It’s time for the October Forcening, so we had to get spooky with Rose’s submission of Halloween Wars S07.E02: “Secret Creature Reveal.” How did Robert Patrick, of all people, do guest-judging creations Frankensteined together from sheet cake, pumpkins, and “crisp rice treats”? We tell you everything you need to know. Ask EHG demands that we share the recess games we dominated as children, what Smurf smells like, and more. Julie pitches a (suspiciously?) brief conversation about abortion on Superstore for the Social Impact Tiny Nonac. Then, after we name our Not Quite Winners and Losers of the week, Tara springs a surprise Game Time on Sarah and Dave, and you better believe it’s spooky. Put down your pumpkin carving tools and listen!
Enlisting In The Halloween Wars
The October Forcening takes us to the Food Network, with…Robert Patrick?!
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Episode Transcription
Tara:
[0:00] So that's where all the toilet paper went to.
Dave:
[0:08] This is the Extra Extra Hot Great Podcast, episode 379 for the October 25th, 2025 weekend. I am T or T1000, David T. Cole, and I'm here with hipster mummy Sarah D. Bunting.
Sarah:
[0:26] Happy Hella Williamsburg.
Dave:
[0:28] And pumpkin balance on top of a cake, Tara Arellano.
Tara:
[0:32] What did you call me?
Tara:
[0:45] Thank you, Sandy.
Sarah:
[0:46] What the Wilhelm. Hello. Welcome to another episode of Extra Extra Hot Great. We are so glad you could join us. We are so grateful for your support. This week, we have chosen trick and treat for the October 2025 for sitting episode. In the event that you have just arrived here in the Extra Extra Clubhouse, you, dear listener, are able to make us, dear panelists, watch stuff. Good stuff, bad stuff, weird stuff. We love your strange brains, so go to ExtraHotGreat.com, click the Submit button, suggest an episode or other module of television for us to discuss. That is what Rose did almost two years ago, submitting Season 7, Episode 2 of Halloween Wars Secret Creature Reveal. Halloween Wars is a Food Network competition show that launched in 2011. It's still on. The Season 15 finale airs as we're recording this in mere moments. The show pits teams of three, a cake sculptor, a sugar artist, and a pumpkin carver, against each other to create various spoopy-themed displays. The last trio standing gets a cash prize. It used to be 50 grand. It no longer is. Sigh.
Sarah:
[2:01] Hallmark stalwart Jonathan Bennett is the host. Judges in Season 7 included Baker Shinmin Lee, Creature Creator Todd Tucker, and various guest judges, which is probably why Rose nominated this episode for discussion since our guest judge for this one, which aired in October of 2017, is Robert Patrick. We will get into this nailed it face-off hybrid in more depth in a second, but first, let's do the Chen check-in. David T. Cole, should listeners watch Halloween War's secret creature reveal? No, Tara.
Tara:
[2:40] I agree. I think you're going to get everything you need out of this piece of television that you need from our discussion.
Sarah:
[2:47] Yes, and so I will keep it short. It was fine because we only had to watch one of them. This is solidly unobjectionable. Put it on in the background at an obligatory social Halloween event choice that I don't care to follow up with.
Dave:
[3:03] I would argue you wouldn't put it in a house. This is more like you have a not a real doctor's office.
Tara:
[3:09] Yeah, this is waiting at the where you're getting your oil changed programming.
Dave:
[3:13] Getting your oil changed, yes. Or perhaps your nails.
Tara:
[3:15] Yeah, nails would be fine, sure.
Sarah:
[3:18] Dog grooming place?
Tara:
[3:19] Uh-huh, uh-huh. Perfect. Exactly.
Sarah:
[3:20] All right, well, let's get a little more micro. Like a lot of shows of its type, the episodes are split into a shorter challenge in the first half, the Small Scare, which can earn you an advantage for the main event slash decisive challenge, the Spine Chiller. These names are also kind of off-brand, but Eddie Hoodle. This week's Small Scare theme was the Mummy's Day Out, with teams setting scenes like a mummy doing yoga a mummy on the red carpet and this clip to our plan that we came up with was he's a hipster because he's new age he's going to the bar and he's getting a bloody mary, what that's not a hipster drink i don't know what new age has to do with it i think they just wanted to bust out some relevant craft on a bloody mary glass made of sugar yeah which is okay but my issue with the show generally is that I don't have any context for any of this. How much do the teams know in advance about what kinds of themes and prompts they get? How long are things really taking to do versus the 45 minutes we're told they got? The pace is super frenetic because there's a lot of teams left this early in the season. I just didn't feel like I had any, it was like two speeds on and off. You guys agree? Yeah.
Tara:
[4:38] For sure. The other, the thing that bothered me the most is when the bar got brought out to be judged. You can see in the back, it's just like pumpkin or something stuck to a wood frame. And so it's like, if this is a food sculpting contest, and a lot of this is not edible, like when you see them building larger things, especially for the big challenge, there's like metal tubing inside that they're building, like just basically wrapping Rice Krispie squares around.
Dave:
[5:03] Eating metal is just a matter of perseverance.
Tara:
[5:06] Yeah. Right. But I just don't.
Sarah:
[5:09] Macroplastics.
Tara:
[5:10] Yeah. They don't taste anything in the first half. In the second half, they're like, and also make a thing to taste on top of in addition to your food sculpture.
Dave:
[5:19] You're underselling that is do your giant sculpture made out of stuff.
Tara:
[5:24] Yeah.
Dave:
[5:24] And then also a little bonbon for us to taste.
Tara:
[5:27] Right.
Dave:
[5:28] Ridiculous. How much they don't eat things in this show about making things with food.
Tara:
[5:33] On Food Network. Yeah.
Sarah:
[5:35] And yeah, Yeah, that really did feel, I mean, I'll get back to that in a second, but I also didn't understand what was required to make things out of pumpkin, by which I mean, like, how is the pumpkin prepared for them by the show beforehand? Like, you see a couple of sequences of one of the team members, like, sawing a stack of sheets. cakes that appears to have been stuck together with could be chocolate frosting could be wood glue for all we know we're not told anything like why do you opt for cake over the crispy squares that they can't use a brand name for like how much of this is prepped ahead I didn't understand any of it so there's like no stakes yeah.
Dave:
[6:18] I would assume they know something about it just because that's the way production goes bad if somebody's totally ill prepared for it So there's a little bit of that. And they also sort of gin it up by running to their easels of pads of paper and start drawing shit. But that is all performance art, I am sure.
Tara:
[6:35] Yes.
Dave:
[6:36] As far as like what they're getting. Yeah, they're getting a whole bunch of raw pumpkins and squashes to carve out, which yes, technically is edible, but who's going to delicious pumpkin rind?
Tara:
[6:46] It's not a dessert.
Dave:
[6:48] No. So like just the idea, like why isn't this then just go the extra step and just make this make spooky sculptures? You don't have to use food because what they're doing is using pumpkins for the things that can look like a pumpkin or something that needs to be carved because it has that level of detail in it. Like the mermaid's scaly stomach in one of the creations. And then where they can, they use cake in order to fool you and to think they're making something you would see at a very posh something or other where people would actually eat whatever you created. Whereas this is, yeah, do you want a piece of the cake or do you want a piece of the raw pumpkin on your plate? That is my number one full stop. Fuck this show. Foundational consideration.
Tara:
[7:36] Yeah. Yeah. If this is ultimately not a food challenge, it is a food sculpting challenge where none of the food that is sculpted is meant to be eaten. Yeah. Like you're saying, this could all be plasticine and it would be the same thing. The other problem I had with the first scare is that the team that wins are the ones, and admittedly, their sculpting is the best, but their concept was, you know how when you call for tech support, it sometimes seems like you're talking to a mummy. So this mummy is doing tech support. It's like, how is that this mummy's day off? That's work.
Dave:
[8:04] Yes the challenge was what is a mummy doing on his day off and their answer was he's working, yeah it wasn't even mentioned so angry about that like if you're going to set parameters and somebody doesn't do it fail them like once in a while shit like that slips by well actually it happens a lot on taskmaster i get angry about it then too where they say something and they're obviously not doing it and but they still get some points yes follow the rules dude Yes.
Tara:
[8:31] It's about integrity and judging.
Sarah:
[8:33] Yes, exactly.
Dave:
[8:34] I'm so angry about this.
Sarah:
[8:38] Let's step this rage a couple acts forward to the main challenge, which is the creature reveal the episode title refers to. This tasks the teams with creating a near full-size scene of a scary thing, spider women, alien dads mad that their daughters are out past curfew, dropping their human faces to reveal the horror underneath. The teams, as noted, also had to include a two-in-one treat to reflect the challenge while giving Shin Min Lee something to judge, like apple pie filling inside a chocolate cake shell in one instance. Did we feel that that was like too much plot given that it was this many teams or is it like, well, Food Network insisted and we had to.
Dave:
[9:22] They had to put something in their mouth at some point. Although the shit filled Pop-Tart was a surprise.
Tara:
[9:27] That is what it looked like.
Sarah:
[9:30] Yeah. There was an Audrey flytrap creature mouth that accidentally gets smashed very dramatically.
Dave:
[9:36] I would say absentmindedly more than accidentally. I think it might be a better.
Tara:
[9:40] Just not looking where she's going.
Dave:
[9:41] Yeah.
Sarah:
[9:42] And I got the feeling that that guy was pre-annoyed, which made me feel like he had been told that his thing was going to eat it. But of course, it all worked out fine. A blown sugar cat literally exploded. I was kind of hoping flying shards were going to do something a little more dramatic.
Tara:
[10:01] Yeah, you think like you should have goggles on. Like you're essentially blowing hot glass.
Dave:
[10:07] Yeah, that's an OSHA violation for sure. Like that shit is sharp. And by the way, if I never hear the word isomelt again, I'll be a happy man. Jesus Christ, isomelt, isomelt, isomelt.
Tara:
[10:18] Yeah, not since Snack vs. Chef. Remember that thing we watched?
Dave:
[10:21] Yep. I'd rather watch more of that than this.
Tara:
[10:24] Same.
Sarah:
[10:24] Yeah, we're also told winners of the quick fire here, the small scale, get a second assistant for part two, but we barely see the first assistants. They don't have lines. There is, again, no stakes or context to this. It's just like people to help you lift a pumpkin if all your team members are ladies at a question mark. I don't get it.
Dave:
[10:47] It's just one of the teamsters from the set. Lift with your legs.
Tara:
[10:51] I totally forgot about that as an advantage, too, because it's so downplayed.
Dave:
[10:56] That does remind me, though, just bringing it up, the helper perk reminded me of Nailed It. And this show is not trying to do what Nailed It did, but it is so close to what Nailed It does functionally.
Tara:
[11:08] Yes.
Dave:
[11:08] Feels bad to me to make fun of these people and their creations because some of them are really bad. Like some of them don't know how to color their creations and they're just like getting gobs of dark stuff and slapping it on a pumpkin trying to make it look weathered or something. But what it really looks like is like Tom Hanks handprint on Wilson from Castaway. Like, it's that bad. Yeah. so like it's not nailed it but it has a lot of quality of the output of nailed it and it kind of made me feel bad for some of the people on the show yeah.
Sarah:
[11:41] I agree well and it's nailed it meets face off like i said but with none of the things that make either of those shows charming or.
Dave:
[11:48] Compelling monty on the discord was complaining about a totally different reality show that Sounded to me like a Fangoria version of face-off, but more prop work rather than facial mask work. And I feel like that show, Done Right, would replace this show as an actual hit. Not on the Food Network, but just generally in your TV scape. Like that, I would like to see.
Tara:
[12:13] Yeah.
Sarah:
[12:14] Or move this to Cypher. don't require them to use fondant or whatever the fuck.
Tara:
[12:22] Right.
Sarah:
[12:23] Anyway.
Dave:
[12:24] That was a very Emperor of Kroll reading. You humans and your fondant.
Sarah:
[12:32] Yes, I read in the historical documents. Okay, we agree that we watched this because of Robert Patrick. He was fine, I thought. It seemed in the beginning like he was like, my agent did not explain to me exactly what was happening.
Tara:
[12:45] What am I doing?
Sarah:
[12:46] Happy totally but he like learned to roll with it he said the doofy lines the producers fed him he was a pretty good sport about the whole thing here he is commenting on the alien dad sculpture looming over his baby girl and her suitor in clip three this is probably the way the young man that came to take my daughter off.
Tara:
[13:06] On her first date probably perceived me thank you.
Sarah:
[13:11] And then he throws a wink in after that i always like him you know what you're getting but they didn't do enough with him i feel that way because the rest of the show is not great yeah thoughts i.
Dave:
[13:23] Think having him on set also points to none of these people doing things in the moment because if he showed up i would definitely skew over to something terminatory.
Sarah:
[13:33] As your scary.
Dave:
[13:36] It's this, but not that challenge.
Tara:
[13:38] Right, right. Yeah.
Sarah:
[13:39] Yeah, silver up your isomalt for sure.
Dave:
[13:42] Fucking isomalt.
Tara:
[13:43] I was mostly wondering how much he got paid for this. Even if it was only five hours of sitting there, which I assume they don't actually sit there the entire time he goes to his dressing room.
Dave:
[13:53] I think we should have checked the credits for like Caitlin Patrick or something like that.
Sarah:
[13:58] Yes, for sure.
Tara:
[14:00] Yes, a favor was being done, certainly.
Sarah:
[14:02] Is there anyone else that the show could get as a judge that would make you dip back into it?
Dave:
[14:08] I felt like the guy they had on that was closest to, like, I do horror stuff, Todd, whatever it is.
Tara:
[14:13] Tucker.
Dave:
[14:13] Tucker.
Sarah:
[14:14] Tucker.
Dave:
[14:14] I want to replace him with the really annoying guy from Face Off.
Tara:
[14:18] Uh-huh.
Dave:
[14:18] The lead guy who was their Fangoria type.
Tara:
[14:21] Uh-huh.
Dave:
[14:21] I forget his name, but he had, like, all the accoutrements that you would expect from that sort of guy.
Tara:
[14:26] He had harnesses on his harnesses, yes.
Dave:
[14:28] Yeah, that's right. Yeah, tool belts on his tool belt.
Tara:
[14:31] Yeah.
Dave:
[14:31] I think he would have done better because I feel like, even though I found him visually annoying, He did do a good job on face-off calling people's bullshit and actually bringing what I thought was expertise. I am not an expert, so he could have been bullshitting his way through, but it sounded real to me. And this guy, I felt like he was doing the apprentice thing, where it's like, here's a reason why I like you. Here's a reason why I don't like you. And there's like no consistent throughput or like America's Next Top Model.
Tara:
[14:58] Exactly.
Dave:
[14:58] One thing is like, you got to be you. And then like, you're being too you. You got to be what the person wants. there's a lot of that going on the judging and again who gives a fuck but let's clean it up if we're going to improve it.
Tara:
[15:10] Yeah the problem with whoever the guest judge is going to be like say if they can get a john carpenter and who knows they could have i certainly didn't investigate what the other guest judges had john carpenter.
Dave:
[15:19] These days is just doing comic books.
Tara:
[15:21] So i think he's free well yes no well he has another he has a new show coming yeah but he's.
Dave:
[15:26] Not doing anything he's just like he's just.
Tara:
[15:28] But he's alive anyway that's not my point my point is the both of the permanent judges are so blah that it doesn't like the guest judge would have to do so much heavy lifting to make me care about it like the cake lady shinman lee you know would just say things like something's missing and then that's it it's like okay well what's missing like what did what would you want to see here that you didn't please keep talking and they're both so absolutely bereft of charisma that, who cares who the third person is.
Sarah:
[15:55] I would add either Gordon Ramsey because he does have a way of like, if people legit deserve screaming at, he's going to do that. But if either they can't really take it because they're children or it's like, well, what is the point of this? Let's actually identify the problem here. He can actually be sort of insightful about the one thing that you could actually eat and digest. But let's face it, what this show needs is Werner Herzog.
Dave:
[16:25] Nailed it.
Dave:
[16:35] I was about to try to do it for the Herzog impression, but I can't do it. The theme. It is the duality of man. It is Ask EHD. It brings you to dizzying heights and terrifying lows.
Sarah:
[16:53] Yeah.
Dave:
[16:55] And by lows, I mean a depth, not the store where you buy nails and wood. All right. That's never happening again. It is time for Ask E.H.G. Let's spin the judging wheel. I'm the judge. It's me. I will determine who will win a sticker set for this question from Cat CM. I just listened to the canon pitch of regular show dealing with the issue of insomnia. And it reminded me how I first learned about the concept of insomnia from Family Ties, where Alice Keaton couldn't sleep for a week. As a child, the question goes, what adult concept did you first learn about from a sitcom? Sitcom. Some people didn't catch the sitcom bit and wrote some answers about Star Trek and stuff. Everything can't be about Star Trek, people. All right. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to tell you the lesson learned or the thing they learned about. I want you two to guess what show it is.
Tara:
[17:55] All right.
Dave:
[17:56] First one, pretty easy. And I want you to answer in the tone that you need to.
Tara:
[18:00] Sure.
Dave:
[18:01] Molesters.
Sarah:
[18:02] Different strokes.
Dave:
[18:03] Thank you. abandoned refrigerators Punky.
Sarah:
[18:06] Brewster Punky Brewster.
Dave:
[18:08] Alright now they're gonna get harder Okay That diabetes makes you thirsty Okay.
Tara:
[18:13] Cosby show?
Dave:
[18:15] No, it involves doctors.
Sarah:
[18:17] E slash R?
Dave:
[18:18] No, it's not E slash R. It's MASH. That one was from MASH.
Sarah:
[18:21] Oh. Okay. All right.
Dave:
[18:23] A handy list of non-liquor products you can actually get drunk off and can buy if you're under 18, I think is the secret sauce here.
Tara:
[18:33] Freaks and Geeks? No. I guess that's not a sitcom.
Sarah:
[18:35] Family Ties again?
Dave:
[18:36] Family Ties is correct. Yes, that was Tom Hanks' Uncle Ned on Family Ties. Reaganomics and conservative politics.
Tara:
[18:43] Also Family Ties.
Dave:
[18:44] Also Family Ties.
Sarah:
[18:45] Family Ties.
Dave:
[18:46] The concept of TV ratings and cancellations for poor TV ratings. Sitcom. I'll tell you it's from the 80s.
Tara:
[18:55] Alf?
Dave:
[18:55] Alf is correct.
Tara:
[18:56] Wow.
Dave:
[18:57] I don't know why that one.
Sarah:
[18:58] Wow.
Dave:
[18:58] You got a ding for that one. Nothing else. But I was impressed. It's the one where Alf, his favorite show, Polka Jamboree, he rigs the rating somehow in order to keep it on the air.
Tara:
[19:08] Okay.
Dave:
[19:08] All right. Child actor labor laws.
Tara:
[19:11] Silver spoons?
Dave:
[19:12] Nope.
Tara:
[19:12] Hmm.
Sarah:
[19:13] Full House?
Dave:
[19:14] Yeah, Full House. Correct. Men as Victims of Sexual Assault. Famous episode.
Tara:
[19:19] Oh, yeah. Too Close for Comfort.
Dave:
[19:20] Correct.
Tara:
[19:20] It was too close.
Dave:
[19:22] I don't like the word adulting, but it's what they wrote. Budgeting and adulting things cost money.
Tara:
[19:27] That's The Cosby Show.
Dave:
[19:28] That's The Cosby Show. Yes, correct. Caffeine pills.
Tara:
[19:31] Oh, St. Bobby Bell.
Dave:
[19:32] Sure. All right. And here's our winner, Catherine. I was 10 years old when the Seinfeld episode aired where he dates a woman whose name rhymes with a part of the female anatomy.
Sarah:
[19:42] Oh.
Dave:
[19:42] Oh, the episode builds to a punchline of Jerry figuring it out and yelling Dolores. But I didn't get the joke and I was embarrassed to ask my parents what body part rides with that. So I went into my bedroom, opened up the book my mother had bought me about menstruation. I poured over the reproductive system diagram until I found a part in question. She didn't let me know what part was.
Tara:
[20:07] Maybe you'll find out someday.
Dave:
[20:08] Okay. Catherine, you win this week's Ask Ask EHG prize on Discord. DM me your mailing address, and I will get you a sticker pack sometime before Christmas. I have such a backline, guys. I'm really sorry if you won in the past few months. I just keep on forgetting. But I will get them out. This, I promise.
Tara:
[20:27] It'll be a thrilling surprise whenever it happens.
Dave:
[20:28] You ready for our questions?
Tara:
[20:30] Yes.
Dave:
[20:30] This one came in directly, not through Discord. And I was a little hesitant. I was like, is this an actual question from an actual listener? Or is this some sort of like AI just spamming any form it can find? Because it kind of makes sense for us. But also it kind of just feels just generally weird enough that I was, I don't know. But let's do it anyways.
Tara:
[20:53] Okay.
Dave:
[20:54] From the do what I do computer game. See, you already see what?
Tara:
[20:59] That's not beating the allegations with that one.
Dave:
[21:01] What are lines that need to be read in sepia tone? An example here is the weather's changing. So Tara, that is a directive from either a person or a server farm in China.
Tara:
[21:14] Yes.
Dave:
[21:14] Please answer their question.
Tara:
[21:15] Some kind of artificial consciousness. Either way, hello and welcome. My answer is I must have the rent right before someone gets tied to railroad tracks. Sarah.
Sarah:
[21:26] The police who investigate crime and the district attorneys who prosecute the offenders. These are their stories. Chung Chung.
Dave:
[21:33] I just went a little parallel to the actual question. So anytime there is a chyron that says X hours or X days earlier, that should be in a silent film dialogue card with the accompanying kooky live piano music. No matter what your genre is, that's the price you pay. So if you've got some sort of serious something or other going on, real sad FBI case, and you do it, it's like, and then you go back to the dead bodies. All right. Kerfuffler. Great name. They are back. I just saw a Smurf air freshener in someone's car. What does a Smurf smell like?
Tara:
[22:13] No. What does Smurf, with a capital S, smell like?
Dave:
[22:16] Thank you.
Tara:
[22:17] Important distinction. Very important distinction.
Dave:
[22:19] Sarah.
Sarah:
[22:21] Burnt blueberry.
Tara:
[22:23] Dave.
Dave:
[22:24] Well, I actually did some research on how you were actually supposed to approach these things. So we've got top notes, middle notes, and bottom notes.
Tara:
[22:31] Okay.
Dave:
[22:32] Top notes, dew and ozone, crushed green stems, faint under ripe forest berry. Your middle notes, damp linen, humid loam, decaying bark, and a whisper of mushroom umami. Bottom notes, just because, sorry guys, I think Smurf smelled like this, patchouli and myrrh. I just think they're kind of gross smelling. Okay.
Tara:
[22:55] Easy. They smell like Smurf berry crunch. Why else would it taste like that?
Dave:
[22:58] Right. What is the Smurf perfume cult?
Tara:
[23:03] Smurf.
Sarah:
[23:04] Smurf.
Dave:
[23:05] Okay. I was going to say blue.
Sarah:
[23:07] Smurfium.
Tara:
[23:08] Smurfium.
Dave:
[23:09] Smurfium.
Sarah:
[23:10] I mean.
Dave:
[23:11] Milsnack.
Sarah:
[23:12] Right?
Dave:
[23:12] Now that Conan is doing more serious, dramatic parts, which TV drama are you giving him a guest actor role in and what is he playing? So what is the backstory here? Conan O'Brien, we're talking about, not the barbarian.
Tara:
[23:25] Correct. He's in a movie currently that is very good. I saw it last week. It's called If I Had Legs, I'd Kick You with Rose Byrne as the lead. and he plays her therapist.
Dave:
[23:34] Oh, okay.
Tara:
[23:35] And he's very good. It is a comedy, but his part is very, it's not hilarious. It's quite deadpan.
Dave:
[23:41] All right. Knowing about his contributions to The Simpsons and also his love for the character Mr. Burns, he did the monorail Music Man episode. I'm going to age Conan up and have him play a behind-the-curve country doctor in a future season of Fargo.
Tara:
[23:55] Ah, I could see that.
Dave:
[23:57] With his tinctures and whatnot.
Tara:
[23:59] Sure.
Dave:
[23:59] All right, Tara.
Tara:
[24:00] I think he'd love that. I am currently covering Murdoch, Death and the Family for Decider, as I mentioned on the main show last week. And he could so easily play a Murdoch on that show because they are all redheads. Sarah.
Sarah:
[24:13] Pittsburgh Deputy Fire Chief Fintan Abbott, Dr. Jack's brother on the pit.
Dave:
[24:19] Dixon Chance. If you had to pitch a tiny cannon for the category of best death trap a villain has put a protagonist into, what would you pitch?
Tara:
[24:30] It already got a huge feature on this podcast. It is the underground coffin that the bad guy put Nick in, in the Tarantino episode.
Sarah:
[24:39] That was my answer as well.
Tara:
[24:40] Of course, from CSI.
Dave:
[24:42] Yeah. All right. I can't top that, but I was thinking a little broader. And you can argue the death part of this, but I was going for like the most complex, the most baroque, the most overplanned. So I'm going to put the village from the prisoner in here. They're not exactly trying to kill him, but I think once they get the information, he's sort of dead meat. So I think in the end, it would have been the same for number six. If an actual death trap, my answer was Hector Salamanca's wheelchair bomb.
Tara:
[25:09] That's pretty good.
Dave:
[25:12] DPOV16, what two actors from an ensemble cast would you love to see work together again in a TV series? They mention Rachel Griffiths and Matthew Rhys for their bantering sibling chemistry on brothers and sisters. So Sarah, what two actors do you want to see together again?
Sarah:
[25:29] I totally agree with the proposed one, and I would love Edie, Carmela Soprano, Falco, and Sharon, Rosalie Apriel, Angela to work together again on something. Comedy, drama, hosting a game show, I don't really care. Tara?
Tara:
[25:45] Hamish Linklater, of course, played Julia Louis-Dreyfus' character's brother in The New Adventures of Old Christine. And the whole time Veep was on, I kept expecting they would find some kind of guest role for Hamish Linklater on that show. He's an actor I really like. Seen him on stage a couple of times even. And they never did. And it made me even sadder to think, oh, no, they don't like each other. Which is why that didn't happen. I don't know that. Maybe the timing just didn't work out. But you have to wonder. Dave.
Dave:
[26:14] Let's laugh and forget ourselves. That's when he played Lincoln, right? Wasn't he Lincoln?
Tara:
[26:21] Yes, he was.
Dave:
[26:21] My choices are Ian McShane and Brad Dourif from Deadwood. They were always one of my favorite pairings in Deadwood when they get into it. Because Doc Cochran was one of the one characters actually in his orbit that would give him shit. So the relationship was pretty good there. So I'd like to see them both in something else.
Tara:
[26:36] Yeah, and hurry up. So neither of them's getting any younger.
Dave:
[26:40] Yep.
Sarah:
[26:40] True.
Dave:
[26:41] Milsnack is back. Which schoolyard or recess game did you absolutely crush all others at? This was grade four or five. And we invented a game, quotes invented a game, called Mott's Murder on the Snow, which you only play in winter, surprisingly enough. But it's basically King of the Hill in Ontario in the winter in the sort of the leavings of the parking lot snow plowing, right? You know, those gross, disgusting, half dirt, half snow, half ice kind of things. The idea was basically King of the Hill. You got to the top and somebody tried to get to the top. You were allowed to push them off the top. And a lot of people got hurt, which is why it was called Murder on the Snow. And I was really good at it because I was fat and nobody could push me off the top. Sarah.
Sarah:
[27:34] I was surprisingly good at capture the flag, by which I really mean I was less bad at that than at most other games, but I was really uncoordinated and people would just forget I was there and then I would leave jail.
Dave:
[27:48] Because of your long arms.
Sarah:
[27:49] Gorilla arms.
Tara:
[27:51] My literal answer in my notes is, LOL, none. Never good at games of this sort.
Dave:
[27:59] Standing near the entrance waiting for recess to be over.
Tara:
[28:02] Probably. I was really good at the reading a book game. Yeah.
Sarah:
[28:06] All right.
Dave:
[28:07] Next one comes from Planty Plant Plant. Tara, please read this one. It's too long for me.
Tara:
[28:11] Okay. Have you ever had information about a TV show that you thought only you had, and so you were insufferable about sharing it? In a recent podcast episode, Sarah mentioned the two ER TV shows, which unpleasantly reminded me of mine. When I was a teenager, my parents took me to a play here in Chicago called E slash R, which became a TV show a few years later, which featured George Clooney in eight episodes. A decade or so later, when a new show called ER premiered, also set in Chicago and starring George Clooney, I would immediately tell anyone I could about the original TV show E slash R and how great it was compared to this Johnny-come-lately ER. And how the question, what is your know-it-all, perhaps not as unknown and or fascinating TV show trivia knowledge that you inflicted on others? Jumping off from the term inflicted, I'm going to say outing Scientologists that no one knows are Scientologists. If you are wondering if someone's a Scientologist, ask me. I know who they all are. Sarah.
Sarah:
[29:09] This actual example e virgule r versus er is often mine but the one that i really inflict on other people is this who appears in the most law and order credits all time, and it's nicky scarfo jr who was the guy in the credits montage with the book over his face during his perp walk he's not even a new york city gangster i don't understand i guess he was like I don't know, copyright compliant. Nicodemus, anyway, shock your friends, stun your enemies, bore your spouses by being like, did you know? Yes, honey, I knew that.
Dave:
[29:48] Damon, what's your all-time favorite EHG game time format? Sarah.
Sarah:
[29:53] I like the IMDB closest to the pin episode number guessing ones, but my favorite is like show title and actor mashup wordplay ones, because I wouldn't say I'm especially good at them, but I'm a little better at them than other formats. And I just love groaning at how your crazy minds work. Game constructors. It's really fun on both levels. Dave.
Dave:
[30:17] I love a lot of them. But the one I think about the most when it comes to format is one we just can't do anymore. And that's a game we used to play at the very start of this podcast called Lost in Translation. I think Dan Blue Rogi was the first person to create it. So basically what we did back in the day, so this would be 15, 13, 12 years ago-ish. He took TV show titles, and I think maybe log lines as well, and ran them through the Lost in Translation website, which was basically a website that would, for you, chain your input through a series of 2010s online translators, which were all not great. So it would go from English to French, French into Russian, Russian to Japanese, et cetera, et cetera, back into English. And then you had to figure out what that was. It was madness because it really had that English sort of terrible translation quality to it. So it was fun to play, but we just cannot do it anymore because online translation is too good. Usually you put something in English, you'll get back the same thing in English eight cycles later. Can't get those bewildering results anymore. But that was a fun format.
Tara:
[31:29] The Do What I Do computer game just heard you saying how good they are and said, thank you.
Dave:
[31:33] Beep. Beep.
Tara:
[31:35] My answer is Tube Tunes, obviously. I keep doing it. Can't stop.
Dave:
[31:38] Ellsbeth, I missed the regular updates from Tara on the Bonkaloo dating shows. Does she still watch them or has she decided to protect her remaining sanity? Let's find out. Tara, Ariana.
Tara:
[31:48] Oh, my no. I forget about the ones on Netflix, which are The Ultimatum and Love is Blind because they don't come up in my Apple TV dashboard when there's a new season. so I missed a season of Love is Blind at some point and I never came back to it or the ultimatum. To have heard the current season of Love is Blind is really good, I don't know if I still care about that one. But as I mentioned in the latest main episode, unless Dave cut it, which he may have, Married at First Sight is coming back next week. This season is set in Austin. It is now on Peacock, so all of you filthy cord cutters can check it out if you've been curious about it. It was on Lifetime before, but now it's on a platform that is easier to get.
Dave:
[32:24] Thank you, everybody, for your questions. Here comes this week's Ask Ask EA's G question for you to answer on our Discord. Or you can email me at davidatcole.fyi if you're not on Discord and you want to answer. Loosely Lawless, my library carts are named Rene Descartes, Paul McCartney, Sidney Carton, Cart of Darkness, and Beyonce Knowles Carter. What should I name the sixth cart? That is your task for this week. Go to Discord, the Ask Ask ESG channel is where you want to put those answers. What is Sydney Carton?
Tara:
[33:03] It's a character, isn't it?
Sarah:
[33:04] Best of times, worst of times.
Dave:
[33:06] Oh.
Sarah:
[33:07] Dickens.
Dave:
[33:07] Oh, okay.
Sarah:
[33:08] Right?
Dave:
[33:08] Books. Blech.
Tara:
[33:10] Spelled with a Y.
Dave:
[33:11] Yuck.
Dave:
[33:13] Uh-oh. Very fast backwards music means it's time for a tiny no-knack presenting this week. It is Julie. I'm a huge fan of Superstore. It's my before bedtime, fall asleep while watching.
Tara:
[37:30] Tiny nonac, I hope you'll agree it still deserves the dishonor. Thank you, Julie. Sarah, you're the one of the three of us who did not regularly watch the show. So why don't you go first?
Sarah:
[37:42] All right. I did not regularly watch the show because I disliked it immediately and profoundly. Did not think it was funny. Thought it was angry in a way that I'm not sure it was aware it was projecting. Maybe that was the point. I did not stick around to find out. Despite many people whose opinions I respect really liking the show, many actors whose work I respect being in the show. It just rubbed me the wrong way immediately. And I wouldn't say that this scene is typical, but the fact that the submitter, which excellent presentation, by the way, Julie.
Sarah:
[38:22] Rhymes with Suly, the fact that the tone, she says it feels off, but then it also felt very written. All of the points about the theory that maybe this is a political statement shoehorned into a show that is a lot more subtle and on the right ethical side of things than normal, I don't know quite what to do and how to vote for it because I agree that that does function as sort of a blemish on a show that you would otherwise enjoy but this scene did have a tone sort of a strident tone to it to me that was part of why I didn't like the show in starting in season one so I'm not totally sure what to do with that information given that any anything else that I heard about the show is that it was sort of broadly liberal not really in its politics, but in the way that it viewed its workers and different class concerns and stuff like that. Mm-hmm. I don't really know exactly what to do, but I'm looking forward to hearing what people who actually watched the show had to say. But taking it out of context, this presentation is very good at sort of, you know, here's what we're normally looking at. And then there's this sort of wet fart of a scene in the middle that might be a network note. So I've got a lot to think about. Tara?
Tara:
[39:51] Yeah, I think it's fair to say the show is liberal or even progressive. It definitely has a pro-labor position throughout the run of the show, and they also, in the middle, get into what happens when ICE raids your workplace and people who are your colleagues are undocumented, and those were explicitly documented. the whole point of an episode. So I agree with Julie that this kind of sticks out, but this aired in the maybe a couple of years after there were a run of shows where characters had abortions and it was fine. Like it was, you know, affirmed as a decision they should make. Like Glow did it and Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, but what those shows have in common, there was a third one too, and I can't remember it right off the bat, but those shows have female showrunners, which this one doesn't so the fact that this one even acknowledged like abortion is a procedure that exists it's like that's progress from where we were in like the 90s even sometimes but in terms of the scene it didn't bother me that much amy and dina are not close friends amy would not have this conversation with dina if it were something she was considering so and dina is not like you can even tell from the scene she does not have the emotional intelligence to have that conversation other than in a completely utilitarian way. So that didn't bump me really. And in terms of does it make great sense for this character to not even consider abortion?
Tara:
[41:21] Maybe not. But the reason that Amy is pregnant at this point is that America Ferreira was pregnant. For real. They were writing it into the show. So there could have been considerations of like taste and respect and like, let's not make our colleague talk about seriously considering aborting what we all know is the real baby that she is pregnant with. You know, like that's that could have been an overarching consideration in how to write the scene. So I hear Julie's point, but I think there are factors outside of the scene that impinge on it.
Sarah:
[41:56] So yeah.
Tara:
[41:57] That's my take. Dave.
Dave:
[41:58] Yeah, I mean, I guess framing it as in like what actually happened in the show is she gets pregnant. This coworker who is the weirdo manager, assistant manager, peppers her with all these questions in the car, a very uncomfortable situation, which she just wants to stop right there. And then clip from the second episode. Obviously, there has been a choice made if even there actually was a choice to that character to be made. like that decision isn't on camera you know what i mean so and i'm not quite sure it ever was something she was considering versus something the show just wanted to bring up to let people know that abortions exist and that is a good deed for this episode which in which case like i don't know if you really wanted to bother with that because it just sort of muddies the water of what we see of that character for the next few episodes right like it just seems like you brought it up and people were expecting some sort of choice to be made. Yeah. But the bringing up seemed to be the thing into itself that they were clapping over.
Tara:
[43:02] Mm hmm.
Sarah:
[43:03] Yeah. I mean, maybe the issue here, I mean, at least for me, is that I think maybe this is, like, it really depends on what category we're going to settle on for this as a nonac. Because it did feel unfunny in a way that was like, not going, went too far, but also not far enough and stuck out for that reason. But as a social impact tiny nonac, I'm not sure.
Dave:
[43:27] To me this argument is like having the the courage of your convictions i think that's what is kind of going on here it's just like if you're gonna bring it up bring it up like not necessarily she has to have an abortion right but that it has to have that storyline where she thinks about it and makes a decision and this is why like just put aside is this the show for that and is that funny for a sitcom and all that kind of stuff i mean others have done it you know mod Yeah. Maybe that's the way to look at it. I mean, for me, social impact is just like way too nebulous of a category for me to want to have in the mix.
Tara:
[44:06] Sure.
Dave:
[44:06] Yeah.
Tara:
[44:07] Well, bad writing is kind of general as well.
Dave:
[44:10] Yeah, but it's not exactly like the writing isn't bad. It's like bad management. It's like bad show running or something like that, right? Where it's like- Wimpy spinning. You know, it came from somebody up top and they just sort of thought that that would be fine to just introduce the topic to that point and let it drop. That said, it's really dark, but scooped out.
Tara:
[44:36] Yeah, that's- That doesn't seem anti-choice to me. I thought that was really funny. Also, the character who says it is an idiot.
Sarah:
[44:43] Yeah, this is the thing that it's like, at least they went all the way there and around, like all the way around the block and back. Like they went so far with it. Whereas the scene in question is sort of like, huh? And then someone checked it off a list.
Dave:
[44:59] Julie sort of like hints at like one of the annoying things about this is they don't really close the loop on it. And that's sort of what I'm getting at too, which is I don't really think they saw it as a loop. I think they just saw it as, you know, just this little pin they were going to put in there in the timeline in order just to say that we brought up abortion and it was.
Sarah:
[45:18] Dear Peoria, she's not.
Dave:
[45:20] Yeah, dismissed off camera.
Sarah:
[45:20] Exercising choice. Yeah.
Dave:
[45:22] It didn't really bother me to watch it like there, but like you could wish more for a TV show. You can wish that they did it, but just like the evidence on the table, it just seems like they wanted to have it out there. and they just didn't do a great job of it but didn't quite hit the no neck level for me. All right, so let's put this to the official vote. Sarah D. Bunting, what do you say, you?
Sarah:
[45:44] I mean, I think we have some, like, definition creep problems here, but I will also say this is not sufficiently worse than the rest of the show, in my opinion, that it qualifies as no-nackable. So it's a no on the no-nack for me.
Dave:
[46:00] Tara?
Tara:
[46:00] Yeah, I'm going to vote no-nack on this as well, personally. But thank you for the presentation.
Dave:
[46:07] All right. What did we settle on for our category?
Tara:
[46:09] We didn't.
Dave:
[46:09] We didn't. All right, so we're going to stick with social impact for the category, but unfortunately... That means aborted abortion discussion from Superstore. You're hereby not inducted into the extra hot, great, tiny social impact. No, now.
Dave:
[46:32] Americans love a winner and will not tolerate a loser. Nope. I'm going to say in the future, try to pick a category. I don't like having to pick a category and then relitigate on the category. If you're having trouble, reach out, get some opinions, stick one in there.
Tara:
[46:49] This is what the Discord is for.
Dave:
[46:50] Yeah.
Sarah:
[46:51] All right.
Dave:
[46:51] Not quite winners and losers of the week. I will go first with the not quite winner. It is Sir David Attenborough, besting Dick Van Dyke to become the oldest ever daytime Emmy winner at 99. So congrats on hitting 99.
Sarah:
[47:08] That's suckers.
Dave:
[47:09] Congrats on winning an Emmy daytime though, the garbage Emmy.
Tara:
[47:13] Still.
Dave:
[47:13] But.
Sarah:
[47:14] Rude.
Dave:
[47:14] Until you drift away from land in the ocean and are saved by a pod of dolphins, you are nothing, David Attenborough. Nothing. Not quite loser of the week. CNN trying yet again to launch a streaming news service. Who wants more news right now? Who is saying, oh, yes, I need another avenue for news. Oh, I love the news these days. Give me that news, they say. And CNN is like, I got to cover.
Tara:
[47:43] Yeah.
Sarah:
[47:43] Not just both sides, even another side. Fuck off.
Tara:
[47:47] I guess this is for people who don't necessarily want to watch the news live, but do want to see Tony Shalhoub breaking bread, the show. So this is the only way they can get it? I have no idea.
Dave:
[48:00] Oh, God.
Sarah:
[48:00] The JFK Jr. story.
Tara:
[48:03] Is that like him?
Dave:
[48:03] Is it a food travelogue show?
Tara:
[48:05] It sure is.
Dave:
[48:06] Fuck off with all these old actors going around the world doing shit shows. Like, just fuck off, all of them. Eugene Levy, fuck off.
Tara:
[48:14] Yes.
Dave:
[48:14] Shalhoub, fuck off.
Tara:
[48:15] Anthony Anderson and his mother. Yes.
Dave:
[48:17] Yeah.
Tara:
[48:17] Yes.
Dave:
[48:18] Fuck right off.
Tara:
[48:19] Agree.
Dave:
[48:19] Cook at home. weird thing to get angry about but here i am.
Sarah:
[48:26] Oh boy uh still mad at halloween wars my not quite winner is robert and michelle king's silicon valley drama cupertino getting a series pickup at cbs for the 2026 2027 season mike coulter is a set to star hubba i am in obviously someone on the discord pointed out they left money on the table not calling a chum hum and i concur, my not quite loser of the week is johnny manziel, Oh, did you want to reason? Well, here it is this week. He is the season's latest special forces colon world's least tough actors quitter. I don't understand why they're still going on it. There is absolutely evidence at this point of what you're in for. And if it bursts someone's implant. Yeah, maybe you should just stay home.
Tara:
[49:22] My not quite winner is HBO, which has landed Sopranos creator David Chase's return to TV. It is a limited series called Project MKUltra.
Dave:
[49:32] Sounds great.
Tara:
[49:33] I can't wait. This is so my shit. I'm so excited. Whoever was doing it, I would be watching it, but the fact that it's him icing on the cake. My not quite loser of the week is Alan Hamill, who was in People Magazine this week talking about having created an AI clone of his, I wrote ex-wife in here, not ex, late, his late wife, Suzanne Somers. They were married when she died. And now two years after that death, he has created an AI clone of her and claims you can't tell the difference, which is quite an indictment of their relationship, I'm gonna say. If the AI can match her that well, I don't think it was necessarily as deep as one might hope.
Dave:
[50:18] Do you think the AI is called Susan some other?
Tara:
[50:22] Yes.
Sarah:
[50:24] You just missed her. Yep. Too soon?
Dave:
[50:28] Yeah.
Tara:
[50:35] Welcome in, grandpas. You've missed a good, solid hour of discussion about why pumpkin is not for desserts, what childhood games we ruled at in the schoolyard. We had a tiny no-knack, not very many of those so far, about Superstar. We've talked about a lot. But it just leads me to one question. Do you guys know what time it is?
Dave:
[50:58] Is it game time?
Sarah:
[50:59] Is it game time?
Dave:
[51:00] Surely not.
Tara:
[51:01] It's surprise game time!
Sarah:
[51:03] What? Bye.
Dave:
[51:14] I am shocked. Shocked.
Tara:
[51:16] I hope you can contain yourself because you got to play. In honor of the spooky season, I've created a game called Strange and Pun Usual. This is a game where you have to figure out the TV show titles that have gotten a Halloween glossary pun makeover. Basically, if a TV show could change its display name for October, like people used to do on Twitter around 2010, it would end up like the answers in this game. So, for example, if I said, the galactic station this show is set in would probably attract more visitors if they cleared out the decorative cobwebs and skeletons, what would you guess?
Sarah:
[51:53] Boobalon 5?
Tara:
[51:54] That is not correct. Dave, do you have a guess?
Dave:
[51:57] No, I don't. Let's go ahead.
Tara:
[51:59] If you had gotten it off that clue, it's worth three points. If you needed a hint, I'd say it was a syndicated show that premiered in 1993.
Dave:
[52:06] I assume this is Deep Space Nine, but I can't figure out what your answer is.
Tara:
[52:11] Star Trek Creep Space Nine.
Dave:
[52:13] Okay. What was the clue again?
Tara:
[52:16] The galactic station the show is set in would probably attract more visitors if they cleared out the decorative cobwebs and skeletons.
Dave:
[52:23] All right. Is that supposed to lead me to creep?
Tara:
[52:25] Yes.
Dave:
[52:26] Okay.
Tara:
[52:26] No show or festive vocabulary word is used more than once, so creep is off the table. the winner will receive a spooky prize of my choosing let's go to picky to see who's going first dave we will start with david all right dave and then sarah we've got 16 questions and a tiebreaker are you ready to play strange oh you didn't answer sarah's number one oh i'm sorry yes you can guess at every level thank you okay dave carrie bradshaw should really probably disclose that she lines up a lot of her dates by using witch spells.
Dave:
[53:08] Uh, hex in the city?
Tara:
[53:10] That is good for three points.
Sarah:
[53:12] Oh, wow. That's very good.
Tara:
[53:14] Sarah?
Sarah:
[53:15] Yes.
Tara:
[53:16] People in the Windy City might seek medical help more readily if they weren't plagued by a persistent feeling of vague unease.
Sarah:
[53:25] Hmm. People in the Windy City. Uh, vague unease. Eerie? I don't know. Eerie?
Tara:
[53:37] Nope. This show premiered on NBC in 2015.
Sarah:
[53:44] Okay. Oh, right. Vague unease. I can't get it to go. Chicago Anomed. I don't know. I don't know.
Tara:
[53:59] Well, you've got the right show. It stars Esipath and Merkerson. Do you want to guess again?
Sarah:
[54:04] Oh, I get another guess? Great. Um, no, my brain is emptied of words. Chicago Med.
Tara:
[54:11] The answer I was looking for is Chicago Dread.
Sarah:
[54:14] Oh, Dread.
Tara:
[54:16] From Chicago Med. Dave.
Dave:
[54:19] Yes.
Tara:
[54:20] Julio doesn't have enough problems still living at home with his mother and counseling ex-cons. Now he also has to put up with the evil spirit of his own ex-con cousin?
Dave:
[54:31] Read that again.
Tara:
[54:33] Julio doesn't have enough problems still living at home with his mother and counseling ex-cons. Now he also has to put up with this evil spirit of his ex-con cousin.
Dave:
[54:42] I don't even know what the show is, so I guess give me the next thing.
Tara:
[54:44] Next clue. It premiered on Hulu in 2022.
Dave:
[54:50] Oh, um, is this that show we watched half of and then gave up on?
Tara:
[54:55] No, we watched it all. We've watched it all twice, in fact.
Dave:
[54:58] I guess there's one more clue?
Tara:
[55:00] Yep. Your star is Frankie Quinones.
Dave:
[55:03] Oh, okay. All right. Read me the clue again. I got the show.
Tara:
[55:07] Julio doesn't have enough problems still living at home with his mother and counseling ex-cons. Now he also has to put up with the evil spirit of his ex-con cousin.
Dave:
[55:16] Evil spirit?
Tara:
[55:17] Well, that's the spooky part.
Dave:
[55:19] Yes. That's not what I would have thought the word would change into. Spirit-based. The only thing I think of is ghoul. This ghoul?
Tara:
[55:28] This ghoul is correct for one point.
Dave:
[55:30] Okay. Sorry, I'm having a little trouble with this game because words in the clue supposed to get me to ghoul?
Tara:
[55:36] Yes, that's what an evil spirit is. It's a ghoul. This is straight off of a vocabulary list.
Dave:
[55:42] All right. I thought a ghoul was like a monster. Okay.
Tara:
[55:45] Sarah?
Sarah:
[55:46] Yes?
Tara:
[55:47] This folksy defense attorney does win a lot of his cases, but some clients are put off when he unfolds his leathery wings and flies off screeching.
Sarah:
[55:59] This is terrible. You should be ashamed of yourself. Batlock?
Tara:
[56:02] Batlock is good for three points.
Sarah:
[56:03] I love it. I want to watch it.
Tara:
[56:06] Dave.
Dave:
[56:06] Yeah.
Tara:
[56:07] Kenny Powers got pretty far as a baseball player considering he's covered in hair and tends to imprison French girls in his castle.
Dave:
[56:17] Kenny Powers. Yeah, sorry. This French thing is throwing me.
Sarah:
[56:21] I feel like I know the show, and then I can't.
Dave:
[56:24] I know the show. I think. I think Kenny Powers is eastbound and down. Eastbound and down.
Sarah:
[56:32] That's as far as I can get, though.
Dave:
[56:34] He's covered in hair, so he's like a werewolf or something. But the imprisoned French girls in his castle seems to be a reference that's going over my head. So I guess I'll take the hint, but I know what this is.
Tara:
[56:44] You do. It is a show that premiered on HBO in 2009 that stars Danny McBride. So for one point, can you get there?
Dave:
[56:52] Well, first of all, I take exception that you gave me two hints I didn't ask for. What if I suddenly came to the realization after the first hint?
Tara:
[56:58] Because you've already gotten the show.
Dave:
[57:00] Yeah, I know, but you gave me the second hint.
Tara:
[57:02] Okay, sorry. Withdraw.
Sarah:
[57:04] You can stall now or later. It doesn't matter.
Dave:
[57:07] I don't know this at all. I have no idea what this is.
Tara:
[57:10] Beast bound and down. That's what happens in Beauty and the Beast.
Sarah:
[57:15] Oh, the castle. Got it.
Tara:
[57:18] Sarah.
Sarah:
[57:19] We're terrible. I'm sorry, Tara.
Tara:
[57:21] Sarah.
Dave:
[57:22] See, it was the plur of girls that threw me. If it was just one girl, totally would have got that one.
Tara:
[57:27] Okay, sorry.
Sarah:
[57:28] I would not have. Moving on.
Tara:
[57:30] Sarah, the host of this travel show makes comedy wherever he goes, often just by cracking people up with his rattling skeleton.
Sarah:
[57:40] His rattling skeleton. The host of this travel show makes comedy wherever he goes. I do not know which travel show this is. May I have the first hint, please?
Tara:
[57:51] Yes, this show premiered on HBO Max in 2024. And I'll give you the bonus hint that it was a lead topic on our podcast.
Sarah:
[57:58] Yeah, no, I thought it was that one. I just can't remember the actual name of it. It's like Bonin O'Brien Travels the World or whatever it was called. Could I have a last hint, please?
Tara:
[58:10] Sure, since the person's name is in the title, I can only tell you the premiere featured a Norwegian salmon farmer named Kai. So you're on the right track.
Sarah:
[58:19] I just don't, I just don't remember the rest of it. I mean, it's like Bone and Bones and O'Brien or something like that. I just can't remember the rest of the name. What is it please?
Tara:
[58:29] It is Bone and O'Brien must go.
Sarah:
[58:33] Must go. Yeah, I would never have gotten there. So moving on.
Tara:
[58:38] David.
Dave:
[58:39] Yes, ma'am.
Tara:
[58:40] Catholic students in Belfast shouldn't cause people who encounter them to feel so fearful, but they do.
Dave:
[58:50] Catholic students in Belfast shouldn't cause people who encounter them to feel so fearful, but they do.
Sarah:
[58:58] Don't overthink it.
Dave:
[59:00] Those the Belfastists. Sorry, what was the determination on repeat things? Halloween stuff can repeat, but no shows repeat? Or is everything...
Tara:
[59:09] No spooky term.
Dave:
[59:11] No spooky term repeats. All right. Well, I guess I'll just say scary girls.
Tara:
[59:19] Yay. Good for three points. Okay. Don't overthink it. Sarah was right.
Dave:
[59:23] All right. Is dairy part of Belfast proper?
Tara:
[59:26] I think so. All right, Sarah.
Sarah:
[59:29] Yeah.
Tara:
[59:30] We'll have this and then we'll do a score break. There's only one way to summon the mythical being who lives in a lamp in my home, and it's by letting out a loud, coarse cry.
Sarah:
[59:41] A loud, coarse cry.
Tara:
[59:45] I'm going to say you don't overthink it either.
Sarah:
[59:47] The mythical being who lives in a lamp in my home. Lives in a lamp in my home. I'm going to need, it's not yell at in, so I am going to need a hint, please.
Tara:
[1:00:00] The show premiered on NBC in 1965.
Sarah:
[1:00:10] I, well, it could be two things. It could be I scream of Jeannie.
Tara:
[1:00:15] That's good for two points. I'm going to take it.
Sarah:
[1:00:17] I'll take it.
Tara:
[1:00:18] Two points. Good for two points.
Dave:
[1:00:21] All right. I just want to explain why I was hesitant, which was a very early one. I didn't think Derry was nowhere near Belfast.
Tara:
[1:00:28] Okay. Sorry.
Dave:
[1:00:29] Okay.
Tara:
[1:00:30] Still got three points.
Dave:
[1:00:31] I did still get three points. Just saying.
Tara:
[1:00:32] Let's do a score break.
Sarah:
[1:00:35] Yes, let's. Somehow, either of us has points as follows. I have five. Dave Cole has seven.
Tara:
[1:00:42] Okay.
Dave:
[1:00:43] Hooray.
Tara:
[1:00:43] Let's do the back half of this and move on with our lives. Dave, maybe the reason this medical professional has such an unbreakable addiction to pills is that someone put an evil spell on her.
Dave:
[1:00:58] Curse Jackie.
Tara:
[1:00:59] That's good for three points.
Sarah:
[1:01:00] Good job.
Tara:
[1:01:02] Sarah.
Sarah:
[1:01:03] Yeah.
Tara:
[1:01:03] The gifted students in this special program don't mix much with the other kids at their public high school, largely because they are no longer alive.
Sarah:
[1:01:14] Actually, because they are no longer alive. Let's hope, since I can guess at any level, that it's dead of the class.
Tara:
[1:01:21] It is dead of the class for three points.
Sarah:
[1:01:23] Here we go. Now we're cooking.
Tara:
[1:01:25] Dave.
Sarah:
[1:01:26] At home.
Tara:
[1:01:27] Desperate singles who've tried everything else meet at the altar and immediately end up six feet under.
Dave:
[1:01:35] All right. That's married at first sight. Immediately end up six feet under, so they die. Buried at first sight?
Tara:
[1:01:43] Good for three points.
Dave:
[1:01:44] All right, I was trying to do cider first, and I couldn't make it work. I went to the start, where everything begins.
Tara:
[1:01:49] Sarah.
Sarah:
[1:01:50] Yeah.
Tara:
[1:01:51] When a Texan man isn't selling propane and propane accessories, he's murdering his fellow Arlen residents.
Sarah:
[1:01:59] King of the Kill?
Tara:
[1:02:00] King of the Kill is good for three points. This is the one I felt the worst about, and I feel bad about it now, too, but here we go anyway. The adventures of these veteran brown coats are fraught with extreme danger, nearly hopeless, you might even say.
Dave:
[1:02:17] The adventures of these veteran browncoats are fraught with extreme danger, nearly hopeless, you might say. All right, so that's Firefly, I think. Browncoats are from Firefly. They got two things that fit here, I think.
Tara:
[1:02:32] Uh-huh.
Dave:
[1:02:33] Nearly hopeless. Okay, so the nearly hopeless thing I can say, this is Direfly.
Tara:
[1:02:37] Correct for three points.
Dave:
[1:02:38] Okay, I was thinking fire die.
Tara:
[1:02:41] Oh, well.
Dave:
[1:02:42] But hopeless got me there.
Tara:
[1:02:44] Okay, Sarah.
Sarah:
[1:02:45] Yeah.
Tara:
[1:02:46] Forced out of retirement by the loss of her life savings, an elegant Chicago lawyer handles only the very scariest cases.
Sarah:
[1:02:58] I hope it's the good fright.
Tara:
[1:03:00] It is.
Sarah:
[1:03:01] Yay.
Tara:
[1:03:02] We each have one more question left. Let's get the scores.
Sarah:
[1:03:06] It remains very close, but slightly less bleak in terms of achievement. I now have 14. David T. Cole has 16.
Tara:
[1:03:15] Oh, shit. Well, here we go.
Sarah:
[1:03:17] What will happen?
Tara:
[1:03:17] Let's wrap it up.
Dave:
[1:03:19] Okay.
Tara:
[1:03:19] Dave.
Dave:
[1:03:20] Yep.
Tara:
[1:03:20] A trio of presenters reports on and test drives cars, which turns out to be the thing that scares them the most.
Dave:
[1:03:29] Top Fear.
Tara:
[1:03:30] Top Fear is good for three points.
Sarah:
[1:03:32] Yep.
Tara:
[1:03:33] Sarah D. Bunting. An aspiring filmmaker is best known for his blood-curdling scream.
Sarah:
[1:03:41] An aspiring Dawson's Shriek?
Tara:
[1:03:46] It is Dawson's Shriek for three points.
Dave:
[1:03:48] That's pretty good.
Sarah:
[1:03:49] I'm so happy for all of us.
Tara:
[1:03:51] That's it. I do have a tiebreaker, but I will spare you both.
Dave:
[1:03:54] All right, let's do it.
Tara:
[1:03:55] Okay, fine. Yell it out. Well, let's get the final scores first.
Sarah:
[1:04:00] The final scores are, I had 17, not the Sprite Eagle, or the Dead Eagle, and Dave had 19. Dave is the picture.
Tara:
[1:04:07] Good job, Dave.
Dave:
[1:04:07] No, no, no, no, nice scream. Nice scream.
Tara:
[1:04:10] All right, here's the tiebreaker. In this procedural spinoff, New England cops investigate criminal ghosts.
Sarah:
[1:04:18] Boston Boo.
Tara:
[1:04:19] Boston Boo is correct.
Dave:
[1:04:21] That's where we go. All right.
Tara:
[1:04:28] Dave.
Dave:
[1:04:29] All right, guys, that is it for another episode of Extra Extra Hot Gray. We discovered that Halloween war is hell, if you actually want to eat something, before answering your burning ass EHG questions like, what's Smurf smell like and what best death trap? Julie's case for what turned out to be the tiny social impact known act was not accepted. We celebrated those who were quite the best and worst of the week and wrapped it all up with Tara's surprise spooky Halloween game time. Next up, more spookiness with It. Welcome to Derry, which is nowhere near Belfast.
Tara:
[1:05:07] As we learned today.
Dave:
[1:05:09] Remember. We're listening. I am David T. Cole, and on behalf of Tara Ariana.
Tara:
[1:05:18] I'm scared of fact checking.
Dave:
[1:05:20] And Sarah D. Bunting.
Sarah:
[1:05:22] It's like a dream in your mouth.
Dave:
[1:05:24] Thanks for listening, everyone. and we'll see you next time right here on Extra, Extra, Hawker.
Tara:
[1:05:39] I'm not i'm thinking i need you to not talk so i can think sorry that came out really rude,
Tara:
[1:05:51] this.