Ted Lasso recap: “Mom City” has bits and pieces of a killer Lasso episode
In the season's penultimate outing, Ted and Jamie reevaluate their relationships with their mothers
TV Reviews Lasso
Ted Lasso is at its best when it remembers it’s a soccer comedy. And while it’s clear that these three seasons have seen the sitcom morph into something more melancholy and more dramatic—not to mention obscenely longer—the show can still find ways of rekindling what it was that first drew so many of us to its charms.
“Mom City” has bits and pieces of a killer Ted Lasso episode. But it has just as many of its many foibles. As a penultimate episode, it works perfectly to begin tying up many of its season-long (if not outright series-long) arcs all the while setting up what may be on the horizon in next week’s finale episode.
The title of this episode refers to the two main storylines we were egged on to follow: Ted and his reunion with Momma Lasso and Jamie’s with his own mom back in Manchester. Both plots found these grown men needing to reevaluate their relationships with their moms, with Ted finally able to voice the resentment he’s nurtured about his upbringing and Jamie finally allowed to let go of the pressure his father’s influence has on his playing.
I’ll admit that I wasn’t as sold on Ted’s plot as I was on Jamie’s. Mostly because, either by design or unintentionally, Ted has felt like an outlier in his own show. Even this episode, with his mom randomly showing up like some deus ex machina plot device, meant he spent the episode’s HOUR AND TEN MINUTES (!) in his own little personal side-quest that eventually brought home the central tension of his character for this entire season: his guilt at parenting from afar. I will say, though, that Sudeikis truly found a way to make that Thank You/Fuck You scene works as a beautiful payoff for Ted’s long-running work on himself.
And yes, we’re all aware of the news he likely gave Rebecca at the end of the episode, yes? But that’s for next week…
Meanwhile, Jamie, returning to Manchester after leaving the team to pursue a career in reality TV only to then end up back at Richmond, gave our beloved star player a chance to reassess who he wants to be and how he wants to play. As a foil to the narcissism of Zava, Jamie has found a way to be a key player for Richmond without thinking of himself as indispensable—though that’s clearly how everyone around him sees him. And yet it’s the nagging taunts from Man City fans (and his father alike) that eventually get to him, forcing Keeley and Roy to team up to help buoy his spirits.
And that involves, as the many (many!) references to The Wizard Of Oz throughout the episode reminds us, returning home. (You can’t have missed them right? Ted and Coach Beard were playing on a pinball machine themed after Dorothy and friends; You’ve Got Mail, which the team watched together, ends with a rendition of Judy Garland’s famed “Somewhere Over The Rainbow”; and the end credit song this week was, aptly, The Wiz’s “Home,” perhaps a blunt a hint about where Ted himself may be headed next week.)
But it’s Jamie who returns home and has a lovely heart to heart with his mother first, finding the strength to face his haters in his hometown and emerge (surprise!) a hero as he leads Richmond toward a nailbiter of a win against Man City—and yes, setting the underdog team for a win for the ages in next week’s episode.
Elsewhere, Nate, having quit his job at West Ham is now seemingly thriving as a waiter alongside his girlfriend. Though, and you’ll never guess this, he’s kind of unhappy. Or, rather, unsatisfied—so when three of Richmond’s brightest come and tell him how much the team wants him back (huh? Yeah, I don’t quite follow how that would’ve happened but okay!), he spends the episode reassessing whether going back to Richmond with Ted’s blessing, of course, would be something he’d even consider. And yes, both he and the show know that such a return would require an about-face from Coach Beard, who gets a lovely speech with the wonderkid where he gets to lecture us all about the beauty of second chances.
That all these storylines were threaded and came to fruition during the Richmond vs. Man City match (we saw so many amazing plays!) only made this penultimate installment feel all the stronger. Its cast of characters always feel most solid and funny and touching when held together by a match, or a practice, or even a common enemy—and that was definitely the case here where issues of motherhood, grace, and kindness came to the surface as everyone from Ted to Nate to Jamie and even Roy and Keeley and Rebecca continued to realize that more important than winning is knowing how and with whom to win.
Moreover, Momma Lasso tells Ted that even while you sometimes win and you sometimes lose, what you always do is keep playing. Again, much like the best Ted Lasso moments, sports are used as a helpful metaphor with which to approach life. What’s key is understanding where it is you want to spend your life playing. Ted and Nate may have two very different (if complementary) choices to make next week, but they’ll both come down to finally letting themselves own up to what it is they’ve long wanted to do.
Will the show’s season (series?) finale stick the landing as it likely sets up Nate as Richmond’s coach while Ted opts to head home to be a father to his young boy? I sure hope so.
Stray observations
- Becky Ann Baker remains such a welcome screen presence, here making the most out of Momma Lasso with just the right blend of folksy passive aggression that makes it clear that the apple didn’t fall too far from the tree. The impulse of the show to illustrate just how insidious that honeyed sweetness can truly be may be one of the most inventive aspects of Ted Lasso’s premise.
- Can we all agree that Rebecca’s “Freddie Mercury’s greatest talent was flipping straights” is easily the funniest joke we’ve had maybe all season? (Also, don’t mind me, I’ll be listening to “Fat Bottomed Girls” for the rest of the day.)
- Am I the only one who’s getting throuple vibes from Jamie, Keeley and Roy? (I am, aren’t I?)
- Who do we think is the musical aficionado in the Ted Lasso writers’ room? In addition to those The Wiz/Wizard Of Oz moments we even got a callout to Les Mis and a Hair reference with that “Manchester England” needle drop. (Also, I’m half counting “The Unsinkable Jamie Tartt” as a passing reference to the 1964 film about Molly Brown, and there’s nothing you can do to stop me.)
- Would you rather have a poster of Keeley or of young Roy in your childhood bedroom?
- I’d hoped we’d get more from Rebecca this episode (don’t I always?), but it seems, from those visitors she got toward the end, that we may be seeing Rupert getting his comeuppance once and for all sooner rather than later.
200 Comments
Honestly, if this wasn’t an A rated episode in your eyes, I don’t know what more the show can give you. And I don’t think we’re watching the same show. The entirety of the Beard/Nate scene, from jump scare to quite contemplation ranks up there with the best things this show’s ever put to film.
don’t be so overdramatic. Just because you think it’s an “A” episode, doesn’t mean we all do. sheesh.
Bud, you spaz out in the comments every time a review goes up. You seem deeply unwell.
SHUT UP SHUT UP SHUT UP!
Legend has it, that if you say “Kore Mara Minna De Mechakucha Odotte Sawago Sawago” into a mirror 3 times, they appear behind you telling you all the things they hate about Ted Lasso season 3.I’m not even sure you have to go to the trouble of saying the name either, they love appearing and saying it so much.
“don’t be so overdramatic.”
Yes, isn’t it quite overdramatic to calmly disagree with a review.
It’s Manuel’s mama, here again to defend her baby boy.
It’s hard for me to think of any show this season being an “A” since this entire season had been a “D” in my mind.
I mean, that was a great scene, but it was one scene in an episode that ran for one hour and nine minutes.
If you had something better to do you’d be doing it.
What does that have to do with anything other being knee-jerk rude and insulting to someone because they criticized a TV show? If only ten minutes of a nearly-70-minute episode of TV are at an A level, I agree with not giving the whole thing an A. So what?
And it was a glorious one hour and nine minutes.I finally figured it out why some of you are hating on the longer episodes. Short attention span. That also explains why some of y’all have been having a hard time connecting the narrative dots here and there.
No, it’s because despite the longer runtimes, the show continually still skips over important steps in the storytelling or puts them off-screen, or doesn’t address obvious conflicts or storytelling possibilities in the plots it sets up, or puts its characters into meaningless stories that don’t serve the characters well at all and even reduce them from what they once were (this one is really for Keeley, mostly).One day someone who loves Ted Lasso unconditionally will be able to respond to people who criticize it without insulting them, but I’m not holding my breath on that one.
Some people just need everything spelled out to them to understand something and that’s fine. You’re not any less of a person because of it, just different. I get it.
Looks like today is not the day either.
I bet you run into assholes all day, huh.
Just the one who insulted me unprompted three days ago and has kept on going since.
I can’t fathom how much you must be hurting if you consider what I’ve said insulting. I’m so sorry. That wasn’t the intention. It’s okay to be different, you’re not any less than–no matter what you tell yourself. Much love.
And I can’t fathom how people still convince themselves they’re being “nice” when they’re being obviously passive-aggressive. I’m sorry your lack of self-awareness and social skills prevents you from realizing that dressing up your insults to other people’s cognitive abilities in faux-polite language doesn’t fool other people. And I’m really sorry that your stage of emotional development is such that you feel the need to treat people this way because they criticized a television show. I hope this will be an opportunity for you to grow into someone with healthier emotional attachments and into someone who actually treats people with kindness instead of just pretending to.Every day is a chance to grow— to be a little more mature, to be a little more kind, to be a little more decent, to be a little more healthy, to be a little more like the person you hope to be. It’s up to you whether you take that chance.
Good review. Agree on the B rating. great to see Becky Ann Baker, who i’ve loved since Freaks&Geeks.i live in Manchester, so it was really cool to see Jamie spitting at cars whilst walking along Hulme Arch Bridge, which i’ve walked across a zillion times :-)i actually rewatched Sleepless in Seattle recently for the first time since i was a kid, that film is so problamatic with Meg Ryan stalking Tom Hanks and manipulating his young son so she can get pounded by Hanks.
First thoughts, I feel this rating is about right. We got lots of moments that feel like the show at its best, but some parts still felt half-baked. Either dragged out too long without being explicated, or not really being developed or shown in the first place. The important moments all landed, though. I just felt like it really didn’t need to take 59 minutes to get to the last ten or so. It was obvious something was Going On with several of our main characters; it felt like they drew it out longer than they needed to.And the Nate stuff still feels weird because we see so little of the process behind anyone’s decisions. Nick Mohammed can play the regret about his past actions well, but it feels… I dunno, in part like his turn this season was too easy and convenient, part like we don’t really get much of the decision-making to bring him back (like the players just showing up the next time we see Nate and offering him a job) or his attempts to make amends— the latter, hopefully, we will see more of next week, though. Speaking of next week, I wish we’d gotten some more specifics on Bex and Miss Kakes showing up to Rebecca’s home, but between that, Miss Kakes not working for Rupert anymore last episode, and Trent Crimm’s mention of workplace misconduct rumblings at West Ham, it’s not terribly hard to see where this is probably going. (Same with Ted’s bombshell— I agree, Manuel; it’s going to be that this is his final season and he’s returning to the States.)Like I said, though, the big moments worked. Beard’s monologue to Nate was terrific; A+ stuff there. Ted and his mom’s confrontation was good. I liked Ted’s speech to Jamie, although I wish it had been developed a little more earlier in the episode. (I mean that in the sense of— I caught on kinda quickly that Jamie hadn’t heard from his father about getting him tickets, so something must be off there and that was at least part of why he was feeling off, so it just took the show a long time to get to addressing that from the point I had gotten there.) The highs were good and there was a lot of funny stuff in this episode, too. A good amount of A material, just not 69 minutes’ worth.
Oh, and in one of my favorite Jamie moments, I did love his little dickhead smirk he gives when he re-enters the game and the crowd starts booing him again— even more than the “come on” type gesturing afterward.Where was Jamie’s dad? Rehab? The age range of the people around him made me think it wasn’t a nursing home.
Yes it was rehab.
I guess his two friends (Bug and the other guy whose name I can’t remember, since it’s not “Bug”) pulling out the flasks right before they cut to him was a subtle hint.
I thought he was dead until we saw the cutaway to him happily watching the match.
Yeah, I think that was intentional on the writers’ part, with the “his dad would have been proud.”
I assumed it was rehab and I’m surprised it wasn’t mentioned in the review above. It seems like another way the show illustrates how the culture change within the Richmond clubhouse ripples outward to affect others. I liked that they showed Jamie texting his dad, but not his dad’s reply. That is the sort of “connect the dots” move that works in the context of the show. We know what’s going to come next, so we don’t need to see it in order to resolve that plot thread.
Speaking of the culture change, I haven’t seen any reviewer mention that Ted’s “thank you” / “fuck you” speech to his mom is a direct reflection of what Jamie told him he wanted to say to his dad. That’s a storytelling mode the show works in well for me: Ted has influenced Jamie to grow and be a better person; the new, improved Jamie, in turn, influences Ted to take the steps he needs to take to grow. (What’s the opposite of a vicious cycle? A healthy upward spiral?)
Oh, two other really funny moments:Roy telling the kids “good lads” after they taunt Jamie.“Jade said if I didn’t fire you, she’d report me over… Well, I can’t tell you, then you’ll know what I’ve done.” (Also, Derek clearly being on coke in that scene.)
What do you think he had done?
No idea, but I figure at best it could get the restaurant shut down and at worst it could send him to prison.
Given the two pregnancy fake-outs they’ve done the last two episodes — the wine club and Rebecca having no truth bomb – Ted’s announcement may just be that Nate is coming back to the team starting today. I think during the course of game week, a golden opportunity to coach in the US is going to present itself — like the US National Team or Sporting KC of the MLS (as seen Apple TV+!) and that’s going to twist Ted into knots while he tries to decide.
Both plots found these grown men needing to reevaluate their relationships with their moms…That’s a bit of a stretch. Jamie reaffirmed his relationship with his mom.This was an almost perfect episode, except for the part with the guys visiting Nate at the restaurant. I was convinced it was a dream sequence until we saw Jade eavesdropping, and then I was like WTF? That came out of nowhere.
Regarding: the guys visiting Nate. That’s been my biggest problem with this season. It feels like everything (outside of his relationship with Jade) is being resolved offscreen for Nate this year. We didn’t get to see him leave West Ham, we didn’t get to see the guys talking about bringing him back, etc. Those feel like important plot points that the show has just kinda breezed past.
Agreed, a 20 second scene of the team conspiring (behind the coaches backs) to bring Nate back and say a couple nice things about him to justify them coming to that decision would have made that that Isaac, Colin and Will scene fit better.
Plus, there’s absolutely no reason that a team on a 15-game win streak would entertain bringing a potentially toxic person back into their clubhouse. You don’t mess with chemistry at that point, particularly when the person in question left so badly. So seeing exactly how the team came to this decision would have done a lot to make that restaurant scene more believable.
If it’s so obvious what the preceding scene in that thread was, it would just be pandering to explicitly show it.
To your exact point, there have been at least a few occasions this season where we’re watching an episode and think wait, did we accidentally skip an episode??
Am I the only one who’s getting throuple vibes from Jamie, Keeley and Roy? (I am, aren’t I?)Not getting those vibes, but now that you mention it…it’s the perfect solution.
I thought there was a chance Roy and Keeley were going to bang on Jamie’s childhood bed.
Yup.
Yeesssss….
I didn’t get throuple vibes, but the vibes I was picking up between Jamie and his mum sure were… something.
Yes, and it was the least Ted Lasso-like thing I’ve ever watched on the show tbh.
Right? How did the reviewer and so many commenters ignore the throbbing hard Oedipal vibes between Jamie and his mom? And it wasn’t even explained. Just dropped in the episode like that’s a totally normal way to interact with your mother. Weird shit.
I saw them, and then I tried my hardest to unsee them. And yet I could not.
One other thing I’ll add that’s a separate thought— rewatching some of the first two seasons, I’ve come to notice more callbacks I didn’t before. The opening to this episode was definitely a reflection / re-creation of the opening scene of the season 2 finale, after the story about Ted’s panic attack runs.But my favorite little thing I noticed was the callback in last week’s episode, which I don’t think I’ve seen mentioned anywhere. In season 2, after Edwin Akufo offers to take Sam to a museum and get some food:HIGGINS: So strange. I once wrote a play about a billionaire who took a footballer to a museum and then dinner.
KEELEY: What happens in the play?
HIGGINS: Well, they get their meal for free because they found a little bit of glass in the pasta.And then, when we see Edwin for the first time in Sam’s restaurant last week, he tells Sam that his associate found a tiny piece of glass in his food and he assumes the meal will be comped.
There were so many callbacks this episode. Just a few that I noticed:- Mama Lasso “misunderstanding” what Rebecca meant by a tour, just like Ted did in episode 1 of season 1. She also told a lot of stories Ted has told before, she just tells them differently (e.g. the poop in the candy wrapper story!)
– Sam and Rebecca’s Bantr usernames were based on the usernames of the characters from You’ve Got Mail.
– Keeley’s hotel videos (one of my favourite running jokes).- The origin of Jamie’s “I’m a sexy little bay-beh”.
– Jamie has said several times he had a poster of Roy on his wall growing up.- “Did he just say Tooting?”- Oklahoma.
Oh, yeah, the Keeley hotel video was great, and called back to one of my favorite episodes. I really loved how they used the callback in that same season 1 episode too, when the team is deciding where to go out after they beat Everton.
Not a callback, but a reference from a couple of weeks ago that I forgot to bring up: at one point a soccer ball hits (and cracks?) the window of Higgins’ office, and he mutters “Juuuust a little bit outside”, which is a reference to Major League, which the show is pretty open about stealing its initial setup from. (It’s more famous from the commercial, which at the time was on TV every 5 minutes for months.)
I laugh my ass off every time the team goes to another hotel and Keeley is the presenter on the hotel’s default channel. Every time.
I highly suggest watching them again with subtitles on. You (or at least I) catch so much missed hilarity even when it’s off screen and quietly in the background
100%. I watch most TV with the subtitles on, and there’s some funny stuff that the captions pick up that I don’t otherwise.
“And then, when we see Edwin for the first time in Sam’s restaurant last week, he tells Sam that his associate found a tiny piece of glass in his food and he assumes the meal will be comped.”
Is that a callback or just two times that a very well-known and obvious scheme was used?
Jamie’s dad does not taunt him along the fans in the episode, Jamie just think he is, as he hasn’t heard from him since Wembley.The show reveals that Jamie Sr is clearly in a rehab facility, looking sober and cleaned up while celebrating his son’s goal.
Once again, I speak to the fans of this show: Life is too short to argue with this guy.
You do, of course, get that the point of these reviews is for people to discuss the show?
I’m awfully tired of reading complaints every week about the running time of the shows. It’s like reviewers have a checklist of things to pick at, and that’s at the top. I personally like the long shows, and was quite happy with this episode!
But you’re WRONG!
The length doesn’t matter if it all feels essential. The problem is that a lot of the time I feel like these longer episodes could stand to be trimmed down and we wouldn’t really lose anything, and also that somehow despite the length they still skip out on scenes I’d consider important to the story. (As someone else mentioned, nearly all the major beats in Nate’s story this season have happened offscreen.)
What the hell else do they have to do? They don’t work for a living.
What was the Queen song played at the end?
“Fart-Bottom Girls”
You live up to your user name. : )
Not; there was more of a ballad-y type song. I know FBG; it’s my favorite Q song.
During the montage? How about this one? It’s not an actual Queen song, but it does have a Brian May guitar solo starting around 2:25
That’s the one. Has a Queen-ness to it and that vocal isn’t as close to Freddy as I thought when watching, but he’s good. Also explains why I’d never heard it before. Thx!
Random thoughts in no particular order:
– You noticed all the Wizard of Oz references but didn’t notice that Mama Lasso’s name is Dorothy?
The Wizard of Oz references started in the very first episode of the first season – “We’re not in Kansas anymore, Coach.”- Nate was not unhappy at his job. He was proud of what a good waiter he was and enjoying having a job with low stakes.
I thought it was clear why the Richmond team approached Nate. It was widely reported that he’d had been fired from West Ham, and the next the team hear Nate’s working as a waiter in a little restaurant in Tooting. Will probably told them about the apology. In their eyes, he’s been humbled and he’s trying to change. The team has been taught by Ted to give second chances (we had a reminder of the second chance they gave Jamie this episode, and how well that paid off) and not to judge people by their worst moments. And Nate was also part of the team for 20 years. Of course they extended a hand of friendship.
(One of the things I love about Ted Lasso is that it expects emotional intelligence and emotional detective work from its audience. The writers often leave deliberate spaces in the pscyhological aspects of the story, where the audience can interpolate based on what we’ve already seen and what we know about the characters. These then usually get confirmed later. I’m sure more details of Nate’s departure from West Ham and transformation story are coming next week, now that Rupert’s three exes have teamed up).
– Speaking of puzzle pieces falling into place, Beard’s monologue was so damn good. That whole sequence was great, with Beard’s angry reaction, Ted pointedly showing Beard the video, Beard’s speech, the ‘headbutt’. It illuminated so much about both Ted’s character (“I knew right there and then that I was never going to let anybody get by me with out understanding they might be hurting inside”) and Beard’s character, which has remained pretty opaque up to this point. Even his caginess about his past and his air of mystery are explained now. And some of his previous comments take on a new, darker meaning (like the comment about being paid to bite someone).
– Van Damme wearing a mask. The Mask of Zorreaux! Also wow he carried the entire team that match, the man deserves a medal.- You are NOT the only one who is wondering about some kind of Roy/Jamie/Keeley relationship. I’ve been thinking about it for weeks, but I figured the show would never go there.
– I really think Ted Lasso does personal growth better than any show on television. I’m not saying it’s perfect. But seeing Jamie, Beard, Nate and Ted’s breakthroughs this episode – well, it’s downright healing to watch.
Your point about letting the audience connect the dots is a good one, although I find it to be a mixed bag in its execution. Sometimes it works, but other times I feel like the scenes that are left out could have been really satisfying or engaging if they were included. I don’t mind connecting the dots a little, but– especially with these episode lengths– I don’t want the best stuff to happen offscreen, either.
Yeah, I think the show is struggling a bit with its large ensemble cast, especially with two of the main characters being away from Richmond this season. Personally I would have preferred less of Keeley’s odd storyline and more of Nate’s. I’m still not sure why it was necessary for Keeley to leave Richmond and form her own PR firm.
Yeah, agreed. Keeley’s story has kept her away from the rest of the cast unnecessarily, they didn’t even really much explore her growth as a boss and learning how to run a business, and really the most notable part of that storyline is that she had a fling with her funder which ended badly. I think she’s been the worst served by this season. She was such a complex and vivid character in season 1, and this season I feel like we’ve seen so little of that character, as the show instead largely focused on her dating and sex life.And I think we needed more Nate for the story the show wanted to tell with him this season, at least. We really don’t see much of the guy he became in season 2, even – he seems to mostly be back to being awkward and eager to please, then he gets a girlfriend and he’s redeemed. Just didn’t really get any sense of any actual journey for him in this regard— it’s just like two moments and now he’s fine again.
My interpretation was that Nate didn’t need redemption per se. It was pretty apparent at the start of the season that his entire heel turn last season was more lashing out, than an actual evil turn.He was the same shy, awkward dude that wanted to fit in from his first appearance this season. They didn’t need much screen time to show that he didn’t fit in with Rupert’s ilk and those awkward times he tried to emulate Richmond’s environment showed he was a better fit in Richmond.They could have added more Nate, but it would have likely been Rupert trying to “treat” Nate to the spoils of success, with Nate watching uncomfortably or making awkward excuses to leave. The other part of his arc would have involved him making amends and waiting tables.They did devote quite a bit of time to him laying in bed, with his dad calling him a genius to snap him out of it and push him towards making amends. Thos other parts might not have been great television, even if the idea of them is interesting.
I liked Keeley getting to start her own firm, but I do not understand why the writers didn’t immediately make Richmond her #1 client. That would have kept her around the clubhouse a lot more, and could have given an opportunity to flesh out a bit more of the Roy/Keeley dynamics and backstory about what went wrong. It would have been so simple to do the PR firm while still working with Richmond.
One thing that gets me about Keeley’s story is how her company effectively shut down immediately after Jack pulled funding. Like what, they had zero income from any clients? Also, didn’t Rebecca offer last episode to take over funding it? I just can’t see how it makes sense that she goes from 100 to zero so quick.
I am in no way a business-type-person, but none of that made any sense to me—not only does the VC firm give KJPR one day of warning, but apparently they can pull out money they’ve already invested in the firm, and KJPR apparently had zero cash reserves or any other sources of revenue. Maybe hiring Barbara back wasn’t the best move…
I agree, where did that come from. The time between the end of one EPL season and the start of another is very short. And in that time, Keeley purchases and starts running a PR firm and Roy and Keeley inexplicably split up. The Jack storyline and the Zava storyline were entirely unnecessary.
“I’m still not sure why it was necessary for Keeley to leave Richmond and form her own PR firm.”Early on, Keeley noted that at 18 she was dating a 25 year old football player and 15 years later she was dating a 25 year old football player. She has spent so much time as an attachment to the football club that for her to grow she needed to escape it’s orbit for a while.
Sure, but is it realistic she’d be able to open up her own firm after working for one year in a PR job at a football club? That was literally her only PR experience up to that point, she was a model before that. But even if it made sense for the character, it made no sense for the plot to strand Keeley in her own irrelevant storylines all season.
Yeah, the execution of the connect the dots moments has been uneven at best, and at worst it’s left viewers feeling like they’re missing out on large plot developments. One of the reasons why so many viewers aren’t sold on Nate’s redemption arc is because we haven’t been given the catharsis of watching him or the team/Ted/Beard work toward change or forgiveness. So it was really frustrating when this episode opened much like the last one did: with characters telling us about a major plot development—the team deciding to ask Nate to return—rather than us seeing it. We’ve seen a couple of big set pieces this season and last that take place in the locker room. We know the show can use their ensemble to create productive, engaging conversations among the team that address critical issues. But they’ve given us those talks around ancillary plots season (like the Awankening) and shied away from it on this much larger point. Letting the viewer see this conversation also lets them see the team putting their culture into practice. The writers have worked hard to develop the voices of many of the secondary player characters this season, and this seemed like the opportunity to showcase that by having that conversation and letting those characters each contribute in a way that felt faithful to their voice. In particular, I would have wanted to see Sam Obisanya’s part of that conversation (also, poor Sam/Toheeb Jimoh. His role has really gotten the short shrift this season).
One of the reasons why so many viewers aren’t sold on Nate’s redemption arc is because we haven’t been given the catharsis of watching him or the team/Ted/Beard work toward change or forgiveness.Right! It’s not even that it’s not believable it happened; it’s that it’s important, compelling, and cathartic to see it happen. Ted Lasso season 1 was so good precisely because it didn’t skip parts of the process. Ted’s work was shown step by step; it was steady, slow, subtle, and gradual, but that’s precisely what made the storytelling so effective and satisfying. With some of these scenes, we can piece together what would have had to happen and it makes sense, even if it’s less satisfying not to see. The team discussing whether they should reach out to Nate is a good example— it’s definitely less satisfying not to see them each bring their own perspective and to see how they consider the team culture, both in how the Lasso Way has changed it and whether Nate would disrupt it. It’s a missed moment for sure, but we know that meeting had to happen. It’s similar with Nate quitting at West Ham— obviously it happened, but denying the chance to see him really commit to the decision and not waver in Rupert’s presence would have been really powerful.But then there are other scenes where, because we don’t see them, we have to wonder if they happened at all. Did Beard ever tell Ted about the extent of Nate’s workplace bullying? Did Ted ever reflect on where he might have genuinely failed Nate or what he was overlooking? What other steps did Nate take along the way to come to some self-realization and accountability besides getting a girlfriend?I’m thinking about season 1 again, and I imagine I would not have liked it nearly as much if, like, in episode 3, Roy just walks into Ted’s office and says “Oi. That Wrinkle in Time book clicked with me. I put a stop to Jamie’s bullying.” Or, Christ, imagine if in episode 9 we start off with a montage of Ted starting his day, then he meets up with Beard and says “You’re not gonna believe what Rebecca told me.” (And then, of course, we wouldn’t see Ted tell Beard, either.)And it’s all really inexcusable with the incredibly long runtimes— they have all this time to not skip important steps in the important stories, but too often they use that time on diversions or side stories that don’t really pay off as well or even need to exist. I think it’s a matter of writing discipline: Instead of showing the scenes that are necessary to building the story organically and consistently, they seem to just want to show us the important plot development points and then the rest are more or less whatever they feel like.
Thank you for eloquently stating what I got roasted for last week. You said it all much better than I did!
This show avoids visual catharsis to the hilarious extreme where they won’t even show the ball going into the net when Jamie scores a goal. We understand what happened, but it’s enjoyable for us to see it happen.
And yet, how often do they feel they need to explain jokes to us?
Ted bursting into tears talking about how he felt afraid to be close to his son sure pulled a whole bunch of tears out of me over here. That entire exchange with his mom was superb.
as someone who travels a lot on business, Ted clenching his heart, with that line saying,”… I know.”, when his Mom tells him his son misses him. I’m still a bit teary eyed this morning.
This was a great episode. One of the best of the entire series.The season had its issues. But it feels like the season’s problems are blinding folks from realizing this was a damn fine hour of television.
Please un-gray me 🙂
This reply will never get read, bc everything I post gets stuck in pending purgatory, but you are spot on! There have been moving scenes in almost every episode, but this one wrecked me. Ted and his mom, Jamie and his mom, Beard and Nate, Ted talking about the pain at missing his son so much…ooh boy lots of tears.
Superb comment. I especially like the point about the show expecting emotional intelligence from its audience. And I personally don’t mind the gaps in storytelling. It’s enough to watch Nick Mohammed’s acting change from episode to episode. No one portrays “wound tight” quite like him.I think the show has been hinting at a Roy/Keeley/Jamie throuple for a while. The crying scene between Roy and Jamie this episode was quite physical and tender, for example. Doesn’t mean they’re horny for each other, but the potential is there. And the posters on Jamie’s wall all but announce his attractions. Intimations might be all the show is prepared to offer us at this point, although I hope it’s bold enough to go there. It’s been refreshingly frank about sexuality up to this point.
I would love to see Nick Mohammed playing a conniving, confident manipulator character. Like Littlefinger, basically.
There are communities on Tumblr and Reddit that have been on the throuple possibility for a season and a half
We had Beard literally do a 5 minute exposition about Ted’s character arc over a Beatles song not too long ago. The show has subtlety at times, but it absolutely can stomp you in the crotch with its “lessons” when it wants to.
I had quibbles with Ted and Nate’s storylines this episode (although both overall worked for me), but Jamie’s might genuinely be my favorite thing the show has ever done. His breakdown in the boot room was hilarious, his scene with his mom made me cry for the first time ever watching this show, and that match is I think the single best football moment in the entire series. I loved all the little callbacks and moments throughout the episode that showed the audience how far he’s come (like getting substituted in completely different circumstances than he did in Season 1, or telling Colin he’s proud of him for his performance in the match); his growth is definitely the show’s single best achievement. As the season ends, I think my main problem with it is that it feels, simultaneously, too long and too rushed? Like the writers stuck to their guns on what they said about the show being a three season story arc, but also didn’t want to edit out any storylines they were interested in, so they threw them all in to Season 3 as a result. There was so much going on this season that I think it could have easily supported two season of 30-minute episodes. It makes for a weird watch, even though I’ve still very much enjoyed it.
Yeah, I think I do agree with that final paragraph. Especially in terms of throwing in every idea they had, some of the stories earlier in the season (I’m thinking of Shandy and Zava most specifically) now in hindsight feel like they were detours that didn’t really add much other than putting off other developments.
I agree on Zava, it was a throwaway thread used to… not really sure. It was like the personification of a Believe sign, I guess?Shandy feels like it was done for laughs, but also had the onus of teaching Keely to understand talent and how some friends can bring you down.Too bad it was all lost the weird plot lines of who is Keely dating this week.
The thing with Shandy is that Keeley actually was right that she saw some talent in her, but also, she was obviously really rough and would need some mentorship and guidance to harness and focus that talent. I don’t think we ever really got that. It was just “Okay, do your thing,” and with Shandy being so wild and irresponsible, it inevitably blew up. I think it would’ve worked a lot better if Keeley at least tried to guide her, even if it failed.Someone last week suggested Zava could have worked if it there had really been some push and pull between accommodating a superstar and sticking to the team’s established culture and the Lasso Way. Instead the team just went ahead and gave Zava everything he wanted and bent over backwards to accommodate him on and off the field. Which, they are correct, superstars get treatment others don’t, but with how much the point of the show has been how the Lasso Way changes everyone for the better in the long run, it feels like a mistake to not even try to integrate the two or put them in conflict.
Agreed on both. I would have loved to see more of what Keely had to offer professionally.She is a former model, dating a former footballer, that got her start in PR by helping her boyfriend’s teammates get deals that they were likely to get anyway by being PFL players.While everyone else in the show got to showcase their ability at their craft, she got to date a couple guys and have rich people give her money. Other than free coffee machines, Bantr and the doomed Dubai Air spot (which were s1 plot points), they just showed her floating past one disaster after another, with-out really resolving any of it beyond the “yeah, we moved past that”, will she/won’t she reconcile with Roy?
Most of the Jack scenario should have taken place between s2 and s3, only reaching in an episode or two, to let Keely and Barbara rebuild and give it some time to grow before the end. KJPR developing into a legit business is more interesting than Ray and Keely being awkward friends.Zava was filler.
The Shandy arc was also about Barbara. Barbara’s comments about Shandy were veiled comments about Keeley, so Keeley immediately felt she had to defend Shandy to defend herself. Learning to manage the business meant learning to deal with both of them.
The point of Zava was a: A key part of Jamie’s arc. Especially getting Jamie and Roy together to train and bond. b: Allowed Rebecca the chance to one-up Rupert which I think her character needed. c: A good way to realistically have them off to a hot start before struggling which leads to d: Zava inadvertently pushed Ted to intervene and helped the team get to total football as exposing themselves as too complacent. Ted’s speech at the end of that episode demonstrated that. When they believed in everything Ted was feeding them, that only carried them so far. Then they switched their belief over to Zava, and then that only carried them so far. After he left and Ted righted the ship, he’s shifted their faith over to themselves and each other.If anything, he was a mid-season plot device to help push the team, especially Jaime, forward and create some kind of change and struggle.
Yes! This show is way smarter than many give it credit for.
It’s something that you can pull off with the network sitcom standard of 6 seasons of 22 episodes each. X gets a new love interest, an efficiency expert shows up and shakes up the office hierarchy, a pregnant family member moves in before the baby is born, etc.—a mini-arc to keep the characters occupied a while but doesn’t have much impact on the overall plot. It’s definitely not something that works when the sitcom in question only has a handful of episodes to tell its very heavily serialized story.
“an efficiency expert shows up and shakes up the office hierarchy” Ah, now you’ve got me thinking about good old Andrea Planbee, who showed up for four episodes of NewsRadio pretty much to fire Matthew and give Lisa Dave’s job, then promptly disappeared, never to be heard from again.But, also, yes, I agree with your overall point.
I don’t think Zava was a detour, I think Zava was a physical representation of Rebecca’s insecurity. This wild over the top chess piece that she hoped would clear the board and Ruppert once and for all. She doesn’t want to deal with Zava until Higgins says West Ham is interested.Ultimately it didn’t work and she course corrected, like we all do when we get to deep in our insecurities. Zava leaving made that happen sooner than it would have but we’re dealing w/ limited space to tell a large story so some threads are shorter than others.
How about Roy whispering in his ear and the show’s wisdom in not letting us know what he said? Jamie’s look said it all.
They sure could’ve done without the Jack and Zava storylines. Ultimately, they were both unnecessary. And Nate’s relationship with Jade is preposterous given that she so little cared for him in the beginning it seemed almost racial.
I’ve been thinking about it more, and while it’s bugged me that all of the most important career stuff for Nate is happening offscreen, I’ve started to think that might be intentional. Nate has always been so hyper-focused on how others perceive him, and being good at his job, and letting his career define him. This season, we’re *only* really seeing his development in his personal life as he’s starting to practice a bit more self care and be more reflective. Essentially, the message I’m now getting is that Nate’s been so focused on his coaching career and winning approval from everyone else, and by putting that stuff in the background a bit this season it’s reflecting his growing ability to measure himself by other standards than his coaching acumen or accolades.
I feel like this would work better, then, if we saw Nate putting in more effort to change. As written, it kinda feels like Jade took an interest in him and that just brought back the old Nate. We really didn’t see him do much to try to improve himself or make amends until these last couple of episodes.(And rewatching some of the older episodes, I realize one reason it bugs me is that Beard never tells Ted the extent of what Nate did, particularly his workplace bullying. I’m sure Ted would forgive him anyway, but it makes it seem like the head coach doesn’t know what’s going on in his own locker room or just why exactly Beard would have such a problem with bringing back Nate. It’s not like all he did was tear the “BELIEVE” sign, you know?)
I feel like Nate laying in bed for entire episode illustrated the self-introspection that Nate went through to .It more than just Jade showed and interest and Nate was back, there were subtle moments all season where she was supportive and encouraging without expecting anything in return.In some ways it is probably the first time he had ever received unconditional support. Up until that point, all of his support was based on his perceived value to the person supporting him, ie: Ted only supported him because he was a better coach, the players only supported him be cause Ted told them to, some people only treated him as a peer because Ted bought him a suit and so on.Jade pushed him to be celebrate his accomplishments because he should take pride in them, when everyone else up until now has told him he had to be better (or wasn’t good enough).
“Ted only supported him because he was a better coach”. Except Ted supports everyone. He supported him the moment he met him.
Agreed, Ted supports everyone, but early series Nate is insecure, picked on by everyone and doesn’t see it as Ted being supportive.
It more than just Jade showed and interest and Nate was back, there were subtle moments all season where she was supportive and encouraging without expecting anything in return.Even with this explanation, though, it’s entirely because of her that Nate starts to change, and not any real self-reflection. And if the viewer isn’t really buying that she suddenly takes interest in him because she sees one moment of him not being an insecure weirdo trying to impress people, then that doesn’t really work as well, either. And handling two of the most important moments in Nate’s return— quitting West Ham and the Richmond team deciding to invite him back— off screen really undermines both the impact and the plausibility of those moments. Tie those together, along with the fact that Ted still seems entirely unaware of how bad Nate’s workplace bullying got in season 2, and it makes his whole season-3 arc just feel unearned.
It seemed to me that Ted DID know what a bully Nate was but he chose to ignore it.
I’m torn. He saw a couple of incidents directly, but I don’t think he saw how frequently or consistently a bully Nate was, and definitely didn’t see how that was growing consistently throughout season 2. Beard did, though, and it’s his job to tell Ted about it, especially once he tries to put a stop to it and that fails. I know they talk about Nate once he leaks the story of Ted’s panic attack, but I still don’t get the impression that Beard let Ted know that Nate’s behavioral problems ran much deeper and more consistently than just one incident of lashing out. In any case, it should’ve been confronted at some point in season 2, let alone before now.It was a problem that was seeded in season 2, but the failure to deal with it at all in seasons 2 or 3— plus how all the potentially difficult parts of Nate wanting to come back were just skipped or papered over— makes the whole thing feel phony and unearned in a way this show once upon a time would’ve dealt with instead of just glossing over to get to the feel-good moments.
Even though just about every fan of the show knows what’s coming, I still gotta give the writers credit for not breaking the big secret at the end of this episode. Giving it a chance to sit there for a week is a good choice, even if 95% of the fanbase knows what’s coming up.I don’t know why, but the way Jamie talked about her in “Two Aces” (season 1, episode 6), I assumed his mom was dead. It’s good to see her get some time, and for Jamie to finally start to heal himself after the shit he dealt with his dad. Also, are we supposed to assume his dad is in prison or rehab (it looks like a rehab, but I have no idea)?Speaking of prison tales, I have a hard time believing Beard’s story, namely because I feel like it would have been more well-known by know. I know that parts were taken from Les Miz (the “loaf of meth” was a good touch), but I can’t imagine a Premier League team would take on a convicted felon, even with S1 Rebecca working to torpedo the team. Also, research online was inconclusive as to how international travel works as a convicted felon.Of course Nate’s coming back. I shouldn’t be shocked, but it’s still annoying that he’s just going back to Richmond. I guess time heals all wounds but still not wild about that.Finally, I was glad to see some soccer action in this episode. Colin has benefitted a lot from Total Football, getting some more chances in the upper third. Expecting we are going to see a match vs West Ham next week for a chance for the title (even though Man City could win and render the Richmond result inconsequential, as Man City still has a 1 point lead over Richmond).
Re: Jamie’s dad – I guessed rehab, my wife guessed a memory ward. Neither of us thought of prison, but now I do think that’s a reasonable possibility too.
I guessed rehab, especially since he looked cleaned-up. I didn’t think prison would be nearly as nice, and there’s too wide a range of ages there for it to be some kind of nursing home.
Yeah, that was my rationale too, as well as him actually smiling at seeing Jaime beat his beloved team.
Its not a nursing home. Rehab has a wider range of people than a nursing home or assisted living facility, where all the folks are older, or have some cognitive problem. He’s getting cleaned up for his drinking, thus his smiling and clapping. Drunk Dad would have been cursing at the kid.
Yeah, that was my conclusion too for essentially the same reasons.
My mind went to prison because he is a notorious shitheel. Rehab would be my second most likely one.
…but I can’t imagine a Premier League team would take on a convicted felon, even with S1 Rebecca working to torpedo the team. Also, research online was inconclusive as to how international travel works as a convicted felon. Yes, however, keep in mind, Beard would be moving to the UK on a work visa, therefore, here are the UK rules as they apply very “loosely” to presumably an American citizen who is a convicted felon, who served time in prison, attempting to apply for a work visa (after reading this I assume that Beard’ s character must meet one of these exceptions):Prison sentencesParagraph 320(2) of the Immigration Rules provides mandatory grounds for refusal for people subject to a deportation order or who have been sentenced to a period of imprisonment. Accordingly, an application must be refused if:the person seeking entry to the United Kingdom:(a) is currently the subject of a deportation order; or(b) has been convicted of an offence for which they have been sentenced to a period of imprisonment of at least 4 years; or(c) has been convicted of an offence for which they have been sentenced to a period of imprisonment of at least 12 months but less than 4 years, unless a period of 10 years has passed since the end of the sentence; or(d) has been convicted of an offence for which they have been sentenced to a period of imprisonment of less than 12 months, unless a period of 5 years has passed since the end of the sentence.Where this paragraph applies, unless refusal would be contrary to the Human Rights Convention or the Convention and Protocol Relating to the Status of Refugees, it will only be in exceptional circumstances that the public interest in maintaining refusal will be outweighed by compelling factors.
Also, can we really make that assessment about Rebecca? This is the same woman who slept with one of her players. Season 1, 2, or 3 Rebecca, I’m pretty sure that she would’ve ultimately let Ted bring his guy onto his coaching staff—keeping in mind we are still under the assumption that Beard would have met one of the work visa application exceptions, and Ted could’ve used that as a legal pass. But hey it’s Hollywood, right? Why waste time on those pesky deets when only <1 percent of us will fact check it anyway?
I’m OK with the unbelievable nature of Beard’s story, if only because it’s been the show’s sort of tongue-in-cheek joke for three seasons now. Could a premier league assistant coach be a literal unknown? Not in the real world. But that was the fun of the character in this make believe world. He was an international man of soccer mystery. I thought they picked a good moment to reveal his past in a way that it would have an impact.
David Martindale -the manager at Scottish Premiership club Livingstone served 4 years in prison for involvement in the supply of cocaine
Of all the massively unrealistic things about this show, it’s the prison thing that bothers you?
but I can’t imagine a Premier League team would take on a convicted felon
Could’ve been a misdemeanor drug charge.Also, if we’re going by what a Premier League team would do, then the premise of the show is done because Ted isn’t qualified to coach in the PL
“Progress not Perfection” poster on the wall, juice and coffee for beverages, and a woman being part of the group would indicate his dad’s in rehab, not prison (could have been a choice of one or the other).
But if they had not set up that brief scene via his friends toasting his absence in the stands, I would not have caught that it was Jamie’s dad at all even though he was center-frame, such was his transformation (the actor looked about 10 years younger to me).
The big secret is he’s going to quit after the season ends and go back to the States. Then the only question is whether Richmond’s coach is going to be Roy or Nate.
Once again, I am one of the (few?) people watching this show who could have used another hour of this episode, I loved it so much.Or maybe I just needed another hour to look at that stupefyingly awesome Roy Kent Chelsea poster on Jamie’s wall. I couldn’t even spare some prurient eyebrow wiggling at Keeley’s poster next to it because I was so fucking captivated by that amazing hairdo. Someone in Lasso merchandising had better reproduce that poster so I can buy it and put it next to my Ron Swanson Pyramid of Greatness poster on my wall at work.Beyond the poster, there was so much goodness in this episode. Spiraling Jamie was a highlight. The end scene with Beard and Nate. Mama Lasso. Barbara! The continued fallout from the international break between Van Damme and Dani Rojas. Mae. Disappearing Jade. Pep Guardiola giving Jamie a congratulation after the match. I could go on, but others will do it in lengthier and more interesting ways.I do want to inject an “Old Man Yells at Cloud” bit here, however. I’m sick to fucking death of the speculation about Roy and Jamie becoming lovers, or Roy, Jamie, and Keeley becoming a throuple, or indeed any of the “’Ship Culture” bullshit that seems to be flooding pop culture these days. Lately, it seems like everyone is pissed off if the characters they like don’t end up boning – especially if said boning is done in the context of a non-traditional relationship. At this point, I wonder how writers are able to go on when every friendship they create between characters is appropriated by thirsty fans who want it to become sexual. I mean, hell, for a second there when Jamie’s mom was revealed, I was actually worried I’d pop onto the Internet after the episode and discover that someone might be ‘shipping a twisted MILF arc (it was bad enough that during Jamie’s heart to heart with his mom, they were shooting down her shirt). I was already sick of Lasso S3 and the way it turned Keeley into some sort of horny totem for the narrative, shunting her personality aside so that Juno Temple’s admittedly next-level physical charms took center stage in an endless roundabout of sexual politics. For me, it’s more than enough that Roy and Jamie became friends. And maybe – maybe – it’d be nice to see Keeley and Jamie be good friends to prove that not every male-female relationship has to result in penetration and etc. Anyway, I’ll finish up by pointing out to everyone who was asking why three Richmond team members would show up to ask Nate back that Leslie Higgins basically revealed, or at least intimated, that he sent them there.
Roy seemed to have some thoughts of his own on a twisted MILF arc, haha.Barbara and Roy interacting was pretty funny, too. (“Nothing, that’s why it would be weird if you were here to fix the pipes.”) I generally enjoy when two characters in a show who have a common connection but not much else in common or reason to meet finally do. (See also a similar meeting in this week’s Barry.)
Well, that one’s fairly plausible. After all, Jamie’s mom has had THAT POSTER on her home’s walls for so many years…
“Juno Temple’s admittedly next-level physical charms”Wait people really think she is good looking because, well, she is not.
When I first started playing D&D, I learned about the Charisma stat. It’s essentially a full measure of all of someone’s charms, and they don’t have to be related to looks. Someone ugly as butt can still have a through-the-roof Charisma stat if they are funny, charming, or magnetic in some way.Say what you will about Juno Temple’s looks – and I won’t share my opinion on that here – but she is charismatic as hell.
Charismatic and fun, yes, and she is not ugly, but she is really not beautiful.
Is there some law that says she has to be?
Oi!!! Fuck off Benj!
Roy and Keeley basically act as surrogate parents to Jamie at this point (even if there’s nothing wrong about his actual mother), especially since one of them was his childhood hero and the other one his childhood crush.
Woof, I hope Keeley wasn’t his childhood crush – that’d make things extremely weird!
Well, maybe not his childhood or his teenage crush, but she was already a famous page three model at the time he left his room, when he turned pro. So, I’d rephrase this as older brother and sister, rather than parents, with the sexual vibe being mostly gone between Keeley and Jamie.
Excellent point.
I was trying to remember/figure out: 1) how much older than Jamie is Keeley, that he had a poster of her in his childhood bedroom; 2) how long did Jamie and Keeley date, that she’d never met his mum (it’s like a 3 hr drive or train/1 hr flight from London to Manchester, not like goin’ to the fookin’ moon, know what I mean); 3) how far into the 2000s did Roy have a mullet, because his career would have fallen well out of the years of Peak Mullet?
This is an excellent comment. I’ll stand there with you yelling at the clouds. Dear lord, why does everything have to be romantic relationship/banging material? Especially LGBT whatever? Give it a rest. Maybe, just maybe Jamie had a Roy Kent poster because he was an idol of his? It’s OK to be friends.
On an intellectual level, I kinda get it. Lots of people who have felt underrepresented in pop culture are desperate to see representation, and ‘shipping is one way for them to express it publicly. But sex stuff that doesn’t directly serve a narrative is, at best, egregious. At worst, it becomes a cultural flashpoint, an indulgence for the prurient, and a distraction from the really important elements in a story.For me, though, I just miss the “middle ground” between the people who want all pop culture sex out in the open and the people who want no sex described, illustrated, alluded to, or represented at all in entertainment. It’s exhausting balancing between the two without anything to help stay upright.
Excellent comment #2 my friend. You are batting 1.000.
Pre-internet I feel like people had a clearer understanding of relationship (and boundaries) between art and audience. Writing up your slashfic and getting into passionate debates with fellow fans at conventions is one thing, insisting “X AND Y BELONG TOGETHER AND IF THEY DO NOT GET TOGETHER THEN YOU ARE GUILTY OF QUEER BAITING AND I WILL HARASS YOU TO THE END OF TIME!” to the showrunner on Twitter is quite another.
Hell, and it’s bad enough with fictional characters; you see the stuff like the unhinged open letters the Taylor Swift fans are writing about who they think she should and shouldn’t be dating, and you really start to wonder about some of these people’s relationship to reality.
Seriously, they should have you do the reviews for this show. Well said.
If there’s a spinoff (especially if it involves Roy Kent), let this be my declaration that I would happily review it!
Yell away manGreat commentsI love the show faults and all. My wife and teen age son and I watch as a family.Loved a lot of about this ep especially Beards speech at the end but man Pep Guardiola himself after the weekend he just had was really special.
There are so many people out there shipping Ted and Rebecca and I hate it – they’re still convinced that they will get together in the finale. They have no sexual chemistry, and it would be fantastically lazy writing for them to be thrown together at the last minute with no groundwork laid.
Lately, it seems like everyone is pissed off if the characters they like don’t end up boning – especially if said boning is done in the context of a non-traditional relationship. Indeed. Just recently a huge chunk of the fandom of 911 not only got ravenously angry, but review-bombed the episode on IMDB, because… two male characters who have long been well established as straight… continued to be straight and didn’t out-of-nowhere move their friendship into a relationship. Apparently a segment of fandom staked their entire enjoyment of the show on them suddenly being endgame for each other.
Random aside, is anyone else having trouble consistently loading the comments? They fail to load a ton of the time for me, on either mobile or desktop, between all the ads that get stuffed in at the bottom on mobile, and the way on both that as soon as you approach the end of an article the perpetual rolling feed they use now jumps you to the next URL.
Yeah, I think it’s something to do with recently implemented/inflicted Taboola ad feed. Comments are loading pretty consistently on desktop for me now that I manually blocked the feed via AdBlock, but I can get mobile comments to load maybe 25% of the time.
New here? Kinja’s been terrible forever.
Yes. The website is shit. Overrun by ads that the unstable site can’t handle. I’m sure they’d invest money to fix it if they weren’t planning on shutting down Gizmodo Media soon.
Yeah. I mean, I understand the need for ads, but when they reach the point where your site no longer has its basic functionalities working because of them, maybe try to fix that. Although at this point I’m not sure any of the Kinja sites give a damn about functionality.
Am I the only one that sees Lasso as a slight retelling of the Wizard of Oz? Ted = Dorthy looking for their way homeBeard = TotoRebecca = Glinda the good witchRupert = Evil WitchJamie = Scarecrow looking for a brainRoy = Titan looking for a heartNathan = Lion looking for courage3 bar guys = the munchkinsMichelle = the wizard (Ted thought she was the goal, but it was his kid all along)
Oooh, I like this a lot.
Definitely works, although I do think Beard/Toto is going to stay in Oz in this one.
OMG I love this take on the show! Especially Beard as Toto <3
Now I’m wondering how Keeley fits into this.Which in itself made me think of Beth from NewsRadio talking about how The Wizard of Oz frightened her as a child because “I was scared some farm girl was going to kill me and steal my shoes.”
More I think on it, Keeley is Glinda and Rebecca is the Wizard. Michelle is “Auntie Em” and Henry is well… “Uncle Henry”
This has been in my head now, so coming back to comment. You’re initial take is accurate, Rebecca is Glinda. She introduces the main character to the new world and inevitably is the one to prove they had it in themselves to go home all along (Ted’s bombshell next week?). Keely is the wizard. Has an inexplicable following, street wise intelligence, never really solves anything, and in their own way, lost.Mae, also as the Mayor (w/ the hooligan munchkins)
Nice.
Yes. Wizard of Oz by the way of Star Wars (OT).Don’t forget Ted’s mother is literally named Dorothy.
“Am I the only one who’s getting throuple vibes from Jamie, Keeley and Roy? (I am, aren’t I?).”I don’t think reviewers/recappers need to be tapped into a show’s fanbase but how did you miss how popular the idea of those three being a throuple is? I feel like it’s EVERYWHERE and has been for multiple seasons.
I loved Roy being smitten with Jamie’s momThe soccer often is the best part of the show to me & this might have been the best game they’ve ever done. I also loved Trent swooping in to get some scoop from Ted’s mom. I really want to read Trent’s book
I could totally Apple leaning in and making a Trent Grimm book available (on Apple devices only, of course). And…I would buy it.
There sure was a lot of emotional hugging going on in this one.
I liked Dottie, but had we set up or established that she was a source of frustration with Ted and his own mental health before this?
The show has made two giant plot leaps with Nate, his quitting West Ham and the team forgiving him for what he did.
Jamie has been the season’s MVP.
I sort of wish Keeley was more independent this entire season, she seems to be floating from one rich friend/suitor to the next. We’re not really seeing any consequences or growth from her relationship with Jack.
Nope, Dottie had not been set up as problematic for Ted at all before this episode. It kind of came out of nowhere. I liked the character and the way the actress played it, but I wished we’d had some setup for her appearance.I think I said, “I miss Dr. Sharon” about eight times this episode, including with Ted’s mom appearing out of nowhere. If we’d had some sessions with Ted mentioning his relationship with her, it would have felt more meaningful when she arrived. Dr. Sharon’s presence has been missed in the clubhouse this season.
I’ve also missed Dr. Sharon, she kept the thread of season 2 together.
Maybe they realized she solved too many problems?
“We’re not really seeing any consequences or growth from her relationship with Jack.”Barbara quit working for Jack and stayed with Keeley.
I am 3 months late to the party but I am just watching this show now and the writers have done Keely SUCH a disservice. It would have been great to watch her navigate being a boss bitch on her own but they threw in the whole Jack thing which results in Rebecca bailing her out (which also is a lovely testament to their friendship) and kind of made it seem like she did a rebound/bottom of the emotional barrel hook up with Roy. It bums me out.
I didn’t notice the supposed long run time. I guess that’s not a big deal when you actually enjoy a show.Jamie has moved on from Key-Lay. I doubt all the changes his character have gone through would set him up for a third wheel scenario in someone else’s love story.Guess I misread (with most others i suppose) that after last week’s episode, Roy/Keely weren’t actually dating again. Good for them, but I’m not sure if matters that they are together or not. That is the least interesting thing about them.If the season started out with the show jogging down from the top of a hill, they are now nearing the bottom at wildly out of control pace. So much story telling is off screen, left for the viewer to interpret and put together. While it is weird that Will, Isaac and Colin would approach Nate, they did establish previously that Nate was secretly making amends. It stands to reason that he may have done a bit for everyone, not just will.
Coach Beard with the patented Roy “Fuuuuuuu….” was a highlight.Jade is so weird. Not sure if it is a good or bad thing, but I am glad she appears to be genuinely good for Nate. Also not sure if it’s some weird quirk like Jan Maas and his unflinching honesty.No mention of what appeared to be Jamie’s dad in some sort of rehab? That was him, right?
Yeah, that was Jamie’s dad in rehab, and I also thought it should have at least been mentioned in the review, as it shows some growth for the character on-screen (something that other, much more central figures have had happen off screen this season).
“Jade is so weird.”I wonder if they can keep making it a thing that every time Nate points he out she has disappeared, like Snuffleupagus. Although, they have established that the manager can see her.really, she’s more like Invisible Boy from Mystery Men: no one sees her if no one is looking. She’s been in a position to observe people interacting without them really noticing her presence. That’s why it’s wrong to say that she was mean until she felt bad for Nate. She’s dismissive of people that she sees treating others badly and when Nate stops trying to be like that her attitude changes.
I’ve really started to wonder if these super sized episodes this season are really the writers shoving two seasons worth of story into one. You can have the writers tell me this was always planned for three seasons, but it really feels to me like it was planned for four (or more) and that maybe this season would have been about Jamie’s evolution from self-centered egotist me-first player to happily being the facilitator to all of his teammates, coupled with maybe the Trent Crimm storyline (at least starting) and maybe the Colin storyline as well, and then a Season 4 being about Nate’s redemption arc and return to Richmond. The main problem is that we didn’t let Nate fall far enough for the redemption part to really feel earned. We needed the evil Wunderkind who slept with the models and all that stuff with Rupert and for the Superleague thing to hang around a bit more (and be handled like it was in real life with the FA and UEFA telling the teams that wanted to participate in it that they’d be blackballed and killing it within 3 days). My guess would be that Covid and other factors kind of sped up the end of the show to this point and now we’ve supersized this season to stuff in a ton of story.This episode was still overall very good. The Jamie breakdown stuff, though, it needed more development time. The fall from “the catalyst for the 15 game winning streak” to moroseness was way too rushed to be effective in my view. The Ted stuff with his mother also could have stood more development, but the thank you/fuck you scene was some of the best work this show did. And I agree that Rebecca’s Freddie Mercury joke was one of the best the show’s ever done.My other real complaint is that they’ve telegraphed the ending to this so obviously: Ted tells Rebecca that it’s time for him to go home to the States and take care of his son (and maybe try to reconcile with his wife, as they did lay some seeds for that) and for Nate to take over as the manager at Richmond on the back of an amazing season that will see them play European football if not outright win the PL. It would have been nice to have more nuance in where the story was going, but I do appreciate how they setup the obvious outcome with Ted’s announcement to Rebecca coming as a cliffhanger.
Agreed on so many of the things you wrote. I’ve sketched out in my mind some similar ways that the show could/might have worked better across 4 seasons, with shorter run times (maybe not 30 minutes, but 40-45?). I think Nate’s descent/turn back to the light needed to be season-long also, maybe in season 3, and then if he returns in season 4 we get to see the coaching staff take shape in a way that it will feel secure when Ted leaves. (I prefer Roy stepping in as manager with Nate accepting the role as his right-hand man, and I’m hoping that the show, by giving us Roy accepting more responsibility/leadership over the past few episodes, is setting that up. I’ll have a real hard time swallowing Nate as the manager over Roy). The Akufo league could have been the team’s conflict in season 3, with season 4 being the push to win it all, along with Jamie’s rise to lead the team and fulfill his potential. Or something like that. There’s lots of ways that the storylines that came and went in an episode this season could have been given the breathing room to have some real narrative weight over the course of a full or even partial season.
Getting back with his wife doesn’t seem likely to be honest.
I enjoy this season’s longer run time mainly because I like to hang out with these characters. The show is warm and comforting even if it meanders and rambles a little bit. I wasn’t a big fan of last season’s fully stand-alone episodes, but I can handle separate ongoing storylines since I know they’ll all converge eventually.I’m not sure how you could have shorter episodes *and* fit more football into every one. These people have to have lives outside of work in order for them to have something to learn about through work metaphors. When would they have time if they were always practicing or competing?
Can we all agree that Rebecca’s “Freddie Mercury’s greatest talent was flipping straights” is easily the funniest joke we’ve had maybe all season? (Also, don’t mind me, I’ll be listening to “Fat Bottomed Girls” for the rest of the day.)no
I had to take a break from this episode after about 15 minutes because I got the very strong feeling that I am missing something.
The scene with Nate being visited by the three players in the restaurant felt like an “it’s only a dream” scene. I can’t put my finger on why exactly, but in the middle of it I really had this feeling of “Oh, it’s so weird, because he is about to wake up!” And then he didn’t, and I was confused.
And the scene of Jamie’s emotional breakdown was just as weird. The acting was so different from (what I remember of) the rest of the show, it felt like something from, I don’t know, maybe an online sketch.
Again: I can’t put my finger on it, but I am really irritated. It feels like the show used a new director for this episode, someone who has a certain style that they weren’t willing to give up. (I’m not saying that this is the case, just that it feels like it.) Which is weird because this is the penultimate episode.
Am I the only one who’s getting throuple vibes from Jamie, Keeley and Roy? (I am, aren’t I?)Nope! I said this many many times during this ep! 😀
I thought the second half of the episode was an A. They brought a lot of storylines to sledgehammer emotional finishes.
The first half was brought down by the same things dragging down the show all season: Too many disconnected stories and poor writing on Nate’s arc.
They keep muddling the message with Nate. The story of his redemption is supposed to be that he realizes he cut himself off from love and support due to his ambition, but he spends the entire season with his new loving, supportive girlfriend. And he looked awfully happy being a waiter and not having to chase the approval of others for someone who is supposed to be unhappy and needs to give into others telling him to go back to Richmond. The entire Nate plotline needed either a total rewrite or reduced to a two- or three-ep side plot, not the primary story connecting the season 2 finale and all of season 3.The entire thing stood in sharp contrast to Jamie’s story and his friendship with Roy, which ended up being the best storyline the show produced across all three seasons.
Wait, that was supposed to be Jamies actual mom? I thought she was an older sister who raised him, just by the age.
Apple better put some muscle into Phil Dunster’s Emmy campaign, with this episode as the main ammunition.
Jamie’s mom looked awfully young, and sure enough, the actor (Leanne Best, niece of one-time Beatle Pete Best) is only 12 years older than Phil Dunster. This suggests to me that Jamie’s mom had him very young, which would also explain how a kind, loving woman could’ve gone for a total knob like his father.
Yeah, I kinda always had the impression she had him young and his dad split pretty quickly after. (I guess it wouldn’t be impossible she was older, but given how quickly his dad left the picture, something more unplanned than that makes more sense to me.)
It says something about Jamie that his mom could have produced him with such a boorish clod, then settled down with a completely poised and centered fellow who treats her and everyone else with such good-humored respect.
My $0.02:I think the show needed a fourth season — even a short one — to give room for all these subplots to breathe. Or perhaps they should’ve just dropped the Zava plotline — is he going to come back in the finale (which *would* be amusing), or was that all relatively pointless given all the main-cast-centric subplots the show is *stretching* out episodes to resolve?
I really don’t see much difference in how this episode played from the last except for the fact that this one actually had football in it for a fair amount of time, so I don’t get why you seem to like this one significantly more (judging from your words, anyway; it certainly seems you regard it more than a letter grade).I mean, I suppose there’s a lot of payoff, too, and that might have helped, but it only seems natural that they wouldn’t get to the fireworks factory until the season closed out.
another super long episode, another “wait, did I miss an episode” from me and my wife as an important development was completely off screened. Last week it was Nate’s quitting his job (seriously…how did they not show this? We got Nate going to meet Rupert at the bar but leaving when he realized what’s up…but not him quitting?). This week, apparently players like Nate again and want him back at AFC? I mean, it’s not like an entire episode happened early in the season where players were so livid with Nate that they got a bunch of red cards as they tried to hurt players on his team…and now, suddenly off screen they’ve talked it out and want him back? It’s another bizarre choice in an endless stream of them this season.
Another great episode! Well done, everyone! Can’t wait to see how it wraps up next week.
Holy shit there was actually a football match in this episode, and it was exciting to watch! Van Damme with the mask making save after save, and seeing Jamie kick the ball out of his net was a spectacular defensive play. INB4 everyone says “it’s not really a soccer show blah blah”, yeah but the soccer is EXCITING and relevant to the narrative.With that said, it’s getting a bit silly that individual players are being rewarded on the pitch for having successfully completed character arcs. Colin came out and was instrumental in the win as a result, and Jamie magically (through the use of horse tranquilizers, most likely) overcame a bum ankle and scored because he went through a breakthrough the night before with his mom. Sure. A bit treacly and sappy, and will be even moreso when Richmond probably beat West Ham next week to complete the absurd underdog story.Finally getting some backstory on Beard was nice, and his monologue was great. Ted’s “thank you, fuck you” speech to his mom was a long time coming, and was amazingly delivered by Sudeikis. I usually hate Nate stuff, and will roll my eyes when he becomes coach of Richmond when Ted leaves next week, but the bit with him pointing to Jade and referencing his girlfriend and her hiding was actually pretty funny.
While I have enjoyed digging into post show comments on here, no amount of doom scrolling will ruin this amazing episode for me. Loved it.
The fan of musicals in the writing room (although probably not the only one) is absolutely, 100% guaranteed to be Brett Goldstein. If you listen to pretty much any episode of his podcast, Films To Be Buried With, you will learn just how deep and broad that man’s love of musicals is. The fact that you are even posing that as a question tells me you’re unfamiliar with his work outside of Ted Lasso.
Biggest non-surprise.NAte comes back.Ted leaves. Nate becomes coach.Only thing is will Beard stay to help NAte, or leave to follow Ted. I think he stays, as its time for him to move on from Ted, and as he said, to repay that forgiveness by being there for Nate. Also, I expect Bex to take West Ham back and kick Rupert out to the curb.
This season has been such a disappointment. It’s as if they had 2 1/2 seasons of ideas and had to stretch in to 3. Zava, Jack were pointless story arcs – everything ended back where it started. Jade’s relationship with Nate is a complete denial of their previous interactions: she was so dismissive of him that I thought it was racial. For her to suddenly change because he gets dumped by a supermodel is head-scratching.
I ADORED this episode. 1.) Ted made me so proud. His therapy enabled him to open up and tell his mom that her emotional constipation did not help him. As someone who also lost a father at a tender age (2), I felt that. 2.) Jamie has matured tremendously. Proud of his character, too!3.) Did anyone else feel that Keeley does NOT want to get back together with Roy? I still feel like when she took his hand in the bedroom, it was to say that she loved him but she wanted to move on. 4.) Love the Irish teacher for Roy and I feel like Jamie and Keeley might reconsider.5.) Beard, or 24601, ALSO had me sniffling. I loved the arc about second chances and redemption, and even Jamie forgiving his dad. This show promotes such positive mental health and also a just an anti-depressant in a TV show. I love this show so very much… kudos to the writers. Who cares if it’s all not perfect? The show is so darned impactful, if for nothing else than encouraging men to express their emotions. P.S. TOTALLY agree on Sleepless in Seattle vs You’ve Got Mail, although that sweet tender moment when he says “ don’t cry, ‘shopgirl,” gets me each time… I also loved the Dave Chappell reference… yes, he’s in it and it’s a bit incongruous, though I do love him.