LIFE AFTER DEATH
THE EXCELLENT SUNDERLAND ’ TIL I DIE RETURNS WITH A DIFFERENT KIND OF ENDING
FULL DISCLOSURE: I’ve been a Sunderland fan for 25 years. (Don’t ask.) I was also born to parents who were Cleveland Browns season ticket holders, so I know sports dysfunction and misery. It’s like Sunderland picked me. The parallels between the two clubs are striking: They’re both located in northern coastal industrial cities with shipbuilding ties, now fighting to stave off a seemingly inevitable blue- collar decline; their football teams, which dominated generations ago, struggle to remain competitive for a rabid fan base.
That backdrop made the first two seasons of Sunderland ’Til I Die on Netf lix so great. The bond between the club and its fans was strong enough to endure whatever harshness the team encountered.
And there was plenty of harshness, in the form of incompetent management and back-to-back relegations. (Imagine the Browns being sent to the Big Ten and then to the MAC.)
Those circumstances tee up the newly dropped Season 3, which sees Sunderland trying to escape League One and get back to the second tier of English football. It is, once again, riveting stuff, even for those without a quartercentury of invested fandom.
Unlike the first two seasons, the third go-round, at three episodes, doesn’t have time to build a substantial narrative arc, nor does it have behind-the-scenes access to the comic-book villains who owned the team in Seasons 1 and 2. At the start of Season 3 the team has just been bought by Kyril Louis-dreyfus, a 20-something scion of one of the richest families in the world (and a distant relative of a certain Veep star). Instead, it leans into on-field action and further mines the relationship between the team and its followers, including one fan who speaks openly about his mental health struggles and takes part in cold water therapy to numb his feelings about the team.
Mild spoiler alert (the events of the doc took place two seasons ago, so this is not exactly news): Sunderland makes it back to the Championship, making all but the most cynical viewers believe once again in the restorative power of sports. It’s also plain-old delightful television—beautifully shot and scored—a happy ending for the true stars of the show: the fans who have done nothing but craved a club they can be proud of.
Postscript: Instead of opening the purse strings, Louis-dreyfus decided to take the Moneyball route, alienating the coach who guided the team to promotion to the point that he quit. His immensely popular successor was capriciously axed last December, replaced by a guy who lasted 12 games before a fan revolt did him in. (It later emerged that he may have had a burner social media account defending him and dragging the fans.) Still, the team is on the verge of the promotion playoffs.
In short: There’s enough drama to make the Browns look like peak Lombardi- era Packers. And it all will make for an incredible fourth season. Please, Netf lix, make this happen.