By Demian
Under the patient guidance of Coach Beiste, the McKinley High Titans have miraculously emerged from the latest football season with a winning record, and are therefore headed on towards the conference championship game -- in Ohio, in February. Unfortunately, Dave Karofsky's ongoing Capital-I Issues with his sexual orientation have led him into an openly antagonistic relationship with Finn and the other male Glee Clubbers, both on the field and off, with all of the non-singing football players backing him up for some reason that makes absolutely no sense whatsoever.
With her players thus so divided, and despairing of her team's chances at that conference game in Ohio in February, Coach Beiste turns to Mr. Schue for advice. Just go with it. Will, of course, suggests they build bridges between Karofsky & Ko. and New Directions by forcing the non-Glee football players to join show choir for a week, and the results are initially as disastrous as one would expect. Somehow, though, he convinces everyone involved that a super-spectacular halftime performance inspired by a 30-year-old music video will make them all, like, totally cool, and Karofsky even starts emerging from his hostile shell during the joint rehearsal sessions, but everything goes to hell when Karofsky & Ko. find themselves slushied by the much-loathed yet gloriously bemulleted puckheads of McKinley's hockey team.
Because of all that, Karofsky and his compatriots flat-out refuse to participate in the super-spectacular halftime festivities, but Coach Beiste stands her ground and boots every single one of them off the team, effective immediately, even though that means she's heading into that conference game in Ohio in February with only five players. Fortunately, Rachel and Mercedes decide to visit Kurt and Blaine over at not-gay-at-all Dalton Academy, and avid gridiron aficionado Blaine comes up with a solution I totally didn't understand, because I am proud to count myself as one of the many, many queers who still hate football. Blaine's proposed solution, however, leads to the Glee Gals volunteering themselves as replacements for Karofsky & Ko., and for yet another reason that makes absolutely no sense whatsoever, it works.
Meanwhile, Sue Sylvester's got her track bottoms all knotted up in a nasty wad because the cheerleaders' Nationals are week, and her lack of inspiration threatens to derail her chances for a record-breaking seventh consecutive title. Sue decides that her only course of action is to shoot Brittany out of a carny cannon at a key moment during the Cheerios' routine, but when Brit-Brit -- with the support of both Quinn and Santana Lopez, surprisingly enough -- balks, Sue completely loses her cool and forces all three of them to resign from New Directions.
Everything comes to a head on the night of The Big Game in Ohio in February, with the other team rather predictably kicking the Titans' diminished ass until Puck and Finn work a little magic both to convince the recalcitrant non-singing football players to perform at halftime and to rescue the cheerleading Glee Gals from Sue's evil clutches so they might do the same. Everyone in the stands of course goes gaga for the halftime routine -- even Karofsky so loses himself in the moment that he joins the others on the field for the grand finale -- and with her team thus so happily reconstituted, Coach Beiste goes on to lead the Titans to victory. In Ohio. In February.
Sadly, the loss of Quinn, Brittany, and Santana Lopez means that Sue also loses what would have been her record-breaking seventh consecutive Nationals title, and she's forced to endure the abject humiliation of a Katie Couric interview. I've a feeling Sue'll bounce back by week's episode, though. Call it a hunch.
Featuring the hateful Katy Perry's equally hateful "California Gurls," performed by the Cheerios, their flaming boobs, and a bunch of guys on dirt bikes; Lady Antebellum's "Need You Now," performed by Puck and Rachel; 1950s advertising classic "See The U.S.A. In Your Chevrolet," performed by most of New Directions during the episode's first commercial break; "She's Not There" from The Zombies, performed by the McKinley High Titans; "Bills, Bills, Bills" from Destiny's Child, as trilled by Dreamboat Blaine and The Dalton Academy Gays; and, finally, the much-hyped mash-up of a thirty-year-old music video with some song I never heard before, as performed by everyone and their mom during the halftime show.
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