“Perfect Record” was a throwback episode of Friday Night Lights-throwback in the sense that past Dillon Panthers crept into the narrative, reminding of what once was. And it is this reminder of what used to be Dillon football that has Coach Taylor with a not-so ‘perfect’ win-loss record.
Our first homecoming of sorts is from Jason Street. Six and Coach Taylor meet for lunch where Jason reveals he is now married and trying to expand his family. Watching Jason and Eric banter back and forth makes us yearn for the days of old, where life seemed incredibly sweet despite the upheavals off-the-field. Somehow, even on the green turf of Hermann field, life was good in the Dillon. Eric does his best to convince Jason that despite interest from colleges, Eric isn’t interested in leaving East Dillon. The foreshadowing is a bit too strong here– we get, loud and clear, that Taylor’s idyllic life is about to change.
Ornette Howard seems to be the front-runner to disturbing Taylor’s West Texas pastoral portrait. Ornette’s ‘gifts’ of TMU merchandise for Vince and Jess seems eerily similar to the recent tales of Auburn University’s Cam Newton’s father asking Mississippi State for $180,000 for his son to play at their college. Ornette Howard is a clearly drawn figure of bad influence. Despite our faith in Vince Howard to make the right decisions, the emergence of the hate site LionHater.com signals a break in Vince’s resolve to stay above the fray. As he confides in Coach Taylor that it doesn’t matter how perfect his season is, recruiters will only focus on is the perfectly-illegal crimes that are documented on the web site. Ornette seizes on this break in Vince’s confidence and the rest of the episode is an increasingly speedy descent into arrogance on the Howards’ part.
The second Dillon Panther of the past to emerge is Matt Saracen. How could anyone watch Vince Howard throw footballs into a car tire hanging in front of old mattresses and not think of the contraption Matt Saracen threw footballs into for three years? For both Matt and Vince, surely, all of those throws will pay off one day… one day.
Finally, the last Panther to appear is Landry Clarke, or at least his football jersey number appears. During the game between East and West Dillon, Luke Cafferty lands a sinister hit on #85 of the West Dillon Panthers. Remembering Landry, it seemed especially harsh for the player to be hit so brutally. Luke’s hit seems to be just the beginning of a game that shows how unperfect, how out-of-control Coach Taylor’s life is. The facade has fallen apart. If there is any doubt, whatsoever, about how far the Lions have fallen, Coach Crowley reminds us, and most importantly Coach Taylor, that something is very, very wrong in East Dillon. Towards the end of the game, as the Lions’ unsportsmanlike behavior continues, Coach Crowley asks, “Are you not going to do anything about this, Eric?” After Vince defies Coach Taylor’s instructions and throws a 60-yard bomb his father has been talking about, the Lions beat their cross-town rivals by 30 points. Coach Crowley leaves the field chastising Taylor saying, “It’s not who we are, Eric.” As a punctuation point to Crowley’s assessment, we watch Tinker– lovable, sweet Dallas Tinker– taunt the West Dillon Panthers, telling them to get off the field. As the adrenaline and fever-pitch of the evening starts to subside, Eric asks his assistant coach if he’s coming to Buddy’s for the post-game celebration. Avoiding eye contact, Coach Crowley sadly states, “Don’t feel like celebrating tonight.” This moment is wrought with significance. We shall see if Eric Taylor turns things around in the next episode, but for now, there is no other character that could so aptly describe the fall from grace that Eric Taylor is in the midst of. Coach Crowley, after all, is the person who left behind success and security at West Dillon to join Taylor and his band of misfits at East Dillon. When Crowley entered the locker room a year ago he told Taylor, “We’ve got no shot at winning,” but he made the move anyway. Crowley’s never shown the hubris and ego that Mac McGill exhibited towards a head coach that was much younger than himself. Coach Crowley was the one to calm Coaches Spivey, Riggins, and Traub when Eric left practice early, or showed up to the game late. Coach Crowley has been the most loyal of sentries to Eric Taylor and now that he’s questioning the Kingmaker Eric Taylor, we know that change is going to come.
On the upside, early on in the episode, Buddy Garrity and the Lion boosters deliver one of the funniest moments in recent memory- including the fantastic “Kingdom” episode. Buddy and the boosters (a future band name?) enter the practice field with all the necessities to keep watch on the field, avoiding a repeat of the rivalry week vandalism incurred last fall. Coach Taylor asks one booster in particular, “Colonel, what you plan on doing with that shotgun” “The safety’s on. The bullets are still in my pocket,” he explains. Exasperated, Eric replies “Take that gun away from him. Take that gun away from him.”
Grade: A
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Cast & Credits
Friday Night Lights, Wednesdays 9 p.m./8 p.m. Central, DirecTV
Eric Taylor: Kyle Chandler
Coach Crowley: Timothy F. Crowley
Tami Taylor: Connie Britton
Julie Taylor: Aimee Teegarden
Ornette Howard: Cress Williams
Vince Howard: Michael B. Jordan
Official website: http://www.directv.com/DTVAPP/content/friday_night_lights/overview