YMMV / Glee

A-H

• Abandon Shipping:
  • Many fans of Finn and Rachel jumped ship after the infamous wedding storyline in season 3. For Kurt and Blaine, it's a toss-up between the incident in the Scandals parking lot, the Chandler incident or Blaine cheating on Kurt.
  • There is no one who still ships Marley and Ryder after what happened in real life with their actors.
• Actor Shipping:
  • The most common pairings seem to be the Les Yay HeYa (Heather Morris and Naya Rivera), which makes enough sense as their characters are together, and Achele (Dianna Agron and Lea Michele), which also makes some sense given Quinn and Rachel's long-term friendship dynamic in-universe. Dianna and Naya together also became popular in more recent years.
  • The Crisscolfer (Darren Criss and Chris Colfer) shipping, since Kurt and Blaine had been canon.
  • Actual couples, like Cory Monteith and Lea Michele, were supported.
  • A lot of people started Crack Pairing Lea Michele with Matt Morrison (Rachel and Mr. Schuester) after it was revealed that the two had previously dated back when they were both on Broadway.
• Adorkable:
  • Brittany's naivety over the simplest of things, believing in Santa Claus and getting excitable when he shows up in shopping malls, donating a dollhouse for all the "homeless dolls", and apparently crying over broccoli because she thought that was a tiny tree where jellybabies lived, all qualify for this, as well as moments where she lacks social skills around strangers. And she also has an online talk show, and is praised for her dancing by the other glee club members.
    Santana: [about Brittany] She's sweet, she's innocent... she's everything good in this miserable, stinking world.
  • Sam loves to do impressions of characters and actors from movies, and tries to win the affections of Quinn by speaking Na'vi language from Avatar.
  • Finn mixes up well-known idioms and shows signs of being Book Dumb, even being amazed that books could be rented out of a library. When he is confused or amazed about something mundane, he makes a wide-eyed confused expression like a deer caught in the headlights, and is also a clumsy dancer (he hits someone in the face once).
  • Marley qualifies, based on her love for sweet things like kittens and Julie Andrews sing-a-longs, her generally sunny disposition, and her excited exclamation that it would be 'crazy' if they used sparklers inside in order to mimic the wild theatrics of Lady Gaga. Not to mention her iconic and quirky hats.
• Alternate Aesop Interpretation: The message of Rachel's speech criticizing the celibacy club in the second episode of the first season was probably intended to be "trying to enforce abstinence in high schools is a bad idea", which is certainly a fairly reasonable point to make. However, with the way Rachel phrases things, it can easily seem as if she's actually not just arguing that enforcing abstinence on a collective level doesn't work, but that she's making the sweeping generalization that even personally choosing to remain abstinent is impossible to teenagers because they're so completely under the control of their hormones.
• Alternative Character Interpretation: Thanks to the well-rounded personalities of every character in the show, fans can either over-identify with a character and see them as the hero of the show, or completely hate them and see them as the villain of the show. There's enough leather pants for everyone.
  • Is Brittany really just stupid, or is she also delusional? Among other signs, she believes her cat has been reading her diary. With the episode "A Night of Neglect", a common interpretation is that she's a Genius Ditz mixed with a Cloud Cuckoo Lander. Though an episode actually showed her cat (on screen) using a computer mouse, so while we have no confirmation that it read her diary, it's clearly smarter than the average cat.
  • Is Quinn a Jerk with a Heart of Gold, the Alpha Bitch, The Chessmaster, or even a Smug Snake or Manipulative Bastard? As certain Season 3 behavior implied, was she actually in love with Rachel, and did Rachel's plans to marry Finn quash those feelings?
  • For the relationship between Santana and Brittany, is Santana an abusive partner in the making? She seems eager to emotionally sway Brittany to her side of an argument no matter what said conflict is, and makes her believe she can do no wrong and makes sure she still remains loyal to her.
• Arc Fatigue:
  • Some people feel that the Dalton arc — when Kurt transferred to Dalton Academy to get away from bullying — was drawn out too long, and that Kurt was being overshadowed by Blaine and the Warblers in his own storyline. It was supposed to make a point about gay bullying, but for the most part amounted to little more than a few big lipped alligator moments and yaoi scenes. According to Word of God, the Warblers were only supposed to appear for two episodes of the second season, but their immense popularity led to them staying on the show much longer, well into the third season. Until "Born This Way", when Kurt finally returned to McKinley, it felt entirely possible that he would be staying there indefinitely.
  • Rachel and Finn's relationship was frequently this, as they were a Foregone Conclusion from the start and yet the show kept finding new ways to break them up and get them back together, even after they promised to "keep them together to focus on other couples" in Season 2. When they did decide to keep them together in Season 3, they made it even worse with the wedding arc which was extremely unpopular with the fanbase (outside of hardcore Finchel shippers), most of whom saw it as out-of-character.
• Ass Pull:
  • Finn being Easily Forgiven for outing Santana. The conflict is solved in the duration of one whole episode and it takes a 180 twist on the fact that in the episode before it, Finn clearly outed Santana as lashing out at her for her nonstop verbal abuse, not because he suddenly "cares for her" and doesn't want to risk her health or life.
  • Suddenly revealed in the same episode, the school's 'zero tolerance policy for violence'. After our suspension of disbelief's been dragged along with two-and-a-half seasons full of bullying, tossing in the dumpster, violent shoving at lockers (some of those actions taken by teachers) and several brutal fights about which no adult apparently could do anything about, we are now supposed to buy that a slap is a big deal. The blatant set-up of this situation in order for Finn to look good by 'rescuing' Santana doesn't help one bit.
  • The New Directions get disqualified at Sectionals in Season 4 due to Marley fainting. Of course, Hunter Clarington just had to involve Dalton Academy in doping, getting Dalton disqualified and the New Directions reinstated (and winning). There were three participating schools, one of which did not get disqualified. New Directions still ends up winning...somehow.
  • Cassandra apparently not hating Rachel. Um, right.... that's why she insulted her non-stop, slept with her boyfriend, and behaving in a completely unprofessional manner.
  • During "A Wedding", Brittany reveals that she wants Kurt and Blaine to also get married during her and Santana's wedding, because supposedly she found them to help her be comfortable with her sexuality. Maybe something like that could work for Santana, but Brittany had always been a unique character because she never expressed any angst or worry over her sexuality. She liked boys, she liked girls, and that was that. Season 2 showed that if Santana was willing, Brittany would be more than fine with dating her in public. In the end, it just seems like Character Shilling (or rather pairing shilling) and a cheap excuse to get Kurt and Blaine married.
  • In The Purple Piano Project, it's suddenly revealed that Artie and Tina are juniors instead of seniors when there was no previous indication that they were younger then everyone else. It seemed like the creators decided that they needed someone to carry over to Season 4 and just chose the two of them.
• Audience-Alienating Era: Season 5. From the start, it was overshadowed by the death of Cory Monteith, featured performances of songs that had not been released yet in the timeline of the show (like Katy Perry's "Roar" and Miley Cyrus' "Wrecking Ball" both released Fall 2013 even though it was set in Spring 2013), asinine storylines (like Will punishing Marley for not wearing a skimpy outfit, an entire episode based around twerking, and the infamous "Puppet Master" episode) and Joe and Sugar just disappearing entirely. To top it off, they decided to ditch the Glee club entirely for the second half of the season, essentially firing five regulars in the process. Had the show not been renewed for Season 6 before the season started, it likely would have been cancelled as viewership tanked during the season. Season 6 tried to rectify it by going back to the Glee Club, but Fox had already made the decision to cancel the show by then.
• Award Snub:
  • The series was nominated for 19 Emmys in the 2010 Emmys but only won four. The Best Comedy Emmy and Best Casting Emmys (Comedy) went to Modern Family instead. Of course, had Modern Family lost those awards, this entry would be on its page.
  • The fans of Community see Glee as being the cause of its own Award Snub, as the former show got zero nominations - even though the shows don't even have the same timeslot.
  • Glee was the reverse of this in Season 2, as it continued to receive loads of nominations even though the critics had soured on it. This changed with Season 3, when Glee only got three Emmy nominations, for Dot Marie Jones' guest performance as Coach Beiste, for make-up and for cinematography - none of which it won.
• Base-Breaking Character:
  • Rachel: She's either sympathetic and inspiring for her big-city dreams and trying to break out of her small town, or a spotlight-hogging nag who belittles people who consider her a friend and often refuses to acknowledge anyone else's talents. She did get some character development in this area later on...which only broke the base further, with many debating whether she'd truly redeemed herself for her past actions (or if they needed redeeming to begin with).
  • Kurt: His fans adore him for his unapologetic refusal to hide his sexuality and identity, while his detractors (some of whom are gay males themselves) can't stand how he often comes off as a Camp Gay stereotype and how he's always treated sympathetically by the narrative even when he's clearly the one in the wrong (two particular sore spots include his blatant biphobia in "Blame It on the Alcohol" and sexual harassment of Finn in "Theatricality"). Season 3 onwards however, he was pretty firmly a fan favourite.
  • Blaine, from Season 4 onwards. His cheating on Kurt was a bad starting place, but he at least was shown to be greatly remorseful for that. However, especially in Season 5, his crappy treatment of the likes of Marley, Kurt, Elliot and others made him increasingly unpopular, though he was still definitely popular as a singer.
• Big-Lipped Alligator Moment:
  • Several Warbler numbers feel rather shoehorned. In particular, "Baby, It's Cold Outside" had little purpose aside from being Yaoi Genre fanservice.
  • While the shippers loved it, Kurt and Blaine's slow-mo run down a hallway in "Never Been Kissed" seems a little out of place. It also seemed that way to Chris Colfer, who said that the scene "was too gay even for me."
• Bizarro Episode:
  • "Puppet Master" from season five is...odd. The A-plot is kicked off by Blaine having a gas leak-induced hallucination of his friends as puppets, leading him to create a puppet effigy of Kurt, which then...somehow manifests in New York and calls Blaine to taunt him about his relationship difficulties. And it ends with Blaine making puppets for all of his friends and everyone singing along to "What Does the Fox Say".
  • "Previously Unaired Christmas" is literally non-canon that exists only because season five aired through December but was set in late spring at the time. It also features scenes where Rachel, Kurt and Santana are seduced and robbed by a sexy helium-wielding mall Santa; and a staged nativity play where Unique-as-Mary gives birth to Baby Jesus in song.
• Broken Base:
  • In the first half of Season 1, there was a sort of "Team Rachel"/"Team Quinn" rivalry between fans of the two characters. (Not in terms of which one belonged more with Finn - with Quinn lying to him about her pregnancy, most fans were on Rachel's side with that one - but with the issue of which one was generally more sympathetic or had more right to feel "wronged" by the other). It was rekindled in the second season after Rachel and Finn broke up and Finn and Quinn got back together. By then, Quinn had been made a lot more sympathetic, and one could have reasonably sided with either character in their battle for Finn (though this changed when it became clearer that Quinn was just dating Finn for his popularity so she could win Prom Queen). Then, of course, there are those fans who think both of them are too good for Finn...or not good enough...
  • The Finn/Kurt subplot in "Theatricality" has sparked quite a hot debate over which character was more in the wrong (Finn for calling Kurt's decor "faggy" or Kurt for the obsessiveness which led to Finn's outburst?). Eventually bled over into the show itself.
  • "Journey" opens with the scene of Beth's conception which people can't seem to agree if it's a romantic moment or an act of sexual assault. The latter isn't helped by the fact that Quinn was drunk, repeatedly said no, and only eventually agreed if Puck used a condom, which he did not.
  • The second season. While its themed episodes like "Brittany/Britney", "The Rocky Horror Glee Show" and "A Very Glee Christmas", and various guest stars have received a lot of hype and been fairly popular with the younger and/or more casual fans, a lot of viewers think the show lost its luster and long for the first season, when it was less interested in creating big moments and more in telling a consistent story and building interesting characters.
  • In season 2, over Artie's relationship with Brittany, and whether the show had done enough to develop it beyond a Crack Pairing. Some thought they were quite sweet together, while others thought that it was still just a lazy attempt at Pair the Spares. It got much more complicated with the addition of Santana's sexuality storyline in the later half of the season, as Artie became the obstacle to them getting together and an increasingly obvious Romantic False Lead for Brittany.
  • Mercedes' performance of "Sweet Transvestite". Some fans think it was an amazing rendition that lives up to the original. Others naturally think that regardless of the quality, the fact that Mercedes is a cis woman completely defeats the purpose of the number. There is very little middle ground.
  • There is something of a battle over Kurt's portrayal. His Camp Gay persona is quite controversial: as the show is so popular, many believe that it gives a bad representation of gay people to the mainstream as Will & Grace did years ago. Others believe that having an openly gay character who is neither Straight Gay nor the least bit ashamed is a good thing. Still, others believe that Kurt's message became more important than the actual character.
  • The Gay Aesops of Season 2 and 3 also came under fire. There was either too many making them Anvilicious or it was perfectly justified. Even some who thought the anvils needed to be dropped weren't always happy about Glee's manner of dropping them.
  • There's been a huge debate on the scene in 'Mash-Off' where Finn outs Santana in response to her incessant teasing. Some say that Santana backed Finn into a corner and so it was only human that he would lash out with the only thing that would make her stop. Others say that as awful as Santana was, outing her for that is Disproportionate Retribution and never, ever justifiable. Then there's the middle-ground, where they admit that what Finn did was completely wrong, but he couldn't have anticipated where it would lead (a political ad that uses her lesbianism to bash Sue), and Santana was hardly innocent in the matter.
    • By the following episode, many people believe that Finn was very Easily Forgiven and that an episode that should have been focused on Brittany and Santana's relationship was instead focused on Finn for no real reason. The one given by Finn was that Santana was the one who took his virginity, so he allegedly selflessly cares about the fact that her not being out is hurting her emotionally. Nevermind the fact that in the prior episode he just seemed to have been pushed to the edge by Santana's verbal attacks on his weight so he wanted to get back at her.
  • "Dance with Somebody" broke the base with Kurt's cheating storyline and Blaine's reaction to it through song; part of the base sided fully with Blaine and despised Kurt for flirting with Chandler; some didn't side with either; and some sided with Kurt as they saw Blaine's behavior as hypocritical given his pre-"Michael" relationship with Sebastian.
  • Marley's eating disorder plot is either not funny, a spotlight on a common thing for teenagers, or brushed aside too quickly to matter.
  • The covers of "Friday" and "Gangnam Style". There's the camp that simply feel that they were bad covers, and another that feels Glee is doing everything to latch on whatever popular trend is happening at the time.
  • The treatment of Brody after the revelation about him being a gigolo. Some people think Finn and Santana were right to confront him, and others think they took it way too far.
  • The Klaine relationship as a whole. Supporters believe it's a powerful relationship that helped save the lives of many gay students in need of representation, that it gives Kurt something good in his life, or that it's a cute relationship. Others despise the pairing for various reasons whether it's coming off strongly as Token Shipping with a Satellite Love Interest, taking up screentime at the expense of more interesting characters and storylines, various instances of emotional abuse being glossed over, that the characters don't have good chemistry or rapport, poor overall execution, or the use of numerous negative gay stereotypes or outright controversial statements which do more harm for gay rights and representation than good.
  • At the beginning of season four, the show split narratives between New York and McKinley storylines - an act that effectively split the fandom 50/50 as to which one is the "real" glee (McKinley has the choir room and contains the teenage characters that most viewers relate to, whereas New York contains most of the stars that draw in the general viewer).
  • The season 4 episode "Shooting Star". 50% of people in and out of fandom think that Glee was very brave to approach the topic of school shootings. The remaining 50% thinks the episode is just using the topic to attract ratings and publicity, comes too soon after the Sandy Hook shooting, and its Axes at School ending comes with offensive implications about Down's Syndrome people.
  • Blaine in "Puppet Master" has split the fandom in two, essentially based on whether you already liked or disliked Blaine. Those who liked him thought his childlike adoration of the puppets was charming and adorable, and his interactions with Kurt are understandable due to his concerns that the two are growing apart. Those who already felt the character and relationship had run its course saw him as whiny, selfish and manipulative towards both Kurt and the club as a whole. There's also a small middle ground who feel there's no way to take Blaine seriously either way because the entire plot was brought on due to a gas leak hallucination.
  • The reveal that the rest of season 5 will take place in New York caused some diversion. Some people disagreed with it, saying it completely ruins the point of the show, while the others said that the show should have done it since the start of season 4. Then there were those who were happy for the decision but weren't happy about the idea the Newbies would disappear and the New York side would have more characters added onto them, worrying it might ruin it. But then there were those who were happy for that.
  • Even before it aired, Santana vs. Rachel in "Frenemies" was ugly either way. There were fans agreeing with Rachel who says that Santana auditioning for understudy is ridiculous considering she has never shown an interest in Broadway, and that she's just trying to steal Rachel's limelight, and then there are those on Santana's side, saying that Rachel blew a majority of the situation out of proportion, taking the simple idea of Santana auditioning to be her understudy and making it a huge deal which she shouldn't have. And some are just Kurt (and Elliot, as of "Trio", siding with neither.
  • The new newbies in season six. Some are mad that they essentially replaced Marley, Jake, Ryder, Kitty, and Unique, especially in a shortened final season that wouldn't be able to offer them much in the form of character development. Others are glad that they appear to be more fully formed characters as opposed to the previous group, which was mostly made of several expies, as well as the fact that they wouldn't have been around long enough to be ruined like the writers.
• Cargo Ship:
  • Wes/Gavel and Kurt/Kilt are fairly popular, but the most widely known one is Santana/Shrub-shaped-like-a-person (Shrubtana).
  • Briano (Brad, the piano player for New Directions, and his piano. Though he cheats on it with the keyboard from time to time).
  • Also, Blaine/Hair gel, and Mercedes/Tater tots.
  • Don't forget Blaine/Furniture, Blaine/Microphone, Santana/Breadstix, Finn/Chair, Quinn/Bacon, Emma/Grapes, and Puck/Eggo.
• Cliché Storm: Critics charge that the show relies too much on hackneyed plot devices; the show really tends to revel in the charge. The fans love it though, and the writers certainly know what they're getting into.
• Crack Pairing: They are common sources for one-episode pairings, though a few have had more long-term success, such as Puck/Rachel, Puck/Shelby and Artie/Brittany. Obviously, Puck seems to be a popular target of them (being the Launcher of a Thousand Ships that he is).
• Creator's Pet:
  • Holly Holiday. It definitely feels this way for people who don't like Holly, since Ryan Murphy called the actress who plays her "Glee's muse" and seems fond of the character by association.
  • Unique, who was made into a main character in Season 4 because of Murphy's adoration for Alex Newell from The Glee Project. Compare the screen-time and focus Joe gets (despite actually winning the season). It went even further with Newell being promoted to main cast in Season 5, although his character's Transgender storyline went towards mitigating this somewhat.
• Crosses the Line Twice: Almost anything Sue does or says, though she certainly outdid herself in season 5 when she managed to take Figgins's place as principal by planting false evidence in his office, including gambling bills, porn magazines, gay porn magazines, gay porn foot fetish magazines, and an autographed copy of Mein Kampf.
• Designated Evil: Finn calling Kurt's decorating "faggy". While he really shouldn't have said that, Kurt was way over the line, and Burt overreacted when he heard Finn say it. Even if he had handled it more rationally, Kurt clearly never cared that his behavior was seriously inappropriate, and complaining to their parents probably wouldn't have helped because of how protective Burt is toward his son.
• Designated Hero: Cassandra, as of Wonder-ful. The way she treated Rachel was not tough love by any sane person's definition!
• Designated Villain:
  • Brody after the reveal that he's a sex worker is treated like he cruelly manipulated Rachel and tried to steal her from Finn, despite the fact that the two were broken up and he has a very sympathetic (and realistic!) reason for getting involved with that line of work.
  • Carmen Thibideaux. Her job is literally to be a dean, and objective. She never shows pleasure at having to do a harsh job, and often praises Kurt and Rachel, but the show treats her as a bad person for being angry with the latter for being a diva again and again.
• Die for Our Ship:
  • Artie. At PaleyFest 2011, Kevin McHale revealed that he often gets "hate Tweets" from Brittana shippers, protesting "I'm not Artie!"
  • Quinn, Blaine, and Mercedes all got this from the Kurt/Sam shippers. Blaine got it the most, but Mercedes likely to got more of it when Sam returned in "Hold on to Sixteen," trying to win her back.
  • The Finchel ship gets this from Klaine and Brittana shippers: whether it's because the latter are confused about who the show's actual protagonists are, or because of legitimate complaints about the discrepancy in treatment of opposite-sex vs. same-sex couples on the show.
  • The massive amount of hate the Finchel fandom itself lets loose against anyone other than Finn who even shows the slightest interest in Rachel. Puck, Jesse, Brody, all of their respective actors and their fandoms catch no end of hell from them. Salling actually got legitimate, police-investigated death threats after Rachel cheated on Finn with Puck in Season 2. In fact, it goes so far as to spill over into the Faberry fandom, a non-canon ship.
  • Sam, due to dating Brittany, and the series' complicated history regarding its depiction of LGBT issues. While Santana was the one to dump Brittany because she wanted to date other people, a lot of people resent the show's aforementioned imbalance in the portrayal of opposite-sex relationships vs. same-sex relationships. Whereas Brittana fans had to wait for over a year to see the two painfully-in-love characters kiss, Brittany and Sam kissed multiple times in the episode they got together. Once Brittany and Santana's relationship was made official, it took place almost entirely in the background whereas Brittany and Sam had major plots revolve around their relationship in two consecutive episodes, leading to some resentment towards the character himself.
  • Some less scrupulous fans were hoping Marley would have died from her fainting spell at Sectionals, so that Jake and Ryder could take comfort in each other.
  • The Klaine fandom sends quite a bit of hate as well. Max Adler (Karofsky), Grant Gustin (Sebastian) and Oliver Kieran-Jones (Adam) have gotten hate sent to them for being a love interest of either Blaine or Kurt. Even Colfer has gotten hate from Klaine shippers due to Kurt's actions in episodes or comments Chris has said that can be taken as anti-Klaine or pro-another pairing like Kadam. Strangely, Criss never really received hate from Klainers even if he said similar anti-Klaine comments or Blaine showed interest in someone else, like Sam in "Sadie Hawkins".
  • Finn gets a lot of hate from Rachel/Quinn shippers from both sides due to having dated both. These fans like to play up Finn's more negative traits, making him out to be a self-centered man-child and sometimes outright abusive towards Rachel, while ignoring his more positive traits like his legit love for Rachel (to the point of letting her go to New York without him so she can follow her dreams). A lot of Quinn/Rachel fanfics will also play up his two-timing ways, despite this never being done out of malice. They also have a habit of vilifying Jesse (who Rachel ends up married to) due to him "stealing" Rachel from Quinn.
• Draco in Leather Pants:
  • Puck. He already had a leg up due to being a traditional "bad boy" archtype, and was often declared the endgame love interest for Quinn from the moment it was revealed he was her baby daddy. The adoration for him oten brushes aside the more uncomfortable aspects of the character - he was a bully, he got Quinn pregnant while drunk, was a serial cheater and waffled back and forth wildly between supporting her pregnancy and treating her like damaged goods. These issues were similarly ignored if he was being shipped with Rachel, but occasionally they were seen as positives when Puck was shipped with Kurt (which was extremely popular in season 1). This section of the fandom saw Puck's actions as a form of internalized homophobia and wanted to explore that. Funnily enough, that leads straight into a season 2 character who seems to exist specifically for those purposes...
  • Karofsky, like a more canonical Puck, is a complex character and many of his fans accept his flaws as part of what makes him interesting. However, some of his more rabid fans completely overlook the way he injures, threatens and tries to force himself upon Kurt.
  • With the help of Gustin's charisma and the show's "interesting" way of character development, Sebastian slowly but surely became this—because there had to be a traumatized woobie beneath that "facade". While the show never delved into any backstory for him, his Heel–Face Turn in "On My Way" helped him be seen in a better light anyway. The fact that the character development stuck adds to it.
  • Santana, as many of her fans tend to downplay her role in bullying other characters to turn her into The Woobie due to her torment over her sexuality, especially since Kurt was bullied horrifically for being gay, sometimes by Santana, he never bullied others the way she did.
  • Quinn, as a lot of her fans will take her side even when she's clearly supposed to be in the wrong. When she said that Dave Karofsky attempting suicide was selfish because she was never driven to the edge, Kurt told her that this was because she had it a lot easier, relatively speaking. While Kurt could have said this without making the ways in which Quinn had it rough sound unimportant, he was saying it in response to Quinn completely failing to consider how no one can be in exactly the same position as someone else, not in response to Quinn merely expressing discontent over what she's been through. Will later reveals that he tried to take his own life after cheating on a math midterm, something that many people might not see as a big deal, to remind the kids that it's easy to forget what's ahead of them when they feel like their lives have sunk so low, so this little quarrel was just setting Quinn up for a lesson anyway.
  • Sue is constantly given a pass for all of the horrible things that she does, including abusing teenagers, because she has funny one-liners and has some moments of being nice. The same people that treat Will as The Scrappy seem to think that Sue can do no wrong.
• Ensemble Dark Horse: Several characters only meant to serve a small roll in the early seasons made such an impact as dark horses that they become full-on Ascended Extras.
  • Brittany, who wasn't in the pilot, didn't speak until episode 4, gets a handful of lines in every episode, and still manages to be one of the most popular characters on the show with her charming minimalistic humor. She's one of the two best dancers, in the second season turned out to be a pretty good singer too. Heather Morris was only hired to choreograph the [[Music/{{Beyoncé}} "Single Ladies"]] dance from the episode "Preggers". When Murphy needed a third actor to play the third member of the "Unholy Trinity" alongside Naya Rivera and Dianna Agron, she was hired. The last ingredient needed to bump her into a main character was the innocuous line in "Sectionals" about her and Santa sleeping together, and once that landed the Brittana fandom exploded.
  • Santana Lopez. She started off as a generic Alpha Bitch. Then there was the moment mentioned above with Brittany, which skyrocketed her popularity. This led to her singing "The Boy Is Mine". People embraced her bitchiness as comedy and fell in love with her voice. All that helped push her into a main character alongside Brittany.
  • It may be hard to believe, but Blaine was also only meant to be a minor character until his good looks, excellent voice, and chemistry with Kurt won a lot of people over and pushed him into being one of the show's main characters.
  • Mike Chang was a popular character before he got lines (which, for the record, was first in episode seven) in part because he was slightly more defined than fellow footballer Matt but also had few enough character aspects (Asian, pop-and-lock, abs) to catch people's attention. His dance moves and burgeoning relationship with Tina kept people coming back, and he's also one of the few characters who never had a base breaking moment in the show.
  • Dave Karofsky, was really only a character in the second season and a few spots before a nd after, but thanks in no small part to Adler's talent his character's Armored Closet Gay storyline made him popular enough to become a rival to Blaine when it came to the fandom's shipping war over Kurt.
  • Holly Holiday, played by Gwyneth Paltrow, going from a celebrity guest spot to a recurring character and Love Interest for Will. She's the most frequently recurring celebrity guest, due to the character's popularity with viewers and the fact that her nature (a substitute teacher who can't stay in one place for long) is easy to work around Paltrow's schedule.
  • Jeff and Nick, two background Warblers who have only had one line between them, have been swooped upon by the shippers, pairing them with Kurt, Blaine or each other.
  • Trent, another background Warbler, got many fans due to his Large Ham nature in one episode of the second season, and later on his Token Good Teammate factor during the Warbler's period as villains.
  • Becky, due to being a mini-Sue who was also more symapthetic.
  • Sugar, especially after she stopped faking Asperger's and became a more fully-fledged Cloud Cuckoo Lander. Ironic because she was apparently intended to be The Scrappy.
• Fandom Heresy:
  • During the height of the show's popularity, there weren't many places where it was safe to admit that you don't like Lea's singing voice. These days, especially after finding out about the Hostility Onthe Set, it's easier to get away with.
  • Chris and Darren also tend to be sacred cows.
  • You can say that you don't like Finn or Santana, but do not bash Cory Monteith or Naya Rivera as both died young.
• Fan Nickname:
  • Finn is nicknamed "Frankenteen" due to his height, inability to cheer and sometimes-stiff dancing.
  • Many people refer to Tina and Mike as 'Asian and Other Asian'. It actually originated in-show, when Sue called them that, and not long later, even Tina, having drawn his name for a duet, said: 'Other Asian'.
  • Klaine have sex is referred to as 'Klex'.
  • People who don't like Blaine call him 'Bland' or 'Plain Blanderson'. And Klaine is renamed 'Kland'.
  • Blaine is 'Hobbit' in many fanfics, especially the Kurtofsky ones.
  • Fandom tends to call Kurt 'Dolphin', due to Brittany's "dolphins are just gay sharks" line, or 'baby penguin' due to Blaine's comparing Kurt to one in season 2.
  • Dave is referred to as 'Yogi Bear' or 'bear cub' from the Scandals scene in “The First Time”.
  • While not a nickname, there are quite a few people in the fandom who love Quinn's first name Lucy and refer to her as such in fanfiction.
  • Joe is 'Teen Jesus'.
  • The short dance Brittany and Santana share during The Troubletones performance of "Survivor/I Will Survive" has been dubbed the "Brittango".
• Fanon:
  • The one common line of belief among fans from start to finish was that the bulk of the characters grew up with each other and were friends since childhood.
  • Sugar Motta is Brittany and Santana's daughter from the future. Eventually, Vanessa Lengies, Naya Rivera and Heather Morris themselves found out about it and ran with it, making little nods and such. It got to the point where when Lengies returned for an episode in the final season, she mentioned it to Entertainment Tonight, giving it more exposure. Variants apply to the characters of Rory and Harmony, painting them to be Klaine and Faberry's kids.
  • Kurt's mother is named Elizabeth. This is never confirmed on the show but it's generally agreed on that he changed his middle name to his mother's sometime after her death.
• Fanfic Magnet: The Warblers. There's even an entire LiveJournal community dedicated solely to Dalton fanfic, not surprising because it’s an all-boys school. It probably helps that their personalities are close to non-existent, which is fanfic-writer gold to do whatever you want.
• Fan-Preferred Couple: There were several over the course of the series, but the most popular one was Quinn/Rachel, followed by Rachel/Puck (which was canon for one episode as a joke, but the fans ran with it). Previous ones (before they became Official Couples) include Kurt/Blaine and Brittany/Santana; with the latter, fan demand played a large part in the decision to make them official.
• First Installment Wins: Generally everyone will agree that season 1 is the best (whether or not they mean the season as a whole or just the first 13 episodes is undecided). A more hardcore contingent of fans hold the pilot to be the best episode of the show and discount almost everything after it.
• Franchise Original Sin: Many fans will say that only the first season is good, maybe the second if they're feeling charitable. The third is seen by some as the point where the show went too far, though for many more people, it's either Season 4 or 5. Those first two seasons, however, showed early signs of all the problems that would come to plague the show later in its run.
  • If there's two things in the series that mark discussion of it, it's the idea that a lot of the characters were either started unlikeable or became unlikeable, and the show ended up playing straight most of the very things it was supposed to be criticizing. This was most true in the pilot, which is often described as a borderline Sadist Show where most of the characters are clearly meant to be huge jerks, or at least seriously messed-up. The thing is, that works because it's a Sadist Show, and it's not about rooting for these people but rather exploring why they're the way they are. Meanwhile, the Broken Aesop moments work because they were meant to subvert traditional high-school sitcom structure, and also convey how amoral the situation was. Later on, the show tried to be sincere while still using the same messed-up jerks and hypocritical morals, and ended up ringing hollow. It's one thing when Will Schuester plants drugs on his students and hatches schemes to woo an unstable woman when he's meant to be a miserable person looking to recapture his high-school glory days, and it's another thing when he's meant to be the Cool Teacher and mentor figure who genuinely wants the best for his kids.
  • Emily VanDerWerff, writing for Vox, described the second episode, "Showmance", as "the exact moment Glee got bad", specifically for the plot of Will's wife faking a pregnancy in order to keep Will from leaving her — soapy melodrama for its own sake that did little more than destroy the dramatic stakes of Will's decision in the pilot (him choosing between being a teacher or a higher-paid accountant knowing that a kid was on the way) by establishing that Status Quo Is God. It wasn't too bad in this instance as the the fake pregnancy sub-plot had genuine consequences and ended in the implosion of Will's marriage, but it was the first instance of the show's over-reliance on increasingly ridiculous plot twists, its frequent undermining of the stakes of the characters' decisions, and its poor treatment of its female characters — all complaints that would grow ever more vocal with each passing season.
  • The third episode of the show, "Acafellas", has its share of detractors for jamming several unrelated, distracting, and immediately-forgotten story lines together — something that was easier to let slide at the time of its release due to how early on in the show this episode was and the fact that the general Myth Arc of the show beyond its driving premise hadn't yet been fully established. But an increasing number of new and abandoned storylines would, in time, become a chronic issue for the show and a primary cause for criticism.
  • Later seasons of the show were criticized for seeming like they were written around the music first and the plot and characters second, as though the writers were less interested in crafting a compelling story than they were in selling records, iTunes singles, concert tickets, and merch. As noted by Joshua Alston for The AV Club, this problem first came up with a pair of back-to-back season one episodes, "Ballad" and "Hairography", which contained the first musical performances that didn't really do anything to move the story forward. This wasn't quite as big of an issue when the episodes in question were first broadcast since they were still balanced out by a relatively sufficient number of episodes and song performances that did advance the story. Unfortunately, as the soundtrack turned Glee into a Cash-Cow Franchise, performances like this grew increasingly common until they far outnumbered the songs that served more than the most superficial of narrative importance.
  • "The Power of Madonna", another Season 1 episode, was the very first tribute episode to a specific artist. In this case, a replication of Madonna's "Vogue" music video, which quickly went viral, and the episode itself garnered high acclaim. In the following seasons, Glee would produce more and more tribute episodes to dwindling success until it reach the point that they would be sharply criticized for them.
  • The first-season episode "Theatricality" still remains one of the most contentious episodes in the series. While it was not the first Gay Aesop of the series, it was the first that had viewers questioning if it was actually effective. Because the episode got the writers praise from critics, this would become a reoccurring trend that would plague the series.
  • Shark Jumping cites the season two episode "Comeback" as the point where the show finally went too far, despite it being a decent episode that happened before serious Seasonal Rot set in, mainly due to it serving as a snapshot of everything that later seasons would be criticized for: clueless attempts at handling serious issues (in this case suicide), another tribute episode (in this case to Justin Bieber), characterization going all over the place, and an utterly anodyne cover designed to cash in on a hit pop song (in this case "Sing" by My Chemical Romance).
• Genius Bonus: Though it's more like Movie Trivia Awareness Bonus, Will dreams he is performing the "Make 'Em Laugh" number from Singin' In The Rain while sick and feverish; Gene Kelly performed the film's title number with an incredibly high fever.
• Glurge: The show deals with a wide variety of serious issues, especially regarding bullying, homosexuality, sex, body image and other such topics, but the main cast's many, many Jerkass moments usually results in a lot of problematic moments and the characters themselves coming across as Unintentionally Unsympathetic (i.e., Kurt telling Blaine that he admires how proud he is of who he is and does not like that he's tiptoeing back into the closet immediately after Blaine suggests he's bi).
• Gotta Ship 'Em All: Discussed to the point that the characters inadvertently give everyone more ships. Most likely a case of Ascended Fanon because Ryan Murphy lurks around the Internet. Not to mention all the Crack pairings that end up canon.
• Growing the Beard: Season 6 is generally considered an improvement over Season 5 for focusing primarily on the Glee club while still using the older characters. It didn't save the show as Fox had already decided to cancel it before it aired putting it in the Friday Night Death Slot, but at least was able to give fans the send-off they were looking for.
• Harsher in Hindsight:
  • Kurt says that being called "lady" is bullying. That makes this screencap from Entertainment Tonight especially cringe-worthy.
  • In his fake apology to the Glee club in "Born This Way" Dave Karofsky says that he had 'read stories about kids who were bullied so much they hung themselves'. That speech takes on a whole new light after the events of On My Way.
  • Kurt and Blaine's first duet as a couple becomes this after the events of The Breakup. The "I couldn't see when it was you and me," "looks like a solo tonight, but I think I'll be alright," "erase the memory of your face," "One day you will wake up with nothing but your sorries" — all of it! Listening to it again just makes you cringe, especially if you shipped them together.
  • The revelation that Finn's father actually died from a drug overdose is much harsher considering Cory Monteith's own past with addiction and unexpected death from a fatal combination of heroin and alcohol. In fact, a lot of viewers said in hindsight that they didn't like the change of the father's backstory.
  • Likewise, the season four episode wherein Finn is partying so hard he almost blows off school. This episode aired shortly before Cory Monteith entered rehab for the last time, and watching some episodes where Finn looks especially rough can be quite heartbreaking.
  • Just before the final song in "Dynamic Duets", Finn declares that the year will go down as the greatest year in New Directions history. The year went on to include Marley developing an eating disorder, the club nearly getting disqualified in Sectionals, Finn's own death, a loss at Nationals, and the club being disbanded.
  • "Goodbye": Will sings "In my heart you'll be... forever young." The camera stops on Finn. There are moments like this throughout the early episodes of the series, but this moment is particularly prophetic.
  • After Finn fails to insult Santana back when she confronts him and Rory, Santana mocks him and points out that she cannot be swayed by dressing-downs because "I was raised on insults". In a somewhat Fridge Brilliance fashion, this would later be followed by the Santana Outing situation.
  • Marley and Ryder's romance is this as Melissa Benoist and Blake Jenner later married then divorced. And in 2019 Benoist posted a video revealing that she suffered domestic abuse in the past from an ex that, while she did not mention any names, fans speculated the time frame coinciding with when she was with Jenner. Jenner confirmed it in 2020 though he also claims that the relationship was mutually abusive.
  • In Season 2's first episode, Sunshine Corazon says she would have stayed, except "Rachel would have made my life a living hell." Watching this in 2020, it's harsher when we see that Lea Michele has issued an apology for doing just that to some of her co-stars, including Samantha Ware.
  • Following on from the above, in "The End of Twerk", Sue, Bree and others attack Unique for going into the girl's bathrooms. As of 2020, Lea Michele has been accused of behaving like that to a transgender (female) model, Plastic Martyr.
  • In the Finn/Cory tribute episode of season 5, Santana performs the song "If I Die Young" by Band Perry. The lyrics in the song take on a haunting feel in light of the news of Naya Rivera's death by drowning. To make matters worse, due to the several days it took to find her body, she was officially confirmed dead on the seventh anniversary of Cory Monteith's death.
  • In "The Spanish Teacher", Puck (played by Mark Salling) says that he expects that in ten years he'll be "dead, or in jail, or both." Less than a decade later, Salling was dead — having hung himself after being convicted of possession of child pornography and domestic abuse.
  • On a related note, many of Puck's plots became harsher after Salling's actions — coercing Quinn into sex by getting her drunk and lying about wearing a condom (AKA raping her) in season 1, his "relationship" with (AKA being groomed by) his teacher Shelby in Season 3, and his brief relationship with Kitty (who is a sophomore while he's six months post-graduation) in season 4 are the highlights; however, the character's generally sex-focused characterization has made it difficult not to think of the actor's charges when watching any of his scenes.
  • In "Pilot", Finn was blackmailed into joining ND when Will claimed he had found marijuana in his locker. That's so funny!...until we find out that Finn's actor, Cory Monteith, dropped out of high school due to serious drug addiction problems. It became even less funny come July 13th 2013.
  • Jesse's joke after if someone died during a Vocal Adrenaline performance being used as a prop becomes a lot less funny when Marley passes out at Sectionals in Season 4.
  • Rachel's horrific behavior towards Sunshine Corazon, which included sending her off to a crack house because she was threatened by her talent, was Played for Laughs in a Black Comedy/Crosses the Line Twice sort of way. However, in May 2020, Lea Michele received swift backlash from multiple former Glee co-stars alleged numerous claims of her behaving in a racist manner shortly after Michele posted a message on social media condemning the murder of George Floyd, among them being a rumor that Jake Zyrus, who played Sunshine Corazon, had had his role on the show curtailed because his talent posed a "threat" to Michele.
• Hilarious in Hindsight:
  • Emma in episode 3:
    "They say it takes certainty more than talent to make a star. I mean, look at John Stamos."
  • Karofsky in "Britney/Brittany", which is even more hilarious after he and Santana becomes each other's beards:
    "How come all the gay guys get the hot chicks?"
  • Santana's snarking on Kurt in episode 5:
    Kurt: "Can we discuss the elephant in the room?"
    Santana: "Your sexuality?"
  • Puck's line to Quinn in Season 1.
    I don't dig fat chicks.
  • In Mattress, Dave Karofsky is defacing a yearbook picture of the Glee club. If the picture's turned upside down, it looks like he's drawn a heart over Kurt's picture (it seems he was going for breasts). Yeah, it's most likely a teenage boy who has no drawing talent, but considering what we eventually find out...
  • Santana and Brittany making jokes about making out with each other in the first season becomes this when their relationship turns out to be legitimate in later seasons.
  • In the middle of Season 3, Puck mentions that global warming means his pool-cleaning business is in demand well into winter. This was meant to be a throwaway joke, but the winter of 2011-12 turned out to be unusually mild for much of the US, with summer-like weather in March (unusual in the Upper Midwest). This could also be a reference to the show's practice of California Doubling, so the weather in it is often unseasonably warm for northern Ohio.
  • When having one of his many snarky exchanges with Sebastian, Kurt says that he doesn't like his obnoxious CW hair. A hilarious line by itself but what really hammers it home is that Grant Gustin (Sebastian's actor) would end up being cast as Barry Allen on the CW. And before that, he had a recurring role on Beverly Hills, 90210.
    • Similarly, Grant Gustin singing (in "I'm Glad You Came") about "the sky fell on me," is pretty funny given that he later plays someone struck by lightning, and as for the line about "my universe will never be the same," given how his character is always being blamed for changing the timeline...
  • In "Laryngitis", Burt says that the Cincinnati Reds are barely major league. The Reds proved him wrong by winning their division and making the playoffs the same year.
  • Since “Dynamic Duets“, Marley has graduated from Woman Fierce to Supergirl.
  • The references to Jeb Bush being president in 2020 become this when by the end of 2015 (the same year the Grand Finale aired), Jeb had become a serious laughing stock of the race, his campaign crashing and burning by February 2016 partly thanks to the unprecedented firestorm that was the campaign of Donald Trump.
  • Quinn saying she could easily get all the parts where the girl cries. First, some Fridge Brilliance when you realize that Dianna Agron is famous in Hollywood, and actually praised by the Glee directors, for being able to cry on command. Second, nearly all of Agron's mainstream roles after this line involved the girl crying (The Family, I'm Not The Only One, McQueen, etc.) — all in the exact same position and, to an extent, situation.
  • All of the characters being repeatedly told that they wouldn't make it in theater. A short round up of what some of the main cast did post-Glee: Matthew Morrison (Will): lead in the musical version of Finding Neverland; Darren Criss (Blaine): lead in Hedwig and the Angry Inch; Dianna Agron (Quinn): lead in McQueen: or Lee and Beauty; Jonathan Groff (Jesse): large part in Hamilton; Amber Riley (Mercedes): lead in Dreamgirls (which is itself an example, given Mercedes' frequent performances as Effie).
  • Many of Artie's more Ho Yay-laden moments became this after Kevin McHale came out as gay in 2018. One of the most egregious ones comes from "Sexy", when Sam, after Brittany and Santana sing "Landslide", makes an off-hand comments about wishing he and Artie could be as close as the two girls are, not knowing the true nature of their relationship.
  • In 2019, Damian McGinty and Heather Morris starred together as love interests in the Santa Fe-set movie Santa Fake, which is hilarious both in terms of his first appearance (where Rory tries to win Brittany's affections) and the following Christmas episode (in which Brittany's family is said to be going to Santa Fe for vacation).
  • At the end of the first episode of the final season, Rachel sings "Let it Go" from Frozen. Flash forward to March 2019 and Disney acquiring 20th Century Fox, giving them the rights to Glee.
  • Along with a little Heartwarming in Hindsight ...In the Distant Epilogue where we find out what's happening with the gang five years later on, 2020 sees Rachel expecting a child as a surrogate for Kurt and Blaine. Cue 2020 and Lea Michele 's pregnancy announcement.
    • Myron was originally in the finale performance but was later removed when the producers didn't feel like the character would believe look the same after 5 years. A few years after the show ended, Josie Totah came out as transgender meaning Myron would look very different in 5 years.
  • During her guest appearance as a Nationals judge, Lindsay Lohan says she liked New Directions because everyone loves a comeback. When she finally did make her comeback with the movie Falling for Christmas, a member of New Directions was her co-star, specifically Chord Overstreet.
• Hollywood Homely: Suzie Pepper (played by the definitely-not-ugly Sarah Drew) saying that she and Rachel are "Mildly Attractive".
• Hollywood Pudgy:
  • Karofsky's a big guy and has a naturally stockier build, and he's most likely at an appropriate weight for that body type. His body type also fits his football position. This hasn't stopped people in-show and out from criticizing his body, not that it would be ok to do if he was actually fat. Of course, the characters have a little bit more of an excuse due to them doing so in a form of self-defense against his often-times physical terrorizing. He refers to himself as a "bear cub" in "The First Time", and says it's working for him.

I-Z

• Idiosyncratic Ship Naming: Fans of the pairing Quinn and Artie often refer to them as "Wheels + Preggers" due to episodes based around their conditions being named that, though to be fair they are also referred to as Quartie and Quarter.
• I Knew It!:
  • Everyone clocked Shelby Corcoran as Rachel's mother when she showed up due to Lea Michele and Idina Menzel's uncanny resemblance. Despite statements to the contrary, the theory was soon proven true.
  • The minute Sam appeared in season two and sang "Billionaire", a lot of people guessed that at some point it would be revealed that he was poor and/or homeless. Sure enough, he was confirmed to be both near the end of that season in "Rumours" and became a recurring element of his character.
• Improved Second Attempt: One common criticism of season four was that many of the new members of New Directions were too similar to the original cast. At the end of season five, most of the new additions were written off and a new slate of members joined in season six. These new members were received better by the fandom for having unique personalities and not being obviously based off of the original cast.
• Incest Yay Shipping:
  • Firstly there's Hummelcest between Burt and Kurt Hummel, a rare example of a father/son incest. Considering that they cannot have a scene without declaring their love for each other, it shouldn't be a surprise.
  • Then they introduced Cooper, Blaine's brother who's even more handsome than he is, and we got Andercest. Not at all helped (or immensely helped, for those who like this sort of thing) by the line "We're not just brothers, right?" said while standing with their faces mere inches apart. Oh, Glee. One might almost suspect you do this on purpose.
  • Mason and Madison had this built in with their introduction, since the Cheerios even mockingly call them the "creepy incest twins". They're not, though they did drop a lot of subtext that they're oblivious to. McCarthycest was one of the first new pairings spinning out of the season 6 premiere.
• Informed Wrongness:
  • Mike Chang Sr. is treated as unreasonable for not wanting his son to enter a field where very few people succeed.
  • Brittany breaks up with Artie because he called her 'stupid,' and he is portrayed as being in the wrong. Which would have been understandable — except that the reason he called her stupid in the first place was because he was naturally hurt and upset that she had been cheating on him for months with Santana, who had convinced her it wasn't cheating "if the plumbing is different". Neither Brittany nor Santana are ever treated as wrong for this.
  • Kurt was pissy at Rachel and Blaine for dating, going as far as to claim that bisexuality is just a coping mechanism for closet cases. When the two decide to just be friends, it proves Kurt right and makes Rachel and Blaine out to be fools.
  • Mercedes tells Puck that Quinn chose Finn to be her baby's father and Puck has to respect that... except Finn doesn't know that he isn't the father, and no matter who a mother chooses to be her partner, the guy whose sperm actually made her pregnant most definitely has the rights to the child.
  • Will gets mad at Marley and calls her "selfish" for refusing to wear a bikini she is uncomfortable with, during a performance that will take place in front of the entire school.
• It's Not Supposed to Win Oscars: Some fans fall back on this when encountering any criticism of the show's unlikely plot points or character interactions. "It's supposed to be unrealistic and silly. It's a parody of musicals!" TIME reviewer James Poniewozik explicitly rejected this in one review, not because he dislikes the show, but because he thought so highly of the first season that he expects greatness from the rest of it: if a show is trying for genuinely emotional moments or Aesops and fail to deliver them effectively, a Parody Retcon is an insult to both the viewers and the creators.
• Jerkass Woobie:
  • As horrible as Terri is through the first half of the first season, as she grows more desperate to hang onto Will, you can't help but feel sorry for her.
  • Sue definitely counts after "Grilled Cheesus" and "Funeral".
  • Santana in "Sexy", where her ice queen facade is chipped away. The episode "Mash Off" makes Santana an even bigger woobie, Finn told her to come out in the middle of the hallway, it's overheard by a congressional candidate's niece, and Santana is outed on TV in a political smear ad against Sue. Santana's in tears by the end of the ad. Then the episode "I Kissed The Girl" shows her being disowned by her grandmother for coming out. If that doesn't make you want to hug her, nothing else will.
• Karmic Overkill: In "Theatricality", Finn refers to Kurt's decor as "faggy", and gets thrown out of his home by Kurt's father Burt. Viewers generally agreed that Finn's use of the word was out of line, but many nevertheless believed that what Burt did in response went too far, especially as it happened after Kurt engaged in some very creepy behavior towards Finn (namely, attempting to hit on Finn even after Finn made it clear he wasn't interested and trying to set their respective parents up because he believed it would give him more opportunity to seduce Finn). While it certainly didn't justify his use of a homophobic slur, it did make his outburst more understandable overall, and getting kicked out for it definitely seemed overly harsh. Tellingly, later episodes have Burt admit he overreacted and Kurt realize that what he did was seriously inappropriate.
• LGBT Fanbase: The creator's gay, twenty members of the main cast are gay, most of the characters and storylines are. Everybody is fully aware of their fans.
• Launcher of a Thousand Ships: Puck, Rachel, Kurt, Finn, Santana, Jesse, Dave. Name a character, really.
• Love to Hate: Sebastian's smarmy attitude and clear intent towards seducing Blaine away from Kurt made him popular with many viewers in spite of Klaine being the biggest ship at the time. Naturally this only counts prior to his Heel-Face Turn.
• Memetic Badass: Sue Sylvester was the original one, but Pavarotti, the Warblers mascot, and especially Lord Tubbington, Brittany's cat, have provided plenty of competition.
• Memetic Mutation:
  • "Do you think this is hard? Try doing memes. THAT'S hard!" (And that's how Sue See’s it!) ^explanationSue Sylvester lives in the realm of Refuge in Audacity, and signs off her television show with the latter phrase.
  • From the top! ^explanationWill Schuester's favorite phrase.
  • Eyes on your own paper. ^explanationWill Schuester's other favorite phrase.
  • "Sex is not dating." "If it were, Santana and I would be dating." ^explanationBrittany Pierce taking Dumb Blonde and Fountain of Memes to a whole new level.
  • The University of Los Angeles. That's in Los Angeles. ^explanationJesse St. James is informing everyone where he intends upon attending college.
  • Think of the mailman! ^explanationHow Finn attempts to stave off premature ejaculation.
  • That fucking COCKBLOCKING PIANO!^explanationWhen Kurt and Blaine kiss in "Original Song," it lasts for a very passionate ten seconds. After they stop to breathe, they practically jump each other for a second kiss — and the scene cuts almost immediately to a keyboard being played as a segue into Mercedes' song "Hell to the No".
  • Suddenly... Karofsky! ^explanationA parody of the Little Shop of Horrors song "Suddenly Seymour", mocking Karofsky's coming out.
  • "Why is the T-Rex eating the Jew?" ^explanationIn universe internet reaction to Finn and Rachel's kiss at Nationals.
  • NO ME GUSTA ^explanationA Spanish sentence Santana shouted a lot, it means 'I don't like it'.
  • Santana reacts ^explanationDue to her original background status, the most notable part of actress Naya Rivera's performance was the epic facial expressions. Even after her promotion they endured, and images/gifs of her are used as a reaction to nearly everything on the Internet. Quinn's faces come a close second.
  • "You're all minorities. You're in the Glee club." ^explanationOne of Will's more infamous lines; it gained a lot of traction after this tumblr post spread around how absurd and tone-deaf it sounds in hindsight for a straight white man to say something like this.
  • "I am going to create an environment that is so toxic"^explanationA screencap of Sue from the episode "Throwdown" that started as a reaction image, but is quite often altered with bits of text blacked out or altered to say something completely different
  • "Pleak" ^explanationRachel's Inelegant Blubbering from "Choke", where she chokes on her NYADA audition and begs for another chance, her "please" getting warped into "pleak".
• Misblamed: Ryan Murphy is often the first person to get any flack for anything disliked on the show. Never mind that he not only doesn't write every episode but there are two other creators who are involved. Although, to be fair, he tends to be the one most likely to play Lying Creator.
• Moe: Kurt. His enormous Puppy-Dog Eyes don't hurt.
• Moral Event Horizon: The guys at Karofsky's new school flew over this when they outed him as gay, drove him to attempt suicide, and mocked him on social media...even after his suicide attempt.
• Narm: Darren Criss isn't a bad actor, but he has a tendency to make the most ridiculous faces when he's singing as Blaine that can really ruin the mood of the song. The most jarring would have to be "Cough Syrup" which is a dramatic moment as it switches from Blaine singing to Karofsky preparing to take his own life, but it gets ruined by Blaine making faces like this◊.
• Narm Charm:
  • The unabashedly cheery second season Christmas Episode, aside from the Rachel/Finn subplot, should have by all means been a non-stop Glurge fest, and yet it was one of the sweetest episodes of the series, especially when Artie stood up.
  • A lot of the things Finn says or does can be this as well. Him singing "I'll Stand By You" to a sonogram would have been hilarious if done by anyone else, but Finn manages to get away with it somehow. Especially since his mother catches him doing it, forcing him to tell her about the baby.
• Never Live It Down:
  • Will probably isn't going to be forgotten for blackmailing a student into joining the club by planting drugs in his locker. Nor is he going to be forgiven for not punishing Rachel for sending Sunshine to a crack house, suspending Marley for refusing to wear a sea-shell bikini when she was battling an eating disorder, his frequently obvious bias for Rachel and Finn, treating any action the club takes without him as a personal betrayal, his frequent rap songs and inappropriate dances with his underage students, or defending twerking to the point where Sue promises to fund a transgender-friendly bathroom for Unique on the one condition that Will stop twerking and he flatly refuses it.
  • Fandom will probably never forgive Finn for inadvertently causing Santana to be outed not only to the entire school, but the entire town. It just goes to show how selective fandom's memory can be, since Finn only snapped back after being bullied by Santana all day and had no idea that he was being filmed by someone who was out to get Sue Sylvester.
• No Yay:
  • How some viewers reacted to the Will/Sue relationship in "Funk."
  • And Karofsky kissing Kurt in "Never Been Kissed", for some people.
    • Will kissing Coach Beiste in the same episode. Namely because Will's actions seemed predatory rather than endearing.
  • Also how many viewers reacted to Will and Terri hooking up in "The Substitute."
  • Finchel is quickly becoming this due to Seasonal Rot.
  • Season 4 gave us Sam/Brittany. Brittana fans immediately called for Chord Overstreet's head.
  • In the final season there was Blaine/Karofsky. The second it was announced they would be canon in the wake of Kurt and Blaine's second breakup, Klaine shippers were PISSED.
  • Much of Puck's ships have become this, due to his actor's horrid deeds. Quick is especially getting hit with this (with their already messy relationship in general being taken more seriously).
  • While Marley and Ryder never really dated, the number of people who shipped them went down severely and the actors' divorce amid accusations of Blake Jenner abusing Melissa Benoist.
• Offending the Creator's Own:
  • Former Saturday Night Live cast member and fundamentalist Victoria Jackson accused the show of being "anti-Christian." Ryan Murphy is a Catholic.
  • Ryan Murphy and several of the show's other writers are openly gay, and the cast has a lot of canonically gay characters, but due to a mix of issues such as Sandy Ryerson being a pedophile and all other manner of unfunny gay stereotypes, Kurt and Blaine often acting very stereotypical and cruel, and their and Santana's hostility towards bisexuals, as well as Ryan Murphy's own questionable statements on the matter, the show also has a sizeable hatedom among gay viewers.
• One-Scene Wonder:
  • Many fans were already clamouring for the return of Bryan Ryan after his debut. A one-episode character played by Neil Patrick Harris. Does this really surprise anyone? Neil Patrick Harris + Joss Whedon = Pure Awesome in its most concentrated form.
  • More like a One Episode Wonder, but The Papas Berry, as played by Jeff Goldblum and Brian Stokes Mitchell. Pure gold from start to finish and by God they cast those roles well!
• Pandering to the Base: Became really notable when Glee got picked up for additional seasons after the first 13 episodes. Suddenly, characters like Kurt and Santana became part of the Spotlight-Stealing Squad, shipping got pushed to the forefront, and the show started making more and more tribute issues. This tends to be a major point on contention amongst the fanbase.
• Pop-Cultural Osmosis:
  • Even those people who actively avoided the show had still at least heard of it and knew of its Bootstrapped Theme, as well as why Cory Monteith's death was notable.
  • Apparently. One review of a compilation CD includes that "the inclusion of Don't stop believin' (Journey) [was a] surprise", as the person "knew that their [Journey's] music didn't do much business in the UK" and were "pleased to find that they have become more popular in the intervening years, albeit mainly due to this song being featured on X-factor." Yes ... The X Factor. That's why this song hit a million sales in 2010. Note: the review was written in October 2014.
• Portmanteau Couple Name:
  • Wemma or Wilma (Will/Emma)
  • Finchel (Finn/Rachel)
  • Quick (Quinn/Puck)
    • Or you can use Quinn's surname Fabray to get the same result as Finn/Puck. Or both portmanteaux to spell out the cause of Beth.
  • Puchel/Puckleberry (Puck/Rachel)
  • Faberry/Quinchel (Quinn/Rachel)
  • Fuinn (Finn/Quinn) because 'Finn' and 'Quinn' didn't really do the job.
  • Winn (Will/Finn)
  • Take a wild guess what Finn/Puck is. Hint: it ain't "Pinn."
  • Puckurt/Purt/Pummel (Puck/Kurt)
  • Furt (Finn/Kurt)
    • Kinn is also becoming popular among Finn/Kurt fans for reasons that become quite obvious once one tries to say "Furt" out loud. Not to mention the fact that they are step-brothers—you know, kin? It's also used over "Hudmel", since that term usually refers to them as platonic siblings or their blended family as a whole.
  • Bike (Brittany/Mike)
  • Mark Salling requested that fans make Puck/Artie videos because "Puck + Artie = Party!" My God... He's one of them!
  • Brittana (Brittany/Santana), or "Santittany," according to Naya Rivera.
  • Puckleberry Quinn (Puck/Rachel/Quinn)
  • Tartie or Artina (Tina/Artie)
    • Meanwhile, shippers for the actors who play them dub them "McHalowitz".
  • Quartie or Quarter (Quinn/Artie)
  • Changel or Kurke (Mike Chang/Kurt Hummel)
  • St. Berry (Rachel/Jesse)
  • St. Fabray (Quinn/Jesse)
  • There already exists Hevans, Skurt, or Kum for Sam/Kurt fans.
  • Shell (Shelby/Will)
  • Chachang (Tina/Mike), also called Changsquared, Changcest, or Tike. Chitty Chitty Chang Chang was used on the actual show in "Prom Queen".
  • Sack or Suck (Sam/Puck)
  • Sinn (Sam/Quinn) as of "Duets". Most fans use Fabrevans or Quam.
    • Sinn was also used for Finn/Sam for a while, but those fans have begun to use Hudevans due to the Tumblr tag being filled with "The Vampire Diaries, watches, and pornstars.
  • Artittany (Artie/Brittany). More commonly, Bartie - and the less-flattering "Barfie" from the Brittana shippers.
  • Klaine is used for Kurt/Blaine. Though Blurt is also a used alternative.
  • Due to the events of "Never Been Kissed", "Karommel" has been offered for Karofsky/Kurt...although "Kurtofsky" is more popular.
  • Blam/Slaine (Blaine/Sam)
    • Kublam for Kurt/Sam/Blaine threesome.
  • Save for Sam/Karofsky and Blainofsky for Blaine/Karofsky have both taken off.
  • Mersamchel for the Mercedes/Sam/Rachel friendship in "Prom Queen", which was used in the Glee-Wind for that episode.
  • Lauren/Puck reference on the show is "Pizes". Fans call them "Luck".
  • Samcedes (Sam/Mercedes) which is now canon.
  • Rory and Karofsky had one long before Rory appeared on the show. So long before that they didn't know what Damian's character's name would be. The shippers went with Irishofsky.
  • Seblaine or the lesser used Blastian or Andersmythe for Sebastian/Blaine.
  • Huntbastian is Hunter/Sebastian. The fandom seems to have willingly taken his claim of being "not even remotely bi-curious" in the opposite direction to that intended.
  • Kurtbastian or Sebkurt for Sebastian/Kurt.
  • Rory/Sugar is Sugory or, occasionally, Sweet Potatoes.
  • After their performance of 'Smooth Criminal', some fans have taken to calling the coupling of Sebastian and Santana 'Sebtana'. It is an interesting pairing, considering that both characters are gay, and as Sebastian's actor Grant Gustin noted, Santana's coming out storyline has been a pretty important one for her. This, combined with Sebastian's haughty air and confidence, makes it seem terribly unlikely that the couple will ever come to fruition.
  • Rorbastian is Rory/Sebastian.
  • Rormony is Rory/Harmony.
  • Brody/Rachel, or Brochel, Westberry, West Side Berry or Westonberry has become popular.
  • Samchel (Sam/Rachel).
  • Bram (Brittany/Sam).
  • Fierce or Quitt (Quinn and Brittany).
  • Wildebrams (Kitty and Artie).
  • Wildeberry (Kitty and Rachel).
• Preemptive Shipping: As soon as fans got word that a new male character named Sam would be appearing in season 2, fans immediately starting wishing he'd be Camp Gay Kurt's boyfriend, and started shipping them as a result. Sam turned out to be straight, but at least Kurt got a boyfriend in the same season.
• Questionable Casting: Kevin McHale is one of the best dancers on the cast (having formerly been a member of a Boy Band), but it's his character who's in a wheelchair. It made for pretty interesting storylines/musical numbers in which he daydreams about being able to get up and dance, such as in "Dream On" and "Michael"; this, however, has been met with criticism from disabled viewers, since portraying a wheelchair user as constantly wishing to leave their wheelchair is stereotypical and doesn't represent the real life experience of wheelchair users, with an issue that has only been become more visibilized in recent years being that of disabled people rarely being cast for roles, even disabled characters.
• Recurring Fanon Character: Jack Harmon is an Unsympathetic Comedy Protagonist OC popular in the fandom who originated from The Harmon Verse, a series of fan works centered on the character. The Fan Verse includes over 40 stories by various authors.
• Replacement Scrappy: The newbies introduced in season 4 started off as this, as they were carbon copies as most of the originals. Fans were quick to notice the similarities between them and characters that already existed. Marley was a lot like Rachel (and was practically only known as "The New Rachel" early in season 4), Jake is the Troubled, but Cute badboy who along with sharing many personality traits with Puck is also revealed to be his half-brother, Unique is jokingly referred to by fans as what the child of Kurt and Mercedes would be like for good reason, Ryder is like Finn given that he's the sometimes ditzy football player who has a passion for singing, and Kitty is the bitchy cheerleader like Quinn who overtime comes to slowly become a better character. Bree, introduced in season 5, seems to be an almost Lampshaded example as she is called In-Universe "the new Santana Lopez". They have gotten development over time and have their own fans, but still many people consider them copies.
• Rescued from the Scrappy Heap: Kitty was a scrappy for a load of fans who were mad at her because she was the one who manipulated Marley into having an eating disorder. However, her apologizing to Marley and her relationship with Artie has won her some fans.
• Retroactive Recognition:
  • In the first two Warbler performances, fans of Power Rangers Samurai might spot Steven Skyler singing next to Blaine.
  • Remember that time Finn Hudson got eaten by a Wendigo?
  • Sebastian Smythe is now Central City's guardian angel.
  • Marley Rose is now the Girl of Steel.
  • Alistair, Spencer's boyfriend from back half of the final season, is Billie Eilish's brother and production partner Finneas O'Connell.
  • Fans of Tin Can Bros and Shipwrecked Comedy on Youtube may recognize one of the Warblers as Curt Mega.
• Romantic Plot Tumor:
  • Finn and Rachel's relationship fits in this category for quite a few viewers. A story about a group of quirky, diverse and talented misfits trying to move beyond their small-town life and pursue their dreams via their shared love of music... and at least a third of each episode focuses on Finn and Rachel's on and off again romance. The fact that the actors of Finn and Rachel eventually got into an actual relationship, and the fact that this pairing was supported by prominent columnists in the entertainment industry and the mass media doesn't help things either. Post-graduation, their on-and-off tango had no tension since it was clear they'd be together in the end. However, the untimely death of Cory Monteith pretty much put an end to that.
  • The fourth season love triangle with Marley, Ryder, and Jake takes a good chunk of time out of almost every episode, and feels very uninspired due to the fact that all three characters are copies of original ones: Marley was dubbed "The New Rachel," Jake is Puck's half-brother and has his attitude, and Ryder is yet another football jock who secretly loves to perform. Considering the nature of the show, and the fact that the two boys have much better chemistry with each other than either of them have with her, many fans wished they'd just come out as bi and go at it.
• Ron the Death Eater: To put it as delicately as possible, some sections of fandom seem to be under the impression that certain characters are nothing but vices.
  • Finn gets this treatment frequently, particularly as a result of him publicly accusing Santana of being a coward and telling her that she's only tearing everybody else down because she can't accept herself and her relationship with Brittany. The niece of one of Sue's and Burt's opponents in the special election for congress, Reggie Salazar, overhears this, and he is about to release an ad that will reveal to the entire state of Ohio that Santana is a lesbian. We're meant to see Finn as the one who crossed the line here, as Will, Sue, and Burt are all sympathetic to Santana when they tell her about the commercial, Santana furiously blames Finn for not anticipating that there would be repercussions to telling her in a crowded hallway to just come out of the closet ("Everyone's gonna know now, because of you!" "Not just the school, you idiot. Everyone!"), and she ends the episode by slapping him in the face. However, many fans take this a step further and make it seem like Finn was the one who outed Santana, ignoring that Santana was already Forced Out of the Closet, when the school paper talked of a prom queen candidate "spending a lot of time in the closet" after Brittany casually confirmed a rumor about Santana "playing for the other team".^*Brittany claimed she was referring to the fact that Santana used to be on the Cheerios and now is in New Directions exclusively, and did seem genuinely oblivious to how this would be interpreted, but that doesn't prevent Santana from criticizing her for her bad choice of words. This lends some legitimacy to Finn's claim that the whole school already knew she was gay,^*While some douchebag sophomore does try to seduce Santana to "make her normal" after seeing Salazar's ad, it's clear that he's the type of homophobic guy that doesn't take lesbianism seriously as an actual concept and sees it as little more than a silly fantasy to be "straightened out"; he even tells Santana that she just hasn't found "the right guy" yet. He'd likely dismiss simple gossip (i.e. blind items in a school newspaper) that only vaguely alludes to her purported lesbianism, when compared to a politician addressing her as a lesbian explicitly. Aside from him, students already treated Santana differently enough for her to be "asked to join the golf team" when Brittany outed her on her Internet talk show; thus, Finn still has a valid argument. and he had no way of knowing that the conversation between them would lead to Salazar attacking Sue for choosing a lesbian as her head cheerleader. This exchange between him and Santana in the following episode explains it best:
    Santana: "Do you realize you're basically forcing me out of the flannel closet?"
    Finn: "Salazar's ad's gonna run. That's what's forcing you to deal with this."
  • The worst would have to be Adam, Kurt's boyfriend from season 4 who despite being shown as rather sweet and caring, some Klainers seem to twist him at times into being a huge jerk. The same goes from Anti-Klainers in regards to Blaine as well who although he has made some mistakes, you would think he murdered everyone in Kurt's life from the way they talk about him.
• Salvaged Story: In "Duets" and "The Quarterback", Burt brings up his controversial rant to Finn about his use of a homophobic slur, echoing fan sentiments that, while Finn was in the wrong for saying it, he was under a degree of stress at the time. Burt also admits that he may have overreacted just a little bit. Hearing it from Burt from Finn might have a point and that he may be taking advantage of Sam just as he had a crush on Finn the year before, finally makes Kurt realize that his behavior during that episode wasn't acceptable either; he at least gives enough consideration to Burt's words that he tells Sam he can duet with someone else and that his reasons for releasing Sam from their partnership lie with himself rather than with Sam.
• The Scrappy:
  • Even in Glee's incredibly divided fanbase, where just about everybody is a Base-Breaking Character, you'd still be hard-pressed to find viewers who like Jacob Ben-Israel or Terri's sister Kendra.
  • A lot of fans who didn't watch The Glee Project find some of the characters created for those actors, and their insertion into longer-running storylines focusing on existing characters, rather irritating. Particularly of note is Rory Flanagan, largely due to the fact that he wasn't really developed beyond "the Irish character". There's also Joe, the dreadlocked guy; getting a Raging Stiffie while helping Quinn with her psychical therapy definitely didn't win him any fans.
  • Will Schuester. While plenty of characters have had divisive moments, they're usually cut a little slack because they're going through their own struggles, they're teens and don't fully understand their actions, or it's simply chalked up to Glee's heightened reality. But Will is given no such grace for his actions since he's a grown adult and in a position of power. Whenever someone brings up the more uncomfortable moments of the show, most of them stem from Will.
• Seasonal Rot: One of the big debates among fans is where exactly it sets in, but everyone was in agreement it was there by Season 4. Viewership was approaching Bile Fascination for season 5, and it's widely considered the show's worst. Seasons 4 and 5 have new actors (almost universally considered not as good as the originals), Big-Lipped Alligator Moment songs even by Glee standards, ridiculous plots (Brittany, with her 0.0 GPA, being a math genius and going to MIT), OOC moments for the veteran characters (Santana randomly dumping Brittany because she decided a long distance relationship wouldn't work), Flanderization galore (Tina, Becky, Unique, Blaine) and relies on old plot devices such as a love triangle between the female lead, the good-natured jock and the bad boy (Rachel/Finn/Puck and Marley/Ryder/Jake), Sue's Dragon of an Alpha Bitch Cheerio defecting to the New Directions (Quinn/Santana and Kitty), more weddings (Finn/Rachel and Will/Emma), and more tribute episodes (Britney Spears and Madonna originally; in Season 5 alone, a Beatles two-parter, Lady Gaga vs. Katy Perry and Billy Joel)
• Shipping Bed Death:
  • Rachel and Finn's relationship is seen this way by a lot of people. In the front thirteen of the first season it was obvious that they would get together, so the delay, the subsequent breakup when they did get together and the way the writing was stacked against Jesse and Quinn was especially frustrating, especially after Ryan Murphy promised they'd stay together in Season 2 to move the focus to other couples. The engagement/wedding storyline in Season 3 made this even worse, causing many fans to cheer when they finally broke up in "The Break Up." Which only lasted for so long.
  • Emma and Will were this so very much as well. As with Finchel, the first thirteen episodes of the show clearly hint the two were going to get together. They eventually got together only to break up when the back nine of season 1 happened. Then when it seems like they were going to get together, Emma is dating a dentist. Season 2 treats up to a big Love Dodecahedron with Carl liking Emma, Emma liking Carl and Will, Will liking Emma and Holly Holliday. Emma and Carl married but eventually broke up. By season 3 Will and Emma were randomly dating again at the start of it. They go steady until he proposes to her in "Yes/No". She agrees and all goes well until "The Break Up", where Will is going to Washington and they go through some problems but don't ultimately break up over it. But then "I Do" happens. The day of the wedding and of course, Emma doesn't go through with it. But don't worry, a few episodes later he reveals he's proposed to her. Finally, in "All or Nothing" the two tie the knot but Emma then was written off the show.
• Ship Mates:
  • Several pairs go well together, and Klaine and Brittana go with just about everything.
  • Between Finn, Rachel, Quinn, and Puck, the pairs are either Finchel and Quick or Puckerberry and Fuinn. Or Finn/Puck and Faberry. A similar dynamic emerged with Sam replacing Puck, especially after real-world actions from Mark Salling tarnished the character in some people's eyes.
  • Jake/Marley shippers will often put Ryder with Kitty or Unique.
  • Brittana shippers often put Quinn and Rachel together as well.
  • Klaine shippers who still like the characters of Sebastian and Karofsky will usually pair them togehter. The whole quartet can also be shuffled around easily - you're just as likely to find Seblaine and Kurtofsky, or Kurtbastian and Blainofsky.
  • People who preferred Tina and Mike to be together but didn't hate Artie typically pair him with Kitty.
• Ships That Pass in the Night:
  • Rory has never interacted with Harmony or Sebastian, and the only time he was close to either would have been a brief moment during competitions. However both the Rormony and Rorbastian ships are strong. At least Rormany is justified, since it's basically a carry-over of Damsay from The Glee Project.
  • There's also the growing pairing of Cassandra and Shelby, who have never met and are only connected by being somewhat-acerbic mentors to Rachel.
  • For what little content the season 6 newbies get, Roderick gets placed with Kitty often since they're both seniors in the club and he's next to her in the Distant Finale. That being said, it's still more common to see Roderick with Spencer.
• Ship-to-Ship Combat:
  • A particularly nasty ship war that comes to mind is Brittany/Santana vs. Brittany/Artie, complete with accusations of But Not Too Gay for making Brittany date a boy, But Not Too Bi for making her stay with Santana in the end, and whether or not Artie was justified in lashing out at Brittany which caused her to break up with him.
  • Finn/Rachel shippers and Quinn/Rachel shippers would often into fights with each other over who Rachel should have ended up with while the earlier seasons were airing, and some still do to this day. Finn/Rachel shippers would often use the facts that their actors were dating at the time and that the early seasons were built around their dynamic, while also pointing out that Quinn was nothing but rude to Rachel for much of the first two seasons as reasons they should stay together. Meanwhile, Quinn/Rachel shippers like to point to the chemistry between their actors and their growing relationship in season 3 as reasons they make more sense than the former, while also portraying Finn as far more selfish than he actually was. Both sides have also been known to get into fights with Jesse/Rachel shippers as well, due to those two getting married.
• Spiritual Successor: To Camp (2003). Gets one itself in Rise (2018) and High School Musical: The Musical: The Series.
• Squick:
  • Sandy. To the point that he gets kicked out of the Acafellas because "when [Sandy is] around, it's creepy."
  • Perhaps not for everyone, but Figgins getting sneezed on in slow motion was perhaps a little Squick-y for some.
  • Brittany and Santana vomiting in "Blame It On The Alcohol".
  • The way Santana describes having sex with Finn, in "The First Time". "It was like being smothered by a sweaty, out of breath sack of potatoes covered in body spray."
• Strangled by the Red String:
  • Tina and Mike Chang, who never interacted in the first season and were basically put together for Token Minority Couple Asian jokes. Since then, they have at least gotten some relationship development, although much of it was offscreen.
  • Mercedes and Sam. Enforced as Sam's actor temporarily left the series due to contract disputes right after Mercedes and Sam got together. When he returned, the writers treated their relationship like some tragic love story. Because it had next to no development, it was hard for most viewers to buy into that and get invested in the relationship.
  • Brittany and Artie started off this way, and earned the show lots of backlash from angry Brittany/Santana fans. It became clearer over time that Artie was intended as a Romantic False Lead, and the whole relationship was designed to force Santana to realize her feelings for Brittany.
• Strawman Has a Point:
  • There is a grain of truth in Bryan Ryan's notion that kids shouldn't plan their lives around succeeding in the arts. The problem is that he doesn't stop at "have a back-up plan," but suggests that they should just give up without having any idea of what their chances are.
  • At least one of the Tea Party members in "Homecoming" talks sense, when she says that Puck shouldn't call them losers if he wants them to listen to them.
• Super Couple: Blaine and Kurt are listed on the trope page. Their first kiss alone caused pretty much the entire LGBT-friendly world to rejoice. The actual LGBTQ world, however, had more varied opinions.
• This Is Your Premise on Drugs:
  • Fame on uppers. Or maybe hallucinogens. Alternately, High School Musical off its antidepressants.
  • And as of "Goodbye", it's turned into High School Musical: The Cover Edition.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character:
  • Dani No-Name, Santana's new girlfriend introduced in season five. It also qualifies for a wasted plot as well. This character had tons of potential. It could have made for an interesting side-plot about Santana having a girlfriend outside of Brittany and giving her some good character development. After her first appearance, in which she does get a decent bit of screentime, the two begin to date. And then she proceeds to get maybe about less than five minutes of screentime an episode and speaks for about thirty seconds of it. This wouldn't be so bad if she wasn't hyped up as being played by Demi Lovato, an incredible singer and a good actress to boot. It becomes especially jarring when at the end of "Puppet Master" she doesn't even appear to sing with the group despite the fact that Starchild (another character introduced in season 5) does. It became bad to the point where people actually thought that she and Santana were broken up halfway through season five - and they eventually do split, offscreen, so Brittany and Santana can reunite.
  • For that matter, Elliot/"Starchild". Introduced to be a member of Kurt's band and friend for him who's not attached the other Lima characters, he managed to get a little bit more screentime than Dani and even had some scenes with Blaine after the Time Skip. Said scenes are also his last, and he's never seen again.
  • The newbies in season four, once they started becoming their own characters and the writing focused on what made them special. This may be a case of Real Life Writes the Plot, however - just as they were coming into their own, Cory Monteith passed away, and soon the fifth season focused on the seniors and the recent graduates, shuffling everyone else off as soon as the school year ended because the writers clearly weren't interested in continuing the McKinley storylines without Cory.
  • For that matter, the new Glee Club members in season six. They may not be breathtaking characters, but they are the first set for a very, very long time that doesn't consist of archetypes already recycled several times in the show. Yet they are here for only one and shortened season and aren't even really the main characters.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
  • "Audition" seems to set up an intense rivalry between Quinn and Santana over the position of Head Cheerleader, including the famous catfight in the hallway, which seems like it will be a big deal that season (confirmed by the creators' comments). Nothing comes of it. Quinn offhandedly mentions she needs to keep Santana off her back in "Duets", but nothing to this effect has ever been seen on screen, and, so far, nothing else has come of what initially appeared to be a pretty significant plot development.
  • The actor-switching scene in "Props" was rather intriguing and also funny as hell at some points (having Brittany as Mercedes, Kurt as Finn and Puck as Blaine). It didn't have to be a major thing but the show dedicated about three or four scenes to it and then it disappeared.
• Ugly Cute: When Karofsky isn't being a douche and all ugly with hate, he's actually not too bad looking and has a nice smile. This is pretty much because Max Adler is both attractive and a complete sweetheart, and it helps that Karofsky himself gets better after season 2.
• Uncertain Audience: Especially in its first season, which meshes things like oral sex jokes with the teeny angst of Degrassi and the kind of anvilicious messages you'd expect from an 80s kids cartoon along with the cutesy singing appeal of Kidz Bop and The Wiggles. Not to mention the song choices were mainly songs from the 80s or before. At times, it seemed like it couldn't decide if it was trying to appeal to teens and young adults or theatre kids switching between classic musicals and contemporary pop songs.
• Unconvincingly Unpopular Character: Everyone in the Glee Club is automatically unpopular for being part of it, even though three of them are cheerleaders and several of them are on the football team. As of season two, the entire club is/has been on the cheerleading/football team or is dating somebody who is. Logically, these are the most popular people in school. It makes the whole "We're all misfits!!" thing hard to swallow.
• Unintentionally Sympathetic:
  • In "Theatricality", Finn essentially gets thrown out of his own home for using a slur to refer to Kurt's interior design choices. We're supposed to hate him because of it, but Kurt had been trying to seduce him even when Finn started to become annoyed with Kurt's unwelcome touching and left their conversations when things got uncomfortable. It reached a point where Kurt encouraged their parents to get together because he would have more opportunity to seduce Finn if they were stepbrothers. It doesn't help that using offensive words when he's frustrated (i.e., calling Brittany stupid, using a slur to describe Sue's baby who has Down Syndrome, etc.) is later established to be a bad habit of Finn's. Fortunately, this is addressed early in the second season when Burt tells Kurt that he found out about his son's less-than-savory reasons for getting him and Carol together.
  • Kurt's behavior in "Grilled Cheesus" was treated as unreasonable because he was uncomfortable with organized religion and asked his friends to not bring it into his dad's medical crisis. But the club actively goes against his wishes by praying in Burt's waiting room (despite most of them not knowing him aside from Carol and Finn), Mercedes refusing to accept Kurt's atheism until he goes to church with her, and nobody seeming to recognize that his discomfort comes from the fact that he (a gay man) is often demonized by the very church that they claim he needs. While the moral of the episode seems to indicate that faith in each other is more important than organized religion, it's no wonder that some atheists were still really pissed off by Kurt defending his stances as "intolerant".
  • Quinn. Yes, she starts out a bully who cheated on her boyfriend with his best friend and then lied to said boyfriend that he was the father of the resulting baby and then made him help pay her medical bills. However, she is only sixteen when all this happens, with two deeply religious and conservative parents who kick her out of her home when they find out. The best friend, a trouble-making bad boy, likely raped her meaning she didn't actually cheat in the first place, and the timeline suggests that the cheating occurred early on in her relationship with the boyfriend, who cheats on her twice before he knows about her own indiscretion.
• Unintentionally Unsympathetic:
  • Will. His supposed virtue is that he is a compassionate teacher who genuinely cares for and puts all of his students first, but it's a bit hard to see him as the sweet teacher he's made out to be after he plants drugs in a student's locker to blackmail him into joining New Directions, blatantly favors a select handful of students within his group, abandons his students on their competition day to pursue a personal audition, lets open acts of bullying of his own students go unreported even when it lands one of them in the hospital, and suspends a female student, who always dresses modestly and had suffered from bulimia in the past, for refusing to wear a skimpy bikini in a musical performance.
  • Kurt is a frequent victim of this. Sometimes, he's a genuine Woobie, but other times, he can be incredibly selfish, hypocritical, mean-spirited, and prone to fits of irrational jealousy.
• Unnecessary Makeover: Rachel gets two of these in the course of the show. The first one in "Hairography" is pointed out as such by Finn (in probably the meanest way possible). The second in Season 4 has turned Rachel Berry into Lea Michele in pretty much every way.
• Values Dissonance:
  • Many international viewers have expressed surprise that this show portrays teachers hugging their students, something forbidden in the UK but mostly^note prohibited in some schools, yes common in US schools.
  • The military themes in Finn's character arc. His steadfast belief that his father became a war hero during his service in Iraq is not likely to sit well with viewers who oppose the Iraq war. Also, the general theme of military heroism and pride can seem pretty bizarre to viewers in several countries outside the US (especially in many European countries) where the armed forces have a decidedly less good reputation and the idea of taking pride in being a soldier tends to be associated with aggressive jingoists and/or morally dubious My Country, Right or Wrong/Just Following Orders types rather than with morally upstanding individuals.
• Viewer Gender Confusion:
  • Before transitioning, some viewers thought Coach Beiste was male (Beiste is, in fact, played by a woman, Dot Marie Jones).
  • More than a few viewers thought Kurt was a girl at first due to his high-pitched voice and somewhat feminine facial features. Now that his actor is older and more well-established, it's less common, though it still happens on occasion for first-time watchers.
• What Do You Mean, It's Not for Kids?:
  • The show falls under this quite a bit, largely thanks to the popularity of High School Musical, a movie with a very similar premise that actually was for kids. Except Glee isn't as kid-friendly as High School Musical, as it has the following: jokes about oral sex, dancing which borders on dry adults, sex between teenagers and older, married adults, the president of the celibacy club getting pregnant, boys complaining about "erupting early" and an adult former student corrupting kids by giving them pornography, alcohol, and lessons in stealing, and that's all within the first five episodes. The characters have freely sworn, used drugs, cheated on each other, got pregnant at 16, lost their virginity, deal with homophobia, etc. A later episode had two teen girls becoming the first to reference in dialogue a certain sex act by name on US network TV. It doesn't help that Glee covers were often played on Radio Disney, or that much of its marketing was made to appeal to the tween crowd.
  • The media appearances of certain Glee actors have been criticized by some "concerned parents" groups for being "too sexy" for young children watching the show.
    • In general, the way so many "family values" groups reacted to the "Push It" number and the negative portrayal of the celibacy club in "Showmance" is a bit more understandable when you realize that a lot of parents of younger children were under the mistaken impression that Glee was High School Musical: The TV Series. (Which had nothing to do with the marketing of the show, but everything to do with the surface similarities - musical comedies set in high schools - and general public ignorance about musical theatre not always being a "family friendly" medium.)
  • If the Parents Television Council's uproar about the GQ cover and the one lambasting Lea's choice to appear in a low-cut photo on Cosmo are anything to go by, people are still not getting it. This was even unintentionally lampshaded by the people in the latter case, who said "Lea Michele may be an adult, but to pretend that she doesn't know her fans are 11 is just ignorance."
  • It doesn't help that Claire's, a store famous for cheap jewelry aimed at pre-teens, used to sell a small amount of Glee merchandise. Including makeup sets for Rachel and Quinn, Team Finn and Team Puck necklaces, bracelets, and even knee socks.
• The Woobie:
  • Beiste in "Never Been Kissed." Even more so in "Choke".
  • Also from "Never Been Kissed", Dave Karofsky who divides people between the polar aspects of a Jerkass Woobie. "Prom Queen" makes him a full-blown Woobie, where he tearfully apologizes to Kurt and is torn between his complicated feelings for him and his fear of coming out. By 'Heart', he has a crush on Kurt, whom he tries to woo with an endearing series of gorilla-grams, but Kurt thought the gorilla-grams were from Blaine and turns Karofsky down when he finds out. Karofsky inadvertently outs himself to a guy from his new high school while spilling his heart out to Kurt. And in On My Way where he tries to hang himself. Wow.
  • Sam in "Rumours". Currently lives in a motel due to the fact that his father lost his job after the economy tanked, is the sole source of income for his entire family, and was forced to sell his guitar (though the Glee club bought it back for him), and his family shares one room, including his little brother and sister. If you didn't even try to shed a tear during Rumours you probably don't have a soul. Don't forget that in "Prom Queen," Sam says his birthday was last week. So on top of all his friends accusing him of being a cheating slut while he's homeless and trying to take care if his family, his friends forgot his birthday.
  • Rory. Irish Exchange student far from home who gets beat up and bullied on a near-daily basis.
  • Quinn. She gets pregnant and her father kicks her out of her house, she gets kicked out of the Cheerios, Sam dumps her after finding out she was cheating on him with Finn only for the latter to dump her at a funeral, she pretty much loses her mind at the beginning of the third season, and when she finally gets herself back together, she gets hit by a car.
  • Finn at the end of "The Break-Up", where he's alone onstage with no direction in life. The other kids might have had painful breakups too, but they still have their goals, and, for Kurt at least, a bright new career ahead of him. Finn literally has nothing. Finn finally finds his direction in "Sweet Dreams," studying to become a teacher at the University of Lima, and returning to co-head the Glee club with Mr. Schuester for college credit. At some point between this episode and "The Quarterback" (between which he does not appear due to Cory Monteith's rehab and subsequently, his death) he dies at the age of 19, never able to realize his potential.
  • Ryder, who has trouble reading and studying because he is dyslexic. The audience wants him to get that A just as bad as he does. Then came the "catfishing arc", where it is clear the entire situation has had a poor effect on his mental health. He was also sexually molested at age 11, and was dismissed by Artie and Sam because his molester was a teenage girl.
  • Marley, without question. Not only does she likely have to deal with daily ridicule for being the daughter of the obese lunch lady, but she also gets manipulated into developing an eating disorder by a girl she believed was her friend, which results in her starving herself and passing out during Sectionals, costing the team what probably would have been a win. She's probably going to have a hard time forgiving herself for that one, given how much pressure she was putting on herself not to let down her friends in the club. On top of all of that, Tina, of all people, has decided to personally hold this against her.
  • Becky, especially after the events of "Shooting Star".
  • Sean, a former football player who is paralyzed from the chest down from "Laryngitis"

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