I'm gonna go to my room and read Tiger Beat.

Friday Night Lights - There Goes The Neighborhood
A tornado forces the Panthers to share close quarters with a rival team; Julie befriends Riggins after he moves in with the Taylors; and Landry makes a decision about his relationship with Tyra. Photo © NBC.

Ok, first off, Tim Riggins is so freakin’ HOT. Good lord.

As the ep begins, we find that Riggins has moved into the Coach’s house and he and Shelley play with baby Grace while a storm brews outside. [How long is Shelley visiting these poor people?!?] Tim leaves for the store and runs into Julie, who accompanies him. Shelley, left alone in the house, reminds herself out loud that Riggins is jail bait. [Finally someone acknowledges the statutory rape factor!] Regardless, I totally think Shelley and Riggins should do it, cause their chemistry is electric.

While they are at the store, a tornado hits and Tim protects Julie with those rippling arm muscles. If she didn’t already have a serious crush, you can bet she does now. Time passes. Back at the Taylor house, Tami tries to talk to Shelley and Jules, and is irritated to find that they are too distracted by Riggins doing situps to listen. All of this adds up to Julie becoming seriously hot for the boy. Talking with Lois about Riggins and the tornado, Julie says he was “holding me like protecting me, not like I love you.” So, at least she is smart enough to know where she stands.

Riggins fits into the Taylor household well (except Tami is a bitch as per usual this season, and she and Shelley get into another huge fight about their differences). In a fun twist on the prevailing “father figure” theme of the show, Eric truly enjoys having a “son figure” around. Riggins and Julie continue to hang out, and this culminates in the two of them going to a party where Julie gets wasted. Some kid brags to Riggins that he’s going to do her, and “big brother” Riggins threatens his life. He takes Julie home and tries to put her to bed, and the drunken fool tries to kiss him. Naturally, this is when Eric walks in, and he screams at Tim to get out of the house. Man, Riggins just can’t catch a break with Coach lately!

Meanwhile, the Landry/Tyra story progresses. Landry tries to hold her hand in public, and she puts him off. Landry asks her to the dance, and she says no but goes with Chip, Larribee quarterback. Landry can’t handle watching Tyra and Chip talking, and starts a huge cafeteria-wide fight. (And calls a guy with excessively curly hair “Richard Simmons,” which was great). Finally, when Landry shows up at the dance looking for her, Tyra admits that she likes him more than she’s ever liked anyone else, and that scares her. Landry, however, is sick of waiting and he’s not gonna wait forever.

In football news, the tornado has forced the closure of the Larribee school (Panther rivals), so the students come to Dillon. Obviously this causes a great deal of strife, and the Larribee kids fuck up the Panthers locker room and pee on their stuff. Their coach does nothing, and when Riggins tries to take matters into his own hands, Eric interrupts and ends up throwing the Larribee coach up against a wall. Go Eric! This episode had a lot of fighting.

Finally, Buddy becomes even more worthy of the viewers’ sympathy when Pam announces that she is getting remarried. He tries to win her back but she gently rejects him. And he cries. Awwww.

I loved this ep. It had all the things that make FNL worth watching, including a bunch of shots of Riggins in tank tops. While I understand Eric’s knee-jerk “dad” reaction to finding Riggins bent over his daughter's bed, with her in it, I am kind of irritated that Eric doesn’t know better by now. I am still sick of Tami, Julie is returning to her former likeable self, Landry has finally thrown down with Tyra. The only sour note was a continued lack of Street.

Will Riggins finally move home with Billy? Will Julie be able to convince her dad that what happened was her fault? Will Tyra man up and deal with the fact that she actually cares for a boy? Will Matt dump Carlotta and become interesting again? Only time will tell…