LOSING IN FRONT OF YOUR HOME CROWD: I have watched neither Friday Night Lights nor Glee, but I have not been able to get this column comparing the two out of my head. FNL comes across as both better and more countercultural, which does not surprise me. (I do think it’s bizarre that the author reads “everyone moves away from Dillon because it’s a dead-end small town” as a rejection of solipsism–I’m pretty sure she means that since the characters we like get switched out for new characters, the audience’s focus remains on the town as a whole, a community, but she makes this process sound a lot less tragic than the “meager chance of improvement earned at the price of leaving your hometown” storyline really is. Why shouldn’t people “loom[] around Dillon forever”–why is staying home presented so negatively, given the author’s other premises? Anyway that’s just a bobble in an otherwise terrific piece.)

Link via Wesley Hill.