The character has dealt with his attraction to both self-centered head cheerleader Quinn Fabray (Dianna Agron) and ambitious yet kindhearted glee club star singer Rachel Berry (Lea Michele), the series' female lead.

In the second season's eighth episode, "Furt", Entertainment Weekly's Tim Stack said, "It's been a while since we’ve gotten some Finn focus, and I think I just missed Cory Monteith.

"[12] Falchuk said of the Finn–Rachel relationship ahead of the third season, "We're not interested in breaking them up this year but at the same time the challenge is they are graduating, they are different kinds of people and where does that take you?

"[14] Finn is introduced as the stereotypical, somewhat clueless popular jock, captain and quarterback of the William McKinley High School football team.

Finn exercises his leadership skills, introducing the glee club members to the show's most identifiable quintessential song, Journey's Don't Stop Believin'.

Realizing he needs to plan a future to support his child and hopeful to gain a music scholarship, Finn entices Rachel to return to glee club by using her feelings for him and invites her on a date to a bowling alley where they kiss again.

[19] By the time Finn realizes that he truly does want to be with Rachel, he is chagrined to discover that she has started dating Jesse St. James (Jonathan Groff), the lead singer of rival glee club Vocal Adrenaline.

Cheerleader Santana Lopez (Naya Rivera) offers to take Finn's virginity to improve her social status and his, and he accepts, but afterward he regrets having done so and tells Rachel that he did not go through with it; she, in turn, falsely claims to have had sex with Jesse.

[20] Finn becomes increasingly jealous of Jesse, who had transferred schools to McKinley (supposedly to win Rachel's affections) and joined their glee club.

When Rachel becomes ill in episode 18 "Laryngitis" and loses her singing voice, Finn takes her to the doctor and again confesses his feelings to her in an effort to win her back.

Finn is ashamed, and in episode 20 "Theatricality" makes amends by standing up for Kurt at school when he is victimized by bullies Azimio Adams (James Earl III) and Dave Karofsky (Max Adler).

In "The Sue Sylvester Shuffle", Coach Beiste and Will Schuester force the entire football team to join the glee club for a week to settle their differences and dispel their prejudices.

At the same time, Sue arranges to have the cheerleading Regionals rescheduled to conflict with the football championship to sabotage both Beiste and Will, whose glee club now has to do the halftime show.

After a fake apology pushes him to the edge, Finn tells her to just "come out of the closet" and accuses her of being a coward for tearing other people down only because she can't admit to everyone that she's in love with Brittany.

In the episode "On My Way", the wedding is set for after the Regionals competition, which New Directions wins, but it is canceled after Quinn is badly injured in a car crash on her way to the ceremony.

Meanwhile, Finn learns his mother has lied about his father's death, which was actually due to a drug overdose likely connected to untreated PTSD following dishonorable discharge from the army and not killed in action as a hero.

He refuses to allow Rachel to jeopardize her future dreams as a Broadway performer, and on what was supposed to be the day of their wedding, instead sends her off on a train to New York without him, telling her that he has enlisted in the army and is "setting her free".

He finds out she kissed Brody (Dean Geyer), a NYADA junior, and feels that he doesn't belong in her world in New York, so he returns to Lima without telling her.

Will takes a leave of absence from McKinley to be a member of a blue-ribbon panel in Washington, DC, so starting in "Dynamic Duets", Finn becomes the interim director of New Directions.

Finn enlists Emma, who is deep in wedding preparations in advance of Will's return, to help him judge a glee club competition for which member is the best diva.

The reception goes on despite the failed wedding, where Finn delivers a speech to Rachel, clearly stating his intent for them to eventually reunite and tells her that they are endgame.

Rachel later thanks Finn for his intervention in "Sweet Dreams" when she calls him to get advice for choosing an audition song for the upcoming Broadway revival of Funny Girl.

During the competition a scandal unfolds as Finn's photo plaque - which was brought along as both reminder and inspiration - is stolen by their rival choir in an effort to sabotage New Direction's performance.

He frequently shares vocal leads with the main female singer, Rachel, as in the pilot episode's closing song, Journey's "Don't Stop Believin'", the single of which has sold over a million copies and been certified platinum in the US and Australia.

"[38] He was not called on to sing much on the first few episodes, as he rapped in "Push It" for "Showmance", had a short solo phrase in the song "I Wanna Sex You Up" in "Acafellas", and was not featured as a vocal lead in "Preggers".

Excluding a scene from the pilot of him singing a portion of "Can't Fight This Feeling" in the shower,[39] Finn's first solo songs are not until the show's tenth episode, "Ballad".

VanDerWerff praised the "terrific" cast in the pilot episode, and wrote that Monteith and Michele "are both agreeable and a little desperate for an outlet as the show choir's central two singers".

[64] The Chicago Tribune's Maureen Ryan opined that "Cory Monteith gives quarterback Finn Hudson a jock-ish authority mixed with an appealingly square naivete.

"[66] Shawna Malcom of the Los Angeles Times noted a contradiction in his characterization in the episode "Preggers"—she questioned whether the intelligence he demonstrated in striving for a football scholarship was incongruent in a character who believed he had impregnated Quinn by sharing a hot tub with her.

"[59] While reviewing "Funeral", the season's penultimate episode, Gonzalez said, "I was glad that the writers chose […] Finn and Kurt to be the ones to connect with Sue because I think they're two of the most genuine characters on the show.