‘Severance’ Season 2 Ultimately Existed Only to Serve Itself. Plus, ‘The White Lotus’ E6.

Chris and Andy talk about the full trailer for ‘Andor’ and whether or not it helps or hurts a show to have multiple trailers released (09:36). Then they break down the latest episode of ‘The White Lotus’ and talk about how the show is finally starting to pick up steam (12:15). Finally, they discuss the ‘Severance’ Season 2 finale, going over what worked and didn’t work for them in this finale and the season overall (38:36). Hosts: Chris Ryan and Andy Greenwald Senior Producer: Kaya McMullen Video Production and Editing: Jon Jones 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.

• 0:00Chris Ryan?

  This episode of The Watch is brought to you by Coffee Mate. Coffee Mate has been searching the globe for flavors that pair perfectly with coffee. So when they heard the new season of HBO's original series, The White Lotus, was set in Thailand, they were inspired to brew up two new flavored creamers, Thai iced coffee and pina colada flavored creamers. They're available for a short time only, so for the love of coffee, go try them now.

• 0:22Speaker 01

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• 0:36Speaker 01

  out here. But I still have a reliable connection, even though I have no idea where I am right now.

• 0:43Speaker 02

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• 0:54Speaker 03

  I need sports staff to clear the room. Stand up and walk now.

• 1:01Chris 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 chanting "Innie liberation now", it's Andy Greenwald.

• 1:16Andy Greenwald?

  Campuses are cracking down on that sort of talk, you know?

• 1:19Chris Ryan?

  You could lose your funding.

• 1:20Andy Greenwald?

  I know, if you start talking about the play of the innies.

• 1:22Chris Ryan?

  Andy, beautiful, beautiful friend, welcome back.

• 1:25Andy Greenwald?

  I'm back.

• 1:25Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, and we're gonna do this show today on Severance and White Lotus, a couple of housekeeping things.

• 1:32Andy Greenwald?

  Okay.

• 1:33Chris Ryan?

  You can email us at [email protected]. You can watch us at ringer-tv, that's the channel on YouTube, or you can just watch us on The Watch feed on Spotify. You can listen to us wherever you get podcasts.

• 1:42Andy Greenwald?

  You watch us if you just touch our podcast.

• 1:44Chris Ryan?

  I prefer you listen to us on Spotify. You can follow us on Instagram, thewatchpod underscore. Guess what?

• 1:50Andy Greenwald?

  Oh.

• 1:51Chris Ryan?

  I'm going to Boston. I am gonna be doing a rewatchable show on Thursday night for Good Will Hunting at House of Blues, but then, me and Bill and Sean are gonna be kicking around the Coolidge Theater all weekend. Coolidge Corner, baby, Brookline. We're gonna be there for a rewatchables foam festival that we're curating, and there's still some tickets available for some of the screenings. It's honestly all killer, no filler. Goodfellas, Heat, The Town, The Verdict, Friends of Eddie Coyle, Spotlight, Departed. Please come through, please say hi. And that is all of my announcements.

• 2:23Andy Greenwald?

  Sort of like a men's rights weekend.

• 2:28Andy Greenwald?

  People don't realize, by the way, that you have real history in Boston. That's not just Bill City. No, I was gonna let that one lie.

• 2:40Andy Greenwald?

  No, history's pendulum swinging back your way. You're good.

• 2:43Chris Ryan?

  Let's just, yeah, keep it moving.

• 2:45Andy Greenwald?

  You have a history in Boston. It's not just Bill City.

• 2:47Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, I lived in Boston for five years. I even liked a trot Nixon, Troy Leary era Red Sox team quite a bit.

• 2:53Andy Greenwald?

  That was fun. I used to visit you there.

• 2:54Chris Ryan?

  I was thinking about the politics of wearing a Red Sox hat at any of these events if I wanted to.

• 3:00Andy Greenwald?

  I think that would be bad for the brand.

• 3:01Chris Ryan?

  Well, okay, I think that some people do have American League teams.

• 3:05Andy Greenwald?

  Okay, yeah.

• 3:06Chris Ryan?

  And I know several people who have their hometown team have now started to adopt, soft adopts the Dodgers.

• 3:15Andy Greenwald?

  I'm okay with it.

• 3:16Chris Ryan?

  Not me.

• 3:17Andy Greenwald?

  No, people, because you and I believe that, believe in the power and the beauty and the agony of local sports fandom.

• 3:26Chris Ryan?

  Upon birth, you were assigned to fandom.

• 3:27Andy Greenwald?

  Yes. So if you are raising children here and they become Dodger fans, hey, might be born on third base. With a 10-year contract.

• 3:36Chris Ryan?

  For the college payments, 10 years.

• 3:38Andy Greenwald?

  But I then would get it if you saw your child taking joy from a local team and you took them to games and you'd want them to share. I'm okay with that. Now, that's not a problem I have because my children hate sports and love to tell me that.

• 3:49Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 3:50Andy Greenwald?

  And they also love denying me joy. But I'm largely okay with it. And also, in case there actually were no CCTV cameras at the time, but we and many of our friends did adopt the 2004 Red Sox when they were beating the Yankees.

• 4:04Chris Ryan?

  If it was a choice between two ferns, you know?

• 4:07Andy Greenwald?

  Totally. Can I, just one small bit of something or other? You know, I used to do a segment, you know, I love doing segments because I love an organized podcast. But we did used to do plane movies when I was flying a lot.

• 4:22Chris Ryan?

  I remember, yeah.

• 4:23Andy Greenwald?

  We've kind of let that go. But I did want to just comment on this.

• 4:25Chris Ryan?

  Did you like of the movies or did you let go of the segment?

• 4:29Andy Greenwald?

  I just raw dog now. Just whenever I'm on a plane. No, I was flying back from the East Coast. You're the color god these days. Look, we can have these conversations, we're on video. Every day I meet, like I see you in the parking lot and I'm like, look at this guy. He's just killing it. Thank you.

• 4:47Andy Greenwald?

  I was flying back and, you know, don't want to be a, don't want to be a whiner, but it was a, quite a turbulent flight.

• 4:54Chris Ryan?

  Mm-hmm.

• 4:55Andy Greenwald?

  Luckily, I had some text messaging ability to reach out to my friend Steady Eddie here on the ground, talking me through it. But it was the most severe turbulence that I've experienced in quite some time.

• 5:05Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 5:06Andy Greenwald?

  So turbulent that when, you know, there's like the, the, look, we've let things slip a little bit in this country, right? Like the seatbelt sign is on and people are like, I still gotta go to the bathroom. And people just like get up and like, like to move around anyway.

• 5:16Chris Ryan?

  I kind of do that sometimes.

• 5:17Andy Greenwald?

  Sometimes, you gotta read the room and the room being the metal sky tube that's hurtling through windshear. And it was so bumpy, this woman was trying to get back to her seat and it was rocking and rolling. It was doing, it was basically that flashback scene in Paradise.

• 5:32Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 5:33Andy Greenwald?

  Um, no spoilers, but on the plane that survives. And what the, what the flight attendant said to the woman that I'd never heard before, she was sort of barely making it clawing her way back to her row and she was right next to me. And the flight attendant came up behind her and said, "Sit down, sit down, sit down right here, there, there, there." Because it was not safe for her to return to the row.

• 5:54Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, that's probably a liability thing more than a, we're, we're going down thing, right?

• 5:57Andy Greenwald?

  So it's, the, the point of the story though, it's a little bit of a misdirect. It's not just that there was a woman forcibly instructed to, to squat on the aisle next to my row, which was great for the nerves. The zannies were kicking real good. Uh, it was that the person next to me on the flight, no matter how bumpy it got, could not be swayed from her plane viewing, which was episodes three and four of Adolescence.

• 6:23Chris Ryan?

  What I'm hearing is that one person on that flight was committed to this project, to this podcast.

• 6:28Andy Greenwald?

  For what it's worth, I got through Severance, I got through Daredevil, I got through my favorite new show, Dope Thief, which we're not even talking about today. But I want to talk about the, the constitution of someone, like, cause Adolescence, even for people, we're not going to spoil it here for people who haven't watched it yet. We think it's the best show of the year. It is an incredible watch.

• 6:46Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 6:47Andy Greenwald?

  It is harrowing. It is hard to watch on furniture that is on steady ground.

• 6:53Chris Ryan?

  Was she second screening anything? Was she like also doing other stuff or was it just like, I'm locked in?

• 6:57Andy Greenwald?

  I think she had a mindfulness app also going. No, she was locked in and she was just like doing the work. She was watching episode three, then she was watching episode four. And right around that moment, when I was like, I will pay anything for this cursed wifi, just so I could send a final message to my friend and loved ones. I turned to see how she was doing. You know, you like to see how other people's faces are.

• 7:18Chris Ryan?

  I love you, but could I just? Can I give an outsider's perspective on how this flight went?

• 7:23Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 7:23Chris Ryan?

  You announced to me that you were like, not signing up for Wi- no, not paying for Wi-Fi on this flight. Talk to you in six hours. We can figure out our schedule then.

• 7:33Andy Greenwald?

  And I won't name names, but I'll say these guys are no longer that friendly.

• 7:37Chris Ryan?

  55 minutes later.

• 7:38Andy Greenwald?

  Well, there's free Wi-Fi for 20 minutes.

• 7:40Chris Ryan?

  I have signed up for free Wi-Fi to tell you my severance takes.

• 7:43Andy Greenwald?

  I didn't tell you my takes. I just sent you a series of emojis that I will now turn into takes on this podcast.

• 7:49Chris Ryan?

  Then you seemed to, did you get like another free 20 minutes after an hour or two? Like, cause you jumped back on to be like very turbulent on this flight.

• 7:56Andy Greenwald?

  I jumped back on, I, I, I'm not shitting you. I jumped back on because it was so turbulent. I was like, I should compose some thoughts to my daughters.

• 8:05Chris Ryan?

  But you texted me.

• 8:06Andy Greenwald?

  I was texting.

• 8:07Chris Ryan?

  Oh, you text a lot of people. Okay.

• 8:09Andy Greenwald?

  I, I throw, I throw a wide net in the last moments of my life, as it turns out. But in that moment, when I was looking for comfort and looking to my fellow man and woman to be like, how should we feel about this?

• 8:18Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 8:19Andy Greenwald?

  All I saw was Eddie and Amanda's tearful scene in the bedroom in Adolescence 104. Stephen Graham was weeping into a pillow. Like, that's me right now.

• 8:29Chris Ryan?

  You know, I don't want to get carried away with plane stories, but if I told the story before about the last time I thought I was gonna die. I was on a flight from Chicago to Philly.

• 8:36Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 8:37Chris Ryan?

  And, uh, we were just going and I was seated, seated next to a guy. It was aisle, aisle. Seated next to a guy who had like five transfusions, you know, like vodka, grape juice or whatever, uh, drinks.

• 8:51Andy Greenwald?

  They're called transfusions?

• 8:52Chris Ryan?

  On the golf course, they are. And, uh, I, I, otherwise it's like Welch's and vodka, I guess.

• 8:57Andy Greenwald?

  Sure.

• 8:58Chris Ryan?

  And this guy was, um, playing video games. He's older, like my age, younger.

• 9:06Andy Greenwald?

  That was, that was a journey.

• 9:07Chris Ryan?

  Well, no, playing video games the entire time and just kinda like listening to tunes.

• 9:12Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 9:13Chris Ryan?

  Drinking vodka.

• 9:13Andy Greenwald?

  Sick.

• 9:14Chris Ryan?

  And then we fucking dropped 90 feet, uh, straight down, like Tower of Terror style. And he started crying.

• 9:21Andy Greenwald?

  No.

• 9:22Chris Ryan?

  And the kicker is, he was a huge Arizona Cardinals fan, I guess. He was wearing all Arizona Cardinals gear. And the only thing I could think about is just like, I can't believe I'm about to die next to an Arizona Cardinals fan. After all the pain they've caused the Eagles over the years.

• 9:35Andy Greenwald?

  I thought you would turn to him and be like, I guess you'll never really know about Kyler, huh? Like, I guess, I guess we'll never be sure if he's a Max guy or not.

• 9:44Chris Ryan?

  I know, is he elite? All right, um, should we get into the television shows that dominated the weekend?

• 9:50Andy Greenwald?

  I want to do Lotus first. I don't know if you had an agenda.

• 9:52Chris Ryan?

  That's fine, man. We can do Chekhov's Hand Job.

• 9:53Andy Greenwald?

  Oh, do you?

• 9:55Chris Ryan?

  You think that's gonna come up again? Think that might bode, bode for the future?

• 10:01Andy Greenwald?

  You think Saxon's gonna come up again?

• 10:03Chris Ryan?

  Um, we can definitely do White Lotus before Severance if you'd like to.

• 10:06Andy Greenwald?

  Oh, last thing, do you want to mention the Andor trailer that dropped today?

• 10:09Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, I, I had a little bit of a philosophical crisis because I think we should only have one trailer for any given piece of content. I almost don't even want another one battle after another, uh, teaser.

• 10:21Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 10:22Chris Ryan?

  Which, the teaser for the teaser, to me, is enough to know that that movie is worth $500 million. I don't care how much his ass off had to pay for it. And I feel like that first Andor trailer was cool. The behind the scenes making of was cool. The third is basically everything you expect from an Andor trailer. It's shots from behind of people walking, it's people talking about evolution, and it's people staring up at the sky at stuff going past them. The only thing you need to know is that, you know, there's a lot of Death Star talk in this one.

• 10:49Andy Greenwald?

  Mm-hmm.

• 10:49Chris Ryan?

  Uh, any thoughts on it?

• 10:51Andy Greenwald?

  Um.

• 10:52Chris Ryan?

  April 22nd is when the second season comes.

• 10:53Andy Greenwald?

  I miss Steve Earle. Uh, no, I thought, I think this trailer is fairly perfect. And we couldn't be more excited about the show. They, they, they had us at Rebellion.

• 11:05Chris Ryan?

  They had us at Andor.

• 11:06Andy Greenwald?

  We were already there, yeah. I think that, I, we, we're going to be saying variations of this for the next few weeks and months. But, um, this show continues to be everything that we ever wanted from the evolution of our childhood entertainment. Truly, like.

• 11:22Chris Ryan?

  It truly, truly is.

• 11:23Andy Greenwald?

  Like, like, I, I just, we have spent a decade not even talking, like, relitigating, like, the Amblin movies or Star Wars movies of our youth, but also talking about this next generation of blockbusters and going through the Marvel Universe, the highs, the lows, the Sokovias, and like. Throughout, we continue to bump up against something that these movies just haven't, they're, they just are unable to grapple with, which is that if you lift an entire Eastern European country off of the earth and drop it back down again, the body count and the lasting generational trauma is probably serious. But this movie is about making Scarlet Witch the hero that she needs to be, so we move on. This trailer alone is decades worth of emotional spackle from our original Star Wars experience.

• 12:07Andy Greenwald?

  They're like, they are building a weapon in a rising fascist state. What can any one person or droid do about it?

• 12:14Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 12:15Andy Greenwald?

  And certainly not relevant to today, but I think it's, it's pretty fucking exciting.

• 12:21Chris Ryan?

  It looks great.

• 12:22Andy Greenwald?

  And I wonder what the, I, I, I, I am too, I respect myself too much to look, but I do wonder what the diehard Star Wars redditor people think about this, considering.

• 12:32Chris Ryan?

  I think they're all out there and they're like, why did you guys abandon the no depression alt-country genre and not have a Jillian Welch song or something playing over this trailer?

• 12:41Andy Greenwald?

  That's what the Arizona Cardinal fan who might be older than you thinks.

• 12:44Chris Ryan?

  Um, okay, so let's get into White Lotus.

• 12:47Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 12:48Chris Ryan?

  It was the sixth episode.

• 12:50Andy Greenwald?

  Um. One funny bit is we never know how many episodes there are. I think our listeners love it.

• 12:54Chris Ryan?

  I, it's the sixth episode.

• 12:56Andy Greenwald?

  No, no, but of, of how many?

• 12:58Chris Ryan?

  Um, I have no idea.

• 12:59Andy Greenwald?

  See? We have no idea.

• 13:01Chris Ryan?

  One of the reasons I have no idea is that I can't tell whether or not this show is peaking or getting ready to peak.

• 13:07Andy Greenwald?

  Right.

• 13:08Chris Ryan?

  I, I, I think it's the latter. I think it's getting ready to peak. Um, I remain kind of steadfast in my opinion of this season.

• 13:17Andy Greenwald?

  Eight episodes, we do know that.

• 13:18Chris Ryan?

  So two more left.

• 13:19Andy Greenwald?

  Yep.

• 13:20Chris Ryan?

  Uh, I am very much enjoying the experience of watching it.

• 13:23Andy Greenwald?

  Mm-hmm.

• 13:24Chris Ryan?

  On a scene-to-scene basis. I will note that I feel like this season, it's almost feeling like the, uh, memification of the show seems to be subsuming the show itself to the extent that you care about that and that you're engaging with that kind of stuff, but Piper Noe and Leslie Bibb Smile and Walton Goggins' confused face.

• 13:44Andy Greenwald?

  Mm-hmm.

• 13:45Chris Ryan?

  Uh, almost like.

• 13:48Chris Ryan?

  Are almost outsized compared to the what is this show about this season? There are certain parts of it that I find quite moving. There are certain parts of it that I find a bit dull. What was your take on the sixth episode?

• 13:59Andy Greenwald?

  So I, you know, we talked about the fifth episode, which was paced as if it was a rip roaring edge of your seat thriller. But I found kind of lacking in the concrete details of it, like it almost didn't earn the quick cuts and tension builds. You know, as we talked about last week, I'm like, I just sort of reject the stakes of Piper's gap year being so crucial.

• 14:23Andy Greenwald?

  This episode I thought was really interesting because I think others have already said that it felt like.

• 14:27Chris Ryan?

  Is that because you don't think young women should take a year off from college and just decide what they want to do?

• 14:30Andy Greenwald?

  I think young women should get as far away from America as possible, to be honest. Hashtag girl dad, but this episode was in some ways like a B side or the denouement of the previous episode. I found it strangely compelling, the most compelling episode of the season so far, so much so that I did something that I rarely do or rarely have time to do, which is re-watch parts of it. And I found it very, very rewarding and it made me think that.

• 14:55Chris Ryan?

  You already have a new lease on life.

• 14:57Andy Greenwald?

  I was reborn. You should have seen me in the laxative.

• 14:59Chris Ryan?

  You are the daredevil reborn. Did you watch White Lotus with a visor on just to hear it right?

• 15:05Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, I don't, I take it in with all of my senses.

• 15:10Andy Greenwald?

  I think that I felt more attuned with the project of the season, which I think has a higher degree of difficulty than it might be getting credit for. And is pretty subtle and thus it's not, it's definitely not hitting the way previous seasons have in terms of reward on plot investment or twists and turns at this, at this point of the season. I also want to begin with a slight criticism before we get into these larger projects that I'm alluding to. Which is for all the praise we give Mike White for just really being a prose pro and knowing how to deliver action, plot, character with economy and efficiency with like a winking knowledge of the medium that he's working in.

• 15:55Andy Greenwald?

  The original time we started talking, we've been talking about that way since the first shot of the first season. Where you see a body and then you flashback and you're like, well, now it's just injected, you know, it's like, it's like, uh, what's the phrase? I was reading about how people who like to put a zen in their mouth and chase it with a Celsius.

• 16:11Chris Ryan?

  Oh, they gave that a name.

• 16:12Andy Greenwald?

  Transfusion.

• 16:15Chris Ryan?

  Somebody gave that a name.

• 16:16Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, yeah, I just saw that. So like, that's, that's what that did.

• 16:19Chris Ryan?

  But they were almost acting like it was like a level, like a speedball, and I'm like, it's just speed. Like a zen and a Celsius will just take you up.

• 16:25Andy Greenwald?

  It's speed and having a ball.

• 16:26Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, I think a zen and a beer is where you want to be.

• 16:29Andy Greenwald?

  But you said that with such conviction. That's just you in Boston. Um, anyway, I, I, I have to say that like, the opening of this episode, and it begins with Tim shooting himself and his family.

• 16:42Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 16:43Andy Greenwald?

  Uh, discovering it was, was bullshit and was manipulative bullshit. And the worst kind of manipulative bullshit, because at this point in our collective, um, T, prestige TV viewing, we know it's not real.

• 16:58Chris Ryan?

  Well.

• 16:58Andy Greenwald?

  And we know that he knows that we know it's not real.

• 17:02Chris Ryan?

  He let it go on a little long for it to be, I, I never for one second thought it was real. But I, I thought he let it go on. He played it out.

• 17:11Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 17:12Chris Ryan?

  Really let, like.

• 17:13Andy Greenwald?

  Let everyone have their reaction to it.

• 17:14Chris Ryan?

  Parker Posey scream, had Piper run over. I felt like it was like, no, you're pushing this to the extent that you can.

• 17:19Andy Greenwald?

  A, a, and giving us a artificial hit of what the show is not giving us, which is blood and guts and screaming and like more base primal plot.

• 17:32Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, we're edging a lot, yeah.

• 17:34Andy Greenwald?

  Careful. Careful, comma, brother. Um. So I, I, I thought that was weirdly manipulative and maybe an example of him, of Mike. Can we call him Mike at this point?

• 17:46Chris Ryan?

  Same.

• 17:47Andy Greenwald?

  Not trusting, maybe getting a little squirrely about his project here, which to me is suddenly a really, really interesting and really, really earnest investigation of the journey of the self.

• 17:58Chris Ryan?

  Uh huh.

• 17:59Andy Greenwald?

  That is so fucking hard to do in a television show for any number of reasons. One of which is that a journey of the self is essentially internal.

• 18:07Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 18:07Andy Greenwald?

  And two, television is a medium that really happens in scenes with dialogue in them. So to watch this episode again and see certain aspects of it, particularly the dissolution or the slow dissolution of three of the primary main characters of the course of this hour. And that's, uh, Jason Isaacs as Tim Radcliffe, that's Walton Goggins as, uh, as, as Rick, and Patrick Schwarzenegger as Saxon. Um.

• 18:34Andy Greenwald?

  I found it really, really earnest, if flawed, but really compelling. And I was more drawn into this episode and the season because of it, watching it that way.

• 18:43Chris Ryan?

  You know, I was trying to think about um the conversation that Greg and Tim have earlier in the season on the boat where I think, I can't remember actually whether Greg or Tim, I think the idea of like you, nobody, people only come to Thailand because they're running from something or looking for something, right? And whether or not you could apply that to all of the characters on the show, you know, like what are each one of these people doing? I think it works for some individuals and then probably broadly for some groups. But the tension of the show and perhaps sometimes the frustration of the show, but also I think the success of White Lotus as a project is the balance of the like

• 19:26Chris Ryan?

  melodramatic Greg finds Belinda on a pathway or, you know, Kate sees Jacqueline, Valentine leaving Jacqueline's villa or whatever. That kind of stuff combined with Piper, Rick, to some extent Chelsea, they're kind of questing on an almost, you know, kind of spiritual level. And I, I, I don't know that necessarily for me, it's all coming together the way other seasons did. But I do think that you're right. Like there is something in this season that is actually pretty profound and I did really like

• 20:05Chris Ryan?

  the scene even with Tim in the monk.

• 20:07Andy Greenwald?

  Even that's the best scene of the season so far, I thought.

• 20:09Chris Ryan?

  Okay.

• 20:09Andy Greenwald?

  I thought that scene was incredible and so much of it is about Jason Isaac's performance. And I don't know how The White Lotus works. There are some shows that famously only give their actors a script at a time, both because maybe they haven't written the other scripts yet, or because they're like, we want you to play the moment, not the future of the character. But I can't help but think, I mean, Jason Isaac is an elite tier actor, but I couldn't help but think that he has been checking his own internal journey because suddenly his

• 20:40Andy Greenwald?

  Two to three episodes of lorazepam haze felt like steps sloppy stumbling steps on a path towards this moment.

• 20:49Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 20:50Andy Greenwald?

  It felt absolutely cumulative and reasonable and understandable that from everything from the look on his face to how few words he had to offer and how much he needed to hear what came back at him.

• 21:03Chris Ryan?

  Relatively pro-drug season because when you think about it, I mean, okay, my, my point is this, that the drugs being imbibed on this season are leading people to the place where they needed to go. You know, like Saxon and Lachlan, pretty, pretty handsy anyway.

• 21:18Andy Greenwald?

  Sure.

• 21:19Chris Ryan?

  That was obviously like confront Saxon with, we don't have to change the subject from what you were talking about, Tim. But, you know, obviously, I think the thing that everybody's going to be talking about or is talking about after this episode is the fact that Lachlan gave his brother a handjob.

• 21:33Andy Greenwald?

  You keep wanting to talk about that, but yet you also talked about edging. So like, do you want, what do you, do you want to see?

• 21:38Chris Ryan?

  You just can't pin me down.

• 21:41Chris Ryan?

  But, you know, those guys are, you know, you could blame the molly or you could just say that like, there's something like this guy was rubbing one out in front of his brother a couple of days.

• 21:51Andy Greenwald?

  So a couple, like I do want to talk about the spirituality in the Tim part, but let's, let's go to where you most want to talk about, which is just two boys in bed together, two brothers.

• 22:00Andy Greenwald?

  I think that there are a number of ways of looking at the scene and I do think that there, that, that Mike White, the director deserves a lot of credit for the way that he did something, again, subtle but artful, which is made us understand how each of those characters was remembering and when and in what capacity they were remembering it. Like that, that was.

• 22:20Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 22:20Andy Greenwald?

  That was doled out effectively. I think that there is a way of, of looking at it that is relevant, that is related to the Sam Rockwell monologue, which is about, you know. Version, the armor of self and having to give up the things you think you want versus the things you want to be.

• 22:40Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 22:40Andy Greenwald?

  What you want to do and what you want. And so in that version of it, yeah, we saw in the pilot, Lachlan was, he wants to know how to be his older brother, like to be a man in the world the way that he is.

• 22:50Chris Ryan?

  Well, I think he's, inside of him are the two siblings, you know, he's, there's part of him that has the very like

• 22:56Andy Greenwald?

  Yes.

• 22:56Chris Ryan?

  sensitive, caring side that Piper is, and then there's part of him that wants to impress the alpha Saxon.

• 23:01Andy Greenwald?

  Or see what it would be like. He's trying these identities on for size because he, you know, is he gonna go to UNC or Duke? That's the real fundamental choices. And so in that version of it, when they are out of their heads and they're in a place that doesn't matter, and they're literally unmoored and they're on a boat and it doesn't count, it's just then he is trying to see what, to be both of these people in that moment. I think there's also an interesting angle to look at this, definitely the season as a whole, which is just incest as the inevitable next step of a truly debased society. When the monk says things like

• 23:40Chris Ryan?

  That's, you're talking about our society?

• 23:41Andy Greenwald?

  I'm talking about the podcast community. No, like what the monk says is, you know, there's a spiritual malaise, you've lost connection with the spirit, so what is left? Self, identity, chasing money, pleasure, everyone runs from pain towards pleasure. And, you know, for certain class of people, the people who can afford the white lotus, anything is possible as, what's the guy's name, the German guy who's gonna sing next week?

• 24:06Chris Ryan?

  Fabian.

• 24:07Andy Greenwald?

  Everything is permissible. Everyone has questionable paths, right? And, you know, at this point, you were talking, so it's like failed, failed state, like end of Rome, Caligula, like, or royal family, just like, what else is there to be done and experienced? These people are so removed from day-to-day concerns and day-to-day people, and also day-to-day restrictions of what's allowable and permissible. And, and I was seeing that this, I did not remember this, but that there were, I saw a few other people writing online about like echoes of incest in previous seasons. I'd forgotten that the

• 24:50Andy Greenwald?

  The Tom Hollander, Leo Woodall relationship.

• 24:53Chris Ryan?

  They were supposed to be, it was supposed to be his uncle.

• 24:55Andy Greenwald?

  Right.

• 24:55Chris Ryan?

  He's like, you fuck your uncle.

• 24:56Andy Greenwald?

  Yes. Turns out he didn't, but that was the suggestion of that. And then even like smaller echoes that like Imperiali and his son both sleep with the same woman.

• 25:04Chris Ryan?

  And the father, right?

• 25:05Andy Greenwald?

  Uh, I don't think he does. I think he has a lot of comments about it. Do you think, did she sleep with all members of that family?

• 25:11Chris Ryan?

  I can't remember, yeah. I don't think so.

• 25:13Andy Greenwald?

  Seems like something you'd remember, Chris. Seems like something you're dialed in on.

• 25:17Chris Ryan?

  The idea of fun is also something I've been thinking about and, you know, cause

• 25:23Chris Ryan?

  why do people go on these trips?

• 25:24Andy Greenwald?

  Mm-hmm.

• 25:25Chris Ryan?

  You know, and they, there's usually a stated reason early on in the season, like we came here to get more in touch with our family's heritage, or we just have money to burn, so we decided to come here.

• 25:34Andy Greenwald?

  Or, or I want to be with my friends from childhood.

• 25:36Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, or we're so busy, but we want to bring the family together for one of these things.

• 25:40Andy Greenwald?

  Unplug.

• 25:40Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, unplug. And then what people do to facilitate that, which, you know, for, I, I, the Jacqueline, Kate and Laurie plot, I, it hasn't, uh, fully connected to the rest of what's going on yet, maybe. But, uh, just because they, they have not done a lot of Greg stuff, you know, and they, they have not been on the Greg boat or done.

• 26:02Andy Greenwald?

  Or invited necessarily to the party that's coming.

• 26:05Chris Ryan?

  And, uh, they remain my favorite characters.

• 26:09Andy Greenwald?

  Mm-hmm.

• 26:09Chris Ryan?

  Carrie Coon should win an Emmy simply for eating fruit. Because the way she eats fruit and specifically the way she holds her cutlery is such a reflection of that character. It's such a great choice. I actually, not to be weird, would love to know how Carrie Coon eats fruit ordinarily.

• 26:28Andy Greenwald?

  Call your, call her husband, your friend.

• 26:30Chris Ryan?

  I could, but I don't want to be inappropriate. Uh, but I would just say she does such a wonderful job. I'm, I love Kate, uh, Leslie Bibb's performance this year. Um, even her phone acting when she sees Jacqueline. Yeah, like some great little, little facial expressions. But they have, they are kind of like searching for what does it mean to be on a trip together? With people that you've been friends with since 10th grade, but also been like kind of betraying since 10th grade and disappointing since 10th grade. And do we go out and get fucked up and go into like a water gun fight in town? Do we just sit by a pool constantly? Like, what is it? Do we, do we achieve zen through wellness? Like, what is it that we're chasing?

• 27:12Chris Ryan?

  I like that idea a lot, like, and I think a lot of the characters are doing that. I think the idea that Saxon has that his body is a temple and that he is the drug.

• 27:22Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 27:22Chris Ryan?

  And what happens to him when he lets something into his temple?

• 27:25Andy Greenwald?

  Yes.

• 27:26Chris Ryan?

  Did the real Saxon come out? I don't know. I mean, like, you know, there's always that debate about do, do chemicals and intoxicants? Are those, that's not me, that was that, that was the drug? Or is it, that was always inside of me, the drug just let it out?

• 27:39Andy Greenwald?

  I think that the, the ladies' trip plot individually, or like, just, you know, just, just, if you just zero in on that and, and, and blot everything else out, I think has some of the best scene to scene acting and some of the best, um, best jokes and best emotional tension. I think it's also arguably the most White Lotus plotline in that that plotline feels like it could have been played out in season one or season two.

• 28:06Chris Ryan?

  Mm-hmm.

• 28:06Andy Greenwald?

  If they had been like, you know, supersized episodes or something. It seems to me that the, the real focus of this season is not, not on like adolescence. What's wrong with men? Um, and so that storyline so far does not have as much to say about that.

• 28:25Chris Ryan?

  Okay.

• 28:25Andy Greenwald?

  You know, I think that, like, Walden Goggins' journey, um, and I, and I saw an article the other day saying that, like, he, he has been saying in press that, like, how hard he found this.

• 28:36Chris Ryan?

  This is not a pleasant experience for him.

• 28:37Andy Greenwald?

  Uh, he's so committed to the, it's the hollowed out nature of this character. Um.

• 28:45Andy Greenwald?

  He's, you were talking about drugs, like so far through this season, he's the biggest drug addict to me because his addiction is to his own sense of self.

• 28:53Chris Ryan?

  And pot.

• 28:54Andy Greenwald?

  Well, there's pot, but, but every single thing that he does is a choice. When he keeps saying, you know, this guy killed my father, I have to find him. Maybe I won't kill him, but I have to have those 10 minutes. You understand that, right? I need to confront him. I need to do these things. He doesn't. That is the version of himself that, though uncomfortable, is the most familiar and feels the safest. So he is actively putting one foot in front of another on what might be a slow walk to hell. It might be his doom.

• 29:26Andy Greenwald?

  With Chelsea, like, it's like a reverse Orpheus and he's Eurydice and Chelsea's just sitting up on top being like, I'm waiting for you.

• 29:35Andy Greenwald?

  I'm not ashamed. I told you I'm letting, letting the big dog out today.

• 29:39Chris Ryan?

  You're like, I lived.

• 29:41Andy Greenwald?

  We haven't even gotten to severance yet.

• 29:44Andy Greenwald?

  This is, this, I should have said this at the top. Today's, my performance on today's podcast, my dream is that I am Bugs Bunny holding the gun.

• 29:54Chris Ryan?

  Going back to the old me.

• 29:55Andy Greenwald?

  Lord forgive me, time to go back to the old me. So just heads up, heads up on that. But do you know what I mean? That like, that, the, the, the idea of self as a prison and that that gets echoed by-

• 30:07Chris Ryan?

  Reverse Orpheus, yeah.

• 30:08Andy Greenwald?

  You didn't, it sounded worse if we keep saying it, but yeah.

• 30:13Andy Greenwald?

  Self as a prison and everything we do is a choice. I mean, that is echoed by the monk. Tim is certainly feeling it. And I, I think it was, and I, and I really, for the first time, felt the arc of Saxon character because he is, he is losing every single thing about his own definition of his self. And then he's, he's inevitably about to find out that he also has no money.

• 30:40Chris Ryan?

  Well, also this man that is obviously-

• 30:41Andy Greenwald?

  And his idol, his false god, basically, is, is empty.

• 30:45Chris Ryan?

  What has he turned to? Do you think Saxon winds up going to the monastery?

• 30:48Andy Greenwald?

  I mean, it's interesting that the, that, that, that Lachlan's going to spend the night there. That, that it will be comfortable, that this is, you know, and Piper, what's her line? Like, she would rather die than be without. She just doesn't have it in her to, to struggle, she says.

• 31:06Andy Greenwald?

  I think it's, yeah.

• 31:08Chris Ryan?

  Is she just talking about herself there, though? Yeah.

• 31:10Andy Greenwald?

  She was.

• 31:11Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 31:11Andy Greenwald?

  Who do you think she was talking about?

• 31:12Chris Ryan?

  No, you're talking about Piper talking about it, or did it?

• 31:15Andy Greenwald?

  I'm sorry, I didn't mean Piper, I meant Parker.

• 31:16Chris Ryan?

  Parker, Posey.

• 31:18Andy Greenwald?

  Parker Posey, whose character's name is...

• 31:21Chris Ryan?

  Uh, Victoria?

• 31:22Andy Greenwald?

  God, this is so hard to keep up with. We're watching a lot of TV right now.

• 31:25Chris Ryan?

  I think it's Victoria, I mean...

• 31:26Andy Greenwald?

  No, no, when she says about herself, she says...

• 31:28Chris Ryan?

  She hasn't...

• 31:28Andy Greenwald?

  She's like, "But you won't lose everything, Tim."

• 31:30Chris Ryan?

  Oh, right, yes.

• 31:31Andy Greenwald?

  She said, "I just couldn't do it, I couldn't..."

• 31:33Chris Ryan?

  That's right.

• 31:33Andy Greenwald?

  "I don't think I'd have the struggle," which led to the second fake fantasy of him shooting

• 31:40Chris Ryan?

  Her.

• 31:41Andy Greenwald?

  Her, and then shooting him, as if that was some sort of kindness. Like, to be clear, like, I am now, I'm more locked in to what the season is doing than I have been at any other point. That said, there is some soft padding that I think, that I still bump on a little bit, and I wonder if there are people who are finding the season, you know, so demonstrably inferior to other seasons, or so frustrating in terms of how it's using its real estate, that this would matter more. But like, the arc of the great playwright Guy Tuck's gun, like, if you just pull it pull it out of the season thus far, they give him a gun, he loses it immediately when Tim takes it, Tim holds it for a while...

• 32:22Chris Ryan?

  Has a couple of fantasies about using it.

• 32:23Andy Greenwald?

  Has a couple fantasies, puts it in a drawer, and Guy Tuck goes and finds it, and no harm, no foul.

• 32:28Chris Ryan?

  Yeah. Well, I would imagine that the gun will come back, I would be kind of stunned if the gun does not come back into play, especially since gun violence, apparently, is going to

• 32:41Andy Greenwald?

  That gun will be discharged.

• 32:42Chris Ryan?

  And also, if you look at it, and it's like, all these little plotlines and subplots are on a mixing board, I think that he has been emphasizing the carnal pleasures of the resort for the first two-thirds of the season, and now I think he's probably gonna have to dial those down and push up the crime element, just because... Otherwise, like, you know, that's two episodes where it's like, well, what are Belinda and Greg? How does that resolve itself? How does Rick get what he wants?

• 33:16Andy Greenwald?

  And from Scott Glenn, by the way, is playing that part.

• 33:19Chris Ryan?

  Scott Glenn is playing the husband.

• 33:21Andy Greenwald?

  Kun Jim.

• 33:22Chris Ryan?

  Yeah. Scott Glenn famously, um, you know, when he goes to Asia for projects. He's not, he's, you know, in Apocalypse Now, for instance, he's supposed to be the guy who first goes up to find Marlon Brando.

• 33:35Andy Greenwald?

  Right.

• 33:36Chris Ryan?

  And they cut him out of the movie.

• 33:38Andy Greenwald?

  I was about to say, did I not see Scott Glenn?

• 33:40Chris Ryan?

  He's in one scene, I think in the theatrical cut, and I think there's a little bit more of him in a director's cut. But it'll be interesting to see, like, how much Scott Glenn do we get? I didn't see the scenes from next week, so I don't know if it's the two of them talking.

• 33:53Andy Greenwald?

  Great, I love Scott Glenn.

• 33:53Chris Ryan?

  But when Scott Glenn goes to Asia, things, things get a little nutty.

• 33:56Andy Greenwald?

  When he goes to Australia, too, if you remember in The Leftovers. So anything.

• 33:59Chris Ryan?

  Oh, that's right.

• 34:00Andy Greenwald?

  10-hour flight.

• 34:02Andy Greenwald?

  Get ready for a different kind of Scott Glenn.

• 34:04Chris Ryan?

  Anything else about this episode before we move on to your beloved severance?

• 34:07Andy Greenwald?

  Um, yeah, I feel like we should probably, well, two things. I mean, I say this, there's no way that this isn't going to end with some potential, some jokes. But I, I, I know week to week, we're like, as only children, we don't really get it.

• 34:19Chris Ryan?

  Yeah. I, I, I. But even as like.

• 34:21Andy Greenwald?

  I do wonder, like, so what is, like, what is the benchmark moral response to brothers giving each other handjobs? Is that like, you could tell me, like, you could be like, oh, there's, there's, there's a whole line of literature about how that happens in some households.

• 34:36Chris Ryan?

  I'm not saying whether or not I've ever done Molly. But had I done Molly, I think the craziest thing that ever would have happened is I tried to get a girl to open a bar with me in the Bahamas, you know? And so getting into a devil's threesome with your brother.

• 34:52Andy Greenwald?

  Yes.

• 34:53Chris Ryan?

  Is a little bit beyond my realm of experience. And so it's hard for me to comment. I also just don't have a brother, so I, you know what I mean?

• 35:01Andy Greenwald?

  Hey, Kaya, could you be our sibling correspondent for a second here?

• 35:05Chris Ryan?

  This is inappropriate.

• 35:07Andy Greenwald?

  This is all on record, so Spotify HR can, can vouch this. I just want to know if you, as a sibling hav'er, have any thoughts about this interaction?

• 35:15Speaker 05

  Yeah, big no-go for me.

• 35:17Andy Greenwald?

  Okay.

• 35:17Speaker 05

  On that one.

• 35:18Andy Greenwald?

  See?

• 35:18Speaker 05

  Big.

• 35:21Speaker 05

  I don't know how they do it in that family, but.

• 35:24Chris Ryan?

  There you go.

• 35:24Andy Greenwald?

  See, it's we're all just Ed Rooney. We're all just watching. The last thing is the Belinda storyline, which the two things we were sort of waiting to happen have now happened. Her son has shown up at a inappropriate, but sort of cute time. He's supportive of his mother's romantic entanglements and and Porchi seems like a pretty decent guy.

• 35:43Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, seems like it.

• 35:44Andy Greenwald?

  I mean, he's not the first person to offer to open a spa with Belinda, so she's not you know, necessarily going down that block again, but I thought that was sweet. Um, and then Greg slash Gary hops out of the bushes, as you alluded to earlier, and invites her up to the big house on the hill.

• 35:58Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 36:01Andy Greenwald?

  Common sense would say, don't go. Uh, the laws of two episodes left in this television season suggests that she probably uh, will be going.

• 36:10Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, I mean, it seems like he's inviting as many people as possible. I, I don't know. It depends on what she's, again, what are these people in these various places for? Like, why is she here? Is it really just to learn healing techniques? Is it to spend quality time with her son? Is it to get closure on a chapter of her life, you know? And obviously that would endanger her, but at the same time, you're curious, like, what, can she just move on from this without knowing what happened to Tanya and actually understanding like what happened to that whole experience that she had?

• 36:39Andy Greenwald?

  The thing that, this is hard to articulate, but like the, this idea that that's really encapsulated, not just by this episode, but by the monk, that, that just Western society and Western thought.

• 36:51Chris Ryan?

  Is pain and pleasure.

• 36:52Andy Greenwald?

  Is, I mean, I don't want to, I'm not, I don't even trying to say this as if I have some wisdom or like, I don't want to make a pejorative, but is degraded in some way, or at least so wildly aligned away from.

• 37:03Chris Ryan?

  Okay, Scott Glenn.

• 37:05Andy Greenwald?

  Listen, when I was reading ancient Greek myths back in Providence. No, but, but, but that it is, it is almost impossible to have two a traditional stereotypical, in some ways, traditional Western worldview and Eastern worldview. It is incredibly hard for them to align. And, you know, I think anybody who travels in Asia, particularly for a vacation, is blown away by the enormity of the difference in experience and perspective and worldview. And you can barely even scratch it, and you're suddenly back, you know, watching Adolescents in the Sky with someone crouched in the aisle next to you. And then you're, and it's over, and it's an idol, it's a, it's a, it's an idea. It's a, like a tantalizing, if only, right?

• 37:49Andy Greenwald?

  I think that this season of the show is smartly running towards that dissonance and is really taking characters who are puffed up when they get off the boat because of every single thing that they cling to to make them feel important or worthwhile. And even for a character like Lori, it's, even though she would never say it, it's her friendship with Jacqueline that gives her some status or some opportunity to escape the drudgery, to have luxury.

• 38:13Chris Ryan?

  Sure.

• 38:14Andy Greenwald?

  Right? But, so we're headed towards a moment of reckoning for all these characters with their journeys of self or their denial of self or whatever. But it's gonna wrap up and they're gonna go home. So what's interesting about The White Lotus to me is that it does, the project itself is the limited nature

• 38:31Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 38:31Andy Greenwald?

  of these

• 38:32Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 38:32Andy Greenwald?

  encounters. And I, it's almost, again, it's almost too big for six episodes. It's like it's both been both too long with padding, but also somehow this isn't long enough.

• 38:43Chris Ryan?

  I hear you.

• 38:46Andy Greenwald?

  Like when, when Sam Rockwell agrees to, like, he agrees to Bugs Bunny meme and do something for his friend, he takes off his, his bracelets, you know, and he says like, fuck it, let's go.

• 38:56Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 38:57Andy Greenwald?

  Like, there, he, Lord forgive him, he's about to go back to the old him.

• 39:00Chris Ryan?

  At least he's not on the sauce again.

• 39:03Andy Greenwald?

  There's two episodes left.

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• 39:18Speaker 01

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• 39:26Speaker 02

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• 39:36Chris Ryan?

  Season finale of Severance.

• 39:37Andy Greenwald?

  Yes, we've had a couple of days now to let it marinate.

• 39:41Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, Cold Harbor, directed by Ben Stiller.

• 39:47Chris Ryan?

  Essentially Mark versus Mark. With some other stuff going on, you know, and

• 39:54Chris Ryan?

  I wanna just kind of let you cook for a second.

• 39:58Andy Greenwald?

  No, no.

• 39:59Chris Ryan?

  No, no?

• 40:00Andy Greenwald?

  Well, okay.

• 40:00Chris Ryan?

  I can guide you.

• 40:01Andy Greenwald?

  I can start with a couple-

• 40:02Chris Ryan?

  I have a lot of notes. I don't have a lot of like, I mean, I thought maybe we could start at the ending.

• 40:09Andy Greenwald?

  Well, can I do one broader thing first?

• 40:11Chris Ryan?

  That's why I said I just wanna let you cook.

• 40:12Andy Greenwald?

  Okay, I appreciate that. But this is even regardless of the episode, like you said Ben Stiller, the director, Jessica Lee Gagne, the cinematographer. Like, I feel like it is really important when talking about the show, and at the start, before we talk about any criticisms we may have, and I feel like you and I may have some, to say other names that I'm pulling from the always correct IMDB.com. But the production designers, Jeremy Hindle. The art directors, I see a lot of it, Chris Shriver and Bartek, Frank Duran, set decorator, David Schlesinger, costume designer, Sarah Edwards.

• 40:46Andy Greenwald?

  These guys are doing god-tier work. The show is a marvel to look at, week to week. And I have, I have issues before, I have issues after. But the scene, but the marching band scene, which I'm sure we're gonna get to, was a bravura visual experience. And it was cut together so beautifully. Jeffrey Richmond, I think, is the lead editor on the show.

• 41:15Andy Greenwald?

  Even like the subtle things, like Sandra Bernhard's line of "Let's go" just as the drums hit.

• 41:21Andy Greenwald?

  Tramell Tillman, like, I reject and really get actually honestly exhausted by the knee-jerk like, "Give that man an Emmy." That happens when anyone likes anything.

• 41:33Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, get a lot of that on your Facebook feed.

• 41:35Andy Greenwald?

  But, yeah, but he, he will get nominated for this, and he may deserve it. I think he's like, I think he's a beautiful performer. I think he's great. And he was amazing in that scene.

• 41:50Andy Greenwald?

  It is impossible to be critical of Severance without, and it's irresponsible to be critical of Severance without, I think, talking about the craft that goes into it. Because I thought that was dazzling. And I really, really liked- The experience of watching that long sequence.

• 42:07Chris Ryan?

  So I have some things I liked as well. I think that if I had a unifying statement or theory of severance this season, it's that I

• 42:17Chris Ryan?

  I like where it ends up and I, and I, I don't like the journey to get there. So conceptually, or philosophically, or in terms of thinking about the show, I like the idea of Helly having a Luke Skywalker, I am your father moment with Jane. You know, that, that kind of pose with the pen and her being like, but I see in you, Kier. You know?

• 42:39Andy Greenwald?

  So that he is, he loves the Inni daughter more than the Audi daughter.

• 42:43Chris Ryan?

  The spunk of the, the Inni daughter more than the kind of complete like.

• 42:47Andy Greenwald?

  Company woman.

• 42:48Chris Ryan?

  Company woman, yeah. I like the idea of Mark at war with himself. It's just a good, it's a, it's a good thing, and I never really saw it coming, frankly. Maybe I wasn't thinking about the show hard enough, but as the reintegration process was being kind of, I would say vaguely discussed with Rigabi and, and then Cabell, who, part of that plot feels very like, we don't really know what's going on because of the, the way that they kind of made a call to the bullpen midway through to get Rigabi out and Cabell in, but like Cabell isn't actually on the show this season. Like she's in two, two or three real scenes and then has her own episode.

• 43:28Chris Ryan?

  But I like the idea of, um, of Inni Mark who's at a different place in his even like psychological and emotional development than Audi Mark. Audi Mark manipulating Inni Mark to get what he wants and vice versa. And Inni Mark eventually making this, you know, sacrificial choice, both in terms of sacrificing what Gemma will experience in the outside world, but also possibly committing himself to a life of whatever he doesn't know as he and Helly run off down the red light. I think that's a cool image and it's a cool idea. I like the idea of Milchick rejecting decades of indoctrination because he can no longer ignore the racist overtones of the institution which he finds himself.

• 44:11Chris Ryan?

  I like the idea of a massive corporate complex with hidden doors and elevators that only go in one direction. But the way in which we build to these, I like that idea, like the steps we take to get there. I find myself just getting too frustrated with, too frustrated with the questions not asked.

• 44:28Andy Greenwald?

  Yep.

• 44:28Chris Ryan?

  Or too frustrated with like the preponderance of questions that do get asked. I mean, most of Zach Cherry's dialogue this year is, what the fuck? What the fuck is going on? Where the fuck is this person?

• 44:39Andy Greenwald?

  Except when he is inexplicably writing a letter saying, it's important to me because I like you being there. Which seems to be a sentiment that exists solely so that he can be there. Do you know what I mean?

• 44:49Chris Ryan?

  That's, that's what I'm getting at.

• 44:50Andy Greenwald?

  It, it's sort of a.

• 44:51Chris Ryan?

  Like that, and that also goes towards like Devon going from being very kind of skeptical of this entire enterprise to just kind of be like, I stand next to Harmony and, and facilitate experiments on your brain.

• 45:07Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, there are.

• 45:08Chris Ryan?

  And also now like we can do severance outside. So I mean, I guess we could always do it at the birthing center, but like.

• 45:13Andy Greenwald?

  Sure.

• 45:15Chris Ryan?

  You can just jump in and out, have a little chat.

• 45:17Andy Greenwald?

  Inside, outside. It's how we want to live in California.

• 45:21Andy Greenwald?

  There, there are moments and there's also like moments of, of wit that are still welcome. Like I, I thought, oh my God, I don't have his name in front of me. My Icelandic homie, my big guy.

• 45:32Chris Ryan?

  Drummond.

• 45:32Andy Greenwald?

  Plays Mr. Drummond. I bet I feel like I should give the guy a shout out. Um, Olafur Dari Olafson, um, plays Mr. Drummond. As soon as he took the Anton Chigurh weapon from the wall, I knew where it was ending up. But I thought that that, the performance was memorable and menacing. And the physicality of the fighting was well conceived and well shot. And then the visual absurdity of him dying because of the severance procedure, because of an involuntary muscle spasm was.

• 46:10Chris Ryan?

  Very funny.

• 46:11Andy Greenwald?

  Hideous, but good.

• 46:13Chris Ryan?

  The only thing I didn't like about the fight. And the thing that I just guess I don't understand is if Lumen is so dangerous and evil and all seeing. There's just so much permissive behavior going on. I mean, unless, unless you subscribe to the idea that the rebellion is somehow part of the experiment.

• 46:33Andy Greenwald?

  There's a, it is the nature of entertainment for it to be convenient. And but the, the, the, the art and the challenge of writing is to obscure the convenience. So it doesn't seem easy. And you can lay a map over any of our favorite movies or thrillers. Um, and there's a way to diagram them that seems incredibly lucky.

• 46:56Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 46:56Andy Greenwald?

  Or simple.

• 46:57Chris Ryan?

  A lot of things go right for John McClane in the Nakatomi Plaza building.

• 46:59Andy Greenwald?

  It's very well said, but the spirit with which it is performed and shot and, you know, the tone of it like that helps. It helps you. The, the challenge, and I, we don't need to reiterate this because we've said it almost every week of the season. I really do think comes down to that point that I keep banging on about, which is that it is incredibly difficult lift to, as a mixed metaphor, but to unpaint yourself out of the corner that the very, very evocative ideas of the first season put them in. So the idea that there are these baby people who are, every single thing they do is monitored and controlled. To get to a second season where only one of them has to do any work, only one of them is special. And they pretty much can do and go anywhere they want. And there are only three people watching them.

• 47:44Andy Greenwald?

  Uh, you know, in the moment of great triumph for this company. It's a little tiny town and it's convenient. And it's similarly like Dylan quits, so he gets, he gets his Chewbacca moment. Which I feel like I want to keep coming back to since you've made that famous on the big picture the other day. But he also goes back because he needs to be there to propel the plot forward.

• 48:05Chris Ryan?

  Well, to hold a.

• 48:07Andy Greenwald?

  A vending machine.

• 48:08Chris Ryan?

  A vending machine against the door. Yeah.

• 48:09Andy Greenwald?

  For, for, for, for long enough. Um, it, you then get into the other dissonance, which I think keeps a lot of people. Well, definitely keeps me at arm's length, which is the show does prioritize cleverness and its own sensibility above all else. So the, I think that's best expressed in, as I said, a bravura sequence of a marching band. Um, which then.

• 48:36Chris Ryan?

  There's a lot of marching band business in the Lumen building.

• 48:39Andy Greenwald?

  Well, that's the thing that the, but the implication is, is that every single one of these incredibly virtuoso young horn players is severed.

• 48:48Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 48:49Andy Greenwald?

  That they were like, I know you were really good at Auburn, but there's not a lot of like future for you with the French horn. So you can have a life year gear and then every so often you'll come play the horn here, but you won't remember it.

• 49:00Chris Ryan?

  But what do they do the 360 days of the year that they're not doing like marching band?

• 49:05Andy Greenwald?

  That's the sort of question that the show doesn't really want us to linger on answering.

• 49:09Chris Ryan?

  But the thing that's weird is that it's not just a psych gag. Helly actually addresses them like you've lost friends too.

• 49:16Andy Greenwald?

  They become Dylan's army.

• 49:17Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 49:18Andy Greenwald?

  But I also think the most Severance thing about that sequence that that might be a nice segue into our frustrations is that it culminates in, you know, the sort of card stuff that they do at college football games where the celebratory cards for Mark are pointed upwards at a at a drop ceiling that no one can see. The reason I feel frustrated by Severance and fundamentally unmoved by it is that Severance as a show exists only to perpetuate Severance. It is a it's like it's a closed loop. Like, I think that people, we we've gotten into calling it this and a lot of people call it this to to get people excited like, oh, it's a puzzle box. Everybody loves puzzles.

• 50:02Andy Greenwald?

  It's a puzzle coffin because all of the solving only leads to more of itself. It's like I I I watch it and it just feels like nothing. I feel like nothing goes in and nothing comes out. It's a show about, I've said this before, about the act of being on the show. I struggle to see anything recognizable or relevant like our world, our emotions, our humanity, our experience. Every plot beat is a problem with a narrow solution like Dylan being there that allows it to continue. I find that kind of oppressive.

• 50:36Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, I think that you really you you you identified something when you were like, say that again about like it's art's job to basically distract you from the seams of its own storytelling like like.

• 50:50Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, because you said it better than I did.

• 50:51Chris Ryan?

  I think that when I always get very suspicious when this happens on movies or TV shows, but it's pretty, it's pretty common and especially contemporary stuff. When Cabell is setting up like the mechanics of what Mark has to do.

• 51:07Andy Greenwald?

  Mm hmm.

• 51:09Andy Greenwald?

  Like it's a heist film.

• 51:10Chris Ryan?

  But at the end, I realized, obviously, it's all made up anyway, but the specific mechanics of what he does is really just there to set up the choice that he has to make.

• 51:22Andy Greenwald?

  Right.

• 51:23Chris Ryan?

  You know, it's like, once you finish Cold Harbor, there's then like a clock on it before she is going to be evaporated, or whatever.

• 51:33Andy Greenwald?

  And you will too, maybe.

• 51:34Chris Ryan?

  And I guess possibly you will too, but there are heretofore unknown secret passageways that you can run down.

• 51:42Andy Greenwald?

  Mm-hmm.

• 51:43Chris Ryan?

  You follow the Irving's directions.

• 51:45Andy Greenwald?

  And Kobell goes, what? The thought that Irving might know about it.

• 51:48Chris Ryan?

  Irving's directions to the testing floor. And then you guys have just a little bit of time to get to a secret door where you won't or will. They get severed when they go into an elevator and then when they get to the secret doors.

• 52:04Andy Greenwald?

  So that both version, it's going to be a handoff between them.

• 52:06Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 52:07Andy Greenwald?

  That's, that's a great conceit.

• 52:09Chris Ryan?

  It's cool, but if you, I, I, I think it's okay, and it's not mean to the show to just be like, why, why? Like, why is that the plan? Why, what's to say that Gemma is not automatically destroyed when Cold Harbor is completed? Like, why, why is there all this? Why is there only one security guard in the entire building if this is the single most important day in the history of the corporation?

• 52:33Andy Greenwald?

  If, if all of the refiners have been working on projects, who are the people who were taken from them, who's, who, for whom they're creating?

• 52:41Chris Ryan?

  Are they all working on Gemma?

• 52:41Andy Greenwald?

  Multiple different realities. And to what end? And again, I, I feel like it really summed up with, I find it really, it's indicative that when Kobell does say, "The numbers are the emotions, woe and frolic of the 25 identities you've severed versions of her that you've created." I'm like, whoa, yeah.

• 53:01Chris Ryan?

  What?

• 53:01Andy Greenwald?

  Huh? So?

• 53:04Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 53:05Andy Greenwald?

  Okay, I mean, that, again, that allowed you to create that kaleidoscope of horror that was episode seven, I think, or eight, where we see her spend a day at the dentist, spend a day writing thank you cards. I mean, these are nightmares, right? And it was evocatively constructed and shot.

• 53:23Chris Ryan?

  There's nothing wrong with dental hygiene and being a thoughtful friend. Wow.

• 53:27Andy Greenwald?

  I think you should cape for Lumen and be like, actually, this all seems pretty reasonable.

• 53:35Andy Greenwald?

  The show is masterful at making elegant solutions to problems that it creates. An example that I also wanted to praise is having the two Marx talk to each other through the medium of a Handycam. That whole sequence was shot and edited brilliantly, so it felt like they were having a conversation, but with just the right amount of, like, even the Foley operators, like, the sound the camera made when they slammed it shut in frustration.

• 54:05Chris Ryan?

  And as they get, as the experience changes for both characters, the handling of the camera became more aggressive. That's a really good observation.

• 54:14Andy Greenwald?

  And Adam Scott's performance is remarkable. I don't know necessarily how to describe the differences between the two Marx as a viewer of the show, but Adam knows it in his bones and can switch like he's stepping in and out of a building to be both of them. That's incredibly precise acting, and that's awesome. But I just think that what's missing, for me, is that actual emotion is severed from the show in pursuit of its own mystery and in pursuit of further adventures up its own ass, to be honest. I don't find the emotional storyline of Mark and Gemma to be that gripping.

• 54:59Chris Ryan?

  What if that's the point?

• 55:01Andy Greenwald?

  Okay.

• 55:01Chris Ryan?

  What if that's why?

• 55:02Andy Greenwald?

  That's why people keep watching, because I think there is an investment calculator here, where people are like, I have invested in a show that I feel is smart and will reward me. It's kind of like, it's like being at the table too long in Las Vegas, something I only know about from listening to the Bill Simmons podcast.

• 55:17Chris Ryan?

  I was making a different point, which is that...

• 55:21Chris Ryan?

  For whatever reason, I'll use I terms, but watching this season, despite

• 55:28Chris Ryan?

  how excellently put together the seventh episode was, where it's the flashback of Jem and Mark's life together.

• 55:38Chris Ryan?

  The relationship between Mark and Helly has a certain urgency. Now, they've really leaned more innie and inside Lumen this season than they... The first season was a little bit more bifurcated.

• 55:48Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, and certainly our empathies are meant to be with the struggle of the innies more this season.

• 55:52Chris Ryan?

  I guess so, yes. Yeah. Although, now you'll start season three, and you would be well within your rights to say, well, like, this version of Mark betrayed not only his outside version, but the woman who had sort of been condemned into this life. Now, we actually don't, I don't know...

• 56:09Andy Greenwald?

  Also, to be fair, we'll all be dead of measles by 2028, so... It's fine. Let's just, let's let them have their graduate-like ending.

• 56:16Chris Ryan?

  I, this is all a way to get to where I wanted to, which is to ask you, that choice to make it like this hero of the show actually does something that's 50% anti-heroic and 50% heroic or romantic, what did you think of the place that they ended it? Because I admired it because I like watching writers write themselves into corners.

• 56:37Andy Greenwald?

  Yes, I just think, so if you can look at it that way, then it is a bold way to leave people hanging. How are they gonna get out of this one? For me, I'm frustrated slightly because I think that it is of a piece with all the smaller examples of that that I've been, I've been talking about today.

• 56:51Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 56:52Andy Greenwald?

  Which is, it got you an incredibly dramatic moment.

• 56:56Chris Ryan?

  And a cool image.

• 56:56Andy Greenwald?

  It was shot really, really well, and it is that kind of that graduate feel, and there's the Mel Tormé song, and they're running, and they're running.

• 57:04Andy Greenwald?

  But, these are not full people. These are the baby people that we're supposedly rooting for, and can't they just be shut off by Milchick flipping a switch?

• 57:14Chris Ryan?

  I know.

• 57:15Andy Greenwald?

  And that's, and that's it? Like, isn't it still Mark at the end of the day?

• 57:18Chris Ryan?

  That's why I think that there's something about the... What these innies need to do, that they are on some kind of secret track. Obviously, Jame being like, "Fuck!" would suggest that it did not go his way. Drummond's dead, Milchick's not happy with his, what?

• 57:36Andy Greenwald?

  Your imitation of Jane reminded me a little bit of Saxon.

• 57:41Chris Ryan?

  When he was getting an HJ?

• 57:42Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 57:43Chris Ryan?

  When it was all coming back to him?

• 57:44Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 57:46Chris Ryan?

  Come on, man. What's the big deal, right?

• 57:49Andy Greenwald?

  Just, just, brothers are just friends you haven't met. Yeah.

• 57:52Chris Ryan?

  That's not my vibe, but like, what the hell, man? Who am I to say?

• 57:56Andy Greenwald?

  I've never been on a boat like that.

• 57:58Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, exactly.

• 57:59Andy Greenwald?

  Maybe things are different. Maybe you get severed when you step onto the yacht.

• 58:03Andy Greenwald?

  The Lotus comparisons are important, though, I think, today.

• 58:06Chris Ryan?

  Do you think Cameron and Mace are gonna be talking about that episode of White Lotus?

• 58:09Andy Greenwald?

  Just pause their TV recap show?

• 58:14Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, I think they're gonna talk about it. Maybe less delicately than we have, and we have not been very delicate.

• 58:22Andy Greenwald?

  I, I, I found the comparison, or, or at least the, the contrast between Severance and Lotus, which I, you know, I watched them both. I ended up watching them both yesterday. I, I found it pretty, pretty stark. And, because I, I think that there's, on some level, they are both attempting to ask questions about the nature of self. And I think that White Lotus's earnest and self-aware, and self-aware in its flaws, style of questioning, like, what do I want? What's it gonna mean? I find that just more compelling than Severance's, which, again, if you're, go on Reddit, talk to your friends, write a theory, read some theories.

• 59:05Andy Greenwald?

  There's a richness there that springs from this, and that's not nothing.

• 59:09Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 59:09Andy Greenwald?

  But the richness of one guy being split between the women he loves, and who does he love and why? That's powerful.

• 59:18Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 59:18Andy Greenwald?

  That's a source of a lot of great drama throughout history.

• 59:21Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 59:21Andy Greenwald?

  That's literally all the novels we like.

• 59:23Chris Ryan?

  My guy Philip Roth, still eating lunch off that one.

• 59:26Andy Greenwald?

  Fell in love with someone at work. Sorry, honey. Keep, keep dissembling that crib.

• 59:32Andy Greenwald?

  But Severance, again and again now, through, you know, two seasons, I think, is, I keep using this word, I don't think it's really that interested in the emotional stakes of it. I think it's interested in the poses and the framing.

• 59:46Chris Ryan?

  That'll be on the poster. Is, is that, that's your, and you're right.

• 59:49Andy Greenwald?

  And, and so it's about the innie revolution of an evil company, where people talk like dipshits hiding underground, like, clear, shh, quiet for a second. You know what I mean? Like, shh, let these people have. Emotion and let them want something or think something and chill out. Stop, stop.

• 1:00:09Chris Ryan?

  Well, we have three years to chill out.

• 1:00:10Andy Greenwald?

  We certainly do. I think the worst case version read on this, and this is the Bugs Bunny kissing his revolver. If I was still writing columns for Grantland, like, I think, you know, people will and probably already have since the finale aired, written pieces about like, what Severance has to say about our unhealthy work-life balance. And I'm like, fuck that.

• 1:00:29Chris Ryan?

  That was the first season.

• 1:00:30Andy Greenwald?

  It's not saying any of that, you know, or about our obligation to ourselves and each other. It's not saying that. I think that for me, the only like, uh, relevant portent, to use a real Seth Milchick kind of word, on display is kind of a sad future, or maybe it's just our dystopian present, where only the richest and the most siloed and the most indulgent have access to the machinery to make art at this level. Like, it is just, it is two brothers on a boat, J and J and O. You know, because it's incredible and it's awesome and it's beautiful and they can spend untold millions being like, now we want to go to Newfoundland for this, you know? And it's, and it's to make a show about people with little chips in their head running around in goats?

• 1:01:16Andy Greenwald?

  God bless.

• 1:01:17Chris Ryan?

  But when Tim Cook dropped Masters of the Air, you were like, hard pass. When he made a show about the heroes.

• 1:01:24Andy Greenwald?

  I, I, I think that it, that, it's that thing that sticks in my craw a little bit. And similarly, to have Helly suddenly start using the language of revolution, you know, of like, like workers revolution, um, only, you know, she's not AOC and Bernie out in Denver. She's like trying to cheer on trombone players, um, so that she can go to the equator. Do you know what I mean? That's wild. It's wild to me. It's just, it's just, there is something, like, I'm not, I'm out the game.

• 1:01:58Chris Ryan?

  You seem very in the game. Close the computer, dog.

• 1:02:02Andy Greenwald?

  I'm out the game. Stuff, this is, especially, and I, let me, like, if you get the chance to make anything in this,

• 1:02:12Chris Ryan?

  This crazy little world of ours?

• 1:02:14Andy Greenwald?

  This cursed world, make it, and chase your dreams and everything.

• 1:02:17Chris Ryan?

  Just jerk your brother off, whatever it takes, man.

• 1:02:19Andy Greenwald?

  Whatever it takes to get there, but I do find that, as a viewer, as a, as a person with creative interests and a creative career, like, I genuinely do celebrate this show. I think it's awesome that they are able to do this, and they are, we are seeing what happens when talented people get to turn everything on their board up to 11, right? Like, go for it. But as a viewer, I find it a frustrating, and frustratingly expensive cul-de-sac.

• 1:02:51Chris Ryan?

  I can't, I can't top that. Let's wrap it up there.

• 1:02:54Andy Greenwald?

  Did you like it? Did you like the season?

• 1:02:56Chris Ryan?

  I thought it was an interesting experience talking about it every week. You know, typically, when we don't love something,

• 1:03:03Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 1:03:03Chris Ryan?

  we'll let it go, but I think we obviously, there was enough there to engage us, even if it was engaging in the negative space. I, uh, I don't know.

• 1:03:15Andy Greenwald?

  I, I find the-

• 1:03:16Chris Ryan?

  I remain sort of like disappointed in the project, but curious about the response to the project, I guess.

• 1:03:23Andy Greenwald?

  The response to it, maybe we'll take a few weeks and then, and then think about it a little bit, but I, it is very meta, and I think that talking about, the talking about it has become part of the show.

• 1:03:32Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, of course.

• 1:03:32Andy Greenwald?

  And I find the desire, like-

• 1:03:35Chris Ryan?

  I did that with True Detective, though. I can't, you know, I let ye without sin.

• 1:03:39Andy Greenwald?

  But also, let me say one other thing, and no one who feels this way is still listening to us, unless it's pure hate-listen, but like, if you love this show, that is fucking great. That's awesome. Like, that is what the television, or the laptop, or whatever you're watching on, that's what it's for, and I think that's great. I also am really, I find it really compelling and hopeful that even that people want to love something this much and want to lose themselves in something. And I don't find it worthy of that adoration, like a, or like a misshapen vessel to pour all that into, but the desire to be engaged with something like that is a good sign.

• 1:04:16Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:04:16Andy Greenwald?

  That it is not all meant to be, you know, just ephemeral second screen, water off a duck's back or a goat's back in this case, you know? I think that's a really, really good thing. The other thing that we won't talk about now, but then like the response to people questioning it or disliking it, or what we used to call criticism, has been

• 1:04:37Chris Ryan?

  That's your personal hell.

• 1:04:38Andy Greenwald?

  Curious.

• 1:04:39Chris Ryan?

  Uh, we'll wrap it up there. I think we have, uh, this coming week, we were gonna do Dope Thief, The Pit, maybe some Deli Boys.

• 1:04:48Andy Greenwald?

  Oh, we didn't talk Daredevil.

• 1:04:49Chris Ryan?

  I will just say, I, I, I loved Bernthal's energy on that episode. You?

• 1:04:54Andy Greenwald?

  I, I like the show and I like two energies. I like Bernthal and I like the young Gandolfini.

• 1:05:00Chris Ryan?

  I love young Gandolfini.

• 1:05:01Andy Greenwald?

  We'll talk about it on Thursday. We don't need to short shrift it, but I, but I, I agree. I think all of us need to walk into a warehouse in New York at least once and have a bearded Jon Bernthal there to slap us around.

• 1:05:12Chris Ryan?

  Uh, thanks to Kaya. Thanks to everybody for making the show today. We'll be back with you on Thursday.

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