Category Archives: Michael B. Jordan

Analog This: Five Seasons of Friday Night Lights in One Post

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This year, I am grateful that Netflix exists. It took me a while (well over a year, to be not-so exact), but I finally finished this show in its entirety. I was hesitant to watch it at first, because sports have never been my biggest interest and also I’ve been putting off watching “The Wire” for way too long. But this was the summer I finally decided to finish “Friday Night Lights.” What a long yet rewarding journey it has been. “Friday Night Lights” is not just a compelling drama. It changed the way I view people who are different than myself. Most importantly, it made me realize that sports are about more than just competition; sports are about stories. A coach can do more than merely teach a sport. A coach can also be your personal hero. Especially if that coach is played by Kyle Chandler.

I thought it would be hard to write a straight-up review of the entire series. Instead, I figured I’d recap each season to the best of my ability. There will be things I forgot (sorry in advance for the lack of Buddy Jr.), but that is because “Friday Night Lights” accomplished more and introduced more characters than the average drama that goes on twice as long as this show did.

To the best of my ability, here is my recap of five seasons, through good times and bad, of “Friday Night Lights”:


Season 1

Here is where it all began, naturally, because shows usually start in the first season. Unlike many of its contemporaries, “Friday Night Lights” never really struggled to find its voice. No matter, how many face lifts it went through, this show always knew what it wanted to be: a way to humanize and find the heart inside the tough world of Texas high school football. You never needed to be a sports fan to get on board with “Friday Night Lights.” And even if you’ve never dealt with poverty or absent parents as so many of the characters do, the struggles faced on this show still feel universal.

I always loved the way that the show, especially in season one, made each issue as important as the last, despite how different they were. In one episode, Smash faces the repercussions of doping. In another episode, Julie mulls having sex for the first time. Few other shows have ever portrayed teen and family life this realistcally and earnestly. Maybe the only other American show to do it this well was also kicked off of NBC too early: “Freaks and Geeks.”

Best Episode: I Think We Should Have Sex

MVPs: Coach & Tami


Season 2

Poor “Friday Night Lights.” This show could barely find an audience to begin with, and then it’s hit by a writer’s strike that cuts its second season nearly in half. Still, the writer’s strike doesn’t explain some of the completely insane plot lines that came out of season two. And by completely insane, I mean Landry Clarke murders a man with a pipe and then he and his father set his car on fire. It was too big of an obstacle in Landry’s relationship with Tyra in a show that usually gives its characters more plausible problems to triumph over. The season also suffered from a separation of the show’s power couple. Also, Julie Taylor became almost impossible to watch, and Matt Saracen was reduced to unlikable status. Yet, despite these issues, the show still came out on top, and left with enough good will that it didn’t manage to jump.

Best Episode: Leave No One Behind

MVP: Tami Taylor


Season 3

It took “Friday Night Lights” some time to climb back to the top but when it came back, it came back strong. Some of the most inspiring, intense, and moving episodes came out of this important transitional season. It contained some characters at their lowest points, including Buddy Garrity, who gets into a brawl at a strip club after a bad business deal that costs his daughter her college tuition. That’s a lot of bad things for one person to do, but as always, “Friday Night Lights” can make you hate somebody one episode, and then love them the next.

However, there was one character introduced this season who is pretty impossible to like, and he became Dillon’s chief villain: Joe McCoy. Now, he’s not a villain simply because he looks like evil Phil Dunphy. In my eyes, he is about as despicable a TV villain as Joffrey Baratheon, despite, you know, never killing anybody. It’s not just the way he abuses his son or pushes Coach Taylor out of his job. It’s his pompous, robotic, unbudging ego that makes me despise him so much. Props to D.W. Moffett on a great performance.

Season three was about a lot of tears and goodbyes. Smash Williams goes off to college and in a “Dazed and Confused” like moment, the boys get drunk on the field, because this is Texas. Tyra works hard and has a whole lot of redemption in her quest to get into a good school. In one of the shows finest hours, Jason Street flies to New York to fight for a dream job as a sports agent as well as a new home for his child. It’s also just flat out funny watching a bunch of guys from rural Texas trying to map out Manhattan.

When season three ended, the show had an uncertain future. It looked like its time at NBC was done. That’s why the finale serves as both a season and a series finale. Eric is forced to become the head coach for the football team of the newly created East Dillon High School. Eric and Tami stand together on the dilapidated field, very cautious and unsure of what the future would hold for them. Luckily, DirecTV, for the first and only time ever, saved the day and let the world watch Dillon for two more seasons.

Best Episode: New York, New York

MVP: Landry Clarke


Season 4

Season four is truly the beginning of a new “Friday Night Lights,” and it takes some time to adjust to. It’s hard to see something you know so well completely change before your eyes. After a few episodes, I felt right at home.

The seasons begins as the unprepared East Dillon Lions are forced to forfeit their first game, a humiliation that doesn’t bode well for Coach Taylor or the rest of the team. It sets up a tumultuous season for the characters, in which much is lost and many mistakes are made. Ultimately, season four is  a true underdog story. The most triumphant victory story of the season is Vince, wonderfully played by Michael B. Jordan, who comes from nothing to become a star quarterback.

Early on, Matt Saracen loses his father. The aftermath of his father’s death is portrayed in what is perhaps the show’s best episode, which is highlighted by an amazing performance by Zach Gilford.

Sometimes it’s easy to forget that “Friday Night Lights” is as much about Tami as it is about Coach, and this season was a crucial one for Dillon’s greatest lady. It was also a sad one for her, when she sees one of her good deeds come back and punish her. By the end, she finds herself going from principal of Dillon High School to a guidance counselor at East Dillon High, a smart move on the show’s creators parts to get both Taylors conveniently in one place.

My favorite part of this season, and the season that followed, was the prominence of the Riggins family, who brought warmth and much needed comic relief to the show. Even at his worst, I always knew that Tim Riggins was a good guy. Then in the season finale, he pulls off the ultimate move of self sacrifice by taking the blame for a crime that his brother committed.  Eric Taylor might be the main character of “Friday Night Lights,” but Tim Riggins is the big, beating heart. “Friday Night Lights” is mainly about what it means to be a man, and that seems to involve stepping up when the time is right and taking responsibility, even when it seems absolutely insane. Tim Riggins exemplifies what it means to be selfless.

Best Episode: The Son

MVP: Tim Riggins


Season 5

The final countdown.

For a brief moment in season five, I feared that it was going to fall into the season two trap of melodrama. What has always elevated “Friday Night Lights” above soap is its great writing that always puts the characters problems into perspective. That was lost in season two with Landry. Then in season five, Julie Taylor goes off to college and has an affair with her married TA. His wife finds out and Julie is crushed. She moves back home and stages a car crash so she won’t have to go back to school. Things get a little insane for a brief second, but I remained on board because for the first time in the show’s history, I felt some real sympathy for Julie. Being called a “slut” in front of your entire dorm certainly could not have soothed the pain of her recent breakup with Matt.

Season five was definitely an uplifting one, as the East Dillon Lions became a force to be reckoned with. However, it was also incredibly heartbreaking to watch Vince’s personal life crumble, as his father comes back into his life and interferes too much with his future. There was always a nice father-son relationship between Coach and Vince and that is almost lost this season.

It took three seasons for “Friday Night Lights” to build a brotherhood between the original Dillon Panthers. In just two very short seasons, the bond between the East Dillon Lions created is even stronger, as best seen in the episode “Kingdom.”

This was yet another important season for Tami, as she is offered the job of a lifetime as Dean of Admissions at a Philadelphia college. Does it make sense that a counselor from a Texas high school could suddenly be asked to run an entire university? Probably not, but Tami Taylor is that awesome that I got right on board. This story also led to the greatest challenge in Coach and Tami’s marriage. In the end, like Tim in the season before him, Coach makes the ultimate act of sacrifice and moves away from Dillon so Tami can take the job.

The Taylors were always two of the most important people in Dillon. Yet, they were also always the outsiders, which helped give us the audience a better understanding of this town. They weren’t born Dillonites, but they define this fictional town that feels all too real. Yet, they were even too big for this town. Dillon will be a very different place without them. But as the ending promises, Coach can bring clear eyes and full hearts to any place he goes to.

Best Episode: Kingdom/Always

MVP: Billy Riggins


Best. Casting. Ever.

Movie Review: Fruitvale Station

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“Fruitvale Station” is based on a true story. I didn’t know that before I saw it, given that I am an idiot who sometimes forgets to read the news. It’s not necessary to know the story before you see it, but some knowledge would definitely help. In short, “Fruitvale Station” is about a standoff between some Bay Area cops and a few young black men at a train station in Oakland that ended in a tragic death.

That is just a short answer to what “Fruitvale Station” is about, and an answer that does not really give it justice. It’s about the last day in the life of Oscar Grant (Michael B. Jordan), which also happened to be on the last day of 2008. It is also about humanizing the dead and finding empathy by creating context. Oscar’s final day is filled with little moments that normally wouldn’t mean much in terms of one’s entire life. However, they mean the world in someone’s final hours.


Oscar had been in and out of jail many times. He is constantly marred by financial woes and an inability to stay out of trouble. Despite his criminal nature, Oscar can best be described as a family man. He loves his girlfriend Sophina (Melonie Diaz), even if he drives her crazy. He’ll pay for his mother’s (Octavia Spencer) birthday dinner even when he’s broke. Most importantly, he makes sure to send his young daughter Tatiana (Ariana Neal) to private school.

“Fruitvale Station” moves slowly, but it is full of those small, important defining actions. A scene where he personally helps a customer on his off day at his supermarket job may seem like a detour, but it shows his surprising amount of caring, even for strangers. It is all subtle buildup (saying it is manipulation wouldn’t be fair) for what’s to come.

This is a film that definitely creeps up on you and makes you put your defense down because it is a surprisingly warm film throughout. It celebrates culture and family. First time writer and director Ryan Coogler nails everything from the dialect to the food in such a detailed way that you would have sworn that he had lived in the Grant household and followed Oscar around the streets of Oakland for most of his short life. As Oscar, Michael B. Jordan gives life and love to Coogler’s script. Even when he’s doing something nasty, there is always a compassion in Jordan’s demeanor that makes it so easy to instantly forgive Oscar. No matter where the film took me, I never wanted to turn against him.

Unfortunately, “Fruitvale Station” is painfully short. I say painfully because I know that there was so much more story that could have been filled in before, in between, and after. While the film is just meant as an encapsulation of one day in Oscar Grant’s life, it felt like there was a lot more going on below the surface that it neglected to bring up. Perhaps Coogler felt that bringing too much up would hurt the film, which is meant to simply glance at all of the events as is. Yet, “Fruitvale Station” doesn’t feel completely objective.

There are certain points in the film where it feels like the fly leaves the wall to start picketing. Now, there’s nothing wrong with a film having a strong social message. However, debates that deeply explore the merits of both sides tend to be much more interesting and thought provoking. A scripted film should never be a PSA. Even if you agree with the point a film is making, it is hard to enjoy when it feels like you’re being preached to.

If you want to see a film that expounds these ideas even further, watch “American History X” instead. “Fruitvale Station” would be a little more like a modern “Do the Right Thing” if it asked the right questions. “Fruitvale Station” looks at race relations and misunderstanding during a time when everyone has a cell phone that can record everything and then be sent everywhere. What “Fruitvale Station” neglects to explore is how easy it is to misinterpret something when watching it on such a tiny screen.

“Fruitvale Station” definitely does justice to Oscar Grant. Bringing a tragedy such as this one to light is one of the most important functions that any film can offer. Yet, when a film only asks one-sided questions, it falls into the trap of reenactment.

Movie Review: Chronicle

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Apparently, when you put together two genres together that didn’t need another entry (superhero; found footage), something good can happen. 

“Chronicle” is like taking a philosophy course, albeit an introductory one where you only go to half of the lectures. That doesn’t mean it isn’t intriguing, it just means that there could have been a little more substance to stick around for. 


Like many found footage movies, “Chronicle” begins with a camera reflected in the mirror, looking directly back at the audience. Misfit Andrew Detmer (Dane DeHaan) uses his camera to block out the outside world, just as the lock on his door blocks out his drunk and abusive father from continuing to make his life miserable. His only real friend is his cousin Matt (Alex Russell), who drives him to school every morning and rambles on about reading Schopenhauer. In between philosophical lectures, he tells Andrew to put his camera away, and to actually start interacting with people.

At a party one night, Andrew meets his female counterpart, a blogger (Ashley Hinshaw), who also films the events around her, but with a purpose. Every male blogger in the world just found their new MPDG. Matt and Steve (Michael B. Jordan, no relation to the other Michael Jordan) find a strange hole out in the woods with a glowing light coming out of it, and they bring Andrew along to film it. They get a bit too close to the light and next thing they know, Andrew has to buy a new camera.

The switch in quality of Andrew’s camera is also the movie’s shift in story. After no explanation of what happened immediately after finding the light (perhaps for the better), the three friends find that they have obtained telepathic powers. Like the other recent found footage movie, “Project X,” the most realistic part of the movie occurs in its early stages. Like anyone with newfound super powers, they test out their abilities. And while Andrew could try and save his dying mother, he instead blows girls skirts up and messes with bullies. Because what else would a high schooler want to do?

The so-called “testing” portion takes up a seemingly long, but actually very short, time in the movie. These scenes showcase some of the most impressive special effects I have seen in a movie in a quite a while. Watching the Seattle Space Needle be built of Legos, and then get torn down, is a stunning visual, and it offers some terrifying foreshadowing. Another scene in which Andrew tears a spider to bits, makes you wonder both how it was made, and what it means. It definitely portends to his psychotic side. Not looking too deep into it, it is a mind-altering sight.

Unlike most superhero movies, the heroes aren’t fighting for some cause, or against some villain. Rather, they are fighting against themselves. When one obtains powers, both a hero and a villain are created within them. If I am understanding Schopenhauer right, then it is our personal will which one we will actually become. Perhaps the battle over control of their powers is just representative of the problems of teen angst. We’ve all gone through it, but not in this way.

“Chronicle” goes deep, but perhaps not deep enough. At times, director Josh Trank gets a little too caught up in the movie’s unique special effects, and forgets to push the story forward. However, we are given a disarming yet frightening performance by DeHaan, who with just his eyes can control our emotions the same way Malcolm McDowell did with his glare in “A Clockwork Orange.”

At one point, Andrew describes himself as the apex predator: he is the top of the food chain, and therefore can do whatever needs to be done to survive. With great power comes great responsibility. This famous line from “Spider-Man” now makes absolute sense to me: when one obtains great power, they are responsible not just for what they do, but for whom they become. It is not just his slide into insanity that makes Andrew so disturbing, but rather the fact that he believes he is justified in his actions.

This is a very intense and absorbing moral dilemma. However, it leads to one of the film’s bigger problems: the complete disregard of all of the other moral dilemmas that could have come about. Andrew’s sick mother seems only to be in the plot as a means to anger his father more. But what would be the implications of Andrew both trying to kill his father, and save his mother? The world will never know. All we know is that he is a good son, and he tried. You’d think someone with telepathy would try a little bit harder.

The final battle is one to be remembered. The battle between cousins Andrew and Matt is very powerful, but would have been more so had the story delved into Matt further. Certainly, he is more complex than to serve simply as the good guy of “Chronicle.” In moral dilemmas, good guys shouldn’t be so easy to define.

Without giving too much away (because, I do hope readers go see this movie), “Chronicle” ends in an underwhelming way that is something of an injustice to the rest of the movie. While Matt seems to be doing a good thing in where he has gone to, a more ambiguous ending would have made a lot more sense here. Watching him fly off into the sunset, like a cowboy who can levitate, would have hammered the whole point across. The new powers the three friends obtain were supposed to make them more popular. In the end, great power is more alienating than no power at all.

Josh Trank’s First Feature: