Why Ted Lasso Season 4 Exists Despite Original Season 3 Plan Explained By Creator Bill Lawrence

After keeping audiences waiting for years, Ted Lasso is about to return for season 4, flipping its original three-season plan on its head.

With season 3 of the Apple TV comedy ending with Jason Sudeikis’ titular coach returning home and most of the other characters getting conclusive send-offs, the sports series seemed all but over, particularly as the multi-Emmy-winning creator and star downplayed his interest in returning. The main reason for this was that he and his co-creators, Bill Lawrence, Brendan Hunt and Joe Kelly, had developed a three-season plan for the show, and felt they reached a natural conclusion with it.

Now, with just a few months remaining until the show’s return, Bill Lawrence has shared why Ted Lasso season 4 exists. In an interview with ScreenRant‘s Liam Crowley for the HBO Max comedy Rooster, the two-time Emmy winner began by acknowledging the “interesting” landscape of streaming television, in which he’s running three different shows with the aforementioned series, Bad Monkey and Shrinking, and will be watching season 4 of the Apple TV comedy “as a fan,” as Jack Burditt, Sudeikis, “a lot of the old writers” and “a lot of people from my company” at Doozer will now be running it.

However, he’s promised that the new episodes are “amazing,” having watched a bunch of them already. As for the reason to bring the show back after the original three-season plan, Lawrence likened it to the way Shrinking will continue with season 4, explaining that he and his creative teams “pitch a beginning, middle and end” to all of their shows, resulting in the aforementioned three seasons, with the Emmy winner says audiences “hopefully liked” Ted Lasso‘s original run.

But with the Apple TV sports comedy having “a group of actors and actresses and writers and talent” so well-beloved, one would be “silly not to take a shot” at bringing it back when asked by the streamer to “come up with another three-season story to tell“:

Bill Lawrence: I know Jason had a vision, and I don’t want to give spoilers about what Ted would do next, but I think the time passage buys you the story, and I think people really like it. It’s not just a continuation of Ted Lasso. It’s not a continuation of Ted Lasso, otherwise Jamie Tartt wouldn’t be on the show Rooster.

Presented with the consensus that the show is now expanding from its generally conclusive ending, Lawrence shared his personal belief that “there’s nothing you can do that can take back how much you loved the first three seasons” of Ted Lasso. He compared it to that of the way he runs his writers rooms, in which “you can’t take back a laugh” after one of his writers pitches a joke, even if someone tries to later state that “the joke doesn’t make sense if you think about this.” As such, he’s assured that audiences are “not allowed to take back liking Ted Lasso,” regardless of their feelings about season 4’s existence.

While a shorter timeframe than others, Ted Lasso certainly isn’t the first series to make its way back after an ending, regardless of an official series finale designation. From the nostalgia-driven likes of The Conners and iCarly to the more franchise-innovating The Librarians: The Next Chapter and Ash vs. Evil Dead, the modern TV setting is full of shows offering new stories after previously sending off their characters for either happy endings or unique directions.

But while Ted Lasso season 3 largely gave emotional farewells to its cast of characters, it did also leave the door open for a few ways to keep the show going, even without Sudeikis’ titular coach. Brendan Hunt’s Coach Beard elected to stay in London and marry a now-pregnant Jane, while also remaining on the coaching staff at AFC Richmond with Brett Goldstein’s Roy Kent and Nick Mohammed’s Nate. Additionally, Juno Temple’s Keeley presented the idea of a Richmond women’s team to Hannah Waddingham’s Rebecca, which she was keen to move forward with.

One of the more interesting takeaways from Lawrence’s new comments is that Ted Lasso season 4 appears to be part of a new three-season story arc. This does fall somewhat in line with what Warner Bros. Television CEO Channing Dungey previously shared about the show’s return, confirming it could continue beyond the next season, albeit while also indicating she hadn’t heard the pitch for the remaining two seasons. Additionally, Goldstein confirmed his interest in keeping the show around forever, while also not overstaying its welcome.

Ted Lasso looking stricken in Ted Lasso season 3

6 Ways Ted Lasso Season 4 Will Be Better Than The Apple TV+ Show’s First 3 Seasons

Ted Lasso’s fourth season has plenty of heavy lifting to do in order to improve upon the storylines from the show’s early seasons, but it can be done.

Given how well the show performed with critics and viewers through its first three seasons, Ted Lasso season 4 would have to perform pretty poorly for Apple TV and WBTV to not want to move ahead with more. Plus, with the show’s creative team sounding pretty reinvigorated through season 4’s production, this new three-season pitch may already be better fleshed out and ready to move ahead in the very near future. This would also give the show the opportunity to bring back any missing original characters not returning in season 4, particularly Phil Dunster, who debunked rumors of his return to ScreenRant.

Ted Lasso season 4 begins streaming on Apple TV in August.