The Penguin - S01E07–08 - Top Hat & A Great or Little Thing - DCUniverse Season Wrap

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[00:01:17] Welcome to the DC Universe, a comics versus podcast where the Lorehounds, your guides to Gotham City's finest penthouse prisons.

[00:01:27] Say that 10 times fast.

[00:01:28] I'm David.

[00:01:28] And I'm Alicia.

[00:01:29] And we're here with our final takes on the first season of The Penguin, focusing on episode seven, Top Hat, and eight, A Great Little Thing.

[00:01:39] Make sure you are all caught up before listening on because we're going to get right into spoilers.

[00:01:45] And we've got Jean.

[00:01:46] Jean here today as well.

[00:01:48] They're going to be blessing us with our hot takes before they jet.

[00:01:52] Have your own thoughts to share?

[00:01:54] Join the conversation on our Discord server where we're talking about The Penguin, Dune Prophecy, Silo Season 2, and whatever else you're reading, watching, playing, or listening to.

[00:02:05] Links for everything are in the show notes below.

[00:02:09] Well, Jean and John, you guys have altered the time flow of your lives, folded space, and are here with us.

[00:02:20] So we should get really right into it.

[00:02:24] We're going to talk about Top Hat, episode seven, where the fate of the Oz brothers is learned and an explosive confrontation between Oz and Zofia.

[00:02:33] And episode eight, the season finale, A Great or Little Thing, where it is the tragedy of the penguin come full circle.

[00:02:44] And that one was written by the showrunner herself, Lauren LaFranc.

[00:02:48] Jean, why don't you lead us off with your feelings, both for the episodes as well as for the season overall predictions, hot takes, whatever you got.

[00:02:59] Pitch it to us before you get a bounce.

[00:03:01] All right, so real quick.

[00:03:05] Yeah, those two episodes were great ways to end the show.

[00:03:10] And I don't feel that it needs a second season.

[00:03:14] I think the final two eps were picture perfect.

[00:03:19] And they don't need to stretch the story of the penguin, per se, out into a second season.

[00:03:26] If they want to flesh out different parts of that universe, I'm cool with it.

[00:03:31] But the penguin story should continue with however what role he's going to play in the Batman 2.

[00:03:39] But we don't need, or I don't need another season of the penguin.

[00:03:43] This was one, this is in my top three shows for the year.

[00:03:49] So I'm going to really be, it gets high marks for me.

[00:03:56] It gets extremely high marks for me.

[00:03:59] And I think this is going to be looked back upon as one of the best shows of the year, period.

[00:04:06] The performances were great.

[00:04:09] Episode 7 was hard to watch.

[00:04:11] Coming off the watching of, you know, Agatha and the tragedy that she lost with little Nikki.

[00:04:24] Little Nikki.

[00:04:25] These are both really tragic storylines, aren't they?

[00:04:28] Yeah, yeah.

[00:04:30] It was tough to watch that whole, the scenes with him and his brothers and where it led to

[00:04:38] and how it led to what it led to.

[00:04:41] Just really tough.

[00:04:43] But it showed, you know, Oz for being what he is.

[00:04:48] He's not a hero.

[00:04:49] He's not an anti-hero.

[00:04:51] He's a downright villain, period.

[00:04:54] True villain.

[00:04:55] True villain.

[00:04:56] And we got to experience his villainy and all the ways that you want to see villains portrayed.

[00:05:05] There's no black, there's no gray, right?

[00:05:09] There's no, you know, oh, maybe.

[00:05:11] There's always gray.

[00:05:13] Ah, there we go.

[00:05:15] Yes, yes.

[00:05:17] But I'm not going to defend him.

[00:05:18] I'm not going to defend him.

[00:05:19] You can't fix him.

[00:05:20] This one you're not going to defend.

[00:05:21] All right.

[00:05:22] But for me, you know, it's just clear the guy is a bad guy, right?

[00:05:28] Um, and he deserves the villain moniker.

[00:05:34] And this show went a long way in showing us why.

[00:05:39] And that was great.

[00:05:41] Um, really enjoyed it.

[00:05:43] Really enjoyed the end.

[00:05:45] I thought that last scene was just perfect with the signal in the sky, um, fade out.

[00:05:51] And yeah, that's where I'm at with the show, man.

[00:05:56] John, what are you, where are you at?

[00:05:58] Mr. Mr. DC comic guy.

[00:06:00] You suddenly got pulled in.

[00:06:03] Got pulled in.

[00:06:04] I've been fooled.

[00:06:06] And Dune.

[00:06:07] Like we got a double caper on you.

[00:06:09] I know.

[00:06:10] I, you know, it's funny.

[00:06:11] I was like, I'm going to be obsessed with DC comics.

[00:06:13] Hold on.

[00:06:13] Let me sidestep and be obsessed with Dune for a minute.

[00:06:17] Um, I gotta say, you know, my wife is, she rejects comic book type stuff.

[00:06:23] Like she, she will actively avoid watching superhero stuff.

[00:06:27] And so when I told her it's in the Batman universe, she was like, I don't know about

[00:06:32] that.

[00:06:33] But then I put it on and she was like, huh?

[00:06:36] And I, I, I convinced her by telling her there's no Batman in it.

[00:06:39] And, and she was like, all right, all right.

[00:06:41] So I think I'm, I'm going to try it.

[00:06:42] I think she liked it more than I did.

[00:06:44] Honestly.

[00:06:44] Like she was, Maya was so into it.

[00:06:47] She was like, Oh, penguin on tonight.

[00:06:49] Let's let's let's, uh, she would like make like a special snack for us.

[00:06:53] Like she was like, this is, this is going to happen.

[00:06:56] What's the special penguin snack?

[00:06:58] Wow.

[00:06:58] I mean, not, it wasn't themed.

[00:07:02] Just a snack.

[00:07:03] Yeah.

[00:07:03] It's like, sorry.

[00:07:04] And chillies.

[00:07:05] Yeah.

[00:07:06] Mushrooms with the, we have to eat it like Danny DeVito in the nineties movie.

[00:07:10] Oh God.

[00:07:13] But anyway, I, I thought it was really excellent.

[00:07:16] It's definitely going to be on my top 10 list of the year.

[00:07:18] I can't say where yet.

[00:07:20] Cause I'm still working that out, but I mean, incredible job by all the acting was incredible.

[00:07:27] The writing was incredible.

[00:07:29] There were like a couple little points where I was like, I don't know about that.

[00:07:32] There was, there was Vic surviving the kidnapping.

[00:07:35] I was like, no fucking way that Sal doesn't just see him laying on the floor and go, you

[00:07:42] know, I like finished the job.

[00:07:44] I don't, I didn't buy that.

[00:07:45] But other than that, I thought everything felt very naturally.

[00:07:48] The consequence of the actions of the characters.

[00:07:51] And it felt like that more than it was just serving the plot.

[00:07:54] Like I, I went into the finale knowing that either Oz could live or die and it would have

[00:08:01] still been a satisfying series.

[00:08:02] And that's an incredible feat for a show called the penguin.

[00:08:06] Yep.

[00:08:06] And then you have Sophia, my God, that kids is how I met your mother because she's insane.

[00:08:13] She's funny.

[00:08:14] She's, she's, uh, you know, I have to say my, my, um, my dad's family is from Sicily and

[00:08:21] my cousin, his cousin, really, she's, she's, you know, several decades older than me.

[00:08:26] She sounds exactly like Sophia.

[00:08:28] Wow.

[00:08:29] Like when I, every time she spoke, I was like, that's the accent that my cousin uses.

[00:08:34] Right.

[00:08:34] All the time.

[00:08:35] Just New York.

[00:08:35] Amazing.

[00:08:36] Sicily daughter of Sicilian immigrants.

[00:08:39] And I was like, wow, that's, that's some good accent work.

[00:08:44] So yeah.

[00:08:44] Yeah.

[00:08:45] I mean, just incredible performances all around.

[00:08:47] I just want a Sophia spinoff show, but I also feel like she was good because they used

[00:08:51] her the appropriate amount.

[00:08:53] So I don't know.

[00:08:54] I'll watch anything that is made in this else world.

[00:08:57] Well, now that they, now that they have the letter from Selena Kyle, Catwoman, her half

[00:09:03] sister, like, obviously I need that story.

[00:09:05] And just in general, like you need that story of the legitimate daughter who still got, well,

[00:09:11] fucked over and then versus the one who spent her entire life trying to make up for not being

[00:09:17] legitimate.

[00:09:18] Anyway, that's a whole nother thing.

[00:09:20] This show.

[00:09:21] Well, do you, do you think though, Alicia, that they'll have a Catwoman open a record store

[00:09:25] in Chicago?

[00:09:28] Only if she gets her mom's hair, you know?

[00:09:31] Yeah.

[00:09:31] Yes.

[00:09:35] Yeah.

[00:09:35] But this, okay.

[00:09:36] So this show is definitely, I'm pretty sure it's going to be in my top five of the year.

[00:09:42] Um, I thought that it was absolutely excellent.

[00:09:46] Uh, but man, yeah, that finale was dark.

[00:09:50] I can't help.

[00:09:51] I put a little thing at the end of the notes that I just have to talk at the end, uh, with

[00:09:56] a spoiler warning, comparing this to the end of Agatha, because there's some interesting

[00:10:00] contrasts, um, interesting parallels and contrasts.

[00:10:04] So, but this was, there was no coming back from where Oz went with Victor.

[00:10:12] Like the, basically, you know, it's like the show was messing with people like me the

[00:10:17] entire time.

[00:10:18] You know, they're like, Oh, look, see here, here's a window where you can slip in some empathy

[00:10:23] and you know, Oh, he didn't mean to lock his brothers down there.

[00:10:29] Right.

[00:10:30] Right.

[00:10:30] Right.

[00:10:31] And then, you know, that moment that he takes out Vic for just saying that we are family,

[00:10:36] you'd know, like that is, this is a, this is a villain.

[00:10:40] And now I'm like, now I'm pumped.

[00:10:43] I want this to be the end of the show because now he's in full villain mode and I'm like,

[00:10:46] Batman, get him.

[00:10:47] You know, I'm not on his side at home anymore.

[00:10:49] Alicia, why were you giving this sort of dot, dot, dot ellipse for, uh, another season?

[00:10:54] Did you have some Intel?

[00:10:55] Well, I haven't been reading all the boards, so I don't know what, is there some specific

[00:11:00] information or is that you?

[00:11:02] No, this is not me.

[00:11:04] Well, so there was a lot of chatter on our discord about that, but also just in general, you

[00:11:10] know, it's, it's just, it seems like, like, I'm afraid we might have a Shogun situation here

[00:11:15] where I didn't need a second season of Shogun.

[00:11:18] I'm definitely going to watch it and hope for the best, but it's like, Oh man, it was just

[00:11:21] perfect.

[00:11:21] Leave it alone.

[00:11:22] And, um, maybe this goes that direction.

[00:11:26] I don't know.

[00:11:26] It could go other way at this point, to be honest.

[00:11:29] I gotcha.

[00:11:29] I gotcha.

[00:11:30] Yeah.

[00:11:30] Any other hot takes real quick?

[00:11:32] Just that I, for me, the star of this was definitely Kristen Miladi.

[00:11:38] I mean, Colin Farrell was also fantastic, but Kristen Miladi and the character, the writers

[00:11:43] who created that character and the costume designers and the production designers and just

[00:11:48] who brought this to life with, with such depth.

[00:11:52] Um, yeah.

[00:11:53] Kristen Miladi is one of the most underrated actors who has been working for decades doing

[00:12:01] work.

[00:12:01] I mean, she was the mother in How I Met Your Mother.

[00:12:03] She was placed in a really hard position where she was introduced in the last season and had

[00:12:08] to live up to eight seasons of hype for the mother and people loved her.

[00:12:12] And that's an incredible feat already.

[00:12:14] I know that's a comedy, but it also had drama, drama aspects and, and she really had to like

[00:12:19] sway a fandom to her and she did so, so quickly.

[00:12:23] And I think perhaps that shows her versatility, but also her, her charm.

[00:12:28] And they really needed someone charming to play Sophia.

[00:12:31] All right.

[00:12:32] So before we, uh, cut John and John loose, I have a question for all of you that I'm very

[00:12:41] curious about.

[00:12:42] And we'll start off with John.

[00:12:44] When did Oswald decide that he was going to kill Vic before they were on the park bench

[00:12:54] while they're having the conversation at some point or when Vic says family, when was

[00:13:01] the decision made to eliminate Vic?

[00:13:07] Wow.

[00:13:08] I think, I think I, I thought about this and for sure, when he was in the hospital, he knew

[00:13:16] he was going to take him out when he's crying at the foot of the, of his mother's bed and

[00:13:21] Vic embraces him, you know.

[00:13:24] Okay.

[00:13:24] In that moment, there was no doubt in my mind that this was Vic's last go around.

[00:13:31] Gotcha.

[00:13:31] Like I knew it.

[00:13:33] But for us, I think he's been teetering on, on whether to do it or not throughout the

[00:13:39] entire season.

[00:13:41] Sure.

[00:13:42] I mean, right from episode one.

[00:13:44] Yeah.

[00:13:44] Not even, but you know.

[00:13:46] Cause he says, turn around, look at the sun, you know, sunrise and all of that.

[00:13:49] But I think he, when Vic was going to leave, I felt in that moment, I felt in that moment

[00:14:00] was when Oz really looked at him a little bit differently.

[00:14:05] Mm-hmm.

[00:14:05] Where all of the, you know, goodwill, if so to speak, that had been built, that might have

[00:14:13] been built was really a facade.

[00:14:16] You saw it right then, right then and there.

[00:14:18] Mm-hmm.

[00:14:18] Got it.

[00:14:19] In the way that he reacted to, you know, Vic potentially leaving.

[00:14:25] Um, but for certain in the hospital, as he cried, I knew it was over for Vic.

[00:14:31] Yeah.

[00:14:32] You knew, but did.

[00:14:34] Okay.

[00:14:34] But did Oz knew?

[00:14:36] Yes.

[00:14:36] Okay.

[00:14:37] Okay.

[00:14:37] I got you.

[00:14:38] John, where?

[00:14:38] Oz made, he made that decision there.

[00:14:41] Dead and there.

[00:14:41] Gotcha.

[00:14:42] John?

[00:14:44] The minute Vic saw the body.

[00:14:46] Which?

[00:14:46] The minute Vic saw, what's the name of the Falcone that he murders at the first episode?

[00:14:51] Yeah.

[00:14:52] Can't think of it.

[00:14:53] Alberto?

[00:14:53] Alberto, yeah.

[00:14:54] The minute Vic saw Alberto, he was dead.

[00:14:56] I think that it was never a question of if, it was always a question of one.

[00:14:59] The one.

[00:15:00] And I think that we got fooled by Penguin's charm the same way all the characters in the show

[00:15:05] did.

[00:15:05] Mm-hmm.

[00:15:06] We all got fooled that he was feeling empathy and feelings for this guy.

[00:15:10] And maybe he did some, but he's also a guy who has, you know,

[00:15:13] taught himself that those feelings make you weak.

[00:15:15] And that if someone is possibly a liability for you, you get rid of them.

[00:15:19] Got to get rid of them.

[00:15:20] Alicia?

[00:15:21] I don't think Vic ever stood a chance from the moment that he got into Oz's circle.

[00:15:25] Okay.

[00:15:26] But I'm looking for the explicit.

[00:15:27] Like, there's a condition of Oswald, like, not letting people get too close.

[00:15:32] And then the, oh, I got to kill this dude.

[00:15:34] No, that's what I'm saying is I think he knew when he met him, he's like,

[00:15:39] I will kill this person.

[00:15:40] Mm-hmm.

[00:15:41] He also knew in this moment, I need someone temporarily to help me get out from the gutter.

[00:15:46] Mm-hmm.

[00:15:46] And Vic had a hand open.

[00:15:48] Got it.

[00:15:48] I got you now.

[00:15:49] Okay.

[00:15:49] Alicia?

[00:15:52] Um, yeah, I think that it was, I think that he always, like, had that in the back of his mind

[00:15:58] as a possibility because I think that we saw that he is a sociopath when basically that he does not

[00:16:05] experience empathy.

[00:16:07] And I was foolish to assign it to him when he knew his brothers were drowning.

[00:16:12] And he was like, no, it's okay.

[00:16:14] I got mom to myself now.

[00:16:15] You know?

[00:16:16] Yep.

[00:16:16] Um, I mean, he knew, you know, people ask, like, did he kill them on purpose?

[00:16:22] I'm like, well, he knew if they ever got out of that situation that he would be in big trouble.

[00:16:27] So he was not going to let them out of that situation.

[00:16:30] He absolutely did.

[00:16:32] Yeah.

[00:16:33] Yeah.

[00:16:33] But I think that specifically, for me, um, when they were in the, in the hospital and,

[00:16:40] you know, he learns that his mother's had a stroke, I was actually, I was like, Vic, don't

[00:16:45] say anything.

[00:16:46] Don't.

[00:16:46] And when Vic put his hand on his shoulder, I was like, don't touch him, Vic, just make

[00:16:49] yourself invisible right now.

[00:16:51] Um, that's when I felt like, oh no, oh no.

[00:16:55] Right.

[00:16:56] Yeah.

[00:16:56] Yeah.

[00:16:57] I, I knew when, um, in the moment on the park bench, when the dramatic music kicks in.

[00:17:05] So that's when, that's like when they signal to us, the audience, like, you know, here,

[00:17:09] here it is.

[00:17:10] And I haven't been able to figure out for myself when Oz made the specific decision.

[00:17:18] I think you, you, everybody's arguments about, um, Oswald sociopathy is, are, is swaying

[00:17:27] me.

[00:17:28] Cause I was thinking, well, maybe it's just, you know, he learned the lesson of being, you

[00:17:33] know, uh, of the weakness of family.

[00:17:35] Like if he's going to make these kinds of moves, you know, he's, he's got to have no

[00:17:39] attachments and no regrets.

[00:17:43] And I thought, well, maybe he made that re-realization later on, but now I'm really questioning, oh,

[00:17:51] well, yeah, maybe it was just always, it was always going to happen.

[00:17:55] And it was just a matter of when.

[00:17:57] And he got like, I think John, you were saying he got what he wanted.

[00:18:02] And at that, after that Vic's usefulness, it was a liability, was no longer an asset

[00:18:07] to him.

[00:18:11] So, and, uh, and we were all wondering how Vic was going to go out.

[00:18:16] And I don't think I ever predicted this.

[00:18:19] I personally didn't.

[00:18:20] Then he threw the driver's license in the river.

[00:18:23] Like he, was that just a, that seemed to be right.

[00:18:28] And, but that seemed to me to be a kind of thing of, of, um, muddying the trail for the

[00:18:33] police.

[00:18:34] Like, oh, this, he took the money as, as robbery, you know, right.

[00:18:37] And they're just like, oh, just some kid.

[00:18:39] Just some kid.

[00:18:40] Random kid.

[00:18:41] John Doe.

[00:18:42] No family.

[00:18:42] What struck me though is his family was killed in the flood.

[00:18:46] And the last we see of his driver's license is disappearing into the water.

[00:18:51] Yeah.

[00:18:52] So cool.

[00:18:54] Right.

[00:18:55] Uh, John, any last words?

[00:18:56] Well, if you want more dark Batman stuff, you can go over to the comics versus episode

[00:19:04] that John and I did on absolute Batman among other things where, listen guys, this Batman,

[00:19:09] he chops people's hands off.

[00:19:11] He's not quite, he's not quite the old Bruce Wayne that you're used to.

[00:19:15] So brutal Batman.

[00:19:18] Oh, you guys got me really interested in this.

[00:19:21] And also just like, um, yeah, just the relationships between the characters being different and like

[00:19:27] Diana growing up, a wonder woman growing up in a different environment.

[00:19:31] And yeah.

[00:19:31] Yeah.

[00:19:32] It's not paradise where she grew up.

[00:19:34] This one.

[00:19:34] Nope.

[00:19:35] It ain't paradise Island.

[00:19:37] That's for sure.

[00:19:37] I'm, I'm ready for DC to bring the darkness.

[00:19:40] I don't know if the new DCU is going to get dark like this, but not Superman.

[00:19:44] Oh, but the creature commandos, it will be like fun.

[00:19:48] Dark.

[00:19:48] That will be.

[00:19:49] I'm okay with the else worlds being the dark stuff.

[00:19:51] Similar to how the comics are doing it, which is that they, they've referred to this world

[00:19:55] as an else world.

[00:19:56] Right.

[00:19:57] Right.

[00:19:57] Um, this, uh, absolute universe that they've created where it will be darker.

[00:20:01] And I like that we can still have classic Batman, Superman, hopeful that justice league,

[00:20:05] but also have these more sort of like new our stories.

[00:20:09] Right.

[00:20:09] Right.

[00:20:10] And penguins also an else world.

[00:20:12] Yes.

[00:20:12] Yeah.

[00:20:13] Cause it's in the right part of the DCU.

[00:20:15] Give, give Matt Reeves all the, all the stories, man.

[00:20:18] That's cool.

[00:20:18] I was going to say, John, that I started to.

[00:20:20] Matt Reeves.

[00:20:21] This is Lauren, the frunk.

[00:20:22] Okay.

[00:20:22] Give Lauren, the frunk.

[00:20:23] Well, yeah.

[00:20:24] This is the Reeves.

[00:20:26] Give the Reeves verse and any, anyone who wants to touch it.

[00:20:30] Let's go.

[00:20:31] This is why I love this so much more than the Batman.

[00:20:34] The Batman visually sound great.

[00:20:36] We've talked about all that, but the writing on this show is what makes it.

[00:20:40] We will not slander the Batman on my watch.

[00:20:43] We're not going to slander the Batman on my watch.

[00:20:46] No, no, no.

[00:20:47] You need a refill on your Haterade.

[00:20:50] As I queue it up for the 50th thousand time.

[00:20:54] Joan, I was going to say, I started watching the Batman.

[00:20:58] It's very long.

[00:20:59] Yes.

[00:21:00] I've only been able to watch it in snippets.

[00:21:03] I'm sort of breaking it up into one hour-ish episodes, as it were.

[00:21:07] And I have to say, there's a lot that I'm kind of like, meh, you know, like Pattinson.

[00:21:12] I'm like, okay, whatever.

[00:21:14] As an actor, right?

[00:21:15] You know, he's not my cup of tea necessarily.

[00:21:17] But the vibe.

[00:21:18] Yeah.

[00:21:19] The vibes on this Batman are wild.

[00:21:23] They're just so dark.

[00:21:24] They're so resonant of a rainy, wet, horrible place to live.

[00:21:31] Which is really evocative of that mega city 70s era.

[00:21:36] Like New York was horrible in the 70s, right?

[00:21:38] Like it was a dangerous, horrible place.

[00:21:39] And it really sort of brings that forward.

[00:21:42] And I think I said this, did I say this on our Discord?

[00:21:45] I can't remember where.

[00:21:46] Maybe it was after the finale.

[00:21:48] I was just like, if this is DC, then like I'm down for this.

[00:21:52] I'm down for this kind of storytelling.

[00:21:55] Well, everybody knows Gotham is all the bad parts of New York.

[00:21:58] And Metropolis is all the good parts of New York.

[00:22:01] And then you mash them together for real New York.

[00:22:03] You know, I don't know about all that because, you know, New York has always been great.

[00:22:08] Even in the darkest times.

[00:22:10] Oh, yeah.

[00:22:11] But I was just saying like they just isolate every negative aspect of New York.

[00:22:14] And they're like, that's Gotham.

[00:22:16] I got to throw one more.

[00:22:18] And I think for the Batman, David, when I told you to watch it, I wanted you to watch it specifically because of the vibe, because of the sound, because of the visuals.

[00:22:28] That is impeccable.

[00:22:29] It is.

[00:22:30] It really is.

[00:22:32] I got to throw out one more sort of conversation mixer here.

[00:22:38] Did DC or this elseworld of DC just successfully do what the MCU has had trouble doing?

[00:22:49] Do I say even ever being fully successful in going from big screen to small screen and then back to big screen?

[00:22:57] So we're building the interstitial spaces between the mainline movies, which is what MCU is trying to do, right?

[00:23:03] We have to see that happen.

[00:23:05] Yes, we do.

[00:23:06] With the second Batman movie.

[00:23:08] Yeah.

[00:23:08] I think that's happened more in the MCU than it's –

[00:23:11] They've had some clunkers though, right?

[00:23:13] Sure.

[00:23:14] Not everything has been –

[00:23:16] But not everything is transferred back to the big screen is what I'm saying.

[00:23:19] Like this is a direct interstitial as opposed to just continuing to spiral out in world building.

[00:23:27] But not an actual one-to-one relationship of this penguin is now going to be in the story of the movie.

[00:23:35] Right.

[00:23:35] I mean we do get that in the MCU.

[00:23:38] I'm not going to defend all the phase five movies especially, but the TV shows, all good except for that one.

[00:23:46] All good?

[00:23:47] All good?

[00:23:47] Except for that one.

[00:23:49] Falcon and the Winter Soldier?

[00:23:50] You know what?

[00:23:51] I liked –

[00:23:52] Falcon and the Winter Soldier in its defense got hit with a COVID stick real, real hard.

[00:23:56] Especially because it was about a pandemic originally.

[00:23:59] So that was rough.

[00:24:00] But I think that there are still aspects of it that I just really loved and that I think about still all the time.

[00:24:07] Like particularly Isaiah Bradley's character and he is going to be in the new Captain America movie next year.

[00:24:13] So there's an example of a character going from small to big screen.

[00:24:17] Jean, did DC succeed where Marvel has failed?

[00:24:22] It's a set-up question.

[00:24:23] It's a provocative question.

[00:24:24] But my answer to that is that this is different from the Marvel TV shows in that this is not connecting to the main DC universe.

[00:24:33] Sure.

[00:24:34] This is not a part of James Gunn's vision.

[00:24:37] Mm-hmm.

[00:24:38] Right?

[00:24:38] So we have to see – the only correlation we can make to this, to MCU and the DCU and the way you're asking the question is Peacemaker.

[00:24:49] Right?

[00:24:50] Right.

[00:24:50] Once we have the Superman movie, then we'll be able to start to make these connective lines between TV and cinema.

[00:25:05] But right now it's really different because Reeves et al.

[00:25:09] And the production team and everyone behind this TV show did not have to live up to what James Gunn is trying to do.

[00:25:18] Mm-hmm.

[00:25:20] John?

[00:25:21] Right.

[00:25:21] It's different circumstances.

[00:25:23] Different, yeah.

[00:25:24] Yeah, but I'm just looking at the big – going from a big screen storytelling to small screen storytelling back to a big screen storytelling.

[00:25:30] Yeah, definitely.

[00:25:31] But I think what John is – what John's saying, like I think he makes a good point in that one of the biggest problems in why we've had some milk toast, particularly movies from Marvel in like Phase 5, for example, is that – is because there's too many cooks in the kitchen.

[00:25:47] And for the Reeves-verse, Reeves and whoever he anoints like Lauren LaFranc, they're allowed to just cook.

[00:25:55] So DC is successful?

[00:25:57] Yes, definitely.

[00:25:58] No, John.

[00:25:59] Well, no, but you can't –

[00:26:01] John, John, no, no, I got to hear from John.

[00:26:02] I got to hear from John.

[00:26:02] That's a hard no then.

[00:26:04] If you're going to make me choose yes or no, which I hate you for, then it's a no.

[00:26:08] I'm going to come in for hot takes.

[00:26:10] Hot takes.

[00:26:11] Let's go.

[00:26:11] Yeah, okay.

[00:26:12] All right.

[00:26:12] Here's my whole spiel and I'm not going to answer the question.

[00:26:15] I'm going to make my own question.

[00:26:17] I reject the premise of your question.

[00:26:18] Yes.

[00:26:18] I think that Marvel and DC have been in conversation since they both existed.

[00:26:25] The Avengers are largely a response – actually, the Fantastic Four are a response to the Justice League, I've learned.

[00:26:31] But then the Avengers become a response to the Justice League.

[00:26:34] And then Justice League changes to be this.

[00:26:36] And then Marvel changes to be that.

[00:26:38] But the whole absolute universe that John and I are talking about right now is largely, people say, kind of trying to be what Marvel Ultimate did in the early 2000s.

[00:26:50] And so I think that they're always going to be learning from each other.

[00:26:55] And you better bet that – who's running it now?

[00:26:57] James Gunn.

[00:26:57] He's the guy now.

[00:26:59] Yeah, and Peter Saffron.

[00:27:01] He's looking at everything Kevin Feige does.

[00:27:03] And he's going to see what works and what doesn't.

[00:27:06] And I hope he learns the right lessons.

[00:27:07] And so this was a success.

[00:27:10] I hope we continue to see more successes like this.

[00:27:15] Right on.

[00:27:15] Okay.

[00:27:16] Well, let's take a quick break.

[00:27:18] Jean, good to see you.

[00:27:19] Thanks for making time.

[00:27:20] John, thanks for making also time.

[00:27:22] We will be right back after this break.

[00:27:25] Peace out.

[00:27:25] See ya.

[00:27:44] And we're back.

[00:27:46] Alicia, that was fun.

[00:27:47] I was trying to get everybody a little activated.

[00:27:51] So I wanted to see what people thought.

[00:27:54] But I get your point.

[00:27:56] You asked me a question and then ignore my answer.

[00:27:57] Oh, I wasn't ignoring it.

[00:27:58] I had to push because I know Jean and John had to get out of there.

[00:28:01] And I wanted to make sure that they got their time.

[00:28:03] So I apologize if you got cut off.

[00:28:06] But I was excited to hear your response.

[00:28:10] Right on.

[00:28:11] So let us work through the story.

[00:28:14] Thanks for doing the outline again today.

[00:28:17] And do you want to actually kind of start to walk us through?

[00:28:21] Yes.

[00:28:22] So this time, instead of we've been doing character focus, but the character threads are really tangled because it's the finale.

[00:28:28] So this outlines more one story arc at a time, combining the two episodes.

[00:28:34] So we've got to start with talking about that flashback that we had to Oz's childhood.

[00:28:39] Um, we see that his mother, she knew the famous Rex Calabrese with his golden car.

[00:28:48] She was doing the books for him, probably something illegal involved in that regard.

[00:28:53] But it seems like he was specifically, uh, you know, worried about taking care of her.

[00:28:59] She's someone he cared about.

[00:29:00] Um, I loved the young Francis Cobb played by Emily Mead.

[00:29:05] I thought that she like, they really nailed the casting of you believed that this was the same person.

[00:29:11] Where do I know Emily Mead from?

[00:29:12] She looked really familiar.

[00:29:14] I looked her up and she's been in a book.

[00:29:17] She's actually been in stuff that I've seen, but I, yeah, she's, I don't know.

[00:29:22] I didn't, um.

[00:29:23] She looked familiar.

[00:29:24] So that, that was all good, good casting though.

[00:29:27] If you feel that way.

[00:29:27] Right.

[00:29:28] Right.

[00:29:29] Um, and I thought it was really interesting too.

[00:29:32] I was just to quickly jump back onto the Calabrese, uh, mention.

[00:29:38] I, you know, when, when we heard Rex talk about him, it was in this really mytho historic way.

[00:29:45] Mm-hmm.

[00:29:46] And I didn't realize that their family was really connected to him in, in many ways.

[00:29:50] Right.

[00:29:50] Obviously with Francis keeping the books for him, cooking the books for him, I should say.

[00:29:54] Yeah.

[00:29:55] Yeah.

[00:29:56] A lot of people online thought that maybe he was the kid's father, but I, I, I never thought so.

[00:30:03] And I think that they kind of disproved it, um, in the finale when he, cause just like they were talking about the father, like a third person.

[00:30:11] So I'm thinking, no, what do you think?

[00:30:14] Yeah.

[00:30:14] I don't think so either.

[00:30:16] And it would be kind of weird for him to, would, did he know that it was, that Oswald was his son on that, on the internet fan theory?

[00:30:27] Or, because if he knew, then I would think that he would have approached the situation differently.

[00:30:33] A little bit more like, uh, our friends over in Pachinko.

[00:30:37] Right.

[00:30:38] Where he takes my nose.

[00:30:39] I mean, if he's there, I mean, he must know, you know, because he's obviously very present in their lives.

[00:30:43] So I have the impression that he knows who the father is and he just like left.

[00:30:47] Right.

[00:30:47] Right.

[00:30:48] Just a deadbeat dad type situation.

[00:30:50] Yeah.

[00:30:51] But then we have, yeah.

[00:30:52] So Oz basically, do you think his mother is the only person he ever loved in his way?

[00:30:58] Yeah, I think so.

[00:30:59] I think he imprinted on her, if I can use that phrase.

[00:31:05] And that was it.

[00:31:08] And so even, I forget the name of the woman who plays his paramour, the sex worker.

[00:31:16] Right, Eve.

[00:31:17] Eve, thank you.

[00:31:17] Yeah, Eve.

[00:31:18] Interesting name, name choice there, Eve.

[00:31:21] She's the only one, right?

[00:31:22] The first one, the only one.

[00:31:25] But that he's always seeing her as a reminder.

[00:31:33] So even though he can't fulfill certain things with his actual mother, right, he's found this surrogate.

[00:31:39] And now he can fully live that fantasy and have that fantasy a lot more real.

[00:31:45] And so I don't think Eve ever came close to being that space, but it was more as the ability to activate on some of those fantasies, right?

[00:31:59] Does that make sense?

[00:32:00] I'm trying to be very circumspect about it.

[00:32:02] It's a very weird topic and I don't know how comfortable I am talking about it.

[00:32:06] But so I think he found somebody that he could, that was close enough to his mother that he could fixate on.

[00:32:15] With the wig in the, yeah.

[00:32:17] With the wig in the dress at the end.

[00:32:18] I did a double take for a minute.

[00:32:20] I was like, wait, is that the younger actress?

[00:32:21] Oh, wait, no, that's Eve.

[00:32:22] Yeah.

[00:32:23] Yeah.

[00:32:23] Yeah.

[00:32:23] And that's where in that moment, his, you know, his psychology really comes present to us.

[00:32:31] Not only does he kill Vic and he's got his mother imprisoned.

[00:32:34] He now has a living, breathing facsimile of his mother that is going to do everything that he wants her to do as his mother, right?

[00:32:45] Tell me you love me.

[00:32:45] Tell me you're proud of me.

[00:32:46] All that stuff.

[00:32:47] So really interested character.

[00:32:49] And I get the impression that his brothers, he never had any warmth toward them, Jack and Benny.

[00:32:55] He just basically saw them as rivals for his mother's attention.

[00:32:59] Like little baby buds.

[00:33:01] You got to push him out of the nest.

[00:33:03] That's right.

[00:33:04] So he gets all the food from mama.

[00:33:07] Well, we're going to talk about the weird, fucked up family therapy session and intervention later.

[00:33:14] Oh, yeah.

[00:33:14] So I'll save my comments for that later.

[00:33:16] But yeah, I think you're right.

[00:33:18] I think he existed.

[00:33:21] He coexisted with them, but then having the motive and the opportunity to eliminate them, he didn't hesitate.

[00:33:29] He didn't hesitate.

[00:33:30] Yeah.

[00:33:31] Yeah.

[00:33:31] Because I don't think he went out that day thinking, I'm going to kill my brothers.

[00:33:34] No.

[00:33:35] I think it was with him.

[00:33:37] It was the same like we saw with Alberto in the first episode where he felt insulted because he thought they went down this hole with this rickety ladder.

[00:33:48] And he's like, you know, this is difficult for me to climb.

[00:33:50] And it's true.

[00:33:51] That was a dick move on their part.

[00:33:53] Completely.

[00:33:54] Completely.

[00:33:54] And I'm sure there's always a lot of rivalry and tension between the two of them and him.

[00:34:00] And, you know, he just, his temper snapped because we've seen him do it on the show over and over again.

[00:34:05] You know, he feels ridiculed and he snaps.

[00:34:09] He lashes out.

[00:34:10] Yeah.

[00:34:10] And threes are tough, right?

[00:34:12] Because there's always an odd person out when there's a lot of emotional tension running.

[00:34:18] I've been watching it with our daughter as well and her friends.

[00:34:22] Fourth grade is drama.

[00:34:23] It's all about the drama, the friend drama.

[00:34:26] And threes are a funny thing.

[00:34:30] When people are vying for the, to be the center of attention among an emotional dynamic.

[00:34:37] Yeah.

[00:34:38] Yeah.

[00:34:39] So.

[00:34:40] Yeah.

[00:34:40] If you just think if he hadn't gone to play flashlight tag with them, if he had just gone home, like he, like he did afterward, then everything would have been okay.

[00:34:52] Quote unquote.

[00:34:52] But yeah, who knows how long it would have been before he found another occasion.

[00:34:56] Right.

[00:34:56] Yeah, exactly.

[00:34:57] I think you're right.

[00:34:57] I think that he would have, it would have come up eventually.

[00:35:01] And I love the, the overlay that this tunnel area is where then he ultimately comes back to.

[00:35:11] Right.

[00:35:11] To rekindle his drug empire.

[00:35:14] Right.

[00:35:14] And for, for his lab and a place that he knows.

[00:35:17] And I just think about that.

[00:35:19] I kind of go to that Edgar Allen Poe kind of thing, the tap, tap, tapping.

[00:35:23] Right.

[00:35:24] But in his case, it doesn't bother him that he knows that, you know, if I just go down that hole and to the left a little bit, there's a door where my two brothers, where I murdered my two brothers.

[00:35:35] He's okay with it.

[00:35:36] It never bothers him.

[00:35:37] It never affects.

[00:35:38] His guilt is never activated.

[00:35:40] Yeah.

[00:35:41] Yeah.

[00:35:41] Well, so I kind of alluded to earlier, the moment that I realized that he was a monster, but didn't fully accept it was when he's watching that film Top Hat with his mom while it rains.

[00:35:52] Mm-hmm.

[00:35:52] Mm-hmm.

[00:35:53] By the way, this movie, this TV show has gotten me to watch several old films, classics I hadn't watched before.

[00:35:59] Um, but, but then after that, they followed up with, he discovers Victor knocked out in his bedroom and, um, and his mom gone.

[00:36:10] And I don't know why in that moment I wanted to ascribe that, like worry that, you know, Penguin was worried about Victor.

[00:36:19] Mm-hmm.

[00:36:19] Mm-hmm.

[00:36:21] And probably if I go back and watch that, I might feel differently after seeing the finale.

[00:36:27] Yeah.

[00:36:27] It's interesting.

[00:36:28] I was watching.

[00:36:29] But it's because also that he sends Victor away before Maroney gets there.

[00:36:34] So, sorry.

[00:36:35] Yeah.

[00:36:35] Yeah, yeah.

[00:36:35] I was watching the Batman movie and there's a scene where the Penguin does something similar to what happened in, ooh, what episode was it?

[00:36:46] Two, three or four, two or three, where he tells Vic to drive and get out of there and they leave Sophia behind.

[00:36:54] And Vic's like, wait, that's, you know, I thought we were in league with her.

[00:36:57] And there's a scene in the movie, which I won't go into detail, where he does something that's very similar, you know, and it was before this show was created.

[00:37:06] So, you know, whether they intentionally are playing on that scene or not, but the fact that when there is this danger or there's a crisis, that Oswald doesn't actually care about other people.

[00:37:23] Mm-hmm.

[00:37:24] And we see that.

[00:37:24] They demonstrate that, right?

[00:37:25] He's like, oh, forget Sophia.

[00:37:27] And so they trick us thinking that, oh, he's going to rescue Vic and his mom.

[00:37:33] Obviously, he wants to rescue his mom, but not.

[00:37:37] No.

[00:37:38] Right?

[00:37:39] He just wants his mother, which is this weird totemic.

[00:37:43] She's this weird totem of his past and this center for him, which is, you know, I don't know.

[00:37:52] We're going to talk, we maybe talk about his mother later.

[00:37:56] Mm-hmm.

[00:37:57] Yeah.

[00:37:58] But why does he keep her?

[00:38:00] Yeah.

[00:38:01] Well, yeah, because he's selfish.

[00:38:04] It was a selfish thing for him to do.

[00:38:05] Yeah.

[00:38:06] But what does she represent for him?

[00:38:08] Especially after the promise he made her, but yeah.

[00:38:11] Yeah.

[00:38:11] We'll get to the ending.

[00:38:13] Okay.

[00:38:14] But so we are in Oz's or the apartment where they've been squatting in Crown Points.

[00:38:23] And Maroney does show up and he beats and drags Oz to the bliss lair.

[00:38:29] And then, you know, as you were, this whole, this final confrontation between, so Oz has

[00:38:35] his men there and they ambush and it's all like, Oz is feeling like, I'm going to win this.

[00:38:39] I'm going to win this.

[00:38:39] And then Maroney has a heart attack.

[00:38:41] Mm-hmm.

[00:38:42] And Oz can't stand it.

[00:38:44] He's like, I killed you.

[00:38:45] I killed you.

[00:38:46] And then, you know, put some extra bullets in him.

[00:38:49] And of course, I'm sure he will always tell the story, I killed him.

[00:38:53] But what a brilliant character moment.

[00:38:56] We're like, it's a twist that doesn't necessarily change anything.

[00:39:00] It just shows you who Oz is.

[00:39:02] What a petty, petty man he is.

[00:39:04] Mm-hmm.

[00:39:04] And then he's being amped up and amped up and amped up through all of this final sequence.

[00:39:12] You know, these two episodes where he's just being driven to the emotional extremes that

[00:39:21] he can experience.

[00:39:22] Yeah.

[00:39:22] And he's mad that he doesn't, you know, that he doesn't actually get to kill Maroney, but

[00:39:27] that he had a heart attack, which he caused.

[00:39:30] But yeah, it's like, yeah, did you really kill him?

[00:39:33] Yeah.

[00:39:34] Yeah.

[00:39:35] And we know that Oz will bend the truth.

[00:39:38] Same thing that he does with the councilman.

[00:39:40] Mm-hmm.

[00:39:41] Right.

[00:39:41] He's like, oh, yeah, you know, hey, I stay out of those things.

[00:39:44] It's like, no, you don't.

[00:39:46] Right.

[00:39:46] And just demonstrating what you said about how when Oz is in trouble, it's always Oz for

[00:39:51] himself.

[00:39:51] Um, so Sophia sends in that car and it's like a fake out where, you know, he thinks

[00:39:58] he might find his mom in the trunk the same way that she found her brother.

[00:40:02] Mm-hmm.

[00:40:02] After he killed him.

[00:40:03] Yeah.

[00:40:04] Yeah.

[00:40:04] Uh, but actually it's a bomb in there.

[00:40:07] And so he just, he sees the bomb and he goes running.

[00:40:09] He doesn't even yell out to his men run or anything like that.

[00:40:13] He just is like, I got to take care of myself and peace out.

[00:40:17] Nice knowing y'all.

[00:40:18] Yeah.

[00:40:19] And then that brilliant thing, he comes out and then he, that was such a brilliant shot

[00:40:24] with what's his face.

[00:40:25] The, um, the guy who, the drops addict.

[00:40:27] Yeah.

[00:40:28] Yeah.

[00:40:28] And he gets the shot through the eye that he just put the drops in.

[00:40:31] I did love that.

[00:40:33] But then, yeah, he gets knocked out again and kidnapped again.

[00:40:37] Right.

[00:40:38] Yeah.

[00:40:39] This, this, um, therapy session in the finale was really some next level stuff in a dark

[00:40:46] way, but also just, so we've been seeing, um, Dr. Julian Rush hypnotize people throughout.

[00:40:53] So we see him do it with Francis, but it's like this trippy thing where she's reliving

[00:40:58] this memory.

[00:40:59] And it's the, it's the older actress that we've been seeing all season because she's the one

[00:41:04] living the memory.

[00:41:05] But when she looks in the mirror, it's the younger version looking back.

[00:41:08] Um, this is where the show hits some next level production stuff that is just so insightful

[00:41:16] and so logical.

[00:41:19] And if you didn't think about it, you would kind of miss it.

[00:41:22] You just be like, oh yeah, but they're paying attention to that level of detail.

[00:41:27] And, and that is just smart, smart TV making.

[00:41:31] Mm-hmm.

[00:41:32] Yeah.

[00:41:32] Yeah.

[00:41:33] Cause that's a whole other actor that they have to bring in and prep and, you know, you

[00:41:37] know, it's, it's a lot of extra work and, but they, they take the time and they push

[00:41:41] it.

[00:41:42] Yeah.

[00:41:43] Yeah.

[00:41:43] Cause story is king.

[00:41:45] Yes, exactly.

[00:41:46] Exactly.

[00:41:47] The, the, and the weird red light thing and that, you know, that felt a little comic

[00:41:53] book-y.

[00:41:54] No, but that's real, a real therapy method.

[00:41:57] Is that a real therapy?

[00:41:57] Yes.

[00:41:58] Okay.

[00:41:58] I had no idea.

[00:41:59] Wow.

[00:41:59] Do you know what, what can you say about it or what can you?

[00:42:02] I mean, it's just basically it's hypnotizing that, that red lights and then, and hypnotherapy,

[00:42:08] it's not, hypnotherapy is not really like a crack thing.

[00:42:10] There is.

[00:42:11] Right.

[00:42:11] It's not be, yeah, be a chicken and you'd be a chicken.

[00:42:14] Right.

[00:42:14] Right.

[00:42:14] Exactly.

[00:42:15] Yeah.

[00:42:15] Yeah.

[00:42:16] Um, it's, it's not unlike the Benny Jesser at use of the voice.

[00:42:19] Right.

[00:42:20] But I love the way that they, they visually portray this.

[00:42:24] Um, and you know, at one point she looks up and, and the two of them, Sophia and Julian

[00:42:29] are just like standing there and like, no, no, no, keep going.

[00:42:31] But also just the story that's uncovered.

[00:42:33] We've already seen this night where she takes Oz out to this club, um, after, I guess, after

[00:42:40] the funeral of their brothers or something like that.

[00:42:42] And now we see it from a different angle and we find out that she was going to have him

[00:42:46] killed by his hero that night.

[00:42:48] Mm-hmm.

[00:42:48] But then his Rex says like, you know, you can use a kid like that.

[00:42:54] So all season long, we've been waiting for the backstory about what happens with his brothers

[00:43:01] because, you know, as like you and Jean mentioned at the beginning, oh yeah, he had brothers and

[00:43:06] in the comic books, canonically, he kills them.

[00:43:08] Right.

[00:43:09] Right.

[00:43:09] And so we've been waiting, like, how is, what's it going to be?

[00:43:11] But like Sophia kills her brother in the comics too.

[00:43:14] So, you know, it doesn't have to be the same.

[00:43:16] Exactly.

[00:43:16] And so we're like, hmm, you know, it's this thing that's troubling.

[00:43:18] And what a brilliant way to bring that story element together with what they were already

[00:43:25] planning with Julian and with what comes out of Arkham.

[00:43:29] And then as a way to further immerse us into the world is to do the hypnotherapy storytelling

[00:43:39] and having us relive it.

[00:43:42] That is, again, just a brilliant story because you could do that in an exposition dump.

[00:43:48] You could do it in a regular flashback.

[00:43:49] But this flashback actually made mechanical sense relative to what they had been setting

[00:43:54] up all season long.

[00:43:56] Right.

[00:43:56] Because they've been showing these sessions with Sophia.

[00:43:58] Yeah.

[00:43:59] Exactly.

[00:43:59] Yeah.

[00:44:00] And Julian and what's his purpose in the role in everything.

[00:44:03] And then how Sophia uses Julian for her ends in this regard.

[00:44:09] Yeah.

[00:44:10] So.

[00:44:11] All right.

[00:44:11] So here's a question for you.

[00:44:12] When do you think was the moment that Francis decided she was not going to kill her son or

[00:44:18] have her son killed?

[00:44:21] I think I rewatched the episode last night.

[00:44:28] And I agree with Jean that this is, I don't know.

[00:44:33] I felt like he was going to put this in his number one.

[00:44:35] And I'm going to be having, I'm going to have a hard time not putting this as my number one

[00:44:38] for the year.

[00:44:40] Because I think this show does something that is a little bit groundbreaking in some ways,

[00:44:46] but I'll save that for the top 10 show next month when we get to it.

[00:44:50] But I was thinking about that very question because they're sitting in the booth and he's

[00:44:55] going on and on.

[00:44:57] Oh, mom, I'm going to take care of you.

[00:44:58] I'm going to get you the penthouse and do that kind of stuff.

[00:45:02] And something happens in that moment.

[00:45:06] And she looks over at Rex and Rex is like, you know, you know, like nodding, like, hey,

[00:45:11] are we, are we doing this or what?

[00:45:12] And she's like, you know, she's, she's like, no.

[00:45:14] And then she, she invites him to dance.

[00:45:15] Oh no, he invites her to dance.

[00:45:19] But there was something, some, something that Oswald said to her or some combination of

[00:45:27] things that activated her and, and changed her mind.

[00:45:31] And I still, I don't know that I still understand what happens in that conversation, but it's

[00:45:37] in that conversation where he's promising her all of these things that he convinces her.

[00:45:42] He doesn't know that his doom is at hand, right?

[00:45:46] He's just like, I'm just out with my mom.

[00:45:49] And yeah, somewhere, somewhere in that conversation is when she decides not to.

[00:45:53] Hmm.

[00:45:54] What about you?

[00:45:56] Um, yeah, I think that, or maybe even when they're on the dance floor and he says, he

[00:46:02] says like, I promise I'm always going to take care of you.

[00:46:04] I promise I'm going to give you all these things.

[00:46:06] And she's like, Hmm.

[00:46:07] All right, maybe let's give this a shot.

[00:46:09] Yeah.

[00:46:10] Yeah.

[00:46:11] But then, yeah, she regrets it now.

[00:46:14] Um, how brutal was that whole thing where Sophia has her like a finger slicer thing,

[00:46:21] whatever on there.

[00:46:22] Right.

[00:46:22] Yeah.

[00:46:22] It was, it's like a cigar thing to cut off.

[00:46:24] Right.

[00:46:24] Cigar cutter.

[00:46:25] Right, right, right, right.

[00:46:26] And, um, and she's says basically your mother already knows the truth.

[00:46:31] Uh, if you don't say it out loud, I'll cut off her finger.

[00:46:35] She already knows it, but you have to say it out loud.

[00:46:38] And I think, I think that he just, there was no way he was ever going to say it because he's

[00:46:43] kind of weak in that way, in the way he hides from himself.

[00:46:49] Mm-hmm.

[00:46:49] You know, he, um, invents a different truth that he can live by that benefits him and,

[00:46:57] you know, shove the ugliness of reality under the carpet behind him.

[00:47:02] Mm-hmm.

[00:47:05] And yeah.

[00:47:06] Do you think he would have ever done anything?

[00:47:09] Even if, even if Sophia was going to kill his mom, do you think he would have?

[00:47:13] Admitted to it?

[00:47:14] No, I, I, I don't think he would have, but I think it is more part of, I don't know if

[00:47:21] I'd characterize it as a, as a weakness.

[00:47:25] I, I, I want to say too, just to jump back on the front side of the scene really quick.

[00:47:30] Okay.

[00:47:30] How brilliant was this scene?

[00:47:32] Mm-hmm.

[00:47:33] The acting, the setup, the writing, the whole moment, this is this family intervention,

[00:47:40] family therapy thing.

[00:47:41] And what is, what is, uh, Sophia say?

[00:47:44] Even though she, you know, some people, you know, somebody might know that, you know, that

[00:47:48] you did them wrong.

[00:47:50] They still need to hear you say it.

[00:47:52] Mm-hmm.

[00:47:54] And that, the whole sort of self-help and, you know, be authentic and truthful and, you

[00:48:00] know, own up to your mistakes and, you know, make new promises, you know, all of that stuff

[00:48:04] is just so brilliantly packaged into this really twisted moment, like fundamentally twisted

[00:48:10] moment because it's therapy at the point of a gun, right?

[00:48:15] Yeah.

[00:48:15] But to the question of, of Oz and would he have ever said it?

[00:48:20] I don't think he would have ever said it because it had, I think it has to do with he, once

[00:48:30] he constructs his reality, he lives in that reality.

[00:48:36] And even though he knows that the truth is, but I think that's the thing is, is that he

[00:48:40] doesn't have guilt, right?

[00:48:43] He doesn't feel guilty about it.

[00:48:44] He doesn't, um, his body doesn't reject the lie, right?

[00:48:49] That, that piece is machine.

[00:48:51] And so if he admitted to it, then he's opening himself, uh, to giving, he's giving his enemy

[00:48:58] an advantage in that moment or somebody else a hold on him emotionally.

[00:49:02] He does it to preserve the, the edifice and to be ultimately dominant.

[00:49:09] Does that make sense?

[00:49:11] Yeah.

[00:49:11] I'm trying to think this through right now as we're talking and I'm not sure I fully understand

[00:49:15] what he's on about, but I don't think he would ever admit to something like that ever.

[00:49:21] Yeah.

[00:49:22] What about you?

[00:49:24] Um, yeah, no, I, I, like I said, I don't think that he would, but, um, I felt for him,

[00:49:30] even though he proves himself.

[00:49:32] So this all happens before we see him kill Vic, which of course adds and make, does twist

[00:49:38] how I feel about him as a character.

[00:49:41] Um, but I felt for bad for him when his mom calls him a monster and stabs him in the gut,

[00:49:46] like the one person that he loves.

[00:49:49] Right.

[00:49:50] But even then he can't.

[00:49:52] He'll never admit that to himself or.

[00:49:55] Yeah.

[00:49:55] Exactly.

[00:49:56] And even tells Vic, oh, Sophia stabbed her or Sophia stabbed me.

[00:50:00] Not, yeah.

[00:50:00] Yeah.

[00:50:01] That's, that's what happened.

[00:50:02] So he's, he's very.

[00:50:03] And that's his reality.

[00:50:04] Yeah.

[00:50:04] He said no.

[00:50:05] And yeah, he's very easy with, uh, bending the truth, whatever the facts are to fit his

[00:50:11] narrative and has no guilt about it.

[00:50:13] Yeah.

[00:50:14] Mm-hmm.

[00:50:15] We, I, I can't help, but think of the, uh, we're watching Dune Prophecy right now.

[00:50:20] And there's a line there where they're talking about truth and, and one of the functions

[00:50:26] of the, of the sisters are to be truth sayers, right?

[00:50:30] They're, they're human lie detectors and negotiations and political and commercial negotiations and

[00:50:35] things like that.

[00:50:36] And one of the things that they, they talk about is the, the body rejects the lie and that's

[00:50:42] how you can tell, right?

[00:50:43] You can see the sweat, the nervous jitterings, the eye twitches, this kind of stuff.

[00:50:47] And Vic's body does, I'm sorry, not Vic, but Oswald's body doesn't reject.

[00:50:51] Well, I think it's also like, so in, uh, not, not to switch gear and talk about Dune

[00:50:56] Prophecy, although I'm very excited we're going to do that.

[00:50:58] Hey, you're, you're in the lorehounds world.

[00:51:00] If you're not into, used to us, you know, crossing the lines, you're in the wrong place.

[00:51:04] But there, in the first episode, there was a line where the truth sayer, I think it

[00:51:09] was Kasha says about, you know, he, the emperor looks to her and is like, is this guy

[00:51:15] telling the truth and she says to him, he believes he is anyway.

[00:51:19] And that is basically, that's how you pass like a polygraph test as well.

[00:51:23] If you genuinely believe it, then yeah.

[00:51:27] And, and I think that, I think that's, that's right on is that Oswald believes it.

[00:51:33] Right.

[00:51:33] Oswald believes that Sophia stabbed him.

[00:51:35] Oswald believes that, you know, his, uh, that his, he didn't do that to his brothers.

[00:51:41] Right.

[00:51:41] Right.

[00:51:43] And you brought up Vic.

[00:51:45] So Vic before, I mean, we'll get to his, his ending in a minute, but let's celebrate

[00:51:49] him for a second because he pulled off something pretty remarkable at the end here.

[00:51:54] Um, he, he gathered this uneasy alliance of all like the second fiddle crime organizations

[00:52:00] and, um, he was leading them all to like be the Calvary, but then the bomb goes off that

[00:52:07] Sophia set off.

[00:52:09] And first of all, how cute is it of Vic that he thought that these people were going to

[00:52:13] care about helping us?

[00:52:17] He gave, he gives that impassioned speech on the street, which is really funny too, because

[00:52:21] I know those streets that that's, um, I didn't live, I used, when I lived in Brooklyn, you

[00:52:25] lived in Brooklyn too, didn't you?

[00:52:26] Mm-hmm.

[00:52:27] Uh, that I, I remember always riding my bike through those areas.

[00:52:30] It's a, it was a good place to get from A to B.

[00:52:33] And so I was like, oh, I know that building.

[00:52:34] I know that bridge.

[00:52:35] And, but when he's giving that impassioned plea of this is my neighborhood, right?

[00:52:41] And, and are you just going to let the gigantes and the, and the, uh, Falcons or not the Falcons,

[00:52:46] the, um, uh, Maronis, you know, just treat you like this.

[00:52:51] And that, that completely falls on deaf ears on all of those other people.

[00:52:56] They're like, yeah, dude, we're here for the drugs and the money.

[00:52:58] Yeah.

[00:52:58] I don't know.

[00:52:59] But it's, but he does get the link and all the rest of the number twos to team up, which

[00:53:06] is remarkable to me that not a single one of them is loyal enough to their boss that

[00:53:13] they would not kill them.

[00:53:15] Like they, each one of them that they showed us killed their number one to become number

[00:53:19] one themselves.

[00:53:20] And you've got to think also that Oz later is thinking about that as well.

[00:53:26] Mm-hmm.

[00:53:27] Yeah.

[00:53:28] And link is the key link here in this, right?

[00:53:31] Because he's the one who's able to talk to all those second in command people and convince

[00:53:37] them.

[00:53:38] And we get the psychology of it when, uh, Oswald is driving Sophia and he's talking about like,

[00:53:47] yeah, you don't, you know what it does to you to always be in that second secondary position

[00:53:51] and never getting a shot, never getting credit, never being acknowledged.

[00:53:56] And I love the line that he says to her, like, or she says to him, like, well, you don't

[00:54:01] think I understand that?

[00:54:02] And he's like, and she's like, oh yeah, it wouldn't matter anyway if you, if you did.

[00:54:06] But at both, at, at, at, at, at several instances on, in both of their sides, Sophia, Sophia is

[00:54:14] being as like, Hey, you guys can step up and, you know, you do the same thing.

[00:54:18] Right.

[00:54:19] And so I love the irony that they were both sort of trying to empower others who've been

[00:54:24] out of power.

[00:54:26] Yeah.

[00:54:26] I do wonder if link, you know, feels if he would want to take any sort of revenge, if

[00:54:33] he were to come back and figure out that, uh, might have something to do with Vic suddenly

[00:54:38] being gone.

[00:54:39] Hmm.

[00:54:42] That's a good thought.

[00:54:43] I hadn't, yeah, I didn't, uh, I hadn't considered that.

[00:54:46] But yeah, uh, he's got to have a good story, but he loves to be in those kinds of positions,

[00:54:51] doesn't he?

[00:54:51] He loves coming up with, that's the juice for him is figuring out all these little solutions

[00:54:56] and being clever.

[00:54:57] He loves to think of himself as being clever and a survivor.

[00:55:01] Yeah.

[00:55:02] So yeah.

[00:55:03] Huh.

[00:55:04] Good stuff.

[00:55:05] Should we take a quick break?

[00:55:07] And then when we come back, we can talk about Sophia and, uh, Oz a little bit more.

[00:55:12] And then we've got some, a listener feedback that we want to get to.

[00:55:15] Okay.

[00:55:15] Sounds good.

[00:55:36] Unhappy endings for Sophia.

[00:55:39] Hmm.

[00:55:40] Hmm.

[00:55:41] And you gotta, I gotta, you guys gotta tell me what's going on with this letter.

[00:55:44] Cause I had no idea where the letter was from.

[00:55:46] Okay.

[00:55:46] Okay.

[00:55:47] Well, first before that, like how, so I was wondering Gia, her niece, who she saved her

[00:55:54] life when she gasped the rest of the Falcons, um, she goes to see Gia in, I guess it's

[00:56:01] not Arkham, but some sort of like orphanage or some state asylum.

[00:56:05] It looks as grim as Arkham.

[00:56:08] Um, and so she realizes that she's doing to Gia what was done to her and Gia wants to

[00:56:15] talk to the cops.

[00:56:16] So I wonder if that's going to be something that's going to blow up in Sophia's face again

[00:56:20] later.

[00:56:21] And I can imagine at this time post flood in New York, that there's a lot of, uh, families

[00:56:27] that have been disrupted and broken and, and people who are, uh, kids who've been either

[00:56:32] don't have parents anymore or who's, who've, you know, have been not reunited yet or, or

[00:56:37] what have you.

[00:56:38] So yeah, that looked pretty grim, like a pretty grim situation.

[00:56:41] Yeah.

[00:56:42] And, and, and she, you know, she's got a vendetta against her aunt because I think probably

[00:56:46] almost assuredly Gia's testimony is part of what got Sophia recommitted.

[00:56:51] Hmm.

[00:56:52] That's a good point.

[00:56:53] That's a good point.

[00:56:54] Hmm.

[00:56:55] Um, did you notice Sophia almost traded Francis for the bliss after seeing, after this trip

[00:57:01] to see Sophia or after to see Gia?

[00:57:04] Um, but then Julian, the, the psych, yeah.

[00:57:09] Psychiatrist who needs to be disbarred immediately.

[00:57:11] He encouraged her to get her revenge instead.

[00:57:15] So.

[00:57:15] Oh gosh, I, I, I miss, I, I don't remember that.

[00:57:18] Was that in the episode?

[00:57:19] That must've been in episode seven.

[00:57:20] Yeah.

[00:57:22] Um, yeah.

[00:57:23] Eight has completely washed out so much of episode seven for me.

[00:57:27] Plus Dune.

[00:57:27] But anyway.

[00:57:28] But just pointing out that, uh, Julian is, is no Mr. Nice Guy.

[00:57:31] Hmm.

[00:57:32] Obviously.

[00:57:33] Indeed.

[00:57:34] Indeed.

[00:57:34] And willing to actually, uh, well, we talk about putting the, the, the screws on somebody,

[00:57:39] but he's, he's actually willing to cut her finger off for Francis's finger off.

[00:57:44] Right.

[00:57:44] But then so is Sophia.

[00:57:45] Like Sophia does a lot of things that show she's not a good person anymore either.

[00:57:50] And one of them is like, she promises the Falcone house to whomever brings her Oz, but

[00:57:56] then she burns it down as she goes to the airport.

[00:57:58] Like that is, that was unnecessary.

[00:58:00] She did not need to do that.

[00:58:02] Yeah, no, I, I agree.

[00:58:03] I was like, wow, what is, what's going on here?

[00:58:05] One thing that I, um, we never really talked about in the episodes and they didn't really

[00:58:10] deal with in the show was that there's a great painting behind the conference room table

[00:58:15] there that we see in, in a lot of shots.

[00:58:16] And I remember looking it up and episode one, and it's a quasi famous painting.

[00:58:21] And I can't remember the details on it now when I thought they were going to go to that,

[00:58:25] but then instead they went to the family portrait and to watch it burn.

[00:58:29] Hmm.

[00:58:30] And her, her father.

[00:58:31] There.

[00:58:31] Oh, and interesting.

[00:58:32] I noticed too, watching the movie that that's played, that character is played by John

[00:58:35] Turturro and they switched to Mark Strong in this one.

[00:58:38] Right.

[00:58:39] Right.

[00:58:39] John Turturro said that, um, he wasn't comfortable with the violence against women in this, but

[00:58:44] he's violent against women in the movie.

[00:58:46] So I'm like, okay, sure.

[00:58:47] Right.

[00:58:47] Yeah.

[00:58:48] Yeah.

[00:58:49] Because he don't, we don't really see anything, uh, in this.

[00:58:52] No.

[00:58:52] It's, it's, it's all talked about.

[00:58:53] It's not actually.

[00:58:54] I think it's so sorry.

[00:58:55] Spoiler for the Batman, for anyone who hasn't seen it, but in the Batman at one point,

[00:58:59] he actually like holds Selena Kyle, his own daughter down with a pipe, like choking her.

[00:59:06] Oh, okay.

[00:59:06] And it's implied of course, that he's involved in, um.

[00:59:09] Right.

[00:59:10] The murders.

[00:59:10] Deaths.

[00:59:11] Yeah.

[00:59:11] Right.

[00:59:12] Right.

[00:59:12] Right.

[00:59:12] Right.

[00:59:13] Yeah.

[00:59:15] Yeah.

[00:59:15] But oh man, that when Sophia gets to the airport and she thinks like, I'm getting my

[00:59:20] way.

[00:59:21] I just burned down the house, but I'm still getting Oz.

[00:59:24] And then Oz just has this little smile and Sophia's face, just that interaction, like

[00:59:29] that wordless interaction between the two of them and the way her face falls.

[00:59:33] And she's like, oh shit, I'm getting tough.

[00:59:35] So good.

[00:59:36] So good.

[00:59:37] And the way they set it up perfectly where we're like, is this a double crawl?

[00:59:42] Is this for real or not?

[00:59:43] Like when they came to get Oz, when he comes out of the council chamber, you're like, okay,

[00:59:48] what, what's really going on here?

[00:59:50] And it could play either way.

[00:59:51] It was perfect.

[00:59:52] And then just, yeah, like you said, that just the fact that Oswald is standing there and

[00:59:58] he's got this little smirk on his face and the realization starts to, it was rolling over

[01:00:03] me.

[01:00:04] I was like, oh, and then when Link kills Zhao, like then you're really into it.

[01:00:10] You're like, whoa, this is awesome.

[01:00:12] Like it really took it to the next level.

[01:00:14] But yeah, the, just the subtle interactions between Sophia and Oz, between Miladi and,

[01:00:20] and what's his name?

[01:00:22] Who's playing Oswald?

[01:00:22] Farrell.

[01:00:23] Colin Farrell.

[01:00:23] Thank you.

[01:00:24] Colin Farrell.

[01:00:24] And through that makeup, like kudos to the makeup team.

[01:00:28] Because yeah, that really, the way that Colin Farrell was able to express through that,

[01:00:33] but it also completely transformed him in that I forgot most of the time what actor I was

[01:00:38] looking at.

[01:00:39] I could barely see him.

[01:00:40] I mean, there was a couple of times where I had like a kind of a hint of a, of a suggestion

[01:00:44] of maybe a, a, a, an indication, but it was brilliant.

[01:00:49] I did notice in the movie too, that in the show they improved his makeup and he improved

[01:00:55] the character.

[01:00:56] So like there was a really nice evolution.

[01:00:59] There's more of a wholeness and a completeness to the character in the show.

[01:01:04] Yes.

[01:01:04] Which I appreciate.

[01:01:05] Yeah.

[01:01:06] And that's really Farrell.

[01:01:07] That's Farrell putting the work into being an actor, I think.

[01:01:10] Yeah.

[01:01:10] Yeah.

[01:01:11] So yeah, this is why I'm worried.

[01:01:12] Okay.

[01:01:13] So we'll wrap up with, um, with, with Sophia.

[01:01:16] This is why I'm a little worried about her.

[01:01:18] Um, so Oz doesn't kill her.

[01:01:21] He does something worse.

[01:01:21] He turns her in and she's back in Arkham and doc Julian rush is back in Arkham too, because

[01:01:28] he's just like a sicko.

[01:01:30] He can't, he's gotta be near her.

[01:01:32] There's gotta be somebody who's gotta be dominating the other one.

[01:01:34] That's just like, um, yeah, he's, he's obsessed with her.

[01:01:39] Yeah.

[01:01:41] And, and, but he gives her this letter and you were asking about the letter from Selena

[01:01:45] Kyle.

[01:01:45] So that is her half sister.

[01:01:47] That's Catwoman.

[01:01:49] Um, okay.

[01:01:50] So I haven't finished, I haven't gotten up to that point in the, in the movie yet, which

[01:01:54] is fine.

[01:01:54] I'm not worried.

[01:01:55] It's Zoe Kravitz plays her.

[01:01:57] And that's why John was asking me if I thought she should go open a record shop because of

[01:02:02] Catwoman.

[01:02:03] I didn't quite catch that, but I got it now.

[01:02:06] Okay.

[01:02:07] All right.

[01:02:07] So that's her half.

[01:02:08] Okay, cool.

[01:02:09] All right.

[01:02:09] So, so, so a nice world building here and keeping the connectivity across the big to

[01:02:15] the small screen.

[01:02:16] Right.

[01:02:16] But so then I, I do want Sophia to show up in the big movie, but I want her to still be

[01:02:22] written by the same writers because I just agree.

[01:02:25] I don't love the way that, uh, Selena Kyle's character was handled in.

[01:02:30] And maybe that's also, cause the Catwoman is obviously one of my favorites.

[01:02:32] I mean, clearly come on, um, sure.

[01:02:36] Zero points for guessing that, but no point.

[01:02:41] So I was, I was, uh, that's probably one of my biggest resistances to the Batman movie

[01:02:46] is I just felt that her character in that was a bit, um, I, I was just uncomfortable

[01:02:53] and not in a way that I found thought provoking, but uncomfortable with, for instance, the fact

[01:02:58] that privacy exists for Bruce, but not for Selena.

[01:03:01] And just that I felt, I mean, I felt like all the characters were a bit flat.

[01:03:06] Um, but I just wanted, I wanted more from her, you know, even if it's like a cheesy,

[01:03:14] um, what's her face?

[01:03:15] Uh, uh, blonde actress, the original Catwoman.

[01:03:19] Meow.

[01:03:20] Oh, uh, Michelle Pfeiffer.

[01:03:21] Michelle Pfeiffer.

[01:03:22] Thank you.

[01:03:22] Yeah.

[01:03:23] Yes.

[01:03:24] It was the meow that did it.

[01:03:26] Unlocked in my memory.

[01:03:27] Okay, cool.

[01:03:28] Well, that, that's, uh, I figured it was a big screen connect, you know, connectivity

[01:03:32] to the main story.

[01:03:33] I just haven't gotten up to that part of the movie yet to know it.

[01:03:36] So, uh, hopefully, yeah.

[01:03:39] If you haven't seen the movie, you know, that's, uh.

[01:03:42] Right.

[01:03:42] Right.

[01:03:43] Well, no, we warned you.

[01:03:44] Yeah, exactly.

[01:03:45] But it's, yeah, they're half sisters, but they come from different worlds.

[01:03:48] So that should be an interesting dynamic.

[01:03:49] Right.

[01:03:50] Gotcha.

[01:03:52] Yeah.

[01:03:52] And then, yeah, we get to Oz is like arguably.

[01:03:57] Even more tragic is ending.

[01:03:58] Like in some ways.

[01:04:01] I don't know.

[01:04:02] No, that's rich.

[01:04:03] That would be rich for me to say.

[01:04:04] I was going to say, I almost feel sorry for him, even though he's free because his life

[01:04:08] is so empty, but I don't think that's fair because he's less miserable than Sophia and

[01:04:13] he deserves it more.

[01:04:14] Hmm.

[01:04:15] Hmm.

[01:04:17] Yeah.

[01:04:18] And what does, is, is anything ever enough for a person like that?

[01:04:23] Yeah.

[01:04:24] No.

[01:04:24] And when you thrive off the chaos and you thrive off the, the, the violence and the,

[01:04:33] and you thrive off of the, um, uh, the crisis and having these crisis moments, nothing replaces

[01:04:42] that.

[01:04:43] Right.

[01:04:43] So what are you going to do?

[01:04:44] You're going to build a big drug empire.

[01:04:46] That's going to be stable and turn profits.

[01:04:49] And you're going to own, you're going to have sway with the city council so that they

[01:04:53] keep off, you know, you're going to create some sort of a quid pro quo where everything's

[01:04:58] sort of in balance.

[01:04:59] That's not what this character is showing us that he loves.

[01:05:02] He loves these, you know, things when they're, when they're out of balance.

[01:05:06] But yet, you know, most, most organizations and corporations want balance.

[01:05:11] They want stability so that they can continue to reap profits.

[01:05:15] Right.

[01:05:15] So what, where is that going to lead for him?

[01:05:18] I think it's an empty, it's an empty, uh, um, an empty chalice.

[01:05:23] Yeah, exactly.

[01:05:25] Yeah.

[01:05:26] And I just can't get over what he did to Victor because Vic said, I love you, your family.

[01:05:30] And he's like, love is weakness.

[01:05:32] Now you must die.

[01:05:33] Um, so, and then.

[01:05:36] So he leaves, he throws like the thing part, the detail I keep thinking about is when he

[01:05:41] throws Vic's ID into the river.

[01:05:44] So it's like, you will be a John Doe.

[01:05:47] You will be forgotten.

[01:05:49] That's a really good point.

[01:05:51] Yeah.

[01:05:52] Vic deserves so much more.

[01:05:53] He did all the things for him.

[01:05:55] And, you know, I kind of knew it was going to be bad when he didn't get on that bus in

[01:06:00] episode, what was it?

[01:06:01] Two or something.

[01:06:02] Yeah.

[01:06:02] Something like that.

[01:06:03] Um, but I also like the horrible person I am wanted to see this story play out with

[01:06:10] him in it.

[01:06:11] That's a really good point too, about that he's, uh, going to be listed as a John Doe.

[01:06:17] That his name won't be written, you know, in the, in the annals along Vic Calabrese.

[01:06:23] Right.

[01:06:24] Right.

[01:06:24] He's, uh, he's just, he's relegated him to, to just another, you know, another victim of

[01:06:31] violence in Gotham city and this, in this horrible city.

[01:06:35] And that is, you know, and then you think about the journey that he was on when he's at,

[01:06:41] when they're in the hospital room, when, when, uh, Oswald stitching himself up and Vic has

[01:06:47] that impassioned speech and then Oswald's like, Oh, you've been practicing that.

[01:06:51] You gotta, you gotta project more.

[01:06:52] Yeah.

[01:06:53] Like Vic really grew and he believed in something and he believed in family and he had hope

[01:06:58] again.

[01:06:59] Right.

[01:07:00] Yeah.

[01:07:00] He, you like, Oh, yeah.

[01:07:03] I love you too, buddy.

[01:07:05] Sorry.

[01:07:06] And that's a problem.

[01:07:07] Yeah.

[01:07:07] That's a problem.

[01:07:09] Yeah.

[01:07:10] I, his love, like you do not want to be loved by Oz.

[01:07:13] That's a poison pill because he finally gives Francis the, just the tragic poetry.

[01:07:19] He gives Francis the penthouse that he always promised her and he can pat himself on the

[01:07:25] back and be like, look, I did it, ma.

[01:07:26] I gave you the penthouse.

[01:07:28] Um, but yeah, obviously she's trapped there and we see a single tear.

[01:07:33] Yeah.

[01:07:33] That lone tear.

[01:07:34] I was thinking of a bell, get her a bell, you know, from,

[01:07:37] uh, breaking bad.

[01:07:39] Yeah.

[01:07:39] The uncle to you.

[01:07:40] Right.

[01:07:41] Right.

[01:07:41] Yeah.

[01:07:42] Yeah.

[01:07:42] Where there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's somebody in there, but yeah,

[01:07:46] they're, they're not able to, to express.

[01:07:49] Yeah.

[01:07:49] It's really, that's just some really weird stuff that he's, he's doing there.

[01:07:54] I, obviously he wants to keep her out of his enemy's hands.

[01:07:58] Right.

[01:07:59] But it's almost like a, like a, like his, somehow his power is an evil.

[01:08:08] You know, magician type.

[01:08:10] That's where he keeps his evil power.

[01:08:12] His fight.

[01:08:13] What do they call it?

[01:08:13] A fight?

[01:08:14] Philactria.

[01:08:15] Oh, I forget what it's called.

[01:08:16] There's a, where like a, an evil mage will keep their spiritual essence there.

[01:08:21] Okay.

[01:08:21] That's where, and if, you know, if the, the hero players, you know, can get to that, they

[01:08:25] can undo the, the evil mages magic or whatever.

[01:08:28] And so somehow Oz is, there's a, there's an essence, there's a connection, there's a totemic

[01:08:36] element to his mother that, you know, as long as she's alive, he's got a center of gravity

[01:08:42] or he's got a reference point to his life.

[01:08:45] Yeah.

[01:08:45] And, but, but, but also just keeping his promises and, and, and the, the imprinting that he's

[01:08:52] done on her.

[01:08:53] Yeah.

[01:08:53] It's weird.

[01:08:54] I don't know how to, I don't know how to unpack it.

[01:08:56] Right.

[01:08:56] And what a dark ending for Eve too, that she, I mean, cause when she was talking to

[01:09:02] Sophia before she was telling Sophia, like, it's not like, you know, we're madly in love

[01:09:07] or something, but it's complicated.

[01:09:08] There's, you know, we have a relationship of sorts and now she's just reduced to playing

[01:09:14] his mother after she, like Sophia helped her realize that Oz doesn't actually care about

[01:09:21] her.

[01:09:22] And she gave up Oz's location.

[01:09:24] And luckily at least Sophia kept her word on not telling him where she got that information.

[01:09:29] But now I was wondering if, if you thought whether, uh, Oswald knows that Eve gave her

[01:09:35] up, gave him up or not.

[01:09:37] No, I would say no, but she's in a precarious position because like she needs to stay exactly

[01:09:44] the right distance from him because if she gets too close, look what happened to Vic.

[01:09:48] But if she pulls away, obviously he's going to have a bad reaction there too.

[01:09:52] Right.

[01:09:52] And she's trapped now forever playing that role.

[01:09:55] Right.

[01:09:56] Right.

[01:09:57] She's not, she doesn't, she's not going to have her own space.

[01:10:00] She's not going to have her own society of, of, uh, of other sex workers or run her, you

[01:10:06] know, her crew or any of that kind of stuff.

[01:10:09] She's trapped in that apartment along with Francis.

[01:10:12] You know, what would be an interesting spinoff is if they did, here's one where you can pander

[01:10:17] to us women, but not pander actually have Lauren the Frank to it.

[01:10:19] Um, but if they had a show that was about the interactions about, um, Selena, Kyle and,

[01:10:27] uh, Sophia and Eve coming together and like their own sort of birds, uh, birds of prey moment.

[01:10:35] I like it.

[01:10:36] I like it.

[01:10:36] That would be good.

[01:10:37] I would, I would, I would go small screen on that.

[01:10:39] Definitely.

[01:10:40] Uh, a limited series one.

[01:10:42] Yeah.

[01:10:42] I would like it in a limited series because, uh, I want the, the character exploration

[01:10:47] that we've had in this show.

[01:10:49] Yeah.

[01:10:49] Exactly.

[01:10:50] And there's something about containing it in a limited series where that compression really

[01:10:57] drives the story and drives the action and makes it a sharper in some ways.

[01:11:02] Cause if you have open-ended, then it can just kind of mush out all over the place.

[01:11:06] But here we've got a job to do.

[01:11:07] We've got a story to tell and we've got to really make sure everything punches, uh, really

[01:11:12] hard.

[01:11:13] Yeah.

[01:11:14] Yeah.

[01:11:15] And then we get the Batman two setups.

[01:11:16] We get, uh, so Oz, he made a deal to pin it on Sophia in exchange for access to the

[01:11:22] big leagues.

[01:11:22] So he's moving up in the political world in Gotham.

[01:11:25] And we also get, John called it a bat signal appears in the sky.

[01:11:31] Did he actually call that like specifically?

[01:11:33] I don't remember.

[01:11:34] I think so.

[01:11:35] I think he said, we're not getting Batman.

[01:11:38] We'll just get the bat signal on the finale.

[01:11:40] Perfect.

[01:11:40] Perfect.

[01:11:41] And that's exactly the amount of Batman I wanted in this show.

[01:11:44] Me too.

[01:11:44] To be honest.

[01:11:45] Yeah.

[01:11:45] Like, look, he's there, he's still alive, but it's not like he's wasting his time on

[01:11:49] petty gang wars.

[01:11:50] Right.

[01:11:51] Well, it got pretty major when they blew up.

[01:11:53] Well, yeah.

[01:11:53] Once they blew up.

[01:11:54] Well, and now the bat signal's there.

[01:11:56] Yeah.

[01:11:57] Exactly.

[01:11:57] Exactly.

[01:11:58] Now things are getting bad.

[01:12:00] Yeah.

[01:12:00] Um, it was perfect.

[01:12:01] It was a perfect way to wrap it up.

[01:12:03] And they, the way they pan, they pull back and then they pan over and they just give

[01:12:07] just enough room in the sky for the bat signal to be perfectly.

[01:12:11] Yeah.

[01:12:11] It was great.

[01:12:12] Chef's kiss.

[01:12:13] Yeah.

[01:12:24] Yeah.

[01:12:24] Yeah.

[01:12:24] And, um, there's rumors that are all over the place.

[01:12:27] There's been a lot of discussion in our discord about it, but of some of the most popular

[01:12:31] ones is a villain called hush.

[01:12:33] Um, there's been a lot of hints about the court of owls, which is sort of a, it's interesting

[01:12:38] if they do the court of owls next, because the court of owls is about like sort of the

[01:12:43] elite secret society.

[01:12:45] And so it's sort of the mirror image of what we just got with the penguin, you know, where

[01:12:50] it was like the, the underbelly.

[01:12:52] Okay.

[01:12:53] Right.

[01:12:53] But we know that Oz is trying to now infiltrate these higher echelons of, uh, Gotham society.

[01:13:01] So that could be interesting.

[01:13:02] Um, maybe there, yeah, there's also a plot line where he runs for mayor.

[01:13:08] Um, there's been some, uh, Reeves, I think basically he gave a list of characters he would

[01:13:14] like to do.

[01:13:15] And Mr.

[01:13:16] Freeze is one of them.

[01:13:17] And we know that, um, it's going to be set around Christmas or around the end of the

[01:13:22] year, at least the next Batman.

[01:13:23] So.

[01:13:24] Okay.

[01:13:24] Lots of interesting places they can go in the next movie.

[01:13:27] And there's certainly implied there might be more TV spinoffs too.

[01:13:31] Okay.

[01:13:32] Well, they certainly showed us that Oswald was very interested in the position of mayor.

[01:13:41] Mm-hmm.

[01:13:41] We get shots of, you know, uh, he looks up at the mayor at one point, uh, when he's

[01:13:46] going into the council halls, he plays with her name tag.

[01:13:49] When he's there, he sits there, you know, in the big chair with the gavel.

[01:13:52] So he's got a lot of fascination around that, the role of mayor.

[01:13:56] So.

[01:13:57] Mm-hmm.

[01:13:57] It would not surprise me if there was something in the offing for that.

[01:14:00] Feels like they're going that direction.

[01:14:02] Yeah.

[01:14:02] For sure.

[01:14:04] Yeah.

[01:14:04] So, okay.

[01:14:05] I had a one spoiler discussion I wanted to have.

[01:14:08] It's a spoiler for, and I saved it to last because it's a spoiler for the Agatha all

[01:14:12] along finale.

[01:14:13] So.

[01:14:13] Okay.

[01:14:14] People who haven't, don't want to be spoiled for the Agatha all along finale might want

[01:14:18] to skip past this, but I just can't stop thinking about the parallel between, we have

[01:14:23] two villainous characters who we, you know, rooting for to have a redemption arc, Agatha

[01:14:31] and Oz.

[01:14:32] Mm-hmm.

[01:14:33] Um, and they, each of them has a protege that they've taken under their wing and have warmed

[01:14:39] up to, you know, so Agatha has Billy and Oz has Vic.

[01:14:43] Um, and they're kind of mirror images of each other in a way, in the way that it ended, you

[01:14:49] know, like we thought it was like, Agatha is dark because she doesn't really get the redemption

[01:14:54] arc.

[01:14:55] And then until you see what happened between Oz and Vic, where at least Agatha, she had

[01:15:02] the chance to kill Billy and stopped herself.

[01:15:05] Mm-hmm.

[01:15:05] And Oz like pushed himself over the end when he was arguably in a less, uh, yeah, there's

[01:15:14] no reason for him to kill him.

[01:15:15] Um, I was thinking more too about the, you know, the Agatha not facing up to what she's

[01:15:25] done, where can Oswald even acknowledge what he's done?

[01:15:31] Like the, the harm.

[01:15:32] Right.

[01:15:33] Agatha at least doesn't want to face, she is honest with her inside somewhere and that's

[01:15:38] why she says all the horrible things about herself.

[01:15:40] And that's why she doesn't want to face her son in the afterlife.

[01:15:43] Because she feels guilt.

[01:15:45] She has a conscious, she has a moral conscious where, where Oswald doesn't.

[01:15:49] No.

[01:15:50] He has no, he has no mixed feelings about what happened to his brothers.

[01:15:53] I don't think he's ever felt guilt in his life.

[01:15:55] Mm-hmm.

[01:15:56] Mm-hmm.

[01:15:59] Interesting that they, both of these shows came out at this time.

[01:16:03] Yeah.

[01:16:03] And they have such different tones because, you know, obviously I have is more.

[01:16:06] Obviously.

[01:16:07] Comedic.

[01:16:09] Wild.

[01:16:10] Wild.

[01:16:10] But still very, very poignant, emotionally poignant in ways that, and great study in character.

[01:16:21] Right?

[01:16:21] I mean, what was driving all of this was character and examining character.

[01:16:27] Yeah.

[01:16:28] Yeah.

[01:16:30] Just saying, justice for Agatha.

[01:16:35] Right.

[01:16:36] We've got some feedback, a couple of emails, and maybe a couple of Discord messages.

[01:16:44] Should we start off?

[01:16:46] Do you want to start off with Rocky Zim?

[01:16:47] Sure.

[01:16:48] Rocky Zim says, so Sophia's buddy slash therapist was doing EMDR therapy on Oz's mother when she

[01:16:54] was staring at the moving red lights.

[01:16:57] It's a trauma therapy technique that I'm trained in and have done myself.

[01:17:01] Oh, wow.

[01:17:02] Eye movement desensitization.

[01:17:04] Eye movement desensitization.

[01:17:06] Mm-hmm.

[01:17:07] Desensitization.

[01:17:08] Desensitization.

[01:17:09] Desensitization.

[01:17:10] Welcome to podcasting, folks.

[01:17:11] It happens sometimes our mouths just stop working.

[01:17:14] It's 10.30 p.m.

[01:17:16] All about allowing the brain to process and unlock certain memories slash traumas.

[01:17:20] That was cool to see.

[01:17:21] Interesting use of trauma therapy.

[01:17:24] Maybe Sophia's therapist would probably have had his license revoked a long time ago.

[01:17:28] LOL.

[01:17:30] That's cool, Rocky Zim, that you have direct experience with this.

[01:17:34] That's really interesting.

[01:17:36] Yeah, I had no idea.

[01:17:36] I thought it was just some comic book thing.

[01:17:38] I had no idea that it was a real thing.

[01:17:39] I mean, I know that the low-level shock therapy stuff is kind of bad.

[01:17:44] It's very much a real thing.

[01:17:45] Yeah.

[01:17:45] Yeah.

[01:17:46] Yeah.

[01:17:46] So that's interesting.

[01:17:48] Okay.

[01:17:48] Yeah, everything that they showed in this is real, but then Julian Rush uses it.

[01:17:54] In the most sinister way.

[01:17:56] Which is very comic book-y.

[01:17:58] Yeah.

[01:17:59] All right.

[01:17:59] We get a really good email from Emily B.

[01:18:03] Also, who has some thoughts on the questions of mental health.

[01:18:08] Dear Laura Hounds, hope you're doing well.

[01:18:09] I'm writing to share some thoughts on the Penguin and its portrayal of mental health.

[01:18:13] As a psychiatric physician's assistant, I've noticed a few things that I believe are worth discussing.

[01:18:19] Mental health is often misunderstood and ill-defined.

[01:18:22] The DSM-5, that's the Diagnostic Statistical Manual, that's the big book of categories, defines a mental health disorder as behavioral or psychological syndrome, a behavioral or psychological syndrome or pattern, in which the consequences are clinically significant pain or disability.

[01:18:40] Portrayals like those in Gotham stories, including the Penguin, especially in episode four, tend to perpetuate harmful stereotypes.

[01:18:48] One of these harmful stereotypes is that people with psychiatric disorders are more prone to violence.

[01:18:53] In reality, they're statistically less likely to commit violent acts than the general population.

[01:18:58] Most individuals with severe mental illness, such as those warranting an extended stay in Arkham Asylum, do not have the cognitive resources or the forethought to develop complex violent schemes.

[01:19:16] Arkham Asylum reinforces stigmas by depicting those with mental illnesses as dangerous masterminds.

[01:19:22] For example, a school shooter drafting hundreds of detailed documents would likely not meet the criteria for severe mental health condition.

[01:19:33] Oh, shit. Hold on a second.

[01:19:35] I got to pause this.

[01:19:37] My wife is calling.

[01:19:37] Hang on for one second.

[01:19:39] All right.

[01:19:40] That was nothing.

[01:19:42] Just mark that.

[01:19:43] Okay.

[01:19:43] See if I can remember where I was.

[01:19:50] Furthermore, the mentally ill are more likely to be victims of violence than they are to perpetuate violence.

[01:19:56] Unfortunately, societal fear of mental illness is amplified by portrayals like those in The Penguin.

[01:20:02] In episode four, I will give them a little benefit of the doubt since these women were likely on bliss, which could have made them more reactive and violent.

[01:20:10] In addition, long-term psychiatric hospitals like Arkham Asylum barely exist in the real world anymore.

[01:20:17] With fewer than 200 left in the United States, most patients receive care in outpatient settings, hospitals, or community programs.

[01:20:24] The closing of many long-term psychiatric facilities has contributed to the growing issue of homelessness among the mentally ill, which further isolates and stigmatizes these individuals.

[01:20:36] As someone who's worked with dual diagnosis patients, those who suffer from a mental illness and substance use disorder, I feel strongly about advocating for better understanding of and treatment for those individuals.

[01:20:52] My own journey of surviving a stroke that affected my mental health.

[01:20:56] Yes, I'm the person who emailed a couple of years ago about listening to the Lorehounds while in the hospital.

[01:21:01] I'm still a dedicated listener and appreciate all the work you do.

[01:21:04] As deepened my empathy and commitment to this cause.

[01:21:09] All of that being said, The Penguin has been amazing and should win all the Emmys.

[01:21:16] However, I hope that in the future we can encourage more accurate and compassionate portrayals of psychiatric disorders in the media.

[01:21:25] Thank you for all that you do, Emily.

[01:21:27] I remember getting Emily's email.

[01:21:31] I can't remember what show we were covering.

[01:21:33] Was it maybe and or?

[01:21:34] I remember receiving the email though.

[01:21:37] And John and I both having a moment of being blown away.

[01:21:40] Like, we're just a couple of dudes doing some podcasting, like, you know, whatever.

[01:21:46] And then the fact that, you know, Alicia, I'm sure you've had this experience too.

[01:21:52] And now that we're all together, that our words actually go out and, you know, affect other people in the world in many ways that we have no idea that it's happening, right?

[01:22:04] It's the wonder of communication.

[01:22:06] All these people out there listening to what we do.

[01:22:11] So, I don't know if you're, you know, just that idea of being able to have this connection with people like that.

[01:22:19] Yeah, no, I mean, absolutely.

[01:22:21] I think that that's one of the reasons why I like to talk about these shows and, you know, is to also have these discussions like what Emily is bringing up here.

[01:22:31] And I think, you know, I was thinking as I'm listening to you read this email, I'm thinking about, well, I think part of it is that we are supposed to understand that this system that exists in Gotham is wrong and broken.

[01:22:44] Right.

[01:22:44] And this is, of course, bringing out, they tried to show us, particularly in that Arkham episode with Sophia, how this is bringing out the worst in Sophia.

[01:22:56] Yeah.

[01:22:56] And I do think, yeah, indeed, that the drugs and the bliss plays a role in everything.

[01:23:00] Well, and the doctor, the chief doctor was actually goading them and setting them up and the guards were in on it, right?

[01:23:05] So, they were pushing them.

[01:23:07] They were creating these conditions, not just, yeah.

[01:23:09] Yeah.

[01:23:10] Yeah.

[01:23:11] And she said no at that point, yeah.

[01:23:14] But I was thinking about just the fact that, of course, Arkham as, you know, a comic book storytelling item was created decades ago.

[01:23:23] But what would Gotham City Comics be without it now?

[01:23:29] And is there, like maybe some Elseworlds somewhere, but is there a way for there to be a Gotham without Arkham as part of it and still be Gotham?

[01:23:39] It's interesting because the Joker and Riddler and all these characters are portrayed in such a way that they come from that sort of dysfunction.

[01:23:50] And that dysfunction is not real.

[01:23:52] Right.

[01:23:53] In our modern context and the way.

[01:23:55] We have other dysfunctions that are horrible.

[01:23:57] But yeah, this is comic book stuff.

[01:23:58] Yeah.

[01:23:59] That's an interesting question.

[01:24:01] But I think Emily brings up some good points that, you know, that we have to think.

[01:24:05] Like even, I had a family member who received the electroshock therapy and it was the kind of stuff that, oh.

[01:24:12] It helps people.

[01:24:13] It totally helped that person hugely.

[01:24:16] It was just like, it was like turning your brain on and off kind of thing.

[01:24:18] Right.

[01:24:18] Have you, you know, hello, IT, you know, have you tried turning it on and off?

[01:24:22] Yeah.

[01:24:22] Right.

[01:24:22] It's like, or this EDM therapy, this EMDR therapy or what have you.

[01:24:28] There's a whole world of stuff that I think we've made tremendous strides in terms of mental health.

[01:24:34] Being able to talk about therapy.

[01:24:36] Being able to talk about medication and all the things that, you know, make our brains work.

[01:24:42] I think the problem here is that, and it's a Gotham problem overall, is that Gotham is just like where everything is bad and wrong, you know.

[01:24:54] And you don't get an example of good mental health care because, you know, that's happening in a metropolis, presumably.

[01:25:02] Right.

[01:25:02] Right.

[01:25:03] So Emily has a follow up real quick.

[01:25:07] After the finale, this was hard to watch at points.

[01:25:10] She's got the little eye covering emoji.

[01:25:13] From the little experience I have, I do have treating patients with dementia.

[01:25:16] They are not as coherent as Frances when she's reliving a memory.

[01:25:20] Their thinking and speech is usually so fragmented and tangential that it's almost impossible to follow.

[01:25:25] The way they portrayed dementia in the penguin seems to be inaccurate, but I can't think of any way that it contributes to any stigma.

[01:25:33] Good luck with the wrap up if you haven't recorded already.

[01:25:37] Emily.

[01:25:37] Emily B.

[01:25:38] Thank you, Emily.

[01:25:38] I'm so good.

[01:25:39] I'm so glad to hear from you.

[01:25:40] Thanks for writing in.

[01:25:41] I'm glad to know that you're listening and that you're doing well.

[01:25:44] And I look forward, we all look forward to getting more feedback from you in future.

[01:25:49] Yeah.

[01:25:50] Do you want to read, Maureen's?

[01:25:51] Yes.

[01:25:52] So this is from after episode six.

[01:25:54] So before the two episodes we're talking about, Maureen said,

[01:25:57] a couple thoughts after listening to the podcast, when Oz questioned Sophia about where they were going when he's driving her to meet the reporter, she dismisses him by saying he's just a driver.

[01:26:07] That dismissal, it was a trigger.

[01:26:09] That's what motivated him to go to her father.

[01:26:12] Besides, he wasn't working for her, but for her father.

[01:26:15] She was an assignment.

[01:26:16] He didn't expect the response from her father, but it was partly motivated by anger at her and partly motivated by a desire to move up.

[01:26:24] Also, when Sophia shoots Johnny, it is a way of establishing herself as the alpha leader.

[01:26:29] She needed the rest of the men to know she was in charge.

[01:26:33] Yeah, absolutely.

[01:26:34] Yeah.

[01:26:35] It's interesting, too, their parallels, too, because they were both willing to take these extreme moments to move up or solidify or what have you.

[01:26:44] But the idea that he's, that goaded him into taking action when she said, oh, you're just a driver.

[01:26:52] That's really interesting.

[01:26:54] Which makes it all the more poignant when he shoots her brother.

[01:26:59] Right.

[01:27:00] So.

[01:27:02] All right, Pawson 20.

[01:27:05] Finale is already here, and I get people saying, where's Batman?

[01:27:09] But I feel like we don't need Batman.

[01:27:13] This show is about Penguin, and this is gangland warfare that's happening.

[01:27:18] Why would Batman intervene when two gangs are fighting with each other?

[01:27:22] Fair enough.

[01:27:22] Yes.

[01:27:23] Good point.

[01:27:23] Good point.

[01:27:25] And Jampak, Jampakiton?

[01:27:29] Pakedion?

[01:27:29] It's late.

[01:27:30] Jampak-Zion.

[01:27:31] Jampak-Zion.

[01:27:32] There you go.

[01:27:34] Wow.

[01:27:35] This is, and yes, you've been, thank you also for your feedback today on the Dune episode.

[01:27:42] Jampakiton says, wow, that is the darkest ending to a show I think I've ever seen.

[01:27:47] Seriously.

[01:27:48] In this current environment, seeing Penguin throw Vic's only remaining proof he ever existed, the license, into the water.

[01:27:55] I was just gutted.

[01:27:56] I used to say people don't do that, but last week makes me lose that hope.

[01:28:01] Wow.

[01:28:01] Mm-hmm.

[01:28:02] Hugs.

[01:28:03] Yeah.

[01:28:04] Yeah, that's really the point.

[01:28:06] This is not a tear up.

[01:28:07] Yeah.

[01:28:07] Yeah.

[01:28:08] No, this is not a tear up.

[01:28:09] But the point of, yeah, that Vic is now just gone.

[01:28:13] You know, he's just a body in the name, a John Doe on the books.

[01:28:18] Yeah.

[01:28:19] All right, last up is Abby.

[01:28:20] Excellent last episode.

[01:28:21] Great cinematography.

[01:28:23] The play with the dark and the few spots of color, mostly from Sofia's attire.

[01:28:28] Oh, man, the makeup and costume design for Sofia.

[01:28:31] Oh, I'm jealous.

[01:28:33] Daniel Salon.

[01:28:34] Again, give him awards.

[01:28:35] Yes, exactly.

[01:28:36] Most of Sofia's attire looked so good.

[01:28:39] Christina Miladi needs to be showered in Emmys.

[01:28:42] It's just the right amount of Batman in it.

[01:28:45] The story of a villain, the hows and whys he got to be, how he is, and the utter stripping

[01:28:51] of any humanity that might be left if there was much to begin with.

[01:28:55] I think for me, this was a great segue down to the small screen so that we really get the

[01:29:02] density and the impact of who Oswald is so that when he comes back up onto the big screen,

[01:29:08] the stakes for that movie are going to be that much higher.

[01:29:11] And that much sweeter.

[01:29:13] Right.

[01:29:14] Yeah.

[01:29:14] Well, I'm also like, it puts me on, they had me on Oz's side and Sofia's side at the same

[01:29:20] time, which was giving me real cognitive dissonance.

[01:29:22] And now I'm thoroughly off Oz's side.

[01:29:26] I'm like, I'm like Batman, go.

[01:29:28] Go, get him.

[01:29:29] Get him.

[01:29:31] And we want to get, we want Sofia to get out.

[01:29:34] Like, get out and, you know, go for it.

[01:29:37] I am Eve.

[01:29:38] I'm like, don't tell him I told you, but he's in Crown Point.

[01:29:41] He went too far.

[01:29:43] Speaking of Abby, she is helping you with Silo.

[01:29:47] So let's do a quick wrap up here.

[01:29:50] How are things for Silo going?

[01:29:52] Yes.

[01:29:52] So, um, the second that we stopped this recording, I am putting my spoiler cast with Abby for,

[01:29:59] um, uh, episode one of season two.

[01:30:02] That's going live.

[01:30:03] Great.

[01:30:04] And, uh, Luke and I also just recorded a, our first mailbag episode.

[01:30:09] So that's going to go live, um, the day after.

[01:30:13] Oh, great.

[01:30:13] Are you guys getting good feedback?

[01:30:15] Yeah.

[01:30:15] Well, I mean, so this was, this was early, but we, we got some, uh, good pieces of

[01:30:20] feedback with really interesting things we didn't know about like Rebecca Ferguson and

[01:30:25] also just really good summaries of, um, what we learned politically from this show and things

[01:30:29] like that.

[01:30:30] So cool.

[01:30:31] Yeah.

[01:30:31] So it was a great first episode.

[01:30:32] Yeah.

[01:30:33] And, um, yeah, so we're, that's on both feeds.

[01:30:35] So in the public feeds, there's the weekly breakdowns and mailbags will be probably every

[01:30:41] other week.

[01:30:42] We'll see how it works out.

[01:30:43] Um, and then in the, Oh, before you segue slightly, if you're going to segue off of Silo,

[01:30:49] I just want to remind everybody that Silo is on Alicia's wool shift dust feed and you need

[01:30:54] to go and subscribe to that separately and go and get the season pass because they're putting

[01:31:01] a lot of work into it and it would really help, uh, with all the things if you guys show your

[01:31:08] support with that.

[01:31:08] So in the link tree, there'll be a link for wool shift dust and go and, uh, check that

[01:31:13] out and, uh, show them.

[01:31:15] There's a link to the season passes and all the episodes, but it's just basically, uh, the

[01:31:19] same sort of deal that, that there was for rings of power and house of the dragon where

[01:31:24] you get extra spoiler cast episodes and, um, yeah, you get it early and you get it

[01:31:29] that free and everything.

[01:31:31] So, um, all the things flat $10 good to go.

[01:31:34] Yeah.

[01:31:34] Right.

[01:31:35] Well, yeah, for season one, it's, it's 12 because, uh, that's, oh, okay.

[01:31:39] Sorry.

[01:31:39] I don't have your prices up.

[01:31:40] Yeah.

[01:31:41] Cause that includes all of the book stuff.

[01:31:42] Gotcha.

[01:31:43] Season two is flat $10 and then there's a deal that's, um, 18 for the two together.

[01:31:48] So I think it's like a 20% discount.

[01:31:51] Support your local podcaster.

[01:31:52] Yes.

[01:31:52] Support your local podcaster.

[01:31:53] And also check out the public wool shift dust feed, uh, not just for the weekly breakdowns,

[01:31:58] but also the, uh, there's an additional Dune prophecy prep up there with a telling of a

[01:32:04] story set in the timeline right before the show.

[01:32:06] Yo, I listened to that the other day, Alicia, that blew my mind.

[01:32:10] And from what we saw from episode one, you were spot on with that story as being a core

[01:32:17] piece of the setup for this show.

[01:32:20] That was great.

[01:32:21] That was a great episode.

[01:32:21] I love you going into full narrator mode too.

[01:32:24] And playing the little background music and the little cheers and applauses or whatever it's

[01:32:28] or booze or whatever, different, different times when you're, that was great.

[01:32:32] Really loved it.

[01:32:33] Go definitely check that out.

[01:32:34] I'm so, I'm still working on my mixing skills.

[01:32:36] And this one was, uh, I was a little rushed just because of other work, but, um, it sounded

[01:32:40] perfect to me.

[01:32:41] I'm going to be experimenting with that, with that format more.

[01:32:44] Love it.

[01:32:44] Perfect.

[01:32:45] Great.

[01:32:46] Yeah.

[01:32:46] So Dune prophecy.

[01:32:47] Uh, I, we watched the first episode last night.

[01:32:50] I'm feeling a little stressed today.

[01:32:51] I gotta get that.

[01:32:52] That was a hard, that's gonna be, I don't think it's gonna be hard to, anyway, there's

[01:32:56] a lot of work to break down the episode and get prepped.

[01:32:58] I'm glad we're doing Wednesday, uh, for this recording.

[01:33:02] And I'm, I was going to ask you maybe off air if we want to switch to Wednesdays in general,

[01:33:07] but, uh, it's looking pretty good so far and, uh, excited and make sure to send in feedback

[01:33:14] for that dune at the lorehounds.com.

[01:33:16] Um, and then we've got, uh, Pachinko tomorrow morning, you and I and, uh, Nate.

[01:33:22] Right.

[01:33:24] Season two, part two of, uh, one part.

[01:33:27] Oh yeah.

[01:33:28] We can fit two seasons into one episode of a show that we absolutely all adore.

[01:33:33] Oh yeah.

[01:33:34] That'll be easy.

[01:33:35] No.

[01:33:36] So, uh, and then I think John mentioned, uh, the DC all in and then Agatha, you still

[01:33:43] got something still in the oven.

[01:33:45] Right.

[01:33:46] It's yeah, it's, I've got all of the, uh, ingredients.

[01:33:48] I just have to cook it now.

[01:33:50] Um, just because we've been ramping up with silo and, and dune.

[01:33:55] And also I've been working on this book project privately.

[01:33:59] Um, it's going to come out this week and we did, I guess I can say it's, it's an eight

[01:34:04] way personality test where we formed our own lorehounds coven.

[01:34:08] I'm so excited.

[01:34:09] And so I've put it, I'm putting it together so listeners can play along too and see which

[01:34:14] role they'd play in the coven.

[01:34:15] That's very cool.

[01:34:16] Right.

[01:34:16] Yeah.

[01:34:17] Using the different, which, um, positions from the Agatha and what does that say about

[01:34:22] you and where do we all fall in and, and who, and how do we make a coven together?

[01:34:27] Yes.

[01:34:27] Everybody has to be a different, which that's great.

[01:34:30] I love it.

[01:34:30] Yeah.

[01:34:31] And then for subscribers, we just did our 11 Z's podcast.

[01:34:36] We, uh, talked about the movie high fidelity.

[01:34:37] We had a little John Cusack film festival.

[01:34:40] That was a lot of fun.

[01:34:42] And, uh, we're going to be recording second breakfast, I guess later this week.

[01:34:46] And, uh, that will just be for subscribers.

[01:34:49] And that's where we get to just talk about, uh, things that we're doing off air and just

[01:34:54] what's going on in our lives and with warhounds in general.

[01:34:57] So if you are interested in supporting your local podcaster, you can use the link tree below.

[01:35:03] We have a Patreon.

[01:35:03] We have supercast.

[01:35:05] It's the same thing.

[01:35:06] Supercast is a little bit better for us, but it really does help us because we just sort

[01:35:10] of depend on all of you to be able to keep the lights on and the bits flowing over here.

[01:35:14] Uh, should we mention a couple of our affiliates too?

[01:35:17] Yeah.

[01:35:18] And so just to, to mention that the silo stuff is not in the same supercaster Patreon, but

[01:35:24] you can do the season passes for those if you only want silo content on the Wolfship

[01:35:27] dust feed.

[01:35:28] Okay.

[01:35:29] Yeah.

[01:35:29] And then we have a radioactive ramblings.

[01:35:32] Our friends over there, Aaron and his cohort, uh, are doing some, they were doing some,

[01:35:37] uh, book series, red rising ramblings, but then they're doing some, uh, Ghibli studio Ghibli.

[01:35:44] Ghibli.

[01:35:44] Ghibli.

[01:35:45] I knew, I knew, I knew I was going to pronounce it wrong.

[01:35:46] And I heard them pronounce it and I was like, they're going to get some, uh, email back

[01:35:50] saying, I don't know what the pronunciation is.

[01:35:52] And it's, it's Ghibli no matter what John says or the founder of the, the founder calls

[01:35:58] it a GIF, but it's G is for graphical.

[01:36:00] It's GIF.

[01:36:01] That's right.

[01:36:01] It's GIF.

[01:36:02] I agree.

[01:36:03] And they have, uh, how, how, what is it?

[01:36:06] Howl's Moving Castle.

[01:36:07] Howl's Moving Castle.

[01:36:08] That's it.

[01:36:09] And then Anthony and Steve dropped a bonus episode on their take on, uh, the Penguin season

[01:36:15] finale.

[01:36:16] Right.

[01:36:17] Anthony had some, uh, had, was, had some engaging, had some, uh, had some provocative things to

[01:36:22] say, but it was all in good fun.

[01:36:24] I have to respond to one thing that he said he proposed.

[01:36:27] He said, well, what if you just watched the first and the last episode of the Penguin?

[01:36:31] And my response to that is I do think you would be able to follow this story, but you would

[01:36:36] miss so much, especially with Sophia.

[01:36:40] Yeah, you absolutely would.

[01:36:41] You would, you would miss pretty much all of her.

[01:36:43] You wouldn't know why some of the things happen, but.

[01:36:46] Right.

[01:36:46] And you would just miss an icon being born.

[01:36:48] Yeah.

[01:36:49] And then of course we have our friends, nevermind the music.

[01:36:53] They just had a sidetrack.

[01:36:55] Uh, Mark talks about his, uh, old band, the Dream Hydra.

[01:37:01] And up next, I believe, oh yes, it's Enjoy the Silence by Depeche Mode.

[01:37:04] And I'm going to, uh, record an intro, fly in an intro for that one.

[01:37:08] Uh, and before that it was Destiny's Child, jumpin', jumpin'.

[01:37:12] So, and, and Nicole talks about neuroplasticity.

[01:37:17] So you gotta love this music show that talks about psychology as much as they do music.

[01:37:22] And then the Depeche Mode is going to be about, uh, introverts or introvertism or contemplative.

[01:37:28] Introversion, yeah.

[01:37:29] Introversion, people who are contemplatives.

[01:37:32] All right, well, that's about it for us.

[01:37:34] Let's get out of here.

[01:37:35] But first let's thank our Discord server boosters.

[01:37:39] I've got some music.

[01:37:40] Are you, uh, do you want to run the whole shot?

[01:37:42] Sure.

[01:37:43] All right.

[01:37:44] Ready?

[01:37:44] Go.

[01:37:44] All right.

[01:37:45] Thank you to our Discord server boosters.

[01:37:47] Aaron K, Tiller the Thriller, Dork of the Ninjas, Doove71, Athena, Ajalea, Tina, Lestu, Nancy M, Ghost of Partition, Richard W.

[01:37:56] And thank you especially to our lore masters.

[01:37:59] Samartian, Michael G, Michelle E, Brian P, SC, Peter O.H, Bettina W, Adam S, Nancy M, Doove71, Brian8063,

[01:38:07] Frederick H, Sarah L, Garrett C, Eric F, Matthew M, Sarah M, DJ Miwa, Andra B, Kwon Yu, Dead Eye Jedi Bob, Nathan T, Alex B, Aaron T, Sub Zero, Aaron K, Dally V, Mothership61.

[01:38:52] Narls?

[01:38:53] Down the road.

[01:38:54] The Lorehounds Podcast is produced and published by the Lorehounds.

[01:39:00] You can send questions and feedback and voicemails at thelorehounds.com slash contact.

[01:39:06] Get early and ad-free access to all Lorehounds Podcasts at patreon.com slash the Lorehounds.

[01:39:12] Any opinions stated are ours personally and do not reflect the opinion of or belong to any employers or other entities.