Ohmigod, I totally want to go back and change the grade I gave "The Power Of Madonna" from an A to an A+ so I can give this episode an A. That way, it'll be higher than the A- LTG gave "Theatricality" but still lower than the A+ I should have given "The Power Of Madonna" in the first place because this was so much better than that Gaga crap but still not as good as cheerleaders on stilts.
So, Emma's dating her dentist, a certain Carl Howell D.D.S., whom we will be referring to as "Hot Carl" because you know that's what that sick bastard Ryan Murphy wants us to call him, and why not give the man what he wants, especially after he gave us so awesome an episode? Anyway, Emma brings her Hot Carl to McKinley High to lecture the students on the finer points of proper oral hygiene and Will -- jealous of their burgeoning relationship, of course -- contrives to have Hot Carl give his first such lecture to the Glee Club. After issuing a dire warning regarding the dangers of filthy plaque buildup, Hot Carl passes out those little pills you chew on to find out if you missed large areas of clingy gunk while brushing, and it turns out that Brittany, Rachel, and Artie have absolutely disgusting mouths, so appointments with Hot Carl are immediately scheduled for each.
Meanwhile, the Homecoming pep rally's coming up, and Mr. Schue managed to get New Directions a slot on the program. Problem is, he wants the kids to perform a selection from the catalog of that seminal Adult Contemporary hitmaker, Christopher Cross, but the kids decide they'd rather do Britney Spears. No, not like...Jeez, would you get your filthy heads out of the gutter for just one minute? Please? ANY-way, Brittany alone amongst the teens raises her hand to object, for her full name is Brittany S. Pierce, and she has lived in the shadow of Other Britney her entire life. She's traumatized, y'all!
Fortunately, Hot Carl still makes liberal use of nitrous oxide when he's working on his patients' mouths, so Brittany ends up having a totally liberating hallucination wherein she is even more lovely and talented than Other Britney could ever hope to be, and this inspires her to demand all of the featured Glee Club solos from here on out. First, though, she tells Santana Lopez all about Hot Carl's magical gas, so the two of them schedule a tandem appointment to indulge in a totally liberating shared hallucination wherein they are even more lovely and talented than Other Britney and Madonna, respectively. Of course, once Artie and Rachel get wind of Hot Carl's magical gas, they too hustle on over to the good tooth doctor's office to have totally liberating hallucinations of their own wherein they are not quite as lovely and talented as Other Britney, but hey. You take what you can get, am I right?
It all leads up to Mr. Schue caving to the kids' demands and allowing them to perform a Britney Spears song at the rally, but because he's still hung up on Emma, and because he wants to prove to her that he can be as madcap and carefree as Hot Carl, he insists upon performing the selection with New Directions, and the resulting on-stage gyrations trigger a sex riot amongst the assembled students so violent that the magnificent Sue Sylvester is forced to pull a fire alarm to evacuate the building.
And in the end, Rachel gets up in front of the others to dedicate some song I've never heard of to Finn because they were apparently wallowing in some sort of bullshit high school angst all episode while everyone else around them was busy being awesome, and a bunch of people cry.
Sorry if this all seems a little too enthusiastic and more than a bit disjointed, but towards the end of the evening, Jane Lynch delivered a piece of absolutely inspired lunacy about what really happened at the 1968 Democratic National Convention, and I still haven't recovered from it.
Featuring Other Britney's "I'm A Slave 4 U" as performed by Our Brittany, Other Britney's "Me Against The Music" as performed by Our Brittany and Santana Lopez, Other Britney's "I'm A Teenage High School Slut" as performed by Rachel, Other Britney's "Stronger" as performed by Artie and The McKinley High Titans, Other Britney's "Toxic" as performed by Mr. Schuester and New Directions, some song I've never heard of as performed by Rachel, and seminal Adult Contemporary hitmaker Christopher Cross's "Sailing" as performed by seminal Adult Contemporary hitmaker Christopher Cross.
Want more? The full recap starts right below!
"Awriiiiiiiiiiiiii!" Mr. Schue overenthusiastically opens the episode. "Who can tell me who Christopher Cross is?" No one under the age of forty, that's for damn sure, and even that's pushing it. Proving me right, our dear little Brit-Brit guesses, "He discovered America." Finn, naturally, nods his head eagerly in agreement. Mr. Schue, to his credit, barely rolls his eyes at their ignorance, and instead perks, "Close! He did write an iconic chart-topper, 'Sailing.'" "I have a bad feeling about this lesson," Kurt announces to whomever's sitting to his left while Single-T Tina, with her arms folded firmly across her chest, mutters, "Never heard of him, don't want to hear about him." Mr. Schue, deliberately deaf to the children's grumblings, lectures that while "some people think of the term 'Easy Listening' as a bad thing," good music can in fact be "controlled" and "restrained." Gaze fondly upon those last two adjectives, gentle reader, and then bid them farewell, for nothing that follows in this episode could ever be described by either.
Mr. Schue next passes out a set of sheet music to the kids. Finn takes one look at the lyrics and immediately wonders, "How can you get caught between the moon and New York City? They're, like, a hundred miles apart." And if that statement's any sort of reflection on Finn's grasp of spatial relations, no wonder he's such a sucky quarterback. "If I may?" Kurt interrupts with a delicate finger in the air. "I think I speak for all of us," he continues, "when I say it's not that we don't love the idea of spending a week on this silky-smooth Adult Contemporary; it's just that, as teens, this isn't the easiest music for us to relate to." Point to the precious adolescent queen. "However," Kurt adds, his face lighting up with excitement, "there's a burgeoning Facebook campaign that has swelled to over five members. Their ardent demand? That this week, at the fall homecoming assembly, the McKinley High School Glee Club perform a number by -- wait for it -- Ms. Britney Spears!" Various children delight at the very idea until Mr. Schue firmly shuts them all down with, "No, no, no -- I don't think she's a very good role model." And... point to Mr. Schue! That doesn't happen very often, now, does it?
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