Glee — Season 1, Episode 4: “Preggers” review

Okay, here’s where things get tricky. This week’s episode was about 75% awesome and about 35% non-awesome. If you think my math is wrong here, then you didn’t see “Preggers,” an overstuffed hour of television that gave 110% to entertain us but just ended up seeming like too much work and not enough fun.

Leading off tonight was Kurt’s football story. I loved the cold open with K, Tina, and some random girl named Britt working out an elaborate dance routine to “Single Ladies,” with trashy/excellent moves all round. Did I have any faith whatsoever in the rest of it? Let’s just say no — the whole thing is absolutely ridiculous and over the top in that special Glee way. Kurt’s dad comes downstairs and sees him in a unitard; K tries to explain himself, and the beards girls cover by saying he’s on the football team, a perfectly logical dodge.  K then strong-arms Finn into getting him a tryout on the team, and blasts the pigskin through the uprights to the accompaniment of his favorite Beyoncé bounce.

Second big plotline, and as far as you know the reason for the episode’s title, starts during a horrid birthpractice session with Terri’s sister Kendra, who now knows that the whole pregancy is a falsehood. This part seemed hella truncated to me during the course of the hour, just a couple of scenes’ worth, really. Kinda makes you suspicious as to why they called it “Preggers,” yes? But the big payoff comes later on (see plot #4).

And then we’re introduced to plot #3, which centers around Sue. First, she gets powermad after beginning to host her own commentary segment on the local news show. We only see a couple of these, but they are both pretty funny, especially the first one where she makes a compelling argument for juvenile justice Singapore style: “To all those naysayers out there who say, ‘That’s illegal, you can’t strike high school students on the bare buttocks with razor sharp bamboo sticks,’ well to them I say: ‘YES WE CANE.’”

Sue’s powermove here is to blackmail Principal Figgins into bringing back Sandy and auditioning students for the school’s new musical presentation,  “Cabaret.” They know this will lure the unhappy Rachel away from New Directions; said diva is upset at Will for deigning to give a solo to Tina. Now, I know this school subscribes to the High School Musical Falsehood (student groups and cliques are ironclad and each student can only ever do one thing at a time), but come on — when has there been a rivalry between choir and musical theatre? Anyway, I digress. Eventually, Will puts his foot down, leaving the solo with Tina (the right thing to do) even though he knows it will cost him Rachel.

And now let’s barrel right on into plot #4 — Quinn tells Finn she’s pregnant…and it’s his! ZOMG Call out the National Guard! We know the story’s fishy because they’ve never done it, but Quinn reminds poor dumb Finn about his premature ejaccident in a hot tub. (For the first time ever, at least two characters mention “a trip to Planned Parenthood” without it being OOH BAD SCARY ABORTIONZ; to the show’s discredit, though, Quinn must needs give birth to this baby and there is no discussion allowed.)

We now feel even worse for Finn; not only is he still rocking the Keanu part, he’s also now apparently Chris Penn in All the Right Moves. But we know that Finn isn’t the father, so who could it be? Anyone? DUH, OF COURSE, IT IS PUCK, dirtbag mohawk and all. He confronts Quinn but she shuts him down, saying Finn is her only chance to get out of Ohio. If feminist hackles were allowed on men, mine would be all up, here.

The stuff about Will teaching the football team how to dance was pretty funny, I guess, but written by someone clearly unfamiliar with football. So, also, is the final game — while McKinley’s record and offense both suck, their defense is pretty awesome, holding the other team to just 6 points the whole game. Pretty convenient that they decide to pull out the ultimate trick play at the end, doing a choreographed dance to…well, guess what popular R&B, Kanye-approved song it is? The idea of confusing the other team with this routine seemed far-fetched until I remember that I employed a strategy like this one time in gym class, and we totally won. So, uh, sure, a team could really super get away with a minute of hip-hop dancing and then a 50-yard bomb to Puck for the score. And you’ll never know who kicks the winning PA so I’ll tell you: Kurt! Who then comes out to his (not very surprised) (but still loving) father! Rainbows, ticker-tape, etc.

Resolutions to the other stories aren’t as nice. Rachel has bagged glee for the musical. Puck is making indiscreet comments in the hallway. And, in a creepy twist, Terri is hoping to adopt the Quinn/Puck spawn, bribing Q with pre-natal vitamins in a car. That might turn out okay…but I’m just not sure.

There’s just too much going on now — too much for good payoffs, anyway. Here’s hoping that tonight’s ep was just an expository one, meant to open cans of worms that will be dealt with in a swift and timely fashion. But a few more like this, and I’m gonna want to get off the bus.