There are sports activities dramas, after which there’s Friday Night time Lights.
Whereas All American and different sequence have explored the heightened drama that unfolds on the gridiron and within the locker room, no present in trendy historical past has constantly executed so with as a lot coronary heart as FNL.
ESPN columnist Invoice Simmons as soon as hailed it as “the best sports-related present ever made.” Many critics would add that the competition is just not a very shut one.
Final month, Selection reported that Common was creating a reboot of the beloved sequence, which ran from 2006-2011.
Now, the information has been confirmed, and the spinoff has been picked up by Peacock.
Certainly some followers are excited in regards to the prospect of returning to the world of Texas highschool soccer.
However the prevailing temper for the time being is one among utter confusion.
And the query on the minds of many FNL devotees is solely: Why?
Community execs usually can’t assist themselves from messing with perfection by returning to confirmed properties.
However on this case, the transfer is especially baffling for plenty of causes.
For starters, the unique Friday Night time Lights is solely not that previous.
13 years is perhaps an eternity within the leisure business, however FNL holds up extremely effectively, and it’s nonetheless accessible on Netflix.
And this isn’t a scenario the place the present is of historic curiosity to younger individuals as a result of it depicts a bygone period of unrecognizable customs and beliefs.
Members of Gen Z may watch Associates or The Workplace to see in on a unique world, however Friday Night time Lights is nearly shockingly modern in its themes and pursuits.
Its depiction of small-town life and the challenges of highschool are as related now as they had been in the course of the Bush years.
Talking of politics, the altering state of the world may need factored into the choice to make the journey again to Dillon, Texas.
However a part of the attraction of the unique sequence was its timeless high quality.
Friday Night time Lights started life as a 1990 non-fiction novel by H.G. Bissinger.
It was then tailored right into a short-lived 1993 tv sequence referred to as In opposition to the Grain (starring a younger Ben Affleck!)
Then it turned a 2004 function movie directed by Peter Berg, who occurs to be a cousin of Bissinger’s.
After which it lived on into the Obama years as a sequence that loved the form of cross-demographic attraction that we hardly ever witness these days.
In every of those iterations, the names of the characters modified, however the city, the crew, and the teaching workers remained targeted on successful as a way of preserving the pleasure of their neighborhood.
Sure, the unique FNL handled well timed points like racism, abortion, and substance abuse, however in lots of respects, it was a defiantly old-school present.
Would a brand new sequence have the ability to preserve the identical degree of populist attraction? Can any present pull off that magic trick in these hyper-divided instances?
No present needs to be anticipated to attempt for full political impartiality, and the unique FNL definitely didn’t.
However within the 2020s, the present would probably immediate a thousand irritating thinkpieces alongside the strains of the present hypothesis about Yellowstone’s political alignment. And that’s the very last thing we’d like.
Additional dampening enthusiasm for at the moment’s information is the rumor that the brand new model of FNL would concentrate on a completely new set of characters.
Which means, in fact, that Kyle Chandler, Connie Britton, and the remainder of the extremely stacked forged wouldn’t be returning.
Britton appeared to verify that rumor in current remarks on the topic.
“I heard that they’re making one other Friday Night time Lights, which I discover weird,” she advised Selection in September.
Evidently, it seems like she’s not concerned with the undertaking.
So yeah, the remake is certainly taking place, and we’re as anxious as a backup QB referred to as in after the star signal-caller bought knocked out of the sport.
It’s a wierd feeling to see such a unbelievable present again within the headlines and really feel something lower than giddy enthusiasm. However on the subject of this reboot we’re having a tough time summoning our “clear eyes, full hearts, can’t lose” mentality.
Over to you, TV Fanatics! Do you suppose this Hail Mary may end in a landing or would you relatively see Common punt on this concept?
Hit the feedback part under to share your ideas!
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