Neurodivergent (Headcanon) Alley: Roy Kent (Ted Lasso)

*Roy-related spoilers.*

As I’ve said before, a neurodivergent reading of Ted Lasso really snuck up on me. I loved the show’s whimsy and wordplay, I adored its enormous heart, and I really appreciated how it tackled issues like toxic masculinity and mental health struggles. Pretty much every character is spectacular. But even as I started exploring my own neurodivergence and clocking the Big ND Energy in so many of my favorite shows, it took me a while to consider Ted Lasso, and I’m not sure why. Is it because it’s about sports? Whatever the reason, I came late to realizing just how neurodivergent this show feels, but now I’m fully on board the “Ted Lasso is autistic as hell” train. And for my first Neurodivergent Alley post on the show, there was only one choice for me.

Actually, I think part of the reason I didn’t clock the show’s autistic coding is because it dovetails so well into the themes of dismantling toxic masculinity, so I was attributing many of the show’s qualities to one theme when the answer is more multifaceted. Roy is a prime example of this. We meet him as the gruff, angry captain of AFC Richmond. He constantly swears, he’s well known for literally growling at people, and he can be extremely good at pushing others away. He's one of several clear foils for Ted at the start of the show, and we the audience wait for the affable, caring Ted to break down Roy’s tough-guy walls and help him get more in touch with his emotions. And to an extent, we do see that. Roy has been messed up by toxic masculinity, like a lot of the guys have. But when we look at how Roy communicates, how he expresses his feelings, and how he interacts with other people, it’s clear to me that the situation isn’t just that.

Ted Lasso has a lot of swearing in general, but Roy swears in virtually every setting, including at his young niece’s school and on TV during his short-lived tenure as a sports commentator. It’s not really that he doesn’t understand the social cue, he just doesn’t care about it. It’s part of how he communicates, along with his flat-facing (he rarely smiles,) his stiff posture, and, yes, the growling. As a professional footballer, and later, a coach, it all becomes part of his “hard man” persona, which helps him get through annoying or uncomfortable social situations. The public doesn’t mind when he flips off photographers or gives terse answers to reporters because “that’s just Roy Kent.” If he occasionally needs to growl instead of use words, it’s handy that growling is practically considered a catchphrase for him.

He can miss implications in his social interactions. When Keeley asks him out and he says he’s busy, he doesn’t realize she takes that to mean he’s not interested. Later in their relationship, he can’t take the hint that she needs a little alone time and has to have it explicitly spelled out for him. More often than not, Roy is bluntly, brutally honest with people. He’s never shy about telling someone they played like shit or calling them out when they need it, and he is not the person you go to for flattering reassurance. He appreciates bluntness in others as well. I love when he asks if Keeley was talking about him, and while Rebecca and Higgins try to evade and “cover” for her, Keeley nonchalantly replies, “Yeah, we’re talking about you,” which Roy is perfectly fine with.

Yes, Roy can be fairly repressed, but he can also just have a hard time with his emotions. There are moments on the show where he needs a few beats to process something in silence before yelling, “Fuck!” or flipping a bench over. It can be really tough for him to ask for help or explain how he’s feeling, and it seems like he sometimes needs to express those feelings out loud before he fully understands them himself. He sabotages his relationship with Keeley because he's scared, it takes him three full seasons to admit he wants to be a Diamond Dog, and it’s like pulling teeth for him to confess that something hurt his “feeling.”

But Roy can also be surprisingly open at times too. Despite leaving Chelsea due to his fears of becoming a "broken-down footballer," he isn’t shy about admitting his physical weaknesses, like the fact that he doesn’t see well at night or that he doesn’t use whistles as a coach because impure metals give him mouth hives. And it extends to emotional stuff as well. When Ted approaches Roy about benching him, Roy isn't just mad, he's very specifically hurt, and he makes it clear that he feels betrayed after Ted promised he'd have his back. When Keeley dances around criticizing a dud that Rebecca is dating, Roy tells her in no uncertain terms that the guy doesn’t deserve her and she shouldn’t “settle for fine.”

This isn’t just Ted’s influence, either. Roy definitely becomes more open about his emotions as the show goes on, but this side of him was always there. He’ll come right out and talk about things that you’d think would be embarrassing for a tough-guy professional athlete to admit, and yet he seems completely unbothered by it. I love that you can’t always predict what he’ll share willingly and what he’ll try to hide. It makes his character more interesting, and for me, it’s further proof that, when Roy has difficulty talking about his emotions, it goes beyond self-consciousness or toxic masculinity. In the scenes where he either can’t open up or struggles to get the words out, it looks almost physically painful for him.

Another thing I really love about the show and Roy’s place in it is that who is he as a person doesn’t fundamentally change. As he grows and Ted makes Richmond a safe place to be vulnerable and show his softer side, Roy doesn’t transform. He doesn’t stop swearing or growling, and he’s still a gruff guy. He doesn’t magically start handling social situations with aplomb. Instead, he’s able to be more fully himself, surrounded by people who embrace all sides of him: the sweet, the open, the grumpy, the sweary, and so on. I love that so much.

Relationship Spotlight: Keeley Jones & Roy Kent (Ted Lasso)

*Some Roy/Keeley-related spoilers.*

Yep, another romantic Relationship Spotlight—in recent years, there’s been a definite uptick in the sort of ships that appeal to me. Ted Lasso is full of great characters who are all terrific on their own and in near endless combinations with one another, but Keeley and Roy are two of my favorites. A delightful Odd Couple that really works, partners who talk and listen to each other, there’s just so much to love about this pairing.

Reason one: they challenge each other. These two start out with fairly combative chemistry, which is certainly popular for good reason. Keeley is dating Jamie, Roy’s least favorite person by a long shot, and that (along with his overall anger about most things in life) colors his early interactions with her. But she takes the grumpy wind out of his sails, refusing to be intimidated and making fun of his hard-man routine. Over the course of the first season, they begin to circle around each other, and each gives the other what for when they’re being out of line, whether that’s Keeley involving Roy in a fight between her and Jamie or Roy taking his bad mood out on Keeley when he’s really mad about something else. Both characters have a lot going for them already but they grow under one another’s influence.

Reason two: they get each other. So many major beats in Keeley and Roy’s romantic storyline are fun and offbeat, but it really works for them. I love that, when a paparazzo snaps a photo of them out together, Roy threatens him, takes his sim card, and offers it to Keeley as “photos of their date.” I love that they plan to have “sexy Christmas” together, but both adjust their plans when Roy winds up having to watch his niece Phoebe, without either making a big thing of that. I love that, when Roy finally understands that he’s been smothering Keeley with a bit too much attention, he makes an apology playlist and gets out of her hair so she can enjoy a nice long bath.

Reason three: they’re there for each other. When Roy reaches his breaking point with his bad knee and realizes he’s going to have to retire from football, Keeley seeks him out alone in the locker room and sits with him as he mourns the end of his career. As Keeley starts making a name for herself in PR, Roy is nothing but encouraging, reassuring her through uncertain moments and putting up with stuff he hates (like photo shoots) for the sake of boosting her even further.

Reason four: they’re just so much fun. When they officially get together, in the press room, the way Keeley “poses” as members of various press outlets to question Roy and make sure he’s really ready for this relationship is too adorable. I love that Keeley is turned on by Roy’s vulnerability and that Roy can’t help exclaiming aloud when he reads The Da Vinci Code, much to her annoyance. They often feel like a cross between best friends and partners in crime, which is what I love to see in a couple. So often on TV, we see couples who 1) are constantly duking it out to be the one who’s “right,” 2) seem to actively aggravate each other, or 3) don’t seem like they’d be able to come up with anything to do together, other than have sex. With Keeley and Roy, every episode with them as a couple shows you just how much they like each other and how they know each day is better with the other in it.

Favorite Characters: Roy Kent (Ted Lasso)

*A few Roy-related spoilers.*

a.k.a. Roy fucking Kent. There are plenty of characters to love on Ted Lasso, not least of which the eponymous Ted, but Roy is my absolute favorite of favorites, so he comes first.

When Ted first starts coaching for Richmond, none of the players are thrilled to have him there, and that very much includes team captain/veteran footballer Roy Kent. Roy is a surly misanthrope, whose trademark growl and sweary demeanor is well-known to the fans. However, he’s been plagued by recent knee problems, and as he edges toward aging out of premiere league football, Roy is surlier than ever. The arrival of a folksy ray-of-sunshine coach who doesn’t know anything about the sport is not a welcome sight to him.

Ted, though, is only the first of many characters to start breaking through Roy’s grumpy defenses. It starts with Ted, then Keeley, then other players as Roy begins taking a more active mentorship role on the team. Ted aggravates Roy by cheerfully believing that he’ll step up and do the right thing, playing a game of chicken with Roy regarding some locker-room bullying. When Roy realizes that Ted is ultimately right, that he can use his position on the team to influence younger players who look up to him, he shouts expletives, but he does do it.

That’s because, in truth, Roy Kent is a rather delightfully secret softie. His sweet but grouchy relationship with his young niece Phoebe is a highlight of any episode it’s featured in, and once he starts dating Keeley, he’s a 100%-devoted boyfriend who adores her. He might hide his love of doing yoga with a group of middle-aged women who don’t know he’s a famous athlete, and he makes no bones about his contempt for the cocky hotshot Jamie, but most of the time, he finds himself doing the caring thing despite himself.

It’s a really interesting characterization. While the angry, aggressive Roy might at first seem a poster boy for toxic masculinity in professional sports, he very much subverts that notion, and yet those are still parts of him. Until he establishes trust with someone, his first instinct is to put walls up, to demonstrate that he won’t suffer fools but also that he’s above petty jockeying for status (except where Jamie’s concerned—he has a tendency to be very petty there.) But at the same time, once he does get to know and trust someone, he can be very open about his sweeter, sillier, more sensitive qualities. When he’s having a hard time with his relationship, he (very) reluctantly goes to Ted about it, then is surprisingly chill when he realizes that talking through some of his issues isn’t so bad. When he finds out that Keeley is turned on by a video of him breaking down during an emotional press conference, he’s at first angry and embarrassed but then makes his peace with her loving his vulnerability. He urges Rebecca not to settle for a subpar relationship, he follows Keeley around like a puppy (then realizes she might not always appreciate that!), and he’d do anything for Phoebe.

It’s so much fun to watch Roy’s journey over the course of the show. Part of this journey is genuine character growth, learning through characters like Ted or Keeley to be more open or patient or adaptive. But another big part of it is simply getting the opportunity to see who Roy already is beneath a lot of the bluster. He’s a wonderful character—frequently hilarious, often heartwarming, sometimes poignant, and always compelling.