‘Task’ Episode 6 With Creator Brad Ingelsby

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Prestige TV podcast, episode six, Task.

Rob Mahoney.

He died in episode six.

No, he didn't die.

Other people did die.

Rob Mahoney, sadly.

He was before the opening credits of episode six of Task.

Rob Mahoney is sadly ill.

He'll be fine.

He's but ill enough that he couldn't be on an unbelievable episode.

So I would shout out to him.

We miss Rob.

We'll have him for the finale, though.

Well, all that happened this episode was Robbie died, Lizzie died,

Tom confronted Grassso about being the mall, and Robbie double-crossed everybody and pulled it off.

Yeah, just that.

We just only pulled that stuff out.

Just like a nothing out there.

58 minutes.

Where do you want to start?

Let's start.

Well, should we say that we've got...

Brad Englesby on this episode as well.

Oh, we have Brad Englesby, the showrunner creator of this thing at the end.

And you could hear him dive into some of the decisions and why he did this show in the first place so we were all leading

this is kind of this new trend of the second to last episode being the biggest episode which i don't know when that started but it was 20 25 years ago this was the action what was the first one you remember

thrones really popularized it i felt like sopranos

initially would do it but then Yeah, Thrones probably thrones was when I think people were aware of like, oh, the ninth episode is the one.

That's the episode.

And now it feels like pretty standard.

Although in this case, it's sixth episode.

I was a little surprised about how much happened in this episode.

And then the question we have to ask ourselves is like,

now what do we do with the, I mean, there's still things to do, but there's so much

episode.

Like the finale, there's so much.

We still have 60 minutes left.

Yeah.

Well.

So when we did the episode five recap, we were wondering how they were going to get out of this shootout and still have two episodes left.

because in the shootout it felt like we had these three groups we had the tarantino triangle happening and it was just like well

is everybody gonna die is it like how are we gonna get out of this and we figured out a way to get out of it somehow i'm still not sure why robbie didn't get shot immediately with all these people coming in on him um but we had because tom had no ammunition i guess yeah well that might have been part of it um But we end up with a double fight.

We're splitting between.

Were you surprised that Tom was able to hold his own with Perry?

I mean, we saw Tom like creaking around and

barely able to go up and downstairs.

All of a sudden, he's Muhammad Ali.

Pulled all of his Hulk energy out for that.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I mean, it helps that I guess that Perry is an older guy, but we did just, we've watched Perry like punch people, drown people, like do a bunch of stuff this season.

So yeah, that, and also it was taking me away from the Jason Robbie showdown, which I was so captivated by.

I thought that was the single best moment of the season when

he's killing Jason

and he's like, fucking God.

And then all of a sudden his eyes go up.

Yeah.

And when I was watching it live, I thought, oh, he killed him.

This is like his reaction.

But then you realize something happened.

He rolls over and you just see the knife sticking up.

I thought that was such a cool shot how they did that.

I thought that was so good.

I was almost wondering when I watched it live, I was almost wondering,

is he going to kill him or is he going to decide like, I'm better than this?

I'm not going to kill a guy, you know, even though we watched a shootout at the beginning of the season, like, is his moral fiber going to prevent him from doing this?

And so that I was like trying to parse what was going on on his face.

And what was going on on his face is he had a knife stuck in his ribs.

And yeah, I like that you didn't, they didn't show us the knife until the roll-off and all that sort of stuff.

But that's a, I mean, it's a classic move.

It is.

We've seen it many times, but it still works.

It works.

It juked me in this.

Yeah, it really.

Yeah, I didn't see it.

I just thought he was going to kill him.

Yeah.

Get away.

And Tom Pilfrey is such a like surprising performer.

Like you never kind of know what he's going to do.

So I was like, maybe that's just the face that Robbie makes when he's about to kill a guy, but it's actually the face he makes when he's about to die.

Well, he doesn't die right away because we get the car ride and

yet again, hearkening back to heat.

We get the one guy cradling the other guy.

And

yeah, and we get to him looking in the trees.

I thought his death was really good.

Like the music was really good.

He flashes to the kids.

He flashes to Maeve.

We hear him tell that story about, you know, that we've heard him tell before about how he and Billy hop on a dragon and fly away.

And then he's like in the quarry.

It's a happy place.

I thought that was a great death scene.

Really, really good.

Big.

I've learned not to guess awards anymore because every time I think somebody has something locked down,

someone comes in and surprises me.

You know, other stuff happens.

And then by the end of the year, when they're in the list, they don't make it.

But I find it hard to believe he's not going to be in the conversation.

It's really interesting.

Have you heard anything from HBO about why they decided this should be a fall show?

Because this is like not primo Emmy qualification time.

Usually you would hold something that you really think is going to go.

I think they needed it.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I think post-COVID when they're making less shows.

Because there's a lot between this and the Emmys.

There's like the pit season two, you know, a bunch of other stuff that's coming.

So, but I think Pelfree should, you know, Mayor won a ton of Emmys for people, right?

Yeah.

And so I would love to see Pelfree win for this.

I think he's so good in the show.

So we think,

and I think Ruffalo was really good too, but I think, I think Pelfree is the one, the first character you remember from this show would be my guess.

I think so.

Though it depends what they do with Grasso in the finale, because all of this is now coalescing around Grasso's character, right?

In a major way.

So that's interesting.

Hold that thought.

We'll get to Grasso

because

the other person that died is Lizzie.

Were you surprised that Lizzie and Robbie died so early in the episode?

Because they die before.

I was shocked by the Lizzie death.

I don't know why I didn't see it coming, but

they set it up perfectly with the hearing thing.

That's always a great gimmick in

movies or shows like this when somebody gets shot too close to the ear.

Yeah, it's ringing.

Topland did it really well with Stallone.

And the sound design on it was really good.

And then you just kind of lose your bearings and you can't hear hear anything anymore.

And you're just,

I thought it was wild that so Robbie and Lizzie die in the first 15 minutes.

And then they put the title up task.

So it's essentially like the cold open for the episode.

Yeah.

Are these two big deaths?

And we had been worried about there were other deaths too.

I mean, I mean, there was like, what, five?

Yeah.

The three other ones, too.

Yeah.

Yeah.

But like.

We've been worried about Lizzie and Garasso sort of coming to a head.

If one of them's a mole, what's going to happen?

They've been setting this up.

The running worry about Lizzie freezing or not, or what's she going to do?

This is

to me almost worse than Grasso killing her because that's something we worried might happen, that he would shoot her.

This is almost worse, or at least juicier dramatically.

He basically did kill her.

He just didn't kill her.

Right.

Yeah.

And so

he can't take ownership of it.

Yeah.

But he's still responsible for it.

The car thing was abrupt and brutal.

yeah

and uh and then of course everybody gets to see it too but tough one there's no death scene for lizzy she's just dead well she's he's holding her and he's like okay what happened she's just gone yeah i think that um i love that shot too she turns to camera and then she's hit by the car yeah um alia and grosso running towards her but neither of them make it in time i thought all of that was really good and i think what's even sadder you know because they set it up last episode right someone's gonna have to call out from the radio from the car.

We have no reception.

So we were wondering about that.

But she's calling for backup.

But what's so tragic is backup's already there, right?

Like that guy goes to pick up Tom and he's like, oh, my deputies are right behind me.

So she did all of that for nothing because they were coming anyway.

Sad.

Tough one.

Big winner, though.

Who is the actress?

Allison Oliver.

Yeah, big winner.

She's really good in this.

Yeah.

And Grasso now is just

evil.

I hate Grasso now.

Okay, interesting.

I loved this episode for Grasso because the scene that he has with Michael Dorsey, that actor whose name I didn't write down, we did get an email about it a couple of weeks ago.

Someone was surprised that we didn't call out that he's one of the guys in risky business, like one of Cruz's friends in risky business.

That's Cruz's friend who has sex with the hooker in the upstairs.

That's the same guy.

So they were like.

Gabriel Sabarge.

You know my favorite like casting spoiler thing?

Yeah.

Someone's like, that guy's coming back.

He's the guy from risky business.

And so

him showing up with an all-time

like corrupt cop like movie name Michael Dorsey, right?

Michael Dorsey, great corrupt cop name.

I love that scene with the two of them in the kitchen, right?

When he puts his head under the water, Gross is like, Did you tell him I was a good boy?

And Gross is grappling with all of this.

And then that scene with Grasso and Tom.

Like, this was such a good Grasso episode.

And I'm so you met.

You missed.

I thought he was good in the extended shootout with

trying to navigate the bad guys and doing that stuff and being sneaky, but also being locked into what was happening.

And I also didn't know if he was going to turn on Lizzie at any point.

Like when he's behind her, when she has that guy lined up, was he just going to shoot her from behind?

Like everything was in play.

It was good.

Very tense.

So you just hate him?

You don't feel like I love the character.

You don't feel sorry for him at all.

Why would I feel sorry for him?

I don't know.

I think there's something like really.

You just like him.

You're like, no, Crasso's misunderstood.

I don't think he's misunderstood.

Obviously, he is responsible for all of this.

But there's all season, he's been asking about

asking Tom about God and faith and all this sort of stuff like that.

And so he's

it's the kind of guy where like I don't want him to get away with it.

I'm not rooting for him that way.

He needs to be punished for what happened or has

heard.

But like

he feels like a guy who made a mistake and

then kept making those mistakes.

And the way that his boss like holds his head under the tap, like he's his abusive dad.

Like, it was really

twisted, like what's revealed about the nature of their relationship.

That was really interesting to me.

Well, let's do this now.

I was going to do it later, but let's do it now.

So what do we think Grasso's backstory is?

And maybe we're going to find out in this last episode a little bit, but but we already, the stuff we learned in episode six about that he was being looked at suspiciously for some dark hearts intelligence.

So obviously he has a history of that.

By the way, I mean, major nitpick,

how does that not come up?

How do you get on the task force in the beginning?

Yeah.

Because there were no charges

in his file.

Of all the people to put on, and we're putting this guy in the task.

I mean, a thought I had is that, you know, if his boss, Michael Dorsey, is

also corrupt, which he is, if they say, Hey, do you have someone for the task force?

He's like, I'm going to put my guy Grasso on there because we want our own, you know, mole in there.

Yeah.

So he's got those connections because, like, he's not a one-man corrupt job, right?

It's a corrupt department.

So, is Michael Dorsey part of the dark hearts or just getting paid off by them?

Do you think he actually belongs?

I don't think he's like patched in or anything like that, but I think he's has a long history of

passing them information.

And Grasso,

it's like Grasso feels newer to it.

And Dorsey's like, don't fuck this up.

We've got a good thing going on.

But he still has to have some sort of incredibly important thing hanging over Grasso.

Like, why he, like, what did he need them to do?

This can't just be about like, we're funneling you a little extra money to do this.

Like, he's, this guy's, I feel like once you do it, you have to keep doing it because then they have leverage on you, right?

Once you start, how do you stop?

If your boss knows and is in on it too, how do you say no the next time?

But I still, don't you don't think that this all starts because Grasso made some mistake that they covered up for and they're like, this will never happen.

I think a cop, a bad cop

mistake.

Oh, okay.

I think there was a bad cop situation decision, something.

I think that's a technical decision.

Somebody took a bad cop mistake, yeah.

Something,

sorry.

Excessive use of force.

Somebody took care of some mistake that he made.

And they're like,

it's basically like, I own you now.

Yeah.

Do this.

And then it's like, well, you did that.

Now I really own you now.

And now Grasso can't get out.

Yeah.

Because we haven't seen Grasso, even though he's basically evil for setting up people and putting people in danger that he was working with all that stuff.

But he also, we never actually saw him do anything evil.

That's why I object to the word evil, I guess, because I think what they keep trying to show us is him trying to save Tom or him trying, you know, he's just sort of like, he's caught in the middle and he's done something to get himself in that position, but I don't think he's like a bad half evil

like maybe but like he's consumed by guilt she was a good person like this happened this is horrible like

if he's evil he doesn't give a shit that lizzie died if he's evil he would have just like fucked her in that bed and not worried about it you know what i mean i think he's like i think it's more interesting for him to be a guy who you're still kind of rooting for, even though he did this thing.

I'm not rooting for him anymore.

Okay.

Lizzie's dead and it's his fault.

Okay.

Grasshoed.

I think Aaliye agrees with you.

I think Aaliya agrees with you.

Yeah.

Well, Aaliyah, who I think was our number one suspect for being the mall.

I don't think number one.

I think we were bouncing around, but she was at one episode.

We were like, she was the one.

She's on, she was on the board.

And now it's like, she's, she killed two people in the shootout.

Her, like, her being a crack shot.

Her being a crack shot comes back

to serve her.

She figures out they're looking at the task group, all that stuff.

I do like how they set up.

So they gave us enough Lizzie and Grasso scenes so that we would understand the tragedy of.

I would have had more.

You would have had more Lizzie Grassocco.

I would have had more Lizzie Grasso, less the Ruffalo daughter.

Family stuff.

And then we've got

Lizzie and Aaliyah have.

like a couple scenes together so that we understand that Aaliyah, you know, when Aaliya finds that passion

on her desk.

So like they, they really tried to establish Lizzie as someone that multiple people would care that she's dead, even though one of them is responsible for it.

Interesting, not Tom, not really a Bon Maid Tom.

No, Lizzie Tom.

Tom's like, I have enough damage.

We got rid of a bunch of daughters.

Yeah, I had a bunch of damage already.

No, thanks.

Let's take a break and we got to talk about the Maeve part of this.

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All right, so.

Tom goes to see Maeve.

Yeah.

And he reminds her we've met before.

Yeah.

And

something really interesting happens with this.

Tom,

they go through all of it and Tom pushes to let her go.

Yeah.

It's like, what are we doing her trial for?

What the fuck was this girl supposed to do?

Like, what law did she break?

And now we're going to make her life worse.

And these other two kids.

I just, I liked how they handled all that because I thought in my head, it's a pretty dark show.

Let's be honest.

Not a comedy.

You thought for several episodes that they were going to kill Sammy.

They still might.

Am I?

Am I

writing that off yet?

I'm not.

It's a dark show.

He's safe at home with Tom.

You don't think he's safe?

But I thought Maeve going to jail for the sins of the Pendergrass family was in play.

I was like, really?

Now we're going to fuck her life up too.

It's already fucked up.

Yeah.

But it actually worked out for her.

But what did you think of that whole interplay?

I love that because, you know, Robbie made Tom promise that he would protect Maeve.

Well, it turns out out it wasn't the only person he made a promise with.

That's true.

And then also,

I like this idea, because we've been asking this question all season, like, why is it interesting to have an FBI agent who was a priest?

Like, what's interesting about that?

And there's this idea of Tom as someone who believes in like a different kind of justice.

Like, you know, what is the law and then what is just?

Yeah.

And Tom is in here arguing with, you know, the lawyer, you know, the district attorney being like, is that?

Well, he he wasn't even doing that.

He wasn't even appealing to her better angels.

He's just like, I don't think you'll get a jury on your side.

You know, he was just like nagging her case, essentially.

But his idea is like, in my sense of justice, which is a sort of divine, you know,

given what I believe in justice, this isn't right.

This isn't fair was happening to Maeve.

And so the idea of someone like Tom being in this system

and, you know, a system where this, this DA was excited to like throw the book at Maeve.

And he's like,

what purpose could that possibly serve?

What are we doing here?

I think in real life, that doesn't happen all the time, would be my guess.

Tom gets away with a lot of stuff.

Tom just takes Sammy home with him.

Like, that's.

Well, that was the next thing.

He adopted Sam, the bird-watching, animal-loving Simpleton kid.

Just brings him in.

He's a simpleton.

By the way, no easier kid to adopt than Sam.

It's like, just get him a couple Legos.

He's good for like a week and a half.

He's got a Batman Lego set.

Yeah.

So

you call him a simpleton where are you in like liking sammy and wanting good things for him

i mean i definitely feel definitely feel terrible for sam

right

for him he made a little

easy life he made a little lego chicken named gurdy and he's like she's my friend is that not tugging at the old heartstrings bill simmons i would have liked a couple scenes with sam wondering what the philly score was or just a couple extra

extra things for him.

Tom's kids were confused.

This seems highly, I understand that he's like technically a foster,

you know, in the foster system or something like that, but this seemed highly like me and Pharaoh is just collecting kids in this house.

I was like, you can't just take him home.

Is this leading to the last scene of the show, episode seven, which neither of us have watched yet?

Of a big dinner table scene with the two daughters with the kid who's in uh jail whatever

who's gonna get out yeah that's probably happening ethan in episode seven

sam

and maeve and the two kids they're all at the table i don't think the two kids are invited it's probably a table for six oh it's just okay um

big dinner scene and it's like tom is a collector i'm gonna try to

i'm gonna try to apply some newly earned knowledge are you just applying Soprano's rules?

Because don't Soprano seasons end with like a big family meal?

Isn't that like a classic?

I was just trying to figure out, like, the end game of this is Tom,

who we see in the first episode, is just like a broken alcoholic, right?

Like, just so, he's so, he's drunker than anyone's ever been on HBO.

And by the end of this, he is now a little bit more sober and

he's added a person to the family.

Simpleton Sam.

Emily's calling him out.

Simpleton Sam.

Simpleton Sam's now at the table.

Traumatized John.

And it's just, he's got his family back.

Something that Rob and I were saying last week is that we felt a little uncomfortable with this idea that like he hasn't gone to visit his son.

But how about that that plot was abandoned?

But he's just brought a replacement son into the home.

Right.

We were like, that feels a little dicey to us.

Yeah, tough one.

Well, I mean,

we you predicted this, I think, in the first episode that Sam was going to end up at Tom's House or the second.

One of our listeners did

because they pointed out that, you know, they both like birds.

Right.

How'd you feel about Ruffalo's chicken impression?

It was bad.

I thought it was a strong episode for him.

Yeah.

Well, he has a bad for Sam because his other adopted son is still in the slammer.

I don't think it's abandoned.

That's got to be finale stuff, right?

Well, why would they spend all that time?

With the hearing?

Are you going to go, we're going to do all that for three episodes and then not have the hearing?

I have to, I'm going to look down the camera as I say this.

I now know, we now know exactly when

this show is taking place.

This has been an ongoing debate with us, but our listeners have had it with our debate about this.

The trial date is June 12th.

So we are in early June.

I have some questions about tomatoes being ready in early June.

That's not how gardens work, but that's okay.

We're in early June.

Probably getting pretty hot there in Pennsylvania.

Emily's still in school, so school's not out for it.

Makes sense.

Phillies are playing.

Yeah.

The Sixers aren't in the finals because they never are.

So do you think we're getting, do you think we're getting the hearing in the finale?

If we don't, like, what was the point of the first three episodes?

You have to.

Tom says in this episode, you know, when he's talking about his, his sins, things he feels guilty about or whatever, he admits, like, my son's been in prison all.

Yeah.

And I haven't seen him at all.

Well, I mean, what's left?

So the plots that are left,

Martha Plimpton's character, she's going to be in the, I think we're probably done with her.

And she's not the mole, and she's just going to be recovering hospital.

So she's over there.

Yeah.

She's working on her fiber intake.

We have Perry and Jason found the fentanyl bag at the end of this episode, but got ropodoped because it wasn't fentanyl.

Yeah.

It was just a bag of bullshit.

Maeve got the bag

of a lot of money thanks to Scary Face Ray because

embattled extra.

No, thanks to Ray.

Thanks to Shelly.

Oh, embattled wife Shelly.

Yeah.

Who turned out, she said, I'm a good person.

Yeah.

And she came through.

So then scaling back to the previous episode.

Yeah.

So it started out.

This is episode five.

Robbie goes to see, he's going to go like kill Scary Face Red.

Yeah.

Then has that interaction and he just leaves and it seems like they're done and we're never going to see her again.

So he obviously went back.

He goes to see Freddie Freas later in the episode.

And that's kind of an abrupt scene that ended abruptly.

Well, it's a setup.

It's a setup scene and we think freddie freas is giving him to the biker gang

but now i'm actually thinking it was a long con

right partially a long con like i don't think i don't think freddie freas is in on it

oh interesting because i think he is i think they didn't show us the end of that scene with shelly or he goes back and robbie makes this deal with shelly but he goes to freddy freas knowing that Freddy's going to tip off Jason.

And he's like, this is where I'll meet you.

I'll meet you at this cabin.

And he has this plan this whole time to draw Jason out there and to kill Jason, that that's what he wants to do, right?

So you think Freddie Freashaw.

Where did he get all the money for the fentanyl then?

Shelly sold it.

But to who?

To the contact that Ray had.

Ray had a guy they were going to sell that had nothing to do with Freddie Freas.

So you don't think she just sold it to Freddie Freas and this is Freddie Freas' revenge against the biker game?

I think I think I think because Freddie Freas hated the biker game, but I think.

So that's why I thought that was why he did that.

I think it's just that Tom knew that Freddy would tip him off to the dark hearts.

Or did Tom go, you hate his game?

You hate the dark hearts.

I hate the dark hearts.

What if we did this?

Okay.

That's a vast conspiracy.

I'm willing to consider it.

Knowing this, I keep calling him Tom because of the actor.

Robbie, like knowing that Robbie had this plan this whole time, re-watching episode five,

when he's like asking Tom about an afterlife and all these other stuff, like he's going to die like he knows he's going he figures there's going to be a shootout and he might lose he wants to kill jason and he doesn't care if he dies doing it and he has no plan after this and he's left the money behind for maeve so we're going to find out what happened who gave them the money right was freddy either involved right is freddy trying to double cross the how vast how many counties yeah uh in pennsylvania are involved in this and then uh

and then the other thing that's still up in the the air: well, there's two things.

One is Grasso.

How are they going to solve that one?

And then, um, Perry murdering Jason's wife.

Aaron, where's Aaron?

He just left her in the water.

Is that the idea?

That's what you were saying last week.

When I kill people in a quarry, I like to put a string and a rock on their legs to kind of keep them down toward the bottom.

Yeah, I think that's a necessity.

Is it just one rock will do it, or do you need multiple rocks?

You want nice big 20-pound rock and maybe some rope, maybe even a second rock just to make sure.

Yeah, I would double rock it.

He just seemed like he's like, I'm good.

That's what's going to happen.

Yeah.

She's going to float around for a while.

Yeah.

It doesn't seem here.

I have, this is the thing that's actually really bothering me about Task.

His name's Perry.

Yeah.

His nickname is Purr.

And that really bothers me because, like, Purr is a nickname for Percy, makes sense, but his name is Perry and they call him Purr.

It's very, it's very confusing.

That is weird, but you can't call him Pear because then he sounds like a fruit.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I would just just name him how about just perry yeah or pea p big p anyway big p used zero rocks to weigh aaron down the quarry if he did we didn't see it so i don't know what's i'm guessing as an experienced murderer he probably was like okay i hope so let me drag this body over so what happens if jason finds out that perry killed aaron well i think the three predictions we can safely make here are

Perry and Jason are going to have, Jason's going to put two and two together and they're going to fight to the death or something will happen.

So there's one.

Two is Tom and Grasso are going to have to have a moment,

right?

And then the third one I think we can safely predict is the hearing will happen at some point in the show.

It would be very weird if it didn't.

Is Maeve okay?

That's my main concern.

She is a bag of money.

that the murder.

So that would be the fourth prediction then.

Well, when do they put two and two together and realize that Maeve have profited from all of this i don't know does she start spending it or does she hide it

made buys a lambo yeah yeah maeve rolls up in a lambo my guess is she's been been impressed by her smarts for most of this although her her her biggest fail was probably the uh let me go drop-off plan payphone call i'll leave the kid in the car it'll all this all work not her best move but my guess is she's going to get out of dodge now with that money take the two kids and they're going to go to probably Canada.

I'm just worried about Maeve perpetually because like, it's like with the Lizzie thing.

We were worried all season that Lizzie was going to freeze.

Yeah.

And then she didn't.

She did and she didn't.

And then she died anyway.

Yeah.

So we're like, I've been so worried about Maeve.

You were like, I'm worried Maeve's going to go to jail.

So then there's this idea, okay, she's home.

She's safe.

She's with the kids.

Robbie thinks he's done something good for her by providing for her with this bag of money, but that's just putting a target on her back right as soon as they put three and three together right yeah where would the money be yeah so you think she'll be the one that there's the shotgun in the woods with the crows scattering up you still want that that's not gonna be

i thought i still thought we were getting that moment can i go back to like the

how do you feel in stories in film or television when they leave things out

and then so like with with robbie's playing with shelly they left it out we didn't get to see it so then it's like a

little twist, a little turn.

Yeah, because I only like it if in retrospect you're like, oh, that's why he left, but they left it open-ended.

That's why he went to sit down with Freddie Frias, but we never heard the combo.

Right.

The clues were all there.

Yeah.

That's why I think Freddie Frias is in on this.

Okay.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Interesting.

Because I think they would have showed the combo otherwise.

That's a fair point.

That's great.

So it's like, how about if we fuck over the Spiker gang in the best possible way?

We'll make it seem like you're turning me in, but you're not.

I have a bag of some money for you, but other money's going to.

The case against that theory is, would Freddie Freas have had people in the woods to try to kill these guys?

Freddy Frias wants all the money.

You know what I mean?

He wouldn't settle for some of the money.

Like he's going to have all these people in a good spot.

Could you just take all of them out?

I think I agree with you that I don't mind them not showing us like certain things or ends of scenes or something like that if the payoff is pretty soon.

Like it's the next episode we find out what actually happened.

It's when it happens, you know, a whole season later.

And you're like, I don't remember.

What are you talking about?

You know what I mean?

Well, I didn't remember.

I mean, we've watched six of these.

I didn't remember that we saw Gabriel Sabarge

in episode one or what that scene was, even though we've watched all these episodes carefully.

It wasn't episode one.

It was like episode two.

It was episode, I think it was episode four.

They like, it was when they're going to the park, and that whole team that's with them in the park, he's running that team.

That's like Grosso's department.

Right.

Okay.

I remember that now.

Yeah, yeah.

I do have one more nitpick retroactive after watching episode six.

Okay.

So they leave with the with all the drugs in episode one, big shootout.

Yeah.

And they, they're stuck with this kid.

Simpleton Sammy, I believe you're saying that.

Simpleton Sammy.

Why not go to this room?

Cutest child.

Why not go to the remote cabin with Sam?

Great question.

Why not use the remote cabin?

Great question.

Right there.

Nobody knows you have it.

Well, then you you don't have Maeve as a babysitter, built-in babysitter.

But do I even want Maeve to know I have this kid or that I did all this stuff?

I did ask Brad about, uh, and people can tune in for that, but like

Tom being a pretty bad cop and Robbie being a pretty bad criminal.

And what's interesting about that to him?

Do you know what I mean?

Because people have been complaining about that.

They're like, Robbie's not very good at this.

And I actually think that's kind of interesting.

Kind of how you become a criminal.

He's just a guy.

Yeah.

You know, that's how I feel about Grasso.

He's just a guy.

Well, the thing with Sam, if you're doing this over again from Robbie's standpoint, yeah.

Sam, not exactly a rocket scientist.

Maybe just drop him off at the mall and he's not going to be like, here's what my two kidnappers look like.

The more we learn about Sam, he's probably not going to divulge a lot of info about the people that briefly took him after his parents were murdered.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Simpleton.

That was the mistake.

He might have been able to describe like an animal he saw, right?

True.

Yeah.

They had a house with three chickens.

One was named Gertie.

Can I ask?

Yeah.

As like a lover of action movies.

Yeah.

When Tom Pelfrey, as Robbie Pendergrass says in the forest, is this what you came for?

Like, what did that do for you?

And through the bag.

It's great.

I mean, they're playing some karaoke with some of the action stuff.

I love it.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I like that.

I really,

I thought the bridge

and whatever symbolism you want to take out of that and people going different directions and then things finally ending on the bridge again.

I liked all that stuff.

Like the, you know, I'm, I normally don't like, normally I'll think stuff like that's corny, but I actually thought it worked with this.

With the like crossing the bridge and the choices.

It's like the symbolism of there are two sides and you're going to go left or right.

And oh, now we're together on our bridge of choices.

Like I did, I did enjoy all that.

Sunday Night HBO is brought up in poetry.

I love it.

I love it.

we didn't i know you they're not your favorite plotline but we didn't talk about sarah and emily at all do you want to like mention they're reconciled they're sticking up for each other sure

okay um

are you on tether hooks to find out if emily's actually going to go to that magic show with that kid she does she scoops world that was a get up and go to the bathroom scene okay you left during the close-up magic guy here's the thing with tv shows he wears a jaunty vest though it's not it's not for you okay it's like yes i got my date cool um here's the thing with these yeah albums have this too sometimes every hit skippable track yeah sometimes every song in the album can't be great tv shows

you know you still haven't watched the sopranos but some people love the dr melfie scenes i personally do not like them i have watched some sopranos yeah

let's be so clear about that trying to think thrones oh yeah you you're like oh god we're back in marine i don't care like what is daenerys doing again this week?

I know.

It's tough to bat a thousand with plots.

Sure.

And I get why they have to have the

Sarah's interrogating him in the kitchen and she's like, what is this kid?

What's happening here?

And he's like, he's like, now does anyone want a peanut butter and jelly sandwich?

I didn't mind that part.

Is there something good like dad moment for you?

So I don't know.

Maybe it's just because what my family situation is like, but I just feel like there would be like slightly more humor.

I get it that there's completely humorless houses, but I feel like somebody needed to be sarcastic in this house, and it's neither daughter.

And then Ethan's obviously not a barrel laughs.

Maybe Ethan's really fun when he's well-mediated.

Maybe the mom was the funny one.

I don't know.

It would be like, dad, dude, it's like you went to eBay and found another kid.

Like, there's just sort of been some joke.

Well, now Sammy's here to really bring up the level.

Sammy's just excited he has a bed.

He's like, do you think?

He's like, is that other kid going to come and take the bed from me?

Poor Sammy.

Predictions.

Is Grasso alive at the end of this season?

How can he be if he's responsible for Lizzie's death?

Is he dead by his own hands or by somebody else?

Is he well, here's my question.

Is he dead because he does something heroic or is he dead because he just is deeper and deeper into the plot?

You know what I mean?

Is there a chance for like redemption for him?

He's killed.

He's killed saving somebody.

Right.

Kills himself.

Yeah.

Those are our three things left.

And do a flock of birds go up in the forest for any of those moments?

No flock of birds for him.

Wow.

No flock of birds.

Door number four for Grasso is gets away, and that's season two.

Season two, the Grasso season?

Which myself on the run?

My sources have told me season two of Task is

in play in a real way.

Stay tuned.

We did ask Brad about it.

Okay.

Yeah.

So that season two could be built around Grasso, or we could just be in a completely

different task in other part of Pennsylvania.

That's a new task.

Because Inglesby has a Pennsylvania hard-on.

Yeah, we can't leave the Wooderers.

We're going to go to the bottom of the middle.

Even if he goes into the Lehigh Lafayette territory, like Patriot League murders.

Do you think he's actually going to pay Ciara this time to co-write season two?

I mean, it was already insulting that he didn't involve him as a consultant for the last one.

Yeah.

But if it was a fictional show, he should have had the 76ers in the finals.

Because it would have been their only chance.

Just a dream.

A fictional dream.

Yeah.

Joelle Embiid.

He's played every game this season.

But America, we could have an announcer.

Yeah.

Do you wish Robber here for this joke?

Yes.

Yeah.

Predictions.

I'm worried about Maeve.

I'm hopeful for Grasso redemption.

Is there a chance Grasso lives and Maeve dies?

Since we started this season with you predicting a child getting shot in the woods, I feel like everything's on the table.

Maeve could die.

I still might not be out of that one.

I want to ask you, okay, you like the symbolism of the bridge.

I I know we're wrapping up, we're not going to take much longer because the trees and the leaves.

And what do you, what do you think of the final shot of Robbie in the water?

Like, Robbie's long dead, and then Maeve gets the bag of money, and then Robbie's in the water.

The rare flashback of something that I thought really worked.

You're like, give me more of that.

Like, it was like Robbie finally got a win.

It was like this guy had a lot of wins in life.

Yeah.

You know?

Yeah.

All right.

So, what are your predictions?

I think a lot of it depends on whether Task Season 2 is the same crew or

different people.

Because is Ruffalo safe?

I think Ruffalo's safe.

Because you need him for season two in some form if he wants to.

If you're going to do Task Season Two, you have to have Ruffalo anchoring it is what you're saying.

I think so.

But could season two be Grasso on the Loose?

It just becomes a different show.

Now we're doing the Fugitive, basically.

Here's what.

So I think Grasso dies would be my to be clear, I would not say no to Grasso is the Future.

Grassso is a fugitive.

Yeah.

Well, we talked about this.

I'm just being like, I don't care, you know?

We talked about this in another episode.

I think that guy's been excellent.

Yeah.

David Frankl.

Yeah.

And in terms of people from England impersonating American actors, it's actually.

He should be casting

every like East Coast crime stuff going forward.

I can't wait to see him on a Netflix rom-com in a year that my wife's watching that's terrible, but she loves it.

Is this

happened to all the actors you like?

No, it would just be like him with,

I don't know, Millie Bobby Brown or somebody who's like, whoa, she's in a rom-com now?

Yeah.

And we're just like, oh, Grasso needed the paycheck.

We got to expand.

You got to expand the portfolio.

You know what I mean?

Here's what I want to say about Mark Ruffalo in the show.

Yeah.

I think he needs something really big in the finale because I think to a certain degree, Tom Pelfrey has kind of stolen the show.

Ruffalo is the star.

He's the big star of the show.

You want his Emmy Thunder back.

Yeah, right?

Pelfree is doing a lot of of work.

Could that be a hearing?

Miriam Frankl is doing a lot of work.

We talked about Allison Oliver and stuff like that.

Yeah.

I mean, something we need to give Ruffalo.

Monologue to the judge in the hearing.

Ruffalo, big moment in the finale.

He needs it.

Paul Newman at the end of the verdict, kind of big speech.

Yes.

Where so, like one of his daughters puts their arm around him after and be like, dad, great job.

And you're like,

I love these daughter scenes.

They're my favorite.

And then they all make food.

They all have peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.

And Sammy is fine.

Sam goes outside to look at at the chickens in there.

That's it.

Uh,

yeah, I don't know what we have an hour left, and I don't know where it goes,

but I assume you've got a mole, like a rat hunt.

Like, we know, I really loved that the exchange between Tom and Grasso, which I thought was all-timer.

Like, I thought it was so good,

and that's the thing is, like, oh,

we should have talked about that.

That was such a good scene.

Ruffalo has been the best at these, like, like, he was so good in that car scene with Tom Pelfree, so good at this kitchen table scene with Fabian Frankel, and like talking about confession, talking about

Tom, Tom doing what Tom does best, right?

Like, like, like Grasso's like, oh, you're good, Tom.

Like, I see what you're doing.

I see what you're trying for here.

Right.

But him saying, like,

there's a difference between what you believe and what you can prove.

And this is what I'm doing.

That's the thing between believing something and proving it.

Yeah.

It's such a good, good, uh, good line.

I'm coming for you, Grasso.

Yeah.

Really good stuff.

I'm coming for you, Grasso, up with, is this what you came for?

It's like killer stuff.

But all season, Grasso has been in this crisis of faith, asking, you know, he grew up, he didn't believe,

you know, asking Tom why he believes essentially.

Why didn't his DJ career work out?

Right.

Yeah.

If there's a God, wouldn't I be the most famous DJ in a Biza?

But he's,

he's cradling Lizzie and later he's like, she was gone.

There was something about her that was gone.

He's like discovered what a soul is.

You know what I mean?

He's in this like real cool

crisis of faith.

Yeah, purgatory.

You want Grasso to have redemption.

You want Grasso season two.

I'm glad you reminded me to bring up that scene because I meant to and I forgot.

I thought that was a great cat and mouse scene.

Yeah, really.

I also liked when Grasso slowly figured out what was going on.

He's like, can I have a cigarette, Tom?

Oh, no, this is my house.

I guess I can have one.

But it was just clear.

It's like, oh, shit, this guy's on to me.

Now, why didn't Tom

just bring the cops over and like arrest grasso like he's not supposed to be on the case at all anymore i know but it's they took his gun he's supposed to be at home he's not even supposed to be there but the guy real clerks enter clearly broke the law like did he need more evidence yeah they have to prove it they don't have proof on him yet so that's what the finale is about is getting proof on grasso right now it's now we're in wire season two Love that for us.

I also think that like

before Tom does the kitchen table scene when they're still in the hospital, before he knows that Grasso before Martha Plimpton tells him about the file which would have been nice to know before they went into the woods why did they go into the woods with him when she knew that I don't know um great point but when uh tom are you sure she knew before

well

she said we have a problem and like the guy who works in her office you know what i mean like she was sort of looking into it so i don't know if she didn't have that file before they went in but when they're in the hospital before Tom knows that Grasso

has his file on him, he gives them the old

Robin Williams, Goodwill Hunting, it's not your fault.

Like, you know, he gives him like a full, it's not your fault.

Yeah.

When

Grasso fucking knows it's his fault.

And to have that at the beginning of the episode and then the kitchen table of like, I'm coming for you, Grasso.

This is an incredible episode of television.

Any stuff from the readers before we go that jumped out?

I think we did it.

Do people feel like this is in the top shelf HBO limited series pantheon or like one level below?

I think they have an opportunity in the finale to bump it up into mayor.

It's not quite mayor territory.

It hasn't become, I think, everyone's watching it, everyone's talking about it yet.

So, if the finale is a banger, I think it has the opportunity to get there.

But, like, don't you have that sense?

It's not where White Lotus was early this year.

You know, it's not.

I think you made the point earlier, like when they released it, which I know they've had success other times in the calendar, but there's just a lot going on in September.

Yeah.

From a sports standpoint, from an everything standpoint, September, October, people are going back to school.

Like,

I think this would have crushed in the summer, like in a crazy way.

Yeah, all that quarry action.

And

they just don't think of the summer this way for shows like this.

And I think they feel like they need something to stay in the conversation when there's so much conversation about everything.

And that's a very, you know, that's, you and I are old enough to remember when September and October is when all the shows came out.

The famous Breaking Bad Game of Thrones same time

against football.

Yeah.

In like 2013.

That was the all-timer.

So,

oh, and Mad Men.

I think there might have been three.

Were there three at the same time one time?

It was

definitely Madman was definitely on at the same time as Thrones at one season.

We had at least two going constantly.

Yeah.

Yeah.

That was really tough.

It It was great, but it was horrible if you were running.

It wasn't horrible if you were running a content site.

No, no, I mean, as someone who was trying to cover it, cover it.

Yeah.

It was tough.

Do you think I felt bad for the people covering it?

We needed the content.

No, those were the glory days.

Yeah, it was great stuff.

But I think that Task has an opportunity if the finale is a banger to

jump up into that level.

But I don't think it's quite there yet.

Would you agree?

I think it has a chance.

It's all about how you land the content.

And

I think it'll have long legs.

I think it has a good word of mouth.

I think people who watched it will tell people to watch it.

I don't think anyone's walking out of the season saying, Don't bother with task.

I think it's gonna like people are gonna catch on.

And I think it's gonna be one of those things where season one is a little quieter, and then a lot of people will have caught up for season two.

That seems like

that's the HBO sweet spot.

That's what they love the most.

Gotta love it.

All right, we're gonna take a break and then we're gonna throw to your interview with Bradine, adjective used to describe an individual whose spirit spirit is unyielding, unconstrained, one who navigates life on their own terms, effortlessly.

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So the episode six title, Out Behind Ideas of Wrong Doing and Right Doing, There is a River,

is a tweak on a line from a Roomie poem.

Yep.

So I was wondering, sort of, what about that Rumi poem spoke to you, and why are we tweaking it from field to river inside of this title?

Yeah, that's a good question, Joanna.

I think what it always, I think what always resonated about the quote was

this idea of right and wrong, and go past that and look deeper.

And that to me was

so much about

the show.

That really was what excited me about the show was to dive into a group of characters that we aren't able to put in a box, that we're constantly trying to

have an audience accept the inconsistencies within each of these characters.

And the quote spoke to that.

I think it was, you know, I always...

I always read it as asking the reader to look past that, to go deeper.

And I think if you look at the show and all the characters, we're trying to do that with each of them.

We always said on set, you know, we don't have to understand

or we don't have to like all the decisions they make, but we have to understand them.

And that's what we were always trying to do with each of the characters in the show was understand the why.

And I think, you know, and listen, it helps to work with such incredible actors.

These guys were just amazing guys and girls.

It was such a wonderful cast.

So they made a big difference in achieving that.

Throughout the season, we've had this great motif of the quarry and the anointing of the the water on the shoulders.

And we get this final shot of this episode of Robbie having pulled one over, at least for now, on Jason,

but

happy and light in the water.

Is this

an afterlife?

Is this the moment Robbie thought of this idea?

Is this just you wanted to show him

in a better time and a place?

What do you think?

Yeah, I think, you know,

it was so, you know what?

It wasn't in the the script, Joanna.

It was not in the script.

It ended, actually, the script ended with, it ended with Maeve.

And it's one of those things, like I had a very distinct experience with this in Mayer, with Evan Peters' character, where I felt like I, in a way, I underestimated the impact that character would, I didn't,

in the script, he wasn't that good.

I'll be honest.

Evan elevated that character in ways I couldn't imagine.

And I remember getting to the fifth episode of Mayor and being like, oh my God, we're really in trouble because people love him so much.

And he, and I mean, I'm not just saying that.

It wasn't that he was fine in the script.

I thought he was a good character, but I think Evan elevated him.

And I felt so, I had the same reaction to Pelfree in this show where.

um i liked robbie as a character in the scripts but when i was editing the show

his performance just what was so incredible And I remember getting to the end of the episode and going,

God, we have to give Robbie his a moment of triumph here.

He's owed that moment.

And I went back into the dailies

and

Jeremiah had shot a couple jumps into the quarry.

And there was this beautiful moment that we found by just going back into the dailies where,

you know, I don't even know what Tom was reacting to in the moment, but he was laughing.

And then the camera sort of, in a, just a moment of luck, Joanne, it went underwater and captured his legs swimming in a way.

And when I saw that, I just felt like it served a few purposes.

One is it allowed the audience to see him again and to give him this win we so desperately want him to have.

And also, I think the quarry to me was always his version of heaven.

Again, he's not a believer in the traditional sense of, you know, where I'm going in this life.

He says it in the back of the cart with Tom.

I never, you know, I forget the exact quote, but he mentions it when he's talking to Tom in the car.

And so to me, the quarry represented his heaven here.

And

as soon as we put it in, at first I was like, I don't know if it's going to work.

And then we watched it a few times, Joanne.

I felt like I can't imagine the episode without it now in a funny way, you know?

I did have a question about Pelfree because I

find him so watchable and everything.

This is a really great marriage of material and actor, but he's always has this thing that is just completely, compulsively watchable and empathetic and odd, like offbeat, a lot of his choices.

What do you think is at the heart of why Tom Pelfrey connects with audiences the way that he does?

You know, it's, I don't know what it is.

It's, it's, it's, I guess, I can, I guess I can speak to why I cast him as Robbie, though.

And, and I think it was an accessibility.

We, I, I think I've told this story before.

Um,

I was on set

of another project, and we would get casting tapes sent to us.

And Tom was one of the very,

I mean, really early in the process, maybe the first like two or three of the tapes we got from A.V.

Kaufman, our casting director.

And he put himself on tape and it was the

scene in episode one where he's talking to Cliff about

he wants someone in his life and his wife has left.

And

I got about half a minute into the audition and he laughs and he has an iconic laugh, Tom.

He has an incredible laugh.

And I heard him laugh and I paused the audition tape.

And I distinctly remember this and thinking, wow, this guy has something.

And then my phone rang and it was Jeremiah, our director.

He's like, dude, I've just watched this guy's tape.

Perfect.

And it was Tom Pelfrey he was talking about.

And I went back and finished the audition and we didn't read anybody after that.

And I think it was a mixture of.

A couple of things.

It was, I felt Robbie's childlike sense of wonder in Tom.

He has this incredible laugh.

He does something incredible with his eyes, especially in the fifth episode.

There's a lot of amazing eye acting,

I would call it.

Like there's a sadness, a heartbreak, a glow, a gleam.

He has all these different shades of acting in his eyes.

But I felt like he possessed the childlike

wonder of Robbie.

And I also felt like there was a...

He has the physicality that I wanted Robbie to have, that

you could believe him in bed with his kids and you could believe him in a drug house smashing his pistol against someone's nose.

And I felt like we had to believe both those sides completely.

And Tom is just, he's just so accessible.

And also, I think in this case, Joanna, he grew up around here.

I think Tom.

And he'll tell you this.

I think he knew Robbies.

I think he really understood this world, the friendship between him and Cliff, the banter between guys, the sports talk.

He really understands this world.

And I think he connected with it on that level too.

I was reading a different interview where you were talking about you're like, you know, Tom's not a very good cop.

Like, he's not a very good cop.

And, you know, Robbie's not a very good

robber, not a very good criminal.

What is more interesting to you about a story of a not very good cop and a not very good criminal sort of barreling towards each other?

Yeah, I mean, I think we really leaned into that.

I think that, you know, that was something we wanted to wrap our arms around.

Because

I felt like we had seen, and we always reference Heat as a structural sort of, as a paradigm, you know, because it was a collision course.

But if you look at Heat, it was a very high-end detective and a high-line robbery crew.

And

I felt like, or I feel like

I'm not that smart of a writer when it comes to characters at the top of their game.

I feel like my

stronger abilities as a writer are to lean into the flaws and the weaknesses and the vulnerabilities of characters.

And also I like to tap into that type of character.

And I just find it more interesting.

I found it to be more sympathetic.

that Robbie was trying to be something he really wasn't and Tom was trying to be something he wasn't.

And I felt that Tom

had lived a life of service as a parish priest and he felt that there was something that he could connect that to the FBI even though it was wildly different and Robbie was driven by vengeance but he didn't quite know how to be a criminal he's quite

he's strong he has the physicality he has the team but he's not that smart and I wanted to lean into that.

I felt like we wanted them to make mistakes and miss clues because

I would always say to Ruffalo once that you're not a guy guy that's good with a gun.

You're not going to see the clues other people miss.

What is interesting to me about your character is that you're approaching the job with a lot of compassion and empathy.

And for Pelfrey, it's not that you're an amazing criminal, but it's that you're driven by

a perhaps misguided love of your brother

and a desire to help your children.

And I don't know.

As soon as we kind of wrapped our arms around that joy, it just felt way more interesting to me.

And I loved how sloppy it was.

and i love that

i love that they would make these like mistakes that you know that we wouldn't expect them to make and i felt like in some way all those little mistakes and errors and flaws make them more real than if they were extremely you know perceptive and um

uh extremely smart about robbing houses i felt like it actually as i started to write it all the flaws actually drew me closer and i felt more connected to them as people i like that you invoked heat heat is obviously like one of the

blueprints for this kind of story and since we are huge heat fans here at the ringer from episode one we were like okay here's here's like here's a cop and here's a criminal they're on a collision course so when are we getting our diner scene?

Like, when are we getting this diner scene?

And, you know, what episode is it going to be?

What is it going to be like?

You know, sort of thing.

And we get it

of a sort in this car.

And something that that,

you know, one of my co-hosts brought up was this idea of like, how interesting to have them facing the same direction instead of like, you know, classically De Niro Pacino facing each other across a table, you've got them both facing front in this car, looking at each other through the rearview mirror sort of thing.

Was that an intentional way to sort of like, let's take three steps away from that iconic thing so we can, we can own it and make it our own thing?

Yes, yes, exactly.

I think we knew we had to have that moment and just like the story demanded that moment.

And

I loved the idea of that scene.

And, you know, again, we got that idea from Heat where you're waiting that whole time and then those two characters come together.

But you're right.

We go, okay, how do we take that idea and do something adjacent?

How do we subvert it in some way?

And in talking to Jeremiah about it, we loved the idea of them being in a car and driving.

And I always had the idea that, you know, that Robbie would, he'd be backed into a corner and he would have to kidnap Tom.

And

I just love the idea that, you know, and it's played so beautifully in this scene by both of them, but especially Mark in that he feels, you know, there's a sense, there's a sensation at his back for every second of the drive, like a bonfire at his back.

He's feeling,

and he's looking up.

And I just felt like it added

especially to Mark's character, a tension there of

kind of, you know, not not being able to face this guy, not knowing what he's doing back there, trying to check the mirrors and get a sense for it.

And it just added a layer of tension that we felt was really great.

And all the driving scenes were done practically, which I felt was such a

is such a beautiful choice that Jeremiah made early in the in the process because we've, I don't know, every time I watch a show and you see the green screen, I just, I always feel it.

And, and we made a real effort to shoot all the driving stuff practically.

There's a couple shots in there where we just, you know, we were up against it with time and we had to, but not many.

And that scene, especially, we wanted to shoot on the, on an open road.

And anyway, I just felt like as soon as we got in the car and as soon as I saw it on the monitor, it just felt right.

And those guys brought it on the day.

And it was.

it's it's one of the strongest sequences in the series i think i'm really i'm really happy with how that one uh ended up yeah and then i i love the mirror of you know them them back in the car together in this time, sort of Tom holding him.

Yes.

Yes.

Ruffalo's, of course, bringing this very paternal, despite his own dysfunctions as a father, like this very paternal energy here, leader of a team, obviously a spiritual leader, but you've got these other sort of adoptive parent-child relationships going throughout.

You've got Perry and Jason.

And then this episode, I thought the sort of Michael Dorsey, Anthony Grasso scene was so incredible.

This idea that, you know, Grasso's like,

did you tell him I was a good boy, right?

And then, and then the way that Michael sort of like shoved, you know, the way that they react

is so

such a twisted sort of father-son dynamic.

So I'm wondering if you could talk about sort of the way that echoes across sort of all the different corners of this story and if Tom exists as if like, don't we wish Grasso had met Tom earlier in his life?

I know.

You know, it's so true, Joe.

I felt like Mare was,

it was really a story about mothers.

And that's what I was really exploring there, and especially Mare

as a mother.

And I felt like this was a story about fathers, very much about fathers.

And I feel like the Perry-Jason relationship is very, very much father-son.

And we leaned into that.

And the same with Dorsey and Grasso.

And I think it's, you know, I think it probably stems from, you know, me being a father and my own sort of anxieties and fears and and and always wondering what are the are the good things about myself that my kids are are taking away and what are the bad things and i love that you i love that you say that about graso because i always said to fab and he agreed like Grasso is a good guy.

He was failed in his mind by the

institutions.

The church, I think he feels has failed him.

That's why he's constantly asking Tom.

Like, he wants Tom to convince him that

God is there, that God is good, that God is

able to redeem him in some way.

He wants to be convinced of that.

And unfortunately, he's asking the wrong guy at the wrong time, which is like, you know, this is the absolute wrong guy at the wrong time.

There's nothing that Tom is going to say in this moment that's going to help you, Grasso.

But I feel like

that's why there is a father-son relationship with tom and grosso is that he almost he wishes he had met someone like tom earlier in his life instead he's gotten so far down this path and it's why i really love the scene i won't spoil it but there's a there's a great scene in the seventh episode that i really um

i really love with him and his sister that i feel like is so moving about um how he's kind of lost his way and um But I think that's a relationship that echoes in all of the families.

and and this really is a story about families the biker family the tax family tom's family and robbie's family and and um and one of the and one of the relationships you know that we always were trying to lean into was the father-son dynamic and i think that's very

um

That's really perceptive to think that if he had met Tom instead of Michael Dorsey, he would be fine instead.

And I think so much of this show is about the choices you make and how they reverberate and

the ripple effect of these small choices because in my mind what i always thought about garasso is he did one thing and he thought i'll do it this one time right and instead it was well now you did it one time

like there's no getting out of it and and he's been able to maintain this house of cards joanna and only when he comes onto this task force it's like someone threw the windows open all the winds coming in and he's trying to he's trying to defend it until he can't you know It's funny.

I misremembered

the rhythms of Mare because I went back and double and my memory was that there was so much more of Mare after the revelation of

who done it inside of Mare.

There is emotionally, you know, Julian Nicholson is and Kate are just sort of like absolutely devastating us, but it's really only sort of like the back 20 of the

finale.

Here we've got Robbie has died, and Lizzie has died sort of 20 minutes into this episode.

And so we've got the rest of this episode and then a whole finale of just sort of cleanup and emotionally sorting through.

And all of a sudden, because of Grasso's enormous guilt around Liz, like I had my eye on him because I'm a, I cover House of the Dragon religiously, so I love this actor.

So I had my eye on Grasso this whole time, but he sort of emerges as this other sort of, you know, stealth surprise central figure of his moral conundrum, him saying in the kitchen, you know, she was a good person.

Obviously, you set up this ultimate pain pain of

this flirtation romance with Lizzie and Grasso, but how are you envisioning the rhythms of the season, this sort of like early climax in one sense, and then

not just a denouement, but like almost another story here at the end?

You know, a couple of things stood out to me that were...

structural, I would say, worries.

But one was I just didn't know how long we could keep Sam in the house.

And I felt like eventually the audience would get a little bored with it.

Like,

you know, he's playing with the chicken again.

He, you know, like, you know, I was, I was worried, like, what are we doing with Sam?

And so when, and so every time I tried to write a scene, I felt like we are really spinning our wheels.

And instead of trying to jam that through, well, well, let's look at the note.

What's the note behind the note?

Well, maybe let's try to subvert expectations.

Even with the Tom

and Robbie scene, you know, audiences probably would have expected that, as you said, to be the next episode or a little bit further into the story.

So I was looking at ways to kind of subvert the expectations of the audience and do something unexpected.

And it felt like, and I also felt like, well, again,

this was the discovery of Pelfree's.

He's so good.

He's so captivated that you go, okay, wow, he's out of the show.

Like, how do we sustain the story?

And

so it became clear that Grasso's storyline and Tom's, all his stuff in his personal life and the dark arts had to carry this,

had to carry us to the end of the show.

And

so we really, really leaned in into the Grasso angle, have a great conversation with him and Tom at the end of episode six.

That kind of sets up a confrontation that's going to happen in episode seven.

It's going to lead to something that has to be paid off at least.

And I felt like, you know, I I was also hopeful that Maeve Amelia is so moving as a character.

The audience, she's so great.

She's so great.

And so I felt like,

you know, I'm hopeful we have enough on the bone at the end of six where an audience wants to see what's going to happen to all these characters who remain.

And

I hope they feel satisfied with.

you know, all the all the arcs ending in a way.

And I, I think

it was tough to bring it all together, but I think we, I hope we did it in a way that feels hopeful.

Robbie not making it to me felt like a foregone conclusion.

So I wasn't really sort of like wondering if he was going to get away or wondering, but I was just sort of like, but is Maeve going to be okay?

Very much on my mind.

So that's so fun.

It's so funny.

My sisters are always, always texting me about Maeve.

And it's a testament to Amelia, who's just absolutely incredible in the show.

And I think

I was so moved by her character because I felt like

she had made all these things were happening to her.

She had done nothing wrong.

She was constantly just trying to stay afloat and get herself out of these situations.

And

she's definitely a character that I love.

And Amelia is just so wonderful.

Can I ask you, this is a personal fascination of mine.

You have so many UK actors in this cast.

And a question I had was, is it easier for a UK actor to access the Delco accent than it is for an American actor in a weird way?

I think it's something to do with the training, Joanna.

I don't know what it is.

I mean, we had Kate who could snap into Delco, and then immediately after cut, it was back to the British.

And the same with Amelia.

I don't know if it's something with the training, but my experience is, is that they have an easier time accessing the accent.

And I don't know if it's because

they train in,

if they have to practice that in their training more, but it is, it's amazing.

And also they're not scared by it.

A lot of the American actors come and they go, listen, man, this is going to be really tough.

You got to get

the British British,

but the British, but

they wrap their arms around it and they're up for the challenge and they actually kind of,

you know, they dig in.

And Allison Oliver, who's Irish, you know, is

amazing at it too.

I think she's got a great accent and she's a trip.

I think she's the best.

Okay, so I want to talk about Allison and Lizzie.

Yes.

One of our listeners actually sort of completely blew me away, away, I think a week or two weeks ago by identifying Lizzie as the deer that Sammy was talking about earlier in the season.

You know, she was, she was like, you know, Lizzie's the one who freezes.

Lizzie, like Lizzie in foot chases is the one who's sort of like, in an ungainly way, sort of like leaping over things.

And so like,

will she be, because we were like, is Sammy the deer or something like that?

Will she be the deer?

And then she got hit by a car.

I was like, I can't believe our listener called that like two weeks ago.

But can you talk about that sort of motif motif that like Sammy talking about deer and looking both ways and then culminating in how it is that Lizzie sort of freezes and then doesn't inside of this showdown, which is what we were hoping for her, that she wouldn't freeze when her life is in danger and then she gets hit by a car and dies.

I know, I know, I know.

Well, it's funny.

I always, I love Sam.

I loved him.

I love that dialogue in the kitchen with Robbie because I think it kind of,

it kind of, you know, it was very innocent and I believed a kid would say it.

and it also spoke to what a um

sweet innocent kid he is in the show and um and and and yeah the story i always felt was

it sort of spoke to so many characters mr hey you know who were kind of rushing into these things without a ton of thought right that was robbie you know perhaps lizzie at times too um so i i never quite connected the deer to lizzie i will say that i wish i was smarter than that.

But I think

there's, I love Lizzie as a character.

And I think Allison

is just so dang good.

Like, I can't really like, again, a character that on the page was fine, Joanna, but Allison is just

so good.

And, you know, one of the lines that's always resonated with me, and we fought to keep it in the show because we were up against time, but

is when she's in the in the woods and they're hiding out in the stakeout and she she says, you know, I don't know what my one, you know, my one quality is in life.

I don't know what it is.

And, and that to me just,

it really resonated because I know so many people, I'm lucky to have, have landed on something that I really love to do.

But so many people I know are out there working jobs that they're not passionate about or don't know what it is they're passionate about.

And I know.

so many people in life who are like that that are looking to you know land on the one thing that gets them out of bed that gets them passionate And I just loved that line because it felt like she hadn't quite, she hadn't quite been able to find herself in life yet.

She was on the path.

And then, as you said, she has this great moment of heroism in the woods where she's scared, scared, and then she gets the courage to do this one thing.

And you feel like, oh, wow, she's going to take this and she's going to carry it with her into this other part of life that after this sequence.

And then bang, everything that Garraso has set up, the chickens have come to roost in his his life in a way.

And yeah, it was a heartbreaker because Allison, you know, again, another one of those things where you get to the edit and you go, oh my God, people are going to hate us because Allison is so, so lovable as a character, you know?

Can I tell you a weird side story is that when

I was covering Mayor of East Town at a different outlet,

and it was the kind of place where like I was watching this, this in this coverage, I'm watching week to week because we're podcasting about it.

We're theorizing.

I don't want to get ahead.

But in that other outlet, I watched all the screeners that were sent out.

And I don't know if you remember this, but when Evan Peters' character died, the VFX weren't done.

And so the blood spatter that hit the wall was not there.

And so I was like, maybe he'll be okay.

I was like, maybe that wasn't a fatal shot.

And then I saw it for real.

I was like, oh, no.

Okay.

All right.

All right.

I see.

I see.

Oh, my God.

I think people still hate me about that.

And again,

a testament to Evan, you know, for being so incredibly lovable and charming because he just, he, there's

so many people who still come up to me about that scene.

Well, I wanted to ask you, because I think you undersell yourself, but I've heard you say that you don't think that you're really like a big picture plot guy, but you like these little interaction, these little interpersonal interaction scenes are your favorite sort of to write.

And sometimes you sort of think of those and then think of the plot as a shell around it.

And of course, like one of the reasons why Zabel's death means so much in Mary is that barroom scene that gets to do earlier yes and you mentioned tom's audition being this Robbie Cliff conversation scene which was my favorite scene of of the premiere and so I was wondering if you had a favorite either small ball interaction or monologue of this season uh that you got to write that you were most you were just like this is it this is the juice oh yeah I mean it's so funny because that you know all the scenes you just talked about um those are the ones that get me out of bed like i love those scenes like you know the grasso and lizzie at the bar and getting to pick the specific music and getting to to

you know to find those moments where allison you know her eyes light up and she like i love those scenes those are the ones that you know i hate editing procedural stuff i'm always like god get me through this just like move the ball down the field five yards let's just get the clue and go to the next scene but i would say a couple come to mind like you scenes that i'm really proud of in the show um

the dinner table scene i think is an episode two i thought we did a really

really good job with that scene and that to me was good because it was moving the plot ahead in that oh now tom is stuck between his two daughters but also it i felt like it revealed a lot of hurt, a lot of emotional baggage that everyone was dealing with.

So I felt like if a scene was was working on two levels, emotionally and then also moving the plot.

I love Aaliyah, you know, confessing to Shelly that she was abused and that, and that she's stuck.

I love that scene.

I really like.

you know, the bedroom scene where Allison's offering KY2.

That one gets me.

Like, I thought that was really funny.

Obviously, Tom and Robbie in the car was a really fun sequence.

sequence.

You know, a scene I really like in the show is

when

Tom comes home with Sam and his daughters come in the kitchen.

They're like, why is this kid here?

And he's like, oh, I didn't know what to do with him.

And does anyone want

a peanut butter and jelly sandwich?

You know,

I love to find the moments of humor, Joanna, because if you take an aerial view of the show,

it's quite heavy.

And so I'm always, you know, most excited about the character beats.

And honestly, those are the moments that get me the most excited.

The procedural stuff I feel is

I have to write it.

And we have great advisors who help with those scenes, but they don't get me very excited, I have to be honest.

And I, it's all the little kind of weird character moments.

Like I, like on Mayor, I loved writing Gene Smart getting hitting by the door and like

all the goofiness that happened in the family.

Those are my favorite scenes.

And I, but I really do feel like the plot is just an excuse, you know, where I get to spend time with all these characters that I really, really love.

And I truly feel that way.

And again,

I know we have to have a plot and people have to click to the next episode, but

I love those little moments most.

I think they are what, you know, as a writer, gets me excited about writing all those characters as moments of connection and humor, you know?

I could watch Lizzie and Anthony talk about his DJ career forever.

You know,

I could too, by the way.

I hope there's a spin-off eventually where I get to write those scenes and because I love to write them and it's so funny.

And anyway, and those two together are just so good, you know?

Okay, so this is my last question.

You mentioned spin-off.

I've seen a million people ask you about sort of a task season two, and your answer is sort of changing as the season goes on.

You were like sort of at the beginning, you were like, let's see if people even like this.

People obviously like it.

But what I'm curious about, i've heard you talk about

this place as like a place you're interested in and so i'm curious if if you wanted to continue more task

um is it the place that you're interested in following or is it sort of like i would still want ruffalo at the center of it or some or more character uh following do you know what i mean yeah i think if we did another it's a great question i think if we did another task it would i think there would have to be some

you know i i would want to explore this uh at least some of the same characters i you know i i i would want to bring them back in a way and take them i i think a part of the fun of task and again i

i'm this is probably a selfish thing here joanna is like i do think a part of the fun of task is that again i get to i get to write another group of of of people on a task force like for me that is the joy like to wait i get to create a couple new characters to put on a task force and explore their you know dynamic over the course of a of a case.

And so, but having said that, I do think that if we did another task, I would like to ground it in Mark's character in some way and bring him back.

Because I do feel like, and I felt this way very much about Mayer is like, I feel like there's an interesting, like there's still more to his journey here.

I just find Mark's life situation so

in the best possible way as a writer, so messy and complicated.

And, um and that's always really i would say good soil you know when something's really messy and complicated um it's good to start from there people are always like why do you write such dark things and i'm going well if people were happy i wouldn't have a story you know so like i feel like they have to move away from something or they're or either they're stuck or they're trapped or there's a in mayor's case she wouldn't confront the death of her son in tom's case he wasn't going to have forgiveness in his heart i would love to bring him back and i love the idea of like

who are, you know, who are the characters he has to work with?

That was such a joy to write the Grasso's and Lizzy's and Aaliyah's.

And I love the idea of, again, I really see myself as a character, right?

So the more characters I get to create, the happier I'll be, Joanna.

Excellent.

Well, I look forward to whatever that looks like.

Oh, okay.

However long I have to wait for it.

And thanks so much for the chat.

I really appreciate it.

Of course.

Thanks, Joanna.

I really appreciate you guys talking about the show.

Thanks to Brad Inglesby for joining us.

Thanks to Joanna.

Sorry, Rob couldn't make it this time around.

Thanks to Chris for helping out as well.

Who else helped us out?

Justin?

Probably Kai, who's probably helping out somewhere in the background.

So thanks to everybody.

We'll be back for episode seven, Season Finale in one week.

Thanks.

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