Millions of viewers tuned in for last week’s heart-wrenching episode of Glee that was a tribute to the life and death of Cory Monteith, the show’s beloved quarterback from McKinley High School. Claire Cohen, a senior at Stamford High, said, “I started crying in the first thirty seconds of the show and didn’t stop until the end.” The majority of viewers definitely had the same reaction while watching this episode due to the real emotions experienced by the cast while filming.

The track list included songs performed by some of Finn’s (Monteith) best friends including “If I Die Young” by the Band Perry, “Seasons of Love” from the show Rent, “Fire and Rain” by James Taylor, and “No Surrender” by Bruce Springsteen. The two most touching songs on the show were without a doubt Amber Riley’s cover of Finn’s  previous cover of “I’ll Stand By You” by The Pretenders,  in which she paid tribute to the wonderful heart that Finn had on and off the set. The definite tear jerker was when Lea Michele made an appearance in the last twenty minutes of the episode and sang a truly beautiful cover of Adele’s version of “Make You Feel My Love” that she dedicated to Finn and all of the times that he kept her company while singing in the car.

On Twitter, three of the top worldwide trends were #thequarterback, #ripcorymonteith, and #rememberingcory, and it was as if the tragedy of Cory’s death hit us all again as we watched each of the characters grieve within the hour. Tears were shed and hearts were hurting, yet possibly the most beautiful moment was when Kurt, Finn’s step-brother in the show, acknowledged the questions about his death simply by stating that how he died didn’t matter. What mattered was his life and all that he did for people, not the one moment in which his life ended. This was a very respectful move by the writers due to the fact that this tribute was about bringing light upon the beautiful person that was Cory Monteith in real life and Finn Hudson on screen.