‘Here Come the Irish:’ A Look at Notre Dame Football’s Legacy

For a documentary series about the Notre Dame football team, “Here Come the Irish” doesn’t show a whole lot of football. The Peacock original is much more focused on the culture, the emotion and the faith that the team has come to represent than anything that might happen on the field. If the in-house production team (led by Notre Dame’s own John Fornaro) wants the viewers to take anything from the documentary, it’s that Notre Dame is special, it’s different and — most of all — Notre Dame is sacred.

The 30-minute premiere “Choose Hard” doesn’t do much beyond setting the stage for the six episodes to come. Filmed during the spring season, “Choose Hard” acts as a prologue, using historical footage, interviews with Notre Dame figures and shots of the players in their everyday lives to establish the university as, well, more than a university. In “Here Come the Irish,” Notre Dame is an important American institution more than anything else. While the show as a whole is clearly made to service fans of the Fighting Irish, “Choose Hard” argues that everybody should care about Notre Dame football as they play their way to a 2024 national title. 

It’s not as though Notre Dame is an underdog — far from it. Archival reels particularly highlight the upward trajectory of the university and team, and how the “Notre Dame brand” of today came to be. But what exactly is that brand? 

As Lou Holtz, Head Coach from 1986 to 1996, says, “Those who know Notre Dame, no explanation’s necessary. Those who don’t, no explanation will suffice.”

Now, I should be at least somewhat qualified to answer the question of brand. Coming from a big Irish Catholic family, full of Notre Dame alumni and superfans, I’ve had an acute awareness of not only the football team but the Midwestern, faith-filled values of the university since birth. Though it was clear early on that the University of Michigan was more my style than Notre Dame, I still just can’t shake the reverential feeling that the Fighting Irish evoke in me, no matter how hard I try. Despite this, I found the definition of Notre Dame in “Here Comes the Irish” to be, frankly, too self-indulgent to be interesting to a wider audience. 

Notre Dame wants you to believe in its humility while simultaneously insisting upon its greatness — as if producing a seven-part piece on why it’s the best football team on earth was a duty bestowed upon it by God. When Marcus Freeman, current Head Coach since 2022, mentions his hunger for a national title — the underlying drive of the episode — it isn’t sat with long enough to create intrigue. Instead of jump-cutting to yet another segment basking in the glory of Notre Dame, I would have found it much more interesting to juxtapose this yearning with Freeman’s occasionally troubled coaching history (Freeman was the first head coach in Notre Dame history to open a season with three losses). 

This constant contradiction leads to a flat storyline full of never-ending ups, leaving “Choose Hard” feeling more like an overstretched advertisement than a premiere. From the shots of the iconic Touchdown Jesus overlooking the field, to showcasing the service work done by both Freeman and his players, to the constant distinction of the Notre Dame spirit — the viewer is never allowed to see Notre Dame and its football team as anything other than sacred.

That said, it’s impossible to ignore just how beautifully shot and scored this documentary is. The visuals in particular are peaceful, with soft coloring and ambient shots of fall leaves surrounding campus landmarks — a far cry from the typical sports documentary. “Choose Hard” is serious and earnest rather than action-packed and punchy, setting up Notre Dame as a “small, midwestern Catholic school” that the everyman can, and should, root for. While those adjectives are technically correct, they don’t exactly cover the reality of the internationally recognized, extraordinarily expensive private institution that Notre Dame has become.

In explaining why he left Louisiana State University for Notre Dame, Offensive Coordinator Mike Denbrock (2002-2004, 2010-2016, 2023-present) sums up the thesis of “Here Come the Irish.”

“I can’t turn down the opportunity to coach a Notre Dame kid,” he says, followed by Freeman verifying that the values of the players speak for themselves.

After all, as this episode has taught us, strong values are allegedly more important to the team than a strategic play could ever be. The problem is, I just don’t know how much I buy that. 

The premiere of “Here Come the Irish” is a well-done promotional piece, but a mediocre documentary. While I’m struggling to pin down exactly what I learned from “Choose Hard,” one thing is for sure: Notre Dame will stop at nothing to dominate the 2024 season (unless it comes to Northern Illinois — sorry Dad, I had to). 

Daily Arts Contributor Caroline Cahill can be reached at ccaroli@umich.edu.

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