Product Details

• Actors: Cory Monteith, Lea Michele, Matthew Morrison, Jane Lynch
• Format: AC-3, Box set, Color, Dolby, NTSC, Subtitled, Widescreen
• Language: English (Dolby Digital 5.1)
• Subtitles: English, French, Spanish
• Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  
• Aspect Ratio: 1.78:1
• Number of discs: 6
• Rated: PG-13 (Parental Guidance Suggested)
• Studio: 20th Century Fox
• DVD Release Date: September 13, 2011
• Run Time: 1001 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (282 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B003L77GAQ
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,612 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)
  • #29 in Movies & TV > DVD > Musicals
• Learn more about "Glee: The Complete Second Season" on IMDb

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

With music that's arguably even better, Glee also takes a dramatic turn in its second season, mixing some tough issues into its combination of musical performance and offbeat comedy. Most prominent is the topic of gay bullying, as Kurt (Chris Colfer) becomes the target of a macho football player. Around the same time, Kurt's trip to scout a rival group from nearby Dalton Academy leads to the season's most electric moment, a rendition of Katy Perry's "Teenage Dream" by a men's group called the Warblers, which became the show's bestselling single ever, and the relationship between Kurt and the Warblers' lead singer, Blaine (Darren Criss), becomes the season's heart. Other relationships develop and become complicated, involving Rachel (Lea Michele), Finn (Cory Monteith), Quinn (Dianna Agron), Artie (Kevin McHale), Brittany (Heather Morris), Santana (Naya Rivera), Puck (Mark Salling), Tina (Jenna Ushkowitz), and Mike (Harry Shum Jr.) as well as new additions Sam (Chord Overstreet) and Lauren (Ashley Fink). And the relationship between Will (Matthew Morrison) and Emma (Jayma Mays) runs into a roadblock in the person of a handsome dentist (John Stamos).

The season is an uneven one, losing steam with the Britney Spears tribute episode and some excruciating plot lines, then having slightly more success with themed episodes (The Rocky Horror Picture Show, Christmas, and the cleverly handled episode involving Justin Bieber, of all people). Fresh energy came from the new students, guest star Gwyneth Paltrow as substitute teacher Holly Holliday, and new football coach Beiste (Dot-Marie Jones), who even inspires a temporary alliance between Will and Sue (Jane Lynch). The show relied less on Broadway tunes and more on classic rock and contemporary pop (Lady Antebellum, Queen, Fleetwood Mac, Lady Gaga) and even introduced its own original songs, the best of which ("Get It Right," "Loser Like Me") are unveiled in the regionals. Morrison and Michele aren't featured nearly as prominently as they were in the first season, but Michele still crushes her big numbers like "Get It Right" and Katy Perry's "Firework," and she participates in dazzling duets with Amber Riley ("Take Me for What I Am") and Agron ("Unpretty/I Feel Pretty"). Other showstopping moments from the season include Rivera's "Valerie," Rivera and Riley's "River Deep, Mountain High," Overstreet and Agron's "Lucky," Paltrow's "Forget You" and "Landslide," the group rendition of My Chemical Romance's "Sing," and almost anything by the Warblers (voiced by Tufts University's Beelzebubs), especially Pink's "Raise Your Glass" and Neon Trees' "Animal." (Parental discretion advised due to mature themes) --David Horiuchi

Product Description

Bring home the complete second season of TV's most exhilarating series!

Despite their loss at the Regionals, the kids in New Directions are more motivated than ever. And whether it's Will doing a sexy tango with a substitute teacher (Gwyneth Paltrow), Sue joining the glee club, or everyone catching Bieber fever, the excitement at William McKinley High School is keeping everyone on their toes. With more incredible musical numbers, hugely popular guest stars like John Stamos, Carol Burnett and Kristin Chenowith and lots of behind-the-scenes special features, Glee Season 2 hits all the right notes.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

165 of 197 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Like "A Midsummer Night's Dream"...For Better or Worse. May 31, 2011

By Phoenix Child VINE™ VOICE

Format:DVD

There's been quite a bit of truly justified criticism of "Glee"'s second season. I myself had to force myself to wait a few weeks after the airing of the "New York" finale to actually try to write a coherent review on this sophomore season. Bearing that in mind, let's take the route of this season's first episode and recap what was the first season of "Glee":

"Glee" tells the story of a tiny, bullied glee club (a show choir where the participants sing and dance to either pop or showtunes or both without actually performing a musical) and how both the power of music and a kind mentor who believes in them helps twelve misfits forge a family and strive to share how special they are with the world, no matter how much is stacked against them. Although it sounds like a strangely cheesy premise and an unlikely TV show, "Glee"'s madcap formula, amazing music performances, terrific acting, intriguing characters, and potently quotable one-line zingers launched it into the stratosphere and it quickly became an international sensation and success. Within these plot lines, "Glee" tackled the sensitive issue of teen pregnancy (and how religion can impact that issue) wonderfully, along with showcasing the struggles of teenagers with body issues, the confusing adolescent world of sexuality, popularity, friendship, family, loyalty, bullying and peer pressure. Although there were a few misses in the first season, overall the season itself was one of the brightest and freshest new shows around, and it won several awards for it as well.

There's the rub, however: "Glee" is handled by three showrunners (Ryan Murphy, Brad Falchuk, and Ian Brennan), all of whom apparently decided that they could do no wrong. They flatly refused to bring in other writers or directors for season two, and since they were still selling massive amounts of music from the show and getting millions of views from their devoted audience of "gleeks", every single thing that was wrong about season one got blown out of proportion in season two, while everything that was right fairly faded to the background. The result? Season two of "Glee" started off strongly but by the second half meandered into sloppily handled plotlines that were often began and concluded in the space of one episode, characters acting severely out of character just for the sake of an episode's "theme", "theme of the week" episodes that were no longer touching or interesting but instead cheesy PSA-type episodes, bloated importance of guest stars, and a season finale that failed in every way that season one's finale succeeded.

Where on earth did "Glee" go so wrong? Season two's worst mistake was the characters acting out of character as "Glee" committed the worst mistake that any sophomore effort of a creative work, be it a film, television show or novel, can make: it completely erased any and all character development from the first season and started the characters off fresh. Rachel Berry, the club's star, who learnt the mistakes of her selfishness and made friends and learned how to lead a team in season one? Back to being a self-centered and often downright mean diva who stepped on each of her teammates to get what she wanted. Finn Hudson, the loveable popular dummy with a heart of gold who learned how to be a star and effectively lead the glee club and also learned that popularity was meaningless because he liked the glee club losers better than the popular football jerks? Right back to being a selfish, obsessed-with-being popular jerk to all of his friends.

However, the two characters this affected the worst? Firstly, Mr. Schuester. Mr. Schue was once the teacher everyone wished they could have: he put his students above everything, he pushed them, he motivated them, he guided them to being the best that they could be. Season two saw our once-beloved Schue essentially hitting a midlife crisis, using his glee club as an excuse to try to get closer to his now-unavailable crush Emma Pillsbury the guidance counselor, acting like a spoiled brat, and continually believing himself better than what he was. The second character was, of course, Quinn Fabray. Quinn began as the pretty and mean popular girl who became pregnant and became part of the heart of season one as she made true friends amongst the glee club, learned the value of family, and overcame her own meanness when the club rallied around her during the pregnancy issue. Season two saw absolutely no mention of her being pregnant anywhere ever. She inexplicably broke up with Puck (no explanation was ever given) and rejoined the Cheerios because she suddenly (like Finn) needed to be popular again. Although some of this damage was repaired by her new boyfriend Sam (newcomer Chord Overstreet), that repair was itself destroyed even worse later on. I won't even mention the destruction of Sue Sylvester, who transformed into a meaningless, cartoonish villain who was rarely even funny by the end and required a brutal character death just to reign her back in.

Despite all of this, however, season two began on a strong note (with the exception of the hot mess that was the "Britney/Brittany" Britney Spears tribute episode; despite some truly hilarious one-liners courtesy of Brittany (Heather Morris), this was likely one of the worst episodes of "Glee" to ever air) as it took a central theme: bullying and its impacts. Openly gay Kurt (masterfully played by Chris Colfer) took center stage as the school's relentlessly homophobic popular crowd was highlighted, leading to the explosive "Never Been Kissed" episode. Rachel's newfound (or oldfound, as the case may be) selfishness led to other glee club members to fight for their chance to shine and wounded the glee club badly when her bullying led to new student Sunshine Corozon (a criminally underused Charice) defecting to New Directions' mortal enemies Vocal Adrenaline, and Schuester's selfish and out of character behavior led to his kids whole-heartedly choosing hilarious new substitute Holly Holiday (wonderfully played by Gwenyth Paltrow) over him, and Santana's mean insistence on hiding from her feelings by attacking other people blew up spectacularly in her face.

In fact, despite two truly terrible episodes ("Britney/Brittany" and the wretchedly badly done "Rocky Horror Glee Show"), season two was off to a wonderful note, until the hiatus. When "Glee" returned after its touching Christmas episode, however, to the spectacularly overwrought Superbowl episode, things began going downhill fast, and they stayed that way for the rest of the season with a few notable exceptions. The biggest mistakes?

1) Rachel and Finn's Story: While I myself am not a "Finnchel" shipper (in "Glee", the portmanteaus of the couples are so important an episode was named after one), what was done to their relationship was criminally bad writing. Rachel wanted revenge on Finn for something he had done and so kissed his friend Puck. Finn broke up with Rachel and refused to forgive her for cheating on him...while he convinced Quinn to cheat on her boyfriend with him. Finn then went on to string both Rachel and Quinn along by emotionally cheating on Quinn with Rachel, then dumping Quinn out of the blue to return to Rachel. None of it made sense.

2) Quinn's further character murder. See above.

3) Kurt's storyline. What began as a heartwrenching display of how bullying gone too far can have devastating consequences quickly turned mind-numbing. While not to give away too many spoilers, Kurt was physically, emotionally, and verbally abused, which escalated into something like sexual assault and physical intimidation, before his life was threatened, causing him to leave the school for a different school with a no-bullying policy. Despite the wonderful plotline of Blaine Anderson (newcomer Darren Criss), Kurt rapidly reverts back to his selfish season one "bitch" persona from the first few episodes, then under one flimsy excuse switches right back to McKinley and goes back to being bullied, essentially rendering his entire plotline meaningless, and then goes on to remark "It's been a good year for Kurt Hummel" at the end of the season. Did I mention his father randomly had a heart attack and almost died in one of the season's better episodes? Really, writers?

4) The finale. The finale (it bears repeating). As I've said, season one's finale was wonderful. Season two's finale was essentially one giant episode centered around Finn and Rachel -- which in itself wouldn't have been so bad, except for it was wrapped up very badly -- while giving us some bad music, a wasted appearance by Jonathan Groff as Jesse St. James, and absolutely no resolution for any of the characters, particularly Kurt or his chief tormentor Karofsky. The ending was predictable and somewhat dim, and was generally an uneven end to an uneven season.

5) The self-contained episodes: NO MORE PSA episodes, please. Deal with an issue for teenagers over a two-episode arc where the lesson is meaningful, like season one did. Also, the plotlines such as Blaine's sort-of-maybe bisexuality that were introduced in one episode and wrapped up a half an hour later were just sloppy and useless.

But what did season two do right?

1) When it was handled well, season two's episodes were wonderful. From the good parts of Kurt's storyline to the heartwrenching religion episode centered around Burt Hummel's heart attack, to a surprisingly impactful episode centered around sexuality, season two's good moments shone like diamonds.

2) New characters. The initial cast of "Glee" will graduate by the end of next season (or some of them at least). Rather than do something terrible like getting rid of all the old cast members and introducing new ones in one fell swoop, the integration of Sam and Lauren into the existing was well done. Read more ›

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Teenage Dream November 13, 2010

By Daniel J. Robertson

Amazon Verified Purchase

WOW! Such a sensitive and timely representation of bullying and high school homosexuality goes way above my already very high expectations for this show. And the substance goes down smoothly when coated with musical numbers that make you want to get out of your seat to dance and sing along! I smell Emmy for Chris Colfer this season. Darren Criss (I think that's his name) absolutely lights up the screen as Kurt's new gay friend, and I predict this show will really be a springboard for him. I can't believe that FOX, the station with one of the most conservative news teams on TV, aired a program in which two men kissed! Why couldn't we have had television like this when I was growing up?!

17 of 21 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Inspirational July 12, 2011

By kyrakahn6

Format:Blu-ray|Amazon Verified Purchase

Season 2 of Glee has earned a lot of heat, to say the least. Meandering plot lines, 'in your face' storytelling,characters being forgotten about. And yes, some of these things hold true. I am still patiently waiting for Tina to make a reappearance as a functioning human being. Yet, for all these criticisms, I believe the season 2 surpassed season 1, for a variety of reasons, some of these reasons being why the show was critiqued as well.
First, season 2 had some of the most fantastic songs ever featured on the show. From Quinn and Rachel's "I Feel Pretty/Unpretty" duet to Kurt's absolutely heart-breaking "I Wanna Hold Your Hand" to Santana's "Songbird", the original cast stepped up to the plate and delivered their best performances to date. And then we have new cast members adding to the mix...you guessed it...the incredible Darren Criss in his portrayal as Blaine and the astounding Warblers! Who can forget "Teenage Dream", and how it swept us all of our feet? To sum it up, the music this season was incredible.
Second, the 'in your face' message episodes. These episodes have been criticized for trying to push a message to strongly and obviously. However, I can assure you that this is the only way that the show's target audience- namely teenagers- are going to listen. For example, the episode that dealt exclusively with alcohol. I believe in every way that the episode was brilliant, because in the end the message it sent was 'Yeah, we know you kids are going to drink. It's a fact of life. But you need to be careful, and adults--please give your teenager the support system they need.' This episode actually reached teenagers that I know, and got them thinking harder than any lecture ever had.
And I have to devote an entire tirade to what season 2 has done for the LGBT community. Kurt's struggle, and the maturation of his friendship with Blaine into a healthy romantic relationship, has done wonders for struggling kids everywhere. To see a gay character not only out of the closet, but learning to deal with bullies and hate, and able to find love? Chris Colfer has done a fantastic, Emmy-worthy job of bringing this character to life and creating not a comic-relief, but an in-depth person with insecurities and flaws that make Kurt one of the most beloved characters on the show. Watching the struggle of two other kids, Santana and David Karofsky, in coming to terms with their own sexuality, is equally important because, unlike Kurt, neither of those two was even aware they were homosexual until this season. Watching how they dealt with the issue in drastically different ways was a wake-up call for so many, and we can only hope we get to watch these two develop further in season 3. But season 2 stands above season 1, in my biased opinion, simply for the amazing Chris Colfer. He is the most talented person on that show and it would be a crime to not showcase him, and a further crime to not use the power Glee has to not try to implement social change by giving people a glimpse of a child, learning how to live in a world that does not accept who he is, and show them how being gay is not, in fact, a crime. To watch one character endure so much, which I'm sad to say many people in the real world have endured all that and more, and then be able to look back and call it 'a pretty good year' just speaks volumes about the courage and hope needed to face everyday life, and that line may be one of the most touching moments of the show.
As for meandering plots, unfortunately I'm afraid the writers have put too much faith in their viewers. When one actually watches all the actors on the screen, how they react, how they look, then all those supposed plot holes disappear. Unlike other shows, Glee requires us to pay attention at all times, and then everything clicks into place. I have not yet met a plot hole that cannot easily be explained away by someone who was paying attention. Also, we must always remember that Glee is meant as a satire- a piece of art/literature/theater etc that uses exaggeration to try and implement change. Anyone expecting it to be realistic has missed the entire point of the show.
The one criticism I will agree on is that we did lose some characters. Tina is gone. She had no role past Duets episode. But however tired I might have been of the Quinn/Finn/Rachel love triangle, I thought Quinn's transition back to popularity obsessed teenager was unfortunately very realistic, judging from my own experiences. But I think we can all agree that Puck's character development this season was even more touching than season 1, and he has become one of my favorite characters.
All in all, I rate season 2 a firm five stars, because of what is has done to try to change things. A show that attempts to implement social change will forever be brilliant, and Glee has done so much for others, as well as myself, in giving hope, courage, and strength to be who you are. I am in debt to this show, and all the wonderful people who made it happen. It is an inspiration.