Here's a thread for discussing what happened in the last episode broadcast by Fox Soccer Channel. Please no spoilers, though, from those who have seen Dream Team in the UK where they are several seasons ahead of the US broadcast ! Thanks !
Ok, so I'll start out since episode two shows tonight. How will the Gaffer try and get the team relegated while blaming it on the young lad who purchased the team from his lottery winnings (suprised this hasn't happened yet in this country). I kinda lost a lot of respect for Tash for starting to sleep with one of Jamie's teammates while he recovers from the crash.
I watched last weeks season premiere and it made me wonder if the show had huge budget cuts between the season we saw last year and the one being shown this year. I guess I should have seen it coming with the bus crash, as that is a perfect plot device to write off characters whose actors are getting expensive to keep around. The production quality seemed to go way down to me. Before i thought it looked as good as any show on prime time tv here in the states, but now it seems as bad as a telenovella. The training seens are the worst. The camera work is so bad. Am I seeing things, or did anyone else notice this shift.
It was back to film tonight and not videotape like last week. Weird episode. If they wanted to hammer home how awkward and a guy in a skyscraper over his head the new owner of HUFC is, they succeeded.
Very strange that they flipped back to film. Any UK people have any info why that was done? I feel sorry for Phil. With Patrick wanting to tank the season, he has found his mark in order to do that. It almost feels like if any goof off the street taking over his favorite team - it would be ackward as hell. BTW, Jaqui is now my favorite woman on the show. Yum. As for Tash and Jamie, Tash at least got to see his way that he has to take care of his demons alone. A shame that someone else will be shagging her until he gets back from LA.
About Angela Saunders, who plays Tash...she was originally up for the role of Chardonnay in Footballers Wives. That's when the character was a blonde. But according to IMDB.com, the producers scrapped the idea because the character was allegedly a little too close to real-life footballing wife Sheryl Gascgoine, wife of Paul. So Saunders was out of FW and switched to Dream Team. Good decision, that...
How long has it been back on FSW? I feel like I missed an entire season. New chairman, Tash has some new love interest and she's had her baby. Jeff was going to buy the club? Tons of new players. Did they skip a season or has the show been on all summer?
No shows during the summer, and they have shown only 2 episodes of this new season. Most of the changes are explained (rather than shown) in the first episode of the season. Brief Synopsis of Episode One of the new season: - Team bus crashes, Danny, Steve, Linton and the owner's daughter are all killed, Jamie is injured, and emotionally traumatized because the crash happens at the exact moment that he receives the call that his wife is going into labor (that last part was depicted in the last episode of last season; it is accurate that the mind associates a horrible event with sights and sounds at the time - a friend of mine who had a bad car crash simply cannot bear to listen to the music that was playing in his car stereo at that moment). - Tash's father and Patrick the manager conspire to buy the club for pennies from the owner who just wants to get rid ASAP. Motivated for the club to succeed, Patrick convinces two new players to sign, Linton Alexander's brother (seen last year), and a famous French player. But when the sale happens, they are outbid by a Harchester fan who has won the lottery. Patrick then puts the same money on a bet for Harchester to be relegated. - Carl marries the nurse who treated him during his recovery in the hospital, he sees Linda's face instead of the nurse's during the marriage (i.e. still loves Linda). Carl visits Linda in prison where she is serving her multi-year term for the murder of Datani instead of fleeing the country as some advised. - Tash has difficulties coping with new baby and hospitalized husband, so she accepts help from teammate Robbie, and they end up having an affair.
Interesting thought... if true, the budget cuts were only temporary, as I know that some relatively famous British personalities star on the show, possibly even in the next season (or else the one thereafter). However, it is true that all the locations used so far have been used previously in the show - team offices, Tash and Jamie's house, the Grange hotel. As far as actors, none of the ones who played the dead characters are, IIRC, any more famous than the new ones, and there are 5 out and 5 in, so no cutbacks in quantity.
Bumped. Before Charles Logan on '24', there was Patrick Doyle, manager of Harchester United. By screwing Bandele over but good, he deprives the team of a striker who's played out of his mind, played the coach against the rest of the team, spending beaucoup $$ on a Chelsea player who he never intended on keeping around, and has forced the owner to fork over $2 million in funds that methinks were supposed to NOT be spent on an injured Real Madrid-er. Devilishly brilliant.
PROGRAMMING NOTE! For the next two Thursdays, Dream Team will be on FSC on at 5PM Eastern, due to college soccer commitments, so set your VCR's accordingly (Tivo should automatically adjust for the revised time, as it did with mine). Don't know if this is a permanent move until the college season ends in November, but now you know.
NOTE: Thursday's Dream Team Episode (9/28) is being shown at 4pmET/1pmPT. The following Thursday it reverts to the 5pmET/2pmPT time.