HBO Max Is Back (Though It Never Really Left) and Four Lessons Learned From ‘Andor’

Chris and Andy talk about the news that Max will be changing its name back to HBO Max and what the news says about the streaming industry at large (1:00). Then they talk about the success of ‘Andor’ and what lessons can be learned from the show (29:06). Finally, they discuss the latest episode of ‘The Last of Us’ (1:00:14). Hosts: Chris Ryan and Andy Greenwald 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.

• 0:00Speaker 00

  Observe the North American dad. 50s, great polo collection. He enters his vehicle information on Carvana. An offer appears in minutes. Remarkable. He squints, reads it again, smiles and says, dang, that's a good offer. The highest form of approval. No haggling, no hassle. No one called him boss. He's still on the couch. Astonishing. Sell your car today on carvana.com. Pickup fees may apply.

• 0:30Speaker 01

  This episode is brought to you by NOS Energy. Every ounce of dirt, sweat and gears. Every checkered flag and trophy raised. Every lap, every race, every hard fought place. They're all jammed inside every can of NOS Energy. High performance energy for burning the midnight oil in the garage and pedal to the metal, human horsepower for the streets. Go ahead, crack open a can of NOS Energy and get after it.

• 0:54Speaker 02

  I ain't sports to have to play with. Stand up and walk now.

• 0:59Chris 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, taking himself to Madison Avenue, it's Andy Greenwald.

• 1:13Andy Greenwald?

  Hey, hey, man.

• 1:14Chris Ryan?

  If I'm making advertising jokes, you know, we're talking about upfronts this week.

• 1:18Andy Greenwald?

  People love upfront talk.

• 1:20Chris Ryan?

  We're going to talk a little bit about TV industry talk today. We're also going to do a little bit of Andor, lessons we've learned from Andor that maybe the industry could learn, or maybe they won't learn. So we're going to talk about the ripple effects of Andor as a kind of entity within the larger storytelling corporate enterprise.

• 1:37Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 1:38Chris Ryan?

  Right? Maybe a little bit of Last of Us because we didn't get your thoughts on.

• 1:41Andy Greenwald?

  Oh, thank you.

• 1:43Chris Ryan?

  On the WFLF this week, Washington Liberation Front. And I just want to tell everybody that you can watch us on YouTube. Ringer-tv is the channel. You can also watch us on Spotify where you're hopefully listening to us. You can hit us up in our email. It's [email protected] and follow us on Instagram at thewatchpod underscore.

• 2:03Andy Greenwald?

  Can I also do a little bit of housekeeping? This might be breaking news for Kai as well, but I believe we've decided we will be putting up our next episode. On Tuesday, right?

• 2:11Chris Ryan?

  Next Tuesday.

• 2:11Andy Greenwald?

  Next week, yes.

• 2:12Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, because I will be out on Monday.

• 2:14Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 2:15Chris Ryan?

  Uh, just, I need a little bit of alone time with some other people.

• 2:18Andy Greenwald?

  Because you heard it was my birthday, so you were like, I gotta, I gotta really give you some space.

• 2:22Chris Ryan?

  This trip was made a very long time ago. Had I known it was your birthday, I probably would still go, but I would be much more.

• 2:28Andy Greenwald?

  To be clear, no matter when you chose this trip, my birthday was still my birthday.

• 2:32Chris Ryan?

  But do you have my, what's my birthday?

• 2:34Andy Greenwald?

  November 17th.

• 2:34Chris Ryan?

  And do you have it like where you're like, we can't do that for Thanksgiving because it's CR's birthday?

• 2:39Andy Greenwald?

  Yes, first of all, it's never Thanksgiving on your birthday. It's just the runway.

• 2:43Chris Ryan?

  It's the next week, though.

• 2:44Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, which is a perfect time to do things.

• 2:46Chris Ryan?

  But you, you do care about your birthday.

• 2:49Andy Greenwald?

  No, I care about you caring.

• 2:50Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 2:50Andy Greenwald?

  I'm, I'm passive but judgmental. I am the best person to celebrate birthdays with. Can I also address the other elephant in the room?

• 2:59Chris Ryan?

  Which is? Is that how you feel about Last of Us? Passive but judgmental?

• 3:02Andy Greenwald?

  That's why I have the career that I had.

• 3:04Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, that's true. It's true.

• 3:06Andy Greenwald?

  I, uh, we are in a different studio today.

• 3:09Chris Ryan?

  Oh, yeah.

• 3:09Andy Greenwald?

  So people who are watching might, might notice this. It's, it's a little strange. It's a little, a lot of air in the room. I feel like a lot of space.

• 3:16Chris Ryan?

  Prefer that to the, uh, small cave that we were in for a long time.

• 3:19Andy Greenwald?

  I like to be able to focus. This is very, it's also very bill coded.

• 3:23Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, well, we can bring our own stuff in here if you want to have like a little picture of like.

• 3:27Andy Greenwald?

  Nick Foles.

• 3:27Chris Ryan?

  Terriers as ratings from 2012.

• 3:30Andy Greenwald?

  I actually do have that picture. It's right behind the Rock of Sock and Robots. You can't see it.

• 3:34Chris Ryan?

  Just like, maybe we could put up a big, uh, you know, poster of the Americans or something, whatever you want.

• 3:39Andy Greenwald?

  So you want to make, because I said when we walked in, this felt like Grantland days. You feel like we should have only content that we covered on Grantland?

• 3:48Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 3:48Andy Greenwald?

  Just Downton Abbey?

• 3:50Chris Ryan?

  Merch? Rust from, from True Detective.

• 3:52Andy Greenwald?

  That's your guy.

• 3:53Chris Ryan?

  Uh, yeah, man. So I wanted to talk to you about upfront. So for people who, uh, don't really follow the trades and follow the way these things work is the networks traditionally go to advertisers and say, hey, here's what we have coming up for the next year. Please buy some ads on our network. Now it's become a little bit more of, I think, a play to the street. That being Wall Street, you know, trying to entice Wall Street, goose stocks. Talk about what you've got coming up, but so many of these quote unquote networks are also technology companies. So you see a lot about iterations that they're making in their products as well as, you know, Netflix, for instance, did an upfront and Sean McNulty, who writes

• 4:36Chris Ryan?

  a newsletter every morning called The Wake Up Through the Ankler, is really good at sort of summarizing a lot of this stuff. And he noted with great interest that Netflix was largely about their ad suite. They were like, we have like a lot of content coming, like I believe Sean used the word tonnage, but the most important thing is the ad suite. And it was like an ad forward, like here's how to buy ads here, here, here, and here.

• 5:01Andy Greenwald?

  I mean, that was the room for it. They also said like two more seasons of Bridgerton and Diplomat is coming back and four seasons, it's gonna be eight seasons.

• 5:10Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 5:10Andy Greenwald?

  But two seasons of television.

• 5:12Chris Ryan?

  Two seasons of TV, but eight seasons of a year unless they change the format and it becomes more of an Andor thing and it's like five years, but each episode is a year.

• 5:20Andy Greenwald?

  Oh, my God. Right. And it's just like two years BBB and it's before the Battle of Brunch because that's the stakes of that show.

• 5:27Chris Ryan?

  That's right.

• 5:28Andy Greenwald?

  Amazing.

• 5:29Chris Ryan?

  You didn't finish that, did you?

• 5:30Andy Greenwald?

  I've still got a season to go.

• 5:31Chris Ryan?

  I would say the stakes get larger.

• 5:33Andy Greenwald?

  Oh, yeah. I actually have a feeling about those stakes.

• 5:36Chris Ryan?

  Okay.

• 5:37Andy Greenwald?

  I could see it coming a little bit.

• 5:38Chris Ryan?

  Okay.

• 5:38Andy Greenwald?

  Part of my passive judgment. I'm not gonna react, but I feel it.

• 5:42Chris Ryan?

  But the biggest story to come out of upfronts this week by far, especially for two guys like us who have been there since, you know, since when and just like that was actually Sex and the City, you know, that's how far back we go, is that Max, formerly known as HBO Max, is now in the future to be known as HBO Max because they are adding back HBO to their title. Now, there has been a few different variations on this in terms of what is just the streaming service called? Is there a bifurcation within the network or within the streaming service for popular fare or populist fare versus the prestige scripted and sports and documentary content that HBO is so well known for?

• 6:28Chris Ryan?

  Ultimately, I think that this is, I guess, a good thing. It's a good thing. It's not like I was like, I just gotten used to Max. I reorganized my tiles on my Apple TV. No, tell me, what do you think?

• 6:40Andy Greenwald?

  I actually still have the HBO Max tile. So I wonder if it'll just fire back up again.

• 6:44Chris Ryan?

  I think I do still have an HBO Go tile.

• 6:46Andy Greenwald?

  I have an HBO, yeah, I have an HBO Now, I think.

• 6:50Andy Greenwald?

  I like to hold on to my tiles.

• 6:52Chris Ryan?

  Well, it goes to show, you never know.

• 6:54Andy Greenwald?

  It's true. It's true. You think some, what else is gonna come roaring back?

• 6:58Chris Ryan?

  Well, isn't there like a Twin Peaks line about like that thing you like is gonna come back and stuff?

• 7:02Andy Greenwald?

  That gum you like is gonna come back in style. Yeah, there is a Twin Peaks.

• 7:05Chris Ryan?

  That streaming service is gonna come back in style.

• 7:07Andy Greenwald?

  There's a Twin Peaks for that.

• 7:08Chris Ryan?

  All right, brother, you hear this news.

• 7:09Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 7:10Chris Ryan?

  I'm gonna Charlie Rose it, and you say what?

• 7:12Andy Greenwald?

  Well, I'll say, is that how Charlie Rose did it?

• 7:14Chris Ryan?

  Oh, yeah. And you've never seen me do Charlie Rose? I stopped doing it because it became inappropriate, but.

• 7:21Andy Greenwald?

  Well, it didn't become inappropriate.

• 7:22Chris Ryan?

  He became inappropriate, but I was like.

• 7:24Andy Greenwald?

  He ruined your bit.

• 7:25Chris Ryan?

  His whole thing would be like Daniel Day-Lewis and Paul Thomas Anderson, and he would be like, he writes this script, he gives it to you, and you say what?

• 7:31Andy Greenwald?

  And then, it's pretty good.

• 7:34Chris Ryan?

  And he leans over and goes, and you say what?

• 7:36Andy Greenwald?

  By the way, it's okay to bring that back now. HBO Max is back. Also, racism is back. You can say anything now. So you can, it's cool. You can be Charlie Rose. It's fine.

• 7:47Chris Ryan?

  Okay.

• 7:49Andy Greenwald?

  As a white man in my 40s, I give you permission.

• 7:52Chris Ryan?

  Thank you.

• 7:52Andy Greenwald?

  It's okay.

• 7:53Chris Ryan?

  Thank you for seeing me.

• 7:54Andy Greenwald?

  This is a safe space.

• 7:57Andy Greenwald?

  That guy agrees with me. Anyway, well, it's interesting. So our buddy Casey Boyes, the chairman of HBO and Max Content, was on, we talked about this on our pod. He was on Matt Bellany's pod, and he was talking.

• 8:11Chris Ryan?

  The Town.

• 8:11Andy Greenwald?

  On his podcast, The Town. And in retrospect, he must have just been biting his cheek the whole time because clearly he knew this was coming. And you can sort of read the tea leaves of what he was saying. We commented on it, right? Which is that the bet on renaming the service Max after the Discovery merger slash acquisition was that this would be the new. The new catch all for an entire suite of entertainment. From your Game of Thrones to your Dr. Pimplepocker.

• 8:41Chris Ryan?

  Is that the only Discovery show you know?

• 8:43Andy Greenwald?

  I think it's the funniest one to mention and he mentions it. I believe there's also a bunch of Magnolia type content.

• 8:48Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, it's like.

• 8:48Andy Greenwald?

  What are those called?

• 8:49Chris Ryan?

  Well, look what I did with Larry McMurtry's library.

• 8:51Andy Greenwald?

  Well.

• 8:52Chris Ryan?

  That's my favorite.

• 8:53Andy Greenwald?

  That's true. You just see like kindling in a boutique hotel.

• 8:56Chris Ryan?

  Wallpaper.

• 8:57Andy Greenwald?

  Great.

• 8:59Chris Ryan?

  Gutenberg Bible?

• 9:01Andy Greenwald?

  Larry McMurtry owned.

• 9:04Andy Greenwald?

  That was the play. And I thought it was interesting and we commented on it on our pod that Casey was like, the data has proven otherwise. That this is no longer a competition for first place. That is really a Netflix. Netflix was there first and they're they're parked there. That it's really a competition for runner up. And the best thing going for them is the HBO content. That that is what drives subscriptions. The other stuff might be nice. There are certainly people who watch everything that's available on Max or multiple styles of shows. But the HBO prestige television stuff is what drives the brand. So you could read the tea leaves on that, that putting HBO back in the title is kind of a no brainer.

• 9:42Chris Ryan?

  Sure.

• 9:44Andy Greenwald?

  I actually feel like it's kind of another half step. Just call it HBO. One of the other takeaways from this week was that ESPN is launching its direct to consumer service.

• 9:55Chris Ryan?

  ESPN.

• 9:56Andy Greenwald?

  And it's just called ESPN. And this is kind of like a galaxy brain zag that makes sense.

• 10:01Chris Ryan?

  I don't think I'm going to sign up for that. I'm still so mad that I think I'm getting charged like three times for ESPN plus.

• 10:07Andy Greenwald?

  Oh, I definitely am. And also there was that period when I was.

• 10:09Chris Ryan?

  Still can't sign in to read like mock drafts.

• 10:12Andy Greenwald?

  There was like six months ago when I was in a real pickle and I think I probably texted you my tech support guy. Where I was like, how can I watch this Monday night football?

• 10:20Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 10:21Andy Greenwald?

  Tilt between our Philadelphia Eagles and whomever. And what I did in order to watch it was sign up for Field Yates's insight into like draft order in 2027.

• 10:30Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 10:31Andy Greenwald?

  So I was able to read our old pal Ben Solak, but I still couldn't watch the game.

• 10:35Chris Ryan?

  Right.

• 10:36Andy Greenwald?

  So I messed up.

• 10:37Chris Ryan?

  Right.

• 10:37Andy Greenwald?

  Anyway. This is all headed towards that place, right? That like, I, I, I think that the. I think the market has decided whether the brand value of HBO still matters and whether it has been diluted by the Big Bang Theory sharing a screen with it. And I think the answer to that is no. I think a lot of the sort of fixed brain stuff that legacy media brands have held on to for a long time, like Disney saying, oh, we can't have swears on a network with Disney in the title. They've let that go. And now eventually it'll just be, yeah, do you subscribe to Netflix, HBO, Disney? Kind of where it always ought to have been headed, right?

• 11:15Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, I think if I had one thing, just as a common man who's not in these boardrooms, doesn't go to lunch, you know what I mean?

• 11:23Andy Greenwald?

  You never eat lunch.

• 11:24Chris Ryan?

  Nobody asks me to go to lunch. But if I had to give one piece of advice to all the non Netflix streamers, is clean it up. There's just too much confusion about what is where, when it airs, how many of them are going up, and where I find it once I turn the thing on. And I do say that as somebody who professionally covers this and follows this and watches as much as I possibly can. I think when you start getting into, this is a tile inside of Disney, this is a tile inside of Max, but we know that the reason most people are coming to Max is actually for Last of Us or Night of the Seven Kingdoms, although they'll have to wait a while for that. You know, it's, I think that anything

• 12:06Chris Ryan?

  that these companies can do to get, disentangle themselves from a lot of the corporate tech speak that infected a lot of these, basically, a lot of these services from the get go would be really beneficial. I do want to throw something at you, though.

• 12:24Andy Greenwald?

  Mm hmm.

• 12:25Chris Ryan?

  You know, I was just doing a rewatchables the other day. I guess they're going to say it's, it was Close Encounters and, uh, cause he got announced. But we were talking about how like, we are farther from Close Encounters, the movie now, than the people in Close Encounters were to World War II, because World War II comes up a couple of times in Close Encounters. And I was thinking about this in relationship to a lot of the way that we talk about television, the way that we talk about these networks, where are we actually getting to a point now where when we're like, what's NBC doing? It's like, actually, no one cares. Like, there is no, there are, most people in the world do not have a relationship with NBC as a place where they go to get comedies.

• 13:06Andy Greenwald?

  No, not anymore.

• 13:07Chris Ryan?

  No, right?

• 13:08Andy Greenwald?

  And that's squandered, though.

• 13:09Chris Ryan?

  So what's more important is that they get Peacock to work.

• 13:12Andy Greenwald?

  At this point, but now that but that's actually more like sunk cost fallacy, right? Right. Like, we botched that. It's kind of like the, you know, Paramount, Viacom spent years ignoring Comedy Central, MTV, and now they are dead brands. Right. That's gone, and you can't really bring it back. I I think that it's actually, I think we're saying the same thing. Yeah. Because I think that that Warner Brothers Discovery, now, there's a secondary level of intrigue about this, that like by putting HBO back in the name and sort of divorcing it a little bit from Discovery. Is there gonna be like a split? Is there gonna be another sales or split in that? That's very possible. We certainly have no idea about that. But, um, but yeah, leaning into what you do have rather than nostalgia is important.

• 13:54Andy Greenwald?

  But B, HBO still does seem to have some sort of connection for some, not just us, and it means something. So lean into that because Max isn't nothing. Yeah. It's a meaningless thing. And that is the bigger lesson. It's funny, you're talking about like, uh, things from decades ago, because what we were just saying about like, people getting precious about, well, we don't want our legacy brand to be, you know, to be tarnished by this new media play or whatever. And I even kind of parroted that line when HBO Max became Max, which was, I get, I tried to see the logic behind protecting HBO. Sure. Do you, we, we recently, you and I, well, I did, and then I was texting you, like, some images from the old Wayback Machine about our old days at spin.com. Mm-hmm.

• 14:37Andy Greenwald?

  Uh, 25, 26 years ago. And that was, it, it, the only relevance here is not how much you love the band Party of Helicopters. The only relevance here is. Still do. It, but it's that, so I was like nominally like the editor of spin.com. Uh-huh. And the people at Spin Magazine were like, we want nothing to do with you and your grubby little computer site. Yeah. So we were essentially running our own pirate top 10 list of what was good that year. Shout out Primal Scream Exterminator.

• 15:10Andy Greenwald?

  Completely divorced from the content of the magazine, which was a loser for all sides, right? It's just, you kind of have to roll with it and allow the thing to become.

• 15:21Chris Ryan?

  I think there's a lot of intelligent stuff happening across the board. You can see The Pit, for instance, is going to be airing on TNT in the fall.

• 15:28Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, that's right.

• 15:29Chris Ryan?

  Like, Andor aired on various Disney terrestrial networks at one point over the course of the last year. You know, they've tried to do it. People are doing smart things with multi-platforming and getting the shows in front of people where they think they might enjoy them. But I think what gets complicated is when... One good example of this, I think actually the Disney Hulu FX stuff is the stuff that's probably most confusing because there are people who are like, well FX is still a cable channel, but a lot of stuff that FX does is only on Hulu. And Hulu is Hulu, but Hulu is also on Disney Plus. Like, that is a message that I don't think you're ever going to be untangle, able to untangle, except for the possibility that you can still sort of

• 16:14Chris Ryan?

  sneakily sell Hulu to people who would get Hulu anyway if they just had Disney Plus. Like, I don't know exactly like how many childless people out there are like, I don't want any access to the original trilogy of Star Wars. Do you know what I mean?

• 16:29Andy Greenwald?

  Wasn't that bill until like last week?

• 16:31Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, but like, we're not actually good barometers of this because like, we are like, I need to be a part of all of this to see where it's going. I think for an average person who's like, I got like 50 bucks maybe to spend after Netflix, like, I don't know, like...

• 16:45Andy Greenwald?

  Well, one thing to think about is, this is not necessarily saying that we should be, you know, this is not a play for sympathy, but the Byzantine way these companies were set up and structured and restructured and sold means that there are a lot of like vestigial departments that are still actively functioning as different arms of what is increasingly the same company. So, the FX programming team, who we laud constantly, John Landgraf, Nick Radd, Gina Balian, they are programming FX, and sometimes FX goes on Hulu. Hulu has its own programming team that has Nine Perfect Strangers, Season 2 coming, you know, and that is not, they don't touch each other. There's a larger argument to be made, and maybe we can get to it later when we talk about Andor, that like... When you ask the question, is Andorra a success?

• 17:29Andy Greenwald?

  My pet theory is that it is very successful and important to the larger Disney corporation, more so than it is to the Lucasfilm project, which is distinct within that larger ecosystem.

• 17:40Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 17:41Andy Greenwald?

  Similarly, about, we're talking about confusion. So at the upfronts this week, we learned that the Greg Daniels penned Office

• 17:51Chris Ryan?

  The Paper.

• 17:52Andy Greenwald?

  Spinoff slash offshoot, I think the poster says, from the universe of, the takeaway is clearly that it is like the documentary team is doing this again. That will be premiering on Peacock this fall. We also learned that there's a new Tina Fey executive produced show with Tracy Morgan and Daniel Radcliffe called The Fall and Rise of Reggie Dinkins. Great name. And that's an NBC original comedy.

• 18:17Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 18:18Andy Greenwald?

  You will then, you will be able to watch it on Peacock.

• 18:20Chris Ryan?

  Sure.

• 18:22Andy Greenwald?

  Will someone who likes one likely like the other in the same way that they liked watching 30 Rock in the Office back to back on NBC? Probably. The fact that they are completely different with different expectations and different headwinds, I don't think that matters to your, your friend Joe 50 bucks. But it does affect his viewing.

• 18:40Chris Ryan?

  Sorry for being friends with the common man.

• 18:42Andy Greenwald?

  You're like, you're like-

• 18:42Chris Ryan?

  Who have multiple streaming services.

• 18:44Andy Greenwald?

  Josh Hawley.

• 18:47Chris Ryan?

  I would be really into a senatorial commission on streaming services. I would watch that on C-SPAN or on Peacock, wherever it happened to be broadcasting.

• 18:56Andy Greenwald?

  We wouldn't be able to find it. But, I mean, most senators are over the age of 70.

• 19:01Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 19:02Andy Greenwald?

  So would it be like telling my parents about Slow Horses? In which I explain in like, like beautiful granular detail. And they're like, more or less, this is, this sounds like a dream. Like this is everything I would like. And then, and they say, how, what channel is it on?

• 19:16Chris Ryan?

  I know.

• 19:17Andy Greenwald?

  And then I'm like, the whole house of cards collapses.

• 19:18Chris Ryan?

  My mom has an Apple TV.

• 19:21Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 19:21Chris Ryan?

  And I have given her access to like any streaming service that she pretty much wants. And she still uses her Samsung's voice command to open up like-

• 19:33Chris Ryan?

  Xfinity on demand to watch anything. And I'm like, Mom, you know, you can watch like all of Andor. Anything basically ever made in the history of your life is right in this little black box.

• 19:43Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 19:43Chris Ryan?

  And she's like, I understand. What time does Andor come on? You know?

• 19:47Andy Greenwald?

  That's beautiful. Have I told you that I recently heard from my mom, she called on the landline to tell me that she had gotten a new hers, that she had gotten a new iPhone. I was like, great.

• 19:59Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 19:59Andy Greenwald?

  Great. Um, do you, are you going to store it with the last three that you bought over the last 15 years? But once they battery died, you never turned on again? And she's like, well, I'm very excited about this new one. I was like, okay, great. Are you into the gen emojis? Like what's the, what's the deal? And she said,

• 20:14Chris Ryan?

  You're feeling that?

• 20:15Andy Greenwald?

  She, she said, uh, well, with the new phone, it can play music, not just have a telephone ring.

• 20:22Chris Ryan?

  Wow.

• 20:23Andy Greenwald?

  And I was like, sounds good. Be sure, I'll be sure to keep calling you on the landline.

• 20:28Chris Ryan?

  Sending her some playlists.

• 20:29Andy Greenwald?

  Oh, that would be so sick. CR's hardcore playlist, 2025.

• 20:34Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 20:35Andy Greenwald?

  It's gonna be great.

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• 22:22Andy Greenwald?

  Any other?

• 22:24Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, I wanted to talk about Knight of the Seven Kingdoms moving out of 2025 to 2026. And

• 22:31Andy Greenwald?

  So a year without Thrones, how are you taking it?

• 22:33Chris Ryan?

  Without Thrones and also the the thing that the biggest shows on TV now fall into, which is like, you just can't run every year. You know, so you're basically going to have

• 22:45Chris Ryan?

  the pit, the industries, like the shows that are like about people doing pretty normal jobs in places where you can film that don't involve a tremendous amount of VFX. But I wanted to know whether or not this felt to you like it's not ready or we could use it more in 2026. One of the most valuable things that Casey said to us when he came on the show was the long-term thinking he's responsible for in terms of the schedule. So that when he's looking, when we're like, oh, I wonder what's coming on in the fall. He's thinking about the fall of 2027.

• 23:20Andy Greenwald?

  Yep.

• 23:21Chris Ryan?

  Does this strike you as something, because the whole I thought value proposition of Knight of the Seven Kingdoms was that it's essentially like people talking underneath of like trees and meadows and stuff.

• 23:30Andy Greenwald?

  Right.

• 23:31Chris Ryan?

  And like walking around a lot. So

• 23:33Andy Greenwald?

  Sounds amazing.

• 23:34Chris Ryan?

  Sure. But like, do you think this is a, hey, we could use this more next year or is there?

• 23:39Andy Greenwald?

  I don't know. I have no insight or intel about this production. And I think that what we will end up probably getting fed is whatever spin is most suitable. Like, maybe this is because of production issues, but they'll say You know, what's great about this is it can be a like a ramp up into House of Dragon season two, so we can connect the two shows in viewers' minds and they get used to it. Or it's to say, this way, we can get into production on season two faster and then it can be a little bit more reliable.

• 24:06Chris Ryan?

  Right.

• 24:07Andy Greenwald?

  But now that we've figured out how to make it, I don't know. I think that generally, the best case, I mean, actually, I was about to, I was about to say one or the other, but in fact, they're almost always connected. Like, if there are production problems, then, then I think Casey and his team, like Franny Orsi, are like, okay, well, what are the advantages here? How can we play this delay to our advantage and plug holes in the schedule?

• 24:26Chris Ryan?

  I had thought it was gonna be this summer, which is why it was surprising. It was apparently originally supposed to go later in the year.

• 24:33Andy Greenwald?

  Yes.

• 24:33Chris Ryan?

  Uh, so maybe it's not that significant of a jump in the first place.

• 24:37Andy Greenwald?

  I think the thing-

• 24:38Chris Ryan?

  But they had it in the coming soon on HBO montage, so I think everybody was starting to be-

• 24:41Andy Greenwald?

  I think it is a surprise.

• 24:42Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 24:42Andy Greenwald?

  But I think, um, the, not to, I think Kaya laughs when I say this word, not to glaze them too much, um, I got a little one, uh, is, I've been counting, by the way. We've been doing pretty well today, but I think you're ahead of me.

• 24:55Speaker 07

  I have a mic now, too, by the way.

• 24:57Andy Greenwald?

  You have a mic now?

• 24:57Speaker 07

  I do.

• 24:58Andy Greenwald?

  Yes, I love-

• 24:59Chris Ryan?

  I'm under the silence.

• 25:00Andy Greenwald?

  Yes.

• 25:01Chris Ryan?

  Any thoughts on Charlie Rose, Kaya?

• 25:03Andy Greenwald?

  Any thoughts on senatorial hearings?

• 25:04Speaker 07

  Oh, I just lost my mic.

• 25:07Andy Greenwald?

  Oh, weird. Um, that, I think that the long-term thinking that is gonna be most crucial going forward is, is to have the balance, is to have a schedule that has enough dependable meat and potato shows that can run every year to allow you the luxury of the every-two-year heavy hitter, summer blockbuster type thing.

• 25:31Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 25:32Andy Greenwald?

  Um, HBO, uh, seems to be pivoting into that, um, into that, that, that rhythm successfully.

• 25:44Andy Greenwald?

  If you look at someone like FX, who, you know, as we often say when we talk about FX, don't, they don't have the same budget as HBO does, um, Shogun, I believe, is going into production on season two.

• 25:55Chris Ryan?

  Sorry, instruction.

• 25:56Andy Greenwald?

  No, I think it, I, it, it's in pre-production. I think it was just announced that it's going into production in Vancouver, um, at the end of the year or even-

• 26:03Chris Ryan?

  Oh, I thought they were like, we are now in production on Shogun. You're probably right, given like the, the global warming, you kinda need to have like a- You know what I mean?

• 26:11Andy Greenwald?

  Wow, you are political today.

• 26:12Chris Ryan?

  No, I just mean like, it's like, it's Shogun doesn't feel like a very summery show if you were shooting it in Vancouver in Japan, like, you'd probably want to have like some foliage and stuff. I guess you could put it in.

• 26:22Andy Greenwald?

  No, they're shooting in January, January in Vancouver.

• 26:23Chris Ryan?

  There you go.

• 26:25Andy Greenwald?

  And anyway, if they're shooting January 26th, that means...

• 26:28Chris Ryan?

  That show's coming out in 27 at least.

• 26:29Andy Greenwald?

  I think we're being, if we're being honest, it's 27. And so much of the, the rosy glow of FX at the moment has been like, oh, what an incredible year they had last year with, you know, dominating all the categories at the Emmys.

• 26:43Andy Greenwald?

  And Shogun is repeatable. It is an ongoing series.

• 26:46Chris Ryan?

  Apparently, yeah.

• 26:47Andy Greenwald?

  But three years between seasons, you need to fill in the margins around it. So, and, and obviously they've announced other things too, and, and they have the shows, but like, but, but having, you need, I think it's increasingly obvious that you need a pit in order to do a House of the Dragon.

• 27:06Chris Ryan?

  I continue, here's my last thought that I just wanted to throw at you. This is kind of adjacent to what we're talking about, but before we get on to Andor and other shows, I just wanted to say this. You know, I think sometimes we have these conversations and I'm like, is this of interest to the larger community of people who are like, what did you guys think of Last of Us? I don't really care what you think of like Wall Street and tech and all this other stuff. And I think that's true, but I do think that these things affect how people watch things. And I also think that it, how people watch things and how they're programmed by these streaming networks tells us something about how more the majority of people who watch television watch things. Like, I was thinking about, it's been brought up a few times, why hasn't Netflix done more internal verticals, curation,

• 27:48Chris Ryan?

  being like, this is this, this is all Netflix original global, you can find things by category, but they haven't really like...

• 27:55Andy Greenwald?

  They branded their prestige shows a certain way.

• 27:58Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, right, exactly. And clearly like Netflix would do anything if they thought it would drive their stock price up.

• 28:05Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 28:06Chris Ryan?

  Bring in subscribers.

• 28:07Andy Greenwald?

  Right.

• 28:07Chris Ryan?

  Create more value. They obviously don't want to do that. Like, they have several of the biggest shows on television that they release in one night because they know that's how people want to watch them, regardless of whether it frustrates people who talk about people watching them.

• 28:21Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, they don't care about them.

• 28:22Chris Ryan?

  So, obviously Netflix has kind of the inside track on like how people are actually watching television, thinking about television, what they care about when it comes to, when they open up the, the sort of, the app, what they want to see. And so when we get into these conversations about like, oh, it's so complicated to find, you know, the English teacher. Eh, I don't know. I mean, like, maybe, maybe it would be make, just make more sense if everybody was just like, here's all the shows we have, you know? And that's how people actually want to like, receive this stuff.

• 28:53Andy Greenwald?

  But I think the other takeaway from this week is that for as much as we have spent over 10 years talking about a very particular segment of television, prestige or streamier kind of fare that engages us. I think that we've often, I don't know whether it's a straw man or just sort of a point on the horizon, we said, but it's worth noting that, you know, the Dick Wolf franchises are still dominating on NBC and get large audiences and et cetera, et cetera. That the idea that there's some sort of still foundational beachhead of a certain meat and potatoes, I've used that twice, that must be hungry, but like television that exists. And the main takeaway from this upfronts felt very existential.

• 29:36Andy Greenwald?

  Because with the shift in sports media rights and the, and the, and the result in like, the ripples.

• 29:42Chris Ryan?

  NBA going to NBC for, for, for the purposes of this conversation.

• 29:45Andy Greenwald?

  Yes, for the purpose of this conversation, NBA spent billions to bring the NBA back to its, to its airwaves, not just airwaves, to NBC, to Peacock, across its platforms. And one of the first dominos from that is massively fewer television shows.

• 30:00Chris Ryan?

  In fact, I think the only scripted stuff on NBC right now, I mean, aside from the Tracy Morgan thing you just mentioned, is Dick Wolf's universe of Chicago shows.

• 30:08Andy Greenwald?

  And Law and Order shows.

• 30:09Chris Ryan?

  Yeah. I think it's like, I pretty much, it's just like the voice, reality stuff, and sports now.

• 30:17Andy Greenwald?

  And, and that's what's left.

• 30:19Chris Ryan?

  Right.

• 30:20Andy Greenwald?

  That's radical. And, and then you hear like, you know, Jimmy Kimmel always does a bit, or Seth Meyers usually does a stand up at the NBC Universal upfronts and Jimmy Kimmel is at the Disney upfronts. And if you read, or I don't think you can see, but you can read their, some of their bits, I mean, it's rough. You know, basically Jimmy Kimmel being like, you guys are all, you guys are all morons and we've got nothing left for you, basically. Like, this is it.

• 30:44Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 30:45Andy Greenwald?

  It is. I mean, the positive spin is that it is existential shift in the industry. And it might quote unquote work, but it does sort of redefine what TV is and what it's going to be.

• 31:00Chris Ryan?

  It's hard for me to imagine a world in which even if it is somehow better than The Office, the paper ever achieves the kind of

• 31:08Andy Greenwald?

  It can't.

• 31:08Chris Ryan?

  impact that The Office did.

• 31:09Andy Greenwald?

  It can't because of the opportunities people will have to watch it and engage with it.

• 31:13Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 31:14Andy Greenwald?

  It doesn't mean it's not going to be good. In fact, I'm secretly kind of bullish on it. But but it's but maybe this all speaks to our larger point of let's be honest about what we're capable of doing, what the reach is, even if that means reducing our expectations. Wait, isn't that what Trump said about the economy?

• 31:30Chris Ryan?

  Well, you know what? This is actually a very, a very appropriate way to segue into Andor and into this sort of ripple effects and the lessons of Andor because let's be honest about what the reach of that show was and let's be honest about whether there's anything replicable about it.

• 31:47Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 31:48Chris Ryan?

  Obviously, you did a lot of like, I think, kind of shoe leather journalism about this. I'm being completely sincere.

• 31:55Andy Greenwald?

  Yes.

• 31:55Chris Ryan?

  So I would love to kind of just clear out and set some picks for you here. But I think we could start here is, you know, it's we're gonna not, we're gonna try not to spoil too much of Andor. But I would recommend you watch the show before you listen to some eggheaded conversation about what it meant.

• 32:11Andy Greenwald?

  And we won't, I don't think we need to spoil it at all, but I but also I don't even know if we've officially said. I'm sure if you're listening, you're aware, but we did have Tony on

• 32:17Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 32:17Andy Greenwald?

  earlier in the week.

• 32:18Chris Ryan?

  That was a full like hour long conversation. So if anybody is interested in that, that went up on Tuesday night, corresponding with the last three episodes of the series.

• 32:28Chris Ryan?

  Was Andor a success or is Andor a success?

• 32:31Andy Greenwald?

  So I think this is the toughest question to answer, and it's still kind of premature. And to your point about doing shoe leather journalism, like I did talk to people in the industry, not people directly involved with the show, of course, but like what the perception of it was. And, you know, it is worth noting, not in terms of it's like, it has nothing to do with any show's like bottom line or budget. But there are certain shows that shoot through the quote unquote industry, whatever that may mean at this moment, like Wildfire. And Do impact people's thinking. And I think I referenced that, that like, three or four weeks into the pit, people were talking about it and referencing it in conversations and in pitches that had nothing to do with medical shows that were attempting to recreate

• 33:14Andy Greenwald?

  the 90s. Andor is definitely at that level of conversation. You know, one of the, one of the executives that I spoke to who, who works at a rival company, finished the season alone in his office yesterday morning because he didn't want to be left out of the conversation. Right.

• 33:32Andy Greenwald?

  The question about whether it's a, so, so what I did though, I basically, in considering that question, I, I came up with four reasons why this could never happen again, and also four reasons of optimism of what can be brought in. Fantastic. For your question about, about success, I sort of, what I said before about, I, I think that the, the impact of the show and the success of the show creatively, which is undeniable, and the conversation, and then hopefully the, the award chatter and nominations, which do matter internally to companies, I think is enormously valuable to Disney and its larger, small screen scripted project. I think that it's a challenging question for Lucasfilm because it is so profoundly one of one. Because the bulk of Lucasfilm's

• 34:17Andy Greenwald?

  business, and I don't say this pejoratively, is maintaining and propping up a legacy brand that sells a shit ton of merch. Yeah. That is historically for kids, not, not adults in the way that Andor is for. It kind of deviates from the brand's core purpose in ways that thrill us, but maybe even leave the most optimistic, sympathetic, even fanboy-ish people within the company being like, well, what are we gonna do? Yeah. And I don't think that's necessarily a failing.

• 34:51Andy Greenwald?

  I think the question about whether it's a success will be, will actually be borne out by a lot of the award stuff and what happens. Although I was, I did get the sense that the long gap between season one and two was beneficial to the show and to the show's bottom line.

• 35:05Chris Ryan?

  Sure.

• 35:05Andy Greenwald?

  Because just existing on the service next to A New Hope and everything generates interest.

• 35:11Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, and I think also-

• 35:12Andy Greenwald?

  And it's a steady performer, I think, on the service.

• 35:14Chris Ryan?

  We're seeing this in contemporary film with centers where the miracle of a film that doesn't have a 75% drop from its first week-

• 35:22Andy Greenwald?

  Yes.

• 35:23Chris Ryan?

  -to its second week because people are telling their friends, "You gotta check this out." So it's still making like $20 million a weekend at least. I don't know that Andor could be considered a blockbuster on those levels, but I do think that Andor is a word of mouth success and that people are making a project out of watching it, are probably watching Rogue One, are spending a lot of time on the Disney app-

• 35:43Andy Greenwald?

  Connecting the dots.

• 35:43Chris Ryan?

  -like connecting the dots. So yeah, I'm sure it's, I'm sure it's got some value in that sense.

• 35:48Andy Greenwald?

  So, okay, so let's go through this list. So here are the things that make this show completely unique, irreplaceable, black swan event, sorry, but let's enjoy it while we had it. Number one is that like, this show was not developed. And what I mean is, like, most projects that get to our screen, you know, almost always it's like a spark of an idea in the brain of a creator, of a writer, or pre-existing IP or whatever. But everyone involved, I think this sincerely with good faith, takes a lot of pride within this industry of like, "We developed it together. We attached talent. We gave notes. We sort of steered it in the right direction." And that gets a lot of buy-in from the executives

• 36:30Andy Greenwald?

  and even like the most thoughtful ones, right? Like, "We got it over the finish line together." And a successful dish has many cooks, many authors, or whatever. This is not that, right? This is a god-level creator in Tony Gilroy saying, "Hey, there's a clear baton pass here. I can do this relay race. I can take the baton from this movie and create the character and get him to the end of it." And that's the assignment. And as he said to us on Tuesday, that's what he set out to do. And then he did it in ways that are just, you know, mind-blowing. But just that simple fact that he just basically, as he said to us, he wrote an email saying, "Well, here's what you do." And then they were like, "Okay, better go do it."

• 37:09Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 37:10Andy Greenwald?

  That is very, very unique.

• 37:13Andy Greenwald?

  Second one is that it fell between the eras and imperatives of streaming in a way that won't be repeated. You know, again, he talked to us about this, but like when he wrote that email, it was go, go, go. It was, it was the gold rush era and everyone was trying to establish a foothold and prove how serious they were about shifting their entire business model on the fly. And so when you have a good, a smart guy come in with a good idea, they were like, great. And then also this, and then also this, and then you get a movie and you get a TV show. That entire ecosystem changed. I mean, that was also pre-COVID, let alone pre-strikes.

• 37:48Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, but it was just like, let's, the money faucet is on full blast because the more we spend on stuff and the more stuff we have, the more Wall Street likes it. So our stock price goes up.

• 37:57Andy Greenwald?

  It's a growth, growth, growth. That all changed radically while they were in production on the first season, which is why this went from being a five-year project to a two-year project. Now, Tony has also said he didn't think he had the horses to do five years and he keeps referring to Diego's face.

• 38:14Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 38:15Andy Greenwald?

  As like moving in the wrong direction. And I'm like, I will go down that direction. That is a very handsome direction.

• 38:21Chris Ryan?

  If I could look like Diego Luna five years from now, I would probably erase and/or from my mind if I could. I would just like gladly trade that.

• 38:30Andy Greenwald?

  I don't see the issue, but.

• 38:31Chris Ryan?

  I can't even grow a beard. You know what I mean?

• 38:35Andy Greenwald?

  But so, so that, hitting that timing is so unlikely and it'd be very hard to go back to that, this place where it's like, go, go, go as big as you can and just try not to break too much on the way out. Like that attitude is definitely gone from all of these corporations. Three, and I feel like this one is kind of contro, not controversial, but might be surprising. Kathy Kennedy, who is on her supposedly, although we don't really see the timeline, has said she's retiring from Lucasfilm.

• 39:07Chris Ryan?

  Yes, there's been some, some competing reporting about that, yeah.

• 39:11Andy Greenwald?

  But much vilified for her tenure in charge of this company and a lot of the blame for the, I mean, we certainly feel creative failures of the seat, the, the new trilogy.

• 39:20Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, ultimately the box starts, stops with her. So, yeah.

• 39:23Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, and some of the other TV projects. I'm not here to overly praise or overly bury someone who I've still never actually met or engaged with. But if you look at her track record and her success record in Hollywood and also why she got the job, it is very old school produ- uh, producerial career. She's worked on some of the biggest movies with Spielberg and Frank Marshall in the eighties and nineties. And the job is to get everything to yes, to help creators get to yes on everything.

• 39:57Chris Ryan?

  And her reputation has been tarnished a little bit because of the fallouts that she seems to have had with various directors on various projects. So whether it's Colin Trevorrow on Rise of Skywalker or

• 40:09Andy Greenwald?

  Lord and Miller.

• 40:10Chris Ryan?

  Bill Miller on Solo, a lot of announced but then never realized projects with Ryan Johnson, David Benioff and DB Weiss.

• 40:18Andy Greenwald?

  If you were a-

• 40:20Chris Ryan?

  Patty Jenkins.

• 40:20Andy Greenwald?

  If you were a Kennedy-

• 40:21Chris Ryan?

  Work Squadron is still flying around out there somewhere.

• 40:23Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, well, you said the Death Star still exists, so, um, look, I think that the argument for the Kathy Kennedy apologists would be she completely trusts and empowers directors, but sometimes she trusts and empowers the wrong ones. Now, I'm not saying that to be, I have no knowledge of any of those interactions. That was what an apologist would say, that like, you have to know, you basically have to know how to drive the sports car you're being, you're being given the keys to.

• 40:50Chris Ryan?

  Right.

• 40:52Andy Greenwald?

  Tony knows how to drive that car. He is an Academy Award nominated writer and director and has a vision and has his team and has been in the industry since that era and worked with a lot of, like, he's worked with Jerry Bruckheimer, like, he's worked with the big, big, big dogs of old Hollywood. I imagine they have a great relationship. And if her legacy at Lucasfilm, on the plus side of the ledger, is she empowered this guy to do this thing? It's pretty good.

• 41:18Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 41:18Andy Greenwald?

  It's pretty good. So it was a good match, let's say. None of this happens in a vacuum. That seemed like a very good producer creator match. And that not, obviously not repeatable. The last one is that, is, and I really want to hear what you think about this, but like- The idea that all of these massive IP universes are flexible enough to allow different shades of storytelling within them, that adult storytelling could exist, and/or proved adult storytelling could exist within Star Wars, but does it also suggest or imply that adult storytelling could exist within Marvel, or DC, or Lord of the Rings? And my gut reaction is no, both because of where those IP universes exist in terms

• 42:03Andy Greenwald?

  of the bottom line of those companies. Like Marvel needs to get Avengers money rolling, assembling again.

• 42:10Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 42:11Andy Greenwald?

  It's not about like, oh, let's really humanize S.H.I.E.L.D., or, you know, what was it? Jesus, I had it right at the tip of my tongue, like, damage control. Like, we're gonna fix the rubble. The other thing is that the nature of those universes, particularly Marvel, kind of invalidate the premise of Andor, meaning a spy series set, not even direct or bullshit spy series, but like, okay, let's really talk about like the CIA in the Marvel universe. It kind of just gets undone once Professor X is like, actually, he's lying. You know what I mean?

• 42:43Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 42:44Andy Greenwald?

  Whereas Star Wars does, had created, and this is something that Tony took advantage of, a universe where there are billions of people, some of them are walruses, and maybe 17 of them have ever seen a lightsaber?

• 42:54Chris Ryan?

  Right.

• 42:55Andy Greenwald?

  So, okay, there's a lot of space there to tell a story. And I don't know if that's true. I want to know what you think about that.

• 43:01Chris Ryan?

  That's a great question. I mean, Marvel has tried to do that. I mean, that's-

• 43:05Andy Greenwald?

  Is that Secret Invasion?

• 43:06Chris Ryan?

  That's what Secret Invasion was supposed to be, and you could make an argument that there were elements of that in Falcon and the Winter Soldier that they wanted, or have talked about. Winter Soldier being their like 70s conspiracy thriller. I think-

• 43:23Andy Greenwald?

  That's Congressman Soldier to you.

• 43:25Chris Ryan?

  That's true.

• 43:28Chris Ryan?

  You know, I can never get away from the hero part of superhero movies. And that ultimately, not only are they gonna be super and trump whatever,

• 43:39Chris Ryan?

  like basically work a day, conflict, trial and error, you know, drama that's happening on the streets of the world that they're talking about, that they can just fly in literally and stop a building from falling and then fix everything or read somebody's mind, but that ultimately Marvel has posited these people as heroic. Now, and/or culminates with several of our most beloved characters doing capital crimes, which is totally like my shit.

• 44:09Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 44:10Chris Ryan?

  But is hard to sell. I mean, that is the adult part that you're talking about. It's like, can you leave this theater or this TV show with mixed feelings about what you've just seen? With mixed feelings about characters that you've invested in? I happen to think that that's how you deepen your relationship to those characters, is to be able to see them not in the best light, to not always be making the right choice, to not always save the day at the end. But, you know, it wouldn't be Empire Strikes Back if it happened all the time. And that's the thing. It's like, we talk about like, well, we want this darkness and we wanna have this edge and we wanna have this kind of like melancholy or sadness or like, you know, feeling that things aren't gonna work out. So that when they do work out, it's really, really Ewok time.

• 44:54Chris Ryan?

  You know, like, I think Marvel has not quite gotten there outside of Infinity and Endgame.

• 44:59Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, and it did, they, I mean, you know, I like those movies. Generally, but in terms of the aim of the project and the capability of the project, it does make me think a little bit about, and we don't need to get too into it, but like the Superman trailer that dropped, the new Superman trailer. And I've been pretty bullish about this project. And the reason being, I just had a feeling that James Gunn gets what makes the character unique and interesting, which is kind of what Kevin Feige has done repeatedly with even obscure Marvel characters.

• 45:27Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 45:28Andy Greenwald?

  If you can just communicate it, the audience is on board.

• 45:32Andy Greenwald?

  This trailer is the first thing that gave me pause because this trailer is the first thing that made me realize that this, there's no universe, certainly not the DC Universe or our universe, where this movie can just be about that one pure idea. It's, this is one of the busiest trailers I've ever seen.

• 45:49Chris Ryan?

  Isn't that the disease of modern life, though?

• 45:51Andy Greenwald?

  It certainly, yeah, I mean, it certainly is.

• 45:54Chris Ryan?

  Isn't that like you went to Yankee Stadium to watch the Yankees be the Yankees, but instead you get sold like all this other stuff and all these other experiences that you're supposed to have?

• 46:01Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 46:02Chris Ryan?

  Like, isn't Superman's not enough? Because if Superman's not enough, nothing is, right?

• 46:07Andy Greenwald?

  And that's kind of, that's, I think that's, I can't say it any better than that. There are moments in this trailer where I'm like, oh, I, truth, justice, heroism, also just like the physicality of like him being so strong that when he falls, like the sidewalk crumples. I was like, it's, it's cool and the visuals are cool, but, but also he's, he's a beacon of truth and justice and the common man, but also he's an international criminal. And also he has an army of robots and a dog and seven other superhero pals. And I was like, this just feels, I just feel stressed thinking about all this.

• 46:37Chris Ryan?

  You already start thinking, it's like, this movie's gonna be how long?

• 46:39Andy Greenwald?

  And, and I guess I have to watch it to watch the next seven movies, but like that kind of fatigue, when usually the opportunity is to do one good thing to start.

• 46:47Chris Ryan?

  Sure.

• 46:48Andy Greenwald?

  And this isn't meant as a criticism of Superman. It's again, a reinforcement of the idea that for as much as a hun, a show that cost hundreds of millions of dollars and had like multiple night shoots in Valencia, Spain, like this was kind of under the cover, under the radar of the larger project.

• 47:07Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 47:08Andy Greenwald?

  It didn't have to teach us what the future of the Jedidom holds, right? It was just about connecting these particular dots.

• 47:16Chris Ryan?

  I think there's even a more, just even speaking from the artistic creative side of it, there's a significant difference between characters and pieces on a chessboard of a shared universe. I've seen a lot of people, very rightly, be like, man, I would love to see a prequel about X or a sequel about Y, or like, what about, what's happened to these characters next? And I understand that desire because I have it as well. But these people were not. Extensions, they were characters.

• 47:48Andy Greenwald?

  Yes.

• 47:48Chris Ryan?

  And so when you watch a Superman trailer and you're like, that is a lot of fucking villains or allies that they're introducing. When it really does seem like Lex Luthor, Lois Lane and Superman are pretty solid foundation to build a movie off of. It's happened before. You know, I think the Marvel disease, the, not disease, but the Marvel issue and the, maybe even the DC issue is that you're making a movie to make more movies.

• 48:16Andy Greenwald?

  Yep.

• 48:16Chris Ryan?

  Andor was made to tell a story that had a very fixed endpoint, which was the beginning of Rogue One.

• 48:21Andy Greenwald?

  Yep, and I think that that ties into the things that I think should be lessons to learn from it, although I do just want to reiterate, one of the most shocking things that Andor has done for me personally is that it 100% made me a fanboy kid again in such a pure way.

• 48:36Chris Ryan?

  It's actually been like a problem, like I should not be thinking about Star Wars this much right now.

• 48:40Andy Greenwald?

  But like, I just so purely and so naturally found myself watching those last few episodes and I, we're not spoiling the show here for people who haven't finished it, but I was like, okay, but really Alexander Skarsgard could do the Luthor flashback show.

• 48:54Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 48:55Andy Greenwald?

  Right, I'm like arguing with, I'm not arguing with myself, I'm dreaming about it, because how cool would that be? Now, it won't happen and it shouldn't happen to the point that you made, but it's pretty exciting that, that the, the show that is supposedly engaging with our cerebral adult selves can also reawaken the other part of us. Okay, so here's the four lessons and I, please, thoughts and comments. Number one, and this might be one of the hardest ones for executives, is trust the ones who deserve trusting. Now, maybe knowing who to trust is accurate for the rebellion and also for veteran executives.

• 49:32Chris Ryan?

  Sure.

• 49:32Andy Greenwald?

  And maybe that is the special sauce that the people who've been together for decades, like the HBO team or the FX team have. But I think the hardest things for smart execs to do, even well-meaning ones, is to get out of the way. And if you have a writer's room of super alphas, like two Gilroys, Bo Williman and Tom Bissell, like, let them cook.

• 49:50Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 49:51Andy Greenwald?

  If you hire Luke Hull from Chernobyl and you see what he does in season one. Honestly, give him his own corporate card. Because it's, it's worth it. It is.

• 50:00Chris Ryan?

  I don't think he was doing his own expenses.

• 50:03Andy Greenwald?

  No, but I'm saying, let him.

• 50:04Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, I know what you mean.

• 50:05Andy Greenwald?

  Build what he needs to build, because he is the best at what he does, operating at the peak of his craft. And again, we talked to Tony about this. He was an EP on season two, which is not standard for production designers, but is well deserved.

• 50:16Chris Ryan?

  Well, it sounds like he was also the first person to talk to Tony.

• 50:19Andy Greenwald?

  Yes.

• 50:19Chris Ryan?

  About, okay.

• 50:20Andy Greenwald?

  Physical spaces.

• 50:21Chris Ryan?

  You've written it. Let's start building out what Mon's wedding.

• 50:25Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 50:25Chris Ryan?

  Mon's daughter's wedding looks like. Let's start building out, what are the nooks and crannies of course on it? Let's start building out what a prison looks like, you know?

• 50:33Andy Greenwald?

  And let's, like, if you're talking about the Gorman Town Square, which is all you can afford to build, how do we maximize it? How do we, how do we maximize the, the story and the drama from the location, or from the stage set? I just think it is, it's a hard lesson to learn in anything in management, but sometimes it's the meddling you don't do that matters the most.

• 50:53Andy Greenwald?

  Two is kind of what we were speaking of, like, adults want entertainment too. And I don't just mean within IP universes, because I think the curse of handholding, of four quadrant thinking, of how can we make this busier, pop more, in a, in a way, kind of what we're saying about Superman. I think that is a disease that has infected almost all of our entertainment. And you see it in, and I think even the casual fans are starting to see it with like, every show beginning with three months earlier. The most interesting thing happens, but that's not where our show begins. Begin your show at the most interesting moment.

• 51:27Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 51:28Andy Greenwald?

  Like, do that. We don't always need handholding or explanations. I think that reference, also to that end, reference points for what shows could or should be, don't need to have like only an 18-month tale. Meaning, when we sit here and we talk about Andor and we get excited, we're talking about like, British mini-series from 1981, or French films from the 60s, or novels, or history books. Like, if something excites you, or historically has excited a group of people, it doesn't lose its special sauce, just because it's not within a streaming window. You know, I, the Bear and Baby Reindeer are exceptional television shows and connected with people. But other things have connected to people too.

• 52:12Chris Ryan?

  Sure.

• 52:12Andy Greenwald?

  And so if those can't be the only two shows that people are throwing around as reference for what they want to do with the medium. I feel like when someone comes in, and there's a lot of this seems to be like notes for executives, but I think it's for creatives too, like. People should trust their passion more, honestly. And I feel like you probably see this too in podcasts, rewatchables. When you guys talk about things that you guys care about, even if it's not, you know, a nine on whatever on Rotten Tomatoes. People will respond to the passion more than the specifics.

• 52:39Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, I mean, I think that there's something that was happening maybe 2015, 16 to about 18, 19, 20 that we saw were technology companies starting streaming networks and kind of not knowing what to do with their money. So allowing people to kind of pursue passion projects. What those passion projects wind up being, whether you're talking about something like 000 on Amazon or I May Destroy You on HBO, can sometimes be construed as people want international global crime.

• 53:13Andy Greenwald?

  Right.

• 53:13Chris Ryan?

  Or people want true stories from underrepresented voices who are talking about trauma. They want point of view, right? Like, they want things to feel at once different, but interesting and familiar. Because that's what the best stories do. It's like you open up a book and you start reading Anna Karenina or you start reading Alan First and you're like, ah. I'm immediately like thrown into this world and I'm thinking like these people and thinking about the choices that they're making and the circumstances that they're facing. But that's not necessarily like replicable on a cookie cutter way where you can just decide like a programming strategy against it.

• 53:55Andy Greenwald?

  Totally.

• 53:55Chris Ryan?

  And so it's really interesting to think about a trend coming out of Andor being like more espionage sci-fi shows based on previously existing IP. Maybe that would be cool. I mean, it's not like we haven't had that, though. Like, one of the funny things that's been happening to us over the last 24 months especially is we keep getting shows where we're like, is anybody else in a simulation where they're making TV shows just for you? And then you get the show and you're like, that was okay. That was pretty good.

• 54:24Andy Greenwald?

  Yep.

• 54:25Chris Ryan?

  And it's not that there's anything wrong with the intention of the creation of the show, but making TV is really hard. Making anything is really hard. And making stuff on this level starts to become kind of a like, can you hear Jimmy? Like, are you really like?

• 54:40Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 54:40Chris Ryan?

  Do you know what I mean? Like, I guess my major point is...

• 54:46Chris Ryan?

  It's about voice and it's about depth to me.

• 54:51Andy Greenwald?

  And that is the hardest balancing act. I mean, I didn't even put that on the list. I was trying to find a way to articulate it that I think you just did so well. Andor was about everything and one thing in every scene and only old Jedi masters can do that. And I think that the lesson that I put that is kind of an offshoot of that is if you have to err on one side or the other as a creator or as a developer, whatever, always err on the side of people, always.

• 55:20Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 55:21Andy Greenwald?

  Like you cannot say, very few people can do what Tony did and say, I'm going to make a show about revolution. And then also have it hit as hard as it did because I think also if Tony was sitting with us, he'd say, well, no, I got to make a show about revolution. But the assignment was to make a show about Cassian Andor.

• 55:37Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 55:37Andy Greenwald?

  And I feel I did that too. He is a good writer because he writes people first. I think that we get, we keep getting further away or forgetting the idea that if the show's not fundamentally about people, if it's about an idea or God forbid, if it's just about a world, then it's a documentary or it's a video game. You know, and there are people who love certain types of video games where you wander open space, you know, universes and you're like, wow, now I can see the sunset over this hill and watch the orcs.

• 56:03Chris Ryan?

  It would be so easy to segue to Last of Us right now.

• 56:05Andy Greenwald?

  Frolic or whatever. I know.

• 56:07Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 56:08Andy Greenwald?

  But and I'm happy, I'm happy for you, but that's not the same as drama.

• 56:14Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 56:14Andy Greenwald?

  Show me a person in that world and tell me, make me care about that person and then fill in the background. And that's essentially what makes something good.

• 56:20Chris Ryan?

  I went back and started watching some of the older episodes for, you know, obviously in researching the second season, talking to Tony. But just even before we had this conversation, I went back and especially watched the Aldani sequence of episodes from the first season and then Arkina season of episodes or a sequence of episodes. And I was really struck by how brave it was to start Cassian where they start him. And he's basically like a petty thief when you first begin the show. You get flashbacks that suggest his, um, his origins and like what difficulties he's faced. And obviously, like when Marva comes into it, you have like a warmer feeling towards him. But if you start the show off, just much the same way you start the movie off.

• 57:05Chris Ryan?

  When he's basically murdering someone to get some information. You know, it's gives you a real cold feeling about the character. And to watch him, not only like, I mean, this is just really sturdy writing. Almost every single character from the number one on the call sheet to people who are in the background of most of the first season, who then become major players in the second season, has an arc that you could easily diagram for people. Where it's like, he starts here and then he gets a promotion and then he gets a demotion. And then he gets a promotion again, but then all this time, his relationship to his mother is like this. His relation to his lover is like this, his relationship to his work is like this. And Cassian is actually like, they should teach it in schools.

• 57:49Chris Ryan?

  To start somebody who goes from like thief to mercenary to prisoner to spy to rebel captain.

• 57:59Andy Greenwald?

  To hero.

• 57:59Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, to hero, to martyr is a pretty remarkable piece of writing.

• 58:04Andy Greenwald?

  I mean, it's unbelievable. And you think about like, first of all, when you were talking about all the people in the background. I was like, in the other geniuses you need to let cook are casting directors.

• 58:14Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 58:15Andy Greenwald?

  Because think about how much casting mattered on this show. Like every single person, I just believe is the single best person that could have played that part. And.

• 58:24Chris Ryan?

  I mean, you got, you go back to the prison episodes. Every single face in that prison, you're like, who the fuck is this guy?

• 58:30Andy Greenwald?

  And that person has a story.

• 58:31Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 58:31Andy Greenwald?

  And like, there's a level of, I also always want to try and be fair minded. Like, the best stories are always just overwhelm you with specificity and decision making. But that said, not every show has this budget. Not every show has this deep bench of imagination to draw from. But very few shows would give us an alien race in revolt and take the time to invent a language for them. The way they do on Gorman, you know, or the celebration and songs and mourning songs that are in the first season, you know, in the Aldani celebration, or what happens at Ferrex at the end. Like, this is what, if you're making a show about people in revolt or about a culture, then you have to service culture. Most of these shows don't have that

• 59:16Andy Greenwald?

  luxury. But if we are moving into a bifurcated and maybe a healthier ecosystem, where some shows take longer and some shows don't, and they're the right types of shows to take longer and not, like a medical drama probably shouldn't take $200 million in two years to make a season. But if you're, if you're, if you have a healthy balance in your diet as a networker, streamer, some of that production money.

• 59:41Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 59:42Andy Greenwald?

  Dragons take a long time, but so do building real culture, real life, investing it with something more than just, you know, Viz effects at the peak of its powers.

• 59:52Chris Ryan?

  Sure.

• 59:53Andy Greenwald?

  The last thing on the list was, just that, I was thinking about, when we talked to Tony, one of the things that really struck me was how much he brought from his movie career to writing for TV, in a, in a good way. In, in the sense that he's, what he said to us about like the number, the page numbers, page count.

• 1:00:15Chris Ryan?

  He's always cutting.

• 1:00:16Andy Greenwald?

  He's always cutting because you have such little real estate. His response wasn't cracking his knuckles and being like, hell yeah, we're gonna do, we're gonna take, you know, eight episodes to get this thing moving. Now, obviously, there are budgetary and story concerns, but so much of TV is so poorly paced and plotted. And a lot of that comes back to the original sin of, oh, now we have room to explain everything. And that, that infects movies too, with prequels and origin stories and blah, blah, blah. But like, if you watch Back on Android, which you've been doing, I think you're, you're seeing in real time how every single moment matters.

• 1:00:48Chris Ryan?

  Oh dude, I mean, I was actually thinking about this on my drive in. I was listening to, uh...

• 1:00:56Chris Ryan?

  I was listening to Big Star, which is this fan, you guys should all listen to Big Star. But on, I think it's on Kangaroo, which is one of their big songs. Steve Cropper, who used to be in Booker T and the MGs, plays on it, right? And he plays like six notes. He apparently was just like, you guys are way too whacked out. Like, I can't do this, but plays like seven notes on a telecaster. And the writing on Andor is basically like that. It is, what is the bare minimum that people need to have an emotion or an idea communicated to them? But has also got style and swagger. I don't, we don't really see Luthen that much in the second half of the second season. But think about how impactful his appearances are.

• 1:01:39Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, every choice.

• 1:01:40Chris Ryan?

  And we also, in every one of those scenes are like, oh, that's what he's been up to.

• 1:01:44Andy Greenwald?

  And I think that it is, I mean, everybody's just making TV for streaming services while the world burns. I get it. But at the same time, I think that one bit of service that is incumbent on the creative industry is to do everything we can to try and re-educate people towards accepting uncertainty and nuance and shadow in art. And then maybe, God forbid, in life as well. But like, that is a fairly noble mission. I think that, that art, I don't feel like I'm being too big for my britches in saying it. I feel like that is what art does for us as humans in the world. And the fact that so much of the power of Andor comes from its silences, from its ellipses, from the space between episodes, between seasons, between scenes,

• 1:02:29Andy Greenwald?

  is significant and meaningful. And in, in expert hands, that can be sloppy.

• 1:02:33Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:02:34Andy Greenwald?

  And it can leave you asking. But that sense that two seasons, two pretty perfect seasons of TV has left us with, which is, oh, my God, we wish we had more, but we are very satisfied. That's a very good place, I think, for people to leave a show.

• 1:02:48Chris Ryan?

  Absolutely. I couldn't have said it better myself. Did you want to talk a little bit about Last of Us? Or does it almost feel like, like a bittersweet ending to the pod? I don't have a ton to say about this episode.

• 1:03:01Chris Ryan?

  A lot of what I said about the previous episode stands. I like this one less than the previous episode. I thought this one suffered a bit from. TV stuff. Uh, from Jesse showing up at just the right moment, even though he had apparently been following them for weeks.

• 1:03:19Andy Greenwald?

  We don't know.

• 1:03:20Chris Ryan?

  We're not really sure. Maybe we'll get more of an explanation about it. I think the way that they tell this story is sometimes like, a thing will be confusing and then it will get like a flashback episode or explanation. But I was just curious whether or not you were enjoying the, uh, the Seattle experience.

• 1:03:36Andy Greenwald?

  God, briefly for a moment, I was just flying. I was like the Superman trailer.

• 1:03:40Chris Ryan?

  I almost don't want to end the pod like this. I know.

• 1:03:42Andy Greenwald?

  I can't believe you brought me there. Um, yeah, I mean, I weirdly, I, this one bothered me less than the previous episode.

• 1:03:50Chris Ryan?

  There you go. Different strokes.

• 1:03:51Andy Greenwald?

  But, but mainly because it, I mean, it was definitely less ambitious and it didn't have like the soaring Jeffrey Wright monologues that really, really frankly pissed me off. This episode was just more like revealed, I think, some of the central flaws of, of the show, you know, like I, I'm really not that invested in the, the teen buddy comedy romance that also involves shooting people and zombies. Like I, I don't, I don't buy it emotionally. I'm kind of out on it. It doesn't make a lot of sense to me. And the arc of the Ellie character learning the limits of her own savagery feels exhausting and also boring to me.

• 1:04:27Chris Ryan?

  I don't think there are any limits.

• 1:04:28Andy Greenwald?

  No, right. But like, but that, I, I don't really see the appeal of that. And I'll just circle back to like, you know, what I, what I kind of had been saying, which is it, it's, we've heard about gourmet cheeseburgers. Well, this is like, this is gourmet walking dead now.

• 1:04:43Andy Greenwald?

  Which, which is very satisfying, I think, to people who like these shows, but it is, it is a remarkable drop off and one that I have sympathy for considering what it was dropping off from. But the second episode, it didn't matter how, what I care or what I feel about zombie shows or how I feel about Bella Ramsey's performance or any of the other details that, that I bump against when I watch the show. That was an undeniable episode of television. It was so expertly made and it was thrilling and it was surprising and it was engaging and that wins every time. But when you drop down from that, and not every episode can be that, you're back down to-

• 1:05:19Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, just like not every episode can be Nick Offerman in the first season. I mean, I think that-

• 1:05:23Andy Greenwald?

  You drop down to the bare bones and I'm like, this isn't, this, I mean frankly, it's just, it's not for me.

• 1:05:28Chris Ryan?

  This is the show. The season, the previous season had a lot of swagger. Like it had, the, the way it opened with the talk show, it had the-

• 1:05:36Andy Greenwald?

  It had style.

• 1:05:37Chris Ryan?

  The woman who was like, we have to bomb the city, like those little flashbacks, those, you know, all the Texas stuff was incredible. I, I thought getting out of Boston and the beginning of that story was really quite striking. And, and you know, I've really enjoyed some Jackson stuff, but I think it, it definitely feels like it's stuck between gears right now. And, you know, I, you can't help it when you read online, like that just feels like the show is now like geolocated for,

• 1:06:06Chris Ryan?

  it, it feels like it's like not satisfying the game's fans.

• 1:06:09Andy Greenwald?

  Right.

• 1:06:10Chris Ryan?

  I don't know if I find it so satisfying because it feels like it has to adhere to certain, like we have to put her in a room with three aliens that she then figures out a way out of, you know? And that, a lot of that feels very video gamey to me, but you know, I mean, there's a couple more episodes left in the season. It does feel like it's also like the, uh, multiple seasons issue, like where it's like, well, we're going to be doing this for two more, two more seasons probably. Is straining it a little bit.

• 1:06:36Andy Greenwald?

  Well, the, the other thing, it was Rob from season one.

• 1:06:39Chris Ryan?

  Cause they didn't really do anything this episode, right? Like they kinda like-

• 1:06:42Andy Greenwald?

  Well, they ran around and we saw some new bosses for a video game level. She played guitar again. Um, we learned why, and then there's a lot of backfilling, which is decent.

• 1:06:50Chris Ryan?

  She plays guitar and you say what?

• 1:06:53Andy Greenwald?

  You don't want to know what I say. But yeah, I mean, we learned, we learned the roots of Dina's savagery, you know? Like, okay, so that's some backfilling. Um, that's fine.

• 1:07:01Chris Ryan?

  I'm just, personally, I assume none of you guys have a happy life.

• 1:07:04Andy Greenwald?

  I think that's fair.

• 1:07:05Chris Ryan?

  It seems like it's a pretty fucked up world.

• 1:07:08Andy Greenwald?

  You don't feel like there was one, like, monastery city that survives?

• 1:07:10Chris Ryan?

  Did you think Dino was gonna be like, "I grew up in incredibly warm, loving household with two parents. Nothing ever happened to us."

• 1:07:17Andy Greenwald?

  It was kinda boring, honestly.

• 1:07:19Chris Ryan?

  Exactly.

• 1:07:19Andy Greenwald?

  But I found my own way. I got into art.

• 1:07:21Chris Ryan?

  That's why I'm such a thrill seeker now, you know?

• 1:07:24Andy Greenwald?

  I mean, the other thing that was robbed between seasons is a point and a purpose. Now, not all shows need an explicit endpoint, but the first season had the momentum of, "Get this magic child out of the city and into the arms of doctors to save the world."

• 1:07:36Chris Ryan?

  Psych.

• 1:07:36Andy Greenwald?

  That's a pretty big stake.

• 1:07:38Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:07:38Andy Greenwald?

  And this season's mission is, "We must avenge this guy." Must we? I mean, yeah, we are making the case emotionally and you're saying something about it, but that is a different set of stakes, and I don't think it's earning the same swag. I think swagger is well said for the first season.

• 1:07:53Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:07:54Andy Greenwald?

  That it had. It's also worth noting that it does appear that we're in for a standalone episode, and it looks like your zaddy's back.

• 1:08:03Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:08:03Andy Greenwald?

  For a flashback.

• 1:08:06Andy Greenwald?

  I'll say this, as a super, I mean, I don't even know if I've earned this title. I was gonna say a casual fan of the show. I don't know if that's my correct designation. As much as I liked having Pedro Pascal on the show and I like watching him.

• 1:08:19Chris Ryan?

  You don't wanna drive back 15 miles to pick up something else. Yeah, I know what you mean.

• 1:08:23Andy Greenwald?

  What is left unsaid about that relationship, right? I mean, it's a lingering wound.

• 1:08:30Chris Ryan?

  I think it's just the secret. It's the secret of what happened in Salt Lake City and whether, what Ellie understands about that.

• 1:08:35Andy Greenwald?

  Because she said, "I know," right?

• 1:08:36Chris Ryan?

  Yeah. I mean, that's the suggestion from The Coming Soon.

• 1:08:38Andy Greenwald?

  When what? Oh, did you watch The Coming Soon?

• 1:08:41Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:08:41Andy Greenwald?

  Do you do the work?

• 1:08:42Chris Ryan?

  Uh, I just didn't turn off HBO Max before the trailer ran.

• 1:08:47Andy Greenwald?

  Well, that's where you're wrong. It was actually aired on Max.

• 1:08:51Chris Ryan?

  That's true.

• 1:08:51Andy Greenwald?

  But this summer, it'll once again air on HBO Max. We didn't talk about it, but we should just also plant a little flag that the studio rules.

• 1:08:57Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, we'll hit the studio on Tuesday. I wanna do the studio. I would like to at least.

• 1:09:02Andy Greenwald?

  Should we wait for the finale, though? When's the finale come? It's next week.

• 1:09:05Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, and I also wanna talk about 100 Foot Wave. We've got a couple of things coming soon, too, like TV shows, Department Q, adults. There's some good stuff.

• 1:09:16Andy Greenwald?

  You also, I noticed you didn't save time for my Minecraft movie review, so I guess we'll have to push that till next week.

• 1:09:21Chris Ryan?

  I wanna do, like, a special Andy Goes to the Movies after Mission Impossible. Where we can just do, we can just have it all stretch out.

• 1:09:30Andy Greenwald?

  I can tell you about friendship.

• 1:09:32Chris Ryan?

  I know all about friendship. Lowercase f, because I do this pod with you. Thanks to Kaya, thanks to John. We will be back on Tuesday next week, but then reverting to our usual Monday, Thursday.

• 1:09:42Andy Greenwald?

  Have a great time getting away from me on my birthday. I love it.

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