‘Task’ Episode 4: All Roads

Task episode four, Prestige TV podcast.

I'm Bill Simmons, Rob Mahoney here, Joanne Robinson.

Here, how many shows do we have left?

We have three left after this, three left.

Probably the worst episode of the four, but yet I thoroughly enjoyed it and I give it like at least an A-.

But it feels like we're just kind of moving toward the second half of the show.

What do you think, Joe?

I think not enough Maeve.

I think I'm most emotionally invested in Maeve, and I think the lack of Maeve makes this.

I liked this episode, All Roads.

I really liked it.

But I, yeah, we're in the middle of like a propulsive story.

I do think the, I'm curious what you guys think about the flashback section.

I'm really interested in like putting a flashback like that in the middle of the season, you know?

Well, Rob's a big Almond Brothers guy.

So he's who's delayed?

Look at that.

See Melissa?

A little summer dip to the Almond Brothers.

Who among us is immune to those particular charms?

Are the Almond Brothers the most quarry-coated band?

Like, is there a better band to listen to when you're at the quarry with your brothers?

Or for have...

Has a band ever been in more flashbacks than the Almond Brothers?

Oh, yeah.

Great question.

I think as soon as we go backwards, they're just ready to roll.

They're just in case you break.

I really like the flashback scene.

I can't wait to talk about that.

Rob, where'd you stand on this episode?

I liked it, but I agree that I was like left a little bit cold.

I think personally for me, I was just hoping for a little more fireworks out of the sting, like out of this big supposed collision between these forces.

And then it just ended up with Cliff getting, I guess, run off the road and nabbed.

And that's fine and eventful in its own way, but I was hoping for a little bit more there.

Yeah, they were setting it up that we were going to have some dramatic, and it just, you know, I thought Cliff could have driven for another four or five minutes, maybe zoomed through some traffic.

It's just all of a sudden it was over.

I'm with you on Maeve.

I actually, if I had a crit, it's weird to start with the nitpicks and the critiques because there's a lot of good stuff in there.

But if I had a nitpick, I'm just way more interested in Maeve than Ruffalo's daughter.

That's, you know, they kept

giving us scenes.

She got the big monologue scene in this episode.

And

I just think she's a supporting fringe character.

And

I just don't don't think she's that imperative to everything we're watching.

And she's kind of over here.

And we just keep detouring to go over there.

And unless we're paying off with that in some gigantic way, I just, I'm not into it.

I think the theme of what she was talking about in terms of this idea of like having to feel grateful to be inside of a family and the larger story that works in every plot line about family and community and what it means to be inside of that community and what it means to be outside that community, or you can never leave that community, I guess, if you're Aaron, et cetera.

I thought that was interesting, but yeah, Emily is not fully working for me, though.

Close-up magic, my guy Leo at the Water Ice

with an incredible curly hair routine.

Like, do you think Close Up Magic is the move if you're a teenager and you're interested in your coworker?

What do you think?

I think it will save you, apparently.

You know, it's really the only thing you need to get out of your, you know, terrible home situation, to forget all of your troubles for exactly one night with water ice cherry bombs.

Like, you know, there's a solution here for Emily, but it's it is tough because I think you're exactly right, Bill.

Like everything,

everything she's saying, like the substance of it that Joe was just talking about is important and resonant and interesting, but it is not the main plot of the show or the driving thrust of what we're doing.

And to the extent that you could, you know, sketch out how it would be, I would say through this episode, you can see the kind of lines on both families, right?

Like you see Tom with his family and the ways he and and his wife, for all of their best efforts, kind of like couldn't make Emily and Ethan not feel like strangers in their own family.

And then for the Pendergrass, like Robbie is under this delusion that he's going to be able to whisk away his kids to Canada, buy a piece of land, live forever.

Like, that's not a plan.

That's not going to work.

And yet, his daughter seems to be the realist in the situation, in the sense that, like, she even knows that he's not going to make it to the For the Daughter dance.

Yeah.

Oh, nice.

Wow.

For the daughter.

Yeah.

She, the, the, Emily's in a different show.

Yeah.

It's fine.

Um, but it does bring up the legacy of daughters in dramas.

Oh, and

this is a big

famous one.

But the homeland's the go-to anytime this happens where you just kind of get the PTSD from season two, especially.

But uh, yeah, but yeah, it's a it's a tough plane to land, especially when uh when there's so many more interesting things happening in this show, and we have these kind of double, let's figure out who the mole is situations.

This was the Perry episode.

I mean, Perry was a real-time heat check from him, which we'll get into.

But

Detective Perry on the case.

Yeah, absolutely.

No, I think it's interesting.

You mentioned the legacy of teenage daughters on shows like this.

Something that Rob and I talk a lot about a lot on this feed is therapy scenes and how therapy scenes can really just like slow down or feel like a too obvious sort of expositional tool or all that sort of stuff.

So I don't know how much the therapy scenes are working for me, I would say.

Wow.

Joe doesn't even know those sopranos of the therapy scenes than that.

That was the most polarizing piece of the show.

I'm on the record.

Therapy scenes and dream sequences.

Yeah.

I'm out.

You're out.

These are ironically two tools that the Sopranos use, but I always felt like were the weakest parts of the show.

But dreams where it's like, oh, that might mean this.

I'm like, I'm out.

Just give me the meat.

Give me the potatoes.

Aggregate this, Bill Simmons, colon, anti-dreams, and also anti-therapy.

Anti-Sopranos, it sounds like.

For my dramas.

For my TV dramas.

Bill,

how does it make you feel knowing that Rob and I are about to watch our first episodes of The Sopranos for the hooked mini-series we're doing on the Prestige feed?

Rob's never watched it either.

Also have never watched it.

I've just skated by in the background while you're grilling Joe.

I'm like, you know what?

I'm just going to sit over here in my corner, but also have not seen the show.

And we're about to go on this.

We're about to.

Oh my lord.

That's really interesting.

When does that start?

Well, we're taping this early.

We should say that like we're taping these episodes really early because we've had some listeners be like, hey, why is Bill talking about future episodes of Task on his podcast when he says he hasn't watched ahead?

We're taping these early.

We're all

operating under the rules.

We're watching it week to week.

But yeah, we are going to do this.

I think it's like the last week of September.

I think the week that this episode comes out, that's what we're going to do.

The best thing about taping these early is finishing the episode and then within three hours, I'm probably figuring out a way to watch the next one because then we can immediately jump ahead.

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Let's talk about our guy, Perry.

Just a heat-check from him this episode.

What's your background with the actor, Joanna?

Like I said, I know him from Suns of the Anarchy.

He was on that show.

I think so.

I mean, he's been around a bunch of other things, but that's what I mainly know him from.

What do you know him from?

He's that guy.

I can't even pin him down.

Just knew him from stuff, but can't even really figure out what I know him from.

And I didn't watch Sons of Anarchy.

What about you, Rob?

I mean, he's been in literally everything, especially in terms of semi-prestige TV products of the last 20 years or so.

It has just popped up in every single show, it turns out.

So he figures out that the gun in the killing was used in the big Redding fight, which we're getting that scene.

They just keep eluding it and circling around it too many times.

And now we know that.

Now that the flashback sign has been turned on,

we're going backwards with that.

What almond brothers song do you play at a shootout in Reading?

Probably something a little rollicking, right?

Gotta be.

Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, something with a little oomph to him.

I mean, you honestly might even zoom over to Leonard Skynyrd, which I think is allowed.

Yes.

Yeah.

You can.

Yes.

It's like adjacent, like almost like a brother in the family.

So he says, it's got to be something personal.

It's got to be something fucking personal.

And he goes and has a little car meeting with Dark Hearts guy.

Do we know that guy's name?

Bearded, kind of, he's kind of the mob boss of the Dark Hearts, but we don't know his name or really what his job is.

I don't even know the name of the name.

He's Vincent.

Yes, he is Vincent, but he's almost more like an envoy from the Dark Hearts HQ or something.

It's like he has been at the meeting and he's come back to give Perry the notes from the meeting.

So have we met the leader?

No.

Well, my understanding is that there's something called the Mother Council.

Love this terminology.

The mother council, which is, I think, like 12 people or something like that.

And Perry's on the mother council, but he's been.

off playing Detective Perry trying to cover Jason's ass.

And I'm really curious why he's so invested in Jason, but trying to cover Jason's ass.

And meanwhile, the mother council had a meeting without him.

He's like, nobody told me you were meeting.

And they were like, that's because you were out here having you know, relations with the woman bartender and investigating what happened with Billy, et cetera, et cetera.

And so Vincent's like, we decided without you that Jason's out.

Jason's your guy,

but he's not handling things and he's out.

So I don't know that there's like a boss boss.

I think it's like a council of bosses, a surprisingly like sort of democratic association

in the MC.

They're very evolved.

And honestly, like the Dark Hearts are apparently incredible scrapbookers.

Like going back through the records is just immaculately done.

So congratulations to Perry or Reaper or Breaker or whoever it was that did all the scrapbooking because they just, you know, really have a delicate touch with it.

I was jealous of the scrapbooking.

Yeah, we don't do that for the ringer at all.

I don't have a 2017 ringer yearbook I can look through.

This had one of my favorite tropes in a show like this.

And there's a couple because there was two others later.

The call's been made.

When the guy's like trying to be like, no, no, what if we do this?

He's like, the call's been made.

Like, this is done.

It's a wrap.

We're dealing with this dude.

And this is now out of your hands.

I still don't know.

That guy might have been the leader of the Mothership Council, though.

Oh, you think so?

Yeah, I don't.

He's either the conciliary or the leader.

And I felt like there was a certain weight to him that made me wonder if he's actually running the whole thing.

We need an org chart.

That's how we got on the council.

Yeah, I mean, like, he has the gravitas, you know.

So, Pair.

I'm assuming it's happening.

It's happening Friday.

Mother-daughter, father-daughter dance, which is not happening because we didn't even get tickets for it.

That's Thursday.

Is it Wednesday?

Is that yeah, because tomorrow is the dance.

Yeah, so it's Wednesday.

Jason's supposed to be out of there by Friday.

So that's the TikTok and what we're working with here.

And out of there, just so we're all on the same page.

He's getting killed, right?

That's the plan as far as the motorcycle gang is concerned.

And it does seem like perry you know joe you mentioned earlier like why would he be going to these lengths to try to save jason i do think there is like an investment in your protege kind of thing happening there like trying to bail out this relationship that has been personally and professionally important to him that said i mean he's going to great lengths and great urgency and kind of like increasing menace and brutality to try to turn over these stones and you know the methods aren't always great but the results kind of speak for themselves like he is the best detective on this show so far he is the best detective on this show.

That's a good point.

Yeah, he cracks down.

He gets dark hearts number three, whatever that guy's name is, and finds out that Billy was running around with Jason's wife, pulls that piece out.

Here's the beating story.

This is the second time we've heard about this beating

that apparently just went on for like as long as an overtime football game, and stuff was just oozing out of his head.

I hope we're not getting that flashback.

But that guy said, it's been following us around like a curse ever since.

Trope number two, yeah, really good one, really good, and then uh, and then he goes to see Jason.

I'm a big fan, Rob, of the

going in for the meeting, but you see the guy subtly putting some sort of like punch thing on.

Oh, yeah, it's like wrapping the knuckles with the metal, yeah.

It's a pro wrestling thing, it's like, oh my god, he pulled the brass knuckles out of his trunks.

But um, did you think he was going to beat that guy to death right there?

I didn't think he was going to beat him to death just because he seemed so invested in saving him, but I was a little surprised at how quickly he let up.

It was kind of just like

a one-punch and then an impassioned headbutt between them of mutual frustration.

And then all of a sudden we're just like back to business, which, look, who am I to argue with motorcycle gang justice?

Like, they clearly have some stuff figured out that the rest of us could learn from, structurally speaking, hierarchically speaking.

Look, I'm just saying there's lessons.

You know, maybe it's not the metal knuckles, but maybe there is a forgiveness there we can all learn from.

What did you think, Jeff?

Yeah, that was like one punch and it was over.

I was quite surprised by that.

But again, like, I'm, I think it's really interesting to track these relationships across

like inside of these non-blood-bound families, inside of like law enforcement, inside of, you know, we meet Grasso's chief inside of this episode.

We meet Grasso's co-workers.

You know, the way that Grasso is like keeps calling, like, keeps asking

Tom about like the priesthood and calling him boss.

There's all these just sort of like pseudo-father figures, and then a lot of like missing dead parents all around, all around the show.

That I think that's what's happening with Perry and Jason.

It's just in a very toxic space inside of the motorcycle club, as much as Rob thinks they have things to teach us.

We can agree to disagree, Joe.

What is your interpretation of Perry,

who

menaced and wrestled Erin back down to her own kitchen table inside of that really good scene?

If you need to leave, I can put you and the kids somewhere he'll never find you.

Is that in the ground?

Is that your interpretation of what Perry is saying?

Like, not I will get you out of here, but I will.

kill you if you try to leave what did what was your interpretation i took that as a as a

absolute absolute threat yeah i i will kill you she i think aaron took it that way as well so yeah i i mean yeah message received in many ways like that he is terrifying in that conversation with her and there's no part of him or that character that you would ever believe would actually help this woman yeah well i thought he was gonna kill jason because he said he lied to him um

there's a lot of spit in this scene and in this episode but their faces are really close and he's spitting as he's talking and i every time i see that i always think of the actors like what's what would have been a bridge too far for me where

what's the actor who plays perry

like like yo dude maybe not just like a hunk of spit in my face as we're doing this like could you could you speak jamie jamie mcshane yeah jamie mcshan yo jamie um can we do a second take where you're not just heaving mucus all over my face and then later um

at the end cliff gives a nice little blood spit but this is a very spitty this is the spittiest episode we've had of the uh do you think we need do you think we need a flashback to what happened to billy because we saw what happened to cliff and i feel like we could just sort of we we understand what it looks like when you do that we're getting the flashback okay the flashback the flashback door has not been open the portal the portal of the past is here after seeing the prosthetics and makeup team work on cliff i don't i don't want to see billy's head split elephant elephant man territories it's great it's great makeup well perry jason says to him she was gonna take the kids She was going to leave me, which I think is trope number three.

Goes to see Aaron, gets some threats in the kitchen.

Not positive.

He believes

her protestations.

No.

No.

I think he knows, right?

He's put this together.

And I'm not sure what his end game is with Aaron, but I don't think it's going to be good for her or the family.

Yeah.

Nope.

I think he's got Aaron figured out.

I think he's quickly now has Maeve's relationship to all this figured out.

And this is the good news, bad news about this being a light Maeve week is yes, she's not in this episode a lot.

I think she's going to be in next week a whole ton, like a ton, and in very insidious and dangerous ways.

Which may be why she wasn't in it that much.

Right.

Probably filming other stuff.

Oh, definitely could be.

The title of the episode is All Roads.

And I was like, well, all roads lead to what?

And I think it's Maeve, like, right?

Because

Tom met her.

Perry now has a scent on her.

And it's like, we're all converging on Maeve and the Prendergrast home.

So yeah, I'm I like Rob's point that Perry's the best detective in the show.

She's really good.

Perry, there's still time.

Go to the other side.

We can fight crime.

We're going to take a break and then we're going to talk about the big revelation.

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Okay.

Joanna called this, or I called, I think Joanna called this.

Martha Plimpton is the mole.

I think you called this, Joanna.

I think this might be a double head fake.

Oh, you're giving me the double.

I consider this, and I just think.

So she calls.

We have the classic,

it's me.

We have a problem.

Right.

Just like, just a staple.

And then Perry is telling Jason, basically, almost in the next scene, we heard from our informant.

So unless they're really, I mean, this is like Rob, this is a Andrew Nemhard in the paint just doing like triple fakes, trying to get a layup off kind of head fake.

We're in Jalen Brunson territory at this point.

So

if it is a head fake, she's really selling it too on her end because when she meets with Ruffalo, and at one point, like her eyes just kind of start darting like she's like almost like a law and order character like almost intentionally trying to look guilty then as the call i think it's her i mean yeah she asks like what time are you meeting in the park you know she asks all the information all the questions you would want uh you know a mole to ask i just think that showing it that reveal is so underwhelming just like showing it to us like that it feels like a fake because If she's not the mole, what that call could be is the call she promised to make, which is to figure out what's going on with the mole.

So like, we have a problem.

We cut away.

The next thing she says is, we have an informant in the department.

You know what I mean?

Like, that could be the call that she's making.

I

still have my eye on Grasso.

That's, that's my.

We were, we were talking about him here.

I just think the Lizzie Grasso stuff is so, they're like hitting that so hard

that that, like, we have heartbreak in store for us in terms of someone betraying someone else

or die or dying one of the two but i think it's more interesting if it's like a betrayal so yeah what do you think rav this is this is my prediction for the week i think we're going double mole i think plimpton is a mole but she's also working with one of the two grosso or lizzy because like if she's the person putting together the task force it would be an incredible stroke of luck for one of them to just like end up on it and also be tied into the motorcycle gang.

But if both of them are compromised and she's been told to put this person on the task force, then all of a sudden the pieces start connecting.

And there's, there's just so many little things with Grasso and Lizzie both that make them feel a little bit suspicious.

Like, you know, the camera will linger on Lizzie a little bit during the Gwen Stefani song when she's like singing about being a bad girl doing bad things.

And look, there's lots of meanings that could tie in there.

But also Grasso's want to get with Lizzie, but refusal.

Like he doesn't want to be in her marital bed, which we can unpack if you guys would like, but also doesn't offer to take her back to his place.

He doesn't offer any alternatives in a way that feels like fishy and closed off and like he doesn't want other people to know too much about him.

I also think there's just like a weird like religious conflict thing happening with Grasso that is super interesting.

Like we've been from the start, we've been hearing about his religious upbringing, his protestations about fish, fish Fridays and all this sort of stuff inside of the Catholicism, but he keeps asking about, you know, the priesthood and all this sort of stuff like that, raised Catholic.

It felt like his objection to being in the marital bed was was a religious or moral one.

And so, like, you know, spiritually, what is going on with this guy, which makes him, I think, a perfect candidate for something as conflicted as I'm ratting or I'm mulling or something like that.

So, DJ, take care of business and then feel guilty after.

Come on.

You're under 30 years old.

You grab the sex when you can get it.

Come on.

What did he think was going to happen?

Like, they're going back to her place.

Did he think that when Lizzie split up with her, actually, like burned the bed on ceremony?

What did he think of her room?

Some people have spare rooms.

I don't know what he thought was going on.

Here's my

living room.

Like there's other spots in the house.

She says,

she's like, I don't want to have sex on the floor or like over my recliner, but I'm like, is there a couch?

Like, we can, we can make this work here.

Here's my question.

What side?

Here's my question.

Are we sleeping in our jeans?

Is that the implication?

She's just like, good night.

And they're cuddled up shirtless with their jeans still on in in the marital bed is it worse to like sleep with your jeans on in the marital bed than it is to just like have sex i just thought i didn't think that was a good scene i i didn't i didn't that scene did not work for me um his reason it just didn't seem like a it didn't seem like a realistic way for

these people have been courting each other for a couple weeks yes they're getting drunk at a bar together it's on

And then just the faucet shutting off that fast.

I don't think that was realistic.

It was also unclear how they were drunk, but then they weren't.

I just thought that scene was all over the place.

I think those characters are all over the place in a way that it's just like constantly making alarms go off for me with both of them.

I like them, but like I don't know what to make of them.

And I'm still suspicious of both of them within the context of the mulling and ratting.

I really like the Lizzie performance.

I think that is really good.

I really liked her, her scene with Aaliyah, the

like the Aaliyah checkoff sharpshooter sort of line that we got and her talking about being on the softball team and like making patches and this idea of like nicknames and camaraderie and this is another bid towards like family and community this is something that brad inglesby has talked about how he's so interested in the delco area is these ideas of like community and how we show up for each other and inside the motorcycle gang it's a very toxic version of that i would say um you know joe you say that but they also do they also do the same version of what lizzie was talking about with her softball team where she was like, I made patches with nicknames for everybody.

Like, the motorcycle game is literally wearing those.

They do patch in.

It's true.

It's true.

Rob's softball flashback to the championship game.

Lizzie up with the bases loaded, making Rice Krispies treats for everybody, and then knocking a grand slam.

I'm going to say, just on Neuroses alone, Lizzie is not a pitcher.

I don't think she has it in her.

She would be an absolute nervous wreck out there.

Yeah, definitely like second base, right field.

Just try to keep Lizzie out of it before she self-combusts.

I think Lizzie's really good she's a hot mess in a good way and uh I really like her and I'm ready to do my power rankings for

if you if there's a double mole or if we're wrong about Martha Pumpton

saddest you'd be if somebody was the mole because for me Lizzie's number one yeah um I'd be like oh I was really getting attached to you uh is there would you have somebody above her Joanna or no no that would be that would be the most devastating um I want to see her confront Anthony if he's the mold.

That's what I really want to see.

But I'm curious why we're setting up Aaliyah as

a crack sharpshooter.

I think that's something that we need to think about.

And also,

we had a bunch of listeners write in.

Oh.

DJ Grasanova at gmail.com was really was really busy this last week.

And a couple people point out that Aaliyah had this line earlier in the season that she says there's mice in here, little shit, little shits everywhere.

So this idea that she would be the one to figure out who the, who the rat is, who the mole is inside of their organization, a lot of people thought that that might be an indication of that.

I also thought in her conversation with Lizzie, when they're talking about the sharpshooting and wanting to give Aaliyah the nickname, and Lizzie kind of gets stuck on the idea of like, I wish I had something.

Like, I wish I had something I was good at,

which makes me a little nervous that she went outside the organization to find something she's good at, like ratting out to to a motorcycle gang.

But I hope we're wrong.

I hope this is not the beat.

Well,

we have we had one other big thing happen.

You knew Sam was going to have to hop out of the car at some point, and it was always in these altruistic Sam moments where he's just, it's just hard to tell if his, I'm not sure if his IQ is over maybe 30, but he's like, fish, water, just like wandering out.

And there's somebody having a sage who sees him, and that leads to Robbie running out.

And

you see a little bit of a dark side for Robbie.

That was the darkest it's gotten with that dude.

But unfortunately, there's witnesses.

The kid says the name Robbie.

So now here we go.

He says, when he says Robbie, like, did anyone else just like feel their stomach drop?

You know, he just like, it almost like slightly slows down.

He's just like, Robbie.

And you're like, no.

No.

Yeah, why aren't we rooting for Robbie?

But somehow we have to.

I don't know.

We also got an email from a listener,

Steve, who had a really good prediction that I like.

I'm sorry, Bill, a little bit better than your the cute child is going to die prediction, which is that Sammy, who loves animals and Tom, who loves bird watching, what if Sam winds up?

in Tom's household at the end of all of this.

I don't know how I feel about like that one.

What was that?

Gone, baby, gone.

Like there's

yeah.

Yeah.

Like I don't know how I feel about like do over adopted son,

but

like, yeah, the animal lovers get to have a connection and it sort of helps pull Tom out of the depression that he's in.

And maybe it,

like, that healing sends him to Ethan's hearing or something like that.

Like, but I like that idea of like...

Chickens are birds.

Let's talk about birds together.

I don't know.

Look, someone needs to adopt Sam, and preferably somebody who's not regularly beating random dudes' faces to a pulp in moments of distress.

That would be ideal, I think.

Yeah, I would say.

So Sam and Ruffalo are fishing or looking at birds, and then the Almond brothers come in with Tuesday's gone.

And then that's it.

And credits.

That's it.

And credits.

I personally would think that would be a little corny.

They would really have to sell me on that one if that was the full circle that he gets one more chance at adoption.

Well, the other thing that happened was Cliff, Cliff died.

We had the fan-o-ods.

What did we say?

Cliff five and a half episodes?

When we did our first?

I think we crushed.

We said five and a half.

We did.

We all went under, and Cliff didn't make it to episode five.

He didn't make it out of looking, and he didn't make it out of this either.

That poor ass

keeps losing.

This is a scenario we talked about, which is that the motorcycle club, the MC gets Cliff.

Yep.

And then, you know, probably the cops get Robbie is probably what's going to happen.

But yeah, Cliff, my guy.

I will say the,

I mean,

the makeup was really good.

This is horrifying and horrible.

I think earlier, I do think we should talk about the like flashback a bit more, but when the, when that flashback ends, yeah, when it's just flips back, when it flips back to the cold, sad quarry and Cliff is just sort of like heaped over a rock and Sam is just like, so like Cliff was already gone.

Like he was just already, you know, he's just like sleeping in the car.

He's just like, it's over.

And this whole, you know, theme that comes up from Billy and the flashback of, like, it's already over.

You don't know, but it's already done.

Um, and Cliff was like, Yeah, I'm already done.

And Robbie's still acting, like, Robbie's still dressing up, dancing with his daughter, like making plans to go to Canada as if it's not already over, but it's over.

You know, I think that's it's over, it's like fully saran-wrapped at this point.

We are, we are completely done and dead and suffering.

Put it in the fridge, it's over.

Yeah, Rob, should we do a first take segment?

Did Cliff deserve to die?

Did he cause this himself?

Did Cliff's mistakes lead to his own death?

Because I think Cliff really fell apart the last couple episodes.

I mean, he fucking fell asleep in the car.

That was Sam in there.

You've won job.

Just stay awake for eight minutes.

But he really felt like he was unraveling

really since the shootout.

And

we've all seen too many of these shows to know that he's not making it to the end.

So there you go.

But isn't the unraveling maybe the better response than the delusion?

Like if you're going to be on one side of it, I think what Cliff is doing is probably in a lot of ways more healthy and human than what Robbie is doing, which is not just continuing on as if there's no problems until all of a sudden people are killing your friend and stealing all the drugs or some of the drugs, but like looping your family deeper and deeper into this stuff, pulling Sam, who...

Everything we've seen from Sam to this point has been feeding chickens and eating pancakes and generally like pretty happy under the circumstances.

Like he just watched Robbie beat the shit out of this dude.

Like, he's going to be terrified at this point.

Yeah, that wasn't great.

It's interesting that you say that because, again, we got another really good email from a listener who was a child psychologist who was talking about the way that Sammy is reacting to basically being kidnapped and how he's very like go with the flow.

And they're like, this

listener, Dave, was saying, like, this is.

absolutely accurate child psychology for someone like Sammy who was who was abused, who was like put down in the basement, like all these sort of things like this.

He's learned to just be like quiet and soft and amenable and sweet and just, you know, make himself appealing to whoever happens to be taking care of him at any given time.

So like, while I'm sure he's traumatized by watching Robbie beat this guy nearly to death,

also, what else has he seen living with the parents that he lived with up until this point, you know?

Listen, Sammy's kind of wired like a 70s kid.

This is what all the 70s kids were like.

We just rolled with the punches.

Didn't know what was going to happen, Who was going to be home?

We just walk around with no oversight whatsoever.

He rolls with the punches.

I respect it.

Quick NBA question for Rob.

Sorry, Joanna.

Which side is Balmer on more?

Is he in the cliff?

This is the anchor is about to come down in my head?

Or is he in the Robbie?

I'm just going to plan for the father-daughter dance and not, and pretend all this stuff isn't happening.

Well, which side is offering more carbon credits right now?

Probably the Robbies.

i think we have our answer i do think you know that's certainly a little more delusion happening in terms of uh being able to sweep all that under the rug there is a little bit of i'm just gonna be able to get in the back of this truck and disappear quality to the clippers pr messaging right now and robbie because this is the key to these shows is the guy who's like he's there's no way out he's gonna get killed by this gang or he's gonna get caught he's got this kid that he's obviously not gonna kill so he's no outs with that he thinks he's gonna go to canada a plan that's never worked in the history of tv or movies ever correct and just like yeah i sold my fentanyl and i opened a little farm here in winnipeg with uh with my adopted then that that plan's not working oh i'm going to bring my kids it'll be fine they'll just they'll just uh move right into the the calgary you know school system um just completely delusional but uh i don't know that's what we get in these shows well i just think i think it's interesting like we've talked from the beginning about this idea of robbie being like this romantic this like dreamer kind of character.

And that's who he's always been.

And I thought it was really interesting in the flashback to have the Billy versus Robbie POV, to have these like two brothers with their matching back tattoos, you know, like sitting by the lake.

And this idea of like what you lose when you lose someone who not only that you love, but who sees you a certain way.

Right.

So, you know, Robbie's like, she's just going to, maybe she'll find someone better.

Robbie's like, doesn't have to look hard to find someone better.

And then, you know, Billy gives him a bunch of shit,

you know, about the size of his dick or whatever.

But then it's also like, but you're great.

You're the best around.

And so, like, losing the person who sees you that way, and there's no one else in Robbie's life who's like, you're the best around.

Certainly not Harper, certainly not Maeve.

Like, no one's like, you're the best, Robbie.

That devastation, like, what that does to you, that kind of loss, losing someone who's known you your whole life, like they don't, their parents aren't around.

Like, who knows Robbie anymore?

Cliff, Cliff is loyal to him.

Like Cliff is great.

But like that, what that costs you to lose, I think is a really, something that Brad really captured in that flashback scene.

I think you're certainly losing the tenderness of that kind of exchange and dynamic, right?

Because I think Maeve and Robbie's kids know him in a way.

And in fact, like they kind of see right through him in this episode, right?

Like Maeve is calling him out left and right.

His daughter knows better than to rely on the fact that her dad is going to show up.

It's like, if you are the romantic in your life, you kind of end up being surrounded by realists because someone has to pull you back down to earth at times.

You turn them into pragmatists.

Absolutely.

And the fact that he's doing that with his daughter specifically is heartbreaking to watch.

The fact that she has to be the sobering adult in the room who's like, yeah, this is not happening.

I put the money back in your wallet.

Fucking sucks.

But like, it, but what makes it interesting in good TV is like it comes within the spirit of Robbie trying to be a good dad.

He just doesn't know how to be a responsible dad.

Yeah, and they did a nice job of making it super awkward that father, that let's do a dance right here.

It's like, oh my God, I could barely watch it.

I love the flashback scene.

I thought it was great.

Yeah.

And I agree.

The fade to

sad, like semi-passed out cliff and like a shitty day at the quarry versus where we were.

I also...

There's so many important things that happened in that scene, but just Aaron showing up and the way she like ran at him and the fact that the whole family is kind of watching it, which leads to, you know, stuff every family has where it's like, oh, yeah, we got to keep this secret for our guy Billy.

But I just, I thought that scene did so many different things and also explained, you know, the, the, the Aaron, why she would, she obviously loved that dude.

Yeah.

Why she would want to get revenge on these guys and the whole thing.

I love, I love that conversation that Billy and Robbie have of like,

I thought you said it was over, like you ended ended it.

And Billy's like, I tried, I tried.

Like, I thought that was really good.

And, and the look on Maeve's face, right?

We see Maeve and Billy like playing around in like the water, father-daughter, sort of like uh, fun earlier, but then the look on her face of just like, this is this is a disaster.

Uh, and putting Maeve in that similar heartburst space of just having to be the pragmatist of like, here's my dad following his heart, doing this thing, he's in love with this woman, and I know how the motorcycle club works, and this is an absolute disaster.

Um, what is this gonna to do to us?

Uh, it's I mean, Rob, she she had a thing for six foot three strapping guys with a lot of tattoos, you could have had a chance

in motorcycle days.

I'm a few tats short, but you know, I could ride with the best of them.

You know, I was, I was really, I was really moving up in the gang until I got way laid.

It's too bad.

The fentanyl incident didn't help you.

No.

Yeah, I like Aaron.

Um,

and then I think that's, I think that's all the stuff we I wanted to hit just about the episode itself, except for Maeve giving Robbie the ultimatum.

Yeah.

Not enough Maeve, but it makes me think next episode is a Maeve episode because that's usually how this stuff works.

Anything else you want to hit for just for episode four, Joanna?

I guess.

A problem that we find ourselves in right now and in the middle of a season like this when a lot of people are trying to chase down clues, even though it was fun to watch Detective Perry.

And I really loved actually that scene had with

his lady and their back and forth about the coffee.

Like I thought that was

really necessary

for to have that moment with Perry.

But like

we're ahead of most of the characters.

Like we know what's going on for the most part.

And that's always a tricky place to have a TV audience in.

If we're ahead of most of the characters, we have the information,

barring this like potential mole head fake or something like that.

So as we move into the last three, which is going to be like action, action, action, chase, all of that stuff, that's going to be propulsive.

But I think that might be why this middle section feels a little soft.

It's just sort of like, it's not a mystery we're chasing along with them.

We're just like, it's a, it's a when, not who, what, how.

It's a sort of like, how, how soon is this all going to come crashing down, which can be tense and exciting, but I think in this case feels just like a little bit softer than some of the earlier episodes.

Well, especially because the task force is the party that's so far behind.

Like they're so caught up dealing with this mole stuff in particular and just getting, like, we should say, I wasn't sure about the mechanics of the phone.

Like, Ray's phone is what's used being used to set up Cliff for the sting.

Was the phone given to the motorcycle gang, like the actual phone, or was it a cloned phone so that they could kind of eavesdrop on the text?

Like, I wasn't sure what was happening there exactly.

But he said he, like, we saw

Grasso send a text and then Cliff said, I haven't heard from them yet.

So, whatever is happening in the phone, like, he's not getting those messages from the phone that the cops have.

So I don't know.

There's something happened with the phones that I don't feel like we understand yet.

You know what I mean?

I mean, maybe there was a phone call.

Breaking his phone was fun too in the car chase.

Cliff had a lot of unforced errors down the stretch.

Like maybe get off the phone and try to drive away from these guys.

Here's what I'll say to Robbie: some no's I have for Robbie.

Robbie

breaks the phone of the guy who took the photo of him, but then he just tosses it.

And, like, I understand you don't want to take a cell phone with you because you don't want it to be traced, but I just felt like him tossing the cell phone and leaving it there did not feel like the move to me.

You bring the phone,

toss it later.

Yeah.

Put it through the shredder.

Like, does it blend.com?

I don't know.

It's almost like Robbie's not that good of a criminal.

Literally, she's being reinforced over and over again.

Yeah.

It's a little new to all this.

rob what when's the next time you're gonna have a heavily saran wrapped bagel you think without thinking of cliff

i don't think i'm ever gonna be able to look at plastic wrap the same way again there was something about just the intensity of the way it was being wrapped that really really got under my skin are we also like how did he breathe bagels

Yeah, in New York City,

they'll super dumb.

They saranibage?

They saran wrap it.

Yeah.

How do you think they did that with the actor?

That was one of those.

How did you do this?

Like, I just couldn't figure it out.

Yeah, that's got to be like

you put little like air holes in there for him.

I'd be so bummed out if that, like, first, like being spit on.

I wouldn't want that.

I wouldn't want to be in that scene.

But then the, yeah, we're going to sarane and wrap you with a bunch of fucking makeup on where you can't really breathe anyway.

And just try to hold your breath for a minute.

It wouldn't be great.

That spit scene in particular.

How many takes?

Was it, was it like fourth take?

Let me get a sip of Kool-Aid, blood splatter on Jason.

Yeah.

Inglesby's like one more.

And it's like, fuck, come on.

We need the coverage.

Yeah, that'll do it from this side.

All right.

It's prediction time, Joanna.

Let's go.

We got three episodes left.

I assume episode six is going to be our Mac Daddy, awesome, holy shit episode would be our experience with these shows.

Could be.

Do you expect any sort of huge swerve, anything crazy in episode five, or is it the MAVE episode?

Well, my main question is when, and we've been asking this before, when do we get Tom and Robbie in the same place?

When are we getting our like diner heat scene, right?

Like, yes.

If, if, like, sick, if six, we only three episodes left.

If six is the big, like, action-y moment, and then seven is the sort of come down,

like,

that has to happen next week, right?

We have to have Tom and Robbie next week.

I mean, you could have it in the action-y episode, you know, the first 15 to 20 minutes is them intersecting for some reason or another, and then the back half of it is the action extravaganza.

I also just feel like I need more

Ruffalo

being a bit more competent, or like maybe he's just not competent.

Maybe that's the thing.

He looked like a like the saddest like sack of potatoes once his like sting went poorly.

But like,

what, why is

Tom in the FBI?

What is he good at?

What have we seen him be good at so far?

Are we going to see that evolve or should we just send him back to the job fair?

Like, what do we think?

I don't know.

Does he have a taste for the action at the level like this?

It's funny because it made me think a little bit of No Country for Old Man

when

Tommy Lee goes and he sees.

He sees the thing shot out of the door after Brolin dies and just the fear he has being in that room versus how he would have handled it 20 years ago.

And he like officially realizes, like, I'm a little too old for this job.

I was getting those vibes from Ruffalo.

I think, you know, to the extent that this is heat, we are not getting the like, this crew is good moment.

Like, this is not, oh, these guys are hyper competent.

This is both of these guys like are kind of okay and also kind of suck at their jobs or, or the criminaling in Robbie's case.

Like, I think some of the bumbling is the point for Ruffalo.

Right.

And Perry's the best at his job of anyone, but even Perry maybe should have put two and two together with

who

is has a vested interest in fucking with us.

Took him well a month to kind of start patching it together that somebody had it out for the gang.

I did like that wrinkle that like on a local level, it was an open secret that Jason had beat Billy to death.

But on a one step up level within the organization, like Perry just bought the company line about him skimming money and thought that was the end of it.

Like I like that there's that barrier to entry because Jason does not seem like the sharpest detective in the world.

I don't think he would be putting all the pieces together, but Perry, now that he has seen the one critical piece, is starting to get the whole picture.

I'm still, I also like, I feel really sort of dialed in on Perry at this point.

Jason remains kind of like

a mystery character to me in terms of like who he is, what he actually cares about.

Like, she was going to take the kids, but like, does he actually care about that?

Or is that a pride thing?

Does he have like a rage, you know, switch that flips?

Like, you know, what, what's his, what's his overall deal?

I'm not sure.

I feel like I understand his interior life at all, but maybe I don't know.

I guess we're going to need to see that head-splitting flashback to figure out if the rage problems are real for Jason.

I don't want it.

So, the two flashbacks we think we might get are the Redding fight and then maybe Billy getting beaten to death.

I actually don't think we're getting either.

Why?

Okay.

Yeah.

Why?

Like, what would it show?

I don't know.

If we were going to get more flashbacks, those would be the two candidates, I would think.

Are we still?

We're still waiting on Tom's wife.

Tom's wife.

Oh, and Tom's wife is another one.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Rob, any big predictions?

I'm on double mole watch.

I'm going to say that the second mole is Lizzie.

I think Plimpton and Lizzie are in cahoots in some fashion.

Whether they have a long-standing relationship or not, I don't know.

But I think it's the two of them who are both moles.

Wow.

See, I'm more suspect of Aaliyah just because she's been suspiciously quiet and it feels like they're tempting us.

Anything else from the list?

That means I take Grasso.

Yeah, we do have a couple things.

We got a Pearl Jam email from Seamus who notes that

Brad Inglesby wrote this great movie called Out of the Furnace with Christian Bill, Casey Affleck, Woody Harrelson.

And the Pearl Jam song release recurs throughout the whole movie.

So Seamus is wondering if like Eddie Vetter is just a Brad Englesby fan and has been.

And that's how they got to use Pearl Jam in last week's episode or two weeks ago.

And then Reyna wrote in to say, just writing in because I was shocked that Bill Simmons didn't pick up on the fact that the priest in task is the same as the priest in an episode of The Sopranos, Amor Fu, who basically enables Carmella to stop feeling guilty about her marriage to Tony, knowing what he does to make money and just try to live a little more of the humble life so as not to partake or benefit from it.

So a Sopranos.

Listen, even the greats slip up from time to time.

Never.

Pass that along to the listener.

All right.

So episode five.

We have, coming next week, obviously, three left.

And it

feels like shit's going to really start going down a real way.

Plus, you're doing the hooked, the hooked thing.

We're not going to cover the girlfriend from Amazon, I don't think, on the Prestige show because it's not very prestigious.

Are you enjoying it?

I gave it a whirl.

I gave it a whirl.

Bill, is your household

a the summer I turn pretty household or not so much?

What are you talking about?

I have a 20-year-old daughter.

Yeah, that's what I thought.

That's what I thought.

Staying up in Boston until three.

She's staying up till three in the morning because that's when Amazon puts the new episode on.

Bill's team Jones.

Are you Team Jair or are you Team Conrad?

What do you think?

I have not watched the show.

I dabbled in just being in the room when it was being watched and made fun of it and was told to leave.

Being in the room, dads, is my favorite part of the whole The Summer I Turn Pretty phenomenon.

So I love that for you.

I think Bill, who has excellent taste, would be Team Conrad.

I really do.

Well, Team Jer is

a tormenting sick, honestly.

In episode 11, apparently there was this sex scene where they went for it, and my daughter said it was

people were very confused by it.

They're like, this is a show for teens.

Why did they like go for it with a sex scene?

What's happening?

Why would teens want sex?

We're all waiting to find out.

They want the sanitized Amazon teen culture sex, not like sex.

She was a little.

Well, they were in Paris, first of all, and like things, you know, things are going to go the way they're going to go in Paris.

Secondly, when I did talk to Jodi and Nora about the episode, I did say I was worried for the dads of America about that sex scene.

So there you go.

The show's over, Bill.

The finale happened, but there's going to be a movie.

So

the saga continues.

So did she stop turning pretty or is she going to be able to turn pretty again?

There's no more summers where she can turn pretty?

Well, there's going to be a movie.

So there's always more opportunities to turn prettier.

Yeah, you know?

Smart.

The movie, the turning the TV show into the movie thing actually kind kind of works.

Yep.

Yeah.

The downtown Abbey approach, I think it's going to work.

The first Sex in the City movie was massive.

And then sadly, they made a second one.

They did.

It's one of the worst movies ever made.

And then sadly, they just kept going with Sex in the City.

Pretty good.

All right.

So who do we have to thank?

Donnie.

Donnie Beach.

Let's thank Donnie for stepping in.

Let's thank Justin Sales, as always.

And thank you to both of you, Rob and Joanna.

Great to see you.

Thank you, Bill.

Great to spend this hour with you.

As always, I will see you for episode five.

Sounds good.

Bye.

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