Ted Lasso season 3 is failing Keeley
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Ted Lasso spoilers follow.
The Amsterdam episode of Ted Lasso this season treated fans to so much of what we have come to love about the show: locker room revels from the team among the flying feathers of a pillow fight, Rebecca (Hannah Waddingham) being treated like the goddess she is in a Before Sunrise-style romance and genuine human connection in the most unlikely of places between Colin (Billy Harris) and Trent Crimm (James Lance).
However, what was a high water mark episode for the third – and possibly final – season of the cherished Apply TV+ hit also hammered home how ostracised Keeley Jones (Juno Temple) has become in the drama.
While the rest of the ensemble cast spiralled off on nocturnal adventures through the city, Keeley disappeared in the opening scenes for an offscreen Norway rendezvous with Jack (Jodi Balfour).
The latest Ted Lasso scenes find Keeley moping in the arms of Rebecca after she's been ghosted by Jack, leaving her "not heartbroken, more like heartbent".
As Keeley scrolls through the sea of texts sent and ignored on her Apple TV+ mandated iPhone, it's hard to shed a tear for controlling Jack after she treated Keeley like an embarrassment for her nude leak.
But Keeley's glum response to what was further proof of Jack's bad character asks whether Ted Lasso even remembers who this firecracker character is supposed to be. Even Ted (Jason Sudeikis) himself seems to sense Keeley is an afterthought – instead of baking her a round of his world-class biscuits like he does Rebecca, he just bungs her some bank notes.
Venture capitalist Jack, with a stealth wealth wardrobe worthy of Succession, is thus added to the list of characters who have blown in and out of Keeley's life this season, only really serving to undermine the character we had come to love in the first two outings of the show.
We watched Keeley's star rise as she defied all WAG expectations and shook off an inconsiderate Jamie Tartt (Phil Dunster) to become a key part of AFC Richmond's corporate dream team.
As this season started with her going it alone as the CEO of her own PR firm, having ended her relationship with Roy Kent (Brett Goldstein), it looked like she was on the verge of an exciting new chapter.
Yet in practice all it's done is put her in the same position as Nate (Nick Mohammed), splintered off from the locker room hub of the cast, but with none of the antagonistic stakes of the newly minted West Ham manager. Instead, Keeley's essentially been isolated in her own bad workplace drama – not a comedy, because there are few laughs here.
Keeley's initial struggles to fit in among her staff of charmless worker drones were reminiscent of Ted's own fish-out-of-water gaffes when he walked into the Richmond world back in the first season. Yet while those around the new coach came around to the 'Ted Lasso Way' and its requisite embroidered sleeve of hearts, there has been no such progress with Keeley and her number two CFO Barbara (Katy Wix).
Instead, we've seen Keeley fail and fail again in a fairly brutal beatdown that has dinted the sassy confidence she had built up to this point, turning her into more of a jokeless punchline in an impressively tall pair of stilettos.
There were initial hints that Ted Lasso didn't know what to do with Keeley as her working relationship with Shandy (Ambreen Razia) played out. Shandy, a model who also used to date footballers, appeared like a cautionary tale of what Keeley's life could have become and gave her the opportunity to pay it forward.
Yet any chance to reflect on Keeley's influencer past through her corporate present is upturned when Shandy's behaviour suddenly – and, if all honesty, inexplicably – flies off the rails, forcing Keeley to fire her. While Keeley learns a valid lesson about being a boss, it questions why Shandy was brought into the fold in the first place when her random demonisation feels like a missed opportunity.
Now as we creep closer to the end of the season, Keeley's character is being used as little more than a barometer for everyone around her – whether it be Jamie, Roy or Rebecca.
The fallout of Keeley's nude video being leaked to the public leads to an outstanding moment of character development – but not for Keeley, for Jamie, who had shielded the video behind the Fort Knox password "password".
Jamie pitched up at Keeley's door to deliver a heartfelt apology, proof of how he'd changed over the years. "I'm sorry. I'm really sorry Keeley. I really am," he told her with a look of genuine anguish.
The conversation called back to a similar one between them in the first season at the team's charity benefit. Jamie had delivered a throwaway apology for some of his classically cocky behaviour. "Do you know what you're even sorry for Jamie?" Keeley asked. "You always ask me that," he smirked before Keeley replied with a quiver in her voice: "Being accountable matters Jamie."
While some think the scene could be a sign of a renewed romance between Jamie and Keeley (Keemie? Jamley?), given how much airtime has been dedicated to the bromance between Jamie and Roy, it seems unlikely they would throw a Keeley grenade in between the freshly forged windmill chums.
The show keeps reaching for a way to keep Keeley involved, beyond making unscheduled house calls to AFC Richmond, but has so far only thrown up a new cast of characters to then shove them back out the revolving door of Keeley's PR firm.
The latest attempt to keep Keeley in the mix, with Jamie's doorstepping, was no doubt moving, but in terms of Keeley's characterisation, all it did was throw her under Jamie's bus, allowing him to drive off into the developed character sunset.
With only three episodes to go in what could very well be the last season of Ted Lasso, there's only a short runway left for Keeley, with a precipitous drop at the end.
Her company's primary investor is now a griping ex, her staff at said firm were less than charitable after her nude leak and there is nowhere at her spiritual home of AFC Richmond where she really fits. That is unless Ted Lasso intends to keep her plumped up on Rebecca's office sofa like a throw pillow.
The best case scenario would be that the remainder of season three does something to diminish the sense that little attention has gone into a character who had stood out on Ted Lasso as one we hadn't really seen before.
Ted Lasso season 3 streams on Apple TV+, with new episodes every Wednesday.
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