What We Do In The Shadows, S04E04- The Night Market

Thank you to Max for commissioning this episode!

This episode mainly focuses on the conflict between Nadja and the wraiths who are supposed to be running the nightclub. She goes off in search of what basically amounts to heroin for the one heading up the labor dispute, and meanwhile Guillermo and Nandor get involved in a familiar-fighting ring.

Thanks so much for listening, and I will see you soon with a new episode!

Episode Transcript

(00:02):
This is an Unspoiled Network podcast.This is spoil Me covering what we do
in The Shadows Season four, Episodefour, the Night Market. In this
episode, folks are out here checkingout this wild destination for wildly different reasons.

(00:28):
We've got cage fighting without a cage, and we've got union negotiations.
Welcome to spoil Me, Welcome tothe show everyone. I am the Timesha.

(01:00):
Thank you very much to Max forcommissioning this episode. Max, if
you're out there, thank you,sir for this. This episode is pretty
funny. I was like more intothis than I expected to be considering just

(01:21):
we're just gonna get into it.So we start things off with Naja being
extremely psyched that her business is goingsuper well. They have a ton of
customers. We see people literally clamoringat the door trying to get in.
And I would really want to mentionher outfit here because she is talking to

(01:42):
camera and this scene she's got asingle stripe of burgundy in her hair,
and she's wearing these like reading glassesthat have rhinestones all the way around the
underside, plus these dangling rhinestone bitsthat fall to like her cheeks. A
really fascinating look, I say thatshe had a burgundy streak, but I

(02:07):
think no, it's both of herpigtails have burgundy in them. This is
a new look for her, andwe are finding out that despite the fact
everything is going so well with thecustomers, we have a real issue when
it comes to the wraith and theirperformance of their duty. So we've had

(02:30):
six deaths in the past week.Four of them were human, which is
apparently considered not so bad. Thisis the only thing, and I am
not mad about it, but Iwish we got a little bit. I
really want to know what people tellothers about where they're going, because nothing

(02:58):
seems to ever catch up with ourfriends, and like a lot of people
have disappeared or are being buried ontheir property, and this is granted,
not their property. This is theVampiric Council headquarters, like that building,
so it's a different situation. Butyou know, my feeling is always I

(03:21):
keep like putting this in sort ofthe context of the Suki Stackhouse novels,
which I'm covering with Miles for patrons, and the whole thing with vampires in
that universe is that everybody knows vampiresexist because they have come out publicly and
told everyone and that the reason thatthey felt safe in doing this was because

(03:43):
finally a synthetic blood substitute was successfullyinvented that they can now live on and
they don't have to feed off ofhumans because it provides the same nutrients.
Of course, it's not nearly asgood, so that's not really anybody is
solely surviving on, but it's reallygood for PR. And the whole way

(04:08):
that the world works is that peoplea lot of vampires are like trying to
mainstream, as they call it,and they get more worried about what happens
to humans on their property because itdraws attention. If a vampire dies,
it's like gonna be political ramifications withinthe vampiric community, but the authorities usually

(04:33):
do not care. When it's ahuman, it turns into a really big
problem, especially depending on the natureof their death, especially like if they're
killed by another vampire, especially throughfeeding, that's like a PR nightmare and
they hate that. So with this, like does anybody ever Like what I

(04:56):
keep thinking about is you take anuber to the vampiric headquarters and the last
thing, the last transaction on yourbank account after you Vanish is an uber
transaction, and they find the driverwho's like, yeah, I dropped them
off right here in front of thisweird office building, and it seems like

(05:18):
a real quick like piece of workfor them to start to hang around and
see lines and lines of strange weirdoshanging out outside the building after dark as
they begin to put things together.I would sort of enjoy seeing a little
bit of that, if I'm honest, But also it doesn't actually matter,

(05:43):
so it's like I'm sort of fiftyfifty on that. Martin says, they
probably just use their hypnosis to getpeople to leave them alone. That would
work on individuals, but when everybody'sgot access to like a case file that's
says the same thing, do theyjust hypnotize like every person who comes and

(06:04):
nobody ever is like, how comenobody's pursued this lead? You know what
I'm saying. I feel like,in other words, we could have a
really great spin off show that isfolks at the local police precinct who are
trying to like figure out what thefuck is going on, and they keep
almost getting closer, and then whateverhappens happens, and we get to see

(06:29):
like the weirdness of it. Andgranted, I'm not a big fan of
copaganda anymore, so this could haveits problems, but you can make them
real goofy losers and it would stillbe okay. Martin says, this is
one of my favorite episodes. It'sfunny, sure, but I mostly just
appreciate the world building and creative inthe honest play. Yeah, definitely definitely

(06:50):
agree with that. So it turnsout that the Rays are basically protests their
workplace treatment they gave she. They'vebeen given jobs, but they have to
sleep in the supply closet, andEvil Mabel is trying to convince Naja to

(07:16):
listen to their concerns. All Najakeeps doing is like she essentially is doing
that they're lucky to have jobs,They're lucky to have a supply closet to
sleep in, like she's doing theTerrible boss thing. So when I said
at the beginning of this episode thatI enjoyed this more than I expected to,

(07:40):
I kind of thought what we mighthave would be like that we were
leading into something that was going togo on for the whole season, and
that is Naja butting heads with theWraiths. Now I am by no means
saying that this is over, don'ttwist it, but I am saying that

(08:03):
I thought I was going to haveto sit there and watch her just like
beat on these poor Wraiths and likemake their lives miserable, and that they
wouldn't really get to come back ather with anything, especially the way that
the episode ends. At first,it looks like they're just going to get
screwed over because somebody got a hitand they're happy with that. But then

(08:24):
the Raids put their feet down andmore than that down and it takes the
left turn unexpectedly. That made mereally really happy. So sorry, Martin
says, that's kind of what WellingtonParanormal is. Accept it's with the original
what we do in the Shadows moviecast? Is that a movie? Also,

(08:46):
Martin, I've never even heard ofit. Wellington Paranormal. That's a
really great name. Honestly, there'shad a TV show. I've never heard
of this before checking it out,definitely going to look at that. So,
oh my god, you guys,I'm so sorry. I just I
opened my Kindle instead of clicking overto Hulu. Here it is so Naja

(09:07):
finally starts to figure out like,I need to handle this situation because they're
becoming organized, and she says,oh, I know exactly how to handle
that. And Evil Mabel, whois definitely on the side of the Wraiths
in this situation, like she hasto play the role of being Naja's right

(09:28):
hand, but she also clearly doesn'tagree with what with a lot of what
Naja's doing and her outlook on management. So she's trying to rep for them
in as delicate a way as shecan and make suggestions but not screw herself
to the point that Naja no longerwants to talk to her about anything anymore.

(09:54):
So we come back into the clubafter the credits and it's transformed a
little bit, and I thought thatthis was interesting. I'm curious if this
is always what it's going to looklike now, or if it's done for
this, like for week nights orsomething. But previously we had all of
these tables that were you know thosethey were lit up from the inside,

(10:18):
and they were that height where youjust stand at them, you don't sit,
and they were scattered around what seemedto be like a sort of open
dance floor. In this we startoff with all of these tables that are
covered in tablecloths. They are notlit up, they have candles on top,

(10:39):
and they are shorter and have chairsaround them so people can sit because
it's a sort of like like dinnertheater feel, but I don't think there's
dinner because there's just blood, whichI guess is dinner, So I guess
it is. But you know whatI'm saying, it's a it's a sort
of like a jack club feel fromthe type of jazz clubs I'm used to

(11:03):
only seeing in movies and that I'msure technically do exist, but I have
literally never heard of one anywhere thatI have ever lived, probably because I
don't travel in the circles that wouldgo to jazz clubs. I, for
the record, am not a verseto checking out a jazz club. It

(11:24):
seems like the kind of thing thatmight be sort of interesting to do.
But it's definitely got a throwback feel. There's not a lot of like the
kind of club that this is feelslike it's in the forties, you know
what I'm saying. So this isa very very different vibe from the way

(11:48):
the club ordinarily or the way itstarted off looking. And we see Colin
Robinson who is practicing tap dancing andsinging, and he is forgetting the words
and being driven really really hard becausenow he is their business. It's no
longer about like a fun hobby forhim that Laslow is actively discouraging. It

(12:18):
is about making the most out ofthis interest so that they can exploit it
and make as much money off ofit as they can. And I am
really what I think is sort offascinating here is like my assumption had been,
oh, okay, so we're gonnahave Colin Robinson be boring in an
extremely new way. But the vampiresseem to be hyped about what he's doing,

(12:46):
so he's not draining them when heis dancing. It seems like they
are getting something out of it.They are actually enjoying themselves. And I
don't think he's feeding at all.We never see his eyes light up,
and I'm not sure if that's justa thing of the past or if that
would be indicative of what's going onwith him. But I'm wondering if there's

(13:07):
like a whole different thing going onwith the way he gets nutrition anymore,
Like does he need to eat?Does he need to Like just what's up
with him, Now, what's thedeal. So he says something to Laslo
about how he forgot the lyrics,and I want to take a break and
read my book. Laslow is like, come here and give me that book,

(13:31):
and he tries to act like hedoesn't have it, but he does,
and he comes over and hands itover and it is fairy Tales,
Justice called fairy Tales, and Laslowis explaining to him how The Little Red
Riding Hood is about a gruesome unsolvedchild abduction, which you know isn't exactly

(13:56):
correct, but also isn't exactly incorrecteither, And it turns out that Colin
hasn't actually read this, so he'ssaying things like, no, that's not
true. I don't believe you.There's also rumpel Stiltskin, which he says
his name is actually rumpled dick Skin. That's where he got his name.
He doesn't tell you that, doeshe. And there's like a lot about

(14:18):
what Laslow is saying to him regardingthe realities of the supernatural world versus what
is in this book that are clearlylike truths that Laslow knows, and it's
like, that is not what that'sabout, actually, And then there's a
part later where he's just clearly pullingstuff out of his ass and saying it,
and eventually says to Colin and sometimesgrown ups just make stuff up and

(14:43):
they just say it and it's noteven true. So anyway, this is
when Xerxes shows up to talk toNaja, and he doesn't talk so much
as handover cards that have a boldlettering on them. He hands a card
over to Evil Mabel, thank youfor taking the time to work through these

(15:07):
issues. We have a list ofdemands to be addressed. Number one,
we require more than one break aday so that we may haunt the descendants
of our transgressors. Naja says,we would all like to have more time
for our hobbies. Number two,we will not be blamed for all phantom

(15:31):
smells at work. This is anold building with old pipes, and the
smells emanating there from our out ofour control. That's as far as it
gets. And it's remarkable because theyare barely even demands, like they just
want more than one break and forthem to not be blamed on like for

(15:52):
smell. That's it. And Najais so angry and I am just like,
girl, what is what is thematter with you. She's so pissy.
I was giving her a lot ofcredit about how she could potentially handle
this business, and I'm seeing thisand I'm just like, absolutely not,
ma'am. What winds up happening?It was a long time coming. So

(16:15):
she gets up in his face,so to speak. I have given you
and your weird, faceless friends ajob and a lovely, warm supply closet
to sleep in. Without me,you would have nothing. Goodbye. I
don't have time for this, AndI'm just, of course thinking this isn't

(16:36):
going to go super well for you, you know, like everything that it's
just the same exact thing as workersin the world. If you piss everybody
off and they all bail, whatexactly are you planning to do? What
are you think's going to happen?This is a popular like lately, especially

(16:57):
you guys. Know, if you'rein the world, there's just this constant
refrain of nobody wants to work anymore. And on the one hand, a
part of me is like, theyprobably don't because frankly, it's simply not
worth it, Like it hasn't beenworth it for some time. Actually,

(17:19):
nobody has ever wanted to work though, like truly let's be real about it,
and less so than ever because it'sjust not made worthwhile. But then,
of course there's the aspect of weare demanding more than we ever have
before for less pay than we everhave before, absolutely no benefits, weird

(17:42):
hours, and the expectation that yoube constantly available while we remain barely staffed,
and if anybody calls out, thewhole pyramid gets like collapsed to the
floor. And yeah, of coursenobody wants that. No nobody wants that
anymore, and we are very,very tired of it. And it was

(18:03):
just a matter of time before everybodybegan to look up and realize, oh,
we don't, we don't actually haveto keep doing this. And so
there's a pretty fun reddit sub threador not sub thread, what do you
call it? Subchannel, subit channel, but anyway, subreddit, I guess
that's what they're called called anti work, and people will either share things that

(18:29):
have happened to them or they willshare things that they have found in the
wild, so to speak. Andthere are a lot of images on there
of like small businesses, especially foodestablishments, that are shuttered for the day
with some kind of snarky note tapedto the door about how nobody wanted to
show up for their shift and thatkind of thing, and it's just always

(18:53):
presented as if like, oh,these kids nowadays, and yet everybody agreed
to not come in, so thatreally doesn't feel like it's about them.
It really feels like it's about you, and you're just really mad that they
decided to call your bluff on treatingthem like garbage. So you know you're

(19:17):
gonna get what you're gonna get,and I really Martin says that sub is
a mixed bag. There's literally nosub that is not though, let's be
real, so many of them it'sjust full of like fake, fake,
fake fake stuff. And Martin says, part of it, I think is

(19:38):
increasing levels of automation. Workers ofthe world unite. Workers of the world
definitely unite. And the automation thing, I think is like not as big
an issue as it is presented tobe, Like I think it is to
a point, but that is apart of a bigger problem, which is

(20:03):
an expectation that CEOs make like sixhundred times what workers make, which was
not the way it has always been. And it's a weird sort of like
shift in balance that has happened overthe last I would say the last like
thirty years twenty mostly the last twentyespecially, but yeah, the whole like

(20:29):
dynamic of what is expected from anemployee versus what they are expected to put
up with from an employer, andthe complete lack of benefits anymore. You
guys, When I was twenty twenty, I was twenty years old, I
worked as the hostess at a resortrestaurant and I was making nine dollars an

(20:53):
hour as a hostess. This wasin two thousand four or two thousand and
five, and I had full timehours, I had health insurance, and
I had a four oh one K. As the hostess at a restaurant for

(21:18):
nine dollars an hour, I wouldbet you absolutely any amount of money that
not only are they still only payingnine dollars an hour twenty years later,
but they sure as funk are notgiving their hostess health insurance and a four
oh one K anymore. That's Ijust there is no doubt in my mind

(21:41):
that is no longer happening. Andthat's the ship that people are just like,
well, that's that's not even likea real job. You can't expect
to work as a hostess and thinkyou're going to get why not? Oh,
like everybody has to maintain a placeto live and their own health,

(22:03):
and we act as if it's likeunreasonable to expect that no matter what we
do for work, we at minimumcan keep a roof over our heads and
go see a doctor when we're sick. And people are just like the entitlement
and it's wild, like when didthis happen? It's gross? So anyway,

(22:26):
I'm sorry. I didn't mean toget into this whole sees the means
of production, but I stand byit. So this situation is cut off.
Here Naja storms off. We seeLaslow and he is reading some history
to Colin Robinson, who is notinto it at all. He wants to

(22:49):
hear from one of his books,and Laslow is trying to get him into,
you know, culture and whatnot.I like the story about the elves
and the shoe maker. All right, I'll tell you the real story.
Some third rate cobbler, ripped tothe tits on formaldehyde fumes used in his
leather tanning process, imagines he's seeinglittle elves do all his work, loses

(23:17):
his business, kills himself the end. Honestly, I feel like that's true
in this universe. I mean likeI feel like a lot of stuff Lasso
was making up on the fly thatfeels like, no, that's what happened.
That's you know what I'm saying,Like, that's fucking The mad hatter

(23:41):
thing, apparently is because hatters usedcrazy like I think they use like some
kind of mercury in the treatment ofhats, and they would go nuts.
And that's where the mad hatter conceptcomes from, which it's just so upsetting
you guys. Do you ever stopand think about all of these like extremely

(24:06):
toxic substances that used to just bepart of everyday life. Put in hats,
put in wall paper, paint orpaste or paint, and so you'd
be literally sitting in a room likesurrounded by a thin layer of asbestos or
lead or whatever, and it wasjust the way you lived. And like,

(24:29):
wonder, what is the next substancewe're going to find out? Does
this you know, like it's inevitable. We've already started to find out that
microplastics that are literally in people's bloodand that it's sort of like unavoidable if
you use plastic for anything in yourlike consuming of food, if it comes,

(24:52):
if it's in contact with plastic,you probably have now got plastic on
your insides. What else have wegot? What else is in our future?
It's just very scary sometimes. Butthis is when Naja she's looking through
a book and she stops and getsvery excited and says, everybody, we

(25:15):
are taking a trip to the nightmarket. And she describes this as a
market that actually exists in every singletown, but it's always hidden from the
prying, pathetic eyes of humans.And Nandor says, it's like the famous
Italian street fairs of Little Italy,very diverse, lots of different cultures represented,

(25:42):
sticky shit all over the ground,and a good place to pillage or
barter chotchkes. I want to addressonce again Naja's look, because at the
beginning of the episode we have thatvery statement eyeglass thing in her hair.

(26:02):
In this scene, she has gota permed look to her hair, and
she's wearing a red beret with likea leopard pattern on it and green,
sparkly eyeshadow, and it's just reallylike the whole energy of her with these

(26:22):
looks is she is playing up herappearance in a way that she hadn't in
other episodes. It's not to saythat she never dressed up, but she
mostly kind of wore the same outfita lot. Her hair was the same
most of the time, and theamount of different looks that she's going through,
it feels like there's a combo ofthings. One, she's more successful

(26:47):
because of this nightclub thing, andbecause of that, she feels like she
has a certain image that she needsto maintain because of that, and she
has to be a bit more fashionedforward, but also the whole Like what
I keep thinking is at the forefrontof this, and I may be wrong,
but when you feel better about yourself, you start taking better care of

(27:12):
your appearance, which weirdly then makesyou feel better about yourself, and it's
like a cycle. And I liketo think that she's finally finding success with
something that she has tried, andit's something that's been a desire to try
for a long time. She's wantedto do one of these nightclubs and kept

(27:34):
getting slapped down, and she finallyhas gotten the chance and it's working out.
So she's kind of like feeling alittle bit high on herself and is
showing off a little bit more becauseshe's feeling more confident, and I am
into it. I really love seeingall of these different looks like it's really

(27:56):
really fun. I'm sure that it'smostly wigs and stuff. I don't care.
It just looks really great. Sowe have a scene with Nandor talking
to his wife and apparently he doesn'twant her to come, and it's like

(28:17):
she's still a human. So itwas mentioned, and I think it was
Martin that was like, maybe he'llturn her into a vampire, and I
was like, I can't believe.I didn't think of that. That is
not on the menu. So far, it hasn't even been mentioned. But
Nandor tells Guillermo, if anybody stopsyou and asks why a human is here,

(28:41):
I want you to tell them thatyou're an orc, to which Karamo
was like, but I don't looklike an orc. And then he gets
this real self conscious expression and hesays do I. And then later on
he does have to say that,and the person sniffs him and it says

(29:03):
my mistake, sorry, and apparentlyit works. I felt so bad for
him in this moment. I wouldsay I was a hobbit. I don't
know if those are real. Inthis universe. But since there are Baba
dukes, I'm going to go aheadand say hobbits are real. I'm not
quite short enough, but I'm certainlycurly headed and round enough, and I've
got fairly big feet, not asbig as one would hope for a hobbit,

(29:26):
but what can you do. We'reall flawed in our way. So
his wife pops out from behind him, Nandor's wife and says, I'm very
excited for this trip as well.Even though we live in the same house.
It's so rare that Nandor asks mealong when he has an outing with
his friends. And as she's sayingthis, you know what, I changed

(29:51):
my mind. I think I'd ratherjust stay home, And I am what
is and we're going to do whenhis wishes run out? How many is
this? I wish there were somethinglike kind of keeping track, but I
also think we're not meant to know, so that when he runs at it

(30:11):
is a bit of a shock.But yeah, he comes up to her.
Oh what a bummer. I'm sosorry, But okay, fine,
I miss you already, and heleaves and she is left standing there looking
a little bit I won't even sayconfused, just sort of blank, and
I wonder if there's any part ofher that is thinking, like starting to

(30:34):
catch on to the fact that sheis being manipulated in some way. I
don't know how much she is awareof magic at all. And I also,
you know, I had said somethingwhen they first appeared, all of
his wives, that he had hadabout them walking out into the regular world
and getting a bit of a shockat seeing how far ahead in time they

(30:56):
have traveled. I don't think thathas happened with her at all. And
I'm wondering if we're ever going tosee her leave the house and start to
like put two and two together thatsomething really major happened, you know.
But yeah, Nandor is just likeI just wanted to hang out with boys,
That's all I wanted. So wesee them all getting onto a subway

(31:22):
car, and Guillermo is sort ofconfused, like this is a regular subway
full of normal people, to whichnaj says, how dare you question me?
And it turns out that she hasevery right to be irritated with him
questioning her, but it certainly seemsodd to begin with. So this dude

(31:48):
steps forward and he says, ladiesand gentlemen, I'm trying to raise money
from my uncle Jeffrey. He needsa new heart. Anything that you can
give all helps. And he startsplaying this music out of this speaker,
and you think that he's gonna singalong, and instead he starts farting in

(32:12):
rhythm. And I love that thesubtitles have brackets and it just says farting
rhythmically. This is such a stupid, bad joke, but it really did
make me laugh because it was sounexpected. And a bunch of people start
to like react to the smell apparently, and they get up and leave.

(32:35):
This is a tip for those ofyou who have not had to travel on
subways. Ever, you're gonna getbuskers like this all the time, people
who either come around and offer toperform in exchange for money, or they're
like selling some little bullshit for money, DVD's, you know, fabric flowers

(32:57):
whatever. You're also going to occasionallystumble on a subway car that it's super
packed today. Everybody is like upto the gills in every other car.
And then, for some weird reason, this one subway car has almost nobody

(33:19):
in it. Perfect Why don't weall pile into that subway car, and
then you're going to get in thereand you're going to realize your mistake.
It's going to be either somebody tooka giant shit on one of the seats
and the whole place smells so fuckinghorrid that nobody can stomach it. Somebody

(33:42):
threw up and the force of thetrain moving made the puke stream from the
one end of the train car allthe way to the other, and there's
nowhere to stand that doesn't have pukeon it. Somebody in general just reeks,
and this can happen to anybody,but I had this happened in particular.

(34:05):
It was somebody who was unhoused,and it was awful. It was
clear like they were probably just goingto the bathroom in their clothing and wearing
their clothing around like they smelled likea full on toilet, and you couldn't
be within like ten feet of thisperson and breathe. It was horrifying.
Anytime that you see in a verycrowded place, a mysteriously like open free

(34:31):
area, that shit is going tobe open and free because it's too horrible
for anybody to handle. You didn'tstumble on a treasure, You fell for
the thing that everybody knew to avoid, so just as my tip for the
day. So everybody leaves, andthen this guy stops the music and says,

(34:57):
all right, if you're still here, you know why you're here.
Next stop night Market. And whenhe says that, his eyes light up
in that gray sort of way thatreminds me a little bit of Colin Robinson.
And I don't know if he waslike feeding off of the awkwardness of
the people around him or what wasgoing on, but yeah, it was

(35:19):
a pretty fun introduction. One dudetakes his beanie off and he's got like
horns on the front of his head. So the train pulls up, doors
open. We see quite a crowdout there with tons of like candles and
torches. It looks so cool,you guys, honestly, And I really

(35:42):
this put me in mind of abook that I covered with Miles actually that
it's called Nevermore I think was whatit was called by Neil Gaiman, and
the market in that is called theFloating Market, I think. And it
is a market that is in Londonbelow, which is like an alternate London

(36:09):
that you can only get to ifyou have the right doorway. In and
it's peopled with like all kinds ofsupernatural creatures. There are human beings of
powers, but there's mostly like monstersand beings of different races, and it's
a really fun book. I amnot, don't kill me a huge fan

(36:32):
of Neil Gaiman, because a lotof the time I find what he's writing
to be basically fan fiction. AndI don't know why so many people suck
as dick over it, but folkslove it, which that's fine. I
just don't really get it. Thiswas a book that was like truly completely
original in a way that a lotof the other work that I have read

(36:55):
by him was not, And Ithought it was a really fun universe.
And apparently he's writing a sequel toit called The Seven Sisters, but you
know, and he was like talkingabout having written the first few chapters a
little bit after his Norse mythology bookcame out, But yeah, I have

(37:19):
no idea if there's any prospective datefor that to come out, But I
just if you guys want to listento me and Miles talk about it,
The Unspoiled Book Club feed has thatconversation, and I really really enjoyed that
book. Martin says, I lovethat book. Oh cool. I'm glad
somebody else knows I'm talking about.Asher says, I have tried to read

(37:40):
Nevermore so many times and I can'tget through it. That's fair, not
everything is for everyone. I justlike went into it kind of afraid that
I was going to feel that waybecause, like I said, I Neil
Gaiman is extremely hit or miss,and I just find him to be kind
of overrated. And there was anotherbook I covered. I believe it was

(38:04):
American Gods actually, and I coveredit with Bitches, and I felt kind
of bad because Bitches was so psychedabout it. But there were a lot
of like a lot of things thatI saw coming and if you have any
real knowledge of mythology and stuff,you probably will. And it once again
just felt like fan fic, whichthere's nothing inherently wrong with fan fic,

(38:29):
but I feel like if a womanwere writing this, they wouldn't get the
same reception. I'm just saying,there's just a certain kind of leeway given
to dudes that I don't think wouldbe extended to a woman. So they're
looking around, there's all like kindsof things going on, not just talking

(38:52):
about maybe getting Laslow a new coffin. There's a bunch of witches that want
to put kids in cages. Theyare really cool looking witches. Honestly,
I was kind of curious. Iwanted to see more of this. We
have gotten some witches in the show, but these, which is, they

(39:15):
felt more like a hobbity type,which they weren't elegant. You know,
it's a safe space for all ofdemon kind we have. Let's see,
I'm trying to find the spot whereNandor describes, like, oh my god,
this the cages that they're pointing out. You don't need any more cages.

(39:35):
I forgot that. That is whatGuillermo says to Nandor because he's thinking
about buying one. A safe spacefor all of demon kind. Sadly,
we have no one form of currencybetween us all, so we have to
rely on the old ways, thebartering system, which is exactly in the

(39:57):
floating market in that book, it'sexclusively barter. Nobody deals in money.
It's just like what can you give? And the things that you can barter
can get really like esoteric, whichis really fun. So this is when
Naja chimes in. Lots of peopleusually end up dead. Luckily, I

(40:24):
come from a long line of highlyskilled hagglers. My Giagia, she once
traded just a little bit of herthigh meat for a whole bag of onions.
So I think I know what I'mdoing. You guys, I don't

(40:47):
even know what to say to that. We're just gonna move right along.
Something about saying thigh meat. OhChrist. So the first place we go
are a pair of valkyries, andI want, if anybody is able to,

(41:08):
I really want to emphasize the differencebetween these two women and the way
they're handling this expression thing they're doing, and why one of them is super
good at it and why one ofthem is not. And this is a
thing that I know. I amnot the only one who can see it,

(41:30):
but it bothers me that directors don'tseem to be either they don't know
how to direct an actor to notdo it, or they don't choose the
right cut for the final product tothat doesn't have this happening. But it's
something I will run into in alot of television, especially, but some

(41:53):
movies as well. The woman onthe left has the wide eyed, staring
thing with an almost entirely expressionless,face perfectly down, and there is something
about her that looks straight up nonhuman. Due to that, the woman

(42:16):
on the right just looks like she'strying really hard not to laugh. It
does she doesn't get across the creepyfactor of the woman on the left,
who seems fully committed and is likenot thinking in the way a human thinks.

(42:37):
You just look at her face andyou're like, oh, yeah,
that's not right. Something's wrong there. The woman on the right was cracking
up a second ago and barely gotit under control before the camera started rolling
again, and she may not makeit to the end of this scene before
she cracks and starts laughing again.That's the thing. And I you,

(42:58):
guys, this will absolutely make orbreak something for me, whether or not
you can tell a person's got abit of a smile going on underneath.
And I'm trying to think of whatI watched recently. But there was another
thing, and I don't know ifI was covering it or if it was
just for fun that I was watchingit, but it was a really similar

(43:19):
thing where the person was supposed tobe like dead serious and have no expression,
but there was a bit of agrin right under the surface. You
could see it. You could seeit so clearly, and it just completely
watered down the whole performance and madeit like, and look, I get

(43:39):
that it's a comedy, but thepart that's supposed to be funny is how
creepy they are. And if oneof them just feels like they're on an
SNL skit and trying not to break, that totally undermines what's supposed to make
it funny. So I just reallyenjoy seeing these like two women side by

(44:04):
side because it's something that I've triedto describe before, and I'm always like,
how do I get across what itwould look like if they weren't doing
this, And it's just such aperfect spot, a perfect example, getting
these two faces right next to eachother and one is on point exactly and
the other isn't, and the twoof them, I will say that I

(44:30):
like the way it's done where theymove and look at the camera and then
move back and look at Naja exactlyat the same time as one another.
I thought that was a really funtouch. And she puts this vase on
the table and they are like kindof walking around as if they're attached at

(44:52):
the shoulder and looking at it andtalking about the glaze and like how much
it's worth. And apparently this wasjust something that Naga grabbed off of,
like Nandor's mantelpiece on the way outof the house. So this worked out

(45:12):
for her, but it was noeffort and not something that she even necessarily
knew was valuable at the time.It makes me wonder if they decided to
sell more of their possessions, howmuch they could get for some of that
stuff randomly that's like actually antiques becausethey just have had it since they were
turned kind of thing, you know. So Laslow at this point he's walking

(45:36):
around with Colin, and Colin's talkingabout fairies, and Laslow opens a dumpster
and these two fairies that basically looklike giant cockroaches essentially float up and talk
to him and he has to belike, yeah, that's what real fairies

(45:57):
look like. And honestly, youguys, if fairies were real, that
is probably more like what they wouldlook like because everything's ugly. Oh god.
So this is when we get tothe real meat of the episode,
which is the familiar fights, andit turns out that there's a whole thing

(46:24):
here where vampires bring their familiars toif not fight to the death, they
fight until one of them is injured, and then a vampire will come and
end the life of the one thatlost, And it's essentially gonna go until

(46:44):
one of them, like is,They're gonna keep going until there is a
one familiar left standing, and usuallyit seems like that familiar is allowed to
just go on with his life.But because Gillermo winds up sort of throwing
a wrench in things by not beingfun to watch, they don't want to

(47:07):
let him just walk away, sohe winds up in a much, much
worse position, and he's over herehorrified, of course, at finding out
the familiars are basically treated like dogsin a dog fighting ring. And Nandor
is like, I know that youcould take every single one of these guys,

(47:29):
y'all. I want you to stopfor a moment and pity me,
because your girl completely forgot Guillermo isa fucking vampire hunter. And I couldn't
understand why Nandor was so confident,genuinely had a moment of like, you
think he can take all of theseguys, Why do you think that,

(47:51):
and it wasn't until it's explicitly likementioned that I go, oh right,
oh my god, because we justhaven't seen any of that out of Guillermo
in a minute, so I lowkey just like completely dropped that from his
personality in my mental checklist. Sorryabout that, Guillermo, but also,

(48:15):
you know, it's been a minutesince we've seen anything, So I'm not
gonna be I'm not gonna blame myselffor that totally. And Nando tries to
do the like, oh my familiarwon't be fighting tonight, and everybody starts
booing him and it turns into thiswhole thing and they do the whole what
is he scared? And he takesthat as a personal insult and is like

(48:37):
fine, and so he puts Guillermointo the ring, so to speak.
I want to mention the guy who'slike hosting this, who's the one who's
out here speaking on the mic.He has this top hat, and I
don't know who this actor is.He felt vaguely familiar, but he fine,

(49:01):
And I think it's just because he'slike such a mischievous energy and I
always tend to go for that kindof like trickster vibe, but there's something
about him that I was just like, hey, what are you doing later,
dude, what's going on? Andthe fight begins. Guillermo keeps getting

(49:22):
the better of everybody, but notin ways that are necessarily exciting and fun.
At one point, there's a womanthat he beats because he just takes
her glasses and she's just sitting thereand it's just like, would she just
give me my glasses back? Andeverybody is booing, oh my god,

(49:45):
you guys, I forgot about thefact that the Valkyries are selling furniture and
meatballs, Like akia, oh mygod, I'm not going to criticize the
ways of other cultures. That's agood little joke actually, So she keeps
trading things up. Is what's goingon with Nada. I'm just going to

(50:06):
jump over to her really quick andfinish what's going on before I finish the
familiar fights. So yeah, shetrades the meatballs to some imps who give
her a T shirt that says,if you can read this, the bitch
fell off and it's meant to beworn by somebody on a motorcycle. And
she goes to this other shady dudeand is like how about this T shirt?

(50:29):
Because he actually he's like, Shebasically is like, don't you have
anything for sale that might come frommore under the counter, to which he's
like, what if you're a narc? And she pulls his T shirt out
and it is like, would anarc have this shirt with a very misogynistic
joke that laughs at very real roadssafety regulations or so it's a very very

(50:55):
good joke because there's this long pauseand the dude is looking at her.
He starts laughing, and at firstI thought he was laughing at her,
but then he's like, the bitchfell off. That's really good, and
I was like, oh my god, she got it, because when she
said find me for onions, Iwas fully expecting that we were going to

(51:15):
see Naja just like hitting roadblocks,and instead that ship is working. It's
working. She's managing to constantly tradeupward. So she gets from him these
vials of some sort of like weird, milky looking substance, and we do

(51:38):
not find out what those are,and we find out later that this is
some sort of like a Lily ofthe Valley essence, and it apparently lessens
the pain of being a wraith,which I don't think I realized that raves

(52:00):
were in constant pain, but thatreally blows. And she offers it to
the union leader in exchange for himaccepting that she is going to change absolutely
nothing, and he is about toaccept it, but his people are right

(52:20):
there and hear what he's doing,and they jump on his ass and pop
him like a blood filled water balloon. There is nothing left but a smear
of blood on the ground. Andthen one of them steps forward and it's
like, I'm the one that's incharge now, and here's what we're gonna

(52:43):
get. And she offers them oneday a week off and she's going to
build four news storage closets for themto sleep in, which is truly like,
that's the deal they strike, andit's, you know, an extra
day a week off, Like that'sgood, but oh my god, it's
just so it's so weak sauce,and I do enjoy how Naja really thinks

(53:07):
she has solved this problem, butonce they jump on him, she immediately
starts chanting shit, shit, shitto herself. After all the trouble that
she went through to get that stuff. It seems as if the vials are
either confiscated or just broken. Iwould not be surprised if they break them,
and I was really glad. Iwas really relieved they at least come

(53:30):
to some sort of arrangement because Iwas thinking that this was going to be
the running joke was that the raidsare treated just as badly as geearmos treated
basically, you know. And likeI said, I'm sure there's going to
be more budding heads, but fornow, I felt like we got sort
of a happy ending here. Martinsays, it's called water Lily of the

(53:53):
Nile. That is such a weirdname. Thank you. I forgot that's
what a weird name. Okay,but it is good to know that that
is, you know, it's sortof like a morphine. Is the connection
that I'm making mentally. So that'sthe deal with Naja. We're gonna wrap

(54:16):
things up with with Laslow and Colin. He's talking to Colin about how gnomes
are or the gnome statues there arereal, and as he's saying, like
grown up sometimes lie because the truthis so boring, I'm thinking, oh,

(54:39):
okay, he's lying about those gnomes. But then the gnomes animate and
just jump down and run away,and I was like, oh, oh,
okay, so that's maybe they're notscared, but they're definitely actually real.
He mentions the emperor's new clothes,and behind him is a witch.
They're very real and one day they'llfight to get hold of your semen,

(55:02):
but not in a fun way.Oh what semen? Oh my god.
So eventually Colin is sort of wonover by Laslow and asks for Laslow to
read to him from one of hisown books, and Laslow starts reading with,

(55:25):
you know this sentence that I'm like, this is ringing a bell.
That sentence is really famous area ofKansas known as out there, We're over
there or something, and I waslike, what is that? And I
looked it up and it's in coldblood. So that's gonna be when he

(55:47):
says to Colin, this gets prettyintense pretty quickly. I was like,
yeah, wow, all right.I mean, if you're gonna be reading
to him like things that actually happened, historical things, you could do worse.
It's it is, you know,embellished, certainly, as he has

(56:08):
been accused of doing capote, butyou know it's going to get a kid's
interest, and considering how incredibly bloodyfairy tales are I guess it's kind of
on par so sure, why not? And now I'm going to wrap up
the familiar fights the whole thing withThere's like a hot one that comes out

(56:32):
and he's wearing what I think arelike brown corduroys and he's smoking while he
starts to like get in Guillermo's faceand really showing off a lot of leaping
through the air, a lot oflike really dramatic and eventually he collapses and
starts having like an asthma attack.But this ends again with Guillermo just sort

(56:57):
of like bumming the audience out,and nobody knows what to do with him,
And eventually Nandor is like, allright, fine, like we're gonna
they have this big, badass avampire that's gonna come in and just straight
up kill Giermo and that's the waythey're going to wrap the show. And

(57:17):
Nandor starts to be like, justkill him, and Garmo says, okay,
look I can, but like,what is everybody gonna do if I
just managed to kill him? Imean a crowd of vampires and I just
kill a vampire. How do youthink that's gonna go? And Nander's like,

(57:37):
ah shit, okay, that's fair. So Nandor then says, I'll
fight him and I'll kill him.And what occurs is the two of them
start this off like it's just gonnabe a little bit of a you know,
show between them, but they begintalking about how Guillermo actually beat Nandor

(58:01):
in their last fight, and Nandorstarts to get pretty salty about the fact
that he won and tries to sayhe let Guillermo win, which of course
results in both of their pride beingpricked and the fight starting to get pretty
genuine, and there are some hilariousmoments. You guys. They're one of

(58:25):
my favorites. So the guy who'sdoing the commentating is very good, and
I know that this is like allscripted, but it's still written well.
So he says something about how whenGuillermo gets up after everybody is certain that

(58:49):
he has died, he's got ashovel and he comes out with it and
start he breaks it in half andstarts like whirling it around, and the
commentator says that he's going phantomenous withit, which I thought was hysterical.
You guys, you should have heardme cackling that got me so bad,
perfect, perfect way to say that. So Guillermo is in the position where

(59:15):
he can kill Nandor. He hasgot you know, steak essentially at his
heart, and Nandor is like,go ahead and kill me. I can't
believe that I lost, And like, what kind of fucking vampire am I
if I can't even beat my ownfamiliar And Guermo is like, no,

(59:36):
that is not what we're doing.We have to fake this so that we
can get the fuck out of here. Pretend to kill me. So that
is what they do. It's apretty, uh like convincing little scene where
Nandor flies into the air behind himand pretends to like snap his neck,

(59:57):
and then he lifts Guillermo's body overhis head and like just eggs the crowd
on who are cheering him. AndI kind of wondered if this was going
to bring out a bit of actualbloodlust in Nandor, where he was going
to be like, you know,I haven't fought to the death in the
midst of a crowd in sometime,and I kind of miss it because it

(01:00:20):
seems like it was his total jamwhen he was a human, you know.
But yeah, that is the end. Of that story between the two
of them, and I was sortof into it. You guys, I
really am a fan of any timethat Nandor and Gillarmo throw down in any

(01:00:45):
real way, whether it's physical orverbal. I just like them having confrontations.
So getting to do this and reallyNandor seeing that Gimo got the best
of him, it's satisfying. Ireally really enjoyed it. So all right,
I'm out of time. I'm overtimea little bit, so I'm going
to have to wrap up. Butthank you guys so much for hanging out.

(01:01:06):
I hope you're all enjoying the coverage. Thank you to Max for commissioning
this, and until next time tothe loom. Motherfucker's That was an unspoiled

(01:01:46):
Network podcast.