Where Are All the Good Summer TV Shows? Plus, the ‘Lioness’ S3 Teaser and ‘Star City’ Episode 4.

Chris and Andy talk about the busy weekend in sports, from the many World Cup games to the Knicks winning the Finals (2:43), before reacting to the ‘Lioness’ Season 3 teaser (12:34). Then they discuss what is shaping up to be a late-summer TV drought and why the Emmys' disproportionate influence on the calendar may be causing it (20:32). Finally, inspired by Andy’s experience watching ‘Weapons,’ (28:47) Chris gives him a handful of horror-adjacent recs (36:33). Finally, they break down ‘Star City’ Episode 4 (45:57). Subscribe to the Ringer TV YouTube channel here for full episodes of The Watch and so much more! Hosts: Chris Ryan and Andy Greenwald Producers: Kaya McMullen and Kai Grady Additional Video Supervision: Jacob Cornett Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

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• 1:35Speaker 01

  I need support staff to clear the room. Stand up and walk, now!

• 1:41Chris Ryan?

  Hello and welcome to The Watch. My name is Chris Ryan. I am an editor at theringer.com and joining me in the studio, the new manager of Tunisia, it's Andy Greenwald!

• 1:53Andy Greenwald?

  Did he get sacked?

• 1:54Chris Ryan?

  He did, after one game.

• 1:56Andy Greenwald?

  After one game?

• 1:57Chris Ryan?

  Swedes will do that to you, let me tell you.

• 1:59Andy Greenwald?

  Whoa!

• 2:00Chris Ryan?

  It's really good to see you. It's great to see Kaia. We're here in Los Angeles. I'm back from my Midwest sojourn. I put in the work. I've watched the shows. I've seen the movies.

• 2:12Andy Greenwald?

  You've seen JB Pritzker up close.

• 2:14Chris Ryan?

  Most importantly, I have watched the football. It's World Cup season. The Knicks are champions. Widows Bay finale on the horizon. House of the Dragon premiering soon. The Bears almost back. I'm trying to set a scene, dude.

• 2:28Andy Greenwald?

  You are.

• 2:29Chris Ryan?

  Trying to paint a picture of the little pleasures life can still offer.

• 2:34Andy Greenwald?

  Wonderful.

• 2:34Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 2:35Andy Greenwald?

  I mean, I'm thrilled. I need this from you. I'm all discombobulated.

• 2:39Chris Ryan?

  The Watch Podcast is a podcast about television and pop culture, and you can email its hosts. One of them reads it. It's thewatchatspotify.com. The Watch Pod underscore is the Instagram handle. You can watch us on YouTube at the Ringer dash TV's channel, where you can also follow Joe and Rob and the Prestige TV Pod as they make their way through Cape Fear, as I have continued to do. I will say, I don't know if you saw the big news about a surprise cameo.

• 3:05Andy Greenwald?

  I don't want to lift the kimono too much, but our friends at Apple TV told us, we got an email saying, hey, big secret.

• 3:12Chris Ryan?

  Yeah. Maybe we'll revisit it. Who can say? Who can say? Today, we are going to be talking a little bit about some news and notes in the world of television, a trailer, some casting news, a survey of a slightly alarming second half of 26 schedule that we've got on our hands.

• 3:30Andy Greenwald?

  You are alarmed.

• 3:31Chris Ryan?

  I just noted it with interest. We're going to talk about the fourth episode of Star City, and Andy

• 3:39Chris Ryan?

  has gone on a kind of new adventure. Widows Bay has given him permission to indulge in horror films for the first time in his life.

• 3:50Andy Greenwald?

  Well, indulge is a bit rich.

• 3:52Chris Ryan?

  Andy watched Weapons because he watched Widows Bay, and he was like, maybe I'm ready. And no spoilers, but you enjoyed it.

• 3:59Andy Greenwald?

  Guys, tweets from 2025. That movie rips.

• 4:02Chris Ryan?

  I've put together a little bit of a horror 101.

• 4:06Andy Greenwald?

  Oh, thank you.

• 4:06Chris Ryan?

  For scaredy cats who like Widows Bay.

• 4:09Andy Greenwald?

  I think this is gonna be really servicey.

• 4:10Chris Ryan?

  Hopefully.

• 4:11Andy Greenwald?

  I don't, I think there are hundreds of us.

• 4:13Chris Ryan?

  Let's start with the most important news.

• 4:16Andy Greenwald?

  Is it the football?

• 4:16Chris Ryan?

  Well, actually, why don't we let our hair down a little bit? Let's, let's get into character. How are you doing and how was your weekend?

• 4:22Andy Greenwald?

  Chris, I love sports. I don't know what to tell you. Sports are great. Sports still got it. And by the way, I do not include MMA in my list of great sports from the weekend. Just, just FYI. I mean, perhaps your aperture was wider than mine. Maybe you could both sides it, but I, that's where I ended.

• 4:39Chris Ryan?

  What sport do you think you would like to see at the White House next?

• 4:42Andy Greenwald?

  Oh, this is a great question.

• 4:45Andy Greenwald?

  What sport would I like to see next?

• 4:46Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 4:47Andy Greenwald?

  Russian roulette?

• 4:48Chris Ryan?

  I think we should turn into the spin. Yeah, I was gonna say gladiator fights, but...

• 4:52Andy Greenwald?

  Why not?

• 4:54Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, it was a cool sports weekend and I think, I've seen a bunch of people say this, but it does feel like a weird moment where there were Stanley Cup, the Carolina won Stanley Cup last night. You had 12 World Cup matches over three days, 16 World Cup matches over three days. Four days and you had the Knicks winning on Saturday night. World Cup is like triple or quadruple headers every day. You can basically watch sports from the second you wake up to the second you go to bed. And it kind of feels like that thing that every single person has like, I've come in and said something about curse out or some, you know?

• 5:32Andy Greenwald?

  Yes.

• 5:33Chris Ryan?

  And it's, it's kind of like, that's the juice, man. You love it when, when everybody's kind of on the same page.

• 5:38Andy Greenwald?

  If even a city as famously disparate and challenging to socialize in as Los Angeles was brimming with good spirit and collective beer ingestion and, and just also, I mean, as, as a longtime supporter since yesterday of Cote d'Ivoire and their sporting project, you know? Like, it was a really nice to see.

• 6:02Chris Ryan?

  You got introduced to Yann Diaw Monday.

• 6:04Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, I sure did.

• 6:05Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 6:05Andy Greenwald?

  You're, you're a longtime...

• 6:06Chris Ryan?

  Liverpool are looking to spend 70 million euros on him.

• 6:10Andy Greenwald?

  That's nice of them.

• 6:10Chris Ryan?

  At least.

• 6:11Andy Greenwald?

  It was really, it was just really fun. And then, speaking of collectivism, like I... New York City. New York City means a lot to us. I have not, I do not root for their teams, but many of my friends do and millions of my friends taking to the streets over the weekend to celebrate.

• 6:28Chris Ryan?

  I was workshopping. No, I'm not.

• 6:30Andy Greenwald?

  Were you gonna zag?

• 6:31Chris Ryan?

  I wasn't zagging. I instantly sent Sean a text to say, I'm really happy for you, dog. Like, I wanted to make sure he knew.

• 6:38Andy Greenwald?

  Before?

• 6:40Chris Ryan?

  By over the weekend?

• 6:41Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 6:42Chris Ryan?

  I was like, there is a settle down juice sip to be had here.

• 6:45Andy Greenwald?

  Do you think?

• 6:46Chris Ryan?

  Well, just act like you've been there before. I feel like we sell, no, I'm just kidding. I think that obviously, like, they, New York is a special, special place. People are confronted with one another in almost every single aspect of their life, from their transportation to like, you know, you getting a hot dog on the street. Classic New York behavior.

• 7:07Andy Greenwald?

  That's you. Yours is, where's Chris?

• 7:10Chris Ryan?

  He's at the haul truck again.

• 7:11Andy Greenwald?

  Gobbling down another dirty water dog.

• 7:13Chris Ryan?

  And I think the fact that they live together means that they party together and celebrate together. And I think it's awesome.

• 7:19Andy Greenwald?

  What was your favorite New York party video that made you wish you were back for this?

• 7:23Chris Ryan?

  I mean, honestly, I'm a simp, but the Safdie Nike commercial was pretty incredible.

• 7:29Andy Greenwald?

  That's good.

• 7:31Chris Ryan?

  You know, I think that I was, I was watching, I think, Mom Donnie was at the

• 7:38Andy Greenwald?

  Puerto Rican Day Parade?

• 7:40Chris Ryan?

  Brazil match with Hokel. And I was like, this is just, this is how I want it to be. You know what I mean?

• 7:44Andy Greenwald?

  That's what it should be like.

• 7:45Chris Ryan?

  Reaching across the aisle, centrist and leftist.

• 7:48Andy Greenwald?

  I was gonna say, which aisle is this exactly? I enjoyed, I saw our friend Washu posted a video of a man like swag surfing on a light, like a light pole?

• 7:58Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 7:59Andy Greenwald?

  With fireworks going off behind him, but my favorite, I think, was the one where there's a crowd of people masked on the streets celebrating and then a, a bus pulls up because there's public transportation and everyone in the crowd immediately starts going, "Bus, bus, bus." And they all are just cheering for the bus?

• 8:17Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 8:17Andy Greenwald?

  And the bus drives on?

• 8:19Chris Ryan?

  It could've gone on, it's free.

• 8:20Andy Greenwald?

  That's, oh.

• 8:21Chris Ryan?

  Oh, right, because you mean, that guy's. I actually don't know if that's happened yet.

• 8:24Andy Greenwald?

  Well, whatever. He's opening a grocery store, I know that. That guy's killing it. Good for him.

• 8:28Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 8:28Andy Greenwald?

  I, I, I loved that.

• 8:30Chris Ryan?

  People are buzzing. I like it. I like it.

• 8:32Andy Greenwald?

  You're okay with it?

• 8:33Chris Ryan?

  Yeah. As a long time Hurricanes fan.

• 8:36Andy Greenwald?

  I wondered about that. What can you tell us from, and then we're gonna get into the other TV, I promise, but. I want to talk briefly about World Cup because you should mention again, you are also hosting a World Cup show.

• 8:46Chris Ryan?

  Co-hosting and really just supporting Adam Friedland and this new project. It's the Adam Friedland Show: The Beautiful Pod. It's on his feed on Spotify Ringer.

• 8:55Andy Greenwald?

  How are you feeling about the, you know, the culture setting that you guys are doing together? You figuring each other out, feeling each other out as you go?

• 9:02Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, we were trying to decide how many of the people who seem to be enjoying America so much on Twitter, like people, tourists in our nation.

• 9:11Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 9:11Chris Ryan?

  Are in fact CIA plants. So.

• 9:15Andy Greenwald?

  Seems like you guys have some shared interests there.

• 9:17Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 9:18Andy Greenwald?

  My favorite thing, before we talk about how much fun it has been to watch these games and the US game was amazing, but all of them are amazing and incredibly fun to watch. I did, I noted with some interest that the single most important thing in American sports, which is naming rights to stadiums. Does those do not travel internationally?

• 9:37Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 9:38Andy Greenwald?

  Or FIFA was like, you have to pay more.

• 9:41Chris Ryan?

  Who named their stadium field?

• 9:43Andy Greenwald?

  Well.

• 9:44Chris Ryan?

  Like, somebody basically took down all the, like, the corporate nomenclature.

• 9:48Andy Greenwald?

  So, so last night's match between Ecuador and Cote d'Ivoire took place at Lincoln Financial Field.

• 9:55Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 9:55Andy Greenwald?

  Home of the 2024 World Champion Philadelphia Eagles.

• 9:58Chris Ryan?

  Hang on to it.

• 9:59Andy Greenwald?

  I just wanted Sean to hear that part. And.

• 10:02Chris Ryan?

  He can't hear shit.

• 10:03Andy Greenwald?

  That is a blowout.

• 10:05Chris Ryan?

  All he hears is New York State of Mind by Billy Joel.

• 10:09Andy Greenwald?

  The Knicks won and Disclosure Day beat tracking. This is Sean's greatest weekend ever.

• 10:15Chris Ryan?

  Sure.

• 10:17Andy Greenwald?

  So, the game, the match was played at Lincoln Financial Field and yet apparently it was played at Philadelphia Stadium in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

• 10:26Chris Ryan?

  Right.

• 10:26Andy Greenwald?

  And the opening USA-Paraguay match, which took place in, it's SoFi, which, I don't, what is SoFi?

• 10:32Chris Ryan?

  It's a bank.

• 10:33Andy Greenwald?

  I mean, of course it is, but really, what is it?

• 10:35Chris Ryan?

  It's a financial services institution.

• 10:37Andy Greenwald?

  Why don't you ask Adam that question? Let's see what he has to say about it. They paid, what, hundreds of millions of dollars for the rights to slap their name on that and yet to the viewers of that match, that was Los Angeles Stadium. It's like playing a Genesis, Sega Genesis World Cup game.

• 10:52Chris Ryan?

  When they don't get the rights and it's just like.

• 10:53Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah. The Philadelphia footballers.

• 10:55Chris Ryan?

  OJ Bimson is running back to pick a random player.

• 10:58Andy Greenwald?

  Was this a football Sega Genesis game or a legal thriller starring OJ Bimson?

• 11:05Andy Greenwald?

  For whom the what, the slippers didn't fit?

• 11:08Chris Ryan?

  That's right.

• 11:09Andy Greenwald?

  So they had to quit.

• 11:10Chris Ryan?

  That's right.

• 11:10Andy Greenwald?

  Anyway, I found that fascinating. Um, any other thoughts as a longtime soccer head about is this particularly good already this year or is it just that larger field? It's been four years.

• 11:19Chris Ryan?

  We need something to feel good about. The hydration breaks suck. I think that they are needed in some environments, but not in climate controlled stadiums or at night. And I think that the outrage at that will continue, especially if there's one, like they were saying, there were several matches where a hydration break occurred when you felt like the game was teetering in a way that could, could go one way or the other. And for them to, to use these as, and I think specifically Fox, but whoever it is, is like

• 11:49Andy Greenwald?

  It's for ads.

• 11:50Chris Ryan?

  maximizing the ad space that they can do is really, really disappointing. Um, you know, they can do picture and picture advertisements if they have to, like they can extend halftime if they want to, like there's all sorts of ways that they could have done this. So for them to break up the integrity of a, of a football match is pretty, pretty disappointing. But other than that, I think it's been a pretty resounding success on the field.

• 12:14Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, for sure.

• 12:15Chris Ryan?

  I mean, there's been some already, some, some real black marks against, I would say the United States of America's hosting capabilities so far, but.

• 12:23Andy Greenwald?

  Really? I thought everyone was going to delis.

• 12:24Chris Ryan?

  I think the Somali ref being sent back home was, was rather disappointing. Yeah.

• 12:28Andy Greenwald?

  You don't think the delis outweighed that?

• 12:30Chris Ryan?

  The, the delis?

• 12:31Andy Greenwald?

  The English tourists going to delis in Jersey?

• 12:34Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, and all the Scottish fans taking over Boston. I mean, all that shit has been amazing though. Yeah.

• 12:38Andy Greenwald?

  Um, where are you on referee cameras?

• 12:41Chris Ryan?

  They're incredible.

• 12:42Andy Greenwald?

  Just like, this looks like fucking Blair Witch Project?

• 12:45Chris Ryan?

  There was a Nike commercial like 20 years ago that I think Guy Ritchie did.

• 12:50Andy Greenwald?

  Right.

• 12:50Chris Ryan?

  That had all, like that was that first person camera kind of. Um, but I think that. When you're watching from the angle that most normal human beings watch football, it's like this back and forth and it can feel kind of languid and you know, they're controlling. And then when you see that ref cam, you realize like, everything is happening in split second decisions and these guys are doing-

• 13:13Andy Greenwald?

  And the impacts are violent.

• 13:15Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, and the impacts are super violent. So no wonder they're diving. It probably hurts.

• 13:18Andy Greenwald?

  It probably hurts a little bit.

• 13:19Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 13:20Andy Greenwald?

  Um, yeah, I, I, I am a every four years believer in the beautiful game and I, as you know, like, I really get swept up in the romanticism of things, both on the field, but also, I do, I'm a sucker for it. I'm like, oh, the South Koreans are being adopted by their Mexican hosts in Guadalajara. And I'm like, what a wonderful world it is. And then I was like, I wonder if FIFA's gonna keep the good vibes going. And I saw that the next iteration of the World Cup is in Spain, Portugal, and Morocco. And I'm like, they could do it again, where people exploring different countries and the countries collaborating. And I was like, where could we go next in 2034? And then I see it's Saudi Arabia.

• 13:53Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 13:54Andy Greenwald?

  It's like, okay.

• 13:55Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 13:56Andy Greenwald?

  Well-

• 13:57Chris Ryan?

  There's a lot of years between now and 2034.

• 13:58Andy Greenwald?

  That's true. A lot of, a lot of, as Adam would say, Riyadh comedy festivals to get through between now and then.

• 14:03Chris Ryan?

  Um, you know, speaking of, of, I mentioned the intelligence services earlier, CIA-

• 14:07Andy Greenwald?

  You did, you're a fan.

• 14:08Chris Ryan?

  And the Middle East, an important storyline within the first two seasons of Lioness, a Paramount Plus show that I-

• 14:14Andy Greenwald?

  God, you're the best.

• 14:15Chris Ryan?

  I'm pretty excited by. That's coming back in the fall.

• 14:18Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 14:19Chris Ryan?

  And I just want you to put it out there that we are back up.

• 14:21Andy Greenwald?

  Okay, so, all right.

• 14:23Chris Ryan?

  I have a lot of enthusiasm for this upcoming season.

• 14:26Andy Greenwald?

  When have you not? Did your enthusiasm dip?

• 14:27Chris Ryan?

  Because I think that the, the Sheridan brand, to me, has taken on some, taken some lumps recently. I think regardless of whether or not there are things to like about the second season of Landman, Dutton Ranch, The Madison, et cetera, Marshall's like, it's started, we've diluted the product a little bit.

• 14:47Andy Greenwald?

  Oh, it stepped on.

• 14:48Chris Ryan?

  I think a little bit. And Lioness this season, which I bet is gonna be the last one, is, uh, is like, that's the pure shit. That's the black tar.

• 15:02Andy Greenwald?

  What specifically makes this?

• 15:06Chris Ryan?

  I don't really know what it is. I think that this is kind of... This is like the darkest, most like unrelentingly violent and cynical project he has.

• 15:16Andy Greenwald?

  You're right.

• 15:17Chris Ryan?

  And I know that, you know, it's received into a world that is ever-changing in terms of the chess pieces on the global military board. And I probably feel differently about like special operator porn now than I do

• 15:33Andy Greenwald?

  Oh.

• 15:33Chris Ryan?

  five years ago.

• 15:34Andy Greenwald?

  Okay.

• 15:35Chris Ryan?

  I don't know when it came out, but it's just a teaser. They seem to be, you know, the marriage at the center of this show between Dave Anabel and Zoe Saldana seems to be still teetering as he tries to reckon with... Did you not watch this teaser?

• 15:50Andy Greenwald?

  Uh, no.

• 15:51Chris Ryan?

  Okay. Well, you have something to reward yourself.

• 15:54Andy Greenwald?

  I can't wait.

• 15:55Chris Ryan?

  After a hard day's work.

• 15:56Andy Greenwald?

  Should we step down and really dive into it?

• 15:58Chris Ryan?

  We don't have... I'm excited for that. That's coming out in the fall.

• 16:00Andy Greenwald?

  Can I pause you for a second? Did you just refer to the lioness as special operator?

• 16:06Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 16:06Andy Greenwald?

  Because what's exciting about that to me is imagining a world where, as in Russian, as we learned from Star City, which we're gonna talk about, there's a real like calling people by their titles and honorifics.

• 16:16Chris Ryan?

  Oh, Chief Designer.

• 16:16Andy Greenwald?

  Chief Designer. I would be really into lioness if instead of calling her whatever her name is, lioness.

• 16:21Chris Ryan?

  Joe.

• 16:21Andy Greenwald?

  Joe. They would be like, "Special operator. You're needed on the border. There's a bunch of trucks that need to get shot up." And she'd be like, "I'm on it."

• 16:29Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 16:31Andy Greenwald?

  Do you know about the video game development of the Sheridan Universe? We haven't talked about this.

• 16:35Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, what are they doing?

• 16:36Andy Greenwald?

  So it was reported that there is, like, they're actively pursuing opportunities to expand this brand into the video game space. And what's interesting, though, so Paramount Games has said that the, quote, "The entire Yellowstone IP is a major focus for them."

• 16:53Andy Greenwald?

  They, at no point do they say that there's going to be a Lioness game. Which I think is so weird.

• 16:59Chris Ryan?

  Technically, it's not in the Yellowstone IP.

• 17:01Andy Greenwald?

  No, but that's the one where you could see the game because it basically is a video game.

• 17:06Chris Ryan?

  It would just be Call of Duty, yeah.

• 17:07Andy Greenwald?

  The, and he's, Taylor Sheridan is making a Call of Duty movie, right? He's, he's attached to that.

• 17:11Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 17:12Andy Greenwald?

  The ones that are, oh, okay, Lioness is mentioned in the thing, but it's third.

• 17:16Chris Ryan?

  They'll develop it.

• 17:17Andy Greenwald?

  After Yellowstone and Tulsa King.

• 17:20Chris Ryan?

  Oh, Tulsa King's weird. I was gonna ask you if you had seen the glowing reviews for the James Bond game that just came out.

• 17:28Andy Greenwald?

  No, no, no, no.

• 17:30Chris Ryan?

  It made me.

• 17:31Andy Greenwald?

  You get the itch, look at you.

• 17:32Chris Ryan?

  I, I just like was, I started scratching up here and I started scratching like right here.

• 17:37Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, right where the, the main vein.

• 17:39Chris Ryan?

  The old wound.

• 17:41Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 17:41Chris Ryan?

  And I was like, should we get the band back together?

• 17:44Andy Greenwald?

  So.

• 17:45Chris Ryan?

  Should we go halves on a PS5?

• 17:48Andy Greenwald?

  First of all, please save me from myself. I do think that in my limited involvement with contemporary video games, which is with my children for the most part, on the Nintendo Switch 2 platform, the days of, like, what we are talking about is like GoldenEye and Perfect Dark, which was really an ideal, like, vehicle in which to express our feelings about Wu-Tang Clan's The W being released and also where we were in terms of, like, drink consumption. Like, that was a good, because you just sort of ran around dark hallways and smashed the button. Video gaming now, for the most part, is like a lot of like, "You're doing great, James Bond. Why not try turning left here?" And he's like, "I bet I can't, my trauma." They're like, "No, Skyfall's to the right."

• 18:32Andy Greenwald?

  Like, there's so much talking.

• 18:34Chris Ryan?

  In video games?

• 18:35Andy Greenwald?

  There's, there's some really good parodies of this that I've been served, but basically, like, for example, when, when we were in college, um, much in the same way that you went to hardcore shows and I asked you if you'd come with me to see Belle and Sebastian play at a university library.

• 18:50Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 18:51Andy Greenwald?

  When we crossed over, it would often be in the realm of like a, like a GoldenEye or Perfect Dark.

• 18:56Chris Ryan?

  Or a super chunk.

• 18:56Andy Greenwald?

  Or a super chunk, right. But in my own time, I would play like Final Fantasy VII.

• 19:01Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 19:01Andy Greenwald?

  You know, and like, really like, bring down the evil Shinra corporation from the comfort of my dorm room. So they remade this game. For the Switch 2. And I was like, "Children, children, your father has a cultural artifact to share with you that has been updated to your demanding graphical-

• 19:17Chris Ryan?

  That always goes well for you.

• 19:18Andy Greenwald?

  ...standards. And the entire game now is like, the whole, the whole purpose of the first game, and it was really brilliant at the time, is you're playing this main character who's a cipher, who looks cool as hell, he's got a big-

• 19:29Chris Ryan?

  In Final Fantasy?

• 19:29Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, he's got a big sword.

• 19:30Chris Ryan?

  I thought it was a lady.

• 19:31Andy Greenwald?

  And name is Cloud, there's many Final Fantasies, we'll get into this.

• 19:33Chris Ryan?

  Okay.

• 19:34Andy Greenwald?

  Kai, how we doing? We're killing it, right? She's interested.

• 19:37Chris Ryan?

  We fixed it hard out today.

• 19:38Andy Greenwald?

  I know, but I'm just saying, the point is, in that game, the blankness of your protagonist is the story, because you find out that his memories are fake-

• 19:46Chris Ryan?

  Sandman style.

• 19:47Andy Greenwald?

  And everyone else is reacting to him, and whatever, whatever. In the new game, because there's a need for constant talking, he's, he's just like, every time he fights, he's like, "Gotcha, you won't walk away from that so easily, will you?" And she's like, "Look out, Cloud, well done." And then like, there's the voice of the game being like, "We must hurry if we want to solve the mystery."

• 20:05Chris Ryan?

  Sounds like the Social Reckoning teaser.

• 20:06Andy Greenwald?

  It's exactly like that! That's contemporary, all of this, right? Like, we must fill the frame-

• 20:12Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 20:12Andy Greenwald?

  And the speakers with as much information constantly as possible. All of this is to say, I don't know if a James Bond game would give us the base thrills that we're looking for anymore. But it might teach you about-

• 20:23Chris Ryan?

  There's only one way to find out.

• 20:25Andy Greenwald?

  Alright.

• 20:25Chris Ryan?

  There's only one way to find out. Speaking of spying-

• 20:27Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 20:28Chris Ryan?

  I, I just want to mention that the Legacy of Spies TV series that's supposed to come out on BBC, but then Starz, I believe, or MGM, MGM, I think-

• 20:37Andy Greenwald?

  Right. Yeah, because of the Bond IP.

• 20:39Chris Ryan?

  Probably next year, I would imagine, and this will lead me to my next segment, is, uh, continues to fill out its cast.

• 20:45Andy Greenwald?

  They're stacking this thing.

• 20:46Chris Ryan?

  They got Hugh Laurie playing Control, which I think is sicko mode. And then one of the most interesting choices I've seen in a minute, Joe Alwyn is playing Jim Prudhoe. For John le Carre fans, this is an adaptation of a John le Carre book, but it, it is basically the le Carre, Inc. You know, his sons and the sort of production company that they formed, it's their effort to basically start the John le Carré shared universe, I think.

• 21:14Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 21:15Chris Ryan?

  Jim Perdoo is like a major character in Tinker Tailor. Uh, and Joe Allen, who has done yeoman's work at rehabilitating his career. And I think his like public facing persona since his romance with Taylor Swift is, is like, you know, he's made some really good movies. He's been in some really good movies and I'll, I dare say, I think that this entire thing kind of hinges on whether or not he's any good.

• 21:39Andy Greenwald?

  He seems good. I've heard he's a nice guy. You don't like his contributions to the tortured poets?

• 21:45Chris Ryan?

  I liked him in The Brutalist.

• 21:48Andy Greenwald?

  Okay.

• 21:48Chris Ryan?

  Classic Pennsylvanian right there.

• 21:50Andy Greenwald?

  I liked his shadow over songs like "The Black Dog" more than I liked his performance in The Brutalist.

• 21:54Chris Ryan?

  You were not a Brutalist guy.

• 21:56Andy Greenwald?

  No, I hated The Brutalist.

• 21:57Chris Ryan?

  Yeah. Um, anyway, that's a show that I'm looking forward to. And, uh, one of the segments I wanted to do with you today is a question I had. Are we back in like 1994? Where we just are taking the late summer off from television?

• 22:17Andy Greenwald?

  Oh, I thought you were saying, are we back in the way like people say it online?

• 22:21Chris Ryan?

  So I was reading Joe Daley had a really good piece in Vulture about Widows Bay and how it has become a kind of late breaking Emmy, uh, if not favorite, at least danger to really upset the apple cart with the Emmys, uh, with the Noms and stuff. And I completely agree. I think I, I don't think that there's been a show, maybe other than The Pit and Knights, that I have heard more people in my life talking about in glowing terms and that they don't vote for Emmys.

• 22:47Andy Greenwald?

  What was the second one you said? Like Night of the Seven?

• 22:48Chris Ryan?

  The Pit and Night of the Seven Kingdoms. Um, where people are like catching up with it week to week. It's growing and growing over the course of its run.

• 22:56Andy Greenwald?

  I mean, Joe had some data about that. I think streaming data is always a little bit suspect, but it seems undeniably true in both like the numbers he had and in lived experience that this is a unicorn in the sense that it is, it has grown exponentially week over week and apparently is still growing.

• 23:11Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 23:12Andy Greenwald?

  Like the audience is finding it even now on the precipice of the finale.

• 23:15Chris Ryan?

  So. I thought that was interesting and in that piece he mentions the, the way that spring in TV has turned into um late November, December in movies and that the studios are essentially

• 23:32Andy Greenwald?

  Yes.

• 23:33Chris Ryan?

  banking their stuff that they think is Emmy worthy to put out at the same time. And now we've complained about this before where there's this huge glut of stuff over the last six weeks leading up until the Emmy deadline. And then there is kind of this like almost collapse that happens. Now, we do have some good stuff coming out in the coming weeks. Like I mentioned earlier in the show, there's House of the Dragon, The Agency, The Bear, The Larry David Show. Uh, I mean, not necessarily for our pod, but The Legally Blonde Show L is coming on, on Amazon Prime, Lucky, The Anya Taylor-Joy Show on Apple. Uh, Lanterns is later this summer and

• 24:14Chris Ryan?

  the Will Ferrell golf comedy, The Hawk, I think is still coming out this summer, although it's always hard to tell with Netflix sometimes. But I don't think other than until Potter in December, there's like a big show in the fall, as far as I, as far as I can tell. Um,

• 24:32Andy Greenwald?

  Well, we could, we could be surprised.

• 24:34Chris Ryan?

  We can always be surprised. And that's actually among my favorite moments for this pod and for watching TV is when either you can catch up on stuff or something comes out of nowhere. Some, maybe it's a show from another country, or maybe it's something that you didn't know Netflix or Apple had, and now it's, it's in your face. HBO often will sometimes like have a random thing that they're showing on, like what would be, be like a Monday night show.

• 24:57Andy Greenwald?

  Yep.

• 24:57Chris Ryan?

  And it becomes a big deal. But I, I don't really care about the Emmys, as I've said before, but do you think that the Emmys are maybe like a little towering a little too largely over the schedule?

• 25:10Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, I think it's a very interesting point to make. And I think that like, We are dealing with a deficit of attention economy. And it has never been harder to break through the noise for anything. Because as we discuss and as we live, everything, TVs, movies, music, politics, news, is competing with everything that has ever happened.

• 25:31Chris Ryan?

  Disclosure Jay probably would have made more money if it wasn't for the Knicks and the World Cup.

• 25:35Andy Greenwald?

  Right. And although Sean managed to do all three, probably.

• 25:39Chris Ryan?

  He sure did, yeah.

• 25:40Andy Greenwald?

  He's doing his part. It's representative in an interesting way of what the major streamers and networks are thinking in terms of what their best bet is for some of their material. And maybe we're due for correction. Because I think that there has been such smart scheduling jujitsu performed over the last few years. It's now been quite some time, but Netflix actually realizing that the holidays aren't the time to avoid releasing things. It's actually the best time to flood the zone, especially with family-friendly or appointment-type viewing, like Stranger Things. That's something that now HBO has learned its lesson from. And that's why the Harry Potter show is coming out around Christmas.

• 26:24Andy Greenwald?

  It may be time now that schedules are finally, this may be the first year, first 18 months, that things have finally kind of got back to normal and on track since the double whammy of COVID and the strikes. But to your point, like, late summer now seems like an opportunity. I think that they have overcorrected for Emmy attention. I don't think that the Emmys necessarily mean so much in terms of, like, we have now been validated. But the Emmys and the Emmy promotional window and then the long tail of Emmy nominations leading to the awards is, it's certainly not free marketing and advertising, but it is another way to stay at the forefront of the conversation and to keep you in the conversation in a way that is necessary for shows that take anywhere from one year to three years to come back again.

• 27:09Andy Greenwald?

  So it's just extending the tail of that. That said, there has to be a limit to this. Because one thing that, I don't even think we're going to talk about it fully today because I don't think you've engaged with it yet, but I did start to check out. Emma Daeus on Starz and it's awesome and clever and interesting and worthwhile and debuted in the UK in the fall and then Starz kind of, Starz picked it up and I don't want to say dumped it, but kind of dumped it a month ago.

• 27:36Chris Ryan?

  I think it's, to whatever extent that like, I just don't think a lot, I don't know that a lot of people have Starz necessarily.

• 27:43Andy Greenwald?

  No, and I don't know if the people who have Starz, I mean, Starz is bread and butter is the, we were semi joking about it, not that these shows are bad, but there are so many power spin offs that it's like, it's an incredibly thriving ecosystem that I don't know anything about. What I mean, what I mean by bringing up Emma Daeus is that I would imagine the marketing department of Starz had a choice. They were like, what is the best bet to get any return on our investment or to have people appreciate the, less cynically, appreciate the show that we've fallen in love with? And I think the two paths were, let's try to get Will Sharp and Paul Bettany Emmy nominations? Or the alternative, what would potentially would have been, there's a dead zone in August where we could say, we've got something fun and surprising and prestigious and cool.

• 28:27Andy Greenwald?

  And for whatever reason, they decided to put it in the most crowded portion of the year.

• 28:32Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, I don't know, I don't know what the answer is. I tried throwing out, let's have the Emmys twice a year and I feel like.

• 28:37Andy Greenwald?

  Do you have, do you have like a Penske shares?

• 28:39Chris Ryan?

  No, but The Town pushed back on that, not Bellany, but The Town itself.

• 28:44Andy Greenwald?

  Lucas Shaw.

• 28:45Chris Ryan?

  I got, the responses I got were like, that wouldn't work.

• 28:47Andy Greenwald?

  Did you get responses? Okay, interesting.

• 28:50Chris Ryan?

  Well, what if you did the Emmys, you know, I mean, the Emmys are held in the spring, I think because of the traditional network TV cycle of fall to, you know, fall to spring TV programming.

• 29:01Andy Greenwald?

  Well, the cutoff window occurs then because that would be in time to capture the finales of the broadcast TV season.

• 29:07Chris Ryan?

  Sure, but like, I don't know, I mean, that's not really how people watch television anymore, so why not have it in October or November?

• 29:14Andy Greenwald?

  No, and, and you know, there is, I was gonna say, there's science to it, it's not science to it, it's just also common sense. Like on that podcast, The Town, I was listening to. I think Craig said that he liked Disclosure Day more than than Matt, and he thought Emily Blunt might get an Oscar nomination. And Matt was dismissive of it, not because he didn't think she was good, but because I think he was right in saying this movie would have to go on a generational box office run to carry her candidacy into the Emmy, sorry, into the Oscar nominating period. I think that's still true.

• 29:42Chris Ryan?

  I guess that's true. I mean, if if Sinners did a generational box office run, I guess that would be the comp.

• 29:47Andy Greenwald?

  Sinners, yeah, it's possible. And similarly, like, shows, there will be Emmy nominees that aired in the fall of 2025.

• 29:56Andy Greenwald?

  Task is an example. Task will definitely get some kind of nomination. But I think the more successful strategy is like, front of mind, we just ended. And then the best best case scenario is Widows Bay. I don't think Apple was like, let's drop this in the eligibility window because we think we have a shot. It was more like, let's just see.

• 30:14Chris Ryan?

  Seems like a fun spring show.

• 30:15Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

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• 30:45Chris Ryan?

  You know, let's talk a little bit about Widows Bay because I know that you were so fired up for this and just for the house cleaning, that's what we call it, house cleaning. We will have a special Widows Bay episode on Thursday.

• 31:00Andy Greenwald?

  For the finale.

• 31:00Chris Ryan?

  For the finale. You know, you you said that like you kind of were inspired by Widows Bay to check out weapons, finally.

• 31:06Andy Greenwald?

  I love Widows Bay so much that I don't have any hesitation about engaging with it. And partly, I think that's because it's rewarded my confidence and faith in it. And Has only given me one example of a clown chasing a man through a crawl space. There hasn't been a ton of that, but for whatever reason, I think it's, one version of the story is like, "I'm braver now," or "Maybe I was wrong about myself." The other version of the story is Widows Bay has made me so excited about the possibility of different notes being played on my emotional storytelling piano that I'm willing to give it a shot. Now, we don't need to relitigate weapons because that conversation missed me and that's

• 31:48Andy Greenwald?

  my fault, but I always hoped to watch it, to one day be a big enough boy to watch it. I believed on some level that I could handle it. I think that I, to my credit, I definitely downloaded it for multiple transatlantic flights, but didn't feel like the time or place.

• 32:03Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, and also, I think it's probably better seen on a bigger screen.

• 32:07Andy Greenwald?

  Yes, I would agree with that as well. And again, I don't want to, I don't want to ding you, you've been nothing but a supportive and good friend to me, but I will say, part of my attempt to say unspoiled is I didn't read anything about it. So I never saw Zach Craigers quote that he was inspired primarily by Paul Thomas Anderson's film Magnolia and Jennifer Egan's novel A Visit from the Goon Squad.

• 32:30Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 32:30Andy Greenwald?

  If you, my friend, had led with that, I would have been to the theater opening weekend.

• 32:33Chris Ryan?

  So my issue with that is, A, that's not my job, B...

• 32:38Andy Greenwald?

  Fair.

• 32:39Chris Ryan?

  If I had told you that...

• 32:41Andy Greenwald?

  Yes.

• 32:42Chris Ryan?

  And you had gone, "Opening night."

• 32:43Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, what would I have said? Paint me a picture.

• 32:45Chris Ryan?

  And Amy Madigan was torn to pieces by children. I think the blowback on me, you would have been mad at me, not Zach Craigers.

• 32:51Andy Greenwald?

  Okay, now, let me just prepare you for the next time this comes up, because this will not be the last movie in which Oscar winners are torn apart by children. The issue for me is if aging Oscar winners had torn children apart. My allegiance and my emotional...

• 33:07Chris Ryan?

  See, I thought you would be like, "Who's gonna, what happens to these children? What kind of therapy do they need?"

• 33:11Andy Greenwald?

  They're bewitched, whatever.

• 33:12Chris Ryan?

  They were bewitched, whatever.

• 33:14Andy Greenwald?

  My child, when the iPad is in front of her, is capable of anything. And I can say anything to her.

• 33:22Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 33:22Andy Greenwald?

  And it will be as if it's water off the proverbial duck's back.

• 33:26Chris Ryan?

  Cut the little piece of hair.

• 33:28Andy Greenwald?

  I could. I could do, the power the parents now have in front of these children is awesome. Yes.

• 33:36Chris Ryan?

  You could be like, this is the Swedish national team.

• 33:38Andy Greenwald?

  Yes.

• 33:38Chris Ryan?

  We're gonna be watching them for two hours and 15 minutes.

• 33:41Andy Greenwald?

  I did try that with the US national team and the disinterest was like a physical presence in the room with me.

• 33:47Chris Ryan?

  Really?

• 33:47Andy Greenwald?

  The air was thick with not caring.

• 33:50Chris Ryan?

  Just the cutaways, like Marco Rubio didn't do it for them or?

• 33:53Andy Greenwald?

  They still believe in JD. So anyway.

• 33:55Chris Ryan?

  I put together a little bit of a list here of recent horror movies to talk to you about.

• 33:59Andy Greenwald?

  Can I say one last thing though?

• 34:00Chris Ryan?

  Of course.

• 34:02Andy Greenwald?

  That guy could really make a movie.

• 34:03Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 34:03Andy Greenwald?

  It was awesome. It did validate a thought that Widows Bay had given me, which is that I can go on two thoughts. One, I can go on any journey with characters if I believe them on an emotional or human level. And I love.

• 34:18Chris Ryan?

  Which character did you identify with in Weapons?

• 34:20Andy Greenwald?

  Gladys. I think the elderly are often discarded by our capitalistic society, you know? And I felt like her attempt to find a home.

• 34:29Chris Ryan?

  I think they.

• 34:30Andy Greenwald?

  We've both been motivated by elder care recently.

• 34:32Chris Ryan?

  Burling gives real like sundad vibes, but I wondered whether or not you really were like, I too would never give up looking for my disappeared child.

• 34:41Andy Greenwald?

  No, none of that. No, no, I wasn't, I didn't need to find me in this. Cause I think we know generally that like book talk and like YA fandom is like super toxic. But then there were those people who were like, I don't read the descriptions. I only read dialogue because why would I want, why would I trust someone else's point of view?

• 34:57Chris Ryan?

  I did not see this.

• 34:58Andy Greenwald?

  This is a whole movement of people. I think I was saving it for our book talk, not T O K, but actual talk about books. Anyway, I do not need to have a hero on screen to watch art. That said, I mean, like the fact that the movie was grounded in a world in which Julia Garner has this like, you know, destructive relationship with Alden Ehrenreich's cop.

• 35:21Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 35:21Andy Greenwald?

  And that they have a history with each other.

• 35:23Chris Ryan?

  A little piece of my Alden Ehrenreich IPO, don't you?

• 35:25Andy Greenwald?

  I am fucking, almost missed it.

• 35:27Chris Ryan?

  One saw him in Becky Shaw.

• 35:29Andy Greenwald?

  I know.

• 35:29Chris Ryan?

  And Andy's text response was, so you really like him, huh?

• 35:33Andy Greenwald?

  What do you mean, no?

• 35:35Chris Ryan?

  That was your response.

• 35:36Andy Greenwald?

  That you saw the movie?

• 35:36Chris Ryan?

  No, that you saw the play. That when I, when I was like, my boy Alden cooking in Becky Shaw, and you were like, oh, you really like that guy, huh?

• 35:43Andy Greenwald?

  Boy, I sound like a real asshole over text.

• 35:45Chris Ryan?

  I think you're probably just like, I can't believe Chris is at like a Broadway play and I'm...

• 35:49Andy Greenwald?

  Must be nice, is probably what I said.

• 35:51Chris Ryan?

  Basically.

• 35:52Andy Greenwald?

  It's like cooking a dinner that I know was gonna be rejected in six minutes, and you were like, Broadway!

• 35:57Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 35:58Andy Greenwald?

  No, no, I just like, I loved the attention to, in the spirit of Magnolia, the attention to characters who felt fully realized and real before the supernatural shit hit.

• 36:10Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 36:10Andy Greenwald?

  And the way that it overlapped stories and took one step back for different perspective and like, just these little details, like Benedict Wong, Principal Benedict Wong and his husband having Hot Dog Day. Like, these little fucking, like, fun, funny details were wonderful, and Aaron Reich is awesome in that part. When I bought into that world, anything could happen in it, and it was enjoyable and gripping and not shocking. I will say that, like, the other thing that I realized in my long absence from real horror, real horror, other than

• 36:40Andy Greenwald?

  NewYorkTimes.com, is, the opinion pages, by the way, not the news, is that, like, I kind of forgot that there's a whole-

• 36:47Chris Ryan?

  Did you write an angry letter about the Kathy Rummler profile that they're in?

• 36:51Andy Greenwald?

  I drafted one.

• 36:53Chris Ryan?

  Dear sir.

• 36:54Andy Greenwald?

  My drafts folder is flamed.

• 36:56Chris Ryan?

  Dear sirs and madams.

• 36:59Andy Greenwald?

  No, the thing that's driving me craziest about the Times right now is that they change their headlines to be less stupid as the day goes on.

• 37:04Chris Ryan?

  Oh, they, yeah, that's always been like a gimmick on Twitter where people are like, "Fixed it for you," you know?

• 37:11Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 37:12Chris Ryan?

  Criminal enters White House for a second time. Fixed it for you.

• 37:17Andy Greenwald?

  The edit. No, but it's like, the Michelle Goldberg column was just like, "I followed the Democrat that everyone who's smart wants to be president." And then, like, by the end of the day, it was like, "A day with Jon Ossoff."

• 37:28Chris Ryan?

  Yeah. Yes.

• 37:29Andy Greenwald?

  Anyway.

• 37:31Chris Ryan?

  They know the angriest people get up first, you know?

• 37:34Andy Greenwald?

  Good morning! Fire off a couple texts to you about what you're wasting your time with in theater. This is gonna sound very silly saying this to you, because you live, you are Bane, born in- This particular darkness, but I definitely have self-selected myself out of a lot of entertainment. That plays to not just horror wise, but like the way you feel at the end when Gladys gets ripped apart by children. Is a cortisol adrenaline emotion spike that also comes at the end of Die Hard, a movie I hadn't seen in a while and watched.

• 38:02Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 38:02Andy Greenwald?

  Like an action movie thing. And that is, that's what I was saying, like the part of the keyboard that I don't often tickle. That was wild.

• 38:09Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, like I, I think that I am increasingly becoming the person who like rides roller coasters to feel something. But worry that like.

• 38:17Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 38:17Chris Ryan?

  Pretty soon I'm not going to need the roller coaster, you know, it's just going to be like, what's the tallest building?

• 38:23Andy Greenwald?

  And what are you gonna do?

• 38:23Chris Ryan?

  Just, just jump and feel, you know? But with horror movies, that's a, I meant that more as a metaphor.

• 38:30Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 38:31Chris Ryan?

  You want to know where you should go next and.

• 38:34Andy Greenwald?

  Or if I can, yeah.

• 38:34Chris Ryan?

  Well, the biggest question is, are you so fired up? Are you so lost on this, on this weapons gas that you'll go see Resident Evil with me?

• 38:46Andy Greenwald?

  I, I think two things. One.

• 38:49Chris Ryan?

  Fountains of blood in this movie.

• 38:50Andy Greenwald?

  I think that's going to be.

• 38:51Chris Ryan?

  Zombies.

• 38:52Andy Greenwald?

  I mean, I did just, I, I.

• 38:55Chris Ryan?

  Undead. I'm sorry. Yeah.

• 38:57Andy Greenwald?

  That's what we're calling them now? Is that the unhoused of zombies? Incredible. Okay. I will cop to one last thing. The, I think controlling the environment helped my engagement with weapons. I did have the lights on. I did have a cat nearby for throttling and grabbing purposes. She was not scared, by the way. She seemed worse.

• 39:21Andy Greenwald?

  I could, I don't know. It was powerful for me to be like, if I'm wrong about this, I could go in the other room.

• 39:27Chris Ryan?

  Yeah. You can always hit pause.

• 39:29Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah. Can't do that this either. That's really getting on the ride. So I don't know.

• 39:32Chris Ryan?

  Yeah. Okay. So Resident Evil is the next Craig or movie.

• 39:35Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah. I saw the trailers. Sick.

• 39:37Chris Ryan?

  It's sick.

• 39:37Andy Greenwald?

  That's your boy Austin Abrams too. Back for more.

• 39:40Chris Ryan?

  Another IPO holding. I've been, been.

• 39:42Andy Greenwald?

  You have been nurturing that one.

• 39:44Chris Ryan?

  I am America's first trillionaire.

• 39:47Andy Greenwald?

  You fucking bought that as a penny stock from Spike Jones.

• 39:49Chris Ryan?

  I saw him in Paper Towns.

• 39:51Andy Greenwald?

  Incredible.

• 39:52Chris Ryan?

  A movie with. Cara Delevingne and I can't remember who else and it's like

• 39:56Andy Greenwald?

  That was a John Green adaptation.

• 39:58Chris Ryan?

  And I was like, that kid's going places.

• 40:00Andy Greenwald?

  Whereas I thought it was Gracie's less talented, younger brother until about six weeks ago.

• 40:04Chris Ryan?

  No, I know, but that probably is why you didn't respect his craft.

• 40:07Andy Greenwald?

  That's correct.

• 40:08Chris Ryan?

  Just because you were like another nepo.

• 40:09Andy Greenwald?

  Exactly that.

• 40:10Chris Ryan?

  Much like Jane Campion's daughter stomping all over Star City. I am detecting

• 40:15Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 40:16Chris Ryan?

  A slight whiff of a need

• 40:18Andy Greenwald?

  Uh huh.

• 40:19Chris Ryan?

  For a minor amount

• 40:21Andy Greenwald?

  Well, you

• 40:21Chris Ryan?

  Of ironic distance in your horror films.

• 40:23Andy Greenwald?

  What I'm saying is give me, give me the three pitch speeds that I could go into.

• 40:27Chris Ryan?

  Okay, so number one would be things that have some tongue in cheek, some meta commentary, some comic elements.

• 40:36Andy Greenwald?

  Scary movie five.

• 40:37Chris Ryan?

  No.

• 40:38Andy Greenwald?

  Okay, good.

• 40:38Chris Ryan?

  Shaun of the Dead.

• 40:40Andy Greenwald?

  I love that.

• 40:40Chris Ryan?

  Okay, just making sure.

• 40:41Andy Greenwald?

  I mean, that, yeah, come on.

• 40:43Chris Ryan?

  Cabin in the Woods.

• 40:44Andy Greenwald?

  Had never seen it.

• 40:45Chris Ryan?

  I think you would enjoy it.

• 40:46Andy Greenwald?

  Okay.

• 40:47Chris Ryan?

  And Scream three, which is the one set in Hollywood where they're making a

• 40:53Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 40:53Chris Ryan?

  Scream, they're making stab about Scream and the script is kind of being written as it goes and killing people.

• 40:59Andy Greenwald?

  But don't you think that runs afoul of my first, the first plank in my absolutely rock solid Weapons platform? Which was real people with real emotional stakes.

• 41:11Chris Ryan?

  You don't think that, uh, that Sidney Prescott is a real person? You don't think she carries potatoes?

• 41:16Andy Greenwald?

  Gravitas.

• 41:16Chris Ryan?

  Uh, okay.

• 41:17Andy Greenwald?

  I, I see what you're saying though, and I love Shaun of the Dead.

• 41:19Chris Ryan?

  So the thing is, is that Weapons has comic moments. Obviously Widow's Bay is sort of pitched more as a what if horror was happening in a sitcom?

• 41:29Andy Greenwald?

  Yep.

• 41:29Chris Ryan?

  Although I think as the second half of the season has gone on

• 41:32Andy Greenwald?

  The horror's coming.

• 41:32Chris Ryan?

  It's gotten away from the office space aspect of it and, and more into the like, uh, these people are in true danger. Um, but I did want to suggest a movie called The Invitation, which is a Karen, uh, uh, Karen Kusama movie from 10 years ago, maybe at this point, maybe longer. First of all, just very much feels like that, I know I'm in a major city, but it feels like I'm alone in the world.

• 41:58Andy Greenwald?

  Okay.

• 41:59Chris Ryan?

  Um, Dinner Party.

• 42:02Chris Ryan?

  Psychological thriller horror movie Logan Marshall Green is in that.

• 42:07Andy Greenwald?

  Sure.

• 42:08Chris Ryan?

  And it is about a dinner party that turns into a kind of a cult initiation kind of thing.

• 42:15Andy Greenwald?

  By the way, for non-longtime listeners, Chris mentioned Logan Marshall Green because that is a stock that is still, you're still, you're holding, but you're not.

• 42:22Chris Ryan?

  He's on Marshalls. He's on the most popular television show in America.

• 42:25Andy Greenwald?

  That's Nepo. He's a Marshall Green.

• 42:29Andy Greenwald?

  That's not, he didn't earn that. No, but, but speaking of like, but you mentioned to me because his mother was my college acting teacher.

• 42:35Chris Ryan?

  Yes, and she's done a great job.

• 42:36Andy Greenwald?

  A great lawyer.

• 42:37Chris Ryan?

  In terms of, there's a couple that like came out where I wonder whether or not they would just be too intense. Like there is not the release valves that I think Weapons has where, hey, yeah, like we're gonna hit stop, it's a new vignette, you're gonna get to start with a new vibe with Aaron Riker, with Abrams, or with Benedict Wong, or whatever.

• 42:56Andy Greenwald?

  And the other thing that is, I think, for me, I guess, sort of, I didn't even pay attention to it. You get a taste of what's coming and then you rewind. So like, Weapons tells you what happens to Benedict Wong, and then you just find out why it happened.

• 43:10Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 43:10Andy Greenwald?

  And it's absolutely horrific, but you are a little bit prepared.

• 43:14Chris Ryan?

  That's what I'm saying. You have, you need a stiff arm up, you know?

• 43:16Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, I need a Heisman. OJ Bimson up in my face.

• 43:19Chris Ryan?

  Among recent films, I mean, for instance, the best horror thriller that I've seen this decade is Red Rooms. I don't think you can handle Red Rooms.

• 43:27Andy Greenwald?

  Who made that one?

• 43:28Chris Ryan?

  It's a French-Canadian film about a woman who becomes obsessed with a serial killer of young girls. And she goes to his trial every day. And there are reasons for that.

• 43:40Andy Greenwald?

  I hope so. I'm a fan of cinema, and I hope that there are reasons.

• 43:44Chris Ryan?

  I do think you might be interested in Empty Man. It has David Fincher vibes. It's kind of more like in the Manhunter genre of, James Badgedale plays a cop.

• 43:57Andy Greenwald?

  It's another guy you love.

• 43:58Chris Ryan?

  And it's like kind of a crossover between like the occult and serial killer, but if you like Mindhunter, if you like Manhunter, if you like.

• 44:06Andy Greenwald?

  Love hunting generally.

• 44:07Chris Ryan?

  Seven, I think that you'd be into that. But again, not a lot of laughs.

• 44:11Andy Greenwald?

  Okay.

• 44:12Chris Ryan?

  It follows David Robert Mitchell's movie about, um.

• 44:16Andy Greenwald?

  Oh, I've heard about this.

• 44:17Chris Ryan?

  A cursed virginity, a virginity cursed, basically. Who follows around Micah Monroe.

• 44:22Andy Greenwald?

  Couldn't be us.

• 44:23Chris Ryan?

  In an abandoned kind of exurbia. Cinematically incredibly compelling to watch. Some really good filmmaking. Couple of real fucking, like, that scary moments. They're gonna make a sequel of that, so get on board now before it happens.

• 44:37Andy Greenwald?

  All right. This is good. Also, you, half of these you could be making up.

• 44:42Chris Ryan?

  I could be. And then Strange Darling was one from a couple of years ago, maybe even just last year. Uh, JT Molner's movie. And he went on to write The Last, The Long Walk, the Stephen King adaptation. It's a kind of Tarantino-esque take on, uh, two people chasing each other across the countryside. And it's like, what, what is going on here? Who's the good guy? Who's the bad guy? But two incredible performances.

• 45:07Andy Greenwald?

  That sounds good.

• 45:07Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 45:07Andy Greenwald?

  And I think this is not, I think this is potentially servicey as well. Because I, like I said, I don't think I'm the only one who is, because people have asked me in my life, like, can I handle Widows Bay? I don't like her.

• 45:18Chris Ryan?

  Right.

• 45:18Andy Greenwald?

  And the answer is absolutely yes. And I think it's good to try new things. And I'm not, I, you know, I play a part here a little bit. Like, I have, I have seen, uh, a scary movie once.

• 45:31Chris Ryan?

  No, but like, I wouldn't make you watch Green Room, which is like Jeremy Sonnier's movie about a punk rock band being chased by white supremacists.

• 45:39Andy Greenwald?

  I care about punk rock bands too much.

• 45:41Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 45:41Andy Greenwald?

  I can't, I cannot see them suffer. I just want to see them held up and invited on this podcast.

• 45:46Chris Ryan?

  Yeah. When you're not here.

• 45:47Andy Greenwald?

  When I'm not here. But I'm worried about them. I don't want to corrupt them.

• 46:31Andy Greenwald?

  Every qualified stay. Life's a trip. Make the most of it at Best Western. Visit bestwestern.com for complete terms and conditions.

• 46:43Andy Greenwald?

  Can I just ask, I know, I know we're up against it, but Kayak, do you, where are you on this? In terms of horror movies? Have you seen any of these that he's mentioned?

• 46:50Speaker 05

  Yes, I've, I've actually seen, I've, this is like the most movies I've seen out of a Chris Ryan list.

• 46:55Andy Greenwald?

  Oh, because we forget this, you got, you guys watch a lot of zombie stuff.

• 46:58Speaker 05

  Yes, um, Green Room is really good.

• 47:00Chris Ryan?

  He's ready.

• 47:01Speaker 05

  The Invitation is very good. It Follows is probably one of my favorite movies I've seen.

• 47:07Andy Greenwald?

  Damn.

• 47:07Chris Ryan?

  There you go.

• 47:08Speaker 05

  Couple decades.

• 47:09Andy Greenwald?

  Wow.

• 47:09Chris Ryan?

  I mean, it's, it's all, it's all right there waiting for you.

• 47:11Andy Greenwald?

  I mean, I am such a, um, what's the word? Baby, that I, I actually.

• 47:16Chris Ryan?

  Give yourself some credit.

• 47:17Andy Greenwald?

  No, but about this, not about watching, like, I can watch hard things and I can surprise myself with scary things and I can be, I was delighted with some of the jump scares and weapons. I will say though, I am so relatively new to this and perhaps have bubble wrapped myself so intensely, that when the movie was over and I was super psyched, I was faced immediately with two problems. One, you were fucking in a different time zone, so I couldn't tell you and brag about how I'd done something.

• 47:40Chris Ryan?

  Mm-hmm.

• 47:40Andy Greenwald?

  Uh, and two, I was like, am I gonna have nightmares? I actually thought, I'm like, well, now must I do the things?

• 47:47Chris Ryan?

  See, I don't have to worry about that because all I have is stress nightmares about doing podcasts.

• 47:50Andy Greenwald?

  A billion percent.

• 47:52Chris Ryan?

  They're never interesting. They're always like, I've woken up late and I forgot what I'm talking about.

• 47:57Andy Greenwald?

  I, I completely, yeah.

• 47:58Chris Ryan?

  Bill's mad.

• 48:00Andy Greenwald?

  Bill's in the basement.

• 48:01Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 48:03Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, so.

• 48:04Chris Ryan?

  Bill is Ant gladis.

• 48:06Andy Greenwald?

  I didn't, I wish I had seen it early enough to have not even been spoiled by Ant gladis.

• 48:11Chris Ryan?

  Oh, and the other one I would say that you should watch, honestly, even though you're gonna find it too intense in places, is the 28 Years Later and 28 Years Later Bone Temple.

• 48:19Andy Greenwald?

  Okay, I, this came up when you weren't here.

• 48:21Chris Ryan?

  Those are two of my favorite movies of the last two years.

• 48:23Andy Greenwald?

  I did start 28 Years Later.

• 48:25Chris Ryan?

  And it's too much.

• 48:25Andy Greenwald?

  And I was like, I can't wait to tell Chris I did this, so he'll be proud of me, and I tapped out.

• 48:30Chris Ryan?

  Okay.

• 48:30Andy Greenwald?

  I tapped out early.

• 48:32Chris Ryan?

  Because of this 360 shots of guys eating deers or whatever?

• 48:36Andy Greenwald?

  Deer can be delicious if prepared properly. Sometimes you have to be warned about buckshot.

• 48:40Chris Ryan?

  I think you really held Gail Simmons's feet to the fire about venison preparation in a zombie apocalypse. I have to rush you through this because I want to do Star City before we get out of here. I'm sorry for the speed round. Lovely episode of television. Dark Forest, it was directed by Stefan Schwartz, which I want to make sure I get right. And Leba Vainberg wrote it. There was some elements of this one that reminded me of For All Mankind in Good Ways, where you start to see the beginnings of, you know, freeway extensions to the future. The beginning of, like I say, a nine-month mission that the chief designer is going to... Spoilers for this fourth episode, obviously.

• 49:22Chris Ryan?

  And we're keeping Star City at the end so that, obviously, like, it's a growing show. It's a show that's new and many people haven't caught on to it yet. I'd like to see it further up Apple's top shows ratings. But it's something that I think is just a wonderful, wonderful show. It is among my favorite things that's been released this year so far. So, yeah, you see the For All Mankind building blocks of like, these people are gonna go out into the far reaches of the galaxy and will be gone for nine months. And it's like, this is the kind of series that takes those kinds of jumps and takes those kinds of risks. But the real drama and the real action remains grounded in Moscow and in Star City. And I thought that this one was a lovely episode of television that was also an example of...

• 50:06Chris Ryan?

  This one, they do things you see on other series and they do them so fucking well. That you're just like, you know what, brother? I know the notes. Play the song anyway. So like, this episode opens with a how Valia was corrupted by the US intelligence services to become a mole. And you've seen like this, these kinds of flashbacks done. Tons of espionage shows, tons of other shows do the like, three years earlier. Now we explain why this person is the way they are. And it's done so artfully, like there are these shots of Tanya and Value when they're at a party together. And there's like, they're both in windows, separate from each other in an apartment. And then you can tell that they see each other and she comes over to him and is in his window.

• 50:51Chris Ryan?

  And they're being watched by a US intelligence operative.

• 50:56Andy Greenwald?

  Operative.

• 50:57Chris Ryan?

  That, and then at the end of the episode, Anastasia, who's been hitting the bottle and signing autographs and kissing babies. Finally, the closest she's come to getting back out into space is setting off fireworks with a bunch of dorks from a, from a physics department at a university on a, by a dacha out on a lake somewhere in rural Russia. And her joy and also like just some of the shots of them setting off these fireworks. I was like, this, this doesn't need to be this good, but because it's this good, it makes this show great. But those were my big, my big takeaways.

• 51:32Andy Greenwald?

  Couldn't agree with you more. I feel like you even, another example, even from just that opening that's explaining the story of how a hero has ostensibly been turned to be a villain within the narrative of the show. The moment when he is approached by the Western operative to turn him, intern him because of the exposure of his wife.

• 51:51Chris Ryan?

  Right.

• 51:51Andy Greenwald?

  To protect her.

• 51:52Chris Ryan?

  He's in a dissident group, yeah.

• 51:54Andy Greenwald?

  They're waiting for a bus and then the bus engine starts and we don't hear the conversation.

• 51:58Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 51:58Andy Greenwald?

  Real, real G's know, you can move in silence like lasagna.

• 52:02Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 52:03Andy Greenwald?

  And you can do that like sometimes in art with negative space and you can do it and it's hard to do it. Particularly hard to do it as a writer in a shrinking industry like television, where you can't trust, you can get your point across to the various levels of executives and development people, producers. But ultimately, it's a visual medium. And if you trust the story you're telling and your collaborators in it, they can tell you the story with the pictures and you can win by saying less. And that was an incredible moment that captures that at its best. You mentioned For All Mankind. I would say that the for all mankind-ness of this episode, for me, at first, was the groaning runtime. Like, and I say this to people, if anyone is still listening who wants to be sold

• 52:46Andy Greenwald?

  four episodes in on the show, I hear you. I didn't feel particularly fired up to watch the fourth episode of Star City because it is so visually committed to the color palette and the world and the moment and the very, very specific storytelling that I was like, is this really? After watching Cote d'Ivoire, is this really going to be the rest of my Sunday night? And when it's an hour and 10 minutes. And the thing about it is-

• 53:12Chris Ryan?

  I could be watching this Tunisian manager's last match.

• 53:15Andy Greenwald?

  I know. But genuinely, it rewarded patience and it rewards, it's like the Slow Food Manifesto.

• 53:23Chris Ryan?

  Dude, I was like, I had a note that was like, some of these scenes feel more like European cinema than they do American television.

• 53:30Andy Greenwald?

  They are very, very long. And the way that it earns it is so old fashioned and kind of beautiful. They earn it by saying, here are the six characters and we are going to draw them into such inexorably tight knots early that every scene is imbued with that extra connection. That, and I think that this, the two standout moments for me of the episode that are both old school and hadn't seen that before. Old school is, Reece Seafan's performance as chief designer is so subtle and so strong. And even if it was just a passing conversation or if it was always the intention,

• 54:11Andy Greenwald?

  The character is based on a kindness and paternalistic decency that anchors the show. Like, in the midst of people who have, like, this was an episode that gave Ludmilla, like, a little bit more... She's endangered too, even though she's mostly just been shooting people.

• 54:27Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, but I love that her reaction to that was just to be... To choose somebody at random to be brutal to.

• 54:32Andy Greenwald?

  Exactly.

• 54:33Chris Ryan?

  Like, she's like, "If I feel pressure, like, some other poor person is gonna get it."

• 54:37Andy Greenwald?

  Is gonna get it.

• 54:37Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 54:38Andy Greenwald?

  So, but you also could see the scaffolding of, like, let's make her a little bit more understandable or empathetic. Chief designer in his scene with, I'm gonna get her name right, with Lakshmi, who's a new character this week, played by Priya Kansar.

• 54:51Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, Dr. Tana, or who are, yeah.

• 54:53Andy Greenwald?

  The way that he sort of brings her on is like, classic, like, Hollywood, almost.

• 54:58Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 54:59Andy Greenwald?

  Of like, "You've mistaken me for someone else, and, but I love your spunk and your spirit, and by the way, I'm fucking sending you to Venus."

• 55:06Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 55:06Andy Greenwald?

  Even though you're not a cosmonaut, was awesome and exciting and very old-fashioned, like, "I love these people already" kind of thing. Counterpoint that with Irina's discovery, much sooner than I think it would have necessarily come in a show, I would have... I didn't think they were gonna be able to pin this on Valia within one episode of the reveal. That Irina is charged with tracking down this tiny coil, this heat-conducting coil that was pirated into the lunar lander. That it was connected to the French perfume that she had already clocked in their apartment the week before.

• 55:41Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 55:42Andy Greenwald?

  Is such elegant spy craft storytelling. I was like, "God damn." Like, you and I watch a lot of spy shit.

• 55:48Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 55:49Andy Greenwald?

  And it honestly doesn't take a lot to make us like it, and I thought that was just wildly clever.

• 55:55Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, and Agnes O'Casey's doing a really great job where the, there is like, this sort of dead ember, like, one little glowing ember of desire inside of her. And I don't know which way it's going. Like, is she in love with Tanya? Is she in love with Valia? Is she just in love with the fact that they have a private life?

• 56:15Andy Greenwald?

  Yes.

• 56:15Chris Ryan?

  That is full of sensual, like, awakening and music and...

• 56:19Andy Greenwald?

  And travel.

• 56:20Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 56:20Andy Greenwald?

  Or, exactly, I didn't even say that. The other thing that made that scene brilliant wasn't the mechanics of like, "Oh, this is a spring, and this is how they got it to her." It's that the previous episode established that she is incredibly jealous of the perfume. So in this scene, you're like, did she manufacture a reason to go back there solely?

• 56:39Chris Ryan?

  To squirt, to spray some perfume?

• 56:42Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah. And that's what makes it excellent.

• 56:45Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, it's a great, it's on a great run. So I agree with you. It can, it can fill along those episodes.

• 56:53Andy Greenwald?

  I worry about falling behind. That's the other thing. I was like, should I, we weren't sure if we were going to cover it today. And then I'm with you. If you're like, I don't know if it's too late because piling up four of these could feel heavy.

• 57:04Chris Ryan?

  Can be four and a half hours. Yeah.

• 57:07Andy Greenwald?

  That's really good.

• 57:07Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, try to keep up. We'll be back on Thursday, special Widows Bay episode and I hope everybody's having a great World Cup and a great first couple of weeks of summer.