TV Finales: 'Stranger Things,' 'Plur1bus,' 'Welcome to Derry,' and 'The Chair Company'

Hey, everyone, we're back.

The gang's all together.

It's me, it's Adam, it's Donovan.

They're gonna join me in a second.

We're gonna wrap up some thoughts on some 2025 television.

Lots of television happened to end the year and we were off for the holidays.

Traveling, doing holiday things.

We hope you forgive us.

We were not out of production, just on a break.

Gotta be honest, some existential questions popped up during that break.

You know, should we continue?

The break was long enough to think, is this podcast worth it?

We hope you enjoy it.

We like doing it is what we came down to.

Whether we have 10 listeners or 3,000 listeners.

We like doing it.

We're gonna do it every Tuesday.

We're back on our regular schedule.

Plus you'll get a bonus episode this week.

How about that?

Today we will discuss the ending of Stranger Things.

You might be surprised on what we think.

Talk about the ending of Pluribus on Apple tv.

We'll talk about that final episode of welcome to Derry, which you might be surprised on what we think there too.

And that utterly insane Tim Robinson show on HBO called the Chair Company.

If you haven't seen it, the.

The non spoilers might explain just a little bit of it.

And then of course, after the break, we do spoilers.

This is your television podcast.

We do this for all of our working class people.

Let's bring in Adam and Donovan and get the show started.

Alabama, take projection.

Hey, welcome back.

It's the three of us.

As promised, we're going to be placing some.

Some bows on the shows from 2025 on our list today.

Stranger Things, Pluribus, a little on welcome to Derry and the Chair Company over on hbo.

There aren't a lot of new things really to discuss this week that.

But over the holidays, maybe there was, you know, we had travels and visits and we took our holiday off.

So we're back and we're in non spoiler section.

Let's begin in the order.

We'll talk about them in spoiler section.

Stranger Things 5.

It kind of did a novel thing for Netflix.

They aired three episodes.

No.

Or was it four on Thanksgiving, three on Christmas, and one on New Year's?

Interesting.

I thought it was a genius move.

I thought it was good.

Yeah.

It didn't separate them too far apart.

Probably the most popular show watched during the holidays.

How do you guys feel in general?

Well, I've only seen two episodes.

Okay.

And I made my feelings very clear.

You hate nerds.

I hate nerds.

No, I'm this is a show that I like, I am going to finish.

It was just like.

It was very easy for me to kind of put down on my list, which is not as negative as a review as I think it sounds like when I say it out loud.

That's so funny because I felt like this show for myself and a lot of people was like a excuse to do something fun again.

And it's almost like a throwback to something that we didn't even realize slipped away, which was like appointment viewing, you know what I mean?

And like a cultural online conversation about one show.

And the way that they doled them out, Blaine, I thought was fantastic, you know, gave us quite a bit to chew on over Thanksgiving.

And if you.

If you weren't able to watch it that weekend because you were busy, you had kind of the whole holiday build up to.

To catch it.

And then Christmas and the New Year's.

That was a great move by Netflix.

Some.

An entity that we complain about a lot and how they roll shows out.

This was really good.

The rollout was great.

Did you like it?

Yeah, in the.

In the same way that I enjoyed just.

Yeah, let's consume this right now because people are talking about it and that's fun.

It was.

It was like eating a really good bag of potato chips again, you know, and I.

We'll get into it.

I think that the things that it did down the stretch were really good and strong.

I understand why people are frustrated by some of the details in it, but I think, you know, we've praised season one of the show so much.

Is like, oh, that was really a great season of television.

And, you know, there's been hijinks and.

And fun through the other seasons and emotional resonance, but I kind of thought that they brought it home.

I know that that's not a popular opinion online, but.

Well, I agree very thoroughly.

We've also seen the end of the first season of Pluribus.

Am I right about that?

Gentleman?

You've seen them all.

Yeah, yeah.

Do you think it was good, Blaine?

Hell if I know what this show is actually about.

And that that's not bad because they're really doing a lot of different things.

Yes, I thought it was very good.

That's going to be the first time I say that on this episode about a TV show that it was good, that I don't know what it was about, but I liked it.

Oh, well, I. I mean, obviously, like, there's the plot, but then they're very, very smartly, like, have other questions kind of bubbling up.

It's well made tv like in the sense that like the episodes are well crafted, it's well acted.

I want to know what happens next.

It's.

It's got a good mix of the like.

There's something here to actually like chew on and reflect on with the like.

Okay, well now what the heck is going to happen?

So yeah, big, big.

Very, very, very positive review for me.

I think as a season I wasn't sure how it would.

How it would end because it seemed like a really big ambitious swing and I think it together very well as a season of television.

Everything has little quibbles and things like that.

But I think as a whole.

Yeah, yeah.

You never knew what direction it was going to go.

Sticking with you Donovan here, it feels like a long time ago, but it really wasn't.

It does, doesn't it?

Yet Colon.

Welcome to Derry.

It ended.

We talked about it quite a lot.

I even got around watching the two movies.

Oh, you did?

Well, most of the second one.

Okay.

But all of the first one.

What you think about the ending of welcome to Derry?

It was fine, love.

So I, I hope folks that it's not a spoiler.

Bill Skarsgard shows up at some point.

You know, it's called it.

I think you know what the draw is.

I actually think like it was like I'm not gonna hold it up as being like incredible but there were some things that like I thought Bill Skarsgard did that I really liked and just some stuff that they added to like or unveiled.

Unveiled I mean about creatures relationship with reality that I thought were kind of interesting.

I found that there are a lot of big fans of this show.

Really.

Yeah, I've noticed that.

I don't think it was a bad show.

It was kind of like sort of fun appointment viewing for me.

But in many points I felt like there was a better show hiding within this show that sometimes they'd do something and it was really.

It would really click and then sometimes they would do stuff and it was, it just wasn't so good.

Also of the.

You know, I said it before but I maintain it the.

The co winner of the doing more than they need to do award with Chad Powers is Chris Chalk in this, in this show who.

Who is really very, very good.

Yeah, I did watch all of the first it film from 2025.

It's also streaming on HBO Max and I was surprised on how the tone was perfectly balanced compared to the series.

Yeah, there's good, good horror but there's also really good endearment.

And I just didn't think they captured that with the series.

I agree with you, Blaine.

Where they, you know, tonally it kind of felt it.

It was a little hit or miss.

Yeah.

Some stuff was great, some stuff was okay.

I don't think there was a lot that ever really fell into bad so much as it was like, this is fine.

What we could be talking about is that it's a sign of having a work to base a movie or show off of.

Like you got an outline.

Because with the show, they're going off script.

They're going off Book of Kings.

Right.

There's some made up.

Well, I mean obviously it's all made up, but new.

New for this show is my understanding.

Yep.

I'm not too steeped in the mythos of it to be able to pick up on all of these things.

Lastly, non spoiler she year more of a November December release.

I'm thinking the Chair Company ended.

I didn't have quite enough time to finish it for my year end list.

I have to say that its originality and insanity may have put it there.

Huh.

It's a project from Tim Robinson of I think you should leave in Detroiters.

I feel like most people either love him or hate him.

There's not a lot of middle ground.

He's not really done.

He's also in the film Friendship with Paul Rudd, wrote the Chair Company with Zach Cannon and Donovan.

This one had you in stitches.

I thought it was hilarious.

My wife, I should mention, is deathly allergic to this.

So, you know, thank you for Beth for putting up with watching the most hated man in America, Tim Robinson.

It was crazy.

It was so funny.

And I think Tim Robinson.

I don't think this is a spoiler to say that Tim Robinson, basically the Persona is like if one of the guys from one of his sketches and I think you should leave.

Had a wife and family.

Yeah, I think that can get a little one note.

But I think for this show it was used really well and it was.

Used really smartly fleshing out the other characters.

Whereas you can't do that in a skit, of course.

A lot.

Adam.

I can't even begin to explain this.

The plot.

I'll tell you the first five minutes.

Tim Robinson plays a guy named Ron who works in a company that makes and designs malls.

Well, he's given a presentation in this first five minutes.

He finishes the presentation, he sits down in a chair and it breaks and everybody laughs at him and it embarrasses him.

And so he.

That leads him down A rabbit hole of conspiracies that I cannot begin to explain.

There are so many people in this show that act like they are in a different show, but it's hilarious.

It's a strength, not a weakness.

Yes.

A strength.

It's not on purpose, but yes.

I need to get on it.

We'll get more into this.

The setup reminds me of, like, a George Costanza beginning.

It very much is.

Very much so.

The jerk store called and they're running out of you.

And there.

There is, like, I think Tim Robinson is really funny at showing a guy with, like, somewhat, like, fragile masculinity and self image.

Like, if there's like, an overarching thing.

And I think that was one of the things I would.

I would pull out like a guy who very much in the.

George Costanza, very bothered by what people.

Think of him, but doesn't want people.

Know, which is great.

Yeah, right.

He wants people to think he's the cool guy.

But if you want people to think you're the cool guy, you're not cool.

Yeah.

Sadly not.

We'll take a break.

And on the other side, spoilers about these things.

Okay, back.

And that means spoilers.

In case you haven't seen any of these, use your timestamps wisely.

Netflix and Ted Serranos.

I know you're listening because you won't start Stop dming us.

Consider splitting more shows up in blocks.

Stranger Things 5 did it exactly that wonderfully.

We'll talk about the end of antics in Hawkins.

Illinois.

In spoiler fashion.

Indiana.

What did I say?

Illinois.

Indiana.

Yes.

We couldn't have the fanatics come after us from the.

The very.

You're right.

They're completely different plane.

One is the crossroads of America.

One is the land of Lincoln.

Get it straight.

Exactly.

One is the hometown of Larry Bird.

One is the hometown of Lincoln.

Who's more important?

You be the judge before these final three.

Was it three?

And again, the numbers confuse me, but probably going to concentrate a lot on the New Year's Eve finale.

You know, I was all in going in.

I thought it was so good.

Just at.

Here's what.

To me, where it was good, it was.

It was saying, you've watched the first four seasons, let's just go for it.

Let's just have every other scene be full of action.

Yeah.

Was the world of Vecna too convoluted?

Maybe a little, but I rolled with it.

I've seen a lot of people just posting, like, highlight reels of season one and saying I missed when it was A small town horror show which was kind of the vibe of season one.

Right.

And then they, they sprawled out and they kind of created a world that really needed more concrete reasoning and answers.

Like there were even times on this show we kind of thought, well, the vibe is really good and the story about growing up and family and all these things was good.

But the, you kind of just have to push past like what are the mechanics of this alternate universe or this monster or whatever.

You just have to think there is a monster, there is a right, an upside.

You know, they really to me kind of tied all of that in, in a way that made that action that you're talking about possible.

You know, they closed the world a bit and just said, all right, here's the, here's the ball field, away we go.

Yeah.

I also thought that they managed to do so much action that captured your attention while also having a lot of relationships be explored.

Dustin and Steve, Jonathan and Nancy, Will and his mom.

And I just thought, you know, that those felt pretty real.

On top of, oh, there was Robin and Will.

I'll mention that one too.

I thought they're budding friendship.

How they danced around the fact that Will is gay and he wasn't sure how to talk about it.

I just thought it was, it felt kind of real to me on top of some things that were very much not real.

I just thought it was kind of tender at times and it's.

Without being saccharine.

You know, it caught some flack for that.

Okay.

I didn't know.

Yeah, people kind of making jokes and some were in kind jokes and other people were maybe less so, saying like why do they have to monologue?

You know, like it'll be the middle of like this this monster is going to destroy the world.

How important is a sit down to talk about Will's sexuality at this moment?

You know, I thought they felt, I.

Thought the writing made it vital.

Yeah, I agree.

I completely agree.

There are war moments really early on, I guess in the, maybe the Thanksgiving episodes where people are walking and talking about their feelings and you know, and you're kind of like these kids just are so quick to forget that they're in like another dimension beneath their town, you know, and they're just kind of like chatting about very teenager kind of thing.

I don't know that I understand where people are coming from.

But also like you're, it's, it's fiction.

It's a fiction.

And the whole point of the show is a coming of age story.

Yeah.

And if you anything that I've.

Criticism that I've read.

They.

They seem to be skipping over the fact that that's what this show is about.

It is a.

A friend group's origin myth story.

Yeah.

You know what I mean?

And, like, the details of it are not as important as the fact that this is.

They will gain distance from it and may even wonder, did that really happen to us?

You know, but it's what it was.

What bonds them to.

In the same way that, you know, you think back on, like, I can't remember everything that happened between me and friends that I've, you know, had for a long time, but it's like, clearly there's so many layers of bonding that it doesn't really matter.

Yeah.

If that makes sense.

Yeah.

Not to leave Will too quickly, making him in previous seasons and having a lot of people grab about this that he was the most lonely, the weakest, the most marginalized member.

Having him become so powerful, I found that to be compelling.

It wasn't forced upon me.

You know, he's the shyest, perhaps the weakest, but it turns out to be, oh, wait, he's pretty important.

I love that.

I'm not sure that he is the strongest actor of the original Kids cast.

Probably not.

It was always.

I always had to remind myself that season one, it feels like he's the main character in a way, but he's not really.

He's almost like an object.

Yeah.

You know, Mike is the main character.

Yep.

In a lot of ways.

And to see it branch out and to see him kind of get his due at the end as the one who's gone through it on a deeper level than everybody else was great.

I thought, you know, when you talked about relationships, one that I wish that they had explored more that maybe would have made that.

That arc even more satisfying.

Is Will and Ill, you know, because they.

They live together.

They're.

They're kind of shown like when they're in California, you remember that they're in class together.

I think that they bonded on a deeper level than Will and L. Oh, okay.

I think that bond could have been played out a bit more on screen.

Yeah.

But that's a.

That's a small gripe.

That is small.

And I found so many of the actors redeem themselves as performers.

Annoyed me maybe in seasons three and four.

Finn.

I said Wolf Castle.

It's Wolfhard.

It's Wolfhard.

Yes.

Yeah.

Finn Wolfhard annoyed me a lot in seasons three and four.

Excuse me.

No, that's right.

Three and four.

And I thought he gave a strong performance here.

Another actor who I found didn't have a place in the series, but yet in season five was perfect was Brett Gilman.

You didn't enjoy him in previous seasons.

And not a lot.

He just felt additional like we need to have a new character because we can't focus on the same few all the time.

Yeah, there were a few introductions.

I mean, my Hawk being another one that it's like, I, I, it's fairly transparent what they're doing here.

You know, you need more but pieces on the board to write with.

But when you got Maya Hawk.

Yeah.

Does it matter?

I thought the Nancy Jonathan scene was handled as well as any breakup could have, could have gone.

I thought that that was done.

Okay.

Like, so it's about the relationships and it's, it's lovely to see two guys admit their friendship and platonic love for each other that we all need to do as well as Dustin and Steve and maybe not take a life or death moment for us to do it.

To me, they're my favorite relationship on the show.

Oh yeah.

And, and Joe Kerry.

Kerry, you know, he was in Fargo and Donovan and I covered that quite a bit.

I just can't wait to see him in a bunch of other stuff.

He's got a lot of potential and.

He'S good at music too.

It's very annoying.

Oh, is he?

Yeah, like, apparently he's got one song out that's like really good.

Is that true?

Yeah, I mean, it's like it sounds like a McCartney's McCartney esque kind of Beatles thing.

I will have to look that up.

Does it go by his name or does he Donovan?

Do you know how to say it out loud?

I've only read it.

Djo.

I sound like such an idiot right now.

I do not.

Well, Stranger Things 5 may have been exposition heavy at times, could have been convoluted at times.

Those are arguments I'll accept.

I, I thought they nailed it.

That dialogue, it was pretty mandatory.

I know you're thinking, yeah, the world's ending.

You wouldn't have this kind of conversation.

But if they didn't have it, you'd gripe about that too.

Yeah, I think specifically with Will coming out, I thought that that was not only a great moment that took.

I mean, that was there in season one.

You know, you remember the bullies, what they said about Will in season one.

It's like, don't remind me.

Well, they at one point are making fun of the friends and say, well, Will's off in fairyland.

Now, oh, and like there he gets called a lot of slurs throughout the years, and you don't know that part of it.

You think, well, this is just adolescent or young adolescent boys making fun of each other.

But I guess there was maybe once you.

Once you see they're.

They're dropping crumbs all along.

And I 80s those, those right.

Slurs were awful.

Trust me.

Right.

I grew up with them.

But all that to say, I think that not only was it necessary from the.

The character art point of view, it was ne.

They made it a part of the story.

Like he.

He had the clearest conscience to go into battle, you know?

Yeah.

Hey, how long did it take you to notice that Hopper was wearing a cap from Heflin, Alabama?

About two seconds.

It took me a long time.

I was like, wait, yeah.

How long has he been wearing this hat?

I did one.

Did he have it in previous seasons?

No.

Right.

There's no way I would have known.

Yeah, that's an actual store that burned and they're doing hats in conjunction with the show, so you can have your own hat there.

It's pretty good.

Yeah.

It's great news for them to have a little fundraiser for.

For a loss.

Did you get that.

That sense that.

And I don't know if this was purposeful that they were hinting at Vecna and Henry as a metaphor for pedophilia.

Am I trying to read too deeply here?

Well, it's funny to say deeply because that would be like the most on the nose thing.

Oh, right.

You know, I mean, in a way it's like the.

You see a.

An adult on the.

The fringes of the.

The playground.

That's like, what do you, what do you immediately think of?

I don't know.

I mean, obviously there's.

I haven't thought that deeply about, say, like, the cave scene where he appears to.

To literally be a good boy scout as a kid and encounters what it.

Both.

Both an actual, like, evil force that's in the box, but also like, runs up against actual, just evil humanity, you know, and that the innocence is stolen.

All of those things.

I think that that can be a.

A really strong point outside of the obvious.

The obvious?

Yeah.

I don't know.

I mean, it does seem.

I'm sure it's there if you want to read it that way, but it also is there to view him as, you know, the classic, like a damaged person who's now lashing out and damaging others.

Right, right.

And, like, how much is there still?

Is he also trapped in Some way.

Yeah.

I love that they wrote in Mr. Mr. Clark speaking the opposite of pedophilia.

Mr. Clark, such a good guy.

I'm so glad he got a few more good scenes in.

People talked about the biggest plot hole, which.

I hate that term.

I just don't think there's such a thing.

They say that Vecna.

There's no clear motivation on why Vecna would want to crash the two worlds.

I don't know, do you?

I don't even think I have a response for that because I just don't like the term plot hole.

Does a hurt person lashing out and trying to destroy things need, like a.

Strong There you go reason?

I think that seems like a fairly strong reason to me.

Yeah.

And.

And just to wrap up here, the.

You're exactly right.

This show was about teenage friendship.

Of course.

I just loved those final scenes.

I mean, they were taken to straight off the page of Stand By Me.

Yeah, totally.

So much of this was.

Wouldn't have existed without Stephen King, but I think they improved upon it.

And gosh, man, it was just crushing me that.

Just take the scene where it's Steve, Robin, Jonathan and Nancy, and they all agreed to meet once a month in Philly.

And you know, that's gone to last two times.

If it ever happens.

It's.

Yeah, that's the one that.

It's heartbreaking.

I think the last half hour is like a Rorschach test to choose your own adventure of, like, where you're at in life.

Because if you're younger, you don't know how sad that rooftop scene is.

That's really the crushing one.

Like, leaving childhood obviously is.

Yeah, that's a sad moment, but there's still a lot waiting.

Leaving those.

Those deep friends.

Like that is.

Because, you know, there's.

It's never as kind of.

Back to what I was saying earlier, how do you.

How do you recreate, like, the intensity of a certain period of your life?

You can't really.

Do you want to address the controversy that they were wearing orange and that's not their school colors?

And, I mean, a few other things.

I. I think that they did enough to make what people were proposing a legitimate thing to engage in online.

I don't think it was insane.

The conformity gate thing, it kind of took over, like, tick tock and some other social media.

Oh, yeah, yeah.

People trying to put all these puzzle pieces together.

And there was enough there in a show that was asking you to look pretty closely at a lot of details, you know, like One of the things that Holly notices is that the.

What do you call the.

This is really showing how out of touch with children I am.

Not.

The merry go round.

Is that what it's the.

Yeah, the merry go round.

Yeah.

The middle color was not the same, and she's like, this isn't real.

Like, something's off here, right?

Oh, yes, that's right.

About one of the other signposts of controversy is there was something that just didn't seem real.

It seemed like it was something Henry was imagining with the.

With the guys, other than the orange.

Robes, when they keep sending electricity up to the roof of the radio station.

That's right.

That big, you know, classic, like, TV show movie.

Like, we have to turn this giant lever to increase the power that changed colors at some point.

And there's other stuff like the.

If you go back through, there's a lot of stills of people possibly under Vecna's control standing like Henry.

Stands like who?

This is horrible.

What's Max's brother's name that was killed?

His name.

He was so good.

Yeah, he was in one season, though.

It's the guy.

The redheaded girl's brother.

Yeah.

So it's Billy is the.

The character's name.

Yeah.

But he is standing at one point, like, you know, Henry stands with his hands clasped in front of him.

Wait, he was in this season?

No.

And when you go back through the older seasons and when he's being controlled.

Ah.

And, you know, the.

The scene.

The graduation scene is.

Is weird.

It's a little weird.

How is it weird for you?

I mean, the extras look a little dazed.

You know, there's people kind of staring at the camera that just.

The whole thing feels odd.

I don't know.

Yeah, but if.

If that had existed or.

Hell, if they end up putting something else out, then that's great.

But if they don't, then, yeah, I think it wrapped up really well.

I think two that we haven't discussed yet.

They had a ton of screen time and really kind of carried season five are Max and Holly, Sadie, Sink and whatever, the young woman who played Holly.

They were both really, really good Holly.

Man, they asked a lot of her, and she delivered.

And she's been on the show since day one.

Is that the same Holly from.

I was curious.

I don't know if we had a Bobby Draper situation.

Me either.

I know that she's been the same since she became.

You know, she was in it a bit more, but I didn't know if she was it back then because that would be remarkable if they ended up with a child actor that good.

You're right.

Yeah, she was.

She was good.

Well, if the.

If the inconsistencies are in there on purpose, you know, I think that's good.

That's.

That leaves it open.

I like that.

It is kind of open ended, you know?

Will Steve, Robin, Jonathan and Nancy ever get together again?

We know they probably won't, but that's opened.

That's open for whatever you want to think.

What do you think of, I guess the big question, did she die or did she escape?

L. I think she probably died.

And that Mike is using the idea of telling a story to kind of make you feel better, whether he knows he's doing that or not.

Right.

He's consoling his friends.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Again, whether he's doing it consciously.

All right.

I think we've.

We got a lot of Stranger Things.

I think that's a good enough show.

You could probably watch it again.

And I don't watch a lot of shows twice.

It held up.

I didn't do the full rewatch, but Natalie decided to.

Wow.

Start season one, episode one in anticipation of Thanksgiving.

Really?

And I caught a few and I was like, oh, yeah, this is.

This is good.

Yeah.

Again, it's.

It's a bag of potato chips a lot of the time, but it also is very human, too.

Yeah, agreed.

All right, we'll shift gears then.

Well, now we're to Pluribus and how it was a beloved Apple TV show, apparently.

Quite beloved.

Real big hit for this streamer.

Probably get.

Deservedly so.

I agree.

Probably gets Blaine my award.

Blaine's award of I love how it's made and I love its story, but I just need Carol to ask some more questions.

What question do you want her to ask?

Like, what.

What are y' all doing?

She asked that.

They're like, it's in our nature.

It's in our nature.

They want to assimilate.

So they're like the Borg.

But why?

Because it's in their nature.

Why do you eat food?

Ah, well, why does the dog chase the ball, Blaine?

No, I actually like.

We'll see.

I actually like the, like, it's in our nature.

A cover up for things that, like, genuinely are crazy.

Like they can't pick fruit, for example, because it's like, this is like, this is clearly.

Like there's.

Like, this is artificial.

Right?

Like there.

No species could evolve like this.

Look, as a TV viewer, I really enjoyed seeing Carol happy to some degree, you know, in that.

Well, you.

You May not want to watch the rest of this show.

Well, then in the penultimate episode, she and Zosa were.

They were just getting along, and it.

Was like they were just hanging out.

There's a really good shot of Carol looking at Helen's grave as Zosa comes to the adjacent window.

And it's almost like Carol's looking at both of them simultaneously.

Using some images to tell a story.

I thought that was just quality.

I think that's in the penultimate.

I think I'll just put a pin in it.

This isn't anything specific.

Sorry.

Not a pin to accentuate what you said.

I think that it, like the visual storytelling of this season, was very high quality.

It is.

That's, I think, that the hallmark of Vance Gilligan's way of filming.

I'm impressed because, I mean, I could tell there were lots of different directors, and it felt cohesive and like there were.

It always felt zippy.

And then sometimes there would be things where it was just like, they're using, like, an image to tell a story in a really good way.

I agree with that.

Another little kind of hint tidbit.

Zosa says, me or my turn.

Long before Carol asked her to refer to herself as me rather than we.

Was she wanting Carol to feel happy long before Carol asked her to do that?

I don't know.

I thought it might be telling that Carol never told anyone about her appreciation of trains.

And then that never sort of circled back around.

Mm.

It might never.

We'll see if it ever comes.

It might just be a detail.

A little detail.

Yeah.

It might be just a character build.

The finale is the one.

I want to concentrate a little bit more on La chica el mundo, which is what Matus boils Carol's choices down to.

You know, do you want the girl or you want to save the world?

And that's.

That's the one that opens with the village girl being converted via a mist or a gas, which we haven't.

Something that's changed everything.

Some process.

If they can do it that way, they could be a danger to Carol and others like her.

Well, yeah, presumably, you know, as we find out.

I don't want to jump too far ahead, but we're in spoiler section.

You know, we find out Carol's not really making either of those choices.

She's not choosing the girl or really choosing the world.

She doesn't want to get.

She does not want to get.

She's not like, this is the right thing to do.

I should save the world.

Yeah.

She's not choosing the girl, she's like, I don't want to be subsumed into this.

And my only option now is to set things back the way it was or they're going to turn me into this.

It's kind of a. I don't want to be subsumed by this, but I don't want to be a lonely fucker either.

Yeah.

Minusos seems like much more the idealist.

Yeah.

At it, like, where he's like, he's intense.

Things are wrong.

We need to set them right.

The scene with the girl in the village who gets.

Who has agreed to become one of them.

She leaves her pet goat in disregard.

You know, they won't hurt animals, but it shows that they have no emotional connection either.

No.

They said at an earlier point.

At an earlier point, like, well, we'll take care of the ones if they're, you know, like they won't go away basically.

And they all leave, but they just don't care.

Yeah.

When she turns, they all leave.

And I mean, the goat's not gonna starve because goats can eat anything and will.

Yeah, it's.

Mommy was right behind it.

Yeah, it's right there.

The fence is open.

It's fine.

There's also the point that they would not have to sing these songs to make her feel like she's involved in some sort of ritual because they all think the same thing.

Yeah.

Like as soon as she's.

It's kind of sneaky.

Assimilated.

It's like, okay, well we're done here.

You know, there's no need to.

To make you feel comfortable to make.

Any concessions to humanity.

Sneaky.

Sneaky.

I think it's interesting kind of what you brought up, Blaine, about like, you know, with the little pet goat, because it kind of makes you think about like, okay, well, like kind of loving things and taking care of things.

Like that is part of being human.

Like the relationships with animals.

And then you think about like entity.

It's like, okay, well it doesn't really have, like it's not going to let them die.

Like, it's not cruel, but it kind of doesn't care.

And then you think about like if.

And if.

If it doesn't have.

If it can't form those relationship with animals and every single human being they want to be part of, like they love.

They have 10 objects of affection left at this point or 11.

I forget how many.

Yeah.

And at a certain.

And they want everyone to just be there.

It's like, it's just gonna.

Is like is loving and Taking care of things.

Just gonna vanish.

Yeah.

Like, maybe that is an important part of being human that we don't want to completely lose, you know?

Yeah.

I love squeezing my cat's bellies.

Oh, they hate it.

The finale confirmed, though, that Manasseh.

Am I saying he's my favorite character?

I love the way he's written to cut through the bullshit.

Oh, yeah.

He's so good.

Especially after.

I will say this something that I liked when you just summed it up with cutting through the bullshit.

But it, like, it kind of took a while to get him into place.

Yeah.

And so.

Because after that, with him, it's like, okay, I'm not screwing around now.

I was like, yeah, okay.

You're not.

You're not teasing us.

Yeah.

Oh, speaking of visual storytelling, Carol's phone goes down the drain.

And both.

Both of them try to get.

You're looking up from the drain.

And if you notice, Carol looks more like she's in jail, and he looks more like he's trying to break free.

It's quite a.

You.

You have to be careful and catch those things.

It's easy to forget that Carol's probably an alcoholic.

Yeah, she drinks a lot.

I forgot about that.

But the motion sensor in this episode proves she's.

I think she's an alcoholic.

She does not have a healthy relationship is at least the baseline, I believe.

And I think we've.

We've even kind of.

That's been, like, threaded through.

Right.

Like, I'm thinking about.

Remember when she was, like, shooting off the fireworks and she's drinking badly, and one of.

And one of them, like, tips towards her head and she's just sitting there.

It's like, okay, you are not.

This is not helping you.

Or healthy in any way.

Well, if this helps listeners at all, alcoholics, unless they're in recovery, are also in denial.

Yeah, right, right.

When she sees the censor, she's mad at Helen.

You can tell they don't have to say it.

Yeah.

She's mad at Helen as opposed to, like, why would she put this here?

Oh, perhaps I need to reflect.

Carolyn.

Zoe says world travel.

Sure.

Fill out all the places I want to go.

I know.

Checking them off.

I was like, I'll go there.

I'll go there.

I.

Between, like, the.

The.

I've forgotten his name, but the.

The French speaking gentleman.

And Carol on her travels, I'm like, I could live very well at the end of the world.

I think I would be fine.

Yeah.

How dystopian is this, you know?

Like, I'll oh, you know what people.

Read in TV shows?

We learned this from Mad Men, if nowhere else.

What people read in TV shows is so important.

She's really like that Left Hand of Darkness.

Yeah, Ursula, good one.

You're a fan, right?

Big fan, yeah.

So what.

What's the Left Hand of Darkness?

What did that signal to you?

I don't know, because I have.

Okay.

And the book takes.

I'm just going to give the very basic sketch because the book is.

It's very, very smart just with the way it's read, but it kind of doesn't give anything away.

But in this.

In this universe, the kind of.

The setup is that there are multiple planets that were all kind of colonized by this.

This one race, the Hanish.

They're basically human, like Earth being one of them.

So we basically have, like, kind of cousins amongst all these other worlds.

And there's.

There's an intergalactic or an intergalactic interstellar kind of organization called the E Men.

They can.

They can speak to each other through fast and light travel.

So there's.

There's a society.

So this guy is sent from the Ekumen to this planet.

And on this planet, gender is not fixed.

So it famously opens with, like, the king was pregnant most of the time.

People have.

Have basically no gender, no sex.

They can't reproduce, but they go through phases where they become either male or female.

Their body changes to either male or female.

And it's not the same every time.

Right.

Like, you could be female three times, you could be male twice right after.

In a row after that.

And then this does not.

He is not the most comfortable person in the world with this.

And then he ends up having to flee the city where he's in because for political issues.

Complicated novel.

There's a lot about gender, a lot about relationships, relationships between men and women, relations between men and men.

That really shifty, fluid.

Identity, of course, being the core of it.

I think being a man or a woman is very, very core for many of us.

And so it's.

It's hard to comprehend.

So, sorry, that's a long story short, and please feel free to edit that down because there were extraneous details in there, but the kind of.

What I read in.

In it was that central concept of identity.

Okay, Of.

Of who are you and what are you?

Well, you mentioned the guy who said he felt like he didn't belong, and I immediately thought of Manasusos again, saying it wrong.

This is a dystopian show where there's no war no violence, electricity.

Yeah, things are pretty.

Things are pretty good.

I mean, we know in 10 years what the half a 5 billion people are going to starve today.

But the.

Well, but this and the show.

But the show.

I mean, if you can't in pretend it can't be reversed.

Right.

Like, is that even.

Is that bad?

Well, is it like 5 billion cells in my die.

In my.

In my body dying?

Yeah.

I mean, the dystopian aspect is that they're too damn nice.

Right.

And it's hilarious to me that Menesuso sees no violence, no racism, no poverty, and thinks, man, this is fucked up.

Yeah, but it's.

But it is dystopian.

There's no originality.

You know, Zosa's impressed with Carol's writing, and I think it's because they can't do it.

I think I agree with any bands formed in this.

Yeah.

I think that kind of threaded through this along with like, that question about, like, love and taking care of things is a question about art, you know, And I. I think they're actually really smart about it.

But, like, even between, like, the writing and like, Carol borrows the Georgia o' Keeffe painting, things like that, you know, where it's like all.

They can appreciate it.

They're kind of.

You know, but like, also, if you love everything, you kind of love nothing.

Yeah.

Like, they love everything because everything is in them.

Yeah.

So they love Carol as much as Shakespeare as, you know, when she sits one of the.

The bodies.

One of the.

When she talks with it, you know, because they love one of my favorite lines.

Because it does.

Because I made me think about this is.

There's a.

There's a science fiction story where somebody says, well, when we talk about the King, it's very, very short.

It's like we talk about the King and we.

He says.

We say he.

He loves everyone.

Which is.

Which we think is the same as he doesn't love anyone at all.

But we don't understand it his way and that.

I was thinking about that with like.

Because I do think there's like, what the level where it's like this is.

You don't love anything at all.

Yeah.

I'll end with this.

I bet you know this masses.

His name is another version of Emmanuel, which is another name for Jesus God with us.

Do with that what you will.

With that.

We'll.

We'll go into welcome to Derry, its finale.

We'll try to keep this kind of short.

Yeah.

Don't have too much to say about it visually.

Actually thought this was very strong episode.

Yeah.

With the frozen lake and the.

Yep.

And the.

Yeah, it was good.

The kids or whatever that are enthralled to him and did it a hundred percent make sense?

Yeah.

No.

Well, yeah.

And, and, but I mean, and I do mean that like even kind of within the logic of the show where it's like he's.

He's almost like a.

An ambush killer at the beginning where he's gonna get one or two people and show you something really scary.

What's he doing this for?

He doesn't have an audience.

Yeah.

He's just going.

The.

The line of the kids floating toward his A carriage is.

Is.

It's a good image.

That's why I think it was.

I liked it.

And I think it's okay that, like, you know what?

It was a strong visual image.

That's fine.

Yeah.

You can just live with that.

The parts that weren't as much kitsch but were heavier, like all of everything Chris Chalk did.

Bill Scarsgard.

His role could have been just pure camp when.

Especially in his human role.

Yeah, but he wasn't.

He still brought a nice even self touch to Pennywise when he was a human that he is.

I felt.

I found personally, it's something about the way he does the voice and the movement.

Yeah.

But like, like the penny.

The like.

And it's like this.

You have to be really careful.

You don't want to show the monster too much.

But first off, we got a glimpse into like, his feelings about himself where he's like, I'm a God.

Yeah.

And then secondly, we learned he doesn't perceive time the same way we do.

Which apparently is the direction they want to go with the show.

I liked it.

I thought it was good.

And I like the way Pennywise expressed it.

Because you're like, this makes him feel more than just a scary monster.

Like, it makes him feel utterly inhuman.

Well, look, if you're gonna say he's from outer space and landed a long time ago on Earth.

Yeah.

It makes sense that there's no such thing as time for him because, hell, he's been here 2000, 3000 years or whatever.

I enjoyed the finale just fine.

I thought it was fun to have Rich return, flip Pennywise off.

That was pretty good.

Poor, poor, rich.

But we, you know, he got a good send off.

He got a nice send off.

And the best friends club remained best friends.

I really feel that I am damning it with faint praise, but it is.

It was a season that I would say if you.

If you like this at all or you like the works of King at all?

Watch it.

Yeah.

If you don't like it after one or two episodes, you're not missing anything.

If you like it after one or two episodes.

Great.

You've got about good at eight pretty good episodes.

Pennywise invading the school was scary.

The additional bit of creepiness is that he asked for only the upperclassmen to go home because he wanted the kids.

Just.

He wants the little kids, man.

And.

Yeah, it's probably going in a direction where the next season is going to be 27 years prior.

And.

Yeah.

Who.

Who knows?

It could be that some of these actors can get there somehow.

Okay, fine.

We.

We had a lot about some kind of shootout that happened.

Yeah.

In the previous 27.

They find the car.

It's in the intro.

But we don't really see much more about that.

Perhaps that's season two.

I don't know.

Yeah.

Did the river freezing make a lot of sense narratively?

But I.

No, it didn't.

But I was.

Oh, that was.

I'll say.

This gave me a lot of tension because I thought we were in for a Harry Bailey situation with It's a Wonderful Life.

I thought, anybody's gonna fall in this.

If anyone's interested in this.

And they haven't seen the two IT Movies.

They're actually.

I would say they're quite good.

The first one more so.

The second one I got halfway through and I had a time made me quit it.

But it seemed like it was okay too.

More tonally in that teenage world.

More tonally in that growing up through horror.

And it could have used more of that in the series.

But it's fine.

It was up and down.

Yeah.

And sticking with perfectly good.

It's time to talk about some spoilers with the chair company, which almost needs to be spoiled in order to give any thoughts about it.

It's almost indescribable.

It is.

Because it's like.

It's him, like, going down the rabbit hole of, like, why did the chair fall apart on me?

One thing that I think that they have captured better than any other show that I've ever seen is the experience of going on essentially faceless corporate entities sites and seeing the absolute nothing that is there.

And then at the same time, while this is going on, like, his wife, like.

Like he's in the.

Also in the middle of, like, a somewhat serious family drama with, like, his.

His daughter's getting married and his wife's business is taking off and his.

And it's.

And they completely hilariously like they have Tim Robinson just be the same guy in every situation.

Yeah.

So he'll be like trying to have a serious conversation.

But it's just Tim Robinson doing this.

He is.

And it's actually kind of great.

The reason why I think people like me like him and his characters is you.

I feel like a guy who bumbles and stumbles and gets angry at myself in scenarios like he's all often in.

Yes.

You're in a job that maybe doesn't bring you 100 happiness.

You know, your boss may be a little overbearing you the annoyance that builds and builds and builds to outright anger.

I've been there in, in every one of those situations.

I do think that he hilariously captures how much and I feel like this is sort of that like masculinity identity thing is like he really captures like how instantly like someone like men especially get pissed off.

Like something will happen.

You'll just be like, yes.

His famous one this time was God damn it.

I can't remember how many times he said that out of the gate.

I just want to say that Lou Diamond Phillips as a smarmy, egotistical boss, he fit perfectly.

He's very good.

There's a bit comedic, there's a bit where he's like introducing him and he's like badass.com coming up and you just want to punch him in the nose.

And it's so accurate.

It's so, so good.

And like I mentioned in the non spoilers there's so many characters or just even background people who are saying things that make no sense to the scene.

That's the other thing that I continually found funny is like.

And I thought it would get annoying, but it kind of never did.

Like there's a bit where like they're that his son's birthday and his son throws up and one of the partygoers takes the birthday cake and puts it on the puddle of vomit and he's like now we don't have to look at it.

Well, Seth, the son, it's never explained why he has like a 70 year old best friend.

It's for his, his stop motion.

It's.

Well, his stop motion project.

That's what they were working on.

But that best friend of his is also heard very briefly telling the daughter's fiance, let me know when you're finished talking because I have better stories.

Yeah.

So I'll.

I think and this is.

I know my wife is allergic to this.

Like it killed her having to hear it.

But the the, like, comedy duo that Mike Cifarelli is listening to, like, Wheezy Wayne or whatever.

Oh.

And it's almost like Jerky Boys, but it'.

Sure.

But he's trying to fig.

He's like, are they prank calling people?

He's like, no, they're just saying things, like, to each other, like, and I mean, and they're just, like, screaming obscenities.

The whole.

That was so not necessary for the show.

And it made me laugh so hard.

And every time it came back in and Mike's like, this is a really funny bit.

Like, it just.

It was so good.

And Mike loves porn to the point that he just listens to it on the radio.

He just.

He was listening to it, not watching.

Yeah, he was just listening to it.

Yeah.

Giving, Giving.

Like putting Mike in as, like, a character.

Like a low level Sopranos loser character with no explanation.

Yeah.

It was just.

It was great.

It was brilliant.

And then an even lower tier Sopranos character was his friend who was laying on the couch.

And also in Tim Robinson's closet.

Yep.

What great writing.

You have to imagine that this writer's room had Tim Robinson standing up and saying, nothing's off the table.

Just go, folks.

I, like, I was just, like, crying, laughing, because I don't think I can justify it.

But, like, when the short guy, the little guy is like, they're in the garage afterwards and he's like.

It turns out he's drunk and he just starts hitting stuff.

He's like, I gotta stop drinking.

They let him get some more things.

So I gotta get serious.

Like, how is this not the funniest thing to.

And it's never explained why Ron brings a dog home and calls it baby.

I mean, we later find out that it was a lost dog, but it's just like, suddenly there's a dog.

And.

Well, they were just to replace the dog that died, that wasn't well behaved.

But it's so.

It's just.

There's no string to tie it.

And I love it.

Yeah, no, it's great.

It's great.

And there's just even, like, stuff.

There's a bit where, like, he gives his son, like, the stupid little foam hat from, like, a detective kit that he's bought.

Oh, yeah.

And he finds in the trash.

He's coming to.

He finds in the trash can.

So he's coming to have a serious talk with his son, but he starts out with, like, who threw away my little hat?

And his son instantly breaks down and starts crying.

It's such good choices.

It's a lot to be said that his job is overseeing the construction of a mall, which is something that's so completely out of line with what people want these days.

Like, well, malls have changed, Blaine.

Well, you might have been in a mall and not even known it.

They're all outside malls now.

It's just a connection of stores.

It's like a. I mean, they really are.

Yeah, I thought that was funny.

Like, this is his.

His chance, his legacy.

Yeah.

And it's not even what he really wants to do.

He wants to do Jeep tours of where did.

Wherever.

Whatever state they live in.

I forget.

Don't.

Which I didn't understand either.

You know, like a.

Like a Jeep tour.

Right.

Is like, you do it in, like.

Like in junk in the jungle or something.

Right.

Like, if you were, say, like, the.

The.

The Yucatan Peninsula.

Right.

You might go on a jeep tour through the jungle and see Mayan ruins.

Okay.

And he's just doing it through, like, Ohio or.

Yeah.

Clanton or White Canton.

Excuse me.

I'm sorry.

Yeah, they're just.

He's just doing cheap tours of, like, the woods in Ohio.

A lot of Tim Robinson's characters, I would say, especially Ron, are regular guys with boring lives, but they get to a point where they don't give a.

And let their ID go wild.

Yes.

And I think it's so enjoyable to watch that.

Also, I think that this show as a whole did, like, a really good, like, push and pull between that, where, like, sometimes he would just, like, lose it, and other times he's like, I have to do the right thing.

But also, like, he secretly wants to, like, you know, like, it was pretty cool.

I had everything pretty much figured out, but can't talk about it now.

You know, just the, like.

And I think they actually did that really well, where he's not just, like, an egomaniac or a raging idiot.

Right.

But he's, like, funny.

He's, like, funnily believable as, like, a fairly average dude who gets way too obsessed with this one thing and, like, kind of reacts like many of us would, where we're not cool about it at all.

We're just like, yeah, I did a pretty cool thing.

Right.

It was good.

I mean, I think they've realized.

I.

This is gonna sound insane if you've seen this, but I think there's actually, like, some subtlety.

Yeah.

Although, like, this sounds insane because, like, you know, his.

His characterization is basically like someone just smashing a hammer into a something.

The whole, you know, it's.

It's very blunt.

It's very over the top.

It's very obvious.

But I think it's actually used really smartly.

Yeah, it's.

It's a good show.

It's odd.

It's original.

It's very odd.

I like the.

The, you know, even.

And like, even.

Just like we, like, even outside the main plot or what you think is the main plot, things keep happening where, like, the one person, the one woman he works with is, like, going to HR because he accidentally saw up her dress when he collapsed on the floor.

And they have to do, like, a thorough auditing of their relationship.

Yeah.

Which is totally accidental.

It's hilarious.

Did your jaw hit the floor when after this unrelated wedding, this guy gets shot by a kid for ruining his dad's life.

And he does it with a.

A 3D printed gun, it looks like.

And really good name for the guy who got killed.

Stacy Crystals.

Saying all this out loud sounds horrifying, but it was so out of the blue, you couldn't help but just, oh.

I was cracking up.

And then we have the very ending which has the strangest looking man I've ever seen since Mickey Rourke had the bad plastic surgery.

What the hell was that guy?

Clearly we're gonna have some exciting excitement in season two.

Yeah.

Because it is getting a season two.

You know, it's almost as if every scene where Ron wasn't at home had a twist of some sort.

Yes.

Did you follow every plot thread?

I followed Ron following every plot thread.

I did too, you know, because, like, some of them are like, he's.

He's crazy.

Like, he's.

His.

He's just in way too deep.

It gave you that sense.

And it also did like, the really, really great 70s paranoid thriller.

Like, if you've ever read Thomas Pynchon's Crying of lot of 49, where, like, everything is potentially meaningful.

Like, everything in the world is potentially meaningful.

And so it did that really well.

But it also was hilarious with the things that weren't.

Turns out that was a dead end.

There was even the big hint that he is imagining all this in an episode where his daughter was like, okay.

Dad, he's been getting hit in the head a lot.

Yeah.

But then it turns out his daughter is just wanting to help him.

We think.

Yeah, that could go somewhere in the second season too.

But I'll be watching it.

I liked it.

I did, too.

It was funny.

Made me watch the movie half of the movie Friendship, which I plan on watching.

Oh, you should finish it.

I'm going to try to finish it.

This is the end of our episode, though, and much appreciation for listening.

We're back, I think on a fairly regular schedule on Tuesday.

So I'm Blaine, and for Adam and Donovan, I'm just very serious when I'm telling you not to sit in a tech and chair, just don't sit.

Take a chair.

Thanks for listening.