I've seen Friday Night Lights the movie but never bothered with the show. Noticed it was on Netflix so I watched S1E1 last night. It's overly simplistic to say, but this feels like it's going to be a really long and drawn-out version of the movie. The pacing is just super slow. Funny seeing Fat Damon young and in shape.
I'd stick with it. FNL is one of my favorite shows of all time. The first season very loosely follows the movie.
I actually just started re-watching last week as background noise. I’ll echo nocera’s statement of it being one of my favorite shows. Very high volume of smoke shows populating Dillon, TX. It was a very good show made great by the threat of, and then action of, cancellation.
First season is excellent but suffers from moments of network TV 20+ episode order bloat. Second season is okay but the worst season of the show. Writers strike ended the season early and low ratings and the threat of cancellation led to the introduction of nonsense storylines that are all but ignored in future seasons. Continued low ratings led to cancellation and revival on a DirecTV channel that no longer exists, finally hitting that 13 episode sweet spot for removing the storytelling bloat.
Season ranking: 5, 1, 3, 4, 2