The Watch - Breaking Down ‘Watchmen’ Episode 6, ‘The Mandalorian’ Episode 3, and the Rest of ‘The Crown’ Season 3 | The Watch

Episode Date: November 25, 2019

We break down another mind-bending episode of ‘Watchmen,’ a show that’s leaving it all on the field (1:00). Do we like talking about ‘The Mandalorian,’ or do we just like talking about Baby Yoda GIFs (35:25)? Plus: Daddington Corner, ‘Frozen 2’ edition (51:00) and ‘The Crown’ S3E8-10 (59:32). Hosts: Chris Ryan and Andy Greenwald Guest: Amanda Dobbins Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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and then play music or news or even play this podcast right where you left off. A little help pans free just say, hey Google, to get started. I ain't sports to have to clear the room. Stand up and walk now. Hello and welcome to The Watch. My name is Chris Ryan. I am an editor at the ringer.com and joining me in the studio, ODing off that nostalgia.

It's Andy Green World. Buddy, our generation, we don't need a prescription for that. We have plenty of prescriptions. We, that's also true. Obviously, we're going to talk about the big shows that we talk about. Yeah, Watchmen and Mandalorian. Mando. Greenwald, great to see you, man.

Nice to see you, buddy. I was kind of Odeeing on nostalgia this weekend. I was back in the old storage space. Do you have one? Finding a box, we have a shed behind the house. I mean, I usually don't let guests in there unless there. Like in the looking glass way? Not the looking glass way, but are you familiar with Blumhouse pictures?

Yeah, I'm familiar. Do you ever watch Storage Wars? No. That shit. Is there a Blumhouse-produced version of that? No. That's a good idea, though. We should erase that and pitch it.

My point being, I found a big box of cassette tapes. And so, well, okay, let me write it back. This is where we are now, Chris, at our life, in our life cycle on Earth. Parts of our life, like times we remember, are now history and are being, like, mined for content. And so there is a document. Like the early tens. Well, not, I mean, now we're. we're talking like turn of the century stuff.

There's a documentary being made about that era, and they reached out to me for some like archival materials. Wow. From our life as music people. And I was like, yeah, I might have some of those interviews. And what was funny, there's a lot of funny things about it, but one of the funny things was is that I knew I had a big box of tapes that came with me from New York. For music stuff, or do they think you have like Condoleezza Rice tapes?

No, no. Condi and I were very, very respectful of each other. no recording devices. Okay. And I knew I brought a box of cassettes from New York when we moved. But I also clearly thought I was a completely different person 20 years ago because I was like, and I'm sure I labeled them all after I finished the interviews. So it's just a bunch of blank tapes?

They're not blank. It's just blankly labeled. Yeah, it's just like 75 maxels, a quarter of which have like my chemical romance, Milano 2006, sprawled across the front. but I did I did find a couple that were relevant and I found a couple that may you know like when you find things and I actually I hope we get to talk to Chris again soon but when you find things that say like Chris Karaba tape six Chris just came in and did Ring Room I heard and I missed it it's terrible but um tape six yeah right there's a lot of in-depth cross Nixon over here but I did find a couple things that I thought were notable one was a bunch of DJ Greenland Lantern and DJ Clue tapes that I 100% bought at that weird outdoor market next to Tower Records on Broadway and 8th Street. Oh, yeah.

There was one tape guy in the back there. I used to like, I mean, I used to sell mixed tapes at Kim's, but my mixtape spot was on 14th and 6th. 14th. Yeah, I think 14th and 6th. I wonder, because there was a moment when we thought that mixtapes, and by mixtapes, we mean like. Rap mixtap.

Yeah. That somehow the internet was going to make. them a thing, right? Like every, because there was a moment, like datpiff.com and like, rappers were releasing new tapes with remixes and things and was like, instead of having to go to Canal Street or that one

kiosk in the Cherry Hill Mall that you and I frequented on occasion. Sure. They were suddenly everywhere, but then I guess it all fell off because then everything became a mix tape. There was that. There was the DJ drama arrest, which I think changed the dynamic. I was big because you were working at the record store still then, right? So there was like a whole

thing where the FBI and the R-A-A. Chris, did you flip on DJ Drama? Are we talking about this on this podcast? It's not. Why do you think I'm stuck on this podcast? Because I never flipped. That's right.

I'll let you know this. On Storage Wars, there's this guy, there's a, I assume he's still on it. This dude named Dave, rotund, but very excellent storage locker purchaser. Yeah, they basically, like, they open up a bunch of storage, like, lockers. You can see into it for a few minutes, and then you start to bid on the items inside. Okay. I'm sorry to be that guy who last. week needs Kaya to explain a meme to him, and this week needs you to explain a very popular

long-running television show. Yeah. Storage wars. Is the idea here that the owners have been delinquent in paying for their storage? It could be that they have passed away. It could be that they are delinquent. It could be in any number of things. But either way, a very familiar group of people come every week, every episode to bid on

these things. And this guy, Dave, his style of bidding during the auctions, is to go, yeah! When he wants to, like... He wants that? When he wants it, yeah. Do you think that we're... He's at the Rose Bowl flea market, I think. If my storage shed door were to be, like, teasingly open momentarily,

and Dave just caught a whiff of the... Of Milano 6, MCR? Of Milano 6, the 30-year-old decaying Model United Nations certificates of commendation. Not even, like, you won Model U.N. But, like, thanks for playing. Participation trope. Do you, Spain? Is that who you were?

Once. Have you been keeping up on Spanish politics? Just slow down. This isn't the DJ drama trial. You don't need to offer up everything within the first moment. The seven issues of the Kid Rock covered December 1999 issue of spin or whatever. I definitely have multiple copies of the issue that had my first printed piece, which was a capsule film review of the movie Stigmata starring Patricia Arquette.

I remember that. That's my first ever What's your first published byline? And I'm not, while you think about it, I will say that late. Well, the first stuff that it was ever in print was in hitter quit at Zine, I think. Right. And then I think it was the voice. Yeah, it was probably the voice. I think it was the voice. What was the piece, do you remember? What was an early piece?

What was an early mind grape squeeze from your vineyard? I think it was a review of this band party of helicopters. But I'm not positive. Listen. No one. And then I wrote it. And then I wrote like a 300 word review for Dolan and Spen. No one has ever caped up for anything harder than circa 99,000 Chris Ryan capped up for a band called Party of Helicopters. Yeah, they're fucking amazing. You love that band.

I still love that band. You put them on everything. It was great. Yeah, Shugay's Black Metal from Kent, Ohio. Is everything you ever needed? Yeah. That's great. Let's talk about Watchmen.

Okay. You don't want to know about more like... Oh, wait. Do you want to tell me more about your weekend? I think we should end. I think we should end with that because as many people know, many other Mommingtons and Daddingtons in our audience. No.

Is Mommington, were we expanding? I feel like we should open up the tent. This is your business. What, parenthood? Yeah, this is your quarter. I went to the movies for the first time in half a year, I would say. What was the theater experience like? You sound so interested.

Because I knew you went at like 10 a.m. right? Yeah, I saw 10 a.m. F2, baby. 10 a.m. F2 judgment day. Do you want to lead with this? No. You want to stay. it. I think you should save it because I've already started this podcast with a one-sided

rant and I feel like I should end it. Okay. That way too. Yep. Kaya, can we get the Dave from Storage Wars sound board? But with Chernobyl music playing over it. Kai, do you watch Storage Wars? I think I've caught an episode of Storage Wars before.

That's why she's the best. Did you make mixtapes in 1999? I was three, so no. Cool. Great. A bracing slap of reality. What an episode of. Watchman last name.

It was great. It's tough sometimes with this show in particular because it feels like every episode of Watchman is a very special episode of Watchman. Without any inside information, and we are going to be speaking to Damon at some point in the coming weeks, I hope, they really are leaving all of it on the table. They're leaving it all in the field. And it's kind of like, it's hard to imagine another season at this sustained high fever pitch level.

So I kind of do wonder whether some of the stuff that he had been saying, earlier about I'm not going to do another one of these. Like if they want to keep doing it, God bless them. But they are really like going for broke here. There's nothing in it that suggests they're planning to make more so far. That said, you can look at it one of two ways. I was watching last night and just marveling over the depth of the story, the richness of this take on the material, the pleasure I was getting from watching it.

and just I find it I'm almost pre-frustrated that there aren't more and I know that it runs against almost everything I've ever argued for I think that it's far, far better to leave people...

I was deeply annoyed that there are only three left. Is that really true? Three left? Yeah, there's nine episodes in the first season. I'm sure that given the way that people are responding that there will be a conversation

about doing more. But I think that's better to focus on the point you're making, which is he's putting everything into this one. Mm-hmm. And I feel like not only that, I feel like he's putting everything he has to say about pop culture into this one.

Yeah. And American culture and American history into this one. Well, let's just... Him and shout to Cord Jefferson, who co-wrote last night's episode, and it was just a tour of force, you know? I mean, I had a couple of people around the office who had seen the episode already and were using phrases like the best thing I've ever seen. Wow.

And so I... Did you tell them about storage wars? I was like, there's this one where they go to Gardena. Oh, that's a hotbed. And they find these old rings. Go, go on. It turns out that worth $4. You go ahead.

What do you think? Well, I mean, I just think what's amazing about this, what you're talking about saying everything there's to say about it, in episode six of the perhaps only season of Watchmen, Damon, with the help of amazing collaborators, obviously the actors, director Stephen Williams, who did a phenomenal, phenomenal job. This was one of the best directed hours of TV I've seen in a long time. And Core Jefferson, who wrote it with Damon, just sort of casually dirt off your shoulder

reinvented the American superhero and what it would mean to be a superhero. And I'll say this. Not to make this Dattington Corner again, but my older daughter is very interested in superheroes and comic books. and often ask me to tell her the real story of Spider-Man. Of Hernd Justice? Well, that's going to get dicey. No, but like the real, real story of Batman or Spider-Man or whatever, like the origin stories, you know, tell me about, so Peter Parker, what happened?

Why, why, you know, what, how did the robber kill his uncle Ben? I'm like, well, this is getting... Did she actually ask this kind of question? She does. And she wanted to know about Superman. And I actually, before seeing this episode of Watchman, was, I was like, she's older now. like maybe we can discuss things like metaphor, you know, or the larger context behind it, because she was also reading some books that were dealing with heavier themes about World War II.

And like, she has a story about a girl in France or in the occupation who hid a Jewish girl in the house. And so she's understanding a lot of this stuff. And I was saying, you know, one of the interesting things about Superman is who the people who made Superman in the moment that Superman was created. And Superman was created by two Jewish men in the shadow of World War II and Nazism. and the idea of being forced to flee a place that was going to be destroyed and carrying with you certain knowledge or power abilities that had to be hidden, but also the promise of America and being reinvented in America and the heartland and being loved there and appreciated,

but still having to live a double life and blah, blah, blah. And for me, that's one of the most interesting things about the myth of Superman, and that's built into it. So you take those ideas that a lot of the early superheroes were created by post-World War II, often Jewish creators and then taking it so Damon looks at this and says well in 2019 what do we want to say

about this and the idea of someone why would you need to put on a mask to beat up bad guys it's because people couldn't handle who you really were right and it's so simple and obviously it was foreshadowed in the Bass Reef stuff in the first episode but the thing that I marvel over with the show in general

is it's so naughty and it's so dense and it's so complicated and I don't just mean this story itself, and I don't, and I don't just mean the ways that he and his collaborators have chosen to tell the story across these nine episodes. But obviously, the subject matter itself is so outrageously loaded and heavy. But there was, when it comes right down to it, and this is the, this is the marvel of the show to me, no pun intended whatsoever, is that at the end of it, after I ended watching this episode, it felt elegant and simple. And it was there all along. And I think that that's a testament to really remarkable writing for the screen.

Yeah, I look at these episodes as essentially essays. You know, essays on a variety of topics, whether they're about, you know, whether or not they're about national shame and trauma, or they're about origin stories and how we get shaped by the things that are around us. And also riffs and essays about our obsession with superheroes, our obsession with comic books, our obsessions with building out stories to replace reality. all these things that we that are really in the front of our minds right now, you can get away with that kind of writing and that kind of work when you have characters and writing and performances that are this personable and this humane.

And even throughout a very complicated, convoluted sort of setup throughout this last episode, you still have these incredibly human performances by Yovina Dapo and Regina King and everybody else who is in the episode. So I'm just really impressed with the way that they managed to balance, the left brain, right brain and stuff. Yeah. And that's one of the hardest things to do.

I think you can get really lost in the sauce when you're out there and you're just like, here's like, I really want to like subvert. I really want to surprise and shock. But it's still like a very affecting story. It's still a really affecting story. Think about, I mean, this episode was what? It was 50-some minutes.

What I think of when I watch it is all of the decisions made. I mean, on a larger level, like, how are you going to tell this story? Which memories are you going to choose to highlight? Because obviously, you're dealing with the memory pills of a man who is well over 100 years old. So there are decades not addressed. So you have to pick your spots there. You have to pick how you want to bring in the current circumstances, how much time to give to Lori shouting at her or Cal reading a letter or whatever happens at the end with Lady True.

and then you also have to decide which I'm just I'm marveling over for example the reveal that his wife is the baby is the baby who is rescued swaddling an American flag swaddled an American flag and because of that there's left it doesn't need to be said all the levels of connection between these two people these two orphans from this horrific massacre and that in and of itself is enough But then if you keep poking at it and you consider it in the light of other aspects of the story, the fact that he is closeted, that he's also pursuing, he's wearing a number of masks, let's say, throughout his life and throughout the episode. What happens to their relationship? Like, you can look at it all of it as a straight line story. He can't stop beating up people so she leaves.

But also, what is the trauma that bound them together originally? What is the, what connects them going forward and how tenable is that? there are all these levels to each relationship. The commanding officer, the commanding black officer who shakes his hand after the other one doesn't, is based on a real historical figure, the first black man to achieve that rank in the NYPD. So again, we have this overlapping narrative of true and not true, and not in a way to say one is better than the other, but to say, like, the truth is in some ways highlighted or cast in a different light

with the strength of the what-if surrounding it. all the time put into dreaming up a enormous comic bookie one can even say that conspiracy theory involving an evil enterprise with code word

cyclops but it's actually the clan there's real evil behind that that was I think that was one of my favorite parts was the turn when when Captain Metropolis interrupts Hood of Justice at the press conference to be like we're going to go fight the Mollock with

his sudden ray that's going to, you know, because that sounds fantastical, as does the idea that there's a secret cabal of guys who are mesmerizing the black communities in these different cities. But is it any less fantastical than people riding around on horses and white hoods or cops, you know, protecting racists in the streets of New York City? I wanted to share, there's a tweet, Victor Luckerson, who used to work at the ringer and has written a lot about the Black Wall Street massacre. He had a couple of tweets last night that I wanted to share.

One was, Watchman has become a pretty fascinating commentary on the muddled ground between history and mythology. Watching it feels like being online and trying to figure out what really happened during a major historical event, the pop cultural ephemera and the facts have used into one. And that's what, that whole Captain Metropolis, Molek, Cyclops, KKK,

that sort of melange of, like, Like, is this real? This isn't real. This is sci-fi, but isn't this crazier than sci-fi? I really thought that's where this episode was at its best in a lot of ways. And I think for people who continue to think that this show isn't worthy of the mantle of the comic book Watchman or Valen Moore's idea, I mean, to me, one of the most profoundly fascinating things. And I think the thing that radically changed my imagination and the imagination of many people who went on to make comic books, let alone read them, is this idea of what are we doing people in masks, people in masks, when there is real. evil. And so

one of the most radical questions asked in the original watchmen, or at least scenarios presented, is that if there was someone who was truly superhuman, you could just use him to stop a war. You know, you could just send Or start one. Yeah, you could send Dr. Manhattan to Vietnam, and then that's over.

The the idea of this power being real and then put towards real politic is truly terrifying and fascinating, right? And so that's what this episode was, that's the this episode is picking up on to me, which is, why are these people with masks just punching other people with masks? Why aren't they punching the rot that exists in everyone for real,

the true evil, right? Which is this systemic racism. I mean, there are many other evils to punch at. This is the one that the show is focusing on with a really, really fascinating level of clarity and curiosity. Yeah. And then you're talking about it as whether or not it's a true adaptation or whether or not it sort of is working in concert with the original text. The original text itself was such a crazy grab bag of all these different source materials. You know, like the Black Freighter, the pirate story that's in it, a lot of the stuff, like the journals of Roershack, like it itself was an intertextual piece of pop culture anyway. So to watch Damon sort of play around in that same way with Black and White and White,

White Silent Films, newspaper headlines, gossip, but also using different genres like, you know, 1930s crime movies and, you know, westerns and all this. I mean, it's just, it's virtuoso stuff. And let's talk about, let's also pay attention to some of the subtle choices that were made that I think are really clever too, like the show within the show, The Minute Men. Yeah, right. A real American hero story. Yeah, the anthology style show that everybody's watching based on this.

again, a line isn't drawn around this, but if you think about it, it's pretty interesting and significant that on this version of a TV show that exists in Watchman's 2019, people can handle seeing their quote-unquote heroes taken off the pedestal, right? They can handle imagining these pillars of their American imagination

be shown as hyper-violent, be shown as sexual beings. you know, in this episode anyway, be seen as someone who is provoked, but kills federal agents interrogating him, right? But the one thing that the audiences wouldn't be able to handle would be if that hero was a black man.

Sure. Everything else is on the table, except race in the show within the show, which is significant for the show we're actually watching. No, and then when you introduce the idea of sexuality into that, that's yet another taboo at that time and even still today of the idea of like, you know, we say secret identity so often in conjunction with superhero movies

that they, or superhero culture that loses its sort of meaning of what we're talking about. But we're talking about these layers of personhood that you have because you can't show your real self to the whole world. It's without going too far off topic, but that is one of the more interesting things as superhero stories have become mainstream stories and become mainstream culture. There is a version. of superhero fandom that has raged a battle.

I mean, that's a grandiose word, but we're talking about a grandiose medium that has waged within fandom, basically, who has the rights of these characters? And, you know, for as much as people can ascribe very regressive points of view to diehard fanboys or whatever you want to call them, you know, people who are mad about representation

or mad about diversity in the comic books, it's a real battleground because a large, large, large part of the American comic book audience are people from marginalized groups who have found strength in the dominant metaphor of living double lives, of being hidden, of being misunderstood. One of the most appealing parts of the X-Men franchise, for example, was the idea that it was a large metaphor for being gay. And I think that other people from other communities probably felt claim to that story as well, the people who were hated and feared for what they are. And now, you know, seeing that quote-unquote battle play out in a different way

on a much larger stage where a movie like Captain Marvel, for example, is a political document even before it's released where people are trying to sink it on Rotten Tomatoes just because they don't want it to exist. This is the rare... And that's it. And I'm not saying Marvel should have handled anything differently,

but Marvel and Disney try to stay out of that. We're just making a good movie for everybody. You know, they know what they're doing, behind the scenes, and I appreciate a lot of what they're doing. But they don't wait into that, that this is one way as better than the other way. They just try to present the movie and then try to white-knuckle it through whatever online controversy may erupt. Damon sets the controls of Watchmen for the heart of the sun, right?

It is about that while doing the very thing. Yeah, yeah. And I think even to some extent, I think that the last couple of episodes, while they'll obviously still be about a lot of the themes and topics that have been brought up before, I was kind of thinking about this as last night ended, so where you feel like you know so much about will and you know so much about the way that this all started in a lot of ways and the way in which it has roots in earlier times and different kinds of heroes. But, you know, we still don't know, we don't know about clones. We don't know about the technology behind nostalgia pills or

what Vite's trying to do and what Lady True is trying to do and all this stuff. And there's three hours left. And it's like, in all likelihood, we're not going to have answers, quote, unquote, to a lot of things that we think we deserve answers to, which is sort of always the dice roll with Damon's stuff, which I love. I love the, I love the action that comes with that. You know, it's like it really feels very lively. And I think that he's gotten, he's backed himself into corners on other shows when that's happened. But I don't feel that on this one. I don't feel that. There's something that we've gotten away from. I don't need a separate episode explaining how Redford kept winning the presidency.

But like as culture has become more on demand in all ways, we've really gotten away from one of the central, I'm going to get grandiose. It's Monday morning, but one of the central premises or tenets of what makes great art, a great artist to me is the person who asks the best questions. It's not the person who answers the questions. It's the person who asks the best questions, the most provocative, the most fascinating, that echo questions. that maybe you've had in your head but haven't put word you know haven't been able to put words behind and if damon walks away from this after nine episodes and he finishes as strong as it's not just started but has maintained um then i would say this is probably the greatest distillation of his gift to date because the leftovers was becoming you know over the course of its three seasons

i think became more and more comfortable with being a show about humanity and emotion loss and loss and grief and open-ended unanswerable questions it was a about death and life, and you can't answer those. And now he went right towards it. And at the end, it, you know, it ended in this beautiful ambiguity, but it did it over three seasons. So if he does all this and asks all these questions

and walks away, I think that's really an incredible place to have reached after the career that he's had. I still maintain, to me, watching leftovers, leftovers felt like a show about loss and grief that started as a concept about what would happen if all these people disappeared.

Yes. And I always felt like in some ways those two ideas were at odds. I felt like... Where it started is very different from where it ended up. Not even... It's not even that. It's not even that I wanted to know more about government agencies that were doing stuff with bodies and stuff,

like with things that were alluded to in the first season of that show. It's more that I think that what he was really interested was this very human universal idea. And he had done it through this... And the guy under the guise of it's about what would happen, what would really happen if all these people disappeared. But it wasn't. It was about...

what if people could live through their grief and live out their grief in these exotic ways because of this slightly altered reality we had? I don't feel any of the skin itchiness in Watchmen that I did in Leftovers

where I felt like the people making Left Loftover sometimes wanted to be making a different show or not have to be responsible for tying up the loose ends of their own work. Watchman, I feel like, is an obvious and completely

complete and total, it's the perfect vehicle for the things that Damon and his team wanted to say. Well, I also think it's a difference between do you want to buy a piece of land and build a home from scratch, or do you want a gut job? Do you want a reno job? Do you see the bones? And you're like, well, this could be something great. And I think that there is, and I'm sure Damon, he's been very clear about this with other interviews and public statements, and I'm sure he'll repeat it with us as well, that this was not fun for him. You just not seem to have been. enjoyed this so much and feels very stressed out by it. But I am curious whether on some level this was more freeing because the mythology, the big, big load-bearing beams, were already there.

It's also an obviously much more fun show to make in some ways. It seems like it would be. None of his public statements have reflected that. But all of this conversation for me is a little bit through the prism of, and I know this sounds ridiculous, but I was listening to the voice that begins our podcast every week, Edward Norton, on Mark Maren. I don't know if you've listened to this interview. I've listened to several Edward Norton interviews. I haven't gotten to the Maren.

They are voluminous. He made the rounds. He made the rounds. He is not... Edward Norton, come on the watch. He's not... He's probably like outside right now. Like, sure.

He definitely has a lot to say. Yeah. He has thoughts on many topics. And, you know, within 10 minutes of sitting down with Mark Maren, he's talking about the... ever the everlasting genius of Bob Dylan in the 60s you know it's just of course that's where you go to but I appreciated what he was talking about because to hear him say something that is sort of if you pay you know if you care about pop culture or music whenever you know this kind of but then you think

about it in terms of the present moment and what he's talking about is the way Bob Dylan played the press from the beginning yes and refused to play games and basically refused to answer questions about his work made that a game into itself made it a game into itself but but but how you know, that actually feels even stronger and braver now when there are, you know, to a factor of one million percent more media outlets and demands on one's time when, you know, and I say this as someone as the beneficiary of it, both as a critic and as a recapper and then for us as a podcaster of having artists come explain their work to us and talk about their work. You know, there is something pretty powerful in saying, I did my job with it.

Yeah. You take it. Yeah. What do you mean? What do I want to say about it? I said it. And then when you get into, like, you know, more collaborative mediums and things like TV, like obviously other people had say is in things and it's hard to make it a unified voice

as opposed to one guy with a guitar in 1968. But there is power in that. And it's interesting to think back to that and to think of even, you know, my reaction to the Watchman through that lens. Has Watchman the show changed your relationship to the graphic album? It's made me want to pick it up again. I mean, I haven't, I intentionally didn't, it's sitting on the shelf right in the same room where I watch the show. And I keep thinking about referencing it, mainly, you know, to show my wife like all the cool references that I remember and how cool it is to know a lot about 35 year old comic books. I think she'd be, but I'm kind of waiting for date night to do that.

Sure. Yeah, of course. Maybe like at a really nice candlelit restaurant. Yeah. Garcon, I'm just going to turn my iPhone flashlight on so that I can read my wife's. I didn't use it for the menu, because I know we wanted the whole fish, and we're just going to share that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But I would like to point out that Mollock, the Magnificent or whatever, is real.

This idea that it's real. Oh, you think that was invented for this show that you were grudgingly watching with me on the couch? I know. No, no, milady. This very cool man named Alan Moore. Yeah. So he's kind of a warlock. But he supports labor.

He does. He does. Anyway, no, but I think that I probably will read it after, which is kind of a great inverse relationship with the material. I will go back to it. There's one other quick comment about this. And again, I think I already talked about, I thought the direction was brilliant.

The performances are brilliant. Just the way the camera moved and moved us through the story. I was thinking about the thought that went into every shot, but also the time and resources they had to be. make it. I was thinking about it with, you know, I was with awe and jealousy, of course. You mentioned all the things that are, that Watchmen deals with that are relevant to our present moment. And the one other one that we hadn't mentioned was just violence. And I'm not the biggest fan of violence. I'm not the biggest fan of, like, you know, cascading rivers of blood flying from people's mouths after they've

been punched. I think that the show has given a lot of thought to how it portrays. Very much so. physical violence. Yeah, the violence in American Hero's story is different than the violence that Hooded Justice is actually building out when he's rolling through New York City. That's closer to John Wick, the raid, and then the TV show version of it is actually closer to, like, Zach Snyder. Yes, when we finally get to the market that was in the TV show, and in this case, now we learn Will Hooded Justice was breaking up a clan meeting in the back, and the owner

of the shop isn't a grateful citizen. He is part of this. Cyclops. Part of this Cyclops. Conspiracy, breaking through the glass, isn't throwing a thug through the window. It's our hero trying to escape and running himself.

When he shoots people, as he does at the end, he doesn't have a pithy one-liner. He doesn't tell the people, he doesn't tell them that they've, justice has been served or whatever. He shoots them quickly, awfully, almost point-blank. and some of them have time to scream out no before they die.

And I appreciate that in a subtle way, the show is asking us to consider our emotional reaction to violence in media, especially when it's quote unquote just. Yeah, when it, and vengeance. And yeah, exactly. I also thought it was interesting how in the American hero story, everybody is such a caricature, like even the FBI agents who were like,

Oh, you know what I'm saying. H.J. H.J. Yeah. And then he's like, you know, say cheese. It's like all that stuff is just like so note perfect in terms of how it's. Like my guy was being interrogated by Francesa and Mad Dog. I know.

That's amazing. Dog! It was sexual stuff. Gettleman should be fired. You almost did up on that. I like it. Let's move on to Mandalorian. Yeah.

Interesting thing happened to me this weekend. Uh-oh. So I get up on Saturday. Mm-hmm. and I watch some sports. Yeah. And then I say to my wife. You love sports.

My lovely wife. And I say I gotta take care of some stuff I need to watch for the pod. Was she just like riveted by college football? Is she annoyed about this? She had already painted her face, you know, for the Auburn game. No, she was like, what are you going to watch? I'm way ahead of her on Crown.

She's going to watch it with her mom. She was like, go ahead and finish it. By the way, you're way ahead of me on Crown too. Like, by three seasons? Did you watch that show? Nope. Yeah. And then I was like, and I'm going to watch Mandalorian.

And she made a face that was just kind of like... Was it a cute baby Yoda face? But that's an important joke. She just made a face that was just kind of like, I thought I'd be in a better spot right now. Did she make a face like... Oh, God, I want to make a crown joke? Things didn't quite work out for me the way I thought they would.

That I'm married to a guy on a Saturday is like, it's time to watch the Mandalorian? Was it like Princess Beatrice's face the day that I... Duke, I don't know any of these characters. Steady on, because there's some some rough spots in the royal family right now. There sure are. Imagine getting fired from your job as someone's son.

That is so nuts. She was like, my son, come meet me in my office slash the castle. You are the weakest link, goodbye. Goodbye. You are no longer employed by this family as our son. So I go in and I say to my wife, I'm going to watch that. And she's just like, that's not for me. Or something to that effect.

And I go watch it. Did she say it in the common tongue? Or did she say it in some sort of? No, she was just like, have fun. And I came back in and then like a couple hours go by. And then like at one point I mentioned to her, you know, baby Yoda is pretty cute. And I would say that my wife went from not only not caring about the Mandalorian to openly deriding the Mandalorian to our bedroom being turned into a. a war room for baby Yoda memes.

Stop it. Like, we re-watched... First of all, I now primarily understand this show through a self-made supercut of only Baby Yoda moments. I have re-watched the scene with her where Baby Yoda's wobbling around, picking up frogs with Nick Nolte. Yeah.

By the way, say that sentence again, just for future generations. Just put it in on a cassette tape and put it in your shed. Yeah. So that when Dave from Storage Wars find this... in a hundred years when Gardina is the capital of the world

I have seen so much fucking Baby Yoda content this weekend like Amanda and Mallory have been sending memes over all the ones with like

Baby Yoda is sitting in the car and the sign says like I'm the AC is on I have plenty of water and I'm listening to my favorite music and Baby Yoda's in there this guy

it's now overtaken the show the one where it's the one where he's standing and looking up and it says me when I walk into CVS high and catch myself on the security cam. Sometimes when I'm low, I think about that and I laugh. Yeah, so it was just like,

it was like three screens. It was definitely a Corey Stoll in the Bourne identity, just being like, I found Jason Bourne, he's in Vienna. It's very good for our pod that that's our favorite and just go to Corey Stoll performance.

But that being said, I think it's worth noting that I've been a little bit of a crank about this show. Yeah. And some have noticed my flip-flopping. Some have noticed that I started to soften on Thursday's somewhat abrupt conversation about Mandalorian, which was essentially like the topic of which was, do you know anyone else who's watching the Mandalorian? And do they like it? Yeah. Episode three slapped.

I just want to officially note the moment that you became. the Lindsay Graham of the Mandalorian. Like three weeks ago on this podcast, Chris was like, if we give the Mandalorian the belt, we will be destroyed and we will deserve it. Now, three years later, you're like, can I go golfing with Baby Yoda, please? Wouldn't you watch that? Yeah, I would. Also, probably Baby Yoda could fix my fucking slice.

Listen, he probably could. Listen, there are different degrees of flip-flopping because I came into this. and we watched the pilot and I was like, okay, I guess it's going to be a... You're like, this is weird, dude! I was like, it's going to be about money. No, it's just going to be this quiet show about a faceless man's love for a cute puppet. Here's exactly what happened. And I'm super into it.

Oh, here comes Chris's patented Mando recast. Kaya, drop the Trinople music. Mando gets back in town. Sure does. Drops the baby Yoda bag with Werner, goaps up, goes to Jacob the jeweler, gets a new bracelet, argues with some bros, turns down an offer of spa treatment from Apollo Creed,

has the second thoughts, rescues Baby Yoda, reenacts the professional's train scene, as jetpack envy bounces. Deborah Chow, pick up your reward on the way out. You missed the part where Carl, Carlythers offers him a chance

to go get, take out Kalamari on a faraway planet. That's what I'm saying. That's his one, no, not the spot treatment, when they're like, go get Admiral Akbar's not his cute son. Right, right.

And meta commentary, they're like, baby Akbar is not what we're here for. That's right. Give me that pure uncut. No, no kitty medicine cut in with it. Just pure baby Yoda. That's right. No baby laxative in your baby Yoda.

Black tar Yoda. Absolutely. Just time me off. You know? Let's just go. Mark Renton in the corner of a Glasgow apartment. I think that's why we were uncomfortable with the show. Because our generation,

okay soda generation is like, well, what's the problem here? Like, what's the half-ass version? We're just like, no. Yeah. You will experience pure joy, drop the hammer. Yeah. It's like watching my wife see Baby Yoda for the first time was Leonardo Caprio smoking crack and Wolf of Wall Street.

It's like, I can't do that. That's, I can't. And I'm Jonah Hill. I'm like, smoke fucking crack with me, bro. And Leo takes the hit. And he goes, oh. Except if Jonah Hill for the first hour of the movie was like, Like, I don't like crack.

Crack will destroy us all. If he was like, this crack is okay, I just thought it was going to be better. Right. Oh, I see. This wasn't the crack you were looking for. Did you like this episode? I loved it. I really, I have nothing interesting to say,

except that I find this to be a very, very enjoyable TV show to watch. And it's fun, and I look forward to it. And I was sad when it was over. I only had, I had, the baby. Yoda note for me, the thing that really elevated baby Yoda this week, was... He slept most of this week. Yeah, but the most, first of all, I can relate. Load management.

The moment, the moment when the wind was rustling his baby Yoda ears. Yeah, my wife loved that. And I, we could keep joking about it, but I do think baby Yoda isn't the only vehicle to communicate wonder, but... How about the baby Yoda stroller if we're talking vehicles that communicate wonder? I think you wish you had one of those. That was a fucking... What's that, what's that famous poem about the saddest words ever written?

baby shoes for sale, never worn. Oh, yeah. For sale, cracked baby Yoda stroller. You couldn't find any other use for a floating storage vessel. Like all my tapes could be in that. I could be walking around with Green Lantern and like Gerard Way and Milan tapes all of the time. DJ Who Kid number 92. Trying to grasp some seriousness here just to say,

you felt the sensory experience of like giant spaceships in this place. and they were communicated to us through the adorable rustling ears of Baby Yoda. And Debra Chow's shooting a lot of this episode from the perspective of Baby Yoda. Yeah, that takes years to learn how to shoot from that perspective. No, she did an amazing job. But here's my... But again, there is a simplicity that is achieved with a show that I think in the first episode, I was racing past.

This can't be all there is. But, oh, if you choose to work in a minimalist style, and it's funny to say minimalist for a show that costs hundreds of millions of dollars to make, and is playing with the biggest IP the world is previously, you know, at one point was the biggest IP the world had ever known. But your recaps are doing it justice because it's just, no, I have some regrets. I'm going to have to go on a big fight scene now. Great.

I only had one thing that I wish to be the case. You wish there was more clone doctor. I wish there were fewer Mandalorians. Okay. It's called the Mandalorian dog, not the Mandalorian. Well, you're not expected to know the dating history of all those guys. Like, what are you worried about? You don't know their true shooting percentage?

I just liked that he was the only one that was walking around. Uh-huh. I didn't like that he was part of some weird cult that said, like, this is the way. Like, I just want to be the one dude, like, lone wolf and cuck. Would you prefer more if they were like, blessed be the fruit? Is the fruit those roasted rat kids? Would you prefer more if they were like clear eyes full hearts, can't lose? Okay.

Are we workshoping? I'm just saying, like, do you say, like, do you say? catchphrases are in the... The catchphrase isn't the problem. Once again, Lindsay, you are mistaken. I know the voters of South Carolina believe in your mission. Just like, I love Joe Biden. But, the reader, he didn't.

Next week, I'm going to do the Mandalorian recap as Lindsay Graham. That's going to be fantastic content. I will not be here for that, but I'm sure Amanda will love it. She'll get all the references and myths and be down to play. But maybe now that he's flying away and he's being hunted, there's a different piece of it. And maybe the feeling was that we needed to, you know, teach us, teach the audience something about Mandalorian culture, which seems not super cool, from being honest with you. Well, they've been through a lot of trauma. Have they?

Yeah. We all wear armor. They don't show our faces. They had a purge. They were like, they were like, get this fucking, these coins out of here, dude. I mean, it's weird that both shows that we're talking about feature our character having, like, our hooded character having stressful flashbacks to what happened when they were a baby. And it's like, well, one actually happened more or less. And one is like space people running from robots.

But okay. It's there to illustrate his trepidation about droid drivers. All right, Senator. I'm just saying I'm just saying I wanted him to be a little bit more isolated and maybe he will be now that he's flying away with a giant bounty on his head. I mean, the great scene was when everybody's little pagers went off beeping 911. That was fucking, that ruled. That was a cool scene.

Also, my favorite scene was Carl Weather's least subtle bounty hunter guy ever. Mando! They all tried to do it. But only you could do it. This is like, what is this? First of all, forget bounty hunting. Don't be that guy at the bar. Yeah.

Andy! The Eagles cannot generate enough offense to beat the Patriots. Sit with me, sir. That actually happened in 2004. numerous times. But yeah, it's a big performance. It's a big... Do you have notes?

No, I mean, what I'm going to tell fucking Carl Weathers? You got his arm ripped off by the predator. He sure did. I'm just glad he's working. He's working. And, you know, the money stopped the phaser or the laser, whatever it was. That's a metaphor. That makes you think he should have smelted his money.

Just like my man, Mando. What's up with that? Yeah. They can't make their shit out of anything else but that specific... I mean, is it... They make all their stuff out of Bescar, right? Okay. Is that what that is?

But then, like, is he- By the way, I don't know what that is. But they kept saying that word. And then is he broke after that? Because it's like, he's wearing his shape. I'm wearing what I, like,

so it's like, it's like putting all your money into a gold rope chain. It's like, if you showed up to record this podcast with a brand new burgundy shacket made out of like direct deposit pay stubs. Uh-huh. So I'd be like,

I'd be like, but and also that that jacket could do podcasts for me. Wait, wait, what? Well, because he gets, it has like a usefulness to it Because you can fight like a mudhorn and live Listen, there's utility to looking as fly as you do There's value to it. Kaya will co-sign that.

Okay, so he fought the mudhorn. I guess you're still having a little bit of a hard time Being a 42-year-old man who's like mudhorns and Bescara and Mandalorian. Maybe if I watch as much college football as you, I would feel more comfortable with these terms of fandom The show's... No, what I'm saying is,

I'm a 42-year-old man who's like, this show is great. I'm really enjoying it. And I can enjoy it not knowing what Bescar is. Right. I'm glad the mudhorn, a creature with a horn that lives in mud,

is simply named. That's cool. Yeah. That is really steering into the skid because 70% of the audience members would be like, what's up with that mudhorn? Right.

And in a different version, fandom would be like, oh no. There's a bunch of stuff like you don't even know unless you watch on close captioning. Oh. For real.

You want to unwrap this for me? The Nick Nulte character is not named Nick Nulte. Okay. It's like, Unk, Unk. That's cool. I'm sure there are young people in this world who call Nick Nolty unk.

People who are listening to us think we are fucking idiots right now. That started years ago. Yet they're still listening. So who's the joke on? I'm just saying. Lindsay Graham. It's on Senator Lindsey Graham.

Look, this show's fun. It is... Every episode ends with his spaceship. flying away. This is way more like Star Trek that I thought it was going to be. And as I got my brain around that, and I was like, okay, this is, you know, we talk about like watchmen putting all of it on the table, leaving it all in the field immediately, like not having other tricks left in the bag. Like, this is the opposite of that. This is like every week we're going to move three feet. But also, and this is a testament to the thought that went into this by the Lucasfilm Brain Trust,

the Disney people, or Favro himself. Think about what you're doing when you make it a TV show. And I think that not using galaxy brain, my thought, and maybe yours too and other people's, was that that would mean adapting the Star Wars world into a TV medium, meaning on a very practical level, during the course of a season of the Mandalorian, there would be three or four standing sets, and the Mandalorian would be moving within certain spaces to, you know, limit production costs or to, you know, take advantage of tax credits or whatever usually goes into making a season of television. Thanks to those LED screens, which I do understand and could explain to you in detail, but we're Almost out of time.

Yeah, I know. Unfortunately. Guy is tapping her foot. Sorry about that. They're not doing that. Clearly, the version of the show that existed for the first three episodes where you go visit Nick Noltee Planet, where you keep going to the Carl Weather's not inside voice bar. Is that you in the back? It's not anymore.

I've saved a seat for you in my booth. My bounty hunter booth. He's gone. I have all this money now. Talk about the spa treatments more. You seem tired. you like to go to a spa day with me. Deep tissue, Swedish, Thai,

whatever you desire, sir. Never, ever take a work colleague up on that offer. That is just good advice ever in any context. It's going to go somewhere else because it can. And so I think that that's, again, taking full advantage of what they can do as Lucasville, as Star Wars, or whatever, but it's making a version of the TV show

that is not limited to what I thought it would be as a TV show and I'm enjoying that. Finally. Oh, go ahead. We need Datington music now. It's become so popular. Congratulations. Chernobyl music. Is there a limit to how many times we can invoke Chernobyl when it comes to fatherhood?

When I see it and I realize the folly of my waist, because I'd figured it's just a fun watch. I don't really know the details of it. Yeah. I don't think so. No. Hold on. I'm getting word to my ear. No. I'm hearing it's not a fun watch.

A lot of people's skin fall off. Okay. Well, you know. Parenthood was challenging its own ways. I did go to... I went to the cinema. I went to the 10 a.m. screening of Frozen 2. I was there. I was like, Andy!

Are you here to see Frozen 2 like I am? What was funny is that the... I am here to see Bong Joon's Parasite for the third time! They don't change the marquee. It's like weird that it's the same place that in a few hours we'll be playing Parasite. Is it... New Beverly? Where did you go see it? We went to the New Barthouse.

It was super cool. Got a couple of IPAs. Sour beers. Some sours early in the morning. Get that juice hunt on. The juice wolves were howling, my friend Mando. Early in the day. Mando, it's Pliny the Elder.

Very rare IPA, sir. People's levels are just popping. This is every day for me. How is it going back there? Kai, are you enjoying yourself? I'm having a great time. Thank you. Kay is once again

on ZipRecruiter They don't sponsor our podcast But they allow Her only filter on ZipRecruiter Is I just don't want any more yelling I just please stop yelling Just please stop shouting in my ears

I just What do you want to know about this experience This 10 a.m. experience It was I would never dare tell you what to tell me Yeah It was it went first of all I want to say You had a lot of nerves about this

It went much better than I thought I was fairly You were like, this is going to be the dark night. For me. I was fairly convinced that this was, because there are two children in play here. One has been to movies, been to movies, and one has not. This is the first movie for your younger child. Yes.

Yes. And, you know, I am married to a very optimistic person who took this same young child when she was even younger to a ballet when she was one and a half. years old. The ballet began. The curtain opened and figures appeared on stage. And my then one and a half year old daughter said, Ballerita!

In Carl Weathers' voice from the Mandalorian. And I picked her up, like the Mandalorian picked up Baby Yoda in a gunfight and ran. And three hours later, rejoined the rest of her family. Where were you? She was like, it wasn't even a ballet. That was what was weird. That was crazy. Yeah.

And she was like, I loved a ballet. I'm like, it was great. It was a great time. So I assumed something similar would happen. Not the case. She was frozen, if I may, with either delight or confusion. Unclear at this moment, because I did ask her about it again today. And she said, I loved it.

And I said, what was your favorite part? And she said, the part where I asked Mommy, what's happening? That was her favorite. Did your wife like the movie? We all loved it. It was excellent. All my concerns for nothing. It was actually, listen, this has been a, it's a very positive episode of the watch,

really big ups to our number one listener, Bob Iger. Also, big ups, Damon Lendelhoff and Star Wars. Franchises are great, TV's great. Yeah. But I have to say, with cynicism hat aside, and I try not to wear that hat with my family, that I was pretty impressed. considering the fact that they could have put anything on the screen.

They could have just like repackaged like a off-brand Mr. McGoo rerun and called it Frozen 2 and made a billion dollars. Like they did not need for this to be well made and considered. Because kids don't have rotten tomatoes yet. Kids don't believe in cancel culture. The thought and care that went into it. And Jennifer Lee, who wrote and directed the first one and wrote and co-directed this one, is really amazing at giving characters motivation, at tracking each character's reason for being there. Actually, this is something we talk about a lot.

Why did this exist? And she found the reasons for it to exist in the pieces that were, the scraps that were left on the bone, basically, in the first movie. And advancing it forward. It's really inclusive. It's really feminist

in a really strong and surprising way for a Disney cartoon. It's funny. I really, really enjoyed it, and we all did. I was misrepresenting my younger daughter. Her other favorite part was when Anna was crying because it combines her two interests, Anna, the younger sister, like her, and crying.

She finds crying to be so fascinating. Does she cry a lot? No, but she's, I mean, sure, she's two years old. But when other people, like, she will be reading a story, and it could be a story about anything. Someone's birthday party, and she'll point to someone like a character half drawn in the background and be like, why he's sad. Is he going to cry?

Which makes me think, to bring it full circle, she would love the first season of the leftovers. It's true. I think that that's where we diverge. But it was a good movie. Have you shown your kid's baby Yoda yet? No, I have not. Is that in play? No.

Not even just like check this out. Well, because then they're going to want to watch it. But it's only like 35 minutes a week. It's not a runtime issue. Mando burns people alive. I mean. Can I just end by telling you the one moment where I, Am I allowed to show it to them if I babysit?

We'll revisit that off air. Okay. Last moment. So I'm at the movie theater, as mentioned. It's 9.45 in the morning on a Sunday. And I am at the concession stand purchasing a popcorn for the family to share. Perhaps one of those magic sodas where you can like mix and match. Oh, yeah.

It's fun. Why not? Throw a little vanilla in at the last second. Just a little surprise. Sure. And the young woman behind the counter is getting my order. And she says, what movie are you here to see? And at that moment, I looked to my left and right and realized the three other members of my family are in the restroom.

And I am a 42-year-old man at 10 a.m. Buying a medium popcorn at 9.45 in the morning and telling a young person I'm there to see Frozen, too. The lengths that I went to explain that I have a family were really 40-year-old virgin-esque. I have a beautiful wife. I was like, you love the children the way they are born and then they grow and they have interests. Yeah. You know, and you dress them. Everything I said sounded weirder.

I was like, well, they're in the bathroom because they can't go by themselves to the bathroom. Because they're so young. Because they're children. Yeah. And yet here we are. And she was being so nice to me. She's like, oh, I'm sure they'll enjoy the movie. Meanwhile, her hand is reaching underneath the counter.

Queen Elizabeth Bell. There's just a button next to the butter marked Amber Alert. And who did justice jumps out? It was all in play. Yeah. I've never been more relieved to feel the pitter-patter of tiny arms grabbing me from below. Again, not my children. Other children.

Actually, just demons, yeah. Just demons from the underworld and one baby Yoda. But it worked out. Great podcast by you today. I really left it all. Like Damon Lindeloff in season one, I've left it all on the floor. Up next, it's me and Amanda talking about the last three episodes of The Crown. You got more content in this podcast?

Yeah, we made a commitment. Save it for Thanksgiving, man. I broke in like 18 commitments over the last three months. Wow. Yeah, we've been like, oh, we're definitely going to break down all of peeky blinders and that I just never talked about it. That's true. That is true. What are we doing on Thanksgiving, buddy?

What's, what content's running? Kaya, what's running on Thursday? Kai and I have talked about it. I mean, what's your avails? None. Right. So, I mean, when you say, what are we doing? I like to consider myself still like the third heat.

Yeah, right. I'm the Tracy Jordan of this particular. girly show. So you guys will be running something. TBD. Okay. TVD. Wow.

It's going to publish Wednesday, though. Solo mailbag. This is the cliphanger episode. That's right. Okay. All right. I'll be back with Amanda in just a minute. Thank you, Andy.

Great job, Branski's. Chris, I'll get you something from Wawa this week. So I'm here with Amanda Dobbins. Hi, Amanda. Hello, Chris. We conclude our discussion of season three of the Crown. Yes. The last three episodes, Dangling Man,

Mbruglio. Am I pronouncing that right? I mean, you're the one, you're closer to the Brits than I am. And Cree to Kerr. Yeah. And sort of odd coda to the season, I think maybe actually coming off of the middle three episodes, which are so remarkable, but still quite good. And I think probably has a lot more to say about what we're going to see in the future rather than the season itself, I think, in terms of it's setting up the Charles Love Life stuff, right? Yes.

It's bringing some characters, maybe not to conclusion, but kind of tying up some loose ends with the older generation and setting up the younger generation. I agree that it feels, it's maybe not a weird quota, but it does feel like this season really took off, what, episode four, episode five, as we said, once we got to that next generation. And you can kind of see where it's going. And this ends with the Silver Jubilee, which is about the queen, but also about the older generation. generation and times passing. There's obviously like the focus on Margaret. It's kind of putting some closure on the themes of the first three seasons, I guess. Because when you think about it, this is supposed to be a six season show. Right. So at the end of season three, we're about halfway. And I think we know from an analysis of the first three seasons that like Peter Morgan is

very way of pacing and he uses the middle of the seasons and he uses all of there is, it's a deliberateness. So yeah, it's weird except I think it's just kind of like, goodbye the queen, goodbye, Margaret. Not goodbye, but... But a lot of the action is going to be Charles and Camilla and presumably Diana and Thatcher, I would imagine. I can't wait to see their Queen's meetings, their appointments. Is that what they are? Yeah. So yeah, we get a little bit of Heath. We get some more of Wilson, very sad goodbye for Wilson. We get some Saul Bello references. We get some polo. What did you find yourself most drawn to in these last couple of episodes?

Was it the Charles stuff or was it the sort of conclude or the kind of end of this one phase of Margaret and Elizabeth together? For me, it's the Charles. For me, it's moving forward because you can both see where the show is going, which is just like an essential part of storytelling and TV. It doesn't really, it feels both familiar and that he's going through a lot of the same things that the Queen's character goes through, but it's also kind of new, as opposed to some of the Margaret and Queen stuff is, we've seen it before.

And, you know, we haven't seen Margaret, like in the dire straits that she's in in the last episode per se, but this old struggle of the number one and the number two and how they interact together, it's familiar territory. So for me, I like the Charles stuff just because I see where the show is going. Yeah.

What was it like? Because that's probably the stuff that you start to have the most personal attachment to as stuff that you've read about the most, right? Like, is that era? What was it like to see the kind of origin stories

of that take place? Especially the Camilla stuff? Yes, so this show does not like Camilla, huh? So, is that your takeaway? I don't know. Do you think this is like a positive Camilla? I mean, obviously, the characters in the show don't like Camilla.

Well, I thought that the way that they told that story was a little odd in places. So, like, was that Mountbatten? Did he, like, prompt Camilla to get into it with Charles, or is he just like, check her out? I think that Mountbatten did play a large role in helping Charles discover himself and find his confidence with women and encouraging him to sow his wild oats. I think that he was a meddler.

I mean, I don't know whether he legit, like, set Charles and Camilla up. Probably not. I think he was sending a lot more, quote, aristocratic women Charles's way. I mean, like, the thing is, is that we're not. seeing all of the other women. So there were a lot of other women? Oh, yeah. He's definitely going through them at a pretty rapid clip, according to.

Really? My basis here is the Diana Chronicles by Tina Brown, which is one of my favorite books about celebrity and is also a great text for this era. But, yeah, I mean, he's the Prince of Wales. Does they make him seem like a really sweet shut-in who's reading Saul Bellow? And I think it's a little bit of both. He is apparently sensitive. He writes long notes.

He is kind of and reads a lot and is not necessarily like a giant personality. But I think he is also the son of Philip and it was the 70s in London. So I think he was doing okay is my understanding. As was Ann. Yes. So I did not know that there was a love square going on there. Yes. This is all tracks.

This is all apparently very true. I actually, the only thing that I'm not 100% sure is true, and I think is probably they've taken some license, is the queen and the queen mother and Mount Baton. Being in cahoots. Summoning the families to be like, you got to take care of this. But legend has it. And again, this is from the Tina Brown book that Camillo definitely was chasing Andrew Parker Bowles for a while and kind of playing Charles against Andrew Parker Bowles. And everyone does believe that Andrew Parker Bowles is the person that she was really infatuated. did wish at that time. And their wedding was announced, their engagement was announced in the

newspapers before he actually proposed. Really? Yeah. I believe it's her parents who placed the announcement. They're just kind of like, we got to get this on. So I don't know whether, I don't know who was pushing her parents to do it, but that is the legend. Yeah. So all of this really is that they're all pawns and they're kind of being told what's appropriate and what's not is very much true to history or at least gossip of the times. Also, the speech when Prince Charles is like, when Prince Charles is just yelling at his mother, and he's just like, are you mad because she's not intact? Right.

So that's a real thing. He had to marry a virgin. Oh, my God. That was a real, real part of the whole looking for a bride situation. And in the 70s in England, there was basically no one except for Princess Diana. You know? It was like the pill and the sexual revolution. But that was somehow still part of the requisite to be Charles's wife, which is nuts. With Dangling Man specifically, I thought this is another lovely episode. So a dangling man is the Derek Jacoby stuff in Dangling Man? It's in Dangling Man. Right. And then his funeral and the letters and the letters and kind of the fallout is in Borneo. It's kind of a two-parter.

but when he is, it's his last episode, yeah, is dangling man. Okay, because it's like, it's very interesting how they, you know, the mirroring that they do is so, is so exquisite, you know, like even Charles and even the Camilla, Andrew Parker Bowl stuff sort of mirroring Margaret and Tony in the last episode, this idea that people would be drawn to the thing that's bad for them. But I was curious about the Duke of Windsor stuff the most because he was also, also a pretty, like, complicated figure. It wasn't like he was just, like, a rugged individualist.

I mean, don't forget this season two episode that's just about how he was a Nazi sympathizer. Right. And maybe not even, like, sympathizer is possibly the most generous word that you could use to describe his relationship to the Nazi regime. Right. Yeah. I mean, that's a thing that happened. That's like, and I think that's definitely, you're supposed to remember that when you're looking at Elizabeth's reaction to him. I think the fact that Prince Charles doesn't really seem to care about that is also supposed to indicate something to you about kind of Prince Charles and what he's prioritizing.

And also just like the degree of ridiculous insulation these people live in where it's like they've only ever been in these palaces and, you know, these situations where they're not actually in contact with the real world, much to Charles's chagrin. You know, much much to his probably everlasting regret that he doesn't have like a life of consequence and that, you know, like he says, even dying would give your life meaning. Right. And you have to keep in mind that even Prince Charles, his entire life has been consumed with this Elizabeth. And a thing that she returns to or the character returns to is this idea that it wasn't supposed to be her. And that because the Duke of Windsor abdicated, her father was put in a position that he wasn't supposed to be in. And she was put in a position she wasn't supposed to be in. But that happened like in her consciousness in real time.

She watched all of that happen. So she has like one set of, you know, damage and concerns to deal with. But Charles has just since he was born. Right. That's like he has just been the future king. Yeah. And he's had not even a taste of life outside of the bubble because he has always been. So in the center of things and also because they're so anxious about duty and tradition

and all of the things that were like thrown aside during the abdication. So did Camilla love him? Was Camilla into him? I mean, who can say? Who knows? You know, it's so interesting to watch it now. Number one, watching these episodes and him talking about, you know, waiting for his life to start and also how that coincides to his mother dying.

You know, that's some Greek tragedy shit for you right there. But that still hasn't happened. This was like 55 years ago. I know. That's the thing that's like, this guy has been living in a petrified princestum. Which is really wild. But so obviously, the other thing is that he and Camilla are married now and have been married for some time and never really kind of gave each other up. I don't know. It does.

Where's Andrew Parker Bowles now? I don't know whether he's still alive. I believe that he, they divorced at some point. Yeah, obviously. And then he was like at the wedding of Charles and Camilla, just like very happily there being like, isn't this exciting? I mean, British, rich people are very strange. I think that this is true to events that in the 60s or 70s

Camilla was focused on Andrew Parker Bowles. Everybody was. Apparently he was, I think he also gets short shrift. He's just like the Drake of the polo scene in England of Royal Polo? But I don't really think that he is getting his full due

in terms of charisma and appeal on this show in the way that... The dad from Broadchurch is not bringing it? Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Well, it's not even that.

And I guess they do show him on the polo field, and maybe I just don't really interpret, like, Polo's pretty dumb. Yeah, but I guess all those guys are sort of pricks anyway, because, like, when they show up at the bar and he's just like, you know, I'm unattached tonight. And he's just like, but I'm going to go find somebody and he finds Anne. Yeah. Anne has just been. Throwing heat. Unbelievable. Yeah.

She gets the more great energy in a lot of ways. And it is, it's a breath of fresh air to have someone just being like I. And even the things that I really love how. what The Crown does is like the moments where you're like this should probably be too much like Anne driving around listening to David Bowie. I was like, it's pretty awesome. Yeah.

I mean, also she commits to the singing, which I really appreciate at top volume. I think that if the three episodes that sort of conclude the season have anything that while the minor strike and the power cuts and the elections are kind of in the background there, it doesn't feel like the earlier episodes in which there's a sort of a historical event that explains the characters. these are characters explaining the historical events.

Did you notice that change at all? Not entirely. I guess I noticed that major, major seismic events, like the minor strike and sort of Heath being prime minister were definitely sideline. I mean, Heath is just like literally playing Beethoven the whole time. That's what they give him to do. Which on the one hand, I don't think he was a particularly effective prime minister. So what else are you supposed to explore for it?

But it was cool as he Arthur Scariel, like get some. screen time. Yeah. Can I just do the... So he's playing, I think it's in Embrolio when he is just kind of doing the soundtrack. And he's playing the Moonlight Sonata, which is a wonderful piece of music. But I just need music supervisors to learn more classical music. It's like we get Beethoven. And to their credit, so Beethoven will be Moonlight Sonata and or the Symphony number seven. Yeah. And then there's Claire to Loon. And then there's like, like, Mozart's Requiem. And that's like it. That is apparently the only pieces of music that. music supervisors know. And I just, I think we all have Spotify.

There is also an experience, though, that I've been having recently, where I've been trying to listen to more classical music, both to like open my mind, but chill me out a little bit. And sometimes it'll be that I think it's kind of Baroque, super harpsichordy, just like six instrument classical music. And I'm like, this is driving me insane. It's like, dang douga, ding, dung, dung. Oh, yeah, I don't mean to. Like, I'm pretty big. I also really like Beethoven, but I think we can expand beyond those like two pieces of Beethoven. I'm not saying everyone needs to go into full, like, deep nerd Bach Broke.

That would be overwhelming. It's just we can't do Claire to Loon in every single episode of television. So we, classical music is to us what the minor strike is to the crowd, where we've just dismissed it out of hand. People are not really thinking through it. The minor strike is something I actually have read quite a bit about just because I've read the books of David Peace, who wrote a series of novels set from 74 through 83 about a serial killer in Yorkshire, the Yorkshire Ripper, but also a lot of it is about the strikes. And then he also wrote a tome called G.B.84, which is about Fatcher and the strikes and all that.

And so I've read a lot about that. It was interesting to see it shot through the lens of the royals because they are rarely remarked upon in these other books. Well, I was going to ask, is there anything in those books that indicates to you that the queen even... Was a crypto-lefty? Or expressed even, like, one sentence of thought being, like, their demands seem reasonable? Nothing. Yeah. Yeah.

I thought that that was a liberty. I don't know whether there was a liberty. You do read some of the biographies of the queen, and they're obviously, like, biographies of the queen, so they're, like, in, like, big royals pocket. But where from time to time, I think particularly where Suez Canal, she kind of was like, what are you? doing to Eden, which is essentially is the limit of what she is constitutionally had to do is being like, are you sure? So I don't think it's unprecedented, but I don't really know that they earned her being like, this seems I'm on the side of the minors, which is basically what they do.

And then they don't revisit it again. Yeah. But I think that that, I wonder whether or not that is in service of Margaret speech at the end. You know, and we could just kind of talk about these three episodes together. But, like, Margaret's sort of like, this is why the monarchy matters to paper over the cracks. Right. And to provide this, like, this ideal and this thing of confidence, this projection of confidence so that people don't just fall into the pit of despair.

Right. I think you can't have that without having it be like, and the person who's projecting this ideal also would like minors to have like a living wage, you know. Who isn't like the worst version and is also relatable. Because you would assume they would be like, shut up. Yes. You know, we believe that there is a divine order to humanity, and so we don't care what happens to minors. Yes.

Yeah. And also, I waited a week to go to Abervan, you know? Right. Exactly. There is a similar that give Philip a speech, I think, in episode 10, which is just, and it's about reading the news every morning and what a disaster is, and it's about the politicians. And I mean, that's clearly, like, I wrote a Brexit speech and I just put it in Philip's mouth. Sure. And the parallel really works, and it is true and nice to be reminded that politicians and governments and people have been making a massive thing since the beginning of time.

And yet we've managed to sustain it. You know, we've managed to sustain things. But it is also, it makes Philip quite sympathetic. And if we know anything about Philip, it's that he manages to say something racist at every opportunity. me, whatever his good intentions might be. So, yeah, I think that's perceptive by you. It's a rose of you with them. I mean, Philip is essentially like, I was a wild guy who got my shit together through

group therapy and I love spaceships and polar. And you're just like, okay, this guy seems great. Tobias Menzies, I love him. Same. But also, he's probably like, my favorite movie is Zulu. And I love reading Kipling and, like, yeah. Yeah, and they also, you know, they give Helen of Autumn Carter as Margaret that just like tremendous speech about the power of the crown and also the queen and her sister have this,

lovely moment about sisterhood and all of this stuff. But I'm just like, well, I've just watched this person be a disaster of a, in Margaret. Just like a drunk, terrible lady in an abusive relationship, which it's not her fault for like an entire season, maybe three seasons. And she's like, here, let me articulate. Right. And let me just kind of. The clouds will open and I will have like a greater understanding of humanity and what we all need. So, yeah, it's television. I have to say, I think Helen Bottom Carter is fantastic in that last scene. You could say it's television.

You can say they're gilding the lily a little bit, gild away. Yeah. If it's Olivia Coleman and Helena Bonham Carter with that kind of rating, like, it's just kind of best in class. And even Coleman doing what she's doing where she is playing a character who has been stripped of her, to have an individuality and has to essentially subsume herself into a role rather than into a personality. And yet still finding these moments of frailty but also hostility, you know, with Charles and, you know, being kind of on this, on this track that's going to take her to a place where she is, she's like her mother. Like, you know, she is like she can't help it. Right. But at the same

time, like, every once in a while, just like that eye twitch or that look and finding the nuance in that Queen Elizabeth look, like the Jubilee sequence of her walking through the hall and walking out and into the carriage and like that just static shot on her face and her like looking behind to Charles. It's like, that's just like amazing acting. Yes. And it's also there is, it's all of the entire season's work of the anger and the towards Charles, as you mentioned, or the resentment really. That's what it is. And kind of a lot of the, the opakness that she is cultivating. I think for a few episodes towards the beginning,

part of it was just a transition from Claire Foy to Olivia Coleman. But part of it was also, I was like, I don't really feel like I have a handle on her character in the way that I did with Claire Foy. Because Claire Foy can just, like, honestly, is like telepathic, I think, in terms of you just put the camera on her and you might as well be reading her mind.

She's communicating so much, yeah. And there is a wall. or something that's drawn with Olivia Coleman. And at first I was like, is this just two different people? But I think it's really, it's purposeful. It's part of the character, that this is a character who is working towards that inaccessibility. And the mask slips every once in a while, which is what's so amazing about various moments and various conversations with people throughout this season. I just want to point out that when she goes to visit the Duke of Windsor and gives the whole speed.

about, you know, I have resented you my whole life, but maybe now I'm grateful for it and he falls asleep. That's like the second speech she gives to like a historical figure who falls asleep. Yes. Which is like a, is maybe a theme that even like her own self-knowledge is just like falling on like no one wants to hear it to quote herself. But it all does come together in that amazing scene where you can watch her trying to be the person on the postage stamp. Right. and all of the different threads and problems are shining through. Have you seen footage of that Jubilee? A little bit.

Yeah. It's pretty weird. So that's 70. Well, I was going to ask you. It's 77, the year of Chris Ryan. Oh, wow. That's what they were celebrating. Yeah.

So I was just wondering whether you felt like it was an accurate portrayal of the world as you know it. Well, I'd be curious to see whether it just picks up the next day, essentially, like, when season... Because I believe season four is either done or is in being edited or, like, I think they shot all the, Olivia Coleman seasons together. They did, is my understanding. Yeah, because there's stuff that, uh, shout out to the British tabloids has, I guess, quote unquote, spoiled, although it's history. But they were like, watch them shoot this scene from history.

And I was like, fuck. They've released a few stills as well, particularly of Diana stuff. Yeah. But they haven't cast Diana yet or they just haven't announced it. They have. They have announced. Oh, who is it? It's, uh, it's an unknown who looks a lot like Diana. Really?

Yes. Oh, so it's not like Florence Pugh with a wig. No, which is good. That would be really weird. I mean, maybe, well, I guess Florence could Pew could be like seasons five and season six, Diana. Okay. But, yeah. Not yet.

You may have cast himald a stanton for five and six. Allegedly. I mean, they haven't confirmed that. But if I had to guess, I think season four, I think we do know it will be Maggie Thatcher because they have said as much in a million. I hope the clash or like the sex pistol started too. But I think it'll probably start in 79, which is both when Maggie Thatcher becomes prime minister and also. Can I spoil history? Sure.

I mean, if you really don't want history spoiled, like, hit the fast forward button. But Mountain Batten is not with us forever. Yeah. And that's also in 79. The Daily Mail was like, check out this still from the set of Mountbatten getting killed. Yeah. Well, but, you know, there's a reason that you cast Charles Dance as Mountbatten. You got to have someone to really bring home that tragedy.

Yeah. So, but I think that those happen within the same year. So I imagine it'll start in 79, which is kind of like starting this year with Wilson. and Churchill. Right. Can I give one note about Wilson? Sure. I don't really feel like we got enough of, like, the relationship between Wilson and the queen. Or Wilson and Marcia, who is his personal, like, yelling at him lady.

Yeah. The lady was just, like, gross and balls. She is his personal yelling at him, lady. She was apparently, like, basically an assistant worked within the cabinet there of Wilson's administrations. It's funny, I was just listening to this really, really great podcast called Politics Today, which is kind of releasing conjunction with the Londoner. review of books and they just did a whole pod about the similarities between this current

British election and the 74 one when Wilson won with a minority and then is out six months later. Yes. Who replaces Wilson? So it's not Thatcher yet, right? She comes in later. After Wilson the second time, it's apparently James Callahan. Okay. James Callahan probably not going to be on the crown.

Well, so he's the, he's 1976 to 1979. He might get like one scene. Okay. And then Margaret Thatcher is May 1979. And I would just assume that they would start there. Right. But the thing about Wilson is, in addition to being a pretty big deal historical figure, they make such a thing at the end of them having a nice relationship and he invites her to dinner at Downing Street, which only...

She invites her to dinner. She's like, I'd love to go. And he's like, holy shit. Which she only ever did. for Winston Churchill. And that's apparently true to life. They really did have a lovely relationship. There's a Peter Morgan play called The Audience, which was in 2013, and it's structured.

It's just those audiences between the queen and the prime ministers. And it just goes, it starts with Winston Churchill, and it goes all the way through. Okay. Who played the queen in the play? Helen Marin. And it's great. It's really delightful. But one of the main takeaways of the audience is that she and Wilson really loved each other.

That's the warmest part of it, and they go about moral. And I would have liked more of that. Yeah. But, you know, I know that they have a lot to do, and I guess they're setting up the next generation. But it did kind of feel fast forwarded at the end. You wonder whether or not, like, obviously this, I think they must have a pretty comprehensive 60 episode plan. So they can't follow some of the bliss that other shows maybe sometimes are like, oh, turns out everybody likes Aaron Paul. let's keep them on the show forever.

You know, like, they can't just do six more Wilson episodes. Right. And I think that it's so perfectly crafted that they're not going to, they wouldn't deviate from that anyway just to have like a few more fun episodes. So I guess I wanted to ask a couple of just sort of broad strokes questions about this season for you. Okay. Who was your like non-Olivia Coleman MVP of the season? I think you have to give it to Josh O'Connor.

Yes. Who is tremendous. Yes. And I was rereading the Guardian. in peace that came out before the season that was like behind the scenes you had referenced. And I think it's

Helen Bonham Carter, who observes that Josh O'Connor will be like a net positive for like actual Prince Charles. Yes. And that people will be more sympathetic and rooting for Prince Charles because Josh O'Connor is so

likable and so good in this role and brings like a lot of sympathy to who is otherwise like kind of an annoying spine-less. I mean, he just rolls up. He drives away from the Navy. He's like, I'm in the Navy, and there are a lot of rules, but whatever. Yeah. I'm going to see my mom right now just to march in and scream at her. Yes. Which, queen or not, it's not the most respectful interaction. Yes. Yeah, I mean, I understand that he's frustrated. He has reason to be frustrated. Sort of the opposite of we stand agree. I'm just like yelling and throwing baseless accusations at her. But he is so charming. And it also is.

written with a lot of empathy. So I think he's amazing. Obviously, Princess Anne is just like fan favorite. The Dame Maggie Smith, it's the Dowager Countess Award. And what's, what does Anne have an exciting next couple of decades? I don't know. It's so funny. My husband was asking me that as well. Everyone's rooting for Anne. What do you define as exciting in the context with her. Like what? Does she have like a Margaret type kind of next couple of decades? Does she like go on tour with Bowie? Like what happens? No. She doesn't go on tour with Bowie, unfortunately, which is But she's not as depressing as Margaret, for lack of a better word. She is as solid.

She becomes like an international, like Olympian-level horse show jumper. Okay. And gets married, has some kids, I think gets married again. She just kind of is like, I'm going to live my life. Okay. So I don't think she has like a lot of attention. Someone was asking on Twitter if there are any books to be read about Princess Anne, which is so nice because everyone really, really likes this character.

The Amanda Dobbins Lending Library? Yeah. I think the answer is not really. Yeah. But I think that's what Anne. would want. Right. So we should feel good about it.

Who else? Who else besides Joshua Connor? Tobias Menzies. Really nice job. Amazing stuff by him. Of non-racist Philip behavior. And I think not even rehabilitates because this character is supposed to be evolving. Season two is really about Elizabeth and Philip and Philip being a real dickhead.

And that last episode in. season two is supposed to be like a restart for them. Yeah, right, right. And this is true to it. And I think he is very smart and funny and gets like a lot of, you know, the witty lines and also gets some, let me explain it to you speeches. Sure. Because he can handle them. But as you said, he really just is a guy who like loves the moon and like self-help and starts a center for spirituality. I don't know. That's a win for him. I thought the last episode with Helen Abonam Carter was quite great. You know what I mean?

I thought Margaretology won. I think you have the same thing with your like the Kirby ghost is all over there. You're kind of getting over it. But I also really thought that was like a great episode to explain jet setting. And just like these people who are kind of so bored with life that all they can do is extravagantly travel. Yeah. But I just loved like her train to Scotland. and then Anne and Colin are also in, is that Jamaica?

Where are they? That's Mystique. The famous Mystique, which is a private Caribbean island, I believe, owned by Colin Tennant or purchased by Colin Tennant. And I think then, you know, other people own homes on it. Okay. That Colin Tennant is the guy in there? Yeah, like a rich friend of the Royals. And I believe that Kate and William and the current Royals like still go there from time to time because you can control a

certain amount of media attention. Not all of it. Obviously not. Yeah. Can I ask you a question about the Scotland scene, though? Sure. The whole pool party scene? Yeah. What time of year is it? I mean, whatever the hottest time of year it's ever been in Scotland. Sure, but I don't understand. I don't understand what time of day and what time it is because like people are wearing wool coats and also bikinis. And they're swimming. Yeah.

And they're lounging and for. Well, I assume in Scotland in the summer, it's like light until like 10 o'clock, right? Sure. So maybe there's some evening wear being worn. at the pool even though it's like we think it's like two o'clock yeah and i understand that like princess margaret wears a fur wherever because she's princess margaret but she's talking there with her friend and yeah and they're like we got to go by bathing trunks for for roddy yeah so then they all go and then suddenly everyone's in wool coats yes yes like you were just in a bikini i don't know i have some questions it's scotland's like the bay area it can just be every other block it's different

um what else can we say about this season i mean i think from as someone who didn't have a tremendous attachment to the first two, this one really spoke to me, and I thought that the standout episodes, specifically the Prince of Wales one, were among the best that the show's done. But I can understand why, for people who are very attached to the foy, Kirby, Matt Smith era,

that this was a departure and, like, it took some getting used to. But it definitely is, like, quite a statement and testament to the stability and sustainability of the show. I completely agree. It's a different energy. It's a middle-aged energy. Yeah. And things are both a little more settled and also the things that are different are, I think we wish they would rather not be, which is like an interesting meta-commentary on the show, which is also about like stability and establishment and people not wanting change.

I, if you miss, I too miss Kirby. I too miss Claire Foy in a way. But I think probably ultimately the experiment works. which is a pretty remarkable thing to think about we're just going to recast our entire everyone's gone, everyone who made this amazing and this show, I mean, the writing is incredible. Obviously, there's like a production design

and, you know, historical detail and everything, but it doesn't work without the cast. And to just chuck a thing that's working and start all over is a big gamble and they pull it off. Yeah. I think it really does help. It is a transitional time, I guess, in all of the characters' lives as well as, like, in the context of the show.

I really feel like once you've got Gillian Anderson next season, you've got Diana in the mix. You've got the 80s, and it'll just be ridiculous. And the rise of television as this celebrity making and breaking force, yeah. Yes, absolutely. But you have to wonder about how much of it, they'll stick to it being shot through the lens of the Queen's perspective and what it always. Because I think with a few exceptions, and even in the Prince of Wales episode, the Danumont really is her saying no one cares. If it's always going to be related back to Elizabeth. And we talked about this, that it's called the crown, not the queen.

And that's an important distinction. But how much of the Charles and Diana stuff, obviously a lot of it will be. But how free will the show be to kind of go explore that? I think that it will actually be a lot more about the queen just because, because you have both Diana and Margaret Thatcher rising at the same time two major, major personalities who are essentially a threat to the queen as the top dog and the person who is getting the most attention and the woman who is getting the most attention. And I think that there was definitely a current of that to her relationship with Margaret Thatcher. And that is definitely the Diana drama for all of the Camilla Love Triangle, you know, and all of Diana's personal struggles was really about. Diana being way more popular than the royal family.

Right. And she's just like an international superstar that they don't know how to deal with at all. And she is overshadowing everybody else. And that's very tough for everyone. It's definitely Charles doesn't handle it well. But I think the queen starts to feel threatened by it. And that becomes she's both a threat to the queen and I guess a threat to the idea of the crown is they have traditionally understood it. I think that by necessity puts the queen back in center stage.

There's several over the next coming years, there's several major, for lack of a better term, set pieces that I'll be really curious to see what they do with, the royal wedding. Yes. And Diana's death. Yes. Like, how do they approach those? Are those phone calls in the middle of the night or is it going to be the way they did the Jubilee where we get these private moments before the televised thing? Right. Or is it going to be something where they're just like, we're going for broke.

We're showing you the whole thing. I'm excited to find out. Me too. All right. Amanda, thank you so much for talking about the crown with me. It was my pleasure. And we will be back, I think, on Wednesday. But yeah, check out if you guys, if you guys haven't seen the crown.

And if you've listened to this for some reason. Watch the crown. Watch the crown. We're good. Yeah, later.