The Rest Is Entertainment - Squid Game And Heroes & Villains of 2024

Episode Date: December 31, 2024

The most popular show in Netflix's history returns for its second season. Does it carry the story along, and what does it say about culture now? Richard and Marina also give us some of their recommendations for TV in 2025 but before that they tell us their heroes and villains of 2024. Join The Rest Is Entertainment Club for ad free listening and access to bonus episodes: www.therestisentertainment.com Sign up to our newsletter: www.therestisentertainment.com Twitter: @‌restisents Instagram: @‌restisentertainment YouTube: @‌therestisentertainment Email: [e-mail] Producers: Neil Fearn + Joey McCarthy Executive Producers: Tony Pastor + Jack Davenport Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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will be over before you know it. Love that chicken from Bobbines. Hello and welcome to this episode of The Rest Is Entertainment with me Marina Hyde. And me Richard Osmond. How are you Marina? I'm sad to be parted from you. Yeah we're in, I'm in like a lockdown situation because I've got a slight cold. I don't want to affect anybody. Richard is under laboratory conditions, as they used to say in game shows where they put people

in a sort of glass box, but I can still see him. Listen, happy new year, sort of. Happy new year. We stand on the eve of 2025. If it's anything like 2024, it's going to be a belter. Most certainly. Now, what are we going to talk about today? We're talking about Squid Game, Netflix's biggest ever franchise, which is back, back, back. Started on Boxing Day, we're talking about that. Talking about heroes and villains of the year, our heroes and villains of the year. Yes, I've compiled mine in a slightly odd way, you'll be thrilled to know. You surprise me. And we are also talking about New Year's TV and how things have changed, how the scheduling

of things has changed and what New Year's TV means. It's a big slot now. The biggest day of the year. Shall we kick off with Squid Game? Let us kick off with Squid Game. As you say, Netflix's biggest ever show, which returned on Boxing Day and they've dropped all the episodes at once. It is a return to the death game.

Yeah. It is, I mean, it's obviously very, very bleak. Yes. There are certain things that they've changed in the format of their in-show game that the players can vote to leave, the majority can split the money. Listen, it's important you change the format in the second series. Yes. We all know that. Just the things you learn from the first series you can put into play.

Yeah, otherwise the death is not fun anymore. Yeah, exactly. It's got to be fun. You need to keep that death fresh. So the creator, Hwang Dong Hyuk, is so extraordinary Richard, isn't he? Because he writes and directs every single episode of this thing, as he did in the first season. In the first season, he like lost loads of teeth and stuff, didn't he? I think... Well, yes. That's the interesting thing is when he's making the first season and, you know, anyone who watched the first season, it's an extraordinary undertaking. But the

one thing, of course, they didn't know when they were making it was that it was going to be a hit. They had no idea that it was going to be successful. They certainly had no idea it was going to be the biggest show in the world and Netflix's biggest ever show and Netflix's most successful, most profitable ever show as well. So he was putting himself through all of that, losing teeth and so on, absolutely on a wing on a prayer. And when they came back to him and said, we'd love to do a second series and a third series, they filmed both at once. I think his initial response was, oh, but I don't want to because it really took so

much out of me. The interesting thing with Netflix is when you sign up to do a show with Netflix, you don't own it. So you don't have a backend. So the fact that that had been so successful, actually there wasn't a huge amount of payoff for Hwang Dong-Hook other than, you know, it makes him look great. It's one of the many, many R&E's in this show about the sort of brutality of late stage capitalism that, yeah, he didn't really properly make that much money from it. He would have made a quarter of a million or something, which is very, very nice to have. But this new season, I'd imagine he's made it making 10 million a season for both of them. I would have thought he'd be on 20 million odd.

That's tooth fairy money. You know, lose nine teeth, get 20 million. That's a deal you'd take, isn't it? Yeah. I mean, he can buy us some new teeth, certainly. I want to talk a bit about the show and why it's so compelling and popular. There's lots of, and internationally so as well. Yes.

Obviously K-Dram is very big, but when he was coming up with the idea, he read lots of comic books in the survival game genre and the gambling genre, which is obviously a relatively niche sort of comic books. Is there a gambling comic book genre? Yeah, I couldn't believe that. I'd be interested in that. Yeah, I know you would. It's right out your strasa.

There's something about it that obviously Netflix wants shows that are very simplistic and stylized. It's almost theatrical in some ways, the very simple and very clear themes. You can see how easy it is to sell into sort of all territories really, or for people to appreciate it in all territories. I found myself watching it, I'm told that I don't want to sort of besmirch the script, because I'm told that the subtitles are quite poorly translated and that Koreans are like, you're missing a lot of the subtlety. Because to me it is a very, very simplistic script. And it helps

to me that I'm seeing it in another light. It's not an anglophone thing because I otherwise think some of the stuff might be too on the nose when I'm reading the subtitles. However, I don't know if that's a sort of something's been lost in translation there. I think the reason that it is so compelling and so popular says something much wider about its times of which the world the world is going through it but South Korea is a very extreme example Yeah, lots of these different things since that first season aired obviously martial law was recently declared in South Korea and then like undeclared I mean, that's a squid game round. Isn'tclaring then undeclaring martial law within 11 minutes. The birth rate is something like 0.8 per couple.

Big movement which now people are sort of saying they're going to fall in with in the United States but of women saying that if my rights and my body and my feminism isn't respected I'm not going to have sex with anybody. That's a movement that started in South Korea. There is massive economic disparity between classes. And there is a sense that there's no point and that you don't have a stake in capitalism and you're never really going to get one. I mean, there's even a K-pop singer in this one.

It's like he's trying to just indict the whole of society, which I thought was like there's nobody left unscathed. One thing I found really interesting in this one is just how much younger the contestants are and this was obviously a big big hit amongst young people the show including sadly to say about among some of my children who were much too young to watch it but unfortunately have because I'm a terrible parent. Really they watched it? Not my youngest but my two boys have watched it and they absolutely love it. They are four and six, right?

They're 14 and 12. They are obsessed with it. But it's interesting, Hwang Dong Hyuk said that he thought that in order for people to have that much debt, that's what would make you play the game within the story. And also to be at a place in life where you feel you have no other hope. The really bleak thing between series one and, I mean many bleak things, I'm going to overuse the word bleak again, between series one and series two is that he feels that you can now be at a place where young people obviously feel they have absolutely no stake in capitalism and that there's no means of getting

one via labour. It is a wonderful allegory for late stage capitalism, isn't it? It is one of those things that in 50 years time when we look back at the revolution, we'll say, well, this was an early sign. If it wasn't this guy losing all these teeth, making a show about rich people, toying with people in debt, which by the way, is capitalism. That's all capitalism is. But with added game show. The things that have happened and made people get into this situation I don't know crypto investment online gambling. I remember last year on the tube I saw oh my god, I saw this sign on the tube an advert on the on the British subway London tube The British subway, sorry, I wasn't trying to I wasn't trying to say that I was in South Korea and I'd seen this advert

I'm talking about the London one. It had a picture of this guy and it said, with all the money I make went renting out my driveway. I barely even think about the £1,376 I lost in crypto. It's like, wow, well, I mean, it's all up there. It's all up there on the advert, isn't it? It's a sort of advert if you showed it to your parents in 1978. They said this will be an advert in 30th time, they'd be like, I can't understand any of those words. There was a couple in the first one and he sort of threw that story away a little bit.

And then latterly came because so many people said, but what was the story? How did those people get into the game together, whatever, that there are more people with existing relationships, familial or romantic within the game, which is obviously one way of testing his whole concept of how anything can survive and whether there is any possibility for collective action at all within this system. But obviously there have always been these shows or films particularly where the future is a death game and whatever it is, Rollerball, Running Man or Death Race 2000 or any of those things where the future is set up as a game and and some sometimes hard target even people

being killed for sport. But it's always set in the future. Yes. Under a corrupt government. Yes, it is. Yes. Yeah. This is fascinating in that the dystopia seems very of the present day.

Yeah. And it's not kind of it's not saying imagine aia seems very of the present day. Yeah. And it's not saying, imagine a world in which it's kind of going, I mean, you could sort of see it. It's fascinating that having made the first one, it's interesting that thing, as I say, when you make something you don't know it's a hit. Suddenly he's filming series two and he knows it's a huge, huge, huge hit and what he chooses to do with the story and what he chooses to do really with the story is to give some of the players a bit more agency and to our hero from the first series coming back and sort of trying to stop the games really, trying to get people to team up, trying to

get people to defeat the bosses. He set it up as a sort of duel between the front man and G Hutton acting as a collective can make any impact on it? I mean, history tells us it can't, but we shall have to see this. I do think it's great. I do think that it's very, very hard to follow up such a huge hit. 330 million viewers the first Squid Game had. I think 2.8 billion hours of viewing. Can I talk about Netflix's monetization of it? Yeah. I mean, Surround Us on that earnings call, whenever it was, said the Squid Game universe

has just begun. They have a multiplayer game. They're going to have an English language version of it, which I think David Fincher is going to direct. Maybe Dennis Kelly is going to write it, I don't know. And obviously they had Squid Game The Challenge, the actual game that they played based on it.

Now, can I just, we did that quite early on when we first started this podcast, and when we had watched it then, there was quite some distance between us watching the game show version of it and then watching the dystopian drama. And I slightly feel like I did find it, as I think I said at the time, sort of really quite grim that they had capitalised on a drama that was about the kind of rapaciousness of capitalism. But anyway, but there was some distance. Whereas I didn't mind it. Well, you didn't mind it. Well Well that's what I want to ask you. Now... Say that the centuries about the rapaciousness of capitalism strike it lucky. Yeah, yeah, but there's...

No, but to do it in the way they did. Yes, I get that. I get all of that. But when when I watched it that time, there was some distance between the transmission of the drama and what's seeing this kind of quite revolutionary game show really. Now I have seen the drama again, I'm like I cannot actually believe that this show about the race to the bottom of late stage capitalism has become a franchise. I found that irony too heavy. When I was watching again I kept thinking I cannot believe they've turned this into an actual game show. The game show doesn't worry me particularly because you know this is it's a drama like it's made up and these people are actors and however much we might like to think it reflects the world in which we live.

It's a piece of dramatic television. The weird thing I think is they have lots of live experiences now. Like in the same way you can do Taskmaster live and you know, you can turn up and play some silly games. You can turn up and play Squid Game live in American. That feels peculiar. Would you like to come along to a big warehouse and take part in the game where people essentially die?

And you say, oh, yeah, that's going to be a lot of fun. You think that's going to be a lot of fun? We'll take the kids. Why is it? I find it absolutely beyond depressing that they've made a sort of trying to make a sort of Marvel product and an extended universe out of something which is supposed to be a

sort of searing indictment of all of that. Is it that people just love the games and that the games obviously are based on fun childhood games? But do your kids watch good game and think it's a searing indictment of capitalism? I think they think it's pretty unbelievably depressing, yes. But they love it. It really gets them. I think it is quite simplistic and it's very, very affecting. Yeah, they think it's absolutely intense and amazing. But yeah, they think it's very depressing.

Can we watch another one? Just one more, please. They can't control themselves to watch one. And it's interesting, some of the brand hookups that ScrewG Game has put together, like Tottenham Hotspur, they had all the guards sort of going around the Spurs stadium for photo opportunities and the large mechanical doll. Well, there's two things happening here. Most of the people listening to this would accept that Squid Game is a satire on capitalism

and a satire on people who don't have a stake in society. Is that what this show is seen as culturally or is it that cool show with the tracksuits where they play the games? And if it's that, then you can have all sorts of brand hookups and they have got all sorts of brand hookups. I think that it is quite a niche view that we are watching a satire and we're watching something about what on earth has happened to us as a society. When you get to the amount of people watching this 313 million, I think you've probably got 300 million people there. Well, has he failed then? If it's a niche view, has he failed? Because that's what he explicitly

says it is. Has he failed? I think no, because I think the only way that you do satirize capitalism is via capitalism these days. Otherwise, it's not a satire. You know, if this was a thing that he was doing, you know, to eight people in a pub in Dalston, which is possible, you could do a live squid game in Dalston, I think it'd be very different. But I think in order to make the point he wants to make, it is beholden on him to get 330 million people to watch. Otherwise, where's the satire? That's what I think. And he's clearly an extraordinary gentleman. It's unbelievable. The idea that he writes, directs and then obviously edits every single one of these is extraordinary. Each of them is an hour. I mean, in this kind of

prestige TV drama, the most you would get anyone to direct in one season is a block of three, because it's like that might be on a half hour show. Mostly people is a block of three because it's like that might be on a half hour show. Mostly people do one or two because that's like doing a feature film in itself. You need to prepare the pre-production, getting it all ready and then the edit afterwards. The idea that he does all of these is completely extraordinary. It's really sort of almost unmatched. I think that people are very very able to compartmentalize the television program and I think that with Screw Game, I think while one part of them could go, no, it's interesting,

isn't it? Because actually, if you think about it, it's sort of true. But at the same time, you go, oh my god, it was so cool when they were on the glass bridge. And that, I think, trumps the latter, trumps the former. The other thing I was interested in the sort of Netflix side of it, because I've been talking to quite a lot of different TV producers about making shows for Netflix. It's been quite interesting the way that you get notes if you're building a drama. What they'll say to you is we need to twist in episode four because the algorithm shows us that people at the end of episode four, people who are a bit iffy about it will just stop watching at that particular point. If you have those kind

of conversations with producers I'm now starting to be able to see the really clear bones of not just like how they've done it in this show, but the actual template. Obviously, if you get a note about something, you either, all notes are good in that either you say, no, this is exactly the opposite of what I'm trying to do and here's let me argue more compellingly than I obviously did on the first draft why this works. But you can't argue with this type of note because you're arguing with a computer. So it also made me realize that it's one of the many things that's made me realize that executives jobs are going. I never thought that writers jobs are going with AI. But if that if the

level of the note is the algorithm says this is what's got to happen at this point because and this is why then you don't really need someone very very highly paid to deliver that. Well interestingly I'm gonna be talking about that in our heroes and villains section in a moment. Oh are you? Okay good. Well I'm gonna hold that then in that case. The other thing just a tiny one more little point about compliance which I had a Netflix which we have talked about before because of Baby Reindeer. They spoke to that person again someone has found that person again who, because they put a real phone number in the first season, this guy was getting up to 4,000 calls a day asking to take part in the game. So that was another

compliance triumph for Netflix. But also they have now, I think, in the subsequent, they eventually painted it out. But yes. I would say despite the dystopia and despite the fact that it's perhaps becoming the thing that it was intended to satirize, I thought it was great this second season. We should have said that up the top really, because it's great TV. Iconic and it's absolutely of the age. And I think it's sort of unmissable.

I think you have to see it. Well, speaking of capitalism, Richard, should we go to some adverts? Let's do it. This is an ad from BetterHelp. This holiday season, do something for a special person in your life. You give yourself the gift of better mental health. BetterHelp Online Therapy connects you with a qualified therapist via phone, video, or

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cushions engineered for comfort and a range of colors and finishes. Dyson On Track headphones remastered. Buy from DysonCanada.ca. With ANC on, performance may vary based on environmental conditions and usage. Accessories sold separately. Welcome back everybody. Now we are going to talk about our heroes and villains of the year. 2024. Yeah of 2024. Yes. Yeah, that specific year.

Yeah, that specific year. I mean, obviously. Makes sense, right? Yeah, makes sense. We could do 2017, but that's, it 2024. Yes. That specific year. Yeah, that specific year. I mean, obviously... Makes sense, right? Yeah, makes sense. We could do 2017, but that's... it would be weird. Yes, we're not going to do preemptive ones, although I would still pick Cole Palmer. It's not even close. First of all, he is a cultural artefact who should be placed in the British Museum,

a non-looted one, which is nice. You want to put Cole Palmer in the British Museum? Not really. I want him, but he is a cultural highlight without any question. He's also got that thing, actually speaking of, he has got that thing that all celebrities dream of, that you can be just incredibly offhand and monosyllabic in an interview and instead of everyone, because you're so good at what you do, that instead of everyone hating you, they call it an art form and they love you even more. So in that sense... I should point out to 48% of our viewers Cole Palmer is a Chelsea

footballer yeah I mean he's so much more than that but he wasn't actually formally one of my cultural highlights of the year, all my heroes and villains one heroic thing we've seen in entertainment this year is the idea of like being messy people actually people have loved things like Charlie XCX the whole brat thing that whole vibe of, that I've just sort of seen described as mess. And those sort of organic stars who don't seem super polished like Chapel Row and Serena Carpenter, they're not really ordained by Vogue any longer, these people.

And they don't have these, they don't appear to have these kind of really kind of meticulous publicity machines. Their internet sort of chooses them. And I suppose my villains in contrast to those would be the people who have been really overly polished. So you see someone like J.Lo who had two films, a tour was announced. She said she launched a skincare line, claimed she'd never use Botox, cocktails line she said she didn't drink. That's sort of taking

your fans for granted and also just being too much. Katy Perry in her sort of faux feminist return, a kind of lazy attempt to resell fans what you'd sold them before, they seemed really out of time those stars and they were just, it was too much orchestration. Sense of a campaign like the Brat Summer or whatever that felt so organic and slightly chaotic just was so much more in keeping with the energy of the times. It does feel refreshing, doesn't it? I wonder sometimes how much of it is stage managed and I wonder how much of it is planned. And I actually think the truth is not a huge amount of it is. I think there is chaos involved and I think there is agency

from the stars themselves in a way that they didn't used to be. Maybe Madonna had agency, but hard to think of too many other stars of the era who did. And now, you know, Olivia Rodrigo, Sabrina Carpenter, Chappell Rowan, just like huge new star after huge new star who seem to have some level of control over their career. I mean, Sabrina Carpenter's year, I mean, she was number one for about 30 weeks. I mean, it's absolutely crazy. It's absolutely nuts what she's managed to do. We talk an awful lot about the actors and stars of things and less about the people behind the scenes. So we've talked a lot about Mr. Bates versus the post office. You know, if you look at it in a public way, you think

wonderful Toby Jones and Monica Dolan, but Polly Hill who commissioned it at ITV didn't have to. I put all these down as well, doesn't that follow you? Oh, that's good. I was gonna say, so Polly Hill and Gwyneth Hughes who wrote the thing, you know, when you look back on successes, they seem obvious. You know, you think, oh, well, of course,

Mr. Bates versus the post office is obvious. And of course you would commission a drama about the post office scandal. But it's not obvious at all. And that's, you know, when we talked about execs and what it is that they do. And sometimes the thing that they do is absolutely just get the scent of something and not let it go until they've got something on screen. And that's what Polly Hill and Gwyneth Hughes did. And I think amazing performances.

I really do agree on ICV for commissioning it and I do think that we've said before it's interesting how many of the things and there's so few dramas that have actually changed policy or changed public opinion to such an extent that policy then gets changed down the years and a lot of them have been on ITV knowing as ITV did that a drama about the British Post Office is not going to be sold to all sorts of other foreign streamers and to still go ahead with it because they just thought that it was an amazing and extraordinary story that had to be told. The people who wrote that story, Nick Wallace and covered it, Nick Wallace at BBC, Rebecca Thompson at Computer Weekly, Private Eye, those people were so overjoyed.

At no stage did they say, oh my God, I've been trying to write about this for years and this one TV drama and everything changed. They were just completely overjoyed with whatever got it over the line. And everybody involved in that story was so grateful to that drama for doing what it did. And listen, we all know that Alan Bates is a hero, but this is an entertainment podcast, so we have to nominate as our heroes the people that actually brought it to screen. Yes, yes. Absolutely, absolutely. And because it's not at all a gimme, as we say. And on a similar note, so Netflix is a very interesting place and it got to a point where Netflix suddenly had an awful lot less money and everyone was saying, oh, Netflix is going to be

in trouble. And I think Anne Mensah, who runs the UK side of drama over there, she started the year with Fool Me Once, the Harlan Coban adaptation, which was a huge worldwide hit. I mean, massive, one of the biggest shows in that in the history of Netflix She ended the year with black doves Which if you haven't watched it is terrific and in between that she had the gentleman your favorite She had one day and she had baby reindeer. She had these huge worldwide hits as one after the other That's not what you are supposed to do It is supposed to be very hard to do that. However much we talk about the algorithm and AI and Netflix shows must be a certain

thing in a certain way. You do have to have extraordinary judgment to work out that all these very, very different shows, some not based on IP at all, some based on a book, or they all come from different places, to have that level of hit rate within one year is very, very unusual. And all of those shows have extraordinary talent behind them. The gentleman I accept, you may not agree. Listen, people loved it. And I just have to accept that.

They were wrong. But Ann Mensah being across all of them, there may be a common denominator here, hit after hit after hit. And that is very, very difficult to do do as anyone who's ever made telly will tell you. Yes it is an extraordinary run. My villain has been sort of lazy puff promotion. I think we're starting to see a real sea change in how things are promoted and what's expected of people and any sort of celebrities or stars who are attached to big things who don't get the vibe right or don't look like they're really trying, there can be a big backlash.

Whereas my heroes for this, it can only be those two girls of the Wicked Press Tour because they left it all out there, Richard. I am pure unfiltered celebrity emotion. You don't feel they're trying to sell you anything other than the specific thing they're trying to sell you. It was chaos in some ways. There was a moment where a fan had photoshopped the poster so it looked exactly like the iconic one from the musical where you see that the Cynthia Rivas character, the brim of her hat obscures her face. She went absolutely nuts and said this is erasure, this is what erasure looks like. And then later I just saw her rowing it back and saying, yeah, no, I think

I should have just like WhatsApp some friends instead. But as I say, it was all out there. You didn't believe that you were getting a spiel. You just felt like for better or for worse, that was truly them. It's related to this idea of mess and authenticity. Authenticity is the key, isn't it? Yeah. And a lack of polish. A rawness that is not that unbelievably curated sort of sense of a selling machine speaking to you. Very much like our Royal Albert Hall show. Which was, which was pure...

A sense of poorly controlled chaos. Yeah. No one could have accused it of being polished my villain of the year Yeah, and there's only one possible answer one of the greatest villains in the history of British television And you know what a villain all the more so because we absolutely loved him and that's Harry from the traitors I mean what a star ever for all the people who go into that show, just go and listen, I've got a game plan. I'm actually going to ace this. And you know, you know, they fall apart so quickly. And Harry just hit the wheels never came off. If anything, he added wheels as the show went along.

And he was the coal farmer of Traitors. Yes, he really was. And the final episode with him and Molly, who now have made up, which of course, because how could you ever stay, how could you ever stay across at Harry, was one of the great portrayals in British TV history. It really was just an incredible ending. And I think really cemented the place of traitors as one of the absolute jewels of British television. One of the greatest for them of all time. It was like watching an athlete, exactly for that reason, as you say,

because people always say, I've got this and that, and actually, you know, life takes over, and it's much more complicated than you think. To be that age and to just see it through to the end, I really want to know what he does next. For a villain, can I say toxic fandoms? Because I think they've got worse. Some of the things we saw, you know,

obviously Chappell Rowan said, people have not given me any space and I can't, this is horrible. Even the studios are starting to say that it's becoming so organized that they can bury things. You know, the Star Wars fandom buried the acolyte. That episode, you know, the House of the Dragon

where two female characters kiss, that was like a huge, they were review bombed. Any non-white character in the Rings of Power, you know, you can see all these particular types of fandoms. The silent majority who loves these shows and loves these films or love whatever it is, is massive. But they are very powerful, the toxic fandoms. And it's really interesting talking to people within who are making television where they

know there's a difficult fandom. You know what they're doing now is, I was talking to someone the other day about this and I thought this is absolutely wild. They're doing testing with super super fans. They get focus groups. I know, I mean this way madness lies. I know, I know.

They get super fans to do sort of focus groups. You're having to put your talent into social media boot camps so that they know how to deal with it. And quite often you're having to take over your talents accounts when things go wrong and they just cannot deal with the barrage. Security firms to sort of counter people being doxxed. Toxic fandoms are sort of out of control and they're starting to have a big effect on the creative process and people will

actually even admit to it now although they don't want to say they'll admit to you that it's having an effect internally, but they can't say out loud because that will only make it worse. My hero in this fan area would have to be the lookalike competitions, which I keep trying to talk to you about. I love the lookalike competitions.

This is when someone will set up a prize and say, there is a $50, I don't think the price has ever been more than 50 pounds or $50, come to whichever park dressed as either, you know, Timothy Chalamet or Glenn Powell. If you think you're a lookalike or for Harry Styles or whatever it is, they almost all end up causing some sort of public order issue because there's so many people come. So someone literally says, I'll give you 50 pounds. If you look like Timothy Chalamet,

I'll give you 50 pounds if you come to the park. If the person who of all the people who come so many of them came Timothy Chalamet himself came down. That was what partially caused the public order thing Glenn Powell There's been one for Glenn Powell. Yeah, I've got him into the end of the year hero, obviously And he he's offered the beat at the winner of his a small cameo in his next movie But it what it is taken off in all sorts of cities around the world these have happened. I feel like this could be abused. Yeah, well, sadly not. It's essentially for the price of £50 you can get anyone in a city who looks like the most handsome man in the world to come and meet you in the park. The joke's on everyone, everyone

enjoys it. It's a form of live gathering and I think that's absolutely lovely. Live is great. If anyone wants to turn up to a park dressed as Timothee Chalamet in a really benign and lovely way and $50 if they're the best, then that is lovely. That is a nice fandom. How do you dress as Timothee Chalamet? Well, I mean, he's been in some movies where they have quite distinctive costumes. So if you've got a purple coat, you're halfway there, aren't you? I'm not sure I've seen a Timothy Shadamay film. What about June? Have you seen June? No, it's not my cup of tea. No I won't do that. Because it feels sci-fi and it's quite long. Yeah you won't see it's actually very good. You won't have seen Wonka, I know that. Did you see

Call Me By Your Name? Oh yes, Call Me By Your Name, that's him isn't it? He's the one who isn't the cannibal. I'm joking Armie Hammer, I know you've withdrawn from public life. Who of course is one of your Heroes of the Year. No, he's not one of my Heroes of the Year, although I did notice Armie Hammer, who you may remember had to withdraw from public life after a sort of, I want to say, cannibalism scandal, cannibalism fantasy scandal. I don't think he did actually eat anyone, but he did suggest he might like to. He's now got a podcast. I mean, like all humans in the year 2024, he's got a podcast. His mother was his second guest on his podcast.

On it, she revealed that she had recently bought him for his birthday, a vasectomy. Really? I am enjoying his slow progress back to the center of public life, Richard. So I'm not going to stick Armie Hammer down as a hero. What am I talking about? But yes, I'm looking into it right now. It's called Arnie Hammer time. I mean, stop hammer time would be more appropriate.

Tom Arnold is his first guest. Roseanne's ex husband. Yeah, the cancellation circuit. Yes, exactly. Then his mum, episode two and three, but then the Booker gets back on an absolute role and his best friend is episode four. Wow. Wow.

Well, of course, you know, the other villains and there's a whole load of them, which is the many men who have disappeared from our screens this year. And I was interested to see that Greg Wallace's replacement on Celebrity MasterChef, at least, is Grace Dent. And it feels like next year, every single job is just going to be given to a woman because why take the risk of not? It's so funny, isn't it? Because of course, for so many years, we used to hear that, you know, that women are too emotional to do these jobs.

Now I'm slightly feeling, I don't know, I just feel that men are too emotional. Their flibbertigibbit behaviour, perhaps they're not suited, perhaps they should be suited to gentler jobs. Well I think because they're hormones. Yeah, the hormones has become a thing hasn't it? It's difficult, you've got a huge amount of time for men. But I really have. Cole Palmer for sure. has become a thing hasn't it? It's difficult. You've got a huge amount of time for men but I really have. Cold Palmer for sure. Cold Palmer to present everything. No not just Cold Palmer just to continue playing for Chelsea but they're just too hormonal. You need someone strong don't you? You need someone strong. You need someone steadfast. And you know no offence to the weaker

sex, none at all and I've got a... of course there should be jobs for them in television none at all and I've got a... of course there should be jobs for them in television playing... Oh, there should be, you know, there absolutely should be some. Listen, I'm speaking as a man, in my position as a man. Oh shit, I didn't realize. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, no, don't worry about that. Like 98% of all podcasters, I am a man. There's so much in television now about how you exploit your back catal catalog and how you build up libraries of television programs which you can sell forever and ever and ever. And just financially, if I have a woman presenting a show, I know that I can sell that show forever. Whereas with a man, you never know. You never know with those guys, do you? That sometime

in five years or 10 years time, suddenly your back catalog of the castle. You could have bought a bad one. Yeah let's give the grace dents the jobs. Now we spoke about Christmas Day television last week and by the way there's some absolute crackers I thought but funnily enough New Year's Day television is the biggest TV of all so depending on when you're listening to this actually that's interesting if you listen to this a day late like it'll be a year later. And by the way you missed an incredible lineup last night on iPlayer, all of it, but you can catch up on iPlayer. On BBC One they had an incredible lineup. This is what I will be doing. 6 p.m. Gladiator's Celebrity Special. 7 p.m. there's Gavin and Stacey Dock. I will actually be

switching over to BBC Two for the first half hour to watch Richard Osmond's festive House of Games. Yeah, I like that guy. 8 p.m. first episode of The Traitors and 9 p.m. first episode of season two of SAS Rogue Heroes, which Stephen Knight wrote, which I absolutely loved. I thought it was brilliant. Keep it locked basically on BBC One on that night. But that is a huge night of television.

They've put some of their biggest things there. And I think it's quite interesting because this has now become the biggest slot of the year for everyone's broke and knackered and They're staying in as of New Year's Day Commercial spend has actually come back at this point I found fans quite intuitive talking to somebody involved in this that advertisers don't really bother advertising between the 23rd of December and the 1st of January So even they've got these big shows supposedly over Christmas, people have sort of judged to have spent all their money and not be doing anything at that point. In a funny kind of way, it's almost irresponsible to put your biggest shows on then because you want to save them for when the commercial spend is coming back in January.

All the big shows come then. Yeah and Netflix as well join in. The new Harlan Coburn Missing You comes out on New Year's Day as well. It can be two things. It can cement your place in the pantheon. So Trader's coming out on New Year's Day is the BBC saying, this is the absolute jewel in our crown. But funny enough, Rogue Heroes, which did well, but didn't go over the top, didn't go

crazily well, that suddenly it's everyone's favorite show. This is the BBC saying, no, this is the show that we absolutely believe in and we're going to stick it off the back of traitors. We're going to stick it off the back of this whole evening of great telly and everyone sort of, you know, watching this amazing stuff. And it's their way of saying, this is the show, which they did with traitors, to just knock it onto the next level of TV viewing. What it also gives you this particular slot,

it's difficult that TV is so obsessed with year on year because ITV are never gonna have that great period again where they had Mr Bates versus the post office last year. There was no major news event. And so the front page of every newspaper every day was about, oh, this post office scandal you're maybe watching a drama about on TV. So you had this constant sort of feedback loop

of promotion for that. You can strip things very easily. Stripping is when you sort of show it either every single night or in a, traitors are doing a thing where they're showing them Wednesday, Thursday, Friday of every week. It's massive for linear. And it's a reminder that these are the big shows

and they are watched far, far more than anything on streamers with the exception of Squid Game, which is as we know, Netflix's most successful show of all time it was the tenth most watched in the audience ratings that week in the UK. It's fascinating and you think it's you think it was the biggest but it's just nice every now and again for linear TV to flex its muscles and this is a day where it can really do it this is like a carnival for linear TV even ITV have got the the last season of Vera as well which has been a huge last season of Vera as well,

which has been a huge hit, brilliantly made as well. They've got that. It's just terrestrial TV just saying, you know, we're still here and you know, we can still bring in a big audience and you know, we can still make great telly. And it's worth having a little celebration of that, I think. They've got two big dramas coming up as well. ITV, they've got like a big James Norton thing, which is a kind of weird psychological thing which will be great. Martin Clunes in a kind of British Breaking Bad, I think he's a sort of farmer on the Welsh borders.

Yes please. Yes please, playing against type. Marina, you have me at Martin Clunes. He's a farmer in a British Breaking Bad, yes please. As you say, they can really make people gather around in that time because people are staying in and it just so suits the times. Tomorrow, if you'll listen to this at a proper time, all of that is coming out. Can we next week do a proper review of Traitors because I'm very excited about it?

Oh my god, I'm genuinely beside myself, yes. And I doubt it's even the last time in the series that we're talking about it. One assumes not. Hip, hip hooray for Terrestrial TV, but also Netflix dropping their new Harlan Coban, which is always an absolute harbinger of a new year and is always such an enormous hit. And this one is particularly good. I've seen the first episode and it's an absolute cracker, including literally in the first scene, Matt Wallace from Busted. What? Yeah.

Right. Playing like a disappointing date. I assume it's a cameo. I don't think he's coming back. He's very good. So recommendations. Let's just talk about our favorite thing of the year. I'm going to talk about my favorite TV show, I think. There's an awful lot of things to choose from. I'm not going to say Mr. Base versus the post office because we always say that. Rivals was amazing. Ludwig was a proper huge hit. Some great new comedy. Colum from Accounts, Alma's Not Normal. Just to give a shout out to Formats because that seems to be the bit of TV that's going away. The 1% Club goes from absolute strength to strength and gets bigger and bigger and bigger.

And The Assembly, the lovely chat show hosted just by a room of neurodiverse people. Michael Schemers was on it this year and hopefully they'll do a room of neurodiverse people with Michael Schumers on it this year and hopefully they'll do a series of that next year. But I would have to say my number one series of the year is a comedy and it's the best new sitcom I've seen for a long time is The English Teacher, the Brian Jordan Alvarez show. I am going to say something that is so completely obvious, but I do think that it is so phenomenal. The era's taught for me in so many ways to find that this year and I have to say Taylor Swift because I find it so extraordinary and she is the most sort of

relatable woman on the planet to so many women and girls who watch her and feel that she's speaking directly to them and who sang all her lyrics back at her. I think I can't really get past that in terms of a sort of cultural achievement. I don't know where she goes from here. Okay, I think that's about us, isn't it? Yeah. Happy New Year. Happy New Year. A preemptive Happy New Year to you and all of our listeners. Yeah. We'll see you next year. See you next year. The End