To Ted Lasso. I was recommended this comedy series, which is available to stream via Apple TV, by more than one person in the comments section and I sought it out.
I arrived at it to find that it is hugely successful and has just won a hatful of awards and got some sort of unprecedented recommission. Coming late to a very popular series often feels like arriving at a party at 11pm and finding that it’s boiling hot, everyone is absolutely off their faces, roaring with drink and Keith Allen is at the piano playing Jerry Lee Lewis with one eye closed, a fag sticking out of the corner of his mouth.
The premise of this show is that an American college football manager/coach Ted Lasso, played by Jason Sudeikis, arrives in the UK to coach fictional football team bottom-of-the-premiere-league Richmond FC. Hannah Waddingham, who is a very accomplished musical actress, plays Rebecca, the owner of the club. We learn quickly that Rebecca has acquired Richmond FC in a very nasty divorce from her philandering husband, Rupert, played by Anthony Head (yes! From the Gold Blend adverts). Further, we find out that she has hired Ted Lasso, who knows nothing about English football, in order to destroy Richmond FC so that she might exact revenge on her ex-husband.
The first season is good, I enjoyed it and worked hard to suspend my disbelief despite the many flaws in the conception and realisation of this show: the culture-clash comedy aspect (“Chips are called crisps, fries are called chips” etc) is a slight one-trick pony; despite this being a premiere league club, only one player appears to have a girlfriend.
A conscious – I think – USP of this show is that there is no conflict and no dilemma beyond very low-stakes piffle. Ted Lasso is a hugely – some might say monstrously – upbeat guy, dispensing shucks, y’all Midwestern wisdom, love and forgiveness everywhere. This is pretty cute and appealing, I don’t need my TV shows to be gritty, (you won’t catch me dead watching Squid Game, I hated The Wire), but the makers and writers of this show have decided to make this such a nice, nice, nice conflict-free zone that is becomes slippery and silly.
Okay, so you don’t want to base your show around a traditional character – conflict – obstacle – resolution setup? Fine, but you have to replace it with something. The jokes aren’t good enough to cope with what amounts to zero plot. I have read How To Be A Footballer and I know for a fact that the day to day lives of footballers are a rich seam of humour. And the characters in Ted Lasso aren’t really characters. In any really good show you can pretty much judge what any once character will do or say in any situation. Take Friends. I know it has its flaws but there you have characters – Joey is dumb, Chandler is funny, Rachel is spoilt, Monica is fussy, Ross is a dork, Phoebe is wacky. And from that there are endless plot and joke combinations. In Ted Lasso, Ted is just nice, Coach Beard is wise and nice, assistant coach Nate is timid and nice. The very briefly Machiavellian Rebecca turns out to also be… nice, Keely – she’s the one girlfriend – is so ridiculously nice. Even the based-on Roy Keane character Roy Kent (see what they did there?) is also deep down just a really nice guy.
Like I said, not every show has to be or can be Succession or I May Destroy You, but the popularity of this is utterly baffling. I pushed on with season 2 because I wished the whole show well – and Hannah Waddingham is very, very watchable – but I could not press on after the episode Rainbow, which relied so heavily on clunky TV and movie references, (there were two in a single scene), that it felt really desperate and untethered, like they had simply completely run out of ideas. I mean, I don’t blame them, I could not write a TV show, but good will alone doesn’t make good telly.
The origin story of Ted Lasso is that Sudeikis was commissioned to make some funny mini-films to promote NBC’s purchase of the rights to English football games. He created this character, Ted Lasso, and made some wonderful comedy out of this dimwit American dropping into the English soccer scene. But the Ted Lasso character of those mini movies is far more abrasive and thick than who he became in the series, with far more potential for a sustainable dramedy in a kind of Brittas Empire-style way. It feels like they had this brilliant, faintly monstrous character and a great fish out of water concept, but completely lost their nerve.
Anyway, this has all been said all over the internet, far and wide, many times and long ago, and I’m not sure why I felt the need to write this.
How about you? Are you enjoying Ted Lasso? And what other TV do you have on the go right now?
god i LOVED the Brittas empire, the ongoing plotline of the children in the cupboard behind the reception desk stayed with me. finally starting to watch Succession here. And also just faffing with utter shite like Below Deck (such soothing white noise television)
Have you watched Maid on Netflix? It is gritty. But so good. And so we’ll acted. I recommend.
Yes so good! This is a rare case where the show is even better than the book
Embarrassingly, I started watching reruns of One Foot in the Grave on the Yesterday channel when I was at home ill and self isolating recently. I never watched it much when it first came out. I was surprised it made me laugh so much and sadly I am now watching whole episodes back to back on Britbox!
I actually think you could probably write a really good tv show or sit com…
you are so kind! I really think that character-creation and plot lines and that kind of caper is completely beyond me. I admire people who can do it
You are a really talented writer. You never know what you can do in life unless you try.
Guilt! Second series just out on iplayer, I’m halfway through, first is on for a month. Only four episodes each. It’s a bit gritty, but it is cut through with comedy and great characters who are not nice at all but very enjoyable to watch navigating a farcical, but well written, plot that pulls them further in the more they attempt to disentangle themselves from it. In contrast to Ted Lasso I’ve hardly seen anything about it and can’t seem to get anyone to watch it. Interesting to read your thoughts on TL, having not watched it yet but only seen the admiration. I totally agree with your observations about the importance of developed and recognisable characters – I hate shows where any line could come from anyone, and the story drives the characters rather than the other way around.
Scenes from a Marriage – wow!
So glad you said this! Just assumed there was something amiss with me, but I couldn’t even get through season 1 of Lasso – bored stiff by about episode 3! Having said that I appear to be in a minority of one in that I couldn’t get through Game of Thrones either, despite trying really, reeeaaalllyyyy hard. Hanging on for season 3 of Succession tonight 🙌🙌
I was stumped by game of thrones too
Watch the remaining episodes. You will be very happy that you did. The funeral ep was an absolute cracker. Everything will make sense and tells of a greater richer arc across the three seasons that we are going to watch play out. Wonderfully rich seam of non toxic masculinity where each shows the vulnerability of their relationships with their fathers.
Same. OH started watching it whilst I was busy doing other things. I came in mid Season 2, along with complete and utter bemusement. He’s now watched it all and has declared it the best thing he’s seen on tv for ages. Me, I’m still left shaking my head in wonderment…
Alma’s Not Normal on BBC – it’s terrific, laugh out loud funny (very rare for me!) and also really quite sad too.
Yes! Loved Alma’s not normal. Funny but also made me cry. Excellent.
Alma is not Normal is just terrific. Funny, moving, thought-provoking; the whole package. I loved it.
Yes agree with what everyone else has said – Alma’s not Normal is great, very funny but also poignant.
So glad it’s not just me… my husband watches (& loves it) without me and that works just fine for me!
Esther your writing is so scandalously delicious I love it. How do you nail every single word in every single article? Your articles reaffirm my faith that there are talented writers out there, ie you who have such a talent to uplift and delight with humour and sincerity, it really is a pleasure to read. I will now watch Ted Lasso, but with the informed edict that it may be nowhere as brilliant as Footballer’s Wives. Or the Housewives of Cheshire.
Woah… not sure I deserve quite such high praise but I will take it!
I live in Kansas City which is the hometown of both the fictional character and Jason Sudeikis. As you might imagine, people are very excited about the show here, especially because there are so many references to KC. I think it is a cute and pleasant show like you said but I don’t understand the overwhelming hype either. It also bugs me that Ted Lasso has a southern accent when he is from the Midwest. I wonder if the producers asked Jason Sudeikis to put on this accent to make Ted appear more “folksy”?
yes! I was thinking the same thing about the accent, but just assumed I know nothing about the subtleties of American dialect
Yes Ted sounds like he is from the backwoods of Tennessee. I think it would’ve worked just as well with Jason Sudeikis actual accent.
Right, I’m going to start off with my favourite relationship-based quote from a film ever. It’s from (500) Days of Summer where the hero’s kid sister tries to explain to him why his relationship with Summer will not necessarily end well.
‘Just because she likes the same bizarro crap you doesn’t mean she’s your soul mate.’
And Esther, just because you don’t love Ted Lasso as much as I do, doesn’t mean I don’t love The Spike. The Rainbow episode is one of my favourites because of its clunky cultural references and I think it’s so interesting that’s what you hate about it. I know lots of other people who don’t like it either but once they know I do they don’t want to talk about it. As if I was actual Mrs Lasso or something. Weird.
It’s not that I don’t see Ted Lasso’s faults. I can see I’m being played emotionally but I like it. It does makes some attempts to get darker further into series 2 (these attempts are bit clunky) and they do try to end on a proper downer where one of the ‘nice’ characters goes rogue.
So in short, I know you don’t like my boyf, but I still love him.
Also on Apple TV is The Morning Show. Now that is proper clunky and all about awful people being awful to each other all the time so I’m not quite sure why I watch it. Just to see Jennifer Aniston’s unnaturally one-tone skin?
Julie, I’m going to immediate shelve a post I was going to do about how I like the Morning Show. I WISH I liked Ted Lasso more! I literally ENVY you. Can we still be friends.
Interesting. I’m enjoying it, some of it grates a bit. I think Ted’s anxiety and Nate’s self-hatred are interesting and are explored a bit towards the end of S2.
Ugh same. Enjoyed the first series as light relief from the all the heavy TV I watch (yes, I know I could just.. not watch the heavy TV. But I like it). But the second series is utter bilge. I’m sad about it but I’ve found solace in Acapulco, also on AppleTV.
Ooh this is very much a thinking woman’s discussion! Reminds me slightly of the book club I used to go to, where I used to think ‘just read the book, think about it & then go to sleep’ !! I’m afraid as much as I like to think I am a ‘thinking woman’ from time to time, ( such a sexist phrase) I do generally just watch tv, laugh/not laugh, fall asleep then go to bed! Ted Lasso was the only series that kept me awake. Sorry Esther I loved it. In what feels like a mean old world right now, it was a breath of fresh air & certainly struck a chord with my teen boys how too many folks judge people too early on.