0:00

Hi. I'm Jeffrey Kramer, and my friend CECL

0:02

Baldwin loves horror movies,

0:04

and he's helping make the genre more approachable

0:07

for me and hopefully for you to

0:09

one film at a time in a random

0:11

order. Are you squeamish about horror movies?

0:14

Don't worry. We will tell you what happens. A

0:16

door horror movies great. Watch along with this

0:18

each week. And as always, check the show

0:20

notes for content warnings about this week's episode

0:23

discussion and film. This

0:25

week we randomly rolled a sick for Carnivle

0:27

or Fun House and a five for

0:29

first three

0:30

episodes. Here is episode

0:32

one forty seven

0:34

out of notebook. She ain't

0:36

nervous too. This

0:46

week on random number generator,

0:49

horror podcast. Number 9,

0:52

Carnivle two thousand and three.

0:54

Warning. Spoilers

0:57

ahead.

1:02

My mother and father are both

1:04

from Oklahoma. A Northeast

1:07

town called Dewey is where my

1:09

dad went to high school. I was born in

1:11

Oklahoma City though we moved to Texas when

1:13

was two, so my memories of Oklahoma were just

1:16

from visiting family. On the

1:18

craner side of things, my granddad,

1:20

Ben, was a farmer, a former

1:22

World War two foot soldier, and a

1:24

carpenter. He didn't suffer fools

1:26

and neither did his wife, my grandma, Lola.

1:29

Lola drank hot Dr Pepper every

1:32

afternoon. She had a very tight

1:34

smile, horn rimmed glasses, a curly

1:36

updo, and three psychotic pomeranians.

1:40

I remember my family there saying

1:42

the phrase okay on occasion. My

1:44

dad and uncle like to call each other that.

1:46

They'd call me that. Too, that I was like

1:48

the little Oaky. It was cute term,

1:51

that shortening of Oklahoman. And

1:53

as a little kid, I thought it was a funny

1:55

word, so I'd say it back. It's kind of like calling

1:57

each other hicks or yokeles or dummies,

2:00

I presume. The word Oki, by the way,

2:02

was coined by Californians. To refer

2:04

to the Dust Bowl refugees who moved west

2:06

during the ecological and economic disaster

2:09

happening in the Great Plains in the nineteen thirties.

2:12

Okies were immigrants in their own

2:14

country. Like those who've had to flee

2:16

Sudan, Syria, Mexico, Ukraine

2:19

to name only a few, Many of those

2:21

leaving Oklahoma in the thirties were

2:23

homeowners with jobs and lives

2:25

and stability in a land that had no

2:27

safety from the government nor mother

2:30

nature. And if there's one thing we know about

2:32

humanity, we loathe refugees.

2:34

We support them from afar, but when they

2:37

arrive, Not my problem. We

2:39

see them as unclean and pory. And

2:41

often, listen, they are. They

2:44

are unclean. When your home is destroyed

2:46

by a bomb or a dust storm or a banks

2:48

bulldozer and you and your family have to

2:50

drive for days with all that you own and

2:52

that's all that you can fit in your car. Then

2:55

see how clean you can keep yourself.

2:57

Check your value on celebrity net worth

3:00

dot com. The short lived two thousand

3:02

three HBO series is

3:04

filled with magic, telepathy, faith

3:06

healing, prophetic visions, supernatural elements

3:09

galore, and yet It's a pretty spot

3:11

on depiction of the Oki refugee

3:14

crisis, really as best as you can

3:16

get without getting Ken Burns or John

3:18

Steinbeck involved. Oki

3:20

as a term, as it's

3:22

a derogatory term, it's an epithet,

3:24

but it has been reclaimed by working class

3:27

Oklahoma's Merle Haggard helped

3:29

this process along with his tongue and cheek

3:31

song Oki from Muskogee. But

3:33

its roots are in one of the biggest refugee

3:36

crises our nation ever saw and it

3:38

didn't involve a single foreigner.

3:40

Hi, Cecil. Hi, Jeffrey. What

3:43

is your favorite ride or attraction

3:45

at a fair or

3:46

Carnivle, like a traveling one, not like a six

3:49

flags. Oh, oh, this is easy. The

3:51

sky chairs, I love the sky

3:53

chairs. Send me up send

3:55

me up as tall as you can go,

3:57

and then just like chill.

4:00

Like, it doesn't have to go up and down,

4:02

it doesn't go whoa. Like, I mean, I love

4:04

I love a whoa. I love roller coasters. I love

4:07

like it's like a ferris wheel except if you're

4:09

like having a solo experience.

4:11

These are the swings on chains that

4:13

are attached to a giant Maypole. It

4:15

takes you up and it whirls you around high in the

4:17

sky. Yeah. And then and then

4:19

you just you just chill.

4:22

Like, it's so relaxing. I I always

4:24

feel very safe for in the most

4:26

part because you don't move around. You

4:29

don't move your body around, so it's not jiggly

4:31

piggly piggly piggly piggly. And

4:33

you also get to see, like, the entire

4:35

lay of the land, which as an air sign

4:38

I love to see my surroundings.

4:41

We did that. Well, you

4:44

took the I did that. You took the Did I did

4:46

did I make you all do the sky chairs? At

4:48

at no. You

4:51

me and our our tour manager

4:53

and friend Lucia all

4:55

went to Tivoli Garden in Copenhagen when

4:57

we were on tour last year. And it was one of the best

4:59

days of my life. It was such a beautiful day. We

5:01

had such a nice time. We got up to

5:03

the sky chairs. I was really interested in going

5:06

it, but I was having looking

5:08

up at how high those chairs go.

5:10

I was having a little bit of a a little

5:12

bit of acrophobia setting

5:15

up. Yeah. Yeah. So didn't do it, but

5:17

you look so at peace sitting up there where we

5:19

watched you the whole time. He was

5:20

like, he looks so chill. Do I know

5:23

the secret, Jeffrey? What's that? I was

5:25

on so many mushrooms that day.

5:27

Not so many. I was on medium amount

5:29

of mushrooms that

5:30

day.

5:31

The correct amount. Enough to enjoy

5:34

all of Copenhagen, just enough to

5:36

make everything a little bit sparkly and everything

5:38

at Tibley Gardens be extra colorful.

5:40

That's

5:41

right. That's right.

5:42

I'm a big fan of anything that I like us spinning

5:45

around. I do like the lower chair, so

5:47

147 that don't lift up. You know, the ones that

5:49

only go maybe like twenty, thirty feet up.

5:51

Those are really fun. I like anything

5:54

wherein you get in the I don't know what these are

5:56

called, but you get in like It's

5:58

like a roller coaster, but it's it's just

6:00

in one big ring and it kind of goes

6:02

up and down in a really fast

6:04

circle on a

6:05

tilt. I was kinda like the wiggle

6:07

worm it's always like a kind of a worm

6:09

caterpillar sort of motion. I'm doing this

6:12

with my hands, making like a wave motion.

6:14

I see, my dad my dad used to talk to my

6:16

dad grew up in Memphis Tennessee in

6:19

the fifties and sixties. And

6:22

he would tell me that, like, when the carnival would

6:24

come to town, his and my uncle's favorite

6:26

thing to do was to go into the

6:28

cage, which was the big circle

6:31

that they would spin. The center the centrifuge

6:34

Gould Circle that they would spin so

6:36

fast, that

6:37

you're, like, pressed to the back

6:39

of the cage --

6:41

Yes. -- and then they would drop the bottom

6:43

out. So you're standing on nothing And

6:45

he said, until one time,

6:48

some kid, three people down,

6:50

threw up -- Yeah. -- and because of the centrifugal

6:53

force, it like like literally

6:55

just like he could see it coming towards him

6:57

and splat like right in his face. And

7:00

then he was like fuck this right.

7:03

That was the growing up in the

7:06

six flags in Arlington, Texas they

7:08

had. The I think it was called the

7:10

spindled spinnaker, I think, was in a I

7:12

can't remember what the exact air spindled top. I can't

7:14

remember which one it was, but it was but

7:17

it was that that very thing. I never went

7:19

in it, but I watch people go into it.

7:21

And there'd always be something where somebody would like

7:23

take their keys out of their wallet and they would like

7:25

stick to the wall or out of their pocket and it

7:27

would stick to the wall next to

7:28

them. That was pretty cool. I never had

7:30

I never had the balls to do this, but apparently,

7:33

this is this is what my uncle, my dad uncle,

7:35

who was my favorite uncle, of course, he'd

7:37

be like, what you wish, what you should try to do.

7:40

See, if you can flip your body over,

7:42

so your belly to the wall, and

7:44

then see if you could Spider Man

7:46

crawl yourself upside

7:48

down. I think this is I

7:50

think he was pulling my leg. Like

7:52

a rub.

7:53

A rub. We're one of our words

7:55

of the day in this from this movie.

7:58

There's so many good words in this I feel

8:00

like, okay, one, Jeffrey, I'm gonna say, this show

8:02

feels impeccably researched. Mhmm.

8:05

And a lot of, like, it it like, I think it

8:07

you you hit the nail the head. Like like, sort

8:09

of being a documentary, this feels

8:11

like like the creators went, we

8:13

are gonna treat the time period.

8:16

With the utmost seriousness so

8:18

we can just do all the higgly piggly piggly

8:21

psychic bullshit that we want. But

8:23

we're gonna get all the language, the the

8:25

landscape, the place

8:27

names, all that technically correct.

8:30

Yeah. And and these little

8:32

shanty tones that kind of form up as people

8:34

are trying to find any

8:37

kind of work. Any kind of any kind

8:39

of labor, you know, in

8:41

in and around the state of Oklahoma. And

8:44

this this show to the first three after the

8:46

week after the show because we rolled first three episodes.

8:48

So we only watch three. I went onward

8:50

to the end of season 147. And then I

8:52

was like, I'm good. I

8:54

don't know if they ever get to California, but

8:57

that westward travel feels like

8:59

that of the Oklahoma migrants is is

9:01

is so important to that story. But but I think they really

9:03

captured the sense of poverty.

9:05

These are people who own houses. You know,

9:07

these are the people that that like had farms

9:09

and that the dust warms

9:11

that that that came up in the nineteen thirties

9:14

or

9:14

really, really fucking intense. Well,

9:17

let's talk about this show and

9:19

one of us. Not Bobby Connor

9:21

Val. Bobby Connor Valley. I said the

9:23

motherfucker with a hat. This is a

9:25

this is just This intro

9:28

again, this is so this is so HBO.

9:31

The intro is we've talked about this.

9:33

I forget on which previous TV

9:35

show we did, but or movie

9:38

we did, but it has a very oh, I think it

9:40

was a black phone. Right. Right.

9:42

The intro to black phone felt, like, mid

9:44

odds

9:45

HBO in front. Right? Showtime

9:48

HBO intro. Yeah. Like, you've got

9:50

sort of an ambient. It's not

9:52

electronica. I wouldn't call

9:54

it, but definitely like a digitally produced

9:57

sound. And this one's a lot of, like, kind of weird

10:00

sitar kind of sound

10:03

to evoke sort of mysticism in

10:05

general. Meanwhile, we're

10:07

getting images of World

10:10

Western Art tero

10:12

cards and sort

10:14

of the events of the day.

10:17

So like babe

10:17

Ruth, hitting a seven hundred,

10:20

Jackie Owens. Yeah. Yeah.

10:23

Like, LBJLBJ no.

10:26

LBR. FDR, sorry, not the other

10:28

one. But things

10:30

like that take two of be like, okay, this is

10:33

this is the time, this is the vibe,

10:36

And then, you know, although

10:38

I will admit I appreciated this

10:40

introduction

10:41

by the end of the second episode, I was

10:44

like, yep, we can fast forward right through

10:46

this. I think I've seen all the easter eggs

10:48

I need to see. Give me the meat. It

10:50

was it was very similar to

10:53

made me think of the intro to the

10:54

leftovers, another HBO show, that

10:56

it's it's it's

10:58

grand. It is it is speaking

11:01

to an epic as

11:02

well. Oh, sure. And and

11:04

this this this is, you know, epic material

11:07

that they're dealing with when you talk about the

11:09

lore of magic in humans

11:12

when you're talking about the divinity

11:14

in Terra readings, and when you're

11:16

talking about the massive sweeping

11:19

changes happening in the twentieth

11:21

century, particularly in America

11:23

and the Great Depression. I

11:25

think it's it's important to note

11:28

the David Lynch thinness

11:31

of the show which I'm

11:33

here for, but also I think they toe

11:35

a line here. This TV show

11:38

feels like it's on the cusp. To

11:40

use a terror word. It is on

11:42

the cusp of, like,

11:45

it's not quite breaking bad,

11:47

so the promos just yet, but

11:49

it's not it's not network

11:51

TV. Like, you know, Twin Peaks

11:53

was on, like, Was it ABC,

11:56

CBS, one of those, you know?

11:57

Yeah. Like, it was on regular normal

11:59

what? Normal, quote, unquote, network

12:01

TV. And this is that era

12:04

of network

12:06

TV sort of dying out a little bit, and all

12:08

of a sudden HBO and Showtime are coming

12:10

up with some some blockbusters. With,

12:12

you know, you look through this cast list, we've

12:15

got, like, if not, like

12:17

Oscar winners, but like in Oscar

12:19

winning films. You

12:21

know,

12:21

Amy Madigan, oh my

12:23

god, like, ten decay, cleo duval,

12:26

Adrian Barbeau for Christ's sake.

12:28

Yeah. But the

12:30

David Lynch weirdness that they're

12:32

trying to cash in on, at

12:35

times it feels awesome

12:37

because I love David Lynch. David Lynch weirdness,

12:40

but it sometimes, it does feel

12:42

like a little bit of a cash grab facsimile.

12:46

Of some of the oddder moments

12:48

of fire walk with me twin

12:50

peaks, you know, etcetera, etcetera.

12:53

Did you get that at all? Yeah. It's

12:55

it's definitely walking that line. III

12:58

made note of this too that I I kind of

13:00

at moments wanted it to be weirder

13:02

and darker than it was. Wanted

13:04

it to cross through

13:07

there, be more inexplicable. I

13:09

think the perfect example for me and again

13:11

We're only covering the first three episodes. So

13:13

if it changes after this, so

13:15

be it. But in the limits of this show,

13:18

I'm only gonna talk about the first three episodes

13:20

and what I was wanting from them. Hopefully,

13:22

it does offer these later. But with

13:25

our character of the assistant manager, Samson,

13:28

There's station management. Right? There

13:30

is the management of

13:32

the of the and

13:34

there's There's always reference to

13:36

what management wants. And

13:39

we have this other character, the blind sea

13:41

earning logs. Who obviously can't

13:43

can no longer communicate is no longer allowed

13:46

to communicate directly with management. So it's just

13:48

Samson who is the secularist.

13:50

Right? Samson is, he's the manager.

13:52

He's the business guy. He's not. His job

13:54

is to make the carnival run, to make

13:57

the show. He is not mystical in any

13:59

way whatsoever. And Samson,

14:02

there's a moment where he turns

14:05

to this

14:07

curtain, this closed

14:09

curtain, and he asks it, you know, what are

14:11

you trying? What are you really trying to do here?

14:14

And that's it. That's the whole moment. And I

14:16

thought, I want I want more shots of

14:18

that curtain. I wanna see, you know, in

14:20

in Night Vale, we play around with station management

14:22

thing. And we always describe station management

14:24

as, like, some unholy glow coming

14:26

from the back hallway or some Because

14:29

it's usually from Brussels.

14:31

It's from CECL's point of view. So

14:33

we're we're getting station management as

14:35

filtered through CECL. And

14:38

CECL can't even begin to scribe

14:40

the horrors of station management,

14:42

which is so much more tantalizing than,

14:45

well, it had exactly six pinchers and

14:47

nine

14:47

claws and Yeah. Yeah. I

14:49

big green eyes and, you know,

14:51

like, that's kind of that's, you know, goosebumps

14:53

kind of bullshit. And

14:54

I wanted something a little because

14:56

I love that type of thing. I love that that

14:58

notion that this is something

15:00

super unholy happening down here, and it

15:03

could be anything, but it's going to be monstrous.

15:05

And I kinda wanted to get a a better

15:07

hint as to what is behind that curtain.

15:09

Is it a monster? Is it a god? Is

15:12

it just a man? Is it a a corpse?

15:14

Right? Is it is it similar to, like, It

15:16

could be any number of things. Is it an object? I

15:18

just kinda wanted some hint at that.

15:20

And I think this this show is a little bit

15:22

afraid to go full

15:24

inchion. At times,

15:26

I'd I'd agree. And sure enough,

15:28

this the show, it it

15:31

writes that line between populist

15:33

entertainment

15:34

But it's also like, oh my god.

15:36

Like, it is bleak. It

15:39

is

15:40

bleak. Mhmm. And

15:42

I love Nick Stahl. think he's great. I

15:44

think he's great in this. He plays sort

15:46

of a perfect, like, you

15:50

know, like, for being our protagonist in

15:52

this, you know, in this three arc three

15:55

episode arc adventure, he's

15:57

the perfect introduction to the carnival

16:00

because his eyes are popping out of his

16:02

head at everything. And so it's a good way,

16:04

explain to me explain

16:07

to the, you know, explain to the rub who

16:10

these characters are. So but

16:12

however, as someone who who went beyond

16:14

the first three episodes. I gotta say, it

16:16

never they don't they don't really

16:19

wise up quick. You know, we're like, okay.

16:21

Cool. Cool. Let's let's yeah, we

16:23

get it. They're magic. Let's see some fucking magic

16:25

now.

16:27

Okay. So the first thing after the credits

16:29

is it's just a close-up of Samsung. This is

16:31

Michael j Anderson.

16:34

From twin peaks of of black lodge

16:36

fame or in fame, the

16:38

left arm.

16:39

Apparently, he had a falling he had a bit of a falling

16:41

out with David Lynch. I don't know the

16:43

story behind this. I've heard this before. Do you

16:45

know the story

16:46

here? I I can't go into specifics

16:48

or can't because I don't know the specifics, not

16:50

I'm I don't have an NDA or something super

16:52

late. But, no, I think it was just I

16:55

feel like Michael j Anderson felt that David

16:57

Lynch like, created this iconoclastic

17:00

role for him. And then I

17:03

feel like he Michael

17:05

De Anderson felt like a little maybe maybe

17:08

used and abused in that. You know,

17:10

like, he got like, he's like, well, I've

17:12

been cast as, I don't know, Mickey Mouse

17:15

or, you know, like, an iconoclastic thing,

17:18

and then it was sort of out

17:20

of his hands how that

17:21

image, how his image was used.

17:23

For those who don't know who Michael j Anderson

17:26

is is a he's a little person and

17:28

so he gets cast in Twin Peaks.

17:30

And there's there's, you know, there's

17:33

this kind of old trope thing where you

17:35

cast people who little people,

17:38

people with deformities, or like,

17:40

extreme and different sort of looks

17:42

into horror and

17:44

scary sort of scenes. This

17:47

happens in our ambassador's work. And

17:50

and it's this definitely happened with Twin

17:52

Peaks,

17:53

Michael Hennicki, not my a a Lars von

17:55

Trere has one in the kingdom. He has two

17:57

of them in the kingdom

17:58

actually. And here's a case wherein

18:00

you have this traveling circus slash

18:02

freak show in Geek show and

18:05

the most normal least magical

18:07

character is the one played by a little

18:09

person. Right? And so I think that's

18:11

probably real excitement

18:14

for for Michael j Anderson if that's

18:16

the case of him feeling pinned

18:18

in by his character from Twin

18:19

Peaks. Because he's like, I just play like, I I have

18:21

an I'm a character, but I'm not creepy,

18:24

black, large, you know, short person.

18:26

I am Samson, I have a I'm

18:29

from a place. I'm from a time. have back

18:31

story. It's like an actor's something

18:33

he could bite his teeth into as an actor. And honestly,

18:35

he does a phenomenal job. He sort being

18:38

the one of the main

18:41

spiritual helpers of Ben Hawkins

18:43

on his journey. Yeah. I

18:45

get the sense from Samson because of the way

18:47

the show begins. After three episodes,

18:50

we're not seeing a ton of growth yet from Samsung

18:53

other than he's following whatever management says.

18:55

And he's helping Ben along.

18:57

But by the end of episode three, he's going to

18:59

still be a look pretty skeptical of Ben.

19:02

Oh. Oh, it's you know, you

19:04

just you wait. But I know but I get the

19:06

sense because of the way episode

19:08

one opens, so this is episode one

19:10

Milfe. And which is

19:12

a town in Oklahoma, that Samson

19:14

actually is going to come along in terms

19:17

of what he understands about magic

19:19

spirituality because this opening is just

19:21

him staring down the barrel of the camera, black

19:23

screen behind him, and he just says before

19:25

the beginning, After

19:27

the great war between heaven and hell, god

19:30

created man and gave dominion

19:32

as he says to the crafty ape

19:35

that he called man. There's

19:37

still any kind of describes there's still an ancient

19:40

war between good and evil happening all

19:42

the time, but there used

19:44

to be magic. But man

19:46

traded away wonder for

19:49

reason, which think is a great line.

19:52

The idea that we said, we are an industrial

19:55

We are an industrial species and

19:58

so we will be of industry, of

20:00

science, of logic, and of reason,

20:02

and that magic. Died

20:04

off except for, obviously,

20:06

a couple of people. Yeah. Just

20:09

two. Just two. Yeah.

20:11

Just two. So we're

20:13

gonna have kind of our two central

20:15

characters two central

20:18

storylines are between Ben,

20:21

which we'll talk about him in a second. The young man

20:23

Oki for Buskiki. Yeah. Yep. Oki

20:26

for Milfei. And then we've got

20:28

we've got Ben and then we have Justin.

20:31

Brother Justin. Brother Justin. Oh.

20:33

Now I gotta say clancy brown.

20:36

Uh-huh. He makes my hard go pitter patch.

20:38

I'm not gonna lie. He his voice

20:41

is fucking everything.

20:43

He is like six nine I'm

20:46

just saying, like, so evil and

20:48

so so sexy in this film or in

20:50

this in this TV show. Oh, Clancy

20:52

Brown, you can do it to me any day. Nice.

20:55

He's he's really He's so great in the show.

20:58

He's so good. Him oh, well, and

21:00

he's kind of and he's with a double actor. Like, because

21:02

because he has nothing to do with the carnival for,

21:05

like, the entirety of season 147, he's

21:07

kind of off in his own, but him and

21:09

his sister Iris played

21:11

by Amy Madigan. They the two

21:13

of them have one of the most fascinating relationships

21:16

on television, bar

21:18

none and, like, listen. It just watching

21:20

the two of them together, it really is,

21:22

like, watching a, like,

21:24

a a workshop. Like

21:27

a what do we call it? Like, where where

21:29

you get, like, famous top of the top

21:31

of the line that they teach it to students. Like,

21:33

it really

21:33

is. Yeah. Like a yeah. Master class. Yeah. Like

21:35

a It's

21:36

a master class. It's like watching a master class in

21:38

scene study. Just watching the two of

21:40

these, just negotiate this weird

21:43

questionably sex. Questionably,

21:49

psychic

21:51

relationship, and I am here

21:54

for it. Amy Madigan

21:56

is tremendous in this show because

21:58

she's not in it much and her scenes

22:00

are in service, like her character

22:02

scenes are in service, to pass

22:04

to to brother Justin. But

22:07

she's always doing something even

22:09

when she's doing nothing. Oh,

22:11

nice. So

22:12

good. Love it. I forgot

22:14

that she was in she was in field of

22:16

dreams. She's his wife and field of dreams.

22:18

Right? She's she's the wife and field of dreams who, like,

22:20

gets all, like, riled up at the PTA meeting

22:23

about catch her the rye. I

22:25

love that scene. But it's also like it's the

22:27

most boomer, but it's it's like, yeah.

22:29

Burning books is

22:31

bad. She's

22:33

like, yeah, man. don't know. I love

22:35

it. So this

22:38

we get to our first action, which is

22:40

just quick cuts. It doesn't let

22:42

you see a lot of some man

22:44

running through a rainy cornfield at

22:47

night, And these

22:49

are going to be flashes that'll

22:51

kind of keep progressing throughout the show

22:54

of dreams that Ben,

22:56

as we'll learn later, probably shared

22:59

dreams and nightmares that Justin is also

23:01

having, and we won't we don't know

23:03

yet the connection between these two characters. But

23:05

it feels like something from the past

23:07

as well. Like, they're being able

23:09

to look in on someone else's

23:11

life like a reincarnation kind of

23:13

deal.

23:14

And we meet Ben and his mother,

23:17

Flora. And they are she's

23:19

Flora's dying of that of the pneumonia.

23:22

She's got she's got the brown lung. She got

23:24

the brown long. This is the Oklahoma Dust

23:26

Bowl, like 9 thirty four, I think.

23:28

And this has been watching over her, and this is, you

23:30

know, It's interesting as he he's sitting

23:33

so far away from his dying mother in

23:35

her bed. Like, he's sitting in the other room

23:37

and a chair watching her. And at one point, he's

23:39

trying to approach her and she's

23:41

she looks scared of him. Yeah.

23:44

And

23:44

she's like, go go go go go and then,

23:46

like, don't touch me. Don't touch me.

23:48

Which, hey, why your mother

23:50

Cluff, mother, wire, mother. I think we have a wire

23:52

mother up in here. Wait.

23:54

What is the definition of these two? Oh,

23:56

really? Oh, so so in psychological

23:59

terms, they do studies where

24:01

they would give

24:02

chimpanzees, like

24:04

at a certain age when they're breastfeeding, essentially

24:07

a bottle wrapped in cloth.

24:10

Okay? And call it cloth mother

24:12

or a bottle wrapped in

24:14

wire like chicken wire, not her like, not

24:16

Barbara, but chicken wire, like, cold and hard,

24:19

and they call it, wire mother. And

24:21

it's the study of, like, how much

24:23

do mammals specifically, you

24:25

know, people need

24:28

physical touch from

24:30

their mother. So, like, they get

24:32

food, the exact same food from both,

24:35

but like nine out of ten times

24:38

humans and and

24:40

primates will always choose cloth

24:42

mother over wire mother. This idea of, like,

24:44

it's not the food that we're going for.

24:46

It's the contact. It's the the

24:49

smell that like that is what helps in

24:51

childhood development. That's what makes

24:53

a person more empathetic to

24:56

other people in life. And actually, it

24:58

also comes down, like, if you can

25:01

sort of extrapolate that into, like, did

25:03

you spank your child in, like, that ulcer version

25:05

of child ruling? But like cloth mother, grandmother's

25:07

like an

25:08

old, old psychological study.

25:10

Check those facts for me, but I'm pretty sure that

25:12

My

25:12

father's side was wire mother.

25:14

My mother's side was cloth mother. Yes.

25:16

Yeah. Yes. She looks very scared

25:19

of him and then she dies. And we see

25:21

him go out to dig her start digging Her

25:23

grave in the dust when the bulldozer shows

25:26

up, and this is this man declares this

25:28

is property of the bank.

25:30

So we know this home has been foreclosed

25:32

upon. Ben has returned home to see his

25:34

mom. Suddenly, we've get it we get another

25:37

truck. And this is Carnivle in Algerian

25:39

font on the side. Yes. With

25:42

a little with a moon and a star and

25:44

a sun Yes. How how

25:46

very wicked of

25:47

them? Mhmm. Or whatever

25:49

word word we're using now for magic's.

25:51

I can't remember. So this is in

25:53

the front seat. We'll see this kind of repeated.

25:55

It's Samsung and Clayton

25:58

Jones

25:58

Jonesie. Jonesie. Jonesie. Jonesy who

26:01

is also so handsome. He's the beef

26:03

cake of the oh my god. He can, like, listen,

26:05

he is shirtless than any

26:07

female Like with all the hootchikucha

26:10

dances, this dude takes off his shirt of the

26:12

drop of hat on the television show.

26:14

And it's pretty nice Yeah.

26:16

We're all fine with that. We're a okay with

26:18

it. So they drive up upon

26:20

the scene because they're coming they're the carnival

26:23

coming into Milfay, Oklahoma that night.

26:25

And Clayton gets out

26:27

there and essentially delays

26:30

the the the bulldozer driver.

26:33

Upon realizing two things about

26:35

Ben when when Jonsie gets out there.

26:38

He realizes, one, oh, that's your mom

26:40

and she's dead. And you're just trying to bury

26:42

her. Two, son,

26:45

you got a chain on your ankle.

26:47

So we know that Ben

26:50

is out of prison. And

26:53

not because he's on

26:54

parole. Yes. No. He's a he's an escape

26:56

e. Yes. Presumably, to

26:58

go back and make sure his mother was okay,

27:00

and she's like, fuck, you don't touch me.

27:03

Which

27:03

dude, that sucks. So essentially,

27:06

The bulldozer man finally realizes too

27:09

that this is his mom he's bearing, says,

27:11

fine. There's a funeral. The attendees

27:14

of the funeral are basically bent and

27:16

the Carnivle, as they bury

27:18

his mother in the ground, which will be

27:20

meaningful later when you realize Flora's

27:23

connection to the carnival. HA!

27:25

Nothing nothing happens by accident

27:28

apparently! No! They

27:30

all sing near my god to thee! We

27:33

see the blind, see your love! Who was singing

27:35

it in French. And then I love this in

27:37

the background as they're finally burying

27:39

her. The background, the bulldozer just

27:41

destroys the house behind them. Like a like

27:44

like A, men. House done.

27:46

House done. Ben passes

27:48

out and the carnival basically

27:51

argues whether or not to take him.

27:53

And they hear the police coming and it's Jonesy

27:55

and Samson knowing that Ben is an escapee.

27:58

They're like, fine. Just fucking bring him because the cops are

28:00

gonna get him. Yeah. So now we

28:02

cut to brother Justin.

28:04

Brother Justin. What's you up

28:06

to brother Justin in your nice

28:08

middle class methodist

28:11

California Church. What's she doing?

28:13

What's your brother Justin? He's got

28:15

the whole world in his hands. I love

28:18

the way they set the set up this

28:20

these church services, the order. Like,

28:23

it is everybody is sitting proper,

28:25

everybody is clean and and

28:28

showered, and this is all middle class,

28:30

small town, Oklahoma.

28:32

Are they in Oklahoma? I thought they were California.

28:34

Oh, this might be California. Okay. I always

28:36

got the impression because it's that sort of like rolling

28:39

hills that Oki, you

28:41

know, because it it's always like their

28:44

churches like Land of Plenty kind

28:46

of

28:46

feels. You're right. No, you're totally right

28:48

because I got confused early on when

28:50

there's a shot of in this first episode,

28:53

there's a shot in the Justin scenes

28:55

of pretty big hills. I'm like,

28:57

this has to be far eastern Oklahoma,

28:59

and even the Washington Mountains aren't quite

29:01

this intense. No. This is like

29:03

Salinas. This has got true Steinbeck

29:06

territory. That totally makes sense because it is

29:08

the okis that are going to move west. To

29:10

California. So it makes sense that

29:12

Justin and Justin

29:15

and Ben are not despite their shared dreams,

29:17

they're not in the same place together.

29:20

Also, we do see brother

29:22

Justin go to a diner that is very distinctly

29:24

kind of that California America Route

29:26

sixty six looking diner. Yeah.

29:29

But there's this properness to it. Right?

29:31

There's this middle class

29:34

whatever. The songs are, like,

29:36

the clapping is Yep.

29:38

You know, where there's kind of like a pause as you,

29:40

you know, it's just there's nothing soulful

29:42

about it. It's all

29:43

nearer my it's all nearer my God

29:46

to the and no amazing

29:48

grace. You know? Like, if that's

29:50

the continuum of what we're singing

29:52

in church, there there nobody's catching

29:54

the holy ghost. No. Nobody's the

29:57

food is probably bland

29:59

as fuck. Let's be

30:00

honest. It is unseasoned. Nick.

30:04

Yeah. They have never seen brown

30:07

chicken when it's done cooking.

30:10

No. So there's

30:12

an older lady, Eleanor

30:14

who's sitting in the

30:15

congregation, and Eleanor's a little dirtier

30:17

-- Yeah.

30:18

-- a little clothes are little

30:20

bit more a little bit more

30:22

frayed, rumbled, and she

30:24

and she has to look like. I mean, she looks

30:26

like she's pulling some shit. Like,

30:28

she looks a little cagey. Like, she's kind of,

30:30

like, darting the eyes left to right. She's

30:33

singing along, but, like, Iris Iris

30:36

knows something's up with this woman from

30:38

moment one.

30:39

Yep. Iris is Justin's sister played

30:41

by Amy Madigan. And

30:44

Iris catches her as she tries

30:46

to leave. They did. They passed the

30:48

they passed the plate. And right

30:50

after they passed the plate, we see Elanor tried

30:52

to leave and and Iris snacks

30:55

her and brings her to brother

30:58

Justin. And Eleanor gives

31:00

her a story about, like, you know, listen, I

31:02

just we don't have the you

31:03

know, there's a camp up by the highway, and

31:05

we ain't got no preacher. So I come down

31:07

here for that because I need it. You know, I got

31:10

it right to pray. You got it right to

31:12

everyone got it right to

31:13

Jesus. He kind of like clasps

31:16

her

31:16

hand. And he was like, well, that's

31:18

that's mighty honorable of you, miss

31:20

Ellis. Or pray. Let's pray.

31:22

Shall we and he reaches and he finds the quarter.

31:25

She stole in her sleeve. And

31:27

he says, you know, we all carry seeds

31:29

of salvation. And damnation. It's

31:32

up to you to choose which seeds you

31:34

plant. And then this

31:36

woman straight up, vomits up a pile

31:39

of quarters.

31:39

Yeah. Like a fucking jackpot.

31:43

Lucky sevens. And

31:46

it's and this is what I like

31:48

about. The character

31:50

arc of Brother Justin, more

31:52

than Ben Hawkins, even

31:55

over the course of this show, because we're

31:57

meeting them at a time where neither of them understand

31:59

that they are blessed that they're touched

32:02

with powers. And so you're watching

32:04

like, brother Justin should be like, what

32:06

the fuck? Like, he

32:08

doesn't even understand if he's doing

32:11

it, if it's just happening, if it's great.

32:13

But but he's like, oh my

32:15

god. Let's pray. Let's oh, shit. Here

32:17

we go. I like the fact that they

32:19

don't draw either of these characters

32:22

as protagonist to antagonist, it's as

32:25

the show develops, it's more like

32:28

147 has like

32:30

darker powers to make dark manifestations

32:33

come true and one has lighter manifestations

32:36

come true. But how they

32:38

use that is neither good nor

32:40

evil, which I think is actually

32:42

a pretty mature look

32:45

at this actually a pretty

32:47

magic with a k kind of view of the

32:49

world. Like, there's no good like,

32:51

good or evil. Those are morality questions.

32:54

And those changed depending on the situation,

32:56

the point of view, who you talked to,

32:58

what the what the scenario was. But

33:02

healing a child or, you

33:04

know, killing or, like, showing someone

33:06

a vision of their awfulness is

33:09

neither inherently good nor bad. It's

33:12

just one is light. It looks like light magic versus

33:14

dark magic. You can use light

33:16

magic for good or for bad. You can use dark

33:19

magic for good or for bad. And I think

33:21

honestly, That's quite

33:23

refreshing. Yeah. To be honest. I

33:25

agree. I I found Justin

33:27

Farnaway the most captivating character

33:29

in this show and, like, truly captivating

33:31

only have as an insult to the show. I the show

33:33

was very interesting and very very compelling,

33:36

but this character is so

33:38

interesting because immediately

33:40

upon meeting a preacher that is preaching

33:43

about the end of the world and

33:45

morality and whatever. You're

33:48

instantly like, we just came off

33:50

of watching Hell House. I'm instantly like,

33:52

I am I am on my

33:53

heels. I'm ready to fight. I'm ready to go.

33:55

Yeah.

33:56

Yeah. Yeah. Evil preacher. We're like, okay, when's

33:58

the when's the other foot gonna drop? Yeah.

34:00

And there's there's a falseness to it, but

34:02

as he starts realizing his powers for

34:04

good, or to do it's

34:07

not even about good. It's about doing God's

34:09

calling. He's doing the same thing Samson

34:11

is doing, which is eating management. Whatever

34:14

the boss tells me to do, I gotta do

34:16

it. By all means necessary, I've

34:18

gotta do this job. And that's simply

34:20

what he's doing and he makes choices that

34:22

seem both good and bad simultaneously

34:25

later when he opens up a second

34:27

church, you're like, yeah, his calling

34:29

is to help the migrants.

34:31

The migrants but also he is

34:33

one hundred percent like we have to segregate

34:35

them from the clean. They have to have

34:37

their own space because it cannot be bringing

34:41

okies and Chinese people into

34:43

the same habitat as the

34:45

nice upper middle class communities of

34:47

California. And also, Keep in mind,

34:49

he reports he is not a splinter. He's

34:51

not a cult leader. He reports

34:54

to, you know, there's a sort of an older

34:56

gentleman that both Iris and Brother Justin

34:58

have were raised by, and

35:00

they answer to the bishops. And so he

35:02

is part of the church machine. Whatever

35:06

I'm not to up on my Christian terminology, but

35:08

he is part of a system. Yes.

35:11

And that system is very important to

35:13

him because later, spoiler,

35:15

he's gonna

35:16

say, fuck off to that system and go out on his

35:18

own and that is when the shit

35:20

gets real. Okay, great. I

35:23

love this moment where

35:25

we cut back to the traveling

35:28

carnival and it cuts the

35:30

inside of the car cab and they've got the radio

35:32

on and we hear FDR. Basically,

35:36

president splaining to the American people.

35:38

Hey, listen. This is how banks work. They don't just

35:40

keep your money in a vault. They are They're

35:43

investing that money. It is. The bank

35:45

doesn't save it invests. The

35:47

more you put in them, the better

35:49

they

35:50

are. Yeah. Come on. Double

35:52

down. Save them.

35:54

Corporations are nothing but people. Too

35:56

big to fail. Too big

35:58

to fail. You know what? Actually, one of the things

36:00

that I wish that was in

36:02

the show. This isn't gonna be a very short tangent,

36:04

I promise, is the Hobo code

36:07

Do you know anything about the Hobo code? I

36:09

do it. I learned about it from mad men.

36:11

Oh, yeah. I guess that's true. There wasn't a mad men

36:13

a bit, but it's like when like, I I

36:15

wanna say, like, a quarter of the country,

36:18

like, hundreds of thousands of people were were

36:20

displaced. Right? Mhmm. And out of

36:22

them, tens of thousands were under

36:24

the age of twenty. Like, we're talking seventy

36:26

five thousand people, seventy five thousand

36:28

teenagers. And what are teenagers

36:31

really good at? They're really good at creating insular

36:34

communication styles. That's how we get our

36:36

cool disco kind of language.

36:39

Uh-huh. So they created these codes

36:41

in which as you traveled from town

36:43

to town, they were simple series

36:45

of hieroglyphs. That they would mark

36:47

on people's houses to let

36:49

other people who are riding the rails

36:52

know, this person will give you food.

36:54

This person, if you are sick, they'll

36:56

give you medicine. This person has

36:58

a very mean dog. Don't don't

37:00

stay away. And to me, like and

37:02

it it's like it literally blossomed

37:05

and then disappeared. Yeah.

37:07

And was, like, not reported on. It, like,

37:09

never made it to any libraries until years

37:11

later when people went, do you remember that moment where

37:13

everybody was unemployed? And

37:16

so 147 we had to

37:17

create, like, a separate language to talk

37:19

about how unemployed we were. Fascinating

37:22

to me. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely.

37:25

You know, they get to the new carnival site. This is where

37:27

we meet logs and Lila

37:29

who It's loads. Loads. think your

37:31

right is loads. Loads

37:33

and Lila. Loads to the sincere,

37:36

Lila bearded woman. And

37:38

they're watching over bed. Ben is in the

37:40

bed in their in their little trailer area.

37:43

And, you know, we we learned in this

37:45

process that loads is the

37:47

seer.

37:47

Right? And so Lila says, you know, do

37:49

that old trick for you?

37:51

Yeah. She's like, oh, loads

37:53

do that fun thing where you touch someone

37:55

and can know their

37:56

dreams. Tell me what he's dreaming about. And

37:58

he's like, he's dreaming about sunshine and lollipops.

38:01

Yeah. Tell me what he's dreaming about, and

38:03

loads gets a glimpse of that cornfield

38:06

runner and men in the World War 147 trenches

38:08

and loads basically passes

38:10

out. These are so fucking intense. Okay.

38:13

So now we are going to meet

38:16

Sophie

38:17

and Sophie's mother. Oh,

38:19

Cleodufol. Fucking iconic. She's

38:23

I mean, one, she's gorgeous. Let's just,

38:25

you know, like like she has one of the

38:28

she she's, if not, the,

38:30

maybe one of my favorite lesbians on

38:33

the planet, like she really is, And

38:36

just the fact that her character

38:38

is to set this

38:40

up, she is the daughter of

38:42

a woman who's catatonic

38:44

but very much alive, and

38:47

the mother can speak to the daughter,

38:49

but only the daughter can hear it. So

38:51

half of clear default scenes are

38:54

just her monlogging with an imaginary

38:56

character. Yeah. Just you could just skip the

38:59

half of the dialogue. Fucking

39:01

rock star. Yeah. So

39:05

I just I had to

39:07

play in the in the near

39:09

future years ago. Called

39:11

imaginary friend is not funny. That's

39:13

right. Oh my god. I remember

39:15

those -- Yeah. -- which was just the same. And I kept

39:17

thinking about it during this because I loved Nock.

39:19

Yeah. Well, it was just somebody

39:21

on stage and you would start with

39:23

a pause and you'd go, who's there?

39:26

That's it. Right now, sir, is who?

39:28

I don't get it. And so you never hear

39:30

the punch line of the joke because it's imaginary

39:32

friend telling it. And but I've

39:35

always as a kid from

39:37

since childhood, I love one side of conversations.

39:40

When there's somebody in a TV show who's got

39:42

down a phone call, is

39:44

primarily where you see this. But

39:46

I was always thinking about the actor. I'm like,

39:49

what are they imagining the other person

39:51

is saying? And as a viewer, you wanna

39:53

know, you you have to imply. I love the

39:55

puzzle of piecing together what the person

39:57

is saying to

39:58

them. I think that's really really fun.

40:01

As as an actor, you

40:03

can extend that into conversations that

40:05

were started off stage and then continue

40:07

on stage. And also when

40:10

one character is monologuing and they

40:12

get and gets cut off. Like,

40:14

you can tell community theater actor versus

40:16

professional actor because they will have actually

40:19

either in their mind written out or

40:22

actually physically written out what they were

40:24

going to say had they not been cut off or

40:26

what the other character is

40:27

saying. That's a little bit of acting 101

40:30

for you guys out there.

40:31

I love it.

40:32

Do your homework.

40:33

I love this relationship because of this one-sided

40:35

conversation so he has with her mother

40:37

who's just comatose and and

40:40

he's very mother

40:41

teenage daughter. Like, it's like mom, stop.

40:43

No. I will not. Go talk

40:45

to him. My mother's telekinetic too,

40:48

and so mother sometimes throws little

40:50

tantrums to make her point. So in this

40:52

first scene, we see her, like, I forget

40:54

what's happening in the conversation, but suddenly

40:57

a bunch of terror cards fly off the table and

40:59

Sophie looks over at them and it's like, you're gonna

41:01

you're gonna pick those up, mom? You gonna

41:03

pick those up? Oh, how about if I don't

41:06

bathe

41:06

you? Uh-oh. But

41:08

no, mom really wants to meet Ben Hawkins.

41:10

Mom seems to know about Ben Hawkins and be

41:12

a trracted to whatever power. Yeah.

41:15

So now we've got loads. Mom,

41:18

Samsung is also like, because

41:20

Samsung, I think is where he mentions that

41:22

you know, maybe Jones. He's like, I don't know

41:24

about this kid, you know, this newbie. And

41:28

147 management say? These are Rub,

41:30

and Samson always says, management says,

41:33

he was expected.

41:35

So we've got three or four characters that are

41:37

now getting even though he's brand

41:39

spanking new to the carnival, Ben

41:42

Hawkins, there's something he's marked. Whether

41:45

for good, for bad, but something

41:47

powerful about him boiling

41:49

under the surface. Absolutely.

41:52

We have a moment in this in

41:54

the scene where Ben, you know, Ben is trying to determine

41:56

whether or not to leave or not. Like, he's he clearly

41:59

is like, I just gotta get back home. I gotta save

42:01

my house even though saw bulldoze. You got

42:03

that, like, this is not where I belong. Like, you literally

42:05

you've abducted me. Oh, no.

42:08

Yeah. This this first episode really is primarily

42:10

about, like, finally accepting that

42:12

you belong in the freak show,

42:15

literally

42:15

metaphorically. Right? Did you catch that at one

42:18

point? I think when he has conversation with

42:20

Sophie. She literally goes

42:23

147 of us, question mark, which is

42:25

Yes. -- market from freaks. From

42:28

freaks because in freaks was the first time

42:30

that that the film freaks as a

42:32

black and white film that not only

42:34

were these, quote, freaks shown

42:37

as carnival sideshow freaks, but

42:39

it's from their point of view. They're the protagonist

42:41

of the film, and it's like the evil people

42:43

trying to manipulate them and like, there's

42:46

been a long time since I've seen freaks. So the

42:48

plot is little hazy, but they're

42:50

presented as people. They thought

42:52

they party. They they have

42:54

lives They're oh my god. They're actual

42:57

human beings. And, like,

43:00

Goobel, one of us, is one

43:02

of the best most quoted lines from

43:04

that film. But this TV

43:06

show knows its DNA, which

43:08

is always nice to

43:09

see. I wanted to point out there's a

43:11

scene with Samson talking to loads, and

43:13

loads is loads

43:16

is pouring himself an absinthe. He's got a

43:18

cold glass where he's pouring the absinthe over

43:20

the cube and spoon. And

43:22

I love this scene because it's, you know,

43:25

loads talking about Ben.

43:27

And it's like, this this boy is dangerous

43:30

because I've seen his dream and

43:32

Samson is saying, like, he's a fucking rub,

43:34

man. But loads is going on and on about

43:37

how he's seeing the dreams and this kid is special

43:39

blah blah blah. And you just see Michael j Anderson

43:41

as Samson just staring at the glass

43:44

of absinthe, which I think is a

43:46

funny moment. It's also interesting too

43:48

because as a person who really loves

43:50

you know, cocktails and things like that.

43:52

Absent was obviously banned

43:55

in during prohibition along with all

43:57

other alcohol in the United States, It

43:59

was not relegalized until two

44:01

thousand and seven. And even then, it's

44:03

like a different

44:04

version.

44:05

Like, you it's hard to get wormwood absence

44:07

absent or something like that? No. It's

44:09

still the same. It's all the same. It's still

44:11

wormwood. It's still whatever. It

44:14

it was similar to, like, marijuana,

44:18

you know, there's a there's a thing where people

44:21

had long since attributed really

44:24

old myths about what. What

44:26

absence does to you. The, like,

44:28

little like, the, like, borderline psychedelic,

44:31

little green fairy, like,

44:33

similar to opium. Honestly, opium is the other

44:36

kind of drug of the day in

44:38

this time period. You know? And honestly,

44:40

yeah, if you get fucked up on anything, yeah,

44:43

you might see little green men. You know, like, it you

44:45

get you drink enough of it, it might fuck

44:47

you up to that point of being quote psychedelic.

44:50

But there is a mysticism. There is a

44:52

visionary

44:53

drunk. Well, that's what I was gonna say. Is

44:55

is by showing this they're they're playing

44:58

on the mysticism of

45:00

Ed Grel and Poe and his absence or

45:02

whatever. Warm wood isn't going to

45:04

make you mad. Lots of

45:06

warm wood will make you mad. It's

45:09

the Toulouse Lattrec, like these people

45:11

who were But honestly, that's

45:13

where that's where visionaries artists

45:16

mystics. Like, it's they

45:18

all live in that thing of, like,

45:20

some days, their hungover

45:23

fuck, and you don't wanna deal with them. And other days,

45:25

they might tell you the truth about

45:27

the world as it

45:28

is. And it's always a bit of a crap

45:30

chute, what you're gonna get. Let's

45:33

talk about some of the characters in this

45:35

carnival. So we've got we've

45:37

already met loads and we've met Lila,

45:39

the of the bearded lady.

45:42

We're also gonna get the strong

45:44

man. Oh, yeah. Who is with

45:46

Ruthy? I forget the strong man's name.

45:48

I wrote it down,

45:49

so

45:49

I'll give her

45:50

seat. Gabriel, the strong man.

45:52

Ruthie, who is the snake

45:54

charmer, I believe, and is also Adrian

45:56

Barber. The

45:58

sexiest grandmother on television.

46:02

I mean, she's iconic. Like and I

46:04

was watching this with a friend of mine who's not big

46:06

movie guy. He's like, he's bad with names. I was like,

46:08

She's, like, escaped from

46:10

New York, swamping, the fog.

46:12

Like, she is, again, this DNA,

46:15

like, they understood when they cast a degree in

46:17

Barbbo, She's a bit of a scream queen.

46:19

Like her reputation in the seventies and

46:22

early m eighties was of like

46:24

a little bit trashy, but but she's

46:27

a phenomenal actor. Yeah.

46:29

And she's sexy as

46:30

fuck. So she got pigeonholed in these, like,

46:32

tough chick kind of roles. I

46:35

appreciate the representation of

46:38

young man attracted to older lady

46:40

in this the way Ben keeps looking at

46:42

her, spoiler alert, they

46:45

go there. Oh. Alright.

46:48

Very excited.

46:50

It's just nice to see it's nice to see yourself

46:52

represented out there. That's right. Okay. Oh,

46:54

and then also don't forget the the the

46:56

kuchy kuch family. The the family

46:58

kuch as I call them, which is

47:00

Stumpy, who's a bringer, he's

47:03

he's the like, hey, come on in and see the

47:05

woman danced so hot. It's gonna burn your

47:07

eyelids. His wife, Rita

47:09

Su, who I believe was later

47:11

on Rome, Like, I think she's

47:13

another actor of this time period who, like,

47:16

you would see her a lot in these kind

47:18

of, like, daring she

47:21

gets she gets naked, but she's like

47:23

so phenomenally beautiful and so

47:25

like a force of nature to watch in these

47:27

scenes. They have daughter Libby.

47:29

They have another daughter whose name I can't

47:31

remember, who's also sort of

47:33

the, like, it's just the family couch.

47:35

And they dance the huchy couch. Every

47:37

night. They're in the couch tent, as they refer

47:39

to it as, we've also got a couple

47:41

of other folks like the the

47:44

sword swallower, and there's kind of the the

47:46

man who the the big tall

47:48

man who's kind of

47:49

gruff. Looks a little bit like Bobon Marianavich.

47:52

Yeah. You've also got the the sort of the the

47:55

the lizard man who is,

47:57

you know, has a skin thing. So that way

47:59

he has to, like, you know, peel the scales off

48:01

who's also kinda bisexual.

48:03

So, hey, by representation. That's right.

48:05

That's right. You know? I love the

48:07

Coach tent scene because the first time we see

48:09

it, it's kind of it's weirdly seedy

48:11

because it's Ben walking through.

48:14

Like Ben is our eyes and ears on the ground

48:16

of this and it's Ben walking

48:18

into each tent and kind of seeing all the different acts.

48:20

And he comes into the cooch

48:22

tent, and it is dimly lit.

48:24

Everyone is smoking. It's like

48:27

a haze in the air. There is a man in the corner

48:29

cranking a little portable Vectrola playing

48:32

a cigar. Oh. You've spoken a cigar

48:34

while you have the barker kind of talking

48:37

about the ladies. And it's not

48:39

like, burlesque, it is just them kind

48:42

of like tip toe prancing around the stage,

48:44

showing off their top

48:45

toss, maybe touching each other,

48:47

Yeah. Maybe touching themselves, but

48:50

in, like, it's suggestive

48:53

and all of the men watching are just

48:55

quietly staring at smoking,

48:57

and it's it's weird.

49:00

I mean, I love it because listen, before

49:03

television, before the

49:05

internet, Before, this

49:07

is before the talkies. Everything

49:10

lived in your imagination. Think about that for

49:12

just one moment. Every kind of

49:14

media. Lived in your

49:16

imagination. The radio was

49:18

the is the the

49:21

great revelation of the day. Books,

49:24

records, movies

49:27

had, like, you know, like silent

49:29

films had just come out, but it's

49:32

it's in its infancy here. Right?

49:34

Maybe, like, maybe twenty five years old tops,

49:37

but like anything lived inside

49:40

your brain if you saw a beautiful

49:43

woman or a beautiful man. And

49:45

you wanted to, like, you know, like,

49:47

put that in your bank bank invest

49:49

that in your bank bank for lack of a better word?

49:52

You just gotta remember it. Yeah?

49:54

You can't just go to like, you know, w w

49:57

rent boys dot com, and just be like, oh, yeah. That

49:59

guy. You know? Yeah. Alright.

50:01

P rent boys dot com. No.

50:03

It's like and and it's so it has

50:05

this like twentieth century,

50:09

desperateness. Of

50:11

like these men, their eyeballs are

50:13

glued to these three women doing what

50:15

essentially is just like like you said sort of

50:17

prancing around in slightly

50:20

revealing under clothes. But

50:23

this is this is the

50:25

hottest thing that they have seen this

50:27

year and they're gonna have to wait

50:29

another

50:29

year. If they want to, like, re

50:31

up that bank memory.

50:33

So let's jump over to

50:36

the final piece of preacher

50:38

Justin from this opening episode,

50:40

which is he's again,

50:42

we see that he is waking from the same type

50:44

of scary dreams that Ben has had.

50:47

And you see him go out wandering

50:49

late at night and he's going past the Oki camps

50:52

and he comes across a bar

50:55

called mister Chins. And it is, like,

50:57

stylized, like, neon sign dragons

51:00

on it. It's very, like, kind

51:02

of, like, cheap looking Chinese

51:05

temple laid

51:08

onto, like, a really standard, just

51:10

shitty old bar in a downtown or a

51:12

suburban area. But it's popping, but it's popping.

51:14

Everybody's there. It is doing business

51:16

handover fist. And

51:18

there's a a Chinese woman kind

51:20

of, like, in your whole, like, dragon

51:22

lady get up who comes out and offers him

51:24

a good time.

51:25

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And

51:26

he declines and then

51:28

it starts to snow. And

51:31

then it starts to

51:32

rain. What looks like blood? Like,

51:34

it looks like it is red on his face.

51:36

What rain? Blood rain, and then

51:38

the neon sign of mister Chins explodes,

51:41

leaving only two lights left lit up

51:43

and they form a perfect

51:45

cross. And he starts

51:47

to pray. And this is where you're like brother

51:50

Justin, I know this is miraculous, but

51:52

also doesn't all this seem a bit

51:55

evil? Like And

51:57

this you're like, dude,

51:59

I don't know if you're on the side

52:01

of the the Lord here. You

52:04

know, it's like, do you remember, oh, Cal, what was that? Was

52:06

that the the the Vampire TV show that was

52:08

so

52:08

classy? They couldn't say the word vampires on Netflix?

52:11

Minnight mass midnight mass. This

52:13

is oh god. It's another midnight mass. Where I'm just

52:15

like, hey. Hey,

52:18

everyone. Look around.

52:21

Maybe that's not an angel of the

52:23

lord. Maybe that's

52:26

a vampire. Like Yeah. don't

52:28

know if you're fighting further rights. You know, it's that

52:30

mud. The the rest of the kids at the

52:32

hall, they're like, you know, like, we've got skulls

52:34

on our uniforms. That are we the baddies?

52:36

Oh,

52:36

that's Mitchell and Webb. Yeah. I feel like Yeah.

52:41

Like, are we the baddies? I think we might be the baddies.

52:43

Uh-oh. Wait. Why would you say that? We

52:45

we have skulls. And

52:48

I love brother Justin because they actually he

52:51

of after the three episodes, he does

52:53

actually sort of fully

52:55

integrate that into his

52:57

character, which I find really fascinating. So

53:00

final bit of this opening episode

53:02

is this. It goes from this taro reading,

53:04

Sophie Reed's, Ben's taro cards.

53:07

And he gets the moon, which she says is about

53:09

confusion and disclosure. And we

53:11

get flashbacks through all of these. So

53:13

we see that it is a flashback of him

53:15

as kid with a dead cat in his arms

53:17

and his mother is saying, like, did you go dig

53:19

that up? You're gonna get a disease, that

53:22

cat is dead, and

53:24

then we get Sophie drawing the death

53:26

card. And she goes, it doesn't mean death death.

53:28

It just means transformation. The

53:30

end of something, the beginning of something new.

53:33

Yeah. Because what had happened was,

53:36

this cat suddenly comes to life. And

53:38

mother's like holy shit, you are

53:40

marked, you are fucked, and she fucking

53:42

drowns this cat. Yeah.

53:44

And tells her son you are marked by

53:47

the

53:47

beast. Bully. Oh,

53:49

wire mother. Yep.

53:52

Yep. She's barbed wire mother.

53:54

Whole. She's barbed wire mother. She really is. Yeah.

53:56

That's beyond beyond. And then finally,

53:58

Sophie draws the magician card, but it

54:00

is reversed. It is upside down. And

54:03

she says, this means you have a great talent or

54:05

ability, but upside down

54:07

means it is unfulfilled. It's it's

54:10

gift you have kept hidden from

54:12

others. And we

54:14

see one more flashback of him with

54:16

this sick mom and her holding up

54:18

across to keep him in his name. Her.

54:21

Yeah. Okay. The

54:23

last thing we see is there's a we see the there's

54:25

a there's a lame girl, a girl who cannot walk who

54:27

sits in a

54:28

wagon. Yes. This is very important. This

54:29

is very important. We saw her earlier in the at

54:31

the carnival. She's in a writer,

54:33

wheelbarrow, her leg is this

54:36

doesn't work.

54:37

Yeah. We saw a really sweet

54:39

with Jonesie helping her into

54:42

the ferris wheel because Jonesie also

54:44

has a a limp. He also

54:46

has a brace on one of his legs. He

54:49

can walk, but he has a a disability

54:51

in his leg, and he helps this

54:53

girl up. But Ben

54:56

runs into this little girl,

54:57

Maddie. And it's important what's important to

54:59

say that this is, like,

55:01

like, Cleared Vault, like a lot of characters

55:03

are, like, are you in or are you

55:05

out? Like, kind of this episode

55:07

is building towards, is he in or out? And I think

55:09

we all know he's in, but he has to make

55:11

the choice. I'm in with

55:13

the carnival. Yes. And

55:15

he runs into this little girl and

55:18

she's like, Grammy says y'all are marked.

55:20

And he's like, no. We're not marked.

55:23

We're just we're just people. It's just a carnival.

55:25

Right? It's fine. And and he asked her about

55:27

her her disability. Like, have you always been

55:29

like that? And she says forever. And he says, does it hurt?

55:31

And she knots, yes. And then you

55:33

see the carnival leaving town without him, like,

55:35

I guess he's out. He's not in. And

55:38

he lays hands on Maddie's legs.

55:41

And we see a wide shot of him

55:43

kneeling over her her

55:45

sitting body and all of the plants

55:48

around them start to turn brown and

55:50

wilt and die. And

55:52

then he gets up and he runs off and catches

55:54

the caravan at the last second. And

55:56

we see a final shot of this girl and she stands

55:59

up. And runs after him

56:01

credits. And

56:02

as she's running yeah. As she's running, it's like she's

56:04

just sucking the life out of all the soybeans

56:06

around her. Yeah. Around her. Yep.

56:09

I love this setup. We get an explanation

56:12

in episode three about

56:14

the rule of your power means you can give

56:17

life to something but it takes life

56:19

from something

56:19

else. And you can take a little sip.

56:22

Like, and I think that's where, like, you get

56:24

the feeling, that's where, like, loads, concerts.

56:26

Like, I must train you. Don't you want me to

56:28

train you? And he's like, yeah. Fuck you. I don't want

56:30

it. You're you're crazy man. Yeah.

56:33

This is ultimately a superhero show.

56:35

Right? Like, it's with great power, it becomes

56:38

great responsibility. And how do you use

56:40

your power, rather

56:41

Justin, Ben Hawkins? Do

56:43

you use it all at once? Do you use it little by little?

56:45

That's the question. Episode two

56:48

after the ball is over. We've got

56:50

this opening scene and it is Ben and

56:52

Justin. Entering a diner

56:55

late at night, they sit

56:57

at the counter and they watch the whole scene

56:59

that's about to play out from the mirror

57:01

above the diner counter and

57:03

they see a man in top hat and tails

57:06

come in and he sits at a at a booth

57:08

near the window which has a full white tablecloth

57:11

and wine and

57:12

candles. You're like, uh-oh, we've

57:14

we've entered David Lynch surrealism, Dream

57:16

Territory. Like, you know right away you're like,

57:18

this ain't

57:19

real. This is like it's pretty

57:21

dreamlike imagery. Very dreamlike, and then

57:23

the soldier enters and sits across

57:25

from the fancy man. And Ben and

57:27

Justin are watching this all from the mirror, and then the

57:30

waitress says to them out loud every

57:32

prophet in his house. And the

57:34

window of the diner explodes in and

57:36

both Ben and Justin wake up in their separate

57:38

locations. So I'm like, fuck.

57:41

Now I gotta find out who these two guys are. I gotta

57:43

find out who my solver and fancy man

57:45

are. Right. Jeffrey, do you know do you know anything

57:47

about the the the the origin of that phrase

57:50

every prophet in in his house?

57:52

Is that I don't. It's

57:54

something I think I maybe have heard before,

57:56

but really, I I guess the idea

57:58

of, like, everything's right with the world,

58:01

you know, like, Like, there's many

58:03

prophets in this world, and each each prophet

58:05

in his house, he's in his, like, comfort

58:07

and, like, everything is correct. It's

58:10

the impression I got. But

58:12

I'd be curious to know, like, you know, you know, you

58:15

and I both love, like, etymology and,

58:17

like, origins or phrases and things like

58:19

that. I'd be curious to know more about that phrase

58:21

every prophet in his house and, like, where that

58:23

came from. Yeah. I think it means

58:26

to I'm gonna I'm gonna tell you

58:28

from just a quick Google Search. I'm

58:30

coming up on Quora, which is kind

58:32

of like a Reddit lifestyle q and a sort

58:34

of site. But it comes from

58:36

Mark. Chapter six

58:39

verse four. Oh, it isn't the BBLA.

58:41

Yeah. BBLA Jesus said unto them a prophet

58:43

is not without honor. But in his

58:45

own country and among his own kin and

58:47

in his own house. Oh,

58:50

okay. I'm gonna guess that that's probably

58:52

referring to every prophet.

58:55

Has his place in the

58:56

world, and it is to do good

58:59

in the world. But

59:00

also also kind of bit seen epobic,

59:02

but whatever. No. No. No.

59:03

No. No. No. No.

59:06

Listen. That

59:07

was a real armchair dissection

59:10

of that of that afraid. By me

59:12

just now. Okay. So

59:15

we're gonna get another kind of supernaturally element

59:17

then being new to the carnival. Jonesy's

59:21

like, yeah, you're in charge of the baggage

59:23

trailers just around back

59:24

there.

59:25

I love this whole thing. This is great.

59:27

I love this episode. I do

59:29

too because I love

59:32

being confused by the

59:35

writing. You know, the write the

59:37

writers deliberately confuse

59:39

you in the way that Jonese confuses Ben

59:41

because he goes back there and there is a baggage

59:43

trailer. And there is a whole bunch

59:46

of cool junk and I'm like, wait, why

59:48

is this here? I don't understand. What a

59:50

weird thing? Like, this looks like props. But

59:53

he opens this old suitcase and he finds

59:55

the top tails and top hat that man

59:57

was wearing. He finds this

1:00:00

photograph of a woman,

1:00:03

and it

1:00:03

says, h s and flow

1:00:06

handwritten on the back. And she's like stating in

1:00:08

front of like a truck this is like big sky something.

1:00:10

Big sky farms. Big sky farms. Yeah.

1:00:12

But it is very important to him this

1:00:14

photograph, and we're gonna find out why at a

1:00:16

moment. And so he comes he's in there

1:00:18

for while and he comes back out and Sam says, like, where

1:00:20

the fuck have you been? And he's like, well, was doing

1:00:22

the baggage trailer. And he's like, well, no, you didn't because

1:00:24

that's just a Snipe hunt. That's the thing we do

1:00:26

to all the new people. It's to fuck with you. Jones,

1:00:29

he's fucking with you. He's like, no. No. I was just there.

1:00:31

It goes to show him that that baggage trailer

1:00:33

is not there. But he does

1:00:35

have the photograph to say

1:00:38

I have this and, you know, there's

1:00:40

this and you see on Samson's face he

1:00:42

knows who that is. This is where he

1:00:44

own. This is where he asks that curtain we see Samson

1:00:46

back in his trailer, in

1:00:49

his office. And he turns around to the just

1:00:51

that closed curtain. He's like, the hell

1:00:53

are you up

1:00:54

to?

1:00:54

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Okay.

1:00:58

So we've got Justin's Church.

1:01:02

And we've got more and more Oki

1:01:04

showing up at this church. Oh, the

1:01:06

eve the the it's expanding like

1:01:08

Lowe's and fishes. Let's stick with

1:01:10

let's stick with Justin's story, and then we'll come

1:01:12

back and do all of Ben's story. What do you think of

1:01:14

this? Just since the the show is divided.

1:01:16

Top it up. Yeah. Shop it up. So let's just

1:01:18

do all of Justin's story. So this is

1:01:21

Eleanor and she's brought her whole family and Eleanor

1:01:23

does look like she's on the righteous

1:01:25

path. That's what she tells her family. She appears

1:01:27

to be like, you know what, this this preacher

1:01:29

set me right with God. I mean, honestly,

1:01:31

she just vomited up two hundred

1:01:33

dollars in, like, Susan b Anthony

1:01:35

dollars. So, yeah, I'd be a

1:01:38

bit moved as well,

1:01:40

I think. And and Justin

1:01:42

looks really pleased by

1:01:44

this. Like, he was doing his job

1:01:46

as a shepherd of the Lord. Right? He brought

1:01:48

people in. He found a way to take a person

1:01:50

and convert her soul or

1:01:52

at least to turn her around from

1:01:54

feversy to praising God, whatever.

1:01:58

So He sees them off and then

1:02:00

we meet Carol Timberland.

1:02:02

Businessman, Carol Timberland, who

1:02:04

says to brother Justin, It's getting a

1:02:06

bit crowded in there these days.

1:02:09

I love white people in Ewendo. When they're

1:02:11

like, it's like being living in

1:02:13

the south as I do now, I'm just like,

1:02:15

just I know what you're saying. Oh,

1:02:18

god. This passive aggressive bullshit is

1:02:21

no. I want no part of this. So

1:02:23

we're gonna have a meeting with mister Templeton

1:02:25

and Justin Carol Templeton and Justin later,

1:02:27

but there is a moment where Justin

1:02:30

and Iris go to eat lunch.

1:02:33

And it turns out to be that same diner from his

1:02:35

dream. And this is Norman. So this

1:02:37

is kind of the higher up in the

1:02:39

church guy. Who

1:02:41

Norman seems much more laid

1:02:43

back and Jolly more of the

1:02:45

world, kind of a normal guy. He's

1:02:47

like he's real proud of the car. He bought a new

1:02:49

car. You know, he's he's like he doesn't

1:02:51

live for Jesus. He lives for life

1:02:54

and Jesus is a part of his

1:02:55

life. You know?

1:02:56

Jesus is his job.

1:02:57

Yeah. Yeah. But there is a moment where

1:03:00

they he keeps talking about we've heard a couple

1:03:02

times even in the carnival where they're talking about

1:03:04

babe Ruth and just hit his 700th home

1:03:06

run. Like, no one ever catch this. The

1:03:09

theme of this is

1:03:12

there's one. There's a special one

1:03:14

in the world.

1:03:14

They're every generation. Special one. Every

1:03:17

generation. That's what Norman says when

1:03:19

he's like, why wouldn't I think this is?

1:03:22

Why wouldn't Abraham be a sign from God?

1:03:24

I think it's a great point like, why would, if

1:03:26

God does signs, why wouldn't he

1:03:28

put signs in baseball? Right? Why

1:03:31

wouldn't he put signs everywhere? Yeah. And it's

1:03:33

material. It's fodder for Sunday,

1:03:35

preach, like, you know, like, why not preach

1:03:38

to the masses? Like, say, listen, there's

1:03:40

exceptional people in this world. Like,

1:03:43

Jesus appear You know, God makes himself

1:03:45

known through baseball, through gardening, through

1:03:47

whatever the fuck it is. But,

1:03:49

you know, like, approach the

1:03:52

church for your congregation

1:03:55

rather than approaching it for this, like, you

1:03:57

know, like, ah Jesus talked to me

1:03:59

personally kind of, you know, it's it's really fascinating

1:04:02

this dichotomy that's being set up of like

1:04:04

who is your church for, brother

1:04:06

Justin. Is it for you? Is

1:04:09

it for the migrants? Is it for

1:04:11

the upper middle class of California?

1:04:14

You gotta pick? And so Justin

1:04:16

and mister Timberland have their meeting. And Justin

1:04:19

puts that message together with the

1:04:21

prophetic vision he had at mister Chen's

1:04:23

that his hallucination or whatever

1:04:26

it was, And he tells

1:04:28

Justin or Justin tells mister

1:04:30

Templeton. He's like, you know, these migrants need a place

1:04:32

of their own to worship. Mister Timberlands,

1:04:34

like, absolutely, get them out of my church. Oh,

1:04:36

yeah. God, get it. Yeah. I don't wanna smell them,

1:04:39

you know. But Justin's like, no. No. No. I

1:04:41

want a special place for them, and

1:04:43

he says, I want mister Chen's bar

1:04:45

which you own. And you're

1:04:48

going to give it to me. And you're going to

1:04:50

give it to Oh, get it

1:04:52

Brown.

1:04:52

Oh, he's like, oh, he's so strong in

1:04:54

the scene. And Timberland gets and then

1:04:57

it's like, you know, it's just it's not

1:04:59

for sale. Good day to you, sir. Good luck with

1:05:01

that mentality. And --

1:05:04

Uh-huh. -- Justin grabs him. Lights

1:05:06

change,

1:05:07

and now we are inside the

1:05:10

history of mister Templeton. This

1:05:12

this reminds me a lot of stranger

1:05:15

things. Does this in which it's like it

1:05:17

goes from like very naturalistic to

1:05:20

like like, very, you

1:05:22

know, very stylized blackness. Uh-huh.

1:05:24

And so, like, the Dragon lady agent,

1:05:26

you know, it sort of saunters out of seemingly

1:05:29

nothing. You know, it becomes very theatrical

1:05:32

and it's

1:05:32

spooky. It's super spooky. Yeah.

1:05:35

We get that we get that that trope, that

1:05:37

stereotype of the of the Dragon lady

1:05:39

coming you

1:05:40

know, out to speak to

1:05:42

mister Timberland, and then we sort of

1:05:44

follow her into the club.

1:05:46

And we see inside of mister Chen's

1:05:48

now, which is, you see gambling

1:05:50

and prostitution and all kinds of

1:05:53

shady dealings and

1:05:54

drugs. It's also like the it's also very ghost

1:05:56

of Christmas. Past. It's totally

1:05:58

One of the places, like, look like,

1:06:00

literally brother Justin is standing with

1:06:02

him, and he's like, look over there.

1:06:04

And it's him. Accepting a bribe

1:06:07

and I was like, oh, these

1:06:09

are your children want and

1:06:12

whatever ignorance. Look on them

1:06:14

that you may know them better. It's like, okay.

1:06:17

Okay. It is it is very goes to

1:06:19

Christmas past. And but

1:06:21

it it's way darker shockingly

1:06:23

dark because we follow him upstairs

1:06:26

to the room where he has

1:06:28

some kind of sexual thing waiting for

1:06:30

him and you're waiting for He's like, I'm hungry,

1:06:33

what's on the menu? And I'm like, is

1:06:35

it gonna be a room full of women? Is it going

1:06:37

to be a

1:06:38

man? Is it go No. It's

1:06:40

a fucking little boy, and I I

1:06:42

was like No. Yeah.

1:06:44

They went there. Whoa. They did

1:06:46

go there. And then all of

1:06:48

this snaps to an immediate halt.

1:06:51

They're back in the living room. Justin

1:06:53

and Carol. Justin mister Templeton.

1:06:56

Mister Templeton just looking shocked

1:06:59

and horrified And Iris

1:07:01

just pops into the

1:07:02

room. She's like, I made lemonade for you all.

1:07:04

Oh, cold lemonade, which, like,

1:07:07

nice and soothing after an after a

1:07:09

short trip to hell, You know what I love?

1:07:11

A nice cold glass and lemonade.

1:07:14

Oh, coming off of that scene inside

1:07:16

of that room, I laughed so

1:07:18

hard. Amy Madigan right

1:07:20

here.

1:07:20

Yeah. Oh, but sure enough, he

1:07:22

gets mister Chins. Yeah. He

1:07:24

does. We see this you

1:07:27

know, at at at kind of the close, we see

1:07:29

him go to mister Chen's late

1:07:31

at night, and the

1:07:33

Calvar is closed. It's empty. There's no more people

1:07:35

there. It's going to be a church. He kind does a

1:07:38

mock sermon on the little stage. So, like,

1:07:40

welcome to our new home. Like, he's just so

1:07:42

excited and happy. He's he's

1:07:44

imagining, looking out at

1:07:46

the imaginary crowd, imagining

1:07:48

all the good he can do. And this is

1:07:50

interspersed with scenes of mister Templeton

1:07:52

driving his fancy car out into some distant

1:07:55

pasture and just shooting himself in the

1:07:57

head.

1:07:57

Yeah. Well. And then Justin returns

1:07:59

home to Iris, and he says, we have a new

1:08:01

church. Brother

1:08:03

Templeton donated it to us. Oh

1:08:05

oh, wow. That's unexpected. And

1:08:08

this is such an interesting scene because he

1:08:10

says I've been chosen to lead The

1:08:12

Lord spoke to me and I have been chosen to lead

1:08:14

our new congregation, the migrants.

1:08:16

And she says, praise the Lord, and he says,

1:08:20

Amen and the Amen just turns

1:08:22

into sobbing, which I

1:08:24

thought was really interesting,

1:08:25

like, that feeling of, like, do you want

1:08:27

to do this? Uh-huh. Do

1:08:29

you know what you're doing? And

1:08:31

and she has, like, the way she looks at

1:08:33

him, it's like she doesn't comfort him,

1:08:36

but you get the impression that this has been

1:08:38

their

1:08:38

relationship. For a very long time.

1:08:41

Yeah. She's a

1:08:44

bit of an enabler. One must say. She's

1:08:46

a bit of an enabler. She knows that he's

1:08:48

just going to boys. Will be boys as kind

1:08:50

of this kind of way.

1:08:52

It's a vague way in which she bathed. And

1:08:54

he goes upstairs. Takes

1:08:57

off his shirt. Neil's on the ground.

1:08:59

This reminds me of what's the character's

1:09:01

stylist from

1:09:03

DaVinci Code. Oh, yeah. Or Sweeney

1:09:05

Todd or the judge from Sweeney Todd?

1:09:07

Yeah. Flogging his own back with

1:09:10

the Flog Earth a little freaking finesse a a red

1:09:12

Grey from the levels. Yeah. Do you have, like,

1:09:14

I must purge this I must purge the

1:09:16

flesh to make the spirit clean

1:09:18

-- Yes. -- and listen. Okay.

1:09:22

Sure. But also, out

1:09:25

of all the pantheon of hobbies, that

1:09:27

is really It's it's

1:09:29

a

1:09:29

lot. Yeah.

1:09:30

But I love it doesn't end there. Like, I

1:09:32

mean, that's salacious enough, but it it

1:09:34

ends with Iris

1:09:37

sitting one room over, listening to what

1:09:39

a hand, you know, what like, my mirror, my

1:09:41

God to be on the radio, doing her needle

1:09:43

point, like sort of like hearing

1:09:45

the flesh. She's like, oh, he's flogging

1:09:47

again. Well, I guess he'll

1:09:50

work it out, but un

1:09:52

perturbed, undisturbed.

1:09:54

Fascinating. Perfect. Like, pitch

1:09:56

perfect these two. She reminds

1:09:58

me so much if if if you

1:10:00

or anyone out there listening watched the

1:10:02

most recent season of Fargo

1:10:04

with Jesse Buckley in it. Oh, no.

1:10:07

And even There's a real like,

1:10:09

can see the connection, the DNA between

1:10:11

Iris and Jesse Buckley's

1:10:13

character from Fargo. Like, there's a,

1:10:16

you know, that Jesse Buckley is playing a

1:10:18

character that has is hiding

1:10:20

so much. From the rest of the world,

1:10:23

and it's great. But her general

1:10:25

outward demeanor is a little bit more closed

1:10:27

like what Amy Madigan is doing here.

1:10:29

But it makes me so much more excited about

1:10:32

Iris, the character here because it

1:10:34

is the type of person that has so

1:10:36

much more in her than she

1:10:38

will let you

1:10:39

know.

1:10:39

Yeah. What secrets is he hiding behind

1:10:41

that nice Church Lady exterior. Yeah.

1:10:45

Back with Ben. What Ben learns

1:10:47

is is that you know, Ben

1:10:49

takes this photo to Ruthy, and

1:10:52

so we do learn that this and he

1:10:54

says it out loud to people that this

1:10:56

is my

1:10:57

mother. In this photo. This

1:10:59

this is this is my this

1:11:00

is Imagine the odds. Yeah.

1:11:03

And Ruthie tells him that, like, oh, well,

1:11:05

that HS is Henry Scudder.

1:11:08

Who used to be used to be the strong

1:11:10

man? No. I think he was a nuss I think

1:11:13

he was another mentalist or mentalist.

1:11:15

No. It's it's listen.

1:11:17

The rep spoiler, the rest of

1:11:19

this season is going could

1:11:21

be called looking searching for Scudder.

1:11:24

Yeah. Like, really, it like,

1:11:26

the search for Scudder is a huge

1:11:28

part of season one. Mhmm. And

1:11:30

it gets a bit old. I'm not gonna lie. It

1:11:32

gets a little bit like, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Maybe

1:11:35

that was your dad. Maybe it wasn't your dad. Maybe

1:11:38

other things that I won't talk to you if you wanna

1:11:40

continue this journey on your own. But

1:11:42

let's stay in the urine now and maybe not

1:11:44

look so much back to the past. You know?

1:11:47

Why don't you do some

1:11:47

things? This show doesn't feel

1:11:50

like it has as much

1:11:52

material as the length and number

1:11:54

of episodes indicates. There's

1:11:56

a lot of, especially with Ben, unlike

1:11:59

Justin. Justin is always doing

1:12:01

a thing. Even if he if even if he's following

1:12:03

the Lord's visions or messages

1:12:06

to him, he's constantly taking steps forward

1:12:08

whereas Ben is searching for a thing.

1:12:10

And Ben also does not let

1:12:12

anyone in these first three episodes does

1:12:14

not let anyone else into his world except

1:12:16

in little bits and pieces. He asks a couple

1:12:19

never goes to the

1:12:19

library. No. You know, we talk about going

1:12:22

to the library on this on the show

1:12:24

a lot of, like, is your family

1:12:26

plagued by a ghost? Are there werewolves

1:12:28

in your neighborhood? Why don't you seek

1:12:30

out an expert? And believe what

1:12:32

they

1:12:32

say? And and fucking

1:12:34

Ben never does that. Now, he's

1:12:37

he's the frustrating character of like constantly

1:12:39

won't talk, so there's so many conversations when

1:12:41

Ben there, especially between him and Sophie, like,

1:12:43

why won't you tell me? And this is how all

1:12:45

the audience feels and we get exhausted by

1:12:47

it? And so if he's like, something's up with you,

1:12:49

he's like, nothing's up with me. And I'm like, Bitch,

1:12:52

if you just told her, like, five

1:12:54

sentences of

1:12:55

truth, we could fast forward to, like,

1:12:57

season two episode three. Just

1:12:59

saying, he has this dream Ben

1:13:02

does. Again of this World War

1:13:04

147 scene and there's and the trenches,

1:13:06

and the trenches and there's the soldier that

1:13:09

we saw earlier?

1:13:11

This is not Scudder but this is the soldier.

1:13:13

Scudder was the man in top hat and tails.

1:13:15

But we do see Scudder

1:13:17

in military garb. Yes. Or

1:13:19

something or something. I I don't

1:13:21

quite understand what happens, but there's

1:13:23

some kind of beast that

1:13:25

attacks the soldier in the trenches,

1:13:28

and the beast is wearing some type of,

1:13:30

like, hat or

1:13:32

shalt It's wearing a hat

1:13:34

with scarf on it with Russian lettering.

1:13:36

There you go. Okay. It happened so

1:13:38

fast. Well, and do you do you know what kind of

1:13:40

beast it was? I don't. What

1:13:43

was oh, do we not get there? It's a bear.

1:13:46

Okay. It I did write that it looks like giant

1:13:48

bear. It but it really it really does. I think that's

1:13:50

episode two, maybe going into episode

1:13:53

three. Episode three, you see a little bit more.

1:13:55

But it really does leave as a cliffhanger because

1:13:58

here's the thing. Jeffrey, here's the thing.

1:14:00

So so like, you know, like, why is

1:14:02

there a bear in the trenches absurdism?

1:14:05

Right? But then Ben wakes up

1:14:07

from this and then sees that hat

1:14:09

with the Russian lettering

1:14:11

on management's trailer.

1:14:13

Is management a bear? Right.

1:14:16

That's the final shot of this episode

1:14:18

is that thing. But when he wakes up from the

1:14:20

stream, yeah, we don't get the bear in the first three episodes.

1:14:23

We get this shot. Episode three doesn't deal with

1:14:25

it at all, but something beastly. But

1:14:27

something beastly. But when he wakes up from the

1:14:29

stream, the first thing he

1:14:31

sees is Sophie's mom

1:14:34

walking toward him. That's right.

1:14:36

And she's holding out her hand and she

1:14:38

claps his hand and says,

1:14:41

you're the one. And then she

1:14:43

collapses. And meanwhile, Sophie finds her mom

1:14:45

missing, goes in panics. Everybody

1:14:47

sees Ben with Sophie's collapsed

1:14:49

mom outside.

1:14:50

What did you do? What did you do? Yeah. And

1:14:52

the other start beating Ben up. We've

1:14:54

got Abriel, the strong man punching the shit out

1:14:56

of him. Jonesie is real real

1:14:58

pissed. Oh, because by the way, there's a

1:15:01

weird brother sister father,

1:15:03

daughter, boyfriend, girlfriend vibes,

1:15:06

like a little cock block between

1:15:08

Jonesie and Sophie that goes on way

1:15:10

too

1:15:10

long, by the way. It is ruthy

1:15:13

that and and Samsung actually, Samsung

1:15:15

that tells everyone to let the boy go, and we

1:15:17

pretty much surmise that that's management.

1:15:19

Telling him to tell them that. That

1:15:22

Samsung doesn't actually know why we should protect

1:15:24

the boy other than management says

1:15:26

so. But but it's affected that, like, you

1:15:28

know, the woman who never moves, has

1:15:31

moved and gone right to

1:15:32

him. Has

1:15:33

moved and nobody saw it except Ben.

1:15:35

Uh-huh. Yeah.

1:15:36

So so powerful but questionable.

1:15:38

So this is where Ruthy I

1:15:40

love the scene where Ruthy takes him

1:15:42

in and puts alcohol on

1:15:45

his wounds and, you know, dresses

1:15:47

his wounds and and cloth mother.

1:15:49

You know, cloth mother, she gives him tenderness.

1:15:52

And she believes Ben that he didn't

1:15:54

do this to to Sophie's mom that

1:15:57

I also like that as he's getting dressed,

1:15:59

he's putting a shirt accom, you see Ruthy

1:16:02

eyeing him, which is great. He's

1:16:04

like, whoo. I love a skinny white boy.

1:16:06

This is where we get the info about his mom

1:16:08

and and Hank scudder. And

1:16:10

then finally, he leaves and I love this

1:16:12

as he's leaving. There's Gabriel Gabriel

1:16:15

the strong

1:16:15

man. Sitting in, like, a little folding

1:16:18

chair outside the tent.

1:16:19

I know. Being like, well, my

1:16:21

my girlfriend, my wife said, I can't come back

1:16:23

in until you're out. And It's

1:16:26

really sweet. But no, Gabriel's his Gabriel's

1:16:28

her her son. Oh, I thought they

1:16:30

were partners. That's her

1:16:31

son. Oh, I'm pretty sure that's

1:16:33

her son. So, like, now she has, like, a surrogate

1:16:36

son in Ben. And

1:16:38

so they form a brother brother

1:16:40

relationship. But it's no. Yeah. It's --

1:16:42

Great. Great. -- it's okay. Yeah. But it's much more

1:16:44

like oh, well, mom's getting her candle

1:16:47

wet, you know. She's getting her

1:16:48

candle, you know, yeah, getting

1:16:50

her groove on with this young kid.

1:16:52

So I guess I'll sit here and carve a

1:16:55

airplane or something -- Yeah. -- out

1:16:57

of soap. And then at the final shot

1:16:59

of this episode, we see that creepy Dream

1:17:01

Air pat or

1:17:03

whatever. Which is like then

1:17:05

dropped for the length of a bible and never

1:17:07

really picked up again. It's it's

1:17:09

shades of the polar bear and the smoke monster

1:17:11

in loss total. You know, and which are just like,

1:17:13

what? This is amazing. But

1:17:16

please take less time than four

1:17:18

seasons to get back to

1:17:20

this. Please. And and

1:17:22

to what I said earlier about, like, the show feels

1:17:24

like it doesn't have the material to fill

1:17:26

the space that it's been given, the

1:17:28

show is coming out right at the same time

1:17:30

if not a little bit before lost. think

1:17:33

lost debuted in two thousand four. And,

1:17:35

you know, we're still new to

1:17:37

this era where we can We

1:17:40

we don't fully understand that DVDs

1:17:43

by mail are about to happen or just starting

1:17:45

to happen. Oh, my God. Netflix by

1:17:47

mail. And two, we're

1:17:49

far away from the idea that streaming

1:17:51

any of this shit can happen. So the notion

1:17:53

that you could binge watch anything that's

1:17:56

not a VHS box set that

1:17:58

your aunt gave you for Christmas of Seinfeld

1:18:00

season four. Yep. We're

1:18:02

not making shows like this. So this show

1:18:04

is is in the early era

1:18:06

of that. So it doesn't quite know how to

1:18:08

play classic prime time

1:18:10

television versus bingeable

1:18:13

television, which is an extended

1:18:15

film basically. Like I said, it's

1:18:17

very on the

1:18:17

cusp. And actually for this for

1:18:20

this week, I did the old school

1:18:22

thing of I watched one episode a night,

1:18:24

waited twenty four hours, watched another episode,

1:18:27

waited another twenty four hours, and I found

1:18:29

that it affected my

1:18:31

psyche. Like, if I could let it sink in

1:18:34

a little more because it didn't

1:18:36

have let's say, the, you know,

1:18:38

the the amount of material for

1:18:42

was it so tightly packed as

1:18:44

these shows would later become with the sopranos

1:18:46

with, you know, like with all these other kind of

1:18:48

shows in which you're like, oh my god. Like Game of Thrones.

1:18:51

Seriously, Jeffrey, I remember bingeing an

1:18:53

entire season of Game of Thrones with Symphony.

1:18:56

Over the course of, like, two days. Uh-huh. And

1:18:59

twenty four hours later, I could not tell you a single

1:19:01

thing that happened on that show. Yeah. Because

1:19:04

when you do binge these shows, you're

1:19:06

in it, you're very much present,

1:19:09

but you retain very little,

1:19:11

you know? Let's get into this last

1:19:14

episode

1:19:14

here. Yeah. But

1:19:15

this is but this is worth it to, like, maybe

1:19:17

tease it out.

1:19:18

Yeah. Definitely. So

1:19:21

Episode three, Tipton. They're

1:19:23

all up in the in the Tipton, Missouri.

1:19:25

And so we've got let's let's start

1:19:27

with Justin, and then we'll go to Ben. But Justin

1:19:30

Justin is we've got the new dignity ministry

1:19:33

at the old mister Chen's. I

1:19:35

love this so much because it's it's a pretty full

1:19:37

house of it looks like Oki's

1:19:39

migrants, Chinese

1:19:41

workers, people like that. And

1:19:45

they're singing, give me that old time

1:19:47

religion. And this is

1:19:50

more it's tentative, but it's

1:19:52

a little bit more soulful. Right? This is bunch of,

1:19:54

you know, it's it's people who are, like,

1:19:56

needing the love of God. They're needing

1:19:58

the voice of God because shit has gone wrong. And

1:20:00

here's fucking iris up at the front being,

1:20:02

like, give me that all time.

1:20:05

Give me that all time. It's

1:20:07

like so smile -- Shar bodies. -- precise.

1:20:10

Yeah. Big smile, and it is not

1:20:12

matching what this congregation is doing

1:20:14

at all. She is trying

1:20:16

to lead through

1:20:18

conducting, but it is not working. The

1:20:20

bit of a silk per salzier kind

1:20:22

of vibes from her point of

1:20:24

view. Yeah. Yeah. But but

1:20:26

listen, her brother has her brother is

1:20:28

leading her there, so dutifully she follows.

1:20:30

Totally. This is where we meet the councilman,

1:20:33

Ned Munson and

1:20:36

Val Templeton who we learn

1:20:38

is the

1:20:39

cousin, I believe, of Carol

1:20:41

Templeton. Like, it's all very, like,

1:20:43

the local, like,

1:20:45

the the mayor, the the the this

1:20:47

this the city council kind

1:20:50

of

1:20:50

vibes. The rich people. The

1:20:52

more important part is that

1:20:54

Val Templeton here is

1:20:56

played by Otheau

1:20:58

from Betel Juice.

1:20:59

That's a side note. Right? Yes. Yes. Yes.

1:21:01

And he has that voice that is instantly recognized.

1:21:03

Imizable. He's so good. Eleven. It's

1:21:06

so funny. And he and he's comedically,

1:21:08

his timing is impeccable, by the

1:21:10

way. So good. Yeah.

1:21:13

They basically say, you know, cool

1:21:15

that you built this, so let's have a conversation and

1:21:17

their conversation is like, you

1:21:19

know, they show him around, show him everything that they've

1:21:21

been doing, and it's it's interesting

1:21:23

because they make him show

1:21:25

everything that they're doing and and what he's

1:21:27

showing them is

1:21:29

the dormitories for like the migrant children,

1:21:32

the Chinese children, migrant

1:21:34

workers, things like that. Saying,

1:21:37

like, there these will be, like, basically, like dormitories

1:21:39

for people to stay. And while they're here at my

1:21:41

ministry, I'm giving them shelter essentially

1:21:43

right here in the middle of town. And

1:21:46

they're like, oh, well, you know, we

1:21:48

meant to tell you that this block is slated

1:21:50

for demolition next

1:21:52

month.

1:21:52

We're tearing all this down. Sorry. But

1:21:55

you know what? It's not a problem. There's an

1:21:57

old roadhouse about five miles out of town.

1:21:59

We're gonna give it to you. We're just gonna give

1:22:01

it to you. We'd never take a thing and then leave

1:22:03

you with nothing. And he says,

1:22:06

I know what you're doing. You just don't

1:22:08

want the okis and the immigrants in your

1:22:10

city. You don't want them near

1:22:12

you. Is this where he says, he's just like,

1:22:14

No. Yeah. Yeah.

1:22:17

And and literally they're like, I'm sorry,

1:22:19

what? And, like, this is where you start to see,

1:22:21

like, the real brother and come out where he's just

1:22:23

like, nope. Do

1:22:25

not accept your offer. And

1:22:27

they're like, yeah, but he's

1:22:28

like, no. It's so good.

1:22:30

And Otheau leans in

1:22:32

and he's like, I tell you something, sir,

1:22:35

that we just made you a very kind

1:22:37

offer. And if you refuse

1:22:40

it, what's gonna happen is imminent domain,

1:22:42

which is where the city says,

1:22:45

we'll just pay you you

1:22:48

an offer you can't refuse. We'll give you the value

1:22:50

of your building and send you on your way and bulldoze

1:22:52

whole thing and the value of your building is

1:22:55

about fifty dollars and a

1:22:56

fart. I don't forget what he says, but it's like

1:22:58

a yeah. Something to that. Yeah. Something like that. Yeah. It's

1:23:01

it's all it's all like white it's like,

1:23:03

you know, white male bullshit. Like,

1:23:05

ustering. Yeah. It's

1:23:05

totally like government mafia.

1:23:07

What we have

1:23:07

here is a failure to communicate

1:23:10

cannibal shit, you know. And Justin

1:23:12

takes Justin takes a moment with

1:23:14

Iris in the hallway and he gets real

1:23:16

worked up because Iris is like take this offer and

1:23:18

he's like, no. Yeah. This is

1:23:21

giving you land. More land.

1:23:23

The Lord gave me this vision, and this

1:23:25

is what I will do, and he is so emphatic that

1:23:27

fucking in the other room, Val Templeton has

1:23:29

a goddamn heart attack.

1:23:31

And this is where this is where and,

1:23:33

like, this is where you watch

1:23:35

brother Justin. And he's like,

1:23:37

oh, Did you have a heart attack?

1:23:39

Like, he is not surprised, but

1:23:42

you for the first time you see Iris

1:23:45

see that reaction and you go

1:23:47

oh shit. She knows he

1:23:50

knows that he's magic. And

1:23:53

does she think he's magic? Does she

1:23:55

know? Like, but this is where you start to see that

1:23:57

this relationship bloom a little

1:23:59

bit. So let's talk about Ben's story.

1:24:01

We're in Tipton, Missouri, and

1:24:03

we've got you know, we're setting and we're

1:24:06

setting the whole thing up. Ben in town

1:24:08

sees a a truck that says big sky

1:24:10

farms, so that's from that photo. So

1:24:12

that's gonna send him on this

1:24:13

way. You have found a clue.

1:24:16

But the

1:24:16

other thing that happens is two

1:24:18

things, two key moments to the plot of this episode

1:24:20

147, see Lyle Donovan,

1:24:23

the Sheriff of this town, and he

1:24:25

has a conversation with Samson. As Samson

1:24:27

is setting up the tent for the carnival,

1:24:29

and we get the sense Lyle is an old friend

1:24:31

they've been through Tipton before. Lyle's

1:24:34

hung out with

1:24:34

them. But Lyle now is the sheriff

1:24:36

of the town. Let's just say he has

1:24:38

he has the mustache that only a Sheriff

1:24:40

could

1:24:40

have. Like for the moment he appears, I'm like,

1:24:42

that's a that's a law abiding mustache

1:24:44

right there. And now with his newfound

1:24:47

position and responsibility for the people

1:24:49

of this town, Lyle is

1:24:52

telling Samson he can't open your

1:24:54

carnival. Yeah. I know what you do.

1:24:56

I know what you do. You shake people down for money.

1:24:58

You know, Samson's really

1:25:00

thrown back. Like motherfucker, like, our old friend

1:25:03

turned sheriff and now he won't let us do Well, so the

1:25:05

other thing that happens is Ben is in town

1:25:07

noticing big sky farms and the little

1:25:09

girl from episode one sees him.

1:25:11

It's like mama, that's the man who healed me.

1:25:14

And they rushed to him like the lepers to

1:25:16

Jesus. And he's like, wait, the

1:25:18

Sheriff said, we can't do a

1:25:20

carnival show but

1:25:23

we can do a revival show.

1:25:26

We will totally do a revival show.

1:25:29

I love theater people because they are

1:25:31

scrupulous

1:25:32

ness, scrupulous, unscrupulous,

1:25:35

ill scrupulous, whatever that word is. And I love

1:25:37

this because Jonesie is

1:25:39

the preacher of the revival show.

1:25:43

And it's been that they're gonna put

1:25:45

into Hank Scutters,

1:25:47

Tuxedo, and put a bunch of pamod

1:25:49

in her in his hair, so he's going to look just

1:25:51

like But, Jonesie,

1:25:55

this is theater people because Jonesie, it's

1:25:58

pretty clear probably has never really

1:26:00

spent much time in church. Yeah. But

1:26:02

enough probably as a

1:26:03

kid, is it jonesy or stumpy? No. It's

1:26:05

stumpy. Oh, it's this is stumpy. It's

1:26:07

stumpy. The dude is normally doing the huchy

1:26:10

kuch intro is like is like

1:26:12

now he's got a bible and here's the thing

1:26:14

y'all. Very little difference. Very

1:26:16

little difference. Change a couple of the terminology,

1:26:19

but really from preacher to

1:26:21

come and watch the the Queen of Sheba

1:26:24

dance, you know, there's a there's a place in France

1:26:26

where the naked lady, like, very little

1:26:28

difference. Toby Huss is the

1:26:30

actor's name, and he he does a phenomenal job

1:26:32

throughout this entire show. He is great

1:26:35

in the

1:26:35

show. And when Lyle, the sheriff shows

1:26:37

up later in saying things like Listen,

1:26:39

I told you you couldn't open it all. But

1:26:42

Lyle was the one who's like, I don't care if you're preaching

1:26:44

or, you know, selling

1:26:46

people on rides and freak shows It's

1:26:48

the same thing, to Wilde, to

1:26:50

the share of what? And it's the same thing to

1:26:52

us as the audience. Religion is the opium

1:26:54

of the

1:26:55

masses. Right. Selling

1:26:57

sex and selling salvation are kind

1:26:59

of the same thing. I love there there's a line

1:27:01

I think maybe in episode two, maybe in three,

1:27:03

in which Sophie says, these people are

1:27:05

asleep. The towns we

1:27:07

go through, these people are asleep, and

1:27:10

all we do is wake them

1:27:12

up. Which is very profound

1:27:14

because that is it's similar. You start

1:27:16

to see, like, why do you go

1:27:18

to the theater? Why do you go to see bright colored

1:27:21

light? Like, to get out of your

1:27:23

everyday rut. Why do

1:27:25

you go to church? To look at

1:27:27

to, like, lift, elevate yourself out

1:27:30

of that everyday physicalness

1:27:32

and touch the spirit for a moment.

1:27:34

But I think that, like, that bit of writing, I

1:27:36

was just

1:27:37

like, boom. That's some solid writing

1:27:39

right there.

1:27:40

So this is obviously a whole, you

1:27:42

know, get up where it's ruthy dressed

1:27:44

as a woman who's got stomach cancer and her,

1:27:46

my god, Adrian Barboe is like shmackeding

1:27:49

her ass off as the like, I

1:27:51

can't breathe and not

1:27:54

save. Like, it is It's

1:27:56

not too over the top, but it is

1:27:58

fun and over the

1:27:59

top. So they basically do this

1:28:01

big healing thing. They've got the whole system

1:28:03

down, but Ben is

1:28:05

wanting to know about this big

1:28:07

sky farms. The next day, he's

1:28:09

kinda, you know, he's talking

1:28:11

to talking

1:28:14

to the guy where he saw the truck. Like, the

1:28:16

man who owned the store that the truck did deliveries and

1:28:18

the guy's like, well, he's like, I think that's

1:28:20

missus Donovan. Because that used

1:28:22

to be her truck and this guy just bought it in

1:28:24

auction. I don't think so so

1:28:26

he goes down to see missus

1:28:28

Donovan who like his mother is

1:28:30

like on her deathbed dying of the brown lung,

1:28:33

but very wealthy. But very Very

1:28:35

use or used to be very wealthy. Now she just

1:28:37

owns the house. But she has a

1:28:39

servant Like, she, like, she is a

1:28:41

fancy

1:28:41

lady. Yeah. There's, like, an old money

1:28:43

sort of thing

1:28:44

Uh-huh.

1:28:44

-- happening. You know, so that

1:28:46

she he goes down to to

1:28:49

go see

1:28:49

her. And she she clocks him

1:28:51

in a minute. She's gonna get a second.

1:28:53

You got your father's

1:28:54

eyes, you know, kind of thing.

1:28:57

And you got the gift just like Henry.

1:28:59

Yeah. And she says, you know, you had this dream earlier,

1:29:01

which we saw a brief moment of two characters we hadn't

1:29:03

seen before. She says, I sent you that

1:29:05

dream. And then she gives us the rules. If

1:29:07

you give life, you gotta take it from somewhere else.

1:29:09

And Well, actually, I think she says Scudder

1:29:11

sent and Scudder sent me a dream

1:29:14

that you would come as well. So you get

1:29:16

the feeling that Scudder, is he

1:29:18

dead? Yeah. Is he dead

1:29:20

but still alive in spirit? Is

1:29:22

he alive alive? Like,

1:29:24

again, searching for Scudder becomes the MO

1:29:26

of c 147. So

1:29:29

share of Lyle Bussing because this is Lyle Donovan.

1:29:32

That's his mom, and he kicks Ben

1:29:34

out. Of course, it is. And

1:29:36

he's like, you crazy, Carnivle got away

1:29:38

from my mother. And she's like, yeah. And she know

1:29:40

she invited Okay. Whatever.

1:29:43

So there's this sort of

1:29:45

weak sauce thing where he and Sophie get into

1:29:47

a fight because he won't tell Sophie about stuff

1:29:49

of as they're driving back to the tent revival

1:29:51

and whatever. And they just end up, like,

1:29:53

kind of not talking to each other just sitting parked

1:29:56

out in the middle of nowhere until late into the night.

1:29:58

They're back at the tent revival. Ben's not there.

1:30:01

They've prepped some other guy named Schmidt

1:30:03

who looks kinda like

1:30:04

him. They're gonna do the act anyway because it's

1:30:06

whatever As Samson says, these birds, they'll

1:30:08

buy anything.

1:30:09

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But they're about

1:30:11

to heal sister Verna who got

1:30:14

run over by a thresher.

1:30:16

Course. Who is one of the Kochtte family?

1:30:18

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I love it. love it.

1:30:21

Wearing the weirdest costume ever, it

1:30:23

is like there are some questionable costume choices

1:30:25

made on this show. By the way. I was

1:30:27

like, are those are those blood

1:30:29

red cowboy boots? What the fuck is

1:30:31

she wearing? What who approved this?

1:30:34

What is going on here? So bonkers.

1:30:37

But so now we've got the fake, Ben,

1:30:40

sitting there who can't actually

1:30:42

heal anybody, even though Ben hasn't actually

1:30:44

healed anybody in the show. It's all Mac. But

1:30:47

sheriff Lyle shows up carrying

1:30:49

his dying mother. And he

1:30:51

was like, if you're a healer, you heal her.

1:30:53

Obviously, Schmidt can't do shit about

1:30:55

it. But Ben walks in at that moment,

1:30:57

and he's like, I'll do you know, and it's all very

1:30:59

that's really I mean, this is the moment in which

1:31:01

you see the version of a

1:31:03

fay feeling show versus the like.

1:31:06

The quiet desperation of like

1:31:09

what this what his life

1:31:11

would be if he were to embrace his

1:31:13

gift. And it's real

1:31:15

sad. Like, she's really she's like

1:31:17

as someone who brings as

1:31:19

a white magic worker, you're

1:31:21

gonna encounter a lot of people at the worst

1:31:24

moments of their

1:31:25

life, possibly the end of their lives.

1:31:28

And that's the job, man. It ain't

1:31:30

glamour. It is not. Although, I

1:31:32

do wish for all the magic that he

1:31:34

has, I do wish she would have put a pillow under

1:31:36

her head because her head is

1:31:38

resting on a fucking wood stair step -- Right.

1:31:41

-- as her boss. Yeah. They might just set her down,

1:31:43

like, all the stairs. I was like, this old

1:31:45

lady, like, out my back. You know,

1:31:47

I'll get a pillow at least. Oeyey.

1:31:50

Comfort in

1:31:50

death, please. Yeah. But what's

1:31:53

important is that she says,

1:31:55

don't touch me. Which echoes

1:31:57

echo one, echoes the language his mother

1:31:59

used. But he seems to be

1:32:01

growing and he he's not quite so like

1:32:03

look up by it, but he says everybody's like, listen, you

1:32:05

all heard her. She has had

1:32:08

enough of this mortal coil.

1:32:10

She might be in pain, but she has accepted her

1:32:12

death. So no there will be no healing

1:32:14

today. Good night.

1:32:16

And he does ask her before she dies. He

1:32:18

says where is Henry Scudder? You said he was

1:32:20

a lawyer. What are the rules? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And

1:32:23

she says, he's in Babylon, and

1:32:25

then she dies. So

1:32:27

our final scene of episode three here

1:32:30

Samsung confronting Ben,

1:32:33

and he's mad. He's like,

1:32:36

what would you have done Ben if she

1:32:38

had not stopped you? From healing

1:32:41

her. You're gonna actually like,

1:32:44

basically, Samson is saying you

1:32:46

will ruin our act. They'll

1:32:48

all know we're phonies. You can't

1:32:50

just go out. You can't be essentially

1:32:54

Don't go rogue here. You went rogue.

1:32:56

You didn't show up. He showed up in the last

1:32:58

possible second, acted like you really were

1:33:00

going to heal somebody. And then this fucking

1:33:03