Dorothy is back in Kansas after Ted Lasso‘s series finale, with the uber-positive coach and titular character of this Apple TV fish out of water comedy drama finally back in the big blue sea of his home state. After a third season that many have – somewhat unfairly – been criticized for drifting away from gags into dramatics, the show resolved itself with an ending that was a little predictable, but in the most satisfying way; unless you’re a TedBecca hopeful, but not all of us can live in a fantasy world.
On that note, “So Long, Goodbye” begins with a TedBecca misdirect as we see a bed-headed coach come downstairs to his boss’s kitchen. We quickly discover Ted and Coach Beard’s neighborhood had to be evacuated thanks to a gas leak when Ted’s fellow American and his fiery – if we’re being nice – partner Jane also wander into the kitchen. The not so hard to guess cliffhanger the penultimate episode ended with is also confirmed: Ted is leaving A.F.C Richmond.
We’re soon at the team’s last training session, where we discover Nate isn’t back in the team as an assistant manager, but assistant kitman. Roy and Keeley have a slightly awkward meeting as we see the hardman grapple with his feelings towards the PR whizz and all-round nice person. We also see Trent Crimm’s (nearly) completed book about Richmond’s season, adding a meta element to the show.
Our second major glimpse of Rebecca comes next as she discusses her ex-husband’s new media woes, which include allegations of inappropriate relationships with his staff. The Richmond owner, who at the beginning of the season was still caught up in a battle with her ex, now seems to genuinely be over it — but she can’t talk about Ted yet. We then get another potential bombshell: Rebecca may sell Richmond, as its value is at an all-time high and could fetch her £2 billion.
There is, of course, a musical interlude, with the team finishing Ted’s final training session with a well choreographed and surprisingly tuneful rendition of the titular song of the episode, from The Sound of Music. The wholesomeness then hits a bump for a while as Roy and Jamie try to both work out their feelings towards Keeley, which devolved into a brawl, before she resoundingly tells them both it’s not their decision to make.
Those who’ve been complaining about the lack of soccer this season are treated to a long game sequence (and a cameo from ex-referee and famed chicken killer Mike Dean). Richmond find themselves two goals down at half-time, allowing Ted to make an emotional speech which ends with him quoting yet another Wizard of Oz line about there being no place like home, but A.F.C Richmond coming pretty close.
Despite the upbeat nature of the show, the heartbreaking ending of missing out at the last fits well with the Ted Lasso ethos, and definitely chimes in with the realities of soccer globally. Just like any big business (and as Roy said in the episode) money talks, and underdog stories like Richmond’s are incredibly rare, whereas painful near misses are universal. It would have almost felt wrong for a show that has captured British soccer culture near-perfectly to have gone for a Hollywood ending, especially given our great national passtime of taking the mick out of each other for attempts at improving (just ask any Brit soccer fan and they’ll tell you about the importance of schaudenfreude in the sport).
On the criticisms of its final series becoming too dramatic, the way Ted Lasso shifted from quirky to character driven has always been telegraphed, especially as mental health became a more consistent theme as the show wore on. Mixing humor with occasionally devastating emotion is something creator Bill Lawrence has executed well previously, and it mostly felt natural when episode times jumped from a tight 30 to near enough an hour, although some of the show’s charm was lost as storylines drifted apart. With that said, everything converged perfectly in the finale, and given how well characterized the Ted Lasso cast is, the fact things wrapped up as expected is more of a triumph of great writing than a failure to surprise. It’s not Agatha Christie, but that’s not why people watch this series.
Thematically speaking, the finale also got it spot on, with the key notions of redemption and trying to do the best by others running through the entire 70 or so minutes. Fatherhood, and the relationship between fathers and sons, has also always been a key thread weaving through the show, and Ted reuniting with his son Henry to avoid passing on his own missing-dad trauma was the perfect bow on top of that particular theme.
Ted Lasso wasn’t the only well regarded Anglo-American comedy drama to finish this week, with Succession also having its last hurrah. While the natures of the shows are intrinsically different, with Ted’s positivity starkly contrasted with the bitter, damaged Roys, they both made their finales easy to predict (if you were paying attention, anyway) yet didn’t disappoint, because they did what the best shows do: give us larger than life yet incredibly realistic characters, and make you care about their lives.
And, in the end, that’s why the 12th and final episode of Ted Lasso season 3 was a brilliant finale to a brilliant show: the series set out to show us that it’s okay to care, and to see the best in people instead of being cynical, and that’s what we’ve ended up doing. The Emmys are calling, and it would be a huge shock if there weren’t at least some nominations for this wonderful kiss of sunshine in a world of increasingly dark and gritty series’. But, even if it doesn’t get the rewards it deserves, Ted Lasso will have a special place in the hearts of those who watched it — even if Ted is a bit of a wanker.
