Plot: Ted returns to Richmond, taking on his biggest challenge yet: coaching a second division women’s football team. Throughout the course of the season, Ted and the team learn to leap before they look, taking chances they never thought they would.
Review: When Ted Lasso concluded its third season back in 2023, Jason Sudeikis made it seem like it was the end of the road for the inspirational football-turned-soccer coach and his singular style. The series co-creator made it seem like there was always a three-season arc for Ted Lasso and would only return if there was a worthwhile story to tell. Well, Sudeikis, along with Brendan Hunt, Bill Lawrence, and Joe Kelly, have found a new story to tell that incorporates some of our favorite characters from Richmond A.F.C., along with a new squad of players. While Ted Lasso started with the hiring of the titular character to doom the struggling football club, this partial reboot of the series begins with another underdog story, but one where everyone is united to pull in the same direction. Ted Lasso‘s fourth season is a welcome return for the series that manages to feel both familiar and fresh, with an all-new team of players who are authentic and original while standing apart from the charms and quirks of the first three seasons’ cast.
While set at the same facilities and town as the original three seasons, Ted Lasso’s return does not boast any of the male players we came to know in the show’s initial run. The season opens with Rebecca Welton (Hannah Waddingham), Leslie Higgins (Jeremy Swift), and Keeley Jones (Juno Temple) traveling to Kansas City to convince Ted (Jason Sudeikis) to coach the newly formed women’s team at Richmond. Ted left London in the third season to be a present parent for his son, Henry (now played by Grant Feely). Knowing where his passions lie and his past struggles with being away from his family, Ted is reluctant at first, but the premiere episode shows how he eventually makes his way back to England. Across the four episodes available for this review, Ted’s challenge as a coach and father is very different from what we have seen before, but his trademark optimism will still be the driving force in uniting this new Richmond squad.
The returning characters are limited to the aforementioned names along with a few other familiar faces. Roy Kent (Brett Goldstein) is still head coach of the men’s squad, with Coach Beard (Brendan Hunt) as his second. Roy and Keeley’s relationship has cooled since we last saw them, but the same spark still exists between them. Rebecca struggles with the financial strain of forming the women’s team, as Richmond investors are not excited about the idea, but she feels confident in Keeley’s vision. Rebecca is also trying to strike a balance between running two teams and her long-distance relationship with Matthijs (Matteo van der Grijn). Ted, meanwhile, is in a better headspace with Henry living in London as well as with his ex-wife Michelle (Andrea Anders). There is also a continuation of Beard’s romantic entanglements with the enigmatic Jane that crop up throughout the season. In short, the arcs for everyone returning from the original cast feel like they don’t miss a beat, even though it’s been a few years since we last saw them.
While the men’s team would have been nice to see again, many of their subplots had run their course. The door remains open for cameos, but the new female players are as well-written, and seeing them come together as a team feels like a natural reset for Ted Lasso. Led by current coach Alice Chilton (Tanya Reynolds), who is not impressed by losing out on the head coaching job to Ted, we meet many of the same getting-to-know-you elements as in the series’ beginning. The squad has some solid players, including the seemingly mental goalkeeper Boots (Jude Mack), who tends to walk around nude, and the sibling rivalry between Siobhan (Rex Hayes) and Niamh (Aisling Sharkey). There is also the walk-on recruit Lizzie (Andor’s Faye Marsay), who brings a fresh perspective to the team, along with striker Gemma (Abbie Hern), who has an acrimonious past with Alice. There are other players on the team who have their own quirks and moments to shine, but as usual, we do not spend as much screen time on the pitch as we do during practice and formative team moments.
As in previous seasons, each episode of Ted Lasso skips between moments to focus on pivotal slices of the football season rather than showing every single match. This approach is a little jarring at times as we don’t see the peaks and valleys of a full season, but it does allow the series to highlight major milestones. It also allows for minor characters like Dr. Sharon Fieldstone (Sarah Niles) and writer-turned-podcaster Trent Crimm (James Lance) to pop in, as well as new additions like the great Tracey Ullman as an important figure in women’s sports who plays a role in the success of the Richmond Lady Greyhounds squad. The ten-episode fourth season sees the return of director Declan Lowney who opens the season with the same visual style and familiar opening credits while writers Joe Kelly, Leann Bowen, Sasha Garro, Dylan Marron, Jane Becker, Bill Wrubel, Jamie Lee, Jack Burditt, and Julia Lindon join Brendan Hunt, Jason Sudeikis, and Brett Goldstein in crafting the same bitingly profane dialogue in equal measure with the inspirational and emotionally-centered psychological goodness the series used to great effect in the first three seasons.
Ted Lasso is a great show that has inspired successful shows by Bill Lawrence and Brett Goldstein (Shrinking), and many others that use the idea of goodness, wholesomeness, positivity, and inspiration to unite people and bring them together to do great things. Jason Sudeikis and his legacy co-stars do not miss a beat returning to their fan-favorite roles, while every one of the new characters fits nicely into the dynamic that made Ted Lasso a breakout hit during the pandemic. Six years later, this is still a setting and ensemble I look forward to spending time with, and the break between seasons has only made it more exciting to see Richmond once again. Ted Lasso could have phoned it in for season after season, but the carefully realized world of Jason Sudeikis and his co-creators once again becomes destination viewing. I am very happy to have Ted back and hope this crew lasts for three seasons of their own.
Ted Lasso returns on August 5th on Apple TV.
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