Karl Puschmann: The Brokenwood Mysteries and The Punisher: One Last Kill

The Brokenwood Mysteries

The detectives of Brokenwood continue to grapple with the small town’s ever-growing murder rate. From attempted alien abductions to a surfing priest with a dark history, New Zealand’s most lethal small town is back! (TVNZ1, TVNZ+) 

The Punisher: One Last Kill 

As Frank Castle searches for meaning beyond revenge, an unexpected force pulls him back into the fight (Disney+). 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:07):
You're listening to the Saturday Morning with Jack Teams podcast
from News Talks AB.

Speaker 2 (00:12):
Carl Pushman is our screen time experty here with us
this morning? Did I Carl jack Clove? You must be
a Slow Horses fan, aren't you?

Speaker 3 (00:21):
I love Slow Horses so good.

Speaker 2 (00:22):
It's such a good series. This Gary Oldman is just
the perfect character for it as well, and funny because
he's played George Smiley uh in the modern adaptation of
Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy. I'm really showing my colors here.
I'm a big geek for the British spy dramas. But yeah,
he's Oh my gosh, he is just so amazing as
jackson Man. But a real privilege.

Speaker 3 (00:44):
His transformation that is unbelievable.

Speaker 2 (00:47):
Isn't it. It's just he's such an odious kind No odious,
isn't right? Because there is there are lobly, Yeah, yes, slobbily.
He reminds me, do you remember this is really turning
back the hands of time? I remember keeping up appearances.

Speaker 3 (01:00):
Oh my gosh, yes, we're.

Speaker 2 (01:03):
Going away back. Do you remember is it was it
Om's Lawoh? Oslo he was. He was the son in
law of Hyacinth's bouquet, and he was this kind of grotesque, farting,
beer drinking blob who sat on the couch watching horse
racing all day. And to a certain extent, there are
some qualities that I think Jackson Lamb and he share. Anyway,

(01:26):
you got two more cracking shows for us this weekend,
so let's begin with the return of The Broken Wood
Mysteries on TVNZ one.

Speaker 3 (01:33):
Yes, back to the most Deadly Town in Artia. The
show's now in its twelfth season, which, you know, that's remarkable,
not just for the longevity the show started way back
in twenty fourteen, but also for the fact that the
small town still has anyone living there after constant grizzly
murders year after year, full on crazy investigations going on,

(01:54):
but five thousand people still choose to make that their home.
You know. The show focuses on investigating those grizzly murders,
but the tone is light and cozy, and you know,
after all the time, the formulas is calculated as a
murderer's scheme, but unlike the Baddies, the writers do get
away with it. It's just such an enjoyable watch. The
episodes are ninety minutes long, so they're you know, episode

(02:17):
or is that a film? You sort of find the
balance there. But the show doesn't drag or lull. It
just gently sucks you into its cozy little mystery that's
going on, almost in complete opposite to the grizzly murder
that's being investigated. It's quite funny, but you know, it
would appeal to those mystery fans who've done it, fans
that like Agatha Christie style mysteries or the Knives Out movies.

(02:41):
It's it's an obvious recommendation for those people. First episode
of season twelve kicks off with an absolute doozy. A
man is murdered on the Broken Wood golf course and
all signs point to it being aliens. So they're starting
to get out there, and they make this sort of
wacky premise believable because obviously the two long standing, grossly

(03:03):
overworked detectives seeing Sergeant Mike Shippid played by and Detective
Christen Sims played by Fern Sutherland, they're on the case
and they have their cynicism, but there's an alien convention
in town. There's a multitude of suspicious characters or with
their own little motives that they could have and acting
very dodgy and suspicious, so you'll get no spoilers from

(03:24):
me whether the small Town now has an alien invasion
going on. But it's a very cozy watch, like sort
of wrapping up in your dressing gown and having a
nice hot cup of tea. It's cozy and comfortable, and
i'd consider those two items mandatory if you're going to
sit down and watch the show.

Speaker 2 (03:39):
Yeah. Yeah, it's so much fun. I mean that The
Broken Wood Mysteries is a bit of a key We classic,
and like you say, it is kind of a good
one for curling up on a couch and suspending your
disbelief just for a few minutes.

Speaker 1 (03:51):
Belief.

Speaker 2 (03:52):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, No, it's a lot of fun. Okay.
So that's on TV and ZED one and TV and
Z plus. Unique show for us this morning is The
Punisher One Last Kill, which is on Disney Plus.

Speaker 3 (04:04):
A handbreak from the extremely co Murders into extremely gory, graphic,
ultra violent, action packed murders. This is the latest from Marvel,
and they've hyped this as a Marvel Television special presentation
and I was quite curious to see what that meant.
After watching it, I've sort of discovered that a special
presentation means cramming a full season or a full movie

(04:27):
into a lean forty five minutes, which is quite an
enjoyable way to do things. You don't have to tune
in week after week after week, and Marvel sort of
let their movies drag over the two and a half
hour mark, which is too long for what they're doing.
So this forty five minute compacting of both of those
things that worked for me. Now, the Punisher, if you're

(04:51):
not aware of him, he's Marvel's most controversial hero. He's
a former marine who saw his family gunned down by
the MiB during a family picnic, and he vows vengeance
on all criminals from that moment. Unlike Batman, he does
not follow a code. Instead, he is just a brutal
vigilant with lethal force, torture, murder, extreme violence. That's all
on the table for him to clean up the city. Furthermore,

(05:15):
I sort of his character sort of got co opted
a little bit in the real world. Military units, police officers,
political extremists started putting his logo onto their uniforms and things,
which sparked quite intense debate over the character's real world symbolism.
That will leave that side of the character alone, because
the character is a very good anti hero if you

(05:37):
like that kind of action stuff.

Speaker 2 (05:39):
Now.

Speaker 3 (05:39):
I enjoyed the Punished comics back in the day, but
I haven't been keeping up with Marvel's interconnected world because
there's so much going on there. So I went to
this very much just as a standalone special presentation. Lets
see what it's all about, and it was quite good.
It was quite a strange watch because the first half
is Frank Castle, the Punisher, dealing with his suffering extreme PTSD.

(06:01):
He's from one Marine, so he's haunted by all that,
and he's in a very very dark place. It's sort
of like those trauma aspects from Rambo one, if you will.
Then he gets drawn back into the world his life
as the Vigilante, and the special presentation then launches into

(06:25):
the insane action of Rambo five. You get this kind
of jarring like, yeah, this is very traumatic and here's
a guy suffering very deep dark trauma and now we're
in full action, over the top schlock like this is
this is a hard m show. It's not a kid's
at all, which is quite. It's quite weird seeing it,

(06:47):
you know, the Disney logo and then hard m But
for for a full action shlock, it's a good watch.

Speaker 2 (06:54):
Yeah, it sounds a lot of fun. Okay, So The
Punisher One Last Kill is on Disney Plus. Carl's first
pick for us, The Broken Wood Mysteries is on TV
in Dead one and TV in Dead Plus. And of
course you can hear more from Karl on his sub
stack scream crack

Speaker 1 (07:08):
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