Why Ted Lasso Is So Good
Maybe you haven’t had a chance to watch Ted Lasso on Apple TV+ yet. We all got busy lives, and it seems that the list of things we have yet to watch only grows longer. We’d all be wealthy if we had a $1 for every time we’ve heard a recommendation and said, “I’ll check it out.” We never get to it… but we mean well. From me to you though… mean it when you say it to me right now about Ted Lasso… because they’re ain’t another show like it.
Now, the show is chock full of the same things that other great shows have. 1) It’s a solid concept. Ted Lasso is an American college football coach who is hired to manage a Premier League soccer team in London, England. Not only is he a college football coach, but he’s from Kansas, so the amount of whimsical folksiness is off the charts. But he’s loveable. 2) There are endless characters. The show is brilliant at quick group exchanges that re-define the characters in every scene. You end up loving everybody. And 3) It’s damn funny. Only Jason Sudeikis could pull off this kind of humor packaged in such a fish-out-of-water character.
But here’s where the show separated itself. It is an exceedingly optimistic show. I can’t think of a single example of a show that has ever left me with such an inspired feeling at the end as this show. The main character is a troubled, but essentially happy man. With a wonderful outlook on life. And his disarming charm spreads around him. Characters that start off as heels end up basking in his glow, and being the better for it. Even watching it has the same effect. You have a genuine desire to spread that goodness beyond the 30-60 minutes that the show is on. There doesn’t seem to be any situation that Ted Lasso can’t see the silver lining in, and what’s more… you can count on him to do it. So far… he’s never stumped. And you come to rely on that, as the show’s characters (and even Coach Lasso himself) find themselves being human, wafting in and out of your favor as a viewer.
Give the show a chance. Yeah, it costs money, and as a middle-aged man who has lived a life filled with a lot of free content of every kind, it’s anathema to me to pay for content as much as anybody… but this is worth it.
“Believe.”
~Jake from 98.7 The Bull
