Glee Part 2

I know there's been some discussion recently about whether or not Glee was a well-written pilot. Critics have been loving it, the buzz has been great -- even my non-TV watching friends tuned in and fell in love. Yet, writer Alex Epstein points out serious flaws with the pilot on his blog. Some of the comments agree with him, and his points are really valid.

Structurally, the pilot was off. Some of the character intros and arc were introduced in a backhanded way. For instance, it wasn't super clear why the teacher wanted to coach the club in the first place. While watching it, I actually got a bit jittery because everything I've learned about writing a pilot seemed to be thrown out the window.

Yet, it was a massive success. And as much as the "issues" with the pilot stuck out to me, I loved the show. I will definitely watch it when it returns this fall, and I kind of can't wait. So it makes me wonder...

How important are the rules of pilot writing? It seems that you can create a successful show without following the code absolutely. Sometimes the audience can surprise you by standing behind a show that if it weren't made by already successful writers probably wouldn't get made. There are enough elements of Glee that fit in with what audiences want -- music, bright colors, underdogs, snarkiness, multimedia -- so maybe in this case, "industry standards" don't apply.