“Ted Lasso” wrapped up Season 4 with everyone involved feeling good, including those watching.
Remember when that’s how TV was supposed to be?
It was far from the program’s best season. It’s unlikely “Ted Lasso” could ever approach its inaugural season, and hasn’t in the three since.
Season 4 was a bit all over the place, with chaotic storylines. Properly reflecting, perhaps, life in minor-league women’s soccer: having to deal with kids, side jobs, indifference, etc.
More likable than the WNBA, that’s for sure.
As AFC Richmond owner Rebecca Welton (played by Hannah Waddingham) said, “Being messy just means being alive.”
The characters in “Ted Lasso” are familiar and well-developed. You feel like you know them.
The heels aren’t really heels. They mostly get redemption. Happy endings for everybody. (But that’s what they said about Robert Kraft.)
You get invested in “Ted Lasso.”
You root for the characters.
“Ted Lasso” shouldn’t be watched through a critic’s eye, or a cynic’s. Do that, and you cheat yourself.
“Ted Lasso” is the opposite of what, say, ESPN has become: brash, bullying, bro-style.
Perhaps I’m no better.
But it’s good there’s a place for fun, family and forgiveness. “Ted Lasso” has a sweetness that sports long ago lost.
Will there be a Season 5?
The Season 4 finale could function as a series closer.
But series founder Jason Sudeikis and his creative team reportedly have story arcs ready for a few more seasons if Apple TV so dictates.
The best characters are Sudeikis in the title role, who normalizes a folksy, Midwest-sort of golly-gee positivity in a world where it barely exists anymore, let alone in big-time coaching; and Brett Goldstein as Roy Kent, soccer hard man turned coach who makes tough into human and hilarious.
But “Ted Lasso” has no duff characters.
Annette Badland’s portrayal of pub owner Mae Green was even funny after Mae died.
Sports aren’t necessarily fodder for creative TV.
“Friday Night Lights” was a bona fide gem. A great series based on a great movie based on a great book. Football meets coming of age. That’s unlikely to fail.
Other TV shows based on sports fall mostly short.
Too many were over the top, and so is “Ted Lasso.”
But series like “Eastbound and Down,” “Brockmire,” and “Winning Time” were even crazier (sillier?) and lacked the aforementioned sweetness.
ESPN’s “Playmakers” (2003) and current Canadian series “Heated Rivalry” are more groundbreaking than good (but not bad).
“Playmakers” was about a pro football team and dealt with drugs, steroids, domestic abuse and homosexuality. A player smoked crack in the locker room.
“Playmakers” got a big audience. But it hit too close to home for the NFL, which coerced ESPN to cancel it after one season.
“Heated Rivalry” is about two gay hockey players who are stars, foes and in a closeted relationship. One Canadian, one Russian. It’s very direct and captures the tightrope walked between public and private.
“The League” was good but was about fantasy football, not football. That paints a picture of our sports priorities, and it’s not a good one: make it about me.
I’m not sure what “Cobra Kai” was, but I loved it.
Source: triblive.com
