I'm gonna call and rescue. Just get the choppers Ping this site as an LKP and then 15 miles POA, whoa, whoa, whoa Word'll spread. Your families will be upset and if these dorks turn out to be just out on some geek expedition, then you wanna hold off for a bit. No, hank, I don't. We're late to the party already. Ham and the sandwich may seem fresh, but mayo's like syrup. Mayo doesn't go running until a couple days out of the fridge. But your process cold cuts will survive the apocalypse.
The things you learn when your kid leaves at lunch in the backseat of the car. You were never much of a sandwich-making kind of dad. What was he peeping? Drop it, duncan, and both come correct.
We're off to the races.
Two veterans of podcast Swinging in one more time to record on systems which have changed and are now apparently more complicated than they were when we were recording last.
Yeah, well, you know what are you gonna do. So I am one of your host, beau, who is afraid of technology. With me also afraid of technology is the inimitable Duncan McLeish. How are you, sir?
Who said that?
Technology. Jesus God, satan Something in here, all of them. If only it were Satan.
I would say that there's only some sort of fousty impact that could ever, ever bring back a show that has taken a year off. I mean, I'm left to say there's like a rocky montage training sequence of us like getting back in DBCC shape, but that just doesn't exist.
Right. Like what shape is that flabby around the middle?
Flabby with opinions, Beau Right, right, right.
Like DBCC, shape is pear, you know, yeah, yeah, but I mean, I appreciate, don't get me wrong.
Oh yes.
I certainly look. One of the things that's been super nice is is people who were like hey, you know when the fuck is DBCC gonna be back, and it was like this is all my fault, like I cannot blame anyone else because I decided to go off and like change careers yeah, fault is not, not, not fair Like what we I like to think.
What we do as a podcast is we find things that will be fun to talk about and then we set up, say, some personal time to come down and talk about those things. I would say we were pretty much, even with our breaks in between certain TV shows. We have been pretty consistent for a decade. So, like DBCC, formed in 2014, if I'm not mistaken, I think we did.
Oh yeah, I'll have to go back and look, but that sounds right.
So we've been doing this for about 10 years. So there is a certain point when even established touring rock acts take a little bit of time off and then come back and hit the classics, and if we're ever going to come back to do anything, the return of True Detective kind of feels like our I don't know our black album. So yeah, our black album, let's just, let's just bring the band back.
I've I mean, that's where things start to go off the rails.
So they got their haircut. I mean, what the fuck is going on?
No, I was low technically, it was when, like after Injustice for All, and it was like this is one of the most rockin'ous bands that has ever been, and then the next time out you're getting a little and nothing else matters. You're like what? What is this?
James what we're doing here. He's like, I don't know, Like creating the highest selling metal album of all time. I think we are, Maybe so, but look, oh yeah, it's a shift. It's not, as it is not as big a shift as the load album that comes after that where there is literally an end to a song where it's like that, it ain't my ooh bitch. Like that is literally how he finishes off it ain't my ooh bitch, and you're like, yeah, metallica kind of sucks, yeah, I love it.
The book to take away is that at first, not at first. At first they were awesome but then they started sucking. They got progressively.
They got progressively. My favorite thing was they released that 72 seasons album last year and people were like they're back and they're really not. That is a long. The way I described it when it came out was if a band was trying to get signed today and that's what they handed into a record label, they would not be signed. So let's not pretend that it's a great Metallica album. It's really not. It's not a great debut album.
So let's just like put it to the side and let's just be like, just go on tour, like I say, like DBCC, like there's a certain point where you're really listening in for the camaraderie and the hot takes. Then you are about as like coming up with some brand new format and changing the paradigm with podcasts.
I don't know what we're here to do. Yeah, we stumble into that.
Yeah, I've caught a light idea, factorable yeah.
Well, we have talked many times before about the cultural cache, where we say a thing and then it just comes to be.
Yeah, yeah, I think so. I think in a lot of respects we were early on the Ilsa Lopez train as well, for sure, for sure. Thank you for a while.
And I think I think I may have said on season three, true detective, that when we're talking about where this could go, what could happen, like I think me and you had a conversation where we're like, oh, you know the fund directors that could take a swing at it we never mentioned Ilsa Lopez, but we certainly mentioned other directors that were like you could take established directors here, like proper big named, like horror, or throw directors and just give
them a season of true detective to run with. And apparently that's not what happened here but did happen here. Ilsa Lopez wrote a pitch for a TV series, like a mini series, called Night Detective and she brought the HBO and HBO basically said this is great, we love it. How would you feel if we changed it and, for marketing purposes, made it true detective? And she was like I can work with that.
And then she went away, changed some stuff around, brought some synergy between the brands and then essentially off to the races from there. So, yeah, and a weird way, it feels like HBO who clearly listened to everything we do, took this on board and ran with it. So, although Night Detective does sound like she was kind of pitching for true detective, like is she taking the HBO Right?
Yeah, you take it to HBO. And as dumb as some of the moves that Max has made as a brand lately. I'm sure there was somebody with enough pretzels rubbing together that it was like wait a second, We've got a show that's already got Detective writing the name.
Well, yeah, nick Pizzolato for those that don't know, he's heavily involved with seasons one through three, basically was the writer of all three seasons, although I think he co-wrote on season three signed a deal with I think it was Fox to develop like he knew something, and Matthew McConaughey was involved with that project and then ultimately left that project, which has kind of left him and limbo over there.
And HBO owns the rights to the name True Detective, which is why they've moved on without him. So it's not like any sort of case of them deliberately ostracising or pushing them out. Pizzolato used all the cashier that he got from the work he'd done on True Detective to pitch a much better deal over with Fox with something else, and obviously there's been acquisitions with Disney and all the rest and sent.
So I believe whatever he's working on now is stalled and we now have Elsa Lopez who has predominantly written the majority of this. There's some kind of co-writing credits as the season goes on, but she's definitely at the heart of the story here and she's directed every single episode, which is the format from season one where we had what was it? Carrie Fukunaka? I wrote, sorry, directed all the episodes.
So we have a singular vision here, like a director giving you a singular vision all the way through, which we've mentioned before maybe more than once, is kind of how we like our True Detective. I kind of like that singular vision all the way through because in season two, for example, some of the it was evident or it's a different director directing this episode, because the feel just like things would become too action-y and too kinetic or they would run that kind of snail's pace.
And this one one showrunner, one writer, essentially, and only six episodes. So this is a shorter True Detective. We will be through this in six. So I'm insanely curious, from all the questions that I have just from episode one, how the hell we're going to get through this with five episodes after.
Yeah, I'm excited to do this because, as we record this, the second episode airs tonight, so it's kind of fitting to like all right, let's pick over this a little bit, let's talk about it, and then tonight will be some answers with probably more questions.
We'll see how far off the mark we are Like. I know that all I'm going to say is I don't know if mole people can exist in Antarctica. Mole people what does Alaska have?
mole people- oh, certainly Under the permafrost. Duncan, let's not be naive.
The permafrost to just mole people with perms.
It's a mole, people, aphros, everyone knows that, but the dreaded tundra mole.
Or the tundra mole. Huh, Don't mess.
Yeah, the Australian drop bear.
So, yeah, like, we're back True Detective, we've got six episodes out of these, Bo. It was like that Listen, I've got some time coming up, let's do this. And you've made me a very happy person because I have a lot of friends that watch a lot of TV. I have no friends that are as passionate about True Detective as I am. I made a snarky post online where I based it and said listen, the reviews for the season. For those people that have seen the entire season.
You know these entities out there your empire magazine, et cetera are saying this is the best season since season one. However, like, don't let anyone fool you into believing that there is a bad season of True Detective. Like all three, those first three seasons are different stories. It's, you know, it's different styles. It's very, very difficult to compare them. Yes, as a standalone, like that first season is absolutely incredible.
But what I've enjoyed is sitting back seeing the walking back of commentators and reviewers on season two, where people are coming back. I shall say we get this more now than we got when it came out. And season three, I think, is the one that maybe has. It's the one that has the most heart out of the three of them.
I really like season three. I think it's quite good.
I thought it was excellent as well. So I mean, I'm down to clown on this, but that's because we've been down to clown on all of them and we genuinely think all three are very much worth your time. And what I'm hoping is at the end of this one we are still sitting here going you know what. At times it's a bit cliche, at times it's a bit tongue in cheek, at times it swings for the fences in a way which doesn't always feel satisfying, but it's out there.
It's out there doing something and I would much rather have TV like this than kind of stale by the numbers, very safe by committee television out there. Given also Lopez a lot of money to make something on HBO is not a bad move to me, even if she's having her time just now with the online Rotten Tomatoes and IMDB crowd she's not handling particularly well, but I also don't think that should be something she should worry about.
Yeah, kind of fuck them. Yeah, that's how I.
Literally we were talking off air. I saw Elsa Lopez tour with Tigers on Off-Rage, played at Glasgow Fright Fest. I spoke about it for about a year before it finally made its way on the shutter where I was just like, if there's one movie that you see this year, and she basically came out and, in the Q&A, had that kind of fucking match it, which I loved about her.
I thought, like this is a woman who is just swinging for the fences and, regardless what we'll see, it still is a male-dominated industry and genre that she's working in and it's good to have a bit of a chip on your shoulder with that, because I think it makes her hustle and really dig her heels.
In. The controversy that's come out about this is that she felt that there was and having looked at some of the IMDB reviews for this episode, I think she's maybe onto something here Some overtly negative comments about this first episode. I've seen a couple of one or two-star reviews which just doesn't make sense. Like, even if you didn't like the story, there's no way you can mark down the acting, the cinematography, the score.
But yeah, like she's basically saying that there are people out there that are trying to sabotage this. She then deleted that tweet and then came back and she said I made the generalization Didn't mean that Didn't mean to say that everyone that loves season one is trying to mark down season four, but it does kind of feel like there's some people gunning for this before it even gets out the door. Some people say it's like one of the worst things. I've seen All that stuff.
Well, if I'm her, I wouldn't be paying attention to any of that. I would be saying look at what the critics are saying and we'll see what comes back in terms of the viewership. That's ultimately how it's going to be judged. Longer term is is it doing good numbers for HBO Max? And you know well I pick it. I'd be surprised if this doesn't pick up some awards come award season, specifically for Jodie Foster, who we'll get into, who's kind of just like fucking effortlessly amazing.
So, yeah, I think she's too focused on it. I think she's sit back and let us take the six episodes and yeah, she's not going to suffer even if this isn't a success. How many people get like a full six episodes on HBO?
Well, yeah and yeah, I mean, this does nothing but raise her profile, and even if she's fighting back against people online, then you know kind of whatever, fuck them. But yeah, I mean it still makes her more credit. Like you can't watch this and not feel like, oh, this is directed. Well, if nothing else, you know what I mean.
Like yeah, even, yeah, like you said, even if you're not not keyed into the writing, I mean, although there, we'll get into this, but there is enough lynching and bullshit in this that I'm like all right, I like I'm down for this. There's one scene where I was like where's the gun light?
Well, like when we talk about so we were speaking about this off here as well I've kind of went. I had I was doing a lot of travel for work, so I've kind of went into the weeds here. The Reddit weeds on on season one Sorry, episode one of season four and there is a lot of theories. There are so many theories flying around. But I kind of feel like she's playing a very shrewd game with the audience here, specifically with how much linkage there is and I kind of superficial capacity to season one.
And let me just give you one of them right in the back yes, yes. And it is the start. So there's a quote right at the beginning.
I have this in my notes too, because I got bad for it. Go, yes, please.
Right. So the quote from this one is from a character or a person called Hildred Castine, who one never said this. Line Two is a fictional character and three appears in a short story called the Repairer of Reputations, which is actually under the collection of the King in Yellow, which is directly referenced in season one when we talk about Carcosa. So like straight away, like the opening scene, I kind of feel like she's like here you go, right, this is what you want.
You want that season one, you want that season one. And watch me swerve away, like straight away Although we're going to have some linking tissue in here, like that just feels really playful to me because she's a tribute and a quote to a fictional character who never made this quote she apparently she's the one that wrote the quote, so this is her.
And Duncan the character that the quote is attributed to is best known as an unreliable narrator. A great example of that of like you can't trust anything that this guy tells you, which is true detective, You're right.
Like that's the theme, Like the people talk about. What's about the cult? It's about, you know, it's about murder, it's about history. It's not really. It's actually about how people are notoriously unreliable witnesses to their own things. If you asked me to recall something, if you asked me to recall something at Ham last week, it's not how it happened, or even if it. Even if it is, it's my perspective on how it happened, which is still probably not how it happened.
And we'll get into, like the Fiona Shaw stuff as well, Like that's one of those things where I'm like. I see what you're doing here, true detective. I see through you, but we'll get into this. Hey, first let's let's do our usual thing. Let's talk about a movie one good, one bad. We won't take forever to do this, because I know we. We went long on an intro, but it's our first show back.
So first one back, fucking calm down, back off. Yeah, I say.
Back off.
I'm like, I'm like, I'm finally from Firestarter Back off. Yeah, this, this, this segment here, is sponsored, but it ain't my ooh bitch.
So I just every time you say that, I deflate a little bit like it. It kills my soul a little every time I hear it Like oh yeah, give me, give me fire.
Give me that which I desire. Yeah, Ooh.
Um. He says yeah.
Oh yeah. So I'll give you my yeah and I'll give you my ooh bitch A bad one.
God wait, let's not make that a bit, please. So it's a it's a my good movie.
It's probably one that's it's still getting a ton of traction here, but for not the reasons I will give it credibility and thumbs up. Um, I caught salt burn this week. Yeah, a lot of people talking about it, a lot of people really really loving that, a lot of people, apparently, who have never seen the talented Mr Ripley, and that's fine, because that's literally all I was thinking all the way through. This is like oh, I see where this is going, I see where this was going.
So a couple of those swift doctrines that, you know, shocked audiences Never really necessarily shocked me, but I loved it for how ballsy and ostentatious it was. It really is a kind of very brash, loud, bold movie. There's one particular scene that obviously has had the internet like a gas that I can't believe that they went there.
And I'm either like so desensitized to things through watching horror movies and, I'll be honest, porn, um, that maybe it didn't shock me as much as the rest of the world. Or there's people just I don't know, jumping in on the kind of, oh, I can't believe they went there bandwagon and it's got great performances. It's a great thriller movie, flies through at pace. Um, I don't necessarily think. Like I said before, I think if you've seen something like the talented Mr Ripley, it is.
It's very, very, very close, Um, but it's kind of fun. It's darkly comic and, yeah, I certainly enjoyed it. I thought it was a really, really, really, really well put together, really well acted film, um. So, yeah, I like that. That's my good this week. What about yourself? What's your good bow?
Uh, just a quick shot. I was looking up salt burners who were talking about it, written and directed by Emerald Fennel, who of course did pretty young, uh, pretty young woman, is that? Right, yeah.
Pretty young woman. Yes, you have that title right Right. Yes.
Okay, promising young woman. Not promising young woman, pretty young woman is the prequel to pretty woman.
That's right. Which, by the way, did you know there was? I didn't know this until recently. This is like. Don't ask me how I ended up in the deep dive on this one. That, like originally when, when Pretty Woman was pitched as a movie and the premise started going forward with it, with Julia Roberts and Richard Geir involved with it, it was actually called 3000. Did you know this story?
Uh, this sounds familiar, but keep going.
Right. So it was called 3000, because that's how much money he's going to give her.
Right right.
Right and it's nowhere near as kind of warm and fuzzy as it is, and actually at the end of the movie he kicks her out the limo, basically tells her to fuck off, and then the director left the project and then it was bought by, essentially, disney and they brought new people in and then that all changed and all of a sudden Julia Roberts becomes like a Disney princess at the end of that movie, which I completely 180.
So, um, yeah, I don't know if I would have wanted to see the darker version of it now or if I'm kind of happy with where they ended up, but I'm just now things turn. But, yes, then it's like, like I say, if you're not seeing salt burn, I would recommend. I think they have a great time with it. I don't think like myself, you're going to come out of this going well, you know what. This is how you make a goddamn. You're going to come out of it being like I like what they've done.
It feels like a modernizing about this. The talent in Mr Ripley is the one that I go back to because the stories are very similar. Um, but yeah, it's good. It's good. You should check out. It should win awards. It is one of the awards. That's a good thing.
Speaking of winning awards, my good for this year week is the Holdovers, which is a great fucking movie Just being released over here, so we're hoping to see it next week, purely because someone said Paul Gia Mattis in it and I'm like that sold. It's yeah, so I'll spoil the movie for you, so you don't have to worry about seeing it. Thank you.
So it saves me a journey, yeah no worries, uh, no, it's.
Look, it's Paul Gia Mattis being fantastic. It is Alexander Payne, uh, in prime form here. Uh, he's one of those directors. I talked about this somewhere else. Um, that, even his failures, like downsizing, I think, is a real mess of a movie but it's a really interesting mess of a movie. Yeah, and likewise, I think that you know his take on. Hey, I'm going to do a 70s style. You know, kind of comfortable drama. You know something in the vein of a like Serpico.
Like, I mean, it's not as dramatic as Serpico. Yeah, it's so low stakes. That's the thing I really love about it is it's a movie where nobody's saving the world or has to stop a thing from blowing up or anything, and at the end of the movie everybody's only slightly better than they started. You know, like, but realistic then, is that what you're saying? Yeah, but you know, but in a really wonderful way, like.
There's a moment when I was watching the movie this is the only spoiler I will, I will give there's a moment when I was watching the movie where I was like God damn, the only thing this movie is missing is a cat Steven song. Sure enough. Next needle drop is a cat Steven song, and I was like, of course, this is the movie that does this. It was in my brain. No, is he living there? Yeah, it's, but that's what it is.
It is like it's like watching Harold and Maude or something like that, where it's just like the, the look of the movie, the fact that it's shot in winter around Christmas and it has this very, very Christmassy kind of vibe to it and the performances are amazing and Gia Moddi is wonderful and funny and human and all of those things Like there's a reason he's winning awards for the role, yeah, and he's very funny at times. It's just a terrific movie.
Like. Everything about the movie is really good and it's one of those movies that I like. When you come away from it you're not going to be like that's the best movie I've ever seen in my goddamn life. But the more you think about them or you're like, yeah, I'd like to watch that again, it just gives you a good feeling when you're watching. It feels like you're watching an old, good movie for the first time. You know it's a really there's a nostalgia play as far as that era of films, I think.
But it works because it's good enough to like remind you of the 70s era of like character dramas when it was like oh yeah, kramer versus Kramer. I mean that's more 80s, but still like that's a great fucking movie and that's just about two people getting divorced.
You know that like the backdrop to a character these days was the whole movie that you know like we'll get into it, but like Night Country has some of that too, where it's like, oh yeah, here's all this stuff about divorces and who knows who and stuff like that. Like that would be the whole goddamn movie if it were the holdovers. Like that's anyway terrific. Anyway, give me a bad movie. Now I'm I'm busy with the highs of Paul Giamatti.
So I finally finished it. I had started it before and I switched off and I'm in the process of kind of formalizing and releasing my top 20 of last year. So I'm kind of at the stage where I'm watching things, that I know I start a very rarely switch a movie off. But this was when I switched off and I was like I'm just going to confirm even though I know the Internet is, I'm going to confirm that I actually didn't like it. There was nothing really redeemable about it.
So I finished that new Exorcist movie and I'd got I'd got about 40 minutes into it and switched off. I couldn't, I could not go back to last year at all. In fact I wouldn't go back to last year. So I have this time, went through it and I like even less than I did then. That's just I don't know how. Well, I think there's two things, two things for comment. I think the first thing for me is I think we should just give up doing anything as a sequel to Exorcist.
I just think it's a full end Like part three isn't really like part three isn't what even William Peter Blatty wanted to do. It's essentially what the studio forced them to do and actually all the stuff that really works in that movie is the stuff that Blatty actually wanted to do and not the ending which they tag into that movie. You know, the, the Blatty cut of that movie, is basically just a police investigation.
It's not the, it's not the Exorcist stuff or all the other things that go with it. I think it's because he understood that he kind of done that Like he's like well, I've done that, this is the best version, it's never going to be no need to do that again and everyone else is trying to do that again. And it's like a surprising miscalculation by Blumhouse. What he's surprising miscalculation.
Even the Halloween stuff which did generally I'm not very good, but the the fact he spent was at 400 million acquiring the rights to that today and say we're going to do a trilogy, which why?
They got hit with that Halloween shit. Yeah, and first of all, the Exorcist is not Halloween. No, it's much more complicated, kind of kind of when you're like hey, not only are we going to do a sequel, we have the sheer fucking balls, the fucking balls to be like yeah, we're going to do three of these.
And David Gordon greens just going to do the same thing. They did Halloween. You know what Everyone's along for the ride.
Right and you're like what the fuck? And he's gone now, like he walked off this or not walked off, but he, he left the sequel. So I don't know if he's left or, and I haven't seen. This I can't like.
I was like I heard this shit. It is all affably bad, like like see, you know, like I, maybe we talk about movies that have exorcisms in them. The one that was that always comes to mind is I can't. The one that was set in New York with the dude was with Eric Banner.
Yeah, is that delivers from evil?
Deliver from evil. That's what I think is what's in my head and I remember me and you talking about that moving go that like as soon as we get to the extra stuff, we're just like what the fuck are we doing here? It's like low rent, horrible knockoff exorcist stuff. This, this movie, when it comes to the exercise and stuff, makes that movie look like the exorcist is just awful, Like absolutely just across the board. I'll thought I'll execute it badly. Time ends in a way. This is the other thing.
It ends in a way Because I was curious once again because there's a trilogy. So I'll see why I want to see the end of the movie. I'll see how they're going to set this up, because I never want to see another one of these. We'll see how it sets up for another two. And it doesn't. Actually it wraps everything up in a kind of neat bow that I was kind of confused as to.
Why would even if that was the script that was put forward why would even be planning to more out there unless we just spent 400 million acquiring the rights? We need three movies to make that back. Yeah, I like to see. If I was David Gordon Green, I would want to walk away from that. But I also kind of think that David Gordon Green is really really really good at that TV stuff. I don't think he's really all that good at the horror stuff.
Now I think that there has been sizable diminished returns, even revisiting that Halloween movie from 2018. I've went back a few to. I actually like it less going back when I'm like, hmm, that choice there. I don't think that thing holds together. Actually, I think that's not very smart and whereas the first time I watched it I came out going that, yeah, this is how you do a sequel to that first movie and modernize it. So yeah, it's terrible. It's really really really, really, really bad.
There was, there were whole sections where I was kind of kind of dumbfounded watching it because I couldn't understand how the studio like that, the studio let this come out. There's parts where I'm like you're a horror studio and there has to be some level of quality control there Although I've seen might swim this year and that might prove to be the quality controls.
I listened to your review of it, which was, I felt, very even handed. You were not.
I didn't want to completely bash it, but at the same time, the longer I've been away from that movie, the more I'm just like that. This movie falls apart really, really, really quick when you realize that the premise is there's a haunted pool, sure yeah.
Not the best, not the best.
The bit that got me is we've been talking about it I said the cinema and we're like that. There's a plot device in this which mentions that the previous family that owned the house lived in it for several years and never used the pool.
How that would come up in disclosure for buying a property, I don't know, but they never used the pool and the pool is like pretty much the back garden and me, as we're talking about, saying what that you would just fill the pool, wouldn't you, and just build something over it. And he was like, yeah, yeah, that's what I would do. And I'd be like, yeah, that would be the movie over, wouldn't it? Kinda.
And or you use the pool you would have. You never would have, just not ever use it, because after two years you've been like you know what? I've never, never been in this pool ever. I'm going to do it Look. I had, yeah, I had, you know, I had some pretty good Sateva and a couple of drinks, I'm going to just cannonball.
Yeah, I just I could not. I think it's not fair because Blumhouse put out Megan last year, a movie that I really enjoyed. So there obviously is a wide tent. But you would think you can forgive a movie like Night Swim, which cost not a lot of money, to make mistakes like that. But this is a movie which cost a lot of money. There's a lot behind this one and I just kind of feel that someone should have sat down there and went. This is the direction we're taking. I don't know, you see, what I mean.
All I'm going to say is it's not just one possessed child, it's two.
They're odd stunkin'.
It's not just priests that come to do the exercise. At the end they get holy men from all religion Like it's like fucking Captain Planet, right.
Yeah, that's what I've heard.
I was like that's like a guy going Buddha like.
I bring Buddha power, but do you mean him with his sense of one?
Yeah, main blowing with that.
So, yeah, as soon as I heard that, I was like I, that misses the entire point of the exercise, like I'm not Catholic, but the trappings of Catholicism are really important to that story.
Plus, like the exorcism is. There's a reason. There is a reason that William Peter Blatley himself no, sorry, william Friedkin himself said look at it as a horror movie. It's a family drama. Because, guess what? It's a family drama. It really is. When you look at it as a family drama, it just happens to be the scariest family drama ever made, whereas this is.
This is someone attempting to make a horror movie and just kind of showing all the trappings of how not to make a horror movie on a big budget. So yeah, that was my, but I'm curious and you're back, because you always bring, you always bring the goods here, some fucking low rent fricking found footage like asylum.
I have. I genuinely have not had time to watch the. The amount of shit. I normally like my honestly. My viewing has been surprisingly quality, like the last few movies I've seen are. Like you know, I watched once again and I watched air and Barbie and like like I watched across the spider verse, like I watched a lot of really good movies, so let me talk about it. This isn't entirely bad. Okay, look who doesn't like to shit on anything I like it, you like it, everybody likes it.
This is not a I'm shitting on this thing. I'm saying I'm mildly disappointed in this thing, but I still might be an even bigger slate than saying I hate it.
It's not that I hate it, I'm just mildly disappointed in it.
So it is right. I wish it was better, but so I'm talking, of course, about a reach or season two.
I've not watched any of this yet.
Okay, look, so let's let's let's talk briefly about reach or season one, but only only briefly. And reach or season one is a great example of a television action series and there are some great moments in it. Did you finally get around to watching House of Usher?
I have not watched House of Usher yet Okay.
Well, the, the actress who plays the young Madeline Usher, the young Mary McDonald, essentially, who plays of her in Flanagan's House of Usher, is like the romantic interest in reach or season one and it's got some good characters and it's all about this dude who's just a fucking behemoth. I've seen that. I've seen the Tom Cruise movies right, which I know.
At the time the issue was Tom Cruise is not Jack Reacher from the novels but at the same time, werner Herzog is the villain in the first Jack, like the first Jack Reacher movie, and that will always like you have me if he's a villain in a movie, if he's in a movie, but he's like a Siberian missing fingers no, I fucking bond villain. I'm like, yes, this is the biggest thing I've ever seen. But yeah, they're not.
They're not. They're Tom Cruise movies and I've heard that the yeah, your Scientology is she imagine them on set. That's the thing that I couldn't get my head around. There's like that Werner Herzog is not backwards, that coming forwards with his opinions and he's on set with Tom Cruise like Mr Scientology If Scientology was a person, is now Tom Cruise. And I'm just assuming they were kept. Well, they're not. They don't share many scenes, so I imagine they were kept apart a lot.
But what I'd always heard was from fans of the novels was actually none of them and it's. You know, these are Tom Cruise like action movies. They're not Jack Reacher adaptations and what I'd heard about season one was actually they're more in line with the novels than the movies were, so put them to the side. That's why he's like 63 and belt like the side of a fucking brecce house.
Yeah, and that's one of the things that's really fun about any and he's a good character. He's like very, no nonsense, it's very. This is right, this is wrong. I'm always going to do the right thing.
His whole gig is that he like was in the military for a long time and left and now just wanders the fucking earth like Quan Chiang Kain, getting into adventures, like he doesn't have an address, he doesn't keep close, like when he's done with his clothes he goes into a store and buys new clothes and throws the rest away and like that's it. That's just he's only possession as a toothbrush. That is it, you know. But and then he goes and gets into adventures and it's fun.
So, getting to season two, season one, setting like this little rural town where Jack Reacher is this fish out of water it was just showing up to watch a blue sky that he'd heard about one time because he's got a bus pass where he goes all over the country and never you know, never stays in one place for too long, etc. Etc.
And it was fun, it was a good time, and so season two has gotten into like well, here's some, some people from his past, like people that he was in an investigative unit with in the military, and they're embroiled in some shit. So it's become much more of an ensemble story, which is fine, but there that means there's less of Jack Reacher saying some cold shit to a dude and shooting him in the face, and that's what I'm there, yeah.
It's a danger of bringing in, like expanding things out as you do lose, and I'm so. I've said it many times yeah, my biggest gripe with the Child's Play movies were not that they got dumb or they were always kind of fucking dumb.
It's just now, all of a sudden, I have Jennifer Tilley as a doll and then we have the fucking David Bowie son as a doll, and I get to say it when I'm like I like why is Chuck Eiland on screen for a little bit doing a one line, and then we're following other people like getting it and mischief and killing people.
The reason you're going to check out a Child's Play movie is to see Chuck Eiland and like, if you have a TV show which is predicated on, well, there's a reason like season four of all this told we didn't have like a corgi like solving crimes on the side. You know, like you don't have that. You don't need it either.
So yeah, it's, it's fine. There's still plenty of fun stuff, and Robert Patrick is in it. And there were a couple of line deliveries. Yeah, where I'm like, oh, that's like when he did the movie. He sounds a whole lot like that. So anyway, did you ever check out?
You probably did, because you watch a lot more Well. You just in general are more skilled than I am. Did you watch poker face?
Yeah, oh yeah, it was great.
Yeah, I watched that, because no one had told me like I watched it on the plane to Japan and no one told me it's basically Colombo. And as soon as, as soon as that penny dropped about the second episode for me, I hardcore binge that entire thing from fucking Dubai to Osaka, like I like, like I watched every single episode, yeah, and it's like where's my season two, which I don't know if we're getting, but we need a season two, fucking amazing.
Yeah, look at this is very true, detective doing the pivot. But yeah, I mean like take as long as you need to just come back and it be as good as season one and that's fine. All you need is some mysteries and Natasha Leon she her, her.
Peter Falk is fucking amazing, like it's so good man.
You know, there's one other thing that I've been just I kind of love.
I kind of love. What I love about them is there's always the elaborate setup at the beginning and then you find that she's been there for a week or something and she's like but I love the bit where, like she's, you know, she's just about ready to go, and then someone lies and she's like, fuck, like, just like you can see, I just got off. You know, I was almost out the door and fuck.
And like the shitty dog she had was terrific and like, yeah, there's just like it's a wonderful shit. So, all right, let's take a quick break here, yes, and then when we come back, let's get into it. Duncan, let's talk some true detective and welcome back as we get into season four, episode one of true detective. This is, of course, written and directed by Issa Lopez as part of her good work on this show. Was there a show title? Did I miss it?
This is night country. The right.
True detective night country.
I don't know what the name of this episode is.
if you're asking, so hold on, let's see.
You'll find out. This is what people expect from us both prepared.
It's hard hitting, but like you already stole my bit about the oh, there's so much more Like there's so much more, so don't worry, we are having no shortage of stuff here.
Well, within the first five minutes here we have connections to Edgar Allen Poe, jules Verne, like fucking, like the shit goes weird. Quick ball.
Yeah, so it just says part one. Well, that was all I. That was a worthwhile search, anyway. So it opens with a quote that goes for we do not know what beasts the night dreams when its hours grow too long for even God to be awake. And this, as you pointed out, is attributed to this character from, you know, a book about the yellow king. So we're into some shit, duncan. What ends?
Maybe it's like maybe one of the most of their true detective, true detective things the show has ever done Straight luggage, just the opening bit, you're like that. Oh right, here we go, here we go.
Well, and it's worth noting, like two and three much less so, but season one flirted with the supernatural, oh God, yeah, in a big bad way, and this is just like oh yeah, let's start from that place. Well all the yellow king shit is she said that she wanted an interview.
She said that she wanted to do an inverse version of season one when she went back to the rewrite. So we have two female detectives looking into this. It's not in the sweaty, warm southern climates of America. If anything, it's on the exact opposite ends. We're in Alaska, completely inhospitable environment. So yeah, like like she's inverting a lot of this.
But the one thing she said she wanted to do and this was a direct quote from her is she wanted to lean into the horror and supernatural elements which, like I think she like made no qualms about very, very, very quickly in this one.
But it's very cheeky references, to be sure. 100%.
And so, like we are, like we're straight away linking straight back to season one with a quote, but, like you mentioned, the quote is well, the quote is not attributed to a person who never made that quote, but also, at the same time, the person that made that quote is a notoriously unreliable narrator. So, like you take that as you will, moving into this season, which has a beginning which had my head spinning, like the opening scene to this is like absolutely fucking nuts.
Yeah, so it starts off Alaska. Yes, we're told, 150 miles north of the Arctic Circle. It begins on December 17th, which is the last, the last sunset of the year, yep, and immediately you're like oh, they're about to get 30 days of. First, josh Hartnett, what's his name? Ray Winstone.
Is that? Who's in that?
We went through the main vampire on Danny Houston. Danny Houston, that's like look, ray Winstone, danny Houston could be brothers, if not.
Yeah, all those English mob movies. I would like to actually see a cut of the departed, where Ray Winstone is actually played by Danny Houston as the underboss to get like no God 100%. Remember that whole scene where she's like that oh, please, god, he's like no God. And then right, creepy as fuck.
Yeah, so anyway, we watch as this native hunter is taking aim on all these like caribou or something, yep, and then the sun goes down and all the animals freak out and stampede towards him. You know, they get spooked and it's. It's like this really creepy scene of like, oh, the sun has said, yeah, they all run off the edge of a cliff to their death.
Yeah, like, which is just like. Do the like? Part of me wanted to go and check. Is this normal behavior for a caribou? Do they become lemmings? I don't know what we're doing here, but they all, they all, they all jump off to their death and he seems spooked by it, and they all get spooked at the same time. Something weird happening here, and it's not actually indicated as to whether or not this event happens at the same time as the event happens in the station.
So it's like a triggering point in the station that we're going to get to in a second where something happens and then we don't see what happens afterwards. If that actually happens at the same time. Is this?
I don't know the thing that's frustrating about this is Because the show starts with like hey, here's a made-up quote from an unreliable yeah, how much of our eyes can we trust? Yeah, and watching this show because, depending on who's telling the story, that perspective could be very different. So that's a very season.
Three thing we had a character who was suffering essentially on set was Alzheimer's, I think is for what he had. So as a result, what we were seeing Was not like he was flashing out and his memory was Notoriously bad in certain sections, who he just couldn't remember, or his recollection of that kind of memento connection where he was actually recording himself Things are right and noticed himself to try and make sure he didn't see certain things or say other things.
So we are given that as a kind of opening gambit to this before we turn to Ascension. Why are there any research stations in Alaska? Bow, after the movie, the thing it's like, the last thing you would want to have is you know where am I being sent? No, I've seen the thing.
Oh the thing. Vibes in this are so heavy it's like what be of the thing.
Collection of video tapes at the station is if that's what they're like. If you're on a boat, you want to watch Titanic. You know, I mean, why is that in this? You know what we'll do, guys. We'll just sit around in our isolated station and watch the thing together. I'm sure that'll bring us together as a close-knit group.
And we're gonna do a tracking, shot down a hallway and see everybody doing their shit and like it's it's a Lopez, just like you want a little the thing. Here is a shot from the thing.
Yeah, she that her three biggest influences from a horror perspective on the making of this season are John Carpenter's thing, stanley Kubrick's the shining and Ridley Scott's alien, or our three biggest influences. And I'm like that, like from this just just the premise, just the little the shot was like oh, okay, so tracking, shot right in, very Kubrick in, it's all out there. It's all very weird and what you see. You get to introduce all the characters, but but what details on this one.
So the name of the station is the Yep Salal right, so Salal apparently once again, according to the Reddit users, a direct reference. This is like a fucking full-on direct reference to Edgar Allan Poe. So apparently has and I've not read a lot of Poe, but his only long-form novel is called Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket, mm-hmm, okay, right.
And at the end of that book he ends up and out on these Antarctic islands, a group of islands which are called Salal and which are apparently inhabited by cannibals, so indigenous cannibals, salal right, which was apparently then taken and Then adapted into a further novel which Jules Verne then put out and a full story about this right. So Salal, so it comes directly from there.
So this is a full-on Edgar Allan Poe, fucking full-on Kind of weird love Lovecraftian reference, right from like she's hitting you with a one-two punch, she's giving you the king and yellow and then she's giving you the fucking Poe name right out there. So yes, straight away. So you've got to think deliberately named.
Yeah, so I was unfamiliar about this all stuff. I mean, it seemed like it meant something because it's such a weird Word well, there's apparently the.
So the Jules Verne novel is called an Antarctic mystery and it partially takes place on the island named to sell, or Salal, or to now, where indigenous people attack white colonists and the to sell. People are seemingly killed off by disease before an earthquake destroys the island.
Okay, all right. So at this research station Duncan, like like we talked about, people are like nuke in their food Watching Ferris Bueller's day off, specifically the twist and shout scene.
Yeah, which just made me want to watch Ferris Bueller's day off. Like I've not seen that movie in about a decade and I saw that series. Like that, is it time to watch Ferris Bueller?
Probably it's never a bad time Like the. The scene where they go to the museum is Secretly the best scene of the movie. Yeah, but anyway. So you know. There's a dude Doing laundry and then we cut to a guy like making a sandwich and practicing his Spanish or something.
I think he's doing a tech talk or he's doing like a Like an influencer video is what right he's filming himself, making this, which I imagine is ultimately going to come into play Somewhere down the line, where we see If it was, if it was broadcast and it wasn't just purely filmed.
I imagine we're gonna see footage of the broadcast and what happens in the media after effect, because there's no cameras around which, because the person that we're about to talk about is right behind them in the shots, you would imagine his phone camera would cover it.
Right, and and this guy behind him just gets the shivery, shakes, yeah, shivery, and then stops, and then he turns around and says she's awake and Then the lights go out. Yeah, and so then we cut Duncan to December 20th, three days later. Yeah, and it's a guy coming to make Delivery, like food deliveries up to this research station, and nobody's home.
No, literally no one is home. This is very Mary Celeste, like when they go on here like the food still out, you know, the treadmills still as posse setting, like there's all indications that people were there just a couple of seconds ago.
Dude, let me tell you how much I've loved a story like that, like Mary Celeste the Roanoke story all of that stuff Any time. It's like we don't know where they went. Yeah, there were a bunch of people and then something happened and yeah, like the, the bowl of soup was still on the table. Yeah spoon in it and I.
The mystery. That's like me, that's like it engages you straight away, as I want to know what happened here 100%.
So I'm on board for that reason, if no other. And but this guy makes the mistake of saying, hey, funions, and it's like. Well, like, don't come with your trash snacks. If you're looking for help here, you know, give me something. I got some cheddar and caramel popcorn, like the big bad kind. It's really good. And there's a lot more Caramel popcorn Then in the usual mix, because sometimes it's like four cheddar to one caramel. That's just not enough.
I just opened it. Don't like this idea. This guy's showing up and like half the food delivery is gone because you know he was never sleep well driving.
I had a drive over now. I'm not a great now driver and I'm a nervous eater. Okay, getting into the cans of the Denty more stew was rough, but I got a electric can opener here, plugs right into the dash and the cigarette lighter.
Why wouldn't? You have that if you were a long-haul driver.
All I gotta do is put the can on top of the cigarette lighter for a minute, heats it up, just like mom used to make.
He's doing this entire monologue while he's walking along trying to find people. Not only is that never seen, he's a nervous talker, and nervous monologuer.
That's why I could use some help and also a toilet, because this dirty more be of sewers really doing a number on me. It's really moving right through me. I think it's all the sodium.
He gets to the main kind of rec area and he's just standing there and then all of a sudden he's kind of like, oh, bar fingers, drops his keys or something, and then ends up looking under the table and there's a fucking human tongue right.
Yeah, that's the point where he's like a better call somebody. Hey, please, this is Darrell. Listen, it started off when I started eating the popcorn on the way up here.
Please show up. He's at the tongue because he's a nervous eater.
Oh yeah, they haven't done something well, this is definitely a maid woman, cuz she looked. No, no, no, no, it was just Darrell.
I realized, didn't like the taste of it. He's a nervous eater, yeah, so, yeah, so, like there's no one in the, we've jumped forward three days. Well, obviously they parse out that they've clearly been gone for three days or something's happened in the immediate that's led to them fucking disappear. But, yeah, everyone's gone and all there is is what appears to be a human tongue and and that's a. That's our setup and, but that's true, detective. Still, that's not really.
That's a mystery, but we always have to have the thing that happened in the past as some sort of weird connective catalyst to get as to where we are. And we're gonna be introduced to essentially our two police detectives, yeah, who at one point were kind of close but are now estranged and guess what?
It was a case, a case they worked on together, bo, that's split them apart and one of them is Clarice Starling, who had a real rough time after a Marry and Hannibal Lecter and em you know in the books and then, or in the novel, watching Hannibal chop his hand off she's. I need to get a new job. I'm gonna Alaska, somewhere that Hannibal will never go, because he only likes warm countries.
Can we talk about how good this credit sequence is, real quick.
Well, it's Billy Eilish, isn't it so? yeah, it's a song called Barry, a friend yeah which is fucking great, and it's just like I don't have a listen to that. I've got a nine-year-old or so. There's the occasional Eilish song that plays. Now it's not. I think she's very talented to watch, you don't. But the whole credit sequence is just Dripping in fucking Twin Peaks mystery and I kind of like the peepsie and stuff.
Like the peepsie and stuff that peaked my interest, come sticking fast with this but says it's really, really cool, can a like, like, can I? Almost heartbeat sort of tempo that works through and lots of imagery of stuff that's actually ticked off in this episode. But other things there's like a like, there's a rocking chair Just moving with like a, like a polar bear toy missing an eye and there's loads of weird shit. But I forget how great the credit sequences to true detective are.
You know me, you forget like it's like there's so many shows that now just do that Off of your eyes, just that's written into shows now and true detective might be in the first show. I can think of that fully. Just did it as a kind of concept and intro. I remember the jinx did it as well, the TV show, the drink, the jinx, the documentary on Robert Durst, and it had something, but I don't know which one came first. So I'm gonna see true detective likely came first and yeah, every show has it.
But instantly I was like what they're gonna do? And then it was like yes, it's, it's so good.
And when I was watching this, this episode, the second time, I accidentally hit season one, episode one, and got a little bit of that opening sequence. I was like, oh yeah, this is a Banger anyway. But yeah, I had to point out this barrier, friends, all I think is fucking great. It's real stripped down and that goes, goes along with the whole theme of the show and the feel of the show and everything. Oh, it's so good. So, yeah, right. So then we go to a fish packing plant.
Mm-hmm and our introduce first to Navarro, yes, who is the non-clarie starling true detective of this.
Total badass. Every life professional boxer. So is she really?
I know that she's fucking stacked.
I would not want to get away the wrong side of this woman she could fuck me up.
I mean in a way, like most people, could let's say, it doesn't matter, male, female doesn't matter, but her in particular there, that scene where she is fucking that guy. Yeah and you get, you know, not the full Monty, but just seeing how she is built, yes, and it was like holy fuck.
Yeah, so she is that professional boxer turned actress played by Callie Reese. And yes, she is.
Thank God she's fucking that Jason Momoa looking motherfucker because she needs somebody that is. Equally like a britch at house, you'll kill a mortal man.
But just with the thighs like she has.
she'll see now to top you, and On accident, not on purpose, like Zena on a top, did it because it gave her that sexual thrill yeah, not no, Navarro yeah. Neesey's, you're dead, like right. She's just like. Look, I'm sorry, you were frail like a delicate bird, you know I mean well, she.
She shows up, you see, and as this Fishpacking plan, there is a guy with a messed up face lying on the ground, unconscious, undeads, door, and and there is a woman comforting another woman, kind of put a cold compress On her eye and we're being brought.
And what's interesting about this is the guy that's bringing the detective in is kind of trying to pivot towards the unconscious guy on the floor and not the women looked after, because that's the culture and she's instantly across to the woman to find out what actually happened and did she? I love it. She just kicks a guy on the ground to make sure he's alright. There's no checking the pulses or he's like yeah, he's out, he's still alive. So she walks over and starts quizzing.
This is kind of me like did you, did you fuck up this man?
This mess over here? Did you make this mess over here?
And we get. We get, like, essentially we get a bit of background on this one. This guy is a complete shithead of a character. Abusive boyfriend has been tormenting the other, loving fuck and beating the shit of his partner. She has left him and he, for whatever reason because we're working the same plant and would you imagine, it's probably the big industry here Like everyone works at the fishing plant or the mine that we're gonna talk about later on and Basically asks, like what happens?
Like yeah, came in here and attacked her, so I picked up my metal bucket and I fucked him up with it.
The way she puts is like asshole hit her, so I hit the ass I for an eye and Well done.
This guy comes to and as he's coming to, like she slaps a cuff on him after taking him down again, like he tries to try some bullshit on her, and she like, very, very quickly once again if you were thinking maybe she just lifts, I'm not, as she'll fuck you up she restrains him on the ground, slaps a cuff on him and takes him away, much to the the supervisors dis me. He's kind of feels like this should be the other way around, which kind of speaks to the culture once again.
But what entries to her? She apparently is Put to the class, her job as so she's not an actual detective and she's a trooper, a trooper right. So, like America has weird In my country it's the police right and you have different grades within the police.
A trooper is someone that sits Generally like road patrol that kind of right and yeah. So yeah, and from where clearly where she was, she has been bounced down. Yes, we will find out a lot more of that soon, so yeah, so yeah, cuz Navarro gets a call, looks real sullen, and we'll find out what that's about in a second, but first to Clarice, you've been hold like literally our chat for the people out there, our chat back and forwards, has been borderline ridiculous, like any.
Like this is is almost as if the show has given it gave us. It's like you want, let's see if we can get Duncan and go back together. We'll give them some true detective that I get them back. I'm like, yeah, we see what you're doing, hbo. And they were like, right, I'll be setting the snow and it'll be a murder mystery. I'm like, oh, it's reference all your favorite horror movies. That's kind of cool. That's like I'm gonna give you Jodie Foster more. Like, oh, yeah.
The Tigers are not afraid. Ladies, do it all, all right.
God damn it. So, yeah, we apologize in advance if we, we Absolutely. But you're your love of silence of the lambs by making so many, it's.
Like it's been a running concern on this show ever since there has been a show that was more More broadly obsessed with that movie?
Yes, yeah.
And to those people who would argue like, why would you want to watch something that is full of such horrible Imagery all the time, I would respond Tovens, the nipples doesn't.
The thing about, like the thing I love about that Jodie Foster is she's obviously she's getting on an age right and actually she fits this role. Fucking pit. She is cold, she is brutal, she's matter of fact, she's kind of fucking amazing. Like right from the off I'm just like that. As soon as she walks in, I'm like I love this character and Like we're gonna, I imagine, over the next five episodes, unpack a whole hell of all stuff in her past.
But as it stands just now she is in charge of the police department there. She's been called and she's the lead detective. She's been called in and to the Antarctic station to do some investigation on An empty what is an empty? Research station. As when she walks in and she's met with that clip from Ferris Bealers on loop and literally the first thing, she's like that who the fuck is it? And we need to switch this off like she's like. She's like turn the fucking music off.
Yeah it, yeah, I like. All the stuff you say about her character is right, I like. I think it's also worth pointing out the the town that they're in. It's a place called. Ennis, yes, and it's it like is a small Alaskan town. Yeah, and I mean it's civilization, for sure it's not, you know.
Civilization. You know I mean so yeah you imagine there are not. It's not like fucking, it's not blue collar cream, you know.
It's Poor Stacy showing up getting drunk and running like yes, yes, the crime. Yeah, and, and then we'll get to Stacy in a minute, but the star of the episode, as far as Stacy's.
We get no of Jill. Is Ken that amazing?
Yeah, it's well. Yeah, we'll get to it, but it's so being called to this station and not really knowing what's going on other than hey, nobody's here, and we found a tongue and already, like, the antenna is up. But yes, she like cruises into this garage. Join very quickly by John Hawks.
Like I'm like this already, like the show is giving us is like that, it's like that just listen, we've got you here's like here, here, just some great actors that are just here to play in this world. And John Hawks is. I love him, I love him and everything, and he's playing you very John Hawks character, which also makes me kind of happy.
Yeah, but he's kind of a doofus a little bit in this, which is an interesting shift of gears for him.
I don't know if I've got some theories. I don't know if he's Kind of playing a doofus and he's actually maybe more shrewd Than he actually is in relation to the case box. Why does he have my? Maybe he's on the payroll. We'll get to that a little bit more.
I think he might be a bit crooked, so oh okay, I see what you're saying, all right, yeah, I mean, I think I think he may have been holding on to something. For because they do point out that he was sheriff at the time. Yeah and that was before he ever got. Yeah, Jenny Foster is quick to say like the anti murder was before she got there.
Yes, I think there's maybe a reason why, also why there's a scene later on when I was like, alright, maybe you're not a you know, maybe you're just playing this role to an extent in front of people, we'll get to it, we'll get to it. I might not bear out to be anything, but I get a feeling that something may come out with that character and other vested interests, with big business in the area.
Okay. Gotcha yeah yeah, cause we? Yeah, we'll talk about the mind as that comes up. But yeah, so she rolls in. It's the first time anybody's really been inside the research station because, it's a research station, like you know. They, they kind of are hands off with this group and the whole time she's like oh, dr Lector, I can't find my clue.
And he was coming and she didn't realize it was coming straight away. And the fight that everyone is called Dr Lector.
Well, naturally, and by the way, who the fuck is playing? Twist and shout over and over again, like that, cause I'm going to, I'm going to have to rip a cocoon straight out of their throat.
Amy Crase. Is the Ferris Bueller still playing? Yeah, so they go in and they're all like they're. It's clear that she's a lot better than what. I've been interested to find out where she came from, because she's just infinitely a better police officer than anyone else in the room.
Right, yeah, I like the fact that, as she's searching for this remote to turn off twist and shout which is playing on a loop, um, the cop, the other cop is like look, it doesn't open, it doesn't open, it doesn't open, and finally she gets the one that does yeah, and he's like, oh, all right, so they've always tried one and being like that this doesn't open or maybe not even try like, maybe not even giving it that much.
Another detail that I like about her and we're about to get to is that she's happy to let people not make a fool of themselves, but happy for to let people, like give their opinion on something before she then tells them why they're wrong. Yeah, it's then like instantly shooting down and she's like what do you think happened here? How do you, how did you come to that? And then she's like here's why you're wrong. Because and then she leaves it. Matter of fact.
So she hears this guy say this to her and she's like that doesn't sound right. And then she guys continue, and then she finds it and then all of a sudden, the sins off and she very quickly tells you that she does not like the artist to perform this song. She's not a fan at all and I wonder if we're going to get more. I did feel like a very, very, very, very extreme reaction.
Yeah Well, there's so much, like you said, that's alluded to in her background, that we just can't possibly have a frame of reference for just yet, but I do. This is also the scene where you get a very clear shot of the copy of the thing on the shelf. And I'm like I see what you're doing, but I'm like a motherfucker, she, I, what. One of the moments I really like here is when she's like so who pays for all this?
And one of the guys is like I don't know grants or something, and she goes are you asking me, dr Lector? And he's like no, I guess I'll look it up. Yeah, I think that'd be a good idea. How about you do your I don't know, goddamn job.
You play that game. I gave a quick poll call. Do we have to share secrets for you to go and access this computer right now? That's about yourself. So yeah, let me go away. They start pulling up details about the station itself. So the cell research station appears to be All men, yes, all men.
All men, different ethnicities, different age ranges, mostly in a kind of molecular biology and geology, and there's no clear remit of what they're doing, but it's kind of it's hypothesized that it's something in relation to global warming and studies in the area is very, very, very big and the way they phrase it is the origin of life. Yes.
It's what they're cause Danvers. Jenny Foster is like oh, that old thing, it's a yeah and yeah.
So like they're pulling up all the files of all the different people so we get a view of who they all are. So it's relatively well man station. She's working a way around, so she notes that the treadmill, for example, that the Asian doctor was running on, it's still a kind of pause setting. So it's asking if he wants to resume this. So he stopped at some point.
So and then she's looking around at like there's a beer, there's a bowl of popcorn, like in the TV room, and she comes to the sandwich and this is where her and John Hawks have the first of our. Let me bitch slap you with just I don't know, like investigation details here and there's a lot of backhanded comments. So it's alluded to that maybe they've been in a relationship at some point.
Yeah, All right. Before we get to that, just to point out that in her journey she also finds a whiteboard where someone has written we are all dead.
Yes, someone has. Maybe don't come looking for us, we're all dead.
Yeah, so, but yeah too, I think the way that I'm reading it is the deputy is their kid because she talks about him going to her debt, like it's one of those things where they don't talk to each other real well. Yes, but there's a lot of your mother and your father when they're talking to him.
Yeah, but she's also got a kid no no, no, no From another relationship. It's not her kid, but it's from another relationship where she has essentially once again it's alluded to that he died and she's just now essentially still looking after that kid. So she's assumed kind of the mother role in this thing. That kid is kind of kind of native origin as well. So yeah, it's just like the family dynamic here is just make the whole police dynamic, family dynamic straight way.
Everything's just messed up, nothing's clean here. Like this is a small, like you said before, this is a small town. Everyone kind of knows everyone intimately. So like we look at easily that yeah, I think they've been missing for the same which year? Not very long sandwiches, you know, there's no, no time, the ham still not moldy, or you know this kind of still soft, and she's like huh. So she's like what I want is a flyover air search thing and 15 miles, I think is what she says.
Is the radius is what he's looking for. He's like whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Sheriff, like what we're doing here, like this is overkill, you're going to panic people and all the rest, and she basically she leaves out factually why from this one sandwich she knows they've been gone for more than I don't know a couple of hours and they'll come back, and from a jolly in the snow.
Well, it's coupled with a real bitch slap for being a shitty dad, because it's huh. I see what you're saying there about the ham. Everybody knows, dr Lecter, that this kind of ham is processed meat. It could last with the apocalypse. But more importantly, dr Lecter, look at the mayonnaise, the mayonnaise.
She says the mayonnaise has now got like a custard consistency, which happens after it's been outside for more than 48 hours. So she reckons it's probably 72 hours, which would make sense with the three days later thing that came up at the beginning of this scene.
By the way, did you not see the crawl at the beginning of the scene? Clearly it happened three days after.
And then she basically says you know, I get all this from having to make sandwiches from my kids and I know that you probably never really had to make me any sandwiches for your kids. And I'm just like such a dick move because the guy she's going around with here, who's been doing the computer investigation on all the rest, is John Hawk's son, right?
Yeah, I let you see their kid.
Yeah, kind of alluded to that. This is her, you know, this is their offspring and the basal is standing over a sandwich and she's basically calling him kind of shitty parents.
You were never much of a making sandwiches for the kids kind of dad. Where are you Dr?
Lecter so so like we're instantly set up here, something really weird is going on. It looks like, from the point when that sandwich was made like, nothing has kind of changed. There's no visible signs of any. That's the other thing. There's no visible signs of blood or anything around here out with the scroll along there. And that's right, the human tongue.
Right, and we talked about this a little bit ago already. But this is the point where you know they're like hey, are you sure that this tongue comes from a native tongue? It comes from a native American woman of this area, because you could tell by the scores on the tongue. It's another moment.
The young cop thinks it's someone biting the tongue and she says no, this is that like the repeated like of threading like fish rope or whatever it is, through your tongue you inherently get a groove. It's common in a lot of women that work in the industry, in the area, and we're like that. Huh, that seems like a real specific detail that you would know, jodie Foster. I wonder if there's ever been I don't know a crime that's happened in this area where someone's tongue was missing.
I don't know, maybe, maybe.
All right. So between this and that, you know of kind of getting some answers about that, there's a very quick scene with Fiona Shaw. Welcome to the show, Fiona Shaw.
Yeah, we love you being everything, please.
Yes, is skinning an animal out on the tundra? Yep.
This is Tuesday. This is Tuesday's activity.
It's just. Some of the details I really like in this show are where you see like people who have a bunch of canned food and shit just stacked in the back for when hey, when it gets snowy and nobody can get here. We want to make sure we've got plenty of supplies.
Yeah. And this is a woman who just lives out on the edge of nothing and is making her living out there and she is skinning this animal and then she sees somebody named Travis standing barefooted in, you know, pretty casual clothes for it being nighttime in Alaska.
Right. So do you know the Travis TV?
I mean clearly this is. I mean it's a ghost to her Yep, but do you?
know how Travis connects to True Detective. How does Travis connect to True Detective? Right, this is where, like pfft the fucking this might prove to be nothing, but this is literally what the internet is like, screaming themselves over at the moment. And episode number four of season one of True Detective Rustin Cole says that his dad lived in Alaska and his name was Travis.
Oh, so it could be Matthew McConaughey. What people are saying?
is. He does have a striking resemblance, with the straggly hair, to what Rustin Cole would eventually look like. And at the end of season one of True Detective, when they're talking about their events in Karkosa and how you know like Rustin Cole almost dies, he says that. You know like when they're talking about the lights beating over the dock, he talks about like almost leaving his body and seeing his dad.
So there's now this kind of internet assumption that this Travis character is Travis Cole, which it might not be, but the fact that he is kind of supernaturally appearing and in a later scene doing something very similar to the swishy swishy of the sky that was in season one, that maybe this is one in the same. There's another nod which once again, I just can't think of all the names in the world and all the places in the world.
It kind of feels like if you're also Lopez, you're like, oh, that'd be fun. Yeah, that's a fun to get in there. And in season three we obviously had the connecting tissue there where they talked about the child abuse case covered by Rustin Cole and fucking Woody Harvison's character from that. So there was a link there as well. So this once again exists in the same universe as season one.
I yeah, I mean, that's very specific. That feels like something that can be totally legit.
Well, it's the name of all the names in the world Travis and Alaska, and it's a low play.
Lopez clearly understands that part of the fun of this show is discussing the show, and I think it's all this I believe it's called the general term for this is the psychosphere, as well as called online off, where people like like watch a TV show and then instantly try and unpack mysteries, some of them clearly in there, some of them kind of alluded to fun play and some stuff that people are just like trying to get that conspiracy theory and to the end to be.
They mean nothing, but let's try and give it meaning. And but this one does feel like a kind of oh right, because we get another one very fucking fast, like super, super fast here with the connection to the dead body of any K, which I don't know if you picked up on, but I'm happy to talk about that as well. So, yeah, so Travis appears, I kind of ghostly weird, almost from the fucking red room character.
When he's doing the dance. I was totally reminded of firewalk with me.
I was waiting for is to turn around and see let's rock. I mean I was like, yeah, what are we doing here? Like all that love, everything about it.
Yeah, yeah, it's terrific, and anyway. So then we go back with Danvers, back to the sheriff's office where Navarro is waiting for to be like hey, I hear there's a severed tongue. Yeah, remember the Annie K case. What's going on?
Yeah, and and roster shuts her down. Real Well, this is a putting you in your place, two steps away from saying fuck off you know what I mean.
Right, I don't know how you heard about this. Maybe you're just following your spirit animal or whatever, and that led you here. You know some of that mystical bullshit that I don't believe in your spirit animal, a lamb, by any chance. So Because if it was, it wouldn't be screaming, right now. It'd just be really wrong.
What yeah and?
And Navarro is just like yeah, my, you know, spirit animal eats old white men like our old white ladies, like you for lunch, yeah, and to light. I don't really like that much in that scene. And she's like yeah, well, whatever, I'm rubber in your glue and perhaps you can investigate what happens.
My spirit animal eats pieces of shit like you for for that Spent on the pieces of shit. I mean I was no one man Pow.
Yeah. And then she gets a call from this mother at her kid's school and she's like I don't have the bandwidth for all of this bullshit right now. It is coming fast and or furious, yeah, and sure enough she has to take all off to go to the next scene. Physically has to take off and you're kind of thinking, oh, there's a kid got in trouble at school.
No, no, no. This is a parent, this is another parent where the kids go to the same school and, um, it is dude in her face, like the kind of righteous angry that parents are when they're.
Just like I've got. I'm about to unload on you and Joe and, to her credit, like Jody Foster knows her kid fucked up and is not like arguing against it too much. She's just like, I know. I know. Yeah, uh-huh, I know. Yes, I'm a piece of shit. Yes, my daughter is a piece of shit. We're a piece of shit family. Yes, we live in a toilet bowl because we're all pieces of shit.
Yes, I know you fucked my way, If you fucked my way, if you fucked my way, if you fucked my way, if you fucked my way, if you fucked my way Um then she gets back at, like a Jody Foster gets back at the SUV after getting this ass or aiming from this mom, and she's just like well, I hope you're fucking happy, dr Licker. That sucked. Were you watching that? That fucking sucked.
So it's a little bit too that on the phone, basically, her Now kind of surrogate adopted daughter and her classmate, who she believes is only 15, are engaging in sexual activity in which they filmed themselves doing it Right and right. Yes, and the mum's found it on the phone, so as it hasn't made its way out, but the mum of the other kid has found it on her phone and is rightly fucking furious about this, so yeah, and Jody Foster is giving her the business about like, are you fucking stupid?
Do you not know that that can get out online? Are you just an asshole? And she's like I didn't think about all the criminal angles on this. I fucking should. I'm a cop, I'm a. You are the daughter of a cop. And also quit rubbing Vaj. Just look at the car going and put it in, recording it with a 15 year old.
I'm the mother fucking police up in this bitch.
Yes, king Kong ain't got shit on me and, as as they're having this argument, there is a surprise car accident right in front of them.
Player willing to just to like both favorite character.
It kind of is Stacy Chalmers drunk again? Stacy Chalmers. It was a guy from the window Like trust me, that is fucking Stacy again. That is the best part. Is the guy going? Is that God damn Stacy Chalmers down there? And of course, Stacy as soon as this car wreck happens. The Jody Foster's like wait here, I got to go see what's going on. And gets out of her car and starts to approach Stacy Chalmers, already getting out of the car like drunk as shit, hey, my baby's leaving me.
I know I'm not supposed to be out here and Jody Foster's meeting. Like are you fucking kidding me? Yeah, you are not supposed to be even driving. You don't even have a license right now.
Yeah, like she. Like full on. Cop slams are right in the front of the car, handcuffs on, and the rest are for rightly reckless driving under the influence, driving driving with a license. I imagine the list goes on and on and on. But this is once you get small town Alaska. Yes, you see what happens. She's probably going to sleep it off and then be released.
It is right next door to an odished the drunk situation. Like here's the keys, go put yourself in the lock up. But like there's a moment where Jody Foster realizes like she's being rough with this woman because she's just had a shitty day and it's kind of coming out on this lady and her daughter's watching and she's like God damn it, I'm just like nothing is going right. And she gets back in the car and the daughter is like you know, I just just so you know she was 16.
She's not 15. She's 16 until he falls here. She's like Jesus, fucking Christ, get the wheel, take the wheel. I mean it has just like this day cannot get worse. Yeah, and so then we go back to Navarro, who is waiting outside for a dude who's involved with the Annie K case.
Yeah, and this is the big mind that the town of Ennis makes its money from. Yeah, and this dude comes out. This is the brother of Annie K.
Okay, that's what I was going to ask. I was unclear exactly what his relationship was. Yeah, this is the brother.
He's mentioned later on as well, and Navarro plays it off as if she has to make contact with him because she's not. But you get the impression that she periodically checks up on the brother to make sure he's all right. They seem to they have a relationship comfortable enough where he's like I do want to go for a drink and she's like I'll come back to mine. Then she's like I suppose so.
And then we go back to this guy's house where he offers her a beer and she says no, no, she's not taking the beer. And then he offers her some of the he's like secret stash or something and she's like no, we're not doing that either. Cop and she asked specific questions of him. So the detailed question here is did his sister ever mention anything about the research station? And we got a bit of background here from the brother as to what Annie was actually doing.
She was a local activist who appeared to have a very, very, very, very strong feeling about the mine as practices and its effect on the environment and as a result I made her really unpopular because her brother basically said listen, I tried to tell her she wouldn't listen to me. If the mine closes down, the town dies why there is no town anymore. If this mine closes down, she says that in the last year they weren't speaking to each other.
And actually, one step even further, he'd be kind of happy if she, you know, just wanted to let this case go now. Enough times passed. He's kind of I think he's resigned himself to the fact that he's never going to get resolution from it. Enough times passed, and what I can only the thing about this is and I think it's another thing that true detective does really really well is the idea of like detectives carrying cases with them, like this unresolved business.
And all the way through this episode she is, you get that obsessive nature that she's had to like kind of resolve this case and everyone that she's speaking to is kind of like let's move on. And you find that the Jodie Foster handles that completely smarter, in different way, where the emotional side doesn't get locked in. But you know she's like even talking to the brother and the brother's like you know you don't have to keep doing this. You know, let this go If you don't have like.
If there's no, I don't have to continue to investigate that. I've kind of made peace with the situation and we can kind of move on and Navarro kind of is she's respectful of the situation, buying going to happen?
Yeah, another thing that I would just add to the list of hey, here's some interesting information we're giving in this scene Is not just you know, here's Annie's background. There's a point where it's when he's offering the beer and Navarro just asked for water instead and he's like actually the water shit. It has been for three days, which I'm like oh timeline, okay.
So something is going on. Something weird is going on here.
Something happened, and there's also a point we haven't talked about this yet in this scene where he asks her at a certain point if she believes in God. Yeah, right so yeah, yeah, it's good scene, yeah, and she's like, well, yes. And then there's this flashback to when she was on a tour of duty in.
Afghanistan or something like that.
Yeah, I rack Afghanistan, something like that and she sees a woman who's like literally half her head is blown off. It's a real like Gus from breaking bad kind of situation and leans down and whisper something to her and we don't get what she says, but clearly something that affected her, affected Navarro, and when we cut back to her, the guy's like I wish I could do that at. You know, I believe we're alone. And she's like oh, I didn't say we're not all alone, it's just that God's alone too.
Yeah, and that's what links back to the opening quote. Yeah, and then the idea of, like, even God sleeps. So right and we get another phone call saying well, it happened again Like there's a lot like I would hate to be a police officer in this place.
There is no downtime Like even when you're getting downtime, even when you're getting some downtime where you're your beloved, which is young man we're about to go to in a couple of scenes is like he is, but he's about two seconds away from being knuckled deep and he has to answer a phone call out of ours for something that is not actually case related is like extracurricular cold case yet yeah, so this is Navarro's sister that we're about to meet.
Who is?
so we get a couple of of establishing shots of the town here too and you see a lot of like there's broken signs and bingo parlors and stuff like that and to sort of suggest that there's kind of a seediness with a small town tends to be around any community where mining is like, if you, if you're like, if you're working in the mining business and I don't want to generalize in total, but anything around mining or oil or really these heavy industry times, is
generally sex trading, gambling or the or the two things that like, take root very, very quickly, because when people are, I don't know isolated, working their fingers to death manually, when they finish, they want to get high, get drunk and fuck.
So yeah, and so we were getting some of these vibes. And then Navarro shows up at a door and there's another trooper there that's like, hey, I want to give you a call because you know she's locked herself from the inside and said somebody was in there with her, but it just sounds like she's a little having an episode again. This is something that's happened before.
And Navarro does get inside and we understand like, oh, this is her sister who has some mental health problems and had moved there like move to Ennis, alaska, one presumed so that Navarro can kind of keep an eye on her.
It's also alluded to in here that their mother like had mental health issues, like bad mental health issues, and because the sisters quite to point out that she's not like their mum, and Navarro basically says you know, if you were, though, we can get you help, and she was like no hospitals. No, no, no, absolutely not. That's not why I came here.
Maybe I made a mistake moving here and so, like, navarro's not only got all this weight on her shoulders, but she's looking after a sister who appears to be exhibiting similar where it's bipolar or whatever it is, appears to be suffering something very, very similar to what her mum suffered.
Yeah, like schizophrenia is something like that. Yeah, we get as we move away from this scene. We're getting some more shots of the town, as Navarro is kind of driving through and there's some whispers going on.
Whispers all the way through this, by the way.
Yeah, it's. It's real creepy and weird. And then we get to back to the sheriff's office, where Stacy Chalmers is voicing her distress.
Yeah, she's basically. She's actual one here.
It is just way, I really love it. Just somebody that's just like.
I mean she is just letting the the place, but she's doing it because in the past this is apparently how she's got out, like she's done this more than once, because the tip, like you have, you have Jody Foster and Jody Foster's possible son are in a room together, kind of going over, and this is cut off here. But they specifically talk about how the station's being funded, yeah, yeah, yeah, so where the money comes from.
And he's saying that he's like you know, and I'm assuming we will eventually get back to this because we get that some of it comes from a particular part of industry, but there's also this in the background. And she's like right, we'll just keep talking through this. Then, all of a sudden, she hears the door open to the cell and she's like oh no, fuck. So they go straight out and John Hawks is letting her out. You know, you just go. You know I'm gonna sleep this one off.
And she's like she's still fucking drunk, like she's not even slept off the booze and we get this great light off. I like I'll take her home. He's like yeah, I know she blows you some time, which, right in front of your possible son, right in front of his father, like just in front of her as well.
She's like well, and they call out like he's got some mail order bride from Vlad of Fostock that is coming to live with him.
It's like, listen, she's coming over for Christmas and we're going to get married. And she's like, oh, Christmas bed and how festive.
Yeah, she's pretty like. It couldn't be any less judgmental Her delivery of these lines. She's just like you, piece of shit.
She's like. Jody Foster is such a fucking good actress Like I love her in roles like this. She's just great yeah.
Yeah, Well, she's got a real edge to her and and it really suits her. So we follow what she says.
They put her back in and she basically says listen, by the way, I want the Annie Kay case files. And he's like, why would I have the Annie Kay case files? And she's like maybe you took them home after the flood. And he's like, did I? And you say, yeah, you've got them. He's like, okay, I'll maybe take a look. And she's like, when's that going to happen? He's like I'll get a rim tip. You know what I mean. So it's like this is where I was already starting to think.
You seem to be really shifty about that, like no, not in any hurry to do anything about this, which could just be, like you said before, general buffoonery and obstructiveness because they were used to being a relationship. So he's trying to be awkward and she wasn't exactly nice to him beforehand. But the other part of me is like you know, like if this is a cold case and this happened in your time, you would kind of be like or ask more questions, which he doesn't do at all.
He couldn't give less of a fuck about this conversation at all, which kind of makes me think could he maybe just being paid to look the other way? Who knows, we will find out.
Yeah, I like that theory though I'm on board with this of him being secretly like having covered something up in the past. Yeah, and there's a real I'm already getting kind of ghost story vibes where it's going to be like oh, a bunch of people did some shit and then this is being visited upon. Yeah. So anyway, so the deputy, our son, like Jodie Foster and John Hawks kid, goes to his home where he's got a kid of his own called Darwin.
Darwin, yeah, and he is married to a native woman as well, yep, and, and they seem to have a pretty good relationship up to the point they're about to start dry humping in front of their kid.
But the thing is like the kid has drawn a picture of. Essentially, once again, the Internet gives and it takes away, but the internet has given here an Inuit deity who is a woman missing fingers. All our fingers are chopped off.
So, according to what I read online, this is a kind of fabled story about a like a kind of princess, whose father punishes her by essentially trying to drown her and as she clings to the boat that he is kind of peddling away from her, he takes an axe and removes her fingers and each of these fingers drop into the water and become their own entity. And this is, this is what she's doing. So there's a kind of there's a kind of hint to.
The internet is speculating that because this is a kid drawing something kind of sinister looking and because two detective has in season one, season three and this season had a kid's drawing indicating something supernatural or case related, that this could be, this could be linked somehow. But he's basically like why is my fucking four year old drawing a blue woman minus fingers, dripping blood?
And she's like oh yeah, she was at the grandmother's, like the grandmother looked after at the laundry, and he's like that and doing this and she's like, well, you know she's helping out because you were working late and you know she's there to help. And yeah, like, what's wrong with giving the kids some stories about his heritage?
And he's like, well, if the kid has nightmares later on, it's okay if we, you know, you talked to him on the phone and explained why you shouldn't be terrified by this fingerless woman, right?
And she's like yeah, you handle this yeah.
She's like you're such a white boy, and then they get. They get down to like some heavy pain.
Yeah, and like I'm look, this show has long been a proponent of this very thing. Yeah, you should be fucking. And then the phone starts ringing and he's like I got to get the phone because I'm like the police here, and she's like uh-huh, but let's keep. Let's keep dry humping in front of our child.
Well, it's the fact that the name on it is that a Danvers that comes up on the thing and she's like just what does Danvers want? You don't have to worry about this and it keeps ringing Right.
And basically she's like it's not the police, it's just your mom and she needs to stop calling because you're finger-banging me right now.
I'm about three seconds away here. Let's just focus, yeah.
And and he shoves her off and I'm like you fool, what are you doing? And then, sure enough, uh, it's Johnny Foster saying like look, uh, you need to get something from your dad's house.
Dr Licker, I hate it when you call me that you need to get the keybox and say, oh, I don't have to, and she's like, yeah, I need to know. So then we.
He says no and she's like oh, I must be hearing something on the line, there must be some kind of interference or something, because I thought I heard you say no and clearly you would never say no to your mother. Yeah, you piece of shit, I raised you. Um so like so he goes to the Hawks yeah.
He goes to like John Hawk is painting the room. The blue is blue color. I've ever seen a a noxious blue color. But he's got the roller out and he's kind of. He's kind of he's just finished painting a bit and he's kind of standing back and he's remarking over the amazing blue room that he's made. And, um, at this point the door goes. He answers the door to his son who comes in and the foot. He's like, oh, what are you doing here?
And he's like that I was speaking to Darwin about getting a picture of me when I was his age, so I can show you. And he's like, oh, cool. And then he walked in and he's like that, huh, blue room here. And he's like that. And the first thing he says is that, is it too much? Is it too blue? And he's like I mean he's like so and so, likes blue, whatever. This Vlad of Vlad, stop, woman. Um. And he's like it's not too bad. And then there's a bit of silence and he's like that it's too blue, isn't it?
It's too blue. I kind of hope that like and like a couple of episodes, time or so, differentiated blue going on the wall, um yeah.
a running gag where it's a different color every time? Yeah.
He's like that, do you want a beer? And he's like no, no, no, I'll just go and get my. He's well, I'm going to get a beer. So they go away. He goes into this room where there is a shitload of case files, just like all of the place, which apparently John Hawks saved during some flood, um, and he's stolen there. And of course he instantly finds the Annie Kay file it can't take away in front of his dad's, who opens the window and basically drops the file outside.
And as he's just closing the window, his dad comes in and says show me what you took. And it reaches in his back pocket and brings out a photo of I think it's him with his mom.
Yeah, and he's like yeah, I didn't know, I had that picture.
Yeah, I didn't know I had that anymore. And then he basically he'd like the the room atmosphere is completely changed. He's like that Watch the slippery shit out there. Um, and then we cut to. I think the next scene is him taking the case files. Or do we jump back to?
no, there's a quick insert, a Fiona Shaw.
Oh, travis is like that Follow me, but he doesn't speak. She's like I will follow you and he's like, yes, and they're just walking out in the middle of fucking nowhere.
Yeah, yeah, in the middle of nothing, he's not.
And he's wearing long johns. He's wearing like, like it's not like jeans, right, that is a pair of long johns like thermal, thermal like tight.
Yeah, it's the clothes you wear under other clothes to keep yourself more warm. Yeah. And then we're walking out into that, and yeah, and then we go to the sun showing up at Jody Foster's place with all the Annie Kay stuff and we we get the information about that crime, which the gist of it is she's found was it near the mind that she's?
found near the main in a container. Yeah, she is. She's brutally stabbed 32 times 32 times she's missing her tongue.
Yeah, star shaped entry wounds.
Yes.
And there's no murder weapon found.
No murder weapon. Our tongue is missing and originally she's like she's kind of tries to pass off. And then the kids like, well, maybe I just take the file back to my dad. And she's like you can't fucking bluff her shit. And she's like, right, I'll give you some more information and we get more information on, specifically, navarro's connection to this. So Navarro was the investigating officer and she, she's the one that was brought into first view of the body and she would not let this go.
And she started like questioning a lot higher and more uncomfortable people and in this one, specifically the owners of the mine. She apparently rub people up the wrong way. Jody Foster was then at some point brought in and Navarro was taken off the case and busted down to Trip her essentially, and we'll get more detail about that later on. But this is kind of the thing.
And of course the kids like and you think this is related and she's like I'm just, I just want to take a look over the phone Once again, Jody Foster playing it very close to the chest. So I'm just just want to take a look over the files, you know, read upon them or whatnot. So we get to feeling that like, like Foster thinks there's something going on here, like Dan, versus all over this. She's like right, this is too bizarre to be a coincidence.
I'm going to take a little look back over this case, but it turns out she actually was very well read in before. So what's my case of? You're off the case and then the box goes away. She had looked into it at the time.
Yeah, and there's a great moment where you know her son is pressing her about the case and she says this is never going to be solved. You know, if you want to know who killed Annie, the town of Innis killed Annie. Yeah. And nobody will ever answer for this. Yeah, so she. She's a bit of a fatalist in that way, but we also see that, like she's still working, she's doing her job.
She's doing the true detective thing, which is well. That case is never really closed until it's closed. Yeah, you might not be diverting all your attention to it, but it's in the back of your head. We also get there's a shot here of initial when she's talking about this and we'll get more when she does the true detective putting out the pictures and that great scene where she puts them out in a spiral. But we do get a shot of her back and Annie K has a tattoo. Did you see this tattoo?
Uh-uh, it's a spiral tattoo from season one.
Oh well, of course, the black line.
You see the bottom of it. So she had that on her back Once again, probably going to go fucking nowhere, but I'm like, oh, I'm pointing at the screen. Oh, like, okay, leonardo DiCaprio and once a part of Hollywood.
I'm like, oh, I'm there. It's the emotional equivalent of like when you go see a band and they replace the name of a city with your town. Oh, that's what. I am. So yeah.
So she knows where they are. So she's got a tattoo. We're going to see more about this as it kind of passes out. But yeah, we're going to leave this, yeah.
And then we go with Navar We've talked about this already where she goes to this dude's house named Kavik, yeah, and just fucks him silly, yeah.
She lets off steam here, she like, and we find that the Kavik is. He's a bar owner, I think, and he's also he makes his own home brew that he tries to give her. He's like remember, I'm a cop, so you shouldn't be even talking about this.
Seems like a decent guy, though, and also seems like she is working out some shit.
Yeah, and he's just like yeah, I think he's like it's indicated that maybe he wants something a little bit more.
Yeah, yeah. Well, because he, you know, once they're done fucking which like just watch that scene, if nothing else. But there is that moment where he's like, hey, next time you call, I'm not picking up the phone.
Yeah, and she's kind of like, yeah, but you get a feeling that maybe he said this before and she's like, yeah, right, and she steals his toothbrush, his SpongeBob SquarePants toothbrush that he likes.
And because he was offended that he, she, was using it. Yeah, because he was like, hey, you don't, you don't use other people's toothbrushes, that's gross. And then she just outright steals it. He's like, hey, I'm making him bed and it's, you know, a degree outside, I'm the mother of the police.
So yeah, so she leaves with that. She's worked out some stuff, but her night isn't even over, because everything's fucking weird we cut to. Is this where we cut to? Jodie Foster in bed sleeping, no no, no, no, no.
We get to no two things. There's her daughter showing up, you know, her adopted daughter, whatever. Who is like, hey, are you? You know? Are you okay about today, cause there was the drunk driver? It's something about my mother, and Jodie Foster is again like I don't have been with for this. Just go the fuck to bed, I don't have time to think about your dead mother.
Yeah, so there's well. No, I think the indication is well, she says that you don't have to be my mother. I think the insinuation is that the dad, the person that she was in the relationship, died of drunk driving. I think that's why isn't she's like you know, you don't have to be my mom. I think that's that's what I picked from it.
So I think that one of the parents is dead because of a drunk driver.
And we are going to. We are going to unpack that some of that, because that was like very quickly dismissed. I'm going to go and take a shower now. So we're going to, we're going to get into their relationship how that family dynamic works, but also the reason that maybe we weren't like you hypothesized earlier on. She's having the fucking worst day. She's just seen our daughter fucking clam banging another woman or another girl and she's just had my fit.
Yeah, we didn't talk about this. My favorite moment of all of this, which she's like. I had to watch it.
Yeah, like she's literally seen this right. And then she sees someone like an accident, drink, driving and that violent reaction. You thought was tall that before, but it's indicated that actually that might be because she lost a partner. So I'm a partner, I don't mean cop partner, I mean as an although it could have been a cop, we don't know and our payment of this kid so yeah, so that was a lot. We're going to find that, hopefully some stuff there as well.
So there's some break from there and once the other scene then, before we come, so the other one is Navarro, with that case of Bud heavy she's carried out and I bought a bottle of Baileys and she's just like this is a fucking, this is, this is what's required.
I have a little bit of screwed this out my system and now I'm getting my drink on.
And yeah, and she passes by bucket guy from the basically talking about how he's going to get her back. Yeah. And so also he's out, by the way.
Yeah, yeah. And so, once again as an indication to this town, he beat the shit out of his girl and now he's walking the streets. This Shelly woman fucking was drink driving, crashed her car, could have killed someone and she's likely going to get out. It's like this. Does anyone actually get prosecuted here, or do they just sleep off in the tank?
Yeah, she also dumped some of the Baileys in the dude's casting Just to give it one last. Fuck you. And then this is the moment, finally, that you alluded to yeah.
So we get two linking things up here straight away that they link back to the opening scene in the Antarctic station. The first one is Jodie Foster's in her bed and as she's sleeping she has this kid's hand come through, like over very fucking G on the grudge. This hand comes over the top of her and is speaking to her and she calls the kid. It's like a boy's name that she mentions and I can't remember what it is.
It's like holding or something harrowed or something like that, and the voice says she's awake and she wakes up. There's no one there. Meanwhile, navarro has a similar situation where she's in our car and she's driving along and we're getting all these whispers constantly and then she hears the you know she's awake and as she's stopping the car, a fucking polar bear with one eye, like one eyed fucking polar bear, walks across and stares right at her.
Yeah. So we get that scene like once again deer hearing, the same thing that the scientists heard, and then we jump into our first proper kind of true detective scene. And this is right. You know what? We're gonna break out? The coffee, we're gonna break out the case. I can't sleep. Let me go back through the photos. Jody Foster literally takes all the case file photos out and then starts interspersing them with the people from the station that are missing to see if she can find anything at all.
And as she's holding a picture of Annie Kaye who's wearing a pink kind of duffel coat thing, she's like, hmm, that rings a bell. And she scans back through and she finds that one of the researchers is wearing a coat. And as she examines the same coat, the same pink coat, as she examines Annie Kaye's one, closer, on the left arm sleeve there is a tear. And when she looks at the photo again, someone's put a essentially a patch and it's a smiley face.
The yellow smiley face patch is over the same arm and she's instantly like you know what? That's too much of a quinky dink. I'm gonna go back out to the station here. So she heads up to the station, she walks in, she hears some noises. She's a bit of a jittery I'd be jittery as well in a fucking empty station and she calls out the person there, I've got a gun, she's got a gun and and instantly go bring them back. This is what the people do.
I was like I can't believe that we didn't already get to a. He's got a gun, you got a gun.
And then Navarro comes round and then we get a bit more of their interaction. So Pierce has some sort of hand over here at some point. So like Navarro was still investigating the case when Foster's character Danvers was brought in, Well, she had been.
yes, Navarro had been following the case because she found the body, as we learned in this scene, and it just like she's never been able to let it go. Jody Foster comes on after John Hawke steps down and she's like, hey, you ought to look into this case. Yeah and Jody, because they have a good working relationship, and Jody Foster is like Nana. That's not a good case.
I think what we learn, though, or what we're learning about Jody Foster, is that she it's not because she didn't look into the case, it's because she didn't see any clear evidence.
Yeah, she couldn't see any way to move forward with it and because Navarro wouldn't drop it. Ultimately she is the one that asked Navarro to transfer to the trippers, which is mentioned here. So she's behind that. And of course, danvers is like you know, like I didn't do it because like I'm malice or anything like that. I just did it because you weren't going to survive this, you wouldn't let it go. And they then have this kind of talk about what's why you're here.
And she's like that, well, I'm just you know, looking curious and all the rest. And she's like well, I'm just looking to see if any of our positions here like a shoe or like a necklace. And Danvers is like I caught. And she's like I caught. And she's like you did look into this. And she's like, yeah, of course I did.
And she's like I'm a great fucking cop. I mean, get your head around that the better.
Yeah, and Navarro says something about you know, we always carry these cases with us and Danvers is like, well, no, we don't. And I really liked that moment. Yeah, not everyone, even though she clearly has. There's like there are some people that can be more pragmatic with the job and less personal with the job. You also find out that, like, one of the big reasons that Navarro could never let this go was one that happened to an indigenous woman and she felt that it was swept under the carpet.
She basically says, if this has been a white woman, you know you guys would have never fucking stopped. And that's when Jodie Foster's like listen, I wasn't even in charge of the case here. I wasn't even here when it happened. It was you that failed the case, not me. Like you were in charge of it. You like you didn't solve it, it's not my fault. But we also find out that the extent of the details wasn't just when Foster explains that it was the stab in the mutilation.
It's the detail you get from the bar here about like once she was dead, they kicked her ribs and they continued to beat up and, you know, butcher the body, physically, abuse her body and just that. That shits beyond. There's like it's so fucking evil that she's never been able to let it go. It's never left her, and they can't find the jacket though, like at all.
And we get more kind of pithy remarks about her spirit animal and her spirit, kelly, what's your, what's your spirits telling you Meanwhile?
I'm crazy responses. My spirit animal says you've got a real shitty fuck which I love, which is very funny which redeems the spirit animal, like, yeah, the shit like you for breakfast.
But meanwhile we jump to Fiona Shaw's character and she's getting the full red room treatment, right, she's getting the fucking like Travis is doing like interpretive dance and you know kind of spooky shit. And then it all culminates with him pointing to an area on nice and we see her kind of look over but we don't see what they all see. And then we get the phone call at the research station where the kids like listen, fiona Shaw's character, rose Agnew, she's seen something on the ice.
And then we essentially cut to them arriving on the scene and this is like some real fucking client. And once again but to mention references also, lopez said as inspirations for this directly she influenced the Mary Celeste but also the Dilly Toph pass, and we get a real Dilly Toph pass kind of meets the thing seen here, because at first they're walking past towards what they're going to find and then, and you know, varo says to Rose how did you find this?
And she's like oh well, travis showed me. And she's like Travis is dead. And she's like I know what you say. Yeah, no shit. Obviously Like, did you see what was we're going to come out here. He could never dance like that in real life. Only as a spirit could you find the power of rhythm.
Only did he have the Julie Cruz inspired rhythm, the ethereal dancing.
I heard of it Harley's like since he died he's been binge watching Twin Peaks.
Right, because he wasn't touching his nose. I'm not really near the mark, that kind of shit. Like it is, it's like holy shit, duncan.
Yeah, but like so, like she fully knows this. We cut across and we see what they see, which is three human men frozen in terror in the ice. And it's not just that they're on top of the ice and frozen, they are buried in the ice Like so they didn't. This isn't just like three days worth it, like somehow they've ended up embedded in the ice and died screaming yes, they're in terror.
Well, the actual flow on terror I couldn't make out from the three that were there and we'll probably find out in the next episode who the three people are in relation to the team. But it does set up a bounty of questions as to where we're going. But we kicked the credits there and like I am rock hard. I'm just like this is this is my shit, right here. This is this is what 2024 is all about.
Yeah, this is like a killer opening Tons of threads, tons of ideas like lots of different avenues we could go down. This could be there's something in the water because of the mines, like as is indicated in the dimension, the kind of the Jills Verne story. I think there's something in that story about magnets, so like the magnetism of that part of the world drove everyone mad. So there could be a bit of that.
There could just be a bona fide serial killer here at work and that message is kind of like a con on the board. You know and you know he's like one of his trophies. He's leaving his trophy to see his act of a game. It could be a bit of that. It could be a. You mentioned before a case of these research guys. Come across this girl, take advantage of her, end up killing her and then putting her out of the mines as a way to distract attention.
Right to throw, yeah, and something happens that basically triggers them all like a mass psychosis and their and their research station. Loads of options here and is the is is the she's awake we're referring to?
are we talking about Annie? I don't know Where's.
Annie. Where's Annie? I don't know. You know what I mean. There's a reason she's called Annie, right yeah? And are you, ok. Ok, annie Kay. So I'm just delighted Michael Jackson was behind the whole fucking thing. No, I think, I don't know, I don't like, because there's also, like I said before, the idea of this kind of in you at goddess being a woman as well. I don't like, I don't like, I don't know.
It's weird to was mentioned various times, but also is very, very, very strange that there seems to be a lot of connections to something that happened three days ago. It drove the animals crazy, it's turned the water bad and all these people at this station are missing and a six year old case is all of a sudden open again.
It's true, it's active man, it's good stuff. I really enjoyed it. Like I said, I hadn't been keeping up with the internet response to it, so I, if you had told me, yes, season one, diehards are like well, it's as good as season one. It's like well, fucking. Of course no one had ever seen anything like this.
And it's hard to recreate that. If you could ever recreate that.
Right, like do something wildly different every time you make a TV show. Yeah. Good Lord, you did it once. Congratulations. You're not going to do it four times in a row, yeah. So that aside, that kind of nonsense aside, I really like the mystery. I like the fact that we don't yet know. Yes, it definitely is leaning into kind of supernatural stuff, but, given given the framing of unreliable narration, yeah is the supernatural stuff.
We see more evidence of people's psychology than it is actual supernatural shit. Yeah. Or are we going to lean into supernatural shit? Are we going to finally have the true detective season where it's like guess what ghosts are real?
Yeah, I mean, I mean I could, I could very well. We've been hinting at and almost every season, like almost every minus season, to the kind of supernatural element is kind of has been there, it's been, it's been underpinning something of whether or not it's like there's more belief than anything else, is belief in something which is inherently scary because it's Pagan or it's you know, it's it's perceived as being evil.
That the idea that we are we're dealing with like characters who in some way feel like they come from, like a belief system of some description. And that idea of belief means science, because what they will remember, these are fucking six, seven scientists that are missing and they're doing like science on the ground on what might be an area which is deeply spiritual and they themselves could.
And then there's a whole idea of just like the most simple thing cabin fever like one person goes mad, like one person who's done a horrible thing, like goes mad at the trigger of something, ends up killing everyone. I don't think the weird thing is I think we're going to, I think we're going to see the phone footage, I think that's going to come out at some point, but the idea of them all being there's no blood in the room, no evidence of a struggle.
They weren't there, and three of them are being found miles away buried in ice. It's just too tempting man. It's just too tempting.
Yeah, it's really good. The only thing that I want from episode two is I wanted to begin with Diane. Who'd have thought my time in the Federal Bureau of Invection investigation would take me north of the Arctic Circle? I've booked a room in a local hotel. Across the hall from me is a psychotic woman who, Trooper sister, keeps showing up in on hours, but they seem like good enough people.
Oh man, let me get shot in this and falls over and then, like a man, delivers a warm glass of milk and just keeps asking them if they're OK. Yeah, that'll be over the moon. Yeah, there's plenty to mine from here. I'm super curious to see where they go. I think, because it's only six episodes, I don't think we're going to be left with a ton of mystery all the way through this. I get feeling that, narratively speaking, we're going to make a lot around the next episode.
I mean in theory. The end of the next episode is the end of Act One.
Yes, and also, if anything has been shown thus far to the tech, the mid episode is always the one where you get like the showstopper episode. You know. It's the one where, like, we got the kind of the scene where they rescue the, the witness, from inside the kind of drug town. And season two it was a big shoot out. I can't remember what it did in season three, but like always that midpoint thing, midpoint season, is episode three in this, so we're not far off it.
So, yeah, I think I'm expecting big things. I really really am. I love where this is going. Like yourself, if they want to lean in much more horror and supernatural, why not? They're all their own things. Every season should have a different feel and a different vibe because it's different people in this different story. So, yeah, looking forward to it.
Yeah, it's really having a ball with it. So far, all right. So early theories we've certainly you've espoused the one about John Hawk. I think he's on the tick. Yeah, I like that I said in my business about hey, I think there's going to be a ghost story S kind of vibe to this, where Annie will have been killed by the researchers and not. I think the mind is going to be a MacGuffin.
I think you're probably right. I think the main has probably paid off John Hawks to not continue investigating purely because of the optics, rather than it was the miners that did it, which kind of feels a bit a bit too on the nose and a bit easy. So yeah.
Yeah, and you know, one thing that we know about True Detective also is that every season is kind of about how money and power will get you out of shit, always, always. And so the mind, I think, is a good way to say that, while still not being the anyway, it's so early like that. Like you said, I'm so excited by the sheer variety of directions this could go.
Yeah, let's put it this way. I don't think there's a very good chance that we could get to the end of this, and none of what we've said is right.
And I'd be like cool with that. Oh yeah, I would love it if they're like hey, left turn, we've solved the Solol thing. And actually that just leads us to another question about this other group. You know the people funding Solol.
There is a mention specifically of whoever owns the. Mine was being investigated by Navarro and that was the big no. No, yeah, because she mentioned the Danvers mentions it to her son. She's like I even. She even went as far as to investigate its own son. Oh shit, or that. So that's a character that very well may appear in an upcoming episode, and we always get those. We always get the person behind the business, behind the company.
The person's at the top is always as a character that comes in, generally as the villain, but not necessarily always. But yeah, I think we're, I think we're we're in for a good one. But all I know is I'm glad to be back doing DBCC and I'm glad to be doing true detective.
So yeah, yeah, it's very exciting, All right, well, we'll be back next week. Between now and then, duncan, where can people find more out of your business?
Yes, please check out my podcast podcast under the stairs, currently working through my top 20 horror movies of 2023 by 10. This episode drops, I will have concluded the back half and we'll be moving on to the essentially 10 through through one which will be dropping in between this episode and the next episode dropping. So, yeah, I go and check that teapotscastcom or at teapotscast on YouTube where I'm now putting all my stuff.
So great and as always, you can find this and more not only at Duck and Bo comes quick, but with the Dark Parade which has all the other shenanigans, I get up to most recently an episode with Kate Pollock in which we discuss the movie Black Swan and also a woman who claims to be in a relationship with an ethereal alien creature. Who's to prove she isn't? You know it's hard to prove a negative, so it's hard to.
But you know, like that whole segment started about people who dated ghosts and has just turned into people who just date weird shit, and but I love it. It's one of my favorite things that I get to do on the regular. So but that's it. Between now and then, Please check out all the stuff Duncan mentioned. Please drop by Dark Parade, and we will be back in a week with more true detective and more answers and a hell of a lot more questions.
So until then, the only thing left for me to do is to say to my good friend Duncan say good night, Duncan.
I'm just going to make that as long as I thought you deliberately done that and I was like I will have to stop recording.