Getting Our BLANKs With Match Game

Clip: [00:00] I've never seen a more lost group of people for this year. I think they don't understand we're still here. Dave: [00:14] This is the Extra Extra Hot Great Podcast, episode 365 for the July 26, 2025 weekend. I am Red Carpet Eyebrows David T. Cole, and I'm here with back row cheater Sarah D. Bunting. Sarah: [00:35] What are you, a cop? Dave: [00:36] And Temu suit of armor, Tara Ariano. Tara: [00:39] Which Kevin Nealon thinks is made of cotton? Welcome to Extra Extra. Hot, great for another weekend. Thank you so much for being here. Thank you for your support. Thank you for making these episodes possible. And thank you for giving us a reason to watch Match Game, which we did. Match Game is the game where you match. Specifically, a contestant is given a setup phrase, like the one I used for the Match Game entry in our Television Without Pity book. Dumb Dora is so dumb. Dave: [01:13] How dumb is she? Tara: [01:14] Thank you, Dave. That instead of filling her car with gasoline. She filled it with blank. The contestant comes up with an answer, obviously in this case it would be Vaseline, and gets a point for each time one of six celebrities on the panel has written the same answer. The version Our Listener May Know Best is the one from the 70s that used to run on the Game Show Network all the time, hosted by Gene Rayburn and featuring panelists like Brett Summers, Charles Nelson Reilly, and Richard Dawson. The current day ABC Primetime version ran from 2016 to 2021 and then went on a hiatus for reasons that will be quite obvious when I say that one's host was Alec Baldwin. Well, four years and one manslaughter acquittal later, match game is back. But Alec Baldwin is not. He has been replaced by Martin Short. This season premiered on ABC July 23rd. One episode aired. That's all we've seen. Let's do the chen check-in. Sarah, should our listeners watch the current prime-time ABC version of Match Game with Martin Short? Sarah: [02:15] Should is a little strong, but if you liked the old version, this is close enough. It's closer than the Baldwin version. So sure. Tara: [02:25] And a shrug. Dave. Dave: [02:27] I think Martin Short's an upgrade from Alec Baldwin, but I also question whether Match Game is reproducible this far out of the seventies. Tara: [02:30] Yes. Dave: [02:36] And I'm going to say the answer is kind of close, but still pretty far away. Tara: [02:40] Mm-hmm. Dave: [02:40] So I'm going to say background television, not appointment television. Sarah: [02:44] Yeah, good good call. Tara: [02:44] Yeah, sure. I'm gonna say nah. I think the old one is still better as background television than this is. Sarah: [02:51] Yes, sure. Dave: [02:53] I would absolutely throw on a YouTube video of a 70s match game rather than watch this for sure. Tara: [02:57] Before this. Sarah: [02:57] Yes. Tara: [02:58] Yeah. Dave: [02:59] Yeah. Sarah: [02:59] Mhm. Tara: [02:59] All right, let's get into it. What makes for a good match game panelist? And were there any in the premiere, in your opinion? Sarah: [03:06] I think you need a wide range of types Of panelists, and it does roughly correspond over time to like where you're sitting. So, like, I think that they correctly put Z-Way in the Dawson spot, which is front, literally front and center. Of the first row, like good with jokes and good with repartee, but also good with actually matching and trying to get people some fucking money, which is ostensibly the point. Front row right is like just kind of a random blow-off. And I think that what like BD Wong I love, but that seemed like a real rando choice and not a lot of matching going on. And front left hand side can be a sort of hard to control wild card, which as the taping went on, Anthony Anderson apparently seemed to be increasingly restive, I guess would be the right word. He was the one I matched with playing at home the most, which was weird. I don't super dig that guy. And then the back row was sort of like. The class clown row: anything could happen. People might have eaten half an edible, might be doing it during. I think that was appropriate to have. Martin Schwartz co-stars or sometime co-stars Selena Gomez and Cara Delavine back there. Nealon is the Trails Nelson Riley. I feel like Nealon lost a bet and didn't really want to be there, which he got called out on by Martin Short on the wardrobe tip. Dave: [04:34] Oh, I thought that was a bit. Sarah: [04:34] But I think the important thing about the panelists is the mix of them and that you do have the one Who is sitting in a sort of like collective unconscious identifiable spot? If you've ever watched any iteration of the show before, that you're like, at least this one person is really trying to get me some gas money up in here. Tara: [04:57] Yes. Mhm. Sarah: [04:58] There were a couple of, at least in the first round, a couple of Roll Randos and it didn't work out so well. There are some issues with this iteration, but I don't think it was actually the panelist casting. Dave: [05:10] I think part of it, though, is the difference between where celebrities were in the seventies versus where they are now. And it's just not like the body language difference between what is acceptable to use in the 70s and how much innuendo you can get away with versus what people are willing to go to here. I mean, the internet wasn't around in the 70s. All eyes weren't on everything you did all the time, and you weren't going to get Flack for saying the wrong thing to half the nation at any given time. So I think maybe Match Game 2025 is playing it safer than this format needs and deserves. Sarah: [05:47] Hmm, that's a good note. Dave: [05:49] And I feel like a lot of the humor that was brought into by the panelists was like halfway to where they really wanted to go, but didn't really get there So that's what I mean when I say, like, is Match Game really a show that you can do now? Tara: [05:58] Hmm. Mm-hmm. Right. Dave: [06:05] Like, Match Game, the one I envisioned way back when, was sort of like Mash game hip-hop stars, or something like that, where they don't give a fuck to start with, and like, fuck it. Tara: [06:12] Mm-hmm. Yeah. Dave: [06:15] They sort of half did that with something. What was the one they did? Tara: [06:17] Hip Hop Squares, which we watched. Dave: [06:18] Hip hop squares, yeah. So they sold my idea. Sarah: [06:19] Yes. Tara: [06:20] Mhm. Dave: [06:21] And it was wasn't bad. It was closer to my idea of what Mash Game should be. Sarah: [06:23] Yeah. Tara: [06:27] Mm-hmm. Dave: [06:27] But the panel could have been it's hard to compete, you know, with Dawson, Charles Nelson Riley, Paul Lind. These are all people that are doing really good, funny stuff all the time. And this was This one feels like there's a lot of agents talking to each other, which I never got the impression with the old match game. You know what I mean? Sarah: [06:45] Well, there was also the divide between Like now you could be a celebrity for kind of anything, but the sort of lanes were much clearer for like T V stars that you were gonna get fifty years ago. Tara: [06:53] Right. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Sarah: [06:59] 40 years ago for Match Game. This is pretty careful. And oh God, the questions just seem to go on for like twenty minutes. Dave: [07:08] They were pretty long. Sarah: [07:10] Like trying to cram brands in there. Dave: [07:12] Yeah. Sarah: [07:12] That was my main issue. Dave: [07:13] Yeah. And one of the prompts was a limerick, and they were reading the limerick. Tara: [07:16] Thank you. Dave: [07:19] And I just thought, okay, well, the fill in a blank is going to be the last word. But the fill in the blank was the second last word, which totally destroyed the reading of the limerick and absolutely confused one of the contestants. Sarah: [07:28] Yeah, no. Dave: [07:30] I mean, I think that's on him, but your brain's automatically going to complete the limerick, and that's not quite the way it worked. Tara: [07:35] Yes. That was the last question in the game, I think. And they all just seemed like they were just tired or over it because Here it is. Dave: [07:43] Yes. Tara: [07:44] I once had a dentist named Ruth, always drunk on gym in Vermouth. She revved up the drill, said lie back and sit still, then bored a hole in my blank, not my tooth. And a bunch of them were conferring, which we'll come back to that as well. And they were like, Booth. A chew. That was Kevin Nealons, which like makes no sense. That's not where a rhyme is. Dave: [08:02] No. Tara: [08:02] Like, give everyone a lesson before you give it. And like. Dave: [08:05] Your word has to do anything but rhyme in this situation. Tara: [08:08] Yes. Dave: [08:09] But that was a poorly formed question Like, okay, sure, I get it. Tara: [08:10] Yes, it was. Dave: [08:12] And I would have put in an answer that shouldn't rhyme, but that's not the expectation for a show like this. Tara: [08:17] Right, right. Dave: [08:18] And the other thing they did, speaking to we just want to get out of here. Not that I felt like, you know, they were like not having a good time, but it really did feel like we got to do something to get the points up, or we just got to do something to get this over with. Tara: [08:31] Yes. Dave: [08:31] Was the earlier game where Martin Short is doing a Garden of Eden question, and the answer that everybody is going to match on is obviously going to be Snake So when he says the last word, which is some S word, he just adds the longest tail of sibilance to it. Tara: [08:37] Uh-huh. Yes. Mm-hmm. Sarah: [08:49] Yeah, I think it was blanks. Dave: [08:51] That's right. Yeah. Tara: [08:52] Right. Dave: [08:52] Really? For your first episode, we're just giving up this suit. Tara: [08:53] Mm-hmm. Dave: [08:55] You know, like it's tongue-in-cheeky, but I mean, I want some semblance of a game here. Tara: [08:55] Yeah. Dave: [09:00] I know it's just all about interactions, but still, let's not throw the game away in episode one. Tara: [09:05] There's that, but there's also and I realize looseness is baked into the format and that's part of the appeal is like, you know, Brett Summers and Charles Nelson Riley like fucking around in their bro or whatever and like 'cause they know each other. But this one felt like a rehearsal a lot of the time. Dave: [09:19] Yes, yeah. Tara: [09:20] Like when you get people getting out of their chairs and like conferring with each other, like I mean, Sarah's intro name, Backro Cheater, like Backro Cheating. What's happening? Like, don't put Selena Gomez and Cara Delavie next to each other. They know each other too well, clearly, because they were both on Only Murders and may know each other otherwise from just being celebrities in the same, you know, category, basically. Selena, I thought, was trying the hardest probably to get matches. Sarah: [09:46] Yeah. Tara: [09:46] And then everyone else, like, didn't really give a fuck and or were like trying to be funny and not being funny, like Anthony Anderson. Sarah: [09:47] Mhm. Dave: [09:53] I think if you're really trying to make this properly in 2025 and you wanted it to capture The magic of Match Game 70s Edition, you want to throw out all those panelists and you want to bring in a pool of people that sort of are familiar with each other. Tara: [10:10] Mm-hmm. Dave: [10:11] So like the Manzoukas Sheer Rob Wriggle sphere. Tara: [10:15] Yes. Dave: [10:15] And you bring in all of those people that are in all those podcasts or in all their same shows and stuff like that Where they kind of know each other. Sarah: [10:16] Yes. Mm-hmm. Dave: [10:21] You get four of them, you put in two wild cards. And that, I think, is the basis for this. That's not going to bring in your four quadrant viewership for a primetime network hour. Tara: [10:32] Mhm. Dave: [10:32] But that's how you have to make this show. And those people are generally funny. Tara: [10:34] Yeah. Dave: [10:36] They're improvisers. They're quick. They're witty. And that's what you need. Tara: [10:39] Yeah. Dave: [10:40] You don't need people. Getting up out of their chair and conferring with other contestants, and Martin Schwartz literally tapping his foot on the floor, waiting for the court to be in order. Tara: [10:50] Yes. Sarah: [10:50] Yeah. Tara: [10:50] I'll say this before I move on to the contestants. Kevin Nealon is 71 and he looked great. Dave: [10:54] He looked really good for his age. Tara: [10:55] I was shocked. Sarah: [10:55] Yeah, he does. Tara: [10:56] I hadn't seen him in so long. Dave: [10:58] And before you move on to contestants, if that's going to be our last thing, I just want to say the set Way too big for the match game. Tara: [10:58] And yes. Sarah: [10:58] Yeah. Tara: [11:01] Sure. Mm-hmm. Dave: [11:04] The match game is an intimate, closed, tight quarters affair. Sarah: [11:07] Mhm. Tara: [11:08] Yeah. Sarah: [11:09] Get that cigarette infused carpeting out there and yeah. Dave: [11:11] Yes. Tara: [11:11] Totally, yes. Dave: [11:13] Yeah, that set smells like nicotine for sure. Sarah: [11:16] Yes, it does. Dave: [11:16] But I thought it was too big and that sort of put this distance between everybody that I thought was counterproductive. Tara: [11:21] I also thought the audience seemed like they were too far away too, because I feel like I barely heard them to the point where it was like, it might be funnier if you shot this in like a talk Soups size studio, and the only people you can hear laughing are like the crew. Dave: [11:25] Yeah. Yeah. Sarah: [11:32] Yes. Dave: [11:34] Yeah. And given all these complaints we have about the show, I will say I thought Martin Short kept it all together. Sarah: [11:35] Mm-hmm. Tara: [11:40] I agree. He kept it moving. Sarah: [11:41] I think he was very good. Tara: [11:42] He was great. Yep. Sarah: [11:43] Yep. Tara: [11:44] So this is basically two regular match game episodes glued toget Essentially too long. You only need a half hour, but that's not how any of these ABC primetime shows do. It's the same thing with Celebrity Family Feud, where it's like two discrete episodes in an hour block. But definitely in the first half, it was clear the contestant casting department was looking for people with big personalities. It was like some weird old lady who told a story about changing her name to Joy Blessing, and then a guy from Montreal who was a drag queen Do you want big personalities in the contestants? Because I don't. And Dave, I know you don't either. Dave: [12:18] No, no, match game contestants should be silent and mostly out of sight. Tara: [12:22] Yeah. Dave: [12:23] They're just there. To provide an answer, and then it's all about the panelists. I don't need personalities, I don't need elaborate backstories, I don't need commentary or heart symbols with their hands. Tara: [12:36] Yes. Dave: [12:36] After every single thing on the show, it was just like too much. Dial it down. It's not about them. Tara: [12:43] Yes. Sarah: [12:43] Like be as flavorless and beige as possible. In fact, just like cast people who can just like sort of sit there and like occasionally clap. Tara: [12:53] Mhm. Sarah: [12:53] Like, all you need is a pulse. Tara: [12:55] Meet in a chair. Sarah: [12:55] That's it. Dave: [12:56] I said, put a frame picture of them, put them on Zoom. Tara: [13:00] Yes. Dave: [13:00] You just mute them when it's not their turn. Tara: [13:01] Uh-huh. Dave: [13:02] Perfect. Perfect attestance for Match Game. Sarah: [13:03] Yeah, like the cutouts, like during the pandemic year when baseball just had cutouts, just do those. Dave: [13:05] Yeah. Tara: [13:09] Yep. Final question. You're Selena Gomez. You are part of the reason that the annoying Joy Blessing did not win $10,000. As Joy is saying goodbye and you hug her As Selena Gomez, you kind of have to go, I will give you $10,000, right? Because I assume that she did. Dave: [13:28] Here's how it goes. I'm going to give you $10,000 worth of Selena Go Mes Oreos. Clip: [13:34] It's time to take a break because to be honest, my bladder is the size of a thimble. In fact, the only time I don't have to pee is when I'm peeing. Dave: [13:50] Okay, it is time for everybody's favorite segment, Ask EHG with the number one billboard hit, the Ask EHG theme. Sarah: [14:14] There it is. Dave: [14:15] All right, before we get into your questions for us, we have to pass judgment on last week's Ask Ask EHG, and we're going to spin the judge wheel, which we've been doing all along That's the actual sound of the wheel. Tara: [14:25] Mhm. Dave: [14:28] It sounds like me. Tara: [14:28] That's right. Mm-hmm. Dave: [14:28] Sarah's a judge this week. Sarah: [14:30] I am. And last week's question came from Meredith. The name John Provost, Timmy from Lassie, came up in a Game Time I was listening to today. My mom worked in the same real estate office as him back in the eighties What minor celebrity do you have a tenuous connection to? Lots of good answers here, but first let's hear from Tara. Tara: [14:51] I have a couple and they're very tenuous. The more tenuous one is that Mollin Ackerman went to my high school after I had already graduated. And the other is that Susan Misner, wonderful character actress. You probably know her if you watch The Americans as Stan's wife for a while before they got divorced. She may still be. The girlfriend of a friend of our friend, Adam Sternberg. I'm not sure if they're still together. I don't even remember that guy's name, but they both came over along with Adam. and his then girlfriend, I think, to watch Nick of Time at our apartment in New York, because it was a movie that Adam, I think, is Still obsessed with. Sarah: [15:27] Wow. Okay. Tara: [15:31] It's a real-time movie. It's so dumb. We can't get into it because it's so dumb and not TV. But Susan Misner's been in my apartment and watched Nick of Time with me. Dave: [15:38] I love Pick of Time. It was so bad. Tara: [15:40] It is so bad. Dave: [15:40] It was great. It was one of those turns it all around. Tara: [15:42] Yep. Dave: [15:43] I love this movie. I will defend it with my life. Tara: [15:45] Yeah. I remember the last time we watched it, it was while we were stuffing envelopes with extra hot grade stickers. So that's a fond memory. Sarah: [15:54] That is very good. Mine, I'm sure Tara knows what it is The med student that Andrea has the affair with on Beverly Hills 9 02 0 is played by James C. Tara: [16:00] Of course. Sarah: [16:02] Victor, who was my mother's hairstylist's nephew. Tara: [16:06] Mm. Well, then I have one more because another character actor, Matt Craven, last seen in Under the Bridge last year, is the son of a woman that Dave's mom used to know from the beauty parlor as well. He is Canadian. Sarah: [16:19] It's where everything happens. It is the Nexus. Understand, we had some very fun answers here, but my winner is the perfect combination of both minorosity. of celebrity and tenuity of connection. Rincey says my freshman year biology teacher used to be Henry Rollins' weightlifting coach in high school. Love that one. Dave: [16:40] Wow Yeah, great answer. Sarah: [16:41] Grizzly Clare had two many moons ago when I was a cashier at Banana Republic. I rang up Ludacris when he bought a pack of plain cotton tees. He declined the offer to sign up for the brand credit card. For some reason, that really spoke to me. And my best friend's uncle was a stunt double for Mr. T, was really burying the lead for Grizzly Claire. Ek Squire said, Okay, this question prompted me to figure out how to use Discord so I could tell the story. I went to school with Meatloaf's daughter around the time that Bat Out of Hell 2 came out. When it did, the big single was, I'd do anything for love, but I won't do that. And our terrible gym teacher at the time cornered her to be like, It's sex and drums and rock and roll, right? Because certainly your father wouldn't promote drug use. And man, way to get an entire class of kids to hate you even more than they already did What control did she imagine a 12-year-old to have over her rock star father's lyrics? Tara: [17:31] Oh boy. Sarah: [17:38] Anyway, Meatloaf was a pretty cool guy. Very good story, Eke Squire. Love that, and welcome to the Discord. But if you want tenuous, here we go. Julie Rhymes with Suli contributes the following My college history professor who almost failed me my last semester of senior year Was a child actor and played Moondoggy on a gidget TV movie. And you know what? Not only do we have a sticker for you, we have a sticker for exactly that. Julie, thank you so much for this contribution. And please DM Dave on the Discord for your prize. Dave: [18:17] All right, let's get into your questions for us this week. First one from Damon. Bojack Horseman had Vincent Adultman, who was actually three kids in a trench coat Which three characters do you pick, and what's the resulting alter ego? Tara, who you stacking. Tara: [18:31] We've got Eddie Haskell on the bottom, Cousin Oliver in the middle, Nellie Olsen up top. They collectively are Jimmy Irritating. Sarah. Sarah: [18:41] Brandon Walsh, Ted Baxter, and Carrie Bradshaw in Overcoat. It's Graham R. Scooperson. Give it a minute. Dave. Dave: [18:51] Mr. Butlatron from Clone High, K9 from Doctor Who, and Muffet 2 from Battlesar Galactica: the Robot Dog. Together, they are Tag Skinhaver. Milsnack, who is the next actor known mainly for T V stuff that Wes Anderson should add to his stable of movie players? Sarah: [19:11] First thought, best thought, Matt LeBlanc, Dave. Dave: [19:15] Huh. Has John Slattery been in one of his? Tara: [19:18] I don't think so. Dave: [19:19] All right. Sarah: [19:20] No, I don't think so. Dave: [19:20] Number one, John Slattery. Number two, Timothy off with his pants, but styled like John Waters. Sarah: [19:22] Yeah. Tara: [19:28] I can see it. Sarah: [19:28] Oh, yeah, I love this. Dave: [19:29] Yeah, I know, right? Sarah: [19:30] Uh-huh. Tara: [19:30] Yep. Sarah: [19:31] With it. Tara: [19:31] Ted Danson, I think he would be good in good in a square frame and good at the deadpan tone that all of his stuff has. Dave: [19:33] Oh, yeah. Sarah: [19:38] Yep, it's a great one. Dave: [19:39] Yeah, that white hair standing out against those mint backdrops. Tara: [19:43] Yeah, his white hair. Dave: [19:45] Yeah, well, you know, we know, he knows, he let us know. Tara: [19:45] We know. We know the truth. We know he knows. Dave: [19:48] That's all good, it's fine. Tara: [19:49] We know. Yep. Dave: [19:50] LBB, what's the actual strangest or most unexpected TV crossover? I had to think about this for a bit because I know there's like ones that you immediately want to go to. And I think I've never seen it, but I know about the supernatural Scooby-Doo one I remember, and I had to look it up. I had the wrong show. I thought Boss Hogg went on like WKRP for some reason, but he actually boss Hogg went to Alice. Tara: [20:13] Hm Okay, sure. Dave: [20:16] Trying to weasel Mel out of the diner through conning, I guess. He was supposed to be a distant cousin of Jolene, the replacement waitress. But my answer is this one. Sarah: [20:26] Okay. Clip: [20:34] You can't tell me that doesn't seem like fun. Yes, I can. You're tough. On some device, that would have started a war. Listen, my mother has this funny rule about staying in my own century. Do you think you could be me back to Earth? No, that is not possible. Dave: [20:55] That is an episode of Webster in which Webster is beamed onto the Starship Enterprise, and it is the Star Trek Enterprise that was Wharf. And it is sort of like a series of vignettes. And that is the framing device that he is doing something, playing video games in his room. Lightning hits the house. That makes him transport to the enterprise centuries in the future And then he's explaining his highlights of his weird life to Worf, and it's just like these various things where he meets other people. The one leading into that clip was him dancing with Ben Vereen And these have been all these discussions with Worf, and then Worf finally figures out a way to send them home at the end. Tara: [21:28] Oh, my God. Dave: [21:34] But I shit you not, a genuine Webster next generation crossover actually happened. It is called Webtrek, if you want to watch it. Tara: [21:42] Oh man, that's crazy. This is also crazy. There was a time when The writers of CSI and two and a half men traded up and wrote an episode of each other's show. And we'll link it in the show notes. There's a whole story about how that came together. And it's crazy, Sarah. Sarah: [22:05] The cheers slash Saint Elsewhere one wasn't that strange or surprising, I guess. It was two Boston shows. They were on the same network, blah, blah, blah. But the way that they chose to do it. Was just weird and seems off for what you would know of the professionals on Cheers. Like the doctors show up in Cheers, and they just keep telling jokes like it's a regular cheers episode, but dropped the laugh track out. Like it's like they didn't think it through all the way, which they probably didn't. Dave: [22:36] Seeken has one just for me. Given your previous thoughts on the stupidity of the name Paramount Plus, I would love to hear what Dave has to say about the new Paramount Plus Premium level of subscription. Well, I can tell you this much. It's one level dumber than Paramount Plus. And I think the logo for this service should be three stack mountains. Jovil Jen, after revisiting season two of Feud and doing a deep dive into Capote, I mentioned him to a friend who admitted they didn't know who he was, and I instantly judged them. What's the subject you know a lot about that makes you judge others when they're unfamiliar with it? Tara, Judgy McGee. Tara: [23:16] I am judgy, but everything that I know a lot about is too inconsequential for me to judge anyone for not knowing about it. Beatles trivia, no one cares. Monty Python lines, embarrassing. Like all of the stuff that I was obsessed enough with when I was in high school working at the public library and would just like get on a subject and read every book they had about it. You know, I can tell you a lot of facts about when different Beatles singles were released and what the B-sides were, but I don't expect anyone else to know that. So sorry, Dave. Dave: [23:49] I judge people who don't know things that I was obsessed about when we had a National Geographic subscription in my youth. So if you don't know geography, If you don't know where things are on a map, and if you don't know what flags belong to what nations, that is something I will judge you for. Sir. Tara: [24:05] It's bad news for me. Sarah: [24:05] Consider me judged. Yeah, most of the stuff that I know extensively is either like In the big book of annoying, obscure nerd shit already. So I don't get to judge anybody. Or it's about New Jersey. We don't get to judge anybody. But if you don't know anything about Watergate, especially at this moment in American history, like, Read a fucking wiki at least. I will judge you for that. Certain history shit, like, come on. Dave: [24:33] Diatho, you've been hired by Dash to develop a set of four Taiyan waffle plates Which four do you design? So basically waffles, stencils, I think is a good way to nutshell that. Sarah, what are your four? Sarah: [24:45] Ben Stone, Paul Robinette, Mike Logan, and Lenny Briscoe. Tara! Tara: [24:50] Similar, I'm going to go with the Seinfeld cast, just simple, simple sketches that you can tell is them that aren't necessarily photorealistic. Dave. Dave: [24:59] Hannibal the Face, BA, and Medog. Tara: [25:02] Love it. Sarah: [25:02] Yeah. Dave: [25:03] Graventy, congrats, you're on the dating game. Unfortunately, this is a great question. Unfortunately, one of your potential suitors is a serial killer What questions would you ask to attempt to ferret them out? Bachelor number one. Where would you take me on a first date if our choices were a fancy restaurant? a romantic movie, or the animal rendering plan down on the lonely highway by the edge of town. Sarah. Sarah: [25:32] Well, look, if you haven't seen Anna Kendrick's Woman of the Hour, it was very compelling. This is the premise. I recommend it. It is on Netflix. Second of all. The true crime genre flourishes in part because people think you can ferret out a serial killer. It's not really how it works. For that easy to spot someone with antisocial personality disorder based on brief Jokey interactions like the ones on the dating game, people would just do that, and series of killings would stop at two, probably. But you kind of want to pick questions that show you something about how well the contestant can empathize, what their relationship with their parents was like. If all their first date ideas are adrenaline junkie shit like bungee jumping, psychopath will have learned how to mirror normal responses to get the results they want, and one that goes on the dating game on purpose is not going to be as easy to flush out. But harmless teasing that gets a super pissy overreaction might be a useful red flag, just generally in your life. But if it were that easy to spot serial killers, we'd just do that. So bring bear spray on the date and trust your gut. Tara. Tara: [26:42] Do you have a good relationship with your mother? See, I was on your wavelength. Tell me about your pets. Sarah: [26:46] Mhm. Yes. Tara: [26:48] And in cubic feet, what is the capacity of your car trunk? Because if they know, that's a tip. Dave: [26:55] Sure, been doing some research Milsnack, Chicago Pope, was a TWAP lurker and has decided to canonize a TV character of your choosing as the patron saint of television. Tara: [26:58] Yep. Sarah: [26:58] Mm-hmm. Dave: [27:08] Which T V character are you proposing, and what miracle have they done to make them worthy of this time? Tara: [27:14] Well, there already is a patron saint of television, St. Clair. But to stay in the spirit of the exercise, I'm going to say Dakota Johnson for the miracle of taking down Ellen DeGeneres. That infamous interview we all remember. Sarah. Sarah: [27:27] Saint John Munch of Baltimore for unifying many disparate franchises into one deeply conspiratorial multiverse driven by faith. Dave. Dave: [27:37] I'm picking Homer Simpson for loving TV more than anyone else on the planet. Clip: [27:44] Oh my god, he's got the precious cable, TV, cable. Television! Teacher! Mother! Secret lover! Dave: [27:55] Dixon Chance, suggests a state other than Texas, because it's always Texas, that would make a good or interesting belt buckle. Sarah. Sarah: [28:05] Nebraska. It's mostly square, but you can use that western sticky outy chunk as a bottle opener. Dave. Dave: [28:13] I pick based on which is least likely to snag on some things or or to cut you perhaps. New York, West Virginia, Louisiana, Alaska, Michigan, definitely all out from the start. Hawaii would be impossible unless you're crafting separate island belts for a family of mice. Florida, America's dong, would actually slap you in the dong all the time if you tried to wear that belt buckle. So the top three contenders are our square estates. North Dakota, Wyoming, and Colorado. We toss out Wyoming because fuck that state. And we end up giving it to North Dakota because outside of walled drugs and being the state where Fargo doesn't take place, What else do they have? Let's give North Pagoda this one. Tara: [28:59] First thought best thought was Ohio, and then I had to Google it to make sure I was remembering its shape correctly, which I was. Ohio and Indiana, I know they're not the same in my mind. They are, though. And so I, you know, let's give this one to Ohio. It probably needs it. Dave: [29:14] Last question for us. Jovial Gent is back. Which ghost of a dead literary figure would you want to teach you how to be cool? So we're watching a lot of Gilded Age. Makes me wish I could fire off some Oscar Weill-esque snappers at a moment's notice. Can't. But just listen to this Gilded Age style shit from Oscar Weil. I have the simplest tastes. I am always satisfied with the best. These are all things you can see Christine Boransky saying. There are only two tragedies in life: not getting what one wants, and the other is getting it. Whenever people agree with me, I always feel I must be wrong. And a man cannot be too careful in the choice of his enemies. That one's for railroad debt. Tara: [29:58] I don't really think of authors as being particularly cool or having anything to teach me, also an author, about Being cool, but so I went with Marcel Proust, who spent most of his life in bed, which is at least a goal that I share. Sarah. Sarah: [30:14] James Baldwin. I doubt he'll have any luck at all, but at least I will enjoy the process and uh I'd just like to hang out with that guy. Dave: [30:22] All right, dear listeners, it is time for you with the answer to the ask, ask, EHG question, which comes from Dr. Calhoun this week What plot hole, logic error, or flaw in a plot ruined a TV show for you? Got an answer, got a candidate, go to the Discord. We have a channel there called Ask Ask ESG. That is where you plop down your answers, and we'll be back next week with a decision on that. It is time for the tiny canon presenting this week is Sarah. Sarah: [30:55] Hello. My so-called life, the seminal teen drama that turns Gasp 31 years old in a few weeks, was Quote about a lot of things, but one of the things that tends to get less attention than, say, Jordan versus Brian is how friendship is negotiated in adolescence, and whether the old Girl Scout adage, make new friends, but keep the old, is really practicable. A so-called Life's Eighth episode, Strangers in the House, brings things to a head between our protagonist, Angela Chase, Claire Daines, and her childhood bestie, Sharon Chersky, Devin Odessa. when Sharon's father, Andy, has a heart attack. Andy is seen on a nurse's station monitor a couple times, but not credited, doesn't get any lines, so he joins the MSCL Pantheon with Tino and the Chase's Cat as show ciphers. As doctors try to figure out how to manage Andy's case, the situation creates crises for most of the characters. Camille Chersky, the great Mary Kay Place, is terrified of losing Andy. Angela's father, Graham, Tom Irwin, who's exactly the same age as Andy, wonders what he's doing with his life, and Angela's mom, Patty, the great Bess Armstrong, tries to help him navigate this crossroads. Rayanne, AJ Langer, worries that she's not still a priority, slash the ranking best friend with Angela. And Sharon herself, semi-abandoned by both her lunkhead boyfriend Kyle and her oldest friend, is forced to turn to Devin Gummersall's Brian Krakow in her time of emotional need. Early in the episode, it's decided, amongst the adults, who are all still besties with each other, even though the relationship between their daughters is now frosty, that Sharon should go bunk with the chases while Andy's in the hospital. Angela goes to the Cherskys to pick up some stuff, and Sharon's spotless chintz explosion bedroom throws Angela back into a flashback to when Sharon had her tonsils out years ago. Clip 1. Clip: [32:50] When I was little, I practically lived at Sharon's house, and Sharon's room was like our world. Spelled your name wrong. Could I have some? You'll get my germs. I don't care. I want my tons in the back too. No. Why not? Cause it hurts. Squeeze my hand as hard as it hurts. Why? So I know how much it hurts. Angela. Sarah: [33:34] But Angela struggles throughout the episode in the present day to bridge the gap between them, even though she wants to. Clip 2. Clip: [33:42] I wanted to hug Sharon and tell her things, like how awful I felt. But it was like I I didn't have the right because we weren't friends anymore. Sarah: [33:57] Of course, they are still friends. It just takes a while for Angela and Sharon each and both to figure out how to get back to each other, with several chilly silences and also outright arguments along the way. Near the end of the episode, with Andy out of the woods, Sharon confronts Angela on acting weird instead of just being there, and they push through to the callback in Clip Three. Clip: [34:22] I know I know we have different friends now. But sometimes I miss you so much. Me too. It really hurt. Squeeze my hand as hard as it hurts. Sarah: [34:49] This callback is on the nose, it is true, but I think it still belongs in the tiny reconciliation canon For one, MSCL heads view this line of dialogue as one of our touchstones, and we always have. For two, it is emotionally satisfying, but true to my so-called life form, doesn't offer complete closure, just credible reconnection. It is illustrative of the ways the show is generous and empathetic to the real stressors and relationships among teenage girls without sanding all the edges off As well, it puts something of a period on this section of the overall story of the show, so the characters can move forward into other conflicts unencumbered by this one. Three, you've got some classic crumple-faced Danes crying in the scene. Four, it is a nice moment for Devin Odessa as well. Her performance in this character are undersung, in my humble opinion. I've never thought this episode had a shot at the main canon, and I still don't, but I've always loved this moment. I had a Sharon of my own who was Actually, named Sharon. This really brought me back, and it always has. I hope you'll get Tino to drive it into the extra, extra hot gray tiny reconciliation cannon. Tara: [36:00] Thank you, Sarah, and damn you, Sarah, because this Made me cry when I watched it, and it made me cry again when I listened to the clip just a second ago. Sarah: [36:06] Me too. Tara: [36:10] Yeah, it's perfect. You have Devin Odessa, the best scowler in the business, opposite Claire Danes, the best crier. We all know this. I mean, the line is the best, of course, but the whole scene is good when, you know, Angela is she is trying, like you said. Sarah: [36:18] Mhm. Tara: [36:24] She she knows that there's something she could be giving Sharon And she's trying to give it to her. And Sharon is just not, she's too proud. She's Angela tries to make conversation like, oh, your mom let me in. I guess you didn't hear me because you were listening to your headphones. What are you listening to? And Sharon goes, a group you probably hate because she's on that side of this divide where like she knows Angela's friends are like. cooler than she is. Like she's the normie top forty listener that Angela has left behind. And, you know, she's still herself the way that Angela is herself in a different way now. But like there's still the ties between them. that will always exist no matter what vicissitudes their friendships go through. And yeah, I mean, the callback is on the nose, but like life is like that sometimes. Sarah: [37:11] Yeah. Tara: [37:12] Like they, that's a moment they both would remember. Squeeze my hand as hard as it hurts. Like, that's why it lands. And you really feel both their pain. And, you know, in the moment, you hope that they can figure out a way to, like, be okay with each other. And they, you know, spoiler, do eventually. Like, they reach some kind of detente where they're they're not really like Angela says in the voice in the first clip like they're not friends anymore but they can still be friendly and they can still fill that function in each other's lives in moments like this that are that are too big to go through by yourself You can lean on someone who has all that history with you. It's lovely. It's my so-called life. What can one say? Dave. Dave: [37:49] Yuck, feelings. I thought it was well done. I think, you know, we have all had that transition where you shed friends from early in your life, whether it's going to college or getting out of college or whatever happens, and those kinds of things. Sarah: [37:58] Mhm. Dave: [38:02] Moments and it did feel real, like when you're just like, Well, we've grown apart, we're never gonna get back together in the way that we were then, but we can still be in each other's lives in some manner. I thought it was very effective. And I cried and cried. Tara: [38:20] Well, one of us cried twice, so you know, you got us a crit. Dave: [38:22] There we go. The average of the household was one cry apiece. Tara: [38:26] That's right. Dave: [38:27] Let's put this to the vote. Tara: [38:29] Of course. Dave: [38:30] I'm going to say yes. So squeeze my hand as hard as it hurts from my so-called life. You are hereby inducted into the extra hot, great, tiny reconciliation cannon. Clip: [38:43] Americans love a winner. Yup! And will not tolerate a loser. Nope. Dave: [38:48] It is time to find out the winners and losers of the week, comma, not quite. I will do our first not quite winner. It is Captain Planet. It's getting a live action series adaptation from Greg Berlante and Leo DiCaprio's production companies. So, a weird mix. A lot of people, I don't know, superhero people and people that love the environment. I guess that makes sense. Now that I think about it So my question is, and feel free to answer if you have a candidate, who is going to play Captain Planet in your mind? For me, I don't know exactly why, except this is the tone I want out of the Captain Planet remake, is Glenn Howerton. Tara: [39:30] Okay, yeah, I can see it. Dave: [39:31] Like, it's not a serious thing. It's sort of jokey because I think if you're serious and sanctimonious about it, nobody's going to watch. I think you have to come into it with comedy and then sell your message in between the lines. Yeah. Tara: [39:43] Is Rick Rosevich still alive? Sarah: [39:45] Oh, yeah. Tara: [39:46] He kind of looks like Captain Planet to me. Sarah: [39:46] Tag. Dave: [39:47] Yeah. Sarah: [39:48] Yeah. Tara: [39:48] I mean, or he did in his prime. Sarah: [39:50] Speedman? Dave: [39:51] Well, while you ruminate, I let the ask ask ESG people in on it as a sort of secondary challenge for the week. We've got some good ones. We've got John Cena just because from Erica. Tara: [40:03] Oh, sure. Dave: [40:03] You know, he's got the base, he's got the jaw. Tara: [40:04] Yeah. Mhm. Dave: [40:05] A lot of these choices I think might be too old for Captain Planet, but let's just go with it. Tara: [40:08] Mm. Dave: [40:10] Katie O'Brien was Portland the first's choice. Alan Tudik from Johnny Assay, I would say no to that one. Let's not turn him into the next Patton Oswal For all these kinds of things. Also, he's way too old. Jonathan Groff from Slovenly Muse. Tara: [40:26] Mm-hmm, that's good, I like that. Sarah: [40:27] Oh, I like that. Dave: [40:29] That's pretty good. Two winners, Mila, William Jackson Harper from The Good Place as Captain Planet. Sarah: [40:37] Oh, okay, uh-huh. Dave: [40:37] Good choice. This one I think is great. It comes from Mandrake. I think it's very similar to Glenn Howerton. Jake Johnson. Tara: [40:45] Okay. Dave: [40:46] I can see that too. Tara: [40:47] And he's already been a superhero, too. Dave: [40:49] Yeah. So Mila Mandrake, if you want a sticker package, let me know on Discord. Hit me up in the DM with your mailing address. I will send you that Not quite loser of the week is Megan Markle's lifestyle show ranked 383rd on Netflix behind Suits, LA, and Suits and all that stuff. And also, their deal got canceled. Tara: [41:09] Oh boy. Dave: [41:09] So. Double whammy for those guys. We're going to get kicked out of the country soon. They're going to have to live on a boat. Sarah: [41:15] Yeah. And the whining is gonna ramp up now, so that's fun. Tara: [41:18] That's sadly true. Sarah: [41:20] I mean, it is sort of fun for me and Tara, but Not Quite Winner is the creator of Adolescence Jack Thorne, who is writing a limited series about Klaus von Bulow at Apple This case was just a Vanity Fair mainstay, of course. Dave: [41:23] Sarah, who's your not quite winner of the week? Sarah: [41:37] Starred Glenn Close in the movie and Ron Silver as Ellen Dershowitz. So this kicked off a whole bunch of fantasy casting between me and Tara the other day. On Slack, I think Tara had some great ideas. Tara, would you like to share your genius Dersh casting that I hope we can speak into the universe? Tara: [41:54] Sure. Yeah, I think David Crumholt for Alan Dershowitz, recently seen in Oppenheimer and the studio also. Dave: [41:59] Oh, that's good. Tara: [42:04] And then, of course, for Klaus von Bülow. I pulled up a picture of the two of them, the the real Klaus and Dershowitz from 1985, and was like, oh my god, Stellan Skarsgård for Klaus. Sarah: [42:14] Mhm. Tara: [42:15] So that's that's my that's my pitch. Sarah: [42:15] Yeah, it's gotta be. Dave: [42:17] Oh, that'd be great. Man, Reversal of Fartship is such a fun movie. Tara: [42:20] It's so good. Dave: [42:21] Yeah. Tara: [42:21] It's really a shame that Alan Dershowitz is a complete piece of shit. Sarah: [42:22] Yeah. Yeah. It really it really was good and Glenn Close's performance in it is Sort of haunting in some ways. Tara: [42:32] Yeah, mm-hmm. Sarah: [42:32] I don't know. If you have the opportunity, check it out. It's worth looking at. And the case is, I mean, it got law and ordered a couple of different ways. So good call, Jack Thorne. Not quite loser, staying kind of on the true crime tip, is Jussie Smollett, soon to be the subject of a Netflix documentary from the makers of the Tinder Swindler That they waited sort of this long. I think it drops August 2nd, and they have been waiting to drop or to like publicize certain properties, which would suggest If a network did this, that it's like, oh, you, or if it were a film, that it's like, oh, they don't, they're not confident in it. We're not giving you screeners. But the Tinder Swindler was good and underrated. So. I have some hope for it, but for a Smollett PR machine. I don't know how this is going to look. I think there might be some Crack potty. It's possible that all this happened. Stuff in there that's like not going to be a great look for Jesse Smollett. So good luck to everybody. And you can probably read a review of that on bestevidence. fyi. Tara. Tara: [43:40] My not quite winner of the week is like really not quite because it's kind of a losery thing to do, but it Sasha Baron Cohen, who has unveiled his new Marvel/slash post-divorce body on the cover of Men's Fitness. And first of all, it's so depressing that the magazine industry where it is Men's fitness still exists basically just to put porn on their covers. Sarah: [44:03] Yeah. Tara: [44:03] Like, I mean, God bless, I guess, like, you're still in business, but. Sarah: [44:07] Someone'll be in their bunk, it happens. Tara: [44:09] True. But he, you know, he got divorced. He's in a Marvel movie. He's like, I'm, you know, I have this body now Like, okay, great. All of the you Marvel people do that. Like, that's not that impressive. And it's especially not that impressive to me when someone goes through a transformation like this who is rich. Like. Yeah, anyone could look like this if they had nothing else to do but prepare seven chickens a day and work out three times. You know what I mean? Sarah: [44:35] Mm-hmm. Tara: [44:36] Like, anyway. Sarah: [44:37] Yeah. Tara: [44:38] But good for him, he must feel great when he looks in the mirror and good for whoever gets to look at him naked, I suppose. Loser of the week Not quite, but kind of really is the late show with Stephen Colbert ending with its current contract and closing out 30 years of CBS programming in the time slot. There are a lot of questions swirling around this. The WGA has called on the New York State Attorney General to investigate whether this constitutes a bribe for a lot of business reasons that you can look into on your own. But the main reason this is a loser is, first of all, I am the only person on the cracked staff who still has live T V, so I have to watch Colbert every night for the next while to see if anything noteworthy happens and you know other than the first two episodes since the announcement that the answer has been no But also because now he's a lame duck until May. If it was like the Conan situation where it all sort of blew up really fast and he was kind of like daring NBC to fire him, like every episode was an event. But now it's just going to be like every guest who comes out is going to be like, This sucks. We're all going to miss you from now until May. Like, it's so long to be in this period. Sarah: [45:43] It's so long. Tara: [45:45] So that sucks. And it sucks for everyone who works on that show. Whether it was losing $40 million a year, as CBS claims, or not. Dave: [45:54] Strap in, it's time for Kim Reed's The Most Awesome Thing I Watched on TV last month. Kim: [46:04] Hi, this is Kim Reid and welcome to the most awesome thing I saw on TV last month. Last month it was Christmas in July as I watched Alice, Season 4, Episode 11, entitled Mel the Magi. So just in case you weren't around or have never watched a television show from the 1970s or 1980s, there's basically a law that if you have a Christmas episode, it has to be a version of one of the following Number one, O. Henry's short story, The Gift of the Magi, where the wife sells her beautiful hair to buy her husband a watch fob, but he sold his watch to buy her some hair combs. It's ironic, like Alana said You may recognize this conceit from Like Every Show, but specifically the first season Christmas episode of Little House. Number two, it's a Wonderful Life where someone who is sad and maybe thinking of ending it all gets to see what life would be like if they were never born thanks to an angel, and it's somehow always worse without them. Like, wouldn't it be funny if everyone was better off? Although I guess that's pretty dark Number three, a Christmas Carol, where a grouchy person gets visited by the ghost of Christmas past, present, and future to show the grouch what an asshole they are, and how everyone hates them, and the grouch changes their ways just in time for Christmas. And number four, Miracle on 34th Street, where a guy thinks he's really Santa, but obviously he's crazy, but is he? And there's always one child or otherwise innocent person who believes. And at the end, we are pretty sure it was Santa, but maybe not, but maybe? These are the ancient texts upon which all television Christmas episodes must be based, and I will not be taking any follow-up questions. So, on to Alice. It's Christmas, and everyone is talking about buying gifts, so Flo proposes they each only buy one present. And I did not understand what the point of all this was because it's not even like they do Secret Santa where they pick names because Alice gets her son Tommy and vice versa. Flo gets Vera and vice versa. Mel says he'll buy a present for himself, but this is all set up for what comes later, and a clunky one at that. Apparently these co workers are spending Christmas together, because I guess none of them have any family, and if I had watched much of this show since like nineteen seventy eight Maybe I would remember the lore, but I don't. I did look it up, and Alice's husband died in a trucking accident, which, wow, that's rough. But Does she have like a mom or a sibling? But I guess the whole point was she was the new girl in town with a brand new smile. So maybe her family lives far away. So, anyway, Vera says she's hosting Christmas, but Flo hates Vera's hamsters, so it's a no-go. Alice offers to host, but everyone says she always hosts and they don't want to put her out. Flo offers to host in her trailer, but no one likes that idea either. So Mel says he's going to cancel Christmas, and Vera cries, because there was something kind of wrong with Vera, but it was the seventies, so we don't talk about it. So then two truckers show up and they grouse that they're stuck in Phoenix until New Year's, and Flo's psych to have a shot at some fresh meat. Alice has the brilliant idea that they should all have Christmas at Mel's. Mel's grouchy about it, but they all agree. So then the gift of the Magi part kicks in because we find out that Tommy sold his guitar to buy his mom a silver creamer to match her silver pitcher. Flo sold her black velvet Johnny Cash oil painting to buy Vera some Burt Bacharach albums, Peak Seventies. Vera pawned her record player to buy Flo a frame for the painting, and to complete the circuit, Alice hocked her silver coffee pot to get Tommy a guitar case Because of sitcom shenanigans, Mel and Henry the telephone guy are the only ones who are privy to all this information, and all the gifts are put into the storage room for later So it's finally time for the Christmas part, but they turn on the sad tree that Mel the Cheapscape bought and the power goes out. And Mel keeps trying to call electricians, but no one's answering because it's Christmas Eve. And meanwhile Alice leads Christmas carols by candlelight because this show is no dummy and took any chance to let Linda Lavinshaw off her pipes. Meanwhile Flo's making out with a truck Everyone cheers when a guy dressed as Santa shows up, but it's the electrician. But the rule is, if there's a guy in a Santa suit, we have activated the miracle on 34th Street plot. Vera's convinced the guy's the real Santa, so she's serving as our child/slash innocent. Santa goes in the storage room and does something, and the power comes back, and Santa ho ho hoes on out of there, and it's time for present, but then Tommy discovers the presents are missing Did Santa steal their gifts? Flo calls the cops, who bring in three guys they found wandering around dressed as Santa, and they ask Vera to identify the culprit, since she spent the most time with him, but none of them are the right one. And then we find out that one of them is Mel. He went and bought back all the hacked gifts, so he was the one who took the presents. So he could put the painting in the frame, etcetera. Which is a semi Scrooge thing. So we get a little Christmas carol in there, even if there weren't any ghosts Then they get a call from the electrician who says he can't come. So they all wonder was it the real Santa who fixed the electricity, which completes the miracle on 34th Street plot. And that was the most awesome thing I saw on TV last month. Tara: [50:45] Extra credit is actually a Discord Ask EHG submission from Ambrose Chapel. We're borrowing it here because the only ones in the Extra Credit hopper are all about Taskmaster, which Sarah doesn't watch. So that's why we're doing this. Ambrose Chappell wrote, The Residence was a murder mystery made more interesting by being set in the White House. Assuming that Chondaland turns this into an American horror story type series, sorry, Ambrose, bad news about that. If you don't read the news, it's not coming back. But let's pretend it is. Which other famous buildings, locations, or structures should they feature next? And how does the location shape the storyline? I'll go first. My structure is the statue of liberty. And here's what's going to happen. Sarah: [51:25] Ooh. Tara: [51:27] Much as the residents educated its apparently few, because it got canceled, viewers on how the White House functions. The statue would take them through the whole process of visiting. How you reserve your tickets, you line up for the ferry, you ride the ferry. The fact that there are different tiers of tickets, the ones that just let you walk around outside versus go inside the statue, and then, you know, riding the ferry back. And because of the ticketing process, The investigators would know a little bit about who was there officially, but since the statue was surrounded by water, maybe someone swam there, risking their life and swam away. There would also potentially be jurisdictional issues between the NYPD and the National Park Police since the Statue of Liberty is a national monument and, you know, TV shows love to have a jurisdictional dispute. I did not watch the finale of The Residence, so I don't know whether politics came into play, even though it was said at the White House. But in the statue, you could definitely have an anti-immigration suspect. Given the poem The New Colossus at the site, but that's also kind of obvious. So, you know, make that character a red herring. Let's say the victim is the head of the committee that Just selected the artist for a memorial to the SNL stars who have died. And the murderer is a sculptor who had her design rejected due to crazy-looking mock-ups of Jan Hooks and Norm McDonald. And that could be a reference to like the weird statues of Lucille Ball and Lionel Messi that went viral in the past few years. So that's my concept: the statue. Dave. Dave: [52:54] So, I had a few candidates before I settled on my actual choice. I really tried to make the Great Pyramids work somehow, the murder mystery inside of those tiny little pathways and tombs, but it got too convoluted. And then speaking about convoluted, then I had a thought maybe the Winchester house. But what I settled on was The evidence of not one but two recent murders suggests that the ghost of Elvis is actually killing people in Graceland. Sarah: [53:22] Oh fuck, I also used Graceland. Tara: [53:24] No, that's so funny. Sarah: [53:25] God damn it. Dave: [53:26] All right, dueling Gracelands. All right, so here's mine. Cordelia Cup is the skeptical detective who must navigate the staff who run, the family that owns, and the fans that visit Graceland. First, the archive director was found gagged with three peanut butter and banana sandwiches in their mouth. And then days later, an Elvis devotee was found dead on a restroom toilet, just like Elvis. Tara: [53:48] Oh no Hmm? Dave: [53:49] The whole mystery setup is pretty Scooby-Dooish in its nature. Someone is pretending to be the ghost of Elvis, killing people to drive Graceland out of business so they can buy it for pennies on the dollar and. Sarah: [54:00] Build condos, yeah. Dave: [54:01] Turn it into condos or something like that. Exactly. But Great Sland Department is actually two people working in tandem. And here's my casting: Logan Schroyer from This Is Us plays the young Elvis. I don't know anything about him as an actor, but he looks the part. Sarah: [54:17] Yep. Dave: [54:17] Guesses who plays the old Elvis. Sarah: [54:20] Austin Butler. Dave: [54:21] No. Tara: [54:22] Kurt Russell. Sarah: [54:22] Vincent D'Inaprio. Dave: [54:24] Is not Kurt Russell. Tara: [54:25] Okay. Dave: [54:25] He hasn't played Elvis before. Sarah: [54:26] Is it Gary Busey? Tara: [54:28] Gary Busey, like that. Mm-hmm. Dave: [54:29] Yeah, Gary Busey's good. The old Elvis will be played by Richard Kind. Sarah: [54:34] Oh, yes. Tara: [54:37] Yeah. Dave: [54:38] Each episode in the season is named and themed after an Elvis hit. Tara: [54:38] Mm-hmm. Sarah: [54:38] Mm-hmm. Dave: [54:43] A suspicious fire in the master bedroom creates paranoia among the Graceland staff in Burning Love. A mute kid visitor is the key to proving the lead tour guide innocent in a little less conversation. A cover-up of a gruesome death by the Graceland event chef is thwarted by Cordelia moments before the guests above hosted Gala start unwittingly tucking into human meat disguised as chicken strips in Love Me Tender. Tara: [55:18] I don't know. Oh, no. Dave: [55:22] The property manager dies, but in this red herring episode, it turns out he died at the hands of the accountant because he forgot the safe word during a BDSM session in. Tara: [55:33] Accountant. Oh no. Dave: [55:36] Don't be cruel. Tara: [55:36] Don't be cruel, okay. Dave: [55:38] And finally, a rare Tennessee earthquake traps all the suspects in the jungle room to create the Agatha Christie-esque final in. Tara: [55:46] Suspicious minds. Dave: [55:48] A rare Tennessee earthquake traps all the suspects in the jungle room to create the Agatha Christie S finale in all shook up. Tara: [55:54] Hunk of burning love. Oh Oh, my God. Sarah: [55:57] Oh, sure. Dave: [55:59] And then finally, over the end credits, each week the ghosts of both young and old Elvis have karate fights with famous historical figures like Ramses II and Emperor Hirohito. And that's Graceland. Tara: [56:14] Damn. Sarah, I really thought you were going to go with the Winchester house, so I'm surprised. Sarah: [56:15] Oh my god. Dave: [56:17] Me too. That's why I didn't really go into any further details on that because I thought that was your choice. Sarah: [56:23] My first thought was Mount Weather, but then I remembered that they already made this show and it's called Paradise. And then I thought Maybe the Roman catacombs, but that kind of seemed like a hat on a hat because the whole point of it is like there's, you know, just skeletons stored in little niches down there. So then I'm like, well, what's the second most famous house in the country? I guess you could argue this point, but Graceland was my answer. I would like the season to be a period piece centered on Aunt Delta. Elvis Presley's aunt Delta lived in the house until her death in nineteen ninety three at age seventy four, and would apparently just be fucking hanging out in the kitchen watching her stories and drinking Sanka with her support hose rolled down, while tours just goin' past. Like into the jungle room. So I would love to see a season in which a visitor dies during the tour. Looks like a heat stroke or a heart attack, whatever, but Aunt Delta, who everyone assumes is not paying attention, is just living her life Tuning out the strangers, shuffling past six days a week, Delta overheard some scheming from some other people elsewhere in the line, and she's got some theories. I am not totally sure who you cast as Aunt Delta. Edie McClurg is a close match physically, but she might be too old, so maybe Adele Dickey, Kristen Chenoweth, maybe. What's her saying? Renee Zellwiger might have fun with this. And then she's just pestering the local precinct at all hours of the night, and Priscilla, played of course by Riley Keogh, has to come down to the mansion and be like, Aunt Delta, now you know we let you live here for free, and you can't just be annoying Memph P D all the damn time. But meanwhile, recent transfer and The King is alive truther, Detective Santos, Johnny Ray Diaz, for no especial reason except that I rewatched Primo recently and I left him Thinks maybe Aunt Delta's onto something which might secondarily help him prove that Elvis moved to Taos or wherever, but his partner, JC Marquis. Tennessee native Matt Zucre isn't having it, probably because he's well compensated by the Memphis Better Business Bureau to close Graceland adjacent cases quickly. so as not to ripple the surface of the local economy. So you've got a murder, maybe, you've got Dixie Mafiae, plural, definitely, and a police force riddled with graft, duh. And you've got all sorts of early eighties fashions and casting in jokes in The Residence, colon, kitch me if you can Thank you. Dave: [58:50] Well guys, that is it for this episode of Extra Extra Hot Great. We discovered if our opinions of the Martin Short hosted match game matched each other before answering your burning ask ESG questions like What's the weirdest TV crossover, and who's our TV patron saint? Sarah put my soul called Life's Hand Squeeze into the first reconciliation tiny cannon. We celebrated those who weren't quite the best and worst of the week, and wrapped it all up with a look at other houses to host a TV mystery show in. Next up, Mark Blankenship joins us for Hitmakers on ESG Prime, and we'll be back here next Friday talking about Jason Momoa in Chief of War. Remember? Clip: [59:33] We're listening. Ah! Dave: [59:36] I am David T. Cole and on behalf of Tara Ariano, Tara: [59:39] Are you gonna wear a vest to every show? Dave: [59:43] and Sarah D. Bunting. Sarah: [59:45] Thank you very much. Dave: [59:45] Thanks for listening, and I'll see you next time, right here, on Extra Extra Hot Great. Clip: [1:00:01] You want a good answer or do you want me to rush it? I'm just looking for today. Mini: [1:00:10] You recording, Nick? Yeah, recording. There you go. He was sleeping. Silence. Sorry. Jeff, shut up. This is Extra Hot Great Bitties today. Hey, everybody. Just be quiet, eh? Come on, guys. This is Extra Hot Great Minis. Today's topic is at the arcade. Nope, that's not the one I went with because that was too much. Hang on, here we go. This is Extra Hot Great Minis. Today's topic is ready, player one. I am bringing this topic today. I'm simply asking, what's that TV character playing video game-wise? I'll go first. It is Game of Thrones Ramsey Bolton, and he's playing Custer's Revenge over and over again. If you don't know why, look it up. It's disgusting. I'm going with two characters from Veep: Ben Cafferty. is um since he's uh so hopelessly behind the times I imagine he's playing Snake on a Nokia phone. And uh Mike McClintock is playing Farmville and constantly sending out invitations and also constantly checking on people. Did you get my invitation? Did you get my gift? Did you get my gift? Totally. Nick. All right. So I'm still a little bit punch-drunk from recapping Game of Thrones. So if this is just, you know, completely absurd, I apologize. But this just kind of popped into my head at some point. And it would be Lord Gransom playing Super Mario Brothers. Something a little Johnny foreigner about that Mario, though. Well, yeah, there would be that. He you know, he he would be as befuddled by it as he is by any technology from televisions or from from telephones to toast. And he would have all these questions like, why don't these gentlemen just accept that they're plumbers? Why are they trying to grab all these gold coins? I think we're rewarding them too much. And then at some point, he would definitely say, Good lord, am I meant to go into that pipe? Yes, I can totally see it, Sarah. I had a nickel. Um Mine's actually an old school pinball game. This is basically a thank you note to John Ramos in podcast form for the beautiful rendering of Dorothy Zvornak that is currently hanging above podcast HQ. As we speak. Dorothy would be playing this pinball game we used to play in college called like Cyclone or Tornado Warning, something like that. It's Cyclone. I know which one you're talking about. When it was multi-ball, yeah, the storm is coming. Take cover. And then this teeny, tiny little, you know, that fan that Vito has in the Sopranos that's like me with the water. That kind of fan would like. sort of wheeze to life and barely even flutter your bangs. And then once Multi Ball was over, the storm is over. Return to your homes. And Dorothy would just be staring at it in Annoyed bafflement as we did so many nights in college. Tara. Paige Jennings from the Americans is playing Tetris because she cannot be chill. Joe. That's a good one. I was thinking that when once we finally do come upon Bran Stark in the next episode of Of Game of Thrones. He's been under that tree all season, learning to get to the final level of Legend of Zelda. And he finally, at the end, emerges with. Story ideas for the next several seasons of Game of Thrones.