Ted Lasso recap: Big speeches, bigger shake-ups
It feels like the show is covering a lot of ground while still leaving so many B and C plots dangling
TV Reviews Henry
If Ted Lasso has been built on the conviction that belief in yourself is all but a superpower (teetering close to serving up pat platitudes about self-esteem and self-care), the series and its titular protagonist have nevertheless hoped to present a more complex vision of what it means to trust in yourself. It’s why that “BELIEVE” sign, torn a few episodes back, seemed so important to the team. It stood as a reminder of what Ted had brought to Richmond. And yet, as this latest episode (“Signs”) suggests, maybe show and characters alike needed a reminder that fanciful rhetoric like that will only get you so far.
Exhibit A: Zava.
Richmond’s golden boy this season has been the limit case of Ted’s philosophy—actually, a more grating version of it, as well. (Cue Jamie’s many eye rolls whenever Zava speaks.) But at his core, Zava was a walking example that such empty mantras would always necessarily need to backed up by practice. By talent. By commitment. By work, really. At some point, it’s clear that Richmond’s players (bar Jamie) were all too happy to rest on Zava’s laurels instead of believing in themselves. That, as they all found out in that match against West Ham, is not enough.
Zava’s belief in himself was obviously comical. And intimidating. There had to come a time when his ego, so built on ridiculous sayings would only last so long in the world of Ted Lasso. (Example: “I don’t care about moving pictures. My favorite thing to watch is…my wife.) His was such a precious individuality that the sensibility preached by Ted could make no room for him. (In a way, you wonder how much better he would’ve been matched over at West Ham where Rupert clearly so values such raging individualism—sorry, I mean narcissism.) Sure, Zava’s disappearance—after telling the team that they have what it takes to win!—was a shocking development, but even if we didn’t know he’d all out quit the sport, we knew his days in Richmond were numbered.
If Ted’s final speech of the episode resonated with the players at all, it was because it tackled the central question they’ve been asking themselves this season: Do they really belong in this league? Are they really good enough (on their own) to go the distance? Which, of course, is the wrong approach. This is why Ted’s speeches are so rarely about winning or losing. They’re about how to move through the world together. “To believe in yourself, to believe in one another…man, that’s fundamental to being alive,” he tells his players. “If you can do that…can’t nobody rip that apart.”
Note how he stresses not how they’re going to win or how they’re about to turn the season around. As ever, Ted (perhaps because he’s clueless about soccer) can only approach his coaching prowess in terms of how to nurture the men these players can be. It’s why he wishes them to let go of those negative feelings that have so characterized their lives and their games as of late. (Did you catch how the camera stayed on Colin while Ted mentioned “shame”? Yeah, we didn’t miss that either.)
Exhibit B: Shandy.
Self-help truisms, as we should all know by now, can be quite easily weaponized by any and all narcissists. For every Keeley who feels motivated to take a bet on herself with much needed humility in order to succeed, there’s a Shandy who arms herself with little else than her own ego. As soon as she started taking initiative on things that gave Keeley, Barbara and Jack pause…well, we all knew where it was all headed.
And yet, there was something deliciously satisfying about watching Shandy—and actor Ambreen Razia—truly chew the scenery in what I can only describe as a Jerry Maguire-gone-haywire “I quit!” meltdown moment. For, despite Keeley trying Jack’s “compliment sandwich” on her friend, Shandy, as we knew, does not have a good relationship with rejection (“or her ex, or the workplace, or most nouns, really”) and seeing her process in real time how much she thinks of herself and how little she thinks of Keeley, yet how much she wants to belong and how little she wants to be fired (and back and back and forth), was easily one of the funniest scenes of the season so far.
Which helped because elsewhere we got quite dour if not outright sour storylines. Nate got dumped while trying to impress that nice hostess at his favorite restaurant while Rebecca got some news regarding her seemingly-coming-true psychic predictions; and even Keeley got herself embroiled in a workplace affair whose repercussions may be harder to suss out just yet.
Are we at a turning point this season? We’re not even halfway through Ted Lasso’s final season and, perhaps given the length of these most recent episodes, it feels like we’re both covering a lot of ground (I didn’t even mention Roy’s amazingly terrifying bully speech) all while leaving so many B/C plots dangling (Colin! Jamie!). I hope now that Zava’s out of the picture we can maybe return to what made Ted Lasso such a breath of fresh air a few years back before its own messaging began to feel stale even within the show itself. Otherwise, I worry I’ll find myself writing compliment sandwiches for the rest of the season, ignoring, as it were, the needless lamb poop jokes it nevertheless felt intent on telling.
Stray observations
- “ARE WE EVER GONNA WIN ANOTHER FUCKING MATCH?!?” That’s it, that’s the line reading of the episode.
- Were you also left hankering for baklava after Nate’s date-gone-wrong-gone-right? Because I sure was even if I was left aghast at the thought of that serving being for two (for TWO!).
- Dani Rojas truly may be the one Ted Lasso character I cannot stand. In a show that’s skillfully turned one-note characters like Keeley or Roy or even Ted into fully fledged characters, I remain frustrated that Dani is always the butt of the jokes. (Yes, I rolled my eyes hard at the Pygmalion/pigs joke transition; get it? He’s simple! Hardy har har.)
- I didn’t like it when Coach Beard and Ted howled like dogs the other day and I cared for it even less when they howled like hyenas this time around. (Are non-toxic men really so exhausting?)
- Henry’s bullying story. So brief. So neatly resolved. So tangentially related. So structured as a Very Special Episode, with a kid owning up to what he’s learned. Am I the only one who could’ve done without it? I get that Ted’s entire storyline rests on his anxiety over having left his family behind, but I can’t say this one landed for me.
- Can we talk about the bad green screen happening behind Keeley at her office?
- Speaking of Keeley’s office: What is in Barbara’s desk drawers?! Inquiring minds want to know!
91 Comments
I found Zava to be fucking insufferable from the beginning (I know, he was supposed to be) and I’m annoyed he stuck around this long. And Dani Rojas’ being reduced to a one dimensional cheerleader can hopefully now stop. Other than that, pretty decent episode. I even liked the Nate stuff. I’m calling it now, at the end of the series, Ted will head back home to his family and Nate will take over, having redeemed himself or some shit. If that’s the route they go, then they’ve got some work to do, but Nate has been a fucking scumbag for so long. He’d have to lose an arm saving a bunch of puppies from a burning house as far as I’m concerned.Weird that there’s no mention of Rebecca possibly getting life threatening news from her doctor. Or maybe I just read it too fast. Anyway, I’m glad no one died in this episode, or they would have put it in the fucking headline.
I don’t think Rebecca’s news will be much more than she can’t have kids biologically. Though that doesn’t put an end to the psychic’s prediction. Someone else predicted (either here or on Reddit) she may end up raising a kid after their parent dies and now I’m worried about Sassy.
Ah that makes sense. My mind went towards cancer because another show I like took a similar hard left turn when they thought maybe they were going to have a baby.
Was that show Superman & Lois? You can admit it. This is a safe space.
Yes. Yes it was. It’s a good show, Damn it!
It’s a very good show(!), and in ways that set it apart from the rest of the Berlantiverse. Just for fun, I’ve been trying to imagine that opening sequence from the other week’s episode, where Lois is going to a montage of doctor appointments and growing tense and frightened and deeply relatable, happening on The Flash. Does not compute!
They really know how to let their characters breath. Also, Dan Romer is one of my favorite composers and his score is awesome. I recently found out their budget is about 5 million per episode, and it’s worth every dollar.
Shit. My exact thoughts about Ted Lasso’s verisimilitude was “no one gets cancer”. I bet it’s not cancer. I bet the doctor says she can’t conceive and then she miraculously does. Holy fucking shit indeed.And then gets relegated.Although I just realised severance had a similar scene with a goat instead of a lamb.
If memory serves, didn’t the psychic just say “you will become a mother” rather than “you will become pregnant and have a baby yourself,” right?
Can you ask for a refund for equivocation?
As soon as I heard the prediction, I thought about Sassy and not Rebecca actually having a child of her own.
“I don’t think Rebecca’s news will be much more than she can’t have kids biologically.”Having gone through infertility treatments with my wife, it always annoys me when TV show doctors just up and tell people they can’t have children. Fertility doctors can tell you you likely have a low egg count or low sperm count/motility, they can diagnose you with conditions like PCOS or endometriosis which might affect your fertility, they can check to see if their aren’t any blockages in your plumbing, but unless you’ve already gone through menopause or have had a hysterectomy or something they’re not going to definitively tell you you can’t have kids…because you still could! That’s what fertility treatments are for! In our case we were slapped with the surprisingly common (like, 20% of cases) diagnosis of “unexplained infertility,” which is basically the doc finding absolutely nothing wrong with either partner’s bits and then throwing up her hands and going “I don’t try IVF; it’ll probably work.”
The fertility doctor told me I had endometrial cancer and when I asked what that meant for my chances of having a baby he still didn’t say no just said we’d know more after I saw a specialist. So in my very limited experience I completely agree with you 😀
That’s like the cpr thing on e.r. when trained medics shock flatline patients. Not in real life.
We’re not done with Zava. My bet is he unretires and joins West Ham and eats Nate alive.
The cruelest plot twist with Zava might be if he returns to the team and fucks up their chemistry and undermines the coaches again
I was expecting him to start waffling about crypto.
Dani had a good line when they first heard Zava would play for Richmond. “I haven’t been this nervous since I played for El Chapo’s youth soccer team”.
Ted will head back to KC, but for his son, not his ex-wife. I don’t see any reconciliation there after she’s now dating his couples’ therapy counselor (puke)
Oh they’re definitely not getting back together. And her dating the counselor is super fucked up on her part, wildly unethical on the counselor’s part.
They hooted like simians, not hyenas.
Now I’m wondering if Manuel thinks chickens sound the way Tommy Wiseau thinks they do, or the way the Bluth family does.
Has anyone at AV Club ever seen a chicken?
And they got Roy to join in for once!…too bad it was all for naught since Trent didn’t have any good ideas anyway
Thank you! Jeez. Also “are non-toxic men always so exhausting?” What a weird statement to make about fictional characters making animal noises in a TV show. Weird leap there.
Speaking of Keeley’s office: What is in Barbara’s desk drawers?! Inquiring minds want to know! The same thing that was in Alan Partridge’s drawer at the Travelodge that Trent Crimm worked at before turning to journalism.
Ahahaha, I had the same thought (well, not exactly in those words).
While not the best episode of Ted Lasso, I did enjoy the general overall feel.Stuff I liked:
Keeley and Jack having a deeper connection, that seemed like it would happen from Jack’s initial introduction (though I did originally think I was jumping to conclusions).Trent’s mug, which may just be a rainbow mug or is a subtle/unsubtle hint that he is in fact gay.Jade being nicer to Nate, after he showed his more real self. Rather than what he thinks people want to see.Roy’s incredible dark and funny 4am revenge strategy.
Higgins dad basically telling his son what he and his mum do in bed. Nobody ever wants to think about. 😃
PS – I’m not convinced Zava has really retired. I can see him using this as a way to break his contract and go to some other (bigger) club in Europe.
Also props to writer Jamie Lee for the Zoolander in joke, with the supermodels and Wham playing as they drove away from Nate in the restaurant.
The Jade stuff came close to seeming like she was just taking pity on him, which wouldn’t have been satisfying, but I think they sold it well enough. Her interest was really more after seeing his appreciation for the restaurant and history with it; that showed a sincerity he usually doesn’t have, because he’s so caught up in trying to impress people.
Yeah, I thought they were clearly trying to go for her appreciating his genuine affection for the restaurant; hence the callback to his description of the baklava when they first went in.
Yep, I agree. And she’s eavesdropping the whole conversation, too, and it seems like she only starts expressing any interest at all when Nate starts talking about how much the restaurant has meant to him and his family over the years.
Roy’s revenge story killed me. I loved how the show just let it go on and on.
“4 AM is the time people are least able to defend themselves”Wait is that why Roy is training Jamie starting at 4 AM
Possibly.
Or maybe he formed that opinion after seeing Jamie stumble-bum groggily to the door bottomless?
Zava possibly leaving like that would be a bit dumb in my opinion, granted he had a habit of dipping in and out of the story at the show’s convenience. I did like his “Zava’isms”.
I wouldn’t be surprised to see him in a final match.
I don’t know EPL rules. Could he come back with West Ham? Or would he have to go to a team in a different league? But you are correct that the two best things were Nate getting more attention from Jade for acting like a human being instead of a stuck-up prick, and Roy’s revenge plan. I totally want to see him standing over some sleeper at 4AM holding a rope and see how they resolve that.
I think there’s a general FIFA rule about not being able to play for more than three clubs in a year. In that respect he could move to West Ham, but he’d be stuck there for the rest of current Ted Lasso universe season and at least the start of the one after.
[real world] he’d be under contract until at least the end of the season, so if he decided to pay for another club he would have to do so during the transfer window in January. Richmond would be due a fee or compensation for breach of contract. However the Man City game takes place at night (presumably 19:45) and the sun is still up mid season? It’s dark by 4pm. Not in this reality so anything’s possible.
I hated the stuff with Jade. The show’s setting us up for a Nathan redemption arc, and I’m NOT here for it. I would have personally preferred Anastasia leaving him in the restaurant and the rest of the scene is Nathan looking sad while Jade smirks in the background. He doesn’t deserve redemption, but he’ll probably get it anyway
The note that the retirement from Zava feels rushed after his inspiring speach rings a little false for me. Zava’s entire speech was about how the team didn’t need him at all. It to me was the first indication that he wasn’t going to be playing in the Man City Game.
Good riddance to Shandy.
Shandy is the new Cousin Oliver.
I was kinda hoping something better would develop there, given that on the shoot she seems to show a real working knowledge of the process and have some good ideas. But then it seemed like they never put her onto something she actually understood and instead just had her keep acting like a party girl and not take the job seriously.
Almost like she’s meant to be a reflection of another character who has talent but is unreliable as a team player.
If Shandy is supposed to be a parallel to Zava, I don’t see it at all. Zava is a genuine superstar who is very weird and self-absorbed but still seems to understand the team looks up to him and at least goes through the motions of trying to bring them together and inspire them, whatever you think of his sincerity. Shandy was supposed to be Keeley’s potential diamond in the rough, but then she hired her and made no attempt to polish her, so to speak, just apparently letting her go do her own thing until it didn’t work anymore, rather than training her or finding ways where her skills could best be put to use.
Yeah, Keeley is a craptastic manager.
Which is really weird because the Keeley from season 1 is smart enough not to be, or at least to try to manage or mentor Shandy properly, instead of just not doing anything past hiring her.
Jesus fucking Christ, you’ll twist yourself in knots trying to find shit to bitch about. Also, reviews aren’t supposed to be point-by-point recaps, my guy.
Roy’s story is not plausible. How could a 12 year old get a length of rope properly cut, buy a can of red paint, know to bring a flat edge, break into somebody else’s house, perform that menace and then deal with the bully’s presumably irate parents? How could anyone do that? The logistics are insane.
I assumed he was talking shit.
The first time is a little tricky, but after a while it becomes pretty second-nature.
Aww they only howl during Diamond Dog sessions which is good men talking about stuff/feelings so just go with it.
I had been wondering if Keeley was going to end up with Roy or Jamie. Interesting to now have a third option.
It’s always best to keep one’s options open.Keeps the dry spells at a minimum
This season has just been good, but just a drag. There is no reason each episodes has needed to be 50+ minutes long.
There’s got to be another shoe to drop with Zava, right? As it stands, the whole “leaves a mountain of smoking wreckage in his wake” thing doesn’t really accord with what we saw — he was kind of insufferable, but not actively malicious, and was, all in all, a net positive to the team. Just having him leave after not doing much of anything would be sort of weird.The obvious twist of the knife would be having him sign with West Ham, even though I’m pretty sure that would absolutely never work in a contractual/legal sense.
Zava posted a video saying he was going to spend more time with his family and his avocado farm. My guess is that’s the last we will see of him.
Zava died on the way back to his home planet
as always, sounds absolutely hilarious, gag packed, really funny, definitely not for weepy/pathetic weirdos
I also had wondered last week whether I was seeing chemistry that wasn’t there between Jack and Keely because of having recently watched through For All Mankind, where Balfour’s character is a lesbian. Guess not!
I had JUST finished watching that the previous week and was like HEY IT’S ELLEN and made the same assumption.
Wasn’t Dani supposed to be a Zava-level (or close) superstar when first introduced?
He was more of an up and coming star. Came in the summer transfer window, immediately got injured. and nobody had really seen him play. He’s an ace, for sure, but while Jamie and Dani are aces, Zava was a wild card.
I think Dani and Jamie were set up as “Aces” or really good, but Zava is more like a Messi level type player.I don’t know why Colin took his spot in the game, but then again I don’t know the sport that well.
Colin took the spot because Colin was the one they took out of the starting line up to make room for Zava.
Sure, but it’s weird he’d be put in as a striker. Actually, if they’re still running the 4-5-1, he’d be THE striker, even though we know Tartt and Rojas are excellent forwards.Hell, I thought it was weird they went to the 4-5-1 in the first place. Playing 4-4-2 with Tartt and Zava up front makes a ton of sense!
I doubt they actually put Colin in at striker (unless they showed that during the match and I didn’t see it)– I’m sure they just moved Jamie up there and Colin into his usual role.
Colin was the one bumped from the starting lineup when Zava arrived.
I believe Colin and Zava played the same position. Colin was benched when Zava was added to the starting roster.
I find it a bit weird this season how the team has been pathetic, then possibly the best team in the league, then totally pathetic again. Though I guess Rebecca and I should be happy with the winning streak that would seem to set up coming next
Yeah, that was one of the things that frustrated me about last season, was how often we just wouldn’t see how the team was doing or coming together, and we’d just be told about their latest streak right before they decided to show a match. The whiplash here is having the same effect. Oh, Zava joins and they go on a huge winning streak that puts them near the top of the standings. Then they meltdown one game and immediately go on a massive losing streak that knocks them back. It just feels contrived when they do it this way instead of showing how they got there, which is something season 1 was so great at doing.
Related, how frequently are Premier League matches? The announcer at the beginning said Richmond hadn’t won in seven weeks, but looking at the standings it only seemed like a three-game losing streak?
I believe the standings showed they had 3 losses and 4 draws in that timeframe. Because there are a fair amount of draws in soccer, they’ll often talk of ‘unbeaten’ streaks or ‘X games without a win,’ rather than winning or losing streaks like you might see in American sports.Matches are typically once a week, though at various times of the year will be twice a week. There are also international breaks, where there would be a week or so off. There would not be a seven week stretch where they only played three matches though.
Ohh, I must not have noticed the draws, that makes a lot of sense.Er, by “makes a lot of sense” I mean “the standings now make sense in the time period given.” The fact that they were crushing with Zava, had one bad game, then all of a sudden go almost two months without winning after that, makes a lot less sense.
teams play 38 matches in the premier league from August to May with a few breaks for internationals and the FA Cup weekends. But matches are for most weeks between August and May either once or twice a week
They play every team twice over 10 months, so it averages to about once per week but the matches are not evenly spaced.
Have you seen Man United play this season? They’re somewhat following this pattern, though still in the important ‘top 4′ places.
This happens in sports all the time.
Not a Tottenham fan, I take it…*sobs*
Manuel seems to like the show at this point less than I do overall. Is this C+ for Ted Lasso, or C+ for, you know, television? Because this does not feel like C+ television to me even if it clearly isn’t a highlight Lasso episiode. That said, yes, the bullying thing could have gone somewhere much more interesting than pretty much nowhere.
Unlike his predecessor, Manuel doesn’t look at the comments, or if he does, doesn’t respond.
It’s interesting that the date gone wrong between Nate and Anastasia was very reminiscent of Taxi Driver, when a very misguided Travis Bickle, who knows no better, invites Betsy to watch a porn movie and she takes the first excuse to leave. Except that Anastasia here is simply callous as she can’t stand being at a place for normies. The humiliation mostly has the side-effect of turning Nate into a better person, who’s ready to assume his modest roots, rather than trying to compensate, and actually connects with a woman after finally dropping the whole “Don’t you know who I am?” act. He won’t become a Rupert clone.
can we drop the psychic storyline and just have Rebecca being a boss-lady and naviagting the male-dominated football world. Plus more Colin, preferably being gay, lol.
That was one of the things that frustrated me about season 2— all the talk about Rebecca as a “boss ass bitch” but we spent almost no time on her doing boss ass bitch stuff, on the challenges of being a woman in a man’s world and how she rises up to them. We spent most of the season worrying about her love life and her relationship with her parents.Similarly with Keeley, who is supposed to be great at PR— Bantr just becomes an overnight success and we have no idea why, it just happens because good things happen to our good characters we like. She also has no concern whatsoever about Rebecca dating Sam from a professional perspective, and I’d think of all people the head of PR would realize what a huge potential scandal that would be if it came out.
“it just happens because good things happen to our good characters we like”This has been my biggest issue with Ted Lasso’s writing for a while now. They are very fond of “tell, don’t show”, so characters just tend to be great because we are told they are, rather than actually seeing them do well. Keeley suddenly running a PR firm when we’ve barely seen her do anything for Bantr being a prime example.
The bummer is that season 1 was so good about doing things the right way. Ted winning the respect of the team was a very gradual and steady process, as everyone slowly realized how his methods were actually improving them, and that he was consistent day-to-day and in living out his values, even when it was difficult to do so. Season 2 seemed like it was designed to give our characters a lot more wish fulfillment without actually showing the work the characters were doing to reach their goals.
It’s fine. The whole description for the show is “people being nice and then sometimes they kiss” I look forward to the “cheats always prosper” and “bad things happen to good people for no reason” variants in the spin offs.
I’m certainly enjoying the season so far and it’s still better than most things on television. But I am starting to feel like it’s letting Ted off the hook quite a bit lately. Part of the conceit is that he’s a fish out of water and doesn’t really understand soccer. But that still leaves plenty for him to do besides make the occasional motivational speech. In previous seasons, he made significant management decisions: promoting Nate, moving Roy into coaching, bringing in the therapist. This season he’s been totally passive. Zava was hired over his head and he did little to nothing to work on integrating him. Roy decided to train Jaimie without any input from Ted. Basically Ted has done nothing to develop the team (outside one trip to the sewer) and the show has yet to call him out on that. Maybe the season will get there, but it’s not clear that the show recognizes this.
WTF is this comment?!I didn’t like it when Coach Beard and Ted howled like dogs the other day and I cared for it even less when they howled like hyenas this time around. (Are non-toxic men really so exhausting?)Like, 1) they are acting like baby monkeys, and 2) you really going to come out here and shit on “non-toxic men”…like c’mon. Do you think Lions are out here naying like horses?
Now I’m really hoping Ted does Roy’s treatment for bullies on Dr. Predatory Fucknut.
Don’t even want him to get Michelle back. She can go away too. Just get Henry away from that manipulative unethical shit.
“Henry’s bullying story. So brief. So neatly resolved.”Why do you think the bullying kid telling his absent father that the matter is resolved means the matter is resolved rather than the kid reading his father like a book and telling him what he wanted to hear?