Good news, Friday Night Lights fans! By fans, I mean the twenty people who watch the show. NBC’s Friday Night Lights has officially been given two more seasons! NBC and DirecTV finalized the deal for two last thirteen-episode seasons of this critically acclaimed, but sadly viewer-less show. It will return in the fall.
Now that the show has been given a third chance (it was brought back for another season after a near cancellation last winter), it’s time to focus on viewership. A lot of people are under the misconception that Friday Night Lights is only about football. It’s a drama/comedy…it’s not Monday Night Football. The show is set in a small town in Texas where, yes, football is a cornerstone of life. Much that happens revolves around it, but not everything is defined by it. In a typical show, only ten minutes tops are devoted to the actual football game. The rest deals with the relationships, struggles, hopes, and triumphs of the community in Dillon, Texas.
Gracias to Fanpop
Premise: Eric Taylor moves with his wife, Tami, and his teenage daughter, Julie, to Dillon. He has been hired as the new high school football coach. I would not want his job. He works crazy hours, he has to deal with irresponsible, cocky, and at times, inexperienced football players, he has to parent his increasingly rebellious daughter, and he tries to balance his “husband” and “friend” roles with his wife. The same story has been told countless times in countless inspirational sports films. The difference is that this show doesn’t have to come to a satisfactory ending after 90 minutes. Eric does not magically transform the unruly team with his unorthodox methods and his “faith” in their potential. He’s rude to them and they’re rude to him. But they learn from each other. Still, even after three seasons, hardly anything is hunky-dory. They all deal and move on.
Gracias to Tapeworthy
As you might recognize now, a huge pull for me in TV shows is realism. I like it when the writers create characters who could be real people, not contrived caricatures that fit into a niche. Matt Saracen is a shy, stuttering QB2 who is thrust into the spotlight after the star quarterback is paralyzed in the first episode. His dad’s in Iraq and he hardly has time for a social life when he’s at home, taking care of his dementia-stricken grandmother. Tim Riggins (hottie), an older player, reminds me of River Phoenix’s character in Stand By Me. He feels he is doomed to the same fate as his brother and father, uneducated and taking menial jobs to live a drunken existence. The other characters are equally dynamic. The show also has a real sense for the locations and mannerisms in the South.The parties the teenagers attend, the cookouts the parents host, the tense meetings Eric has in his office, and the local diner gossip are all pitch perfect.
Check out this show! I don’t watch any football and I love Friday Night Lights, so don’t be deterred for that reason. Tami and Eric’s relationship is reason enough to watch it. They are hands down the best married couple on television ever.
Gracias to TV Guide
Daydream Delusion 