Compare And Contrast Friday Night Lights Freaks And Geeks

INTRODUCTION

I compared Friday Night Lights, Freaks & Geeks, and Suburgatory in parents/family, major character death/injury, and relationships (which includes friendships and dating)

Parents:

I chose parents/family as a category because in a lot of teen tv shows and movies the parents are portrayed as the bad guys and they’re generally too strict or they try too hard to seem cool and they end up having no control. Also because I have lived with my mom for almost all of my life, and then moved to live with my father for a year and he had a very different parenting style than my mom did.

Friday Night Lights portrayed families in a way that the kids who were poor didn’t have their parents around, the well off kids had both parents who had

high expectations. There were absent fathers, literally or figuratively; Matt’s dad is stationed in Iraq, Smash’s dad died, Julie’s dad was so immersed in football he seemed to not care about anything else. Over all in Friday Night Lights football was more important. More important than family, friends, and significant others. Even when Jason Street got seriously injured people were more concerned with how the football game was going to be finished than if he would make a recovery. When Jason was in the hospital his friends and family was more concerned about his recovery so he could play than him recovering as a general thing.

Freaks & Geeks had more of a focus on friends because to the main characters at the time friends are more important in most cases. Although Lindsay will stand up for her brother Sam and he’s concerned for her, Lindsay will still try to be cool for her friends over being there for her family. She throws a kegger when her parents are out of town, she goes out with her friends instead of passing out candy with her mom, and while she’s out she goes to egg kids who happen to be her brother and his friends. She feels bad for egging Sam but she still would’ve done it to another kid.

Parents have a big role in Suburgatory.

Tessa’s mom left when she was young and when she moves to Chatswin there’s a lot of focus on mothers. Dallas puts a lot of focus on making sure her daughter feels beautiful. Some of the moms realize that Tessa is motherless and try to mother her and kinda insert themselves into her life. George has been with Tessa her whole life so he understands her and how she’s feeling. Tessa calls him George but he questions it in the first episode which means before the move she called him dad, the reason behind her doing this is probably because he went through her things and violated her trust and privacy.

Major Character Injury/Death:

I chose major character injury/death because it’s present in all of the shows that I watch. There wasn’t a lot of major character death in any of the shows, but in Friday Night Lights Jason Street, the star quarterback, gets paralyzed from a football injury in the first episode of the show, and Smash, the running back of the team, gets asked about the death of his father in the beginning of the show. In Freaks and Geeks Lindsay starts acting differently after her grandma tells her there’s no heaven or hell after death before she dies. And in Suburgatory there isn’t any major character death in the show.

Relationships

(dating/friendships):
I chose this because in all shows aimed at teens there’s always some relationship drama.
In Friday Night Lights the relationships are mainly focused on sex, the girls are really defined on who they’re dating and who they’re sleeping with, and looks play a big part in who someone is interested in. Also what position they play on the team is really important, when Matt does well on the first game he plays as QB a rally girl flirts with him and makes him cake. When Jason is hospitalized Lilah supports him that he can recover but in this show over all football is more important so when she’s helping him she just wants him to be able to play again. Lilah’s parents mention that since he can't play she should break up with him since they’re no longer sure of his future. There isn’t really any respect for other relationships or friends, Smash starts to move in on Jason’s spot on the social ladder as soon as he can with Jason in the hospital, which adds tension to the team. Smash cheats with Tyra, who is dating Tim. But also some friends are loyal to the point it’s toxic, Tim, who was a good friend of Jason’s, stops caring about things after Jason gets hurt.
In Freaks and Geeks there’s a lot of focus on relationships and friends since Lindsay is going through a rough time and trying to figure out where she belongs in the social ladder. Nick and Lindsay end up together and are really cute. Sam tries to be with a cheerleader Cindy. People act like their relationships define them.