Summer Mailbag: The 'Secret Invasion' Finale, Toy Movies in a Post-'Barbie' World, 'Ahsoka' Anticipation, and More!
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Hi, I'm Erica Ramirez, founder of Illy and host of What About Your Friends, a podcast dedicated to the many lives of friendship and how it's portrayed in pop culture. Every Wednesday on the Ringer Dish feed, I talk to my best friend, Steven Othello, and your favorites from within the Ringer and beyond about friendships on TV and movies, pop culture, and our real lives. So join me every Wednesday on the Ringer Dish feed, where we try to answer the question TLC asks back in the day, what about your friends?

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And let me guess, you're doing this out of the kindness of your heart? Oh, God, no, don't be silly. My father entered into a deal like that. It didn't end so well. Yes, well, let's be sure not to repeat the mistakes of Talos and Fury and leave love and friendship out of this.

And welcome into the Ringerverse, here on the Ringer Podcast Network. I'm Mallory Rubin, and it is my absolute pleasure to invite you, not only to new Skrullos, but also to join us on the Ringer's Nexus podcast feed for all things fandom. Joining me today, now that she's finished explaining that I've been held hostage for a long time, it's my house of bar.

Diana. Diana. Co-host Joanna Robinson. Jo, what's up? I went straight for the jugular there with our favorite line from the Secret Vision finale.

Full of emotion this morning. What a joy it is every Friday morning when we do record on Friday mornings to hop on the microphone and talk to you about anything and everything. It's truly the highlight of my week always. Same. I love you dearly. Delighted to be here. Same. Wow. I feel the same way. It's wonderful. I'm glad that we're not leaving friendship and love out of it, unlike some of the characters in the Secret Invasion finale. We are...

going to chat a bit about the aforementioned Secret Invasion finale, but we're going to do it inside of a mailbag. It's summer mailbag time here at the House of R, so we're going to hit a few Secret Invasion questions, but we're also going to hit a lot of other stuff. We're going to talk about some things that bring us joy, some things we're feeling excited about. It'll be a blast. We always love a mailbag. But before the Ravens call...

Programming reminders. Quick ones. Okay, this weekend, Jessica Clemons will be diving into all of the Easter eggs from Home, the Secret Invasion finale. Jess also dropped a Gen B trailer breakdown, which you can find on our YouTube channel. You can find as a video on Spotify. Check that out. It's wonderful. On Monday,

Mint Edition is diving into The Witcher Season 3 Part 2. And then on Wednesday, The Midnight Boys. We'll be chatting about what from all indications appears to be a modern cinematic classic.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Mutant Mayhem. The boys loved this movie. I haven't seen it yet, but they absolutely adored it. I can't wait to see it. The group chat has just been popping off about the turtles. They love those turtles. They are so happy about the turtles. I can't wait for the movie. I can't wait for the pod. Jo, what are we going to be talking about next week? Next Friday? I am so, so glad you asked me this.

What a thrill. We're going to talk about this a little bit more actually inside of a Milbag question, but the people have asked for this. We have answered them. They were like,

Good Omens, could you do it? So yes, we are going to cover Good Omens season two dropped today, yesterday, last night, something like that. We're going to cover Good Omens sort of season one and season two and the book, like the whole Omensverse situation on the podcast next week. And we're going to good old fashioned smuggle. Yeah. No. No.

Mallory, is it enough to talk about a decades old book and two seasons of television and one podcast? Why no? Let's set the bar higher. We're going to smuggle that inside of a tropes course episode.

I think the balance is going to be a little different from some of the other tropes courses that we've done. This is going to be like a lighter tropes course, but we wanted to talk about one of my favorite tropes of all time, enemies to lovers. So it's, you know, it's the story that Mallory and I share from enemies to lovers. I knew you were going to say that.

Michael Sheen and David Tennant share in good omen. So that's what's on the sketch for next Friday. Can't wait. Yeah, I'm thrilled. Just sincerely can't wait. Are you the Aziraphale to my Crawley or is it vice versa? What a great and penetrating question that is. My goodness. I think we both have a little bit of both of them in us. I'm the one with the ridiculous hair right now, though. So I might...

When I was rewatching it over season one, I kept texting you like, the thing I regret most about not being able to talk about season one with you in real time is not getting to enjoy wig watch with Joanna Robinson. Time period after time period after time period. Astonishing stuff. Remarkable. Jo, that's a lot. Oh, yeah. That's a lot of content. Sure is. How can everyone follow along? Oh, gosh. I'm so glad you asked me. Firstly, let's just make it easy on yourselves.

Just follow the pod. Like, subscribe. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Subscribe. And then you get all of that. I want, like, I mean, it's a lot. Um...

But if you're like, what's coming? What day of the week? What's going on? Maybe our social channels can help you with that. Right. Perhaps. Sometimes we, the people who make this podcast know what's coming when sometimes. Sometimes we do. Sometimes we change it. Yeah. You might've heard on the Midnight Boys this week that we'd be doing a deep dive. Yeah. That was the information that they were working with. So they did nothing wrong. Here we are. We zig and we zag. Um,

Follow us on social at ringer verse on Instagram and Facebook on question. So that's what we're calling it now. I know where we are. I'm like, Nope, no, no. Let's to be defiant Twitter. It shall be HBO. It still is. Anyway. So yeah, do all of that. And also,

If you're listening to this mailbag episode and you're like, gosh, I wish I could have had a question on this episode, hobbsanddragons at gmail.com. It doesn't have to be a mailbag episode for you to email us. We will take your Apple questions. We will take your Orioles enthusiasm. We will take your mushroom recipes. Hobbsanddragons at gmail.com. I will just say for this mailbag, and I was worried because we decided a little late in the week to do this. Uh-huh.

And I was like, oh, no. Will we get enough questions? Folks, pals, ladies and gents. We got like hundreds of emails. So we wish we could answer them all. There were a lot of tremendous ones that we will not be getting to this week. But we have a lot of fun ones to tackle as well. So anyway, Hobbits and Dragons. They're the best. I mean.

House of Ari's house of our heads. We still haven't really landed on the, still like the hoard name. The hoard is good. It really makes us feel like we could go into battle. You know what I mean? Our bannerman. Oh God. Our banner people. Yeah. I love it. All right. Last reminder up at the top. It's the same one that we end the intro with every time. It's the friendly neighborhood spoiler warning. Now, how can we give a friendly neighborhood spoiler warning for a mailbag? Well, today's podcast will feature plot details, uh,

such that they are from the secret invasion finale anything that's ever happened in the mcu might come up some marvel comics canon might come up that's all on the table and you know as mentioned already we will be chatting about a lot of things other than secret invasion so you'll hear what those things are in the question that's the best we could do for the spoiler warning this will just be a good time for all yeah i don't i don't anticipate that i need to like not a hugely spoiler heavy episode anything yeah yeah the secret invasion chat i don't think um

Speaking of the Midnight Boys though, can we, like before we get into Secret Invasion, can we start with a little mini Midnight Boys segment? Yeah. All right. Let's take a bite of the apple. Listen, we had some requests, multiple requests. Mallory and I have been making our apple feelings known for a long time now. It has now escalated to like something of a gift war in our text messages of apple moments in pop culture history. Anyway, this is where we are. Yeah.

But it's not just the two of us. We've now roped in our brethren over on the Midnight Boys due to a couple emails we got asking for the Midnight Boys take on apples. So we have the boys here to talk about their apple feelings. We have only heard two of them in advance. The other two... A couple teasers, yeah. Yeah.

are a real mystery and uh isaiah's producing our pod today i have been told buckle up yeah chuckle heads all right so here we go isaiah will you play us the midnight boys entries into the apple wars hello this is van lathan joanna robinson's best friend and podcast soulmate uh my favorite apple is the ambrosia got a taste to it i love the way it tastes

I don't bake anything with it. I just open it up and I crisply bite into it and I feel healthy like a real human again. I want an apple right now. Don't poison my shit. But I like the ambrosia. Yo, this is Charles. Good take, Haver. Positive king all 2023. I would have to say in the Apple Wars, I'm a Honeycrisp. Honey, you know, if you're getting wild and crazy, you might throw a pink lady in there. And if we being basic, probably like a Gala Apple. But Honeycrisp is the one.

- Hello, this is Ring Reverse producer Steve Allman, here to weigh in on the apple discourse. Fun fact, I'm actually allergic to apples, at least uncooked apples, so I haven't really had apples in a great many years. However, my sister and my grandma constantly would make and bake and cook wonderful apple dishes, my favorite of which were homemade apple sauce and homemade apple pies made

with Cortland apples. So by that precedent, I would have to say that Cortland apples are my favorite apple. What's up, ring-a-verse? It's your boy, Jomie from the Midnight Boys. Pew, pew. We have been asked to weigh in on the grand old apple debate, red versus green. And I've got to say...

It's tough. Now, I just want to be very clear here. I don't eat apples. It's just what it is. I'm not an apple guy. Okay? I like a good grape. Okay? I like some oranges. Now, you can spit with oranges, but eating apples raw? Eh, it's not really my thing. Now, what is my thing is making pie.

And I love me a good apple pie. Let me tell you from scratch, I know, Joe, you don't like hot fruit, but let me tell you something, a nice little warm slice of pie with some ice cream on top, tell me you ain't living. Delicious. Now, here's where I've got to weigh in on the big debate. When I make my pies, okay,

You got to use the good fruit, the one that's going to stay a little, got a little, you know, it's not going to just melt when you bake it. It's going to stay nice and firm, okay?

And it's gonna be a little tart, so I gotta rock with the green. The Granny Smith is the superior bacon apple, so I'm rocking with the green apples. I'm sorry, Mal, but I gotta go with Joe on this one. Shout out to y'all. Love y'all. See you soon.

Now, first of all, amazing, amazing stuff. Secondly, Mallory was just like gloating at her 4-0 win that she felt like she had there. Listen, I understand. It's a clean sweep because my position on Granny Smith's has always been the best place for them. I understand that you're a competitive person. I understand. But wouldn't you just out of friendship to me give me one out of four? No! Scoreboard! Scoreboard!

Say Jomie, who declared openly for me, I get one and you get three. We can call that one a draw. I don't even understand. We can call that one a draw. What was Van's apple? Ambrosia, which is a red apple.

And Charles had not only three red apples, which are my top two. Charles is very clearly... Charles is ride or die, Mallory. I understand that. Van looking at his apple, which I've never had an ambrosia, but it looks very Mal-esque. So I will give you Charles and Van. I'm actually not even sure Steve and Jomie should be allowed to vote, given that they don't even eat apples. It's true, though. I think the Steve one is a victory for me because...

He's saying that the only time he'll eat an apple is if it is warmed in a sauce or in some sort of dessert, which I love and you despise. And also a Cortland apple is another favorite of mine. I used to pick those in orchards during my circus years. The apple debate is multifold. It's not just...

versus green. And you're not, let's be clear, you're not even red. You're like mottled. It's not, you're not going, you're not something for a Red Delicious. You're something for a multivariated apple, right? Okay, so like. I love all apples. This has never been for me, as you know, an anti-Granny Smith. It's a, Granny Smith has a place and a time and it's not at number one on a power ranking. That's all. No.

You have said outside of a pie, Granny Smith belongs in the trash. Or an applesauce. That is what you have said. An applesauce or a pie. How dare you? Or like a sandwich with a brie. I've always said this, but on its own, like to put in your hand and take a bite out of as your number one choice. Crisp and refreshing. It's confounding to me, but that's okay. People are different. And that's what I love about life. All right. So we all agree three to one. I get one, you get three. Do you want to chime in on this?

since you're here today, do you have a favorite? I regret maybe asking this in case this ends up being a... Don't worry, it's not going to go my way. It never goes my way. I would probably fall more in the Joe Me and Steve camp of I don't really eat apples like that. But I definitely would say I lean red apples over green apples. There we go. There we go. This is just great. Boy, you know what this means? More Granny Smith apples in the market for me. The whole world is deluded that you need...

Either a sugary sweet apple or have it mushed down into a pie or a sauce, then more crisp green apples for me. There's five in my fridge right now. Love them. Have I told you that I'm developing, speaking of Steve's answer, an allergy to apples? Have I told you this? It's what you get, honestly. My throat itches every time I eat one now. Guess what I had an hour ago? A honey crisp apple. And it was worth it.

Did I curse you somehow? Maybe. I think it's just the general decaying of my person, which you've been able to track in real time as my partner in content for the last couple of years. How are your eyeballs? I can tell there's another person with me on Zoom. That's great. All right. All right. Should we dive in to the old bag? Should we start with the...

Little secret invasion finale talk and then hit some other cues. Really, really disappointing showing from the boys. I'm going to have to reach out to Jess. This episode is brought to you by Peloton. You know, for me, fitness has always been about finding that groove, whether it's hitting the pavement outside, which I've been allowed of, or dialing up a sweat session indoors.

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or the Peloton app. It's like having your own personal coach with you or right at home in your living room. Call yourself a runner with Peloton at onepeloton.com slash running. All right. First question today comes from Cam. Here it is. So Nick Fury's plan was to send Gaia in his place to fight Gravik.

Gravik uses the harvest and it turns both he and Gaia into the strongest characters of all time. Did the great Nick Fury really just bet the fate of the world on the idea that Gaia would win in one-on-one combat? Multiple question marks in a row in the email. What if she loses? It's not like she is any stronger than Gravik at that point. Joe, care to comment?

It's a great question. I do think part of all of that was to sort of distract Gravik while they tried to pull off what they pulled off with the president. Because like the most pressing need is to deescalate, right, a potential war. So that was like really the most important thing. How does Ritson have time to call off an order if he's busy asking his Secret Service agent for their guns, though? Give me your gun. Also astonishing. He was just like.

slowly building up to a racist screed that he decided to give at the end of the episode? Anyway, point being, it's not a great plan. It's not even a good plan, one would say. But I would say my issue with that whole plot point had more to do with, I thought Kingsley Ben-Adir was really good in his last scene with his human face on. And it bothers me that he's giving that impassioned,

Well, reasoned, justified, frustrated argument to the wrong person. You know what I mean? That Nick Fury doesn't get to hear what Gravik had to say, because I think what Gravik had to say was important. We'll talk a bit about Nick Fury's like character development over the course of the series. And if in fact there was one, and I would just say like, this could have been a really key moment.

for him to learn and grow and change and whatever, which is what we want to see in a character over the course of an adventure. But instead the emotional climax is set up for a twist. Yeah. We almost saw it coming inside of that scene. Exactly. Like JK, it's, it's a guy. So like, and this is, this is the, an aspect of the faceless man problem that we talked about sort of when we first talked about this, which is just sort of like, is it more interesting for there to be like a surprise or,

when we were covering Thrones and people would constantly guess that like Arya was hiding at someone, I'm like, how obnoxious would it be?

for that scene to have not been between those two people. You know what I mean? And that's how I felt in this, like the quote unquote surprise, which didn't feel that surprising to you and me, but like maybe to some people that quote unquote surprise is not worth it to me to not get to have that graphic fury confrontation. So it's a bad plan. And I don't think it's great TV storytelling either at the same time. So I agree. I think that's a great thing to call out inside of all of this. I, on the, on the,

powering up front yeah i genuinely felt as what i would have considered like if i'm looking inward a surprising level of rage watching this unfold in real time this made me angry because it's not just a puzzling story choice that is contained i it really i think shows a lack of

thought and care for the present inside of the show and what is working and impactful and why the future in terms of the implications of this decision and the past in terms of like assessing what a character like Nick Fury do a thing like this, right? It's not...

just trusting that Gaia can beat Gravik, though I do think Cam is right to call that out as like, oh, well, what if that had gone wrong? It's an exceedingly risky move. And I do think we have to ask, given the centrality of the extremist healing power in particular this season, that's probably the thing other than branch extension arm we've seen the most. If we should believe that

If we as the viewer should believe that he's actually dead, but I would say even more importantly, if we should accept the characters would believe that and just like, oh, you got a hole in your chest cavity. Cool. We're done. That's a wrap. I'm going to walk away. That just doesn't make any sense to me. I think that giving all of the power in the universe to somebody who,

you know, with respect, but in the interest of like assessing the board with candor and clarity here, was working for the enemy three weeks ago is really weird to me. Like, yes, Gaia is somebody that Fury has known for a really long time. Gaia is the daughter of one of Fury's closest friends and a person that he regrets losing and missing. So them forging an alliance and working together makes sense. But,

Do we know enough? Does Fury know enough to trust Gaia with that power? And do you know, let alone Gravik and hoping the battle swings the right way? Do you know what would have been so easy if they wanted to do this and not leave us with this like massive problem at the center of the MCU? Since they're making all of this up anyway. Time capsule. Why not just say, yeah, it wears off.

12 hours. This is like taking in a leave, Joanna. Yeah. You know? And in her conversation with Olivia Colman at the end of the episode, she could have just been like, I can already feel it leaving me or whatever. I was praying for something like that. And then we get the opposite, which is confirmation that she is still powered up when she's talking to Sonia, which is like a wallop. It is so easy to not do this. I know.

I think from the Fury perspective, this is one of the things I'm quite hung up on because, you know, you made a lot of great points early in the run when we were doing the deep dives about Fury in particular, but also more broadly, like the role of a spy in fiction and when you should or can trust any kind of nominal good intention or bond. I...

Do you feel, though, that this is like a substantial betrayal from Fury of his bond with all of the Avengers? Like, I believe, to be clear, I believe that Nick Fury is a character who would have been collecting their DNA and readying for some sort of circumstance where maybe they had all been eliminated and he needed to put together another initiative somehow. That actually, like, as fucked up as that would be, would track for me with him and what we've seen from him. You know, blood on the Coulson playing cards, right?

to just hand it over, not only is that reckless and irresponsible, it shows absolutely no consideration for those characters. Like, we are supposed to believe that the bond that he has...

with Carol Danvers is a decades-long, life-defining thing that both out of practicality and urgency, but also trust, that's the person he summons when he's fading into flakes in the snap. He just gave two other characters her powers on a fucking whim. And I'm also worried that, you know, in seeing people's responses to this, because there's certainly...

who love the MCU like we do, want it to be great like we do, and take that to the point of trying to defend some things that we find objectionable in this finale. And one argument I keep seeing is like, well, we can't know until the Marvels how this is all going to play out. And what I would say to you is I don't want that burden on the Marvels. I'm kind of excited for the Marvels. I think the trailers have been really fun.

I would love the marbles to be like a really fun body swapping thing. And I don't need the marbles to have to clean up the mess that's left behind from secret invasion. Like that's not something I want to put on that project. And so, you know, wait until the marbles and see is not a positive for me. Um,

Um, as we go forward. So I think that's a great point. And it does get to this larger conversation that we, you know, often check in on. And I think I've been revisiting with more frequency lately, which is when this like sprawling connected universe works and homes and brings us that like heightened sense of, of, of impact that you get when there is a connected universe and when it feels like, man, there's just constant trade-offs and borrowing and buying to set up other things. Um,

That sweet spot is always like if the setup is there and something is spinning into the future, which is kind of the inevitable proposition of the MCU and for a long time was part of the joy of it. And now it's like one of the fraught parts of it. It also has to work in the vacuum of that particular story. Right. When Fury ends this finale and ends this series, piecing off to Saber again.

I don't understand what his character arc is inside of this show at all. Right. I mean, what are the lessons that he took? It doesn't feel like there is one. Follow through, stay present, pay attention, no shortcuts, no quitting. And then he's like, see ya, but don't worry. Your mortal sworn enemy said they're willing to chat. So I fixed it. It'll be fine. The Midnight Boys covered this really well, I thought, in their episode of like, this is the first,

profoundly fundamental failure of this because while I agree that like the proposition of something needs to be able to sort of stand alone in the vacuum of the property that

That character should have moved somewhere on the needle by the end of that. Otherwise, why are we on the adventure with them? And especially with someone like Samuel L. Jackson, who has been in the franchise from the very beginning and has not had like a solo outing. Like this is what we were saving for Samuel L. Jackson, like who's at the heart of...

so many franchises at the center of pop culture for so long. And it's like, this is the showcase moment. And this is what we did with him. And what we basically did is, and this, this is the question. Not only is there like the burden of continuity that we've been talking about, but an offshoot of that is, and we talked about this a lot with like no way home, which is like when you move properties around and they're in continuity, like,

Then you have to hold things in stasis in a weird way. So we don't know for certain if the Marvels are supposed to come out before this or after this, because we didn't have confirmed release dates for the Marvel, like for Secret Invasion for the Marvels moved. But I can see a world in which the fury that comes out at the end of this has to be.

Where he might be at the beginning of the Marvels or after the Marvel, you know what I mean? Like just, and it's a stasis proposition. And then that's just not as interesting for me to watch as someone who cares as much about character as they do. Super scrolls, punching each other or more about character actually than the super scrolls punching each other. Yeah. Like I want to see movement for Nick Fury. I want to see him learn something, feel, feel chastened or feel full of hope about something or, you know, and I just don't,

feel like anything changed for him and that I think is the fundamental issue. I feel like that kind of answers Michael's question, don't you? Like that was sort of

Unless they want to check it out. Yeah, I guess the only other thing from Michael's question that we might want to hit is Rhodey. Is the Rhodey stuff. Want to just hit that right there. We had another question that went through some of the other things that we just talked about in real time from Michael. And part of Michael's question was about Rhodey. And if you're going to have flashbacks, why not actually show us Rhodey, Agent Ross and others getting captured? We need an actual, I'm reading the email now. We need an actual timeline of when Rhodey was switched. I could go on and on. Do you want to talk about the Rhodey of it all for a second here, Joe?

Yeah. And I should say we do have one like uplifting. Yeah. Chance for positivity question coming from secret invasion. My favorite moment in midnight boys history. Let me just say it was on positivity corner. Opening with positivity corner and Charles begging. Yeah.

begging them to come back to him because he had nothing to say just a remarkable and wonderful podcasting moment from our cherished pals great stuff so much um yeah okay so so okay so the roadie situation is this i'm sure if you're listening to this and you're following secret invasion you've already like looked into this but when we first see roadie come out of the fracking pod um

In the hospital gown that he wore in Civil War, the first fear for people was that... And seemingly still in a state of paralysis, right? Yeah. I feel like they kind of left that as ambiguous as they might because who knows what anyone feels out of the fracking pod, but sure. Is this Rhodey from... Was he snatched from Civil War? Yeah. There's plenty of...

against that actually that exists even within like without them maybe retconning it in the future like Gravik isn't like why are they replacing Avengers that point right like Nick hasn't left for you know space yet Gravik hasn't like started his plot yet so why are they replacing Avengers way back in Civil War like who did that who ordered that you know sort of thing um

But here's what Ali Salim, who is the director of all the episodes, said in an interview with Collider. Again, this is sort of a mealy mouth. We're not saying one way or another thing, but he said there are a lot of conversation with Marvel, but it all ends up in the script that Rhodey has been a Skrull. We can only assume he's been a Skrull since Captain America Civil War. And yet.

I think the definitive answer is not as much fun as letting the audience go back to roadie scenes and unpack it and see what they think. I think that's what Marvel would say, quote, yeah, it's an idea, but definitive, go explore, see what you come up with. And like, that's a kind of classic Marvel thing where I feel like they're not ready to commit

one way or another right now until Armor Wars. Even inside of the episode, right? Where like Ross says, Colonel Rhodes, how long have you been in there? And Gaius says, whoa, Colonel Rhodes, I've got you. You've been held hostage for a long time. They're trying to like entice us with the mystery of it. Yeah. But Mallory, if Rhodey has been in the fracking pod since Civil War,

What is the thing that frustrates you most about that proposition? I mean, we talked about this at the very beginning of the season when it was just abundantly clear before the actual reveal that Rhodey was a Skrull and would shortly be revealed as a Skrull, that the alarming prospect on the timeframe front was what if that jeopardized his emotional moments and

with Tony at the end of Endgame. Now there's stuff beyond that, certainly. I would say everything in Endgame is really compromised by this decision. When everybody exits their hollows, who stays back to talk to Nat about the thing that will be the most painful for her to confront? What has happened to Clint Barton?

It's Rhodey. When Rhodey and Nebula are on their journey and everybody's breaking up in the Pym Particles and they're together, it was this interesting way to take two characters who had been kind of on the fringes of the more central figures in the story and put them in the spotlight together.

specifically through that shared bond of some sort of change in their life. Now, if Marvel attempts at some point to say, well, there's this like meta quality to a Skrull talking about that, or, hey, remember when you guys went to Portsmouth and saw the military guy who was actually a Skrull really seemed to care about his son? He had absorbed all of these feelings. Like one of the things we've learned is that you absorb the memories and the feelings. Right.

there's like technically a way they could explain that, but it's just not something that fans will want or accept. Yeah. The end game, the end game end thing with Tony is just like unforgivable. We've talked, we talked about this, but now we, I mean, now it's like a real thing. Yeah. So here's, here's the thing. So yeah, you, you referenced that nebulous scene. And in that scene, he says, I wasn't always like this. Right. And yeah,

We at the time assume he means either like the paralysis or having a armored suit, you know, like what, you know, the various things that have happened to Rody, blah, blah. And you could read it as this is a scroll, though, hopefully a different scroll from the scroll who is like really sloppy at the job of impersonating Rose in this episode. That's the other thing that just doesn't make any sense. If he's been a scroll this long, why the sudden drastic change? Yeah.

in behavior is it that the scroll who was impersonating him just decided fuck it we're really going for it our plan is at the final stage so i don't have to pretend anymore i can call admirals fucking idiots to their faces in front of the president and no one will notice or care i think that these are all phenomenal questions and i'm so glad you're asking them but the the one response that i've seen that i think and it doesn't change what has happened but

Everyone seems to hate this so much.

that I don't see a world in which Marvel doesn't try to retcon this because they haven't boxed themselves in officially one way or another. I don't see why they wouldn't take the opportunity to be like, JK, he went in for gallbladder surgery after Endgame or after Falcon and Winter Soldier and that's how long he's been in there. You know what I mean? Like, they could fix this really easily. The same way we were saying like the Aleve solution for the Super Skull Powers is an easy way to fix this. So,

gallbladder. Perfect. Do you need a hospital for a deep dental cleaning? What else can we workshop here? This is a great idea. You're onto something here. Man, we chat a lot in a positive and appreciative way about the MCU as a living document. I think it's something we sincerely enjoy about it. We've spoken a lot. You've made wonderful points over many podcasts about

the MCU's ability, and this would be part of that retcon possibility, to take something from the past and update it or fix it. This is the inverse. When you meddle with something that is held sacred and dear. For what? For this? Yeah, exactly. You would sacrifice the beauty of the endgame death scene, which you and I both rewatched this morning, for this?

I was like shaking rewatching it, Joe. I think that in some ways you could say Rhodey is like... And Ross, you know, so the characters they picked in some respects are the right tier of character. And like level of influence in the government, et cetera. You know what I mean? Yeah. But the moment in time thing is just so crucial there because when MCU fans who adore Endgame, who consider it one of not only the best movies they've gotten to see, the best Marvel movies they've gotten to see, but one of the...

the most precious shared experiences in this decade plus run of us getting to watch and love the MCU together. And now you rewatch that scene. And when Tony is fading in his final seconds and the first person who leans over in front of him is a scroll impersonating James Rhodes. And then you go to his funeral and we pan in on tears streaming down. Rhodey's face. Like,

Why compromise the sanctity of those moments? Why is that worth it? I genuinely don't get it. I don't know if anyone from Marvel is listening. Would they listen to this? I don't know. But if you are, guys, fellas, pals, ladies, it's not too late to fix this. So easy to fix this. I'm going to spend some time this afternoon looking up gallbladder information.

You've inspired hope in me, Jo. This is why you're the best. I'm glad. I actually want to cite our pal Brian Cogman because I think that was his gallbladder surgery. He sent me in a text. This is why you're a one of one, man. This is great. This is great. Here I was just a second ago thinking about watching Emilia Clarke look down at her tiny Drax arm. And now I'm thinking about gallbladders. Life can improve in an instant.

I tweeted the mailbag prompt before I had gotten to see the Secret Invasion finale. And my pal and yours, Dave Gonzalez, tweeted at me like, did you two laugh when you saw her tiny Drax arm? And I hadn't seen it yet. And I was just sort of like, oh, can't wait for that. Remarkable. Can't wait for that moment. And I did indeed laugh. Should we hit an impositivity corner? Let's do it. Question from Kate, who writes...

because Olivia Coleman is a goddess who brightens everything she touches. Is there a genre show you would love to see her in? For some reason, I love the idea of her appearing in silo as a person who knows who built the silos and is keeping the knowledge secure and verbally cracking the knuckles of people who to keep them in line. Where would you put Olivia Coleman in Sonia mode or otherwise? Where would you put her Mallory?

What a wonderful prompt. I know. I love this. Let me take this opportunity to say that my favorite moment of the finale by far and one that I absolutely loved. I was in tears laughing. Was the Gaia conversation.

When Gaia says, let me guess, you're doing this out of the kindness of your heart? And Senya said, oh God, no. Don't be silly. That killed me and that was great. The silo call is a good one. I like that. A little bit of an air of mystery. I think it's difficult for me not to offer up something in the Song of Ice and Fire universe, something in a Thrones show. It feels like a perfect setting for her...

and her ability to capture like mania and control and power, but also humor and levity and specifically like oddity. I think that would be really fun. So I was inclined to say, let's get Olivia Coleman into House of the Dragon season three. Obviously season two is in the process of being filmed right now, but yeah,

Then I thought, I don't know. Are we limiting ourselves? Is that too short of a runway for our time with Olivia Colman and Westeros? Why don't we incorporate her into the plans for A Night of the Seven Kingdoms, The Hedge Knight, or what I will continue to call stubbornly Dunkin' Egg, and get her in there from the jump? That also, that story really has that nice mix of Thrones Palace intrigue and adventure, humor, a little bit of that light spark that she's really able to bring. I don't know, a little...

a little lady Weber, a little red widow, Olivia Coleman action. I love it. But then the other thing I thought I wanted to throw your way was the boys, Olivia Coleman as a VOD exec. Yeah. Yes. I mean, yes. I feel like that's a little too close to what she just did for the MCU. Um,

But because we didn't get as much of it as we wanted, I feel like I'm almost like left craving more of it as a result. She's so good. What about you?

I was thinking, because I am recently obsessively rewatching and catching up on Star Trek Strange New Worlds, that it would be really fun. That show is so fun. I'll talk about it a little bit more later. But, like, that show is so fun. Like, fun. And she's so good at fun. And so as either...

a mischievous alien figure. There's like this character of Q that shows up in various Star Trek properties or whatever. So like a Q-esque sort of mischief maker or...

You know, there are various admirals or whatever that will just show up occasionally on a screen to like make Captain Pike question his moves or whatever. You know, just like someone in authority. I think it's similar to what you're saying with the boys or what we saw here, like someone in authority who was able to make someone feel quite small very quickly, you know, with a smile on their face sort of thing. So I kind of like the idea of of that for her. I love that. I love that. OK, this is great.

Or is the doctor? More Olivia Colman in our lives. Oh, that would be fun. Yeah. I mean, that would be wonderful. I mean, isn't that the pick? That's amazing. That's amazing. So that would be like a few years from now, you know? Yeah. We're about to start our new journey. Yeah. When Shitty Gatwa is done. Yeah. Let's get Colman in there. Let's get Colman in the TARDIS. I fucking love that. Yeah. Wow.

Who would Olivia Coleman's companion be? David Tennant as like a human who happens to look like the doctor. They've got their broad church chemistry. They could do it. Oh, man. Broad church might come up again today. Oh, interesting. Next question. Can I ask you this Ahsoka question? Sure. This one comes from Jackson, who says Mallory's enthusiasm for Ahsoka is infectious. I'm super hyped about Rebels 2.0.

Here's my question. Do you think the new Ahsoka series will incorporate plot elements or characters from the Timothy Zahn novel? I'm going to say novels. If so, I'm rooting for Mara Jade to show up in some fashion. I would just say we have been waiting for Mara Jade to show up for like 20 years of Star Wars fandom. It feels like anyway, Mallory Rubin, what's your answer to this? Oh, great question.

Have I mentioned that I expect Ahsoka to be the achievement of a lifetime? Yeah. That's exactly where your expectations should be, given what Dizzy Plus has been giving you. No, I love you. Stay hyped. Stay enthusiastic. We need you. We need you in this world. We need you on that wall to cite something you might have talked about last night.

We do. We need you on the fandom wall. That was the quote I used when I walked out on stage, Jo. What did you say? You want me on the wall? You need me on that wall. Look at us. I have mine always. Beautiful. So great question. Thank you, Jackson. I think that the Legends canon novels from Timothy Zahn, the Heir to the Empire trilogy, are

I really liked the observation and the theory that Van floated when we all did our Star Wars Celebration pod and talked about the first Ahsoka trailer, where he identified that he thought the Balan character from the Ahsoka show seemed to have a lot of the Joris energy and character traits from Heir to the Empire. And that seems likely to take either...

a character and give us some sort of composite or update where the strands are the same, but maybe the character has a different name plot wise. Certainly. I mean, given all of the efforts to thwart the new Republic, that's like going to be a huge part of what the show is about. Um,

And Filoni, you know, in particular, we've chatted about this a lot on some of our other Star Wars pods, really like prizes pulling aspects of Legends canon into the Disney canon and bringing it back. He's like, you're going to decanonize all this? Cool. I'm going to slowly recanonize it. You know what I mean? Thrawn canon.

I mean, Thrawn is obviously like the best example of that when Filoni brought him into Rebels and made him canon again. So I think very possible for all of those reasons. Marge in particular, I mean, it would be a thrill. Star Wars fans would be delighted.

Is this the time that it finally happens? I don't think so. There's also like, I feel like we're just currently very much in the, you know, Mark Hamill saying he's like all good playing Luke Skywalker and like, can you introduce Marjade in a different way? Certainly, but everyone would be like, yeah, thinking about, hey, yeah, here we go. Luke's wife. I think what is most

more likely to be like a closer mapping in terms of the elements that are pulled are the new Thrawn novels from Timothy Zahn, where there are two trilogies. We've chatted about them a lot on other pods. I think the first reason that this is the more likely spot for characters and plot elements is because they're already there.

based on when they came out directly and consistently connected inside of the books to the rebels characters. The rebels characters are present in those stories in a way that just makes the ties like easier to port over. Yeah. Will we see like the Grisk as a character set in Ahsoka? Will we see that aspect of a huge, a chiss enemy and a, a force and a threat from the unknown regions penetrating into the empire? Yeah.

maybe, I think the Unknown Regions more broadly, the Chiss Ascendancy, the role of Thrawn and his people in Galactic Affairs will be present here. Characters? I mean...

We mentioned on some pod many moons ago that the Expanse's Wes Chatham has been cast. They haven't said definitively who he's playing, just that he's playing Thrawn's right-hand man. This has to be Eli Vanto. I would be astounded if he is not playing Eli. And so, like, again, that's just, we're pulling a central figure from a couple of the Thrawn trilogy characters

books into that show and then does that mean we'll see like a character like Admiral Arlani at some point other figures from the Chiss Ascendancy I think that's pretty likely um I'm thrilled to have Eli in the live action a fascinating character I won't really spoil here why we'll probably talk about that a little more on some of our Ahsoka previews but uh I just can't wait to see Eli who I think is wonderful can't believe we get to talk about Ahsoka in a month

Unbelievable. Can I talk about an element from the Thrawn novels? The non-canon Thrawn novels that I think would be cool to see. So as you know, I'm like slowly making my way through the Thrawn novels and

In addition to everything else that we are watching and reading in preparation for everything that we're doing. And there's this really cool thing that shows up first in the Dark Force Rising, which is the second of the original trilogy. And it's the Katana fleet, the Katana fleet, which I know you know about, but it is. So it's like 200 dreadnought cruisers where the crew went mad, jumped into hyperspace and was lost. It was lost crew of 200 dreadnought cruisers.

a ghost armada, just the phrase ghost armada is like one of the coolest phrases, you know? So basically like Thrawn takes control of this. The, the Katana fleet is,

You've got your flagship, the Katana, and then like all the other ships are just sort of operated from. So it's like empty ships operated from, by the way, a plot point in a recent Strangely Worlds episode. But Ghost Fleet. And then there's this like battle between Thrawn and like in the books, like Luke and Han are involved in blah, blah, blah, and all this sort of stuff over the Katana fleet. I don't really need Luke and Han involved in this, but I just like...

the concept of the Katana fleet or the ghost armada to be involved somehow. I think that would be really cool. So yeah, I just can't wait. We're going to have a time. We're going to have a time with Ahsoka. We're going to have a great fucking time. We've had a lot of people ask. I don't, I can't remember if this is in our quick ones questions. Not, we've had a lot of people ask if we're going to do prep. Oh yeah. Have you met? Yes. Get ready. We will have, I think right now we're two separate sort of pre Ahsoka, uh,

prep episodes. So yeah, we are doing all the reading and all the rewatching and all the amassing of favorite moments and all that sort of stuff to get it to get everyone ready. I had someone, a listener, a friend of the pod asked me just this week. She was like, do you think I need to watch rebels? And like, Mallory would say yes. And I would say if you have the time, great. But if not, that's why we're here. Actually, like we, we've watched rebels. So you don't have to me. No, treat yourself to one of the thrills of your life. Yes, absolutely. Sorry.

There you go. All right, Joe, I have one for you now. You're ready for this? Yeah. This is from Carrie. As per the subject line, I want to know now what the subject line was. I just really need Joe's thoughts on Oppenheimer and its wigs or lack thereof. Because Nolan's reveal that his filming schedule was moved around Killian's haircuts immediately made me say to myself,

I wonder what Joanna Robinson thinks about this. I think Christopher Nolan, thank you so much for this question, Kelly. I think Christopher Nolan is,

And the number of people who tagged me when that when that interview came out with with Nolan. I think Christopher Nolan, who, by the way, has a tremendous head of hair. Let's just say that off the bat. Yeah. Is a real ally on the wigwash front, honestly, because to be clear, Cillian Murphy in Oppenheimer and we got a lot of Barbenheimer questions. Yeah.

Mallory has been caring for her best friend in the whole world, Halo, so has not gotten the Barbra Heimer experience yet. Last night was the first time I had literally left my home in eight days because of my little guy. So I have not participated in the pop culture event of the decade. Yet. We're doing sideways Barbra Heimer today. So this is one way in, which is wigs. And so...

Killian Murphy as Oppenheimer. We follow him from like his university years through the end of his life.

and so there are many haircuts along the way. And in his youth, it's like long and wavy. And it is like end of his life. It's like a great buzz cut. So like that, um, astonishing stuff. Love that. They just like did the whole film schedule around how long or short Killian's hair was. I think that's tremendous. I love that. Um, I would say Robert Downey Jr. Definitely has is rocking a wig in that movie. So it's not like it's a wig less experience. Um,

And he's got some pretty significant sort of like makeup on throughout. But overall...

Really, really tremendous stuff. Loved the hair in Oppenheimer. Here's where I'll kick some dirt on Barbie, you know, which has not been what I've been doing for the last couple week and a half. And I will say this. Dua Lipa's wig in as Mermaid Barbie is one of the worst things I've ever seen. And if you're like, well, it's probably intentional because she's like got should have like, you know, turquoise plastic looking here as Mermaid Barbie.

go look at John Cena's wig as the male as the merman mermaid Ken and how beautiful of a wig they gave him so like what did Dua Lipa do to get what they put on her head that's the mystery go google image search John Cena in the Barbie movie and then Dua Lipa and then just go what happened here yeah Mallory doing this in real time

Okay. Okay. Okay. I'm understanding the note. Let's see. Oh, sensational. Right? Tremendous.

They treated him so well. A beautiful, luscious head of Fabio hair with the hairline perfect. Everything laid perfectly. Dua Lipa's got a Party City wig on. What happened? I have questions. On the wig wash front, and I hope that Mint Edition gets into this, is like, what is going on with the wigs over on The Witcher Season 3 Part 2, the Henry Cavill Final Victory lap that he's doing over there? Because...

Questionable wig situation on The Witcher if you are a fan of that show. That's it for wig watch on the mailbag. Incredible stuff. All right. We have a Barbie adjacent question next, right? Yeah. This is a Barb question from Zach that I can ask you. What toy property? So Mattel has said that they're like, oh, this is just the tip of the of the Matteliverse thing.

Berg. Tremendous word usage from me there. Anyway, we're going to get a lot of... Thanks. Mattel vs. Berg is closed trippingly. I feel like, yeah, we're going to see a lot of Mattel stuff to come, including a movie that nobody wants, which is a Lena Dunham Polly Pocket movie. Anyway...

Zach wants to know what toy property would you pair with what director to create the next Barbie phenomenon? So you don't need to limit yourself to Mattel though. I personally from this prompt did go over to the Mattel page to like, see what all they own. Cause I wasn't sure what they own, but anyway, what did you, what did you are the true toy head here? What did you come up with? I had a bit of a journey with this question. Okay. I went on a journey, Joe, and here's what, here's, here's what the journey, uh,

consisted of it it started with a lot of excitement and then some dread when i realized that most of my favorite toys have already had movies or stories made about them like my instinct of course was to do something about legos but as you know the lego cinematic universe is one of my most beloved so then i thought okay well like what other toys and merch do i have around and the thing is so much of my merch

comes from movies and shows. So I was in this real like, what's the chicken and what's the egg like loop assessing my own life? Yeah. Then I thought, all right, let me just do a like a loop. Let me make a circuit around my place and see if inspiration strikes. And as I did that, I stopped to pet my cat Halo a lot because he's the fucking best. And then I noticed how many Funko Pops I have.

And I thought Funko Pops, maybe there's something here. Maybe we bring Lord and Miller in and tap in to that Lego energy where you're in universes that already exist, right? Like a Lego Batman movie, but you're doing it with Funko Pops or Legos. And wouldn't that be fun? Maybe it could be like a super like very,

violent, you know, R-rated, like hard R Funko Pop movie just for a twist. Or maybe it could be like buoyant and jubilant and light and fun. I don't know. But then I thought, is that too close to the Lego idea? Should I try something else? And I thought, what do I really like? Like, what did I always have around when I was young? What do I still have around now? And I thought, a Rubik's Cube. And then I Googled it and there's a fucking Rubik's Cube movie. I'm in, Joanna. Right.

So I mean, this is the year of like the Blackberry and Tetris and Beanie Baby movies. You know, yeah. Beanie Baby. That's a thing. Beanie Babies would have been another thing. I mean, my mother is currently on a run of sending me and my husband, Adam, an astonishing number of photos of things that

we have like left in their basement over the years. And she's like, I need this. This is tell me what to throw out. It's time. Like a whole giant box of Beanie Babies still there. But the Beanie Babies, it's not a new idea anymore. So here are the three things I settled on as my finalist. I'd like to know if any of them excite you.

And I did try to think about Zach's prompt about pairing with a director, though I'm not very good at that kind of a prompt. I feel like I'm a shark on Shark Tank and you're about, I get three pitches and I'm going to shark approve one of them. I've never watched Shark Tank, so I don't know what they do. They're like, one shark bite for me. That's what I'm going to do. That's exactly how it goes. Yeah. The shark bites. That's right. Is it true? No. Okay.

Okay. I should make, I should make reality TV. Okay, go ahead. You should. One. And listen, is it possible that some of these are also already in development? Maybe, maybe I did my best. Who's going to say an Etch-A-Sketch movie? What happens in it? I want this to be like a Tim Burton movie where the sketches come to life. Great.

And are they in danger of being like shaken and erased? They're constantly in a state of existential dread about whether they can hold on to a very, very fleeting existence. Movie of the summer 2025. I can see it. OK, what's next?

Light Bright, the movie. Turn on the magic of colored lights. We know. This one I feel like is a sure thing because we have seen the Light Bright featured centrally in a crucial stretch of Stranger Things. And it was fucking electric, folks. It was great. So I'd like to extend an invite to Guillermo del Toro to join us on our Light Bright adventure where we are using our Light Bright to communicate with people

an extraterrestrial being the light the light bright movie from guillermo del toro is thrilled is this also a hard art is this a horror movie it's got a horror element and that's why that's why like it's something that it's gonna help me grow it's gonna help me face my fears stretch you yeah yeah yeah yeah third and finally yeah the easy bake oven movie

from kelly freeman craig of are you there god it's me margaret and the edge of 17 this is a coming of age tale oh my god about those movies the power of self-discovery and exploration via light bulb microwave instant brownies and i think it would be fabulous great as the uh alpha shark here on

this episode of Shark Tank, I'm going to give one chomp of my pearly whites to Guillermo del Toro's Light Bright movie. That is the one that is getting the green light from this shark. Okay. I wasn't sure if the bite from the shark was an eliminating bite. No, no, no. That's an two fins up from this shark. Fabulous. Okay. Let's do it. Let's make it happen.

Here's my pitch. And I did pull something from the Mattel page. Okay. And it's sort of a redemption story for this character because this character was done kind of dirty in Toy Story 4, which is a doll known as Chatty Cathy. Okay. Who was created by Ruth Handler, who created Barbie. And this film is directed by Sarah Polly. And in this film... This is inspired.

Like a lot of tales that we love...

A character's what a lot of people can see as a character's main flaw, a.k.a. she will not shut the fuck up, will somehow be an asset that is needed to complete our quest or something like that. So everyone's gonna be like, Chatty, Kathy, she talks too much. Right. And then at the end of the day, her ability to speak volubly will help save the world somehow. And most importantly,

She's going to have to learn to pull her own string. Chatty Cathy from Sarah Polly. I have chills right now. This is like, Jo, when the House of Our Heads, the Horde, started posting five-star reviews with the headline Cackling Witches after you changed your Twitter header.

I love the Cackling Witch reviews. They're absolutely the best. This is remarkable. Well, that was fun. I think these movies should be made. I can't wait to podcast about these in a couple of years with you. I genuinely think the Chatty Cathy movie and the Late Bright movie could be masterpieces. Yeah, absolutely. Do you think we'll be thanked in the Oscar speeches? I know that Sarah will thank me. I know that. Guillermo, I'm not sure he's a wild card, but Sarah is very thoughtful. Yeah.

She almost thanked me in her Oscar speech last year. So, you know, fantastic. I love it. Okay. This year. What is time? Anyway. Yeah, that was really fun. Great one. By the way, I'm sorry. The joke is the joke is that Sarah Polly won her Oscar for a film called Women Talking. So Chetty Cathy is her follow up. Obviously, I should have. I should have said the joke out loud. Anyway, there you go.

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Our next question.

This is a great one. These are just great today. They're always great. This is from Emily. Been loving the content recently. Thanks, Emily. Thanks, Em. And I'm super excited for the rest of the year. My question for you guys, as you move your way through the David Tennant era of Doctor Who, is this. Which Tennant era is your favorite? What is it about him that's so damn appealing to us all? I'm personally a fan of his work on Good Omens.

as crowley he's such a delight to watch on screen and the way he interprets the character is absolute perfection side note a house of our episode on the new season of good omens would be a welcome surprise i already ruined the surprise i suppose um surprise we're doing it um uh so great question i it's hard for me to pick something outside of his

Era as the doctor, because that was just like my introduction to him. It's so indelible to me. I've rewatched those episodes so many times. He's done a number of projects since that I have been interested in. But I actually think like...

that's his performance that I like the most. I think when I most fell in, like even further in love with David Tennant actually happened during the pandemic when he and his good omens co-star, Michael Sheen started their pandemic project, which is called staged, which has three seasons. The third season, uh, came out November of last year. Um, Mallory knows a bit about, I don't know if she's watching any of it, but she knows a bit about it because I send her basically every single tick tock from that show gets sent directly to Mallory Rubin via decks. Um,

And it's so charming because Michael Sheen and David Tennant, if you haven't seen staged, they're playing fictionalized versions of themselves. And it's, it's that perfect, like playing like really petty, terrible versions of themselves. And, but as like,

friends who love each other and their real wives get involved and like all the stuff that, you know, you get like guest appearances from like Phoebe Waller-Bridge and Cate Blanchett, blah, blah, blah. And like the first couple seasons are almost entirely like Zoom. And there was almost no Zoom based content that was good out of the pandemic. This is like the only one. So yeah, so 10. And also if you love 10 and you haven't

There's like a few extra things that you can watch to further deepen your love of 10. And one is the Catherine Tate, David Tennant, red nose day sketch that they did where Catherine Tate played one of her main characters that you played on her sketch show. And he plays a substitute teacher. That is a really fun to watch. And then if you're just like really in your feelings about David Tennant, they gave him a lifetime achievement award, the British television awards, which I'm getting. I don't think it was BAFTA. It's like some other British television award. And, um,

What they do at that award show, which I love, is that it's a surprise every year. So the person doesn't know that they're winning. So he's sitting in the audience and like his lovely wife who played his daughter once is sitting next to him. And then the clip reel starts playing.

And then like, so the camera's on him as he realizes that this award is for him and his dad is on it. And like Catherine Tate and Olivia Coleman and like all his co-stars are involved. And he is just like overwhelmed with like shock and emotion that he got to like win this prize. That's a comfort watch for me. So that wasn't a great answer, but it is my answer. Mallory Rubin, what do you want to say about this? And does it have to do with murder in a small town? Yeah, I have three answers.

David Tennant eras that are in the mix. I do think that now my answer is his time as 10, which I would have previously that 2005 for, you know, 2005 to 2010, but 2005 in particular would have referred to as the Barney Crouch Jr. era. But here I am now aware of his time as 10. How rich is my life? This is just a wonderful thing. I, the time that I remember thinking like,

this is a person I could maybe never get tired of watching on my television was 2015, which is Jessica Jones, where he played Kilgrave. And I really liked the first season of that show. He plays a terrifying, deeply disturbing character in that show, but it's a wonderful and haunting performance.

That's also the middle of the Broadchurch stretch, and it's right on the heels of Grace Point, which was 2014, which is the US, the American adaptation of Broadchurch. So he was very present in my life as a detective in a small town, brooding, and as a terrifying mind controller. Yeah. Yeah.

It looks great in purple. Yeah, it looks great in purple. One of my one of my holy colors because of the Ravens, as you know. And then, yeah, the Good Omens, the Good Omens time that 2019 range, because I thought I also like you love the book. I was so excited for the show.

There are some things in the first season that I was less high on, but there's not a single. And I mean, this is really second of him on screen as Crowley that like wiggling his hips as he saunters in that is not sheer perfection and bliss. I need David Tennant in his Crowley jeans and boots and Timmy Oliphant and his railing jeans and boots to have like a walk off because it's.

astounding it's quite similar yet different justified and revisiting good omen season one at the same time yeah last week it was almost like jarring to see the you want to do some like tail of the tape split screen the hip wiggle waggle comparisons it's just great two of the great ones joe

I'm really excited to talk about Good Omens Season 2. You and I agree that, like, Crowley and Aziraphale are... Or, you didn't say Aziraphale, but I assume. Crowley and Aziraphale are, like, what really works about Season 1. Tannen and Sheen together are just heaven. Heaven! I have seen four of six episodes of Season 2. I have not seen a second of Season 2 yet. Which, it's not a spoiler to say because this is just, like...

We're not adapting the book anymore. And all they've done is just like lean in. It's just the continuing adventures of Carly to Zerophil, which is the part that everyone liked from season one anyway. So, you know, that's what we will be talking about next week. Another who, who question. And this is a hybrid question from Cass and Shannon, who had sort of similar questions for smushing together. My question for the mailbag is if you woke up tomorrow as the doctor, where would you go in time and space?

What fictional character from any fictional universe would you take with you as your companion? What's your cashphrase, your outfit, and what big villain do you face? Oh boy. What a great question. Okay. Where would I go in time and space? How do you want to do this? Should we take each, should we run through our full list or should we take each category and share our pick? Okay. Yeah. Where we'd go in time and space. We'll start with that. Here's my honest answer.

Like if I'm being truthful, this was the first thing I thought of. And I think a lot of people are going to hear this and say, you're picking something in the city you're from and the place you grew up, like dream a little bigger. But I think I'm so swept up right now in Orioles magic that this was honestly what I thought of. It was kind of like a two, a two parter that were tied in my mind and which way I would ultimately lean, I think would say something about me. The first thought was the final game.

Of the 1982 regular season at Memorial Stadium, known to be great Oriole manager Earl Weaver's final game. He ended up coming back a couple seasons later, but he was retiring.

they needed to sweep Milwaukee Joe in a four game series to make the post. I remember. Yeah, of course. You know this. Yeah. They won the first three games. So we're heading into the final game and that's where I'd want to be. Now you might be thinking to yourself, wow, you'd want to go to the game where they won and they made the playoffs. And then I assume you Mallory are going to tell me they won the world series. No, that's not what happened. They got their fucking asses kicked in that game. Why then am I picking it?

There's a famous, you can Google this, there's a famous Howard Cosell, legendary sports broadcaster, call of what happened. It's worth listening to and hearing. They lost, and every single, I'm getting chills thinking about this and I'm about to cry, every single person in the stadium stayed and clapped and cheered as Earl walked around and wept and

And they didn't win. Like, they lost. And when I think about the team and, like, fandom, my dad used to tell me about that moment all the time when I was growing up. And it just seems like it would be really special to watch the Cosell call his mom

They have stayed to cheer. The fans have stayed. They have stayed to cheer. Just like beautiful. My other thought was 1966 when they won their first World Series as the Baltimore Orioles, sweeping the supremely favored Los Angeles Dodgers. But I am leaning toward 82. And then I thought, okay,

is that weird to pick just a Baltimore thing? And I was like, if I was going to do something more in deeper in history or a little more, maybe like romantic or romantic in a different way than that. Well, what I pick. And honestly, my answer to me was already featured in Dr. Who would go to Shakespeare's Globe Theater. I would. And I think my first, my first like gut pick would probably be that I'd want to see Hamlet. But what I decided is I would see, I would want to see Julius Caesar and then I would double dip and go to Caesar's

Rome. Oh, I love this. A double Caesar feature. Caesar, Caesar. Exactly. That's what you're saying. Exactly. Pizza, pizza. Okay. I love this. I love this. By the way, if you guys enjoyed Mallory's impassioned Orioles moment that she just had right then, which I did, I loved it. You might want to check out ESPN Daily today to hear Mallory talk about the Orioles. Are you a big ESPN Daily listener? Daily. Never miss it. Oh, boy.

um all right spoiler alert I'm not gonna cry when I talk about mine and I I really wish I had gone more emotional to match your energy um I've mostly uh put the filmography of Woody Allen to the side for personal reasons but there is one film that I have not been able to fully let go of and it's called Midnight in Paris um

in which our protagonist Owen Wilson is transported back in time to 1920s Paris to meet the lost generation of writers and artists and creators. So he meets like Salvador Dali and Scott Fitzgerald and Ernest Hemingway, blah, blah, blah, that I'm doing. I'm doing a midnight in Paris. That's what I want to do. I want to go to 1920s Paris and meet all of those creatives, those brilliant, brilliant people, Louise Bunuel, like all these people. Um,

Yeah. So that's it. That's the short and sweet version of what I'm doing. Absolutely great pick. Is it weird that neither of us said, like, I would like to go to another planet? I know. Because, like, we have that option. It's like either you're doing a history episode or you're doing it, like, somewhere in space. And we're like, meh, aliens. I feel like if I went to space, I would just, I would not handle it well.

I worry that if I went to Shakespeare's Globe, I would not handle the aromas very well. Do you think the doctor has like a special thing that like prevents the hygiene of a certain era? Yeah, just like you hear everybody speaking English. Everybody smells great. Universal translator, universal aroma therapy. Yeah, you're not just constantly smelling like rancid BO and rotting teeth. Yeah, lemongrass and ylang-ylang or whatever. Okay, great.

Love that for us. Okay, the next prompt inside of this question was fictional character that you'd take with you as your companion. I'm so excited about my answer. I don't think we have the same answer. I went with a real meatball down the middle obvious one. Who did you pick? Hurley from Lost. Oh, great one. Great one! No one else I would rather have an adventure with than Hurley. I love that! Yeah. Fantastic. When I landed on that one, I was like, that's the one. That's the one. Dynamite. What'd you get?

I picked Obi-Wan. And I want to be clear, this would be one of the versions of Doctor Who where the Doctor and the companion are in love. Yeah, I was going to say, you just like... You know, there's that great parody song, Why Isn't There More Fucking on this Island about Lost. You're like, why isn't there more fucking in this TARDIS? This is Doctor Who after dark. Great. Love it. Sex all the time. Love it. Catchphrase. Okay. So...

what's funny again i am going to talk about strange new worlds a bit more in a second but like every captain on the enterprise has a you know catchphrase like picard would say engage blah blah captain pike on stage two world says hit it it just sounds like it actually sounds kind of weird to me um so i'm like this is very important like because you can go kind of wrong with a

inspired by the doctor. I would say this is a thing that my sister and I do anyway already. So I was like, well, why, why stray from it? The doctor says, my sister says, has just said that since she took French in, in like middle school or whatever, which is means the same thing as LZ. It's just like a little less like,

commanding it's not like let's go it's like let's go so that's what my sister says oniva i say andiamo because i took italian so i would just say i would say andiamo like you know he says no but i'm not great at italian but i can't say let's go in italian you know um yeah so if if uh you know if i'm trapped on a shuttle on a planet called midnight you shall know me by me saying andiamo mallory what's your catchphrase beautiful

I'm just going to go with the one I actually say all the time, which is protect ghost, but I'm going to update it for whatever the mission is. Right. So protect blank, like any time we're heading in, maybe it'll be my companion's name. Maybe it'll be the place we're heading. Something. It's like a flexible. It's there's constancy, but it's flexible. It's nimble. It can like adapt in the moment. That's right. That's what I want. That'd be catchphrase. I think. Yeah. Yeah. This is a big one. Outfit.

Yeah. Okay. So doctor's looks are often very coat centric. This is like a key aspect of, of the doctor look. Um,

So I'm going to pick a coat from a show that I actually only watched the first season of, but it is this iconic red leather coat that I just think is so incredible. The show is Into the Badlands, this sort of like martial arts fantasy show from AMC that I watched. I watched the first season, I fell off, but the coat has stayed in my mind. So if you Google image search, red leather coat, Into the Badlands, it's just an incredible, incredible thing. Great pick. I love that. Fantastic. It's up there with...

The Jamie Lannister season five. Oh, no. And oh, my God. Actually, what I should have picked is the Jamie Lannister season one. The King the Kingslayer, the like duel with with Ned in the streets. The white leather. Yeah, I personally could absolutely never pull off that color. It would just like I was wearing a jacket made of my own skin. But you could rock it. No, I don't. I think I think that's a great, great note. OK, Mallory, what is your doctor who fit?

My Doctor Who fit is basically the just standard wardrobe. The outfit I wear every day because I think that's really what I want out of my experience as the Doctor is, though I would rather be the companion than the Doctor, I think, is to capture some sort of essence, right? And so like the fancy coat that exudes authority and expertise is

I don't know. I don't really rock a lot of those. So I have I will say I have gotten into some some outerwear and some jackets recently. I've really been on a on a chore coat and shacket kick. So maybe I would change my mind about this. But when I was like, what would I really want to wear if I had to wear the same thing every day all the time, no matter where I was past future different planet?

Ringer hoodie. That's my outerwear. I love that. I'm going with a green ringer hoodie. I can unzip it. I can zip it up. I can roll up the sleeves. I can put on my hood. It's comfortable. It's practical. Underneath, I would have a black Ravens t-shirt. I was going to pick a Lamar jersey, but I don't think that would be like the most comfortable thing. And I am really... Comfort is paramount to me as the doctor and also as just...

this regular person right now sitting here talking about this pants i was thinking jeans because usually i wear just jeans and t-shirt every day but i'm going with a jogger really leaning into the casual vibe okay here's how here's what i love about you you're like in my fantasy

I wear my comfy Jim Jam PJs indoor wear. And nonetheless, I am fucking Obi-Wan Kenobi in the TARDIS. And I love that for you. That is, just to be clear, quite literally the dream. I genuinely love that for you. And then shattered backboard Air Jordan ones, which are Oreo colors. So I'm getting the various passions in there and comfortable always. What's next on the doctor list? Who is your villain?

Okay, I'm just going to say two words. It won't mean anything to you yet. I picked a Doctor Who villain that you have not met yet. I'm just going to say the words and then we'll talk about it later. The silence. Spooky. What are you picking? I have selected as my villain, my foe, my foil when I am the Doctor, a time loop trapped villain.

Benny off who can only say Danny kind of forgot about the iron fleet. That's the nightmare folks. What are the worst things that anyone has ever said in their life? The horror that I would have to confront. I love this for you. This is so you a gym jammed Mallory getting to fuck Obi-Wan and the TARDIS and

Getting to go to the globe to see Shakespeare and defeating Benioff at his lowest moment in time. Yeah, some Oriole shoes and a ringer hoodie. Ideal. Iconic. All right. Speaking of fashion icons. Yes. We got this email from... I read the last one. I read the last one. You read this one. Okay. Speaking of fashion icons. We have a...

A mailbag question next that is not necessarily ringerverse core, but is Joe and Mal core. This is something that we've chatted about before on our sister pod, the prestige TV podcast. This question comes from Alex, long time listener, first time emailer.

I know that Mallory at least loves Miss Maisel, Midge for fans. And I want to know what you both thought of the series finale season. For what it's worth, I thought it was a very good send off for the characters and wrapped up the storylines well, even if we did not get enough time with Lenny Bruce. You can say that again, Alex.

While some of the old age makeup was better than others, do either of you have a favorite or least favorite flash forward scene? I love the framing device of the roast episode. Do you have a favorite set or outfit from season five? Did you cry as I did during Midge's big break on the Gordon Ford show? Joe, you can take any of those prompts, all of them. General thoughts on the final season of Maisel anywhere you want to go with it.

As Mallory and I were individually and together struggling with the lack of Lenny Bruce in the final season of Mrs. Maisel, and it was a real torment. Frankly, a torment. A real tough moment for us. What I did have to appreciate is that the show is getting back to its core, which is the relationships between Miriam and Susie. This is the core relationship, and the show really wanted to make sure that we...

remembered that. I thought some of the like conceits of the time jumping around were interesting. And I think this idea of like a great rift between the two of them and like coming back together, I thought spoilers for the final season of Maisel, I guess the roast didn't fully work for me though. I just thought that Alex Bornstein as Susie throughout the season was just astonishing. I thought she was fantastic. And the end of that episode really got me. And then I will say their final episode,

like the last scene where they're, you know, watching TV together and they've like planned, they've synced up their watch together and stuff like that. And we get to see Susie's incredible, like aspirational, like Morocco menagerie, like retreat that she has built for herself. I love that. Like two old friends who've been through a lot together, been through a big like fight together and come out the other side. That meant a lot to me. And I think their VCR is beautiful. Beautiful. I think the fine,

Midge and Lenny scene was also incredibly beautiful. Like they knew what we wanted. They gave us a taste of it and they were like, this isn't the show, but you've decided it's the show. So we'll give you a little bit of it. But really, we think the show is Midge and Susie. I don't wholly disagree. So yeah, I think it was just timing is the reason we didn't cover the final season. It's not like we were out on it and hated it or something. There was just like a ton of stuff going on at the time. But

Yeah, people have been asking for a while what our Maisel feelings were, so I'm glad we have the opportunity. Mallory, what are your final season Maisel feelings? Needed more Lenny. No, I enjoyed the final season. I'm sad that the show's over. You know, it was one of those things where it felt like the right time to end it, but I'll miss it. It's been really a thing that I've loved for a handful of years now. I...

perhaps controversially, perhaps not, I'm not really sure, really did not like the flash forwards and wish they had not done them. I would have much preferred to leave the show with the feeling that you have when you close the cover of a book that you spent a lot of time thinking about and love. And you're like, part of the thrill of it is getting to wonder forever what happened to those characters. Like, I wish we had more open spaces in our minds to like fill in and wonder about

If we were going to see the future, my dearest wish, this will surprise no one who's heard us discuss Maisel before, would have been for Joel to die. I was devastated that Joel's...

Joel to be transformed into like the love of her life. Well, Susie's really the love of her life, but like, yeah, not here for that at all. That said, I really enjoyed everything in the, in the, that the contemporary, in the contemporary storyline, particularly like midges breakthrough and everything at the Gordon Ford show and everything with the family and the, the,

The time that we got with Abe and the grandkids and like confronting how genius surfaces in their family. I would have loved even more of that. That was all very special. Favorite outfit for me. I think we're probably supposed to pick a midge fit here, but perhaps on brand, I'm instead picking a piece of menswear. I am going with the

Frankly, transcendent light blue with like taupe stripes open cardigan that Gordon Ford wore while propped on the edge of the desk talking to Midge. Fantastic. I mean, we have to say that like the Gordon Ford show stuff I thought was really well done and really interesting. Yeah. Everything in that the present day of the story was wonderful. The flash forwards I could have done without, but.

Maisel, what is it? I will go with, again, I really think that old Susie is aspirational for me. And so she's wearing this very Moroccan sort of tunic robe thing with gold clogs. Yeah.

I think it's phenomenal, honestly. I think it's fantastic. I want to say that I think I'm maybe only like two or three years away from having the same hair as Susie had in that scene. Do you have curly? Your hair isn't curly. No, but it's like I'm going gray so fast and the gray hairs have just, they're moving in a different way. They do. They have their own texture. So I wonder if some waves are going to come out here as I continue to rapidly go gray here in my thirties. Yeah.

All right. Sarah, Sarah, Sarah, uh, Mitch, we'll miss you. We will. We had a great time. We had a time and Lenny Bruce, at least they didn't like make us watch like Lenny Bruce die or anything like that. Do you know what I mean? Like I thought, I thought the, like the way they handled that was really well. Okay. It was so sad. Yeah. Sarah wrote in to ask, um,

As we are headed into a year where shows will be impacted by important and ongoing strikes, I'd love y'all's opinions on some older series to watch. In my 20s, I was too young to watch Lost, The Wire, Sopranos, Buffy, and similar popular shows while they aired. I get decision fatigue. She said, I'm in my 20s, blah, blah, blah. I get decision fatigue and also worry about how the series will hold up to new eyes in 2023. Would y'all consider doing a classic series recommendation that corresponds with a more recent house of our show? For example...

If Yellow Jackets was your favorite 2023 show, you would love Lost. So, Molly Rubin, what do you got? The idea of Lost is like a really old show. I know. Makes you feel like Susie already. This hit me hard. Yeah. So...

I was thinking about it like shows from like around that time, early 2000s, you know, stuff that's very much maybe like in the public consciousness for people who would be asking these questions, but maybe hadn't seen them. I mean, my top two picks are unsurprisingly going to be the top two that I always say, but I'll reiterate them here. Lost, which was in the prompt. If you haven't watched Lost, which ran from 2004 to 2010, it was one of the most important shows in the history of the world.

don't be daunted by the episode total. It's part of the, the, the pleasure of it. And don't be daunted by anybody who tells you that it didn't finish strong. Cause it's fantastic. And they didn't understand. Wonderful. And you should watch it. Yeah. And then of course I have to throw out one of my all time, my other all time favorite shows, Battlestar, Battlestar Galactica, 2004 to 2009. If you missed BSG at the time, I can't,

Cannot recommend it highly enough. It is one of my favorite shows ever. It moves with this real propulsive force. So many indelible characters, some really great, like classic quintessential sci-fi ideas that we talk about on the pod a lot. That's always, always worth recommending and checking out. Firefly 2002. I mean, Firefly is a fantastic show. I don't know if it's on your list or if you have some other favorites.

Steph from incredibly complicated and fraught figure Joss Whedon coming on your list, perhaps. But Firefly is on mine. No crossover yet, actually. Surprisingly. This might be our first crossover. We talk about this a lot as well.

If you have not enjoyed Avatar The Last Airbender, 2005 to 2008, and then the ensuing Legend of Korra, which maybe isn't as eligible because it's more recent. That started in 2012. But watch Avatar, which is genuinely one of the most remarkable things that has ever come into the world. Treat yourself to it.

Spent some time with Momo, my guy, the best. And then I went deeper into the vault for one, in case people want stuff from a little bit further back. I recommend people check out The Prisoner. Now, there was the 2009 remake, but go to the 67, the original. If you want a genre mindfuck, I will say literally nothing about it. You should go in knowing as little about it as you can. But if you're interested in...

black mirror or twilight zone or like high concept mystery sci-fi uh check out the prisoner which is fantastic and deeply distressing um i'm i'm shocked and amazed we only have one overlap so here's this is this is like one of my favorite prompts of all time i love this okay so for the ringer listeners like a ringer audience

not the ringer verse, but the ringer audience to iconic things that you should definitely watch Friday night lights. Obviously, if you have not watched Friday night lights, let me just say that if I had done a broad ringer one and not ringer verse, that would have been, then we would have had more. Oh yeah. Cause that would be on my list too. Absolutely. I know. I'm sure there are plenty of shows on here as all of your shows are fantastic. Um,

And all of my shows are fantastic. So we're fantastic together. I have three categories. This is the ringer sports category. Number one, Friday Night Lights. Number two, Sports Night. Both incredible, incredible shows that even I, a sports illiterate person...

Who only knows who only understood the words Howard Cassell in the in the speech that Mallory gave earlier. Love those for overall TV literacy. Maybe that would be my catchphrase is the doctor. Clear eyes, full hearts can't lose. Yeah. Well, I was just saying when you said Avatar, I was like, should my mind be yip yip? Hell yeah. Yep. Yep. For overall TV literacy.

I will say, and this is recency bias, but I will say Justified. Watch Justified. It's just a phenomenal show. I have a bunch of people I know just like recently watched it for the first time. They all loved it. I understand why on the outside Justified seems like it might not be a show for you, literally anyone who's listening. And I'm just here to tell you that it's not what you think it is, especially as you get into season two and on. So Justified,

top tier shows. If you like Cobb Vanth, please do yourself a solid watch Justified. And then the other one that I have in the sort of the TV literary category is Freaks and Geeks, which like if you love Stranger Things, like Stranger Things take the genre out, but that exploration of like

geeky 80s kids and whatever freaks and geeks which is just like chock full of the future stars of tomorrow it's just like an incredible show only one season so like an easy watch and just like one of my favorite shows of all time and then last but not least in the ringer verse umbrella

I will put Over the Garden Wall, which is like a very special animated, short animated series with the voice talents of Elijah Wood. It's like one of the most beautiful...

magical. I watch it every fall. It's very short. It's like a bunch of little, like I think 15 minute, 10, like something like that. Little animated episodes. It's got beautiful music. It's like a Lord of the Rings ask fantastical adventure, not just because Elijah would is involved, but it's just sort of like people tromping through the woods. And Melanie Linsky is a voice. She voices this bird. And like, it's just an incredible voice cast, incredible, magical show.

If you like Loki or Doctor Who, may I suggest Quantum Leap? Quantum Leap, one of my Alzheimer's shows as a kid. I love that show. Dr. Sam Beckett is leaping through time, hoping each time the next leap will be his leap home. And if you... In the ringer verse...

but also in the like TV literacy umbrella, I would put Twin Peaks, Twin Peaks, which is like pretty spooky, but also just, and very, very weird, but also just like incredibly, incredibly influential on Lost and a number of other shows. Like if that like sort of weird, surreal aspect of those various genre shows appeal to you, you know, or if some parts of Yellow Jackets this season appeal to you, that all comes back to Twin Peaks. And last but not least, and I pretty,

be sure that Mallory will give me a hearty enthusiastic thumbs up on this one.

Pushing Daisies. The pie maker? Yeah, the pie maker. I mean, I don't know how you handle it, given the volume of warm fruit, but I fucking love that show. You know, a light genre mystery of the week kind of show with like candy colored sort of poppy aesthetic. Lee Pace at peak swoony attractiveness. Just great Christian Chenoweth style.

stuff Anna Friel is there great great show so like those are all completely solid and all of those are available to sort of stream on a service so there you go fantastic last one here yeah for our rapid fire lightning round conclusion Brad wants to know what our most favorite viewing moment what our most favorite viewing moment this year television or movies what has it been

I have three words written down in front of me. It's one thing. Three words. They're going to be the same as mine. I bet. Do you want to say it together? One, two, three. Long, long time. This was easy. I was like, oh my God, when I first saw the question, how will I figure it out? And I was like, actually, this is...

So easy. The easiest thing I've ever done. Yeah. Watching episode three of The Last of Us and then getting to talk about it and share it with you. Yeah, exactly. Absolutely wonderful. Obviously, every moment that we spent talking about Grogu creating the most important content in the history of television is the runner up. But yeah, long, long time. Long time. Do you ever watch The Last of Us? It's how we show our love. Oh, quick ones. Rapid fire. Oh, quick ones. All right. This first one's for you. And

It comes from. I know. I put his full name because it could not. I could not shorten it. I had to include the full name. Willoughby Dobbs, the fourth. Amazing. Amazing. Sensational.

What are your thoughts on Star Trek Picard season three and Strange New World season two? I was really emotionally affected the way Picard wrapped up. I think it balanced nostalgia with the next generation folks and looking forward with Seven and the Titan really well. And I'm looking forward to Captain Seven Helm show if it happens. I love what Strange New World has been doing with episodic television with serialized characters.

arcs. Number one's trial episode felt like classic Trek, but with modern sensibilities, the lower decks crossover episode was so special and amazing. Joe time for some ice. So ball hit us really quickly. I will just say this really quickly because Ben and I are going to be doing like a full strangely worlds season to wrap up episode on the feed when the season ends.

But catching, I was a little behind. This week I caught up with all of season two and watched, I watched a little ahead because there's a musical episode and I had to watch. I had to watch the musical episode. Stunning, stunning, like amazing. Stunning, but. Maybe that should be the catchphrase. Yeah. Maybe I'll just say like a Negroni Spagliato and you'll just be like stunning. As your companion, I'll say stunning. Stunning. Yeah.

watching this season one of Stranger Worlds is very special season two is like on a whole new level it is doing that quasi lost thing where there's sort of like character centric episodes so instead of

old episodes of old seasons of track where you would have captain's log and you would hear the captain narrating every episode this one we get like ensign's log doctor's log like you get to hear the character like and so you're like oh it's gonna be a an ahura episode or a manga episode or whatever um the it is so unafraid to hop around genres and tones so the lower decks crossover which is a crossover to be clear between an animated show and a live action show was so

well done. And it is followed by next week is like a, like heavy war episode. And then the musical episode and what it reminded me of. And it's like fearlessness of tone and genre and playfulness is the magicians when the magicians was really good, a show I love. So it's like, it's like Star Trek, the original series,

made passionate love to the good seasons of the magicians. And that's what we were getting with strange new world, which is, I just think is a phenomenal, phenomenal show. Even if you've never watched a second of Trek, you don't have to have to enjoy strange new worlds, two seasons. It's in the tail end of its second season. Really recommend it. Ashley W has a question for us about tropes. Can I ask this of you, Mallory? Sure.

Please. The question I have is about your Tropes course episodes that y'all have done. I've loved both of them so far. I was wondering if you have or would you ever consider an episode all about the power of prophecy in a story? Three of the biggest genre stories y'all have talked about over the years. All the prophecies in them that are as iconic as the characters. Star Wars, Harry Potter's Game of Thrones.

I could listen to y'all talk for hours on your thoughts about how the heroes fight against the prophecy or let the prophecy engulf their entire being. Mallory Rubin, have we talked about a prophecy troops course? We sure have. We will. I think what we feel comfortable saying is that we will absolutely definitely do this at some point. The question is simply when and if we're being honest, how many how many episodes? Yeah. Yeah. Because it's going to be difficult to contain this discussion. So it will be interesting.

one of the treats of our life. We are the prophecy tropes course. We are so excited to do this, but yes, we don't, we don't know exactly when and it will be mega. Yes. Do you want to hit another, a couple rapid fires here, Joe? I have one for you. It's from, we got this from a couple people. Tatum asked this. You'll have asked this Joanna Robinson, bestselling author. Hmm.

Is the book tour happening? Hi, my name is Rona Robinson and I wrote a book and it's coming out in October of this year, October 10th. And we will be doing nothing is like set in stone. Well, a few things are, but like nothing is like really, really set in stone, stone, stone. But I would say the plan right now, the loose plan is that I will be in New York the beginning of October, right around New York Comic Con. I will be I should be in L.A. at the end of the month.

I'll probably be in the Bay Area the week of release. That's the second week of October. And there are plans in November to go to Austin for the Texas Book Festival. Amsterdam and London are the current plan. We'll see what else happens. Do I have dates and times for you? No, but I promise I have...

gross i have a website jerrywrote this.com uh on that website eventually there will be some sort of like book tour page where you can see sort of like where i will be and what i will be doing so how weird weird a book tour you're the best just like you you're the best the book is the best the book tour is going to be the best you deserve every fucking second of this thanks pal

Can I close out with a really rapid fire book rec section? Yeah. Book recs. What have you been reading lately? Yeah. So I mentioned three books. This came from Grady, but I mentioned three books on a recent episode. And I've been like overjoyed to see that a bunch of people have been like reading them. A bunch of people are reading Trust in the Emerald Sea. Great. I love to help struggling author Brandon Sanderson, who definitely doesn't have a ton of people reading his books. Yeah.

One that I forgot to mention that I want to mention is The Adventures of Aminah Al-Sarafi, which is a book that I love that I didn't mention by Shannon Chakraborty. And it is about a pirate queen on the Indian Ocean. It's sort of like Ocean's Eleven meets Pirate Adventures where she is like off of one last job and has to assemble her old crew. And it is like,

witty witty banter fun adventure not as much maybe see going as you would expect in a pirate sort of adventure novel but it's wonderful a wonderful book and then I'm right in the middle of right now

a book called justice of Kings, which is the first book in the empire of the wolf series. The new one came out this year. That was the, I'm reading the first one right now by Richard Swan. I think it is, or shy. I can't read my own handwriting. It's either Swan or shy. So apologize. But I should know this, but anyway, it's like, it's like,

You remember in season one or in book or in the first book of a song of my supplier gave throws, uh, when Ned is like detective Ned, uh, and King's landing. This is a lot like this where it's like, it's like, it's a high fantasy sort of Thrones esque universe. Our main character is a sort of Sherlock Holmes. He's a justice Sherlock Holmes. He and like figure is a big sort of detective story. And the narrator is his Watson. Who's like this young woman. So like, it's,

It's like any sort of big fantasy world. It takes a moment to get into because you're like, what are these words about their various power sets? And what are these locations? You know, like that barrier of entry of a dense fantasy world. So it has that. But once you get going, it's like a rip-roaring sort of detective story that I really, really enjoyed. Last but not least, I just bought this today based on one of our listeners' recommendations.

It's called A Thousand Steps into Night by Tracy Chee, and I haven't read it yet, but I just ordered it from my local bookstore, Walden Books. Support your local. And I'm really excited to read it. So that is book recommendations. And that is our mailbag episode. Mallory, what a joy. Love a mailbag. Just a blast, as always. Love the Raven cause. Love the Horde. Love you. Love you. What a time. You never give up the fight.

As they say in the Secret Invasion finale. Thanks for bringing it back to the reason we're here today.

That is a wrap on today's mailbag. Thank you to Isaiah Blakely for once again joining us here on the House of R, our producer for today's episode. Thank you to Arjuna Ramgopal for his additional production on today's episode and Jomi Adeneron for his work on the social for this episode. Remember to head back into the ringerverse over the weekend for Jessica's Easter egg breakdown of the Secret Invasion finale. Pop back to the feed next week for The Witcher season three, part

Part two from Mint Edition. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles from the Midnight Boys. Pew, pew, pew, pew. Good Omens, the Omensverse, and the Tropes course from yours truly, from the House of R at the end of next week on Friday. Until then, good news from Saber. The Kree said they're open to peace talks.

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