Despite appearances, Friday Night Lights is not just about football.

Just when you begin to lose hope in the television networks and their abilities to produce quality television, every once in a while they’ll surprise you and prove you wrong. It was a great day for television in late March when NBC announced that in conjunction with DirectTV, they would be picking up Friday Night Lights for not just one more season, but two 13 episode seasons! Don’t get me wrong – I’m all for watching television as a means of escapism and indulging in someone else’s life for an hour every week. I’m not going to deny that I am a sucker for trashy teen dramas, but at the end of the day sometimes there is only so much television about spoilt rich teens that one can take and I’m left craving for something real.

For the uneducated, let’s get something straight here - Friday Night Lights is NOT just about football. Yes it revolves around a high school football team, but once you watch the show you’ll realise that football is just the subplot for the show and that is so much more than that. You don’t need to like let alone understand football to be able to watch Friday Night Lights - the football games are just a platform for the hopes, dreams, and beliefs of small town America. They are a means of binding a community together and allowing them to have a taste of success, hope and belief, without ever necessarily ever moving out of their small town. I think that is more real and closer to home than attempting to relate to teenagers living in the big city or wealthy seaside communities, who have trust funds with more money than any of us will ever see in our lifetime, don’t you think?

Tami and Eric Taylor

Friday Night Lights has just finished its third season. The NBC television show is based on the novel of the same name by H.G. Bissinger. The novel was also turned into a film starring Billy Bob Thornton and Garrett Hedlund in 2004. Interestingly, Connie Britton, who plays Tami Taylor on the show, was also in the film adaptation. At the most basic level, Friday Night Lights chronicles how the small Texan town of Dillon rallies together every Friday night to support local high school football team, the Dillon Panthers. The football games shape the community’s identity and inspire them to hope and believe, even if it is just every Friday night from September to December. Yet the show - which has plenty of love from the critics, but not so much love from the ratings – is so much more than that. It’s a social small town commentary on life issues such as race, class, religion, drugs, sex, and disability. It’s not about the big moments that define life, but rather the little millions of moments that make up life.

Perhaps the way the show is shot also impacts on its life-likeness. Rather than having one camera shooting multiple takes from different angles and different emotions, Friday Night Lights shoots with three cameras with no shot blocking and no rehearsals. There is a lot of ad-libbing and improvisation, so it’s all about the characters and the emotions, not about hitting the mark in every scene. And it is that true to life likeness that resonates with viewers and draws them in.

Jason Street and Lyla Garrity were the golden couple before his accident happened.

In season one, we were introduced to new high school football coach Eric Taylor (Kyle Chandler), his wife Tami (Connie Britton), and their fifteen year old daughter Julie (Aimee Teegarden). It’s the first game for the year and the whole town in banking on Coach Taylor to lead the Panthers to success. With star quarterback and town golden boy Jason Street (Scott Porter) on the team, it looks like an easy march to victory. That is until Street is injured and left paralysed during the first game. Suddenly the shy and bumbling second string quarterback Matt Saracen (Zach Gilford), is thrown into the game and now the pressure is on him to take over the great Jason Street. Saracen never expected to actually play the game, so Coach Taylor has a lot of work to do if he wants to avoid the football fanatic community coming after him for not winning. If that wasn’t enough, Coach Taylor also needs to handle the ego clashes between two of his key players – the cocky Brian ‘Smash’ Williams (Gaius Charles) and the local lothario Tim Riggins (Taylor Kitsch).

But like I said, Friday Night Lights is not just about football. Jason Street’s accident left the town of Dillon in shock, as they struggled to make sense of what had happened. In all his anger and confusion, Street lashed out at long time girlfriend Lyla Garrity (Minka Kelly), and while she struggled to remain devoted to Street and stand by him, she eventually ended up in the arms of his best friend, Tim Riggins. Fooling around with your boyfriend’s best friend is never a good idea and when the secret came out, so did the gender double standards – Riggins was patted on the back, while Lyla was ostracized and tormented. It was almost too much for the former golden girl to take and lead her to question the things in her life including her love of cheerleading.

Elsewhere in season one, Smash was dabbling with drugs as he struggled to maintain his high performance and impress college scouts so that he could get a scholarship to college. Smash’s father died a few years back and with his mother raised him and his sisters, the only way to college is through a scholarship.

Matt and Julie - the innocence of first love.

Thrust into a new world on the field, young Matt Saracen was also thrust into a world unknown to him off the field. No longer QB2, Matt had to learn to deal with the new attention he received as a result of being promoted to QB1. He also embarked on his first romantic relationship with the Coach’s daughter Julie Taylor. The relationship between Matt and Julie is a highlight of the show – the innocence of first love is such a joy to watch amongst all the heavy drama on the show.

Amongst this football fanatic town, there’s sassy teen Tyra Collette (Adrianne Palicki), who couldn’t give two hoots about football. Tyra began the show as Riggins’s on and off street smart girlfriend, who did whatever she pleased. She was seen as a bit of a bad girl but when she formed an unlikely friendship with Julie Taylor, we realised that she was just headstrong and a bit misunderstood. We also saw her apply herself to her studies once she realised that she needed to lift her game if she wanted out of Dillon. This led to yet another unlikely friendship with Matt’s geeky best friend Landry Clarke (Jesse Plemons). Out of all the characters onFriday Night Lights, Tyra has definitely changed the most.

The adults of Dillon play just an integral part on the show as the teens. Some would say that the Taylors are the heart of the show and without them the show just wouldn’t be the same. Eric and Tami Taylor are one of the most real married couples I have ever seen on screen. Although they are quite loving, there are times where they don’t see eye to eye but at the end of the day they either makeup or reach some sort of compromise. They also aren’t afraid to keep teenage daughter Julie in line, and they also deal with the pressures of careers – they are seriously so real and relatable and could pass off as an ordinary real life family unlike many other married parents on screen.

You don't mess with the Smash.

Then you also have Matt’s ailing grandmother, who just breaks your heart as we see Matt deal with football, school, and taking care of her. There’s also Lyla’s fuddy-duddy father Buddy Garrity who comes off as a bit of an annoyance and somewhat of a sleaze at first, but you can’t help but sometimes sympathize with him as a person – sometimes but not all the time. There’s Tyra’s single mom Angela Collette, who is your stereotypical trailer park mom with no education and always falling for the wrong men, but in the end there are times where you know she just wants what is best for her daughters. On the flipside, you have Smash’s widowed mother Corinna Williams, who works hard to make ends meet and provide for her family. There’s also Riggins’ older brother Billy, who is pretty much Tim’s parental figure and despite appearing to be not the brightest bulb, always has Tim’s back.

Friday Night Lights Season 3 Cast

Season one was a standout season for the show. It’s hard to put into words just how amazing the first season was at conveying the simplicity of a small town and portraying real and ordinary characters, yet projecting them into engaging characters that you grow attached to each week and let into your lives. It is everyday universal life yet so much more appealing.

The season 2 Tyra-Landry murder storyline was not exactly a favourite with fans.

Season two was cut short to 15 episodes as a result of the writer’s strike, maybe this played a part in the change of the show in season two, but nonetheless season two had a different feel to it that’s for sure. Despite being praised in its first season for its simplicity, it seemed that Friday Night Lights jumped the shark in season two and attempted to tackle more dramatic storylines. There was the hit and run plot involving Tyra and Landry, Tim moving out of home and living with a creepy hermit with some sort of meth lab, Street travelled to Mexico to find a cure for his paralysis that involved shark stem cells or something. That being said, there were also true to life plots in season two , such as Smash dealing with the racism and how it affected his football future, Julie rebelling as everything in her life changes, Tami dealing with motherhood a second time round so long after she had Julie and with Eric not around, and Lyla seeking solace in religion as a way of trying to define who she is.

It may have taken awhile, but fans were overjoyed when Tim and Lyla finally got their act together.

Season three however, was just pure perfection and returned to the simple roots of season one that we all know and love. I have nothing bad to say about the third season because I loved it THAT much. There was also a lot of lightness in this season in comparison to the previous two seasons. Tim and Lyla were finally together, Julie and Matt reunited – definitely a highlight! (If you adored them in season one, season three is even better!), Tyra’s older sister Mindy, and Tim’s older brother Billy, got engaged, so no doubt that makes for an interesting family gathering. We also said a tearful farewell to Smash and Street who had finished high school, and welcomed new football star J.D. McCoy, and his not-so-nice father.

Season four will definitely be interesting to say the least. It looks like Coach Taylor will now be at the redeveloped East Dillon High, which shall make for some interesting viewing considering his wife is principal at his now “rival” school – Dillon High. Get ready to cheer for the East Dillon Lions! We’ll also be saying goodbye to Lyla and Tyra, who are heading off to college. But don’t worry, we’ll still have some of the old gang still in Dillon like Julie, Landry, Riggins, and Matt.