June 13, 2025 • 53 mins
T Lo unpack the big celebrity scandal of the week: Sabrina Carpenter being horny. They trace the history of finger-wagging young women in pop music for being sexually aggressive, but show why the outrage is always selective. Then, it's another rant about the latest episode of "And Just Like That..." PLUS: T Lo's suggestions for movies and TV shows you might have missed!
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:23):
We're Tommy Lorenzo and this is the Pop Style Opinion
Fest tele Kittens. Welcome back to another edition of the PSO.
I am the Tea and you're Telo Tom Fitzgerald and
I'm here with the loan. You're Tile Lorenzo, cous my
love Husbano. How are you love to help you?
Speaker 2 (00:36):
I'm wonderful as usual, it is.
Speaker 1 (00:39):
A very busy June for us. We are every weekend
is either a nephew graduation or a next wedding and
then uh, although this won't be a weekend in the
middle of the week. Well, on Wednesday, June twenty fifth,
will be in Dallas for a Pride event where we're
going to teach you all about fabulous drag queens and
(00:59):
trans women changed our lives. And you can read about
that and find all the details on the front page
of our site. That's Wednesday, June twenty fifth. If you
sign up now, you will get a free signed copy
of our book Legendary Children, And of course you get
to meet us, ask us questions, post pictures, the whole
nine yards posts. We're going to give you a night.
Speaker 2 (01:19):
Yeah, there's also information on Instagram. I just supposed a
new information. So there's you know.
Speaker 1 (01:25):
And you should know that we had to change our
our Instagram account several months back because the old one
got hacked. So if you haven't done so by now
position yet, it's Tom and Lorenzo official.
Speaker 2 (01:37):
Yes, that's all.
Speaker 1 (01:38):
One word, Tom and Lorenzo Official on Instagram.
Speaker 2 (01:41):
We were attacked.
Speaker 1 (01:42):
We were attacked, and I'm it was literally one of
the most upsetting things that happened this year.
Speaker 2 (01:49):
I should know that's not true, but it was. Yeah,
it was said, it did. Yeah, I don't want to
get into that, but it was. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (01:55):
It felt like, I mean, in our line of work,
it's not just your something, it's a it's a huge
portion of your your business model. So for that to
have happened, it was actually kind of devastating anyway.
Speaker 2 (02:08):
But we have a new one and you can subscribe
follow us.
Speaker 1 (02:13):
And there's cat pictures and we'll put vacation pictures up there,
and of course every Christmas ornament that we bought in
the German Christmas markets will go up in decemberb So yeah, anyway,
busy month that is here now, he says, Hi, Yes,
tab Hunter are twenty two pound cat has jumped up
on the table and he's going to stick his butt
in my face while it's usual. Okay, so we have
(02:38):
many things to talk about. We each have some Lorenzo
has some TV shows, and I actually have a movie
which it's not a recent movie, but it's it's an
undiscovered classic I think that I want to talk about.
And then we're going to get a little into the
celebrities Gondal of the Week, which is a Sabrina Carpenter
being horny, and then of course we're going to talk
(03:02):
about the latest episode of and just like that, which
continues it's downward slide into irrelevance. Anyway, first up, I
will start, and then I will coss to you for
the TV shows. This is a movie that came out
last year actually and dropped out of sight, and now
it's on Hulu and I want to urge people to
(03:24):
watch it. It's Steven Soderbergh's presence. I love Steven Soderberg
as a director, and in the recent years he has
done a series of what I would call small intimate films.
The first one was Kimmy starring Zoe Kravitz, and I
absolutely endured that film. I think it came out in
twenty twenty two, and it was sort of an updated
(03:46):
COVID era hitchcocky and thriller and it was really really good.
And then just recently he came out with a spy
movie starring Kate Blanchette and Michael Fasspender called Black Bag,
and again it was a small, intimate, well done film.
This film I'm talking about is Presence, which came out
(04:06):
in late twenty twenty four, and it is he's playing
around the various genres and that it's a classic, classic
haunted house story. However, I'm not going to spoil anything
about the story, but I am going to tell you
about the premise of it. I'll tell you right now.
It's not a scary movie at all. It's literally not
(04:27):
a scary movie. There are no jump scares, there's nothing
horrifying that happens. It is a haunted house story and
that is different from a scary story. And I don't
want to get too far into it, but if you
actually saw the film, you know what I mean. You
know that it's a it and actually it's my favorite
(04:49):
type of haunted house story. It actually haunts you for
several days afterwards. And that's why I want to recommend it.
So the cast is, you know, it's not important. The
mother of the it's a family, and the mother of
the family is played by Lucy lou And the one
slight criticism of the film I will give it is
that she her character comes a little close to a
(05:09):
sort of tiger mom stereotype of the Asian mother. But
I think there's more depth to her character than that.
Chris Sullivan plays the father. And then there are two teenagers,
Kellie Lang and Eddie Madey. There's a lot of tension
in this family. It is a very dysfunctional family. And
most of the oh, let me tell you, let me
(05:30):
say this. The hook of Presents and this is not
a spoiler, you will figure it out in the first minute,
is that the entire movie is seen through the eyes
of the ghost. So you are following the family from
Rooin's room and you're getting bits and pieces of conversations,
and there's stories going on. There's stories about shady business
(05:54):
deals and a very tragic past for one of the characters,
and bits and p of this come out in all
of these conversations as this ghost is moving around the house,
and there's some interesting formal stuff that he does. Steven
Soderbergh is great about that, about making you understand that
(06:14):
there are certain rules for this ghost, like it literally
cannot leave the house. So there's a lot of looking
out of windows and you're getting half listened to conversations
like muffled conversations through windows, and I don't want to
over sell it all leads to something. Every single conversation
(06:37):
and interaction in the movie. And this is what I
love about Soderberg because it's so well constructed. And I
have to say he didn't write the script. David Cope
wrote the script, but all of the directorial choices are
all in service to answering a question as a viewer
you didn't actually realize you had until it gets answered.
And that's all I'll say. It's not that there's some
(06:59):
big whist, but there is an answer, and when you
get it, it forces you to look at the entire film.
It forces you to start looking at scenes again because
then they have a certain you have a certain understanding
of why it was shot that way or why it
played out that way. It's extremely well acted, and what
(07:20):
I love about it is it's just subtle, and I
love that about Soderberg is that he is a subtle director.
He expects his audience to be intelligent enough to understand
what he's trying to convey without underlining it. All the time.
He never underlines anything, and I love that about his directing.
And final thing that I'll say is that to me,
(07:45):
all of the greatest haunted house stories, like The Conjuring
or The Exorcist, or even Poltergeist or The Haunting, all
of those movies they understood that houses are scary if
(08:06):
you're peering into a space and nothing's happening. He understands
is that it's about moving from room to room. It's
not scary dark lighting. Most a lot of the film
takes place in full daylight, but it's shadows and movement
and depth and is there something out of the corner
(08:27):
of your eye. A good haunted house film knows how
to do that. So there is a certain level of
tension through the whole film, but you are never going
to be scared. So I do want to tell you
that right now. It is not a scary film, but
it is a very thoughtful and pun intended, deliberately haunting film.
(08:47):
You will actually think about this for days afterwards. Once
once the entire story is put in perspective at the
end of it. That's it. I don't anything else because
I really didn't I knew. I'm telling you pretty much
everything I knew going into watching it, and I don't
(09:07):
want to tell you anymore because I was so pleasantly
surprised by where it went and how I felt after
it was over. Just a very thoughtful, in some ways,
very humanistic story that is like all ghost stories. It
is about death, but not in a depressing way. And
(09:31):
that's all I'll say. The acting is great, the directing
is top notch, the writing is very sharp, and every
single thing, every single line, every single shot, if you
were to watch it a second time, you'd realize, Wow,
this was all really thought out. So I can't recommend
it enough. That's Presence, starring Lucy Lou directed by Steven Soderberg.
(09:53):
You can find it streaming on Hulu and you can
rent it. I think on things like Prime Video and
Apple TV Plus and stuff like that. I think it's
worth your time. Go out and look at Kimmy as well,
which I also think you can get on Prime Video.
That's k I M. I is how it's spelled I
wish I had watched Black Bags so I could give
you a whole trilogy, but I haven't watched it yet.
(10:13):
I'm gonna rent that soon anyway. That's my little streaming
rental sounding recommendation for the week. Okay, Lorenzo, you've got
TV shows?
Speaker 2 (10:22):
Yes? The first one I want to talk about is
the it's called Department Q on Netflix. Story mainly Matthew Good.
It's about a former top rated detective who was assigned
a new a case and then things went wrong and
then he was wrecked with guilt and then left the
(10:46):
department and then came back to a new code case.
They're searching for a woman who vanished several years you
know ago, meaning earlier. So that was very I was thot,
oh my god, here we go again, you know, the
same kind of story. But I wanted to watch it
because I go to a bunch of sites because I
(11:08):
have to put the lounge together, and everyone was talking
about the show. So I was like, all right, let
me give it a shot. And then I saw that
it was in Edinburgh, burh buruh Edinburgh, and I was like,
all right, I want to watch it because I love,
you know, looking at things and I want to see Scotland.
So I was like, oh, I'll give it a shot.
(11:28):
And then I started watching it and I was like,
this feels very weird, even for a British show, detective show.
And then I found out that the show it's actually
based on a book written by a Danish writer. I
was like, all right, now it made sense because this
feels more Danish than British. It's very weird, very odd.
(11:51):
The whole thing is.
Speaker 1 (11:52):
All the Danish people are going to come for you now.
Speaker 2 (11:54):
No, no, I'll explain. They tend to be very dark,
and you know Skennaven shows in general, they're very much
like that approach, you know, you know, dead girl in
the woods kind of thing that you know, the whole
town it's looking for her and then turns out everybody's horrible,
that type of It's always that kind of approach, which
(12:14):
I still love because it's beautiful, the places are gorgeous,
and you know, I'm always hooked. So I thought, oh,
now it makes sense because it feels more Danish than British.
It's an incredible cast. Everyone is amazing. So just to
name a few, we have we have Matthew Good we
have also what's her name, Kate Dicky. I absolutely love her.
(12:39):
She was in a Game of Thrones. I love her.
And my favorite Kelly McDonald. I absolutely worship this woman.
She plays the police therapist and her lines are hysterical.
She's so freaking amazing. So I watch it. I thought
it was interesting. It's getting a lot of buzz. Everyone
is loving the show because it's weird, you know, like
(13:00):
weird things, and I thought it was interesting, interesting, That's
how I put it. H incredible cast, beautiful cinematography. Again
based on a Danish show, so you're gonna get that
Danish vibe of looking for a woman who disappeared, and
you know those the shows, skin daving shows in general,
(13:21):
they love that kind of stuff. So anyway, I would
give it a shot. You might like it. Everyone is
talking about the sets, about the locations. It is actually
beautiful and the performances are great. So that's my number
one suggesting department. Q on Netflix.
Speaker 1 (13:36):
Is that out yet?
Speaker 2 (13:37):
Oh yeah, it's out? Okay, Yeah, it's out. In fact,
I saw the screens, but I wasn't interested. So then
I started going to sites and everyone was talking about
about the costumes, the sets, you know, the locations and
all that and the cast. So I was like, all right,
let me give it a shot. It is interesting. I
think most people will enjoy it. I just thought it
(13:57):
felt because what they did was they transferred the store
from Denmark to England. So if not England, I'm sorry, Scotland.
So it feels it felt a little weird. You know
when you get a situation in a place that made
sense in Denmark and then you switch to Scotland. I
don't know, it feels a little out of blades, but
you might enjoyed it, you know, give it a shot.
(14:18):
So that and there are some shocking moments and you know, anyway,
you'll like it. My second suggestion is the one that
I really liked, also on Netflix. It's called Secrets We Keep,
also Danish, and it's a very interesting show. I absolutely
loved it, devoured the whole thing on one night because
it's about the disappearance again of a woman again, disappearance
(14:41):
of a young Filipino op air who works for this
very very wealthy Danish family. So it's a very interesting show.
I love the subject matter about the whole op air
thing in Europe, which is huge. A lot of Filipino
is also moving to countries like Denmark to work as
(15:02):
it opay, So it's about that. It's about the whole
you know, socio dynamic thing and also power structure. You know,
very wealthy people in Denmark and these people coming, these
immigrants coming to work. And then she disappears, and I
absolutely love the show. I thought the show was very good.
The actors are amazing. Everyone does a very good job.
(15:26):
So I highly recommend it if you like that kind
of show, if you like you know, international shows, I
think you like this one very much. So it's called Secrets.
We keep on Netflix.
Speaker 1 (15:36):
Also fantastic. This concludes Tom Lorenzo's recommendations for distractions. We're
going to take a short break and then we're going
to come back and talk about Sabrina Carpenter pissing everyone
off once again. We'll be right back. We're back, and
we're going to talk about how everyone goes completely nuts
(15:56):
for one blonde pop star every general and then scrutinizes
her every single move. Sabrina Carpenter has She's always recorded
a little bit of controversy with her pop music, which
is extremely horny, but as she pointed out, it's not
(16:19):
the only kind of music she writes, but the music
that she tends to that tends to get the most
attention are the songs that are a little horny. And
she's a pretty blonde, petite white girl, and that tends
to evoke a lot of reactions in people about how
(16:39):
she should be treated and how she should be acting.
And we saw this play out with other petit blonde
white pop stars like Britney Spears and Madonna.
Speaker 2 (16:48):
And I think the fact that she's a Disney isn't
she a Disney yet child?
Speaker 1 (16:51):
And I also think the fact I point out that
she's twenty six years old, And I will note that
every time we cover Sabrina car carpen her on a
red carpet, we have to wind up usually deleting some
slightly offensive commentary about her sort of normalizing pedophilia and
(17:13):
working a Lolita look. And the thing is, she doesn't
dress like a little girl. She is small, she's got
those big eyes, and she wears her hair in a
very retro throwback kind of way, but she doesn't dress
like a little girl. So doing like Lolita accusations against
her just isn't fair to her. And I think it's
something that people default to every time a young woman
(17:37):
appears to be dressing for attention, you know, sexual attention. Anyway,
she did an interview with Rolling Stone that came with
a bunch of racy pictures, and she released her new
album She Really Knows About, an album that's dropping in
August called Man's Best Friend and the Her Is Her.
(18:01):
It's sort of like a Terry Richardson style aesthetic where
it looks like a polaroid. It looks like it was
taken in a hotel room, and she's kneeling on all
four as well. A man just out of frame is
grabbing her hair. And I actually, in the description of
that image, I am making it sound more salacious and
(18:23):
violent than it actually is. It looks like, you know,
something consensual is happening there. It looks like something slightly
kinky is happening there, But it doesn't look like something
violent is happening there. This comes down to a question of,
as these conversations tend to do, of consent. And I
(18:44):
do think when we talk about someone like Madonna or
someone like Britney Spears, because they both face this kind
of scrutiny, there was a slight difference Madonna came into
her own as an adult woman, and she was clearly
very much in control of her image and her esthetic
in her career from the jump. So her use of
(19:05):
sexual imagery was considered consensual and aggressive, and in fact
was considered something of a feminist act, that she was
taking control of her sexuality. Now, fifteen years later, or
maybe more like yeah, yeah, fifteen years later, Britney Spears
hits the scene and the vibe was different because she
(19:28):
was so young, and it didn't feel so much like
she was in control of that image as it was
being imposed on her by other people. And we know
from many years later, we know how much of Britney's
career was not up to her and how much of
it was imposed on her by other people. So, yes,
there is a history there, but you do have to
(19:49):
look at it, you have to take it on a
case by case basis. Of course, pop music has always, always,
always victimized and exploited young attractive women, and there are
the stories of them being abused are legion, But Madonna
showed us forty years ago that you cannot make assumptions
(20:11):
that every woman who's doing this sort of thing has
been forced into it. Oh, and she was very open
about that. She did change the conversation. I also want
to add that. And the reason we're bringing this up
is because it erupted. There was this huge TikTok fury,
all these articles written about it, and you know, a
(20:31):
lot of finger wagging at her for promoting this kind
of imagery. Now, I do want to talk to you.
I'm really trying to give the overaw and.
Speaker 2 (20:41):
Then will batter. There are many details.
Speaker 1 (20:43):
There are many details about this. One is all right,
We need to have a discussion about is she doing
this for the male gaze?
Speaker 2 (20:51):
Right?
Speaker 1 (20:52):
Which is she objectifying herself for men? The other thing,
the other question is this a poor image to serve
to young women? And then there's more. You know, you
could take a much broader view and talk about the
current political atmosphere, the current social atmosphere in which say,
(21:14):
reproductive rights are being strapped from women and the trad
wife esthetic is being promoted more and more and more
so these sort of throwback sexy images. And I'll say
this about Madonna, they weren't throwback images when she did
the Sex Book. It wasn't all qtt pooh, Dolly Parton drag,
which is kind of what Sabrina Carpenter does. It was
(21:36):
cutting edge S and M, and she was pulling it
was porn, and she was pulling from queer porn aline. Yes,
so I'll give Madonna that she was not doing retro
throwback sexy, and Sabrina Carpenter just completely trades in that.
She looks like a cartoon character. She You know, the
(21:57):
whole thing is just very sort of sex kit mid
century inspired sort of stuff. I'm going to toss to you,
but before I do, I just want to say I never,
as a middle aged man, I would never, ever ever
spend my time criticizing a young woman for engaging in
that sort of thing, because I'm not an idiot. I
(22:18):
know how I would sound, but I'm actually completely one
hundred percent on her side. Like, go and be a
little slutty. You're young and cute and right if you're
in control of that, I'm who am I to tut
tut it?
Speaker 2 (22:31):
All? Right? I think that's that's I think it's it's
a combination of a lot of things. I think the
image I think brought a new attention, you know, a
new focus here. Right, If we didn't have that image
that album cover. I think things would be it would
have been a little different. Now, my point is I'll
start by saying that, you know, all this conversation about
(22:51):
Sabrina Corporator and everybody else, you know, it's because you're women.
We never have that kind of conversation about man on stage.
I mean, in general, we don't. Men do a lot
of things on stage that we just find. You know
that it's normal, that it's okay when a woman does it,
then she's you know, she's a slut, she's she's she's
(23:12):
she's supervocative, she's whatever. I do think that when it
comes to music, and as a musician, I think and
if you create your own music, your own thing, you
tend to give, you tend to explore what you're going through.
And these people are young, these you know, these ladies
are young, Yes, super hot. These ladies are young, and
(23:34):
they're exploring their sexuality, their lives, their boyfriends, you know,
their their dates there, whatever and that, and they expressed
that in their music on stage performing all that she's young,
she's hot. Why not. I don't see a problem with
any of that. Having said that, I have noticed as
a musician, as an artist that there's too much going
(23:55):
on on stage that kind of like in a years
or takes the attain the focus on the music, on
the artistry itself to what's going on on stage. You know,
you have people like Beyonce and and and all these
people like having all these tons hundreds of people on
(24:16):
stage dancing and doing all that and robots and things.
I think that's too much. And I think I'm not listen.
I don't care what you wear. But sometimes I'm I
see these performance on stage and I'm and I look
at what they're wearing. I was like, really, do you
really need to go that far? Sometimes?
Speaker 1 (24:35):
And now you do sound like a.
Speaker 2 (24:37):
Because I was like Grandpa, I don't know. It looks
a little too much to me sometimes or unnecessary. But again,
if you feel that's how you express your music, how
you express yourself, your sexuality or whatever you're going, so
that's fine. I don't have a problem with that. It's
just an observation. It's something that I observe when I
see when I see those people, I mean, there you
(25:00):
they're wearing like body suits and you know, and things
like that lingerie and stuff, and I'm like, all right,
everybody else did debt. I'm not shocked by it, but
I sometimes I feel like, is this really necessary all
the time? Every time everyone performs now on stage. But
having said that, I don't have a problem with what
(25:21):
she wears. There's a lot of conversations. There's always been
a conversation on TikTok, especially about what she wears. That
her dresses are too short, that you can see her underwear,
all that that's such prudition. I think, I think that's bullshit.
I'm in favor of wedding wearing whatever you want on
stage or anywhere. I don't care. People will talk about it, obviously,
(25:45):
but I don't have a problem with that.
Speaker 1 (25:46):
I also think that there is.
Speaker 2 (25:51):
A lot of this.
Speaker 1 (25:52):
I alluded to this earlier, that a lot of this
comes down to her being a white, blonde woman. Yes,
because you know, Beyonce hits the stage in booty shorts
or in body you know, French cut body suits and
that sort of thing. You know, Nicki Minaj and Cardi
B and Megande Stallion, all of these artists have come
(26:14):
out in very very skinny outfits, and people aren't claiming
that they're the downfall of society. They're calling them horrors.
Don't get me wrong, Like black women come in for
a lot of criticism. But there's this sense that she
is because of the way she looks, that she's being
victimized here, that there is some sort of victimism, and
(26:34):
also because of the way she looks, unlike say Meganese Stallion,
she has a responsibility to those precious white girls that
are following her. There is a little bit of racism
underneath this, There is a lot of there is a
bit of paternalism underneath this that they single out this. Listen, nothing,
nothing I have seen of Sabrina Carpenter, not one single
(26:57):
image has come close to not one. Everything she's doing
is relatively fricking tame. And there are current artists who
are not pretty little white blonde girls who look like
they're fifteen years old, who are doing much sexier or
similarly sexier work, and they are not getting the same
(27:18):
sort of reaction.
Speaker 2 (27:19):
Right, I just want to say, what's out there? One
of the things that the cover you describe the cover already,
I don't have a problem with the cover. I can
see that it might trigger a lot of things, but
I think anything in terms of art will trigger still exactly,
and it's how you do with it, you know, as
the one being triggered by it. And you know, there's
(27:41):
a lot of conversation about you know, it's Mayo gaze
and it's objectifying yourself. You know, you're degrading yourself. This
is a step back for women. There's always this conversation
and the thing is that they were making the comparison.
I don't know, if you guys watched the brit Awards
when she sings on stage and then she's she's she
kneels as as you know, giving the idea that she's
(28:03):
giving someone a bj which you know that happened on
stage and and anyway, and you can see it. That's
exactly what she's alluding to, which can be a little
too much for some people, but for others, you know. Anyway,
so they're they're making the comparison here that she did
that on stage and now the cover here. I don't know,
(28:24):
I mean there's also I remember, I remember, conversation is
about the that that type of situation, that type of
cover that you know, it's also a fantasy that women
are allowed to have, uh you know that that kind
of thing that you know, you're in that kind of city.
Speaker 1 (28:41):
You mean, like a rape fantasy, not a rape. But
because I don't I don't get that from no, no.
Speaker 2 (28:45):
No, no, I don't. No, I wouldn't say rape, but
dominated by by your partner.
Speaker 1 (28:51):
I mean, yeah, he's pulling her hair, but that's pretty mild.
Speaker 2 (28:54):
But I also think it's kind of a pick and
choose here because people are nuts over you know, the
fifty shape or whatever, and that's kind of the same
situation exactly. So it's fine. The books are fine, but
this is not okay.
Speaker 1 (29:05):
This is what I'm trying to say. People's outrage is
highly highly selected, and the I think the big reason
for her getting this sort of outrage is because her
sexuality is very cutesy, poo very cutesy, pooh white girl sexuality.
It is similar to Britney Spears as you know, classic
you know, hit me Baby one more time kind of looks.
(29:26):
But yeah, I think it's just another Sometimes I look
around and I'm like, Wow, you're really doing this again.
We're going to do this again. And the thing is
that girl be slutty when she's young. For God's sake,
she's having fun with it. I mean, I'm not saying, look,
if something comes out that she has been exploited or
if there's any indication of that, But she defends this
(29:47):
stuff pretty hard and she rolls her eyes at her crack.
Speaker 2 (29:50):
I think it's a combination of a lot of things.
People also talk about her music, that how her music
is so sexual and the whole that music she wrote
about relationship with with Barry King, and you know that
kind of thing that triggered a lot of people when
people were thinking that she was being a little too mean.
But you know, Taylor Swift does it all the time.
(30:11):
I know again, beg it you. And then people are
sort of right now on TikTok especially, people are comparing
her situation with Sidney Sweety, who just did a collab
with a soap company that made uh soap with her
actual bath water and we're charging like south the door.
(30:31):
So people were talking about Sweety using her sexuality, like
when they she Pucket, I know, like she pretends she
was dating that guy I forget his name in the movie,
you know anyway that Glenn Powell, Yes, thank you, So
all that kind of stuff like like these women are
using sexuality too often, too much, and that's you know,
(30:55):
degrading and blah blah blah blah blah. So I don't know,
I'd say men do that all the time, why women
can't do it? If you want to judge, have a
compensation about it. You know, it's anything you put out there,
you know, it's subject to that. So it's something I've learned.
But they should be allowed to do whatever they want,
(31:15):
just the same way men do. And you know, and
why not. I have no problem. You can wear whatever
you want, if you want to be naked, that's fine
by me. I have zero problem with any of that.
But again, I'm not a woman, and maybe a woman
has a different view or some women have a different
view on what's going on, and you know, it's you're right.
Speaker 1 (31:37):
Yeah, I just think, of course, And if I don't
think there's anything wrong with finding those images problematic or disturbing,
I just don't think she should be vilified for for
engaging in them, because you know, you have to allow
for a certain level of consent and independence on the
(31:58):
part of the person per vein these images. So anyway,
I think we've kicked this around. I think so, yeah,
all right, we'll take a short break and then we're
going to come back and talk about.
Speaker 2 (32:09):
My favorite show.
Speaker 1 (32:10):
Oh my god, and just like that, all right, we'll
be right back. We're back, and we actually don't want
to talk about it just like that, because but we
actually have committed ourselves to it, and we know that
some of you are tuning in to listen to us
rant and rave about this show. And Lorenzo was like,
maybe we should try and be a little more positive.
(32:31):
I'm like about, what, like, are we supposed to pretend
that certain things are working for us?
Speaker 2 (32:34):
I think they tried this episode, and I'll mention.
Speaker 1 (32:37):
I'll mention a few things that actually worked. Do you
want me to go where you are?
Speaker 2 (32:42):
Now you go?
Speaker 1 (32:43):
I thought, well, I thought there were certain storylines that
I was like, Okay, this is coming out of nowhere,
but it feels like a storyline. So like Lisa losing
her editor, right, that was a good storyline that was
there were some good scenes in there. They actually had
dial where they sounded like adult human beings. I will
(33:04):
get into a bit about why I think that storyline
is a little bit of bullshit, but we'll put that
aside for a second. I thought the scene of Charlotte
scoring after all from the other mothers in the group
was actually really funny and a really good use of Charlotte.
Like this other especially some we've been talking about, It's
(33:24):
like you need to use these characters in the lives
that they are actually living, right, and then it works.
There is this I don't care that all of these
characters are insanely wealthy, but I do care that sometimes
they the show doesn't want to show you how wealthy
they are. And that was kind of one of the
things I had this week was and we talked about this.
(33:48):
Lisa is in her spectacular fricking kitchen complaining about having
to raise her kids and how being installed as a mother,
and she's mashing potatoes. And I turned to you and
I said, nobody who has a kitchen like that cooks
in a.
Speaker 2 (34:01):
Kitchen like that. I don't want to cook.
Speaker 1 (34:03):
And same thing with Charlotte. She's in her spectacular outain
kitchen complaining about her family and how the demands on
her time. And I am not minimizing the demands that
working mothers have and how it affects their careers. However,
when you are part of the point zero one percent
(34:25):
that doesn't her mashing those potato I'm like that, I don't.
This looks silly to me in that setting, that not
a woman who measures her own potatoes.
Speaker 2 (34:33):
That's when the lame writing happens here, because I know
what you're doing. You're trying to make a point that
she's a mother, she's a wife, and she has a job,
but she wouldn't be preparing dinner with that kind of money. Sorry, no,
I'm sorry.
Speaker 1 (34:48):
As you pointed out, you said she wears couture to work.
Speaker 2 (34:51):
Borline couture. She's like having this conversation in her office
and all I can see is her outfit. I was like,
nobody would wear that.
Speaker 1 (34:58):
I don't care about the fantas the stuff, I really don't.
But then you try and show we're mashing her own potatoes,
and I'm like, what the this is silly. Let these
characters be who they are. Maybe the writers of the
show don't want to admit this, but guess what Charlotte
would hapen nanny right, and she'd have a maid, and
so would Lisa. Like there's no freaking version of their
(35:22):
lives where they wouldn't have household staff.
Speaker 2 (35:25):
Right, And I think there it's very much you know,
black and white here. I mean in the sense that
you know, you are a mother and you take care
of your kids and the cookie and all that, or
you are you were extremely wealthy you and you have
a career, hire somebody, and then you know you completely
negat your kids, you're family or whatever, because you know
(35:46):
you have you have a job, very you know, important
job in your life. But you can have something in
in in the middle exactly, meaning that you don't do
the cookie, but you still care about your kids going
to school and and you know, scheduling everything and with
a nanny and a chef or whatever. I mean, she
has money for all that, So you can show that
she's still busy because she has to organize all that.
Speaker 1 (36:07):
And if you want to do a storyline there, then
she feels guilty that someone else is doing the work
for her, if you want to. But this idea of
them like she's like tossing like Charlotte was like tossing
us out in her kitchen, and I'm just like, I don't,
I'm sorry, what No? And she does she do the vacuuming?
Does she's rubber toilets. I don't believe any of that.
Speaker 2 (36:26):
You wear Oscar the Loranta all the time.
Speaker 1 (36:27):
In your kitchen.
Speaker 2 (36:28):
No, I'm sorry now, Like, let them be.
Speaker 1 (36:31):
The characters that they actually are. You can make fun
of the like I thought that adderall mom scene was
exactly like, Yeah, make fun of Manhattan wealthy mommies and
the weird little networks that they have.
Speaker 2 (36:44):
That. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (36:46):
Similarly, I will say that I I'm not really minding
Miranda too too much. She's looking for someone, She's looking
for her next thing. There's a certain level of desperation
involved in it, which is true of her and Seema
and all the single women on the show. There's this
(37:07):
undertone of desperation, which again I keep saying this. They're
writing forty year olds, but these women are fifteen to
twenty years older. So this sense of desperation would make
sense if they were fifteen or twenty years younger. But
at that age it is very unbecoming. You might be
(37:30):
able to get away with one character acting like that,
but when you have three characters, none of whom are married,
all of whom are tying themselves in knots, either to
keep something or to find something. I'm sorry that I
watched all these characters do this when they were young,
(37:50):
and it made sense when they were young. Watching them
do it again in their you know, senior years is
fucking depressing. And it is a very borderline offensive approach
to writing aged characters, right.
Speaker 2 (38:05):
And even back then when they were desperately trying to
find the one, they were focused on their careers all
and their friendships everything, one of them, yes, And they
would occasionally have these moments where they were like, you
know what, I need to stop obsessed, right, But you
don't get that with these characters.
Speaker 1 (38:20):
You just don't get it.
Speaker 2 (38:22):
And this whole episode now, I was looking at Aiden
and Carrie and I'm like, this just this is such
a silly approach to a relationship. You two are over
the age of fifty.
Speaker 1 (38:34):
And almost sixty. Yeah, any actually are sixty.
Speaker 2 (38:37):
And you're treating this relationship in this very silly way.
The things you're doing, Oh you oh, I.
Speaker 1 (38:42):
Hope he invites me over? What the yeah are you hope?
Speaker 2 (38:46):
Oh? He didn't invite me over? Blah blah blah, and
the kind of upset he didn't invite me over, and
then I didn't and then he invites her over, and
then he's like, oh, I forgot to tell my kids
that you're coming. So you have to sleep with the cows.
Speaker 1 (38:58):
I mean what and she's she's like, all right, that's
alone in a room, I know, wistfully writing about her
her It makes no sense.
Speaker 2 (39:06):
It's so bad how mature people approach things.
Speaker 1 (39:10):
Not intelligent mature, No, not wealthy people who have resources
and are seemingly and this is the thing, like as
a New York as an author, I'm just like, okay,
So she rolled her eyes at being invited to south
By Southwest and to Google, but she jumped to go
to a book fair in Virginia and no te no shade.
(39:31):
I would go to one too. But the only reason
she went right, so she could, you know, sneakily have
lunch and hopefully get invited over. And I'm like, what
the are you thirty? Even at thirty that would be
probably a little pathetic.
Speaker 2 (39:43):
But and the way things are again, the writing, the
fact that she's getting uh, you know, prescription drugs or whatever.
Speaker 1 (39:51):
For what was the point of that?
Speaker 2 (39:53):
What was the point of it? First of all, why
didn't he have Yeah, he has a complicated relationship with wife.
And then all of a sudd she's just calling Carrie
and and finding out that carry's coming and by the
way could you bring this to what It's like?
Speaker 1 (40:06):
Okay, I feel like there's stuff there that's going to
like the another shoe was going to drop, like when
she told when she gave the adderall to him, he
acted very strange and she kind of wondered what was
going So I think there's stuff there that's going to
drop later. But I have to say I when they
(40:26):
did the thing last season where Aiden told her that
he couldn't be in a full time relationship with her
because of his son, and I was like, well, that's
you know, I hate that they're jerking her around, but
that is a grown up sort of reason for not
pursuing a relationship right now. Except now they're both acting
like everybody, the ex, wife, him, even Car. You're all
acting like assholes, and it's Wyatt Wyatt, Wyatt, Wyatt, Wyatt Wyatt.
(40:50):
I'm like, why are we all talking about this kid
who isn't even a character on the show. It's just
not interesting to me. If it was, you know, every
three episodes we heard from Aiden and they talked and
then you know, I wish we could be together. I
would be kind of okay with that. But this sort
of where she's like, Oh, it's the keys to our house. Lady,
(41:10):
you sound like a crazy person when you talk about
our house. It's your house.
Speaker 2 (41:15):
It's your house. Yeah, he's nowhere, he's barely in the now.
She behaves like a teenager, and he makes no sense.
You went through hell, your husband died.
Speaker 1 (41:26):
You are a widow. You should have a certain perspective
about this sort of thing of a relationship.
Speaker 2 (41:31):
Exact.
Speaker 1 (41:32):
You were acting like someone who's never had a boyfriend.
Everything about it is just it is offensive to me.
Offensive that you think that that people in their late
fifties are going to act like this.
Speaker 2 (41:45):
It's it's again the writing. Is this idea that he's
just kind of like, go back to old Carrie, like
the whole the rat thing with the squirrel remember the
squirrels always this, you know.
Speaker 1 (41:57):
In other words, she's shown absolutely no friggin in her
life exactly in the last thirty years, she is apparently
the exact same person. And that that's what I mean.
I'm like, this is a a pathetic way to write
older people, and it's she's being written by people who
don't understand what it's like to be that age. You're
not going to be obsessed with the shit that you
(42:19):
were obsessed with in your youth.
Speaker 2 (42:21):
Right, and uh we because it's funny because in the
in the last app podcast, we talked about that, the
fact that they were not showing their work and the office,
and they kind of did now and I hope we
see a little more of that.
Speaker 1 (42:33):
Yeah, I want to get back to Miranda. So Miranda,
they actually do like occasionally frame her discussions in work.
They so she took that BBC producer out for drinks
and everything. I don't understand why this is being dragged
out so far.
Speaker 2 (42:52):
Right, we don't even know if the woman is queer.
Speaker 1 (42:56):
I think we did know. I think that made clear.
I don't know, but I'm just like, why is this?
I mean, Hm, to borrow a phrase from my late grandmother,
she'd or get off the pot. I don't like, Well,
go ahead and either have this story play out or
have this woman once again reject her in a humiliating way,
(43:17):
because that's what they always do with Miranda. I don't
mind that she's pursuing this as a newly queer woman
in the stage of her life. She would be out
pursuing something. I get that, and I do think Unlike
Carrie and Seema, Miranda's not coming off pathetics. There's a
certain level of humor and cynicism and clear eyedness about
(43:39):
her character that those scenes don't play as her being pathetic.
I do want to say, though, I'm really getting piste
off that everyone's tiptoe and around fucking carry because she may.
Miranda made a very mild joke about Carrie running off
to have lunch with her boyfriend, and then we had
to have another scene with her apologizing to Carrie, Carrie
(44:00):
sort of pouting about it, and I'm like, what the fuck?
These people have known each other forty fifty years some
of them. Why are they acting like this? And why
is they like what?
Speaker 2 (44:10):
Yeah, remember bullshit Bagel, bullshit Bagels, I remember that.
Speaker 1 (44:14):
But now everyone has the tiptoe around Carrie and her
precious little, weird freaking relationship Seema. Well, at least Seema's
wasn't entirely about, you know, wanting to find a husband
or a boyfriend. This was more, this was work oriented.
But again, it was this long, long, you know, just
(44:35):
all this discussion about something that we knew was actually
going to happen. Like everything you've told us about Sema
up until this point, I know she's going to launch
her own company, So why are we pretending, Oh, I
don't know, maybe I'll be okay. Oh they're not going
to put my name on the door, but maybe I'll
be No, you're not. You're not okay with this. So
why are we writing scenes like that.
Speaker 2 (44:56):
It doesn't fit the character at all, not at all,
not at all. I mean I still remember first episode
with seem I mean, she was this incredible powerful woman, right,
and now she's this thing that is just oh.
Speaker 1 (45:06):
And again it's like, oh, men, men are disappointing me
and putting me in a box. And again, if you're
writing young women early in their careers, that's great, but
you've already established that she is a powerhouse, right, So
this whole oh, I don't know, I don't know. I'm
not I don't know enough to ask her. No, that's
not who you've just know if.
Speaker 2 (45:27):
If that character she could complain about man, call them
assholes or whatever, you know, because she has experience for them,
especially you know, at work. So yeah, I can see
all that, but this whole like.
Speaker 1 (45:39):
You know, oh my god, take my name on They're
not gonna get me what I want. Well, you should
ask for what you want. What the hell you're both
fifty five, Like, what the hell?
Speaker 2 (45:46):
Yeah, it's it's it's it's not right. But anyway, but
Sema has amazing hair.
Speaker 1 (45:51):
She has amazing hair, She has the best outfits on
the show. She hasn't been serena showdery.
Speaker 2 (45:56):
Oh my god.
Speaker 1 (45:57):
She deserves so much better than what they're doing.
Speaker 2 (45:59):
I go watch Homeland and you see how good she can. Yeah, act,
she's a great actor.
Speaker 1 (46:05):
Go watch Mississippi Massala. She's amazing and yeah, it's awesome. Anyway, Anthony,
Oh my god, Anthony again Anthony, it's just about dick
and I don't know, like that scene with the boyfriend
coming dressed like one of the with his big dick,
and the oh my god, it's and then oh, all
these older women and gay men are like following him
(46:27):
down the such a.
Speaker 2 (46:28):
That would not happen in New York. I'm sorry, No,
no matter how big your thing is, that would not
happen in New York. No. People are used to it
the New York. They've seen every.
Speaker 1 (46:38):
It's just such a nineties sort of view of gay
men and how they act in public and what's important
to us and every I am not opposed to Anthony
being a horny little queen or a vulgar little queen.
Speaker 2 (46:50):
But that's all.
Speaker 1 (46:50):
It's literally all yes, it's all he has is his
stupid bakery. And and it's just really because Michael Patrick
King wants all these hot guys walking around in the
back ground in tiny.
Speaker 2 (47:00):
Little aft and they were hot.
Speaker 1 (47:02):
They are, But I just find the whole thing. I know,
it's sad. I think that's what it is. It's sad
because all of you, you could have had a show
where we it was a new set of problems for
these people. But all you're capable of doing is writing
the thirty year old versions of them and watching their
sagging aged faces delivering the same sorts of dialogue that
(47:25):
they were delivering, you know, when they were young. It's
just it's sad. It's just pathetic.
Speaker 2 (47:31):
And it's also putting them in these situations where they
have to act like they're they're ridiculous, like the whole
thing Charlotte, and the whole thing with Harry trying those genies.
Speaker 1 (47:39):
Me in his pants and everything.
Speaker 2 (47:41):
First of all, I would never happen.
Speaker 1 (47:42):
There is so much fascination with the fact that Harry
is a middle aged man and prostate and that's like,
there's all this stuff about Harry's dick and his prostate
every time he's given a storyline, and I'm like, again,
who were the young women who were writing these stories,
because it's a really kind of a fense way to portray,
you know, a late middle aged man. He's ridiculous and
(48:05):
he has no bladder control, and he humiliates himself in
public and he just sort of shrugs about it. When
it happened, and I hated the whole thing. I was like,
this isn't cute, this isn't funny, this doesn't even sound
like Harry.
Speaker 2 (48:17):
Yeah, it's it's yeah, it's turning to a show where
they're making they're ridiculing the man and then treating women like.
Speaker 1 (48:24):
Well they always did that. That doesn't bother me. But
they're they're rid of killing the women too. They're not
making thing.
Speaker 2 (48:29):
That's a thing, but they're they're yeah, But at the
same time, it's like, really.
Speaker 1 (48:34):
I just think they they really made Charlotte and Harry
look like morons. In that hole. Let's go out clubing
until five o'clock. In the morning thing.
Speaker 2 (48:42):
I just don't.
Speaker 1 (48:43):
Believe that that's that she needed to be doing that
sort of thing. The whole storyline with the cute Dutch
guy offering her coat and trying to kiss her. I'm like,
what is this a sex in the city episode? She
right right, fifty eight years old? Like, what the hell
are you doing. I'm not saying you can't party and
fuck around and do irresponsible things in your fifties.
Speaker 2 (49:05):
I can't.
Speaker 1 (49:06):
Of course you can be horny, of course you can
want a relationship. All of these things are very true.
It's just the way everything's being written in the most
insulting possible way, insulting to the characters and insulting to
the people who know those characters, and insulting to anybody
in the age group of these characters, because you are
simply making all of them look like pathetic folds.
Speaker 2 (49:28):
I think that the Again, I'm looking at Charlotte when
she was dancing, and I kept thinking about this. Yes,
first thing I thought of, Yeah, so there's this desperate
need to recreate, recreate or or i don't know, bring
back things you know, or keep them still attached so
much to the path. Just just create new things, new situations,
(49:51):
new I experience for these women.
Speaker 1 (49:53):
See. I always thought Charlotte, given her station in her background,
she should be a docent at the met. She shouldn't
be partying at five o'clock in the morning. I don't
know that. I do think it's interesting that Carrie wants
to pursue romance fiction, but Jesus Christ, every single sentence
she has written so far is horrible, like just bad,
(50:16):
bad writ It's absolutely horrific. Speaking of which, I think
the one thing that the show really misses out on
is it removed the first person voice over. Oh wow, yeah,
well they they did. She's not writing a column anymore,
so there's no reason for her to be doing that.
But that is part of the reason why everything feels
so dry and dull. As you said, it's also Hallmark.
(50:37):
It feels very that whole scene in front of Harry
Carrie's house with the gardener, when Sema pulled up and
then the younger gardener came over, and then so what
this is going on forever and ever? And what? I
guess they're doing something with Seema pursuing that gardener. I
have no idea.
Speaker 2 (50:54):
Maybe again, but it just went on and on and on.
Speaker 1 (50:59):
Just the writing is bad. The acting isn't great either.
Speaker 2 (51:03):
I think I think it's a combination of again, bed
writing and trying to insert all these things to be woke. Like,
you know, I was looking at the party where Charlotte went,
and they made sure every Yeah, I know, queer identification
was present in that room, and I appreciate that.
Speaker 1 (51:21):
That it is New York, it is an art but at.
Speaker 2 (51:23):
The same time, it's like, no, that would not be
the case. Sorry.
Speaker 1 (51:28):
I also think her coworker going on online about how
horny she is and how much she wants to fuck
the Dutch guy. I was like, is that, Oh my god, Yes,
I mean I know, no, it was unprofessional.
Speaker 2 (51:39):
It was a little too much. And yeah, yeah, it
was a little too much.
Speaker 1 (51:42):
Anyway, I know we're sounding really judgmental and pressy, but
I would be fine if they were all partying and
getting laid and struggling in their careers. I'm not averse
to any of those storylines, but all of these storylines
make them look terrible. And that shot of Carrie sitting
on the bed in the fucking guest house all by herself,
(52:02):
I was like, is this just are we supposed to
think these people are pathetic and everything.
Speaker 2 (52:07):
Is so silly and dated, like the whole thing about
parking the car and oh my god. You know it's
just like it's omar omar if you watch the Hallmark channel,
that's that's how they established they set up the situations
and the conversations. Yeah, it very basic stuff that you
just you don't see that happening in real life. And
(52:30):
if you have a little bit of understanding of these characters,
I mean, they would not not even say those los.
Speaker 1 (52:37):
All right, I think that's it. Like I said, we're
going to finish out this season planing the whole way,
no doubt. But I gotta say, I don't think I
would come back after after this. There's only so much
punishment I can give myself.
Speaker 2 (52:50):
Yeah, we'll see.
Speaker 1 (52:51):
Maybe it'll end on some great cliffhangerh Oh my god,
I know, we'll see what happened whatever. All right, we'll
be back next week with whatever cross there and crosses
our deaths. Until then, take care of your styles, love
you mean it, Bye bye bye
We're Tommy Lorenzo and this is the Pop Style Opinion
Fest tele Kittens. Welcome back to another edition of the PSO.
I am the Tea and you're Telo Tom Fitzgerald and
I'm here with the loan. You're Tile Lorenzo, cous my
love Husbano. How are you love to help you?
Speaker 2 (00:36):
I'm wonderful as usual, it is.
Speaker 1 (00:39):
A very busy June for us. We are every weekend
is either a nephew graduation or a next wedding and
then uh, although this won't be a weekend in the
middle of the week. Well, on Wednesday, June twenty fifth,
will be in Dallas for a Pride event where we're
going to teach you all about fabulous drag queens and
(00:59):
trans women changed our lives. And you can read about
that and find all the details on the front page
of our site. That's Wednesday, June twenty fifth. If you
sign up now, you will get a free signed copy
of our book Legendary Children, And of course you get
to meet us, ask us questions, post pictures, the whole
nine yards posts. We're going to give you a night.
Speaker 2 (01:19):
Yeah, there's also information on Instagram. I just supposed a
new information. So there's you know.
Speaker 1 (01:25):
And you should know that we had to change our
our Instagram account several months back because the old one
got hacked. So if you haven't done so by now
position yet, it's Tom and Lorenzo official.
Speaker 2 (01:37):
Yes, that's all.
Speaker 1 (01:38):
One word, Tom and Lorenzo Official on Instagram.
Speaker 2 (01:41):
We were attacked.
Speaker 1 (01:42):
We were attacked, and I'm it was literally one of
the most upsetting things that happened this year.
Speaker 2 (01:49):
I should know that's not true, but it was. Yeah,
it was said, it did. Yeah, I don't want to
get into that, but it was. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (01:55):
It felt like, I mean, in our line of work,
it's not just your something, it's a it's a huge
portion of your your business model. So for that to
have happened, it was actually kind of devastating anyway.
Speaker 2 (02:08):
But we have a new one and you can subscribe
follow us.
Speaker 1 (02:13):
And there's cat pictures and we'll put vacation pictures up there,
and of course every Christmas ornament that we bought in
the German Christmas markets will go up in decemberb So yeah, anyway,
busy month that is here now, he says, Hi, Yes,
tab Hunter are twenty two pound cat has jumped up
on the table and he's going to stick his butt
in my face while it's usual. Okay, so we have
(02:38):
many things to talk about. We each have some Lorenzo
has some TV shows, and I actually have a movie
which it's not a recent movie, but it's it's an
undiscovered classic I think that I want to talk about.
And then we're going to get a little into the
celebrities Gondal of the Week, which is a Sabrina Carpenter
being horny, and then of course we're going to talk
(03:02):
about the latest episode of and just like that, which
continues it's downward slide into irrelevance. Anyway, first up, I
will start, and then I will coss to you for
the TV shows. This is a movie that came out
last year actually and dropped out of sight, and now
it's on Hulu and I want to urge people to
(03:24):
watch it. It's Steven Soderbergh's presence. I love Steven Soderberg
as a director, and in the recent years he has
done a series of what I would call small intimate films.
The first one was Kimmy starring Zoe Kravitz, and I
absolutely endured that film. I think it came out in
twenty twenty two, and it was sort of an updated
(03:46):
COVID era hitchcocky and thriller and it was really really good.
And then just recently he came out with a spy
movie starring Kate Blanchette and Michael Fasspender called Black Bag,
and again it was a small, intimate, well done film.
This film I'm talking about is Presence, which came out
(04:06):
in late twenty twenty four, and it is he's playing
around the various genres and that it's a classic, classic
haunted house story. However, I'm not going to spoil anything
about the story, but I am going to tell you
about the premise of it. I'll tell you right now.
It's not a scary movie at all. It's literally not
(04:27):
a scary movie. There are no jump scares, there's nothing
horrifying that happens. It is a haunted house story and
that is different from a scary story. And I don't
want to get too far into it, but if you
actually saw the film, you know what I mean. You
know that it's a it and actually it's my favorite
(04:49):
type of haunted house story. It actually haunts you for
several days afterwards. And that's why I want to recommend it.
So the cast is, you know, it's not important. The
mother of the it's a family, and the mother of
the family is played by Lucy lou And the one
slight criticism of the film I will give it is
that she her character comes a little close to a
(05:09):
sort of tiger mom stereotype of the Asian mother. But
I think there's more depth to her character than that.
Chris Sullivan plays the father. And then there are two teenagers,
Kellie Lang and Eddie Madey. There's a lot of tension
in this family. It is a very dysfunctional family. And
most of the oh, let me tell you, let me
(05:30):
say this. The hook of Presents and this is not
a spoiler, you will figure it out in the first minute,
is that the entire movie is seen through the eyes
of the ghost. So you are following the family from
Rooin's room and you're getting bits and pieces of conversations,
and there's stories going on. There's stories about shady business
(05:54):
deals and a very tragic past for one of the characters,
and bits and p of this come out in all
of these conversations as this ghost is moving around the house,
and there's some interesting formal stuff that he does. Steven
Soderbergh is great about that, about making you understand that
(06:14):
there are certain rules for this ghost, like it literally
cannot leave the house. So there's a lot of looking
out of windows and you're getting half listened to conversations
like muffled conversations through windows, and I don't want to
over sell it all leads to something. Every single conversation
(06:37):
and interaction in the movie. And this is what I
love about Soderberg because it's so well constructed. And I
have to say he didn't write the script. David Cope
wrote the script, but all of the directorial choices are
all in service to answering a question as a viewer
you didn't actually realize you had until it gets answered.
And that's all I'll say. It's not that there's some
(06:59):
big whist, but there is an answer, and when you
get it, it forces you to look at the entire film.
It forces you to start looking at scenes again because
then they have a certain you have a certain understanding
of why it was shot that way or why it
played out that way. It's extremely well acted, and what
(07:20):
I love about it is it's just subtle, and I
love that about Soderberg is that he is a subtle director.
He expects his audience to be intelligent enough to understand
what he's trying to convey without underlining it. All the time.
He never underlines anything, and I love that about his directing.
And final thing that I'll say is that to me,
(07:45):
all of the greatest haunted house stories, like The Conjuring
or The Exorcist, or even Poltergeist or The Haunting, all
of those movies they understood that houses are scary if
(08:06):
you're peering into a space and nothing's happening. He understands
is that it's about moving from room to room. It's
not scary dark lighting. Most a lot of the film
takes place in full daylight, but it's shadows and movement
and depth and is there something out of the corner
(08:27):
of your eye. A good haunted house film knows how
to do that. So there is a certain level of
tension through the whole film, but you are never going
to be scared. So I do want to tell you
that right now. It is not a scary film, but
it is a very thoughtful and pun intended, deliberately haunting film.
(08:47):
You will actually think about this for days afterwards. Once
once the entire story is put in perspective at the
end of it. That's it. I don't anything else because
I really didn't I knew. I'm telling you pretty much
everything I knew going into watching it, and I don't
(09:07):
want to tell you anymore because I was so pleasantly
surprised by where it went and how I felt after
it was over. Just a very thoughtful, in some ways,
very humanistic story that is like all ghost stories. It
is about death, but not in a depressing way. And
(09:31):
that's all I'll say. The acting is great, the directing
is top notch, the writing is very sharp, and every
single thing, every single line, every single shot, if you
were to watch it a second time, you'd realize, Wow,
this was all really thought out. So I can't recommend
it enough. That's Presence, starring Lucy Lou directed by Steven Soderberg.
(09:53):
You can find it streaming on Hulu and you can
rent it. I think on things like Prime Video and
Apple TV Plus and stuff like that. I think it's
worth your time. Go out and look at Kimmy as well,
which I also think you can get on Prime Video.
That's k I M. I is how it's spelled I
wish I had watched Black Bags so I could give
you a whole trilogy, but I haven't watched it yet.
(10:13):
I'm gonna rent that soon anyway. That's my little streaming
rental sounding recommendation for the week. Okay, Lorenzo, you've got
TV shows?
Speaker 2 (10:22):
Yes? The first one I want to talk about is
the it's called Department Q on Netflix. Story mainly Matthew Good.
It's about a former top rated detective who was assigned
a new a case and then things went wrong and
then he was wrecked with guilt and then left the
(10:46):
department and then came back to a new code case.
They're searching for a woman who vanished several years you
know ago, meaning earlier. So that was very I was thot,
oh my god, here we go again, you know, the
same kind of story. But I wanted to watch it
because I go to a bunch of sites because I
(11:08):
have to put the lounge together, and everyone was talking
about the show. So I was like, all right, let
me give it a shot. And then I saw that
it was in Edinburgh, burh buruh Edinburgh, and I was like,
all right, I want to watch it because I love,
you know, looking at things and I want to see Scotland.
So I was like, oh, I'll give it a shot.
(11:28):
And then I started watching it and I was like,
this feels very weird, even for a British show, detective show.
And then I found out that the show it's actually
based on a book written by a Danish writer. I
was like, all right, now it made sense because this
feels more Danish than British. It's very weird, very odd.
(11:51):
The whole thing is.
Speaker 1 (11:52):
All the Danish people are going to come for you now.
Speaker 2 (11:54):
No, no, I'll explain. They tend to be very dark,
and you know Skennaven shows in general, they're very much
like that approach, you know, you know, dead girl in
the woods kind of thing that you know, the whole
town it's looking for her and then turns out everybody's horrible,
that type of It's always that kind of approach, which
(12:14):
I still love because it's beautiful, the places are gorgeous,
and you know, I'm always hooked. So I thought, oh,
now it makes sense because it feels more Danish than British.
It's an incredible cast. Everyone is amazing. So just to
name a few, we have we have Matthew Good we
have also what's her name, Kate Dicky. I absolutely love her.
(12:39):
She was in a Game of Thrones. I love her.
And my favorite Kelly McDonald. I absolutely worship this woman.
She plays the police therapist and her lines are hysterical.
She's so freaking amazing. So I watch it. I thought
it was interesting. It's getting a lot of buzz. Everyone
is loving the show because it's weird, you know, like
(13:00):
weird things, and I thought it was interesting, interesting, That's
how I put it. H incredible cast, beautiful cinematography. Again
based on a Danish show, so you're gonna get that
Danish vibe of looking for a woman who disappeared, and
you know those the shows, skin daving shows in general,
(13:21):
they love that kind of stuff. So anyway, I would
give it a shot. You might like it. Everyone is
talking about the sets, about the locations. It is actually
beautiful and the performances are great. So that's my number
one suggesting department. Q on Netflix.
Speaker 1 (13:36):
Is that out yet?
Speaker 2 (13:37):
Oh yeah, it's out? Okay, Yeah, it's out. In fact,
I saw the screens, but I wasn't interested. So then
I started going to sites and everyone was talking about
about the costumes, the sets, you know, the locations and
all that and the cast. So I was like, all right,
let me give it a shot. It is interesting. I
think most people will enjoy it. I just thought it
(13:57):
felt because what they did was they transferred the store
from Denmark to England. So if not England, I'm sorry, Scotland.
So it feels it felt a little weird. You know
when you get a situation in a place that made
sense in Denmark and then you switch to Scotland. I
don't know, it feels a little out of blades, but
you might enjoyed it, you know, give it a shot.
(14:18):
So that and there are some shocking moments and you know, anyway,
you'll like it. My second suggestion is the one that
I really liked, also on Netflix. It's called Secrets We Keep,
also Danish, and it's a very interesting show. I absolutely
loved it, devoured the whole thing on one night because
it's about the disappearance again of a woman again, disappearance
(14:41):
of a young Filipino op air who works for this
very very wealthy Danish family. So it's a very interesting show.
I love the subject matter about the whole op air
thing in Europe, which is huge. A lot of Filipino
is also moving to countries like Denmark to work as
(15:02):
it opay, So it's about that. It's about the whole
you know, socio dynamic thing and also power structure. You know,
very wealthy people in Denmark and these people coming, these
immigrants coming to work. And then she disappears, and I
absolutely love the show. I thought the show was very good.
The actors are amazing. Everyone does a very good job.
(15:26):
So I highly recommend it if you like that kind
of show, if you like you know, international shows, I
think you like this one very much. So it's called Secrets.
We keep on Netflix.
Speaker 1 (15:36):
Also fantastic. This concludes Tom Lorenzo's recommendations for distractions. We're
going to take a short break and then we're going
to come back and talk about Sabrina Carpenter pissing everyone
off once again. We'll be right back. We're back, and
we're going to talk about how everyone goes completely nuts
(15:56):
for one blonde pop star every general and then scrutinizes
her every single move. Sabrina Carpenter has She's always recorded
a little bit of controversy with her pop music, which
is extremely horny, but as she pointed out, it's not
(16:19):
the only kind of music she writes, but the music
that she tends to that tends to get the most
attention are the songs that are a little horny. And
she's a pretty blonde, petite white girl, and that tends
to evoke a lot of reactions in people about how
(16:39):
she should be treated and how she should be acting.
And we saw this play out with other petit blonde
white pop stars like Britney Spears and Madonna.
Speaker 2 (16:48):
And I think the fact that she's a Disney isn't
she a Disney yet child?
Speaker 1 (16:51):
And I also think the fact I point out that
she's twenty six years old, And I will note that
every time we cover Sabrina car carpen her on a
red carpet, we have to wind up usually deleting some
slightly offensive commentary about her sort of normalizing pedophilia and
(17:13):
working a Lolita look. And the thing is, she doesn't
dress like a little girl. She is small, she's got
those big eyes, and she wears her hair in a
very retro throwback kind of way, but she doesn't dress
like a little girl. So doing like Lolita accusations against
her just isn't fair to her. And I think it's
something that people default to every time a young woman
(17:37):
appears to be dressing for attention, you know, sexual attention. Anyway,
she did an interview with Rolling Stone that came with
a bunch of racy pictures, and she released her new
album She Really Knows About, an album that's dropping in
August called Man's Best Friend and the Her Is Her.
(18:01):
It's sort of like a Terry Richardson style aesthetic where
it looks like a polaroid. It looks like it was
taken in a hotel room, and she's kneeling on all
four as well. A man just out of frame is
grabbing her hair. And I actually, in the description of
that image, I am making it sound more salacious and
(18:23):
violent than it actually is. It looks like, you know,
something consensual is happening there. It looks like something slightly
kinky is happening there, But it doesn't look like something
violent is happening there. This comes down to a question of,
as these conversations tend to do, of consent. And I
(18:44):
do think when we talk about someone like Madonna or
someone like Britney Spears, because they both face this kind
of scrutiny, there was a slight difference Madonna came into
her own as an adult woman, and she was clearly
very much in control of her image and her esthetic
in her career from the jump. So her use of
(19:05):
sexual imagery was considered consensual and aggressive, and in fact
was considered something of a feminist act, that she was
taking control of her sexuality. Now, fifteen years later, or
maybe more like yeah, yeah, fifteen years later, Britney Spears
hits the scene and the vibe was different because she
(19:28):
was so young, and it didn't feel so much like
she was in control of that image as it was
being imposed on her by other people. And we know
from many years later, we know how much of Britney's
career was not up to her and how much of
it was imposed on her by other people. So, yes,
there is a history there, but you do have to
(19:49):
look at it, you have to take it on a
case by case basis. Of course, pop music has always, always,
always victimized and exploited young attractive women, and there are
the stories of them being abused are legion, But Madonna
showed us forty years ago that you cannot make assumptions
(20:11):
that every woman who's doing this sort of thing has
been forced into it. Oh, and she was very open
about that. She did change the conversation. I also want
to add that. And the reason we're bringing this up
is because it erupted. There was this huge TikTok fury,
all these articles written about it, and you know, a
(20:31):
lot of finger wagging at her for promoting this kind
of imagery. Now, I do want to talk to you.
I'm really trying to give the overaw and.
Speaker 2 (20:41):
Then will batter. There are many details.
Speaker 1 (20:43):
There are many details about this. One is all right,
We need to have a discussion about is she doing
this for the male gaze?
Speaker 2 (20:51):
Right?
Speaker 1 (20:52):
Which is she objectifying herself for men? The other thing,
the other question is this a poor image to serve
to young women? And then there's more. You know, you
could take a much broader view and talk about the
current political atmosphere, the current social atmosphere in which say,
(21:14):
reproductive rights are being strapped from women and the trad
wife esthetic is being promoted more and more and more
so these sort of throwback sexy images. And I'll say
this about Madonna, they weren't throwback images when she did
the Sex Book. It wasn't all qtt pooh, Dolly Parton drag,
which is kind of what Sabrina Carpenter does. It was
(21:36):
cutting edge S and M, and she was pulling it
was porn, and she was pulling from queer porn aline. Yes,
so I'll give Madonna that she was not doing retro
throwback sexy, and Sabrina Carpenter just completely trades in that.
She looks like a cartoon character. She You know, the
(21:57):
whole thing is just very sort of sex kit mid
century inspired sort of stuff. I'm going to toss to you,
but before I do, I just want to say I never,
as a middle aged man, I would never, ever ever
spend my time criticizing a young woman for engaging in
that sort of thing, because I'm not an idiot. I
(22:18):
know how I would sound, but I'm actually completely one
hundred percent on her side. Like, go and be a
little slutty. You're young and cute and right if you're
in control of that, I'm who am I to tut
tut it?
Speaker 2 (22:31):
All? Right? I think that's that's I think it's it's
a combination of a lot of things. I think the
image I think brought a new attention, you know, a
new focus here. Right, If we didn't have that image
that album cover. I think things would be it would
have been a little different. Now, my point is I'll
start by saying that, you know, all this conversation about
(22:51):
Sabrina Corporator and everybody else, you know, it's because you're women.
We never have that kind of conversation about man on stage.
I mean, in general, we don't. Men do a lot
of things on stage that we just find. You know
that it's normal, that it's okay when a woman does it,
then she's you know, she's a slut, she's she's she's
(23:12):
she's supervocative, she's whatever. I do think that when it
comes to music, and as a musician, I think and
if you create your own music, your own thing, you
tend to give, you tend to explore what you're going through.
And these people are young, these you know, these ladies
are young, Yes, super hot. These ladies are young, and
(23:34):
they're exploring their sexuality, their lives, their boyfriends, you know,
their their dates there, whatever and that, and they expressed
that in their music on stage performing all that she's young,
she's hot. Why not. I don't see a problem with
any of that. Having said that, I have noticed as
a musician, as an artist that there's too much going
(23:55):
on on stage that kind of like in a years
or takes the attain the focus on the music, on
the artistry itself to what's going on on stage. You know,
you have people like Beyonce and and and all these
people like having all these tons hundreds of people on
(24:16):
stage dancing and doing all that and robots and things.
I think that's too much. And I think I'm not listen.
I don't care what you wear. But sometimes I'm I
see these performance on stage and I'm and I look
at what they're wearing. I was like, really, do you
really need to go that far? Sometimes?
Speaker 1 (24:35):
And now you do sound like a.
Speaker 2 (24:37):
Because I was like Grandpa, I don't know. It looks
a little too much to me sometimes or unnecessary. But again,
if you feel that's how you express your music, how
you express yourself, your sexuality or whatever you're going, so
that's fine. I don't have a problem with that. It's
just an observation. It's something that I observe when I
see when I see those people, I mean, there you
(25:00):
they're wearing like body suits and you know, and things
like that lingerie and stuff, and I'm like, all right,
everybody else did debt. I'm not shocked by it, but
I sometimes I feel like, is this really necessary all
the time? Every time everyone performs now on stage. But
having said that, I don't have a problem with what
(25:21):
she wears. There's a lot of conversations. There's always been
a conversation on TikTok, especially about what she wears. That
her dresses are too short, that you can see her underwear,
all that that's such prudition. I think, I think that's bullshit.
I'm in favor of wedding wearing whatever you want on
stage or anywhere. I don't care. People will talk about it, obviously,
(25:45):
but I don't have a problem with that.
Speaker 1 (25:46):
I also think that there is.
Speaker 2 (25:51):
A lot of this.
Speaker 1 (25:52):
I alluded to this earlier, that a lot of this
comes down to her being a white, blonde woman. Yes,
because you know, Beyonce hits the stage in booty shorts
or in body you know, French cut body suits and
that sort of thing. You know, Nicki Minaj and Cardi
B and Megande Stallion, all of these artists have come
(26:14):
out in very very skinny outfits, and people aren't claiming
that they're the downfall of society. They're calling them horrors.
Don't get me wrong, Like black women come in for
a lot of criticism. But there's this sense that she
is because of the way she looks, that she's being
victimized here, that there is some sort of victimism, and
(26:34):
also because of the way she looks, unlike say Meganese Stallion,
she has a responsibility to those precious white girls that
are following her. There is a little bit of racism
underneath this, There is a lot of there is a
bit of paternalism underneath this that they single out this. Listen, nothing,
nothing I have seen of Sabrina Carpenter, not one single
(26:57):
image has come close to not one. Everything she's doing
is relatively fricking tame. And there are current artists who
are not pretty little white blonde girls who look like
they're fifteen years old, who are doing much sexier or
similarly sexier work, and they are not getting the same
(27:18):
sort of reaction.
Speaker 2 (27:19):
Right, I just want to say, what's out there? One
of the things that the cover you describe the cover already,
I don't have a problem with the cover. I can
see that it might trigger a lot of things, but
I think anything in terms of art will trigger still exactly,
and it's how you do with it, you know, as
the one being triggered by it. And you know, there's
(27:41):
a lot of conversation about you know, it's Mayo gaze
and it's objectifying yourself. You know, you're degrading yourself. This
is a step back for women. There's always this conversation
and the thing is that they were making the comparison.
I don't know, if you guys watched the brit Awards
when she sings on stage and then she's she's she
kneels as as you know, giving the idea that she's
(28:03):
giving someone a bj which you know that happened on
stage and and anyway, and you can see it. That's
exactly what she's alluding to, which can be a little
too much for some people, but for others, you know. Anyway,
so they're they're making the comparison here that she did
that on stage and now the cover here. I don't know,
(28:24):
I mean there's also I remember, I remember, conversation is
about the that that type of situation, that type of
cover that you know, it's also a fantasy that women
are allowed to have, uh you know that that kind
of thing that you know, you're in that kind of city.
Speaker 1 (28:41):
You mean, like a rape fantasy, not a rape. But
because I don't I don't get that from no, no.
Speaker 2 (28:45):
No, no, I don't. No, I wouldn't say rape, but
dominated by by your partner.
Speaker 1 (28:51):
I mean, yeah, he's pulling her hair, but that's pretty mild.
Speaker 2 (28:54):
But I also think it's kind of a pick and
choose here because people are nuts over you know, the
fifty shape or whatever, and that's kind of the same
situation exactly. So it's fine. The books are fine, but
this is not okay.
Speaker 1 (29:05):
This is what I'm trying to say. People's outrage is
highly highly selected, and the I think the big reason
for her getting this sort of outrage is because her
sexuality is very cutesy, poo very cutesy, pooh white girl sexuality.
It is similar to Britney Spears as you know, classic
you know, hit me Baby one more time kind of looks.
(29:26):
But yeah, I think it's just another Sometimes I look
around and I'm like, Wow, you're really doing this again.
We're going to do this again. And the thing is
that girl be slutty when she's young. For God's sake,
she's having fun with it. I mean, I'm not saying, look,
if something comes out that she has been exploited or
if there's any indication of that, But she defends this
(29:47):
stuff pretty hard and she rolls her eyes at her crack.
Speaker 2 (29:50):
I think it's a combination of a lot of things.
People also talk about her music, that how her music
is so sexual and the whole that music she wrote
about relationship with with Barry King, and you know that
kind of thing that triggered a lot of people when
people were thinking that she was being a little too mean.
But you know, Taylor Swift does it all the time.
(30:11):
I know again, beg it you. And then people are
sort of right now on TikTok especially, people are comparing
her situation with Sidney Sweety, who just did a collab
with a soap company that made uh soap with her
actual bath water and we're charging like south the door.
(30:31):
So people were talking about Sweety using her sexuality, like
when they she Pucket, I know, like she pretends she
was dating that guy I forget his name in the movie,
you know anyway that Glenn Powell, Yes, thank you, So
all that kind of stuff like like these women are
using sexuality too often, too much, and that's you know,
(30:55):
degrading and blah blah blah blah blah. So I don't know,
I'd say men do that all the time, why women
can't do it? If you want to judge, have a
compensation about it. You know, it's anything you put out there,
you know, it's subject to that. So it's something I've learned.
But they should be allowed to do whatever they want,
(31:15):
just the same way men do. And you know, and
why not. I have no problem. You can wear whatever
you want, if you want to be naked, that's fine
by me. I have zero problem with any of that.
But again, I'm not a woman, and maybe a woman
has a different view or some women have a different
view on what's going on, and you know, it's you're right.
Speaker 1 (31:37):
Yeah, I just think, of course, And if I don't
think there's anything wrong with finding those images problematic or disturbing,
I just don't think she should be vilified for for
engaging in them, because you know, you have to allow
for a certain level of consent and independence on the
(31:58):
part of the person per vein these images. So anyway,
I think we've kicked this around. I think so, yeah,
all right, we'll take a short break and then we're
going to come back and talk about.
Speaker 2 (32:09):
My favorite show.
Speaker 1 (32:10):
Oh my god, and just like that, all right, we'll
be right back. We're back, and we actually don't want
to talk about it just like that, because but we
actually have committed ourselves to it, and we know that
some of you are tuning in to listen to us
rant and rave about this show. And Lorenzo was like,
maybe we should try and be a little more positive.
(32:31):
I'm like about, what, like, are we supposed to pretend
that certain things are working for us?
Speaker 2 (32:34):
I think they tried this episode, and I'll mention.
Speaker 1 (32:37):
I'll mention a few things that actually worked. Do you
want me to go where you are?
Speaker 2 (32:42):
Now you go?
Speaker 1 (32:43):
I thought, well, I thought there were certain storylines that
I was like, Okay, this is coming out of nowhere,
but it feels like a storyline. So like Lisa losing
her editor, right, that was a good storyline that was
there were some good scenes in there. They actually had
dial where they sounded like adult human beings. I will
(33:04):
get into a bit about why I think that storyline
is a little bit of bullshit, but we'll put that
aside for a second. I thought the scene of Charlotte
scoring after all from the other mothers in the group
was actually really funny and a really good use of Charlotte.
Like this other especially some we've been talking about, It's
(33:24):
like you need to use these characters in the lives
that they are actually living, right, and then it works.
There is this I don't care that all of these
characters are insanely wealthy, but I do care that sometimes
they the show doesn't want to show you how wealthy
they are. And that was kind of one of the
things I had this week was and we talked about this.
(33:48):
Lisa is in her spectacular fricking kitchen complaining about having
to raise her kids and how being installed as a mother,
and she's mashing potatoes. And I turned to you and
I said, nobody who has a kitchen like that cooks
in a.
Speaker 2 (34:01):
Kitchen like that. I don't want to cook.
Speaker 1 (34:03):
And same thing with Charlotte. She's in her spectacular outain
kitchen complaining about her family and how the demands on
her time. And I am not minimizing the demands that
working mothers have and how it affects their careers. However,
when you are part of the point zero one percent
(34:25):
that doesn't her mashing those potato I'm like that, I don't.
This looks silly to me in that setting, that not
a woman who measures her own potatoes.
Speaker 2 (34:33):
That's when the lame writing happens here, because I know
what you're doing. You're trying to make a point that
she's a mother, she's a wife, and she has a job,
but she wouldn't be preparing dinner with that kind of money. Sorry, no,
I'm sorry.
Speaker 1 (34:48):
As you pointed out, you said she wears couture to work.
Speaker 2 (34:51):
Borline couture. She's like having this conversation in her office
and all I can see is her outfit. I was like,
nobody would wear that.
Speaker 1 (34:58):
I don't care about the fantas the stuff, I really don't.
But then you try and show we're mashing her own potatoes,
and I'm like, what the this is silly. Let these
characters be who they are. Maybe the writers of the
show don't want to admit this, but guess what Charlotte
would hapen nanny right, and she'd have a maid, and
so would Lisa. Like there's no freaking version of their
(35:22):
lives where they wouldn't have household staff.
Speaker 2 (35:25):
Right, And I think there it's very much you know,
black and white here. I mean in the sense that
you know, you are a mother and you take care
of your kids and the cookie and all that, or
you are you were extremely wealthy you and you have
a career, hire somebody, and then you know you completely
negat your kids, you're family or whatever, because you know
(35:46):
you have you have a job, very you know, important
job in your life. But you can have something in
in in the middle exactly, meaning that you don't do
the cookie, but you still care about your kids going
to school and and you know, scheduling everything and with
a nanny and a chef or whatever. I mean, she
has money for all that, So you can show that
she's still busy because she has to organize all that.
Speaker 1 (36:07):
And if you want to do a storyline there, then
she feels guilty that someone else is doing the work
for her, if you want to. But this idea of
them like she's like tossing like Charlotte was like tossing
us out in her kitchen, and I'm just like, I don't,
I'm sorry, what No? And she does she do the vacuuming?
Does she's rubber toilets. I don't believe any of that.
Speaker 2 (36:26):
You wear Oscar the Loranta all the time.
Speaker 1 (36:27):
In your kitchen.
Speaker 2 (36:28):
No, I'm sorry now, Like, let them be.
Speaker 1 (36:31):
The characters that they actually are. You can make fun
of the like I thought that adderall mom scene was
exactly like, Yeah, make fun of Manhattan wealthy mommies and
the weird little networks that they have.
Speaker 2 (36:44):
That. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (36:46):
Similarly, I will say that I I'm not really minding
Miranda too too much. She's looking for someone, She's looking
for her next thing. There's a certain level of desperation
involved in it, which is true of her and Seema
and all the single women on the show. There's this
(37:07):
undertone of desperation, which again I keep saying this. They're
writing forty year olds, but these women are fifteen to
twenty years older. So this sense of desperation would make
sense if they were fifteen or twenty years younger. But
at that age it is very unbecoming. You might be
(37:30):
able to get away with one character acting like that,
but when you have three characters, none of whom are married,
all of whom are tying themselves in knots, either to
keep something or to find something. I'm sorry that I
watched all these characters do this when they were young,
(37:50):
and it made sense when they were young. Watching them
do it again in their you know, senior years is
fucking depressing. And it is a very borderline offensive approach
to writing aged characters, right.
Speaker 2 (38:05):
And even back then when they were desperately trying to
find the one, they were focused on their careers all
and their friendships everything, one of them, yes, And they
would occasionally have these moments where they were like, you
know what, I need to stop obsessed, right, But you
don't get that with these characters.
Speaker 1 (38:20):
You just don't get it.
Speaker 2 (38:22):
And this whole episode now, I was looking at Aiden
and Carrie and I'm like, this just this is such
a silly approach to a relationship. You two are over
the age of fifty.
Speaker 1 (38:34):
And almost sixty. Yeah, any actually are sixty.
Speaker 2 (38:37):
And you're treating this relationship in this very silly way.
The things you're doing, Oh you oh, I.
Speaker 1 (38:42):
Hope he invites me over? What the yeah are you hope?
Speaker 2 (38:46):
Oh? He didn't invite me over? Blah blah blah, and
the kind of upset he didn't invite me over, and
then I didn't and then he invites her over, and
then he's like, oh, I forgot to tell my kids
that you're coming. So you have to sleep with the cows.
Speaker 1 (38:58):
I mean what and she's she's like, all right, that's
alone in a room, I know, wistfully writing about her
her It makes no sense.
Speaker 2 (39:06):
It's so bad how mature people approach things.
Speaker 1 (39:10):
Not intelligent mature, No, not wealthy people who have resources
and are seemingly and this is the thing, like as
a New York as an author, I'm just like, okay,
So she rolled her eyes at being invited to south
By Southwest and to Google, but she jumped to go
to a book fair in Virginia and no te no shade.
(39:31):
I would go to one too. But the only reason
she went right, so she could, you know, sneakily have
lunch and hopefully get invited over. And I'm like, what
the are you thirty? Even at thirty that would be
probably a little pathetic.
Speaker 2 (39:43):
But and the way things are again, the writing, the
fact that she's getting uh, you know, prescription drugs or whatever.
Speaker 1 (39:51):
For what was the point of that?
Speaker 2 (39:53):
What was the point of it? First of all, why
didn't he have Yeah, he has a complicated relationship with wife.
And then all of a sudd she's just calling Carrie
and and finding out that carry's coming and by the
way could you bring this to what It's like?
Speaker 1 (40:06):
Okay, I feel like there's stuff there that's going to
like the another shoe was going to drop, like when
she told when she gave the adderall to him, he
acted very strange and she kind of wondered what was
going So I think there's stuff there that's going to
drop later. But I have to say I when they
(40:26):
did the thing last season where Aiden told her that
he couldn't be in a full time relationship with her
because of his son, and I was like, well, that's
you know, I hate that they're jerking her around, but
that is a grown up sort of reason for not
pursuing a relationship right now. Except now they're both acting
like everybody, the ex, wife, him, even Car. You're all
acting like assholes, and it's Wyatt Wyatt, Wyatt, Wyatt, Wyatt Wyatt.
(40:50):
I'm like, why are we all talking about this kid
who isn't even a character on the show. It's just
not interesting to me. If it was, you know, every
three episodes we heard from Aiden and they talked and
then you know, I wish we could be together. I
would be kind of okay with that. But this sort
of where she's like, Oh, it's the keys to our house. Lady,
(41:10):
you sound like a crazy person when you talk about
our house. It's your house.
Speaker 2 (41:15):
It's your house. Yeah, he's nowhere, he's barely in the now.
She behaves like a teenager, and he makes no sense.
You went through hell, your husband died.
Speaker 1 (41:26):
You are a widow. You should have a certain perspective
about this sort of thing of a relationship.
Speaker 2 (41:31):
Exact.
Speaker 1 (41:32):
You were acting like someone who's never had a boyfriend.
Everything about it is just it is offensive to me.
Offensive that you think that that people in their late
fifties are going to act like this.
Speaker 2 (41:45):
It's it's again the writing. Is this idea that he's
just kind of like, go back to old Carrie, like
the whole the rat thing with the squirrel remember the
squirrels always this, you know.
Speaker 1 (41:57):
In other words, she's shown absolutely no friggin in her
life exactly in the last thirty years, she is apparently
the exact same person. And that that's what I mean.
I'm like, this is a a pathetic way to write
older people, and it's she's being written by people who
don't understand what it's like to be that age. You're
not going to be obsessed with the shit that you
(42:19):
were obsessed with in your youth.
Speaker 2 (42:21):
Right, and uh we because it's funny because in the
in the last app podcast, we talked about that, the
fact that they were not showing their work and the office,
and they kind of did now and I hope we
see a little more of that.
Speaker 1 (42:33):
Yeah, I want to get back to Miranda. So Miranda,
they actually do like occasionally frame her discussions in work.
They so she took that BBC producer out for drinks
and everything. I don't understand why this is being dragged
out so far.
Speaker 2 (42:52):
Right, we don't even know if the woman is queer.
Speaker 1 (42:56):
I think we did know. I think that made clear.
I don't know, but I'm just like, why is this?
I mean, Hm, to borrow a phrase from my late grandmother,
she'd or get off the pot. I don't like, Well,
go ahead and either have this story play out or
have this woman once again reject her in a humiliating way,
(43:17):
because that's what they always do with Miranda. I don't
mind that she's pursuing this as a newly queer woman
in the stage of her life. She would be out
pursuing something. I get that, and I do think Unlike
Carrie and Seema, Miranda's not coming off pathetics. There's a
certain level of humor and cynicism and clear eyedness about
(43:39):
her character that those scenes don't play as her being pathetic.
I do want to say, though, I'm really getting piste
off that everyone's tiptoe and around fucking carry because she may.
Miranda made a very mild joke about Carrie running off
to have lunch with her boyfriend, and then we had
to have another scene with her apologizing to Carrie, Carrie
(44:00):
sort of pouting about it, and I'm like, what the fuck?
These people have known each other forty fifty years some
of them. Why are they acting like this? And why
is they like what?
Speaker 2 (44:10):
Yeah, remember bullshit Bagel, bullshit Bagels, I remember that.
Speaker 1 (44:14):
But now everyone has the tiptoe around Carrie and her
precious little, weird freaking relationship Seema. Well, at least Seema's
wasn't entirely about, you know, wanting to find a husband
or a boyfriend. This was more, this was work oriented.
But again, it was this long, long, you know, just
(44:35):
all this discussion about something that we knew was actually
going to happen. Like everything you've told us about Sema
up until this point, I know she's going to launch
her own company, So why are we pretending, Oh, I
don't know, maybe I'll be okay. Oh they're not going
to put my name on the door, but maybe I'll
be No, you're not. You're not okay with this. So
why are we writing scenes like that.
Speaker 2 (44:56):
It doesn't fit the character at all, not at all,
not at all. I mean I still remember first episode
with seem I mean, she was this incredible powerful woman, right,
and now she's this thing that is just oh.
Speaker 1 (45:06):
And again it's like, oh, men, men are disappointing me
and putting me in a box. And again, if you're
writing young women early in their careers, that's great, but
you've already established that she is a powerhouse, right, So
this whole oh, I don't know, I don't know. I'm
not I don't know enough to ask her. No, that's
not who you've just know if.
Speaker 2 (45:27):
If that character she could complain about man, call them
assholes or whatever, you know, because she has experience for them,
especially you know, at work. So yeah, I can see
all that, but this whole like.
Speaker 1 (45:39):
You know, oh my god, take my name on They're
not gonna get me what I want. Well, you should
ask for what you want. What the hell you're both
fifty five, Like, what the hell?
Speaker 2 (45:46):
Yeah, it's it's it's it's not right. But anyway, but
Sema has amazing hair.
Speaker 1 (45:51):
She has amazing hair, She has the best outfits on
the show. She hasn't been serena showdery.
Speaker 2 (45:56):
Oh my god.
Speaker 1 (45:57):
She deserves so much better than what they're doing.
Speaker 2 (45:59):
I go watch Homeland and you see how good she can. Yeah, act,
she's a great actor.
Speaker 1 (46:05):
Go watch Mississippi Massala. She's amazing and yeah, it's awesome. Anyway, Anthony,
Oh my god, Anthony again Anthony, it's just about dick
and I don't know, like that scene with the boyfriend
coming dressed like one of the with his big dick,
and the oh my god, it's and then oh, all
these older women and gay men are like following him
(46:27):
down the such a.
Speaker 2 (46:28):
That would not happen in New York. I'm sorry, No,
no matter how big your thing is, that would not
happen in New York. No. People are used to it
the New York. They've seen every.
Speaker 1 (46:38):
It's just such a nineties sort of view of gay
men and how they act in public and what's important
to us and every I am not opposed to Anthony
being a horny little queen or a vulgar little queen.
Speaker 2 (46:50):
But that's all.
Speaker 1 (46:50):
It's literally all yes, it's all he has is his
stupid bakery. And and it's just really because Michael Patrick
King wants all these hot guys walking around in the
back ground in tiny.
Speaker 2 (47:00):
Little aft and they were hot.
Speaker 1 (47:02):
They are, But I just find the whole thing. I know,
it's sad. I think that's what it is. It's sad
because all of you, you could have had a show
where we it was a new set of problems for
these people. But all you're capable of doing is writing
the thirty year old versions of them and watching their
sagging aged faces delivering the same sorts of dialogue that
(47:25):
they were delivering, you know, when they were young. It's
just it's sad. It's just pathetic.
Speaker 2 (47:31):
And it's also putting them in these situations where they
have to act like they're they're ridiculous, like the whole
thing Charlotte, and the whole thing with Harry trying those genies.
Speaker 1 (47:39):
Me in his pants and everything.
Speaker 2 (47:41):
First of all, I would never happen.
Speaker 1 (47:42):
There is so much fascination with the fact that Harry
is a middle aged man and prostate and that's like,
there's all this stuff about Harry's dick and his prostate
every time he's given a storyline, and I'm like, again,
who were the young women who were writing these stories,
because it's a really kind of a fense way to portray,
you know, a late middle aged man. He's ridiculous and
(48:05):
he has no bladder control, and he humiliates himself in
public and he just sort of shrugs about it. When
it happened, and I hated the whole thing. I was like,
this isn't cute, this isn't funny, this doesn't even sound
like Harry.
Speaker 2 (48:17):
Yeah, it's it's yeah, it's turning to a show where
they're making they're ridiculing the man and then treating women like.
Speaker 1 (48:24):
Well they always did that. That doesn't bother me. But
they're they're rid of killing the women too. They're not
making thing.
Speaker 2 (48:29):
That's a thing, but they're they're yeah, But at the
same time, it's like, really.
Speaker 1 (48:34):
I just think they they really made Charlotte and Harry
look like morons. In that hole. Let's go out clubing
until five o'clock. In the morning thing.
Speaker 2 (48:42):
I just don't.
Speaker 1 (48:43):
Believe that that's that she needed to be doing that
sort of thing. The whole storyline with the cute Dutch
guy offering her coat and trying to kiss her. I'm like,
what is this a sex in the city episode? She
right right, fifty eight years old? Like, what the hell
are you doing. I'm not saying you can't party and
fuck around and do irresponsible things in your fifties.
Speaker 2 (49:05):
I can't.
Speaker 1 (49:06):
Of course you can be horny, of course you can
want a relationship. All of these things are very true.
It's just the way everything's being written in the most
insulting possible way, insulting to the characters and insulting to
the people who know those characters, and insulting to anybody
in the age group of these characters, because you are
simply making all of them look like pathetic folds.
Speaker 2 (49:28):
I think that the Again, I'm looking at Charlotte when
she was dancing, and I kept thinking about this. Yes,
first thing I thought of, Yeah, so there's this desperate
need to recreate, recreate or or i don't know, bring
back things you know, or keep them still attached so
much to the path. Just just create new things, new situations,
(49:51):
new I experience for these women.
Speaker 1 (49:53):
See. I always thought Charlotte, given her station in her background,
she should be a docent at the met. She shouldn't
be partying at five o'clock in the morning. I don't
know that. I do think it's interesting that Carrie wants
to pursue romance fiction, but Jesus Christ, every single sentence
she has written so far is horrible, like just bad,
(50:16):
bad writ It's absolutely horrific. Speaking of which, I think
the one thing that the show really misses out on
is it removed the first person voice over. Oh wow, yeah,
well they they did. She's not writing a column anymore,
so there's no reason for her to be doing that.
But that is part of the reason why everything feels
so dry and dull. As you said, it's also Hallmark.
(50:37):
It feels very that whole scene in front of Harry
Carrie's house with the gardener, when Sema pulled up and
then the younger gardener came over, and then so what
this is going on forever and ever? And what? I
guess they're doing something with Seema pursuing that gardener. I
have no idea.
Speaker 2 (50:54):
Maybe again, but it just went on and on and on.
Speaker 1 (50:59):
Just the writing is bad. The acting isn't great either.
Speaker 2 (51:03):
I think I think it's a combination of again, bed
writing and trying to insert all these things to be woke. Like,
you know, I was looking at the party where Charlotte went,
and they made sure every Yeah, I know, queer identification
was present in that room, and I appreciate that.
Speaker 1 (51:21):
That it is New York, it is an art but at.
Speaker 2 (51:23):
The same time, it's like, no, that would not be
the case. Sorry.
Speaker 1 (51:28):
I also think her coworker going on online about how
horny she is and how much she wants to fuck
the Dutch guy. I was like, is that, Oh my god, Yes,
I mean I know, no, it was unprofessional.
Speaker 2 (51:39):
It was a little too much. And yeah, yeah, it
was a little too much.
Speaker 1 (51:42):
Anyway, I know we're sounding really judgmental and pressy, but
I would be fine if they were all partying and
getting laid and struggling in their careers. I'm not averse
to any of those storylines, but all of these storylines
make them look terrible. And that shot of Carrie sitting
on the bed in the fucking guest house all by herself,
(52:02):
I was like, is this just are we supposed to
think these people are pathetic and everything.
Speaker 2 (52:07):
Is so silly and dated, like the whole thing about
parking the car and oh my god. You know it's
just like it's omar omar if you watch the Hallmark channel,
that's that's how they established they set up the situations
and the conversations. Yeah, it very basic stuff that you
just you don't see that happening in real life. And
(52:30):
if you have a little bit of understanding of these characters,
I mean, they would not not even say those los.
Speaker 1 (52:37):
All right, I think that's it. Like I said, we're
going to finish out this season planing the whole way,
no doubt. But I gotta say, I don't think I
would come back after after this. There's only so much
punishment I can give myself.
Speaker 2 (52:50):
Yeah, we'll see.
Speaker 1 (52:51):
Maybe it'll end on some great cliffhangerh Oh my god,
I know, we'll see what happened whatever. All right, we'll
be back next week with whatever cross there and crosses
our deaths. Until then, take care of your styles, love
you mean it, Bye bye bye
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