Glee

I don't really know what to think about Glee (the pilot anyway).

It's High School Musical but a TV series instead of a TV movie (Finn, one of the main characters, the QB on the football team, is coerced into joining the glee club and SHOCK has to deal with pressure from his teammates about singing), and it expands into the adult world much more significantly than HSM (it's about a 60/40 mix, I'd say, the 60 on the adult side).  It's uplifting, heart-soaring, farcically campy and silly, at times touching, and just generally entertaining.  But I can see it not being to everyone's taste (the musical numbers at times reminded me of Idol's group sings...)

Actually I guess it's more like the bastard lovechild of HSM and Bring It On.

On the casting side... it's got (the original Broadway version of) Hairspray's Matthew Morrison and Spring Awakening's Lea Michele (yay!) meaning the teen female lead CAN ACTUALLY SING AND DANCE.

And Jane Lynch (who is not really utilized much in the pilot but the brief moments she's there... hilarity ensues), who by herself would be able to make me watch paint dry while she read the telephone book (do they still make those?)

The pilot is also about 12 minutes longer than can be fit into an hour of TV, so unless FOX works out a deal with the affiliates to bleed into the 10pm hour or does some significant cutting... it won't air as I saw it.  Which is a shame for all of the above reasons.

It might also be the most expensive television show of all time when it goes past the pilot.  Musical numbers take extra time to shoot right because of voice/lip synching.  Plus all the dancing.  Plus all of the music licensing (I mean, there's a LOT of music).

Which adds up to the sad reality that subsequent episodes won't have nearly the amount of magic the pilot has.

But, hey.  I have to say I am so very on board (much more so than for the script of ABC's Fame-esque pilot Limelight).

I'm not sure why this show hasn't been scheduled yet.  I can't believe Fox would take something this potentially amazing and relegate it to the summer (maybe it'll premiere after the Final Two Perform episode of Idol on May 20th?)  Sigh.