As Knives Out director Rian Johnson revealed several years, ago if you see a character in an Apple show speaking into a non-branded phone, you can take it they’re the villain. Apple doesn’t allow villains to be shown using its products. And not that anyone needs to be told this, but all of that Ted Talk on the iPhone confirms Lasso as the hero. Yet at a more fundamental level it’s a celebration of shiny and expensive kit – all brought to you by the corporation that invented luxury minimalism.Īs often as not these products appear in what experts call the “fifth quadrant”: the square bang in the centre of the screen that is usually the focus of viewer attention. The show is ostensibly about behind-the-scenes back-stabbing on American breakfast TV. Jennifer Aniston and Reese Witherspoon spend enormous chunks of their screen time with iPhones clamped to their ears or whispering sweet-nothings to their MacBooks. Much the same experience is served up by Apple TV+’s other big hit, The Morning Show, which returns Friday for a second season. He doesn’t quite prostrate himself before an effigy of the late Steve Jobs but you get the idea. Ted talks on his iPhone, natters over FaceTime, sends emails with his MacBook Air. In one episode of the eponymous comedy series about a feel-good football manager, Apple products feature 36 times. Ted Lasso, the sweetest guy on television, is trying to sell you stuff.
