Despite its success, Glee never received a proper spinoff, but the one idea that almost happened would have been disastrous for the franchise.
An unused idea for a Glee spinoff would have been anything but gleeful. Running for six seasons between 2009 and 2015, Glee was, at one time, a TV phenomenon. Despite attaining such huge success, Glee never produced a proper spinoff series. The Glee Project premiered in 2011, but was merely a reality competition where aspiring warblers could win a stint on the main Glee TV series. Perhaps unsurprisingly, a proper in-canon Glee spinoff was considered at one point, but never came to fruition.
The inherent problem behind the Glee TV show's concept was that, sooner or later, the main cast would graduate from high school. As this milestone approached toward the end of Glee season 3, questions were raised over how the show would continue, and what would become of the characters after their time at William McKinley came to an end. According to Glee co-creator Ryan Murphy (via Deadline), the original solution to the Glee graduation problem was sending Cory Monteith's Finn, Lea Michelle's Rachel, and Chris Colfer's Kurt to star in a New York-based spinoff.
Fox inevitably would have tried to market the New Directions 2.0 as Glee's future, but the fresh-faced newbies would have been in direct competition with the spinoff crew, who had already earned the audience's hearts and investment. Fox could have canceled the main Glee show and focused exclusively on the New York spinoff, but then would have lost the youthful spirit at the heart of the franchise, creating a no-win scenario. Melding old and new casts together into the later Glee seasons offered the best of both worlds - an injection of new blood and a continuation of the familiar.
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