Friday Night Lights Review: The One Where They Don’t Play Any Football Because They’re Too Busy Doing Other Things

Alright güeys, it’s time for your weekly dose of Friday Night Lights, the football drama where they don’t play any damn football. This week’s episode, “Almost A Homecoming”, tries to cover a lot of points, so let’s get to it:

The Vince vs. Luke storyline is too much already. We get it. One of them is black and the other one is white. Can they settle their differences already so we can move the fuck on with the season? We’re seriously over the whole who’s-gonna-be-the-top-dawg-for-the-Lions bullshit. We knew there was going to be conflict after the way last week’s episode ended, but did the writers really need to devote this much time to it?

In other news, Coach Taylor is trying to bring some pride to East Dillon by calling up the alumni football players who won the state championship in 1983. The community hasn’t been exactly welcoming and it’s been a struggle for the coach to get people to support his team. It’s almost a certainty that West Dillon will only be an afterthought for the remainder of the season, which is good. All the major West Dillon characters were becoming too villain-y and cliche.

Last week, we mentioned how we’d love to see some interracial loving, and they obliged. Landry, the pasty white doormat finally grew a pair and kissed Jess. Holy crap was this awesome. After he kissed her, Landry walked away as if nothing had happened, all bad ass and shit. Good for him. It’s refreshing to see nerds and geeks get some play with a hot girl.

Once again, Matt Saracen and Tim Riggins got a lot of screen time. The two went hunting together and talked about their sad lives as townies. We were about to give up on this episode because of this until the writers decided to drop a huge bombshell on us. Turns out Matt’s dad was killed in Iraq. It was a very poignant moment that made us care about the character again.

The next episode won’t air until the week after Thanksgiving, so all the good shit they ended the show won’t be addressed until then.