The Watch - Reviewing ‘Thor: Ragnarok’ and Finishing ‘Stranger Things’ Season 2 (Ep. 201)

Episode Date: November 6, 2017

The Ringer’s Chris Ryan and Andy Greenwald give their very different reviews of Marvel’s 'Thor: Ragnarok' (5:00) before discussing the final three episodes of ‘Stranger Things’ Season 2 and how they felt about the series overall (26:00). Finally they rundown some of the shows they’ll be watching in the coming weeks (48:00). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey guys, thanks for listening to The Watch. Today's episode features me and Andy talking about Thor, Ragnarok. We also break down the last three episodes of Stranger Things Season 2, so that's episode 7, 8, and 9. We wrap up that and we talk about the future of that show. We also talk about all the shows that are coming in the next few weeks and the ones that we're going to be talking about, a lot of really cool guests coming up.

On last Thursday show, we talked a lot about the Neptunes and the return of NERD. If you want to check it out, we will be tweeting out our Neptune's playlist on Spotify. So definitely, definitely look for that. So today, Thor, Stranger Things, and in the future, a bunch of good stuff coming. So thanks for listening, Branskies. Today's episode of The Watch is brought to you by Mack Weldon, with a smart design, premium fabrics, and a simple shopping experience.

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Go to stitcher.com slash premium and use promo code watch at checkout to get your free month. That's Stitcher.com slash premium. I need supports to have to clear the room. Stand up and walk now. Hello and welcome to The Watch. My name is Chris Ryan. I'm an editor at Therigger.com and joining me in the studio. He just bought Lakeside property and Asgard.

It's Andy Greenwald. Boy, a show of extremes today, Chris. A show of extremes. For you, for your takes. Extreme takeover. Extreme takeover. Andy, it's Monday. Happy November.

This has been November for a minute. The final days of my 30s. Yeah. Do you want to talk about that today? How are you doing? Not yet. But it just really, I wanted to just mention up front. We're going to talk today about Thor Ragnarok.

And we're going to talk about the last three episodes of Stranger Things. Before we got into Thor, that wasn't necessarily in like a sensitive place when I saw this movie. But I think you could say... Thor? No, when I saw this movie, I'm going to tell you about. Oh, oh, you were using... I see. You're setting it up.

This weekend, I went and saw Lady Bird. Oh, great. And we're not going to talk about it today because I really want you to see it. I can't wait. I need to just like make a plea. which is like to anybody listening to the sound of my voice, go see this movie. It is far and away my favorite movie of the year. Wow.

It is such a like incredible accomplishment by Greta Gerwig, who wrote and directed it. And Sorcia Ronan is amazing in it. Like Lori Metcalf is incredible in it. And if you don't know, it's about set in 2002 in Sacramento. And it's about a Catholic school girl who calls herself Lady Bird, who wants to get the hell out of Northern California and go to the East Coast to to liberal arts college and it's her senior year of high school and it kind of follows her through the the academic year from 2002 to 2003 and um it is like very very funny and incredibly touching

and i was trying this take out on a couple of people and when we when we get to what i really want to talk about it but if i could compare it to any movie okay and both in terms of how it made me felt at the end but also it's very kind of got a lot a lot of similarities is uh 25th hour wow yes in terms of, I mean, 20th hour is a lot more like, kind of like a crime movie that at the end turns into like a full-blown family drama. This is a little bit more like a really lovely

bomb-back comedy, early bomb-back comedy that then gets very, just really resonant at the end, but they have some similar themes about regret and wishing you could communicate with your parents better. And it's just, I cannot recommend it more highly. I'm so excited to see this film. I have to ask you one question that I don't believe is a spoiler.

How much of the sensations of regret and loss and change have to do with the white chocolate Chris Weber era kings? Because when you say Sacramento-O-3... There's a lot of Pajah in this movie. Right. I am right there. I'm wearing purple. I'm wearing the purple and white. And I'm just getting the game stolen from you by the Lakers.

Yeah. No, it's... I don't know whether it's... Everybody who I know who has seen it has walked away feeling pretty similar. This is exciting. Yeah. So it's... It's the real deal, man.

There are a few things as good and exciting as a good and exciting movie, which is a good segue to Thor Ragnarok. It's been kind of a quiet time at the box office, kind of a quiet time at the movie multiplex, and then Thor comes through, and everything about it is perfect, is like kind of exactly what people want right now from a superhero movie. It doesn't take itself too seriously.

It has some great action set pieces. It is full to the brim with humor. And it features some of the biggest and brightest Hollywood stars that we've got out there. Which side of the ball are you on? Listen, listen, kids. Get their big stars in the picture. I want you to go first because you just walked out of the movie here. Nothing glitters like Jeff Goldblum in blue lipstick.

That moves the needle at the box office. Guys, I adored this movie. I just walked out of it because you guys know, Monday mornings at the arc like, that's my bag. this movie was pure pleasure for me. I think it is exactly what a comic book movie should be. I think that not just because, and we can talk about the how's and wise of this, but not just because it breaks from the tradition of either the overly important

or the overly destructive or violent or dark trend that has dominated a lot of the movies over the last decade. But what it has is that very, very specific mix of yes, humor but also righteous teenage wonder that is what attracts people to stories like Thor to the art of Jack Kirby or Walt Simons and all these other people who worked on Thor and made Thor cool

even though one of the arguments I'm hearing from a lot of people including our friend and colleague Sean Fennacy who has an absolutely terrific podcast interview with Thor's director of the big picture yeah Tycho YTT. They both copped to this thinking we never liked Thor at all even though maybe we liked comic books. Sure.

It works when you steer the absurdity meter up to 200 and it becomes something glorious. As soon as those first notes of immigrant songs start playing, as soon as you see Tessa Thompson on a winged Pegasus about to hurl a sword at Kate Blanchett, let's go. Yes, it is both ridiculous and glorious, and it has absolutely no shame in straddling that divide.

And in fact, not just straddling a divide, if I may, building a rainbow bridge between the. The Bifrost Bridge. Yeah, look, this movie was, this, this, this movie is pure pleasure, and I'm, I'm blown away by it. I loved it. Okay. I didn't dislike the movie while I watched it. Okay. And I don't feel particularly strongly about not liking it. Okay. But I didn't particularly care for this movie. This is a strong, strong ground, you're staking out for a podcast. I didn't, no, I mean, like, what I'm saying is, like, you're not going to see me protesting

outside the Arkley because of this, and I'm not, like, trying to sap anybody's good time. But I didn't really like this movie very much. Okay. I feel like it was like a Pixar movie where it basically was like four children, except for the jokes for the parents who brought them there. Okay, interesting. So I kind of just thought it was pretty much nonsense. And a little bit like everybody involved was definitely like we don't really like Thor,

which is like fine. I disagree with that. I just think like everything from like it's, it was like a lot of it was about sort of being like, do we really want to make like the same old Thor movie, which I don't think you should. The first two movies were not particularly good. No. So even from like they're cutting the hair,

which I thought it was like symbolically like a gesture of kind of like, this is not like the old movies. Yeah. We're kind of updating this character. Shouts to Stan Lee for, they finally gave him something to do. Yeah, right. I thought that it had a kind of,

the sense of humor was sort of like everybody in front of and behind the camera kind of thinks this is a joke. And that's fine. But it's still there is like, it is part of a social contract between movie grower and filmmaker where you're like, yeah, yeah, you know, like, I'm giving you this money because you

believed in what you were making. And I don't know necessarily whether or not the narrative surrounding Tycho Atiti's, like, involvement in the movie, which was sort of like, I don't really know anything about some of the superhero stuff. My job is to create a kind of atmosphere of absurd humor on the set.

And it plays very improv, it plays very loose. I feel like a lot of the characters were really a little bit more like what's the funny thing I can say here rather than anything relating to like my character now that being said I also don't particularly enjoy

the Guardians of the Galaxy Volume 2 part which is basically like people staring at each other and being like this is what friends and family do there's like a couple of throwaway lines about like this is what heroes do in Thor Ragnarock but I don't know man and I think also like I might also you know I was talking with Sean you about this

just before we went on I think I immediately get a little bit like if somebody tells me something super funny I'm just like okay like how funny is it yeah you know um but yeah I just I think I felt like the ultimately

if this movie was just the running man on the prison planet it would have been dope but they get off Sakaar and they're still like an hour to go and they have to have like a fight with a wolf as as Tika said in the interview with Sean to him this movie is after hours with with with gods you know that's a great great great great line but like it's still another hour i think the thing of like carl urban's redemption i think

the thing where where we are not connecting is that what the thing that i think tyka does best in all of his work is that he he is completely in touch with just like mainlining a certain kind a deep and true and pure kind of love for the grandiose and the absurd and the genre that exists in a certain type of kid. Comic book, reading kid, Star Wars, Action Figure, Playing Kid, the type of sensibility that has in many ways taken over our culture. The same sensibility that drives stranger things and drives stranger things fandom, even among people who don't even think the show is particularly good.

There is something that is very... I feel like you're foreshadowing. No, well, I think people know. But I think he's very much in touch with that. But I think what he's able to do is somehow build this. castle on top of that sensation and have it be, it is self-aware. Yeah. But it is also, I use this word twice, but it is also glorious.

You know, there is something about it where, yes, I do want. As much as I, you know, I like deconstructions of things, you know, I think if we're talking about comic books, I'd probably rather talk about a Grant Morrison comic at this point of my life, you know. But is there still a part of me? Somewhere underneath all the layers of permafrost and jaded critic, whatever, that wants to see the Hulk punch a giant Hellwolf? Yeah, I guess I kind of do.

Sure. And to see it brought to life in that way, not just the Hulk punch it, but Tessa Thompson dressed as a Valkyrie with a space machine gun shooting it. Yes, give me more of this and give me genuine affectionate while we're doing it. I got a little bit numb to that by the end of the movie. It's just like a long movie to be that stupid. Well, see, I just didn't think it was stupid.

I also thought, I did feel cheated on one score, which is that when we were talking about this off of the trailer, we were like, the rumor is this movie is 85 minutes. Yeah. Where do we hear that? I don't know. It's not. It's two hours long, you know. It's like a long too as well. But I didn't think so because there's something pure here.

Like, one of the things that we often have said in talking about these big movies is that one of the key to doing them is you hire. um shakespearean actors because shakespearean actors whether it's lord of the rings or whether it's a marvel movie um or or what have you shakespearean actors can sell bullshit by the pound they can make it feel important the same thing for throons like you make stephen delane do stannis's dialogue it's all of a sudden it's like poetry yeah but here's something that we have a culture as a culture have mostly forgotten which is when we say shakespearean trained it means they are trained to do drama and comedy and to delight equally in both. And so going into the movie, I was like,

well, how much money did they offer Anthony Hopkins to do this movie again? And then I see him in that first scene. The shots of like Norway, quote unquote, those are actually just Anthony Hopkins' house. That's his property. Yeah, he's like, I let you shoot here now. The scene where he is Loki as him.

Can I ask you a quick question? I just wanted to finish the thought. He's having so much fun. Yeah. And it's so funny to see him have fun, despite, you know, after basically, not suffering, because he gets paid to do it.

Yeah. But to be hired for his gravitas for two movies. And then just gets to be like a funny crank eating grapes in a nightgown. I never doubt that everybody involved had a blast. It seems like they did. I'm especially a big fan of Anthony Hopkins's Odin is dead now outfit, which was just like a linen suit. They happen to be wearing.

Yeah, in Norway. But when Kate Blanchett's like, well, why did you do this movie? And she's like, I wanted to make something that my kids would be psyched about. I think that's cool. I just don't care. You know what I mean? That's not like a motivating factor for me to go see a movie is because it's just like, it's just not in my,

in my wheelhouse. And it seemed like nobody really, like, if there's no urgence, and it's not even that particularly connected to the rest of the MCU, which God knows, like, I could do a little bit less with the MCU. Sure, sure. But it almost felt like, why didn't, like, so could the collective power of the people involved in this movie not have gotten something else made that was like really funny and had nothing to do with a Bifrost Bridge or Asgard or Sarda or whatever like the demon is.

Not to be the Marvel Defender, but like that's one of the beauties of the comic books is that you can tell different types of stories within the same shared universe in different artistic perspectives. You know, this movie does not need a, I don't think does not need a straw man or a punching bag to compare it to. But they ran the Justice League trailer in front of it. Yeah. And I'm sitting here watching that trailer. And I'm like, this movie is death. It is literally the death of my visual mainframe. It's just like space bugs and Jason Momoa grunting.

And it is so abhorrent on so many levels. And then to me, the worst part of it isn't just the cynicism of it or the desperation of it or whatever. The worst part of it is Affleck being like, that's not how the saying goes. That's not it at all. Because Jos Whedon came in to do like to marvel it up a little bit. And it's so cynical and inert, you know. And to me, this movie, it sounded to me like you were describing that kind of thing when you were describing Thor, the sort of jokes, just to have jokes, to have on top of jokes with nothing beneath them.

To me, this movie was just suffused with life. Like, it was suffused with real passion and real excitement and real fun. Is it, when we talk about Lady Bird in a week, am I going to be doing callbacks to Raggarach? I promise you not. Like, I can separate those parts of my brain. But this is, it's surprising. And maybe it's because I just saw it. And maybe because I did and to some degrees do still love comics books.

It's like a fun movie. I like I definitely get it. No, but there's a lot of it has to do with like the neon explosive color of it. And the Mark Mother's boss score, which is dope. Totally. There is a strain of quote unquote criticism that exists in the 21st century, often online, that I consider to be my my own personal giant hellwolf. And it's basically when people look at things and their response is,

this, what could be bad? You know? It's like people who just tweet like the Lion King cast. Shoot it into my veins. Yeah. And it's just like, well, you're not, no. Like, we have a semi-responsibility to be thinking, sentient people here and like engage with something. And it's just so reductive when they're like, when things get praised just solely for the construction

or whatever nostalgic it happens to scratch. That said, maybe as I'm talking about it, that's what I'm doing here. Maybe I'm not immune to it. It's just so it caught candy after a while just makes me sick. You know what I mean? For sure. It was, I'm not knocking, like, the witticisms of it or, like, the general vibe of it. Rachel House is great. Tyca's voicing the rock revolutionary gladiator is great.

Wait, what about, can we talk about the goddess Tessa Thompson? I have a few, a few notes I'd like to give up, yeah. I just want to say this. Here are the people who should be upset about this movie. Wait, I definitely have a few of these people. Okay, let's add to this list. Here are the people who should be saltiest. The people behind Westworld.

No, no, no. Wait. Okay. Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy should look at this movie and look at Tessa Thompson in this movie. And think about what they used her for and what they did do her in season one of Westworld. And they should be ashamed. Okay. They should look at how they use Anthony Hopkins and look at how he was used in this movie.

Because Tessa Thompson is so 100 in this movie. She is so funny. She's got a great accent. Who knew? Didn't need to have an accent. But I guess Valkyries have English accents. Sure. Yeah.

And there are these moments when she's on screen with Hemsworth and Hiddleston and and Ruffalo, and she's just owning it. It's delightful. Yeah. I want to talk to Idris Elba's agent. Okay. And talk about, like, the nine movie deal you signed in 2009. I know.

Or whatever it was. When they were like, I'm sure they had a vision for this character. But the fact that my guy needs to get on, like, you know, the plane to come shoot, like, huddling as guardian refugees into a mountainside and then being like, where to, with contact lenses in. I know. This dude should be James Bond. I know.

Stop wasting him. There is some element of this where I think that weirdly, the pendulum has shifted from people being like, get me in a Marvel movie to actually on this one, they probably just sent Tyka. And he was just like, will you come play in my movie? Sure. And people were like, okay.

Yeah. There's a couple of shots of him where I'm like, is Idris in the same room as everybody else who's in this scene? Probably not. I mean, even Carl Urban, like, it's a bizarre turn for a dude, you know, whose bones McCoy is. in the Star Trek movies, but at the same time, he's from New Zealand, too.

And he's out in the front lines of the press being like, Tyke got to make a Tyco movie and I wanted to hang with him. It's definitely like, I'm happy for everybody involved. I want to talk a little bit about, so there's the scene when Cape Blanchett is hell as she first shows up in Asgard again, and she goes into that room where the Bifrost bridges, and she kills those other guys around Carl Urban.

And it's like... The guys who were nominally the co-stars of the previous film? Zachary Levi is one of them. Yeah. And, like, that was like, he's got a character. Yeah. And Kevin Feigy was like, it was a noble death for that beloved character. And I was like, what?

Yeah, those guys got sunned. I was like, I didn't even know he was in this. For real, you know, like, what's your name? Jamie Alexander is just thanking God for blind spots, rigorous filming schedule. So she didn't have to get onto the Feige jet to Australia just to be knifed by Cape Ledgett. Yeah, that was a pretty, I mean, it's a pretty rugged, like, none of this is working, including these quote unquote beloved characters. They are, like the

Warriors 3, like if you like Thor. Do they get killed in actual Thor comics? Everyone loves them. Let me tell you something else. Asgard doesn't generally get burned to the ground by a 100 foot. I want to see a list of people who were like, you know, when they were in like Iron Man 2 and they were like, I really think when they do Infinity War in 12

years, that's when I come through. It's just like, hey, Mickey Rourke, so we're going to have to... No, but what's his name? What's the name? Frank. What's his... Frank? What's his... Frank Grasbo? You know, he was And they told him like, oh, you're coming back for whatever it was, the Ultron one. Yeah. He was probably like, bet.

Like, that's cool. I've heard like, I've really got a vision for the crossbones backstory. And they're like, no, you're just going to rob something in the first five minutes. And then that's it for you. It's a wrap. All of what we're saying does speak to the secret sauce for success of these Marvel movies, which is they have found a way to minimize commitment. Yeah.

To an extreme degree. Now, this movie filmed in Australia, which is, not convenient to many people, but it is to Chris Hemsworth. It is to Kate Blanchett. You know, they have the studios in Atlanta going 24-7 so people can drop in and drop out. And often, we think about people being this movie like Jeff Goldblum was hilarious, wonderful, love to when he's in the movie. How much screen time is it?

Like, how much of a commitment was it for to be there? Apparently, he did like a 25-minute improvised speech on set. Great. Give me that. I also should be careful what I wish for because I have the feeling, like, you know, one of the nice things about this movie is that even though there's a lot of like Hela stuff, and there's a lot of Asgard stuff. It is for the most part, like, they are in mid-flight already.

You don't have to do a lot of origin story stuff. Yeah, that's very important. I get the feeling like that is about to change soon because we'll have all of these new characters being introduced, and then we're going to have to do the heavy lifting of 85 people in two Avengers movies. Well, they're all people we know. So I don't think a Marvel movie will feel this light and breezy for a very long time. Yeah, I mean, the thing that would make the most,

that makes the most sense, I do think, for their continued success going forward, is to allow the standalone movies to be standalone movies. And they had that going for a while. They've gotten away from it a little bit. And then they had that weird, I mean, it's not weird. It's a formula that works. But the idea of, like, well, we want to reintroduce Spider-Man for the third time in a decade. So we need Tony Stark to fly around a little bit, too, just to sort of be the connective tissue.

But you mentioned Spider-Man Homecoming, and I actually think that that movie had, like, the humor of that movie was more baked into the story. and baked into like the characters and like the actual I love that movie and I mean no shade at it when I say this is a movie about a thunder god with a giant hammer

who runs around on a rainbow bridge you know what I mean? Sure. Like in the comics there was just an arc where Thor lost his hammer and was riding around on a dimension hopping goat like this there is some fun to be had here in this world

should you choose to accept it? It's wild that this is just what pop culture is now that's I guess what I'm saying. I would rather it be this that understood the fun of it. The fun of it. And, you know, those very, like, Frank Frisetta-esque, like, tabloes that this movie flashed back to, there was consideration to it.

Sure. There was some aesthetic sensibility. I don't want to make it sound like its neighbors, too. It was definitely, like, more wealth. I just thought it was, like, a little, like, do you guys really want to be doing this? Yeah, it was funny, though. Okay. Let's take a quick break to hear from our sponsors, and we will be back to talk about the last three

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next business trip at upside.com. Upside.com, you deserve a better business trip. Minimum purchase required. Seasite complete details. We're back. Let's talk a little bit about these last few episodes of Stranger Things, episode 70 and 9, Andy. And I continue to be fascinated by the conversation

around Stranger Things because precisely because the first season was such like a great slow burn word of mouth phenomenon that was like, there, they're, But very few people watch it all at once the first day it came out It really added to the charm of the experience because it was so unlike a lot of the way Netflix shows Operate and I was actually we were in a meeting earlier today with a None other than Bill Simmons host of the rewatchables

This is the most notable achievement and He was talking about how he thought like Netflix kind of screwed this up because what they should have done is release three at a time like Hamid's Tale like a couple at a time and that there would have been a lot of lot more conversation around the episodes if that had happened. I take his point. But I think that if that had been the case, the reaction to seven,

the seventh episode called The Sister, right? Lost Sister. Would have been that much more passionately against it. Sure. I think the fact that it is hidden among the season and you can kind of

take it or leave it and then as soon as it's over you can get back to Hawkins didn't, if that had been a standalone episode that people are like, it's, Stranger Things is on on Thursday. Yeah. People would have been pissed. People should be pissed now. People should be in the streets over this episode, man.

Like, not really. But, I will say this. It is hard to remember a more, um, it's hard to remember a worse episode, standalone episode of an otherwise decent show. Yeah. And I don't mean decent to be insulting. I mean that Stranger Things, regardless of. regardless of how you feel about it generally maintains a certain level of quality.

This episode is a disaster from start to finish, I think from maybe not conception, but certainly execution. And it lies there like a certain something in a swimming pool in Caddyshack in the middle of this season to a degree that is really surprising. Now, to your point, despite how negative I am about that episode and, as people know by now, the season as a whole. There was something about it that I almost appreciated because it's a little bit like... Shoot your shot, right? Yeah, there's a little bit like, oh, someone's alive in there.

You know, and I don't like what they're showing me, but oh, okay, you know, they were maybe feeling themselves or they were feeling, you know, that this was what they needed to tell. And this is also evidence of the, all it wants, the strengths and limitations of Netflix, because only Netflix, I think, would have given the Duffer Brothers the room to run that they did in the first season. and probably only Netflix would have been like and what's your what's your your overview for 207?

Oh really? Oh, you want to make the most You want to remake the legend of Billy Jean in Chicago? You want to make people go back to the Quincy punk episode and be like well that was a more understanding representation of a subculture

in the 70s and 80s than this was. Sure, go for it. You know? A couple of interesting things have come out about this episode. There has been, I was going to say there's been a press push by the Duffers, but it's actually like one interview that has been aggregated a million times

because of how device of seven is. But they're just basically like, we wanted to challenge ourselves. There was that, but we've mentioned a couple of times the slight strain you can kind of feel on the writing process in this season of them kind of speeding up to slow down in places.

And the fact that this isn't checkoff sister that Callie doesn't come back in the last two episodes is definitely like a sign. that this was, we tried it out, we didn't quite think it worked, we're not going to bring her back in this season. Now, obviously, this is about bigger world building. The future of this show is probably outside of Hawkins for as much as Hawkins is this show. I think that they're going to have to start thinking about the ramifications of like, if there is a secret program with

at least 11 kids, where are the other 10? Right? And we found one of them. But I thought that the way they talked about this episode, the idea of it being almost like a weird backdoor pilot of something else from the Stranger Things universe. And also that this needed to happen for Eleven's storyline to have her come back. And all that stuff about it was very telling about the environment that this season must have been created in. Okay, yeah. So while I didn't enjoy it per se, I think I am one of those people who watched it in the

flow of the last few episodes of the season. I think I watched this season in two chunks. and so it kind of is like a bad episode of 24 where you're like oh my god this was like a yeah and I got a really long episode with the daughter and then there's some jack stuff this was I was like I see what's going on here and I see what they were trying to do

and I don't even know what about it is that bad other than everything you know what I mean it's like any one of the performances is bad no it's just it's just so it's bizarrely tone deaf and so um adjacent to

anything of interest to most people. You know, there's, there are a lot of examples in beloved shows where, and this actually ties into something I said last week, too, about the need creators have to show their work. And even a little bit to our conversation about Thor and how all the heavy lifting was done by the first two movies, even if no one liked them, so that Tyco, YTT could come in and just ignore all that and just build the story. This feeling that we have to put this character through this gauntlet in order for her to become the character we need her to be later in the plot.

So you're going to take this medicine and we're going to. go on this journey with her, even though nobody wants this, you know? And I do think that there ought to be someone in the room of the creative process being like, if nobody wants it, then nobody wants it. Even if you don't want it, you know, then you don't need to be doing it. Yeah, like, what is the end point you're trying to get to? Is it to get 11 a makeover and show her that she can lift a truck? That she's the incredible Hulk, that anger fuels her, basically. The idea of creators challenging themselves is worthwhile, and even on shows that are among the greatest of all time, there are plenty of examples of people stepping outside of their

comfort zone to the show's detriment. Any time on the Sopranos, for example, that we would go home with Dr. Melfi, and then she and her colleagues would be sitting around a dinner table talking about NPR and, like, the most weird, like, abject performance of suburban, upper middle class, liberal, whatever that was, you know, intentionally placed against, uh, um, Tony's world. Sure. They felt so totally out of place

and out of whack. So there's plenty of examples of that. But to me, it's just, it's just further proof that this season,

now that I've seen the whole thing, just needed a radical rethink from the ground up. Wait, what story are you guys telling? Wait, what is really working?

What do you want to do here? Because all of the things that worked, you could talk about how sequels just basically tell the same story again, but louder. I wish in this case.

Because if you, if you really like having watched all of it drill down and think about where everyone was at any point and what the threat was this year none of it really makes any sense or adds to any there was no well they couldn't commit to the bit because the threat was will like the threat was always good

the threat was will it was right there they tease it the spy is probably the best episode of the season the idea that like will could be possessed by this darkness and that and might have to be sacrificed to defeat it i am I'm somebody who's just like so in the best for the charm of these kids and for the comfort food feeling of this world

that like all the upside down stuff all the Hawkins National laboratory stuff just any of it, it just really doesn't matter to me. I think I am reacting to this the way you reacted to Thor, which is like you're like, it's a friggin' Pegasus jumping over a rainbow bridge. I'm like, man, it's the 80s

and the police are playing. Like, I'm just kind of fine with that. Except this season felt so claustrophobic by pulling the characters apart The town of Hawkins was not a character in this season. And I do think that they basically got to the ledge and they were like, no, but once, without knowing anything about the process of how they made this show, wrote this show, the stuff about Will and the fact that they have talked about like Will was supposed to maybe kill someone this season is like that's the darkness. That's the Empire Strikes Back Temple of Doom thing that you guys wanted.

And that was the thing that you were going to confront viewers on. But they obviously just felt like you can't bring Will back from that. And if that's the case, then you basically run out of room. And you have to then just backpedal and you can get Will turns good again by just using a lot of heat lamps. Yeah, they just sweated him out. And then he got to dance with the girl we've never seen before in the end. Look, they punt it. I think you're exactly right.

And it gives me a lot of concern about the success of the show going forward because what is the threat? What is the enemy? Now, you can tell me the threat is a giant eight-legged nightmare monster from another dimension that wants to come to our dimension because that's what evil. creatures do. Right. But I don't care about that, really. What you care about, what we care about is when there is a villain, there's a face, there's a desire. There's nothing here except just evil hebi-jeebies coming out of the walls and out of the ground right now, unless Will becomes the face of it. Right. And so by stripping that away, I don't know what we're up against anymore, because we've also neutralized the bad men doing the bad things. I mean, I guess Modin's just

waiting on that third season check because he's still floating around and that's obviously still out there. But, you know, we talked about last week the problem with the spy episode was that they're all red shirts that get killed. Now, shouts to Sean Aston, who literally was the McBain's partner of the season. But because my faith in the Duffers was so shaken, leading up to that episode, to that moment when he goes,

I was like, they're not even going to be able to do this because they've fallen in love with him too. Sure, right. And that was a bummer to me. There are flickers of life. There's flickers in this season. that remind me of what was so compelling and enjoyable about the first season. Sometimes they feel like they almost happened by accident.

Like Billy flirting with a certain actress, a certain actress whom you and I adore. A certain actress whom you and I think has been woefully underserved the season. Are you talking about Buono, though? I'm always talking about Buono. I got that Bono follow, though. What about Bono? Can she take a bath without being interrupted?

Look, she looked lovely in her silk robe. I know we all want Calgon to take her away. She wants Calagon and her agents to take her away probably at this point. Thank you to everybody who tweeted me like literally nine hours into Stranger Things being available, being like, what about Bono though? Like, I thought she was going to die. Yeah, no. But in that scene, all of a sudden you're like, oh, okay, here's this character, Billy, who makes no sense, serves no purpose. And in many ways, that scene with his dad, where they're humanizing him or whatever?

I like to think that in the same way that Lindeloff is like, I made the beginning of leftover season two for Andy that they made that scene in Stranger Things for me. That's a beautiful, beautiful thought. appreciate that. But it's just, to me, it's just a sign of like, and then we can, I think we should change the conversation to like what else, what can be done going forward and what the show might turn into. But there are, there are just these little, the show was frustrating to me because of not just the goodwill, but because of the good decision making in one season. And people don't become worse storytellers or worse filmmakers. I really do think, and we have no information to back this up other than the show, that the time constraints, the pressure seem to be, in this case,

maybe impossible, maybe enormous. It would be a good sign if Stranger Things 3 is announced as 2019. Well, yeah, but then you're going to get a bunch of kids with bad mustaches. But already, I don't know if, like, Finn Wolfhard had a lot of, like, commitments to it, but Mike wasn't on the show this year. Well, this is the thing. We've talked about this before. And if it sounds like we're like, I think we both want a lot from the show.

I get more from it than Andy does, obviously. It is a fascinating thing where it is sitting right in the center between this art and commerce debate that we're always having, not especially in the way that we are processing television now by its delivery system. Okay, and this idea of do you go deeper or do you go wider?

Obviously, this show is a, it is a huge, huge hit. It might be the biggest hit in the history of Netflix. It's not. It's not. Okay. It does very well,

but from everything I've gathered, there are other shows that do a lot better. Okay. That being said, it is a pop culture phenomenon. It does, and the shows that I've heard

that do better, don't get the same kind of breathless coverage in the media. That's one of them. I'm pretty breathless for that show. It sits right at this nexus between art and commerce in terms of like they've got to get these as many seasons out of these kids while they're still cute. You can't just like let it go for three years and bring it back and do the late high school years. And that's going to put a lot of pressure on them.

So they're introducing people like Max and they're introducing Billy and they're introducing Callie. And it's like, well, why aren't you just spending more time with Mike, who was probably the most interesting character of the year? Because he turned it into kind of an asshole. You know, and like this whole experience, what if this whole experience did the unthinkable would just make one of these kids not cute? Yeah. And also, like, the Mike and 11 thing really has emotional weight. Absolutely. And it was buried this season.

She is the ultimate girlfriend at camp. Like, it's great to watch. Like, that's an incredibly interesting relationship. And there was no time or room for them to even have more than a time. tacit conversation. As soon as they see each other again, the duffers pull Mike into a room with Hopper and then have this over the top like, you all right, I learned it by watching you emotional breakdown where he hugs him until he's hitting him till he's hugging him. That didn't feel right. That just felt like something that was created in the room and then didn't play. Just certain other

choices, like the character of Max, that actress was good. I liked the dynamic of adding her to the group. But we got nothing about her other than she is the literally the dream girl of boys like that who skateboards and plays video games and has cute nicknames for them but makes out with him anyway, her brother got an emotional backstory in that scene with the abusive father. She doesn't get, Max doesn't get any backstory. She's just like, oh, where do you have demons in this town? Let's go. I like DigDug.

Let's fight. Let's roll. Let's play Dr. Quinn Television Doctor. Nope. Love it, but nope. What do we do to fix this show for you? Okay. So do you invest more and fewer characters?

I think you need to. You leave Hawkins? I mean this seriously. I think they need to take a beat. Now, obviously, I think you make a really strong point. For any number of reasons, they are not going to have a long break between seasons. And in fact, all this advice is probably moot because whether it's been officially renewed or not, that room has probably been going for quite some time.

Oh, yeah. I mean, they're doing four seasons. That's the line. That's the word. Yeah. But I do think they need to do the kind of conversation that can be very, very hard to have for a show, particularly a successful show, particularly a show caught in the very breathless cycle of production in the 21st century,

which is let's really take a moment, let's leave our writer's room, let's go on a retreat. I don't know. Let's go to Chipotle. Let's take a break. I don't know. Do people like Taco Bowl?

I don't know. I'm trying to put myself into the head of a Duffer brother, and I'm not sure which one. And ask, what is the show about? Really? Okay. Shows don't do this enough.

What is the best version of the show about to you? What I'm afraid of, the best version of the show to me is growing up in an innocent time and learning the world is not innocent. And there's danger in the world. And finding something, finding a way towards good,

finding a way towards community within that. What worries me is, and this is often the case that when things get noisier and more things get added on to it, that what the show is about to the people making it is the upside down.

Is scary things that go bump in the night or slither or whatever. So for me, the show is about Steve reclaiming his rightful place as king of the town. Steve didn't even get a CODA.

All these other characters get these like sweet moments at the dance. Where's Steve at? He's healing from his broken face. Unreal. Is Billy catching a charge for that? The unfairness of Steve's life. I agree. Steve... Okay, Christoph Kraslowski.

The unfairness of Steve's life. That's the best version of season three Stranger Things. The decalogue of Steve. No, it's like copland. Yeah. But it's like fat old Steve. Moving slowly through the town that he used to run. You blew it. That's what I'm saying.

That would be the best first. You're the town and you blew it. You had the nice hair. Like, these are the matchups. These are the mix, the matchups you could only get if you listen to this podcast. But, no, but I mean it, I really mean this genuinely because having made it through the second season, the parts that I thought were most compelling in the first season, everything about the experiments in 11 and the ruin, the flashbacks and Modin, you know, in this idea of there is a, there's a scary evil out there and you don't know what it is. Let's, can we go back to some of that? honestly, if you look at the second season

and you just break it down into its pieces, no one was ever challenged. Nothing was ever difficult. Now, Bob might argue the alternative to that. Yes. They had the... Talk about having a coda. They're like, did you know Bob's dead?

Did you know that Hell Beasts are currently gnawing on Bob? Like, fuck, corn on the cob. The... Every plan they had worked. They rescued Hopper just in time. They set the thing on fire when they needed to. They literally cranked the thermostat up on the, well, they didn't have nest then, but they just turned up the heat lamps and the demon was gone.

They took an elevator to hell and an 11 had a flashback and sealed a hellmouth. I thought that was pretty dope. I mean, it looked cool, but what? Why is everything easy? Why can she do this? Do you know what I mean? It just, at that point, I didn't even know what I was looking at because I didn't know why. I didn't know why.

So to me, and I'm curious, I know people don't. like hearing me criticize it, so I will stop now. But I do wonder if now the more people have caught up or if they hadn't already been interested. There are times when you and I've disagreed on a show and I think that you're being unfair. I do not think you're being unfair to the show. And I do think that generally people, I think people probably the majority of the opinion is somewhere in between us where I think that people would admit that they love this and they want this to be better and that they were disappointed in the season. Also, recency bias is just like every breath you take at a school dance is like going to just get a lot of points with me. I just really,

You know what I mean? Like I just, I can't help who I am. It's beautiful. At the end of the day. I enjoyed the last scene. I enjoyed a show. And one of the reasons why I like the, I like and root for the Duffer Brothers is because they are, in the same way I was talking about Tycho Waititi, you have being in touch with

that sort of youthful, innocent fandom. The Duffer Brothers get an unvarnished sweetness of nostalgia and of being a teenager. And so the kindness that Nancy shows to dust. resonates. Yeah. When Mike sees 11 come in, it's like, okay, these are real, that's that uncut raw. This is exactly what you were saying. Which is like, why do they divide and conquer these kids?

Like, put them all in a gym together, play the police, like, let them have fun in a room together. And who knows what the reasons were, like what Millie Bobby Brown's Godzilla shooting schedule meant she could or couldn't be. Is that what she's doing? Yeah. She is, by the way. She's a really good actor. All right.

We should wrap it up. I want to talk a little bit about the shows that we're going to be moving on to now that we've got stranger things out of the way. And by the way, people have asked us this, like what had the belt? And by the way, I appreciate your commitment to our completely arbitrary bit that we do and we don't do enough of. The reason we didn't talk about it, I think, or at least I didn't, is because clearly Stranger Things has the belt in the cultural sense.

I was just very, I was sort of grudgingly holding it back. I think you can make an argument. Like, you can make, if that's, if that's the case, then it's, I think that the idea of the belt is really like a 50-50, like our critical acclaim versus like what people people are talking about. Because if it was just the latter, then I guess the good doctor would have the belt. And if it was the former, then... The deuce.

Yeah, the deuce would have the belt. But, you know, I think Mine Hunter kind of splits the difference. But one of the problems with, like, Netflix, is that I don't know when people are watching these things. And I don't know... You can just tell these shows just don't get written about and talked about in the same way as, like, an HBO show. And it's precisely because nobody is ever on the same thing.

I cannot tell you how many times I've been in a bar or a dinner or something over the last month where it's like start talking about Mind Hunter and stop because somebody's like, oh, I've only seen three, you know, and maybe they'll finish it, maybe they won't. But that's not the same thing as obviously Throne says a lot of other things going for besides that, but it's not the same thing as Big Little Lies where it was like, oh, did you see the last episode? Oh my God, I have to talk to you about it. It's an interesting conversation within the industry too because I have to think that

creators who have spent, I mean, we talked to Jonathan Groff, they spent 10 months shooting Mind Hunter, that on some level, they're, you know, a little frustrated or bummed that the conversation can't continue or the, whether it's purely for ego validation purposes or it's just to feel, you know, that you're part of something. The question is whether anybody outside of people like you and me care about this? But I'm saying, I do think that I'm curious, not for fans, because it doesn't matter, you get the content, but I'm saying creatively, if anyone will begin to steer their business, they're not going to steer their business elsewhere. Here's what I was going to say.

Everybody wants to sell this show to Netflix because Netflix says, here's the money, go make your show. We will make it. know, we don't pilot stuff. There's no notes. Apparently not, because we all saw episode seven of Stranger Things season two. Go make it. That's all you want. And then at the end of it, I wonder if there's a little bit of a bittersweet feeling

because you aren't getting that hit. You're sort of missing, you think, oh, here's your golden ticket to the whatever age we're in of television. We get to be part of it the same way the great shows of the last decade got to be part of it. But then it's kind of not the same thing. Yeah. You are just, you know, Jonathan Groff and Holt McElaney are going to go back to Pittsburgh

for 10 more months. and make another season of Mine Hunter. Then they might make another one after that. And they're doing incredible work, and I hope everyone watches it. But it's on some level, I wonder if it bugs people the way it does seem to bug me clearly, that all that work, they are shoveling more content. It just seems like it's a shame if there's so much talent in television right now to not have it properly appreciated. And they're doing all that work for Netflix's share price.

Sure. Okay. Which is, you know, I'm sure it's doing great, by the way. Coming up, we're going to be talking about a couple of shows in the coming weeks. So we just wanted to like kind of lay out the menu here. At various points over the coming weeks, we'll be talking about Smilf, which is a Showtime show. Not just talking about it. On Thursday show, I believe, barring insult or injury, we will have the creator star writer, sometimes director, Frankie Shaw.

Fantastic. I'm really impressed by Smilf. You can watch the pilot. I think it's on YouTube too. It is a show that the log line, like single mom in Southie, you think could be done in a variety of horrible. ways and it's done with real personality, real specificity. It's really good. Okay, so we're also going to be talking about Godless, which is a show from Scott Frank and Steven Soderberg on Netflix. It is a Western about a town of women in the 19th century fighting off like outlaws.

What's the last time Scott Frank and Steven Soderberg collaborated? What was the name of that? Was that out of sight? Yeah. Yeah, that was out of sight. Scott Frank also made an amazing movie called The Lookout that if you haven't gotten a chance to check that out, you should definitely definitely see that. We hope to talk to him on the pod. We're going to do a Mr. Robot check-in. Yeah, guys, watch Mr. Robot this week. Yeah.

I can tell you that. Marvelous Mrs. Maisel comes back on Amazon soon. Yeah. And we're also going to talk about girlfriend experience and hopefully have Amy Simons on the show. Yeah, because you were way out ahead of me on Girlfriend Experience. Remarkable show. And our friend, Sam S.M.L. was talking it up.

And I didn't catch up to it. And then I did finally watch it. Yeah. It's really, really a fascinating and well-done show. And by all accounts, the second season is even more interesting. because it went from being, it was sort of a half-hour drama, which I'm all in on, but it was a one-and-done season following one character. And this season, because it's a show made by two distinct filmmakers, Lodge Carragun and Amy Simets,

they apparently made two distinct shows. Which is, you know, with two different stars. Two different stars. And, you know, I'm excited anytime someone messes with the format and tries to give us something a little bit different or changes pace with what we're expecting because there's so much is the same. and these are really interesting filmmakers who, they're not on Netflix or on stars, but appear to have been given carte blanche.

Yeah, so we're really excited about a bunch of the shows coming up. We'll obviously have Megan Abbott back on to talk about Queenpin, which is the next... Who's reading Queenpin out there? And when Megan comes back on, we'll probably hit the end of Mine Hunter because she was tweeting today about what a big fan she was of the show, especially the end, so we'll get back to Mindhunter eventually.

Look at us watching TV talking about it? It's like 2013 in here. We'll have some other surprises next week. Yeah, man. Good to see you. Great to see you. Great to see all my Braini-ski friends out there. Go see you, Lady Bird.

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