Blaine begins the episode with a podcast overview and the generalities of this week's episode (0:02).
Once Donovan joins, they discuss the return of the longest-running TV show, 'It's Always Sunny In Philadephia' and determine how its sustained its longevity (3:15). From there, they have brief discussion on the Apple TV+ series 'Stick' and its most recent episode (11:14). To conclude the non-spoiler segment, they give thought to 'The Bear' as a whole season (14:42).
After a short break, it's time to discuss the ridiculous plot points of both 'It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia' and 'Abbott Elementary,' as the gang end their time there (14:57). Both hosts agree that the Apple TV+ 'Stick' had its best episode thus far, and they explain why (32:38). Finally, it's the last four episodes of the fourth season of 'The Bear' (35:38) Was it better than season three? Were problems solved? All that, and more on this week's Taking It Down episode.
For more, visit the link that's provided here to go to The Alabama Take: https://thealabamatake.com/
If you wish to sign up for the newsletter mentioned, use this link to sign up and have it delivered to your inbox: https://thealabamatake.com/newsletter
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:01):
Thanks for tuning in to TakingIt Down.
Taking it down is thestreaming and TV podcast, which understands
you have a limited amount oftime but plenty of intelligence,
no matter your job or your status.
We know that a deeperunderstanding of art doesn't mean
that you want a lecture either.
It means you want to think itthrough or test your ideas or hear
a real conversation, not justcritics flexing film school jargon
(00:25):
or Hollywood insiders rattlingoff numbers from a box office.
From using your timesagaciously on what to watch to constructing
why a show hits or misses,you'll leave each episode on Tuesday
with recommendations or whatto avoid.
Each Tuesday we start with aspoiler free segment.
Decide if a show's for you or not.
(00:45):
After a quick break, we digdeeper into a show or movie's qualities.
It's the section where weunpack television with an eye for
the blue collar folks, withconversations about what the series
is doing, where it stumbles.
If it matters.
We're talking TV withouttalking down.
All right, if you're new, welcome.
I'm the weekly host, Blaine.
(01:07):
I'm also editor in chief ofthe website the Alabama Take.
That's the site where writingson various things appear and it produces
this podcast and several more podcasts.
In a minute I'm going to bejoined by co host Donovan who has
the best insights on shows and more.
This week we are getting intothe return of the longest scripted
(01:28):
television show ever.
At this point it's It's AlwaysSunny in Philadelphia.
Believe it or not, that's thelongest series that's not animated.
Surely the Simpsons will wearthat crown.
I guess, until someone rips itfrom Homer's dead, drunken, bloated
hand or head.
Anyway, we'll also touch onthe latest episode of Stick on Apple
TV plus.
(01:49):
And then to end, it's our bigwrap up on the thoughts of this fourth
season of the Bear from Huluand fx.
There's your rundown.
It's time for ProfessorDonovan to come in and give me a
new ideas we've never considered.
Lets get going Alabama take projection.
(02:10):
All right, Donovan's here.
There is no Adam in thepodcast this week.
I don't think next week either.
Third chair being empty, he'sbusy communing.
With the Lord on a higherplane of existence than we could
ever imagine.
The fact is, he's in GreatBritain enjoying the hell out of
himself, seeing Oasis performlive, putting on shows of his own
under the moniker Sister Ray Davies.
(02:33):
And that's on Wednesday, July23rd at SJQ in The heart of Dalston,
which is a huge part ofLondon's big music scene.
Go.
It looks awesome.
Do you like the.
That I had all that info at.
At my.
I did.
I looked it up too, and I waslooking at pictures and stuff.
Yeah, it does.
It's the center of London's music.
(02:54):
Dalston.
I guess it's pronounced Dalston.
Maybe Dals.
D Think so.
Anyway, sjq, you can meet Adam.
Co host Adam.
If you have heard him, you cango meet him.
Go with care, though, becausethat bloke's likely on cloud nine.
Cloud ten.
Bosch.
(03:16):
Somehow or another, though, Ithink we were running the podcast
without a third chair last time.
It's Always Sunny inPhiladelphia began.
Its previous season really was.
Was that.
I think it was just you.
And I think you're right.
We did the Ricksky Ratepisode, which has just a hilarious
Danny DeVito bit where he'srefilling, getting water in a cardboard
(03:37):
fry container for some reason,and he's like, what the hell?
It looks like I'm doing.
I'm getting water drinkingfrom a. I know what you're talking
about.
They're an inch and a halfhigh at most and they hold.
FRAT the greatest example ofnetwork interference ever.
Yeah.
With Danny DeVito being addedto It's Always Sunny.
(04:01):
Yeah.
After the first season, I think.
Was it John Landgraf in chargeeven back then?
And he said, I think so.
They added Danny DeVito for anepisode and he insisted that he stay
on cast.
Yes.
That was brilliant.
Yeah.
You don't hear about studiointerference being really good, and
I like that, probably.
Because it usually isn't, but.
But this one.
Incredible.
(04:22):
We've got two episodes of It'sAlways Sunny in Philadelphia to begin
its season back 17, a recordnumber for scripted television.
Yeah.
Have they learned anything?
That's the best part of this show.
I'm sad this isn't thespoilers section, but friends, I
can tell you, they did not.
If they did, it would be adifferent show.
(04:43):
Absolutely.
It would be horror.
It would be the world we live in.
We have it.
We do live in the world thatSonny created.
I. I think that we're gonnasee some good corporate synergy this
season because I really thinkthat putting Frank on the Golden
Bachelor.
Yes.
As we've seen teased in the trailer.
(05:03):
Yes.
That's not a spoiler.
It's been teased.
He's going to be really.
Is gonna be really excellent.
He's gonna get a real piece of ass.
He thinks to love Danny DeVitois a national treasure.
Thank God he's on TV as Frank,the dad.
If you don't watch It's AlwaysSunny in Philadelphia, but you do
(05:27):
watch Abbott Element.
Element.
Abbott elementary, theirrecent, fairly recent show episode
might have confused youbecause the gang was there.
The gang was there because ofcommunity service.
And this season starts withthe gang.
You know what.
What were they doing when theyweren't being filmed with the Abbott
(05:49):
elementary crew.
Who'S filming elementarybehind the scenes footage of.
Yeah, there's tenure at Abbott Elementary.
It was good.
I thought the gang fucks upAbbott Elementary.
You know, I love how they giveyou everything in the title almost.
Yes.
And as it turns out, it wasway worse than what was on Abbott
(06:09):
Elementary.
I did watch that episode.
Did you happen to go back andwatch it?
I did not watch it, but I reada review of it and I heard you talk
about it.
But I'll be Abbott elementaryas it is.
Makes me sad in a way thatit's always Sunny in Philadelphia
visiting Abbott elementary doesn't.
How so?
Just because of the chronic.
(06:30):
It's not getting any better.
Chronic underfunding forschools, especially for the most
populations that are at themost like it.
It may.
It bums me out that we as acountry have just been like, yeah,
public school teachers need tosupplement their classrooms with
their own income.
And watching a show about it,I don't need to watch that.
(06:51):
It makes me like.
So much of the plot is like,obviously they're being creative
and trying to help the kids.
And I'm just like, oh, but ina good world, you shouldn't have
to do this.
But it's a comedy, sosupposedly it's very funny.
It is funny.
It has some really good moments.
I'm not saying anything badabout Abbott elementary, this show.
I'm saying something aboutDonovan watching it, who was just,
(07:14):
like, too bummed out to keep going.
What it reminds you of.
Yeah, exactly.
Just the relentless march ofneoliberalism, I guess.
I think you've got it.
Yeah.
Abbott elementary manages tomake all that good comedy, but it's
because of their character interactions.
Yeah, They've got solidcharacters there.
You saw a hint of the janitor.
He is so funny to me.
(07:35):
Whereas them all being onSunny, it's like, I know everything's
supposed to be horrible.
That was great for me.
Yes.
There's a bit in Abbottelementary where they cannot fathom
children not knowing Run DMC'sHollis Christmas in Hollis.
And they're playing it, andthen every teacher kind of walks
around in the Background ofthe scene.
(07:57):
Even the janitor walks by andis just singing every word.
They know every word.
How do you not know this one?
And we got a little something there.
And in this episode.
Yes.
Yeah.
My wife watches Abbott and Icatch a few episodes from there and
my wife even watches it withour 7 year old because I'll be damned.
Broadcast comedy still exists, huh?
(08:18):
Yeah, there's one.
Yeah, there is one.
It's.
It's got toned down elementsof the gang.
In that episode.
Do they teach Charlie to read?
I don't think he.
He does get to read.
No, they teach him to read.
Suppose they do teach.
Yes.
Frank ends up in the cage thatthey're designed to catch a racc.
We learn more about that raccoon.
(08:39):
Yes.
But what an odd crossover.
It's so weird.
It feels like it almost has to work.
Yeah.
Quinta Brunson, you could tellshe really, really had some fun playing
against type in one veryspecific moment in this episode.
Yeah.
Her co star.
What is his name?
Tyler Michael Williams.
(09:00):
Is that.
Am I right about his name?
Tyler James Williams.
Tyler James Williams.
You were pretty much right there.
And I love him.
He's a.
He's a good actor too.
He's funny.
A lot of fun to watch.
So the first episode of It'sAlways Sunny gives the other side
of the story of what happenedat Abbott.
Both the Abbott episode andthe Sunny episode are very funny,
but the combination of thegang being completely dumb as well
(09:22):
as the Abbott facultydevolving in their presence using
stronger language, it isn'tjust jarring.
But laugh out loud funny.
It makes sense.
That's.
It's the classic Sunny wherelike even good people are brought
low by how horrible they are.
Yes.
Yeah.
That's the longevity of theshow, how it centers around horrible.
(09:45):
I think the world keepsgetting better for a few people at
least and worse for a lot more people.
And then those of us in thewhole a lot more camp, we want to
see folks who are justhorrible, Truly dumb, but never succeed.
Yeah.
You know, because in the realworld we got horrible.
(10:07):
Truly dumb.
And stepping up to lead maybe.
What.
What are the things I loveabout Sonny is.
And I.
Did you read the New York Times?
I did.
Article.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So anyone who had New YorkTimes last week, folks, they did
a.
A good feature on Sonny for onit in.
In honor of its 17th season.
(10:28):
And I think that the guy whowrote that, and I would agree with
him, really hit the nail onthe head with just like how clear
eyed the show is about Its characters.
Uh huh.
No one's under any delusionsthat these guys are good people.
In fact, it wouldn't be funnyif anyone but them thought that.
And like they're utterly cleareyed about them as their character
(10:50):
and also about like what thatleads to in a way that feels really
fun and refreshing.
It would be weird if someonewatched this show with thoughts that,
oh, one of them or two of themare kind of okay people.
Right.
If you want to emulate any ofthese folks, you might have done
too much Charlie work.
(11:11):
Who I would watch this showand think these are normal.
This is something to do.
But we'll talk a little bitmore about.
It's always Sunny in thespoiler in maybe just a couple of
things.
There's not a lot to pointout, you know, if you get the the
idea.
But there are of course, plotlines that could be spoiled.
We'll get to those in thespoiler section.
(11:33):
Let's shift gears.
Did Stick have its bestepisode yet with Clark the mark for
you?
Yeah, it was the most focused.
And as I was watching it, Iwas like gentle listeners.
There are no true surprises inthis episode.
None.
But it is.
It felt like the most focused episode.
Yeah, it was kind of containedin a way.
(11:55):
Yeah, exactly.
Yeah.
What I saw was an episode justso heavy with tropes, only a surprise
or two at the most.
Yet I ended the episode justas pleased as if I'd watched, you
know, one of the best comediesof the year.
But it's not quite that.
Not as a whole, you know,Price drinking at the bar, having
(12:18):
Owen Wilson go back and forthwith strangers.
That's good.
Yeah.
Yeah, it is.
He's drinking.
You know, it harkens back towhat I saw last week.
This crew works at its bestwhen they are working together for
a goal.
Yeah.
When they're all somewhatsplit off.
(12:39):
I mean, and that's.
I'm not here to accuse likeclassic sitcom A cop being B plot
structure of, you know, like that's.
That's a classic formula.
But it did feel more cohesivewith everybody in the picture instead
of kind of split up in their various.
Yeah.
Having a clear outside of thegroup antagonist with Tim Oliphant
(13:04):
as the rival smarmy golfer whomakes millions more garners more
investment successes than Price.
Having him be the focus of whothey're after I think helped a lot
too.
It helps that Timothy Oliphantis really, really good at playing
someone who is genuinely unlikable.
He plays.
(13:26):
It's not over the top.
It's not over the top.
He plays smarmy.
He can play a hint this guymight be dangerous.
There's a hint that.
There's a hint that he mightthrow Price out or maybe even have
his buddies beat him up.
Yeah, he could.
So we do get the Price and hisold rival in the same room.
(13:47):
It takes a lot of sportstropes to get us there, but I think
it does them well.
It's the best episode for meand a good sign, I think, for.
For stick on where it's going.
Hard not to talk about thatepisode in relation to Ted Lasso's
dart episode, but I think theywere shooting for different things.
(14:10):
Yeah.
And I'd say Ted Lasso is stillthe winner there.
Oh, yeah.
I mean, as far as quality.
Yeah.
But I think it also was goingfor a moment of gentle heart, truth,
all of those things, you know,genteel heart and truth here.
I think we're just using some.
Some good old let's.
(14:30):
Let's.
Let's rub it in the face ofthe antagonist kind of tropes.
I mean, it was a sting.
A classic sting.
Yeah.
Do you like Stings, guys?
Exactly.
The bear is also on our docket.
Season four.
We're done with season four asof today here.
No spoiler land, though.
(14:50):
How'd you feel about theseason as a whole?
Good.
And I think not.
I think this is outside of therealm of spoilers, what I'm gonna
say.
But I think that some of whatit was dealing.
It was dealing with a lot ofdifferent things, and it wasn't perfect.
There were moments that werelike, okay, we're all stammering
because that's what we'reknown for.
(15:11):
We're the stammer show.
Wow.
Yeah.
And, you know, there wereparts that were sentimental, which
is fine.
It's hard.
I'm sorry.
I'm not saying that's bad, butI think there was a big overall kind
of dealing with, like, thedifficult artist.
Like, what.
At the point where people are like.
And for that himself, too.
(15:32):
Like, your art doesn't justifyX, Y, or Z.
What's it worth?
You know, what is the worth ofyour art when you have all this other.
When it's doing all this otherstuff to you.
I thought that was.
That was good.
When it's your demise, whenit's detrimental, in a way.
Yeah, could be.
Or when it allows you to treatother people poorly, you know, because
(15:54):
you're great and you can getaway with that because you're great.
Yeah.
You are right There Is a lot.
It was trying to do a lot andI think that it did a lot of that
quite well.
Yeah, well, I saw a lot ofgripes about season three.
They wanted questionsanswered, you know, slam fist on
the desk and you know, thebear is as serialized as anyone as
(16:17):
any show it wants to tell.
Elongated story, obviously tothe point where it even maybe gets
people annoyed that it doestake too long to get around to this
or that.
But I do think season four was good.
I thought it allowed forseason three to show why it existed.
(16:38):
Yeah, I agree.
I know what we talked aboutthat I think last time and I had
the episode, the start, thefinishing this season reinforced
that for me.
Yeah.
It seems as though it's aseason of a lot of pain, a lot of
truth, a lot of honesty thatbegins maybe some improvement for
a lot of these people.
It's almost like thecharacters are saying to themselves,
if I have, if I'm going to beany good at anything, I've got to
(17:01):
shrug off this burden.
Yeah, there was a lot of goodstuff and this is.
Sometimes it got a littlesentimental, but a lot of good stuff
about.
Just a lot of good stuff aboutfriends, family dynamics and the
way that those can entrap us,but also the ways that maybe those
can be changed.
(17:21):
Right.
That things can be faced, thatwe can make changes in our lives.
And I think a lot of thatfeels very resonant.
If you're sitting out thereand you've never felt that you needed
to make a change in your life,then good for you.
The rest of us will have the bear.
Yeah.
Yeah.
There might be moments whereaudiences, some people would watch
(17:44):
this show and think there's noway, way someone is that mentally
incapable of normaly when theylook as normal and act almost somewhat
normal as these characters do.
Even I would question it at times.
I would think, is this real?
(18:05):
Is this real as far as howthey're acting?
Am I believing this?
Am I in?
And most of the time I was,you know who.
And this is also not a spoiler.
The.
The one portrayal that.
And I think this is just downto acting.
That I think is absolutely correct.
Is Jamie Lee Curtis as thethird mother absolutely correct as
(18:29):
Donna?
I think so too.
Yeah, she's got it exactly right.
I think so too.
With that we'll take a breakso that we can break down some of
these things.
Spoiler wise, we'll run themdown in the same order.
So after the break, about a 30or 45 second break, you'll hear us
talk in depth about these things.
No social media algorithmdisplays everything you follow.
(18:52):
You try to hunt and find whereyour friends are on each of these
sites.
That's the reason you followedyour friends in the first place,
to see what they're up to, forit to be right there.
With the decline of reasonablediscussion on social media as well,
you know it's time to stopscrolling or at least rely on it
less.
We'll have a newsletter everynow and again, about once a week,
(19:16):
maybe less.
There will be a segment ineach newsletter that recounts what
we've done, both on the siteand in the podcast.
You won't feel left out, andyou won't have to rely on Facebook
or mama or their Uncle Teddytelling you this or that.
Instead, get it right from thesource, the middleman, the algorithm.
(19:38):
We'll give you a link to the newsletter.
Each newsletter provides somestories, some thoughts, but there's
always that section what'sgoing on on the site, so that you
can click on those in case youmissed them.
And now back to the show.
Okay, let's stick to our order.
I don't think I have a lot tosay about It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia,
(20:01):
the first two episodes.
I think they're going to doone per week now.
But they wanted to get that Abbott.
I guess they want that bump.
That Abbott bump.
Well, they wanted to get thatAbbott, probably plotline completed
so they could move on intotheir season, I would imagine.
I don't know.
They may not have any saywhatsoever in how many episodes get
released.
That might be a John Landgraftkind of thing.
(20:22):
The guy who runs fx.
I did appreciate the Abbottelementary episode because it dares
to ask the question, can jetfuel melt steel beams?
These kids don't know about 9 11.
This was like.
In some ways, this episode wasmore disjointed.
It almost felt like acollection of sketches.
(20:44):
Did not make it any less enjoyable.
And that's kind of how Abbott works.
Yeah, it is.
Which is fine.
I mean, there's nothing wrongwith that.
I'm not.
No, no, no, no.
I'm not denigrating it.
As Donovan said, it is funny.
And she on it all you want,but Billy Joel's We Didn't Start
the Fire actually rocks.
And I didn't really realize ituntil I went back and listened to
it.
(21:05):
I was like, I just took thissong for granted as a kid.
What the hell kind of rocks?
This was just like cla.
Like, it was.
It was just classic Sunny, right?
Like, they're trying to lureChildren to the.
To the choir room.
To the choir room to get thembecause they need to find their sexy.
So they're sexy.
Bad boy.
They gotta create a boy.
But this is one show where itwould be so funny just to sit there
(21:29):
because one idea leads tothis, leads to the next one, and
then there's just no way.
How does trying to get somekids to play basketball lead into?
They don't know enough about911 lead into we gotta recruit a
boy.
Banter update.
We didn't start the fire.
(21:49):
There's a lot of shenanigansand hijinks, man.
I mean, that just opens thedoor for them to be so themselves
and so stupid.
So stupid.
What do they do?
Spend two hours at least.
They take way too long forlunch to argue about 9 11.
They spend long enough thatthey clearly after school and they've
gone into conspiracy theoriesto the point where they're not sure
(22:13):
if the World Trade centeractually existed because no one's
ever seen it with their own eyes.
Dee's incredulity of we saidwe'd never forget, guys, and the
kids don't even know.
The kids don't even know.
It's just a meme to them.
Oh, yeah, that's right.
That's what they say.
(22:33):
Getting to see one very nicecharacter swear the way she does
about Dee was a real fun, funtreat for me.
So good.
It really was.
I can't wait for my wife towatch this episode because she's
yet to catch up for her Abbotttie in.
She's not a big Always Sunny.
She's kind of like me.
She will walk through the roomwhen it's Always Sunny is on and
(22:55):
maybe catch a scene or two andchuckle and then leave.
I kind of do the same thingwith Abbott at times.
Although I do watch a littlebit more of AB Elementary.
I do love that Dennis inAbbott elementary.
As soon as he sees thecameras, he's like, no, I'm gone.
Right?
I'm not going to be a part of this.
And you don't see him for therest of the episode, but here you
(23:16):
find out he's actually making coffee.
Turns out he's just makingcoffee, trying to construct a boy
band.
He's actually the only.
He's the only one who'sactually, I think, made a positive.
Weirdly enough, he made apositive contribution because his
coffee was really good.
Yeah, he was making.
He had to go, like, rundeliveries for all the teachers and
(23:36):
stuff.
What does he say?
He compares himself to WalterWhite at one point.
The Walter White of coffee.
Yeah, that's pretty good.
And then we have a secondepisode of It's Always Sunny.
Where what does it's alwayssunny do?
They look at culture.
They look at our society andthey say, what is stupid enough for
(24:00):
these very stupid people towant to be a part of, to want a piece
of?
And he inherits Is it Cake?
My daughter watches Is It Cake?
On Netflix from time to time.
She used to.
Hilarious, hilarious setup.
And so you.
You kind of forget that that'swhat they're doing.
(24:21):
Yeah.
Especially until the end whenyou're like, wait.
And then Frank Bus.
He's like, I got you.
I wanted to prove to you themagic of cake technology.
Frank fakes his own coma tobasically make a cake of himself.
It was only a matter of timebefore they figured out it was cake.
(24:41):
But, boy, it took them a verylong time.
They leave Dee to convalescewith or be there with Frank in the
coma, if he is even convalescing.
And the three guys run off toa gala because that's where the money
is, the investment for Patty's Pub.
Two really good things hereis, like, how impressed these guys
(25:07):
are by, like, they're just so stupid.
So, like, of course, like,they're the only people in the world
that could be impressed bythis, like, venture capitalist guy.
Like, they meet.
That they meet.
Who is just on every drug imaginable.
The stakes of the drug, itjust levels up at each party he takes
them to.
(25:28):
So that was great.
To the point.
To the point that they're in acrack house.
To the point that they justdid a crack house.
So that was good.
Also, it's such an obviousjoke, but when Dee pulled out the
folder that says my mostprized possession.
Yeah.
And she opens it, it's just.
(25:48):
What is it, like an episode ofBig Asses, 1973.
Yeah, it's.
It's a magazine of.
It's a porn magazine.
It's a porno.
And then, of course, Frank hasfaked a picture that Dee maybe has
drawn as a kid.
And I love my daddy.
And that was actually theprize possession.
Oh, it's just good comedy.
This is great writing.
(26:09):
It was good.
It was good.
And I don't know how they doit so consistently.
I guess I just sit around in a room.
They're so well acquaintedwith one another, and they bounce
ideas until one thing leads to another.
At this point, I mean, it hasto be like, wait, like, right, what
would these dipshits do ifthey found out Frank was In a coma,
Would they.
Would they get sidetracked bysomething else completely?
(26:30):
Yeah, they would.
You wonder if it starts with,what would they do if Frank was in
a coma?
Or what would they do if theyfound out that you could make anything
into a cake?
Which one of those was the.
Those are both validapproaches into the mentality of
this episode.
Yeah.
Consistency of Sonny, though,is really amazing.
(26:50):
It's.
I feel like it's never.
Like it's always kind of been.
It is what it is.
If you don't like it, you'renot gonna like it.
Yeah.
But it is what it is, andthere's never really been a drop
in quality after 17 years.
That was actually my.
What I was gonna bring up next.
17 seasons and seasons.
Yeah.
I guess longer than 17 years.
Yeah.
(27:10):
Because it started in 04, Ithink, or 05.
Yeah, it was in that range.
It's in that range there.
It was.
Right.
I think the first episode hadcome out right before I went to college,
so.
05.
06.
Okay.
Or.
Sorry.
The first season.
17 seasons, I saw somecomplaints for.
Let's see, when.
17.
What was it?
(27:31):
Seasons 14 and 15.
A lot of people thought thequality was dropping and it might
be time to fold the tent.
Yeah.
I didn't.
I saw a little.
Do you remember the episodeswhere they kind of sort of went to
heaven and hell or some sortof afterlife?
I didn't think those were as good.
They were all right, overall.
(27:52):
Yeah.
You don't want to see themhave to pay.
You don't want consequencesfor these people, but you also don't
want them to succeed either.
No.
I like when a little bit ofconsequences happen.
The funny thing is there'sjust enough consequences here that
they're always put back atsquare one.
Yeah.
It's just a reset.
And it kind of makes sense tome that they're in heaven, the heaven
(28:14):
and hell thing, becauseobviously their existence is purgatory,
because they could never move forward.
They can never change.
That's what it was.
You know, they're stuck inlimbo forever with each other.
And I may have the seasonnumbers wrong, but it was the end
of one season and then thebeginning of another.
Kind of picked it up rightthere with it.
And it was also right aroundthat time when Glenn Howerton decided
(28:38):
that he didn't.
He thought he was kind of donewith the show.
Yeah.
And he left for many episodes.
And I think that hindered.
They really do create abalance when it's all of them.
Yeah.
I think they're just Kind oflike you alluded to.
I think they're just verycomfortable at working with each
other at this point.
If Glenn Howerton had trulybeen done, I think it would have,
(28:58):
I think they would have re.
Established a rhythm.
I think that's just a natural.
Yeah kind of progressionalmost in a show when you, when you
have an actor step back likethat and obviously he's.
He's back, thank goodness.
Still killing.
Each of them brings theirhoned Persona to the, to the cast.
You know, you got GlennHowerton's semi leadership.
(29:20):
Definitely psychotic.
Definitely.
Oh, he's a megalomania, megalomaniac.
He's got that.
These, you know, also got atouch of that being his twin sister.
And she.
But she just wants to be seenand succeed as an actress in any
way possible.
Doesn't matter what acting isit, even if it, if it even is acting.
(29:41):
Yeah, she wants to be a star.
And then poor Charlie, he'sjust the dumb guy.
He never learned to read andhe'll eat anything.
I will say to you as I'mrunning through the Personas here,
there was no funnier scene inmy life than Charlie and Frank running
(30:03):
as fast as they can into theirown apartment to eat the cat food.
And they're like narratingwhat you have to do to eat the cat.
Cuz all these cats show up, they.
Eat the cat food.
What is it they do to fallasleep though?
Is it paint fumes?
Yeah, they do paint fumes soyou can't taste the cat food settling
off paint fumes.
(30:25):
And then of course you got ourcloseted gay guy with Rob who's changed
his name to Rob Mack now, apparently.
Yeah, I saw that.
Kind of crazy.
And then Frank, Frank thetotal degenerate.
The, the.
This is not a funny thing tosay, but they play it for laughs
because it's so stupid and horrible.
(30:48):
He's racist.
He's just stuck in 1910, itseems like when white men ruled the
world.
And he thinks that's the wayit is.
He carries just guns everywhere.
He always has a firearm.
Always has a firearm.
And he's the, he's the onewho's got the most money of them,
which makes him the mostdangerous because he can fund any
(31:09):
stupid idea.
He's an utter degenerate.
And it's great.
It is great.
And it's so wonderful too thatthose mid seasons that he and Charlie
bonded and there was therunning question of.
Wait, is that also his son?
Yes.
Which never gets answered.
Fine enough that it doesn't,but it's cute and funny in its own
(31:32):
stupid way.
This show's been around longenough that it knows how to deliver
an episode.
I think that's like, okay,this is kind of functioning in the
way that we think this isgonna function.
And then they're able to throwus all time curveballs.
The ones where it's like,wait, is Charlie the dumb guy?
Like, where they have the, thehealth inspection of the bar and
it's only Charlie that holdsit to, you know, like they're, they're,
(31:54):
they're playful enough withtheir dynamic that they know when
they can upset it, you know,And I love that.
Is that the one where it'sfilmed almost in, In a one shot?
Yeah.
Yeah.
There's probably a couple cutsthere, but it's.
And it comes out right.
It came out right after Birdman.
They're kind of mimicking it.
You know, they take something.
They always take somethingfrom culture.
(32:15):
Yeah, they do.
And sometimes it's really bigin depth thing from culture.
Such as, you know, they havethat huge episode about abortion
and abortion rights, but thena lot of times they'll take something
like cake magic.
Yeah, that's.
That's cake.
Yeah.
Is it cake?
What is cake?
Yeah, let's get into Apple tv,one of those.
(32:39):
I don't have a ton to sayeither, but we'll.
Yeah, I think I feel the same way.
We've said a lot that could besaid about the show overall.
I think so far it does give.
Us an opportunity to talk about.
Stick with any specifics fromthis mysterious episode, though,
in case anybody didn't want tobe spoiled on it.
And they're in this part.
It's too late.
Yeah.
Best episode to date.
Despite adhering to thesepredictable TV plot lines.
(33:01):
Classic Sting.
Did it get you at all whensaying no, Santi and Zero started
arguing.
No.
Yeah, me either.
Me either.
Like, I'm like, I know what.
I know a good Sting when I see.
Huh.
I did too.
Now the only thing I thoughtthat was in question was I, I thought,
oh, come on.
Clark would have recognized Mitts.
(33:24):
Well, he's.
He's not.
He's far away.
He's far away.
Yeah.
And he's just yelling.
He's just yelling.
Okay.
They do play it.
Or do play their Sting wellenough, I suppose, where that's plausible
enough.
Yeah.
When he.
When they finally get closeenough, Clark does.
I appreciate that they gaveClark the line.
(33:44):
The Timothy Oliphant the line.
I didn't know that was you, Mitzi.
Yeah, I didn't know that wasyou back there yelling, yeah, yeah.
It's a good.
It's a good one.
I love that.
I kind of got pumped thatPrice is able to hit that shot with
a three wood and he skims itover water in this amazing, superhuman
(34:05):
fashion.
I suppose the plausibilitythere is.
Okay, if he can really dothat, why is he not still in the
pga?
Yeah, I mean, I have no thoughts.
About that, but his breakdownmust have been that horrible that
no one will want him back.
Kind of tight, focused episode.
Everyone has the same goal.
There's some zigs, there'ssome zags, there's some zaniness.
(34:27):
And at the end of it, well, he get.
Clark gets his comeuppance alittle bit.
Yes, he does.
I'll just praise the actorplaying Santi once again.
His facial expressions work.
Work well for acting.
He.
He can say a lot with anexpression because when he comes
back to the rv, zero opens thedoor and says, do we.
(34:50):
Did we win?
And he.
He makes the face.
He tells her everything sheneeds to know in a look there.
And it's good.
Yeah.
Yeah, we promise.
So let's deliver ourconversations about to go deep into
what to make of those lastfour episodes of the bear, episode
seven through ten.
So that's where we are.
If you don't want to hearanything about episode 7 through
(35:13):
10, you might want to wait.
Quote of the week, I thinklands out here.
So we begin unpacking the bearand it comes from my wife.
My wife.
I asked her if she watches thebear because it's good.
She said she did.
She didn't.
I said, well, that might be agood thing too, because I think it
(35:34):
would stress you out.
And her reply was, I thoughtit was supposed to be a comedy.
It is not a comedy.
It has abandoned most of thosepretensions at this point.
Yeah.
If.
If it ever even had any.
Episode 7 might as well callthe wedding episode.
Although it's title is Bears.
(35:54):
Has there ever been an episodeof television that screamed every
single one of these charactersneeds to be in therapy?
I mean, the answer I thought the.
Little girl was okay.
She seems things in a mostlyhealthy fit.
Claire Bear too, doesn'treally need a lot of therapy.
I think she's pretty healthy.
That's true.
Everyone else, desperately.
Sydney is in need of it andmaybe this season has taken her to
(36:19):
that brink.
By the way, when I said hasthere ever been an episode of television?
The answer is it's always anyepisode of.
It's always but a Close second.
In fact, there's a.
There are a couple episodes ofIt's Always Sunny where they're in
therapy.
It goes horribly awry.
I think that the Bear's agreat show, and I think this season's
a little better than the last.
(36:39):
And we talked about.
Probably thanks to last season.
I don't think you could havethis one without the other.
But every conversation in thisseries, especially this season, is
really about what they're notsaying or the conversation under
the conversation.
And maybe this season, it gota little exhausting.
(37:00):
You know, this is how we talkin real life.
This is real life talk.
But in TV and film, yourdialogue doesn't need to be that.
It needs to be much more efficient.
So there might be a sense ofexhaustion from the audience.
And if they say someone wereto say that, I would say that's very
fair.
I almost get the sense becauseI feel something along those lines.
(37:24):
And there's almost a pointwhere it becomes like.
It's almost like you're seeinghow the trick is done.
You know?
How so with the dialogue,Blaine, I mean, it's just like, you
know, I don't know how to explain.
You get it.
Like, I'm kind of flirt.
Doing the.
Yeah.
You know what I mean?
It's like the rhythms andstuff of the dialogue, instead of
(37:46):
mimicking natural language,which I think it does, it almost
starts to feel like, oh,that's a little trick.
Like, I get.
I get it.
Yes.
Which I think is fair.
If you come up to me and say,that's the way you're starting to
feel about this, I agree.
Well, do you remember when Ialmost had that complaint about Mad
Men and I figured out, oh,wait, that's what it's supposed to
(38:08):
be doing?
I figured it out prettyquickly because my near complaint
with Mad Men was, wait, he'scheating on his wife again?
And he's drinking again.
Wait, shouldn't he learn his lesson?
No, that's the point.
He doesn't.
Yes.
He hasn't.
I wonder.
This is pure speculation.
I know Christopher Storerwrote a lot of these episodes.
(38:30):
I wonder if that's just a trick.
Maybe trick is too unkind a word.
A quirk.
Yeah.
Maybe we're just seeing aparticular creator's quirks coming
through.
Probably.
Probably.
But I just.
Yeah.
When you, you know, it's likewhen you see the theater, like, sometimes
it's great to see the theateras theater, but when you see the
theater as theater and itdoesn't want you to see it as theater,
(38:53):
not you know?
Yep, I agree with that.
A minor complaint.
It also slows down the.
It slows it down to real lifein a way where change doesn't happen
overnight.
Change won't happen in every episode.
These, these characters,almost all of them are acting out
of pain.
Fear or fear of pain from pain.
(39:15):
Their, their inability todetermine the route to deal with
it at this point in the seriesmay feel unrealistic for a television
show, but it's very realisticfor life.
It's a lot.
It's something that culminatesin this episode with them helping
a child with her fear underthe table.
And it gathers them all aroundquite in an obvious visual there
(39:38):
of, hey, all this probablystarted in our childhood and here
we are under the table helpingEvie, Richie's daughter.
Yeah.
And it does a good job of,like you said, Blaine, the change
is not overly dramatic in the Bear.
(39:58):
It doesn't happen magically or miraculously.
And I thought thing it did agood job of showing in that episode
was you giving the advice.
Them giving the advice to the little.
They're able to give advicethat they can't take for themselves.
That's true.
And I think, you know, andoftentimes I think that's something
you'll hear in therapy, right,when people are kind of trying to
(40:22):
help you maybe reframe your thoughts.
And the way you think aboutyourself is like, hey, would you
say this to a friend?
Or like imagine you're afriend, what would you say there?
And I think that was kind of alittle bit of like they're being
honest and facing things, butalso there's an element of like,
I'm explaining this to alittle girl so she doesn't have to
be afraid.
(40:43):
And you know, especiallyCarmody and Shug and Richie are still
very much defined by theirchildhood and the, the kids that
they were that they carry with them.
Quite sweet for all of them togo around and talk about what they
fear.
It was a, it made for good agood episode.
(41:05):
It was a self containedepisode too, which is nice to see
with television these days.
And it was.
I found it to be a lot of themquestioning their knowledge of others
because there were at leasttwo times, maybe three, where we
have characters say to eachother that they don't know the other
well enough to make aninference about their internal state.
(41:27):
And yeah, a lot of that ofcourse echoes that Mikey hurt them
because of their lack, maybebecause of their lack of a true father.
Do we, does the show ever saywhat's happened to their dad for
sure.
I don't remember.
Just that he's gone.
He's left.
I think.
Is he gone or is he dead?
Or was there.
I think I got the impressionis he left?
(41:50):
Not that he's dead.
Yeah.
But they could switch that onme hurt.
I mean, obviously it's ahurtful and painful thing when someone
dies, but like the hurt thatshe has seems more like he left.
The hurt that she takes out onher kids sometimes.
Okay.
That or at least part of.
Part of her track.
Part of her.
(42:11):
That's just my thought.
Yeah.
I don't know if it's accurate in.
In tv, film, literature.
Well beyond.
When you have charactershaving a meal together, they're.
They're sharing more than justfood, usually in a deeper manner.
Here it was the gum betweenCarm and Uncle Bob Odenkirk, you
know, which.
Which to me signified this isa smaller piece of almost food.
(42:35):
So we're gonna have a smallerconnection between these two.
It's not going to be.
The stitches won't be.
It won't be sewn as tight.
It's very small still.
Bear's still showing.
It can pull some.
Some great guest stars.
Well, loving Bob.
I'm so glad to have.
It would make sense that he's back.
Yeah.
(42:55):
Yeah.
I enjoyed the.
It did make me laugh that JohnMulaney's character is back, but
this time he's completely inbusiness with the facts.
Yeah.
Like he's.
He's propping up.
He thinks their schemes are incredible.
He.
He kind of sees the family aswhat they are too.
He.
Yeah, he's.
He.
He's amused by them.
(43:15):
Right.
And class A acting fromEberron Moss.
Baccarat in the.
Yeah.
He gives this look to hisdaughter Evie when Tiffany kisses
her and joins in to help withthe fear under the table.
And it switches smartly editsto him giving this look to them.
(43:36):
It's good stuff.
He.
With it, man.
He's gonna break my heart.
Because he looks.
He does such a good job ofRichie as like, he's really.
There's a lot of brash andbluster, but he's also this really
vulnerable guy.
And every time he's around hiskid, he looks like his heart's about
(43:56):
to break.
And I think that that's theacting there.
Yeah.
It's.
It's a truth of.
Of human nature too, which isthat, you know, it's good acting.
I do say.
I will say the Francine plot line.
It was there, of course, togive us a.
Another idea of forgivenessand moving on.
Having Sugar have to deal withsomeone as well.
(44:19):
But it also played like just agood excuse to have Brie Larson.
And I don't know that itdidn't deserve to be cut and make
the episode.
I think that's mostly what it was.
It was just an excuse for themto pre Larson and replicate Franny
and Sugar doing the same thingthat Richie and Carm did last season.
(44:40):
Right.
Yelling at each other, butsaying the exact same thing.
Yep.
It kind of ended up a littlemuch ado about nothing for me.
I think if you treated it justas like the culmination of an ongoing
joke as opposed to something.
Yeah.
Momentous.
I think.
Yeah.
Don't.
We shouldn't overweight itwith importance.
(45:00):
I think.
Okay.
A bonus of the weddingepisode, really.
Any episode that he's in isgetting to watch Oliver Platt.
Look at these guys and galswhen they're speaking here it's him
and Richie alone with one another.
And.
And Richie makes this profoundpoint that he.
He may be the connectivetissue for the rest of the family.
(45:21):
And Oliver Platt just giveshim this look like, no shit.
Without saying, I mean, youcan almost read his mind there.
I think that there have beenmore close ups than ever been employed
in other seasons.
In this season, I believe thatthat is also Christopher, if you're
out there and I'm maligningyou, I apologize.
(45:42):
But it seems like that'ssomething he really likes in the
episodes that he directs.
Yeah.
Because whenever I've beenlike, wow, then it'll go to the directed
by Christopher story.
I'm like, oh, okay.
That's why we're up their nostril.
Well, you know, it's this.
Everyone's getting closer andin that closeness, maybe there's
a little less dysfunction, alittle bit more happiness.
(46:04):
The episode actually ends withRichie laughing at the picture on
his phone because he's of joythat he's a part of the family there.
He's.
Yeah, he does have friends,you know.
There it was a little.
That episode as a whole was alittle sentimental.
Which can I think Ruby folksthe wrong way.
But I think it's hard sometimes.
(46:25):
It's really hard to talk aboutthese important things without being
sentimental in a way that forsome reason, rage and anger and hurt
aren't sentimental.
But like, appreciating being apart of that family life in that
way is sentimental.
I don't know.
It's just a stray thought I'vehad for myself.
Yeah.
About.
Or a stray thought I've hadfor myself about my reaction upon
(46:48):
watching that episode, which Idid like.
Yeah, I did too.
And here's where the fullseason drop hinders the show once
again.
Sydney tells Richie in this episode.
Yeah.
She says, well, there's onlyone decision.
That's right.
And then a week betweenepisodes gives you.
Gives that line a lot of backand forth and little tense that you
(47:10):
don't get from being able topush play on episode eight right
then, which.
Honestly I felt everythingpast the wedding was really hampered,
especially leading into thefinale was really hampered by being
released all at once.
Yeah, I think it does it.
I mean, we want, you know, wewatched it to talk about it, but
I do think the kind of the wayto your stuff, it almost does it
(47:33):
a disservice to kind of rollthrough it the way Hulu encourages
you to watch it.
Yeah.
It's such an odd choice forthis show because I don't do this
with every show.
It's very strange.
You know, even with.
And limited themselves tothree episode dumps here, we just.
We still just get the wholething all at once.
(47:53):
I don't know.
Some.
I'm sure there's some reasonfor it.
Maybe that's.
I don't know, maybe they havethe analytics showing that people
really engage with it in this way.
I don't know.
That's what they see.
I guess.
Episode 8 Green starts.
The name of it is Green startswith a weird opening.
It's as weird as maybe thefirst episode of the series where
(48:14):
Sidney has a dream of disaster.
A cooking show that's gone crazy.
She's running off the stageinto an empty theater.
I guess that's kind of thesummation of the bear, though.
They're all worried that thiscooking presentation's about to fail
while they're running fromtheir issues that everyone else could
see.
You know, I guess.
And the fun thing about beingrecorded like this and having people
(48:37):
hear my opinions every week isthat I'm probably gonna contradict
myself in six months.
Months to a year.
Yeah.
But I don't know if I need adream to make any one internal state.
You know, like, it was justkind of like, all right, let's go.
Like, I. I know that she'sstressed out.
Yes.
Yeah.
Well, that is, I think, easily implied.
(48:57):
But Carm had a very similardream where he was in front of a.
He was at a cooking show.
Yeah.
That's the one where he endsconfronted with the bear, is it not?
I'm not sure.
I just remember that he.
He has the And I think theidea there is not that she's stressed,
but she is stressed on thelevel that Carm is.
Is stressed too.
(49:17):
Yes.
But also, I don't think I needanyone's dreams ever again.
Yeah, it's true.
The only time.
The only time I've been like,yes, a dream sequence has been if
David lynch is directing it.
Well, yes.
Where the whole movie could bea dream.
Yeah.
Did you get the nod toGroundhog Day with Sid waking up
to I Got yout, Babe?
(49:39):
Did I get to the nod toGroundhog Day with him explicitly
watching Groundhog Day?
You know, these guys and galsare having the same day.
It seems like they're inpurgatory too.
Just like our sunny friends.
Yeah.
Wow.
Except they can actually moveforward a little bit, but they're
feeling a little stuck themselves.
(50:02):
Ricci lays it out in theepisode called Green with his line
that Honesty's scary.
Fixing things like this with honesty.
Scary.
Watching Karm walk back up tohis mom's is frightening to him,
maybe to the viewer.
We've seen bits and pieces ofalcohol, alcoholism, and just some
really severe dysfunction.
(50:23):
Who knows how much he blamesher for Mikey's death.
In this episode covers kind ofwho's going to try on the Honesty
to fix who's going to do this.
And for Carmo, so far, it's.
It's Karm, but it's not Marcuswho avoids his dad.
Yeah.
He has a look that his dad'swaiting to talk to him and he turns
(50:46):
the other way, which is interesting.
And.
Because then we'll go aheadand get the penultimate episode,
which links together perfectlywith this one.
Yes, it does.
To Annatto, I guess.
Is that the name of the dishthat they're talking about?
Tonato.
He said what?
Carmen says it in the episode.
I'd never heard of it and Icouldn't pronounce it.
(51:07):
And this is what you weretalking about, I think even in the
non spoiler section whereJamie Lynn Curtis is Donna working.
She's basically working hernight step, I suppose, where she
makes amends.
And I think the key moment inall of that is.
I mean, there's just greatacting between the two where he's
(51:28):
great, he's at tears, she's at tears.
And, you know, he tells her,you know, it's okay, you don't even
have to say it.
And now I see where you're going.
She does.
But I do think that the keymoment is just after, is when he
cooks for her.
Because when you cook for yourParents, that's as grown up of a
moment as you'll have.
You know, the literal tablesturn in a way.
(51:50):
Well, and in the one feast ofthe seven fishes where we introduced
Donna, she won't let otherscook for her.
That's so true.
She wants to make everythingbeautiful, but she won't let others
cook for her.
And I think there, I don'tthink this is the whole of it, but
there is a bit of, like, yourability to give love is also bound
(52:12):
up in your ability to receive love.
It's the old Mr. Rogers thing, right?
Like, he thought if childrenwere told that they were loved, they
would be loving.
And so Donna Don is being ableto kind of receive love from her
son in a.
In that gesture, I think is.
Is big.
Instead of holding on to thecontrol and being like, no, I'm the
nurturer.
(52:33):
I. I do.
We do things my way.
Huh?
It's also the episode whereTina gets the pasta under three minutes
with help of Zen advice fromLuca, that devious Luca.
More.
More proof of growing, youknow, getting it right, getting better.
Donna apologizes for her poor motherhood.
Karmic, in an episode, tellsUncle Jimmy thanks.
(52:54):
On a voicemail.
Carms quit smoking.
Every.
You know, it's thesecharacters trying their best to make
small steps to improve.
One of the earlier times wetalked, like, I do think that was
part of the point of seasonthree for, for me.
Yeah.
Is that these, thesecharacters had to be.
They're stuck doing the samething and it's not working.
Season three is almost their bottom.
(53:16):
That's kind of what I mean.
Since it's like if any ofthese characters have any hope, they're
gonna start recognizing fromthis and from the bounce back that
they're.
If they want differentresults, they gotta do different
things.
You know, maybe a bit ofsubversion with Marcus winning a
best new chef every day.
(53:38):
Do need a Marcus.
I loved it though.
But when they, When Sugartells them food and wines, giving
top five chefs whatever the.
The recognition is, there's amoment where Carm looks right at
Sydney.
You catch it?
And he's thinking it's gonnabe you.
Right?
He's thinking it's Sydney.
Yeah.
Which you.
The viewer is supposed tothink too.
Oh, yeah, right.
This is also the episode,correct me if I'm wrong, where Rob
(54:03):
Reiner's character.
And I forget his name.
Yeah.
It's something funny.
The consultant.
Yeah.
He meets the computer and he.
And they have that dialoguewhere it says, interesting first
name.
The.
And he says, yeah, it's a nickname.
You don't.
You don't have a nickname.
He says I have a nickname.
What is it?
Not gonna tell you.
Nice to tell you.
It's a nice little funnymethod for us to be reminded these
(54:23):
are people who will not revealthemselves to others at first.
Yes.
I'm going to keep as much hidden.
Uncle Jimmy honking, losinghis mind.
Honking in the car was a nice touch.
He was a child.
That was really good.
The Joe Perry universe liveson in the Bear with Marcus's roommate
wanting to go to Hoots to celebrate.
What's Hoots?
(54:44):
It's Hooters.
It's his favorite restaurant.
There was another one that Ithought needed a trim.
I don't know that I. I neededChester in there to be awkward and
weird.
I made me laugh.
Just let me see him.
Since he's the same characterthat he played in Joe Parrot talks
with you.
Yeah.
Basically the same character.
Not to be a little nicer.
(55:05):
Yeah.
Probably not to be cliche or cheesy.
What?
But the bear can also be about.
It wants to be, I think, andkind of succeeds at it.
And about the grand scheme ofit all.
It can be about life itself.
And every second is the Super Bowl.
As Richie's staffmate says atthe end of the penultimate episode.
(55:27):
Yeah.
If you believe life'simportant then and you're paying
attention to every moment,then, yeah, it's every moment could
be the.
The winning one.
Our lives are the sum of whatwe do with them.
Right.
So you got five moments ofgreatness and 25 moments of hell.
Well, I bet that'll outweigh.
(55:49):
Yeah.
It didn't come to me as asurprise at the end of nine to find
out that Carm had taken hisname out of the ownership agreement,
the partnership.
As soon as he was wanderingaround Frank Lloyd Wright's house,
I was like, he's out, he's done.
Yeah.
Everyone probably had guessedhis changes would be something along
the lines of he's not going tobe a partner anymore.
(56:11):
I mean, I think that was kindof obvious.
The ending did leave mequestioning how it all relates to
his telling uncle that heknows how to fix it all.
Yeah, I know how to fix itall, though.
It's okay.
And you think, okay, well,he's probably taking his name out
of the agreement, but whatdoes that mean?
So takes us to final episode.
Goodbye, high turmoil.
This one is basically stays inthe high in the frequency of high
(56:34):
turmoil.
But it's just a four character play.
Yes, I would say it is sameyeah, Four characters.
We never see anyone else.
And it stays in the same spacefor 35 minutes, give or take.
I guess that's kind of abottle episode.
I mean, a bottle episode is a classic.
We ran out of money right here.
(56:55):
You know, I don't think that'sthe case here.
I don't know.
I don't think that's the casehere either.
They may have used all theirmoney on the soundtrack.
I don't know.
I appreciate it.
I felt like the bear is sometimes.
I've sometimes criticized itfor what is probably nice to call
quirks.
Right?
Like the rhetorical quirks,the stylistic quirks, the.
(57:18):
You know, we've got our bigcast of characters, so I thought
it was actually really goodand effective to pare it down to
Richie, Shug, Carm and Sidney,kind of the four.
The core of.
The core emotional lives ofthe show, I guess.
Oh, yeah.
And Sugary doesn't even makean appearance to the last five, ten
(57:40):
minutes.
Right.
Sydney's dedicated to therestaurant at this point, and there's.
She's kind of in a no way outsituation because she has said no
to Shapiro.
We see that earlier and we seethat in a previous episode.
And then.
So with Carm's removal fromthe contract, it's so funny for me
as a viewer, I'm not thesmartest sometimes.
I just assumed that when heremoved himself, I thought that was
(58:01):
noble.
I thought that was an improvement.
You know, the removal ofstress from himself and giving it
to Sydney and saying, here,it's yours.
Take it.
Succeed.
You're gonna do great.
But then hearing her reactionand seeing her, I was like, oh, shit.
Yeah, he's.
He's burdening her with debt,isn't he?
Yes.
I think it's both things, right.
(58:21):
Because he, I think, would seeit like that.
But Sidney is like, I don'tknow if this is gonna work without
you.
Oh, and my credit's alreadydestroyed and this restaurant is
in debt and you just.
You left me holding the bagfor your idea.
Yeah.
I don't know that it's everbeen more evident that Carm also
(58:41):
has an addict's mentality.
It's not as horrible asMikey's, we hope, but here he's kind
of saying, I can't get ittogether here.
So a change of location isgoing to fix me.
And that's.
That's addict thinking.
Like, if I can't get it righthere, then let me move.
And I will quit drinking.
I will quit online shopping.
(59:02):
I will whatever.
And it's sad.
These are self centered peoplewho are all hurting.
And rather than acknowledgingsometimes those that hurt, that pain
and that each one of them hasa deep and unique pain related to
the same thing.
They yell and fight.
You know, audiences can getfrustrated with them, I think, because
(59:23):
if one side would becomevulnerable enough to open up to the
other side and that side wouldlisten and relate, a lot of healing
could be done.
But this is life, you know,that does not happen.
You know, we do get a littleof this when Richie finally says
that he thought Carm avoidedthe funeral due to blaming him.
Richie for Mikey's death.
(59:45):
And turns out Carm was at the funeral.
Just not very long.
Do you get in this one thekind of push through to honesty,
especially between Carm and Richie?
Yep.
And I agree with you, Blaine.
It's real life.
Like so many things in ourlife would be different if we were
just vulnerable.
For so many of us, that'sworse than the bad situation we're
(01:00:08):
in, you know?
Yeah, it hurts.
Yeah, I can relate.
You know, I mentionedaudiences could probably get frustrated
with this kind of behavior,but I could also see myself in it
where being honest and openfeels like the end of the world.
And yeah, that's probably howthese characters are supposed to
(01:00:30):
be feeling.
And there's a little.
There's a bit of the death of yourself.
Yep.
When.
When you do that.
Yeah.
Your, your idea of yourself,your ego.
Wants to protect you from that.
Yeah, exactly.
It thinks it is.
And here instead of sharinggum like Carm and his uncle Bob Odenkirk,
(01:00:50):
you know, they had the small connection.
Carmen, Richie, get the real thing.
They share a cigarette andeven Sydney gets some of it.
Until Richie says, you're nogood at that.
Give me that cigarette.
Which would be me just tryingto smoke a cigarette.
It's as if this longconversation demonstrates it might
be the final stretch ofhealing to begin.
This is the.
(01:01:11):
This is the jumping off of.
I think everybody's going tostart healing a little bit.
It's going to be intense.
There's still some pain leftover and some deep rooted anger.
Nicholas Qua, if I'mpronouncing his name correctly on
Vulture, argued that it wouldbe a fascinating finale.
Oh, it would be fascinating.
(01:01:32):
It really was.
They chose to end it here.
That would be a bold move.
I think I'd be okay with it.
The clock does hit zero.
Yeah.
I mean, that's some big timeambiguity if they choose that or
if they have to.
And I think mainly because ofthe beef's Plot line still lingering.
Well, they open the two orthree or more windows that truly
(01:01:54):
carry the restaurant and, andRob Reiner's guidance.
Is it, is it helpful?
Is it legitimate?
Is it going to work?
And then, you know, you seehim pair up kind of with the computer
and you think, these guys aregoing to be like a super team.
Yeah.
Yeah.
That revelation that Carm wentto Mikey's funeral hits.
It's all of them so hard.
(01:02:15):
And I think it's because theywere all thinking, fuck him, he can't
even make it to his ownbrother's funeral.
Or I think Sugar might have.
The thought of this poor kidmust be in such pain and emptiness
because he can't even make the funeral.
There's these two ways oflooking at it and I think a lot of
them are you.
(01:02:35):
You didn't even come to the funeral.
Yeah.
Which we, which we had revealed.
Was it the wedding episode?
Yeah, we.
We found out Carm actually.
Was it.
Yeah.
From Bob Odenkirk.
He says, I saw you at the funeral.
And he does so, so gently.
Yeah.
And which I thought was goodsetup for this because it's so obvious
that Rich resented him forleaving and Carm resented Rich for
(01:02:58):
being the brother to Mikey.
Oh yeah.
And.
And Sugar, obviously, youknow, he's her baby brother.
Uh huh.
She sees him.
She has that.
Yeah.
She sees him as pitiful,scared and fragile because she doesn't
even question that he'sleaving the shift business when he
tells.
Yeah.
She's not the one to have abig reaction like Sydney and Richie.
Yeah.
(01:03:19):
You know, honestly, it couldbe healthy for, for Carm if he goes.
If he doesn't replace cookingwith something unhealthy.
Yeah.
And what do you do with his character?
I guess.
What do you.
Yeah, I guess for the nextseason he still has to stick around
to help them.
He's got, he's got to help thething, make it.
Much like Lucas there to helpto lift it.
Lifted up a lot of stuff.
(01:03:41):
He helped Tina and Marcus and.
Yeah.
Yes.
Yeah.
You know, maybe Carm can bethat guy.
Which is what I thought he wastrying to do.
I thought he was just going tosay, here, it's your restaurant.
I'm just going to work here.
I didn't see him bailing.
There is that conversationCarm has with Shapiro that we never
hear.
You know, he gets the phonecall from him.
(01:04:03):
Shapiro may have extended himan invite.
Now that would be far fetchedprobably, but you know, there are
options that Christopher Storrcould play with what if Carm went
to work for Shapiro?
I don't think that's gonna happen.
But even if the offer's on thetable, it could cause your next season's
conflict.
Yeah.
(01:04:23):
Yeah.
I think I liked this season of television.
I think that it prolonged afew things.
I'm not so sure that the.
That.
That this season the bearcouldn't have gotten everything in
eight episodes and felt.
Yeah.
I'm not saying the pacing wasoff because these.
(01:04:44):
This is real life.
This.
And real life takes a while.
Did I need to see Tina try toget the pasta under three minutes?
Seven times?
Would five times have worked?
Yeah.
Right.
Did I need Sydney to have adream sequence where she's under
the gun just like Carm was?
I don't think so.
Did I need the Francine plotline to see sugar also needs improving?
(01:05:09):
I don't think so.
So, Right, so it's not aperfect bit of television, but it
was.
It was good, I thought, youknow, it was good.
Makes us think things, feel things.
Even if it made me feel things.
You know, if it kind.
I. I do think that there's like.
Even if it's.
You're watching something andyou're like, eh.
Like if you got something outof it where it's like, well, I thought
(01:05:32):
a little bit about this.
I felt a little bit more about this.
That's good, right?
That's true.
That's good for you.
And it did that.
So therefore maybe makes mytop 10 at the end of the year.
We'll see.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
I thought it was pretty good.
Not perfect and lots of quirksthat kind of do take away, but overall
pretty good.
(01:05:52):
It would be nice to seeChristopher Storr, if he can produce
another season, say, you know,what's working, the emotions are
what's working and what's notworking, and then come up with a
season five that might end it all.
We don't know.
Yeah.
All right, well, we've reachedthe end of our episode.
Speaking of endings, for Adam,who's not here, and for Donovan,
(01:06:16):
who he is, I'm Blaine, and wehope that you don't look back in
anger.
Goodbye to everyone.
Talk to you next Tuesday.
Thanks for tuning in to TakingIt Down.
Taking it down is thestreaming and TV podcast, which understands
you have a limited amount oftime but plenty of intelligence,
no matter your job or your status.
We know that a deeperunderstanding of art doesn't mean
that you want a lecture either.
It means you want to think itthrough or test your ideas or hear
a real conversation, not justcritics flexing film school jargon
(00:25):
or Hollywood insiders rattlingoff numbers from a box office.
From using your timesagaciously on what to watch to constructing
why a show hits or misses,you'll leave each episode on Tuesday
with recommendations or whatto avoid.
Each Tuesday we start with aspoiler free segment.
Decide if a show's for you or not.
(00:45):
After a quick break, we digdeeper into a show or movie's qualities.
It's the section where weunpack television with an eye for
the blue collar folks, withconversations about what the series
is doing, where it stumbles.
If it matters.
We're talking TV withouttalking down.
All right, if you're new, welcome.
I'm the weekly host, Blaine.
(01:07):
I'm also editor in chief ofthe website the Alabama Take.
That's the site where writingson various things appear and it produces
this podcast and several more podcasts.
In a minute I'm going to bejoined by co host Donovan who has
the best insights on shows and more.
This week we are getting intothe return of the longest scripted
(01:28):
television show ever.
At this point it's It's AlwaysSunny in Philadelphia.
Believe it or not, that's thelongest series that's not animated.
Surely the Simpsons will wearthat crown.
I guess, until someone rips itfrom Homer's dead, drunken, bloated
hand or head.
Anyway, we'll also touch onthe latest episode of Stick on Apple
TV plus.
(01:49):
And then to end, it's our bigwrap up on the thoughts of this fourth
season of the Bear from Huluand fx.
There's your rundown.
It's time for ProfessorDonovan to come in and give me a
new ideas we've never considered.
Lets get going Alabama take projection.
(02:10):
All right, Donovan's here.
There is no Adam in thepodcast this week.
I don't think next week either.
Third chair being empty, he'sbusy communing.
With the Lord on a higherplane of existence than we could
ever imagine.
The fact is, he's in GreatBritain enjoying the hell out of
himself, seeing Oasis performlive, putting on shows of his own
under the moniker Sister Ray Davies.
(02:33):
And that's on Wednesday, July23rd at SJQ in The heart of Dalston,
which is a huge part ofLondon's big music scene.
Go.
It looks awesome.
Do you like the.
That I had all that info at.
At my.
I did.
I looked it up too, and I waslooking at pictures and stuff.
Yeah, it does.
It's the center of London's music.
(02:54):
Dalston.
I guess it's pronounced Dalston.
Maybe Dals.
D Think so.
Anyway, sjq, you can meet Adam.
Co host Adam.
If you have heard him, you cango meet him.
Go with care, though, becausethat bloke's likely on cloud nine.
Cloud ten.
Bosch.
(03:16):
Somehow or another, though, Ithink we were running the podcast
without a third chair last time.
It's Always Sunny inPhiladelphia began.
Its previous season really was.
Was that.
I think it was just you.
And I think you're right.
We did the Ricksky Ratepisode, which has just a hilarious
Danny DeVito bit where he'srefilling, getting water in a cardboard
(03:37):
fry container for some reason,and he's like, what the hell?
It looks like I'm doing.
I'm getting water drinkingfrom a. I know what you're talking
about.
They're an inch and a halfhigh at most and they hold.
FRAT the greatest example ofnetwork interference ever.
Yeah.
With Danny DeVito being addedto It's Always Sunny.
(04:01):
Yeah.
After the first season, I think.
Was it John Landgraf in chargeeven back then?
And he said, I think so.
They added Danny DeVito for anepisode and he insisted that he stay
on cast.
Yes.
That was brilliant.
Yeah.
You don't hear about studiointerference being really good, and
I like that, probably.
Because it usually isn't, but.
But this one.
Incredible.
(04:22):
We've got two episodes of It'sAlways Sunny in Philadelphia to begin
its season back 17, a recordnumber for scripted television.
Yeah.
Have they learned anything?
That's the best part of this show.
I'm sad this isn't thespoilers section, but friends, I
can tell you, they did not.
If they did, it would be adifferent show.
(04:43):
Absolutely.
It would be horror.
It would be the world we live in.
We have it.
We do live in the world thatSonny created.
I. I think that we're gonnasee some good corporate synergy this
season because I really thinkthat putting Frank on the Golden
Bachelor.
Yes.
As we've seen teased in the trailer.
(05:03):
Yes.
That's not a spoiler.
It's been teased.
He's going to be really.
Is gonna be really excellent.
He's gonna get a real piece of ass.
He thinks to love Danny DeVitois a national treasure.
Thank God he's on TV as Frank,the dad.
If you don't watch It's AlwaysSunny in Philadelphia, but you do
(05:27):
watch Abbott Element.
Element.
Abbott elementary, theirrecent, fairly recent show episode
might have confused youbecause the gang was there.
The gang was there because ofcommunity service.
And this season starts withthe gang.
You know what.
What were they doing when theyweren't being filmed with the Abbott
(05:49):
elementary crew.
Who'S filming elementarybehind the scenes footage of.
Yeah, there's tenure at Abbott Elementary.
It was good.
I thought the gang fucks upAbbott Elementary.
You know, I love how they giveyou everything in the title almost.
Yes.
And as it turns out, it wasway worse than what was on Abbott
(06:09):
Elementary.
I did watch that episode.
Did you happen to go back andwatch it?
I did not watch it, but I reada review of it and I heard you talk
about it.
But I'll be Abbott elementaryas it is.
Makes me sad in a way thatit's always Sunny in Philadelphia
visiting Abbott elementary doesn't.
How so?
Just because of the chronic.
(06:30):
It's not getting any better.
Chronic underfunding forschools, especially for the most
populations that are at themost like it.
It may.
It bums me out that we as acountry have just been like, yeah,
public school teachers need tosupplement their classrooms with
their own income.
And watching a show about it,I don't need to watch that.
(06:51):
It makes me like.
So much of the plot is like,obviously they're being creative
and trying to help the kids.
And I'm just like, oh, but ina good world, you shouldn't have
to do this.
But it's a comedy, sosupposedly it's very funny.
It is funny.
It has some really good moments.
I'm not saying anything badabout Abbott elementary, this show.
I'm saying something aboutDonovan watching it, who was just,
(07:14):
like, too bummed out to keep going.
What it reminds you of.
Yeah, exactly.
Just the relentless march ofneoliberalism, I guess.
I think you've got it.
Yeah.
Abbott elementary manages tomake all that good comedy, but it's
because of their character interactions.
Yeah, They've got solidcharacters there.
You saw a hint of the janitor.
He is so funny to me.
(07:35):
Whereas them all being onSunny, it's like, I know everything's
supposed to be horrible.
That was great for me.
Yes.
There's a bit in Abbottelementary where they cannot fathom
children not knowing Run DMC'sHollis Christmas in Hollis.
And they're playing it, andthen every teacher kind of walks
around in the Background ofthe scene.
(07:57):
Even the janitor walks by andis just singing every word.
They know every word.
How do you not know this one?
And we got a little something there.
And in this episode.
Yes.
Yeah.
My wife watches Abbott and Icatch a few episodes from there and
my wife even watches it withour 7 year old because I'll be damned.
Broadcast comedy still exists, huh?
(08:18):
Yeah, there's one.
Yeah, there is one.
It's.
It's got toned down elementsof the gang.
In that episode.
Do they teach Charlie to read?
I don't think he.
He does get to read.
No, they teach him to read.
Suppose they do teach.
Yes.
Frank ends up in the cage thatthey're designed to catch a racc.
We learn more about that raccoon.
(08:39):
Yes.
But what an odd crossover.
It's so weird.
It feels like it almost has to work.
Yeah.
Quinta Brunson, you could tellshe really, really had some fun playing
against type in one veryspecific moment in this episode.
Yeah.
Her co star.
What is his name?
Tyler Michael Williams.
(09:00):
Is that.
Am I right about his name?
Tyler James Williams.
Tyler James Williams.
You were pretty much right there.
And I love him.
He's a.
He's a good actor too.
He's funny.
A lot of fun to watch.
So the first episode of It'sAlways Sunny gives the other side
of the story of what happenedat Abbott.
Both the Abbott episode andthe Sunny episode are very funny,
but the combination of thegang being completely dumb as well
(09:22):
as the Abbott facultydevolving in their presence using
stronger language, it isn'tjust jarring.
But laugh out loud funny.
It makes sense.
That's.
It's the classic Sunny wherelike even good people are brought
low by how horrible they are.
Yes.
Yeah.
That's the longevity of theshow, how it centers around horrible.
(09:45):
I think the world keepsgetting better for a few people at
least and worse for a lot more people.
And then those of us in thewhole a lot more camp, we want to
see folks who are justhorrible, Truly dumb, but never succeed.
Yeah.
You know, because in the realworld we got horrible.
(10:07):
Truly dumb.
And stepping up to lead maybe.
What.
What are the things I loveabout Sonny is.
And I.
Did you read the New York Times?
I did.
Article.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So anyone who had New YorkTimes last week, folks, they did
a.
A good feature on Sonny for onit in.
In honor of its 17th season.
(10:28):
And I think that the guy whowrote that, and I would agree with
him, really hit the nail onthe head with just like how clear
eyed the show is about Its characters.
Uh huh.
No one's under any delusionsthat these guys are good people.
In fact, it wouldn't be funnyif anyone but them thought that.
And like they're utterly cleareyed about them as their character
(10:50):
and also about like what thatleads to in a way that feels really
fun and refreshing.
It would be weird if someonewatched this show with thoughts that,
oh, one of them or two of themare kind of okay people.
Right.
If you want to emulate any ofthese folks, you might have done
too much Charlie work.
(11:11):
Who I would watch this showand think these are normal.
This is something to do.
But we'll talk a little bitmore about.
It's always Sunny in thespoiler in maybe just a couple of
things.
There's not a lot to pointout, you know, if you get the the
idea.
But there are of course, plotlines that could be spoiled.
We'll get to those in thespoiler section.
(11:33):
Let's shift gears.
Did Stick have its bestepisode yet with Clark the mark for
you?
Yeah, it was the most focused.
And as I was watching it, Iwas like gentle listeners.
There are no true surprises inthis episode.
None.
But it is.
It felt like the most focused episode.
Yeah, it was kind of containedin a way.
(11:55):
Yeah, exactly.
Yeah.
What I saw was an episode justso heavy with tropes, only a surprise
or two at the most.
Yet I ended the episode justas pleased as if I'd watched, you
know, one of the best comediesof the year.
But it's not quite that.
Not as a whole, you know,Price drinking at the bar, having
(12:18):
Owen Wilson go back and forthwith strangers.
That's good.
Yeah.
Yeah, it is.
He's drinking.
You know, it harkens back towhat I saw last week.
This crew works at its bestwhen they are working together for
a goal.
Yeah.
When they're all somewhatsplit off.
(12:39):
I mean, and that's.
I'm not here to accuse likeclassic sitcom A cop being B plot
structure of, you know, like that's.
That's a classic formula.
But it did feel more cohesivewith everybody in the picture instead
of kind of split up in their various.
Yeah.
Having a clear outside of thegroup antagonist with Tim Oliphant
(13:04):
as the rival smarmy golfer whomakes millions more garners more
investment successes than Price.
Having him be the focus of whothey're after I think helped a lot
too.
It helps that Timothy Oliphantis really, really good at playing
someone who is genuinely unlikable.
He plays.
(13:26):
It's not over the top.
It's not over the top.
He plays smarmy.
He can play a hint this guymight be dangerous.
There's a hint that.
There's a hint that he mightthrow Price out or maybe even have
his buddies beat him up.
Yeah, he could.
So we do get the Price and hisold rival in the same room.
(13:47):
It takes a lot of sportstropes to get us there, but I think
it does them well.
It's the best episode for meand a good sign, I think, for.
For stick on where it's going.
Hard not to talk about thatepisode in relation to Ted Lasso's
dart episode, but I think theywere shooting for different things.
(14:10):
Yeah.
And I'd say Ted Lasso is stillthe winner there.
Oh, yeah.
I mean, as far as quality.
Yeah.
But I think it also was goingfor a moment of gentle heart, truth,
all of those things, you know,genteel heart and truth here.
I think we're just using some.
Some good old let's.
(14:30):
Let's.
Let's rub it in the face ofthe antagonist kind of tropes.
I mean, it was a sting.
A classic sting.
Yeah.
Do you like Stings, guys?
Exactly.
The bear is also on our docket.
Season four.
We're done with season four asof today here.
No spoiler land, though.
(14:50):
How'd you feel about theseason as a whole?
Good.
And I think not.
I think this is outside of therealm of spoilers, what I'm gonna
say.
But I think that some of whatit was dealing.
It was dealing with a lot ofdifferent things, and it wasn't perfect.
There were moments that werelike, okay, we're all stammering
because that's what we'reknown for.
(15:11):
We're the stammer show.
Wow.
Yeah.
And, you know, there wereparts that were sentimental, which
is fine.
It's hard.
I'm sorry.
I'm not saying that's bad, butI think there was a big overall kind
of dealing with, like, thedifficult artist.
Like, what.
At the point where people are like.
And for that himself, too.
(15:32):
Like, your art doesn't justifyX, Y, or Z.
What's it worth?
You know, what is the worth ofyour art when you have all this other.
When it's doing all this otherstuff to you.
I thought that was.
That was good.
When it's your demise, whenit's detrimental, in a way.
Yeah, could be.
Or when it allows you to treatother people poorly, you know, because
(15:54):
you're great and you can getaway with that because you're great.
Yeah.
You are right There Is a lot.
It was trying to do a lot andI think that it did a lot of that
quite well.
Yeah, well, I saw a lot ofgripes about season three.
They wanted questionsanswered, you know, slam fist on
the desk and you know, thebear is as serialized as anyone as
(16:17):
any show it wants to tell.
Elongated story, obviously tothe point where it even maybe gets
people annoyed that it doestake too long to get around to this
or that.
But I do think season four was good.
I thought it allowed forseason three to show why it existed.
(16:38):
Yeah, I agree.
I know what we talked aboutthat I think last time and I had
the episode, the start, thefinishing this season reinforced
that for me.
Yeah.
It seems as though it's aseason of a lot of pain, a lot of
truth, a lot of honesty thatbegins maybe some improvement for
a lot of these people.
It's almost like thecharacters are saying to themselves,
if I have, if I'm going to beany good at anything, I've got to
(17:01):
shrug off this burden.
Yeah, there was a lot of goodstuff and this is.
Sometimes it got a littlesentimental, but a lot of good stuff
about.
Just a lot of good stuff aboutfriends, family dynamics and the
way that those can entrap us,but also the ways that maybe those
can be changed.
(17:21):
Right.
That things can be faced, thatwe can make changes in our lives.
And I think a lot of thatfeels very resonant.
If you're sitting out thereand you've never felt that you needed
to make a change in your life,then good for you.
The rest of us will have the bear.
Yeah.
Yeah.
There might be moments whereaudiences, some people would watch
(17:44):
this show and think there's noway, way someone is that mentally
incapable of normaly when theylook as normal and act almost somewhat
normal as these characters do.
Even I would question it at times.
I would think, is this real?
(18:05):
Is this real as far as howthey're acting?
Am I believing this?
Am I in?
And most of the time I was,you know who.
And this is also not a spoiler.
The.
The one portrayal that.
And I think this is just downto acting.
That I think is absolutely correct.
Is Jamie Lee Curtis as thethird mother absolutely correct as
(18:29):
Donna?
I think so too.
Yeah, she's got it exactly right.
I think so too.
With that we'll take a breakso that we can break down some of
these things.
Spoiler wise, we'll run themdown in the same order.
So after the break, about a 30or 45 second break, you'll hear us
talk in depth about these things.
No social media algorithmdisplays everything you follow.
(18:52):
You try to hunt and find whereyour friends are on each of these
sites.
That's the reason you followedyour friends in the first place,
to see what they're up to, forit to be right there.
With the decline of reasonablediscussion on social media as well,
you know it's time to stopscrolling or at least rely on it
less.
We'll have a newsletter everynow and again, about once a week,
(19:16):
maybe less.
There will be a segment ineach newsletter that recounts what
we've done, both on the siteand in the podcast.
You won't feel left out, andyou won't have to rely on Facebook
or mama or their Uncle Teddytelling you this or that.
Instead, get it right from thesource, the middleman, the algorithm.
(19:38):
We'll give you a link to the newsletter.
Each newsletter provides somestories, some thoughts, but there's
always that section what'sgoing on on the site, so that you
can click on those in case youmissed them.
And now back to the show.
Okay, let's stick to our order.
I don't think I have a lot tosay about It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia,
(20:01):
the first two episodes.
I think they're going to doone per week now.
But they wanted to get that Abbott.
I guess they want that bump.
That Abbott bump.
Well, they wanted to get thatAbbott, probably plotline completed
so they could move on intotheir season, I would imagine.
I don't know.
They may not have any saywhatsoever in how many episodes get
released.
That might be a John Landgraftkind of thing.
(20:22):
The guy who runs fx.
I did appreciate the Abbottelementary episode because it dares
to ask the question, can jetfuel melt steel beams?
These kids don't know about 9 11.
This was like.
In some ways, this episode wasmore disjointed.
It almost felt like acollection of sketches.
(20:44):
Did not make it any less enjoyable.
And that's kind of how Abbott works.
Yeah, it is.
Which is fine.
I mean, there's nothing wrongwith that.
I'm not.
No, no, no, no.
I'm not denigrating it.
As Donovan said, it is funny.
And she on it all you want,but Billy Joel's We Didn't Start
the Fire actually rocks.
And I didn't really realize ituntil I went back and listened to
it.
(21:05):
I was like, I just took thissong for granted as a kid.
What the hell kind of rocks?
This was just like cla.
Like, it was.
It was just classic Sunny, right?
Like, they're trying to lureChildren to the.
To the choir room.
To the choir room to get thembecause they need to find their sexy.
So they're sexy.
Bad boy.
They gotta create a boy.
But this is one show where itwould be so funny just to sit there
(21:29):
because one idea leads tothis, leads to the next one, and
then there's just no way.
How does trying to get somekids to play basketball lead into?
They don't know enough about911 lead into we gotta recruit a
boy.
Banter update.
We didn't start the fire.
(21:49):
There's a lot of shenanigansand hijinks, man.
I mean, that just opens thedoor for them to be so themselves
and so stupid.
So stupid.
What do they do?
Spend two hours at least.
They take way too long forlunch to argue about 9 11.
They spend long enough thatthey clearly after school and they've
gone into conspiracy theoriesto the point where they're not sure
(22:13):
if the World Trade centeractually existed because no one's
ever seen it with their own eyes.
Dee's incredulity of we saidwe'd never forget, guys, and the
kids don't even know.
The kids don't even know.
It's just a meme to them.
Oh, yeah, that's right.
That's what they say.
(22:33):
Getting to see one very nicecharacter swear the way she does
about Dee was a real fun, funtreat for me.
So good.
It really was.
I can't wait for my wife towatch this episode because she's
yet to catch up for her Abbotttie in.
She's not a big Always Sunny.
She's kind of like me.
She will walk through the roomwhen it's Always Sunny is on and
(22:55):
maybe catch a scene or two andchuckle and then leave.
I kind of do the same thingwith Abbott at times.
Although I do watch a littlebit more of AB Elementary.
I do love that Dennis inAbbott elementary.
As soon as he sees thecameras, he's like, no, I'm gone.
Right?
I'm not going to be a part of this.
And you don't see him for therest of the episode, but here you
(23:16):
find out he's actually making coffee.
Turns out he's just makingcoffee, trying to construct a boy
band.
He's actually the only.
He's the only one who'sactually, I think, made a positive.
Weirdly enough, he made apositive contribution because his
coffee was really good.
Yeah, he was making.
He had to go, like, rundeliveries for all the teachers and
(23:36):
stuff.
What does he say?
He compares himself to WalterWhite at one point.
The Walter White of coffee.
Yeah, that's pretty good.
And then we have a secondepisode of It's Always Sunny.
Where what does it's alwayssunny do?
They look at culture.
They look at our society andthey say, what is stupid enough for
(24:00):
these very stupid people towant to be a part of, to want a piece
of?
And he inherits Is it Cake?
My daughter watches Is It Cake?
On Netflix from time to time.
She used to.
Hilarious, hilarious setup.
And so you.
You kind of forget that that'swhat they're doing.
(24:21):
Yeah.
Especially until the end whenyou're like, wait.
And then Frank Bus.
He's like, I got you.
I wanted to prove to you themagic of cake technology.
Frank fakes his own coma tobasically make a cake of himself.
It was only a matter of timebefore they figured out it was cake.
(24:41):
But, boy, it took them a verylong time.
They leave Dee to convalescewith or be there with Frank in the
coma, if he is even convalescing.
And the three guys run off toa gala because that's where the money
is, the investment for Patty's Pub.
Two really good things hereis, like, how impressed these guys
(25:07):
are by, like, they're just so stupid.
So, like, of course, like,they're the only people in the world
that could be impressed bythis, like, venture capitalist guy.
Like, they meet.
That they meet.
Who is just on every drug imaginable.
The stakes of the drug, itjust levels up at each party he takes
them to.
(25:28):
So that was great.
To the point.
To the point that they're in acrack house.
To the point that they justdid a crack house.
So that was good.
Also, it's such an obviousjoke, but when Dee pulled out the
folder that says my mostprized possession.
Yeah.
And she opens it, it's just.
(25:48):
What is it, like an episode ofBig Asses, 1973.
Yeah, it's.
It's a magazine of.
It's a porn magazine.
It's a porno.
And then, of course, Frank hasfaked a picture that Dee maybe has
drawn as a kid.
And I love my daddy.
And that was actually theprize possession.
Oh, it's just good comedy.
This is great writing.
(26:09):
It was good.
It was good.
And I don't know how they doit so consistently.
I guess I just sit around in a room.
They're so well acquaintedwith one another, and they bounce
ideas until one thing leads to another.
At this point, I mean, it hasto be like, wait, like, right, what
would these dipshits do ifthey found out Frank was In a coma,
Would they.
Would they get sidetracked bysomething else completely?
(26:30):
Yeah, they would.
You wonder if it starts with,what would they do if Frank was in
a coma?
Or what would they do if theyfound out that you could make anything
into a cake?
Which one of those was the.
Those are both validapproaches into the mentality of
this episode.
Yeah.
Consistency of Sonny, though,is really amazing.
(26:50):
It's.
I feel like it's never.
Like it's always kind of been.
It is what it is.
If you don't like it, you'renot gonna like it.
Yeah.
But it is what it is, andthere's never really been a drop
in quality after 17 years.
That was actually my.
What I was gonna bring up next.
17 seasons and seasons.
Yeah.
I guess longer than 17 years.
Yeah.
(27:10):
Because it started in 04, Ithink, or 05.
Yeah, it was in that range.
It's in that range there.
It was.
Right.
I think the first episode hadcome out right before I went to college,
so.
05.
06.
Okay.
Or.
Sorry.
The first season.
17 seasons, I saw somecomplaints for.
Let's see, when.
17.
What was it?
(27:31):
Seasons 14 and 15.
A lot of people thought thequality was dropping and it might
be time to fold the tent.
Yeah.
I didn't.
I saw a little.
Do you remember the episodeswhere they kind of sort of went to
heaven and hell or some sortof afterlife?
I didn't think those were as good.
They were all right, overall.
(27:52):
Yeah.
You don't want to see themhave to pay.
You don't want consequencesfor these people, but you also don't
want them to succeed either.
No.
I like when a little bit ofconsequences happen.
The funny thing is there'sjust enough consequences here that
they're always put back atsquare one.
Yeah.
It's just a reset.
And it kind of makes sense tome that they're in heaven, the heaven
(28:14):
and hell thing, becauseobviously their existence is purgatory,
because they could never move forward.
They can never change.
That's what it was.
You know, they're stuck inlimbo forever with each other.
And I may have the seasonnumbers wrong, but it was the end
of one season and then thebeginning of another.
Kind of picked it up rightthere with it.
And it was also right aroundthat time when Glenn Howerton decided
(28:38):
that he didn't.
He thought he was kind of donewith the show.
Yeah.
And he left for many episodes.
And I think that hindered.
They really do create abalance when it's all of them.
Yeah.
I think they're just Kind oflike you alluded to.
I think they're just verycomfortable at working with each
other at this point.
If Glenn Howerton had trulybeen done, I think it would have,
(28:58):
I think they would have re.
Established a rhythm.
I think that's just a natural.
Yeah kind of progressionalmost in a show when you, when you
have an actor step back likethat and obviously he's.
He's back, thank goodness.
Still killing.
Each of them brings theirhoned Persona to the, to the cast.
You know, you got GlennHowerton's semi leadership.
(29:20):
Definitely psychotic.
Definitely.
Oh, he's a megalomania, megalomaniac.
He's got that.
These, you know, also got atouch of that being his twin sister.
And she.
But she just wants to be seenand succeed as an actress in any
way possible.
Doesn't matter what acting isit, even if it, if it even is acting.
(29:41):
Yeah, she wants to be a star.
And then poor Charlie, he'sjust the dumb guy.
He never learned to read andhe'll eat anything.
I will say to you as I'mrunning through the Personas here,
there was no funnier scene inmy life than Charlie and Frank running
(30:03):
as fast as they can into theirown apartment to eat the cat food.
And they're like narratingwhat you have to do to eat the cat.
Cuz all these cats show up, they.
Eat the cat food.
What is it they do to fallasleep though?
Is it paint fumes?
Yeah, they do paint fumes soyou can't taste the cat food settling
off paint fumes.
(30:25):
And then of course you got ourcloseted gay guy with Rob who's changed
his name to Rob Mack now, apparently.
Yeah, I saw that.
Kind of crazy.
And then Frank, Frank thetotal degenerate.
The, the.
This is not a funny thing tosay, but they play it for laughs
because it's so stupid and horrible.
(30:48):
He's racist.
He's just stuck in 1910, itseems like when white men ruled the
world.
And he thinks that's the wayit is.
He carries just guns everywhere.
He always has a firearm.
Always has a firearm.
And he's the, he's the onewho's got the most money of them,
which makes him the mostdangerous because he can fund any
(31:09):
stupid idea.
He's an utter degenerate.
And it's great.
It is great.
And it's so wonderful too thatthose mid seasons that he and Charlie
bonded and there was therunning question of.
Wait, is that also his son?
Yes.
Which never gets answered.
Fine enough that it doesn't,but it's cute and funny in its own
(31:32):
stupid way.
This show's been around longenough that it knows how to deliver
an episode.
I think that's like, okay,this is kind of functioning in the
way that we think this isgonna function.
And then they're able to throwus all time curveballs.
The ones where it's like,wait, is Charlie the dumb guy?
Like, where they have the, thehealth inspection of the bar and
it's only Charlie that holdsit to, you know, like they're, they're,
(31:54):
they're playful enough withtheir dynamic that they know when
they can upset it, you know,And I love that.
Is that the one where it'sfilmed almost in, In a one shot?
Yeah.
Yeah.
There's probably a couple cutsthere, but it's.
And it comes out right.
It came out right after Birdman.
They're kind of mimicking it.
You know, they take something.
They always take somethingfrom culture.
(32:15):
Yeah, they do.
And sometimes it's really bigin depth thing from culture.
Such as, you know, they havethat huge episode about abortion
and abortion rights, but thena lot of times they'll take something
like cake magic.
Yeah, that's.
That's cake.
Yeah.
Is it cake?
What is cake?
Yeah, let's get into Apple tv,one of those.
(32:39):
I don't have a ton to sayeither, but we'll.
Yeah, I think I feel the same way.
We've said a lot that could besaid about the show overall.
I think so far it does give.
Us an opportunity to talk about.
Stick with any specifics fromthis mysterious episode, though,
in case anybody didn't want tobe spoiled on it.
And they're in this part.
It's too late.
Yeah.
Best episode to date.
Despite adhering to thesepredictable TV plot lines.
(33:01):
Classic Sting.
Did it get you at all whensaying no, Santi and Zero started
arguing.
No.
Yeah, me either.
Me either.
Like, I'm like, I know what.
I know a good Sting when I see.
Huh.
I did too.
Now the only thing I thoughtthat was in question was I, I thought,
oh, come on.
Clark would have recognized Mitts.
(33:24):
Well, he's.
He's not.
He's far away.
He's far away.
Yeah.
And he's just yelling.
He's just yelling.
Okay.
They do play it.
Or do play their Sting wellenough, I suppose, where that's plausible
enough.
Yeah.
When he.
When they finally get closeenough, Clark does.
I appreciate that they gaveClark the line.
(33:44):
The Timothy Oliphant the line.
I didn't know that was you, Mitzi.
Yeah, I didn't know that wasyou back there yelling, yeah, yeah.
It's a good.
It's a good one.
I love that.
I kind of got pumped thatPrice is able to hit that shot with
a three wood and he skims itover water in this amazing, superhuman
(34:05):
fashion.
I suppose the plausibilitythere is.
Okay, if he can really dothat, why is he not still in the
pga?
Yeah, I mean, I have no thoughts.
About that, but his breakdownmust have been that horrible that
no one will want him back.
Kind of tight, focused episode.
Everyone has the same goal.
There's some zigs, there'ssome zags, there's some zaniness.
(34:27):
And at the end of it, well, he get.
Clark gets his comeuppance alittle bit.
Yes, he does.
I'll just praise the actorplaying Santi once again.
His facial expressions work.
Work well for acting.
He.
He can say a lot with anexpression because when he comes
back to the rv, zero opens thedoor and says, do we.
(34:50):
Did we win?
And he.
He makes the face.
He tells her everything sheneeds to know in a look there.
And it's good.
Yeah.
Yeah, we promise.
So let's deliver ourconversations about to go deep into
what to make of those lastfour episodes of the bear, episode
seven through ten.
So that's where we are.
If you don't want to hearanything about episode 7 through
(35:13):
10, you might want to wait.
Quote of the week, I thinklands out here.
So we begin unpacking the bearand it comes from my wife.
My wife.
I asked her if she watches thebear because it's good.
She said she did.
She didn't.
I said, well, that might be agood thing too, because I think it
(35:34):
would stress you out.
And her reply was, I thoughtit was supposed to be a comedy.
It is not a comedy.
It has abandoned most of thosepretensions at this point.
Yeah.
If.
If it ever even had any.
Episode 7 might as well callthe wedding episode.
Although it's title is Bears.
(35:54):
Has there ever been an episodeof television that screamed every
single one of these charactersneeds to be in therapy?
I mean, the answer I thought the.
Little girl was okay.
She seems things in a mostlyhealthy fit.
Claire Bear too, doesn'treally need a lot of therapy.
I think she's pretty healthy.
That's true.
Everyone else, desperately.
Sydney is in need of it andmaybe this season has taken her to
(36:19):
that brink.
By the way, when I said hasthere ever been an episode of television?
The answer is it's always anyepisode of.
It's always but a Close second.
In fact, there's a.
There are a couple episodes ofIt's Always Sunny where they're in
therapy.
It goes horribly awry.
I think that the Bear's agreat show, and I think this season's
a little better than the last.
(36:39):
And we talked about.
Probably thanks to last season.
I don't think you could havethis one without the other.
But every conversation in thisseries, especially this season, is
really about what they're notsaying or the conversation under
the conversation.
And maybe this season, it gota little exhausting.
(37:00):
You know, this is how we talkin real life.
This is real life talk.
But in TV and film, yourdialogue doesn't need to be that.
It needs to be much more efficient.
So there might be a sense ofexhaustion from the audience.
And if they say someone wereto say that, I would say that's very
fair.
I almost get the sense becauseI feel something along those lines.
(37:24):
And there's almost a pointwhere it becomes like.
It's almost like you're seeinghow the trick is done.
You know?
How so with the dialogue,Blaine, I mean, it's just like, you
know, I don't know how to explain.
You get it.
Like, I'm kind of flirt.
Doing the.
Yeah.
You know what I mean?
It's like the rhythms andstuff of the dialogue, instead of
(37:46):
mimicking natural language,which I think it does, it almost
starts to feel like, oh,that's a little trick.
Like, I get.
I get it.
Yes.
Which I think is fair.
If you come up to me and say,that's the way you're starting to
feel about this, I agree.
Well, do you remember when Ialmost had that complaint about Mad
Men and I figured out, oh,wait, that's what it's supposed to
(38:08):
be doing?
I figured it out prettyquickly because my near complaint
with Mad Men was, wait, he'scheating on his wife again?
And he's drinking again.
Wait, shouldn't he learn his lesson?
No, that's the point.
He doesn't.
Yes.
He hasn't.
I wonder.
This is pure speculation.
I know Christopher Storerwrote a lot of these episodes.
(38:30):
I wonder if that's just a trick.
Maybe trick is too unkind a word.
A quirk.
Yeah.
Maybe we're just seeing aparticular creator's quirks coming
through.
Probably.
Probably.
But I just.
Yeah.
When you, you know, it's likewhen you see the theater, like, sometimes
it's great to see the theateras theater, but when you see the
theater as theater and itdoesn't want you to see it as theater,
(38:53):
not you know?
Yep, I agree with that.
A minor complaint.
It also slows down the.
It slows it down to real lifein a way where change doesn't happen
overnight.
Change won't happen in every episode.
These, these characters,almost all of them are acting out
of pain.
Fear or fear of pain from pain.
(39:15):
Their, their inability todetermine the route to deal with
it at this point in the seriesmay feel unrealistic for a television
show, but it's very realisticfor life.
It's a lot.
It's something that culminatesin this episode with them helping
a child with her fear underthe table.
And it gathers them all aroundquite in an obvious visual there
(39:38):
of, hey, all this probablystarted in our childhood and here
we are under the table helpingEvie, Richie's daughter.
Yeah.
And it does a good job of,like you said, Blaine, the change
is not overly dramatic in the Bear.
(39:58):
It doesn't happen magically or miraculously.
And I thought thing it did agood job of showing in that episode
was you giving the advice.
Them giving the advice to the little.
They're able to give advicethat they can't take for themselves.
That's true.
And I think, you know, andoftentimes I think that's something
you'll hear in therapy, right,when people are kind of trying to
(40:22):
help you maybe reframe your thoughts.
And the way you think aboutyourself is like, hey, would you
say this to a friend?
Or like imagine you're afriend, what would you say there?
And I think that was kind of alittle bit of like they're being
honest and facing things, butalso there's an element of like,
I'm explaining this to alittle girl so she doesn't have to
be afraid.
(40:43):
And you know, especiallyCarmody and Shug and Richie are still
very much defined by theirchildhood and the, the kids that
they were that they carry with them.
Quite sweet for all of them togo around and talk about what they
fear.
It was a, it made for good agood episode.
(41:05):
It was a self containedepisode too, which is nice to see
with television these days.
And it was.
I found it to be a lot of themquestioning their knowledge of others
because there were at leasttwo times, maybe three, where we
have characters say to eachother that they don't know the other
well enough to make aninference about their internal state.
(41:27):
And yeah, a lot of that ofcourse echoes that Mikey hurt them
because of their lack, maybebecause of their lack of a true father.
Do we, does the show ever saywhat's happened to their dad for
sure.
I don't remember.
Just that he's gone.
He's left.
I think.
Is he gone or is he dead?
Or was there.
I think I got the impressionis he left?
(41:50):
Not that he's dead.
Yeah.
But they could switch that onme hurt.
I mean, obviously it's ahurtful and painful thing when someone
dies, but like the hurt thatshe has seems more like he left.
The hurt that she takes out onher kids sometimes.
Okay.
That or at least part of.
Part of her track.
Part of her.
(42:11):
That's just my thought.
Yeah.
I don't know if it's accurate in.
In tv, film, literature.
Well beyond.
When you have charactershaving a meal together, they're.
They're sharing more than justfood, usually in a deeper manner.
Here it was the gum betweenCarm and Uncle Bob Odenkirk, you
know, which.
Which to me signified this isa smaller piece of almost food.
(42:35):
So we're gonna have a smallerconnection between these two.
It's not going to be.
The stitches won't be.
It won't be sewn as tight.
It's very small still.
Bear's still showing.
It can pull some.
Some great guest stars.
Well, loving Bob.
I'm so glad to have.
It would make sense that he's back.
Yeah.
(42:55):
Yeah.
I enjoyed the.
It did make me laugh that JohnMulaney's character is back, but
this time he's completely inbusiness with the facts.
Yeah.
Like he's.
He's propping up.
He thinks their schemes are incredible.
He.
He kind of sees the family aswhat they are too.
He.
Yeah, he's.
He.
He's amused by them.
(43:15):
Right.
And class A acting fromEberron Moss.
Baccarat in the.
Yeah.
He gives this look to hisdaughter Evie when Tiffany kisses
her and joins in to help withthe fear under the table.
And it switches smartly editsto him giving this look to them.
(43:36):
It's good stuff.
He.
With it, man.
He's gonna break my heart.
Because he looks.
He does such a good job ofRichie as like, he's really.
There's a lot of brash andbluster, but he's also this really
vulnerable guy.
And every time he's around hiskid, he looks like his heart's about
(43:56):
to break.
And I think that that's theacting there.
Yeah.
It's.
It's a truth of.
Of human nature too, which isthat, you know, it's good acting.
I do say.
I will say the Francine plot line.
It was there, of course, togive us a.
Another idea of forgivenessand moving on.
Having Sugar have to deal withsomeone as well.
(44:19):
But it also played like just agood excuse to have Brie Larson.
And I don't know that itdidn't deserve to be cut and make
the episode.
I think that's mostly what it was.
It was just an excuse for themto pre Larson and replicate Franny
and Sugar doing the same thingthat Richie and Carm did last season.
(44:40):
Right.
Yelling at each other, butsaying the exact same thing.
Yep.
It kind of ended up a littlemuch ado about nothing for me.
I think if you treated it justas like the culmination of an ongoing
joke as opposed to something.
Yeah.
Momentous.
I think.
Yeah.
Don't.
We shouldn't overweight itwith importance.
(45:00):
I think.
Okay.
A bonus of the weddingepisode, really.
Any episode that he's in isgetting to watch Oliver Platt.
Look at these guys and galswhen they're speaking here it's him
and Richie alone with one another.
And.
And Richie makes this profoundpoint that he.
He may be the connectivetissue for the rest of the family.
(45:21):
And Oliver Platt just giveshim this look like, no shit.
Without saying, I mean, youcan almost read his mind there.
I think that there have beenmore close ups than ever been employed
in other seasons.
In this season, I believe thatthat is also Christopher, if you're
out there and I'm maligningyou, I apologize.
(45:42):
But it seems like that'ssomething he really likes in the
episodes that he directs.
Yeah.
Because whenever I've beenlike, wow, then it'll go to the directed
by Christopher story.
I'm like, oh, okay.
That's why we're up their nostril.
Well, you know, it's this.
Everyone's getting closer andin that closeness, maybe there's
a little less dysfunction, alittle bit more happiness.
(46:04):
The episode actually ends withRichie laughing at the picture on
his phone because he's of joythat he's a part of the family there.
He's.
Yeah, he does have friends,you know.
There it was a little.
That episode as a whole was alittle sentimental.
Which can I think Ruby folksthe wrong way.
But I think it's hard sometimes.
(46:25):
It's really hard to talk aboutthese important things without being
sentimental in a way that forsome reason, rage and anger and hurt
aren't sentimental.
But like, appreciating being apart of that family life in that
way is sentimental.
I don't know.
It's just a stray thought I'vehad for myself.
Yeah.
About.
Or a stray thought I've hadfor myself about my reaction upon
(46:48):
watching that episode, which Idid like.
Yeah, I did too.
And here's where the fullseason drop hinders the show once
again.
Sydney tells Richie in this episode.
Yeah.
She says, well, there's onlyone decision.
That's right.
And then a week betweenepisodes gives you.
Gives that line a lot of backand forth and little tense that you
(47:10):
don't get from being able topush play on episode eight right
then, which.
Honestly I felt everythingpast the wedding was really hampered,
especially leading into thefinale was really hampered by being
released all at once.
Yeah, I think it does it.
I mean, we want, you know, wewatched it to talk about it, but
I do think the kind of the wayto your stuff, it almost does it
(47:33):
a disservice to kind of rollthrough it the way Hulu encourages
you to watch it.
Yeah.
It's such an odd choice forthis show because I don't do this
with every show.
It's very strange.
You know, even with.
And limited themselves tothree episode dumps here, we just.
We still just get the wholething all at once.
(47:53):
I don't know.
Some.
I'm sure there's some reasonfor it.
Maybe that's.
I don't know, maybe they havethe analytics showing that people
really engage with it in this way.
I don't know.
That's what they see.
I guess.
Episode 8 Green starts.
The name of it is Green startswith a weird opening.
It's as weird as maybe thefirst episode of the series where
(48:14):
Sidney has a dream of disaster.
A cooking show that's gone crazy.
She's running off the stageinto an empty theater.
I guess that's kind of thesummation of the bear, though.
They're all worried that thiscooking presentation's about to fail
while they're running fromtheir issues that everyone else could
see.
You know, I guess.
And the fun thing about beingrecorded like this and having people
(48:37):
hear my opinions every week isthat I'm probably gonna contradict
myself in six months.
Months to a year.
Yeah.
But I don't know if I need adream to make any one internal state.
You know, like, it was justkind of like, all right, let's go.
Like, I. I know that she'sstressed out.
Yes.
Yeah.
Well, that is, I think, easily implied.
(48:57):
But Carm had a very similardream where he was in front of a.
He was at a cooking show.
Yeah.
That's the one where he endsconfronted with the bear, is it not?
I'm not sure.
I just remember that he.
He has the And I think theidea there is not that she's stressed,
but she is stressed on thelevel that Carm is.
Is stressed too.
(49:17):
Yes.
But also, I don't think I needanyone's dreams ever again.
Yeah, it's true.
The only time.
The only time I've been like,yes, a dream sequence has been if
David lynch is directing it.
Well, yes.
Where the whole movie could bea dream.
Yeah.
Did you get the nod toGroundhog Day with Sid waking up
to I Got yout, Babe?
(49:39):
Did I get to the nod toGroundhog Day with him explicitly
watching Groundhog Day?
You know, these guys and galsare having the same day.
It seems like they're inpurgatory too.
Just like our sunny friends.
Yeah.
Wow.
Except they can actually moveforward a little bit, but they're
feeling a little stuck themselves.
(50:02):
Ricci lays it out in theepisode called Green with his line
that Honesty's scary.
Fixing things like this with honesty.
Scary.
Watching Karm walk back up tohis mom's is frightening to him,
maybe to the viewer.
We've seen bits and pieces ofalcohol, alcoholism, and just some
really severe dysfunction.
(50:23):
Who knows how much he blamesher for Mikey's death.
In this episode covers kind ofwho's going to try on the Honesty
to fix who's going to do this.
And for Carmo, so far, it's.
It's Karm, but it's not Marcuswho avoids his dad.
Yeah.
He has a look that his dad'swaiting to talk to him and he turns
(50:46):
the other way, which is interesting.
And.
Because then we'll go aheadand get the penultimate episode,
which links together perfectlywith this one.
Yes, it does.
To Annatto, I guess.
Is that the name of the dishthat they're talking about?
Tonato.
He said what?
Carmen says it in the episode.
I'd never heard of it and Icouldn't pronounce it.
(51:07):
And this is what you weretalking about, I think even in the
non spoiler section whereJamie Lynn Curtis is Donna working.
She's basically working hernight step, I suppose, where she
makes amends.
And I think the key moment inall of that is.
I mean, there's just greatacting between the two where he's
(51:28):
great, he's at tears, she's at tears.
And, you know, he tells her,you know, it's okay, you don't even
have to say it.
And now I see where you're going.
She does.
But I do think that the keymoment is just after, is when he
cooks for her.
Because when you cook for yourParents, that's as grown up of a
moment as you'll have.
You know, the literal tablesturn in a way.
(51:50):
Well, and in the one feast ofthe seven fishes where we introduced
Donna, she won't let otherscook for her.
That's so true.
She wants to make everythingbeautiful, but she won't let others
cook for her.
And I think there, I don'tthink this is the whole of it, but
there is a bit of, like, yourability to give love is also bound
(52:12):
up in your ability to receive love.
It's the old Mr. Rogers thing, right?
Like, he thought if childrenwere told that they were loved, they
would be loving.
And so Donna Don is being ableto kind of receive love from her
son in a.
In that gesture, I think is.
Is big.
Instead of holding on to thecontrol and being like, no, I'm the
nurturer.
(52:33):
I. I do.
We do things my way.
Huh?
It's also the episode whereTina gets the pasta under three minutes
with help of Zen advice fromLuca, that devious Luca.
More.
More proof of growing, youknow, getting it right, getting better.
Donna apologizes for her poor motherhood.
Karmic, in an episode, tellsUncle Jimmy thanks.
(52:54):
On a voicemail.
Carms quit smoking.
Every.
You know, it's thesecharacters trying their best to make
small steps to improve.
One of the earlier times wetalked, like, I do think that was
part of the point of seasonthree for, for me.
Yeah.
Is that these, thesecharacters had to be.
They're stuck doing the samething and it's not working.
Season three is almost their bottom.
(53:16):
That's kind of what I mean.
Since it's like if any ofthese characters have any hope, they're
gonna start recognizing fromthis and from the bounce back that
they're.
If they want differentresults, they gotta do different
things.
You know, maybe a bit ofsubversion with Marcus winning a
best new chef every day.
(53:38):
Do need a Marcus.
I loved it though.
But when they, When Sugartells them food and wines, giving
top five chefs whatever the.
The recognition is, there's amoment where Carm looks right at
Sydney.
You catch it?
And he's thinking it's gonnabe you.
Right?
He's thinking it's Sydney.
Yeah.
Which you.
The viewer is supposed tothink too.
Oh, yeah, right.
This is also the episode,correct me if I'm wrong, where Rob
(54:03):
Reiner's character.
And I forget his name.
Yeah.
It's something funny.
The consultant.
Yeah.
He meets the computer and he.
And they have that dialoguewhere it says, interesting first
name.
The.
And he says, yeah, it's a nickname.
You don't.
You don't have a nickname.
He says I have a nickname.
What is it?
Not gonna tell you.
Nice to tell you.
It's a nice little funnymethod for us to be reminded these
(54:23):
are people who will not revealthemselves to others at first.
Yes.
I'm going to keep as much hidden.
Uncle Jimmy honking, losinghis mind.
Honking in the car was a nice touch.
He was a child.
That was really good.
The Joe Perry universe liveson in the Bear with Marcus's roommate
wanting to go to Hoots to celebrate.
What's Hoots?
(54:44):
It's Hooters.
It's his favorite restaurant.
There was another one that Ithought needed a trim.
I don't know that I. I neededChester in there to be awkward and
weird.
I made me laugh.
Just let me see him.
Since he's the same characterthat he played in Joe Parrot talks
with you.
Yeah.
Basically the same character.
Not to be a little nicer.
(55:05):
Yeah.
Probably not to be cliche or cheesy.
What?
But the bear can also be about.
It wants to be, I think, andkind of succeeds at it.
And about the grand scheme ofit all.
It can be about life itself.
And every second is the Super Bowl.
As Richie's staffmate says atthe end of the penultimate episode.
(55:27):
Yeah.
If you believe life'simportant then and you're paying
attention to every moment,then, yeah, it's every moment could
be the.
The winning one.
Our lives are the sum of whatwe do with them.
Right.
So you got five moments ofgreatness and 25 moments of hell.
Well, I bet that'll outweigh.
(55:49):
Yeah.
It didn't come to me as asurprise at the end of nine to find
out that Carm had taken hisname out of the ownership agreement,
the partnership.
As soon as he was wanderingaround Frank Lloyd Wright's house,
I was like, he's out, he's done.
Yeah.
Everyone probably had guessedhis changes would be something along
the lines of he's not going tobe a partner anymore.
(56:11):
I mean, I think that was kindof obvious.
The ending did leave mequestioning how it all relates to
his telling uncle that heknows how to fix it all.
Yeah, I know how to fix itall, though.
It's okay.
And you think, okay, well,he's probably taking his name out
of the agreement, but whatdoes that mean?
So takes us to final episode.
Goodbye, high turmoil.
This one is basically stays inthe high in the frequency of high
(56:34):
turmoil.
But it's just a four character play.
Yes, I would say it is sameyeah, Four characters.
We never see anyone else.
And it stays in the same spacefor 35 minutes, give or take.
I guess that's kind of abottle episode.
I mean, a bottle episode is a classic.
We ran out of money right here.
(56:55):
You know, I don't think that'sthe case here.
I don't know.
I don't think that's the casehere either.
They may have used all theirmoney on the soundtrack.
I don't know.
I appreciate it.
I felt like the bear is sometimes.
I've sometimes criticized itfor what is probably nice to call
quirks.
Right?
Like the rhetorical quirks,the stylistic quirks, the.
(57:18):
You know, we've got our bigcast of characters, so I thought
it was actually really goodand effective to pare it down to
Richie, Shug, Carm and Sidney,kind of the four.
The core of.
The core emotional lives ofthe show, I guess.
Oh, yeah.
And Sugary doesn't even makean appearance to the last five, ten
(57:40):
minutes.
Right.
Sydney's dedicated to therestaurant at this point, and there's.
She's kind of in a no way outsituation because she has said no
to Shapiro.
We see that earlier and we seethat in a previous episode.
And then.
So with Carm's removal fromthe contract, it's so funny for me
as a viewer, I'm not thesmartest sometimes.
I just assumed that when heremoved himself, I thought that was
(58:01):
noble.
I thought that was an improvement.
You know, the removal ofstress from himself and giving it
to Sydney and saying, here,it's yours.
Take it.
Succeed.
You're gonna do great.
But then hearing her reactionand seeing her, I was like, oh, shit.
Yeah, he's.
He's burdening her with debt,isn't he?
Yes.
I think it's both things, right.
(58:21):
Because he, I think, would seeit like that.
But Sidney is like, I don'tknow if this is gonna work without
you.
Oh, and my credit's alreadydestroyed and this restaurant is
in debt and you just.
You left me holding the bagfor your idea.
Yeah.
I don't know that it's everbeen more evident that Carm also
(58:41):
has an addict's mentality.
It's not as horrible asMikey's, we hope, but here he's kind
of saying, I can't get ittogether here.
So a change of location isgoing to fix me.
And that's.
That's addict thinking.
Like, if I can't get it righthere, then let me move.
And I will quit drinking.
I will quit online shopping.
(59:02):
I will whatever.
And it's sad.
These are self centered peoplewho are all hurting.
And rather than acknowledgingsometimes those that hurt, that pain
and that each one of them hasa deep and unique pain related to
the same thing.
They yell and fight.
You know, audiences can getfrustrated with them, I think, because
(59:23):
if one side would becomevulnerable enough to open up to the
other side and that side wouldlisten and relate, a lot of healing
could be done.
But this is life, you know,that does not happen.
You know, we do get a littleof this when Richie finally says
that he thought Carm avoidedthe funeral due to blaming him.
Richie for Mikey's death.
(59:45):
And turns out Carm was at the funeral.
Just not very long.
Do you get in this one thekind of push through to honesty,
especially between Carm and Richie?
Yep.
And I agree with you, Blaine.
It's real life.
Like so many things in ourlife would be different if we were
just vulnerable.
For so many of us, that'sworse than the bad situation we're
(01:00:08):
in, you know?
Yeah, it hurts.
Yeah, I can relate.
You know, I mentionedaudiences could probably get frustrated
with this kind of behavior,but I could also see myself in it
where being honest and openfeels like the end of the world.
And yeah, that's probably howthese characters are supposed to
(01:00:30):
be feeling.
And there's a little.
There's a bit of the death of yourself.
Yep.
When.
When you do that.
Yeah.
Your, your idea of yourself,your ego.
Wants to protect you from that.
Yeah, exactly.
It thinks it is.
And here instead of sharinggum like Carm and his uncle Bob Odenkirk,
(01:00:50):
you know, they had the small connection.
Carmen, Richie, get the real thing.
They share a cigarette andeven Sydney gets some of it.
Until Richie says, you're nogood at that.
Give me that cigarette.
Which would be me just tryingto smoke a cigarette.
It's as if this longconversation demonstrates it might
be the final stretch ofhealing to begin.
This is the.
(01:01:11):
This is the jumping off of.
I think everybody's going tostart healing a little bit.
It's going to be intense.
There's still some pain leftover and some deep rooted anger.
Nicholas Qua, if I'mpronouncing his name correctly on
Vulture, argued that it wouldbe a fascinating finale.
Oh, it would be fascinating.
(01:01:32):
It really was.
They chose to end it here.
That would be a bold move.
I think I'd be okay with it.
The clock does hit zero.
Yeah.
I mean, that's some big timeambiguity if they choose that or
if they have to.
And I think mainly because ofthe beef's Plot line still lingering.
Well, they open the two orthree or more windows that truly
(01:01:54):
carry the restaurant and, andRob Reiner's guidance.
Is it, is it helpful?
Is it legitimate?
Is it going to work?
And then, you know, you seehim pair up kind of with the computer
and you think, these guys aregoing to be like a super team.
Yeah.
Yeah.
That revelation that Carm wentto Mikey's funeral hits.
It's all of them so hard.
(01:02:15):
And I think it's because theywere all thinking, fuck him, he can't
even make it to his ownbrother's funeral.
Or I think Sugar might have.
The thought of this poor kidmust be in such pain and emptiness
because he can't even make the funeral.
There's these two ways oflooking at it and I think a lot of
them are you.
(01:02:35):
You didn't even come to the funeral.
Yeah.
Which we, which we had revealed.
Was it the wedding episode?
Yeah, we.
We found out Carm actually.
Was it.
Yeah.
From Bob Odenkirk.
He says, I saw you at the funeral.
And he does so, so gently.
Yeah.
And which I thought was goodsetup for this because it's so obvious
that Rich resented him forleaving and Carm resented Rich for
(01:02:58):
being the brother to Mikey.
Oh yeah.
And.
And Sugar, obviously, youknow, he's her baby brother.
Uh huh.
She sees him.
She has that.
Yeah.
She sees him as pitiful,scared and fragile because she doesn't
even question that he'sleaving the shift business when he
tells.
Yeah.
She's not the one to have abig reaction like Sydney and Richie.
Yeah.
(01:03:19):
You know, honestly, it couldbe healthy for, for Carm if he goes.
If he doesn't replace cookingwith something unhealthy.
Yeah.
And what do you do with his character?
I guess.
What do you.
Yeah, I guess for the nextseason he still has to stick around
to help them.
He's got, he's got to help thething, make it.
Much like Lucas there to helpto lift it.
Lifted up a lot of stuff.
(01:03:41):
He helped Tina and Marcus and.
Yeah.
Yes.
Yeah.
You know, maybe Carm can bethat guy.
Which is what I thought he wastrying to do.
I thought he was just going tosay, here, it's your restaurant.
I'm just going to work here.
I didn't see him bailing.
There is that conversationCarm has with Shapiro that we never
hear.
You know, he gets the phonecall from him.
(01:04:03):
Shapiro may have extended himan invite.
Now that would be far fetchedprobably, but you know, there are
options that Christopher Storrcould play with what if Carm went
to work for Shapiro?
I don't think that's gonna happen.
But even if the offer's on thetable, it could cause your next season's
conflict.
Yeah.
(01:04:23):
Yeah.
I think I liked this season of television.
I think that it prolonged afew things.
I'm not so sure that the.
That.
That this season the bearcouldn't have gotten everything in
eight episodes and felt.
Yeah.
I'm not saying the pacing wasoff because these.
(01:04:44):
This is real life.
This.
And real life takes a while.
Did I need to see Tina try toget the pasta under three minutes?
Seven times?
Would five times have worked?
Yeah.
Right.
Did I need Sydney to have adream sequence where she's under
the gun just like Carm was?
I don't think so.
Did I need the Francine plotline to see sugar also needs improving?
(01:05:09):
I don't think so.
So, Right, so it's not aperfect bit of television, but it
was.
It was good, I thought, youknow, it was good.
Makes us think things, feel things.
Even if it made me feel things.
You know, if it kind.
I. I do think that there's like.
Even if it's.
You're watching something andyou're like, eh.
Like if you got something outof it where it's like, well, I thought
(01:05:32):
a little bit about this.
I felt a little bit more about this.
That's good, right?
That's true.
That's good for you.
And it did that.
So therefore maybe makes mytop 10 at the end of the year.
We'll see.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
I thought it was pretty good.
Not perfect and lots of quirksthat kind of do take away, but overall
pretty good.
(01:05:52):
It would be nice to seeChristopher Storr, if he can produce
another season, say, you know,what's working, the emotions are
what's working and what's notworking, and then come up with a
season five that might end it all.
We don't know.
Yeah.
All right, well, we've reachedthe end of our episode.
Speaking of endings, for Adam,who's not here, and for Donovan,
(01:06:16):
who he is, I'm Blaine, and wehope that you don't look back in
anger.
Goodbye to everyone.
Talk to you next Tuesday.
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