First and foremost, it pains me to write 5.08. Knowing that this is Friday Night Lights final season, writing 5.08 signifies that there are only 5 episodes left. Oh hell. I digress.
Kyle Chandler’s Coach Eric Taylor makes a painful grimace as his boys are about to enter a meager pep rally in the East Dillon High School cafeteria. Pain, anguish, frustration, and good old pissed-off-edness wash over him. For a brief moment one wonders if he’s about to have a stroke over all of it and then he turns and yells and Vince and Luke to “Shut up!” This order on Taylor’s behalf is just one of several fractures, splinters, and tears in the relationships of FNL’s Dillonites.
The biggest fracture in the world of East Dillon is Vince’s burgeoning ego and Reggie Bush/Cam Newton family involvement thanks to his father. In the classic cliché that there is no “I” in “team,” Vince is a big fan of praising himself and thinking about how fantastic his future will be. An ‘unofficial’ visit to Oklahoma Tech has his awash in poolside beauties and informal promises from the head coach that the job is for whomever of their top two recruits says yes first. The Howard family shenanigans reach a head when a photo of Vince in Oklahoma reaches a recruiting website. Hubris explodes as he fractures every solid relationship he has built at East Dillon. The most egregious example of Vince’s ugly greed comes when Coach Taylor first questions him about his time away from school. When Vince blames it on his mother’s drug addiction… well, it’s simply disgusting. Growing to love Vince over these last two seasons has been a slow process and in one awful lie, those positive feelings start to fade.
What do you say about Billy and Mindy Riggins? They have provided well-needed laughs over the last few seasons, but in this episode we have to be honest with ourselves– they’re hot messes. As much as I, personally wanted to believe that Mindy could shake some sense into Billy, raising her son in the dressing room of a strip club proves she’s the mess we thought she was; she’s the mess her sister Tyra was so desperate not to become. Watching Becky fall in deeper and deeper under the spell of the Landing Strip ladies is a bit sad. You can’t help but remember her desperate fights last season to be better than her circumstances and yet she seems to be pulled back into a battle between circumstance and desire. Frankly, watching Becky depend on the stripper triumvirate for her latest scholarship pageant borders on pathetic. Rightfully so, the judge who hands Becky her runner-up roses tells her, “I think you should take a hard look at the company you keep.”
Just when we thought the ‘relationship’ (read ‘bad storyline’) between Julie Taylor and her teaching assistant was over, Derek shows up at the Taylor household to cause more damage. In a beautiful use of props, there is a satisfying pay-off as Eric breaks Derek’s taillight with the handlebar of Gracie’s bicycle. As Julie begins her journey back to school, we can only hope that finally she’ll quit being her own worst enemy. And then she calls Derek and finds out that he came to Dillon to try and get her back. We see Julie turn the car around and moan a bit inside, only to find that she turned around to travel 2,000 to arrive at the Matt Saracen’s doorstep. Julie Taylor, you’ve not been so hot in the relationship department this season. Don’t screw this up, too.
And now back to Coach Taylor’s break before the pep rally. Built up frustrations with his eldest daughter, his star quarterback’s felon-father, and in-fighting between Coaches Crowley and Riggins, Vince and the rest of the team create a maelstrom of tension that spur Coach’s “Shut up!” The assembly looks more like a ruse than a pep rally. Here we have another Friday Night Lights staple– the affective score by Explosions in the Sky. As the electric guitars swirl, we sense the tensions that threaten every member of the East Dillon Lions on and off the field.
Who will heal these fractures? And how? I can’t wait to see.
Grade: A
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Cast & Credits
Friday Night Lights, Wednesdays 9 p.m./8 p.m. Central, DirecTV
Eric Taylor: Kyle Chandler
Tami Taylor: Connie Britton
Julie Taylor: Aimee Teegarden
Ornette Howard: Cress Williams
Vince Howard: Michael B. Jordan
Becky Sproles: Madison Burge
Official website: http://www.directv.com/DTVAPP/content/friday_night_lights/overview
*****
On a personal note, I must admit that it has been hard writing about these final episodes. I know that these reviews are weeks past their original air date. I’m simply a gal aghast that this show is ending. Maybe not writing about the episodes is my way of delaying the inevitable truth about the end…