Glee this week featured New Directions as puppets, and the debut of Pamela Lansbury, Kurt’s new band. Read our full recap of Glee season 5, episode 7 “Puppet Master” below.
We open on the choir room looking like a place occupied in real life by real teenagers, screwing around and shouting over each other. When Schue is held up due to a school inspection, Blaine attempts to exert some authority and, with oblivious arrogance, directs the club towards his ideas for Nationals prep. This is met with scathing resistance, and the group tease him for being a self-centered dictator, which, given that he’s basically Rachel in male form, is pretty true. When he realizes the club is not respecting his self-imposed superiority, he flounces out.
In New York, Blaine’s fiancé is having a parallel control-freak incident – Kurt has booked Pamela Lansbury’s first gig. The rest of the band become less excited when they learn that the venue is Callbacks – a Broadway piano bar not really favored by the hip music scene of which they’re attempting to be a part. They doubt the show’s success, and Kurt’s determination to revert the group to his original Madonna-cover-band idea, but he is adamant that it’s the right thing for his vision. We are then treated to the literal vision Kurt had when checking out the venue, a fantasy of Pamela Lansbury taking the stage and performing Madonna’s “Into The Groove” for a packed house. It’s a fairly embarrassing performance, the band is dressed like they’re in S Club 7, and Adam Lambert’s height and age difference makes him look like their babysitter.
Kurt’s description of his popstar dreams are interrupted by a phone call from Blaine. Blaine is calling to rant about how much the glee club sucks for not respecting his ideas, Kurt commiserates, and the pair have a bonding conversation about how annoying it is that other people have opinions. However, Kurt warns Blaine against coming on too strong and appearing like a control-freak or “puppet master” and there’s an amazing moment where Blaine holds the phone away and rolls his eyes, because Kurt seems oblivious to the fact he’s the world’s most guilty of trying to force people into roles and behaviors in his life. Kurt then witters on about the gig he’s booked and invites Blaine to come along and see it, and Blaine says he will, though he continues to look unimpressed that Kurt isn’t focusing on his problem or recognizing it as a trait they share.
Figgins is still working as McKinley’s janitor, and with the arrival of the school board to evaluate the school, Figgins and Sue argue about Sue’s impending permanent principal-ness. When she meets with the board in her office, she gives a convincing speech about the good she’s doing, and they seem impressed. One of the men, Superintendent Bob Harris, seems to be flirting with her and asking her out, but during the conversation it becomes clear that Bob thinks that Sue is a man. That isn’t to say that he wasn’t still flirting with her – his spiel had all the trimmings of the “I’m a late-in-life ex-married gay who isn’t out and I’m only going to talk in euphemisms but let’s hook up” trope, but yep, he definitely thinks she’s a man.
Sue is horrified – rightly so, in my opinion, because I don’t think she’s mistakable for a man at all – and later has a girly heart-to-heart with Becky about whether she looks masculine. Becky says that, although Sue possesses “an allure that goes beyond gender,” she could try more feminine clothes. Sue explains how her signature track-suit style came to be: when she began as a teacher in the 80s, she looked feminine, with a pink skirt and long hair. She immediately found that her image garnered no respect, especially from male students, and she drastically changed her appearance in order to reflect her position of authority. She worries that any deviation from that now may result in the same kind of disrespect happening again.
“You’re early,” a mysterious voice says as Blaine flounces into the choir room alone, and he jumps. “Jeez! Argh! Brad! You scared the crap out of me!” he shoots angrily at Brad the Piano Guy. “Warn me before you talk.” The look on Blaine’s face is absolute Chandler Bing-esque comedy gold – someone get Darren Criss a proper comedic role, pronto. He then whines to Brad about his rough week, and ignores the piano player’s own attempts to talk about his life problems – rather more serious than Blaine’s, and including a severe gambling problem and losing his house. Blaine, naturally, hears none of this as he continues to simply rant about himself and the glee club. Not noticing Brad’s scathing irritation, Blaine comes to the conclusion that if the club wants him to pipe down then he will – he’ll sit in the back and do absolutely nothing. He parks himself in the far corner, not his usual front row seat, and we hear gentle hissing from the wall vent behind him before he wakes up in a hallucination.
The rest of New Directions have literally become puppets – Sesame Street style puppet people, and they all lavish Blaine with love, praise and attention – his subconscious is s conceited and needy, it’s hysterical. He’s thrilled in a puppyish way, and talks to them in a total children’s TV presenter voice. They beg him to sing, and he happily complies with Queen’s “You’re My Best Friend.” The puppet New Directions dance around all over him, playing with him and hugging him. Darren Criss barely, just barely, contains his own squinty-eyed, toothy grin of pure glee at getting to film this scene – you can see it in his face, but he manages to rein it in and mostly keep it to Blaine’s childish arrogance of being elevated to his rightful, adored place.
Jake’s apparently still doing the whole “training the Cheerios” thing, and after a lackluster rehearsal where he tells them off, one particular girl gives him the knowing smirk of a recent conquest. Bree, on the verge of furious tears, asks if Jake slept with her too, and Jake smugly replies that actually, he’s slept with the whole group. Bree looks weirdly betrayed and devastated, like, I didn’t think that was their deal, but okay. Blaine catches up with Jake to thank him, as Jake was Blaine’s only vague supporter in the episode’s initial scene. Jake absently commiserates about people not making an effort, and Blaine – who must know he sounds like a crazy person – tells him that something is going on in the choir room, possibly a rift in the space-time continuum, and advises Jake to sit in the back corner and see for himself.
Jake cuts off Schue’s discussion about dance routines, telling the club not to bother and criticizing their lack of both effort and skill in the dance department. He and Marley start to bicker and she tells him he’s not all that as he slumps into the Crazy Chair. He starts to slur and ends up hallucinating a huge performance number of Janet Jackson’s “Nasty,” where he shows off his skills with his entire Cheerios troupe, dancing through the halls with Marley and Bree both picking up parts of the song in a confrontation with Jake. The song then becomes a mash-up with “Rhythm Nation,” and the setting then changes to a recreation of that music video – high contrast black and white footage in a massive warehouse. At the end, he’s woken from his Crazy Chair coma by Figgins, who makes him clear out of the room.
So, wait a minute. Is this a recent thing? Or does the Crazy Chair explain every weird non-realist scene in the history of Glee? Whenever someone is doing their strange hallucinatory performances of singing in the halls or envisioning themselves on some crazy set – have they just been breathing the funny air? Has this been going on the entire time? This explains so much. So much.
Blaine’s senior elective is arts and crafts, because of course it is, and Blaine’s teacher is my new favorite character on Glee. She’s a floaty white haired hippy with a voice like gravel and when Blaine asks if he can switch from the medium of yarn to making, instead, a puppet – of Kurt, nonetheless – you can tell she’s 2000% done with him. I can only begin to imagine how annoying Blaine must be as a student. “Your request surely begs the question why on earth would an 18-year-old man want to make a puppet,” she states, but allows him to continue – Stoner Brett, who’s busily yarn-bombing a large bong, is not allowed to venture into decoupage experimentation. Blaine makes his Kurt puppet and walks around talking to it in a rather disturbing way, making himself win arguments that he couldn’t win in real life – we catch the tail end of one that sounds like “Kurt” asking for Blaine’s forgiveness for how he acted about their break-up. He literally makes the thing say “In this argument, I don’t have a leg to stand on!” which, puns aside, is a really messed-up attitude for relationship fantasies.
Sue, while testing out some stilettos, gets incidentally mad at Blaine about the puppet, but when he stands up for himself, she overreacts to the situation because she thinks that Blaine is less intimidated by her authority because of the shoes. She confiscates the Kurt-puppet, which is possibly a good thing. Sue then asks Will, in a sincere moment, how he manages to retain his masculinity while doing typically “feminine” things, like pirouetting. She explains her embarrassing situation, and he hits her with the old “Ginger Rogers did everything Fred Astaire did, backwards and in heels” line, which – as she points out – is not really relevant whatsoever to the conversation. However, he’s determined that the solution to her problem is to learn to dance like this. Why? When is this Bob guy going to see her dance? This is seriously like asking someone “what’s 12 x 4” and them saying “pineapple.”
For some reason she agrees, and he tries to strike a deal – he’ll teach her in exchange for money for new Nationals costumes. She tells him that there’s no way she’s giving the glee club more money, not until he explains where he got the money for the $1000 inflatable parachute in Gaga week, which, LOL. Will tells her it’s her loss and walks out, but oops, Sue has unknowingly sat herself in the Crazy Chair. She dreams singing “Cheek to Cheek” and dancing with Will in glamorous black tie. Jane Lynch, it must be said, sounds pretty fantastic. When the song ends, Sue wakes up and narrows her eyes, aware of the strange issue in the choir room.
Bree grabs Jake and pulls him aside – the reason she’s looked so upset about him recently isn’t because she’s jealous or wants to date him, it’s because he got her pregnant. Straight away, I’m like “really? Another Puckerman baby story line?” but apparently the twist here is that she is going to get it terminated – she doesn’t want anything from Jake aside from support in going to the doctor, and tells him to keep it an utter secret.
Blaine, meanwhile, breaks into Sue’s office at night and attempts to steal back his Kurt puppet. He gets caught nearly immediately and given a week of detention while being smacked with some serious Sue Sylvester realness, in which she calls the Kurt doll his “monstrous puppet bride,” Blaine a “strange, tiny, doe-eyed pervert” and questions the “magic discount bullet train” that keeps shuttling the McKinley kids to and from New York every other week. It’s a thing of beauty. “Go feel shame.”
At home in his room, Blaine calls Kurt – who’s about to go onstage for his gig – to tell him that he’s not there in New York. The call gets really weird when Kurt discovers why Blaine isn’t there, snapping and not letting Blaine explain himself very well. Blaine starts envisioning Kurt as the puppet version, and tries to explain about Sue’s detention, but given that he’s wearing the same clothes and it’s still the same night, we have to assume that he’d already skipped out on real-Kurt in order to save puppet-Kurt, and then got in trouble. He tries to explain about the puppet as well, but Kurt gets mad at the idea that Blaine made him into a puppet, and what that metaphorically means. Kurt hangs up and Rachel brings him the bad news that there’s only one audience member at the gig – an old man that thinks the actual Angela Lansbury is performing. Awkward.
Figgins hosts detention, featuring Becky, Jake and Blaine. The thing is meant to last eight hours, 4pm – midnight, and is utterly rife with Breakfast Club references. As Figgins leaves, Blaine tries to turn the situation into a feelings-fest, where they sit in a circle and talk about their “core wounds,” and when Becky rudely rejects his idea, he drifts off into puppet-land again, and he’s delighted to be back in a world where people are nice to him. Becky, apparently, is playing Emilio Estevez, as she starts talking about her anger issues, saying she taped Dotti Kazatori’s buns together “for her old man.”
This whole Breakfast Club thing would be a bit more effective if Glee hadn’t cut the “Don’t You (Forget About Me)” performance they’d initially planned for this scene, but what’s fantastic is the look into Blaine’s psyche this provides. Sometimes, with Glee, you wonder if tiny things here and there are purposeful character aspects that just aren’t currently being focused on, or if they’re meaningless things that fandom builds up in its collective head. But this episode taps so hard into Blaine’s compulsive need for approval and attention, his chronic need to be liked and validated at any cost, which is something that fans have latched onto but that the show has never outright addressed. Blaine has a long conversation with the Jake puppet about whether the fact that he feels most at home with friends that he can utterly control is indicative of a deeper issue. “Or maybe, everyone should just wise up and start doing everything you say because you are so right-on all the time!” the Jake-puppet, or Blaine’s subconscious, tells him. This is freaking incredible.
Real-life Jake wakes Blaine out of his daze and asks Blaine to cover for him as he skips out of detention early to help Bree go to the doctor. He finds her and she says it no longer matters – a false alarm, apparently, because I don’t think Glee would ever have a story where someone had a real abortion. She’s very upset and shaken by the whole thing and tells Jake just how awful his behavior is, saying that he probably will end up in that kind of trouble one day unless he changes his ways. He tries to apologize and she calls him toxic.
Sue – after Unique gives her a makeover to soften up her looks – shows the school board around McKinley, wearing a sensible skirt and jacket. Bob Harris quietly apologizes for his faux pas, which Sue gracefully skims past, and brings the tour to the choir room. Figgins accosts the group calling Sue irresponsible, announcing that there’s a dangerous gas leak (apparently this is what caused the Crazy Chair situation). Sue’s one step ahead and points out that she figured that out – and fixed it – herself, something that was technically his job, and the school board is very impressed. They offer her the leadership of the school permanently, and she asks Bob out on a date. He’s very taken aback and says no, and everyone looks at each other awkwardly.
Blaine questions his own sanity while talking to the new puppet he’s made – Tina. This isn’t a hallucination – this is real, and he does the voice for the puppet as he revels in fake-Tina’s romantic affections, even though he’s gay and engaged, because he’s just that needy. He’s caught by real Tina, who is somewhat disgusted by the puppet, but she apologizes on behalf of the club, and tells them their unanimous decision to give him the lead vocals and planning controls on one of the songs at Nationals. As they walk off, he tells her that he’ll miss having a Kurt puppet, because “he did anything I said.” There is no real solution or development to Blaine being slightly unhinged here is there?
Jake seems to have done some soul-searching since Bree’s harsh dressing-down, and teary-eyed, he runs to Marley and begs, with sincerity, for her help and love. He says that he doesn’t want the bad aspects of himself, and that he needs her – that she’s the only one that actually makes him feel changed. However, she tells him that things didn’t work out before, and that she no longer feels the same about him.
Kurt brings cronuts back to the loft (I was wondering how long it would take for them to shoehorn in cronuts to the NYC scenes) to celebrate that the band has a second gig at a much more suitable indie venue: the Williamsburg Music Hall. By sheer luck, their one audience member liked what he saw and gave a bootleg to his nephew, who works at the trendy Brooklyn hotspot. Kurt thanks the rest of the band for sticking by him and his vision. And by the way, it’s still weird to me that Adam Lambert’s character is so blandly passive. I’m waiting for something to happen there. The loft receives a courier delivery from Blaine, an apology gift for missing the gig. It turns out to be… puppets.
God only knows why Blaine thinks this is normal in any way, but he also presents New Directions with their own puppets too when he gives them an apology speech about his controlling tendencies and how he hopes to channel it into leadership, not bossiness. As the club exclaims over their puppet selves, the final scene changes – with absolutely no reason, context or lead-in, to an on-stage performance of the ridiculous YouTube viral hit, “The Fox,” in which the New Directions all wear animal noses and ears while operating their puppets. Why? Look, let’s blame it on the gas leak.
Next week, in Glee‘s fall finale, we’ll see how they manage to pull off a Christmas episode when it’s approximately April in the school year.
Glee season 5, episode 8 “Previously Unaired Christmas” airs December 7, 9pm Eastern on Fox.
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