Duets (Chorus)

Choir leader Will Schuster ( Matthew Morrison ) decides to arrange a competition, dividing students into pairs. The one whose duo wins will receive dinner at the expense of Schuster in the Breadstix restaurant. And since Pak ( Mark Salling ) is imprisoned for stealing an ATM, newcomer Sam Evans ( Cord Overstreet ) comes to the choir. Kurt ( Chris Colfer ) begins to suspect that Sam is gay and asks him to become a duet partner. Kurt talks about this to Finn ( Corey Monteith ), and he tries to convince Kurt that Sam is not gay, and partnership with Kurt may not benefit Sam, since Kurt’s orientation is not accepted by some students of the school, and if Sam will sing with him as a duet will ultimately make him an outcast. Despite this, Sam decides to carry out the word given to Kurt and sing with him, and Kurt ignored Finn's remarks, as he was still angry with him because of the quarrel when they lived in the same room. Later, Kurt's father, Bart (Mike O'Malley), reminds his son of what his love of Finn last year led to, and advises him to abandon the duet with Sam. Kurt agrees and performs an improvised duet with himself, singing the song "Le Jazz Hot!" From the musical " Victor / Victoria ".

Santana (Naya Rivera) is doing a duet with Brittany (Heather Morris), but later decides that her best chance to win is to sing with Mercedes ( Amber Riley ). They sing "River Deep - Mountain High" together, and in a couple of Brittany they get Artie ( Kevin McHale ), with whom they start dating. Artie has sex with Brittany, and before they submit their number, Santana tells Artie that Brittany slept with him to get a duet partner. Artie refuses to sing with Brittany. Tina ( Jenna Ashkovits ) and her boyfriend Mike ( Harry Sham-ml. ) Argue about whether they should do a joint duet, as Mike specializes in dancing rather than vocal. As a result, Mike agrees to sing with her, and they are preparing a number for the song “Sing!” From the musical A Chorus Line . It becomes Mike's first solo part in the choir and is honored by Will Schuster.

Finn and his girlfriend Rachel ( Lea Michelle ) are preparing the song “Don't Go Breaking My Heart”, but Rachel decides that they must deliberately sabotage their performance and tweak Sam's win that would allow them to keep him in the choir. However, everything happens as Finn predicted: Sam becomes the target of school hooligans, who traditionally pour ice on his cocktail. Quinn helps him clean his clothes, and Sam invites her to prepare a duet. Meanwhile, Finn and Rachel, dressed as a priest and a schoolgirl, sing "With You I'm Born Again" by Billy Preston, which turns out to be an expected failure. Sam and Quinn perform "Lucky" by Jason Mraz . During the voting, all the choir members vote for themselves, except Finn and Rachel, who vote for Sam and Quinn, and they win the contest. During lunch at Breadstix, Quinn gives Sam signs of attention and says that this can be considered as their first date.

Noticing that Kurt is depressed and deeply worried about the fact that he is the only openly gay at school, Rachel decides to support him. She says that the choir highly appreciates him, and asks to perform with her a duet out of scoring. They sing the “Happy Days Are Here Again” and “Get Happy” mashup for the rest of the choir.

In the US, “Duets” was watched by 11.36 million viewers, which was the highest rating of the evening and was slightly higher than the previous episode of “ Grilled Cheesus ” ^[5] . In Canada, an episode was watched by 2.25 million people, which allowed it to take the seventh line in the weekly rating of television programs ^[6] . In the UK, the series was seen by 2.51 million viewers, which made the highest number of the week for cable TV channels E4 and E4 + 1 and the second in the cable network as a whole ^[7] .

The episode received mostly positive reviews from critics; Many highly appreciated both the storyline and the selection of songs. In the episode, the kiss of Santana and Brittany was shown for the first time, which was only hinted at earlier, and the issue of Santana’s unconventional orientation was the subject of controversy among viewers. The AfterEllen.com LGBT website columnist, Christine Keith, called the series “the strangest series of any television series ever broadcast on television” ^[8] . The New York Times called it "up to this point the best of the season" and similar to the "old school" Choir "" ^[9] ; A similar opinion was expressed by Raymond Flanders from The Wall Street Journal , according to whom the episode recalled the earlier series “Choir”, when the viewer was “simultaneously surprised, shocked and satisfied” ^[10] . Bobby Hackinson of the Houston Chronicle also noted the absence of “tricks”: “No Britney , no guest stars” ^[11] .

• "Duets" (Eng.) On Fox.com
• Duets (English) on the Internet Movie Database