The Ted Lasso backlash was inevitable, but the Christmas episode supercharged the debate

Vulture

"In accordance with the laws of TV physics, some version of this was always going to happen," says Kathryn VanArendonk. "The first season of Ted Lasso was so beloved, the universe simply could not sustain that same level of unanimity for the second season. With the acknowledgment that it’s terrible to overgeneralize, that debate around season two has gone mostly like this: Ted Lasso is not now and has never been a good show; it is overly sentimental and blind to its hero’s flaws; this season in particular lacks conflict and drive, criticisms countered by the response that all of those points are taking something perfectly lovely and dunking on it just for the perverted pleasure of yucking someone’s yum. If the fervor over Ted Lasso this season seems curiously intense (and, yes, totally exhausting), it may be because several elements of the show and the way it exists in the world have hypercharged the conversation about it. These are just my guesses, but if the whole season had been released all at once, I suspect there would not be this level of furor. If it were not a show about the nature of being good, I likewise have a feeling there’d be less outrage over it. And really, I think no small part of the Ted Lasso Discourse, sigh, is the fault of the out-of-season, mega-sentimental, momentum-halting Christmas episode. 'Carol of the Bells,' the second season’s fourth episode, is a largely stand-alone Christmas story, and it’s full to the brim with schmaltz and sweetness and all the other words we use for fiction that are also descriptions of food we think tastes good but have decided is unhealthy. From the perspective of 'what is season two of this show going to be about?' the episode is also a little galling. Ted Lasso’s first season came with silly but obvious stakes, framed by the tension of Rebecca wanting the football club she now owns to fail and the hapless but unexpectedly effective Ted slowly winning everyone over. But there’s no similarly tight arc immediately obvious in season two, and plunking this weird, empty Christmas story right at the point when the season was already starting to look aimless only exacerbates the impression that the whole show lacks friction. 'Carol of the Bells' makes it seem as though there are no real problems in Ted Lasso-land; there is only fuzziness and warmth and good holiday cheer."

ALSO:

• Ted Lasso is neither smart nor funny: "The thing about Ted Lasso is that even though it’s billed as a comedy, it’s not very funny," says Jack Hamilton. "The show’s humor is broad and obvious, mostly rooted in things like kooky facial expressions and catchphrases and groany Dad shtick from (Jason) Sudeikis. Ted Lasso doesn’t really have jokes so much as it has material for gifs that can circulate on Twitter and produce quick dopamine rushes by reminding people of the time they watched Ted Lasso. The show’s second season, currently airing, is brazenly lazy in both concept and execution. Early episodes offer nominally comedic riffs on Mexicans being superstitious, British people not knowing what pickup trucks or 'the yips' are (the term was coined by a Scotsman in the 1920s), and men not wanting to go to therapy. An interminable amount of story is driven by text-message exchanges and social media, presumably as an excuse to show people looking at Apple devices. A recent Christmas episode about the importance of togetherness featuring a subplot about a child with halitosis was so preposterously cloying that it felt openly cynical. None of this is smart, and none of it is funny. And yet the show continues to be rapturously well-received."
• How Ted Lasso casting director Theo Park assembled her Emmy-nominated ensemble: "There were challenges all along the way," says Park, who is up for an Emmy for her work. "We already knew Jason (Sudeikis) and Brendan (Hunt) were going to play Ted and Coach Beard. It was an open slate after that. Both of them came over to London, which was great. We could spend some time face-to-face to talk about the remaining cast members. We started with the search for Rebecca." Park says of Hannah Waddingham: "I’ve actually always known she was funny. I was working for Nina Gold when she was casting Game Of Thrones. We remember Hannah coming in and being totally hilarious behind-the-scenes. I mean, after action she would go into the Septa Unella mode right away, but in real life she is effervescent and hilarious. I then actually cast her in a small role in MGM’s 2019 comedy film, The Hustle, starring Anne Hathaway and Rebel Wilson. The director of the film, Chris Addison, I really respect him. He did say to me after about Hannah that 'Oh my god, she’s amazing.' We always had great feedback on her, so I’m glad we let her do this and she’s really showing her range because Rebecca is a well-written role with lots of facets to her personality."
• Cristo Fernandez recalls Ted Lasso creators contacting him for Dani Rojas role after they saw his actors' reel