Oneshot - The Completely Made-Up Adventures of Dick Turpin

[00:00:01] Okay, David, this is where we're supposed to choose a side. Green or black? John, my soul is as black as night. Your turn. I am black for life! So, we're not fighting? I thought this is where HBO wanted us to, like, pick sides and fight and stuff.

[00:00:24] Don't worry, I'm sure we'll find plenty to disagree about on the pod. But we seem to agree on one thing. We both really like this show. The politics, the drama, the lore! It was made for The Lorehounds.

[00:00:35] And since we just finished recapping season one, we couldn't be more ready to defend our black queen in the Dance of the Dragons.

[00:00:42] And with the season pass option in Supercast, listeners can get early ad-free access to each weekly scene-by-scene deep dive, plus our custom show guide with all the characters and connections. See you in The Lorehounds podcast feed each week for our Dragonfire Hot, but probably positive, takes.

[00:01:00] The Lorehounds House of the Dragon coverage is also safe for team green consumption. Side effects may include a deeper understanding of dragon lore, a heartened conflict with itself, and an inescapable urge to read the book Fire and Blood by George R.R. Martin. Dragon seeds may experience burning.

[00:01:23] Stand and deliver! We're The Lorehounds, and we're going to be your highway robbery crew for today. I'm David. And I'm Marilyn. And this is our pamphlet, otherwise known as a one-shot, of the completely made-up adventures of Dick Turpin, an original series starring Noel Fielding, still streaming on Apple+.

[00:01:50] In this podcast, we're going to start with a series synopsis and our spoiler-free hot takes.

[00:01:54] After our break, we're going to cover some of the highlights of the individual episodes, talk about some of the historical antecedents of both the life and the legend that is the real Dick Turpin, and then discuss one or two themes of the series.

[00:02:07] We'll wrap up with a little bit of listener feedback. Stick around to the end of the podcast for info about our upcoming schedule, as well as news and updates about all of our affiliate podcasts.

[00:02:19] If you are enjoying what we do and are interested in supporting the Lorehounds community, check us out on Supercast or Patreon. Supercast is like Patreon, but it's kind of built better for podcasters.

[00:02:31] And subscribers on either platform get early and ad-free podcasts, a bunch of other goodies, and we'll have a little bit more info about that at the end of the podcast. And if you want to get in touch with us, there are a couple of options.

[00:02:45] You can send emails to lorehounds at thelorehounds.com or head to our website and either use the voicemail feature or the contact form. We've also got a fun and active community on Discord. We've got a great mod team that helps keep things organized and working.

[00:03:02] We've got channels set up for all the different shows and projects that we've got going on. If you're looking for that virtual water cooler place to talk about your favorite shows, movies, books, things like that, join us over there.

[00:03:16] It's a really great place to interact with other human beings in this world dominated by AI. There's actually, we think, real people all over there. I don't know if we have an AI detector working yet, but everybody I've encountered there definitely seems to be three-dimensionally human.

[00:03:33] I think the Turing test is broken. I don't think it's going to actually work in large language models anymore. I hope somebody comes up with a new one quick then. Anyway, we're not here to talk about AI. We're here to talk about Noel Fielding and Dick Turpin.

[00:03:46] Anyway, Marilyn, how have you been? I know that you've been busy with your Rings and Rituals podcast. Hopefully, that has been going well. I think you guys are about to wrap up with your season. We have recorded the final season eight episode. You are a real podcaster.

[00:04:02] You've recorded a full series, a full season. That's amazing. Congratulations. Thank you. But wait, there's more. We have a bonus episode of music. John and I do. And then we're going to do an entire feedback episode at the very end.

[00:04:16] We have got some incredible feedback going on in my two, three, four paragraphs. Oh, great. We just said, look, we want to really give this the time and attention that it deserves. So we're going to love them all in there.

[00:04:29] Plus, because we were coming out every two weeks, the feedback never really chimed very well. Right, right, right. So we just said, okay, let's just scoop it all and put it here. Not to mention the two scholars to talk about Tolkien.

[00:04:42] You think you're not going to have enough material, and then suddenly it's an hour and a half, and you say, gosh, maybe we should just save the feedback for that final episode. So I make no promises for how long that's going to be, but settle in, get comfortable.

[00:04:56] It's a classic thing to say, oh, this will be a quick podcast. No, no, no, that's the curse. That's the curse of the Riddle Hag. And then we got some big news, at least Tolkien-wise, in terms of Rings of Power.

[00:05:12] We've got a couple of movies coming up, and I think you and John were talking about some of that as well. Lots more news. You're going to be co-hosting with us on all of Rings of Power this season. I am so excited about that.

[00:05:26] I'm just like a kid in a candy store. I get to see screeners! I get to see screeners! If we get them. If we get them. If the gods are not fickle. Yeah.

[00:05:36] But anyway, yeah, it'll be fun to have you with us on that so that we can really take it apart. There was some exciting news too about Rings of Power and good old Tom Bombadil. Tom Bombadil. He isn't an enigma.

[00:05:52] Tolkien said that specifically in one of the letters. And so, what I guess what showrunners who handed in an enigma could resist running with it. Yeah. And, you know, the sky's the limit in some senses.

[00:06:06] And of course, people who've only ever seen him in The Lord of the Rings and maybe read some of the poems about him, hopefully can let go of their very vivid and lovely and beloved images.

[00:06:20] Because, you know, you kind of wonder, well, he couldn't have been in the Withy Window for all of existence. Because otherwise he never would have gotten a name amongst the dwarves and a name amongst the humans and a name amongst the elves, right?

[00:06:33] So, he had to get out of there sometime. And I guess that's where they're starting from. I have a personal theory if you care to hear it. Well, maybe we should save it for a Lord of the Rings-themed podcast. Yes.

[00:06:47] Because we really should be talking about Dick Turpin. Dick Turpin. So, I was able to catch up. I watched all of the season originally with my wife and I watched it together. And then I was able to catch up through episode five up to yesterday.

[00:07:05] I wasn't able to finish six, but we've got a synopsis and you'll clue me in a little bit. But let's start with, we're going to keep it spoiler free up until the first break and then we'll start taking apart the episode.

[00:07:18] So, you know, if you want to, if you dear listener have not yet seen the series and you just want to get a sense of what this, you know, episode or what the season is about and whether you should devote any time to it or not,

[00:07:31] we can just kind of set you up with some ideas about what this season is. Mm-hmm. So, the log line or plot synopsis is, well, this is written by Robert Lloyd, a TV critic for the LA Times. Mm-hmm.

[00:08:08] When he accidentally kills the gang's leader, much to the gang's delight, he inherits the position, not quite taking charge of sensitive moose, played by Mark Wooten, enthusiastic honesty, played by Duane Bouchy, and skeptical Nell, played by Ellie White.

[00:08:25] They will later be joined by Craig the Warlock, Asim Chowdhury, and about as good at his job as they are at theirs. I'm not sure if I understood that last line necessarily.

[00:08:39] And we should definitely add that, oh, what's his name? Why am I blanking the actor's name? Hugh Bonneville. Hugh Bonneville, yes, has a lovely role in this one. And he's not in absolutely every episode, but he keeps coming back. He's a very important character in it. Absolutely.

[00:08:57] Some of the details on this, it's a six-episode season. All of them come in just around 30 minutes, so it's very light work. It's great filler things if you've just got a little bit of time to kill and you want something fun and light to watch.

[00:09:15] It looks like the ratings and reviews on Rotten Tomatoes were at 86%. And RogerEbert.com says, a bit too silly, which is perfect. Common Sense Media, I'm not sure you put this one in here. Is that a particular one that you know?

[00:09:33] I can't say that I have any experience with it, but I was just pulling through websites and looking at reviews and things and they said four out of five.

[00:09:41] So I just thought I'd throw it in there. It seems to be the sort of thing that the audiences enjoyed more than the critics. Got it. For what that's worth. For what it's worth, right. IMDb said seven out of 10.

[00:09:55] Let's start off with your general overall sense of the season. What did you think of this? What do you have to say in broad sense?

[00:10:06] Yeah, well I see it as an 18th century action fiction adventure with very strong and positive gay subculture. And that's one of the things I really love about it. Interesting, okay.

[00:10:16] They're not over the top with it. It's just there, it's part of the furniture, nobody winks or is aghast or anything else. And some of the things they do are just very, very funny.

[00:10:29] If you can in your mind imagine Monty Python marrying Horrible Histories, both of which are very funny British shows, you might have a sense of what this is all about, what it's like. I think it's whimsical rather than absurd or silly. Okay.

[00:10:45] And they put in a lot of mimicking of 21st century culture. They do, they really do. And they do it well. Yes, yes. They really seamlessly weave it into the gags. They do. You have condemned criminals having an AA style meeting.

[00:11:01] And you have Turpin offering a satisfaction survey to one of the people that he's just robbed so that next time he can make it a more pleasant experience. Oh, and problems with childcare crop up, right? Right, right.

[00:11:20] Crime syndicates, self-actualization, mindfulness and self-care. I mean, very, very 21st century concepts. Visually, it is substantial. They really spend a lot of time and energy, which is very appropriate for the 18th century.

[00:11:37] I loved seeing all their locations because they were familiar. Some very well-known castles and their London alleyways and things. Not that I've seen London alleyways in the 1700s, you understand, but still historical and yet bringing in, again, as I say, this 21st century sensibility.

[00:12:00] So it's just a whole lot of fun. And you can probably binge the whole thing, something around three hours if you want to. Right, if you wanted to. Yeah. What about you, David?

[00:12:11] I really enjoyed this. As I was mentioning to you before we got on the mics, my wife and I watched this together.

[00:12:19] We sort of have a Friday after we do some family time, we get our daughter off to bed and then we usually just kind of collapse in bed or on the couch and veg out together.

[00:12:30] It's our one sort of evening where we don't have any other responsibilities, just being in each other's company. And so we included this as one of our shows that we picked up. She was a little reluctant at first, but enjoyed it in the long run.

[00:12:47] And then I rewatched everything up to five in prep for us to record. And one of the things that I really noticed when I was doing my rewatches is how packed every episode is.

[00:13:01] It is absolutely stuffed to the gills with gags and the main storyline and then the little subplots that go on. It is just really, a half hour feels like 45 minutes or so in this episode length. There's loads of gags. They're all very funny.

[00:13:25] It's not evolutionary in the form of this style of comedy, but it's a great development of this style. And it's squarely within its genre and it really is on a nice edge in terms of mixing 18th century with, like you said, 20th century humor and gags.

[00:13:48] And that's not an easy thing to do, to zipper those two things together. So it really feels seamless. Like you said, the production values are great. The costuming is fantastic. It sure is. They have a lot of fun. They do some really great special effects.

[00:14:04] I was really surprised at the money that they threw into a couple, especially with the rattlehag episode, I think it was episode four. They did a bunch that I was really surprised by. The writing is funny and punchy.

[00:14:19] The gags play, they have gags that start at the beginning of an episode and then they don't resolve until the end of the episode. And then they're actually consequential. Yes, they keep recurring and you think, okay, well, yeah, and you understand why. And then something happens, it's great.

[00:14:37] And then they do this whole thing about the pamphlet. Without getting into spoilers, there's an author who's documenting the stories of Dick Turpin real time. And I think that pamphlet as a structure for the narrative, the overall narrative,

[00:14:56] and a way to connect a bunch of different aspects of the show was really smart. They've employed it really well. She's a great director who plays the part of the pamphlet writer. She's great. She's perfect for it. And I just think overall, it's a really smart show.

[00:15:14] So if you are a viewer, if you're somebody who enjoyed Monty Python or a lot of the Britcom stuff, I think you would really enjoy this. Or even if it's What We Do in the Shadows or some of these other half-hour sitcoms.

[00:15:33] I don't really watch The Office much or Parks and Rec. No, I don't know any of those. Yeah, but those are modern American versions of this, which are usually very smart writing with lots of good gags and lots of great characters. John is always quoting different shows.

[00:15:51] I think you would be somebody, if you like those, I think you would really enjoy this. Because the humor is very relatable. Well, also if you're interested in history, and particularly history of this period, there's a ton of historical fiction shows that occur around this time.

[00:16:08] I like the way they are being historically accurate with some of their things. I mean, you mentioned the pamphlets. Right, yeah. Pamphlets were a huge deal in the 17th and 18th centuries. The 18th century version of a podcast. Seriously.

[00:16:22] I mean, the various revolutions, including in this United States and later with England and later in France, were formed around pamphlets. Interesting. Pamphlets being written and printed and shared and sedition and all kinds of things. So yeah, it was definitely a thing. Bloggers of their day, right. Absolutely.

[00:16:42] They were often polemical, they were vulgar, they were satirical, and almost inevitably they became political. I remember learning, the first time I learned about pamphlet culture, and I don't know that much, but I remember learning something around the early American Revolutionary period or post.

[00:17:03] And the fact that these different factions and political parties, I think it was post, I think it was still early in American history. I'm just trying to place the time in my mind and it's hard to. Sure.

[00:17:14] But anyway, just that these different factions and political parties and political leaders basically all had printing presses. And they could crank out their point of view on stuff constantly. And it's like we say, there's nothing new under the sun again.

[00:17:37] Fine, it's just bits and ones and zeros going out across the fiber optic lines, but still the same idea where, hey, I've got a point of view and I'm going to be pushing it out, trying to get as wide an audience as I can.

[00:17:50] Yeah, the methods change, but the content and the intention remain the same. And it's also useful to realize that this reflects the rise of literacy generally, because if you don't have enough people who can read, what's the point? That's a very good point.

[00:18:04] You can find other less expensive ways of spreading your word around. Standing on a soapbox in the corner of a park. Right. There were pamphlets on Dick Turpin. And they started immediately after his execution, which doesn't occur in this series. I will spoil that right now.

[00:18:21] But they didn't really start appearing until the 18th century. But he became this folk hero. He was popular. He had pop culture. Pop culture. There were pamphlets, broadsheets, ballads. I think there was even dramatic dramas on stage. Oh, sure. I'm sure. Right. Yeah.

[00:18:44] Shows and the whole nine yards, I'm sure. And the ultimate accolade, Madame Tussauds made waxwork in 1846. Well, that's cool. I actually didn't realize that this series is so rooted in real history, which actually gives the show even some more dimensionality. Because if they're actually plucking real historical things,

[00:19:05] either real history or mythological history, I guess you could say. Like if you took something like a metal hag, which is mythic, but it occurred in that time. That's when people had it in mind and talking about it.

[00:19:18] That's all great stuff because it actually roots the show in something. And then for folks who do know, you have an extra dimension of historicity that it's fun to play with. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, the fact that Dick Turpin was born in Hempstead

[00:19:34] and he was known for deer poaching with the Essex gang. They got involved with him because he was the son of a butcher. I mean, all these different details that they're weaving in. Yeah. They're getting very, very granular about this.

[00:19:48] The more you look, the more fun it is. And that's what's great too, is to know that the writers have done what good writing room and good writers on a show can do, is that they can mine all of this richness and then weave and weave and weave.

[00:20:10] It's very cool. And they're even bringing in some 18th century gay subculture. We can talk about details as we go along through the episode. Give me one second here. I gotta pause.

[00:20:23] All right. So one of the things that we like to do a little bit on our one shots is have some consistency of things that we talk about in form and structure from episode to episode. One of the things that we have is our analytics section.

[00:20:39] We have the Shippey test, the Lopez test, the Sanderson slider, the Pequila scale for violence. I don't think any of them apply in this case. This is a wholly original work.

[00:20:49] The violence is probably like a, the Pequila scale is what? Like a negative three, negative two, negative three? Negative five. Right. There's some firing of guns and people get shot from time to time, but it's all very comical. And an ear hanging. Yes, that's right.

[00:21:10] And then just quickly a note on the cast. The center of this show is Noel Fielding. Oh, absolutely. And if you don't know Noel, then you might have seen him on the Great British Baking Show. He's one of the current co-hosts of the show.

[00:21:31] I think he's like the third round of hosts, but he's been there for now a couple of seasons and it feels like he's sticking in, which is really great. There's another great Britcom called The IT Crowd, and he plays a very funny bit part, a recurring character.

[00:21:46] He plays like this vampire creature that lives in the server room. It's very funny. Very different from a bug. And then I know him from another show even older than that called The Mighty Boosh, which is... Oh yeah, I saw that. What is that? It's a weird...

[00:22:06] You know, before YouTube, this is, I don't know how they got this greenlit, but it's about this band. And it's a very bizarre show. You just actually have to watch it to understand it. They did three seasons, and I think you can see...

[00:22:24] It was on Netflix for a while. You could probably find some stuff on YouTube, but if you want to go back into Noel Fielding's roots, he's been a fixture in British TV for quite a while now.

[00:22:35] And then of course we have Hugh Bonneville, who most of us know from Downton Abbey. He was in a great TV show that was one of my top 10 shows called The Gold. Right. The other year back, and he plays a hardened police detective.

[00:22:52] And yeah, I don't know what else I've seen Hugh Bonneville much in. Hopefully he's getting around a little bit more. But like we said, he plays a very funny character in this, very important character. Extremely well done.

[00:23:03] I think one of the real challenges of something like this is for the actors to maintain their clear believability and everything that's going on. Not break in any sense, not break the fourth wall by turning and winking at the audience or anything like that. They really maintain...

[00:23:24] They go all in on the gag. Every actor commits to every gag and bit wholeheartedly. In some fairly trying circumstances. The character Moose does some, there's some Mark Wooten, there's some really over the top performances. But that character is over the top. Exactly.

[00:23:42] If he didn't commit to the bit, it'd be half. But because they are soup to nuts in bones to I don't know what are all the different phrases to say fully committed. They're all extremely fully committed. Definitely.

[00:23:59] I loved the fact that this was going on around the same time as Shogun. Because I really got a Shogun vibe from the outfit that Moose eventually winds up with. Thanks to Dick. And he's actually even using a staff. Right, yes, yes.

[00:24:15] At one point. So I just, I really wonder if this was intentional on the part of the showrunners or not. All right, well let's take a quick break and then when we come back, we're going to skip through the six episodes.

[00:24:25] We'll give a little synopsis, sort of point out some of our funny, our favorite moments from it. And then you've got some more historical notes that we can talk about.

[00:24:36] We've talked about a bunch of them, but we can get into a few more of the themes and details. We'll kind of salt them into the different episodes. That sounds good to me. Okay, great. So hang on. We'll be right back. And we're back.

[00:24:58] All right, Marilyn, why don't you lead us through the conversation space here from episode to episode. And you can just take us through the little plot synopsis for the episode. And then we'll talk a little bit about each one.

[00:25:13] Sounds good. So episode one, a legend is born, sort of. A vegan son of a butcher in Hampstead decides to be a stylish highwayman with creativity. He inadvertently kills a notorious gang leader and inherits the gang, who rescue him from being hanged by Jonathan Wilde, a crooked thief-taker.

[00:25:34] The aim of this new highwayman is less violence, more charm, maybe even panache. Which really sets the whole tone of the gay subculture I was talking about. Okay. You know, it's just, it's really there. And again, all the historical details.

[00:25:54] Jonathan Wilde was a crooked thief-taker and he wound up getting hung. Really? Really. Tom King was a real highwayman who wound up getting shot. The first date that we see on this screen is 1735, which was the date I believe that the Essex gang was broken up.

[00:26:14] So that's kind of an interesting choice. But don't know if it has any meaning or not. And the hired mourner, that was a historical practice. That was a great gag. Yeah. They took this historical fact and they just transformed it into this amazing comic turn, if you will.

[00:26:39] So the structure of the first episode, which is this, he has the dream and then he's on the gallows. And then we're reviewing everything backwards sort of from there. Yeah.

[00:26:53] I thought it was a really good and smart way to front load the episode and then sort of front load the season. So that we had a momentum and a pace to run through for these episodes.

[00:27:10] So it's like they called out the destination and they gave us a little glimpse of what that was all about. And then we just sort of had a bunch of momentum that carried us through all the episodes. So I thought it was a really smart setup.

[00:27:24] And we get one of our first characters who gets dropped in a little while and then disappears and then comes back again later and then disappears in Jeffrey the jailer. Yes. Right. Who is treating his entire experience of the people on the bus as if it's us.

[00:27:42] As a coachman. As a coachman, right. Instead of the prison coach on their way to the hanging because Dick is being hung with a bunch of other people at the same time supposedly.

[00:27:51] So they stop for a toilet break and he says make sure you take all your belongings with you. Anybody who is not back at this time will be left behind. Right.

[00:28:03] If you've ever been on one of the British buses, you'll know it's exactly the same set of statements and routines and warnings and all the rest of it which in and of itself is really funny.

[00:28:14] And then we get that little 12 step group session with all these other criminals as they're introducing themselves to each other. Yes, yes, yes. I'm Dick Turpin. Hi Dick. Yeah.

[00:28:29] I will say that going back to the professional mourners and then the gag of I've got a boy in very low spirits. Yeah. They're really funny. But that whole thing, that particular gag, I don't know why but it struck me as a very Monty Python-esque gag.

[00:28:51] Yes, I agree. And when it hit that note, I was sort of, hmm, you know, I'm going to see, I'm going to wait and see.

[00:29:00] And then when, oh, I've got a, well, you know, if you don't like her and you don't like her, then I've got a boy with very low spirits over here.

[00:29:07] It was very funny and I was like, okay, if they can maintain this kind of quality of writing and setups, then I'm really going to enjoy this. So I think they signaled to me very early on the kind of quality that they were establishing.

[00:29:24] And it never, it never wavered. Like we were saying before, they were always committed to their bits. They were very smart about them and right from the beginning, you just, I felt that they're really confident. They really know what they're doing.

[00:29:39] And the pacing is excellent. It moves along briskly but you never feel pushed. You always have time to understand what's going on but there's, you know, there's very little lag time in all this.

[00:29:48] So you have a little Karen who is an eight year old tender of the pub, which is called The Failure. The little Karen character is great. The actor who plays her is so fabulous.

[00:30:02] She has the right amount of sort of moral authority and dominion over these adults, but then they'll go, oh, but you're just a kid. And they're like, yeah, she's like, you can't do that to your child.

[00:30:13] Really good. So in episode one, we really meet most of everyone, all except for Nell's mother. Right. And the syndicate. Yeah. And the syndicate, but then they play that off nicely, but we get our primary characters and the recurring people.

[00:30:30] And then we get that first recurring gag, which is the wagon wheel. Right, right. Which takes out Hugh Bonneville at the end, which is just perfect. Quite nicely. Quite nicely. Yes, the whole hanging scene is very good.

[00:30:43] Again, historically accurate in terms of, yes, the market square is thronged with people who want to jeer and throw rotten vegetables and so forth. Right. It's spectacle. It's entertaining.

[00:30:54] It is a spectacle. And the upper class guy there with his nose gay and saying, this is a hanging, get on with it kind of thing. And then I think they left him dangling. I mean, there's nothing gory or horrible about it.

[00:31:06] But he does, they actually do give him the drop and he's hanging below the platform out of sight of anybody while his gang is fumbling around trying to rescue him. I think he must have had a stone to be standing on that length of time.

[00:31:22] But they may also have given him what's historically known as the short drop. Meaning if the rope isn't long enough to give you a really sharp jerk to break your neck right away, you just dangle there and strangulate.

[00:31:35] And that can take up to half an hour or more depending. Wow. Okay. Yeah. So again, historical accuracy. It's just astonishingly funny. And it is at that hanging that the wagon wheel goes off. Yeah.

[00:31:49] And Turpin says, shouldn't we tell somebody about that? I mean, that's a hazard that is. Right. We see it rolling through several more scenes. Yeah.

[00:31:59] And then finally, we should talk about the fact that Jonathan Wilde, Thief Taker, is also currently the parent in charge of young Christopher, his son, who is what, eight, ten years old maybe? Yeah.

[00:32:11] And they're having to take him with him on all his work because they've lost their childcare. Well, they set this up great when he's first interacting with Dick Turpin after he's taken over the gang. Right.

[00:32:25] And he says, you know, having this very serious negotiation with, and then Christopher keeps interrupting his dad. Dad, look, I found a dead wolf!

[00:32:33] Yeah, exactly. And I can say as a parent who had a working parent who lived through the pandemic with a child at home, that this is true and accurate. This is exactly what's going on.

[00:32:46] I was thinking of you, David. I was thinking of you and your daughter. I was thinking of John and his children. Anyone, not just parents, anybody who's a caregiver of small children will totally relate to this.

[00:32:57] And then so when, of course, at the end, when Christopher is trying to point out the wagon wheel that's bearing down on his dad, it's a perfect setup. Yes, it absolutely is. Very, very funny.

[00:33:10] And then like with the childcare too, as you said, it's very 20th century, right? So again, weaving in these things.

[00:33:14] Yeah, yeah, yeah. So the other historical figures, Tom King, the former leader of the Essex gang who Trippin accidentally kills, historical figure. And I think I said this already. Sorry, Jonathan Wilde was an actual thief taker.

[00:33:29] Yeah. So that, that counts. Favorite lines. Dick inadvertently discovers that there's a secret passage in the pub. Oh yes. And Karen, little Karen says, well, of course you didn't know if you did, it wouldn't be secret. Right.

[00:33:47] And Dick then says, I wish I had a secret passage. And little Karen says, that sounds weird. And Dick says, yes, you're right. That does sound weird.

[00:33:56] And then later when Jonathan Wilde says, well, if everybody knew about it, it wouldn't be so secret. And then Dick Turpin says, that's what I said. And then it's this whole thing of them, you know, oh, we're not so different.

[00:34:10] We're not so different, which when we are in the London scene that sort of plays out a bunch as well. So yeah, they're even within episodes, across episodes, they're seeding little hooks that they can play with later on. So you don't have to watch any of these back to back. You can watch them completely at your whim, but there's always going to be something that's going to glue. There's going to be a little bit of glue to carry them all together.

[00:34:37] They stitch them together. And we also pick up at this point that Wilde is a corrupt thief taker, because he tells Turpin if you give me 95% of your profits, then I will tell you which coaches to rob and when and so on. And Dick says, no, I think I'd rather just do it on my own, Dick. And that's when he makes the enemy.

[00:34:58] And the line of you and whose army? Yes. This army, and you see them all marching up in their red coats and their white trousers and their muskets and all. Should we move on to the unrobable coach?

[00:35:13] Oh, yes. This is where we meet Craig the Warlock with his panic attacks and his inhaler. And I mean no disrespect to people who actually do have panic attacks or inhalers. I can't say for sure. I mean, I thought it was funny, but I don't have panic attacks or inhalers.

[00:35:27] Right. Just so people know that that is a thing. You know who else we meet is Linda the Dog Walker. But anyway, carry on with your synopsis. By the secret hideout who waves at them every morning. Everybody knows Linda the Dog.

[00:35:43] So then after that, we experience the Highwayman's Night at the pub. Yes. And encounter the Hellhounds, who by the name you can tell are probably the meanest, nastiest. The tougher game. Number one, they have a ratings plaque on the side. A silent rating bank.

[00:36:01] Everybody goes up and down each week according to whatever they did or didn't do. Don't ever get as low as the Doobie Brothers. You won't be happy. So the leader of the Hellhounds is astounded to see Nell with this motley crew and calling Dick the leader.

[00:36:18] Because Dick is sitting there knitting a balaclava and little Karen is bringing him peppermint tea with a little dash of honey in it. So he tells Nell he's just he's ashamed to see her amongst these reprobates and come join my gang.

[00:36:37] But in the end, the Essex gang manages to win her back and at the same time break the curse of the unrobable coach. So this is what I was saying before about all of these episodes are super packed.

[00:36:49] So we have Craig, we have the introduction and set up for Craig the warlock. We have the whole pub culture thing and the culture of the highway robbery crews. We get the whole Hellhound tryouts that they have.

[00:37:07] And we have the unrobable coach all wrapped up into a single episode. It is an absolutely, I don't know how they pack this much. The writing is so efficient. Yes. And the storytelling is so on point that it's amazing that it all sticks together, but it really does.

[00:37:24] It's beautifully choreographed and some pieces reach forward into the future and so forth. The thing with the unrobable coach being that if you try to rob it, you become the coachman.

[00:37:37] Right. Oh, and then they have to go on a side quest to get the things to be able to rob the coach. Right. They have to get the magic mittens that the evil Duke made to hold on to the diamond and not be trapped by it.

[00:37:50] They supposedly have them. And so the Hellhound leader says, right, I'll have those. Only of course, because we saw Dick knitting balaclavas. And we did get a glimpse of what the actual mittens were like. We can see, all right, there's something going on here.

[00:38:05] And of course, Dick has knitted mittens for him to use. And therefore, he's now trapped in the unrobable coach and condemned to drive past the same tree at midnight all the time and so on and so on. Until Dick knows he has to get the mittens.

[00:38:22] And so they have to go to the tomb of this Elizabethan Duke who set up the curse in the first place because his wife was killed because of this emerald the size of a monkey's fist. And they even have a monkey standing there making a fist.

[00:38:35] So you can do size comparison and say, yes, it really is. And so we see Dick Turpin, the marriage counselor, because the ghost of the Duke comes and is going to damn them to perpetuity.

[00:38:48] And then his wife shows up and says, oh, will you please just let it go? And Dick is saying to the Duke, just listen to what she really wants. And to the Duchess, I understand. I know you've been waiting all along. She doesn't want huge diamonds.

[00:39:05] She just wants your attention. Again, classic. Classic 21st century negotiating. And I think this is where the character of Dick Turpin really starts to make sense for me in that he fumbles and does these things that cause all these problems.

[00:39:28] So he's the one who accidentally gets honesty trapped into being the coachman and gets them in trouble with the ghost of the guy who laid the curse. But then he's just being himself in the moment. And he's offering this sort of marriage counselor advice.

[00:39:51] And that seems to win the day. And for me, that's when it really started to resolve that here's this guy, here's our Dick Turpin in the television show, Newell Fielding, who's just sort of leading with his heart out of his chest. Nice.

[00:40:07] And that's going to cause a whole bunch of problems. But in the end, it's going to resolve a whole bunch of problems because Dick Turpin is being who he is, Dick Turpin. Yeah. And that honesty and that authenticity of who he is. And he never questions himself.

[00:40:24] He never has a moment of a sort of a dark night of the soul moment like, what am I doing? Is this really me? No, he's just so happy in and of himself and just bumbling through the world.

[00:40:34] And that's going to cause misadventure, but it's also going to solve and resolve a bunch of conflict for people.

[00:40:40] And this is what he brings to the two guys in the gang, particularly to Moose, who is very doubtful of himself, has all kinds of desires that don't match his profession at this point. So suddenly Dick, who is a fabulous...

[00:40:54] And he's supposed to be, Moose is supposed to be the heavy in the gang. Right. So he's suddenly whipping up these new outfits for all of them.

[00:41:00] And Moose is just thrilled because he has this sort of very flowy robe sort of thing that looks like the samurai robe, you know.

[00:41:09] And at the time he's dancing with May Day ribbons and just really loves having Dick give him permission to let this softer side of him come out. Even as he's also still a highwayman and holding people at gunpoint. Exactly.

[00:41:28] But he just, Dick is his guru and his friend and his companion and all these things. Honesty too, I mean, he dresses up all the gang and Nell is still, Nell is a skeptical one.

[00:41:40] She knows what a real highwayman is and she's aspired to that all her life. But without Nell and without Nell's skepticism, without that sharp relief between her and the other characters. I mean, so honesty is a little bit clueless in a lot of ways. Very straightforward.

[00:41:58] And Moose is supposed to be the heavy, but he's devoted to Dick. But then so is honesty. Oh yeah. If we didn't have a skeptic in the group, then it would be too sweet. It's like when you eat something too sweet. Oh yeah.

[00:42:15] There's no contrast and then it becomes sickly after a while. And Nell's constant, and then of course they make fun of Nell all the time with it. But her skepticism creates the tension that makes it all a little bit more palatable.

[00:42:31] So by the time Dick is finished, we have three of the four being cross-dressing. Right. Because Nell is dressed as a man and was trying to insist, well I am a man. And they said, no you're not. That's true, I forgot that she starts out that way.

[00:42:45] See this is what I mean. It's all there if you have the eyes to see it. You know, and I'm just enjoying it for what it is, for the surface level gag stuff. Which is great.

[00:42:57] And yet, with Moose it's a little bit more clear, but then yeah, no, I see where you're driving now. I didn't realize that that was actually operating in there. And honesty is the leather guy. Right. It all fits.

[00:43:11] In the very beginning, Nell is saying, look you guys, I should be the leader. Not this very peculiar person who doesn't know anything about highway robbery. And they say, okay go ahead, shall we go for lunch or shall we go look for a robbery agent?

[00:43:27] She said, oh what a hard decision. Let's see, lunch would be great because I'm really hungry. So we see that Nell has a weakness too. Yeah, right. So they all have their personal challenges to work with somehow. Should we move on to episode three? Yes, indeed.

[00:43:44] So this is where if we haven't, I think we did get intimations of this beforehand, but it turns out that there is a crime syndicate and Wilde is working for them. Right.

[00:43:56] And he is now in the hot seat because he allowed the Essex gang to steal gold from the syndicate. And so the syndicate is led by a woman who tells him that he better get that gold back

[00:44:11] or he's going to have trouble breathing because he will have lost his head. And so Wilde goes chasing after the gang and literally chains himself to dick when they catch up. And then suddenly, they are confronted with other members of the syndicate

[00:44:27] who kind of would like to step into Wilde's shoes. Great gag. And so for the rest of the episode, they're being chased around by these two syndicate members and they're chained together literally as well as figuratively and have to figure out a way to work together to survive.

[00:44:43] And I say they develop a new closeness, but take that with lashings of salt. So I think it's between this one and episode four that would be my favorite episode of the season. I would agree with that.

[00:45:04] And one of the things that I really liked, because one is just getting us into the world, two is developing everybody a little bit, and then right away they take us into London and amplify all the stakes. They put us in a new place. They introduce Honesty's family.

[00:45:25] The Whisper Network. Yes, the Whisper Network. Which shouts across the square. And then the whole thing with Moose and Christopher and their little side adventure. It really just does a whole bunch. And then of course, obviously introducing the syndicate to us

[00:45:41] and then setting up Wilde's ultimate, what's going to bring him down ultimately. So again, super packed, but great tempo. And it elevated the whole season up a notch where now there's some tension and now there's stakes and there's really things going on.

[00:46:02] Yeah, and you'll notice we mentioned Christopher because Wilde brought him along. Yes. I don't remember if it's this episode, but at some point he talks about, well of course I'm bringing my son because he's going to inherit the business

[00:46:14] and he has to start learning early and so on and so on. But Moose winds up being his friend, caretaker, whatever you want to call it. And they just really have a marvelous time in London together. It's a lot of fun.

[00:46:30] Oh, and Christopher has made the trading card. Yes, right. Again, another 21st century detail there. And this is the one that opens with Dick taking a customer satisfaction survey. After the robbery. Actually during the robbery, right? Yeah. And Honesty Inside Dick's Head. Yes, that was really great.

[00:46:55] And we got to see Honesty actually develop as a character a little bit more. There's this very intuitive tracker and can actually track Dick across the entire city of London. Oh, was this the one too or was it in... I think it was.

[00:47:11] Wasn't it this one with all the Dick jokes? No, that was episode two. No, that was episode two. The Dick jokes. The never-ending Dick jokes. I want that Dick in my hand and Christopher is snorting with laughter. Oh, grow up, Christopher. Really good. Really good. That was excellent.

[00:47:32] Now being dragged along with Dick and just hating it. Right. That this totally off the wall incomprehensible method is working. Yeah, right, right, right, right. With honesty, yeah. It's good. I think the chemistry between Fielding and Bonneville is great in this episode. And Bonneville is playing it so...

[00:47:57] He really is. He's as committed to the gag as everyone else. He is. Noel is just playing himself in the 18th century, right? That's Noel Fielding, right? Yes, yes, yes. But that's his charm is what is funny. And for Hugh Bonneville, who's this very serious and heavyweight actor,

[00:48:15] to see him just commit to these ridiculous gags and pal around with Fielding in London and doing all this silly stuff, it was a really great vibe. I really enjoyed the silliness that those two... And then of course there's the line that Bonneville says

[00:48:36] when he's talking about, oh, well, I'm just trying to survive. And he says, all that remains is the evil that men must do to survive. Yeah, yeah. And then I forget, I wish I wrote down the gag after that.

[00:48:49] But then there's a, oh, he's stitching him up with... Yes. Because he's got his shot in the arm. Yeah, yeah. And then Noel's like, okay, all done, let's go. And they sort of go off. But so there's this heaviness and this lightness in the same moment.

[00:49:03] It's just really such a well-balanced script. Yeah, they realize they need to take on some costume disguises because the two syndicate members are after them. So they walk out from the closet and there's Hugh in this peasant cap and trousers and leather jacket, whatever.

[00:49:22] And Noel is dressed as Sally Fielding, Juanita the Nun, but like the flying nun with the really massive head cap with the white wings kind of thing and bright, bright pink habit. Juanita O'Malley. Olay, let us pray. Nun by day, bullfighter by night.

[00:49:46] And then we see a little bit of historical London in the underground fight pits. Right, right. That was the thing too, because of course it was illegal. Gentlemen could go to boxing seminars and they could box bare fist and have fights and things.

[00:50:00] But this mad Sally or whatever it was with the massive clothing. Right. In which they lose the gold then afterwards. They lose the gold because they place a huge bet on her and unfortunately her bones are too brittle and they just sweep her up off the floor afterwards.

[00:50:16] Let's talk about episode four, Curse of the Rattle Hag. Yes, this of course, witches here. Alicia, if you're listening, I think you'll love this one. Craig the warlock interrupts his license exam. Oh my God, such a fun gag.

[00:50:34] And helps remove the rattle hag from the village of Hampstead after Dick and the gang have released her from Jeffrey the jailer's carriage. Dick discovers he can lay the most colorful eggs imaginable. And we see a remarkably sus witch trial. Which by the way, they mostly were anyway.

[00:50:52] So that again, very historical. Right, right. And the way she demonstrated it was quite funny. The jury, which is clearly biased. Right. And the one person who is judge, prosecutor and forget the defense because clearly she's a witch because we said she is.

[00:51:11] All of that representation of sadly a lot of historical fact. But just brilliantly presented and very, very funny. Yeah, I loved the magical exam for his license. Oh, that was a real. 712th time, I think.

[00:51:26] So what is the real or where did is the rattle hag a thing? I just assumed that that would be it would have been some sort of story or mythology. Is that does it have a historical root? I don't know of any. I did. Interesting. The name.

[00:51:49] The one place that they make up that potentially they made up was the one thing that I thought that would have been historical. Yeah, would have been accurate in some way. Well, I mean, which persecutions in England ended around 1716?

[00:52:00] Actively, I'm sure that there were still people who believe in witches and if anybody was accused, I don't think it would have been a happy event. But it had been fading out for a while now in the fringes of Europe and the North American colonies.

[00:52:14] It went on a little bit longer than that. Right. But still plenty of stories around to tell in Darkened Nights. And the whole process of the so-called trial, if they were fortunate enough to have one, you know, not as funny and not as many gags,

[00:52:29] but in essence, the same thing. And there were men because I think they were almost always men who went around and were witch hunters as a profession. Wow. Okay. Yes. And as a profession, you know, stood at the trial of these women and men.

[00:52:47] Let's get rid of one myth here. It wasn't only women who were accused. Okay. In fact, in Iceland, 90% of the witch accusations were against men rather than women. So there's a lot of stuff out there in the universe about what happened during the witch trials,

[00:53:03] which much of it is made up or misunderstood. Okay. The fact that they brought it in though, I think, was a good historical piece. Okay. We just have to be careful and not say rattlehag 27 times. I'm not sure what our count is up to.

[00:53:18] Oh dear, I didn't start to count. No. Well, we're in two different spaces, so I think both of us have to say it 27 times. Okay. The R word. That was a really good gag. It was a superb gag. And when they said that and they set it up,

[00:53:34] I'm like, oh, how are they going to pull this off? And they did. And it worked really well. Beautifully. Beautifully. And the fact that the rattlehag would suck your soul out and you'd become a chicken. Right. And so they start that, and so Dick becomes a chicken.

[00:53:47] And my reference to the color Dick Chirpin or Chick Turpin, they went back and forth between the two. You know they had fun writing that. Of course they did. But those eggs took me right back to 1960s psychedelic posters. Okay. Yeah. I mean, they were just stunningly,

[00:54:06] and to watch Noel fielding after he was restored to his usual state give birth to an egg. Give birth to an egg. And also, I loved the scene. Dick's examiner actually comes, I'm sorry, Craig's examiner actually comes along with them

[00:54:22] as they're trying to get rid of the rattlehag. And she said, okay, because he's failing miserably on his tests. And so the guys rush in and say, hey, you've got to help us rescue Dick. And he says, guys, I'm busy. I'm in the middle of an exam.

[00:54:36] And the examiner says, oh, no, this will be a wonderful way to test your capacity. Come on, let's go. So this becomes his exam. But in the end, the examiner does have to restore Dick. And what I love is they don't even try to show this.

[00:54:50] They show the reaction of everybody, of the audience, and how horrific this transformation is. How horrible it is. And classic Alfred Hitchcock move, right? You don't show the thing that's frightening. You show people's reactions to the thing. And then your own imagination takes over.

[00:55:07] Our imagination is more powerful than whatever they could show us on screen. Absolutely. And then all the reactions and everybody having to react blindly. So how many takes did they have to do to get just that right? Yeah, it was really good. Yeah.

[00:55:24] And of course, the trial itself also being, of course, massively Python-esque. Yeah, right. In fact, I'm not sure about what they probably said. All right, let's start with this one and then move it up three levels. But the depiction of the character, the Riddle Hag,

[00:55:39] how she was clearly a mad witch and loved evil and all the rest of it. And so she and Nell, because she was defending her at the trial, and Dick because he just showed up and did weird things, are all now on the stage

[00:55:56] with Spike there waiting to be burned. And Dick tries to persuade her, you know, you don't really want us to die, do you? And she's like, oh, well, I suppose not. Your souls are safe with me. And one of them says, really? She's like, of course not, donuts!

[00:56:13] I'm pure evil! She was great. She was really good. And as you say, the special effects were really pretty extraordinary. They put in a lot, yeah, for a show of this caliber to put in the amount of special effects with the Riddle Hag flying around

[00:56:31] and the flame and all that, that was pretty good. And the flies and the lasers and stuff coming out of our eyes. Right in the middle of the 18th century, you know, small town with chickens running around and pens for the livestock and all the rest of it.

[00:56:48] I'm not sure if this one or, like I said, or London was my favorite. There's a lot that I liked. I think the London is my favorite just because of the Fielding Bottle Vale dynamic. I think so too. But the Riddle Hag is the Riddle Hag herself

[00:57:06] is such a funny character. Oh, she's great. You know, the whole, yeah, come on Donuts, I'm pure evil. Or when she was in there and they were trying to give her a drink. Hey, like chill out and all you need is some company

[00:57:22] and some people to be really honestly interested in you. And then of course they serve her what did you say, generic lager? It sets her off. Little Karen says, well, better change the barrel again. Well, and of course in London in a small town

[00:57:38] you're not expected to be served or in England, you know that you want some local ale. That's unique to the place. Yeah. And Little Karen, I guess this is the next one when Craig has had to give up the warlocking and find a job with Little Karen.

[00:57:58] He puts frogs in the drinks. Oh, right. She goes to the back and says, oh, excuse me. Very good. Well, let's talk about episode number five. Yes. Episode five. Tommy Silversides, there's a new hiring man in town. And this I'll just comment that this episode five and six,

[00:58:18] episode five leads into episode six directly. Right. So this is the setup for the to resolve the season. Part one and two. He manages to wrest the gang away from Dick's leadership with his panache and his kidnapping skills. So, yes, the it's all about the image, isn't it?

[00:58:41] Yeah. Right. It's all about the classic tropes of the guy riding along alone on a horse shooting off both his guns, leaping up off the horse in the tree and somersaulting down and all the rest of it. And he impresses the heck out of this family,

[00:58:58] father, mother and daughter who have paid money to have the Dick Turpin tour so that they can see how he can be personally robbed by Dick Turpin himself. That was a great little bit. What do you mean he's not here? Well, he's signing some pamphlets.

[00:59:14] And so in burst, Tommy Silversides and said, I am your new hiring. And so he kisses the woman and he lifts all their jewelry in fantastically clever ways and so on and so on. He has flowing blonde hair and this silvery blue outfit

[00:59:32] and is quite the eye catcher. And then there's a little episode in which we learn that it's Nell's mom who is the leader of the syndicate. Right. Yeah. And, you know, throughout the six episodes, I kept thinking the two actors who are playing pamphlet writer

[00:59:47] and Nell's mother look remarkably similar. But it was two different names. So, I mean, I did look that up so that wasn't the same person. That would have been an extra interesting little twist, but they didn't go there. Yeah, this one, I think was my least favorite.

[01:00:03] It just kind of, you know, I didn't I get the Tommy Silversides character and I understand what they're doing with it. And I just I don't the humor didn't grab me as much. And I did really feel like, OK, this one is just, you know,

[01:00:20] linking setting up and linking us to the to the resolution of the series or the season. And yeah, I don't know. It was it was fine. It was I mean, I like the bits with Nell's mom and, you know, getting getting all that kind of stuff set up.

[01:00:35] But yeah, otherwise, Tommy Silversides. Yeah, it was just fine. I mean, all the gags were still good and everything was great. My least it intrigued me the least, I should say. Yeah, I'm I I like Broadway musicals to be in Broadway. With apologies again to Alicia.

[01:00:53] I'm just not a fan of plopping right into the middle of everybody suddenly burst into song. And I'm like, all right, fine, whatever. And frankly, I think if they had dropped some of that, they could have made just just made one long episode. Interesting. OK. Of the two.

[01:01:08] Right. I think they were trying to eke it out some and I wish they had put in just a little bit more material. Right. Rather than make Tommy Silversides the entire focus of well, they had to set up as the foil for the foil of to him.

[01:01:24] And it all makes sense. And then having everything that Dick is built up to this this point, taken away by this guy who is very sweet talking until right. He's gotten what he wants and Dick has been arrested. And then suddenly his true colors

[01:01:38] show and he's really mean and nasty, which, you know, as an audience member, you're thinking from the very start, don't trust this guy. You know, snake oil personified. What are you doing? What's going on here? So it's it's almost like a pantomime, right?

[01:01:54] Where the villain comes on stage and everybody goes, oh, boo, snow. Right. Yeah. Look behind you, all that kind of stuff. Even the point that he's got a fake, which we learn later is a fake chest plate. Yes. He's doing all this Tai Chi type exercise and

[01:02:11] push ups with his back like spread apart and just all kinds of really, really. And of course, Nell is enchanted by him completely. Yeah. Which in a sense, you know, I guess you could make a case for that happening. But. It to me, it did

[01:02:27] seem like kind of a weird flip of her character. I mean, they had to do it because of the connections with the mother and all that other stuff. But well, you know, sometimes we're just captivated by a person. And even though they may be

[01:02:41] not all that we I like to I think I use this once describing somebody to a friend of mine. They're a hollow bunny. You think that they're a solid chocolate, but then you bite into the. Oh, yeah, yeah. So the superficial on the outside is really yummy and

[01:02:55] very good. Yeah. Empty in the middle. Well, listeners write in and tell us what you think was was Nell's falling for Tommy Silversides just a little too much or was it much in character and to be expected? Should we slide right into definitely. So as a result

[01:03:14] of the gang abandoning him and so forth, Dick is imprisoned by the syndicate. It was all part of Nell's mother's scheme all along because she wants him to join the syndicate. And if he refuses, which he does, then Tommy will replace him and she'll still the syndicate

[01:03:32] will still have what it wants, which is control over all of the crime throughout Essex and beyond. And it turns out, of course, that Silversides is an actor who was hired by Nell's mom. And by this time, he has dropped his charms and he's made everybody miserable.

[01:03:50] So Nell is telling them that if they don't go along with Silversides, that her mom is going to kill Dick. And so that that kind of holds them in place for a while. But eventually they've had enough and they decide, yeah, we got to rescue

[01:04:04] Dick. But how are we going to get inside? Well, we have to have an insider to the syndicate now. Who could that be? And so the next thing you see is a scene of this very ominous hooded leather figure almost sort of harking back to the doctors

[01:04:20] during the plague time, but not quite. Because he's the torturer. Right. And Jeffrey is the jailer again. I mean, Jeffrey's back again. And so Dick is alone in this cell where he has to eat moss off of the stones. And he's made a huge beard out

[01:04:35] of rat's eyelashes to entertain himself. And he does have an en suite and that whenever it rains, the rain comes to the roof. But all of the other prisoners get to come into his cell to take their showers, you know, whenever the rain happens.

[01:04:51] So in comes this very ominous figure. And the next thing you know, it's Jonathan Wilde who the gang has gone to and said, please, can you help Dick escape? Well, and it turns out that Wilde is on a new journey of mindfulness and self-care, engaging in care

[01:05:08] and good relations with his son. And so this is why he comes to rescue Dick. Which is in itself remarkably funny. At one point, he's you know, he and Dick are talking and Christopher says, oh, look Dad, I found a little thing. And Wilde says, excuse me a

[01:05:26] moment and turns up. Lovely darling. Look at that. It's clearly the playback to the dead. Right. Exactly. First episode. And he's evolved as a parent and is. Yes. And is happier than he's ever been in his life until Dick departs with thanks and it

[01:05:43] inadvertently locks them in his cell. That was funny. Now, here's my question to you. Do you think you did that on purpose? But that's the thing is with Turpin, you can never know if it's intentional or thoughtless. Yeah. He's just so involved. He's so.

[01:06:00] That's the thing as well is that he's so self-involved that you don't really know is this just sort of this this rude selfishness or is he like you don't know what's going on? He's like, oh yeah, I'll meet you. I'll meet you these things.

[01:06:15] It's like, but I don't want that. You haven't listened to me at all. Right. You're just doing what you want to do and what feels good to you in the moment. Yeah. And so, you know, I think he would really want to be

[01:06:26] buddies with Wilde like if they could actually have a. Oh, I agree. You know, if Wilde could come to his side. So I don't know. I just feel like it's that lack of self-awareness. But he's also at the same time very self-aware. So again, it's a really

[01:06:43] funny thing. I just when I saw that, I thought, OK, this is his way of payback. OK. All right. Because he knows he's not really in any danger that, you know, he's going to be rescued eventually. But of course, I think Jeffrey's gone away for a wedding.

[01:07:01] Right. Because he describes being in jail like being at his second cousin's wedding. Right. Which, oh, by the way, that's what I've got to do. Yes. Very funny. So, yeah. Quick side discurses on 18th century gay subculture. Sure. It was a thing. They were Molly houses.

[01:07:20] They were mostly found in London, mostly social, but they could also be sexual gathering places. Punishments for gay behavior included pillory, transportation of the colonies, prison and death. So. To be an out gay person was was a very brave thing to do. And it mostly centered on men

[01:07:37] because women weren't considered to be able to have sex. They were not sexual in and of themselves. OK. Which made things convenient. Right. For some lesbians and bisexual women. But it was a very cultured space, the Molly House, and it centered mostly around cross dressing. OK.

[01:07:56] And drag and trans behaviors, although some of them would service as gay brothels and listeners who have followed the Outlander series, either in the books or in the television series on stars or both, will remember the character Lord John. And he appears in several of the

[01:08:10] books and has his own subset of adventures as a gay man in the military in the mid to late 18th century. So. This was definitely a thing and a presence in that period treated rather differently historically. But I just love that they are invoking this. OK.

[01:08:29] As part of the series and as Dick in particular. And not to be too superficial, but I just quickly because I don't know I didn't know anything about what a Molly House was or even though that was the term. So I just put it in really quick

[01:08:42] to do the searches. And yeah, there's a great Wikipedia article about it. We don't know how great it is, but there's a substance some substance on Wikipedia about Molly Houses. And it makes sense. I mean, this whole ridiculousness that we have, at least in our modern day, like

[01:09:00] there are homosexuals. Shock and awe. It's like we've had it all along. It's been here forever. Not a new thing. Not a new thing. And then the idea that when you if you can't be open about it and you have to be in a way subversive or

[01:09:22] there's a word I'm trying to think of and I can't think of it now. But, you know, where you're you're hiding from it or you have to have things like Molly Houses and stuff that that in itself is a compression of the culture. And that actually shapes

[01:09:34] even even to a degree the intensity of things like having to have a place like a Molly House where it might be even more in excess. People might even go to more excess because it's so compressed. Well, if you have no cultural reference in your

[01:09:52] day to day life and in your family and school and so forth. Once you do have this awareness that this is who you are, you do look around for things to tell you, well, what does that mean? Right. Right. How do I do this? What is it?

[01:10:07] And so if the Molly House is the one source that you can find, then yes, you do tend. It tends to be sort of self referential. Right. And this is what we're doing. Exactly. And what other options do I know about? You know, how how

[01:10:21] do gay men be and behave? Right. Again, the same thing for lesbians and for bisexual people. But they weren't going to be developing a culture of their own necessarily in this same way. Right. Yeah. Their issues were different issues. And so they wouldn't be exhibited quite like this.

[01:10:41] But I love that they are able to take what we think of as stereotypes, even jabs and criticisms and turn them into something fabulous. And I use that word quite advisedly. You know, Dick is being a skilled semster, if you can call it semster instead of

[01:11:06] semstress, you know, so. Right. Right. Right. Colorful. He doesn't want to kill the two swans because they're both female swans and they're in love. This isn't the very first episode. You know, he's a vegan and I can't tell you how many vegan gay guys I know.

[01:11:25] It's just all of these little things are just dropped in very carefully. And I really think that, you know, gay listeners and audiences will get a lot of fun out of this series, probably more than I will. I don't I think Noel Fielding is

[01:11:43] heterosexual and I think he's married with to a woman. And I believe he has a family because he's referenced it when he's on the British Big Show. Oh, that's interesting. Well, perhaps he's bisexual then. Whatever. He definitely picks up the vibe. And I think that's what he's

[01:11:58] always had, because even going back to the IT crowd and the Mighty Boosh and just his he vamps and plays up and painted nails and all this kind of stuff. So I think he's somebody who is always skirting gender lines. OK, but he's but in this very

[01:12:18] character driven way and I don't know that that's his. I don't know literally what is real. I'm just trying to remember from what I've seen from the Big Show. But it's not like he's like, oh, I am of, you know, you know, I identify this and

[01:12:35] I'm I'm homosexual that or whatever. And so I'm going to make it an issue. I'm going to really push it forward. I think it's interesting that if he actually is a cisgendered heterosexual man and he's playing with gender, it creates space for a lot

[01:12:52] of other people to be comfortable in and around and or to go, well, wait a minute, maybe I'm a degree of this or I'm a degree of that. I don't have to fall in this hyper genderized norm. Yeah, I think that the show

[01:13:08] actually does a beautiful job of opening that up, opening the space up like you've been pointing out. Exactly. Rita Mae Brown has written some wonderful books about lesbians and so forth. And she had this they're fictional. So she tells different stories about different characters.

[01:13:23] But she has this idea of of the spread of a scale. It's not just spectrum. Right. Yeah. It's a spectrum. Thank you. That's what I was reaching for. And she has this blue dot theory that she says if tomorrow morning everybody who had any sense

[01:13:39] of same sex attraction woke up with a blue dot in their head, they wouldn't all be the same shade of blue. You know, some would be turquoise and some would be navy. Right. And the whole spectrum in between. And so that's kind of what I think you're

[01:13:55] expressing here. And I also love how you touched in the very beginning on his wide open heart. Right. Right. Right. Right. He wants to be who and what he is. He wants everybody else to have that same freedom. And that's why Moose in particular, but also honesty

[01:14:12] are just so pleased with him. Because nobody's encouraged him to do that before. Right. And so maybe that's another kind of underlying piece of this whole thing. But well, I think that I think you're exactly right in that he's he's trying to live. Dick Turpin's trying to live

[01:14:33] Dick Turpin's truth. His own best life and his truth. Exactly. And and that is going to cause things to happen in the world. He's a good catalyst, isn't he? Exactly. For for good or ill. And everybody's just got to kind of deal with it. His father has

[01:14:49] to deal with it. His cousin has to deal with it. You know, his gang has to all deal with it. But it's never he's never doing it out of a sense of he well, his ego is driving it. But but his I don't know. His heart is genuine.

[01:15:05] And not he's not driven by evil or the you know, or survival pursuits. He's just trying to live his heart with his heart out. And and that that's going to do stuff. Yeah. I've just circled around it again. I don't need any way else to describe it.

[01:15:23] And it is it's great dramatic catalyst or great comedic catalyst for a show like this. And the final episode ends in a beautiful note because, you know, as you say, he he wants to live his own best life and he wants everybody else to do this. Exactly. Yeah.

[01:15:39] And in this cell thinking his gang has deserted him, nobody's going to rescue him. It's actually Jonathan Wilde who says to him, no, don't give up. You need to continue to be the best worst highwayman that's ever been. Right. Yeah. Right. And he takes that on

[01:15:57] and he goes and he challenges Tommy Silversides to the duel. And of course, because Tommy Silversides sharpshooter is no longer hidden in the trees, he realizes he doesn't have a chance and he turns around and runs away and is revealed to everybody to be a fraud.

[01:16:12] And so Hampstead is happy to welcome back their their homegrown highwayman and his gang. Right. Yeah, I don't think I just did it. I was just doing some quick searches. I believe that he is married to a woman and I believe that they have a child. Mm hmm.

[01:16:32] Lillian, Liana, Lilliana Bird, I think is her name. So, yeah. So I think Fielding is just somebody who's gender bending. Yeah. Just and play in the in the best tradition of, say, oh, what's his name? Or at least the character from Rocky Horror Picture Show.

[01:16:50] Why am I blanking the name? Oh, yeah. Well, I'm blanking it, too. Yeah. Anyway, but just just just vamping all over the place. Right. And sort of writing out. So. Right. Anyway, the director, the manager, what's the name? No, the the main character. The yeah, the the trans

[01:17:08] transvestite. OK. Right. Tim Curry played the character. God, it's been so long since I've really got a lot of hopefully we don't trigger too many people. Listeners right in. Exactly. Don't be mean. Right. Anything else that we want to touch on or

[01:17:26] when we wrap it up from here, I think I would just say go back to the beginning of the show. I would just say go watch this series. Absolutely. We don't know if there's going to be a season two or not. Apple hasn't announced.

[01:17:38] I don't know what their success metrics for a show like this are going to be. Apple has been pretty liberal. There's a lot of shows that I would have thought would have gotten would have not gotten a season two or season three. And they have. I think it's

[01:17:54] a great a great little comedy series, a great little comedy series. And I would really hope that Apple picks it up for a couple more seasons because I think they could have a lot of fun with this. I really hope so. There's certainly a lot of more

[01:18:09] areas that they could pursue. Jokes they could mine. Oh, I forgot we have one piece of feedback. We do have a piece of feedback. I was going to remind you if you think you're going to start swinging into the. Yeah. You want to read that for us?

[01:18:21] I will read that. This is from Danny M. Hi, Marilyn and David. I really enjoyed Dick Turpin. I think he really blends the palette after watching some heavier stuff. You mentioned that in the beginning, and I think that's absolutely true. Right. Hoping we get a season two.

[01:18:34] I'm with you on that one, Danny. At its best, it was very Monty Pythonesque in its absurdity and wordplay. I think my favorite character was now she cracked me up with how exasperated she constantly was by everyone around her. But then again, she was just as

[01:18:48] silly as anyone else. Yeah. Good point. I think that's maybe why they threw in the whole romantic notion of Tommy Silverside. But, you know, she's got her weakness, too. Danny continues, I definitely got the same sort of vibes I got from Our Flag Means Death, another period comedy.

[01:19:05] I strongly recommend that show to anyone who enjoyed this. Danny. Yes. And I've heard that mentioned, I think some of the reviews mentioned that Our Flag Means Death, which I have not seen and know virtually nothing about, except I think it's a send up on Pirates.

[01:19:18] Yeah, it is. And I believe it also does a bunch of work in short of working around issues of gay culture and homosexuality. And I don't, I haven't seen the show, so I can't speak to it. So I'm being, I'm trying to like

[01:19:35] be very careful about my words to be respectful of it. But I understand that it had a lot of fun to play in that space. And that, too, is very historical. OK. Yeah. Interesting. So maybe I should take a look at that. I think it's a good idea.

[01:19:52] I'll take a look and see, see what they're doing. History is such a great resource for television and movies and books, you know, really is. More and more people can look into that source rather than having to make up a planet named Squirtch and recreate these

[01:20:08] things that, yeah, actually did happen in our history. So, yeah, take a look, folks. Well, I just did a little exclusive for our subscribers, and I think we'll do a public version of it. I think we'll do a public version of something not as in-depth.

[01:20:26] But I did a little solo podcast on the on our subscriber channel, and I was taking apart the new trailer for the new Alien movie. Right. Right. And which called Romulus. And there's a thing in there where they reach into some history.

[01:20:43] And I was making that very same point that when a show explicitly or implicitly has history as we've got it recorded, it grounds stories in a way that is different than something that's made up because you've got to, you have an orientation or you have something

[01:21:04] to grab onto. Whereas if you're just making it up, you are still pulling from all of that, but you don't have a way to organize your thoughts. And so I just appreciated that in that trailer that they were leaning on real history. I believe in the on the

[01:21:23] Romulus Remus and the Capitoline Wolf in the history of Rome. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, history can give a real continuity and coherence. Yes, coherence. That's a really good word. That's exactly two stories that some people can make up stories of a similar nature. Right. It's really hard.

[01:21:44] Well, I think we can wrap it up from there. Thanks for bringing this up. I'm glad we got to talk about it. It's a really fun show. Oh, I'm really glad that you picked it up. I was I was on. You're dying to talk about it from

[01:21:55] the very beginning. Kind of like Mrs. Davis in a way. Yeah. Same same streamer, different different shows, but both of them really delightful in their own ways. So if you are interested in supporting our community at large, John, Alicia and I and all of our

[01:22:13] other co-hosts like Marilyn and Brandon and John and Ron and Anthony. And I forget everybody. Yep. Right. On radioactive ramblings, you can join the community by subscribing. You can use either Supercast, which is our preferred method or Patreon. Supercast is just like Patreon, but it's just better for

[01:22:35] subscribers. I mean, for podcasters, we offer ad free episodes, early access, exclusive and bonus content. We're just coming up on our two year anniversary, and I think we're going to try to push out some merch, but we might do it so that, you know, folks who are subscribers

[01:22:55] are going to be able to get some stuff at cost, at least for our birthday celebration time period. At least I'm working on. We have other things like show guides like John is putting together a really great show guide for House of the Dragon.

[01:23:07] We had something for True Detective and Shogun. And we'll have something for Rings of Power. He's putting on putting together a big online and second for Rings of Power. I take a look at that. Yeah, he's still building it. So but this is all these show guides

[01:23:19] are built with this notion platform and we're able to really tailor a lot of the information so we can augment what we're watching without spoiling anything. And yeah, you know, we're we're a human centered and human oriented community. No algorithms here. It's a great group of people who

[01:23:37] will are trying to figure out, hey, what's good in the world. And so if you want to support that and encourage that, then we would invite you to subscribe. As little as three dollars a month or you can get an annual subscription for like 50 something dollars a year.

[01:23:55] It's like insanely good value for what you're getting. I mean, we put out six podcasts this week. People know it's crazy. We've got the content train is rolling, you know, because it is after all a and we have a discord community. Lots of fun.

[01:24:14] Marilyn, you're there quite often talking with folks about Tolkien stuff, about other mythologies and shows and Earthsea Earthsea. We are going to finish up Earthsea. We are. I promise. We have plans. We just got to get through this summer. We've got a great mod team so they

[01:24:30] help keep things ship shape and running over there. We also sponsor a whole bunch of affiliate podcasts. So if you want to get in on that we've got radio active ramblings. That's with Aaron. A couple of his friends, they were covering the fallout show. They're now switching to

[01:24:47] they're going to be covering the boys season four, which is really awesome because while they're doing that, John and Alicia are covering the acolyte, the new Star Wars thing. And then John and I are going to be covering House of the Dragon. And so, yeah,

[01:25:02] Aaron and his friends are going to be covering it over there. That's a Pukilis scale plus eight or something in terms of violence and whatnot. Yeah, it's pretty wild. But, you know, it's a fun show because it really makes fun of the superhero genre. Uh huh.

[01:25:19] Because like what if superheroes were real? Superman, you know, probably a very dangerous and psychopathic person. Not somebody that you'd want to be close to. No. Alicia has her Wolveshift Dust podcast and they just finished up Beacon 23 season two. She's got some interviews with the showrunners coming up.

[01:25:40] She's also working on some Dune stuff. They just put out a book club podcast on the book Silo. She also has the the Star Wars canon timeline project, which she's cross posting some stuff for the acolyte. And that's a really an amazing thing where she's reviewing and talking

[01:25:58] about the entire timeline of the Star Wars story universe. It's pretty phenomenal. She and Bob, if there's anything that together they don't know about. It's incredible. Star Wars in all of its manifestations. It's not worth knowing. I am just astounded. Yeah. The breadth and depth and the detail.

[01:26:20] Real lore hound stuff, isn't it? Absolutely. To the nth degree. It's amazing. If you are a deep Star Wars fan, this is definitely for you. So check it out. And then we've got properly Howard movie review. That's Anthony and Steve. He's an academic. Steve's a standup

[01:26:36] comic and they get together and they talk about pop culture and it's pretty funny. They've been there their season this their current season has been felonies and fugazis and they've been covering some pretty funny films like Pulp Fiction, Gross Point Blank, Shakedown, Tango and Cash.

[01:26:55] A lot of good crazy 70s and 80s pop culture stuff. And yeah, so that's a good one to find. And then of course we have Rings and Rituals, your podcast, Marilyn, looking at using season one of the Rings of Power as a way to examine ritual and

[01:27:15] ritual not only in the legendarium but also in our lives in our daily lives. But using the television show as a way to unpack that and examine it. And you're about to wrap up as we said at the top of the episode. You've got a couple more

[01:27:30] episodes to go. Yeah, we just finished recording Episode 8 and we have a special bonus episode where John and I talk about ritual and music. Very cool. Yeah. And then we will have one final episode, Sara and I together going over the feedback

[01:27:47] and I'm here to tell you listeners, some of you have just really run with this request. That's great. Three and four paragraphs long of very, very interesting deep lore questions. So thank you very much for that. We're looking forward to engage all that stuff.

[01:28:04] So on the main feed, we've got the Acolyte is running. We're about to pick up House of the Dragon. We definitely have the boys at the I'm sorry, the boys over on his own radioactive rituals, but we have the bear at the end of June.

[01:28:19] Alicia just dropped a podcast on or will be dropping a podcast on Interview with the Vampire, which is running. We certainly got Deadpool and Wolverine going to be covering Alien Romulus. We just put out one shots for Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes and for Furiosa.

[01:28:35] We've got brings a power in August. We've got Pachinko season two in August. We have a ton of stuff. Maybe severance is probably going to come back this year. X-Men. X-Men 97. We had some coverage on. So we are at full speed ahead here. So again, please consider

[01:28:55] subscribing. That really helps us keep everything running. But I want to give some shout outs really quick to the people who do support the community at large. And first off, our Discord server boosters Narls, Aaron K, Tiller Thriller, Dark of the Ninjas, Doof71, CaptainJinji56 and Athena

[01:29:17] Agilea. I'm not sure you gotta write in and let me know how to pronounce your name. Anyway, thanks for boosting the server. That helps us to have a bit more resources on our Discord. That's great. And then to our top tier subscribers, people who subscribe at our $10 level.

[01:29:37] We always like to give them a shout out. So Martian, Michael G, Michelle E, David W, Brian P, Nick W, SC, Peter O.H., Bettina W, Adam S, Nancy M, Doof71, Brian 8063, Frederick H, Sarah L, Gareth C, Eric F, Matthew M, Sarah M, DJ Miwa, Ondra B,

[01:29:57] Kwong U, DeadeyeJediBob, Nathan T, Alex V, Aaron T, Subzero, Aaron K, DallyV21, Mothership61, Narls, Kathy W, oh wait, I think we have a new lorehound, but I'm waiting. They're on a free trial. So I was going to see. But anyway, always last but never least,

[01:30:21] Adrienne. Thank you all so very much. What a mighty chorus of supporters. Thank you so much folks. Yeah, and ongoing support in many cases. It's really great. So thank you all. Thank you to everyone who subscribes at all levels and thank you to everyone who listens. Everybody's got

[01:30:43] to manage their lives and some people can subscribe and others can't and that's totally fine. We're just happy that we have a community of listeners and that we have a fun group of people to nerd out about all the fun entertainment that we enjoy.

[01:30:59] Yes, and one of the best ways you can support is to tell friends. There you go. That too as well. Marilyn, always a pleasure. Good to see you. Oh, it's been fun John. John, hey look at me. I guess it's time to stop. David,

[01:31:11] it's been delightful. You've been talking to John more than me. I have. I think that's part of what's... Hey, look I could, if you want to compare me to him, I can't take that as an insult. Anyway. Both of you are definitely on equal footing and equally individual.

[01:31:29] And now we have Alicia as well. So it's a triumvirate. Well, a triarchy. That's the from House of the Dragon they have. There's a triarchy that's an evil group of people. I don't do House of the Dragon and none of

[01:31:41] you are evil so we'll just say a delightful trio. That's right. All right. Well, thanks Marilyn and we'll see you on the next one. Thank you. Okay, David. This is where we're supposed to choose a side. Green or black? John, my soul is as black as night.

[01:32:27] Your turn. I am black for life. So we're not fighting? I thought this is where HBO wanted us to like pick sides and fight and stuff. Don't worry, I'm sure we'll find plenty to disagree about on the pod but we seem to agree on one thing.

[01:32:43] We both really like this show. The politics, the drama, the lore. It was made for the Lorehounds. And since we just finished recapping season one, we couldn't be more ready to defend our black queen in the Dance of the Dragons. And with the season pass option

[01:32:57] in Supercast, listeners can get early ad-free access to each weekly scene by scene deep dive plus our custom show guide with all the characters and connections. See you in the Lorehounds podcast feed each week for our dragonfire hot but probably positive takes.

[01:33:13] The Lorehounds House of the Dragon coverage is also safe for team green consumption. Side effects may include a deeper understanding of dragon lore, a heartened conflict with itself, and an inescapable urge to read the book Fire and Blood by George R.R. Martin. Dragon seeds may experience burning.