I have spent an obscene amount of time watching the entire FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS series in 2014. I'm not going to pretend it was a life-altering experience or anything, but I don't regret a second of it. I wouldn't even say it was a guilty pleasure, because it wasn't. FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS is an interesting piece of contemporary culture and I believe that whoever has a tiny bit of intellectual curiosity will enjoy it as much as I did.
Not convinced? I don't blame you. I still don't understand why I first pushed PLAY and sat through the first episode, but I did and I thoroughly enjoyed it. I know the series is over and alreeady half-forgotten in the age of immediate gratification, but the advent of Netflix has made FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS basically available for free, so you should seize the opportunity of cheap entertainment. You want reasons to watch FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS? I'm going to give you reasons. How about a whopping 35 of them?
(mild spoilers. nothing important, don't worry)
Not in order of importance :
1) FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS is a rare occurrence of athletes being given a satisfying dramatic treatment. The characters are all defined by football in one way or another, but they aren't archgods or soulless bullies. Sports is an important factor in our culture and FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS is one of the only pertinent examples of complex characters being written around it.
2) The Kyle Chandler and Connie Britton duo is the only example I can think about of a highly functional on-screen marriage. The series is centered around it. Contemporary popular fiction almost solely based around desire. Protagonists in love can't get through to each other and when they do, the narrative is over. Not in FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS. It displays the dynamic of compromise, support and open dialogue any couple needs to be successful. It's a realistic quirk in a series that doesn't care much about realism.
3) It makes the important distinction between sports and sports culture.
4) Kyle Chandler's intense guy hair is awesome.
5) I have a theory that season two happens in an alternate universe where Lyla Garrity (Minka Kelly) is a Born Again Christian, Tim Riggins (Taylor Kitsch) wears muscle shirts and Landry Clarke (Jesse Plemons) murders somebody in self-defense. Nothing of what happens in season two has any incidence or is every discussed afterwards, leading to my theory that season one was so awesome (and long, 22 episodes) that it opened a vortex.
6) There are hilarious, self-aware screenwriting jokes scattered along the first three seasons *. My two favourites are: In season two, Landry Clarke says: ''I'm tired of being supporting cast. I need my own storyline,'' before proceeding to get himself a hot girlfriend (Adrianne Palicki) AND a storyline and in season 3, Buddy Garrity (Brad Leland) looking straight at his son in the midst of a family scuffle and saying: ''We really don't need to talk about Kevin''.
7) Although FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS is occasionally sexist, it's a rare show that features strong female characters who care about other things than men. Connie Britton's character Tami Taylor leads the way, but Minka Kelly and Adrianne Palicki's characters had their self-defining moments. Aimee Teegarden's character Julie is by far the most cliché and sexist female character of the series. It's not a feminist show by any means, but it's pretty reasonable for mainstream television.
8) The football games are laughably bad and always won on the last play. If FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS logic would be reality, the Dillon Panthers would be the high school football pendant of the Miami Heat and Coach Taylor would be Erik Spoelestra and Coach Spo's hair is way too well groomed for this parallel to be made. Still the games will pry a smile or two away from you each time.
9) Kyle Chandler's what-the-fuck face is even funnier than his game hair.
10) The Good Guy Tim drinking game. Every time someone unfairly shits on Tim Riggins' feelings, you take a shot. Every time Tim Riggins opens a beer to drown his sorrows, you take a shot. Every time Tim Riggins gets accused of something he didn't do, you finish the bottle. FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS will entertain you and turn you into an alcoholic at once.
11) The ending of season three has one of the best sucker-punching ending of all-time, alongside season 3 of LOST and the discombobulating plot-twist at the end of the first KNIGHTS OF THE OLD REPUBLIC video game. It literally turns the series around and supercharges it for the last two seasons. It's that good.
12) Michael B. Jordan is underrated. Hopefully he evolves to make more interesting career choices than friggin' Will Smith. He's already played in interesting movies.
13) Taylor Kitsch is also underrated. His emotional range is WAY more limited than Jordan's but he has a Clint Eastwood'esque animal magnetism.
14) Unlike most series that weren't pre-written, FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS eventually gets rid of useless and cliché characters.
15) Minka Kelly is gorgeous.
16) Female characters in FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS actually dress like normal normal people and don't behave like male fantasies.
17) As Chuck Klosterman points out, it's reactionnary and manipulative at times, yet you can't deny that the overkill of emotional music makes you feel things that are alien to your own moral code. That is something to experience at least once in your life.
18) The writers of FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS have a done a fantastic job of deconstructing cliché. More than once, they went head first into cliché premises and picked the elements apart so patiently, they created something entirely new out of old, broken ideas.
19) If you have seen BREAKING BAD's last season, you will appreciate the emotional range of Jesse Plemons.
20) That scene. That scene and that episode are worth sitting through the first four seasons alone.
21) The sheer length of the series is sufficient to show the positive aspects of sports on young, directionless people while minimizing the corniness. Of course, football is the answer to every existential question in FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS, but it's true that sports have an intangible power. It can focus troublesome minds positive goals, unite people who would otherwise have nothing in common and give status to people and cities who would otherwise not have status at all.
22) It's inspired by a true story (I'm sure you didn't see that one coming).
23) Watching FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS a good way to understand how crazy Canadian people are about their hockey teams. The open line radio shows were eerily similar to ours.
24) Billy Riggins (Derek Phillips) is comedy gold.
25) The Riggins brothers are comedy gold in general. They are an endless source of awfully choreographed domestic violence scene.
26) Whenever Michael B. Jordan and Cress Williams are playing a scene, they are so good together that it's like you're not watching the same series.
27) If you make Billy Riggins tweets, there is a chance Derek Phillips answers.
28) The finale is mind-blowingly satisfying and predictable. It was written for the fans AND it respects the themes and the morals of the entire series.
29) Every teenager looks (and is) 30 years old and it's pretty funny.
30) That said, characters don't stay for the sake of the show. Every season of FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS consists of one school year and the cast changes season after season. It makes for an interesting storytelling dynamic.
31) Sometimes, characters are thrown in just to make a point and then disappear.
32) There will be a moment when you're Jonesing because you have nothing to watch. Then watch FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS. It's five seasons long, it should cover you existential void for a while. You can thank me afterwards.
33) It's a great way to step outside your comfort zone without having to face something you don't understand. Sometimes, somebody else's comfort zone can be one's own twilight zone. I learned a couple of things about storytelling from the show.
34) Just to be contrarian to whoever is watching the hot series right now.
35) Just look at the friggin' guy!
* Somebody probably got fired over this. It's the only way I can explain why they stopped.
