by Mike Hilty, Contributing Writer
During 2020, I started a quaranstream list of TV shows to catch up on or finally start shows that I’ve been meaning to try. There were a lot of list of shame shows, guilty pleasure shows, and some shows I felt like only I was interested in. I originally wanted to start this with a group, but ultimately went solo so I can watch shows at my leisure. So in September 2020, I was looking for another show to watch after watching Umbrella Academy on Netflix. I wanted to switch it up to a comedy, so I was deciding on either Vice Principals on HBO, Future Man on Hulu, or The Orville on Fox. I got a text from a friend saying I should try Ted Lasso.
I haven’t looked back since. Ted Lasso, after one season, became one of my favorite shows. Not just a favorite of the moment, but rather a Mount Rushmore, top 10, rotation player when I have a bad day show that will be one for the ages personally. It encompasses things I love about shows: sports (maybe not exclusively, but I’m a sucker for a good sports show), comedy (literal laugh-out-loud lines from great comedic actors), and heart (2020 was not a great year, so anything to give me the feels was greatly appreciated). Season one ended with a gut punch that laid the table for a season two with borderline unfair expectations.
Season two of Ted Lasso follows our title coach and his football team, AFC Richmond, as they try and get promoted to the Premier League in England. The characters are battling soccer pundits, personal demons, relationship issues, among many other things this season. This season, the only really addition to the show (other than a few new Football players) is Dr. Sharon Fieldstone, played by the wonderful Sarah Niles. Dr. Fieldstone represents a very important theme that persists throughout the season: mental health. The need for mental health help and the reluctance to seek or accept mental health help permeates throughout the season. The therapy scenes between Dr. Fieldstone and some of the characters were some of the best moments of the season. Her evolution through the season as she evaluates the players and staff and figures out how she can be of best help to each of them was like watching a chess player figure out a strategy on how to win. She has to personally grow and realize some things about herself in order to get some people to open up more. She is indeed a SMF and I’m curious to see how she will be used moving forward.
In addition to mental health, another major theme this season is relationships. They are all over the place, from romantic relationships, to friendly relationships, to professional relationships, to everything in between. One main issue I have with this season is that individual people get to shine and some relationships get to shine. In those relationships, some people get sidelined more than usual. For instance, this season Roy has a great story arc; Roy and Keely have some strong story arc moments, but Keely is largely relegated to secondary character. I’m not a huge fan of this simply because Keely is a wonderful character and deserves more time to shine. Other relationships don’t add up to the sum of their parts. Although I wasn’t a huge fan of Rebecca and her relationship, I wish we could have gotten more of Rebecca being the B.A.B. from earlier in the season. I would have much rather preferred more of that versus a potential relationship.
Others also grow and develop as characters. I found Roy’s storyline throughout this season great. At the end of the first season, we find him on the brink of retirement in arguably one of the season one finale’s most gut wrenching moments. He feels lost at first with what he wants to do, but is ultimately pushed into the path that he was meant to be in. His interactions with Keely and Ted have been highlights, but his interactions with Jamie and Phoebe show how far he’s come from being the journeyman football player to where he ultimately ends up. Kudos to Brett Goldstein for this. I predict at minimum another Emmy nomination might be in the cards.
Overall, this season does suffer some growing pains (show me that smile again (show me that smile), don’t waste another minute on your crying, we’re nowhere near the end, the best is ready to begin) that I found a little distracting and uneven. There are a few things that come up in this season that I thought would have major implications moving forward. One in particular involves Sam Obisanya during a match that I thought would come up again. It never did, so I’m either to believe there were no major consequences or maybe this will play out more in the next season. There’s also a lot going on this season that I’m afraid the writers just ran out of runway for this season. Some storylines are stronger than others and some people’s story arcs are uneven and don’t get the proper amount of attention.
This ultimately leads me to Nate the Great’s storyline. I could predict the outcome and ultimately what happened to him midway through the season. But since there so much going on with other characters and other storylines, Nate’s story suffers a little bit. This isn’t to say I’m not a fan of what happens. I think it sets up nicely for what’s to come in the future. However, for Nate to get to where he is at the beginning of the season to where he ultimately ends up required more story for him and more context from how some of his issues came up. Sure, they did some, but more would have been helpful. Maybe more will be addressed next season or maybe the writing team is operating with the less is more mentality. Either way, for Nate to get where he ultimately ends up, I wish there was more time for that.
Greatest Hits: each TV review I do I will have my favorite moments of the season in no particular order (shoutout to the show Lost for giving me the idea). I will make these as spoiler free as possible:
- The locker room scene at the end of the Manchester City game
- “Shut up. Just shut up. You had me at coach.”
- Trent Crimm, Independent
- Rebecca and Ted’s parallel stories about their fathers
- Everyone in life should dance like Coach Beard dances once in their life
- “Fairy tales do not start, nor do they end in the dark forest.”
- Sassy talks to Rupert
- Those greyhounds are adorable!
There was a lot I loved about this season and there were some noticeable issues as well. This season reminds me of Phase 2 of the MCU. The second phase of the MCU was filled with some great moments, but there are too many storylines that are being juggled that don’t have a payoff. I look forward to season three, but I hope that they focus more on certain people, or give each story their due diligence.
Football is life!
Grade: B-
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