Hanging Ten With Gidget

Dave: [0:13] This is the Extra Extra Hot Great Podcast, episode 359 for the June 21st, 2025 weekend. I am slow learner David T. Cole, And I'm here with splendid talker, Sarah D. Buntett. Sarah: [0:32] Go, Gadget, go. Dave: [0:33] And hopping spinster, Tara Ariano. Tara: [0:36] But maybe if I'm really lucky, I'll break my leg before the dance. Tara: [0:48] Welcome to Extra, Extra Hot Great, the show made possible by your Patreon support. Thank you so much for being here. Thank you to everyone who has ever submitted to The Forest and Incool because we're back in it. We're leaping in to talk about Gidget Season 1, Episode 20, Ego Agogo. Gidget, Sally Field, is an adorable high school student and surfer. She lives in Los Angeles with her widowed father, Russell, Don Porter, an English professor at UCLA. The classic sitcom situation she gets into in Ego A Go Go is asking Norman Durfner, aka Durf the Drag, to the spinster hop, basically out of pity, then tries to weasel out of it when she realizes her rivals are going to judge her if she dates him. But breaking the date with Norman doesn't go at all the way she expects. Also, Norman is played by a very young Richard Dreyfuss. The show was adapted as a series from the Gidget movie series, which was adapted from the Gidget book, all created by Frederick Conner about his daughter, Kathy. The first movie starred Sandra Dee. Cindy Carroll took over after that for Gidget Goes Hawaiian and Gidget Goes to Rome. But Sarah Moondoggy in all of them was the late James Darin from the end of Melrose Place, the cruise guy that was in love with Amanda. Sarah: [2:05] Oh, yeah. Yeah. I assume you're getting to Francis Ford Coppola's 2000 high school musical version. Tara: [2:12] I was going to mention that because I just learned about that this week as well. There was a musical. It starred Krista Rodriguez from Smash. And Dermot Mulroney was in it as well. Anyway, there were also TV movies. Our friend E.W. Swackhammer of Terror at Lundin Bridge fame directed Gidget Gets Married, I believe. Dave: [2:31] Good for him. Tara: [2:31] There was a new Gidget TV series in 1987 that had four episodes with the guy who played Kurt in Heather's. Lance Fenton, which also feels like it could be a Gidget name. Anyway, this episode originally aired January 27th, 1966. It was written by Barbara Avedon, who went on to write on Bewitched, Wonder Woman, and Fish before creating Cagney and fucking Lacey, okay? It was directed by Gerald Bernstein, who would later direct a bunch of The Flying Nun, also starring Sally Field. This episode was submitted to The Forcing Pool by Messy115, who writes, I loved watching reruns of Gidget and the Monkeys and the Flying Nun during boring summer when I didn't have anything else going on. Plus, I love the outfits. Word. And Sally Field is charming, all caps. The guest star shows that acting as a prick has always come easy for him. I agree. Let's do the Chen check-in. Sarah, should our listeners watch Ego, a go-go, and or Gidget in general. Sarah: [3:33] Gidget in general, I don't know. But if, like me, you've never seen one, this is a good one. Tara: [3:39] Yep. Sarah: [3:39] I liked it. Tara: [3:40] Dave. Dave: [3:40] Yeah, this is also my first Gidget. And I was charmed. Charmed. I wouldn't mind watching some more, frankly. Tara: [3:47] Well, we'll get into it because I really loved it too. Dave: [3:49] Before we start, since Messy 115 mentioned The Flying Nun, I will have to admit that previous to my 50th year on Earth, I thought that Gidget and The Flying Nun were the same show and that The Flying Nun also surfed as a secondary means of transportation when her habit ran out of gas or whatever. Sarah: [4:11] I also thought that until fairly recently. So yeah. Dave: [4:16] Okay, good. Tara: [4:17] I also, not having ever seen The Flying Nun either, have to guess there had to have been an episode where she surfs. They must have done it. Dave: [4:25] I'm not sure what The Flying Nun's about either, to be I mean besides the fact that there's a nun and she probably has the power of flight but beyond that I don't really know what it's about but it feels like surfing could be a part of it I think it's. Tara: [4:37] Something about her headgear it like picks her up like a. Dave: [4:40] Kite I'm not kidding I. Tara: [4:41] Think that's it. Dave: [4:41] Oh okay so it's a show about unlikely aerodynamics yes perfect okay. Tara: [4:48] So in the cold open get some very efficient table setting Sherry Lou and Marilyn played by Susan Yardley and Leslie Towner are bitchy social climbers. LaRue, played by Lynette Winter, is a good friend to Gidget, and Durf really is a drag. Clip one. Sherry Lou, are you going to the spinsters' hop? Natch? Who are you taking? whose aunt just so happens to be one of Rock Hudson's secretary's half-sist. No, LaRue. Then who? Mitch Shields, who crewed three times in the Ensenada yacht race, coming in second on his. Sarah: [5:58] Oh, hey, clarinets. Tara: [6:00] No, we had to hear it all. Dave: [6:01] Two seconds into this episode, two seconds, Sally Field is giving this while she eating lunch. Oh, my God. These bitches side eye. Tara: [6:11] Yeah. Dave: [6:12] That immediately won me over. Like we're literally two seconds into the show. I'm like, all right, this is great. I didn't expect it from something from the mid 60s, like that attitude and some of the dialogue later in the show, too. I'm like, oh, OK. But that moment, I asked her to make a gif of it that I was so pleased with it. But she's got like, what is this outfit she's wearing at the start? Describe it because I don't have the vocabulary. Tara: [6:35] I'm so glad you asked, Dave. She has a crocheted kerchief, which is something we recently mocked because it came back in the aughts. We see it in Dawson's Creek. And this kerchief, by the way, they're in Southern California. So it's like it's not functional. It's purely a style accessory. And then she's in a sleeveless dress that's sort of like styled like separate. So with like a burgundy bodice and then like a checked burgundy and gray or beige skirt with panels, like a little built in belt and then matching tights and then white or off white flats. Dave: [7:07] It's opinionated, but I don't really know if it's fashion forward for the time. It seems for sure. Yeah. So that plus nibbling on lunch plus fuck these bitches. Tara: [7:18] Yeah. Dave: [7:19] Perfect. Tara: [7:20] Absolutely. Sarah: [7:20] And LaRue's eye roll while eating carrot sticks, also fantastic. And LaRue's Mustang, I mean, it's the Brandon Walsh car, but it's dark red and it rolled off the line moments before filming. Tara: [7:32] It's so shiny. Anyway, this smashes us into the opening credits, clip two. Did I hear your waterboarding, Valentine? Sarah: [8:28] That's what I heard. It must be water sporting, but probably the days of the you've never owned a television before. Let me immediately tell you what the show is about. Theme songs. So good. And then a little ukulele at the end for that island feel. Okay. All right. Mid 60s. Tara: [8:47] Exactly. You can tell this is like right on the verge of two different musical moments. Like we're about eight months away from the release of the Revolver album by the Beatles. Like things are about to change. This is sort of straddling two moments. Like it's got a little bit of rock, but it's also very Bobby Darin-y, you know? Dave: [9:06] So the credits are accompanied by still photos. Very well done studio stuff of Gidget doing silly things and her father just sitting there being meh, but I thoroughly enjoyed the credits. I thought the art direction was great. I cut a whole bunch of stills from the credits. And if you go to my Blue Sky account, Cole.FYI, you can see them. My account has turned into a Gidget meme account for the next week or so. Tara: [9:36] Fantastic. Dave: [9:36] Yeah. Sarah: [9:37] Love that. Dave: [9:37] I absolutely loved it. And that weird font they use, which is sort of like a church pamphlet font from the era too is very prevalent in like the Sunday service little paper books that they put out. So yeah it's all of a type. Love it. Tara: [9:52] So right after that Gidget is explaining her reasoning to LaRue in LaRue's as we already said hot ass tomato red Mustang convertible hoping that she'll be lucky enough to break her leg before the dance so she's on to go. LaRue says she just needs to find a combination of Prince Charming, Ringo and Sandy Koufax Sarah we will come back to that. They walk inside and see Chuck Batson doing calisthenics and lifting a wooden chair over his head with one hand. Chuck is played by Ed Griffith. Dave found some intel on him as well. Dave: [10:22] I knew the face. I didn't know it that young, but there's something that triggered it. So I had to look it up. First, I couldn't find out where he was. So I had to go spelunking on the internet a little bit. This actor, many years later, was in Pee-wee's Big Adventure. And he is not the main trucker, but he is the secondary trucker in the I am now at the truck stop after meeting large Marge scene. And he's the guy that says, Yeah. Did you say large Marge? So that's him. Like 20, 20 odd years later, I guess. He looks good. He's looking good. The one thing I didn't get about the Gidget part, though, is although I guess chairs back in the day were made of stronger stuff. Tara: [11:03] Yes. Dave: [11:03] But the lifting the dining room chair as a feat of strength caught me as a little odd. But I suppose the chair probably weighed three times as much as a chair does now. Tara: [11:12] No doubt. And lifting it with one hand over his head. That's, you know. Sarah: [11:16] Okay. Tara: [11:17] It's heavy. Dave: [11:17] Yeah. Tara: [11:18] So this is what that sounds like, clip three. 6'1", 175-pound even. Run 109.5 flat, Gadget. Leroy? It's okay. Gives them his bicep to squeeze. And they do. And at first, Gidget makes a face like, and then she's like, hmm. Dave: [12:17] Sarah, I know you're from Jersey, but you live in Brooklyn for a long time. How much better would this podcast be if you talk like Chuck? Sarah: [12:25] Hey, oh, I don't know. That's like mid-century Brooklynese. Tara: [12:31] Yeah. Sarah: [12:31] Like that stickball. Dave: [12:32] I was going to say, it's stickball. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. Tara: [12:35] Yeah. Sarah: [12:36] Benson Hurst. Sure. I mean, you know, functionally the same. Dave: [12:40] He wants to go play stick balls. Sarah: [12:42] I want to go play stick ball. This is where I sort of got on the show's side versus just being like, let's sit through this as a 60 year old curio of when there was nothing else on. You had to watch what was on because it is really fast and dense. Like some of it is like, oh, that like the lingo you dig, you dig. and stuff like that, like post beat lingo with the kids. Some of it, I was like just shopping the production design, even though to them that was just stuff. It's like, oh, it's seafoam cabinet transistor radio. Hello. This sequence is where it sort of got me writing wise that it's like they kept it moving and it was really dense and they weren't necessarily with the exception of some like moments at an ad break. Pretty tight. Tara: [13:34] Fair. I mean, we'll get to the screen gems of it all, but it was from the same era and same studio is like Bewitched and I Dream of Jeannie and the Monkees, of course. So it's like similar shot on film. There's a laugh track because there's no audience. A lot is resting on the music cues. Anyway, Ed Griffith was not from Bensonhurst. He was from John Steinbeck country, Salinas, California. And we lost him in 2006. We miss him. Gidget hatches a date for grade scheme over a jigsaw puzzle with LaRue and decides to cancel on Norman. Dave: [14:08] That's not how you do a jigsaw puzzle. You can't have half the puzzle pieces in the box and half of them on the table. You either have, well, frankly, you have to have all the pieces on the table. There's no other way to do a jigsaw puzzle properly. Those ladies are going to be there forever because they're only working with half the pieces. Tara: [14:24] Yeah, they're doing it on like her desk in her bedroom. It's not enough space. Sarah: [14:28] I am not a crackpot. Correct jigsaw puzzle procedure is dump them all out. Get all the edge pieces. when the edges are done, put the other pieces back in the box to save tabletop space and take it from there. Dave: [14:41] I don't agree with that. Put him back in the box, but we agreed on the edge. Tara: [14:45] This is going to tear us apart. We have to keep moving. LaRue does not believe that Gidget will cancel on Norman. And I can't clip the moment when Gidget starts deflating while dialing Norman's number, which takes a while because it's a rotary phone because it's the past. Not even Norman's mother can believe that a girl is calling the likes of him. But when Norman does come over after dinner, it's immediately awkward. Clip four. Isn't this relaxing? Oh, yeah. Tara: [15:30] Are you warm enough? What do you mean? Norman admits he's never been on a patio at night with a girl before like this. And Gidget is working so hard to let him down easy that he thinks she's complimenting him this lavishly because she wants to get serious. But he has plans to follow his uncle into the brain business, so he can't. And he breaks the date on Gidget before she can do it to him. And at school the next day, Norman has so much self-confidence after being the dumper. Plus, he's had a makeover courtesy of his mother, who apparently believes for the first time he is worth investing in, that Sherry Lou asks Gidget to double to the dance with her. And Gidget has to say yes to save face. And at home, Gidget runs into Chuck again on her way to her bedroom. She mopes about her datelessness. He offers to go with her, but she turns him down because now she is so into Durf, the former drag. And when she gets Durf to return to the patio after dinner, he is the monster she created until he overhears Chuck learning how to diagram sentences the way Gidget suggested earlier in the episode by having Prof make Chuck the subject, clip five. Tara: [16:40] Let's say with your help and mom's, I'm scaling the pinnacle of my potential. Sarah: [17:58] You mean i sound like that well you're not from brooklyn oh but the way he praises himself like he was some gift to to to i. Tara: [18:09] Do oh wow, the next morning professor lawrence thanks gidget for her study method she says it was Simply a Matter of Feeding the Male Ego, clips it. Well, look what happened to Durk. I mean, like he said, he really went, That's Stanley. Sarah: [19:36] Pioneering the dad joke. Get to seeing her. Tara: [19:39] This was the moment that made me wonder, okay, we've got a single father, single widowed father, a daughter who thinks she knows better about everything. She's got one sister who's already married. Is this like a very subtle gloss on Emma for Jane Austen novel? But according to the internet, no, that's just me. Dave: [19:57] But anyway, this scene takes place in the kitchen and it starts off with them doing the dishes, right? Or is that a different scene? Tara: [20:04] Doing the dishes is before he comes over the first time. She's making her lunch. Dave: [20:08] All right. Well, let's rewind quickly to the dishes since we're talking about kitchen stuff. In that previous scene, the water is the hottest water ever to be depicted in this sitcom. Tara: [20:18] It's true. It's steaming. Dave: [20:20] I think there's a little smoke bomb in the sink. I think that's how they fake it, because obviously that water isn't connected to anything that would boil water in this set. It's just like running from a bucket, probably. Yes. And they also have to make it look like steam. So there's like 12 cigarettes in the sink or something. I don't know what's going on. Sarah: [20:37] Probably. Dave: [20:38] But it looks like it's like 500 degrees. Tara: [20:40] Yeah. Dave: [20:40] And she's just casually watching the ditches. The skin would be falling off her hands if she was actually doing this. I thought that was pretty funny. Tara: [20:47] Well, she does drop a plate. So, you know, maybe she's lost the use of her nerves. Dave: [20:52] That's right. Tara: [20:52] Anyway, everyone learns a lesson. That's the end of the episode. To answer your first question, Gidget was a coinage by Frederick Conner. It's a conjunction of girl and midget. Dave: [21:03] Oh, oh dear. I didn't know that. Tara: [21:05] Yeah, well, you know, it was the 50s. Dave: [21:08] So what happened to Richard Dreyfuss? Here he is back in 66 looking like a little Jerry O'Connell. Tara: [21:16] Yeah. Dave: [21:17] And doing a good job. The opening clip was very winning. Tara: [21:20] Yes. Dave: [21:21] And he is really good here. You know, we love him in Jaws. Tara: [21:25] Of course. Which is less than 10 years after this, which is crazy to think about. Dave: [21:28] It is crazy. And then he got brain worms or whatever happened. Tara: [21:31] He did. Dave: [21:31] And then now he is who he is. So it's tragic. Stay away from worms. Tara: [21:37] Tale as old as time, though. Sarah: [21:39] Yeah. I had a little thing for him after Stakeout was one of the movies that HBO had the rights to air four times a day in the summer of 87 or 88. He absolutely was that charming prick short king of that era. It really is a shame that Mr. Holland's opus was actually brain canals. Dave: [22:01] The craziest thing about Stakeout is that there somehow was a sequel to Stakeout. Tara: [22:06] Yeah. Sarah: [22:07] Yeah. Dave: [22:07] And I saw it in the theater. It's called Another Stakeout when they used to name movies like that. Tara: [22:12] With Rosie O'Donnell in her imperial era of movies. There's a particular kind of glamour to a high school show that is set in California, especially for, I mean, certainly for Canadians. I would imagine people who are from the Northeast as well. I wouldn't have thought it goes back this far. Like, I think of it in connection with, like, obviously Buffy and 90210 and, like, Saved by the Bell. But seeing the girls eating their lunch outside in their adorable outfits, obviously LaRue's hot-ass fucking car made me jealous. Now, if I'd seen this as a kid, I would have lost my mind. But, like, was I the only one or did you get this too? Dave: [22:48] No, but isn't this also the era of, like, the endless summer and stuff like that? Tara: [22:52] Yes, of course. Dave: [22:52] Right? Sarah: [22:53] So it's in the culture. Tara: [22:54] Yes, of course. Sarah: [22:55] Beach Boys. Tara: [22:56] Beach Boys, yep. Dave: [22:56] Yeah, there's only so many places in the United States where you can get on a surfboard and do it in the sun. Sure, probably you can find a spot in Oregon where you're not going to get dashed against the rocks, but nobody wants to do that in Oregon. They want to do it where it's sunny and warm with their sandy beaches. So, yeah, I get it. I mean, in previous to this, you have the whole, you know, just manifest destiny, go west of it all. So, like, culturally, it's there in America, but the very Californian sunshine forever vibes, I think were there. start. So I mean, I get it. But like, it's always, always weird to see how high California is when it comes to like wanderlust destinations. It always is number one. And number two is way, way, way down. Tara: [23:41] Wow, Joan Didion over here. Sarah, what are what were your thoughts on this? Sarah: [23:46] Well, going back to the Sandy Koufax reference, this was also sort of the beginning of the golden era of Los Angeles Dodgers who were fairly recent transplants from Brooklyn. Sarah: [23:58] A thing that certain older residents of my neighborhood are still pissed about. Guys, it's over. There's apartments where Ebbets Field used to be, please move on, that you would have usually actual Dodgers show up. The Brady Bunch, again, had not Koufax, who wouldn't have trifled with that shit, but Wes Feral, maybe just sort of like lesser stars from the Dodgers were regularly showing up on sitcoms and kids programming. And then this is also sort of a golden era for Los Angeles University sport. I think if O.J. Simpson had not showed up at USC by now when this aired, he was imminent. Mm hmm. Certainly, Lou Alcindor was at UCLA at this time. And I think occasionally would be on things, would be on shows. I would have to check. He contains multitudes, as we know, post-career. But I mean, it really was such a time capsule in terms of the references, like that sort of weird, if everybody has their bingo cards out, liminal space in the 60s, culturally between like very wholesome programming. You have a reference to the space program, which was front of mind, like Mariner 7. I was like, oh boy. Space show reference. You have mid-century Los Angeles Dodgers. Sarah: [25:22] You have like, you know, far out, like it'll be kicky and all this slang that's like, I'm incorporating this immediately. And that whole Beach Boys endless summer flavor. And you're just like minutes away from Monterey, Summer of Love stuff, kind of turning it in a more Paisley psychedelic direction, like overtly. So this was really fascinating to watch on that level. But also, again, pretty smart writing compared with what I was expecting. Like when her dad is like, take Frankenstein. She's like, she says something like, I would, but he won't go with me. He's too cool. I thought it was cleverly done, but especially that cultural stew that it served without even knowing that it was doing that for future generations, obviously, was fascinating, I thought. Dave: [26:14] Yeah, and I think just a few years later... this type of show morphs into like the Brady Bunch and shows like that, which are like not quite as sharply written as this episode was. Tara: [26:25] Well, to Sarah's point about like the turn, you can see it happen during the run of the monkeys, like from season one to season two. It's like, oh, a big fashion revolution has happened. Someone found out about Paisley. But anyway, back to Sandy Koufax. Frederick Conner was born in 1905. He was an Austrian Jew who moved to the U.S. in 1936. So that reading that, I just wondered if that was part of like, let's mention a Jewish hero, but also like what a life to be born in Austria in 1905 and then wake up one day in the 50s and your daughter is like an all-American surf queen. Like, it must have been very strange for Frederick. Since Messy One brought them up, Sarah, talk some more about the costumes because I know you were probably slavering over them like I was. Sarah: [27:12] I mean, it's like seeing pictures of my parents who at this time in history were like already married. They lived in New York. It reminded me of the sort of 50s-ish style revival that happened when I was in high school and just like interviewing my mom about like, what did you wear to school? And she was like, dungarees rolled up to be pedal pushers and a button down shirt. Same as you. We just styled it differently and our skirts couldn't be that short. I mean, it was really something to look at like the costume technology, I guess. And to know that some of it is what you can put your characters in if you're on a lot in a show. But also that it's not that far off from what they would have worn. Tara: [28:04] Yeah. Sarah: [28:04] And would have gone outside to eat their carrot sticks in a baggie like just some things are eternal. That and rolling your eyes at the cat pack in your class and being a bitch about it. And just the fact that everybody looks at least 28 because there's just cigarette smoke in every room. Yeah. Well, yeah, not her. Tara: [28:28] LaRue, you could tell me she was 38 and I'd be like, sure. Sarah: [28:32] Yep. LaRue is a mature young lady. Dave: [28:36] Do you think the song from 30 Rock, The Cleave, is a direct descendant of the theme song to Gidget? because when I heard the Gidget theme for the first time watching this, I'm like, wow, that really feels familiar. And I think that's what I'm thinking of is the famous Cleave song from 30. Tara: [28:50] It definitely sounds like that. But I think like the Gidget theme is probably a knockoff of other like she's, you know, Rat Pack era. She's a swinging dame or whatever. Like they just all kind of sound the same. Dave: [29:01] Yeah, that's probably right. Tara: [29:03] I had a tight five about Screen Gems, which has now been folded into Sony Pictures Entertainment. But Dave, I will say they had a CanCon deal with CBC. They made the Pierre Burton show a little bit after this. Dave: [29:15] Wow. Tara: [29:16] Yeah. I already made a note about the 60th anniversary of the show's premiere, which is on September 15th, to see if I can get cracked to let me write something about it. So I'm ready to dive back in. Dave, I'm surprised to hear that you would be willing to like dip into Gidget. Dave: [29:30] Why is that, Tara? Tara: [29:31] I don't know. Just doesn't seem like your kind of thing. But Sarah, as a fellow monkey's head, would you keep watching? Sarah: [29:37] I would start at the beginning and see how it went. But the monkeys just went off the rails so quickly in terms of quality. That wasn't the point of the monkeys. That was to move record units. I have higher hopes for this, but yeah, I'd give it a go. Tara: [29:53] All right. Well, thank you, Messy 115. This was so fun. You. Dave: [30:14] All right, it's time to change gears for the segment everybody just loves the theme for. It's the number one theme in the universe. Even better than Gidget. It's time for Ask EHG. all right let's talk about last week's ask ask ehg question our judge this week is sarah. Sarah: [30:45] I certainly am hello jovial gent asked which tv show that seemed terrible in concept turned out to be surprisingly good. I was really glad to be a judge for this one because I had like answer paralysis and the answers were quite fun. Before we get into your answers, dear listeners, let's hear from the co-hosts. Tara, what was your entry for this one? Tara: [31:11] Cobra Kai. Why would anyone want to continue a so-so movie franchise from 25 years earlier? Well, the answer is because someone had the very good idea of turning it on its head. Cobra Kai, I think, lost the plot toward the end. It certainly went on too long. It never topped the first kind of perfect season. But that first season is perfect. So Cobra Kai. Sarah: [31:34] All right. Dave, do you have an answer for this one? Dave: [31:36] I do. It is a show that seemed utterly ridiculous on paper, but really informed. I'm going to say the path of all the careers of everybody on this podcast right now. And that is The West Wing. Tara: [31:50] Oh, yeah. Yep. Dave: [31:51] The West Wing is a show about the White House starring Rob Lowe. Tara: [31:58] Yeah. Dave: [32:00] Now, you've watched The West Wing already, but think about a world where you have it. And I just did that elevator pitch. He is some sort of like genius consultant to the U.S. government. And that's the show. And guess what? It's going to air on primetime on NBC. Yes, that NBC. And you're like, uh-huh. And I remember we were going through, you know, the new shows for whatever year that was. And we're like, should we? Like, this sounds ridiculous. And I think that's why we put it in, because on paper, this sounds like something to make fun of 24-7. And then it turned out to be like one of the premier network prestige shows of its time. And, you know, you can debate how stupid it is now and like how pie in the sky everything was and, you know, all that stuff. Tara: [32:46] But just you can you don't really have to. Dave: [32:48] It was sort of a ridiculous premise when you look at it. But it turned out to be one of our biggest shows. and it informed our choices moving forward from that. Plus it got Aaron Sorkin to come on the site and make an ass out of himself. And that probably alone was like the number one thing that helped us get the word out about the site was Aaron Sorkin walking into the forums and taking a big dump all over them. Like, great, more of that, please. Sarah: [33:13] Yeah, for the last time, Camel Lights. That is an excellent answer. And I absolutely, I remember being on that call and being like, look, at least we're not going to have to pay somebody to recap it longer than three. weeks. This shit is going to be, in the trash by Halloween. Dave: [33:29] Yeah. If I told you that premise and then the premise for The Lion's Den and then told you The Lion's Den was after The West Wing, you'd be like, really? Really? Sarah: [33:38] Yeah. Listeners had many good contributions that many of which fell sort of in the same buckets. Squid Eye suggested Cobra Kai. Darren Glass suggested the Saved by the Bell reboot. Confidential to Darren. It is not pandering if you are correct. Seth nominated Hannibal, and that is so true. I cannot believe it got made and kept getting made for three seasons. Sarah: [34:04] Leslie went a bit further back in time for the Battlestar Galactica remake, but our winners today are actually twofold. Diana Joy will get some stickers for Suggesting Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, a show even my musical-avoidant cop-rock-traumatized-ass has really enjoyed when I've had contact with it. And Sister Night, for really making an eloquent case, and I will let Sister Night take it from here, quote, Crazy Ex-Girlfriend was marketed as a, quote, quirky romantic comedy musical about a girl who gives up her dream job to chase a guy who dumped her in high school. And word on the street at the time was it was converted to broadcast standards after Showtime passed. This show should have been utter trash can emoji. Instead, we got one of the most nuanced, semi-comedic portrayals of mental illness in TV history, a ridiculously deep talent bench of an ensemble, and a ton of original songs that were, one, resonant thematically, two, plot and character developing, three, actually effective genre send-ups, four, often on-point cultural commentary, five, bangers even out of context, and six, sometimes just one extended poop joke, A Beautiful Thing. That's a wild degree of difficulty for a 13-plus episode network season on a CW budget, end quote. I mean... Someone gets Sister Night to write a book about Crazy Ex-Girlfriend because it's in there. Tara: [35:30] Yes. Sarah: [35:31] And I completely agree with all of that. Excellent work all around to everyone. But Diana Joy and Sister Night, please contact Dave on the Discord for your stickers via direct message. Dave: [35:42] Thank you. All right, let's get to your questions for us this week. First one is from Mandrake. Following Tulsa King and Nola King, what actor over 70 do you want to see as which city king? We're talking about this recently. Nola King is a spinoff coming up from Tulsa King. Instead of Sylvester Stallone, we're going to have Samuel L. Jackson. We were all hoping that they just basically clone Tulsa King in all its stupidity and make another show out of it. And that, I think, is the template moving forward for this question. So, Tara, who and where? Tara: [36:16] I'm assuming because they're streaming shows that they pay poorly and are inconvenient to make. So I'm going to consign someone I hate to do this. And that is why Gary King, as in Indiana, is going to star John Voight. And I'm going to have to insist they shoot on location. Sarah. Sarah: [36:38] I didn't go that way, but I respect the spite. I would love to see Michael Keaton in Kenosha King. His character used to be a big time Pittsburgh bookie who's now obliged to eat second rate Scrapple in Packers country. And now he's going to have to address the question on all of our minds, namely why Wisconsin seems to have such a high density of outre true crime tales coming out at air. Gein, Slenderman, Making a Murderer. I could easily go on. I hope the show goes on. I hope the show happens. I like Michael Keaton. I think he's okay. He'd do a good job. Tara: [37:13] Isn't that also where Jeffrey Dahmer is from? Sarah: [37:15] Yes. Tara: [37:16] Okay, great. Sarah: [37:17] Milwaukee. Dave: [37:19] My choice is Christopher Walken in Yuma King. Mostly because I think Yuma is a fun word for him to say. Every time he says Yuma, you take a drink and you enjoy it. Also, he complains about the heat a lot in the show because the actor is from New York City. And I think he would bring that with him. His thing, a la Sylvester Stallone, not understanding how coffee is served these days after his stint in prison. Walken's thing is because he was born in 40s New York City, he's angry that here in Yuma, he can't get a decent egg cream. Sarah: [37:55] Yep. Dave: [37:56] Seth, uh-oh, a trickster god has issued you an ultimatum. You must permanently display a single Funko Pop on your otherwise bare mantle, or you'll be transfigured into a Funko for the rest of time. Which plastic figure are you choosing, Sarah? Sarah: [38:15] Easiest question of the week, Mr. Met. Dave: [38:18] Who? Wait, who? Tara: [38:20] Mr. Met. Sarah: [38:21] Mr. Met. Dave: [38:22] Oh, Met. Sarah: [38:22] The mascot of the New York Metropolitan. Mr. Met. Dave: [38:26] I don't know who it was. Tara: [38:27] He's the mascot of the Met Museum. Dave: [38:30] I see. I think Funko Pops look incredibly terrible. I truly don't get why people buy them. Tara: [38:37] Well, we just lost Adam Grossworth. Bye. Dave: [38:39] Yep. All of us make bad decisions sometimes. So I'm doing this under duress, and I truly judge you if you collect these. Wow. There is, I looked up, there's a Zap Brannigan one where he's actually lying down instead of just standing up like all the Funko Pops usually are. It's the scene where he's trying to secure Leela with his Shampagan. Tara: [39:02] That thing. Dave: [39:03] Good concept, like to have a figurine of that. I could see it. It would be fun. Terrible execution. It looks nothing like the character at all because none of the Funko Pops do. There's a Twilight Zone narrator one, but you'd have to keep it in the box so people would know who it is because, again, looks nothing like Rod Serling. There is a Charlie Brown one from the Peanut Specials to tie it into TV. Without, like all Funko Pops, as far as I can tell, without the most expressive part of his face, his weird mouth that Charles Shorts turns into various squiggles. Charlie Brown, no mouth, looks nothing like Charlie Brown. If you have $5,200, I discovered, you can buy a, and I don't know what this means, Freddy Funko as Jamie Lannister Funko Pop. I guess he's heir to the Funko fortune. $5,000. Tara? Tara: [39:52] I mean, I'm not thrilled to have to follow that, but I'm going to go with Joan Holloway because this- Dave: [39:59] Joan Holloway Funko Pop just keeps on falling over and you know it. Tara: [40:03] I mean, her boobs are definitely not proportional, but she is in like the classic red sheath dress with the pencil necklace as seen in my desktop wallpaper currently. Dave: [40:17] Currently, for the last 10 years at least. Tara: [40:19] For the last 10 years at least, you're right. Dave: [40:22] All right. First of two from Jovial Jen with the Love Hotel TV show combining the Real Housewives franchise with Love Island and now Wife Swap colon Real Housewives. What other TV show would you like to see merge with the Real Housewives franchise? So wait a sec. These are actual shows that exist right now? Tara: [40:40] I haven't heard of the Wife Swap one, but that sounds real. Dave: [40:43] OK, so my choice for a show that we're going to merge into the Real Housewives franchise is The Fall of the House of Usher. One at a time, they disappear. Tara: [40:55] Expedition Bigfoot, Sarah. Sarah: [40:58] I hate to drag a franchise I actually enjoy down to their level, but I know this franchise uses Dick's Backs to good advantage. That's Amazing Race. Honorable mention to Hell's Kitchen. Just send Gordon Ramsay into their houses screaming and let everyone suffer the consequences. Dave: [41:16] Number two from Jovial Gent. Which game show would be more entertaining if all the contestants were reasonably intoxicated? Tara: [41:23] I mean, all, but if the type A's of the devil's plan were a little more tipsy, maybe their arithmetic would not be so tight and they would not be so disciplined with their alliances, which would make for more chaos in the show, which, especially this season, would have been good. Dave? Dave: [41:38] Yeah, good pick. Well, I just want to point out that we have Mashed Game as proof of concept. Tara: [41:43] Yeah. Dave: [41:44] Because I'm pretty sure they were all plastered well in advance of taping. Tara: [41:47] For sure. Sarah: [41:48] Yep. Tara: [41:48] And drank during it. I'm pretty sure we see Tumblr. Sarah: [41:52] Visibly. Tara: [41:53] Yeah. Dave: [41:53] Of water. Tara: [41:55] Okay. Sarah: [41:55] Brown water. Dave: [41:56] Yep. I think drunk Jeopardy could be entertaining. I think just people who know facts but lose facts because they're drunk could make for an amusing couple episodes. Tara: [42:06] Yeah. Sarah: [42:06] Talkback version of my local is pretty good. Dave: [42:09] I think, though, that if I had to pick game shows, I would go with one where it's one of those pairs of people playing because i think interacting when you're drunk with somebody you've kind of know will heighten everything so i'm thinking like password or pyramid or even like the newlywed game like those sort of things like more of a an american panel show sort of take on things would work best double the drunk double the chaos here's. Tara: [42:34] Here's a twist only one team member is drunk. Dave: [42:37] And then the other one has to keep trying to keep it on the rails so. Sarah: [42:40] This is like extra hot great. Dave: [42:42] Yeah got it had to beat you to it yep sir once. Sarah: [42:47] Again we're back at my desire to a revive drunk history be as a competition show but i am actually answering wheel of fortune because sometimes the wrong answers on that show with like two letters. Dave: [42:59] Left out of 40. Sarah: [43:00] In the phrase. Dave: [43:01] Make me. Sarah: [43:02] Think that they did take an edible to calm down before the taping which is why they think Like, friends, moments, countrymen, lend me your cars as a thing. So why not make it official? And fuck it. Give Ryan and Van a nice flat shoes and a flask each as well. Why not share the wealth? Dave: [43:23] I, as soon as you said Wheel of Fortune, imagine somebody going to spin the thing and then falling on the wheel and just getting spun around for a while, like one of those carnival rides, centrifugal force. Sarah: [43:32] Pierces the eyeball. Dave: [43:33] And this episode never airs. Sarah: [43:35] And it becomes a whole thing on like r slash snuff on reddit. Dave: [43:39] We found something worse than bankruptcy they died fandy has our next question what would be your tv themed vanity license plate. Sarah: [43:50] I'm gonna have to expand the seven characters. Dave: [43:53] That you get. Sarah: [43:54] In this state to eight with eight eight eight eight zero s ch if you know you know. Dave: [44:02] All right i don't know what oh okay Tara. Tara: [44:09] Tara Wig Cop Dave. Dave: [44:12] RCK space BTTM. Sarah: [44:18] Thanks buddy nice rock. Dave: [44:20] Bottom there it is I don't pay attention to the content of that show I'm just there to press buttons and edit it after because you know it's not my jam but rock bottom one of my favorite things to ever happen on that. Tara: [44:33] Which show was it Dave. Dave: [44:36] Melrose Place? Tara: [44:37] Blink, blink. Yes, it was Melrose Place. Sarah: [44:39] Good job. Tara: [44:40] Sarah, recently we were in the car and I asked Dave, I was telling him about what I told you that Adam Brody said he read for the Michael Pitt role on Dawson's Creek. And I was like, you know, he's the one. And then I was like, wait, I don't know how much of this you've taken in. Do you know there's a character named Henry? And Dave was like, kind of. Anyway, that's enough to know about Henry, in my opinion. Sarah: [45:03] Yeah more than uh more than that is unwanted. Dave: [45:13] I'm saving that bees or laura inspired by justin chambers in gray's anatomy power rankings which tv character was done the dirtiest with their exit from their show i thought of uh anya from buffy she seemed like the victim of the finale have to kill a character from the yeah credits syndrome good call mod flanders from the simpsons and then uh i'm not sure worst or best once again bringing my knowledge from again with this dead scott from beverly hills the kid who twirled the gun i'm saying no. Sarah: [45:47] I mean he became a legend. Dave: [45:49] Was he done dirty or was that great it. Tara: [45:52] Was kind of great. Sarah: [45:53] Yeah it's like romano he became a legend in the process. Dave: [45:56] It's true yes yes do you think dead scott and romano met in heaven or yes for sure okay they're. Tara: [46:03] They're making out right. Dave: [46:04] Now i have a flipped answer best dirty exit from a tv show omar little from the wire you got done dirty but i thought that was very apropos mm-hmm sir i'm. Sarah: [46:15] Not sure how dirty it did the character versus the entire story and everybody watching but logan getting smithereened in the veronica mara season four finale spoiler guess was some bullshit and i'm still mad, That dishonorable mention to the Dan Conner, is he or isn't he shit? What are we doing? What are we doing? We're not writing a book. That's dumb. Tara. Tara: [46:38] Well, I thought you were going to say this, and it happened off screen, but I think it still counts. The 902 and O sequel series on The CW basically said Dylan is an absent father to the child he had with Kelly, and that's shitty to him. And that was even before he died. It's even shittier now before Lou Perry died. Sarah: [46:56] Yeah, shit happened on that show that it's like, if it happened to someone like a character that I hate, fine. Tara: [47:02] Yeah, like Donna getting divorced. Sarah: [47:04] But I feel like it's not considered canon by anyone. Like what they did to Jackie Taylor on that show was also horseshit. So let's say it's not canon. Tara: [47:12] Yeah. Dave: [47:13] All right. Here is your Ask Ask EHG question to answer in our Discord. There is a channel just for that. It is called Guess What? Ask Ask EHG. Tara: [47:21] What? Dave: [47:22] This week's question comes from Steel Mill Eric. who is the most unfairly shat upon character in TV history. And by that, he means by the production, by the writers, not by fans. So put your answer in that channel. We'll be back next week to choose a winner. Sarah: [47:38] I know what Tara and I are going to say. Dave: [47:42] It is time for the Tiny Canada presenting this week is Sarah D. Bunting. Sarah: [47:47] Yep, that's me. Before I begin, I would like to put a content warning right here for discussions of suicide and suicidal ideation. Listen with care for yourselves, as always. And if you need to skip ahead five or 10 minutes, please do so. Here we go. I would not be surprised if the entire episode of ER I am presenting out of today, that's season three, episode 11, Night Shift, didn't make it into the big girl pants canon someday, because there is a lot going on. There's Charlie, Kirsten Dunst, having exhausted her goodwill with Doug, George Clooney, making a scene when he draws a line with her, then returning to county later after getting viciously attacked. There's Carrie's Laura Innes circadian rhythm study or whatever the hell that they're playing for comedy. There's Benton, Eric LaSalle, trying desperately to get on the pediatric surgery rotation and Dr. Keaton, Glenn Headley, we miss her, refusing to recommend him and the added complication to that story of Benton finding out that Keaton and Carter, Noah Wiley, are doing it. And speaking of doing it, there's Mark, Anthony Edwards, and Chuni, Laura Cerrone, defying legal to perform a crucial spinal tap and then celebrating after their shift by fucking while bacon is burning. Sure. Dave: [49:03] As you do. Sarah: [49:04] Yeah, as you do. It's a Chicago thing. All of which I had forgotten was even in this episode because by far the most memorable scene is its last one, in which after a fairly quiet night in the ER, EMTs roll in with a patient who's gotten hit by the L train and whose face no longer has articulable features as a result. Sarah: [49:23] Prior to this, the episode has spent a good amount of time on yet another subplot that Carter's colleague and I believe roommate, Dennis Gant, Omar Epps, is struggling across the board. Gant has discovered recently that his longtime girlfriend from back home is cheating on him and he's in an obsession doom loop about that. That may be affecting his work and he's Benton's direct report and Benton has not been happy with Gant's performance for a while over and above Gant's possibly being distracted. it. When Gant fails to follow up on a lab in this episode and a child nearly dies, Benton rips him six new ones. And when Gant then tattles basically to Anspaugh that Benton is being inappropriately mean to him, Carter gets sucked into the conversation against his will and doesn't really back Gant's play. Partly because Benton's gonna Benton, which seems to be Carter's argument, and partly because he's clearly weary of what he has called Gant's moaning. Gant and Carter talk this out later, but as the ambulance is discharging its unrecognizable cargo with only a few minutes left in the episode, the prior 43 minutes of careful setup give you a very bad feeling. And then everything goes O'Henry in the worst possible way. Clip one. Sarah: [50:40] Yuck, which end is up? Jumped or fell in front of a train. Open skull. Tara: [51:24] Blade. Lydia, what number did you page GAT to? This room, 3376. That's the number in this major. Oh, my god. What? The patient. Scan. Sarah: [51:48] After this, the camera slowly dollies backwards out of the trauma room and down the hall and into the silent credits. Sarah: [51:56] Spoiler, Gant does not survive, but perhaps we might honor the character's memory via the tiny death cannon for the following reasons. Number one, the pacing is flawless. The episode has very carefully seeded scenes of Gantt's depression, poor work performance, inability to self-soothe, alienation of Benton and Carter in different ways. And I do mean carefully, there's no very special light hung over any dialogue or behavior. Gantt is flailing, he's getting on colleagues' nerves, but the writing lets it stay ambiguous as to how much he's doing that and whose responsibility it might be. Within the scene that I clipped, the pacing is also perfect. The time for when Lydia, Ellen Crawford, pages Gantt to Georgia Fox's Doyle figuring out who the pager belongs to is well under a minute, and the audience's realization is just far enough ahead of the characters to let the horror dawn and break on everyone more or less at the same time. Not an easy tension to maintain. The ER writers were tops at it, never more so than here and in other episodes, but those are already in the full canon. Number two, the acting is affecting. Wiley's almost childlike Dennis, followed by the strangled sweet Jesus, mirrors the audience's response. And because he's our POV character, we can see that he's also doing the math that we're doing, going back over the episode to see what he might have missed or done differently. Sarah: [53:18] And number three, it's one of those everyone's kind of right and kind of wrong and very relatable in the muddling through it situations that ER specialized in in its first few seasons. It nodded at capital I issues, overwork among medical staff and trainees, the profession's failure to support or educate others about colleagues in crisis when legality and morality collide, but it didn't turn into a PSA. Even the exact manner of Gantt's death is left ambiguous, technically, at least for a while. Gantt's death could have felt stunty, like a cheap writing exercise for sweeps, and it likely would have, but a technically difficult emotional idea is, if you'll forgive my word choice, executed with precision and confidence. That's why it belongs in the Extra Extra Hot Great Tiny Death canon. Tara: [54:08] Thank you, Sarah. I'll go first. just hearing the clip again it gave me goosebumps and you're so right about carter the pacing of the scene as you also said is so shocking because in a show like this usually i mean the music here cues you that this is a serious one but they have cases that are goofy and cases that are scary and they don't know yet what we know because they can't hear the music that this is a scary one and so their sort of gallows humor at the beginning of like yuck now all he needs is a face it's like you're really going to regret that in about 45 seconds. But that's part of it that like, this is how you cope when you have this job. You can't know everything about where things are going to go. You have to lighten moods where you can. And then- Tara: [54:56] Stop when you get to the oh sweet jesus i. Dave: [55:00] Mean the. Tara: [55:01] Progress of carter especially in this scene is just absolutely gutting this is this is an excellent pick. Dave: [55:07] Didn't you think there's something troubling in that though like i understand that when you see this sort of shit day after day that gallo humor is a defense mechanism i do the same just without having to be a doctor for sure but But then when they get to the realization via the beeper that this is somebody that they know, it kind of feels a bit like, oh, shit, now we actually have to try. Tara: [55:30] Well, yeah, yes, yes. Dave: [55:32] There was sort of like this sort of sinister moment where like you're like, OK, it's shocking and it's a revelation and it's scary to everybody in the room. Tara: [55:42] Yes. Dave: [55:42] But also, why didn't you have your game face on from the get go? Tara: [55:46] Right. Dave: [55:46] There's a little bit of that here, which I thought was also like adds to the whole scene of like, oh, yeah, like that. Tara: [55:54] I don't think it's so much that. OK, now we really have to try. It's that before it's like the signs were pointing to this is going south no matter what we said. Sarah: [56:03] There's gray matter on that. It's like, well, we're probably done here. Tara: [56:08] Right. Sarah: [56:08] Yeah. Tara: [56:09] But as you say, Dave, like when you when you know who the victim is, then that makes you make decisions that you wouldn't if you didn't. And we certainly saw that in the pit this season, too, where it's like this is this is just human nature. Dave: [56:25] Right. Well, OK, maybe not like we were trying before, but more like you're going into overdrive and, you know, you start to spiral out a little bit because of that, because obviously the stakes have changed. Tara: [56:37] For sure. Dave: [56:37] But there was, but it felt, it felt unprofessional. You know what I mean? Like in the moment. Tara: [56:42] Yeah. I mean, it's the difference between going through the motions because you have to like doing, you know, essentially the bare minimum for a patient that you're 90% sure is going to die no matter what you try versus like, what if we pulled off a miracle, even though like your conscious mind knows you won't, but that's just like, like I said, human nature. Dave: [57:01] Yep. Tara: [57:01] Anyway, great pick, Sarah. Dave: [57:02] Yeah, great pick. Great presentation. I like how my tiny cannon presentations are. Here's a clip. Tara: [57:08] Yep. Dave: [57:09] And then Sarah's like, here's my treatise on ER. Sarah: [57:12] So let me contrast. Tara: [57:13] It's going to be real different next week when I bring my first presentation for the tiny commercial cannon. So look out for that. Dave: [57:20] Also one where they bring somebody in on a stretcher and they can't tell what their face is. Tara: [57:24] There is an implication that someone's going to die as well, but we'll get to it. Dave: [57:28] Yeah. this one won me over and that's a poor choice of words but it did when don't know what doctor said it but yuck which end is up i'm like okay i understand what they're doing here dr sarah yeah i see the turn i see the prestige coming but it still was very like oh creepy creepy and then the only thing i would say is i feel like the pager thing should have happened faster that's all I mean, I feel like where it was a good 10 seconds ahead of the scene, but like, I get it, but it also kind of made them seem a little dumb. Tara: [58:02] I feel like they just, they let the tension play out to make it all it when it snaps back. It's like, Oh God. Sarah: [58:10] Also there, they have a couple other things going on, like holding his brain in his skull. Dave: [58:15] So it was good screenwriting, but like compared to reality, I just thought it was like, Oh, I think somebody would have put, put a and B together faster than that. But I mean, brilliantly written. It works very well as you're watching it as a piece of television. So I shouldn't quibble. Really effective scene. Great pick. Great presentation. Tara, what say you? Cannon worthy or not? Tara: [58:35] Just kidding. Of course. Yes. Dave: [58:36] Yeah, me too. So Gant's death from ER. You are hereby inducted, this is weird music, into the extra hot, great, tiny death cannon. Tara: [58:46] Yay! Yay! Dave: [58:48] You did it! Sarah: [58:49] Americans love a winner. Yep. Tara: [58:52] And will not tolerate a loser. Nope. Dave: [58:55] All right. It's time to discover who are our not quite winners and not quite losers of the week. I got two not quite winners for you. First one, Star Trek Strange New Worlds renewed for a fifth and final season in advance of this third season premiere. Tara: [59:09] In July. Woo! Dave: [59:10] People are upset though. This is sort of like, we're going to bifurcate this because yes, great five seasons of a show. That's a good run, especially these days. We're well out of the, you can go 12,000 seasons in syndication for a Star Trek show. Tara: [59:24] Right. Dave: [59:24] Get that out of your system is my advice. But the fifth season is also going to be a short one. I think it's six episodes. So that gives everybody time to like figure out how to nail the ending of a show where the ending is already in its DNA. We know what part of the ending is. I won't spoil it in case you're somehow unaware, but we know where certain things are going to end up. and I like the fact they got a lot of time to think about it. So I'm hopeful, a show I really enjoy. I'm never too upset when a show goes four or five seasons. Like that's always a good run. Sarah: [59:57] Mm-hmm. Dave: [59:58] In our brains, we want the things we like to last forever. But then sometimes we don't want to go one forever after we get to season seven or eight. They run out of ideas. They're stretching it out. Characters aren't making decisions that will affect people truly. Tara: [1:00:12] That's true for every show except the Chicken Sisters. Dave, just want to remind you that we have a break coming up and we have screeners for the first five strange new worlds. So something to live for. Dave: [1:00:21] I am there for it. All right. And then my second winner is Charles Skinny Pete from Breaking Bad Baker. he's going to be one of the new additions coming to the pit season two so good for him i always loved him on breaking bad and yeah and uh and here we are in the pit he's got the look of somebody that uh i i mean i'm gonna guess he's a patient who knows yeah i don't know but i i get that vibe from him you know like he's got some he's got something wrong with him and he's one of those long-term patients in the uh in the er could be a. Tara: [1:00:49] Loved one could be a nurse. Dave: [1:00:50] Could be we'll find out when pit season two drops my not quite loser of the week is good omens as what why as michael sheen says he doesn't think finale special will be released which yes good but i just want to point out in this universe now where we have this probable i'm gonna say information that puts amazon ahead of netflix in the morality ratings which sit on that for a second let that set it I don't like it. Yeah. Netflix has committed to put season two of The Sandman out there, I believe. Tara: [1:01:27] Oh, yeah. The trailer just dropped this week. Dave: [1:01:28] That hasn't changed. So I guess Amazon wins the game in sweepstakes. All right. Sarah Daybending, what do you got? Sarah: [1:01:35] Speaking of scumbags, my not quite winner is The Mortician. It is HBO's most watched documentary series in over five years, which I guess means that it either got close to or surpassed, I'm going to say, The Vow, the NXIVM thing? Tara: [1:01:52] Yeah, probably. Sarah: [1:01:54] I talked about it on the main show earlier this week. It's good. I mean, it's a lot, you know, gory, but it's good. And keeping with a medical theme, my not quite loser of the week is Grey's Anatomy's Owen Hunt, as even Kevin McKidd, who plays the character, admits that he's a, quote, walking red flag. And secondary loser is probably Kevin McKidd, who I have watched in a lot of things, but even I could not hang with Grey's Anatomy. And, like, you're still on that? Get yourself killed off while you're still young. Tara: [1:02:26] Why would you do that? Like having a job like that in network drama that's going to run for another 500 years? Cling to that with your fingertips. Sarah: [1:02:35] I mean, yeah, I guess. I just want Journeyman to be rebooted. Tara: [1:02:40] Well, until such time. Sarah: [1:02:41] I'm trying to fix it. Dave: [1:02:42] Sarah's whole life mission is to rearrange the chess pieces and so to bring back Journeyman. Sarah: [1:02:48] But if you're doing that, you can't bring back Journeyman. And it's like, oh, God, put a cold compress on, Buncee, you're losing it. Dave: [1:02:56] If I just go back in time and kill that one brontosaurus, it will set up a butterfly that will lead to the reboot of Journeyman. Sarah: [1:03:03] 17 seasons of Journeyman. Tara: [1:03:05] Kevin McKinn's like, I just want to buy a house. Dave: [1:03:08] Kevin McKinn's like, my back hurts. All right, Tara, who's your winner of the week? Tara: [1:03:14] Well, I mean, we'll see. But my winner officially is Reacher because it is adding, among others, for season four, Kathleen Robertson, a.k.a. Claire Arnold from 90210, Kevin Corrigan, a.k.a. The Ugly Guy from Walking and Talking, Kevin Wiseman, a.k.a. Marshall from Alias, and Sidel Noel, a.k.a. Cherry Bang. I think that was her character in Glow. So, Sarah, what more does this fucking show have to do to make you personally start watching it? Sarah: [1:03:44] Nothing. Tara: [1:03:45] Okay, great. Sarah: [1:03:45] I'm in. My husband has read every single one of the books. It is his airport book. And he is like, he refuses. He won't treat with any reacher that is not in the book. Tara: [1:03:57] That's crazy. Wow. I know. Dave: [1:03:59] The man's got standards. Tara: [1:04:01] He's, well, I mean, I guess I can understand theoretically, but like, he's depriving himself of so much joy, Sarah. Sarah: [1:04:07] I'll try to sneak it in as our next household watch. We did finish The Americans and we're looking for another action drama. Dave: [1:04:15] You haven't watched, correct? Tara: [1:04:17] No. Sarah: [1:04:17] No. Dave: [1:04:18] It feels like you're, I mean, I feel like Duster. I mean, I feel like this is sort of the same chunk of the world. Sarah: [1:04:24] I've got nothing against it. It's just one of those, like, if I'm going to start watching it, I feel like I should offer Dan the opportunity and then it's going to turn into a whole PowerPoint where it's like, sometimes things aren't the book, get over it. He has a lot of wrong beliefs, including about peanut butter and honey proportions in a sandwich. So sometimes it's best to just not. Dave: [1:04:43] Do you take a bite out of it and all the honey oozes out? Tara: [1:04:46] Or too little honey? Sarah: [1:04:48] I mean, we're talking like you can measure the peanut butter in centimeters, plural. And then the honey, he's just like, I'm done. Like, no, wrong. Dave: [1:04:59] Have you finished Duster, Sarah? Sarah: [1:05:01] No, not yet. Dave: [1:05:02] Without going into details, I thought they really kind of nailed the season finale. And they did some resetting at the end, which I thought boded well if they end up doing a season to it i. Sarah: [1:05:12] Got sidetracked into the last of us so and then duster is next to be tagged back in. Dave: [1:05:17] The thing i like about duster and it gets me every time is that they add little things each week to the credits depending on what's happening in the plot and then they maintain it so by the end of you know it's like the uh the the credits of theseus you know just like little things change and they edit things out by the end so yeah fun little fun little thing there it's. Tara: [1:05:38] A it's and it's way to make you not skip intro because you have to watch and see like. Dave: [1:05:41] What's the thing going to be? Yep, yep, yep, yep. Tara: [1:05:44] Not since new Perry Mason where we were trying to guess what the outro image was going to be. Dave: [1:05:48] I miss that game so much. I was just thinking about that last week when Perry Mason came up in game time. Remember the end imagery guessing game we used to do? Like that alone. Sarah: [1:05:58] Yes, we did at our house too. Dave: [1:05:59] I wanted to see seasons more of Perry Mason just to play that game. Sarah: [1:06:03] Me too. Tara: [1:06:04] We could watch it again. I certainly don't remember what anything was. Dave: [1:06:07] Yeah. All right. Wrap it up there. Tara: [1:06:08] All right. Jesus. In my ongoing watch of what's the slow death of late night TV, my not quite loser of the week is what is left of late night TV. It is, as we see, the outstanding late night talk series Emmy category will only have three nominees because they had like fewer than 15 options to choose from, which is grim. And also CBS as Taylor Tomlinson, who we talked about before when she quit after midnight, she had her last show and basically in her in her farewells was like, fuck CBS, because I didn't want the show to end. I just didn't want to do it anymore. And it's on them for not replacing me. And she's right. Like she has the right to say, I don't want to go to an office four days a week. I'm a stand up comedian. I would rather go on the road and work, you know, four hours a week instead and make a lot more money, probably. Dave: [1:07:05] Yeah. I mean, I get that. And I think that's all true and good for her. But also, it just kind of tells me that that show wasn't really doing much for CBS. So they just took the opportunity to say, fine, bye. Sarah: [1:07:15] Yeah. I mean, she has to have known what the fate was going to be if she didn't stay. So she should make the choice that's right for her. But yeah, this is not positive. Tara: [1:07:25] Well, I have an interview coming on Cracked next week just to tease it a little bit. Our friend and past guest and future guest, we hope, Josh Gondelman, has a new stand-up special coming out on the 27th. So I talked to him about it. And since he has worked in Late Night, he's a past writer on Last Week Tonight. And Desus and Mero, we talked about sort of all of this and what's going on with the landscape. So look out for that. I will plug it when it's up. Tara: [1:07:48] I'd like to get on with the show. Yeah. Yeah. Dave: [1:07:56] That wasn't me being passive aggressive. That was Gidget's father. Tara: [1:07:59] Okay, fine. Today we are talking about what I have titled, because it did not have one, A Farewell to Monoculture. I stole this from an Ask EHG submission from LBBB, who writes, what would you identify as the final instances of true monoculture within various TV genres, which dramas, comedies, or reality shows marked the last time broad swaths of the public were collectively engaged before fragmentation took hold and specified not real life news events, just like shows. Let's just do all three of our picks all at once. And Dave, I know you did a, you did a data, you did a Dan Casino on this question. So go ahead. Dave: [1:08:41] Yeah. So I figured in order to figure out which show was, you know, the peak of monoculture for each of those genres, I had to figure out which shows were the most popular at the time and then suss out which ones were the most watched by the most people and most talked about and most dominated the discussion at the time. So I got the Nielsen ratings for one, two, three initial genres. So first drama, second drama, third drama, et cetera, for comedy and reality. Just seeing that from 1999, and I did all the way to 2019, which is way too far. I mean, obviously, when you look at these, the monoculture seemed to have peaked in the early mid aughts. I'm going to say is my conclusion, not to move forward, but... ER dominates dramas until CSI lands. And then it's not until the 2010s that NCIS takes over from CSI. Tara: [1:09:33] Navally. Yes. Dave: [1:09:34] Yeah. In comedy is friends or everybody loves Raymond until big bang theory comes along. In reality, first, we start off with who wants to be a millionaire in 99 before Survivor, American Idol, and Amazing Race, all sort of like trade places. They're pretty, pretty equal. And they all dance around each other. So those are the shows that are top of that time. So I'm looking at these shows. Definitely ER is first for a while. And then Law & Order and CSI get ahead of it in the mid-aughts. But that was definitely a very buzzy show in the start. And then as the cast changes, I think you lose some of its juice. But CSI, like out of the gate, so strong, so strong. Comedy Friends is obviously moving towards its finale here in the early aughts. Tara: [1:10:24] Ends in 2004. Dave: [1:10:25] Yeah. And then reality, those three shows are sort of dancing around each other. So in 2003, 2004, these are your shows. CSI, Law and Order, and ER are your dramas. Friends, Everybody Loves Raymond and Frasier are your comedies. American Idol, Amazing Race, and Survivor are reality shows. With the exception of Everybody Loves Raymond, because that is a CBS show for older people, I feel like the internet was talking about all those shows all the time for sure. Law and Order, a little more niche-y, but still very buzzy and very important to people that enjoy crime shows. Tara: [1:11:02] Yeah, I would say it's not niche-y. It's just that it's not serialized. So it's easier for people to dip in and out of because they're not really linked except for that one weird season. Dave: [1:11:11] Right. And then we see how they taper off, right? Until we get to the point where these are being replaced by NCIS, Big Bang Theory, Modern Family, The Voice comes in towards the end. And although reality is sort of like pretty kind of maintains the chorus as far as what the buzziest shows are through the teens. But because I think they're so long in the tooth by the time we're ending that decade, they're not really as buzzy that much. And they're sort of like you think of Survivor when it debuted in 2000. It was on the fucking cover of Time magazine versus what Survivor is now where, you know, it is for the diehard fans. But there are still a lot of them, but it's not like monoculture, right? Tara: [1:11:51] Yeah. I bet a lot of people are going to tune back in for season 50 to see what they have. Dave: [1:11:55] Season fucking 50. Tara: [1:11:56] Season 50 is this year. Dave: [1:11:58] I would say like the monoculture, as we sort of think of it, is over by 2010. But its peak is in somewhere between 2003, 2005, where we have sort of CSI being the buzzy drama. We've got Friends probably as the buzziest monoculture comedy, especially with it ending and everybody being obsessed with who's going to end up with who. And then probably American Idol, I would say, is probably the big reality monoculture one that had the widest audience. I think Survivor is buzzier. It had more staying power as far as like what we still talk about today. American Idol, I think, wins for the last reality monoculture because it had the widest audience. Although I would say Survivor probably is the buzziest show of that type when we look at it from today back and how it's staying power. Tara: [1:12:50] Yeah. Dave: [1:12:51] And the years, 2003 to 2005, I think that's where we get peak monoculture. So that is my data-driven analysis. Tara: [1:12:59] Okay. Dave: [1:13:00] But if you want to use your heart, go ahead. Tara: [1:13:04] Well, I guess I used my heart in terms of the drama category because I went with Lost in terms of buzz plus ratings, which it had at least at first. And it premieres in 2004, so it's right in that zone. I think no one was that happy about watching it all the way to the end. But I think probably at least half of the people who started it finished it. I think serialization meant you couldn't dip in and out of it, which you can with seasons of like 24 because it's a different story every time. And it really did change TV in ways we're still seeing today, like for good and ill. Like every puzzle box show owes it royalties, really. Like not just all the ones like Surface and Threshold and fuck all that shit that happened like that was more directly. like even you know something like Westworld is sort of a similar thing where it's like what is the mystery and who can you trust and blah blah blah so lost for that I think yeah that's. Dave: [1:14:02] Lost is a great example yeah. Tara: [1:14:03] For comedy I'd said friends of course it had adorable stars they were on every magazine and every fucking talk show until people were sick of them they NBC came up with supersized episodes because people were like feral for it and even if you never watched it a basic working knowledge of like what friends is is somewhere in you because it was so yeah inescapable in its era and for reality i take your point about american idol you're probably right that it had more staying power because it's a show that like like you said it had a wider audience like it's something the entire family can watch versus like your grandma being like that's too mean-spirited they're so mean and it was interactive let's not yeah yeah it yes great point survivor seasons i would say one to 14 which takes you to like 2006 i think had the nation in a chokehold yeah like if you weren't current on it you were not part of culture like american idol if your fave got voted out you'd be like no i don't really care what happens now but like for survivor you had to engage in it even you dave and this was like not your jam but you watched it. Dave: [1:15:07] Yeah i watched the first like probably four or five seasons religiously i mean I mean, our methodology here is a little bit different. And I think yours kind of speaks to the question a little bit better. Like I was sort of like, what's the last year of what's peak monoculture year? And what were the shows then? Whereas you're sort of like drilling down on sort of the last true water cooler show of its type. Tara: [1:15:28] Exactly. Dave: [1:15:29] Which. Yeah. Sarah: [1:15:29] Right. Dave: [1:15:30] Which I think like Lost, you're totally right about Lost. Like Lost was a way bigger monoculture show than like CSI, which was huge. Yeah. But Lost captured the internet. And let's not forget the internet is way bigger during Lost years than it is early aughts. Tara: [1:15:45] For sure. Dave: [1:15:45] So that helps too. Tara: [1:15:46] Yeah. Dave: [1:15:46] But like Lost was such a, what we now derisively call a Reddit show before that was a term. Tara: [1:15:54] Yeah, for sure. Dave: [1:15:54] It definitely was like puzzle first, everything else second show that really grabs, grab people at the time. Tara: [1:16:01] Yeah. I think it also like, you know, for whatever happened with Damon Lindelof and like, that's a whole other fucking thing. It also deserves credit for having like an actually diverse cast, whether it had a diverse staff behind the camera seems like not really. And that was a problem. Dave: [1:16:16] Well, the other thing about all the wannabe shows that came after is Lost was just well-constructed in order to present an air of mystery and intrigue in a compelling world. Tara: [1:16:29] Yeah. Dave: [1:16:30] They never delivered on the, let's say, just the aesthetics and the mood that they set up. Tara: [1:16:36] Yeah. Dave: [1:16:37] But when you were watching the first couple of seasons, you're like, what the fuck's up with the numbers? Tara: [1:16:40] Right. Dave: [1:16:41] Why is there a hatch there? This feels like a universe that they have built beforehand and we are on this journey of discovery rather than what happened, which is here's some neat shit. We'll figure it out later. But at the time, we didn't really know that. I think a lot of people sort of clicked into that by the end of season two, maybe season three. And then those people like me were like, see ya. But you cannot deny those first couple of seasons how people were trying to decode the show. Tara: [1:17:09] It was like nothing you had ever seen before. and Survivor same thing like Survivor was sports for people who hate sports yeah so those are my picks Lost, Friends and Survivor Sarah good picks. Sarah: [1:17:20] I mean, I sort of came at this a little differently, like the final instances I sort of thought of as like particular moments or episodes where something fucking crashed the TWAP server. So, I mean, is this because I'm a lesbian to do that, but I'm not counting it from law and order. But there's also the question of not confirmation bias, but, you know, I miss the reasonable person on FameTracker for a lot of reasons, but primarily because I still like for decades, I really have had no idea what a normal civilian thinks is popular or is sort of like watching just because it's on. How do people who don't think about it for a living interact with TV? What are they watching? Tara: [1:18:09] Yeah, that's it. Like sometimes when I have a question, I will text my sister like, do you know about thing? Sometimes she doesn't. Sometimes she doesn't. Because, you know, she's normal. Sarah: [1:18:18] Yeah, because people are normal and watch different things like Big Bang Theory was just everywhere, but we had no truck with it really at any time. So there's that. And then I also feel like there's some different sub genres in here that maybe aren't directly addressed by drama, comedy and reality. With that said, drama, I agree that it's probably the first couple seasons of Lost. I would say that maybe the Sopranos finale is a moment that if you're defining monoculture as even if you haven't consumed the cultural artifact directly, you understand what it is in context and can't describe it. You could fill 100 words about it, even if you never watched it or saw it. I think it's probably lost. or the CSI Greg Gets Buried episode, which we talked about in an extra, extra hot great last year, I guess. That was something where I had quit the show, but I came back in because it was still a huge show that was a main character. Tarantino was a BFD. So you could point to that. Comedy, I watched the Friends finale and I didn't really watch Friends. It was the finale of this absolute titan that blocked out the sun for every other comedy for 10 years. So I think that's accurate, 2004. Sarah: [1:19:43] Reality, I think it's a lot harder to gauge and a lot more fragmented than we might think. And weirdly, right around 2000, which is like Survivor, Idol, Peak Millionaire, it was like that was very monoculture in terms of people really talking about the future of TV and how the turn towards unscripted and all of that stuff. But it also created the fragmentation that we see now in some ways. Tara: [1:20:11] That was also around when it was like real world Hawaii, which was also a hugely buzzy season that kind of changed the course of what that show was like. Yeah. Dave: [1:20:21] And I think like at this time, you're in the sweet spot for monoculture. The internet is there and people of like mind are gathering and talking about it. And that sort of stokes the fire. But it's before you had that process, but more and more niche where like people that are into the sub sub genres mix it up. And then you sort of get proliferation of like cable channels and streaming channels in the future that cater to those smaller markets in order to carve out some wins. And you're right in that sweet spot where people are gathering, but they're not splitting up. They're not doing the people's Judea front type of thing. Tara: [1:20:57] Yeah. Sarah: [1:20:58] But it's actually the people's front Judea. Tara: [1:21:02] Or the Judean people's front. Yes. Sarah: [1:21:04] Like part of me wants to put this inflection point earlier, like end of peak Simpsons slash beginning of peak South Park, which is a different sort of like what is satirical animation doing? and how much are like comedy heads, stoners, and 12-year-olds all watching the same product. That I would say is like at the year 2000 or possibly before. But then there's also that weird writer's strike time in 2007. Sarah: [1:21:36] Leno going to prime time, like in terms of a TV event or way of consuming that everybody was talking about, that definitely felt like monoculture, but we were also in the fucking building. So it's impossible to tell what that really was. But like in terms of finales that people talked about deaths that people talked about, like I think the West wing you have to put in the conversation, um, it does boil down to somewhere around 2003 to 2005, like Dave said, where the internet is a place where no matter how obscure the show was, you could find someone to talk about it with you, which is how I got on it in 94, to talk about my so-called life on a listserv. And then slowly, more people have internet at home, but that also means that they don't have to quote stick to whatever everybody else is watching because they can talk about whatever they want because there's always going to be a place for that yeah i think that starts to turn in the mid-aughts we. Dave: [1:22:39] Agree all right guys that is it for this episode of extra extra hot great and we surf the four sitting pool with our season one episode 20 episode of Gidget before answering your burning Ask EHG questions like, what's your TV vanity license plate? Sarah got ER into the tiny death cannon. We celebrated those who weren't quite the best and worst of the week and wrapped it all up with an exhaustive look at exactly when monoculture died on television. Next up, what's next, Dara? Tell me. Tara: [1:23:20] Next up, we have Jessica Morgan joining us for The Waterfront on Extra Hot Grade 568. Dave: [1:23:27] Remember. We're listening. I am David Teagle. Tara: [1:23:35] And on behalf of Tari Arianna. That was Ayo Boy. Dave: [1:23:39] And Sarah D. Butting. Sarah: [1:23:42] Let's move people. Come on. Dave: [1:23:43] Thanks for listening. We'll see you next time right here on Extra Hot Grade. I just realized that two people having sex while bacon burns on the stove is called Canadian back bacon. Sarah: [1:24:17] No, making the beast with two back bacon. Dave: [1:24:21] There you go. Teamwork. Sarah: [1:24:23] Do I have to do everything?