The fourth season of the comedy series Ted Lasso has begun releasing on Apple TV+, bringing actor Jason Sudeikis back to his role as an optimistic football coach who understands life better than a life coach. Created by Sudeikis alongside Bill Lawrence, Brendan Hunt, and Brett Goldstein, the show originated in 2020 as a co-production between the United States and the United Kingdom. Spanning 35 episodes across four seasons with runtimes of 40 to 45 minutes, the project holds a rating of 8.5 on Kinopoisk and 8.8 on IMDb, starring Sudeikis, Goldstein, Hannah Waddingham, and Jeremy Swift.
At the end of the third season, Ted Lasso returned to his home state of Kansas after coaching Richmond, a successful English football team that never won a trophy. Taking a job as a supermarket cashier to avoid missing the childhood of his teenage son Henry, played by Gus Turner, Ted continues to apply his coaching mindset in his hometown. He uses practical examples to stop a younger store colleague from shoplifting while encouraging a good-natured atmosphere throughout the town.
Henry has started getting into trouble at school for quoting lyrics from tracks by Public Enemy. Parenting remains Ted's top priority, leading him to decline an initial request from businesswoman Rebecca, played by Hannah Waddingham. Rebecca travels to Kansas to ask Ted to return to London and manage her new women's football team. Although he initially turns her down, the repetitive routine of store work and memories of previous victories and defeats prompt Ted to consider the move, while evaluating whether his extended family, including ex-wife Michelle, played by Andrea Anders, would follow him to England.
Audience viewership and critical reception
The core characteristic of the series is its persistent optimism across every frame. Television critics praised the first season and its follow-up, but consensus shifted during the third season, which was originally intended to be the final entry. Reviewers faulted the third season for aimlessness and an excessive focus on secondary characters. However, viewer interest grew as the season progressed, setting audience records by the finale. Fans watched 800 million minutes of the show in a single week, leading producers to continue the series beyond the season that ended in 2023.
Ted Lasso originated from promotional comedy sketches created for NBC Sports before debuting during the COVID-19 pandemic lockdowns in 2020, offering therapeutic value to viewers staying at home. The show reframed locker room talk, a phrase popularized during the 2016 presidential campaign of Donald Trump following off-camera sexist remarks about married women. Sudeikis and his creative team transformed the sports locker room setting into a safe environment where male characters share feelings, build healthy bonds, and develop positive masculinity during early adulthood.
Comparison with contemporary streaming series
The fourth season arrives as Ted Lasso takes on women's football in a world changed by new developments, including artificial intelligence and neural networks. The show belongs to a small category of streaming series centered on human coexistence rather than rivalry, alongside programs such as The Good Place, How To with John Wilson, High Maintenance, Sex Education, and Shrinking. Christopher Storer's haute cuisine drama The Bear explores similar themes through a more nervous, profanity-filled style.
These television series reflect a move away from postmodern cynicism toward values of openness, curiosity, and new sincerity. In this framing, leadership requires a willingness to sacrifice individual ego for team victory, and to sacrifice victory for fair play.
