I'm A Winner, And You're Fat

WARNING: As always, Glee spoilers ahead. Go watch the season finale before you read.

Well, that's the end of that.

The majority of this episode takes place over one day (specifically, Saturday, April 17), so there's no need to hash out an episode timeline. So, instead, let's talk about the end of the pregnancy plot line, which I (and millions of others, no doubt) called a month ago.

We start with Quinn saying she isn't due... for a month?

This is not so. Terri's whole fake-pregnancy scam operated on the premise that Quinn was due during Spring Break, and thus the switch could happen without a lot of questions. Carmel High, I might remind you, had its Spring Break five weeks ago. There just isn't that big a window for high schools to have a week off. It should have been three weeks ago. It's conceivable that it was last week. It certainly isn't still a month away.

On top of that, no matter when Quinn is due, she got pregnant during the summer, which leads me to the second annoyance about this scene - her uniform. It's one thing for the Cheerios to still be in uniform every single day, even though Nationals were a week ago - I'm sure they're just practicing for next year, and Sue Sylvester isn't the kind to give them time to rest on their laurels - but surely they don't wear those uniforms every single day all summer long. Were the writers afraid that if Quinn was wearing street clothes, we'd forget that she was a cheerleader?

The birth itself actually illustrates pretty well a point I've been making most of the season, about the difference between "suspension of disbelief" and "bad writing." Quinn goes from backstage to the hospital to having the baby in the time it takes for Vocal Adrenaline to perform (Rachel tells Shelby about the baby while the judges are deliberating), and everyone gets back to the auditorium in time for the results to be announced. That's a mighty close hospital, and a mighty short labor, but that's what suspension of disbelief covers. Putting a date on something and then ignoring or changing that date is bad writing.

And that's what you missed on Glee. Season One of the show, much like New Directions' first season, was a good start. Tune in this fall and see if the kids, and the show, can build on it.