Glee - 205 - The Rocky Horror Glee Show

 Original air date: October 26, 2010

This is a pretty fitting episode for spooky month and ironically, the first time I ever saw Rocky Horror Picture Show was at a friend's Halloween party when I was 14. Should we have watched it? Probably not but it was actually her father who put it on excitedly and I will admit, I did not get it. It took me a while to get into Rocky Horror but I do like it quite a bit now and it's in large part to Tim Curry's performance. It's campy, it's fun, it's a little dark and it's absolutely, 100%, not the type of musical that any school would ever allow their students to put on. If you cut anything it would cease to be what it is, it's not intended for teens, sure they can watch it and maybe they'll get it or maybe they won't but perform it? It would never fly. So, strike one for this episode. 

We start off with lips who I think we determined were Santana's lips, singing the intro song to Rocky Horror and when I first watched, I thought the show might just go meta and give us their interpretation of the play just with the actors from Glee and that actually might have worked because you could just write this off as one of those experimental episodes that didn't actually happen but nope, we move from that to a dress rehearsal where There's a Light is playing. Carl bursts onto the scene and demands to know if Will is messing with his woman. Will has nothing to say because in spite of supposedly learning this lesson in Britney/Brittany, Will is still childishly pursuing Emma who is dating Carl. Will still thinks he can get us on his side though and in a voice over says he stepped in it and asks how a high school production of Rocky Horror Picture Show turned into his horror. I'm going to go out on a limb and suggest that it's because you're making a bunch of high schoolers perform Rocky Horror Picture Show. The songs, fine. They're catchy as hell but don't put the actual play on with a bunch of underage kids, please. 

He claims it started a week ago and we flash back into the teacher's lounge where Will joins Emma who is eating a sandwich with crusts on when she normally cuts them off. Emma is shocked herself and happily says she forgot and then regales him with tales of how much fun she had on the weekend because Carl took her to see Rocky Horror and she loved it. Will is barely listening to her because what he cares about is the fact that Carl is actually good for Emma and is helping her overcome her problems while Will ran from them and made out with Shelby. Sorry, writers, I do not forget. After Emma finishes gushing about how much fun she had, Will interjects with his own totally not made up story about how he totally decided to have the kids do Rocky Horror for the school musical this year. Uh, that's not how school musicals work because I'm pretty sure one teacher doesn't just get to decide and only cast his own club in it. Also, no high school on Earth would perform this musical. I mean, it's not scandalous or anything but it's extremely sexual and I imagine everyone involved would just be mounds of uncomfortable with the whole situation. Emma agrees with me and looks extremely uncomfortable and put off by the idea but Will doesn't read the room and is just like, "I know, cool right?" Which means I get to use the good ol' official Will Schuester gif courtesy of Cody Ko:

If you have to ask if people think it's cool, it's definitely not cool

I know what you're thinking. Isn't this exactly what happened in Britney/Brittany? Where Will uses his students to appear cool to Emma and it backfires horribly on him? Yes, you're absolutely right but plot, character progression, sense? We don't know them around these parts. This is Glee, damnit! So, Will is going overboard to be seen as cool and show that he has so much in common with Emma while she looks increasingly uncomfortable and points out that it's probably not the best pick for a high school performance. Will says he'll have to edit and Emma is like, yeah like the whole thing? Will laughs it off and says it's totally worth it to expose his kids to his favourite musical of all time and then tries to get a high five from Emma who looks even more uncomfortable and I die of second hand embarrassment.

Will bursts into the choir room and exclaims his decision to do an entire musical in like a week(?) and that it's going to be Rocky Horror. Finn has never seen it and I'm honestly surprised he's the only one who hasn't because it's not really that common for high schoolers to find and embrace something like this. Rachel has seen it which completely makes sense and she also schools Will on the fact that doing a musical like Rocky Horror with underage kids is probably a really terrible idea. Kurt agrees and says that a high school in Texas couldn't even do Rent. There's a reason your typical high school musical is either Grease, Brigadoon, or Oklahoma. Maybe Les Mis if you're lucky. Will asks if that isn't the point of art, to push boundaries and I'm just like, you're the adult Will. You should be the one reigning things in and setting boundaries. They're high schoolers. 

Will's big solution is that he's cutting the more risque scenes which I call bullshit on considering the rest of this episode and what happens but he's also sending home permission slips. Yeah, that doesn't actually solve his problem because I'm sure most parents would just not sign them? Unless maybe they're not familiar with Rocky Horror outside of hearing Time Warp at weddings? Will says that the proceeds of admissions will go towards their transportation to Nationals so that gets the kids on board. Rachel wants her and Finn to play Brad and Janet. Artie says he's the guy in the wheelchair, naturally. Will suggests Kurt for Frankenfurter but Kurt is less than interested in the idea. Mike pipes up that he wants to do it which actually got me really interested because Harry Shum Jr. rocks and he never gets speaking parts normally. Will wants to double up Columbia and Magenta because there are too many girls vs parts and then gets Sam to play the creature. Santana bugs him about working on his abs but Sam's got that on lock and has no problem showing off his body. Finn looks a bit worried though.

Rachel is explaining the plot to Finn in the auditorium but he still has no clue what is going on in the play. Word, it's definitely a jumble of craziness but it is fun. She asks him to try and he's willing until he learns he'll be doing a big scene in his underwear. And this is where I call bullshit on Will. This is exactly the type of thing that would get cut in a high school production for exactly the reason of teens being hella uncomfortable in their bodies and also, underage kids prancing around in their underwear for an audience is not a look any school wants. I know this show wanted to do a thing about self-esteem but no, this would never happen. Will would have to put them in like pajamas or something. Rachel tries to talk Finn up but he's clearly still not wanting to do the scene.

We cut to a FOX style broadcast that leads into Sue's Corner a bit where Sue rants about stuff. This time her ire is set towards Halloween and how she wants fear brought back to it so that kids know how to behave. Then we cut to Sue in her office as two executives come in and tell her how much they liked her little rant the night before. These guys have discovered Will is seeking the rights to Rocky Horror which Sue hates because she took her sister to a screening and the audience threw toast at them because she's disabled (the audience throws toast at the screen and Sue obviously misinterpreted). Rocky Horror is weird, ok? Sue eagerly asks them if they want her to shut it down but what they want is for her to do an expose on how the progressive movement has infiltrated their schools which sounds very accurate the more I come to learn about conservative weirdos. 

It's a nice touch that the executives are played by Meatloaf (Eddie)
and Barry Bostwick (Brad) from the original movie cast.

The glee kids are in rehearsal and Will wants to start with Damnit, Janet. Santana makes a snarky comment about seeing Finn shirtless and Brittany backs her up by accusing Finn of eating sloppy joe's every lunch and thinking it won't show. Rachel calls them out for being rude but the girls all point out how much the boy's make comments about their bodies behind their back which is absolutely true of the guys on this show. Santana says Artie made a crack about her boobs looking like ostrich eggs and any sympathy I had for Finn has kind of gone out the window because the guys comments about girls are always ruder, also he always comments on how small Rachel's boobs are so it's not like he's innocent in the body shaming department. Look, body shaming is never ok, no matter who it's aimed at. I'm just saying it's hard to feel sympathy for anyone on this show since admittedly, they're all pretty terrible people who have all mocked someone else for the way they look. They start singing and Sue calls Will into the hallway to talk.

Will thinks Sue wants to shut them down but she says she appreciates how the show pushes boundaries and wants to be a part of it. Will is skeptical but also stupid and agrees to let her join. Sue wants to be involved with rewrites too so now he has to run his script past her. 

In the gym room, Sam is telling them all his horrible diet foods and Finn is not on board with it but according to Sam, there are no car pool lanes to sexy. I don't get it but basically, if you want to look good you have to eat the blandest meals on Earth and that just sounds like no way to live to me. Finn starts complaining about how they're guys and this stuff shouldn't matter and lamenting when girl's started caring about stuff like this. Artie blames access to porn and says that it's altered girls' brain chemistry so they think more like men. Can I just say, I hate all of this? And ask most girls and they'll tell you that a soft body is a lot nicer to hug. Some abs look ok but overly built guys look gross to me. Also, cry me a river? Because girls who barely have any meat on their bones have been called fat by guys so I'm having a hard time drumming up sympathy for this storyline. Like, no one should feel pressured to look a certain way but again, girls deal with this shit for their whole lives, it's ingrained so guys just now starting to feel this pressure and being shocked by it? Maybe they need to look inward and start treating women better themselves. I feel like the writers are missing the point and the message shouldn't have been "but guys too!!" it should have been "holy shit, this feels like crap. Maybe I shouldn't be doing it to others" and I would have been more on board with this. 

Will is chatting with Emma about Sue and how he thinks she's just been a bully because she wants to belong. He never learns his lesson, this one. Emma looks like she's thinking the same thing but she quickly forgets this when he offers her the chance to be costume designer for the show. She's super excited and accepts but makes it clear she still has Carl and is only excited about the costuming and not spending a lot of time with Will. Mike walks in at this moment and tells them that he has to drop out of Rocky Horror because his parents finally read the script and were like, you're doing what now? Hell no! Honestly, I don't blame his parents but I'm a little disappointed we don't get to see Harry Shum Jr. have a bigger part. Side note, this was actually FOX's doing as they didn't want a male dressing up as a woman, you know the entire point of the role. They also refused to let them say transexual which is super on brand for FOX but then...why even let them do this episode at all? Did they not realize what this show is?? I just hate FOX so much. They cancel anything remotely good and ruin anything they keep. 

Sue compliments Becky on her Halloween costume because she's dressed like her. And the show loses me on their whole message to teens about body image when they have Sue casually tell Becky to take her megaphone and go yell at "fatties". Is body shaming only bad when it's aimed at already skinny people like practically everyone in glee club minus Mercedes? Because that's what this show is kind of implying with their messaging. Feel bad for our main characters who are already pretty skinny because they feel self conscious, now here's Sue who's going to torment the fatties, am I right? I hate it, is what I'm saying. Will finds Sue and tells her that he can't find a Frankenfurter replacement and so the play is cancelled which will jeopardize her chance at a local Emmy.

Sue walks by Emma's office as she and Carl are looking over their Rocky Horror costumes. Sue is unimpressed until Emma mentions how big a fan Carl is and that he knows the lyrics to all the songs. Sue gets an idea. An awful idea. She starts pouring on this whole thing about arts being important and how lack of art leads to drugs which leads to tooth loss. Of course, Carl is on board to help.

Will is super not on board with Carl trying out and says that he has to audition. So, Carl performs Hot Patootie and all the glee kids love it. Sue is unimpressed now because they're looking for a Frankenfurter and not an Eddie. Will agrees and demands he perform a Frankenfurter number. Carl is the only one in this whole damn production that is seeing sense and says that while he's ok playing Frank in his own house, it would be inappropriate in a high school production and that, at least as Eddie, he wouldn't have to grind up against the students. Can Carl be a teacher in this school? He's the only one that seems to have the kids' best interests at heart? Will, unfortunately doesn't prescribe to Carl's line of thinking as we'll see later. 

Mercedes jumps up and volunteers to be the new Frankenfurter, claiming she can put a modern spin on it. Sue is extremely happy because now they have both a Frankenfurter and an Eddie for their play. I mean...they do know what happens to Eddie in this play, right? I think Sue was smart to write him out. He kind of just appears and then is murdered so...yeah leave him out maybe? 

It's already dress rehearsal time because why not? Musicals can totally be prepped in a week, right? Anyway, Finn wants to practice this scene in his clothes while Sam asks for gold board shorts instead of the really short ones he's wearing because he's afraid of showing nuttage. Emma, there's something wrong with you because yeah, those should have been loose shorts. It's a high school production for sobbing out loud. Will says they'll take note which screams to me that they're not changing a damn thing for their own student's comfort because he has a show he wants to put on to get into Emma's pants, damnit. He calls for them to start and we get Mercedes performing Sweet Transvestite. Kind of odd that they can say transvestite but changed "transexual" to "sinsational" I mean, accurate to a high school rewrite (our school did Grease and changed the line "lousy with virginity" to "lousy with hypocrisy" which made no sense) but why is one word ok but not the other? Did they not know what a Transvestite is? Anyway, the performance is fine, I don't feel like it's any more modern but Mercedes did really well singing the song. Carl bursts through the wall at the end of the song which makes no sense because he's supposed to come in to the dinner party scene singing his own song but Carl "felt his entrance at this point" or something. Emma is all for it but Will is less than impressed. I feel like this was supposed to make me side with Will but I hate Will, it's just something that doesn't make sense for a fan of Rocky Horror to do. Still, it's making me smile that Will is basically turning into Principal Dr. Cinnamon J. Scudworth so, I'll allow Carl/Stamos to keep being annoying to him:

You just know this is what's playing in Will's head while he seethes
in the corner because everyone but him loves Stamos. 

Will talks to Emma about how there's a problem with the play and that it's Carl. She thought he was perfect so Will quickly agrees and then claims that he now cares that some parts are too much for students to play so he has graciously taken Sam's role from him so he can play it. Emma is floored because I think she's realizing that what Will is proposing is that instead of Sam playing the creature, Rocky who eventually ends up bedding Janet, played by Rachel, will now be played by a teacher. An adult is going to be pretending to have sex (or to have had sex) on stage with a student. THIS IS GROSS. This would absolutely not fly in any school and I think Will would be asked to keep his distance from all students if this actually happened. 

Emma even points out that he's a teacher and he seems to think this is a good thing because it would give the show more "credibility"? To who, Will? Credibility to who? The parents? Who would presumably be coming to see their children perform and not a grown ass man pretending to get it on with their kids? No, I'm too weirded out by this. I know that in this scene, it's Emma performing Touch-a Touch-a with him but if they went through with the play, he'd be doing this song with Rachel. A song that is literally about how horny she is and how she wants to fuck Rocky. He really thought that this would be an appropriate song to perform with a student. Will is the worst teacher, oh my god. I mean, he shouldn't have been asking kids to re-enact this stuff but joining in is just vomit inducing. Emma gets weirded out by the end because they're both close and breathing heavily so she runs out of the room. My headcanon is that she realized that Will was going to perform this with a student, got super grossed out and ran away to vomit in the nearest bathroom.

Finn is trying to lift weights when Sam comes in to help him. Sam is late because he spaced since he was fired as Rocky. He's worried about how he complained about his shorts and feels the fat rolls over his shorts which is really sad and serious and honestly makes me hate Will even more. Congrats, Will. Your bid to make a play on Emma shattered the self-confidence and self-esteem of one of your students. Teacher of the fucking year. Finn tells him he's in perfect shape but meanwhile he looks like a tubber (he does not, he looks like your average person with a regular, normal body). Sam talks him up and says that it's more about projecting self-confidence than actually looking sexy. Finn feels much better and says he's going to show everyone how hot he is without having to hide behind muscles. Sam thanks him but then isn't sure if he's being insulted. Then he curses cool ranch doritos and I want to give him a hug. Sam is still the best. 

Next we cut to everyone except Finn rehearsing a scene in which every character just repeatedly says each other's names while Sue complains loudly about how boring the play is. Rachel thinks it's pointless to rehearse without Finn but he's apparently no where to be found and not answering his phone. Then Figgins walks in and demands to see Will in his office. 

It turns out that Finn has been suspended for walking through the hallways in his underwear. This was his bright idea to get comfortable being in his costume. Instead of being like "Will, what the fuck are you doing putting on a play like this if that's the costume?" Figgins tells Finn he's suspended and will have to take summer school to make up for lost class time. Will asks Finn to leave so he can talk to Figgins alone and brings up an incident where Santana pantsed Brittany and she was not wearing anything underneath. Figgins relents and gives him a warning but he warns Will about doing this play. He's not going to stop him but he asks him to consider why he's doing it and that he and the club are on the line if any heat comes from performing this. 

We next cut to the scene we started with where Carl storms in and demands to know if Will was messing with his woman. I hate the way he phrases this but like, Emma clearly talked to him about it so we know their relationship is pretty healthy if she went directly to tell Carl how weird she was feeling after Will kind of manipulated her into performing a risque song with him. Carl schools Will on what a healthy, intimate relationship looks like and Will petulantly asks him if he's quitting the show. Carl says he isn't because he actually cares about the arts and doesn't use them to pick up other guys' girlfriends. Touché. The kids slink away awkwardly while Will looks super embarrassed, as he should.

Will is working in his office when Becky comes by trick or treating. He forgot to pick up candy though because he was working so hard on Rocky Horror. Becky tells him it's an abomination, which is what Sue said on her tape. Then she automatically takes Will to the office to show him Sue's prerecorded expose on the Rocky Horror show. Then Becky threatens to cut him unless he gives her chocolate. She is becoming slightly less charming with every appearance, I have to admit. I don't really like the whole "make mentally disabled people say disturbing things because funny" jokes, it feels really tasteless. 

Will yells at Sue for setting him up but she rightly puts him in his place and asks if anything she said was really arguable. He crossed a line with his students that he shouldn't ever have crossed and all to impress a woman who already has a boyfriend. Will argues that they have the internet and are already exposed and Sue is like, yeah but you don't have to lead them to it and validate it for them. She argues for him to let them be kids and guide them safely through high school. Will finally realizes what a gigantic, inappropriate tool he's been and decides to pull the show. Sue is now upset because she made these points way too early and now can't air her expose. Except...just because they didn't perform it, doesn't mean she couldn't air it. He still had them rehearsing it and performing inappropriate things and she could have edited it to say she pulled the plug in time before the students had to perform in front of everyone but I suppose that doesn't drum up the fear they always want to drum up. Like the made up war on Christmas. 

Will tells Emma the play is off and she's sad but she should really be happy he came to his senses. This was not a show that should ever have been considered for high schoolers to perform. He admits he only put it on to get closer to her and actually apologizes for abusing their friendship like that. He recognizes that Carl is the best thing for her right now and that he needs to back off. If there's one thing I like about this repeated storyline is that he's putting the apology towards the right person. It's Emma he's hurting when he does shit like this, yes Carl too but he should care about hurting his own friend more than a guy he's only just met. 

Will then breaks the news to the kids and apologizes to both Finn and Sam (he should probably also apologize to Rachel but we didn't see how his choices might have hurt her this episode since we were mainly focused on the man feels this episode). I'm glad he finally realized what he was doing to the boys' self-esteem though. He acknowledges he shouldn't have put it on and then says that it's the perfect show for them since it's about outcasts, which they are. So, he says they're going to perform for themselves and we end the episode with the glee kids doing a performance of Time Warp.

I'll give them this, the cast looked cool dressed up in characters from the show
You can even see Mike still dressed as Frankenfurter (maybe this was shot before
FOX put the kibosh on that).

This was one of those episodes where the songs are fun, and they are great but the context of the episode throws everything off kilter if you think about it too much. I tend to overthink so this episode mostly put me off because of the unseen implications of what Will was doing. If you're only familiar with the songs from Rocky Horror, then you're probably like oh, spooky Halloween musical but no, it is not. It's an extremely sexually charged musical that is very messy. Like, it's not known for being groundbreaking or challenging, it's known for being a hot mess. A really fun, campy hot mess but it's infamous as being a so bad, it's good experience. It's great but it's not a hidden masterpiece. It's trashy camp at it's finest. I think I might have liked this episode as a trippy dream or something or stand alone special but it's really creepy in the context they showed it where Will is using his students to get with Emma and making them perform inappropriate scenes with him. Still, the songs were once again fun in a not so great plot. We get into a new plot line in the next episode, Never Been Kissed. Until then, Happy Halloween!