FOX’s ‘Glee’ finale a little too magical

There have been some detractors from Tuesday night’s second season finale of “Glee.” I am not among them – or if I am, it’s for different reasons.

The episode wasn’t a complete disconnect from the rest of the season. There were callbacks to obscure one-shot walk-ons from last fall. There was this ... odd vibe between glee club director Will Schuester and the director of rival show choir Vocal Adrenaline, a villain right out of central casting. There were end-of-the-year break-ups and hook-ups, and then there was The Kiss.

At the end of the glee club New Directions’ first song, a duet between singers Rachel and Finn, caught up in the inspiration of the moment, Finn kissed Rachel, who kissed him back.

This despite an all-day date the two of them had all around New York, the end of which Rachel determined she couldn’t hook up with Finn because she was moving to New York after high school to follow her dream. She left him standing there in the dying strains of a suddenly awkward serenade.

Their teacher, Will Schuester, slipped away from the group (leaving them unsupervised – way to go, Will) to meet up with April Rhodes, a recurring character played by Kristin Chenoweth, at her autobiographical Broadway show.

She wasn’t there but some random guy in the theater told him he had talent – after Will burst into an imaginarily accompanied and auto-tuned song. The random song-bursting continued when Rachel and Kurt did the same thing on the empty set of the Broadway show “Wicked.”

I can’t say I support what the writers are doing. It seemed like they were just doing a whole lot of random stuff because the “Glee” kids were in New York and they wanted to show the “Glee” kids doing everything they could do in New York – singing, dancing, and Rachel really needs to boil her credit card (don’t ask).

I don’t mind that it ended on kind of a low note. I’m charmed by Rachel and Finn deciding to spend their senior year, at least, as a couple, and that singers Sam and Mercedes are a couple, too, and Santana and Britney have come to some sort of understanding. All of the relationship stuff was very sweet.

Spontaneity

My main beef with the production was that structurally, this show choir at William McKinley High School won regionals by singing original songs and decided to try that again at nationals.

They intended to stage an original song that they’d write in their hotel room, and presumably choreograph on their way to the theater. Taking whatever time they needed to work out their little romantic foibles, tours of New York, pillow fights and oh yes, one of the singers, Quinn, is feeling a little down so day before the show, her friends gave her a haircut.

They didn’t know when they left Ohio what song they’d sing, but they had their costumes ready?

This bothers me more than it will anyone who hasn’t tried to stage a production, but a performance just needs more thought and planning than the script allowed for.

Oh, I know. This is television. There is nothing that happens on “Glee” that isn’t planned out for weeks and even months ahead of time, with entire teams of lighting and sound techs, makeup artists, stylists, choreographers, costumers, voice coaches and the like at the ready.

But the first thing I noticed when they staged their presentation was the spotlights came up on Rachel and Finn and I thought, who cued the lighting guy that they’d need that? Who let the lighting and sound crew know the choreography for the number? Hell, who let the kids know the choreography? Not their choreographer – the show choir consultant Will had hired earlier this month to get them ready for nationals – this consultant who saw it for the first time from the audience.

So I’m meant to believe this group with its mix of strong and weak voices, strong and weak dance skills, where teamwork is traditionally shaky at best and we never see them investing the time or commitment in rehearsal – not only does this group somehow get to nationals in the first place, but on the back of the rather throwaway song they just wrote maybe the night before, they came in 12th place? They beat out 38 groups? How bad were these other groups?

It’s a weak complaint, I know. But having some idea of how hard it is to get a show to the point where it’s presentable, watching “Glee” is a little like watching “Harry Potter.”

That said, I’m absolutely looking forward to its return in the fall.