Sectionals (Episode)

This article is about the episode. You may be looking for the show choir competition level with the same name.

Sectionals is the thirteenth episode of Glee's first season and the thirteenth episode overall. It aired on December 9, 2009. After this episode, there was a four-month hiatus with the following episode, Hell-O, airing on April 13, 2010.

Sectionals is finally here for the Glee Club, but when Quinn's secret unravels, the club may not be able to recover in time to compete. Since Will has been disqualified from the competition, Emma steps up and tells him that she will take the kids to Sectionals as the club's faculty adviser even though her wedding is on the same day, and Will makes a potentially life-changing decision. Meanwhile, Sue's scheming hits an all-time high as Jane Addams Academy and Haverbrook School for the Deaf perform the New Directions setlist.

The episode was written and directed by Brad Falchuk.

Plot[]

Screen Shot 2013-08-11 at 1.28 — New Directions members trying to keep Rachel from finding out that Finn isn't the baby's father

As a result of a technicality in the show choir competition rules, Will is not allowed to accompany New Directions to Sectionals because he had accidentally taken payment for a commercial the club did. Mercedes is fed up with Rachel always getting the spotlight, so she proves to Rachel by singing And I Am Telling You I'm Not Going from Dreamgirls. Emma postpones her own wedding by several hours so that she can take the club in his place, although her fiancé, football coach Ken Tanaka, feels she is choosing Will over him. The glee club learns that Puck is the real father of Quinn's baby. They decide not to tell Rachel, believing that she will tell Finn, but she deduces it anyway and tells him. Finn runs into the choir room after Rachel reveals of the true paternity of "his" baby and punches Puck. Quinn, who breaks out in tears, begs him to stop and finally admits Puck is the true father. Finn shouts that he's done with her and with the others, implying that he's quitting New Directions.

336px-Quinn-father — 'Yes, Puck is the father'

Rachel follows Quinn to a bench in the hallway and apologizes for telling Finn. Much to her surprise, Quinn says she is not mad at her and Rachel did what she was not brave enough to do: tell the truth. Quinn asks Rachel to leave her alone and Rachel walks away, just in time to see Puck, who is approaching Quinn as well. He says he wants to be with her and do everything he can to be a good father. However, she declines, telling him that she wants to do this on her own for now.

New Directions arrive at the event to discover that their competitors have received an advance copy of their set list, and are performing the songs they have chosen. Emma calls Will, who talks with Finn in the locker room and leaves his car keys so that Finn can drive to the competition. Although he is still furious with Quinn and Puck, he decides to rejoin the club, and drives to Sectionals. During Sectionals the Jane Addams Academy performed the songs And I Am Telling You I'm Not Going and Proud Mary. Then the Haverbrook School for the Deaf performed Don't Stop Believin' which left the audience in tears and Rachel got up and left with the New Directions to make up a new setlist.

The club scrambles together a new set list. Emma then confronts rival choir directors Grace Hitchens and Dalton Rumba over their use of the leaked setlist, while New Directions are forced to choose new performance pieces at the last minute aided by the return of Finn. Mercedes allow Rachel to take over the ballad, because "if anyone is going to wing it on the fly," it should be her. Rachel says that she has a song that she's been working on since she was four, Don't Rain on My Parade. Finn arrives just in time and brings along a number that the New Directions can put together as their second choice, You Can't Always Get What You Want, while Quinn decides on the final song, Somebody to Love. After their performance, Grace attempts to confess her duplicity to the judges, but they have already unanimously decided that New Directions have won the competition.

MyLifeWouldSuckWithoutYouNewDirections — The kids singing My Life Would Suck Without You to Will

Having previously discovered that his wife Terri was faking her pregnancy, Will tells her he no longer loves her. He later attends Ken and Emma's delayed wedding to find that Ken has ended the relationship as a result of Emma's feelings for Will. She announces her intention to leave William McKinley High School, explaining that it will be too painful for her to carry on working with both Will and Ken. Back at school, Principal Figgins suspends Sue for leaking the glee club's set list, and has Will reinstated as New Directions' director. This leaves the Cheerios with no coach. The glee club members show Will their trophy and perform My Life Would Suck Without You for him because he couldn't be there to see them win Sectionals. As Emma prepares to leave the school, Will chases after her and stops her with a kiss.

Songs[]

Song Title	Original Artist	Performer(s)
And I Am Telling You I'm Not Going	Cast of Dreamgirls	Mercedes Jones
Don't Rain on My Parade	Cast of Funny Girl	Rachel Berry
You Can't Always Get What You Want	The Rolling Stones	New Directions
My Life Would Suck Without You	Kelly Clarkson	New Directions

Unreleased Songs[]

And I Am Telling You I'm Not Going from Dreamgirls sung by the Jane Addams Academy Glee club.
Proud Mary by Ike and Tina Turner sung by the Jane Addams Academy Glee club.
Don't Stop Believin' by Journey sung by the Haverbrook School for the Deaf Glee club.

Guest Cast[]

Special Guest Star[]

Eve as Grace Hitchens

Guest Stars[]

Co-Stars[]

Josh Sussman as Jacob Ben Israel
Peter Choi as Emcee
Thomasina Gross as Perfect Engleberger

Trivia[]

This episode was watched by 8.127 million viewers.
This episode gives the first hint that Santana and Brittany have been hooking up. Santana says, "Sex is not dating," and Brittany then adds, "If it were, Santana and I would be dating."
Jayma Mays called the kiss between her and Matt Morrison, "The Kiss."
- She wasn't given the script about the kiss, in order to keep it real.
"Sectionals" was originally supposed to be the last episode of the first season, but Fox asked for nine additional episodes after this one.
Rachel sang Don't Rain on My Parade for Sectionals from the musical Funny Girl.
- Characters, namely Rachel and Santana, are involved with the Broadway revival of the show during Season 5, with Santana the understudy to Rachel's Fanny Brice.
- Actress Lea Michele would also go on to play Fanny Brice in the real-life revival of the show, taking over from Beanie Feldstein in September 2022, following Feldstein's short run from April.
Both Shelby and Jesse (unknown at this point on the show) saw Rachel's performance of Don't Rain on My Parade as stated in Hell-O by Jesse and in Theatricality by Shelby. This enlightened Shelby that Rachel was her daughter due to their similar voices, range, and looks.
- Shelby sings the titular song from Funny Girl in Theatricality, comparable to Rachel's Don't Rain on My Parade from the same musical.
While the New Directions perform You Can't Always Get What You Want, Grace is watching them. To her right, there is one of the choreographers who choreographs Glee in real life, Brooke Lipton.
This is the episode that Lea Michele submitted for her 2010 bid for the Emmy for Lead Actress in a Comedy.
This is the final episode of the 2000s decade.
This is the only Sectionals competition in which Rachel sings solo. She is seen singing at least in (I've Had) the Time of My Life from Special Education, but there she performed as part of the group.
On Jenna and Kevin's Showmance Podcast, Glee Re-cap Edition Hairography Ep, actor and writer of the series Michael Hitchcock, who portrays Haverbrook's Choir Director Dalton Rumba, told, that in Sectionals episode he dropped his pretzel by accident, but carried on and acted like he didn't realize it. This is the take they used. This scene is around 19:30 minutes in.

Mistakes[]

When Quinn slips on the floor, Puck is ahead of Mike, but in the next shot, he is behind Mike.
Toward the end of Rachel's solo at Sectionals, the rest of the group comes on stage. In the close-up, you can clearly see Finn and Puck cross paths and stop behind her. Then, in the next shot, the boys are still walking by Rachel at the front of the stage.
When the Haverbrook School was performing "Don't Stop Believin'," there was a scene where a man wiped his tears, and Rachel shook her head upon seeing it. In the previous scene, which focused on the audience, Rachel had done the same action, thus repeating the same gesture twice.
The club asks for Will's help in setting the set list for Sectionals, and Will says he can't help them. However, the setlist is already in place, as Sue has leaked it to the other two teams.
- Furthermore, it seems unlikely, that disqualification of the coach automatically nullifies the setlist, so the New Directions just try to stick to the songs, that are already set. But still they consider «ballad» vacant, although And I Am Telling You I'm Not Going is already in the leaked setlist. And given how Mercedes’ rendition of that song left everyone, including Rachel, in awe, they wouldn’t have thought twice, when they devise the setlist.
  - Furthermore, if three songs in leaked setlist was set in stone, New Directions should rehearse them a lot. So why Mercedes’ rendition of And I Am Telling You I'm Not Going left everyone, including Rachel, in awe?
Emma had first stated (since her engagement with Ken) that she did not want to have a big ceremony for their wedding, so nobody had to know about it- or even be there. However, the reception clearly showed preparation for a fair amount of guests (finger food, reception hall, etc.).