Ted Lasso (TV)
| Fandom | |
|---|---|
| Name: | Ted Lasso |
| Abbreviation(s): | |
| Creator: | Jason Sudeikis, Bill Lawrence |
| Date(s): | August 14, 2020 – May 31, 2023 |
| Medium: | TV series |
| Country of Origin: | United States |
| External Links: | Wikipedia, official site |
| Click here for related articles on Fanlore. | |
Show
The show aired on Apple+ beginning in 2020, requiring subscription or creativity to acquire episodes.
The initial premise followed an American college football coach who was hired to coach the Richmond Greyhounds, a fictional Premier League football team in England. From there, the relationships between members of the team, staff, and their friends and family became the focus.
The primary themes of the show revolve around fatherhood and masculinity, both toxic and positive.
Season 3 ended in May 2023 having completed its three season arc, possibly ending the series as a whole. (The series creatives have been very non-committal about the idea).
Fandom
Fannish output includes fanfiction, fanart, fanvids, and meta. During the show's run, each episode often prompted large amounts of discussion on various social media platforms, including many longer-form meta posts. While fluff and getting-together tropes are well represented in fanfiction, fans also explore heavier topics such as child abuse, mental health and illness, and infertility, spinning off of canon moments and exploration. Explorations of domestic abuse or harm perpetrated by father figures is one topic that appears fairly regularly, prompted by the canonical relationships between Ted and Jamie and their respective fathers.
Ships
The largest ship in the fandom by a considerable amount is Ted Lasso/Rebecca Welton, also called "Tedbecca", which was the topic of much "will they, won't they" debate and meta throughout the show. The largest slash ship is Roy Kent/Jamie Tartt. Keeley Jones/Roy Kent (a canon ship), Trent Crimm/Ted Lasso, and Roy Kent & Jamie Tartt friendship round out the top five relationships tagged on AO3 as of February 2024.
Keeley Jones/Roy Kent/Jamie Tartt as a polyamorous triad is another popular ship, this poly ship became increasingly popular throughout the final season, as various scenes had some fans hopeful that the show might make the ship canonical. Although Roy/Jamie and Roy/Keeley are both popular, Jamie Tartt/Keeley Jones without Roy's involvement is fairly rare in fanwork, despite the fact that it was a canon ship during the show's first season.
Femslash pairings are rare in the fandom, with just 218 works categorised as including F/F. The most common pairing in this category is Keeley Jones/Rebecca Welton. While there was a short-lived canonical sapphic pairing, Jack Danvers/Keeley Jones, this is rarely included in fanworks, likely due to how unlikable the character of Jack was canonically and how she treated Keeley.
The team members of the Greyhounds are collectively referred to in the fandom as "the Richmond Himbos." Ships pairing up various Himbos are also written. There are also a reasonable number of reader insert works on both AO3 and on Tumblr.
Ship Wars
While the fandom mainly takes a ship-and-let-ship attitude, there has been some conflict between fans of Tedbecca and both fans of and the entire existence of "Sambecca," or Sam Obisanya/Rebecca Welton, a canon ship in the second season of the show. Some fans feel that the age gap and power imbalance inherent in Sambecca makes it toxic or inappropriate.
Since the conclusion of season three a similar conflict has also arisen between fans of Tedbecca and fans of Rebecca Welton/Matthijs, the "Stranger" from season three's episode Sunflowers. Some fans feel that Rebecca Welton deserved a partner that the audience knew and trusted more and actually had a name before that was referred to before the credits of the final episode.
Racism In The Fandom
There is extensive discussion in meta posts about the fandom around the character of Nathan Shelley. Some fans feel that both his canon storyline and fannish reception are heavily influenced by racist tropes and reactions. In particular, negative takes on Nathan's character following his second-season storyline often include violent or disgusted responses that are argued to stem from racism on the audience's part.[1]
There has also been a lot of discussion around how other characters of colour were portrayed and the story-lines they were given, including how many characters of colour received less sympathetic or nuanced portrayals and opportunities for redemption compared to the white characters within the show and how elements of characters seemed rooted in stereotypes[2]. These discussions and criticisms also consider how the fandom tends to react to characters of colour compared to white characters; for example, how many fans were on-board with the redemption arcs for Rebecca and Jamie, but not for Nathan[3].
Example Fanworks
Fanfiction
- someday we'll be all that we need by gayicedlatte
- a kind of dwell and welcome by Leupagus
- The Iron Giant by ArdenDrifter
- they say i did something bad by Narcissablack
Fan art
- Favs from Ted Lasso by _justsasss
- Ted Lasso illustration with colour by jonbruns
- "you just left" by Mariana (spiceymemory)
- Tedbecca Christmas by hauntedkate
Fan vids
- BELIEVE by Alonso13
- LIFE by Paddy Neideck
- Deja Vu Edit by nicisatnite
Meta
- Ted Lasso S3 on AO3: fandom response to Season 3 by Destination: Toast!
- Will Ted and Rebecca become a couple in ‘Ted Lasso’? These fans say they’re ‘soulmates’ by Lorena O’Neil (LA Times)
References
- ^ "The fact that Nick Mohammed has to write this post makes me mad". Archived from the original on 2024-02-09.
- ^ "piraytoro Tumblr post on racism in both Ted Lasso story-lines and reactions from the fandom". Archived from the original on 2024-02-09.
- ^ "mrmalcolmslist Tumblr post about redemption arcs in Ted Lasso". Archived from the original on 2024-02-09.