The Watch - Black Panther, Netflix, FX, and the State of Peak TV (Ep. 158)

Episode Date: June 12, 2017

The Ringer’s Chris Ryan and Andy Greenwald react and dissect the new teaser trailer for 'Black Panther' and the larger Marvel Universe (3:00). They also discuss Netflix’s recent cancellation of big shows like 'The Get Down,' 'Bloodline,' and 'Sense 8' (12:00), and how FX is managing its own empire with 'Fargo' as its tentpole show (23:00). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today's episode of The Watch is brought to you by Mac Weldon underwear, which BT Dubbs is definitely better than whatever you're currently wearing. Let me tell you why. They have smart design, premium fabrics, but for me, it's the simple shopping experience. Underwear is one of those things that I don't really feel the need to make appointment shopping out of. You know what I mean? Like, I don't want to go drive all the way to Grove or whatever to go pick up some new underwear. The fact that you're just able to knock this out online is amazing. And in addition to looking in front, feeling great. All Mac Weldon products are crafted with natural fibers that have built-in performance capabilities, so they work just as hard as you do. They even have a line of silver underwear and shirts that are naturally anti-microbial, which means they eliminate odor.

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I am the editor at the ringer.com and joining me in a brand new studio. He wins, Tails I Lose. It's Air Degree World. We're here, man. It's fresh. It's crispy in here. A new podcast studio. It is.

The air conditioner is flowing. It's a little chilly. Zach Mack is on the boards. Zach, as it turns out, like- Congratulations. Zach has been doing yeoman's work. Yeah.

Yeah. Our producer has been just conscripted for this incredible project that our maesters, well, the maister and the Mother of Dragons, Jason Concepcion and Mallory Rubin are doing. They're watching, rewatching all 60 episodes of Game of Thrones. And then, I believe, recording at least 60 hours per episode. Is that correct? Yeah. And then Zach goes through, it's sort of like Ken Burns' Civil War documentary.

He just boils it down. No, that's like it. I was listening to it this weekend. And if you like Game of Thrones, if you like television, if you like Jason and Mallory, which I think covers the Venn diagram of human experience. Those are all things that we like. Then you should really listen to this podcast. So it's binge mode, Game of Thrones. They're doing every episode of Game of Thrones.

There's a podcast episode dedicated to every episode leading up to the new season. It is an incredible. And season two dropped today. What great timing on my part. This is a great... I felt like I'm acting like a morning zoo DJ right now. It's a word of new time. But this is all a wonderful...

pair of tea for our own Thrones coverage, which we'll be talking about soon. Yeah. And so let's just get into it, man, because I feel like it's been, it was actually a good weekend for pop culture stuff. Yeah, that's why we're doing our Tony Awards recap show. So, dear Evan Hanson, big night. What a delightful guy. You ready to talk about that? I have no idea what I'm saying.

These are just words I read on Vulture. Okay. That's 40% of my contributions to the podcast. So here's my Friday night, right? A lot of just like Me and Juliet Littman So excited for the NBA season to end We're just like yeah

We got we got all our coverage planned We're assuming there's gonna be a historic sweep And I was really happy that Cleveland won Because it's just like it was just obvious like what the rest of the playoffs have been missing and everything Yeah, so exciting But uh you love it You know what might have won Friday night You know what might have won game four of the NBA finals

Oh I think I do know That Black Panther shit dog Yeah yeah People were pretty hype on that Yeah just like here's a good point Here's a good tip, Hollywood. Play run the jewels under your trailers. Yeah, also, just great placement, great timing.

It was cool that it wasn't just like a 10-second thing that they did like the full minute and a half jam. And we are eight months out from this movie. Yeah, yeah. So it was a surprise. I think that's kind of the, I'm trying to remember if that's, I think Star Wars does like a year out and then they'll do like more closer. But I think your point is right that this felt like more than a teaser trailer. This was like a clear out the lane because someone's about to go ISO. It was a very exciting.

And I think that I don't like to get too starry-eyed about this stuff because I think in my head, I'm very sort of cynical about the superhero industrial complex. It was just last week we were expressing that. What it is done to Hollywood and, you know, I think that they're good and bad things. But in my heart, I was kind of thinking about this because, you know, Wonder Woman didn't really drop off that much this week. is officially a phenomenon at the box office and seeing what's coming with Black Panther, I just had like a real, like, damn, you guys did it.

This is really cool. And that phase whatever we're in, not of Marvel, but of this decade-plus journey since, I guess, Iron Man or Dark Knight or whatever you want to put the first year at. The fact that it's continuing to evolve and the fact that we're getting to see different stories and different kinds of stories, even if they're the same story,

origin story, and like a confrontation. That's exactly what I wanted to say, and praise here. Like, I think that if we think about this through the prism that maybe we used to have in our music criticism days, which is there are a probably finite number of new songs,

but potentially infinite number of new singers. If you're really lucky, you get both. You get an artist in the field of music that can transcend something completely new that you haven't heard before in a completely new way. But generally, what we praise is one or the other. I've never heard a melody like that or a collision of influences like that or this point of view.

This is one that I've never heard before. I was thinking about that this morning when I was listening to the new Waxahachi album, which I'm so excited to talk about. I had to reference it, even though it's not coming out for another month. Where I was like, this album is every album you and I loved in the 90s, but I've never heard it sung by someone like

Katie Crutchfield before. And that's where we are kind of with the Blockbuster movie. industry. We spoke last week about that I thought to me the most moving, like actually. And by the way, I rarely say that these movies are moving. You know, they are efficient or they are impressive. But the opening scenes on the island of the Amazons really were moving and surprising because I just had simply never seen that before. Yeah. You see this trail. That was not on TripAdvisor. The Germans were surprised what they found there. No, exactly, I'm not going to do a Germans joke. You sure?

You could. You haven't done an accent in the new studio yet. To see this Black Panther trailer and to see just this African-American excellence in terms of performers in this movie playing these roles, looking like they're having a blast doing it with images that we haven't seen before was incredibly exciting. And I think that also speaks to something that I hope is contagious in this movie, which is it did look a little bit. I can't believe I'm saying this. was a little bit of hashtag squad goals here

because it looked like the cast that Ryan Cougler, the director assembled for this, is just outrageous. Yeah, because you know, when you think Coogler, you think circus and you think Freeman. Exactly. And you think about the two. No, but what I'm saying is

so many talented actors signed up for this. Absolutely, man. And, you know, Chadwick Bozeman is the Black Panther and was terrific in Civil War and his small, even not it wasn't small, but this is his movie. But the Michael B. Jordan shows up in a supporting villainous role. Lupita shows up. Denai Guerrera shows up. Forrest Whitaker,

Angela Bassett, shows up. Daniel Kaluuya, fresh off of Get Out, is in this movie, and we don't even know what kind of a supporting role. It's kind of exciting. Yeah, look, I think that beyond everything that you just said, that these movies are here to

stay. They're going to continue to tease these out. They've got plans probably until 2025, 2027 for a lot of these franchises and a lot of these cinematic universes. And And the real question is going to be the formal invention of the directors of the filmmakers. That's why, you know, Logan is in the top five movies that I've seen this year. Because Logan didn't deconstruct anything as much as it was just a very different feeling movie about very familiar characters and very familiar plot set up.

You know, it's essentially Terminator 2 meets a Western. And it was awesome. The same thing can go for Black Panther. I'm sure that Black Panther is going to be dealing with a lot of the same stuff that the Marvel Cinematic Universe is dealt with. I'm sure it's going to have responsibilities to the larger plot points that are being pushed forward by these movies. These movies are essentially all set up in delivery for a larger story that actually is kind of stupid. You know, like the Infinity Stones or Phenos or whatever we're building towards. It's whatever.

Who cares? It's about the movies that get you there. And that's why you can have something as delightful as an Ant-Man or something as surprising as the first Guardians or something as exciting as what Black Panther looks like. And let's also talk about when you get the wiggle room to have freedom in these movies. And the first Guardians of the Galaxy movie was a more than pleasant surprise, mainly because you had in James Gunn someone who had a very specific point of view and take on this. But also, I don't know if he wisely chose or it was just given to him something that was basically tangential to what they were building with the Avengers movies. So he didn't have to interact too closely. He could go out on his own a little bit.

Now we're finding that these major studios, or in this case, the major pipelines of this IP, of the DC universe and the Marvel universe, they got, and I don't think this is a bad thing, but they got a little bit out in front of their skis by saying, okay, we're making Black Panther and we're making Captain Marvel. This is in Marvel's case. And we're going to have an African-American director and a female director for these movies. They just said that. And then they didn't have those people fill the slots.

So Ryan Coogler coming off special. coming off of Crete had an enormous amount of leverage to take this movie or not. They really needed him to take this movie. This is the movie that David DeVorne walked away from. That's correct. They thought they had David DeVernay doing it and then she walked away and then basically after that, Cougler had all

the leverage in this and it appears that he's taken it in the best possible way in terms of he definitely was involved in saying that you wanted to run the jewels in the trailer. He rewrote this whatever screenplay they had going into it. He's probably responsible for getting Michael B. Jordan on board since they work so closely together.

And then, you know, I mentioned last week I'd done this event with the guys who did the Castle Rock studio. One of the guys was Alan Horn, who at the time was at Castle Rock, then went to Warner Brothers, and then now is the head of film for Disney. And I asked him about this movie. So he drives a car that is literally made of money. Can I tell you something? I don't want to speak out of turn. He had a very modest sedan. He is a 75-year-old man, and I feel like he's not in line getting a Tesla.

It would be really way too creepy to talk about this. Yeah. But living in Los Angeles and seeing some of the people that we see on movie screens, television screens, and then seeing them in a Hyundai Alantra. Yeah, yeah, right? I saw that happen this week. I'm not going to get too far. You want to name names?

No. But he, I asked him about it, and his, he basically said, you know, those guys, and he was like Kevin Feigy and Lou Desposito, like the Marvel machine. It's like, those guys know what they're doing. He's like, but this kid, and he was talking about Ryan Coogler, because Ryan Cougler is younger than us. He's like, he really knows what he wants and what he's doing. And he was basically saying that, you know, this is one of those circumstances where the machine was in place for someone to use or be abused by.

And he was basically making it sound like Cougler did what he wanted to do. And that we'll see. We have months to find out. But that's even separate and apart from the movie Black Panther, the idea of a young filmmaker being able to use the machinery as opposed to getting crushed by it. Any example of that is positive. And he's also, it's not like he's getting completely sucked into the machine. He's got a new movie. He's already planning with Plan B with Michael Jordan that's based off a Rachel O'Veeveh article from the New York.

Tana Hussie Coates writing it. Yeah, and it's called Wrong Answer, and it's about a standardized test cheating scandal at public schools. But it kind of sounds a little bit like quiz show or something or like a heist movie. Are there vibranium deposits in that film as well? Yeah, Josh Brolin is going to be the teet on a throne. The tag at the end of that movie. The expanded. No child left behind.

Okay, let's also talk about something else that came up over the weekend. It was the ATX festival down in Texas, which is a huge television festival. Keep waiting for you to say the Tonys. And it's a big TV festival down in Austin, and I think one of the big storylines coming out of there was a possible Northern Exposure Reunion. Is that a big storyline? I'm just telling you what I read. It seems like it's a fun festival. It seems like people are pretty chill, having a good time down there.

But there was a conversation about the sort of changing television. landscape that happened, a panel talk that featured Nick Grad from FX, who's been on the show before. Friend of the pod. And they got to talking a little bit about the recent, I guess, quote-unquote spike, because if there's none and then there's three, there's a spike of cancellations over on Netflix. And Netflix recently walked away from The Get Down, which was their epic sort of retelling of the origins of the hip-hop's origin story in the Bronx.

and since 8, which was the Rachowski siblings, sci-fi, I don't even know. Because I... Yeah. I was not personally a fan of either of those shows, although I heard that the Get Down season two got a lot better. Part two of season one. Part two of season one.

That's what it was. That's what we're doing? Okay. No, well, I mean... That's what this was. We'll get into it, but the Get Down was such an unprecedented money suck. I mean, that... And it was such a troubled production that they decided to...

split it to give them more time. Yeah. I mean, Sensei and the Get Down, according to reports, each episode cost $10 million, $10 million per episode. So that's a chunk of change. That's a lot of money. I can buy you like two Dave Chappelle specials. Honestly, I don't think he can.

But I wanted to kind of get into this idea that, this is something Nick said, they can't have 10,000 shows. And I think that, speaking of the cancellations, I think it brings them back in the ecosystem of where we're all trying to make the best shows and the best decisions. Sorry. And then someone from Hulu said, by canceling shows, it merely reached the level other networks are already operating at in terms of a bottom line.

And that if canceling shows is the phase where they are, he said, it makes sense. I wanted to talk a little bit about this, not because I'm like, well, let's fantasy draft some Netflix shows to get canceled. I could do that. As much as I was curious whether you had any thoughts about the idea of this, I feel like what's being laid, the groundwork that's being laid there is the idea that there's a Netflix bubble, right? Yeah, I mean, that's something that's been the FX party line for a while. John Landgraf, Nick's boss, has been quite public with his feud with Netflix, basically saying that we cannot be compared because they refuse to operate under any of the same rules or reality that we operate in.

And it's not just their refusal to cancel shows. And on that note, you remember Will Arnette has a show called Flaked. That's pleasant. There's some good things in it. I like Will Arnett a lot. I believe they found out that they were renewed for season two just because someone from Netflix mentioned it at a podium. Like, even they were not prepared to have a second season.

And then Netflix was like, yeah, yeah, that's going to happen. So not just in that sense, but also in the sense that they still refuse to release viewership information. So no one has any idea what they value, how they value, how things are doing, what to compare it to. Their success stories have a way of finding their way into the press. Exactly right. These stories about, and I had no reason to doubt them. since Brad Pitt's in it, but this idea that War Machine has become a modest hit. Yeah.

And there was another story that War Machine is beloved at the Pentagon. That's, that's, that's, that's, that's, you guys can finally put Dr. Strangelove away. Speaking of squad goals. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, sidebar, like, this is a season that I didn't know about here in Los Angeles, not June Gloom, but FYC, basically, that the, that the Emmys are now, right? The Emmys are now like the Oscars, basically. And so during this month, the final month of Emmy voting, their billboards, all over town reminding you of shows because they're not just reminding us, but reminding

Emmy voters specifically. And Netflix has so many shows. And obviously they're going to thumb the button a little bit harder on shows they really want nominated, but they had to at least appear to be rooting for all of them. So they rented a house and they just had events nonstop. That's an understatement to say they rented a house. What was the space? It's like a huge installation down on Wilshire where it's like it's basically Netflix

world. I mean, you go in and you see all these different exhibits that are dedicated to like the Crown and the Stranger Things and all the shows that they have. So it's pretty impressive. It's like... It's like... It's like Epcot Center but for Netflix. Especially because they really are behind... I mean, they're not really are behind. I don't want to

intuit their motives, but the Crown, Stranger Things, Master of None. These are their Emmy. Whatever. I mean, the thing that I think... Here's what... Here's what... I find interesting about this cancellation talk is that it does create a sense of urgency where I think that the Netflix model

has completely destroyed urgency. I think you and I would admit, and it has nothing to do necessarily with our television watching habits, although those have changed as well, that there has been some kind of flattening of the kind of need to watch the show the night it comes out.

Totally. Even something for, like Twin Peaks, which I have waited for, for so long, I feel okay if I miss Sunday night. I know how to avoid any spoilers that might have been attached to it. And I feel like I can get to it Monday or Tuesday. I haven't done that yet, but I have thought about that. And Netflix is very, I think that Netflix has something to do with this in the sense that there is this feeling of constant presence of television rather than the appointment viewing of television.

So if my wife watches all of Orange and New Black on a Saturday, she can do that or you can stretch it out over three months. And that the conversation about it is basically a personal one. You can go seek out recaps. You can seek out message board threads or whatever. You can have conversations with people in text message. But there's not that, like, it's Sunday is happening. We talk about it on Monday. Now that's very much coming from our perspective, but I do think it's true.

I think that if you introduce the idea that these shows might not always be there, it does change the dynamic a little bit to it. And I feel like in the last six months, I know when I talked to Justin Simeon about dear white people. I know when you think about things like, if the specter of cancellation had been hanging over bloodline earlier, I wonder what would have happened with bloodline.

Those bad people would have done worse things. Or maybe they would have stretched out the Ben Bendleston's plot line longer. It just told one story. Yeah, or just there's a lot of things that could happen to a lot of these shows if it's not, you know, you guys have to have an unmediated financial

disaster or at least like spend a lot of money without getting a lot of fans. I agree. And it is a weird divide because it is an industry issue, and I don't know how many consumers are like, thank God, I had too many choices. Sure. I do think that. But attempting to put a consumer spin on this, I remember, I'm sure everyone has gone through this, you know, sitting down, having some free time, wanting to watch something, going on to Netflix, and then struggling to find things. This is before the deluge. Back when they would have a couple movies, the movies would disappear, they had a few shows. Now, and this also could be because I just upgraded my Apple TV, so it's a different layout interface. Just a little brag there.

I opened Netflix, and it feels overwhelming to me. There are, I think, too many things there, and it's very difficult to navigate and to remember which things. And it has a very good algorithm where it tells me what sort of things I usually like. Unfortunately, I sometimes forget to toggle. If you enjoyed watching a man eat mackerel, The problem is I often forget to toggle between Mia's user and kids. I wish I could record my version of Siri for you. Listen, it's often suggesting Sophia the first back episodes.

What's up, dog, make a left. I would be fine with that. So it feels overwhelming. It feels overwhelming. And then this is also a good segue, I think, into, we want to talk about Fargo because we've been slow in keeping up with it and we're both caught up now. But also, you know, Nick Rad was down at ATX and hopefully we'll get a chance to talk to Nick about this again. But it's interesting thinking about the state of FX this year in relation to the Netflix news.

So it makes a good segue. So it makes a good segue into we want to, it makes a good segue because we want to talk about Fargo since we've been behind and we're caught up now. But I also think it's a good segue into having a larger discussion about a network like FX and how it's faring in this current climate. Yeah, let's do that discussion after a quick word from our sponsors. Today's episode of The Watch is brought to you by T.J. Miller's special meticulously ridiculous. Comedian actor and voiceover artist T.J. Miller is starring in his first HBO stand-up comedy special. The special filmed at the Paramount Theater in T.J.'s hometown of Denver, Colorado, highlights the Silicon Valley stars high energy on orthodox comedic observations on life, death, and everything in between.

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All it takes is 10 seconds and three taps and a swipe, and you're in there. So get in on these killer last minute deals and download the Hotel Tonight app now. Okay, Andy, we are back, and we're talking about Fargo, but we're also talking about FX. In a lot of ways, I think, I was thinking about this the other day, because, and we're going to get into this, because of like a lot of the, not instability, but the wild variance of FX's schedule because of things like Atlanta going away while Donald Glover makes Star Wars or makes Han Solo and Louis deciding he doesn't want to make Louis for a while, but he does want to make Horace and Pete elsewhere or whatever. Fargo is the accidental flagship show of FX, which I think is very telling for a network that probably is reorienting itself, reorienting itself to this changing television world. Yeah, I think that FX makes generally makes sterling creative decisions.

And I think that they have been among the most flexible in this, as things have changed, and thus they've really risen to the top while other networks have floundered. And I think the thing that, if you look back, the decisions that John Landgraf and his team and Nick and Eric Shrier made was that they were going to go all in on two things as there was a lot of uncertainty. They would go all in on the talent and support them

with minimal strings attached and trust their visions and trust their own sense of scheduling and what they wanted to do and what they're passionate about. And then also, be... very, very early to embrace limited series or anthology series. And that's paid off for them enormously.

You mentioned Fargo. There's also American crime story, American horror story. Yeah, I guess in some ways I always sort of forget Ryan Murphy stuff because I personally don't like it, but yeah. But your point being, it's hard, I think, for a flagship show to be a show

that is essentially a different show every year. There is So it's your point. By going all in on these sorts of shows and this sorts of talent, you are definitely going to be represented in the Emmy platform every year, which really does matter, as it turns out. But you don't really know what shows you're going to have and what the reaction to them is going to be.

You don't have that stability, that certainty of trotting out, hey, it's the gang we love. It's those crazy gangsters of the Bada Bing for another year. Sure. which was, that's my, that's basically how I describe the Sopranos. That's how everyone remembers it. Just a bunch of kooky guys hanging out of a strip joint in the pork store. Walking around the forest.

And also when you hit your wagon to this transcendental talent, transcendental talent is also often mercurial. And if you invest in it, you can't pick and choose how and when you invest in it. So the Louis deal is a great example. Like Louis sort of pioneered this, I'll do the show when I want to do it thing. And it has worked out for them because. He pioneered a couple of other things. I mean, it's sort of the next great evolutionary step of the half hour.

Of the stand-up comedian half-hour where it's like these variations on themes, but he's adding in this almost, you know, this a love letter to classic cinema. Yeah. It's filtered through his own perspective. It's very idiosyncratic. Now, he also has a larger production deal, which FX would argue, and they have argued when I've talked to them about this, is paying off in other ways. I mean, better things came from that one Mississippi, the Tignitaro show,

is an FX studio show that happens to be on. Got that baskets. It's fucking money. Amazon, they got baskets, yeah. But it also means that when you have Atlanta, which was our favorite show of last year, and had just a tremendous moment and would be so primed. I mean, it would be a huge deal if that show was coming back this summer or even this fall.

It's not coming back till next year. I think they wrote the season and then he went off to space. And I mean that both in Hans Solo and on the last Childish Gambino record. So it's sort of tough to say if FX is having, last year they had all these Emmy nominations and all this momentum. They're having a very different year this year, I would say. And part of that is because the Americans, the show that I love, that in many ways is the most, it's not traditional, but it is a drama that has the same characters every year. It is telling one story that maybe should be their most traditional flagship show.

But just when it got the Emmy attention, as I talked to Rob Harvilla about last week, I think it really faltered creatively. And then there's also Fargo. And Fargo is a really interesting case. I think the second season was a masterpiece. And I think it has just gotten better and better in my estimation since. It's just really a remarkable season of television. This season has been more of a struggle. I think we talked about that at the beginning,

that it felt a little bit stale, a little bit familiar. There were, more than that, I think it feels very, a lot of the seasons felt very small. In the other seasons, there have been characters who have come from outside of, of the Oh, You Betjo world and sort of reacted to it or spun off of it, whether they were the gangsters coming from Kansas City last year, Boeem Woodbine and what's the name?

Everybody loves Raymond, Brad Garrett. Yeah. Or even the crime family from North Dakota, who had a very different perspective and attitude from that part of the world. This year, it's really just been these few characters. And I think that's probably a creative choice to see what would happen with these few characters spinning. And yes, we have the villain of David Thuleus' villain coming in.

But it hasn't had the same effect. It hasn't had certainly the same emotional effect. And a lot of these episodes have felt very... Almost experimental. Experimental is a nice way to put it. I was going to say sour. Yeah. I think that this was the first year that I felt like the show is self-consciously Fargo, the television show,

rather than self-consciously Fargo the movie. I mean, in a way. The first season, I think, it had a lot of work to do to get out from under the Cohen Brothers, and it did that successfully, largely, I think, on the performance of Billy Bob Thornton. But it was a really cool season that got better and better and better as it went along. As it got more confidence in its own ability to be in some way separate. Yeah. And then in the second season, I felt like just from jump,

it just had such an incredible, charismatic cast, and told such a very small yet big story. And this is sort of what you're talking about is like racking focus down to these granular things, these granular stories. But balancing an epic crime story with a family story with this sort of more deeply philosophical, weird stuff that Noah does, season two was the most perfect balance of that

that I think he struck in the three seasons of Fargo, Legion, everything else. this season felt way too fargo to me you know what I mean like the the the Carrie Coon character Carrie Coon's an incredible actress but felt like another like I don't know why if you have all this creative freedom and you have you can do all sorts of different stuff season two showed us that that you needed another ultimately really good cop yes yeah and another devil character from out of town who arrives and another group of bumbling it idiots who get destroyed by their own greed.

Well, I think there's also, the difference between two and three, there's really not much warmth here at all on the show, certainly not in the surroundings. Last year, it's fun when shows make us empathize with unlikely characters. And we meet Kirsten Dunst and she's sort of a mess and she runs over someone with her carb. But her performance and the character ultimately a triumph of sort of this ferocious individual. who has been trapped and we come to feel for her.

And the Denson Wilson-Molati triangle really was like the heartbeat of that show. The family, you know, in that, or even though the other version of the family, Gene Smart character is this matriarch, it was much more about family. And this season,

and then the other thing you get when you cast Ted Danson in that role is you get all the TV part of it. And I mean that in the best possible way. There is no one on TV easier to love and root for than Ted Dantson. I'll obviously forget the first season of damages, but yes. Or whatever the second season of damages.

When he was indulging in a Coke orgy, in a believe a sports car, a van or something, yeah. I was like, I feel for this guy. This season, and this is why I kind of think Carrie Coon may have been miscast, which is a crazy thing to say. If you tell her that she's playing a dogged small town policewoman, she's going to play the shit out of that. You know what I mean?

she's going to tear, she's going to sink her teeth into it and play that part. But what she doesn't bring, and this is what made her so incredible in the leftovers, is she doesn't, she's not going to give you extra warmth. She's not going to bring you into her world in that way. She's going to play someone who is ferocious as a person. She's not going to give that extra 10% of TV like, well, it's been tough being a single mom, which is amazing. And it's what makes her such a strong actor.

But if Noah's not going to write that extra 10%, and she's not going to play it, then we lack it. Right. There's also something here that's been happening. So the last week's episode, the eighth episode. Which I think was easily the best episode of the season. And was actually one of the best episodes of TV that I've seen this year. I thought it was really excellent and just really weird.

And it was really weird. I don't know if it was conscious or not, but the whole opening sequence reminded me a lot of this really awesome horror movie that came out a few years ago called You're Next with the animal masks and the sort of hunting people. It was just awesome. But I think one of the things I noticed about that episode was that the way it started with the car crash, with the bus crash. A lot of the times on Fargo, I feel like you'll get to the end of an episode, imagine it like a dial, like a toaster oven that you turn the dial on and it heats all the way up. And then like if your toast isn't done, you just keep it going. I felt like Fargo episodes always started a little too cold and the season started a little too cold.

and I knew immediately how long it was going to take to heat up. And even though it's a limited, it's an anthology series in which they are not necessarily related to the season before, the episode before, I mean, there was obviously an episodic storytelling. But I feel like too often these episodes were starting at zero rather than at 40 or wherever we left off. You know, I was going back to some colder climate. And this was the first episode where I felt like this propulsion of, yeah,

Yeah, like this is all, what is happening, man. Well, look what he pulled off in this episode, and this is the nature of how we tell stories on television now, that it, you know, we're often kept on our heels in terms of what to expect week to week. This week had a phenomenal action set piece. Yes. And it's like, we've gotten a little bit cynical about those because we see them all the time now in TV. But that was awesome. It was gripping. It was thrilling.

It was visceral. It was terrific. Mary Elizabeth Winstead is the MVP of the season. She was so good on this. She's been great the whole season. She is just, she's, she's terrific. And she's chained to Mr. Wrench, who we haven't seen since season one, except as a boy in season two,

because he's the only character who's been in all three thus far. So we go from that high to then an equal high, but a very different one, in the bowling alley, where we get the other thing that this show can do, which is surreality, quasi-spiritual metaphysicality. I mean, it was... A lot of storytelling.

A lot of storytelling, but a brilliant set design, incredible framing, incredible direction. And then in Ray Wise, who by the way is having a hell of a year. Ray Wise, just one of those actors... Wise Thuleus 2020. He gets forgotten and then gets brought back. And it's like, oh, okay, yeah, you're terrific at this. And what I've thought to cast Leland Palmer as the Wandering Jew?

You know, I wouldn't, but that's why I'm not running a show. Like Fargo. I loved that scene. I loved everything about it. It made me excited to be watching TV again. And it's, you know, I hope people listening to this can understand that this is just what this job is for us now of unpacking this stuff, where the Fargo project is fascinating. And when it dips, we can be frustrated with it. But I do think that the imperfection of television demands that we're going to have those dips if we're going to get these highs.

There were long sections in the middle where of the first, you know, seven episodes, I just could have done without it. There's something like the Peter and the Wolf phrasing at the beginning of, I think, the third episode is that's so clever. But I wasn't ready for clever because I didn't feel anything yet. There's a lot of... There's Varga being bulimic. Yeah. There's a lot of experiment. Okay.

You could be unkind and say there's a lot of showing of the work. And then you could be kind and say, I really admire... the feeling of trying shit. Yeah. But you get to the point where you're like, do we need to see you try shit? Like, would this have benefited from a longer runway where you're like, yeah, I wrote this Peter and the Wolf,

I wrote this Varga, the guy that doesn't believe it. Like, you know what, maybe this doesn't work. But here's the thing. This is the world we're in. This is the world that FX has helped create. Yeah, which is that if you empower a guy, and in this case it's Noah, if you empower him to say there's going to be a UFO in the middle of the shootout,

and that's what's going to turn the tide of what's going on. And you say, okay, go do it. Then when he says, I'm going to do Peter and the Wolf at the beginning of episode three or whatever other choice we weren't really feeling, you can't then say, are you sure about that? Right. You got to ride with the horses that you've invested in here. And having worked with him, I know that that's how he operates.

He has a feeling, and his gut feelings have given us. moments of sublime television that we haven't seen from anyone else. All of this is a part of this conversation is to say, obviously we're going to finish the season and see where we end up. But it's tough to characterize this season as anything but lesser than the second, which is fine. That happens. But it's been interesting to note that Noah has said it to me, and he said it not on a microphone, and he said it at this ATX festival,

that this might be the last season of Fargo that he does. That could be like a Louis this is the last season, meaning he's going to wait a while. or this really could be it. And I have mixed feelings about it, but I kind of think that might be the right call. You always want things to go out at their greatest, in some ways, if they're going to go out,

like go out with the greatest memory of it. And there are definitely going to be pieces, I was going to say, six months from now. They'll be six weeks from now saying that the third season is loki, the greatest season, and here's why. But there might not be more there in this vein. And there certainly are ways, I mean,

there are other avenues to express unique storytelling. What's the point of having these anthology limited series is if we're also going to be like they have to have the same lifespan as these 10-year network series? I mean, I respect it. You know, and if he feels like he's told the three stories that he wants to tell here, that's fine. I think obviously, like, there is a literal Fargo sequel of the movie that is like on the, that's waiting to be told to some extent.

Yeah. I don't know in what, you know, you bring McMorman back, you know, like you do it. But I don't think, don't know that she would ever cross her actual husband and go make that movie. I'm going to go ahead and say probably not. Can we sidebar one thing on this conversation? Yeah, sure. Maybe this is a longer podcast, but I have a lot of questions about you and McGregor. Because I'm trying to think of someone who is more, who is that talented.

That generally liked by, I believe by most audiences. at least by critics, certainly by filmmakers. That creative, he likes taking chances and doing things, and that conventionally matinee idol, handsome, like he could be a movie star, who always kind of seems to get the... Hit 280?

Yes, the B-minus. When he takes his big bets, and we've said versions of this conversation with Colin Farrell, but he's a very different type, and he never was quite as famous and certainly struggled in other ways. When Ewan McGregor takes his swings is big swings, it kind of doesn't work. Now, these are the kind of swings that you're

like, okay, you should, those are worth taking. But how come it never quite works out for him? I think the casting is an interesting, you know, Thulis has been the standout performer for me this year, but I think that, at Winstead too, but I wonder what would have happened if the Carrie Coon and the two McGregors were different characters, we're actors. Nothing against either of those people who've done work in the past that I've adored. But I think that they're, if we're talking about it when you get to the idea that there is a coldness

and I know that you're like she's doing the best she can with the material she has and I agree with you but you have to wonder how the material might have been different if it was a different actor so who knows

I want to get quickly because we have to wrap things of soon before we end what is your best Ewan McGregor like because Eume McGregor he keeps going man my best Ewanerger

is still the shallow grave terrain spotting early run and then I really do like him and Ghost Rider he's quite good in that almost because it plays into a kind of catish loser vibe that isn't so extreme where he's defacing himself

the way he is in Fargo, but it has like a kind of like, this is a guy who never really was able to put it all together. You're talking about Ghost Rider or Ghost Rider 2? Ghost Rider 2, where he just did the voice of Nicholas Cage. No, it's Ghost Writer. It's a Plainsky movie. And then he's low-key, very good, and I've decided I'm just going to mention this movie as much as possible because I love it so much.

He is very good in Haywire. Oh, yeah. I love that movie. And he's really good in ensembles, I think. I think he's great in, like, coming off the bench and throwing a couple setup in it. Because I'm watching him in Fargo, and he came to play. You know what I mean? Oh, yeah, and he sells it. He's down. He's like, let's thin the hair. Let's go for it. Let's get

me the Sean Penn Carlito's way hair. I just don't get the character, and I don't have sympathy for this character, and yet he's sort of become a sympathetic figure. Yeah, it's just a little too cute. The fact that this is about stamps and parking lots. I think I'm just like, who gives you shit? You know what I mean?

A lot of people have been asking who gives a shit about Dougie Jones. Oh, yeah. And I don't want to, we can do a bigger peaks look when I think peaks rolls forward a little bit. But if Fargo kind of, and I talked a little bit about like the

temperature going up and down in Fargo and how it was hard to adjust, I don't really have that same feeling about Twin Peaks, even though it was literally I've literally spent three hours of my life now watching Kyle McLaughlin in a Oversized green jacket staring at statues. So good. And yet I am, I'm still pot committed, man.

I'm still here. And, you know, the Laura Dern cameo is incredible. What an incredible moment. Even the things where you're just like, is this bad? Like the public service announcement traffic accident scene from last night. I have some thoughts about that. So let me hear them. I continue to believe strongly with enormous passion and joy in my heart that this show is transcendent.

is incredible, is the highlight of my week in many ways. Jim Pano Wozik, the New York Times TV critic, who is a great guy, and I respect enormously, tweeted that he thought this was the first time, was a little boring. I countered that I would watch just the adventures of Dougie and Janie E. for 18 hours. Did you counter that on Twitter, or did you just say that when you read the tweet? I don't want to say because Sean Fantasy, our friend, doesn't like it

when we reference tweets we've made. Oh, okay. But I made that tweet, dog. Okay. There is such, like the original Twin Peaks, there is such high and low in terms of emotion, in terms of... Camp. Yeah. Camp.

Kyle McLaughlin is delivering a performance in clowning for the ages. I mean, I'm serious. I actually don't like clowns. Me either. I'm not scared of them, but I actually think they're just like... That sounds like someone who's scared of him. No, I just mean in terms of his... Clowns feels like something that we could leave behind.

Okay, but you're talking about like... grease paint on the face. I mean in the traditional theater sense. Yeah, but even like in that sense, I'm like kind of like, he's great. But you're loving it. He's great. You're loving it. Naomi Watts is at 100.

Yeah. Okay. When she first shut up in this role, I was like, this seems like a weird use of Naomi Watts. She's such a good actress because you can tell she has, like, what are the chances that he was like, here's what Dougie, because I saw somebody was talking today. Oh, Adam Neiman was saying that Watts's performance is filling in all the blanks on who Dougie is. And I was like, that's incredible.

I'm pretty sure David Lynch did not tell her that, though. She is such a phenomenon, and you see this in everything that she does. You don't need to tell her much, and she will go to 100. You know, that's what's totally unique about her as an actor. And she's so much fun to watch. Look, I'm not in any hurry because it's coming. You know, even the one-arm man was just like, you have to wake up. And like, okay, this is fine, guys.

This is fine. Maybe people would feel different if they were been. it if this was Netflix. But I like that we're waiting. I like what we're getting. I like that we saw Diane. I mean, who knew we were going to ever see his secretary? She would look like that, and it would be Laura Dern.

The other aspects of this episode were deeply traumatizing and discomforting in a way that only David Lynch can do. And yes, I'm talking about Ike the Spike, the little person with the Ice Pick. That was fucked up. That was so awful to watch and visceral. and what he's doing is he said, like, okay, so this guy's going to murder someone. Okay, here's a murder. You know, the camera isn't flinching.

It's not being cute. It's not fading away. We saw that. Similarly, he sets us up with a mother and son playing beautifully, and then the son is killed, and it's horrific. And then what happens is the camera pulls the emergency break in parks, and we are still there. And it reminded me of Sarah Palmer and the pilot screaming over the loss of her daughter.

This has always been a part of it. But I also can't help. like the five extras that they got to do the reaction. I wanted to talk about that. They were like, damn. It was a little bit like the leftovers, which also began with a child disappearing from a car. So I thought of that and the trauma of that scene. But what I also thought of, and let me tell you, David Lynch does not intend this.

He does not think about this at all. I can confirm this from every interview he's ever done and just every piece of work he's ever done. But it's hard not to watch this with a meta sensibility about what TV is and what TV does now. And we talked about that in the premiere of Twin Peaks to return with the glass box, someone waiting for something to happen and what happens is horrific. This reminded me a little bit of that, which is we watch a lot of shows about people dying. There's a whole genre of British shows about women and children dying. The bad news relay of which is basically like a thing that happens a lot on British crime shows where there's like a 10 minute sequence of people finding out someone's been killed. And that came from Twin Peaks probably in a lot of ways.

It was influenced by. This one for me was we saw people watch. This was a spectator event. And all the people who watched this truly horrific act, no one did anything. They all just watched in various ways. And the ways they watched, I think what you were alluding to is didn't seem that it was all internal. Yeah. And that's kind of what we do with television.

I just feel like it had the, I mean, I think that it's more likely that David Lynch has watched bad driving PSAs than it is that he, you know what I mean? Like British television. and it feels like it felt like an interesting piece of pastiche, but also like I could see why somebody who isn't as emotionally committed to Twin Peaks might be like, what the fuck is going on? I was so, that was a moment where I started to, it almost pushed me off. For a minute I was like, I can't handle this. I can't handle kids being heard ever.

But it was so traumatic. But this is what David Lynch does that other filmmakers don't, which is he will give you the raw, uncut emotion, and you may be discomfited by it. You may find it to be corny or whatever. But there it is, man. It's right there. It's going to last longer than makes you comfortable.

And then Harry Dean Stanton, 90-year-old Harry Dean Stanton is going to walk over and talk about it. I have one Twin Peaks scholar question for you. So what is the gold thing floating in the air? I have no idea. Oh, I thought that was a thing. Like, that's not. Doesn't that get zeroed in? Like, doesn't somebody in the lodge get zeroed into some?

I assume that was a soul leaving the body. But it's also like showing up on the papers that Dougie is circling. those ladders and things. I have no idea. Maybe someone who is more scholarly than I can control. Hit us up if you know at the watch pod. But there were two things that were throwbacks, old Twin Peaks in this,

and one was the light turning red, the traffic light turning red, which would often happen right before Bob would show up or something spiritual would happen. And then the other thing was the focus on the telephone wires. Yeah, well, that's been a big motif this year, is like the idea of this electricity and yeah. But seeing that, I have to say, he challenged me because I'm watching that.

And I'm like, okay, so Harry Dean Stanton is now going to bring this boy back to life by giving up his soul or something. Like I was already gaming out a pedestrian version of Twin Peaks that David Lynch would never make. Right. But no. Right. The moral of this is you're not going to get what you want, man. You better just strap in and watch what you get. All right.

Next Monday. So this Thursday, probably I do a special. You may not be here for that. It might do a ringer recommends. That's what makes it special. Come on. You know how I feel about you. Next Monday, we'll talk a little bit, probably about Peks.

Maybe we'll talk a little bit about next week's Fargo or whatever. But we're going to do kind of our version. Preacher's coming back, too. Oh, Preacher's coming back, and I'm excited about that. But we'll probably do our version of Manola Dargis and Tony Scott's list from the New York Times this weekend of the 25 best movies of the century. So far. So far. First of all, everyone checked.

that out. It's just a fascinating exercise. It's really interesting. My mom, livid about that. What did she want on there? Just started calling and just ranting about Renata Adler and Pauline Kale to me this morning. I was just like, Mom, it's way too early in California for this. This is what happens when people make lists, but it was an exciting, worthy, not necessarily right, but a worthy exercise. Yeah, absolutely.

And you and I, cinefiles from way back. My mom's point was that there need to be more populist entertainment about that in that list. Yes, I'm not surprised. Let's see if my mom's right. All right. Until then, uh, great to see you. Great job, Baransky. Great new studio, Baranski.

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