Anyone with even the vaguest understanding of the profit motive can understand why Apple TV sports comedy “Ted Lasso” has returned three years after its poorly received — yet still widely watched — third season seemed to close the book on its story. A streaming service continuing to milk one of its few major hits doesn’t prohibit the result from being enjoyable; if the first three seasons of “Ted Lasso” are effectively one (overlong, especially toward the end) sports movie, then Season 4 is its perfectly routine sequel. And in a genre filled with redemptive second chances, “Ted Lasso” could use one of its own. If a show has the chance to correct for mistakes like overindulgence and bloat, why not take it?
Season 4 introduces a premise that gives Jason Sudeikis’ titular American-football-turned-British-football coach a chance at both a fresh start and a return to old stomping grounds. Two years after Ted walked away from AFC Richmond and took his signature mustache back to Kansas City, team owner Rebecca (Hannah Waddingham), marketing chief Keeley (Juno Temple) and operations head Leslie Higgins (Jeremy Swift) arrive stateside with an offer he can’t refuse: coaching the club’s brand-new women’s team, who begin their existence as the underdogs — specifically, Greyhounds — their male counterparts once were. Given the cultural bias against women’s sports leagues, they’ll likely remain so even if they succeed.
The concepts of class reunion (Ted goes back to London and gets the gang back together!) and clean slate (Ted takes on a new challenge!) are somewhat at odds. Sure enough, Season 4 is far more enjoyable as the latter than the former — even as “Ted Lasso” keeps privileging nostalgia and tired subplots over its best chance at a renaissance. Tanya Reynolds of “Sex Education” is a welcome addition as Alice Chilton, a coach whose constant scowl and clipped severity make her a well-suited foil for Ted’s sunny optimism until she inevitably warms to it. But, at least in the five episodes provided to critics out of an eventual 10, she’s pretty much the only new character who feels fully established, because “Ted Lasso” refuses to make room in the ensemble by sidelining (or is it touchlining?) old ones.
Like Sudeikis, actor Brett Goldstein remains a creative force behind the camera, which may explain why his churlish then player, now coach Roy Kent remains such a presence despite the pivot away from his men’s squad. But while foregrounding Rebecca and Keeley makes sense given the renewed focus on women in sports, Roy and Keeley’s on-again, off-again romance lost its allure several seasons ago. Figures like Roy and Ted’s longtime deputy Beard (series co-creator Brendan Hunt) would be better deployed as occasional cameos, yet they remain load-bearing — and space-occupying — protagonists. The consequences can border on the absurd: a major decision by Ted’s ex-wife Michelle (Andrea Anders) is sped through rather than shown from her perspective; an episode hinges on a team problem with cliques that’s only depicted onscreen far too late. Until then, we’re mostly told about it by other characters with longer tenures.
Contributing to the sense of overcrowding is an otherwise welcome development: no single episode of the first five clocks in at over an hour, the way so much of Season 3 did. “Ted Lasso” is not for everyone; the blindingly earnest social consciousness and relentless positivity some find so grating remain firmly in place. (Feminist commentary was never the series’ strong suit, and centering the women’s team prompts more of it than ever.) But Season 4 reigns in some excesses and offers glimpses of fresh new faces: a walk-on player who’s also a single mom; a goalie who refuses to wear gloves; a new mentor for Rebecca, played by comic legend Tracey Ullmann. If only the show would clear the field for them.