The Prestige TV Podcast - 'The Undoing' Exit Survey

Episode Date: December 2, 2020

Chris Ryan and Amanda Dobbins try to answer some remaining questions they have about 'The Undoing' finale. Hosts: Chris Ryan and Amanda Dobbins Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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only on Netflix May 8th. Hello and welcome to TV concierge. My name is Chris Ryan. I'm an editor at the ringer.com and I'm joined by another editor athringer.com and my friend, Amanda Davins. Hello, Christopher. And today Amanda and I are going to be conducting the exit survey for the one and I think only season of HBO's The Undoing, which wrapped up on Sunday.

So we're releasing this on Wednesday, a couple days to marinate in what we learned. Amanda, before we get to what we learned and what we thought of the show, I just thought we could just chat a little bit about our relationship to the undoing so people know where we're coming from. I quickly, you know, really got into this show when it came on. I think that it was like perfectly timed, both in the long tale of like being at home and just needing stuff to entertain us. I just was really craving a show like this, just a straight up mystery. You and I both love a pulpy, like talky mystery like this. How did you feel about the show like over the course of the six week run that had? So unlike you, I didn't have screeners. So I joined the

show a little bit late, as I think many people did. It was sort of a slow burn because it was week to week on HBO. But I found myself having that very rare thing in 2020, which is like a traditional TV experience. And I can't think of any other show this year where both my husband and I on Sunday night would be like, okay, well, I guess we got to watch this show. So A, it's not spoiled. And B, so we can complain about it or ask really specific questions. But I, of it with everyone that we know. And that's what I did. I send you a lot of feedback after every episode that I watched. Some of it was, I'm mad at the undoing. Some of it was, here is my theory for this week. Some of it was just concerns about various characters' legal strategy, which I would

like to explore later. Definitely. But it felt it was nice. That to me, the Hugh Grant performance and just spending time with Hugh Grant, thank you, television, thank you HBO, thank you, Hugh Grant. But then also just that kind of traditional Sunday night water coolery-esque feel to it was the best part of the show for me. Yeah, I think it once it was way better than any business, it had any business being and way worse than it needed to be. And in some ways, it being worse than it needed to be made it more fun to watch. Yeah. You know, the first question that we have for our exit survey here is finish the sentence, the ending of the undoing was dot, dot, dot, dot. And I, I, I, I, I, keep thinking about this idea of it being a limited series not only in its run of episodes,

but the ending of the undoing was limited. It was limited in its scope. It was limited in its depth. It was limited in its rewards. But it wasn't, I didn't necessarily, I mean, the end was the end. But the show itself, I found really, like, quite fun to watch. I'm going to say something about the ending of the undoing. I'm going to finish that sentence differently. It was not as bad as it could have been. And I think that one of the many texts... Because he could have jumped. Well, no, I mean, honestly, I think I would have been open to that. I was okay. And in fact, really enjoyed Hugh Grant getting his 10 minutes of full sociopath or psychopath or whatever diagnosis you would like to give this person from your couch, which you were allowed to do for TV characters only.

I thought he was hilarious in that. And he was clearly having so much fun. I mean, the best part was all of the interviews that he gave throughout. Shout out to the watch. But also after the show when he was just gleeful. Like, he was like, ha, ha, ha. I did it. I wanted to do it. I asked if I could be more guilty than I already was. So I was into that. There was also just a long list of answers that I was not going to accept.

And I was going to like write David E. Kelly and personally ask for my money back, even though I don't even know how much money I'm paying for HBO at this point. But like if it was the kid, absolutely not. If it was out of nowhere, one of the five underdeveloped characters, absolutely not. I was going to be very mad. For you, it had to be Gracer, Jonathan. Yes. And I will say that the kind of the Jonathan fake out in terms of the amount of time I invested in show, the show was not the most satisfying. As you said, it like, it didn't, it was a limited series, but I also think it didn't really have enough to fill those six hours that it gave us. But at least that wasn't out of nowhere. You know what I mean? It didn't answer all my questions, but I could at least be like, okay, well, I guess you got me. I guess I got God. Yeah, I mean, I was a big proponent of the Henry theory early on. I just felt like that kid kept showing up places. And this is our second question is basically what wild theory about the murder do you still choose to believe?

Susanna Beyer and David E. Kelly knew what they were doing here. I'm sure Susanna Beyer was like, I'm doing this so I can have these diffuse shots of Central Park and like long, long shots of Nicole Kibman strolling through New York City with a purple coat. but they knew that they were throwing scents everywhere. And it was very much like the way Broadchurch worked in the first season where essentially every episode of Broadchurch, you would get to the end of an episode and be like, definitely the guy who works at the store, definitely him,

or definitely the dad, or definitely the mom or maybe even her partner. And he would just keep going until obviously it just sort of ended with the more, I can't remember, the Broadchurch ending, I think, is quite sad. The undoing one is just the most obvious Occam's Razor one. I was really in supportive team Henry. I feel like they did a good job casting that kid

and did a nice job having him show up places where he wasn't expected, seemingly quiet, creeping up on his mom and being like, Mom, what are you doing? Mom, what are you doing? And they kept having Grace say, Henry, you're scaring me. So when they brought out the hammer

in the violin case at the end of episode five, I was like, it peaked too early. My Henry stock collapsed because I felt like that's got to be the last. last half hour twist, not the hour and a half left to go. Yeah. So I think they did a good job throwing the scent at Henry.

And they gave you a lot of fodder, which we always appreciate. We appreciate fodder in the podcast world and just in life. Lord knows we need it. But so I was okay with it up to the point that it was actually him. And if it had actually been the kid, I would have been very angry just because that is like an unsat-that is unsatisfying. That's just sad. It was this kid who didn't understand what's going on. A mildly nauseating way to spend six weeks.

Yes, exactly. And I feel like I read enough mystery novels and crime novels and Gone Girl Spenoffs and Tana Frenches that it often is the kid. And it being a kid or a psychopath are two of my least favorite solutions because they don't reveal anything about the time that you just spent, right? Yeah. So this technically was a psychopath solution, but it was all also a solution about how you watch the show and getting tricked. So I was less angry about it. But can we go back to wild theories for a second? I'm not willing to accept that Nicole Kidman didn't have something to do with this.

I'm just unwilling to accept it. We didn't. It was not answered for me. That's where all the loose ends are. Yes. Her propensity for like these fug state blackouts, this flash that she keeps having of Elena and of being painted or whatever, like, that exchange was in the women's locker room

of her athletic club and the moments that they share at the auction early on in the season. But they definitely put the most amount of ambiguity around like what Grace's POV is and what her experience of like the story is. Sure, a few more things. She's just walking literally by the scene of the crime at the time of the crime.

I got absolutely no resolution for that. Number two, Nicole Kidman taking this role to do what? Look confused outside of Central Park or in Central Park as opposed to like Monterey for six episodes. Still don't understand that. It's nice work if you can get it. Sure, but Nicole Kidman, you're an Oscar winner. You can demand slightly more than just being like, I don't know what's going on. Whatever.

Number three, Grace, the character, not hiring a lawyer. Like, I'm still outraged. That makes absolutely no sense within the world of like law and order, which this, as you have said before, this is basically like a six episode version of. Or number two, the Upper East Side. They're so rich. And at no point when she is being interviewed by police officers in her lobby and in her father's lobby is she like, maybe I should have a lawyer.

What gives? That's not realistic. I don't know. I do want to shout out one last theory. It comes via Ben Dietrich who writes. for the Ringer occasionally and has a great podcast called Cookie's Hoops. And his theory was that Sylvie was, in fact, Grace's murderous alter ego. And I have to say, if you think about it in those terms, there are only like two or three

scenes where Sylvie is definitely there. Now, Lily Raib is in the show a lot. But there are only like two or three scenes where she interacts with really anyone other than Grace. and like there's other actually no reason Lily Raib's day rate must have been outstanding because she answers four phone calls, shows a bit reared in like 10 times, and that's it, that's it for her. Right. I feel like that theory works beautifully until the last episode.

Yes. And then, and then, of course, she plays a pivotal role. But that brings up some unanswered questions, which is the next one on this exit survey. Number one, Lily Rape, what you doing? Yep. Number two, Donald Sutherland, what you doing? Number three, Edgar Ramirez, what you doing?

Like, what are all of these people doing? Yeah. What were they told? Like, like, we've got a great part for you. You will just accost people in the lobbies of Upper East Side Buildings for two episodes and then disappear. You were in Carlos, bro. Like, you can't, like, could you not get, like, one scene that goes into who your character is? I think Donald Sutherland is excellent in this show.

And I have absolutely no idea what his character was supposed to. to do except like play the piano and chess and be funny. But if you're Donald Sutherland, shouldn't you want more to do? I, he's a little long in the tooth. If your job for an entire New York fall is just to hang out in a museum gallery, a beautiful, apparently real life apartment and do one scene in a helicopter, that's a pretty good gig. I thought that the most inexplicable subplot now in retrospect, and I think this would almost be a good other question here for the survey is what now is an inexplicable subplot, knowing what we know, is why spend so much time on Reardon? Like, I just felt there was just so much Reardon, internal Reardon politics and like

whether or not Donald Sutherland was going to continue to fund Reardon and how Henry was getting along at Reardon. And it had no bearing whatsoever on the story. That's true. And now that you mention it, wasn't Janelle Maloney, aka Donna from the West Wing? Yes, in one of the moms at Reardon for like two scenes, then goodbye forever, which was sad. I was glad to have Donna back in my life. I guess maybe at some point they had the, like, it's Henry Red Herring more fleshed out, and so you need to know more about this school. Right. I should mention in Mark Harris's interview with Hugh Grant that was in Vulture, Hugh Grant alluded to the idea that they had some alternative endings, basically, that they, I don't know if they fully shot anything else, but that, you know,

he signed on knowing that what he knew, but that at certain points, they were like, well, maybe it will, we'll split this way or that way, depending on how we're feeling about the things that are happening.

My big unanswered question is, is it like, this is more of just like a general question is, is just like the access the Frazier family has to America's skies and just like, I don't wonder about that. And my husband was like, no, they're rich,

it's fine. When you're rich, you can do whatever you want. And I was like, I don't really think you can go on like a police change. chase of your own. Like drafting the police chopper, listening in on the police band radio, spotting the Rangerover on its way wherever it was going. Right. Intercepting said car, scooping Henry and just leaving the crime scene. No statement needed. Yeah, that's right. And also,

Edgar Ramirez is there just being like, it's fine, it's fine. He can leave as long as he's safe. I just, that's not my understanding of how police work, the police work. No, not at all. Did you have any other unanswered questions from, I want to ask you this, this is, I think I shared one, is just the absolute late game collapse from Haley Fitzgerald. I think we all knew that Jonathan's defense lawyer kind of lost her fastball when Grace is just like, no, no, no, I'll testify. And she was like, yeah, that sounds good. That sounds great. She was like, we've got it. I might call the cop back, but like we've seated enough reasonable doubt. And then Grace is just like really glassy-eyed, like, I just want to do this.

Can I just get one more note related to this? I think that's a great point. I don't have anything add to the failed legal strategy. But what ultimately brings down the legal strategy is the confession of the mom to Nicole Kedman to Lily Rafe's character. Yes. And the way that they do this and the one specific line that is repeated, which is, this is not a direct quote,

but something to the effect of, you're telling me that he showed no guilt or empathy. And then like that's, the mother says that to Nicole Kidman, and Nicole Kidman repeats it back to her. Then Nicole Kinman calls Lily Raid. And she is like, his mother said that he's incapable of suffering or empathy.

And Lily Raim is like, let me get this straight. She said that he was incapable of suffering or empathy. And then the prosecutor says the exact same, like pop psychologist line against. Again, tremendously bad writing that made me laugh a lot. I get what happened and I get that they do explain that because Grace was the defense witness, the defense could not ask for a mistrial.

It doesn't feel ethical that Lily Rape could like slide that info to the prosecutor. And the prosecutor could just be like, word on the street around Reardon is that your mom says you're a sociopath. They said it had something to do with waiving spousal privilege. I guess so, yeah. But Nicole Kidman would have to know that, which would suggest that at some point she consulted a lawyer. And Chris, I know that she did not consult a lawyer. I guess Sylvie Steinitz is her shadow lawyer. I guess so, but she calls Sylvie and is like, I need you to meet me in the park so I can

strategize how to, like, Nicole Kidman sets it in motion. Yes. But I guess they do have the first conversation about how he didn't show suffering or empathy or whatever. And perhaps Sylvie planted it. And then Nicole Kidman puts it in play. It's not like I wanted something else to happen. Everything that happens to Jonathan he deserves, especially once he puts the murder weapon in the fireplace of his summer home, when he apparently had all the time in the world to go do something else with it, including driving up to the lovely Lake George region in upstate New York. That brings us to our final question is one of the big,

twists in the show is when Grace goes to Jonathan's workplace early on in the season and finds out that he was in fact fired three months ago and that he had been separated and that there had been like this NDA signed and everything. NDA's aside, I find it like beyond belief that no one, there's just never gets back to Grace over the course of those three months that Jonathan no longer is a surgeon and that he is able to kind of like have this fake life where he's going to the hospital every day. But our exit survey question is, what do we think that Jonathan was doing every day that he had, you know, that he was unemployed for those three months in between getting fired and killing Elena? Right. So I don't know if this is an all day type of answer, but he's definitely sleeping

with Sylvie. That is like a, that's one of the only explanations. Yeah, that's implied. So, you know, that takes an hour or two, depending on how they're scheduling their days. You know, wandering the part. I guess he would be spotted. Do you think he has to go to other parts of Manhattan? I was going to say he can't go to the museums because you never know when Donald Sutherland's just going to be holding court there with a series of cops. My big hope is that did you ever hear

when you were a kid, did you ever sing that song Charlie in the MTA? If he sings at the end or is this a different weird song? This is a song about a guy in Boston who apparently like when this song was written you had to pay to get on the train or you had to also pay to get off. if you didn't have the fare, you couldn't get off the train.

So Charlie gets on the MTA and just goes in a loop around Boston and never gets off the train because he does. And his wife keeps bringing him lunch, but not money to get off the train. I can't remember the lyrics of the song. My hope is that Jonathan just rode the subways for months. And that that just because I like the idea of Hugh Grant just being on the F one day. On the F train. I do like the subway idea.

Also, possibly instead of staying on it forever, he just takes it to Brooklyn and lives his own Hugh Grant, Brooklyn life where no one from the Upper East Side would ever go even in 2020. And he's just like, you know, hanging out in Williamsburg, doing whatever they do, checking out some live music, and then going home at the end of the day after living his Brooklyn life. My last question is a little bit off menu, but I still want to ask it because I've already seen a little bit of a drumbeat for this.

And Nicole Kibman, you just can't put her in a limited series. People want them too bad. Is there any world in which there is an undoing season two? You can't count it out because we saw a Big Little Eyes season two, even though they didn't need to do that. And they even left season three door open, which please, you know, I was the world's number one, Big Little Eye season one fan.

Let's not. I don't want this. Do you want this? No. I guess I would be open to... My whole thing is like they should do more true detective style stuff where they basically take the vibe and premise of a show and just apply it to other cities,

other time periods, whatever. So I would be fine if they wanted to do the undoing Chicago or the undoing Houston or the undoing whatever. But don't do it with the same characters and be like, what's Jonathan like in prison? Right. I would almost flip it and say if they want to do different murder mysteries in the undoing milieu

and maybe actually reared in matter. again, that is just like really law and order upper east side, but also I would like be very happy to watch that. I think I just don't need to see the fallout of Nicole Kidman trying to rebuild her life after this like completely tragic thing. I mean, you know, my best to all of these fictional characters. Yes, my best day to Henry. Yeah. That they like find purpose and continue to like play chess. but I don't know that I need to spend the time doing that.

Yeah, that was what happened to big little lies too, is just you were like, oh, yeah, I think I was, I was done here. That's too bad. Yeah. Okay. Well, we can wrap it up there. Amanda, thank you so much for joining me. This has been TV concierge.

Tune in. We'll have another episode on Friday.