Welcome to Wrexham Season 4, Episode 8 Review: ‘Do a Wrexham’

Welcome to Wrexham Season 4, Episode 8, “Do a Wrexham,” follows Wrexham AFC as they are on the brink of a history-making, back-to-back-to-back promotion. This season finale is well aware that everything – this season and the past three – lead up to this. The episode encapsulates that pressure cooker in the last five (well, four) games of the season with a near-constant check-in with where Wycombe sit on the table. All the while, “Do a Wrexham” wraps up outstanding narratives as best it can with the time it has left.

As always, Welcome to Wrexham’s structure, editing, and storytelling continue to excel, with this season finale delivering multiple emotional payoffs. Most of all, “Do a Wrexham” beautifully captures how special this moment is for football history, this club, and this docuseries. It’s an undeniably magical experience.

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Quality Character and Inspiring Resilience

Given that this episode nearly exclusively follows the men’s first team, it’s perfectly in-story to check in with the academy players. Though it is brief, “Do a Wrexham” provides closure for goalkeeper Bryn Owen and defender Tom Kelly on their journeys to potential professional contracts with the club.

Unfortunately, Owen doesn’t progress up that ladder. His response – being sad for those he feels he let down and optimistic about the future – is an incredible insight into his character. The same is true for Kelly, who receives a professional contract and commends his parents’ support. Even though they are only in a few episodes of the series, Welcome to Wrexham successfully earns this moment and all that it means for Owen and Kelly.

In a different sense, it’s rewarding, which doesn’t even adequately capture the emotional response to this part of the episode, to see the young Wrexham fan, Archie White, at the Racecourse. Sarah White, Archie’s mother, saying, “He just makes so proud because of how happy he is,” is so succinct, moving, and wonderful. That happiness is contagious as he lights up around the Wrexham AFC players, coaching staff, and co-chairman Rob McElhenney. 

It’s impossible not to grin ear to ear as Archie walks across the pitch, grabs a bit of grass, and scores a goal at the Racecourse. It’s no wonder that McElhenney describes Archie as “a beacon for the whole club,” and it’s great to know that Archie was present for that promotion match against Charlton Athletic.

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Wrexham AFC Makes History

Of course, figures within the club (co-chairman McElhenney and Ryan Reynolds, director Shaun Harvey, and various players) look at this potential promotion through the pressure of expectations. It’s interesting for that to apply to the docuseries, too. Welcome to Wrexham has already captured two promotions, one of which brought Wrexham AFC back to the EFL (English Football League).

A big question looming over “Do a Wrexham” is how the docuseries itself will pull off depicting another one. What this episode pulls off is intimate yet grand and entirely fitting of an Emmy Award-winning docuseries. The constant competition between Wrexham AFC and Wycombe Wanderers works because the structure supports the tension. Not to mention, the docuseries imbues that dynamic with a unique context after the camaraderie in “Life or Death.” 

That pairs nicely with the highs and lows leading up to the Charlton Athletic match. Even the Wigan Athletic match feels particularly bittersweet. Recently, the news broke that the club signed Wrexham AFC striker Paul Mullion for a season-long loan. So, even though the results of the matches may be known, Welcome to Wrexham’s excellent storytelling makes them count. That sentiment extends to Ker finishing the marathon in support of the Wrexham Miners Project.

Nothing is more successful than weaving personal photos and videos into the Charlton game footage. That visible throughline from the players’ and staff’s youths to their present recontextualizes the game. Their childlike joy becomes contagious. It’s the dynamic tool that Welcome to Wrexham needs to properly and thoughtfully redefine “Do a Wrexham.” It’s so well done that the docuseries is justified in curbing any speculation about whether they can do it again and make it to the Premier League. This season’s finale confidently encourages fans to bask in Wrexham AFC’s history-making magic of back-to-back-to-back promotions. As James McClean cheers, “Up the history makers!”

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What did you think of Welcome to Wrexham Season 4, Episode 8, “Do a Wrexham?” Let us know in the comments below!

Welcome to Wrexham Season 4 is streaming on Hulu.