Ted Lasso Finale explained by Brendan Hunt; Will there be a season 5?

SPOILER ALERT: This article contains spoilers for the Season 4 finale of “Ted Lasso,” now streaming on Apple TV.

There’s a new coach at AFC Richmond, and it’s not Ted Lasso. The Season 4 finale of “Ted Lasso,” titled “The Departing Lass,” ended with Ted (Jason Sudeikis) handing the job of manager of the AFC Richmond women’s team to Alice Chilton (Tanya Reynolds), while he demotes himself to assistant manager alongside Coach Beard (Brendan Hunt).

Alice is up for the challenge, having been instrumental in the team’s rise. And at the same time, it turns out that Ted has been thinking about his father lately – who committed suicide when Ted was just 16 – and realizing that he has been too absent for his own son Henry again, he knows it’s time for a change.

Meanwhile, there’s also a change within the men’s team, as Roy (Brett Goldstein) has been offered – and accepted – a huge job managing the Chelsea team. But he and Keeley (Juno Temple) are about to have a child, so he has a lot to think about. Not to be outdone, Rebecca (Hannah Waddingham) proposes to her boyfriend Matthijs (Matteo van der Grijn).

And while the team mourns the death of pub landlady Mae (Annette Badland), she ends up saving the day from beyond the grave. Indeed, Zelda (Tracey Ullman) is ultimately thwarted in her attempt to acquire a majority stake in AFC Richmond by Mae’s last will and testament, which returns her shares in the team to Rebecca, keeping her at 51%.

Oh, and Nate (Nick Mohammad) comes to visit Nelson Road – and attends a meeting of the Diamond Dogs, who are called into office when Roy asks for advice on becoming a new father. And Beard, after going through a mid-life crisis this season, gets a haircut.

That’s a lot of history, not to mention a new version of the opening theme, now performed by Brandi Carlile.

Hunt, who also serves as executive producer and writer on “Ted Lasso,” spoke with Variety on the Season 4 finale – including whether there will be a Season 5.

Let’s start by talking about the end of the season. There was a little red herring when Roy left, so it looked like Ted was going to ask Rebecca for that job again. But instead, he was going to ask her to demote herself. How did this happen?

This was something Jason wanted to achieve from the very beginning in the writers’ room. He saw Ted’s resignation as a fundamental part of what the season was going to be. That’s why episode 1 starts with a close-up of his “Lasso assistant manager” badge, then we land on Ted Lasso as the assistant manager at the end. As for the fake, yes, just a tiny goose for the last moment. For anyone who still thought that somehow this was like a side joke with the women’s team – “ha, I knew he’d come back” – no, it’s not. We really love our women’s team, thank you very much!

We see that Ted still feels like he hasn’t spent enough time with Henry, and this lays the groundwork for his decision to withdraw. What was the discussion in the writers’ room about what Ted’s journey would be this season?

The Henry thing is the main thing. The idea of ​​bringing Henry to London this time, he thought in his head, ‘now I’ll have a lot more time with Henry’ – and it hadn’t worked out that way. He missed his games, especially since the Employee of the Year plaque reminds him that his record-breaking father unintentionally left him. You may be a little too dedicated to your job, and this can be harmful to your health. He just wants to make sure he’s with Henry more. And then, at the same time, he saw Alice grow up. She was almost ready when we first met her, and now she’s much more ready. I think he’s just ready to be support staff right now, have more free time and see what he can do with it.

Have you ever thought about letting Zelda take over AFC Richmond, perhaps as a cliffhanger for next season?

We definitely thought about all the options for this, including, “OK, what if there was a new boss here that everyone has to deal with, and what would happen?” » But in the end, we said no. This is Rebecca’s perch, and she’ll understand.

Speaking of cliffhangers, there aren’t many this season. But there are still a few avenues to take. What did you want to leave unresolved in season 5?

There aren’t many cliffhangers. But Ted and Beard as peers rather than hierarchically, I’m curious about that. Roy and Keeley become parents, curious about this. Rebecca got married, curious about it. The guys who run the pub, and how will the team take Alice as leader? These all feel more like questions than cliffhangers. But also, nothing yet indicates that we will be able to answer these questions. So for now, they’re still hanging in the air.

This raises the key question. What are you hearing about a season 5? What does Jason want to do in terms of comeback?

He’s playing the cards close to his chest, and I’m not privy to the poker games I hope will take place between the powers that be. I think we always hoped to come back for more than one, but if it ends up being just one, then OK, no big deal. It ended well. We’ll just have to see.

We’ve actually seen more of Mae this season, which made what happened at the end of episode 9 even more impactful. Did Mae have to die for Rebecca in order to save the team?

We had the idea that if we were going to lose Mae, then the phrase that kept coming up was: how can Mae save the team from the grave? And that’s how we headed towards this. Thank you to Annette Badland, who is so loved by us all and such a soldier. Once Jason told her what was happening, she agreed.

But tell me about the decision-making process surrounding Mae’s death.

It’s one of the life milestones that we go through, and we didn’t really experience it on the show, at least with someone we know or care about. For example, we never knew Rebecca’s father, but we were at his funeral. But Mae seemed like the right person for this, and to deal with all the repercussions. And then how can she, in death, just save the day.

Alright, let’s talk about Beard. He starts wearing colored contacts, he changes his hairstyle and starts wearing earrings. How did we decide that he was going to be tested this season?

Especially by the end of Season 3, we know that yes, Beard has a pretty strong facade, but he’s always had demons. We also learned this when we went to Beard’s after hours. As someone who has always dealt with her own self-image issues, it’s like you could, in her case, get the Ted Effect. You may like to find the best place possible. But you still have issues to deal with and you need to take care of them. And essentially, Jane’s situation without Ted for so long shook him. This left him in a vulnerable position. The point of all this is that there are only so many things other people can do for you. You need to go to the healthiest place. And he just can’t do it for a while here, following Jane’s stories. And then, when he thinks he’s going to get over this in the New Year, he takes another punch to the gut. All of which is a long-winded way of saying it’s just a good old midlife crisis – but with modern cosmetic choices.

And Richard Schiff apparently plays a version of Beard in Jane’s play!

I love Richard Schiff and I hope he enjoys it, because I know he watches the show. So it was a very intentional choice to shout out the legend.

How do you know he watches the show?

We literally ran into each other at the Emmys one year. The year I introduced Jane Lynch – and we didn’t even talk much. That was the year they were doing all the old cast reunions, and at one point, just walking up to my seat, here was the entire cast of “The West Wing.” Richard Schiff, in particular, smiled at me in a warm and wonderful way. It was very clear, like, “Oh wow, Richard Schiff loves the show. It’s really great.” So this is our cry.