Ted Lasso Just Can’t Help Itself

4 min readI want to live in the world of Ted Lasso. Not because the grass is always cut and everyone smiles a mile wide—frankly, that all screams “Written and Directed by David Lynch” too much for my comfort—but because things seem to always work out in the end. Even if they shouldn’t.As of today, the Apple TV hit has made its unfathomable return for a fourth season. I say unfathomable because season 3 was not just written as a series finale but felt like it, too. But here we are. Season 4. The first episode, aptly titled “Home,” brings the story to American soil to find Ted Lasso (Jason Sudeikis) spending his post-coaching retirement—well, not doing much. Without a team to coach, Ted lives his divorced life like an aimless supporting character in other people’s stories. It’s only when his old Richmond pals, Rebecca (Hannah Waddingham), Keeley (Juno Temple), and Higgins (Jeremy Swift) show up on his HOA-regulated front lawn that Ted has direction again.After an acclaimed first season in which Ted Lasso’s pleasant vibes and portraits of healthy masculinity made it a pandemic-era darling, its underwhelming second and third seasons revealed the limits of its once-winning playbook. The series started out sincere and sentimental; it fast became saccharine and slushy. The characters of Ted Lasso, and the challenges they faced, ceased to feel like honest explorations of our turmoils but rather how nice it would be if folks just got along.With the promise of a fresh start for Ted Lasso, there was hope his namesake series might find that core again. Maybe it will. But episode 1 is not the best foot forward on its path to redemption, and the retention of its bad habits is really keeping this one-time MVP from further greatness. It’s just such a bummer to know that Lasso hasn’t fine-tuned its plays after all this time. It’s still the same mawkish comedy whose sense of the world is as much of a farce as the sets, props, and wardrobe.But there is a flash of hope yet. A glimpse that maybe, if not Ted Lasso the show, then Ted Lasso the character has undergone change. At a barbecue restaurant (which, of course, Ted is on a first-name basis with the staff), the Richmond three offer Ted the chance to coach a new women’s team. We know the answer is yes; the many trailers and pre-release interviews have all said aloud this is the plot of season 4. But there isn’t a story without a refusal of the call. And Ted does more than just refuse.He seems kind of mad about it?Michael BeckerTed Lasso gets points for calling out Rebecca’s biggest sin in season 1, but is it enough to make season 4 worthwhile?There’s a distinctly negative energy in Jason Sudeikis’s performance as Ted Lasso this year. For much of episode 1, his Ted comes off like a haunted hitman weary of taking another life. Not, you know, a semi-retired coach. When Rebecca confidently offers him the job, Ted quips: “We trying to sabotage this team now too or something?” It gets a laugh, and Rebecca clarifies the offer is real and not a bad-faith opportunity like before. But Ted isn’t laughing. He’s swift to brush it aside until it disappears, like dirt under the couch. “Let me sleep on it, yeah?” he says before rushing out of the restaurant booth. I know that behavior. That’s the kind of bullshit I do when I know the answer is a firm “no” but I’m too tired and, frankly, cowardly to verbalize the truth.This isn’t uncharacteristic of Ted. But it’s nice to see Ted Lasso trying to plumb deeper depths again. In particular toward one idea that seemed prohibited by its premise: a job can just be a job. Just because Ted can change and even improve people’s lives through his Jedi wisdom doesn’t mean that is his life. He’s still collecting a paycheck while doing that, after all.At the same time, a post-Richmond Lasso is a shell of the man we know/knew. Sure, he’s cheery as a grocery store manager, but you can tell the man is dying inside. Like Mickey Rourke’s Randy “The Ram” Robinson working the deli counter. The point the first episode makes (eventually) is that it matters that Ted’s son see his father happy doing whatever his job may be. For Ted, he can no longer stand the long-distance parenting thing while cultivating other fully grown, overpaid athletes as if they’re children. He takes the offer of coaching women’s football like he takes his tea: “No thank you.”But if Ted has any flaws—even accidentally, because the show’s writers seem unwilling to make him imperfect—it’s avoidance. He sucks at being direct! Even when he knows something’s amiss with his son (which there is, but it isn’t anything serious beyond his own coach being sort of an ass), Ted lets things fester until his mother smacks him with the truth and Rebecca tells him that home can be just “a state of mind.” The episode ends with what should have been the start of season 4: Ted shooting his wife a text, not knowing his kid is on her iPad, about moving to London. “A change of scenery would be nice” is the reply. Being indirect runs in the family, it seems.How convenient. How clean. I don’t have a problem with that on principle, and shows with pleasant vibes are welcome in my dojo. (I’ve been obsessing over Sterling Point on Prime Video, which also premiered today. Heard of it?) But back-to-back seasons of a hunky-dory Ted Lasso have made me numb to the show’s reaches for sweetness and sincerity, even if whatever it offers actually is those things. I imagine it would be really nice to live in Ted Lasso’s world. Everything just seems to work out, and I can ignore the seams of reality tearing apart.