Glee-cap "Dream On"

If last week's episode was about finding one's mojo and being true to yourself, this week's episode was about dreams. This week was exiting for the guest appearance of Neil Patrick Harris and the fact that it was directed by Joss Whedon.

Enter Will's nemesis, Bryan Ryan (NPH!! NPH!!) who, will tells us in voice over made his life a living hell in high school, getting all the girls and worse, all the glee club solos. Now he's back, as a macho school board asshat with an anti-Glee Club streak. After a career singing on cruise ships and lounges, he now sells used Hummers (Stop making that face, he tells Will, "Global warming is a myth") and has since found "Jesus" - no, not Him. A central/south American therapist. He also now hosts a Glee Club support group. Glee Club kills, he tells a motley assortment of Glee Club has beens (including Molly Shannon - I am not sure how I feel about her addition to the cast...). His mission now is to make an audit of all of the school's extracurricular activities with a view of making some budget cuts. He tells Will that he wants to speak to the students. Will says no, but he has no choice. It's high school all over again.

Bryan Ryan speaks to the Glee kids, telling them to write their dreams on a sheet of paper. He brutally rips Artie's page from his notebook and tells all the kids that their dreams will never come true. They will spend the rest of their lives in Ohio (YIKES) and never amount to anything. Will throws old Peppy McPep Talk out of the room after all of the students look troubled and Tina starts to cry.

Rachel's dream? Being a star of course. But Bryan Ryan has shaken her confidence. She takes to the dance studio. Jesse comes back (hooray!) from his spring break (with another school. I don't get it either.) They make up and he tells her that she has nothing to worry about - her playing Evita on Broadway? An inevitability. Still, there's something missing - her mom. Jesse encourages her to try and find out her mom's identity. After some research, Rachel has her answer. Her mom, naturally, is Broadway star Patti LuPone. The year of her birth was a big year for "mother", Rachel tells Jesse, as she has just finished starring in Pal Joey. BUT - she also made a tour with Mandy Patinkin to Ohio just after that (and there is the fly in your ointment, Rachel - as everyone knows that the two of them had not toured together after Evita until just recently. Because yes, that's the only problem with this scenario) and this is when it all happened. Jesse looks bemused "Wow," he said. "Did Mandy Patinkin have anything to do with it?" Rachel knows this is a dumb idea but it does not stop her from offering to present research on why Bernadette Peters is her mom.

But ACTUALLY - Idina Menzel is her mom!!! Okay fine, her character, Shelby Corcoran, coach of "Vocal Adrenaline" is her mom. And Jesse knows it! While helping Rachel with some "CSI" style research into her past, he "finds" a cassette (in his pocket) that says "From Mother to Daughter" Rachel freaks out. "What if she sings on the tape?" she asks Jesse. "What if she's terrible?" Then a worse thought "What if she's better than me??" She's not ready to know. Jesse meets with Idina/Shelby in her car and promises that he will have Rachel listen to the tape. Here's my question - what if Rachel hadn't brought up her mom? How would Jesse have worked that in otherwise?

Artie's dream? Is to be able to get up out of his wheelchair and dance. And in one, brief and beautiful dream sequence, he gets up out of his chair and starts to dance to "Safety Dance" in the middle of the mall - it becomes a bit of a flash mob scene, with everyone joining in to his dance (I gotta tell Pierre!!). But this is a dream that won't come true for him.

Back to Will and Bryan Ryan - Will takes Bryan out for a beer "for old time's sake" which is weird because they didn't like each other. Bryan tells Will he's been living a lie! He misses singing, and he goes secretly to New York to see shows. He's got a box of Playbills in the basement he tells Will "like porn!" Will goes to the jukebox and cues up "Piano Man" - they both sing. It turns out Bryan's secret dream is to return to the stage. Will convinces Bryan to audition for the community theater production of "Les Mis" - they both show up to audition for Jean Valjean. Will says he's going to sing "The Impossible Dream" Bryan says he is, too. Will says actually, he's going to sing "Dream On" and Bryan says, oh, that's right, he is too. The director tells them to sing it as a duet (he also runs the dry cleaner and can only leave for 30 minutes at a time). They sing "Dream On"

Bryan has a change of heart, slashes the Cheerios budget (and has a tryst with Sue in her secret upstairs room) and buys the Glee club new stuff (denim jackets! dancewear! sheet music!) But Sue comes down to congratulate Will on his new role as Jean Valjean. Bryan also gets a part - a townsperson with one line "Hooray!" Bryan is furious, declares he's cutting the Glee Club and stomps out, taking all of his bedazzled denim with him.

Will needs to act. He makes an impassioned plea to Bryan about the importance of the arts to these kids. "They may not be stars," he tells them "But they shine like stars." They get labeled when the walk in the door as freshmen, but Glee allows them to be who they are. By cutting the club, Will says, Bryan is dimming their stars and creating 13 black holes. Bryan is not moved. Will offers to give his Jean Valjean role to Bryan (which frees up his schedule for, I don't know - teaching?). "You give me the role and I save the club?" Bryan sneers. Will says yes. Bryan cheers up and agrees. The club lives to sing another day. Dreams really can come true.

Rachel finally listens to the tape from her mother, which promises to "explain everything" but is really just her singing "I dreamed a dream" (note the Les Mis and tie to Rachel's almost mother, Patti LuPone, the original Fantine) which was pretty but explains nothing. Because Fantine DIES, right? How does that offer Rachel any clues??

Next week - the club goes Gaga - Lady Gaga, of course! The teaser promises extreme Gaga style wardrobe and music, and also Rachel putting something together and approaching Shelby and saying "I'm your daughter!" Maybe she's psychic??