As an opening montage reveals, some time has passed since we last saw the Ted Lasso gang cleaning up Sam’s vandalized restaurant, and, for the team as a whole at least, it’s been a triumphant stretch. The Greyhounds are winning again! We’ll never know whether or not this is the direct result of having strings tied to their penises, but the results don’t lie. But, in an easy but effective bit of dramatic irony, we quickly learn that all is not well with everyone. “You have to think that no one is happier than Coach Ted Lasso,” a sports pundit opines as the image fades to Ted’s downcast face. He’s not happy. The reason for his unhappiness is pretty obvious. Henry’s come to visit, which is great. Michelle has brought him, which is complicated. And Dr. Jacob (er, Jake) has come with her. And, frankly, that sucks.
Ted does his best to remain upbeat, but watching Henry treat Dr. Jacob as a father figure is clearly painful. But not, it turns out, as painful as the thought of Dr. Jacob assuming a more permanent place in Michelle’s and Henry’s lives, a possibility made all the more real by Michelle telling him she and Dr. Jacob will be going to Paris during Henry’s visit. And not Paris, Texas, or any of the other ones. Paris Paris. The place, Ted jumps to conclude, Dr. Jacob will propose to Michelle.
This naturally calls for a meeting of the Diamond Dogs. And while Roy again recuses himself (while remaining within earshot), the Dogs decide that Trent Crimm will make a fine addition to the pack. After arriving winded, Higgins does his best to put things in perspective after first asking Ted if Dr. Jacob asked permission. (“I’m her ex-husband, not her current father, so no.”) Just because Dr. Jacob took Michelle to Paris doesn’t mean they’re getting engaged. Ted has plenty of concrete concerns in his life. He shouldn’t worry about what might never happen.
Taking that advice to heart, Ted sensibly moves on — for a few minutes, anyway. Before long, he’s talking to Rebecca about hiring a private eye to spy on Dr. Jacob and Michelle to find out if they’re getting engaged. There are plenty of things they could be doing besides getting engaged, including visiting Oscar Wilde’s grave. (News of Wilde’s death hits Ted hard since so many quotes feel “so modern … so of our time.”) Rebecca reluctantly agrees. But, we’ll later learn, she’s hesitant to pull the trigger.
While Ted waits, he talks to Henry about Dr. Jacob. He learns nothing, and the next day, he and Beard decide to take Henry wherever he likes. This turns out to be a football game, and since the only game in town involves West Ham, the outing proves to be awkward. Oblivious to the tension, Henry shouts to Nate from the stands, a moment that gets picked up by the tabloids, creating awkwardness for Nate back at the clubhouse. (Maybe the takeaway from this episode is that the British press is truly awful.) When Rupert suggests Ted should be banned from future games, Nate hesitates and then agrees.
After the game, Beard, Ted, and Henry hang out at Mae’s pub (after smoothing over her hostility at their having dared go to a West Ham game). While Beard tells Henry the facts behind “Hey Jude,” a song being sung by a nearby busker, without drawing any direct parallels between the ways they reflect Henry’s life, Ted talks to Rebecca about their private-eye plan. Rebecca has stopped mincing words. Ted needs to put the past behind and get on with the present. Most immediately, he needs to go sing along to “Hey Jude,” which he then does. He may not have made it better, but he’s trying.
But maybe Michelle isn’t entirely in his past. As glum as Ted is, he still clearly has a breezy chemistry with his ex in the episode’s opening scene. And, as it draws to a close, it becomes clear that things aren’t as he feared with Dr. Jacob. Michelle gives no indication that she and Dr. Jacob are now engaged. In fact, as he watches Henry, Michelle, and Dr. Jacob pull away, something seems amiss. Henry breezes past Dr. Jacob’s fist bump, and there’s a hard-to-parse exchange between Michelle and her not-fiancé as they get in the cab. Hmm …
While Ted deals with his complicated personal life, Keeley begins the episode basking. Her relationship with Jack couldn’t be going better. They’re sleeping over regularly and making plans to go to fancy polo events. Then a clip from Keeley’s past throws a wrench in the works. Thanks to a hack, an intimate video she once made has started to circulate on the internet as part of a “massive leak.” Keeley is, naturally, mortified. Jack, however, is reassuring. She’ll take care of it.
It’s a nice promise. But the reality of the situation doesn’t quite square with it. While Keeley waits for Jack and her Scrooge McDuck–like cash reserves to deal with the problem, she has to watch awful, shame-y comments pile up on the internet. Then, instead of the video disappearing, she learns that Jack expects Keeley to do her best to contain the fallout by apologizing via a statement drafted by one of her lawyers. This does not sit well with Keeley. Maybe that’s because the statement reads more like something that would be given to a careless Disney Channel star than a businesswoman in her 30s with no regrets for her actions, just anger that her private property has been made public.
Meanwhile, news of the leak (dubbed by the tabloids “The Great Awankening”) hits the team, prompting a variety of responses before they realize their friend is involved. Colin uses it as a chance to reassert his heterosexuality (uh-huh), while Issac advises that they should not even look at it since it wasn’t meant for them. Others aren’t so convinced, and Jamie emerges as the voice of reason from the ensuing buzz: it’s private property, and those in possession of such should take care to delete it from their phones. (Only Sam, who lets his exes delete whatever they like when they break up, seems more enlightened.)
Once they realize that Keeley is among those who’ve been leaked, all other arguments become academic. It’s deletion time, as Isaac emphasizes. This extends to Colin, who moves to a private space to delete his collection. But it’s not so private that Isaac, who suspects he’s disobeying orders, can’t find him. After grabbing Colin’s phone, Isaac learns his secret and walks away. Where this goes next is unclear. Isaac is gruff and thinks in absolutes, but he’s also been proven to be quite sensitive. Like Colin, we’ll have to wait to find out.
After speaking to Rebecca, Keeley decides that she cannot issue the statement and asks Rebecca if she can fix things by, say, restructuring “society so women aren’t constantly sexualized while simultaneously crucified for being sexual.” Rebecca cannot, but she can offer good advice, including giving Jack time to prove she’s more broad-minded than the statement she gave to Keeley suggests.
But signal after signal suggests that Jack has revealed herself. She’s suddenly not inclined to bring Keeley to the high-society polo event. And while she is up for a fun jaunt on the town, she pointedly introduces Keeley as her “friend.” Jack is an appreciator of the finer things in life, and Keeley has suddenly become a tainted good. It’s an odd heel turn for Jack and out of character enough that it takes a while for the fullness of her actions to sink in. When Keeley does realize Jack is ashamed of her and ready to sell her out, it’s over.
The men Keeley’s closest to both take time to seek her out and comfort her. First, Roy approaches her in the parking lot with concern. He says all the right things until he doesn’t, asking her who the video was for. As close as they’ve been, and in many ways still are, Keeley doesn’t tell him because it’s none of his business. Roy immediately recognizes his mistake and how hard it might be to talk it back. Later, Jamie pays a visit to Keeley’s house, feeling bad for her and responsible for what happened since the video was hacked from his personal email. It’s a grave error, to be sure, but Keeley understands and recognizes Jamie’s sincerity, and they end the discussion with a friendly hug.
As with Keeley, we first see Nate waking up and, for the first time in the series’s history, he’s not alone. Things have been going well with Jade since their first date. But Nate has to wonder, is it right to say they’re progressing? He’s not taking any chances, brushing his teeth and even showering before getting back into bed with her. And though Jade still seems into him — she’s in no hurry to leave and happy to get breakfast — Nate still wonders where they stand. Not that, he insists, they have to put a label on it. Nate doesn’t get a lot of help from those around him, not even from the makeshift Diamond Dogs (or “Lovehounds”) he puts together at West Ham, complete with a pseudo-Higgins and a pseudo-Roy. Ultimately, there’s not a lot of drama here. Jade’s into him. In fact, she’s happy to call Nate her boyfriend. They, at least, end the episode on an unambiguously happy note. As happy as they may have begun the episode, the same can’t be said for anyone else.
Biscuits
• Here’s a question: Where’s Doc? Ted could probably use her counsel right now, even if he’s not experiencing full-on anxiety attacks (which seems like progress). But is Ted progressing? Everyone around him keeps telling him to move on and let Michelle live her life, no matter what that means. But he keeps seeing hints that they might get back together. Where the series ultimately goes with this remains to be seen. Right now, it’s ambiguous whether or not we’re supposed to share Ted’s hopefulness.
• “English breakfast to me is just a pile with a bunch of little tiny piles.”
• This episode was co-written by Keeley Hazell, who also plays Rupert’s wife, Bex. It’s no accident that she shares a name with Keeley, who was partly modeled on her, and this episode undoubtedly draws on her own experiences of having a sex tape leaked in the 2000s.
• Another question (and this isn’t the first time it’s been raised): Do we like Nate? He’s extremely endearing in this episode, but there’s a lot of unsettled business, and his weird reaction to seeing Ted, Beard, and Henry in the stands only confirms this.
