Friday Night Lights: Pantherama! (Episode 107)

What am I thankful for this year? Once I get beyond the givens of reasonable health and family happiness, a couple of things come immediately to mind: One is Tyler Hansbrough, bless his ferociously competitive heart, who came back to play at Carolina for another year instead of leaving for the NBA, in hopes of taking his team to the NCAA championship. Go, Heels! And I'm especially grateful that when production shuts down in early December, the well-oiled machine that generates Friday Night Lights will have completed fifteen episodes. Fifteen! Not just scripted, but filmed! Done! Finished! Good job, y'all!

"THE SMASHTRAIN IS PULLING OUT OF THE STATION; YOU'D BETTER HANG ON BEFORE YOU LOSE YOUR SEAT" -- After a couple of seasons strutting his stuff for the home crowd, Smash can finally start sitting down with college recruiters and start working toward his future, which for him means more NFL and less GPA. At the beginning of the week, Coach Taylor sits his boys down and reminds them that meetings should be arranged through his office, and that they're not to accept anything from the recruiters or it can screw up their eligibility for the season. Smashmama has her own view of things and tries to steer Smash toward a traditionally black college that only offers academic scholarships and has never had an NFL player drafted from its team. Smash all but laughs in her face. His grander plans get encouragement from a girl whose name is Noelle, but who we're just gonna call Ne'erdowell. Her brother (a former Dillon Panther) is living large down at Miami Southern -- he worked his game well enough to end up with a Porsche. That's pretty much music to Smash's ears, and he ditches his mama to start taking recruitment meetings on his own. Yeah, Brian, you sure wouldn't want a voice of reason whispering in your ear now, would you? Smashmama pays a visit to Coach Taylor at the school, saying that her dead husband was "a trifling man" who couldn't be counted on for anything…except that he was always there for Brian. "I'm not asking you to be this boy's daddy," she says, "I'm just here to remind you he doesn't have one." Coach T breaks up an off-the-books meeting between Smash and the Miami Southern recruiter, sending the weasely little snake slithering off. Taylor says to Smash, "You got heart, charisma, and a lot of skill," and tells him he's one of the best athletes he's ever coached. Then he says he went head-to-head a lot with his dad, who questioned every move he made, before saying, "I'm here. I just want to remind you of that." Aww! It's nice to see Smash get some exposure, and I'm not even talking about the "Pantherama!" yet!

"HONEY, WE'RE NOT SELLING PUPPIES HERE" - We've got not just one but two homeless boys in Dillon this week: I think with all the time Tim's had to spend around the house since he got kicked off the team, he's realized that he can't take being there while Billy and Miffie play house. He packs his things and leaves in a huff, heading straight for Trouble. She answers the door, looks at his pitiful pile of stuff and says, "What's all this you got going on here?" It's very cute, and I have to say, Adrianne Palicki is looking particularly fine tonight. She's always gorgeous, but they've got her dressed in clothes that accent this and highlight that to an eye-popping degree. My Ever-Patient Mister had his tongue lolling out on the floor at several points in the episode. We had much pausing in our house tonight, and for once, it wasn't on Tim's face. Tim fits in a little too well at Trouble's house, what with Double making him breakfast and Toil snuggling down on the couch with him and discussing her stripper costumes -- "I dance in boots, chaps and a thong." Good grief. Trouble takes one look at Toil with her legs draped over Tim and lays down the law for him: "Don't you dare screw my sister." When he tries to act innocent (something I doubt Tim Riggins has pulled off successfully since he repeated kindergarten), she says, "I know you like to create havoc wherever you go." She says she's got a line, don't cross it. So…anybody but Lyla…or her sister…and I bet she wouldn't take too kindly to him having a go at Julie Taylor, either, if we're looking for lines not to be crossed. Tim responds with "How's Landry?" which got a big laugh at our house. Trouble won't let Tim get too comfy on her couch -- she tosses him out after 48 hours and he moves on to some guy named Guy that Toil knows. Guy apparently needs help taking care of Roscoe and Coltrane, his two…ferrets. I'd love to have been in the writers' room when they decided to ditch the pitbulls pitch and go with ferrets instead. Not just any ferrets…ferrets named after the sheriff on The Dukes of Hazzard. Guy's place makes the Riggins boys' Dude Ranch (TM my friend Katherine) look like the Bellagio in comparison.

Our other lost boy this week is Santiago. For the record, this guy has grown on me about five thousand percent since his first verbal thrust and parry with Lyla Garrity by the side of the road. He's a heartbreaker, folks, in a show littered with them, but if you've got to be an orphan with a juvie rap sheet and butterfingers, you can't do better than having the collective power of Eric and Tami Taylor working your case. Eric wants Santiago on the team; Tami wants to figure out why Santiago's so darn cagey about his uncle and why he won't come meet her face-to-face to sign off on Santiago's academic plan. Remember, Santiago's parents got deported, but since he was born here, he got to stay and go through the US juvenile system instead of the Mexican one. Finally, Santiago admits his uncle hasn't been home for ten or eleven months; he's been living alone in a trailer, apparently. Eric says the team will be Santiago's family, and they can help keep an eye on him. Tami says they need to get the family part down first, and then Eric can have him for the team. The compromise has me shaking my head and laughing, because it's a crazy plan that just might work: Buddy Garrity, old St. Satan himself, gets appointed as Santiago's guardian. Eric and Buddy cooked up the plan, but it's Tami who gives it a seasoning of salt and pepper when she takes time to go see Buddy at the dealership and remind him that though he's raised three kids (of which two are practically mute and the third is a platitude-spouting, unicorn-riding, back-sliding born-again), taking on Santiago is a huge responsibility. I know Buddy's first love will always be the Panthers, and his actions almost always reflect that, but I think he sees this as his own chance at redemption, and I choose to believe he's sincere about it. Buddy and the Taylors bring Santiago home to the bachelor pad Buddy got when he and Pam split up, where Tami suggests he add some vegetables to the fridge full of dead carcasses. Buddy shows Santiago to his room, apologizing for the bunk bed and desk that obviously belonged to Buddy Junior when he was just a wee whippersnapper, and for how small the room is, saying he never imagined he'd be living there that long. Santiago brushes off his apologies. "This is the first real bed I ever had," he says. Oh, hell, here I go again. *sniff* *sniff* Even My Mister got a little misty over that one.

[Hey, wait a second! I have an idea! Since it's a bunk bed, there's room for Tim, too! We can have Garrity's Crappy Apartment for Wayward Boys instead of the more idyllic Taylor Home For Wayward Boys that I've been touting since early last season; it's still better than shacking up with ferrets.]

Once Buddy leaves Santiago to get settled, he opens up his one little duffle bag and pulls out some letters, which he slides under his pillow. "Oh, Santiago" doesn't have quite the same ring as "Oh, Tim," but maybe I just haven't had enough practice. This Benny Ciaramello guy is doing one hell of a job with the role of Santiago -- he's pulling out the lonely little boy hidden under the tough guy exterior, and most of it happens in his eyes and the set of his mouth. It's great stuff, true and subtle, like all the best moments on this show. I can't believe how much they've made me care about this guy.

"YOU HUNGRY? I ALWAYS EAT WHEN I GET DUMPED" -- Okay, here we go…let's talk about Matt and Julie. Not Matt-n-Julie, since The Cute got run over like a deer on the highway, but Matt and his luuuurve interest(s) and Julie and hers. It's good to be Matt Saracen these days -- he's still got Lauren chirping at his side, kissing him in hallways, and turning him on with all her talk of struts and suspensions and whatever. Turns out she knows her horse power, and Lord knows the only thing better would be a girl who could make an apple pie in her underwear while reciting the entire Panther playbook by heart. When Matt says he's thinking about buying a car, Lauren goes with him, proves she's not just blowing smoke up his tailpipe, and haggles the price down for him. You know who else knows cars? Grandma! Of course! We get some good quality Grandma time this ep, and it's about damn time. Love you, Grandma! With Grandma comes Carlotta, the caregiver, who manages to find time to squeeze in some dance lessons (we're getting to why in a minute) for Matt. She's a hands-on kind of gal, if you know what I mean. She's got Matt's hands on her swaying hips in a blink, showing him her moves in about the time it takes Grandma to order a tiara from QVC. Matt's smitten. Or else he's just horny; sometimes it's hard to tell at that age. Later, he thanks Carlotta for helping out, then leans in and plants a kiss on her. She pulls back, looking shocked, but the next morning, as she leans over to hand him his breakfast plate, her hand lingers on his shoulder, and many smoldering looks are exchanged. My Mister asked how old she's supposed to be. If I had to guess, I'd say college age, since she's supposed to be working her way through school. It's probably not the best idea either of them ever had, but I'm going to let it ride before I start climbing on soap boxes. Besides, I'm up pretty high already on the one I need for Julie and her new crush, "Noah."

Who's Noah? That would be Noah Barnett, the new English Lit/Speech/Creative Writing teacher, who serves as faculty advisor for the school newspaper. He's also a vegetarian, a Libra, and he likes imported beer, long walks on the beach, and smarty-pants blondes with polysyllabic vocabularies. Noah's played by Austin Nichols, who made a great impression on me as Morgan Earp on Deadwood, as a man who could say a lot without saying a lot. I was such a fan, in fact, that I even tried to watch John from Cincinnati, but, well, since I tend to like my dramas to be both well-acted and nominally comprehensible, let's just say I'm glad he's found his way to Dillon. Despite the strong "Don't Stand So Close To Me" vibe I'm getting, he's still way less creepy as Noah than he was as John. He's young enough that Tami confuses him for a student. He's got that scraggly beard thing going on that the Sweaty had, too, where it looks like he shaved in the dark, once, about a month ago, with his mom's disposable Bic, which for some reason Julie seems to find appealing. Aside from the squirrel that died on his chin, he's pretty cute, with hot eyes and killer cheekbones. He'd be a great match for someone not in high school.

Noah and Julie bond over everything from journalism, where he advises, "Don't use a ten-dollar word when a nickel one will do," to the woes of being dumped. Julie writes an unflattering feature article in the paper about where the money raised by the annual "Pantherama!" (I'm getting to it! Keep your pants on! Whoops, was that a spoiler?) goes, whether it's evenly distributed, and who decides which activities benefit from the event. The article does not please her papa. But that's nothing compared to the hell that will rain down upon the head of the young teacher, the schoolgirl fantasy, once Tami Taylor's done with him. She's already got her suspicions. I guess finding your teenage daughter necking in the driveway with a sweaty, pot-scented college boy would raise the hackles on any mama, so her radar is ratcheted up so high bats are bouncing off it. Either that or Julie's ridiculously transparent in her awkward, flushed crush, and it's like she's wearing a blinking neon sign that only her mama can see that reads: "THE SWEATY WAS JUST KIDSTUFF." These latest inappropriate romantic tinglings make Tim and Miffie's furtive dalliances look downright staid.

"YOU ARE NOT USING JESUS CHRIST OUR LORD AS AN EXCUSE NOT TO HELP OUT YOUR COUNSELOR, ARE YOU?" - Since there's no real movement on The Massive Fuck-Up this week beyond a reconcilatory confession from Landry to Trouble about the carbecue, I get to just revel in the pleasure of the "Pantherama!" The exclamation point seems to be official; I added the quotes because they make me happy. Tami's got too much on her plate to handle both the entertainment and silent auction for the big fund-raiser, the "Pantherama!", so she enlists Trouble and Lyla to handle entertainment. I don't think we've seen the girls together since Trouble offered her a ride home from State, so it's kind of fun to see them working together, getting along, and womanhandling the menfolk into doing what they want. What do they want? Volunteers. Lots of them. Trouble marches herself into the locker room, fondles a freshman clad only in a towel, and gets the entire team lined up, literally, to help her out. A cheer routine morphs into a strip routine which brings down the house when our boys disrobe down to their boxers in front of a gymful of parents, boosters, teachers, and students. Except Landry, who for some reason keeps on his undershirt. We get acres of weight-trained muscles, including Smash and Matt, which is a delight and deserves a screencap as soon as I can find one, as well as some truly awful plaid boxer shorts. Tami and Eric manage to look disapproving, but nothing's going to harsh the glow for Trouble and Lyla, who are very cat-got-the-canary about it all.

My only complaint about the "Pantherama!"? They had stripping going on and Tim Riggins wasn't smack dab in the middle of it! What the hell, producers? Let's get that boy back on the team! Pronto! If anybody can turn baggy boxer shorts and a pair of sneakers into a sexy fashion statement, it's Tim Riggins. You could wash a week's laundry on that boy's abs, and his hipbones are a gift from God. There's much I love about Tim beyond the fact that his sweatpants stay up by sheer force of will, so I don't want you to think I'm completely objectifying Taylor Kitsch, but…why hire someone who looks like this:

screencap by kelly button

And this

And this

if you're not going to include him in your totally gratuitous male strip show? Not to take anything away from Landry in his old man undershirt, or the mighty fine torsos of Smash and Matt, but a peep show without Tim is like a margarita without tequila.

No new episode next week, since everyone will be shopping on Black Friday. I'm headed home to North Carolina, green bean casserole fixin's in hand. Happy Thanksgiving, y'all! Remember to count your blessings!