Where Are the Netflix Viewers Going? Plus, ‘Slow Horses’ Season 6 Finale and ‘The Lowdown’ Season 2, Episode 3.

(upbeat music) - I need support staff to clear the room. - Stand up and walk, now! - Hello, and welcome to the watch. My name is Chris Ryan. I am an editor at TheRanger.com, joining me on the other line where it is Autumn in New York, it's A.D. Green Wolves! - Autumn in New York I've had a real one owner rideer type weekend. - What's that mean? - You've shoplifted it? - Doesn't she die in that film? - Oh, spoilers for Autumn in New York, which I don't think I've ever actually seen. - Thanks a lot, man. - You have no idea? You just thought it was like a lovely seasonal, glimpse of civic life. - You know what the thing is, is that this season for me is just watching the most appraved horror. So I don't really get a chance to see the more domestic interiority that you're used to, you're film going. If we have enough time today, I'd love to hear an update on Andy's adventures in movie going. I know you watched the drama this weekend because they call you cutting-edge, Andy, for a reason, you know? - You were experimenting with cutting-edge greenwald and then you decided to go for the more - Well, I made jump. I was like, should I call him Zite Greenwald? Because he's in the Zite guys all the time. Really good stuff for me so far today. Andy, you and I are freed from the Philadelphia Eagles. We are out here in the world observing and processing the world of culture. And also noting one another's deafening silence on the re-election of Lula in Brazil. So just so you know, I've noted that you have not yet posted to Instagram about that. - I just think that it's-- - Your boy lost. - My boy lost. - It's okay, take the L dignity man. - I just have reservations about electing octogenarians. Like I'm the only one that thinks that I guess. I guess I'm the asshole. Okay, who's even going to the Amazon anymore, am I right? - You have not been silence. You really had a robust-- - I'm a big Lula guy. - From jump, right? - Yeah. - From his earliest day. - Which go back way into the 20th century. Today on the pod, a little bit about an interesting report from Bloomberg about Netflix. We're also going to talk about the season finale of the sixth season of Slow Horses in the future of that show. And a delightful third episode of the second season of The Low Down. On Thursday, I believe I will be discussing Kerry and Crystal Lake with Joe. But we may get an Andy appearance in some shape or form to discuss these episode four of The Low Down by then. - You don't want to hear my thoughts on Kerry and Crystal Lake. - I would love to hear your thoughts as like, like I couldn't be less interested guy because I just imagine that's the case. Andy, I want to start with you here. At Bloomberg dropped a piece a couple of days ago, Lucas Shaw, who appears frequently on the town with Matt Bellany, wrote about some interesting behavioral data happening over at Netflix in terms of its users. So here's a quote from Lucas's piece, Netflix Incorporated Users are watching the streaming service lets than they once did. The latest sign of engagement was for the world's most valuable entertainment company according to people familiar with the matter. Customers aren't opening the app is on as many days of a month as they did a couple of years ago, said the people who asked not to be identified. The company uses a metric known as QPD or Qualify Play Days to measure how often customers use the app. The average customer is also spending less time watching while the total time on app increased by a couple of percentage points in the first half of the year, that's because more customers have been added each individual is watching less. Now some caveats go along with this. It's a really good piece you should read in Bloomberg if you have chance. Netflix has cracked down on password sharing. So there is probably some funkiness with the numbers in terms of it's not families of four or five or people's boyfriends and girlfriends using logins as much, but I do think it speaks to a larger narrative shift and anecdotal kind of evidence in terms of where Netflix is at. And I'm very curious to talk to you about this because you both have children who would possibly be using the service kind of as it is intended, not only to watch kids programming, but to define library stuff. You have kids who binge and will crush seasons and seasons of television. You yourself are on a television podcast that are known to dip into Netflix. You also doing some work for Netflix, it's worth being said. But I was curious whether or not this story felt true to you even if you didn't understand all the QPDs and minutes spent stuff. Well, I assume most of the loss of minutes watched and time spent are related to Gilmore Girls going from Netflix to Amazon Prime, which has really hit my household heart in terms of my own representative engagement with the platform. But I mean, I think there's two answers to it. One is my own personal engagement with it, which I think is that tracks with my own experience in terms of the number of shows that I've been watching on Netflix. This is definitely pre-East of Eden, which got a lot of burn on my various screens. That definitely was appointment viewing for me, but otherwise it really was becoming something that I would just check more infrequently, really just to see what movies they had to see if it was something worth watching or even downloading for a plane. But I think this story is more interesting to me in the context with which it was reported, which is on the back of all of these changes and helping understand changes on the executive level and helping to understand why Bella Bajaria for content and Danlyn for movies may have lost their jobs despite and there's been some interesting pushback reporting on this topic as well, meeting all of the goals that were appealing. - During what there were to doubt for them. - Exactly. Like that's the more interesting story to me, which is that Bella was brought in to globalize the service check, brought into widen the breadth of the type of programming they were doing, bringing in reality and bringing in sports and bringing in live events check, check, check. And Danlyn was brought into, you know, steer away from the chefier, let's say content that previous film head Scott Stuber was doing and to try to get prices in check and sort of maximize what the service was good for in the films department. And by all accounts, he did that. All of this speaks to what we've been sort of trying to find a way to articulate, which is is it possible that they just want better stuff? Is that there may be figuring out something that old school programmers have known for a while, which is be talked about, be a destination. You have to keep the flame burning beyond just the auto renewal of the credit card month to month to have a service that isn't just like dominant, but vibrant. And I think that's a pretty interesting shift both for the business and potentially for the culture that we enjoy. - Whether it's intentional or not, I do think it's an indictment on their administrations. I think that there are to me two kinds of Netflix users. There's those who go because they have something specific in mind that they're looking for. So they're going because somebody said, you gotta watch East Veden or you have to watch Stranger Things or you have to watch Three Body Problem or whatever. And I think that as we have documented on this podcast over the years, there have been fewer and fewer appointment viewing reasons to go to Netflix. For scripted television, people may obviously be going for Thanksgiving football games and for wrestling matches and for comedy stand up specials and roasts or what have you. But in terms of like our bread and butter, scripted sort of prestige-leaning television, that's why you would go somewhere. And if you feel like not only I haven't heard about anything, you also are not like you spend a couple of years being like, there's nothing dependable that I know is gonna be there. Then it starts to all look kind of like static when you open up the app because there's so much there. You'll randomly see some show from ABC Family from 20 years ago is in the top 10 and then there's like three reality shows and you're just kind of like, this is a morass. Like I feel like I'm looking at cable again because it's just reruns and reality in sports. The other kind of user I think goes to Netflix as television and they open up the app as the same way that you and I used to flip on the television when we got home from school or when we got home from work to have like a night light kind of, you know, hear Craig Killborn do sports center in the background while we made dinner or something like that. And that is the one that is the indictment here because if that's, if my hypothesis about these two kinds of users is true, that means that there's been enough of a negative experience for those people that they aren't turning the app on like that anymore. Now perhaps there could be any number of reasons around this. There could be increased competition from Max and some of the other services. Amazon has obviously had a really nice year in terms of having a bunch of YA shows that have been more or less water cooler. You can say that, oh, I don't know. I mean, sports are back. You could say that any movies are back. You could say that people are going to see more movies in theaters these days. There's all sorts of reasons why that might be the case. But for the most part, I think it's probably just in a form of attrition where people are like, you know, I keep turning this thing on and I keep not being satisfied with what I find. And furthermore, they keep taking my shows off whether it's they lose the library titles or they've canceled shows that I was like, well, where season three or four of this. And so I think they have a little bit of work to do to rebuild this because as we both know, the pipeline doesn't just, you don't just turn the water on and off. It takes a minute. minute to get quality back into the system to get big shows, good shows, appointment shows back on the air. I mean, so much of what Netflix did was about what it did differently in opposition to the way we previously understood television or prestige television to be and how it operated and how we received it. And I do think in moments like this about how and the biggest caveat of like obviously we are who we are at the age that we are, we like TV a certain way, but I don't think it's completely unrepresentative of the type of viewer that they have traditionally tried to court and still want in their corner, which is to say that like scarcity still is a great driver of urgency, meaning the desire to keep up with shows that we are passionate about whether it was like the last season of succession or whether it's industry or even something like lanterns is still driven by the once a week you better watch it when you can and you build the enthusiasm to be part of it while it is happening. And you have to be a pretty spectacular zeitgeist grabbing show on Netflix to have the same effect, I think, because otherwise you are just left with the complete binary of the people who watch it all in one night or in the people who watch it when they watch it. And I think that Netflix's previous idea was that it would be equally valuable for HBO to harvest its type of weekly viewer, but for them to just have the forever viewer. But I do think that puts them at a disadvantage in a cultural moment when it is just so very hard and getting harder to grab the spotlight. I was thinking about two shows on Netflix that I like and I use that word very intentionally, which is to say it's not slow horses where I can't wait to watch the next one. And those shows would be the gentleman, which we talked about briefly this year and nobody wants this, which just returned for its third season. These are both shows that I like when I watch them, I am enjoying things about them, I find them pleasurable, I find them comforting or, you know, disturbing and alarming and comforting in the case of the gentleman. Neither show lights a fire under me though in terms of I got to watch it within a certain schedule. Both shows exist for me as things that I know I could turn to when football is over for the day or when I have a flight coming up or something. And that is a good service for the consumer, but I don't know if that is a market mover or a market sustainer when you have the ambitions and also the stressful stock situation that Netflix does. I think you need to feel urgent in a way that they have not. You know, I've been having this dialogue with Sean and Amanda on the big picture for the better part of a couple of months now, maybe most of 20s, 26. And it's, you know, not even that involved, but it's kind of like knowing that the conscious has been passed from TV to movies in terms of when I come into the offices, people are usually talking about the movie that they saw this weekend or the movie that they can't wait to come out. So like even something like clay face seems to be getting lucky lose who are like, that's the biggest movie in the country and like, oh, is that the new DC movie? And should I check that out? I like horror movies. And I just haven't heard that in a while anecdotally about TV. TV seems to be more like this weird private behavioral thing where people are like, oh, yeah. And then I randomly just watched two seasons of blue lights on Amazon. You know what I mean? Like it's, it's all like weird, super niche, super unique individual behavior, not collective. This is like, okay. So this really is, I know we use this analogy all the time, but the Thomas Friedman column about being in a taxi cab in Karachi and assuming that that extrapolates some deep wisdom about the universe. I will say that since being back in New York and seeing old friends and having nice dinners with people and things, people who are not just not in the industry that we're in, but also on the other side of the country, inevitably there is a part in adult dinner conversations certainly over the age of 40 where people are like, what have you been watching? What do you like these days? And I will tell you that the conversation in the last two weeks, tiny sample size has been almost identical in that people talk about slow horses, never in talks about how amazing it is and how great it is. >> But they have watched the new season. >> No, they've watched it. No, they're up on it. >> Okay. >> And then there's a pause. And then someone will say something like, do you know what I really liked on Netflix was the audacity. I'm like, excuse me, no disrespect to the audacity. But that's an AMC original that migrated to Netflix relatively recently and is benefiting as it deserves to by being on the front page of Netflix. But that is not representative necessarily of like a culture driver in the way even clay faces. That's like you had an experience engaging with something that is very specific to you. And whether it's in if it's the audacity or your point about like, well, I like blue lights or I've been checking out Britbox like it gets diffuse really quickly. >> Yeah. >> I totally agree with you. What do you think then with this context of like, so this is really the driver of these big, big Netflix changes and there was some rumors out today that the Peter Rice who's now taking over content at Netflix that that relationship with Ted Serendos began actually a year ago when and this is like a thousand years ago in media time. But there was a moment almost exactly a year ago and it seemed like Netflix was going to win Warner Brothers and that the conversation with Peter Rice dates back to then when when Netflix was saying, Peter Rice, would you like to come manage these assets for us? And then they stayed communicating for a while after that and now we just ended up taking over the whole thing. Do you feel like there is a path to success in this or is it a weird moment in which old school Hollywood logic is now going to have to be applied to these new media tech companies which are historically have been very, very, very antagonistic to the idea of being part of a business in which you can't control everything in which quality is going to be actually the thing that gets you over the top and you can't quantify that on a spreadsheet. Yeah, and I think quality is relative. I think that that things that that you and I might revere other people find boring and things that other people think is quality we might find a little bit wrote or whatever. But, you know, I've seen other reporting that's like, don't get your hopes up about like the Peter Rice era being, you know, of of of challenge to HBO Sunday night prestige kind of TV that it might be more about fixing relationships within the town and ironing out some, some wrinkles in the clothing rather than like building a whole new suit. I wonder how long I wonder if in a year we're having this conversation about Netflix breaking away from binge. And I wonder if in a year we're having a conversation about Netflix significantly starting to explore theatrical releases for movies because I do think that there are decades and decades of behavioral patterns that show that this wasn't just a way to stretch things out and to make money on advertising that this is actually how these stories should be interpreted and this is actually the best way to write these things is to not have to have the whole thing completely finished and uploaded and never to be touched again. And you know, I don't think I don't think succession was still being written as it went as a shot and while it was airing, but there are there are plenty of experiences where people were still editing. Yeah, I'll push back there. I mean, succession. They were finding it on the day. I mean, they also employed it certainly at least one actor who really liked to just sort of, you know, do a little improv on set, but but they were editing and shaping it as it went on. I mean, like one succession was airing. It's not like they were still shooting the way they would with like SVU and a season of SVU where they're like episode three is airing and we're shooting episode 18. You know, or whatever it is, so I just think that I think that there are there are truths that are non commercial, not not financially based that I think Netflix might want to explore and might eventually have to get back to. And I think if you have something as significant a stranger things, they've basically gotten to this place anyway by doing like three, three tranches of releases for the last season to that show. But if they ever get their hands on another big ticket, that level of blockbuster to have that be over in one day for a lot of people or two days, that's just a waste of eyeballs. Like you could have had a month of conversation and a month of people coming back to the service and after they finish that episode of Stranger Things, what else is there to watch right now? And I just think they have to get back to some sort of basic practices like that, especially when you are in an ecosystem in which to make a show like that, it takes two to three years to get a season on the year and you burn it all in a weekend is not good economics, said by someone who has really knows nothing about economics. I would also say the other news story just to point out it's not nearly as big of a surprise or big of a headline, but our pal Casey Bois announced his leadership team for Paramount and surprise. It's the end. It's, he did changing himself, it's his own leadership team, which, first of all, makes a lot of sense. Jane Weisman, who was in her position as head of content programming for Paramount has departed. And many people at Paramount are for now anyway keeping their jobs, but they are now reporting under previously established HBO hierarchy, which is Casey at the top. It's Amy Gravitt for Comedy, it's Francesco Orsi for drama, and it's Sarah Aubrey for the Max Originals. And I think it's interesting. I mean, this is a team that has proven not only that they can work well together as they have for many years, but that they can kind of grow their core. for competency of high quality across different types of shows now. The HBO leadership team of 10 years ago, well, it was kind of this leadership team, okay. So of 20 years ago, I don't know if they would have even wanted to say, can we make a good DC original, and can we make a good family drama for a more of a broadcast type sensibility, which is what they're doing with that upcoming Ray Romano show? This group has done all those things. So it'll be interesting to see how they apply that to Paramount, and it's also interesting to think about that in relation to what Netflix has not really been worried about what other people were doing, because they were the everything app. And maybe now they are going to have to deal with the spread of other streamers in the interim, having figured it out what they are good at, how to do it, and how to professionalize so they can compete on a show-to-show basis, if not a market share to market share basis. Well, that's the other thing that has been heavily suggested by Sarandas and others as they've done their earnings reports and talked about the future of the services. This idea of Netflix shifting to become more of an open platform where you can watch Peacock on there, and you can start to use it the way people use Prime Video where they can sign up for NBA League Pass and Paramount Plus and HBO through Amazon. I have to say, since we're just two guys talking here, I'm starting to get closer to wanting to do that. I have traditionally kept all my services separate, like I'll shut down. You're not a bundler. It's not that I don't bundle. It's just that I will go out of Amazon to go watch Max, or I will go out of Max to go watch Peacock. I haven't canceled my stuff and then resigned up for it through one service because that's what you have to do. Like link Peacock with Amazon Plus or Amazon Prime. But I am because of sports and because of basketball specifically, I watch NBA through Amazon Prime. That's where I think League Pass is available. Maybe it's on YouTube too, but I've just been like on Amazon Prime so much that I don't want to keep shutting down my stuff every time I have to like change over to regular TV or whatever or watch Reggie Dinkins. So it's kind of, it's kind of an interesting moment where I wonder whether or not I'm going to start shifting my, my user experience. Watch this space, you know, this is where you guys come for. Really interesting. Do you think that you're going to get approached by the Apple TV people being like, you know, we, do you do everything through Apple? No, I am completely chaos menu. Like I actually only recently learned that I was subscribed to services like stars and Britbox still through my Apple account, I was just, I was just doing a little, what do they call it? Like a little financial, not autopsy, but a little like diagnostic about where's, there's some leaks here. I'm noticing. Power, colon ghost. I'm paying for that. Yeah. Yeah. I'm keeping that whole power franchise alive. I'm waiting for them to finish the story before I get into it. Yeah. It reminds me of when I joined New York sports club in like a, unlike a hangover Sunday once in like 2002 time to get to fitness and then and then found out that I had been a loyal member. I think I think there's like a plaque with my name on it, like one brick of their new lobby at their, at their facility in Park Slope, and I, it took me about six years to realize that I had done that. I'm in that relationship with T.D. I'm a silent benefactor. Yeah. Bank. I have like two dollars in T.D. bank from what I left, lived in Boston every year. I got a letter from Mr. T.D. being like, sir, sir, please, this costs us more to digitally house these two dollars. Please just close your account. I'm just like, I'm letting that, just, I'm letting that baby just accrue with interest. Yeah. I think I also, I think I have a savings account with $8.63 in it. And I'm like, what? I'm saving it. I think I still have. As you remember how, in Philly, the main banks, like, changed hands five times in seven years. Oh, yeah. So I, I think I still have like a, a LeCovia something that is no longer in existence. I think, well, let's, let's run it back. Like, I think, um, beneficial bank was the, with the, with the first Mac machines, it was that fidelity. And then they, and then they became LeCovia. And there's US FS or US. What was the, there was something in Philly that was like, that was my Mac. This is really good podcast. This is good. I think this has been really good so far. Let's talk about the finale of slow horses, which we were, uh, delinquent in doing so last week. I want to get your thoughts. I feel like I've been living with this for a minute or I've been watching, you know, I've, I've been kind of living with this conclusion. Obviously, now I think that my insistence that this was a much darker season of the show kind of makes sense. Um, I wanted to know for you, let's go spoilers full, full, full green light. Here, if you have a watch the sixth episode of the fifth season, sixth season, that's six, six season. Uh, please do so. Um, I actually have not watched the next season on slow horses yet. Uh, I forgot to. But, um, what did you think of the very ending, which involved, uh, what would, could, could be a coin toss moment for the, uh, life and death of, of River Cartwright? I loved it. I mean, I, I, I unambiguously loved the season. I gotta tell you, like it is, I mean, everything about the show is real, is unprecedented. But I don't know of many shows that have completely, that have both confidently and completely changed my emotional viewing language. So expertly, in the sense that by the time last season came around, I watched it from a very comfortable leaning back posture of like nothing here can surprise me. It could potentially delight me, but I am not really concerned about the well-being of my favorite characters and my stories, the way that I would be on a different type of series. And then this finale was absolutely screaming with tension with like, there, there was no way to lean back while watching this episode, not just the very end of it. It was, um, breathless with possibility and quite dangerous possibility. And that's a very hard thing for any show to, to conjure up, let alone a show in its sixth season. So I, I thought it was really, really exciting. And the only thing I, if you want to start from the ending, I will say that the only problem is, is that you and I and probably everyone who listens to a podcast like this just simply watches too much stuff now. So the visual language of a scene in which something bad is going to happen is just so, so apparent. Yes. That, you know, I, I wait, what surprised me was, uh, check off crowbar. The fact that River ended up potentially dying in the last moments did not surprise me, because when you show up at a house to surprise someone who is a trained assassin or at least spy in potential assassin with a romantic candlelight dinner, I just assume she was going to shoot him. So I was, you were, you were blaming Sid and not the Russians, or are you thinking that they're one and the same? Oh no, no, no. I was just assuming I knew peril was coming. Okay. I knew that River was going to be in trouble here, but I assumed it was because he didn't alert the super spy currently showering that he was a friend in the house. Uh, I don't blame her for the placement of the crowbar. And well, I guess you could blame her for not tidying up. I thought that that scene was like indicative of, uh, this show's subtle growth in that, you know, you get this moment and there was something about the selection of the Nick Drake song for him pulling up to the house. That was like, this feels different. It doesn't feel like he's about to have a romantic reunion and get what he wants and get what we all want him to have and have this beautiful like moment with Sid. This seems more like a funeral moment or or something ominous in which is like, it's testament to, I think needle drops are a little overexercised in modern television. But that did something where you're like, God, this is beautiful. But this is also very sad and it's a little bit unnerving. Like what is this song communicating and what is this moment communicating? I believe earlier in the season, Sid, it said something about meeting him as grandfather's or something like that. And like, you know, because it has some fucking Cameron crow juice to it. You want, you want like, you complete me here and yeah, I just thought even as soon as Adam Randall takes the camera off the tripod and we start lurking around that house, uh, hand held. Do you just still like, this is ominous? And that's another indication of this show's growth and also like, just the way it's, it's communicating what it wants on a sort of sub-tutaneous level is just making us feel uneasy with camera work in a moment that could also be romantic or a movement, the big comic. It's like, you know, when he gets into that house, it's just not right. And I thought it was, it was really well done that way. Adam Randall should get talked about more like this is one of the best directed seasons of TV and recent memory. It is stunning in terms of exactly what you're saying, the way the camera is communicating, mood and anxiety and point of view. But also the way the camera is just capturing beautiful fucking images. Yeah. But this is also the season that had the stunning images of the box park where, where Stru and his living in the beginning and the, in the way that the location that they chose for Diana's house and how it fits in with the landscape and doesn't fit in with the landscape and the windows. I mean, the whole thing is gorgeous. And yes, the end is setting us up for something. But also, the way the show has been able to revel in slow building of character and the slow development of flavor still has surprised me that there was a moment last season when River was stuck doing for the 19th time. Well, why don't you just tell me what's going, like, he's just frustrated with a situation and you begin to think that his point of view is the right one, which is that he is really, really good and just constantly being held back. What this season did was complicate that in interesting ways. He is a sin eatery is what keeps happening to his hand is so vicious and awful and punishing and he just keeps getting back up. And at no point, though, do you get the sense that he is particularly clever, he's just particularly dogged and that kind of is what is his undoing here, you know, that he still doesn't quite have the nuance of it. He just has a kind of a hero narrative for himself. And again, to sort of develop that with your main character or reveal it, this deep in was really remarkable. The version of Roddy Ho that was on, that was the took the lead in season five that within one season, you could get the version of Roddy Ho that has a wordless response to flight's death. And then the next time you see him, he's playing a shooting video game in Sloughhouse, but without saying anything more, you understand why he is doing it. Usually shows turn up the volume over time and people become caricatures more and more characters of themselves. And I think that was definitely the case in season five, rarely do shows course correct or lower the temperature on things the way this show did this season. Let's talk a little bit about flight's death, which is brutal. And by that point in the in the action set piece, you do almost are like, this seems like too much, like you could have escaped without executing her. I thought it was just a real, real master stroke, obviously, in the books, the trajectory of that character is mapped out. Mick Heron had published nine, nine slow horses books. I believe with some novellas in there, Clown Town is the most recent one in 2025. I haven't read that far. I've spoiled a little bit of parts about the future of this group for myself, intentionally and unintentionally. But with flight, I actually didn't know that that happened to her. So that was a gut punch, especially as that character was just sort of like, Flight's going to join the slow horses. This is awesome. Like they needed somebody to replace co. It makes sense. Like blah, blah, blah. And instead you got a, you got a team that's got a injured reserve longer than the Eagles. That hurts. Yeah. I mean, I did see the next season thing. And I'll say that it is very surely heavy. Yeah. Because the next season thing did not confirm or deny whether Jack Loudon is on the show anymore. Like that, that's a very classic, you know, next episode, next season thing to do. They're waiting for Denis Villanuev to tell them whether it's okay, whether he's available or not. They, there aren't enough people on the show anymore. I will say that. I did think that we were going to merge from the season with someone emerging or joining the team. And it's one of those things where like you can admire the ballsiness of it. But also it would have been great story if she had joined. I mean, I think I was with you. I was like, this isn't actually an exciting place for the actor to go. It's an exciting dynamic to introduce to the room. That even makes sense. Tavor really want her out. Like in the private sector, she knows too much. She's been to intimately linked to Taborner. She's got so many skeletons in her closet. Like just let her while away her days at, at Slawhouse. But, um, yeah. But, but the book, I mean, I did do, we were cautioned about this by people. And I, so I did look into the plot of Joe country, the book. And it's really remarkable. Like it is wildly divergent. There are pieces that they used, but they did not just that one to one adapt the book. So it's two books for this season. Right. It's two books. But the plots were sort of Frankenstein from one half from another and kind of Frankenstein together in a way that I thought was really clearly paid off. And it was quite exciting. But I do think that I have been guilty having not really having not read the books of giving almost too much credit to McCarran's books themselves. And in thinking of people like Will Smith and the current showrunner whose name is Gabby. Well, I'm trying to talk Gabby choppy who deserves all the flowers here. I've given them more credit as like train conductors, as opposed to creatives in their own right. And I that is clearly not the case to be able to have all of these strands going. And then to whether it made sense, well, it was happening or not, make it quite clear who did what and why in the final episode. Now, do I understand why Frank was at that funeral? No, but I don't really care about that. The ultimately, the, this is, you know, is it gave, I don't fault a show for being overly complicated, especially a spy show when you find room for one of the main characters to plausibly explain what has just happened as, which is what Jackson does at the Child's birthday party. So once we got there, I was like, Oh, okay, well, someone knew what was going on. And at least they told us. Yes. And from that point, the action unfolds. They get to the church at the end. And there's the good Louise of fake out. Why are they going to the church? Okay, she's fine. I mean, she's not fine, but she's alive. I did read that they did multiple takes or at least an additional take in which they drank a shot for everyone who died this season. Oh, but they would have been the A, they would have been drunk, but B, it was like simpler to the idea that like they do a shot in memory of all the people they can't actually mourn because they were undercover or whatever. But then they did have, surely say, for co, which then made it me feel it was kind of mean. Like I feel like it's either for everyone or it's not, you know what I mean? So it would have been for a couple for flight. For the two that died. Oh, and for Strunloy. I want to died this season. Strunloy and the woman who we never actually knew who was on the boat. Uh, yeah. I mean, I think co is like, had saved their lives a couple of times and was more present in their life. But yeah, it's, it's interesting that they didn't do like an entire like for all those who have served under Jackson lambs cloud of farts. Like we salute you. What I said about River goes for lamb as well that like this season, he was a lot more to me human. And I don't mean in terms of like emotional. I just mean like there was more to him than being smarter than everyone. There was a sense of like, you know, the larger history of the person and his feelings about sacrifice. And also not always being front footed by about everything that things events were playing out beyond his control. And that's been updated on them beyond. Yes. Like even when he's like get co in there and they're like, he didn't make it like that seems a little bit more plausible than previous versions of Jackson lamb, which have basically predicted the future of terms that have everyone was going to behave. And he would also come in and say, I am the one who sent you on that wild goose chase to prove a point or to draw out something. It just seemed like he was almost omniscient in maybe seasons four and five. Uh, Jackson's very interesting. By far the thing that you see many people say is that their favorite Jackson lamb moment is his story about Berlin days, getting feet burned off and whether or not that was his story or some other person's story. And I think it speaks to a desire for a little bit of interiority from somebody who is entirely surface, you know, as entirely external with his his thoughts and emotions and behaviors and whatever because he doesn't care what people think of him. Um, if indeed we are in the back nine, if not the back five or back three of this series, you know, they have seven coming eight has been renewed. Uh, loudness up for bond. Also, they've caught up to the books. Um, I, I'm very curious to see where they go with all the characters. You know, first of all, I don't know whether or not with eight, if that's, if seven is clown town, which it might be, whether eight would be for a yet to be published, Mick Aaron book, and whether or not that will be tied together in any way. But yeah, like I think that people probably are ready for some movement in Jackson lamb's, uh, preeminence. Like is it, is it that he wants to go for first desk or is it that he wants to retire? Like I, I don't know, it seems like how long can this man just sit here and eat Chinese food and, and, and have gas? Is this show built to be a forever ongoing or was there always some larger serialized canonical story that it was telling about these people and is it steering towards any kind of conclusion? Yeah, or would you want to do the ER version of this show where it's a whole new set of doctors, you know, and it's maybe Mark Green is still there. And in this case, that would be Jackson, but like, you get a whole new set of, of horses. Let's talk about the lowdown before you get out of here. I feel the plunder hit and it just makes me feel warm and happy all over to watch this show, man. Spoilers for episode three to the extent that there are any, I can give you a rundown of the plots synopsis. But this episode opens up with Ethan Hawk wandering the Oklahoma night and getting picked up in a van by a mysterious driver played by Steve Earl plays a guy named Dale who seems to be a sober guard. an angel for the barflies of Tulsa. And I'm like, what the fuck is going on, man? This is like, this is just like all the things I'm interested in are happening on this show. And it just keeps getting deeper and better. This felt the most like they had hit the equilibrium between a fantastic short story where a character can pop up for two pages and a great deep novel that's connected to a much larger, you know, archaeological dig of Oklahoma underworld. What did you think of this episode? I think the show is elevating. I think the show is finding a gear that I don't know if we expected it to. I think we hoped that it would. I don't know if the people who made it understood that it could, but it has. Like if you are listening to us and you have not invested in the show or engaged with it and you did, or even if you engage with it and you didn't love the first season, please watch this season. This show is taken a massive, massive, massive leap and it is an absolute joy to watch. And I'm not just saying that. We'll always use this caveat. I'm not just saying that because Sterling Harjo clearly loves 80% of the same things that we love in terms of movies and music and culture and what we want out of these programs that we dedicate so much of our lives to. I kind of can't shake the feeling that season one was was constructed to make a case for the show that they ultimately wanted to make, which doesn't mean that I'm saying you trojan horse anything, but season one built this like, like rogues gallery of evil demigods, you know, whether it's Kyle McLaughlin's character or Tracy Let's's character, like really big over the top. How deep does this thing go? How high does this thing go? Conspiracy theory stuff. This season has relaxed into a story that feels at once more intimate, but also kind of more crackly and alive. And within that new structure, it's not just that in one episode you get the Steve Earl scene that you're talking about, which was so haunting and bizarre and great, but you also get another another scene of Ethan Hawke and Tommy Lee Jones acting their asses off with real, real emotional presence and intensity. You also get the chemistry between Hawke and Betty Gilpin. I was going to do the next thing I was going to bring the chain. It is so exciting to watch. You ask me and I'll just keep answering. They have found someone who can post up on Ethan Hawke, because if you were going to say anything about this entire endeavor from the first season, it might be, it might be. If I was concerned trolling that that is a character that is difficult to watch be on 11 for eight hours. That him exploding into a room screaming about truth and journalism and his sort of clairvoyance about the world, it needed a different gear. It needed a different pitch. And the scene where she's obviously just one of the most gifted performers of her generation, but the fact that he is seeding the scenic spotlight to her, and that moment where she's just like, yeah, like the reason why I'm so dead set on finding Miko is because I fell in love with him, you know, and then I am a lonely person. I thought he was a lonely person too. And we had this incredibly intimate phone relationship for a year. And she's crying and he just gets out of the way. But he's still Ethan Hawke and he radiates empathy. And it's beautiful. He, you can tell, first of all, he respects the hell out of her, that he is like whenever we've talked to Ethan Hawke, whenever he talks to anyone, and he talks a lot, he talks about how much he loves acting. And he talks about it the same way athletes talk about loving playing ball. And when he's on the court with someone who he respects as a partner, you can tell. And the senior talking about carry it further, like she says the thing about, you know what it's, how often does that happen when you can just be still with someone? And he says it doesn't. And he meets her exactly where she is emotionally. And then I believe, if I'm getting my chronology right, then they do the long walk into the ren fair, which he then corrects and explains is a renaissance fair. It is neither. As they are walking towards the great Uncle Brownie from res dogs and watching them just walk and banter and take pleasure in the things they are saying as characters, but also as actors. Like I don't know if I've seen Hawke play a two man game like that since the before trilogy. Yeah, it's just also in the van on the way home when he's dropping her off and he's wearing the dump him t-shirt that he got out of her dryer. Oh, I've got one more. The single best moment in the episode to me is when they are in Miko's ex's house with the sun. By the way, even the like the way they built that where he like sees a wheelchair and then pretends to be a guy getting candy in a wheelchair and then immediately gets found out. Like the the journey is worth the destination. Yeah. The detours are the point. So anyway, in that scene in the house, Ginger is talking to this woman about the man that they both love or have love. And it's becoming apparent that like this man had secrets from both of them. Yeah. And what is Hawke doing in that scene? Hawke is attempting to spin a basketball on his fingers. And at one moment, it spins off of his fingers and hits Ginger in the shoulder. And I don't know if this was planned or this was just like one take. And Betty gives us not reaction. Yeah. She's just like, of course, you can't just stand still. It's so funny. It's so alive. And like again, this episode was written by Duffy Bodro who is I think is I think his origin stories. He and Bill Hader were childhood friends in Oklahoma. Yeah. He's a frequent collaborator with Bill Hader. And it's also directed by Scott Teams, who's from Georgia. And he's a big screenwriter in the horror world where he's done, I think, in Sidious, the red door one and wrote one of the Halloween, the David Gordon Green rebooted Halloween and worked on the David Gordon Green exorcist. So yeah, just like too, but also directed on rectify. But the but the Duffy Bodro thing I wanted to bring up for is because you don't want to ever overly credit as scripted an episode writer like it, it all flows through Sterling for sure. But there is some real berry energy to this episode in the sense that like the show is really crystallizing around its own internal logic that weird things happen and spiritual things happen and you know, a metaphysical like all these things are possible in this world, but they make sense to the show's own internal metronome. And that is such a remarkable thing. So that even a side quest story, which currently is about Keith David and archeological dig to get there or to understand it, he crosses with Michael Hitchcock, who is still on the show. And it's wonderful to see him. But those two characters having their own storyline that so this point isn't even touching the Miko story. But you feel good about it. Like it's earned a B story. Yeah. I mean, Tommy Lee Jones has essentially been seated for three episodes. And they've had the same conversation multiple times where he's like, you haven't told tomorrow to get out of here. And he's still there. Um, obviously getting in with Francis and Ryan Cara Armstrong has done a really good job. It's got to be a thrill to be like, I'm sitting at it diner table with Tommy Lee Jones. Do you think that's a thrill for most 14-year-olds? I don't know. Like you're going to be one of how not that many people from your generation to be able to say that like, yeah, I also acted with Tommy Lee Jones. That's incredible. I just, I just like imagining explaining to my daughter that like, no, no, this, this is very old man was in. We don't have to meet him. But he really took the lead in US marshals, which is, you know, less appreciated. But dude, the two dudes at the end, he chokes him out. And then she says, what are you guys doing? He says, I'm just showing Lee the shed. Yeah. It's great. Did I just choke out a cop? Great show. I'm really happy with where we're at. You know, there's a bunch of stuff coming on. We've got a couple of comedies returning like Reggie Dinkins. And we'll be back for all of it. Andy, hopefully it gets to talk to you a little bit on Thursday about lowdown or something else. So have a good week brother and I'll see you soon.