‘Survivor’ Season 50 Finale, ‘Widow’s Bay’ Episode 5, and All-Time Episodic Runs With Joanna Robinson

Chris is joined by Joanna Robinson to react to the ‘Survivor’ Season 50 finale and their thoughts on the season as a whole (2:56), before talking about the first two episodes of ‘The Boroughs,’ a Netflix sci-fi show produced by The Duffer Brothers (28:04). Later, they discuss ‘Widow’s Bay’ Episode 5 (28:04) and then, inspired by a stellar three-episode run of the show, talk about some of their favorite three-episode runs in TV history (38:29). Subscribe to the Ringer TV YouTube channel here for full episodes of The Watch and so much more! Host: Chris Ryan Guest: Joanna Robinson Producers: Kaya McMullen and Kai Grady Additional Video Supervision: Jacob Cornett Order and it will come. Like today. 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.

• 0:00Speaker 00

  Visible puts the ultimate wireless hack in the palm of your hand. With unlimited 5G wireless data and hotspot designed to keep you connected. Powered by Verizon's 5G network. And no contract holding you back. Plans start at $25 a month. Or get the premium Visible Plus Pro Plan and save $10 on your first month when you use promo code HACK. Make the switch at visible.com. Terms apply. See visible.com for details.

• 0:35Chris Ryan?

  This episode of The Watch is presented to you by Amazon Prime. Ever have a plan come together out of nowhere and realize you're missing something? Like a last minute beach day, a spontaneous hike, or an outdoor movie night you didn't plan for? That's when Prime's same day delivery has your back, getting you exactly what you need, fast and reliably, so you can actually join the moment instead of watching from the sidelines. Same day delivery, it's on Prime. Visit amazon.com/prime to find millions of items delivered fast, available in select areas. Terms apply.

• 1:09Speaker 02

  Stand up and walk now.

• 1:12Chris Ryan?

  Hello and welcome to The Watch. My name is Chris Ryan. I am an editor at theringer.com. And joining me in the Peace Center.

• 1:20Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 1:21Chris Ryan?

  It's my shaman, Joanne Robinson.

• 1:24Speaker 03

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:24Chris Ryan?

  Jo, thank you so much for doing this. You're coming right off of a prestige TV recording.

• 1:28Speaker 03

  Please look out for my lizard. She's on a walkabout.

• 1:30Chris Ryan?

  I just love what you've done with the place here. We're over here in the Sticklemore Studios. Jo's joining me today. Andy will be back next week. We're not going to do a recording on Monday. I'm giving Andy Memorial Day off from Euphoria.

• 1:42Speaker 03

  What a kind boss you are.

• 1:46Chris Ryan?

  I want to close that for him. But we will be back. I maybe, you know, if something really super significant happens on Euphoria, maybe Andy and I will record on Tuesday.

• 1:54Speaker 03

  Define significant. Rue dies.

• 1:57Chris Ryan?

  Multiple plot lines converge.

• 1:58Speaker 03

  Oh, OK. Jacob Elordi has something to do.

• 2:01Chris Ryan?

  Jules and Jacob Elordi show up in like a similar scene.

• 2:04Speaker 03

  Oh, Jules has lines. That makes sense.

• 2:06Chris Ryan?

  Exactly. But today, we're going to talk a little bit of Survivor. A little bit of The Burrows, which is a new show on Netflix that I checked out, two episodes of.

• 2:14Speaker 03

  I watched two, yeah.

• 2:16Chris Ryan?

  I want to talk to you, obviously, about Widows Bay. Andy and I will hit it harder next week, but I had a fun idea for us where... I think episodes four and five are elite television, two of the best episodes I've seen this year, and it got me going down a little bit of a best episodes run of TV series. And let me tell you, that was a fun little list to look at. I often think of things in terms of like the runs that they're on. That's more of like a bill mind thing, but I really enjoyed thinking about these and there were some really obvious like ones that jumped out. And we're going to talk a little bit of Survivor. In fact, just good for the sake of newsiness, and you can hit us up at the watch at spotify.com

• 3:00Chris Ryan?

  and you can follow us at the watch pod underscore on Instagram, ring or dash TV. We can also watch prestige TV on YouTube and listen to us on Spotify or wherever you like, honestly, transistor radio, maybe Andy and I are still broadcasting from a far away time. How are you? Are you good?

• 3:15Speaker 03

  I'm great. How are you?

• 3:17Chris Ryan?

  I just had to do my spiel.

• 3:18Speaker 03

  That's great.

• 3:20Chris Ryan?

  This is my fifth podcast of the week, so I'm feeling in the groove. I know that you're probably there too, but we both found time to watch a little bit of Survivor. So spoilers for anybody who hasn't watched the finale yet, I guess. I had to stay up quite late to watch it because it did not go to Paramount Plus until the wee hours. You guys just did a house of our crossover with Tyson and Riley earlier in the week. So I know that you're locked in. What did you think of the finale? Were you a fan of how things were executed?

• 3:52Speaker 03

  How do you usually watch Survivor? That's a question I have for you.

• 3:56Chris Ryan?

  I usually turn it on at 10:00 PM on Paramount Plus and then I will be completely candid with you and our listeners and say that after about 12 seasons that like, we started really watching it in earnest in my household during the pandemic. After about like 12 or 13 or 14 seasons, we may have gotten a little bit quick with the trigger finger when it comes to skipping the physical challenges.

• 4:20Speaker 03

  Oh, yeah.

• 4:20Chris Ryan?

  So we get it down to about like 40 minutes an episode by just being like, we're social players. I'm interested in what happens before and after the challenges.

• 4:29Speaker 03

  Do I need to unlock, like, maybe I don't have the elite tier of Paramount Plus because I thought it was like, it only hit, I had thought I had to watch. Watch it on like Paramount Live TV. But maybe it's just I needed to wait for East Coast after midnight for it to.

• 4:42Chris Ryan?

  Yes, it's, I think it goes up at like 10, 10 15 on Paramount Plus. But like many nights I have been sitting there like refreshing like it's getting too late to start. It's getting too late to start.

• 4:52Speaker 03

  Okay, I thought when they said it will post the next day, they meant like the next day. So I've been, I've been watching it as appointment television on Paramount Plus, like starting it up right at eight o'clock. I have to be home and, and I've been like watching commercials.

• 5:05Chris Ryan?

  Do you have cable?

• 5:06Speaker 03

  Uh, no, I'm like, I, no.

• 5:08Chris Ryan?

  Oh, wow.

• 5:08Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 5:09Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 5:09Speaker 03

  I don't, I have just this.

• 5:10Chris Ryan?

  Oh, wow, that I still have cable, I don't know.

• 5:13Speaker 03

  Yeah, like I watch, I don't know what, yeah, yeah, because I don't watch a lot of network stuff. And if I do, I'll just like watch it next day on Hulu.

• 5:19Chris Ryan?

  That's how I watch Marshall's, you know?

• 5:21Speaker 03

  The only thing is like you don't want to get spoiled for Survivor and stuff like that. So I've been watching like old school, like before VCR television. I've just been, because you can't record off Paramount Plus. So I was just like, I have to be home at eight o'clock.

• 5:32Chris Ryan?

  Did you grow up in a, the channel stays on one channel all night family?

• 5:36Speaker 03

  Uh, kind of, well, I mean, they used to block program in a way.

• 5:40Chris Ryan?

  National news.

• 5:41Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 5:41Chris Ryan?

  Like, did you guys read a one, one news network?

• 5:44Speaker 03

  Jeopardy into, yeah, absolutely. But we, um, but for this, I went to, um, a finale party at someone's house.

• 5:52Chris Ryan?

  Lovely.

• 5:52Speaker 03

  And it was like, I don't know, a room full of people and I knew two people. But the, the point you were making about skipping through physical challenges. Survivor, I don't think you need to watch every single second with like all of your attention. I agree. And so to watch it with a rowdy room of people where they were talking over, usually talking over television bothers me. In this case, it did not because like I don't need every single second, especially in the Jeff Patter, the live finale interview stuff. And, you know, spoilers for what's happening, right? We were all very invested specifically in certain people not winning.

• 6:28Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 6:30Speaker 03

  So, once Tiff was out, which was a huge bummer for the room.

• 6:34Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 6:35Speaker 03

  Everyone, except for one person, was Team Aubrey. So like, we were yelling and very excited and I have not watched Survivor in that way. It felt like I was in a bar or something like that, where it's just sort of like everyone's blood was up and they were really excited.

• 6:47Chris Ryan?

  You know, because a couple, I feel like there's been, I'd have to like look at the actual champions over the last couple of years. But it does feel like there have been a lot of. Even if going into the finale, you thought there was more of a debate, like people running the table, like people winning like, you know, eight, 10, whatever it is, 10, nothing in the final jury. And this one felt like a little bit more like, I didn't think Aubrey could lose to Jonathan and Joe, but I also wasn't certain Aubrey was gonna win, if that makes sense. I feel the way about Survivor finales that I feel about the Super Bowl, which is if my team is not playing, I treat it as like sort of a grand piece of entertainment, but not as something I'm as invested in. And I get a little melancholy during Survivor finales, because I really like having like a regular Wednesday appointment of television.

• 7:32Chris Ryan?

  There's two things to talk about. There's the actual gameplay and who won.

• 7:35Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 7:36Chris Ryan?

  And then there is the snafu that occurred that basically happened when Survivor finales often cut back and forth between the game that has been taped in Fiji, or on Fiji.

• 7:49Speaker 03

  10 months ago.

• 7:50Chris Ryan?

  10 months ago, whatever it was. And then the live LA studio finale show that Jeff is hosting. So was that like a Paramount or something? I mean, where?

• 8:00Speaker 03

  Yeah, it was a Paramount live, yeah.

• 8:01Chris Ryan?

  And this year, this season, season 50, which has been this sort of coronation for the show, Jeff screwed up. It seems like Jeff screwed up. I don't know whether he-

• 8:10Speaker 03

  No, he definitely screwed up.

• 8:11Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, I don't know if somebody was in his ear being like, and now tell him, like, send Rizzo to the jury or whatever, but we were about to get our fire making competition. I hate fire making. I think it's a really unfair way of deciding who goes to final three, but it's tradition. It was gonna be Rizzo versus Jonathan. I think everybody imagined Jonathan was going to probably-

• 8:30Speaker 03

  When Jonathan could like start a fire every single day with his brain.

• 8:34Chris Ryan?

  His friggin' Homelander.

• 8:35Speaker 03

  Someone I was watching with was like, Jonathan should start his fire at the fire making, just like looking at Rizzo. And just like, because he doesn't need to concentrate at all. I could do it in his sleep.

• 8:45Chris Ryan?

  But Jeff does a little stand-up interview with Rizzo, and then in the middle of it- Before the fire making takes place, he's doing a like, we're about to see fire making and Rizzo, why don't you join the jury?

• 8:54Speaker 03

  Right.

• 8:55Chris Ryan?

  And it was described to me in a text before I saw it was, make sure you watch tonight, there's a La La Land Moonlight moment.

• 9:03Speaker 03

  Yeah, yeah.

• 9:04Chris Ryan?

  Now, I thought what that meant was like Jeff got the count wrong and a final vote, which obviously would be very difficult. But what did you, what was kind of going through your mind when you saw this happen? Were you like, is this a technical problem?

• 9:16Speaker 03

  So the people I was watching with, we started late so that we could fast forward through commercials. And the person who was on the fast forward, everyone in the room started accusing him of like missing the fire, you know, because it was like clear, as soon as Rizzo comes out and there's an empty stool with the rest of the jury, you're like, okay, but like, what did we miss? I was talking to Tyson and Ashley, because they're here recording Pod has Spoken. And I was like, what was it like in the room, you know? And, and basically, because so many people had to do their job incorrectly for that to have happened.

• 9:46Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 9:48Speaker 03

  Every single P A, every single producer, every single person just like let this happen because they play the episode in the room on the big screen. So like,

• 9:56Chris Ryan?

  Oh, wow.

• 9:57Speaker 03

  They're, they're watching it and it was clear that they had not shown fire making yet. Tyson said he was sort of zoning out because they had already watched the finale. So like he, he was not even, but he was like, he's like, wait, didn't they not show fire making yet? He said, Ashley and Tyson said that Dee, who we couldn't see on the camera, she was like the far left of the jury, that she was like gesturing to Jeff to be like, cut it. That Rizzo kind of tried to say like, did I, whatever. But yeah, they, I guess they queued Jeff too early, but I, but I still don't understand how it was allowed to go, like no one stopped him.

• 10:34Chris Ryan?

  It's also funny that it's not like a Saturday Night Live, like we'll catch it for the West Coast thing. I guess once the cat's out of the bag, the cat's out of the bag.

• 10:40Speaker 03

  Well, he did so many bits about it throughout the rest of the evening.

• 10:43Chris Ryan?

  I guess that would have killed it.

• 10:44Speaker 03

  Yeah, exactly. But yeah.

• 10:46Chris Ryan?

  As far as the winners, so spoilers again, obviously we're into this, but Aubrey wins.

• 10:52Speaker 03

  So who did you want to win?

• 10:54Chris Ryan?

  Aubrey.

• 10:54Speaker 03

  Oh.

• 10:54Chris Ryan?

  Oh, entirely?

• 10:56Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 10:56Chris Ryan?

  I was,

• 10:58Speaker 03

  Like, was this a Super Bowl?

• 10:59Chris Ryan?

  Up until a certain point, I was really hoping Suri would win.

• 11:02Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 11:02Chris Ryan?

  Because I wanted to see, to me, her gameplay is the other side of being. A physical.

• 11:09Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 11:10Chris Ryan?

  Beast and.

• 11:11Speaker 03

  A mental beast.

• 11:11Chris Ryan?

  And camp beast.

• 11:12Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 11:13Chris Ryan?

  And she's just like, one of the reasons why I skipped challenges is I'm like, I don't actually think people. Suri is never really held accountable for not being good at challenges. You know what I mean?

• 11:21Speaker 03

  Rizzo either. Rizzo lost every single thing.

• 11:23Chris Ryan?

  So if there's really no like, hey, you're holding us back. Now, every once in a while in the beginning of seasons, you'll be like, hey, we need to win some challenges. We need to win some food.

• 11:31Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 11:31Chris Ryan?

  You're out. But as it goes on, I feel like the physical challenges are really just for the immunity necklace. So it's like, I'll find out who won, but it doesn't matter how people performed.

• 11:42Speaker 03

  Hmm.

• 11:42Chris Ryan?

  Um, so I was cheering for her. I think she obviously ceilinged out because at a certain point, you have to sort of say like, if we go to the final three of the series, she's gonna win.

• 11:51Speaker 03

  I think she got out on like a, an unfair twist, but the, the two twists of the game where they randomly divided the tribe into, uh, you know, mini tribes.

• 12:02Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 12:02Speaker 03

  That's what like screwed Genevieve out of the game earlier this season when they did it. And that's what screwed Suri out of the game because if she had had access to everyone to weave her spell.

• 12:12Chris Ryan?

  Of course.

• 12:12Speaker 03

  Which she used to protect Ozzy, her ride or die all season.

• 12:17Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 12:18Speaker 03

  Ozzy would not have been voted out. If Ozzy wasn't voted out, then Suri is less vulnerable, you know, and like the Rizzo. Like Rizzo didn't want to go to the final three with Suri, but Ozzy genuinely did. And so I kind of, and you know, she had Tiff. So I feel like if Ozzy hadn't been so dumb and if they hadn't divided the, the tribes the way they did, like there was a path for her to the end. It was a narrow path.

• 12:39Chris Ryan?

  I wonder if she's like, ever like practiced fire making. Like if you're Suri and you're like that good at social, do you think you're even like, okay, so like, cause she's always gonna eventually be like, who's been running this game? Oh, like.

• 12:52Speaker 03

  Me.

• 12:52Chris Ryan?

  Suri is. So I was cheering for her. I was happy for Aubrey.

• 12:56Speaker 03

  Yeah, me too.

• 12:56Chris Ryan?

  And, you know, in retrospect, I think it's useful to ask you about this. Like, we can watch television sometimes and lose ourselves in it, but then a lot of times we'll watch a show and we'll kind of be like, I kind of see the seams or the stitching and what, where we're going with this. It's actually kind of a useful way of looking at the boroughs. Um, and.

• 13:16Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 13:17Chris Ryan?

  You know, now that you know Aubrey won, it's been obvious, I guess, for like six episodes that she was going to win because they really started giving her.

• 13:25Speaker 03

  Well, she kept saying, now is when my game begins. She said that like four or five episodes in a row. I will say this, and I, we do have proof of this. Mallory and I entered a Survivor pool this season. The same pool, I entered it last season. I did win last season. We did not, we did not win this season. We got second place, though. But part of like the pool is you have to pick your, you know, your final champion.

• 13:47Chris Ryan?

  Okay.

• 13:47Speaker 03

  We picked Aubrey only because in the very first episode, there was that extremely weird Genevieve and Aubrey conversation.

• 13:55Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 13:56Speaker 03

  That just stuck out as so bizarre.

• 13:58Chris Ryan?

  Where it was like, it can only be one of us?

• 14:00Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 14:00Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 14:01Speaker 03

  And it was just sort of like, we thought it had to be one of them. We were like, it's either Genevieve or Aubrey. Otherwise, why is this scene in here at all?

• 14:07Chris Ryan?

  Socially minded, like, C-suite Denzians.

• 14:09Speaker 03

  Yeah, yeah, exactly. It was just sort of like.

• 14:12Chris Ryan?

  Who play from the middle?

• 14:13Speaker 03

  There's just like no reason this scene is here because it was just so awkwardly shot and edited that unless they were trying to seed something from the very beginning for one of them, and we weren't sure which, we picked Aubrey. We also picked Genevieve to go far. She didn't.

• 14:26Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 14:27Speaker 03

  But like, so that's why we didn't win. But that was my only editing clue early on. But otherwise Aubrey wasn't getting like a great edit early on.

• 14:37Chris Ryan?

  No.

• 14:38Speaker 03

  So I, I don't know. In terms of like, for a while, we were like, oh, is it Christian? Because they're focusing so much on Christian.

• 14:44Chris Ryan?

  He's just such a good narrator. I think he gets a lot.

• 14:46Speaker 03

  Is it Devens? You know, because he's so entertaining, et cetera, et cetera. I was worried it was Jonathan. But yeah, it's complicated in terms of, I really loved analyzing a reality show edit.

• 14:58Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 14:59Speaker 03

  To try to like, see what stories they're trying to create. It was especially challenging, I think, with Survivor 50 because they were really trying to craft these, Rizzo, remember when you lost at Fire Making and you're about to, you know, like, they're like, what can we craft where we can use archival footage to really like stitch together the history of Survivor and make this person's downfall feel like connected to their previous games? So they were working overtime to craft certain sub-narratives inside of the winner narrative, do you know?

• 15:29Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, they maybe spent, to my taste, a little too much time indulging like some character work that wound up not really paying off. Like, the coach thing kind of wore out its welcome for me pretty quickly. I feel like, yeah, like Christian's an amazing player, who I just think is a great play-by-play guy for Survivor, but like ultimately got so much camera time. But then it's like, how early do you want to start tipping your hat towards Aubrey?

• 15:58Speaker 03

  Right.

• 15:58Chris Ryan?

  It's almost better that they did it this way.

• 16:00Speaker 03

  Well, and I think it's interesting because one of the complaints, especially after the Zac Brown episode, is when people were sort of ranking confessionals. They're like Zac Brown has more airtime than Tiff.

• 16:11Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 16:11Speaker 03

  And then, but Tiff was someone who went a long way in the game. So they saved a lot of the Tiff stuff for later.

• 16:17Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 16:17Speaker 03

  And that's a strategic edit, but it also, you know, pissed a lot of people off because they're like, why aren't you showing these various players at all? And get Zac Brown the fuck out of here, which I agree with.

• 16:28Chris Ryan?

  Mr. Beast's gone.

• 16:30Speaker 03

  Tyson's, over the course of the season, and advice that Tyson has given again and again on his podcast is, if you're auditioning for Survivor, the number one thing you need to be able to do is exactly what you're saying, is tell a story.

• 16:42Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 16:42Speaker 03

  So if you can convince them that when you sit down for a confessional, you'll have a really fun and dynamic way of describing what has happened or what you're thinking.

• 16:53Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 16:53Speaker 03

  That's the number one thing they're looking for. Yeah, they're looking for like people who look nice, like in a swimsuit. Yeah, they're looking for people who are good at challenges. Yeah, they're looking for, you know, quirky characters. But that narration is something they need from everyone in the group.

• 17:07Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, especially, I think also part of the problem was that they had such good orators on this season was that tribals wound up being dominated by like the same four people.

• 17:18Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 17:18Chris Ryan?

  Like in a good way for television, but probably at Tiff's expense maybe a little bit.

• 17:22Speaker 03

  Yeah, yeah.

• 17:22Chris Ryan?

  So, yeah, I mean, I thought it was a really entertaining season. Like I said, like, there's always like a little bit of like, the finale is not actually Survivor, you know, to me.

• 17:31Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 17:32Chris Ryan?

  Um, I guess it's been a while since we've had just like a gobsmacking, amazing.

• 17:36Speaker 03

  I mean, I will say. The way they edited Aubrey going into her final immunity challenge, where she's just sort of like, these guys don't want me to go to the final three, so I need to win this immunity.

• 17:47Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 17:47Speaker 03

  And then as soon as the room, I was watching and saw what the challenge was, people were up off their feet screaming.

• 17:53Chris Ryan?

  Cause they were like, she could win this.

• 17:53Speaker 03

  She could win it.

• 17:54Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 17:54Speaker 03

  That's not something that Jonathan's gonna dominate at.

• 17:56Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 17:56Speaker 03

  So it was just sort of like, and did production do that? Cause they wanted Aubrey to go far? Who knows? But like, that was, to me, was the most exciting. Like, Tiff losing, the biggest like, oh, man, now we're stuck with these chucklebugs. And then, and then Aubrey getting a challenge she could actually win.

• 18:12Chris Ryan?

  I can't believe Joe was like, I never lied until I lied once.

• 18:15Speaker 03

  I know, but then he made-

• 18:16Chris Ryan?

  And that was like his whole story.

• 18:17Speaker 03

  No, but then he made his whole thing like, I lied when I needed to. And I was like, where did the honor integrity thing go, Joe?

• 18:22Chris Ryan?

  Uh, you were just sitting on a boat the entire season being like, don't lie to me.

• 18:25Speaker 03

  Yeah.

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• 20:26Chris Ryan?

  All right, let's talk a little bit about The Burrows. Because this is one that's been kind of looming and I was waiting for like maybe a huge drumbeat of press and trailers and hype for it. And, you know, I have this long-running confusion with how Netflix chooses to like announce itself. And I think they don't need to do that really because they have the platform. So shows wind up just becoming wildly successful with or without like a traditional promo. This is from Jeffrey Adles and Will Matthews, who did a very well-regarded Dark Crystal.

• 21:04Speaker 03

  I liked it.

• 21:05Chris Ryan?

  Reboot, like skittering off, how would you describe that?

• 21:08Speaker 03

  Re-Imagination, something, yeah.

• 21:09Chris Ryan?

  Called, what was it called? Oh, The Age of Resistance. And they created this series, it's executive produced by the Duffer Brothers, who this is their second series that they've EP'd for Netflix this year. The other one being Something Very Bad is about to happen. About to or going to, I can't.

• 21:27Speaker 03

  About to.

• 21:27Chris Ryan?

  About to happen, which I loved. And so they've shown themselves as able to guide shows. I think they definitely have like.

• 21:38Speaker 03

  I think more successfully in some of these, like, you know, the Weiss and Bedingoff deal or whatever. Like, there is just a real Duffer Brothers ethos that seems clear inside of these shows. It feels.

• 21:47Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, and. I was almost surprised watching these first two episodes. So just as like a brief, the log line is in a seemingly picturesque retirement community, a group of unlikely heroes must band together to stop an otherworldly threat from stealing the one thing they don't have, dot, dot, dot, time. This is basically set at a villages-esque retirement community, but with maybe few MAGA inclined seniors who are trading STDs. I don't know if anybody has ever seen the villages documentary, but it's quite a thing. The show opens with a very like amblined out set piece with Dee Wallace, who people will know from ET and Ed Begley Jr. And what seems to be an alien and lots of hints and lots

• 22:31Chris Ryan?

  of Easter eggs and stuff. And then turns into a really well observed, occasionally amusing, really well acted, given the cast, show that is basically like fine for 45 minutes and then has in each episode, like a pretty.

• 22:49Speaker 03

  What the fuck?

• 22:50Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, last five minutes. And so the Duffers know what they're doing. Alfred Molina plays the main character, Sam Cooper, who's a widower, who's just moved to the burrows. Alfred friggin Woodard plays an ex investigative journalist who is living there with her husband, Art, who is played by Clark Peters from The Wire, who plays like a stoner who's kind of just doing yoga and playing golf, but also some other stuff. Dennis O'Hare plays a terminally ill resident of the facility. And then Gina Davis is somehow qualifying for senior citizen now, so.

• 23:23Speaker 03

  They keep iterating like six, we're in our 60s. We're spry young.

• 23:27Chris Ryan?

  It's like, we're just getting ahead of the curve here.

• 23:30Speaker 03

  Bill Pullman also very important inside of this. Yeah.

• 23:35Speaker 03

  To your point, the cat, like, you know, when I watched the trailer, I was like, wow, this incredible cast that they've assembled. And also like, do I feel my age that, you know, these actors, especially when you see like Bill Pullman and Gina Davis, and you're just thinking about A League of Their Own or something like that, you know, like these actors who we grew up with were like, oh, they're populating the retirement community. Is this what people felt like when they watched Cocoon in the eighties or whatever? You know, this is very Stranger. Things meets Cocoon, uh, NRG, the Amblin, you know, swing that they're making, which they obviously made with Stranger Things.

• 24:07Chris Ryan?

  Stuff rattling on the shelves.

• 24:08Speaker 03

  Yeah, all of that stuff is here, the cul-de-sac, et cetera.

• 24:13Speaker 03

  But it's so well acted.

• 24:15Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 24:15Speaker 03

  And I was just sort of like, I was thinking, I was like, if this show were a bunch of sixty-somethings that I've not seen in other things, I'd be far less interested.

• 24:23Chris Ryan?

  Bunch of sixty-something influencers who just popped in, popped into TV.

• 24:30Speaker 03

  Oh, my God.

• 24:30Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 24:31Speaker 03

  The TikTokers are gonna get old, man. That's, that's tough. But, but Alfred Molina is so good, Bill Pullman's so good, Ebig Lee Jr.'s so good, Gina Davis, Alfred Woodard, Clark Peters, fantastic. And so it's just, you know, it's just really well done. And a script that I'm not sure is, and the other question I have, we've only watched the first two episodes, but this is the perfect kind of fun theory show. There's just a lot of mysteries. It's very like, don't worry, darling, what's happening here sort of thing. But it's a binge drop. And so by the time that some of your listeners are listening to this, they've already watched the full season and they know what happens in the show. We still are like, what's in the walls and where is the key and what's happening, you know?

• 25:14Chris Ryan?

  That's like, I was kind of thinking about that because we're about to talk about these two episodes of Widows Bay that have been coming out. Once, it's a weekly episodic drop and the way in which one episode can build on another. And now like, I think anticipation for the sixth episode of Widows Bay will be at like this fever pitch after these last two. And you just don't get that with this. And in some ways, I feel like they almost write these shows knowing that. I'm, I'm not sure some of these things get sold to Netflix and may get recut lightly. But like, this was probably, I think, if it comes from the Duffers, like brought through the Duffers.

• 25:48Speaker 03

  Right.

• 25:48Chris Ryan?

  Deal that they had with Netflix for the pre-existing one before.

• 25:51Speaker 03

  And guys who've worked for Netflix before, yeah.

• 25:53Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, it really does feel like if you cut together all of the domestic. Alfred Molina scenes of him having like reveries of his late wife, played by Jane Casameric, is that?

• 26:04Speaker 03

  Casameric, yeah.

• 26:06Chris Ryan?

  Who people know from Malcolm Middle. Or Alfred Woodard sitting at her breakfast nook, kind of thinking about stuff like, that's this domestic drama that I don't know if you would be able to distinguish necessarily, episode one from episode three, because there's a lot of repeated kind of gestures and scenes.

• 26:21Speaker 03

  Melancholy, yeah.

• 26:22Chris Ryan?

  But then all the stuff that's like lore and the weirdness of this.

• 26:27Speaker 03

  Who's stealing the rose quartz?

• 26:28Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, and all of Gina Davis's stuff from her arts and crafts studios getting stolen. And there is, like you said, Don't Worry Darling, like a little bit of a Stepford Wives element to what's going on with the guy who runs this place.

• 26:39Speaker 03

  The founder, yeah, exactly.

• 26:41Chris Ryan?

  All the stuff with Seraphim, which, you know, is a, like, basically alien presence, angels, which is what they call their Alexa in this place. And all of the condos are kind of hardwired with this.

• 26:55Speaker 03

  But Alfred Molina very specifically ripped his out of the wall when he got there.

• 26:58Chris Ryan?

  And he is an engineer, everybody's got their little special skills.

• 27:00Speaker 03

  That's the thing, we've got a doctor, we've got an investigative journalist, and we've got Gina Davis who's into crystals, which will come in handy. So like, everyone having their occupation that will be helpful. But also, I agree, something I really do appreciate is this idea of like, a vulnerable, and you get this with kids, but a population that no one's going to believe or is easily dismissed.

• 27:23Chris Ryan?

  Or they can be like, you're having, you know, maybe you're starting to have dementia.

• 27:25Speaker 03

  Yeah, Ed Begley Jr.'s character in the first couple of episodes here. But yeah, so watching Alfred Molina, who, something I do appreciate about these episodes, and again, I've only seen two, is like, how we're not so far ahead of, like, he's quick on the investigative beat, you know, and he will probably draw the rest of them into this as they go forward, but like, you know, he's already like, I saw something, and I'm not believing the story they're telling about what I saw.

• 27:56Chris Ryan?

  I'm not even like, so old that I need to be here, so I know I saw something.

• 27:59Speaker 03

  Yeah, I know I saw something. And so he's already investigating, so it's not like, we saw the thing which we did in the, in the cold open, and we're just waiting around for people to figure out that there's like, aliens in this show there with us. But how quickly, like, when he talks to his daughter, the great John Malone is here, like, that, how quickly he sounds unhinged, and how easy it's going to be for him to be discounted. And so like, that, that. You know, the commentary that the show can make about how we treat our elders and how we dismiss our elders is a potentially rich vein inside of the show.

• 28:36Chris Ryan?

  I mean, this is also, I'll say, set in New Mexico, shot in New Mexico, and like the Vince Gilligan universe, I think it's always nice when a show is just like, yeah, this is where we're shooting it. So like, we're gonna have, not elements of New Mexico culture, but like, it looks like the kind of place where you're like, like, where is this village? And it's like, New Mexico is the kind of place that those places pop up.

• 28:58Speaker 03

  Middle of the desert. Like, Area 51's over here, and then right next to it is this. Yeah, exactly.

• 29:04Chris Ryan?

  And, yeah, I think it just like, looks really good. I have this weird thing with shows like this, which I would describe as like a B-tier Netflix show, where the binge is almost like, if I don't keep watching this right now, I may just stop.

• 29:19Speaker 03

  I'll forget.

• 29:19Chris Ryan?

  You know, and, but I like, I enjoyed what I watched, and I'll try to give it some more.

• 29:24Speaker 03

  To your point about the launch, I watched this a couple days ago. I started, we had the screeners for it, I started the screener, and then you're like, hey, I want to talk about the show. And I just opened up Netflix and realized it's now

• 29:35Chris Ryan?

  On.

• 29:35Speaker 03

  out, you know, like, and there was just no fanfare between when it moved from my screener row to like, it's just a show that's out there. But I'll be curious, I remember watching the trailer when it came out earlier this year, and I was like, this could either really be something, or just vanish into the ether.

• 29:50Chris Ryan?

  I think a lot of older people have Netflix. Also, I will say that there's a lot of really good details, especially in the first episode of, like, the Dee Wallace character, like, watching Jeopardy and answering all the questions, and then kind of watching Golden Girls, and like, there's some really, like, good understanding without being

• 30:07Speaker 03

  The CPAP machine.

• 30:08Chris Ryan?

  Condescending.

• 30:09Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 30:09Chris Ryan?

  The CPAP machine.

• 30:10Speaker 03

  The CPAP machine being like, and Bill Pullman's great in, in what we get from him. Have you watched the trailer?

• 30:17Chris Ryan?

  Of this?

• 30:18Speaker 03

  Uh huh.

• 30:18Chris Ryan?

  No.

• 30:19Speaker 03

  Okay, then I won't, I won't say what I saw.

• 30:21Chris Ryan?

  Does it give further, like?

• 30:22Speaker 03

  It gives, it gives an indication of something is gonna happen that I am, am uninterested in happening.

• 30:28Chris Ryan?

  Okay.

• 30:29Speaker 03

  You let me know when you get there.

• 30:31Chris Ryan?

  We'll have to like check that.

• 30:32Speaker 03

  You'll know what it is.

• 30:32Chris Ryan?

  I will. I want to talk to you about Widows Bay.

• 30:34Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 30:36Chris Ryan?

  We can do this one of two ways. We can do the episodes thing first and talk about Widows Bay second, or we can just chat. I know you've been discussing it with Rob, so I don't want to make you double it too much.

• 30:46Speaker 03

  Episode four is my favorite episode of television I've seen this year, so I'm happy to talk about it as much as possible.

• 30:51Chris Ryan?

  Me too, and I will spoil Andy's takes where he is like, this is probably the best thing I've seen this year, like by far.

• 30:58Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 31:00Chris Ryan?

  I have also started to notice anecdotally, more and more people being like, holy shit, Widows Bay. Like, so it does feel like it's starting to get like a little bit of heat in the streets. Have you noticed that?

• 31:11Speaker 03

  Van was just in here, and I had been hammering him to watch it, and he was like, yeah, and then I was on the phone with Chris, and Chris is like, hang up the phone and watch it. And I was like, oh, I see, when I told you to watch it, you didn't, but Chris told you to watch it, and you did. He's like, no, both of you are equally important. Anyway, you got Van to watch it.

• 31:27Chris Ryan?

  Devil and angel on his shoulder.

• 31:28Speaker 03

  He loves it.

• 31:29Chris Ryan?

  Actually, Van is the devil on both of our shoulders, but yeah.

• 31:31Speaker 03

  That's correct, correct. Yeah, absolutely. It's kicking up in the conversation, which is great. It deserves it. Like, it is so, it's a miracle of a show, is how it feels.

• 31:40Chris Ryan?

  You know, I was reading a recap of it on Vulture, and I realized that I am not actually like, I'm so blown away by, A, the comic performances and just the staging of the whole thing, and how, for me, even just watching on my screen at home, three-dimensional the town feels already, where I'm like, oh, yeah, and I kind of know where this is, and now they have to drive here, and I've already settled so into the landline technology and like, all these things about it, that I have not really been like hardcore clocking the underlying lore of the town that I think is going to become increasingly important over the second half of the season.

• 32:25Chris Ryan?

  And we get a little bit of this. At the Historical Society in this most recent episode.

• 32:31Speaker 03

  Shout out Jerry.

• 32:32Chris Ryan?

  It speaks to the wonder of the show where it's like, it's there, it's gonna matter. But it is, in so many shows, that would be foregrounded. There is a lesser version of this show that is like, what do you mean, the mayor's wife? You know, like, from like, we're piecing together all this stuff. And this is so confident in the moves it's pulling and the characters it's developed, that they can have that kind of like down in the, down in the faders.

• 32:57Speaker 03

  I agree with you, and I think there's confidence across the board, like with their, you know, something that Rob and I are tracking in our coverage is like, you know, we're doing sort of, it's, it's hard to talk about comedy in a, in a week to week kind of way.

• 33:08Chris Ryan?

  Tell me about it, it's comedy month on Rewatch Moles.

• 33:11Speaker 03

  It's difficult, but like, um, the categories that we're sort of trying to frame this around, we have something that's like obvious joke, and then you have something that's throwaway joke.

• 33:20Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 33:20Speaker 03

  And those are kind of hard to distinguish on this show, but there's just so many little jokes of like something written down somewhere, and the camera doesn't zoom in on it and make sure you saw it, it just rewards you if you took the time to look at it.

• 33:33Chris Ryan?

  Did you see Katie Dippold on Script Notes?

• 33:36Speaker 03

  Script Notes, yeah.

• 33:37Chris Ryan?

  And so this is John August and Craig Mazin's podcast where they talk a lot about like the very fine details of like screenwriting and production. And Mazin is just like, I am in awe of this show. Like, you guys, do you know how hard it is to shoot that much at night? Do you know how hard it is to like, get your production design team to make the teeth game? And it's gonna be a one second throwaway joke, but it's like.

• 34:01Speaker 03

  It's just some pliers in a box.

• 34:02Chris Ryan?

  And I know from talking to Andy, how hard that stuff is, like when he was working on Briar Patch, and he was like, yeah, like, I want, like, he was like, we wanted to do this beer label on our beer bottles, but we couldn't, so we had to do, you know, it's like, and he's like, and that took like a week, a week of like cumulative meetings about this beer bottle that's gonna be in the back of a scene, and to see it get like, I'm picking up on those little things, and it's just, it's encapsulated in the Chris Fleming performance in this most recent episode, to speak to your point about.

• 34:33Speaker 03

  Todd O'Connor.

• 34:34Chris Ryan?

  Obvious joke and throwaway joke.

• 34:35Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 34:35Chris Ryan?

  Where, I mean, the funniest thing of, that I've seen this year is him being like, just don't look at a mirror, and then he closes the door and it's a full door mirror. It's just really fucking good.

• 34:46Speaker 03

  I just also really loved the delivery of like when Patty reckoned and she's like Todd O'Connor? And you're like, hey Patty, you know, just like a real throwaway. Was that coke? Yeah, you know? Um, or like I have to go because my girlfriend's cat absconded or whatever. It's just so funny. Chris Mummings is so good in this episode. But also just like something that Rob and I did in our coverage of episode five is we went through like drug trip episodes. Yeah. That have been like really great throughout TV history. It's a formula that like almost always hits for me.

• 35:13Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 35:13Speaker 03

  But I really appreciated, you know, going back and looking at like Mad Men episodes or that Roseanne episode, et cetera, et cetera. I love the artistry of-

• 35:23Chris Ryan?

  Alex P. Keaton on caffeine pills.

• 35:25Speaker 03

  There you go, yeah. Um, I, I love the artistry of the lights going out and coming back up as Tom flips in and out of time. And it's just sort of like, especially when he's, when you come up on the gas station and the car is just sort of like, you know, off kilter and just like all the lights come back on, on the set as Tom is waking up. And it's just like, it looks incredible.

• 35:47Chris Ryan?

  Uh, who, I always forget her name. Who's the actress who plays, um, the woman who's with him at the gas station?

• 35:53Speaker 03

  Oh, Rosemary?

• 35:53Chris Ryan?

  Uh, Dale.

• 35:54Speaker 03

  Dale Dickey?

• 35:55Chris Ryan?

  Dale Dickey.

• 35:55Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 35:56Chris Ryan?

  She has now been present for two, like the fact that she is there for Patricia's witch ceremony.

• 36:03Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 36:03Chris Ryan?

  Burning Man.

• 36:04Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 36:04Chris Ryan?

  And then, uh, also for Tom's gas station and is completely nonplussed by either of them.

• 36:09Speaker 03

  Unbothered. Knew about the hag, uh, heckled Tom into the hotel. What does Rosemary know? I'm, uh, what has she seen that this is just like completely unbothered?

• 36:18Chris Ryan?

  I hope that she, I, that's the thing also about this series. I've been thinking a lot about X-Files just because I know they are going to, they're obviously rebooting it with Ryan Coogler and Daniel DeWiler. But I saw that there's like a Chris Carter director's cut coming of I Want to Believe on DVD.

• 36:33Speaker 03

  Oh, my God.

• 36:33Chris Ryan?

  On Blu-ray, yeah.

• 36:35Speaker 03

  Okay.

• 36:35Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 36:36Speaker 03

  Okay.

• 36:37Chris Ryan?

  So I've just been thinking about like- Maybe what a miracle that show is, but also like those were, we had something where it was like, you can make something that flits in between the monster of the week and the season-long story and the larger conspiracy. And I don't know that they want to make this show for eight years and ever put up episode numbers like, uh, like X-Files, but there's no reason why this couldn't have like a slow horses run where they are like.

• 37:06Speaker 03

  I'm curious about that, like how long they can sustain the mysteries and the lore, like how much is going to be wrapped up at the end of this season? How much do they, does Katie have the mentality of, that a lot of TV creators have now, which is like, put everything on the board because you don't know if you're going to get another season, or how much is she thinking about it in a long-term kind of way?

• 37:25Chris Ryan?

  You know, it's so funny you should mention that because I was, when I was looking at episodic runs in great TV shows, and maybe even not all-time great TV shows, but great episodic runs, and I, in so many of them, you can see the way TV changes as you go through the years to, you know, we have to go back, would probably be in like the first season if they were doing Lost today.

• 37:51Speaker 03

  Yeah, but also they wouldn't even, like, by the time you get to, we have to go back, you're 60 episodes into Lost.

• 37:57Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 37:58Speaker 03

  To go back to your X-Files point, I was actually just talking to a friend of mine who's watching it for the first time right now, X-Files, and she's like, I don't know, that I, I don't know that it's as good as everyone was hyping it for me. And we were talking about why, you know, I was like, you gotta get to the Darren Morgan episodes. And she got to the Darren Morgan episodes and she's like, okay, sometimes great, but there's a lot of stretch. And so, and she's a huge Buffy the Vampire Slayer fan, so they're running similar, at the similar time with similar episode counts. So why does that show work for her and this one doesn't? And we were talking about the depth of the cast, because in Buffy the Vampire Slayer, or in Widows Bay, we have a whole town of people that I am invested in. And with X-Files, it's just Mulder and Scully. Like, you've got some other characters, but it's really.

• 38:41Chris Ryan?

  They're always meeting these people.

• 38:42Speaker 03

  It's really just Mulder and Scully. And the beauty of a 22, 24-episode season.

• 38:48Speaker 03

  The example I always love to bring up is from Lost, which is the season three episode, Patricia Tanaka is Dead, where they just, Hurley and Jen and Sawyer and Charlie get a VW van restarted. That's the episode, basically. And a lot of people like think it's a throwaway, but it's not because you're just investing in characters and you're spending time with characters.

• 39:10Chris Ryan?

  And they get to interact with each other.

• 39:11Speaker 03

  And so those 22, 24 episode season, you know, The Pit does this really well, where we're just, we have like a broad swath of characters. It's inviting us to just hang with them and spend time with them and emotionally invest in them. And that's what Widows Bay is doing really well. Like, the sort of horror trope of the week thing that they're doing is really funny, but also like, I'm invested in Patricia being shunned by all the girls she went to high school with. I'm invested in Tom's relationship with his son, you know? Like, I care about Wick and Jerry's like dating background, you know? And like, I'm interested in what's going on with Rosemary. What's Ruth Steele? And what's happening with Dale? You know, and this is the Katie Dibble, Parks and Recreation DNA that's inside of the show, but it's just created such, I don't, I would want to hang out

• 39:56Speaker 03

  with these characters for seasons and seasons of television.

• 39:59Chris Ryan?

  I mean, this script has been around for a long time, like the Widows Bay script. I'm curious, I would love to read earlier drafts of it, and I would love to know, because to me, the iceberg is, nobody born on the island can leave the island. That's obviously why he's been keeping his son on the island. Whether or not he, the son is truly like, because I, in my house, we've been debating like, if this kid's so naughty, why hasn't he tried to get onto a ferry yet? So does he know, maybe intrinsically, he shouldn't, that's like the one thing he shouldn't do? But if you were to save that for the cliffhanger of the end of the first season.

• 40:36Speaker 03

  Right.

• 40:37Chris Ryan?

  That would be like, kind of a little bit more of what traditional TV would do, but instead, that's introduced, I think, in the middle of the second episode or something?

• 40:44Speaker 03

  Yeah. I feel like we're getting a lot of lore really quickly.

• 40:46Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 40:47Speaker 03

  Yeah. And that's, that's great, because, you know, that's something, of course, that's something like Lost, a show that I love, but was accused of withholding.

• 40:55Chris Ryan?

  Answers.

• 40:56Speaker 03

  Lore and answers. So, yeah.

• 40:59Chris Ryan?

  Okay, so I want to do this little exercise with you here. Widows Bay is on, um, episodes four and five. Pretend like you have not seen any more Widows Bay. I know that you guys just recorded. They are dropping six and seven together next week?

• 41:11Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 41:12Chris Ryan?

  Is this a Memorial Day thing?

• 41:13Speaker 03

  No, I don't think it's a spoiler to say because they've been leading up to this. Episode six is titled "Our History."

• 41:19Chris Ryan?

  Ah.

• 41:19Speaker 03

  So it's like a flashback sort of thing. So I think they want to drop a more standard episode along with it to make it, you know, to not make you feel like I have to wait another week to check back in with characters I care about.

• 41:31Chris Ryan?

  So they've begun this kind of like, I would say, episodes four and five, especially for everybody kind of responded to. I loved five as well.

• 41:39Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 41:39Chris Ryan?

  I, I mean, you could say three is the hotel episode and you could say they've already gone on a run in this. For the sake of our conversation, I'm classifying a run as three episodes or more. Two episodes is good, three episodes is a run. And so now that we're watching Widows Bay do this, I wanted to like, talk a little bit about, when I asked you this question, did you have an immediate response?

• 42:01Speaker 03

  You know what? So sometimes, you know, whenever I get to go on the watch and you give me prompts, I get excited because I love talking about the history of television. Um, I had already done the homework for this.

• 42:12Chris Ryan?

  Oh.

• 42:12Speaker 03

  Because a year ago, when Mal and I were doing like our Buffy rewatches, in Buffy Vampire Season Two is my all time favorite run of episodes of television. And then I like, I tweeted it out. I said, is this the best run of episodes of television?

• 42:26Chris Ryan?

  And some people had some responses.

• 42:27Speaker 03

  And then I got a bunch of responses. So I was like, already did my homework, we're good.

• 42:31Chris Ryan?

  So that's why it became prompt Twitter. Yeah, exactly.

• 42:35Speaker 03

  Exactly. Um, but Buffy Season Two, which is, um, and normally I would hesitate to bring my like nerdier genre stuff to the watch, but this is Widows Bay, so here we are. Buffy Season Two, which is Surprise and Innocence, which is... Widely regarded as, as one of the best sort of turns of a plot that has ever happened in a show where our love interest on the show, Angel the Vampire, loses his soul and becomes the villain of the show.

• 43:02Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 43:03Speaker 03

  And this is just like early Joss Whedon, we didn't know you could do this on television sort of stuff. So that's the two parter, Surprise and Innocence, incredibly good. Phases, which is this great Seth Green werewolf episode, just like Seth Green finds out that he's a werewolf.

• 43:17Chris Ryan?

  Right.

• 43:18Speaker 03

  Incredible. Bewish, Bother and Bewilder, which is Xander fucks up a spell and like all the girls of Sunnydale want to tear his clothes off.

• 43:24Chris Ryan?

  Kind of like Obsession.

• 43:25Speaker 03

  Yeah. And then Passion, which happens to be my favorite episode of all time of Buffy Vampire Slayer, which again is another, spoilers for season two of Buffy, which aired 20 plus years ago. A major character dies.

• 43:39Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 43:40Speaker 03

  And the first time that Joss Whedon ever did that, in a way that I was 16 when I saw it and I was like, I didn't know you could do this in storytelling.

• 43:45Chris Ryan?

  Don't think my wife is recovered yet.

• 43:46Speaker 03

  Yeah. So, um, that run to me, starting with Surprise and Innocence, Phases and Bewish, Bother and Bewildered, though they're the kind of like quirky standalone, there's a werewolf episode, there's a witchcraft episode, they're incredibly good. And then Passion is just an all-timer and that is just like an incredible run.

• 44:04Chris Ryan?

  Did you watch it when it was on?

• 44:06Speaker 03

  I did.

• 44:07Chris Ryan?

  And do you remember being in the throes of like, I can't, I like literally can't wait for Buffy to be on, this is so incredible that, did you even subconsciously understand that you were watching like?

• 44:16Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 44:17Chris Ryan?

  A successive episode run, kind of?

• 44:18Speaker 03

  Um, I don't know, but well, so, um, I'm the exact same age as Buffy, so I was 16 when this was airing and, um, I think I told this story.

• 44:28Chris Ryan?

  Grew up in a hellmouth.

• 44:29Speaker 03

  Yeah. We're in County California, but like, um, my, uh, I wasn't allowed to watch TV on weeknights, uh, when Buffy was airing. I think I probably had gotten in trouble and that was my punishment or something like that. So I had a friend who would tape it and bring it to school for me.

• 44:43Chris Ryan?

  So clutch.

• 44:44Speaker 03

  Um, and she brought me Passion and she was just like, if you can watch this before the weekend.

• 44:51Speaker 03

  That would be great.

• 44:51Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 44:52Speaker 03

  And I found a way to do it and I was just and but that was before like the internet couldn't ruin it for me. We weren't online in that way. So it's not like I was gonna get spoiled necessarily, but she just really wanted to talk to me about what happened.

• 45:05Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 45:06Speaker 03

  And went passion, very specifically. That's when I knew I was watching something incredibly important and special.

• 45:13Chris Ryan?

  You'd be thinking about for a long time.

• 45:14Speaker 03

  Yeah, the rest of my life. That's my number one TV death of all time. I think just because of when it hit, like who I was, how it changed how I understand how television works.

• 45:22Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, I mean, I think that was the thing that was sort of awesome about that nascent period of TV going into what we consider golden age and prestige, where there's all this rule breaking happening, but because I don't even know if the executives in charge knew what was they had on their hands.

• 45:40Speaker 03

  Right.

• 45:40Chris Ryan?

  So like, obviously, like, I know that Buffy had like plenty of budget and, you know, headbutting going on behind the scenes with like their their network execs and stuff like that. But like, sometimes you would just be like home on like a Wednesday night watching something and you'd be like, is anybody else seeing this? Like, this is crazy.

• 45:56Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 45:57Chris Ryan?

  I felt that way when I watched Battlestar season one.

• 45:59Speaker 03

  Oh, yeah.

• 45:59Chris Ryan?

  No, I was just like, this is this happening?

• 46:02Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 46:02Chris Ryan?

  Like, you know, um, my number one pick for this run that I felt pretty immediately was Succession season two, episodes two through four. That's Volter. That's Hunting, which is Bore on the Floor. Safe Room, which is one of my favorite Succession episodes of all time.

• 46:24Speaker 03

  Is it because of how often you love to throw water bottles at Andy?

• 46:26Chris Ryan?

  Uh, it's just, it is the it is the episode that I think is peaked Jeremy Strong.

• 46:32Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 46:33Chris Ryan?

  I thought that was the best. And he and he and uh, he and Shiva are just like in like another like planetary atmosphere in that episode.

• 46:42Speaker 03

  That's the hug.

• 46:43Chris Ryan?

  It's not gonna be me.

• 46:43Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 46:44Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, or whatever. Yeah. Um, and then actually.

• 46:47Speaker 03

  I love Turn.

• 46:48Chris Ryan?

  Turn Haven.

• 46:49Speaker 03

  I love, that's one of my favorites.

• 46:50Chris Ryan?

  The only reason why I sometimes give Turn Haven a demerit is it is also the first time that I got mad at Succession because I did not think Shiv and Kendall were sufficiently. Acknowledging what had just transpired.

• 47:05Speaker 03

  Hmm.

• 47:06Chris Ryan?

  Now, you can say like, that's just that family and this is also TV and all these other things. But I'm like, they had like this insanely vulnerable moment. And Shiv got this incredibly important piece of information.

• 47:18Speaker 03

  Right.

• 47:18Chris Ryan?

  That obviously Kendall is being blackmailed not to put himself forward as CEO.

• 47:23Speaker 03

  Right.

• 47:23Chris Ryan?

  And so, why is that not ever even acknowledged in the next episode?

• 47:28Speaker 03

  Oh, like a real glee moment where like from episode to episode.

• 47:31Chris Ryan?

  And it also felt like they reset and just became like banter twins again.

• 47:34Speaker 03

  Hmm.

• 47:35Chris Ryan?

  Um, so Turnhaven is awesome though, but those three I, I especially love.

• 47:40Speaker 03

  I mean, Hunting, incredible. Walter, very good. Turn, the, the thing that Turnhaven does that, that showcases what Succession does so well is like, just introduce you to a whole new cast of characters that you have like mere minutes to sort of get,

• 47:54Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 47:55Speaker 03

  Learn who all these pierces are.

• 47:57Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 47:57Speaker 03

  And it's just, and it feels very theatrical and they got a bunch of theater talents in to play these roles. And I just.

• 48:03Chris Ryan?

  It's so funny to like, to go see plays in the intervening years.

• 48:07Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 48:08Chris Ryan?

  How many pierces are just like in a play?

• 48:10Speaker 03

  Exactly. Yeah. They just raided Broadway for this episode. But yeah, I, I love Turnhaven.

• 48:15Chris Ryan?

  It's like The Pierces and All of Gilded Age.

• 48:18Speaker 03

  Yeah. Yeah.

• 48:20Chris Ryan?

  Um, what was another one that you liked?

• 48:21Speaker 03

  Um, you, you already claimed some of my favorites, so I will, I will let you, uh, get to those. But for, I'll, I'll do another genre one. Doctor Who, um, I talk about this one all the time. Silence in the Library, this is the end of David Tennant's run.

• 48:36Chris Ryan?

  Okay.

• 48:37Speaker 03

  As the 10th Doctor. So Silence in the Library and Forest of the Dead, which is an all time two parter, um, set in a library on a planet somewhere. Um, and then Midnight, which is my favorite episode of Doctor Who, which is like a standalone, David Tennant with a bunch of random characters on a train. And it's just this bottle episode, chamber horror piece, like essentially like an Agatha Christie horror thing that happens on a space train. Um, I love Midnight. Turn Left, which is, which then showcases the companion of that season. And then Stolen Earth and Journey's End, which is they, it was like both Avengers Endgame before Avengers Endgame. They brought back all the characters.

• 49:14Chris Ryan?

  All the Who's?

• 49:15Speaker 03

  All the characters from all the seasons for this incredible like two parter. That is, um, you know, and, and I think Tennant is the best Doctor we've ever had. And, um, it's, they just gave him banger after banger and. Steven Moffat, who wrote Silence of the Library, Forest of the Dead, like, this is a real audition for him to take over, which he did when Matt Smith started as the Doctor.

• 49:36Chris Ryan?

  Um, is it widely regarded by other Doctor Who fans as like, peak Doctor Who? Or is that like a?

• 49:42Speaker 03

  I will say, or is this a joke? I will say Silence of the Library, Forest of the Dead is widely regarded as like, an incredible two-parter. And then the two-parter at the end of the run, Midnight in turn left because they are so odd. But I think in these side of these runs, and this is, this is a good case. I'll be curious what you think of Widows Bay, episode six. Like, can you have a run of like, two episodes that are very much in keeping with the show?

• 50:05Chris Ryan?

  And then a diversion.

• 50:06Speaker 03

  Yeah, one that's like, sort of off that, if it's incredibly good, does that just prove what the show can do even more?

• 50:13Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, and it's funny that I picked Succession, and I was looking at some of the big blockbuster shows that we've covered over the years. And I was going through Thrones seasons.

• 50:23Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 50:23Chris Ryan?

  The run up to the children is like, incredible.

• 50:26Speaker 03

  I agree.

• 50:27Chris Ryan?

  But then you also look at the five episodes before that, and you're like, those are pretty good, too.

• 50:32Speaker 03

  Can I just do all of season four?

• 50:33Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, um, so that's, with genre shows, and especially with shows that are adapted, maybe.

• 50:39Speaker 03

  Or 10-episode seasons, you know?

• 50:41Chris Ryan?

  Yes. Um, my next one was, I just, I forgot that this was the case. The last three Better Call Saul episodes before Breaking Bad Time takes over. And this is basically the end of Howard. And Gus's chess maneuvering with Lalo about the meth lab. Holy shit.

• 51:04Speaker 03

  Yeah, holy shit.

• 51:05Chris Ryan?

  I was watching clips from this last night to refresh my memory. And like, Kim with Lalo and all the stuff that Mike is trying to-

• 51:12Speaker 03

  Lalo shows up at their, yeah, at the apartment. And also, we were just so locked in because they had their plan in Post-Its. And so we were just sort of, I was like, poring over the Post-Its. And like, and the end of Howard is so tragic. And what's happening to Kim in that moment is so hard to watch, but irresistible. And, um, and you want to root for Jimmy and Kim, but you're like, what are we doing?

• 51:37Chris Ryan?

  But she like, she's just self-aware enough to be like, I've, my soul died here. So like, we can't be together anymore.

• 51:43Speaker 03

  Oh, it's so good.

• 51:44Chris Ryan?

  And then, not for nothing, they just do more episodes of Breaking Bad after that, which is fucking crazy.

• 51:51Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 51:51Chris Ryan?

  Um, but yeah.

• 51:53Speaker 03

  I had a Better Call Saul run from the previous season, which is Wexler versus Goodman.

• 51:57Chris Ryan?

  Oh, my god.

• 51:57Speaker 03

  JMM, Bagman, Bad Choice Road, Something Unforgettable.

• 52:02Chris Ryan?

  That might be better. That might be better.

• 52:05Speaker 03

  This is just, Better Call Saul was just unbelievable.

• 52:08Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 52:09Speaker 03

  Unbelievable television.

• 52:10Chris Ryan?

  Let me ask you one.

• 52:11Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 52:11Chris Ryan?

  Did you have, I, so I put down Andor, the prison arc, eight through 10, season one. Did you have a different Andor arc?

• 52:19Speaker 03

  I do, only because I saw you put the prison arc on there. And the Narkina arc is so good.

• 52:24Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 52:24Speaker 03

  But the Gorman arc from season two, I think also, and like, this, Andor's a perfect show because you have these three-episode chunks. And I was like, does the Gorman arc beat the Narkina arc for me? And I, I don't know what does, only because the Narkina arc is where we realize what we had in Andor, right? And you get the Luthen speech, and you get the Kinaloi speech, like, in the same fucking episode.

• 52:48Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, and it's also like, the, the peak of like, oh, Eben Moss' back rack's gonna come out for three episodes. It's, it's just like, you, you can't really, like, feel too safe with anyone.

• 52:58Speaker 03

  Right.

• 52:59Chris Ryan?

  Because your favorite character might get killed in two episodes.

• 53:01Speaker 03

  Absolutely, Nemec, our guy. Um, so, yeah, so the, the Aldani arc into the Narkina arc are like, of season one, are just incredible. The Gorman arc, I think the Gorman arc, at the end of the day, might be stickier for me, because I know you and I were like, really into tracking all of the French Resistance comps in season two. Um, and then the end of the Gorman arc, which, we have the Cyril-Cassian showdown, which is one of the best moments in all of the history of television to me.

• 53:30Chris Ryan?

  I agree with you.

• 53:31Speaker 03

  Right?

• 53:32Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 53:32Speaker 03

  And, uh, and then also, the feeling we all had that we're almost out of Andor.

• 53:36Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, and then, is Mon Mothma's escape is the next episode, isn't it?

• 53:40Speaker 03

  He's the next episode after that, right? And then we only have two more, you know, like, the, the-

• 53:44Chris Ryan?

  And then it's Clea and Lani and everybody else.

• 53:46Speaker 03

  Yeah, time was just like, running the fuck- Out and so like that was part of it too. It was just like, it was just slipping through our hands as we're watching it.

• 53:52Chris Ryan?

  Yeah. Oh, man.

• 53:53Speaker 03

  Cause like when we watched, when we watched season one, we were like, maybe we'll get five seasons of Andor. And then by the time of season two, you're like, Tony, Tony's like, this is it.

• 54:01Chris Ryan?

  When I did that pod with Sean, I was watching, I just kept watching the conference room scene of them putting down the shades and being like, okay, you know, we just gotta get it out. What are we gonna do about these gourmet people? And I was like, I don't know. This, this, this might just be like a top five show for me of all time now. What to do about limited series or anthology series here is interesting because I, I think there's a lower degree of difficulty. If you're just gonna do six episodes for your middle block to be really good, you know, like first episode, it's like, okay, meeting these people. Last episode, there's often a little bit of a kind of like winding down clunkiness to it. Usually I think you and I both have a couple of shows that either intentionally or not intentionally wind up only being one season.

• 54:48Chris Ryan?

  I threw out, I threw out the middle three episodes of Chernobyl.

• 54:55Chris Ryan?

  I don't even in my mind have like a, and then this happened, and then this happened. I just remember the vibe of it, but I also watched Chernobyl.

• 55:02Speaker 03

  Barry Keoghan.

• 55:03Chris Ryan?

  Way after the point. Yeah. And I thought the end of Chernobyl was a bit, not, not my speed, but like the, the middle is just really great. And then I have episodes three through five of the first season of True Detective, which is Locked Room. Who goes there, which is the famous tracking shot and Secret Fate of All Life, which is not so. If you have any like limited or one season ones, we could do, we could talk about those.

• 55:28Speaker 03

  Yeah. So Fargo, season two, episodes seven through nine. So did you do this? I know you did it. Lop, lop at the castle. The castle is flying saucer at the, at the motel. Part of it is, part of it is like, are these three episodes in isolation really good? Yes. But part of it also is the experience of having watched Fargo season one and saying, what is this incredible episode of television?

• 55:51Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 55:51Speaker 03

  Is Fargo the best show that's ever happened? That's how Fargo season one happened to, like, felt to me at the time. And then Fargo season two happened, another incredible cast. But at first I was like, I don't know that they have it. And I'm unsure about Kirsten Dunst here. And like, is this what I want from Jesse Plummens and et cetera, et cetera?

• 56:10Chris Ryan?

  Alison Tolman is season one or two?

• 56:12Speaker 03

  Two.

• 56:12Chris Ryan?

  Two.

• 56:12Speaker 03

  Yeah. And, uh, and then, no, she's, she's season one, sorry.

• 56:19Chris Ryan?

  Season one.

• 56:19Speaker 03

  She's season one.

• 56:20Chris Ryan?

  Okay.

• 56:21Speaker 03

  Cause season two is when you have Patrick Wilson playing.

• 56:24Chris Ryan?

  That's right.

• 56:24Speaker 03

  Keith Herding.

• 56:25Chris Ryan?

  Her dad, right?

• 56:27Speaker 03

  But Chris Miliotti is here. Like, it's an incredible cast. Sam McLaren is here, et cetera, et cetera. But when you get to the motel and it's just like, fly, you know, Kirsten Dunst saying to Jesse Plummens, yeah, it's a flying saucer and we gotta go. You're like, oh, Fargo season two riffs, you know? And so that's, when you get the reassurance, the same thing happened with Andor. Cause I remember the first three episodes of season one of Andor, we were all like, we're not entirely sure.

• 56:56Chris Ryan?

  Of season one?

• 56:56Speaker 03

  Of season one. And then the Aldani and Arkena. So like, when you're like, oh, they know they're cooking. They know what they're doing. Like, that feeling is so strong.

• 57:05Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, for Andor, it's very specific because I, we didn't have the pre-existing, even if it was like in the press notes, you didn't really understand how it was gonna feel to do. It's the three episodes and then there's gonna be a time jump and a location change and a character ensemble change.

• 57:22Chris Ryan?

  With Fargo, I remember feeling like so cynical about the TV project in general.

• 57:28Speaker 03

  Oh, yeah.

• 57:28Chris Ryan?

  You know, and then by season two, just being like, this is actually like an incredible proof of concept that TV can do stuff.

• 57:35Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 57:36Chris Ryan?

  That's just truly, truly remarkable when it comes to adaptation and riffing. I couldn't decide what my Watchmen run was. You, you, you put this down, but I, I knew it was in there and I think you nailed it. But this is another good example of like, I know it was in the middle for me somewhere, but you, I think you're going towards the ending, right? Like, or the second half?

• 57:56Speaker 03

  It's close, right? Little Fear of Lightning, This Extraordinary Being, and Almost Religious Awe. God walks into a bar.

• 58:01Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 58:02Speaker 03

  And see how they fly.

• 58:03Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 58:03Speaker 03

  You know?

• 58:04Chris Ryan?

  That's like a half the season.

• 58:05Speaker 03

  Yeah, you could trim Little Fear of Lightning and see how they fly off and just do This Extraordinary Being and Almost Religious Awe and God walks into a bar and just sort of absolutely crush it. I mean, Watchmen is so special.

• 58:18Chris Ryan?

  It's really cool that when, because do you, have you ever listened to, Damon was on House of R, Damon Lindorff went on House of R. It was an awesome, awesome podcast.

• 58:25Speaker 03

  Thank you.

• 58:25Chris Ryan?

  Now being aggregated to death, but that's okay. But I still kind of freak out, like, sometimes I'll be talking to him and I'll just be like, goddamn, dog.

• 58:35Speaker 03

  You made Watchmen.

• 58:36Chris Ryan?

  You made Smits.

• 58:37Speaker 03

  You made Lost, you made The Leftovers. I know. This Extraordinary Being being the, like, nostalgia episode, right? Being like, one of the best episodes of television ever. And then God walks into a bar also being like God tier television. So that, that, that, those three, and Almost Religious Awe, like, Watchmen.

• 58:55Chris Ryan?

  I know.

• 58:55Speaker 03

  Remember how Watchmen happened?

• 58:56Chris Ryan?

  I know. Thank you so much for doing this.

• 59:00Speaker 03

  You don't want to talk about Lost, though, since we're here with Damon?

• 59:01Chris Ryan?

  Okay, so was, if I was like, what's the three best episode run in Lost? Does, is there a run that comes, is it, is it season three, seventeen through twenty, which culminates with We Have to Go Back? Or is there a different one?

• 59:15Speaker 03

  I think without question, it is Greatest Hits, Through the Looking Glass, Part One, Through the Looking Glass, Part Two. We Have to Go Back.

• 59:23Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 59:24Speaker 03

  Because the Greatest Hits, which is this Charlie episode, like, leading, as you know, like, talking about TV deaths, right? The death of Charlie at the end of season three of Lost, spoilers for Lost, is incredible television and...

• 59:37Chris Ryan?

  Spoilers for Better Call Saul two, I guess.

• 59:38Speaker 03

  Yes. Sorry, Howard. But like, uh...

• 59:44Speaker 03

  Charlie, as a character, on rewatching Lost, you know, I did a podcast rewatching every episode of Lost, and like Charlie, the character, does not work for most of season three, because they had, the way that Damon puts it, they arced out Charlie. They like, did all of his stuff too early, and then they just didn't know what to do with him, right?

• 1:00:01Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:00:02Speaker 03

  And so, they, um, so he's just like running back the same, you know, drug loop over and over again, and so you're frustrated with his character, and, and then you get something like Greatest Hits, which is Charlie going back through the moments of his life that he's sort of, like, he, he's been given this prophecy, you're gonna die, brother, right?

• 1:00:19Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:00:20Speaker 03

  And so, the, the episode before he's gonna die, and like, you know, you're watching television, you're like, are they gonna subvert that? What are they gonna do? No, he just dies.

• 1:00:27Chris Ryan?

  He's gonna be a force ghost, yeah.

• 1:00:28Speaker 03

  But, but you care so much more about it, because you had this episode before, which could feel cheap if not done well, of just sort of this one character reflecting back on his life, and all the little moments that he is proud of, a time that he, like, helped a woman who was getting her purse snatched, the time that he was at a community pool with his dad as a kid, but it's just, it's done so well, and, and, and a perfect encapsulation of what the, the Lost flashback structure can do.

• 1:00:53Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:00:54Speaker 03

  That leading into Charlie's death, which coincides with his big lore, it was a flash forward, you were watching this whole time moment, which, like the sort of Buffy thing, changed television forever, and people have been chasing that high.

• 1:01:06Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:01:07Speaker 03

  Forever. I don't think you beat it. It's so good.

• 1:01:10Chris Ryan?

  Was there a different Thrones run?

• 1:01:12Speaker 03

  No, I think the end of four is, like, because I can, I can name you isolated standout episodes.

• 1:01:19Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 1:01:20Speaker 03

  That I think are better, but in terms of like, because I really think five is when, I think five is when things start going wrong for Thrones, and that's earlier than a lot of people think.

• 1:01:28Chris Ryan?

  Is that the sept?

• 1:01:29Speaker 03

  Uh, no, that's six.

• 1:01:30Chris Ryan?

  Six.

• 1:01:31Speaker 03

  Five is like Sansa's wedding and stuff like that, like, I think five is the early germs of things going wrong.

• 1:01:37Chris Ryan?

  I remember five, when's Hardhome?

• 1:01:39Speaker 03

  Is five.

• 1:01:40Chris Ryan?

  Five.

• 1:01:41Speaker 03

  It's five or six.

• 1:01:42Chris Ryan?

  Because Hardhome is when I kind of was like.

• 1:01:44Speaker 03

  Five.

• 1:01:45Chris Ryan?

  Oh, I wonder if it's gonna feel like this, where there's like, two or three episodes that are like, oh, oh, pretty good.

• 1:01:50Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:01:51Chris Ryan?

  They're sort of Game of Thrones episodes, but it's a lot of like, two people walking and talking, and then there is a blockbuster movie, and then there's three episodes, and then there's a blockbuster movie.

• 1:02:00Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:02:01Chris Ryan?

  But four. Four, I remember just being like so fully captivated and also like so, so invested with the characters at that point.

• 1:02:10Speaker 03

  Yeah, and like the way that The Children ends with a joke we used to make at the time is everyone you love is on a boat, like all these people just like getting on a boat to go. So the possibility of like opening the world was so exciting.

• 1:02:22Chris Ryan?

  That was my favorite part about it.

• 1:02:23Speaker 03

  And then that's just like a problem they had. And the world got too open and they had to bring him back down. But Four, I think, is like, and on re-watch, it's the last, for me, the end of Four is the last time where I'm like, they just knew exactly what they were doing.

• 1:02:39Chris Ryan?

  It almost is like, that's when it felt like they still wanted to keep making it.

• 1:02:43Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:02:44Chris Ryan?

  You know, or they weren't thinking about...

• 1:02:46Speaker 03

  Or they were excited, super excited about it.

• 1:02:48Chris Ryan?

  I'd love to be back in Los Angeles. Joe, thank you so much.

• 1:02:52Speaker 03

  Oh, my God, thank you.

• 1:02:53Chris Ryan?

  You're a champion for doing this with me. I really appreciate it. Thanks to Kai and Kaya for producing today. Andy and I taking Memorial Day off. I'm sorry to Sydney Sweeney. I hope that whatever happens to you on Sunday night will hold until Thursday.

• 1:03:07Speaker 03

  Rob and I are going live on Sunday.

• 1:03:08Chris Ryan?

  See, this is why you're you.

• 1:03:09Speaker 03

  No, no, it's just like ill-advised, I think, to do a live reaction to Four.

• 1:03:13Chris Ryan?

  I just, I'm going to the Pacific Northwest, man.

• 1:03:15Speaker 03

  You're living a better life. Your work-life balance is better than mine.

• 1:03:19Chris Ryan?

  I'm not, I think we're about equally deranged, yeah. Thank you so much for listening and we'll be back next week. Take care.

• 1:04:05Speaker 06

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