June 3, 2025 • 66 mins
Blaine and his sidekick begin with an announcement about the home site The Alabama Take (0:01) before getting into what the episode covers for the week (0:45).
Once Adam and Donovan join, Blaine breaks down some things about Todd Chrisley (1:26) before they briefly discuss the new Wes Anderson trailer (4:09) and theater expectations gone wrong (6:27).
From there, it's the usual non-spoiler section where Blaine broadly explains how 'Duster' goes sideways (8:51), an overview of this season of 'Hacks' on Max (11:03), general feelings on the season of '100 Foot Wave' (16:19), and the overall thoughts of 'The Last of Us' (19:20).
In the spoiler section, Adam and Donovan break down 'Hacks' (21:34). Blaine and Adam discuss the profundities of '100 Foot Wave' (36:03). And finally, Donovan and Blaine try to determine if 'The Last of Us' ends fairly (53:30).
For more, visit the website The Alabama Take linked here.
To help the podcast, donate any amount with the Buy Me a Coffee link here.
For t-shirts and more, visit the online store with the link here.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:01):
Oh, hey, buddy.
Do you know what we're up toat the Alabama Take?
No, what?
Is it exciting?
Well, yeah.
We have one spot for people tofind out everything they want from
us.
Do you know what that is?
Oh, subscribe to the newsletter.
That's it.
And we're working on a reallybig goal at the Alabama Take.
Well, what's that?
(00:22):
We're trying to get to 500subscribers to our YouTube channel
in the next two weeks.
Do you think we can do it?
Oh, yeah, for sure.
All people have to is go toyour YouTube channel and subscribe.
That's all.
It's free.
It's absolutely free and painless.
Thanks, bud.
You're welcome.
(00:42):
You know, since I have youhere today, which is rare, do you
know what we're covering inthis week's episode?
Yep.
You will do non spoilers on.
On Duster Hack's 100 foot wave.
And the last of us.
(01:02):
Whoa.
That's right.
Plus we get off on a tangentto begin on Chrisley.
Yeah, Chrisley.
Oops.
It will be fine.
Alabama tape projection.
(01:23):
As promised.
Here they are.
Welcome to Adam.
Welcome to Donovan.
And with the three of uscombined, it's difficult to contain
the kind of excitement that wehave for Chris Lee being out of jail.
The world's healing.
I don't know what that means.
It's okay.
You don't have.
I'm not trying to be like Mr.
(01:45):
Cool.
Like, I'm not informed aboutpop culture.
I genuinely had no idea whatpeople were talking about.
I had to.
So there's this guy named ToddChrisley who very, very much acts
like a gay man, but is marriedwith many children and is obsessed
with women, he claims.
(02:06):
Anyway, that's probablynothing says straight like that.
Yeah, it's probably neitherhere nor there.
But he lived in Atlanta and Nashville.
One of the two.
I think he Both, actually.
I think he.
He lived in Atlanta once andthen they moved to Nashville.
And he's got wild kids andthey just basically treat him like
shit.
And he gives them the what for.
(02:27):
He doesn't let them get awaywith it.
He gives them the what for.
But anyway, he got.
What?
Tax.
Tax evasion, maybe something.
That's the way we got Capone.
Yeah, he went to jail and thenTrump let him free.
Now you're asking Blaine, howdo you know this?
When my wife was home with ourbaby daughter years ago, she got
(02:49):
really roped into his realityTV show and watched like binge watched
it while holding the baby.
And I would come in everyafternoon and that's what would be
on?
It's funny because he's suchan idiot.
So anyway, if you're likemassively sleep deprived and gone
(03:09):
through a life changing event.
Yes, how.
And that he's not gay, but he also.
That he's not gay, but he alsogives the funniest gay man responses
to everything.
I don't know.
It's just amusing.
You know how we havecompletely ruined.
Say, like this podcast justnow today.
Yeah.
The actual names of SECfootball coaches saying Stan Mullins
(03:33):
or whatever.
So when this happened, I waslike, wait, did the governor of New
Jersey go to jail?
And I didn't know because Iknow him to be Chris Christie.
Oh, Chris Christie.
Not Chris Lee.
But yes, my brain is a jumbled mess.
But, Adam, you don't rememberme constantly tweeting about Chrisley
(03:54):
in the heyday of Twitter?
If it was the heyday ofTwitter, then Carl Welzine was probably
taking up most of my bandwidth.
But into real things that wedo care about.
That was TV related, granted.
So we're going to talk abouthow excited we are for the new Wes
Anderson movie.
They're 30 minutes talkingabout real things we're excited about.
(04:16):
Shoot, shoot.
From the hip on this one.
I've got no notes.
Oh, I just like to laugh.
What's.
It's Tom Hanks.
Tom Hanks in the what?
And this one's called thePoltergeist Experience.
Poltergeist.
But it's symmetrical.
You know, I'm curious to seehow it goes.
(04:37):
The last one, I think wassomewhat divisive for people.
I loved it.
I thought it was really cooland ambitious and I love to see someone.
Yeah, that one.
I really do know the title.
I love to see someone who madethat many movies and has that style
and could basically just churnout the same thing time after time.
(04:57):
Some people argue.
He does.
Yeah.
But I think if you do look athis movies, there's a progression
instead of he's not.
Not that I don't love thisman, but he's not Adam Sandler.
But what if they work together?
The Sandman.
I would watch that.
I'd watch the hell out of that.
Happy New guys this summer on Netflix.
Refreshing my local theater inthe AMC app more than I should to
(05:21):
see when it's going to be here.
Oh, Happy Gilmore Too is on Netflix.
Oh, okay.
Just straight to Netflix.
It's actually, since we saidit just now, it's already been filmed
and delivered.
No, I'm not.
That's not a joke.
Happy Gilmore too.
Okay.
Yeah.
It's happening.
Oh, my God.
Incredible.
Yeah, I'll watch it.
(05:43):
The headline I saw was that.
Or maybe it's not a headline,but bit I saw is that Adam Sandler
has done surprisingly fewsequels, though he's done a lot of
movies.
He classically did thegrownups duology.
Right?
That one is about it, right?
Yeah.
There's no click too, huh?
(06:04):
No Mr.
Deeds too.
No Punch Drunk Love, too.
He gets it all, really.
His movie.
Hey, hey.
I love him.
All those pudding cups addedup to a trip to Hawaii, my friend.
I love it in Hawaii.
I love Punch Drunk Love.
I love Philip Seymour Hoffmanin it.
He's amazing.
But I would put.
That's a Paul Thomas Anderson movie.
Can I get the way thattangential on this podcast?
(06:28):
Do I.
Can I just get supertangential on this podcast?
What?
As if we're not.
What's ever stopped us before?
I took a date.
I took a date to see PunchDrunk Love.
She was expecting an AdamSandler movie, and I knew what we
were getting into.
Needless to say, I'm so gladwe do not date anymore.
(06:52):
I had a similar experiencewith other theater goers when I went
to see Uncut Gems.
And there were very clearly, alot of people wanted the Sandman.
They wanted the Sandman andthey got the Sandman, but not in
the way they wanted.
And it was hilarious.
Like, it was just liketrickling out 20 minutes in.
It's like the exodus begins.
(07:14):
I'm the only one laughing.
I thought the movie was hilarious.
Nobody dead.
Dead silent.
I know that I've told you allthis before, but when I went the
funniest this has happened tome on not.
Not an Adam Sandler Story, butOnce Upon a Time in Hollywood.
I'm sitting there.
We've made it to the pointwhere Manson walks across the driveway
in that scene.
(07:35):
This.
Yes.
See, Donovan has never seenthis movie.
It's true.
But I know what it's about.
So this is not even like whenthings are getting tense.
So nothing's really happenedyet in the movie as far as gore or
whatever.
And these people get up toleave and say as Manson strolls by.
I didn't know this was about that.
As if there was going to be abloodless end to a Tarantino film.
(07:58):
Hilarious.
Yeah.
Right.
Who do you think you're.
Yeah.
95, 96.
My friends and I were watchingPulp Fiction in the theater, whatever
year it came out.
And when Travolta pulls thegun over the car seat to talk to
the guy in the back Seataccidentally blows his brains out
and we all, the four of us arejust bold over laughing and everyone
(08:22):
in the theater is appalled atus, wanted to kick us out.
That's a funny scene.
It's hilarious.
So it's.
I love these stories of notknowing what you're getting into.
It's like the Drive by Trucker song.
The Gigi Allen came to townwith the old man.
He had no idea.
(08:43):
I told our listeners and boththe youth I'd at least watch one
episode of the Max series, Duster.
My prediction is this LatoyaMorgan and J.J.
abrams created series will notbe an Emmy winning show.
It's trying its best.
It's not merely with just cars.
(09:03):
It's edit feels like a beard.
Its edit feels like it'sattempting to cover up some plot
issues.
Honestly, I think the biggestissue is that it's the characters
are caricatures, but there'snot enough fun going on.
The characters arecaricatures, but there's not any
(09:24):
goofiness to go along with it.
The rest of the series istaking itself seriously.
There's no wink.
There's no wink.
Yeah, it sounds like.
Yeah, it almost feels likekitsch, but it doesn't know that
it's kitsch.
So it's the worst kind.
Yeah, it kind of issimplistic, very well shot.
There's an occasional goodacting moment or two.
(09:47):
It's really funny that it'sreminiscent of Starsky and Hutch
or the Dukes of Hazzard or BJand the Bear, those early 80s shows
that were in that sort of design.
But it's just not finding itsbalance on how serious it should
be.
Or maybe not serious it shouldbe, how funny it could be or interesting
(10:08):
in that way.
But it's weird.
It's a weird one.
I don't know that I'll watchall of it.
I might watch one more or something.
But Holloway swagger is interesting.
And then also by overblown.
I don't know.
It's not great.
This is what I feel like whenI hear Mr.
Abrams, if you're stilllistening to this, after, after left
(10:28):
you the abuse.
The abuse of last week.
But jj, you're just going toget something that like at its best,
best is fine.
Like he's fine.
Yeah.
You know what I mean?
Like it's fine.
Really good.
It looked really good.
That's about all I can really say.
The set pieces, the car lookedgood, the costume designs were really
(10:51):
cool.
Just it felt like cartooncharacters put in a Martin Scorsese
film.
Or something.
There's not a balance here,but something that is good.
From what you guys have toldme, you've seen the fourth and most
recent season of the Emmyaward winning Max series Hacks, which
(11:11):
stars Gene Smart as a comedian.
And then what comes after success?
What happens when you get the success?
I think is what the fourthseason's about.
From my summation.
You guys know more.
Of course.
We're.
We are in a non spoiler section.
But how do you feel about theseason, especially in comparison
to the previous three?
(11:32):
Do you like to laugh?
Donovan always comes up with the.
Do you like to vomit?
I've got one for you.
Is it about how do you findbalance after you get what you want?
How do you.
What happens to you when youdo find your success?
Is it a little bit about that?
(11:52):
I would not say that they areseeking balance necessarily.
Okay, thank you.
But it is about.
Yeah.
What.
What happens when you get the.
In some ways when you get thething you want and you realize that
you have just unlocked a wholenew level of work and expectations
and pressure that you thoughtthat you were aware of.
(12:13):
It's the dog catching the car.
I was going to say that youstole my analogy.
Look at us.
The three of us hang out too much.
We need some original voicesin here.
Anything else you want to addin the non spoiler section on full
season of Hacks?
I'd agree that it's very muchof a piece with the previous three
seasons, which is a complimentbecause I feel like they've all been
(12:34):
going at a really high levelof excellence.
It manages to be consistentlyfunny about people that are sometimes
awful, like sometimessympathetic, sometimes awful.
And sometimes you gotta goguerrilla mode.
Give me a comparison.
That's unwarranted.
But the studio versus Hacks, which.
(12:57):
Who has the most undeservingcharacters or the most.
I was gonna actually compareit to Hacks, Especially since Gene
Smart pops up in that episode.
And I don't think that was the.
What's his face?
Jimmy.
I can't remember.
The guy who plays him.
Yeah.
Each other.
That makes sense.
And it's even the fact thatthey just wrapped season four and
(13:18):
it didn't.
It debuted in 2021.
Is that.
Does that sound right?
2020 sounds right now.
I think it might be a Covidera release.
I think.
Yeah.
The production would have been.
But maybe HBO and Max are likedipping a toe into just making a
lot of or more shows wherethey just rapidly produce stuff.
(13:40):
The days of like, how long isit before Game of Thrones comes back
seems.
I mean obviously we're livingthat right now with a Game of Thrones
related thing.
But they churn them out andthey're hitting some familiar beats
but doing it in an interestingway, I think.
Whereas the studio feels thisis not a dig on hacks with the studios
(14:01):
a bit more arty, like theywanted to do ambitious episodes,
one shot kind of stuff, whatever.
And the people are way moreextreme, I would say.
On the studio.
On the studio, yeah.
Does that check out?
Yeah, I think so.
The studio is interested inbeing a show about movies in the
(14:26):
ways that Adam mentioned.
Right.
Where it's like the characterswho are sometimes so extreme that
they're almost like an allegory.
Not really an allegory, butSal is not a realistic character
necessarily, but a fun one.
And thank you.
That's the word.
Yes.
And in a way that like Hacksis not interested in being it like
(14:47):
it is about comedy in manyways, but it's not interested in
being a show about comedy inthe same way that the studio is interested
being a show about movies andthe media more broadly anyway.
It does touch on a lot ofgenerational things and was a clever
show coming out of COVID erapolitics in a lot of ways.
(15:07):
And maybe even navigating likein this most recent season.
The.
I mean we're in a minefieldhere talking about like where does
society stand in like a.
In some ways like a post wokeworld and like how to that pendulum
just constantly swinging andthem trying to make sense of that
if that checks out.
(15:29):
So even though it is hittingsome familiar.
Not sitcom Y but more sitcom Ythan the studio beats, it's still
ambitious, I would say.
Yeah, I think it's ambitiousin almost a traditional way where
it's like it wants to beambitious in the like in a very character
driven way.
And it's not formally oranything like that.
(15:51):
What Donovan said at the top.
Do you like to laugh?
This is like this and it'sjust occurring to me that we do this.
There are shows that we willwatch while eating dinner some nights
and shows that you have towatch after eating dinner.
They are more of yourattention reason and you can't do
that while chewing.
I don't know.
But your food you can miss Hacks.
(16:11):
Is on while we're eating.
It's just a.
It's just a good show, good program.
It's fun.
Yeah.
All right, next in our nonspoiler section, Donovan, do you
like to surf?
I've been told by my doctor never.
To attempt it again.
Yeah.
He showed me a picture of awhale washed up on the shores of
(16:35):
Long island and that scared me straight.
Yeah, that's enough ocean for Donovan.
That put a nail in that coffin.
I'm done.
Now we are going to talk abouta 100 foot wave, the HBO docu series
about big wave surfing andseveral of the extreme sports participants,
particularly in Nazare,Portugal, home to the biggest, maybe
(16:57):
the deadliest waves that crasha rocky shoreline.
This series is directed byChris Smith, who is doing some really
elegant work to create storiesfrom this group of surfers and their
families.
No spoilers here, of course,but third season just ended.
I loved it.
And the question withsomething like this and a question
(17:18):
from hacks to me is like, howmuch more can we get out of this
as far as storytelling goes?
And they have answered thecall every time.
To my mind.
I don't know that I ever.
I don't know that I've enjoyedanything quite as much as I enjoyed
season one.
That initial let's get to knowthese people.
(17:39):
Here's them discovering thisplace, like a Wild west feel or astronauts,
whatever.
They're the first peoplereally trying this and figuring it
out.
I love that so much.
And then when it turned moreinto let's look at this whole community.
And then it really zoomed outquite a bit this last season.
It's still really good.
(17:59):
It was never as strong asseason one to me, but it's still
by the wrap of season three, Ithought, man, this is just a great
show.
It's so much better than ithas any right to be in a lot of ways.
Like in a.
I think of how many pieces ofmedia were made in the post X Games
(18:20):
culture or extreme sports, whatever.
And this is so the opposite of that.
It's so artfully done andhuman and just fantastic.
Yeah.
Smith, the director and histeam have hit a stride here, I think
with their filmmaking.
It's a shame it might be thefinal season.
It could be.
It's just rumors.
I don't want to say anythingin the spoilers.
(18:42):
Save it.
I just know that I thought itwas the best of the three and I'll
tell.
Oh wow.
Yeah, I'll tell more why I think.
That I could agree with youonce we get into the spoilers.
I just thought the firstseason was so good and so strong
and holds up to a good rewatchand we'll see with the other ones.
But yeah, I'm interested tohear why you think that about season
(19:03):
three.
I'll allude to it here.
I just admire and love howthey used what they documented to
shift into maybe a deeper theme.
Yeah.
So.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And finally, in our nonspoilers, Donovan and I have reached
the end of the second seasonof the HBO series the Last of Us.
We've got the whole package now.
Donovan, did you like what you saw?
Yeah, I think once it hit itsstride, I did.
(19:25):
I do think that the season issuffering a little, honestly, from
being so short.
Only seven episodes, which ispretty short.
And to be that short with acouple episodes that were like, this
is working out fine, but.
And then to have some.
There was some that werebetter than others.
(19:46):
And I think having seen thewhole thing, this is gonna sound
like I hated it, but I thinkhaving seen the whole thing too,
this season feels more like apart one than season one did.
Oh, yeah.
On the other hand, it's well done.
I'm on record as liking the acting.
It looks great.
It's still in interest.
(20:07):
I still enjoyed watching it.
Yeah.
I don't think a televisionshows look this good this year, and
I thought it had a misstep or two.
Yeah, definitely.
And it was because of thebrevity, I think, is I'm with you
on a lot of this, and we'llget into some of the specifics on
why the brevity.
Heard it.
Yeah.
And I, you know, I.
(20:27):
I get that it's got.
It's a tough dance.
Right.
Like you're dealing withactors, schedules, you're dealing
with how much money you have,you're dealing with.
And then you let it go on anepisode too long.
And we're on here complainingabout the exact opposite thing.
So I get it.
I think it was the writerstrike too affected.
This one wasn't.
I didn't remember that being apart of it.
(20:48):
Maybe.
It's possible.
Okay, now let's take a breakhere, and then we'll get into the
spoilers that we were tryingto dance around.
So we'll be back in 30 seconds.
(21:32):
Tell us more about hacks.
All right, number one, there's nudity.
Gratuitous.
That's important.
Is that true?
Yeah, there's some.
Yeah.
See?
Plane's gonna watch it now.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Donovan, I.
I wrote out some questions Ithought one of us had to.
Right.
That was wise.
And I didn't do it.
(21:53):
There's almost no chance thatwe both do it.
So what did you.
We'll just.
We'll set it up.
When do you think this show isat its most successful?
Ooh, great question.
And here's why.
Really good question.
Because it's based on theconceit of the show is that there's
these two women who love andrespect and work in the same medium
(22:19):
and are separated.
She could be her grandmother,really many decades in between.
And how do they both.
How are they coming together?
How are they not compatible?
How mean can Jean Smart be to her?
Yeah.
So like, when is this?
Because to me, the show hasdefinite beats that it hits over
and over again.
(22:40):
When is it really thriving, doyou think?
Yeah, I do think that it doesthrive in the space where like both,
like you're.
Both of them are awful in acertain way.
Like, Jean Smart is just being mean.
Ava's being perhaps like toquote something from this last season.
(23:01):
Right.
I felt that way until itpersonally affected me.
So like you have that kind oflike rough edges.
But then it does hit.
It will also hit the beat of.
There's a little bit of.
A little bit of heartwarmingmoment too.
Right.
With Jean Smart.
Deborah Vance acknowledges Avain some way.
Ava pulls it out to help her.
(23:23):
There is a foundation.
It's a good show.
Or one of the things I likeabout the show is that there is a
foundation of mutual respect.
Although both of thesecharacters are also profoundly selfish
people and ping pong inbetween that.
Is Ava as selfish?
She can be pretty selfish.
I don't think that she's asselfish as Deborah.
(23:45):
I could be pretty selfish.
This season seems like anexploration of that to some degree.
And I think maybe what I wasgetting at with the question is I
tend to think of them aseither being adversaries or together
or Ava has her feelings hurtby like, those are like the three
(24:06):
modes.
And to me, when they.
All they're doing is likeramming them together and then they
bounce apart, that gets alittle tired.
And it really works to me wheneven if they're being awful to each
other, if they're stillworking together.
I feel like the season as awhole did actually a pretty good
job with that by getting tothe point where you don't want to
(24:26):
see them fight anymore.
I was just over at this and then.
And then.
And then clicking to themworking together again.
I thought they got some goodcomedy out of them not being able
to work together very well.
And then we're able toactually smoothly transition them
being on the same page too.
Are you on board for the arcthat's happened?
Yeah, it makes sense.
(24:48):
Do you think it can sustain?
Because the.
Unfortunately I saw the newsthat it's been renewed Before I saw
the final episode.
So her.
The TMZ reported death was.
Didn't really hit.
What do they do in another season?
I was wondering that too,because this is like you said earlier,
this is like the dog catchesthe car.
(25:11):
Right.
It's season.
It seems like we're going backto season two.
I don't know.
Yeah.
That's what I wonder about isI don't know.
But I'm also not writing forthis show and the folks that have
done that seem to.
Like you said, it's not likethe most groundbreaking show of all
(25:32):
time.
And I think you can predictthe arc of this season.
Right.
Cause it is expected.
But with working within asomewhat conventional framework,
they've so far done a good job.
So I'll at least watch.
Maybe I won't like it as much,but I'll watch it.
I think that I could havewatched more episodes, maybe even
another half season of themjust like negotiating the challenges
(25:55):
of running the show.
I was surprised that they cutthat off when they did.
Obviously you have to show Deborah's.
I think she had the mostsubstantial personal growth this
season that she's had in theshow so far.
Right.
Both to like, Absolutely.
Professionally take a standand to tell Ava, oh, this show wouldn't
(26:15):
be the show without you.
Yes.
And that was a very earned,heartwarming moment.
I thought within the.
Again, you're tempering this with.
Yeah, it's a silly show, butit can also tuck at the heartstrings
a little bit.
Yeah, no, it's good.
I think it does a good jobtoo, of navigate or hand juggling
(26:35):
a not large cast, but large.
Ish cast.
Kind of checking in on themand I'm like, oh, yeah, he's got
an ulcer.
That's funny.
That's.
I was about to ask whathappened this season to keep it fresh
beyond giving them a latenight environment.
I do.
It's so conventional, but I dothe Kayla and Jimmy dynamic.
(26:58):
Yeah.
Which of course is he's thestraight man, she's the.
But that.
That moving forward, thatactually worked for me like as like
tugging at the heartstrings,but more like just straight comedy.
When Kayla realizes how shelikes Jim like that she likes working
with Jimmy, but being theperson she is, she's like, we bad
bitches need to all starttreating him bad.
Nobody else really changed orgrew that much.
(27:20):
But that part, that thatdynamic still makes me laugh.
The actor.
Actors playing both of themare very good together.
She's just completely unhinged.
Yes.
And he's not.
He's just constantly trying todeal with it.
It was using her dad to showhis what could be called weakness.
(27:41):
It was good that it took allseason to really enough things draw
together that he really didseem pathetic at that moment.
Yeah.
Yeah.
As he's.
He's been bitten by a dog.
He's got a staph infectionthat smells like kimchi.
Blaine's face reacting to thisis great.
He has no context for this whatsoever.
I gotta say another.
(28:01):
This just popped in my head.
Another MVP is.
I can't remember her name.
I'm sorry.
But the actor playing theassistant that she.
I was really trying to tee youup to talk about the assistant.
Like, there was.
This is.
There's a bunch of funny bits,but there was a.
She had a line where shedidn't know something about astrology
and she's.
Because I might be gay, butI'm no lesbian.
(28:21):
And just the combination of,like, funny, like, New York accent
with no.
Like, what is her backstory?
She came from, like a closedHasidic Jewish.
Saw one movie and turned herback on it all.
Yeah.
To go work in Hollywood andjust attack.
Consistently funny.
Yeah.
Attacks Los Angeles with theferocity of the east coast generally
(28:44):
and just is get shit done leftand right.
The scene where she is on thebus when she takes the call and.
It'S just map in the city.
That was good.
That was good writing.
Did you enjoy the way that thesupporting cast moved through the
season?
So there's been people whowere maybe more present who had to
(29:05):
take a backseat this time?
Yeah, I was fine with it, honestly.
The.
The episode with thechristening was funny, but almost
was like, okay, this is thecheck in episode on.
On dj and because they justweren't in the season very much.
And it does tee up likeDeborah actually being a grandmother,
but so far not a bunch hasbeen done with that.
(29:29):
I was surprised at how littlethey used that storyline.
Yeah, me too.
She was so present in previousseasons and that tension was there.
And you kept expecting that tobe part of the struggle.
How am I gonna balance this?
Whatever.
Personal.
Yeah.
Would come up with the.
(29:49):
But no.
They just kept it in the office.
Yeah.
But yeah.
I didn't feel like.
Like the B plots were, like,overly distracting or anything.
I think they do rely prettyheavily on Kayla and Jimmy for the
B plots and.
Which is fair.
I like dancing, like, tryingto get.
Trying to.
(30:09):
This is the second.
I guess just like the studio.
This is the second show we'vewatched where someone needs to do
cocaine so they can go out and perform.
It was eerie how similar Iwatched those within a week of each
other.
Because medical science needsto catch up with the realities of
the world here.
Yeah.
But they're so good, right?
But it does keep making me laugh.
(30:30):
Like when the dance mom's, youneed to boof me.
And like Jimmy's Kayla, you do it.
She's.
No, it has to be Jimmy.
I'm just like the face he makes.
That's great.
With cocaine.
With cocaine, yeah.
Yeah.
I got pretty wild.
She has to go out and perform.
Did you.
What did you think of thefinal episode?
(30:53):
Good.
Although in a way, I had justtalked about this with my Blaine
last week in a way that HBOshows sometimes seem to have.
The penultimate episode is thebig one.
Totally.
And then the last one is.
Okay, we're setting it up.
And it doesn't really.
Because they're not ending.
Obviously.
We know it was renewed.
(31:14):
They're not winding things down.
So it is.
It was good.
But it also.
Just watching it.
Okay, this is setting up for now.
They're teeing up.
Yeah.
Anything else?
Right.
And even before the death airquotes around the death moment, you
know that because it's renewedthat they have to pull out of this
tailspin.
They're not going to haveadventures in Singapore for another
(31:34):
year.
But I thought it was okay.
We don't really see her.
Deborah's never vulnerablelike that doesn't spiral.
Really always bounces back.
But man, they left when theyturned that episode in.
It was with the fullconfidence that they were getting
renewed.
You don't film that ending if you.
You're calling your shots.
This is like absolutely.
(31:56):
Mad Men would film the awardshow episodes while award shows were
happening in real life.
Just because I think they'rearrogant pricks and I love them so
much.
But yeah, when it ended, itwas almost like.
Almost set up.
Like the Marvel post credits thing.
Really good way to put it.
Yeah, exactly.
(32:16):
It has to happen now.
Which.
That felt a little clunky.
But yeah, it definitely.
I think you've alluded to thisbefore where it was definitely more
in the service tickle yourbeats than it was necessarily in
where it really shines.
Yeah.
And it was fine.
(32:36):
Right.
There were no episode of thisso far has been like terrible.
But the season really.
It could have ended with nineand I would have felt fine.
That could have been theseason finale.
Yeah.
Yeah, absolutely.
It is funny to think about theearlier seasons dealt with more.
There is like a life and deathepisode right.
(32:57):
Where the Guy.
Do you remember that episodethat almost seems like a fever dream
to say now where she, like,gets with the guy and he ends up
killing himself?
He, like, jumps out a windowor something.
Like, right after that, youhook up.
Yeah.
It's.
Has the show changed since then?
Could the show still do that?
Good question.
I don't know.
I would almost want.
(33:17):
I almost hope they, like, testsomething like that again.
Yeah, it just.
It's gotten so much more.
And I guess Ava is dealingwith fairly serious loneliness at
times.
And I don't know, it justseemed more.
A little glossier this season.
I am interested if they'regonna steer into that because we
do have a good moment.
(33:38):
It is just setting it up.
But where Deborah is beingmean to Ava, but she's also not necessarily
wrong.
She's not wrong.
And so if we're.
I think what I think would be interesting.
Right.
Is okay if we're going back tosome of the setup for season two
or three.
(33:58):
If we.
If they continue to exploreAva realizing that, like, I like
and respect this person, butin some ways I'm.
This isn't good for me.
I'm being restricted.
Yeah.
And she's just let herself.
She had way more agency this time.
But it's a great explorationof mentor mentee dynamics of at what
(34:20):
point are you being takenadvantage of?
And then when is it a good balance?
And then when are you takingadvantage of them?
Absolutely.
Yeah.
So if they.
If.
We'll see if.
But if they go into that, Ithink that could be a really interesting
direction.
And I think that the reasonI'm not.
I would rate the finale alittle higher if I felt like they
(34:42):
had foregrounded that a littlebetter instead of just, okay, we
got to go through the beats sothat we get you.
Basically, if it wasn't.
That felt like it was more ofa servant to plot than the plot.
Being a servant to therelationship between the two in that
last episode, not in theseries as a whole.
Yeah, we'll see.
Season 5.
I assume it'll be in about a year.
As long as Los Angeles doesn'tcatch on fire again.
(35:05):
Because they did have to delaya little for this season with the
fires.
I think it was the second orthird episode they dedicate to the
first responders.
Oh, wow.
Yeah.
They had to stop shooting.
I remember that from the.
Yeah.
Use fire safety.
Los Angeles.
I'd like to watch this season.
And I don't want your city to.
Burn down, because if theywould rake their leaves.
Problem solving.
How many times in the south,have you, like, been driving by in
(35:29):
the autumn, fall or whatever,like latest fall, when the leaves
finally find out, fall downand see someone, like, flick like
a match or something in a leafpile and then walk inside?
Because I've seen it at leastonce as I'm like, driving by.
Holy shit.
He's gonna burn down thetrailer park.
Wasn't that what you saidcaused the fires?
(35:50):
Yeah, you just gotta rake the leaves.
Yeah.
We're Gonna continue with HBOrelated things.
Not Max per se, but HBO 100foot wave with some spoilers this
go around.
Adam, do you have favoritesurfers for the show?
The participants, favorite,like, characters?
(36:14):
Yeah.
It's kind of weird to saycharacters, but yeah.
I didn't know if you weretalking specifically about their
surface performance or theiron screen performance, either one.
I don't know enough aboutsurfing to really have an opinion
about the first one.
It's just amazing.
It's all amazing.
Although you do glean a littlebit from watching the show.
Who's flashy and who's more workman.
(36:35):
Like, about all of it.
We both said Cotty, right,that it's so hard not to like him.
Cotty's attitude is usually alittle bit more aspirational, whereas
Garrett says, oh, that's anextreme version of something I might
do in my more selfish moments.
They really let him be a dickthis season.
I don't know.
I like them all.
There's no.
Nobody on screen is somebodythat I'm like, let's move along.
(36:58):
There aren't any.
You wish they'd dedicate lessscreen time.
I think they struck a reallygood balance with all of it.
I could tell, like, some ofthem seem more polished than others.
Like, I feel like Kai, Lennyis a very polished interview compared
to the others.
And you can tell because theygive him more sound bites.
(37:18):
And I.
Even though I have neverphysically even touched a surfboard
when he's out there, like,doing his spins and stuff, I'm gonna
keep it old school, but I haveno right to have that opinion.
He's an incredibly impressive athlete.
What about Tony?
Tony.
He had a tough arc this seasontoo, didn't he?
He got a lot of screen timelast season and I thought it hindered
(37:43):
the season.
You thought it hindered seasontwo that he got so much?
Yeah, it was almost like a.
They're looking for acontinued storyline setting.
Even if you don't follow himinto his career, you're giving him
a launch pad that just didn'treally pan out, at least in in the
(38:04):
world of the story.
No, he didn't.
What sort of story do you takefrom CJ and his gravitation to.
And yet utter fear of the big waves.
He's a tough guy, too, becauseat times he seems like the most grounded.
(38:25):
Yeah.
The one willing to go.
That was horrifying.
I don't want to go out thereagain and, like, willing to admit
that someone like Justineseems very grounded in her approach,
even though she's.
They're all like the governoron their sanity, if not completely
blown, at least a little offto be able to do this in the first
place.
But C.J.
kind of.
He's frustrating in.
(38:46):
Again, you hate to talk abouthuman beings because this is a documentary,
but in what is on screen, heretreats into talking his way out
of performing that.
It's okay to just say, I don'twant to do that anymore.
You don't necessarily have tojustify it this way and that.
And I think that I maybe canbe more sympathetic to someone like
(39:11):
Garrett being like, let's justgo do it.
Let's do it.
I usually have more of that attitude.
Than, yeah, it's interesting.
They let him end the season.
End, end.
He gets final say.
He does.
We were talking earlier.
Did you know something moredefinite about this being a final
season?
(39:32):
No, it just.
It seemed like the way thatthey were telling the story, that
they felt like the tale ofNazare or this generation of it had
run its course.
Yeah.
That they told the rise andall of that.
Maybe I'm partial to seasonone because beginnings are fun.
And when things have hitcritical mass and then stay there
(39:52):
for long enough that theyeither establish into old hat or
peter out.
That's a bummer, right?
It's fun when things are onthe way up.
As they zipped around theworld this time, which was awesome
and cool to see.
And I.
I mean, that Cortez bank stuffwas stunning.
But as they moved to Italy inthe last episode and it just seemed
(40:15):
like a lot of things wereclosing rather than starting.
They were starting in otherways, other chapters of life, whatever.
But this one was coming to a close.
And as the.
It almost had a bit of a panicas the episode played out.
And it felt more and more likea series end because I didn't even
know it was the last episodeof the season.
And then for.
(40:37):
To get the hint that, oh, thismay be it, and to.
You're happy for these peoplewho are starting families and having
positive life changes, but atthe same time, it's the documentary
would change substantially ina way that, like, is true to life.
Right?
Like, they're getting older and.
No, that's.
It's just a little too real.
(40:57):
Each time a pair tows out intothe water, there's this sense that
something transcendent orhorrible is going to happen.
And then you get the episodewhich gives you this true and sad
dichotomy of life where Marciodies in Nazare in a surfer.
(41:20):
And in the very same episode,the guy who was towing him, Lucas
Chumbo, is holding his ownbaby, his small child.
Think I assumed that what youwere getting at and saying that season
three was your favoritebecause of the themes that it hit.
It really did such a beautifuljob of showing that circle, the endings
(41:43):
and beginnings of things andthe importance of family and in real
life stuff.
And it was really beautiful.
I think it's C.J.
who says the waves come in andthey come out and they're always
there.
And ghouls.
And the show didn't.
And it shouldn't have.
After someone dies at theplace you've been making a documentary
about, do they surf Nazareagain after that on screen?
(42:08):
Yeah, they do.
Asking, do they.
Did they show them surfing again?
Yeah, they do.
But it never.
There's no Big Waveinvitational that comes or like an
epic day or any.
The big.
The shift.
The focus shifts to Cortez andto into Hawaii.
And yeah, it almost.
I know that they are there andthey're surfing, but it.
(42:30):
Yeah, it was just such asubtle but powerful way to mark like
the bubble burst in some way.
I'm impressed by how clear ofa story they got out of the first
and third season.
It.
I hear there's.
They capture the communitythat centers around surfing, but
(42:52):
yeah, there is a littlecompetition, but it's grounded in
real love and respect andappreciation for one another.
It's really a testamentagainst the ME culture.
We're used to this culture ofstepping on others to get ahead.
This subcultures mirrors anideal, kind of even an ideal working
class where they're each eagerto help one another.
(43:18):
You have to have someone asskilled as you to go do the thing
because you have to havesomebody to drive and you really
have to have a safety guy out there.
And it's.
It is a team sport in a veryodd way.
Yeah.
That takes me to somethingthat the show never does present.
Not once do they explain howthese men and women are funded.
(43:40):
They're oft covered insponsorship gear and they're flying,
but yet they're Flying fromIreland to Portugal to Maui to Cortez
bank off the coast,California, I would assume.
I wondered about this too,specifically in season three.
Less about the travel and morebecause I assume they're like, if
you're a big wave surfer andevery big wave surfer is going to
(44:01):
this spot, then Red Bull isgoing to foot the bill for you to
travel there.
Yeah.
Because it's worth it to themto have your photo made and video.
Whatever.
Did you notice when they'regoing to Morocco and they get stuck
on the McDonald's drive thruthing and the people come out and
help them?
Yeah.
Do you see what they did?
They gave them all Red Bulls.
Like all the workers who wouldcome to help them were walking away
(44:23):
with armfuls of Red Bull.
Oh, I noticed they weregetting something.
Yeah.
And they probably got some Tshirts or something.
So in some ways they aredefinitely brand peddlers.
But you do wonder, I guess nowthey've been part of a very successful
or a fairly successful HBO program.
There's got to be some moneyin that.
But I would enjoy thinking,oh, I really need to.
(44:45):
Recenter I'm going to go toItaly and probably keep my property.
Beachfront property in Hawaii.
No, hate.
I'm not.
There's no judgment here at all.
It looks amazing.
But you do.
As someone who doesn't knowabout the financials of.
Like you said.
Yeah.
And this is the first season.
I think they called it a jobabout three or four times.
(45:06):
Chumbo did that a lot, didn't he?
Yeah.
He said a tearful goodbye tohis family.
It's work and that to me.
Talking about beginnings andendings, he's in the dead center
of the moments where Garrettmay have left his family behind.
The son that comes back, theolder son in Italy.
(45:29):
But you're also seeing Garrettslow down.
And so when Trumbo says, I'mgoing to work, it's we know.
And he knows that this is notreality forever.
You know that you do age outof the job that he has.
And so much like smartprofessional athletes in the NFL
or wherever, get as much moneyas you can while you can.
(45:54):
Another clear split the seriesdid with the season is the central
motif you mentioned ofGarrett's drive.
Is it going to push him to bethe greatest ever without any argument,
or is it just going to injurehim beyond repair?
You wondered that until youget into that fifth episode where
he's in Italy and it seems asthough he's found a happy medium.
(46:20):
It seemed that, but it's stillGame to go with the crew when the
call comes.
Yeah.
And he's.
Morocco.
Yeah, to Morocco.
And when he says, I'm happyjust to drive, I love driving.
If he had said that inprevious seasons, I wouldn't have
believed him.
But now I feel like he evensays, I just like being part of the
crew.
Yeah.
(46:40):
It seemed to be that's like athing that you say when you're injured
and you really want to be out there.
But it seemed more genuinefrom him this time.
And I.
Again, Donovan sitting herelistening to us.
And Donovan, you've never seenthe show at all.
No, I have not.
You just do not expect whenyou start a program about surfing
massive waves, that you'regonna get this exploration of mortality
(47:03):
and fatherhood and life.
All of this stuff.
It's so good.
That's good documentaries.
Right?
They're about one thing andeverything at the same time.
A lot of good documentaries.
I think I like that.
Yeah.
This one maybe does the bestof any.
There.
The episode the Eddie was backin Hawaii where they were doing the
(47:25):
competition called the Eddie.
You just had to swell withpride for Luke Shepperson, who.
Who won.
But this guy won the surfingcompetition while doing double duty
as a lifeguard that day ofjust a lot of courage and unimaginable
energy.
(47:45):
He was basically runningconcessions and then checking into
the game to score some threes.
Yeah.
And winning the mvp.
Just true working class behavior.
Because why did he do it that way?
He couldn't take off workdespite being in.
In the tournament itself thathe was safeguarding.
(48:05):
By far the busiest day.
Right.
Of the decade on that beach.
Right.
Like there was all hands ondeck, you can surf in your break
kind of thing.
He really is what we sometimestry to stand for.
To top it off, he had thisstrong humility the entire time.
He almost was interviewed moreas a worker than the actual winner
(48:26):
of the tournament.
A little ways into that, mysniffer went off.
I'm like, I think this guystands a pretty good shot.
Really?
Yeah.
Well, it was uncertain becausewe just never heard of him.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And it's an interesting perspective.
Even if he hadn't beencompeting, it's an interesting perspective
to have the local who reallyknows the scene and can explain the
(48:48):
nuance of what's going on.
Yeah.
And then not to disregard.
What was it, 1978.
Eddie himself, his stolen disappearance.
He just disappears.
It was such a spiritual tale.
Yeah.
The stories about the turtleshowing up several times.
He is those turtles.
(49:08):
Yeah.
And then again, they.
Smith and his crew Cultivatesuch good story.
They double down on Garrett'sfrustration two episodes in a row.
And it sets up a finale.
Garrett's drive kind of turnedhim cruel.
And that's a question that's addressed.
And he mentions himself.
(49:29):
Yeah.
That was because he's the hero.
Right.
Like, we're rooting for himall along.
And there are things, momentswhere he's not great.
Or if you read between thelines, he's not great.
How he meets his wife, not great.
They're pretty upfront aboutit, but they also glaze over it pretty
quickly.
But then to see him be cruelto Cotty, of all people.
(49:53):
And that.
That scene where Kati's.
I guess we're gonna go.
It has to kind of.
I felt like I was thereexperiencing the awkwardness of when
they come back to land andit's just uncomfortable.
And this guy is at your house,and he's flown halfway across the
world to be here, and you'rebeing a dick.
I think anybody with ambition,like the Sabin quote of high achievers,
(50:16):
don't like lazy people orunderachievers or whatever.
That was the.
Even though Cotti is none ofthose things, he's excellent and
dedicated.
That was like the rub right there.
Right.
That and that he felt like hewas on the clock.
Like you.
How many more great waves areyou gonna get?
Yeah.
And this guy ruined it for me.
That's a very human questionof what do you do as you age?
(50:38):
But you still are very muchalive with desires and drive, and
you haven't given up onpersonal goals.
And this show doesn't haveanswers to these questions, but it.
Maybe it's a non sequiturhere, but is Michelle McNamara a
saint or what?
Their whole life is so hardfor me to comprehend.
(50:59):
Yeah.
Yeah.
Like the.
It reminds me a bit ofmusician families.
One partner is left to holddown the fort while the other is
able to pursue their dream.
And even if it's putting foodon the table and allowing for a certain
lifestyle, that doesn't reallymake up for the lack of time.
(51:19):
And you have to zoom out andsay this whole thing is.
You would hope people couldsay they zoom out and say this whole
pursuit is worth it becausethis is a great life.
But there are some very hard moments.
I do love Garrett'srelationship with Earth or nature.
Feel like it's worth watchingand worth doing and learning from.
And it was such a diametricalshot to see him carrying one of his
(51:41):
small children in the autumnmountains of Italy.
You can see his Breath.
Yeah.
You'd never seen that from him.
Landlocked.
Yeah.
Usually he's in Hawaii with noshirt and a pair of shorts or even
in Nazare and in water with asurf suit on.
(52:03):
And then to have it end withCJ's speech I thought was good.
Where he says we get to choosewhich wave we ride and where we put
our attention.
I thought that was a profoundpiece of television to do that with.
Justine warrants a mention here.
Her becoming a mother and theway that they doled out.
(52:23):
You knew all season that they.
This was something that shewanted to do.
Would there be time?
How does a woman who's beenshown to get after it just as hard
and as well as the men.
But she even says in theepisode it's there's some unfairness
to the guys having families,but they get to still ride the whole
(52:44):
time and pursue their career.
And she has to pause for whatshe says in very athlete terms.
Oh, I have to pause the whole season.
She's exchanging this time.
But when you're thinking aboutthe limited time that Garrett has,
you're like, yeah, this is oneyear away for her.
But then to be holding thechild at the end as all of these
things are happening in CJ'sgiving his monologue I thought was
(53:06):
great.
And she.
Her and her partner are so likable.
Yeah.
See my quality humans and their.
The early season relationshipwith Tony was.
That's so tough.
I know that's zooming back, but.
And it never really got any resolution.
Much like life.
Yeah, that's it.
All right.
We will say goodbye to anotherHBO hit show, the Last of Us.
(53:29):
We should be getting moneyfrom HBO for this.
We should be paid.
Sponsored.
Sponsored by hbo.
We're not.
I should at least get mysubscription for free.
Yeah, exactly.
All this free advertising I'mgiving them.
Because we are going to talkabout the Last of us with some in
depth thoughts.
Bound to spoil.
(53:50):
I think my issue with the wasthat the finale didn't give us a
period at the end of the sentence.
I think it didn't land with the.
With a period.
It was a lingering.
It was an ellipses.
I think that's what I meantprobably when I said this felt very
much like a part one.
Yeah, it did.
Not that like I expect you tonot have a cliffhanger.
(54:11):
But it felt like if I had onemore episode maybe, I don't know,
maybe if I had one moreepisode differently, I don't know.
The show looked stunning.
The tension was high.
Every Episode was great, Ithought, but dragging the ending
across multiple seasons feelslike a disservice.
(54:34):
And I think maybe this trackhad something to do with it, but
it needed more of a resolution.
I thought that contrasting itto season one.
Right.
Where obviously it ends withJoel and Ellie in the car.
I think it's in the car.
He's lied.
He's lied to her, and the nextthing is open.
(54:55):
That was good.
Right.
Because it's both.
Or they were on horse.
Right.
It puts.
I don't know.
I'm feeling whatever it was.
I'm thinking Carr for somereason, but I couldn't swear to that.
But he had rescued her.
You're talking about.
He'd rescued her.
And to their next thing,wherever they're gonna go.
And it.
Like you said, it's a period,but at the same time, it is open
(55:15):
to questions that you can'thelp but think of.
And I think that.
I think it's possible to do that.
And they chose not to do it.
And like you said, maybe thereare external factors.
I do hate a cliffhanger endinglike that, where I'm like, I'm not
gonna get to see this for two years.
So if it's this big, does thatmake sense?
(55:36):
No, it does.
It needed to stop and point,and instead it gave viewers a pretty
captivating reset that we'llsee nothing of for two or three years.
Right.
And especially if.
I don't know.
I shouldn't complain about itbecause I did the episode, but I
was kind of like.
I was.
Especially if this is gonnarecontextualize this whole season.
Yes.
(55:57):
Honestly, in two years.
I am not gonna.
I can't.
I don't have time to just gorewatch everything before the new
season.
Like, recap videos can only doso much.
There's a fear for me that I'm like.
That I'm not gonna rememberbecause we get hints throughout the
Seattle episodes anddefinitely in this one that there's
something else going on thatwe're not really familiar with.
(56:20):
And I'm afraid that I'm gonnaforget all the pertinent details
come season three.
I'm not gonna know what'sgoing on.
I know the tease for nextseason is that we're gonna get these
three days from Abby's pointof view.
That's my understanding.
And if she shot Ellie.
And I don't know if we'll everget much more about Jesse's quick
(56:42):
and sad death.
Poor Jesse.
That was sudden and striking.
There's a lot of afterdepending on what they do next season,
there's a lot of aftermaththat I would want to see.
Went right into it.
Yeah.
When Jesse and Ellie werewatching the wolves deal with the
one scar and they were havingto hide and he was holding her back
(57:04):
from getting involved, itreally did feel like right then he,
oh, he's gonna die, isn't he?
And he was talking about beinga dad just before that.
Oh, yeah, he's gonna die.
Absolutely.
But you knew it.
He was too good for this world.
The finale did what manyfinales do, it drug its feet.
(57:24):
But to the last 15 minuteswhere it didn't have time on purpose
to finish what it started.
Right.
I expected Ellie wasn't goingto get Abby in this season, but I
don't know.
A more resolution, moreresolute action could have ended
it.
I'll actually flip that.
And I think that I appreciatedthat it didn't drag its feet as much
(57:47):
as it could have.
The runtime for this episodewas a little shorter than even some
of the mid mid season episodes.
I was like, okay, good.
Because you, you can really.
They could have really draggedit out, especially for a finale.
Right.
They could have gone with abigger run time or a season finale,
bigger runtime, et cetera, et cetera.
Yeah.
I have heard critique that italmost felt like they just entered
(58:11):
a portal and then they were inSeattle with Elliot and Dina that
they could have used a.
I mean, the character building there.
They showed me enough of themjourneying that I'm like, that's
great.
And they had already set uptheir relationship and they didn't
give us like nothing on whenthey're traveling.
Like, we do still see their dynamic.
(58:33):
Yeah, that's actually speakingof their dynamic, that's when I knew
Jesse was gonna die when he's.
I'm cool with you and Dina.
I just want.
You're dead.
You are dead.
Is that cool?
Yeah, it was.
It was funny that we.
I failed to mention this lastweek, but I guess it was because
we were discussing thepenultimate episode a lot more than
(58:55):
any others.
But the addition of JeffreyWright to this season is good stuff.
As soon as he was on screen, Ifelt the answer to my question of
can a show be as good withoutPedro Pascal?
And yeah, he's good.
Jeffrey Wright's got gravitas,so, yeah, he could.
(59:17):
Yeah, he does.
Pair him with Caitlyn Deaverand this could be a good third season
coming up.
Yeah, it's definitely seems tobe teed up to give us something that
we've not seen.
Before which so many times wecomplain that we just see the same
old thing.
But the teases they've givenus of the principal characters, I
(59:38):
think speak well, like, it'sprobably gonna be good.
Yeah.
Did you pick up on anythingwith Abby?
Video game players are.
They could butcher us if they wanted.
But there's somethingimportant about her to the Isaac
character.
Is it because she might havesome of the knowledge of that her
(01:00:01):
father had as the son?
I don't know.
And this is a video game players.
Turn it off right now.
Just don't listen for a second.
I was going to.
I was like.
When they were like, she's not here.
He's.
He really needs her.
And he gives the explanationthat she's the future.
She's being groomed forleadership, essentially, and she's.
Who's going to take over if hegets killed.
(01:00:22):
There was a second where I waslike, is she immune?
Oh, but.
And I wondered if there wouldbe like a.
I don't think that this iswhere it's going, but I kind of wonder,
like, if she was immune and they.
The story then would basicallybe like her father chose Ellie instead
of his own daughter.
I don't.
(01:00:44):
I don't.
I don't think that's what's happening.
Yeah, I don't think so either.
But I just.
I just had a moment where I'm.
It was more like, well, thatmight be interesting if they had
done that.
I don't think that's the case.
Yeah, I do that.
We're now living in the worldof the show where there.
There are wolves and scars andthen there's the Ellie Tommy form,
formally Jesse gang.
(01:01:06):
Yeah.
We're caught in the middle ofit all, and there's just no forgiveness
from either side.
Yeah.
It seems pretty vicious outthere in Seattle and mysterious and
mysterious.
That part didn't feel like aslot to me because you're still in
their point of view and youdon't know why they don't just say,
you guys have this side of the street.
(01:01:27):
I'll have this side of thestreet, and leave us alone.
Right.
You don't really know what'sgoing on.
Yeah.
You don't.
Beyond the broad strokes.
Yeah.
Yeah.
How the scar people, theseraph bots, have turned into such
Luddites or adopted that sortof lifestyle.
(01:01:49):
Yeah.
Who's their spiritual leaderwho seems to be dead.
Yeah.
You know, two, three, four.
Confusing.
Yeah.
So what'd you think of theseason overall?
Yes.
Big thumbs up.
I think that there is anelement of Discovery, almost like
what Adam was talking aboutwith Hundred Foot Wave.
(01:02:10):
There's a.
There's almost an element ofDiscovery and finding out, like,
the world in the first season,that's exciting.
And no second season can everlive up to that.
And so you have to be justunderstand that, like, you're not
gonna get the same way youfelt about the first season.
And I do think that it, likethis season, the episodes were more
(01:02:34):
connected, if that makes sense.
Not that the.
The first season stood alone,but there's ones that don't work
as standalones at all.
And having all already laidout the ground rules, it's still
good.
It did a good job of showingus the world.
And there are hints of somedeeper threats coming.
(01:02:57):
Right.
They're smarter, seemingly smarter.
And I do.
And I think that, like, itwasn't paced perfectly for me.
I'm having this really weirdthing happening where it's only seven
episodes and I watched itevery week.
Like, I watched it pretty muchevery Monday after it came out.
Yeah.
And I'm still feeling like Itook a gap between, like, episode
(01:03:21):
three and four and didn'twatch it, which didn't happen.
But I.
Thinking back on it, I don'tknow if that's a function of it possibly
needing another episode.
I do think that thepenultimate episode was the emotional
culmination of the season, andI think that worked very well.
And I think they pulled thatoff extremely well.
And it did contextualize thisepisode too.
(01:03:43):
Right.
Because off you see Ellie'sfeelings, but also would Joel even
wanted this for her.
Right.
You know, she's.
Yeah.
I thought that was very good.
And they got another featahead of them, which they're gonna
try to do, which is they'regonna make us sympathetic to Abby
now.
Oh, yeah.
And I assume we will be.
(01:04:05):
She's a very good actor.
Yeah.
And you're gonna, I'mguessing, even be on the side of
Jeffrey Wright's Isaac andsay, I'm for this guy.
I want.
I, I.
Not that they wouldn't pullfor him versus Seraphites, but would
we pull for him against Ellie?
Probably not.
But I assume we'll be moresympathetic to Abby.
(01:04:26):
And even at the, like, at thispoint in the game, so to speak, Abby
has done nothing that Elliehasn't done or tried to do for very
similar motives.
That's exactly right.
And that's what they're gonnaplay with next season.
I assume that they're gonna be doppelgangers.
You know, they're kind ofmirror images of each ways.
(01:04:46):
How much of that.
Yeah.
Immune.
Yeah, I doubt it.
That was just.
That was like a stray thoughtthat I was like, whoa, that would
be cool.
I'd like to see that.
But I strongly doubt that, asvideo game players are probably gonna
be like, please open theWikipedia page and look at it.
And I'm tempted almost.
But I'm also not tempted.
(01:05:07):
I think I'm not going tobecause I liked not knowing Joel
was gonna die this season,which, if anyone played, I didn't
know that.
And I think that's good for me.
Yeah.
All right.
Yeah.
I imagine it shocked you.
Yeah, it did.
When you're kind of like, man,it's episode two, and he's.
He's the co star.
Yeah, he's a bigger star thanBella Ramsey is.
(01:05:30):
He's the biggest star of justabout anyone in there.
All right, that's the end ofour episode here.
Hope you enjoy it.
Head to the Alabama take, andif you want to hear from us without
being chained to social media,subscribe to our free newsletter.
We'll tell you what's new withanything on the site and even tell
you a silly yarn.
If you're really lucky, youget an Andy Griffiths recap.
(01:05:52):
There you go.
And again, help us reach ourgoal of 500 subscribers on YouTube.
It's growing.
That's our mission for thenext couple weeks.
For Adam, for Donovan.
I'm Blaine, and we hope youdon't get capsized in the pouring
rain near Scar Island.
It might get ugly.
Talk to you all next week.
Oh, hey, buddy.
Do you know what we're up toat the Alabama Take?
No, what?
Is it exciting?
Well, yeah.
We have one spot for people tofind out everything they want from
us.
Do you know what that is?
Oh, subscribe to the newsletter.
That's it.
And we're working on a reallybig goal at the Alabama Take.
Well, what's that?
(00:22):
We're trying to get to 500subscribers to our YouTube channel
in the next two weeks.
Do you think we can do it?
Oh, yeah, for sure.
All people have to is go toyour YouTube channel and subscribe.
That's all.
It's free.
It's absolutely free and painless.
Thanks, bud.
You're welcome.
(00:42):
You know, since I have youhere today, which is rare, do you
know what we're covering inthis week's episode?
Yep.
You will do non spoilers on.
On Duster Hack's 100 foot wave.
And the last of us.
(01:02):
Whoa.
That's right.
Plus we get off on a tangentto begin on Chrisley.
Yeah, Chrisley.
Oops.
It will be fine.
Alabama tape projection.
(01:23):
As promised.
Here they are.
Welcome to Adam.
Welcome to Donovan.
And with the three of uscombined, it's difficult to contain
the kind of excitement that wehave for Chris Lee being out of jail.
The world's healing.
I don't know what that means.
It's okay.
You don't have.
I'm not trying to be like Mr.
(01:45):
Cool.
Like, I'm not informed aboutpop culture.
I genuinely had no idea whatpeople were talking about.
I had to.
So there's this guy named ToddChrisley who very, very much acts
like a gay man, but is marriedwith many children and is obsessed
with women, he claims.
(02:06):
Anyway, that's probablynothing says straight like that.
Yeah, it's probably neitherhere nor there.
But he lived in Atlanta and Nashville.
One of the two.
I think he Both, actually.
I think he.
He lived in Atlanta once andthen they moved to Nashville.
And he's got wild kids andthey just basically treat him like
shit.
And he gives them the what for.
(02:27):
He doesn't let them get awaywith it.
He gives them the what for.
But anyway, he got.
What?
Tax.
Tax evasion, maybe something.
That's the way we got Capone.
Yeah, he went to jail and thenTrump let him free.
Now you're asking Blaine, howdo you know this?
When my wife was home with ourbaby daughter years ago, she got
(02:49):
really roped into his realityTV show and watched like binge watched
it while holding the baby.
And I would come in everyafternoon and that's what would be
on?
It's funny because he's suchan idiot.
So anyway, if you're likemassively sleep deprived and gone
(03:09):
through a life changing event.
Yes, how.
And that he's not gay, but he also.
That he's not gay, but he alsogives the funniest gay man responses
to everything.
I don't know.
It's just amusing.
You know how we havecompletely ruined.
Say, like this podcast justnow today.
Yeah.
The actual names of SECfootball coaches saying Stan Mullins
(03:33):
or whatever.
So when this happened, I waslike, wait, did the governor of New
Jersey go to jail?
And I didn't know because Iknow him to be Chris Christie.
Oh, Chris Christie.
Not Chris Lee.
But yes, my brain is a jumbled mess.
But, Adam, you don't rememberme constantly tweeting about Chrisley
(03:54):
in the heyday of Twitter?
If it was the heyday ofTwitter, then Carl Welzine was probably
taking up most of my bandwidth.
But into real things that wedo care about.
That was TV related, granted.
So we're going to talk abouthow excited we are for the new Wes
Anderson movie.
They're 30 minutes talkingabout real things we're excited about.
(04:16):
Shoot, shoot.
From the hip on this one.
I've got no notes.
Oh, I just like to laugh.
What's.
It's Tom Hanks.
Tom Hanks in the what?
And this one's called thePoltergeist Experience.
Poltergeist.
But it's symmetrical.
You know, I'm curious to seehow it goes.
(04:37):
The last one, I think wassomewhat divisive for people.
I loved it.
I thought it was really cooland ambitious and I love to see someone.
Yeah, that one.
I really do know the title.
I love to see someone who madethat many movies and has that style
and could basically just churnout the same thing time after time.
(04:57):
Some people argue.
He does.
Yeah.
But I think if you do look athis movies, there's a progression
instead of he's not.
Not that I don't love thisman, but he's not Adam Sandler.
But what if they work together?
The Sandman.
I would watch that.
I'd watch the hell out of that.
Happy New guys this summer on Netflix.
Refreshing my local theater inthe AMC app more than I should to
(05:21):
see when it's going to be here.
Oh, Happy Gilmore Too is on Netflix.
Oh, okay.
Just straight to Netflix.
It's actually, since we saidit just now, it's already been filmed
and delivered.
No, I'm not.
That's not a joke.
Happy Gilmore too.
Okay.
Yeah.
It's happening.
Oh, my God.
Incredible.
Yeah, I'll watch it.
(05:43):
The headline I saw was that.
Or maybe it's not a headline,but bit I saw is that Adam Sandler
has done surprisingly fewsequels, though he's done a lot of
movies.
He classically did thegrownups duology.
Right?
That one is about it, right?
Yeah.
There's no click too, huh?
(06:04):
No Mr.
Deeds too.
No Punch Drunk Love, too.
He gets it all, really.
His movie.
Hey, hey.
I love him.
All those pudding cups addedup to a trip to Hawaii, my friend.
I love it in Hawaii.
I love Punch Drunk Love.
I love Philip Seymour Hoffmanin it.
He's amazing.
But I would put.
That's a Paul Thomas Anderson movie.
Can I get the way thattangential on this podcast?
(06:28):
Do I.
Can I just get supertangential on this podcast?
What?
As if we're not.
What's ever stopped us before?
I took a date.
I took a date to see PunchDrunk Love.
She was expecting an AdamSandler movie, and I knew what we
were getting into.
Needless to say, I'm so gladwe do not date anymore.
(06:52):
I had a similar experiencewith other theater goers when I went
to see Uncut Gems.
And there were very clearly, alot of people wanted the Sandman.
They wanted the Sandman andthey got the Sandman, but not in
the way they wanted.
And it was hilarious.
Like, it was just liketrickling out 20 minutes in.
It's like the exodus begins.
(07:14):
I'm the only one laughing.
I thought the movie was hilarious.
Nobody dead.
Dead silent.
I know that I've told you allthis before, but when I went the
funniest this has happened tome on not.
Not an Adam Sandler Story, butOnce Upon a Time in Hollywood.
I'm sitting there.
We've made it to the pointwhere Manson walks across the driveway
in that scene.
(07:35):
This.
Yes.
See, Donovan has never seenthis movie.
It's true.
But I know what it's about.
So this is not even like whenthings are getting tense.
So nothing's really happenedyet in the movie as far as gore or
whatever.
And these people get up toleave and say as Manson strolls by.
I didn't know this was about that.
As if there was going to be abloodless end to a Tarantino film.
(07:58):
Hilarious.
Yeah.
Right.
Who do you think you're.
Yeah.
95, 96.
My friends and I were watchingPulp Fiction in the theater, whatever
year it came out.
And when Travolta pulls thegun over the car seat to talk to
the guy in the back Seataccidentally blows his brains out
and we all, the four of us arejust bold over laughing and everyone
(08:22):
in the theater is appalled atus, wanted to kick us out.
That's a funny scene.
It's hilarious.
So it's.
I love these stories of notknowing what you're getting into.
It's like the Drive by Trucker song.
The Gigi Allen came to townwith the old man.
He had no idea.
(08:43):
I told our listeners and boththe youth I'd at least watch one
episode of the Max series, Duster.
My prediction is this LatoyaMorgan and J.J.
abrams created series will notbe an Emmy winning show.
It's trying its best.
It's not merely with just cars.
(09:03):
It's edit feels like a beard.
Its edit feels like it'sattempting to cover up some plot
issues.
Honestly, I think the biggestissue is that it's the characters
are caricatures, but there'snot enough fun going on.
The characters arecaricatures, but there's not any
(09:24):
goofiness to go along with it.
The rest of the series istaking itself seriously.
There's no wink.
There's no wink.
Yeah, it sounds like.
Yeah, it almost feels likekitsch, but it doesn't know that
it's kitsch.
So it's the worst kind.
Yeah, it kind of issimplistic, very well shot.
There's an occasional goodacting moment or two.
(09:47):
It's really funny that it'sreminiscent of Starsky and Hutch
or the Dukes of Hazzard or BJand the Bear, those early 80s shows
that were in that sort of design.
But it's just not finding itsbalance on how serious it should
be.
Or maybe not serious it shouldbe, how funny it could be or interesting
(10:08):
in that way.
But it's weird.
It's a weird one.
I don't know that I'll watchall of it.
I might watch one more or something.
But Holloway swagger is interesting.
And then also by overblown.
I don't know.
It's not great.
This is what I feel like whenI hear Mr.
Abrams, if you're stilllistening to this, after, after left
(10:28):
you the abuse.
The abuse of last week.
But jj, you're just going toget something that like at its best,
best is fine.
Like he's fine.
Yeah.
You know what I mean?
Like it's fine.
Really good.
It looked really good.
That's about all I can really say.
The set pieces, the car lookedgood, the costume designs were really
(10:51):
cool.
Just it felt like cartooncharacters put in a Martin Scorsese
film.
Or something.
There's not a balance here,but something that is good.
From what you guys have toldme, you've seen the fourth and most
recent season of the Emmyaward winning Max series Hacks, which
(11:11):
stars Gene Smart as a comedian.
And then what comes after success?
What happens when you get the success?
I think is what the fourthseason's about.
From my summation.
You guys know more.
Of course.
We're.
We are in a non spoiler section.
But how do you feel about theseason, especially in comparison
to the previous three?
(11:32):
Do you like to laugh?
Donovan always comes up with the.
Do you like to vomit?
I've got one for you.
Is it about how do you findbalance after you get what you want?
How do you.
What happens to you when youdo find your success?
Is it a little bit about that?
(11:52):
I would not say that they areseeking balance necessarily.
Okay, thank you.
But it is about.
Yeah.
What.
What happens when you get the.
In some ways when you get thething you want and you realize that
you have just unlocked a wholenew level of work and expectations
and pressure that you thoughtthat you were aware of.
(12:13):
It's the dog catching the car.
I was going to say that youstole my analogy.
Look at us.
The three of us hang out too much.
We need some original voicesin here.
Anything else you want to addin the non spoiler section on full
season of Hacks?
I'd agree that it's very muchof a piece with the previous three
seasons, which is a complimentbecause I feel like they've all been
(12:34):
going at a really high levelof excellence.
It manages to be consistentlyfunny about people that are sometimes
awful, like sometimessympathetic, sometimes awful.
And sometimes you gotta goguerrilla mode.
Give me a comparison.
That's unwarranted.
But the studio versus Hacks, which.
(12:57):
Who has the most undeservingcharacters or the most.
I was gonna actually compareit to Hacks, Especially since Gene
Smart pops up in that episode.
And I don't think that was the.
What's his face?
Jimmy.
I can't remember.
The guy who plays him.
Yeah.
Each other.
That makes sense.
And it's even the fact thatthey just wrapped season four and
(13:18):
it didn't.
It debuted in 2021.
Is that.
Does that sound right?
2020 sounds right now.
I think it might be a Covidera release.
I think.
Yeah.
The production would have been.
But maybe HBO and Max are likedipping a toe into just making a
lot of or more shows wherethey just rapidly produce stuff.
(13:40):
The days of like, how long isit before Game of Thrones comes back
seems.
I mean obviously we're livingthat right now with a Game of Thrones
related thing.
But they churn them out andthey're hitting some familiar beats
but doing it in an interestingway, I think.
Whereas the studio feels thisis not a dig on hacks with the studios
(14:01):
a bit more arty, like theywanted to do ambitious episodes,
one shot kind of stuff, whatever.
And the people are way moreextreme, I would say.
On the studio.
On the studio, yeah.
Does that check out?
Yeah, I think so.
The studio is interested inbeing a show about movies in the
(14:26):
ways that Adam mentioned.
Right.
Where it's like the characterswho are sometimes so extreme that
they're almost like an allegory.
Not really an allegory, butSal is not a realistic character
necessarily, but a fun one.
And thank you.
That's the word.
Yes.
And in a way that like Hacksis not interested in being it like
(14:47):
it is about comedy in manyways, but it's not interested in
being a show about comedy inthe same way that the studio is interested
being a show about movies andthe media more broadly anyway.
It does touch on a lot ofgenerational things and was a clever
show coming out of COVID erapolitics in a lot of ways.
(15:07):
And maybe even navigating likein this most recent season.
The.
I mean we're in a minefieldhere talking about like where does
society stand in like a.
In some ways like a post wokeworld and like how to that pendulum
just constantly swinging andthem trying to make sense of that
if that checks out.
(15:29):
So even though it is hittingsome familiar.
Not sitcom Y but more sitcom Ythan the studio beats, it's still
ambitious, I would say.
Yeah, I think it's ambitiousin almost a traditional way where
it's like it wants to beambitious in the like in a very character
driven way.
And it's not formally oranything like that.
(15:51):
What Donovan said at the top.
Do you like to laugh?
This is like this and it'sjust occurring to me that we do this.
There are shows that we willwatch while eating dinner some nights
and shows that you have towatch after eating dinner.
They are more of yourattention reason and you can't do
that while chewing.
I don't know.
But your food you can miss Hacks.
(16:11):
Is on while we're eating.
It's just a.
It's just a good show, good program.
It's fun.
Yeah.
All right, next in our nonspoiler section, Donovan, do you
like to surf?
I've been told by my doctor never.
To attempt it again.
Yeah.
He showed me a picture of awhale washed up on the shores of
(16:35):
Long island and that scared me straight.
Yeah, that's enough ocean for Donovan.
That put a nail in that coffin.
I'm done.
Now we are going to talk abouta 100 foot wave, the HBO docu series
about big wave surfing andseveral of the extreme sports participants,
particularly in Nazare,Portugal, home to the biggest, maybe
(16:57):
the deadliest waves that crasha rocky shoreline.
This series is directed byChris Smith, who is doing some really
elegant work to create storiesfrom this group of surfers and their
families.
No spoilers here, of course,but third season just ended.
I loved it.
And the question withsomething like this and a question
(17:18):
from hacks to me is like, howmuch more can we get out of this
as far as storytelling goes?
And they have answered thecall every time.
To my mind.
I don't know that I ever.
I don't know that I've enjoyedanything quite as much as I enjoyed
season one.
That initial let's get to knowthese people.
(17:39):
Here's them discovering thisplace, like a Wild west feel or astronauts,
whatever.
They're the first peoplereally trying this and figuring it
out.
I love that so much.
And then when it turned moreinto let's look at this whole community.
And then it really zoomed outquite a bit this last season.
It's still really good.
(17:59):
It was never as strong asseason one to me, but it's still
by the wrap of season three, Ithought, man, this is just a great
show.
It's so much better than ithas any right to be in a lot of ways.
Like in a.
I think of how many pieces ofmedia were made in the post X Games
(18:20):
culture or extreme sports, whatever.
And this is so the opposite of that.
It's so artfully done andhuman and just fantastic.
Yeah.
Smith, the director and histeam have hit a stride here, I think
with their filmmaking.
It's a shame it might be thefinal season.
It could be.
It's just rumors.
I don't want to say anythingin the spoilers.
(18:42):
Save it.
I just know that I thought itwas the best of the three and I'll
tell.
Oh wow.
Yeah, I'll tell more why I think.
That I could agree with youonce we get into the spoilers.
I just thought the firstseason was so good and so strong
and holds up to a good rewatchand we'll see with the other ones.
But yeah, I'm interested tohear why you think that about season
(19:03):
three.
I'll allude to it here.
I just admire and love howthey used what they documented to
shift into maybe a deeper theme.
Yeah.
So.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And finally, in our nonspoilers, Donovan and I have reached
the end of the second seasonof the HBO series the Last of Us.
We've got the whole package now.
Donovan, did you like what you saw?
Yeah, I think once it hit itsstride, I did.
(19:25):
I do think that the season issuffering a little, honestly, from
being so short.
Only seven episodes, which ispretty short.
And to be that short with acouple episodes that were like, this
is working out fine, but.
And then to have some.
There was some that werebetter than others.
(19:46):
And I think having seen thewhole thing, this is gonna sound
like I hated it, but I thinkhaving seen the whole thing too,
this season feels more like apart one than season one did.
Oh, yeah.
On the other hand, it's well done.
I'm on record as liking the acting.
It looks great.
It's still in interest.
(20:07):
I still enjoyed watching it.
Yeah.
I don't think a televisionshows look this good this year, and
I thought it had a misstep or two.
Yeah, definitely.
And it was because of thebrevity, I think, is I'm with you
on a lot of this, and we'llget into some of the specifics on
why the brevity.
Heard it.
Yeah.
And I, you know, I.
(20:27):
I get that it's got.
It's a tough dance.
Right.
Like you're dealing withactors, schedules, you're dealing
with how much money you have,you're dealing with.
And then you let it go on anepisode too long.
And we're on here complainingabout the exact opposite thing.
So I get it.
I think it was the writerstrike too affected.
This one wasn't.
I didn't remember that being apart of it.
(20:48):
Maybe.
It's possible.
Okay, now let's take a breakhere, and then we'll get into the
spoilers that we were tryingto dance around.
So we'll be back in 30 seconds.
(21:32):
Tell us more about hacks.
All right, number one, there's nudity.
Gratuitous.
That's important.
Is that true?
Yeah, there's some.
Yeah.
See?
Plane's gonna watch it now.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Donovan, I.
I wrote out some questions Ithought one of us had to.
Right.
That was wise.
And I didn't do it.
(21:53):
There's almost no chance thatwe both do it.
So what did you.
We'll just.
We'll set it up.
When do you think this show isat its most successful?
Ooh, great question.
And here's why.
Really good question.
Because it's based on theconceit of the show is that there's
these two women who love andrespect and work in the same medium
(22:19):
and are separated.
She could be her grandmother,really many decades in between.
And how do they both.
How are they coming together?
How are they not compatible?
How mean can Jean Smart be to her?
Yeah.
So like, when is this?
Because to me, the show hasdefinite beats that it hits over
and over again.
(22:40):
When is it really thriving, doyou think?
Yeah, I do think that it doesthrive in the space where like both,
like you're.
Both of them are awful in acertain way.
Like, Jean Smart is just being mean.
Ava's being perhaps like toquote something from this last season.
(23:01):
Right.
I felt that way until itpersonally affected me.
So like you have that kind oflike rough edges.
But then it does hit.
It will also hit the beat of.
There's a little bit of.
A little bit of heartwarmingmoment too.
Right.
With Jean Smart.
Deborah Vance acknowledges Avain some way.
Ava pulls it out to help her.
(23:23):
There is a foundation.
It's a good show.
Or one of the things I likeabout the show is that there is a
foundation of mutual respect.
Although both of thesecharacters are also profoundly selfish
people and ping pong inbetween that.
Is Ava as selfish?
She can be pretty selfish.
I don't think that she's asselfish as Deborah.
(23:45):
I could be pretty selfish.
This season seems like anexploration of that to some degree.
And I think maybe what I wasgetting at with the question is I
tend to think of them aseither being adversaries or together
or Ava has her feelings hurtby like, those are like the three
(24:06):
modes.
And to me, when they.
All they're doing is likeramming them together and then they
bounce apart, that gets alittle tired.
And it really works to me wheneven if they're being awful to each
other, if they're stillworking together.
I feel like the season as awhole did actually a pretty good
job with that by getting tothe point where you don't want to
(24:26):
see them fight anymore.
I was just over at this and then.
And then.
And then clicking to themworking together again.
I thought they got some goodcomedy out of them not being able
to work together very well.
And then we're able toactually smoothly transition them
being on the same page too.
Are you on board for the arcthat's happened?
Yeah, it makes sense.
(24:48):
Do you think it can sustain?
Because the.
Unfortunately I saw the newsthat it's been renewed Before I saw
the final episode.
So her.
The TMZ reported death was.
Didn't really hit.
What do they do in another season?
I was wondering that too,because this is like you said earlier,
this is like the dog catchesthe car.
(25:11):
Right.
It's season.
It seems like we're going backto season two.
I don't know.
Yeah.
That's what I wonder about isI don't know.
But I'm also not writing forthis show and the folks that have
done that seem to.
Like you said, it's not likethe most groundbreaking show of all
(25:32):
time.
And I think you can predictthe arc of this season.
Right.
Cause it is expected.
But with working within asomewhat conventional framework,
they've so far done a good job.
So I'll at least watch.
Maybe I won't like it as much,but I'll watch it.
I think that I could havewatched more episodes, maybe even
another half season of themjust like negotiating the challenges
(25:55):
of running the show.
I was surprised that they cutthat off when they did.
Obviously you have to show Deborah's.
I think she had the mostsubstantial personal growth this
season that she's had in theshow so far.
Right.
Both to like, Absolutely.
Professionally take a standand to tell Ava, oh, this show wouldn't
(26:15):
be the show without you.
Yes.
And that was a very earned,heartwarming moment.
I thought within the.
Again, you're tempering this with.
Yeah, it's a silly show, butit can also tuck at the heartstrings
a little bit.
Yeah, no, it's good.
I think it does a good jobtoo, of navigate or hand juggling
(26:35):
a not large cast, but large.
Ish cast.
Kind of checking in on themand I'm like, oh, yeah, he's got
an ulcer.
That's funny.
That's.
I was about to ask whathappened this season to keep it fresh
beyond giving them a latenight environment.
I do.
It's so conventional, but I dothe Kayla and Jimmy dynamic.
(26:58):
Yeah.
Which of course is he's thestraight man, she's the.
But that.
That moving forward, thatactually worked for me like as like
tugging at the heartstrings,but more like just straight comedy.
When Kayla realizes how shelikes Jim like that she likes working
with Jimmy, but being theperson she is, she's like, we bad
bitches need to all starttreating him bad.
Nobody else really changed orgrew that much.
(27:20):
But that part, that thatdynamic still makes me laugh.
The actor.
Actors playing both of themare very good together.
She's just completely unhinged.
Yes.
And he's not.
He's just constantly trying todeal with it.
It was using her dad to showhis what could be called weakness.
(27:41):
It was good that it took allseason to really enough things draw
together that he really didseem pathetic at that moment.
Yeah.
Yeah.
As he's.
He's been bitten by a dog.
He's got a staph infectionthat smells like kimchi.
Blaine's face reacting to thisis great.
He has no context for this whatsoever.
I gotta say another.
(28:01):
This just popped in my head.
Another MVP is.
I can't remember her name.
I'm sorry.
But the actor playing theassistant that she.
I was really trying to tee youup to talk about the assistant.
Like, there was.
This is.
There's a bunch of funny bits,but there was a.
She had a line where shedidn't know something about astrology
and she's.
Because I might be gay, butI'm no lesbian.
(28:21):
And just the combination of,like, funny, like, New York accent
with no.
Like, what is her backstory?
She came from, like a closedHasidic Jewish.
Saw one movie and turned herback on it all.
Yeah.
To go work in Hollywood andjust attack.
Consistently funny.
Yeah.
Attacks Los Angeles with theferocity of the east coast generally
(28:44):
and just is get shit done leftand right.
The scene where she is on thebus when she takes the call and.
It'S just map in the city.
That was good.
That was good writing.
Did you enjoy the way that thesupporting cast moved through the
season?
So there's been people whowere maybe more present who had to
(29:05):
take a backseat this time?
Yeah, I was fine with it, honestly.
The.
The episode with thechristening was funny, but almost
was like, okay, this is thecheck in episode on.
On dj and because they justweren't in the season very much.
And it does tee up likeDeborah actually being a grandmother,
but so far not a bunch hasbeen done with that.
(29:29):
I was surprised at how littlethey used that storyline.
Yeah, me too.
She was so present in previousseasons and that tension was there.
And you kept expecting that tobe part of the struggle.
How am I gonna balance this?
Whatever.
Personal.
Yeah.
Would come up with the.
(29:49):
But no.
They just kept it in the office.
Yeah.
But yeah.
I didn't feel like.
Like the B plots were, like,overly distracting or anything.
I think they do rely prettyheavily on Kayla and Jimmy for the
B plots and.
Which is fair.
I like dancing, like, tryingto get.
Trying to.
(30:09):
This is the second.
I guess just like the studio.
This is the second show we'vewatched where someone needs to do
cocaine so they can go out and perform.
It was eerie how similar Iwatched those within a week of each
other.
Because medical science needsto catch up with the realities of
the world here.
Yeah.
But they're so good, right?
But it does keep making me laugh.
(30:30):
Like when the dance mom's, youneed to boof me.
And like Jimmy's Kayla, you do it.
She's.
No, it has to be Jimmy.
I'm just like the face he makes.
That's great.
With cocaine.
With cocaine, yeah.
Yeah.
I got pretty wild.
She has to go out and perform.
Did you.
What did you think of thefinal episode?
(30:53):
Good.
Although in a way, I had justtalked about this with my Blaine
last week in a way that HBOshows sometimes seem to have.
The penultimate episode is thebig one.
Totally.
And then the last one is.
Okay, we're setting it up.
And it doesn't really.
Because they're not ending.
Obviously.
We know it was renewed.
(31:14):
They're not winding things down.
So it is.
It was good.
But it also.
Just watching it.
Okay, this is setting up for now.
They're teeing up.
Yeah.
Anything else?
Right.
And even before the death airquotes around the death moment, you
know that because it's renewedthat they have to pull out of this
tailspin.
They're not going to haveadventures in Singapore for another
(31:34):
year.
But I thought it was okay.
We don't really see her.
Deborah's never vulnerablelike that doesn't spiral.
Really always bounces back.
But man, they left when theyturned that episode in.
It was with the fullconfidence that they were getting
renewed.
You don't film that ending if you.
You're calling your shots.
This is like absolutely.
(31:56):
Mad Men would film the awardshow episodes while award shows were
happening in real life.
Just because I think they'rearrogant pricks and I love them so
much.
But yeah, when it ended, itwas almost like.
Almost set up.
Like the Marvel post credits thing.
Really good way to put it.
Yeah, exactly.
(32:16):
It has to happen now.
Which.
That felt a little clunky.
But yeah, it definitely.
I think you've alluded to thisbefore where it was definitely more
in the service tickle yourbeats than it was necessarily in
where it really shines.
Yeah.
And it was fine.
(32:36):
Right.
There were no episode of thisso far has been like terrible.
But the season really.
It could have ended with nineand I would have felt fine.
That could have been theseason finale.
Yeah.
Yeah, absolutely.
It is funny to think about theearlier seasons dealt with more.
There is like a life and deathepisode right.
(32:57):
Where the Guy.
Do you remember that episodethat almost seems like a fever dream
to say now where she, like,gets with the guy and he ends up
killing himself?
He, like, jumps out a windowor something.
Like, right after that, youhook up.
Yeah.
It's.
Has the show changed since then?
Could the show still do that?
Good question.
I don't know.
I would almost want.
(33:17):
I almost hope they, like, testsomething like that again.
Yeah, it just.
It's gotten so much more.
And I guess Ava is dealingwith fairly serious loneliness at
times.
And I don't know, it justseemed more.
A little glossier this season.
I am interested if they'regonna steer into that because we
do have a good moment.
(33:38):
It is just setting it up.
But where Deborah is beingmean to Ava, but she's also not necessarily
wrong.
She's not wrong.
And so if we're.
I think what I think would be interesting.
Right.
Is okay if we're going back tosome of the setup for season two
or three.
(33:58):
If we.
If they continue to exploreAva realizing that, like, I like
and respect this person, butin some ways I'm.
This isn't good for me.
I'm being restricted.
Yeah.
And she's just let herself.
She had way more agency this time.
But it's a great explorationof mentor mentee dynamics of at what
(34:20):
point are you being takenadvantage of?
And then when is it a good balance?
And then when are you takingadvantage of them?
Absolutely.
Yeah.
So if they.
If.
We'll see if.
But if they go into that, Ithink that could be a really interesting
direction.
And I think that the reasonI'm not.
I would rate the finale alittle higher if I felt like they
(34:42):
had foregrounded that a littlebetter instead of just, okay, we
got to go through the beats sothat we get you.
Basically, if it wasn't.
That felt like it was more ofa servant to plot than the plot.
Being a servant to therelationship between the two in that
last episode, not in theseries as a whole.
Yeah, we'll see.
Season 5.
I assume it'll be in about a year.
As long as Los Angeles doesn'tcatch on fire again.
(35:05):
Because they did have to delaya little for this season with the
fires.
I think it was the second orthird episode they dedicate to the
first responders.
Oh, wow.
Yeah.
They had to stop shooting.
I remember that from the.
Yeah.
Use fire safety.
Los Angeles.
I'd like to watch this season.
And I don't want your city to.
Burn down, because if theywould rake their leaves.
Problem solving.
How many times in the south,have you, like, been driving by in
(35:29):
the autumn, fall or whatever,like latest fall, when the leaves
finally find out, fall downand see someone, like, flick like
a match or something in a leafpile and then walk inside?
Because I've seen it at leastonce as I'm like, driving by.
Holy shit.
He's gonna burn down thetrailer park.
Wasn't that what you saidcaused the fires?
(35:50):
Yeah, you just gotta rake the leaves.
Yeah.
We're Gonna continue with HBOrelated things.
Not Max per se, but HBO 100foot wave with some spoilers this
go around.
Adam, do you have favoritesurfers for the show?
The participants, favorite,like, characters?
(36:14):
Yeah.
It's kind of weird to saycharacters, but yeah.
I didn't know if you weretalking specifically about their
surface performance or theiron screen performance, either one.
I don't know enough aboutsurfing to really have an opinion
about the first one.
It's just amazing.
It's all amazing.
Although you do glean a littlebit from watching the show.
Who's flashy and who's more workman.
(36:35):
Like, about all of it.
We both said Cotty, right,that it's so hard not to like him.
Cotty's attitude is usually alittle bit more aspirational, whereas
Garrett says, oh, that's anextreme version of something I might
do in my more selfish moments.
They really let him be a dickthis season.
I don't know.
I like them all.
There's no.
Nobody on screen is somebodythat I'm like, let's move along.
(36:58):
There aren't any.
You wish they'd dedicate lessscreen time.
I think they struck a reallygood balance with all of it.
I could tell, like, some ofthem seem more polished than others.
Like, I feel like Kai, Lennyis a very polished interview compared
to the others.
And you can tell because theygive him more sound bites.
(37:18):
And I.
Even though I have neverphysically even touched a surfboard
when he's out there, like,doing his spins and stuff, I'm gonna
keep it old school, but I haveno right to have that opinion.
He's an incredibly impressive athlete.
What about Tony?
Tony.
He had a tough arc this seasontoo, didn't he?
He got a lot of screen timelast season and I thought it hindered
(37:43):
the season.
You thought it hindered seasontwo that he got so much?
Yeah, it was almost like a.
They're looking for acontinued storyline setting.
Even if you don't follow himinto his career, you're giving him
a launch pad that just didn'treally pan out, at least in in the
(38:04):
world of the story.
No, he didn't.
What sort of story do you takefrom CJ and his gravitation to.
And yet utter fear of the big waves.
He's a tough guy, too, becauseat times he seems like the most grounded.
(38:25):
Yeah.
The one willing to go.
That was horrifying.
I don't want to go out thereagain and, like, willing to admit
that someone like Justineseems very grounded in her approach,
even though she's.
They're all like the governoron their sanity, if not completely
blown, at least a little offto be able to do this in the first
place.
But C.J.
kind of.
He's frustrating in.
(38:46):
Again, you hate to talk abouthuman beings because this is a documentary,
but in what is on screen, heretreats into talking his way out
of performing that.
It's okay to just say, I don'twant to do that anymore.
You don't necessarily have tojustify it this way and that.
And I think that I maybe canbe more sympathetic to someone like
(39:11):
Garrett being like, let's justgo do it.
Let's do it.
I usually have more of that attitude.
Than, yeah, it's interesting.
They let him end the season.
End, end.
He gets final say.
He does.
We were talking earlier.
Did you know something moredefinite about this being a final
season?
(39:32):
No, it just.
It seemed like the way thatthey were telling the story, that
they felt like the tale ofNazare or this generation of it had
run its course.
Yeah.
That they told the rise andall of that.
Maybe I'm partial to seasonone because beginnings are fun.
And when things have hitcritical mass and then stay there
(39:52):
for long enough that theyeither establish into old hat or
peter out.
That's a bummer, right?
It's fun when things are onthe way up.
As they zipped around theworld this time, which was awesome
and cool to see.
And I.
I mean, that Cortez bank stuffwas stunning.
But as they moved to Italy inthe last episode and it just seemed
(40:15):
like a lot of things wereclosing rather than starting.
They were starting in otherways, other chapters of life, whatever.
But this one was coming to a close.
And as the.
It almost had a bit of a panicas the episode played out.
And it felt more and more likea series end because I didn't even
know it was the last episodeof the season.
And then for.
(40:37):
To get the hint that, oh, thismay be it, and to.
You're happy for these peoplewho are starting families and having
positive life changes, but atthe same time, it's the documentary
would change substantially ina way that, like, is true to life.
Right?
Like, they're getting older and.
No, that's.
It's just a little too real.
(40:57):
Each time a pair tows out intothe water, there's this sense that
something transcendent orhorrible is going to happen.
And then you get the episodewhich gives you this true and sad
dichotomy of life where Marciodies in Nazare in a surfer.
(41:20):
And in the very same episode,the guy who was towing him, Lucas
Chumbo, is holding his ownbaby, his small child.
Think I assumed that what youwere getting at and saying that season
three was your favoritebecause of the themes that it hit.
It really did such a beautifuljob of showing that circle, the endings
(41:43):
and beginnings of things andthe importance of family and in real
life stuff.
And it was really beautiful.
I think it's C.J.
who says the waves come in andthey come out and they're always
there.
And ghouls.
And the show didn't.
And it shouldn't have.
After someone dies at theplace you've been making a documentary
about, do they surf Nazareagain after that on screen?
(42:08):
Yeah, they do.
Asking, do they.
Did they show them surfing again?
Yeah, they do.
But it never.
There's no Big Waveinvitational that comes or like an
epic day or any.
The big.
The shift.
The focus shifts to Cortez andto into Hawaii.
And yeah, it almost.
I know that they are there andthey're surfing, but it.
(42:30):
Yeah, it was just such asubtle but powerful way to mark like
the bubble burst in some way.
I'm impressed by how clear ofa story they got out of the first
and third season.
It.
I hear there's.
They capture the communitythat centers around surfing, but
(42:52):
yeah, there is a littlecompetition, but it's grounded in
real love and respect andappreciation for one another.
It's really a testamentagainst the ME culture.
We're used to this culture ofstepping on others to get ahead.
This subcultures mirrors anideal, kind of even an ideal working
class where they're each eagerto help one another.
(43:18):
You have to have someone asskilled as you to go do the thing
because you have to havesomebody to drive and you really
have to have a safety guy out there.
And it's.
It is a team sport in a veryodd way.
Yeah.
That takes me to somethingthat the show never does present.
Not once do they explain howthese men and women are funded.
(43:40):
They're oft covered insponsorship gear and they're flying,
but yet they're Flying fromIreland to Portugal to Maui to Cortez
bank off the coast,California, I would assume.
I wondered about this too,specifically in season three.
Less about the travel and morebecause I assume they're like, if
you're a big wave surfer andevery big wave surfer is going to
(44:01):
this spot, then Red Bull isgoing to foot the bill for you to
travel there.
Yeah.
Because it's worth it to themto have your photo made and video.
Whatever.
Did you notice when they'regoing to Morocco and they get stuck
on the McDonald's drive thruthing and the people come out and
help them?
Yeah.
Do you see what they did?
They gave them all Red Bulls.
Like all the workers who wouldcome to help them were walking away
(44:23):
with armfuls of Red Bull.
Oh, I noticed they weregetting something.
Yeah.
And they probably got some Tshirts or something.
So in some ways they aredefinitely brand peddlers.
But you do wonder, I guess nowthey've been part of a very successful
or a fairly successful HBO program.
There's got to be some moneyin that.
But I would enjoy thinking,oh, I really need to.
(44:45):
Recenter I'm going to go toItaly and probably keep my property.
Beachfront property in Hawaii.
No, hate.
I'm not.
There's no judgment here at all.
It looks amazing.
But you do.
As someone who doesn't knowabout the financials of.
Like you said.
Yeah.
And this is the first season.
I think they called it a jobabout three or four times.
(45:06):
Chumbo did that a lot, didn't he?
Yeah.
He said a tearful goodbye tohis family.
It's work and that to me.
Talking about beginnings andendings, he's in the dead center
of the moments where Garrettmay have left his family behind.
The son that comes back, theolder son in Italy.
(45:29):
But you're also seeing Garrettslow down.
And so when Trumbo says, I'mgoing to work, it's we know.
And he knows that this is notreality forever.
You know that you do age outof the job that he has.
And so much like smartprofessional athletes in the NFL
or wherever, get as much moneyas you can while you can.
(45:54):
Another clear split the seriesdid with the season is the central
motif you mentioned ofGarrett's drive.
Is it going to push him to bethe greatest ever without any argument,
or is it just going to injurehim beyond repair?
You wondered that until youget into that fifth episode where
he's in Italy and it seems asthough he's found a happy medium.
(46:20):
It seemed that, but it's stillGame to go with the crew when the
call comes.
Yeah.
And he's.
Morocco.
Yeah, to Morocco.
And when he says, I'm happyjust to drive, I love driving.
If he had said that inprevious seasons, I wouldn't have
believed him.
But now I feel like he evensays, I just like being part of the
crew.
Yeah.
(46:40):
It seemed to be that's like athing that you say when you're injured
and you really want to be out there.
But it seemed more genuinefrom him this time.
And I.
Again, Donovan sitting herelistening to us.
And Donovan, you've never seenthe show at all.
No, I have not.
You just do not expect whenyou start a program about surfing
massive waves, that you'regonna get this exploration of mortality
(47:03):
and fatherhood and life.
All of this stuff.
It's so good.
That's good documentaries.
Right?
They're about one thing andeverything at the same time.
A lot of good documentaries.
I think I like that.
Yeah.
This one maybe does the bestof any.
There.
The episode the Eddie was backin Hawaii where they were doing the
(47:25):
competition called the Eddie.
You just had to swell withpride for Luke Shepperson, who.
Who won.
But this guy won the surfingcompetition while doing double duty
as a lifeguard that day ofjust a lot of courage and unimaginable
energy.
(47:45):
He was basically runningconcessions and then checking into
the game to score some threes.
Yeah.
And winning the mvp.
Just true working class behavior.
Because why did he do it that way?
He couldn't take off workdespite being in.
In the tournament itself thathe was safeguarding.
(48:05):
By far the busiest day.
Right.
Of the decade on that beach.
Right.
Like there was all hands ondeck, you can surf in your break
kind of thing.
He really is what we sometimestry to stand for.
To top it off, he had thisstrong humility the entire time.
He almost was interviewed moreas a worker than the actual winner
(48:26):
of the tournament.
A little ways into that, mysniffer went off.
I'm like, I think this guystands a pretty good shot.
Really?
Yeah.
Well, it was uncertain becausewe just never heard of him.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And it's an interesting perspective.
Even if he hadn't beencompeting, it's an interesting perspective
to have the local who reallyknows the scene and can explain the
(48:48):
nuance of what's going on.
Yeah.
And then not to disregard.
What was it, 1978.
Eddie himself, his stolen disappearance.
He just disappears.
It was such a spiritual tale.
Yeah.
The stories about the turtleshowing up several times.
He is those turtles.
(49:08):
Yeah.
And then again, they.
Smith and his crew Cultivatesuch good story.
They double down on Garrett'sfrustration two episodes in a row.
And it sets up a finale.
Garrett's drive kind of turnedhim cruel.
And that's a question that's addressed.
And he mentions himself.
(49:29):
Yeah.
That was because he's the hero.
Right.
Like, we're rooting for himall along.
And there are things, momentswhere he's not great.
Or if you read between thelines, he's not great.
How he meets his wife, not great.
They're pretty upfront aboutit, but they also glaze over it pretty
quickly.
But then to see him be cruelto Cotty, of all people.
(49:53):
And that.
That scene where Kati's.
I guess we're gonna go.
It has to kind of.
I felt like I was thereexperiencing the awkwardness of when
they come back to land andit's just uncomfortable.
And this guy is at your house,and he's flown halfway across the
world to be here, and you'rebeing a dick.
I think anybody with ambition,like the Sabin quote of high achievers,
(50:16):
don't like lazy people orunderachievers or whatever.
That was the.
Even though Cotti is none ofthose things, he's excellent and
dedicated.
That was like the rub right there.
Right.
That and that he felt like hewas on the clock.
Like you.
How many more great waves areyou gonna get?
Yeah.
And this guy ruined it for me.
That's a very human questionof what do you do as you age?
(50:38):
But you still are very muchalive with desires and drive, and
you haven't given up onpersonal goals.
And this show doesn't haveanswers to these questions, but it.
Maybe it's a non sequiturhere, but is Michelle McNamara a
saint or what?
Their whole life is so hardfor me to comprehend.
(50:59):
Yeah.
Yeah.
Like the.
It reminds me a bit ofmusician families.
One partner is left to holddown the fort while the other is
able to pursue their dream.
And even if it's putting foodon the table and allowing for a certain
lifestyle, that doesn't reallymake up for the lack of time.
(51:19):
And you have to zoom out andsay this whole thing is.
You would hope people couldsay they zoom out and say this whole
pursuit is worth it becausethis is a great life.
But there are some very hard moments.
I do love Garrett'srelationship with Earth or nature.
Feel like it's worth watchingand worth doing and learning from.
And it was such a diametricalshot to see him carrying one of his
(51:41):
small children in the autumnmountains of Italy.
You can see his Breath.
Yeah.
You'd never seen that from him.
Landlocked.
Yeah.
Usually he's in Hawaii with noshirt and a pair of shorts or even
in Nazare and in water with asurf suit on.
(52:03):
And then to have it end withCJ's speech I thought was good.
Where he says we get to choosewhich wave we ride and where we put
our attention.
I thought that was a profoundpiece of television to do that with.
Justine warrants a mention here.
Her becoming a mother and theway that they doled out.
(52:23):
You knew all season that they.
This was something that shewanted to do.
Would there be time?
How does a woman who's beenshown to get after it just as hard
and as well as the men.
But she even says in theepisode it's there's some unfairness
to the guys having families,but they get to still ride the whole
(52:44):
time and pursue their career.
And she has to pause for whatshe says in very athlete terms.
Oh, I have to pause the whole season.
She's exchanging this time.
But when you're thinking aboutthe limited time that Garrett has,
you're like, yeah, this is oneyear away for her.
But then to be holding thechild at the end as all of these
things are happening in CJ'sgiving his monologue I thought was
(53:06):
great.
And she.
Her and her partner are so likable.
Yeah.
See my quality humans and their.
The early season relationshipwith Tony was.
That's so tough.
I know that's zooming back, but.
And it never really got any resolution.
Much like life.
Yeah, that's it.
All right.
We will say goodbye to anotherHBO hit show, the Last of Us.
(53:29):
We should be getting moneyfrom HBO for this.
We should be paid.
Sponsored.
Sponsored by hbo.
We're not.
I should at least get mysubscription for free.
Yeah, exactly.
All this free advertising I'mgiving them.
Because we are going to talkabout the Last of us with some in
depth thoughts.
Bound to spoil.
(53:50):
I think my issue with the wasthat the finale didn't give us a
period at the end of the sentence.
I think it didn't land with the.
With a period.
It was a lingering.
It was an ellipses.
I think that's what I meantprobably when I said this felt very
much like a part one.
Yeah, it did.
Not that like I expect you tonot have a cliffhanger.
(54:11):
But it felt like if I had onemore episode maybe, I don't know,
maybe if I had one moreepisode differently, I don't know.
The show looked stunning.
The tension was high.
Every Episode was great, Ithought, but dragging the ending
across multiple seasons feelslike a disservice.
(54:34):
And I think maybe this trackhad something to do with it, but
it needed more of a resolution.
I thought that contrasting itto season one.
Right.
Where obviously it ends withJoel and Ellie in the car.
I think it's in the car.
He's lied.
He's lied to her, and the nextthing is open.
(54:55):
That was good.
Right.
Because it's both.
Or they were on horse.
Right.
It puts.
I don't know.
I'm feeling whatever it was.
I'm thinking Carr for somereason, but I couldn't swear to that.
But he had rescued her.
You're talking about.
He'd rescued her.
And to their next thing,wherever they're gonna go.
And it.
Like you said, it's a period,but at the same time, it is open
(55:15):
to questions that you can'thelp but think of.
And I think that.
I think it's possible to do that.
And they chose not to do it.
And like you said, maybe thereare external factors.
I do hate a cliffhanger endinglike that, where I'm like, I'm not
gonna get to see this for two years.
So if it's this big, does thatmake sense?
(55:36):
No, it does.
It needed to stop and point,and instead it gave viewers a pretty
captivating reset that we'llsee nothing of for two or three years.
Right.
And especially if.
I don't know.
I shouldn't complain about itbecause I did the episode, but I
was kind of like.
I was.
Especially if this is gonnarecontextualize this whole season.
Yes.
(55:57):
Honestly, in two years.
I am not gonna.
I can't.
I don't have time to just gorewatch everything before the new
season.
Like, recap videos can only doso much.
There's a fear for me that I'm like.
That I'm not gonna rememberbecause we get hints throughout the
Seattle episodes anddefinitely in this one that there's
something else going on thatwe're not really familiar with.
(56:20):
And I'm afraid that I'm gonnaforget all the pertinent details
come season three.
I'm not gonna know what'sgoing on.
I know the tease for nextseason is that we're gonna get these
three days from Abby's pointof view.
That's my understanding.
And if she shot Ellie.
And I don't know if we'll everget much more about Jesse's quick
(56:42):
and sad death.
Poor Jesse.
That was sudden and striking.
There's a lot of afterdepending on what they do next season,
there's a lot of aftermaththat I would want to see.
Went right into it.
Yeah.
When Jesse and Ellie werewatching the wolves deal with the
one scar and they were havingto hide and he was holding her back
(57:04):
from getting involved, itreally did feel like right then he,
oh, he's gonna die, isn't he?
And he was talking about beinga dad just before that.
Oh, yeah, he's gonna die.
Absolutely.
But you knew it.
He was too good for this world.
The finale did what manyfinales do, it drug its feet.
(57:24):
But to the last 15 minuteswhere it didn't have time on purpose
to finish what it started.
Right.
I expected Ellie wasn't goingto get Abby in this season, but I
don't know.
A more resolution, moreresolute action could have ended
it.
I'll actually flip that.
And I think that I appreciatedthat it didn't drag its feet as much
(57:47):
as it could have.
The runtime for this episodewas a little shorter than even some
of the mid mid season episodes.
I was like, okay, good.
Because you, you can really.
They could have really draggedit out, especially for a finale.
Right.
They could have gone with abigger run time or a season finale,
bigger runtime, et cetera, et cetera.
Yeah.
I have heard critique that italmost felt like they just entered
(58:11):
a portal and then they were inSeattle with Elliot and Dina that
they could have used a.
I mean, the character building there.
They showed me enough of themjourneying that I'm like, that's
great.
And they had already set uptheir relationship and they didn't
give us like nothing on whenthey're traveling.
Like, we do still see their dynamic.
(58:33):
Yeah, that's actually speakingof their dynamic, that's when I knew
Jesse was gonna die when he's.
I'm cool with you and Dina.
I just want.
You're dead.
You are dead.
Is that cool?
Yeah, it was.
It was funny that we.
I failed to mention this lastweek, but I guess it was because
we were discussing thepenultimate episode a lot more than
(58:55):
any others.
But the addition of JeffreyWright to this season is good stuff.
As soon as he was on screen, Ifelt the answer to my question of
can a show be as good withoutPedro Pascal?
And yeah, he's good.
Jeffrey Wright's got gravitas,so, yeah, he could.
(59:17):
Yeah, he does.
Pair him with Caitlyn Deaverand this could be a good third season
coming up.
Yeah, it's definitely seems tobe teed up to give us something that
we've not seen.
Before which so many times wecomplain that we just see the same
old thing.
But the teases they've givenus of the principal characters, I
(59:38):
think speak well, like, it'sprobably gonna be good.
Yeah.
Did you pick up on anythingwith Abby?
Video game players are.
They could butcher us if they wanted.
But there's somethingimportant about her to the Isaac
character.
Is it because she might havesome of the knowledge of that her
(01:00:01):
father had as the son?
I don't know.
And this is a video game players.
Turn it off right now.
Just don't listen for a second.
I was going to.
I was like.
When they were like, she's not here.
He's.
He really needs her.
And he gives the explanationthat she's the future.
She's being groomed forleadership, essentially, and she's.
Who's going to take over if hegets killed.
(01:00:22):
There was a second where I waslike, is she immune?
Oh, but.
And I wondered if there wouldbe like a.
I don't think that this iswhere it's going, but I kind of wonder,
like, if she was immune and they.
The story then would basicallybe like her father chose Ellie instead
of his own daughter.
I don't.
(01:00:44):
I don't.
I don't think that's what's happening.
Yeah, I don't think so either.
But I just.
I just had a moment where I'm.
It was more like, well, thatmight be interesting if they had
done that.
I don't think that's the case.
Yeah, I do that.
We're now living in the worldof the show where there.
There are wolves and scars andthen there's the Ellie Tommy form,
formally Jesse gang.
(01:01:06):
Yeah.
We're caught in the middle ofit all, and there's just no forgiveness
from either side.
Yeah.
It seems pretty vicious outthere in Seattle and mysterious and
mysterious.
That part didn't feel like aslot to me because you're still in
their point of view and youdon't know why they don't just say,
you guys have this side of the street.
(01:01:27):
I'll have this side of thestreet, and leave us alone.
Right.
You don't really know what'sgoing on.
Yeah.
You don't.
Beyond the broad strokes.
Yeah.
Yeah.
How the scar people, theseraph bots, have turned into such
Luddites or adopted that sortof lifestyle.
(01:01:49):
Yeah.
Who's their spiritual leaderwho seems to be dead.
Yeah.
You know, two, three, four.
Confusing.
Yeah.
So what'd you think of theseason overall?
Yes.
Big thumbs up.
I think that there is anelement of Discovery, almost like
what Adam was talking aboutwith Hundred Foot Wave.
(01:02:10):
There's a.
There's almost an element ofDiscovery and finding out, like,
the world in the first season,that's exciting.
And no second season can everlive up to that.
And so you have to be justunderstand that, like, you're not
gonna get the same way youfelt about the first season.
And I do think that it, likethis season, the episodes were more
(01:02:34):
connected, if that makes sense.
Not that the.
The first season stood alone,but there's ones that don't work
as standalones at all.
And having all already laidout the ground rules, it's still
good.
It did a good job of showingus the world.
And there are hints of somedeeper threats coming.
(01:02:57):
Right.
They're smarter, seemingly smarter.
And I do.
And I think that, like, itwasn't paced perfectly for me.
I'm having this really weirdthing happening where it's only seven
episodes and I watched itevery week.
Like, I watched it pretty muchevery Monday after it came out.
Yeah.
And I'm still feeling like Itook a gap between, like, episode
(01:03:21):
three and four and didn'twatch it, which didn't happen.
But I.
Thinking back on it, I don'tknow if that's a function of it possibly
needing another episode.
I do think that thepenultimate episode was the emotional
culmination of the season, andI think that worked very well.
And I think they pulled thatoff extremely well.
And it did contextualize thisepisode too.
(01:03:43):
Right.
Because off you see Ellie'sfeelings, but also would Joel even
wanted this for her.
Right.
You know, she's.
Yeah.
I thought that was very good.
And they got another featahead of them, which they're gonna
try to do, which is they'regonna make us sympathetic to Abby
now.
Oh, yeah.
And I assume we will be.
(01:04:05):
She's a very good actor.
Yeah.
And you're gonna, I'mguessing, even be on the side of
Jeffrey Wright's Isaac andsay, I'm for this guy.
I want.
I, I.
Not that they wouldn't pullfor him versus Seraphites, but would
we pull for him against Ellie?
Probably not.
But I assume we'll be moresympathetic to Abby.
(01:04:26):
And even at the, like, at thispoint in the game, so to speak, Abby
has done nothing that Elliehasn't done or tried to do for very
similar motives.
That's exactly right.
And that's what they're gonnaplay with next season.
I assume that they're gonna be doppelgangers.
You know, they're kind ofmirror images of each ways.
(01:04:46):
How much of that.
Yeah.
Immune.
Yeah, I doubt it.
That was just.
That was like a stray thoughtthat I was like, whoa, that would
be cool.
I'd like to see that.
But I strongly doubt that, asvideo game players are probably gonna
be like, please open theWikipedia page and look at it.
And I'm tempted almost.
But I'm also not tempted.
(01:05:07):
I think I'm not going tobecause I liked not knowing Joel
was gonna die this season,which, if anyone played, I didn't
know that.
And I think that's good for me.
Yeah.
All right.
Yeah.
I imagine it shocked you.
Yeah, it did.
When you're kind of like, man,it's episode two, and he's.
He's the co star.
Yeah, he's a bigger star thanBella Ramsey is.
(01:05:30):
He's the biggest star of justabout anyone in there.
All right, that's the end ofour episode here.
Hope you enjoy it.
Head to the Alabama take, andif you want to hear from us without
being chained to social media,subscribe to our free newsletter.
We'll tell you what's new withanything on the site and even tell
you a silly yarn.
If you're really lucky, youget an Andy Griffiths recap.
(01:05:52):
There you go.
And again, help us reach ourgoal of 500 subscribers on YouTube.
It's growing.
That's our mission for thenext couple weeks.
For Adam, for Donovan.
I'm Blaine, and we hope youdon't get capsized in the pouring
rain near Scar Island.
It might get ugly.
Talk to you all next week.
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