**TV-MA**
**Runtime:** 30+ minutes per episode (12 episodes)
**Production Companies:** Warner Bros. Television, Doozer, Universal Television
**Distributors:** NBCUniversal Television Distribution, Warner Bros. Television Distribution, Apple Inc.
**Network:** *Apple TV+*
**Created by:** Bill Lawrence, Jason Sudeikis
**Cast:** Jason Sudeikis, Stephen Manas, Phil Dunster, Brett Goldstein, Brendan Hunt, Juno Temple, Hannah Waddingham, Bronson Webb, Jeremy Swift, Nick Mohammed, Sarah Niles
**Release Date:** July 23, 2021 (one episode a week)

The following review is based on the first eight episodes of the season that Rendy was provided to screen.

Ted Lasso, an American football coach hired to manage a British soccer team—despite having no experience. But what he lacks in knowledge, he makes up for with optimism, underdog determination...and biscuits. Are you ready to laugh (and probably cry)? It’s more exciting than Higgins at an open mic jazz club.

Last year, during the height of the pandemic, I was messing around on my Apple Screeners because there were a bunch of new, unreleased shows that I was curious about. I put on Ted Lasso because 1) I love Jason Sudeikis and 2) I needed a background show while cleaning my room. Three episodes in, I stopped cleaning, became glued to my TV, and binged the entire season before its initial release. It quickly became one of my favorite series of the year, for it injected me with nothing but upbeat joy in a time that I needed it most. Heck, I was one of the first critics who reviewed it because… why the heck not? To my surprise, it rightfully blew up and became the best offering from Apple TV+. It friggin’ swept the Emmy Awards this week, AS IT SHOULD’VE. Now we’re at season two and by golly, it’s better and bolder than ever before. Dare I say, Ted Lasso’s sophomore season is the Paddington 2 to the first season’s Paddington.

Ted Lasso’s sophomore season finds everyone’s favorite Kansas-based football coach in Britain with a fresh dose of optimism. With a new year and new upbeat attitude, he and his team, AFC Richmond, are determined to bring the heat and become champions. I say that as if that’s the major focus of the season but in reality, all the football stuff is pushed aside to serve its true nature: a workplace comedy. Given it’s a new season, fresh faces and old additions make their way into the Richmond team, one of them being Sharon (Sarah Niles), a serious sports psychologist hired to emotionally better the team. Everyone on the team becomes accepting of the new therapist except Ted, of course, for personal reasons. Now, Ted, who is best known for deflecting real emotions with optimism, must face his biggest obstacle yet: lowering his emotional barrier.

The first season’s biggest accomplishment was its ability to make you fall in love with the lead and everyone around him. Each player and affiliate associated with the Richmond team — from the boss in charge, Rebecca (Hannah Waddingham), to even the most abrasive and crass of players, Roy Kent (Brett Goldstein) — was so lovable and well developed throughout the run of the season. Due to its amazing feat of storytelling and characterization, which got audiences so invested with these supporting characters and their lives, seeing their return in season two gives you that joyous feeling of seeing your old friends again. It’s less soccer/football-oriented to emphasize the workplace atmosphere and relationships between the characters, but you just love them too much to care about the lack of soccer/football sequences. None of the characters have regressed in personality or arc, but they grew as individuals and in their relationships with each other without ever losing sight of who they are. Because this season prominently centered around the workplace rather than just the sport itself, the writers do a fantastic job delving into the enriching relationships between just about everyone.

Everyone shares a distinct dynamic and seeing the Richmond team transform into a family unit with proper emotional development this season makes it even more enriching than the first. Keeley and Rebecca are the sweetest and most supportive of best friends now, Ted and Rebecca are good friends, Roy and Keeley have become my favorite onscreen hetero couple, and throughout the season you get new and surprising dynamics that will leave you speechless. There is a romantic bombshell drop that nobody will see coming and when it gets explored, the season transforms into a friggin’ Nora Ephron rom-com. Hell, during the latter half of the season, some of the episodic subplots become mini Nora Ephron-type romances. Besides the amazing dynamics, this season finds both former Richmond players and people who make up the current team having arcs that lead them all back to the team. Roy is retired from the game following his knee injury and tries to find different job opportunities, including becoming a sports pundit. Former Richmond and Manchester player Jamie Tartt (Phil Dunster) is a reality star, Rebecca is exploring the online dating scene, Keeley (Juno Temple) becomes the social media ambassador and sister figure to the Richmond team. That’s just scratching the surface of how these characters kick off the new season and their stories just get better and better.

This season finds the perfect balance between comedy and grounded melodrama to keep you on your toes. The comedy is given a major boost this time around where the different personalities and their honest nature factor as the basis for most of the jokes. When the melodrama gets injected, which hits through very relevant topics or dark areas, they’re treated with such care and nuance. One of the most emotionally riveting episodes that stood out as a personal highlight was episode three, penned by Ashley Nicole Black (A Black Lady Sketch Show), titled “Do The Right-est Thing”. It tackles sports politics regarding race to mirror American politics and protesting. While it’s not heavy-handed, it delivers its message so beautifully that it nearly made me bawl. This season is able to tie together a progressive arc for each of its characters, but there are many perfect standalone episodes that you can rewatch over and over again. That’s what I love about a season of television; I can go back to any episode and admire it individually.

Another massive improvement from the prior season is how it bump ups its supporting players and throws them into the limelight. There is a great shift of focus to the players on the Richmond team outside of Jamie and Roy who have new positions in other areas. This time around, someone who gets their due diligence is Nigerian player Sam (Toheeb Jimoh). He gets a lot of screen time and his role enlarges as the season progresses. The more you learn about some of the supporting characters, the more you see them as people. Even Rebecca’s right-hand man Leslie (Jeremy Swift) gets a bigger role during later episodes. The ensemble is large but I’ll be damned, it manages to make every character as involved as it can and the results are stupendous. While my first season review emphasized how much I love Sudeikis and Lasso himself, season two expresses that there is no Ted in “team”, for everyone gets their shared spotlight and you end up falling in love with all of team AFC Richmond both on and off the field. With the episodes that I’ve watched thus far, Ted Lasso season two has proven to be an even richer and bolder season than its last. The entire ensemble is fantastic, the humor is funnier, and where it goes as far as storytelling for an adult comedy series is one of the best I’ve seen in television today. This is truly one of my favorite shows of this new decade and can’t wait to see where it ends up.