Following reports that Glee’s sixth season will be its last comes a flurry of rumors about the direction of the show, and life after Glee, which could possibly involve a Rachel Berry spinoff. That’s the latest rumor, but a recent report suggests it’s false. Still, we’ll add it to the pile of other reports, including that Glee might move Kurt to Russia, and that the last season could be set entirely in New York, presumably putting Rachel Berry back at the center of the musical drama series.
E!’s been keeping track of these rumors, the latest of which suggests that Ryan Murphy is working on a spinoff series for star Lea Michelle. E! says this one isn’t true. Their source says “There is Glee and Glee only,” which I guess means the only thing Ryan Murphy is working on is Glee. (Well, and his other projects like American Horror Story and that HBO pilot Open.)
It’s possible the rumor spawned from reports that — in addition to potentially moving Kurt to Russia — Glee might confine its storyline solely to New York, which I’m assuming would mean emphasizing most of the plot on Rachel, though there’s no reason one or two other characters from WMHS couldn’t join her, Santana and Kurt in the Big Apple. Personally, I think this would be a great idea… two years ago when they were planning Season 4. But doing it for the final season?
When Season 3 was wrapping and a number of lead characters were graduating, there was talk of a spinoff for Rachel in New York, but when the project didn’t go forward, the concept was merged back into Glee, effectively making two connected series into one by focusing half the show on the high school glee club and the other half on Rachel and Kurt's New York adventure. It wasn’t a disaster, but honestly, I don’t think it was a good thing for the show. Without the spinoff, the series should’ve either moved forward with Rachel’s story and left WMHS behind, or stayed in high school and let Rachel move on, off screen. Of course, the latter would require cutting its star loose. So they tried to do both, and more than a season later, I still feel like I’m waiting for either side of this show to hit its stride. Picking one road and heading down it, rather than trying to straddle both may have been the better option. Season 6 might be much better off throwing all of its attention on New York, but it’s probably too little, too late at this point. The same could be said for the possibility of focusing the entire last season on WMHS, seeing as more characters will probably be graduating this year. Although there’s something to be said for the show returning to its roots with a refreshed set of underdogs…
When we learned that Season 6 would be the final season, it was reported that Ryan Murphy was going to have to rethink the ending of the series, since he originally had it shaped around Finn and Rachel’s story. Due to Cory Monteith’s unfortunate passing last summer, that’s not an option now. Given that the series is still at the beginning of its fifth season, it’s kind of a relief to hear that they’re looking ahead to Season 6 and plotting the show’s eventual end game. The sooner they know where they show is going to end up, the sooner they can start setting the course. And for Kurt, that course could involve Russia, though it sounds like that's just one scenario that's being thrown around.
Check out photos from this Thursday’s episode here.
