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0:33

Mom, what are we doing here? Your

0:43

father's laundering money for a Mexican drug cartel. I

0:49

shit you not.

0:54

Hey, is Ben Bailey Smith here? And

0:56

Sasha Bates. And you are back

0:59

in the place where we explore our favourite

1:01

fictional TV characters. Working

1:03

out the way they behave, why they do, sticking them

1:05

into therapy. Um, so here we are

1:08

again, Sasha. Tell us about that clip at the top.

1:10

That was 15-year-old

1:12

Charlotte Bird getting the rundown from her

1:15

mum, Wendy, about how they ended up in

1:17

a rural lakeside town in

1:19

the Ozarks. Like Schitt's

1:21

Creek that we covered a few weeks ago, it's

1:24

another story of a family stuck in a town

1:26

away from what they know.

1:28

But it couldn't be more different. It's dark,

1:31

it's brooding, and this community

1:33

are far from welcoming.

1:35

Amazing series. I know you've not completed

1:37

the full box set. I

1:40

have. It was one of those ones where season

1:43

two I was like, I mean, I

1:45

don't know, do I care about this? And

1:47

I took a huge hiatus. Then I came back,

1:50

and I'm so glad I did, and it is worth

1:52

sticking with it all the way through. You know,

1:55

to me, Jason Bateman is a

1:57

comic genius, and I've

1:59

always been a fan. of him from a comedic

2:01

perspective. So to see him

2:04

not just act but direct

2:07

so competently,

2:09

a really dark and kind of twisted

2:11

drama is just

2:14

so refreshing. And it sort of vindicates

2:16

my theory about comedians in

2:18

that we have a way of like

2:21

tapping into the dark in a way

2:23

that, you know, completely dramatic

2:25

actors can't seem to tap into

2:27

the funny,

2:28

you know. And I always find that fascinating

2:31

to watch. But you've done the whole

2:33

season one, obviously. What's your first?

2:36

Yeah, I found season one really

2:38

interesting and really intriguing because it does

2:41

kind of raise as many questions as it answers.

2:44

And I like that. I like not having a full

2:46

picture. I like having sort of work it

2:48

out. And it is really

2:51

interestingly shocked because it's a lot of it's really

2:53

murky and dark and it's a bit hard to

2:55

see. And I think that contrasts

2:58

a bit like White Lotus did. It contrasts

3:00

with the beauty of the surroundings because they live on this

3:02

gorgeous lake and tourists go there in the

3:04

summer with their yachts and their

3:07

sort of holiday shorts and things. And I

3:09

think that sort of reflects the light

3:11

and the dark of Wendy, our client

3:14

for the week. She's very light and

3:16

dark. She comes across as a very kind of wholesome

3:19

American mum, but she's, yeah, there's

3:21

a darkness in her as well and a darkness

3:23

in their marriage. It's a show about secrets

3:25

and lies and trust and integrity,

3:28

but also impenetrable. Yeah.

3:30

And you're right. It is like this sort of Antichrist

3:33

version of Schist Creek, isn't it? The

3:35

mum, the dad, the son, the daughter, fish

3:38

out of water in this sort of

3:40

backwater, so to speak. And you

3:43

know, it isn't devoid of laughs, actually.

3:45

I think Jason especially

3:47

does make me laugh a few

3:49

times in Ozark. I think because

3:51

of just the extremity of the situation and

3:54

the fact that

3:55

although the family descends into crime, he's

3:57

an accountant, you know? And he looks like...

4:00

an accountant. You kind of relate

4:02

to this family in some weird way

4:04

and Laura Linney, there's something about

4:07

that smile. It

4:08

does lend to a very

4:10

particular darkness that I'm sure you'll get into in

4:13

a bit. So coming up, we're going

4:15

to be looking at how honesty isn't

4:17

always black and white. And we're going to ask what

4:19

leads someone to cheat in a marriage and we

4:21

ask what sort of mother Wendy Bird

4:24

is. Obviously expect some spoilers season

4:26

one and a whole heap of cursing because

4:28

it's the Ozark. Welcome

4:31

to Shrink the Box.

4:37

This is quite nice this actually. We are going to

4:39

have the local light fingered

4:42

badass Ruth Langmore

4:44

played by Juliet Garner to give

4:46

you a full recap of season one

4:48

this week and explain everything

4:50

you need to know. Yeah,

4:53

I told you about Marty Bird, right? How

4:55

he was some fancy fucking money manager

4:57

or some shit. Only he was

4:59

actually laundering money for the Mexican

5:02

drug cartel. Anyway, his

5:04

partner was skimming. So

5:06

the fucking Bird family landed in

5:08

the Ozarks with two suitcases

5:10

full of cash. And

5:12

they took over the Blue Cat Lodge and

5:14

the strip club figuring they'd use

5:17

it to launder money. I talked

5:19

Marty into

5:20

hiring me. You know those

5:22

hillbilly heroin farmers, they turned

5:25

their sights on the Bird family. Marty

5:27

and Wendy, they made a deal with two devils,

5:30

cartel and the snails. Only

5:33

that crazy ass Darlene, she

5:35

went and killed the cartel's man.

5:39

There's going to be men that are coming here. They're going to be looking for answers

5:41

I can't give them. God,

5:44

that is really useful, isn't it? Honey,

5:46

we had that every week. Thank

5:49

you. Thank you, Ruth Langmore. You

5:51

know, next week when I do my recap, I want

5:53

that. I want those timpani's in between

5:56

every line. I've written a big gunshot

5:58

at the end.

5:59

That's my hope. Don't fill the accent. So,

6:03

this week we're looking at Laura Linney's Wendy

6:05

Birds. Sasha, tell us a bit about her.

6:07

Oh yeah, Wendy has been married

6:10

to Marty for over 20 years. They've

6:12

got two kids, Charlotte and Jonah.

6:15

The very first thing we learn about her is that

6:17

she's been having an affair with a man called Gary.

6:20

So we know already that she's not above a bit

6:22

of deception. We also

6:24

learn that she can remain very cool under

6:26

pressure because when poor old Gary

6:29

gets thrown off a balcony very early

6:31

on, she manages to kind

6:33

of stay calm. And we see that throughout. I mean, they

6:35

go through so many different kind of crises

6:37

and she always keeps her cool.

6:40

So I'm really intrigued by how she

6:42

manages to do that. The stressful conditions

6:44

keep on piling up and she keeps

6:47

on kind of rising to meet them.

6:49

Yeah. And like you say, she has this really

6:51

sort of flexible moral compass,

6:54

which helps innately with them

6:56

slipping into this world of crime.

6:59

But what do we see about Wendy's ethics

7:01

and the way that they reflect on the show as

7:03

a whole?

7:04

She's got that lovely warm smile and she really

7:06

does come across as like sort of regular, fluffy mum.

7:09

Her eyes twinkle. Yeah. She does sort of kind

7:11

of exude homeliness and kindness.

7:14

And she is kind and she does love her kids

7:16

and she is sort of warm and twinkly. But

7:19

there's a real coldness, there's a real steeliness

7:22

inside her. Yeah. Her

7:24

real self, I think is very different to her presenting self.

7:27

And that's true in her marriage as well. They do

7:29

work as a team really well. There's

7:31

some really deep understanding from

7:34

having been together for so long. They've got this shared

7:36

desire to do the best for their kids. And

7:38

yet she'd been lying to him. She's been having an affair. He

7:41

suspected her enough to put a private investigator

7:44

on her tail. So he's clearly wondering

7:46

who is she as well. Yeah. She

7:49

can be ruthless. She's smart. She's

7:51

a strategizer. She's really intriguing.

7:53

We're sort of introduced to her in a way with

7:55

this explicit video.

7:57

And it's a very unusual way to introduce...

7:59

a character, but I

8:02

suppose it has the effect of turning

8:04

us, the audience against her from

8:07

the start. But as it develops,

8:10

you quickly see, well,

8:12

no marriage is perfect. It didn't feel

8:15

from the start like Marty was

8:17

the type of husband, at least in that moment,

8:19

who

8:20

gave her a massive amount of attention

8:23

or was 100% honest with

8:25

her either. I mean, he has the opportunity to confront

8:28

her and he sort of

8:29

strings her along, doesn't he, in a way? Yeah,

8:32

I mean, it's really- He's got that knowledge and I think he's sort

8:34

of perversely enjoying that power.

8:36

They talk about it later and we'll talk about it later,

8:38

what's going on there, because he

8:41

watches that video of her having sex

8:43

with Gary 27 times. She

8:46

discovers when she looks on the counter. And

8:48

yeah, he never once says anything to her. And

8:51

he's really impenetrable, he's watching it. And

8:54

a lot of what he does, you don't really know what's going on

8:56

there. And I think that's partly why she turned to

8:58

Gary, because I think he can

9:00

be quite cold and he doesn't give much

9:03

away. And again, I think

9:05

when they talk about it

9:06

much later on in the series, she

9:08

sort of says, you were walled off and cold

9:11

and she felt invisible and unheard

9:14

and lonely,

9:14

I think. These are the dangers within

9:17

any marriage, I suppose, are the board up

9:19

resentments. Even if only one

9:21

person has got them, you can have problems. If both

9:23

people have them, nobody's

9:25

addressing them. All sorts of

9:28

volcanoes can erupt, all sorts of fireworks

9:30

can go off. So this resentment's been

9:32

building and there's definitely an anger that

9:35

maybe hasn't been directed in the right way that

9:38

they both seem to share to different

9:40

degrees, as we can hear in this snippet.

9:43

People cheat. They

9:47

have sex with people who they aren't married to.

9:50

It happens, it's not unique. I

9:54

was unhappy, you're not exactly blameless in this.

9:57

For this house, I want you to find one as nice as possible.

10:00

but as cheap as possible. I

10:02

want you to think, start our home. We got $20,000 to our name. Just 20.

10:06

So please, do not sign anything without

10:08

talking to me first. And

10:11

we are not husband

10:13

and wife

10:13

anymore. We're

10:16

just business partners on our jobs to raise

10:18

those kids. But you're absolutely right

10:20

that I share some blame for this. I should have caught

10:22

Bruce. I was in charge of the numbers. I should have seen it coming.

10:25

But my mind was elsewhere, Wendy. You

10:29

know, it's Saturday night, and your Foxy

10:32

boxing or your Zumba or whatever the hell

10:34

it is that cost me a few hundred dollars every single month. It

10:37

ended two hours ago, and there's no Wendy. Why

10:40

does she get so many texts every night? Why does she have

10:42

to leave the room to make a phone call? I wonder who's fucking my wife.

10:45

So that's my bad.

10:47

And no, I don't forget Gary. I

10:50

don't forget how you emptied our bank accounts when you knew

10:52

I needed that money, Wendy. You

10:54

knew I needed it. And

10:56

I doubt very, very much that you did that by

10:58

yourself. You did that in a vacuum. So my

11:01

memory is crystal clear.

11:02

It's super tense.

11:05

He tries his best doesn't he, Mike, to

11:09

not rise to when she just

11:11

sort of states things like, plainly,

11:13

you know, people cheat, that kind of thing. That she,

11:16

you can tell she wants him to be as

11:19

heightened as her. And his calmness

11:21

is very irritating, actually. He

11:24

doesn't want to talk about it at all. And that's sort

11:26

of why she cheated in the first place, I think.

11:29

And he's already thinking about, you

11:31

know, very much like an accountant, right? What's the next

11:33

step for the next financial tax year? These

11:35

are the things that need to happen. Here's

11:37

the money. Me and you are now business partners.

11:40

I get it, but it's not really dealing with

11:43

anything that needs to be

11:45

dealt with. They do manage to find a way

11:47

to carry on working in

11:49

inverted commerce together before they

11:51

find intimacy again. So what does this

11:53

say about where their marriage is

11:56

at,

11:56

where it's been, where it's going? Well,

11:58

I mean, like you said, they have...

11:59

to become business partners because they're stuck

12:02

together now. They've got the cartel after

12:04

them, the only way of saving their own lives.

12:07

Wendy had to see Gary murdered in front

12:09

of her. Marty saw his business partner,

12:11

Bruce murdered in front of him and a few other

12:13

people, so they know the stakes are high. So they've got

12:15

no choice really. And by having

12:18

to come together to fight those external

12:20

threats or get out ahead of those external

12:22

threats, it means they can in a way bury

12:24

the problems in their marriage and just... They're

12:27

living day to day because they're having to just cope

12:29

with can we keep ourselves alive.

12:31

So they've in a way got an excuse

12:34

to not have to look at what's going on between

12:36

them. And I think a lot of relationships

12:39

sadly are like that.

12:40

When you haven't got a cartel hunting you

12:42

down to kill your entire

12:44

family, you're just a normal working

12:47

family. I think there's maybe

12:49

the initial romantic vision

12:51

of a future when the kids

12:53

fly the nest and then you can go back

12:55

to how you were in the sort of honeymoon period.

12:58

But then I think what happens a lot of the time is

13:00

you spent 18 years focusing on

13:03

this external job and then the

13:05

kids go and

13:06

you look at each other like, what now?

13:09

Two of the films we really love is the Before

13:11

Sunrise and Before Sunset with Ethan

13:13

Hawke and Julie Delpian. There's a line

13:15

in Before Sunset, the

13:18

second one where they meet up again after 20 years

13:20

and he talks about his failing marriage and he says,

13:22

it's just like we're two strangers running

13:25

a small nursery together. And it's

13:27

always stuck with me that notion that, yeah,

13:29

as soon as you've got something else to focus

13:32

on, you don't have to look at yourselves anymore.

13:34

By seeing that video of Wendy

13:37

having sex with Gary and by rewatching and rewatching,

13:40

it's almost like he's saying, I've got to

13:42

work out what's going on. Who is this person?

13:44

How could she do this to me but get sidetracked

13:46

by saving their lives?

13:48

Their externals are incredibly

13:51

extreme. It's life and death stuff.

13:53

It's a high level crime. And

13:56

with each episode that passes, you sense Wendy's

13:59

maybe...

13:59

be kind of equipped to, if

14:02

not like perfectly equipped, because you know, she's

14:04

never dealt with anything like this before, but she

14:06

seems to have a certain skillset.

14:09

There's something in her, isn't there, that

14:11

helps her

14:13

in these extreme situations.

14:14

The way that she's able to control her panic

14:16

in the face of watching her lover be murdered,

14:18

the way that she's able to just like pack back and say,

14:21

yeah, let's go to the Ozarks and you know, let's

14:23

get ourselves a house and let's find a way to make

14:25

money. I understand that in later

14:27

series, you do learn

14:28

about her. You go back with Wendy and

14:30

it really makes no sense.

14:31

Yeah, but in this first one, you're just going

14:33

off the clues and there's something

14:35

in her that makes me think, oh, she's been

14:38

on the run before or she's been frightened

14:40

before and she's had to learn to tamper

14:42

down those natural reactions. She's learned

14:44

to hide it. And there's a really

14:46

interesting scene where she thinks

14:48

Marty's dead because he, one of

14:51

his solutions, when they feel like they've run out

14:53

of options is to kind of offer

14:55

to kill himself in order to get, so

14:57

that they can get the insurance money. And she thinks he's

14:59

done it. Obviously he doesn't do it. And

15:02

she's so upset. She goes in the bathroom, the

15:04

motel bathroom and she shoves a towel

15:07

in her mouth to stop herself crying out

15:09

loud. And again, you kind of think she's learned

15:11

to hide her feelings, to save them up, to

15:14

wait till she's got a safe space. And then

15:16

she knows I can go in the bathroom, I can scream,

15:18

but silently into a towel. So

15:21

she's clearly had a difficult childhood

15:23

for her to be able to have got so good at that. But

15:26

also you can see that she's functioning out of

15:28

her sort of fight flight mechanism. She's

15:30

working at that survival level and

15:32

flight is her go-to. Her first instinct

15:34

was, I'm going to empty the bank house. I'm just going to take

15:37

off with Gary. So Gary was

15:39

splattered across the pavement. But she does it a few

15:41

times throughout the series. Her first instinct is

15:44

let me get out of here. She says to Marty

15:46

at one point, oh, maybe it would be sensible

15:48

to put the assets in my name. And he's like, yeah,

15:50

right. That's not going to happen.

15:53

And later on still, she says, I think we should

15:55

send the kids away to Chicago. And he's like, oh

15:57

yeah, you're trying to teach them your trick of just getting.

16:00

the hell out of town and how

16:02

long will it be before you follow them. So she

16:04

has this, that's her go-to, this sort of flight,

16:07

this fleeing instinct, which he doesn't

16:09

have. He's more able to be solid

16:11

and stable and say, no, we're going to do this together.

16:13

Yeah, it really is. And it is made explicit

16:15

later on. As of season

16:18

one,

16:19

we only really know her recent past

16:21

and there's a lot of nods to what

16:24

she used to do before she became a housewife,

16:27

which is really interesting because a

16:29

bit like Shiv Roy, she was

16:31

a bit of a political advisor and she

16:35

had a lot of kind of high profile

16:37

colleagues that she worked with back

16:40

in Chicago. So she's also

16:42

got that other skill of like, well, hold on, high

16:44

pressured environments. I remember this, you

16:47

know, and she's now got to re-empower

16:49

herself again. And we

16:51

can hear a bit of that here. I've been trying

16:53

to tell you since yesterday about that half-built

16:55

house on Sunrise Beach. Hmm.

16:58

What about it? Well,

17:01

I use the money from the Chicago house and I bought

17:03

it. Now I'm

17:05

no expert, but I'm pretty sure you can

17:07

inflate construction costs and you can launder money

17:09

through it. And quite frankly, I don't give

17:11

a shit if you like it or not, because

17:13

I feel pretty good about it. It's

17:16

a good idea. And I did

17:18

it for our family. What

17:20

do you do today? For

17:23

our family. Okay. Bottle

17:25

stroke club. That's

17:28

one way to make living. Yeah. It's obviously

17:31

even more profound for women who've

17:33

had children. But you know, as we all

17:35

get older, you do get that thing of like,

17:38

what was I good at again? What was I really

17:40

like top of my game

17:42

at? And when you get

17:44

a little sort of rekindling of that, when

17:46

you remember how to get on the horse, can

17:49

be incredibly enthralling.

17:51

Maybe I'm reaching, it seems to be what's

17:53

happening with Wendy. Like she's getting

17:56

that little sniff of, oh, hold on. I'm

17:58

quite, I remember this.

17:59

There's a moment when she talks to Buddy,

18:02

whose house they end up living in.

18:04

And she says that she'd worked on the Obama

18:07

campaign. And there's this real wistfulness

18:09

when she remembers what it was like

18:12

to be powerful and to be in the midst

18:14

and to be used for her brain

18:17

and her skills. And in fact,

18:19

there's a flashback episode and I think like that

18:21

episode seven, which I found so interesting

18:23

because you can kind of see how they got involved with the cartel

18:26

in the first place. It was partly because, as

18:28

you said, she left work to look after

18:30

the kids when she then tries to get back

18:33

and she goes back into the political arena.

18:35

And she's interviewed by this sort of child. He looks

18:37

about 12. It turns out she worked for

18:39

his father and he's patronizing

18:42

and he just looks at her like she's this sort of old,

18:44

invisible-

18:45

Dinosaur.

18:46

Dinosaur. And that

18:48

sparks a huge depression and it's because

18:50

she's depressed and we see her kind of not really

18:52

able to look after the kids and saying, oh, I thought at least

18:55

I was a good mom. I can't even do that anymore. And

18:57

it's to sort of reawaken her and

18:59

to give her back a purpose that Marty

19:02

kind of takes her to meet the cartel in the first

19:04

place. Because he was initially like, I'm not doing this.

19:07

And then he sort of takes her to like liven

19:09

her up and he sees that she comes alive again.

19:12

So I think you're right. Yeah, again, going back to the

19:15

Ozarks and again thinking, oh yeah, I've

19:17

got a role here. I can really contribute.

19:20

I'm not just a washed up housewife, which

19:22

she never was, but that's what society told

19:24

her she was as happens to so many women,

19:26

of course.

19:26

Absolutely. And we see that, don't

19:29

we? Down in the Ozarks.

19:30

Yeah, you really get the sense of that, that they're

19:32

all fighting. All these women are fighting to be

19:34

taken seriously and they're all really

19:37

smart. I mean, Darlene Snell,

19:39

another sort of hillbilly turned heroin

19:42

farmer. She just goes straight for the violence.

19:44

She just wants to kill people.

19:46

Yeah, she's literally showing you her power.

19:48

Yeah, yeah, she really is. And then

19:50

Ruth, who is I think only like 19, she's

19:54

so smart. Marty

19:56

sort of takes her under his wing and

19:58

you can kind of see her blossom.

19:59

in somebody telling her she's good at something.

20:02

There's another very telling scene, I think, where

20:05

in order to try and infiltrate

20:07

the strip club that Marty ends up buying, she

20:10

has to go and try and get a job as

20:12

a stripper and she's so not suited to

20:14

it at all. And in the interview, the

20:17

guy that runs it says, oh, stripping

20:19

might be every girl's dream, but not every

20:21

girl's a stripper. And you think, oh, thank God, that

20:23

is literally, that is what they've got to

20:25

aspire to. And

20:28

then it's also quite funny when Marty

20:29

later does buy the strip club and

20:33

he tries to talk to all the strippers

20:35

and he says, you all have the right

20:37

to self-esteem and you'll never have to give another

20:39

blow job. And he's trying to really empower

20:42

them. And they're like, well, how are we gonna make any money then? And

20:45

you get this sort of like urban woke

20:47

man trying to say,

20:49

it's okay, you don't have to do this. And they're like, come

20:51

on, honey, we haven't really got many other options

20:54

down here in the Ozarks. And they don't, they

20:56

don't have many options and they do what

20:58

they need to do to get by.

21:00

Yeah, so it's a desperate world that they're

21:02

in. And I think for us, the audience,

21:04

like we feel that tempo

21:07

because we relate to the

21:09

birds, right? We all think of ourselves

21:11

as the normal family in

21:13

amongst this nightmare. Listen, we'll

21:16

take a little break. And after that, we're gonna

21:18

dive into just what sort of a mum

21:20

Wendy is and how sometimes

21:23

stressful environments can actually

21:25

be positive. And we're gonna look at the moment when

21:28

Wendy discovers that Marty has been watching that

21:31

footage of her on repeat. So

21:33

we're gonna see you right after the

21:35

ads, unless you're a subscriber to the Tate

21:37

channel, in which case we'll be back just after this

21:39

teaser. What musical artist

21:41

does Ruth Langmore love?

21:43

Hmm, see you shortly.

21:45

["Shrink the Box"]

21:54

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Okay, boom, we're back. One of my

24:40

favorite things about Ruth, I mean there's so many

24:42

things to love about Ruth Langmore.

24:44

Being a big fan of 90s rap.

24:47

She listens to Gangstar. We see her listening

24:49

to Wu Tang, Notorious

24:52

B.I.G. It's always whenever she pulls

24:54

up, she's playing some bangers. I

24:57

just love that about her. All right, Sash. So

25:00

we hear at the top of this episode how

25:02

Wendy tells her kids that

25:05

their dad is laundering money for a drug cartel.

25:07

She just blurts it out.

25:09

Now, I don't

25:11

wanna judge. I don't have my silently judging

25:14

cap on today, but surely

25:16

you should keep some things back

25:18

from your kids. So do you know? It

25:20

is the sort of decisions that parents have to make

25:23

all the time about how honest to

25:25

be. And I think there is an instinct to wrap your

25:27

kids in cotton wool and make them think that nothing's ever

25:29

gonna go wrong, which

25:32

I think you can do to a certain extent, but at some point

25:34

they are gonna have to face the reality that

25:36

the world is not always gonna go

25:38

their way and they are not the center of the universe to anyone

25:40

other than themselves and their parents. It

25:42

is important for kids to transition into

25:45

a world where they are not the center of the

25:47

universe. By doing that,

25:49

you do learn resilience. So I think

25:52

you always sort of gotta be treading that fine line

25:54

between how much do we protect them and how much do we prepare

25:57

them for the fact that they're gonna have to meet

25:59

bad people.

25:59

see bad things happen. If you keep

26:02

these massive things from

26:04

your kids when they do eventually find

26:07

out if you just didn't give them any hint of it,

26:09

let's say, does that build

26:11

a whole new resentment in the kids?

26:13

It's similar when parents try

26:15

and hide the fact that they're having problems

26:18

in their marriage because the kids can pretty much

26:20

always pick up on stuff. They sense

26:22

something and then they often imagine

26:24

things are worse than they actually are. And

26:26

with these kids, their whole lives have been uprooted.

26:29

They don't understand why they're not allowed to go

26:31

home, can't see their friends, they're not allowed to be on social

26:33

media. It would be very hard,

26:35

I think, to not bring them in, to

26:37

tell them at least something of what's going

26:40

on. I mean, Marty at one point suggests that

26:42

Wendy's telling

26:43

them in order to win them over to her

26:46

side as opposed to his by blaming him, which

26:49

isn't so unfair because she was just as much.

26:51

They took the decision together to

26:53

get involved with the cartel.

26:56

Jonah, in a way, Jonah the young boy,

26:58

he almost takes

27:00

on the worry that they're not showing because they're

27:02

just surviving. They're firefighting

27:04

from day to day to survive. And he's

27:06

the one that then has to think, okay, maybe I should go and

27:09

get a gun. Maybe I should learn how to shoot it. So

27:12

they've sort of parentified him, really.

27:14

And I think it does come back to help

27:16

them in many ways. There's a whole

27:19

scene where that's sort of important.

27:21

There's something about the fact that they are doing

27:23

this as a team and they feel like

27:26

we're in this together, that is

27:28

what saves them in many ways. So

27:31

obviously in an ideal world, you're not going to be bringing your kids

27:33

in. But I don't think you can ever categorically

27:36

say do or don't tell them stuff because

27:38

when they know something's going on.

27:40

Every time they try and keep a big one from

27:42

the kids, the kids react very

27:45

badly. The way they try and shut it down

27:47

at dinner or whatever. There's no

27:49

way of hiding it because they're surrounded

27:51

by death in every way. They've got the cartel

27:54

after them. They've got the Snell heroin farmers

27:56

after them at some point. Ruth is an ongoing threat

27:58

for a long time.

27:59

They live in the house with this guy Buddy who

28:02

walks around with a, what you call it, one of those oxygen

28:04

tanks who is literally kind of dying.

28:08

And here's this very visible presence of

28:10

how close death is. They

28:12

have a body wash up under their dock.

28:14

And if their lives are at stake,

28:17

then the

28:19

parents natural instinct is

28:21

to protect them. But in this particular

28:23

case, that doesn't mean by protecting them by bullshitting

28:26

them, I suppose. Yeah. Kind

28:29

of, I mean, especially Marty, and we see it developed

28:32

down into further series, kind

28:34

of doing a bit of additional parenting with Ruth,

28:37

who's also very young and

28:39

living quite a dangerous

28:42

life. And we see them parent

28:44

her. And then when we follow her home, we

28:46

see her parenting a bunch of men,

28:49

basically. And is it two younger cousins

28:51

or one younger brother and

28:52

a younger cousin? I think they're cousins. Yeah. You

28:55

sort of parents them, but then you've got these bigger men

28:57

who are massive idiots,

29:00

babies kind of thing. So she sort

29:02

of has to parent them all. And she's

29:04

the only girl, the only feminine presence

29:06

there.

29:07

Yeah. I mean, she's really been left to

29:09

fend for herself. Her dad is in prison. He's

29:11

the older brother to the two useless uncles

29:13

that are left behind. And she's

29:16

got such a difficult job because she has to go back and she has to

29:18

sort of act like her dad to her uncle.

29:20

She has to be like really badass and threaten them because

29:22

they're such idiots. But then she also has to

29:24

be a mum to her cousins. So she's having to

29:27

take on both parenting roles in a way.

29:30

And so when Marty and Wendy

29:32

turn up, at first it's like

29:34

she can't bear them because it's their everything

29:36

that she never had. But then she gradually

29:39

kind of realizes that the stuff that she

29:41

can learn, Marty mentors her

29:43

and Wendy, when she sees

29:46

that she's been hit, she goes around

29:48

with the black eye. She kind of helps her

29:50

to patch it up. But she also says, yeah,

29:53

I tripped once. They're both sort of talking

29:55

and coach that I tripped once. And then I tripped again.

29:57

And then when I tripped a third time, I made sure I didn't

29:59

go.

29:59

down that path again. And she's sort of like

30:02

giving her these messages of you don't have to take

30:04

this shit. Later, Ruth

30:07

wants to protect Marty so much

30:09

that she is prepared to kill her uncles

30:12

in order to stop them killing Marty. And

30:14

there's this really touching moment where she says, I couldn't

30:16

let them kill you. And he's like this really

30:18

loving father and he hugs her and he says, you know, you

30:21

did well and you know, you're gonna

30:23

be all right. So she goes from absolutely

30:26

hating the birds and wanting to kill them

30:28

herself to saving them because

30:30

they're kind to her. She ends up saving them in many

30:32

ways.

30:32

When you watch Ozark, you

30:34

do that thing. He's like, just go to the police. Why

30:37

are you taking this all on board? I mean,

30:39

they have the opportunity more than once

30:42

to go to the feds, right? And get

30:44

protection.

30:44

It's almost as though they just realized

30:47

that we're better off alone. We're better off

30:49

sorting this. And I feel that they sort of think

30:52

that they've got the skills to do it. Like

30:54

Wendy clearly has had a lifetime

30:56

of working in survival mode. Marty is really

30:59

smart. But also what I think is quite interesting

31:01

and another sort of theme of this show is

31:04

this notion of you stick by your decisions

31:06

and you make your choices. And again,

31:09

in that flashback episode, I think

31:11

it's episode seven that I found really interesting,

31:13

you see that Marty and Wendy

31:16

are in a car crash and then she is in hospital.

31:18

And Marty is having a conversation with Bruce

31:21

in the hospital waiting room, where

31:23

Bruce says, you know, one of these sort of platitudes

31:25

about all everything happens for a reason. And Marty's

31:27

like, no, that's bullshit. You make your decisions

31:30

and you stick by them. And that's sort

31:32

of a theme that we have free will.

31:35

And if you make a decision, you kind of have to live or die

31:37

by that decision. Unlike Wendy,

31:39

he doesn't try and flee ever. He's like, no,

31:42

this is where we are. And he also

31:44

talks

31:44

about just prior to the car crash, he

31:46

and Wendy having a discussion about how

31:49

tiny decisions have big impacts

31:51

and clearly they're tiny decisions and

31:54

so I think that's a good thing to

31:56

kind of go to that first dinner with Dale of the cartel,

31:59

now. So he sticks to what

32:02

he said he was going to do. I

32:04

get the vibe that they could go to

32:06

the feds and the feds could take it all off

32:08

their hands and they go and change their names. They go and live in

32:10

Arkansas. And then all the old

32:12

problems of the marriage and their

32:14

relationship with their kids rears its ugly head

32:17

almost immediately. Whereas with this,

32:19

it's like you're

32:21

on a long car journey with the kids and

32:25

you're all irritating each other and you're thinking, oh God,

32:27

I don't know if I can do a weekend with this lot again.

32:29

And then, you know, the tire blows out or

32:32

something strange happens

32:33

and you all suddenly have to pull

32:35

together. Maybe bizarrely,

32:37

perversely, this huge challenge

32:40

is the thing that could save the marriage, could save

32:43

the relationship that these parents have

32:45

with each other and with their children.

32:47

Well, I think you're right because there is actually

32:49

some research that says that people

32:51

that go through frightening experiences together,

32:54

there's something about that release of the fear

32:56

hormones, the adrenaline and the cortisol

32:58

actually does make them bond more afterwards.

33:01

And they think there's something in that around why teenagers

33:04

like watching horror films together and why then

33:06

the friendships that you make as teenagers often last

33:08

throughout your life. So there is something in the

33:11

hormonal response to fear and

33:13

the having to pull together. It's why businesses

33:16

go off on corporate raft

33:19

building exercises because there is something

33:21

in that of put somebody in a situation

33:23

of adversity and they come out stronger,

33:26

which also, I guess, speaks to the

33:28

should they or shouldn't they have told their kids the

33:31

truth. What brings them all back together

33:33

at the end and was slightly leaping

33:35

ahead, Marty in a way wants

33:38

to protect them by getting

33:40

them all new passports, telling

33:43

them to run, he'll stay and face the music,

33:45

but he wants to save them. And they get

33:47

so far and then the kids

33:49

like, look, whatever we're facing, let's just do

33:52

it as a family. And they're sort of home

33:54

free at that point. They could run, but they decide, no,

33:56

there's no point in doing any of it if we're not doing

33:58

it together. And they go back in.

33:59

into the kind of the lion's

34:02

den, because they'd rather do it as a

34:04

team, which is really sweet. I feel a

34:06

bit tearful saying that,

34:07

actually. Honestly, I couldn't agree

34:09

more. And I do

34:11

implore you to stick with Ozark,

34:13

because right up to the very final frame

34:16

of the very final episodes, that

34:18

is there. That thing of like,

34:20

let's do this for each other. It's

34:22

quite mad, but it is ultimately

34:25

very touching. So

34:28

is that what we can take away from all of this, that

34:31

extreme

34:32

situations or strange

34:34

adversities can sort

34:36

of jolt us, like a sort of jumpstart

34:39

into remembering what's important,

34:42

what we love and why?

34:43

I think what also helps them come back

34:45

together as a couple is that all

34:47

this time they've not been talking about the video

34:50

and her betrayal. We heard him very

34:52

early on shutting that down. But

34:55

they do end up getting back

34:58

into bed with each other. And he

35:00

does something that he saw happen

35:03

in the video. He slaps her on the bum. And

35:05

she's like, you've never done that before. Why

35:07

would you think that I would like

35:09

that? And he said, oh, I just thought you would.

35:12

And that leads her to suspect, does he know

35:14

the kind of sex that I have with Gary? She

35:17

looks it up on the computer, and that's when she learns that he's watched

35:19

it 27 times. And it's only after

35:21

that that they finally have an honest conversation.

35:24

Finally, he's honest about why

35:27

he's been acting like he did because he was

35:29

just heartbroken. And she can be honest

35:31

about, I didn't think you saw

35:34

me. And there's something about that honesty

35:36

that finally comes after all these weeks

35:38

of ignoring it and pretending it didn't happen and

35:40

being angry with each other. There's

35:42

an honesty there that he has to say, actually, you

35:44

really hurt me. And then later, when

35:46

they do go off to get the new passports

35:49

and they have a phone conversation, when

35:51

she then says, I'm so sorry, I hurt

35:53

you. And he says, it's not your fault

35:55

I had shut down. So there's something about the honesty

35:57

that they can finally have about how hurt.

35:59

They were that's the springboard

36:02

for progress. Yes, it's so hard But

36:05

to begin with that honesty

36:07

and if there's somewhere in there you can find

36:10

the maturity to apologize like

36:12

a genuine apology Yeah, that

36:14

can also be a huge springboard those two things

36:17

combined And you know

36:19

anything's possible you can come back from the

36:21

precipice

36:22

exactly And I think that's why despite

36:24

all their stress and and fear

36:27

There is an honesty to their relationship and

36:30

there is a pulling together in a team works

36:32

and the adversity is making them stronger Even

36:34

the fact that she had an affair has made them stronger

36:37

because they've been able to say the stuff that they couldn't say

36:39

That was good

36:39

and they both want the same

36:42

thing to some extent It's not that

36:44

either of them wants out of the marriage

36:47

that also helps massively Yeah,

36:49

because you can say all the fucking stories

36:52

you like you can be as honest as you like But

36:54

if one of you actually doesn't

36:56

long-term want to be there, then you're still

36:58

screwed

36:59

Yeah Like I said before that her sort of

37:01

a her go-to response to fear is

37:04

Going into flight mode and then she

37:06

actually gets the opportunity and he's like, yeah have

37:08

the passports you go And she doesn't

37:10

want to because she feels loved

37:13

she's understood that you know He does love her

37:15

and she did hurt him and so she goes

37:17

back that instinct to flee is

37:20

no longer there It's like no, I don't need to do this

37:22

because I've got him he's stable.

37:24

Oh my god. I just can't wait for you to meet

37:26

her brother When her brother

37:28

comes oh my okay. I can't wait

37:30

to watch it now. I kind of slightly gave

37:32

up on it All

37:37

right, well that's Wendy bird thank you everyone

37:39

for your emails this week Keep

37:42

sending in your character suggestions and all your thoughts about

37:44

the show and your theories this week We

37:47

have one from Ivy who says Ben

37:49

and Sasha.

37:50

I've just finished my A levels I don't know why she

37:52

talks that just cuz she's doing her a levels I'm

37:55

catching up with every episode love

37:57

the podcast. I want to recommend that either

37:59

or Marianne or both from normal

38:02

people sit on your sofa as they both

38:04

have really fascinating relationships with their families,

38:07

partners and friends influenced by trauma

38:09

and struggles with their mental health. Keep making

38:11

the podcast, it's perfect. Thanks Ivy.

38:13

I don't know about that but that's

38:16

very lovely. I'll take it. Who's this?

38:19

This is from Durba, a listener

38:21

from the UK who says, amazing

38:23

show, love the discussions about my and

38:26

others' favourite TV characters. It's

38:28

so great that you will be covering the legend that

38:30

is Catherine K-Wood. Oh yes we have. From

38:33

Happy Valley. May I suggest

38:36

Eleanor and or Tahani from

38:38

The Good Place on Netflix.

38:40

Kimmy from the Unbreakable, Kimmy Schmidt.

38:43

Mare from the Mare of East Town. God I just don't need

38:45

to watch that, damn. Nadia from Russian

38:47

Doll.

38:48

Also Natasha Leon, our

38:51

fantastic producer was telling us is

38:53

in a new show called Poker Face. Yeah, which

38:56

is well worth a watch. So maybe

38:58

check that out Durba if you haven't already. Thank

39:00

you. Do follow us wherever

39:02

you prefer to get your your poddies and

39:05

tell your friends because that's how we are

39:07

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39:29

Thank you to our lovely production team. Production

39:32

management is Lily Hambly. The assistant producer

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is Bashak Ertan. Social media is Jonathan

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Emieri. The studio engineer is Gully Tickle

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and the mix engineer is John Scott.

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Senior producer is Selena Ream and executive

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producer is Simon Poole. Shrink The

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Box is a Sony Music Entertainment production.

39:49

Right then my favorite part of the show,

39:50

Sasha giving us the big reveal. Who

39:53

is on the couch next week? The last

39:55

couple of weeks we've looked at marriages

39:58

because we had Alison and Mike.

39:59

from ghosts last

40:02

week. And then this week, we've looked at the slightly

40:04

more stressful marriage that is

40:07

Wendy and Marty Bird. And so

40:09

sort of continuing with that theme, I

40:11

think we need to look at a third marriage,

40:14

which is also very different. Have a listen

40:16

to this.

40:17

Don't be mad. I just got up to change

40:19

her. Well, Mitchell

40:21

really wanted to firburize the baby. Firburize.

40:23

It is a method of getting the baby to sleep

40:26

through the night by,

40:27

yes, basically letting her cry herself to

40:29

sleep. Torture. It's

40:32

not torture. It's just hard

40:34

if you happen to be a person who hates to hear another person

40:36

suffer. Mwah! Mwah!

40:38

Mwah!

40:40

Or two people suffer. Mwah! Mwah!

40:43

Mwah! Mwah! Mwah! Mwah! Mwah!

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Mwah! No, no, you got up to comfort her, but

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only teaches her that every time she cries, her

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daddy will come in and cuddle her and put on her favor.

40:52

What are we watching? Brian

40:55

DePalma's controversial masterpiece, Scarface.

40:59

For the baby? She happens to like it. I

41:01

don't know if it's the colors or the sounds. Oh,

41:03

here comes the nightclub massacre. She loves it. Watch

41:06

her little eyelids. It's so cute. They get so heavy. Yeah,

41:10

unmistakable. It's Cam and Mitch

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from Modern Family. Oh, man.

41:15

They really, they

41:17

cracked me up, man. So this is going to

41:19

be our first gay couple as well.

41:22

So we've done a couple of siblings,

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haven't we? Yeah. Couple of marriages.

41:27

Yeah.

41:28

We've done our straight marriages, and now

41:30

we've got our first gay marriage, Cam and

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Mitch. Hilarious characters,

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both of them. Polar

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opposites in a lot of ways.

41:38

Yeah. They're sort

41:40

of the classic old couple, aren't they? Cam is very

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over the top drama queen, just

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completely natural.

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And yet he's also really sporty

41:50

and, you know, like mucks

41:52

in, like literally. He's got that farming

41:55

background. He's like super tough. Yeah. And

41:57

he's all like flamboyant shirts and.

41:59

musical theater and jazz hands. I know, he's

42:02

great. He's such a contradiction in terms, but

42:05

he's so different to Mitch, who's so uptight

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and buttoned up. That's his law.

42:10

Yeah, and just not so comfortable

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with himself. I mean, I think that's the big difference,

42:14

is Cam is completely comfortable with being both

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a kind of

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American football player, farmer, and

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Camp drama queen who dresses up as a clown. I

42:24

mean, it's just such a weird job description.

42:26

But- Fizzbo. Fizzbo, and Mitch

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is just so not comfortable with himself, really,

42:32

because we learn so much about the family,

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Mitch's family anyway. And we see the

42:37

effects of having had Jay as a father,

42:39

and the mad Dee Dee as a mother.

42:42

And yeah, they're fabulous. So I think it's worth

42:44

doing them together because they are such contrasts,

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but also have such a strong

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marriage, but strong

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in a different way to the birds and in a different way

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to Alison and Mike.

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Yeah, and there's never a bad time

42:55

to put on an episode of Modern Family. That's

42:58

fabulous, every episode is agreed. Similar to when we did

43:00

Seinfeld, it's just like it's a show you can just

43:03

stick, stick on a net. Sometimes my kids

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will say, have you seen this one? I say, no, so we

43:07

stick that one on. It's just, ah, always,

43:09

always makes me laugh. So we're gonna focus on season

43:11

one, right?

43:12

Yeah, I think so, because you learn quite

43:14

a lot about them in season one, and they have

43:16

just, as we heard in that clip, they have just

43:18

adopted Lily, their

43:20

baby. They got from Vietnam. But

43:23

they adopted from Vietnam. I

43:25

mean, I think it's the one where you get the most backstories

43:28

to how they came to be together.

43:30

And also, yeah, they were adapting

43:32

to being new parents. So they've got their own stresses

43:34

of a very different kind. And as we heard from that clip,

43:37

they have very different parents.