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The latest episode of Ted Lasso is called ‘Big Week’ because naturally, the episode takes place during the biggest week yet, Richmond finally facing off against arch rivals West Ham (and therefore Rebecca versus Rupert, Ted versus Nate, etc). We bookend the episode with Roy training Jamie to get better than Zava — at the start, Jamie is annoyed about getting up at 4AM and even throws up later on due to the exertion.
Yet at the end, Jamie’s ready to go when Roy arrives — not only dressed and awake, but with a lit helmet to make it easier to see in the dark. It’s an inarguable upwards path, while things are muddier for the rest of our gang of misfits. Much of the rest of the episode revolves around Nate and his complicated feelings about Ted — it’s quite a roller coaster as Nate’s conscience pulls him one way while Rupert pulls him another.
Ted’s arc is all about his relationships — it starts with him post-hookup with Sassy, who turns down actually dating because Ted is a super mess — and she’s not that far past him. This leads to one of the funniest parts of the episode with the completely logical reveal that Ted has a 5.0 Uber rating. It makes honestly too much sense. And I don’t know how many people actually appreciated the pedantic friends with benefits conversation about the two similar 2011 movies Friends with Benefits and No Strings Attached, but I loved how stupidly specific it was.
It’s also quite funny when Beard simply says ‘Yes’ about Ted being a mess, and even Higgins asks why Ted isn’t mad at Nate. But perhaps that’s because Ted is really only truly mad at one person: Dr. Jake. Rebecca even relates with him about being quite a mess herself — even if she’s quite a bit more manic this episode with her attempts to be calm about facing off against Rupert.
Yet Rebecca turns this around when she hears Bex playfully insult Rupert’s age — it’s a little too humanizing, and when she spots Rupert with his secretary (obviously gross) it’s easy to simply whisper to her ex-husband that his wife and daughter deserve better. Not that Rupert remotely seems to take any stock of that. He’s too far busy trying to corrupt Nate.
Nate is shown spitefully knocking a little figure of Ted off his planning board — then immediately feels bad and picks it back up. Certainly a sign of his conflicted feelings about the man that 100% is responsible for his success. Later he brings up the idea of apologizing to Ted to Rupert, of all people, who obviously scoffs at the idea. Naturally the episode must make things more and more complicated, having Ted first wind up alone in an elevator with Nate where Ted is immediately friendly, but before Nate can apologize — the worst timing occurs and Rupert comes on at the same time.
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Later on, Nate notes that the whole team is giving him the evil eye because of Beard and Roy’s poorly thought out gambit of showing the video of Nate tearing the ‘Believe’ sign, and it seems to throw him. Yet he ignores Ted’s post-game handshake and then gets called a snob by a reporter later — it certainly shakes him again. Nate is unmoored the entire episode — even when he’s recognized by the manager at Taste of Athens, the maitre’d he asked out stays impassive and he stays awkward in front of her.
The very last note for him in the episode is watching Rupert being overly friendly with his secretary immediately after introducing him to a supermodel. Definitely feels like a real sort of litmus test for whether or not Nate will fall entirely or be redeemed.
It gets more complicated for some of our other pals — Keeley realizes the limits of Shandy’s proactive ways when her friend does a ‘Sleep with Celebrities’ advertisement on the Bantr app, which obviously would never fly. Yet when Shandy asks about Jamie, Keeley is initially quite dismissive, then seems to realize that her ex has actually made a lot of growth — could be trouble for Roy even if he wants to get back together. Another big setup moment for the rest of the show.
As for the whole ‘Jack Danvers’ thing I knew immediately that when Keeley called Jack a ‘him’ that the somewhat unisex name would imply Jack was a woman. Of course I immediately recognized the great Jodi Balfour from another great AppleTV+ show, For All Mankind, and I hope it’s more than some corporate synergy because she’s a great actor. Hopefully this is more of a real tease and not an empty one — perhaps more like CFO’s odd crush on Rebecca which might not pay off at all.
I feel pretty confident that the closeted Colin thing will pay off, as Trent Crimm immediately notes when Colin makes a joke about sleeping with Zava. It’s been a long held fan theory that Trent might be gay too, although if that was true you’d hope that would mean he wouldn’t out Colin (even for his book). More teases for the rest of the season/show.
But of course, the very biggest tease of all is Ted calling Michelle and expressing real hurt feelings over Dr. Jacob (which is justified), as they are still co-parents. It’s a change for Ted in many ways — not papering over discomfort with jokes or positivity, but oddly enough, Michelle seems to be positively affected by the conversation. Does that mean Ted and Michelle are getting back together? Honestly at this point it’s anyone’s guess, but all of these threads are so far being handled really well. It’s quite a masterful episode of tension and drama, with a lot of funny moments thrown in — I have some ideas about the rest of the season but as for now, I still have no idea where it’ll end up, and I’m completely okay with that.
What did you think of this episode? Give us your thoughts in the comments section below.
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