'Plur1bus' Is All Of Us, 'Welcome to Derry' Is Good Enough To Scare, 'The Lowdown' Reveals Its Secrets!

Hey, welcome to Taking It Down.

We're going to get started soon.

This is the most controversial podcast you'll hear today.

Here it goes.

This is Taking it down, the streaming and TV podcast produced by the Alabama website and podcast network the Alabama Take.

Each Tuesday we tell you the worth of a show in the spoil in the non spoiler section which begins each episode.

Then we break down some of the series in the spoiler section after the breakdown.

This week, three shows, though not all make it to spoiler section.

We've got the new show on Apple TV Plus.

I think it's just Apple TV now.

Oh, did they drop the plus?

They really should have.

It doesn't make any sense.

Apple TV's new Vince Gilligan series, Pluribus, the continuing horror Fair on hbo.

Welcome to Derry.

And finally, we'll put a cap on our analysis for the Lowdown starring Ethan Hawke on FX and Hulu.

And thank goodness I'm not alone because this guy has ideas beyond my imagination.

So let's welcome in co host Donovan Reinwald.

I love her.

Take projection.

There he is.

Great.

Great to be here, Blaine.

Once again we got a plethora of tv, but we've only selected three to discuss this week.

Though with the lowdown ending, we got room next week.

I only got so much time in my life.

You gotta.

And there's a low down shaped hole in my heart right now.

There you go.

I think Player Abyss is gonna fit in there pretty nicely.

A show that piqued my interest over on Netflix entitled Death by Lightning.

Based on the.

Have you heard of this?

Is this the James Garfield one?

Yeah, based on the assassination of James Garfield.

I actually read like it's four episodes and a review I read is like, oh, this is actually pretty good.

So I'm kind of intrigued.

Garfield oft overlooked assassination because of Lincoln's 20 years earlier.

All I really know about James Garfield.

The President is.

Loved lasagna, Hated Mondays.

No, that's Garfield.

The Cat isn't James Garfield's first name.

Several reasons.

This one could work.

It looks good.

I've seen the trailer.

Michael Shannon's a great actor.

I love Michael Shannon.

Did you ever see him in the Little Drummer Girl?

The limited series based on the John Lecrae novel?

No.

Very good.

I'd suggest it if you like Michael Shannon.

I do.

It was a couple years old, probably six or seven years ago now.

But very, very good.

Very distinct actor too.

It's made by the creators of Game of Thrones, I think.

Is it?

Is it?

They have a hand Sorry, I got a Google.

I gotta Google this.

I think they have a hand on it.

That could bode well.

I like a period piece that paints a picture of history.

And lastly, it's four episodes long like you mentioned, so it feels about right for a historical drama.

I have become increasingly fond of things that know their length.

Me too.

That don't overstay their welcome.

Adolescents from earlier this year being a notable example.

This year.

Yeah.

I don't see anything about these Game of Thrones folks, but you know, they, they get around.

Maybe not then.

Curious.

I'm very curious about.

About this because it's.

It's been getting pretty good reviews.

Yeah.

Yes.

And on top of that, isn't it about James Garfield got his time in the sun.

I mean, you, you know everything about the others.

I can only think.

Yeah.

Well, let's see.

Lincoln, of course.

Garfield.

Can't remember.

Wasn't.

It was.

It was Garfield the anarchist.

He was killed by the anarchist.

McKinley was killed and then Teddy Roosevelt became president.

And then obviously jfk.

Huh.

Those are all the ones, man.

We had a lot of presidents get assassinated.

Trump.

Trump was shot on the campaign trail.

If, If I.

Well, I mean someone shot Ronald Reagan.

But Trump was shot on the camera.

If I remember the.

About Garfield though, I think he linked like he got shot and he lingered.

Oh.

Like he, he didn't die for like a month or something like that.

Maybe I'm mixing that up, but I think.

I think that was him.

So.

We'll see.

We'll see.

It's got a good cast.

Also airing this week on Peacock is All Her Fault, which sounded like it had potential.

It's.

It has Sarah Snook as a mom who goes to pick up her child from a play date.

But the mom isn't the mother she left her son with and she hasn't heard of her son.

Some mystery thriller.

Yeah, I've read.

I've read short stories by Philip K. Dick.

No, this one's getting high marks.

Could be worth is.

Okay.

Could be.

And this is all not to say that Frankenstein is streaming now on Netflix after being in the theater.

Very excited for this.

Would.

Would rather have seen it.

You know, these limited Netflix theatrical releases.

I. I'm technically within driving distance because I could have gone to New York or Boston, but that's.

It's too much.

But I, I mean, I love.

Who doesn't love Oscar Isaac, right?

Like, we've, we've, we've, we've.

They're going with the full gothic ruin of, of, of the the monster, the creature, the sets are most, you know, he he Guillo del Toro somehow like makes these fantastic looking movies for like pennies.

Think the sets look fantastic.

You know, it's.

I'm.

I'm pumped.

I think if, if you are the kind of person who is gonna like this, you already know who you are.

Yeah.

I don't think this is gonna change anyone's mind.

That's just a.

That's just a thought.

Go.

Go watch Pan's Labyrinth instead.

As for things we have seen, the much ballyhooed Pluribus debuted over the weekend.

That's Vince Gilligan and company's first venture back to TV since Breaking Bad and Better.

And it stars Rhea Seehorn and she's from Better Call Saul.

She's a disgruntled speculative romantic fantasy fiction author who finds that some weirdness is spreading the evening she and her best friend and manager are taking a break from her book tour.

It's.

It's a show that's really heavy on premise and Breaking Bad or Creating Excuse Me and Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul.

Die Hards likely want to remember that Vince Gilligan got his start.

Rightly so.

On the X Files.

Yeah.

And that's what this feels like.

A lot.

I've watched both of the debut episodes which Apple TV put out this weekend and they'll now go weekly.

But the first one is titled we is Us.

Man.

It was engrossing from start to finish.

I couldn't put it down.

I'm so glad that I didn't wait to watch it.

Yeah, I. I watched it Friday night.

I'm intrigued and invested.

It has a lot of momentum, especially after the first episode.

It was very suspenseful.

And I'm a sucker for post apocalyptic story usually if they're well done.

And Racer Sear deserves a starring role after the master class she puts on after Better Gol Saw.

And I'll boldly add here that Better Call slaw Saul was the better of the.

Of the two.

Not an uncontroversial opinion.

No, here's my opinion.

Sorry, not a.

Not a completely controversial opinion was what I meant to say, because I think people agree with you.

Now I will say I think better.

This is just one man's opinion.

I think you're probably right, Blaine, but I think that Better Call Saul had to build on breaking like Breaking Bad hadn't happened.

It probably still would have been a really good show, but we had the whole.

I think they both work really well together.

Yeah, but I'll agree with you Better Call Saul is in some ways more of a tragedy than Breaking Bad is.

Yeah, it is.

I went into Pluribus blind.

It's the best way to encounter it.

I think I knew nothing, like, nothing about it other than it starred racy horn and was made by Vince Gilliken.

That was it.

It's tense.

You really don't know what's going to happen next.

There are so many underlying themes here that the first episode, it doesn't play too much with those.

It just thrusts you into the world.

And I was here for it.

But now the second episode becomes a.

Play.

Off of a few characters and it feels a little bit more Hitchcockian.

Invasion of the Body Snatchers.

Something that maybe make more sense to Vince Gilligan himself is that it really plays out like a great episode of one of those first three seasons of the Twilight Zone.

And what most will find is that this is a TV show about anything.

That's.

It's not.

It's not.

Because it's a TV show about nothing.

Do you mean that in the sense that, like, it is very easy to ma.

I think shows that do this are often brilliant, but, like, it's really easy to kind of map various things on there and you can kind of interpret it and take it different.

Right.

I think that's hard to do very well, but when it's done very well, it's great.

Yeah, that's what it's doing.

And you can map on dozens of things here and not be wrong.

I had been looking at some reviews and my.

I might be confused at this, but my understanding is that reviewers initially were asked not to say anything about the premise.

And then I think I looked at the Guardians review and it had the premise and I kind of wish I hadn't.

Yeah, don't look at the premise.

But I'm.

I'm.

I'm intrigued, obviously.

Two of the best shows of the past century.

25 years, you know, the new century, and already under Vince Old Vince's belt.

We will bring it up more next week.

So that's the.

We won't talk about it in spoilers at all.

So everybody get caught up.

You'll have three by then.

It's going weekly Friday night on the spoiler side of things.

Soon we'll continue our talk on the prequel of the recent two Stephen King films.

It.

And the prequel is welcome to Derry.

Here's my non spoiler thought on this one and it helped me parse through this.

Okay.

I'm so intrigued by this show.

I loved watching that.

I wanted Another one as soon as I finished episode two.

Yeah, I wanted to see some more.

Too, but I can't tell you if it's worth a shit.

I actually also kind of feel that way where it's like the first two ones.

And even if it's not good in the sense that it's not elevated or doesn't transcend its premise, it is like well made TV in the sense that it is capably made.

The actors are good.

The actors, they got to be.

The kids I actually think are good.

Those kids can usually be really annoying.

It can like the tone can swing a little bit.

The gross out scenes I think are really gruesome.

But I get the feeling that in like three episodes I could be like.

And all of the underlying issues that would rear their ugly head were already there and the whole thing fell apart.

So far on two episodes I'm like, I'm willing to give it a chance, but I don't like, is it, is it, Is it good?

Like it's.

I guess the real question is like, is it good beyond the.

Just like, I want to be entertained for 45 minutes.

To me, it's great in the way a Texas hold' em game is great.

Like, what card's coming next.

Yeah.

And I don't know yet.

Obviously one of the underlying ideas is fear.

Right.

And I think that's really rich.

And I think there are a lot of places especially having.

But I think there's something rich for the fear that we have as children of different things.

Because being a child is terrifying.

And then your imagination adds to it enough.

Yeah.

And these are older children.

Right.

They're young, by and large, young high schoolers.

But I think that is a scary time.

So I think there's something there.

It is a scary time.

And I think that they're using that time frame intelligently of adolescence.

And I think if they continue to do that, it will be great.

You know, I'd kind of forgotten that the, the it universe kind of was about fear.

Yeah.

You know, I really.

I'd only watched the Tim Curry version in the 90s with, with ABC and I didn't recall that fear being that big.

I thought it was just a monster show, but.

Gotcha.

No, he appears to you as some, you know, and obviously people hate like, people hate clowns.

Right.

This is from me not having read the novel, but.

Right.

But it is sort of almost like a.

Almost Lovecraftian in the sense that it's like, you know, where it's like, it's like an alien Entity, whether it's from another planet or I think there's a hint that maybe it's from like another dimension or whatever.

But.

Yeah, but it needs to feed on.

On fear.

On you.

On.

And of course, children are very rich for fear.

Right.

So sometimes it'll appear.

That's why it's appearing as different things that are scary, especially.

And usually you get small kids because, you know, they.

Oh, they scare easy.

You can jump.

Scare them easily.

But here it's.

It might mine the depths of that adolescence fear you have of.

Oh, my God, Susie doesn't like me.

Yes.

Yeah.

And I like that.

I like that, too.

But I think that it is falling more on, like, the.

The dread side of fear than the shock side of fear.

And I think.

I think that dread for me is more effective.

Always has both of those.

Well, and maybe that's why I like it.

I think.

I think it.

And, you know, it's fun to see.

Honestly, part of what I'm liking is it's fun to see old friends.

Like, we got Chris Chalk back.

You know, the creature feature elements are good enough for me.

There's something truly disgusting.

I think it's truly disgusting in the second episode that revolts me a little bit, even as I think about it.

And I liked the kind of bait and switch that it played with me, where it kind of set up in the first episode.

One gang of characters only to.

To.

Maybe that's not who you were going to follow through the whole series.

We don't.

We don't really know yet.

Yeah, that was sort of.

Real fans would have gotten that bait and switch, and even I got it.

But not this guy.

It worked for me.

To switch gears a little.

We're also talking about the Sterling Harjo created, I suppose, somewhat detective series in its own quirky way.

It's an investigative series in the sense that the detectives were.

The detective is.

He's bad reporter, he's a bad dad.

He's lived in Tulsa, Oklahoma, and he looks like he had Ethan Hawke.

I had nothing but enjoyment for this series.

I thought it had a great sense of place and funny, if not fascinating characters, but I just didn't think they showed them enough.

Hmm.

Yeah, I think.

I think.

I think based on what we've discussed earlier, I had the feeling that I would come up.

Slight feeling.

Feeling a little higher on this show.

Yeah.

Than maybe you did through its run.

I couldn't ever see if I.

If it wanted to be more than a whodunit, you know, and it's pulling up what?

The penultimate episode where the show put on a pair of glasses to let you see everything a lot more clearly.

I saw, I think, what it was doing, which I'll get into, into spoilers.

And I'll say almost the flip side of that from you, Blaine, is that I felt like what it was doing was subtle enough that when we got into the penultimate episode and some of the themes have risen to the surface, it's like, oh, yeah, okay.

Like that.

That was there the whole time.

Like, if you go and think about it.

So I. I thought almost like the same.

Almost the same.

The.

The seeing the same thing you did, but maybe.

Maybe interpreting it in a slightly different fashion.

Yeah, exactly.

Do you think it should have done more earlier?

Investigated earlier on how natives of Oklahoma were stripped of their land, not to no black people of Tulsa being bombed by their government.

Or would that have been.

But that would have been given the medicine without the sugar, I think.

I think that would have been showing its hand too much.

Honestly, Americans, I think we should know that without having me told by a TV show.

Although I'm not sure if this is what is common knowledge anymore.

And I think that by centering the characters and the communities that were affected by those things as integral aspects of the show.

And then, of course, having actual Neo Nazis as your villains, kind of.

You kind of tip your hand a little there.

Right.

So the show never overdid it with strings of its plot for you?

No, I don't think.

I mean, I think it was a little.

I think by its very nature, the show was a little shaggy and I. I was okay with that.

I think some people perhaps would have wanted something a little leaner and meaner.

I enjoyed it.

I thought of it as, you know, it's kind of a.

Kind of a ride, you know, like the destination, yes, is important, but the.

You know, the.

The amusement is often in how you get there.

Was that a ride in a white van?

That van should have exploded by the end of that.

Of this series.

Let's take a break on the.

You'll hear a bit of news from the Alabama take and on the other side, we'll talk.

Spoilers only on welcome to Dairy and the Lowdowns finale.

If you enjoy our podcast and our other podcast under the Alabama Take umbrella, and we hope you do, maybe you'll be inclined to make a small donation.

If you wish, go to the alabama.com, click on donate and click on Buy me a coffee to make a small donation to our website.

It helps with hosting, podcast hosting website Hosting it keeps the good things coming.

Or if you'd like, click on the show notes, find the donation link there, and make a donation as big or as small as you wish.

Thanks so much and thanks for listening.

Let us know how you listen.

Let us know what we should talk about next.

It's good to know who you are.

See you soon.

Okay, we'll kick off spoiler section back with the HBO horror drama welcome to Derry, where, you know, it's tough to be a kid.

It's tough to be a kid.

It's tough to be a minority.

It's tough to be alive during the Cold War.

This, in the previous episode, reminded me a lot of A Nightmare on Elm street in its early run when it was morning camp.

Yeah, like.

Like the original.

Yeah, like the original nightmare and the first one.

And two.

Yeah, yeah, that's a good.

That's actually good.

Blaine.

I didn't think of that.

It did.

See, I see it, though.

I see it.

We're in spoilers.

Ronnie, our black girl who works at the theater, she only has the one parent left, and they're trying to pin her dad on the murders that happened in the theater in the episode one that.

Where we thought that would be the gang of kids that would be haunted by Pennywise, but instead some of the.

Most of them are killed or at least elsewhere.

Well, yeah, yeah, you mentioned that last week.

I still don't know.

I'm not.

I don't know either, because the one kid was trapped in a.

In a film reel, sort of.

That's right.

Yeah.

He was holding a baby.

But I don't.

The other ones might very well may be dead.

They're certainly presumed dead.

And there was a lot of blood and some severed.

Some severed limbs.

So Ronnie played the film for them.

And then Lily is the survivor of the ones who are sitting amongst the theater seats.

Yes.

She's the only one to make it out.

Yeah.

And Lily has this friend Marge who wears glasses and, you know, she wants to kind of be concerned, but as most teenagers do, she's way more interested in trying to fit in with the other three girls and play Patty Cake.

Smart Marge does kind of suck, right?

There is a. I mean, I think there is.

At least we'll see what this character goes.

Because right now she is just sort of a shallow teen.

I.

Maybe we're supposed to be like, you know, like there is enough that she's.

She wants to bring Marge with her into the.

The Patty.

The Patty Cakes, into the popular girls.

I don't know.

It Looked so awkward that I just thought.

And awkward in a 50s way.

Not awkward in the way that the t. That the show was presenting.

And it was just awkward things.

50s, 50s and 60s teens did high school.

I guess it felt like a little bit of.

I mean, I think there is a little bit of.

Perhaps I am wrong about this, but there is a little bit of like we're juicing up, like your kind of idea.

Your idea of the 50s, you know, or.

Sorry, the 60s.

It's the early 60s, you know, you got, you got.

They got like the delinquent kids in high school and you got the, like.

It's a little, it's a little surreal, it's a little hyper emotional, which I'm okay with.

In a David lynch kind of fashion.

In a David lynch kind of way.

Yeah, exactly.

I would not have been surprised to see a guy in a black leather jacket with the sleeves rolled up.

Absolutely.

And one foot on the locker and his back against the locker smoking a cigarette and a teacher walking by telling him, putting it out.

You know, you put it out.

Not, not obviously not as good, especially in that first episode of Twin Peaks.

But yeah, I think it's coming like from that same well of like iconography, this kind, you know, that we kind of all have as a collect.

Yeah, this is trying to be a little bit more grounded in reality, you know, I'll say.

I, I love Will's character.

This is Leroy's son.

He's the Air Force pilot's son who's.

He's just arrived in Derry and he's just thrust into it.

I can't imagine being a new kid thrust into a new school.

That never happened to me.

Luckily, when it did happen to me, I was going to colleges and, and I hated it then.

And I felt so paranoid that I shit myself every time.

You did new schools often, didn't you?

I did move.

My dad was in the military.

So, you know, new schools, new friends.

When you grow, when like you're in the military and your friends are all in the military, or, sorry, they weren't in the military.

But my friends growing up a lot, until I was about 10 or 11, their dads and moms were all in the military.

So you just kind of knew in the back of your head that, like, this friendship has about a two year expiration date on it because someone moved.

Yeah, you kind of knew.

You knew.

Everyone knew you were gonna move.

Like sometimes I would.

If I had, like a particularly good friend, I'd be like, well, I'm sad to Leave them behind or whatever.

But, you know, you're.

I was.

So when you're a kid, it just seems natural.

Right.

Did you ever get to the age where you had a crush and you had to leave her?

Probably a little young for that.

Okay.

But yeah, like, I had like, friends that I was like.

Like I considered to be like as like an 8 or 9 year old would.

But, like, we're good friends for that eight or nine year old.

You know, this is way off tangent.

I had crushes really young.

I think a lot of people do.

Well, yeah, I might be speaking to the majority of Americans when I say, yeah, second grade.

Blaine had crushes, like, big ones.

Like.

Like heartbreaking ones.

I would go home and cry.

That is heartbreaking.

You're seven.

What are you gonna do?

Well, I still go home and cry.

So not much has changed.

Nothing's changed.

Don't worry about me.

I've made it this far.

This is Will Hanlon.

He is the Air Force pilot's son.

Now, the interesting thing about Leroy.

Who is the Air Force pilot.

Help me out, Donovan.

I hope I got this straight.

He can't feel fear.

He cannot.

He has it.

He has strange.

He has very specific brain damage to his amygdala, to his.

What do you call it?

It's the.

It wasn't his frontal cortex, was it?

No, it's part of the brain.

I thought the frontal cortex is where you held your aggressive.

Excuse me?

Not aggression, but your risk taking, according.

According to Merriam Webster or hey, even better, Wikipedia.

This is inside.

It's.

It's inside your.

Your.

Your brain.

And this is the part that is responsible for emotional processing, such as move by society.

Yeah, we didn't have this in previous iterations of it, have we?

I don't think so.

I mean, I'm not an expert, and.

You know, I grew up with a guy who couldn't smell.

Really?

Yeah.

He would walk up to you, you know, a day or two after he hasn't showered, and he'd say, can I dust ink?

And we would say, yeah, go shower.

Just shower Every day to be.

Be certain.

Well, he was lazy too, so.

Oh, gotcha.

Yeah, he couldn't smell.

Legit thing.

So he's obviously the ma.

I think he's a major.

The major is uniquely suited for a task involving something that makes you so afraid you die because he can't be afraid.

And that brings in the Chris Chalk character, who is.

Has a form of psychic ability.

He's got the shining.

That's what they call it in the, in the Stephen King universe.

And what is that exactly?

Just paranormal sensitivity?

I don't know.

It seemed like extra sensory perception in the, in the Shining.

So they're digging in this trench there in Derry or outside of Derry, and they need the guy without fear.

That's Leroy.

They need Chris Chalk's character, I forget his name, to sense where these places are.

Seems like it.

And something about those things can win the Cold War for them.

Well, we don't, you know, it seems, it seems, yes, that this is a classic and we've gotten this in other Stephen King stuff, even like, you know, but it is kind of a classic one, right?

Like the, the, the horrible paranormal, extraterrestrial, extra dimensional evil is going to get weaponized by the, you know, and this is obviously in the context of.

Pretty explicitly brought up.

Right.

The, the.

The Cuban Missile crisis is going to happen in a, what, a year?

Year and a half.

I mean, half a year.

A year.

So we're gonna have some cocktail assassination.

Well, it is a Stephen King adaptation.

They might.

Well, they fast forward to Dylan writing, pinning a song, Murder Most Foul.

I think that that is going to be in the DVD special features.

Oh, okay.

Okay.

I'm just checking.

No, I mean, we're totally killing.

I totally left Will behind.

You know, he's thrust into the school and just snapped.

The teacher snaps on his ass.

I'm like, he just walked in.

Give the kid a break.

Yeah, he's having a tough time and of course his kids can smell it, right?

He's a nerd.

He's a nerd.

He's a.

We have to say it.

I'm sorry.

He's black in the early 60s in a majority white.

In a majority white school town.

The busing, you know, thing is happening and the kid behind him kicks his chair out from under him.

That embarrasses him.

He falls.

I really like this Will Hanlon character.

They set him up nicely to be liked.

Yes, they do.

And I'll say this though, one thing that they didn't do well is they're trying to play off the realism of America of that time, which is great.

I want them to.

Yet you have the things like Will's mom going to the store and then turning around, looking outside and kids are brutally beating another kid and no one's stopping them.

And she's like, no one's stopping this.

I mean, that just felt odd.

But it also felt like, I, I know it's supposed to be a part of the town, but like, like, how do you balance the realism of the 60s versus what?

You want this town to feel like you've got nothing on that.

I know.

I'm.

I'm thinking, yeah, she goes out there and.

And bust it up.

Yeah.

Which, I don't know, perhaps kind of thing truly does happen, but I think, you know, you.

You asked to kind of.

I have like a not good answer because I don't know how to articulate it well, but I. I feel like, like you do.

If you, if you, if you sacrifice the.

Like, it's fine that things are somewhat hyper real, but there is a level of, like, okay, if you sacrifice some level of realism, some level of, like, well, these are human beings living human lives, you lose the horror.

Right.

Because, like, nobody's scared about, like, what happens to a cartoon character.

Right.

Like, they're.

They're in a different universe.

You know, nobody's scared about what's going to happen to the Roadrunner.

He's going to be fine.

Yeah.

Leroy, being the dad, does mention in passing that they left Shreveport because his wife Charlotte was too involved with the civil rights movement down there.

And getting them in trouble seems like the suggestion.

Yeah, he's.

At least.

And that takes us to Ronnie, the other black character.

Her dad's being blamed for the murders, the kids, and they just flat out arrest him because they get Lily into the police room and they basically frame the question to where she had no way to answer it other than to say he could have done it, basically.

And she's afraid because she has spent some time in a mental institution that she will be returned if she says what really happens.

Yep.

It gives Ronnie the nightmare scene.

Is this the scene you want to talk about?

No, that one.

That one was gross, but the one with Lily's dad was grosser.

Okay, tell me.

So the nightmare scene with Lily.

Excuse me, with Rani, her dad is a single father.

Yes.

What I'm trying to say.

And she dreams of being good and effective, too.

I should say it's very effective because she dreams of being birthed and having killed her mom in childbirth.

And then as she looks within the.

The pregnancy of her mother, she sees Pennywise's eyes.

Yes, it's good.

And I think that's what.

What keeps me sticking around.

I think it's really hard to do horror series.

Yes.

Like, you can't scare me with the same thing tonight on the episode that you did last night on the episode.

Or if you do, it ends up being just kind of monster of the week where you're like, oh, all right.

Well, Scully and You know, Mulder, not that I don't like the X Files.

But, yeah, the X Files did it.

Fairly well, and they do, but, like, there are definitely episodes there where you're like, well, we know we're going to see a monster at this point because we have to.

Because it's the formula.

Especially with Vince Gilligan and Bryan Cranston being in an episode.

Yeah, no.

And I have nothing but affection for the X Files.

But especially as the run went on.

It made you feel something.

Even if it wasn't a great episode, it made you feel dread.

Yeah.

The best ones.

I think this show's not doing quite that, but it is.

It's.

It's.

It's scaring you a little, and it's grossing you out a little.

That takes us to the.

The next big set piece that you wanted to talk about.

Enjoyed it.

And I think that first off worked well enough that I'm never going to go to a grocery store ever again.

But I think, yeah, set this up a little.

I don't know if I am able to explain this properly, but I liked this because I feel like, well, Lily's.

In a grocery store.

Lily's in a grocery store.

She's got a shot, and it's a normal grocery store.

She's.

She's gotten.

Her looks exactly like a 50s grocer, 50s.

She's doing a little bit of shopping.

Yeah, shopping.

And I think what.

What works so well for me.

So she's.

She's kind of.

And she's going through pretty.

Pretty.

She has pretty normal interactions.

And then as she's going through the store looking for the things she needs, the shelves are sort of shifting.

Like it's.

It's become a. I guess a maze has a solution.

What doesn't have a solution?

A labyrinth.

A labyrinth.

Yeah.

But what's important to know is that her father.

She's also a single.

She is.

Her father has been.

Her.

Has been killed.

And.

And she has witnessed some of this in a horrific industrial accident.

That's right.

And it was an oddly choiced pickle jar.

Yeah.

He was in a pickle.

He was.

He was pickle canning.

Yeah, pickle canning.

And it's so odd.

I thought it was kind of.

It was kind of odd.

I thought that was a little kitschy, But.

But it worked for you.

Well, that part is fine.

Honestly.

I think that's a little kitschy, too.

Okay.

But for me with the piece is.

I think when you like a grocery store, like an American grocery store, that we have all encountered is already, like, kind of an unreal place.

It is.

There's a certain creepiness to it at late at night.

And it's like the way you now Joe Pera talks to you.

Did the absolute flip of this and does a great episode about the grocery store.

So this is the horror version of that.

Which is on HBO Max.

Which is on HBO Max.

And I.

And I mean, I think, like, when you really.

When you start to think about, like, the grocery store, the life that, like, the grocery store supports, which is most of what we often, you know, we know, like, it's.

It's like cans from all over the world, and you just walk down and you take things off the shelf.

It's meat from God.

You know, it's.

It's this huge.

It's like this huge industry.

Right.

Creating food is a huge industry.

Packaged and processed and made a little bit unreal for you to just take off the shelf.

And so that space already being kind of fearsome.

I loved that.

It kind of kicked it up into, like, it's.

It's creepy.

Yes.

You're tapping into something.

I worked in a grocery store for four or five years.

Small town, 90s, you know.

Yeah.

Free Internet.

So you had that vibe.

And you're right.

It has a.

That.

That we closed at 9, and that 8, 45, 15 minutes was like, if I turn this corner, am I gonna see.

Am I gonna see a broom hang.

Hanging here and look like a skeleton?

It's.

It's such a mundane space that you dropped most of the human.

With most of the people who have ever existed in human history into a grocery store.

They would be like, what the hell is this?

Like, how do you people live?

So this.

This thing got you because Lily's with her buggy, as we call in the South.

Forgive us.

Forgive us, listeners up north.

Her buggy.

What do you call it, Donna?

I call it shopping cart.

I've always called a shopping cart.

It's a goddamn buggy.

Well, my parents are not from the South.

Stop it, Donovan.

You're breaking hard.

What's the.

Seriously, what's it.

What.

What do.

Let's say Connecticut folks call it?

Jeez, do you know Heart.

Shopping cart.

A cart.

Yeah.

But there's.

There's certain part of America where it sounds funnier.

What is it?

Is it.

Over in Michigan, they call it something.

Oh, I can't remember.

They call it something.

Isn't there a.

A novel?

It started on Reddit called It Might be Dayton Aurbex Bad Man.

Okay.

And it's kind of A slow, creepy account of horror.

Horror account of late night grocery store stuff.

Yeah, I'd buy it.

I've never.

I don't know about that, but that.

Sounds a lot of people criticize it.

Of course.

It started on as a Reddit thread.

Oh, I see.

It's critic too.

Yeah.

Yeah.

But, yeah.

So we have Lily coming through, and then she finally gets trapped and encircled with all the pickle jars where her.

What looks to be a human head, it's.

You definitely can't tell.

It's her dad is trapped inside one of the jars.

Now, this is where I. I think.

I'm not going to pretend that they're doing anything.

Yeah, extremely elevated here.

This is just where it switches into the grotesque.

But it works for me because, like, you know, the Pennywise thing is like, what's the primal thing that you' afraid of?

Right.

For Lily, it's this inciting.

Obviously, losing her father.

What she witnessed the horror of it.

And then something that, like, is gonna make you feel like you're going insane.

Leaving out the.

The head in the jar would have made it more horrifying for you.

No, that worked for me.

Okay, good.

Because it's her.

So gross.

Like, the way that the.

The thing kind of rebuilds itself, constituent parts.

And then we have the.

You know, one of the.

I mean, a primal horror too, right?

Is like the corrupt parent, right?

Like.

Like he just.

Daddy just wants a kiss.

That's.

And I mean, I think it's pretty easy to understand like, in real life, where this.

Where this.

Where the fear comes from, right?

Like your father wants a kiss.

That's a normal thing.

But then there's like the.

The.

Like this is the bad version of that.

And obviously the.

This.

It's not invoked here, but I think we do have the fear in real life, right, of, like, wrong relationships.

Exactly.

Like wrong relations between and.

Which would.

Which would be abuse, of course, between.

Between parents.

And I.

And I think that this works very well for me paired with Ronnie's, because it is.

It is the bat.

Like, it's the.

It's the corrupted bad mother that comes back, that wants to bring you back inside her, that she hates you, she blames you for her death.

She wants to take you back inside.

Like, that's foundationally very.

Ronnie, she killed her.

Probably.

Yeah, that's what I mean.

She probably died in childbirth.

But, you know, like, the normal, quote, unquote, normal folks, like, the normal thing is like, I gave you life, right?

I'm as happy that.

That I gave you life.

That I made you that you were born in parentheses, even though I died.

Maybe.

But like, this kind of inverts that, right?

Where it's like, I hate that I gave you life because you killed me.

And so it's the.

The quote unquote normal.

Obviously, in real life, people have.

There's a zillion different ways to think about this, but the quote unquote normal is kind of tip tipped upside down here.

And then the grotesque certainly doesn't hurt.

Yeah.

Okay.

The final scene of welcome to Derry, second episode.

Which, by the way, it came out early.

It came in on Halloween.

It came out on Halloween.

We could have done this one last week.

Sorry, we didn't know.

I honestly didn't know.

And it would have been good Halloween.

Watching the final scene, I think it's.

The final scene has Chris Chalk's character, whose name I will learn this week.

It is.

Oh, yeah.

Dick Hallorann.

Cause he's a recurring character.

He's in the Shin.

He's.

He's in the Shining.

There you go.

As an old man.

Okay.

So Dick.

Dick is in a helicopter with.

Is Major Hanlon and the General.

General Shaw.

He's in the helicopter with General Shaw.

And they're going to try to use their skills.

The.

No fear from one of them.

And then Dick's ability to sense out.

Right there's where you should dig.

And we can get closer to our goal of this entity that could help save the day in the Cold War.

But yet it's surrounded on all sides by something.

We've got to find it.

And once we can dig deep enough and find it, we'll win the day.

Oh, everything will be great.

All right.

That's where this one leaves off.

I can't wait for episode three.

Like I said at the beginning, I cannot tell if this show is worth a shit.

I think it's because I haven't sensed its through line yet.

Yeah, gotcha.

Which it might give me one in the third or fourth episode and it might solidify.

Okay.

This was good horror and told an interesting story.

Yeah.

So we'll see.

As far.

Yeah.

Just from a.

Like a.

The pulp level of like.

I want to turn the page and find out what happened, but I wanted a little bit more.

You know, things can work on that level.

I don't know if this is going to transcend.

I suspect it may not.

It may be very good.

I suspect it is not going to be like.

Well, you know, like, this is good.

Like.

Like the.

Sorry.

Stephen King Kubrick's the Shining.

Like that transcends, you know, that, that kind of.

But it's unfair to hold everything to that standard.

Well, neither you nor I have seen the two IT movies that were.

I saw like the latter half of the part one, but like on cable, like Kate, like.

Like T. You know, like it was on cable TV or whatever.

YouTube.

Exactly.

So I'm.

I don't have a.

It seemed good for what it was.

You know, good reviews.

One has Bill Hader in it.

Yes.

They're one of the adult kids, right?

Yeah, I do want to watch them.

That first one got like really good reviews.

Yeah, I think they were a little weaker for the second one, but that's okay.

That's fine, you know.

Well, it's got Bill Hader in a second one, so that'll carry it.

All right, Bill Hater.

Let's.

Speaking of ill hater.

Not really at all.

Ethan Hogg.

Probably doing it much longer than Bill Hader.

Let's return to the lowdown from FX and Hulu, but this time with spoilers, especially the last two episodes.

I think I want to start with the lead, Lee Rayborn.

Lee Rayborn.

And that's the Ethan Hawk character.

He's the lead.

He's the protagonist.

Sterling Harjo, the creator and writer, made him the central figure.

But I believe that Harjo is messing with us as an audience only slightly here.

Nothing outlandish.

It's basically that Rey is not a good person.

And in a show about a lot of nosy, white, well meaning people, Rey is just one more nosy, white, well meaning person.

And where he's go, he's constantly going where he doesn't belong.

He.

He is a busy body.

A busy body.

He calls himself a.

He continually calls himself a truth story.

And many of the other characters raise that question.

Well, what does that mean?

I think Harjo did that on purpose to say, look, I'm doing something.

And the other.

Everybody can see right through it.

And so many people from historically marginalized communities tell him, leave it alone.

Leave it alone.

Yes.

No, you'll.

This is only in the last episode you will find him saying these two quotes.

These are direct quotes.

Last two episodes.

I was only trying to help.

Yes, there's one.

And the other one was I was trying to do something good.

We talked at the very beginning of the series a little bit about Gen X and I think that the episode with Peter Dinklage in it kind of crystal, which we need more Peter Dinklage in many things, kind of.

But it did kind of crystallize this.

And this is very, very kind of nebulous.

I don't have a good way for it.

But like that, like kind of self image that you have, like the.

Like I'm the last guy not to sell out.

Yeah.

You know what I mean?

And I like that.

And then that.

Remember that, that really, that really, Chris.

I think there's an aspect of that with him where he may genuinely be trying to help.

Sure.

But also he's trying to inhabit a character that he created of himself.

I mean, like a Persona.

Yes.

But we see some cracks in that.

Especially that one with Peter Dinklage.

That was very good to personalize that out.

I felt like I was the last person to buy an iPhone.

I stood my ground on that.

So stupidly.

His relationship with his daughter Francis may be the best.

Showing that he's just not a good guy.

I mean, he's lovable.

He's trying hard, but it's not working out very much.

I wouldn't say that he's necessarily a bad person.

He's not a bad person so much as is he maybe a selfish person.

He's incredibly selfish.

Yeah.

His daughter Frances, throughout the seven episodes.

I think it's seven or eight.

Their relationship borders on negligence.

And it's so sad.

It's flat out sad.

In fact, it would be tearful were it not for some poignant moments sprinkled throughout the writing.

Where she's presenting her own written word in a bookstore cafe is just so heartbreaking.

No 14 year old writes that well.

No, I cried.

No, I agree, Blaine.

It was very good.

But that was to hear that from her.

It was sad.

Luckily at the end, they.

They kind of come to a common ground.

That this is how it's going to be.

Ray, you know, jumping ahead.

But Ray.

Ray looks like he may have turned.

Turned and turned a page.

Perhaps he does.

Maybe even after hearing that.

I am of the theory that Sterling Harjo wanted to start this version of a detective show, but one that's super subverted.

You know, where Lee is kind of bad at it.

I mean, he's good at some things, but he's getting really bad at the person, the whole thing.

And a lot of what he touches turns into shit.

I mean, it's, it's.

He's.

He's like the bull in.

In the China Shop, right?

Yes.

You know, which I am too.

And it, and it's.

I mean, and it's like.

I think that that is good because it makes for compelling tv.

And it also surfaces a lot of themes Interesting themes.

But yeah, he's, he's a bolt.

Like to bring our discussion of task last week, you know, we kind of talked about like the good.

And sometimes like you need to like think like there are two goods but one requires you to think more of others.

And I think it's objectively good if like the bad people in this series do not succeed.

Like that is an objectively good goal.

Like if reparations are made, if the land is given back.

But also he doesn't for a second stop to think about what is good for the people affected by all these things.

He doesn't ever ask their opinion.

And many of their opinion is like, just leave it alone.

I have the note.

It's almost like Harjo is saying that the white anti hero.

He wants to comment on the white anti hero.

The white anti hero is actually just a loser.

He's not evil.

Like the Washburn's definitely not as evil as the white power church or even Frank.

He's just kind of a meddling little loser.

Sometimes he helps, sometimes he hinders.

It does feel like there's something going on there too with different levels of like, for, for.

For lack of a better word, like cluelessness.

Yeah, this dumbfoundedness in, in.

In the sense that like when we get to the end of this, this is skipping ahead a little folks.

But I figure you, when we get to the head of the show, it turns out that like Donald, one on one is really not that bad of a guy.

I, I thought McLaughlin, Colin gave the best performance of the battle.

He's so good because he went from menacing to very down to earth and kind of normal guy.

Yeah.

Who's just had this shit thrust upon him.

And not only that, it, it's again like hard to predict.

Like he's not actually that bad a guy.

Yeah, he might be.

He might be a little racist, but it's kind of out of dumbness.

I guess what I was gonna say was like hatred.

He was intentionally blind to what was going on.

In the same way that I think Lee can be, you know, in the sense that like, hey, I call Betty Jo and tell her where the will is and ends with a guy getting shot.

Like, did you never consider any of, you know, like, there's that sense of like.

And I almost wonder if there's like this commentary on like, you know, you do almost like this like white savior figure where it's like you do maybe this person genuinely does want to help.

But when they cast themselves at the center of things and don't consider anything else.

And.

And I feel like, too, this was something I was kind of thinking about maybe during the last episode.

Like, it.

It just feels like Lee doesn't have the requisite knowledge that a lot of the marginalized communities that he's perhaps speaking on behalf of and is the only voice for in this.

He just doesn't have the requisite background.

Understanding history.

I thought it was actually done really well for laughs.

I think that you summarized everything hard Joe wanted to present to us.

I think he did it really like, it was dramatic, but it was really funny, too.

When the killer Mike's character has been talking, he's kind of talking about the corruption and everything, and then Lee just starts parroting exactly what he said because he can't come up with his own things.

Exactly.

And I think that was.

I think that was brilliant.

I thought this.

I thought that this show was very, very, very good.

Especially because I think I kind of do, like, things where it's like, you know what?

If you just want to watch something under the umbrella of crime.

Yeah, go ahead, buddy.

Yeah, but there's going to be people who watch this show who thinks, oh, it's a.

It's a halfway decent tangled crime drama.

Okay.

And it is.

And it is.

And it is.

And then there'll be a kind of quirky crime drama, and then there'll be there.

I think a really good way to watch it is to think about what Harjo had in mind, which is.

Yeah, it is a quirky, tangled crime drama, but some of the quirky tangledness comes from the white savior.

People just step off every now and again.

And let us take care of this.

In the very good scene where Donald is celebrating the Oklahoma Sooners, who.

You know, these are the land rush people who, like, literally raced in.

Yeah.

The little kids and plant, you know, but historically, like, they literally raced in and staked claim to ground.

And he keeps saying, this is an empty land.

This is an empty land.

This is an empty land.

When in fact, it was.

You know, this is where the Trail of Tears ended in Oklahoma.

You know, it was.

The tribal nations were actually there, and I think there was kind of something there.

I don't really quite know how to connect this, but, like, for the white folks, it's like, those other people weren't necessarily there.

Yeah.

Because the white people were the important story.

Whereas, like, you know, in the narrative of the Sooners, like, the Native Americans, we're not anywhere.

They don't even matter, because the narrative is, we came in, we staked a claim.

We built this thing.

Yeah.

I don't want to try to defend any.

Any sooners of that era, but it might have just boiled down to something stupid like, well, you don't have paper saying you own it, signed by an official.

So I just take it either.

Still stupid.

I think one thing that can help us point to what Harjo has in mind is Lee Rayburn only wants the truth so he can feel like he's doing something righteous.

You know, he kind of want to pats himself on the back some.

Yeah.

And that can be fun and comical.

And I'm not saying that Harjo is saying, don't ever do that.

That's evil.

Look at this guy.

Because that he's obviously the protagonist and he's interesting and funny and it's.

It's Ethan Hawke and he's not bad.

No, he's not bad.

I did, I did like that.

It was kind of what we've talked about.

Like there are different maybe attitudes towards the truth.

Right.

Like some people say, well, you know, the truth will set you free.

Some people say, deeds done in darkness will always be brought to life.

Yeah.

And then, you know, there's folks that are like, you know, this truth.

Yeah, it's true.

But like, the cost is too great to bring it out in the open.

And I think that, like, these are still like relevant conversations that we're having as a nation where it's like, is it is the truth?

Some people will say, you know, the truth is the truth and it needs to come out no matter how hard and how painful it is.

And some people will say, well, that was a long time ago.

You know, is it making anything better?

I mean, like.

And I think that it's pretty clear where Sterling Harjo falls on this, but I think that this is an interesting commentary into this ongoing.

You know, it was so polite word is debate, I guess.

Yeah.

Discourse or whatever.

Discourse.

That's a good word.

It was so smartly done by Harjo.

It took me up until the penultimate episode to figure out, oh, this is what he's doing.

Yeah.

And it's.

You could read a lot into what Harjo's take is on various levels of white assholery is you get your Ray, you got your Donald, you got your Allen, you got your Frank.

Yeah.

It's like a hierarchy of white asshole.

You got.

You got Pastor, Pastor whatever.

Pastor Scary Mark.

Pastor Mark, that's what his name was.

And by the way, Pastor Mark.

And I forget who plays him whenever he shows up In a television show.

The actor.

Not Pastor Mark, the actor.

When he shows up in a television show, my ears perk up.

And I really wish that they would have introduced his character about two or three episodes earlier.

Earlier he was doing.

So this is just a complete something that I enjoyed, but like a little.

A little something that.

I can't remember that guy's name either.

Wait.

Yeah, he.

He's on Boardwalk Empire.

Yeah, famously.

He's also in many shows.

Like, there's a bit where he's kind of doing his preaching, talking, and he just slips in like, thank you, God, in there.

And it's so.

It's so fun.

This actor's from Oklahoma, and we're going to name him because he deserves it.

He is.

He's from Oklahoma originally.

Paul Sparks.

Paul is the.

Yeah, Paul Sparks as Mark Sternwick.

So Paul's master Mark.

He's in Boardwalk Empire.

If anybody's watched that, you know him for sure, because he's got this stupid little laugh that he incorporates, and it is a.

It's so funny that he does it.

I felt this show started great, maybe had a filler episode or two, and the last three or four were great.

I thought maybe it was lacking a central focus, but I think that's on me.

I think I figured it out, and I'm glad that you came with the same ideas, so I know that I'm not too off base.

Of note, by the way, is the show credits Walter Mosley, the crime writer.

Yeah.

To.

As.

As part of the.

I saw that.

The writing or production cast.

So, yeah, shows, they're doing very specific crime writing.

You.

You can follow along for that.

But if you dig a little deeper, you know, Hardro might be saying something.

I think it really puts a lot of it on the nose with its clear affection for the works of Jim Thompson.

So much so that Dale, you know, says.

Quotes him.

You know, the only thing.

Something like, you know, things are not as.

The only plot is things are not as they seem.

And I think that Jim Thompson books are a lot like this where, like, you know what?

If you just want to read it as it's a narrative of a crime or whatever, fine.

But if you start scratching away at it, you'd be surprised what pops out.

Yeah, that's kind of how this is.

That's the way, you know, that was.

Clearly, they.

Clearly.

I love the homage to Jim Thompson clearly lovingly incorporated into this, and I think nicely done.

I think they knocked it out of the park.

Honestly, I love this show.

Show felt like a Little.

A little like Charles Portis come to life too.

It did.

I felt, you know, in the sense that, like, probably.

It's so hard to stay a favorite.

I love True Grit, but possibly my True Grit might be his best.

Actually, Masters of Atlanta is probably his best, but the Dog of the south is probably the one I find the funniest.

Well, give me Norwood.

And there's.

There's so.

Even in Norwood too.

Like, there's so many things that are going on where you're like, I don't know how this connects to anything.

In the end, it kind of doesn't.

But it was so fun, you don't really care.

Well, let's end here.

We can't make promises because we never know how things may go.

But Death by Lightning sounds interesting.

Sounds very interesting.

And Frankenstein on Netflix sounds interesting.

We'll definitely be jumping into Pluribus as well.

Oh, yeah, Plural.

We got to talk about it.

Because it is.

I'm gonna have to.

I gotta catch up.

As soon as you watch it, you'll call me.

Probably.

We have to talk about this now.

Yeah, yeah.

Maybe those three things.

Maybe.

No promises can be made.

Pluribus probably will be on the docket, though.

And in a couple of weeks that we think Adam's coming back.

So he served his time.

Yes, we've put.

We're gonna bring him out of the hole.

You can hear him knocking sometimes.

Hey, thanks, everyone, for listening.

If you like the show, if you made it this far, God bless you.

My goodness.

Who listens to the end visit?

Just go to, I don't know, Apple.

Apple podcast.

What?

Spotify podcast.

And.

And.

And leave us a five star review and say these guys know their quads.

And for Adam and Donovan, I hope you never get trapped in a grocery store.

Huh?

That's my wish too.

Mine too.

Goodbye.