#ted lasso critical

[lunar-years]

I wouldn't say Ted Lasso did any of its abuse/abuse recovery narratives "well" but I do think they did parts of all of them like really well, which is what makes it all so incredibly frustrating. Like, showing how hard it can be to intervene by having the Diamond Dogs be avoidant and non-confrontational despite their mutual concern about Beard's relationship with Jane, but then having Higgins step up and say something anyway (and even though Beard didn't take his advice, it still felt like okay, this is a good, this is a realistic and messy and complicated narrative to tell that nevertheless highlights the importance of speaking up and being there for your friends even if it doesn't always work out how you'd planned), having Beard & Roy jump in to help Jamie at Wembley and Roy respond so well to Jamie's story in Amsterdam, humanizing Rupert in International Break and giving the backstory for why Rebecca fell in love with him and offering them a moment of real connection again without once pushing the narrative that he should be forgiven or that Rebecca even considers for a second taking him back...all that shit was GOOD!!! it was really nuanced and complex and good!! andddd then it ended with the BeardJane wedding, a James Tartt Sr. forgiveness agenda and Rupert morphing immediately into an over-the-top cartoon villain like what 😭 they had the capacity...and yet!!! nooooooo.

#the most annoying thing about this damn show is that i actually think the writers are by and large really good writers #which makes it all the more frustrating when the writing is downright bad or lazy or whatever lol #like i KNOW yall could have done better than this...cmon #ted lasso critical #ted lasso #i try not to complain about s3 as much now but sometimes...im still thinking about it. #ANYWAY #tw abuse #rebecca welton #coach beard #jamie tartt #anti beardjane #rupert mannion #james tartt sr.

[ceruleanwhore]

In my soul, I feel disgusted and betrayed by this finale and I am shocked that the same writers who were able to give us such a truly wonderful show somehow came up with such a terrible ending for it. This episode directly opposes the very nature of the show more than any other episode in such a way that then calls into question the rest of the series. This episode feels every bit as hollow and sad as Ted himself seems to be throughout the finale and makes me wonder if we ever were actually supposed to believe and to hope at all in the first place, even though I thought that was the point of the series. 

The first of many issues I have with the episode is how they handled Rupert. The whole show is about belief, but specifically believing in others’ capacity for good and ability to change for the better. It’s about believing in redemption and reconciliation, which they actually could have done for Rupert even this late in the show. The scene in episode 10 where we get a glimpse of the inner child that’s still tucked away somewhere inside him showed us that even he still had this potential, up until they did what they did for the finale. While I, personally, tend to be more like Sassy was in that scene — gleefully cheering for the downfall of an odious scoundrel — it felt completely wrong for this show in particular to include that kind of public humiliation, which we the audience are all supposed to be cheering for, and in the middle of Ted’s last game ever with Richmond.

Where we actually could have used a side bit about a scoundrel getting his comeuppance is with Ted’s ex wife and their ex therapist. I think it’s absolutely terrible that they went and set up Rupert’s downfall the way they did while Jake apparently gets off scot free and never gets his license revoked or anything. There also is never really any acknowledgement of just how wrong what he did was, how he should have his license revoked, and how his actions call into question every bit of therapy Ted and Michelle got from him. No one ever questions ‘Oklahoma,’ never mind the entire divorce, relative to this man’s breach of ethics and it bothers me to no end that the most we get is his absence at the end from scenes with Ted, Michelle, and their son. We didn’t need Rupert dressing up like Darth Vader and physically assaulting someone, we needed Michelle realizing how completely wrong her whole relationship with Jake is, dumping him, and reporting him.

The next issue is Ted himself. Obviously, he was in a gloomy sort of mood throughout the whole episode, but I think it’s really important to point out how that didn’t actually clear up once he got home. I do believe he was happy to see his son but, from the plane ride onward, it’s like he’s just hollow. We see him coaching little league soccer for his kid and yet there isn’t any of the heart and soul in it that we’ve seen him put into his other coaching. It’s like he’s depressed, which is understandable because he just left a whole incredible, supportive community to come to Kansas where, like Odysseus at the end of the Oddyssey, he’s a stranger in his own home. He goes from having a whole city around him to support him to seemingly having nothing and not even being a welcome member of his own family since he’s still divorced. Also, as others have pointed out, that montage that seems to be a dream sequence when he’s on the plane ride home is all about him writing himself out of the lives of everyone he just left behind. He’s decided that it’s better for everyone there to just forget about him and move on with their lives as though he was never there and he’s literally dreaming about how happy they’ll be to do that. 

This is a major thematic issue for this series because one of the main points of the series is the idea that everyone can change for the better and, more importantly, just about every character does. Ted spends all that time in England working on his own shit like everyone else, and even gets over his aversion to therapy in order to seek help for the first time ever, just to throw all of that away at the very end because apparently he’s just back on his bs and that’s it. This is where it would maybe be alright if there were another season after this one to address and fix this, but there isn’t. In the very last episode of the whole thing he’s throwing away his entire community, dreaming about how happy they’ll be without him, and there’s nothing and no one there correcting that. To me, this is like if right at the end of the last episode with no room left to fix it, they just had Beard go steal another car and then act like the audience is supposed to be okay with it.

The other thing, going off of that, is how they handled some of the relationships, and I specifically want to start off by talking about Ted and Rebecca. They have the distinction of being the only ship to truly be baited, more than once, and very unnecessarily so. The bait scene at the start of the final episode contributes nothing to the plot, the characters, or their relationship with each other — all it does is mock the members of the audience who were foolish enough to believe they ever could have been together. This, to me, also goes against the core values and themes of the show, because ship baiting like that is inherently mean-spirited and Ted Lasso at its core is meant to be kind. There is nothing kind about essentially dangling something over someone’s head, playing keep away with it, until you finally just chuck it in the river and laugh at the person for being so foolish as to think they were ever going to get it. It’s mean for the sake of being mean and again, for the umpteenth time, it contributes nothing.

So then let’s get to Roy, Jamie, and Keeley. Jamie and Roy are another example of a strong relationship that’s developed beautifully over the course of three seasons regressing at the very end because oh no, people ship it and we can’t have that. I do think that Keeley turning both of them down was necessary but Roy and Jamie literally getting into a fistfight over her was completely unnecessary and detrimental to their individual characters. By this point, they both are mature enough and respect Keeley enough that it’s genuinely ooc for them to be fighting each other about who gets to date her while she’s not even there. Season 3 Jamie and Roy would’ve been leaving the decision to her without reverting back to macho Neanderthal crap. 

To me, this is also about the creators recognizing that people in the fandom have ships and, for whatever reason, feeling the need to try and shut that down rather than just leaving well alone. If, instead of getting in a fight like they did, Roy and Jamie had a conversation about their shared experiences of wanting to be with Keeley but not knowing where they stand with her and recognizing how hard it is for each other, then it could end up contributing to the further growth of their relationship and, along with it, shipping and oh no, we can’t have that. Just like with Avatar: the Last Airbender, the presence or lack of romantic relationships is not the issue here, the problem is with writers accidentally setting up an incredibly compelling ship and then being like “oops, we didn’t mean to do that,” and trying to ctrl z it in the finale, at the detriment of the whole story. Why oh why do writers keep feeling the need to sacrifice the quality of their whole story for the sake of trying to get people to stop having opinions?

So then last up is Ted and Trent. As many others have pointed out, that bit where Ted’s reading the book and makes that comment about the ‘laugh police’ in response to Trent’s excitement and anxiety is extremely out of character. Ted “but he’s our dork” Lasso would never say that and I was horrified to hear those words come out of his mouth. However, this goes in with the destruction of his entire character arc and every bit of growth he’s done throughout the past three seasons all in this one episode, because that was him actively pushing Trent away because, as previously acknowledged, he’s back on his bs.

One issue with this is that Ted then never has a proper goodbye with Trent and the closest thing to that is the note he left asking Trent to change the title of the book. It’s not that I necessarily think he needed individual goodbyes on screen with every other character but Trent in particular was hugely important for Ted, like how Rebecca was. Do you really mean to tell me that Ted wouldn’t actually say goodbye to the journalist who wrote what, coming from him at the time, was essentially a glowing review when he was actually hired with the intention of destroying Ted’s career? Do you mean to say he wouldn’t get a proper goodbye with the man who threw away his whole career over him? The man who then decided the first thing he wanted to do after leaving said career was to write a book about him and his team? Seriously?

The other thing with Trent is that, where Ted’s ex wife and even Rebecca have felt the need to use ‘Oklahoma’ with him to get him to tell the truth, Trent has a talent for discerning the exact truth from Ted regardless of what he does or does not say. It would have been perfectly in character for him to go talk to Ted like Rebecca tried to but then actually succeed where she failed because he would be able to clearly read Ted’s signals and throw that all back at him. Unlike Rebecca, he could directly call out how much Ted didn’t actually want to leave.

That is actually the biggest issue this episode had — cowardice. The only reason I can think of why they wouldn’t even consider doing something like what I just described is because, like with Roy and Jamie, they are perfectly aware of the chemistry between those characters and how they have set them up so it reads like they’re in love with each other, and a scene like this would be just about impossible to do without coming across as romantic. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: Ted and Trent would’ve already been snogging by the start of the season if one of them were a woman. This show did the thing where they’ve decided that they can have a couple gay characters, but those characters can only get with specifically devised side characters because God forbid you just have your two existing characters of the same gender kiss a bit. Between the pairings of Ted and Trent, and Roy and Jamie, there is enough textual evidence of mutual attraction and the potential for real, romantic relationships that one could write over a hundred pages about it, and that is not an exaggeration. When I look at this finale, one of the things I see is the titular character being destroyed because they decided that was better than letting people think that he could maybe not be straight.

The last issue I have here is that there really were no goodbyes. Rebecca showed up at the airport and that’s it and I thought that was very weird and, again, very much not in accordance with the entire rest of the show. Even if they didn’t have the entire team show up at the airport to say goodbye, it didn’t make sense to not even have just the Diamond Dogs show up for that. Where tf was everyone? Because just from watching the whole rest of the show, I think it would be impossible not to expect the team, the dogs, the folks from the pub and maybe also Shannon from town. It was a cold, empty departure far from fitting for the show at all and it left me coming out of that finale feeling cold and empty from the crippling disappointment. They had a whole show centered around interpersonal relationships and support and then had the coldest, loneliest ending anyone there could have devised.

My final thought here is that this is not an ending and the only way to salvage this wreckage is with another season. This feels like something they’re doing to drum up attention and interaction so that it’ll be successful when they do come in and announce that they’ve changed their minds and there will be another season, like an encore at a concert. However, if this really is the end, then I am absolutely disgusted and feel very betrayed right now because this show told me to believe and taught me that maybe hope isn’t actually a bad thing that’s out to get me, just to turn around and crap all over that. This show didn’t just apparently waste hours of my time, it was actually helping to get me to move on from past pain and start to accept hope as a good thing, until it shattered mine. They desecrated the very art they created and then expected the audience to applaud such disrespectful destruction, and I am disgusted by it.

#ted lasso #ted lasso finale #ted lasso meta #ted lasso review #ted lasso s3 #ted lasso season 3 #ted lasso season three #ted lasso spoilers #tedbecca #royjamie #tedtrent #tedependent #ted lasso critical #ted lasso criticism #anti ted lasso

[marielle-heller]

idk, something about just having EVERYONE fitting together so perfectly without Ted (Dr. Sharon returning and Keeley finding a project to work with Rebecca on and of course Beard having come back, even Rebecca’s stranger fits back into it!!!! Sam is maybe the ONLY one to leave but for his own DREAM!) … it’s sad. it’s fucking sad. like having everyone be SO together just for Ted to return to his son and the woman who divorced him in part over his optimism… it’s REALLY fucking tragic jesus christ. the way he’s cut himself off from everyone he loves and who loves him except for his son he at most has shared custody of. his relationship with his mom is still iffy. he’s shown entering the same house as Michelle which raises TOO MANY UPSETTING POSSIBILITIES (most pathetic of which is he is staying there till he gets his own place, but nearly tied with the possibility that they’d somehow get back together and he’s back where he started). everyone is so joyfully together and Ted, the person who BROUGHT them together, who helped forge stronger relationships between the team and made Rebecca realize she cares about it doing well… he’s so fucking isolated from their joy. he’s forcibly removed himself. I really don’t think he’s doing well and I really think this is the saddest ending possible. he’s not even shown to be in touch with them in ANY manner and it’s just… has an ending ever been crueller to its main character? I get moving on but moving on to WHAT? it’s not clear how many friends he has in Kansas that he’s eager to get in touch with. what his career prospects are. I appreciate him wanting to be a good dad but Henry alone is not going to cure the ache in his heart and the borderline unaddressed alcoholism. and Ted deserved so much more happiness. he sometimes didn’t feel like the main character of his own show, and I think that’s really reflected in how much respect the story has for him here

#ted lasso #ted lasso spoilers #ted lasso discourse #ted lasso critical #I’M UPSET! #ted lasso is no longer a feel good comedy this feels like the end of a tragedy

[boasamishipper]

i think the biggest problem of season 3 (of which there are Several) is the shift away from football being the crux of the story, which has undoubtedly resulted in the aimless, overstuffed, unfocused narrative we've been seeing for the last eight episodes. season one was as excellent as it was because whether richmond won or lost a match actually mattered; if they lost too many matches, they'd be relegated, and relegation was always treated as a distinct, tangible threat. there were stakes. and while season two had its issues with pacing and unnecessary subplots, no one would call it aimless. the characters had a goal (pun intended): to get promoted back to the premier league. if they lost too many matches, they would stay in the championship league. we as the audience were invested in whether or not richmond won or lost, and the narrative was all the stronger and more coherent for it.

season one asked us, can afc richmond avoid relegation? and we were invested in the answer. season two asked us, can afc richmond be promoted? and we were invested in the answer. now we're eight episodes into season three, and the overarching goal of the season, the question it is asking its audience to remain invested in, is...what? what are we building towards? is afc richmond's goal to win the whole damn thing? to beat west ham? to beat man city? to do just enough to avoid relegation again?

and because we can't answer this question, the narrative has suffered greatly. how are we supposed to believe beard when he says man city is the team's white whale if we haven't even seen them play each other yet this season? if ted's total football epiphany was so life-changing for richmond, why did we speed past all the matches this episode where the team won using that strategy? if this is all leading to a final nate-ted west ham-richmond match, why haven't we spent any time with nate at west ham? why haven't we gotten to see him grow and develop as a coach? at one point, the team was doing so badly that higgins suggested firing ted, who has been visibly struggling on and off the pitch - and the narrative did not give that suggestion the weight it might have had in season one or two. we spent an entire episode watching rupert, rebecca, and chelsea fight over zava - and then two episodes later he was gone, and we haven't so much as mentioned him since. just last season, sam was being heralded as the star of afc richmond, highly sought after by other club owners - but we haven't gotten to see any of his alleged brilliance on the pitch this season at all. i have to kick a little ball around, which those same people love me for, sam said in 3.07, that is, until i fuck up or miss a penalty, or i decide to fight back - a speech that was excellently delivered by toheeb, but loses some of its weight because we haven't actually gotten to see any negative reaction to sam missing a penalty or fucking up or deciding to fight back (not even in season 2 after the dubai air boycott).

(all this to say: i do enjoy the show. i love the characters, i've been enjoying the episodes as individual units, and i'll continue to tune in week after week. but for a show that once boasted football was life, it's sure been suffering since it decided to stop focusing on that.)

#ted lasso #ted lasso spoilers #ted lasso critical #been thinking this for a few days now and had to get it all out on paper (so to speak) #yes this season is just as punny and heartwarming and quirky as usual but like. what is everything building towards here #like the only overarching plotline so far is colin's coming out arc and it's being handled great so far #but that can't be the overarching question of the season you know??? #too many questions not enough answers #they should have kept the episode lengths at 30 minutes; forced the writers to keep the plot as tight and focused as in s1 #45-60 minutes is a lot of time when you aren't building towards anything

[notagoldfish]

The problems of season 3 are vast and deep, but the finale itself could have been made so much better if it had ended with Ted on a Zoom call with the Diamond Dogs, pulling Henry into frame and showing them howling together. This would indicate that Ted not only intends to keep his Richmond family and support but also that Ted intends to open real, honest lines of communication with his son and take a different path than his father.

(And we'd get to see Trent got to keep his Diamond Dogs placement even after he left Richmond.)

#ted lasso #ted lasso spoilers #ted lasso season 3 #henry lasso #trent crimm #roy kent #nate shelley #leslie higgins #willis beard #coach beard #ted lasso critical

[based-and-rinpilled]

You were disappointed in the finale because Tedbecca didn’t get together, I was disappointed because Jamie and Beard allowed their abusers back into their lives. We are not the same.

#tl #Ted lasso #tl critical #ted lasso critical #just to be clear I did like the finale #I just hated the way some things were played out #and I’m not anti tedbecca I’m anti entitled fans seething over a ship staying platonic #Jamie tartt #willis beard #coach beard #she speaks yet they say nothing #hit posts

[jicklet]

Oh no I forgot you ship Ted/Becca.

😆 Hi anon! I hope this doesn't ruin your day or anything, whomstever you are. If you don't ship it or ship something opposing or whatever's your bag, I'm sure we can still be friends, or whatever we are.

But I've been mulling this all over since the finale, and this is a good excuse to get my thoughts out. Because I come from ye old timey shipping days of "the idea of them together is cool, regardless of whether it happens or not." so that wasn't really my problem with the ending.

Here are the things that are true:

I really like themes and parallels. I like connecting dots and finding connections and all that jazz

The number of themes and parallels they set up between Ted and Rebecca was delicious and very fun for me.

My reaction to the finale is less upset than it is frustrated and confused.

My frustration isn't purely 'they didn't get together romantically so it sucks.' I had started making peace early S3 with realizing it probably wasn't gonna happen

I am frustrated because I wanted all those bits of cool narrative shit they laid out to Do Something

I am frustrated because it feels like Ted and Rebecca have had very few emotionally connected scenes since season one, and what's the point of parallel journeys and soulmateism if their journeys are going to stay so parallel and not join up more, and then just apparently diverge completely

And on the apparent diverging, I don't love it but it would have sucked less if their lines just matched up more in the middle! That could be poignant! But as is, it's more disappointing than tragic, because whatever potential was there wasn't almost realized and then lost, but instead just... never really approached. It feels wasted.

The show did not owe us them getting together, but what it did give us, I found unsatisfying. That's just a bummer, man.

Forgive me this metaphor but I cannot find a better way to put it: I am frustrated because I feel like I got ridden for 3 seasons while they went 'just wait it'll feel so good' and then they were like 'are you ready?' and then just hopped off and left.

I am confused because at the end of their story, I cannot figure out what I am meant to be feeling about it.

Again, I didn't need them to get together romantically, they totally could've found some other way to make it satisfying! But. Ted and Rebecca getting together romantically would have also tied it up in a lot of ways that worked and made the narrative satisfying.

Having a romance arc that works with their character arcs and the themes they've built on is just really cool as a story.

Obviously all that parallel journey stuff would've actually been leading them somewhere, ie to each other, yay woo

And not to each other just because they've been through similar shit, but because, as that last post said, among a lot of other reasons, they've been set up well to be what the other person needs.

Romance is not the be all, end all. But:

Ted and Rebecca both want to be in love with someone, someday.

Here is someone who already understands and balances and supports them.

Like, that's awesome. Is that not the qualities you want for them in a future romantic partner?

I can't see how it diminishes their friendship if it caries on very similar to it has been, just like, sometimes they smooch. Maybe I'm just too demisexual for this idk

Boat guy. I like boat guy, but he's a chiller version of Ted. I can't find that post that points out all the parallels there, but that episode by the time we got to Kenny Rogers I was like. Uh. Hm.

It's confusing to have boat guy have a beautifully intimate evening with Rebecca, all the while having so many specific details similar to Ted, and then just act like romantic Tedbecca is a wild, character-ruining concept.

Because the show ends with Ted leaving and Rebecca miserably walking out of the airport and straight into proxy-Ted. I have no idea how to feel about that.

I could keep going, but I'm about out for now, so uh. Woe, wasted Tedbecca potential be upon ye~

#Ted lasso critical #Ted lasso spoilers #V watches Ted lasso #Tedbecca #Ted x Rebecca #don't like; don't read pls no flames lmaooo

[queen-mabs-revenge]

holy shit nate deserved so much better than whatever the fuck this season was. nick gave us everything and this season really said lmao jason jelly who? i cannot believe after everything all he gets is a fucking ryanair ticket right back to where he started completely off screen my god without a shred of explicit narrative agency what the fuck what the fuck??? i'm genuinely livid - his journey was so well crafted in s1 and 2 and had such potential to be the real emotional cornerstone of S3 and he was jettisoned... and for what???

literally for what????????? what happened in s3 that was soooooo important it merited that level of production cowardice???

something is absolutely rancid with the stench of streaming statistics, focus groups, and studio interference i s2g. now with the whole picture laid out i get a really shitty feeling that apple came back with 'people don't like nate' — as if that wasn't the dramatic point of the story to that point, and as if nick didn't crush it showing nate's complexity and unhealthy relationship with his own self worth setting up a great confrontation and resolution. we know bill lawrence left due to creative differences and there were massive rewrites this season... now seeing the entire thing, i have a big feeling it was around nate's arc being sidelined in no small part due to studio interference...

#ted lasso spoilers #nate shelley #ted lasso critical #if i'm gonna make theories about this season... #it's got board room fingerprints all over it #and jason was like 'whatever as long as i get to be divorced about it'

[time-is-restored]

btw this might be me swinging a bat at a hornets nest but like. absolutely none of my disappointment from the tl finale comes from ship baiting or any relationships that didn’t happen (though to be clear, i think the tedbecca fake outs were meanspirited and served no narrative purpose - in noted contrast to the season's earlier jamiekeeley fakeouts, for example, which were explicitly there to demonstrate jamie's growth + maturity)

tedpendant is a really fun concept for me, and i LOVE the characterisation + thematic potential there!

but as someone who personally resonated with a lot of ted’s struggles, the idea that ted could leave richmond so… seamlessly, for lack of a better word, really doesn’t sit right with me. the thesis of the shows entire first season - assuming it can be said to have only one - was about how everyone needs the love and support of a community, whether that comes in the flavour of someone who hypes u tf up or someone who will relentlessly call u on ur shit (or, as happened quite frequently, both!).

rebecca, roy, jamie are the clearest examples as the characters with the most screentime: they were all deeply isolated and disconnected from the people around them, and that was making them miserable. the connections they made with the team, the vulnerability they finally allowed themselves to express (the ghost banishing ceremony comes to mind!), and them going on to want *more* out of their life are what made their arcs about *progression* rather than *regression*. without that clear theme of compassion + community inspiring positive growth in everyone who encounters it, there is, frankly, no season one.

my personal favourite scene from season one comes right after michelle walks away from ted, when they’ve agreed to get divorced. ted sits down on the bench looking gutted, and a little shell shocked - and beard sits down with him. hands him the drink, and they sit there together. silent, but together. to me, that scene is an implicit promise from the episode, to the audience: ‘it’ll be okay. it’s going to be hard, but ted isn’t alone, and his friends won’t leave him behind.’

it also makes it clear to the audience that ted isn’t the saintly-giver-of-grace who needs nothing in return, as one might assume on first brush, but rather that he’s Also struggling with his own shit (as is everyone, always, in real life!) and he has something he needs from the people around him too.

and looking at the text of s3, and the conclusion to his arc in the finale, i just don’t believe that he got it. he wasn’t just sad that he was leaving (which would be understandable!), he was completely closed off. unresponsive to the people around him reaching out, borderline confused as to why they were trying so hard!

(side note, while i completely respect the read of ted and trents last interaction being rather rude + ooc on ted’s part, i personally read a different motive into it. for me, it was more like… he didn’t understand where trents enthusiasm was coming from? like, he read that as trent being too invested in what other people think of him, and responded in a way that he hoped would emphasise that ted doesn’t *need* to laugh at everything trent wrote, bc trent Already Knows that he’s done something really cool and kickass, and he shouldn’t value anyone else’s reactions above that. basically, based on his demeanour in the episode, i genuinely don’t think it would’ve even occurred to him that trent was more invested in HIS reaction than he would’ve been with anyone else.)

again, looking purely at the text, the show had already established that ted has really strong depressive + avoidant tendencies, as well as panic attacks (largely triggered by his fear of not being ‘good enough’ in various roles, ie: a father). we saw one area he was able to calm HIMSELF abt these fears (worry for henry, which is a Hell of a choice considering the ending…), but in literally every other heightened moment, he had to rely on his support system to help him make the choices that he WANTED to make, rather than ones inspired by avoidance and fear (ie: confronting michelle abt jake, talking to his mum abt why she was visiting + his dads death).

and to be clear, this is a GOOD THING! we’re not supposed to go through life alone, no matter how bad OR well we’re doing. rebecca and keeleys friendship isn’t worth less for all the scenes where they’re both in good places. if anything, the opposite is true - it’s lovely that they both have someone who want to celebrate the achievements in their life!

and fuck it, we’re sure as hell not supposed to go through life with exactly one (1) person whom we expect to fulfill ALL of our emotional needs at all times either! like, im sure i don’t need to labour my point here, but tying everything to one (1) person in ur life doesn’t make u any less isolated than if u were going it completely alone, whether it’s a family member, a friend, or a partner. i won’t pretend to know the first thing abt what it’s like to be a parent, but i don’t think it’s unreasonable to say that no parent would be at their best if they had absolutely no support/camaraderie/general love provided to them from Anyone other than their child.

so when ted is SPECIFICALLY shown to be in a bad place, over and over again (did he come to terms w his fear to be close to henry overnight???????), and then removed from his community? of COURSE the audience is left feeling unsettled, and like the rug has been pulled out from under them. there was no time in this finale dedicated to how ted would still be in contact with anyone from richmond. no promises of visits, or phone calls - fuck, nothing about emails!! according to the text, we might as well assume this is a clean break (and the maybe-dream-sequence does Fuck All to assure us otherwise. if ted doesn’t go to beards wedding, what WOULD he go to????). and since the show has ALSO completely failed to give us even an IMPLICATION of who/what ted’s support system would be in kansas, there’s… a reasonable argument to be made that this is It for ted. that, after two seasons doing NOTHING but attesting otherwise, the audience is supposed to suddenly believe that ted can (and SHOULD!) pull himself up by his bootstraps, and cope entirely on his own.

that, to me, is a betrayal of the show’s premise. we were promised a show about how, no matter how dark things may get, none of the characters would be left to struggle alone. and then they ended the show with ted alone.

i don’t know. i guess if i had to give this post a tldr; if anyone has any gen fic/meta/Literally Anything in the pipeline, i would absolutely love to be tagged/directed towards it. i’ll be endeavouring to write something myself, as well, but it might take a while before i can return to my WIP, lol.

#this is the most measured version of this post i was capable of fghjskdjhgfdgjhsfd #the least measured one is just the aromantic flag with the ‘we are going to beat u to death’ meme overlaid #look ik this is hardly impartial wrt very small + insular communities like nuclear families #but its fucking impossible to go into media analysis and not bring Anything from ur real life in there w u #so im trying to forgive myself for being a little hashtag Vulnerable + Opinionated on main #in the spirit of what this show could’ve been lol #if not here then where etc etc #Ted lasso spoilers #Ted lasso meta #Ted lasso critical #also just to be clear here im being dead serious abt that last point #im spiritually doing the jamie run to demonstrate to u all how badly i want gen shit #please. p l e a s e . #okay wait last ramble here but. this is also why the lack of information we got on trent was so crushing to me #like ur telling me this man went through the incredibly painful + harrowing process of breaking out of his (comfortable! safe) shell + #cynical journalist persona. came out to someone VERY important in his life. and has done nothing but face the music wrt acknowleding #his past mistakes + endeavouring to be better and kinder. and we never get to know if he has ANY support through all that? at all? #is he dating? what's his family situation like? does he have full custody? any friends from work? any friends period????? #like i can should must and will die on the beard + roy + higgins + colins are trents best friends hill but #its like the premise of the show stopped mattering just in time for him to be left in a legitimately depressing limbo #like 'yes everyone needs love + support bc life is rlly hard. but we're tired of making a show abt that so This Is All Ur Getting #+ screw anyone's personal life that u didn't already see in s1. You Know Enough.' #anyway i love u all this is a very silly show and im gonna go play t.o.t.k for a few hours o/ <3

[laniidae-passerine]

but genuinely you can’t be doing the whole ‘oooooh two divorcees looking for emotional connection after heartbreak!’ and ‘I believe in romcommunism’ and ‘is it Ted that Rebecca is texting on banter???’ and ‘watch as they grow independence and self love but constantly with the feeling they’re intertwined in some lovely, chosen way’ just to go ‘actually they never get to together and Ted fucks off back home to the place that is now shaped by not great memories’. The fuck??? I’m bisexual, I was so there for the deeply unlikely TedTrent but I always thought TedBecca would happen because it makes more narrative sense. For two whole seasons they orbited around each other with this impending sense of collision, this hope they could find love in the strangest of conditions, in a stranger they’d never have chosen, only for that to be completely ignored??? This isn’t about ooooh heterosexual couple didn’t kiss (I will die on the bi4bi or at least Bi Ted hill fuck you) it’s about the fact that now, tons of moments are stupid as fuck! You played that with a hint of romance! You played that like something was going to happen! You wouldn’t shut up about Rebecca’s love life and Ted’s need to let go and have somebody else handle it all for him, they seemed made for each other from the start and you went ‘nah fuck it’????? WHAT IS THIS????

#ted lasso critical #sorry to tedbeccas!!! sorry to you!!! #coming from a ted multishipper who would have cheered if beard and him kissed with tongue #you guys were the ones who were supposed to win! we were meant to go ‘ah shame about tedtrent but we did see this coming congrats’ #and then all go back to ao3 together in peace!!! I was going to read tedbecca celebration fics invetween roykeeleyjamie and tedtrent ones!!! #AND WE ALL FUCKING LOST #I’m enlisting in tedbecca army now how did this happen #FOR A SEEMINGLY CISHET WHITE COUPLE???? THEY LOST??????? THEY NEVER LOSE???? #wow. literally the one couple like that I was rooting for above all the other options and they went fuck you. ted gets nobody and goes home #yeah you wish you were crazy ex girlfriend. but you’re not. they EARNT that ending. you earnt none of that. lord above it sucked #ted lasso spoilers #ted lasso #also sorry back in my notes to clarify as a person who is also mixed race #I know cishet couples can lose if it’s a biracial couple <3 but like #just used heterosexual as shorthand sorry

[lunar-years]

okay. at risk of being too harsh on Ted...

I genuinely do not think he's a very good coach. And I do not mean that just in the obvious "well he doesn't even know anything about the sport he's head coach for" way, even though like, yeah, duh that really is a crucial point. I mean it in like, he's genuinely not as good at managing and delegating and working alongside his fellow coaches! The way he acts and the ways he manages the team so rarely feels...collaborative? I've been thinking about it a lot after reading posts from other blogs about how he constantly brushes off/ignores Beard's advice and also sends Jamie mixed messages and stuff and it's like. YEAH. It's all very "Ted makes the final decision" about everything and that's deeply goofy because Ted literally knows the least about the game out of all of them!!

We see him ignoring Beard's advice to bench Roy, and ignoring that Beard is actually trying to help the team win, as it is their job to do, until Beard finally snaps at him in s1. When he decides to reject Jamie he doesn't pause to consider it or discuss it with anyone, and even afterwards when he does have the coaches "take a vote" it feels...very performative? Like no matter what they said, it was always going to be Ted's decision in the end, and if they disagreed with what he'd already decided he wanted to do, he was just going to do it anyway.

Then he gets in Jamie's head about being a team player and passing the ball a to the point where it's actually hindering Jamie's role on the team and the strength of his performance. And even though Roy recognizes that, rather than going to Ted about it and making different suggestions, he comes up with the whole signal thing which in hindsight sort of feels...very much like Roy trying to package his complaint in a way that will be digestible to Ted's approval? Like, "oh we'll give him the signal so he doesn't feel bad about playing the way we need him to play. but ONLY when we give him the sign don't worry we'll still control it!" Instead of just being like Ted, look, I don't think your strategy for Jamie works at all and here's what we need to do instead.

It almost feels like none of the assistant coaches really feel comfortable questioning Ted's judgement...because he doesn't foster a space for them that welcomes that kind of feedback from them. Even with the Zava thing, he doesn't listen to Jamie, and Roy and Beard don't question it, BUT Roy offers to individually coach Jamie. Because Roy knows what's happening with Zava is bullshit, and he'd rather pull Jamie aside and deal with the problem himself in the way that he can, rather than talk to the head coach about how it's bullshit. And the ONE time Beard and Roy go off and try something against Ted's wishes (showing the Nate video), it massively backfires and they scramble over themselves to apologize while Ted feels even more vindicated in never valuing their input. It's like a never ending cycle of bad management. and the WORST part is that Ted will TELL them he wants to know their thoughts and hear their strategies, but then he doesn't follow it or he just goes off and does his own thing, so it results in like...a level of unintentional condescension, I think.

At the end of the day, I do not think Ted has bad intentions or is going into this stuff intending to walk over the other coaches, but it happens because his purpose and goal for the team is fundamentally misaligned with what the other coaches value. Ted wants to make the team better by changing the culture at Richmond (at least until he checks out and loses interest in even that) and Beard & Roy (& Nate) want to focus on helping them win matches. I also DO think there's something in all of this that could have been a very compelling major factor in Nate's downward s2 spiral. I've always said that to me the most lackluster part of Nate's arc was not his redemption but his downfall--which had a basis that was severely under-explored onscreen. When he leaked Ted's panic attacks, it felt so severe and sudden a leap because there wasn't enough to back up Nate's headspace throughout the season, even thought the basis is THERE. The foundation for Nate feeling ignored as a coach and having his input constantly undervalued is THERE. They just don't ever let the characters properly explore it, or god forbid allow Ted to reckon with how he's ostracized all of his coaches to some extent.

#ted lasso #roy kent #ch: ted lasso #coach beard #nate shelley #ted lasso critical #i do not consider this a hate post but i'm gonna add the anti tag to be safe #anti ted lasso #basically I don’t want to take up a character tag with criticism

[avelera]

“Ted Lasso” critical opinion here, but while I still enjoy the show and make time to watch it within a day of it coming out, they’re so conflict-shy about having anyone be the central villain, or even the central antagonist of an episode, that the whole plot has gone to mush.

(Now just to be clear, I’m criticizing the show’s dramatic structure, not the relative merits of the characters or their individual stories. That’s subjective and people love their favorites and that’s fine. But the show, right now in Season 3 as of episode 8, has no villain or central antagonist and thus no plot other than a vague ambling towards the direction of the final game.)

Rebecca was a stellar villain in Season 1. Her having a redemption arc and a sympathetic backstory doesn’t make her any less structurally the villain. Her role as the villain glued the season together, it offered a powerful focusing factor to the arc and it gave someone for Ted Lasso as our protagonist to face off against, even if he didn’t always know it. As the villain she was the gravity that pulled the story together.

Though it is much panned by many writers, the fact is, having a hero, villain, and a love interest with a central plot of the hero keeping the villain from getting what they want (and an emotional B plot of everyone getting what they need even if it wasn’t what they wanted at the start) is a really strong central story that propels a narrative. Combining villain and love interest is possible and also compelling but notice, whenever Rebecca was in the role of love interest in Season 1, Rupert was brought in to pick up the villain slack. Rupert’s presence kept a villain in the picture to propel the story when Rebecca was busy in that other role.

Now, Rupert has had some walk on moments of villainy in S2 and S3 since then, but besides those moments… who the fuck is our villain in season 3? Who is the plot arrayed against? What is our hero, presumably still Ted, trying to achieve? What does Ted want? Honestly, what does anyone want at this point that they’re taking material steps to achieve and that is being kept from them by a villain or antagonist of some sort? What is this plot about other than Richmond maybe stumbling its way into a championship by the end?

The lesson of Rebecca being so beautifully humanized at the end of S1 and getting that wake-up call from Higgins to stop acting like a cartoon villain and realize everyone here is human was a fantastic story beat. But the lesson from it wasn’t that there shouldn’t ever be a villain. Rebecca having a redemptive moment of realizing she’s been an ass to everyone who actually cares about her, that she’s sacrificing her present to get revenge for her past, is still absolutely beat for beat a standard part of a villain arc. She’s still a villain even if she gets redeemed at the end. S1 had a strong central story of hero vs villain as a result and the humanity of the characters in an otherwise cartoonish plot was what elevated the story to critical acclaim.

Now… everyone is just too damn humanized. And the thing is, you can still humanize people and have them be antagonists, or even outright villains! You can have story conflict that isn’t a huge angry fight, it’s just different people who want different things that are in conflict with what the other person wants and prevents them from getting it. It’s actually a completely natural set up for “Ted Lasso” because it’s a sports story for goodness sake. Everyone wants to win! Everyone has a good reason to win that’s just as valid as anyone else’s. Everyone is working hard to win the trophy and has their own reasons to deserve it, and that puts good people in conflict with one another.

But no one is the villain in Season 3, or even a consistent antagonist taking material steps to stop the hero from getting what he or she wants. Not even Nate, who was perfectly set up to be the dark mirror to Ted this season, with a cold, severe coaching style based on a lifelong understanding of the game, but with no social skills to balance it. A true head to head of the Lasso method vs the method of his protege, the man he gave a chance to shine when no one else did. (Don’t even get me started on the dropped potential for a plotline that takes into account Nate’s age and the racism he undoubtedly felt in his career to still be a kit man at his age, a role that was next taken by a white teenage boy, and despite the skill he’s shown as a coach the minute he was given a chance. Where did all of that go? Nate had legitimate grievances of being overlooked and then achieving his dream despite this and being good at it, but I digress.)

Maybe we’re being set up for a banger finale, a few hours of really tightly plotted story that brings this all together, and we’re just killing time until we get there. I certainly hope so. Because story tropes exist for a reason. Keeley and Roy and Jamie’s love triangle story in S1 was a standard romance trope but it was well applied and that made it work. Ted vs Rebecca is a trope right out of Air Bud, for goodness sake, but it worked because it was well applied.

There’s no tropes happening right now in S3. There’s no plot. There’s no villain. There’s nothing for this story to coalesce around. Maybe it’ll all come together for a banger finale but man… man, I really hope it does.

#Ted lasso #ted lasso critical #Maggie rambles

[writingway-in-writinghell]

I must say. The way they handle mental health, parental abuse, trauma, sexuality, toxic masculinity (and overcoming it) in Ted Lasso is like nothing I’ve ever seen in a popular piece of media. They really understand what they’re doing there.

It makes me sad, then, that a lot of the narrative surrounding Nate (and to some extent Shandy as well, since her arc was cut short) is so. Colorblind. I mean, yes, Jade isn’t even exceptionally rude by European standards when it comes to customer service, but she sure is rude enough that it stands out to me, a German. And we’re not known to be the most bubbly people. (Really, we can be rude af. Don’t go to some parts of Eastern Germany, resting bitch-faces everywhere here, it’s draining.) And, well. I’ve never been stared at as if the server was a dead fish, ya know. As if I was invisible.

So when people of color in the fandom tell us that they see racist behavior here in Jade, and in Jack’s and Barbara’s treatment of Shandy? We better believe them. Because if even my white-bread nose can smell this against the wind, something is off.

And the thing is, I was ready to give Jade the benefit of the doubt! I even commented somewhere that she seems like someone who sees through people, like she just knows when they act a part, when they try to turn up their nose at her.

Cue Anastasia. And Jade treating her with dignity, something she denied Nate from the beginning, and he’s been coming to this place for years!

The whole framing of Nate’s interactions with her have a taste of “finally the white woman takes pity on the brown man now that he praised her restaurant’s cuisine in her proximity”, and that taste truly is bitter, especially compared to everything this show does well!

It stings. And now imagine you’re a fan from the same minority group (in England) as Nate and Shandy. And you see this treatment of their arcs. The disrespect. How it’s played as a joke. And then you see how well they execute queer narratives and how tenderly they approach mental health.

Man. The framing of Nate’s narrative is such a perfect mirror for reality. And people HATE him for lashing out after years of this disrespect? I think we can be glad he didn’t strangle someone. Why do you think Ted isn’t angry at him? (Hint: It’s not because he avoids negative feelings. Not in this case.)

#this is rambly but the last episode and how well they executed it really is a stark contrast to nate and shandy #will nate EVER hear an apology? from anyone? #we still have 6 episodes but idk the way they gloss over his upbringing all the time makes me doubt they’ll get there :/ #this isn’t a ~redemption arc~ he made two mistakes. two! #ted lasso #ted lasso spoilers #ted lasso critical #nathan shelley

[boasamishipper]

i can tolerate a lot of things from writers and showrunners but outright condescension and disdain for their fans is not one of them

#ted lasso #ted lasso critical #tedbecca #i didn’t like it from rian johnson and i sure as shit don’t like it from the ted lasso showrunners #i didn’t think tedbecca was going to be canon (and honestly didn’t care one way or the other) #(as in my enjoyment of the show was not hinging on tedbecca being canon. i was there for sam dani and nate first and foremost.) #but that 3.12 opening felt very meanspirited for a show that’s all about being curious and not judgmental #like if they felt so strongly about platonic tedbecca and KNEW they would never get together #what was the deal with playing coy when they were asked about that for the last two years #everyone involved could have just shut it down a la tina fey right away and we wouldn’t have this problem #i just don’t like ppl (fans and creators alike) laughing at the tedbeccas for picking up the pieces that the showrunners were putting down! #hunt and sudeikis and everyone in that room basically dangled a carrot for the last two years #and now they’re denying the carrot even existed #which does not sit right with me #also (hot take) but if the finale opened by mocking tedtrent fans and not tedbeccas y’all would (rightfully) be up in arms #the writers are adults and did not need to waste parts of the literal series finale punching down at a section of fans #whose worst crime was being annoying

[notagoldfish]

Ok, admittedly I was first just amused that even Business Insider is having a go at S3, but then I read this:

“After a firm signs a term sheet, the fund wires the money to a startup for shares of ownership. They can't claw back the cash once it lands in a startup's bank account.

Here's a more realistic scenario. Jack tells Keeley that her firm won't send any more money, if the capital hasn't been called already. Now Keeley has to look at how long she can keep the lights on with the funding she has. If runway is short, she could decide to lay off some employees to cut costs or sublease the office to bring in some extra money. Cash would still flow to the agency from existing clients.”

And goddammit this would have made such a better subplot and conclusion for Keeley than Rebecca just handing her a check and then being relegated to the 1990’s version of a subversive conclusion to a love triangle! 😭😭😭

Everything about the Jack plot sucked, but at least here, we'd have finally gotten to see Keeley struggle with actual business decisions as a boss and remind us how GOOD SHE IS AT HER JOB.

And since I'm doing a Keeley rant anyway, I just want to say that she didn't need two dudes showing up at her door, dripping with character regression and misogyny to choose herself. KEELEY REPEATEDLY CHOSE HERSELF IN PREVIOUS SEASONS.

When she broke up with Jamie, she chose herself. When she took the PR job in the first place, she chose herself. When she left to start her own firm, SHE CHOSE HERSELF. Choosing herself was never a problem for Keeley, and her relationships never held her back from fulfilling her dreams.

Forcing the "Keeley chooses herself" plotline is so disrespectful to her as a character, and the fact that Keeley has constantly fought for herself and chosen herself no matter her relationship status.

#ted lasso #ted lasso spoilers #ted lasso critical #ted lasso season 3 #ted lasso finale #keeley jones #juno temple #every woman on this show deserved better

[saltyoaktree]

I think what agitates me the most about the finale is that it made like half of season 3 seem completely pointless. Nothing led up to anything

#ted lasso spoilers #ted lasso #ted lasso critical