Pilot (Friday Night Lights)

It is Monday morning, and five days until the first game of the season for high school football team Dillon Panthers. While coach Eric Taylor is surveying the field, some of the players are getting ready for practice. Fullback Tim Riggins is recovering from a hangover, and his brother Billy warns him that he could be kicked off the team if he does not show. Meanwhile, second-string quarterback Matt Saracen is preparing lunch for his grandmother, before his friend Landry Clarke drives him to practice. At the stadium, a television crew is conducting interviews. It is revealed that coach Taylor, who has recently been made head coach, used to coach the exceptionally gifted quarterback Jason Street. It also becomes clear that there is a deep-seated conflict between Tim Riggins and the brash and loud-mouthed running back Brian "Smash" Williams. Later, at the local fast food restaurant where the players regularly hang out, Landry and Matt try to approach the coach's daughter Julie. She insists that she does not associate with football players. They assure her that Landry is not on the team and Matt gets virtually no playing time because of Street, but she still rebuffs them both.

The main cast of Friday Night Lights

On Tuesday night a pep rally is held at the local car dealership. The owner and host is Buddy Garrity, who is also the father of Jason Street's girlfriend Lyla. Coach Taylor is surrounded by members of the local community questioning him about the game. It is gradually emerging how important football is to the town, and the great responsibility that rests on Taylor's shoulders. His wife Tami, meanwhile, is reluctantly recruited by the society wives to join their book club. Riggins' girlfriend Tyra Collette tries to stoke up trouble by flirting with both Street and Smash. Wednesday goes by with a team visit to a group of elementary school football players who idolize the older boys. The two teams recite the Lord's Prayer together. On Thursday night, the night before the game, Street and Riggins are at a party. Riggins lays out his plan of Street going to the National Football League and Riggins living off one percent of Street's salary. Then they can retire to a ranch where Riggins will act as Street's caretaker. They make a toast to "Texas Forever".

On game night, coach Taylor gives a pep talk where he warns the players against taking the opponents – Westerby High School – too lightly. They say their rallying cry, "Clear Eyes, Full Hearts, Can't Lose!" and enter the field. The first half is problematic for the Panthers, and at the end of the second half, the visitors make a potentially game-winning interception. Street is the only one left to make a tackle. He succeeds, but the tackle is so hard that he remains prone on the ground. The crowd is left in silence as the starting quarterback does not move, and has to be taken off on a stretcher to a waiting ambulance. Coach Taylor now has to put in the highly unprepared Saracen, who initially makes several silly mistakes. The coach tells him to relax and focus, and Saracen manages to connect with Smash, who scores a touchdown. Riggins recovers the ensuing onside kick for the Panthers. In the final seconds of the game, Saracen throws a long pass to a receiver, who makes it to the end zone for another touchdown. As the Panthers win the game, both teams gather at mid-field to pray for Jason Street. Team members then head over to the hospital, where Street's condition is still unclear. Riggins and Smash reconcile, while Julie tries to comfort Lyla. In a voice-over, coach Taylor is heard saying that "We are all vulnerable, and we will all at some point in our lives fall."

Lisa de Moraes, in her "TV Column" for The Washington Post, pointed out that in spite of critical praise, the show's premiere did poorly with viewers. With 7.17 million viewers, it had "the worst ratings performance for any series premiere in the official 2006-07 TV season."[19] On the other hand, Cynthia Fuchs of PopMatters wrote that the episode's good performance among the coveted demographic of men aged 18 to 34 could be a saving grace.[20] The episode was nominated for an Artios Award for "Best Dramatic Pilot Casting". Casting director Linda Lowy was the nominee for the award, which was won by the series Brothers & Sisters for the episode "Patriarchy".[21]

The pilot of Friday Night Lights received good to middling reviews. Virginia Heffernan of The New York Times gave the episode a very good review, and suggested the series could be good enough to transcend the medium of television. She praised the "intelligent performances" of the actors, and though she found the "Smash" Williams character less convincing than the others, she thought it improved towards the end. She also appreciated the use of audio to tell the story: the buzz of a surgeon's saw or the sound of skin stuck to leather.[22] Keith Phipps of The A.V. Club, wrote "I appreciate the feel for the high stakes attached to small-market school sports, the knowing take on the high-school caste system, and the details of family life." Still, he worried that America was "failing to fall in love with" the show, and expressed doubts as to whether it would be allowed to survive.[23]

Henry Goldblatt, writing for Entertainment Weekly, gave the episode a grade B. He accused the show of abandoning the "racial diversity and the gritty poverty" of the film, but still allowed that Peter Berg had "kept the thrust". The Matt Saracen character was singled out as particularly promising. While positively contrasting the show with other teen-age dramas like One Tree Hill, Goldblatt also had doubts about its staying power.[24] Variety's Brian Lowry called the show "Earnest, beautifully shot and perhaps more organically religious than anything else in primetime". Still, he felt the show was "like one of those family programs middle America and conservatives pine for that too few of them actually bother to watch". He pointed out that the show had to compete with both House and Dancing With the Stars, among women as well as men, in order to survive.[25] The Washington Post critic Tom Shales called the show "Extraordinary in just about every conceivable way," particularly emphasising the quality of the cast. Shales did have issues with the documentary style of show's camera movements, but still thought it could be the "best new drama series of the season".[26]

• "Pilot" at NBC.com
• "Pilot" at IMDb