Drinking In Apple Cider Vinegar

Dave: [0:15] This is the Extra Extra Hot Great Podcast, episode 339 for the February 8th, 2025 weekend. I am Special Green Rock, David T. Cole, and I'm here with mistletoe therapist, Sarah D. Bunting. Sarah: [0:36] Pucker up. Dave: [0:37] And actual migraine sufferer, Tara Ariano. Tara: [0:40] We're not all liars. Dave: [0:49] I've got this whore of a headache. Tara: [0:53] Welcome to extra extra hot great for another weekend thank you so much for your support welcome new members if you're brand new to the patreon after my call out on the main show this week we're thrilled to have you here we are talking about apple cider vinegar in which mel nope i did it just like the intro not mel gibson bell gibson played by caitlin deaver is an Australian wellness influencer who beat brain cancer with natural remedies and built an empire telling her millions of fans how they could do the same, except maybe she never had cancer and she's not only a grifter, but one who stole her whole shtick from an actual cancer patient. Samantha Strauss adapted the series from the nonfiction book The Woman Who Fooled the World by Bo Donnelly and Nick Toscano. The six-episode season dropped on Netflix February 6th, but we did not get screeners so we probably won't get too deeply into its run let's do the chen check-in sarah should our listeners watch apple cider vinegar qualified yes dave. Dave: [2:01] Not my type of show, but based on how much Tara enjoys learning about strangers' lies and then the consequences thereof, I will say probably will work if that is your jam. Tara: [2:13] Yep. Dave nailed me exactly. I got to the end of it and was like, well, this is only average, but I'm definitely going to watch all of it. See, also inventing Anna. So yes, this is for me. It may not be for you if it's not even on your radar. You already know that. Dave: [2:28] I have one note that's not really about the show, but it was in the show, and I'm sure it was just footage they got yanked off Pond 5 because it's pictures of all the healthy stuff that her company offers at the start while they're doing the exposition run. And one of the things they show is somebody making a fruit smoothie in a blender, and they just put the whole strawberry in, stems and all. Don't do that. Take the time. Tara: [2:54] Yeah. Dave: [2:54] Take the top off, then you put them in the blender. Nobody wants to eat those little weird fuzzy strawberry leaves in their smoothie. I mean, for that alone, this person should be going to jail. Sarah: [3:04] Dave, maybe you need a Bell Gibson branded blender that really liquefies all of the fuzzy little leaves and then you won't have that problem. Dave: [3:13] Sidebar to my sidebar. Remember just a scant few months ago, we were still in the long tail of a blender you can buy that works off your USB port and you can take it with you after you blend blenders? Totally gone now. I've never even seen a whiff of them since. They got liquidated and they're out of our lives finally. So that's fun. Sarah: [3:33] Oh, I have one. Tara: [3:35] Do you use it? Sarah: [3:36] I mean, I have used it. Dave: [3:38] Those are the celebrity biography books. They're always on super heavy discount at the, you know, oh, the sign fell in his own words. 200% off. Okay. Anyways, sidetrack over and then the sidetrack to the sidetrack over. You may proceed talking about the show. Tara: [3:56] Okay. Well, I know you don't have a ton to say about it. So I'm going to have my questions for you up top. And they are also sidetracky. Dave: [4:03] Are they about smoothies? Tara: [4:05] No. Dave: [4:05] I'm out. Tara: [4:06] I'm going to say your time with the Goop Labs TV show. Remember that? It did not really take in terms of your wellness journey. I doubt it. So neither the subject matter here nor the true crime genre is really your thing. But I did go back and confirm that when Belle's coworkers throw her a little baby shower at the office. They serve mud cake. Dave: [4:24] Yeah. Tara: [4:25] Like they have at every single office party in Fisk. So how does it feel to know you're prepared not just to attend a celebration in Australia, but potentially to throw one? Because all it takes, it seems like, is buy a present, buy a mud cake, you're done. Dave: [4:38] They're simple people. They're all former criminals. I'm just glad they can actually put a cake together. Really the only thing I have to say about this beyond mud cake, which honestly, though, So, you know, I say ingest, but it looked like a pretty good cake. I'm not really into chocolate cake, but it looked good. So good on them. Way to go, Australia. You did something right once. Yeah. I don't know why I'm begging on Australia. Tara: [5:03] Seriously, I don't either. Sarah: [5:05] Don't either. Jesus. Dave: [5:07] I don't know. I'm a little goofy right now. Okay, anyways, my big problem with this show is just that I find the lives and the trappings of influencers extremely boring. Like, it's not my scene. I look down my glasses at them, being snooty McCole. And then the presentation of online influencers are always, you know, that rapid fire. Here's a whole bunch of emojis kind of stuff we've all seen before. And it just like, it tires me out. It makes me want to go down for a nap. Tara: [5:40] Well, and also what this one had the opportunity to do was hook you with talk of apple cider vinegar because you're a big fan of vinegar. Dave: [5:48] Big fan of vinegar. Tara: [5:48] We have apple cider vinegar in the house. Dave: [5:51] Sounds stupid, but I am a big fan of vinegar. Tara: [5:53] I know. No, and the first episode doesn't even get to like what the apple cider vinegar has to do with this story. I mean, presumably it's some kind of fish oily fake treatment, but they don't even get to that in the first episode. Dave: [6:05] You know what I'm loving in 2024 and 2025? The ascendancy of dill pickle as the accent flavor of the moment. Tara: [6:12] Yeah. Dave: [6:13] Because it's very vinegary and I love dill pickle flavored whatever. Frank's hot sauce with dill pickle flavoring in it. Fantastic. Tara: [6:20] Yeah. Dave: [6:20] There is a new crunchy Cheetos out there. That's flaming hot dill pickle. Oh, I've yet to find it, but I really want to get it. These are the things I'm excited about. Tara: [6:28] Yeah, I mean, my parents are coming this weekend. I'm sure we'll go to Alamo at least five times during their visit. So you can look forward to having the dill pickle buttered popcorn at Alamo. Sarah: [6:38] Oh, God. Dave: [6:39] The challenge they have when your main characters live through the internet is just making that interesting in your screenplay. Yeah. Like, how much do you show on the internet? How much do you take creative liberties to real life and eyes, you know, place that moment outside of the browser, you know, outside of the apps on your mobile device that I feel like is hard to do. And I'm not really 100 percent how they did it here. I felt there's like, you know, some moments there where it didn't seem right. But that's not exactly, I think, what people are in here for. People are here for people being caught in their big lies and just falling deeper and deeper out of Fargo. Tara: [7:19] Yes. All right, sit back. Now I'm going to talk to Sarah. This was obviously a complex story. The premiere was, I thought, structured to give the viewer a grounding as quickly as possible. What did you think about that, Sarah? Sarah: [7:32] I thought it was built really well. Caitlin Deaver is like all over this genre. And so I'm always excited to see her and feel that it's a sign of quality. I'm not all that familiar with this particular story, but where my qualified yes comes in is that some people are capital H here for any wellness scam, like online guru shit. Like there's a bunch of circles and in that van and like as the shifting overlaps, like my esteemed colleague and co-editrix-in-chief at Best Evidence, Eve Beatty, is absolutely going to inject all the episodes of this into her veins and do a review at Best Evidence. I am very psyched to read it. My issue is more like this isn't necessarily my jam in terms of subgenre. So I don't know if I'm going to finish it because I liked the first episode a lot, but why wasn't this a feature? I'm not sure that the story is that complicated. Tara: [8:37] I mean, it seems to have a lot of personnel and a lot of twists. I guess we'll find out at the end, or rather I will, because no one else is probably going to watch it. I could just let you know. Sarah: [8:45] Right. Tara: [8:46] So after that opening montage that Dave referred to, one of the first things that we hear is that Belle Gibson was not paid for her story for this project to be made, which I don't think I've seen handled that way in a show like this before. You probably have. How did it strike you here? Sarah: [9:01] Never seen that before either that I can remember. Maybe I'm just like not watching the right stuff. That could also be an Australian journoethics thing. I did think that that was a clever, like if that was something that they had to incorporate and they didn't want to use a chyron, that I thought that was cleverly done. And I thought mostly her occasional like address to camera and kind of not spiking the frame, but that often a shot was composed so that she's speaking to someone else in the scene, but she's looking at you, the viewer, and the way that that sort of is a commentary on well-fluencing and the frame of social media and how it like lies and says a lot of things at once that it doesn't want you to hear. I thought that was clever. It's well done. Tara: [9:54] Yeah. I'll be interested to see if that's a trend that continues. It does feel like something where as people sort of get more savvy about true crime and more into like the ethics of it and the propaganda aspects of it and all this stuff. I'm not telling you anything you don't know. I'm speaking to the listener. You know all this stuff. But like that that might be a differentiator going forward where it's something that a viewer would want to know about like, OK, where is my ethical compromise in this? Oh, the person that they're talking about didn't cash a check for this? Great. I mean, I think that's the law in the U.S. anyway, but it's not necessarily something everyone knows and might make a difference in someone watching something or not. Sarah: [10:35] It is a trend that you're seeing in some properties recently, like expanding on that annoying visual trope where they do a wide shot from the side of the talking head interview with all the cables on the floor and shit like that, which is like, okay, we understand how TV is made, but how true crime is made, that they're leaving all the tails and tags on the tapestry and letting you look at it being made from the back. Right. That could get old fast, because that too is going to turn into a trope. But here, I think it's well positioned, because the fact is that everyone in this story is kind of a twat. Tara: [11:17] Yeah. Sarah: [11:18] Like, are we all just like rooting against people in differing degrees? Or is there actually a hero here? Tara: [11:26] Well, speaking of which, about halfway through, we meet Mila, who's played by Alicia Debnam Carey from The Walking Dead. And she is unrelated. She's just another person. She doesn't know Belle at the start of her story, but she finds out that she has sarcoma in her arm and is told that she has to have it amputated because it's like it spreads so much. There's so many tumors. They can't just take them out individually. And so she decides to fucking do her own research and comes in and is like but what about mistletoe therapy like sarah mentioned up top and their doctor's like okay your other option is you die is that what you want to do yeah like what. Sarah: [12:06] About my butt i don't know i mean. Tara: [12:09] Yes yeah this was the part that worried me because i feel like they and i don't again i don't know anything about the story and truly i'm never going to read this book either so all i will ever know about it is what's in the show but they're definitely they portray her oncologist his name is dr shu the guy who's like well your other option is to die when when he's pushing back in this meeting that where he's introducing her entire care team and she's like but i found this thing and what if we tried that her parents are with her and when he's trying to explain how serious this is he's talking to her dad and so i'm like i'm worried about where this is going because it seems like they're leaning to She did find an alternative therapy and it did work. And it's because the male medical blah, blah, blah, didn't listen to a female patient. And it's like, I'm worried. I'm concerned about what side of this the show is going to come down on. Because at this point, it seems not to be too sure. Sarah: [13:07] Yeah, I think it's... What it's probably saying is, like, if you don't understand how people get taken in by a, I don't even know, fucking root beer cleanse, which, now that I say that, it sounds delicious. I would give myself some root beer. Mmm. For me. Sarah: [13:26] But that it's because medical professionals are using terms that you don't understand they're talking to your dad instead of you they're being presumptuous or curt or whatever like you're not really seeing that with the medical professionals that we see here but they just sort of assume that you're on the same page with them even though they like they have training in different pages So I think their take is like, yes, this is obnoxious and, you know, artificial-ish, but you see how someone would be radicalized about their own care if someone is talking about taking, you know, your dominant hand and just talking past you while they're doing it. I think that that's the idea. And that they're at the same time saying when women don't feel seen and they feel like they don't register, this is what turns Belle into the Joker is that no one turns up for her cupcakes in the park baby shower thing. And so she goes online and makes up a bunch of lies and gets positive affirmations about her health troubles. Sarah: [14:39] And it's like, these are two sides of the same coin. How much is ignoring women at fault for stories like this? Like, I don't know where the show is going to come down on that, but they're stitching them together and putting them on like the two sides of the coin. Tara: [14:57] Right. Sarah: [14:58] Is interesting. Mm-hmm. Tara: [15:00] I mean, they do cross paths. They do come to know each other, and we find that out. But it explains why a certain type of woman is going to go looking to do her own research and then fall off the deep end and then at the end look up and be like, oh, I'm in QAnon now and not understand that it's just because she had bad allergies. You know what I mean? Ultimately, the internet was a mistake, and I think we can all agree on that. Sarah: [15:26] Yeah it was we had a good run bye. Dave: [15:37] You know what's having a great run it's the theme to ask ehg yep best everybody loves it nobody hates it this is it, All right, Ask EHG is here. That means we have to figure out last week's Ask, Ask EHG with our judge, Tara. Tara: [16:08] Hello. Before we get to the listener answers, Sarah, I believe you have one. Dave: [16:13] For what? Tara: [16:14] To the question. I forgot that part. I'll take that over. Dave: [16:18] Just do something random, Sarah. See what happens. Apple pie my pants. Good answer. Sarah: [16:23] The aristocrats. Tara: [16:25] First, the question. What is the biggest change of opinion you've ever had about a show Lara wants to know? Sarah: [16:32] Well, Lara and Tara, thank you for asking. This is definitely recency bias, but let's go with it. It's The Americans for me. When the first two episodes aired, I watched them. I was repelled by every character. I just was having felicity object permanence problems big time. Tara: [16:52] Yeah. Sarah: [16:52] I just hated everyone except Philip and bailed. my husband and I are now at the end of season two. It is really good. It's such a wild thing to be here in early February, 2025 experiencing this show. That's like some sympathy for the FBI. Like what FBI? Is that still a thing we have? Anyway, we still definitely have hate odds for characters to the point where every time Paige comes on screen, Dan has to clap a hand over my house. I hate her so much. Anyway, they're less irrational, these hate-ons, but yeah, definitely, definitely a huge change in esteem, and I'm glad that I went back to it after all. Tara: [17:35] The timing of this is very funny because our friend Bobby Finger over on the Who Weekly podcast just finished his watch of it after resisting for years and years and years and years. Sarah: [17:44] Oh, all right. Tara: [17:46] Yeah, you will have a lot to talk about if you wish. All right, Now to the listeners, Anne with an E writes, mine was Yellow Jackets. I was so all in on like the harrowing joys and evil of girlhood and a natural descent into darkness and cannibalism. And I tried to hang in through the first episodes of season two and I couldn't. I might binge it once it's over if I hear it all came together, but I really didn't want any supernatural or mystery box element. Me neither. Sarah: [18:13] Me too. Oh God. Amen with an E. Tara: [18:17] Mm-hmm. Erica writes, for me, The X-Files. My sister was watching it one night in its original run, and I walked into the living room during the episode Humbug. Now, Humbug is a great episode, one of my favorites, but for my 13-year-old ass, a Darren Morgan comedy ep is not the best place to start. Put a pin in that. You're going to hear more of that sort of thing in 340. Erica goes on. A couple of months later, I saw the episode Squeeze during Weekend Marathon, and about, I don't know, six hours later, I looked up and was like, hey, have y'all heard of the X-Files and my parents and sister were like, uh, yes, we've been watching this show for two years now. Sarah: [18:55] Oh, I love that. Tara: [18:56] A very recent one from Jesse. With the finale, 9-1-1 Lone Star takes its place in the list of shows that started strong and got worse and worse before ending with an absolute crap finale. I'm so behind on this show, I can't wait to find out what that possibly means. But our winner this week is Risa Chet, who writes, I used to be all in on the people's court. I'd watch it day in, day out, years of small claims, contract disputes, gift versus loan cases, and illegal apartments. until a case where an artist got permission to put up one of his artworks in a common area of an apartment building where it was later defaced. To my shock, the judge thought the art was ugly and basically deserved it and found in favor of the defacer. I was so mad, I never watched the show again. Frankly, the whole thing makes me furious all over again years later. I love that righteous anger. I had to choose this. I can imagine how incensed I would be if I were watching that episode. Great answer. Did not expect to see the people score it in the mix. So thank you, Research Act. Sarah: [20:01] Lovely. Dave: [20:02] All right. DM me on Discord to claim your prize. I will need your mailing address. Let's get to your questions for us this week. First one comes from LBBB. Have we reached oversaturation for Joel McHale? We've tackled Joel McHale relatively recently in the past. So I will just say quickly on the whole podcast behalf, not as long as Will Arnett lives. Darren Glass. No, seriously. How can I tell the night agent and the recruit apart? Sarah, help him up. Sarah: [20:34] Ah, you're just going to have to look them both up every fucking time like I did. Dave. Tara: [20:39] Wrong. Dave: [20:39] The night agent prefers their tea with milk and two lumps of sugar while the recruit prefers their tea with two lumps of sugar and milk. Tara. Tara: [20:47] I made you a mnemonic. You're welcome. If his hair is dark and cute, you are watching the recruit if he's by the phone and fair it's night agent i declare you're welcome. Dave: [21:01] That's really good thanks d3 f42 netflix announced they are remaking little house on the prairie who do you think should be cast and they ask if possible please include nelly in your recasting all right this is for me so pa jason statham, Ma, Salma Hayek The kids, dogs from Puppy Bowl And Nellie is Didi from Dexter's Lab And the house is Pizza Roof House from Breaking Bad Wow. Tara: [21:31] Okay Well, I actually took it seriously I took it seriously Okay, alright, fine Jason Statham. Dave: [21:38] You know, like getting revenge for everything that goes wrong Yeah. Tara: [21:41] Being cockney on the prairie for no reason that's ever explained, like in all of his movies Yeah, ma ingles is going to be maya mitchell from the fosters and good trouble for pa we're looking at tyler hooklin the only superman who seems to have escaped the superman curse the one from superman and lois other than the show got canceled but you know as nels olsen nelly's dad we're going to do david dust malchin as most recently seen in late night with the devil among other many other things harriet olsen the town bitch everyone hates and dudek absolutely right yeah i'm afraid that is empirically correct as isaiah edwards the weird anti-social mountain man that comes into town sometimes robert eiler who guess what is the same age as that actor when the show started i looked all of them up and confirmed and i'm not going to try and cast all the ingalls kids It's because I'm up on kids, actors now. The only exception I'm going to do is Nellie at D3F42's request. Nellie's going to be played this time by Ryan Kira Armstrong. I know she was a sweetie when she played Fern in Skeleton Crew recently, but she also played a vampire kid in a season of American Horror Story. She was a real shit. So I think she is up to the challenge of this casting. Sarah. Sarah: [23:02] Yeah, the kids. I was like, whatever. So that's just the Powerpuff Girls. Except for Nellie, who is played by Amanda Seyfried. Yes, I know she's 39. I don't care. The Monpa Ingalls and the Olsens are Matthew Rhys and Kerry Russell and Noah Emmerich and Susan Meister. Tara: [23:21] Yes. Sarah: [23:22] Yes, I understand. That makes no sense. I don't care. And then as grown up, Laura and Almanzo, I have Sabrina Carpenter and Barry Keegan. Yes, I know they broke up. No, I don't care. Albert will be played by an actual log. Dave: [23:37] Suli has our next question. Now that CBS has the show Watson, in which there are doc-tectives, what two other genres should be hybridized? So in that case, it's medical and crime, so we got doc-tectives. So what else are we talking here, Tara? Tara: [23:52] I want to see a therapy show about couples who are in the process of a home renovation project. So it doesn't have to be Orna from Couples Therapy, although I think she would be perfectly suited for it. But, you know, the home shows just focus on the. Tara: [24:06] Home parts and not the parts where you're screaming at each other. You wish the house would burn down with you in it because getting that done is very stressful. And I'm sure people have a lot to say about it and could probably use the help. Dave. Dave: [24:20] All right, so my genre is called Makeover and Over, and it's a home makeover show that features time travel. Sarah? Sarah: [24:29] Mine is True Swim, so true crime documentaries, but animated a la Tartakovsky shows or Space Ghost Coast to Coast. But it's a podcast, and the guests are like Amanda Knox, who is fully in her fuck you, I can so era and would totally do it, I bet. Dave: [24:49] That common side effects actually covers a lot of that ground. Tara: [24:53] It's true. Dave: [24:55] You should probably watch it. Michelle TB with the Jonas Brothers X-mas movie announcement. What other band would you like to make a scripted holiday movie? I think B-52s would fit the bill here. Tara: [25:06] Oh, that's a great answer. Dave: [25:08] Oh, it's Kris Kringle. Sarah. Sarah: [25:13] The Nightmare Before Christmas 2, No Cure for Christmas, in which the band The Cure is struggling to make it to a Christmas Eve show and ends up getting a ride for Robert Smith's great uncle Nick. Dave: [25:26] Uh-oh, holiday mix-up. Sarah: [25:29] Uh-huh. Tara: [25:31] Well, naturally, my mind went to my favorite band of all time, Pentatonix, and then I remembered they did that last year. Just kidding. I don't like Pentatonix. They did do a Netflix movie, though. Dave: [25:41] Is that one of those groups that has 36 people? Tara: [25:43] No, it has a normal number of people, but they're acapella. Dave: [25:46] Oh, barf. Okay. Tara: [25:47] I believe there's five. Sarah: [25:48] Hence Pentatonix. Yeah. Dave: [25:51] Try some instruments. Tara: [25:55] Instead, I'm going to pitch the remaining two living Beatles as Christmas Angels and hope they make it all the way from now until December, because they are old. Dave: [26:05] Uh-oh, bad luck for John and George. We are now out of the B-52 zone. You may return. Tara: [26:14] We'll see. Dave: [26:14] Milsnack, besides Tyra, who is rooting for you, Tara? Tara: [26:18] The spirit of Mr. Rogers is rooting for me, even though I never liked his show, because he knows that and he doesn't care. That's why Mr. Rogers is Mr. Rogers, including as a ghost. Sarah? Sarah: [26:28] Tom Branson of Downton Abbey. Tara: [26:31] Dave? Dave: [26:32] Steven Root. Melissa, what part of your life feels like a storyline into TV shows, Sarah? Sarah: [26:38] Uh well the last few months trying to coordinate with various rescue organizations to do foster cat things has felt like a subplot on high maintenance that got cut but my real answer is the bookshop which occasionally when i am flat on the ground communing with a dust bunny and trying to see into the back of a shelf i'm like is this unaired sherlock footage or what this is not a complaint just saying Dave. Dave: [27:05] So this feels like something from a 70s sitcom. Our part Basset Hound, we think, part Pit, Sandy McTire, can't decide whether she wants to sleep under the covers or on my head and sort of keeps on going back and forth between those two. Feels like a very 70s sitcom moment. So that's the storyline I think that they could take from my life. Tara? Tara: [27:27] Mine is also about Sandy, and it is my personal evolution from a dog neutral person into one who sometimes carries Sandy around like a human baby in my arms. Dave: [27:38] You should explain what she does when you have to work on the couch. Tara: [27:41] Oh, when I have to work on the couch, if I have my, you know, my laptop out, usually it's, you know, my lap and then a pillow and then the computer. And she will come along either side and then just like stick her snoot under the pillow until I lift it up and then she gets in my lap. And then I put the pillow on top of her and the computer on top of the pillow And everyone is perfectly happy. She will sit like that for hours. Dave: [28:04] Yeah, she's developed this I want to be under things trait in the past couple months and it's very, very cute. Tara: [28:09] Well, it is congruent with her breed that, you know, she likes to burrow. Dave: [28:13] Wrightwood, what is your Mount Rushmore of comedic TV actresses? I will admit that at first I did five. I'm like, wait a minute. That doesn't feel right. You only need four, not five. Tara: [28:24] That's right. Dave: [28:25] I'm going to put Tina Fey up there, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Carol Burnett and Tara I'm going to put Betty White up there after watching Mary Tyler Moore these many months sorry. Tara: [28:34] Tara that's fine I almost put her on mine too and that I didn't I did also choose Julia Louis-Dreyfus though as well as Jack A Megan Mullally and Molly Shannon Sarah. Sarah: [28:45] Bea Arthur, Paula Pell, Jessica Walter, and Julia Louis-Dreyfus. Tara: [28:52] Wow. Dave: [28:53] Good for her. Tara: [28:54] Good for her. Yep. Dave: [28:56] All right. Sarah: [28:56] Good for all of us. Dave: [28:57] Open your ears. This is the Ask Ask EHG question for you guys to answer on Discord in the Ask Ask EHG channel. It comes from Almanzo Was a Creep. Necessary background for this question. At 4 a.m. on January 31st, I woke up with the sweats and severe stomach pain. By 10 o'clock, I was again completely horizontal in my bed, approximately 10 pounds lighter. I turned on your January 31st episode thinking some light banter about TV would distract me from the situation at hand. For the record, I made it through your discussion of both Kraft dinner and tuna and appropriate spice levels for foods. And then came Tara's tiny canon submission. Sarah: [29:39] Which was the illness one from Hardy Down. Dave: [29:42] So for my question, which episode of television hit way too close to home for you personally? That is your question and answer, dear folks. So go to that channel, plop your answer there. We'll be back in a future episode with the judgment and the giving of the prizes. Dave: [30:01] Oh, that tiny little backwards music means it's time for the Tiny Nonak, and presenting is Tara. Tara: [30:08] So 30 Rock is one of our cartoonier live-action TV shows, and Slapstick plays a bigger part in it than you might remember, from a hallucinating Liz making out with a plant because she thinks it's Jon Bon Jovi, to Lutz falling through the drop ceiling onto a table loaded with lunch from multiple restaurants. Dave: [30:25] Blimpies! Tara: [30:26] In the series finale, I'm sure I can and will come up with submissions from the show for the slapstick tiny canon in the future. But today I'm here to make a pitch for a 30 rock moment to be inducted into the slapstick tiny no knack. In season three, episode 20 titled The Natural Order, the central conflict revolves around Liz's frustration that Tracy is always late and unprepared. He tries to get the moral high ground by saying she infantilizes him because she is racist. She counters that if he wants her to treat him the same way she does all her other employees, she can. Tomorrow she will send a regular car, not a tourist bus shaped like a duck, and she expects him to be there at 10 a.m. and know his lines. Tara: [31:09] To her shock, the next day he is on time, prepared, gives his colleagues useful notes, and calls for the union break. Tara: [31:16] Liz starts to apologize for their clash the day before, but Tracy gathers everyone to say she has actually taught him that everyone should be treated the same, regardless of race or sex. Liz absolutely agrees. And then the clip. I feel parched from being so professional. Could I trouble you for some water? Yeah. Tara: [32:46] All right, let's take it from the top. Okay, I know you can't see it. There's a clip in the show notes of the moment, but you can hear how long Liz struggles with the bottle. You can hear the water splashing all over the floor. And when we rewatched this episode recently, it infuriated me anew because before we graduated to the tier of fridges that have filtered cold water dispensers, brag, we were a water cooler household. And before the innovation of adding a little plug that keeps the water in when you put on a new bottle on the cooler, which was definitely a feature on water cooler bottles like this at the time this episode aired, unlike the one that is in the episode, I had to learn how to do it, which is you turn the bottleneck down on the edge of the cooler, you peel off the cap, you drop it in position as the water starts spilling out of the neck that you have already placed above the reservoir. It's a little tricky the first time. We know Liz isn't a woman in STEM who would think through the physics of this operation before she attempted it. But even so, when you actually watch the clip, you can see how they basically have to make her look like her hands don't work to miss the cooler as many times as she does, resulting in a nearly empty bottle by the time she has secured it, the rest having spilled, as I said, on the floor and herself. And I realized this is a joke about jokes about women being incompetent. And as someone who, like Liz, is physically weak and uncoordinated and thus feels attacked by it, it still gives me Liz-style nerd rage. Tara: [34:13] Give weak and uncoordinated women credit for being able to complete this very normal everyday task. And if you're not going to do that, make the woman's incompetence look more believable. I hope you agree and that you will induct this tiny complaint into the tiny no-neck. Dave: [34:30] Thank you, Tara. I think the good analogy for the level of incompetence at play that they have to start from is she's basically somebody in one of those TV commercials at two o'clock. Like, there's gotta be a better way. It's like that, even though there is a better way in the technologies already in the water bottle. Unless that water bottle has been sitting in the studio for, I'm going to guess, 12 years by this point. Tara: [34:54] That sounds right. Dave: [34:55] I lived in L.A. It was the last time I think we paid for bottled water like that. And during that time is when we ended up getting the one with the plug in it. So this is technology that everybody's adopted by then. So this water bottle thing shouldn't even exist, frankly, in this. But then they make her so dumb and she can't sell it physically. I know this sounds stupid to talk about this, but this is what we do in this podcast. But it really is like she can't pull off being that useless. Yes. It's just not in the way she's physically interacting with the water bottle. You can tell where she's taking a deliberate step back for no reason. Tara: [35:33] She's like swinging it. Dave: [35:34] The physics don't make sense. Yeah. Like they're trying to play it like the water bottle is so heavy that it's throwing her back into the scene and then front and to and fro like she's on a deck of a ship at a storm. But it does not work. You can tell it's all manufactured, which makes it very frustrating. It's like seeing, it's like the real fourth wall they're breaking instead of like the comedic one. Like, oh, okay, you actually can't sell this and I'm seeing it happen. Yeah. And that's what makes it so infuriating because it's a really smart, dumb show. And this is exactly the kind of thing they usually excel at selling. Yes. But no sale here. Tara: [36:10] Mm-hmm. Dave: [36:10] Sarah. Sarah: [36:11] I mean, at first, it was like, oh, it me, the first couple times I had to change the water cooler at Kingkiller Studios, which because I was the COO of an organization that was, you know, three people, and I'm. Strong and tall, but deeply uncoordinated. Even with the technology, it could be a challenge. So at first it was sympathetic. But I think the problem here, I'm sure that there's a name or a term for this. And if there's not, we should coin one. But humor either has to be extremely realistic and recognizable or extremely over-the-top surreal and unrecognizable. This is in whatever the opposite of the sweet spot is, the sour spot. It's too much to be believable, but not enough to be funny anyway. This is such a bougie thing to say, but as a homeowner, seeing water sloshing all over a floor that is not immediately then cleaned up, it raises my heart rate. I can't deal with it. I didn't like this scene at all. Bug it. Dave: [37:21] All right, let's make this official. So I'm going to say yes to this one being in the Nonac. Sarah, what say you? Sarah: [37:27] I concur. Yes to the Nonac. Dave: [37:30] All right. That means Liz changing the water cooler bottle from 30 Rock. You are hereby inducted into the extra hot, great, tiny slapstick Nonac. Dave: [37:40] Americans love a winner and will not tolerate a loser. Nope. It is time to discover who is not quite the winner and not quite the loser of the week. I will go first with our first not quite winner. It is Jeremy Strong sending up his own image with a very method appearance in a Super Bowl ad with the Afflecks, both Ben and Casey, two of them, for Dunkin Donuts. Here's a clip of him method acting his way into Dunkin's. What are you doing in there? We're doing a Dunkin' Donuts commercial, right? Right. I'm just trying to find the character. Sarah: [38:27] Bean method? I mean, I'll be ready in like three hours. You should have paid for Matt. I told you that. Dave: [38:33] I guess Jeremy Strong got the memo that everybody thinks he's kind of a weirdo, and this is having his cake and eat it too, because it's image rehabilitation and he's getting paid to do a Duncan's commercial. Yeah. And the visuals are really good. It's very Apocalypse Now. Like, he's in a giant cup of coffee, I guess, and his head's out of the liquid, but it's all filled with coffee gunk. So it's very much like that scene in Apocalypse Now. And he just plays it extremely straight. And it's actually a pretty good ad. This was the Grammys commercial. The follow-up, I think, is going to be the Super Bowl commercial. So it's not them showing it early. It's a little story, I guess. Good double dip on his part. Sarah: [39:14] Yeah, agree. Dave: [39:15] Not quite loser is the Grammys, down 9% from last year. And I'm just going to say right now, once again, award shows, stupid. Sarah? Sarah: [39:29] My not quite winner is Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I would have made this a, like, main event full-on winner, but I'm just not convinced this is going to happen. But it does have a revival in development at Hulu, and Sarah Michelle Gellar is set to return. There's a lot of problematic aspects of it that could be moved on from and or corrected in such a revival. So I'm fascinated to see who else they get to direct, to produce, to have another look. Dave: [40:00] I guess not the vampires, though. Sarah: [40:01] Yeah. Dave: [40:02] What happened? You got old, dude. Tara: [40:07] They're in their demon faces all the time now, like, uh, something happened. So you can't see their ring. Sarah: [40:14] Exactly. Or someone lets a chicken loose on set and Boreanaz is like, well, my not quite loser of the week. I mean, he's really a full loser, but Brian Austin Green, who has wasted another golden opportunity to look like the bigger person and waste it, not really understanding what's happening. Basically, what's his face? Machine Gun Kelly and Megan Fox, who are about to have a child together, are not on speaking terms. Dave: [40:44] I believe it's going to be a Glock. Sarah: [40:48] Ryan Austin Green decided that he, accused of being a deadbeat dad in the past, said that Machine Gun Kelly should, quote, grow up, kind of inserted himself into the situation as the voice of wisdom and reason from someone who has a podcast no one asked for and thinks he can get away with not doing leg day. I don't know. Like, I just don't understand why he can't go away. Shutting the fuck up at this juncture would have been perfectly understandable and probably preferred. Could not bring himself to do it. Had to be an expert. So, bag, shut it. Tara: [41:29] My not-quite-winner of the week is Love It or List It, which has been in limbo for a year. It has been renewed. It will be coming back, but Hilary Farr is out and is going to be replaced with an HGTV personality whose name is probably known to some of you but was not known to me. Page turner wow not even page with an i just spelled like the word page turner or like the phrase that means a very engrossing book she's. Dave: [41:58] Gonna be in that show bookish from the uk. Tara: [42:00] Where the guy's. Dave: [42:01] Name is book oh. Tara: [42:02] Yeah look either her parents named her this or she chose it herself and either way a person made the decision that this was going to be their professional name and And she is the not quite winner of the week, or the show is, but I hate it. My not quite loser of the week, British TV got an anti-bullying czar. Her name is Sarah Swingler, and everyone was touting this with a lot of ceremony. But whoops, her role has been reduced to one day a week of lobbying because she has been accused of workplace bullying. I already. Dave: [42:38] And their weird downstairs neighbor, Mrs. Flett, first name Pam. Yeah. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Tara: [42:46] They're going to take a flyer on this casting. Dave: [42:48] Sure. Sarah: [42:49] Both of you get out. Tara: [42:57] Our extra credit topic today comes to us from Wrightwood. It is titled, EHG, This Is Your Life. You get to choose one TV mega writer producer to write the rest of your life's story. Who do you choose and why, and how does it all go horribly wrong? I'll go first. I'm choosing Darren Starr, and the reason is, from Sex and the City to Cashmere Mafia to Younger, and I'm also giving him wisps of credit for and just like that, even though he's like only technically attached. We see older women hanging out, looking great, being funny. That's all I want in life. I considered Golden Girls creator Susan Harris for the same reason, but those mid-80s fashions for mature women. Not for me. I can't. Sarah: [43:42] Oof. Yeah. Tara: [43:44] The Dorothy looks alone. I just... Not happening. How it all goes wrong, there are a few standard ways that things go wrong in a Darren Starr show. Infidelity ends a relationship. You go broke and have to rebuild your life. You're so great at your marketing job that your client makes you the star of his new campaign. Oh, no. But I'm going to say that, like Jane Mancini, I find out my spouse used to be a stripper before we got married, and I make him dance for me. And then decades later, when I, like Carrie Bradshaw, tragically outlive him, My biggest problem is figuring out what to do with my two beautiful Manhattan's apartments, but at least I get to talk about it at brunch with my beloved friends. That's right. Going wrong is going right. I found a loophole in your little scenario. Thank you, Rightwood. Sarah. Sarah: [44:37] Well, first I'd like to say that Rightwood is a little vague here, in my opinion, as to which it we mean is going wrong. Is it the story part or the rest of my life part? So i am trying to split the difference with my answer let us begin at the end for reasons that will become clear in a moment my life's story is almost certain to come to a close with a lethal moment of klutziness you are talking to someone who has literally slipped on a literal banana peel more than one time in her life so i'm assuming that my demise involves some slapsticky bullshit it where I fall down a manhole and am fatally concussed or something similar. So, with that in mind, Ryan Murphy will direct American Crime Story Story, colon, Flail Safe. We start at the end with whichever high-pocketed middle-aged actor is playing me, staring sightlessly up from the ground, haloed by a pool of blood. And a voiceover, Sunset Boulevard, something about, you're probably wondering how I got here. Me too. Was it murder? Sarah: [45:44] And then we go back in time to, like, earlier that day. And we see how the fictionalized Sarah D. Bunting ended up dead in a pool of blood, or if she's even dead, or if that's even her blood. The next episode starts even earlier, prior week, prior year, the next episode even earlier than that, and so on through the season. Each one pinned to a different major case out in the world at that time, but also providing clues as to who might have killed me. Probably six to eight episodes long, each one starting earlier in my story, a la American Crime Story Season 2. And the finale ends with a slow push in on the baby playing 1973 Buncey, as 1973 Barb, Dakota Fanning, why the fuck not, it's my life, watches the Watergate hearings while nursing. And the baby winks and credits and spoiler, it was probably the cat. Dave? Dave: [46:40] I went a slightly different way. I'm doing a collection of showrunners to highlight different parts of my life. So Aaron Spelling is first up. He's going to turn my photography hobby into a niche procedural, something like Shutter Cops, you know, like Pacific Blue level show, where I accidentally capture a crime in progress in my hobby photos. I don't want to be a detective. It just follows me wherever I go. Sarah: [47:07] That's right. F, stop, don't shoot. Dave: [47:09] Yep. Nice. Aaron Sorkin for documenting the increasing difficulty of walking and talking thanks to my inflamed ribcage parts. Ryan Murphy for adding a lot of drama to our game night parties. I think the trouble is going to start during running charades and ends with a sinkhole eating the whole backyard. When the person trapped in the sinkhole finally is rescued, the first thing they say was, was it Eva Mendes? Tina Fey for turning my daily commute from bedroom to my office 20 feet away into a show. It's really funny, but there's one joke that's kind of racist. We pretend not to notice when we talk about that show. Eric Kripke googly recreates the blood-filled foot blister that just simply won't fucking go away. Chris Carter for bringing the zipping across the skylight I saw as a kid into a visitation plotline from alien researchers. looking into the perfect vegetarian chili recipe. And finally, J.H. Wyman, who just continues to make more episodes of Almost Human at my request. Dave: [48:20] And that is it for this episode of Extra, Extra Hot Great. We pressed into the new fraudster drama, Apple Cider Vinegar, before answering your burning Ask EHG questions like who would you cast on Little House and who's on your Mount Rushmore of comedic TV actresses. Tara put Liz Lemon's water bottle moment in the tiny slapstick. Nonac, we celebrated those who weren't quite the best and worst of the week and we wrapped it all up with a look at our lives on TV. Next up is Kindfo Kerfuffle on EHG Prime. Remember, we're listening. I am David T. Cole and on behalf of Tara Ariano. Tara: [49:03] I'm here on this, I really hate the word journey. Dave: [49:07] Sarah D. Bunting. Sarah: [49:08] It's the parts that got small. Ow! Dave: [49:12] Thanks for listening. We'll see you next time, right here on Extra, Extra Hot Great. Uh-oh, here comes the last clip.