'The Better Sister' Review: Your Summer Mystery Binge Drop With Bill Simmons and Joanna Robinson

Folks, it's J.

Kyle Mann from The Ringer.

And as always, basketball is so freaking, freaking good.

It's so good, in fact, that the Ringers NBA Draft Show is finally back just in time for a ramp up to June.

We've got you covered every week as we take an in-depth look at who's got next for the NBA's future.

We'll talk the rising and falling stocks of the best and the brightest prospects in the 2025 NBA draft class.

From Cooper Flagg to Dylan Harper to BJ Edgecombe and more.

Tap in with me on the Ringer NBA Draft Show every Wednesday and make sure that you follow, subscribe, and hit us with us five-star ratings.

This episode is brought to you by the all-new ESPN app, all of ESPN, all in one place.

Your home for the most live sports and best championship moments.

It's the ultimate fan experience.

Step up your game and get even more than before with no annual contract required.

Level up for more on the ESPN app app or at stream.espn.com.

Sign up now.

This episode is brought to you by the Home Depot.

Labor Day savings are happening right now at the Home Depot so you can get more out of your outdoor space this fall.

The Home Depot has a wide selection of cordless outdoor power equipment that makes it easy to clear your lawn starting at just $79.

You got to love a power tool.

Then why not make those colors pop with string lights and mums that bloom all season long?

Shop Labor Day savings now through September 3rd, only at the Home Depot.

It's the Prestige TV podcast.

I'm Bill Simmons.

I'm with Joanna Robinson.

We watch the Better Sister on Amazon, a show that we did not intend to cover.

Correct.

On the Prestige TV podcast.

But then I started watching over the weekend and i texted joanne and rob like you guys in on this show and rob but rob was too too cool for school for it uh you know he's he's a little busy right now i think yeah he's got basketball and uh it didn't pass the shit detector test for him it did for me i talked to you about um what do we do your friends and neighbors about yeah looking down and up at the tv yeah doing stuff on my ipad versus like looking up and following.

This was perfect.

I was about 50-50 between the TV and the iPad on this one.

Where were you?

I gave it a little bit more.

I would say like 60-40.

And I actually, it's funny that you bring up your friends and neighbors because

I couldn't help but compare the two since we were just talking about like, you know, a murder mystery among the upper class.

Craig Gillespie worked on both shows.

There are some similarities and some of the alibis and stuff like that.

So I was comparing it a lot to your friends and neighbors.

And I actually, I liked this better than your friends and neighbors because I think it had a better sense.

I think it had a better sense of what it is, which is like

classic airplane book, you know, beach read fodder and is not trying to be capital P prestige, but it's just trying to give you like a good murder mystery with a ton of great actors.

That's another thing, like when we were talking about Apple shows and you were talking about this imbalance between the star power and then invest in the star power and then not in the rest of the cast.

This is like a fully fleshed out, everyone's delivering cast kind of show.

I had a great time with it.

I'm really, I'm really glad that you had a great time with it.

I had a very good time.

I wouldn't say it was a great time, but it was a very good time.

No, I mean, like, it's definitely not the best show I've seen this year, but I just like, I like when a show knows exactly what it is and is working on that level, like very perfectly.

Does that make sense?

I thought it was an HBO show.

after a head injury.

Like not quite good enough to be on Sunday Night HBO, but like one level below.

On Amazon Prime for the summer and a binge drop.

It's perfect for what it is.

It's funny you mentioned your friends and neighbors because both shows started out the exact same way

with a dead body covered in blood and the hero of our show not understanding what's going on and freaking out, basically.

It was an identical.

And it's so funny that Craig Gillespie did both shows.

Are you, were you waiting for Jessica Beal to fall into the pool or something like that?

Well, her dress was covered in blood.

It looked great.

It looked great.

Yeah, they did a great job.

It just seemed like somebody shot a hose of blood at her.

Yeah, I just feel like everyone's worried about AI coming in and replacing the creative for some of the, and it's like,

we're not exactly the most original right now in 2025 anyway, whereas a lot of these shows just they have to establish the dead body.

Then it's like, I wonder who did it.

Then there's all these other pieces.

And then

the show moves.

And then it's like, I think it's this person.

No, it's this person.

And we just keep going and going.

And it just feels like we're on autopilot with this concept at this point.

I still like it.

You're expanding a law and order episode out across eight episodes.

Oh, that's a good way to put it.

Yeah.

With better actors.

Yeah, with better actors, but you still got to be like, wait, was it the doorman?

You know what I mean?

That's like a classic law and order swerve.

But I think that

you also, when you were texting Rob and me about it, you brought up Presumed Innocent.

Like, where does it stack up against Presumed Innocent for you?

I thought it was, I think these are all around the same okay from a from a quality level presumed innocent was fun because uh because of jake gyllenhall was is just a bigger star than you know anyone and your friends and neighbors or or better sister um so that part was fun but that presumed innocent also had a lot of issues i mean oh you know that his marriage and the chemistry he had with uh the actress who played us with that that was way off the kids the ending of it was really stupid yeah this didn't have a stupid ending i thought this didn't have an annoying kid.

I liked the teen kid that they got.

He was kids.

This didn't have a character where I'm like, oh, I can't believe I'm spending more time with this person.

And

I would say Presumed Innocent, I think, had higher highs.

To your point, Jake Gyllenhal.

Rob and I love Peter Sarsgaard so much on that show.

You know, like there were like really higher highs, but it was trying to be very arty.

The ending was so stupid and Presumed Innocent, the like swerve that they made off of the book and stuff like that.

This, again, is just like not trying to

be sophisticated.

It's just trying to be, you know, a ham and cheese sandwich.

And it's like a really good ham and cheese.

I was ready for a ham and cheese sandwich.

We're going to do spoilers much later.

So I'm going to keep the first half.

We can talk big picture and then second half we can go into

some of this stuff.

But

it does feel like we have a playbook for these shows at this point.

Dead body.

Our hero couldn't have done it.

Wait.

Did she?

Could

he or she have done it?

Yeah.

Was it this person?

Oh, oh, this character, the quirky, kind of crazy sidekick character.

Huh, what's going on with them?

In this case, Matthew Modine.

Ah, there's a cop who doesn't have a lot to work with, but is really playing up some

sort of personality trait and just going for it on that end.

Oh, there's a little another sidekick.

In this case, Elizabeth Banks, who's the other sister, is kind of this, is kind of the SARS guard in this one, where just like the actor who has the most kind of stuff to do.

Yeah.

Jessica Beale is handicapped with the,

I have to be the prim, pristine, rich, wealthy wife who's just looking like this half the time.

But Elizabeth Banks, the part is way more fun.

Don't you agree?

Yeah.

And something I love about

about a show like this is they obviously like cast the show and then they did rewrites to get specific with like the way in which some of the the actors look like they kept making fun of that one cop for like when he shaved off his mustache and all this other stuff.

And then with Jessica Beale at one point, someone describes her as having like gymnast arms, uh, you know, because her arms are incredible, but like you're also just like looking at them half the time because they're so dazzling.

Um, but yeah, yeah, Jessica Beale has a very, but but she was way better than I expected her to be.

I'll be honest with you.

Like, I don't have high expectations for Jessica Beale, and she doesn't have a ton of variation she has to play but there's like you know when things when everything unravels at the end again we're not getting into spoilers there's some crying jags that i like bought i i you know i was i was like i'm convinced by what's going on here i watched the first four episodes with my wife and she said multiple times was just admiring how toned and awesome jessica beal looked like oh man great arms wow her butt looks awesome oh yeah the whole thing yeah like just like wow she really put in the time pilates poster girl jessica beal looks incredible it was like being at the NFL draft combine, watching somebody admire like an offensive lineman.

But yeah, I listen, I didn't have a lot of high hopes for her either.

As,

you know, and it is interesting to think of as you rise up the ladder of caliber of actresses.

Like if Kate Winslet is in this part, or we go, we go like up there.

We go Kate Blanchette like five years ago, or we go to that level.

What else did they have?

What more could they have brought to the table?

And I'm not sure that was the point of the part.

I don't want it.

I don't want that because, again, that's trying to be better than this show actually is, you know?

Yeah.

Like the only person here I think who is like possibly a little too good for the show, what the show actually is, is Elizabeth Banks.

But like, since she got her start in comedy, she's like a comedy actress in a lot of aspects inside of this drama.

And so that all works really well for me.

I think,

you know, you mentioned Kate Blanchett or Kate Winslet.

You know, we have to think of

the Kates, the various Kates.

Marybe's Town.

this is that's the hbo version of this without a head injury right like that's what that is and that was a really good show great show perfect show disclaimer kate blanchette disaster of a show and that's another sort of like mystery apple um what are we doing here we're trying to be something really arty and sophisticated but it's based but that show was also based on like this show is on based on a beach read book if you're gonna adapt a beach read book just do that's that's the level that we need from that every time.

So, yeah.

Yeah, she, you have to look good.

I have to believe you were a high society wife who also was running a magazine.

Um, you only need to do basically three different acting things.

You need to be like kind of aggro.

You need to be just completely stunned or you need to cry.

Also.

You need the haircut, which she and Leslie Bibb both did.

Multiple haircuts, right?

Yeah, true.

You need like, you need to go backwards.

And then Elizabeth Banks, who I think

I thought she dialed it up the first couple episodes and then gradually came down to where it needed to be.

There was definitely some send this scene to the Emmy reel kind of acting coming from her.

Like really, really.

It was like, all right, okay.

All right, Elizabeth.

Maybe one more take.

But she was really going for it.

And I think she could smell the Emmys from the moment she shows up in this thing.

She's

out of control.

The character's just like a Hot Mess Express.

Like that's, that's the, that's the character description.

And hot mess expressed with a heart of gold is, you know, is what we're dealing with here.

And I think she, she really delivered on that.

And I think, I think the contract, like, I think it's really good casting.

Beal and Banks are really believable sisters to me.

There's like something in them that feels sisterly, but it's just sort of like the road not taken.

Elizabeth Banks is the older sister who has a long history of

abusing drugs and alcohol, et cetera.

So that's like

Hot Mess Express.

And then Jessica Beale is like the version who just like always did everything.

Right.

The better sister, you know, to your point.

And good title.

I got to say that one of the best things about this show, good title.

Good title.

It made sense immediately.

I was like, I get this.

I know who the better sister is.

I know who the worst sister is.

Well, I mean, or like it was one of challenging or do-you.

And I think that like

Lorraine Toussaint, who plays Catherine, the sort of like, you know,

Jessica Beale's boss, she later in the season says something about like, oh, it's like a Danielle Steele novel, isn't it?

The two sisters, blah, blah, blah.

Exactly.

Like, it's juicy.

It's soapy.

It's like, it's trashy in a really fun way.

Great.

It is.

I've made this point many times before on this podcast and on my podcast.

I've always felt like sisters are the underrated piece of turf for TVs and movies.

The dynamic of sisters and all the baggage that comes with it is so fat.

And this show did a good job, especially in the early episodes, because nobody can be meaner than two sisters to one another.

It's the highest, meanest level two human beings can get.

It's pretty tough.

But there's also this like love and affection.

And

there's just all the stuff that makes really compelling TV.

And obviously, I'm an only child.

I only know the sisters like on my dad's side of the family because my dad had two sisters that were really, really close.

So I saw that.

I saw the happy version of it, but this version of it was really cool.

And then you bring in like, wait, they were both with our guy, Corey Stoll, Corey Stoll, perfect.

Corey, perfect, he's available.

Oh, he's, he's, he's booked, he's busy.

Poor man's Peter Sarsgaard is here, and uh, just like really perfect casting for this role, like, really, just like he's had a nice run.

His IMDb is uh swollen from the last last 15 years.

No one does like smug asshole better than Corey Stoll, genuinely really, really huge fan of his.

So, yeah, when his character, when we learn, again, I'll give the official, we'll go to a break and we'll be like, all right, it's time for spoilers.

When we learn one thing about his character, it's like, of course.

Of course.

Yeah.

Obviously.

Of course he's doing that.

So you mentioned how

this show from the Apple, where the Apple just has the two stars and then basically tries to get lucky with everybody else.

But this star, this show had Corey Stoll and Kim Dickens.

Who I thought was really good as the police sergeant or cop, whatever she was.

Yeah.

this detective storyline is anchored by Kim Dickens.

Matthew Modine has is anchoring this like shadowy legal case side of the story.

Laurence.

It's great to see him.

I love Matthew Modine.

I'm not positive what he's going for in this show, but

I think it's just gay.

He's like, my character's gay, so I'll wear a lot of ascots.

It seemed to be

ascots and like he changed his voice.

Exactly.

He had a voice like

this.

And I was like, all right, you've made some choices.

Those are the swings that Matthew Modine decided to take.

Lorraine Chisson is like anchoring the media mogul side.

Every storyline has an actor that I want to spend time with.

I don't know if I love Lorraine, but it was an interesting performance.

She was also, I thought she was really going for it.

There was that mushroom scene.

That mushroom scene.

You didn't like it.

Wow,

you're going hard here.

I love the mushroom scene.

And Gloria Rubin.

Like, you know, as we are in our ER celebration era after the pick, Gloria Rubin's here to be the defense attorney.

So that delighted me.

Yeah.

It was great to see her.

It's hard.

Every time these ER characters pop up back into our live, now, you know, I'm obviously a little older than some of the people listening to this, but ER was such like a huge, massive show.

And you had such an attachment to so many of the people on there.

And I always root for them whenever I see them and anything else.

So with her, I was like, oh,

exactly.

Look at you.

And

maybe you have a little bit of history with our guy, Jake.

Who knows?

It's getting a little flirty.

Yeah, a little and a little nasty uh it's pretty great one other thing with elizabeth banks felt like she did a no makeup decision for the first couple episodes to to to add to the hot mess express

did you notice that to me more than anything uh it was the like the bad blonde dye job this is something that like uh she really dumped she really dumbed the look down in a bunch of ways the um like trying to disguise her inherent hotness the um

over on the on the netflix show sirens megan faheep uh who we loved in white lotus season two plays a similar hot mess express sister and has like the exact same

peroxide die job like this is the classic my sister's a mess her roots are grown out uh die job look on these women uh in an attempt to disguise their absolute smoking hot i like how you brought up sirens like there was no chance i didn't watch all five episodes did you enjoy sirens Not really.

No, I didn't.

That was one.

That was the one I took one for the team for my wife because there's been a lot of NBA playoffs out of my house.

So she's siren.

She's like all in first day.

I didn't think it was very good.

I hated sirens, man.

I didn't really understand what the point of it was.

And I also thought the lead, like the femme fatale, the Mega Fahey sister, I just didn't think was good.

I didn't buy the character.

And

that show kind of hinged on her being incredible and she wasn't.

She was really good on House of the Dragon.

She's going to be supergirl.

Like, she's great, but like not in that role.

And that whole thing was just, it's not what I would have want from Julianne Moore.

It's not what I want from Kevin Bacon.

It's not what I want from anyone.

And I think that's just like, again, a bad version of what this show does really well.

Like, that, you know, that's like a ham and cheese sandwich, but like, it's all cheese, no ham.

You know what's great about that show, though?

It did check some boxes.

It had an awesome, awesome house.

Oh, yeah.

And some weird island that I didn't know anything about.

So I'm like, episode two, it's just on.

I'm just googling the island.

I'm like, what's going on here?

How far is it from New York City?

This is 40-minute deep dive on this place I didn't know existed.

Is watching TV like being on Zillow for you?

Zillow, Google.

Yeah, it's just, it's a way station for me to just look stuff up or look up stuff on eBay.

Yeah, yeah.

But that show was, I thought, pretty bad.

I thought that I would give that show.

We were doing a grade system.

Yeah.

That's like a D for me.

Yeah.

What is that?

I thought this was like a B or a B plus.

Yeah, B plus.

It's all a B plus.

Somewhere in there, depending on what you you wanted.

It had the same issues some of these other shows have.

It probably should have been six episodes.

They stretched it.

It should have been six episodes.

Can I take you behind the curtain of what happened this weekend of me watching the show?

No, go ahead.

You texted us.

I had not seen it.

Rob had not seen it.

Oh, so I got you excited.

I went out to lunch with my cousin who had watched the first three episodes.

And I was like, all right, tell me what the show is.

What's happening on the show?

And she recapped the first three episodes for me.

And then it was just like really fun to sit there with her and try to put out all my guesses as to who did it, having not seen a single second of the show.

I was just like, let me try to guess.

And obviously I guessed correctly.

I mean, I did a bunch of guesses, but one of them was correct.

You know, throw, throw enough darts at the wall, you'll hit the bullseye.

But,

but it was funny to like hear the recap and I was like, oh, okay, this is, this is, I know exactly what this show is.

And that sort of prepped me.

for the right expectations going in, which I think is why I had such a good time with it.

I think you just came up with like a 15-minute prestige TV podcast idea.

Guess he did it.

A show is coming out, and we just look at the IMDb and watch the trailer and try to guess exactly what happened.

I love it.

Everybody gets like a four-minute,

here's what I think, and then it just goes, and then that's it.

And whoever wins wins like a booby prize.

I love it.

What's the next one we could do for that?

I don't know.

That's a good question.

That wouldn't work for like the bear.

It has to be like one of these like a new one-off starry kind of show.

Yeah, where it's like a summer book with some sort of crime.

Yeah.

Something gets solved.

Somebody's a detective.

And then you just kind of guess what happens.

Let me tell you something.

Apple, Amazon, or Netflix will have a show for us in the next two months.

It's just a border, especially during the summer.

Summer.

Yeah.

Nantucket, Martha's Vineyard, Malibu, Hampton.

Somebody's getting murdered.

A lot of suspects.

Let's go.

We're all chasing big little lies.

And this is not a big little lies, it is an A show.

At least the first season is.

I would say A plus.

Yeah.

First season.

That is like everything I want from one of these shows.

Exactly.

And then, you know, this is like the B plus version of A Big Little Eyes.

And well, that's interesting you mentioned that about, because that's the Jessica Beale.

That would have been

the highest version of the Jessica Beal character.

It was Nicole Kidman like 10 years ago as running a magazine.

And like, wow, she's doing this show.

That's amazing.

This isn't a spoiler.

I think it's just like

the gimmick of the a gimmick of the show are these like ghost.

You get a lot of flashback stuff, but you also get these like strange like sort of ghost conversations.

How did you feel about that as like a device?

Just felt like padding.

I thought as again, this was a six-episode show.

Yeah.

And they had to throw in some gimmicks and some red herrings to just stretch it, stretch two more hours out of, out of whatever was happening.

Our two main ghosts, we should say, are like, is their dad?

You know, the two girls had this abusive dad.

So like that character is a ghost who pops up and they have conversations with.

And then Corey Stahl, who was the murder victim you know in the first minute of the show.

So that's not a spoiler.

So, um,

like dead husband, dead dad, and then conversations with the living, but it's not really a, it's supposed to be a ghost thing.

It's almost like a memory therapy thing.

And didn't love it.

Yeah.

Okay.

I also, I like Corey Stahl as an actor.

I actually thought he was a little too likable

in the first two episodes.

So when, when we have a little bit of a turn as it keeps going,

I, I didn't feel like he, I didn't know if I believed the dark side for him.

I think for me, I'm always suspicious of Corey.

Yeah, okay.

Maybe, maybe I just like him more.

I like him a lot, but I think he always plays characters and I'm like, I don't trust you at all.

So.

All right.

Well, we'll take a, let's take a

break.

So if you're listening to this and you haven't watched the show yet,

feel free to turn it, turn it off because we're going to hit some spoilers because I have some questions about what we watch with this show.

Okay.

This episode is brought to you by Pretty Litter.

If you track your steps, your sleep, even your screen time, why wouldn't you track your cat's health too?

Pretty litter is like smart tech for your litter box.

This color-changing litter actually monitors your cat's health by detecting potential issues in their urine, things like pH changes or blood, so you can catch problems early.

Plus, Pretty Litter ships for free right to your door, so no heavy bags to carry and no last-minute pet store runs.

Right now, save 20% on your first order and get a free cat toy at prettylitter.com slash prestige.

That's pretty litter.com slash prestige to save 20% on your first order and get a free cat toy.

Pretty litter.com slash prestige.

Pretty litter cannot detect every feline health issue or prevent or diagnose diseases.

A diagnosis can only come from a licensed veterinarian.

Terms and conditions apply.

See site for details.

This message is a paid partnership with AppleCard.

There's one thing I'm going to make sure I pack for my summer vacation.

It's my Apple Card.

I can earn up to 3% daily cash back

on every purchase, including fuel for my car and booking places to stay.

Plus, I don't have to worry about fees, including foreign transaction fees, which is perfect when I'm planning to travel abroad.

To get an Apple Card for your summer travels, apply on the wallet app on your iPhone today.

Subject to credit approval, Apple Card issued by Goldman Sachs Bank USA Salt Lake City Branch.

Variable APRs for Apple Card range from 18.24%

to 28.49%

based on credit worthiness.

Rates as of July 1st, 2025, terms and more at applecard.com.

This episode is brought to you by Prime.

Prime delivery is fast.

How fast are we talking?

We're talking a cooler for your snacks, a folding chair, a Bluetooth speaker, and a six-pack of your favorite seltzer delivered by tomorrow.

Fast.

Oh, yeah.

Extra napkins, last minute guac bowls, backup phone chargers, even a replacement remote.

Fast.

I feel like I've ordered all those things.

We're talking everything you need for game day.

Fast, fast-free delivery.

It's on prime.

We are now in the spoiler part of this episode.

So did you Google how long it took to drive from Cleveland to the Hamptons?

No.

How long does it take to drive from Cleveland to the Hamptons?

Eight hour and 50-minute drive.

It's 556 miles, but now you got to work in the Hampton traffic.

So it's probably

10, 11, I'm going to say, for one-way.

Depending on time of day, right, for the Hamptons traffic.

Right.

But she gets,

she gets worried about,

she gets worried.

So we should say, should we say, yeah, let's go.

We'll start spoiling it.

Elizabeth Banks did it.

Elizabeth Banks did it.

And it hinges on, she couldn't have done it.

She's in Cleveland.

This, okay, spoilers, not just for this show, but I'm just about to spoil the reveal of the murder mystery for your friends and neighbors, which wasn't even like 5% of the plot of that show.

But like, I am going to reveal it right now.

This is the second show in a row row where the cell phone pinging the tower was the like alibi that proved to not be true.

And this is exactly what happened.

I was at lunch with my cousin.

She's like, I was like, Do you think Elizabeth Banks did it?

She said, She couldn't have.

Her cell phone pinged in Cleveland.

I was like,

They tried to get me with that and your friends and neighbors.

Cell ping doesn't work.

Just leave that cell phone.

Yeah, exactly.

Moratorium on cell phone pinging as the

year.

Yeah, like a year hiatus.

Yeah.

Well, they show the phone suspiciously in the first episode and it's cracked.

Smashed.

Yeah.

And they show it.

And when you see it in the first episode, you think, oh, they're doing this to show that this lady is like, does not have a lot of money.

She can't even fix her broken iPhone screen.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

But that's not why they showed it.

They showed it for the callback at the end of the season, where it's like, ah, remember that phone with the smash screen?

Yeah.

She left it in Cleveland.

That's B plus material, baby.

Yeah, it was pretty good.

I was impressed.

Yeah.

So she zoomed down there.

Now, I'm going to, I'm going to start picking nets immediately here.

Okay.

She zooms down there,

kills the guy.

Her DNA is not on him.

They never think to.

Well, it is, but they don't think that.

They never think to test her, and they just blindly accept.

Oh,

her phone pinged in Cleveland.

Cross her off.

She had like an incredible motive, and she was a Hot Mess Express.

Not only that.

No way she did it.

But

when later they're investigating the doorman and his alibi doesn't check out because they interviewed the bartender.

I was like, Why did nobody ask the bar?

You know, if his alibi was like, I was at the bar watching the game, and they're like, Okay, sounds good, and nobody checks it.

And then later,

later, they ask the bartender, they're like, Well, it turns out you left the bar.

And I was like, Why did nobody, you know, was is the answer that they got so distracted and enamored by the teen son as a suspect that they just sort of dropped everything else?

Who also wasn't a great suspect, the teen son,

like as far as like the show is concerned or as far as like the cops should not have suspected the teen son what was his motive why the teen son so the reason that he starts going down this road is because he feels like he's covering up for his mom which i actually like that ring yeah i thought i was like that's good that's that's a good son um

brings a gun to school why did he bring a gun to school because he was worried

one of his parents would kill the other with it.

Do you have to bring it to school?

Probably not.

Maybe you could hide in the backyard and have the same effect.

Just putting that out, you have a pretty big house.

Probably put that gun somewhere.

Not sure you have to bring it to school, which is an automatic.

You're getting expelled.

But

I just feel like the flaw of this show fundamentally is that Elizabeth Banks should have been.

a much bigger suspect.

Of course.

And they should have really checked that out and been like, well, wait a second.

Plus, we have cameras everywhere now.

And I find it hard to believe first in this.

You don't think she has John Hamm's Wi-Fi remote from your friends and neighbors where she could just another thing.

I don't feel like this shit exists, but they have this expensive house.

They have no ring camera.

Right, exactly.

There's none of the neighbors have a camera that shows the street.

Like

this is very 2005.

How they're doing.

Yeah, we live in a surveillance state.

You can't get away with murder anymore.

No, it's impossible.

Yeah.

Listen, I kick myself every day.

I miss my chance to murder people.

Oh, the 90s.

What a time.

Yeah, it was a great time.

The 70s were the heyday.

You could just get in a van and pick up pitchhikers.

Nobody knew what was going on.

Now it's like your camera's everywhere.

What could have been for you, Bill?

What could have been?

Different career entirely.

Those 70s killers really had it going.

So the son, I just feel like,

I don't know.

I didn't, never believed in the motive, and he didn't seem like a killer to me.

But did you agree?

Do you agree with me that he was like not an annoying teen?

He was good.

I thought he was a good actor.

I thought he was really good.

I thought all the like jail stuff with him was really good.

I think that, um,

and I wonder

when they arrest him, I was like, oh, this is this is this feels like a kickback of like the series of murder shows we've seen recently where they where the teen kid did it.

And they're like, we're going to arrest the teen kid first.

And that's going to be, and you know, that's not who did it because if they arrest him first, there's always the chance for the double twist and you come back around and it was the kid.

But no, he was, he was like a gentle giant, this, this, this whole

who had a night costume under his bed.

What a sweetie.

Come on, House of R.

Um, but yeah it's uh the teen son always like if if i'm murdered my teen son would be a suspect immediately just because that's how it goes apparently but the the answer to be would be sean fantasy killed me to take over the rewatchables oh is that is that they would figure that out episode eight yeah i don't know sean feels the kind of person who might get away with murder that's a good point yeah we never have we never have a season finale no It's just the season finale is just Sean doing like a Wes Anderson month

and I'm just dead.

That's how you'll know.

That's how you know Sean did it if he celebrates with Wes Anderson Month on the Rewatchables.

What is wait?

Getting away from the spoilers for a second.

You say you're Jessica Beale, I was kind of surprised.

I didn't know she had this in her.

So you were very pro-Elizabeth Banks before this?

Yeah, in general?

Are you not pro-Elizabeth Banks?

I really liked her in the 2000s and some of the stuff she was doing early on.

And I thought,

I really thought there was a chance for like a Reese Witherspoon kind of run for her.

Like she, like, she's in this Mark Wahlberg sports movie called Invincible.

And she's really good as the, as like the girlfriend.

And it's like one of those like classic shitty sports movie parts where the girl, it's like, oh, it's the love interest and there's like nothing there, but she's awesome in it.

And I remember after that thinking like,

oh,

this will just be, she'll move into that Reese Witherspoon, Sandra Boat thing.

And in in some ways, it happened.

In other ways, it didn't.

But she also did a lot more stuff behind the scenes.

Yeah.

And in a weird way, she had more success.

As like a producer-director.

Yeah, yeah.

Her pitch perfect run.

She's forever iconically a Hunger Games character.

So she will forever be.

The Hunger Games was the big thing for her.

Yeah.

She will forever be someone for generations because of her involvement in Hunger Games.

Pitch Perfect is a huge thing for her.

And I think that like,

yeah, she did not become the A-lister

uh leading woman in front of the camera that i think you know maybe some of her earliest stuff promised almost there

but i think i think she carved a really interesting path for herself yeah and i'm i'm never unhappy to see her i think that what she earned with better sister now

is she now has a five six year runway for those big little lies type shows oh movie like she's down

yeah she's like it's like sports there's some people aging out of the demo and now she's like i'm moving right in as It's like, my son's in college, and now I'm drinking too much, and blah, blah, blah.

And oh, my husband's dead.

She's, she could have two of those.

Here's my, here's my nit to pick.

Uh, you know, you're on Zillow Watch when you're watching these shows.

I'm usually on how old is this person actually

watch?

That's like

I'm on five watches.

Okay, you're you contain multitudes.

Janelle Maloney from the West Wing plays the mom of Jessica Beale Elizabeth Banks.

Wow.

And she is

10 to 12 years older than them.

And I just wanted to put that out there in the world.

Interesting.

Well, so how old was Gloria Rubens?

Gloria Rubin is

Gloria Rubin, sorry.

Yeah, Gloria Rubin is 60.

Looks phenomenal.

And that guy, Jake, that

pretty clear they had some sort of history.

Yeah.

I'm going to say he's like late 30s.

38, yeah.

Yeah, Jake.

you know up and down the hamptons i guess he's all over the place

uh i have more nitpicks okay so

this is probably a me problem okay and not a show problem but it does get a little complicated and like with this whole plot with framing and framing matthew modine's character and we have that and there's a shadow thing and then jake's dead at the end and there's a lot going on in that final episode that if you're not paying full attention,

you almost have to go backwards.

Like, all right, I got to watch this 30 minutes again because they just unleashed nine things at me here.

And

I think that's okay.

That might be me problem, but what did you think?

Well, yeah, that's the that's usually, I think it's just the fact that it's the opposite of the usual final episode of the show.

The final episode of the show of these kinds of show, usually you find out who did it.

You've usually already figured it out who did it, so you're quite bored by the reveal, or it's such a stupid twist, like presumed it is.

So they throw in three more things.

Yeah.

So this has like, yeah, we find out who done it at the basically the end of the previous episode, into the very beginning of the final episode.

And so it's not the question at the end of the show is not who'd done it.

It's like, is she going to get away with it?

Which I don't know about you, but I was rooting for her to get away with it.

You know, she's like starting this new romance with this guy she met in AA, always a great idea.

You know, she's got a a relationship with her kid.

Yeah, what could possibly go wrong?

She's got this relationship with her kid.

Like, I was like, I want Elizabeth Thanks to thrive,

you know, after this.

I want her to get away with it.

So, how are they going to figure this out?

And it involves

shittily, I guess, exposing Kim Dickens' character.

And also, it's like a double, you know, scheme.

The Kim Dickens thing came pretty late.

The her anger management stuff and all of that.

It sounded like that got thrown in.

You should have seated that earlier.

I agree.

I would agree with that.

I would have seen, I would have liked to have seen a flash of it too.

Yeah, yeah.

Like the first couple episodes.

Yeah.

But Kim Dickens is doing in this episode, in this show, what, you know, there's that like hard-boiled detective character and your friends and neighbors that Rob and I were both like, oh, brother.

Kim Dickens is like, let me show you how it's done.

This is how you totally.

So

yeah.

I actually, she had a couple of really good acting moments in that.

Like, she tells that story about when she was ahead of her,

ahead of the other cops and caught the suspect, but it was a bad idea.

And she was pretty solid.

Yeah, yeah.

So they throw in this thing at the end

where Jake's dead.

Yeah.

And it feels like the only reason they did that was to set up Amazon might pick us up for season two.

We need like some sort of hook because otherwise.

Phil, that didn't occur to me.

I hate that.

Yeah, I'm some cynical person.

Otherwise, it made no sense.

Why was he dead?

Who killed him?

It was, he, he makes some allusion at some point too.

If They find out that

I'm a dead man, but they don't follow it up really.

And it just feels very season two-ish.

Well, you're, you're really right.

It would be a terrible idea to be clear, Amazon, if you're listening.

Don't do this.

It didn't work for big little lies.

It won't work for you.

But

yeah, there's that.

And there's also the

rogue FBI agent.

And all of that stuff.

Jessica Beal in her wrapping up of everything,

she's going to frame Matthew Modine, but she's also like calling in a complaint against the FBI agent.

Sort of, I was wondering if they were going to try to frame him for something, but sort of, so like, there's, there's, that thread is sort of open a bit.

And then

is, isn't the implication, though, that Matthew Modine had

Jake killed?

Because he's on the phone with the gentry group goons, whoever they are, and is like...

It's a gentry group.

Evil.

Just an evil group.

I don't even know what they do.

They're just evil.

Slave labor, human trafficking to build states.

I forgot.

Yeah, human trafficker, but they're called the gentle group.

It sounds like a law firm.

But he's like, Jake's no longer a problem.

And then, and then, and then Jessica Beale's character hears something in the house and goes outside with her gun, and then nothing comes of that.

I don't know.

So, yeah, you're always right about this stuff.

Matthew Modine was like, he pulled his ascot.

He's like, Jake is no longer a problem.

His ascot game.

First of all, who knew ascots were still a thing in 2025?

No, it's really Modine.

Yeah, Modine was trying to bring it back.

At one point, his Ascot

affliction is so severe that at one point he's wearing an Ascot with like a tight polo shirt.

Like, you know, and this one he's wearing an ascot with like a button down or whatever, but he's or like a sweater, but he's wearing it with a, with an over a tight polo.

And I was like, happy Pride Month, Matthew Modine, I guess.

Here you are.

So I think he saw an episode of Scooby-Doo and was like, you know, Fred's Ascot.

I don't, I think that maybe that could add that to my look.

You're absolutely right.

Yeah.

Fred Core.

Yeah.

So I didn't, the Jake thing I thought was super weird.

Um, that one of the things that bothered me the entire season,

which I can't remember, they might have established in episode three in the flashback where she has the knife,

Jessica Beale,

puts it in the glove compartment of her car,

just keeps it there.

Like one of the first things anybody is going to search.

Her fingerprints are all over it.

Finds the files in the glove compartment.

Finds the secret gentry group human trafficking files in the safe in her Manhattan apartment.

They didn't search the safe of the murder victims.

They didn't search anything.

How about this?

Kim Dickens, terrible at her job.

She's just mangling the investigation all over the place.

Pretty bad.

How do they not check the glove compartment?

Yeah.

Then Elizabeth Banks opens the thing.

It's like, oh, there's the gun that our dad gave us once upon a time.

There's blood all over it.

I wonder what this is.

Yeah.

No, the cops not at the top of their game in this show, in this B-plus

Amazon Prime show.

Yeah, the Kim Dickens sidekick, mustache, no more mustache guy.

No more mustache guy.

So he has a mustache for

like

this guy doesn't really stand out in any way.

He's not funny.

He's not really sinister enough.

Um, his big move is he had a mustache and they shaved it, and they mentioned it.

Other than that, I don't know why he's here, and this was a classic, and I was trying to maybe you could have gotten more from this part from somebody else, yeah.

Maybe I was trying to look up if this was like a Henry Cow, like, did he have to shave it for another role that he was doing, and then they decided to make like a big deal of it inside of the show?

Because there's no other reason to stop shooting for a month, and he had to, and then they had to like felt like the obligated to mention it.

I didn't, I mean, like, you know, feel free to tell me if anyone's listening and they know the answer to this, but I like the only other thing I could see on his TV that was right around the same time is the beekeeper, and he's got facial hair in that one.

So I was like, I don't know, I don't know what happened that he shaved his mustache and they decided to make a big deal of it, but they did.

Yeah, that's a weird one.

What'd you think of how they did rich people stuff in the show?

Because that's always an essential piece of these shows.

I really like, I gotta say, I really like their apartment in New York City.

You're our correspondent, Bill, on this front.

I don't know.

I don't know anything about the New York City apartment luxury parts, but it did feel like I checked a lot of boxes for things I've seen in other shows.

I'll tell you what I know, which is New York Legacy Media.

So, the way in which they were trying to do,

definitely trying to do Vanity Fair with her magazine.

And so, all the stuff we got, like down to the font of the logo and stuff like that.

So, and her Anna Wintor-esque Bob.

I mean, of course, that's vogue, but like, you know, she's just trying to run this Conan-ass

kind of circle.

And I, yeah, they got, they got some things right there.

They got some things quite right there.

That was another another one of my nitpicks.

You're just going on leave immediately if you're in a giant murder investigation.

They're like, hey, they have to do this big scene where her boss is like, hey, we talked to the board and we want you to take a leave of absence.

Guess what?

The leave of absence is happening when your whole family is in a murder investigation.

You're not just going to go to work on a Tuesday and be like, okay, so let's talk about the front of the book.

Let's go.

What do we have for our last feature?

Yeah.

What should the letter to the editor be this month, do you think?

Yeah.

Well, and then the other thing is, I'm sorry, they don't speed rush murder investigations.

These things take forever.

Like Karen Reed, which is like the biggest murder thing happening in Massachusetts this decade, takes forever.

And you can't just be like, all right, we'll move that up to April 9th.

Like these go for like two, three years.

So by the time this kid actually goes to trial for this murder, it's at least a year after the murder.

Okay.

Right.

He's, he's already like graduated from high school.

He's not like, all right, I guess I'm back in time for my

chem exam.

Yeah, he's done.

He's missed a year and a half of school.

They do a lot of time does pass in a way that you're not really noticing because they'll say like, hey, the trial is six weeks from now and then it'll be in the next scene.

So like six weeks pass.

She's there.

They're like no trial is six weeks from now.

They take six nine months.

But I'm just saying like they're also

speed running a lot of time in this show.

Like this took place, you would think watching it over a couple weeks, but I think it was months and months and months that this show takes place.

But you're saying it should have been years.

And, but I'm saying I wouldn't watch that.

The kid's 20 by the time he's free.

I'm telling you, Bill, I would not want to watch years of the life of these people.

So.

Well, here's another thing.

So if we're stretching it out to eight episodes,

give me the kid in jail for a couple of scenes.

Is he scared?

Does he feel like, does he have to fight somebody the first day or else he's going to become a target for all the other inmates?

Is he in solitary?

I don't know.

Are they calling a murderer?

Why did he have the black eye?

I feel like I got that from that.

He's like, I got beat up.

I didn't know what to do.

Now I know what to do.

And then later he's like, I've started to do that.

I would have loved to have seen it.

Okay.

It sounds really interesting.

Okay.

You know?

I'm a 17-year-old rich kid.

I'm in a maximum security prison.

Where am I?

What is the jail like?

Is he scared?

Is he crying?

Nothing.

Okay.

Season two.

Well,

it was actually kind of interesting because

there are...

Two actors, Lauren Toussaint and then the guy who plays Artie, are Orange and the New Black actors.

And so I was wondering if there was like DNA crossover between those two shows.

But like,

yeah, so you wanted Orange and the New Black, but with this teenage kid

in prison.

I'm just saying it was sitting there.

Okay.

What would you have cut?

What plotline would you cut in order to spend time in prison with this teen kid?

I thought there was a little too much.

Banks Hot Mess Express.

AA meetings.

You would have cut the AA meetings.

Probably would have cut the AA meetings.

Okay.

But then we don't.

That's a cheap gimmick.

We don't meet hot-weathered author guy.

You know?

Yeah, I'm not sure we needed that guy either.

But maybe we would have cut some Jake.

Maybe two less Ascot scenes.

Oh, yeah, yeah.

Definitely cut the Ascot month.

I'm not asking for 45 minutes in prison, but give me like the first night in jail.

Give me like he's going to get food and somebody hits him over the head with a...

with a tray and he's got to like fight back or he's got some guy on the inside being like, you're going going to be a target unless you show them that you got it.

You're going to stand up for yourself.

So now he gets like, just give me like three jail scenes.

This is your Oz fan coming out.

Easy content.

You always have to do it.

Easy content.

I see.

Well, when somebody goes to jail, naturally, you put yourself in the position, it's everybody's worst case scenario to go to jail.

And I kind of want to know what he's thinking.

He just seems not damaged enough by the end of this.

It's like, oh, let's make some eggs.

Do you think that they didn't show him in jail because they wanted to keep you in doubt as to whether or not he did it and if you spent like literally any more time with that kid you're like that kid definitely maybe this but i mean you mentioned it earlier with the law and order template like the the person who gets arrested in the first 25 percent of a show like this is ends up not being the killer so it's almost like you cross him off once he gets arrested it's very true um

But the cover-up thing was a very good angle that I don't remember seeing before.

That he felt like he had to do this this because he didn't want his mom to go to jail.

I feel like we've seen that before.

And I could not name for you what it is right now, but a sort of like, I thought you did it.

I thought you did it.

Yeah, it does feel vaguely familiar, but I did like it.

Jessica Beale, you mentioned sort of like all the confusing wheelings and dealings in the last episode.

But

I think I sat up and paid attention because we had been primed for that because midway through the season, like in order to get her son

free and out of court,

she goes and fucks Jake and sets him up.

And I thought that was like a beautiful, ice-cold move from Jessica Beale's character and then puts on this whole performance in court.

And it was just like

that was the best part of the show.

Yeah.

So you're like on the lookout for her ability to scheme and manipulate things.

And so when she like

swings by Matthew Modine's place at the end, presumably with like, I don't know, a collection of ascots for his husband and,

you know, plants the murder weapon.

Like, it's great stuff.

Did you want more trial or less trial?

Because presumed innocent leaned the other way and went big in the trial.

No, that was, I thought that was a perfect amount of trial.

I didn't need any more, it was like two days of testimony.

Yeah, yeah, we had a trial montage, multiple witnesses just banging stuff out.

Yeah, uh, I thought the weakest character

and actually liked the performance more just how they drew it up was the doorman.

Doorman Artie, Dorman Artie, just

being that much of a

I don't know, an enforcer, he's going to talk shit to Corey Stoll.

That one didn't totally out.

I think he was like full of whiskey courage.

And

I did like the side plot where he was like selling rich people's cast offs on Craigslist.

Like the,

you know, residents of the building who were just dumping their couch every couple of years.

He's just like making a profit.

That might be true, by the way.

I hope it's true.

Yeah, I think people do that.

I hope it's true.

Yeah.

um all right anything else we have to hit with this show no i just i think

now that you're coming to grips with the season two because you know i'm right i know you're always right and it's it's disappointing um that uh who killed jake could it have been more than what we thought

um

but i think that um maybe a matthew modine dies in prison epstein style no you want i don't know if you're gonna want a whole three episode arc of matthew modine in prison.

Well, no, but maybe he it's it's a quote-unquote he killed himself, but did he?

Do you think he's killed?

The cameras got shut down for a half hour when he was in sale.

Can you wear an ascot with an orange jumpsuit?

Is that something that you can do?

Well, that means he gets out of jail and it's they give him his stuff back and it's like a wallet and seven ascots.

You know, Modine's my guy, right?

Oh, I love Matthew Modine.

I think Vision Quest is like

important 80s movie.

Married to Friday.

For me, weird did on Rewatchables.

Yeah, he's a great run by him.

Yeah, lovely.

Pacific Heights, which we have not done on the Rewatchables yet, but is one of my favorites.

No, I'm a big Modin fan.

I really like his, the Modina sense of like,

he's in a Cristerinal and Batman movie.

He's in Stranger Things.

He's, you know, he's around.

He's working.

That makes me really happy.

The Ascot choice is just, and surely it was not his choice, but it was, it was really interesting thing.

I think more shows should aim to be B plus.

I think we would have a better society if more shows were just delivering solid B plus and not shooting for A when they don't have the ability to get there.

Do you know?

I'd rather a solid B plus show than like a show that's really trying to get to A and winds up in the CE territory as a result, you know?

I agree with you.

And

I'll give you my score of looking up versus looking down

that we talked about, which is our version of a sports metric.

Okay.

How engrossed you were in the show.

I was probably 45% looking up at the TV during this entire show.

It really isn't.

At the start of this episode, you said 50-50.

You just downgraded it.

I think I downgraded it five.

The more I'm thinking about it.

It's because they didn't have prison scenes.

And you were like, if you would have put those prison seeds in, you would have gotten it.

Those middle episodes, the trial, I was up.

Yeah.

But yeah, there was some

other.

And, you know, you're checked out on

the table.

Did the sisters hate each other or not?

That was another one where all of a sudden they're making eggs in the kitchen together.

And it's like, I thought you guys didn't talk for 10 years.

I thought they jumped

fast on that.

That's the point of sisterhood.

They're like constantly in and out with each other in this.

Like, Jessica Beal is in with her.

And then she

then rats her out to the journalist at the party.

You know what I mean?

Like, it's just

constantly swinging.

Should she have been more white trashy and more annoying than she was?

Do you want like an accent?

Would you have preferred she had been from the south and given you like I felt like cigarettes were a must, to be honest?

I don't know why she wasn't chain smoking.

She was smoking.

That's how Kim Dickens got the DNA off of her.

She dropped her.

I'm saying

cigarette in the kitchen.

Cigarette every single day.

Jessica Beale getting mad about, you're really going to keep smoking my house all that.

Like, I just would have

ramped that up.

Fucking the cater waiter at the fancy Hampton's party is not trashy enough for you.

You need

to get it.

Yeah, that was like three more of those.

Okay.

Yeah, that was pretty good.

Okay.

The mom, you like the mom, too?

I really like that actress.

She was in the penguin, and I think she's really, really good.

You didn't like her?

I like her.

I felt like she was going for it.

She delivered most of the ham and the ham sandwich, and I thought it was

delicious.

I thought it was great.

All right, better sister.

I'm going B.

It sounds like you're a B plus.

I'm going a happy B, though.

It's not like, I'm not dissing the show.

It's like a very positive B.

B plus, the plus you earn for knowing exactly what you are.

And I appreciate that about the show.

And your friends and neighbors, what did you where'd you end up with that?

B minus C plus?

That's a B minus C plus for me.

Yeah,

where are you with that?

Where's your college?

That was a B plus for me.

Okay, all right.

Yeah, I really enjoyed it.

It's because there's more homes for you to look up on Zillow.

No, I really like the college episode.

I thought I had such a good time that one episode, it bumped the grade up for me.

It just like had you coasting through the rest of the season.

It was just like remembering.

I did spend at least one episode trying to figure out where they were filming it, which was somewhere past the Connecticut border in New York and that whole like westchester riot i mean so i did the deep dive on that that was the zillowiest show that we've watched for a long time yeah absolutely yeah there were some some really fun houses to look at but i'll tell you sirens it was the one redeeming quality of sirens i i had no idea that that whole world i was i was deep diving that one really mad at myself for finishing that show for having watched the whole thing really mad at myself i will say though our guy kevin bacon was really good he looked great he looks phenomenal megan fahey handsome as ever.

Megan Fahey also quite good, I thought.

Of all the people in that show, I thought she was quite good, but it's not what I want.

I understand why that's where she went after White Lotus, but it's not.

She deserves better.

What are you and Rob?

What do you have coming up on Prestige?

Anything?

We're doing Stick, the Owen Wilson show

and the golf show.

And Rob had never seen Tin Cup, so he's watching Tin Cup for the first time.

And I had never seen Happy Gilmore, so I'm watching Happy Gilmore for the first time.

So we're going to do a little like...

Maybe this will lead to the Sopranos finally.

Loser guys play golf is, you know, something we're going to check in on.

So, all right.

Good to see you Joanna.

Thanks to Kai and John as well.

You can check out the Prestige TV podcast as a video podcast if you didn't know that on Spotify.

And we have, what is it, Ringer Dash TV is the YouTube channel.

Yeah.

All right.

Thanks, Joanna.

Good to see you.

Thanks, Bill.

Bye.

This episode is brought to you by Whole Foods Market.

You know the deal.

Summer means grilling and maybe even impressing your pals with the best cookout of summer.

Well, if you want to go big on quality without breaking the bank, say hello to 365 by Whole Foods Market.

They've got everything you need for the grill-from antibiotic-free chicken thighs to uncured hot dogs, even wild-caught salmon burgers.

If you're feeling fancy, you can pick up organic condiments, sides, chips, drinks, even dessert from ice cream, cake cones.

Plus, you'll see these yellow low-price signs all over the store.

Yeah, they actually mean something here.

Same for the yellow sales signs with new deals every Wednesday.

And if you want to stay at home, no worries.

There's delivery options too.

So, whether you're a grill master or just there for the snacks, there are so many ways to save on summer grilling favorites at Whole Foods Market.