The Prestige TV Podcast - 'Defending Jacob'

Episode Date: May 7, 2020

Bill Simmons and Amanda Dobbins talk about 'Defending Jacob,' the soapy procedural drama on Apple TV featuring a woefully miscast Chris Evans. Hosts: Bill Simmons and Amanda Dobbins  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

TV concierge, I'm Bill Simmons. I'm with Amanda Dobbins. We're going to talk about a new show on Apple Plus called Defending Jacob and in classic Apple Plus fashion. There's a couple things that work here and a lot of things that don't. Amanda, what are they doing wrong? Why can't they get this right? It's a great question. I'm going to go out on a limb and say, I enjoyed the first four episodes of this. It's not perfect, but I had a nice time. It is a pretty down-the-middle procedural with family, elements. And there is unfortunately a teenager who is killed and we don't know who did it. And we have a lot of suspects. And there's a courtroom element to it and there's a family element to it. And I want to know what happens. I do want to know what happens, Bill. I don't know. I didn't get spoilers. So please don't spoil it. But there are some casting issues that make the show notable and also perhaps

hold it back. Do you know who I'm referring to? Well, there's multiple casting issues. issues. And there's also just bad writing. I emailed you or I texted you and I said, let's do defending Jacob because it is enjoyably bad. It's bad and I enjoyed it. And I look forward to the next episode, which to me is all I'm looking for for a TV show.

I don't want to be challenged sometimes. I want to turn my brain off. There's a murder. It starts in the murder episode one. I wonder who did it. By the second episode, spoiler alert. Chris Evans' son becomes a target, which is bad because he's a big lawyer in town. Yes, he is.

And then he hides the knife. Just stuff starts going wrong. It's just not well crafted. And yet enjoyable. I was thinking about what the well-crafted version of this show would look like because this is a show about a kid who is accused of murder and his parents, played by Chris Evans, who will come back to, and Michelle Dockery, who you might know as a show. Lady Mary from Donne Abbey and how they're dealing with their son and their son being accused

and do they believe their son's guilty and like, quote, what is this due to a family? Like a classic setup for a procedural and a good, interesting setup. But if it were like a really serious just interrogation of a family, it would be such a bummer to watch. It would be so unfun because they would be just like be so guilty all the time and there would be all these like parenting concerns. And it has elements of that. but it is also pretty soapy.

You know, there's a new suspect every episode and there are children on Facebook just making ridiculous claims. And Chris Evans is always doing something that's going to get him disbarred as a lawyer. And that honestly makes it easier for me to watch. If this were the serious prestige version of this show, I don't think I would be four episodes into this. We had the serious prestige version of the show. It was called The Killing.

And it went pretty well. It went pretty well for one year. and then the wheels came off, and everybody got really mad. That was a show that came out when I was at Grantland, and we were into it, and then the wheels came off. There was real anger.

This was when AMC was at the height of people kind of trusting AMC's taste, and when it didn't land the plane, people were past. The show never really recovered, but the whole concept of somebody was murdered. I wonder what happened. over the course of this shortened TV season,

we're going to figure it out. It's unassailable. It works every time, even when it's bad, like with the show, which is not good. Can we talk about Chris Evans? Look, I haven't sold any Chris Evans stock. I don't hold this against him. He's an EP.

He acted in it. He's a New England kid. I'm a fan. I get why he did it. He is woefully miscast, unfortunately. I completely agree. I don't even think that he is. bad. It's not bad acting. He's just supposed to be both a really devoted, a dad of a teenager,

which I think Chris Evans is 38 years old and technically like he could be the dad of a 14 year old, but there's like a boyish charm about him. I really don't believe it. And he's also supposed to be this assistant DA who is willing to like throw principle aside instantly in order to protect his kid. And like I like everybody else know Chris Evan is Captain America. And I just, he's too goody, goody. And I just don't believe him. He's like a really good, cool uncle, which is sort of the role that he played in Gifted. Did you ever say gifted? No. It is the movie where Chris Evans and Jenny Slate also of Massachusetts met. And he plays, it's like if Goodwill Hunting were about an eight-year-old and also not very well made. Oh, I did see Genius. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I kind of liked it.

Exactly, because he's playing like the cool uncle who just wants the best for his nephew. I think he's an uncle. It's an uncle-like role. And that makes sense. But dad, who is also just going to, like, screw the legal system in order to protect his teenage son, I just don't buy it. Well, so he brings too much Chris Evans baggage is what you're trying to say. And I completely agree. He's too young.

He's six, seven years too young to realistically be this kind of this dad who's, professionally kind of made it. And for some reason, just had the one kid. And, you know, they kind of don't really know what's going on, which is, by the way, also not that realistic. But I want this character to have, like, a dark side. Like, he's up to shit. Like, we're going to find out skeletons about him.

And it's Chris Evans. And you just know it's not going down that road. They even try to give him some skeletons. And you're just like, no, I'm sorry. I don't believe this. At one point, they have him dispose of some evidence. And I'm just like, I do not believe that Captain America would dispose of this evidence. That is just not acceptable.

Can I deal one other casting problem? Yes. Because it solves a bunch of our problems, including a problem that we discussed on a previous TV concierge. This actually, the mom should have been Reese Witherspoon. The way to do this would have been more star power. And now it's like playhouse for the A-listers in a really kind of not great procedural. But at least it's like, oh, my God. Chris Evans is married to Reese Witherspoon and she gets to do some acting and somebody writes

something terrible in her garage and she's going to angrily paint it over. I would rather see that version of Reese Witherspoon, the likable mom thrust into a situation that wasn't her vault versus Little Fires Everywhere, you're a borderline terrorist, Reese Witherspoon. I don't like that Reese Witherspoon. I agree with that. Be nice. Don't, but a nice person falling into the wrong hands for whatever reason, Reese Witherspoon is my favorite. I would have enjoyed her more in this. Thank you. I knew you would. I think you also isolated a problem. I think Michelle Dockery, who plays the mom, is like actually, she's very good. She looks very haunted by this and also is on a completely different show than everybody else. She's on the prestige drama version of this show. And she's

knocking it out, like a great Emmy reel. But it doesn't make sense. I also, one of many things I wanted to ask you as someone who is this show is set in Newton, Massachusetts, is that correct? Is there any way that this person could be from Newton, Massachusetts? None zero zilch. This is, this, honestly, this should have been like Amy Ryan. I need, I need somebody who feels like she was born in Massachusetts, like hardcore Massachusetts, like Lowell.

And just kind of never left, but then attached to this Chris Evans character who really turned into something, but there's still like this hardcore mass hole side to her. I don't know where this person's from. And I'm with you. This is like watching a pickup basketball game where everybody else is just kind of breaking a sweat and running around. And she's really think she's in game seven in the NBA finals.

And it's in, you're in the rock show. I don't know. I feel bad. Your agent misled to you, but this is not the show we're in right now is the show you think you're in. Speaking of Massachusetts, as a Boston show, how do you feel that this?

show is doing. Okay. You're just, you're very mad. The accents are all over the, like Pablo Schreiber, who I like. And, you know, I'm always reading for him. I like when he pops up in things. I have no idea why he's in the show. Like, this should have been like, you know, like the John Slattery trying a Boston accent type guy. Or you just go hardcore with somebody, that guy from Massachusetts movies. They're like, oh, that guy. And he's just got a kick in Massachusetts accent. I don't know why he's in the show and why he's in the Newton area. Makes no sense. It's also technically Chris Evans is supposed to have been a mentor to the Pablo Schreiber character, which is another situation where Chris Evans, yes. But it's gone badly somehow. There's like resentment and it's never

explained, now they're rivals and none of it makes sense. It makes sense in the fact that Pablo Schreiber character is just like comically evil. There's absolutely no nuance whatsoever. He is just like a shithead. And Chris Evans calls him such within like the first five minutes is the only time Chris Evans gets to be Massachusetts when he just like starts cursing out the fellow lawyer in the office. Well, and we should mention speaking of casting, get out Betty Gabriel, who I, another one I'm always reading for. And I actually think her performance combined with the character is the most authentic out

of all the characters. I agree with that. She is definitely in terms of interviewing the kids because they have to interview all the kids at the school as a part of the investigation. She, like, connects with them, and she looks, like, practical and resigned. And also... What about when Chris Evans goes, can I ask you a favor? And she's, like, we're not friends.

I don't, like, that... I thought that whole scene was actually really good. Just like, you've never treated me like a friend. Why should I be a friend to you now? I thought that was great, too. But then the character, number one, does exactly what he asks. Anyway. And, number two, sends him a text message as a record of it.

If you're going to break the law and give the assistant DA who's been suspended the police file of the local sex offender, don't also send a text message being like, hey, I dropped off the file, which is what she does. There's also the villain who they're trying to set up as this might have been the actual killer is this pedophile-type guy who's comically pedophily where it's just having to go down to the local school today and sit at a bench and just leer at the kids. notice this. This won't be weird at all to anybody. They have one really classic Apple TV moment where at the end of an episode, he goes through his phone and deletes photographs of one of the people in the case. But it's just this very loving long shot of an iPhone. Except that it's a sex offender deleting them. Yeah, I'm surprised they didn't have them have a Samsung. So my daughter loves this show. This is like the greatest legal drama she's ever watched. And it makes sense because it's a show geared toward 14 year olds. That's kind of the IQ of trying to figure out what you're looking for,

like ninth graders. I'm amazed this wasn't a Netflix show. I wanted to ask you a couple things as a parent and as a person who has teenagers in his life. And maybe also your daughter can speak to this. My first question, because one of the major plot points is that all the kids are posting on Facebook about this and posting accusations. Are kids that stupid? No, first of all, the biggest flaw of this show is that kids are on Facebook. I don't know what year we're in, but it's certainly not a year in the last 11 years. All of this would be happening on Snapchat. I don't know a single kid my daughter's age or my son's age who even knows how to get onto Facebook. So I thought that was hilarious that Facebook was a plot twist.

I do just also, the cops are reading the comments so literally. And it seems like the teens have such an awareness of the surveillance of all the adults in their life on all internet platforms at all times that it does not seem plausible to me. And if we're going super spoilery. So the kid's story is he stumbles across this dead body in the woods and he kind of panics and does know what day. It's the dumbest worst story I've ever heard. So then you just went to school after you touched a dead body, just went through the day, came home, played some video games with your buddy? Like, what?

It's just way too blatant and ridiculous. But I'm the most disappointed in Chris Evans. Again, I own a lot of Chris Evans stock. I've been with them at various points of his life. And first, why? I don't know how much they paid him, but maybe that's the answer. But if you're going to do this, if you're going to try to depart from the Chris Evans persona that we know and love,

you can't bring so much Chris Evans baggage into it. It's hard. Come up with a different look, something. I agree because it's hard. I get why he wants to do it. And also like Chris Evans is what's selling this, right? You texted us being like, hey, it's the Chris Evans drama.

And I'm like, I will absolutely watch this because Chris Evans is in it. And I like that he wants to challenge himself. But yeah, he just can't get past it. And is that really even trying? I wonder if halfway through the filming of the first episode, he realized, maybe Apple was giving, Apple's legendary for giving way too many notes on every creative project.

With all of that said, I still recommend this show. I think it's a peanut gallery show. It's like get together with, you know, whoever you're dating or you're married to, if you have kids, throw them in the room too. And just watch it. There's some groaners. There's some crazy moments. I enjoyed it.

It's an unintentional comedy show. They do that part perfectly. I don't think it was intentional. I think it's pretty well-paced. I'd like everybody in it individually. And I want to know what happens. Yeah, good. Mission accomplished.

Congratulations, Apple. For a man, and obitz, this is Bill Simmons. That was Stevie Cotsierce.