DVD Review: Glee Encore

Last month the latest Glee DVD hit store shelves called, Glee Encore. The DVD is right around 77 minutes of back-to-back Glee performances from season one. I absolutely love the idea of releasing a DVD like this, because there have been plenty of times when I’m watching Glee where I've been so excited to see the performances that I wished I could skip ahead to them.

The way the DVD is set up you can either watch the performances one  episode at a time, play them all at once, or you can click “Shuffle” on the menu screen and the performances will play in random order, which I think is a pretty cool feature.

As a fan of Glee, there are performances that I was looking forward to watching on Glee Encore, yet they were nowhere to be found. In particular, the performances I am surprised are not included on the DVD is the mash-up of “Halo”/ “Walkin’ on Sunshine,” the Regionals version of “Don’t Stop Believin’,” and Vocal Adrenaline’s “Bohemian Rhapsody.”

To me it only makes sense to showcase both mash-ups from the “Vitamin D” episode, not just “It’s My Life”/ “Confessions Part II,” because both of the mash-ups were what made that episode stand out.

I feel like “Don’t Stop Believin’” from the “Journey to Regionals” episode should have made the cut for this DVD. The New Directions’ full set list from that episode was “Faithfully,” “Any Way You Want It”/ “Lovin’, Touchin’, Squeezin’” and “Don’t Stop Believin’.” To leave off the full circle moment of the season just doesn’t make any sense.

And lastly, the absence of Vocal Adrenaline’s performance of “Bohemian Rhapsody” also from the “Journey to Regionals” episode is just disappointing. That was Glee guest star, Jonathan Groff’s shining moment on the show, and was also one of the best performances of the entire first season.

If you can get past the handful of performances that should have been highlighted on the DVD, Glee Encore is actually pretty fun to watch and sing-a-long to. It’s fun to kick back and relive moments from a show that add some “Glee” so to speak to fan’s lives.

Glee Encore is available now on DVD and Blu-Ray.

Photo credit: Patrick Ecclesine/FOX

Article Author: Kirsten Coachman

Based in the San Francisco Bay Area, Coachman covers the latest in music, TV, and DVDs for Blogcritics Magazine. She has interviewed various people from across the entertainment spectrum, including Blue Valentine director Derek Cianfrance and singer/songwriter Rob Thomas. …

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