Friday Night Lights (TV series)

For the 2004 film, see Friday Night Lights (film).

Friday Night Lights
File:FNL Un.JPG
Created by	Peter Berg Brian Grazer David Nevins
Starring	Kyle Chandler Connie Britton Gaius Charles Zach Gilford Minka Kelly Taylor Kitsch Adrianne Palicki Jesse Plemons Scott Porter Aimee Teegarden
Country of origin	United States
No. of episodes	22 (list of episodes)
Production
Running time	43 Minutes (Approx) Timeslot: 60 Minutes including commercials
Original release
Network	NBC
Release	October 3, 2006 – present

Friday Night Lights is an award winning American television serial drama adapted by Peter Berg, Brian Grazer and David Nevins from a book of the same name. The series details events surrounding the Dillon Panthers, a high school football team based in fictional Dillon, Texas. The show uses a small-town backdrop to address many issues facing contemporary Middle America.

Produced by NBC Universal, Friday Night Lights initially received an order of 12 episodes and began airing on October 3, 2006 at 8:00pm on NBC. NBC increased this number on November 13, 2006 ordering a full season of 22 episodes . In addition to airing in the United States, the program is also broadcast in Canada, The Philippines, Finland, Sweden, Ireland, Norway, Iceland, Italy and the United Kingdom and is available from several online sources.

On May 10, 2007, NBC sources confirmed to TV Guide's Michael Ausiello that the network had renewed the show for a second season . This was confirmed by NBC on May 14, 2007 when it was announced that the show would change timeslots during the 2007/2008 season, airing, appropriately enough, on Friday nights at 10/9c. After a shakeup in NBC management the timeslot was adjusted so the show could air an hour earlier at 9/8c. Season 2 episodes are scheduled to begin airing on October 5, 2007.

Characters

Major Roles

• Eric Taylor (Kyle Chandler) — The varsity football coach of the Dillon Panthers. Under immense pressure to succeed, he is constantly conflicted between what is right and what will win. He doesn't seem to approve of his daughter and Matt Saracen, the team quarterback, dating. He has accepted a coaching job in Austin at fictional Texas Methodist University (TMU), and the team gets the news right before the championship game.

• Tami Taylor (Connie Britton) — The wife of Eric Taylor, mother of Julie Taylor, and a guidance counselor at Dillon High. Often acts as the voice of reason to Coach Taylor, and has just found out she is pregnant. She did not approve of her daughter's friendship with Tyra at first, but began to accept it when she felt guilty for treating Tyra so badly. Also became the mentor to Tyra, encouraging her to set goals in life and go on to college. Tami became excited about the move to Austin but began to change her mind when she realized that she could not leave Dillon behind. Has told her husband that she isn't going to Austin and that she is staying in Dillon with Julie to raise her baby, and continue helping the students of Dillon High.

• Julie Taylor (Aimee Teegarden) — Daughter of Eric and Tami Taylor. Attends Dillon High School, as a sophomore. Has admitted that she hates football and football players, although she soon gave notice to Matt Saracen, who began to develop a huge crush on her. After talking more and more to Matt, she agreed to go on a date with him and is now officially his girlfriend. Julie also began to develop a strong friendship with Tyra Collete, a friendship that her mother does not approve of, going so far as to forbid her from being around Tyra, who Tami blames for the rebellion that Julie began showing when their friendship first started. Julie does not want to move to Austin, as she finally felt at home in Dillon, after moving from town to town all her life. Julie will now be staying in Dillon with her mother, while her father goes to Austin, alone.

• Jason Street (Scott Porter) — The former star quarterback of the Dillon panthers and former fiancee of Lyla Garrity. Street was paralyzed from the chest down during the first game of his senior year and has developed an interest in quad rugby. He is an assistant coach of the Dillon Panthers.

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The cast of Friday Night Lights (Connie Britton not shown).

• Lyla Garrity (Minka Kelly) — Former fiancée of Jason Street and former Panthers cheerleader. With Jason looking at extensive rehab after a catastrophic injury, Lyla must deal with emotional conflict between staying with Jason or moving on. Recently cheated on Jason with Tim Riggins, Jason's best friend. Her father is Buddy Garrity, owner of a car dealership, the Dillon Panthers' biggest booster, and recently tossed out by his wife for having a fling with Tyra Collette's mother.

• Tyra Collette (Adrianne Palicki) — Tim Riggins' on-again, off-again girlfriend and the town "vixen." She seems to be one of the only people in the town who doesn't follow football religiously, and is often disdainful of the way the Dillon Panthers are worshipped. She has expressed an interest in leaving Dillon, but currently still lives with her single mother, Angela. Has recently become friendly with Landry, after often showing her dislike of him. It seems their friendship will grow as Landry appeared to comfort and help her almost immediately after a stranger at the Alamo Freeze attempted to rape her.

• Matt Saracen (Zach Gilford) — #7 - The shy and stuttering quarterback of the Dillon Panthers and boyfriend of Julie Taylor. Saracen's father is in Iraq and he lives with his grandmother who is suffering from Dementia.

• Smash Williams (Gaius Charles) — #20 - The running back of the Dillon Panthers. The most talented player on the team, he is the most likely to succeed at the college level. His desperation to get to the next level leads him to take drastic measures such as using steroids. Smash's drive to be at the top stems partially from a sizeable ego, but also because he sees a football career as a "meal ticket" and a means of providing for his family. His father is deceased and he lives with his mother and two sisters. He is often shown praying with the team or attending church with his family. Prior to the championship game he was approached by Ray "Voodoo" Tatum to change schools. He dislocates his shoulder in the championship game but refuses to sit out, which leads to him score the winning touchdown to win the Texas state championship.

• Tim Riggins (Taylor Kitsch) — #33 - The fullback of the Dillon Panthers. Best friend to Jason Street, but fell in love with Jason's girlfriend while the two had an affair. Sullen and morose, he is the silent backbone of the Dillon Panthers football team. Appears to suffer from alcoholism. He has difficulty with schoolwork and there is a suggestion that he may be illiterate. Lives with his older brother Billy, because their parents skipped out on them.

• Landry Clarke (Jesse Plemons) - Best friend of Panthers quarterback Matt Saracen, but not on the football team, he often gives Matt advice and support, although his advice is often unhelpful. Front man of the Christian speed-metal band Crucifictorious. Recently, he was also Tim Riggins' personal literature tutor, at Mrs. Taylor's request. Landry provides many of the light-hearted comic moments on the show. Landry harbors a huge crush for Tyra, and has recently managed to form a friendship with her, despite her previous open dislike towards him.

Secondary Roles

• Buddy Garrity (Brad Leland) - Owner of a popular Dillon car dealership and father of Lyla Garrity. With his powerful influence in the town, Buddy always tries to be involved with the Dillon Panthers football team, doing whatever he can to bring talent to the Panthers and resolve any problems with the players or their families. Recently hired Tyra Collette's mother, Angela, and engaged in an affair with her. After Angela made the affair public, Buddy's life came crashing down, revealing that his prestige and influence were built on a house of cards.

• Billy Riggins (Derek Phillips) — Brother to Tim Riggins, Billy is a semi-father figure to Tim acting as a peer most times but looking out for his interests like a father at others. Won a State Championship as a Dillon Panther during his own high school days.

• Mac MacGill (Blue Deckert) — Offensive coordinator for the Dillon Panthers. Had hoped to be tapped for head coach position that went to Coach Taylor. He was nearly forced to resign after inadvertently using a racial slur to describe certain players athletic abilities. Grew up with a racist father and has admitted to inadvertently allowing some of that to seep into his own psyche.

• Lorraine “Grandma” Saracen (Louanne Stephens) — Grandmother to Matt Saracen, she often requires special care from Matt. She suffers from Dementia.

• Corrina “Mama” Williams (Liz Mikel) — Mother to “Smash” Williams, she is very protective of all her children and worries particularly about the pressure Smash puts on himself. She often acts as the voice of reason to Smash when he's allowed his natural enthusiasm to rise to the point of being harmful.

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NBC Promo Art for Friday Night Lights.

• Herc (Kevin Rankin) — Athlete with the same injury as Jason Street, member of the national quad rugby team who has taken Street under his wing.

• Waverly Grady (Aasha Davis) — Girlfriend to “Smash” Williams and daughter of Reverend Grady, she is very politically-oriented and tends to incite people to act on issues she feels are important. Suffers from bipolar disorder which recently manifested itself when she stopped taking her medication.

• Ray “Voodoo” Tatum (Aldis Hodge) — Louisiana resident (displaced by Hurricane Katrina) and Panther quarterback for two weeks after being brought to town by Buddy Garrity to replace Jason Street. He only played in one game, in which he was removed at halftime for calling his own plays, a strategy which gave his opponents a disastrous interception. Though originally said to have returned to his home of New Orleans, he ended up transferring within Texas and was the starting quarterback for West Cambria High School against Dillon in the Texas state championship game.

• Jackie Miller (Brooke Langton) - Single mother to Bo Miller with a predilection for younger men. Developed small fling with Tim Riggins but chose to end it, fearing Bo's reaction should he discover the truth.

• Henry Saracen (Brent Smiga) — Father to Matt Saracen and a member of the armed services, he is stationed in Iraq and has indicated he will remain there until the military mission in Iraq is complete. Having been absent for much of Matt's life, he struggles with being a father -- a situation that has led to tension between the two.

• Angela Collette (Dana Wheeler-Nicholson) — Mother to Tyra Collette and former mistress to Buddy Garrity, she has lived her life attached to a man, having only had one real job. She is unsupportive of her daughter Tyra's attempts to better herself and get into college. She often creates or worsens Tyra's problems by treating her like a peer instead of a daughter.

• Bobby “Bull” Reyes (Walter Perez) — Star defensive player who is known to have severe anger problems. Was arrested for assulting a fellow student. Reyes lied to Coach Taylor, the police and the rest of the town when he told them all that the student he assulted, Matt Saracen's friend Kaster, made racist comments to him. This was not true, as it was Ray 'Voodoo' Tatum who was responsible for the racial slurs toward Reyes. When Coach Taylor found out that Reyes lied to him, he was kicked off the team.

• Tony Dolia (Charon R. Arnold) — #1. Tony has been instrumental in several of the Panthers' on-field victories and was only shown outside of uniform when he and the rest of the Panthers went to visit Jason Street at his rehab facility before their game against Arnett Meade.

• Bradley Cole (James Powers) - #56, Bradley is shown mostly outside of the Panther uniform and has had a few speaking roles throughout the first season. Helped destroy Tim Riggins' truck with a few of his teammates after learning of his affair with Lyla Garrity. Also gave Matt Saracen the keys to his lake house, where Matt and Julie were planning to have sex for the first time.

Episodes

Main article: List of Friday Night Lights episodes

Plot

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Jason Street and Matt Saracen

Friday Night Lights is the story of the Dillon Panthers, their Coach Eric Taylor and the fictional city of Dillon, TX, a town that lives and dies with every game their Panthers play. It is not a “sports show” in that the individual episodes tend to revolve around the personal lives of the Coach and his players and not around the actual playing of Football. Upcoming games are treated more like ever present specters in the background, influencing events while not being the focus of them.

Accordingly not every episode will show an actual game even though every game that is played by the Panthers is shown to some extent, often in cut scenes at the end of an episode.

The show puts special emphasis on dealing with social issues facing the various team members and their families. Episodes have addressed pertinent social issues such as infidelity, drug use, mental illness, racism, alcoholism and parental abandonment.

Season One

Main article: Friday Night Lights (season 1)

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Coach Taylor and Tim Riggins

Season one revolves around two main events, the ascension of Coach Eric Taylor to the position of head coach and the paralysis of star Quarterback Jason Street. These two events set off a chain reaction that leads the series through its first season, a season that largely revolves around a few basic themes.

The first of these themes is the overcoming of adversity. This is most evident in the juxtaposition of the team's new quarterback Matt Saracen and Jason Street who is now paralyzed from the waist down. Both these characters must struggle against seemingly insurmountable odds as Street learns to live without the use of his legs and Saracen must rise to be worthy of the position he has now inherited. Both struggle mightily against their respective challenges and their journeys largely parallel each other as each eventually conquers those challenges.

At the same time, a theme that repeats itself throughout the first season is the struggle Coach Taylor must face trying to balance the need to do the right thing with the need to appease a town whose hopes and dreams are inseparably intertwined with their high school football team. At several points Taylor must risk his team's success and consequently his job to do the right thing.

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Brian "Smash" Williams

Finally, the first season's overarching theme is that even seemingly stereotypical people have unknown depth; once that depth is revealed people generally aren’t as different as they believe themselves to be. Nowhere is this made clearer than in one of the season’s most volatile relationships, that of “Smash” Williams with Tim Riggins. Williams is a driven athlete, obviously college bound, with a good family, while Riggins is an unfocused alcoholic with absentee parents and no prospects beyond high school. When the season opens both characters despise each other but as it progresses they become more and more dependent on each other eventually forming a friendship. In doing so they realize that they aren't as different as they had once thought.

Each character is touched in some way by this theme as most were introduced as stereotypes of a small Texas town in the Pilot. Gradually, as the season progressed, the audience began to see each character's depth and to discover the similarities among them.

Production

Inspiration

Main article: Friday Night Lights (film)

Friday Night Lights (the TV show) takes its inspiration from a book entitled “Friday Night Lights: A Town, a Team, and a Dream” which was published in 1990. The book, written by H.G. “Buzz” Bissinger details the 1988 season of the Permian Panthers, a high school football team in Odessa, Texas. The book itself is intended as a work of journalism and is assumed to be completely factual (though some citizens of Odessa dispute the book's accuracy). The characters in the book are not renamed and the book makes no attempt to conceal their identity.

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Connie Britton, Kyle Chandler and Aimee Teegarden.

The 1990 book was followed up with a film in 2004 starring Billy Bob Thornton and directed by Bissinger’s second cousin Peter Berg. The film’s characters are again based on the real life residents of Odessa circa 1988 and the film stays loyal to the book itself in most ways.

Conception

Once filming on the movie was completed, Berg turned his attention to adapting the story for television. Unlike the film, the show's pilot chose not to use Odessa's fabled Permian high school team but instead took their story as inspiration in creating a new, entirely fictional, cast of characters.

Still, much of the work that went in to the pilot’s creation was a duplication of work that was done on the movie, and it is clear that Berg made a conscious choice to carry over many of the elements from the 2004 film. These choices include casting Connie Britton and Brad Leland in similar roles and using songs by Explosions in the Sky, a band that wrote most of the film's soundtrack. However, the soundtrack for the show would eventually be released as an individual soundtrack, using cover art from the Season 1 DVD, and containing only a single track from the film.

More significantly, Berg has expressed in interviews how much he regretted having to jettison many of the interpersonal topics covered in the book because of the time constraints of a feature film. Creating a TV series, particularly one based on fictional characters, allowed many of those elements to be brought back in and addressed in-depth.

Filming for the TV show's Austin, TX-based pilot began in February 2006. Berg describes filming the pilot and eventually the show in Texas as “a deal breaker [for him]” and the pilot goes out of its way to pay homage to its Texas football heritage. One example is in the opening of the pilot where a caller on the fictional “Panther Radio” compares Kyle Chandler’s coach Taylor to Texas Longhorn coach Mack Brown. Brown ironically makes a guest appearance later in the pilot playing a Dillon booster alongside Westlake High School coach Derek Long.

The pilot also incorporated as much of the surrounding area as possible. Football scenes for the pilot were filmed at Pflugerville High School's Kuempel Stadium and at RRISD Complex. The Dillon Panther uniforms were based heavily on the uniforms of the real life Pflugerville Panthers.

In addition to physical locations, many of the characters were also inspired by Berg’s observation of local high schools when preparing to film the movie. One example of this is the character of Jason Street whose promising football career is ended by a spinal injury in the pilot. This was inspired by a real life incident in which David Edwards, a player from San Antonio’s Madison High, was paralyzed during a November 2003 game. Berg was at the game when the incident took place and it had a profound effect on him, leading him to base the pilot around a similar incident.

Performances

The show’s producers decided at the outset to allow their performers leeway in what they say and do on the show. Though scripted like any hour-long television drama performers are given great leeway in the delivery of their lines and the blocking of each scene. If actors feel that something is not true to their character or that a mode of delivery doesn’t work they are free to change it provided they still hit the vital plot points.

The freedom that producers have extended to the performers is complemented by the fact that the show is taped without rehearsal and without extensive blocking. Camera operators on the show are trained to follow the actors rather than actors standing in one place and having cameras fixed around them. This allows performers to not only feel free to make changes but to feel safe in making those changes because the infrastructure will work around them.

Executive Producer Jeffrey Reiner described this method as “no rehearsal, no blocking, just three cameras and we shoot”.

Working in this fashion has had a profound influence on everyone involved with the show with series star Kyle Chandler going so far as to say “When I look back at my life, I'm going to say, "Wow, [executive producer] Peter Berg really changed my life."” Executive Producer and Head Writer Jason Katims echoes this sentiment saying “When I first came on [the ‘FNL’] set, I thought, it’s interesting — this is what I imagined filmmaking would be, before I saw what filmmaking was”

Filming

Friday Night Lights is filmed in and around Austin, Texas and is unusual in its use of actual locations as opposed to prefabricated stage sets. The show uses real locations in and around Austin exclusively and has no sound stage where filming is done. This, along with the production team using hundreds of locals as extras, gives the series a uniquely authentic look.

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Taylor Kitsch, Gaius Charles, Kyle Chandler, Scott Porter, Minka Kelly and Zach Gilford

The drive towards authenticity continues in the show’s documentary style filming technique which employs three cameras for each shoot and shoots entire scenes in one take. This differs from most productions in that most productions will film scenes from each angle repeating an average scene several times and readjusting lighting to accommodate each shot. By filming a scene all at once the producers have tried to create an environment for the actors that is more organic and allows for the best performances.

This desire for authenticity in the production extends to the football games as well with the series making heavy use of the uniforms, cheerleaders, fans, and the stadium of the real life Pflugerville Panthers. Producers even go so far as to tape Pflugerville games and use it as game footage in the show. Added to that are real life University of Southern California football announcers Peter Arbogast and Paul McDonald who provide off-screen commentary during the football game sequences.

It has been reported that filming for a second season may be moved to another location to save on cost. The series represents roughly $33 million a year in revenue for the area in which its filmed and states such as Louisiana and New Mexico have been aggressive in courting the production company. Texas itself has been said to be considering legislation that would allow them to match the offers of other states and the production company has stated a preference for the Austin area where it currently films.

Marketing

Initial marketing of the show was targeted at the youth market and focused heavily on the football element. NBC teamed with social networking site Bebo.com to create a site that allowed students to upload video and photos as well as create blogs about their local football teams. Students who participated were eligible for one of ten $5,000 scholarships. The focus of this promotion was a deal that would provide NBC and the show promotion on Bebo’s network of youth oriented sites including Piczo, hi5, Tickle, Ringo and FastWeb.

Promotional Website with Toyota.

To complement this promotion NBC sent out “School Spirit” kits to 1,000 high schools around the country. These kits included posters, pop-poms, mini-footballs and disposable cameras all bearing the show’s logo. The kits also contained copies of the show’s Pilot episode on DVD. This promotional trick is something the network would return to for its second season promotion when it teamed with HouseParty.com to send out 1,000 "Party Kits" which contained advance copies of the Season 2 opener along with other promotional material.

In addition to the Bebo.com partnership, NBC paired with Toyota to create what they called the “Hometown Sweepstakes” in which students could earn cash grants of up to $50,000 for their school’s athletic program. This contest was open to high school students age 14 to 18 and was designed to draw people to the show’s official web site where they could download AOL Instant Messenger Icons, screensavers, and desktop wallpaper from the show. In addition, students that registered could download free movie theatre passes to special early screenings of the show’s Pilot episode. These movie theatre screenings took place in 50 cities nationwide and ran until a week before the show premiered on NBC.

This early strategy caused several marketing problems for the long term the most notable of which is the lack of women viewers. The early marketing campaign created an audience of almost exclusively young men and all but repelled women with its football heavy slant. This in turn deprived the show of a large audience who would enjoy the more character-driven soap elements.

Given this dilemma NBC chose to aggressively switch course and pursue the female demographic in the later part of the season. The network designed a strategy based around accentuating the personal elements of the show even going so far as to rechristen the show with the tagline “It’s about life”. NBC Marketing President Vince Manze stresses that their goal was to let people know it was not just about football but about family and relationships as well.

The network even chose to once again take their case to movie theatres by running 30 second spots featuring both cast members and fans being interviewed about the show.

Distribution

Online Episodes

NBC has been aggressive in its online promotion of Friday Night Lights. Streaming videos such as cast interviews and full episode from the previous week have been available on NBC.com since the series’ inception and in December of 2006 NBC expanded this selection to include every episode of the season. The move to offer every episode was only made for a few select shows and represents a marketing push on NBC's part. Beyond NBC.com it was announced on March 14, 2007 that the show would be part of an expanded lineup available via MobiTV .

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Cover Art from iTunes store.

In addition to the free ad-support offerings every episode of Friday Night Lights became available for download on the iTunes Store on February 10, 2007 for $1.99 per episode. As a special promotion the pilot was initially offered as a free download.

Repeat Schedule

In an attempt to bolster series ratings NBC repositioned reruns of the show to air on its sister network Bravo during the weeks leading up to the season one finale on NBC. These were aired on a schedule of one hour every Friday and three hours every Saturday.

Bravo is known to have an audience that is upscale and largely female which is in line with NBC President Kevin Reilly’s new strategy for selling the show. When questioned about this strategy he admitted to regrets over initially marketing the show incorrectly saying “It’s been so clear to me that [the marketing for] the show ended up confusing people in terms of what [the public thought] it was supposed to be”. He goes on to say that he feels the show is, at its core, a “women’s show” and that his wish is that the marketing had reflected that to a greater extent.

NBC has used this method of ratings-bolstering with limited success in the past, most notably during the ratings challenged final season of the West Wing.

Once the 2006-2007 television season ended, NBC planned to air reruns throughout the summer in the hopes of gaining new viewers during the summer hiatus. Despite rising ratings for the reruns, NBC abruptly pulled them from the network's schedule on June 24, 2007. NBC Representatives confirmed that reruns would resume airing in late August/early September and would be timed to the DVD release of Season 1.

Deleted Scenes

As part of their online push for the show NBC has made the rare move of publishing deleted scenes from each individual episode on their web site. Normally, deleted scenes are held until for an eventual DVD release but NBC/Universal has chosen to make them viewable online for a few of the shows that they produce.

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Original Promo Art on NBC Website

These scenes often provide information that is revealed later in the episode or series. An example of this is a scene from the episode entitled "I Think We Should Have Sex" in which it is established that the character of Walt Riggins has resumed living in the same house as his son Tim. The scene, while providing interesting exposition on the relationship, serves only to establish a living arrangement which is made evident in subsequent scenes (which were aired).

That said, the exposition given in a deleted scene can often change the intent of material that aired such as in a deleted scene from the episode "Blinders". In the episode that aired the character of Tim Riggins gives some prejudicial advice in regards to racial tension that is developing on the team. Only in the deleted scenes is it revealed that this advice was actually taken verbatim from advice his father had given to him and not necessarily what the character would have done had he not been trying to emulate his father.

DVD Release

The DVD release of the first season was made available on August 28, 2007 for a retail price of $29.98.

DVD cover	Season	Episodes	Originally aired	Discs	DVD release date
					Region 1	Region 2/4
	1	22	2006-2007	5	U.S./CAN: August 28, 2007	UK / AUS: TBA
	Running Time: 955 minutes Rating: NR DVD Special Features: 5 single-sided DVDs Anamorphic Widescreen (1.78:1) English Dolby Digital 5.1 Subtitles: English SDH Running Time: 14 Hours, 7 Minutes Deleted Scenes on each disc Behind The Lights: Creating The First Season of Friday Night Lights Packaging: Digipak with Slip Sleeve

Public Reaction

Critical Reception

The series has met with overwhelming critical acclaim from the very beginning with Virginia Heffernan of the New York Times saying "this new drama about high school football could be great — and not just television great, but great in the way of a poem or painting..." a sentiment that was echoed by the Washington post who called the pilot "[e]xtraordinary in just about every conceivable way." Positive reviews also came in from USA Today, the San Francisco Chronicle, the Arizona Republic, and the Boston Globe.

Praise for the pilot has even come from international sources with The Guardian's Jonathan Bernstien calling the pilot "accomplished and engaging" and the Metro awarding it 4 out of 5 stars..

Young members of the Friday Night Lights cast

Praise for the show has continued throughout its inaugural season with many online journalists using the frequency of their medium to heap regular praise on the show. Matt Roush of TV Guide has dedicated several of his “Roush Dispatch” columns to the show calling the last episodes of season one “terrifically entertaining” while Zap2it.com's "TVGal" has gone so far as to ask her readers to "promise to watch [the last 4 episodes of] Friday Night Lights". . Even gossip columnists have praised the show with Kristin of Eonline saying she "love[s] the bejeezus out of [the show]" and TV Guide's Michael Ausiello calling the season one finale "predictably flawless" .

The show has nonetheless received negative reviews, particularly from the Los Angeles Times, the Philadelphia Inquirer and Texas Monthly magazine.

Fan Response

Friday Night Lights is a show that has enjoyed what former NBC President Kevin Reilly dubbed a “passionate and vocal [fanbase]”. This fan dedication has shown itself in everything from advertisers expressing their support for the show . to news outlets getting massive amounts of support mail after running positive pieces about the show..

It has also led to the creation of several websites dedicated specifically to the show. These include the general information site FNL-online.com as well as several sites dedicated specifically to securing a second season for the show. Sites with this goal in mind include fightforlights.com which has collected positive press clippings about the show, savefridaynightlights.com which has organized an online petition for its renewal, and a MySpace page which includes video, audio and text about the show.

Awards & Nominations

The series and its creators have received several awards over the course of the series. By far the most prestigious of these is the George Foster Peabody award for broadcasting excellence which was awarded to the show for its first season where the award committee said “No dramatic series, broadcast or cable, is more grounded in contemporary American reality [than Friday Night Lights]".

Below is a list of honors the series has received...

Wins

2006

• American Cinema Editors — Best Editing on a One Hour Series for Commercial Television - for the episode "Pilot."

2007

• George Foster Peabody award - Award for Broadcast Excellence

• Television Critics Association — Outstanding New Program Of The Year

• Emmy Award - Outstanding Casting For A Drama Series - Imagine Television, Film 44, NBC Universal Television Studio

Nominations

2007

• Television Critics Association — Individual Achievement In Drama – Kyle Chandler
• Television Critics Association — Individual Achievement In Drama – Connie Britton
• Television Critics Association — Outstanding Achievement In Drama
• Television Critics Association — Program Of The Year

(Series was the TCA's most nominated show of the season )

• American Cinema Editors — Best Editing on a One Hour Series for Commercial Television - for the episode "Pilot."

• American Film Institute - 10 best TV shows of 2006-2007 Season

• Writers Guild of America — Best New Series of 2007

• Emmy Award - Outstanding Directing For A Drama Series - Peter Berg for the episode "Pilot"

Television Ratings

U.S. Ratings

Main article: Friday Night Lights (U.S. Ratings)

The show has received much critical acclaim - it was the season's second-highest-rated new show on MetaCritic (behind The Nine, which was cancelled midseason) but has not met with much ratings success having consistently placed below 50 in the Nielsen rankings.

International Ratings

According to the Media Guardian (a UK newspaper) the show's pilot, which aired on February 21, 2007, was watched by a mere 26,000 viewers in the UK. This is attributed to the program airing on ITV4, the least popular ITV channel, and being aired opposite the first leg of the Barcelona-Liverpool tie in the first knockout round of the 2006-07 UEFA Champions League in soccer.

DVR ratings

On December 29, 2006 Nielsen Media Research reported the results of having, for the first time, monitored viewers who use a Digital Video Recorder to pre-record shows for later viewing. These ratings, called "live plus seven", include all viewers who use a DVR to record the show and then watch it within a week of its initial airing.

According to the Nielsen numbers, DVR viewers increased Friday Night Lights ratings by 7.5% overall in December. When Nielsen monitored viewers again in April of 2007 the increase went up to 17% for the week ending on April 8th. .

These numbers are up to some debate though with Medialife Magazine reporting the "live-plus-seven-day" rating for Friday Night Lights as 35 percent higher than its live rating in DVR homes.

Affluent Viewers

On March 5, 2007 Media Life Magazine reported that Friday Night Lights is one of the most popular shows among "affluent viewers". This was determined using a report from Magna Global who in turn used analysis done by Nielsen Media Research. Affluence in the study was determined by yearly income.

In the study, Friday Night Lights tied for the 11th most watched show by affluent viewers. According to the study viewers of the show make an average of $65,000 per year. .

International Broadcasters

Country	TV Network(s)	Series Premiere	Weekly Schedule
United States	NBC	October 3 2006	Sundays 9:00pm ET
Canada	Global Television Network	October 3 2006 - present;	Wednesdays 8:00pm ET
United Kingdom	ITV4	February 21 2007	Wednesdays 8:00pm
Australia	Network Ten[1]
Israel	yes stars 1	June 28, 2007	Thursdays 10:00pm
Philippines	ETC		Thursdays 8:00pm
South Africa	M-Net	May 4 2007	Fridays 7:30pm
Sweden	Kanal 5[2]	May 29 2007	Fridays 9:00pm
Thailand	Star World	August 10 2007	Fridays 9:00pm
Norway	TVNorge[3]	June 20 2007	Wednesdays 7:55pm
Ireland	RTÉ Two		Saturdays 3:30am
Brazil	Sony Entertainment Television	June 15 2007	Fridays 10:00pm
Chile	Sony Entertainment Tv		Fridays 10:00pm
Italy	FOX	June 28 2007	Thursdays 09:00pm
Finland	Subtv	September 7 2007	Fridays 09:00pm
France	NRJ 12	October 2007	Unknown
Colombia	Sony Entertainment Television	June 15 2007	Fridays 9:00pm

Global Television has recently put the show back on its schedule.

External links

• Official NBC Friday Night Lights website
• Full-length streaming episode of Friday Night Lights' Fall 2007 premiere on Yahoo!
• FNL Gallery
• FNL-Online
• Friday Night Lights
• Fridaynightlights.tv
• Dillon Panthers : A FNL Site