If I Speak - 102: I’m not ready for a relationship – but I don’t want him to see other people

Episode Date: February 24, 2026

CONTAINS WUTHERING HEIGHTS SPOILERS! What else would two literature lovers (and actual Brontë experts) be talking about this week but the film of the moment. Is Jacob Elordi too white? Is Margot Robbie too old? How much adaptation is too much? Plus: tough love for a special one in a situationship. Still got a dilemma? […]

This is if I speak. Who are you? I'm Moily MacLean. Who are you? I'm Ash Sarka. And guess what, bitch? I've got questions for you. Oh, okay. A bit scared now, but yeah. Wow, you kind of, you responded to that in a really unexpected way. I thought that didn't wake anything up for you.

Stuff has already been awoken. I was just responding. Go on. you'll see that these all have a theme so question one what's the most romantic thing someone can do for you it's actually hard to pinpoint something because i think the most romantic gestures i've ever been shown and i don't know if this goes for you too they're so unexpected because they're a recognition of things that you didn't even know you needed until that moment and it can be anything from someone just sitting and listening to you and not allowing you to move on from a moment

where you really needed to actually talk about something to a very simple delicious dinner that isn't fancy but is exactly what you wanted in that moment. So I think it's difficult because I think I can't put, I can't be prescriptive about romance but I think the thing that carries it to get carries together threads romantic moments to me is quite recognition of something I needed, or a moment where we feel so totally bonded and on the same wavelength.

Like that to me is true romance. I don't, it's nice to have flowers, but I really, that's not really the thing that I feel is most romantic and that I've had in my life. What about you? I think you're completely right in that all of the most, romantic things that I've ever happened are like ungeneralizable right and they're so specific so the one that comes to my mind and it's quite recent is my partner is helping navara out with our strategy and for me that's super duper romantic because it's like hypercompetent yeah so I'm letting you look

after my baby yeah do you know what I mean yes I do that would be that's this is a small wet dream of mine seeing professional competencies yeah So hot. Or if I'm thinking about something generalisable and replicable, someone waiting to meet you off of a train. And that has happened to be a lot recently. And it's really nice. I think someone, yeah, someone coming to meet you

after you've been travelling in general is very romantic. That's romantic. Right, moving on. Next one. Most compelling romantic heroin in fiction. Obviously it's Lizzie Bennett. Ah. Obviously

Sorry, who else? Who's up there for you? She's my number one. Lucy Bennett, but also Emma, because she reminds me of some of my own clueless meddling. I think Emma's too close to their bone for me.

Painful read. Yeah, I'm like, oh, this bitch thinks she knows everything. I do exactly the same. So I think Lizzie for me because she is, she herself is so prideful and she's so sharp when that sharpness nearly blunts. Blunts, that's not the word. Sharpness and he's a slice, I can't get the metaphor. Anyway, the sharpness nearly ruins their own chance at love and she has to soften in order to find

love and give, and I think it's just a lesson that is very hopeful to someone like me. Last question. Most romantic member of the vegetable family. Oh, that's an interesting one. We know the most sexual, which is the obegium, but that's because of the malign hand of apple. But what is the rest of romantic? I'm thinking. Do you have an answer already?

No, I mean, I think a riband corgette. Oh, yeah. But is it, are we doing vegetable on its own, or vegetable when gussied up? because that's lingerie, basically, a ribboned croix. Well, the thing is, is that I'm not talking about what else has gone into the preparation, but if the courgette is in ribboned form, highly romantic. Very romantic, very autolengi.

I'm just thinking. Do you know what was weird? There came to my mind potato. Because even though the potato is not actually, it doesn't seem romantic, obviously it can be gussied up, but it's so practical and dependable. and it can be anything, it really serves all your needs.

You know what? Like, do you know what that made me think of is when Homer Simpson does the boudoir shoot? And that's a hassleback potato. Yeah. Like you can have a hassleback, you can have a dauphine wife,

you want to be a really fancy, you can have a fondon. A fondon is a deliciously romantic potato. But then sometimes you need some mash. I think the potato, I call men potatoes a lot, and I'm wondering if actually I mean that they can be perfect partners,

but other, sometimes they can just be spuds. You know? I totally get where you're coming from. Right, that has been 73 questions. Those are great questions. Minus 70. Bam. We're a big question show today because there's another question coming is there not.

Today we are doing what, Ash, what segment are we going to do? Mystery question. And who sends our mystery question to us? What is the mystery question segment? Explain for new listeners. The shadow director. of if I speak Chal

This is when Chal our producer sends us a question that we then have to talk about for the next 20 to 40 minutes depending on how carried away we get Let's gussy up this spud Chal I'm ready for a ding We have a ding

Ding If Jacob Olaudey is white Margot probably is 35. An emerald funnel is posh. What does that make Wuthering Heights? Jacobs are white. Margos are old.

Oh, 35. No, but I'm trying to do a roses are red. Jacobs are white. Margos are old. This shit adaptation will never win gold. This is true. Okay, let's get into it. Where do we want to start?

Do we want to start with Jacobs are white? Do we want to start with Margot's are... 35. Or do we want to start with Emerald Fennell is posh. Because you're quite acquainted with Wuthering Heights. I am. Tell us about your history with Wuthering Heights, the novel. Okay, so I haven't seen this adaptation and you have.

I have. But back in my old life, I taught a Victorian literature module to uninterested American students. And Wethering Heights was one of the novel. that I taught, although the thing that I was really, really into was Jane Eyre because I had a whole thing about Bertha representing the slavery payments that made it to Yorkshire and there being this dirty money, which is hidden away, but it's sort of like rattling, rattling at the bars. That's so interesting. But, okay, let's start with the race discourse.

I actually don't mind that they cast Heathcliff as well. white and I think that there's been a response largely on social media which has been taking things from the novel and saying this means this so Heathcliff when he is brought home by Mr Earnshaw on a dark and stormy night is described as a little gypsy in aspect a little lascar could be an American or a Spanish stowaway. And that's being taken as fact as he is a Laskar. He is an American styleway. He is a gypsy. And the thing that that misses is that you're seeing it through the eyes of Nelly, the servant, who's then describing it to someone in the present day. And the point is the ambiguity. The point is we don't know where this kid's come from. He just looks different

to everybody else. And the other thing is that you can't see. separate how he's being racialized from his wildness, right? He's, you know, he seems like this little animal that's been brought back. So I don't necessarily mind casting Jacob I Laude. I just think from everything that I've read about Fennell's adaptation is that it's a real flattening of this like really rich and complex and slippery. and untrustworthy novel. And maybe that's to do with the fact that it's cinema. With cinema you have to make these choices

which collapse the possibility and collapse the ambiguity because you're literally seeing it in front of you. So I don't mind that the cast him as white, though I do think that, you know, Jacob and Lundy is like too bironic. And I think Heathcliff is like actually a more, a much more complex character.

The thing which I do mind, and they just haven't thought about is why is Mr. Earnshaw bringing home a random kid from Liverpool? Why? Oh, because this isn't the implication that he's his son or something. Could be.

Could be, all right? If you're bringing, as a man, in that era, why are you bringing home a kid from a port town, right? We all know what kind of ladies live at the port and work at the port. I think that there is an implication of incest and that the passion between Heathcliff and Catherine

in the novel, the elder generation is Catherine and the younger is Kathy, but everyone forgets because of the Kate Bush song. So all these things which wind me up. Is that there's an implication of incest, I think. And because you're seeing it, you're seeing Kathy as a child, a person from whom information is being withheld.

And a key driver of the plot in the novel is information being concealed or revealed at various times, often by Nelly, often by Nellie the servant, who's an unreliable narrator, is that I think part of the drama and the trauma and the pain is there is this potentially incestuous forbidden love that Catherine is being kept from fully understanding. And so is Heathcliff.

two people who fundamentally don't understand their origins. And that's why it all goes really wrong. Whereas Emerald Fennell is a bit like hot people corsets wanting to bang. Well, she actually do bang. Sorry guys, by the time this comes out, I'll expect you to see it. They do bang. And what's interesting about the banging is it's the least sexy aspect of the movie. When I went to see Wuthering Heights, I was obviously not expecting Wuthering Heights.

the book and I had put that on my mind and I was I didn't want to see Wuthering Heights initially but then one of the girls was like shall we go see Wuthering Heights so I assembled a crack team of Avengers the gays and girls and we went to see it on opening night which was so much fun

I love going to see a bad movie on opening night especially a bad blockbuster it is such a honking good time it is a really into in good time. It's fab.

So we knew we were going to have a good time at Wuthering Heights. When I got into Wuthering Heights the movie, everyone looked like me in that we, I will, what am I saying? Everyone looked like me in that we were all wearing our little gold hoops and I had a stickback bun. Everyone had a stick back bun. Everyone was wearing a fake oversized leather jacket. It was the girlies convention because it was the 13th.

So everyone who was partnered or could be with their partner on Valentine's Day was going the next day. So it was just a lot of junk. women and a few gays. I was not drinking. However, in the middle of our screening, we'll get back to analysing all the heart's a second, but I just got to tell this story.

Because in the middle of our screening, so the film starts, and it is abundantly clear from the moment the adult actors get on the screen, that they are being out-acted by their child counterparts. And also that Margot Robbie and Jacob, a lord, he don't actually have any chemistry. And there's going to be no plot.

And I don't care about the plot so much, because, again, I wasn't going to see Wuthering Heights the Bronte novel that I read when I was 15. I was going to see Bridgeton on screen. But I didn't even get that. So the best bit of the movie was halfway through when a very drunk woman obviously got up to go to the toilet

and fell over in front of our row and stayed down for quite a long time. My friend saw her actually fall. I just had the thump and then saw her on the floor. But she said she followed that drunk stay. age way. And then eventually got up and went to the toilet and all her friends

rushed out after her. But the three there was like tears of rose so we could all see it happen. And for the next ten minutes no one could stop giggling because most people were quite tipsy. So there's these waves and giggles breaking out. I was like yeh-hee. Meanwhile

on the screen Kathy was trapped in the chains of love which is this film is weirdly like Barbie in that it does seem to have been an opportunity for funnel to dress Kathy up in lots of outfits and put her in lots of settings. And after she got, there's a bit in the middle where she gets a major opportunity to montage that.

And she's like, just outfit after after outfit, after outfit. She's in Linton's house. And it's weird surreal setting, weird surreal setting, a bit of Tim Burton, a bit of poor things mixed together. After that, she completely loses interest in her own movie. And there's nowhere for the plot to go because she's changed so much. So she's just like, okay, now Kith

to Heathcliff and Kathy. and they have very boring sex and then spoiler Kathy just dies there's no baby there's no stakes it's like once they've

consummated their relationship the point of the film is done but the sex is boring like the sex in Bridgeton was much sexier so you don't even so whatever you went to see this movie for if you went to see it for Wuthering Heights the book you're disappointed like big time

if you went to see it for a bodice ripper and Emerald Fennell giving us big visuals big feelings you're also disappointed because you get none of those. It is so flat. It's like, have you ever had a wank when you don't really want to wank? It's just vibrator. And you're like, this is not moving me in any way.

It's that. It's literally that. So I wondered why she even bothered to adapt Wuthering Heights when she could have done, this is my fevered imagination of like, gone with the wind, Wuthering Heights, all these big things. And I'm making a new bodice ripper, like a Catherine Cuxon vibe. And I'm going to put Margot Robby, and I'm going to put Jacob Lordy on screen, even though they have no chemistry.

But I won't be as constrained by this source material, which clearly leads her, like, even with tweaking it, she runs out of road completely. And, yeah, sure, the adaptation element will get people through the door, but she's already getting people through the door. Saltburn was a huge hit. That's why she was able to make Wuthering Heights. She could throw whatever money she wanted at this. She has so much to play with.

I don't know where she just didn't do something new, that she's like, fevered imaginations from the past, come together for this. body. We'd have all still been there. I'd have still gone to see that. I mean, this is things that I don't mind Margot Robbie being 35, right? Like, I don't, I don't mind that. And I think that this is one of the things about adaptations, which is, it's never going to be a reflection of what it is you saw in your mind's eye when you were reading Wuthering Heights. And that's fine. And I also buy what Emerald Fennell said of like, well, this is me trying to reflect what it was like as a 14-year-old reading.

the novel and it sort of sounds like it does have an infantilized view of what the novel is and you know pisses me off pisses me off that the plot which is kind of the most important bit of the novel which is about the next generation right which is about Catherine's daughter kathy and heathcliff's son linton and hindley's son heriton is just gone and that's because it's complicated like it's because it's complicated and and this um romance scare quotes intentional between Catherine and Heathcliff looks obscenely selfish and self-regarding when you look at the suffering of the next generation and I do think that that is um part of part of the world of the Victorian not

novel that people these days find hard to get around because we don't have a strong Christian ethic or morality anymore. But that was really real to the Brontes. I mean, like, just to talk about the work of the sister and Jane Eyre, what happens to the tree that Mr. Rochester and Jane Eyre first kiss under? You've mentioned this. It gets struck by lightning. Get struck by lightning because God is unhappy. Because God is unhappy. And what has to happen to Mr. Rochester before he's allowed to marry the woman that he loves,

he has to suffer and be punished, right? He goes blind, he's relatively impoverished, right? Thornfield Hall goes up in smoke. And he's, his mastery over the world, his mastery over his own household is completely broken. And that's because for Charlotte Bronte, she's like, no. Like, you know, the forbidden element of a forbidden love is not merely internal, right? And it's not merely societal conventions.

Like there are laws of God which can't be, can't be contravened. And, you know, people have to be punished for their wrongs before they're allowed the reward of marriage. And I think that this is one of the things where, That's all taken away. So what you get from Catherine and Heathcliff is like heaving bosoms and like, nature and wildness and uncontained passions. But I actually think that Emily Bronte thinks Catherine is a fucking nightmare. She's selfish.

And it's her daughter, Kathy, who has her mother's wildness, but has an ability to love that her mother doesn't have. And that's the thing is that the next generation is a comment on the older generation and a comment on all of their flaws. In the movie, the Emerald movie, what's interesting is Kathy is very selfish and spoiled. I don't think Margot Robbie should have played her. I mean, the age thing is a thing.

In this movie, it's funny. But it's also just, she's not got the right sensibility. But in the movie, she is incredibly selfish and spoiled, but what is fascinating is it just sort of ends there. So instead of having a child, there's none that have child. childs. No of them children. Isabella Linton

just becomes a sub. It's so funny, you have to, you have to watch this film. Isabel Linton just becomes a sub. No child there, she's just rescued. Catherine apparently falls pregnant. We never see any evidence of this baby, by the way. She's been, she is pregnant for about a million years in this film.

There is no bump. There's no bump. But she does miscarry and then, I'm sorry, guys, this is spoilers, spoilers. She miscarries and then has, we'll put a spoiler thing at the start of this episode I think and then get set to see me that's how she dies

so there is no passing on to the next generation the film ends with Heathcliff just hugging and going like please haunt me and Jacob will already Yorkshire accident it is quite bad at times the Australian for both of them creeps through but there's a point where again in this sexless

drive me mad just leave me not yeah when this sexless sex montage that Fennell gets them to do they are somehow having sex in an empty wing of Linton's house he's just crept in and she's like what are you going to do

to my husband and he's like I'll slit his throat I'll drink his blood and everyone in the cinema started laughing because it's so clunky and so like

what are you talking about why are you having sex in his house he's in the house somewhere what's you on about that you could just creep into his fucking house in the middle of like whatever Victorian early Victorian period

and have sex have rampant sex she's meant to be pregnant for half this movie what's going on here? It's so classic, like, fan,

this is what I don't like about movies like this, there's no stakes. It's just like, you can't invest in these characters, even separate from the actual Watham Heights characters. You can't invest in characters

where there's no stakes. And actually they kind of get their way because they just get to have some sex and then one of them dies. Like, well, that's the thing is that I think it is a form of self-insert fan fiction. Yeah, it is.

Well, it is fan fiction. Like, and, Again, fine and you can sort of be like, oh, it's like a meta-commentry on like blah, blah, blah, whatever. But again, like, really in the novel, it's so much weirder. Like, in the novel, when Heathcliff digs up Kathy's grave, there's a hint of necrophilia there. We don't even get that in the film, by the way. There's no, digging up of any graves.

And instead it's like, oh, no, I'm such a sick puppy. I'm such a sick fucking puppy. Like, Isabella's a sub. No, man, make Heathcliff a necrophiliac. And then we'll talk. Heathcliff's not even that weird in this film, by the way. He's just like big moves hay around, comes back, has a gold tooth and a mullet. That's it.

He's not weird. And he says to Isabella, he's like, it becomes a consensual relationship where he's like, I'm never going to love you and I'll only marry you to get back at Catherine. And I'll be very mean to you. And then she's like, please be mean to me. Daddy. No, it is. She's literally daddy.

She's like, he's like, would you like that? And she nods. Would you like that? She nods. It's, they establish. a consensual BDSM relationship between Heathcliff and Isabella. So when she's taken away, you're like,

no, she's having such a good time. Rather, like, this woman has been rescued from domestic abuse. She's getting her shit rocks. Yeah, she's literally getting her shit rocks. And it's just, it's such a, it's a really cowardly film. And because Fennell's always like,

I want to shock, but nothing about this shocks. It's just like, it's just a very boring border stripper. And I was, I am fascinated by the level of outrage. it has provoked, because I don't actually care about it adhering to the text that match. As soon as I saw Emerald making Wuthering Heights,

I was like, that's got nothing to do with Wuthering Heights. It's got the same names, but it's got nothing to do with Wuthering Heights, and that's okay, right? Because she did say it was the fever dream, as you pointed out,

from her 14-year-old mind. But I find, you know, the original message we got sent, which is like, you know, Margot Robbie is 35, Jacob Belaw-D is white, and Emel Fennon is posh. The flatness as well

of the critique that surrounds this film is as flat as the movie because it's like, okay well Jacob, you know, Heathclim is actually black. Why do you, like, why do you want a black man to be subject to this shit? It's my question.

Emil Fennell is posh and that's when she makes these movies. Why can't we just go a little like deeper into that? Like, yeah, she is pushing me. So many directors are posh. That's not even her major crime. Her major crime is trying to make a commentary on class while actually not being that interested in it. So she's always like commenting on class,

but in a half-hearted way when it's like actually just fucking make your body stripper which she has now done without even the class elements and it turns out it's quite boring. Boops. I mean I think

I sort of think that like not to sound like Aaron Bastani but sound like Aaron Bistani like part of it. My mentor. Like the spirit of Tradstani has possessed me is that part of it

is to do with how sexually obsessed we are as a culture. Is that immediately that you take something that's really, really complex, and you're looking at it through a purely sexual lens, and it's purely about your own titillation. And I think that's how you end up with something that's so flat, and also less sexy,

because what's really transgressive about it is all this other stuff, and all this other stuff which is deeply morally compromising. So if you take the relationship between Isabella and Heathcliff, which in the novel is definitely, an instance of domestic abuse heavily implied to be rape is what leads to the conception

of Linton their son also implied that he kills the alcoholic brother Hindley but like Hindley as I Gabba's just been completely written out they've turned Mr Earnshaw and Hindley into the same character Martin. No! Martin Cleans by the way

MVP of the film. Emma. Dot Martin really acts his socks off but like yeah it gets rid of Hindley but the thing about like Heathcliff that makes him transgressive is that he is cruel and he is brutal

like and violent and I think in order to make this the bodice ripper of her dreams like that has to get flattened and then what is transgressive and what would be transgressive about still finding him arousing or titillating or sexy

is taken away because it's like oh well abusers are bad so he can't really be that much of an abuser. Like in the novel, he tortures children for decades, right? Because he's so fucked in the head. And like, again, this implication of possible incest that, you know, Catherine and Heathcliff never fully understand. Like, Heathcliff doesn't know who he is.

His first name is his surname, right? Like, there is this thing which is taken away from him, which is a story of origin. And, like, familial origin and genealogy is everything, both in the era in the novel because it's all about inheritances, right?

Thresh, cross, Grange and Wuthering Heights, the estates, it's a way of talking about what you inherit from the generation before you, and Heathcliff doesn't know

really what the generation before him is. Like, we are supposed to piece it together through implication. So yeah, what's really transgressive is stripped out of it.

So then all you get is corsets, right? All you get is sex acts. All you get is BDSM. And so I think that's the thing, which is our sexual obsession, which I would think is kind of, it's almost more of a pornographic obsession, right? So it's thinking of what is sexuality in this very narrow way actually overall makes it less sexy and less sexually transgressive. Yeah, which as you pointed out, it just goes to show that the erotic actually has to exist alongside like emotional investment. Because otherwise it is just two bodies interacting in a way.

that doesn't move a viewer at all. If I want to watch porn, I can watch porn. This isn't even good porn because there's no, you don't see any bare-ass cheeks. There's no cock. We were promised full frontal. No, we weren't. There's no cock.

And I do think what people forget about Saltburn is that, yeah, they were obsessed with Barry Kehan's cock. I just love to say it's a great word in that. But they were also emotionally vested in that character. That film had, I never watched it. I never will, but people, had already become emotionally invested in Oliver. So by the time you get cock

at the end, and it's not even sexual cock, he's just dancing through a mansion. The cock just happens to be there existing on the body. And I think this film, it's doing, the scenes where they are having sex in the rain, in a carriage, it's so unsexy.

And when I think about comparing it to like, call me by your name, for example, where again, there wasn't even that much explicit sex. In fact, there was no explicit sex. Yeah, there was a passive. to a palm tree. There's a pan to a palm tree.

So much sexier because of the way they build the tension. And Bridgeton as well, even when they do quite softcore sex, first season, I haven't seen, actually I have seen second season, didn't watch third, don't care about fourth. First season, despite the best efforts of the block of wood, Reggie Jean-Page, terrible actor.

It's sexy. It's actually sexy. The sea where Daphne's getting eaten out on the last. ladder? The montage they have in the rain, that's sexy. You've somehow become emotionally involved. That is a bodice ripper in a traditional sense that really does engage you on an emotional level. Whereas I think I cried in the second season as well actually at one point. When, oh yeah, because it's the storyline that Jonathan Bailey has about his father's death and his need to like protect the family in the wake of being forced very traumatically into the role of patriarch. and the emotion investment I had in that character.

Oh, an avoidant, hyper-competent individual who lost their father. The subtext ain't subtext, like, it's just text for me. The subtext is a billboard, baby. Yeah, it's a billboard. But I cried, and I was really emotionally invested. And when he finally, like, gives in and has a sexual encounter with this woman that he really wants, but feels he can't have because of his responsibilities. It matters.

It means something. It's tender. And for her as well, who also has the same responsibility to her sister, the protectiveness, the, like, this patriarchal role of like, I'm going to look out for you.

I'm going to put aside all my other desires so that I can make sure you have a future that I don't. And they both get to have this like mutual moment of pleasure. That means something. And yeah, it's so soapy and it's so like overblown, but it still succeeds on a level

that Wuthering Heights by Emerald Fennell could never reach because it just doesn't understand that. I mean, I think to maybe broaden it out and I'm interested in what you think about this. What are for you the best adaptations of Victorian novels and what did you like about them? Well, you're saying Victorian, so now I'm having to Google all the dates.

Oh, I mean, okay, right. Bleak House. Let's branch out. 2004. Let's brunch out. right there you go that's one Bleak has 2004

is great BBC that adaptation I was young when I watched as well because it was 2004 so I just remember I remember viewing it and having my mind

blown because first of all they made it so that I could understand it but it was still yeah it's still so so beautifully like scripted and paste and the characters are so well realized

from that what's that weird looking guy plays gup Oh, what's his name? He was in loads of stuff for a while and he has that froggy face and he was the perfect casting. It's gone of Kerry Mulligan's early roles as the naive ward, Ada,

and she falls in love with the other ward, Richard, or that might be the actor's name. And, you know, you can tell they're heading for absolute doom and disaster by his own folly. But the love story they unpacked there. And it's Anna Maxwell Martin as Esther. I just thought it was so brilliantly cast and so brilliantly told

and the tension that ramps up and the cliffhangers there were 30 minute episodes as well if I remember so it was like bite size they did it in the serialised

way that it was meant to be presented I thought that's a fantastic adaptation I really liked the BBC adaptation of Janeair with Ruth Wilson oh yeah she was fab

she was so so good why did you like it so much tell me what else okay one is Ruth Wilson has a phenomenal face phenomenal face eyebrows like question marks

and obviously she's captivating and she's gorgeous but she's also believable as like some as kind of mousy right so when it's like you know do you just think because I am little and I am poor that I have no heart and she's crying and oh when she gives that speech I have as much heart and as much I'm like ah she fucking sold it whereas I think often they cast someone who's like Hollywood

conventional and I'm like shut up. Shut up. You'd be a blanche and we all know it. Shut the fuck up. We all know it. A good Rochester as well. It was what's his name wasn't it? Toby Stevens. It's Maggie Smith's son

isn't it? Is that Toby Stevens? Let me sit. Because he definitely paid someone in something. And I thought he was great because the thing about Rochester is that it's supposed to, you know, again not be yeah it was Toby Stephen's God how was that in my brain

he's not supposed to be someone he's Maggie Smith's son yeah what a hell some NEPO babies earned it yeah and he changed his name he's great but like he's not a Jacob Elawdi right Jacob Aloudi is like everyone thinks you're handsome let me stick you in this role

whereas that thing about you know the sort of too masculine Right? Like too masculine, um, appearance of Rochester. I thought that he got really, really well. Um, I thought it was a fab, fab, fab adaptation. This, obviously I go on about prime pretrial and it's not Victorian,

but I do think the 2005 adaptation is one of the best ever made. But that's also because I was a 2005 cohort. Whereas the 1995 cohort, they think that that's the best one ever made. What did you think of the new Emma with, um, what's her face, Anya Taylor Joy, because people raved about it and I tried to love it, but I didn't. I really liked it.

I thought it was like visually, like, quite sumptuous. And I think her sort of like dull-like face enhanced the sense of someone who thinks they're more mature and more worldly and more knowledgeable about people than they actually are. Yeah, she was good about it. I really liked it. I just didn't, I wasn't obsessed with it,

but maybe I'll never be obsessed with Emma. I thought it was pretty good. Yeah. I thought it was pretty good. And like it, there's the sort of, there's like a weirdness and a comedy about it that I liked. Like during the big love declaration scene and she has a nose bleed and it's like,

I thought, that was great. Yeah, that was great. That was great. I'm always fascinated by the need for new adaptations to, to make, as you say, like the obsession with the physical intimacy. And there has to be like snogging. There has to be sex. And sometimes obviously that's making the implicit explicit.

Like there's implications in some of these Victorian novels about affairs. And the, the, um, these adaptations will bring those. It just, you know, have a shot of them in bed together or something like that. But other times it's just completely injected where it isn't. at the end of Emma, I don't think there's much kissing, but they obviously have to make them kiss loads. There's implications in pride and prejudice of kissing at the very end, but they don't do it into the 2005 one.

But now I presume, I haven't seen it yet, because it's not out. But I'm interested to see how they handle it in the new one they're making, which I think's got Emma Corrinan and maybe Jack Loudon. Oh, Jack Loudon. Now there's a man. That's a man. That's a man. The other day my boyfriend, he's insisted that I refer to him as such

because in his words, stop talking about the other podcast or claim me. Was like... A man of self-respect. Yeah, unfortunately. Anyway, we were watching a TV show and I was like, oh, that guy's so hot. It wasn't Jack Loudon. And he goes, that guy's just like a more handsome version of me. He was like, he's not hot at all.

I was like, he obviously is. and he said, I don't think so, but it makes me feel better that you think that. And you have such a type. And I said, I do really fancy also Jack Loudon. They're all made in the same like sort of mould. Okay, what you just did there is you're like, by the way, my boyfriend looks like Jack Lownd. No, he doesn't. He doesn't look like Jack Loudon.

But I'm saying there's the same mold of like stocky kind of, you know what I mean? It's like stocky, I don't know to describe it. I don't want to describe it too much because I want to describe him too much. But the point is he was like, he was like, you know what I'm like. Like these are all the same type of person. I never realized that was a type of person that I was attracted to. Because I always thought I was curly-haired brunette like me. I thought I was like Oscar Isaac.

But now I think of Oscar Isaac is quite stocky. But they're all like stocky, reddish, blondeish, Celtic, Germanic vibes is what I will put it as. With hair. All of those things are wildly contradictory. But they're not. They're not. I will show you pictures after the people I mean.

You'll be like, oh, these are all in the pantheon of the same people. Built like a pit bull. Anyway, Jack Loudon, the man that you are, and the fact she's married to Sir Sharonan as well, I am obsessed with them. What a couple! They met on the set of Mary Queen of Scots when he was playing Darnley,

and she was playing Mary, 2015. And he was upset, he was like, she was so, her age and the way she commanded that set. The level of respect when he talks about her. Anyway, sorry, I've just voted a long time talking about

how hot Jack Loudon is, but he's going to make a great, Darcy. Anyway, they don't kiss. They don't kiss in 2005. And you know the story about the American version of that film? No. So they had to make a different ending for the American version where they kiss on a lake and it's rubbish.

Because the American audiences are such Philistines that they could not accept the end of the film without Darcy and Elizabeth kissing. Fucking... Yankee go home. Yankee go home. Anyway, I think this has said something about how we deal with sexuality now

versus how the Victorians did. Maybe the Victorians actually had a better understanding of the erotic. Make Heathcliff a necrophiliac, you cowards. Don't make him a person of colour again, but make him necrophiliac. That's the official campaign.

We're running apparently. I want to see grave robbing. I want to see grave robbing. I do think it's funny how obsessed people are with pulling out the most the easy, the most, it's not even woke, it's like the flag.

elements of the way to talk about something. And people are really obsessed with racially aligned casting at the moment, which I get on one level, because I do think in some cases it's egregious and it's important. Like, why are we blacking Zoe Sal Danna up to play Nina Simone? That was insane. That was insane.

But there was a recent thing where Adessa Zion was cast as a character who in the book is half Mexican, half Jewish. And the author of the books that in the script actually her ethnicity wasn't what's the words specified they were leaving it open because it's an adaptation

but there was a huge outcry over the specific casting to the point that a lot of like Latin American actors or Latin ex actors in America it turned into they turned it into sort of the focal point of a campaign about the general

erasure of characters and I think that's a totally valid point as a campaign that should be run but it was interesting that it hinged on this one character who actually in the script wasn't specified as this, and the author didn't care. Also, I do just think that it's called acting, darling. And I think that it's one thing to talk about who gets opportunities and who doesn't.

But for me, the rule of thumb is if you have to physically alter your appearance to make your skin darker or accentuate racialized features, then you've made the wrong casting decision. But, you know, it feels a little bit like we're bringing back race science, you know? It's like, well, you have to have a genuinely two tonic. I think in the Odessa case, it was because she'd already been receiving backlash because in this series she's in, I love L.A., they'd cast her and they'd made her, they'd fake tanned her to the fucking Ariana Grande, 2015 Heights, and given her a look that people interpreted as very, like, L.A. Hispanic. And what was interesting about that is it kind of is in keeping with her character

because her character was the type of person who would appropriate a racial ambiguity. But people cancelled her because I'm like, it made sense for this character that she would do something. So like that. It's not her choice,

like the actor's choice. So she pulled out, I think she was already sensitive about that outcry. But it was fascinating to me that this show about these very spoiled influencers who have no morals, a character,

yes, we see a lot of influencers who engage in racial ambiguity to do things. It made sense. Also, maybe acting and live action role play are different. Yes. This is,

this, I think people are very, it's this idea of like representation and then it turns into what we've talked about before, which is any character you see on screen has to be the morally good or morally bad. There's no like in between. And if you play a morally bad character,

you're a bad, bad person. Very odd, very, very, very odd ways of thinking about things. It's also like the, um, the, Gen Z mind could not comprehend a movie like downfall anymore. My God. Like the guy playing Hitler and playing Hitler so well.

Like he would have to do a press tour being like, I think Hitler was really bad. He would. That would be the whole thing. His thing would be like, I just have to say Hitler's bad. Oh, can I make one last point before we move on to dilemmas? So I haven't watched Wuthering Heights yet.

And one of the reasons why I haven't watched Wuthering Heights and I don't really have a powerful desire to is that I'm sick of publicity tours where actors have to pretend that they're, in love. And so there was a fake romance between Pamela Anderson and Liam Neeson, which I knew was fake right away. I was like, this fucking bullshit. This is marketing. And you can see it with Margot Robbie and Jacob Allody. And she's like, oh, you know, he filled my room with flowers. And there was like a really genuinely romantic moment when he was shielding my face from the rain. I'm like, it's called acting. You don't have to really be in love because

it's called acting. Yeah. And I get it that, like, like the marketing component of all art has just like swelled to an obscene scale. And we've talked about that before. And there's an article in The Guardian about like Wuthering Heights granola pots. What? Yeah, yeah. So there was official branding for like Wuthering Heights like bowls. And it was like chia seeds represent Catherine's composed side.

like cocoa nibs it's you know heathcliff's untamed wild blah blah blah get the exit doors i'm off honestly honestly um but like the marketing bit's so huge and again it's this thing of people having to think that there's a relationship to real life rather than going this is fiction and that's what makes it exciting like fact it's fiction and not real makes it exciting and i'm sick of seeing people pretend to be in love for the purposes of marketing Like it makes me, it puts me off because I'm like, you think I'm a child. Yeah, and also

you think I'm incapable of suspending my disbelief. I'm not. Well, it's hard to suspend your dis. It makes it hard to suspend my disbelief when I see them not only doing that but also doing it badly. Like, Marco Robbie and Jacob and Lordy. Oh, God.

That dampened my hopes of the movie because I was like, you're doing such a poor job with pretending to be in love. At least Cindy Sweeney and Glenn Powell act like they fucked. These, this was just embarrassing for both of them. I felt really bad. I was like oh, sweetie, you're so, you're like one of the most famous actresses

in the world. You don't have to do this. Merrill Street wouldn't be doing this. I'll tell you that. Meryl would not. Merrill would never. And on the flip side, in the wholesome boxes when Tom Holland and Zendaya pretended they weren't in love for three whole Spider-Man movies, but quite obviously were in love. That was a nice wholesome.

They were like so, oh, that was love. They were so insane on their press doors. They were just laughing the whole time. Love that. Anyway, we've got to do a dilemma. Dilemma time. This is our regular segment. I'm in big trouble.

And if you are in big trouble and you want us to offer some words of, if not wisdom, then at least nosiness, then email us at if I speak at Navaramedia.com. That's if I speak at Navaramedia.com. Moya, are you going to read? No, because my Google has just signed me out, so I have to sign in. I will read. Love that timing, amazing stuff. Dear Ash and Moyer, long-time listener, I came to your first live show in September 2024.

I've started seeing the sky. We met on Hinge and decided last minute to meet at a pub one night and we hit it off immediately. Since then, we've been on four more dates, which have been once a week, and all of them have ended up with me staying the night at his flat. I have just recently raised the question of whether either of us are seeing or talking to other people. I said in the message that I was not, but was not expecting him to do the same. He replied saying he was, but that we should chat about it instead of messaging, and we had a good one-hour phone call.

I asked questions, and he answered, and we generally discussed what we both want out of this. We are both in a position where we don't want a relationship and neither of us are in fact ready for that but we do want to see each other again and we agree to do so. My dilemma is this. We are both on the same page relationship-wise and I want to be okay with the idea of him casually seeing other people too because I believe it is a natural and healthy part of modern dating.

However, I feel in my heart that I don't like it. We have a great time together and I maybe naively see some progression between us. I feel jealous and somewhat inadequate in myself because he sees and sources things from other people. He is also a handful of years older than me, and we've had very different experiences in romance and partners, and I am not ignoring the fact that these things factor in significantly.

How do I deal with wanting the best of both worlds? I don't want anything serious, and then have all these conflicting feelings about him seeing other people. Yours sincerely a confused and mad at herself special one. You should see Moyer's face. Moira describe your face. This is an audio product. A lot of you are big and greedy.

I'm so, I'm sick of this shit. I'm sick of this shit. I'm sick of us fucking like wanting our cakes and eating it all. I am sick of it. And I used to be like this a little bit. I don't want a relationship, but I want all the things that come with the relationship. and the feeling of being a monogamous relationship

without being in a monogamous relationship. I don't want to be mean to you special and I don't want to be mean to you. I'm sorry. It just pisses me off the inability to like have self-awareness about what we're talking about here. You're like, why is it a natural and healthy

part of modern dating to date other people at the same time? Why is that a natural and healthy part of modern dating? I think that's actually a very unnatural and unhealthy part of modern dating to constantly think there's a stream of other people that you might have a better time with, but you might not. And just to see,

I think not being able to commit to something is a very unnatural and non-hurted part of modern dating. I think that if you want to do polyamory and open relationships, you should do that when you're in a secure relationship that actually is committed and built on real principles rather than the start of something that is completely open-ended

and you haven't really agreed anything other than the part you don't know what you want. Another thing while I'm here, oh, you see some sort of progression, but you've told him you don't want a relationship. What's the progression? Where are you progressing to? Where are you going?

Sorry, why am I so mad about this? It's not your fault special one. You are confused, but you're saying or you're asserting all these things and not actually interrogating what you're saying. Like, where do you want to progress to if you don't want a relationship? There is nowhere to progress to. You can maintain. You can exist on the same plateau that,

but you don't want to see other people. You feel inadequate already having suggested this. Why are you in? engaging in your own act of psychic self-harm. Why do you want to hurt yourself? Wake up! I'll tell you something special one, because we've had bad cop. Yeah, we've had the baddest of cops.

You had the baddest of cops. You've had Mark Furman here. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. And now I'm going to be the Northern Irish one from Line of Duty. So, look, special one. Here's what I think's going on. I think you're doing the classic dance of a woman who wants a man but doesn't want to lose him by articulating what it is you really want, which is you're trying to mirror his wants. Both of us don't want a relationship. Both of us feel like this,

but you've already said, but in my heart, I'm actually finding it difficult and painful that he's seeing other people and I want some form of progression. Like that is inherently contradictory as bad cop over there said as she was beating your head in with the truncheon. It is contradictory. It means that what your stated preferences are and what your revealed preferences are through the language of your heart and the pangs that it's experiencing are different. And I think that you're doing something which I've seen a million times before, both in friends and also in myself, which is in order to try and maintain this, guy being in your orbit not driving him away, you're saying, well, I just want the same things

that you want. But you don't, you don't. And that's fine. It's fine to want progression and for them not to. But you're ultimately wearing yourself down. And I think that there is an element of a lack of self-respect when you're not listening to what your heart is telling you. Right. And you're not honoring the fact that your desires are making themselves known to you. I don't think this is a problem of you not knowing what you want. This is a problem of not accepting what it is you really want because it's incompatible with what he wants and do you want him? Or flip it around. What if they really don't think they're ready for a relationship? Either way, you still got to leave it alone. You've got to leave alone if you're not actually ready for a relationship. Otherwise, you're

entering into a situation ship. But I'm not saying, I mean, look, I think that if you're somebody who is trying to make their wants to fit in with what you think someone else wants, then you're not ready for a relationship. But I just, I don't think that this is, I think this is the classic woman trying to mirror man situation. I mean, from the letter, it does seem like that because it's obviously she was, she said, you know, I'm not seeing anyone else are you

and he was like, yeah, I am actually. Do you want to ask about it? Woo, okay. We don't want a relationship. Why don't we want a relationship? And this is the thing is that he's actually been, he's been really straight up with you. You're the one that's not being straight up with him.

Yeah. I just, I feel like from my past and recent experience, I've realised you have to be honest, like about what you actually want. Otherwise you're not going to get it. And people are scared to be honest because, as you said, they think it will chase the other person away. Well, that's the point.

It's filtering. You are filtering out who actually is compatible with you and your wants and who isn't. It's such a straight woman thing or like a woman who's dealing with a man shouldn't say straight. But like, I don't just think it's straight thing. Like my gay guy friends do this all the time. But I think it's particularly women. I've seen it so, like a million different times. which is women are the biggest bullshitters on the planet to themselves.

No, I have gay guy friends who are also on the same level as list. What is it about loving men? Okay, then the disease is loving men. Yeah, it's, it's, it's... And the disease is loving men, right? Makes us bullshit ourselves. Well, it's something about patriarchy and the need to be chosen and wanted. Yeah.

There's something there about, yeah, when you want someone, you will try and contort yourself to be what they... But you have to think about what you need and what you actually want. And this person does not, maybe does not fit with that, no matter how much you like them interpersonally. It's exhausting trying to maintain being in someone's orbit until they choose you. Yeah. And it doesn't work.

And it's not, it's not, that's not an, it's not a grown up way to approach relationships. It is so, um, like there's the dishonesty. There's also a certain kind of very exhaustive. and cultivated passivity that you're trying to maintain. Like you're trying to engineer a situation where you're chosen, but that you don't have to leave yourself exposed by saying what it is you really want. Yeah. Yeah.

And you're just sort of in limbo. And I promise you, when you actually meet someone who you have a mutual appreciation and agreement of where it could go, you will feel that. And that energy is just so easy to go with. And then you can focus on all the other things. You've got to fix up about yourself. Like, you know, you avoidance or that shit.

But when someone likes you back, there is not this constant struggle of maintaining the right level of like, I'm here, but I'm not pressing, but I'm not pressing you. I'm just here when you need me. Do you want me? But also I'm not asking. That is a mental weight I don't think we need in 2026. And I don't think that's a healthy way of doing one dating.

I don't think any of it's healthy at all. agree okay okay special one I'm sorry I yelled at you Ash is here to like be the nice one on this occasion I will give it to the people who say I'm rude and nasty but I think it was warranted

no sometimes do you need tough love sometimes the love needs to be tough it was very tough I'm sorry special one I hope you still come to our live shows I apologize but Ash will be there and that's what's important yeah but I can flip that I can turn on a dime okay okay okay

this has been if I speak arousing if I speak arousing if I speak cultural mistake this was a cultural one I like that we got a lot of Ash's English lit we we we read novels once upon a time and sometimes we can

remember them yeah I can't remember much but you can so that's good all right thank you for listening special ones we love you even more we're tough on you bye