The Prestige TV Podcast - ‘Your Friends and Neighbors’ Episode 5: High Risk, No Reward

Episode Date: May 2, 2025

Jo and Rob visit a crazed art dealer to recap the fifth episode of ‘Your Friends and Neighbors.’ (0:00) Intro (6:52) The mystery dead body reveal (15:04) Coop and Elena’s increasingly close partnership (26:01) Following up on Rob’s NBA comp for Nick (28:39) Is the expansion of Barney’s plotline working? (40:08) The most interesting threads for the remainder of the season Email us! [e-mail] Subscribe to the Ringer TV YouTube channel here for full episodes of ‘The Prestige TV Podcast’ and so much more! Hosts: Joanna Robinson and Rob Mahoney Producers: Kai Grady and Donnie Beacham Jr. Additional Production Support: Justin Sayles Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Folks, it's Jay Kyle Mann from The Ringer, and as always, basketball is so freaking, freaking good. It's so good, in fact, that the Ringer's NBA draft show is finally back just in time for a ramp up to June. We've got you covered every week as we take an in-depth look at who's got next for the NBA's future. We'll talk to rising and falling stocks of the best and the brightest prospects in the 2025 NBA draft class. From Cooper Flag to Dylan Harper to BJ Edgecom and more. tap in with me on the Ringer NBA draft show every Wednesday and make sure that you follow, subscribe, and hit us with those five-star ratings. Want to support your gut health? Take Activia's gut health challenge by enjoying two Activia yogurt today for two weeks and see if you feel a difference. With billions of probiotics and 20 years of scientific expertise, Activia is one of the easiest and tastiest ways to start your gut health ritual.

Try Activia today. Enjoying Activia twice a day for two weeks as part of a balanced diet and healthy lifestyle may help reduce the frequency of my minor digestive discomfort, which includes gas, floating, rumbling, and abdominal discomfort. The playoffs are here, and you can predict the action all the way to the finals with Fandul predicts. Predict the spread, total points, and even the game winner. Sign up and get a $25 bonus. Offered by Fandul prediction markets LLC, a registered futures commission merchant. 18 plus.

Bonus is non-withdrawable and expires seven days after receipt. Trading derivatives involve significant risk and may not be suitable for all investors. Manage your activity with our consumer protection tool. Restrictions apply. See terms at vandul.com slash predict slash bonus dash offer dash herms. Hello and welcome to the Prestige TV podcast. I am Rob Mahoney. I'm Joanna Robinson.

And we're here to talk about episode five of your friends and neighbors. Not to be confused with your family and friends, Joe, because Ali is distinctly neither, we are told. Absolutely not. But you know what? You're both. How are you doing today, Joe? A friend and a neighbor or a family and a friend or all the above.

I think certainly a neighbor. within the Ringer universe. Certainly, what are me, you and Kai, if not podcast, family, and absolutely a friend. So all of the above.

Wow. What a thrill. What an honor. What a joy to be with you here on this Friday. I'm excited to talk about this episode of television with you,

specifically around Mahoney because it starts with an awful lot of Nick. And everything I know about Nick, I have learned from you. So I'm excited to get all of your your Nick takes as we head into this episode.

We're going to get to that. I have some revised opinions on who Nick is within the broader NBA ecosystem. We get some clarity, some swerves. I'm really mostly confused on that front, but we'll get to it in time. You and I were both on Bill's podcast this week, and you were talking about basketball. I was talking about your friends and neighbors, so worlds collide. But I like to think if you played our segment simultaneously,

I would like to think it would sound like we're talking to each other. Oh, that's so nice. I tried to get Bill to weigh in on who is Nick in the NBA, and he just like, freeze right past it. So I really tried to get a little bit more info on this, but I leave it up to you, the expert then. We're trying to do the work here.

But a lot going on, as you said, we're both on the Bill Simmons podcast today. Joe, what else is going on the Prestige TV podcast feed right now? Great question. You know, so we're covering The Last of Us, of course. Of course. With interviews,

there was a great interview with Gabriel Luna that Rob did this week on the podcast. I really suggest you check it out for all of your Tommy needs. And then also, Charles and Jody are covering the rehearsal. Yeah. And I know that chiefly because we get their emails as well as our own emails.

So I'm seeing all the rehearsal emails come pouring in. So you can email any of us. PrestigeTV at Spotify.com. We don't have a specific email for this particular show, but you can find us. Prestiastewitv at Spotify.com. We love your emails. Thank you so much for sending them. We certainly do.

And you know what? What I want to know, first of all, from all of the people emailing in this week and from you specifically, Joe. we're hitting all of the squares on the midlife crisis bingo card at this stage of this particular season. Which would be your method of choice? If you're really working some things out, if you're this wealthy and have these problems, are you jumping on the trampoline of Anwi? Are you at the bottom of a pool?

Maybe screaming, maybe just having a moment of angst. Are you setting shit on fire or are you getting into a physical altercation with a business partner? Oh, thank you so much for asking. I think I want to set something out. Here's the thing about Barney and that fire. Yeah. I was actually kind of excited about that because I was wondering if there was some sort of like insurance

he was going to collect. It kind of seemed like it. I thought he was trying to start a fire, but then it just turns out he was being a drunken asshole. And I was like, that's less impressive to be Marty. But I think the fire, if I have some insurance that I can collect on it. Yes. You can't set us up with money problems plus intention

fire and have us not jump to insurance fraud. I just think that's the natural setup of that scene. They gave Barney the classic like money pit shot when he's like standing over the pin. The camera's looking up at him and I was like Tom Hanks, is that you? Rob, what about you? Which of those are you trying? Oh, I'm definitely bottom of a swimming pool.

That seems, you know, you really got to scream some things out down there. You have a moment of absolute kind of silence slash the ambient noise of maybe like the pool cleaner working. That's where I want to be working out all of my deepest emotional baggage. Okay, I have two follow-up questions. Number one, what is pool culture like where you're from in Texas? Like, does that do people- Can you clarify? Yeah, well, like, I don't know if like, if you live in Texas, pools are more prevalent because it's so hot and then like people have like above-ground pools or whatever they can get in terms of like a water feature in their backyard. Yeah. Or if that's not the case, you know, we in California have to worry about droughts, but we also have

the California optics lifestyle to deal with. I do not have a pool, nor have I ever had a pool. My grandmother had a pool and she was like, never get a pool because it's a paid in the ass. It's quite a quagmire. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I think there is that. Like, you know, I grew up in North Texas, which was a huge booming suburban sprawl at the time when I was growing up there. And so everything was being built with a pool because of that excessive heat. And now I think there's a lot of regret about a lot of those pools because those houses are harder to move because, as you said, nobody actually wants to own a pool. You just want access to a pool that you then have to maintain. You just want a friend with a pool. My best friend growing up had a great pool.

And it's like, that's where you want the pool at your friend's house. Follow question, other question is, if you are battling your, you're not yet middle age, but you're soon, you know, like someday in the future middle age, unwee, what preferred needle drop is playing in your mind as you sit at the bottom of the pool potentially screaming or not? You know, I think for that moment, you got to go something extremely painfully on point, on the nose. Like an REM, everybody hurts. We're just, we're really going straight down the middle for it. There's no time, there's no space for anything like a little obtuse.

Do you have a take on this? I just feel like, I thought you were going to, when you were like, you have to go on the nose, I was like, should we just go straight to the Garden State soundtrack? Not that that's like midlife crisis, but like, I don't know, unweened. It doesn't help that Allie in this episode is basically turning into Natalie Portman from Garden State in real time. I many questions about what's happening with that character. Is it, well, that's so funny because I did write down Natalie Portman, but it was for Hunter's girlfriend, right? The manic pixies are about, you know?

She pulls the old, have you heard the shins maneuver with his headphones essentially? It certainly does. Yeah. But, you know, so we have manic pixie dream girls abound. We also have the revelation of what our dead body, who our dead body actually is, Joe. How did you feel about the. reveal of the much slash not really anticipated cold open payoff of who Coop found in cold blood and the fact that it was Sam's ex-husband to we can all agree sucks.

I like that it took me a little bit by surprise. Like I think I thought we were going to get that at the end of the season. So to get it mid-season, I think was a fun moment. And it wasn't until right before it happened that I realized where we were, you know. So I thought that was fun. And then it does it changes the show. oh, I think we all assumed that Coop was involved in the dead body, whether or not it was an accidental tussle on the stairs or whatever it was.

But he just discovered the body. So that's interesting. And then we have this fun, like, sort of desperate housewives wisteria lane mystery of, like, you know, who killed, you know, did he just tumble down the stairs? Was it Sam? Did Sam kill her husband? And that's why she's, you know, off to see her parents for a while. Like, what happened there?

And that's, you know, is, I don't have any other, did Elena do it on a, on a, like, post-cocaine binge? I have no idea. So I like a mystery. And so I'm glad to have a mystery sort of flunked in the middle of the air. I'm also glad to have a mystery. I mean, there's the mystery of what happened to him. There's the mystery of who may or may not have seen Coop coming or going as he makes quite a clamor, you know, coming out of the house falling into the pool, as we have now seen twice.

Yeah. So, yeah, I think there's a lot of things in play as far as how that could pay off. And I do appreciate it. You know, we're getting the escalating stakes of the theft hijinks. And for someone who, you know, Coop has been on the golf course, hearing his peers complain about their very expensive watches that have gone missing. And he is completely undeterred by the fact that anyone and everyone is noticing the things that he is stealing. And it's like, you know what?

I should steal paintings. And you called this, Rob. You were like, don't get into art theft. Don't do it. You said it and then Lou said it. And that's how I knew you were right, because I believe everything that. Luce is on this show. So, yeah, don't steal art.

It seems like a terrible idea, and it is a terrible idea. But we do get to see an old friend of the Prestige TV podcast, do we not, Rob? We certainly do. We get the introduction of this character, Christian Thomason, played by our good pal, Olofer Dari Olifson. A welcome presence on the show, Joe, and I have to say, I don't think this is exactly being telegraphed at this point when he's sort of like accosting Elena in the hall, and like, he's a very aggressive personality.

in general, feels like our big bad that is not just massive debt may have arrived in this season in terms of a physical corporeal foil that may present some danger to coupe. That's interesting. So you think he's not just like a one-and-done? He ran off. There's a world in which

and I haven't watched the head, so I have no idea. There's a world in which he's a one-episode guest star and he just like, they're just not going to get the Lichtenstein back and that's the end of that. but his you know as we saw in severance this guy's physical presence is overwhelming even to a guy who is sort of tall and built the way that John Hamm is like this guy is

overwhelming and I thought it was a really interesting role for him because on the one hand he could definitely do eccentric but like I don't know there was just something about it the way that he was like dance dancing with the, like, and he was like, love doing cocaine. Then I was like, do you?

I don't know if this fits to me. This scene fits to me. The hallway aggression, though, that was, that felt very unsettling, obviously, to say the least. And Elena saying, like, she had a handle on it was, like, do you think the pepper spray was just, like, right out of you and she was going to, like, bring it out? Or what do you think her plan was there? Or was she just sort of posturing to coop that she had a handle?

on it? What do you think? I think she had a quote-unquote handle on it in the way that she is playing a game. Like, right? She is a part of this. She understands that she's going to be put in some positions like this as she tells Coop like, this isn't my first time being in one of these hallways. And is trying to basically finesse her way out of it because the stakes of this theft are so important for her and so financially crucial for her. Right. Coop is playing, as we've said, leading into this episode several times by a different set of rules with different repercussions if he gets caught. Different repercussions if one theft doesn't work out. And so he comes in, you know, full of him and vigor, ready to just, like, fight somebody. I think Elena is just trying to finesse. So I don't think she has a hold of it in the sense that, like, she has the pepper spray on the ready so much as she's been in these sorts of situations before. And Coop is just, like, flying off the handle because he doesn't have any experience in this world. And she felt like she could, yeah, I don't want to, like, I support Elena and all of her endeavors. I'm just curious.

And then, like, on the coop front. Yeah. How much does it, like, filter into all of our interpretation? him saying in his voiceover, like having done blow for the first time in 10 years. So his hallway behavior and, you know, the cold open of the whole series, he's like, you know, had one sort of cocaine. Not that that will like change your life for hours and hours and hours, but, you know. Joe, you and I have proven to be experts in recreational drug use on this podcast. I mean, I think who would be more qualified than us to say what one bump of cocaine would do to someone like who?

Yeah, great, great point. I do want to say, like, comedy John Hamm has been here around the edges of this show, but not, you know, he's more like dry, dry toast John Ham than he is comedy. But his initial rejection of the cocaine, I think it's the funniest thing I've seen on this show. I thought it was so funny, just his facial expressions of like, hmm, I'm good. Thanks so much. I thought it was really, really good. The initial rejection of the cocaine, honestly, anytime Kookew. and Nick interact in a very curt way.

I appreciate it. I think the coldness of how funny and sharp he can be in some of these exchanges. I really enjoy in John Ham's performance. But what did you make, Joe, of his physical acting in this episode? And by that, I mean, his robust collection of dance moves. I would say definitively the twirl is his go-to. And like many dancers, he goes to it a little too often.

It's the twirl. And then, like, I'm really glad that the scene was written as cooom. can't dance because I was just like, John Hamm, we found the one thing you can't do, or he was doing a great job at pretending like he couldn't dance. But like, as we mentioned in an earlier episode, John Hamm was like talking about how he could play golf, he could play tennis, he could do all these things he asked him to do. But Coop in the club dancing, I was just like, oh, it wasn't just the age difference. Because you can imagine, like, let's imagine a different madman character on the floor there, like Roger Sterling. Like Roger Sterling, I feel like would be completely

at home in that club and be fine. Coop sore thumb, sticking out like a sore thumb. And Elena really trying to make it work and sort of, she looks great. She was doing great. Yeah, but the twirl, the twirl, you know, some pinash in the twirl. What did you think? It's all about the energy, right? It's the enthusiasm you bring to it.

And Coop is a bit of a cold fish coming in, but clearly he and Elena have something going on as the dial turns in the ever. Everybody loves coop arrangement. It's now Elena's turn to swoon a little bit, to beckon him to the dance floor. Right. To have some, like, hints of what feels like at least a kind of chemistry, if not outright romance, that the show has been circling for a couple weeks. I guess this is just what the show is going to be. Like, Sam's out of town, Mel is otherwise occupied.

Liv is doing who knows what. Like, it's just Elena's turn? It's Elena's week for custody of The Crush. Yeah, and Sam broke up with him, question mark. So does that make it cleaner? I don't know. I have a lot of questions about what's going out with Sam. Clearly so.

Yeah, the Elena Coop stuff overall, I don't quite know what to do with. Like, they're actors who I enjoy bouncing off each other on screen. I just don't have really a feel for what those characters are bringing to this story other than being oversharing, overly close and intimate business partners, which, as many people say in this episode, is a bad idea. I also thought that the scene, okay, so the scene after the club, when she's in the street, she's talking about

how the stakes are different for her than they are for him. We had talked about, this is something that I wanted from the show, and you mentioned this last week about the stakes being different for them. But for her to just say it, I don't know, the way that scene was written,

it just felt so on the nose versus like I would love to just have this being a running thread and commentary rather than a sort of in-your-face fight that we get. But Coop doesn't really seem like he takes anything out of

as a learning moment for him. So I don't know. I will say at least the show is pretty overt. If we're going to be saying things up front and just make it all matter of fact, Coup says in his narration, in this episode, basically acknowledging how little he knows about basically anything,

that he has been caught in this situation because of his lack of knowledge and understanding about the nuances of everything involved. But what he says, I think it's the voiceover when he's in the hardware store having a guy show him how to attach canvas to a frame. Which is a great idea before you commit art theft. Watch a YouTube tutorial.

Like, why are we out in the world doing this? I don't know. But when we get the voiceover and he says something like, I had no other choice. I was like, Kup, you have so many choices. You've chosen to be a person who cannot envision a lifestyle without luxury. I guess in a Tim Ratliff sort of from White Lotus sense to a certain degree, You can't envision a life in which you're not providing for your wife and your children.

Sure. But I don't have this email in front of me, but one of our emailers is like, sell the car. Like, there's things you can do that he hasn't done that he hasn't even tried to do. So, yeah. Yeah, I mean, I think it goes to, you know, the show has been trying to engage with this idea of like the illusions that you create, that you have a certain amount of wealth so that you can hide behind it with your very expensive home renovation projects and secretly, like, be draining all your bank. accounts. And clearly, Coop is caught and Barney

is caught, and many of these characters are caught, in a version of that kind of prison of their own making. I just don't necessarily buy it as, like, the most pressing stakes-driving dramatic device. Even when, you know, we have, those stakes are amped up a little bit in this episode

by all of Hunter's antics. You know, he has met this girl, the one girl he knows at school, who is now talking to him. He is passing out his Adderall to anyone who will take him into the back room of a theater department. She's like, I love the Smiths. I love the Smiths.

I want to say the smash cut from this girl taking Hunter by the hand and leading him down the hall to Hunter's dad and Sam having an intense chemistry lesson is nasty business and I don't appreciate it. Like, that is uncalled for. But that's not what Hunter is off to do. Hunter is off to distribute his Adderall to the theater kids, question mark. I see, are they theater kids or are they just kind of infiltrating the theater, like the backstage area? I have to say, I think at least she is a theater kid. I mean, the makeup work, theater tech at least. Top tier.

Top tier, Ziggy Stardist. I have to say, actually, I think that Mel is the best opportunity we have in the show, and Allie, to undercut Coop, which I think the show needs at all times. And so when he's like, I didn't know you were into Bowie, and she's like, now is not the time for your cool dad shit, Coop. Absolutely not. And then he's like, good luck, buddy. I was just like, coop you suck.

Like, dear God, anyway. You just committed to paying $200,000 or whatever to keep this kid in school, to bribe this kid's way back into school. Yeah. You know, I will say Chris and Andy have flagged this early, this idea of like some of the reference points in terms of music for these types of shows being very, you know, like Gen X or millennial or even boomer oriented. And so, like, like, writers room oriented when they're writing for teenagers.

Are the kids into Bowie? I say this all the time, actually, like, I promise you, I had this exact conversation with Bill on his podcast today when I was talking about how teenagers and the writers room references that they put on teenage kids. Because Bill was talking about how he's like, this show gets teenagers wrong. All shows get teenagers wrong. And he was like talking about his first-hand experience watching, you know, his kids' friends, like, come through the house and stuff like that. And I was talking about exactly this. This was before I had watched this episode and saw that he was like, had Ziggy Star-O's makeup on.

Just straight up. That's what he asked for. Like he's a kid getting his face painted at a carnival. Like, I want the Ziggy Stardis. Give me the full Ziggy Stardis. Yeah. I know that we've already established our bona fides as recreational drug users. But like, what did you think Romney of the kids crushing and snorting Adderall backstage at school?

Certainly checks out. I mean, for one, here's the thing. It doesn't even need to be this sophisticated kids will find things to snuff, like to sniff and huff regardless of whether they actually work as recreational drugs. But in this case, yeah, look, it's clearly very effective to snort speed if that's what you want to do. Yeah, the way you get the label and it's like amphetamine and I forgot, I wrote down the other one, but it's just sort of like, okay, Adderall, yeah.

If you're Hunter, are you trading your Adderall for, to impress this girl for cool points or whatever? or are you selling your Adderall for money? Is it start with trading and then you're like First one's first taste is free. Come and find me later. He's a very nice kid. It's a very nice drug distributing kid.

He's a very nice kid. I'm rooting for it. Possession with intent. Whatever. Not a big deal. I mean, clearly the show is kind of setting up with the coop stuff. He gets called into the parent meeting and it's clear that he has not been present

for the many preliminary meetings that have led to this point in terms of Hunter being out of class or whatever. Like, Kuba's been inattentive. But beyond that, he's also someone who is regularly breaking the law.

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Carvana. Pick up fees may apply. You know, as a counterpoint to this, yeah, clearly Coop and Mel do not have the most functional relationship in the world, hence their separation, hence their pending divorce, or are they officially divorced? I think so. Yeah.

Whatever their current status. Yeah, yeah, they're divorced, yeah. We see Nick and Mel do something in this episode that it seems like maybe Coop and Mel have never done, which is have a very straightforward conversation about their feelings. And they do it where everyone does it. off to the side of a luxury presentation of a $30,000 toilet. Because what better place to really air things out, Joe? Our infomercial moment of the episode is the Lichtenstein,

but the toilet commercial that we get to start the episode was genuinely a high point in this entire series. I thought it was really, really funny. And Nick's whole demeanor, all of that was really good. Yeah, and the Mel, I mean, we got a long email from a listener that I don't agree with about, like, how Mel is the villain of the show with love and respect to that person. And I just, I really like her. I like her showing up and saying I was an asshole. Yeah.

You know, like, and I do wish that Nick had said, I'm sorry, I threw you a party you didn't ask for. He kind of, he kind of gets there. He said that's the last time I throw you a party or something like that, not I'm sorry you didn't ask for this, you know. Yeah, the apology doesn't quite get there, but he does come through with a like, well, it's not like you didn't warn me that this isn't what you wanted, basically. Right, right, right. Yeah. So, like, I, I really like, I liked that exchange a lot. I really did. Yeah. I did too. I feel like clearly they have something that is functional in a relationship sense, even if it's also clear that Mel is not actually that invested in it. Like, I think they have a communication style that works. It's just like Nick feels like a guy who means well, but. ultimately does not do a lot for her in a lasting relationship sense. He's the wrong guy. She wants to make it work, and she wants to do it in a healthier way than she has done it in

the past. I like Nick. I do want to ask him, what does he think he's playing at when he tries to get Hunter to have a smoothie instead of Flaming Hot Cheetos? This is a teenage warrior. He's trying to encourage healthy habits. I understand. He owns a gym.

And I understand a smoothie is a better snack than a Cheeto, but this is like a 15, 16 year old kid, like, what are we talking about here? It's true. On the, on the, like, writers' room, writers imposing their taste on teenage kids, did you freeze frame Mahoney look at the posters on Hunter's wall behind his bed? You know what? I did not really go through and clocked them. Did you see any in particular that jumped out at you?

There's the killers, which, again, just feels like... A little old. A little old. For Hunter. And then I think it's the roots. it said phrenology on it, which is a Roots album, but it didn't match the album cover, so it might have been like a concert tour or poster.

But again, it just feels like we're watching Hunter, budding musician, you know, doing his art. And I was like, who are his influences behind him? And I was like, the killers and the roots? Grandin Flowers, naturally, the touch point for all Gen Z and Gen Alpha kids. It's not right. So, yeah, it's interesting.

Yeah, that seems so much more like the music of, a much older sibling or cousin or maybe even a younger parent or aunt or uncle, like not quite of his generation. Yeah, maybe it's Ali's influence or something like that, but it's not even like his dad's music. Like if it were his dad's music, he'd be like, oh, these are concerts he went to or his mom's music. Like, but it's a little too young for them and a little too old for him.

So I was like, who showed him this music? Who gave you this? I guess the children just have access to the internet. Well, he didn't learn it from watching them. I think that's the important thing. He found it on his own. He came by it honestly, and maybe he is a huge bowie sand.

Like, who's really to say? But I can't get us out of this toilet-oriented segment without two things, Joe. One, like, whoever, whichever copywriter slash via person in the writer's room for this show wrote the tagline, The Next Movement as the selling point for this toilet is just inspired work. That person, and by proxy, the copywriter within the world of the show, both deserve raises.

But this is where I was really throwing. for a loop on the who is Nick in NBA terms conversation, Joe. Three time? Is it the three time championship thing? So we know he's a three time All-Star. We know he's a champion. All the introduction stuff is fine. But when he's coming off and having this heart to heart with Mel, one thing he says is, as he's talking about

kind of overcompensating for his insecurities and why he threw this big party for her, that's what happens when you fall to the second round of the draft. Okay. Okay. Uh-oh. First thought. that's good that's good writing i love this idea of a second round draft pick having to overcompensate for so much these are like maniacal competitors who absolutely obsessed to the day they die over where they were drafted that tracks for me second thought this isn't richard jefferson

anymore now we now we have a problem um the other detail kind of in conjunction with that that really muddled things is as you're going into this like home shopping network set up yeah for the toilet they scan the audience and we see a bunch of nick fans and the audience, all wearing Spurs jerseys with his number 79, which we talked about last week. And we had someone email in wondering if maybe that's his birth year, hence why he could be number 79, which absolutely fair point, fair play, makes sense to me. This is a Home Shopping Network S setup filmed outside of New York City. And we know that Nick played for the Knicks.

There is not a single Knicks jersey. Everyone is wearing Spurs jersey. Do you know how famous a Spur you would have to be to wipe out all of the NICS? the Nick's allegiance and only be spurs in that audience, Joe, it's like incomprehensible. How, who's the most famous spur that ever was? Probably Tim Duncan, I would say is the most famous spur. But so here's where we get into problems. Like, Nick is not successful enough nor reclusive enough to be Tim Duncan.

Okay. He is not French enough to be Tony Parker. He's not Argentinian enough to be Manu Genoble. He's not, he's like too verbose to be Coi Leonard. He's too old to be either Lamarcus Aldridge or Dejante Murray. And so we're left in this, this zone. of like he can't possibly be any real life spur who fits more or less this mold of person. So I am at a loss at this point. I've got no idea who this is supposed to be.

Rob, I mean, would it help you sleep at night if we just called him a composite character? Is that too simple right? He clearly is a composite character and I appreciate that. But something about the Spurs jerseys in New York. I'm like, you lost your marbles. This guy is a three-time All-Star and is projecting as if he is a Hall of Fame player in New York City. They just regulated you so badly. that you did not even look at the music posters on Hunter's Wall,

which is your go-to move. That's so funny. This is how messed up I was. There's just a... Look, there's a lot happening this week. We have the introductions of new characters. We have these clear variables in terms of mixed characterization that I don't know how to deal with.

Yeah. We also have the expansion of Barney's story from, oh, we're going to tell you that he has money problems to I guess we're going to show you that he has money problems. Like, what did you make of this expanding plot line with his in-laws? I mean, I really enjoy. the actress who plays his mother-in-law. I thought that was done really well.

I thought the scene where she comes in and writes him a check and says, my daughter is not a client and all that sort of stuff. It's just like really, really good stuff. But it just seems like it feels like the show keeps expanding and expanding and expanding in a way that I'm just sort of like, at what point have we lost control of what our main story? Because now we have like the Barney expansion. Then we also go home with Sam and meet her parents briefly. but we're meeting her parents.

And I'm like, how many families am I tracking inside of the show? It seems like a lot. So, like, Barney, the actor who plays Barney is also, I think, a producer, an exact producer on the show. So, like, you know, if he's like, hey, I'm here for comic relief, but I also want my own, like, interesting storyline. Like, I kind of understand that. But I feel like I need to focus in on something. I feel like I'm just constantly pinging around. And I'm losing track of, like, who has the answers to the SATs and their desk.

drawer who had the Liechtenstein in the first place and all those sort of stuff like that. So, yeah, I just need tighter control in the neighborhood, I think. It's what I'm asking for. What about you? I think we do need that. It feels like they're going for that sort of big ensemble feel. And I wonder, practically speaking, Joe, if that's just kind of an intentional setup to help in the making of the show going forward, where, you know, if John Hamm is going to be the anchor character, John Hamm has to be on set all the time. But if you make characters like Barney really important, then you can.

film things at other times. If you make Sam her own self-standing character who's not in a relationship with Coop, like, can you film the stuff with Olivia Munn separately? Like, I kind of wonder if it's practical as much as it is like characters pushing for a balance, kind of ensemble performance. You understand some things, or you understand that like

Barney married Rich, that like his he is a rich guy in this neighborhood, but his in-laws don't respect him. They think their daughter married beneath her, all this sort of stuff like that. And so we already got indications of this,

but if Barney gets looped into the criminal enterprise, I wonder if this is setting the stage for us understanding why he would be backed into that corner. These are the personal stakes on this for him. It really feels like we're headed that way. When you're setting up these characters with money troubles in this world, it's just kind of a matter of time before they get looped into the bling ring. I don't know what Barney's role in it would be.

But maybe he'll need a different layer of protection or a different kind of weight. If you know, wash the money somehow or something like that. Yeah, there's got to be some element of that. I think what I'm feeling about it right now is the criminal enterprise is expanding, right? We're getting into art theft. Barney may or may not be involved at a future date. Thomason is being pulled into this world.

Just the degree to which Coop is like very upfront in what I imagine is like a convenient expository way in talking to Lou about exactly the crimes that he's about to commit in a building that is wired for video and sound seems like a really bad idea. All of his ideas are bad ideas. But it runs in the family, right? Because can we talk about Allie and... Yeah. Her re-engaging and her stalking behavior?

Like, just when you think things are going well for Allie, she's got a, like, consistent gig at the tap room. Then she... She's clearly at the gym because she knows Bruce goes to this gym. Absolutely. That is why she's there. She is straight up stalking this guy. Who we've seen her stalk earlier in the season.

Just back to stocking. Light to medium. docking in this case. Like, nothing insidious, but she's here, you know, taking a class, hitting the bike or the elliptical. I can't remember what she's on. It's just so... I really like the Allie character.

I really like her interactions with Coop. I loved her making fun of, like, Sam's comical sex noises. She's eating a peanut butter banana sandwich. She's protein loading. Love that for her. Yeah. The way she sort of, like, rolls herself over the back of the couch to sit down and watch TCR with Coop

and make fun of, like... his taste in old movies. And I also really like John Hans or something. Like when she's like, can we watch something that was made after I was born? And he just like sits there for a while. Then he just goes, no. It was really good. But now of Ali, I mean, this is what Ali does.

This is why Ali needs Coops Care and stuff like that. But Ali's showing up when he approaches her and she's like, oh, fancy meeting you here. And takes her sweaty hair out of the like hair tie and starts to like roll her, like, her, like, her space. her leggings down. And I was just like, Ali, I was so upset. I was just like, find some stability. Like, chase your bliss.

Like, she's someone who can check in with Hunter. He's not doing well and he could really use you. But please stay away from Bruce and his. But also, like, is Bruce complicit? Like, if Bruce shows up at the tap room, which I could see him doing because there was a part of him that, like, seemed a little sparked by her being there. You know what I mean?

They clearly have such history together. I think it would be impossible for him not to care about her and be worried about her in a sense. But, yeah, like there is, of course, if he starts showing up and they start having a relationship, then we're shifting from stalking into something that's a little bit more mutual. Well, that's what I'm saying is like, I think at first we were like, oh, God, this poor man was like, can you get this woman off my lawn, you know, sort of thing. And now, and he had Coop's number, her parents seem to know about him, all this sort of stuff like that. So this is like a long-term X,

but there was just like a little sparky, flirtatious interest from him, not like a deeply uncomfortable, what the fuck are you doing here vibe from him that made me worried that he's going to show up at the tap room and I don't want him to, you know? That seems very realistic. I got the like maybe I'll go to the check you out of the tap room sometime as more, I'm saying this so I can get out of here, like pleasantry, then earnest engagement.

Also, it was an interesting cocktail. I could see it going a number of ways. Yeah. For legal reasons, the prestige TV podcast does not recommend that you stalk your ex until they come see your live music performance. Like, we cannot endorse that strategy. We can't. But if you want to clock into the gym and then give Nick shit about breaking up your brother's marriage,

feel free to do that. That sounds like a great plan to me. What is Nick doing in this moment? Like, you can't just let her go. But also just like supervise? How often is Nick even at the gym? It's a great point. On location, I assume there's like multiple branches.

It's a franchise. It's a franchise affair. He's on the ground at the one location. Allie happens to go to me. And no one's buzzing that this huge NBA superstar is at the gym? Apparently not. Joe, I have another investigative deep dive for you. You mentioned Coop's Taste in Movies.

We've remarked upon it before. People have been emailing us specifically about Coop wearing a Criterion Collection hat earlier in this season, which we love a cinephile. Yeah. I worry that hat and this presentation as guy who loves old movies. I worry that it might be stolen valor. I worry that this may be, that ultimately Coop may be the movie equivalent

of the Lichtenstein loving posers that he's mocking throughout this episode. Oh my God. Coup had such a I'm not like other girls' moment in his voiceover when he was like, they don't appreciate the Lichtenstein at the end. He's like, oh, he's kind of liked Likton's like, You know, too bad.

I always really enjoyed, like, Dynstein. I was like, come on, Coup. Give me a fucking break. I think Cooper can hang in a conversation about classic cinema. And I think he does actually like a TCM marathon. Do I want to watch his Criterion Closet video the way that I want to watch St. and Chris's Criterion Closet video? No.

We're waiting with bated breath. A piece of content has never been more anticipated for me than Sean and Chris in the closet. But Coup passed. Pass for me and Coupe in the Criterion Clause. Hard pass. I will say especially this. Like to me, so we get this other moment of voiceover from Coupe right before he's about to decide to break into Sam's

house in which he discovers the dead body, all time, terrible decision under any circumstances, but especially these. And he's saying, I could drink too much and fall asleep, watching the Criterion Collection in my house. That line to me, it felt like a real, like, German three kind of moment. I see what you mean.

So you could fall asleep watching the Criterion channel at your house. Sure. That's a thing you could do. You could fall asleep watching something from the Criterion collection at your house. Yeah. Would you ever say fall asleep to the Criterion Collection if you actually knew your shit? I kind of say you wouldn't. I wouldn't.

Someone with a subscription to the Criterion Channel and, but no, I don't own any actually Criterion Collection DVDs. You're not that kind of physical media, bro. I'm just like a budding. physical. I was like, I had my era, which was, I think, before the criterion collection. So I had, like, most of my physical media comes from, like, I mean, it's been going for a while.

I know, but I yeah, maybe I need to step up my game. Maybe I like Coupe possessed stolen valor, but I think that, yeah, you're right, that's a good shout. But this is the difference is, you're open about that. Coupe is, he's hiding behind it, as if, you know, this is just the life he leads.

I mean, all of his voiceovers, again, I don't know if I'm supposed to say, what a cool guy. He likes the little movies and Lichtenstein or if I'm to say what an asshole and an idiot he's robbing Sam's house he is an asshole like what are we doing here

robbing his like neighbors who seem to deeply suck fine but Sam who you are in some kind of relationship who you tucked her son in the other night like what are we doing Coop

I would like to think that that's the cocaine talking but I agree with you, this isn't a character that we're supposed to love and we're obviously not supposed to love all his decisions. Right. He and Sam's relationship, as much as, like, I would like to see some version of it work, does not seem like it's headed in that direction. It doesn't work, but, like, have some respect for the woman that you've been, like,

hooking up with. Yes. Who just told you she was leaving town and then you're texting her, you up, like, within 24 hours. And she's like, I'm out of town. remember. I was so upset when I saw that. Anyway. I told you two things. I'm out of town and we're broken up and somehow you've forgotten both of them within the span of a day.

It's really tough stuff. And then what does he do? He thumbs up. He thumbs up. He thumbs up. Coop. Gross. Coop sucks. Most of the characters in the show kind of suck, but have some redeeming qualities. And I do appreciate that from an alley perspective that they're trying to make that character in some

ways challenging and unlikable and give her things to do that are not super straight forward, let me roll over the back of your couch and be the kind of like very appealing and inviting charismatic sister. They're trying to do things with these characters. I just, I don't know, Joe.

It is too spread out. You're absolutely right about that. Do you want to like zero in on the murder mystery? What, like, threat are you most interested in following for the rest of the season? I do think we're going to zero in on the murder mystery whether we would like to or not. And we did get an email from Emily who was

answering our prompt about what's going to happen with Chekhov's trunk. We've seen Coop's pop up repeatedly over the course of this season so far. We guessed either there's going to be stolen goods back there, maybe the dead body will be back there if Coop tries to smuggle it out. What Emily suggested is what if Coop himself is put by maybe Thomas and maybe somebody else into his own trunk and is able to escape because of that latch? What do you think about that idea? On the one hand, I really love that idea. I do. I think that's really clever. On the

other hand, I really think it needs to be something that screws Coop over because he has just neglected it all season. It's just another symbol, like another example of something he's neglected, being a dad, being a husband, figuring out literally anything to do that doesn't require ripping off your friends and neighbors, etc. I would love this to bite him in the ass a bit, actually. But I don't know. I know what you're saying, you're agreeing with me when you're like, coop is not likable. I just don't know that the show agrees with me. You don't think so? I don't know. I genuinely don't know. I think the show is like, you love John Hamm, don't you? And I'm like, I do. They're like, you let Don Draper get away with a lot

of shit, didn't you? And I was like, I do. I do. I did. I really did. But Don was more charismatic than Coop, ultimately. Like, there is a, there is a, like, it may be a veneer, but there is a veneer there that is more appealing and is a better sell than whatever Coop is doing. Yeah, Don definitely knows how to sell himself. And I also think that, like, when it comes to self-reflection, I don't think Don Draper really, or he didn't fool himself in such an overtly clumsy way.

Like, the way in which Don was kidding himself about himself, was slower to unravel and stuff like that versus when we hear Coop say shit and I'm like, that's wrong or you're not paying attention or what the fuck are you doing? It's just, it's different. Don Draper, problematic Faye forever.

Coop, you've got work to do. It's hard with the dramedy when the lead of your show is both kind of unlikable and also quite dumb. they need a certain kind of competency to win you over or else. If you're both, then it's like,

it's always sunny in Philadelphia. Like, we're veering into a farce really, really quickly. Yeah, that's a good point. Like, I can get swept.

When Don Draper's on the pitch, I can get just like swept away by how good he is at that. Or when he, and so then when he like, does right by Peggy, I'm like, that's all,

and then I forget all the ways in which he's an absolute or when he is a terror, I'm just sort of like, is this the price you pay for genius? Or that's the question you have to ask yourself. But like, for Coop,

Like, is this the price you pay for buffoonery? I was like, what are we after here? So, yeah. Well, Joanna Robinson, midlife aspiring pyro. Yes. Preventative car maintenance enthusiast. Correct. Are there any other things you want to hit before we get out of here?

No, I think we got to all of it. Thank you so much for hitting the Ziggy Startup stuff, like especially. Oh, I did like, here's the last thing I'll say. I like, this is like a little thing that I like in shows. Allie calls Coop Andy, which. I don't think anyone else does, and I just really like that. Like the little names you have that, like, you know, your sister you grew up with would call you, but no one else would.

I thought that was a really cute little moment. Also explains why I think before this point, the only other character to do it was Ali's therapist. And so now it's like, okay, now I understand why the therapist calls Amanda. This finally makes sense. But thank you to you, Joe. Thank you to Alice therapist. Thank you to Kai Grady, who's producing for us today. Thank you to everyone who's listening and emailing us at Prestige TV at Spotify.com.

And please do email us about your midlife crises. I would love to know whether you're more of a fire or a pool kind of person. And we will, we'll see you for the last of us. We'll see you for more of your friends and neighbors. We'll see you for the rehearsal, at least Jody and Charles will. We'll see you next time. Bye. This episode is brought to you by Netflix's remarkably bright creatures.

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