This is a mischaracterization of what I'm talking about. The things you are talking about are plot elements. Glaurung is the main threat of the season finale.
To me Glaurung looks like part of the threat of Angband and Morgoth, not something wholly unrelated to Angband. He's not from another planet, or even another continent. Those other plot elements will also be the main plots of their respective episodes. I don't see the difference between them. And we are not introducing Nargothrond or Gondolin before Dagor Aglareb, so we're already introducing new plot elements after the season midpoint and certainly after Episode 4.
Also, I never said that all of the major storylines should be introduced in episode 1, but the first 3-4 episodes. On this point I have not been the least bit vague, so I'm really curious as to where the exaggeration is coming from.
I am sorry that I've misunderstood you. To me it has been vague nonetheless. I know it must be very annoying that I often don't understand what's obvious to everyone else.
I recognize that he can't be new in Episode 13, but I don't agree that he needs to be already a Dragon in Episode 4.
There are examples both in SilmFilm and in other arc-heavy shows of introducing major plot elements in the second half of a season, such as the Trolls in last season, and the Shadows in Babylon 5. The Trolls didn't feel like a problem to me and I don't remember you saying that they would cause a problem or that they had to be introduced in Episode 3 or 4. I don't see how Glaurung is any different from the Trolls in this regard. He's a new kind of monster from Angband, not an entirely separate antagonist unrelated to Morgoth. He's a big deal, but he's an integrated part of the larger picture of Angband, which we'll empasize by showing him being created and growing bigger in Angband.
I tried to re-watch the Babylon 5 episodes in question last night, to remind myself how they went, but had too many technical difficulties. Babylon 5 introduced a completely new antagonist, which was utterly unrelated to all previous antagonists and which became the primary antagonist for two seasons. These Shadows were first mentioned in Episode 13/22 of Season 1, and first appeared as concrete antagonists in Episode 9/22 of Season 2. While Babylon 5 does have flaws and tempo problems in some of its other plotlines, the Shadows storyline was timed and written beautifully.
So I cannot agree with you that the Dragon project can't be introduced after Episode 4.
And I've asked a couple of times now why Glaurung can't be introduced in the early season
as a Maia instead of as a pre-existing Dragon. My suggestion has not been addressed at all. I do not see why showing that Glaurung used to be a Maia would be such an awful thing.
I remain very concerned that by using your timeline, in which Dragons are already created in Episode 4, that Morgoth will do nothing whatsoever after the Dagor Aglareb, for 5 episodes (200 years), and possibly end the season by giving up for 195 more years. We need to show Morgoth reacting to the Dagor Aglareb by making actual new plans, and your planned timeline shows the opposite. I strongly think that depicting Morgoth as utterly passive/doing nothing for 5 episodes is a bad idea, and a much worse problem than introducing a plot element in Episode 9.
Morgoth won't be on screen for several episodes before Dagor Aglareb, and then would do nothing for 5 episodes after. He'd be absent or inactive for almost the whole season.
So what is the overall picture of the bad guy activityu this season? They are failing and struggling. That's not very impressive. Their efforts will (except for the kidnappings) look unimpressive, at least to some degree.
I think it will be far more menacing, and far less unimpressive, if Morgoth reacts to the Dagor Aglareb with confident, decisive action and new plans. He will be very unimpressive indeed if he reacts by throwing up his hands, completely giving up, and sulking passively for hundreds of years.
Imagine this: the Enemy is defeated utterly in battle, his forces crushed, his fortress besieged. Some of his minions are feeling hopeless... but Morgoth simply says this was merely a temporary setback and the Elves will all be ended in due time. I can always breed more Orcs. And then without concern, without any sign that he takes this as a decisive defeat, he immediately begins building a new weapon. That would be menacing, even terrifying.
Far more menacing than Morgoth sitting on his hands for 5 episodes, passively watching other people make decisions for him.
I was in agreement until the last sentence. We know that Glaurung is still in his youth at the end of this season. The body into which Glaurung is introduced need not be fully grown only to suddenly not be fully grown immediately thereafter.
You have a good point. You're right the body can't be fully grown. At the same time I don't like the idea of Glaurung ever being like a puppy, a baby, on screen. I think he should start already well on his way to adulthood, already a substantial portion of his final adult size.