We gave “Glee” a chance. We really did. When the pilot hit, we were pleasantly surprised by the mostly strong performances, and the quality of the writing, even if it struck us as kind of riffing on/ripping off “Election.” And the musical sequences, while auto-tuned to hell, were well-shot, and showed an ambitious breadth of taste, from Journey to Lily Allen.
We lost patience with the show fairly quickly (somewhere around the time that the unspeakably irritating teacher tried to reclaim “Ice Ice Baby”), but some news broke last night that has guaranteed we’ll be watching at least one episode next season; Academy Award winner Javier Bardem will make a guest appearance on the show.
The actor worked with “Glee” creator Ryan Murphy on the upcoming “Eat Pray Love,” apparently became a big fan of the show, watching the first season in a week, and approached Murphy about making a cameo. Bardem will play a Spanish rock star who befriends the wheelchair-bound Artie. Bardem told EW that “We’re going to rock the house. We’re going to do Spanish heavy metal, which is the worst.” Having (fortunately for him) bailed on “Nine,” it looks like the actor will get to scratch his musical itch and, as he does with everything he’s in, will increase the episode’s quality exponentially.