Loading summary
Transcript199 lines
- [00:01]
A
What makes a leader worth following? What should you really care about in your job? As technology is changing so quickly, is it just gonna be about machines talking to other machines? I mean, should you quit your job and start something on your own, what would that take? What does success and risk look like when we're all at the starting gate together? These are the questions we answer each week on Lead Human with Jack Myers and Tim Spengler. Join us each week and subscribe at your favorite podcast platform and YouTube. We'll tell stories, we'll hear from some of the best, and we'll try to figure this out together.
- [00:35]
B
Refresh your space for summer during PURA's Summer Savings event enjoy 20% off site wide with exclusive savings on our smart Home fragrance diffusers. It's the perfect time to upgrade. Visit pura.com
- [00:50]
A
pros save more on the materials you need to get the job done inside and out at Lowe's right
- [00:56]
B
now, get 10% off in stock Trex
- [00:58]
A
Naturals decking now available in more styles. Plus get 15% off select custom entry, interior and storm doors. Then we'll deliver it all straight to your job site. To help keep your jobs moving, get the brand's pros trust priced right and ready when you need them. Our best lineup is here at Lowe's
- [01:15]
B
ballot through 527 while supplies last selection varies by location.
- [01:25]
A
I'm Alan Sepinwall. I'm a TV critic.
- [01:27]
B
I'm Kathryn Vanierdoch. I am also a TV critic.
- [01:30]
A
We are friends and neighbors and we love to talk about TV with each
- [01:33]
B
other and now we are going to talk about it with you.
- [01:37]
A
So as always every week we're going to try to answer an important question. Is the TV good?
- [01:42]
B
Today we are going to be talking about some fascinatingly mixed bags of how good TV can and sometimes is not can be and sometimes is not. So we are going to be talking about the new season of For All Mankind as well as the brand new spin off of For All Mankind, Star City and that those are both series that we have many incredibly fond feelings and then also many questions about. And so that will be fun to talk about. And I am very curious why you started texting me about how you were having a breakdown to do with Star City and I'm excited to discover the exact nature of that breakdown.
- [02:28]
A
Okay, so I will be having a nervous breakdown again on camera for that and then afterwards Catherine is going to try to catch me up on everything that has happened on the TV show Outlander since its first season up through its finale a couple of weeks ago. Before we do that, we've got some housekeeping. The first one is in our first episode, we talked about the fact that we will be doing a Patreon, which is@patreon.com tvisgood. We're going to do one bonus episode a month where we do some kind of deeper dive on a show, an episode, whatever. And we've decided on our very first Patreon episode is going to drop next Monday, June 1, at the same time as the third episode of the regular show. Katherine, what are we going to be talking about in our first Patreon episode?
- [03:09]
B
We really, we went through a couple of different options for what this first Patreon episode should be. We would like to really do episode commentaries, but felt like that was a little bit of a. An odd setup for a first Patreon. That's something we'd really like to be able to do later. Obviously, we are expecting that we are going to be getting polls from people about what we should be talking about in the Patreon episodes. But for the beginning, we wanted something that felt like a show we care about very, very much, ideally an episode we care about both of us, very, very much. And one where it feels like there's a lot to talk about that is both resonant to, like, who we are as TV critics, how, how we have. How TV has changed over the last several decades, and then also can speak to a lot of our frustrations with, but also the things that we find so interesting about where TV is today. And so we are talking about Mad Men's the Six Suitcase and the Suitcase. The Suitcase. And I'll just go ahead and say it. When we realized that this was gonna be the first Patreon episode, we also realized that we could point out that that's what the money is for.
- [04:33]
A
So that's what the money is for. That's an interesting phrase.
- [04:36]
B
Yes.
- [04:37]
A
How did you come up with that?
- [04:38]
B
Well, it is. It is the. This is the episode in Mad Men where Don yells that at Peggy and.
- [04:46]
A
Okay, that sounds good. I'm gon watch that.
- [04:48]
B
Yeah, it's a, it's a fun time, I have to say. I. How many years? How. When's the last time you watched the Suitcase?
- [04:55]
A
I mean, yesterday, but before that it had been probably around the time I wrote, like, the revolution was televised. So, like, 14 years ago.
- [05:06]
B
Yeah, I have seen it since then. But, but like, but maybe it's been a decade. And let me tell you, what a freaking banger to Revisit. What a great time.
- [05:17]
A
So, yeah, so that's your homework for the next show is Mad Men is streaming on both HBO Max and AMC plus or maybe you have one of the snazzy DVD or Blu Ray sets. Regardless, we will be talking all about the suitcase on patreon.com tvisgood we are very excited for that.
- [05:34]
B
Yes. Okay, we have to talk a little bit about some things that have happened online since we first dropped this episode. Last week's episode, Last week's episode, we, we stirred up a great, a great controversy. Now I should have seen this coming. You should have seen this coming. Somehow neither of us realized that we were going to be releasing a podcast about television that was also about the existence or non existence of Central Jersey. And this is something that we feel is going to be, have immense, applicable, emotional people all around the world, including our listeners in Paraguay. By the way. Apparently we're the number one TV and film podcast at Paraguay. Welcome Paraguay. We feel that everyone, everywhere is going to care a great, great deal about Central Jersey. And so we're gonna go all in on, on how it definitely exists. Definitely.
- [06:38]
A
I don't know that this is like a great idea.
- [06:42]
B
We will be bringing it up at our regular TV is good meetings. It will be an agenda point every single time.
- [06:52]
A
I just, I got yelled at so much online over the thing saying what I thought was a non controversial statement that Central Jersey is not a real thing.
- [07:01]
B
But we learn. We learn and grow. We learn and we grow. So Central Jersey obviously gonna continue to be a point of great contention. A bone of great contention.
- [07:16]
A
Oh no. Oh no.
- [07:17]
B
Okay, I'd also like to give a shout out to everyone who made sure that we will be talking about the masterwork of the last 30 or so years of television, the incredible television series Bones. Yes, of course we will be talking about Bones. We're not going to do it right now. You can't, you can't go straight Bones, right? You gotta build up to bones. You gotta lay the groundwork for bones. So, you know, be patient, be cool. You know, let us, let us cook for a bit.
- [07:52]
A
And then you hosted an entire podcast about Bones. What was it called?
- [07:57]
B
It was called the Bone Zone, Alan. It was called the Bone Zone. It was with my great friend Andrew Cunningham. You should check out his podcast that he does with my other great friend Craig getting. It's called Overdue. It's a fantastic books podcast. And yes, we did talk about, about Bones. Like how, how we're ever not talking about Bones is frankly baffling to me. So.
- [08:23]
A
But we have lots of other things to talk about and we're gonna get to them. But the last thing is a show that I will be talking about an awful lot between now and 13th when a journey into the Twilight Zone with TV's first visionary comes out in bookstores. Available for pre order now. A book?
- [08:38]
B
A book, you say you have a book coming?
- [08:41]
A
Yes, I have two books coming out, but one is coming out this fall about Rod Serling, creator and host of the Twilight Zone. And if you are enough of a TV nerd to be going to the ATX TV Festival next weekend, I will be hosting a screening of one of my favorite Twilight Zone episodes, Walking Distance, with our mutual friend and my former podcasting partner, Dan Feinberg, our firewall and iceberg. And so we'll be screening the episode and then talking about it. But I will also just be around ATX all weekend. So if you see me, I will be wearing some sort of silly graphic T shirt. I'm very tall. I have a beard. I'm really hard to miss. Come up and please say hi.
- [09:17]
B
Yeah, I will not be at ATX this year, which I am very sad about. Hopefully back again next year because ATX is a really, is a really good time. I think every time both you and I have gone to that festival, we have come away feeling like, like it's a really cool place for TV people to hang out.
- [09:35]
A
Yeah, two years ago we did, we did a whole panel on bottle episodes that they filmed and it has never been released to the public. And I think people need to see, speaking of nervous breakdowns, the one that you were having over the course of that hour.
- [09:47]
B
Yeah, we did a whole murder board with a. Built, with like a bulletin board and, and like red string and stuff. And it was very normal and relaxed.
- [09:57]
A
That's such hugely normal. Exc.
- [10:00]
B
Yep, yep, yep, yep, yep. Okay, so the new show that we're going to be talking about this week is Apple TV's Star City. And this is a spin off, not prequel, a spin off contemporary timeline show to Apple's now long established sci fi alternate history series for all mankind. The premise of Star City is that we are going all the way back to the same time period that is encompassed by the first season of For All Mankind. And we are telling that same story from the Russian Soviet point of view. It is, it is a really fascinating show, I think, to. To revisit. As for All Mankind viewer, I am uncertain how interesting and legible it is. If you have not seen For All Mankind, like legitimately uncertain. I'm not, I'm not trying to be like, maybe not. I'm like, I. I'm. I truly can't tell whether this show is interesting. If you have not seen For All Mankind. I will say the cast, I think, is really great. Reece Ifans plays a guy who is mysteriously known only, I think, as Chief Designer. Everyone calls him Chief Designer. Does he have a name?
- [11:24]
A
I kept listening for it through five episodes. At no point does anyone call him other. Anything other than Chief Designer.
- [11:30]
B
Yes. And he plays a almost wizard like character who is able to stare at a hunk of metal and be like, this will make it into space. And then another one and be like, this will never make it into space. He's great in that role. I think the show really rests in on the back of Anna Maxwell Martin. She plays Lyudmila Raskova and she is the one sort of running Star City. The, the. The figure who has to translate between what is happening at Star City and then what the. The bigger sort of Soviet aims are from the, from the government. And so she's the one who's perpetually cracking the whip. She is sort of the villain, but also sort of the. A protagonist. Ish. In this show. I think she's quite, quite good in it. Agnes O. Casey plays Irina Morozova, who is a young spy. Essentially. She sits in this big room full of other young ladies who are all listening in on all of the cosmonauts. I really enjoyed that episode of that element of the series. And also Alice Englert as Anastavia Bell Lakova, who is a cosmonaut who loves, loves, love space and cannot really understand any of the other wild political elements of her life. Fun fact. Alice Englert is director Jane Campion's daughter. And yeah, so that, that is roughly the setup. There's a lot more to get into. But like, Alan, what are your thoughts about Star City? Because I know you and I have been on a real For All Mankind journey over the past several years.
- [13:21]
A
Yeah, for all Mankind. It's been like a real roller coaster. I thought the first season was very good. A bit uneven, I thought. The second season is one of my favorite seasons of television of the last decade. The season two finale of For All Mankind is just spectacular example of how you take all of the storylines in a serialized show and have them all so good. Yes. Maybe down the road we will do like a deeper dive just on that episode or even just on the scene where the two astronauts jog on the Moon while wearing duct tape spacesuits.
- [13:51]
B
Oh, it's so good.
- [13:52]
A
Unbelievable. Unbelievable. But I feel like it's really fallen off a cliff to the point, whereas we'll maybe get to in a little bit. I stopped watching this season after a few episodes. I just sort of have lost all interest in any of the legacy characters or any of the sort of next generation characters that they've tried to introduce since those first couple of seasons. And I also feel like it has, for the most part, lost the thread of here are people doing cool and dangerous space shit. Which was, again, two astronauts jogged across the lunar surface in duct tape suits. You know, someone like, had to throw a pass in zero gravity to try to, like, connect with another spaceship. All of these things that the show did in its early days on sort of like the frontier of the space race is mostly gone. Not entirely gone. You. You had me watch one of the later episodes this season where there's some cool stuff as they're landing on. Is it Europa? It's one of the Titan. Titan, yes. It's a moon of Saturn, not a moon of Jupiter. And that was kind of fun. But almost everything else in that episode, I just was putting me to sleep. And so by going back to 1969 and showing, like, some of the earliest lunar missions, you go back to that sort of janky, reckless, anything can happen, anyone can die state. But at the same time, it's strange because I don't remember everything that happened in for all Mankind Season 1, but I do remember enough to know that, like, the. One of the missions dramatized in these first couple of episodes of Star City, I know exactly what happened on it. And I know, like, there's a sense of danger in this show, but I know that everything worked out for it. So it's. It's this weird thing where I can't tell how much they. To speak to what you said. I don't know how much they really need people to know what happened on the other show and whether knowing what happened on the other show is a benefit or a detriment. So that's weird. On the other hand, I really do like, as you said, the spy stuff. It's both a space show and an espionage show. It's sort of for all mankind crossed with the Americans. There's so much more paranoia here. Everyone is so much more tightly controlled than you saw the astronauts being on For All Mankind or in pretty much any documentary or pop cultural adaptation of stories about the space race. And so that is very interesting. And I do like I do like Lyudmila and, and a couple. Irina and a couple of the other characters. Mostly the women. I think the women on this show are really terrific. The male cosmonauts are mostly forgettable.
- [16:16]
B
That's fine. They're not. We don't. Nobody cares about them. That's not what this show is about. It's about Russian lady space spies. Like Russian lady space spies. Come on.
- [16:26]
A
I have no beef with Russian lady space spies. It's just if you're spending a lot of time on male Russian cosmonauts and chief designers and such, I would like their time with them to be a little bit more interesting than it is. Even, even Risa Fonz, who's an actor I really like a lot. I don't, he doesn't have a name and I don't feel like he has enough of a personality. He's just sort of very.
- [16:48]
B
He's a magical wizard.
- [16:49]
A
And yes, he's a magical wizard who is very focused and very concerned about protecting his cosmonauts from Lyudmila and the Kremlin and the Politburo and whatever the specific Soviet organizations were circa 1969. But yeah, the, the parts that are more spy focused or more focused on the female characters, I thought those were really good. Some of the other parts are a bit blander.
- [17:11]
B
Yeah, yeah. I tend to agree. I, I am waiting for. I have, I, I have a beautiful goldfish memory about most things. And so watching this, like, I, I actually cannot recreate in my head which of these missions worked and which didn't. And so I. A lot more of the peril, particularly because I think the whole mode of this show is like the Americans are being very careful and the reason they haven't sent anyone to the moon is that they'd like everyone to come back alive. And the Soviets are like, eh, we care more about trying, so just put them in a tin can and shoot them up there. And like, I am very susceptible to feeling the like, emotional impact of like, nobody tested any of this. What are you idiots doing? And I, I, so I, those, those are working for me pretty well. I agree that the, not the, the male characters I don't particularly care about. This doesn't bother me at all. I'm used to not caring about male characters on television. Sorry to trigger everyone, but.
- [18:24]
A
But what about men, Catherine? What happened to men?
- [18:27]
B
What about the men? No, no, I mean, of course I think this would be a much better show if, if particularly the sort of husband characters felt like they had meaning. For these, for these women cosmonauts. But I do think the women are strong enough that, like, I wouldn't mind waiting around for them to. To figure out how to balance that a little bit better. But I. What I am lacking is the sense of forward momentum within the show itself. I watched several episodes, had a perfectly nice time, and nowhere in my brain am I like, ooh, when, when can I watch more? How can I get back to this thing? Like, it's a nice kind of, let's sit down and spend time with it, but it's not. I, I don't have that sense of feeling compelled. Here is what I do want to say. I. I don't agree with Alan about this current season of For All Mankind. I'm not going to try to claim that it reaches the heights of the Certainly season two, no question. But I do think it got so bad in some of the middle seasons that I was able to. My, my bar of expectation was. Became so low that I was then able to sort of check back in with the current season and be a little bit pleasantly surprised about the kind of occupation that they are telling about Mars this season. My colleague Roxanna at Vulture has been talking to me quite excitedly in the DMs about the way that this is a really interesting political parallel to a lot of things that are happening in the real world right now. I too, was taken by that. I also think it's just goofy. It's really fucking goofy in a way that sometimes I like, they do a flash mobile in the cornfield on Mars and then everybody gets blown to pieces. Come on, that's fun. You know? You know that.
- [20:35]
A
Okay, I will give you the exploding Martian cornfield flash mob. Absolutely.
- [20:39]
B
Yes. Yes. And. And I continue to appreciate this show's willingness to kill people off sometimes. It took 17 million years too long for some notable characters on this series.
- [20:55]
A
I don't know who you're referring to, Catherine.
- [20:58]
B
Nobody knows. Nobody can know. Is it Ed Baldwin? The old Methuselah space? Methuselah Possible.
- [21:04]
A
I remember when For All Mankind started in the first season. That was sort of a bumpy first few episodes. And it's really, I think, episode three or four when it starts to come into its own. And that is when they realize, oh, you know, the Soviets have put a female cosmonaut on the moon. We need women astronauts. And it's when that show really put the women to the forefront that it started to be, oh, this is interesting. This is good. And so I do think that there is Something about this particular creative team that for whether intentional or not, they are at their best when they are writing for the women versus for the guys.
- [21:38]
B
For All Mankind, I think, is an interesting demonstration of how that can sometimes play out the. The current season of For All Mankind. I would argue the weakest links continue to be the men, even though they have reinvented the central cast of this show several times over. At this point, I find both the kind of Elon Musk stand in character to be. I don't understand what he wants or anything about his internal motivation. He just sort of stands there staring stonily out into the landscape and then
- [22:15]
A
he's a plot device. He does not have any inner life that they did at least one episode either last season or in season three, where you're trying to learn a little bit more about his past. And it just. It gets you nowhere. He is nothing. And I like. I like Eddie. Eddie Gathege a lot as an actor. And they're just giving him nothing other than be enigmatic.
- [22:34]
B
Yes. I am similarly frustrated by the character that they have leading the sort of Mars revolution. I think he. I keep waiting to care about his outcome and I keep kind of hoping that instead somebody else will take the reins. I really enjoyed seeing Costa Ronan show up as a Americans alumni this season, and I wished that there was more of him, but I found him to be a more compelling screen presence, but partially because he's just. He's just good. Yeah. But the women continue to be more interesting for all mankind, for sure.
- [23:21]
A
Again, the Americans DNA of Star City is maybe the most interesting part to me when it is being a paranoid conspiracy thriller about what it is like to be among the most celebrated people in your nation and yet not trusted one iota by your government and having less freedom than even the average Soviet citizen. That's interesting. That's cool. The. Some of the other stuff less so.
- [23:43]
B
Yeah. Yeah. All right. Would you like to tell me about some of your reservations about language on Star City?
- [23:52]
A
Okay.
- [23:53]
B
Okay, let's go.
- [23:54]
A
Deep breath, deep breath. Okay.
- [23:55]
B
It's gonna be fun.
- [23:56]
A
So on for all Mankind, we have already seen Soviet cosmonauts. We've gotten glimpses of this. We have literally seen one of these missions appear on American television with people speaking in all of those scenes. The cosmonauts, it will shock you to learn, are speaking Russian. On for all mankind, they are Russian speakers. It is their native language. On this show, everyone speaks English.
- [24:22]
B
Well, I mean, that's the language I speak, so why should I be Mad.
- [24:26]
A
Everyone speaks English. Everyone speaks English with English accents. You know, I mean, I guess Rhys is maybe doing more of his traditional Welsh accent. But regardless, no one is making any attempt to sound Russian. But beyond that, there are scenes where characters interact with Americans or people from, you know, who speak other languages. And I have no idea what they are supposed to be speaking the language in in those scenes. And beyond that, Catherine, when you see written language, when you see newspapers and other things, it's in Russian.
- [25:00]
B
Well, of course it is. They're in Russia. So obviously there they are of. They are reading. Yes, of course they would be. Now I have two.
- [25:10]
A
It's Russian with sub. Like, they have to subtitle, like, printed pages.
- [25:15]
B
Yes, of course. Because it's. Of course it's in the Soviet Union. Like, of course it is. And of course they are speaking. Now, I have two things that I'd like to bring up in related to this. The first one is. Now, we have not seen it yet. Nobody has seen it yet. But the first one is Christopher Nolan's the Odyssey. How do you feel about Boston, Odysseus?
- [25:35]
A
I mean, I've seen Kevin Costner play Robin Hood with sometimes an English accent. Most times not. I mean, I've. You know, what's the Al Pacino movie where he says, like, yonder lies to castle of my father. I mean, there's. There's definitely, like, history is littered with historically inappropriate accents. And if the show was just starting out this way, if it was a standalone show, maybe I'd be okay with it. If they. If they.
- [26:00]
B
The problem is the internal consistency for you.
- [26:03]
A
A, it's the internal consistency. B, they never bother to do the thing that, like, Hunt for Red October did and some recent TV show, I can't remember did, which is you start out with a scene or two of people speaking Russian, even just a couple of minutes, and then you do the push in and suddenly it's English. And it's the way. The show's way of saying, hey, they're still speaking Russian, but we want to make this easier for you to follow. They do not do that. They're also the kings from the first
- [26:28]
B
scene, but it is a new, different show. Right. Like, presumably you could sort of take the opening credits of this show and kind of use that as enough of a signal that, like, they are going to shift perspective. Like, you don't need the push in. It's a. It's got a different title.
- [26:43]
A
But you. You see, like, there's the second Soviet Lunar Mission, which we have seen on for all mankind. We have seen one of the cosmonauts give a speech from the moon in Russian and now it is being spoken in English.
- [26:58]
B
Yes. Because it's from the Star City perspective. It's up. So my other example is a film I also have not seen, but am planning to see this weekend, the Sheep Detectives. And one of my children's favorite part of the Sheep Detectives trailer, which again, they have not seen yet, is where the sheep are speaking in English to each other. And then from the outside, the humans look at the sheep and they're just going, ba. Right. And this is Sheep Detectives. It's just like, of course we are in the minds of a language. Like they don't want to. I mean, I, I now, I do think that there is enough familiarity and comfort with subtitled language that if this were an entirely Russian production that I would be totally. I think they could, they could get away with that. The problem is they wanted, they didn't want to cast Russian actors. They wanted to cast Anna Maxwell Martin and Recy Fonz. And so, like, why? Why? I don't want them to be doing fake. I want them to be doing performances in their, in their most familiar tongue so that Anna Maxwell Martin can stare at me stonily, as she does with her face, which is so effective because it seems like it should be a nice face, but she's mean and, and so, like, you know, I, I don't need anybody to be doing additional accent work. Additional accent work is dangerous. Have you seen any of. Off campus? That's what went wrong there, I think.
- [28:31]
A
I have not seen the. The Straight Hockey show, no.
- [28:34]
B
Yeah. Well, the Straight Hockey Show. The lead of the Straight Hockey show is a young actress who is formally most known to me for playing Kate Middleton in the Crown. And she's doing an American accent and she can pull off the American accent and off campus, but I think it's why she can't function in important other ways in that show. So, you know, I think there's a, there's a. I'm fine. I'm fine. With Boston Odyssey and with Sheep Detectives.
- [29:00]
A
As, as you can affirm from the texts I was sending you, as I was watching it, like, I just felt like I was losing my mind. Especially when we started seeing the newspapers is. I think that's when it broke.
- [29:11]
B
That's the moment you broke.
- [29:12]
A
It's like, if you're just going to do everything in English, I guess that's okay. It's still weird. But like, when they're speaking English and they're reading Russian. It's, it's too much. I, I, I cannot abide that.
- [29:24]
B
The thing that I will join with you about this on is that English accents, and by English, I don't mean like American, although it's true for American accents as well. British accents have cultural meaning depending on what that accent is. It, it means something very different about that character if they are speaking in like a place. Posh Oxford accent versus Mancunian versus Welsh. And because we are through a sheep detectives filter here, I, I can't say for sure if I'm supposed to be taking those kinds of class and culture related meanings about these characters based on those accents. My guess is probably no, but it does. That is what that sort of brings up for me.
- [30:12]
A
And with all due respect to sheep detectives, which everyone I know who has seen it says is fantastic, and I'm
- [30:17]
B
looking forward to it. No, I'm excited. I'm pumped.
- [30:19]
A
Let's go sheep. Like you're expecting a different level of reality in a movie about detective sheep than you are in what is mostly meant to be a grounded, prestige, baity, streaming drama spinning off of another streaming drama.
- [30:36]
B
It feels like you're not taking sheep Detectives seriously enough.
- [30:38]
A
You know, I can't wait to see sheep detectives.
- [30:42]
B
Fine. That's fine. I mean, I just want to point out that this is also the show where they run on the moon and duct tape. So, like, I think maybe don't, don't
- [30:50]
A
even speak ill of Gordo and Tracy's sacrifice. That is. I'm like, we're going to pause after the segment and I'm going to watch that scene again before we get to Outlander.
- [30:59]
B
Never forget. Never forget. Okay, are there things that we need to say about Star City or for All Mankind that we have not mentioned yet?
- [31:07]
A
I just, it's so rare with, for All Mankind for me to tap out on a show that I loved as much as I loved For All Mankind in that second season. And I just feel like, as you said, Miles, the main leader of the Martian resistance, is so boring and Dev is so enigmatic, and some of the second generation female characters are a bit better, but still not at the level of like a Molly Cobb or, you know, Danny Poole. Those people. And so because the show, the show did a really good job of setting up its original ensemble and a terrible job of, because it was designed to have all these time jumps you would think they would have plotted out in advance. Okay. After 10 or 15 years, who are going to be the exciting new Characters who are taking over for Ed and Gordo as our central figures. And it's like they never figured it out. And so that was ultimately what drove me away, because there's just nothing I'm invested in anymore, except for the occasions when they're doing the cool spaceship.
- [32:06]
B
I like the cool space shit still. And my. My feeling about this season of For All Mankind is that I found myself actually not minding the sort of Mars native kid characters as much as I was expecting to Flash mob. Big important exclamation point there. One of the stupidest things I've seen. I was like, literally like, no, no. It was like watching it through my fingers. But I wanted to watch it, you know, so there was that element. I mean, there is a thing about season, this current season, that there are a couple things that I find so egregious that I'm kind of on board just because they feel ballsy. One of them we have already seen, which is the return of, or not return, but introduction of a kid from one of the most loathed characters in this show's history.
- [33:04]
A
Like, there's doubling down and then there's just, like, spiting your audience with.
- [33:09]
B
I, again, then was like. Like I just found myself being trolled in such a. In such a. How do you not respect a move like being pranked? The other thing is a spoiler for the finale, so I'm not going to talk about it, but it's sort of clearly what is being hinted at in the penultimate episode. And I again, was just kind of pumping my fists because if this show is going to go anywhere for one more season, that's where I want it to go. And it's like, yeah, let's do it. Let's go there. So, you know, I. I'm excited. I will happily watch whatever they do next. And. And I. I have accepted the kind of regular eye rolling that is required to hang in there for those things.
- [33:59]
A
And I think I'm definitely going to keep watching Star City, at least through the end of this first season, because the thing was, for all mankind could often be bumpy in the middle of seasons, you know, or even at the beginning. And then the finales, other than the season four finale, which I thought was awful, tends to be really, really good at the end. And so I want to see if the creative team this time can tie things together as well as they've done in the past. If they can, I will stick it out. If they can't, well, then it's just. I'm. I Guess I'm done with the franchise. Acast powers the world's best podcasts. Here's a show that we recommend
- [34:44]
B
if you've ever dreamed of quitting your job to take your side hustle full time, listen up. This is Nikayla Matthews Akome, host of side Hustle Pro, a podcast that helps
- [34:53]
A
you build and grow from passion project to profitable business. Every week you'll hear from guests just like you who wanted to start a
- [35:01]
B
business on the side. If you can't run a side hustle,
- [35:03]
A
you can't run a business.
- [35:04]
B
They share real tips and so I
- [35:06]
A
started connecting with all these people on
- [35:07]
B
LinkedIn and I saw Target supplier diversity
- [35:10]
A
was having office hours. Real advice.
- [35:12]
B
Procrastination is the easiest form of resistance
- [35:15]
A
and the actual strategies they use to turn their side Hustle into their main hustle. Getting back in touch with your tangible cash and sitting down and learning to give your money a job like it changes something.
- [35:28]
B
Check outside Hustle Pro every week on your favorite podcast app and YouTube.
- [35:34]
A
Acast helps creators launch, grow and monetize their podcast everywhere.
- [35:40]
B
Acast.com Summer smells like summer road trips, ocean breezes and long evenings under the stars, it's a feeling you want to hold on to restore your sense of place. With Pura's new summer fragrance collection, we've captured the magic of the season in clean premium scents that transform your home into your favorite destination. Discover the art of scentscaping and bring the summer in. Visit pura.com to explore the collection. There is a kind of hilariously good transition point between For All Mankind and Outlander, but I can't say what it is because it is a spoiler for the For All Mankind finale. And so for people who then watch the For All Mankind finale and know anything about Outlander, this is going to be four of you. I just want you to know that I know exactly what is funny about connecting these two shows. And I can't say it. And so you're just gonna have to do it for yourselves. And, and I'll patreon a little, little post about it maybe after that finale drops. So should we, should we move along? Are you ready to hear?
- [36:57]
A
I'm. I'm. I'm ready to hear. Let's. Let's get into Outlander. First of all, why are we pairing beyond the reason that you can't talk about? Why have we chosen to do Outlander when. When we've already said that the the goal of the show is we'll talk about one new thing and one older thing and technically, Outlander debuted 12 years ago, but its finale just aired less than a month ago. So why are we doing these together?
- [37:22]
B
Well, they're both Ronald Moore shows, which is a really interesting thing about, about the creative genesis of them because I do actually think that there are, there's a sort of shared DNA in, in elements of these shows beyond.
- [37:39]
A
First off, let's, let's explain who Ronald D. Moore is. You know, odds are if you're listening to this show, you probably are enough of a nerd to know. But just in case, Ronald D. Moore,
- [37:47]
B
you tell, tell us, tell us, Alan, about the lore.
- [37:50]
A
Well, children, pull up by the fire and I will tell you all about Ronald D. Moore. He was a writer on Star the Next Generation, sort of moved up very quickly. It was clearly he was one of the better, if not the best writer on that show, help write the finale. He then became one of the most important writer producers on Star Deep Space Nine. Briefly worked on Star Voyager, grew super frustrated with it, wrote this manifesto about all the things that Voyager was doing wrong that you can certainly find online somewhere, and decided to take all those frustrations out and do his own show, which was a reimagining of Battlestar Galactica, the Great early to Mid 2000s Sci Fi Channel series. And that was just an incredible, it's, it's an all timer kind of show. Since then he's tried a bunch of other things, one of which is Outlander, one of which is for all mankind and Star City, where he is credited as a co creator, although I don't know how active he's been beyond setting that up. So he has done a lot of sci fi, but he has also done this fantasy romance show with time travel.
- [38:48]
B
That's right. So speaking of fantasy romance show with time travel, I think I just want to start by asking you, like, literally what, if anything, did your brain absorb about what Outlander is like? If somebody were to stop you on the street right now and be like, what's Outlander about? What would you say?
- [39:07]
A
I mean, I've seen the first eight episodes of Outlander when it debuted and I was writing for Hit Fix. RIP Hit Fix. It seemed the books were a big enough deal and I had a number of friends who were huge fans of them and I felt, all right, let's give this a try. I'm as you know, I'm not necessarily automatically inclined towards fantasy or romance, but if it's done well, you know, I will, I will get into it too. And also Moore's involvement had me Interested. So I do know is about what is her. I don't remember. He's Jamie. What's her name? Is it Claire?
- [39:40]
B
Claire. Yes.
- [39:40]
A
Okay, so Claire is a nurse in 1940s England. She is married to Frank.
- [39:47]
B
Yes. Tobias Menzies.
- [39:49]
A
Yeah, Tobias Menzies. She's. She's very happily married. And somehow, through methods, she winds up traveling back in time through the Scottish islands Circle. Yes. Where she. She is treated as a Sassenach. She is an outsider. She's an outlander. She is not from there. And yet she is quickly, like, taken in by Jamie, this super dashing, handsome, you know, heroic dude, and they get into all sorts of romantic entanglements and there's a lot of conflict going on. Not only because she's trying to get back home and doesn't want anybody other than him to know that she's a time traveler, but, you know, he's also dealing with a lot of political violence. There's a lot of sexual violence in the show, even during the brief period when I was watching. And then the last thing I remember is. And only the last thing I know, the last thing I saw, because I reread my. My review and notes of it right before we did this is Claire has a chance to travel back to the present. She is like, steps away from going back through the portal. Frank, I think, can hear her on the other side. And instead she is grabbed up by some goons who are rivals of Jamie and pulled away and cannot go back beyond that. I've seen glimpses of things just in online headlines, but I, for whatever reason, never went back to the show after that. So I'm a blank slate.
- [41:08]
B
Okay, so what I think we. What I think I want to try to convince you of is that this show, although, like, for all mankind, it is hard to say that it is a universally good show. It is a really interesting one, and I think a lot of the problems with it speak to this really messy, interesting thing about fandom in television today and this transit, this sort of branching that has happened in TV drama in particular over the last decade that this show has been on to this point. I wrote this piece for Vulture when this last season premiered. And that piece is about thinking about the show as this really uncomfortable and never fully resolved hybrid between this Game of Thrones fantasy, sexually violent, violent, full stop, prestige play about what fantasy should look like on television, and then this romance that is always being threaded throughout. What this show is trying to do, the. The way that it depicts sex, the way that it depicts these Characters love for one another, how much their love for one another is the turning point for so much of what's happening in. In the wider world of the show. And that there's a world where you can see those two things being pushed together in the same show and it being then like the biggest thing that's ever happened on television. Because what you're taking is like, all of the stuff that made people love Game of Thrones and all of the stuff that has made women understand the power of a romance genre for, like, decades and decades in books and has made the original Diana Gabaldon books to be so enormous. And you are putting them together like the nothing. Nothing could unite the world better than this. And in fact, instead, they are at every turn undermining each other in a way that the show is never quite capable of resolving. And it was just wild to me thinking back about the history of what made this show so appealing and then. And so, so, so, so messy. So you tend to have issues with romance generally. Is that like, is it a trophy thing to romance? I'm not. I know you're on it, but. But, like, have you. How do you feel about Bridgerton these days? I. I just feel like this is not a genre that speaks to you.
- [44:10]
A
No, it's. It's not. You're. That's 100% fair. And Bridgerton is one where. I think I watched half of the first season and thought this is pretty well done. It is not really for me, and that's okay. And, you know, that's a show where I'm really happy that it's still around. And I know how many people like, like it.
- [44:24]
B
Yeah, but what is it about when you say you're not a fantasy person? Why is something like fantasy a bigger lift for you than a science fiction situation, like, for all mankind?
- [44:36]
A
Well, a. For all mankind is sort of. It's. It's more like speculative fiction than science fiction. Like, it's sort of one step removed from genres, but.
- [44:44]
B
Yes, so.
- [44:45]
A
But you know what I mean. Like, it's. It's realistic science fiction or whatever you want to call it. So, you know, something like the Martian where it's only like a step removed from what we do. It's characters in a relative present day or period setting. I don't know. It's. I'm not opposed to fantasy either. I loved Game of Thrones. It's more along the lines of, like, there is nothing intrinsic to romance or to fantasy or to, like, you know, the problems of the landed gentry in England. That, like, in and of itself, I'm like, yes, I have to see that. You know, And I know a lot of. You know, there's a lot of, like, crap I will watch or I will read, you know, like comic books or whatever, where I know they're not good, but, like, I like these characters or I like this concept. You know, I grew up being into it, and therefore, the fat. The thing that it's about becomes more interesting to me than how it's about that. And that's. That's a weakness of mine, and I'm aware of it. But I do. There's a lot of romances that I've liked. You know, I really liked heated rivalry, the. The gay hockey show. So it becomes a matter of execution more than anything. You know, I really like the first season of Downton Abbey, or at least the stuff about the servants on Downton Abbey. You know, the Crawley is a lot less so. But, you know, it's. It just. It becomes one of those things where if you do it well, I will go with it no matter what, even if I'm not the target audience for it. And I liked what I saw of Outlander in those first eight episodes. I can't necessarily speak now to why I didn't go back to it. I did have this interesting experience with one of my much younger co workers at the time. Had not read the books, but she was very much into, like, fantasy and a lot of the other elements that the show was doing and said, like, you know what? I'm gonna recap this show. I'm gonna talk. I'm gonna write about every episode of it. I'm really excited. And for the first few weeks, she was super into it. And then I forget exactly when she starts sending me these, like, increasingly distressed slack messages about just the amount and graphic nature of the rape on the show. And she. I don't remember if she stopped after episode eight or if she stopped after the. The end of season one, which was almost a year later. But at a certain point, she's like, this is too. I cannot do this.
- [46:54]
B
Yeah.
- [46:55]
A
And so I think that kind of speaks to what you're saying about how it's trying to combine these not necessarily conflicting elements, but these different elements together. And so sometimes you get chocolate in your peanut butter, and sometimes you get things where some. Where people like one taste and cannot abide the other.
- [47:11]
B
Although it is upsetting to think about the people who like the taste of the rape plots. They probably do. They probably do exist.
- [47:20]
A
The people who wrote Game of Thrones really liked it.
- [47:22]
B
Well, exactly, exactly. Yeah. I think that's a really common experience with this show. And the thing that it really has reminded me of is that Outlander has had this messy relationship with its source material. And from my perspective, the mess is that it is too close to that source material. I think Diana Gabaldon, these books are a phenomenon, and you cannot really discount how incredible this achievement of this series is for her. But they are also just. Oh, I mean, there's a lot that I think could have been edited in a quite different way, particularly as those books go on and their continued reliance on sexual violence as the thing that is driving the plot forward to me speaks to a thing that she needs to keep returning to for herself as an author that I do not think the audience needs to keep returning to for the audience of this series. And so if I had, if I had been able to design a perfect Outlander series, it would have. It would have drifted much farther from the original books than this series did. It does. It does depart in some important ways, particularly by the end, some particularly bananas ways, which we will be getting to in a second. But for me, it is a reminder of what I value in a TV adaptation, which is to be a good show that speaks to its audience first and be faithful to its source material. Like 7th and there's a bunch of other stuff in the middle.
- [49:08]
A
Yeah, I mean, there's. There's things that work in one medium that do not necessarily work in another medium. And I think a lot of shows run into this trouble. You know, Neil Gaiman is problematic for far, far more reasons than this. But, like a thing that did not
- [49:21]
B
know we were going there.
- [49:22]
A
But yes, okay, like the American Gods TV show.
- [49:25]
B
Yes.
- [49:26]
A
All of the good stuff in the American Gods TV show was whenever Bryan Fuller and the other people working on it were, like, took the ideas in Neil Gaiman's book and did something new with them. And anytime they were just straight off adapting it, it was like, tedious. And Neil Gaiman had Bryan Fuller pushed out because he's like, no, just adapt the book. That is all I want. And something that works on the page does not necessarily work on the screen. And we've seen that a lot over the years. And so without knowing, without having read the Gabaldon books, I certainly can agree with the larger concept.
- [49:59]
B
Yeah, well, having not seen really much of Outlander past that first season, I thought it might be fun to return to our Weeds related. And now you don't have to pretend that you like know what happened. You're just gonna guess based on plausibility and wildness. What?
- [50:19]
A
Please, fire away.
- [50:21]
B
Actually did happen in Outlander. And what things have I made up? Okay, so Claire's nemesis, the her would be rapist in the 18th century in Scotland looks exactly like her current day husband. True or false?
- [50:41]
A
True. You know it's Tobias Menzies.
- [50:42]
B
That Ibias Menzies. Yep, it's Tobias Menzies.
- [50:44]
A
Both Blackjack or something like that.
- [50:46]
B
His name is Blackjack Randall. And so that is something that the show is just like. Yes, they're exactly the same. She has to deal with that a lot. Claire is not the only time traveler on the show. Increasingly we find them littered about the landscape. And this would create a problem because if people are just time traveling back and forth, nothing makes any sense anymore. The they're so far from regular life that like, how could you ever even follow the events of history? And so the show event invents a complicated system of genetic time travel plus gemstone time travel currency in order to put pressure on the time travel. Which means that if you don't have the right gemstones, you can't actually go through the stone circle. So time travel doesn't happen that much.
- [51:42]
A
True or false? This is a true or false question.
- [51:44]
B
True or false?
- [51:47]
A
I'm gonna say false.
- [51:49]
B
That is false. But all of the gemstone situation is true as well as the fact that there are time travelers everywhere. The false element of it is that although they invent this complicated gemstone currency system, it never actually seems to affect everyone's ability to time travel at all. Gemstones just show up constantly whenever people need or don't need them.
- [52:13]
A
So it's like hidden immunity idols. Got it.
- [52:16]
B
Yes, sure. Exactly. And also somehow people just travel without them sometimes or they just happen.
- [52:22]
A
I like when shows have rules and then completely ignore them. That's the best.
- [52:25]
B
I agree. In seasons two and three, the show splits again because Claire is pregnant and does and Jamie decide and knows that Jamie is going to die at the Battle of Culloden. And so she gets sent back to the 20th century. True or false?
- [52:47]
A
True.
- [52:48]
B
This is true. This is what happens. She, in the 20th century, gives birth to their child whose name is Brianna. And Brianna then falls in love as an adult. We skip forward 20 years. Brianna Falls in love with Roger. And Roger and Brianna discover that Jamie did not actually die, which is why Claire has to go back in time to the 18th century. This is true. I'm just gonna give you that. That is what you.
- [53:21]
A
That Sounded like it had to be true.
- [53:23]
B
Yes. Here we go, though. In the 20th century, Roger traces where Jamie went to the United States, and then Brianna, for some reason, goes back to Scotland, and Roger follows her back to Scotland, and then he has to get on a boat. Boat that is captained by his great, great, great, great grandfather to then go back to America again. True or false?
- [53:50]
A
So they travel back in time, you're saying not just to Scotland, but past Scotland.
- [53:55]
B
Yes.
- [53:57]
A
False.
- [53:58]
B
You are correct that this is false. All of this is true. But it's not captained by his great, great, great great grandfather. It's captained by Brianna's future rapist, a villain name named Stephen Bonnet.
- [54:10]
A
Why are there so many rapists on this show?
- [54:13]
B
When Roger finally traces everyone back to where they are now, living in North Carolina, he is greeted by Jamie with open arms. Until Jamie discovers that Roger is a red coat or believes he is a red coat and then casts him out. True or false?
- [54:34]
A
False. True.
- [54:35]
B
This is false. Instead, Jamie believes that Roger is the person who raped Brianna and beats him to a pulp in the woods. And then they discover that Roger is actually Brianna's boyfriend. And then they have to trade one of their sons for a Mohawk in order to get Roger back for a.
- [54:52]
A
Like, an indigenous person or a Mohawk haircut.
- [54:55]
B
An indigenous person. They have to give the Mohawk one of their own other random sons that they have collected. Okay, true or false? They meet George Washington.
- [55:04]
A
True. Why are you even doing this if you don't meet George Washington?
- [55:07]
B
That is true. True or false? Claire invents and then becomes addicted to cocaine.
- [55:14]
A
She invented cocaine. I want that to be true.
- [55:19]
B
It's false. She invents and then becomes addicted to ether.
- [55:24]
A
I mean, that makes more sense. She's a nurse. Yeah. I don't like. Who is the inventor of cocaine? I'm going to ask. I'm going to ask Wikipedia later on.
- [55:32]
B
Well, who's the inventor of ether? It's Claire is the answer. Brianna brings Goodnight Moon back from the future, and Jamie reads it to his grandchildren. True or false?
- [55:43]
A
True.
- [55:44]
B
That is. That is true. The thing that Jamie complains about is that there are bears sitting on chairs. And he knows that that bears would never sit on the chairs. And indeed, in the next episode, someone is killed by a bear.
- [55:59]
A
Well, I mean, teddy bears didn't exist back then, so I understand about that. But that's. That's a nice one two punch right there. Set up punchline.
- [56:07]
B
Yep. And then finally, in the end, the child that Jamie and Claire miscarried in season two is discovered to have been alive this whole time and they are magically reunited, even though somehow she would have been born at like 20 weeks or something, and we fully saw them bury her in France.
- [56:33]
A
That's got to be true.
- [56:34]
B
This is false. They are not reunited. Instead, they are magically reunited with their granddaughter, who somehow knows a song from the 20th century which was taught to her by a nun who then took her in after her mother, who did survive somehow being born at 20th.
- [56:51]
A
I'm just. I need like this. This is like some Pepysilvia right here. Like, I need to see it all diagrammed out because I've completely lost the thread of what you are telling me.
- [57:01]
B
Yes, it is insane. It is one of the craziest things. It is a choice that has outraged most of the Outlander fandom and me as well. I don't know why they did it. It makes absolutely no sense. And. And it is completely unnecessary because it's not the thing anybody cared about relative to any of these characters. I have been raging about it for weeks. I. That is my Outlander. There are like a billion other things Brianna in. Brianna brought back the matches that burned their house down. Like, it just is.
- [57:31]
A
I will say, having heard this quiz and having heard what went on again, I did like the show when I watched it. I don't know that I'm feeling a burning desire to now. Like, oh, I. I was missing out. I should go back. All right, so I think thus I know the answer to the question, but I have to ask it anyway. Catherine, was the TV good this week?
- [57:51]
B
I think we're going to give it a mixed bag. Mixed bag on TV this week.
- [57:56]
A
All right, thank you for listening. When we are not podcasting, we are also writers. You can find me@whatsalan watching.com and you can find katherineulture.com I am at bluesky.
- [58:07]
B
I'm at cave and aaron@bluesky. And I'm on Instagram at Cave and Arandonk.
- [58:11]
A
I'm on Blue Sky Instagram and Threads Eppenwall and on Facebook @alencepinwall.
- [58:17]
B
As we mentioned before, please rate, review and subscribe. It really helps us both join, but then also, hopefully inevitably defeat the algorithm.
- [58:26]
A
And we hate the algorithm, but we love tv.
- [58:29]
B
We want to thank Joe Kennedy for our theme music, Kate Bergner for our artwork, and Riley Routh for editing.
- [58:35]
A
And thank you for listening.
- [58:42]
B
Foreign.
- [58:50]
A
Powers, the world's best podcasts. Here's a show that we recommend.
- [58:58]
B
What if you laughed all through your commute? Or if you heard the funniest story while at the gym. Well, now you can I'm Jameda Jamil, and guests on my new podcast, Wrong Turns, share their most mortifying and hilarious disaster stories. I'm talking people like May Martin, Bob the Drag Queen, Katherine Ryan, Jake Johnson, Margaret Cho, Simon Pegg, Penn Badgley, and so many more. So listen wherever you get your podcast. Wrong Turns where dignity goes to die
- [59:28]
A
Acast helps creators launch, grow and monetize their podcast everywhere. Acast.com
- [59:37]
B
aprobecha Los Ahoros de Memorial Day in Los y compra los vasicos parelo gar pormenos ahoro centadolares en la Parria's
- [59:45]
A
Char Broil Performance Series. A vacation rental shouldn't come with surprises.
- [60:08]
B
It should come with Verbo Care and 24.
- [60:09]
A
7 Life Support.
- [60:10]
B
If the hot tub's broken, that's a Verbo Care thing. If my teenager starts calling me Leslie,
- [60:14]
A
that's a family thing. Leslie Vrbo Care and 24. 7 Life Support. If you know you verbo terms apply. See vrbo.com trust for details.