The Prestige TV Podcast - 'The Staircase' Season Finale Recap

Episode Date: June 11, 2022

Bill Simmons and Joanna Robinson react to the finale of HBO’s ‘The Staircase’ and dive into their feelings on the season as a whole.Hosts: Bill Simmons and Joanna Robinson Associate Producer: Jo...nathan Kermah Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Starting point is 00:01:43 The sheer dress and platform heels you'll never wear again, there's a birthday girl searching for them right now. Your one-and-done look is about to pay for your next night out, or at least the right home. Your style can make you cash. Start selling on Deepop, where Taste, rents, red, recognize his taste. It's the Prestige TV podcast. My name is Bill Simmons. I'm here with Joanna Roberts. I'm going to talk about the staircase, which just finished on HBO Max. This was prestigious. This is probably going to win some Emmys and some nominations and all kinds of things. I especially liked it because I did not see the documentary in Joanna. Had you seen
Starting point is 00:02:29 the documentary? No. I think you and I are the only two people who hadn't seen the documentary. So we went in fresh. And I love documentaries. Somehow I didn't I didn't see it. So I didn't know anything that was going to happen. And I don't know. I think you and I are probably better off experiencing it in real time, not knowing the story. But I can see how other people would have been constantly comparing the documentary to this, stuff like that. I thought just as an eight-episode true crime show, I thought it was way, way up there. What did you think?
Starting point is 00:02:59 I'm wondering at this point if you, Bill, make a distinction between what's an HBO show and what's an HBO Max show? because it surprised me that this was on Max versus like the Time Traveler's wife, which was on HBO sort of proper, I would have flipped the two if it were me making the programming. I don't know if they're experimenting. But anyway, very prestigious, very good.
Starting point is 00:03:19 Colin Firth, incredible. Tony Colette, always good. Julie Benosh, just a really stacked cast, obviously. But I also liked what it was doing with the ambiguity of the case. Like, it's not trying to tell us exactly. what happened. It's trying to do something else, which I think made it stand apart from, there's a bunch of true crime shows out right now, right under the Parenthood of Heaven, candy, the truth about Pam, that Renee Zellwerger show, you know, and this is trying to do
Starting point is 00:03:50 a step beyond trying to tell the story. Do you know what I mean? Yeah, higher level version. That's an interesting HBO Max HBO point you made, because I thought the same thing. This was the first time I was actually confused by the two brands. Because to me, this is just a classic textbook Sunday night HBO show. This is no different than The Undoing with Nicole Kidman or the Kate Winslet show, whatever. Yeah. It just felt like such a Sunday night 9 o'clock show. And I think maybe they needed to put at least, I don't know, two or three kind of HBO caliber, HBO Mac shows.
Starting point is 00:04:29 But I'm with you, man. Especially it's not like HBO has like a slew of programming. right now. They have Barry, obviously, but they're a little in between. They don't have a show like this right now. Yeah, they're a little light right now. And the other question is something like Hacks, which was an HBO Mac show in its first season, but like won a ton of Emmys and is one of the highest regarded comedies. And they kept it on HBO Max rather than moving it, which to me says they don't see the brands maybe as distinct as I sort of thought they were. And also, most people probably watch all of this stuff on HBO Mac. And so they can't even tell what is an HBO show and what is an HBO Mac show. Do you know what I mean? I think the average person at home doesn't make that distinction. Yeah, I think in 2022 as we're heading toward this summer, some of the streamers have kind of come in with, all right, here's our strategy.
Starting point is 00:05:23 But it was the strategy from 2019 or 2020. We haven't seen a lot of evolution with how we watch stuff. Like you think about HBO Max, I think the stats for Euphoria. what was it, like 80% of the audience was on HBO Max instead of HBO. And to me, I think they've established HBO Max so well at this point that a show like this actually could have been elevated even more on HBO. I didn't start watching it initially because I was like, oh, it's an HBO Max show. It's another true crime thing.
Starting point is 00:05:50 And then people anecdotally in my life were like, you got to watch the staircase. It's amazing. My mom who hates just about everything unless it's subtitled. She's like such a prestige snob at this point. You got to watch a show that's set in France. but this one, she's like, this show's great. So I gave it a chance, but I think that HBO-H-B-O-H-B-O-Max, I wonder how it's going to play out going forward.
Starting point is 00:06:11 Because to me, it should just be on both if it's great. Yeah, maybe they're just trying to further blur the distinction between the two so that eventually, I mean, I think all of these brands, if you think about like Disney's programming, all these brands are pushing all, you know, towards the future, which they see is just streaming, that everyone will be on streaming and cable will not exist anymore. and fewer people go to the movie theater, et cetera. So I'm wondering if it was like Juliet Benosh that got your mom into this.
Starting point is 00:06:40 She's like, there's a French actress in this. I got to watch it. That might have been. Yeah, you know, you made the key point before about all the true crime stuff. It's a legitimate glut, but a lot of this stuff is really well done. And I think just from a fan viewer's standpoint, it's just tough to spend week after week with like, somebody died in the house. what happened.
Starting point is 00:07:03 Oops, somebody's hiding a secret. So you really have to pick and choose. Like, I didn't watch Candy, the Jessica Beale show. Yeah. I heard it's good. I'm just, I kind of chose the staircase. And some people do this with the podcast, too, right? That since serial eight, nine years ago, they're just like, this is what I love, true
Starting point is 00:07:21 crime. My dad loves spy novels. It's like been a running joke in our family for 30 years, like the books with the red cover. Some people are all in or some people are picky about it. I think I'm probably more picky. But this show had a lot of things that I like. I love when a secret emerges around episode three.
Starting point is 00:07:39 It's like, wait a second. What sights is, what sights is this Mike Peterson going to? And I thought the best thing about this show compared to some of the other true crime ones, they really did a good job of establishing Tony Colette's character, the relationship that they had, and really making her seem like a full person instead of somebody who just got murdered. Yeah. No, I'm with you. I don't have like huge.
Starting point is 00:08:02 appetite for true crime. I'm not like a, I don't have 20 podcasts in my queue that are all like about dead girls and women. But, but, um, when it's done really well and when it has something extra to say, I also got into the show a little late, like I think around six episodes had aired by the time I caught up, you know, towards the end. Yeah, but I think, I think was episode six, the owl episode? Honestly, I think that's what like got a lot of people like buzzing the owl theory, which is one of the wildest aspects of the staircase. And I think that's when a lot of people were like, no, you have to watch this show. They went all in on the owl theory.
Starting point is 00:08:38 And if you are an owl theory, a truther, what's really fun is if you watch the show, there's like owls hooting in the background throughout the whole season. But I think that the decision they made to show her dying multiple times, the first time they showed is really brutal, episode two. And then they show it again. and then they show it again. And I think they're trying to make some sort of point about how we're desensitized to how many of these grizzly murders
Starting point is 00:09:11 that we treat us sort of like games or puzzles for ourselves to solve, who done it? And I like that the end of this show is not, that's not the point. The point isn't whodunit. There's this creepy shot of Colin Furst's face at the very end of the series. But like it's about how you can. can't know what happened. Do you know what I mean?
Starting point is 00:09:34 I thought the showing multiple versions of the murder in the most elaborate way possible was really interesting. I'm not sure I've seen that before in a show like this, right? I don't think so. Here's theory A and they really go into it. I'm with you, man, the owl theory. I was watching with my wife. We banged out seven on a Friday night and a Saturday morning.
Starting point is 00:09:58 It was just like one of it. It was like four on a Friday night. It was there was finally no basketball or sports on and then woke up the next morning and did the other three. And the owl thing, I think that was when we were like, oh, the show, wow, this is good. I might be an owl truther. I could be talked into it. I don't know. Are there meetings?
Starting point is 00:10:17 Is there literature? What's going on? The staircase Reddit board, which has been thriving and active, I think, for over a decade, is like full of owl truthers. I've got a really good friend who's an owl truther. And I love that. I was reading an interview with the. actual woman that Julia Benoche plays, she's still an owl truther. That woman is still all in on the owl theory. She's like, it's the only thing that explains everything. I was like,
Starting point is 00:10:42 okay. It's pretty good. So I feel like, yeah, I just contradict myself constantly in sports and culture. But the fact that this was being trickled out once a week, I think is great for the kind of prestige culture we talk about where you have a week to do the theories and all that stuff. At the same time, my wife and I watched seven episodes in like 18 hours, and it was enjoyable to watch it that way, too. So I think, I wish I had watched it week to week because I would have, the Reddit culture and all that stuff, I would have been all in trying to figure it out. But it was also really fun to binge, which makes it a pretty rare show. Also the acting, I mean, you just go the top three people in this. First grade, Tony Clitt's great.
Starting point is 00:11:26 Juliet Benosch, especially in the last episodes, which I thought was a pretty uneven last episode for the most part. But I thought she was spectacular in the show. And then all the kids were really good, too, even Patrick Schwarzenegger, who knew? I was going to say, I was like, Patrick Schwarzenegger, you were way too handsome and privileged to actually be talented, but he is really good in the show. Dain DeHaan, who I like don't always connect with. I thought was really, really good. Sophie Turner doing her best stuff since Thrones, you know? So I, yeah, I, I, I thought it was extremely well cast. Parker Posey, like deep in the bench, you get a player like Parker Posey doing like a really fun wild accent sketch of a character. Yeah, incredibly cast. Did you know something that sort of blew my mind is that before Colin Firth signed on, Harrison Ford was supposed to play Michael Peterson? Man, I had trouble. That doesn't work at all, right? Yeah, it doesn't. I especially him at this stage of his career. I just don't think he's a good enough actor at this point. He's pretty old.
Starting point is 00:12:26 He's 45 years of smoking pot. He's a little out of it. I don't know. I mean, it's rare to see him, like, it's rare to watch a Ford performance where you feel like he really cares anymore. Occasionally you're like, oh, he seems awake. And then most of the time he seems like he just showed up and he's like, hi, I'm here, I'm Harrison Ford. And you can't have that for this role. I think what First is doing, because Michael Pearson, I mean, here's the wild thing about this case.
Starting point is 00:12:54 Whether or not he did it. that guy is a terrible human being. And so Colin Firth having to sell us on both that guy being a terrible human being and him being charming enough to snow all these women and keep his kids loyal to him despite being absolutely awful to them. Like he had to walk that line. The Colin Firth sort of established charm that exists from, you know, being Mr. Darcy or whatever, helps.
Starting point is 00:13:22 But I don't see for doing what Firth was able to accomplish there. I totally agree. So Colin Firth. Yeah. Like what are your like top three or four Colin Firth things? Because he's one of those, he's like one of those athletes
Starting point is 00:13:35 who's been around for a while. Yeah. He's been really good in some stuff. But I don't think he gets mentioned with the best actors. Like in sports, he would be one of the guys who just falls through the cracks.
Starting point is 00:13:47 And then we're like, oh, and that guy's good too, but you kind of forget to mention him as one of the best guys. But I do feel like he's just an excellent actor who's had some great. moments, but I was constantly during this eight episodes just been like, man, this guy's really good.
Starting point is 00:14:03 This is a high level performance. But what are your favorite column first performances? I think my favorite is a single man, which is the movie he did before, like the year before he won the Oscar for the King's Speech. And I think the King's speech is fine, but I think a single man is the, like, I feel like it was one of those Oscars where everyone was like, well, he should have won last year. So let's just give it to him this year, you know. So those are really good.
Starting point is 00:14:27 I really liked also, this is dating me, but like in the English patient and also in Shakespeare in Love, like he comes out of playing Mr. Darcy, this like famous romantic hero. And then he plays these like petty, shitty, awful people in in those movies. Not really, to me, should that he wasn't going to just rest on being, you know, Mr. Darcy forever for the rest of his life. So I think he's made some interesting choices. But I agree that people don't always think of him. And I think this is the most nuanced thing he's done where he sort of put together both of those things, where he can be like the shitty shitty, shitty asshole.
Starting point is 00:15:08 And he can be the sexually dynamic, attractive, leading man. And he smashed them together for this to portray this really baffling human being in the staircase. How about you? Do you have top column fourth performances? Well, I was looking at an IMDB. and they have the known for, which is always key during the rewatchables when I'm looking up that guys.
Starting point is 00:15:28 Yeah, yeah, yeah. You're like, what is that guy from? And the known for is always so helpful. Yeah. So, Colin first, known fours, there's four. It's a single band, the King's Speech, Kingsman, and Bridget Jones's diary. Of course, Kingsman.
Starting point is 00:15:43 Those are the known four. Yeah. I mean, he's great in Bridget Jones diary. But that kind of sums up the career, right? Yeah. He's in Bridget Jones's diary and the King's speech. and then this weird staircase thing. It's interesting though with Bridget Jones's diary,
Starting point is 00:15:58 this could have easily been a Hugh Grant, kind of the stage Hugh Grant is at his career role. But I think one of the frustrating things about Hugh Grant over the last 30 years is he was never able dramatically to go to that last level that people like Colin Firth and Tony Collider at. He was good. Like he was fine in the Nicole Kidman show.
Starting point is 00:16:17 He's good, but he's not, I don't think he could have pulled off a role like this. No, but I think it's, It's close to what he was trying to do in the undoing. And that show, I just didn't think had anything for him. No. But I think to your point, I think Tony Col. So there's three Oscar winners, two Oscar winners in this cast, right?
Starting point is 00:16:37 Julia Finoche and Colin Firth. And it's wild to me that Tony Collette is not an Oscar winner. She's never turned in a bad performance. And she's never turned in a performance where she wasn't at 100%, if not higher, you know? And so the, you know, Justice for Tony, like get Tony her Oscar is a forefront of my mind. But I think she's extraordinary. And I think the room that this show has for her character, giving us this full scope of this woman who is just like at the end of her rope, no matter what happened that she fell down the staircase.
Starting point is 00:17:15 Whether or not he pushed her or not, he like pushed her into the breaking point in terms of all of their domestic. ongoing's doings. So good. She's incredible in this. Do you know what her only Oscar nomination is? The answer surprised me because I just looked at. Is it a Sixth Sense? It is. Supporting actress Sixth Sense. So her known for us on IMDB are the Sixth Sense about a boy hereditary in Little Miss Sunshine.
Starting point is 00:17:45 Oh, not Muriel's wedding? Come on. No. Little Miss Sunshine, I think, is if we've been, we've been circling her for the rewatchables for a while. She's fantastic in that. I also think I just watched Hereditary. Don't judge us, but my whole family's big horror movie. We just rewatched it.
Starting point is 00:18:03 She's incredible in Hereditary. And I don't even think she didn't get nominated for anything for that movie, but she's kind of the one that makes that movie work. So she's another one. If we're talking like athletes, she's like the underrated one under the radar. She never gets mentioned with like in that Kate Winslet group or whatever, but she's done a lot of good work. I feel like whenever it will be her year, it'll be sort of like when Laura Dern won or something like that, where it was like, why hasn't this happened yet?
Starting point is 00:18:31 Right. It's ridiculous that this person doesn't have an Oscar, give them the Oscar. And I remember the year that Hereditary came out and she is, I don't, why would I judge you for watching Hereditary with your family an incredible, incredible movie? But I remember there was a huge, there was a huge push for her to get at least nominated for Hereditary, which she carries entire. on her back. And yeah. So she's got a good true crime face too. Where it could be, it's pleasant, but then it can really go.
Starting point is 00:19:02 It's like a good true crime horror face. When things go wrong, she looks like she's completely traumatized. Yeah, her eyes kind of like pop out. Yeah. There's one moment in the finale when she's talking to her sister on the phone. And she's like, we should just go away somewhere. Let's just leave. And her sister's like, are you kidding?
Starting point is 00:19:20 What is this a joke? And there was this moment that Tony Colette showed like 90 emotions on her face and finally went, yeah, of course, I'm kidding. And I rewound it to watch it again because exactly what you're saying. Her face can just transform from like Placid to, you know, trauma mask, you know, in the span of a second. Yeah, she's incredible. Yeah, I little Miss Sunshine. It's still probably my favorite.
Starting point is 00:19:43 I probably have a hereditary too. Then this one really good. The other one who's in this who didn't have the career I wanted her to have is Rose marina de Witt. I didn't recognize her at first. Yeah. I mean, she's, you know, Rachel getting married was almost 15 years ago at this point. But she, I don't know what, sometimes people just don't get the right roles or, you know,
Starting point is 00:20:04 they have a moment and it just doesn't totally happen. And now she's settled into basically character actress. But I was thought she was really good. She's great in this too. And then Sophie Turner, you mentioned her, yet again with another fucked up dad relationship. right? She's watch your dad get beheaded on Thrones. And now she's got a dad as a serial as a murderer on this one.
Starting point is 00:20:26 But I thought she was good too. Yeah, yeah. I think, and, you know, her American accent is getting better and better. Maybe living with Joe Jonas is helping her with that. But I thought her American accent was seamless where it's not always been in the past. And yeah, I thought she was great. These poor kids, these poor Peterson kids and everything that they endure and their very weird family and the fact that a whole entire other mom fell down the stairs and died is, you know,
Starting point is 00:20:54 second to the owl theory, the wildest thing that comes out of this whole story. Rosemary DeWitt, I think it was just a matter of like the makeup and wig and everything that they put her in where she was transformed completely into this type, this person, this woman I definitely know. And especially when she shows up the end with these like chunky, chunky, like, highlights on her hair, and she does this like double read of this really impassioned letter at the trial. And yeah, she's fantastic, deserves more. She's like an indie movie queen.
Starting point is 00:21:28 You know, she's like a Duplas brother queen. But she deserves more. You're absolutely right. Yeah, she's like a Duplas brother is having a premature ejaculation problem. And they have to talk about it for seven minutes. She's like a lot of those kind of movies. Exactly. The Julia Binoche piece, which if you're going to make the case that Peterson killed his wife, the lying.
Starting point is 00:21:54 And basically he ropes her in and seduces her to help but obviously never really cared about her. I guess it would be the takeaway. Or the moment he got out realized it wasn't when he thought, who knows. But what they did in episode eight, which I thought was a pretty uneven episode for the most part. But it made me more convinced that he probably killed his wife because. The way he was just callously able to shut off the faucet on Julia Benoche's character, I thought was pretty alarming. And the way he treats his kids when he gets out, et cetera, like there's no gratitude or
Starting point is 00:22:27 all of branches and using his kids as an excuse to not go to Paris. And she's like, what are you talking about? Yeah. I think that I was convinced from the beginning that he did it because it's almost always, like you have to really work hard to tell me it's not the husband or the boyfriend because that's almost always the case of who. The owl. The owl is the only way he didn't do it.
Starting point is 00:22:46 There's no other scenario. He should be out there like the strongest advocate for the owl case. But I think that I completely agree. Do you ever, when you're watching something like this, do you ever spoil yourself by reading Wikipedia pages? I don't. Okay. I don't. I try to, especially something like this where I didn't know anything.
Starting point is 00:23:02 I remember there was a documentary. I remembered being surprised that they were doing the TV show after basically two different documentaries where it's like, wow, they're going back to this. Yeah. But I also avoided it as much as I could. I think that was the right move. I think it was. I spoiled myself on just between seven and eight on whether or not he was still with her was something I was interested in.
Starting point is 00:23:27 And when I found out that he dumped her and like didn't go to Paris with her and she spent, what, a decade over a decade of her life, however long doing everything for him, giving up her life for him. I was like, this guy is an absolute monster. Well, it also taps into a theme that's been in some of these shows that I am always fascinated by. The woman who becomes obsessed with the case and falls in love with the guy, I think is one of the all-time weird ways to fall in love. It might even be number one. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:23:59 It's like, this guy's, there's got to be some danger element that's part of the attraction. Or like, I can save him. Yeah, it's like combination savior, but also I might. get also murdered by this guy? Like, I don't, I don't fully understand it. What's less attractive than somebody who's in jail? Right. Well, maybe they can focus all their attention on you because they don't have much else going on.
Starting point is 00:24:25 I don't know. Yeah. I could have used more of that. I'm not for it. I'm not saying you should. More of the jail stuff. No, more of the, I thought it was a little flimsy how she fell for him, how they kind of reenacted that.
Starting point is 00:24:38 All of a sudden, she was all in on them. And I never saw the one scene that made me think, oh, that was the scene when something clicked. I think a big question for something like this. And I think you and I talked about this a little bit on respective prestige shows about the Silicon Valley influencer boom shows that we were talking about. It's like, what is your responsibility to tell in something like this where you're trying to make it exciting and dramatic? What is your responsibility to be accurate and how much poetic licensor are you allowed to take? there's like a disclaimer at the end of every episode of The Staircase where it's like, this is a fictionalized version of our true story, et cetera.
Starting point is 00:25:14 We're not trying to tell you exactly the truth. And the main pushback I've seen from the real life people who were involved, who were depicted in the show, are from the documentarians who were like, listen. She's like, this woman, Sophie, is like, listen, I didn't fall in love. I'd never talked to him before until I was done with the documentary. She's like, so I didn't cut the documentary in a certain way because I was in love with him. I didn't meet him until afterwards. And similarly, the documentary director is like, I never asked him to do another, like, the old William Hurt do another take, but more emotional sort of thing.
Starting point is 00:25:52 Like, he's like, I never did that. I never did that. Whether or not there, so they feel like this movie, this series is throwing their documentary under the bus a little bit in terms of questioning its adherence to the truth or its bias. But I don't know. Do you have any thoughts or feelings about how much poetic license something like this is allowed to take? Well, I thought it was just class. HBO is on a great run with this when they need real life stuff to drum up more PR and interest in the show. And it was like between episode seven and eight, all of a sudden Michael Peterson comes off the top rope.
Starting point is 00:26:30 The documentary people, they get pissed. And it was a two-day news cycle about what was accurate and not. accurate at the show. All that does is help HBO. I mean, all the winning time stuff, when Jerry West flipped out about winning time, that was the greatest thing that ever could happen at winning time. So, yeah, look, it was tougher for me with winning time just because the way they bastard asked some of the facts, I just didn't get it. They didn't, it was stuff they just didn't need to do. Whereas on this show, you know, there was so much ambiguity. What are you going to do? Like, you can't obey the facts because in some of these
Starting point is 00:27:07 cases, we don't know what the facts are. So I thought they, I thought they landed the plane really well in that stuff. I thought the last episode, the biggest questions I had were just why the family was so loyal to this guy who killed this person they loved, almost definitely. And, you know, like Patrick Schwarzenegger's character, like him, him vlogging it, like he's becoming a celebrity from it. I just felt like there should have been more shame and horror within the family than there was. But maybe this is how it played out, I don't know. Other than like we can't get our own reservation at our favorite restaurant, which is like, that was like, that was so weird that they would have even thought that, oh, let's pick up like
Starting point is 00:27:46 where we left off before. But maybe that's what actually happened. I don't know. Todd Peterson, by the way, Patrick Spersonator's character is still vlogging and still saying very spicy stuff about his dad. If you want to check that out, anyone listening. But yikes. Big yikes.
Starting point is 00:28:00 But I think what's interesting, what I'm frustrated about in the final episode is that I don't feel like I got the story of why all the kids were at the trial in 2011, but not at the trial in 2017. What happened in those six years other than that one disastrous dinner that we watch, what happened in those six years where these kids who were so loyal to him for so long are like, dad's too hard to be around. Let's just not worry about it. I want to know about that. That's where I went diving after I watched the finale. I was like, do all the kids hate him now? And if all the kids hate him now that makes me even more sure that he did it. Like,
Starting point is 00:28:35 because his kid's loyalty was one of the best arguments for his innocence. Right. Yeah. That's, yeah, I mean, the 2011, they were so all in.
Starting point is 00:28:44 Yeah. That was the part I couldn't totally figure out. And, you know, eight episodes. I certainly didn't want longer episodes. But I think if you're going to do eight plus hours of content, I thought they could have explored that stretch.
Starting point is 00:28:57 Yeah. That whatever led to people being a little more horrified. by him. I mean, maybe it was the horrible way that he dumped this woman who his kids, like, seemed to have a relationship with. But again, I'm just, I don't know, I'm making stuff up. Maybe that's the sequel, the staircase, too. If they could have like two to three parts of the documentary, uh, why, but I, no,
Starting point is 00:29:18 I don't want to spend any more time with Michael Peterson, to be honest with you. I think I've had my fill of that guy. I'm done. My, my worst thought watching this was like, if I committed a murder, how loyal would my kids be to me? Like, if I was accused. How loyal do you think? Would my kids go to the trial?
Starting point is 00:29:31 I feel like my son probably wouldn't go. He'd be like, Dad, I can't make it again today. But your daughter's there. I think my daughter would be there. I don't know about my son. I don't know how loyal he would have been. My daughter probably would have been vlogging about it, doing a whole bunch of things.
Starting point is 00:29:46 Yeah, this was a really good show. This, I think we can say this show won the true crime wars of 2022, at least so far. It did because under the banner started really strong, but I don't think it stuck the landing at all. I think that show fell apart at the end, whereas I think this, despite what your good points about the finale, I think the, like, sticking to the ambiguity made the ending more interesting than any of the other show where they're just like, and this is how it was done, the end. Do you know?
Starting point is 00:30:13 Agree. Under the banner, I just think anecdotally, it didn't seem like it was relevant at all. Didn't seem to catch the way, definitely that the way that they wanted it to. Candy. Anecdotally, I don't know one person is watching it. Yeah. the truth about Pam negative. That show was bad.
Starting point is 00:30:33 Very bad. I actually wanted to watch it. I just thought that was a bad show. So this show won the True Crime Wars of 2022. And then I think it seems like the dropout won the... Yeah. Silicon Valley Wars. The Silicon Valley Wars.
Starting point is 00:30:48 Although I liked all three shows, and I'm personally, I really miss the week crashed. I really miss Charlottad O'Don Heathway. I think about them a lot. You're like, Those are the true America sweethearts. Are you going to run America Sweethearts from Blockbuster, you and your wife, to sort of cap off this staircase experience? I think if one of us was watching that, I think the other would be side-eyeing them looking a little suspicious. What's going on?
Starting point is 00:31:12 What do you try to tell me with America's Smears? Is someone getting murdered tonight? What's happening? So what do we have for prestige the rest of the way? Because this feed's about to get a lot more boring. Barry's going to end. Better Call Saul is wrapping up this summer. Boring.
Starting point is 00:31:27 How dare you? Westworld. Westworld. Come on. Westworld. That's right. You and Shoemaker and Heifitz. When does that start? Two to three weeks from now. Yeah. Okay. What else do we have? Is there anything on your radar? On my radar this summer. I mean, I'm drowning in Ringerverse content this summer. So I don't know about prestige. I know you guys are getting annihilated on the Ring ofverse. Marvel movies, Star Wars, Stranger Things. This is unbelievable. It's a lot of stuff.
Starting point is 00:31:54 But Stranger Things, apparently it's like two, two and a half hour episodes. Yeah. Like two basically movie. dropping in July and Saul wrapping up in July. Yeah, July and June. Yeah. And then HBO, I don't know what their big summer show is. What is it? I don't know what they're doing between now and House of the Dragon,
Starting point is 00:32:16 but House of the Dragon is obviously what's coming in like a wrecking ball in August. Well, we might do a couple Hall of Fame episodes on the Prestige TV. So be ready. Be on duty. This podcast was produced by our guy Kerm, Jonathan Kerma, working on a Saturday. On his way to a potluck. On his way out. On his way to a potluck stuck around for us.
Starting point is 00:32:40 Stay tuned for Barry tomorrow with Sean Fantasy and Bill Hader. And you can listen to Joanna on House of Our. What's your other podcast called? I always forget the title. Oh, trial by content. Trial by content. I always think of it as Joanna and friends. Yeah, fair enough.
Starting point is 00:32:55 But yeah, so you can hear on that and you can listen to me. on the BS podcast because we have a lot of Celtics games coming this week. Joanna, good to see you as always. Good to see you. Watch out for the owls.

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