Posted by Kim, Sage, Sarah, and Jen
Well, folks. We made it. Season Five of Friday Night Lights is in the books, and thus ends our organized rewatches of beloved series of the mid-aughts and early teens. (Temporarily! Perhaps we will take something on next summer, stay tuned!) What began as a spontaneous thing born out of pandemic boredom became a lifeline of sorts, connecting us all twice a week in a time when human connection was definitely lacking. Thank you for joining us. I know I can speak for Sage when I say that we are so grateful that so many of you took this trip with us.
So queue up one last play of “Devil Town” as #ClearEyesFullHearts fam members Sarah (a total series newbie) and Jen (who had some how NEVER seen the finale till now!) join Sage and I to talk the highs and lows of Season Five.
Clear eyes. Full hearts…
- Favorite Episode
Jen: The finale is so perfect I was tempted to pick it but then there is Episode Five, “Kingdom.” It’s hilarious, heartfelt, and slightly chaotic. Somehow, “Kingdom” made me nostalgic for long, sports team bus rides. Kyle Chandler’s comedy lives in reactions and it’s on full display here — from telling Stan he can wake up the bus full of kids to his exasperation at hotel modernizations. And then there is Coach, wordlessly listening to his boys with pride. They seem so young talking about how they’re uncomfortable at a hotel. Here, at the midpoint of the season, before Vince goes off the rails for a while, he’s just sweetly committed to this team. Coach had a reason for last season’s forfeit and Vince will ride the bus with his newly branded teammates. In a season with some hard to watch character moments, I love that this episode takes the time to show the joy and warmth of these characters.
Kim: There’s a delirious sense of chaos that pervades “Kingdom” and I fucking love it. There’s something about taking our characters out of their normal circumstances that is just plain invigorating. (See also: any away game episode of Ted Lasso.) And it’s even more invigorating when it’s a raucous group of teenagers, most of whom have never stayed at a hotel without their parents before. What makes this one so fun is that it’s like the pinnacle the Lions hit before the team falls apart in terms of their sportsmanlike game play and their camaraderie off the field. At this point in the season the Lions feel like they are unstoppable, but they are Icarus, not realizing that they may be flying too close to the sun. That feeling is addictive and everyone, even Coach, gets in on it in this one. As Sage pointed out, Eric says he’s going to bed, but then he also takes a whole damn bottle of whiskey with him. It’s THAT kind of a party atmosphere.
I also love “Kingdom” because it just evokes so much nostalgia for me. Every year in high school, the speech and debate team I was a part of got to go to a tournament in Gatlinburg, TN and the tournament started on a Thursday, which means we got to leave on WEDNESDAY and miss two and a half whole days of school. We got hotel blocks and we were assigned roommates. I think that’s why the whole segment with the boys on the patios of their hotel talking about their hopes and dreams, completely oblivious to the fact Eric is listening to them, hits so hard. I’ve lived that scene. And I would like to think that my coach had the same smile on his face as he eavesdropped on me and my friends.
Sage: What I love the most about “Don’t Go” is that it involves so many of our characters stepping up to the plate. The most significant instance of that, of course, is Buddy’s surprisingly passionate speech at Tim’s parole hearing. But we also have Regina, who’s been holding back in the hopes of Vince and his dad working out their relationship on their own, finally speaking up on behalf of her son. Buddy refuses to let Eric leave him again without a fight, and Vince also makes his voice heard, showing up on the Taylors’ doorstep to privately and personally ask Eric to stay.
And we end on two of the most powerful scenes of the series, as far as I’m concerned. When he does decide against pursuing that other job and shares that news definitively and publicly, we can see that Eric learned something from the way he handled the last offer and how his silence hurt the players who trusted him. When we meet him, he’s someone who wants to keep his head down and do his job without any of the noise and politics, but by this point, Eric has realized that he has a responsibility as a member of this community to let people in. Meanwhile, Tim is a shell of himself at his welcome home party. His ordeal is clearly not over, and it hurts to see him like this. But this storyline yields more brilliant work by Taylor Kitsch, who makes Tim seem positively haunted, and proves again that this show doesn’t intend to romanticize experiences or circumstances that are actually traumatic.
Sarah: The finale. Has any show ever had such a strong finale, once that served both the current storylines and the show as a whole, so well? I laughed, I cried, I saw Buddy Garrity on a golf cart at a Panthers practice. And the finale’s resolution of the state game — to cut away at the decisive moment and just show the aftermath — is both great TV and the show’s putting into practice its central thesis regarding football. It really didn’t matter if the Lions won or lost that game. We didn’t need a score to know everything we needed about our team’s performance out there.
- Least Favorite Episode?
Kim: There’s some good stuff in “The Right Hand of the Father,” between Cress Williams’ arrival as Ornette Howard and the kickoff of the Buddy/Buddy Jr. storyline. But it’s the stories for the women of Friday Night Lights that pushes this one into the least favorite category for me. First of all, we have Julie sleeping with Derek, knowing he’s married. Julie’s penchant for older, emotionally unavailable men has been established since the Swede incident in Season Two, so this whole story isn’t out of character for her, especially given the way Derek manipulates her with his sad sack song and dance. But that doesn’t mean I have to like it!! And I don’t! I don’t like it!
And then there’s the whole drunk rally girl video. Everything about the way the video is handled leaves a bad taste in my mouth. The girls are sat down and lectured at while the boys face few repercussions, other than just some extra laps at practice. Tami comes off as the shrill sheriff of the Purity Police and it’s not a good look for her. And not to mention, after all the hullabaloo and even hinting that Tami is gonna take Marah under her wing a la Tyra Collette, we never hear from her again. It feels like wasted time. I adore this show, OBVIOUSLY, but sometimes they are just…not great when it comes to the lives of women and it makes me sad.
Jen: I think the show really stumbles with “The Right Hand of the Father.” There are scenes that are absolute standout but the shaming of the girls regarding the video from the party really tarnishes it for me.
Sage: I’m sensing a theme across my least favorite episode picks, because “Swerve” is another hour during which almost everyone is off their game and there’s a general sense of ickiness. The title comes from Julie’s boneheaded albeit earned move to delay going back to school, and her subsequently admitting the truth to her parents leads to a lot of discomfort that’s just not fun to watch. Eric is so out of sorts, he leaves practice, and without being told, I can guarantee that that’s never happened before. Vince is threatened, which I feel is something that we didn’t need to happen — there were other ways of showing that Ornette can command fear when he wants to. And sweet Luke doesn’t have anyone to talk him through the extremely shitty bait-and-switch pulled by the grown adults at TMU. Who comes off the best in this episode? Billy and Mindy, who step up as their own slightly irresponsible but good-hearted trailer park versions of Tami and Coach.
Sarah: “Swerve.” We finally have to deal with the fallout of Julie and Derek and…ugh. I really wonder if I’d watched this show when I was Julie’s age if I’d’ve had more sympathy, or at least not seen through Derek right away. I know if I’d been in her place I’d have been just as vulnerable and fallen for all his stupid lines. It’s not the worst episode, but it’s the one I can’t see myself wanting to rewatch again.
- Underrated Episode?
Jen: “Swerve” starts with Julie intentionally wrecking her car and the beginning of her wallowing at her parents’ house. Like I said, character moments that are hard to watch. But as someone whose first year of college was a disaster of my mistakes and my difficulty owning up to them, I love that this show went there with Julie. Isn’t so much of transition to adulthood about learning to take accountability for our actions? Some adults never learn it and Julie is struggling here. She’ll get there, but not in this episode.
And we watch Eric become almost unhinged — leaving practice, arriving late to the game, and getting truly angry at Julie. Her apology to him at the end of the episode is one of my favorite father-daughter moments of the whole show. They’re in the middle of figuring out how to relate to each other now.
For all its focus on the Taylors, Swerve gives us some great Riggins and Howard moments. Knowing the man struggles with public speaking, Coach Billy Riggins stepping up to give a pre-game speech is all the more meaningful. And Cress Williams absolutely delivers on his monologue about prison.
Kim: I’m going with the season premiere “Expectations,” mainly because it has the tough job of bridging the gap between generations of Friday Night Lights, in that they had to balance satisfying college send-offs for our last two OG teens, Landry and Julie (our babies are all grown up!!) while also setting the story in motion for our new generation. They pulled it off magnificently, of course, but I just don’t think it’s appreciated enough. Plus, it gives us a thirst shot almost right away AND probably the funniest Tinker moment of the season.
Sage: We were robbed of more time spent with the Landing Strip girls being the big sisters Becky never had, so “Fracture” takes this one automatically thanks to her new squad supporting her at her pageant. (And heckling the judges when she wasn’t crowned.) And while it’s a shame that the Epyck storyline ends in a frustratingly realistic way when she’s transferred to somewhere Tami can’t help her, this episode takes their relationship in a subtly clever direction. We love Tami and we know that her heart is in the right place, but she is still a white woman who lives in a nice house attempting to get through to kids the only way she knows how. Epyck clocks her almost immediately as a concerned party whose ears prick up at a sob story, and a sob story is what she feeds her. I really would have liked to see more of their dynamic explored, but cheers to FNL for letting Epyck score a point there.
Sarah: “Gut Check.” I’ve never been to Chicago and I’m not sure I’ll ever be able to go now, because it won’t be to visit my cute ex Matt Saracen and his suspiciously tidy and huge loft. Can you even imagine.
- Favorite Character?
Sage: I wasn’t going to let this series end without dedicating one of these posts to Coach Eric Taylor, known idiot and husband of my dreams.
This story doesn’t belong to Eric, but he is our protagonist, and while certain aspects of his personality remain consistent, in other ways, he is a completely different person by the end of the show than he is in the pilot. His arc, stripped completely down to the bones, is to realize that he is meant to be a high school football coach. This, specifically, is what he loves and what he is good at. It’s not a stepping stone. He is equipped in ways other coaches are not to mentor players at the age they need it the most. What group of confused high school boys couldn’t benefit from a few semesters with Eric Taylor?
And it took a season with East Dillon to get him there. Eric will be tied to some of his Panthers forever (some by marriage even!), but it’s coaching the Lions that he tells Jess has been the best time in his life. Eric built a program in East Dillon from the ground up, and what really transformed him is that he did not do it alone. It represents everything he loves and believes in about the sport — the team becomes a source of pride not only for the players but for the whole town. Eric’s role in life is to facilitate others doing great things, and that extends to people like Buddy and Jess and Levi.
Eric falters in Season Five when he forgets for a moment that his wife should also be included in the above. The other journey he goes on this year is as a husband. I’ll talk about that more in detail later in this post, but for now, I’ll simply say that when he finally arrives at the right conclusion, he embraces it wholeheartedly and without a trace of bitterness. Eric may take the occasional detour, but he always gets where he needs to go eventually, and that’s far more meaningful viewing than following a guy who gets it right immediately all of the time.
Sarah: Ladies and gentleman: Buddy. Fucking. Garrity. Buddy at the start of this show was everything I don’t like about sports and small towns and good old boys. But slowly and surely, Brad Leland’s performance wormed his way under my skin. Buddy can still be a real fuckup sometimes (remember the thousands of dollars of damage to the Landing Strip?), but when he’s on your side, it’s for thick and thin. He left the Panthers for Eric and Tami, for god’s sake! Buddy is unfailingly sincere and trusting. He went from a comic relief/love to hate him Area Man to the beating heart of the Lions, and the skill required to pull that off never fails to shock me. I’m a Brad Leland stan now.
Kim: How do you not say Vince Howard for Season Five? I think back to the opening of Season Four, where we are introduced to Vince running through the streets pursued by the police and then we cut right to the scene where Tim walks out of his literature class right as the professor starts talking about Odysseus and the Hero’s Journey. At the time, I took that as a clear allusion to the path Tim Riggins had laid out before him, but it’s also the path Vince Howard takes too. His arc in Season Five is a perfect story circle. It starts with the giddy anticipation of the future that Vince suddenly has laid out before him in the form of recruitment letters. Then we have the way his father crashes back into his life, bringing anxiety but also a renewed hope for a relationship with him. By the middle of the season, Vince, having grown too cocky and egotistical, falls out of grace with his team and his coach, and he spends several episodes working his way back to being the young man that we all fell in love with in Season Four. He arrives back to where he started, on the brink of greatness, having irrevocably changed. It’s such good writing, and Michael B. Jordan really shows us EVERYTHING he can do this season, yet still it feels like he’s only getting started. No wonder he became a fucking movie star.
Jen: The core of this season for me is all in this scene from “The Right Hand of the Father”:
Vince: “Coach, my dad just got out of prison. He’s staying with me in my house… and I can’t stand him. My mom, she asked me to forgive him. To be ‘better’. And you’re asking me to be ‘better’. I don’t know how to be ‘better’ because he never taught me how! He never taught me how to be ‘better’! He’s not around!”
Coach: “Listen to me. I said you need to strive to be better than everyone else. I didn’t say you needed to be better than everyone else. But you gotta try. That’s what character is. It’s in the trying.”
Vince Howard is trying to be better, but this kid has so much on his damn shoulders and so little modeling of how to do it. He’s trying to figure out who to look up to and who to trust. Watching Vince try to negotiate who to look to for advice is infuriating at times. He makes selfish moves on the football field and takes far too much of his frustration out on Jess. He wants to believe that his dad has changed and is surrounded by people who are telling him maybe he shouldn’t believe it. It’s a credit to Cress Williams that I buy that Ornette Howard wants to change — he has character. And sometimes that isn’t enough. Vince and Regina ultimately have to draw lines to protect themselves from Ornette. It’s open-ended exactly what will happen with Vince and his dad.
I know that Coach is right that Vince is gonna shine. Vince apologizes for his mistakes with Jess, a single tear rolling over his cheek as he kisses her. I could have watched Jurnee Smollett and Michael B. Jordan together forever. Vince can speak with confidence about his successes and struggles to the official who still chooses to kill the football program that made him. Power and money wins — but I know Vince will make the most of his senior year. When his mom and him embrace after the semi-final game, I know these two who have been through so much are going to make it. There’s a lot more of Michael B. Jordan’s trademark smile in Vince’s future.
- Least Favorite Character?
Sarah: Epyck, and hear me out. Epyck never got the screen time I felt like the writers wanted for her, and as a result we got another Santiago: a character coming from a very different place than any other student on the show, but ultimately got short shrift. Epyck ultimately being written out after hurting Tami may be realistic, but I never felt like we got a handle on who Epyck was or what the writers were trying to say with her. We know she lied about her home life and was always hungry…but for what? To quote Oprah, so what is the truth? If we take Epyck at face value, she lies and gets in fights because that’s who she is? She’s just a pathological liar? That doesn’t feel like a character this show would create, and ultimately the character’s writing never feels like it lives up to Tami’s interest in helping her.
Sage: Was there ever a plan for Hastings, and if so, what the hell happened to it? The storyline that brought him onto the team made it seem like Hastings was going to be a significant presence, but he’s just kind of around. His friendship with Buddy Jr. is pretty cute though.
Kim: That one cunty teacher who is either Tami’s adversary or is secretly in love with her, depending on the requirements of the episode.
Jen: I spent a good portion of the time that Laurel is on screen calling her “that terrible teacher” or uttering, “What is this woman’s problem?” The East Dillon teachers have a hard job, but this woman brings such an attitude that makes me want to scream.
- Favorite friendship?
Sage: For the longest time, I had Eric and Jess earmarked for this category. (They’re Jimmy Dugan and Dottie Hinson without the sexual tension. You know I’m right.) But then I remembered Julie treating Landry to one last (and possibly first?) lap dance in Dillon. For most of the time that they’ve known each other, Julie and Landry’s friendship depended on her status with Matt. But even with their ups and downs, they somewhat unwittingly developed a relationship that stands completely on its own. They’ve always understood each other — they have more in common than either of them does with Matt — and I think Julie secretly values Landry calling her on her shit. There’s a beautiful looming nostalgia in the last night they spend partying together in their town that made me miss people I haven’t spoken to in decades. You stay golden, Julie Taylor, indeed.
Sarah: I don’t think FNL ever really got a handle on a really strong male/female platonic relationship until Becky and Tim (or “Timriggins” as she used to call him, like he was a Pokemon). I was really wary of their relationship in the early days (thanks as always to Kim spoiling us that it never got romantic!), maybe because we’d never seen a friendship like theirs before. But both of them always needed someone who was there for the worst and didn’t look away, someone who believed in the same dreams they did. Tim took her shopping for the pageant! He showed her his land! And she always, always believed in him, even when she was the only person in the entire town. My biggest regret of Tim being sidelined for so much of the last season is how little we saw of them together, but even so: Tim’s friendship meant Becky had somewhere safe to live even when she was scared to ask for it. Ugh, my heart and these two!
Jen: The moment Mindy gets Becky back in the car to take her back to the Riggins’ radiates “she’s my family now, you unappreciative assholes.” It’s decisive, and it’s glorious. Some of the best friendships on this show are along the line between friendship and mentorship. You can see shades of Angela Collette in Mindy, with the prodding of Becky about her dating life. Then there are moments that tip the power back into a friendship as Becky encourages Mindy to negotiate for better hours at work and helps her to feel better about her post-pregnancy body.
Kim: I love the friendship between Becky and Mindy so fucking much. I love how it’s one that was initially born out of necessity and obligation but blossomed into something genuine once Mindy let her walls down and Becky started to relax a bit. I love how their dynamic is motherly and sisterly at the same time. It’s very much the same kind of relationship Mindy has with her own mother: borderline inappropriately friendly sometimes, but fiercely protective at all times. I love how Mindy gives Becky the space to be a teenage girl and never talks down to her or makes her feel silly. I love how Becky builds Mindy up. And I love how after Billy had to talk Mindy into letting Becky live with them, Cheryl basically has to pry her daughter out of Mindy’s arms when she returns. THIS is a female relationship Friday Night Lights definitely gets right, and I wish we had gotten more time with it.
- Best Moment on the Football Field?
Kim: I’m trying not to go too hard on the finale, since we have a whole question reserved for that, but how can I not say that MAGNIFICENT montage of the State Championship game? What I love about it is that it’s not a repeat of the Season One Championship game. There’s a hazy, fairytale-like quality about it, almost like the game is a memory rather than an experience we’re having in real time.
I love that we know it’s a tough game even without a play by play from Slammin’ Sammy Meade. I love how they focus on the faces on and off the field, the faces we’ve come to know and cherish over the course of this series. I love how they choose to just let Snuffy Walden’s score do the work, along with some well timed sound editing. And I love how the only time we are yanked into the present is for that final scene with Vince and Coach, where he tells him to just GO FOR IT, and then we’re back in our dreamlike state as Vince launches that pass. I love that we never see who catches the ball. (I like to think it was Luke, the dream team of Howard and Cafferty getting one last moment in the sun.) It’s all so fucking beautiful and perfectly executed and shows exactly why people say Friday Night Lights is a show about football that’s not actually about football at all.
Jen: Everything about the way the State Championship is depicted is masterful. The slow-motion shots of the game and our loved ones in the stands. The evocative music with snippets of the whistles and called plays. It encapsulates how this show is about football and not about football at all. It’s about the people who football matters to and this is an ode to them.
Sarah: The cut in the finale from Vince’s Hail Mary throw to several months later. It shocked me. As much as we were saying it didn’t matter who won or lost that game because our Lions had done their best, I was still on tenterhooks. The utter confidence of that edit thrilled me.
Sage: We get our confirmation that Vince found his receiver, but I love that Friday Night Lights flashes forward from the State Championship right in the middle of his Hail Mary pass. The game ends on potential. It ends on all of these people we’ve grown so close to looking up into the night sky and hoping for the best. And that’s what FNL represents to me. Life will come at you without warning, as it does for Jason Street in the pilot. And there’s no way to completely prepare for that. All you can do is work hard at what you love, gather your community around you, and then let it rip.
- Best Tami Taylor Queen moment?
Kim: There are definitely showier Tami Taylor Queen moments in the final episodes of the season, especially when she takes Eric to task over her job offer. (The muttered “eighteen years” in “Texas Whatever” is KILLER.) But I have to shout out the moment that makes all of those moment possible: the moment that Tami Taylor takes over that panel at Guidance Counselor con, refusing to be intimidated by the man who is dismissing her opinion.
Audience Member: Getting back to the issue of standardized testing, what improvements can be made in regards to college admissions?
Random White Guy on the Panel: Well, I think one of the options is that Texas needs a baseline for their standardized test scores and accountability for those scores. Now, we can learn a lot from looking at California’s integrative accountability system, and that has a state academic performance index, and it’s also monitoring the federal adequate yearly process and program improvements.
Queen Tami Taylor: And I would love to just add one thing to that, if I could. I feel that we’ve spent a lot of time today talking about these standardized tests, and I think we’ve already acknowledged the system is failing us. And if we continue to just keep looking at these tests and focusing on these tests, then we will fail our students. And if we keep pushing those kids towards the ever-important test score, we’re pushing them to fail.
Random White Guy on the Panel: It seems naive to presume that these test scores don’t exist.
Queen Tami Taylor: I don’t mean to presume that they don’t exist, but the students have very different needs. And we have a responsibility to see what those needs are and to address them.
Random White Guy on the Panel: What would you have us do? Sit down with every student in the state?
Queen Tami Taylor: Yes. I would.
This one goes out to all of us who have been on convention panel with that ONE white guy who thinks they know everything and that the only opinion that matters is his. Next time it happens to you, just think: WWTTD. What would Tami Taylor do? She would USE HER VOICE and she would not back down. Be the Tami Taylor you want to see in this world, friends.
Sage: “I’m gonna say to you what you haven’t had the grace to say to me: Congratulations, Eric.”
If Eric Taylor were a perfect person and not a flawed Texas boy still working through his internalized biases and beliefs, Tami would not be the character we love. I think it was so bold and refreshingly unsentimental for FNL to allow Eric to have his problematic reaction to her job offer in the literal twilight of the series. It shows that we’re still observing these characters with clarity and allows for some of the finest Tami moments of the run.
Tami has every right in the world to feel under-celebrated, ignored, and generally let down by her husband’s response to her own dedication and intellect being recognized. What makes her goals is that she’s able to communicate these feelings with the precision of a knife thrower and the compassion of the Virgin Mary herself. She shares a background with Eric and therefore understands the norms that have shaped him. But she won’t allow what he is and isn’t familiar with to hold her back. Moreover, she will hold him to the commitment that they’ve made as life partners. Tami has spent her whole life with Eric playing the role of his biggest fan. The very least she deserves in return is the same amount of support.
Jen: Tami Taylor finally getting the career recognition she deserves is glorious. Seeing her be offered the job of dean is a pump-your-fist-in-the-air victory that rivals anything that happens on the football field. And then we see it means nothing if Eric doesn’t agree to prioritize Tami’s career for a change. When she simply says “eighteen years” to Eric to remind him of their early conversation, it’s an absolute queen moment. She is clear that it’s her turn and it’s time for him to get on board.
Sarah: It’s got to be a tie between “I’m going to have the grace to say to you what you haven’t had the grace to say to me: congratulations, Eric” and “eighteen years.” Tami standing up for herself while Eric refused to remove his head from his ass over the prospect of supporting her career first has to be it.
- Favorite Coach pep talk?
Sage: “You may never know how proud I am of you.”
Eric never uses more words than he needs.
Jen: I already wrote about the talk that Coach gives to Vince in the “Right Hand of the Father.” I’ll just add to say so much of the genius of this pep talk is the way Kyle Chandler plays it. He starts out giving Vince one talk and Vince breaks down. Chandler sits so still through most of it, letting Jordan’s performance be the focus. This is also an excellent way to de-escalate the situation. Vince needs to let out his frustrations and I love that Coach’s response is he is not asking him to be perfect just to keep trying.
Kim: There’s something so special about Coach and Vince scenes. In general, many of the best Coach scenes have to do with his relationship with his quarterback. We didn’t get enough time to get a good grasp on Coach and Jason’s relationship while Jason was playing. The dynamic with Matt was always more father/son than coach/pupil, because even then I think Eric sensed that Matt wasn’t going to pursue football past high school. But Coach and Vince? Yes, their relationship has a fatherly aspect but I believe that Eric knows that Vince has the potential to go far, that his gifts could take him beyond Dillon, Texas and Eric takes that potential seriously.
Eric is also an idealist who believes that who Vince is off the field is just as important as what he does on the field. I love that he sits and LISTENS as Vince unloads on him about his father. (Truly, few people actively listen as well as Kyle Chandler does.) I love that he basically tells Vince that the hard is what makes it great. And I LOVE that moment after Vince shows incredible leadership at the end of the game that Eric shakes his hand and tells him “Now, that’s character.” My heart, it explodes.
Sarah: There’s a moment in the final episode of the BBC radio sitcom Cabin Pressure that always makes me cry. For context, you have to know that each episode of the show is a different location in alphabetical order: Episode 1 is Abu Dhabi, 2 is Boston, and so on. So in the finale, “Zurich,” when they announce their next destination is Addis Ababa, I always feel this enormous leap in my chest at the confirmation that just because the show’s over doesn’t mean the story ends. So when Coach says in the finale, “Clear eyes, full hearts … eh, we’ll deal with later,” I get that same heart-leaping, sobbing Addis Ababa feeling. His new team doesn’t know it yet, but we know this is their first of many brilliant Coach pep talks. It’s a whole new beginning for them.
- Favorite ship?
Sage: Generally, I’m not in favor of teenagers making lifelong commitments of any kind, but we can all agree that when Matt and Julie aren’t together, bad things happen, yes?
In all seriousness, what helps me to believe that they’ll be okay and that they actually know what they’re doing is the scene where Matt confronts Julie about hiding from her life. If he cared about her less, he would just be happy to have her there and wouldn’t be concerned that she’s throwing away her future just because she’s embarrassed about something. But that’s not their relationship and that’s not the kind of partner Matt is.
Also, who among us doesn’t dream about being proposed to in front of the Alamo Freeze??
Sarah: The dark horse that I never would have expected: Billy and Mindy. Their creating a found family with the Lions and Becky took me completely by surprise. Despite Derek Phillips’ impeccable comic skills, after their wedding their relationship was never played for a laugh. It showed Coach and Tami weren’t the only ones committed to making their marriage work. Billy and Mindy listen to each other and support each other. Take Mindy’s shock that Billy took Becky in, or Billy comforting Mindy and listening to her when she’s so scared of having the twins. I completely believe Billy and Mindy are the new Coach and Tami of Dillon, and Dillon’s damn lucky to have them.
Kim: My favorite thing about the last two seasons of Friday Night Lights is how they expanded the roles for Billy and Mindy. I love how they are like a trashier version of Eric and Tami, fully committed to not only each other but the youth of Dillon. I love how they take in strays and how the Riggins house becomes a safe haven where people can just show up at all hours and not be turned away. I love how Billy and Mindy don’t always get everything right, but they always TRY to and that’s the most important thing. They ALWAYS step up and say yes, even if they have no idea what they’re doing. Dillon’s in good hands as long as they’re around.
Jen: One of the absolute delights of this rewatch has been discovering my love for Mindy and Billy Riggins. I’m gonna quote Shannon when I say, “Mindy and Billy morphing into Tami and Eric is the least expected and most delightful surprise of the season.” As individuals and together, they take on kids in the fine tradition of the Taylors. Mindy is as surprised as anyone when she says, “I think, unfortunately, in this circumstance, we happen to be the role models.” But here’s the thing — they’ve been through these hard things themselves and they’ve taken their past experiences and are using them to guide these teens. Watching them find stability through everything thrown at them is a beautiful thing to behold.
- Favorite Shipper moment?
Sarah: Ahem. *clears throat, stands on soapbox* This show needed more Tyra/Lyla interactions. That said, how could it not be “it’s your turn?” It has to be, right? What could possibly compare to Coach running down a mall escalator like a damn rom-com?
Sage: To be quite honest, if I had my way, Tim and Lyla would have been endgame, while Landry became Senator Collette’s adoring, Emhoff-like beta husband. But I’m not made of stone, people. Life doesn’t return to Tim’s eyes until it looks like Tyra, who is — as Kim pointed out — the only one who can snap him out of this, is about to walk back out of his life. It’s the perfect bookend to their breakup back in Season One, when all Tyra wanted was for Tim to ask her to stay. This time he does. And while I’m still not sure whether they end up together in a traditional sense, it’s clear from the finale that they’ll always be in each other’s lives.
Jen: When Julie Taylor admonishes Matt for not telling her that he was coming home for Christmas because they could have planned something, she had no idea what was coming and neither did I. Of course, Matt Saracen would take the time to get his grandmother’s ring and then propose in front of the Alamo Freeze. I had no idea how invested I was in their relationship until I was shrieking at the screen. Yes, they are young but this is not unusual. Coming from a small town, I lose count of how many couples I know that married that young. And to paraphrase Julie, they have the best inspiration.
Kim: The way I SCREAMED when Matt fucking Saracen dropped to his knee in front of the goddamn Alamo Freeze and proposed to Julie Taylor with his grandmother’s diamond ring. Alexa, play “She’s in Love with the Boy” by Trisha Yearwood.
- Funniest Moment?
Sage: It’s a Billy Riggins sweep in this category for me. I get so much joy out of his scenes with Luke this season, especially when he decides to become #44’s redneck self-help guru, personal trainer, and dating coach. Honestly, one could do worse.
Kim: Billy Riggins, with baby Stevie strapped to his chest, putting Luke Cafferty through the paces and making him work out with all the accumulated junk in the backyard, basically inventing CrossFit.
Sarah: Billy doing his best Burgess Meredith in Rocky in the backyard with Luke has to be it. “My wife is a woman, dumbass.”
Jen: Derek Philips yelling individualized insults at the Lions in Kingdom is hysterical. My personal favorite is when he tells Ruckles, “You will run with hate in your heart.” And the punchline with Eric telling Billy it’s supposed to be a walk through — gold.
- Best Warm Fuzzy?
Sarah: Mindy and Billy dropping Becky off back at her mom’s, and both of them visibly trying to be strong for Becky, and Billy supporting Mindy. My heart! It hurts so much!
Kim: There is a lot to love about the relationship that forms between Jess and Eric, from the way he begrudgingly takes her under his wing to the genuine affection he has for her by the end of the season, offering to help her get set up with a new coach in Dallas. But I think my favorite Coach and Jess moment is when he stumbles upon her crying in the locker room. Jess is obviously embarrassed that he caught her in a vulnerable moment and at first it seems like Eric might give her the Jimmy Dugan “There’s no crying in football” treatment. Instead, he reminds her that he’s got two daughters and that she can take all the time she needs to pull herself back together. It’s such a sweet, loving thing to do and it’s something only a Girl Dad would be able to understand. And that’s the story of how Eric Taylor became the father of three daughters.
Jen: Eric goes home and looks up the female coach that Jess told him about. It’s so endearing. He is straight with her about the odds. He’s right, it’s a man’s world (will they ever give Becky Hammon a NBA coaching job?). And she looks him in the eye, saying, “I’m not asking to play.” She knows the odds. He doesn’t know quite how to navigate what Jess wants but he can recognize talent and determination and he goes for it.
Sage: There’s something really magical about “Kingdom.” It brings back so many memories about overnight class trips and the illusion of freedom they provide. Especially for these boys who’ve rarely been outside of their town, let alone on any kind of vacation, a break from the norm must feel like the biggest gulp of fresh air.
So yes, they’re feeling the pressure, but they’re also aware of how unlikely it is for any of them to be in this hotel and waiting to play this game — and they let themselves bask in it a bit. It doesn’t push the story forward much to have Eric sitting on his patio, hidden from their view and overhearing their conversation, but it is, I believe, one of many small moments that lead to him turning down the Florida job. As much as high schoolers may sometimes vex him, Eric doesn’t actually want to coach older players, who may be less complicated but are also harder and less malleable. He wants to be in these kids’ lives at this moment in their lives, when a minibar is still a novelty and winning their trust is a privilege.
- Thirstiest Moment?
Sage: Staying on the “Kingdom” track — the way I screamed at a drunk and horny Eric muttering, “What’re y’all wearin’?” into the phone at Tami and her girlfriend. It’s so messy and adorable and totally out-of-character (sober Eric would die if his sex life ever even came up in conversation), but it makes sense, because this is about as happy and free as we’ve ever seen him. He’s such a serious man, and he takes his job seriously because he knows the impact that he has. So any time his boyishness comes out like this, I am a total goner.
Sarah: Episode 4, 19 minutes in. Coach leans against the bleachers with his arms over his head to talk to a booster. Or so I assume. I have no memory of actual dialogue.
Kim: I’m sorry but nothing will be hotter than Eric going absolutely FERAL when Derek has the audacity to show up at his house. It’s in the way Kyle Chandler portrays Eric’s Red Ross tunnel vision in that moment, his laser focus terrifying and hot all at the same time. Eric doesn’t see anything else other than this weasel of a man who hurt his daughter and all he can do is mutter nonsense under his breath as he chases Derek away with the fucking handlebar of Gracie Bell’s tricycle cause it was the thing that was literally in his hands at the time. No wonder Derek basically pissed himself. Truly, it’s the one moment where I am like YAS LONG LIVE THE PATRIARCHY and I’m not afraid to admit it.
Jen: “I’ve been waiting five minutes for my drink.” Thank god they brought Adrianne Palicki back to stroll into the bar and remind me of the sexy confidence this woman exudes.
- Right in the Feels moment?
Sage: Vince is desperate to believe that his dad is becoming the man that he needs him to be, and so he overlooks a lot. But Vince’s mother is his life — he risks his entire future making a devil’s bargain to get Regina clean. So when Ornette dares to bring drugs around this woman who is only recently in recovery, the veil falls away. Over Vince’s dead body will he let this man drag her back down to that point. It takes an incredible amount of courage to do what Vince does and physically confront Ornette, but the thing is, he acts completely on instinct. From the moment we meet the Howards, we’re shown that there isn’t anything Vince would not do for his mom, and here again, he probably saves her life.
Sarah: The Landing Strip girls taking Becky to her pageant. I once had a really similar experience: I was graduating university and someone really important to me bailed on attending at the last minute. And so my aunt and uncle showed up instead, and they were the loudest in the crowd when I walked across the stage. In general, I love when we get to see the Landing Strip women together. This show doesn’t often see lots of women together supporting each other like the football players get to, so I’m always glad to see more of them.
Jen: “It’s time for you to let Tim Riggins come home.”
Watching the history and complicated connections between Tim, Billy, Eric, and Buddy during Tim’s parole hearing absolutely wrecked me from the start. Opening with a shot of Tim’s haunted face and panning to Billy’s shaking hands adorned with a championship ring clutching his speech. He’s rambling about patriotism and change when he puts the paper away and he says it plainly, “Bottom line, he’s got a family who loves and misses him.” Coach is the one who names “Tim’s mistake” as “tragic and deep,” but it plays out here on Billy and Tim’s faces. These brothers have been wrecked by this situation and Tim getting out of prison is only the beginning of fixing it. We all knew that Coach would deliver but wow did Buddy give a speech that destroyed me. He defines the Tim Riggins we’ve seen over five seasons with “this kid right here has more heart than almost any person I know.” And with Taylor Kitsch’s smile, that heart shines through.
Kim: It is truly devastating to see Tim Riggins as a shell of his former self after he gets out of jail, that devilish twinkle in his eye completely extinguished. Ever perceptive, Mindy can see how much pain Tim is in. She doesn’t even try to stop him when she sees him packing up all of his shit because she knows he can’t be there anymore. Instead, she just tearfully points out how grateful Billy is to Tim, and how grateful SHE is to him and that his sacrifice does not go unnoticed. Stacey Oristano is fantastic all season, but she’s truly next level here as her voice cracks as she tells Tim “You’re different. You know that?” And then the way Taylor Kitsch just breathes, “Yeah. I am.”? Kick me in the stomach, it would hurt less.
- Best Hero Moment?
Jen: I’m going to choose a slightly unconventional one for this. I think a lot of the hero moments in this season tend to be quieter. And the moment that Buddy Garrity reels back his anger, which we have seen can be ugly, to ask, “How can I help you, son?” I love a man working to ignore some of his toxic instincts to figure out how to be a better dad. Buddy Garrity’s heart, you all, he is learning to use it to step up.
Sarah: Coach running at Derek’s car with Gracie’s trike handlebars. Undefeated. My only regret is he didn’t manage to sweep Derek’s head right off his shoulders with them.
Sage: The Collette home may have been chaotic, but Tyra and Mindy never doubted that Angela loved them. And it doesn’t take Mindy long to determine that that is not the case in the house of Becky’s father’s girlfriend. Much like I said about Vince for the last question, Mindy’s protective impulse kicks in here, and she decides in a split second that keeping Becky emotionally safe is worth whatever extra effort and money she and Billy have to spend to have her around. And for Mindy, it’s less about what she owes to Tim and more about what’s owed to Becky herself. She deserves to be loved. She deserves to be a teenager. She deserves to be a part of a family and to not have to worry about what she’s walking into when she gets home from school. Mindy fiercely claims that for her, and it’s her best moment in the series.
Kim: I know we all love Buddy Garrity to the moon and back but I also know Buddy Garrity can be an acquired taste and his overzealous and boisterous nature can be a turn-off if you don’t truly know the heart of the man behind it. So needless to say, I CLENCHED when Buddy basically steamrolled the judge into allowing him to be a character witness at Tim’s parole hearing. It really could have gone either way, and judging from the looks on everyone’s faces, they all knew that.
We shouldn’t have doubted though. Because for as much as he’s claimed to be a Panther, Buddy Garrity has always had the heart of a Lion.
“Sir, please, please. If you…if you don’t mind, please. I’ve known this young man since before he hit puberty. And this young man has done a lot of things wrong. I’ve seen him do a dozen things wrong. But let me tell you something right now, he is not a bad young man, and he’s certainly not a criminal. He doesn’t need to be in this system. He dated my daughter for years, and we took him in like family, so he’s like family to me. And I could tell you this kid right here has got more heart than almost any person I know. And I can promise you that when you let him out, he will have a full-time job working for me. And I can guarantee you that nothing like this will ever happen again. You have my word on that. It’s time for you to let Tim Riggins come home.”
If Buddy’s WORDS don’t get you in that moment, then the way Tim cracks the tiniest of smiles will. There’s no better person to have in your corner than Buddy Garrity, because not only does he make these grand gestures in the moment, he actually follows through on them. The very next episode Tim is behind the bar at Buddy’s, slinging beers with the sleeves cut off his t-shirt. Just as he should be.
- Favorite pop culture reference?
Kim: Fall 2010 was PEAK America’s Sweetheart Taylor Swift. She was sitting right in the sweet spot between the Kanye “Imma let you finish” incident at the VMAs and the release of “Speak Now,” her third studio album, so girlfriend was EVERYWHERE. So, when Luke Cafferty waltzes into the locker room like he basically won a Golden Ticket, begging his teammates to ask him where he’s gonna be the next day, Vince’s immediate response of “a Taylor Swift” concert could not be more on point if they tried.
Jen: I loved thinking about what a Taylor Swift concert in 2010 represented versus what one in 2021 is like.
Sarah: OK, this is cheating, but Julie’s Einstein-like history prof’s lecture on myth vs. history before Derek stepped in and ruined everything had me thinking back to my days as a wee little history major myself. The big thoughts I had! How important everything felt! The undiagnosed depression of it all! He was my Proustian madeleine that sent me rocketing back 15 years.
Sage: It’s either Lorraine watching Sit and Be Fit, presumably on the local public access channel, not doing any of the exercises, or Luke trying to make country rap happen a few years ahead of Nelly collaborating with Tim McGraw.
- Were you satisfied by the finale? Why or why not?
Sarah: Yes, absolutely. Were there things I would have changed? Sure. I was disappointed we didn’t get to see all our boys again (Justice for Herc!), but I watched the jam-packed extra long director’s cut of the finale and I don’t know what I would have cut. I only clued in watching this last season that the credits always ended with a shot of the Taylors together on the field, and it was the only way the show could have ended.
Sage: I was! The Friday Night Lights finale doesn’t seek to reinvent the wheel or anything, but it’s a fitting farewell, especially if we’re talking about the extended version. The NBC cut loses some short scenes that provide closure for a few characters and relationships, including Eric and Tim, Matt and Landry, and Mindy and Becky. The shortened version actually confuses the situation between Vince and Ornette by shaving off a scene where Vince invites his dad to come and watch him play at State, making it look like Eric goes behind his back when he encourages Ornette to come. And it removes some nuance from Eric and Tami’s stalemate about moving to Philadelphia. But I digress.
Life goes on for everyone, which is the theme of this finale. The only real “ending” is that the Taylors (all three of them) move out of Texas. Otherwise this finale looks to the future while honoring the past, like Buddy supervising the installation of a sign bearing Eric’s motto in the Panthers’ locker room. And it’s filled with small, poignant images, as all great FNL episodes are. Grandma Saracen kissing Julie’s hand. Tim and Tyra drinking beers on lawn chairs on Tim’s land. Luke pressing his State Championship ring into Becky’s palm.
The choice of Delta Spirit’s “Devil Knows You’re Dead” to score that final montage really says it all, especially when you contrast it with “Devil Town.” The lyrics of the former are all Irish blessings — the ultimate acknowledgement that while you can’t shield anyone you love against the worst, you can always hope for the best. FNL has always balanced its realism and its optimism, and it disappears into the sunset on that same note.
Kim: How do you end a show like Friday Night Lights, especially when the mid-series reboot proved that the very DNA of the show is that you can switch out the characters but the story remains the same? The finale feels like the end of a chapter, or maybe the end of book one of a series, and that’s why it’s so fucking brilliant. The stakes are incredibly high with the State Championship and the fact that the Lions are about to be disbanded, but I also love how the finale pulls out a little bit to show that very little about this game matters in the long run. What matter is the people you meet along the way and the relationships you form with them and the experiences you share together. That’s why that closing montage is so beautiful. It gives us the sense that life goes on, be it Vince being the star quarterback of the Dillon Panthers or Matt and Julie making it work in Chicago or Buddy making sure there’s a memorial to Eric in the Locker Room or the Riggins boys finding peace as they build Tim’s house together. And then we have Coach and Tami arm in arm as they walk off the new football field together, on the verge of changing lives in Philadelphia. Eric’s team may not know his catchphrase today, but they will tomorrow. And that’s what matters.
Jen: As I said before we watched the finale, I watched this show as it aired until the end when I just didn’t want it to be over. I meant to return to it sooner but as time went on it seemed I needed to do a rewatch. The time never quite came and I feel like I built up a lot of pressure around this finale. I was spoiled for some of it but surprisingly not a lot.
The show has to wrap up the fate of the Lions and resolve the conflict between the Taylors, plus they brought back multiple characters to say goodbye to. How do you say goodbye to the people of Dillon? For one, you don’t shy away from acknowledging the smaller characters — Grandma Saracen and Angela Collette get moments in this episode, for example. It reminded me of the richness of Dillon.
Every time I encourage people to watch Friday Night Lights, I tell them it’s the closest I’ve ever seen to my experience of growing up in small-town America. There’s a specific feeling of going back to your home during the holidays. Matt, Julie, Tim, and Tyra each capture a key part of that. I identify with Matt and Julie — someone who felt like my small town could never give me the dreams I wanted. It’s only during holiday returns like this quartet has at the bar that I realized that even though I was right, some part of me will only ever be understood by those I grew up with.
Whatever you think of Tyra/Tim — I love that FNL depicts a woman who is thinking about bringing the skills she learned in college back home. I don’t know where Tyra will end up or with who. But I love that Friday Night Lights presents this as an enviable dream. I think sometimes when your home is devalued going back is shown as a lesser or safer choice. If Tyra does chose to go home again, I have no doubt she will be Mrs. Taylor but bigger, and that is one amazing choice.
We see the Riggins brothers building a house on Tim’s land. It’s the sweetest “Texas Forever” because it feels like a promise of a great future.
And then we end on Eric and Tami because they were the backbone of the show. Making a home across the country. A fading shot of the two of them together on the football field is perfection.
- Sum up your feelings about the season in a paragraph or two?
Sarah: I love the Lions so much, and the decision to move the show to East Dillon was brilliant. I miss what the Panthers used to be and love that team, but the show essentially rebooted in Season Four. I will always be amazed they pulled the same trick on me again, to get me to love this team and these boys (and football). I feel like Friday Night Lights could have kept going, and they say that’s the best time to end, leaving them wanting more. This season told a complete and fulfilling story of the Taylors doing something absolutely magical again, as well as what it did to everyone afterwards. An amazing end to an amazing series.
Jen: Friday Night Lights never shied away from depiction of hard social issues and how they impact the characters we love. Sometimes there are missteps, I wish the comparison and racial dynamics between the prison experiences of the Riggins and the Howards came through stronger. Other times, I was stunned by the nuance. I think Regina Howard’s recovery journey was handled with a quiet compassion and strength. Angela Rawna is just one example of what amazing actors can do on a show that gives them quality material.
It’s seasons of television like this that make me want to thank casting directors because Friday Night Lights could put an entire football team of great actors on the field. You only need to look at scenes like Stacey Oristano absolutely delivering with her portrayal of Mindy begging Tim to stay. Season Five gave us future movie stars Jurnee Smollett and Michael B. Jordan showing us how brilliant they already were. And they’re doing it alongside actors who don’t often get their due because they remain mostly on television — Connie Britton, Kyle Chandler, and Taylor Kitsch among them.
Sage: Man, it’s hard to pass any kind of judgment on this final season, because I wish FNL could have gone on forever, or at least for one more school year in East Dillon. Remembering what a battle it was for the show to survive, I know we were lucky to get five seasons of it, but I can still feel short-changed. Because of how successfully they were able to transition to a new school and to cycle in new characters, not to mention the breadth of Americana there’s still left to cover, the show ends with plenty of life left in it and potential unfulfilled. However, they made the most of this final year, giving the Lions their moment in the sun and throwing a curveball at the Taylor’s marriage. There are too many characters to serve (from both eras of the series) to give each of their story’s equal weight, unfortunately. I would’ve liked to have seen more of Luke pondering his post-graduation choices and gotten an update on Lyla and Landry, for example. But, logistic challenges aside, Season Five knows what we want (happy(ish) endings for all) and delivers on that.
Kim: To me, Season Five almost feels like a bonus. It was a gift I never expected to get, and therefore, I have a hard time being objective about it, because I’m just so thankful I got it in the first place. Did it have some stories that they spent a fair amount of time on that ultimately went nowhere? Of course it did. (Sorry to Hastings and to Epyck, we barely knew ye.) But so much of the season is so goddamn satisfying that I don’t care! The Lions’ journey to the State Championship is quite possibly more compelling than the path the Panthers take in Season One and that’s SAYING SOMETHING. All of our friends get endings that feel in character and are ninety-nine percent satisfying. (The one percent unsatisfying is Luke joining the military, which is 100% in character for him, but that doesn’t mean I like it!) Of course, I would have loved to have gotten some more closure for some of our OG characters, but a lot of that has to be chalked up to actor availability and to budget. But this is me nitpicking! Season Five is also the most bingeable to me and they stick the landing SO WELL that you can easily forgive some of the little mistakes they made along the way. Texas Forever, bitches.
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