Rating summary

Movie		4.0
Video		4.0
Audio		4.0
Extras		0.5
Overall		4.0

Ted Lasso: The Richmond Way Blu-ray Movie Review

Across the ocean without a paddle.

Reviewed by Randy Miller III August 3, 2024

Developed by Saturday Night Live alum Jason Sudeikis, Scrubs creator Bill Lawrence, writer/actor Brendan Hunt, and SNL scribe Joe Kelly, the ubiquitous sports comedy-drama series Ted Lasso enjoyed a popular run on Apple TV+ from 2020-23 before its planned ending and won't be resurrected anytime soon. (What won't they think of next?) This is a series that's big on heart and hits the ground running with an original premise, great characters, sharp dialogue, and occasional drama that punches you in the gut when your guard's down. A love of football is optional.

As its cover image implies, Ted Lasso (Jason Sudeikis) is a seemingly naïve optimist whose mustachioed grin belongs on a Judd Apatow movie poster. It's an expression that's regularly plastered onto his face beginning with the very first episode, where the moderately successful Kansas-bred college football coach is unexpectedly hand-picked to manage a fictional English Premier League soccer team, AFC Richmond; it's something of a ragtag group now owned by Rebecca Welton (Hannah Waddingham) after her recent divorce from husband Rupert (Anthony Head). Simply put, she would like nothing more than to sabotage the team Rupert has cared about for most of his life -- clearly much more than their turbulent 12-year marriage -- and she sees Ted as a bumbling fool who will run it into the ground. Needless to say, he endures a chilly reception from the players, the new owner, the press, and of course the local fans, who are rightfully furious that this goofy outsider seems to know absolutely nothing about their sport. Ted smiles anyway.

This "grin and bear it" approach only gets Ted so far... but in most cases, it's far enough. Since the club -- led by both the grumpy, aging team captain Roy Kent (Brett Goldstein) and the talented but cocky young Jamie Tartt (Phil Dunster) -- is unreceptive to Ted's charms, he builds a rapport with two fellow underdogs: Nathan Shelley (Nick Mohammed), the team's kit man with a hidden talent for playmaking; and Leslie Higgins (Jeremy Swift), owner Rebecca's meek assistant and patriarch of a large family. For a while, Ted's only other support is from his wife Michelle (Andrea Anders) and son, but it's strongly implied that they're going through marital difficulties from which they may not recover.

As the first and best season of Ted Lasso progresses during ten 30-minute episodes, it strikes an extremely careful balance between comedy, drama, and pathos. This is pretty impressive stuff for a character Sudeikis originally created and performed for NBC Sports' coverage of England's real-life Premier League almost a decade ago; it's essentially the equivalent of an SNL short being made into a long-form series, whereas most of them aren't even deep enough to fill a 90-minute movie. The performances are uniformly great from Sudeikis on down, which also includes Ted's right-hand man of few words, coach Beard (Brendan Hunt), team PR marketer Keeley Jones (Juno Temple), talented new recruit Dani Rojas (Cristo Fernández), journalist Trent Crimm (James Lance), and more. In all honesty, this first season is akin to "lightning in a bottle"; from almost every angle, it hits the ground running with energy to spare. There's barely a weak episode in the bunch -- only a few extremely minor speed bumps on the way to its exciting finale.

Part of the fun of its first season, for better or worse, is the slightly predictable but wholesome way Lasso stubbornly rebuilds his team from top to bottom. From secret cookie-baking to thoughtful gifts and shrewd confidence boosting, he's a figurative beacon of light that can't help but eventually win over most everyone else he meets. In a lot of ways, Ted Lasso reminds of the Paddington franchise... and not just because of the London backdrop. There's not a shred of malice in this character's heart so we can't help but root for him, his inner circle, and of course his struggling team as they desperately try to avoid relegation. Don't know what "relegation" means? Don't worry. As mentioned before, the backdrop of soccer/football is unavoidably ever-present but you absolutely don't need to be a die-hard or even casual fan of the sport to follow along or, of course, enjoy yourself: this story is overwhelmingly seen from the perspective of an American with no knowledge of it whatsoever. It even regularly pokes fun at odd cultural and social mores on both sides of the pond in a way that's funny but, like its main character, clearly not mean-spirited at heart.

Literally and figuratively, Ted Lasso's second and third seasons are a bit bigger than the first: not only is there a larger episode count (12 apiece), but they run about 5-15 minutes longer in the second season and occasionally over an hour during the third. In some cases this is a good thing, as new and returning supporting characters are now focused on in a way that broadens the series' emotional depth. But in my opinion it usually throws off Ted Lasso's pace more often than not, with the majority of these detours feeling noticeably rushed rather than carefully well-balanced. There are obvious exceptions, such as the fan-favorite episode "Rainbow" (S2, E5, and for many the show's finest hour), "Man City" (S2, E8), "Inverting the Pyramid of Success" (S2, E12), "Sunflowers" (S3, E6), "Mom City" (S3, E11) and, of course, the poignant and crowd-pleasing series finale "So Long, Farewell", which closes Ted Lasso on an emotionally satisfying note that doesn't encourage a hasty spin-off or, worse yet, a reboot several months or even years down the line. The creators have gone on record saying that they have no plans to continue the story for a long, long time, so what we're getting here is a complete package save for those NBC Sports shorts from almost a decade ago.

I was surprised as anyone else when Warner Bros. announced this seven-disc, three-season complete series Blu-ray collection back in May (curiously subtitled "The Richmond Way", which will undoubtedly confuse a few casual fans into thinking it's some kind of spin-off series or a follow-up movie); as far as I know, this is the first Apple TV+ show that's earned a physical media release. And though we sadly don't get a 4K HDR option here -- or bonus features, for that matter -- this is still a nicely put-together set with solid A/V merits and compact, practical packaging.

Episode List

Season One: "Pilot", "Biscuits", "Trent Crimm: The Independent", "For the Children", "Tan Lines", "Two Aces", "Make Rebecca Great Again", "The Diamond Dogs", "All Apologies", " The Hope That Kills You"

Season Two: "Goodbye Earl", "Lavender", "Do the Right-est Thing", "Carol of the Bells", "Rainbow", "The Signal", "Headspace", "Man City", "Beard After Hours", "No Weddings and a Funeral", "Midnight Train to Royston", "Inverting the Pyramid of Success"

Season Three: "Smells Like Mean Spirit", "(I Don't Want to Go to) Chelsea", "4-5-1", "Big Week", "Signs", "Sunflowers", "The Strings That Bind Us", "We'll Never Have Paris", "La Locker Room Aux Folles", "International Break", "Mom City", "So Long, Farewell"

Ted Lasso: The Richmond Way Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Ted Lasso streams in 4K resolution with Dolby Vision support on Apple TV+, so it's a real shame that a UHD option hasn't been made available on home video. Even so, Warner Bros.' 1080p/SDR transfers do a capable enough job with the all-digital source material, offering crisp and clear fine detail on close-ups and wide shots alike, where skin and costume textures can easily be picked out as well as proverbial blades of grass on the soccer field... er, football pitch. Color reproduction is also quite strong when the situation demands it, whether it be the bold primaries seen on team uniforms and the locker room or cozy pub lighting, not to mention the unmistakable red of London phone booths and double-decker buses. Black levels run decently deep and shadow detail holds steady with no major issues.

Disc encoding doesn't seem to pose any red flags (cards?) either: the seven-disc roster seems to offer sufficient real estate for this amount of content, with two dual-layered discs apiece for Seasons 1 and 2 and three discs for the longer Season 3. Each disc's bit rate seems to stick fairly comfortably in the 25-30Mbps range depending on location, at least during the random times I checked, although Season 2's slightly larger amount of total content -- as least compared to the first -- causes those numbers to dip slightly. No matter: only sporadic amounts of macro blocking and very light posterization could be spotted along the way, and most of these issues may only be detectable on larger displays (65-70"+). On the whole, it's a very capable effort and well within reasonable expectations for the format.

Ted Lasso: The Richmond Way Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

The DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio mix offers a solid surround sound presentation of this dialogue-driven show, one that features surprisingly little on-field action but nonetheless makes its presence known when needed. Conversations are cleanly recorded and perfectly intelligible (depending, of course, on your ear for various accents), while foreground and background effects are well-mixed and don't fight for attention. Discrete effects and the rear channels are put to good use for location-based ambiance, be it a rowdy locker room, boisterous pub, or of course a passionate crowd. There's also plenty of room left over for the terrific score and soundtrack: much of it is music by Marcus Mumford of Mumford & Sons, but there's also no shortage of needle-drop music cues by the likes of A Trible Called Quest, The Streets, Onyx, Biz Markie, Elastica, Robbie Williams, Vampire Weekend, David Bowie, The Lumineers, Queen, John Fogerty, Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, Nirvana, Digable Planets, Bob Dylan, Run the Jewels, Bob Marley and the Wailers, Oasis, Sir Mix-A-Lot, Blur, Rick Astley, and many more. (That's about 20% of the featured artists, to put things in perspective.)

While I have no immediate reservations about this 5.1 mix as a whole, it's still somewhat disappointing that Ted Lasso is available in Dolby Atmos for streaming on Apple TV+... but that format isn't offered here.

Optional English (SDH) subtitles are included during all 34 episodes.

Ted Lasso: The Richmond Way Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

This seven-disc release ships in double-width keepcase with multiple hinges and an inner print which, like the cover artwork, emphasizes that Ted Lasso is anything but a one-man show. A matching slipcover is included and we also get the pack-in printed bonus of a fold-out "Believe" poster as proudly displayed in the team's locker room. Unfortunately, no on-disc bonus features are included, which is pretty disappointing given the rather high asking price.

Ted Lasso: The Richmond Way Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Ted Lasso is a solid sports comedy-drama series that enjoyed a popular run on AppleTV+ from 2020-23 before its planned ending; as is, it's a really enjoyable effort despite the first season being its best run of episodes. The show's deft mixture of both comedy and drama is amplified by memorable characters, great performances, and a lot of heart, and of course you don't even need to be a die-hard fan of soccer/football to enjoy it -- in fact, it probably helps if you aren't. Perfectly suited for both drop-in viewing and marathons (I flew through the first season in a day), it also has a decent amount of replay value which makes an even better case for owning a physical copy. While Warner Bros.' three-season set is a little pricey and there's no 4K option (or extras), solid A/V merits make this a recommended purchase for established fans. Newcomers will probably love it too, but streaming a few episodes first wouldn't hurt.