Spoiler Alert: This article discusses the second season of Ted Lasso, including events that occurred in the season finale. If you have not watched all of season two, please do so before continuing.
Well, that was quite the ride, wasn’t it? And before I dive into this post-mortem on what worked and what was decidedly less successful about the second season of Ted Lasso, I was to stress that I still genuinely enjoy this series. It remains my go-to show recommendation, because there’s a universal appeal to the characters, stories, and overall tone of the series. It’s also one of the best-crafted comedies on television. Which is why some of what I’m about to write might come off as harsher than you might expect – I’m holding Ted Lasso to a higher standard than your average television show. The writers have the goods – they’ve proven their ability to craft compelling and complete arcs, show us complex character development that builds slowly and smartly over time, and they’ve shown that they know how to write to the strengths of their massively talented cast. And when it all clicks – which is did for two of the four main season arcs – this show is at the top of the television heap (no small feat, considering the expanse of television currently airing). But when it falls short – as it did for the other two main season arcs – it’s glaringly noticeable. For a less accomplished series, that wouldn’t be a big deal. But for a series with as much going for it as Ted Lasso? It has to hit its marks across the board – slacking off and putting out C work when you’re capable of so much more is just a disappointment.
Let’s start with the good – the season arc for Ted this year was a thing of beauty. From the sensational writing – which trusted not only Jason Sudeikis to provide deep emotional resonance to a character that has relied more on his folksy humor over the past two seasons, but also required cast newcomer Sarah Niles (as Doctor Sharon) to hit the ground running and provide an even-keeled counterpoint to Sudeikis’s more showy performance – to the strong pair of performances anchoring the arc, this storyline was as close to perfection as you can get. We’ve known since the first season that Ted has panic attacks. And it wasn’t too much of a stretch to assume that there was some trauma at the heart of the character. Effusive and positive people may simply be that, but more often than not, when you are as open and cheery as Ted has been, there’s a reason behind it. Perhaps it’s benign – you realized that sweating the small stuff every day was too much, so you resolved to be outwardly more positive to hopefully brighten the day of those around you – or maybe it’s something more in line with Ted’s use of his cheery disposition – as a way to insulate himself from having to feel things deeply while ensuring that no one around him ever feels that he doesn’t care.
Getting to the heart of his trauma – the suicide of his father when Ted was a teenager – was a well-crafted storyline. Throughout the first half of the season, we were shown a series of father-son (and in the case of Rebecca, learned about her father through her relationship with her mother – more on that in a bit) relationships of varying types. Sam and his father are immensely close and the rising football star goes to him for advice and counsel regularly. Jamie has a shit dad who has broken his son time and time again. And Nate, well, Nate’s father is odious in a whole other way than Jamie’s, and I’ll be discussing that bit of genius writing when I dig further into his brilliant arc in a moment. But this showing of how essential the father-son dynamic is in building up men primed us to understand Ted’s deep sense of loss, pain, and anger once his past was fully revealed. And having Sharon, an outsider who was charmed by Ted to a point but who never fully drank the Lasso Kool-Aid be the one to gain his trust enough to let that pain emerge was the perfect salve to this particular story.
Now, Ted’s not cured (and I certainly hope the writers don’t simply consider this arc concluded and never deal with it again in season three) and he’ll certainly need additional therapy – hopefully with Sharon, because Niles is such a damn good addition to the series and her easy chemistry with Sudeikis is so strong it would be gutting to lose her moving forward – but he does have the tools to do the work. And I wouldn’t mind if the series let us see some of that work moving forward. But with the time jump at the end of the season (a rather clumsy choice, as it wiped away some ills within the writing, but also didn’t do the work to do so, a particularly frustrating choice), I have a fear that the writers will consider a lot of Ted’s work as completed off screen, which would be a disappointment. Yes, there’s a clear focus now: Richmond is back in the Premier League, and there’s a supervillain Nate to take down, but there’s also a sense that the second season was meant to be about gazing inward at the show’s characters while three will be about looking outward into the football world at large. I could be completely wrong, but I’m not sure the series will allow us this deep dive into a character’s psyche to overtake the season storyline again moving forward, which is a shame. This is clearly the arena where the writers do their best work (again, this arc, this plotting, it was masterfully crafted). I hope we get more of these long, complex character arcs in season three – perhaps one for Nate the Great?
And that would be the other strong arc in season two – albeit one that didn’t quite have the pay-off I had hoped to see. Much like knowing that there was something brewing psychologically with Ted since back in season one, we’ve known that Nate likely had some trauma from how horrifically he was treated by the team when he was “just” the kit man. We saw the bullying, we watched Roy come to his aid, and we saw as Nate slowly gained confidence through a combination of Ted’s encouragement and the team’s respect. And this season, we saw that despite all those professional strides, Nate never truly felt like he belonged. He constantly needed reassurance that he was good enough, and he rarely got it. He was knocked down time and again by his distant and dismissive father. He was socially awkward with Keeley. He didn’t get that being an assistant coach means that you don’t get to be the face of the team – and when he got a small taste of recognition, he allowed it to quell, temporarily, the deep-seated fear that he wouldn’t be good enough for his job, his family, and his own sense of self. And he got addicted to that positive reinforcement. And bought into the hype, because the alternative was listening to the voice of his father in the back of his head. And he convinced himself that he was a genius, a wonder kid – and that those around him were holding him back. Every time that voice of doubt emerged, he took it out on Will, so that he could feel strong again. It was a vicious cycle that the show was great at revealing to us slowly.
But the kicker in the finale – that Nate blames Ted for his own insecurities – was just shattering to see. Ted Lasso has allowed us to view events through the eyes of various characters – a rarity for a series with a cast this large. But despite spending time with Nate on his own – and seeing how he has changed throughout the season – we haven’t really had many instances to look into his frame of mind. Yes, we’ve seen how his father’s rejection hurts him. And we’ve seen that he has a continued need for positive reinforcement from those he looks up to, including Ted, but we haven’t seen how he sees himself fully realized. Which is what made his speech to Ted – the first time Ted took the time to really see him this season, a failure I suspect Ted will be noodling on for some time* – all the more troubling. We’ve seen Nate through the eyes of many this season, but also never really understood the depth of his self-loathing and lack of self-confidence. In the absence of a father to support him, he placed Ted in that roll. And he felt Ted abandoned him. So, in the vacuum Ted left by not actively reaching out to Nate to check in on him, Nate found Rupert, a true snake who spoke poison in his ear and convinced him that Ted was the problem. A joke, someone who doesn’t understand the sport Nate loves, an interloper only there to take the credit for ideas Nate works so hard to dream up. But Rupert will give Nate a chance to shine. A chance to be the hero. A chance to really make his father proud. And get the girl. In the face of that promise, all Nate had to do was turn on the man who gave him a chance – but who appeared to stop caring when Nate needed his approval the most. It’s a dark, dark twist. And one that will resonate throughout season three.
*It was clear during “No Weddings and a Funeral” that the series wanted us to clock that Ted has the picture Nate gave him in a place of honor in his house – on the mantle next to his photo of his son. We know Ted thought of Nate as a son, and that he was proud of him. So much so that he didn’t think he needed to check up on him. And so much so that he never imagined Nate could be bullying someone like Will. It’s a failure on the part of Ted as a manager and as a father figure, and one that he will likely feel the need to atone for on some level (another reason I hope Sharon returns in season three). But to have Nate call out the lack of the photo at work, when we know Ted holds that photo dear, was crushing.
If the Nate and Ted storylines were the narrative high points of the season, the show was less successful when it came to navigating its season two romances – to the detriment of the characters, their development, and the overall arc of their stories. The season started off strong for both Keeley and Roy, together and individually. Keeley had found her rhythm as the head of PR for the Greyhounds, and while she occasionally suffered from professional imposter syndrome (particularly prior to her photo shoot – a moment that was honest and important for her character growth), it appeared that the writers were worried that wasn’t enough, and opted to zero in on Keeley’s personal life for baseless drama as the season came to a close. Similarly, the early portion of Roy’s season two arc was stellar: lost and unsure of his identity following his retirement from football, Roy tried his hand at commentating, only to be lured back to Richmond by Ted’s good-hearted scheme. Seeing Roy find his footing as a coach – and father figure to his players – was a great development for the prickly character. Also great? Seeing how well he and Keeley worked out their issues (minor, naturally, but still issues) by talking them out.
But then the backslide happened, with no real explanation or build up. The Jamie confession to Keeley at the funeral felt strange and out of place (and out of character for Jamie – while we’ve seen him sending some looks her way throughout the season, there was no real evidence that he still harbored feelings for her until that particular moment). Then Roy’s three hour chat with Phoebe’s teacher was odd, albeit with more foundational grounding than the Jamie subplot. Were we meant to think that there was a romantic spark there, on either side? Were we supposed to simply see it as a case of there are other people out there that could make Roy happy? Hell, were we supposed to think he meant to look outside of his clearly strong, well developed relationship with Keeley for something else? Then, to have him confess . . . something to Keeley, only to have her mention Jamie’s confession, well, it all felt contrived to inject drama into a relationship the writers had shown time and again was as solid as a rock. The finale only served to muddy the waters even more. Roy brushes off Nate’s apology – he’s not threatened by Nate (much to Nate’s frustration), and he knows Keeley is mostly fine about what happened. But he wants to punch Jamie because he IS threatened by him, or the idea of him and his past with Keeley. And Jamie apologizes to Roy for his confession – not to Keeley, who he put in a shitty spot, but to her boyfriend, as if Roy has a claim over Keeley’s life.
This may have been the single moment in the finale that annoyed me the most: Roy, who has shown over and over that he values Keeley as an equal, reverting to caveman-level antics because he’s sometimes insecure around Jamie. Beyond the action itself, what really annoyed me was that we never got the chance to see Roy and Keeley talk about it – assuming they talked about it. And why wouldn’t they – we’ve seen them realize that open, honest communication is the bedrock of a relationship this season. Why not allow us that insight into their characters at this stage of the game? Well, so that you can have Roy and Jamie almost come to blows. What a cheap reason not to provide deeper insight into two of your leading characters. And the kerfuffle over the airline tickets at the end of the episode? Yet another short cut to resolve-but-not-resolve the relationship conflict. Roy is still, for whatever reason, doubting himself and their relationship, while Keeley is crushing it in the business world and feels they are on solid relationship ground. Perhaps season three will allow us the chance to have that very necessary conversation between these two – where Roy explains that he’s feeling lost, threatened, unsure, and Keeley is the one to offer him the pep talk – but these last three episodes have felt like the writers were rushing to the finish line, while desperately needed some additional drama to fill the time. And Roy and Keeley became the sacrificial lambs for some poor storytelling.
And, finally, there’s Sam and Rebecca, the two characters who were most under served by the writing this season. Following season one, where Rebecca was just as essential to the central arc as Ted, season two found her less a boss ass bitch (despite statements to the contrary) and more a rom-com lead. Yes, there’s been some discussion that Rebecca should be out there, trying to find something in her personal life – especially following her past track record where she was willing to let herself play second fiddle to Rupert’s wants and needs, which followed in the footsteps of her parents’ painful marriage – but my god, I would hope that someone like Rebecca, who understands how the press works when it sniffs out a scandal, would have seen how utterly idiotic it was to even THINK about dating one of her players. And if the possible scandal wasn’t enough to make her realize the error of her ways, wouldn’t the drastic power imbalance send up some red flags?
That’s where this romance lost me – and I suspect a number of fans. Yes, we love both characters, but this relationship was such an irresponsible decision from Rebecca (and Sam, as well, as he’s a consenting adult who also should know better). And for the writers to simply gloss over this insane choice and paint it as just one minor problem when it’s something that could destroy their careers boggled my mind. Add to that Rebecca’s horribly manipulative decision* in the penultimate episode to go to Sam’s home and tell him she doesn’t know if she wants to be with him, but she doesn’t want him to leave, well, just ugh. I want them to be happy, but I don’t want the show to indicate that everyone and everything is perfectly ok with the boss dating their employee. Because that isn’t ok. If this was Rupert dating one of his female athletes, even if the athlete was a fully consenting adult, people would be up in arms over it.
*Now, I’m well aware Rebecca’s statement wasn’t maliciously intended. She didn’t go there to consciously manipulate Sam into staying – in fact, I suspect she meant the exact opposite. But she absolutely should have checked herself before taking those steps, because it came off horrifically poorly. And she should have figured that out and taken a step back to let Sam make his own choice – which he ultimately did, thankfully – without her influence at all. She lost the right to have any say when she stepped out of the relationship. And, of course, this situation highlights the exact reason why these two shouldn’t be in a relationship: Because Rebecca has the ability to influence his career. There’s just so much wrong with this, and the writers don’t seem to want to address those issues, which is problematic.
So, Rebecca was reduced for much of the season to a woman in search of love. All well and good, but we didn’t spend much time actually watching her run her football club. You know, the thing she genuinely enjoys doing, and the thing on which the entire series hinges. The lack of focus on football and whether that was a good or bad choice for the season is something I don’t have the time to delve into – I suspect someone out there will tackle this topic, and I’ll eagerly read their thoughts – but to take a character who was proven to be a sound businesswoman by the end of season one and excise that portion of her character development to create a ill-formed romantic entanglement that didn’t result in real dramatic stakes for the character or series, well, what a disappointing turn of events.
As for Sam, the rising star of the team, it was a strange choice to saddle him with a romantic relationship full of red flags – although none impacted him negatively – after having him stick his neck and career out in protest of the team sponsor at the start of the season – another huge red flag, with devastating potential ramifications that went nowhere. If Rebecca was reduced to a romantic foil for Sam, Sam was given some key pieces of character development, but no real dramatic stakes. He gets Richmond to leave their problematic sponsor, but nothing happens as a result. No backlash from a petty billionaire, no issues for Sam, no problems for Rebecca, no breach of contract suit. Nothing. He enters into a potentially damaging personal relationship with his boss, but there’s no fallout. In fact, everyone seems to think it’s a great idea. Then, he spurns the offer to join a billionaire’s new football club, sparking an unhinged outburst* from said billionaire. Again, nothing happens (or, at least nothing has happened yet – there’s a chance something may come of it in season three, though I wouldn’t hold my breath). So, Sam made a number of unsound decisions – although staying at Richmond wasn’t necessarily unsound – and yet, nothing has come of them. There was no real narrative reason for this, outside of creating brief dramatic tension within the series with no actual follow through. That’s ok in one instance. But multiple points throughout the season? That’s just sloppy writing.
*I love Sam Richardson. He’s incredible. But boy, was that choice to play Akufo’s final reaction completely over the top the wrong one. I’m not sure if that was Richardson’s choice or if it came from the script, but yikes. Had it been played stone cold serious, with a legitimate threat to Sam regarding his choice to reject the offer, well, that would have been chilling and fitting. But to turn that moment into an over-the-top farce, that’s a massive error in tone within a string of episodes that had various tonal issues.
And that really gets to the heart of what frustrated me with these final few episodes – uneven writing. To have a series that can deliver in the form of the Ted and Nate arcs, while injecting unnecessary drama into a strong Roy-Keeley relationship and botching everything around the Rebecca-Sam arc, is troubling. We know the writers can deliver on great, compelling, layered storytelling. Why not take the time to lay the foundation for Roy and Keeley’s romantic troubles throughout the season, rather than introduce them into the final, hurried stretch of episodes? And why gloss over the very real world implications of Sam’s actions early in the season and the potential issues in his relationship with Rebecca? There was more than enough drama in both those stories to sustain an arc over the course of the season – you don’t need to add in the potential of his transfer to another team at the end (underdeveloped and out of nowhere) to inject the arc with “real” drama.
So, season two of Ted Lasso was a mixed bag in the end. What it did well, it did incredibly well. The cast remains top-notch, turning in some incredibly nuanced performances. But when it lost the plot – at times, literally – the series showed a lack of focus and understanding of its characters, their roles, and how the series wants to ultimately portray them within its world. And that’s the part that will likely stick with me the most as we wait to see what comes about in season three. Yes, there will ultimately be some sort of showdown with Rupert and Nate’s West Ham United club. There should be time spent on Ted’s reaction to Nate’s deflection – and his entire, self-centered speech – early on in the season (despite the apparent time jump in the finale, which robbed us of a number of key character beats, this absolutely needs to be addressed right out of the gate, as it’s such a huge moment for Ted).
We need a real understanding of Roy and Keeley’s relationship – how has Keeley moving away from the club helped or hurt it? And how has Roy come to terms with his role in her life and his position around her ex-boyfriend? That must be addressed in a deeper way as well (maybe a return from Doctor Sharon?) And, in perhaps my biggest wish for the third season, I would love one of Sam’s loose story ends to get a pay off – whether it’s bringing back Richardson for a small arc or having some fallout for his and Rebecca’s relationship. Allowing Sam to have a clear, possibly painful set back in his life or career would go a long way to truly developing the character. He’s such an interesting character and Toheeb Jimoh is such a strong actor that Sam needs a real arc with real stakes that builds naturally.
That’s a lot to put on a wish list, I know, but as I said at the outset of this piece, this is a show I hold to a high standard. It’s proven that it can be an all-timer series. It needs to take the time and effort to build all of its storylines out with the care it gave to Ted and Nate’s this year. Because these characters – and these actors – deserve the writers’ absolute best. Here’s to season three – where it will all come together one (potentially last) time.
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