The Prestige TV Podcast - ‘Poker Face’ Episode 7 Recap

Episode Date: February 16, 2023

It's time to rev those engines as Joanna and Rob race into the latest episode of ‘Poker Face.’ Hosts: Joanna Robinson and Rob Mahoney Senior Producer: Steve Ahlman Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Start selling on D-pop, where taste recognizes taste. Okay, okay, okay, okay. You win, you win, you win. You know what? Fake racing is harder than it looks. No, no, no, no, no, man, come on. It's an arcade romance. It's dumb, you know, it's messy, it's self-defeating.

No, you don't want this in your life. With a shot. Yes, I respect it. Welcome back into the Prestige TV podcast feed this week on our journey across these here, United States. We are in Tennessee. I'm Joanna Robinson. Joining me today at the Raceway. Is that what you call it?

It's Rob Mahoney. Hi, Rob. At the track? You know, just getting a few laps in, driving in some circles. I cannot wait to talk to you about a sport that I know nothing about. We're here to talk about episode 7 of Pokerface, which is called The Future of the Sport.

This is our weekly check-in with Pokerface. This is kind of an interesting episode. There's like a few tweaks on the format this week. So we're going to talk about that a bit. And we've got a bunch of emails from folks. coming writing in with their pitches for their episodes of poker phase and also some responses to some of the wild and crazy things that we have said on this podcast. Before we get into the future of the sport, we do need to check in on something that we introduced Rob to last week. Yes.

Which is Leah Michelle Literacy Corner. We found out after we recorded last week's podcast because if you listen to last week's poker face prestige podcast, you will. remember that there is a literacy joke that Tim Meadows' character talks about how there's like a section on his Wikipedia about his literacy, this sort of like awful rumor that was started about him, about whether or not he can read. We since looked up and, yes, there is a section on Liam Michelle's Wikipedia page about this rumor about her literacy. And then Steve Allman and I, you know, journalists that we are sent Rob a few TikToks on

this subject. So Rob, where are you on Liam Michelle Literacy Corner? How are you feeling about it? My world has been shaken. I got to admit, like, the evidence you sent was very compelling. I think this is moved from rumor to fact. I don't know how you could dispute these particular clips in which, in particular, there was a smash cut compilation of all the various award shows she's been a part of as a presenter

in which she never, to an uncanny degree, never reads the name on the card. It's very concerning stuff. We don't want to get sued. So I think we should keep it in room. Rumorville, but so Lee and Michelle's lawyers don't come for us. Okay, fine.

If you have not looked this up, I really do urge you. I think it's probably not true. I just think the video evidence is very compelling. She's not helping herself, that's for sure. Not in any way. Also, we want to do

Charlie's route check-in that we started last week. One of our listeners wrote in with this really brilliant idea for me, which is check the license plates in every episode, and that has just helped unlock. everything for us. So here we go. We started in Laughlin, Nevada. We went to Albuquerque, New Mexico. We went to Houston, Texas. We got some information on the metal band tour. That was

sort of a vague one that I was doing, but it's, it's, they mentioned Kenosha in this episode. So we're in the like Milwaukee, Chicago area for that one. That info came from our listener, Jonathan. The Massey Oaks retirement home is in Georgia. We were in Seneca Lake, New York last week for the dinner theater. And here at the track, we are. in Tennessee. Don't let Peach Tree or the mention of Peaches fool you. The license plates say Tennessee, not Georgia. So we are in

Tennessee. How do you feel like, I think we need to make like an actual Google map and like plot this sort of like Indiana Jones style route around the United States. Is this making any sense to you, Rob? Yeah, I just need like the little

muscle car doing the airplane flight across the country. Although now that you lay it out in that respect, it kind of feels like the New York episode might have been moved around a little bit. Like maybe that wasn't the original place in the order and for whatever reason they thought it might be more comfortable there. I'm very curious what the original order was

and how they've mixed it around because I need to double check next week. No spoilers for next week, but Rob and I have seen that episode. I feel like we're in California. I don't know how we can not be in California next week. I'll check the plates. I haven't checked the plates yet,

but we're really excited to talk to you guys about next week. This week was a little bit thinner on the ground, I think, especially like missing a lot of the jokes that we felt, like, really floated a lot of the other episodes. How did you feel about sort of the, I don't know, the jokes per minute and or this episode in general? I think there's some things to recommend it, mostly kind of structural, interesting quirks of the episode. But overall, I think it might have the least meat on the bone of any of the episode so far. And it felt like they knew it, too. honestly, just based on the runtime, based on the way it's presented, it feels a little wanting. Yeah.

A little thin. I think a little bit of a – I was really looking forward to Tim Blake Nelson as a guest star, and I just didn't feel like, you know, he's not even in the majority of this episode. This is really Charles Melton's episode. Charles Melton, known for being one of the Reggies in Riverdale. I don't even know what that means, but I'm going to take your word for it. plays a race car driver named Davis McDowell, who is up against an older race car driver, Keith Owens. What exactly happens in this episode, Rob?

Yeah, I think you let it in pretty well. I mean, this episode is about a bitter stock car racing rivalry. And yeah, I said bitter stock car racing rivalry. That is the sport in question and the future of the sport, the title of this episode. Between those two drivers. And in the lead car, you have Davis McDowell, as you mentioned, who's kind of a hot-headed upstart character, trying to make a name for himself. And behind him, you have Kyle Owens,

played by Tim Blake Nelson, who is a driver in a lineage of drivers, right? He was kind of drafting off of his family name a little bit. So you have tensions between them boiling to the point that Owens decides to sneak into his rival's garage and tamper with his car, sabotage his car. But Davis sees him in the act, and instead of fixing it up,

decides to further compromise his own vehicle, and then Egg-on Owens' daughter, Katie, who's an aspiring driver herself to do a practice race in his tampered car. And so Katie crashes, drama ensues, and that's where we find Charlie, who's working at the go-card racetrack,

as you mentioned, of Top Joe, with Davis's mother and is sympathetic to Davis until she finds out that he might be more involved in the crash than he's letting on. Do you have anything to add, Joe? No, I think you really crushed it.

Thank you. I'm going to say a couple things. First of all, if you need to email us about anything that we've said, both now or for the rest of the email. You can email us at Hobbits and Dragons at Gmail.com. And the reason you could use that email is that we continue to debate about Charlie's superhero status.

In this episode, she refers to herself as a cancer dog, right? She's got this, like, special thing that she does. Known superheroes cancer dogs. We got an email for Bertrand who wrote Natasha Leon gave her character a decent working title superhero name in the pilot episode, Lady Galahad. also let's add another superpower into the mix. Charlie's ability to earn the trust of the people around her. Admittedly, this is also a Natasha Leon's superpower. A grill master wouldn't reveal their secret recipe to a random temporary employee,

but if that employee were Natasha Leon, they totally would. I buy it. So what do you make of Bertrand's contribution to is Charlie's superhero discourse? I mean, that is a valid point about her, you know, as we've circled around before, her true superpower being empathy or love or however you want to describe it. The show definitely does, you know, trade in that space. But this is not a superpower.

This is, as we've discussed many, many times, a preternatural sense, a heightened sensitivity, sure, not a superpower. Great. Follow-up email from Morgan, who says, My biggest poker face thought that I have every week is that in addition to her superpower, she has to be some kind of bad luck charm because she keeps going to places and then people get murdered. Yeah.

And shows like Columbo, Syke, or, you know, even shows like Supernatural, where the early seasons had them traveling around with very few recurring characters. The main characters were officially some type of private investigators or intentionally searching out crimes to solve. Charlie stumbles across them, sometimes only figuring out there is a crime because of her superpower. I don't mind it, but I find it interesting. So I will just say to Morgan, like the follow-up is that long-running murder-she-wrote joke that the idea of like Jessica Fletcher, the lead sleuth of murder she wrote, who was a crime novelist, not a necessarily, like a private investigator, but wherever she went, be it in Cabot Cove where the body count

was high or like a trip to Chicago, wherever she went, there was a murder. So the joke about murder she wrote is that Jessica Fletcher is the one doing all the crime because wherever she goes, a crime follows. But yeah, this how long, again, can this premise of Charlie, who is not even a crime novelist, she's just a humble go-kart slash barbecuer slash old folks home employee. How long do we feel like we can hang with this premise of murder or attempted murder happens wherever she goes? Yeah, it's nice that we at least in this episode had an attempted murder or attempted manslaughter. I'm not sure what the charge would officially be in this particular episode, but it's nice that we get some variety on that front.

I do agree if you're Charlie at some point it does start to get a little concerning that people are just dying left and right all around you and maybe there really is something to that like you know that roommate theorem where if like you keep having roommates who are assholes maybe you're the asshole maybe you're the problem

I don't know something's following Charlie around the country I don't know what it is maybe it's a supernatural force all its own I've never heard that phrased in the roommate point of view but to tick off a box for our cover to speak I will mention the TV show Justified and say there's a great line of justified, which is if you meet an asshole in the morning, you've been an asshole. If you meet assholes all day, you're the asshole.

So, yeah. We also get this email from Sean that I loved. Sean points out that the two main characters in last week's episode, Existage Death, were bickering former co-stars. They're named Michael and Kathleen. Is it a reach to think the creative inspiration or even dream casting might have been Michael Douglas and Kathleen Turner of romancing the Stone and the war. the Rose's fame, with perhaps Catherine Zeta Jones is their intended victim. No shade on Ellen Bark and Tim Meadows and Javila-Giville, but perhaps that would have been a fun trio to see. So what do you think of this Michael and Kathleen dream casting here?

That's incredible. The readers are going next level with this stuff. It would not have ever occurred to me, but it's kind of right there on the page, to be honest with you. I know. If they could have gotten Michael and Kathleen and Catherine Zena Jones, like phenomenal stuff. And having just seen quantum media last night, no, two nights ago, what is time? Michael Douglas can do anything.

Maybe there's time because it was officially announced since our last episode. Poker phase back for season two. Big news. Maybe Michael Douglas, you know, but let's just go ahead and get that contract all signs still delivered. Yeah. Give us that War the Rose is bickering energy. I love that for us. All right.

So speaking of season two, we got a couple pitches. We will get back to stock car racing, I promise. I'm not that averse to talking about sports. But we got a couple pitches as we asked for people for, like, locations and premises for future episodes, season two episodes of Bookerface. I'm going to hate you with some ideas and I'm going to like, like, you tell me which one you like the best. Okay. So Peter suggests New Jersey, a water park modeled after Action Park, which is apparently a water park so risky and dangerous that there's a documentary called Class Action Park on HBO, which I never heard of. But, so, you know, Waterpark employee is a job for Charlie interacting with teenagers, et cetera, et cetera.

Okay. Justin writes in Santa Rosa Beach, Florida golf course. So an excuse for Charlie interact with douchebag rich people, which is always a fun idea. And we're in Florida. So that's one idea. Margie suggests Cape Cod and that Charlie is working at. at one of the nearby restaurants serving lobster rolls, fried clam strips, and clam chowder. The death could also happen at one of our many beaches, perhaps with a shark scare happening

at the same time, or perhaps during a Cape Con League baseball game, another great locale will be Provincetown, which brings up all kind of wonderful gate theme possibilities, or at the Kennedy compound. Okay. Charlie goes to the Kennedy compound. Sounds really fun. Unfact. This is me, Joanna, just really quickly.

I went to Cape Cod for the first time a couple summers ago, and we were driving around. and we were just driving near the Kennedy compound, just, I don't know, we were driving around. And really scary security guys came out and we're just sort of like, what are you doing here? And I was like turning the car around, apparently, not coming anywhere near the Kennedy compound. By driving around, do you mean casing the place? You know how I like to rob, you know, political legacy families of the United States. We all have our hobbies? And then Bertrand suggests Charlie on a boat,

some kind of temporary dead can work that she takes out of pure desperation. We can give Benjamin Brad a paycheck to scat out around the docks. Some gruff fishermen sent him on his way. Charlie probably is a full conversation with a dead fish or something, those creepy, cold dead eyes, etc. So, okay, Charlie at a boat, Charlie at a golf course in Florida, Charlie in Cape Cod, Charlie at a New Jersey water park, which is your favorite?

I would say why pick and choose? Because the answer clearly is Charlie on a cruise ship. It's a boat. You got the rich people coming in. You've got the seafood. Look, you want to see people in a lobster bib? We can work that in. It's a good psychag.

And some of these things honestly do have basically like a functional water park on the premises for her to deal with, you know, brats of all ages. So I would love to see Charlie the cruise ship employee. I mean, honestly, in so many different capacities there, the sources for comedy are endless. Last but not least, this ties into this episode about this idea of truth and truth detectors and how it works and how it does. And we got this email from Allison about the Monkey Time episode, the old folks home episode.

And she wrote, I was thinking about your comment that Charlie was, quote, unquote, tricked by the murderous ladies in episode five. She did not perceive that they were lying to her when telling the story about their quote-unquote protest back in the 1960s. Many have called Charlie a human lie detector. We know that the vulnerability of a lie detector is that it won't identify someone as untruthful if they believe it is the truth that they are telling. I think this was the case in episode five. Those women believe that what they were doing was right and justified. So when they tell the story, that is what Charlie hears and there's no element of untruth.

It is only when she hears the story from another angle that she can compare the two. I think this is Charlie's magic. Not that she realized solely on detecting lies, but on understanding people. So that gets into this week's episode where we have. a would-be murderer, or at least would-be coma inducer, who finds out about Charlie's special power, and so works around it. So I kind of want to start there.

So we get Davis finds out from Charlie and tests her early on, before he's even trying to do crimes about her ability to sniff out a lie. And since he knows that, there are a few situations in this episode where she asks the question and he answers the question or he answers truthfully like,

I found this in the car, you know, that all happened. Like he keeps two things that actually happen but skates the added layer. And she only hears the lie, over hears the lie, to someone else. What did you think of that twist on the idea, Rob? I really liked it. And you're right.

The contrast, or our listener is right, in terms of the contrast from Time of the Monkey. Because, yeah, that was definitely a representation of a kind of truth as the person believed it, as the two ladies believed it. And this one is so premeditated. It's so calculated in terms of manipulating Charlie's power to basically, like, for a criminal to exonerate themselves,

to clear their name, to point people in another direction. And it's so purposeful in a way that's honestly, like, pretty diabolical. And I think sets up this episode where this, this series of events in terms of the criminals we've seen is honestly like among the more like miserable things that anyone has done so far, like in terms of the most malicious things. And yet the punishment we get at the end,

I think is pretty light. The yips? That's it. The punishment is the yips. Is the yps. Snoring, gasping during sleep, feeling fatigued, ask your doctor about zeppbound,

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Stop taking bad travel advice. Start comparing hundreds of sites with kayak and get your trip right. Kayak, got that right. Okay, so the episode starts with Tim Blake Nelson's character. Owens has the yips, right? We see it in the shaking of his hand. And by the end of the episode, again, because we've discussed this before, Charlie's not calling the cops and she's not a cop. So she has her, like, various forms of justice.

And in this case, she sort of sews a seize of doubt into Davis McDowell's head and we see his handshape. And he's got the ips by the end of the episode. And you're saying, this is not enough for the fact that he tried to at least grievously injure Katie, if not kill her and make her father believe. that he's the one who did it in the first place. Yeah, I actually think there's a pretty interesting moral dilemma at the center of this episode that not many of the previous ones have dealt with, right, where we have an initial criminal in Tim Blake Nelson's character who's doing something that's clearly wrong,

tampering with someone's car in a way that could be really dangerous and cause them harm. And then we have the follow-up crime in which not only, you know, not only does Davis encourage Katie to drive his car knowing that it's compromised, But what's the really screwed up part is tampering with the seatbelt. Like that's the tell, right?

This is not, I want you to crash the car and I want my rival to feel badly. Like, you are actively trying to kill someone at that point. And so the idea that you take this interesting moral dilemma, and yes, I'm all for creative punishment. I'm all for, you know, what's the quote in this episode? Karma is some kind of consequence. Like, I like that kind of justice.

This does not feel like karma. This does not feel like a karmic balance considering really the only punishment is that Davis knows that Katie is a better driver than him and will eventually get better and drive anyway, which is something he already knew. I mean, maybe I could justify it in saying, like, he did all this and he's still,

like, he completely compromised himself morally, blackened his own soul, and he's still going to lose anyway. You know, he did it to secure his future and what is his future going to be now that he's at least safe. liked out. But yeah, I mean, we should add that he also tries to run Charlie off the road at a certain point, too, you know, like just straight up murder her that way. And I also think

Davis McDowell, there's so much Davis McDowell in this episode. And Charles Melton with love and respect is like a good looking dude, but maybe not like my favorite guest star that we've had so far this season. So I think that perhaps if it had been a different casting in that role, I would have been more invested in this episode overall. The other really, really, I thought really fun wrinkle, though, in this episode is that the claim of bullshit, the most enjoyable claim of bullshit we get in this episode comes not from Charlie, but from Donna Owens, Tim Blake Nelson's wife. And so it's this idea, I mean, it feeds back to our superpower debate, right?

Like, is it a superpower or does Donna just know her husband so much, right? of course, that when he lies, she can call bullshit. And the way she delivers it, it gave me a little thrill. I loved that moment. And the fact that he, like, capitulates and confesses based on his wife calling him out for what he did and his lies. I loved that. What did you think, Rob?

So really what you're saying is this first third-party bullshit we get is like the last Jedi wrinkle where we're all superheroes. You know, we're all able to call bullshit. Yeah, it's the broom boy of the... of, yeah, sure, sure. I think that's it. No, I really like that element, too. And especially the specific call-out, I think, is executed really well.

And, I mean, the development of Tim Blake Nelson's character in this episode is interesting, because I think you could argue that even though he does something awful in tampering with someone's car, he ultimately, like, does prove out to be the person that his wife thinks he is, right? Like, the person who would take responsibility for it. And really, another interesting structural wrinkle in this episode who confesses, to the crime before Charlie can even fully prove it. Like he is completely putting it out there, completely taking responsibility

for what he thinks to be a horrendous error in judgment that ultimately caused his daughter to go into a coma. Yeah. And we see the events play out twice, kind of, in this episode. In a way, I don't think we get, you know, because you have like the Katie wrinkle.

You know what I mean? Like there's different things that add various wrinkles to this. episode, like him, him switching the seatbelt, et cetera. And so it's, again, I like them messing with the format. Some of it felt like a little repetitive to me in this episode, but I like them messing with the format as much as much as they can to keep things sort of exciting and twisty. I want to follow up on something you brought up last week, which is the social media aspect. You, like we were talking about tracking the social media elements in these So let's run through them really quickly.

And the first episode, we've got the Dick Cloud, right? Like, that's a key point to everything. Iconic. And the second episode we've got our poor guy, subway employee, has a thriving TikTok, right? So that's an aspect. Episode three, I think is just like the radio. I don't think there's like another social media. That's sort of old media.

That's fine. Number four is the clearest one, the crampus prank, plus the murder podcast. plus the YouTube reviewer music kids at the end, right? That's a triple whammy. Yeah. Time of the Monkey, which I called Monkey Time earlier, and you corrected me gently, but Time of the Monkey, I think, doesn't have anything, right? Am I missing something from Time of the Monkey?

Well, yeah, but that's a, you know, it's a home for elderly people. They're not, they're not on the gram like that. You just have the Fletcher, I mean, but the Fletcher should have their own TikTok channel where they talk about various SARS cards. I listen to that podcast. 100%. And then episode six, we've got Kathleen, and Michael trending on Twitter.

And then in this episode, we've got Davis is live streaming, sort of his encounter here. Do you have any sort of unified theory around the use of digital media here? Or is it just like an attempt to keep this feeling not dated like Columbo, but anchored in the here and now?

I suspect it's the latter. And there's also another occurrence in this episode, too. I think his family first sees the, like, inciting incident between these two drivers in which is like a fist fight at the track. also see that on some kind of social media as well. And so it does seem like with a lot of these, it's either the inciting incident

or it's something to kind of urge the plot along, which makes me think it's more kind of grounding device, as you're saying, than any kind of thematic framework or any kind of moralistic judgment because we've seen it used for, honestly, some really good purposes and mostly kind of neutral ones. It doesn't feel judgmental at all. It might just be part of, I mean, we need to keep our eye on it,

but it might be all part of this whole Charlie is. isn't a PI. She isn't working for the cops. So sort of how does, you know, she's not going to a crime scene to gather clues. She doesn't have the recourses of using, like, you know, calling in the cops and something like that, not that she should. So, yeah, I don't know. It's an interesting element. I hope that either we get a chance or someone gets a chance to ask the creators about that if they had anything bigger in mind about any of that. All right, what else do you want to say about this episode? Like, what else worked for you? What didn't work for you in this episode? Well, I have to ask you, considering Tim Blake Nelson was the guest star you were most excited to see.

Yeah. And it turns out we were wondering, is he going to be a criminal or a victim? And he's kind of both in this episode. Yeah. That's perfect. That's perfect for Tim. They really walked that line. He can do both.

He can do them all the soap perfect. Do you have a favorite Tim Blake Nelson performance? I'd have to think about it. I mean, he's definitely a guy who, like, pops in almost everything you see for exactly the quality you've highlighted, right? That, like, that ambiguity. And there's kind of an awshuckiness to him that's always pleasant to see pop up in pretty much anything. Yeah. Tim Blake Nelson just using his natural accent all the time and everything always is a joy. Of course, the first time he's on my radar is, oh, brother, we're out thou.

Just an incredible, incredible performance. But also in Watchman a couple of years ago, really, really good in Washington. A phenomenal show. Yeah. I'm never upset to see Tim Blake Nelson. I think I was just most upset in this episode that I didn't. see more of him. It's a little underutilized for sure. Could have been the whole episode, just him, honestly. Yeah, and, like, we should look at who we still have left on the board because there's only a few more episodes, three more episodes. You and I, as we've mentioned, have seen episode eight, so we know who's popping in that.

But, like, Stephanie Shoe, you know, Oscar nominee. Joseph Gordon Levitt has yet to appear in anything we've seen. Raya Perlman, Clea Duvall, Rowan Blanchard, everyone's favorite young adult actors. And of course, Ron Perlman in the flesh. So, you know, there's a few goodies left. And I don't know how they're going to appear.

But okay, okay, let me ask you. Jessica Gordon-Levitt, victim or criminal? I think they're going to go against type criminal. Criminal. Raya Perlman, victim or criminal? That one's tough. What's your feel for that? A victim.

or like the mother of a victim or related to the victim somehow or whatever. Clayad Duval, criminal or victim. Do I know who Clea Deval is? Oh, she was in, but I'm a cheerleader with Natasha Leon, so I think that's probably why she's here. She's like in the faculty, an episode of Buffy.

Oh, of course. Okay, no, as soon as you said the faculty, I know who exactly who this is. Okay. She is, I think she's going to be a criminal. Yeah. Yeah, got to be. All right, anything else you want to say about this episode of television, Rob?

There's a bit. I mean... Yeah. What do you want to tell me about stock car racing that I may not know? Are you a stock car racing aficionado? What context am I missing? You may not be into the sports, but, you know, this is... I am a sportsman by day job, right?

Like, I cover the NBA. When I saw the title this episode, The Future of the Sport, like, okay, now we're getting into my territory. Is it going to be, you know, like a five-star recruit for football or basketball who, like, will do anything to get to the top of the class? Is it going to be the corrupt face of professional pickleball? Like, what is this going to be? And then, no, it's stock car racing in apparently small town Tennessee. Took a little bit of the wind out of my sales, if I'm being honest with you.

Not the world I was hoping to inhabit for this episode. How do you feel like stock car, are you, do you know anything about stock car racing? beyond what we saw here depicted. Can you judge the accuracy of what we saw? I now know that you can compromise a car with a, what is it, a gear tie and a fish hook? Yeah. That's good to know.

You know, just in case, you never know when you might develop some enemies in the stock car community. So if you in your future become a stock car racer, you'll be checking the under the bonnet, under the hood for, for fish eggs. How could you not? Yep, I agree. I do think there's a, to your point about Davis earlier and that performance and that how

much time we spend with that character, there is like a misallocation of resources here a little bit in terms of where the story focuses. And in particular, like, we don't really spend any time with Katie. And so she becomes basically a plot device to urge it forward. That's kind of a shame. But even the time we do spend with Davis, like there is a connection. between him and Charlie, for sure. Oh, he tries to smooch her.

Tries to smooch her. She turns him away. Yeah. I actually thought that would be an interesting dynamic. We've explored lots of different things that are getting between Charlie and the truth. We haven't really seen any kind of romantic interest that might cause her to not see things totally clearly.

And so I kind of thought that might be where we were headed. And so when that was a swerve, I was just wondering why we were spending so much time with him. Like, the show clearly wants you in this episode clearly wants you to identify, with his economic circumstances, to understand why he might be desperate, and in some ways wants you to like him,

but the end result, I don't feel particularly attached to him by the time the turn comes. This is so funny, he's 32, and I know him best for playing a teenager on Riverdale, so I definitely thought he was younger than he is Charles Milton. But, and what I mean by one of the Reggie's is that there was a different actor playing the role of Reggie

in season one of Riverdale, and then he, like, went on to, quote, quote, bigger, better things, which I think was, like, 13 reasons why. Is this the hot Reggie or is this the less hot Reggie? They're both extremely hot. It's really hard to pick. But this is definitely Reggie.

This is Darren number two. This is Reggie number two, Charles Melton. Second Reggie. I'm trying to think of who, like, who, like, what if we put, like, Noah Centeno in this role? Or someone who's just, like, oozes a bit more charisma and, like, ability. Yeah. Reggie's kind of a villain on Riverdale, so maybe I'm just predisposed to not really like Charles Melton. But, like, and I'm not even actually.

that much of a devoted Riverdale. I regret that I know this much about Riverdale, if I'm being honest with you, but like if you paint like Noah Centeno or some or some other like sort of like young teen centric idol actor to put in this role and I am more predisposed to like be tender towards them or to like root for that like kind of ship them with Charlie or something like that. Then the evil turn feels a little bit sharper. But like this guy I'm like, I don't, I don't like you from the start. I don't like you by the end. That's where I am.

It's trouble. Have you seen the recruit with Noah Centeno? I have not. Have you? I've seen part of it. And honestly, I mean, I think he would be great in this kind of role.

There is not only the charisma, but like a doofy vibrato that he can pull off pretty well that I think could lend itself really well to like a stock car racer who's trying to be more macho than he is. Yeah. And then it'll puff in his chest out a little bit.

I think he could have been really cool in a role like this. All right. So Hollywood call us. We've got a lot of crowdsource ideas for future episodes of Pokerface as well as some casting notes. And if you want to use Tim Blake Nelson again in another episode where he plays a completely different character, I promise I will not complain. I will just pretend by which time we get to Pokerface season 9, I will just pretend we've never seen him Blake Nelson on the show before and use him better this time. All right. Anything else you want to say about this episode of Pokerface?

I mean, we got an overt delivery. reference in this episode. We've had a heat reference previously. I'm just wondering are the writers of this show just crushing episodes of the rewatchables and not telling us. Okay. Rewatchables watch. We'll just start tracking that. Just put it out there.

That sounds great. Next week's episode, again, we're not watching ahead generally. We watched ahead just because of some scheduling stuff here around the Spotify offices, but an incredible. I cannot wait to

If you watch this episode, you're like, this is a little weaker, maybe the last one's a little weaker, maybe I'm out on Pokerface. I just really urge you to stick around for next week's episode, which is wild on nine different levels that I can't wait to talk to Rob about. I'm so proud. A little saucier, a little spicier than I would have anticipated. I'm going to say controversial. That's what I will say this episode television is. All right. So we will see you all next week for that episode of Pokerface.

please keep sending your ideas for season two episodes of Poker Face, weigh in on superhero debate if you have Lee and Michelle literacy ideas, any in all comers. Pappasandragons and Gmail.com. This episode was produced by Steve Allman. We'll see you next time. Bye. This episode is brought to you by Netflix's remarkably bright creatures.

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