the finchel stuff in britney britney is sort of rough bc like, i do think rachel is ultimately in the wrong Too in their fight, and it’s unhealthy for her to want to be the Only thing that makes finn happy - but it seems like the framing of the episode (and any discussion i’ve seen on other platforms) is that she’s More wrong than him and i just fundamentally think they’re both being immature teenagers in a high school relationship? and they both are kinda wrong and also both kind of have a point.
bc like… the context of their dynamic is that even if this is complicated now, he used to be the popular one with a lot more social power (who, as per the pilot, apparently at one point, threw eggs at her??) and that doesn’t just entirely disappear from their dynamic or her insecurities just because things are Somewhat different for him now. also like… last season, she was the girl he cheated on his girlfriend with, and, in all honesty, kind of strung along for a while. she’s not totally innocent in that first part - she did pursue him knowing he had a girlfriend. but it’s not irrelevant to their dynamic as it exists now. like that is actually literally how he treated her for half a season. and while i think choosing to be a relationship with him means she should try to trust him more, it’s not as simple as rachel being irrationally jealous or insecure as the show sort of acts like it is?
i don’t think he’s Evil for his side either; he’s a flawed teenager. and i don’t think he should just acquiesce to rachel not wanting him to be on the football team if it’s what he wants. but the fact that he can’t make any space for her to be somewhat insecure about it, or about the idea of him straying to other girls, in their first conversation (when he did ask her opinion of him not being on the team anymore in the first place), i would be frustrated by, given all that context! (i DO think he does a somewhat good job if trying to assure her later, at least, tbf to him.)
also i guess a point of frustration is that, in response to her saying something Admittedly not that healthy, but that genuinely isn’t intended to hurt his feelings, he laughs at santana making fun of her clothes in a pretty mean way. so… he’s allowed, by the narrative, to laugh at someone demeaning his girlfriend for the way she dressed (which he’s previously said he liked, so it seems like it’s literally just supposed to be a small retribution for her saying something he didn’t like.) but he’s also allowed, narratively, to have a problem with how she’s choosing to dress differently and have that be treated relatively sympathetically and resolved by the end of the ep… even though he, at the very least, punctuated someone demeaning her for not dressing sexily Enough before. (and he doesn’t just laugh! he literally says “santana has a point.”)
and this is not meant to be like “finn sucks and rachel’s a victim” post — she also doesn’t act great in this ep! what she says about wanting to be the only thing that makes finn happy, very pointedly telling him she gives her blessing for him to rejoin the football team “… if [he] can”, and setting up a trap/test for him with quinn - all not great behaviors either!
but at the end of the day, it’s just not lost on me that this episode ends with finn getting everything he wants — he’s back on the football team and rachel’s gone back to her normal way of dressing. and while i actually like her normal style a lot more than i do the way they style her when she’s trying to be stylish and sexy — it’s still fundamentally frustrating that? she’s the only one who really compromises on, like, Anything (read: everything) by the end of this episode.
