#feels like watching roy and jamie's dynamic in ted lasso s1

[dragonsareawesome123]

Louise Gruzinsky and Ava Navarro from Big Shot are literally Roy Kent and Jamie Tartt from Ted Lasso in a different font asjsksks

[notyetbulletproof]

@ahoyjacaranda and I were chatting about this past Ted Lasso episode and our thoughts about Keeley Jones have resulted in this post:

What if all this drama is a step in the “Delivering on the Keeley Jones Character Arc” direction?

From the moment we meet Keeley and through her friendship with Ted and Rebecca, she is lovely and kind to everyone she interacts with. She’s sassy and will put you in your place but she’s not cruel. We do however learn about her through her relationships (expected in an ensemble show sure) then watch her come a little into her own. Watch her find new dynamics with others. She takes care of people, leaves people better than she found them. She’s allowing people to add value to her life too.

(Side-note: the writing lifts her out of the trope they played on and then Juno’s acting makes her the beautiful stunning awesome girl we know and love).

Anyway!

We kept coming back to what she said in that conversation in the bathroom with Rebecca. About her dating footballers. About getting older and growing out of certain things and still having the same dating patterns or making the same choices in her relationship. The fatigue of that. The monotony of it. The discontentment. Not breaking the cycle and excepting something different. And Rebecca asks her “what about being accountable?”. Being accountable (both to yourself and others) matters.

Then she and Roy got together. We kept thinking about the little things. The fact that Roy’s insecurities or struggles with vulnerability and letting people in is focused on more than Keeley’s. At the moment, that’s what it feels like. Probably because Roy (canonically) finds vulnerability and open communication more difficult than Keeley does. AND ALSO what happened between S1 and S2 and Roy needing to find his way back to himself and his life outsid of Roy Kent the soccer star. He’s still fucking Roy Kent(just new roles).

Perhaps the exploring of their vulnerabilities, insecurities and communication skills are gonna come back to a more balanced point soon. We’ve seen bits of it. We’ve seen her insecurities and struggles through communication issues, through her genuine fear when she thought Roy was leaving (as opposed to realising that he finally understood what she needed). Keeley is used to being the mature one in her relationships. The one that looked after the other person. The one helping. The one who stays. The one who comes back. The one who acknowledged her missteps and accepted it when the other party didn’t. Till she stopped and realised that equal accountability is important.

With Roy, she has a partner. Someone who wants to work as hard as she does. Someone who wants to help as much as she does. Someone who wants to listen as much as she does. Someone who calls her out the same way she calls him out. Someone who takes responsibility and accountability. Someone she does the same thing with. She takes accountability for her actions when she’s with him, takes responsibility. It’s having a partner VS being “the girlfriend”. It’s having someone you root for who also roots for you. We didn’t see that before. It’s not that it never existed but it’s supposed to be different with Roy, that’s why it works so well.

She’s used to relationships with dramatic exits, angst(!), poor communication or always being the one to “teach” the other. It’s not like her relationship with Roy is perfect, it’s just that now she’s with someone who is as invested as she is. In it as deep as her. Doesn’t want to screw it up as much as she doesn’t want to screw it up. So yes the dramatic shit still happens but it’s the follow up. It’s the coming back. It’s the working it out. It’s the let’s table this until we can actually communicate. It’s the lets talk to each other- because clearly not saying anything and bottling things up leads to outbursts and cold shoulders. Which are all counterproductive and can be annoying—- COMMUNICATION TAKES WORK. And they do the work??? It’s not always gonna be easy but that’s what it means to build a life with another person.

As for why this could be more part of Keeley’s arc than Jamie’s regression or self-sabotage or transference or (fine!) growth— is that we haven’t really seen her character arc play out outside of her relationships with other people. I’m not saying it won’t be an overarching arc or interwoven with both Roy and Jamie because we’ve seen the way Keeley impacts the people around her, we’ve seen her find joy and happiness and love. Still, in the same way we’ve been learning what fuels these characters, what has made them who they are, it would be nice to learn more about Keeley.

Why we think this is part of a confronting insecurities/vulnerabilities/preventing self-sabotage arc is simple—- It’s like when you want something for so long and then you finally get it and it takes more adjustments than you thought necessary. You know you want it and you love it but you’re also incredibly scared to lose it. So you revert to old coping mechanisms. It leads you to engage in self-sabotage because you don’t know how else to be. You have to call yourself out. Hold yourself accountable too.

Remind yourself that you deserve to be happy. And happiness more often than not, takes work. It’s a choice to push through the mud. Not every day will be a happy day but reminding yourself that it doesn’t always come easy, that taking work does not make it LESS good is helpful. The work is necessary. Not all the time sure but the things that matter are worth the tough work of communicating needs/wants/desires, being vulnerable, being accountable, being honest. Showing up. Doing the work.

Listen, we’ve been burned by writers before. So while we’re optimistic, we’re not putting all our hopes on this because LIFE you know?? Still wouldn’t it be nice?

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As usual, this got away from me. I’ll stop now.