Television is a powerful medium. It has the power to inspire, provoke change and share stories that are normally left untold. At its best, it can make its audience feel real emotions. However, such reactions from the audience need to be earned. “Rise,” the new musical theatre drama which premiered on March 13 on NBC, failed to do just that.

“Rise” wants to be an inspiring new drama simply by just existing. A great show tells authentic stories for the sake of telling an authentic story; accolades from the audience are just a bonus. On the other hand, “Rise” comes across as telling a story for the sole purpose of galvanizing its viewers.

Over the course of its hour-long premiere, “Rise” failed to tell one original story. Every single moment – from its characters to its plot points – have been recycled from a myriad of other shows. The show itself is basically a carbon copy of Fox’s “Glee,” without the humor or spontaneous musical numbers—aka the best parts of “Glee.”

For those still curious about the plot, “Rise” revolves around a Will Schuester type English teacher named Lou Mazzuchelli, who takes over the school’s theatre program to make a difference in students’ lives.

The students’ storylines include a girl with a homewrecking mother, an obviously closeted gay boy with religious parents, a football player who is choosing between a football scholarship and the school musical, a kid secretly living in the projection room and a transgender boy named Michael. Also in the mix is a very weird storyline about Lou’s alcoholic son.

While it’s appreciated that “Rise” is representing characters with different ethnicities, sexualities and identities, they all seemed a little too shallow. The show already found itself in hot water for straight-washing the role of Lou Mazzuchelli – who was gay in the book from which the show drew inspiration – and the diversity sprinkled throughout the series does not necessarily make up for it.

Hopefully, as the show moves forward, it will go deeper than it did in its premiere and put some sort of fresh spin on its story. Right now, no uplifting scene of students singing around a fire is going to make anyone feel anything if they are already half asleep from boredom.

The issue with “Rise” is not the story it is telling, just the way “Rise” is telling it. It is boring and unoriginal which makes its “inspiring” and “dramatic” moments unimpactful because the audience just does not care. If “Rise” can fix these problems, the series has the potential to become a combination of “Glee” and the more dramatic “This is Us.” Until then, “Rise” has a lot of improvements to make. “Rise” airs Tuesdays at 9 p.m. on NBC.