PLUS I Will Find You

0:07Welcome to Pilot Plus, your extended guide to every show that matters. And on this week's installment, we are tackling Harlan Coben's I Will Find You, a rare American-based adaptation of one of his books. This coming from the 2023 novel of the same name, which is adapted here for Netflix by Robert Hull. And it has Sam Worthington as David Burroughs, a man who has serve five years in prison for the murder of his young son only for his sister-in-law played by severance's brit lower to turn up randomly one day visit him in the clink and tell him his son may in fact still be alive what manner of crime is this to find out we of course turn to our queen of crime steph sealan tell us about it oh my god okay so well okay right is this the first i think I think we said before this is the first time, this is the first American adaption of a Harlan Coben book.

1:01I was thinking about this. It's definitely unusual for his Netflix deal because he works with a British publishing company, doesn't he? It's the first standalone novel to be turned into an American show. He did Prime Video. On Prime Video, he did the adaptation of one of his other strands of novels. The YA strand was turned into a Prime Video American show set in America. But I think this is the first standalone adaptation of his novels set in America, not transplanted to the UK and made by a Key Street production. Okay. I feel like, you know, we know the ingredients of Harlan Coburn, right? We all know.

1:43We're well-versed in what's going to happen. It's nothing as it seemed. There's a miscarriage somewhere. You know, it's always - Yeah, I was about to say, it's a miscarriage of justice. Sorry, miscarriage of justice. Sorry, there's a miscarriage of justice somewhere. There's the twists and turns that we all really look forward to. We know they're coming. It's kind of, you know, cathartic viewing in the fact that you usually in the end, everything gets sorted out and it's fine. So, you know, you're going on that journey. What I would say about this one is for me, a lot of the time, and I'm not, this is going to sound harsh, but it's not harsh.

2:18Okay. With a lot of the dialogue of Harlan Coburn stuff, it's quite cheesy. is there's a little bit of it there's a cheesy element to it there's a you know they it's very hammy okay and I think for me although I'm just gonna sit on my stall I really love this and I'm gonna watch it all and it's gonna be brilliant the for me the American accent doesn't help with the cheesiness in the way that the British accent does and I'm boys looking quizzical right I just think in a British accent with Harlem Combers, it kind of dampens down the cheesy lines, whereas the Americans are hamming up the hamming even more.

2:58Sam Worthington is bringing a classic big screen energy to this. We're used to seeing Sam Worthington on the big screen. and I just, I don't know whether I feel like he's quite right for this. For me, it doesn't, it feels like he wants to break out of it. But yeah, he's in the classic in prison, you know, rightfully or wrongfully imprisoned. We're going to soon find out. We're not going to give away any spoilers. Obviously, people will have read the book. And yeah, there's a visit from his sister-in-law and she shows him a photograph that may or may not be the son, which he found murdered in his bed in their home.

3:37Now, immediately people will be like, oh, is it an AI thing? What is it going to be? But this son has this birthmark that his son has a very distinctive birthmark. And yeah, without giving... Which is handy. Yes, I thought that. That's quite convenient. Yeah. It's a bit like the guy... There's a guy in it. There's also... Sorry to interrupt. There's a guy in there who's got like a white bit of his hair. Have you got to that far? Who's known as skunk? and I'm like it's handy this guy an identifiable bit of white hair as well you know there's shady police officers there's there's everything it's the formula isn't it it's a formula and it's a formula that works this one's kind of set in Boston so for me I couldn't get away from it feeling a little bit like a police CBS police procedural it felt very Blue Bloods to me if any of you watch I love Blue Bloods which is Tom Selleck's I am very familiar with Blue Bloods so I'm a big fan of blue bloods it felt a little bit like blue bloods the movie to me okay um that said this all sounds like it i've been really disparaging about but but it i know but it feels like yeah it feels like but it feels like it could be because it's got sam worthington in it's my point it's like that's what it feels like it's trying to be that um this all sounds disparaging but it isn't because i really enjoyed it i loved it and it's going to give me everything that uh that harlan coven gives me every single time which is pure entertainment and joy but i don't know know whether i quite like the american-ness of it sorry that's just my one my one thing that i kind of was like oh i'm not sure about this i'm not sure make holland coben british again that's what steph says maybe maybe just because of the the hamminess but i now please all disagree with me go for it boy you are in the pocket of big coben but let's hear it yeah yeah i am yeah i think i know what you mean yeah i think the the um it's funny when the first when When they did the first British transposing of a Harlan Cogan book for Netflix, it's quite amusing in itself.

5:41If you're completely used to reading his novels, which are all set in different parts of America, then it was actually, looking back on it, it made the TV versions slightly cheesier than the books. The books, I don't feel, ever were that cheesy. No, I don't think they were either. No, I agree. They have a very different vibe to the TV adaptations. Yeah. So almost like the bar was set back in whatever the first one was. I can't remember without studying Wikipedia. But so there'll be one set in the suburban setting with – and yeah, there was something quite kind of disconcerting about that. We got completely used to it, and it became a genre in itself, didn't it?

6:22Agreed. The British versions of Harlan Coben stuff, and they are incredibly entertaining, as you say. But I completely, I just took this on as face value as, oh, you know, this is kind of refreshing that this is a whole different, this is much more like, I think particularly this novel, which is one of my favourites of his recent books, because it is a bit different actually. Like, you know, to start with, it's kind of like the whole prison setting is different for him. And it almost becomes like a prison breakout story to begin with. and that's quite fun and exciting and kind of well done. Is that a spoiler?

7:01Is that a spoiler? I don't think so. I think it's mentioned in most of the - I suppose the premise is that he, yeah, okay, fine. James, is that a spoiler? I'm not saying he's succeeded in breaking out. I'm saying he's trying to break out. But, you know. Beep, beep, boydy, reversing. Yeah, but it's not a spoiler, surely. Okay. And I think the whole kind of vibe of it is different enough to make it a refreshing change from Much As I Love and are entertained by the British versions, the British tellings of these stories, there is something quite... Not only is it set in Boston, you've got Central Park in it, they're suddenly wandering through Central Park, they're in New York, they're in all kinds of places.

7:41And it feels quite a little bit more lavish, I think. I think there's something about setting a drama in a suburban setting, even if a lot of the settings in Harlan Comer stories have been living in big mansions, and there's quite a lot of well-off people living their lives. And that's often quite glamorous lives, or at least kind of fairly basic suburban lives. Whereas to have suddenly the vistas of New York and Boston, et cetera, and car chases and attempts to prison breakouts, it feels different. It just feels nicely different to me. So I know what you mean. It's definitely got a different vibe to it, but I like the vibe.

8:19Like, I think the cast is, I think Britt Lowa is just fantastic in everything she does. So she kind of really helps. She elevates it, definitely. I'm trying to avoid using the word elevate because - I'm using it. I'll take it over now. That'll be my word, elevate. You say elevate, yeah. I mean, Sam Worthington, I'm not the biggest fan of Sam Worthington in the world. I mean, you know, the Avatar films are so just mediocre, aren't they? I'm just deliberately trying to raise James' hackles. You're trying to bait James. I am baiting James, yeah. that, you know, he's kind of, he's fine, isn't he? But actually, he kind of works in the centre of this thing because he's like, weirdly, he's an everyman kind of character who's been accused of the worst crime imaginable, killing his own son.

9:00And I think it works with him because right from the start, you're like, he can't possibly have done it. You know, you're like, there's no way that this guy in this performance could have done that, committed that act. So you're just kind of like trying to unravel exactly what happened. And you can feel the deployment. I think the deployment of the various possible characters who might have been involved in this case to explain what the hell is going on is very clever by the show. Robert Hull created it and show ran it, I think. And I just think as an adaptation of a Hull and Coburn novel, it's pressing all the right buttons.

9:36It's bringing in all the right twists and turns as they happen. And I'm really enjoying it. Like you, I'll definitely finish it when I've got time. I'm halfway through the moment. Oh, by the way, I want to mention, I think what does elevate it a little bit is the cop duo. So Shai McBride as Max, who is the FBI fugitive task force, and his colleague, Sarah, played by Logan Brannick, they are like a literal double act, kind of like Laurel and Hardy almost wandering through this whole thing. And they often make stupid decisions and kind of have to shout at each other for making stupid decisions. Now, by the way, there's a rooftop chase in episode three or four.

10:18Have you seen that? Got that far? No. There's a rooftop chase, which is like they're doing their tribute to Mission Impossible. Do you remember the Mission Impossible one? Oh, yeah. Where Tom Cruise hurt himself. He actually hurt himself. When he broke his foot. When he broke his foot. They're literally trying to do that. Even attempting that on this scale is quite an interesting watch. I mean, yeah, people will devour this. They absolutely will. and I'm not, I just, I don't know if I would have preferred this if this had a British setting for this one, just because maybe I'm just stuck in my Harlan Coburn ways of recent years.

10:47I think you are, yeah. Embrace the change. No, I should. You're right. We'll be back with the British ones anyway, because the next British one will be due at Christmas here. Okay. So yeah, you'll be fine. My complaint is the opposite of Steph's. The opposite of Steph's, while overlapping slightly, which is that I welcomed the American setting for this. partly because i i have not read all of harlan cobert's books but i've read like six or seven of them and you know boyd's absolutely right they don't you know they're quite serious you know you get swept along with them they're they're crime thrillers are really naughty um but they're not like they're not silly whereas it's that s word again whereas the tv adaptations have historically injected a hint of absurdity to them there is a silliness to them a campy quality to them which weirdly i've always found a little bit alienating like it's not quite what i want from a harlan coben story it's not why i come and this one due to the american setting and because it does take itself quite seriously this is almost the antidote to that like this is almost what i want from a harlan coben story i want it to take itself seriously i want to be swept along with it and not have like a oh like this tongue-in-cheek campiness to it however the problem you i i felt the problem for me here is the campiness of the british versions means that whereas the dialogue is very on the nose it lends itself to that camp tone and i found the serious tone of this was let down by how dreadful the dialogue is and i spelled dialogue d-i-r-e-l-o-g-u-e uh like it genuine see that was probably not great for it but visual gangsta podcast yeah thank you a bit of spelling humor for you there but uh but genuinely there are bits where i was just like i was almost wincing at how on the nose the dialogue was and i thought it just needed a little bit more sophistication because this is actually quite a sophisticated story you know it feels like you know like do you remember double jeopardy the ashley judd movie like it's got double jeopardy is one of my favorite films that is one of the greatest films and if you ever want to understand what Double Deputy is just watch that film it's her best performance honestly that film with Ashley Jard when she goes Maddie do you know who I am oh god but it has a hint of that to it and but there are like so so lines of dialogue concerned me some of the plotting there's nothing wrong with the overall plot but the way it's delivered on screen just clanged a little bit for me and first and foremost for me was the relationship between Burroughs and the warden which literally starts with the you're basically a son to me and you're just like oh no please please no don't say things like that and just the way their interactions are managed was so cumbersome and i just think it needed another pass to make it more organic more subtle more believable to fit the tone of the show because i just don't think that kind of clunky you know very hammy dialogue very cheesy dialogue really worked for the tone of this one and i just i felt a little bit let down by it and but as Steph said like I actually enjoyed it I thought was loads of fun the plotting you know is great like it's a Holland Coburn mystery like and everything that comes with it I just wish the dialogue had a little bit more realism to it so that I kept pulling me out of the story so I think that was that was my big letdown and even the sequences which are clearly ridiculous and there are a number of them you can get away with that I think if you really sell it and I think elements of this maybe didn't quite sell it the way I wanted it to but so anyway those are my those are my very particular quibbles no no no i think that's absolutely right i think you can get away that's my whole point is i think you can get away with that kind of dialogue in a british accent but it for some reason it just doesn't quite land here those very hammy lines less region more tone i think i think if you're going to take yourself if you're going to be very self-serious you have to have dialogue that's believable if you're kind of taking the piss a little bit and being a bit tongue-in-cheek you can get away with an awful lot more whereas i think this just needed slightly more grounded dialogue that wasn't quite so on the nose uh and maybe a little bit more subtlety in the way the the scenes played out but but it is fun like it's it's still a fun film and i really like sam worthington i've got a lot of time for him i get boyd i'm really why have you taken against i love him in that jennifer lawrence i'm an avatar hater isn't it i find him just he's just a bland presence at the center of this you know phenomenon that is he's a he's a he's an actor who i have to say he is an actor who on screen always comes across as taking himself deadly seriously so weirdly he's actually what i want for this role but again with the dialogue i think those two things don't sit that well together was if you'd had someone who maybe was a little less maybe with a little twinkle in their eye you again could get away with the dialogue but that moves away from what i want from the show so you know what's that film that russian spy film that he's in with jennifer lawrence i really like that film you know she does that amazing russian accent what like red uh red sparrow whatever it's called red sparrow yes where she says do this or become a sparrow and she becomes a sparrow is it is sparrow isn't it yeah i believe so yeah it's good it's good it's very good russian yeah he's great in that film i can't believe he's taken against him no no he's good i like him in this he's i think he works in this it's just the blandness at the center avatar that annoys me yeah it's just it's just james is right it's just an anti-avatar thing i find that Okay.

16:04Those films are very awesome. Oh, that's Sam. This is about Avatar. Yeah, Boyd is an artist. By the way, the best ever adaptation of a Harlan Koma book is still, to this day, the French film Tell No One. I knew you were going to say that. Yeah, which is absolutely fantastic. That's my favourite of his books. I should tell no one. Absolutely brilliant. Such a good one. Kristin Scott Thomas among them. Yeah. Anyway. Trey Francais. Trey Francais. That was very... Trey Francais. That's a bit Boisey from Only Fools and Horses, wasn't it? Boisey, yeah.

16:39I will find you by Harlan Cobham which lands on the Netflix when Boidy I think today Thursday the 18th of June you will find it on Netflix today very good and you will find yourself really enjoying it too double hit and you may find yourself living in a talking head song so many references, cultural references So many references. Speaking of which, it's time for the postbag.

17:15Postbag. I'm not going to lie, this week's postbag was absolutely bursting at the seams. Bursting at the seams with feedback, Steph, with feedback. Oh, no. To our Yellowstone Roundup. up. Do they all just say, stop it, stop it now? Well, as we know, Amar took issue with the fact that we were doing the LSM round. He was not happy, not happy at all, and made his objections quite clear. But I thought it was quite even-handed about it while he did so. Oh, God, I'm scared. However, this week, the postbag has had many other, many, many other comments on these lines. So I opened the postbag to get ready for this particular podcast to be greeted to be greeted by an email from russell russell's rent sent us quite a long a long message i'm going to summarize i'm going to summarize russell can never be unkind so come on russell come on okay russell said i'm a long-time listener and pilot plus subscriber i devour each weekly episode as part of my listening routine and have discovered more incredible shows through you than i can count but the core remit of pilot tv is being the guide to every show that matters and that's exactly what keeps me coming back.

18:29I am not a fan of rewatch podcasts. I tune in to pilot to hear about new shows. And he obviously concedes that the pilot premise is routinely stretched when you review second and later seasons, but I actually enjoy that as it's introduced me to some brilliant television. However, the ongoing multi-episode Yellowstone discussion, which began weeks before the actual rewatch even started, is pushing me to my limits. To be completely candid, there's no way I would ever actually unsubscribe. But the mere fact that the thought crossed my mind makes me worry about the broader impact on the show's listener base.

19:04The first season of Yellowstone aired in June 2018. That was eight years ago. What is most disappointing is that James is typically so well in tune with the audience and what they want to hear. This current detour feels like a rare moment of willful disregard for that connection. Please, for the sake of Pilot Plus and for the sake of your loyal paying subscribers and for the sake of your own sanity, stop this madness oh and i read that and i was just like oh my god i was wrong we were wrong steph we should not have done this like this was a folly it's like we said last week this should have been a whatsapp group we're just self-indulgent pricks we are self-indulgent twats and i had embraced that and i was you're ready to come onto this podcast and say russell i'm sorry amar i'm sorry you're both right we have wronged you we have let you down and then steph and then something happened and then i scrolled up in my inbox where i had counts them one two three four five six seven eight nine ten eleven around 20 to 25 messages putting forward a shall we say somewhat different point of view to wit to wit gavin says after this week's letter complaining about how much time in the pod is taken up with yellowstone talk i just wanted to put forward the other side i started series one a couple of years ago and for some reason didn't gel with me and i gave up after four episodes marshals came out and i poo-pooed it same for dutton ranch since i seem to share a lot of the same taste as james once he and steph started waxing lyrical about it i thought i should try again two weeks ago i dived in i finished season one i started season two i went straight into season three i got to the end the cliffhanger dragged me into season four without a break i bought the new james bond game and it went mostly unplayed i downloaded project hail mary and it's still sitting in my amazon stuff still unwatched now I listen to this week's roundup only to hear that you plan to finish it next week and I'm committed to watching the last 14 episodes in 7 days so I can listen to the Dutton Branch segment as soon as I wake up next Thursday sorry for the long-winded email but I just needed to tell you both that you are not alone in this obsession don't listen to the naysayers after all to paraphrase John Dutton the one constant in life is that you build something worth having someone's going to try and take it from you I am obsessed with the fact that he is on this exact same journey as us because I was up to half past two yesterday I was up to half past two this morning when I got to episode 11 of season five and we'll go into it on the Dutton branch but James may or may not have finished the whole thing without me we will explain what is going to happen with that shortly but I should say you know uh Becky says hi James brackets Judas and Steph brackets sneaky sneak oh sneaky sneak I like that I know it's probably not everyone's thing but I am loving the Yellowstone chats there we go another one uh and michael said having listened to your season three yellowstone roundup i felt compelled to write in and say don't listen to any of us do not stop doing the yellowstone roundup just keep doing what you're doing and never mind what people say uh what we got kathy wrote in to say that i just wanted to let you know that dutton branch is the sole reason I finally signed up for Pilot Plus.

22:14No. And the reason I've got it stuck into the fifth and final season of the show myself. I've resisted Pilot Plus before as I don't have access to many of the streamers. But revisiting old faves is worth every penny. Oh my God, Boyd. Listeners won't know this, but Boyd has literally been shaking his head since James started talking about this. He's disgusted by this whole endeavour. Oh my God. I had to download Paramount Plus to my phone, right? So I've now got a Paramount Plus subscription, standalone subscription on my phone because I was in bed and I was like, I've just got to watch some more of them and I can't go downstairs because it's too scary to download them onto my Sky and then watch them on my SkyGo app.

22:52So I was like, no, I'm just going to download it. I'm going to do the seven day trial because I'll finish them in seven days. And that's how crazy this has made me. This whole thing has made me. Oh my God. John wrote in to say how could you possibly doubt that people are enjoying the Dutton branch you tapped into something unexpectedly wonderful in that first instalment there was genuine tension when Steph declared her love for Yellowstone and we weren't sure if James would reciprocate and then each week not knowing which of you will have galloped ahead with the episodes the drama oh it's extraordinary and these go on and on I'm not going to read out all of these but suffice it to say there has definitely been some love here someone did point out just wanted to say that James talks about Yellowstone in the same reverent tones as Downton Abbey.

23:34Dynastic drama, melodramatic storylines, nostalgic rose-tinted depictions of the way a country looks at themselves. I like to call this impact on James the Dutton Abbey effect. Oh, nice. Oh, I like that. That's a good observation, yeah. He's weirdly obsessed with Downton and now this, yeah. Oh, God. Well, we can't get into what we... They're both anomalies in the James brain. They are. I should say, also, John has said, as evidence of this, John's friend has started listening to Pilot Plus purely for the Dutton branch. And each week, John listens to the whole episode of Pilot Plus, then messages her to say which minute the Dutton branch begins so she can dive straight in and listen to that.

24:13So I would like to say to Amar and Russell, we have listened, we have heard you, we have taken your complaints and on board. And in response to your complaints, there will be no Dutton branch in this week's Pilot Plus. We have stopped doing the Yellowstone Roundup as part of Pilot Plus. But, you know, I think it's a tip of the Stetson to Taylor Sheridan himself. We have chosen to do an entire spin-off. And we're going to be doing a standalone Yellowstone episode to address this properly. So you don't have to download it and you don't have to listen to it. Will it be James and Steph's Yellowstone Roundup?

24:49Will it be Pilot TV, the Dutton branch? Will it be Celan and Dyer's Country Living? Home on the Range with Steph and James. Who knows? We have yet to title it, but there will be a one-off episode, which we're going to record next week, and we're going to do it in the studio. And I'm going to even wear a cowboy shirt. I don't own a hat, but if I did, I would wear one. We're going to do it properly and give it the send-off it deserves, where we will talk about Seasons 4 and Seasons 5 and the show, obviously, as a whole. Is it partly because Steph is having a very busy week and, frankly, hasn't yet finished the show?

25:18Yes. Yes, that is a factor. But also, we want to give it the send-off that it deserves. So, yes, prepare for much Yellowstone action. i will be decorating the studio i'll be wearing my most beth dutton outfit ever um if we can get a horse we're bringing one into the studio it's going to be yeah it's going to be filmed it's going to be wild we are going to film it i might even put it up on youtube if i can find a hat i absolutely will do oh we definitely i'm i'm getting you a hat we're putting it on youtube 100 do you want to know something uh something that will genuinely upset you steph oh god what i was going through my my emails uh and not only not only were we offered casey dutton for marshals but they offered to bring rip and beth into the studio for dutton ranch and at the time i went oh we don't watch elaston we don't really know who these characters are i was and also kelly riley i was like been on been on very recently so you know and i turned them down james yes i'm gonna i'm gonna effing murder you when i see you're gonna take me to the train station i am taking you to the train train station baby and you if you're a yellowstone fan you know what that means i swear to god i'm so angry right now it's such a good job that we're so far away from each other i really really did fuck that one up i did actually drop paramount and i and say we're very very happy to have one now and they were like unfortunately we can't do it oh that's desperate that's embarrassing i did i went back to them and i i i at humble pie you have shamed yourself series two of dat them back at some point yeah next time next time we'll get them next time it'll be fine steph i can't believe this has become your main priority you've even thought you've you've positioned this ahead of widow's bay you're not even up today on widow's bay i think it's i've just got one more of widow's bay and i think we at some point said we were going to do a boyd i cannot express the power of yellowstone like like this is it's just it's so overwhelming how much you need to know what happens.

27:14It's just, it's addictive. It is absolutely addictive. If Dutton, if Yellowstone was a drug, I am seriously in trouble. It's honestly that good. It's the fentanyl of... It really is. I can feel Russell and Amar's gazes boring into my soul at this point. So I'm going to say we're going to stop that there. But we are now recording our Yellowstone special in a week. You have a week to send in your questions, your thoughts, anything you would like read out on the show for our Yellow Stand special do send them in to the regular post bag which is postbag at pilottvpod.com and we will read them out on the show while wearing cowboy attire can I make a request if people are right can you write in with your favourite your favourite rip scenes that's what I'd like to know what people's favourite rip scenes and their favourite lines anything like that I would love to hear okay right sorry Amar sorry Russell and we do appreciate that some people do not want to listen to it and so you won't have unless you watch our YouTube.

28:13All right, let us move on to the regular postbag, non-Yellowstone edition. And we begin with a message from Catherine, which says, detour episodes. I'm sure I'm not the only one yelling at my podcast device this week during the discussion of spinoff or detour episodes, having just watched the fantastic episode six of Widow's Bay, called Our History, with the phenomenal Betty Gilpin and a scary Hamish Linklater, which delved into the history of the curse of Widow's Bay, set completely in 1702 and apparently filmed last. This was definitely a great example of this type of episode. Ah, if only you had watched this rather than 138 seasons of Bloody Yellowstone.

28:50Cathy. Cathy, you know what I have to say? I'm just going to say again, like I am the big champion of Widow's Bay. And the only reason I didn't mention that actually is partly because I was getting very confused about what the detour episodes were for quite a lengthy amount of time. But also I didn't want us to spoil anything for people that hadn't watched Widow's Bay. I think Boyd and I both actually said that at the time. There was a great one, but we couldn't talk about it. But absolutely, hold our hands up. Fair point. We're stupid. Someone also pointed out that I mentioned Lost, but didn't talk about the Nicky and Paolo episode, which is obviously the one that people talk about the most when they talk about digression episodes of Lost.

29:28But, you know, we mentioned a few other ones. I also, I mentioned previously that I've been watching the new series of Dark Matter. This won't mean anything to anyone because it hasn't come out yet. But there are two, count them two, SideQuest episodes in the new series of Dark Matter. And they are both excellent. So just thought I'd throw that out there. Robin has a message called A Small Gripe. And it says, hey guys, if James is going to use words like Verisimilitude and irrationally refuse to watch Black Mirror, he should probably take the time to learn the difference between a crash Zoom and the dolly Zoom.

30:00Thank you for your attention to this matter. That is an absolutely fair point. I had been referring to that type of zoom as made famous, or most known, I guess, from that particular shot on Roy Scheider's face and jaws, as I've been calling it a crash zoom. And it is, in fact, that's absolutely right. It's a dolly zoom, not a crash zoom. Mea Culper. That was my mistake. What about a split diopter? What's that? I don't think I've ever used that one, so that's good. It's when you bring both foreground and background into the focus, isn't it? Yes, Brian Palmer uses it a lot. Yeah. My hero. Right.

30:33What else have we got here? this is from Liz and Liz says just wanted to know that I watched all of and absolutely loved Alice and Steve and although Alice obviously made a mess of things I always felt 100 % on her side watching the morning show made me realize just how much I love justifiably angry women being allowed to be properly furious Jennifer Aniston and Nicola Walker both being extremely good at this and it's something we don't see often enough I also wanted to say that if you haven't seen the documentary series the mother of all cons on iPlayer it's really worth watching a compelling story and desire to reveal information in a way that made me drop my jaw on one occasion and say out loud what on another hoping you will have enough to review and discuss during this difficult world cup period have you seen this have you seen the mother of all cons steph this feels like something you'd have seen no it hasn't it's not something i've seen but i feel like i've heard of it i'm gonna i'm gonna i'm gonna writing it down right now it's yeah it's been on bbc i meant to watch it's been on iplayer and bbc3 and everyone's saying it's really it's a mad story but I particularly I agree about angry women that's why I sit next to Steph all day so

31:40Boyd literally right I'm going to take a photo of us when we sit together because what happens all day long right is I talk to Boyd all day and he tries in various ways not to engage with me because otherwise he would not get any work done because I'm just talking to him all day and asking him questions and my other thing that I do that he absolutely hates is I look at him whilst I'm talking to someone else. And he's like, are you talking to me? I'm like, no, I'm just looking in your direction. But I could be talking to a person and he hates it. So yes, no. And I do get a little bit excited sometimes.

32:13So, okay. Right. This is a message from Peter. And Peter says, Never emailed previously, but wanted your take, if I haven't already missed it, regarding season two of Paradise. We enjoyed the first season. I thought it was well-written, clever and entertaining. What the hell happened in series two? It actually made me angry. What a mess. Almost everything that happens has no real bearing on the story. It's terrible. Surely you must think the same. It's now a test of your punditry. Well, I suggested that we do a little bit of Paradise spoiler chat in this episode, but was unfortunately told by Boydie that he was too lazy to finish the season once again.

32:50So all I can do is apologize on his behalf. Listen, I told you, I said, I was getting more, I watched more episodes, and I was like more than halfway through, but I hadn't, and you took that to me, oh, I finished it. Meanwhile, I targeted Widow's Bay, thinking, oh, Steph's going to want to do that. I've got a special for that, because that actually ends this week. Yeah, that would have been a good one. And it would be perfectly timed. And now she's abandoned that as well, because she's claiming she's busy and she's writing. Could we point out the irony? Steph, the original champion of Widow's Bay, the torchbearer, if you will, abandoned it for Yellowstone.

33:21I have already explained my addiction problems, okay? I don't need to explain them again. Okay. Luckily, with Kay coming in soon, I think we are actually going to do a spoiler special for Rivals. Yes, you are. Because that is... On next week's plus, you and Kay get to talk about Rivals. Yes, it's still topical. And then at some point, when Steph finishes Widows Bay, which obviously, you and I are now supporting and Steph has abandoned, then, you know, you can talk about Rivals. Oh, God. Message here from Simon, and it's Reality TV, or is it? I wanted to email after hearing the traitors referred to as reality TV on the pod and James using that as a reason not to watch surely it's a game show not reality TV made in Chelsea Geordie Shaw and Towie could be called reality TV but the traitors surely not does it need a genre to itself I'd hate to think James is missing out based on a false pigeonholing of the show I I can answer this.

34:17Reality TV has become an overall genre referring to pretty much anything that's not scripted or, you know, a format, a kind of actual game show format like, what would I like to you or something? You wouldn't call that reality TV. But a competition show featuring celebrities in a specific closed setting, i.e. the castle where they film The Traitors, and whereby you're watching, or even the civilian version, and you're watching them competing against each other, that is less of a game show and more of a reality TV show in the current designation, if you like. So it's almost like you're probably right purely in an accurate way of saying, you know, yes, sure, The Traitors is a competition, it's a game show in some ways, but they used to call Big Brother a game show back in the day.

35:11It's only a game show became like a phrase they'd say about Big Brother because it is still a competition between the contestants. But predominantly, it's a reality show. And I think still, The Traitors is predominantly a reality show. So that would be my defense of using that phrase. Yes, because it's, I think, a reality TV show. Yeah, yeah. But I mean, there are ambiguous kind of genre bleeds into other, you know. Yeah, that's fair. Because you've got, as you say, it melds kind of almost like it's a knockout type tasks with kind of inter-character drama and eviction and all of that stuff. So it's a blending of things.

35:50It's actually a classic reality TV format, really. And reality TV, at that point, has come to mean this type of show 100%. This one comes from Mark and it says, Hi team, I want to talk about snippets of future episodes. This is happening more and more, with a coming up section at the end of each episode showing bits of the future. The most recent one is Spider Noir. I don't like it. It gives away the plot. I have to scroll through. What do you think? Can I answer this? Of course. Because if you remember when we reviewed Spider Noir, so what was this listener's name? That was Mark. Mark, I'm with you.

36:24I'm totally with you. That coming up at the end of Spider Noir gives it, completely gives it away. You are 100 % right. however if you remember when we reviewed it I felt that I wasn't getting enough action in the first one and I may have given up on it had I not seen that coming up I think that was strategic because I think they knew by the end of that first episode people hadn't had enough I thought it was very I think I thought the pace was all off on that first first episode so actually I was like oh it's okay because I watched the coming up and it's going to give me what I really want and I really need but you're 100 % right and if you were more patient and faithful as you clearly were mark that would have spoiled it yeah you're totally right I don't mind when at the end of a first episode they say like this season on insert show name I sometimes don't think that's a bad thing for all the reasons you've just said because you might be on the fence about whether you're going to watch more of it and then that might be oh actually I do want to see what happens oh okay it's going in an interesting direction oh okay there's stuff coming up you know so I sometimes think that's not bad as a way of kind of driving you to to watch more i hate it when at the end of an episode they'll say next week on this show like that bugs the hell out of me because it's a massive spoiler i don't want to know i'll just i'll watch the next episode you don't need to sell it to me it's fine the thing i hate more than that is something that was an absolute mainstay of kind of 80s television when you'd have right at the front of the show a clip reel of everything that was going to happen in that episode do you remember this where it'd be like it'd give you like almost like the entire show in microcosm at the beginning and one of my favorite shows of all time ron d moore's 2003 battle star galactica did that every single episode at the end of the title sequence they had a little montage of all the major beats that were going to happen in that episode and so every single episode i have to cover my eyes during that period before it started and i never understood why they did it you're saying that they'd have like a title sequence yep and then like a like a little montage of stuff about to happen in the episode yep really mental yes that happened in other shows did it it was where they used to do it as back in the 80s they used to do it where they would show you what was coming up on the show but i'd never like this is a weird thing to come out in 2003 because it used to be like you'd have the end of the music and then you have this dum-dum this percussive bit of music would go on for maybe what 10-15 seconds and it was just flashes of imagery from that episode of the show but obviously massive spoilers and it yeah drove It was absolutely mad.