The Silent Explosions in the Penultimate 'House of the Dragon'; Plus, The First of 'Ted Lasso' Again

[00:00:01] Hello all, it's Taking It Down, the TV podcast from The Alabama Take. Today on the podcast we're discussing the seventh episode of this season of House of the Dragon and right after, we'll talk a little about the return of the Apple TV show Ted Lasso, and then a little on the show Furious which is streaming on Hulu. Adam and Donovan always join me, so with that let's get them in here and begin. At Alabama Take Projection

[00:00:29] And here they are, it's Adam, it's Donovan joining me for this week's podcast, Pur-Uj. Little slang guys, that meant usual. As per-Uj. I think that's legal language actually, like as per-Uj. It's of Latin derivation, yes. Yeah, maybe so.

[00:00:53] We've taken in the penultimate episode this season which is the penultimate season of House of the Dragon. This one was called The Dragon and the Winter. Did it feel like the usual HBO penultimate episode? Like they kind of have this style of either really raising the stakes or just giving you some bombast in the penultimate and then kind of sweeping up the dust in the last episode. What about, what about it fit that mold or didn't?

[00:01:21] It did not to me. It broke the, that was definitely like the Game of Thrones mold. Very much, like every season you could count on that. And The Sopranos did it a lot. Yeah. The Wire too. Didn't really do it. Yeah. It didn't. Always think of the final episode of the season on Game of Thrones with there's got to be a morning after, you know. Yeah. Deadwood did it as well.

[00:01:45] They had their huge set piece in the penultimate episode and the last one was like, let me just go and get you ready for the next season. Is this an effect though? And obviously this veers immediately into spoilers, but we can still talk broad language here. We'll talk broad language. Yeah. Since the show has gotten out of the first season, it's just kind of, there's been a lot going on. Mm-hmm.

[00:02:09] You know, like there wasn't, not that those other shows didn't have like high stakes episodes, but like with say the original Game of Thrones, you kind of know where they're steering, like what the big conflict is going to be. And this is just like, there's something all the time. This season gave us, you know, the battle of the gullet in the traditional format would have been last season's last or penultimate episode. We get it from the first episode this season.

[00:02:36] I think there's some stuff with the character that makes an exit in a previous episode. The spot it happening in the episode and the place the episode happens in the season I think is kind of breaking that up. I'm perfectly fine with this, I should say. Like I'm okay with my expectations being subverted because you did kind of get to the point with Game, especially towards the end of Game of Thrones, not when it was like really, really snapping. But at the end it's like, gotta fight the White Walkers now, I guess. Right.

[00:03:06] I'm with you. I love my expectations to be subverted. I love, it's either, you know, either subvert my expectations or give me a whole lot of nuance. One of the two or both. So, and they're doing that. I think purposefully it's got to be. It didn't seem as decisive as other next to last episodes feel, but I did think it had some good tense moments. Oh, I enjoyed it. There was one scene in particular, even though like, especially when a character is right next to the dragons, you can tell there's special effects.

[00:03:35] This episode reminded me how good their visual effects team is and how not lazy they are, especially in the way they differentiate the different dragons where I can instantly see who is who and they all look and act differently. I thought that's pretty darn good that it's like, I'm not even thinking about this. I counted maybe one moment where it wasn't quite great. Yeah. And it was a moment, literally like a second or two. That was, hey, I'm fine with that. I get it. It's tough.

[00:04:04] I was really just struck again by how good the designers and artists are doing with differentiating the dragons. And that's all, I mean, that's not just the visual effects people. That's the whole team, which is a really cool process. It did have a lot of things that felt like this is important going forward now. Oh, yeah. There's stuff happening for sure.

[00:04:26] Yeah, without feeling too much like table setting, it was still like this is an important thing here and everything is going to be charged by this thing or two or three. There were a few. It was still Game of Thrones though, right? Like with Game of Thrones, I just think with the template, like it's not going to stray too far away from one central tenant and that's horny. You saw it, huh? It was horny. You felt it.

[00:04:58] So horn, there's some horn in this. And you guys knew this was the next last season, right? Yes. I think this is part of, this kind of goes back into earlier discussions. But I feel like knowing that makes me feel like they're not going to get too out of control. Yeah, it does. It almost makes, I don't know, it was kind of like the way I felt when like Shogun was a limited series. Where I'm like, I'm fine with this. Like this is good. Like things can end. Mm-hmm.

[00:05:28] I think the king of this, that golden era of prestige television that we lived through and probably is why this podcast exists, us talking about it. I always think of Breaking Bad. And I think, I'm sure I'm paraphrasing some Vince Gilligan interview that I half remember, but he said like, I know exactly how many episodes I need. No more, no less.

[00:05:50] Which I thought was genius because how many people, once they get a good thing, are like, let's just see how long we can, critics love it. We have so many people watching. So to know that there's an end point, I think is fantastic. It is not the point of this podcast at all, but I agree with Adam and I think it's so cool that Vince Gilligan, we're not here to talk about Breaking Bad, but I think it's so cool that when Vince Gilligan was like, I have more to talk about in this universe, he was like, I'm going to do another show.

[00:06:19] And it's going to be Saul's. Instead of like trying to drag something else, he made something fresh and new and arguably stands up there with the original series for sure. I mean, that's in my opinion. It's so good. But Gilligan's a wizard. I did like the critic Emily Vanderwerf. I think she writes mostly for herself now.

[00:06:39] But she, years ago when she was writing for the AV Club, compared the Breaking Bad's five seasons to a five play, tragic play, with the crucial turn coming in the third. And then the last two acts being all the fallout. And I'm like, that was really, like, that just made me think like, like exactly what Adam said, where it's like he really knew what he was doing. It was so tightly done. And it's great.

[00:07:08] I wouldn't have, even stuff like the movie, things like that, it just added to it. It didn't take anything away. It didn't drag it out. Which I, again, not to have derailed us there, but yes, it's, end dates are a good thing. Limitations are good. Yeah. Yeah. Also this week came the big, celebrated, at least for Apple TV, return of Ted Lasso with its fourth season and its first episode of the fourth called Home.

[00:07:36] I got to make a confession here, you guys. Blurt it. Okay, it's the fourth season, right? Like I've seen the first three seasons. This whole time I thought it was Fred Lasso. Oh, everybody gets that wrong. One thing I noticed is that Jason Sudeikis, he really elevates Bill Lawrence's jokes. You think he sells them? I think that he may be the guy in the chamber that you want for Bill Lawrence television.

[00:08:05] Now, I have not seen this, but can you imagine the power that would be putting Jason Sudeikis and John C. McGinley together? That could work. You could rip a hole in the universe. That could really work, right? It'd be good, right? Let's get that show going. Yeah. Free ideas, Hollywood. I would watch the hell out of that. That's an interesting side-by-side because, you know, there's like the modern Bill Lawrence of Ted Lasso and shrinking,

[00:08:32] and then like kind of the more old school Scrubs, and I think McGinley is so tied to the Scrubs-style humor. Yet, obviously, Lawrence, there's common threads, but this would be the two universes really colliding here. I think that like John McGinley's Scrubs, like John McGinley's like peak point of that kind of Bill Lawrence humor is when he's talking about, I think it's the head president of the hospital or the head of the hospital having sex,

[00:08:59] and he's going, wha-bam, wha-bam, and they cut away, and it's like several minutes, and they come back, and he's just going, wham, wham, wham, wha-bam, wha-bam. Wham, wha-bam. It's so good. I'm thinking about Jason Sudeikis, too. I saw, I've forgotten that he plays Schmitty, the long-lost gang member on Always Sunny, and he shows back up, and there's that clip of all of them at lunch when Dennis is ordering food for everyone, and Schmitty's like, what is going on?

[00:09:29] But Jason Sudeikis is so funny at playing, in that instance, like the straight man, but just such command of this is reiterating what you say every line that they gave him he just somehow ran the ball so far down the field he's a funny guy we've already talked about 30 Rock he was funny in that he was funny in 30 Rock because it only happened for that one season on SNL but he and Tim Robinson crossed over on SNL and they have some funny sketches together

[00:10:00] I would like to see those again yeah some of those are really good this was pretty standard Tid Lasso I thought if you like the middling to good episodes and it's three season run I don't think you're going to find any issues here couple funny moments there's an attempt at a little pathos but overall it's continuing a story a lot of people are going to like I think there's always this was a short break right but it also does feel like they're bringing something back

[00:10:29] you know it doesn't feel like it was implied that there was going to be a season four and so you're always a little anxious in how that's going to play out and I thought yeah this was like we said last week are we coming to it for like earth shattering television at this point? no not really but it was the brand of warm hug that I think we hope for when we watch this show it was kind of nice to see the I don't think it's a spoiler to say

[00:10:57] I mean right at the end of season three Ted is going home and now we see what that looks like and so we get all of these Kansas City places become real that have been alluded to and it just seemed like a fun payoff kind of episode it was plain it was obvious it ran around 40 minutes it's pushing up against the length I think Ted Lasso finds success I noticed too that next week's episode is even a minute or two longer so

[00:11:27] I'm a little worried you know 35-32 minutes for Ted Lasso seems to be a template that works we'll see though do y'all know anybody that this is like a big deal for them like they've seen the original run over and over again I just think the the cult status that this show has for some people if they go a minute or two over maybe what we think they should they are not in danger of losing their core

[00:11:57] fan base I don't know anyone like that you see a lot online right I do I even think I don't have anyone like in my life personally like that but I think the folks reaction to this coming out is kind of testament to like the status of the first three seasons where like pretty much everyone I know is like yeah I'll check that out like for a lot of other shows like the goodwill would be like this is the cash grab and I think the goodwill is enough that people are like no I'm

[00:12:27] I'm genuinely interested in seeing what they're gonna do even if it's not my cup of tea which is funny because the second and the third season very much existed in the goodwill afterglow of the first season for me yet somehow it's still even extending into season four this is still like I feel the same way I'm like yeah I'll check this out there was stuff I really liked in season two and three but like season one that was a tight piece of television and it kind of got a little shaggier

[00:12:56] as the series went on although I did like it when they made them tile their penises together that was a fun one we'll keep our thoughts on this next show and the non-spoiler only side and it might appear next week in both segments it is Furious on Hulu pretty new show it's a Elizabeth Merriweather series on Hulu about a lady named Alice she's a

[00:13:24] really new FBI agent who believes she's on to a killer Donovan I've seen two you've seen one yep watched the first one last night tell me why someone should or shouldn't watch this so this is I'm curious to see how this show is going to go and I'm curious as to what the term Furious is going to apply to over the course of the show I have some guesses based on the first episode

[00:13:54] but I will say if you are not comfortable with stories centered on women and you don't want a story centered on women this is probably not the show for you whereas if you are interested I think that you have pretty strong acting the crime part of it hasn't stood out a ton until now so far but like good mystery and

[00:14:23] intriguing premise where I'm kind of like I would like to know more of what's going on and then they do also do a good job of we are not totally tied to the FBI agent's point of view we get the killer the person we know is the killer I don't think it's a

[00:14:53] spoiler because it would get frustrated watching this that you can kind of think through the threads and come a little bit further than what the show gives you and you

[00:15:29] what it's not fun to watch somebody take 30 hours to figure something out mind hunter did this a lot too where it would be like oh the first theory we put together is correct but I understand it's a show so sometimes yes you can see that it's a TV show overall though I'd give it a thumbs up I'm intrigued I want to see what's

[00:15:59] really not a ton except as the new girl creator and I did like new girl I like Jake Johnson a lot Zoe Deschanel especially after that first season once they smoothed everything out good cast by and large Jake Johnson is standout funny to me there's an episode where he wants to be a writer like Hemingway so he's like I have to live the Hemingway lifestyle and the Hemingway lifestyle is getting

[00:16:31] so this one it was really it really made me laugh I was surprised because like new girl is like pretty quirky and gentle I think and this one there was there's an edge there's a serious edge especially as one of the other characters in the FBI is in the sex crimes division where nothing fun happens nothing fun or good happens and so I was surprised at the end of this episode I think

[00:17:01] Blaine probably said this very clearly last week but I was surprised at the end of the episode when the credits flashed I thought that she was the one one wonder if the killer will be quirky but I'm willing to let that one spool out some more it's a smart detective show

[00:17:30] I think it's got many well placed feminist ideas I don't know if I would call it a feminist show I don't even really know what that would be but it has some that are very well placed and they aren't awkward or forced I think it might be a feminist show based on this just in the sense that it is foregrounded in women and women's experiences and women's experiences of the world and women's experiences of the world with men and it's definitely

[00:18:00] interesting in power dynamics very interesting in power dynamics between patriarchal systems and women and that might answer my first question which is who's going to enjoy it who should avoid it and with that let's take a break and on the other side we'll get into some spoilers and we will have House of the Dragons penultimate episode and the first episode of Ted Lasso on the docket

[00:18:45] okay we're back back to House of the Dragon and its seventh and penultimate episode the dragon in winter I find Rihanna relatable despite her very high status because she's riddled with imposter syndrome and this is me every day at work asking people to reveal if they've dreamed about me the night before you and Raniere that's how I start my days is going classroom to classroom saying what'd you dream about me I agree Blaine

[00:19:15] does come and say did you dream about me every goddamn morning he's calling me up what'd you dream about me last night it's as sure as my morning cup of life any ideas notion

[00:19:45] as to what that means and are these dreams the be all end all since we saw you know Helena's in there and we seen dream fire who I literally can't remember the last time we saw could pretend something somewhat interesting but I think the dragon doesn't appear until our second dream it's this first one that's so ambiguous you're right you're right you're right because the to fruition but that first one is just the gates

[00:20:15] opening lots of fiery sunlight I keep saying fiery because is it dragon fire or is it sunlight my opinion I got I watched this on Monday so sorry I'm a little mixed up my opinion you are definitely supposed to think of fire I mean it's called house of the damn dragon right I guess there's kind of like a little bit of a memory of the season finale of game of thrones but I think population at a large which kind of seems

[00:20:45] like this might be portending that kind of thing there's been a lot I mentioned it earlier but one of my favorite scenes from earlier in the show was when I think it was Hammer's dragon flew over Tumbleton and the horses are shying and everything and it's like they keep reminding you these things could explode and it comes up in this don't you

[00:21:14] think that being a dragon rider changes you you know which is I don't know that that has been said aloud or discussed between characters it's been obviously implied quite a bit I thought that was good I also enjoyed when Rhaenyra immediately you know we praised her last week for being like a believer like a big picture like dreamers exist there is this prophecy this whole thing that she feels compelled obviously taken

[00:21:44] in the wrong direction it veers toward insanity and all sorts of fortifying things because her gods told her to do them but in this it's like oh I may have this person neck of my sister you forget that that's her sister so much of the time yeah you do but they reiterate that here has this prophetic mind let me

[00:22:13] ask for nothing mystical extremely literal tactical information so she goes from this like big picture thing to like how can this serve me immediately which I thought was I mean kind of see like Helena just the gears are growing this is not how it works same dream Helena sees snow falling or ash again too could be taken two ways if it's snow understood that people this far away from winter would have inklings

[00:22:43] that it's even in the distance wasn't the winter that comes at the end of game of thrones the first in hundreds of years if I remember correctly and I may be misremembering this it was the first that like basically a generation had seen it was within living a winter was within living memory oh really yeah if I remember correctly like it's like like the seasons are not set sorry the duration of the seasons are not set

[00:23:13] so this was it had been if I'm remembering correctly it had been like a long summer so like younger folk like children and even like younger folk but like grandparents could remember which is something they're complaining about in season one of the original show right like that all of the young men at the tournament are yes Don Henley's boys of summer yeah yeah they don't really understand I assume that it's the ice is playing on the fact that we as viewers will have

[00:23:42] several different meanings or thoughts for this you know we can remember Game of Thrones we know it's set up you know the ice encroaching the winter coming that's the song of ice and fire the snow not ice as in immigration yeah right that ash from you know ash of course the dragons I had a third meaning that I'd thought of and then it just disappeared out of my same but we I think we have like the multiple interlocking meanings and I think that actually

[00:24:12] I am very very grateful that they're not going overboard on Helena's dream sequences but I think it actually works for dreams where you have you know how like two things are true at once where I'm like it was my school but it was also Walmart yeah that kind of overlay there's a word for that that I'm also forgetting let's get into Eamon's story here he's dealing even more with Operation Hot Mother it's actually become Operation Kill Son Allison appears

[00:24:41] to him where first it's a sexual fantasy dream sort of but she appears to him IRL right after where she and Alice are practically fighting for the young guy's attention all leads to Allison trying to poison Eamon after he kills the actual assassin and maybe takes a circular route to get to her poisoning him anyway it probably is going to go nowhere because Alice sees what's happened she calls him an idiot for trusting Hot Mother

[00:25:11] you know she tried to warn him funniest line delivery of the show where she's just like he collapses and she's just like exasperated idiot you know something I've noticed about this episode it had some truly elevated dialogue almost dare I overuse this word Shakespearean at times and it made that idiot moment truly punch you don't hear a lot of idiot you hear like fool or like other things that we would think that they would say but just that was sometimes

[00:25:40] the intrusion of modern language is distracting but that was very funny it was it was it made me think of for the exact same reason Adam it reminded me of Widow's Bay where they've got what's his the old revenant in the coffin and all of a sudden he's just like fuck you Tom's like no fuck you no fuck you best part of that series she says you Targaryen boys all

[00:26:10] want the same thing don't you what does she mean mommy yeah I know I was joking incest is what she means brother motherly love is what she means so on the topic of Harrenhal Brianna finally relents and gives it to one of the frays well if she can take it exactly so that's gotta mean something going bored else why have it in here solve two problems right get rid of someone who's being annoying and take Harrenhal potentially taking

[00:26:40] her off the board or win win I would say or somebody annoying dies Harrenhal is still in play but someone annoying is dead so I thought that was a smart movie Rhaenyra in one session basically turning two people who bother her into potential scapegoats was great I like that which she already had the Manderly guy in mind for scapegoat thanks to Masaria but using it finally

[00:27:10] there's nothing better than rewarding someone with something that you don't want if you win this you get to take my trash out Rhaenyra feels like an imposter I mentioned that I feel it deep down and Masaria takes full advantage of this doubt I don't think I like this Masaria lady the mistress of whispers she's likely egged on by her encounter with her former boss she shows up asking for

[00:27:40] favors and prompts her needles her saying you're not one of us anymore you're not the working class but she also says you're also not one of them right something like that you don't belong here either yeah she's like did you right like do you want to impress me the actress

[00:28:10] the actor whose name I forgotten playing Masaria does she I think she does an excellent job and it's aided by the writing of like they really never ever show you her cards but they give you enough that you're like yeah like the alarm bells are going off right like Rhaenyra you're vulnerable you feel betrayed by Damon you're open to this she's taking advantage of you but we don't actually have like real evidence to say that

[00:28:39] not really yet but it feels very questionable you listing those motivation makes it fair absolutely that is something she would want to do yeah I thought they did an interesting thing the last two episodes if you're tracking people who touch Rhaenyra like when her and Allison are having a grabs her arm when she turns away from her and immediately the king the queen's guard is there you know unhand the queen

[00:29:09] don't touch her like sword drawn ready and then you have the same thing when Masaria goes and does the same motion and she catches herself right and like even looks at the guard it's like oh I shouldn't have done that then you have full on like no one's in the room and they're going to touch the hell out of each other so like and I I think they use that because the theme of the season right is like Rhaenyra becoming increasingly isolated

[00:29:38] and like down even to physical touch is regulated by the state in some way or like her own need to project power or whatever it is within that is we're like questioning her motives they also use a very deliberate touch between Rhaena and Helena she grabs her arm and the camera lingers on this grab yeah I think Adam nailed

[00:30:08] it I'm gonna half remember this but there's an idea there's an I learned this from political like I think that's exactly it is she like because she has these two bodies her one human body is increasingly isolated and lacking the things that human beings need

[00:30:37] how are you guys feeling about Ormond's twofold new elements to his plan he's going to use Lord Corliss as a pawn of some sort even a hostage even though he says he's not and he's got off making the heel turn is it really a heel turn yeah off just you're going to give me what I wanted okay I'm with you which is the best ale that he's had in a while yeah tastes good huh well you know it's kind of funny because Ormond is so arrogant and thinks he's so

[00:31:07] superior to everyone else yet this is a place where the Reds arrogance has completely blinded them because they ale in a castle it worked for me it's also kind of working against the other piece on the board

[00:31:36] that Ormond is talking about Corliss right like even when he got captured he's fairly nonchalant about a dude just showing up in the woods in front of him state your business why are you bothering me and he seems mostly just annoyed to have to be there at that dinner it's like a meme of like what are

[00:32:22] hilarious yeah he really did not want to say please Matt Smith nailed that moment yes he did he wrenched it we got the huge dragon showdown in the middle of this episode and that's of course we alluded to in non-spoilers without saying it I thought this was excellent it was wild I thought the way it played out was excellent I

[00:32:52] he drops a guy who's under fire he literally drops in the real world Matt Smith hit the ground it was great it almost had the end of the good bad and ugly feel to it you got the

[00:33:22] the dragons are so majestic that when they get hurt something feels wrong like you're breaking something beautiful and I think that's kind of the way I felt

[00:33:52] Now, a little sympathetic towards Sheepstealer, despite being a monster. It's kind of sad as he's crawling away crying. I hate it. I hate it when anything bad happens because they're so much like their – I mean, they're not their pets. It's obviously completely different than that, but it feels like a Jon Snow bonded to his dire wolf kind of thing.

[00:34:20] When you – so when bad things happen to the dragons, I hate it, especially because even though they're meant to be the nuclear bomb, they're meant to be even like a we shouldn't have dabbled in that kind of magic kind of thing. It changes people. It's still – you just – you think about – you can't help but be like Sheepstealer was just chilling, living his wild life, and got sucked into this thing that really didn't concern. Yeah.

[00:34:50] Him, you know, and now has to die for these reasons that are completely – I thought of like, you know, the memorial to animals lost in war in London, like that kind of thing of – Yeah. And of course you think that every time a horse catches on fire when – and breathe a dragon fire happens, but I don't know, the animal thing, I'm always just like, I hate that part of it. Yeah. They have so many elements of both cat and dog. Yeah.

[00:35:19] I think it's a testament – I'll say it over and over again – to the FX people and the designers and the artists that these – like you're seeing it and you're like, oh yeah, I do feel like I'm seeing like a pet or like some majestic creature that shouldn't be caged up being hurt right in front of me. Like I'm willing to suspend – you know, I can suspend my disbelief enough that like this feels emotionally resonant,

[00:35:46] which is not something you often say with CGI. Not at all. Special effects? So kudos to the work that's being done there. I think this – actually this whole show, but this episode is an example of like they're so smart about their special effects. They don't depend on them at all.

[00:36:09] And when they come in, they complement and supplement what's going on in the story rather than being flashy for flashy's sake, by and large anyway. It definitely feels like that. I've got two points here. I don't think Sheepstealer's dead. I think that – We didn't see him die. He kind of crawled off. He can go off. I think he can heal. The second thing is I didn't realize dragons would go out and attack another of their own out of free will, another of their species.

[00:36:37] Assuming Sheepstealer isn't dead, is that a worry Rayana or Orman should have? Because it's – he didn't know where to direct his fire with a rider on him. I don't know. I'd be concerned. I saw a few people point out that Rhaenyra, the bond that the other riders show to their dragons, hers gets – and I'm forgetting her dragon's name. I'm sure Donovan can. He doesn't know either. It's okay.

[00:37:04] The concern that Rhaenyra shows relative to the other riders about her dragon who kind of got put through the ringer the most in that fight aside from Sheepstealer, it doesn't seem like she's super connected at this point, which kind of plays into that emotional – and maybe that happens off screen. Maybe she's comforting the dragon on the way back to King's Landing or something, but she's out of the dragon pit pretty quick once they get there.

[00:37:33] I completely agree with you. Seems to show some further that emotional isolation and unavailability. And I think we're counterpoised there with Damon's relationship with Caraxes. Right. Where it's like they're really one weapon.

[00:37:50] Well, and the people have pointed out that he has at least a decade, if not more, on any other dragon rider, right, of bond, of experience, of – which goes back to Donovan, what you were saying, of like, he hit the deck because he understands the possibility here. Helena's last dream ramps up into this because that is the one where they take her baby away and she mounts her own dragon. It seems a little easier to parse, assuming it's bound to happen. The dragon count suddenly becomes a lot more evened out.

[00:38:20] And if you keep in score, you've got Aegon and the Greens having five riders, if they can work together with Aegon. That would be Helena, Darren, Eamon, and Ulf, assuming again they work together. So, Rihanna and the Blacks will have six. Rihanna's own, Damon, Adam, Hugh, Bela, and Joffrey, who's been taking that nappy nap, he can ride. So, it is five to six.

[00:38:49] Who's your money on, you know? Assuming that plays out. Which leads us to that brand new dragon. Brand new old dragon. Thomas Glenn Carney's performance has me liking Aegon more and more. Agreed. It's something to think about. If he wins this war and becomes king again, will he rule differently? Is he a changed man? Is he still the cocky, drunken kid?

[00:39:14] I mean, based on that speech and thinking that he has scared the army away, it seems like that part of him is very much still intact. That was hilarious. And then, like, the way that he acts when he realizes that Sunfire is there. He's just, like, thrilled that he can burn them up. Like, it was grim, but it was also, like, kind of funny. Like, he's just gleeful.

[00:39:39] In the benefit of the doubt corner, though, if you had a loved pet and you found out he's just barely hurt and not dead, you're going to hoop and holler a little. Oh, if I found out that my beloved pet, who I thought was passed away, was back in my house and could breathe fire on my enemies. Yeah, I'd be excited. I found that very relatable.

[00:40:05] I love that soundscape of the approaching army that were coming for Aegon, Tywin, and Larys there for a while before he's skadoodled. I thought that they built that tension wonderfully. Very well. I mean, you really, you know there's probably going to be an intervention of some sort. Doesn't take diving into spoiler land to figure that out. But still, like, you're thinking these dudes are laying all their cards on the table.

[00:40:33] And you even think Aegon may chicken out there for a second. And then he throws the scabbard away and is like, all right, let's do this. Hmm. I kind of like that out of him. It's an episode of the resurrection motif in one way or another. There's the obvious one of Sunfire at the end with Aegon helping it and being helped out. The idea that Aemon's actually alive, confirmation from Alicent seeing him. The rider of Sheepstealer is now alive again for Rayanna.

[00:41:01] She knows who it is and it is Daemon's daughter. Aegon's no longer playing dead. Yeah. Something I thought they did very well talking about resurrection or kind of the flip side of that, Blaine, is, you know, the thing like that, like, how could having a dragon not change you? And I mean, I think the metaphor there is, right, like power, might, the ability to force others to do things.

[00:41:27] And the flip side of that is they don't give a spare thought to the person who was killed in Bayless dead. So much so that his skull is thrown into the flame because he's not a real person. He's just a piece in this drama where the real people act and the real people are the ones with dragons and the ones in power. And I say real people in quotes, of course. Well, when you all were, Blaine, you listed out who has what dragon and how even the sides are.

[00:41:55] That's basically turning everyone else into cannon fodder, right? Because there are like standing armies involved in this, but they don't matter. I mean, they do, but they don't. So you're saying it puts Ormond under the flames, Sergwain under the flames, people like that. Yeah. Mm-hmm.

[00:42:15] I mean, I think that they are powerful enough to surround themselves with some security relative to the nuclear bombs flying around because they have their own nearby. But yeah, there's only really – if you're talking about survival, there's like two classes of people here, right? Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

[00:42:36] And of course, I think smartly, this factors into – I mean, we see it without being told, this factors into Ormond's disdain for the Targaryens, disdain for the dragonriders, disdain for them as savages. Because of course, if you don't have that kind of power, he's happy enough to grab it and make Darren – is it Darren? He's happy enough to grab it and make Darren King. Yeah. Yeah, I feel like they've been singing this season for me.

[00:43:06] I know Adam had one episode he didn't like. I liked it as – I think I liked it a lot more than Adam did. But I feel like this one's really been like – I'm kind of like – I'm looking forward to seeing the show when it comes on. Yeah, definitely. Same here. Finale. For us tonight, we record on Sunday. As for Apple TV's return to their cash cow, probably. Ted Lasso, let's talk about the fourth season debut with some spoilers.

[00:43:34] So I complimented Jason Sudeikis at the beginning. I think it's the writing here. Did he not overdo the all-shucks Midwestern persona in those opening ten minutes? Or is that just – we're supposed to realize he's back home and that's how he really acts? It's not overboard for him to do it there in that setting? I mean, it's kind of like a heightened reality version of that, right? Like even when they're flipping coins into the fountain and briefly get in trouble from the security guard. And he's like, I'm just messing with you.

[00:44:04] You know, you'll have – I think everybody's just supposed to be in this vision of Kansas City, this paradise on earth. I do have something to interject there on this subject, and that's I have a friend who's from Ohio. Like a colleague of his went to a conference in Ohio and came back, and she came back. She's like, when I first met you, I thought you might be a serial killer. Then I went to Ohio and I found out that's just how people act around there.

[00:44:34] Southern stuff too. That like people from other parts of the country are like, you're going to kill us all. No, you're just being friendly. That's literally just how people act. If this show was The Leftovers or anything really bold, really daring, this would be a show where Ted now works at the grocery store while his British friends maybe come over and attempt to make an American soccer club. And I'm not so sure it wouldn't be good.

[00:45:02] The first 10 minutes of the show with him in the grocery store were the best of the episode for me. I thought those jokes were pretty good with him dealing with the kid who was stealing and coming in and talking about the pepperoni being as good as human food. I mean, he can't turn it off, you know? No, he can't. He's got to help someone. Yeah. He even tries to get the lady not to buy cigarettes. He tries, but he also didn't mind those being stolen and being returned to the store.

[00:45:31] You know, a few less for her. So it's all good. I do realize the episode had a tough balance because we all know he's going to take the job as a manager of the women's soccer team. And Keely's put together at Richmond. But we also would be calling it horrible writing if it starts there and use flashbacks or had Ted say yes to the job in the opening scene.

[00:45:57] Although I would be kind of curious what those episodes would look like if they did flashbacks to see how it came about. That would have been an interesting tack, but I don't know if it would have worked. I think you had to have this for a few reasons, right? Okay. One, you got to show him in his natural environment. We've got to catch up on his family. You know, we needed to see where he lives in his son's messy bedroom and that that's where that family's at at this point.

[00:46:25] They're not, he's not quite the little boy that he was before. And we also had to bring the three Brits over to Kansas City, right? Just for some fun fish out of water kind of jokes. I don't know how much gas in the tank I have for cutesy shopping sprees with Rebecca and Keely. Probably not a lot. I don't know that it established much that I didn't already know either. It probably plants a seed for joke.

[00:46:48] It comes later with her outfits and lets us know the real why of getting Ted or trying to get Ted to come back. Well, maybe she's, he makes the joke about, are you trying to hire me so that the team fails? Like he did the first time. Yeah, it's a good joke. And it's, it feels a little dark for him. It was. A little mean on his side, but for him. Yeah.

[00:47:13] But maybe they do those, the shopping trip, the goofy suit, whatever to show like this is, this is a changed person. You couldn't imagine season one, episode one, Rebecca doing that. Adam, if I end up in a retirement community, which may not be that bad unless it's the one from the boroughs, make sure I'm in one that doesn't allow Fox News to be played. Yeah. In fact, maybe no news at all. Would be nice. That'd be great.

[00:47:41] It'd be the healthiest retirement community in America. In fact, how, how old do you have to be before you get into one of those? Because. That depends on how much money you got. Oh, well, count me out. There's some ingredients here to make a good cake. There's a story of a man who's now trying to do right by his family as well as do what he loves and find that balance. I think that that has some promise.

[00:48:06] I'd like to see Lawrence and his writers dig into that a little deeply while still trying to maintain some comedic elements. That's a good premise, I thought, because, you know, season one, episode one, this is a man who is a coach and who is taking a job because that's who he is. And that's what he does. And you just go, go, go. Right. And he's obviously you slowly find out there's the separation, there's this divorce, all these things that maybe pushed him to fly across an ocean.

[00:48:36] But much less investigated, it seems like, is the idea of like kind of what his mom tells him. Do you want your son to grow up with you doing something that you love? Is that like the example that you want to set? I guess the balance of being there versus being the example and that energy overflowing to him, which I mean, I don't have kids,

[00:48:58] but I feel like this is something that a group of writers and actors and all of these things probably think about because I know musicians think about it because there's quite a lot of sacrifice goes into living a creative life. And I am sure the coaches, you know, they move all the time. They put their families through all of this. So that all seems kind of tied up in something that I could see the creators who are living and dying by the next gig also thinking pretty hard about this.

[00:49:28] They're never at home, coaches. Am I crazy or was Ted Lasso the coach of Wyoming? No, it was somewhere in Kansas, right? It wasn't Wichita State, but something like that. Cornhuskers. It was Omaha. They're the Cornhuskers. I think it's Omaha. And they had won a national championship, right? Yeah. Yeah. Because it shows him doing his Jason Sudeikis dance. The dance, yeah. God, I love that dance. I thought it was fun and acceptable episode of Ted Lasso.

[00:49:56] Nothing I would call stellar, but also it wasn't bad. I do appreciate they only gave one episode. I think that was the right move because we all know this setting, these characters. Granted, they're in a different setting, but we all get the gist. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And it was such a prequel feeling thing. Even the way that they, like a play setting kind of episode.

[00:50:23] Like you said, this could have almost been flashbacks, but even the use of when the song came on. They didn't use the song at the beginning. It's in the closing credits almost to say, we're back. Like, you know, we weren't back from the top, but now we're back in action. Yeah. That does feel like their goal and that was pretty well accomplished, I suppose. I think that's it for us. And I just want everyone to remember that grocery store work is honest and good work too.

[00:50:51] You said you enjoyed those first two minutes, not to keep going here, but that really showed the kind of guy that Ted is. Agreed. It worked for his character perfectly. Yeah. Something to take away there. Yeah. Yeah. So everyone, whatever you're doing, have a great week. Be good at it.