Vulture, New York magazine's entertainment division, applauded ABC Family's The Fosters for including a late-term abortion by a main character in the latest episode.

The Fosters is a series centered around a lesbian couple, Lena and Stef, raising a multiracial mix of biological, foster, and adopted children.

For Vulture, Margaret Lyons, an avid watcher of the series, writes:

Every week, The Fosters finds a new way to make me cry — often through empowering love, sometimes through supportive honesty. This week's big tearjerker caught me by surprise, though, because it's something very rarely depicted on television: The Fosters included a late-term abortion, and it was really damn sad.

In the latest episode, Lena is carrying a child by a sperm donor but develops preeclampsia, a life-threatening condition, and after multiple "wrenching conversations" with her wife and mother, decides to abort the baby. The pregnancy was at 20 weeks. Lyons said the show "kinda-sorta glossed over the fact that that's an abortion, but it is."

While everyone was sad, in the end, "the decision to survive and parent her five children seemed like the right one for Lena and the Fosters."

"Terminating a pregnancy is not inherently tragic — women have a variety of abortion experiences — but for Lena (and Stef), this was devastating," writes Lyons. She was pleased with this "slight spin" the show took by breaking with "normal" abortions and tackle the more rare late-term abortion:

This was about a parent's reproductive health and choices, and about a wanted pregnancy that put the mother's life at risk.

And besides abortion, Lyons praises the show's other plotlines that have kept her coming back week after week, such as how the show "proves" that biological parents aren't necessarily the best scenario ("your dad's a frequently irresponsible alcoholic, but your mom's new wife is actually the shiiiiit and is an excellent parent.")

Lyons closes the piece out by giving The Fosters her progressive seal of approval:

Come for the earnest teen drama, stay for the progressive politics, and then stay even longer for the deeply felt human drama.