Getting Into High Gear With Duster

Dave: [0:00] I see here we go do i know you i need to remember, this is the extra extra hot great podcast episode 354 for the may 17 2025 weekend, I am over-emotional heart transplant recipient David T. Cole, and I'm here with Lady Dix, Sarah D. Bunting. Sarah: [0:40] Women in hot. Dave: [0:41] And sloppiest Jose, Tara Ariano. Tara: [0:44] Oh, God. Tara: [0:51] They got Lady Dix now, apparently. Yeah. Welcome to Extra Extra Hot. Great for another weekend. Thank you so much for being here and thank you for new members that have joined us since our last episode. We're thrilled you're here getting to spend this time with us and we with you. This week we're here to talk about Duster. It's 1972 and Nina Hayes, Rachel Hilson, is a brand new graduate of Quantico asking to be assigned to a case against Ezra Saxton, Keith David, a local crime boss in Phoenix. Higher-ups do assign her to it, but make sure she knows it's not because she asked. It's because they have no other options. When she gets to town, she meets her new colleagues, Awan Bitsui, Azavak Kustachan, who is friendly and excited to have her there, Agent Grant, Dan Tracy, who's the kind of territorial dick who says things to her like, sorry to blow your fro, and the ranking agent, Abbott, who's played by Greg Grunberg for reasons that will become clear in a moment. Nina almost immediately gets a break in the case involving Jim Ellis, Josh Holloway, Saxton's go-to getaway driver. Even though everyone tells her Jim will never turn on Saxton, Nina figures out that she has a way to connect to Jim on a personal level. Tara: [2:07] The show was co-created by J.J. Abrams, and there's our Grunberg connection, and LaToya Morgan, whose past credits include Shameless, The Walking Dead, and Sarah. Turn Washington spies. Tara: [2:21] Duster premiered its first season on Max May 15th. We got access to the whole season, but we'll be careful about spoilers. Let's do the Chen check-in. I have never needed to ask a question less. Sarah, should our listeners watch Duster? Sarah: [2:34] Oh my God. Strip down your skivvies and roll around in that bunt nip because it's a yes from me. Tara: [2:40] Love to this. Dave Get the road meatloaf. Dave: [2:45] That's a good that's good hit the road so you can get to duster. Tara: [2:51] Complimentary it's a me it's a yes for me as well so we got to the end of the. Dave: [2:54] First episode were you gonna say it's a meatloaf for me as well no it's i was gonna. Tara: [2:58] Say it's a me for yes i've only had a sip of pepsi zero sugar. Dave: [3:04] And that was not enough sarah's sick tara sleep deprived i'm not doing so great either so it's gonna be an interesting show it's either going to be off the rails or it's going to be melatonin for your life? Let's find out, shall we? Tara: [3:16] I mean, I am like, you know, not a drug user of any kind. And I am on half of a hydrocodone that may be expired right now because of a bad problem. So we're going to see how this goes. Sarah: [3:29] I've also sleep deprived AMA. Tara: [3:32] So when we got to the end of the first episode, I said to Dave, I like that a lot, but you know who's going to love it is Sarah D. Bunting. And Sarah has let me know. And you've already heard I was right about that. So Sarah, speak on it. What are the elements that particularly make this, as you put it, pharma grade bunt nib? Sarah: [3:47] First of all, I was concerned, frankly, because Josh Holloway is not my jam. Usually one of my least favorite elements of Lost, and we will be talking about that a little later. Dave: [4:01] But don't you think this is where the character of Sawyer is properly. Like, he's basically playing Sawyer, but it works here, where in Lost you're like, what is this guy doing here? Tara: [4:12] Right. Sarah: [4:13] Yeah, I mean, like, if this were like a John Munch multiverse question, like, this clearly would be Sawyer's father. This doesn't really go anywhere else, so I'm just going to drop this semi-interesting factoid. Holloway was born Moon Landing Day. Tara: [4:29] Oh. Sarah: [4:30] 1969. Nice. and does not look like he's that old. The production design is thorough and considered without standing back and smelling its own, you know, brown and orange shag farts. Mm-hmm. There's a lot of people in here that I've seen sort of like in passing and a couple other things, but never showcased that I'm really enjoying. Holloway is perfectly cast for this. And it's also like it's self-contained as a kind of like caper, but also a crime story that is content to just be that. And it's not like, here's some supernatural shit. We're already seeding season two. in the second episode of season one. Like, it's got a pretty good story. The reason that Hayes thinks that she can turn him is like, I mean, it's big enough for the story, but not so big that you're like, take one thing off. It's sort of hard to describe, and not just because I am tired and sinus-y, but it's like, it sets out to do a thing and it does that thing. It's like a pleasure to watch. Everyone is charming, but not, you know, performatively charming it's just really confident and controlled. Dave: [5:48] Yeah i described it as a blue skies justified it's a little more loosey-goosey and kind of fun than justified was it also has sort of elements of a usa show like burn notice in it so you sort of like as a starting point i would say that but also a superior piece also it's a mob story it's got all those things going for it and All those things mixed up. They work really well. And I mean, honestly, Josh Holloway just plays this character for the rest of your life. You're fine. Tara: [6:22] Totally. Dave: [6:22] This is what everybody wants from you. We don't want you in intelligence. Tara: [6:26] Or the colony or whatever that sci-fi thing was. Sarah: [6:30] Yeah. Like, don't be on network. Like, let him swear and let's see his ass. Like, why not? I mean, I don't know if we actually do see his ass. I'm not far enough into the season. Dave: [6:39] Yeah, he's sort of playing like the same sort of dude Brad Pitt played in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. He's got that kind of vibe to him. He's not a stuntman. Sarah: [6:48] That's a really good comp. Tara: [6:49] Yeah. Dave: [6:49] So that's the sort of swagger he's bringing here. And I think it works. And I enjoy things set in the 70s. It is totally my aesthetic jam. Duster is the name of the car, the brand of the car that he drives. My parents had a duster, not the souped up sports version he has. They had the, I don't know, street legal duster, the boring duster, the family duster without the little whatever the thing is in the hood that pops up and makes it go vroom vroom. I was like, oh, duster. I remember the duster. I thought it was fun, light, but not like so light that you're reaching for your phone all the time. I mean, I mean, like a blue sky show sort of, I think, was the pre Netflix type of thing where sort of engineered to capture the minimum of your attention needed to keep the station on. And this feels like a step up from that where you kind of want to give it your attention because it is earning it, but it still feels light and airy and fun in the same way. Sarah: [7:50] Yeah i mean it's not like too heavy but i would say that it's like there's definitely a better call sol verse feel to it and not just because of the southwestiness of it but just like first of all a matter of factness about the diversity of life and people in the southwest that is that's how life is lived so and they're not like again standing back proud of themselves for including people at the casting level there's also a shot of like ryan murphy feud to it sort of visually but it's like there is that lightness definitely and the justified sort of like the quality of light literal light is similar but there's also a radical acceptance of your hero as sometimes kind of a frustrating shithead in it as well that i i sort of associate with vince gillian properties and maybe a uh like a little pinch of perry mason reboot also it's like there's some pretty heavy shit going on but everyone's just like also eye-rolling at each other's doctor's appointments at the same time. Like, I love it. Dave: [8:58] I think also that in the Justified Better Call Saul comp, you have those concentric circles radiating from the main characters of stupid people that exist in the margins of the organizations that come into play. There's a great scene in the pilot where basically there's a goon sent to beat somebody up and he's explaining what you have to do to just get what you want. And then the end of that scene is the guy who just got beat up waving goodbye to the assailant. Tara: [9:26] Yeah, same thing. Sarah: [9:27] Thanks, buddy. Dave: [9:28] Which was great. I love those kind of touches and a sort of light mob story. And yeah, it provides. Tara: [9:36] Another one that, and this is the loosest comp, but... Hear me out something duster has in common with peaky blinders is a good handle on how to like shade in real details about the period that informed the story that the characters are telling without seeming like it's like stopping down to plant its feet and like have a character read from wikipedia like it's just very yeah matter of fact about like for example in this case one of the things that we find out in the very first scene is like nina it has been recruited like it seems like minutes after j edgar hoover died and like this is part of many things that are going to change at the fbi because he's dead like because he was racist and you know originally they they explain they hired they're hiring more black agents to like infiltrate potentially activist spaces and that's what they hired him to do and she's like but what about this and they're like uh fine that's part of it and then you know later in the episode we also hear a news report about the break-in at the Watergate. Sarah: [10:36] Which he promptly changes to AM radio so he can bug out and enjoy his life. No one's ever going to go wrong using either a mid-70s giant tank of a Mercedes. The Americans, well done. It was like that one sort of light yellow one was in every episode for like three years. Did not hate. We named it the Bananamobile. We love that. Tara: [11:00] Sure. Sarah: [11:00] But also just a dirty payphone in the middle of goddamn nowhere ringing. And waiting for the hero to show up. I love that shit. Tara: [11:07] Yeah, they filmed it in Tucson. And so, you know, we just got back from there. So it's still warm in our hearts. Although when they showed the downtown, I was like, I don't know, that looks more like Albuquerque. And then looked up and was like, okay, fine. At least they're not in Phoenix, but I'm sure there's no places in Phoenix that still look like 1972 at all. Dave: [11:25] I also like part of the show that has the main character character, duster. One of his adversaries is his dad's girlfriend. It comes up so much. Sarah: [11:37] Fucking Charlotte. Dave: [11:37] Fucking Charlotte. And she's always trying to get him out of her life because they obviously super duper hate each other. Sarah: [11:44] Her delivery of get out of my house, fucko, was like, there's no one to hate here. Sorry. Tara: [11:50] Yeah, that's Gail O'Grady from NYPD Blue in another era. But yeah, she's and the thing that she keeps saying is like, don't come over without calling first. in front of us. Like, you know what? She's right. Call first. I know you don't have a phone in your car, but use your CB radio. Dave: [12:05] It's not your house anymore. Maybe it used to be once upon a time, but you don't live there now. Tara: [12:09] Yes. So other than a brief shot of, as Sarah said, Jim picking up a payphone call in the middle of the fucking desert to get his assignment for the day, he's introduced to us with Luna, who's played by Adriana Aluna Martinez. She calls him Uncle Jim. We're given to understand. He's not her uncle. He is secretly her biological father. I actually think this kid actor is good. She's not like too kid actor-y. Sarah: [12:32] Totally agree. Tara: [12:33] But the presence of a child in the main cast is, in my opinion, instantly the worst thing about the show. What did you guys think? Sarah, I'll go to you first. You hate children. Sarah: [12:44] I don't hate children. Tara: [12:45] I know. Sarah: [12:46] Most children. Listeners, I don't hate your children. She was immediately charming. And one of the things i liked about the show is that it sort of understands that this is something that it has to get past with a lot of viewers and they made the kid like a legit kid who would think that this was the coolest shit ever like i had an uncle jim and my uncle jim would like you know not take me on a trip to go pick up a from a drive-thru but you know like your uncle lets you do shit that your dad doesn't and like your mom's not gonna like this sweet let's do it but she was also like this is someone who thinks pandas are cool and like well cast and i think that this particular obstacle for the hero is played well i agree with you that usually like the presence of a kid is like this is an underworld figure there are enough complications that's what i mean we don't need this additional, you know, but Luna, they, they cast it well. And I think the show is aware of, that it only has so much of that that it can do. So I trust it to stay on the right side of the... Dave: [13:59] Yeah, well, I assume she is there so that whatever peril that she finds herself in will give Duster the permission to go from mob driver to avenging whatever at some point in the series, right? Tara: [14:13] Rampage of Psycho. Dave: [14:14] Exactly. I don't know that. We haven't watched that far ahead, but that's my guess why she's here. And she's okay. If they asked me, would you want this kid character in there? I would probably say no and figure out another way to do all that. But, you know, J.J. Abrams loves kids and shit. Tara: [14:29] So that's true. So we've already talked about him a bit. I feel like Josh Holloway would probably be the first to say he does not have the greatest range of the actors he knows. But as Dave said, this is the kind of role and it was probably written directly for him, given the J.J. Abrams connection that I personally want to see him play. He is so good in this rogue mode. I mean, he's very another comp for him as a character for for Duster, the guy. It's like he's like a Magnum P.I. type. Dave: [14:59] Like he's just he's the kind of guy that calls you by where you live, Saskatchewan. Tara: [15:04] Yes. Yes. He calls he starts calling Nina Baltimore immediately. But yeah, you know, we see him wake up every morning when he wakes up. He's in like some other random woman's bed and it's like, does he have a home? Does he need one? Maybe not. But he just like when he comes out of his car from the diner after he's like arranging a job, he just sees Nina in the front seat and is like, all right, I guess this is what I'm fucking doing. This is his life. Dave: [15:29] Those scenes were like I could see the memo on the HBO Max desk. J.J. Abrams, but now with tits. Tara: [15:36] Yes. Sarah: [15:38] Well and she is really good in that scene too because you can see hayes sort of like assessing him and being like well all right uh-huh i would yep but i can't and they have good i mean i hope it doesn't go there but they have good like um partner kim which is something that like fincher movies tend to have that that like the actors are cast and directed so that they would believably like know each other and didn't just meet when they got the pages that morning and so i think that's successful and i think it's also good that he the character gets to be funny and fun like part of my issue with lost is that everything was just so like let's stare into the middle distance and wait for this flashback to show up and like oh god okay but you know he never got to have any fun or be funny or use swears at his stepmother and like Corbin Bernson same thing like there are a lot of these people that it's like just in cut them loose yeah. Dave: [16:38] Yeah he plays his dad in the show yeah. Sarah: [16:40] Yeah and Bernson brilliant in this that he's trying to keep stepmother and son happy and like I guess used to be a, Proper villain, as the man says in Ocean's Eleven, but then is just sort of like, I don't know. And then he has a line towards the end of the second episode that should be like barf, but then it works because you've had this groundwork laid. I don't know. It's like, I don't want to oversell it, but it just does what it does really well. Dave: [17:08] All right. Well, I'll give one criticism. Their font game is off. They're using some fonts that they think are 70s fonts, but definitely were engineered well after that period. And their signage game could use some work. The signs that are up for like, you know, the taqueria they go to or whatever, like those are very much looking like they just came out of the paint shop on set and put up there. Yeah yes a few things like that some of the scenes where they're driving supposed to be driving around tucson there's like garbage cans whose design is obviously you know they just they only have so much money to scrub out this stuff from the footage i guess using cgi so it's it's fine you know like you definitely get a feel for the 70s it's not overdone like a tarantino thing you know it feels like you're there in the 70s the way you remember it if you're that old cough cough i am as old as this show is set for season two they can figure out their fonts yeah. Tara: [18:03] You're definitely right about the signs i mean as soon as something goes up in the desert like it's it's. Dave: [18:08] It's brown it's. Tara: [18:09] Faded like it. Sarah: [18:10] Happens real fast but i mean it's really hard for me to bring any serious criticism. Dave: [18:17] To a. Sarah: [18:18] Show that casts someone as adrian barbeau and then casts actual adrian. Dave: [18:23] An actual Barbo. Tara: [18:24] Yeah, that was pretty good. Sarah: [18:26] Okay. This show is feeling itself and it should be. Tara: [18:29] I won't spoil what I've seen in the IMDb listing, but that's not the only real-life period character who, like, comes by. That's all I'll say. Dave: [18:39] I mean, one of the, can I just say, like, just hint at one of the other things you'll see pretty quickly because I think it paints a good picture of what the show is doing is, I guess, it's the second episode. There is a second mob guy who wants a particular piece of pop culture delivered to him in exchange for something that Duster needs. And it's just a heist involving this Palm Springs house. Then he has to steal this very, very famous piece of pop culture. Sarah: [19:08] Iconic. Dave: [19:09] Yeah. And I was like, oh, that's fun. Those are the kind of touches that I'm like, yeah, okay, this show knows where it is on the spectrum and delivers. Tara: [19:17] Yeah. Well, you also said, and I didn't notice it because I was taking notes, But that as the story goes on, different elements of things that we've seen get added to the credits. Dave: [19:27] Yeah, it's doing that thing. Yeah. Tara: [19:28] Which is fun. Sarah: [19:29] And the credits are like adorable and fun and may have been the first thing that they made. And again, fine with it. Tara: [19:36] Yeah. Yeah. It's really fun. I'll leave it on this. And Sarah sort of hinted at it. We're not close to the end of the season. We don't know. This is this is not a spoiler other than for something that has not happened. Do we want Jim and Nina to do sex together? Because I know the show wants me to want Jim and Izzy, who's playing Luna's mother. Izzy is rather Luna's mother. She's played by Camille Gowdy. The show wants me to want them to get back together for the sake of the child, if nothing else. But at least in the early going, they have not done enough to make Izzy that interesting. But I'm at this point torn between do I want Jim and Nina to be great friends or do I want them to fool around? Your thoughts? Dave: [20:15] Well, I mean, the problem is so far in the early going, the mother is very much being relegated to doing mom things in the storyline. So you don't really get a lot of sexy energy from that character yet. And maybe they're just doing that so that when she gets a moment to herself, she hires that babysitter or whatever. And then like we can go to the races on that part of it. But I don't know. I think I'd rather have him, Duster and the FBI agent have a non-sexual relationship. I think that has more legs. Yeah. Sarah: [20:48] Or, I mean, I would be comfortable with them doing it because I think it would be hot and then looking at each other and being like, okay, that happened and it's not going to happen again. And then we all just move on. I'm fine with it. But like I said, I think they have good colleague, like collegial chem, and they maybe just shouldn't fuck with it since obviously he can get it in with anyone that walks by. so you should just stick to that. Tara: [21:15] It is time to ask some questions. Sarah: [21:17] It is time to ask some stuff. It is time to ask some questions. It is time to ask some stuff. It is time to ask some questions. It is time to ask some stuff. It's time for EHG. Dave: [21:33] Ask some questions. Tara: [21:36] Ask some questions. Ask. Sarah: [21:44] Ask them questions. This is what it sounds like in my sinuses today. Dave: [21:50] My favorite part on the second hearing of that is I realized he actually didn't get the segment name correct. It's time for EHG. He missed a word. Oh, well, that just makes it better if he asks me. It is time for Ask EHG. I am the judge for this week. last week, we heard from Erica who asked, what is your favorite series finale? Tara, got an answer for this one. Tara: [22:17] I do. And I imagine some other people said it as well. It is in the canon. It is The Americans. Dave: [22:23] Yep. Tara: [22:23] One of the best. Sarah: [22:24] Agree. Dave: [22:25] I'm not going to read any alternative answers because a lot of people, I think, were answering what is the best series finale. And a lot of people were arguing why this and that weren't the best series finale. The question is, what is your favorite series finale? So I was going for a finale that was important to you and why. And I think the person that nailed that directive was Johnny Asay. He's back. The question was not what is the best, but what is your favorite? Yes. So Johnny says, I have to say all good things from finale of Star Trek The Next Generation. That show was the first show that really imprinted on me as a TV watcher. By the time the finale aired, I was 15 and had been watching the show religiously for the previous four years. In other words, it was informative for me. With the benefit of 30 years of hindsight and so many other good, great finales in the time since then, I can see why All Good Things doesn't typically make the all-time top 10 finale lists. But at the time, it gave Teenage Me a fantastic send-off for the characters, particularly Picard, and a healthy dose of timey-wimey stuff and a final scene that hit me right in the feelings. So it is still my favorite. So I like that. I like that little story. It's a good finale, though. I mean, I don't think it might be selling it a bit short. It was a great send off for that series. Tara: [23:38] Someone has made a canon pitch for it. We just haven't gotten to it yet. Dave: [23:42] Oh, there you go. Tara: [23:42] We may hear it. Sarah: [23:43] Okay. Dave: [23:44] In the mix. Tara: [23:45] Who's to say? Dave: [23:45] All right. Let's get to your questions for us this week. First one is from Anne with three E's. The TV conclave has elected you TV Pope. Hooray! You get to canonize one TV character as a TV saint. Who do you choose and what are they the patron saint of? And then I added to this, you also have to give yourself a TV pope name. Tara: [24:07] Okay. Dave: [24:07] So who are you putting up for sainthood in television and what is your pope name term? Tara: [24:14] St. Luthan Rail, patron saint of revolution. And I'm going to be Pope Claire I because St. Claire is the patron saint of both TV. And also, I learned childless couples. Hello. Could not be more obvious. Sarah. Sarah: [24:29] Let us pray to St. Diane Lockhart, patron saint of the perfect Bob. And I have created this fiat as Pope Lucia I after St. Lucio Uguzon, the patron saint of cheese. Which has a lot of applications. Dave. Dave: [24:47] Jeez. All right, so I, Pope Philo II, declare St. Littlest Hobo as the patron saint of TV travelers. Beezor Laura has our next question. What show are you most glad you quit before it was over, and what was the moment that made you quit it? Sarah. Sarah: [25:05] First thought, best thought here, I hope. I never regretted quitting Lost. I lived in a house with people who stuck with it, and they were big mad at the end. My brother is still kind of pissed that he watched the whole thing. I don't remember exactly which episode it was, but there's some cliffhanger. I'm going to say the middle of season two. It's a hatch cam and you see Locke looking down into yet another hatch with yet another animal on it. And I was like, okay. It went to credits and I went into my then TiVo's season pass list and removed Lost. I was like, I cannot do this. I am going to lose my mind. Also, I hated half the characters, So it did sometimes feel a little weird, given our jobs at the time, to be purposefully out of the loop on one of the last great water cooler network shows. But I think it was justified in the end, so to say. So that is mine. No regrets. Dave. Dave: [26:10] Yeah, I think a lot of people want to say Game of Thrones for this. And not me, because I was never really super into that show. And I felt like I tuned in every once in a while just to like keep up with everybody what the hell they're talking about. But I don't think people that like started to hate that show ever stopped watching. You know what I mean? Like I feel the people that were like, is this show getting bad? And they're like, oh yeah, it's bad. Oh my God, it's really bad. Oh, the show's over now. Like that was the trajectory for that. Sarah: [26:36] Yeah. Dave: [26:36] My answer is Silo. I didn't hate the first season of Silo, but when it got to the end and I realized Silo was locking into the repeat and wash cycle of those type of shows. Also see like Silicon Valley where they sort of repeat the process that they've already mastered just at a higher difficulty level for the people in the show. That I'm really wary of now. You're just giving me the same thing except all the monsters are twice as strong now or all the bosses are twice as rich or whatever. Like the end of Silo 1 was, I'm out of the silo new silo no thanks flush down the toilet you go I'm also somewhat like mystery box intolerant now so that was another thing where I was like oh I can't do this again like I don't give a shit about the purposeful hiding of clues and all that kind of stuff like there's something about that show if you can't engineer it perfectly it just like falls apart for me and um you know as far as like how interesting and captivating I find it. Tara: [27:41] Yeah, I'm I've said this before. I'm not interested in any show that's going to have a lot of stories about like fan theories about blah. Like this is not how I want to engage with a show. I can have my own fan theories. I don't want there to be discourse around it and for the show to feel like it was made for that purpose. Dave: [27:58] Yes. This is why I probably not having watched Severance for our show and then you having to watch Severance for work at a time where I couldn't watch it. Like, I'm never going to tune in now because it feels like that kind of show to me where it's like, it's a puzzle. But it's also like, there's something about a puzzle show where you're beholden to the pace at which the pieces are being put out that I find insulting on some level. Like, just give me the information so I can figure it out. You know what I mean? Like, it's like the first five minutes of an Agatha Christie mystery for two seasons. And you're just like. Sarah: [28:33] Fuck. Well, and also, for us, it's like we are sort of, this is work for us as enjoyable as it is at times. Like, don't make it more work. Like, if I don't have to watch something like that, that, frankly, T-Bone has made sound like work. No, I have enough work to do. Dave: [28:53] It's not like I don't enjoy mysteries. I just enjoy mystery box shows, which are, of course, a different animal. Tara: [28:59] Yes, for sure. Anyway, my answer is Marissa throwing a chair in the pool in the season two premiere of The O.C. Bye-bye. Bye forever. And I never went back. Dave: [29:08] Oh, all right. Jovial gent, I was getting my morning coffee and heard the barista say, these shoes are full of drip and felt so out of touch with the youths. What is a moment recently that made you feel out of touch with the youths? Guess is that my answer here, Tara? Tara: [29:25] Oh, I have no idea. Dave: [29:26] Okay. Because I genuinely don't care about what the youths think. I'm at that point in my life now where I'm like, am I going to wear my short socks with my hiking boots? Yes. Sarah: [29:38] I don't care. Tara: [29:39] Well, also, you don't interact with youths either. Dave: [29:41] That's exactly right. Tara: [29:42] You don't have youths in your life. Dave: [29:43] The youngest people in my life are the people Tara invites over for the Dr. Tara: [29:48] Odyssey parties. Watch parties. Dave: [29:52] Via her, you know, Discord. Tara: [29:55] The Who Weekly Discord. Dave: [29:56] The Who Weekly Discord. Tara: [29:57] And they're in their 30s. Dave: [29:58] Yeah, exactly. They're just millennials when they're like, Gen Alpha's coming over, talking about their, I don't even know what it is, skibibi toilets or whatever. Tara: [30:06] No, they're too old for that. Dave: [30:08] I know, but I'm saying that's what Gen Alpha would be done. Tara: [30:10] That's a thing. Yes, that's a Gen Alpha thing. Yeah, they're the kind of people who when we played celebrity at our game, I put in Addison Rae. People were like, okay, who? But anyway, go on. Dave: [30:20] I'm not embracing this dance. I'm not like all flibbity-flu. I don't care. I just like generally doesn't really cross my mind to really be upset or care if my uniform for the past 25 years, shorts, a shirt, and a thin hoodie is cool or not because that's what I like and that's what I'm going to wear. And I'll be 80 years old walking. Guitar will be dead for 15 years or so. And I'll be sad. I'll also be walking around the streets in that get-up. Tara: [30:48] Okay, let me ask you though, Dave, Do you think for a shoe to be full of drip is good or bad? Dave: [30:53] I think it's good. Tara: [30:54] Okay. Yes, you're right. I know what drip is. Yeah. Okay. Dave: [30:56] I think I only know drip. I think I know that because there was a song on the first couple episodes of Empire when we had to watch it for the show. It was like a song all about drip and Mark Blankenship was going on and on about how good this song was. Tara: [31:09] I think that's supposed to be like sex drip drop. Dave: [31:12] Oh, was it? Okay. Tara: [31:13] It's drip drop. Oh, okay. Dave: [31:14] Well, then I'm misremembering it. Tara: [31:17] Not about shoes. Dave: [31:17] Is that what? Did it go in their shoes? Tara: [31:20] I don't think so. Dave: [31:21] They're walking around after they had sex with their shoes still on and everything dripped into the shoes and they're walking around with slushy shoes for the rest of the day. That's what the drip drop song is about. Sarah: [31:32] Someone needs to see a doctor. Tara: [31:34] I don't think drip as a slang term existed back then, honestly, but I may be wrong. Sarah: [31:39] I don't think it did either. All right. Well, yeah, I agree. Dave: [31:42] All right. So who's next? And can you work in bodily fluids into your answer, Tara? Tara: [31:48] I mean, surprisingly, no, considering it's from the premiere of Forever. But let's just play the clip. This is a show about cool kids, admittedly cool kids from seven years ago, but still. This just says everything I would want to say. Cool. Dave: [32:21] There are so many things that I don't understand. Thank you, Sarah. Yeah. It was good meeting you. Tara: [32:31] It was really nice to meet you, too. Let's move on. What? This is what kids think is good music seven years ago? Like, I mean, today's youth might listen to music today that's even stupider sounding than that. But like that sounded like a joke to me. I couldn't believe it was supposed to be the moment. It's like, this is really meaningful to me. Really listen to the words. What words? Dave: [33:06] It's like when I found that voice changer megaphone at flea market for two dollars. And I would just walk around for the next week in the house. This is the only way I would talk. Tara's time or dinner. Tara: [33:20] Anyway, that was it. Sarah. Sarah: [33:22] There is a moment at the end of, there's a hybrid documentary, but also there's like fuller reenactments about Jeffrey Dahmer and like the law enforcement team that showed up at his house. And at the end, the guy playing Dahmer is like sitting on a park bench and there's a very similar song to that that's like, like this iron and wine thing that's like really creepy so when this started playing it forever i was like what is he is he gonna eat her like in you know with a knife and fork way sense oh no then yes well and yeah here here we are at the bodily fluids mine is that my nephew grown my nephew who is turning 16 next month shut the fuck up no he's not. Tara: [34:05] Are you serious. Sarah: [34:06] Yeah wow yeah he is okay taller than me he groaned that he was crashing out. And I was like, that makes sense. You must be exhausted because he just like we're in the car coming home from his sister's show and he had done tech for it. And my brother was like, you know, Dodo, it doesn't mean that you're exhausted. It means that you're spinning out emotionally. And granted, I am like Dave, like I sort of clocked this as by not knowing what the kids are talking about. But like caring, like, did I feel out of touch with the youths? Yes. Was this a negative thing necessarily? No, it was a day ending in. Why? Like I never figured out how Riz was supposed to work and then they stopped saying it. So it was like, okay, well, It is the children who are wrong. I'll just keep trying to make rad and massive happen and nobody will pay attention to me and it's fine. Dave: [34:58] Aren't you still working on getting that sassy one? Tara: [35:01] Groovox? Dave: [35:01] Groovox in the mix. Sarah: [35:02] Oh, no, I'm not working on that. I'm just admitting that mistakes were made around Groovox and also from Ty-Guy. Dave: [35:08] It could still happen, sir. It could still happen. It would be a Groovox time if it did. Sarah: [35:12] It couldn't and shouldn't. Dave: [35:13] Back-to-back jovial gen questions. After seeing Taika Waititi appear as the lucky duck on The Masked Singer, Which other Oscar-winning writer-director would you want to see in the show? And what costume would they wear? Tara, all that, please. Tara: [35:28] It's going to be Bong Joon-ho, although his translator is going to be the one singing, so it's going to make it harder for the guessing. But he's going to be on as the germ as a reference to Parasite. Dave: [35:39] Dave. Well, first of all, this seems like a mistake on Taika Waititi's PR company's part to put him on the Masked Singer. That feels like a step down for him. Tara: [35:49] Okay, well, I mean, this is, again, where I have to point to my Who Weekly knowledge because he's married to Rita Ora, who is on the show. Dave: [35:56] Okay. Tara: [35:57] I think she is guest-hosted and is, like, a panelist. Dave: [36:00] Okay. Tara: [36:00] Yeah. Dave: [36:01] All right. Still no, I think, on that one. Sarah: [36:05] Is she still pronouncing it pho-o? Tara: [36:07] Probably. I don't watch. Dave: [36:09] But my answer is Joel and Ethan Coen as a hippopotamus and the symbiotic little bird that hops in their mouth to eat the stuff off their teeth. Tara: [36:17] Yep. Dave: [36:17] That's their thing. Tara: [36:19] Mm-hmm. Dave: [36:19] And the great thing about that is Jenny McCarthy, I don't know if she's still on the show, but for the purposes of this, she is great. Jenny McCarthy keeps screaming, one of them has to be a robot. Tara: [36:31] They have had two person costumes before, too. Dave: [36:34] Oh, have they? Tara: [36:34] Yeah. Dave: [36:35] All right. Tara: [36:36] Sarah. Sarah: [36:37] I went with Martin Scorsese because I think he actually like would want to be on it and may just be waiting for someone to ask, which they aren't going to because it's Martin Scorsese. but obviously he would be Pizza Rat. Tara: [36:49] Ah, that's so good. Dave: [36:52] That would be great. Tara: [36:53] That's really funny. Dave: [36:54] Seekent, gun to your head. What's your favorite song, Sarah? Sarah: [36:58] Low How a Rose Air Blooming, Tara. Tara: [37:00] Better Be Home Soon by Crowded House, Dave. Dave: [37:03] Well, my first album was Phil Collins' Face Value that I ever bought. So I got to go in the air tonight. Tara: [37:08] Nice. Dave: [37:09] Penumbra, which Muppets would you cast as traitors, as in the traitors? Tara: [37:14] Yes. Dave: [37:15] So I outsource mine to friend of the show, Adam Grossworth. Tara: [37:18] So here is Adam Grossworth. Dave: [37:20] Host of Muppetergy podcast. He writes, I didn't do an entire cast, but Miss Piggy's the obvious choice, giving her star status and real housewife energy. But she's a terrible liar, refuses to do any physical challenges, and the entire cast turns on her quickly. Rolf befriends Alan's dog. Janice's laid-back vibe makes her a strong contender until she gets accused of throwing a physical challenge. She was just high, though. Gonzo is a strong contender because he'll take any amount of abuse and do anything Alan asks, but ultimately has no chill and can't be trusted. Link Harkthrob brings Tom Sandoval energy. I think I know that name. And weirdly flies under the radar for a long time. The winner is Scooter, who everyone feels protective of because of his youth and apparent innocence, but he's actually a conniving twink who stabs everyone in the back. Tara: [38:13] Okay, can I jump our order? Because I also said Scooter. Not for those reasons. I didn't do a full cast either or guess who was going to win because I don't watch the show. But my picks are for people, Muppets, that no one would suspect, but I think are actually very organized and on the ball, and those are Scooter and Kermit. So I'm so happy to be affirmed by Adam in my pick. Sarah? Sarah: [38:35] Adam also affirmed one of my picks, Janice, because everyone loves her, and she seems like she would just be not schemey in that way. And I also cast Sam the Eagle because I think everyone would assume he's on the side of truth and the American way, which would let him operate that much more deviously. And Beaker, because how are you going to see that coming? You're not. Physical challenges could be a problem, but I think it gets by. Dave: [39:00] Muppeterity.com if you want more Muppet in your life. That's Adam's podcast. Check it out. Are the screeners you receive the same as the episode we see when it airs, writes L-Triple-B? So, I mean, we don't need to go around the horn on this, so we can just discuss it. But the quick answer is often no, Tara. But do you have any faves? Tara: [39:23] Well, yes. I mean, I love it when we get them. And because a lot of times they are like, they'll say before it starts, you know, special effects are temp or whatever. And sometimes they're more temp than others. Dave: [39:34] Sometimes the extremely temp ones are so much fun. Tara: [39:37] Yes. When you can see the backdrop with like, you know, the tape X's on it. It's all green. This happened with a screener I was watching last week where like you open the door of a house and it's like, oh, that's really not a real house. I had no idea because it's just like a backdrop behind the front door. And sometimes you saw this for the first time recently. I forget what show it was, but where it was like they cocoseted two different shots together. Dave: [40:00] That was wild. Tara: [40:00] Yeah. Dave: [40:01] That's actually pretty impressive how they do it. It's not that they're filming them separately in locations and then compositing it together. They're just taking bits of alternate takes and putting them in the same timeline. Tara: [40:15] Right. Dave: [40:15] It could just be like, yeah, they're taking character one and character two and character two had a better reaction in take two than take one, so they use that. But also like they're taking pieces of things like sometimes the smile is like what's composited. Tara: [40:30] Stuff like that so it's just like. Dave: [40:32] It looks like something from conan o'brien show for. Tara: [40:34] A second before they do all the final stuff so it's it's. Dave: [40:38] Can be a lot of technological fun. Tara: [40:40] Yeah that happened one time with uh an episode of 911 where it was like two characters in the back of a car together and it's like there's a wavy line in between them because they were not from the same take. But other than that, when it's quite obvious, I generally assume, like usually when we get a screener, it's pretty finished. Most of the time, I would say. Sarah: [41:00] I think, For nonfiction, it depends. It also depends who is issuing the screener. For scripted stuff, I would say 90% of the time it's the same or close enough to the same. When I was covering stuff for sci-fi, I would get them way in advance, and it was just Canadian character actors wandering around while someone had a dinosaur head on a broom handle, and then it's just a green sheet with X's on it in the background. So that would happen a lot but true crime docuseries often like they finish the first one and they'll give that to you and then they'll give you the other two but it's full of pond five yeah totally yeah yeah or like tvs that have like vintage tvs that they will put in the um like static b-roll later but for now it's just like green paper taped over the screen the trend in true crime now is to like leave some tails visible like you could see all the cables and the light reflectors like in a shot of a talking head interview so a lot of it you can't necessarily tell what changed it's not like i'm going back to check because well. Tara: [42:09] That's the thing if i've if i've watched something right i i almost never watched the air version because you know why would i got i. Sarah: [42:16] Got enough. Tara: [42:17] Of the gist but we recently were told when we talked about the studio and how there's the whole plot point in the premiere about Kool-Aid and nobody is like, wait, it's not even Kool-Aid, it's Flavor-Aid. And then someone was like, no, I did hear someone say that. So it sounds like they did ADR. I think it was the Chase Sweet Wonders character saying it in the episode. That was one. Dave: [42:38] It's a shame they don't just once in a while put out, this is what it looked like two months before we finished it. Because not like a behind-the-scenes special effects thing where they're showing off, but just like, look at the jank. Tara: [42:50] They. Dave: [42:50] Should just do that once in a while for a. Tara: [42:52] Show yeah this is what's lost when we don't get like TV you know DVD box sets anymore I mean I know they still make them but they're certainly a lot rarer than they used to be and that's. Dave: [43:00] Blooper shows would often show how rough it is and stuff. Pizza Carrie has her next question. Why won't Nathan Fielder go away? Tara, you've had the most experience with Nathan Fielder here. Tara: [43:12] Yeah, I mean, people are obsessed with him and his shows are very buzzy. So that's the reason, basically. But I'm on other discords where people are, I'll just say it, super horny for him. Like they are just in the threads about the rehearsal, like lusting for him, which, like, I mean. Sarah: [43:31] God bless. Tara: [43:31] More for you. Like, he's one of the more, I would say, unlikely, unexpected sex symbols, but he's definitely... Dave: [43:39] He looks like middle management out of, like, Insurance Adjusters Corporation or something. Tara: [43:43] Listen, that's what's doing it for a lot of people out there because they are, like, I'm serious, feral for him. Dave: [43:49] I could use an adjustment. Tara: [43:50] Say that. Sarah: [43:50] Wow. Tara: [43:51] Yeah. So, anyway... Dave: [43:53] Drip, drop. Tara: [43:55] Historically, he has not been for me, but I... because I had to review season two of the rehearsal. So I watched all of season one and then all of season two in a day. And watching 12 episodes back to back, like, you know, maybe Stockholm Syndrome me, but pretty early on in season two, like, I got it comedically, not hornily, what he's doing. So, you know, the new season, I will say, is doing something interesting, I thought. But it's also, like, the show and he are not anything I would ever evangelize for. Like he's either your thing or he's not and you know it and it's fine. Dave: [44:32] Yeah. Tara: [44:32] There's no middle ground on him. Dave: [44:34] I got a couple solo questions here. Vandy's asking Tara, can you spot fake facial hair as well as you can recognize fake wigs or actually just wigs? What's a fake wig? Tara: [44:48] Just a very bad haircut. Yes, I can. Oh, I wanted to say on the wig tip, too, unless Josh Holloway was doing yoga in his character wig on the beach on New Year's Day for his Instagram, that's his real hair in duster. On beards, I recently was skimming through some screeners for the forthcoming AMC show Nautilus. I imagine this is something we might check out for the podcast in the future. This is the Disney Plus show that got dropped. I think it's like based on Jewel Verne property. Just chock-a-block with fake beards as far as the eye can see. So yes, to me, I think it's more obvious when facial hair is fake than when it's a wig. Dave: [45:33] Yeah, it's really hard to master that. Usually it just looks like they put Elmer glue in the shape of a beard on your face and then threw pubes at you. And that's your beard. Yeah. By the way, Vandy didn't say fake wigs. That was me trying to rewrite the question in real time and adding fake to wigs. So it's not her fault. It's mine. L triple V is back with one for Sarah. Given how many times he's been undercover and on the news, how believable is it that Elliot Stabler could continue to go undercover? Sarah: [46:01] Okay. Anyway, I know the answer L-Trips wants here is not believable, but it is probably more believable than you're assuming if you factor in the following two things. Number one, most people are not extremely online in any sense, much less the news sense. I don't think the average New Yorker, never mind the criminal enterprise types that is what he's infiltrating, would necessarily watch enough or read enough local news to know anyone except like the mayor and maybe some higher ups in the police department, which especially in the last year on the ground here, people are resigning because they're being investigated like every couple of three weeks. So most people are not paying attention to this shit in their daily lives. Sarah: [46:48] Number two, even if they were, New York City is full of stabler looking dudes, especially in the outer boroughs like you walk into any fucking johnny mcswiggins in queens or staten island and there will be several stablers watching the next game probably a stabler owns the joint so no you probably could not keep doing it after like two operations because people talk to each other versus however many times they have him doing it on the show i don't watch it because i think it's stupid i'm glad he's getting paid whatever but if he's not trying to re-infiltrate the same mafia over and over. This is a hundred times more thought than the show gives it, but it is not entirely out of the realm that he could get by with it, in my opinion. Tara: [47:33] Yeah, I agree. I don't know what Austin's police chief looks like, never mind like anyone who's been attached to any busts. But I will say if any news report ever shot Stabler from the side or the back, I think that blows his cover because then it's going to be a situation where he walks in and someone's going to be like, oh, you're that fat ass cock. Sarah: [47:56] Yeah. Oh, Detective Bubble Butt. Tara: [48:00] Exactly. Sarah: [48:01] Yeah. Tara: [48:03] Head on, no problem. No, no, no. Dave: [48:07] I can't imagine him in any context. My mind immediately goes to wet hot American summers. And now I got a fridge to hump. I like it. Anytime. Anytime. Sarah: [48:16] Yeah. Dave: [48:17] Excellent. Thorough answer, Sarah. Thank you. Dr. Calhoun, besides TV, what trivia categories would you do well in and which ones would you be terrible at? Good, flags, fonts. Flags, fonts, flattelstar, phallactica. Geography, place names, that kind of stuff. Tara: [48:38] Yeah. Dave: [48:38] And Star Wars, obviously. Bad at the Bible. Numbered rulers, either the humans who tell you what to do or the wood kind. Either one. I don't know anything about them. Tara: [48:50] Sure. Dave: [48:50] And literature. Terrible at books. I don't know what they... I'm not well read. I'm not well read. Tara? Tara: [48:56] Well, I do Learned League, the thing that I pay to do that I hate the most Now that I don't belong to a gym anymore. So I have empirical evidence on this. After television, which is obviously by far my number one topic, my next three best categories are quite predictably theater, film and literature. I'm exactly who you think I am. And my three worst categories, also very predictably going from the bottom up, math, geography and games slash sport. Dave: [49:24] Math has no business in trivia. Tara: [49:26] Yeah, don't tell me. tell Thorsten L. Integrity or whatever the hell his name is. Sarah. Sarah: [49:32] Based on my Learned League breakouts, I'd be pretty good at, besides TV, film, art history, pop music, and also, you know, baseball, the Civil War, because again, I'm my own grandfather, and commerce econ stuff. Absolute disaster at geography, current events, mathematics, and anything to do with what the kids are doing. Like, this TikTok star, nope, whatever. The aristocrats. I don't fucking know. Tara: [49:58] I just pulled it up for fun. For television, my career record is 96 out of 104. So almost perfect. Math, seven out of 39. Wow. Dave: [50:10] Quick. What percentage is that, Tara? Tara: [50:14] It's not rated. It's below one, it seems. I don't know. Dave: [50:19] Yeah, that was a math joke. Tara: [50:21] Yeah, I know I get it, but I can't answer it because I'm too stupid. Sarah: [50:24] It would be about 19 or 20 percent. Dave: [50:27] They're very good. Tara: [50:28] OK. Dave: [50:28] All right. Millsnack, you're a home ec teacher for eighth graders. You have a sub coming in for a week. What related TV program are you planning for them to show the class while you are out? Tara: [50:39] Sure. Depending on where we are in the semester, it's either going to be Project Runway. First, if we're doing sewing or if we're on to cooking, it'll be Julia. Dave. Dave: [50:48] I'm going to go with 1900 house. They get a family and they have to live like they're living in 1900 and figure out how to make everything in a house work. I mean, I'm sure there's a few practical things to learn, like, you know, how to stitch, sew something back together, how to darn a sock. I'm going to guess 1900 is big darning area, but mostly sock. It's mostly so that it's a message to stay in school and do well so you can buy modern appliances that will do all this shit for you. Sarah: [51:19] I'm going to go with making it, the Polar Offerman Craft competition. There's enough of it to cover a week. There's enough skills to qualify as broadly educational. It's professional enough that most of the class won't think it's too corny. But if they do, it's a solid jumping off point for discussion. And it might inspire some makes among the class. Maybe not the woodworking episodes. That seems like not a can of worms you want to open with 12-year-olds. But yeah, this is perfect for the sub to fill time with broad range of stuff. Go down the hall to the lounge and make yourself some soup. Dave: [51:51] All right. That's it for us. Thank you for all your questions. The Ask Ask ESG question where we turn the tables, you must answer it, dear listeners, comes from LBBB. They ask, which TV cliffhanger or unanswered question do you most want to see magically resolved? Go to our Discord. There's a channel called Ask Ask ESG. That's where you plop your answers and we'll be back next week with judgment and whoever wins get this fantastic cake sticker that makes absolutely no sense that every time i look at it still it makes me laugh and the only way to get it is to become the ask ask ehg winner so get to it. Dave: [52:32] Hello extra hot great i'd like to submit into the tiny death. Tara: [54:28] You're supposed to be in mourning. Well, then wear a veil over your face while you do it. Can't, Jackie Jackie I'm fine fine I'm fine I have some bad news dad. Tara: [55:07] He's dead. No, dead. Dead. He's fine. He sends his love. I am not dead. Tara: [55:25] That comes to us from Leslie. Thank you, Leslie, for this inauguration of the death canon. I'll go first because I almost submitted this for my last tiny canon instead of what we do in the shadows clip. And then I saw it was on the list and thought, well, if someone else has already done it, I'll let her take the lead, of course. This is one of the most legendary clips from Roseanne ever. I remember, obviously, the Jackie phone call the most, but I forgot there is a lot of funny in the Roseanne bit as well. The way that the scene balances both of their frustration with the actual jokes is so good. The reason it works is because it does feel so real. No one wants to be doing any of this. Everyone is trying to fob it off on someone else, but it has to be done. There's no point trying to get out of it. You just have to get through it. But also the the way that the Jackie's phone call goes from the performance of, you know, being very gentle, gently trying to deliver the news to like it has to get across because I need this conversation to end of like just the screaming. He's fine. He sends his love. Like, it's just it's a classic for a reason. So great submission. One of my all time favorites, Sarah. Sarah: [56:40] I think that this does so well and Roseanne generally I think is pretty good at getting across like that just many fundamentally undignified aspects of the big moments in life when a TV show or a movie is quote good at death that it's coexisting like this sort of like bomb crater moment emotionally is coexisting with a lot of like just really frumpy admin that you have to deal with. This happened in my own family that we are still making terrible, dark jokes about the fact that my late mother, Barb, passed away shortly before Halloween. And they just like FedEx you the remains, which seems weird. I don't know, maybe drive it there, but they do just on a FedEx truck. And so my dad took delivery and, you know, at the front door and put it on a sideboard at the front door. And then it just stayed there. And I was there like, I don't know, October 29th. And there was the Halloween candy next to mom. And I was like, dad, one of these things really needs to not be here. And he's like, I'll move it. I was like, will you? And, you know, like actual Halloween day, I was like, Dad, go to the front hall, take a picture of what's on the sideboard and send it to me. Mom better not fucking be there. Take her to the kitchen. Shit. Tara: [58:02] He was just being on theme. It's macabre. Sarah: [58:05] Yeah. He's like, I put her on the piano. Don't tell me how to live. I was like, oh. Dave: [58:09] Don't put containers of powder in the kitchen. I'm just saying. Tara: [58:12] That's a good point. Sarah: [58:14] I mean, yeah, like no, no children were harmed in the storage of my mom. But anyway, it's, I mean, so much of it is shit like that. And then, you know, the people who are left making terrible dark jokes about like, oh, trick or treat, is it? Check this shit out, Low Pockets. So, yeah, that really spoke to me. But also this overarching desire to just be done with these like awkward parts and also all the other parts. Dave: [58:47] It's part that, but I think it's also part, like, the things you have to do in the industry around somebody dying sort of is there to provide busy work so that you have time to not process it, you know, until you're ready to process it as part of it, too. Sarah: [59:04] For sure. But there's also, I think the other thing it does well and that Roseanne always did well is, like, the different ways that adult siblings have into, like, coping with family of origin shit. And this fairly short scene really illustrated that well. It felt real and observed, but it's also extremely funny, like just the increasing volume of passed away and dead and the desperate faces that Metcalf is making, like, please let a hole open up and swallow this entire situation. Yeah, excellent idea for a tiny canon. Thank you for the submission. Dave: [59:40] Yeah, I'm looking forward to many more death entries in the tiny canon. I came into this completely cold. I've never really watched Roseanne and I had no idea that this existed. It just didn't cross my desk and it made me laugh out loud. It was a really great scene. I also like the sort of unspoken understanding that there is a sister that they don't really care for because at the end of the day, they're fine just letting her understand that dad's still around and, you know, she's going to find out in a very awkward way in the future, but they don't really care enough to really make that today's problem. That's going to the future them problem or future sister problem, I guess. Is that sister a character on the show ever? Tara: [1:00:21] No. Dave: [1:00:21] It's just, it's a voice? Fantastic. Even better. Great television moment. By the way, this comes from Roseanne, season five, episode 16, Wait Till Your Father Gets Home. Tara: [1:00:31] Yeah, written by Amy Sherman before she was Amy Sherman Palladino, by the way. Dave: [1:00:35] Oh. All right, let's put this to the official vote. Tara Arianna, what say you? Tara: [1:00:39] Yay! Dave: [1:00:42] And you're Sarah, Sarah T. Bunchy, what say you? Sarah: [1:00:45] I'm fine. I send my love, and it's a yes for me, too. Dave: [1:00:48] All right. This is, I'm going to say yes to, of course. This is my least favorite part of the episode, where I try to get everything in during the ending, sped up Tiny Cannon success music. So here we go. Wish me luck. So, Jackie and Roseanne's phone call from Roseanne, you are hereby inducted into the extra hot, great, tiny Death Cannon. Yeah! Bam! Dave: [1:01:12] Suck it, everybody. Americans love a winner. And will not tolerate a loser. Nope. All right. It is time for Not Quite Winners and Losers of the Week. Our first Not Quite Winner is Law & Order Toronto colon Criminal Intent. Which, first of all, what? Tara: [1:01:32] Yeah, well, now you know. Dave: [1:01:35] But wait, it gets so much better. It's getting a two-season pickup. What? Wait, at the CW. What? Tara: [1:01:43] Yeah. Dave: [1:01:43] So once again, to recap, Law & Order Toronto, a thing that exists. It has a criminal intent version. It's getting two season pickup and it's happening at the CW. Okay. Tara: [1:01:53] Right. To be clear, it's already aired in Canada. They're just, it's the CW and importing it. Yeah. Dave: [1:01:59] Sure, sure, sure. Tara: [1:01:59] Making it clear to the listener. Dave: [1:02:01] So me and Tara recently went on a road trip. On the road trip, we saw a sign for some store. It's like, that looks intriguing, but weird. What is that? So we looked it up and it was something called a bin store. Sarah, do you know what a bin store is? Sarah: [1:02:13] Not really. Dave: [1:02:14] So a bin store, I'll tell you about the one that we have close by in Pflugerville, Texas. So a bin store is a place, it's sort of like the new version of a closeout store, I think, where the store will just buy a whole bunch of like stupid shit. And I think it's also a bit like Storage Wars, where they're just buying like Amazon returns that were never open to see what is inside. And so you walk into the store and And there's just shit all over the story. It looks like somebody threw a grenade in a Salvation Army. But the hook is every day of the week, whatever they had at the start of the week gets cheaper day by day. So Monday you pay full price. Tuesday you pay, you know, 80%, 60% or whatever. However, it goes down. So the longer you wait, less stuff there is. But the cheaper it gets, how does that they clear out the bins every week? And the CW feels like it's a bin store now. It just feels like they're taking whatever from wherever. They're throwing it in the bin. Mondays, we got you a lot in order. Maybe you will show another one on Friday. Sarah: [1:03:14] Yeah, like sports, British heist, limited series. They're hemorrhaging money, too, no? Dave: [1:03:19] Australian docu-comedies. It's just like, they're all over the place. Sarah: [1:03:23] Yeah. Dave: [1:03:23] Like, I feel like they're just, like, adding the weird cheap shows they get from foreign markets just to keep it alive. And once in a while, they have an original program. But what a dumpster fire. Sarah: [1:03:33] Yeah, and then there's, like, occasionally, college basketball. Like, what? Tara: [1:03:37] Yeah. Sarah: [1:03:37] Anyway. Dave: [1:03:37] Anyways, not quite loser of the week is, of course, Max. I think probably everybody's already heard about this. HBO, HBO Go, HBO Now, HBO Max, then Max. And now, once again, HBO Max. So I don't know how much money went down the drain for all that, but it couldn't have been insignificant. And so they're going to be back to HBO Max soon enough. So, I mean, it's a better name, but fucking hell, dude. Sarah: [1:04:07] Just got to a point like last month where I was not pausing for a split second to be like, oh, wait, it's just Max. Tara: [1:04:14] We aren't even talking about the times, like the logo when it was HBO Max, it was purple. Then when they changed it to Max, it was blue. As of like six months ago, now it's all black. Like all of them are black practically. Go back to purple. Nothing else is purple except Tubi and who fucking watches Tubi? Nobody. Sarah: [1:04:31] I do. Dave: [1:04:32] Sarah does. Tara: [1:04:32] Sorry. Dave: [1:04:33] All right, Sarah, what do you got? Tara: [1:04:33] No offense. Sarah: [1:04:36] What have I got? The winner, my not quite winner, is Deion Sanders, soon to be the subject of a Netflix docuseries. You might be asking yourself, self, didn't they already do a 30 for 30 about him? But it was like weirdly disappointing. And then he's had this whole like other chapter since that 30 for 30 as a college football coach. And then there's this whole, you know, thing with the draft and glad someone is taking another crack at his one wildlife because he is extremely charismatic and watchable. So this is good news. I guess it depends on who's directing it and whether he gets approval or not. The not-quite-loser of the week. On-call, dead at Prime Video after a single season. Talked about this in a previous Extra Hot Great episode, I think 552. We'll link that in the show notes once I track it down. This also is a good thing. This also had potential. Not worth re-exploring. Not everything Dick Wolf does needs to go to air, folks. You can give him some free time. Tara: [1:05:38] Maybe this will free Dick Wolf up to do a Masquerade series, because that's what I would like to see him revisit, honestly, this movie with Rob Lowe and Doug Zavon, and maybe this time they can fuck, but that's beside the point. Sarah: [1:05:51] Oh my God, yes, please. Tara: [1:05:52] Speaking of TV about people fucking rivals, the Disney Plus slash Hulu show coming over from Britain. This was the show Dave and I talked about in our catch-up episode after the break. Like, David Tennant is a TV network creator, director, and it's all about the various nefarious things that people do to try to get this business off the ground. At the end of the first eight-episode season, I was like, that was great. I need so much more of it, though. Like, when a show is that juicy and soapy, you want it, at least I did, wanted it to be more like Dynasty, where, like, it just keeps going and even crazier shit happens because they have to fill out the time. And I didn't quite get my wish, but season two is going to be half again as long. They're going from eight to 12 episodes, and I couldn't be happier. Sarah: [1:06:42] Woo. Tara: [1:06:43] More boobs. Loser of the week, not quite division. Recently, we talked about Clayton Eckerd because he is a former bachelor who was crying that Gabby Windy went on a podcast and said his dancing is so bad that if you watch his videos, you'll wish you didn't have eyes. Sarah: [1:07:00] Oh, yeah. Tara: [1:07:01] Such a good line. Anyway, he's back in the news, but this time he's not the loser. The loser is a person named Laura Owens who has been indicted on multiple felony charges for faking a pregnancy alleged to be his. So this guy is cursed. Like, what the fuck? Why is his karma so bad? Why do I keep hearing about this man in all these terrible contexts? I mean, in this case, he's the victim, but still, wow. Dave: [1:07:30] Yikes. Yikes. Sarah: [1:07:37] Hello, Grandpa. Welcome. Welcome back. We're glad you're here. We wish that you had been here for this entire giant episode. You've missed like 80 minutes of our discussion of Duster. We talked about TV shows we had no regrets about quitting. We went into the EEHG conclave, face Merkins, shoes full of bodily fluids. We covered a lot in 80 minutes, and we think that you would really enjoy it, despite my terrible job of selling it just now. Kick up that pledge to five bucks a month, and you get another entire episode. And you support a team of creators that can't keep making podcasts without listeners like you. That's it. In this economy, we're just glad you're here at any level. And that we get to share with you our conversation about the debut episode of Saturday morning kids program, The Weird Al Show. Yes, that Weird Al. The show ran for a single season, September to December 1997. Reruns aired through the towards the end of 98. The show did not come out on DVD until 2006. It was like a show-within-a-show thing. Weird Al is himself living in an underground tree home while working as a TV host. Sarah: [1:08:55] Apparently, Weird Al Yankovic had been pitching networks on an Al kids show for a while, which sort of makes sense, but sort of doesn't. If you have seen UHF, the journey that George goes on with Uncle Nutsy's Clubhouse kind of feels like it might have been pretty true to life and informed this whole situation. If you have not seen UHF, go watch it. It is on Prime and it is dumb and weird. I am a big fan of Weird Al's, but I didn't even know this existed until recently, and I thought we could give it a look, see if it's any good, and if it's not, what we think went wrong. Just go through the show and discuss. Thus, before I get into it, had either of you had any contact with The Weird Al Show? Tara: [1:09:35] Never. Did not know it existed either. Dave: [1:09:37] Yeah. Likewise. Just was off my radar, I guess. Sarah: [1:09:41] And I think there was probably good reason for that, but the creative group on deck is wild. Peyton Reed directs the premiere. Peyton Reed, who directed Bring It On, and most of the Ant-Man catalog. The writers include 30 Rock vet Ron Weiner, Letterman vet Mark O'Keefe, but despite a promisingly weird and accordion-forward theme song, as you might expect, clip one... Sarah: [1:10:25] I mean, it is a kid's show. One wonders if maybe he didn't start with the theme and then the pitch worked its way back from there, but it is just trying herniatically hard from the very beginning, as every episode would going forward. This one, which is called Bad Influence, begins with Today's Lesson, which is intoned by legendary voice actor Billy West, a.k.a. The Red Eminem, Zoidberg, and the other iconic characters. In the premiere, this lesson is, Don't follow people who can get you into trouble. Think for yourself. Sarah: [1:10:59] The Al in the show, a Mad Inventor type, is working on an x-ray spray and some bad jokes about his car keys when his new quote friend Spike, Kevin Marshall Flinkman Weissman, shows up to underline and asterisk the lesson. Spike apparently is the head of a club that he is considering letting Al join, but only if he lets Spike use the x-ray spray to, like, steal stuff and raise hell. And if Al does a bunch of dumb shit that Spike claims is cool, like ripping off a single pant leg and dipping both his arms in molten chocolate. Spike is also insufficiently admiring of Harvey the Wonder Hamster's Evel Knievel stunt work, but Al should really know that Spike is some bullshit when he's not enthusiastic about the best activity invented by God or man for clubs, clip two. So come on, Al, do something to entertain me. Oh, uh, okay, um, oh, hey. Sarah: [1:12:09] All right. Okay. Come on over here. I mean, hello. But it's also the best part of the episode by far, because here come the commercial parodies and not a minute too soon. Clip three. Isn't this fun? No. You don't want to pay a lot for daycare by pirates. Dave: [1:12:26] But you expect the superior quality and experience that only pirates can provide. That was the only part of the show that got anything out of me. I was going to say right now, I got a little chuckle out of that. And the rest of the show, I was like, hmm, hmm. Sarah: [1:12:41] Well, yeah, we'll get into it. But this ad is a bunch of burly dudes in pirate costumes helping small children finger paint and play wiffle ball. And it is so rando and hilarious that I liked it. Soon enough, though, it is back to reminding everyone that Spike is a dickwad who's been fucking with Al this whole time, starting with a fashion report from downtown Julie Brown as herself that makes it clear Al ruined his pants for nothing. Then there's another ad, this one for a pizza chain that keeps the pie hot by not wasting valuable time putting in a box, which also makes no sense. And then Spike is back on his bullshit, making Al shave his eyebrow, put on bunny ears, and be an asshole to his neighbor, Bobby the Inquisitive Boy, played by Gary Leroy Gray. Bobby has skinned his knees skateboarding and would just like a Band-Aid, but instead he gets a social hygiene film that an audio-only clip doesn't quite do justice to. Clip four. Safety is everyone's business. We can all stay out of harm's way. Sarah: [1:13:59] Home right away so your friends won't beat you up for looking like a dork. I mean, obviously, in this notoriously visual medium of podcasting, you can't see this, but in this black and white clip that is illustrating the spider portion, the dad in the film is making this flawless, like, go ahead, full 360 motion with his finger as his kid is rolling out a spider that really made me laugh. I mean, I can't describe it. It was very funny to me, but I think I was also getting beaten down by the exhausting kidsiness here. And there's even more of Spike being a rude twat, messing with Al's viewer mail, begging on reading of any kind. Al is finally saved by the bell, sort of, when the only other member of this club appears at the door, dressed like a stereotypical TV poindexter. Clip 5. What is he talking about? And what happened to your eyebrow? Oh, I shaved. Sarah: [1:15:03] Other guys in the club yet. What are you saying? Uh, that we get it. That's what I'm saying. Very nice of Pat and Oswald to agree to do this show, but maybe don't get quite so baked before the call time that you can't get through your lines without laughing. Al finally figures it out. Bobby and his neighbor, the hooded Avenger, come by to make sure we understand what true friends look like. And then the bare naked ladies show up en route to a Ren fair. Wear, change clothes, and functionally play us out of the episode with a lip-sync of Shoebox, which, great, fine, we're done. I am glad for everyone's sake that the show only lasted 13 episodes, but I may go through the other episodes and look for the parodies because those are good. Those are what Al can actually do. The rest of this, even grading on a kid's TV curve, was fairly painful. And I apologize. Dave: [1:15:58] Good. I was expecting an apology. Sarah: [1:16:02] Yeah. Dave: [1:16:03] Yeah. P.U. Sarah: [1:16:04] There it is. Dave: [1:16:07] Given I hadn't heard of the show before and when it came up, I'm like, oh, really? Well, that might be okay. And then it started and I was like, wow, this is pretty terrible. And you absolutely nailed it. Weird Al is good at the parodies and bad at everything else. We all want to love Weird Al unconditionally, but the Weird Al show proves that we have to love him conditionally because not everything he puts out is as good as his song parodies. Having met Weird Al at Soup Plantation. Tara: [1:16:37] Met is a strong word. Dave: [1:16:39] You know, one of my favorite things from my youth, one of my favorite things from my adulthood, together at the same place. We shared a meal next to each other at different tables. I'm a fan, but holy shit, this was just like bad. And like, we've already had the better version of this called Pee Wee's Playhouse, which was so much better and miles ahead on production quality and everything. Like part of this is Weird Al obviously got $20 an episode to do it. The parts where he's not sort of in his comedic element doing a parody, it kind of feels like he's just making noise. Like that's what his vision of what kids want is just loudness and brightness. And, you know, like he's talking to a baby and not like an eight or nine year old who would really go for his stuff. Tara: [1:17:28] Yeah. Sarah: [1:17:28] Well, I think there's also this might have been a network problem or it might have been a like a classification error, basically. But like his shit works for kids. Like when you first discover Weird Al and you're like in third or fourth grade or whatever, maybe you have an older sibling who's into it. Maybe you just like heard it, whatever. But like you respond to it because it does sort of feel like it wasn't made capital F, capital K for kids. It feels like it's for everyone or sort of for grownups, but you get it. So you feel like it's good and you also feel kind of special because you get it and it's not talking down to you, really. I wouldn't say it's for master's candidates or anything. It's a song parody called Lasagna. Let's not over-index it, but... When you put that vibe of like something that appeals to children because they don't really think it's for children, it's like for babies. And you try to put that brand into like stereotypical learning and hugging kids programming. Everyone involved looks uncomfortable. And then you have a musical guest. Like, I mean, Barenaked Ladies are fine. I've got no kick with them. But what are we doing? Dave: [1:18:43] Kids don't care about musical accent. Older kids. Sarah: [1:18:45] Yeah. Dave: [1:18:46] That is not this age group. I mean, going back to the Pee Wee Herman thing, Pee Wee's Playhouse is subversive. And that's what I think is missing here from the stuff that isn't a parody. And like Weird Al's parodies can be subversive as well and sort of tap into that same energy. But everything around this show isn't really doing that. It's more like a homage to the Howdy Doodies and everything from that rather than sort of taking it and twisting it Weird Al style. It seems to be more of a one-to-one production, except it is existing in an era that isn't as wholesome as when Howdy Doody was airing. I mean, at least like culturally. And it just sort of all that part of it just falls flat. And it's not funny. Some of the things that I think he's trying to like tap into that kids would find funny, like the hamster doing the stunt ruined by the other character. Like, now let's do it like where the hamster dies. It's like, what? Like, what exactly is the messaging here? So there's just a lot of missteps. I think it feels sort of like he wanted to do, or rather he should have done something that had more edge, but was perhaps worried about his image at that point or something, or didn't really feel like it would sell to kids, which is weird because we already know it does. Sarah: [1:20:09] It should have been like Nick at Night or Liquid TV or something like that that was just like sui generis and wasn't trying to fit into some sort of like Captain Kangaroo mold that like that's not what appeals to. To kids about Weird Al. Like, just be, I don't know, Nick at Night. Tara: [1:20:27] Yeah, it was such a bummer to me that, you know, it started out with this very specific, like, putting the lesson right up top tells you exactly what this is trying to be. And, yeah, like you said, it's not even being a spoof of that. It's just doing a sort of... Sarah: [1:20:43] It's just doing that, yeah. Tara: [1:20:44] Right. It's a quasi-updated, you know, modern version of, like, prescriptive programming for kids. And it's like, this is so boring. And, you know, the Al that we get in this is sort of childlike in the way that Pee-wee is on Pee-wee's Playhouse and in Pee-wee's Big Adventure. Tara: [1:21:01] But even Pee-wee could have, you know, there could be a little bite to what he was doing. Like sometimes it was various female characters were like hitting on him and he didn't get it or he wasn't interested or whatever. And this, you know, but he would like sort of slap back or he would get mad. And it seems like Weird Al is not interested in being anything but the completely palatable version of a musical parody artist that has a large children's following. But there's no reason to watch this show i mean dave nailed it like there's there already was a good version of it called bb's way house and this is such a ripoff and it's so it's so obvious, what it's ripping off and like you can see when you watch it every single meeting that was had to get it from like whatever the good idea was in the past to this version that they thought would sell better that was just like sanding off every single every single edge that might have ever been there or anything that seemed too sorry weird or whatever like just to make this the most generic version of the thing that it can be so that it's for no one but i will also say i mean to the patten oswalt point like in 1997 he wasn't anyone yet he was just like a working comic that was around i mean peyton reed probably knew him from directing remotes of mr show which is also what he was doing around this time yeah uh what a drag to. Sarah: [1:22:29] Your point about the childlike quality it's like i think they clearly want him to be this like sort of ageless but childlike figure but like i mean this is a tall adults with facial hair. So figure out some other way, like make him a Mr. Wizard figure or something. But this, like the peewee-esque thing is not going to work. And that's a sort of inimitable property anyway. Whatever you think of what happened afterwards, trying to sort of like wander it with this instead is not, not functional. Anyway, I apologize to the panel. Dave: [1:23:05] Apology accepted. Sarah: [1:23:07] Thank you. Dave: [1:23:09] Well, guys, that is it for another episode of Extra Extra Hot Great. We took the new J.J. Abrams Show Duster out for a spin before answering your burning-ass EHG questions like, What's your first sainthood as TV Pope, and why won't Nathan Fielder just go away? Leslie got our first tiny death cannon in for Roseanne's death phone call. We celebrated those who weren't quite the best and worst of the week and wrapped it all up with Sarah forcing us and apologizing for watching the Weird Al TV show. Next up on EHG Prime, it's Murderbot. Remember. We're listening. I am David T. Cole and on behalf of Tara Ariano. Tara: [1:23:58] Hey, it's my good friends, Barenaked Ladies. Dave: [1:24:01] And Sarah D. Bunting. Sarah: [1:24:03] Roll roll on the ground. Dave: [1:24:05] Thanks for listening everyone and we'll see you next time right here on extra extra hot great.