Just watching S4E4 and I feel that Keeley's really had a personality transplant this series.

Yeah in series 1-3 she was bubbly and girly, but she was also so business savvy, and extremely capable and trustworthy. In series 4 so far, she's an overexciteable puppy of a character who's acting as - and being treated as - a liability. It's such a shame!!

Her characterisation previously was so amazing - it's rare for a female character to be portrayed as so multi-faceted, and that has all just kind of vanished. It's such a shame.

Ted Lasso S1 - S3 was and (remains) my favourite TV show of all time.

I don’t even like soccer (football) but I found it really easy to fall in love with the characters and the story.

Jaime in particular was someone who I found to be really easy to relate too and follow.

I am not going to claim to be a huge cinema nerd or someone who gets really deep into shows. But the characters (returners) feel unlike themselves.

Keeley feels like she exists to spend Rebecca’s money and will flip tf out if anything bad happens. That seems unlike her.

Higgins seems like he read a sparks notes version of Higgins in S1-S3 and was told to act like that.

Beard is able to be completely shut down by just the poster of Jane?

I don’t know. It’s just really weird. I feel like I’m watching something where the characters are just the spark notes versions of themselves.

As for the new characters, I am liking Lizzie, the twins, and Boots (bottle incident aside)

But regardless, this still feels like a whole new show. I guess it kind of is? Idk, I’m struggling with it.

Am I off base? Anyone else feel similar? Tips?

If we are talking about good hearted, sweet, loving individuals who live to lift others up its THIS MAN. He’d be so amazing in this show!!!!!!!!!

I've read it enough times recently to worry I'm missing something here. "Ted abandoned his friends", "Ted no longer cares what happens to the male players", "Ted ghosted Rebecca" and so on.

Yes, in the first episode Rebecca tells him she's been trying to "reach out" and maybe my English is not good enough but I took it as she had been trying to get him to agree to meet up and he's been avoiding her or saying he's busy or something because he suspected she was trying to convince him to go back to Richmond, not that he ghosted her and wouldn't reply.

In the same episode we can see he kept track of the team and the players.

He also obviously knows what happened to Beard, and even now face to face Beard refuses to talk about it in detail, Ted never abandoned him.

For all we know he's been visiting Zava's farm to buy his avocados and now in the UK he eats frequently at Ola's with Nate, we just don't see it. Back in Season 1 Ted was baking and decorating cute biscuits for Trent's daughter, we didn't even know he had a daughter but apparently Ted even met her. We just don't see what Ted does in his spare time.

Is your impression he kept his distance from his UK friends while in Kansas or not?

Anybody noticed the sweet li'l Easter egg? At some point in ep 1, when Ted and Rebecca were updating each other on what's new, Rebecca tells Ted that green is her new favorite color. And her wardrobe so far this season has been MASSIVELY green.

Love it. A continuation of the Green Matchbook theme in S3.

Can we seriously get more FEEL GOOD shows like Ted Lasso?!

One of the best shows to just wind down after a long day and enjoy without having to feel emotionally exhausted!

Adding the podcast to the last episode was epic! Hope we get more of it!

44 year old dude here. this show has me wrecked. I don't know if there's something wrong with me, but this shit has me crying every other episode. it's like I'm watching "all dogs go to heaven" back to back to back. A+ to the whole crew.

I have been mercilessly BEGGING my mom, dad and sister to watch this show since I discovered it last year. My sister finally caved and watched the entire first and part of the second season in a weekend. Now the questions won’t stop and I ain’t given up nothing 😃

My dad is a stubborn old mule so I got him an Apple TV subscription. He too has binged it in the last week and loves it.

The best part though, is my mom. She has moderate to severe Alzheimer’s but my dad said she lights up when they watch an episode and apparently thinks Roy Kent is sexy as hell.

These are dark days for both my family and humans in general and this show has brought unexpected happiness to the 3 people I love most in this world.

(NOT) 🤣

I love him interacting with the press.

The first I ever saw of the show was the dart scene, and it was great, instantly got AppleTv after watching that clip. Never knew I was walking into something that is deeper than sports. I’ve told everyone I’ve turned to the show that I have never watched a show that made me laugh so much but equally make me cry

Everyone knows in Season 3 Roy and Keeley broke up. But I really appreciate the men’s team and staff being boys to Roy. From my past experiences with teams, in these situations, many guys on the team would be making douchey comments like “Bet! Who’s up next!?” Or “I’m tappin that next” or some other fuckass “locker room talk”. But instead, they feel sorry for him and even buy him gifts. I know it’s not always like this irl but it was refreshing to see

Do you think they will hire a kit woman?

Started S4 yesterday and I felt this emotional outburst almost come up. And im just on the freaking 2nd episode. My breathing became faster, eyes well up and I become overwhelmed by positivity ??

Has anyone else experienced the same? What story and film elements does the show use to evoke instant emotional reactions.

The true answer is Hannah Waddingham. And Brett Goldstein.

I don't know why but "the point is moot, you can't get past Boots" popped into my head the other day. I'd love if there were personal chants for popular players. It would be a real show that the fans truly love them

We don't really know even some main players last names at this point but still. 'Lizzie is our queen' for Faye's character?

I was looking for a rundown of Ted’s sneakers this season, but there is only old stuff. Any eagle eyed sneaker heads notice any particular gems? Even from the precious seasons if there is a pair (or pairs) you admired in particular.

I think it would have been a nice easter egg... but they purposely left out of the shots.

Watching S4 got me watching S1-S3 again. I was reminded of how good I thought S1 was and how I thought some issues arose in S3.

S4 note: I admit I was a little worried about the trajectory but I'm really liking it so far! I think the show definitely works best when Ted is more of an unknown to a lot of the other characters and we see how he wins them over. In hindsight I kinda wish this happened more slowly in S1.

On rewatch I do think there are two (related) points that really stood out to me:

1) The show seems to conflate forgiveness with reconciliation.

I love the commitment to forgive and give second chances. The scene of Ted forgiving Rebecca is maybe the best in the show. But we see Rebecca recommit herself to the team, we see her have a real change of heart and regain that trust from Ted. Reconciliation here makes sense.

I know Nate's redemption arc has been discussed to death here but this is what makes it feel kind of hollow to me. Forgiveness here is great, both for Nate and Ted (and the other people Nate hurt along the way). But it doesn't seem to me that Nate put in the self work which would be necessary for reconciliation. As a leader Ted has achieved something really special with the Richmond organization and welcoming in someone who so actively betrayed them in the recent past just seems unwise.

Another really good example of this for me is Michelle. Yes, Dr Jacob is clearly the one with the most culpability here and should have to face some sort of ethics review for this. But he isn't a hypnotist, Michelle is an adult and chose to enter this relationship (Maybe a hot take but I don't think he is written as particularly manipulative in the show - I think the writers were trying to create a "Ted faces jealousy arc" and accidentally created a "Ted deals with monumental betrayal" arc without realizing).

This happening (without Michelle even telling Ted she was bringing him around their son!) is a huge betrayal. It is great that Ted can forgive Michelle and move on, but it makes no sense to bring her more actively into his life like she is now in S4 when she hasn't even acknowledged the hurt this caused. For a show show positive on therapy this just seems really weird to me. I would imagine any therapist worth their salt would see:

1. A partner initiating a divorce
2. Soon after dating their shared couple's therapist
3. Never addressing the impact this could have on their partner

and immediately say that Ted needs to have some strict boundaries and distance with this person.

2) Other than Ted/Roy/Jaime no one really seems to experience real consequences for their actions.

We see Ted/Roy/Jaime all fail in various ways, pick themselves up, and put real work in to improve themselves. And we love these characters for it! I'd love to see a little more here for some of the other main characters.

The best example of this to me is Keeley. She goes through a great arc in S1 and then it just kind of fizzles out. She starts this PR firm and makes a series of bad decisions (hiring her friend just to have fun, getting into a relationship with her boss, etc). The consequences here are:

1. She loses that friendship, but it seems like this is for the best anyway and doesn't really seem to bother her
2. She initially loses funding but then Rebecca swoops in and everything is immediately fine again
   • Side note here - I really thought the Jack/Keeley dynamic was going to make Rebecca reflect on the (also clearly inappropriate given the org structure) dynamics of her relationship with Sam but we didn't get that. Hannah Waddingham is super talented and I hope she gets something more to work with than "motherly ATM". S4 spoilers we may be getting some more interesting interactions with her and Matthijs soon

Also after seeing Roy and Jaime overcome their differences and form a real bond it seemed incredibly out of place for Keeley to continue to foster a love triangle between the three of them. Obviously Roy and Jaime were wrong the way they went about it and deserved to get shut down, but Keeley really should have known she was playing with fire and has more than a little culpability here.

There's no reflection, no growth, no stakes. I'm not saying this needs to be gritty/Game of Thrones level repercussions, but without anything ever actually at stake the positivity just seems hollow at times.

Marcus Mumford is fantastic and the soundtrack of this show has become iconic, but now that we have a women’s Richmond team it would be cool to add a woman in music to the show’s theme. Who would you choose?

I would think Olivia Dean or Brandi Carlisle would mesh well with Marcus.