Glee roared back onto Tuesday nights with a bunch of changes and a lot of new faces. Team McKinley wasted no time in dealing out the whos and whats and got us all up to speed within the first few minutes. Lauren (Ashley Fink) is gone, from Glee Club at least and possibly from our consciousness and that is just a crying shame. Also gone is Trouty Mouth Sam (Chord Overstreet) who we found out for sure dated Mercedes for a hot minute back in June and has since moved away. Mercedes (Amber Riley) has since moved on to a big hunk of chocolate lovin who wants to make cocoa babies with her. About time Mercedes got some. Wait, I keep forgetting these are high school kids. Anyway, Quinn (Dianna Agron) also seems to be M.I.A as the gleeks convene in the choir room for some melodic geekgasms with Mr. Schue.

Schue (Matthew Morrison) has his work cut out for him this year now that Sue (Jane Lynch) is running for local congress and is hell-bent on ending federal funding for the arts in public schools. Schue and his lady Emma (Jayma Mays) go on the offensive with a glitter-bomb during Cheerio tryouts that unfortunately backfires. Schue and his songbirds are also facing a humiliating Nationals loss and the inevitable backlash from the student body. He hoped to get thing going again with his weird and misguided Purple Piano Project but all he managed to do was get one set on fire and another destroyed by Hurricane Sue. So far the year is not off to a good start.

The winner of The Glee Project made an appearance when Kurt (Chris Colfer) and Rachel (Lea Michele) went to a NYADA (New York Academy of Dramatic Arts) mixer to kick off their Broadway dreams. McKinley’s two stars got served a piping hot ladle of truth when the other hopefuls basically danced and sang circles around them and they were left crying in Rachel’s Chevy Volt while garden-hose rain poured down.

There were some fun moments, my fave being the delusional Glee club hopeful Sugar whose audition was the stuff nightmares are made of and her Aspergers the stuff of comedy gold. I hope we see more of her shouting inappropriate things at people in the future. The big shock of the night came from Quinn who finally showed up looking like an extra from The Legend of Billy Jean with pink hair and a band of new friends who call themselves The Skanks. I don’t really know where this complete change of character came from but her wistful looks at her old castmates doing jazz hands means it probably won’t last long. I kind of like the pink hair though.

More big news came when Blaine (Darren Criss) transfered to McKinley to spend more time with his boyfriend Kurt. This spells trouble for Finn’s spot as the male lead but I think it will be a nice breath of fabulous air for them. I especially liked Blaine’s sassy red pants but I think I’ll miss the cute Warblers blazer and their tight choreography. Oh, and let’s not forget that Santana (Naya Rivera) was banned from Glee Club for being a traitor! That won’t be good for anyone cause you know she’s a spiteful little thing.

The music didn’t dominate this episode which was nice. I’m guessing since they had a lot of exposition to get through there wasn’t a lot of room for warbling. But the songs they did sing were pretty good. The lunchroom Go-Gos party with “We Got the Beat” was appropriately peppy but nothing I feel I need to download on Itunes just yet. Kurt and Rachel’s song from Wicked “Ding Dong the Witch is Dead“ was wonderful of course. I really should see that show eventually I suppose. Blaine tore up “It’s So Unusual” but Blaine tears up everything and he can keep right on doing it as far as I’m concerned. I wasn’t nuts about the medley the NYADA kids did but the “You Can’t Stop the Beat” finale was good stuff.

My favorite quote:

Brittany: I have pepperoni in my bra.
Santana: Those are your nipples.

Glee seems to be getting back to it’s fun season one roots this year and I say bring it on. Things got a bit heavy handed last year despite some great episodes. This premiere brought enough shake ups and the promise of our seniors leaving at the end of this year should be enough to keep things interesting. Welcome to another year of Glee folks.

Tune in next week when we find out what the heck “I Am Unicorn” means.