The Prestige TV Podcast - ‘The Curse’ Season 1 Finale Recap

Episode Date: January 12, 2024

Sean and Jo return to break down the Season 1 finale of ‘The Curse.’ They discuss the extremely bold conclusion, whether or not the final episode has a deeper meaning beneath it, and the subsequent provocation of critics and viewers alike. Along the way, they debate whether Asher was actually cursed and his final attempt to win over Whitney’s approval. Later, they talk through similarities (and differences) between the Showtime series and ‘Twin Peaks.’ Hosts: Sean Fennessey and Joanna Robinson Producer: Kai Grady Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Did Don Draper really buy the world of Coke? Did Tony Soprano really die? Or just order more onion rings? Were those guys really in hell the whole time, or was that just the audience? The finales of our favorite shows can make us argue, make us cry, and make us crazy. From Spotify and the Ringer, I'm Andy Greenwald, and this is Stick the Landing, a new podcast where we'll be telling the story of modern TV backwards, one fade out at a time. Each episode, a guest and I will choose a celebrated series from history,

from the 70s to the streaming era and beyond and do a deep dive on its very last episode. Was it all a dream? Did it turn into a nightmare? And most importantly, what can we learn about tomorrow's new shows from the way yesterday's ended? TV is a journey.

I hope you'll enjoy this podcast about the destination. Starting January 17th, find Stick the Landing on Wednesdays on the Prestige TV feed, on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. Hello, welcome back to the Prestige TV podcast feed. I'm doing a Robinson. And joining me today to break down what is surely the most baffling episode of television of the year, because it's only January.

But it might not have any competition. It is Sean Fennacy. Talk about the curse finale. Sean, how you doing? I'm doing so well. I'm recording from the ceiling of the studio here in Spotify and Los Angeles. I feel great. If I leave this room, I don't know what will happen.

But until then, we will continue our conversation about this incredibly audacious TV show. Holy shit, Joe. I said just before we started recording that I'm looking forward to Sean convincing me helping me make sense of this episode of television because I am entering this conversation quite skeptical of all of this

but I was like but if anyone can convince me that this was tremendous art, it is one Mr. Sean Fantasy. For those who maybe didn't watch this episode of television I don't know why you would listen to this podcast and some of you do so let's just explain really quickly that would you say

a third of this episode is fairly standard curse plot type stuff. We get an interlude on the Rachel Ray show, which is a show that is no longer in production, but is a show that they do a lengthy segment of

with a soprano's actor making meatballs. That's a whole part of it. There's a deeply, wildly uncomfortable Shabbat dinner between Asher and Whitney. There is the gifting of the home back to Abshir

that goes not the way that Whitney and Asher wanted to. These are like standard curse sequences and then for the last two-thirds of the episode is a prolonged set piece of Asher having woken up on the ceiling of the house and gets progressively higher until he eventually floats away to space and freezes and dies, we must presume. Meanwhile, Whitney is given birth to their child because I should have said to start. There's a time jump. Whitney is now heavily pregnant,

etc., etc. The one thing I forgot to mention in the sort of like standard curse section is the absolute hypocrisy of Asher Whitney installing a room for their baby that is not in code with their standards and practices for the home because it's fine for everyone else to live there, but not for their baby to live in the odd conditions of the home. So we get the whole back and forth with their contractor, which is pretty hilarious and wonderful. So, Sean, just hit me with your large, big picture,

how are you feeling about this finale? How are you feeling about this season of television as a whole? I've only watched it once. My immediate reaction was that it met my expectations, which was for this show, to maybe not justify itself, because who am I to say, what is the justification

for a work of art, but to make sense of its long arc, it needed something extremely bold as a part of its conclusion, in part because the show was very much built on a kind of mystical premise, that there had to be some clarification

about this idea of a curse and fate and reaping what you sow in a more cosmic sense. And I'm really glad, that they did that. I'm really glad that the show chose to rather than just continue to make a kind of photocopy of the Larry Sanders, Albert Brooks, you know, David Lynch like mashup that we've been discussing and enjoying, that they did something that felt more like those opening moments of uncut gems when the camera is sort of flying into Africa and we're seeing these gems and we're seeing

that these gems might have a kind of power that could corrupt a man's soul and that that is a springboard into the story of the Adam Sandler character in that film. That that is something that is a signature of the Safeties. And a lot of that cringe stuff that we're talking about, that's what Nathan does. But the Safeties,

they have a jittery anxiety in their work, but they also have something that extends beyond our understanding of the world scientifically. And so in that respect, I thought it was amazing. I also thought the set pieces that were actually a part of the show were appropriate. The show, it's obviously a deeply allegorical episode of TV,

and I don't know ultimately how I feel about what it is trying to say, so I'm excited to kind of talk to you about it. That being said, as with everything related to this show, I'm sure this is not going to work for everybody. I just Googled the curse finale just before we jumped on. Let me just do that one more time for us, so in real time I can read you the various headlines about the curse finale. The curse finale soars to an unforgettable ending.

The curse finale is bonkers and deeply frustrating. The curse explained, what the hell was that? The curse, the Gravitron. The curse might have just aired the weirdest TV finale ever. So I think what we have here is like a work of art that is drawing a huge reaction, but also people are like, I don't want to get this wrong. If I just say it's crazy, then maybe that's good enough. If I say it's too confounding, I might be considered dim or something.

We're at this interesting moment when culture arrives. I've never seen anything like this before. So it's kind of fun to talk to you about. So you are skeptical. What did you think? A friend of mine who had watched the finale before, like watched the finale screener. We had a screener, you and I watched it like a couple days ago or whatever. Watched for me and he said, have you watched it yet?

And I said, no. He said, please text me while you're watching it. Which is a sort of like alarm bells thing for someone to say to you. And I might have sent similar alarm bells to you after I watched it. And I was like, have you watched it yet? Let me know when you do. I didn't because I wanted to do this in person, but I will say,

Adam Neiman sent me that note three months ago when he watched it. And it was like, have you finished the curse yet? And I told him, well, I think I'm going to be potting about it, so I'm stopping and I'm not going to keep watching. Got it. So I was braced for something wild to happen. If someone was asking you for, like, real time texts

while you're watching it. And when it happened, when we wake up, the camera pans up, and he's on the ceiling, I texted this friend of mine, I said, like I'm actually not surprised because I think you

I wasn't surprised. You and I think had been identifying the surreal creep that had been happening in the show. So I wasn't shocked to find that it went like full surreal. I was shocked to find that I did it. This was just the rest of the episode

that did, like the length of it, did shock me. I don't know, shock, but surprise me and then occasionally fatigue me. But I was glad. agree with you, I was glad that we went like full surreal. I'm glad that that happened. Whether or not

I think it was successful, it certainly wasn't successful for me in the moment. That being said, having read a lot of those article headlines that you listed out, because I was curious, are people going to call this out as bullshit? Some people did. Like, Vulture did, Rolling Stone did, etc. Or are people going to be afraid to, to your point, to look dim if they don't praise it as high art or try to analyze it through the lens of David Lynch or Kafka or whatever you prefer, you know, whatever lens you prefer to put it on? So it's almost like a, it almost feels like an emperor has no clothes experiment from

Fielder and Safty. Like I would not be surprised if they're like, we're just going to do this and let's watch people tie themselves in knots trying to like find profundity in it, which has its own delights. But what I will say, to your point, is that the amount of conversation and alarm or excitement or irritation or whatever it has provoked, that means it's interesting art, you know, so no matter what, it's worthy of a conversation. I agree with that assessment. I'm intrigued by the idea of calling bullshit on it because I think that assumes that there is a way to kind of call bullshit on something like this. Like, I'll give you an example. You're one of the foremost

lost analysts, critics, podcasters in the history of time. Maybe the foremost. Wow. And I haven't spent one, one millionth the amount of time thinking about that show that you did. I just watched it as a consumer. I wasn't even covering television hardly at all

at that time in my career. And I was a massive fan of that series. And then, like so many other people in that final season, I really started to lose my grip after getting frustrated with the storytelling. And then I was just one of those very, at this point very, like a large group of people

who were just like, this finale is just bullshit. And I did the thing that you're saying that some critics are doing today where I was like, I'm not satisfied with this. This feels like a cop-out. This feels like a provocation without an idea.

I don't really like that this is where this show went. And I think that that is a different example to me of a critic doing that and just in general, like an artist taking a big chance on a story, because that was a show that people loved, that had a huge, following. And so the audacity

that was on display there was very different. And I would say in some ways more commendable because the curse is like this art piece. You know, it's on the eighth most popular streaming service and it's a, by nature, it is kind of distancing itself from its audience. It's trying to turn

a certain group of people off in some ways. For me, obviously, like it is tailor made for me. Youth, like a thoughtful critic and consumer, like all popular culture, you're naturally interested in what it is they're trying to accomplish here. I love that idea that you framed of them just making this to fuck with people

and if they just did that if this was just pranksterism, I would be into that. I think that that would actually be quite an experiment. We watched several late night show interviews with the creators of the show doing Andy Kaufman.

Betty Safdi has made a documentary about Andy Kaufman, right? They're, Kaufman's brand of humor which is this sort of like just intentionally provocative, no, I will not explain it, does it have a deeper meaning? No, it's really just meant to make you uncomfortable. Again, like, I don't think if it's provocation without any depth to it,

or let's say a blank page that they're inviting you to write on, then I don't think it's unintelligent. These are very intelligent people. So no matter what it is, I don't think it is like an idiotic swing in a mess or anything like that. And I don't think anyone would say that. But there's a difference, I think, between the ending of lost, other than the ones you outlined, which is, Little Off and Q's were in no way trying to be provocative. And no matter what Fielder and Safdie are trying to be provocative and provoke discomfort of some kind, even it is just to make people who are trying to be intellectual for a living scramble. There's a Great. In addition to, we already called out last week, Esther Zuckerman's, like, great recaps that she's been doing in New York Times.

There is a three-way roundtable between three New York Times critics about this finale, where they're just sort of like, again, the aforementioned floundering of like, is it Kafka? Is it Lynch? What is it? What are we watching? Is this good? Should we even try to explain it? We're not sure? Like, if you're fielded and Safty and Emma Stone, like, I don't want to leave her out of this, like, how are you not kind of giggling over your Cheerios? like reading that reaction to this thing you made, you know? We flummoxed the New York Times. Like, here we go. So that's interesting me. Here's the one, I mean, and there's plenty of interpretations we can put on this. Asher being misunderstood for so much of this episode and frustrated in being misunderstood is akin to how much he is misunderstood and not helped the community that they have invaded all season, etc.

or you could make that argument easily. I think one of the most interesting thing to me, if I tried to take very seriously the last two-thirds of this episode, is the way in which when Whitney and her doula, which, by the way, the dula comedy is like, I don't know if you and your wife had a doula, but I have like... Yes, but in a very different way than they did here.

Dulas are amazing. This parody of duels is hilarious to me. It's accurate. Yeah. So funny. He's like, yes, Mama, you got this. I'm right here with you. I won't be going with you.

You're so strong. Like all this sort of stuff was really, really funny to me. My wife isn't caught up yet because she hasn't watched the finale yet. But when I was watching it, I was like, oh, my God, she's going to have chills now in her spine when she sees this. But Whitney and the Dula leaving, meaning Asher is there with no one who witnessed what happened in the first place. So no one who could explain. to the firefighters. They have only,

Dougie didn't see it, the firefighters didn't see it, the neighbors didn't see it. So nobody believes him because nobody saw it in the first place the way that Whitney saw it. And then similarly,

the only person in his life to see the end of his life is Dougie. And so you've got Whitney and Dougie, this has been the unholy trio trinity of this whole thing. Whitney and Dougie, if they ever talk again, are the only people

who have the entirety of what happens. happened to Asher here, and that will forever bind them in this sort of very sick way. And there is something, I was compelled in the moments where we're watching, I got a little bored in the house sequence other than trying to figure out how they did it logistically, but the sequence where he's on the limb of this tree and Dougie's like, why are you trying to run away from being a dad? And everyone's like patronizing him and not believing him. That did provoke something in me.

I think part of the reason for that is that it's the best performance that Fielder is giving in the entire series. When he is clinging to the tree and he is terrified, I bought it 100%. And there is a kind of like, you're so taken out of the natural world when he first is affixed to the ceiling when they first, when they wake up the next morning effectively, that you're just trying to get your bearings, as a viewer. You're just trying to understand what has happened here. you know, for me personally, I was like, I know immediately what they're doing. Like they are finally meeting the moment that I was describing where they are going to do something truly surreal. Yeah. Truly Kafka, whatever adjectival describer you want to add to it that will do what I think is the ultimate question of the show,

which I think I had meant to ask you when we spoke earlier this week about six through nine. But I can say now, which is sort of the question of was Asher cursed? and I think if we're going to take a literal analysis of this episode, and we should maybe do it briefly and then spend the rest of the time thinking about the meaning of this storytelling decision, because, you know, if in fact Asher flew through the skies because he was operating in a kind of reverse gravity to the rest of the people on Earth,

that would be the most extraordinary scientific story in the history of man. And it would be studied forever. So forget about what Dougie and Whitney have to say to each other. Asher becomes like one of the most important men who ever lived because of this incredible scientific phenomenon that has occurred to him. So it's not super worth thinking about from like a did this really happen kind of perspective, you know, like it's a big idea that we're meant to interpret, I think.

Isn't the final say on this, it's not that Asher's going to go down in history as this like incredible scientific phenomenon because you have the conversation between the neighbors, what movie they're filming, how they do that? That's the guy from HDTV. So it's her TV? I think so, huh? But Dougie is in show business. Like, he's going to make,

he's going to make dough out of this. Like, even though he's had this realization. I feel like it's going to be like alien autopsy where people are going to be like, I don't believe that that actually happened. Oh, well, that could be true. That could be true. That's a good, that's smart,

that's the smart reading that maybe it will not be believed, even though 100 people watched it happen. And I think the way that it's being shot, I mean, this whole sequence is very, postmodern and the most postmodern way you could describe it very white noise, et cetera. And well, Rachel Raffy is exactly into that. You know, like the thing that postmodernism does, I get frustrated with postmodernism often, but like the thing that it does that I like is the way it weaves in the most populous,

mainstream pop culture stuff into stories of extreme surreality. And so like, that's why we spend so much of white noise talking about Elvis. But like, so to have Rachel right here actually feels note perfect. but the non-reaction, like Dougie's having a reaction, but the firefighters aren't having a reaction. There isn't like a mad scramble. Everyone's just sort of going about their business

in the background, you know? You're right, but that just feels like a storytelling flourish to get a point across. Like the woman who chainsaws him off the tree and he flies into the sky. Yeah. She watched it happen. Like, if you witnessed that,

you wouldn't be like, oh, I don't know what happened. You'd be like, where's this man's corpse? Why did it fly up? I think you're trying to put like a real world explanation, like a real world reaction to this and that's not the world that this show is operating in anymore. That's my point. That is the point I'm making,

which is why I don't think it is worth actually analyzing what is happening in the quote-unquote real world of this story. The question is, to me, it's ultimately either that this is one of those Kaufmanesque provocations that you're describing, which I think is absolutely in play, that they were like, what's the weirdest thing we could think of that would affirm the anxiety that we've been promoting

throughout these previous nine episodes, and then just leave it at that. And once we've landed on a cool idea that we know we can execute, we'll do it and we'll leave people scratching their heads. Absolutely. If you told me that in Nathan Fielder's heart of hearts at his most truthful, hooked up to a lie detector test,

he said, I just did it to fuck with people. I would believe it. Yeah. But I also think part of the reason why it was a good choice creatively is because there are a number of ways to read this obviously very metaphorical or allegorical decision that they've made about your world being turned upside down

or being unable to escape the inevitable pull of a gravitational force that there are these these literal ideas that fit more clearly into like life of the mind stuff with Asher in particular but like what this revealed to me too is that this is ultimately Asher's show

that this is Asher's experience, it's Asher's curse and the thing that I was thinking about the most and I just love to over-read television with you. So thanks for being such a willing participant. Same, honestly. It's Asher's idea to give Abshir the house. Right. And he comes up with this idea because he tells himself

that he's working on himself to be a better person, to be a better partner, so that Whitney will stay with him. But obviously what he's doing is an act of desperation and fragility, and he's constantly looking for ways to impress her or keep her engaged with him. And he has convinced himself that doing this very noble thing

is actually an act of good, which is something that she really believes should happen even if she doesn't actually do acts of good in her day-to-day life, and that this is like the last straw, that this thing that he has done, trying to give this house. And then the reception that Abshir gives them,

which is so funny. So good. And Barcad Abdi is so funny in this scene, asking about property taxes and what he's going to owe and his complete, you know, the non-plus nature in which he receives a home

is so amazing and they're so gobsmacked but they also don't want to seem even rude to one another in the privacy of their own conversation after they walk away and think they try to say that he is so gobsmacked

by the idea of receiving it but they have to talk themselves out of saying well he seemed like a dick not really appreciating what we just did that was like the final cosmic straw that turned things over for Asher that is like Asher is not worth saving

or is unsavable and that the universe has made its final declaration on him. Now, maybe that's not it. I don't mind it. I don't mind it as a, it's as viable as anything else, honestly. There's one other piece of that theory, which is, of course, that Whitney is pregnant and is about to give birth.

And that there is a, there can only be one quality to the story. The Highlander, yeah. For the baby to come, Asher's got to go. And the baby came because Asher did something that closed the loop on the curse. one Asher in one Asher out sort of thing Exactly You go with that Did you consider that

Like is it does it I haven't read any of the things that you just described by the way I haven't read any recapped so like Is that being proffered as a theory Everyone's just floundering honestly Honestly I don't even take Kaufmanesque Glee in this and I'm just sort of gleefully reading all of these No one has quite put it that way

I think though Esther did bring up the ratchel as an idea, but says that's like such a non-Jewish idea that it seems odd to place it inside the story of this, of Jew, in an episode where we have a Shabbat meal. That being said, we have that meal and Whitney makes it horribly tasteless Holocaust joke. It's just like a one last reminder of what a piece of shit she is. So that she sucks. It's nice that that's there. So maybe it's, it does fit in here because, you know, you know, the Judaism on display is a hollow one. I don't know what to tell you about that. But like, I did struggle to connect that, like, what is the, what switches the, like, what flips the switch, right? Like, what, and you're saying it's this, in, in everything you described about giving the home.

And I was like, I can't believe they should up with, like, no paperwork. They're like, we're just doing this. And he's like, what is the paperwork on this? And then I loved the, like, really sinister, the guy was in the background. And it's just kind of, like, sinister. And also the way that that man's beard is, just the way his beard is, makes him look like he has no mouth. So it looks, like, very creepy.

And, like, the fact that I'm sure is, like, don't worry about it. And that it's just never, that made me, that put me in such a David Lynch space. That is exactly. That is the most lynching moment in the whole series. He looks right into the camera. for one second and then he's gone. Chilling. And there is something going on in that house.

Yeah. And maybe he's just a friend who came over to hang out, but probably not based on the energy that the show is giving us there. The way that at Shares won't open the door all the way. Yeah. It's like might as well be Bob from Twin Peaks. And like here's how I feel about sitting in this space of,

I've never this frustrated. I've never been this frustrated when watching David Lynch or Twin Peaks or anything. But that space of unknowing that does. discomfort of knowing and intellectual provocation and wanting to attach a meaning to it. I was once assigned, when I was at Vanity Fair, I was assigned by my editor. It was like this piece that flummoxed me forever. And it was a piece for the magazine. So it was bad because I had like a real ticking clock on it where I was tasked with like

hunting down what the true meaning of the Twin Peaks, the return finale was. And I was like, I was this possible to do. And my editor later apologized. He's like, I might, maybe I broke you with this assignment. And I was like, I feel like you kind of did, because, like, the point is there is no one, right? People can write extremely convincing arguments of 90 different interpretations of the Twin Peaks return finale. A great episode of television, by the way. Love it.

The one that it concludes with the scream, right? With the scream. Yeah. What does the scream mean? Like, what does any of that mean? What I will say that Lynch does, that this doesn't do, is I'm much more emotionally invested in those characters because he, He wrapped all of that intrigue and mystery and surrealism inside more conventional storytelling tropes of like real characters that we might care about and like care that Dale Cooper is

okay and all this sort of stuff like that. Can I just say it is actually the same but different? Tell me. Because when you started talking, I was like I felt the same thing, which is that he used the format of a cop detective show or a, you know, a family drama on a network TV. But the curse does do the same thing. It's just a modern version of that thing, which is that, like,

this is the format of a green queen kind of HGTV show. So you do come to build a relationship with these characters in a way. Like, we are fully invested in their lives. We know a lot about Whitney and Asher. But I don't like them as much. I don't care about them. I know about them, but I don't like them. And I don't wish,

I'm not rooting for them in any way whatsoever. But the more you watch Twin Peaks, the more you hate everybody. Because you realize that, like, everyone is so corroded by the world beyond the world, you know, that, like, the damage that people do to each other. Like, that's a big theme of the, of, I mean, especially Fire Walk with me, but like, a lot of the series is, like, what's underneath the fingernails of this, of our society?

That's all of Lynch's stuff, right? I, yes, I think that is true of Fire Walk with me, but I think that's why Firewalk with me is, like, the least liked of any Twin Peaks property. I know, so good, though. I think he gets, I agree, but, like, I think he gets back to, when you have in the return, sorry we're talking about the return and not the curse but like you know when you have you have certain like residents of the town like in the diner that you can that are just like normal people that you care about you've got Naomi Watts's character that you care about you can you start to care about

Dougie who's this weird alternative version of Dale Cooper and then Dale Cooper's missing for so long and you're like you know where is where is he bringing him back like um so I I you know and even the character David Lynch plays. Like there are likable, root forable characters in the Twin Peaks world as corrupt and corroded and, you know, blue velvet, what's the rot beneath

suburbia that is on David Lynch's mind, but I still think he is, he wants to talk about the rot beneath our like Americana dream society, but he also is kind of half in love with the Americana Dream

society that he thinks there's an instance they're worth protecting. And this show, The Curse, is so cynical, start to finish, that like, even Kara, who we kind of care about in our rooting for, to your point last week, she's interested in Dougie,

so that's one mark against her. She was part of a New York Times article about quitting art. Like, that's just, that's just part, it's really funny, but it doesn't make me be like, I mean, I'm a little bit like, okay, work the system, Kara, do what you need to do. But, but she's not even in the

finale. So, you know, and Upshire, who I kind of care about, I do care about, just because he's been buffeted about by these ridiculous people, has a demon in his house possibly, or just a sinister-looking man? You know, I just, it makes me, it makes the puzzle feel different when there's nothing at the center of the puzzle that I emotionally am attached to. Does that make sense to you? It does. It does. I mean, I, I am honestly very fond of films that, that kind of purposely pursue unlikable characters, you know?

Todd Salons does this, for example. You don't get, like, a really emotionally invested in too many of the characters in Todd Salon's journeys. Even the ostensible heroes are these, like, very flawed people. There are a lot of filmmakers

in the 90s who made a lot of movies like this who are like, fuck your conventional expectations. Like, watch a Vincent Gallo movie. You know what I mean? There's not really a lot of people who are like, I hope he wins. If you've never watched a Vincent Gallo movie,

don't watch a Vincent Gallo movie. That's what I'll say. That's my advice. It depends on how old you are, honestly, is how I feel about that. I was in an impressionable age when I saw Buffalo 66. So I think I'm not turned off

by the idea of an unlikable character, but that is obviously not the mode of series television. Series television is the opposite. Serious television is get invested in these people's lives, get emotionally connected to their stories. You want to like them.

You want to spend time with them. They're not unlike your favorite podcast hosts. These are people I want to spend an hour with every week. So I totally get that, and I think the show is purposefully subverting that. And they're subverting it with like the ultimate secret weapon, which is maybe the most likable

and most talented actress in Hollywood. You know, like Emma Stone, who is going through this extraordinary moment where she has like, again, like for the fourth or fifth time, realized the promise that everyone saw in her when they saw her in Superbed

where they're like, wow, she's got it. She's so cool. Like, I just want to hang out with her and she's so talented and funny and beautiful and smart. And she took on a part where she was like,

I'm the worst person in the room. And she's in a room full of assholes. Yeah. And it's like a fear. hilarious performance, and yet I'm still interested in what's going on with Whitney. And the series does this amazing thing, which is

that they show you this incredible moment in a person's life where they're having a child, which would be the dramatic emotional conclusion to the story of Whitney and Asher in any other conventional story told. This would be the great finale where Asher

would burst through the door and he would say, honey, I'm here, and they would hug their child together and then we would fade to black. But that, of course, he is fading to black into the infinite nothingness of space. And Whitney gets to be free of him, this man who, even though it's months later and she has decided to stay with him, she so clearly loathes. And so maybe in some ways the show is a kind of test of our patience, or maybe it is a kind of purposeful, fun house mirror reflection of our expectations of a television show. I think it's, it was always kind of playing with that a little bit,

which I enjoy. But you mentioned something earlier that I thought was interesting, which was like, you didn't think that loss was a provocation. And I think that, you think that loss was a provocation. And I think provocation maybe sometimes has a negative connotation which means it's like provocation without intent. And I think in some cases, I think the ending of loss was a provocation. I think it was so dramatically sculpted

so as to force a reaction of some kind, whether you loved it or didn't love. I don't know a lot of people who were like, meh, on the lost finale, you know? I just didn't know that we were going to have a Joanna DeFeshawn discussion today. I would come with like so many notes. You can do it any time you want them.

I'm sorry. No, no, no, no, we can talk about it. I'm ready to talk about any time. No, I mean, I understand what you mean. They're trying to provoke emotion. Right. I think maybe the word I want more is like needling rather than like provoking, you know? Yes.

Like I think Safdi and Fielder squirm is the word. There's this great variety profile of Benny Safdi that came out last week. And squirm is the word they used a bunch of times. And I would just say that like that, like, that. discomfort, that squirming, that all of that is not something that Loss is ever interested in. Loss wants to make you cry. It wants to wring emotion out of you and is interested in trauma, this sort of thing, but is not interested in making you wish you never turn the television on in the first place,

you know what I mean, or make you wish the cameras weren't on these people at this given time. I think it's okay. I mean, I'm happy to argue, litigate the ending of loss any day of the week. but I think that I think the intent of the creators your mileage may vary on the success of it but I don't think that Lindelof and Kuse were ever just sort of like gleefully

like let's see what the audience might feel about this. No, no, no. I do think that that's what Nathan Fielder and Benny Safdi are interested in, in addition to other things. For sure. I'm not accusing that finale of being glib or anything like that. I think it's interesting to talk about these shows that have

these kind of metaphysical qualities, though. Like Twin Peaks to Return and Lost are two shows. that really trafficked in these kind of these concepts of kind of mysticism in other worlds and a self beyond the self. And I think it's reasonable to assume that that is something that interests the makers of the curse, even though it is a show that has a more broadly satirical comic and distancing tone. The meaning of it, if there is a meaning, is still of interest to me. Like even what I shared with you before about the option. year giving him the home and then going back.

Like that was almost like a logical explanation of what the storytelling was. But what was the, what is the meaning of someone being sucked into that nothingness? What is the meaning of life, this family's life ending in this way? The other possible explanation, which might feed into a possible meaning, is that line we talked about at the end of episode nine when he says to her, ask your sister Whitney, if you didn't want to be with me and I actually truly felt that I'd be gone. you wouldn't have to say it, I would feel it, and I would disappear. So there is a moment, even after the whole Absher business, there's a moment when they're going to bed,

and he is like singing to her pregnant belly and he says, there's a little me inside of you, just like one of the worst things anyone's ever said in their lives. And Emma Stone once again gets that same look on her face that you and I were trying to figure out, what it meant in episode nine, this very inscrutable. Is this rejection? What is this? Is this submission? Is this rejection?

I think it's her trying to hide repulsion. That's what I think it is. And if that's the case, I actually truly felt that I'd be gone. You would have to say it. I would feel it and I would disappear. You know what I mean? She tries to hold on to him.

I think my favorite shot, actually, of the hole on the ceiling business is when she's hanging off of him, trying to pull him down. and he's on the ceiling. And she's literally like her feet are up off the bed. Like she is in the air. That's a great, that was a great image.

So she's genuinely trying to pull him down. But then a certain point when the contractions start, and maybe this is a good question to ask you, a father of a daughter, Sean Fentasy. There is this idea. I'm not saying it's true in your family, but there is some people feel this way that like once a woman has a child,

child her primary affections transfer. And it's like, that's not true in your family. But I'm just saying like, if she has like, just the barest shreds of affection for Asher, she may not even have room for that once there is this like other object for affection in her life. You know what I mean? And Asher's like, what am I even here for?

I'm even more vestigial than I ever was before, you know? 100%. I think you nailed that that sequence in particular, where he is speaking to her belly is almost, it is, it is, it's like the Jaws music started playing or something in that moment is happening. I was like, this is not going to go well.

There's no way, we've got 38 minutes left in this episode and things are not going to turn out well. I do think that there is ultimately, there can only be one aspect to the story, very clearly, and that this is part of it. And that also maybe her repulsion of him is factoring into this having to transpire. I think her trying to save him

is less to do with like the contraction starting. And if you want me to call my wife and ask her who she has the most affection for in our family, I will do that for you. That could be good podcasting. But I think it is more just if anyone that you were close to anything like this ever happened to them, you would do everything you could to try to help them.

You know, there's something primal instinct about that too. where it's like, this is so ridiculous what is happening to him. I don't want to underestimate the incredibly impressive execution of this very strange idea that could have gone horribly awry. It reminds me it's a very kind of like Buster Keaton. Oh, yeah. You know, not just in the performance, but in the kind of visual trickery of this.

There were a few moments where I was like, wow, how did they do that, just as you did? Particularly when he is under the awning of his home and the doula is helping him, He flips up. Yeah. And it was just like a visual cue. I'm sure there was some wirework involved there.

And I'm sure there was some reverse angling. But I was like, this is breathtaking. This is scary and weird. And I've never seen a body move like this. Were you looking? I was looking, he has close cropped hair, but I was looking like where his hair was hanging to like understand like sort of what the center of gravity was in any given shot. Like is he actually on the ground or is he actually being suspended from something? that was one thing that I was

What did you think? I can't make Honestly I can't make sense of all that And I agree with you Like we shouldn't overlook that Like it is It works really well For me was almost when he

When he went from the bedroom Into the bathroom Like the ceiling of the bathroom Before he went back into the bedroom And I was like Probably they just built a set That they could rotate That's the classic way to do this

That's the Fred Astaire way to do this That's the what we do in the shadows way to do this Like that's how you do that but I was like, or did they build something upside down? And I was like, if they built it, like, probably not. But if they built this upside down, like the bathroom upside down, I was like, I was dazzled by it. Yeah, there's a little bit of like how did they do like a zero gravity in movies in the 60s too to it, you know,

where it's like there's a lot of upside down filming and then it turns right side up and, you know. And I think in terms of rotating what's the center of gravity, there is a man in the fetal position in space. Like there has to be a 2001 space out. see, you know, invocation for us as we're watching it. Yeah, I don't, like, even when he's

on the branch, when he's on the branch, there is a sense of him being pulled up. There's, like, space between him and the branch, you know? You know what that is? That's great filmmaking. Yeah, it is. I bought it when he was on the branch. I was fully believing what was happening. I agree. Which is

a huge hurdle to take in a show like this, and they clear it so impressively. Are you looking for support in your weight management journey? Zepbound terseptitide may be able to help. Zepbound is a prescription medicine used with a reduced calorie diet and increased physical activity to help adults with obesity, or some adults with overweight who also have weight-related medical problems to lose excess body weight and keep the weight off. Zepbound is approved as a 2.5, 5, 7.5, 10, 12.5, or 15 milligram injection. Zepbound contains terseptide.

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Tell your doctor if you experience vision changes before scheduled procedures with anesthesia if you're nursing, pregnant, plan to be, or taking birth control pills. Taking Zepbound with a sulfonel urea or insulin may cause low blood sugar. Side effects include nausea, diarrhea, and vomiting, which can cause dehydration and worsen kidney problems. Talk to your doctor. Call 1-800-545-99-79 or visit Zepbounds. Any alternate theories on what this is about, what this was? I mean, how seriously do we want to take Dougie's interpretation that he's just,

Asher's just running away from being a dad, that that's all this is? I think maybe there's a way to reinterpret his interpretation to say that Asher should not be a father. And Whitney should not be a mother. These people should not parent children. What do you make of Dougie's emotional catharsis at the end of the series? I just, I don't know how to hold that because like, Dougie seems like a person who might have that moment and then just like roll on past it the way that he is seemingly

like hold on to it the way that he held on to his wife's death but then like be telling that story later at another date making another date uncomfortable telling them about the time that this guy he knew flew into the sky. You know what I mean? But don't you feel like he's been making incremental progress over the last few episodes and becoming less shitty? That's certainly...

Like he cut all the Green Queen stuff out. Like he cut all that stuff out of the show and he felt bad about showing it to Asher. And he's even trying to make a kind of, I don't know, kind of recompense with Asher in those final couple of episodes. Now, he's getting in his own way and he's still being shitty at times

like ordering the chicken at their meal. Well, do you think there's a future for Whitney where she's a better person in this Asherless, I'm a mom existence that she's about to embark on? No, no. And so like one of my real, reads on this is that in addition to there

can only be one Ash or there can only be one Whitney and that Whitney was always meant to be the only star of this show that they're making

and the only star of this story and so now that she has had the deck cleared and she can be a single mom and that can be a part of the show that she makes

that there is opportunity for her to not only not be a better person probably to be a worst person honestly to be a bigger star and a worse person.

It's not Green King it's Green Queen it's Green Queen and also that she will get to do that thing you know, some really cynical people do, which is like when they lose someone, they, like, use it.

You know, they, like, they exploit their loss. And since she clearly is repulsed by her partner, she will have no problem exploiting that loss. Grief more. To gains. And so in a way, like, maybe she'll be happy, you know, and she'll get to glide off the tragedy into telling a better story for herself.

But I will say, like, that makes it sound like, well, the ultimate villain of this show is Whitney. I think a big theme of the show is that no one is good. And that people who, like, the Absher moment at the end of that sequence in the final episode, I thought it was like a nice reminder of the fact that if there's something insidious or weird happening inside of Abshir's house, it's because, like, what do we really know about this guy? He was squatting on a house that he didn't own. He was no longer paying rent because he hadn't talked to the guy who owned the house anymore.

Yeah. Just because he's, what, an immigrant from Minnesota? Like, he's a good person? Like, the whole thing is, the whole thing of this show is sort of like, trust no one. Our whole society is people just trying to survive and just trying to get by and just trying to get more. You might not vibe with that concept, generally speaking. But I think the Nathan Fielder, like, pursuit is one that is like inherently kind of cynical. Well, I mean.

About existence. Certainly. And I think it's, I think to yes and that or yes and sideways, move it, I would say that watching, again, best performance, maybe of his life, Nathan Fielder clutched to that branch and try to scream for someone to listen to him and to understand that he knows what needs to be done, he knows what he needs, and no one is listening to him. It's, to me, underlines this idea of, like, no one is actually paying attention to anyone else. And as much as we are constantly studying each other,

whether it's like watching reality TV or social media or whatever it is, no one is actually trying to understand anyone or listen to anyone around them. They're watching it and then drawing their own conclusions. And I think the best example of that is when Asher gives Whitney the push present, the model home, and he explains to her what kind of present she likes. He's like, I thought about getting you jewelry or something like that, but I know that you don't like stuff like that. And the look on her face and the look on all of our faces is like,

you do not know this woman at all, at all. And so this idea that like nobody's listening, nobody's paying attention, though everybody is watching and assuming that they know. You know, and that's sort of the capitalist society that we live in right now, the way that we live. I think that's a great reading. I hadn't quite thought about it that way.

and I buy that completely. In fact, when he's on the branch, he is so clearly telling the firefighter, don't do this. Yeah. If you do this, like I am the person, but what we do is we constantly confront people

who seem to have a different idea than what we have, and we think that they're crazy, we think that we know better. And then he's being treated like a person who's crazy, even though he knows exactly what's happening to him, and nobody knows better than he does. I mean, he doesn't, I wouldn't be myself, if I didn't bring you a literary quote here today,

and you're welcome. In the Metamorphosis, like Kafka's Metamorphosis starts with famously, as Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from uneasy dreams, he found himself transformed in his bed into a giant insect, right? So they're like clearly invoking that, right? Like, awoke in his bed to find he was on the ceiling or whatever. But this is the, this is the Gregor Samsa line for Metamorphosis.

I cannot make you understand. I cannot make anyone understand what is happening inside me. I cannot even explain it to myself. And that's also true of Asher, right? He knows exactly what will happen if they cut the branch off, but he can't explain to you what's happening. There's no explaining what's going on in this moment for him because it is so extreme and so bizarre,

how could he possibly articulate it, you know? That's, and I think that's like a signature aspect of surrealism in general, which is that it can better help illuminate the circumstances of life, but not explain the meaning of life. It is not the purpose of surrealism, not to show us why we are on this planet or what it means to be a good person. It more just illuminates

the absurdity of common experience. And that's the point in the show. These are very regular people who are just trying to get more money and trying to get fame at a time when everyone, seemingly everyone is trying to get fame, everyone's trying to get recognition for their work. These are people who think that they're good

or think that they have ideas about how to be good. They want to have a family. they want to be have independence from their parents even though they feel that they cannot detach from that independence they want to forget about the jobs that they had before that weren't good they want to only be focused on the good jobs they have now these are very normal things you know

their ugliness is portrayed in a harsh light but these are not like these are not the ultimate villains of society they are products of a society that that supports a kind of average villainy I think at the end of the day, the most important cynical assessment Nathan Fielder is making here and Benny Safdi's making here is the majority of people don't want to be good. They want to be seen as being good. Wendy and Asher don't care about improving Absher's life, obviously. They care about having the footage of him being so grateful to them that they can play back to themselves and say, look, we're good people. Look at this thing we did. We are so good. and exposing how much it's at the center of, like, social media in general. You know, like reality TV, yes.

What is seen, I think, is the way to think about it. What is seen in public life? And we have a much bigger idea of public life than we ever did because more people have a public life than did five, ten, 50 years ago. Do you think my tweet is funny? Do you think my TikTok is clever? Do you think my Instagram is pretty? Like, all of these sort of things is like what so many of us are caught up in.

And, you know, how ultimately that. will leave all of us anchorless and floating into space, question mark? Let me ask you a question. This is a very personal question. Okay, John. I hope you receive it in a professional fashion. In the spirit of which it is met, yeah. It's a two-part question. The first part of the question is, do you think you're a good person? And the second part of the question is, do you think about being a good person? I don't think I'm an entirely good person.

Okay. But I think my percentages are not as bad as they might be. And yes, I do think about being a good person. Sean, what's your answer? I don't know. The show is making me thinking about it, you know? I think I'm fundamentally decent, but I don't know if I'm good. Does that make sense? Nice but not kind? One of those things? Yeah, just but like I'm a subscriber to the product of my environment concept. And having a consciousness about goodness does not make you inherently good. But I think having a consciousness about goodness doesn't make you inherently bad either. I agree. That's why I think I think I'm just kind of a milk toast person.

I think we're both okay. You can't tell me that I'm bad. That would be trouble for you. You don't want that. But I don't know. I mean, the fact that the show can kind of draw that out of me is powerful. I'm genuinely not sure if I liked this finale at all, but I liked this conversation and I like that this provocation happened.

Does that sound fair? Absolutely. Yeah. And if you don't like it, I think that's great. I mean, I think that's actually, I mean, what is universally acclaimed art but garbage, you know? Like, there's no such thing. That's commonplace fluff. That doesn't mean anything.

What is the best thing that everyone likes? I actually have an answer for this. Wow. You've just described an entire other podcast series that we should be making here at the Ringer. The most universally acclaimed thing that everyone likes. That is also genuinely great. But then you're trying to blend the objective with the subjective there, which is so hard to do. I'll tell you what, for a long time before it became a difficult topic to discuss, it was thriller.

Wow, okay. Who doesn't like thriller? Music Sean came to the table. All right. You know what I mean? Yeah. Where it was like, this is the biggest album of all time. I've never met a person who's like, I'm not really interested in that era of Michael Jackson.

I used to think it was the Beatles, but there's a whole Beatles backlash that's been happening. Yeah, I fucking hate that. Doesn't sit well with me, but it is true. I think it's Jurassic Park. That's very, that's very Joanna, though. Is it? Yeah. Well, you're so Jurassic Park pilt.

You love Jurassic Park. Jurassic Park is a perfect movie. I love it. I love it. That everyone, like, nobody doesn't like Jurassic Park, and it's a great movie. Do the kids like Jurassic Park? Yeah, the kids like Jurassic Park. I don't know.

They might be tainted by the World's, the Jurassic Worlds. That's what I'm saying. Like, I don't know if that holds forever. Who knows? Okay, this is a good question. I don't want to give up on this quite yet. Like, what is the TV version of this? I mean, I think growing up, it was I'd never really met anybody who didn't like cheers.

You know, like, cheers had was one of those things where we can all agree. Like, Mary Tyler Moore was like that for a long time. Like, everybody was just like, well, Mary Tyler Moore, she's a saint. That was back when we had, like, so few options. That's true. I think of the way that people talked about Johnny Carson. You know, you never hear anybody say, like, I don't like Johnny Carson. I don't know if I've ever heard anyone say that

because he just was. He was like oxygen. He was like the river stream. Like he was just, he was a part of our natural existence and we all had to subscribe to him at 11.30 p.m. every night. When I woke up this morning, I didn't know A, that I would be in a loss finale debate with you

or B, that he would say Johnny Carson is like oxygen. We're not debating loss. We just have a difference of opinion. Oh, that's so funny. All right, let's keep thinking about what's the best thing that is actually popular. Yeah. We'll come back to it.

Yeah. At Joe wrote this. Give her all your feedback. At Sean Fantasy. Basically also what this conversation between us has accidentally served to help us promote this new thing that I can now name that is happening in the Prestige TV podcast feed, which is Stick the Lanny with Andy Greenwald, that Andy and a bunch of our pals, Sean, are you doing one? Did you do one? I did one. Okay.

You did one? Did you do one? I did one. And I have another one that I'm doing in a couple weeks. That is one of the things that we discussed today. The little thing happening where Andy fell in love with potting with Joanna. I don't know if you're aware of this. He was like, oh, wow, I see now.

I see the greatness of Joanna Robinson. I was like, we've been here, man. I love potting with Andy. It's really fun. The episode that he and I did together was one of the most fun pods I've done in a long time. It's a great premise. So Stick the Landing, which is a discussion of various TV series finale, whether they were successful, unsuccessful,

defense of unintentional. I don't know which one you did. I'm excited to, I think we're going to keep it a secret, but I'm excited to ask you off air which one you did. That will be, and Kai Grady, who produced his episode, worked on that series, so shout out to Kai, but that will be premiering, what, in the next week, too? Something like that.

I think, yeah, next week, yep. So stay tuned for discussions of very serious finale like the ones we talked about today. How long will it take Andy to get to his discussion of the curse season finale? Yeah, that's a, well, it depends if this is the series finale or not. What do you think of it? Do you think this is it? I should be.

I think it should be. Not because I didn't like it, just because, like, I don't, where do you, how do you, where do you go from? Let's do a prequel, young Asher. A young guy. Oh, to replace the hole that young Sheldon has left in your heart. That's right. I see how it is. All right.

Thank you to Sean Fennacy for asking me to cover the curse with him in the first place. Thank you to Kai Grady for producing this episode. I will be back next week on this feed with the Fargo finale, the True Detective Premier, and we will be running in to stick the landing territory soon, and we will see you somewhere, sometime, hopefully not up a tree on the Prestige TV podcast. Bye.