Reviewed by Jason Davis

There will be no football metaphors in this review.  I won’t refer to first downs, field goals, or other such things because I have absolutely no idea what any of them mean.  Despite my Texas origins, I’ve never got the sport, which makes the fact that Friday Night Lights is my favorite series on broadcast television somewhat ironic.  In the interest of journalistic integrity, I should probably cop to the fact that a friend of mine from high school -- Stacey Oristano, whose role as a stripper belies her real-life sweetness -- has a recurring role on the series.  In my defense, I was hooked long before I knew she worked on the show and didn’t even recognize her on first appearance.

For me, the appeal of the series rests more in its execution than in the individual components of its makeup.  That’s why Landry’s (Jesse Plemmons) accidental murder in the opening episode of this strike-truncated season didn’t ring any alarm bells for me.  Sure, it’s a plot that smells suspiciously like something 90210 might have tried in its waning years, but that long-running Fox soap could never have handled it with such angst and uncertainty as showrunner Jason Katims and his writers deployed.  Rarely have I felt so much remorse and confusion emanating from a character as when Landry confronts his newfound girlfriend Tyra (Adrianne Palicki) about his guilt.  The fashion in which the story played out was perfectly plausible without letting the character off the hook or taking the series into a different realm of drama.  The same comments could be applied to the story of the Dillon Panther’s paralyzed quarterback Jason Street (Scott Porter) and his quest to attain unsanctioned restorative surgery south of the border.  At a glance, it looks like melodrama, but this show pulls it off with heart rarely glimpsed elsewhere on the airwaves.

Combining the best ensemble of actors to be found anywhere (or at least tying with Battlestar Galactica’s) with a writing, directing, and editorial style that encourages spontaneity (and its frequent offspring, creativity), Friday Night Lights provides a spark of life in an overproduced TV landscape where carefully choreographed camera moves capture tightly scripted dialogue re-written to perfection and edited together like a perfectly patterned jigsaw puzzle, sans rough edges.  The show could come disguised as a police procedural or with the trappings of the science fiction genre, but the delivery is the key rather than the content -- it’s a drama about unformed teenagers (and adults, for that matter) grappling with real life and its concomitant loose ends and ragged edges.  And in that respect, Friday Night Lights excels like few others.

 

This year’s DVD release adds a trio of commentaries to yet a slew of deleted scenes worthy of season one’s plethora of excised treasures.  Katims, Palicki, and Plemmons are joined on the supplementary soundtracks by actors Connie Britton and Aimee Teegarden as well as frequent director Jeffrey Reiner.  As is becoming customary with DVD releases of all superlative series, the show’s session from the William S. Paley Festival is also included.  The 16:9 image and Dolby Digital 5.1 audio showcase the production values to the best of DVD’s abilities.