stands. Plus, I still really enjoy the I Want to Sex You Up and Bust Your Windows performances.
Stay tuned for the next episode, Preggers.
Like I said before, Acafellas is not loved by most people, due probably to the fact that it's very adult-centric, is my best guess. I actually like that because I liked all of the adult characters at this time. They were fun and interesting and despite a few borrowed jokes, I think it's a solid episode. But, don't take my word for it, let's dive right in and you can see for yourselves.
We start the episode at Will and Terri's place. They are entertaining Will's parents. Will decides, out of excitement, to spill the beans about Terri's pregnancy to his parents and Terri gets "oh shit" face because she knows there is no baby. She nervously tells his mother that they are turning the craft room into the nursery and his mother drags her to that room to see. See what, I don't know, I guess Will's mother gets a kick out of staring at an already decorated room and being told what it may or may not look like once the nursery is finished. Whatever, it basically gives Will and his father a chance to talk about whether or not Will has the guts to be a father. His father claims that he lacked guts and worries that Will got that from him, since he failed to go to law school because he was scared. Will gets a worried look.
We then cut to the next day in glee club, where Will is showing the students some choreography he came up with. Rachel stops him and tells him that the choreography sucks and that they won't beat Vocal Adrenaline if they use his moves. She tells him that they need Dakota Stanley, who is apparently a great choreographer and the one that their rival team uses. Through cutaway, we learn that Rachel has been fed all of this info from the Unholy Trinity, Quinn, Santana, and Brittany. Then we cut back to the choir room after we learn that Dakota apparently understudied the candelabra in Beauty and the Beast on Broadway. Will tries to come back with asking if he ever actually performed. Quinn snaps back:
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| Snap! |
We then cut to Will bitching about this to Emma in her office. He says that he wanted to perform, it was his dream, but he lacked the guts. Emma says that it takes more certainty than talent to be a star.
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| OOOH PREDICTING THE FUTURE!!! (This will make sense when we get to season 2, I swear) |
Will says that he wants to be able to set a good example for his son and then he apologizes for unloading on Emma about his home troubles because he doesn't want things to be awkward. Emma then gets awkward about the fact that she is totally dating Ken now, so it's ok for her and Will to be friends because she's like totally into Ken. Will asks how things are going with them and she manically says how everything is great and that women really like a guy with confidence. Another sick burn on Will. Nice.
We then cut to the teacher's lounge and we get to see Sandy again! They are celebrating the fact that the shop teacher, Henri, is returning to work after having cut off his thumbs. He has an over the counter cough medicine addiction which caused him to be spacey and his thumbs got sliced off by a saw. Gross. Henri comes in and is followed by Howard Bamboo who brought a cake for the occasion.
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| Well, now that's just awkward |
Sandy starts singing For He's a Jolly Good Fellow to try to cheer Henri up and the rest of them follow, harmonizing quite nicely. Will agrees and we segue into them singing This is How We Do It by Montell Jordan. They have decided to form a male hip hop a cappella group and call themselves...
They have all formed their group and given it a name, except for Sandy because it was apparently creepy with him in it so he got the boot. Terri interrupts their practice to yell at them about needing sleep otherwise she'll miscarry. She then makes an innuendo comment to Will who more happily boots the guys out.
Will then voice overs that being in a boy band totally improved his sex life. He and Terri were now having sex once a week...shocking. He also tells us that it was like she was trying to make a twin. In fact, she's just hoping to make one but with no success. I think their problem is that they only have sex once a week. Did you know that you only have a 20% chance of getting pregnant in a month? I didn't, until I started trying for a child. While some people seem to hit that 20% non-stop or extremely easily, others don't have such an easy time, so yeah, having sex once a week being an improvement on their sex lives? No wonder Terri can't get pregnant. You've got to have sex to get pregnant, lots of it.
Sorry for the sex ed lesson, I just thought that was interesting because the first time I watched this show, I was not trying to become pregnant so I thought of it as a silly joke about dull sex lives and marriage, now I just think it's stupid. How did Terri expect to get pregnant when she knew she was having trouble conceiving before?
Moving on. The next day, Rachel brings Will a plate of sugar cookies as an apology for being hard on him about the dancing thing. Will says he's not mad, he's thankful because if she weren't so hard on him, he wouldn't have had the guts to start Acafellas. Rachel says that they need him and he's missed six practices and isn't really there when he is there. Will tells her that he thinks they should hire the Dakota guy because he doesn't have time for all of glee anymore. What a tremendo-douche.
Finn is angry at Rachel for making Will not like glee club anymore. Santana and Quinn aren't concerned because with Will out of the way, they can hire Dakota. Finn tries to stand up for Will but the others vote in agreement to hire Dakota.
Finn argues with Rachel over the Dakota/Will issue and then has the gall to ask her if she's doing this because she's mad at him for the auditorium thing. What? You mean lead her on, kiss her, run away when you get an awkward boner, and then go back to your girlfriend? Why would she be mad about that? #FinniskindofaNiceGuydouche Rachel calls him out on his assholery and maintains that they are going to hire Dakota. Finn threatens to quit but Rachel holds her ground. Good for her.
Quinn and Santana fill Sue in on their progress. Sue is most pleased because she wants her full budget restored so that she can get a fog machine.
Meanwhile, Mercedes is sad panda-ing while watching various couples interact. She asks Kurt if he's ever kissed anyone and Kurt admits that he hasn't. He then tells her that they are going to see no play, being in glee club and should prepare for that. Then he cheers her up by asking her to hit the mall with him after school so that they can look fashionable when they go to check out Dakota. This is the part of Kurt's characterization that makes me sad that they made him want to perform when he really should have been in fashion.
Quinn and Santana swoop in on Mercedes after Kurt leaves and try to convince her to ask Kurt out despite the fact that it is super obvious that he is gay. I thought Mercedes knew this given her "I don't think I'm his type" comment but she actually seems to consider it.
We next cut to a restaurant or something where Will, Howard, Ken, and Henri are all singing Poison by Bel Biv DeVoe.
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| This has nothing to do with anything but I will always be reminded of this sketch any time I hear Bel Biv DeVoe. Always |
Anyway, they are a huge success and he's selling lots of CDs of their stuff, apparently. I don't know the logistics of this. When did Will and Terri get the money for him to record a professional CD? Also, aren't they just singing covers? I don't know the legalities of the music industry and don't care enough to look it up, but I would think that if you were making a profit with the CDs, you'd have to pay royalties to the songwriters whose songs you've used. Whatever.
We meet Will's parents who are super pumped for him. His mother is quite obviously a drunk while his father seems pretty level headed and is very proud of his son. It's nice. Figgins is also there and wants Acafellas to sing at a PTA meeting...why? I don't think there were ever live concerts at PTA meetings at my school but who knows?
The next day, Will is reading a review of their performance in the newspaper...how is this even happening? Is this a small town thing? I live in a small city and I don't think our newspaper covers amateur acts like this. Also, it praises everyone but Howard and I just want to give him all the hugs.
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| Awww, poor Howard |
Sandy bursts in then and demands to be let in the group because he has connections with Josh Groban. This leads to, quite possibly, one of my favourite random moments on the show. Howard asks who Josh Groban is which leads Sandy to say:
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| It's the delivery of this line that just kills me every time |
He claims that he can get Josh Groban to see their show. Will declines Sandy's offer and says they have standards. That's pretty darn harsh but, then again, Sandy is suspected of molesting a student. But apparently those standards disappear once Sandy mentions that Groban is looking for an opening act.
The kids have gone to Vocal Adrenaline's auditorium to try and hire Dakota Stanley. Even though one of the girls from VA tries to talk them out of it because "he's a monster". Instead, he's just a short guy with anger issues. We watch VA perform Mercy by Duffy and it's pretty damn good. I miss early VA, they were fantastic. Rachel approaches Dakota and asks if he would work for them. He tells them flat out that his fee is $8,000 plus a $10,000 bonus if they place in the top three before peacing out. They wonder how they'll ever get that kind of cash.
We then cut to the choir room where Will and Ken are practicing for their PTA performance. Ken asks where everyone is and that's the cue for Howard to call and inform Will that he is dropping out of the group.
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| This is because the critic panned you, isn't it? |
Emma then enters to tell them that Henri has relapsed and downed six bottles of cough syrup. Sandy took him to the hospital and Figgins has insisted that Henri check into rehab right away if he wants to work at the school and be around kids again. Acafellas appears to be doomed.
Later, Finn tells Will that he is quitting glee too. Will denies that he quit and tries to convince Finn to stick with glee. He then decides that it's an awesome idea to recruit a 16 year old boy into his a cappella group with grown men, one of whom is already accused of molesting a teenager. This should work out well.
We then cut to the locker room where Puck approaches Ken and asks him if he can join his a cappella group. He says he can play the guitar...um, I don't think you understand what a cappella means, Puck. But he also says he can sing, before questioning whether there will be a lot of moms at the gig. We then segue into a voice over of Puck telling us that basically, he digs cougars and I throw up in my mouth a little. Not because he likes older women, I get guys liking older women, I do, I'm throwing up over the casualness of him mentioning that he hooks up with older married women when he's supposed to be sixteen...hello? Sandy? Is it only not ok for him to do it because he's a guy? The women here are just as vile and this is reminding me too much of Pacey/Mrs. Jacobs territory where they are putting it on the teenage boy being into it, thus making it ok. IT IS NOT OK, WRITERS!!! IT IS NEVER OK!
Anyway, Ken also lets Puck join the group but threatens him to not screw things up for him because, apparently Emma gets super horny because of him being in the group. *hork* There goes my lunch again...
We then cut to Will teaching Puck and Finn the Acafella choreography. Finn is having a difficult time with the steps so Will uses some baseball analogy thing which apparently works and they're both good at the dance now.
Rachel and Tina try to talk some sense into Mercedes and her crush on Kurt. Mercedes isn't having it because she thinks Kurt likes her.
Meanwhile, the kids are doing a car wash to raise money to hire Dakota. Sue has apparently agreed to let the Cheerios help out, because she wants them to hire this guy to break the glee club up, you see.
Mercedes asks Kurt if they can make their relationship official and Kurt is taken aback saying he thought he made it clear they were just friends because he's in love with someone else. He glances at Finn but when Mercedes looks, she thinks he means Rachel. Kurt agrees that it's Rachel he loves and Mercedes loses her shit:
A lot of people hate this performance but I kind of love it for
all its ridiculousness and also, the song is catchy.
Anyway, the kids have apparently raised enough to hire Dakota and while I find the scene in question, funny it is basically a rip off of one of my favourite guilty pleasure movies, Bring It On. You know, where the girls hire choreographer Sparky Polastri who is crazy and mean? It's basically the same scene. The students line up, the choreographer critiques them, calls them fat, tells them to diet or whatever, insults them and they get mad. Where they differ is that in Bring It On, they put up with it, go through with his weird choreography and get burned, the glee kids get so mad that they end up firing him and being stronger for it. Set up is totally ripped off but the pay off is different enough, I guess. This scene still always reminds me that I could be watching Bring It On...
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| Spirit fingers!!! |
Night time and the guys are getting ready for their big PTA performance...I don't see how this is a step up from performing in a sports bar but Josh Groban apparently did show up, so there's that. They perform probably the cheesiest 90s hip hop song ever by Color Me Badd, I Wanna Sex You Up and it's glorious.
I know you're not gonna sing that song!
After the performance, the guys are hanging out backstage when Josh Groban comes in to congratulate them all and tell them how well they did. Everyone is super excited but then he asks for Sandy and drops the bomb that he's actually there to give him a restraining order.
Will is obviously deflated from the experience. Terri apologizes to him for not being supportive enough and tells him that he was really good. Will's father interrupts them to ask where his wife is. This leads us to the weirdest segue ever of Josh Groban hitting on Will's mom. Why?
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| Ok, then |
Will's dad then asks how he's doing and Will says he's ok with everything because he's a good teacher and that's good enough for him. His father agrees and says that he inspires people, and he inspired him to finally finish law school, like he always wanted to do. It's a sweet moment that I kind of love.
We then cut to Mercedes apologizing to Kurt for busting the window out his car because it didn't mend her broken heart. I'll stop. Anyway, she offers to pay for it but Kurt says it's ok because his dad took his car away after finding his tiara collection. This does not jibe with what we later find his dad to be like but whatever. Anyway, Mercedes says that she hopes he and Rachel get together which prompts Kurt to tell her that he's gay. She asks why he didn't just tell her and I'm sitting here thinking, because it was kind of extremely obvious that he was. But ok, show, let's let him stay in the closet for now. Even though everyone else in glee already assumes that he is gay.
Sue is displeased with her minions for failing in their mission and revokes their tanning privileges. Santana is super upset but Quinn sasses that Sue taught her a valuable lesson.
Quinn: When you really believe in yourself, you don’t have to bring other people down.It's kind of nice but also meaningless since Quinn continues to work for Sue for a few more episodes which renders this sass a wasted opportunity for character growth. Save lines like this for when the character finally comes around, blowing your load this early means that if she does this again later in the series, it kind of cheapens that moment.
Cut to the kids in the choir room, now happily learning Schuester choreography. Rachel wants to tell Will something and he looks super annoyed/terrified of being critiqued by her which is pretty hilarious. Rachel just wanted to tell him that it was really good though and everyone laughs. End of episode.
That was Acafellas. It's not a great episode but I still liked it because it was entertaining enough and the music was still really fun. It's definitely one of the weaker season 1 episodes but it is still way more enjoyable than what this show devolves into so my fondness for it stands. Plus, I still really enjoy the I Want to Sex You Up and Bust Your Windows performances.
Stay tuned for the next episode, Preggers.
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