Even still, I won’t get into my own life saga or the specifics of holding off on watching the show, but I will tell you that when it originally aired, I was working in television in LA, and I feared that the depiction of any real-life place with open spaces or trees might actually cause me to dust off my Skip-it and play on the 405 during rush-hour. In contrast, now I’m hanging onto the caboose of Dillon, Texas from the comfort of my parents’ basement with a Wal-Mart in one direction and nothing in the other. In other words, I’ve solved my previous conundrum.
It was around four years ago that I went on an ill-fated date with a guy who took me out for pie and told me that “Friday Night Lights really effed up, and the writers, like, had to apologize and stuff.” So as I watched what I now consider basically the greatest show of all-time, I waited and I waited for this earth shattering moment to drop from the sky. In my world though, a world in which my mom raised me on One Life to Live and I majored in Beverly Hills, 90210 during my formative years, had the internet not demanded my outrage at Landry avenging Tyra’s attack by snuffing out the bandit, I wouldn’t have ever realize what Pie-Man was talking about. People get hit by lead pipes all the time – just ask Professor Plumb, he’s in the study.
In any case, I freely admit that I didn’t love this show right away. However, before you tell me what an asshole I am, please know that at this current moment, I’m wearing a Dillon Football shirt and searching my area for abandoned copper wire with which I’m hoping to get the jumpstart I need towards owning 25 acres of land one day with Tim Riggins by my side. Some people dream. Some people, like me, dream big.
Now that I’m on the subject of dreaming, I digress to the original point of my late-night rant which is to address the disappointment I feel towards whichever chucklehead it was who decided to hack apart my new favorite show and edit crucial moments out of the version I saw. Ok, you can claim they're not crucial. Here’s my rebuttal… I spent the twenty-six episodes following Tyra Collette’s season three departure with my head cocked to the side and a dazed look on my face wondering when there might be any indication that my newfound fictitious life idol would come to some kind of resolution of gratitude with her own mentor, Tami. I didn’t spend twenty-four hours waiting for Godot because no one cared enough to shoot the scene, it turns out. Apparently someone – someone-edited out the sub-one-minute hug-it-out moment from the season three finale and later claimed on the DVDs that it's part of a “different storyline.” Huh? How could a three season arc be part of a different fucking storyline?
Yes, the show is just good. And yes, people are going to have their own opinions on this – and I've now read many of them through odd fan fiction and comment threads online. But here I will say that the turning point in my personal investment of the show - the day that I stopped playing Tetris while listening to it in the background - was the day that I realized how much I cared about Tyra. It’s possible that I see a little of myself in the formerly misguided teen. For instance, I too received a “go eat glass” letter from my top-choice university, and I too lost my shit on everyone around me and begged the school to let me in. And I can tell you firsthand that though Tyra’s results might “not be typical,” her eventual acceptance into this school isn’t completely out of the realm of possibility either.
Right around the time that NBC was finally airing season five, I was on a ”quarter-century crisis” driving tour across America, and I can safely declare that Tyra is the only other person “I’ve met” who understands how scary it is to be alone at an Econo Lodge. The writers didn’t exaggerate here. You would call your principal. You would call your congressman. You would call the drug dealer down the street who previously gave you directions if it meant someone would lead you the hell out of there. Luckily for Tyra, she has Mrs. T on her team, and luckily for me, I had recently purchased a Daisy Air Rifle from the Wal-Mart museum and figured that from a distance, it didn’t look a whole lot different than a shotgun. (Read more on that: http://ifeellikeiwillfindit.com/2011/06/15/day-13-june-15/)
At one point, Tami tells Tyra, “I’ve made an investment in you,” and I echo this sentiment entirely when it comes to watching these characters. When Tami sweeps up remnants from the glass coffee table that Tyra's mother sits on (Mensa applications due next month), I want to sweep glass. (Side note: Kelly Taylor’s mother also goes through a glass table on Beverly Hills 90210 so it’s more common than you'd think). When Tami coaches Tyra in volleyball, I want to see her win. When Tami tells Tyra that Cash is a no good, bull-riding loser headed for nowhere, I want the bull to turn back for Dillon. When Tami reprimands Tyra for winning the student council election with a questionable campaign strategy, I want to give Tyra a high-five and say, “sure I’m ten years older than you, but you’re a lot cooler than I am”… ok, so that one doesn’t really work. But when Tami says, “you’re going to college,” I swiftly slide to the edge of my seat, waiting for it to happen.
It’s because of this investment that I’ve made in watching the show that I took note in sharpie when Tyra receives her acceptance letter to college, and per the version of the events that unfolded before me, doesn’t so much as nod a "thank you" in Tami’s direction. In fact, I was so thrown off by this lack of closure, and by the fact that their final conversation is marred by sadness and disappointment in a car outside Dallas, that not only did this void cloud the entire series for me, it sent me to a place I rarely travel in search of some kind of theory or explanation – the message boards. The place where the real fans tell you what's actually going on. And as usual, they provided the answers I'd been seeking.
The tireless fans of the show had asked the same questions that I did and led me to the 30-second conversation that someone evidently decided I should never get to see. A conversation in which Tyra does thank Tami for her help to which Tami responds, “you don’t have to thank me, just go kick ass.” A conversation that is alluded to in the series finale when Tyra tells her friends, “I’m halfway through college, and I’m kicking ass.” A conversation that takes the girl who reminded me that I should want to be invited to the White House (how had I let that dream escape me?) from ungrateful and selfish to grateful and selfish. A conversation that makes all the difference to me as a viewer while watching this show.
I’m sure that I don’t understand how this kind of thing works, and I can live with that. However, if you’re reading this and you find yourself in a position to edit a television show one day, please remember one thing. Sometimes you have to skimp on an ingredient. That’s life. You can give someone a jelly sandwich, you can give someone a peanut butter sandwich, you can even fold over one piece of bread if you’re determined to hang onto both the peanut butter and the jelly. But whatever you do and whatever you decide to leave out, the sandwich needs to close. You can’t wrap something up that isn’t finished, and no one wants to eat their lunch with sticky hands.... In other words, don't screw with my favorite characters please.
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| Me, making a potentially life-saving purchase. |
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| Tyra, unarmed at an Econo Lodge |
