Friday Night Lights

Last Friday's new episode, "How Did I Get Here," was yet another terrific hour of Friday Night Lights. Click here for the Insider's photo gallery from the episode. You can also relive the drama in our episode guide and discuss it in our forum.

This week, Friday Night Lights returns at its usual night and time with a new episode, "Pantherama!" We'll have a preview poster later in the week.

With two seasons of Friday Night Lights and numerous other TV roles under her belt, the lovely Adrianne Palicki is building quite the resume. Now she's added a new movie role to her upcoming list of work projects.

According to Variety, Nip/Tuck's Dylan Walsh will star in the remake of the 1987 thriller The Stepfather. Sela Ward and Penn Badgley (of Gossip Girl fame) will reportedly round out the family tree, with Friday Night Lights beauty Adrianne Palicki also in negotiations to secure a role in the horror project.

Adrianne Palicki: Keeping busy with movie roles.

The Stepfather is (and will be) an Alfred Hitchcocki-style suspense thriller that revolves around a teenage boy's relationship with his psychotic stepfather.

Things take a turn for the worse when the boy (Penn Badgley) discovers that his new dad may have killed his previous family. Sela Ward will star as the mom, while Adrianne Palicki will play Badgley's girlfriend. Sounds like fun!

Welcome to the Friday Night Lights Caption Contest, a Monday tradition. Let's take a look at who won this week's edition of the Caption Contest.

It was a difficult call, but we chose LoveMeLyla. That caption poses a number of good questions! The winning reply appears below the pic. Scroll down to read the full list of replies we received for this past week's Caption Contest.

Thank you for playing and making Friday Night Lights Insider the best Friday Night Lights fan site online. Good luck again in this week's contest!

This week's Friday Night Lights Caption Contest image:

Lyla: "How did you swim to shore if you can't feel your legs?"
Jason: "How did you guys appear on land two seconds later?"

It looks as though the ongoing Hollywood writers' strike could affect the future of Friday Night Lights. The show, among NBC's most acclaimed, is filmed in Austin and brings in $1.5 million per episode to the city.

The show's producers said because of the strike, there is only material written to keep working through December 4. Production would stop then, although there are several additional episodes that have already been written and shot.

NBC would not comment on plans for Friday Night Lights, but it doesn't appear there will be a resolution to the writers' strike anytime soon.

Marching in protest, thousands of television writers and their supporters blocked the road in front of a studio near Los Angeles Friday morning.

"I've spent the last 25 years of my career working with writers, and I understand their grievances in this case, and I don't believe they're being unreasonable, and so I'm here to support that," said actor Kelsey Grammer.

The strike will most certainly affect what people watch.

"I am an empty shell waiting to be filled in by the material written by these folks," said Tonight Show host Jay Leno.

The Tonight Show shut down production in the wake of the strike, and NBC announced Friday they are looking for guest hosts to replace Leno.

Members of the Writers Guild of America said they want residual pay for movies and shows that end up downloaded or offered for free online.

"The backbone of this industry is the people whose faces aren't recognizable, the people trying to get by, make a living and get what's due them," said actor Tim Robbins. "This is simply an issue of fairness."

Network prime time schedules could be reduced to the two R's: reality shows and repeats. There is no sign that contract talks will resume.

The last writers' walkout was in 1988 and lasted more than five months. It cost the industry an estimated $500 million.

Wow. Just wow. Some of the developments on the most recent Friday Night Lights took us totally off guard, and the entire episode reminded us why this series is TV's best. Follow the link to relive all the action or read what you missed in Friday Night Lights Insider's episode guide to "How Did I Get Here."

Photo gallery, quotes and music guide from the episode are still to come, along with our staff Round Table discussion. As always, you can discuss the episode, characters and everything about the show in the Insider's forum!

We were starting to wonder if these two were still together. Singer John Mayer and his girlfriend, Friday Night Lights star Minka Kelly hadn't been photographed together as much recently, but they stepped out Sunday for an NBA game.

Seated at the New York Knicks-Miami Heat battle at Madison Square Garden, Mayer was greeted on the scoreboard: "Welcome John Mayer, Recording Artist."

We would have gone with "Please welcome Minka Kelly, the beautiful, talented star of Friday Night Lights" but perhaps we're a little bit biased here.

Minka Kelly and John Mayer: Watching the NBA, still going strong.

This week's episode of Friday Night Lights looks like another good one. Eric is back in Dillon but things aren't going smoothly, while Tim Riggins gets a rude awakening and Landry feels the heat turned up like never before.

You can discuss "How Did I Get Here" with fellow Friday Night Lights fans and critics before and after the show in our FORUM. It's easy and free. Share your thoughts on the Dillon Panthers, their stories and whatever strikes you. Enjoy!

After the show, Friday Night Lights Insider will post its official episode recap, as well as compile a photo gallery, list of quotes and music guide. Help us out if you can! Thanks for making us the #1 Friday Night Lights fan site online.

Below is NBC's promo for this Friday's all-new episode of Friday Night Lights, "How Did I Get Here." There's plenty going on as Riggins gets the boot from the team, Coach has problems at work and at home, and the heat gets cranked up further on Landry as more clues to the murder are uncovered...

As always, you can discuss "How Did I Get Here" and all things about the show before, during and after the episode in Friday Night Lights Insider's forum.

Lots of notable Texans will be gathering at the 2007 Greater Austin Walk Now for Autism this Saturday to raise money for autism awareness and research.

One of the participants will be Jesse Plemons, who plays lovable sidekick and football player Landry on Friday Night Lights.

The Mart, Tex., native will be on hand at the event for pictures and autographs.

Plemons' mother is a teacher in Waco who works with children with autism.

The walk is at the Dell Diamond in Round Rock, Tex., the Austin American-Statesman reports.

Area residents should consider joining Jesse Plemons in this effort to raise money for a good cause - and maybe meet him, too!

A return to the glory years appears to be within reach for the real life Panthers of "Friday Night Lights" fame. Odessa Permian is 9-0 going into its regular season finale, the latest into a season they've been unbeaten since 1993.

"What's happening now has been a thing that's kind of brought back the good old days," said former Permian coach John Wilkins, who went 148-16 with two state titles from 1973 to 1985. "The crowds are coming back."

Odessa Permian won six state championships, three of them in the 1980s when the Panthers lost only 11 games. At that point, the assistant coaches were lured to better jobs and the school's pre-eminence gradually faded.

The last title came in 1991, and the vaunted Panthers lost an unthinkable 49 games in a 10-year stretch from 1997 through last season. That included the longest losing streak in school history, a six-game skid in 2004.

But an Eric Taylor-esque young coach — the only one of 11 since 1959 who also played for the school — is turning things around in this small West Texas city known for two things: oil and football. 

A return to glory: Odessa Permian - the school chronicled in the book "Friday Night Lights" by H.G. Bissinger - is unbeaten going into its season finale.

Last year, in only his second season, Darren Allman led the Panthers to a 9-4 season and a regional semifinal loss to Southlake Carroll, a school with four state titles in five years in Class 5A, the state's largest.

Gary Gaines, one of Allman's predecessors whose 1988 team was depicted in the book of the same name that inspired the movie and series Friday Night Lights, said the 38-year-old Allman has returned the team to fundamentals.

"He just had a little better insight as to what was needed," Gaines said. "He has just put it all together."

Continue reading this article on Permian from MSNBC ...