S02.E09: Beard After Hours

[Whimsy]

Quote

After the semifinal, Beard sets out on an all-night odyssey through London in an effort to collect his thoughts.

airdate 9/17/21

[MissLucas]

Since the other thread is closed now I thought it worthwhile to copy-paste the list of Jane's messages that @SHD compiled (thanks!):

Quote

Did anyone else pause and pause and pause so that they could read as many of Jane's 50+ text messages as possible? She seems like she's a LOT to deal with. She completely spun out just because he didn't answer right away.

I transcribed them (all 52!) - typos are as they appeared in the texts.

********

If you’re not going to join me, I at least hope you’re having some fun.

Hey.

I do love you, you know.

I said I love you.

I LOVE YOU.

Oh, now you can’t say it back cos I took too long?

F*** you Beard.

I did what you asked

I’m literally doing what you asked.

F*** you Beard

You know there’s a lot of men after me tonight.

I turned down three guys already.

Make that four.

A guy kissed me while I was writing that text.

You’re a real piece of work, Beard

I’m never gonna speak to you again

You’ve got 10 seconds to call me

Time’s up.

Right.

We’re done.

I’m having the best night

I realize how fun life is without you around me

You would’ve loved this place

But you would’vev ruined it

I don’t even love you

It was a joke

I thought you liked jokes.

Oh god my dress just fell off.

How annoying!!!

Listen, You know that time you said you wanted to meet my mum, and I said you couldn’t meet her. I wasn’t embarrassed about you, I was embarrassed about her. But you know what, I am embarrassed about you. You’re embarrassing. My mum’s f***ing amazing.

I’m willing to consider you’re not getting these texts because your battery died

And if that’s the case I’m truly sorry

It’s hard to discuss feelinfs

I know you always say I’m really reasonable but you don’t know this about me…

Sometimes I can be a bit emotional

So maybe I’m lashing out

OK

Nothing?

Still…nothing?

For real???

This is too far.

OK I literally couldn’t give a f*** what you’re doing but don’t you dare ever speak to me again.

Don’t come crawling back to me. Ever. You’re dead to me, like I hope you’re lying face down

In a ditch somewhere and a squirrel is eating you. A f***ing squirrel is eating you from the feet up until all that’s left is your f**ing stupid beard and nothing else

I mean it

S**t

Beard?

You HAVEN’T been hit by a train, have you?

Baerd?

Just reply so I know you’re not dead

Cos I’d feel like s***

If you were dead.

 

Just in case that it was not clear before: RUN BEARD, RUN!

(And the fact that he didn't is probably the most revealing about him from the whole episode.)

[Whimsy]

It looked like, from the episode, it looked like Beard saw all the messages and ran without reading them. He should’ve read them because that’s the type of thin you run FROM not TOWARDS. 

I didn’t hate the episode, but I didn’t  love it either. There were a few minutes I liked but overall.. eh. 
 

Does anyone know the song at the beginning with Beard on the bus?  I tried to Soundhound it but it came up with nothing. 

[SnarkShark]

Hmm.  I expected Beard to be weird.  Seems normal though...

[shipmate]

I adore this show (and Coach Beard) but, overall, this episode was a huge steaming cup of WTF for me.

[Domestic Assassin]

29 minutes ago, Whimsy said:

Does anyone know the song at the beginning with Beard on the bus?  I tried to Soundhound it but it came up with nothing. 

The song at the beginning was a cover of the theme song done by Jeff Tweedy from Wilco.

https://www.stereogum.com/2161018/jeff-tweedy-covered-the-ted-lasso-theme/music/

[Cupcake04]

3 hours ago, MissLucas said:

Since the other thread is closed now I thought it worthwhile to copy-paste the list of Jane's messages that @SHD compiled (thanks!):

Just in case that it was not clear before: RUN BEARD, RUN!

(And the fact that he didn't is probably the most revealing about him from the whole episode.)

Thank you!  Am I the only one having a hard time reading all the texts on screen?  All the Rebecca/Sam ones I had to pause and get up and walk over to tv to read!  lol (don’t get old people, it suuuucks!).  

btw….why are all the threads new?  what happened?

[Trillium]

I enjoyed the weird random trippy night. Something that is long in my past and was never quite that insane…10,000% less interesting. 
 

My favorite part was definitely when the Crown & Anchor guys got to be on the pitch.  

Edited September 19, 2021 by Trillium

[MissLucas]

39 minutes ago, Cupcake04 said:

btw….why are all the threads new?  what happened?

show got promoted to multi-discussion status. From now each episode gets its own discussion plus additional ones for cast, spoilers etc.

[jacehan]

40 minutes ago, Cupcake04 said:

Thank you!  Am I the only one having a hard time reading all the texts on screen?  All the Rebecca/Sam ones I had to pause and get up and walk over to tv to read!  lol (don’t get old people, it suuuucks!).  

btw….why are all the threads new?  what happened?

Ted Lasso got upgraded from a single thread to a full forum.

[Cupcake04]

10 minutes ago, jacehan said:

Ted Lasso got upgraded from a single thread to a full forum.

Thank you!  Makes sense…..upgrading ahead of tomorrows Emmy wins….fingers crossed!  

[WorldWarIV]

The pacing of this season is so weird. It's the penultimate episode of the season, and although I love the idea of a Beard-centric episode in theory, it just felt weird and out of place. It didn't build up any momentum for the last episode, while last year we had Rebecca confessing the truth to Ted and Roy being benched. Instead we have Beard being back again with Jane for like the third or fourth time? The stakes are at an all-time low  for me.

[Kostgard]

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.

Edited September 19, 2021 by Kostgard

[Domestic Assassin]

This season has 12 episodes instead of 10, so there will be 3 more this season. But I agree that the pacing has been off this year. I know that they had a 10 episode season mapped out when Apple asked them for 2 more episodes, and that they expected that the first 3 would be released together on the first week. So the original plan was that the rom-com episode where Roy comes back to coach would have aired in the second week instead of the fifth week, and yeah, that kind of threw things off IMO. And this week's episode kind of killed the momentum that had been building. I didn't hate this week's episode, but I was underwhelmed. It had some good moments, but I don't feel like I learned anything about Beard that I hadn't already figured out. FWIW I hated "After Hours" (the movie this was based on), although I haven't seen it since it came out.  Maybe it just made me feel old.

[Turtle Wexler]

3 hours ago, Cupcake04 said:

Thank you!  Am I the only one having a hard time reading all the texts on screen?  All the Rebecca/Sam ones I had to pause and get up and walk over to tv to read!  lol (don’t get old people, it suuuucks!).  

Not just you, Cupcake! I feel like I didn’t have this problem last season? The blue and white is easier for me to see than the grey and black. I know that shooting computer screens is difficult because the monitor refresh rate makes a scrolling line appear. I’m not sure if the same is true for phone screens and so if they do something to try to simulate it? I find Sam and Rebecca’s texts in bantr a bit easier to read.

[Turtle Wexler]

1 hour ago, Kostgard said:

 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

Brendan Hunt talks about this in the TV Line interview.

Quote

It’s because “Blue Moon” is among the most beloved chanting songs for Manchester City. And so, the blue moon is basically [following] Beard this whole night, as he is haunted by this loss… The whole night is kind of like an exorcism for him, of the ghosts of what happened at Wembley. And when he’s at his lowest point — when he’s getting his ass kicked by these Man City fans — we have Marcus Mumford singing “Blue Moon.”

 

Edited September 19, 2021 by Turtle Wexler
Fixed link

[KittenPokerCheater]

I don't know that our old posts carried over into this new shiny topic/forum/thread, but I will always love this episode for the sure joy the Lads from the Pub had on their faces when they realized where they were- and then got to play all over the pitch at Heaven Wembley.

Otherwise, it was a pretty good bottle episode, however avant garde.  

It was weird to find out that Brenden Hunt is actually so proficient at  hulahooping- I wonder if he has been hulahooping all his life or if he learned it for this (or some other) show.

[Gwendolyn]

I'm trying to decide if liked or disliked this episode and whether it would've stood out so badly if I were binging season 2, like I did season1. This is a momentum killer, but at the same time I worry this is a reprieve before the excrement hits the proverbial fan as the story heads deeper into Ted's "dark forest" to get that cliff hanger ending like Empire Strikes Back (that Sudeikis has referred to in interviews, not the ending, just that this season is like Empire Strikes Back and the movie basically was a cliffhanger and since they know there is definitely a 3rd season why not leave the story in a place where we yell at our screens knowing we have to wait until next summer). 

I mean it was a bit artsy fartsy for my taste.  And I couldn't tell for the longest time if Coach Beard had made it home and then dreamed the whole thing after some beers or if he really was out wandering around London. Though I did enjoy parts, like allowing Baz, Jeremy, and Paul to leave the pub and have a bigger role. But the whole interlude with the lady who offered to repair his pants and her angry bf (until he saved Beard from James Tartt) I could have done without. And I thought the whole rave scene could have been shorter. I get them not messing with the story line they settled on prior to getting two extra eps, but I'm not sure I would have stuck them in the season, unless they were going to drop them as 2 eps as once. Like if they'd paired the Christmas ep with Rainbow and Beard After Hours with Ep 10, like a bonus, but not a story momentum killing bonus.

Also this show is expensive for me having to obtain music. "A Girl Like You" and "The Universal" brought back fond memories of my year abroad at uni in Norwich, as they were on the radio all the time along with Pulp and Oasis. I already had Edwyn Collins, but of all The Blur I was still missing that song!

[Trillium]

10 hours ago, WorldWarIV said:

The pacing of this season is so weird. It's the penultimate episode of the season, and although I love the idea of a Beard-centric episode in theory, it just felt weird and out of place. It didn't build up any momentum for the last episode, while last year we had Rebecca confessing the truth to Ted and Roy being benched. Instead we have Beard being back again with Jane for like the third or fourth time? The stakes are at an all-time low  for me.

There’s 3 more episodes this season. They had 10 episodes for S2 planned, Apple asked for 2 more so they added this and the Christmas ones as more stand alone. 

[Whimsy]

14 hours ago, Domestic Assassin said:

The song at the beginning was a cover of the theme song done by Jeff Tweedy from Wilco.

https://www.stereogum.com/2161018/jeff-tweedy-covered-the-ted-lasso-theme/music/

That’s funny. I didn’t even realize it was a way slowed down, stripped version of the theme song lol. 

[Maysie]

Actually, I liked the episode. It gave me some insight into Beard and was kind of a nice break from what I imagine is going to be some intense viewing (at least by Ted Lasso standards) to come.

For instance, I always pictured Beard to be a fairly confident person, however the episode showed that there’s a lot more going on underneath than what I assumed-seems like there’s some self-loathing and at least some need for approval, as well as some desire to break out of the confines he’s kind of created for himself.

Was it a dream of some sort? I don’t think we’ll ever really know. It seems something happened because he has the bruise and the pants, but I guess the rest is open to interpretation, which is okay with me. I loved the pub guys living their dream on the pitch-I hope that was real, and I guess we’ll get an idea if it was if there’s any type of change in their future interactions with Beard.

Whether it was a hallucination or not, I think it will be interesting to see how that night impacts Beard and his future interactions with the team.

[marceline]

This episode was way too long. It was cute and certainly had some sweet moments but when I rewatch this series in the future, this is one episode I will skip.

[AngieBee1]

2 hours ago, Maysie said:

Was it a dream of some sort? I don’t think we’ll ever really know

From Coach Beard himself:

Q: Are we to assume everything that we saw actually happened?

BH: Oh, I think absolutely everything really happened. The only thing that is in his head is Thierry Henry and Gary Lineker, who are legends by the way — actual sporting legends. Thierry Henry, I mean, he’s someone who I became a fan of when I was getting into soccer while living in Amsterdam. He’s a big part of the reason why I fell in love with the sport, and thus he’s a big part of the reason why Ted Lasso even exists. So, yeah, the only thing that’s imaginary is those guys. Those guys are the devil on his shoulder, the bad voice in his head. They’re like his version of Fight Club‘s Tyler Durden.

[KarenX]

14 hours ago, Kostgard said:

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 mean sometimes a key is just a key but sometimes it’s a phallus? He’s been emasculated?

[SnarkShark]

18 hours ago, shipmate said:

I adore this show (and Coach Beard) but, overall, this episode was a huge steaming cup of WTF for me.

I think this, and the Christmas episode, were added after the episode order size was increased. 

[WorldWarIV]

On 9/18/2021 at 9:37 PM, Domestic Assassin said:

This season has 12 episodes instead of 10, so there will be 3 more this season. But I agree that the pacing has been off this year. I know that they had a 10 episode season mapped out when Apple asked them for 2 more episodes, and that they expected that the first 3 would be released together on the first week. So the original plan was that the rom-com episode where Roy comes back to coach would have aired in the second week instead of the fifth week, and yeah, that kind of threw things off IMO.

 

On 9/19/2021 at 8:05 AM, Trillium said:

There’s 3 more episodes this season. They had 10 episodes for S2 planned, Apple asked for 2 more so they added this and the Christmas ones as more stand alone. 

 

That explains a lot, thanks guys! I hope Apple won't mess too much with the flow of the show in the future though.

[Good Queen Jane]

On 9/19/2021 at 12:50 AM, KittenPokerCheater said:

I will always love this episode for the sure joy the Lads from the Pub had on their faces when they realized where they were- and then got to play all over the pitch at Heaven Wembley.

It wasn't Wembley, was it? I thought it was the Richmond pitch. The guys from the pub have never been able to get tickets there and it makes more sense that Coach Beard would be able to get them in there than at Wembley.

[TV Diva Queen]

On 9/20/2021 at 8:59 AM, Good Queen Jane said:

It wasn't Wembley, was it? I thought it was the Richmond pitch. The guys from the pub have never been able to get tickets there and it makes more sense that Coach Beard would be able to get them in there than at Wembley.

I agree, It was Nelson Road, their home pitch. The old guy/groundskeeper said something likes “welcome to Nelson road”. Those are words that I would never know had it not been for the show, so I couldn’t be making it up. Lol

Edited September 22, 2021 by TV Diva Queen

[marcee]

This was the only episode of Ted Lasso I disliked. Not only did I dislike it, I actively despised it. Beard is fun and interesting in small doses. Less so as the focus. This was a waste of an episode and it made me sad. Despite that, there were a few highlights: bar bros enjoyment of Nelson Road and Beard's stint as an Oxford professor among them.

[DB in CMH]

I've been finding this season a slog to get through, and this one was the sloggiest.

[BrindaWalsh]

You know what, I liked it.  If they were going to do any episode this way, Beard is the only one they could do it with.  I went between wondering if it was a dream, a trip, or real.  And I guess it came down through his night through his broken down and intoxicated lens.  Yes, it was bizarre and different, but Beard is a little bizarre and different.  It was mostly contained.  I don't know.  I don't need or want a lot of episodes like this but I can give them one.

You can always give them one.  Look at all the shows that have randomly done musicals over the years.  IMO only Buffy got it right.  But all those other shows stepped outside their formula and did it.  So I can give the Ted Lasso writers a pass here. 

On a side note, i loved how when he got to the club, suddenly his pants worked.  And I also loved the shoutouts to pop culture along the way.  Limelight in its heyday.  "If you are there, God, it's me, Margaret's son." Milk and Bones which looks just like NYC's Soho House and (and a similar impersonation scenario as the SATC episode).  There were others, I just can't quite remember them.

[Dandesun]

I liked it too. I've been binging to catch up... basically, this is a show that I kept going 'I really need to check it out' and then after the Emmys I was like 'Why have I been putting this off?' So I dove in.

This episode was surreal. It was Theatre of the Absurd. It felt oddly fitting after the Man City loss.

Thierry Henry and Gary Lineker providing color commentary throughout also made me laugh. 'Shut up, Theirry Henry!!' And seeing them raise their glasses at the club at the end just put the finishing touch on the absurdity of it all.

[Cornhusker12]

On 9/19/2021 at 8:12 AM, Maysie said:

I always pictured Beard to be a fairly confident person, however the episode showed that there’s a lot more going on underneath than what I assumed-seems like there’s some self-loathing and at least some need for approval, as well as some desire to break out of the confines he’s kind of created for himself.

Ya know, I normally appreciate when characters get extra shading and layers, that's obviously how all humans are, but I've actually enjoyed that Beard had just been this unusual guy who happens to be 100% confident and comfortable in his own skin haha. It felt a little strange to see him suddenly expressing these self-loathing thoughts in this episode.

I'm not sure how to describe this correctly... earlier in the season I thought the vibe of the show had become too easy and simple and everyone was just this happy-go-lucky group of friends supporting each other and every episode's storyline was stakes-free and worked out immediately, but lately it seems like the attempts to add depth and drama have come from just telling us that all the characters have trauma in their souls.

The connective tissue between "omg the feel-good biscuits and soccer show we all need right now!" and "but wait, everyone is actually SAD!" just feels a little thin.

Edited September 28, 2021 by Cornhusker12

[SoWindsor]

I spent this entire episode thinking Beard had killed himself. What with Ted sharing that’s how his dad died and one of beard’s hallucinations said he’d fail at killing himself, the foreshadowing was really strong. Also I knew that the next episode title mentions funeral. I was shocked that it he was alive at the end.

I didn’t enjoy this episode. And I’m not enjoying this season either. I was looking for more of a Schitts creek replacement. Great storytelling and character development but still light, happy and feel-good vibes.
 

This isn’t doing it for me which is disappointing because I loved season one. 

[limecoke]

This episode is the bottom of the season two barrel. Just awful. Only redeeming feature- brief moment of Gilbert O’Sullivan singing “Alone Again, Naturally.”  Sadly, post season one, I think this show got drunk on it’s own success because two is just mediocre. Sad.

[blackwing]

On 9/22/2021 at 9:09 AM, marcee said:

This was the only episode of Ted Lasso I disliked. Not only did I dislike it, I actively despised it. Beard is fun and interesting in small doses. Less so as the focus. This was a waste of an episode and it made me sad. Despite that, there were a few highlights: bar bros enjoyment of Nelson Road and Beard's stint as an Oxford professor among them.

Count me among those who greatly disliked this episode.  But that's probably because I don't really care for Beard.  He's better when he's the mostly silent guy sitting in the office.  A whole episode devoted to him was too much.  I also have been wondering if his last name actually is Beard?  For some reason while watching Season 1, I thought it was part of the joke that they just call him Beard but that's not really his name.  I was thinking that for this episode which focused on him, we would actually learn his name.  But everyone still calls him Beard, even Jane.  She doesn't even use his first name ever.

It seems though this episode got good reviews overall, and I could easily see Brendan Hunt winning the Emmy for this episode.  I'd rather see a bottle episode devoted to Jamie Tartt.  I liked Phil Dunster on "Strike Back" and I think it was a slap in the face to him that every single male in the main credits cast got nominated for an Emmy except for him.

[TV Anonymous]

This is one weird-ass episode that does not align with all others in the series. Right until before end scene, I was expecting that this was Beard in an acid trip and he would wake up somewhere. Only at the end scene where he arrived in the locker room with bruises on his face and finally with the sparkling trousers that I realized that everything was real. WTF indeed.

[Kel Varnsen]

On 9/18/2021 at 9:36 PM, Kostgard said:

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. 

The interesting thing is that he did try to get away from Jane. He went home at the end of the night. But then his key broke and he went to that weird church to get out of the rain. Then the church also happened to be a secret rave where Jane was. 

I liked but didn't love this one. I think my favourite part was Beard tricking those guys into thinking he was a retired Oxford prof. He is always reading and gets every one of Ted's references so I always figured he was super smart.

On 9/19/2021 at 12:50 AM, KittenPokerCheater said:

Otherwise, it was a pretty good bottle episode, however avant garde.  

Not sure I would call this a bottle episode. Those usually involve just main cast members on one or two established sets and are a way to save money. This was Beard and the pub guys having adventures all over London with a bunch of guest actors. That can't have been cheap.

[FnkyChkn34]

4 hours ago, Kel Varnsen said:

Not sure I would call this a bottle episode. Those usually involve just main cast members on one or two established sets and are a way to save money. This was Beard and the pub guys having adventures all over London with a bunch of guest actors. That can't have been cheap.

It was a bottle episode because it was written after the 10-episode season was finished (writing at least, if not also shooting) and Apple then ordered a 12-episode season.  They had to create filler.  A bottle episode to me is usually something that's disconnected and mostly irrelevant to the progression of the main story; clearly, we could have done without this episode just fine.  

[DEL901]

1 hour ago, FnkyChkn34 said:

It was a bottle episode because it was written after the 10-episode season was finished (writing at least, if not also shooting) and Apple then ordered a 12-episode season.  They had to create filler.  A bottle episode to me is usually something that's disconnected and mostly irrelevant to the progression of the main story; clearly, we could have done without this episode just fine.  

Yes, and the Christmas episode was the other one.  This season, Apple gave plenty of notice when they asked for 12 episodes so there will be integration.  

[kwnyc]

I liked it. And the Christmas episode (it seems traditionally British to have one...see "Call the Midwife" and "Downtown Abbey.")

It's also the kind of episode you can only have after you've met a mysterious character and watched him for awhile. I thnk it was a good change of pace, and drew some supporting characters into the spotlight for a bit (the fans), and also gave us a real look at how flawed Coach Beard really is, and for that matter, how much he needs & depends on Ted. 

[QQQQ]

While watching this episode I kept thinking... this is just like the movie After Hours! I didn't realize it was called Beard After Hours, so it all makes sense now!

 

Ted Lasso Pays Homage to Scorsese's After Hours

[LilJen]

My husband is threatening to obtain—and wear, in public—the weird disco/acid trip pants that Beard acquires. If he does that, of course, I will deny ever knowing him.

[ahisma]

8 hours ago, LilJen said:

My husband is threatening to obtain—and wear, in public—the weird disco/acid trip pants that Beard acquires.

Honestly, I love those pants! They take me right back to the ‘70s.

[LilJen]

On 3/16/2022 at 3:25 PM, ahisma said:

Honestly, I love those pants! They take me right back to the ‘70s.

Well, sure, disco and psychedelics all the way! But would you wear them in public? Not for Halloween? Unironically? 😜

[ahisma]

20 hours ago, LilJen said:

Well, sure, disco and psychedelics all the way! But would you wear them in public? Not for Halloween? Unironically? 😜

Maybe!

[Inquisitionist]

The last-minute increase from 10 to 12 episodes for season 2 does explain some of the odd pacing, but not all of it.  Does S2 cover just one season?  Clearly, I don't understand UK football, because last episode, Richmond got knocked out of the semi-final round for the FA Cup, which sounds like a season-ending thing, but then the season goes on?

[ajsnaves]

Someone could probably explain it better, but the FA Cup is a tournament amongst the several English teams, among the different tiers.  It is separate from regular season.  It is rare for a Championship League team (Tier 2) to make it that far from what I gather.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FA_Cup

I get that this is a divisive episode for some, but it is one of my favorites.  I love the bits with the 3 barflies whose names I forget.

[MargeGunderson]

15 hours ago, ajsnaves said:

Someone could probably explain it better, but the FA Cup is a tournament amongst the several English teams, among the different tiers.  It is separate from regular season.  It is rare for a Championship League team (Tier 2) to make it that far from what I gather.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FA_Cup

I get that this is a divisive episode for some, but it is one of my favorites.  I love the bits with the 3 barflies whose names I forget.

Baz, Jeremy and Paul. I watch the episodes for their scenes, and for Beard hula-hooping at the end. 

Edited June 14, 2022 by MargeGunderson

[Inquisitionist]

I cheated on Mr. Inqui by watching S2 on my own, so now I have to pretend I'm seeing episodes for the first time when I watch them with him.  That was a real chore for this one...