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Friday Night Lights' Zach Gilford, 26, a Chicago native, got a degree from nearby Northwestern but actually rooted for Michigan. It's a long story.

He was raised on the North Side but would rather chug phlegm than see the Cubs win a World Series. Gilford is an Ozzie Guillen guy. A Bears guy (he owns an authentic Nathan Vasher Bears jersey). A Bulls guy (a high school friend tattooed "Pip 33" on him in honor of Scottie Pippen, and his dog is named Pippen).

Anyway, we were there to talk about him and Friday Night Lights, a series so achingly well written and well acted that it almost makes you want to go through high school again. Season Three begins October 1 on DirecTV.

It isn't a perfect viewing arrangement, but it's better than waving goodbye to Friday Night Lights altogether after Season 2.

Peyton Manning is a huge fan of the show, which chronicles life and times in a small Texas town and its obsession with high school football.

That's what Manning told Scott Porter, who plays Jason Street, the Dillon quarterback whose life is forever changed when he suffers a spinal injury. Porter introduced himself to Manning not long after the Colts won Super Bowl XLI.

"I don't want to bother you," Porter said. "I just wanted to tell you congratulations on the Super Bowl."

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In what seems to be growing consensus among executives, the Hollywood writers strike could continue for sometime - but this could mean a faint glimmer of good news for one group of shows: struggling prime-time series.

Very soon the networks will begin running low on original episodes of most shows. Any new episode will become an increasingly valuable commodity.

No network is going to waste paid-for episodes. So the marginal shows will stay on until their episodes run out between now and the end of January.

Thanks to the strike, some marginal shows will surely get to run their full slate of episodes — and perhaps win a shot at coming back next year.

In this group are first-season series like Journeyman and Life on NBC, K-ville and Back to You on Fox, Big Shots on ABC and Cane on CBS.

Some holdovers may also be affected for the better, such as Friday Night Lights on NBC, Men in Trees on ABC, 'Til Death on Fox and Shark on CBS.

A show like Friday Night Lights, for instance, with high critical praise and low ratings, could get a chance to break through in January, when it's likely to be among the few fall series with some new episodes left.

As previously reported, Friday Night Lights started Season 2 production early and producers managed to get 15 episodes completed before the strike.

Continue reading in the New York Times ...

You may think that, as of last Friday's episode of Friday Night Lights, the Landry and Tyra murder plot line would be over. Well, the Chicago Tribune reports today, you might want to rethink that position.

The December 7 episode of the show is entitled "The Confession" and yes, that means what you think it means. Though Landry confessed about what he did to his cop dad in the November 9 episode, "How Did I Get Here," there could be a more public admission coming in a couple of weeks.

That December 7 episode also features the return of Kevin Rankin (who's been moonlighting on Bionic Woman) as Herc, Jason Street's buddy.

As for this Friday's episode, "Pantherama," it features the first of a few guest appearances by Austin Nichols of John From Cincinnati fame.

Austin Nichols will reportedly play Noah, a teacher at the high school who forms a somewhat unlikely bond with Julie Taylor (Aimee Teegarden).

In other Friday Night Lights news, rumors that the show is moving to ESPN are false according to an NBC spokesman, who says no, it's not happening.

Follow the jump for few thoughts about this season of Friday Night Lights thus far, courtesy of the Chicago Tribune's Maureen Ryan...

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By the standards of a show justifiably called the best on TV, episode #4, "Let's Get It On," had all the complexity of a light-beer commercial.

For starters, Tim and Jason's trip to Mexico in search of booze (the former) and working legs (the latter) has finally come to an end, and nobody died or disgraced themselves in a way they can't recover from. But they came damn close.

Tim Riggins, in his unparalleled and infinite wisdom, chose a "booze cruise" as the location during which to tell Jason Street, with Lyla Garrity standing by to furrow her gorgeous brow at key moments, that he shouldn't have the surgery because it isn't going to work and he could quite possibly wind up dead.

After a dramatic and unsuccessful confrontation, Riggins and Lyla leave Six to stew in his own anger, and what does he do? Tips himself overboard.

Of course Jason realizes the true value of life as he's sucking down sea water, and of course, as the indie-rock ballad hits epic violin mode, he fights his way to the surface and of course, he's going to spy a beach in the near distance, and of course, a wave comes along and propel him toward the sand. Hallelujah!

Moments later, Riggins and Lyla drive up in a truck — weren't they just on a boat? — and it is confirmed: Jason Street now wants to live. Plus, he's sorry for being a jerk. Now... anyone up for a drink? At the end of the episode, the three amigos are all tipsy and making out with one another. Well, not the boys. You get the idea. Lyla, unable to shake the label of the most boring character on Friday Night Lights, breaks the smokin' hot mood by saying, "I gotta go pray."

We kid you not. Okay, that was the worst of it, and we admit that we very much enjoyed it, the extreme cheese factor notwithstanding.

Continue reading this review of "Let's Get It On" by New York Magazine ...

As we all know, Friday Night Lights launched its second season with a true shocker: Smart, funny, geeky teen Landry Clarke killed a man threatening to attack Tyra Collette, Landry's crush. Then the pair dumped the body.

There was just one problem, according to the Los Angeles Times. The show's relatively small, extremely intense fan base didn't buy it.

"I hated, hated, hated the murder scene," wrote a poster named Tom on the website of Alan Sepinwall, critic for the Newark Star-Ledger.

"Friday Night Lights has always struck me as a production that shows the drama in a real town... The murder scene felt, well, desperate."

Critics who have championed Friday Night Lights were equally upset.

"Absurdly melodramatic and unbelievable," wrote The New Yorker's Nancy Franklin. "The plot thread could easily overwhelm the show and kill it."

Set in a small Texas town and shot in a documentary style, Friday Night Lights has earned a cult following and need-to-improve ratings.

Most fans were drawn less by football than by the nature of the characters: Coach Eric Taylor (Kyle Chandler), his high school counselor wife, their daughter, the paralyzed QB, his two-timing girlfriend, the new quarterback, and so on.

Although viewers might relate to characters who cheated, drank way too much or fought, they didn't know any 16-year-olds who had killed someone.

Some suspected the plot was a ratings ploy, a notion buoyed by releasing of the first episode to Yahoo and the appearance of actors (really) in Allstate ads.

Producer Jason Katims said the Web release and the commercials - some of which contained upcoming air dates of the premiere - were attempts to attract viewers.

"It would be good to have new viewers; I won't deny that," he said.

But he contended the controversial murder plot twist was organic and based on Landry's and Tyra's characters - particularly how the actors portrayed them in a Season 1 episode when the same attacker tried to rape Tyra.

"The way Jesse Plemons played those scenes, he was bringing so much to the table," Katims said. "We realized we had this actor capable of doing much more."

"It wasn't like we thought this would be the thing to draw more audience. On the other hand, we did want to come out in the first episode with a story line that would be surprising and have urgency to it," he said.

This story line will play out over the course of nine episodes and will allow a new focus on the relationship between Landry and his father, a policeman.

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After an overblown season debut — in which Landry accidentally kills the stalker who tried to rape Tyra — it was time to restore peace to Dillon in episode two, writes New York Magazine. As peaceful as things can get, anyway.

Seeds are now in the ground for a season's worth of blowups, heartaches, and wounds that can only be mended by winning football games.

First of all, Landry and Tyra, in the afterglow of his heroism, got it on, a budding romance that, like all teenage romances, is surely doomed.

Given that this is Friday Night Lights, doom will take some crushing form, no doubt related to poor decisions, on the part of both the characters and the writers, to dispose of the body and cover up the death.

Meanwhile, Landry's pal Matt Saracen, the brooding backup-turned star QB, was just dumped unceremoniously by Coach Taylor's daughter, Julie.

Who didn't see this coming? How a cutie like her ever went for such a sad sack we'll never understand. Fortunately, a new love interest arrived on the scene for Matt Saracen in the person of the Latina caring for his grandma.

At least, we're pretty sure she's going to be his love interest because she's kind of hot (naturally) and has already busted his balls.

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Last week's second season premiere of Friday Night Lights offered a development so wildly off-pitch that it could conceivably cast a pall over the series for the rest of its run, according to an MSNBC column.

The plot twist, as anybody who watches Friday Night Lights knows by now, was the accidental beating death of a man who attempted to rape Tyra (Adrianne Palicki) last season, then resurfaced in the Season 2 opener.

After would-be suitor Landry (Jesse Plemons) killed the man, the freaked teens decided to dump the body in a river instead of notifying police.

For a series that constantly tried to make an end run around audience resistance by insisting that it was about its small-town Texas characters and not football, the killing added a level of sensationalism that wasn't helped by the fact that Tyra and Landry are both high school students.

Make no mistake about it: the first season of Friday Night Lights was about as perfect as any season can possibly be. The pilot laid it out fairly clearly.

When star Jason Street (Scott Porter) was injured and the confidence-lacking second-stringer Matt Saracen (Zach Gilford) was sent into action in his place, it could have simply been another example of the underdog that nobody ever saw coming winning the big game in front of the entire town of Dillon.

But the fact that that all happened in the show's first very episode subverted the clichés through the recognition of one simple fact: victory over overwhelming odds was the beginning of the story, not the end of it.

The rest of the season chronicled the fallout from every angle. Rookie coach Eric Taylor (Kyle Chandler), already feeling pressure from the football-crazy town to deliver a state championship, found the season much more difficult with an untested quarterback anchoring the squad.

Matt Saracen had to deal with sudden celebrity he wasn't prepared to assume and expectations that he wasn't sure he could meet.

Street, meanwhile, had to adjust to his new life in a wheelchair, which had ripple effects in the lives of his girlfriend, ever-optimistic cheerleader Lyla Garrity (Minka Kelly), and his best friend, monosyllabic fullback Tim Riggins (Taylor Kitsch), who ended up in each others' arms.

And so on, and so forth, as the reverberations from the events of the pilot echoed through the lives of the people of Dillon. The show explored racism, steroids, mental illness, team loyalty and first love with intelligence and heart.

Continue reading this article here ...

The murder / corpse-disposal plot twist, and what it does to Tyra and Landry - is clearly the focal point of this young Friday Night Lights season.

Below, Friday Night Lights producer Jason Katims discusses the plot twist and its fallout in an interview with blogger Alan Sepinwall.

Alan Sepinwall: While I loved a lot of "Last Days of Summer," especially scenes like Eric and Tami arguing on the couch about when he had to go back to TMU, I was really concerned about the developments in the Tyra and Landry storyline. Can you talk about how that story developed, and what you're trying to do?

Jason Katims: First of all, I've heard some people say it's Ben Silverman trying to change the show or something. The first thing is it's a [plot twist] that we were talking about doing last year in the first season. It's not something that we're doing because the network asked us to change the show. This is a storyline that the writers and producers of the show came up with separate and apart from any network dictate. Now, have you seen the second episode?

Alan Sepinwall: NBC only sent out the premiere.

Jason Katims: We should get you that episode, because honestly, a lot of questions you might have about why we're doing this... Here's our idea behind this storyline. What we want to do is not turning into a murder mystery or CSI, but it's basically these two teenagers in a position where it leads to this incredibly intimate storyline between these two characters that would never - their relationship would never become as intimate as it does if not for this event.

Like all Friday Night Lights stories, it's about character, two people trying to deal with it, what they've done, all the guilt and everything would happen to them, and that the two of them get more connected than they ever would have.

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We know you don't need any reasons to check out Friday Night Lights if you're visiting this site. You've discovered it already. But for the purpose of converting your oblivious friends, Yahoo TV came up with the top five reasons to watch it. Do not be hesitant to bust this list out and convert a new fan!

1. The plot is simple. Friday Night Lights is all about real life and its awkward, messy glory. No time-traveling or mysteries, just good old-fashioned real life drama and life lessons that go way beyond the football field.

2. The cast is really good looking. Hey, there's no harm in admitting it! Lyla Garrity (Minka Kelly) and Tyra Collette (Adrianne Palicki) are stunners, to say the least, while the guys on this show aren't half-bad either. Just sayin'.

3. The characters are down to earth. You'll swear you grew up next door to them, in some cases. They marry good stories with subtle humor that's current and relatable and makes the characters seem very realistic.

4. The relationships are the real thing. There is nothing as fickle and thorny as human contact - especially regarding teen relationships - and Friday Night Lights lets you eavesdrop on all those deliciously awkward real-life moments between friends, lovers and family members.

5. Football is good. The roller coaster ride that is the Dillon Panthers' quest for state championship glory is interwoven with character-driven storylines that grip your heart. The show is relentless (and successful) in grabbing you and taking you on a wild ride every week. Not bad for Friday night TV!

  The whole family: Tami, baby Grace, Julie and Eric Taylor.

Kristin Veitch of E! Online isn't going to suggest that you start watching Friday Night Lights if you don't already. She's flat-out ordering you to.

The TV reporter just returned from visiting the Friday Night Lights set in Austin, Tex., where she learned what a unique television series Friday Night Lights is, and that the actors who bring it to life are some of the sweetest, most grounded people you could ever hope to meet. She writes:

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I spent the day in Austin at the Taylor home, which is actually a real house in a Dillon-esque suburb, and it didn't feel like work at all but rather like hanging out with a very cool family who legitimately like one another.

These guys are clearly having a good time, from Kyle Chandler (Eric Taylor) and Taylor Kitsch (Tim Riggins) cracking each other up between takes, to Aimee Teagarden (Julie Taylor) joining in giggly fun when the crew began sucking air from helium balloon props to Scott Porter (Jason Street) and Kevin Rankin (Herc) razzing each other while talking about — what else — football.

And, oh yeah, how could I forget about Kyle Chandler taking orders and cooking up bacon and eggs for the whole crew while shooting the day's breakfast scene!

But that's not to say these guys aren't busting their backsides. Friday Night Lights is produced in an entirely different way than any other show on TV, because there are no rehearsals.

Very often, the entire script can be thrown out the window.

So, there is no room for slacking. The actors have to be on their toes — and ready to improv — at a moment's notice. Even while on set, surrounded by cameras and lights, there were moments I honestly forgot the situation wasn't real and the people were actors — a true testament to their talent.

Actress Jessalyn Gilsig (Nip/Tuck) was on set — guest-starring for six episodes as the sister of Connie Britton's character, Tami Taylor — and told me with huge, excited eyes that the production process is "insane!"

Her scene in the Taylor casa was supposed to revolve around yoga, but once they started shooting, the director chucked the yoga angle, and the actors improvised the entire scene. "This is the reason I'm such a huge fan of the show," Gilsig told me. "They are doing what no one else is doing."

You can see that very fact for yourself when you tune in to the second episode of Season Two of Friday Night Lights on Friday at 9 p.m. on NBC.