Kostgard

Totally - this is all about how Nate never grew up. He expected Ted to do all the work in the relationship because that’s what adults do for their non-adult children. It’s not Ted’s job to pat Nate on the head. He tried to help elevate him to adulthood - bought him grownup clothes, took him to grownup events, gave him a grown up job. But it was Nate’s job to take that ball and run with it. Instead he got mad that daddy stopped holding his hand. Ted maybe could have realized that he needed to be more explicit about the handoff for Nate to get it, but again…not his job. And again, Nate needs therapy to help him grow up. But I can’t see him ever seeking it out. That’s interesting that he seems to be based on a real person, because this is pretty much how I see things playing out for Nate. Rupert will only keep him around as long as he’s useful. He will lose the dressing room pretty quickly and if he can’t get his team to beat Richmond, Rupert will toss him aside. Then Nate will bounce around a few different clubs until he’s out completely and can’t get back in the sport or is only offered lower-level positions his ego won’t let him accept. I really think if he can’t beat Richmond, Rupert will toss him aside. The new target for Rupert’s ire appears to be Ted. When Ted walked into the funeral a few episodes back, Rupert looked at him with pure loathing. I’m positive he hates Ted for winning over the Richmond team and fans, and still REALLY hates him for that one time he kicked his ass at darts. This now about tearing down Ted and not getting back at Rebecca.

Yes, this is part of why I wanted a stronger reaction from Ted. He has a right to feel angry/hurt/betrayed. Swallowing everything down is part of what lead to his issues. Nate just never grew up. While his hurt is real, he’s upset, basically, because daddy didn’t give him a gold star every day. And he didn’t talk to Ted about his hurt feelings, he tried to punish Ted for it. A functioning adult would understand that the team was struggling and if they were going to get promoted Ted had to take action, and that meant bringing Jamie and Roy on board. Ted still never showed favoritism for Roy. But Nate resented the competition. Then Ted admitted he had been having panic attacks. For a functioning adult, that’s an “Ah-ha” moment where you realize your boss has been distant because he’s been dealing with his own shit and you react with empathy. Nate did not. At all. Instead he immediately used that info to get back at Ted for the lack of gold stars. These are the actions of a child who breaks his brother’s toy because he didn’t play with him the other day. This is Amy March throwing Jo March’s manuscript in the fire because Jo was dismissive about Amy’s whining over wanting to go to the theater. The actions of a child who can’t process their emotions, not an adult. Nate has some serious arrested development going on. Ted can’t fix that. Nate needs professional help. He won’t seek it out. The petty part of me is glad that Nate at least got some tiny daggers stuck into him, with Ted’s comment about how you are defined by your choices. With Roy letting him know he didn’t see him as a threat/competition. At all. And most directly with the way Beard regarded him with cold contempt all episode. All that said, I enjoyed this storyline (despite how mad it made me) because it was someone being less than perfect who made bad, hurtful decisions and things built up instead of getting shrugged off, like too much else this season. I think that is my primary complaint - too much that seemed like it should have consequences/reactions just didn’t because the characters shrugged it off. It’s hard to get invested in these turns of event when you know it won’t mean much to the characters and they will all just shrug and move on. But while I didn’t find the Rebecca/Sam storyline satisfying, I’m glad Sam took the “I choose me” route, because that was my main objection to the whole thing. Rebecca knows who she is and her place in the world. Sam is at a place in his life where he’s figuring that out, and I’m so glad that’s what Sam decided to do. And I’m glad that Trent Crimm, Independent was grossed out by the story he wrote and got himself fired. He defined himself by that choice. Roy and Keeley could be interesting because this is probably the first time Roy has really played a supporting role in someone else’s life as their career took off (being a sports star, he was probably always the supportee , not the supporter. That’s why being left out of the magazine spread hurt). But I think he’s willing to make that shift. He’s just gotta figure it out. Looking back, I think my favorite thing about this season was the development of the friendship between Ted and Dr Sharon. Looking at where they started to where they ended up is remarkable. And it took both of them showing a little vulnerability to make it happen.

I’m more uncomfortable with the Sam/Rebecca power dynamic over how it will make other people feel than Rebecca leveraging her power over Sam to manipulate him. I don’t think she would do that (what she did at the end of the episode any woman could have done, not just his boss). Realistically, it would make things awkward because people would always suspect Sam is getting special treatment because of who he’s dating, and people would be afraid to say anything negative about Sam’s performance (even if warranted/needed) lest Rebecca come down on them. This is a huge reason why companies have policies against this sort of thing - it makes it weird for everyone. Except this show takes place in bizarro land where everyone thinks it is great, so…okay. But the main thing is that they are really at different phases in their lives. As someone said up-thread, Sam is only 21 and just on the cusp of launching his adult life. Rebecca is well past that point. Does Sam want to have kids? I don’t think Rebecca does. She very much strikes me as someone who loves her goddaughter, but has no desire to raise one of her own. If they were treating this like an affair they know isn’t built to last and to grow into a relationship but they are enjoying it while it lasts, I’d feel better about it. But they are treating like they are soulmates. I don’t think Ted did anything wrong really leaving the field. He had a medical situation that prevented him from staying - doesn’t matter if he had a panic attack or was about to shit his pants from bad fish pie, as everyone speculated. And it would have been worse if he had stayed - be it having a crippling panic attack in front of everyone and freaking his players out - just like shitting his pants in front of a stadium full of people would have been worse/more distracting than leaving. Trent Crimm, The Independent did ask Ted for a comment a couple episodes ago, and I don’t think Ted was obligated to reveal his health status. His health prevented him from being there. People could believe he was about to shit his pants because the bottom line is the same, and he chose not to reveal private health info, which is his right.

I feel like maybe this is why Rupert's wife gave her share to Rebecca - basically, some insider trading. Rupert knows something bad will happen (because he's behind it) and he got his money out before the shit hit the fan. And while I suspect Ted is going to be nicer to Nate than I want him to, there has to be consequences for actions. Nate hasn't just blundered into some dumb mistakes, he's committed cruel acts. Repeatedly. He just did it publicly this time. And he's just not on the same page as everyone else - when the team was celebrating getting the choreo down, Beard and Roy were clapping for them, and Nate was just standing there with a sour expression. Even if Ted forgives him, I call BS if everyone else does and just welcomes into the fold.

Yeah, I don’t think Nate is really thinking any of this through. Beard would never breathe a word of it. Roy’s moral compass would never allow such a thing and he clearly thinks the media is bullshit anyway. Higgins would never hurt the club that way. Nor Ted. Rebecca knows about the panic attack last season, but I don’t think she knows that’s what happened at the game for sure. Either way, she wouldn’t leak that. Neither would Keeley if Roy happened to tell her about it, which Roy wouldn’t do. Trent Crimm, The Independent didn’t have to reveal his source. It would take Ted about 10 seconds to figure it out. And the more I think about it, the more it pisses me off. Ted really lifted Nate up, and this is how Nate repays him. All because Nate feels like he’s owed something. He was a damn kit man and Ted made him a coach, yet Nate doesn’t see how rare that move is. And outside of how this may hurt the club, I don’t think Ted has told his son or ex-wife about what he’s been going through. We know his son follows the team, and there’s an excellent chance he will see that article, and now Ted has to explain to his young son what is happening, which is something he may not be ready to do. God. Nate, you suck. I think this is where life will smack Nate down. He let the “wonder kid” stuff go to his head and now he’s not only convinced he can do Ted’s job, but that he deserves it. But he does not have the leadership/people skills to do Ted’s job. He doesn’t have the management skills to build a team - he’s had experience with one underling, and he treats him like shit. If he manages to land a coaching job (which would probably have to come from Rupert’s manipulations, because outside of some good press, what is Nate’s CV? Kit man plus one year of assistant coach experience that lasted until he decided to talk to the press about his boss’s personal health issues? Real impressive), he wouldn’t be able to manage the coaching team, the players wouldn’t respect him and would eat him alive.

I noticed too that the suit that finally got the thumbs-up from Keeley looked like it belongs in Roy’s wardrobe (after a conversation about how Roy always wears black). I thought that said something about Keeley rather than Nate, who I thought was actually pulling off the plaid suit (just needed a better fit on the jacket). I wasn’t surprised at Nate’s move on Keeley - while I don’t think he’s really been mooning over her, he did talk last season about how wonderful it must be to have someone like Keeley love you. And she’s always been kind to him, and Nate’s just the type of guy who would mistake that for something else.

I don’t know if Ted’s first impulse is to fire Nate, but between this and kissing Keeley, who is both his co-worker and his other co-worker’s girlfriend, Nate has been doing a lot of shitting where he eats and he’s probably created one seriously tense work environment. He’s probably gonna have to go one way or another. And just…what the actual fuck, Nate. You don’t start spreading the news about someone’s mental health in public. That’s not your information to hand out and I can’t believe that Nate doesn’t know that. If he was determined to shit on Ted to the media, there are plenty of other ways to do it - like the way he still isn’t learning about the game he coaches. And I don’t believe for a minute that Ted proactively takes credit for anyone else’s work. He always goes out of his way to give credit where it is due. Of course the media gives credit to the head coach. That’s how it works and as Roy said, that’s the job. Nate, a big fan of the game, should know that. He can fuck all the way off. I think once Ted collects himself, he can turn this into an opportunity to talk about mental health. Rebecca would continue to back him and I’ll bet even Trent Crimm, The Independent would be happy to help him get the word out. But how is he supposed to trust Nate again? How is Roy supposed to trust him (it’s not like Nate didn’t know they were dating), and Beard has already been giving him the side-eye a bit. How can he continue to work there? I really like Dr Sharon. I hope we somehow see her again. I continue to be surprised that no one takes issue with Rebecca dating Sam, her employee.

I would argue that they’ve been misrepresenting her from the jump if this happens. Even when she was dating Jamie, it wasn’t really because they had a great connection, but because dating hot-dumb 23 year old footballers is what she did. It was part of her brand. I get that a drama-free relationship isn’t very exciting, but I will join others in burning down the pub if Keely dumps Roy for Jamie. I would rather she just break up with Roy because she’s tired of having four heart attacks a day due to Roy’s habit of materializing out of thin air (he’s every-fucking-where!) and scaring the shit out of her. I was glad that Ted asked Dr Sharon for a hug because he was so clearly in need of one that I was practically screaming, “Will someone hug him already?!” I liked that Dr Sharon clocked his messy apartment. Not having the energy to do basic chores can be a sign of depression. Ted’s really been struggling and I think all his energy goes into holding it together in public. I knew Sam and Rebecca couldn’t last, but not for the reasons it ended. I’m really surprised not one person was all, “Girl, you’re his boss!” I liked Dani in Rebecca’s slippers. When Rupert said his wife was just going to give her portion of the ownership to Rebecca, I was like “Seriously? That’s all this evil bastard is doing this season?” Then he was whispering to Nate, and I thought, “Oh, there’s the evil bastard we all know.” Trouble is definitely brewing there.

How fitting that Jane’s last name is “Payne”. I would tell Beard to listen to Higgins and run away, but this episode, and the amount of shit Beard got into, tells me that Beard is attracted to chaos and attracts chaos. Maybe that helps explain his relationship with Ted - Ted is the only wholesome steady force in his life he knows he can count on (though poor Ted himself has been dangling by a thread). But I spent the whole episode wondering if Beard drank from the wrong pot of tea at Jane’s again. Hard to tell how much was real. Was Jane even there with the hula-hoop? Or did Beard just imagine her there? I would guess the whole thing was a hallucination if not for the bruises and sparkly pants the morning after. Especially since after Beard talks about the theory that this is all a simulation he follows the woman in a red dress into trouble. And the weird full moon Beard was looking at over Wembley Stadium at the beginning of the episode? It shows up again later in the episode when Beard gets kicked out of the private club and the woman in the red dress is waiting for him, except this time the moon is a light fixture attached to the building. The whole episode was just trippy, and I’m sure there’s a ton of stuff I missed. Like, is there something symbolic to the way Beard kept dropping his keys without noticing? And then when he did make his way home, the key breaks off in the lock? I did enjoy seeing the pub gang join the fun. And their absolute joy at running around on the pitch. I assume that actually happened, anyway. Joke of the episode: Woman in the Red Dress: One exposed ass could bring down the monarchy itself. Beard: How dare you speak of Prince Andrew that way.

I also noticed that in the locker room after the loss and everyone is quiet and contemplative, Will tries to hand Nate a water bottle and Nate just glares at him. We are, unfortunately, not at the end of Nate’s ugliness. I do think this show is slowly but surely indicating that good intentions are great, but you gotta back that up with work and/or reality will set in, and it can be a rude awakening. Ted is a good life coach, and he knows how to get teams to work together, but the skill set is limited. He fixed a lot with the team in season one, but he couldn’t fix Dani in season two, and they had to bring in an expert. He couldn’t fix himself, and had to go to an expert. He brought on Roy and promoted Nate to fill in the gaps. But there’s something else here - why the hell has Ted STILL not learned a lot of the basics about the sport? At this point it is inexcusable. I’ll bet he knows plenty about American football (he even identified himself as an American football coach at the hospital) but he hasn’t bothered with what the rest of the world calls football. I know it’s most likely because Ted’s been hanging on by his fingernails since before he came to London, dealing with anxiety and probably depression, and right now he literally doesn’t have the mental real estate to dedicate to learning about the game. So he’s leaning into his strengths and coasting by. That only takes you so far. And that’s gotta be what’s eating Beard. He blew up at Ted last season about it, and yet here’s Ted still all, “Y’all got some crazy rules in this sport! I don’t get it at all!” It’s at the point where it’s not cute any more. And if they keep losing like this, the team will start to resent him. And if Ted gets the Axe, Beard might get it too (or he may feel compelled to go, we don’t know why he followed Ted). Ted’s in for a rude awakening soon. And the same with Rebecca and Sam. It’s nice now because they both really like each other, but even if the age difference doesn’t cause issues (though someone in their early 20s must be in a different place in their life than someone their 40s) the reality of the fact that she’s his boss will weigh in sooner or later and cause trouble for them both. Chapter two in a trilogy is when your chickens come home to roost and wreck up the place.

Right? I noticed in the last episode that her skin is fantastic. I also just noticed that the next episode is called “Beard After Hours” and I wonder if we’ll get an all-Beard episode.

I also enjoyed the insight into Dr Sharon’s life. Makes sense she has a therapist, most therapists do. We saw how riding her bike is how she tunes out and relaxes, though I guess she breaks it to yell about dogs (as an owner of a greyhound, I take offense at her yelling at someone for putting a sweater on their dog - some dogs need it! Though, my dog does hate his coat, even if it is necessary, so Dr Sharon would be right about that. And I also hate dog owners who can’t control their dogs, so I guess we’re on the same page after all). And accepting a gift like a new bike from a client seems like an ethical trouble spot. I also liked that we learned that Phoebe’s dad sucks, which is why Roy stepped up. Sad as his fear that Phoebe is only picking up the worst of him is, I’m guessing a lot of parents have that fear at some point. Thoroughly enjoyed that Ted’s confession about his panic attacks lead to a cascade of confessions from the rest of the Diamond Dogs (and Roy). Rebecca and Sam…are going to be an issue. Realistically, anyway. I get that Rebecca is doing that “be brave enough to let someone wonderful love you” thing and Sam is pretty great, but this is dangerous ground. She’s the divorcée of a very wealthy man who snagged his beloved football team in the divorce, hired an American with no knowledge of the sport to coach the team, saw them regulated to a lower league, and oh, hey - remember how one member of the team protested against their sponsor and faced zero repercussions? Yeah, she’s sleeping with him. The British media would eat her alive if they caught wind of this. Then this episode killed me in the end with Jamie’s confrontation with his shitty dad, Roy hugging Jamie because he realized what a shitty dad Jamie has been living with, and Jamie crying as a result. Then Ted wanders off to go finally say out loud what happened to his dad.

Good point. Nate has only experienced a few jerks online who called him a loser (and those jerks will always be out there. You could find the cure for cancer and then save a bunch of puppies and orphans from a fire on your way home and some dink on the internet will call you a loser). And one or two jerks were enough to send Nate into threatening Will. Nate is gonna be in for a rude awakening when the inevitable backlash starts and he will not handle it well. I wouldn’t be surprised if Nate runs off to another team (especially if he starts getting heat for the way he treats Will) and it will be an absolute disaster. He may know the sport, but he doesn’t know how to handle people. His players won’t respect him, and we are all seeing how well Nate deals with that.

That’s interesting that he’s basing it on SNL players making it big, and reminds me of something Bill Murray once said - he said that it’s pretty typical to become an asshole when you first start to hit it big, and that’s fine and normal, but it has to wear off. Murray said that basically you can have two years to be an asshole, but if you don’t check yourself and stop that behavior after two years, it will probably become a permanent condition. So, yes - someone needs to help Nate nip this behavior in the bud, pronto. But I feel like something is going to come to a head for Nate to get a reality check. If he’s lucky, it will be a gentle check from someone like Jamie, who can identify because he also has a father he can never please, and he’s learning that being an asshole isn’t actually all that rewarding and you’ll end up alone. Or it can be a super-harsh wake up call from someone like Roy, who probably would have murdered Nate on the spot if he had witnessed what he said to Will. Or it could be heartbreaking - like if it’s Ted, Nate’s surrogate “good” dad who has done the things a “good” dad should do (encouraged him, gave him advice, made him take risks, helped him buy his first suit, etc) who is the one who witnesses this or Will tells him what happened, because realistically, someone doing something like that in the workplace? Basically threatening someone? Is not cool and H.R. Pufnstuf would say that at the very least Nate would need to be formally disciplined, if not straight up fired or demoted. Nate is harassing an employee he outranks and there are laws against this kind of thing. As for the issue of Nick Mohammad’s age, I think that is the point. Or at least part of the point. Severe self-esteem issues can lead to a sort of arrested development, because you don’t have the confidence to go out there and live life and make mistakes and learn from them and gain that maturity. Nate has obviously been living some sort of half life, where he wasn’t hitting the typical milestones (that’s not a bad thing in itself, everyone moves at their own pace and it’s fine if they are content. But Nate has clearly been craving a different existence for a long time). As others have pointed out, he was clearly much older than the typical kit man from the start (Will is far more typical of who has that position - a kid). That told me that Nate hadn’t taken a lot of risks in life, because he didn’t think he could do it/didn’t think he deserved it/was certain he’d be rejected. That’s why Ted started getting him out there and making him take risks. Ted took him to the charity auction/dinner, because that’s the sort of event Nate probably hadn’t experienced before. Ted made him read his observations about the team directly to the team, and made sure that the risk and Nate’s knowledge of the sport and the team got rewarded. Nate’s behavior in someone who is Will’s age wouldn’t be unusual. But Nate is clearly older than that and I think that’s why Ted started to push him out of his shell. Ted saw he needed help. Dr. Sharon has really grown on me and I loved her this episode. And I appreciated Ted’s journey through approaching therapy - that sort of self-care and self-examination can be really scary. And I suspect Ted is sitting on a deep well of sadness he’s been afraid to look at for a long time. And Dr. Sharon was right when she said that therapy is going to piss Ted off before he starts to get better. I think it’s pretty common in therapy to get angry/sad at your situation before you can process that and start to get better. Other notes: - Keeley and Roy continue to be wonderful. Even though they were having issues, I enjoy their sort of radical honesty (every time Roy asked “Are you talking about me?” Keeley always said yes while others denied it). And Roy and/or Keeley is a massive Sade fan. I looked at the playlist on Apple Music and there is a shit-ton of Sade on that four hour playlist. - I initially hated the idea of the secret smoking in the boot room because first, smoking is just gross and it must reek in there. And two - ladies? Ashing into shoes and leaving your cigarette butts for Will to clean up? Rude. But when Higgins pulled out his pipe, I was suddenly okay with the secret smoking room. It was just perfect. But seriously - clean up after yourselves, ladies. You’re both classier than that. Please let Rebecca and Higgins start moonlighting as a jazz duo.

The actor who plays Nate is 40, but I read Nate as in his 30s. He probably comes off a bit younger, but that’s because he basically spent a long time kinda hiding from life and didn’t take the necessary risks to gain life experience due to his lack of confidence/timid nature. The “wonder kid” comment was a bit of Nate’s delusion, like him believing he was a “big dog” in the previous episode. He may be closer to a lot of the players (who are probably mostly early to mid 20s) in terms of maturity, but he’s probably a lot closer to Roy in terms of chronological age.

Beard seems to crave drama in his relationships, so Jane fits the bill even though it’s bound to end in some sort of disaster. Like arson. I mean, following Keeley all the way home just to ask if Beard was shagging Ted? It’s a good thing Beard doesn’t have any pets. Jane would totally kidnap his cat if he had one. I can’t decide if I want to know what Beard’s deal is or if it is better that he remains an enigma. I mean, it’s crazy that Ted accepted a job overseas to coach a sport he knew nothing about. We now know why he really did it. But why did Beard follow him? I’m not sure I want to know the answer. I love Mae and the pub gang.

They had me fooled on who LDN 152 was - ultimately not surprising, but still a bad idea. I did like that Rebecca knows Ted has had panic attacks in the past, so she was the only one truly worried about him. And I am glad that Ted sought out help. It’s been clear that he’s been dangling by a thread for a while. But Dr Sharon is going to make him do the work. Also glad Nate got that taste of victory, but I’m afraid it will go to his head, or something will happen like his dad still isn’t impressed, and Nate will take that hard. Loved that Higgins couldn’t stop himself from telling Beard how he felt about Jane, and that Beard didn’t get mad but took it in the spirit Higgins intended.

Oh, god. That would be a sign of Nate absolutely flying too close to the sun (even outside of the fact that Rebecca is his boss) and it will end in disaster. I would say he wouldn’t have the guts to do it, but when Ted said that Isaac needed to talk to a “big dog” Nate un-ironically volunteered himself. Rupert being the person on Bantr might be true, but I still feel like it is Ted. Again, because of the cornball username based on “You’ve Got Mail.” I can’t see Rupert pulling that reference. Plus, I just think it is too cruel for Rupert to mess with Rebecca like that. I think Mystery Man being Ted is going to be messy enough (and they actually cut to Ted on the phone to Rebecca on the phone twice in this episode. The most obvious was Ted looking at his phone as he walks to the field right after Rebecca sent a message. But earlier in the episode - after the “big dog” bit - the scene ends with Ted picking up his phone, presumably to call an actual big dog. Then they immediately cut to Rebecca on her phone fawning over the Rilke quote. Since the previous scene cut when Ted picked up his, we don’t know what he did with it). However, Rupert being behind Bantr as a company? THAT I can definitely see, and it would answer some questions for me. I was wondering how a little dating app that was just starting out had the juice to sponsor a football team. But if Rupert and his money are behind it…yep. That would explain it. I couldn’t remember if Keeley basically invented Bantr or if she was just promoting it, but regardless Rupert could still be the person who invested in it. OR he could buy it out from whomever has it now - after he saw it was sponsoring the team. Making the team financially dependent on him would be a way to get control back.

Trent Crimm being Mystery Man would certainly be a fun twist, but while he would know Rilke, I can’t see him using “You’ve Got Mail” as the inspiration for his username on Bantr. Unless, of course, we discover he’s secretly a rom-communist himself. I don’t think anything bad will happen to Higgins. I think they are just developing his character. He could have easily just been the abused assistant at work. But he demonstrated last season that he wasn’t a doormat and refused to cross some lines with Rebecca, and this season they are building on that by showing that the nerdy number-cruncher at the office actually has a very full and satisfying life outside of work. And considering that I think things are about go really downhill for some characters, they gotta have someone with a happy, stable life. I also don’t think they’d go so dark as to have Nate attempt suicide, but I think he will cross a line with his behavior that will force Ted to demote or fire him, making them both miserable. One thing Ted seems to be learning this season is that he can’t just gloss everything over with platitudes. Things are serious and he has to make hard decisions to address them - like bringing Jamie back when he knew it would upset the team, but they needed another star player. And why he brought Roy on, recognizing that Roy has a skill set he does not. Having to knock Nate down after lifting him up will be really hard on him. But if they do all this, it will be good character development. Last season everyone went from hating Ted and his barrage of dad jokes to actually liking and respecting him. Now, if things go the way I think they will, people will learn there are many layers to Ted, and his sunny optimism was actually born out of a place of sadness. And hopefully Ted will learn that people will still accept him if he isn’t Mr Sunshine all the time, solving everyone’s problems. Last season he said that his wife couldn’t cope with the non-stop optimism. I’m guessing in large part because Ted hides behind it instead of actually dealing with some issues, and that’s no way to have a marriage. And Ted will have the same problem in his next relationship if he doesn’t figure that out.

Did a mini rewatch tonight and noticed a few other things: There actually seems to be a ton of clues indicating Ted’s father died by suicide. In the episode where Jamie is trying to get back on the team and he goes to see Ted at the pub, they start talking about how hard Jamie’s father is on him, and he asks Ted if his father was like that. Ted appears to blink back some emotion and says, “No. He was always much harder on himself than he ever was on me.” Then there was the scene where Dr Sharon seemingly apropos of nothing tells Ted her favorite novel is “The Prince of Tides.” That book is about a football coach from the South with a suicidal family member and he hides his pain by making jokes. Then of course we see Ted watching “It’s a Wonderful Life” right at the scene where George Bailey is considering suicide, and the camera is pushing in on Ted’s face as some sort of emotion is bubbling up, but gets interrupted when Rebecca is outside his window. Finally, I noticed that Mystery Man’s handle on Bantr is “LDN 152.” This is clearly a reference to “You’ve Got Mail” where Tom Hanks’ handle on AOL (where he anonymously chats with Meg Ryan and they fall for each other over emails and DMs not realizing that they already know each other IRL) was “NY 152.” For Hanks’ character that was based on his address. Now, I don’t think Ted has “152” in his address, but a self-professed “Rom-Communist” would certainly know the reference.

I liked this episode (and I liked the Christmas episode…well, up until the final scene and what the youngest Higgins saw. That was too much magic). But man, this show, despite being sugary sweet this season, is really, really making me tense. I think folks are right to worry about Nate. I think he has been kicked around so much during his life (first by his dad, whom Nate said in the Christmas episode is never happy/satisfied with anything, and then by Jamie and his hangers-on) that he’s got a lot of rage buried deep down and he is a ticking time bomb. We’ve seen hints of this - the obvious example of Nate turning into a bully at the first opportunity he had when he finally outranked someone, but remember last season when he was playing along with Roy’s anger and broke the window? It got played off as a joke, but I feel like it was foreshadowing. And not just using Rebecca’s technique but also spitting at his reflection suggests something dark/violent to me. He’s been so desperate for respect and recognition that if he starts to feel it slip away with Roy’s return, I fear he’s going to respond very poorly to that. We saw his face when Roy walked out onto the pitch, the crowd chanting for him. Not only will he feel pushed out by Roy’s presence, but if Roy catches him bullying the new kit man, he won’t try to smooth it over like Ted. Roy will give him hell for it. This could get ugly (though, oddly, I think the person who could help Nate - besides a therapist - is Jamie). The other person I’m worried about is Ted. While we haven’t spent a lot of time with him this season, I just think he’s not doing well. At all. He’s not outwardly showing it, but I think he’s feeling the pressure of the team not doing well. I think that’s why he recruited Roy and why he’s tolerating Dr Sharon even though he hates her being there. The distance from his son is most likely eating at him, especially since he lost his own father when he was young (I saw someone recently suggest that Ted’s father died by suicide, and…that would just explain SO much). We already know Ted has some sort of anxiety disorder (not just the panic attack in the Liverpool episode - he was doing that thing with his hands in the pilot) and maybe depression? I just feel his Ted-ness is both his way to connect with people and a defense mechanism. Dr Sharon scares the shit out of him because she can see his Ted-ness for what it is. I just can’t shake the feeling he’s heading for a major breakdown that will make his panic attack look like nothing. Which brings me to the next thing stressing me out… Rebecca. She’s obviously putting so much into this mystery man, what with her constant romantic giggles and sighs, that it feels like it is setting her up for major disappointment. It seems obvious to me that it will turn out to be someone she knows. It could be Rupert, but that would just be cruel and nothing else. I saw someone suggest that it is Beard, but I think that would be resolved with Rebecca saying something like, “I’m flattered, but I don’t think it would be appropriate since I am your boss” and that would be the end of it. The shot of Ted looking at his phone after Rebecca sent the message could be a red herring, but I feel like it being Ted would produce the most drama (I thought there was also a clue in that when Rebecca was happily reading over the messages at the top of the episode she was kicked back with a glass of whiskey…and Ted’s biscuits. Despite the drink indicating it was the end of the day and she usually devours Ted’s biscuits as soon as he brings them in the morning). I just don’t think Rebecca would respond well to that news. At all. Especially if it is revealed that Ted has known for a while who he was talking to - and if it is him, I think he’s at least suspected he was talking to Rebecca before the message in this episode confirmed it. She will feel like he was playing her for a fool even if that was not his intention. And what is Ted’s intention? I see one of two possibilities - he could be interested in her. Rebecca would not be cool with that because Ted is “safe” to her. He’s her safe divorce buddy. Him being interested in her makes him not safe. The other possibility is he knows it is Rebecca, and thinks he’s doing something that will boost her confidence and make her feel good about herself. Rebecca will see that as a huge betrayal of their trust. Ted will have basically catfished her even if he was trying to do something nice. And I feel like Rebecca’s reaction is going to be something that pushes Ted over the edge (either hurt because he was genuinely interested or mortified at what he’s done to embarrass Rebecca if he’s doing this only to boost her confidence). Ted and Rebecca may be endgame, but a lot has to happen first, and at the very least this chapter has to end badly (again, IF it is Ted she’s been messaging). I think I read that they only intend to do three seasons of the show. If so, this is their “Empire Strikes Back” and things have to fall apart so they can put them back together in the next chapter. Things have been too harmonious this season and it is stressing me out. That said, it will really piss me off if they don’t address this stuff. I’m already a bit miffed that the team lost their sponsor after being regulated and it’s apparently no biggie. That should have a big impact.

Oh, I know that, I just think that she should have been frayed (if not completely breaking down) much sooner. We learned that she was asked to do "something terrible" and I assume that meant killing Maddox. She set out on this mission knowing she was going to kill someone she is/was close to. I just feel like we should have seen her nervous about this all along (she could have chalked it up to not being used to being in space or something like that, since it also seemed that going "off world" was not something she had a lot of experience with, to throw the other characters off the scent). It makes sense that killing Maddox would put her over the edge, I just feel like we should have seen her teetering on that edge all along, but we didn't because they didn't want to give the twist away to the audience.

Man, the stuff with Troi and Riker REALLY worked for me. I thought I would enjoy it all for nostalgia reasons only, but the scenes with them were some of the best in the series so far. I thought I would be annoyed since the plot basically stopped while they were there, but it felt like time well-spent. And they really threaded the needle perfectly with Kestra - it's hard for a kid character to be precocious without being annoying, but she was great. And this is the first time I actually cared about Soji, so good on them for that, too. I liked the stuff with Agnes too because OF COURSE that would happen. She's not a spy, she's not an assassin, this stuff would absolutely shake her. My one complaint is that she should have started breaking down much sooner. Raffi is back to kind of annoying me. I'm just not down with a lot of the acting choices being made here. It just doesn't feel natural. And I am pissed that they killed Hugh, and that it was Space Cersei who did it. He deserved better, and we deserved more of him. I hope Elnor shreds her to bits.

This episode was fun, because Patrick Stewart was clearly having a ball hamming it up, Jeri Ryan was great, and of course you gotta dress like Huggy Bear from Starsky & Hutch when you go to the Vegas hellmouth planet. God that place seemed awful. Not sure about Raffi and her son. Seems she went completely off the rails for a while there. She also told him she was clean, but we saw her vaping right before they left. I don’t know if “nothing in the last 48-72 hours” qualifies as “clean.” Some called Agnes as up to no good, and it seems they were right. What was she shown/told that not only turned her against synths but also turned her into a murderer? I love that because Elnor was raised with the practice of “absolute candor” he cannot lie and therefore cannot act.

I agree with all this - and when I noted that Picard came rolling in wearing the colonizer uniform, he was really representing Star Fleet and their thinking (even though he was in casual colonizer wear, he still had his Starfleet com badge on) and not specifically his own, though he clearly was part of it. And it isn't necessarily a reflect of bad intent (I don't think Starfleet was all, "Hey! We're here to exploit your people and your natural resources!"), just...thinking you know what's best and not actually checking in with the people you are helping and then feeling free to cut and run. How many times has a global power like the US gone rolling in somewhere, cleared out the "bad guys" then was all, "Hey, you're gonna live over here now, we built you a little school over there, and here's a bag of grain. See ya!" while the people were all, "Um, this doesn't quite work for us. Also, you're leaving a huge power vacuum, so...help? Still? Please?" And I don't think this is trying to paint Picard as the terrible Starfleet captain (let's be real - Kirk had to have pissed off people left and right during his career. There's probably a galaxy full of people who want to kick his ass). This is, I think, the first time we are seeing Picard and Starfleet really deconstructed this way. It was apparently something Patrick Stewart really wanted to do, and I really like the idea. No, it doesn't feel like the Trek we're used to, and I can see how people find it slow or boring, but I think it is fascinating. And I think it is how we learn and improve - don't gloss over the bad stuff because something or someone has mostly been good or had good intentions. Look at it and learn from it. I think that is exactly what Picard is doing, and perhaps it will flow over into Starfleet. Yes, I find myself wishing that she was just his highly inappropriate supervisor, and not his sister. Let's just...not go there again, shall we?