'Glee' Season 3, Episode 4 Recap & Song List - 'Pot of Gold'

"Glee" is back after a long break due to baseball stuff, and its attempt to lure you back into the fold is with "The Glee Project" winner Damian McGinty.

So, how did he do? Answer: not bad. Moving on...

More detail? Okay. McGinty played Rory Flanagan, an Irish foreign exchange student staying with Brittany of all people (welcome to America, this is about the average intelligence level of our citizens). Brittany, because she's Brittany, thinks that Rory is a leprechaun, and asks him to grant her three wishes which she will reward with her "pot of gold." And yes, she means what you think she means.

But Rory spends most of the episode just getting shoved into lockers, because (if you haven't forgotten) McKinley High is full of the most intolerant, violent assholes in the entire country, if not the world. They bully a kid because he's Irish? Is there any group that these kids don't hate for no reason? They're like some kind of white supremecist group that's cool with black people.

McGinty had not one, but two songs this week, and did a nice job with both of them. Kudos, kid. Welcome to, as Santana put it, "the Blaine and Rachel show."

Speaking of Santana, she spends the whole episode attempting to convince Brittany to go with her to Shelby's new girl glee club, which currently consists of only Mercedes and Sugar. She succeeds with Rory's help, so now the "Troubletones" (I liked Brittany's suggestion of "Free Beer" better) has Mercedes, Santana, Brittany and Sugar in it. They also apparently have lots of 1940's era costumes, a full band and some back-up dancers for their "Candyman" performance.

Two things: one, that might be the most sneakily inappropriate song in pop music's recent history, and two, I was expecting a little more of a fight from Sugar for the spotlight. But whatever.

Burt, meanwhile, gets upset at Sue for getting the budget for the musical slashed, recovers by having the whole thing funded by the local mortuaries, and decides to run against Sue in her bid for office. That means more Mike O'Malley in the coming weeks, and that's a very good thing.

Quinn, meanwhile, has some half-baked plan to litter Shelby's apartment with items that will get her baby taken away by social services. Puck, however, has a change of heart and goes back to take away the stuff... and makes out with Shelby in the process. Scandal!

Sadly, this episode fell into some of the traps it laid for itself in season two. Most glaringly was a return to the use of "I've prepared a little something for you." In a proper musical, songs should come out of a moment of high emotion for the performer. In "Glee," when they can't figure out a way to fit the song into the plot, they just have one of the kids perform it for the group. It never works, because it is completely devoid of any meaning.

Case in point, this episode's performance of "Last Friday Night (T.G.I.F.)" by Katy Perry. Ryan Murphy and his crew knew that Blaine needed a song here (because fans love him), and they knew they needed to throw in some pop music (because many of the fans don't know who the hell Foreigner is). Thus, Blaine performs a random Katy Perry song for no good reason.

That's not a knock on Darren Criss... the guy is a serious talent and should absolutely be singing on every episode. But his talents can be much better utilized, and the songs can be much better chosen and placed within the context of the episode. End of rant.

To counter-balance that, here's a list of things I liked:

-"Say that U2 is overrated!" "No! Never!"

-"Yeah, she's kinda like Rain Man with boobs"

-Kurt getting pissy about Rory's falsetto

-Sue calling out a major logic flaw in last year's finale: "Flying the glee club out to New York without a set list, only to lose Nationals with a song they made up the night before." Seriously. Nobody that unprepared for a national competition should ever be surprised that they lost.

-"So we also bake and deliver delicious brick-oven pizza." That got a good laugh out of me.

This week's song list:

"It's Not Easy Being Green" - Kermit the Frog - Rory

"Last Friday Night" - Katy Perry - Blaine

"Waiting For a Girl Like You" - Foreigner - Puck

"Candyman" - Christina Aguilera - Santana, Mercedes and Brittany

"Take Care of Yourself" - Teddy Thompson - Rory

Brittany Line of the Week: "Free Beer"

Sue Line of the Week: "I am literally horny with fear"