There was a big premiere event for Ted Lasso last night in NYC. Jason Sudeikis, Hannah Waddingham, Juno Temple and the rest of the cast all made some appearances. This is all for “Season 4,” which AppleTV begged for over three years ago. Like, AppleTV would have thrown any amount of money at Jason Sudeikis to keep Ted Lasso going on a steady schedule. Instead, Sudeikis and the writers drove the series off a cliff in Season 3 and ruined a lot of goodwill with fans. Now they want to come back three years later like nothing happened. What a mess. Well, Season 4 premieres today on AppleTV+. I haven’t watched the first episode yet, but I’m looking through some of the reviews:

Variety: “‘Ted Lasso’ Season 4 Is Both a Promising Reboot and a Tedious Sequel”

Anyone with even the vaguest understanding of the profit motive can understand why Apple TV sports comedy “Ted Lasso” has returned three years after its poorly received — yet still widely watched — third season seemed to close the book on its story. A streaming service continuing to milk one of its few major hits doesn’t prohibit the result from being enjoyable; if the first three seasons of “Ted Lasso” are effectively one (overlong, especially toward the end) sports movie, then Season 4 is its perfectly routine sequel. And in a genre filled with redemptive second chances, “Ted Lasso” could use one of its own. If a show has the chance to correct for mistakes like overindulgence and bloat, why not take it?

Slate: “The New Season of Ted Lasso Is Actually … Good? The previous season was a disaster. The surprise new one might actually make you “believe” again.”

The world didn’t need more Ted Lasso. By the time it wrapped up in 2023, the pandemic comfort watch had worn out its welcome, its winsome appeal pushed far past the point of cloyingness. The folksy charm of Jason Sudeikis’ Midwestern goofball had curdled into hokum, and the other characters had become calcified in their own quirkiness. Three seasons and 34 episodes turned out to be as much as the conceit of a soccer ignoramus turning a bedraggled group of misfits into a tightly knit team could sustain, and although the show managed to keep it together through the final stretch, the ending was as much a relief as anything else: Thank God they stopped before it got really bad.

The Hollywood Reporter: ‘Ted Lasso’ Review: Season 4 of Apple’s Hit Soccer Dramedy Struggles to Find Anywhere Interesting Left to Go

It would surely take a real a-hole to hate on Apple’s Ted Lasso. As of the latest season — the fourth, following a third that played coy to the very end about whether it might be the last — it remains perhaps the most insistently warmhearted series on television, full of kindly heroes who are open of mind and generous of spirit.

Every new person is just a new friend waiting to happen. Every new challenge is an exciting opportunity to extend oneself or someone else a bit of grace. In a world where cruelty so often seems to be the point, it should be a balm for the soul, a fortifying reminder that common decency still matters and always will.

And yet, I must confess, what this latest outing brought up in me was not my better angels but my inner grump, growing ever more impatient with the whole endeavor. Unimpeachably well-intentioned but frustratingly hollow, the long-delayed new season mostly serves to confirm that the Richmond way may have run its course. Perhaps I’m being harsh on a season that, in fairness, I did not actively despise. (I did warn you I was a jerk.) Where season three frustrated with its aimless pacing, its unruly plotting, its self-congratulatory strain of goodness, new showrunner Jack Burditt (30 Rock, Modern Family) dials back the worst of the show’s excesses.

[From Variety, Slate and The Hollywood Reporter]

Yeah, it doesn’t sound promising, but I’ll give it a shot. The reviews confirmed one of my favorite unhinged things about the series: that Jason Sudeikis uses Ted Lasso to exorcise his demons over Olivia Wilde. Magically, in Season 4, Lasso is able to uproot himself from his Kansas life because his ex-wife agrees to uproot herself and their son so they can all live in England. Yeah… Olivia wasn’t even willing to live full-time in New York with you, Jason, I’m sorry.

Photos courtesy of Backgrid, Cover Images.