The Shards, Hit Point, and Alley Cats

28:18Who do you guess? I think Boyd with Shades of James. I think it's Boyd it's Steph it's Kay it's Terry it's James all all of the above because I do I think I'm probably more aligned with Boyd because I tend to like a lot of things a lot of things I don't think there's one particular thing I'm not a massive fan of foundation so that really takes me out of that really but I do like a lot of the stuff that James does like as well so So that's a bit of a weird one. But what I've been watching, and obviously, yeah, you say obviously my name quite a bit during the... Do you have PTSD? I do, because I get a few of them.

29:03So there's... Darren, what a ledge. There's that one. Where's the other one? I've got another one here. Darren, you've lifted my spirits. Thank you, Darren. I needed that. What? I'd wonder what was being offered, but yes. there's plenty obviously uh wait for the blooper reel at the end of the year for more fun and laughter not that real um but what i've been watching i'll tell you what i caught yesterday and i it dropped on the sky and it's on sky atlantic and i watched the first two episodes last night i don't know if you reviewed it i can't remember if you reviewed it or not it's called station 11 um i think we reviewed it way back in the day yeah because this is quite an old show.

29:49Is it? Yeah, it was originally on, I think it was on Fox, which doesn't exist anymore. Fox was a channel, you know, back in the day. Yeah, yeah. I'm talking about exhibits in the 50s, but it was probably like 10 years ago or five to 10 years ago. And I'm pretty sure Station, that's off the top of my head, but Station 11, yeah, it was a big deal. But I think this is the first time it's been available to general viewers via Sky. Ah, that's interesting. Yeah, because I don't, and it's got Tam from EastEnders in it. Him is critical. yeah tamwa um so i watched that and i thought that was quite good yeah that was quite good first couple of episodes i'm in uh it's all about like a flu pandemic uh which you know can be slightly triggering uh but it was it was it was pretty good i really enjoyed that um i do have to talk about ride or die oh yes because yes oh no this is another one this is another just to remind my listeners that Steph insisted that only women get ride or die and men.

30:46So have you fallen into the trap down of being a man and not liking it? No. So I did like it. I binged all of it. I was on holiday last week and I binged a lot when I was in my camera with the wife. And we both enjoyed it. I love the story. I thought the acting's a little bit wooden all the way through. And just from sort of like, it was almost, it was very, my wife said, it was very much drama school acting. Get in the bin, Darren. Get in the actual bin. I like that. Daring, daring attack on Hannah Waddingham. Oh, Mrs. Darren, who needs to get in the bin? My thing about it was, Kay, right, is that I didn't think that Boyd could appreciate the intricacies of female friendships later on in life.

31:32That's what I thought. Do you know what I mean? because it's Octavia Spencer and Hannah Waddingham. And I felt strongly that the reason he didn't enjoy it was that. Steph claimed that all of the people who've been negative about the show are men and all the people who've been positive about the show are women. You may feel I'm simplifying this, but she absolutely insisted on that. And in fact, I've forgotten that I listened to the Jonathan and Honey Ross podcast and they reviewed it on that. And Honey Ross, Jonathan's daughter, didn't like it either. Anyway, Darren, back to Darren. Yeah, it was my wife that didn't like the acting.

32:01I actually quite enjoyed the whole show. And I think that the best bit was Octavia Spencer and Hannah Waddingham. And I like the story. I'm intrigued to see. They dropped all the episodes at once. I love that when they do that because I want to watch it when I want to watch it. This dropping stuff weekly, Apple, no. No, you want to do it on your time. Yeah, exactly. You're going to have to wait for Ted, I'm afraid. Do not dictate to me when I can watch a TV series because that's why I have to wait for things now. The other thing I was going to watch is The Pit. And I remember Boyd saying only an episode or so ago, which might have been Monday, that it's the sort of show that you have to binge.

32:45You can't just watch The Pit one a week. Impossible. I've done 15 episodes in over two and a half nights because it's just, you cannot stop watching this stuff. It's so, so good. So I'm fully in with the pit. But the final thing I wanted to bring up, Little House on the Prairie. Did you like that? Yes, Darren. I was a massive fan of Little House on the Prairie growing up. The OG. Yeah, the OG. I love the music. There's one problem with it, which is they missed an open goal of just having her run down a hill. Going at the end. and I just thought everybody would have thought oh this is fantastic yeah it is like Fisher Price my first Yellowstone great description but I I really liked it thank you Darren yes as did I no I quite liked it didn't we generally quite like it I think James didn't like it maybe someone didn't like it I accidentally watched every single episode that's right because it was a lovely watch yeah Jack the Dog stole the show I think from me Was it Jack the dog?

34:00The dog was great. The dog jeopardy was a real pull for me. Plus it's got Sawyer from Lost, isn't it? Looking completely different with black hair now, not like his lovely curtain hair that he had in Lost. And my wife very much liked Mr. Ingalls. So that was a tick in the box. In fact, I think all the male actors... Not a euphemism. That was so important. Let's just be very clear. My mind went somewhere else. Dirty, dirty. I think all the lead male actors are, let's say, a snack. A snack, wow. Yeah, they've cast hunks, haven't they? They've cast well. They've cast well, let's say that. But I really enjoyed it.

34:46But I didn't realise that this actual first season is set before they get to where Little House on the Prairie was in the original series. because then they showed some stuff at the end. And I was like, oh, well, I didn't realise that. So I'm just hoping, and I don't know if it's been renewed for second season. Let's get a number crunch on that, Boydie. In my mind, it has been, but I don't know if that's just, I'm just making that up. I said at the time that I felt, because I love Deadwood, and I said it had Deadwood vibes and James poo-pooed it. And then some other people said it had Deadwood vibes.

35:18And then he said it did have Deadwood vibes. I mean, it's like you certificate Deadwood, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Oh yeah, Little House on the Prairie Season 2 is coming to Netflix. There you go, Darren. Come on. There you go. Yeah, officially renewed. Officially renewed. That news broke on the 11th of July. So yeah. That's lovely. I'll tell you what, it's filling like a Gilmore Girls hole for me. It's got that lovely sort of like, there's zero certainty. Steady. Darren, I wasn't expecting this element. I really wasn't either. but like filling Darren's holes, you know, ticking boxes. Darren's coming, bringing the smut.

35:56Yeah. You've got to love a Gilmore Girls binge. I was going to say something else and quickly stopped myself. Good for that. I think this is an indication this is why we don't have Darren on the show. Darren is out of control. He's going to get cancelled and then he won't be able to edit the podcast and it'll be a disaster. That's true. But what a joy to have you on at this special 400th, or is it, episode. and thank you so much. And that's, I love, nice insight into actual Darren's reviews there. We're now going to say goodbye to Darren. Thank you. Thank you, Darren. Bye, everyone. Bye. Bye. We continue to stick with the format of the show and that format means that Kay is going to unravel the post bag to give us a question from a viewer and listener.

36:45Right, our message is from Steve who says, hi team, more industry and Succession talk. Sorry. I just finished Industry and I'm not sure why. I was all set to stop watching after Series 3 because I find it just fine. And yet every season I get stuck in by glowing reviews from the likes of Void and maybe some FOMO and I can't say why I end up watching. I did the same thing with Succession and never successfully cut ties. They're both mostly fine shows and I've enjoyed big parts of both but find a lot of it really overrated. also as discussed it's a fail on the bellend test have you ever successfully given a show away that you've put a lot of time into um do you have any advice cheers steve my answer is very quick and simple in that i do it you're going for a classic wanna one show and it's it's kind of a a wanna and a nonna because i don't tend to do that if i've invested a lot of time in something because i just you know what i mean i just need to see how it ends and yeah i've dedicated too much life to it.

37:47I think anything beyond three series, then I'm definitely finishing it. But have you got specific shows to answer the question? No, no, as in like I'm saying when I watch more than two series. Oh, you've never done it? I don't tail off because I've been best. No, no, no. When Kay sent this question, I don't do it. If I, the thing is, the only, there was only, do you know what I did have kind of issues with Midway Through, but then I went back to it. Yeah. Stranger Things. At one point I was like, I think I'm done with Stranger Things. I think I'm done. But then I went back to it and it's great.

38:20But I can't even think of a single show that I've given up because exactly as Kay said, like once I've invested, I need to see it completed. I need to know. Well, no. So now that you've watched the first two seasons of Interview with the Vampire and the start of the Vampire, does that mean you're now hooked in? You can't leave. You have to carry on watching it for the rest of humanity. No, now I've started watching Interview with the Vampire. Now that's very different because now I started watching Interview with a Vampire, I think I'm going to end up watching the first season and the second season and I don't think I'm going to watch the stat.

38:52That's what I think, but I don't know because I think of the tonal shift, which I'm seeing as a very big sign. Stay open. But you know what? I'm staying open. I'm staying open because I'm hoping that the wave of wonderfulness will carry me through. But I've never given up a show that I've invested in. Because also I think once you start watching it like if you've watched a couple of episodes then you can give it up then and then do you know what i mean then you you know if you don't you're not going to like it yeah oh well this is my question is going well what about you just saying what's your great answer yeah go on wow us you're getting prickly i see just because i'm pointing how you neither of you answered the question well i'll tell you i've got some examples we have answered the question we're saying we don't do it well yeah that is the question was have you ever given up a show yeah no and and and do you have any advice my advice would be if you don't like it after a couple of episodes just don't even get involved in it my advice would be stay committed i look forward to future listener questions where the answer is just no it's a series of special after we've got darren in for the 400th why do I just have 400 listener questions all the answer is no can I just say very quickly in my defense what I would say is the post bag has very much run dry and um we didn't have any opportunities to do a shout out because various people were off and um didn't think to put it on socials and I think it's a good question it doesn't mean it's not a question if the answer is just yes or no that's what question that's what questions are that's what questions are from steph there um yes indeed that's what questions are um that's what friends are for who's the same one dion warwick um anyway i have actual i have actual examples of yes okay well good well then you're doing it you're doing all the work go on i'm not saying that i'm just saying i have yes the walking dead oh the walking dead for me it It was all about – I loved Andrew Lincoln, obviously, in it.

41:01Known him for years. Name drop. Oh, Clang. Loved the first few seasons. It was a proper horror drama. It didn't hold back on the horror. Then when it started getting – it became the biggest show on American TV at one point. It was on AMC in America, which I think was the channel that gave us Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul and Mad Men. AMC is often forgotten in the whole, you know, kind of all the best American shows. There's HBO we know about and Netflix, but AMC was big back then. And it became the biggest show on American TV, but, oh, my God, it got very repetitive and just kind of, yeah, I lost it.

41:38So I stopped watching that after, I think it was four or five series. Westworld started off as a brilliant version of that idea of, you know, a kind of amusement park where absolutely lifelike android, if you like, versions of humans you play games with them and that games games would end up being lethal where it's supposed to be you know you're in a gunfight in a in a fictional western world as per the title and then but then actually they actually turned on the humans and it's a brilliant idea and it was a great film um with your brother in the early 70s and the first season that maybe the first couple of seasons of um westworld i thought were really good that's an hbo show that was on sky here then it started getting really complicated with timelines i don't know if either of you watched it it was like by by season three honestly i felt like there were like eight different timelines nine million different plot twists and i just didn't understand i remember watching i think season three or four and just genuinely not understanding what the fuck was going on people talking too loudly no that wasn't the problem steph it's never referring to my penchant for criticizing shows where people are shouting at each other no or whispering or whispering too much Yeah, exactly.

42:51No, neither of those is the problem. It was just unbelievably complicated, and it just disappeared up its own fundament. And my final example is Homeland. Homeland, right? Oh, no. Oh, my God. I'll allow it. Go on. Tell me why. Well, I just, I think that went stretched to like seven, eight series, mainly. All incredibly. Claire Danes, brilliant. Yeah. And, of course, it's been very influential, I think, Homeland. and it has because you know Spawn like loads and loads or certainly influenced loads and loads of espionage thriller type shows which feel very topical you know it reflected all the kind of big news stories at the time but I think halfway through it just became very repetitive and cast members left and they carried on without them and Claire Danes was crying in every single episode in every single scene it just got too much for me so those are things that I gave up on I think I remember going back to the finale of Homeland thinking I really should catch up on the previous couple of seasons but I couldn't be bothered Boyd Can I just Can I issue a plea Right And also I've just remembered Something I gave up on Right Please go back and watch Homeland Please I did a re-watch recently And Homeland is It's just absolutely stunning And you should You should go back and watch it Okay When you say you did a re-watch How many episodes did you watch How many series Oh When my dad was over And he decided to start watching Homeland So I was like doing a re-watch Yeah do you remember Now I just remembered What I gave up Lost Yes Yes I gave up Lost Because See, you're answering the question.

44:17Yeah, okay, well done me. Right, okay. Yes, but I'd forgotten I'd given it up because I did watch the finale. Like I did watch something, it was like a two, was it a two-part finale? I can't remember now. But anyway, I did watch the - No, it was just extended. It was like - It was an extended finale, you know, when they're in the church, no spoilers and all of that kind of stuff. But yeah, yeah, I gave that up. I think I gave that up. Oh God, I can't even think maybe second season. Oh really, early doors. Yeah, second or third season. And then, yeah, it's when they went over and they found the other people on the other side.

44:48I was like, no, I'm out. Okay. I'm out. That was a show that I was sorely tempted to abandon. Absolutely. But I stayed with it. And I kind of ended up hate watching the kind of like four, five, six seasons until we got to the finale, which I don't think worked. One of the famous controversies did or didn't have a satisfying conclusion. For me, it didn't. But yeah. And that's a very good example. Thank you. See? Okay. You reminded me I did give up the yellow jackets. Oh, wait. We just needed time. Yellow jackets. We just needed time. You see, you just needed time. Yellow jackets is a great example.

45:18Yeah, I've only started with that. I remember it wasn't like I'd invested tons. I'd just watched one series and then I was like, no, okay, fine. That's a lot. You know when Series 2 started? Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's like, oh, this is really good. Series 2 did try my patience, I remember. Yeah. Right, see, excellent answers. Thank you very much. Okay, fine. You're welcome. For listening to the question. Now, because we've hit so far in advance recording this, listeners, to, you know, draw the veil away. I keep referencing the veil. Why do you keep doing this? I don't know. Yeah, it's bizarre, isn't it?

45:47There's no point in doing news, is there? Well, it would be like three weeks old. So instead of news, I'll tell you what I'm going to mention quickly is, what I thought I'd do, because this is our 400th episode, I thought I'd go back to the very first episode. So do you, I mean, there's no reason. You, Terry and James. Terry invented the podcast. So in case listeners don't know, Pilot TV was an actual magazine that Terry White, one-time editor-in-chief of Empire, created with help from me and James. And it was her idea to do a podcast to kind of boost the whole idea of it, the brand. And so we started doing the podcast, the three of us.

46:26And the very first one, weirdly, was done before a live audience. Oh, wow. Yeah, at one of those kind of like media events, one of those like ad week type. Like a panel event type thing? Yeah, like a panel. We were the panel on stage, and there were loads of potential advertisers and stuff like that in the audience. And you won't guess. So this was in 2018. Unless both of you have an encyclopedic knowledge of what happened in 2018, can you guess what shows we covered on that very first episode? I would say, is it final season Game of Thrones? No. It was coming up for that. Yeah, I think that was later.

47:07That was later, I think. Yeah. Tell us. Go on, tell us. Yeah, otherwise I'm going to be here for forever. Exactly, yeah. Bodyguard. Do you remember Jed Mercurio's Bodyguard? And the funny thing about this is… What's his name? What's the lead guy in that? Something Madden? Yes, yes. It's the one with Richard Madden. Yes. And Keely Hawes, right? And it was huge. It was massive. It was gigantic. And Jed Mercurio had already done quite a few seasons of Line of Duty, of course but this was even more successful and popular and it was absolutely kind of like the topic of popular culture that everyone was talking about and what happened was and remember there was a it was brilliant it was it was had spectacular twists and turns spectacular ending and everyone was like whoa when season two coming and it was a constantly he was constantly being a last job when season two was going to happen um and he kept he was like get quite annoyed with people for asking him about it.

48:04And it's still never happened. We've never had season two of Bodyguard, which is extraordinary if you think about it. Like this year, we're getting the new Line of Duty, which has taken a while on time. Yeah, he's been busy before. Yeah, he has been busy, to be fair. But that was one of the main shows. And then Killing Eve, what a period this was. Killing Eve was another show. And I was looking at the notes for that podcast, and the notes say, a highly anticipated thriller, Killing Eve, from Fleetbag creator Phoebe Waller-Bridge, which apparently took a long time to get to British TV. So I don't remember this at all.

48:36Apparently Killing Eve went out in America quite a long time before we actually had the chance to see, even though it felt like a British show, you know, with Freebrew Waller Bridge at the centre of it and stuff. And finally, we did Black Earth Rising. Do you remember Black Earth Rising? Michaela Cole. Yes, Michaela Cole. She didn't create it, but she was in it. She starred in it. And it was a really bold, daring drama. and yeah that was the other big show what a lineup gosh that was a good strong week wasn't it what a week fantastic and finally in episode two in the second episode which was if you like the first proper episode we recorded i think in the studio i don't even remember how we did it whether we did it remotely or in the studio ever but it was the first property without an audience and it was the first property and the thing that we discussed on that day what historic time this was was the first of Jodie Whittaker's episodes of Doctor Who.

49:28Oh, my God. The 13th Doctor. And we all loved her, innit? And I remember we all kind of were surprised by the way the turn it took and just by the whole excitement of having a woman playing the Doctor, etc. And Chris Chibnall being the showrunner at that point, who's a kind of renowned and acclaimed script writer. So it was all happening back in 2018 in the first few episodes of the Pilot TV podcast. Wow, that's when you were cheating on your other podcast, Basic Binges. Oh, yes. You were cheating on our original podcast. Steph, I'm glad you remember that. I totally forgot about his betrayal. Absolute betrayal.

50:06And then what happened, Kay, is then you started cheating on me and then it was just me on my own being a Basic Binger, which couldn't actually exist. What path we trod. Yes. Someday someone will write the history of this whole situation. And, I mean, it'll be very popular history, I'm sure. people would be fascinated. Anyway, but that concludes the non-news segment of the podcast. People should re-listen to the episode, maybe. I'm not, I wouldn't advocate that. No, no, no, let's just, let's just, let's draw a line. Yeah, let's draw a line. Let's draw a line under it. Okay. Moving on, it's time for the reviews, everyone.

50:43We start with one of the shows that I've been banging on about for weeks. In fact, I've been banging on about as soon as it was announced, which is Ryan Murphy, the creator of American Horror Story, American Crime Story, Love Story recently. He has created, with the original writer of the book called The Shards, Brett Easton-Lellis of American Psycho fame and Less Than Zero, which was published when he was like 20, 21 years old. And this show feels like an autobiographical thriller, in which the main character is called Brett Easton-Lellis and is a would-be young writer hanging out with his mates in high school in Los Angeles in 1980-81.

51:22And in the background, people are being abducted and killed because there's a serial killer on the loose. How all this ties together is a question for the viewers and the listeners and maybe a question for Kay. Kay, what the hell did you make of The Shards? I really like this. I mean, you'd been talking about it so much anyway. and so I'd sort of been primed to like it. But yeah, I really enjoyed this. It's a love letter to 80s LA, basically. It has fantastic soundtracks, the costumes, the locations they use and it's a deep dive into the affluence and the privilege of these young kids who have successful but largely absent parents and it's about how they are fending for themselves but they're doing pretty well because, you know, they're kind of occupying themselves with lots of drinks and drugs and parties.

52:18And it all centers around Bretts played by Igby Rigney. Igby Rigney? I know. I'm so obsessed. I'm so obsessed with Igby Rigney. Let's have a second for that, shall we? Yeah. And he, as Boyd said, is an aspiring writer. He's a closeted gay man and he's in his senior year of high school. and he's sort of, he's very charming and intelligent and ambitious and he's a control freak as well and he becomes incensed by the arrival of this student called Robert played by Homer Gear, Richard Gear's son, which is like going to be ironic soon when I tell you that one of the other characters is played by, is it Kaya Gerber?

52:59Kaya Gerber. Yeah. And obviously their parents used to be married which I find fascinating. Cindy and Rich. Cindy Crawford. Amazing. Sorry, yeah, Cindy Crawford's her mother and Cindy and Richard. But anyway, so yeah, he plays Robert and he's this new student and Brett is kind of obsessed with him because he feels that he saw him a year or two previously in the cinema while he's watching The Shining. And the reason why he noticed him is because he fancied him. But when he sort of confronts Robert with this or, you know, says, oh, you know, I've seen you before. Robert just denies all knowledge of him and that irks him.

53:35like that irks someone like Brett enormously and then it becomes a fixation for him and he becomes convinced that Robert is the trawler who is the the name for the serial killer who's going around abducting young women and killing pets and so it's a story of that but it's just I don't know I just found it so absorbing and because of like the way it's been shot and the high quality of it become immersed in this world it's really interesting because you don't know if um brett is a reliable narrator or not because and i had to check that boy and steph right when when it starts off and he's going to the cinema he's really clear about it's on this date i go to the cinema and then a little while later i i remember the date because it was like connected to certain dates of my life right and then i was watching it and then the date suddenly changed and i had to rewind it because i was like because i've got brain fog at the moment i was like oh have I just been a bit just forgetful there?

54:33And it was different. So I was like, oh, actually, is this because I'm watching a rough cut of this screener or is it actually a purposeful thing to show that he's this unreliable narrator and we can't trust entirely what he says? Oh, the latter for sure, yeah. Okay, yeah. So anyway, the whole series will be dominated by this fact that is Robert capable of these heinous crimes or is Brett weaving this story? I mean, he's a talented storyteller. He's got a love interest and her mum, no, her dad, sorry, is a big Hollywood screenwriter and sort of says, oh yeah, I'll take you out for lunch to Brett.

55:16And we can discuss it, the idea being that he also fancies Brett. And so we know that Brett's a good storyteller. So how much of this is fact? How much is fiction? it's brilliant but the only thing I would say is because I read ahead because I wanted to know what the book was about I think that the ending is going to I don't know if I will enjoy the ending if they stick faithfully to this book in which case I don't know if I can invest more time in it but it is brilliant and I think Ryan Murphy's back on form and it's obviously a great creative collaboration they've got here Read the ending I'm not going to spoil it, but what I would, because I've seen the whole thing, obviously, at nine episodes.

55:59The ending is different to the ending of the book. Oh, okay. So I'm not going to go into more detail, but it's, yeah, it's a whole other business. Okay, that's good. I might continue then. Steph, what did you make? Well, I was really nervous about this, Boyd, because you've talked about it so much. Incessantly. You said, you know, no, and you had really kind of like made me feel so excited about this. so much so I was like I'm gonna I'm gonna have to read this book because it's like Boyd said it's like one of his favorite books from the last decade and I thought okay this is this must be really special and it absolutely didn't disappoint I I loved it this is Ryan Murphy for me at his absolute best I love and Kay you've made mention of this the way you know Ryan Murphy stuff is all very the color saturation really does draw you in and you feel completely like embraced by whatever you're watching um igby rigney screen presence is just i i couldn't take my eyes off him and i know you're supposed to do that and that's the character britt's character but i he was mesmerizing to me he and actually everybody because they're all these beautiful young people um and uh yeah wes bentley's in it now wes bentley this is big news for james because he is jamie in yellowstone And so seeing him playing this character, you know, the closeted gay dad of Brett's girlfriend.

57:23On the prowl. Yeah, which was absolutely, it was a joy to me. One of the things that I loved, it immediately got me hooked, is the narration is so well done. And when Brett is talking, when he says, you know, kids today, they think they have it difficult, but our generation had it tougher because we had to put up with serial killers. Right. And I was like, that is so true. And I'm just going to give you this fact. In the 80s. OK, there were which which was a historical peak for serial killers. There were in the United States. How many active serial killers do you think there were in the 80s in the United States?

58:01I was going to go low. I was going to go too low. I was going to say 25, but now that you've made... I'll say 25. 52. 770 active serial killers in the United States in the 80s. That's brilliant. Historical peak, right? Okay. Yeah. Absolute. Right. So for me, I... So it wasn't hyperbole when he said that. No, it wasn't, right? And that's why I love the show. I mean, Kay and I, we were born in the early 80s. The 80s is an incredible... everything about this show is so absorbing. The only thing, okay, and the only thing that slightly upset me about it, and this is just absolutely a personal thing that I don't like, is because they've got all like the missing dogs and the displays, and obviously this is very Ryan Murphy, the displays of the bodies, I won't give anything away because I don't want to spoil it for anyone.

58:55That, I found that quite hard to watch, but they do it well and they flash it quickly. Yeah, they don't dwell on it. No, they do not linger. And that to me is quite important because obviously pet death is not good. Pet death is distressing. The thing is pet death is not for me. And I don't, you know, which sounds crazy because obviously I, you know, edit a magazine called Cry Monthly, but I found that quite hard. But yeah, so you've got the golden age of serial killers. You've got absolutely stonking soundtrack. um kaya gerber what's so incredible about her casting is because she is basically her mother she brings that 80s supermodel vibe to it and it feels so authentic it may it's just she is just she's masterful casting um yeah the beautiful cars the whole 80s yuppies lifestyle all of that was great um yeah and then okay the gender fluidity which i loved all that exploration it's kind of super erotic isn't it yeah i loved all of it i'm really glad you both liked it what's because we haven't got long but go on what what made the shard so unique was that it started out on brettie's podcast which is still going and i listen avidly every single week and um the way he did it was, I think it was in lockdown that started it.

1:00:17So he basically framed, it was not a novel at that point. He framed this as he's going to look back at his own life when he was a teenager, going to his posh prep school with his friends, and when there were serial killers around everywhere. And you're constantly scared that maybe the serial killers can stalk you. And then when this Mallory guy joined their friendship group, young Brett, who was a would-be writer, aged 18, suspected that Marais was a serial killer because he saw him. And so he framed this whole thing as a memoir, really. Even to the point where his kind of producer on the show, his equivalent of Darren, our Darren, who edits the show, his version of that, who's always in the studio with Brett, who's a bit of a goofball, actually.

1:01:03Unlike Darren. He would ask Brett, so there really was a serial killer called The Trawler? And Brett would go, yeah, yeah, absolutely. I'm not making this up. So Brett himself said that all of this happened and he stuck to that line through thick and thin of reading and every week he would start the podcast by reading out a long long excerpt from the shards and it would build and build and build and he and it went on for weeks and weeks and he read the whole thing and only later did did the publisher come to him and say you've got to turn this into a book and he never intended it to be a book and so he just intended it to be so he still maintains it's the trip like this no no no he doesn't so now it's it's like no no he you know he didn't he didn't well he wouldn't even come out and say it's gonna go that far yeah it really took off and became a huge thing i remember googling the trawler right because i really i couldn't work out whether it was fictional or real so that was the extraordinary background to the story and it was very very sexual you know they're incredibly explicit scenes in it and in fact my one critique of this version, I think they've done a brilliant job.

1:02:06So Brett himself co-wrote the first couple of episodes with Ryan Murphy. I think it looks incredible, as you say. It's also not only the light, it's got that grainy film quality of films back in 1981. It looks like it was made in the early 80s. The needle drops are actual needle drops. Yeah. Did you notice? It's so authentic. What's so clever is the needle drops arrive so at parties and you literally see the needle on the disc and I thought that was so clever. They do that four or five times and like their actual literal needle drops and brilliant ones. The Ultravox song Vienna, which is key in the book, very, very key in the book.

1:02:40That has a huge place in it. All Duran Duran, Blondie, Stranglers, Golden Brown, but just the musical choices are phenomenal. Elvis Costello, et cetera. And the casting is absolutely brilliant. And Igby Rigney, you're right. Not only, because not only does he have the presence, he sounds like real Bret Easton-Less. If you listen to the podcast, He has quite a weird way of talking. He has a very specific, slightly odd way of speaking. Yeah, intonation patterns, very specific. And he has meticulously recreated what the younger version of that voice must have been like, and the way he talks to other people, and the way he speaks in general, and the narration.

1:03:23It's just perfect. So Wigby Wigney, what a bit of casting. And he even looks like the young. He's got a real screen back. But he also kind of looks like the young Brett because he's not like classically hunky handsome, right? He's just, he's kind of like a decent looking young guy. He's striking though. He is striking. Do you know what he is? He's self-assured. Yeah. But, and even then he's also a bit of an outsider. Even then, you know, with his, you know, being gay and in the closet, et cetera. But he is perfect in that, right? And as you say, all of the rest of them, Kaia Gerber, Wes Bentley, Evan Rachel Wood.

1:03:55Oh, yes. Yes, we should mention her. I mentioned from Westwood, who is amazing in it. And she is the husband of the bisexual guy. The wife. The wife. The wife. Sorry, the wife. The wife, her husband, Wes Bentley. And as a duo, they are incredible. They're bickering. And she also hates her. Oh, they're totally unhinged. They're totally unhinged. She's in torment. She also hates her own daughter, fascinating enough. So all of that, I think they've done it brilliantly. I think they've captured the essence of the novel. So my one critique is, right, the novel is very very explicit and it's part of and i feel they've slightly weirdly for ryan murphy it feels actually slightly less shocking than it might have been and tonally not so for example in this day of off campus right and heater driving all those shows which are very raunchy and have a lot of you know scenes of intimacy and they and naked nakedness nudity they actually hold back a bit if anything are they sticking to 80s level of raunch i don't know what the i think they're no i don't think it's that i think they've just decided to tone to tone it down a bit for some reason they've toned that down because they've ramped up the the murder because actually those scenes are incredibly shocking like the scenes where the body placement and that is really shocking so i think maybe i have no idea but i think i know what you mean it doesn't feel it It feels like it could be much more sexually explicit.

1:05:22You know, these people are having like coke-fuelled orgies, for God's sake. But maybe it kind of feels more powerful that you know they're having that, but you don't need to see it. But then you see the shocking scenes of the murder scenes, which are fucking horrendous. Yeah. One of the critiques, that's an interesting point, because one of the criticisms of the novel from some critics was that he didn't tie together the serial killer storylines with the general love interrelationship stories and the sex stuff, basically. And so maybe it was an attempt to do that. Maybe you're right. But it's definitely a decision they've taken.

1:05:54And I think it's slightly miscarried just because the whole tone of the book is so immersed in the sex and the kind of interrelationships that go up. That is strange then, then it's not reflected at you. So I think it's a bit of a weird decision. Yeah, that's my one critique. But I loved it, yeah, in general. And there are nine episodes to come. So that is The Shards, which is on Disney Plus right now. Let's move on to Hit Point. Yeah, this is UK TV's first original drama series, commissioned specifically for you and Dave. And Dave, of course, we're used to having repeats of Would I Lie to You and documentaries about Absolutely Fabulous.

1:06:36In fact, they're on gold. Anyway, bottom line is it's an original show for UK TV. it stars Nick Blood and Saffron Hocking as a police duo investigating a daring robbery of some drug money that is kind of owned if you like by a French gangster who comes over to investigate what's been happening and then there's a lot more there's a kind of like a reveal halfway through the first episode which is in this spoiler discussion is actually in all the marketing materials and even the trailers for us so I think we can actually well it just I mean if you want to avoid it fine. I'll let Steph decide how to tread the fine line between what is and isn't a spoiler in the show.

1:07:13What did you make of Hit Point? Right. So this was a last minute drop from Boyd last night for Kay and I. And I'm really glad it was because I thoroughly enjoyed this. This has been a great week for watching for me. Right. First thing, okay, Nick Blood is delicious. He is so gorgeous I love him also Saffron Hocking I mean that skin she it's just incredible right when I first started watching this I was like wow this is like two cool cops being outfitted by like Primark's latest drop and they're going to go around really do you know what I mean that's what it feels like it's like they're walking out of like a Primark exclusive catalogue and they're going around and they're they look great is this a compliment I'm trying to work it out no no it's compliment listen yeah look they you know do you know what I mean they like they look good they look great they look the part they don't look battle-worn in any way do they they look like you know and I thought is this gonna yeah is this gonna is this gonna take away a bit of authenticity but I really like the way that it's shot they kind of have this split screen cool Guy Ritchie-esque device um so yeah we start with Nick Blood and he's in a double egg situation in the fact that he's in his flat his cool flat and he's cracking eggs and he gets like five doubles and you kind of think oh okay what's going on then you meet him with his partner saffron hocking so leo and bella together and he's clearly obsessed with her and she's kind of nonchalant because she is absolute cool girl extreme but obviously with a deep emotional core my favorite kind of cool girl i know someone like that they're called caro baro um right uh yeah i love i their their whole dynamic together they work really well together they work really well as a pairing and also I found it genuinely funny there's some really great lines in it and there's a great bit where they're chasing down a perp I'm not going to give away any spoilers because I'm already in a lot of trouble with people so which is genuinely funny which is genuinely funny you get the the French the French baddie in it which is you know requisite there's a lot of you know tropes that you kind of need to have to have this thing but I think it's elevated by these two actors that brilliant and it's twisty mctwisterson of of which i'm giving away none of the twists so yeah i i i really liked it really enjoyed it i'm definitely going to watch it and when the last kind of the second half of it you're like oh oh oh because i didn't watch the trailer so i was genuinely surprised by all of it yeah yeah peter serafinovich pops up as the one of it who's always that man i mean yeah i loved him when he was in amanda land i love him and everything but god he's great yeah giving it full scouts as well yeah it is it is the i hate the word but i'm going to use it tropey so none of this is original particularly but it's handled so kind of stylishly and wittily created and written by howard overman most famous for misfits from misfits only for which was right and misfits was very you know it took the whole idea of superheroes and turned it on its head and created something really um kind of densely layered and this is doing the same thing I think it's taking, you know, kind of gangster thriller vibes and trying to create something a bit different.

1:10:26And I think you're right, that kind of banter, to use another awful word, between Nick Blood and Stephen Hawking is great. And it all rests on that, doesn't it? Now, I'm going to compare it. I am going to compare it to the Hannah Waddingham, Octavia Spencer. You cannot. Why? I could do what I like, Stephen Hawking. and you know these these yeah gone to someone's head the reason I forgot the comparison is because that show relies a lot on the chemistry right between those two lead characters I don't think the script for that show was witty and clever enough to convince us I blame the script not their performances I think this script is good enough and it makes the banter between them feel not only real but funny and heightened when it needs to be there's a chat they have with a guy a large guy about eating burgers and stuff which is a really funny little little kind of five minute sequence that doesn't really add anything to the story right but it's just a kind of little bit of stuff and that what i like about the show is it takes time out every now and then to just have a funny observational conversation and i think it works really well so yeah i was really really pleasantly surprised as well okay yes i too and as you say i think everything hinges on that chemistry and they've got in spades so i i agree with it i'm not gonna repeat everything you said but i agree i found it very entertaining i particularly like the um cat cat and mouse and fox and ape uh chase that went on in the container park and how all that unfolds and the amount of rug pulls because you think you think you know what's going on and then suddenly there's another twist.

1:12:05So overall, I thought it was very funny and entertaining. That's the thing. It's entertaining with high stakes as well. My only small, it's not even a criticism. It's more an observation. You can say what you like, Kay. You say what you like. No, because it's just like, I think it's just me, but the title is on this horrible brown background, right? Wow. And it's called - Colour palette issue. Well, only because it's called Hit Point. And the colour does look like poo. So I'm like... Oh, dear. I mean, I wasn't expecting that. I wasn't either, but you know what? I'll take it. I was like, why have they put it against brown?

1:12:45Oh, I see what you mean. Shit point, hit point. They've literally put it against a brown that really looks... I think if you saw it, if you looked it again, you'd be like... Oh, my God. Anyway, it's only a small observation. It didn't detract from my overall enjoyment on this show. It just suddenly struck me. because it kept on flicking up. And I was like, what? I was worried. And now I'm thinking it goes from that pooey thing. And then I was worried at the beginning because I was like, oh God, no, not a container site. You know, when everything, you know, all these things, there's so many chases in container sites.

1:13:16It is a huge trope. And you're thinking, why is no one manning these container sites for fuck's sake? You know what I mean? Come on, get it together, people. It's quite a setting though, the container site with all the colourful containers. I know, but you see them all the time. Just saying. Fair enough. Well, it's well done. We all enjoyed it, is the bottom line, despite the brown. Hit Point is on you and Dave from Thursday, the 13th of August at 9 o 'clock, and I think it'll all be on UK TV and you, the streaming service, as well. And finally, we get to Ricky Gervais' animated sitcom, Alley Cats.

1:13:50Ricky was on the show last week, of course, friend of the pod. I've known him for 25 years. I am in the pocket of Big Gervais. I have to make that absolutely clear. We interviewed him on the live podcast we had. If we'd have had a 400th live, well, maybe we would have asked him to do that as well. Who knows? But in lieu of all that, we've got Ali Kats, which is basically about a bunch of cats hanging around in a kind of like basement of a deserted building, watching TV, chatting shit, being really rude to each other. And with a couple of kind of story threads, including one little kitty who wants to find a home, which is really, we'll get to that.

1:14:31Yeah, voiced by Joe Hartley. And a kind of quasi-romance, possibly, between one of the cats and Ricky's cat, Gus, as well. But these are little 15-minute chunks of animation. Kay, are you down with the alley cats? I am down with the alley cats. I enjoyed, I've watched three episodes. I mean, they're very easy to watch, as Boyd said. They're just 15 minutes each. And I just like being in their company because all of these cats, these stray alley cats, are voiced by Ricky's mates from Afterlife, basically. So you have Tom Basden, Andrew Brooke, Diane Morgan. Who else? Oh, David Earl. Oh, my God, David Earl.

1:15:13David Earl gets all the most incredible lines, I think. He does. He plays Puke. So my favourite characters are actually Puke, played by David Earl, and Ponce, played by Tom Basden. And they are essentially playing the characters they play in Ricky shows, right? So, you know, if you like Ricky shows, and you like them in that you're gonna enjoy this because it is essentially Ricky with his mates hanging out, voicing cats, saying the things that they'd probably talk about anyway, which is that, you know, Ricky is essentially just discussing the big themes in life, like death. I mean, at one point they are discussing how they would like to die, which I found quite amusing, the different ways they might do that.

1:15:51It's funny. And he's also airing his grievances and taking the piss and swearing a lot. So if you're sensitive to this C word, I would just give you a friendly warning that this is kitty littered with it. Every few seconds is just like, yeah, it's where it's central. so overall like there's not much of a like there's the lost cat lost kitten storyline and this potential love interest as Boyd said there's not much storyline going on it's just it's just like watching some cats hanging about yeah he compares it to he compares it to being a podcast I was just about to say that it's like a podcast yeah yeah so I'd say so I loved it as in I really enjoyed it it's not it doesn't feel different I mean obviously the animation is the animation is really good by the way I'm not really into animation but I thought all the cats looked great and really sort of connected with their actors.

1:16:48I thought the little quirks of the actors were really well reflected in them. There was this beautiful, like weirdly I got caught up and there's this scene with like clouds floating past, which I just thought was really nicely done. Nice touches. So yeah, other than that, I don't think it's not remarkably different from Ricky's back catalogue in terms of the content. and if you like that, you're going to love this. One thing, my only criticism is, or one thing that stuck out to me was the fat kid jokes. I feel are boring now, I've got to say. Yeah, I do feel they're boring. Well, that's kind of an allusion to Afterlife, isn't it?

1:17:26Yeah, exactly. But I mean, because, yeah, famously in Afterlife, there was a funny joke in that, and it was about this kid being ginger and stuff like this. But for some reason, when it happened, I think it's in episode two maybe, and I just was like I'm sort of like not only because it's 2026 and like who you know we've sort of all evolved and moved on from that but from like a comedian point of view I'm just like Ricky's done that joke so I don't feel like you know I think he he can move on from that now but other than that like I think there are going to be a lot of people who are offended by it it will cause inverted commas controversy Ricky won't give a shit he's just doing his thing What this really is a testament to is the power of Ricky Gervais.

1:18:12He's endurance, yeah. Yeah, but no, also like his might in the TV world, that like Netflix has signed off this thing. I've never seen a show. It does a lot of things that are unexpected. 15-minute chunks of essentially really nothing actually happening other than cats hanging about. And don't get me wrong, it's enjoyable and entertaining. Every other word's the C word. and it that to me is a real sort of like you know flag and sound of like i can do what i want yeah i can do what i want and i will be backed by netflix because i have this back catalogue that's incredible i'm incredibly successful and good at what i do and so now creatively i have absolute carte blanche to do what i want so yeah no i think you summed it up steph i mean i'm going to hold my hands up and just say in my world ricky jabase can do absolutely no wrong i am a massive fan and I loved it so much this is absolutely my type of humor um one of the things I want to mention about the animation was I really enjoyed this show feels very uniquely British to me it feels like a very British humor and what I really enjoyed about the animation is they are animating um British streets British scenes and I felt like that gave a layer to it that made me feel warm and fuzzy because like oh yeah that's the corner shop oh yeah they're the high-rise flats it felt like somewhere i live right so that for me i was immediately into that um one of my favorite some of my favorite lines and i don't want because they're only 15 minute episodes but they the jokes do just keep rolling and rolling um love living in ignorance shit for brains and proud i wrote that down and then um am i a bit of an asshole no but you've got potential like this And they just keep coming.

1:20:02They just keep coming. And there's little details like when they're trying to get this little cat home and he chooses Vanessa Carlton's A Thousand Miles song, that kind of stuff, you know, it's just, I mean, I'm going to use it. I think he's just a genius. Diane Morgan's character is amazing. Olive. Olive, yeah. He's brilliantly stupid. oh my god when she talks i nearly wet myself when she talks about when they're having the discussion about how to end their lives and she's saying like yeah no no but you'll just land on your feet and she was like yeah but you've got nine lives so when i jump off the 10th time it'll be fine they're like no she was like yeah yeah i'll do that i'll just i'll just jump off 10 times it was going off and i just couldn't it just it was absolutely brilliant um yeah it's obscene it's you know you cannot watch it with small children around or anyone oh my god it's not that kind of animated show.

1:20:57It is our offended. Unless you're really open-minded about your small child. Well, yeah. I mean, I think it's an absolute triumph. I loved every minute of it. I thought it was brilliant. Thank God for that because there's definitely like someone came up to me in the office, right? When I did the Richard Gervais interview in Heat and said, oh, they'd seen the trailer for Ali Kats. And they were like, oh, it's not, it's going to be terrible, isn't it? And you're going to say you love it. And, you know, it's all, and I had to say, well, because I'd seen it at that point. I'd seen, and I watched the whole thing, you know, all six episodes.

1:21:28It's effectively like a feature if you watch it all in one go, an animated feature. But it just is, if you like Ricky and you like, it is like, as he's deliberately tried to do, a kind of very plot-like hangout show with these characters. It's a hang. It's an absolute hang. And it's just a joy to spend time with them. It's uncensored. As you say, who can get away with being this uncensored and this rude? Not only the C words, which I fully embrace, obviously, the effing and the seeing, but the rudeness of what David Oll comes out with sexually is extraordinary. So it's the actual detail of what he says that makes it so shocking.

1:22:05But it's just a real joy. And the other thing is we've talked – I don't want to get bogged in. I could go on for hours about this. But famously on this podcast, James and me and Kate to some extent are not used to that. We all – none of us are huge fans of animation. And yet the thing about this is, and this was like, I think it's like this with The Simpsons for me a lot, the best, the classic period of The Simpsons. You forget it's animated after a while and you just enjoy it for what it is. And that is what this did for me. And by the way, as you were saying, Kay, the backgrounds are often beautiful.

1:22:35Oh, yeah. It looks as great as it needs to look, depicting, like beautifying, you know, literally like alleyways and, you know, dodgy. Yeah, it feels like home. It's lovely. And what I want to say is one, I started the interview with him by asking him about this scene because I love, there's a scene in episode four, which is part of the romantic subplot that I alluded to, alluded to indeed, which plays out, it's a montage, and it plays out to There Is A Lie That Never Goes Out by The Smiths, which is one of my favourite songs of all time, as it is one of, because this could be a new feature, I've done my favourite films of all time, I'm now doing my favourite songs of all time, and it's so beautifully done.

1:23:11So in the middle of this rude, shocking, outrageous thing, there's time for a lovely bit of romance to The Smiths, and it's oh my god it's brilliant he had to get permission from johnny marr and morrissey separately so they don't talk to each other famously and they both agreed he had to describe the scene he talks about it in the interview um and can you imagine and i really i'm really i want to be a flower on the way morrissey sits back to watch the show and watches his song used in that way in the show i love it indeed and as which would be no surprise to anyone even though i am in the pocket big gervais is still fantastic but kay and i loved it and we're not yet exactly yeah Yeah, yeah.

1:23:46Exactly. So, AliCats is already out now. It was embargoed for review until it came out last Friday. So, that's why I reviewed it this week. And I'll quickly say what else is on this week. There's Reacher, the new series of Reacher, which James and I are both obsessed with. We're both big Jay Reacher fans. That's on Prime Video on the fourth season on Wednesday, the 12th of August. We'll be doing that on the next Pilot Plus. Women in Blue, or Laf Azuleth, the Spanish language show on Apple TV, on Wednesday, the 12th of August. So that's season two of that show. There's a show called My Brilliant Career on Netflix on Thursday, which is an Australian drama, a period drama, with a great cast including Christopher Chung from Slow Horses and Anna Chancellor from Four Weddings and Genevieve O 'Reilly from Andor, et cetera, et cetera.

1:24:30So that looks really interesting as well. Oh, my God. What a week it's been of recordings. Thank you so much to Kay, particularly for joining me for all of these. Thank you. Even more to Steph. This is actually Steph's holiday, people. I'm with you. This is her so-called holiday. Talking to us. Please do carry on slagging her off for opinions. We don't encourage people. At the same time, bear in mind she has taken out this chunk of her holiday to do this recording with us. And thanks to you all for listening. I don't know why I'm talking about the whole show. It's an extended leave. It's an extended leave.

1:25:04No, we should thank them for 400 episodes. Yes, thank you. You should. And thanks to you all for listening. you've seen us through 400 episodes of this thing that we call pilot tv we wouldn't do it without you no matter what you think of our criticisms and um i don't know what we're doing next week because we're recording this so far in advance whatever it will be it'll be fascinating listening i'm sure thank you to everyone pilot out