Creator Eric Kripke on Ending ‘The Boys.’ Plus, ‘Top Chef’ Season 23, Episode 10 and ‘East of Eden’ Trailer.

Andy and Kaya talk about the trailer for Netflix’s upcoming ‘East of Eden’ adaptation starring Florence Pugh (6:32), Jodie Comer being the lead of Damon Lindelof’s next HBO series (13:24), and the extended hiatus between seasons of ‘Ahsoka’ and ‘The Terminal List’ (16:48). Then they react to ‘Top Chef’ Season 23, Episode 10 (30:34). Later, Andy is joined by ‘The Boys’ series creator Eric Kripke to discuss what originally drew him to the material, writing that main character’s death in the penultimate episode, setting up ‘Vought Rising,’ what’s in store for the series finale, and more (45:26). Subscribe to the Ringer TV YouTube channel here for full episodes of The Watch and so much more! Email us! [email protected] Host: Andy Greenwald Guests: Eric Kripke and Kaya McMullen Producers: Kaya McMullen and Kai Grady Additional Video Supervision: Sarah Reddy Order and it will come. Like today. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

• 0:00Speaker 00

  I'm pro football Hall of Famer Brian Dawkins, and I lived for a long time with something I did not know the name of: major depressive disorder. I carried sadness and anger because I thought I could handle it alone, but I couldn't. Now I want to make sure others know that that support is out there. If you're experiencing similar symptoms, talk to a healthcare professional. Visit mddallies.com to watch my story.

• 0:25Speaker 01

  Paid partnership with Johnson & Johnson. Brian Dawkins has not prescribed Caplyta lumateperone.

• 0:37Speaker 02

  I needed more from my antidepressant, so my doctor added Caplyta lumateperone, proven to provide greater relief from depression symptoms than an antidepressant alone, building on my progress without starting over. Caplyta is for adults with major depressive disorder when used with an antidepressant and is available by prescription only. Individual results may vary. In clinical trials, weight gain was not common.

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  Ask your doctor about Caplyta. Learn more at caplyta.com or call 888-252-4824.

• 1:35Speaker 03

  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.

• 2:09Speaker 03

  Stand up and walk now.

• 2:12Speaker 04

  Hello, welcome to The Watch. My name is Andy Greenwald. I still have no official title at The Ringer, but I'm joined by someone who does, Kaya McMullin. Welcome back to the big chair.

• 2:21Speaker 05

  I promise you, we're working on it still. Maybe like three years from now.

• 2:26Speaker 04

  What do you think my title would be? Person most desiring parking validation?

• 2:32Speaker 05

  We love to call people a talk strategist lately, so like, I think we could probably grab you one of those.

• 2:37Speaker 04

  What do you think my talk strategy is? Show up a little late, unprepared, talk a lot.

• 2:42Speaker 05

  Watch like three trailers before we get going.

• 2:44Speaker 04

  Just did.

• 2:45Speaker 05

  Yep.

• 2:45Speaker 04

  Well, just to bring people up to speed, I have to sit in the big boy chair today. It's not very comfortable for me. I'm not wearing enough layers. I'm not wearing a hat, but Chris is continuing his drinking tour of the East Coast, and we miss him dearly. But thank you for stepping up. We are going to talk about a bunch of headlines, some new stuff, and then later in the show, I will be joined by Eric Kripke, who is the showrunner and developer of the Amazon series, The Boys. The Boys will be ending next week, so we're talking to him in anticipation of the finale. We haven't actually done that interview yet, so I can't do that thing where I say what it's going to be like, but I think it's going to be pretty good.

• 3:20Speaker 05

  I think it'll be nice.

• 3:21Speaker 04

  And I will let people know, I intend to have the first part of the interview be generally spoiler free, because I am curious about what it's been like running the show essentially for a decade. It was announced in 2016.

• 3:34Speaker 05

  Yeah, I know. I was gonna say. That's really rare these days.

• 3:37Speaker 04

  It's so rare, and he has gone through so many permutations of not just the show, but of the industry itself. So we'll talk generally about that, and then we'll pivot into some more specific things. And Kaya, I know that you wanted to join me for Top Chef Talk.

• 3:49Speaker 05

  Yes.

• 3:50Speaker 04

  You've been sidelined from these quick fires for too long.

• 3:52Speaker 05

  I know. I've made my way back from Last Chance Kitchen.

• 3:56Speaker 04

  You did. You did. You're back on the big show. And now you have to handle dessert, just like Rhoda. Okay, but the first thing that I really want to talk about with you is, this might seem like an after dark thing, but I promise it's not. So this week, as I'm sure you know, the NFL schedule was announced. I know you've been following this very, very closely. It was announced that my beloved Philadelphia Eagles will be playing in my beloved city of London against the Jacksonville Jaguars on Sunday, October 11th.

• 4:22Speaker 05

  Perfect time of year to go to London.

• 4:24Speaker 04

  That's kind of the time I'm always there. But I don't know if I will be there this year for any number of reasons, but here's what I want to say to you. I want to speak it into the universe.

• 4:32Speaker 05

  Let's do this.

• 4:33Speaker 04

  I think The Watch podcast needs to be boots on the ground for this event, one way or another.

• 4:37Speaker 05

  Of course.

• 4:38Speaker 04

  I think we could talk culturally about this game.

• 4:42Speaker 05

  Okay.

• 4:42Speaker 04

  I think that we could, I don't know, the Jacksonville part, maybe we talk about Jason Mendoza from Parks and Recre-- no, I'm sorry, from The Good Place, like that, we could bring TV into it. I'm pretty sure we could wrangle an invite to the industry set. They will be filming the final season then.

• 4:55Speaker 05

  Two in one.

• 4:56Speaker 04

  I think we could do it, or at least I think Chris could do it, because he spoke more consistently positively about the last season than I did. Shout out to the fellas. What's the third thing? What's the third heat that's gonna get us there? And I'm not above asking people to email suggestions or to come up with boondoggles to get us there. What's the email address? I don't have access to this email account.

• 5:15Speaker 05

  TheWatch at Spotify dot com.

• 5:17Speaker 04

  These emails will be read.

• 5:19Speaker 05

  Mm-hmm.

• 5:20Speaker 04

  Not by me.

• 5:20Speaker 05

  No.

• 5:21Speaker 04

  So if you would like to continue, and I say you generally, the insane comments that people like to make about me, you can do that in the email safely.

• 5:29Speaker 05

  Our email inbox is very positive, I will say. We got some really, we got lots of thoughtful stuff.

• 5:35Speaker 04

  But you also, you're the filter.

• 5:37Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 5:38Speaker 04

  It's very nice.

• 5:38Speaker 05

  Well, Chris and I, Chris and I filter.

• 5:40Speaker 04

  You guys protect me.

• 5:41Speaker 05

  One thing I've always been curious about is why, why do we do, why do we play NFL games abroad?

• 5:47Speaker 04

  I think they are attempting to grow the game.

• 5:49Speaker 05

  Okay.

• 5:50Speaker 04

  And during my time, though, the last two years, when I would sort of see sad-faced, hungover slash on their way to getting drunk Jaguars or Titans fans wandering around Fitzrovia, I can't say that I felt like it was making a profound cultural impact, but they do it, and they do it every year, and they've played games in Brazil and Germany and other.

• 6:09Speaker 05

  The Fantasy Football Podcast went to Dublin last year.

• 6:12Speaker 04

  Which camera's on? The Fantasy Football Podcast went to Dublin, so why shouldn't--

• 6:15Speaker 05

  So why, why not us?

• 6:17Speaker 04

  What's more fantasy football than this podcast?

• 6:19Speaker 05

  When's the Pride and Prejudice adaptation going out? Can we make it this like a threefer?

• 6:24Speaker 04

  We need a threefer. We need a third thing.

• 6:26Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 6:27Speaker 04

  So we'll do an event, we'll come to your business. I, I don't--

• 6:31Speaker 05

  I don't know, I don't know.

• 6:32Speaker 04

  I don't even work here, so I will do anything, but let's get there. Let's make that a goal.

• 6:36Speaker 05

  Okay.

• 6:37Speaker 04

  And--

• 6:38Speaker 05

  We're putting it out there now.

• 6:39Speaker 04

  So, okay, so, so I wanna go to the, the game, Chris wants to go to visit industry, and you want to be Pride and Prejudice adjacent.

• 6:46Speaker 05

  Yeah, I'd like to be on the ground, just, you know, assessing.

• 6:49Speaker 04

  So this is the Netflix series.

• 6:51Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 6:51Speaker 04

  We don't have a new release date for that, do we?

• 6:53Speaker 05

  It's supposed to be this year, so I feel good.

• 6:55Speaker 04

  Laced 2026, I think you might be right about this.

• 6:57Speaker 05

  That feels good for an October release for me.

• 7:00Speaker 04

  What are your Pride and Prejudice power rankings?

• 7:02Speaker 05

  Um--

• 7:04Speaker 04

  Like, what's the definitive for you?

• 7:05Speaker 05

  I'm probably the movie.

• 7:06Speaker 04

  The 2005 movie?

• 7:07Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 7:08Speaker 04

  I've said it before, it's the number one draft pick for movie night in my house.

• 7:12Speaker 05

  And I've said it before, your daughters have great taste.

• 7:15Speaker 04

  Great taste, but it's impenetrable because I was like, look, there's a new series coming out. No interest. Absolute no interest. Yeah. And in fact, like, I can't even be like, look, there's your beloved Mr. Darcy. He's starring in The Miniature Wife.

• 7:30Speaker 05

  Well, I think that's fine. Who do you think would have to be in the Pride and Prejudice adaptation for them to be like, yes?

• 7:37Speaker 04

  Sabrina Carpenter.

• 7:38Speaker 05

  Okay.

• 7:39Speaker 04

  Do you think we could squeeze her in there? She's not too tall. Could probably fit her in. Okay.

• 7:43Speaker 05

  Did your daughters go and see The Devil Wears Prada 2?

• 7:46Speaker 04

  They did.

• 7:47Speaker 05

  And?

• 7:48Speaker 04

  I think their review was perfect. Everyone looked great.

• 7:51Speaker 05

  Okay, well, I'm gonna go see it this weekend, so.

• 7:53Speaker 04

  They did not advocate strongly for the plot.

• 7:56Speaker 05

  That's fine.

• 7:57Speaker 04

  But they thought everyone looked great.

• 7:58Speaker 05

  And I mean, really?

• 7:59Speaker 04

  You really understand the assignment. You know what I mean? They get it. The next point of business, you brought this to my attention, is that Netflix, which really is suddenly in the prestige business here, dropped the trailer for this long gestating mini-series adaptation of John Steinbeck's East of Eden. This is notable because, I mean, notable for a number of reasons. One reason was, I really feel like this has been in development for half a decade for numerous different outlets.

• 8:24Speaker 05

  And I feel like there's been multiple East of Eden. Wasn't there just a Jude Law? East of something?

• 8:29Speaker 04

  That, I don't know.

• 8:30Speaker 05

  Hold on.

• 8:31Speaker 04

  Are we in the Steinbeck sense? What makes this interesting, there are many things that are interesting about this. The cast is bananas, and we'll get to them. But Zoe Kazan directed this, wrote and directed this. And famously, her grandfather, Ilya Kazan, Hollywood legend, directed the 1950s film that James Dean starred in.

• 8:49Speaker 05

  And the Jude Law property I was thinking about was just a movie titled Eden.

• 8:53Speaker 04

  Oh.

• 8:54Speaker 05

  So we have an Eden verse.

• 8:55Speaker 04

  Do you think they're related?

• 8:56Speaker 05

  Nope, not at all.

• 8:57Speaker 04

  This one's just slightly to the east.

• 8:59Speaker 05

  A group of disillusioned Europeans settle on a remote uninhabited island in the Galapagos.

• 9:03Speaker 04

  That was the Ron Howard sex movie.

• 9:06Speaker 05

  Right.

• 9:07Speaker 04

  And it did about as well as a Ron Howard sex movie would be expected to do.

• 9:11Speaker 05

  Oh, Sydney Suwini was in this one.

• 9:13Speaker 04

  My favorite television actress. So this, so what do you think of this trailer? This is bananas cast, Florence Pugh, Christopher Abbott, Mike Feist, Hoon Lee, who is the best thing about your friends and neighbors week to week, Kieran Heinz, Martha Plimpton, and official friend of the pod, Tracy Letts.

• 9:30Speaker 05

  Dark. Quite dark.

• 9:32Speaker 04

  Yeah, you feel dark. You have dark feelings?

• 9:34Speaker 05

  The lighting was dark.

• 9:37Speaker 04

  Yeah, like everything these days.

• 9:39Speaker 05

  Um, so I have not read East of Eden. I read other Steinbeck properties in high school.

• 9:47Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 9:48Speaker 05

  But I mean, I love Florence Pugh and I would really follow her anywhere at this point.

• 9:53Speaker 04

  I would say that this is not how I remember the book or the film.

• 9:56Speaker 05

  That's what people are saying online because apparently Florence Pugh's character is basically evil personified and in this they are kind of girl bossing her.

• 10:05Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 10:06Speaker 05

  What is what you said?

• 10:07Speaker 04

  I did say, I did say.

• 10:11Speaker 04

  I mean, first of all, I think it's important if you're going to be redoing something, you should have a different slant and you should have a new angle, a new entry into it. I do think that it's interesting that in order to film a novel set famously in Steinbeck's beloved Northern California setting, they have gone Central Valley, I'm sorry. For me, it's Northern. I just live down here.

• 10:29Speaker 05

  Everything above Ojai for you is Northern.

• 10:31Speaker 04

  Literally, that's really true, but you, you're actually above the Central Valley.

• 10:35Speaker 05

  Yes.

• 10:35Speaker 04

  I'd like to apologize to you and to our future governor Chad Bianco for that slip up. I think they filmed.

• 10:41Speaker 05

  Who's Chad Bianco?

• 10:43Speaker 04

  Isn't he the sheriff who's running for governor?

• 10:45Speaker 05

  There's so many people running for governor.

• 10:47Speaker 04

  Listen, could we do a California politics podcast instead? I'd really like to. I am disgusted. Anyway, they chose to shoot this entire thing quite east of Eden.

• 10:59Speaker 05

  Yes.

• 10:59Speaker 04

  In New Zealand.

• 11:00Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 11:00Speaker 04

  And so when they are looking, when, when Cal and Kathy are looking out over the landscape of America, they are in fact looking out over where the hobbits live. In the Shire.

• 11:11Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 11:13Speaker 04

  But.

• 11:14Speaker 05

  Which I feel like is a bummer because Steinbeck is so, especially that area, Salinas, Lake Valley, Central California, it's so, like, it's basically a character in the books and.

• 11:29Speaker 05

  Would be nice for it to be a character in the show.

• 11:32Speaker 04

  Do you think is the argument that Steinbeck's California no longer exists? That's also Matt Mahan, the mayor of Sacramento's whole campaign argument, I believe. Bring back Steinbeck, so that you have to sort of create it in fantasy and in aggregate? And also within tax breaks?

• 11:47Speaker 05

  Yeah, but I mean, that just like, that trailer, like, nothing about it. Like, you can recreate California in other locations.

• 11:57Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 11:57Speaker 05

  And you've seen it done many a time.

• 11:59Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 12:00Speaker 05

  That trailer, nothing about that trailer screams that area to me. Um, I've made, I, my parents live right above, um, the, above Salinas, like 30 minutes.

• 12:11Speaker 04

  Do they?

• 12:12Speaker 05

  Yeah, so I make that drive like quite frequently.

• 12:15Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 12:15Speaker 05

  Between LA and, uh, like, northern California. Take the 101, it's a lovely drive. Um, yeah, nothing, nothing about that trailer screams.

• 12:27Speaker 04

  Brought that back to you? I am interested in this for a number of reasons, but mainly as Netflix's back to prestige play. It, it's interesting because there's this project, Pride and Prejudice, which we didn't even intend to mention. And then just knowing behind the scenes, like them maneuvering for big literary novels to try to get a hold of those adaptations. That it does seem like a return to what they were doing 10 years ago. It did seem like there was a moment when Netflix was like, why would we even be in this marketplace? We don't need to do prestige.

• 12:56Speaker 05

  Gourmet cheeseburger.

• 12:57Speaker 04

  The gourmet cheeseburger, why do we need to serve steaks?

• 12:59Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 12:59Speaker 04

  Suddenly they're back in the steak business, which made the potential Warner Brothers deal more interesting. Because then they would just be buying the, um, in this case, Peter Lugar. Sorry, I'm losing the steak metaphor, but it seemed like they would be buying the thing that they were trying, the, the space they were trying to get back into with HBO.

• 13:18Speaker 05

  Mm-hmm.

• 13:19Speaker 04

  That didn't happen, so now they're making their own HBO shows. So we'll see. Um, speaking of Warner Brothers, two other small bullet points for you. One, my favorite headline of the day in the trades was Warner Brothers Pam Abdi, half of their, um, record-breaking at the box office film team, emphasizes, quote, "commitment to bringing Looney Tunes back to the screen."

• 13:41Speaker 04

  Who said we can't do things in America anymore? I genuinely need to ask you this, Kai, as our youth correspondent.

• 13:47Speaker 05

  Mm-hmm.

• 13:48Speaker 04

  Does Looney Tunes mean anything to you? Do you care?

• 13:50Speaker 05

  Yeah, I loved Looney Tunes as a child.

• 13:52Speaker 04

  All right, good.

• 13:53Speaker 05

  And I'm sure future generations of children also enjoy some Looney Tunes.

• 13:57Speaker 04

  Well, they won't unless Pam Abdi gets her button gear and brings Daffy Duck back to the big screen.

• 14:02Speaker 05

  What was the Will Forte, uh...

• 14:05Speaker 04

  Yeah, Coyote versus Acme.

• 14:06Speaker 05

  Isn't that, is that not Looney Tunes?

• 14:08Speaker 04

  It is.

• 14:08Speaker 05

  Is that not in the Looney Tunes verse?

• 14:10Speaker 04

  I believe it is in the larger Looney Tunes verse, but wasn't that canceled? And now they're bringing it back?

• 14:15Speaker 05

  But now apparently Pam Abdi's...

• 14:19Speaker 04

  Renewing her commitment?

• 14:20Speaker 05

  There's a red, there's a movie that's already made for you.

• 14:23Speaker 04

  Do you think that this is connected, you know how, um, one of the reasons why the Ellison's were able to do Paramount was that they promised Trump and Brett Ratner they could make, they would make Rush Hour 4? Do you think that like he wants to bring, someone in the administration wants Foghorn Leghorn back on the big screen to like, show us how it's done?

• 14:41Speaker 05

  I would not.

• 14:43Speaker 04

  I wouldn't be surprised.

• 14:44Speaker 05

  Yeah, great.

• 14:45Speaker 04

  Great, great, great news.

• 14:46Speaker 05

  Great.

• 14:47Speaker 04

  This is another thing you could put on the list of things I will be excited to share with my children that they will have no interest in.

• 14:52Speaker 05

  Mm-hmm, okay.

• 14:53Speaker 04

  But, um, I look forward to that. Casting announcement for friend of the pod, Damon Lindelof's new series, which is called The Chain.

• 15:00Speaker 05

  Mm-hmm.

• 15:00Speaker 04

  I believe it is announced as a mini-series. He wrote the pilot with Carly Rae, who worked with him on The Leftovers. And it is based on a novel that has a disturbing premise about child kidnapping.

• 15:12Speaker 05

  Love it.

• 15:13Speaker 04

  And he's cast Jodie Comer.

• 15:14Speaker 05

  I saw that, yeah.

• 15:16Speaker 04

  I have no notes other than to say that's awesome.

• 15:18Speaker 05

  Yeah, I love Jodie Comer.

• 15:20Speaker 04

  Who doesn't love Jodie Comer? Maybe Sandra Oh, but that's only internet scuttlebutt. I don't work here, I can say anything.

• 15:27Speaker 05

  So the premise is that she, her child gets kidnapped.

• 15:31Speaker 04

  Mm-hmm.

• 15:31Speaker 05

  And then to get her child back, she must kidnap another child.

• 15:35Speaker 04

  Oh, that's out there. All right, the book's been published.

• 15:37Speaker 05

  Yeah, I mean, I saw this on Twitter. I feel like that's like a, like, you know...

• 15:40Speaker 04

  This is true.

• 15:41Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 15:41Speaker 04

  This is the premise.

• 15:42Speaker 05

  Um, how do we feel about that for you? Famously, no, don't let a child kidnap.

• 15:48Speaker 04

  Well, how do I feel about it as an entertainment?

• 15:50Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 15:50Speaker 04

  Or how do I feel about it as a premise if I was forced to do it? Let's do one and two.

• 15:55Speaker 05

  It's up to you. It's your podcast today.

• 15:57Speaker 04

  I think it's a people's podcast. I think for number one, I find the idea of Damon taking a really, really grabby, this will move books, this would become a gangbuster, um, Blumhouse horror movie premise.

• 16:11Speaker 05

  Mm-hmm.

• 16:11Speaker 04

  And doing Damon things to it, making it a longer series, maybe making it more psychologically.

• 16:16Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 16:17Speaker 04

  Um, complicated.

• 16:18Speaker 05

  Mm-hmm.

• 16:19Speaker 04

  I love it.

• 16:19Speaker 05

  Great.

• 16:20Speaker 04

  Personally, I think I could do it.

• 16:24Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 16:24Speaker 04

  I think I could, in or- because okay, the idea is in order to get my kid back.

• 16:28Speaker 05

  Uh-huh.

• 16:29Speaker 04

  I have to take someone else's kid? What, so then at the end of this equation.

• 16:33Speaker 05

  Yeah, you just give the person their kid back.

• 16:35Speaker 04

  Well, no, at the end of the equation, do I then have an extra kid? Or do I pay that kid forward to someone else?

• 16:41Speaker 05

  I think you'll have to watch the series.

• 16:42Speaker 04

  Who do I swap the kid with? Because I want to be clear about this, like there, I think there's a lie about parenting.

• 16:47Speaker 05

  Mm-hmm.

• 16:47Speaker 04

  That I need to be the one to dispel on this entertainment slash fantasy football podcast. And the lie is that once you have children, you love all children.

• 16:58Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 16:59Speaker 04

  I like mine.

• 17:00Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 17:00Speaker 04

  There's some other ones I like. You know what you did, Kyle? Maybe some people are like this, once their hearts expand to take in all children, but it's not like when, once you have ki- once you have kids and you hear like a kid screaming on the plane or misbehaving at a restaurant, you then have empathy with the parent.

• 17:17Speaker 05

  Right.

• 17:17Speaker 04

  You can still be annoyed by the kid.

• 17:18Speaker 05

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 17:20Speaker 04

  So if I gotta take one, I'll take one.

• 17:22Speaker 05

  Kids are everywhere these days.

• 17:23Speaker 04

  You can just grab them.

• 17:24Speaker 05

  You can just grab them.

• 17:26Speaker 04

  The parks are overflowing with them.

• 17:28Speaker 05

  I love it. I feel like Jodie Comer is like, has not had a great run recently, so I'm excited.

• 17:34Speaker 04

  Where, where are we at in the Comer-verse?

• 17:35Speaker 05

  I don't like.

• 17:37Speaker 04

  What have we been doing?

• 17:38Speaker 05

  I don't know. Let's pull up the IMDb.

• 17:41Speaker 04

  Hmm.

• 17:42Speaker 05

  I, that's the, and that's the problem is that, um, it's Last Duel, oh, she was great in 20 year, Eight Years Later.

• 17:48Speaker 04

  Yeah, she was good in that.

• 17:49Speaker 05

  You saw that?

• 17:50Speaker 04

  I couldn't make it through it. Don't tell Chris. I did turn it on.

• 17:53Speaker 05

  But she was really good in that, but The Bike Riders was not.

• 17:57Speaker 04

  Oh, my God, remember her accent in The Bike Riders?

• 17:58Speaker 05

  Yeah, that was tough.

• 17:59Speaker 04

  That was a good moment on the internet. Did you watch 28 Years Later?

• 18:02Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 18:02Speaker 04

  Oh, you guys watch scary zombie stuff all the time.

• 18:04Speaker 05

  All the time.

• 18:05Speaker 04

  And do you watch it in the evenings, then you just sail off to bed? Untroubled? That's because you're not spending all your nights worried about who's going to kidnap your kid in exchange for their kid.

• 18:13Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 18:14Speaker 04

  It's just, you can't turn it off.

• 18:17Speaker 04

  Incredible. Wonderful. My last point that I wanted to bring up, and this is something that I think that will continue to be a point of discussion on this podcast, and Chris and I will get into it as these shows turn up. I believe in the last week, we had the announcements of release dates or release areas for the second season of two fairly high-profile shows.

• 18:38Speaker 05

  Okay.

• 18:39Speaker 04

  One was Chris Pratt's The Terminalist, which was an action show.

• 18:43Speaker 05

  I don't remember.

• 18:45Speaker 04

  Did, by all accounts, did quite well for them.

• 18:47Speaker 05

  If you say so.

• 18:48Speaker 04

  Again, that's what they said to me.

• 18:52Speaker 04

  And Disney pluses Ahsoka

• 18:55Speaker 05

  Okay.

• 18:55Speaker 04

  in the Star Wars universe starring-

• 18:56Speaker 05

  That came out, what, a decade ago?

• 18:59Speaker 04

  No, the cartoons did. The point is, Terminalist premiered to great fanfare in the year of our Lord 2022. July 1st, 2022 is when the premiere episode of The Terminalist debuted.

• 19:15Speaker 05

  Okay.

• 19:16Speaker 04

  Season two is now been announced to premiere, I believe, in October of 2026. This is a four-year gap between seasons one and two of a show.

• 19:26Speaker 05

  For a show that, I mean, who watched that?

• 19:28Speaker 04

  Chris. This is why we can talk about it. Well, I mean, this was also part of what appeared to be Amazon Prime's successful strategy of doing pulpy, right-leaning-

• 19:40Speaker 05

  The Jack Ryan-

• 19:41Speaker 04

  Manosphere-type things.

• 19:42Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 19:43Speaker 04

  Reacher.

• 19:43Speaker 05

  Reacher.

• 19:45Speaker 04

  Especially with movie stars. In The Terminalist's defense, there was a spin-off series, prequel series, starring Taylor Kitsch that did premiere last year. So The List was growing over the past few years, but four years is an insane amount of time to do between seasons. Similarly, Ahsoka premiered with my beloved Rosario Dawson in 2023.

• 20:05Speaker 05

  Okay.

• 20:05Speaker 04

  Dave Filoni, the now head of Lucasfilm, said that, first of all, he said that of all the Star Wars characters, Ahsoka, comma, his own creation, comma, is his favorite character, which is a bold choice.

• 20:20Speaker 04

  He announced that season two will be coming in early 27, putting it right in that sweet and entire college career window of four years between seasons. And I guess what I wanted to say was, what are we doing? Like, I understand Chris Pratt's a big actor and has movie commitments. I understand that Chris Pratt, at one point, was a big actor and has a lot of voiceover commitments. I understand that Disney shows require a lot of post-production, although I didn't think they needed this much, since they do a lot of it in front of the volume, which fills in the background as you're filming. It just does not seem to me to be a successful strategy to delay that long between the first and second seasons.

• 21:04Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 21:05Speaker 04

  You know, I mean, we're going to be talking to Eric Kripke soon, and there were delays between seasons of The Boys. But there was a global pandemic and a strike. They still managed to get the show out on time.

• 21:15Speaker 05

  And now that they are able, I'm watching them crank out the pit, literally, like, year after year at the same, like, there's a new season every year.

• 21:26Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 21:26Speaker 05

  I'm just like, so why, why can they do that over there and not do that elsewhere?

• 21:31Speaker 04

  You can make the point, you can make the argument, I won't, but someone could, that these specific shows are in genres that are challenging to reproduce on the old television model. There's a reason we didn't have action stars starring in these types of global action shows every year, back when it was must-see TV on Thursday nights in the 90s or Star Wars on TV. That's harder to do.

• 21:52Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 21:52Speaker 04

  The problem is, like with everything else in this country, we have so radically abandoned the middle, the middle class,

• 21:58Speaker 05

  Right.

• 21:58Speaker 04

  that the glaring delays here really, really stand out.

• 22:02Speaker 05

  Well, and in the case of The Terminalist, why are you making a spinoff to your show before you've even made a second season to your show?

• 22:11Speaker 04

  I don't know. I think you could also say, my understanding is that this has been in the can for a while, and that you could point to institutional changes.

• 22:20Speaker 05

  Ah.

• 22:21Speaker 04

  That Jen Salkey departed Amazon, Peter Friedlander took over the programming slate at Amazon, and maybe took some time to make decisions about windows and releases and what the overall plan was. But- It's a real problem.

• 22:35Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 22:36Speaker 04

  It's a problem that trickled down to like we, you just did, we would do it all the time, too. Point to the pit as the example of what you can do. I worry about that a little bit because the pit perfected the broadcast television show for the modern streaming era. What seems to be the market inefficiency now is the good, ongoing drama. Now, this has been something that's been an efficiency inefficiency for a while. It's not easy to say like, hey, we found a succession. We found Mad Men like that's not hard to do. If it was, we would be living in a very different universe. But I do feel like attention strayed so far from those things that we just lack that backbone to our television in a way that isn't. Obviously, those of us who do a weekly podcast are really feeling it, but I think audiences are feeling it, too.

• 23:21Speaker 05

  Yeah, it's just, we need to get a little bit more serious here.

• 23:25Speaker 04

  We have to get serious. Talk to your camera when you say it. I think it's OK. You have standing here. We have to have to have to get more serious here.

• 23:32Speaker 05

  But I'm happy for Chris that his beloved Terminalist is finally returning.

• 23:37Speaker 04

  He loves it.

• 23:38Speaker 05

  Does he? Did he actually like it?

• 23:40Speaker 04

  I mean, I think that I don't want to put words in his mouth. Yes, first of all, I want to put words in his mouth, but I don't feel qualified here. Chris is a pretty easy sell for shows about guys wearing non branded baseball caps carrying guns. It's, I mean, it's not that complicated. But I was looking at like the 10 year shift in drama series, Emmy nominations. And just to realize the way that event series, genre series and anthology series have just eaten the heart out of what used to be the bread and butter of our television viewing experience 10 years ago. For the purposes of the Emmy conversation, I went to 2015 to do 2025.

• 24:24Speaker 04

  The 2015 Emmy nominees for outstanding drama series were Game of Thrones, big genre show, still managed to make it come out mostly on time. House of Cards, which at that moment was still a year to year show. Down Nabby, year to year show. Better Call Saul, year to year show. Mad Men, the last great year to year ongoing drama. Orange is the New Black, year to year ensemble show. And Homeland, the same. Like, that was what we were used to having.

• 24:53Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 24:53Speaker 04

  And you can argue the merits of each one of those shows, but you understood what they did, what your relationship to them could be, and on and on. So, fast forward 10 years, and the nominees are Andor, one of the greatest shows of the century, but always two seasons and done.

• 25:09Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 25:09Speaker 04

  With a significant gap. Slow Horses, year to year show.

• 25:14Speaker 05

  Hey, and they are a real, they're almost like-

• 25:16Speaker 04

  Clockwork. They have the trailer for the next season at the end.

• 25:19Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 25:19Speaker 04

  But I would argue, A Slow Horse is 10 years ago would not have made it into that category.

• 25:25Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 25:26Speaker 04

  It would be like, a nice thing to enjoy. It would not have been considered the stake.

• 25:31Speaker 05

  The backbone of the drama category.

• 25:33Speaker 04

  The Pit, which we just discussed, deserving. The Diplomat, which I think, quality wise, you may vary on, but I think that there is a, there's delays, but it is a good faith attempt to like, have something going. Severance, see in 2028. White Lotus, not the same show year to year, and not, you know, and also, you can't always count on it schedule wise. Paradise, lots of fun, deserving, I don't know. And The Last of Us, big genre show, couple of years in between. And what's the runway? Like, it's, it's created to end. So, some of this is obviously presaging the conversation I'm gonna have with Eric, which is just like, he's really good at making a show that isn't trying to answer a question, but is just trying to keep it going.

• 26:18Speaker 04

  But it, I don't know. Am I, am I drawing too wide of a net here by pointing out these long season disparities? And then- railing about the Emmys.

• 26:27Speaker 05

  And that's another point, too, is that everything is like eight episodes now.

• 26:33Speaker 05

  And it just seems like somewhere along the way, everything got way more expensive and also way more inefficient, which is not like.

• 26:42Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 26:42Speaker 05

  I don't know, like, and I'm sure it's like a combination of like lasting COVID effects and lasting strike effects, but like, it just seems so confusing to me that it just takes so long to do these things. And also that costs a lot of money. And then also you get the East of Eden trailer and everything's dark.

• 27:02Speaker 05

  And filmed in New Zealand.

• 27:04Speaker 04

  Voice of the people on this one. I think there are a lot of reasons that go into it. And one of them is of course, like budgets, when you, if you have the Apple strategy, which seems to be like, if we can get an Oscar nominee to do it, we'll do it.

• 27:17Speaker 05

  If we can get three Oscar nominees to put in one scene together.

• 27:20Speaker 04

  Exactly. Then we'll renew it. Like Margot's Got Money Troubles, which apparently is an ongoing series now.

• 27:27Speaker 04

  That raises the price. If it's a Star Wars show, if it's a Game of Thrones show, that raises the price and it raises the, um, the post-production time.

• 27:34Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 27:35Speaker 04

  All that's baked into it. I continue to think one of the biggest problems is we skipped a generation in terms of teaching people how to make television.

• 27:44Speaker 05

  Right.

• 27:44Speaker 04

  This, this deeply speaks to some of like the Writers Guild stuff a little bit in the weeds.

• 27:49Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 27:49Speaker 04

  But in terms of.

• 27:50Speaker 05

  Yeah. I mean, I remember that was one of the big discussions, the last round of negotiations was like, let's have, can we have writers back on set?

• 27:56Speaker 04

  On set to learn how to produce so that you don't have to hire people who have never been on set to run shows. And then you ship them to Budapest in control of a hundred million dollar budget and they inevitably fail. And then you have to bring in more people to back them up. And then you have to shut down production to rewrite the scripts. And I'm not necessarily looking at you, Dune prophecy, but it could be any of the many Dunes, comma prophecy out there.

• 28:17Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 28:18Speaker 04

  This is not really sustainable. I think it's really notable that the pit, we're holding up with good reason and celebrating it and the, the guys who, who make it. I'll have a little gray in their beard. And literally, they are the guys who made ER. And they were on the shelf for, John Wells was never on anybody's shelf. But like Scott Gemmell was like, give me a chance, I'll do it again.

• 28:39Speaker 05

  Or you have something like Widows Bay right now, where you have someone who had lots of reps on Parks and Rec. And now

• 28:45Speaker 04

  Katie Dippold.

• 28:45Speaker 05

  It's making a really good show.

• 28:47Speaker 04

  It's a really good example, and I wish I could sit here with you and talk about this week's episode. But I had, I had to watch so many episodes of The Boys to catch up.

• 28:54Speaker 05

  It's okay. I also wish I could sit here with you and talk about this week's episode, but I do.

• 28:59Speaker 04

  Okay, fair. The last point about the ongoing show thing, I think it's worth discussing is when networks, streaming services do stumble on something that is working, they cut it short. Today, this week alone, Netflix announced a fourth and final season for The Night Agent and a fifth and final season for The Lincoln Lawyer. Neither of these are shows that I watch.

• 29:22Speaker 05

  I watched the first season of The Night Agent.

• 29:23Speaker 04

  Did you? Did you like it?

• 29:24Speaker 05

  It was good.

• 29:25Speaker 04

  The phone rings, right?

• 29:26Speaker 05

  Yeah, the phone rings and then he has to go save the girl.

• 29:29Speaker 04

  So it's a horror show. Nothing is worse than the phone ringing.

• 29:32Speaker 05

  It's a, I would say it's a thriller.

• 29:33Speaker 04

  Okay. I, uh, I was gonna say, when is not watching a show ever stopped me? I, what I can tell about these shows is that they are working in the sense that like people enjoy them. They understand what they are. The audience is good and consistent. Production seems to be flowing well enough. They get the shows on the air with regularity in the model that we're talking about. And yet they're ending. And I think that's when we talk about the inexperience on the writers or production side. It's not inexperience on the streamer side. It's just a disparity in goals.

• 30:10Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 30:10Speaker 04

  Netflix reaches the fifth season of something. And even if there's more creative road, or if there's, you know, like in the old days, NBC would be like, this is one problem, one less problem for me to keep something going and to keep people tuning in and guaranteeing advertisers a certain thing.

• 30:29Speaker 04

  Netflix is like, well, now we have five years of the show and we're done.

• 30:32Speaker 05

  And we'll get to sit in our library forever.

• 30:34Speaker 04

  Exactly. It's never leaving.

• 30:35Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 30:36Speaker 04

  They don't have to do any kind of costly renegotiations with cast or crew for second contracts or reflecting the success or whatever that may look like for them. And also, it's this weird brain space that they're allowed to occupy, which is we're not, we can be concerned about our current audience of The Lincoln Lawyer and we feel bad for them. But we are also measuring their sadness and engagement with the untold millions of future viewers of The Lincoln Lawyer who will be in our systems, in our ecosystem, discover a show and be like, sick, five years of it.

• 31:10Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 31:11Speaker 04

  Probably in their algorithms, that's more millions later.

• 31:13Speaker 05

  Yeah, like how many people are waiting for the next season of Lincoln Lawyer?

• 31:16Speaker 04

  Versus how many people might discover it and be excited to find it.

• 31:19Speaker 05

  And be like, oh, great.

• 31:20Speaker 04

  Another reason not to cancel this month, and that's cheaper for them. So, anyway, all of this was this segment of the show that I like to call,

• 31:26Speaker 05

  Everything is bad?

• 31:27Speaker 04

  We're screwed. Everything is bad. But.

• 31:31Speaker 05

  Everything is bad and nothing works anymore.

• 31:34Speaker 03

  This episode is brought 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 that you can actually join in on 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.

• 32:05Speaker 04

  Before we bring in Eric Kripke, Kaia, your silence on Top Chef has just been too much. We need to talk about Top Chef.

• 32:12Speaker 05

  I really enjoy this season.

• 32:14Speaker 04

  Tell me, tell me where you're at with it, and then we could talk specifically about this week's episode. I will call up the specifics.

• 32:20Speaker 05

  I don't know why. I was trying to figure this out last night. I don't know why I'm particularly enjoying this season more than others. I think it's because there's not like a very clear frontrunner, I guess.

• 32:34Speaker 04

  There is, you could argue after this week there is, but I know what you mean. There's not someone who is doing donuts, not literally making donuts.

• 32:40Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 32:41Speaker 04

  Dunking on everyone week after week.

• 32:42Speaker 05

  Yeah, exactly. Like, there's not a Buddha where it's this like, and like, that can be fun to watch where you're like, wow, this guy is just like a master of his craft.

• 32:50Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 32:50Speaker 05

  And like, he's just like. Dominating, but I mean, the key to reality TV competition shows is kind of that you need to not know what's gonna happen next.

• 33:02Speaker 04

  True.

• 33:05Speaker 05

  And also, I like, I feel like there's like Anthony and Lawrence, who are kind of like the two front runners.

• 33:13Speaker 04

  Tier one.

• 33:13Speaker 05

  Tier one, and then everybody else below them is kind of having like a mid-off.

• 33:18Speaker 04

  Let's call it the Sherry zone.

• 33:19Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 33:20Speaker 04

  Sherry might be the most mid-contestant in the last decade of Top Chef.

• 33:24Speaker 05

  Yeah, but like, that's almost, it almost because there's so many mid-contestants, it's almost fine, I guess. I don't know. And then you have like Rhoda, who's just like.

• 33:37Speaker 04

  Very inconsistent.

• 33:38Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 33:39Speaker 04

  Let's say. I think, I think I'm struggling with it, and I'm trying to identify, I'm trying to identify what the major problem of the season is, like, because there's a bunch of stuff that we could list, including like, the clearly reduced budgets that they're dealing with in these last few years.

• 33:53Speaker 05

  They got outside.

• 33:53Speaker 04

  They got outside.

• 33:54Speaker 05

  They got outside.

• 33:54Speaker 04

  The de-emphasis of the quickfire as something that has anything to do with what, again, this week was different. This week did lead directly into the elimination, but broadly speaking, the quickfire is just brand management and cash winning.

• 34:09Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 34:09Speaker 04

  Which is not really related to the larger competition. Maybe this is just like the glorified bubble that I allowed myself to exist in, because this is the only competition show that I watch. It did feel in many, it does feel, it did feel in many years that we were seeing some sort of real-time conversation about what greatness in American cookery might look like.

• 34:30Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 34:30Speaker 04

  Like, when, you know, when Chef Eric shows up with West African ingredients that the show had never brought in before, and I'm like, oh, this is now new, a new line of conversation has entered the chat. Or Buddha's like, absolute technical excellence versus, and I'm not gonna be able to name contestants off the top of my head anymore, but like, versus like.

• 34:48Speaker 05

  I was just googling.

• 34:49Speaker 04

  But like, there were people like, well, what I do is more soulful and homey versus technical brilliance, and what does that look like? And are we entering the era that I think Chris has talked about, like, the Survivor era, where there are people who are students of the game.

• 35:01Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 35:01Speaker 04

  Coming to the show, and that's kind of what Buddha was. He's like, I know how to win this. I know that he cooks at a restaurant in New York, and people enjoy it, but I don't think he's gonna be the face of cuisine. He's the face of competitive cuisine, which is a different thing, and was, you know, maybe not my favorite either, but interesting to watch, the dynamics. The fact that that this week felt so crushing because we lost when, who was by far the most engaging television personality.

• 35:30Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 35:31Speaker 04

  But failed to cook the fish properly in a fish challenge was kind of emblematic of where we're at.

• 35:37Speaker 05

  Well, and lost your your nemesis.

• 35:39Speaker 04

  I've heard that Seeger stands are big in our emails right now.

• 35:42Speaker 05

  Yeah, there's a lot of justice for Seeger.

• 35:44Speaker 04

  How many burners do you think Seeger has right now?

• 35:47Speaker 05

  I mean, he looks like a guy who would have a few.

• 35:49Speaker 04

  A couple, but I feel like that was, I don't remember the last time that happened where I was like, the show is going to be worse off for losing a personality.

• 35:57Speaker 05

  Right, I see what you're saying.

• 35:58Speaker 04

  As opposed to worse off for losing culinary excellence.

• 36:01Speaker 05

  Maybe that is why, maybe that's a component of why I'm enjoying this season more is because I maybe the personalities are outshining the food. Like, I genuinely like, like, most of the people on the show. And like, I think each, I was sad to lose the other, the brother.

• 36:17Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 36:18Speaker 05

  I was really, I've been really enjoying that dynamic.

• 36:21Speaker 04

  Yeah, that was nice.

• 36:22Speaker 05

  Um, but yeah, I mean, I think I would agree that as a whole, the cooking on this season has been poor.

• 36:29Speaker 04

  Not up to snuff. And then I think you notice then, I've said this every week. I just think editorially, they know what they're doing in a way that is confident and good. And the judging panel, those three are phenomenal. And when they bring in old friends, like an emerald or something, it does elevate it. But it feels so small week to week. Like, even when they went outside, you know, uh, to go fishing, the challenge was just like using these small fish that they or their associates managed to catch and serving them to a very small table of people. And it's like, in a way, I mean, maybe in a way, it's representative of the world that we never recovered from COVID because there's an element of the season that feels like it's still a little pandemic-y.

• 37:12Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 37:12Speaker 04

  Like, we can't let that many people in and we can't let them go out.

• 37:15Speaker 05

  They came out of COVID so strong.

• 37:18Speaker 04

  So strong with that global all-star season.

• 37:19Speaker 05

  Yeah, and I wondered what's, if what's happening now is kind of also parallel to what's happening right now in like the concert, like, um, industry where people came out of the pandemic and they were so ready to like be with other people again. And so it led to like a huge surge and like. Tours and like ticket prices and blah, blah, blah. And now people are kind of like, okay, I did it. Like, I was with the people again. And now I can't really justify spending $400 to go see like a mid-level person.

• 37:53Speaker 04

  And Plus, if you're out there, your kid could get snatched by Jodie Comer.

• 37:56Speaker 05

  Exactly.

• 37:57Speaker 04

  You gotta be careful.

• 37:57Speaker 05

  That's what I was thinking about, too.

• 37:58Speaker 04

  I knew you were thinking about that for me.

• 38:00Speaker 05

  But I wondered, too, if it's now with the same thing with the restaurant industry where post-COVID, people were so eager to be out and like at restaurants and trying food. And now that's kind of waned and what we're left with is really, really high prices. And like, it's kind of like, do I need to go spend $200 on a meal? Like, not

• 38:21Speaker 04

  Our podcast, where we just talk about how mid all Los Angeles restaurants are and also how sad our politics are. I don't know if we would do numbers. But like, like, the experience of staring at the ballot we got in the mail and then staring at Postmates and being like, man, we are cooked. Like, I don't want anything on either of these lists right now is a real, real problem.

• 38:43Speaker 05

  Everything is expensive and nothing really works anymore is kind of the general theme.

• 38:47Speaker 04

  100%.

• 38:49Speaker 05

  Um, I have a question for you. Does it still mean something to win Top Chef? If you are a chef, does it still mean, like, does that still carry a lot of weight, do you feel?

• 38:58Speaker 04

  It's a great question. I think broadly speaking, it doesn't in what we might have once thought of as a career. But I think that long ago, the path, the traditional path for restaurateurs and cooks diverged where the first few seasons, the first 10 winners of Top Chef, I think, almost to a person, immediately opened a restaurant with their winnings in their hometown. And some of those restaurants thrived. Some of them, like, we're recording in Spotify, there's a Girl and the Goat, which is Stephanie's restaurant here. A lot of those restaurants closed because most restaurants close. And really, the path open to winners is to become professional media chefs.

• 39:40Speaker 04

  And the migration from the Top Chef universe into the Food Network universe, like, immediately start competing on those shows. Immediately start hosting things over, over there.

• 39:50Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 39:50Speaker 04

  When those, those used to be a much thicker firewall between them, that's vanished.

• 39:56Speaker 04

  Or like Buddha, who immediately went on to the Padma's rival show to compete on that.

• 40:01Speaker 05

  So you just do a circuit now.

• 40:02Speaker 04

  That's what he's, that's what he's good at.

• 40:04Speaker 05

  We also get a lot of emails about how your silence is noted on Padma's cooking show.

• 40:12Speaker 04

  The reason for that does, that's not, that's just like, I don't have time to watch it. And then it was like six weeks in, I'm interested. I mean, she got good cooks to be a part of it. I've heard that the competition level is really good, but that the production for like the first season of a show has been spotty. In terms of like actually executing it.

• 40:31Speaker 04

  I don't know. I mean, it was interesting. So Dwayne got, got kicked off and she was a sparkling personality.

• 40:36Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 40:37Speaker 04

  Two personalities at times. When she asked Jonathan.

• 40:40Speaker 05

  To Dwayne.

• 40:40Speaker 04

  Yeah. When she said to Jonathan, do you want to call your brother? Was low key, one of the most savage things ever said on this show. But she immediately did, went on her Instagram and once the elimination aired and did AMA. And of course, all the questions are about like, would you go on Tournament of Champions on Food Network? Would you come back for an All-Star season? Would you do that? And she's like, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. I think that the brand is the front of house person that she did more than.

• 41:10Speaker 05

  I see. Yeah. Cause her cooking was never particularly.

• 41:15Speaker 04

  I mean, it seems like it's what I would, I would want to eat those things.

• 41:18Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 41:18Speaker 04

  But either you, to do that, you either move to a smaller town in America and open the restaurant that does that and devote yourself to that life. Perhaps Widows Bay needs some Vietnamese flavors. Or you become the public face of something.

• 41:32Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 41:32Speaker 04

  And that's also not something that every chef can do.

• 41:36Speaker 04

  I mean, I do think it's interesting that like, like Brandon is in, I think he's in Montana. Like some of these, wrote us in Hawaii, that they're pulling chefs who are able to make their life and their restaurants work outside of the major spotlight cities.

• 41:49Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 41:51Speaker 04

  But what it means, I don't know. I mean, I don't watch any other competition shows. So do you feel like, is Top Chef still meaningful and entertaining? If it is just another Food Network Tournament of Champions where a bunch of interesting people run the race? You know, it definitely always succeeded. You know, in terms of the reception, because it was like, well, Tom Colicchio is here, and we get Danielle Boulud to drop in, and this is like the gold standard.

• 42:18Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 42:19Speaker 04

  Does it matter?

• 42:19Speaker 05

  Is your pool of contestants getting smaller and smaller because less people are incentivized? Like, your best chefs are like, I don't really need to do that anymore. It doesn't really mean a whole lot. Then that might be the reason why, season after season, like, we're getting less of an interesting cast.

• 42:37Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 42:38Speaker 05

  I mean, my theory with reality TV shows is that they're almost always best at the beginning, when you're not especially, and this is like less for like, reality competition shows, and more for just like, a Housewives type of deal. But like, Love is Blind really faces this, where like, it was really great at the beginning, when it was like, lesser known, and so people, in theory, were more on the show to actually find love. And now, people are just on the show because they want to like, launch their influencer career.

• 43:06Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 43:07Speaker 05

  And it just gets all a little too meta, and like, a little too boring.

• 43:11Speaker 04

  Yeah, people go on Top Chef, they know what the score is, at this point. And it's, you know, every so often, you'll get a sous chef who's like, my boss was this champion, and now I want to come on and do the same thing, and like, they're sponsoring me almost, to have my chance to do it, but otherwise. There's also these just changing trends in dining, where like, 10 or 15 years ago, like, Voltaggio Brothers would be like, or Richard Blaze would be like, the assignment is to make a cheesecake. I will reinvent cheese and cake. And that was a certain type of energy, and a certain type of show. Trends in dining are definitely more like, how much homier can we make this? How many ways can we do a smash burger? How many ways can we do fried chicken?

• 43:50Speaker 05

  How many ways can we do an elevated Chili's?

• 43:53Speaker 04

  Exactly, and that, or all restaurants want, and they should, want to be Houston's, or Hillstone Group, like, which I love, but you kind of want to see the imagination.

• 44:01Speaker 05

  You will not find me bashing.

• 44:02Speaker 04

  It's as good as it gets, but I don't know if I want to watch that in a competitive setting.

• 44:06Speaker 05

  That gets boring.

• 44:06Speaker 04

  And so, bringing it full circle to this season, like, what Lawrence did this week, I would, I would pay money, any night, to eat what he made. Like, the classic Chinese-style steamed fish with rice inside, like, that is exactly, that is my favorite thing to eat, as Chris loves to mock me for.

• 44:24Speaker 05

  You like a steamed fish?

• 44:25Speaker 04

  I love a delicate fish over rice, but... It is reflective of where the show is at, that he seems like on a glide path to certainly the finals by just executing something very, very, very well.

• 44:36Speaker 05

  Right.

• 44:37Speaker 04

  Um, no shame in that, but.

• 44:39Speaker 05

  Was it Rhoda who just gave them like the fried fish over like a pureed?

• 44:44Speaker 04

  Yeah, she cooked it perfectly in that.

• 44:46Speaker 05

  And so, yeah, at like whatever week we're at, is that?

• 44:50Speaker 04

  It's right. That's a great point. That's a great point. And is that a fault of the challenges and the ingredients and the budgets? Or is that just where they're at, where they are like scrambling to stay alive? Where if Dwayne had just cooked the fish, it was uncooked, not only would she be safe, she would have been in the top three because she did something that is from her perspective, from her culture, everybody liked, and it would have been done well. What was exceptional?

• 45:16Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 45:17Speaker 04

  Nothing really.

• 45:18Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 45:19Speaker 04

  Damn.

• 45:20Speaker 05

  So where do you think they're gonna go next?

• 45:22Speaker 04

  What, like what, place in America?

• 45:23Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 45:24Speaker 04

  Whoever gives them a tax break. Like, there's always someone on Reddit who's just like, I have looked in the city records of Charlotte and I see that they got 1.3 million dollars to film there. So that's also why they will likely never, I mean, you know, we'll see if I'm wrong, and maybe Gail can talk about this if she comes back on, but I don't think they will ever be back in LA, New York, Chicago. People are like, will they, obviously, I would like this, why don't they go to Philadelphia, which has truly great restaurants right now? And the answer is Philadelphia does not have a, from what I understand, there's, there's no line item budget for attracting. They do have, I do believe they have some Hollywood tax breaks and credits, but I think I read that they do not pay productions outright to come as part of like civic boosterism.

• 46:07Speaker 05

  Bummer.

• 46:08Speaker 04

  I know. They're too busy just letting people park in the middle of the street and, you know, sell their tickets to Knicks fans. Um, it's a bummer.

• 46:16Speaker 05

  I will say as a whole, I want to read, I am really enjoying this season, and I love Top Chef.

• 46:21Speaker 04

  Oh, yeah, but it wouldn't be a podcast.

• 46:23Speaker 05

  I know.

• 46:24Speaker 04

  If we didn't pick Knicks.

• 46:25Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 46:26Speaker 04

  Um, Kaya, thank you for sitting in with me.

• 46:27Speaker 05

  Of course.

• 46:28Speaker 04

  Always a pleasure. Um.

• 46:29Speaker 05

  Wow, we went right up to the wire.

• 46:31Speaker 04

  Right up to the wire. And we didn't even get to book talk. So we'll have to circle back to book talk.

• 46:35Speaker 05

  Great.

• 46:36Speaker 04

  Um, did you read Play World by Adam Ross?

• 46:37Speaker 05

  No.

• 46:38Speaker 04

  Okay. Well, maybe we, maybe you can. Well, Chris made me read it, so it's good.

• 46:44Speaker 05

  I know. That's what all the dudes want to read right now.

• 46:47Speaker 04

  It's true. All the dudes? Man, I gotta zag. All right, give me, we'll go offline. You'll give me a book that the ladies like. We'll get right back to it with my interview with Eric Kripke.

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• 48:11Speaker 03

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• 48:41Speaker 04

  I am thrilled to be joined once again by the showrunner, the developer, the lead voice behind Amazon Prime series, The Boys, Eric Kripke. Welcome back to the watch. Thanks for having me. Very happy to have you. Because we are talking at a fraught, not vaught, time. We have just watched the penultimate episode of the series, the seventh episode of season five. So we will, at some point, talk about the events of that episode and the season and look ahead to the finale, which I have not watched. But I kind of wanted to, instead of starting at the end, start at the beginning, both to avoid spoilers, but also I'm really, really curious about this journey. So if you don't mind, I want to like make you send your mind all the way back.

• 49:24Speaker 04

  I realized this morning that The Boys was announced as a TV show in April of 2016. Correct. A decade ago. That's 10 years of your life. And the world has changed enormously since then, both politically, culturally, and specifically to our conversation within the industry. It was announced as a Cinemax original, I believe, at the time. Could you talk a little bit about what drew you to the project then, what you thought was cool, interesting, and relevant 10 years ago, considering how much all of that must have changed since? Yeah, I came into it, first and foremost, as a super fan of Garth Ennis, the author of the comic.

• 50:07Speaker 04

  And For My Money, Preacher is one of the two or three best comics, period. Did you also have the experience I did, which is inappropriately reading it as a teenager and having your mind blown, but in a way that you could never explain to anyone around you? I did, except I was like 22. But yes, close.

• 50:32Speaker 04

  But it's fun. Like, what's great about his comics is like, you really can't read them in public. You know, you really have to shoulder it in case you get arrested for indecency. Which is great socially for 17 and 22-year-olds. Especially when you're on a, especially when you're on a plane and it's your job to read. That issue of The Boys and you're sitting next to a kid. Well, Eric, you've done that to me because I've had to catch up on The Boys while traveling. And so my laptop is open with unspeakable things. So. Yeah, and now, and now you can't go 500 yards within a school. So.

• 51:08Speaker 04

  Um, I was really into just Garth Ennis and I, so I found The Boys as a comic and, you know, read it voraciously. Um, and then, um, I was talking to a producer, friend of mine, Ori Marmar, um, who had the rights and I just, I just jumped all over it. Um, around the same time Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg were coming on board as well. So we all met and just kind of came on together. And, um, we started with, um, it would really be fun to take the piss out of celebrities. Right.

• 51:49Speaker 04

  You know, um, Seth's, uh, pitch, uh, when we first went around town was, um, what if Iron Man was Robert Downey Jr.?

• 52:05Speaker 04

  Good pitch. And, and then I, and then I would pitch the story, but, um, so it started with like, almost in a proto The Studio way, which is Seth and Evan know an incredible amount of insider knowledge about celebrities and the industry and how celebrities are packaged. And we're going to put all of that into a superhero show and make the world's most realistic superhero show. But it's interesting because at the time, like, taking the piss out of celebrities, sort of knocking superhero culture down a peg, just as Marvel was ascendant. That, that was enough, I would imagine, to get you some interest and maybe a green light.

• 52:45Speaker 04

  At a certain point in your development process, uh, reality began to outpace fiction, I think, in ways that probably, uh, surprised all of you. Was there a moment that you point to as, as the, as like an inflection point where things that you may have thought were extreme or wild or fun in the comic or in your writer's room were suddenly? Becoming plausible and you may have to rethink some of them.

• 53:09Speaker 03

  There's more of like a couple of small moments. I mean, you know, we took it out and pitched it before Trump was elected, for example. And when we first started talking about it, he was the insane dark horse candidate that no one took seriously, if you can go all the way back to that. And so it was a few things. It was, I had dinner with Garth Ennis and I was picking his brain about what he liked about, like what inspired him to make The Boys. And he, and he said something, and again, this was, this was before the election. And

• 53:51Speaker 03

  he said, you know, he's like, I was thinking about how terrible some celebrities behave, but ultimately they don't have that much impact on the real world. You know, he said, but what if they had the impact of politicians? So what if you crisscrossed celebrities with authoritarians? What would happen? At the time, honestly, it washed right over me. I was, I was like, wow, that's, that's a kooky sci-fi concept, my man.

• 54:24Speaker 04

  Are we ordering desserts?

• 54:25Speaker 03

  Yeah, exactly. And then, you know, and then obviously Trump was elected around when we were initially developing, you know, I may have written the pilot, but we were, you know, starting to put a room together and really develop what's this show. And that sort of came back to me and I was looking at the characters and, and I said, yeah, they really are, you know, forward facing celebrities in reality.

• 54:59Speaker 03

  TV stars with the souls of authoritarians and fascists.

• 55:07Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 55:08Speaker 03

  And suddenly that was happening in the world. And, and, you know, I said to one or two of the other writers, I said, did we accidentally stumble into the metaphor of the moment? Um, and we sort of felt like we were talking about the current world we were living in, maybe more than any other show. And most importantly, we were way ahead of everybody else.

• 55:37Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 55:37Speaker 03

  Right? Like, like people were only then just starting to take out pitches and stuff. And we were heading into pre-production.

• 55:45Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 55:46Speaker 03

  You know, so I'm like, we can get first to market, which is part of the game too, right? And we can get first to market with maybe one of the most current shows on television. And wouldn't that be amazing if our superhero show could also be a satirical metaphor for not just the celebrity world we're living in, but the political world?

• 56:10Speaker 04

  I'm also curious if you can think back the major differences. Again, this is from the 10 year window of like, okay, you're, you're talking to Seth and, and Evan, and you're pitching something to Cinemax versus you are bringing this ship to a close for Amazon Prime in a very different world. In terms of what this, I'm wondering if you have, if you have an ability at this moment to reflect on what the show became versus what you initially thought it could be, your own expectations, what has surprised you? And its role within like, what it means to make a, this is very broad, but I'm specifically like, what it means to make a show feel so significantly different 10 years on, post COVID, post strikes, post so much.

• 56:49Speaker 03

  I think this show frankly succeeded far beyond my wildest dreams. You know,

• 57:03Speaker 04

  The years on Supernatural, you know, so I've been on a show that has, you know, gone years and years. And granted, I left it after it's somewhere in between seasons five and six, but.

• 57:17Speaker 04

  We should note that it ran another 10 years. Yeah, then it ran another 10 years. Crazy. But we always said the whole time, like, it sure would be nice to be a hit instead of a cult hit. Um, and the boys, just to be on a big fat hit. And, and it captured the zeitgeist and it captured politicians' attention. And Barack Obama is telling people to watch it. And it was incredibly gratifying because it was the first thing I'd ever done. That was genuinely me.

• 57:58Speaker 04

  Um, because I was, you know, I had network standards and practices for anything I did for Supernatural. But to be able to completely do my sense of humor, my influences, which is like half Sam Raimi and half the movie network. And, um, you know, what I find important and interesting and funny. And to be able to do it all without any restrictions and then to have it hit. You know, it's like a very lovely feeling when you like really put yourself out there. Uh, is weirdly the most personal thing I've done.

• 58:40Speaker 04

  And, and for it to have this reaction is, is mind blowing. I mean, it's, it's never gonna happen again, but, um, but it was a nice ride. Well, first of all, we don't know that we, as, as your show has proved, we don't know a lot of things about what's to come. Um, I, one of the things that I admired and always. Commented on and complimented year to year was what it felt like watching The Boys was for all of the forward facing, you know, as relevant as looking at the news ticker stuff that you were playing with, like as the fissile material, the show had old bones in the sense of like, these characters are on this story, these characters are on this other story. We will tell a story this episode that will build into a larger jigsaw puzzle,

• 59:23Speaker 04

  et cetera, et cetera. And I love that about the show. And I wondered if you could, thinking of that sort of how to, how to, how to make the trains run on time element of TV that you learned in the trenches of your previous jobs, how do you approach a final season? Because I think inevitably, when you end a serialized show, you choose the answer and you choose the question that it was asking the whole time. It's no longer about all the fun things that you could explore. It has to be about one thing. How did you decide to make that turn into the final, into the final leg of the race? What was interesting to you to settle on as it was time to wrap it up?

• 1:00:04Speaker 03

  Well, what was really challenging and interesting was we had spent the first, you know, four seasons talking about pointing out everything that was messed up in the world.

• 1:00:20Speaker 04

  Right.

• 1:00:20Speaker 03

  Nothing but naming problems. We were naming problems for years. And then finally, in the fifth season, we all look at each other and we're like, we actually have to say a solution. So you, you started having conversations we had never had before, which is like, you know, where do you find hope in the world? How do you think we make things better? How do we get that in the show without being deadly earnest? Right? Because it's a show that sort of lives on its, I wouldn't call cynicism, but it sort of has this

• 1:00:59Speaker 04

  Irreverent sarcastic vibes. You can't suddenly become, you know, Jimmy Stewart, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington. You have to couch it in its in its tone. So how do you get all that across was a big thematic concern for us?

• 1:01:16Speaker 04

  And then how do you properly service 15 characters? In a way that feels satisfying and emotional.

• 1:01:31Speaker 04

  And that was, you know, our attack. You know, look, finales are hard. People, what I've come to really very much realize as we've been airing it is everyone has a very distinct idea of what they want the finale to be. Always, yeah. And when you're not doing the thing that they had in their, the vibe that they had in their mind, they're very vocal. And, and, but, but I approached it and the writers approached it of like,

• 1:02:11Speaker 04

  it's, we've always put the characters first, like we're just going to keep doing what we're doing in that we're going to track, you know, through every episode and then those, as you said, through every episode and then puzzle pieces into the season. We're going to track these characters to their conclusion. And if we get that right, then everything else is gravy. I think it's such an interesting point and I want to drill down on it. So this is, I'm going to jump into some spoilers for the season through episode seven on this, but specifically when you're talking about what, what, what fans want and the way fans engage with the show and the way audiences

• 1:02:53Speaker 04

  broadly engage with the show. I think it's interesting to like, let's carve out like what happens with Kamiko in episode seven, which is like, you can look at it in terms of like, The plot of trying to expose her to radiation to give her a power that might kill Homelander, that's not something that was seeded like that emerged in this episode. But if you watch it as the A, the A plot or the A side of the record that is about the end of her relationship with Frenchie, then it becomes something quite different. And so I think it's interesting to consider the way an audience who is gaming out a season and gaming out character and plot might bump up against something that I would imagine, not to put words in your mouth, and I'd like to hear your perspective on it, you were building from the other side of that wall.

• 1:03:35Speaker 03

  A few things. I mean, one is, you know, obviously, we were building towards spoiler, Frenchie's death. And so we wanted Kamiko to be, you know, we wanted to talk about this episode as if Kamiko's, we were trying to put in all the, the clues and breadcrumbs that Kamiko was gonna die by the end of the episode, to try to take a little bit of the attention on Frenchie. I think with frankly, middling success, I think, I think, I think once Frenchie starts talking about his future.

• 1:04:09Speaker 04

  I was gonna say, it was a McBain Simpsons moment when he's like, and we can adopt a dog. The three kids, sure, but.

• 1:04:14Speaker 03

  Yeah. Yeah. When Scoey is gonna have buy the boat called the Live Forever.

• 1:04:22Speaker 04

  Exactly.

• 1:04:23Speaker 03

  Right. No, for sure. But, but, you know, there's also, there's also something like, you're watching this slow motion car crash and you know that it can't be averted. And so we wanted to do that. We actually went back, because we always do, like, one big value of streaming, I'm sure you know it on the shows you work on, is most of them are written before you shoot. And so you could really go back to episodes, you know, once you really have a better handle of how the ending is gonna work, you can really go back and seed them in. So, you know, as early as I think, episode four, Butcher is having Witness Soldier Boy.

• 1:05:07Speaker 04

  A deep power that guy in the wall and you see that his wheels are turning. He's watching the soldier boy video in episode five. He's carrying all this weird equipment into the back and, and he says, me and French, she are working on something because proper planning and preparation. You can start seeding in all these things that they're actually in the background of the show. They've been doing this all along.

• 1:05:32Speaker 04

  And so that was valuable. But yeah, to me, the moment is about the end of the episode. You're, you're just, you're building to ripping those two apart.

• 1:05:46Speaker 04

  And, and really showing that if there's going to be any victory, it's got to come with terrible sacrifice. There's no way to get too granular on this answer because I think our audience is interested in what goes on in, in writers rooms generally. I wondered if you could talk about the process, especially for this final season of like addition versus subtraction. And what I mean by that is I wondered if you had a whiteboard where you wrote every single dream thing that you, you and your team hoped to get on the screen, whether it's bringing back PJ Byrne or killing Seth Rogen or giving finally the dog vomit POV that, you know, the audience had been demanding. Versus all the things you have to winnow away to, as you said, service 12, 15 characters.

• 1:06:29Speaker 04

  So I, I don't know if it's, it's worth talking about just in terms of like the whiteboards themselves or looking at a character. If it's easier for you, like looking at Huey or something like all the things you want for someone versus how much you have to take away and trust that, like in the Coco Chanel line, less is more. Well, I mean, a lot of it came, it's a good question and a lot of it comes out of the first five, six weeks of the room.

• 1:06:53Speaker 04

  Cause that's when we're really more than anything, talking about the overview of the characters. And I think the thing we were most.

• 1:07:03Speaker 03

  Clear on was like the last 10 minutes of the finale.

• 1:07:11Speaker 03

  You know, after the big fight and explosion, we sort of knew where we wanted every character to end up.

• 1:07:22Speaker 03

  So we have, you know, columns on the whiteboards for every character. And, and, you know, call it beats one through 10 or whatever that stretch over the eight episodes. Sometimes it's more, sometimes it's less. And we had the last beat of all of them.

• 1:07:41Speaker 03

  And so then it became, all right, well, what's the first beat? What, what do we think is in the middle? How do we make it feel so that they're moving and growing and turning to get to this ending? That we want to get to.

• 1:08:01Speaker 03

  And then whatever didn't serve us.

• 1:08:05Speaker 03

  That usually that was a good clue that it had to, it had to go away. I mean, we throw in jokes and moments and satire and our usual nonsense. But the spines were always looking at what they needed to go through to hit the beats that we needed to hit. Like there's a, a written on the board for episode seven was, um, we need to remind Huey and remind the audience that Butcher will murder anyone who gets in his way, on his way to his ultimate goal and to beware.

• 1:08:49Speaker 03

  You'll see in episode eight that that becomes an important piece of information. So, you know, they're all like built of a piece. The other thing we did, and, um, because I heard anecdotally that this is what Breaking Bad did. And I liked the idea is we had our writer's assistant go through every single loose end. Every single character that was alive, every single storyline that we left on the floor. And they had an entire board filled with it.

• 1:09:21Speaker 03

  And so it's sort of a good buffet, right? When you're looking for, what's the story that we want to play? Or what's a character? We're like, well, let's go to the board. Is there something we can pay off that we set up seasons ago? And then we'll look like geniuses because we did that. And so that's where like bringing out Eagle the Archer again. And, and, you know,

• 1:09:43Speaker 04

  Langston Street.

• 1:09:44Speaker 03

  Yeah, like Adam Bork and, and, um, you know, all those things came out of, uh, just having like a menu up that we could, uh, we could play with.

• 1:09:58Speaker 04

  Internally, what is the reaction like in the writer's room? When someone suggests a, uh, gold Christ like statue of Homelander versus two weeks ago in your writer's group chat? When someone sees the gold Christ like statue of Donald Trump that everyone is prostrating in front of? That, that seems like a full circle moment.

• 1:10:16Speaker 03

  It's not a good feeling. Like no one, no one is sending each other the high five emoji.

• 1:10:22Speaker 04

  Got it. Yeah.

• 1:10:23Speaker 03

  Yeah, it, it's only like, this is really creepy. And, and what people have to remember is we wrote it two years ago. Right? We wrote it before, uh, uh, he won the second, his second term. So we're trying to come up with, here's what's really scary and unsettling. I think we weren't even reacting to

• 1:10:47Speaker 04

  Right.

• 1:10:48Speaker 03

  the shit that Trump pulls like we had in previous seasons. That was not what we were studying. We were studying countries that had authoritarian creep and what that looks like in its early stages. You know, that golden statue is a Saddam Hussein thing. That wasn't, that's where we got it from. You know, and, and going into sanctuary cities and, and, you know, starting to claim yourself as there by divine right. And, and, and we were, if anything, we were really looking at history because the truth is, um, and, and I think some

• 1:11:31Speaker 03

  Fans I've seen are expecting like, oh, it should have been this apocalyptic, you know, battle like deep into World War Two or something and and that's just one, we can't afford that. But two,

• 1:11:45Speaker 03

  that's not the story I wanted to tell. I wanted to tell the story that like the fascist creep to we're building camps and we're moving people into camps. What's scary about it is it looks like the world you're in. There's no moment where the switch flips and Thanos is there and suddenly it's some big, you know, apocalyptic fight. It's your world with groceries and and reality shows and soap operas and and the people in charge saying, oh, this is absolutely the patriotic right thing to do. You know, and so I wanted to show that world. But, you know, I wanted to show not, you know,

• 1:12:29Speaker 03

  Berlin 1944. I wanted to show Berlin 1938. You know, and and so you, I can't tell you how unsettling it is that when every one of these things come true and it's based on something we found in Eastern Europe or Germany or one of the banana republics.

• 1:12:51Speaker 03

  Because they're all warning signs.

• 1:12:53Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:12:54Speaker 03

  You know, and and so when everyone's like laughing like, oh, my God, they did it. I'm like, no, you guys, like, you feel a little bit like the dude at the end of Invasion of the Body Snatchers. Like, you're running up and down the street and you're like, no, these are warning signs. These are not good, funny things. These are bad, bad, bad things. I'm as powerless as anybody. I think if anything, the show has demonstrated an unbelievable ability to not change anything.

• 1:13:22Speaker 04

  What a legacy.

• 1:13:23Speaker 03

  Right?

• 1:13:24Speaker 04

  Exactly. We can't talk about the gold statue without talking about the man and the actor who inspired it because as a longtime holder of Anthony Starstock, as one of like the world's biggest Banshee fans, I knew that this guy could do anything, but I even I didn't know he could do this. And I, I wonder what the experience has been like writing for an actor who almost, well, I think is deeply underappreciated in this role because people just think that's what he's like, or that's what he's doing, but he is capable of pushing it. He finds new layers to this very, very complicated flawed monster, week to week. He's astounding in the role. And if there's any, if there's any Television Academy listeners,

• 1:14:07Speaker 04

  like, please give this guy an Emmy. Like, I don't need any for me, but give Anthony Starr an Emmy for Christ's sakes. The thing that will convince them is the dog POV sex dream where he offers his ass to the dog. I feel like if you can get someone who's for your consideration to consider that part of him. Well, if nothing else, we could put up that clip as he's going up to accept the award. Absolutely. I mean, what more does this man have to do to earn your respect? But to answer your question, it's an incredibly collaborative process where we'll

• 1:14:43Speaker 04

  write what we, you know, need this story to be. And then I have a lot of, you know, really in-depth conversations with Ant where we go over every line. And I completely welcome it, you know, like, I actually love that process. When somebody is as locked into the character as he is, like, he never says, like, you know, the cliched actor things of like, well, why don't I do the cool thing? Or why don't I have more screen time? He's only like, you know, I'm really trying to prove to my dad that I'm a real man.

• 1:15:29Speaker 04

  So maybe when the president offers me a glass of milk, I get really mad and puffed up and I ask for a Manhattan instead. Like, that's the type of conversation. And that'll come, that came from him. Yeah. You know? And I'm like, that's amazing. We're definitely going to do that. And, and so, and then he'll say something. I'm like, well, I don't actually think that's where we want it to go, or this is going there, or maybe that's too far. And, and we'll just go back and forth. And, and I'll end up rewriting there live as he and I are just talking about the psychology of the character. And, and so then he gets really locked in about, it

• 1:16:14Speaker 04

  also helps him understand the character beats one to one to one. So when he gets on set, he knows exactly where he's moving through a scene, which he really needs to know. I mean, that's something that he likes to be prepared. It's so subtle. I was watching Singing in the Rain again with my daughters and I was watching Gene Kelly in the beginning and I was like, oh my God, there's some of this in Anthony's performance. The bar we're saying dignity, always dignity and the lights are blinded. And like, he, he's pulling on so much to play a character that in the wrong hands could be so one note. It's amazing. In the spirit of, we were saying, like, where is hope in this universe? The one thing that I was noticing, and I, I was curious your

• 1:16:56Speaker 04

  thoughts about it, was this season, as much as anything else, has seemingly been about the limits of fear as a cudgel, which is another thing that I think might be, this is a more positive thing that you could send around in the group chat, where there's like a whole article in the New York Times about how some European leaders aren't saying how high anymore when our president tells them to jump, and how small that is, but how the effect it can have on bullies. And we saw it in A-Train or Frenchie just not being scared of him, to his face. Now, it didn't work out well for them. Did work out well for Paul Reiser, which, which I think was great because you can't, you can't kill Paul Reiser. You're not gonna kill. Maybe Homelander loves mad about you. But, but, but I did wonder if you could speak on that a little bit as a theme.

• 1:17:41Speaker 04

  Yeah, there's, there's a couple in there, which is one, um, the fact that if you take away his power, um, and if you take away the power of a lot of autocrats, um, they've got real glass jaws, you know, real thin-skinned, insecure, um, narcissistic, ego-driven, like they're like, take away their power and they're the most pathetic kid in your history class. Um, and, and, and we all make this sort of pact of like,

• 1:18:23Speaker 04

  well, I guess they're all in power, but it doesn't necessarily have to be that way, you know? And I think that's a point we're making with Homelander, and I think you'll really, no spoilers, but really be driven home in episode eight, which his characters keep saying to him, you know, soldier boy, A train, they keep saying to him like, you're nothing. Yeah. Um, and that's a point we're making. The other thing is, you know, this thing that, you know, where he's, there's an emperor's, you know, new clothes factor to this, where for the first time, his people are saying like, oh shit, this guy's really crazy. Yeah.

• 1:19:05Speaker 04

  And so what do we do? And, and most of them acquiesce. Um, but the point is, there is a point with which most autocrats eventually go too far. You know, the, the, you know, the famous McCarthy, like at Long Lasser, have you no dignity? There's a moment with which the fever breaks. And they're exposed, yeah. And you're exposed and the crowd is like, oh, this person is insane. And that's another. Thematic that we're trying to head for, which has precedent in history. And it's hopeful. It's a little wishful thinking, maybe.

• 1:19:49Speaker 04

  I do want to end with a thought about the finale, but before we do, I did want to point out the other artful, if not downright acrobatic thing that you guys have done this season is you are setting up the prequel series, which I believe is, is it 27 likely to? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Early or first half of 27. Vought Rising. And I've never, maybe this has been done before, but I've never seen an example of a show introducing a character at the end of their story, knowing that we have a lot of beginning of the story. I mean, I guess broadly speaking, that's Saul Goodman on, but that was not the intent. Whereas Bombsite shows up at the, I would imagine,

• 1:20:29Speaker 04

  if not the end, close to the end of his adventure. And there's a lot of road to come in the new series in which he is a regular. How did you balance, how did you do that balancing act? A balancing act is exactly right. How do you do enough that you can touch on it, but not so much that you feel like it's homework? Or you feel like it's just a commercial? Where it really came from, honestly, was we had this notion of this V1 MacGuffin and we knew Soldier Boy was going to be a character this season. And just like, well, why is he

• 1:21:08Speaker 04

  a mortal? And why is Stormfront a mortal? And what is it about, you know, whatever they had, right? And, and, and so, once you come up with V1, we didn't start it with like, we gotta get Bombsite in there, guys. We gotta set up our thing. It's just more like, Paul Grellong, who runs that show, his room is down the hall, you know? And so, we're hearing in our room what's coming out of that room. And we're like excited by it, you know? And so, and we got to hear what he was doing with Bombsite, this character, and it was all very cool. And so, when the question comes up in our room of like, well, who ultimately

• 1:21:50Speaker 04

  has the V1? You know, is it just some rando old hero that you never will see again? Or should it be one of those characters? Because those characters are so badass. That's how it kind of evolved. It was pretty organic. There wasn't like a lot of.

• 1:22:10Speaker 03

  Craven, you know, commercialism in there. It came from a spot of it's a full universe and we have these pieces. And so if if we're able to use them, why not?

• 1:22:23Speaker 04

  Without spoilers, what would you like to set up for the finale? Like, what would you hope people are excited about? What you hope they will take away from it? Anything that you'd like to to give to the adoring public in the days before they learn everything?

• 1:22:39Speaker 03

  Right. I would say I hope they like it. I would say most confrontations that they're hoping for happen.

• 1:22:55Speaker 03

  You know, we really did the exercise of like, what does the audience want in this finale? And let's make sure we give it to them and don't do that rug pull thing, which is like, it's more artful to not give you the thing you're counting on.

• 1:23:10Speaker 04

  People love that.

• 1:23:11Speaker 03

  Yeah, yeah, like, I just like, give them the thing that they want. So the things happen that I think they will want to have happen, hopefully in some interesting and surprising ways.

• 1:23:23Speaker 03

  And I want them to, you know, walk away feeling like what we've been saying throughout, which is

• 1:23:37Speaker 03

  hope is hard and it's difficult to to make the world a better place. And it comes with incredible setbacks and it comes with lots of failure and it and it comes with a lot of sacrifice. But if everyone just tries to do it a little bit every day, then we have a chance to save the world.

• 1:24:02Speaker 04

  I think that's beautiful. That's that's better than the legacy. What was the previous legacy you had, which is I hope they like it? I think that's that's a stronger act out.

• 1:24:10Speaker 03

  Okay, I'm gonna go with this.

• 1:24:11Speaker 04

  That's my note. Last thing, a week ago, you had a number of celebrities, clearly fans of the show, some executive producers of the show, guest star. All of them had the privilege of having their bodies ripped apart by a super speedster literally running through them with just the most. What is the Foley you use like to for the exploding body sound? It's really resonant.

• 1:24:31Speaker 03

  It's it's a lot of stakes getting ripped.

• 1:24:36Speaker 03

  In two.

• 1:24:37Speaker 04

  There you go. Okay.

• 1:24:38Speaker 03

  Um, and I think there's some smashed melons in there as well.

• 1:24:42Speaker 04

  There's a little frisson of Gallagher that I notice each time.

• 1:24:47Speaker 04

  Okay, so they all got that, that, that privilege, that honor on screen. Eric Kripke, the developer, the showrunner of the show. If you did your Hitchcock moment, maybe you did, I haven't seen the finale yet. What would your preferred gruesome explosive destructive death be? Because truly, if you want a second legacy, the grossest deaths may be ever on television.

• 1:25:09Speaker 03

  I'll happily take that.

• 1:25:13Speaker 03

  You know what death I always really enjoyed because it really creeps me out? You know that moment when someone is surrounded by zombies? And the zombies start ripping out their intestines and eating them while the person is still alive?

• 1:25:29Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:25:30Speaker 03

  That's what I would want.

• 1:25:31Speaker 04

  You'd want that moment of like awareness.

• 1:25:33Speaker 03

  Yeah, like where you see that it's happening and your lower intestines are being pulled out, but you're not dead yet. And that feels like the type of movie death I would want.

• 1:25:45Speaker 04

  It's not like.

• 1:25:46Speaker 03

  I want to be super clear.

• 1:25:47Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:25:47Speaker 03

  I don't want that death in reality.

• 1:25:51Speaker 04

  But I feel like you were projecting a little bit with Seth Rogen, who has half of that, is aware that his body is ripped up. And then someone brings up the pickle movie he made. So I wonder if, can I just, can I hat on a hat? You are attacked by zombies, you see them eating your appendix and your whole body. And then one leans over and says Supernatural season three was kind of mid.

• 1:26:10Speaker 03

  Like, I enjoy that. I think, no, I think that's the, I think that's the bow on the whole thing.

• 1:26:14Speaker 04

  Perfect. As a perfect bow as I can come up with. Eric, thank you so much for your time. Congratulations on all five seasons of The Boys. And we'll look forward to the spin off and maybe we'll get another chance to talk.

• 1:26:23Speaker 03

  Uh, thank you. This was a lot of fun.

• 1:26:33Speaker 01

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