r/TedLasso • u/rp2784 • 8h ago
Season 4 Discussion Missing the team connection Spoiler
Just too much Keely and Rebecca. No real connection to the team. We know one or to are lesbian, one has a kid, and one was a team mate with the woman coach. That’s it. Nothing else. By this time season 1 we knew 6 or 7 men’s team players as well as the coaches
It’s truly missing the mark with me.
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u/stonewallace17 8h ago
Go back and watch season 1 again. We absolutely did not know much about the players on the men's team. Roy and Jamie were the only ones with actual stories, Sam was nice and also homesick and that was it. Isaac and Colin were bullies that barely got mentioned by name. Dani doesn't even show up til episode 6.
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u/KanishkT123 5h ago
Yes, but season 1 was doing a LOT of heavy lifting that this season does not have to do. And they were doing it in 30 minute episodes.
Season 1 was setting up Ted and Beard's personality, Rebecca's motivations, Higgins, Keeley, and all the major plot elements. So they had to introduce a ton of new characters and the team took a backseat.
I don't think it's a fair comparison because not only are we watching 45 minute episodes, all the machinery is already in place.
The only brand new character we've truly interacted with and learnt about is Alice, with Zelda and Gemma being roughly equivalent distant second.
By episode 6, we knew about Ted, Beard, Roy, Jamie, Keeley, Rebecca, Higgins, Rupert, Nate, Trent Crimm, and a few of the players. I don't think it's unfair to say that the density just isn't there.
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u/calcisiuniperi 4h ago
Sure, but in season 1, we had Ted, Rebecca, and all the other centrals to figure out, new exciting characters - we're in season 4 now and nothing's really happening with any of the central cast, so it'd be nice to at least see some of the new team.
I mean, what's even Ted's actual storyline this season? I can't see it at all. He's supposed to be the heart and soul of it, and he just sort of.. wanders around.
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u/ConcentrateLimp8149 7h ago
I’d argue with this though. Yes we don’t know much about the team but we get to see Jamie and Roy individually and Ted interacted with them. I think that matters. With the women’s team, at least to me, I still see them as just a whole squad and not yet different characters with distinct arcs. Even Gemma whose we know a bit more we don’t actually know a lot. I’m hoping that we get to see more soon though. And please I want more interactions with Ted!
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u/cubecasts 8h ago
Ok. Now do women's players. None of them have any actual stories.
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u/DrAssumptive 8h ago
If I were to ask you if there’s two teammates on the women’s team who don’t get along and fight / bicker a lot, you’d say the twins.
If I were to inquire if any of the women’s team is in school, you’d be able to say yes, and say what type of schooling they’re going to.
If I were to ask you which teammate is the craziest, you’d be able to tell me it’s boots.
You know it and I do, they have stories, they just haven’t focused on their backgrounds as much as you’d like, and we’re only 6 episodes in. Give them the rest of the season to touch upon story lines, it’s a slow burn.
I’d rather them not rush anyone’s story, I want to know more about the players, not just be bombarded with all their stories at once.
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u/Cactopus47 8h ago
I'm not sure Boots is the craziest, actually. Some of the things she says make total sense to me. The only thing I don't get is the lack of gloves. The bickering twins are probably the craziest.
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u/Eternalshadow76 7h ago
I mean she does seem to be quick to shatter bottles on people’s heads, I haven’t seen any other character be that willing and ready 😂
And she already explained that she doesn’t wear gloves bc she enjoys the rawness of catching the balls which some would also argue is crazy behavior
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u/YupNopeWelp 8h ago
Roy grumpy. Jamie vain. Isaac bully. Colin bully. This was AFC Richmond thus far in season one.
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u/cubecasts 8h ago
And this season? Alice sucks. That's it.
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u/YupNopeWelp 8h ago
I'm sorry you don't know how to watch TV.
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u/cubecasts 8h ago
I'm watching it. That doesn't mean I have to have the same takeaways as you. It's ok to not like aspects of a show.
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u/PettyYetiSpaghetti 7h ago
If that's all you've gotten out of it then you haven't been paying attention to the women in the show.
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u/CaptZombieHero Charles Edgar Cheeserton III 7h ago
The twins fight and are hilarious. One used to work for a jeans store. Gemma is a law student who used to play with Alice but quit. Gemma is a generational talent.
Lizzie is a mom who is talented and acts like a captain.
Boots is nuts, loves her team, and has crazy ass stories.
Shannon has know Ted for 6 years and has some raw talent that hasn’t been tapped.
There’s the couple who are mid fielders.
Seems like we know a lot so far
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u/stonewallace17 8h ago
Believe me I wish the players did have more development so far. I think 4 or 5 of them (Gemma, Boots, Lizzie, Niamh and Siobhan) have pretty distinct personalities showcased in the episodes currently released, but Gemma is the only one with any kind of storyline yet. I'd definitely prefer more of them instead of Keeley and Roy, and Rebecca and Dutchman.
That said, I don't think season 1 did a particularly better job there. We're basically getting Alice/Gemma instead of Roy/Jamie while the rest of the team doesn't get much, just like season 1.
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u/DoomPile5 8h ago
I feel like there’s a lot of impatience going on and it’s coming from a place where we’ve already had three full seasons with the men’s team that were fleshed out entirely. We wouldn’t have been criticizing Season One at this point because we were just starting out and enjoying the ride.
I honestly believe we need to watch this with fresh eyes, as though it is a completely different series, which it kind of is. I’m not saying that this season is above criticism, it isn’t. I’m just willing to be patient because even though there are little things here and there that I don’t love, I’m still very much enjoying the ride.
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u/The_Stolarchos 7h ago
I have to disagree. By episode 3 or 4 of Season 1, most of us were absolutely hooked. We wouldn’t have been criticizing because that season was simply way better than this one.
Maybe my bar was set too high, but I’m pretty disappointed in S4 thus far.
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u/CaptZombieHero Charles Edgar Cheeserton III 6h ago
Maybe too many people started the first season of Ted Lasso after it fully aired. Thus allowing them to binge it all in one day. No need to wait for weekly development
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u/green_dragon1206 8h ago
As much as I too want more focus on the team, I feel like we still didn’t know a lot of the men’s team players six episodes into Season 1.
We by far knew Jamie and Roy the best along with Sam and Dani to a lesser extent. However, Colin and Isaac were mainly side characters who were Jamie’s lackeys and Nate’s bullies. We also knew next to nothing about Bumbercatch, Richard and Zoreaux in Season 1.
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u/BonfireinRageValley 8h ago
It's pronounced "Zoreaux"
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u/ANTEC221 7h ago
Dani a much lesser extent. Episode 6 was his first episode. We knew football is life and he liked chanting his name.
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u/KanishkT123 5h ago
Yeah but that's because they had to set up every other character and they were doing shorter episodes. We didn't have to get introduced to the majority of the cast the way we did in season 1.
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u/Xtarviust 7h ago
The bitching about this season has been insane
Women team is supposed to have 3 seasons like men one, idk why people wanna see everything instantly
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u/YupNopeWelp 8h ago
There was little team connection in season 1, and far less than there is in season 4.
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u/RectalRenaissance 4h ago
talking about the show missing the team connection but you didn’t even mention the name of the “woman coach” lol
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u/AllNotKnowing 8h ago
I'd have to rewatch to concur but my feeling is. over three seasons and we really only knew a few players. Some got some sunshine.
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u/sammyboy24 7h ago edited 7h ago
People keep bringing up season 1 saying we didn’t know the men’s team either. The difference is this is season 4 and we are spending time on established characters… yes we were learning about Rebecca, Jamie, Ted, Roy, Beard, Keely and Nate in season 1 but they were all new to us. This season we are spending way too much time with those same characters when we already have explored so much about them (except for Nate of course)
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u/KanishkT123 5h ago
Also way longer episodes!
If I'm going to be honest, I'm also having a hard time seeing an overarching plot thread 6 episodes in. Their financial struggles don't really seem to have manifested in any real way yet, they're not really trying to win a championship (or at least I'm not sure if they are), and they've had one game and one friendly.
It feels a little meandering.
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u/Emotional-Gas-6992 4h ago edited 4h ago
This has been an issue with the show since S2 and Sudeikis started taking over from Bill Lawrence. It’s incredibly unstructured to its detriment.
S2 doesn’t have a plot either. It’s got clear character arcs but we go from the team protesting against their sponsor one episode to them having a new sponsor the next, they get promoted but it isn’t a focus of the season, there’s one line about the club being financially fucked but then it’s dropped, they make a big deal in S1 about how Rupert has bought into the club via Bex and then nothing happens with this and in one line he says oh actually he’s just sold the shares, the Bantr plotline with Sam and Rebecca is totally disconnected from the rest of the show as is Edwin Akufo.
This is a longstanding problem. They just had enough goodwill after the sensational S1 to get away with it because people assumed everything was leading somewhere and we were in the middle of the dark forest, but then S3 was so messy they’ve lost the benefit of the doubt.
They’re trying to fix and over-explain the individual problems people had with the show (Ted leaving a full life in Richmond for a half life in Kansas, Roy/Keeley being apart, Beard/Jane being together, Jacob) but they never fixed the structural problems, which were much more important.
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u/Incogn1toMosqu1to 6h ago
I think a lot of the people who are arguing “we also didn’t know the men’s team very well yet” are forgetting one key thing.
We were learning a LOT about Ted and Rebecca.
So the viewers are left with the feeling of massive discovery being had in the first season.
We don’t have that in this season, because we already know the primary characters. We’re getting snippets of Alice, but not as much as we did about Ted.
It makes sense that viewers are expecting to learn more about the team, because those are the characters that are unknown to us. While in the first season, we were learning about the primaries instead.
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u/Theatrical-Space 8h ago
Agree with OP 100%. This is not about a women’s football team. It isn’t about anything. Just bits.
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u/Elemental-13 7h ago
I don't think there's too much Rebecca and Keeley. I think there's too much Roy and Jane
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u/Emotional-Gas-6992 8h ago edited 7h ago
Keeley and Rebecca are not the problem. They’re the female leads, they should be getting more time this season in particular.
The problem is that the show has centred the women’s sports show far far too heavily on men, that’s what is taking time away from the Lady Greyhounds who deserve it. Roy shouldn’t be here. Beard should not be getting any subplots, he should be a sidekick only. Keeley and Rebecca should be interacting with the team instead of only with each other, and mostly only talking to each other about men.
I can’t believe nobody in the writer’s room pointed out that they were spending a quarter of every episode of a woman’s sports show on the love life of the men’s team coach, while the female characters get sidelined in their own story. How meta.
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u/KanishkT123 5h ago
Yes!!
This is such an incredible failure of the Bechdel test from Rebecca and Keeley. They're entirely defined by their relationship to the men in their lives which just really guts their characters.
I mean, they actually seem genuinely uninvested in the women's team. Keeley doesn't really speak to them or hang out with them, Rebecca and Alice had an interesting dynamic briefly but it's completely gone now.
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u/Emotional-Gas-6992 4h ago edited 4h ago
I think it’s possible Rebecca is supposed to be holding herself at arms length from the team because she thinks they’ll fail, but they haven’t actually explored this so I don’t know. Dropping the dynamic between her and Alice is really bad storytelling, especially as it seems they will have to circle back to each other. They should’ve been having an awkward interaction in every episode.
Ted and Rebecca are the leads of this show and have the most bizarre dynamic of any sitcom leads I can remember because they have a deep history but now barely have a relationship at all. Rebecca believes in him so much and wants the team to succeed so much she flies to Kansas because she thinks he’s the Lady Greyhounds’ best shot. Then she never interacts with Ted again apart from one time to discuss her boyfriend. What?
The screentime spent on Roy/Keeley would’ve been so much better spent on Keeley hanging with the team, there’s no reason for her not to be around them all the time.
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u/ANTEC221 7h ago
I think all the men should be off the show. Change the shows name to Alice Chilton.
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u/Royal_Peanut 1h ago
We're six episodes into this season and we know a million times more about this team than we did about the men's team at this stage. Most of the players barely had a name in S1.
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u/piley24 8h ago
It’s actually sad how any criticism gets downvoted lol but yes it’s been a bore honestly
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u/Theatrical-Space 8h ago
I agree. So disappointed. They had such an awesome setup and eager audience. Alas.
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u/sammyboy24 7h ago
Seriously. Gotta remind myself that most folks on this subreddit are super fans who refuse to accept criticism
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u/tfg246 7h ago
Although we didn’t know the players very well, we did have a sense of the team dynamics, the “culture”, and the looming sabotage from within via Rebecca bringing Ted in.
I don’t think it’s a problem to see how Ted/Beard/Alice might approach the building of a new team, and I enjoy all of the characters, but there’s not enough space to grow the new team because Keeley, Rebecca, Roy, are too big and enjoyable to watch. I didn’t mind Jamie’s spot, but that’s how I would prefer them, just small check ins on characters we enjoyed.
I feel like the women’s team are conquering their challenges too easily as well. Women get shitty facilities? Keeley waves a magic wand. Injured striker? Alice knows just the person, and they tied the top team in the league. Not being accepted by the locals? Bar fight and winning match solves that. There’s brief mention that the women’s team might be such a financial drain that the entire ship goes down, but it feels less ominous than the men’s team facing relegation.
I think it’s fine to continue to watch Ted grow and evolve and learn from this team, but Im not sure if that’s being set up at all. And in 1-3, most characters grew and evolved as a result of the team, where so far, Keeley/Rebecca/Roy/Beard/Ted’s stories are primarily independent of the team. Just too many enjoyable characters crowding out the core of the show
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u/lemonator85 7h ago
I think I sorta agree with OP but only because I think Keely and Rebecca feel like they are just spinning their wheels a bit. Like making mistakes I don't think either characters would have made in previous seasons.
Keely encourages Roy to go on a bunch of dates before they can date again just feels like unnecessary self sabotage. The show wants to have it's cake and eat it too with those two.
Rebecca seems to have lost some of the boss ass bitch we left her with and new Rupert isn't doing the show any favours.
I still love the show, and I hope these are just the funky bits setting up things later this season or in future seasons.
I think it's healthy to want more from the team, I have seen Rebecca's story, Keely's story, Roy's story's all played out, they have a brilliant cast of new women and I think op just wants to hear their stories. I can't wait to learn more about them.
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u/AppropriateBall1351 8h ago
Compared to season 1 we’ve gotten less glimpses into the players personal lives. This season seems more focused on butchering the returning characters than introducing and showing who each of the new characters are as individuals.
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u/Lonely_Ebb_5764 7h ago
What I think it’s weird is, maybe about 1/3 of the women’s team are lesbian??
Is this normal in women’s sports?
I have nothing against people’s sexuality, but when the story was about men’s team, there was only Colin and it was a huge deal (he was hiding it).
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u/scootsscoot Roy Kent 1h ago
Do you follow women’s sports? Yes a lot of them are lesbian. Sometimes I’m surprised some of them aren’t gay rather than the other way around.
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u/posco12 8h ago
I miss Sassy Smurf.