History Analysis / Glee

* Emma comes across as a modern day deconstruction of TheIngenue and why such a person can't exist. She's so pure and clean she's a mysophobe, she holds onto her chastity so much that she's a virgin way into her adult years, she's so kind that she's an ExtremeDoormat, and she's so naive that she can't give functional advice to her students when she is a ''guidance counselor''. Her trying to be a [[SeeminglyWholesomeFiftiesGirl Wholesome Fifties Girl]] is really [[StepfordSmiler just an attempt to hide her major insecurities and nerousis]].

* Kurt is a {{Deconstruction}} of the stereotypical CampGay--his flamboyance makes him the most frequent target of bullying, which clearly takes a toll on him, and eventually he's forced to transfer schools when the bullying from one person goes UpToEleven--namely, when Karofsky's antics [[spoiler: gain a VillainousCrush edge, to the point where Kurt is ''terrified'' at the sight of him.]] Also, while he and his father have one of the most heartwarming relationships on the show, for a while he was so terrified of losing his father's love that he did ''very'' questionable things to keep it. [[ButNotTooGay The lack of anything resembling kissing or sex scenes]] [[spoiler: until "Original Songs"]] is explained by Kurt's genuine discomfort and lack of information regarding sex, which isn't hard to believe for someone who is/was the only openly-gay kid in his high school[[note]] note that most American public high schools have '''500-1000 students'''[[/note]].

*** This troper is still unsure if Sue's mother is ''actually'' hunting nazi's, or if it's just a wacky excuse for abandoning Sue and her sister...
*** Which would still mean that she is not such a good mother.
*** (same troper) that was my point, that would actually make her an even worse mother...
** And the fact that Sue didn't even invite her own mother to her [[spoiler:sisters funeral]], because she thought that she wouldn't care, made it even worse.

*** While her parents are totally fine with [[ItWasHisSled her being a lesbian]], her father saying he'll love her always and forever, she doesn't care about their opinions as much as 'buela's. Who says she never wants to see Santana again. Which undoubtedly caused some emotional psychological damage, given what she was already going through.

** And the fact that Sue didn't even invite her own mother to her [[spoiler:sisters funeral]], because she tought that she wouldn't care, made it even worse.

* Rachel and Finn can both be read as deconstructions of the stock teen-show heroine and hero. Rachel's ostentatious 'good girl' persona, assumption that she's entitled to be liked, admired and popular because she's talented, and assumption that her life and achievements are the centre of everyone attention (whether positive or negative) as well as her own make her a ramped-up version of a stock 'put-upon' heroine; however, the episodes constantly contradict her own assessment of herself by making it clear that she's really not very important to anyone but herself, that having a good singing voice does not in any way expose her to the same discrimination and difficulties experienced by others such as Artie, Quinn [[spoiler: during her pregnancy]] and Kurt, and that she's just as horrible to everyone around her as the 'mean girls' are to her. Similarly, Finn looks like a standard NiceGuy jock/leader whose BookDumb appearance hides a smart guy who just needs to have the confidence to follow his own path - romantically or otherwise - in order to make the world a better place. However, it's repeatedly shown that he's heavily invested in staying at the top of the social pyramid, is much more of a follower than a leader, and has no ability to change the culture of WMHS and no real wish to. His genuine lack of intelligence and bad decision-making are also shown to have serious, negative consequences for more people than just himself, and are not compensated for by his occasional flashes of emotional insight.

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** Correspondingly, he's also a {{Reconstruction}} of the CampGay: his flamboyant fashion sense is a way of asserting his individuality because he'd rather do that than try to hide all the ways in which he's different from the other boys, and any minor-to-moderate cross-dressing seems to spring from his genuine belief that "fashion has no gender". His haughty, catty demeanor is largely a [[JerkassFacade front]], as flinging insults is the only way he can retaliate against his bullies, and as he gains more friends and stops fearing for his safety he becomes much warmer and less bitchy. He gets on with the girls better than the boys (at first) because the girls aren't afraid to be seen with him, and when the boys warm up to him later he gets on just as well with them. And not only does he get a real, on-screen romance, but the show averts ButNotTooGay ''hard'' and the relationship is treated like every other one.

* Glee is often seen as a send up of the similar-at-first-glance ''HighSchoolMusical'', mainly in the way it addresses teen pregnancy, homophobia (or just [[HideYourGays homosexuals]]), drug abuse, and other daily realities which are unable to be shown in the kid-friendly Disney Channel version of high school. This was apparently unintentional, as the show creator Ryan Murphy has stated that he's never seen HSM, though he admires it as a cultural phenomenon, and that he did not have it in mind when creating the show.

*** {{Jossed}} David, [[spoiler:after his suicide attempt]], tells Kurt that his mum thinks he needs to be [[spoiler:[[CureYourGays cured]]]]

* Brittany can be seen as a {{Deconstruction}} of the DumbBlonde stereotype, making her a source of tragedy rather than comedy. Her intelligence seems to be low enough to suggest that she would be unable to cope in the outside world by herself. The faculty, save for Will, look the other way because of her position as a Cheerio, meaning that she never gets any help and no alarm bells go off for an underlying health condition. Plus, in a school where the average students think that a head of broccoli is a toilet brush or that women have prostates, are Britt's non-sequiturs really going to stand out? However, we do seem to be seeing the beginnings of {{Reconstruction}} - Although Brittany's continued belief in Santa Claus throws up some challenges for the rest of the club, it does help the other gleeks to get together to do something selfless. Also, her refusal to leave Artie for Santana demonstrates that she sees things in a very black and white, almost childlike way. She does what she thinks is right (and possibly tries to make up for her mistakes because she's realising that cheating with Santana does count) without falling prey to the brattier, more selfish instincts that virtually everyone else in the shows displays in romantic relationships.

* Kurt is a {{Deconstruction}} of the stereotypical CampGay--his flamboyance makes him the most frequent target of bullying, which clearly takes a toll on him, and eventually he's forced to transfer schools when the bullying from one person goes UpToEleven--namely, when Karofsky's antics [[spoiler: gain a VillainousCrush edge, to the point where Kurt is ''terrified'' at the sight of him.]] Also, while he and his father have one of the most heartwarming relationships on the show, for a while he was so terrified of losing his father's love that he did ''very'' questionable things to keep it. [[ButNotTooGay The lack of anything resembling kissing or sex scenes]] [[spoiler: until "Original Songs"]] is explained by Kurt's genuine discomfort and lack of information regarding sex, which isn't hard to believe for someone who is/was the only openly-gay kid in his high school[[hottip:*: note that most American public high schools have '''500-1000 students''']].

* Holly looks like the CoolTeacher that appears a lot in the media- a [[TotallyRadical "hip"]] teacher who her students relate to. However, the more we see of her, in [[Recap/GleeS2E7TheSubstitute The Substitute]], we see that she doesn't really have her life together and she lacks the ability to truly care for her students, as seen when she doesn't help Mercedes and doesn't even know what her punishment was.

* Holly looks like the CoolTeacher that appears a lot in the media. A [[TotallyRadical "hip"]] teacher who her students relate to. However, the more we see her, in [[Recap/GleeS2E7TheSubstitute "The Substitute"]] We see that her students don't really connect to her, as seen by the confused faces on her students during her Spanish class on LindsayLohan, and she doesn't really have her life together.

* Born This Way takes on both CookieCutterCuties and BeautifulAllAlong. Tina and Rachel worry about not fitting the CookieCutterCuties molds because of their race and it is shown that even white women cannot hold up to this standard without surgery. [[spoiler: Quinn]] had to lose 70 pounds, go on acne treatment, wear contacts, dye her hair, always wear make up and get a nose job to look perfect.

** Will's mother is an alcoholic.

* Both times a parent of Dave Karofsky is called to the school, it's always his father. There's even speculation his mother either left or died like Kurt's.