Friday Night Lights

By asepinwall@starledger.com (Alan Sepinwall) • I'm glad to see that Landry has learned a lot from his time with Tyra about what not to do - and what to do - around a girl he likes. The awkward Landry of season one wouldn't have been able to so confidently plant a kiss on Jess and then walk away like that. (The Landry of season two just would have ki...

By asepinwall@starledger.com (Alan Sepinwall) • Great coaches - Eric Taylor (Friday Night Lights), Mickey (Rocky), Herb Brooks (Miracle), Norman Dale (Hoosiers) • Movie-to-TV adaptations that didn't suck - Oscar Madison (The Odd Couple), Buffy Summers (Buffy the Vampire Slayer), Tim Riggins (Friday Night Lights), Karen Sisco (...

By asepinwall@starledger.com (Alan Sepinwall) Spoilers for tonight's "Friday Night Lights" coming up just as soon as I take a plate of responsibility... "See, you're the only one that didn't get the joke." -Levi BurnwellHaving established the new world of East Dillon and its most notable residents over the first two episodes, a busier-t...

By asepinwall@starledger.com (Alan Sepinwall) Spoilers for tonight's extra-long "Sons of Anarchy" coming up just as soon as I introduce some serious people to some serious fungi... "Blood family, hometown, all that s--t moves back a row. Once you're patched, members are your family. This charter is your home." -Juice"Balm," the best epis...

By asepinwall@starledger.com (Alan Sepinwall) I just wish there was a way to more easily integrate our two Panther alums. Saracen in particular still feels like he's off in his own show. While I like the idea of Riggins turning into an acolyte of Coach's - Taylor Kitsch and Kyle Chandler were both terrific in the way they showed how happy eac...

By asepinwall@starledger.com (Alan Sepinwall) • Love that Tim once again finds himself in bed with a MILF. Did he and Lyla decided not to bother with the losing proposition of a long-distance relationship, or is this just Riggins being Riggins? • Louanne Stephens remains a comedy machine as Grandma Saracen. "Landry? Stop throwing the ba...

By asepinwall@starledger.com (Alan Sepinwall) In today's column, I review "Friday Night Lights'" fourth season, which is as terrific as I expected it to be, based on the clever ending of season three. After the jump, I'm going to briefly explain how I intend to cover the show this season.

By asepinwall@starledger.com (Alan Sepinwall) Make fun of NBC all you want - God knows I have - but even in the midst of this downward spiral, they've put some of the best shows on the air, and found unlikely ways to keep them on the air. "30 Rock" is going into its fourth season. "Friday Night Lights" will produce at least five season's worth of...

By asepinwall@starledger.com (Alan Sepinwall) Gabriel Byrne, "In Treatment" Kyle Chandler, "Friday Night Lights" Michael Chiklis, "The Shield" Bryan Cranston, "Breaking Bad" Jon Hamm, "Mad Men" Connie Britton, "Friday Night Lights" Hope Davis, "In Treatment" Alison Pill, "In Treatment" CCH Pounder, "The Shield"

By asepinwall@starledger.com (Alan Sepinwall) Once upon a time, I would have used a show-canceling power on "Friday Night Lights" after the first season finale, particularly after how the second season began, but then parts of the third season were so great that I'm glad the show continued, even if we had to suffer through The Unfortun...

By asepinwall@starledger.com (Alan Sepinwall) When I wrote my open letter to NBC, I focused more on the business reasons than creative ones, because arguing purely for quality rarely has an effect. ("Friday Night Lights," great show though it is, simply wouldn't be on the air without the DirecTV deal subsidizing much of its cost.) So now...

By asepinwall@starledger.com (Alan Sepinwall) Kevin Rankin is quickly becoming one of those actors whose appearance instantly makes me more interested in whatever he's in, whether it's a good show (as Herc on "Friday Night Lights"), a bad show (as the only interesting part of "Bionic Woman") or in between. Here, he used his Steve Zahn 2....

By asepinwall@starledger.com (Alan Sepinwall) For the last time this season -- but not, thankfully, forever, as the DirecTV/NBC arrangement will last another two seasons -- let me point out that I'm reposting the original versions of my "Friday Night Lights" reviews from the DirecTV run in order to retain the original comments. Since...

By asepinwall@starledger.com (Alan Sepinwall) I joked at the end of season one that a renewed "Friday Night Lights" would feature NBC-mandated changes like murder mysteries and Tyra and Lyla working at a bikini car wash. We eventually got the murder (though it came from Katims, not NBC), and we got the bikinis, too, but the brief glimpse...

By asepinwall@starledger.com (Alan Sepinwall) The Panthers fall deep into a hole in the first half as the QB-Coach tensions get worse, then after a speech at halftime, the anonymous Panther defenders improbably shut down the opposing offense and Matt Saracen leads the team to an equally improbable comeback.

By asepinwall@starledger.com (Alan Sepinwall) Now, there are still two episodes to go in the NBC run of season three, so I want to step very lightly around what happens in those episodes -- and I will ask any commenters who watched the DirecTV run to do the same -- but the season's closing episodes do beautifully set up the show for at least t...

By asepinwall@starledger.com (Alan Sepinwall) As usual, I'm reposting the original version of my "Friday Night Lights" review from the DirecTV run to preserve the comments, and as usual, doing so may not ping everyone's RSS reader. So if you just watched "A Hard Rain's Gonna Fall" and want to read about it, click here. Also, please keep yo...

By asepinwall@starledger.com (Alan Sepinwall) Even though a lot of the Tyra/Landry material has been repetitive, I really like the easy banter the two characters have together, which only makes a moment like the one where Landry gives her a pep talk about all her hard work feel even sweeter.

By asepinwall@starledger.com (Alan Sepinwall) Spoilers for "Friday Night Lights" season three, episode nine coming up just as soon as I pick a theme for the winter formal... Street is gone. Smash is long gone. Starting with "Game of the Week," we have five more episodes in the TV season and four more games, at most, in the football season. Shoul...

By asepinwall@starledger.com (Alan Sepinwall) Spoilers for "Friday Night Lights" season three, episode eight, coming up just as soon as I peel down to my unadorned id... And annoying as the Tyra subplot is, it did give Connie Britton a lovely subtextual moment where Tami had to let Tyra know that she blew the college interview without ever...

By asepinwall@starledger.com (Alan Sepinwall) The random introduction of a new Panthers player, with a problem that was easily solved in an episode with virtually no tension and no inspiration felt pointless. Even Tami giving a nice speech about how wonderful Eric is -- followed by Eric opening the car door for a very self-satisfied Ta...

By Alan Sepinwall(noreply@blogger.com) Okay, after a lot of thought, and reading the comments here, and talking to other critics, I've decided that the only proper way to deal with the "Friday Night Lights" dilemma is to review the episodes as they air on DirecTV, rather than waiting to comment when the NBC run begins in February...

By Alan Sepinwall Meanwhile, I'm sure many people are glad that Julie and Tami have stopped being at war with each other (I never minded this subplot, but that seemed to be a minority opinion), and yet the turnaround came awfully quick. Having Eric back in the fold certainly helped, as he convinced Tami to not...

By Alan Sepinwall And for what? What benefit does this possibly bring the show compared to what's being lost -- in terms of Landry as a character and in terms of the series as a whole? Katims said the goal was to push Landry and Tyra closer together, that "their relationship would never become as intimate as it...

By Alan Sepinwall AS: Okay, but for argument's sake, when you talk about wanting to introduce Landry's father, you're already doing this story where Landry tries out for the football team, and you could introduce his father there, and this (the murder) kind of overwhelms that. Couldn't you have just done t...

By Alan Sepinwall I wrote reams and reams of praise about the first season of NBC's "Friday Night Lights": how it's the best show on network TV right now, how it's a drama about high school football that's of equal appeal to sports fans and sports haters alike, how it's so obviously great that NBC actually set...