I was looking forward to posting episode-by-episode reviews of the documentary series “4th and Forever,” chronicling the 2010 season of Long Beach Poly football. But due to aforementioned restrictions imposed by our Charter overlords, I’m not able to watch the show when it airs every Thursday night on Current TV. Instead, here is a roundup of some of the more notable reviews from outlets around the country.
Mary McNamara of the Los Angeles Times:
As gratifying as it is to see some of the inner workings of a local phenom, “4th and Forever” falls far short of its subject matter, proving once again the limits of reality television.
Liberal rag.
Ginia Bellafante of the New York Times:
You don’t come away knowing Long Beach the way you come away from “Friday Night Lights” knowing Dillon. And you don’t develop a satisfying rejection of the myth that sports are a great engine of American social mobility, a disappointment this show shares with the film “The Blind Side.”
I would venture to say that it’s easier to sum up the (FICTIONAL) city of Dillon through a football team than it is with the vast and immeasurably diverse city of Long Beach. But that’s just me.
David Knowles of the Hollywood Reporter:
At such moments, this reality show feels, well, real. But as the stories of other players are told, you can’t help but become aware of the multiple camera angles that capture seemingly intimate moments, and the way the crew seems set up in just the right spot for family members to enter and deliver their well-worn lines about hard work and success.
There is a definite gap between the scenes that are authentic and the ones that are set up in advance. Even from the short clips that are available online, this is an obvious issue, unlike the current breed of super-authentic reality shows like “Mob Wives.”
Troy Patterson of Slate.com:
Long Beach Poly is what Long Beach has to be proud of,” one player says at the top of the first episode. That overstates the case a bit, I think, giving short shrift to Snoop Dogg, the Queen Mary, and the JetBlue terminal at LGB, but we take the point.
Don’t forget the breakwater!
Among these reviews and others, there are a few critiques that seem to be unanimous: The dialogue can be a little artificial, the show teases by telling instead of showing, and everyone hates the plugged-in game announcer. But the appeal of the story and the players themselves are undeniable, especially when it comes to their off-field lives.
Like I said, I was unable to watch the series premiere myself. But there are plenty of sneak peak clips at the show’s official website that give you a pretty good indication as to the style and feel. One thing that keeps coming up in the critiques is the show’s resemblance – or lack thereof – to the NBC show Friday Night Lights. To me, though, 4th & Forever is clearly more closely related to the annual HBO mini-series Hard Knocks, which follows a different NFL team through training camp every year. And in that light, 4th & Forever isn’t so much a poorly made real-life version of Friday Night Lights, but a true to form high school version of Hard Knocks. And that sounds like something I would definitely watch.
Did you watch the opening episode of 4th & Forever? Did it represent Long Beach Poly well? Did it represent Long Beach well?
What did you think?