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Second Rate Second Chance: The Letdowns of Love is Better the Second Time Around and Living With Him

And we're back! We brought our good friend @twig-tea back to talk about how two Japanese BLs should have been 10s but absolutely flopped for us. This week we're talking about second chance romances, long-term pining, and their roles in queer narratives. Join us to break down what it's like to watch a show fall apart in real time.

Timestamps

The timestamps will now correspond with chapters on Spotify for easier navigation.

00:00:00 - Welcome 00:01:15 - Intro 00:02:38 - Love Is Better The Second Time Around: What Worked 00:13:31 - Love Is Better The Second Time Around: What Didn’t Work 00:23:32 - Love Is Better The Second Time Around: Final Thoughts and Ratings 00:26:54 - Living With Him: How it Started 00:36:33 - Living With Him: Where it Went Wrong 00:44:40 - Living With Him: Final Thoughts and Ratings 00:52:03 - Why The Queerness Matters

The Conversation Transcripts!

Thanks to the continued efforts of @ginnymoonbeam as transcriber, and @lurkingshan as an editor and proofreader, we are able to bring you transcripts of the episodes.

We will endeavor to make the transcripts available when the episodes launch, and it is our goal to make them available for past episodes (Coming soon thanks to @wen-kexing-apologist). When transcripts are available, we will attach them to the episode post (like this one) and put the transcript behind a Read More cut to cut down on scrolling.

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00:00:00 - Welcome

NiNi

Welcome to The Conversation About BL, aka The Brown Liquor Podcast.

Ben

And there it is. I’m Ben.

NiNi

I’m NiNi.

Ben

And we’re you’re drunk Caribbean uncle and auntie here sitting on the porch in the rocking chairs.

NiNi

Four times a year we pop in to talk about what’s going on in the BL world.

Ben

We shoot the shit about stories and all the drama going into them. I review from a queer media lens.

NiNi

And I review from a romance and drama lens.

Ben

So if you like cracked-out takes and really intense emotional analysis…

NiNi

If you like talking about artistry, industry, and the discourse…

Ben

And if you generally just love simping…

NiNi

There is a lot of simping on this podcast…

Ben

We are the show for you!

00:01:15 - Intro

Ben

And we're back. This week, we're gonna be unpacking two Japanese shows that really let us down this season in our Second Rate Second Chance episode. We've brought our friend twig-tea back to the podcast.

Say hi, Twig.

Twig

Hi everyone.

Ben

We brought Twig back on because Twig and I have been watching Japanese BL and Japanese cinema for a long time. We have seen a lot of the good and bad of Japanese BL, and unfortunately both Love is Better the Second Time Around and Living with Him fall into the bad column for us.

We both have a genuine fondness for the way that Japanese teams often execute queerness with a lot of approachable specificity that really lets both of us connect to the queer truth of these characters.

That's personally important for me because, beyond these shows kind of fumbling the bag, they also undercut the queer narratives they're telling with some of the mistakes they've made. This is something that's becoming a burgeoning issue for me and Twig in our discussions about the state of global BL, and so we're going to also get into that towards the end.

00:02:38 - Love Is Better The Second Time Around: What Worked

NiNi

Let's start with Love is Better the Second Time Around. Ben, what is Love is Better the Second Time Around about?

Ben

Love is Better the Second Time Around is a second chance Japanese BL about two guys in their earlyish 30s who were very close in their teens when they were in school together, broke up, and are now running into each other again as a result of work.

Our main character's name is Miyata Akihiro. He is an editor for some sort of business and economics magazine and he is assigned to work with this writer and professor, who happens to be his childhood boyfriend. They were supposed to be very serious, and then they had a really painful breakup at a crucial moment. Iwanaga Takashi has clearly still been in love with Miyata this whole time and is flirting relentlessly with this man. They work through some, but not all of their issues and are able to start going out together again before the show absolutely shits the bed.

Before we get to that portion of it,Twig! Walk us through the early developments when we were initially responding positively to the show and what we were really dialed in on.

Twig

The first four episodes of this show were some of my favorite television this year. Which is why I’m so upset about the last two, but we'll get there.

When they meet each other as adults, the messiness of their past is established right away, and you can feel the tension between them. The grudge that Miyata holds is really fun to watch. Iwanaga is a real flirt. He leans into the sort of playboy personality that was also really fun to watch.

It immediately felt adult. Iwanaga admitted to having casual sex with his assistant. Miyata made fun of him for it. They had a kiss in that first episode. It was so good. Miyata decided that he was an adult now, and he wasn't gonna be pushed around by his senpai from high school anymore. The assistant, Shiraishi, was a bitch. A really fun bitch to watch. [laughs]

Ben

[laughs] He really was. He was a real bitch for like, the first four or five episodes. I loved it.

NiNi

I enjoyed that.

Ben

He was played by Takamatsu Aloha, who was in Tokyo in April Is… playing Ren there. It was really fun to see him again.

NiNi

He really nailed the whole bitchy, “Who is this new person? Why are they around this person that I am perceiving to be my man? I need to get rid of this person quick, fast. What is the fastest way that I can do that?” Mm, loved it. It was so, so bitchy. Perfect.

Twig

And it played so well to what felt like the point of the story, which was that the main characters are older now, and to have this younger person around acting younger really helped highlight the fact that these older characters are a little bit more mature and so they're making slightly more mature decisions. [laughs] I won't say very much more mature, but a little bit. He actually worked really well to help emphasize that part of the story.

And we learned early on that Miyata was trying to get engaged; we also see him [laughs] fail at it so badly. That scene is one of my favorites, where he's opening the ring box and Fukuda-san, she won't let him propose. She keeps closing it in his face.

Ben

That was honestly one of the most enjoyable meta moments about BL, where the girl who doesn't deserve this sees a very bad proposal coming and physically restrains [laughs] restrains [NiNi laughs] the main character from opening the ring box so he can't propose.

NiNi

It was super funny. So good. She was just like, nope, nope, nope, nope, nope.

Twig

It was perfect. And then, of course Miyata then called Iwanaga to complain about not being allowed to propose, which was perfect and gave more opportunities for extreme flirting.

I loved so much that these two characters started having sex again while Miyata was still mad and still unwilling to be in a relationship with Iwanaga. Miyata confirming that the sex did not mean anything.

NiNi

I loved that he was just like, “I wondered if you were good at this. I'm so mad at you right now.” [NiNi and Twig laugh] That was so funny!

Ben

That was also kinda hot, let's be real.

Twig

Yes! Ben and I had a whole conversation about how finally a scene with tension in yukatas pays off and we see people actually have sex.

Ben

Let me tell you. The real sign that you've been in Japanese BL for a while is when you see two fuckin’ boys in yukata sharing a room together and you know no one's gonna fuck.

Twig

Right? [laugh]

Ben

There's a fun one for the listeners. Sound off in the comments. List all of the Japanese BL that put those boys in yukata and then did not deliver.

Twig

But we got it in this one, finally. And we also got that iconic line, “If you love me, don't apologize.” Which is also, whoo.

NiNi

I did enjoy that. “Do not apologize for this because I'm ‘bout to have a good ass time.”

Ben

I wanna do a quick follow up on one of the comments you made about the maturity of these characters relative to Shiraishi in the story. This is a moment where Shiraishi intentionally doesn't deliver a message about an updated deadline to Iwanaga for the column he's writing for Miyata’s magazine. And it causes a real problem because now Miyata has to go rush to Iwanaga, who was away on a work trip, and get him to hurriedly write this article. It leads to an important sex scene, which is great for us and the yukata delivery that we were very happy about. But I really like that Miyata is so done with Shiraishi. When he finally confronts him about it, he's like, “I don't care if you don't like me, but you're fucking up other people’s lives when you do shit like this.” He wasn't angry at him, the just jaded disappointment cut that man to the fucking bone. He was not ready for it.

Twig

It both illustrated Miyata being more mature and also wasn't letting Shiraishi get to him, that you're not actually a threat, but you're now a problem, so you need to stop. It really highlighted how young and petty he was.

Ben

I really love the way you sum that up. “You're not a threat, you're a problem” is so succinct. And that's really what hurt him in that moment, he realized he had really fucked up. There's no winning at that point. There's only the huge loss of face on his part.

Twig

Exactly.

And then we got Miyata jerking off to Iwanaga’s face in the shower.

Ben

It was really accessible sexuality in this show that was actually really surprising for us because we've been dealing with a lot of cutesy BL lately, it feels like, so it was really refreshing to have these guys have access to their own sexuality and be able to express that and act on it.

Twig

There are ways in which sex is handled in BL. Sometimes it's held back to add tension to a story, but it's often also done in a way that makes the story feel puritanical. From episode 1, we knew that they wanted to fuck. By episode 3 they were fucking.

That just felt so refreshing. Yeah, these are grown ass adults who have had a previous relationship before. They know each other, so there's some level of familiarity there. They're attracted to each other. They want to bone down and so they do. That seems perfectly reasonable. It's actually ridiculous it doesn't happen more often.

NiNi

From the moment that Iwanaga sees Miyata again, it's game on. He's like, “Okay, this? This is happening. I don't care what it's going to take for this to happen, but this is absolutely happening.”

Twig

He bought that man cufflinks.

NiNi

He did what needed to be done, absolutely. He was not playing around. He decided that this is what they're doing and he made it happen.

Ben

So I think what I really wanna highlight here about this particular show with the second chance component is we were actually super dialed in on how seriously the show was taking that part of the premise. Iwanaga comes from a very wealthy family and he was dealing with some shit and he was like, we're gonna run away. Normal, stupid kid shit. The two of them planned to meet at the train station and get out of there and go make it in Tokyo. A stupid character we'll talk about later complicates the situation by convincing Miyata that Iwanaga is just toying with him. Miyata is hurt and embarrassed by this, and does not show up to go on the train. The two of them end up separated by Iwanaga’s family circumstances, and that was their big break.

So when they meet up again, Miyata has real beef with this man. And the show doesn't downplay the seriousness of Miyata’s hurt. That was such a real relief. If the characters have done real harm to each other, we do need to focus on the reconciliation that's critical for this relationship to work this time, and that was something that this show was handling so seriously. Even though Iwanaga wasn't actually giving Miyata all the things that we, the audience, were like, he needs to do these things if it's gonna work. His charm was enough that Miyata was wanting for them to complete the reconciliation.

We don't get second chance like this where the breakup was actually the fault of one of the guys, even if it's complicated by familial homophobia stuff. They were serious about each other at the time, but Iwanaga was doing this playboy shit even then. And so Miyata can't feel secure with him because it's the same bullshit again. I like that their 30 year old selves were not fundamentally different from their younger selves. They were just more experienced.

Twig

The last thing on my list of when I was still really vibing with the show is the “feelings-off,” as I like to call it. Miyata challenged Iwanaga, “You never felt as strongly about me as I felt about you” and Iwanaga said, “Try me.” And so Miyata challenges him, “Did you ever cry about me into your pillow? Did you think about me when I wasn't there? Do you jerk off to me, ‘cause I did.” He gives him four or five things to say, “Were you this embarrassing about me, because I haven't seen you be embarrassing about me.” And Iwanaga says, “Yes. I was.” And that's finally the thing that allows Miyata to give him another chance.

00:13:31 - Love Is Better The Second Time Around: What Didn’t Work

NiNi

So we build all that up. We're having a great time. Everybody's vibing with the show. And then it all turns.

From the time that the family started showing up, that was when the show went, to me, off the rails. I was just like, all of this is interesting, but not the same story that they were telling all the time.

Ben

It was confusing. We were in this really solid second chance romance arc where we were focused on the guys rebuilding their relationship with each other. And then it feels like they didn't know what to do with the guys once the “fuck you, don't touch me” barrier falls away. They immediately complicate that by trying to reintroduce Iwanaga's family trauma as this sudden barrier.

This is the common theme with the two shows that we’re gonna talk about, introducing contrived bullshit barriers to keep the characters apart and fuck up their ability to talk to each other when the entire arc is built upon these guys improving the way they talk to each other. That's the real fundamentally unsatisfying aspect of all of this. I'm usually a defender for the way people interact in Japanese cinema. We talk about trying to bring a level of cultural competency to watching Asian media, having been raised in the west. Respect the way that these cultures handle some of their communication protocols when they're engaging with each other. We talk about respecting the way honorifics work in these languages and how that impacts the way these people talk about each other. Listening to some of the tones they use with each other, about how certain terms immediately signify things, and these things don't always translate well. You just have to be able to hear and understand these things. I don't really wanna give these two shows that we're gonna to continue talking about here a lot of credit for this.

This show was in the middle of a really satisfying second chance romance arc of rebuilding a relationship and then completely throws that out the fuckin’ window. Iwanaga is now the male scion of a wealthy family that disowned him for being a homo, but now needs him to come back because his sister is like, “Yeah, fuck all this Japanese nonsense. I'm marrying a foreign man and we're gonna r-u-n-n-o-f-t. That's fine as an arc on its own, but I kinda wish we had like an extra episode or two for these guys to move further along their arc before we introduced that, and it was doubly frustrating because Iwanaga immediately regresses in a way that is not satisfying because he isn't our main character. If Miyata was the one who was suddenly regressing, we have been in that man's head. We were in the shower when he was beating his dick to this dude. We get it. We know what this man is going through. So if he were the one to regress, we would be down with it. We would understand the emotional complexities that he was facing. But the difficulty with Iwanaga being the one to suddenly back off in the middle of all this family nonsense is we never understood the family nonsense. So reintroducing that with this shit heel of a cousin who really wants to fuck Iwanaga was just so deeply unsatisfying, and honestly kind of offensive, because they don't even dwell on it. They're relying on the shorthand of us just going, “Well, they're gay, right? Homophobia. Whatchu gonna do?”

NiNi

[laughs] What I was gathering the story was leading up to the family coming in at that point in time, is that at this point in the story, maybe their romantic feelings had gotten ahead of their commitment. So they're feeling a lot of things, but they haven't talked about a lot of things. They haven't decided what they're gonna do or who they're going to be to each other. They're just sitting in the moment enjoying being together, enjoying having sex and all that kind of stuff. But they haven't really decided what they're gonna be. And then all this family shift comes in so you're just like, oh, okay, they're out over their skis. They don't know what they're doing. All this stuff is happening at exactly the wrong time because it's throwing them back into a history that they haven't really dealt with. Okay, this is good.

But then instead of focusing on that, they focus it towards Iwanaga’s family and what actually happened back then and how it affects Iwanaga, and that doesn't really work? I don't care about that at this point in time. I want to know what's happening with Miyata and Iwanaga’s relationship.

Twig

I think there's room for where we could have cared about it, but we weren't given time or space. There's a story there of Iwanaga so alienated from his family that he wanted to run away with his boyfriend, and they found out about it, and he took all of the blame and didn't let anyone know who Miyata was so that he wouldn't get in trouble. And so his family disowned him. He was cut out of the family registry and cut out of his family’s life. There's a really tragic story there and we're given almost no time to sit with that or care about it. His hurt isn't given any time.

Instead, we just find out that Iwanaga made the decision to let Miyata think he was the butt of a joke and stay heartbroken for years, decade, rather than admit that Iwanaga had family problems when they were kids. And then we see him be willing to let Miyata go again for the exact same reason as adults. And so all of the work we'd seen Miyata do to process what had happened in their relationship in the past and decide to trust Iwanaga again. Iwanaga betrayed that trust, frankly, by not allowing himself to be vulnerable with Miyata. We find out in the very last episode that Miyuata actually fell in love with Iwanaga in a vulnerable moment, he saw him crying alone on the pier, and that was where his feelings turned to love. So we know that Miyata cares about Iwanaga as a person who is not perfect, and he wants Iwanaga to be less cool. And Iwanaga has not learned the lesson.

So, I left this series feeling like I can't trust this relationship to continue in any other way than exactly the way it's happened twice before. It's very frustrating.

Ben

There’s this moment in, like, episode 5 or 6 where Miyata goes and confronts Shiraishi, who decides to stop being a bitch at the final moment. Why?

Twig

I was disappointed.

Ben

He should have been a bitch the whole time. [laughs]

Twig

I just needed to see this man be mean to Miyata one more time and they didn't give me that.

Ben

That's the point, because Iwanaga never has that important vulnerable moment with Miyata. The emotional reveal has to come from the not-rival, which is not satisfying.

You know what? I'm not done bitching. Let's talk about what the show thought it was doing with the cousin. I feel like the cousin is meant here to be the stand in for what trying to be queer and closeted inside of this family does to you. So we get this vile man in Sugimoto who is just so gross and playing these goofy, manipulative games trying to achieve some sort of position for himself or his branch of the family. Is what I think they thought they were doing? It did not land for me at all.

Twig

Yeah. At some point, it seemed like we were supposed to believe that Sugimoto was secretly on Iwanaga and Miyata’s side the whole time. And he was, like, testing them and that test was supposed to be some sort of thing that they should be grateful for. I was like, no.

Ben

I'm gonna do that the next time I get called on some bullshit. You passed the test!

[all laugh]

NiNi

I legit don't understand, like I actually don't narratively understand what happened there. Not just in terms of what they thought they were doing thematically, but narratively that whole part of the story is so confusing.

Ben

NiNi is correct. The first four episodes we were like, “This is a banger. This is gonna be a 10. We gotta tell all the other girlies you need to watch this.” Episode 5 happens, we were like, “Whoa, what the fuck?” And then by the time episode 6 ends, we're like, “Never mind, girls. You don't need to follow us in this one.”

Twig

Shiraishi and Sugimoto have the same role and arc in that final episode.

Ben

Like, we already had a bitch. We didn't need another one!

Twig

Two bitches is too many bitches. [laughs]

Ben

And they didn't even team up and have, like, nasty sex or something.

Twig

Oh my God, I could have forgiven everything if that had happened.

NiNi

First of all, “Two bitches is too many bitches” is perfect, but the other thing is it feels like they thought they needed to have a bitch in the past and a bitch in the present.

Twig

Do you want me to tell you my theory?

Ben

Oh, bestie, I want to hear all of your theories. Go for it.

NiNi

Tell us. Tell us. Spill the tea.

Twig

So I tried really hard to find the manga for this because I needed to know what had gone wrong in the adaptation and I couldn't find it. If anyone out there has it, please send it to me. What I do know is that there are three volumes and that it's still ongoing. One of the things that Japan likes to do, usually one of its worst mistakes when they do an adaptation, is they try to squeeze together at least two volumes into what should be one volume series adaptation. And so we get one really good arc, and then an entire volume or two squeezed into the very end, feeling rushed because they are rushed. So that's my totally uneducated, but based on experience, guess about why this felt like two different shows and two different arcs. Because it probably was?

00:23:32 - Love Is Better The Second Time Around: Final Thoughts and Ratings

Ben

Unfortunately, that is gonna end it for this show. I really want you all, if you've taken the time to listen to us, to really understand that…end of episode 4, we were like 10s, 10s all around. This show is doing some great shit. There's some hot messes here that need to be resolved, but the way that we're being led through this with these characters, the way they're talking to each other, the way we're in it with them was so, so satisfying. Before this show shits the bed.

I am a queer cinema critic who really loves BL and the role it fulfills in the global queer cinema landscape. My goal is to connect other queer people to meaningful stories that they can enjoy. And sometimes that means that we have to say a show really fucked up, guys. If you do watch it, please understand that we loved the show for four episodes and then it transitions in a way that is not satisfying at all. But the first four episodes were still some of the best shit we've seen in a long time. And with that in mind, let's rate this motherfucker!

NiNi?

NiNi

I get to go first. Oh me, oh my.

Ben

We love J-BL, so you get to rate without us giving our ratings. [laugh]

NiNi

I will give this a 6.5. Disappointing me at the end is always gonna hurt me more than something that was wobbly from the start.

Ben

Twig-tea?

Twig

I gave it a 7. After I first finished it I gave it an 8, but the longer it sat with me, the madder I got. So I’ve downgraded it.

Ben

It is also a 7 for me, because where this show goes wrong is very obvious. I think BL viewers would learn a lot about the genre from watching this and understanding where some of us have come from. With that in mind, I'm giving this show a 6.9 from The Conversation because the sex was good in this show.

[NiNi and Twig laugh]

NiNi

Producer privilege rearing its head, I see you, I see you.

Twig

We didn't talk about how pretty Iwanaga is.

Ben

You know, we have not simped over these men. Let's talk about how fuckin’ beautiful Furuya Robin and Hasegawa Makoto were. Holy shit! We have needed some older guys in J-BL—older being 30, for fucks sake. [NiNi laughs] But these guys are fucking beautiful.

Twig

He put on his reading glasses and I [goofy voice] swooned.

NiNi

Hasegawa Makoto was a delight to look at.

Ben

Holy shit! As we're recording this, it is Furuya Robin’s birthday. Happy birthday, sir.

Twig

Happy birthday!

NiNi

Happy birthday, indeed. Keep aging like fine wine.

I'm so mad, though, this show was at 10 right up until, like episode 5, and then it went from a 10 to 6.5.

Ben

It really was. NiNi’s rating is not off. If I didn't think the show was useful to talk about for people, I would have given it probably a 6.

NiNi

Love is Better the Second Time Around gets a 6.9 from The Conversation, recommended with severe caveats.

00:26:54 - Living With Him: How it Started

NiNi

Let's move on to the next show that disappointed us: Living With Him. Ben, what is Living With Him about?

Ben

[deep sigh] Living With Him is about how we will never get the roommates BL that we deserve. [NiNi laughs] All of the energy that we were supposed to get out of roommates BL was lost to the Philippines during the quarantine period. We blew all of that energy on lockdown stories. Goddammit!

Living With Him is about two college freshmen who are going to live together because they were once childhood friends, and their moms think it might be financially beneficial and emotionally beneficial for the two of them to reconnect, since they're both going away to start school away from home and they would like for them to have someone to live with that they also know. We're primarily following Natsukawa Ryota, who is so excited to be going to college. He has dyed his hair brown. He is no longer gonna be doing house chores and taking care of his little sisters. He is ready to spread his little wings and figure out who his actual personality is going to be. He is living with his childhood friend, Tanaka Kazuhito, who is obviously gay and obviously has had a huge crush on Natsukawa for a long time. Kazuhito is also dealing with some major changes in his life—he was a national competing level baseball player in high school who can no longer play baseball due to a shoulder injury. It's very clear that Kazuhito has feelings for Natsukawa, and Natsukawa picks up on this fairly quickly, particularly because all of Kazuhito's friends are being real shady about it.

And I was really excited about what this show was going to be, because this was about two childhood friends reconciling and dealing with this major thing between them. What was really enjoyable about this show—now that we covered the premise of two childhood friends moving together, one of them has a crush, the other one picks up on it—is they talk about this crush in episode 3, and we were primed for the rest of the show to deal with this crush being in the open and reconciling what that change in your relationship is gonna look like.

Where this show goes wrong. After episode 3, episode 4 is them being awkward around each other—a completely reasonable reaction. They come to some sort of agreement by the end of that, and decide they’re going to go on a trip together in episode 5, but they do nothing with that. Episode 6 is a useless fuckin’ flashback episode about shit we already knew to lead into the seventh episode where Kazuhito decides to preemptively reject himself for Natsukawa's benefit, who suddenly can't open his fuckin’ mouth. Into stupid forced separation nonsense for a whole fuckin’ episode and then Japanese track star run for no reason, don't link up with each other, and then pick up episode 8 not dealing with the failed Japanese track star BL run. And we end on this perfunctory note where they wanna suddenly get us back on track in the finale.

Gone on an extensive ramble there. I apologize for you having to edit that, NiNi.

NiNi

I was just lettin’ you cook, fam.

Ben

I would like for you to unpack your experience coming behind us and catching up with our disappointment.

NiNi

As usual, when it comes to the shorter BLs, I like to binge, so I started Living With Him loving everything about it, loving the emotional core of what it is. One of the big things that really got to me is that they do, throughout the show, have flashbacks to their childhood, and there's a lot of good The Knowing content in there. I was just like, “Oh yes, this is so good. He's been feeling this way for such a long time. We're gonna delve into that. It's gonna be so good. It's gonna be so emotional.” [sigh]

And then they don't really do anything with that. For five episodes, the show had me. Kazuhito is teasing Ryota, saying-not-saying the thing. Ryota basically figures it out with the help of Kazuhito’s friends. He's now starting to think, “Okay, well, what is this?” To have a conversation about it. And then you're getting into episode 4 and episode 5, where they’re turning these things around in their heads, and then the last thing that happens in episode 5 that I really responded to, they have like a physical movement where he tells Kazuhito “You can hug me,” basically. And that moment was so heavy. It was so good. And I'm looking forward to having the outgrowth of that moment. And instead we get a fuckin’ flashback. [laughs] And then we get weird sort of casual-homophobia-not-homophobia from Kazuhito's mother.

Ben

Worse, we got compulsory heterosexuality.

NiNi

And then it's like that didn't happen in the end like, okay, that's a digression that we went on. We don't know why we did that. We're going back to the main story now. But now I've lost the emotional thread. They're doing all this stuff and it's cute or whatever, they decided they're going to be together, great, but it's not landing anymore. They've lost me. They've broken the tension. They've broken the emotional thread. I don't feel it anymore.

Okay. So, Ben and I have both talked a lot. Twig you step in here. What are your thoughts about this? How did you feel that the show went wrong? What did you think the show did well?

Ben

Walk us through your process, Twig.

Twig

It’s so, so bad. [laughs]

Ben

Walk us through it, bestie.

Twig

All right. Okay. I was so invested in these two. We start with Natsukawa and the show sets up so well that he's excited to be on his own, and he's unsure about his childhood friend Kazuhito being there. Kazuhito is immediately weird in ways that throw Natsukawa off, and which the audience, or at least the gay audience, immediately clock as, “Oh, this man is gay and catty about it.” NiNi, you called it teasing. Oh, it’s more than that. I was having so much fun with Kazuhito and the way he was like, “Mmm. I wonder what it could be. Why would girls always be unhappy with me as their boyfriend? I wonder.” This man. [laughs]

NiNi

It was so good. He was basically like, “I am trying to tell you in every way possible that I am A) gay and B) into you, and you are just not picking this up, sir.”

Twig

And he was mean about it in a way that wasn't mean mean, but when they go on their adorable not-date, which was some of the best domesticity we've had in a while, Kazuhito says to Natsukawa, “It's all right, you wouldn't get it.” The way he was just calling him out for being obliviously heteronormative without actually calling him out, it was beautiful. And the best part about that was he was wrong. Natsukawa did figure it out, and so Kazuhito being so sure that Natsukawa was too straight to get it, actually blew up in his face in a way that I loved.

The way that they were so honest with each other and the way that they cared about their relationship, this is one of the things that this show does really right about friends to lovers. Even though they're a little bit unsure with each other cause they haven't talked in a while, they still really care about this relationship between the two of them, and they don't wanna fuck that up. But rather than not fuck it up by holding it all in, they actually talk to each other about it ‘cause both of these men have an understanding that communication is actually important. Both of them say to each other at one point or another, “I think you've misunderstood something that I said. I'm gonna clarify that.” Or, “I said that that was a joke, but I was actually lying about that. I did mean it.” The fact that we got to a place where Kazuhito owned his feelings and said, “Listen, tell me if you're uncomfortable, but I'm happy to just keep things as they are” and Natsukawa immediately empathized with him and said, “Wow, this must have been so hard for you. Is there anything I can do to make this better for you?” That was beautiful. It was such a loving moment, even though it wasn't romantic yet? Their relationship was so good and then the show fucked it up so badly. [laughs]

The other thing I loved about this show, before I move on to why I'm so mad at it, was the way they used the friendship group to establish that Kazuhito had clearly talked about this man before, when he wasn't around, [laugh] to the point where his friends recognize who he was and how important he was to Kazuhito. So they met Natsukawa—they treated him like he was a minor celebrity. Like, “This is Natsukawa?”

NiNi

He reminded me of What Did You Eat Yesterday? When what's-her-name finally meets Kenji.

Twig

Oh yes! Yes.

Ben

I would like for you to note that NiNi is the one who brought up What Did You Eat Yesterday? this time, not me. [Twig and Ben laugh]

NiNi

Duly noted. It's delightful. He doesn't even have to introduce himself. Yoshida is like, “Oh, you must be Natsukawa.” And he's like, “What?” and she's like, “Shhh shh shh shh shhhh. Don't worry about how I know that.”

Twig

Kazuhito gets called away and he's like, “Come on, guys. Let's go there.” And they’re like, “No, we're good. We're gonna stay and talk to this man.” [Twig and NiNi laugh]

NiNi

The gossip is here! Why would you go where you are, this is where the good stuff is.

Twig

[sigh] And then.

00:36:33 - Living With Him: Where it Went Wrong

Ben

And then! Take us in, Twig.

Twig

Okay, so, episode 4 happened, and I did appreciate sitting with the awkwardness after the intensity of those emotional conversations and the uncertainty of what things were gonna be like now. That actually felt true. But the problem was it started to feel slow. This is where I think it started to drag.

Episode 5 was clearly filler. We go camping. Okay, there shoulda been a kiss. I'm still mad about it. What it seemed like they were trying to do with the camping episode was establish some of Natsukawa's insecurities. He wants to seem a little more competent and cool in front of Kazuhito. That already felt a bit weird to me because in their apartment he's the one who cooks, so he already has established himself as someone who does things that Kazuhito can't. He also in the flashbacks, in the earlier episodes to their childhood, was established as the one in Kazuhito's life who didn't see him as perfect. Who liked him as he was and as not perfect. So for him to suddenly be caught up in Kazuhito as a perfect guy didn't feel true to the character we'd gotten to that point?

NiNi

I felt like this episode was really about Natsukawa trying to flirt. I feel like Natsukawa has certain confidences, but the insecurities that Natsukawa is dealing with here are about his romantic potential. It's not that he sees himself as smaller or less, but it's more like when it comes to romance and sex and all those things he doesn't feel as confident in that way.

Twig

I agree with you, which is why it was so weird that so much of the camping thing was about how Natsukawa learned all of these camping things so that he could give Kazuhito a good time and then couldn't get the lighter started and so they had to rely on these girls. It felt like they were focusing on the wrong parts of him that he didn't have confidence in.

NiNi

But if he's trying to flirt with Kazuhito in this way, then maybe it's more like, “I'm trying to flirt and I'm failing at it” kind of thing.

Ben

See and this is where things could have been really interesting. Here is the problem: Natsukawa wanting to take care of Kazuhito as his primary way to respond to their situation made total sense. The only skills he's really developed outside of studying are domestic chores. Being unable to deliver on that front when they went camping was totally reasonable and there was something potentially interesting there, but they don't really deal with that properly. There's this actually kind of satisfying moment at the end where he says plainly, “I want you to rely on me more,” that lands pretty smoothly from where we were in episode 3, where he was like, “You must have been holding this for a long time. How do I help you?” And ending on “rely on me more, dummy,” was absolutely fine.

The big problem for me was episode 6. If the thematic point and the thrust of episode 5 is “rely on me more, dummy” the byproduct and answer to that in episode 6 should have been that man waking up and saying, “I've always relied on you.” But instead, the show backs off from them entirely by having Kazuhito break up in the next episode because they don't know what the fuck else to do. I guess. The natural response to that fucking long-ass flashback telling us that this man has always thought about this man, that he has defined a huge part of his adolescence, was for him to wake up and say it. And he doesn't. This leads to the finale episode where finally he says what he has to say and Kazuhito's like, “This is the happiest moment of my life. Let's dead fish kiss” and I'm like, absolutely not! This man has been horny for 10 years. I need to see that being released now.

The thing about me with this is, like—Shan and I joke about this. We are real haters. But like a big part about being a hater is being a lover! You love these shows. You love what they do really well, and where they fuck up is so obvious sometimes. The obvious fuck up of this show is Ryota saying clearly “rely on me more” and then Natsukawa not talking to him for basically two episodes after that, the end of episode 5 is a very clear request from one of our romantic leads to the other that the other romantic lead does not respond to. The guy who has been in love with this man the whole fucking time receives a direct request from him. The guy who was apparently the reason why he was able to get his fucking life back together, and he does not respond to that clear stated request, and because he can't respond to that, it shuts down Natsukawa's arc for the rest of the show about who is he beyond caring for other people. It's so deeply unsatisfying.

NiNi

Twig, in terms of where it breaks down for you, is that similar to where Ben's talking about or do you have a different place where things start to break down?

Twig

Episode 6 is definitely the waste of an entire episode, just illustrating things that they'd already told us through conversation. Show, not tell, but there's no point in showing us what you already told us. That's a waste of time. Natsukawa, his arc got completely fucked up by all of the wasted space in this show. That's why it feels so confusing and unsatisfying, because the order of what he goes through internally no longer makes any sense.

What we see him do in this show is he starts confused, uncertain about what's going on with Kazuhito. He has a realization about what's going on with Kazuhito, and they have the conversation about it. He has time to reflect on it and think about what his feelings are. He accepts his feelings. We see him realize that he likes Kazuhito, he wants to be with him. Then we see him hesitate about that, “Because I like you, it's actually really hard to tell you,” which is not how they've been communicating to date, but okay. And then he goes from that to concern about homophobia, which makes no sense to have as a thing to happen after you've already gone through acceptance and hesitation. And then it gets resolved. It was a confusing clusterfuck because it didn't make any sense, and the only reason why his arc happens that way is because they had those two filler episodes of his acceptance and hesitation in the middle that weren't in the manga. I did read it to figure out what the hell went wrong.

Ben

Twig, walk us through the experience you had reading the manga to get some clarity.

Twig

A lot of the things that I thought didn't necessarily work or I was confused by in the show, worked perfectly in the manga because of the order in which they happen and the lack of space between them. Natsukawa’s arc in the manga is, he reunites with Kazuhito, is confused by what's going on with Kazuhito, he has a realization and the conversation with Kazuhito about it. He's left to think about it. He immediately goes from that to his concerns about homophobia and then it's resolved.

So all of the moments where he realizes he feels good with Kazuhito, he wants him in his life, he misses him when he's not there, those happen after the concern about homophobia. It made a complete difference. Things that I hated in the show worked perfectly well in the manga because they made sense in terms of an order of events and the emotional arcs that people went through. It was a really good illustration of understanding the overarching arc you're telling and not just the moments, because they kept all of the moments of the manga, they're all in the show, but by moving them around a little bit and adding so much in between them, it completely changed how they landed for the audience.

00:44:40 - Living With Him: Final Thoughts and Ratings

NiNi

The show feels like it wanted to touch on a lot of things, but it also didn't want to touch on a lot of things, so we get some of Natsukawa’s arc regarding the way that he feels about having spent his teenage years looking after his sisters and some of the things that have come out of that. His family is a decently big part of the show. And there's some things there with his mom and how his mom may feel guilty and like she needs to make up for certain things. And then his sisters are still asking him for stuff even after he's moved out. They're still buggin’ him all the time. There's stuff in there that's swirling around, but it never really gets concretized.

And then there's stuff around Kazuhito's mom that again, swirling around and never really gets concretized. And I just feel like the show wanted to do all of these things, but they weren't serious about any of them. And then they spend all this time in the middle, these two entire episodes, pulling in a bunch of stuff that has nothing to do with any of this.

Twig

I wanna pick up what you said about the parents. The show spent time with both Kazuhito and Natsukawa’s moms. We Natsukawa’s mom clock immediately that there was something wrong with Natsukawa because he was making something deep fried, which is a sign that her son is going through it. And I thought that was a really beautiful way of showing that his mom understood him. And then we got the conversation with Kazuhito's mom when the comphet happens where Kazuhito's mom asks Natsukawa to let her know if Kazuhito meets anyone so that she can find out about his love life because he never tells her anything.

And then the final episode, we get a moment with both moms where they clearly clock that something's going on with their sons and seem happy about it? And that was so unearned and made me so angry. Natsukawa’s mom at least seemed like she knew her son, but Kazuhito's mom was fully oblivious, and for her to get that moment of, “Oh good. My son is now happy with his boyfriend” to the point where—I took in these yukatas so that they can have this yukata moment—mmm, to bring that back.

Ben

There it is. Sorry, listeners, you won't get to count this show when you list them out.

[all laugh]

Twig

So they get these yukatas taken in so they can have them permanently. And nod to, “I know that you guys are gonna be a thing,” a quiet without having to say it aloud, “I'm cool with your relationship” and she makes an offhand comment that Kazuhito is so much happier now, like he was when he was younger, that indicates that she knows that Natsukawa is making a difference in Kazuhito’s life and she's happy about it.

Where the hell was that energy when she was talking to him before, where did this come from?

Ben

You're right, man. After two episodes of angst in episode 6 and 7, they rushed the shit out of the resolution in episode 8.

Twig

This show had too little material to work with, was too cowardly to add very much at all. The little bit that they did add was not good, so maybe for the best that they [laughs] didn't try to do too much, but they wanted to keep the main beat in the same place, which meant that they shoved a bunch of filler in the middle that fucked up the entire emotional arc and then rushed the ending. They just shat the bed on it. The part that I was actually really interested in—which is, what is this relationship going to look like once it gets off the ground?—we didn't get any of that.

Ben

This show was good for like 30 percent of its run, tolerable for about 62 percent of its run.

NiNi

62 percent, that was so specific.

Ben

It’s what 5 divided by 8 is. [Twig laughs] It's just math.

NiNi

Sir. Sir. Sir!

Ben

Anyway, this is from the same team that brought us Old Fashion Cupcake, so we're trying to understand why the people who have made a five episode banger decided to take what should have been a five episode banger and make it an eight episode fart.

Twig

Talk that talk.

Ben

This show was so vacant. They clearly ran out of the great source material by the end of episode 3 and did not know what to do for the rest of the show. Spending this much time in one character having intense angst over another character not ending in a satisfying release of that tension is extremely disappointing. If Kazuhito was holding these feelings for 10 years, that perfunctory little dead fish kiss was so unsatisfying. I rebuke it.

NiNi

We shall not speak of it.

Twig

The one thing that did keep me going through that last episode were the performances specifically of Sato Ryuga and Sakai Sho. The performances in this show were good and I would like to see them in something else.

Ben

I would very much like them to try again.

NiNi

I absolutely agree, even through all the nonsense I think that the acting was solid and I would like to see these boys do something again. [sigh] I don't wanna talk about this show anymore.

Ben

Let’s rate it!

NiNi

[laughs] Let's rate this sucker.

Ben

It's a 6. It's a 6. It was not exactly offensive, but this show made the egregious sin of being boring. How do you make a Japanese BL boring? That is the reign of Thailand, with its 50 to 100 fuckin’ minute episodes.

[Twig laughs]

NiNi

I'ma let you cook. For now.

Twig

The worst part about it is it's so close to being so good. You can almost fix it just by watching 1-4 and then 8.

NiNi

No.

Ben

No.

NiNi

No.

Ben

No.

NiNi

No.

Ben

No.

Twig

No?

Ben

[laughs] No. Absolutely not.

Twig

Ha! [Twig laughs]

NiNi

I would be right there with you normally, but 8 is not good.

Ben

I love you, Twig. [laugh] I will be back-to-back with you against anyone in this fandom. But I can't be with you on this, sis. Episode 8 fucking sucked because it doesn't complete either character’s actual character arc! Mm-mm.

NiNi

It doesn't pick up on the stuff that was going on up to episode 5, and then it also doesn't pick up on the stuff that they were doing in 6 and 7. So it doesn't follow either of the arcs that they were going with.

Twig

This is my point. You have to cut out all the shit it didn't pick up on [laughs] and then it's fine.

Ben

[laughs] You're gonna make it the five episode BL it should have been.

Twig

That’s what I’m saying!

NiNi

No. I'm sorry, even if you wanted to do that, I'm sorry, those lame ass kisses at the end? Forget about it.

Ben

NiNi! Rating.

NiNi

It was a 7 until this conversation, now it's a 6.

Ben

Twig-tea!

Twig

Yeah, I'm with you all, it’s a 6.

Ben

It's a 6 from The Conversation.

00:52:03 - Why The Queerness Matters

Ben

Both of these shows got less than a 7 from The Conversation, and the conversation about them is different. Love is Better the Second Time Around was actually so fucking good for the bulk of its run and then clearly jettisoned to go be something else instead. With Living With Him, it's very clear that they didn't know what to do with the amount of runtime they had. You can see this show falling apart in real time. This show was not it and it should have been. The potential was sky high and the show really let me down. It went from being a 10 to a 6. That is a terrifying fall. I don't think I've ever had such a turn with a show in my experience in BL.

NiNi

So, the thing about these two shows, why we ended up placing them together, aside from the fact that they started strong and flopped. The flop happened for both of these shows in trying to go for a flashback. Trying to go to time prior to the show to tell us… what, exactly? And I think that's the thing that really I'm taking away from this. If you're gonna do a flashback in a story, the flashback has to give you something, it has to mean something, it has to illuminate something. And for both of these shows, I do not feel illuminated by the flashback. I didn't feel like the flashback gave me either new information narratively or new information thematically and emotionally. I just feel like the flashbacks were there because they wanted to flash back to a different time for whatever reason, but there's no real reason in either of these stories for the flashback to exist.

Ben

It's because they're making the mistake of not recognizing what western M/M romance understands, that if you're going to break the characters up in a meaningful way, do it at the 60% mark.

Twig

I want to pick up what NiNi said, too. The flashback has to accomplish something and we should learn something from it, but also the character should have learned something since, and it should set us up for them to move their arcs forward in a way that makes sense from what we had before the flashback.

NiNi

Absolutely, yes.

Twig

In both of these cases, the flashback did not fill in the information to allow us to follow that character arc in any way that was meaningful or satisfying.

Ben

I'm not always keen on flashbacks in romance. I gotta be honest. The problem with romance flashbacks a lot of the time is, unless you're contextualizing something that the audience has picked up on the whole time, you're just retconning your show.

Twig

Yeah, I agree. For the most part. I think sometimes shows seem like their goal is to trick the audience and that most of the time should not be your goal except in very specific genre circumstances. Most of the time, your audience should be able to at least anticipate sort of what's coming-ish and be excited about it. The how and the why is the part that's interesting, not the, “Oh, you did something that you didn't tell me you were doing for the last however many hours of my life.” It shouldn't be a surprise.

NiNi

For me, that's not entirely it. I have enjoyed before a midstream flashback that tells me something brand new that I have to go back to the beginning and be like, “Oh a twist!” Like, I've enjoyed a twist flashback before. It's not even a question of that. It's a question of, the flashback has to have a purpose. It has to have a reason, it has to give me something, sooomething that I did not already know. Like I said, whether that's narrative, whether that's thematic or emotional, but it has to illuminate something new for me. It has to have a reason for being there. And I just feel in both of these cases the flashback had no reason for being there.

That said, I have enjoyed this episode. For many reasons.

Ben

It's because we dunked on Japan. That's it. [NiNi laughs] That's it.

NiNi

You can't even let me have the fun of saying it.

Ben

No, no, no. You don't get to have it. ‘Cause I love Japanese BL. This dunking is me trying to grab them by the shoulders, like James T Kirk grabbing people by the shoulders, and being like, “What are you doing? I need you to get it together. [laughs]

NiNi

I am enjoying this episode because sometimes I do feel sort of alone in my little “Eh, I'm not entirely feeling it” bubble on some of these Japanese shows, so it's nice to have company for a change, is what I was saying. I was not trying to shade you.

Ben

Here's the thing, let's unpack this. Japanese BL works for me the most often because their romance stories often track for something very specifically queer about them. All the Japanese BL that I constantly bring up on this show has romantic angst that also taps into my very specific concern as a queer critic. And that's particularly why I get frustrated when these shows fuck it up.

As Twig pointed out, Living With Him introduces a compulsory heterosexuality moment after the character has made the big emotional turn and recognized that he does want to remain close to his friend after he learns an important queer detail about him. That is a huge queer fuck up! The big fuck up with Love is Better the Second Time Around is, these guys went through the task of getting back together and trying to be open with each other and being vulnerable and kind of embarrassing with each other. When the homophobia rears its head again and is gonna separate them, the show does not reward us or the characters for the growth that they've been trying to achieve by letting them have that moment together to become a battle couple.

That's the real problem with it, ‘cause, like, in a normal fucking heterosexual romance, who gives a shit if the straights are gonna stay together? The whole world is going to help them stay together if they want to, or let them divorce if they don't. We're the only ones who're going to give a shit about each other when the boots come marching again. And so when I'm watching BL, I'm watching from the queer part, and when these shows fuck up on the queer part is when I turn against them so aggressively. That's why you’ve seen Japan not even catch strays this time. I'm sniping at them for these shows because this is not correct. [NiNi laughs]

This is the true fuck up. This is the crux of my disappointment here. They fucked up on the queer front, not on the romance part. I can take it or leave it on the romance part. Writing romance is not as easy as people think it is. People fuck that shit up all the time. But if you can do something that feels queer in a way that feels truly correct to me, I'll be very forgiving about some romance missteps. But both of these shows fucked up on the queer part of their romance arcs and I do not forgive that.

Twig

After they were doing so well, that's the part that hurts. They started getting the queer part so right and then got it so wrong.

Ben

I truly get you, why you don't always vibe with these shows, NiNi, because they're not always satisfying in that way as romance stories. I totally get you on that. But what always works for me in the shows that I want to advocate for when we get together is that these shows have a real kernel of queer truth that is worth connecting to and worth advocating for for people who want to engage with queer stories. It's why you and I were able to bond so strongly over I Told Sunset About You, I Promised You the Moon, and Bad Buddy. Those shows are satisfying romantically and also as queer cinema. The shows that we both love the most on here are very good at both of those things. But the queer part of their storytelling is non-negotiable for me in a genre about boys kissing each other.

NiNi

I hear you. I'm with you. This episode is gonna air right at the end of June. I think this is a great way—

Ben

Oh yeah. Oh yeah.

NiNi

—for us to—

Ben

Oh yeah.

NiNi

—end Pride month.

Ben

Happy pride, bitches!

[Ben and NiNi laugh]

NiNi

Because it is important to remember that among everything else, amongst all the love and romance in this genre, that this genre is a queer genre and the queerness matters.

Ben

Any final thoughts you'd like to share with the audience, Twig-tea?

Twig

I don't have anything to add. That was right. Correct! That's what I have to say to that.

NiNi

That is going to wrap us up on Second Rate Second Chance! Twig, thank you so much for being with us.

Twig

Thank you for having me.

NiNi

We will see you guys next time. Until then, we out. Say bye to the people, Twig.

Twig

Dispatch!

Ben

Dispatch!

NiNi

[laughs] Say bye to the people, Ben.

Ben

Peace.

#ben and nini's conversations #podcast #the conversation #on art #lgbtq #bl series #japanese bl #summer series #summer 2024 #love is better the second time around #living with him #kare no iru seikatsu #koi wo suru nara nidome ga joto

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bustyasianbeautiespod · 1 year ago

Text

Episode 8 Transcript: A Happily Married 4x Divorced New Boytoy Situationship

[Garageband version of Buddy Holly’s “Everyday” plays]

C: Hello! My name is Crystal.

G: And my name is Grey.

C: And this is Rubbish and Probably a Podcast, a Good Omens commentary podcast where I, someone who has seen this show too many times…

G: And somebody who only knows this show through Crystal discuss every single episode of Good Omens.

C: For today’s episode, we are discussing Season 2, Episode 2: “The Clue,” featuring the minisode “A Companion for Owls.” A companion to owls. Whatever. Who give a shit?

G: Yeah. This should have been titled "A Companion to Owls, featuring the minisode The Clue." Nothing happens. Barely anything in the fucking modern age happens. Like, everything was from the fucking Land of Uz, so.

C: Yeah. Sure fucking was. [G: Sure was!] Well, last time, you were not having a good time with the show [G, laughing: Love is real!], and I said, "You might like this one." What's your evaluation of what I said?

G: Love is real. That's my first evaluation. [C laughs] My second evaluation is, we are so back. We are so back! [C laughs] This season really is the era of being so Crover and being so back, and right now, we are so back. It's so good! It's a good episode!

C: I mean, if it’s going faster than a roller coaster, it can also be going up and down like a roller coaster.

G: Yeah. The entire time I was giggling, twirling my hair. I think everything that is introduced this episode, minus the Nina and Maggie stuff, was wonderful, both in the Job era and the modern era. Like, I think it's a great-

C: The modern too?

G: Yeah! I like the mystery. I like Gabriel. I like what they're doing with-

C: You like Gabriel??

G: [laughing] Neil Gaiman needs to fuck up so hard for me to end this season not completely enthused by the whole Gabeelzebub situation.

C: Yeah, I mean, well, maybe he will. So. [G laughs]

G: Yeah. You know, I know you told me that the ship name for that is Ineffable Bureaucracy, and I am saying "bureaucracy" multiple times this episode just to fuck you up when you're transcribing, but I do like- well, I mean, I like the whole combination name ship name for them.

C: What, which is Gabeelzebub?

G: In my notes, I wrote Beelzebriel, [laughs] which is so difficult to pronounce. That's why I'm not saying it. But written down, it's nice. [C: Sure, yeah.] It's cute. I am enthused by it, it must be known.

C: You haven't even seen them talk?

G: I do not give a shit. They have a theme song. They have a theme song! You know what? If you want to get me, if you want to get me invested in anything, give it a good song. Good song.

C: It is a good song, and it was in the trailer, and I spent like, months before the show dropped [G laughing] listening to the song, being like, “It's so great how Aziraphale and Crowley's love will come their way.” [laughing] And then I got fucked so hard.

G: Well, I just think it's cute that they have a theme song.

C: Yeah. Sure, man. Whatever. We'll see how Episode 6 goes. You'll probably be fine with it. I just think it's stupid.

G: Wait, so they get revealed in Episode 6?

C: Oh, goddammit! Why do I keep- [both laughing] ... No? No?

G: I think this is something that I actually do give a fuck about now. Like, it's acting! But the whole theme song thing is so cute. Like, it really is that shallow for me. Like, Gabriel, who tried to forget, who has forgotten everything and is working very hard to keep everything forgotten, like, just singing this and being like, "Yeah." [C: It's a catchy song.] Like, it's their fucking theme song. That's so cute! That's so cute.

C: Sure. [G laughs] I'll try to believe in love, but currently I don't. [G: I believe in love, always and forever.] I mean, I do believe in love for Aziraphale and Crowley forever and ever, especially in this episode, though, so I believe in some love.

G: You know what? Right now, I believe in love more for Gabriel and Beelzebub more than I do for Aziraphale and Crowley. [C: Wait! The whole minisode!] And you know what? I do not believe in love for Maggie and Nina at all. [C: Oh, not at all.] Not at all. Love is not real with that one.

C: Yeah. I really tried this week. I mean, you were in the Discord group chat where I announced that I was gonna try to read Maggie and Nina fics [G laughs] to like, finally get myself to care. [G laughing] And I couldn't do it. It couldn't- I couldn't do it. [G: I'm so sorry.] I tried three fics, and just yeah. It felt like there were fire ants crawling over my brain, [G laughing] and I was so bored and so unhappy. [G: I'm so sorry.] It's not- yeah, it's not happening.

G: Yeah. Oh, also, this is another one of those episodes where - I mean, to be fair, I didn't want to do it. Like, we were still - me and Crystal, we were still on the call, and I was like, “I'm not gonna watch this episode until the very last minute. I don't wanna see anything more of Season 2.”

C: "I hate Good Omens. I hate Aziraphale and I hate Crowley."

G: [laughing] I really was of that mindset. And Crystal was like, “Just check the first five minutes of the episode, and if you don't wanna continue watching, then don't until we have to record, but, like, just watch the first five minutes." And then I did, and then the fucking Land of Uz logo showed up, and I was like, "Okay, I'm watching this entire thing." [C laughing] God.

C: Yeah, wait, the listeners know about how the-

G: [overlapping] Our history with the Book of Job? [both laughing] Yeah. One of our- I think one of our very first conversations, like, actual, legitimate conversations, was about the Book of Job. [C: Was it really?] Like, I'm willing to bet. I'm willing to bet. Like, I feel like that is like, a substantial landmark in our friendship, [laughing] when we first started talking about the Book of Job.

C: Well, I don't rember that, [laughs] but perhaps so.

G: You know what- what's so funny? Like, I think we were talking about it, and then, like, the concept of like, where is it in the timeline of the Bible shows up. You said like, "Oh, it's like, the oldest thing in there. Like, of all the books in the Old Testament, like, it's the oldest one, so like, it happens like, way earlier than any other Old Testament book." And I was like, "Is that true?" And then I never checked, and you never convinced me. And you know what? I checked yesterday, and it's true.

C: Fuck yeah.

G: Also, I reread the entire Book of Job- like, the thing is, [laughing] I spent more time fucking reading and rereading the fucking Book of Job, like, fucking line analysis and stuff online, I spent more time doing that than actually thinking about this episode.

C: Oh, you were exegesising?

G: No, I don't know what that means.

C: Oh, it's like- an exegesis is like a "critical explanation or interpretation of a text," usually of Biblical works.

G: Hell yeah! Well, I guess I was.

C: I had to do one on the first eight verses of the Song of Songs [G laughs] in my like, Biblical literature class, and it really like, changed my life.

G: Yes. Congratulations. [C: Thank you.] Aziraphale and Crowley should read that to each other.

C: [laughs] Yeah. And they will in many, many fanfictions.

G: They will! For fucking real. Me, I am really into the Book of Job. It's like, I think it's the only book in the Bible that, like, I read in its entirety. Like, the text itself, from the Bible, I read in its entirety. Not like, verse by verse, or just a single chapter, or like, it was in the Gospel or in the liturgy in the mass and then I heard it. Like, I actually like, went out of my way to read it and stuff.

C: Yeah, the Song of Songs is that special little girl for me, but Book of Job's not bad.

G: Not bad! So yeah, I did reread the Book of Job, but I don't think anything substantial is gonna come out of it [both laugh] in this recording of the podcast, truly.

C: Well, you can compare the Bildad the Shuhite from the Book of Job to our lovely, precious Bildad the Shuhite in here.

G: For real. For fucking real. For fucking real. He makes shoes! - G: For this episode, the synopsis is: "Heaven and Hell are determined to find the missing angel. "

C: Not even who. Just "the missing angel," you know. That one.

G: Yeah. [laughs] "An overheard song provides Aziraphale with a Clue. Crowley and Aziraphale visit the pub to discuss ways that humans fall in love. While almost 5,000 years ago Crowley is sent to inflict punishments on the righteous Job, God’s favourite person, as Aziraphale learns at first hand about temptation [C: Crazy line.] and what Gabriel will and won't believe."

C: What do you mean "as Aziraphale learns firsthand about tempting"? Do you mean the food? [G: Yeah!] Is that all they're talking about?

G: But like, isn't the whole point of that that like, it's not like, a real temptation? He just chose to do that? [C: Well, yeah.] Are we supposed to read that as a whatever?

C: I don't know. [G laughs] All I know is I'm glad that after Aziraphale got his pervert moment during the apology dance, [G laughing] Crowley got to be as big of a pervert. That's- yeah.

G: Yeah. Last episode, as I said while editing it, really was a slut to pervert Aziraphale pipeline episode. [C laughs] And you know what? It was.

C: Yeah, good for him. Yeah. So we open in 2500 BC in the Land of- Uhz? Uz? [G: Uz.] One of those. [G: I don't know. Yeah.] It's a land. There's two letters in the name of it, and they're U and Z.

G: Yeah. This is so funny, because, like, wait, like, when we were watching this, I was watching it, and I was like, "Ugh. I don't wanna watch this." And then, like, when Crowley was talking to the goats, I immediately went, "Is this Book of Job?!" And you were like, "Mm-hm!" [C laughs] And then suddenly, like, everything in the world was beautiful. Everything was beautiful. Flowers everywhere, blah blah blah. Truly a moment.

C: Yeah. This is true. This did happen. We open on Crowley, who is sporting a look, for sure.

G: Truly a look. But no, I love it! I think it works fine.

C: You know, when the first screenshots of this minisode came out, everyone was clowning on Crowley for the goatee, but now that I've spent some time with them in this time period, it's like, yeah. Hello, beloved.

G: No, I think it's so nice!

C: They have very, very nice wavy hair. It's a little past shoulder length, and they're wearing like, this black and red headband, and like, these sort of goggle-looking sunglasses. And I think that the specific model of them- it's by Rigards, and the specific model is called the Nite Owl, so that's fun. There's this fuckass goatee on them, which, I mean.

G: It's so wonderful.

C: [laughing] If you say so. You know, I'm happy for them. I'm happy for them. They're trying something out.

G: Yeah. And you're happy that somebody is experiencing joy somewhere in the world, somewhere in the world.

C: Yeah, somewhere in the world. And they're wearing, like, these black robes with a red and black striped shawl over them or something. [G: Mm-hm.] Yeah, I do like the colors in the whole get-up. It's very fun. But yeah, they're like saying-

G: [laughing] I like this look more on Crowley than the modern day look. [C: I mean-] Well, not for this episode. This episode is amazing.

C: Yeah, the fucking. Yeah, no, the turtleneck really is crazy.

G: "Hello."

C: Yeah, oh god! [laughing] [both laughing] God, his pussy cunt slay is soo. Hiii. Anyway. So. [G: Hiii.] Hii. Hi. So, the camera's just focused on Crowley's face right now, and they're saying really dramatically, "You should know why you're about to die. God has abandoned you. The God who claims to love you, who demands your praise, has given you up to be destroyed," and then it zooms out, and they're talking to a goat! You can't kill kids.

G: You can't kill kids. For fucking real.

C: God bless. And I mean, you know, there's the obvious, you know, "who claims to love you, who demands your praise" is clearly- I mean, they're working through some things. [G: Yeah.] And they will continue working through some things. Like, you were so right when you were like, "The Fall is like if you thought your boss was your friend and then you got fired." [both laughing]

G: For fucking real!

C: Yeah. God literally claimed to love them as a coworker [G, laughing: And then fired their ass so hard and so raw.], but when they asked questions, She instead demanded their praise and then fired them. Hated their suggestion box idea so hard and so raw. You know, Crowley goes like, "Bad luck. Shall we begin?" And summons this big old fireball. But then- [both scream] Aziraphale shows up! [G: Aziraphale!! Aziraphale.] And he's like, in some kind of fucking light portal with like, spikes of crystal around it or something.

G: [giggling] Yeah. And he's doing the typical, like, hand in front, like in a- you know, like, Moses parting the sea kind of pose. And it's like, ahh, I love you, Aziraphale!

C: He looks great.

G: The outfit is so nice. [C: Yeah.] I love the outfit! [C: It's good.] 'Cause it's a- I don't know how to describe that outfit, actually. Is it a toga? Is that a reasonable thing to say?

C: No, ‘cause it has like, regular sleeves. I thought togas, were like, they had the sort of shoulder suspension-

G: Ah. Well, there's like, the whole sleeve part, but like, the front, is like, pleated like how a toga would be pleated. And also, like, the collar detail is amazing! Like, it's this gold-y bronze-y color that's like, a lace, and the sleeves are also lace-trimmed. Oh, it's wonderful! It's wonderful! I think it's amazing what the costuming department did this episode with the angels specifically. I think it's so cool.

C: Yeah. Aziraphale looks so beautiful

G: Like, that fucking pleating? The way the fucking fabric is folded? Like, that's so difficult to do! It's difficult to do! I think it's wonderful!

C: It's also cinched at the-

G: At the hips area, yeah.

C: Hips area, yeah, yeah. Very nice shape to it. He looks wonderful and beautiful. He goes- agh, you shouldn't have given me this scene. I can't do voices. This is a very voices-heavy scene.

G: [laughing] Avaunt! Aziraphale is just doing the whole, "Do not-!" What is that?

C: "Stay your hand, demon! Despised tool of Satan, [overlapping] in the almighty name of God, avaunt!"

G: Avaunt! And then just completely stops and is like, "Oh. It's you!" [laughing] They're so cute! One of them is so cute!

C: "Dear me." Yeah. His voice sounds sort of different in the [G: This episode?] minisode certain points, I think, especially during like, the funny bits. I'm not sure why. Maybe that's just a line delivery thing.

G: What do you mean?

C: I don't know. Does his voice not sound like, kinda odd on the like, "Ah, it's you! Dear me!" part. Like, I feel like he's using- the notes that his voice is on, if you transcribe them to a piano, the progression of the notes [G laughs] is different than his usual progression of the notes.

G: I mean, Aziraphale was a bit different, still, during this time.

C: Yeah. He was a bit different. And then he goes, "Haven't seen you since... Flood?" Which was in 3004 BC. So they haven't seen each other for 504 years! It's craazy. It's crazy. It's crazy.

G: I mean, it is reasonable to think of this as just the third time they're seeing each other. [C: Yeah.] Because we have established that the flood was the second time, so. My god. Well.

C: But I'm also surprised that they had this and then, during the Jesus thing, Crowley was still like, “Oh, you've come to gawk at the poor guy?” Like, hasn't Aziraphale proven himself already?

G: It was just banter. Maybe it's just banter.

C: It was not banter. [G laughs] Like, she was not having a good day that day, so I guess it could just be that.

G: I mean, to Crowley, it could be banter, and for Aziraphale, it's like, “I'm offended you would ever think that of me!” you know?

C: Maybe. I don't know. I just assume both of them were like, sort of grieving there, so there wasn't that much room for banter, but who knows? Who knows? You know, it really is just a job. [laughs]

G: It really is!

C: Aziraphale's just like, "Oh, sorry that I have to like, interrupt your whole thing." Like, "Oh, no, don't worry. Like, as you were. Go." And then Aziraphale goes back to the [G: Little stone side thing, yeah.] "Avaunt, foul demon" thing, yup, and Crowley just goes, "No." Aziraphale's like, "No?"

G: And the portal like, closes in, and everything. And it's like, "No?" [C laughs] And then Crowley goes, [both] "No... thank you?" He's so cute! [both giggling] Ahh! It is adorable.

C: Yeah. It's very, very cute. Crowley is like, "No. I have a permit. Here you go." And Aziraphale's like, "A permit? From whom?" Again, his voice is different, but it's funny, so it's fine. Crowley says it's from God, and he like, literally turns away and he's like, "Ah. You see, it's not that I mind jokes." [both laughing] He wants to be fun and fresh so bad. Crowley is like, "Yeah, no, I know that like, Job's like, God's favorite and everything, but no see, look, there's a scroll," and they unroll it, and it goes all the way around the valley. They're on a cliff, by the way. It goes all the way down and around the valley and back up again, so yeah. Fun enough visual gag. And the TL;DR is that "Satan and his diabolical ministers may destroy everything Job owns, no questions asked, hugs and kisses, God."

G: I mean, the whole permit thing, is of course, very interesting. Like, we have established last season that like, Hell still follows The Plan. Yeah, so like, this permit thing, I mean, I guess we didn't see the paperwork like, in Season 1, but like, it's fascinating to me that there's paperwork even for this kind of thing. Go fucking- Let's fucking go bureaucracy.

C: I think the vibe is probably just like, they need a permit because they feel like literally every single angel would be trying to kill them if they didn't have one, so it seems like more of like, an insurance thing [G: No, of course, yeah.] than having to follow the rules. But it is interesting. It is interesting. Also, on the "Satan and his diabolical ministers," Crowley does like, a whole like, "Whoops!" kind of shrug/wave on it. Agh. They're so cute. And Aziraphale is just like, "No! This can't be real!" He calls Job an absolute poppet. [G: Absolute poppet.] [both laugh] And he really is an absolute prophet. Crowley goes, "Well, I am a demon. Maybe I'm lying." which is something that continues throughout the episode.

G: Happens a lot, yeah.

C: Yeah. And I feel like it's interesting that Crowley is doing this self-identifying as a demon who lies thing nowadays because I feel like in the present day, like, it's like, Aziraphale who's doing this to Crowley. Like, you know, most notably at the end of Season 1, Episode 1 when Crowley says that he senses that the like, hellhound has found its master, etc etc. So like, yeah, Crowley started using it as a defense mechanism or whatever, and now Aziraphale's using it as a defense mechanism that is also mean. Sorry to both of you. Crowley's like, "Okay, let's see how it goes." And then fireballs all of the goats. And then goes- I don't know how to do the laugh. It's like, if you said "ho ho ho" but through breathing? [G laughs]

G: You know what? You may as well.

C: Yeah. And then "Seems legit to mee!" Aziraphale rushes up to Heaven and takes the scroll to Muriel! [G: Muriel!] Who looks so cute. Like, isn't- I know you said you liked their hair last episode. [G: Yeah.] But isn't their hair so much nicer here?

G: Well, I mean, I am endeared by present day Muriel.

C: Yeah. Well, I'm just glad that they have to wear a hat for the rest of the fucking season. [both laugh] Hair and makeup saw what they did, and they were like, "Oh, no." They also have like, a robe that's sort of similar to Aziraphale's. I mean, all of the angles have slightly different looks with like, the gold trim on their robes, but it's still the same vibe. They tell Aziraphale about how there was a bet where, you know, God was saying how righteous Job was, and Satan pointed out that's just because God's been so nice to him. Aziraphale seems very shocked that God and Satan were like, chatting at all, I suppose. [G: Yeah.] Sorry, Aziraphale. But yeah, "God's letting Satan destroy everything Job has, and then we'll see."

G: I mean, don't you find it fascinating that in Good Omens, Crowley makes references to the Nazis going to Hell, so we know that people go to Hell. Like, that is the thing that happens. Oh, I was- Never mind, then. There's also references to people going to Heaven. I completely forgor. It's the- in the musicians.

C: Heaven has Liszt, but all the musicians are- yeah, blah blah blah. Or, does Heaven have Liszt? I forgot which composer Heaven has.

G: No, I was just gonna bring up that like, in the Old Testament like, you know, Heaven and Hell is not really a thing. Like, the concept of Heaven is more of "that's where God hangs out." It's not like, somewhere people go. So I was wondering about that this episode, because, like, they bring up Hell a lot, right? I mean, obviously, 'cause there's the whole like, [dramatically miserable] "I'm gonna go to Hell. Take me to Hell now." [both laughing] portion, which is the funniest thing that's ever happened. I'm so sorry. I know Crowley is crying and is so miserable [C: Aziraphale?] but it's so funny. [G laughs] Yeah. [C laughs] Aziraphale is crying and is so miserable. The Satan/God relationship is interesting, because, like, also, like, the way Good Omens presents it, it's almost like they're equals [C: Yeah.], yeah, which, interesting thing.

C: Interesting thing.

G: Like, why is Satan so much more powerful than Gabriel and Michael and Uriel, who are in the lore, right- [C: Also archangels?] Yeah, like, they're supposed to be of equal power.

C: Well, he's a big old red thing and everything. [G: Yeah.] I don't know. I don't think Falling imbues you with powers or anything. No clue, no clue. Aziraphale's not happy about this, but he's like, clearly just looking for reassurance. He's like, "Okay. But like, they're just taking like, his worldly goods?" And Muriel's like, "Yeah, nothing important, no! Just his farm, his camels, his goat, his oxen, his children, his geese." And Aziraphale’s like, "His fucking what?"

G: And Muriel goes, "His geese!" [laughing] And does this little geese motion.

C: Yeah. "Big cross ducks" and yeah does this wings waddling/flapping thing.

G: You know how like, in Season 1, I said that like, if Crowley, and like, one Eric met up, like, maybe they would have been friends. Like, I think Muriel and Aziraphale, if they just spent some more time together, I think they would be friends! And like, the thing is, we talk constantly about how like, Crowley is not like the demons. Like, they're very different from their lot. Like, Aziraphale, you know, not like the angels, all that. But, like, most of what we see of the angels and the demons are like, their bosses. [C: Right. Yes.] These are like, the higher-ups. Like, of course, they're gonna be- they're like, you know, we said one time that like, they're supposed to be loser employees that their bosses hate so much it's unreal. [C laughs] Of course they're gonna be different from their bosses. But like, maybe they are similar to the other employees that the bosses hate so much it's unreal, you know?

C: Yeah, yeah. Well, I mean, Shax is in Crowley's former position, and I feel like- I mean, they don't get along, but like, they can have a conversation, at least.

G: Yeah, that's true.

C: Yeah. Muriel's so cute.

G: Muriel!

C: Muriel! And Aziraphale has already run off to ask the archangels about this. God. How did he keep- This all happened in, what? Like, 2500 BC? And he still was like that all the way up until the Apocalypse?

G: Yeah. [both laugh] No, it's so fucking funny.

C: He's just been running around the same spirals for like, thousands of years. Like, alright girl. Right. I guess the archangels are also in the same sort of robe get-ups [G: Yeah!], and Gabriel has like, [both] longer hair, which I think is pretty fun. But, you know. Michael's all like, "Oh, yeah, just trust in God's plan, you know? Everything's good." And Aziraphale’s just like, "Oh, yeah, no, everything's okay, 'cause like, everything that he loses, after the trials are over, like, he's gonna get everything back?" And they say that he's gonna get twice as much as he had before: twice the oxen, twice the goats, twice the children! And Aziraphale is very shocked at the "twice the children" part. And yeah, I feel like just these two exchanges are both where like, because he's been on Earth and like, has interacted with people, he just keeps assuming that humans and children will be put in a separate category than like, objects or animals or belongings, because, like, those are like, real people to him. But the archangels like, just don't think like that. Sorry, girl.

G: It does present like, an interesting thing, because, like, the whole argument God has for Job, right, is that "You don't understand what it's like to build the universe" and all that crap. Like, "Were you there when etc etc?" Like, the whole point of God is "You don't understand what it is like to be God," but like, looking at this, like, the angels don't understand what it's like to be human. Does God? [C: Yeah.] And it's like, that is the crux of the situation

C: Yeah, and also, Michael says it's probably gonna be seven children, not six, because God likes sevens. Aziraphale automatically assumes that they're going to make Sitis give birth to all of the kids, which would not be my assumption. 'Cause it's not like, I feel like if they're doubling the goats, they would just miracle goats to appear. They wouldn't like, run over to like, a nearby goat and make that goat birth like, 400 goats, you know? [G: Yeah.] But I guess that is the plan, so, I don't know. Maybe something like this has happened before.

G: Also, I wanna point out, I like that they named the wife.

C: Yeah, 'cause she's not named in the-

G: She's not named in the book, yeah. Sitis.

C: He's worried about her because she's 58, and like, yeah, "Are we sure that she wants to give birth four more times?" Oh, also, Gabriel's like, "Oh, I know everything about like, human birth, because I saw Eve's creation, so like, yeah." And it's something he's very proud about throughout the episode. Good for him. But yeah, when Aziraphale asks, "Are we sure that Sitis wants to give birth four more times?" Michael goes like, "No. Seven more times. 'Cause the three children that she already has will be dead. Keep up!" And, I mean, you know, the angels are all laughing at Aziraphale like he's so stupid, blah blah blah. And Aziraphale is just like, "I think they they quite like the old ones!" [G laughs] [G: Yeah.] Like, "If we kill them-" But Gabriel is like, "No, no, we're the good guys. We're not killing anyone. What we're doing is simply not stopping Hell." which is literally what Armageddon was. And yet. And yet Aziraphale was still the same. Alright. I mean, I feel like this is- All the minisodes feel like they were written after Season 1, which they were, and this is definitely that vibe. But like, I'll mostly let it slide because it's good and I like it, so there. And this scene is quite good in that like- Like, imagine the only people you could be honest with regarding how you're like, immortal, and have all these experiences and knowledge is like, your bosses in Heaven, and every time they're up there they make you feel like completely untethered from reality because their opinions and worldview are like, so so different from yours, that, like, you just- Like, they're laughing at him. They're like, "You're so dumb. What are you even talking about?" Like, it is hard to hold on to your own beliefs if, like, that is the only feedback from the outside that you're getting about those beliefs. Like, I'm sure that, at times, Aziraphale’s like, “Well, maybe I am the one who's wrong.” And then the whole cycle continues. [G: Yeah.] But like, agh. It's soo- llike, it's been 500 years since he's seen Crowley, who's like, the only one who, like, maybe, has similar opinions to him, and like, knows that he's an angel, and like, the last time that you saw her, like, it was the flood, and you know that, like, she actually understands like, what children are and what like, humans are and what child-parent bonds are like, and like, she values life in a way the other angels never have, and then you like, sit with them on a rock at the end of the day. Ah!

G: Yeah, I mean, we talk constantly about, you know, "Aziraphale and Crowley are literally 'I'll Be Your Mirror' by The Velvet Underground." But like, literally, though! It's about how like, somebody to tell you you're not crazy. Like, this is it, right? Like, Misha Collins voice, "You're not crazy.

C: [overlapping] Your special little Misha Collins.

G: [laughing] Exactly. So good. [C: Yeah. Yeah.] I wuv them.

C: Yeah. And someone to sit in your chair and ruin your sleep, but that comes later. [G: Yeah.] [makes pained sound] - G: We go back to present day. Gabriel has - if I remember correctly, Gabriel still wasn't in an outfit last episode, right?

C: Yeah, he ended it in a towel, but now he is dressed.

G: Yeah, he's in an outfit! And I really like this outfit. So he's wearing like, trousers, white shirt, and then like, a vest. A knitted vest. Is that true? Is it a knitted vest? I think it's a knitted vest. And a coat, just like Aziraphale's. But specifically, what I really like is that the white shirt is not purely white, it's patterned, and the pattern like, curls up to the collar in the front of the collar in his right side, and I think it looks great! I love a pattern. As I said, I love the costuming this episode. I think it's great. And Gabriel's outfit, I think it's wonderful.

G: Yeah, well, I'd say before Gabriel appears, I am- Okay, 'cause it goes to the present day, and it goes to Aziraphale just sort of standing there, like, contemplatively. So like, we're meant to think that like, the minisodes, this is Aziraphale standing and thinking about this. [G: Oh, yeah yeah yeah.] So it's like, I wonder what caused him to think about this. 'Cause later, when we go back to Job, it's because [G: Yeah, there's an obvious reason.] Gabriel says something. Yeah. But like, what's he thinking about now? Like, why is this happening now? And also, what purpose does this minisode serve within the modern day story, like, at this time in Aziraphale’s life?

G: Yeah. Interesting question. It really is interesting how like, in Episode 3, when the backstories were happening, you were like, "What purpose does this serve to the recent day happenings?"

C: Oh yeah, I've rewatched Episode 3 since then. I think the answer is just so that the weight of their history is felt so the weight of the breakup is felt. Like, I feel like if we didn't see that, Crowley's "How long have we been friends? 6000 years." would have been like [G: Means nothing, yeah.], "Yeah, okay. I don't know what that is." But like, yeah, I think that's what it was mostly. But yes, continue?

G: Yeah. But no, it's fascinating to me, because I do not tend to think of it that way. [laughs] And like, when you asked me that, that was the first time I thought, "Oh, yeah!" Like, [both laughing] "There is a point to this fucking story." Also, right now, this is the first time I'm thinking, "Oh, yeah, there is a point to telling this story other than just to tell it." Like, it is supposed to supplement the season’s happenings. Actually, that's a very interesting question. Like, even after this episode, do you find a reason why the Job story specifically is to be told?

C: It's- I mean, the part Aziraphale says out loud later is just like, "Man. Gabriel, you used to fucking suck." [laughs] Like-

G: But that's not even like, the main point of the episode. I mean, that's not the main point of the whole story of the Job situation.

C: Yeah. I'm not really certain. I guess since the Apocalypse, this is like, the first time Heaven’s really returned to Aziraphale’s life, so it's the first time he's actually really had to think about like, thwarting Heaven again. So like, maybe it's just-

G: So like, it's a flashback to the first time that happened.

C: Yeah, thinking back to the first time it happened. [G: Yeah.] And how it was nice to have Crowley with him because, yeah, being on your own side is lonely, but I guess they are now on each other's side, etc etc. I don't know. Maybe it is just randomly wedged in here. Who knows? Like, the fact that they call it a minisode instead of having it be a flashback sort of seems to mean that they want it to be like, viewed mostly separately.

G: As I said, Gabriel walks in and like, startles Aziraphale and asks like, "What comes after K in the alphabet?" And Aziraphale is like, "Jesus Christ, can you like, make a noise the next time you're moving around? You're fucking startling me!" And, you know, Aziraphale says, "Oh, the next letter is L. What the hell are you doing?" And Gabriel's like, "I'm arranging the books to make it easier to find in alphabetical order! By the first letter of the first sentence."

C: Fun fact about that. Remember, I told you how like, fucking Amazon Prime, as part of the promo for Good Omens, made character playlists for Aziraphale and Crowley? [G: Yeah?] Each of them were 9 songs each, and if you look at the first letter of the first lyric of each of the songs, Aziraphale’s spelled out “ineffable” and Crowley’s spelled out “tempting.”

G: [laughing] That's so corny, but I really like that.

C: Or, I guess it was 8 letters for Crowley's, then, because that's an 8 letter word. But yeah. But yeah. [G: That's cute!] And "Take Me to Church" was the M for "My lover's got humor" for Crowley, so.

G: Aziraphale is like, "Wait! What are you doing? Nobody would ever-" and then realized that, "Actually, this is really good for business, [C laughs] aka not business, because I don't want to sell any books." So he's like, "Okay, that's great! Good idea! Carry on!" And Gabriel, in response to Aziraphale saying that he should like, make a sound every time he moves, just starts making like, randomass noises, and Aziraphale's like, "Please don't do that." And then he changes the noise, and Aziraphale's like, "Not that either!" So what eventually he settles on is singing "Everyday."

C: It's a-getting closer.

G: It's a-getting closer. [C hums "Everyday"] I mean, isn't so fucking odd that, like, Aziraphale sings a different part for Maggie later?

C: Well, it's him misremembering the lyrics, and I do have like, an analysis- [laughs] Not an analysis. [G: Okay, fine.] I do have thoughts about the ways he's misremembered them.

G: Okay. Well, it's cute. I have said earlier that I think it's cute that they have a theme song, and I like that like, the fucking jukebox situation is happening. I think it's super cute.

C: Yeah. It's interesting 'cause you're going in knowing that like, the like, Ineffable Bureaucracy thing is happening, yeah, whereas I went in with no knowledge about any of that whatsoever. [G: Yes.] And, I mean, it was really funny when it happened [G laughs] because it's like, "Wow. He really made that crackship canon."

G: Well, to me it's a bit important, so.

C: Okay, yeah. I guess they do have a theme song, so that could matter.

G: They have a theme song.

C: Yeah. This is, according to Spotify stats, my most played song of all time.

G: Is it?

C: And it is just because of the time between the trailer and the show when I found out it wasn't even for the people I cared about. [G laughs] I think that's why I'm so bitter.

G: But isn't like, your top three like a fucking David Tennant-

C: [laughing] Don't you- I- No-! - G: We go to the Bentley, and Crowley is sleeping, right?

C: Yeah. And doesn't look comfortable at all. Like, asleep in the front seat, but like, can't lie down, so it's just sort of leaning back with like, arms crossed over stomach. [G: Yeah!] Like, she has to have a crick in her neck. It's so sad. [G: Yeah.] And he's sleeping with his sunglasses on, I suppose, to block out the light, 'cause there's not even like, curtains, or even tinted windows in the car. Like, he spent so long fearing the Heaven and Hell surveillance state, and now, they have to live in a place that doesn't even have coverings over the fucking windows. It's so bad.

G: It is. Sorry, Crowley. Shax knocks on the door. Informs Crowley he's in trouble. And Crowley is like, you know, "Former demon." I like that! Former demon. [C: It's a job title.] "Hated by Heaven, loathed by Hell." Does Aziraphale think of himself as a former angel? I don't think so. [C: Probably not.] The whole identity versus job situation. I mean, we're going to talk about it, I'm sure, by the end of this episode because of what happens with Aziraphale.

C: But maybe "former demon" is also keeping up the holy water ruse, for like, Hell and things.

G: Oh yeah, I completely forgot about that.

C: Because they think he was like, a demon/angel/human hybrid thing now, so.

G: You know, I severely cut that episode. I cut- [laughing]

C: Yes, [laughing] I was very sad at the line you said that you cut out.

G: You know what? What if we say it here and then the people can know.

C: Do it. Yeah.

G: [laughing] Wait, no, I'm embarrassed to say.

C: Okay, fine. Grey said, "What if they didn't body swap? What if they came in each other so raw and so hard that they're now immune to holy water and hellfire?"

G: Yeah, because of the come. so. Wonderful. What if?

C: Because of the come. What if?

G: What if? Shax informs Crowley that, and Crowley says, like, "Oh, how will our hero cope?"

C: So fun. So cute. [G: Yeah!] I love that they're trying to romanticize and fictionalize their life, like, yeah, haven't we all been there?

G: And Shax is like, continuing the whole like, doesn't know when Crowley's being sarcastic situation. But, you know, she's catching up! She gets that this is a joke. And she asks to come in, but you know, doesn't actually, she just comes in anyway.

C: Yeah. In Aziraphale's seat.

G: She says that she has spoken to Beelzebub, who believes that Aziraphale has something to do with the Gabriel situation, and also that a miracle of enormous power happened last night close to-

C: - "your friend’s bookshop." She says, "your friend's." Interesting.

G: Yeah. And she says that it's a kind of miracle only the mightiest of archangels could have performed. And at this point, I go "Boo!" because I am- I mean, I don't really give a shit about the Raph- No, actually, I do give a shit. [C laughs] But, like, you know. I don't like it.

C: I don't like it either.

G: The whole Crowley used to be Raphael, blah blah blah. It doesn't make any sense?

C: I mean, isn't Raphael the archangel of healing or whatever? Crowley's show no aptitude for that. Though I don't know what the other angels are archangels of and if they've shown aptitude for those things, so. Right. We were talking about if they were trying to push an archangel Crowley sort of situation.

G: Yeah. And well, were they?

C: I can't- I don't know. I hope they aren't, but I don't know. I hope they aren't!

G: Well, I hope they aren't also.

C: Yeah. I think that it's just that the double miracle has some kind of a power.

G: Yeah. It's just the power of love.

C: Yeah, 'cause it's like, Crowley's solo miracles aren't like, so powerful that, like, they set off alarms in Heaven or Hell, so I don't see why this would-

G: I mean, we already had power of positive thinking last season, why can't we have power of love this season?

C: Yeah, exactly. But I also like that Shax says "your friend's bookshop," 'cause earlier she was calling Aziraphale Crowley's contact. [G: "Your associate," yeah.] And I think that it seems like both Shax and Hastur pull out the friend card when they're being threatening. So, fun.

G: Yeah. And you know, she says, like, "Are you saying you don't know anything about this?" And Crowley actually says, like, "Well, how do you know I didn't do it?" which is fun. 'Cause I mean, they already think that he's like, some demon/human hybrid, like, a powerful being that can't be holy-fired. [C: Water.] So like, it's not such a leap to think that Crowley is also capable of this. [C: Yeah.] And Shax threatens her to hell and back, and by hell and back, I do mean like, "Disliked by Heaven, hunted and eliminated by Hell." And, you know. Fun stuff!

C: Everybody hate them and want them to die, but not God, [both] She said, "Faggot, you will live forever." [laughs]

G: Exactly.

C: Oh, also, the minisode was completely written by John Finnemore. I think Neil Gaiman had no involvement whatsoever. [G: Slay.] So that's a fun fact for you.

G: So like, are all the-

C: Minisodes are written by other people. The next one's written by Cat Clarke, and then I forgot who wrote the last one. - C: We go to the record shop. Aziraphale comes in. Yeah, Maggie's in another great outfit. Like, I think the colors coordinate very well. At least she has one good thing going for her. And Aziraphale's come in so that he can ask her about the song that Gabriel was singing, and he sings it out loud for her, and it's- Oh my god! He's so cute! He like, does his fucking like, conducting hand gesture to like, count out a measure first. [G: Yeah!] And then-

G: No, but like, he also does it later for Crowley when he sings it for Crowley. [C: Yeah! Ah!] And I think it's the sweetest thing! [C screams] Like, he literally counts "1, 2," in his head, and it's so cute. [C: Yeah!] So cute.

C: Yeah, and he keeps conducting himself while he's singing here, too, it's adorable! It's so good! I mean, do we think there's choir practice in Heaven? [G laughs] Like, Crowley mentions like, having to listen to celestial harmonies [G: "Celestial harmonies."], so like, is this the habit picked up from choir practice? I love Aziraphale so much!

G: What if Aziraphale had a harp? Like, have we considered?

C: What if? So yeah, he misremembers the lyrics as "Every day, it's a-getting stronger" and then "Love like that will surely come my way." So yeah, Gabriel's saying, "It's a-getting closer," so that's a misremembrance, but the song does have "stronger" in another line, but that line is "Every day seems a little longer / Every way love's a little stronger." And also, like, the second line's supposed to be "Love like yours will surely come my way," but he misremembers it as "love like that," so like, both of the misrememberings are like- the first one is like, taking love out of the line and making it into like, a general it and the second one is changing "love like yours" to "love like that," so both of them are about like, being less specific and less love-related, which is interesting to me. It means nothing, but it also means everything to me.

G: What are you talking about that in the first line, it removes love?

C: Oh, like, if we're thinking of it as a "every way love's a little stronger" misremembrance instead of a "it's a-getting closer" misremembrance. But it is- [G: Well, it's a "getting closer-"] yeah, it's a "getting closer" misremembrance. Yeah.

C: But you know what? It already means nothing, [laughing] so changing it back to that also means nothing. [laughing]

C: It already means nothing, yeah. And no matter what, it will mean everything... to me. And then Maggie just immediately starts randomly crying.

G: What is this? Why are you crying?

C: Was she just standing here waiting for an excuse to cry at someone? Like, why would this be what causes her to start crying? Like, if she was gonna cry, wouldn't she have done it like, earlier, by herself? Like, it's not like the song is so romantic that it reminds her of Nina and then she starts crying, right? Like, that's not what's happening?

G: I think that's what we're supposed to assume is happening.

C: We are?

G: I think, yeah.

C: Well, that's stupid.

G: I think it's stupid, too.

C: Yeah. Yeah. And they do a little better job with like, putting actual water like, on her lashes, or whatever for this one. But it's still not that good.

G: I mean, at least Aziraphale's was pretty fun!

C: Yeah, at least Aziraphale’s reaction was pretty fun, but I just, they've had Maggie cry in both of the episodes that she's in so far, and like, she's not very good at it! [laughs] Like, she's not very good at crying.

G: Yeah, but, like, you know, it's not supposed to be a cry that's like, moving in that way.

C: Yeah, yeah, yeah. And she moves on really fast. Like, her voice is barely affected afterwards. Yeah, and she tells Aziraphale, "Oh, no, I'm not crying." [laughing] And Aziraphale goes, "Do you actually think you aren't? Because I-" [both laugh] Which is soo-

G: He motions towards his face in like, a teary motion, and it's so- [C: Yeah.] For fucking real.

C: I'm not being fair to Maggie. Like, I'm trying. Like, I went and replayed this whole scene but like, tried to pretend that, like, Maggie, was like, a friend that I already cared about to try to see if, like, that could get me to be nicer, and like, it worked for like, a second where I was like, "Oh, no, friend, I've already decided to care about! Why are you crying?" But then after like, a minute, it was like, "No, I can't do this." [laughs] I just- I don't know. The way she reacts to things is just- we wouldn't be compatible as friends. I just don't understand her as a person or like her very much, even though she's done nothing wrong. So she says- well, Aziraphale asks, "May I ask you why you are...n't crying?" And Maggie just- like, I just don't think a person would say this. [G: Yeah.] She goes, "Well, I'm certainly not crying over her." and points at Nina across the street. Like, okay? [laughs] Like, okay.

G: It's so contrived.

C: And she does like, some dumb exposition thing that like, just doesn't feel natural where she's like, "I mean, sure, it took me months to nerve myself up to even bring her an LP, and then absolutely, we got locked in the coffee shop last night, and granted, I then made a complete ass of myself, and she already has a partner." And okay, so we're meant to think that she's been into her for months. [G: Yeah!] And she didn't know her name until yesterday.

G: Oh my god!

C: Like, what is this? [G: What is this?] I just, what is this? [G: What is this?] It's not that I don't think that it's impossible in that, you know, it's a pretty common practice to develop a workplace crush in order in order to cope. If you're the boss and you don't have any employees-

G: [laughs] Common practice for you. [C laughs]

C: No, okay, no, it's not just me, 'cause I was talking to my other friend, [G laughing] who's recently started work, and she said she's been scouting for a workplace crush to focus on instead of work as well. [G laughing] I think it's like a thing! I think it is a thing.

G: God, that's true! Maybe!

C: Like, sometimes you don't like your job, and you need a distraction. [G laughs] [G: Yeah.] So anyway, so yeah, again, so, you know, she doesn't have a a person in her workplace to develop a crush on, but like, she can look outside of her door and windows across the street, and Nina's like, a pretty person. So like, I understand just like, sort of sitting there in your shop-

G: But would you call that pining? [C: What?] But would you call it pining? Would you call it pining?

C: I would not call it pining. [G: Exactly.] I would call it wanting a distraction from the workday. And I think that that is what this is, but like, the show's treating it like it's real.

G: Yeah!

C: Like, you want a distraction from your work, so you look across the street at like, the pretty woman over there, and you decide to fantasize and like, imbue all of her actions and gestures with meaning that they don't actually have. Like, okay. Cool. Sure. That's a real thing. The show is not engaging with it like that's the situation. The show's engaging with it like this is like, actual love, or something. [G: Yeah.] Like, well, it's not [laughs], so. It isn't. God, I'm so mean! I'm so mean!

G: I don't think it's that mean. 'Cause I agree with it. [both laugh]

C: Well, we're both haters, so. [G laughs]

G: Exactly.

C: When she mentions getting locked in the coffee shop, Aziraphale does turn a bit and do a bit of a, "Oh?" sort of face, which is fun.

G: Yeah. That man has read fanfiction. [C laughs] You know what? Perhaps even written it.

C: Perhaps even written it. And then- and then she says, "But apart from that, I'm pretty sure I'm in love." Um, no.

G: It's so stupid! It's so stupid.

C: No, you're not. Like, you aren't, though, so, you're not.

G: No, you're not! It's so- I feel like love at first sight, which I do think is a thing, needs like, that mutual connection to work. You can't have someone be like, "Ugh, your business is terrible. And also, go away." [both laughing] Like, you can't be like, "We're in love!" [both laughing] Like, I don't think it works like that, you guys.

C: Yeah. And I don't know. Like, Nina has- there are things that are quite likable about Nina, like, last episode. Like, I think that her sentences about the record shop are objectively funny. But Maggie didn't seem to be charmed by like, any of it. Like, I didn't see her feelings for Nina shifting in any way. [G: Yeah.] It just seems like a, "Well, I already decided I was into you, and now I'm just gonna be here." So, I don't know. Annoying as shit. Ugh, I'm worried that like, first, I sound like a ninth grader who makes fun of Romeo & Juliet for killing themselves, and second, that I'm not giving them the like, grace I give Aziraphale and Crowley because of anything, but like, Aziraphale and Crowley are in love, and they're not [G laughs], so like, how can I help that that is the situation?

G: Yeah. I mean, Maggie owns a record shop, and they don't even have a theme song! Like, come on!

C: Exactly. Exactly. [G: First rule of making a good romance!] And it's like, I believe that Aziraphale and Crowley had a connection at like, first sight, because it's like, an important moment in their lives. Like the whole Garden of Eden thing just happened, and both of them are like, grappling with, like, what they're supposed to do with themselves in this strange new world, and like, they are finding company in each other, and also like, a good conversation partner to bounce ideas off of. Like, that's something. What did Maggie and Nina even talk about? Nothing! Nothing at all! Like, you guys don't know or respect each other at all! Like, Maggie, you're just depressed and have no friends! Like, find something else to do with your time.

G: Yeah, take up knitting.

C: Yeah, literally just take up knitting. Or like, get on the fucking apps or something if you want love that bad, but like, love like that is not coming your way [G laughs] across the street from Nina's coffee shop!

G: Exactly.

C: Yeah. Aziraphale gives a bit of an indulgent smile at the "in love" thing. Like, yeah, okay. Good for him. He and Crowley need to be Conan Gray “Crush Culture” so bad.

G: You know, you keep on referencing that- [laughing] sorry, I sound absolutely horrible-

C: It's just the- The main thing is just that in the music video, like, he's going around hating love so much, and he comes across a bunch of straight couples on dates, and he like, smashes up their picnic tables, and there's one point where he comes across a lesbian couple, and he's like, coming closer with the bat, [laughing] and then he's like, "No, actually, you guys are fine," [G laughs] and then he continues on his way. She also says that Nina hates her, which, like, she fucking does, [G: Yeah, she does.] so like, leave her alone. The end. And she's like, "What am I gonna do?" Like, nothing. Take up knitting like we just told you. Why didn't you hear that? Aziraphale's been looking anxiously across the street the whole time, and like, I thought it's 'cause the angels already arrived. [G: No.] But like, it's not like. He's just been looking at Nina the whole time. I don't get it. Why would he do that? Or, I mean, maybe he's just worried 'cause he's leaving his shop alone, which that tracks, too. He says, "Can I get back to you on that? I think right now, I'm a bit out of miracles." And later, he and Crowley have a discussion where it's like, okay, so like, here, it literally seems like he was like, "If I had a miracle, I would just force her to fall in love with you!" But later, he says that that's not how miracles work, so I guess that's not-

G: But he does do a miracle later!

C: What miracle?

G: He gets the guy out of that seat?

C: He does. Yeah. This whole thing is very inconsistent.

G: 'Cause last episode, we talked about how like, they're not allowed to do miracles. Well, I think they are.

C: Yeah, I mean, Crowley is 'cause [G: Is, yeah.] she just said, like, "I don't want to get Hell's attention with something too big" or whatever, but Aziraphale was acting like he couldn't at all. But like, he did, so what's the deal with that? Well, I'm really glad miracles don't work that way, 'cause like, it seems like at least Crowley would not have any ethical qualms with doing that if miracles did work that way, which is pretty fucked in the head of him, I have to say. [G: Have to say!] But I guess we'll get to that when they discuss it in the pub. But yeah, Maggie says, "Okay, like, whatever. I'm over it." So the song is "Everyday" by Buddy Holly and Norman Petty, and she has a bunch of copies of it because there's this pub in Edinburgh that she sends some records for their jukebox, and all them turn into "Everyday," no matter what. And she says that "That's mad, but they're Scottish, so..." which is very annoying. Like, can British writers stop pulling this shit? Like, it happens in Doctor Who all the time. too. Like, sorry that you like, don't want them to be independent? Like, I don't know what you're going for here.

G: What? What are you talking about?

C: Oh, no, just, I feel like a lot of British writing, like, they throw in jokes about just like, Scottish people are crazy, and like, it does feel like a “We wanna keep them in the empire” [both laugh] [G: Okay.] thing every time it happens. [G: Okay.] I mean, maybe it's just because I’m reminded mostly of like, a joke in Doctor Who where like, everyone on Earth had to- all the countries had to get into spaceships because the earth exploded, and there's like, "Oh, yeah, and the Scottish one has their own spaceship, but they keep trying to declare independence from each other," blah blah blah. But yeah. Whateber. The pub is called The Resurrectionist, and it's on like, 66, like, Goat Lane, or something like that. I don't know. And then Aziraphale hears a trumpet, which means that the angels are coming. - G: We see that there are angels coming up to the bookshop, and it's Michael, Uriel, and Saraqael. And, you know, Aziraphale as bolting to the fucking bookshop [C: Doing a gay little speedwalk.], greets them by the door, say hi and everything. Are we to assume that this is the first time Aziraphale is seeing these people again?

C: I think so.

G: And, you know, they say, "I think you know why we're here. We're looking for..." and then Gabriel shows up behind, and he's, you know, very jolly, very ecstatic. Goes like, "Greetings. I'm Jim. Short for James, but I don't need to keep telling everyone that. I'm an assistant bookseller!" Which is so cute.

C: Do you think Gabriel's like, funny this episode?

G: Oh, yeah!

C: I don't think he's any less annoying than he was last episode.

G: He is pretty annoying, but you know what? That scene later- I'll say the scene when it comes. But, like, there is a scene this episode where every time I watched this episode, I laughed out loud at it, which is pretty impressive!

C: Okay. Well, I don't think he's funny.

G: I don't think he's that funny, but eh, it's something. Like, you can see that Aziraphale's face, he's scared and everything. And I'm scared! 'Cause like, I completely forgot about the fucking miracle. I thought that because they figured out that a miracle happened, that they just know intrinsically what the miracle is, so I was like, "Oh, they're gonna know that this is Gabriel so hard and so raw." But turns out they don't. They ask, like, "Where is Gabriel?" Jim is like, "Oh, sometimes people call me Gabriel." [C laughs] And they're like, completely unfazed by this, like, do not give a shit. You know, they go inside.

C: Saraqael has to miracle a wheelchair ramp 'cause Aziraphale's dumb bookshop is not accessible.

G: Aziraphale is trying to get Jim to go away, but Jim won't. And he's trying to get them to get some books, and you know.

C: He does say, "Books are keen," which I thought was a fun sentence.

G: Yeah, I think that's a very Aziraphale thing to say.

C: Mm, I don't know. I mean, Aziraphale does say "pash" this episode. Anything could come out of that man's mouth. [G laughs]

G: For fucking real. Anyway, they mentioned that there was this huge plume of miraculous activity from this shop last night. They say it's "nearly 25 Lazari," which I think is so wonderful that they use Lazarus as a metric for miracles. [C: It's great.] It's even more powerful than resurrecting Lazarus.

C: Yeah, 25 times

G: 25 times, baby. That's crazy. No wonder it worked. They're like, "So you did the miracle?" And he's like, "Yeah, I did a miracle, because, I like- my- my neighbor is in love with the coffee shop owner, and Nina doesn't love her back, so I did a big miracle to make it work out so-"

C: He says, "big, big miracle" in his like, "Kraken. Great big bugger" voice.

G: [laughs] Yeah, "great big bugger" voice. And he's like, "Yeah, so she and Nina, they're now in love." And the angels are like, "Well, okay. Did it work?"

C: He should've just said no. [laughs] Like, apparently, that's not how miracles work. So like, "I expended a bunch of power and it didn't work."

G: Like, he literally should have just said like, "Oh, like, the reason why I was putting in that much miracles is because like, small ones wouldn't work, so it just kept getting bigger and bigger, but it kept not working! Who would have thunk?"

C: Oh well. Guess he panicked.

G: Aziraphale's pretty bad at lying. [C: Yeah] Pretty bad at lying.

C: Yeah. Even though he told like, the second lie in the history of the universe.

G: Anyway, they asked, like, "Oh, so it doesn't have anything to do with Gabriel?" And he's like, "Oh, yeah, you- you did mention that." And they're trying to like, trap him and be like, "Oh, did we? Did we mention it?" [C: But they did, so.] But they did mention it. Gabriel shows back up, and is like, trying to kill a fly with the books. Sure is something! [laughs] I mean, it means absolutely nothing right now in this story, but like, is that something? I think it is something.

C: Well, who's to say?

G: Who is to say? As Gabriel goes up to Michael, Michael starts recognizing him and is like, "Oh, do I know you?" And Gabriel is just like, "Yeah, I'm the assistant bookseller. Opened the door and everything."

C: Yeah, though before Gabriel says that, Aziraphale's literally like, closing his eyes in like, fear and dread.

G: And then they say they're going to send someone to verify the miracle tomorrow morning. So, uh-oh!

C: Uh-oh! And after they leave, there's like, a brief scene where Aziraphale’s listening to “Everyday” as he like, consults newspapers about stories regarding the pub and sketches Gabriel.

G: Oh, he sketches Gabriel! I did not catch that. I thought he was sketching some rando! [laughing]

C: No, that was Gabriel. [both laugh] - C: We cut to the Dirty Donkey pub, and [G screams] Crowley looks so beautiful. [G: Yeah.] He's so beautiful.

G: You know what a big part of why this episode works [C: Why?] is because they're hanging out. Like, they do have a job thing, and like, they are doing this for a purpose, but also, they're just together, and they're not antagonistic towards each other. They're not fighting. And it's like, it's so nice. It's nice to see them just hanging out.

C: Yeah, it is.

G: You know, last episode, I kept complaining, like, "We don't even know what's there to lose!" like, "We don't even know what they're like, in a regular day." And then, we just see them immediately after the fighting starts, and they're mad at each other and whatnot. But like, now, here we see them hanging out. And it's like, "Yeah, it's nice." It's nice.

C: Yeah. I mean, everyone's seen the most famous post of all time, which is "crowley i’m so sorry you literally put on a black turtleneck and a million accessories because aziraphale invited you out of the house for once and not only did you stay in the pub for about 5 minutes total but you never got fucked. you didn’t get fucked not even once."

G: Not even once. So sad.

C: And she didn't even. She didn't get fucked, not even once. God. Looks great, though. They go in, and Crowley's so excited to get to hang out. [G: No, for real!] She's like, "Oh, we're going to the pub! We never go to the pub!"

G: Well, shall we talk about the outfit?

C: Yeah, I mean, it's literally a black turtleneck and a million accessories, and they didn't even get fucked, not even once.

G: God, I love the little leather vest on the inside. What a look!

C: It's- yeah, there is a leather vest being worn. It definitely is a thing that is happening on my screen for me. Aziraphale's not excited to be in the pub, and they're just here because they can't be in the coffee shop. And then [laughs], he stops Crowley with a- with a hand on the chest that really- mm. Well. [G laughing] I think about it very- I think about it often. It's a thing that I think about, in my mind, often.

G: You know, when I first watched this, I did not like [C: Catch it?]- I mean, I noticed it, but like, I didn't have that kind of reaction. And when you were telling me about it, and you sent me a screenshot, I think, I was like, "Yeah, who give a shit." And then, like, I tried to think of it as like, if I was Crowley [C: Yeah.], and then my Aziraphale, like, the equivalent of my Aziraphale in my life put their hand on my chest like that, I think I would lose it completely. So like, okay, I get it.

C: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's craaazy, it's crazy. It's just such a casually like, possessive but also just like- it's like, "We are two people who can just touch each other." Like, that's a very intimate thing to do. And it's- it's- [G: Yeah.] Like, the- yeah.

G: It's not like an arm, you know? It's not like an arm tap or a shoulder touch. [C: Mm-hm!] Aziraphale's not putting his arm around Aziraphale's shoulder. It's a very-

C: [laughing] You just said "Aziraphale's not putting his arm around Aziraphale's shoulder." [G laughing]

G: Well, he isn't, so. [both laughing]

C: It's true!

G: I don't know why, but I've gotten really bad with the switching names thing recently. I mean, I don't even have an excuse. At least back in Season 1, I was concussed for [both laughing] the majority of the fucking season. [C: You were!] No, but why- So horrible. Ugh, well, so. I mean, Aziraphale wasn't putting his hand around Crowley's shoulder. He's putting it on Crowley's chest. And that is a very different touch. That's a very different thing to do [C: Yeah.], right?

C: It's- yeah. Yeah. [G: Yeah.] Like, entire palm flat against it. Like, hello. It's like, such a prom photos pose, also, for a brief second. But yeah. It's like, he doesn't so casually. Like, it's not like, a big thing. But like, Crowley kind of just like, stops completely in his tracks and like, freezes a bit, but like. We can't see the expression properly, but like I feel like it- I think Crowley is like, losing it a little bit. A tad.

G: No, you know, like, when you're hanging out with someone you like, and it's like, in the moment you're like, things are just happening. And it's, you know, things are just happening. And then later, when you go home, you like, start going through the day in your head, and you're like, "Oh my god!" I feel like this is a moment for Crowley where like, in the moment, she's like, "Yeah. It's happening." And then she goes home, and she's like, "Oh my god!" So, you know, good for them.

C: Yeah. Yeah. Good for them. Yeah. Aziraphale wants Crowley to get him a drink, which, god. Can you believe that like, love is real, and also that, like, they're in love [G laughs], and they're like, maybe the only people have ever been in love in the history of the universe?

G: No, for fucking real.

C: Yeah, he wants a large sherry, so, you know, under some stress today. He like, miracles a guy away from a table so that he and Crowley can have it. Crowley orders a large Talisker and a sherry for Lady Bracknell. Yeah, the Talisker, that's the same drink that they were drinking like, in the pub in 1.05, so yeah, I guess that's just Crowley's go-to. And Lady Bracknell is a character from Oscar Wilde's The Importance of Being Earnest-

G: He actually mispronounces it.

C: Yeah, he says Brackney or something. Apparently, that character's thing is just that she is "the embodiment of conventional upper class Victorian respectability." So [G: Yeah], cute. While Crowley's ordering, Mr. Brown from Brown's World of Carpets swoops in, takes the other seat. He and Aziraphale met at the Whickber Street Traders and Shopkeepers Association Annual Meeting several years ago, and he's holding Aziraphale to a promise to host the association's monthly meeting next time. Aziraphale’s been avoiding this guy for forever because apparently, every time Mr. Brown comes over, the shop just happens to be closed. How strange. And Crowley like, shows up [G exclaims] with, yeah, the drinks. [G: Yeah?] And, he hands- he goes like, [overlapping] "A sherry for you, a whiskey for me. Hello." [G: "Hello!"] Just in the cuntiest voice to Mr. Brown.

G: Here are the three things [C: Mm-hm?], here are the three options as to what people in Soho think of them. [C: Yes.] One is, they're a married couple. [C: Yeah.] Well as may be.

C: Well as may be.

G: [laughing] That's not even- May as well be. Two, they are so Crover and so back. Like, they're an on again/off again relationship.

C: I mean, some of them had to have seen the "When I'm off in the stars, I won't even think about you."

G: [laughs] Yeah. Exactly. People have seen- people would have seen that. Number three, because there is also the option that, like, prior to that, it's not like they see Crowley around that much. Maybe Crowley is like, a new-

C: Boytoy.

G: [laughs] No, exactly! He's like, the new boytoy, and you know what? He's all three, baby! [laughs] They're all three. [C: Yeah.] Crowley really is the married for forever spouse, thrice divorced [C: Four times], four times divorced situationship, and also, the new boytoy. It well may be. [C: It well may be.] I'm so sorry, Edna St. Vincent Millay, that I take that line and just say it for everything. [laughing]

C: Oh, that's what you're referencing!

G: [laughing] Yeah. Yeah. It's a reference to- what's that poem called? "Love is Not All," by Edna St. Vincent Millay. Beautiful poem So wonderful. [C: It's good. It's a good poem.] Yeah. It well may be. [both laugh]

C: Yeah. And then, just the way they're standing next to Aziraphale and doing the like, face on the "Hello." [G: No, exactly!] It's so like, possessive also. [G: Oh, yeah!] Like, they literally do belong to each other, and people do- will say that they're in love, so. Ah! [G: Yeah.] So Mr. Brown's like, "Oh, yeah, Mr. Fell just said he's totally like, super excited to host the monthly Street Association Get-Together." And Crowley goes, “Oh, you astonish me!” [laughs] No, it's- he doesn't even say it like that, it's like- how do they say it?

G: "Oh, you astonish me." [C laughs] [C: Yeah!] It's not even like a- I don't know how to-

C: It's just a casual, like, that's just like, a sentence.

G: "Oh, that's surprising" thing.

C: Yeah, it's so cute! ‘Cause she says the same thing to Shadwell when he says that he doesn't take credit cards, so like, that's just like, a Crowley sentence. It's so cute. It's so so cute. God. Mr. Brown leaves and Crowley sits. And Aziraphale says, “See, this is why I don't go to the pub, because, like, I really hate that guy's guts!” But okay, both of them have news about how last night's miracle got detected. And Aziraphale says like, "Oh, we can't talk about this in the cafe because it's about the woman in the cafe." And well, you know, Crowley lost his flat, but as Aziraphale's now lost his bookshop to Jim [G laughs], and now has lost his coffee shop. So, you know what? Fair is fair.

G: Equal proportions. Yeah.

C: Yeah. And [laughs] Aziraphale says about Nina, "Maggie in the record shop has a... pash on her [G: Pash!], and doesn't know how to conduct a courtship." And oh, god! He's so cute! First off, the word "pash." So fun. And also it means like, an infatuation which is like, yeah, like, she's not in love, she just like, has a thing for her. So true. Okay, it's either that he just fully does not believe that she's actually in love, or he, like, feels uncomfortable saying the word "love" around Crowley because he was totally fine saying it around the angels. Grey-coded for real.

G: I think the pash line is more of, like you said earlier, like, he's trying to say, like, "You know, she has a crush. Like, it's not that deep." But like, crush is like, so out of Aziraphale's vocabulary [C: Yeah.], so "pash" is the way to go. It's such a cute word, though! [C: It is.] I need to start using it! And also, it's so- it's so cute to me that like, he's like, "She doesn't know how to conduct a courtship."

C: [laughing] Yeah! And he's so like, judgy about it too. Just like, "Ope. That's not good." [G: Yeah.] Like, bro, you can't either.

G: A courtship, too. Out of anything that could have been said in that line.

C: Right. It's not that like, Nina has a partner or isn't into Maggie. [laughing] It's just Maggie doesn't know how to conduct a courtship.

G: Yeah, not even like, "Maggie doesn't know how to convey her feelings," or anything, really. It's like, "conduct a courtship." Like, okay. Fine.

C: Like, she can't find a chaperone for their next outing in the carriage. [G laughs] [G: For fucking real.] But yeah, yeah. So cute. But like, I don't know, Crowley is quite stressed, too, and like, not really receptive to Aziraphale’s thing, ‘cause she just goes, “We've got a real problem, and it's in your bookshop right now.” But Aziraphale is like, “No, it's the same problem, ‘cause Heaven got alerted to our Gabriel miracle,” and Crowley goes, “Ugh,” and like, leans all the way back in their chair, like, so far back, and they were already like, sitting the way that I do at work when, like, the managers walk by and give me judgmental looks so like, really, really slumped back. [G laughs] Good for her. Yeah, so Aziraphale’s like, "And, you know, I told them that I made Maggie and Nina fall in love 'cause it was the first thing I could think of, and they're sending someone to check tomorrow."

C: And Crowley says, "Okay, like, just miracle it to happen," which, come on. Seriously? Like, I get that their lives are at stake or whatever, but that doesn't- it doesn't really seem like- You know, when they were like, discussing killing Adam, it was like, a big thing. They spent time on, like, the moral issues regarding that. But like, this is just- this is very casual, it's like, "Okay, just do it." Like, that's not cool! Don't do that. [G: I mean-] Like, we had a whole free will thing. [G: Yeah.] And also, like, the miracle would fuck Maggie's- or sorry. I keep getting mixed up still. [G laughs] Okay, the miracle- Are you gonna keep that in just to like, [laughing] make yourself look better? You should. You should.

G: [laughing] About switching Aziraphale and Crowley constantly, yeah. Exactly.

C: And it'd fuck Nina's life up so bad, 'cause it's like, would this be like, a permanent thing? Like, she would just constantly think that she was into Maggie? Would this just be like, long enough for them to like, get in a relationship, and then she has to like, get out of it after like, she would have already had to break up with her current partner, which is probably gonna be like, a pretty like, stressful/traumatic experience? Like, you are doing something that will affect her for like, years of her life. Like, that's not cool. Don't do that.

G: But like, with like Crowley- I don't know. Like, is Crowley aware- I mean, the thing is, they are aware of how people are like. So like, I don't know. In my head, I'm like, "Is there a situation where Crowley would not understand the implications of this situation?" But I really don't think there is.

C: Yeah, no, I think that Crowley understands the implications just fine. I just think that, like, Neil Gaiman and - what's the other guy's name? - John Finnemore just weren't thinking about it that hard.

G: Maybe it's like, more of a dig at Aziraphale? Like, "Oh, it's something- like, this is like, a common thing you do, right? You set people up," you know?

C: Does Aziraphale do that?

G: I mean, with all the fucking, you know, literature about Cupid, blah blah blah, like-

C: Aziraphale's not a Cupid, though.

G: No, but you know what I mean. Like, it's a miraculous love that- something something. Just the thing is like, I feel like Aziraphale always assumes what Crowley is doing or like, intentions, and always links it back to like, demonic stuff. [C: Mm.] I am to think that maybe like, this thing is like, Crowley being like, "Oh, it's what your lot does, right? Like, you get people together? Do a little miracle, wiggle your fingers about?"

C: Yeah, I mean maybe. But, eh. I'm not feeling that explanation. I think that, like, everyone's just being a bit of a dick.

G: Yeah and like, isn't it so wild that's like, none- Aziraphale doesn't know that Nina has a terrible partner. [C: Yeah, just that she has a partner.] So for all he knows, he's breaking up a completely okay, normal relationship. Well.

C: [laughs] Yeah. Oh well. He DGAF. But luckily, miracles don't work like that. Aziraphale's proposal is like, "Okay, let's just like, make them regular fall in love to fix everything." And Crowley goes, "You mean like, a sudden rainstorm forces them together beneath a canopy. They look into each other's eyes and realize they were made for each other?" [groans] It's so Crover! It's so Crover! It's so Crover! [G: We're back, etc.] [laughing] Ohh my god. But like- I mean, Aziraphale's like, “Sounds unlikely.” and Crowley is like, “No no no, get humans wet and staring into each other's eyes. Vavoom. Sorted.” and then like, pauses, and then sort of adds, as an afterthought, "I saw it in a Richard Curtis film." And the thing is, there have been multiple people in Tumblr who are like, "I've seen every Richard Curtis film, and this doesn't happen," so.

G: Does it really not? [screams]

C: Like, there are rain things but like, it doesn't involve going under a canopy or whatever. So like. So yeah. So yeah, no, this is fully just like, okay, like, it is so fucking Crover. Alright. But I mean, Aziraphale and Crowley didn't look into each other's eyes and realize they were made for each other, though. Like, I think that was a a one-sided, "Oh. This guy's interesting." sort of thing, but still, it is so Crover. It is Crover, and also over, and also joever.

G: I mean, the thing is, I know that they fucking dance at the end of this fucking season, or at some point in this season. [C: Yeah.] So like, I don't know. It's like so fucking Crover to me that's like, for Crowley, it's like, "We're already in love." Like, "This already happened, and we're already in love." And for Aziraphale it's like, "Well, we're not yet in love, so we need to like, have a ball about it." [laughs]

C: Yeah. Well. [G: Crover.] Crover. So Aziraphale's like, "Oh, no, okay, if we're gonna use fiction, let's like, use like, real literature! [G laughs] Remember Jane Austen?" Okay, the thing is, this is- okay, it's something that annoys me, but I think I've gotten over it by deciding that, okay. Whenever their favorite authors, favorite whatevers are like, people who are like, famous today, I'm like, "No, that doesn't make sense, because they were like, there at the time." [G: Yeah.] So like, I bet like, Aziraphale’s favorite author’s like some fucking obscure-ass, like, random person who, like, died in like, 120 BC and like, Aziraphale has the only copy of the scrolls or whatever whatever, right?

G: And the thing is like, not even obscure. Like, we're talking like, maybe famous at the time, just didn't turn out to be a classic, you know? [C: Yeah, yeah.] Because what is famous in the moment is going to be very different from what we remember to be famous at the time, so, yeah.

C: Yeah, no, exactly. Aziraphale’s- and Crowley's favorite music should be like, stuff that like, in 50 years, it should be like, stuff that, like, she downloads on Bandcamp today for 99 cents, and like, she has the only copy of it ever on her phone.

G: Well, don't say that. [C: What?] Crowley's favorite music should always be Queen, no matter what. [laughing]

C: Fine. Yeah, okay. I think for Crowley, it makes a little more sense because, like, they like being cool, so they would go for like, certain things that are like, famous in certain ways. But yeah, okay. But you know what? I've decided to content myself with the dumb thought that like, "Well, no, ‘cause if it was like, someone they favored, they would have helped make them famous, like Crowley did with Hamlet. So like, it's not like they're famous so they like them. It's the other way around." But also, it's still not satisfactory to me as an explanation.

G: You're telling me that Azira-fucking-phale will not be a gatekeeper in literature? [C laughing] That fucking asshole? Yeah.

C: Yeah, he'd be like, "I hope no one buys any of your books ever, and that I have the only copy," so, yeah. But yeah, no, apparently he's a Jane Austen fan. Okay. Whatever. I mean, I do want to like, invite him to watch Emma. (2020) with me. Yeah, Aziraphale goes, "Hey. Rremember Jane Austen?" And Crowley is like, "Yeah, of course. I'm not gonna forget her in a hurry, am I? The brains behind the 1810 Clerkenwell Diamond Robbery. Brandy smuggler, master spy. What a piece of work." which, you know, that is pretty funny. I think it gets a little boring when they keep doing the bit later. But, you know, good for them. [G: I think it's fun.] Yeah. And that it feels more correct. It's like, "Yeah. Crowley was there, and would know, like, obscure things," which, like, this isn't a real robbery or whatever. But, like, yeah, it's like, it didn't survive through history, but Crowley was there. That feels right. But Aziraphale's like, "No no no. She wrote books. Novels." And Crowley's like, “Jane? Austen?!” And then Aziraphale says, “She had balls.” Trans Jane Austen rights. [G: Yeah.] Yeah, Crowley does a double take. But, you know, it's like, "No, cotillion balls." Aziraphale says, "People would gather and do some formal dancing and then realize that they had misunderstood each other and were actually deeply in love." [laughs] It's so Crover for me.

G: Well, what if they are deeply in love?

C: Yeah. What if they have misunderstood each other and are deeply in love? [both laugh] Have we considered? [G laughing] [both] Oh, it's so Crover. I mean, I haven't read every Austen novel yet, but I don't have an immediate thought about what that is. Like, Lizzie and Darcy's dance, they didn't realize-

G: I mean, they didn't- like, the dance was bad for them. [laughs]

C: Yeah, it was bad for them. Like, it helps them establish, like, a conversation rapport, but like, they didn't realize any kind of misunderstanding. Emma and Knightley's dance was like- I mean, there is a scene, like, in the dance hall, where, like, she's dancing and he's not, and she looks over and at him talking with all the older men and realizes that she doesn't view him as one of them, she like, views him as like, in the pool of viable bachelors. But like, that's not them dancing together and learning about like, they both misunderstood each other. And then, I don't know, what else have I read? I think I've only besides that read S&S and Mansfield Park, and I don't recall anything specific from those. [G: Yeah.] So yeah, I don't know. Austen fans, let us know.

G: I mean, the only literature I've read that features a ball [laughs] is "a golden tattoo" by witching, which is a fucking fan of Crowley and Aziraphale in a ball. [C: It's a good fic.] I need to talk about it. It's so wonderful. So good. Everybody go read it. It's gonna be on the rec list that I posted- [laughing]

C: And by now, somebody has asked Grey about his favorite lesbian A/C fics, so you'll see it on our Tumblr.

G: Yeah. And it's gonna be on that list. It's gonna be on that list.

C: Yeah. So they start heading out, and Aziraphale's showing Crowley the record of "Everyday," and he says, "I think it may be... a Clue." And he's putting on like, his voice and his face when he's doing magic tricks [G laughs], which is cute. Crowley is like, sort of annoyed at the way that Aziraphale’s pronouncing the capital letter in "clue." But, you know, Aziraphale sings the first line of “Everyday” again, and this time, it's accurate, because, like, he's heard the record a few times, and he does do the counting out measures thing. God!

G: I mean, it's cute ‘cause, like, Aziraphale starts singing, and then like, not even like, finishing the first line, Crowley is just like, "No. I never heard it." And Aziraphale was like, "Well, that was his singing!" [laughing] And they're so cute! They're so cute. [C: Yeah.] - G: So they go back to the bookshop, and there's a little bit where, like, Crowley walks over to a shelf where it zooms in on the author name, and it's Jane Austen, and Crowley is like, "Wow! She wrote books, too! You people, I will never get the hang of you lot."

C: That is a cute line. Like, it's a bit much, and it's a bit overacted, but I like reminders that they actually do care about humanity [laughs], because it doesn't happen that often.

G: I don't think it's overacted. I think Crowley just acts like that. [C laughs]

C: And also, she doesn't take her sunglasses when she gets in anymore because it's no longer a safe place to be because of Jim's presence.

G: Yeah. But, you know, it gets taken off later [C: For threats.] as a threat. [laughs] Aziraphale goes up to Jim, and he goes like, "Okay, now, tell me, what do you know?" And Jim is like, "Okay. Whaddayaknow?" [laughs] And I-

C: You really do think he's funny this episode. [G: I do!] I would have skipped like, all of these lines in my summary. [G: No, this-] I'm happy that someone somewhere is having fun. [G laughs]

G: No, this line, like, every single time I watched this, I burst out laughing.

C: Not a single smile from me. [G laughing]

G: [laughing] We were on the call, and you were like, chopping carrots or whatever [C laughs], and I was like, laughing so hard at this! And I was like, "Gabriel's so funny this episode!" And you were like, "Okay." [C laughs] and then just kept on chopping your fucking carrots, and I support that. I support that. I'm glad somebody somewhere is hating on something.

C: Thank you.

G: Anyway, laughing is over. The next bit is a bit tedious, and it's just, you know, Aziraphale trying to ask Gabriel questions, and Gabriel's like, "Oh, yeah, I remember that, from this morning. Oh, yeah, I remember the angels, from this morning," and it's like, you know, they're not getting anywhere. So Crowley is like, takes off his glasses to threaten the hell out of Gabriel, and it's like, "Think hard! Like, what is the very first thing you remember?" And Gabriel kind of convulses, closes his eyes, and like, when he opens his eyes, it's a [C: Purple.]- it's the purple eyes. And in a voice that, towards the end, kind of blends into like, a Legion voice, goes like, "I remember when the morning stars sang together, and all the angels of God shouted for joy." But he like, collapses in on himself, and like, obviously, this is a painful thing. And, you know, Aziraphale and Crowley is like, "No, keep going. Yeah, yeah, yeah." But Gabriel's just like, "I can't." Starts getting like, a bit agitated and is like, "I can't remember those things. Like, my head isn't big enough. Not anymore." which is fascinating. I don't know if I brought it up last episode, but like, a question I had like was like, "Is Gabriel, like, human? Like, what's the situation?" But like, I guess this is our evidence that, like, that's not the case.

C: Yeah, there's still the remnants of who he was, at least.

G: Well, not who he was, but like, more of like, the eyes, like, the eyes change, and like, I am to assume that humans cannot [C laughs] magically change their eyes to purple.

C: Oh, maybe you can't. My eyes are purple right now. You just can't see it because it's a podcast.

G: This line, like, "My head isn't big enough. Not anymore." I was like, "Huh!" They dismiss Gabriel. And about that line, the line that Gabriel said, Crowley says, "Hey, didn't your boss say that to Job? Do you remember?"

C: It's interesting that they say "your boss" because I feel like both of them have been very careful to say, like, "your former bosses," "your former people," regarding like, the angels and the demons [G: Yeah.], but it's like, Aziraphale still serves God, though. Like, that still seems to be a thing. Or it's-

G: And that is going to be so relevant in the last scene of this episode. Aziraphale!

C: Aw. Yeah. [G: Aziraphale.] "I'm like you now! A- demon!" [G makes pained sound]

G: You with your [overlapping] curly little- [C: And your neat white-] [laughs] It's so Crover.

C: [laughing] God, remember how much we hated last episode? [G laughs] Ugh, well, we are now giggling and twirling our hair.

G: What happens here? Aziraphale looks at the book, right?

C: Aziraphale opens like, a book that has the story of Job in it, and there's like a painting [G: An illumination, yeah] of Sitis raising her hands. And then we sort of zoom in and get back into the flashback. - G: And the flashback is Crowley is in a room with Job.

C: Yeah, I think it's like, the farm that got fucked over or a barn, something like that. 'Cause their house is a separate place.

G: Yeah, it's a barn. Well, I mean, in the book of Job, like, everything happens all at once. Like, they all happen at the same time. [C: Oh.] Job learns about them all at the same time. 'Cause what happens is like, every servant comes in and is like, "Hey, this happened, and I'm the only one who survived." And then, like, before that servant can finish that sentence, another servant comes in and it's like, "Oh, this happened." They separate it here in the Good Omens episode. We're back to Job.

C: He is played by Peter Davison, who is David Tennant's father-in-law. This is the nepotism minisode of all time.

G: Oh my god, yeah! But also, the kid is played by David's kid.

C: Yeah, Ennon is played by Ty Tennant, yeah. Fun stuff.

G: You know what's so funny is, again, in the Book of Job, the new children, he mentions the three daughters, so it's Jemima, Keziah, and Keren-Happuchand. [laughs] So they changed the other one from like, a named daughter [C laughs] to someone else to have his son in there, and I love that. Congratulations.

C: Trans rights!

G: [laughs] Yeah, exactly. You know, Job is on the floor, sores all over his body. But he's saying like, "Oh, like, everything's miserable. Yeah, you've come at a bad time. God has forsaken me." And Crowley's like, "Oh, you must be furious. After all of your devotion to God, for Him to do this?" And like, Job was like, "Not at God. Like, I'm furious at myself." Crowley's like, "Well, what have you done?" And Job says, "I don't know. How horrible must I be not only to deserve all this, but to not even know why." [C: Yeah.] Horrible! [laughs] [both] Well.

C: "These people's lives are destroyed, and we screw it up anmakeiwurse!" [both laugh]

G: For fucking real.

C: But, yeah, okay, the thing is, okay, Crowley has been sent here to like, do all this shit to Job, and also to like, tempt him into cursing job- into cursing God, sorry. [G: Yeah.] Okay, so it's like, okay, like, right now, she is trying to do that, right? [G: Yeah.] Like, is this half-assed at all, or is this like, "No, I actually want this to- I do sort of want this to happen."

G: I mean, towards the end of this episode, the moment Sitis was like-

C: "I will curse God," yeah. Crowley rushes in like, "Uh-uh!"

G: I'm not sure. Maybe this is just vying for information.

C: Like, the kids aren't even dead yet.

G: Also, like, there is a personal thing for Crowley here, where it's like, after everything, like, all this, and why? For why? And you don't even know. And like, for Crowley, you know, Crowley does know. They do know. But the intensity of the punishment doesn't seem to fit what is actually done, which is like, kind of what's happening with Job right now, right? Like, one thing about Job is like, he is never described as sinless or pure or anything other than by his quote "friends" who are trying to be like, "Oh, you say you're sinless" when he, in fact, never said that, and nobody ever said that. [C: Hm.] Like, he is constantly referred to as "blameless," which is like, that's the whole point. Like, even if you sin, like, shouldn't there be some leeway? Or like, shouldn't you be allowed to blah blah blah. And with Crowley, you know, I feel like Crowley, there's something for Crowley there.

C: Yeah. I mean, also, Crowley's gotta be like a- Like, it is kind of annoying if God wins this bet. God is trying to prove like, "Oh, I can have unconditional love, like, even if I'm like, a total shithead to someone." Like, if I got cast out of Heaven, I would sort of want God to fail at that.

G: Aghh, I'm thinking again about Crowley and fucking Abraham and Isaac. [C: Yeah.] So horrible. [C: Yeah.] So horrible! You know, I hope they do a flashback episode with that, [C: Yeah, I hope so.] but don't involve Aziraphale at all. Like, I want it to be just Crowley, which is very big for me! [laughs]

C: Yeah, no, you never want that.

G: Yeah. [laughing] But yeah, I think Crowley would get a lot from that. Yeah. Well, Sitis comes in. She is suspicious of Crowley, like, "Who are you? What are you doing?" Sitis asks, "Who is this?" and Job says like, "Oh, [both] this... person was looking for the children." So fucking real.

C: Agh! God! Nonbinary-ass demon, I love you so much!

G: Crowley is like, "Oh, I'm just an old friend here to offer some comfort." And then when Sitis asks for more information, Crowley just goes, "I don't know. You tell me." And like, it's like, a kind of a miracle, 'cause Sitis's face turns into recognition, and she's like, "Oh. Bildad the Shuhite." [C: Yeah.] And Crowley's just like, "Yeah, why not? So, the kids? Where are they?" She's like, "Oh, we're a little bit busy, so like, maybe next time." Crowley is just like, "Well, I mean, since everything is happening, maybe someone should check on the kids, 'cause, you know." And Sitis is disbelieving, like, "Surely God won't do that. The kids are innocent." And Crowley just goes, "Yeah, I mean so were the goats." [both laugh] So Crowley enters this like, beautiful orange place, that's like, you know, it's a beautiful building. Very nice. Lots of birds. And so Crowley is walking walking walking walking, and then Aziraphale just shows up on the side [C: In front of the door to the children's quarters.], and like, he is doing that pose. [C: Yeah.] Like, it's a different pose from the "avaunt" pose, but it's like, this, like [C: Hands raised], I don't know. The pose you do with the "Our Father," but like, higher. He's saying, like, "Crowley, you don't have to destroy Job's children." And Crowley says like, "Well, I mean the last time, you also said I can't, but I did destroy those goats, so." And Aziraphale's like, "Well, technically, you can, but like, you don't have to. Like, the great thing about being a demon is you can do whatever you want."

C: Yeah. He's crazy. That's literally not even true. What does Aziraphale think that demons do? Also, what other demons has he met besides Crowley?

G: We are to assume there has been, because, like, maybe there are other demons on Earth. Is that true? Or is it verified that they're the only ones?

C: No, I think there are other ones, 'cause Shax says like, "I'm Hell's representative in London," which implies that there's like, probably one per city. And also there was like, Crowley had, like, they had a guy at the air base to direct the Dowlings to the nunnery and all that shit.

G: Oh, yeah. And also like, if we are to refer to the book, they had their whole like, situation with the Nanny Ashtoreth, Brother Francis, and then the tutors, so. And those are not them in the book. I mean, isn't that so nice, though, that they arrange it so that they're both going to be assigned to London?

C: Yeah, it is. It is nice.

G: So cute. They're cute. Well, they're in wuv.

C: Yeah. They are in wuv.

G: Crowley points out that like, "Oh, you sound jealous." And Aziraphale is like, "Um, no, I'm not. I get to do what God wants!" [C laughs] And Crowley says like, “Oh, God wants, you know, to kill innocent children to win a bet. So, mm!" Aziraphale's like, "I don't think this is what God wants. [C: He's so in denial.] And I don't think you want it either." So in denial. You know, I really like that like, this episode, God does show up, and it's like, "Yeah. This is what She wants. Like, for fucking real."

C: Yeah, it's like, Aziraphale at first is like, “Well, it literally can't happen because God would stop you.” "Okay, fine, God is not stopping you, but like, this still isn't what she wants." Like, he has to keep losing like, tenets of faith or whatever. Not that. He has to just keep losing beliefs as he goes as more evidence is presented. This literally happened during the Apocalypse also, again. It literally already happened, or will happen. And I also like how he immediately goes from like, the like, "I'm not sure this is what God wants," but like, the whole time, he's saying it very quietly because he's worried that She's gonna hear and like, come down and be like, "No, it is." but he immediately goes into, like, "No, but this isn't what you want." Because, like, later, when it's the whole thing about the permit, right? It's like, he can't actually act against Crowley 'cause like, he's not allowed to, 'cause that would be him acting as an agent of Heaven against the permit. So like, he could really only convince Crowley to not do it through his words, which is like, something Aziraphale’s usually not that good at. Like, I feel like he's usually an actions-first guy. So, I don't know. It's nice. This is nice. Also, if anyone really likes this minisode and wants to read another Bible fic where Aziraphale makes realizations that he's still unable to unpack until the Apocalypse, stream "Before the Water Rises" by Vitreous_Humor [G: Yeah!], which is a Noah's Ark fic.

G: Aziraphale puts more bank in the "I know who you are, and I know you won't like this." But that is where the conversation goes.

C: Also, he pivots and walks really, really close to Crowley on the "I don't think you want it, either." Like, they were across the room from each other until now.

G: And, you know, Crowley says, like, "What do you know about what I want?" [C screams] And Aziraphale goes, "I know you." You saw each other three times, max! Bruh.

C: But that's not what he's referring to, which I don't like.

G: Yeah. Boo! Booo!

C: Literally hissing, booing, throwing fucking tomatoes.

G: I mean, the thing is like, when we do see them together in Heaven, Crowley was like, "I hate Earth." So like, you know.

C: Well, I think we're to presume that they've seen each other in Heaven multiple times since that first meeting. [G sighs] Like, it's not the only time they saw each other as angels.

G: Well, I mean, to me, like, what this is in reference to is the Flood more than anything, right?

C: Yeah, exactly. That is what it would be about. But, like, Aziraphale just says some other random bullshit. Like, what? Like, no. It's just the Flood. It's just the Flood. [G: Yeah.] The obvious reason that he thinks that he knows what Crowley wants in this situation is because of the "You can't kill kids" during the Flood. Why are we going further back than that?

G: Crowley says, "You don't know me," and Aziraphale says, "I know the angel you were." [C: Booo!] Crowley says, "The angel you knew is not me." So I guess this is time for my formal apology to Crystal [both laughing] for being such a fucking asshole last episode. [C laughing]

C: I was also being an asshole. I literally "Your headcanon IS valid. To you." you-ed. You- to you.

G: [laughing] I mean, you are being a little bit negative, so. [both laughing] You know, my note for this scene was just the biggest sad face I could possibly type [C laughs], and then, "Okay, fine! You were right, you were right, I was wrong, you were right." [C laughing] And you know what? [C: Yeah.] It well may be. [C: It well may be.]

G: Aziraphale pulls the, "Then, you tell me that you don't want to do this. Look me in the eye and tell me you're not working with Crowley!"

C: What?

G: Oh, it's a Supernatural reference [C: Ohh!] but I mispronounced the Cr-ow-ley into Crowley. [C: Ohh! Well, you had to say Cr-ow-ley.] Oh my god! Character development. [C: Huh! Nice!] Character development. But Crowley takes off the glasses and goes, "I long to destroy the blameless children of blameless Job, just as I destroyed his blameless goats."

C: His favorite animal is kids. I love that they're on the same level.

G: Oh, they're the same height?

C: No no no, sorry, I mean I love that the goats and the kids are like, [G laughing] on the same level of evil to Crowley. Like, he's like, "The goats were also like, innocent. Like, I don't get what you mean. It's like, the same thing, bro."

G: Anyway, this scene, Aziraphale's face falls. And I don't know how this episode goes, so I also am like, "Oh, no!" [C: Aww!] "Oh, no!" Legitimately.

C: Aww. Aziraphale-coded for real.

G: I was like, "I don't know how we're going to be so back from this. Man, what the fuck?"

C: You thought Crowley wanted to kill the kids?

G: Well, I knew that like, Crowley’s probably lying here-

C: Yeah, about wanting to. But Crowley was still going to do it?

G: - about wanting to, yeah. But like, bound by Hell or whatever, bound by the fucking permit whatever. Like, maybe he is gonna do it [C: Yeah. Yeah. That's fair], and this is like a "Let's just reckon with it with as little hesitation as possible to make it as, you know, easy."

C: Yeah. Well, now that we do know Crowley's plan, why did they lie here? What was the purpose of this? Is it to-

G: Just to save Aziraphale?

C: Like, from knowing that if he went along with it, he'd be thwarting the will of God? Yeah. Yeah. That sounds pretty correct, I suppose.

G: Obviously, Crowley can do this by himself. Like, he doesn't need Aziraphale’s help. [C: Yeah, so keep him out of it.] So like, why bother this angel? Yeah. Why make this angel feel the loneliness and guilt and the isolation of the thing that I am about to do?

C: Yeah. I mean, I also think that just, Crowley doesn't like being seen as nice still. [laughs] Like, I think that's also part of it.

G: Probably. [C: Yeah.] Do you think it's like, "If I admit to myself that I'm nice, then what was the Fall even for?"

C: Uh, huh. Maybe. Like, maybe that's part of it. I mean, I think that- I mean, there could just be so a bit of basic like, well, we know that she likes to be good at her job. Like, it makes her really bad at her job if she's nice.

G: Aziraphale just goes, "Then God forgive you." and starts to walk away. And they're walking away from each other, backs turned, etc etc, when we see- [both] when we hear a [goatlike] "Mehh." [both laugh] I can't do it.

C: No, that was pretty good.

G: Yeah, well, we hear a goat sound, and Aziraphale's like, "Huh!" And at the same moment, I go, "Huh!" And then I tell Crystal, "Oh. He kept the goats." And then, like, in my head, I was like, "What is Aziraphale about to do right now?" And I legitimately in my head, I was like, "The ceiling is gonna collapse, and then goats are gonna come [both laughing]- goats are gonna fall from the ceiling." [both laughing] It was what I was fully expecting. [C: Real.] It's raining goats. [C: Hallelujah.] But that's not what happens. Like, I really like this scene because of the like, Aziraphale turning around and Crowley just watching like, "What are you gonna do? What are you gonna do?" And like, I do find- I mean, there's a scene kind of this vibe - not vibe, I guess, but like, this look -later, when towards the end, right, with the "Is Aziraphale going to lie?" part, the section of the episode, and like, in that scene, like, Crowley is also just standing there, looking. And it's like, "What are you gonna do? What are you gonna do?" [laughs] The goats did not, in fact, fall from the sky. [C laughs] It's the birds. The birds are the goats, and Crowley changed them to birds to keep them here. [C: Yep.] Aghh! Crowleyyy. [C: Yeah.] This moment, I was like, "I should have never doubted you. [C: Yeah!] I should have never doubted you." [C: Never!] You know what? I shouldn't have. And of course, Aziraphale's face, which we need to talk about always and forever. [C: Uh-huh.] Aziraphale does this thing where he purses his lips, almost? Like, [pouty] "Hm." like, that kind of- imagine a face that goes with the sound, "Hmph!" [C laughs] Like that. That face. And then puts his hand on his hips [C: Yup.] and is like, "Hmph!"

C: He goes, "Well." [G groans] He's so cute. [G: This scene is so cute.] Yeah.

G: Like, I watched it, rewatched it, rewatched it. It's unimaginable how many times I've rewatched this scene specifically. Well, we do this like, transition to the next scene, where it's like, the screen is moving, which I thought was fun. I think it's fun. And the screen moves to like, the inside of Job's house. Aziraphale is just standing there, like, smiling a little bit, Crowley's pacing. And Crowley's like, "Oh, stop grinning." And Aziraphale's like, "I'm not grinning!" [C: Yeah.] But like, he is. [C: So happy.] And Crowley's like, "Doesn't mean we're on the same side. Just temporarily not on different sides."

C: Job's kids come out of the door, and Aziraphale is just like, “Be not afraid. I am an angel of the Lord thy God,” really dramatically, but the kids are unfazed by this, because apparently, angels just come in like, just to bring Job wine that he prays for and all that shit all the time.

G: No, it's curious. Like, what is this? "Usual angels"? [C: Yeah.] I think that's very curious.

C: Yeah, yeah, apparently, there's angels that often stop by to bring wine and shit. And Aziraphale's all like, "I have no wine, child!" Like, he's so bad with kids. Mwah! And yeah, so there are three kids here. And the one who's been talking mostly is Keziah, and the next one to speak is the first gay human on all of Earth [G laughing] or something. But yeah, he truly is gay. Good for him. Like, he goes up to Aziraphale with like, this condescending look [G: And like, rubs- Yeah.] and sorta like, brushes his fingers over his chest for like, a second. Like a, "You didn't like, bring any wine, but like, hey, you're hot," or whatever [laughs], but like, condescending the whole time.

G: I don't think that's it, but okay, fine. Good for them. [C: What?] I don't think that's it. [C: What is it?] I think it was like a, "Eugh. Look at you. Eugh." [laughing]

C: Yeah. It is kind of like a "Oh, you poor thing" sorta thing.

G: Yeah, this is just like you and I during the Paris scene. Like, "What's the 'Oh, good lord' mean? Does it mean like, 'Ooh,' or does it mean like, 'Eugh!'" And for me, it's the "eugh."

C: Yeah. But he is still- like, regardless of how he feels about what Aziraphale looks like, [G: Gay as hell, man.] he is still the first gay person on all of Earth. Or, you know, he could be like- there could have been a lot more gay people before, but he is definitely gay. Like, that is how he is being played.

G: Yeah, there were gay people before, but they got killed in the Flood, and this is the first since the Flood.

C: Yeah. Yeah, exactly. [G laughs] And he's about to become internally homophobic because of how fucking annoying the only other two people he's ever met are. [G laughing] [G: For fucking real.] Genuinely believe that after this, the next time he finds himself flirting with a guy, he'll be like, "Oh, god! We sound like those guys," and then he'll just immediately shut down. Sorry that Crowley invented sexism, and now Crowley and Aziraphale have reinvented homophobia. Aziraphale warns them that there's been a demon that Satan has sent to destroy them tonight.

G: He's putting on the voice. [C: Yeah.] He's putting on the angel, like, commanding voice.

C: Yeah. The kids are like, "Nah. It's not happening. Like, Satan wouldn't dare." And they introduce themselves as "Keziah, daughter of Job," "Ennon, son of Job," [both] "Jemima. I made this pot!" You know, the deal is like, God loves Job, so that's not happening. It's not happening. And then Jemima goes, "You're a funny-looking angel," and Crowley goes, "Aren't I just." and winks and clicks her tongue, and Jemima gives like, an excited gasp and goes, "Are you a demon?" And Crowley goes, "Oh, she's good." Like, Crowley loves kids, and he loves when they ask questions. [G: Yeah.] Agh. It's so cute.

G: Crowley does know how to interact with children, is the thing.

C: Yeah. Yeah. And Aziraphale is like, "Okay, yeah, technically, he's a demon. But, like, you know." And then-

G: [laughing] "Sent here to destroy you all!" He's so funny.

C: Yeah, no, and it's the voice you do when you read the monster, like, during like, bedtime stories, right? [G: Yeah.] Like, he's still like, playing around. But then, you know, they actually light the entire house on fire. [G: Yeah.] So, whoops! And the kids are screaming. Sorry that Crowley did this to you, you guys. Like, he probably could have explained before this, but, you know, we needed the dramatics of it all. And Aziraphale’s like, “But you said you wouldn't.” And they go, “I'm a demon. I lied.” [G makes pained sounds] And then we get the exchange where the kids ask Aziraphale to save them, and he goes, “I'm afraid not. He has a permit, you see,” which again, so interesting. So interesting that he's just straight up can't stop Crowley. But okay. And now we go to the part where I'm assuming you were actually sobbing over [G: Yeah.], where Aziraphale goes, “But be not afraid. You're perfectly safe.” And Crowley’s like, walking closer, and like, they're all like, wreathed in flames and all that shit in the back, goes, "Are you sure, Angel?"

G: Is this the first "angel," like, historically?

C: Yeah. Yeah. It is. [G starts laughing shakily] It feels like a species thing, though, doesn't it?

G: No, at this time? No.

C: No? Really? I feel like during the minisode, a lot of it just felt like a species thing, and I was like, "I wonder when it becomes a pet name." But no, you feel like it's already a pet name in this moment?

G: I mean, like, why is it being said? Why is "angel" the term here? It's because like- [C: "I'm a demon-"] It's like a reminder, right?

C: Yeah, of our sides, we're not on the same side, etc.

G: Like, "Look at, you're an angel." Yeah. I mean, if it's not a pet name here, this is where- like, after this, everything else should be, I feel like.

C: I'm not convinced that it's a pet name yet.

G: Like, it's the turning point.

C: If you say so.

G: And I am saying so.

C: And Aziraphale steps closer [G whimpers] and looks like, right into Crowley's eyes [G: It's Crover!], like, no doubt, like, steel in his voice, and goes, "Yes. Quite sure." And Crowley's like, in her head, like, "Fuck, yeah, you're right," and then does a miracle and sends them falling through the cellar. Also, the ox goes through the floor too.

G: I don't think Crowley was like, "Yep, you're right." Like, I think it was always gonna be this way.

C: Oh, no, I mean it- no, it was always- like, that was always the plan. It was just like the "I can't hold up the dramatics for much longer."

G: Truly a scene. They are so "Umaapaw"-coded. Which absolutely nobody understands. Does anybody of you- like any of the listeners, does any of you speak Filipino? Listen to "Umaapaw" by Ang Bandang Shirley.

C: Did you translate the lyrics once or no?

G: I did! For my fucking [C: AMV. Destiel?] Destiel AMV for it, yeah. [laughs} But there's a line here that goes like, "Buo ang loob ko saiyo / Ganito ako kasigurado," and in English, the second line, "Ganito ako kasigurado," means "This is how sure I am." [C: Oh?] And the line that precedes that is, "Buo ang Loob" is... So in the Philippines, the concept of loob is fundamental to Filipino philosophical discussions because Loob means "inside" and the way it's used in a lot, lots of Filipino phrases is, as in, inside the body, like, your insides. So it usually is like, representative of the soul, representative of the heart, the will, you know, stuff like that. The phrase used here is "Buo ang Loob" and "Buo" means whole. In English the closest one is, I think, wholeheartedly, but it's different. It's different. It's not just that. It's like- It's not just wholeheartedly, it's like. "Ah." The whole line is "Buo ang Loob ko saiyo" Which means buo ang loob- so wholeheartedly, with you. So it's like, like, "Everything that is of me, becomes whole, [C: Oh? Oh?] with you, or because of you or whatever, and this is how sure I am." [laughing] Which is crazy! I think it's so them! Everybody disappear and die.

C: Yeah. Yeah. Ah!

G: It's so good. Just watch my Destiel AMV for the translation [C laughing], but the entire time, [both laughing] think about- think about Aziraphale and Crowley.

C: Should we reblog it?

G: Yeah, we'll reblog it. Yeah. You'll see it. - C: Aziraphale's so smug. So happy. He's like, "I knew it. Wind, I assume. That's what Satan really has planned? A mighty wind from the wilderness to smite the mansion and bring it down upon them?" And Crowley is like, "Yeah, yeah, yeah, aren't you so smart?" And Aziraphale goes, “Actually, I- I think, getting us all in the cellar was very clever.”

G: This is so like, their first meeting in Heaven's fucking like, "I think you did an excellent job." [C laughs]

C: It is in a similar tone of voice, yeah. Yeah. And you thought that that was the most annoying thing anyone's ever done.

G: [laughs] Well, I think this was cute, and that was annoying.

C: Yeah. So nice. It's so nice. It's so nice. But meanwhile, like, again, these kids are scared out of their minds, and Ennon's like, "Will someone please tell me-" and Crowley snaps their fingers and turns him into a lizard. When Keziah's like, "What have you done to him?" Crowley goes, "This." and turns her into a lizard. Jemima [G: Jemima!] is so cute. She's so happy. She's like, "This is great." She's like, "Can I be a blue one?" And Crowley is like, “Oh, it's alright. You haven't annoyed me yet." But she goes, "But can I be?" And they go, "Oh, sure." and then does so. And then I think they all eventually go into the pot that Jemima made. So the storm starts to like, wreck the house, bring it down upon everyone, and Crowley settles in for the night. Gets like, a big ole like, jug of wine. Aziraphale is like, "Are you drinking human wine? It's the source of drunkenness." So yeah, got some moral things regarding wine. I guess Jesus hasn't appeared yet, so. And ugh, I know this is meant to parallel the like, vinylatte scene last episode-

G: [laughing] No, but it's so funny!

C: - but like, it's good, and that one was bad, so.

G: [laughing] You know, Maggie- [C: What?] Maggie should have gagged like Aziraphale did [both laughing] in this scene when Nina brought out that wine. Like, I think I would have shipped them if she started fucking gagging. [both laughing]

C: [laughing] God, Aziraphale- Mo, Michael Sheen's really getting into like, the physical comedy bits during this scene, and it's wonderful. It's wonderful

G: [laughing] Literally gagging, puking, like, it's so funny!

C: GYeah like, Crowley pours out some wine for themselves, offers- Well, pours out two cups and offers one to Aziraphale. Aziraphale turns away, has a hand up to block the evil wine, and is like, retching and gagging. And Crowley's like, "Yeah, alright. You don't drink. Try the food, though. You can't get drunk on food." Walks over to the ox, which, you know, fell down with them. [laughs] Was it already cooked, or did the fire cook it? [G laughs]

G: You know what? Why not? [C: Why not?] The fire did cook it. To the perfect medium rare.

C: Exactly. And takes out like, a plate with like, some ox ribs on it and holds it up to Aziraphale and goes, “Go on. Have an ox rib.” And, god. They're so fucking horny. [laughs] This is- yeah, no, this sure is a scene. So- you know that time someone asked stupid Neil Gaiman on stupid Tumblr about this, and he was like, "What? No, it wasn't sexual. Sometimes an oxrib is just an oxrib." Like, okay, well, I mean, David Tennant and Michael Sheen did not get that memo, so. [G laughing] [G: For fucking real.] Also, it's so stupid, because, like, every other time someone's asked him about a minisode, he's like, "I didn't write it. You'll have to ask the author." [G laughing] But for this one, he's like, "No! No! They would not ever have sex. What's wrong with you?" [G: God.] Like, you didn't even write this. Like, okay.

G: [laughs] Yeah. You're not even doing it with the audacity of a co-author.

C: [laughing] Yeah, you're not even a co-author. You don't have the audacity. [G laughs] Aziraphale's like, "Are you trying to tempt me?" And Crowley's like, "Not at all. Angels can't be tempted. Can you?" And Aziraphale's like, "Certainly not!" And Crowley's like, "Well, there you are, then. You're free to try the food." Man. Crowley was being sarcastic with the "You're an angel. I don't think you can do anything wrong." in Eden, but like, it worked [laughs], so now it's like, "Alright, let's do this one again."

G: I really like when Crowley says, "There you are, then." I mean, the only other time Crowley says it is in the book, but like, I love it. "There you are, then."

C: There you are, then. But yeah. What is Crowley's motivation here?

G: No, I don't know. Like, why give- Why?

C: I'm not certain.

G: I don't think there's any like, reason to think that Aziraphale might be really into this.

C: Yeah, like, there's no indication at all. Like, it could just be like, a general like, you know, like, “I like wine and food, and no one else seems to appreciate it. But, like, we seem to be of similar minds in like, multiple things, so let's see if this-"

G: This is just like you trying to get me to watch Good Omens, yeah. [C laughing] They should have started a podcast about food.

C: I don't know, I feel like there's a moment later, where it's like, you could read this as Crowley like, not like, wanting Aziraphale to Fall like, very hard, but like, "Well, let's see what happens [G: Just a little bit?] [G laughs] about it," you know? But anyway, it doesn't really jive with my personal headcanons that Crowley was the one to introduce Aziraphale to food. [G: Oh yeah, you don't like this.] Like, it's just- I don't know. That's like, Aziraphale’s number one thing. I mean, okay, maybe books are his number one thing, and like, they're not gonna be like, "And Crowley was like, 'Hey, look, there are words on a page.'" So that's fine, I guess. Books are his number one thing. That can still be a solo thing. But I have no actual reason for disliking it. I just think that, like, there's something that are quintessentially like, them, and I would prefer it if they came to those conclusions and interests by themselves.

G: [laughs] Yeah. Sure, why not?

C: You don't really have an opinion?

G: I don't really have an opinion about this, but you know what would be so funny? [C: What?] If in the next minisode, it's revealed that Aziraphale is the reason why Crowley likes plants. [laughs] Like, why not? [both laugh] Let's just go all in.

C: I thought what you were gonna say is that it'd be funny if it was revealed that Aziraphale literally has eaten food before, [G laughing] but like, he's just like, "No! I wouldn't eat food! I'm an angel! Eww!"

G: "I would never consume food!" [C: Yeah, yeah.] He's just like that one fucking video-

C: - fic where Crowley had already gone to Petronius's restaurant earlier that day?

G: [[laughing] He's like that one video of Brian Jordan Alvarez where it's like, "I don't drink water." [C laughs] That's what Aziraphale is. "I don't drink water."

C: For real. But anyway, the fic that I just referenced- "Worth Knowing" by Twilightcitysky, is, yeah. It is mentioned there that, like, Crowley had already gone to Petronius's restaurant earlier that day, and then pretended to not have had an oyster so that she could have lunch with Aziraphale.

G: And the video I'm talking about is "I Can't Eat" by Brian Jordan Alvarez. It's so funny.

C: Yeah. It is pretty funny. Yeah, this isn't what the show is going for, but in the spirit of Grey, I'm choosing to believe that Aziraphale has totally eaten before this already. [G laughing]

G: What do you mean in my spirit? I didn't even say that?

C: No, in the spirit- I mean, like, how you were with like, last episode. [G: Ohh.] You're like, "They don't even remember meeting. This didn't even happen." in the "before the beginning" scene.

G: For fucking real.

C: Aziraphale's still doing the "Ew, eugh, blech!" thing, but picks up a little piece of meat, and then like, is frowning and scrunching his face up so much as he takes the first bite and chews. And then midway through chewing, e does like, his gay little gasp [G: Yeah!] and goes, "Oh, I say." And- it's like, the amount that's left in his fingers is like, it's like, one bite worth. But I really like, that, he takes like, a bite that like, leaves, like, maybe like, one-sixth of the piece of meat left. It's like he's trying to pace himself, but like, immediately after, he like, shoves the like, remaining sliver into his mouth. Yeah. Yeah. He's very into it.

G: And Crowley doesn't eat. [C: No.] Crowley doesn't eat.

C: No. Crowley is watching.

G: This is all for Aziraphale.

C: Crowley's still holding- Crowley's holding the plate. I don't think that they put down the plate. We cut to later, so we don't know, but I think Crowley just stood there, holding the plate the whole time, and Aziraphale just went through the entire plate before getting to the ox, like, with the- Like, I don't know how to explain what Crowley's expression is? Like, rapturous, I would say?

G: Yeah, I think this is like, yeah. I would say, this is like, a horny thing

C: It is. It's- yeah. [laughs]

G: Yeah. It well may be.

C: It well may be. Oh, also, before, like, eating the piece of meat, like, Aziraphale licks it with his tongue like, in this weird way [G: Yeah.] [both laughing], yeah. [G: God.] I remember reading a post from my mutual that was like, "my favorite ace headcanon about Aziraphale and Crowley is that like-" Oh, god, do can I even say this on the podcast? Is that Aziraphale only likes eating pussy in the way that he likes eating ox ribs, and [laughing] Crowley lets him do it not because he actually likes getting eaten out specifically, but because he likes watching Aziraphale eat his pussy like it's ox ribs [G laughing], and like, so true. Am I- is that allowed? Does that go past our limit of how sexually explicit we're gonna be? Anyway! We like, cut to later. God, Crowley's so horny-looking! Like, their eyes are opened so, so wide, and they're just not blinking, staring. Like, okay, girl. So yeah, we cut to later, and like, Aziraphale is food-drunk, off his gourd, grease all over his face. He's finished the plate. He's moved onto the ox. The ox's bones are like, stripped bare. [G: He's ravenous.] Like, he's eaten at least like, two-thirds of the entire fucking ox. [G: Ravenous.] Won't stop eating to talk. It's just like, talking while chewing, and goes like, "Come on. You're a little bit on our side." And Crowley's like, "No, not even the slightest." And Aziraphale's like, "Well, you're not on Hell's side." Oh, also, Crowley is like, on the floor, like, sprawled out, drinking wine. I think they're on like, the last dregs of the jug right now. Crowley considers a bit and then goes, “I go along with Hell as far as I can.” Ahhhh. And Aziraphale goes, "So whose side are you on?" Labor organizer Aziraphale rights. Crowley goes, "My side." And Aziraphale goes, “Gosh! Well, that sounds… lonely.” Ahh. And Crowley goes, "No, it's not lonely. I'm good. Whose side are you on?" And Aziraphale gives like, a scandalized look, and is like, "God's, of course!" But Crowley's like, "The same one that wants me to whack the kids?" "Whack is so fun." In Supernatural, every time they come up with a new word for kill [G laughs] [G: Yeah.], it's like, "You're the most- You're disgusting creatures [G laughing], and I want you off my screen." But Crowley can do whatever she wants forever. If Crowley had said here, "The same God that wants me to gank the kids," I'd be like, "I like the word 'gank' now. [G laughs] It's good."

G: For fucking real. He should have said, "God wants me to ventilate those children." [C laughing]

C: Real! Aziraphale goes, "Yes. But." And Crowley goes, "Yeah, that's just how it started for me. See you in Hell." which is a bit mean. And is like, that's the part where it's like, "I wonder if, you know, the food was like, 'Well, let's see what happens.'"

G: No, I don't think so.

C: No? No? What do you think the vibe here is?

G: Of the food or-

C: I don't know. Just this whole thing.

G: I don't know. It's like, just, I mean, obviously, from what we see later on like, Crowley does not believe Aziraphale's [overlapping] actually going to go to Hell, like ever.

C: Yeah, that's true. I mean, with his curly little- and his neat white. I suppose so. But there's a similar-ish scene during like, bookshop drunk scene where Aziraphale goes like, "Well, I'll be damned," and Crowley goes, “It's not that bad when you get used to it.” But like, it's- this is much more mean-spirited than that one. Like, it's a very different tone, 'cause I feel like this one does feel to me like a genuine like, "Well. You might actually Fall. This is a genuine belief I hold." But you're right that later-

G: I don't think it's a- Okay, continue that the "you're right" first, because I want to be right.

C: [laughing] No, just that you're right that it seems like, later, it seems like a ridiculous notion to Crowley, so, I don't know. Hard to tell.

G: No, but I mean, the thing is like, even if Crowley here was like, "Oh, you're gonna go to Hell, become a demon," I don't think it's that mean-spirited because I feel like mean-spirited comes from a place of like, intention and stuff, and I don't think they know each other well enough for Crowley to fully comprehend how important it is for Aziraphale [C: That he's an angel.] that he's an angel, yeah.

C: That's true. But I feel like Crowley could guess. Like, I feel like you'd just be like, "Would the average angel take well to the sentence, 'I think you're gonna go to Hell and become a demon'?" And like, I think the answer would be like, "No, it would be bad. They would be unhappy and sad about it."

G: Well, so what? Crowley's a demon.

C: I mean, I don't blame Crowley for it. I think that like, it was totally fine for them to do it, and they should do it again. But I do feel like it was said with the thought, "This is probably gonna hurt Aziraphale a little bit, and I'm okay with that."

G: Yeah. And you know what? I think this Crowley is okay with it, and I think that's completely fine.

C: Real. - G: Our next scene is- there's this bit where Aziraphale’s like, “Oh, my God!” And Crowley is like, “Wow! Blasphemy. Unbecoming of you.” Okay, here, Crowley says “angel” again. [C: Yeah.] What do you think? Is this a pet name or not?

C: I mean it is in direct relation to like, “You're blaspheming.” [G: Ugh! Well.] So, species again. Sorry!

G: When do you think it changes?

C: Not a time when we see it.

G: Yes, but like, for example, in the Episode 3, like, where in that? Before what? After what?

C: Honestly, I think not - Oh, god, this is a bold stance. - Not until the Arrangement.

G: You know what? I believe it. 'Cause I was going to say, like, definitely after, like, the Wessex situation. [C: Yeah, exactly.] So maybe not after the Arrangement, but definitely around that time. Like, maybe a bit before, and that's what tips it over, you know? [C: Yeah. Yeah.] Are all the other minisodes flashbacks?

C: Yeah. And the other ones are all bad, also [laughs], in my opinion.

G: Ugh. It's not this kind of flashback. Like, not Biblical or whatever.

C: No, I wish. [G: Sad.] Huh, okay, you know what's interesting [G: No, I don't.], is that in the official Amazon captions, whatever whatever, sometimes angel is lowercase, and sometimes it's-

G: Capitalized? Oh, that's juicy!

C: It's uppercase here, like, in this episode, but it was lowercase on “Doing good again, angel?” in Season 2, Episode 1. So I feel like when it's lowercase, it's a pet name, and when it's uppercase, it's a species?

G: Sure. Why not? [C: Why not?] Why not? "Hello, Aziraphale." Do you remember that? It's so cute.

C: Yeah. Yeah.

G: What's happening here is Job is actually talking to God, and Job's not having a great time. Middle of a storm kind of situation. And, you know, God is asking like, "Oh, do you know how I created the Earth? Where were you when I lay the foundations of the Earth, Job?" And Aziraphale and Crowley are watching.

C: It's not a good scene, because God feels so strongly like a voiceover, you know? Like, it's like, it doesn't feel like she's actually talking to him, and it also doesn't feel like he's hearing her, because Pete Davidson- Davison [G laughs] is sort of just like, standing there like, with his arms- [laughing] Mm. [G: Why not?] But yeah, Pete Davison is just standing there with his arms up in the air, like, going like, "Why? Why?" like, at random intervals? [G laughs] [G: Yeah.] Like, it barely feels like he's responding to anything God's saying, or is even hearing any of it. It was like, clearly added in post. He wasn't even like, directed to know when She was supposed to be saying sentences. Like, it looks bad.

G: I mean, what we're supposed to focus on is that Aziraphale and Crowley are seeing this, and they're like, "Oh my god! Like, do you think he's getting any answers?" And it's like, "No, but just to be able to ask the question." [pained sounds]

C: Aww. Crowleyyy. Ahhh.

G: Crowleyyy. [laughs] Job comes back in, and Sitis is there and is asking like, "Oh, what did God say?" And Job's like, "I don't know. Like, I think what God is saying is once you have made whales, you can come back and like, have answers. But otherwise, fuck off!" [C: Yeah.] Yeah. I like that this is how they do it, really, 'cause, I mean, obviously the Job from- that's in the Bible story Job - is very different from this story Job. It does feel very frustrating in the original where it's like, God comes in and says all this, and honestly, quite unreasonable, and Job is like, "Yeah, why not?" And, you know, it's treated as a good thing that like, "Oh, you cannot comprehend God's plans, and like, you just have to submit yourself, and look at Job." You know, it's treated to be like, a good resolution to the story. But here, it's like, "No like, Job doesn't get it." I mean, it's still- you know, same thing happens. God says the same things and all that. But it's the like, "How are we supposed to take it?" you know, that's different. "How are we supposed to take that?" [both laugh], as @montessori.boy TikTok "Rainbow Dress" puts it.

C: Sitis does [G: Asks about the children.] go, like, “And what did They say about the children?” Sitis they/thems God, which I love.

G: She/they God! Hell yeah! [C: She/they God rights!] [laughs] Diversity win! [C: Yeah.] [laughs] And then, you know, Job is like, "No mention of the kids." And, you know, they're both terrified when the angels show up and they like, glow. It's like, a giant glow, and then, as it glows out, they're there. And Gabriel is saying, like, "Virtuous Job, you have passed God's tests." and like, says, "Okay, I'm gonna dole out your rewards, and the first reward is, like, you have lost, what? 300 sheep? And now you have 600!" And the angels are like, clapping. [laughs] [C: Yeah.] And, you know, Gabriel's like, "What do you say? [laughs] And Job was like, "Uh, thank you?" And it's like-

C: "Don't thank me. Thank God!" Also, at some point, Aziraphale is like, going, "Sorry, sorry, sorry," [G: Oh yeah, I forgot!] and edging into the crowd of angels. I think they are like, missing a part in the formation, so I guess Aziraphale's sort of supposed to be part of this congratulations party.

G: Yeah. Literally just like a fucking job you hate, for fucking real. [C laughs] So Job says, like, "Oh, but what about our children?" Sitis too. And, you know, Gabriel is like, "Well, your three children are completely fucking dead. But now, God will grant you to conceive seven more children," and the angels are clapping, but of course, Job and Sitis are completely horrified by this. You know, like, "I loved my children!" "We don't want more children, what the hell?" And Sitis-

C: Yeah, and Job falls to the ground weeping, and that's like, background sound for, like, [laughs] the rest of the entire scene. And like- [G laughing] [G: Real! For fucking real!] And I feel like it's pretty- I mean, it's similar to, you know, the screams in the background of 1941 [G laughs] where it's like, "These humans are suffering so so horribly while Aziraphale and Crowley, like, flirt in 5D space in front of God and everyone." [G laughs] [G: Yeah.] I feel like in 1941, it didn't annoy me that much because we didn't like, know those people, but like, we have met Job, and I know exactly who's crying on the floor and what about, so like, it's like, they are gonna be very charming and fun soon, but I also find them kind of very annoying [laughs] for the rest of the scene.

G: Like, they spent that whole night eating and drinking, and they weren't like, "Okay, what's the plan tomorrow?" [C: Yeah.] Like, they really DGAF.

C: Yeah. Yeah. Also, like, those kids were lizards on the floor the whole time. Like, Crowley didn't really explain the situation to them at all. Like, hopefully, like, in their lizard brain state, they just weren't able to stay up all night worrying, but like, what if they did? That sucks.

G: I mean, I hope they're lizard lizard brains for real, [C: Yeah.] because, like, I don't want them to hear [both laugh] and see Aziraphale and Crowley that night.

C: [laughs] Yeah. Yeah.

G: Yeah. Job's on the floor, sobbing, etc etc. And Sitis goes, "If my children are dead, then I will curse God-!" [C: Yeah.] And Crowley comes in and is like, "Whoa-whoa-whoa! No-no-no! Don't do that! That doesn't end well! [C: Yeah.] Remember me? Bildad the Shuhite?" [C: Yeah.] And the angels are like, "What the fuck?"

C: Is Crowley gonna be in trouble that Job passed the test? Like, this was an assignment that she had, and she failed.

G: No! I mean, the whole situation is to just to take away what's there, so like, as long as-

C: But the point is- I guess. I guess, according to the rules of the bet, yeah. That's true.

G: I mean, that's not Crowley's problem.

C: Yeah, yeah. Though, I mean, Crowley did have, you know, the moment where, like, they were trying to like, get Job to say that they were mad at God, so like, I'd think that part of the assignment, like, beyond taking things away is to be like- I don't think Satan's playing fair in this bet, so I'm sure it's like, "Hey, and if you could try to like, convince them." And now, like, they're like, explicitly stopping Sitis from like, causing the bet to fail, so, this seems like something they could get in trouble for.

G: I mean, it's not about Sitis, though. [C: That's true.] Like, Sitis was always like, "What the fuck, God?" But like, it's Job who the bet's about, so.

C: Yeah, fair.

G: Yeah, the angels are like, "Who are you? What the fuck?" And Aziraphale's like, "Oh, he says he's Bildad the Shuhite?" And Crowley's like, "Yup!" Like, puts on the voice that she puts on for Hastur.

C: Mm, yeah. Aziraphale says the "He says that he's" because Aziraphale's, so far, trying to avoid lying to the angels.

G: Crowley is like, "Oh, yep! Bildad the Shuhite. Need any shoes?" [C laughs] And, like, Michael is like, "Well, Shuhite means from the land of Shua." Crowley's like, "Yeah, where I am, in fact, [overlapping] a leading shoemaker."

C: "You think they don't wear shoes in Shua?"

G: And Aziraphale's like, "Fuck. I mean, wouldn't be really helpful if you were an expert on human births?" Crowley is like, "Yup. Shoemaking and obstetrics. [C laughs] These have always been the twin passions of Bildad the Shuhite."

C: [laughing] I love her!

G: So cute. And, you know, they say, like, "Oh, Sitis is gonna have more children," and like, "Well, what do you know?" And you know, Crowley's like, "Okay, well, let's just do it." [C: "Let's get started right away."] Yeah. Goes up to Sitis and whispers, like, "Just make sure that you do everything as I say." [C: "Just trust me."] And then, like, Aziraphale also comes forth. [C: Yeah.] And what does he do?

C: Well, I mean eventually he does the miracle to turn the children from lizards into humans.

G: I know, but like- 'cause-

C: I think it's just like, Crowley's like, "I'll need an assistant," sort of. Like, trying to make sure that the other people stay farther away and don't try to help.

G: Yeah, why not?

C: Yeah. Sitis has to be having like, the worst time. Like, I'm glad that Crowley did the like, "Just trust me" thing to like- 'cause like, I feel like this is a scary situation. I feel like it could have come a bit earlier, and could have been a bit more reassuring, but I don't know. I guess they met like, the minimum requirements for reassurance for this time.

G: Crowley is just starting the procedure, and like, Aziraphale's like, "Oh, in fact, Gabriel here personally witnessed childbirth in the Garden of Eden!" And everyone's like, "Ah-ha-ha," clapping clapping, "Oh my god!" And Gabriel is like, curling, like, twisting, curling his hair like, [valley girl] "Oh my god. Yeah, I did." [both laugh] So fucking funny. Basically, Crowley makes Sitis reach into Job's robes, pull out three of his ribs, and give him a hug.

C: Aziraphale gives a fun wink/double thumbs-up thing.

G: For what?

C: 'Cause Crowley's like, directing her to be like, "Oh, no! Reach a little higher- reach a little higher," and then, when she reaches the right place, where I think they've hidden the like-Are these the ox ribs or something? that they've put in Job's robes?

G: Ohh! Is that why Aziraphale comes forward, then?

C: Maybe. To like, miracle those into Job's robes? Yeah, potentially.

G: Why not? Aw. Well. So like, she pulls out the ribs, and Crowley is like, "And now, embrace." And then they hug, and behind them, the lizards are there. And Aziraphale miracles it to, you know, turn back to humans. And they do! And everyone's very happy and hugging each other, and Michael's like, "But they're not babies," and Crowley's like, "Well, was Eve a baby?" Gabriel's like, "No, no, no, they can arrive at any age." [both laugh]

C: Yeah, "They can arrive in any size." But okay, it's weird that none of the angels are like, "This is three, not seven." Like, they made such a big deal about it being seven.

G: I don't know. I was wondering why it's three. The way it is in the Book of Job is, it's ten. [C: Oh, wow.] So I think what the intention here is that they did still conceive the seven children.

C: Oh, interesting!

G: Yeah, I don't know. I don't know.

C: I think it's just three because they didn't wanna cast a whole Sound of Music ensemble.

G: Yeah. Yeah. And also, it was COVID time. But I was wondering, why is it three? Like, is there a specific reason? [both] I don't know. Job is like, "Oh my god! Ennon!" And it's like, the angels were like, "What? That's the name of your old son." But they're like, "No, no, no, Job." Sitis, specifically, was like, "No, Job, this is not Ennon!"

C: "Who just looks a lot like our old son."

G: "It's a miracle that, you know, he looks exactly the same as our old son." And Ennon was like, "No, I'm not, what the fuck?"

C: Yeah, no for real. [laughs] I like this because Job was always the one who had more faith in God. Sitis was more like, "Well, this sucks and they should've answered your question." So I feel like, for this moment, I feel like Job, in the first moment, thinks that, "Oh, this was actually the plan all along. Like, this was an extra test or something, [G: Yeah.] and like, They meant to bring our kids back." But, like, Sitis immediately catches on, like, “No, this is- we were saved by the grace of like, two rogue agents. Like, this is not what God wanted for us.”

G: Her entire point in the story was like, "Well, Job, I mean, this is so unfair. You must be so mad at God, and like, you should curse God and then die." [both laugh] Which did she say, which I think is so funny. And the end of the- at the last chapter, when, like, all of Job's- all of his family is brought back, and then he has new children, and everything is wonderful, like, the wife is completely gone from the story. [C: Huh.] So I was thinking of that, and then I thought about like, what they did with Sitis this episode of like, I don't know. I like it. [C: Mm-hm.] I don't know how to word what I am thinking.

C: Uh, like, they give her more agency, and they also like, confirm that her point of view is, in fact, like, the valid one. Like, yeah.

G: Yeah. That one. It's like, this person who is painted as unreasonable, or like, having no faith or whatever, but like, it's completely reasonable, though, is the thing. [C: Yeah.] Like, everything that Job lost-

C: She also lost?

G: His wife also lost, yeah. Like, it's the exact same loss aside from the fucking like, sores. I like this portrayal of Sitis. I'm really happy about it. [C: Yeah.] The angels start getting suspicious, and they're like, "Huh. Well, Aziraphale. What is this? Like, are these the new children God promised Job?" And Aziraphale, still trying to not lie just goes- And then Michael goes, "No, they certainly ought to be. They seem to be his old children." And Gabriel asks, like, "Aziraphale, who are they?" And we get this very quite long, actually, tense moment where, you know, it's Aziraphale, and Crowley is just watching from the side. And you know what I really like about this scene? Aziraphale doesn't look at Crowley. [C: Hm.] Like, this is not like a "We already went through this much trouble, you and I, so like, I owe it to you to push through it." This is like, an Aziraphale decision. Like, Aziraphale is choosing to do this of his own accord, for his own agenda, and I like that. It really didn't start out as "our side." It's just "my side" and "my side." [C: Yeah.] Aziraphale lies and goes, “They are his new children. You have my word as an angel.” [C: Yep.] And, you know, everyone's celebrating. Whatever whatever. Good for them. - C: Back to the present, in the bookshop. So Aziraphale goes, "Crowley?" But apparently Crowley just fucking left 'cause Aziraphale was just standing there, thinking about the Book of Job, for like, an hour or some shit. Not very niceys of Crowley, honestly, but okay. It's Gabriel there, and Aziraphale tells him, like, "You used to be awful. I mean, so awful." And Gabriel asks if he's awful now, and Aziraphale goes, "I don't know. I hope not." We go to- Crowley's walking by the coffee shop, goes up to Nina, and I mean, Nina's like, had a really bad day because we know that her partner is really awful, and they probably spent all of last night like, fighting, and like, she probably got yelled at a lot. It's probably terrible. So I am sorry that this is happening to her, but also, Crowley's so cute! [laughs] So like, maybe this is like, a wonderful exchange that's like, really bringing light into her life, despite the fact that none of her facial expressions say that. Have we considered that? She remembers Crowley from getting struck by lightning, [both laugh] and also the six espressos. And Crowley goes, “Silly question. But how do you feel about sudden rain?” And Nina's just like, "Yeah, that's a silly question," but they press on, "No, but in the event of a sudden torrential downpour, would you be likely to shelter under an awning?" [both laugh] Aw, god! They're so cute. You're soo cute. And Nina goes sarcastically, "Wow! It's like you've looked deep into my secret soul." She is an objectively funny person, and there is someone out there for her, but it's not Maggie. And Crowley goes, "Well, it's a knack. For instance-" and then looks meaningfully towards the record shop. Okay, you're like, an employee. You own a coffee shop. Someone's who's come in for the first time yesterday - Okay, I guess. Okay, I guess the reasoning is that Crowley saw the two of them locked in the coffee shop [G: Yeah.], so that's why Crowley- so Nina's like, "Oh, so that's why like, Crowley like, thinks that like, maybe there's a thing going on there, and it is a bit presumptuous of them to be asking, but, like, whatever. Like, they're clearly a rude person. [G laughing] Like, they went with that guy who took the plate and everything, so."

G: God. They should put that under Crowley's name.

C: Which part?

G: Anthony "clearly a rude person" J. Crowley. [C laughs] [C: Yeah.] And with Aziraphale, it's Mr. A. Z. "surprisingly a rude person" Fell. [both laughing]

C: Yeah. Yeah. Took the plate! Crowley, you know, inclines his head towards the record shop, and Nina goes, "Oh, not a thing. Definitely. We're just friends. Actually, we're not friends. We barely know each other." And well, that's true.

G: She's so right for that.

C: It's true. So yeah. Like, it's not supposed to be a 1601 parallel, right? Because it will never be 1601, and it can never be 1601.

G: Ugh, is it supposed to be? I hate that so much.

C: I don't know. I don't know if it's supposed to be.

G: But it's not to me, because I don't want it to be.

C: Yeah, same. Real. She explains that, you know, all that happened was that they got trapped in the shop together, her partner was not impressed, not a pleasant evening. So yeah. Sorry, Nina. So Crowley heads over to the Bentley, where Aziraphale is standing next to it, and he goes like, immediately, "Do you need a lift somewhere?" What if like, love was like, real, and it was always real, because they've always been here, and they've always been in love? So- and Aziraphale's like, "Oh, no thank you, I was like-" and then he explains, you know, the thing with the clue, you know, the thing with the pub that we already saw Maggie explain earlier, so it doesn't really make sense for him to say it again. He says that he is going to go up to Edinburgh himself and investigate.

G: No, no, no, wait. I need to point something out.

C: Oh. Oh, the tongue! [G laughing] The tongue thing on "investigate."

G: [laughing] Yeah. What even is this? Aziraphale, what is this?

C: He does it during magic as well.

G: [laughing] Yeah, it's so fucking funny to me. Like, literally, Aziraphale read the phrase "tongue-in-cheek" in like, a book once, and was like, "You know what? I'm gonna do that." And you know what? He does. I just love how expressive Aziraphale is. [C: Yeah.] And like, especially because like, we have seen him not be like this in like, you know, when he's upset or like, when shit's going down for fucking real. So like, when he is like this, it does feel very much like, a, "Oh, he's having a nice time. He's comfy. He's happy." And it's important to me.

C: Mm. Crowley immediately goes, “Fair enough. What time is your train?” 'Cause, like, I'm assuming it's like, "Okay. Like, okay, then I'll drive you to the train station." due to how love is real and has always been real because they've always been here, and they've always been in love. [laughs] But okay, then Aziraphale goes [G laughs], "Actually, I rather thought I might take the car." And Crowley goes, "What car." And Aziraphale goes, "Our car."

G: "Isn't she a beauty?"

C: Yeah! Yeah! Aziraphale is so- It's so funny. It's the most sentence he's ever said. 'Cause Crowley goes, "We don't have a car," and Aziraphale goes, "Of course we do. Isn't she a beauty?" And it's soo. I don't know how to explain how it makes me feel. But it's so much. I mean, I feel like part of Crowley's resistance to this is that it is like, his house right now, but I think he would be just like this, even if he still had a flat. Yeah, Crowley goes like, "The Bentley is my car." Aziraphale goes like, "Well, yes, technically, just as that bookshop is technically my shop, but we both get plenty of use out of it, don't we?" What does that mean? [G laughing] You haven't even tried penetration yet!

G: You know, what if they already did? It just wasn't important for our journey?

C: I mean, maybe so.

G: But it is important for our journey! So we should've seen it.

C: It's incredibly important for my journey. [G laughing] But it's nice that he thinks of the bookshop as theirs, though, 'cause I don't think Crowley thinks of it that way. But like, aww. Isn't that nice? Crowley is literally the "& Co."!

G: Yeah! [laughs] Aww.

C: Crowley is like, "No, you can't drive my Bentley," but Aziraphale says, “No, I can. I have a license. I passed my driving test 90 years ago. They didn't even require tests, but I insisted." He's so-! And he does like, a little punching motion on "insisted," I think.

G: Yeah! [C exclaims]

C: Yeah. 90 years ago was 1933. I don't know exactly why- Like, why did Aziraphale want to drive in 1933? Like, the Bentley wasn't around, 'cause they don't see each other until 1941. Did Aziraphale have a car?

G: I don't think so.

C: Well, he had to practice for the driving test.

G: I just cannot imagine Aziraphale being like, "I'm gonna go behind the wheel." But apparently he does, and apparently he will next episode, so.

C: Yeah. Agh, man. Crowley's still saying, "No."

G: And like, I think this is the part where like, Aziraphale reaches out for the car-

C: Oh, reaches out for the Bentley, and Crowley slaps his hand away? [both laughing]

G: Yeah. It's so funny! [C: Yeah. Yeah. God.] Crowley just goes, "No!" and then slaps that fucking hand away. Good for them.

C: Good for them. Aziraphale’s like, "No, it's happening. I'll be very careful, and while I'm gone you can look after the bookshop, and Gabriel!" And I guess Crowley does have to acquiesce. We're back at the bookshop. You care about this scene.

G: I do like it!

C: Why? [pause] No, you're allowed to have fun and like things. I don't want to take joy away from your life. Gabriel's looking through books, and he's shelving them according to, you know, first letter of the first sentence. The first one he does is, "It was the day my grandmother exploded," which is The Crow Road, which is not by an author that I know, but seems like it'll be relevant to the story in some way. Because the next one he shelves is Pride & Prejudice. "It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife." And after he says that, he goes, "Whatever that is," which means that he doesn't know what a wife is, but he does know what the other words in the sentence are, [G: Yeah.] so that's kind of confusing. Like, I'd say that fortune seems- I mean, I don't know. Is the idea that he doesn't understand human concepts? I mean, [sarcastically] well, angels are sexless, so why would he know what a man is, Neil Gaiman? Huh? [G laughing] Huh, Neil Gaiman? And then he gets to Good Omens, the book, which starts with "It was a nice day," and the camera makes sure to show you like, half the page so you know for sure that it's Good Omens the book, and then he goes, "That's more like it." And then he shelves it, and I just think it's dumb. ‘Cause, well, it shouldn't exist.

G: Well, I mean, the reason why I liked it is because, well, "In the beginning" is like, the title of the chapter, but the way the way it is filmed, and like, the way the book is formatted, it looks like the first line of the book, so like, I think the visual of Gabriel seeing that and then skipping it is pretty nice. Like, even though I know that that's the chapter title, and maybe this is not the intention at all, but like, Gabriel seeing "In the beginning" and like, immediately recognizing that like, "I don't want to say that out loud." [C: Hm. Okay.] I like that, number one. Number two, what the fuck does this mean?

C: Nothing.

G: This is separate from the "I like it" part. This is just a "I'm saying something about it" part.

C: It literally is just a "This would be fun to put in." Well, it wouldn't be fun to put in, and also, like, you are not Chuck Supernatural, so.

G: No, but like, the reality of the situation now would be that Aziraphale has a Good Omens book in the bookshop, so like, either this is something Aziraphale has for some fucking reason - why? I don't know. - or like, this is like, something that is being thrust upon Gabriel specifically [C: Okay.], which I also find interesting.

C: No, it's in the bookshop.

G: And since you do not give a shit about it, I assume- yeah. But like, the bookshop right now.

C: Oh, you think- Okay, see, when this happened on the screen, Danica also thought it had to have some kind of plot relevance or mean something like, on a meta level, blah blah blah, but it doesn't. Like, it doesn't. It's just Neil Gaiman thinking, "Wouldn't it be funny if," and it's like, not funny, and it's just confusing, ‘cause it's stupid. [laughs] Is how I feel about it.

G: Well, I will watch through the rest of the season, and I will make up my mind by the end of it. [C: Alright.] But I did like it. Am I going to be the Gabriel defender in this fucking-

C: You can do that. That can be your life.

G: Yeah. Well. So. We go to the last scene of this episode, where Aziraphale is sitting by a stone by the edge of a cliff. [laughs] He's like, crying and shit.

C: Yeah. He's worrying his hands in his lap.

G: Yeah, hm. [sympathetically] Crowleyy.

C: That's not even Crowley. [both laughing]

G: I literally am not- [both laugh] Like, maybe I should get concussed again so I can get their names right. [both laugh] I think this is like, surprising to me, because I feel like prior to this, we haven't really- [laughing] [C: What?] G: This is so stupid. We haven't really seen Aziraphale sit. [C laughing]

C: Yeah, you mean [overlapping] at this point in history? Yeah, they've been standing the whole time.

G: Yeah. Yes. And so like, seeing Aziraphale sit now and like, he sits like how he sits in present day. But like, he is worried this time, so he's like, fiddling with his hands a bit. But that's Aziraphale! [C: Yeah.] You know? That's Aziraphale. [C: That's my guy.] And this is the beginning of their bench situation. Look at them.

C: No, exactly, exactly, exactly! Yes, correct.

G: Crowley shows up, and Aziraphale’s like, "Ah, yes, I thought perhaps they might send you." But, like, teary-eyed, sad.

C: Yeah. I think something I like about this is that I feel like there's definitely a version of Aziraphale who could go, like, "It was you! You tempted me into like, going against God," blah blah blah blah blah, "How could you?" But like, I feel like the "I thought they might send you, like, to collect me" thing, like, the use of the "they," it's like, clearly "No, I think that your actions that other day were completely unrelated to like, the Hell politics going on in this specific situation, and like, if you're here to take me to Hell, it is fully based off of their orders, and not because you wanted this."

G: Aziraphale stands up very dramatically [C: Mm-hm.] and collect himself, and he goes, [laughs] "I'm ready to go." [C: "To Hell."] [laughing] As I've said, I understand that this is a very sad scene [C laughs] [C: Yeah.], but god, it's so funny! He's so fucking funny. But he's like, "I'm ready to go to Hell." And Crowley's just like, "I'm not taking you to Hell."

C: Well, Crowley sorta looks at him, and then takes a seat. And I feel that's nice. It's like a, he's not reassuring him out loud yet, but it is like a, "There's not gonna be any immediate action." [G: "I'm sitting down," yeah.] "This is like, a calm thing. Like, we can take some time."

G: Crowley says, "I'm not taking you to Hell, angel."

C: Maybe it is a pet name! I take everything back! Maybe it is! [both laug] Oh my god! They're in love! [laughing]

G: They're in wuv. [C screams]

G: Well, Aziraphale goes like, "Okay. Why not?" Crowley says, "Well, I don't think you'd like it."

C: Yeah. But it is a bit gentler. Like, as a sentence, [G: Oh yeah, for sure.] it seems like it's supposed to be like, a fun, cocky thing, but like, the way that they say it, it's just like, "Yeah. Well, I don't think you'd like it."

G: I say it like that because, like, I say it a bit disbelief, because, like, I know for a fact at the end of this season [C: Oh.], Aziraphale will ask Crowley to go back to Heaven. [C: Yeah!] And obviously, it's a very different situation, right? But still. [C: Yeah.] Aziraphale's like, [dramatically] "Yeah, but like, you have to. I'm like you now. [both laughing] A demon." [laughing] He's so dramatic. And then Crowley does the cutest, cutest, cutest fucking thing, where, like, you know, starts laughing, just gently, like, in a ribbing, you know, like, smiling, grinning in a ribbing way. And goes like, "Sorry, you think you're a demon? With your-" and then does like the little wavy hands at the end of the sentence, and goes like, "With your curly little- and your neat white-" And it's so cute!

C: Yeah, on the "neat white," I don't know what the gesture- It's like, a hooves gesture. It's like a four-legged animal walking sort of thing.

G: Yeah, well, Aziraphale is like, [distressed] "I'm a fallen angel! I lied. To thwart the will of God!"

C: Yeah. Which means that he is finally willing to admit that, like, the "I don't think that is actually what God wants" was just him saying that to feel better.

G: And Crowley just says, "You did. But I'm not gonna tell anybody. Are you?"

C: Aziraphale just shakes his head.

G: Crowley is like, "Nothing has to change, does it?" And Aziraphale asks, "But what am I?" Ahh. Crowley says, "You're just an angel who goes along with Heaven as far as he can." [C: Yeah.] Aziraphale asks the exact same question he asked when Crowley referred to himself as this, and he goes, "That sounds..." [C: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.] And, you know, Crowley completes the sentence for him. Like, "Lonely?" "Yeah." And Aziraphale says, you know, "But you said it wasn't."

C: Also, the "Yeah" is sort of like, Crowley's not making eye contact, like, they're sort of just looking off, and they say it pretty quietly, in a way that's meant to sound casual, but it's like, "Aw. Augh."

G: Crowley says something that he has been saying this entire time, which is, "I'm a demon. I lied." [C: Yeah.] And that's the end of our episode.

C: Camera goes out and zooms out, and it just shows the backs of the two of them as they sit on opposite ends of that rock, overlooking the cliff. And- agh! Like, the music is so nice. There's like, strings and shit throughout, like, the end of this all. It's soo- It's so much. They're going to sit on benches and things like, on opposite ends from each other for 4500 more years. Until that fucking bus. [G: Yeah.] It's crazy. It's crazy.

G: I mean, like, the thing is, throughout this episode, I didn't mention it earlier because I think it's more appropriate to discuss it here, but like, when they were in that fucking cellar and they're waiting out the storm or whatnot, I like, started crying when they were talking. [C: Aww.] You know, while Aziraphale was gorging [C laughs] himself on that ox. And like, you know, they're just sitting down, and they're like, "Well, isn't it lonely?" "What's that?" And then, you know, this scene comes, and I don't cry, but it's the same sentiment of like, "God. They go way back." [C: Yeah.] They have been friends for so long. [C: Yeah.] And there's so much history there, and like, it's a lot. I mean, the thing is, you know, when Crowley says it, "How long have we been friends? 6000 years." You know, like, the reference is to Eden. But I think this is where it starts, really, right? Like, this is where they become friends. [C: Yeah.] This is their first act of rebelling together. It doesn't end with a note of like, victory or anything. It ends with, like, you know. "Oh, it's lonely." "It's sad." [C: Yeah.] And, you know, they're so different from the people and the institution that they're supposed to share the same motivations as. And it's like, "Oh, it's so lonely. It's so isolating." But like, we know how this pans out, and we know that, like, through the years, they will find comfort in each other, and they will find company with each other.

C: Yeah. Now that we're talking about this, I think it is interesting that "That sounds lonely" was Aziraphale's first thought at all. Like, I feel like it tells us more about what he gets out of being part of Heaven. Like, he likes being a part of a group, even if that group makes him feel crazy and stupid all the time. Like, what does Aziraphale get out of being part of Heaven? He's like, worried that if he's not part of Heaven, he'll be lonely. Isn't he already? Like, what? What's the sitch?

G: I don't know. I mean, also, the recognition here that it's so important to Aziraphale that he's an angel. And like, it is. Again, I know for a fact that towards the end of this season, Aziraphale goes back to Heaven to like, fix it or whatever, and I think seeing this - and of course the season is long, and according to Crystal, arduous, [C laughs] but like, seeing here, right now, having seen Season 2, Episode 2, I'm like, "I think it makes sense for Aziraphale to want that." [C: Yeah.] 'Cause like, it is important to him that he is an angel, and it is important to him that, like, if not the will of God, then the good, the greater good is enacted. For Crowley, being a demon, we constantly are like, "Oh, it's just a job," but like, for Aziraphale, the thinking of like, "Good shall prevail," and this and that and this and that, like, it matters to him so deeply. And when that question of what is good is uprooted, it hurts him very deeply. I think it makes sense that Aziraphale will want to fix Upstairs, right?

C: Yeah, like, I guess?

G: I mean from here. From where we are now. Yeah.

C: Sure. I don't know. I feel like I didn't really see it.

G: You have always said to me like, the- Yeah, you always say to me the decision didn't make sense, but, I don't know.

C: It seems incongruous with the point of his arc in Season 1, I guess, is my main issue with it. And, like, the whole, like, "our own side" thing, like, had the implicit "isolated from Heaven and Hell" part of it.

G: I don't know, either. I don't wanna- 'cause like, it's impossible to talk about these things without gleaning something from it in terms of like, "Well, how does this apply in real life?" I wanted to be perfectly clear that I do not think that like, [both laugh] systems can be fixed from the inside. You know, like- But like, in this situation, I don't know. The expansion of the kind of angels that we see- [C: Like, Muriel's nice.] No, exactly. Like, that addition of like, the expansion of that perspective, I think, lends to that kind of reading that-

C: Yeah. "Is it just the archangels that are dicks?"

G: Not even that "Is this true or not?" It's just that "Is it reasonable for Aziraphale to believe this?"

C: Yeah. Crowley's been lonely for 504 years. When are they gonna see each other again? I'm so miserable.

G: You know, I've been going back and forth with this for fiveever. Have I mentioned this in the podcast? [C: I don't know.] Halley's comet? Have I mentioned this?

C: Not on the podcast.

G: I've been going back and forth with this since, like, I think Episode 3 of Season 1. I was like, "Oh, isn't it so wild that, like, you know, Halley's comet for us, it's a lifetime, but for them it's just a blink of an eye." I said that. And then, a couple eps later, I was like, "It's not, though." Like, the time that passes is the time that passes for them. It's not quick. It doesn't come quicker. It's the same amount of time, same amount of experiences that happens between this and that. And like, I thought about it again this episode, because it's like, even after I said that, of like, "Oh, but it's not just a blink for them," I was thinking of it in terms of like, the time that they are apart from each other, like, those times are long. But also, the time that they have together is incomprehensibly big. And it's like, I don't know. [emotional] It makes me- It makes me emotional! [C: Yeah.] Like, it's been forever. Literally. They're gonna go through so much. [C: Uh-huh.] And there's going to be forever more to look forward to. Isn't that crazy?

C: Yeah. [teary] And they haven't even tried penetration yet! [G laughing] God! They're so much! Ugh. Ugh. Ugh.

G: God, remember last episode when I was like, "They don't even have chemistry! [C laughs] Also, love is not real." Well, they do have chemistry, and love is real.

C: And love is so real it's unreal! [G laughs] - C: Grey, what did you think about this episode?

G: Well, I quite liked it! [C: Yeah.] Quite liked it. I like it!

C: I also liked a lot of it. Some of it, I found quite annoying, which does spoil my viewing of it a bit, but a lot of it was good. So, Best Line/Worst Line? Oh boy. I haven't thought about it.

G: Well. I mean, I- okay, I'm not gonna put it as my- not best line or worst line. Just a funny as hell line. [C: Yes.] I thought that the "I'm ready to go" was so funny. [both laugh] Like, I'm sorry to Aziraphale, you're having the worst time of your life so far. But like, girl. [C laughs]

C: Yeah. I think the line that sticks most with me is just the "You're just an angel who goes along with Heaven as far as he can," and then the Crowley equivalent as "a demon who goes along with Hell as far as he can." [G: Mm-hm.] Like, yeah. What an apt description of them! Ah!

G: Well, best line, I think would be- Oh, I'll say my best line- I will represent the Gabriel girlies in the chat [C: Uh-huh.] by saying that my best line is "Whaddayaknow?" I genuinely thought it was so funny. I was laughing so hard. I thought it was so funny.

C: Happy for you.

G: [laughing] Thank you. Is that your worst line now, for retribution?

C: My worst line- You know, I really wanted to say, "It was a nice day." but my worst line is Nina- or sorry. Is Maggie- [laughs] Mm. Okay. My worst line is Maggie saying that she's in love. You're not. The end.

C: Oh, I have another best line [C: Oh, okay], which is, "Quite sure." [C makes pained sound] They literally trust each other so hard and so raw. [C: Yeah.] Like, it's unreal. Ah. I don't know what my worst line is. I don't know. This is one of those episodes where I'm like, "I don't have a worst line, because I think it's all good!" But you know what? I think, okay, here's my worst line. "Actually, we're not friends. We barely know each other. We just got trapped in the shop when the power went out." [C: Yeah.] I really don't like that line, because it's like, "Oh, so you are aware. But like, you're gonna do this anyway," [laughs] you know?

C: Are aware- oh, that they're not friends?

G: Like the writer. [C: Yeah.] I mean, people don't have to be friends to date, but I do think they need to like each other to date.

C: Yeah, and they don't like each other. [G: - isn't happening! Yeah.]

C: Okay, gayest, transest. I mean, the eating watching was pretty fucking horny

G: I like the hand on chest moment.

C: Oh, fuck, I forgot! Oh my god! No, yeah, that one; sorry, that one, the end. And honestly, I don't even think that the eating one is my second gayest moment. I think my second gayest moment are Aziraphale’s hands on his hips [laughs] when the goats appear. [G giggling] Yeah.

G: Well, what's your transgenderiest moment?

C: Oh, "This... person wanted to know where the kids were."

G: I mean, it's also mine, so. [C: Hell yeah.] Predictions and ratings, right?

C: Oh, wait, your prediction last episode is that we would get a clue regarding Gabriel. Did we even really get a clue regarding Gabriel? Like, Aziraphale hasn't even investigated it yet.

G: Yeah, but it's just a clue. [both laughing] Next week is the investigation. [C: Real.] Well, my prediction for next week is there's gonna be an investigation, and Aziraphale is going to drive the car.

C: Wow! How could you have guessed such a thing?

G: Who would have thought? Who would have thunk, even? I know for a fact that this scene happens, because one time I was scrolling through Twitter before I finally blocked the- or at least muted the Good Omens official page, and one of their - you know, like, on Twitter, there's like, this like, bait tweets, where it's like, "What is your favorite scene that involves a phone?" or whatever. [C: Oh.] And that was like, the question for this one. "What's your favorite phone call scene?" And the Good Omens Twitter account posted a video of [C: Aww, yeah.] Aziraphale calling Crowley, and Crowley like, picking up the phone and being like, "A.Z. Fell & Co. Bookshop," or whatever. "If you- we don't have the book that you're looking for [C: Yeah!], and if we don't- if we do have it, we're not selling it to you." [C: Yeah. Yeah.] And I thought that was really cute. And I know that happens next episode, for- I mean, I think. 'Cause like, Aziraphale's somewhere else, and this is like, a chance for them to separate, due to the investigation.

C: Yeah. What if love was real?

G: What if love was real? I think in that scene, Aziraphale - because I watched the whole thing. I'm so sorry. I have no self control. The moment it started playing, I was just completely entranced. [C laughs] But I think Aziraphale at some point goes like, "You're really not selling any books, though, aren't you?" And I think it's so cute! It's so cute. Other predictions. You know what? I'm predicting that I will like wherever the fuck is Beelzebub and Gabriel's story goes. Why not?

C: Okay, do you have any predictions about what it will be? Like, why did Gabriel lose his memory? What's the deal with that? Do you have thoughts?

G: I mean, actually, the memory, no. But like, I think it's safe to assume that the changing the records in the jukebox is a Beelzebub thing. We haven't even mentioned that it's a thing with Crowley. Like-

C: Oh, what do you mean? Oh, with the Queen and the Bentley?

G: Just like the Queen CDs, yeah. I mean, I don't know. Like, I'm just in it for the ride, baby. I have no predictions.

C: Alright. No predictions. Alright. Ratings out of 10. [G: Personal rating!] We forgot to do this last episode because we were stewing in a sea of hatred [G: Yeah.], so I guess- alright, what's your-

G: I already said mine from last episode to you personally, and it's [C: Yeah, you said-] [both] 3 out of 10. [laughs]

C: And I said mine to you, which was 5, though, maybe I should bump it down. I was like, waffling between a 4 and a 5.

G: Well, okay. Give it a 4.

C: I mean, I haven't seen Episode 1 since then, so I don't know. Sure. It's a 4. Why not? Okay, this one.

G: I think this is a 10 out of 10.

C: Seriously?

G: Like, this is a 10 out of 10 for me. Completely revived my love for Good Omens.

C: My goodness. Okay. Alright. I was gonna say maybe an 8? But maybe not even that. A 7 or an 8. ‘Cause, okay, I gave Episode 3 an 8 because I was like, “The flashbacks were a 10, and then the rest were like, more of a 6 or whatever situation.” So-

G: But I do love the frontbacks in this one?

C: The what?

G: Or is it the flashfronts? I don't know. [laughing] I thought the current day stuff this episode was fine.

C: I found most of it annoying.

G: I only hate the Maggie- Yeah, I hate the Maggie and Nina stuff. So I'll give it a 9.5, actually. Oh, but we only [overlapping]- we said we were only doing whole numbers, so, agh.

C: Okay, I'm gonna say an 8. Just know it's more of a 7.5 than an 8.

G: Okay, I'm gonna say a 9.

C: Mm. I suppose that’s it for this week’s episode of Rubbish and Probably a Podcast. Next time, we will be talking about Season 2, Episode 3: “Chapter 3: I Know Where I'm Going featuring the minisode The Resurrectionists.” Ugh.

G: "I Know Where I'm Going"? Hm. Okay.

C: Leave us a rating or a review wherever you get your podcasts.

G: Follow us on social media! We interact through the accounts set up for our Supernatural commentary podcast, Busty Asian Beauties. So we are on Tumblr at bustyasianbeautiespod.tumblr.com, and email us at [email protected].

C: Thanks to everyone who’s donated to our Ko-Fi at ko-fi.com/bustyasianbeautiespod! See you guys next time! [both] Bye!

[Garageband "Everyday" plays] - [beep]

G: Can, I say, like, I mean, this episode doesn't reckon with the things- like, the themes of the Book of Job that I connected with. So like, it doesn't even matter! Like, it doesn't even- like, me rereading it- Also, I forgot how fucking annoying everybody in the Book of Job is. [both laugh] Like, every single person who speaks in that thing. Like, they go through so many rounds of defending their stances, and like, every single time Job speaks, I'm like, "I mean, he has a point. That's probably the end of it." [both laugh] And then there's a fucking "And Bildad the Shuhite asks-" [both laugh] and it's like, "Have you not done? Are you not fucking done?" [C laughs] Yeah, truly a moment. [C: Yeah.] Also, that random guy who just shows up? What is that? I mean, I read that like, people say that like, "Oh, that's probably like, the reason why it's so weird is that it's just like, an extra chapter that somebody added, like, way way way way later or something," but it is very odd.

C: Yeah. Yeah. - [beep]

C: Yeah. "A companion to owls" is a line in the book of Job, right? What is the context of that?

G: I actually- I don't know.

C: Okay, is it just like, "Job's such a nice guy, he's friends with owls and all that shit"?

G: Wait. I'm going to look up the word "owl." No, it's just "knowledge" over and over again. [C: Huh.] I mean, there's an ostrich. Could have been companions to ostriches. [laughs]

C: Real.

G: Let's look up like what actually- let's actually look that up, though.

C: "When I looked for good, then evil came unto me, and when I waited for light, there came darkness." Blah blah blah. "I went mourning without the sun. I stood up, and I cried in the congregation. I am a brother to dragons and a companion to owls."

G: Wait, what- what chapter-

C: 30:29?

G: Well, it's not what is here in mine, so.

C: Oh, yeah, I've been looking at the King James version.

G: [laughing] I was right. It says here, "I am a brother to jackals and a companion to ostriches." So I was right with my ostriches comment, yeah.

C: Oh, slay! Okay? Well, yeah. And are you looking at like, the New International or-

G: World English Bible, Catholic Book Order.

C: Oh, Catholic Book Order. Yeah.

G: [laughing] Oh, shut the fuck up! [both laughing] Well, I mean, it was the one I could download a PDF for [C: Yeah. Yeah.] 'cause I don't wanna read on a website, yeah.

C: That makes sense. Interesting! It's dragons and owls in the King James version, but it's jackals and ostriches. Huh! Translation's so fun.

G: There was a line here where it's like, it talked about it- It has the words "Adam" and "transgression" in the same sentence, and I was like, "Oh my god, just like Benedick for real." [laughing] It's so Crover. [C laughs] God.

C: Ah, yeah. - [beep]

C: I have got to relisten to “Being Alive” on loop, for like, the rest of the day. It's been a while since I've had a "Being Alive" day.

G: Yeah, right now, I'm in a "People Will Say We're in Love," loop, so RIP.

C: Yeah. If anyone has the- if anyone has a bootleg of the 2019 Oklahoma!, please please please [G laughing] just email us-

G: With the Damon Daunno, yeah.

C: I've been trying. I've been trying. Pleeease? Please please pleeease. I need to see Ali Stroker, like, in my eyeballs, and I need to see, like, the new takes on the musical in general. I mean, I don't think they like, interact with the US historical revisionism of it, but, like the misogyny, it seems like they really do like, lean into- It's cool. Just give me the bootleg. Thank you! - [beep]

G: Wait. Let's let's do a little aside, and I'm gonna look up these fucking playlists. "Crowley." [singing] Everyday, it's a-getting closer, going faster than a rollercoaster-

C: Oh, fucking hell, I forgot that "I Will Follow You Into the Dark" is on Aziraphale's! I hope we all die.

G: [laughing] That's so corny! That's so corny! I hope we all die. Okay, Crowley is "I'm in Love With My Car," [laughing] "Every Breath You Take." That's so funny! "I'll Be Your Mirror." Okay, fine! Fine. Fine. Fine. Well, what's- wait! Where's Aziraphale?

C: I sent it to you. It's on the next- the next thing.

G: Why is it separated?

C: 'Cause they released them, like, on different days.

G: "What a Wonderful World." Well, that's cute. [C: Yeah.] "Earth Angel"? That's a fucking Destiel song. Everybody disappear. [C: Oh, okay.] "Angel Eyes." This is so corny! Who made this?

C: It is. I mean, this was during like, the everything strike, so just like, some rando. [G laughing]

G: Yeah. Well. It's cute.

C: Well. So that is what the playlist setup was referencing, I suppose.

G: [singing] Everyday, it's a-getting closer. Okay, let's go back! - [beep]

G: I mean, I am a person who, when I was a kid, I watched the movie Click, featuring Adam Sandler-

C: What? What movie?

G: It's a movie called Click, featuring Adam Sandler. [C: Uh-huh.] And I thought it was a magnificent movie. I thought it was very wonderful. It was the first time I heard the song "Linger" by The Cranberries. [C: Ohh.] I thought it was the best song ever.

C: I mean, it is.

G: I was posting about that song on my Facebook. [laughs] And I thought it was a wonderful movie. I thought it was a wonderful song. And then, I saw on Twitter that was like, "Oh, straight men really got tricked into thinking Click is a good movie by The Cranberries." [both laughing] And I was like, "Oh, damn!"

C: And were you a straight man at the time?

G: No, well, absolutely not. But you know what? It well may be. [C: It well may be.] I was tricked into thinking Click was a good movie because of "Linger" by The Cranberries.

C: I mean, like, "Do you have to let it linger?" is the question of the century, so.

G: For real. And you know what? Every day, it's a-getting closer.

C: Yeah. - [beep]

G: But isn't your top three like, a fucking, David Tennant song?

C: Don't you-! I had- [G laughing] No. No.

G: It is!

C: I mean, maybe. No- no one needs to- I don't have to answer that question. I want a lawyer.

G: What was that song? "Sunshine on Leith"? Is it that one?

C: I want a lawyer! [laughing] I want a lawyer! [both laughing]

G: That is truly amazing of you. You know, when you first made me listen to that, I was truly appalled by how bad [C laughing] David Tennant's voice is. [both laughing] I was shocked to my core. [both laughing] I was like, "Why did they wake him up, like, [C laughing] at fucking 4 AM in the morning, and then make him pop into the recording booth immediately [C screams], and then made him do one take, and then settled with that?" Like, "What is this?"

C: [laughing] It's not that bad! [G laughing] It's not good. I'll give you that. Like, he's clearly not a person who sings. [G laughs]

G: Yeah. You know my number one song of all time is "That's Enough, Let's Get You Home."?

C: Damn. That wasn't even a standout for you when you first listened to the album.

G: Yeah, well, it's really good.

C: It is really good. Oh, god! Dream girl literally- Ah!

G: We haven't even mentioned "Dream girl, come, but keep your hands off me" in this podcast, which is so them. [C: Yeah.] God. "Here is the church, here is the steeple, open the door, [both] see all the people." And fucking "Alright, that's enough, let's get you home." Well. [laughs] [C: Well.] God! Also, the line like- what's that? "Of the two things we do on our knees, watch me fold my hands [overlapping] just to crack at my knuckles." Like, hello? [C: Yeah.] Hello! [C: Yeah. Yeah.] So horrible! [C: So horrible.] What if they're so in love it's unreal, but also, it's so miserable?

C: Well, what if?

G: And you know what? We don't have to guess. [laughs]

C: Yeah, it's happening on our screen right now. [G laughing]

G: Yeah. - [beep]

G: I know Gabriel to be the archangel that I dreamt of one time as coming down upon me in my sleep, [laughing] and telling me that I should change my name to Charlie.

C: [laughing] What?

G: Have I never told you this?

C: [laughing] No? What did he look like?

G: I don't know! As in, you know like, when you read books, and it's like, because Gabriel is the angel who went down- [C: To Mary.] who went down on Mary. [C laughing] Fucking funny-ass word. [both laughing] [C: Real.] Well, you know what? No, but like, he is the angel who went down upon Mary and told her that "You're gonna have the Messiah as a child." And I had that dream where that happened to me. I was Mary. But instead of saying, "You're pregnant with the Lord," he said, [both laughing] "You should change your name to Charlie."

C: Well. And did you?

G: Well, no, but I did tell friends that like, "Maybe I should!" Like, "Is this God talking to me?" [both laugh] And then, like, a friend of mine was like, "But you really like the name Grey!" And I was like, "Yeah, you're right. I really do. You know what? God may want me to change my name to Charlie, but I am a person who is driven by-"

C: Defying God's will.

G: Yeah, I'm defying God's will. I'm driven by my own desires and my wills. [C: Yeah.] [C laughing] Charlie. [both laughing]

C: Oh, because at this time, you only knew the Supernatural Gabriel. [G laughs] I'm assuming it was not someone who looked like Supernatural Gabriel.

G: No, it was Biblical Gabriel, yeah. [C: Yeah.] Like, okay, when I was a kid, I read this fucking manga- it was- I mean, "manga," whatever, but I think it's Western-made. It's called [laughing]- it's called Manga Messiah, and it's like, the New Testament in manga form. [C laughs] And I read this religiously! Like, I read it so much it's unreal. I had two copies of it [C laughs], for some reason. I don't even know why I had two copies. But like, I would read it all the time that my teachers would be like, "Can you stop reading that?" And I was like, "Well, it's the Bible. [both laughing] The Bible story." And they're like, "Yeah, but like, we're in class." [both laughing] And the Gabriel I dreamt of, I think- Actually, I'm not sure. But I think it's the Gabriel from that manga.

C: That's so correct of you.

G: [laughing] You know what? I am telling so many stories, but, there's like, one page there where there's a panel, and it's just a closeup of Jesus's face, and I remember going up to my sister once and saying, "Oh, he looks so pogi here!" [C laughs] Pogi, it's a Filipino word for handsome. [C: Yeah.] [laughing] And my sister says, "Don't ever say that again. [laughing] You'll go to Hell!"

C: [laughing] What was the end of the sentence? "Don't ever say that again," what?

G: [laughing] My sister said, "Don't ever say this again. You're gonna go to Hell." [C screams] [both laughing]

C: I mean, a lot of people have like, sexual awakenings via Jesus, though. It's like, a known thing.

G: [laughing] Yeah. But every time I remember that, I'm like, "Oh my god, that's so funny!"

C: Yeah. And you literally are gonna go to Hell.

G: I didn't say anything- anything like- [laughing] I just said he looked pogi! Which is a completely reasonable thing to say. [both laughing]

C: Yeah. Is a man not allowed to aesthetically appreciate Jesus in this day and age?

G: For fucking real. - [beep]

C: And there's a video of like, a bunch of takes of the scene where like, David Tennant says a new thing, like each time-

G: What are the things? Can I see it? Can I see it? Can you send it right now? I need to watch it right now?

C: Do I have it? It's not that interesting, I would say.

G: But you should- Okay, I have access to it. Oh my god! Crowley is so cute! [both laugh] "We never go to the pub." For my what? What is that?

C: Which one?

G: My mai- what?

C: Wait, which one

G: Right after the one where, like, he didn't even get to complete the sentence.

C: Oh, wait, I haven't gotten there yet. Let me check.

Crowley in video audio: Sherry for Angela Lansbury.

G: [laughing] I can hear your audio. That's so wonderful.

Crowley: Hello! Large Talisker, please, and a sherry for my maiden aunt. C: My maiden aunt. [G laughing]

Crowley: Large Talisker, please, and a sherry for the dowager duchess. C: For the dowager duchess.

G: That's so funny! [laughing]

Crowley: - and a sherry for my elderly friend. C: My elderly friend.

G: [laughing] They should have kept the maiden aunt!

Crowley: Large Talisker, please, and a sherry for m- [C whimpers]

C: The last one is "the old ladyyy." [G: Aww.]

C: They're literally married! They're wed! [G makes pained sounds]

G: A sherry for the old lady!

C: Yeah. Like, what if love is indeed real?

G: Well. Ah! It's so real. Well.

C: Yeah. And it was invented 4004 BC, and it keeps being reinvented every single day. [sighs]

G: Yes, exactly. And they haven't even tried penetration yet, so.

C: [laughing] They haven't! [G laughs] - [beep]

C: Who laughs at your jokes?

G: Noo! [C makes pained sound] [G makes pained sound] Oh, god.

C: I'm so cringe and so fail.

G: It really is about "Don't dance with me for the entire fucking night. People will think that it's alright with me." [C: Yeah.] And they are right. It is alright. [C: Yeah!] It's alright for them. [C: It sure is. And, you know-]

G: You know, for anyone curious, this is how me and Crystal talk on a daily basis. [C laughing] Like, we just quote things to each other, and then go, "For sure." [both laughing] "For fucking real." "It well may be."

C: Yeah.

G: Not a single original is shared among us, yeah.

C: Nope! Not at all. Not at all. - [beep]

C: You didn't even like Emma. (2020), Grey.

G: You know what? I didn't.

C: It's like, the best movie that's ever happened to like, the world, and you didn't even like it.

G: Here's the thing. I didn't, but I think you reblogged a gifset [laughs] of it the other day with like, the gifs from the movie and then like, what it says in the book, and how they adapted it, and I was like, “Okay, I'm gonna give this another shot.” [C: Aww!] So, who knows? [C: Thank you.] Power of gifsets on Tumblr.

C: Yeah. Truly the most important movie of all time, besides, like, the other movies that are actually good. [G laughs] It's good too, though. [both] Yeah. - [beep]

G: Do you know why I was so taken by Job? I mean, this is going to be an outtake, whatever. You know why I was so taken by Job?

C: The Book of Job?

G: Yes. I read it when I was- it was tenth grade, and so when I was 13, I- that's when my psoriasis really started. So, grade 10 is 16. So like, it's been a while, and it's really bad. And do you remember how like, in the Book of Job, he loses everything. [C: Right.] Children, everything. And his first reaction was like, "Oh, I must have done something wrong. I'm gonna go on my knees, and I'm going to tell God that like, I'm sorry and also thank you for everything still. The Lord gives, and the Lord taketh away." And then Satan was like, "Well, it's because you haven't hurt him yet. Why don't you [laughing] fucking give him a skin disease. See how miserable he's going to be." [C laughs] And then I thought that was so funny, 'cause I was like, "Damn." [overlapping] That was worse than killing his children? [both laugh] "This is the worst thing Satan can think of, and I'm experiencing it right now." [C: Yeah.] So that's pretty fun! Also, like, the year prior to that, I was like, having such intense like- 'cause I mean, I knew I was attracted to women from a very young age. It was like, never a question. I never had a realization. It was just what is. But like, around ninth grade is when I started like, having like, relationships and stuff, and like, I got it in my head that I was being punished for that [C: Oh.], and that's why I had like, debilitating psoriasis [C: Oh.], to the point that I like, stopped praying because I was like, “God won't listen to me because He hates me for this. So I'm just going to ask the people who I think God won't hate to pray for me instead.” So like, it really was a- it really was a time! [C: Yeah.] Like, reading Job at that moment in my life was like- I mean, it sounds so corny, but like, it did change my life. [C: Oh, yeah.] It like, changed how I saw things and everything. Like, I don't think the purpose of the Book of Job was like, “Oh, how does it feel to have a chronic illness?” but it is what it was for me, you know? Well, I think maybe- I mean, you know, whatever. Yeah. Fun stuff!

C: [laughs] Fun stuff. - [beep]

C: It is nice when, like, people like, think you're a guy on the street, and then you like, have to just nod at them because if you talk, they'll change their mind.

G: [laughing] One time I was in public transportation, and these two ladies were seated in front of me, and I was just chilling and not even thinking about anything. And I go, "Hey, can you get this money to the driver?" 'Cause like, I was in the very back, so I can't, you know. And like, the lady whips her head at me, and like, is like, has this look of shock on her face, and, like, you have to remember that I'm not even thinking about gender in this moment, like, hasn't even crossed my mind. So she delivers the money up front, and then she turns to her friend, and they're both a bit older, so like, they're they're talking a bit loud, you know? And she whispers, but in a way that everyone in that fucking van can hear, whispers to her friend - in Filipino, but I'm translating - she whisper, "Oh! The person behind it is a girl! [C laughs] I thought it was a guy!" And I was sitting there like, [laughing] "Why must you say this in front of me?" [C: Yeah.] And the thing is, she covers her hand the way you would whisper, but like, in the other direction. [C laughing] Like, she covers towards the other direction [both laughing], so I still could see it so clearly. I thought it was so funny. I thought it was so funny. [C: It is.] And you know what's so fucking annoying is like, when you tell cis people this, they're like, "Oh my god! It's so terrible that you have to experience this!" And I'm like, I'm having fun. Like, I think this is funny. [laughing]

C: Yeah, this is wonderful! It means what I'm doing is working. Let's keep this energy going!

G: [laughing] No, for fucking real! For fucking real. - [beep]

C: There are birds around on the floor. [G: Yeah.] Are they crows? I don't know what bird species they are.

G: No, I think they're pigeons. I think they're pigeons.

C: They are? But they're black. Like, fully.

G: No, they're not. They're gray!

C: What?

G: [typing] "Birds Good Omens." I don't think that's gonna work. Why not? You know, if you Google Bildad the Shuhite, it's Crowley who shows up, [laughs] which I think is so wonderful.

C: Instead of the actual guy in the Book of Job?

G: Yes, exactly. [C: Real.] But you know what? There's- I mean, the Book of Job guy doesn't even have a face, so who give a shit. [C: True.] And also, he's annoying as hell.

C: I mean, Aziraphale and Crowley are kind of annoying during the minisode too, though. Like, whenever they're around humans-

G: Why? Oh yeah, for sure.

C: Whenever they're around humans, they're just having a silly goofy time at each other, and everyone else is having like, the worst life that they've ever lived.

G: These are-! Okay, they're not pigeons. Well, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. You were right, you were right, [C laughing] etc etc.

C: "I was wrong, you were right," yeah.

G: Well, what are they, then? What are they?

C: I have no clue. Like, I want them to be crows just for the purpose of like- well, I want- I'm still trying to figure out if Crowley has an affinity for crows.

G: But like, aren't crows like, big? Isn't a crow like, big?

C: Eh, kind of? I mean, ravens are very big. Let me look up like, "crow bird," and then see if they look at all like this guy.

G: You know what's so wonderful about birds is like, you think you know what a bird looks like [C: Mm.], but you don't. [C: That's true.] Like, you see a bird, you're like, "Ooh."

C: I really can't tell-

G: That's not- those are not crows.

C: They- I mean- What are they?

G: They look like grey-winged... blackbirds.

C: Okay.

G: [laughing] It's so funny when you look up like, "black bird with a bit of grey," and [laughing] like, the result is like, "a grey-winged blackbird." Like, yeah! I fucking bet.

C: No. But these blackbirds have like, orange beaks.

G: Yeah, it's not them.

C: If anyone knows birds- I don't think that they don't look like crows. Like-

G: But they're so tiny! Look at them, they're small!

C: I guess. I guess. Like, you could look at those photos and say that's the same bird, couldn't you? I don't know.

G: I love birds! Look at them.

C: It doesn't matter. It literally doesn't matter at all, in any way, shape, or form.

G: I need to get into bird-watching. Somebody needs to birdwatch. Oh! Is this a crow? The one you sent me?

C: Yeah.

G: But like, look at their beaks. It's not the- it's not right. [C: I can sorta see a bit of a-] Somebody who knows about birds- [C: Yeah, okay, if anyone knows anything about birds-] You know what? I'm going to send this to Rese, and maybe we'll get an answer in two to three days [laughs], which is her response time. [both laughing]

C: Sounds good. And if anyone else knows things about birds and knows what species the birds in the minisode “A Companion to Owls” are, then let us know. - [beep]

G: Do you think Crowley would Will Wood "Tomcat Disposables"?

C: Hmm. Maybe. Yeah. Why not? I mean, she doesn't have a landlord, so-

G: I love how I say that, but like, it's not even a reference to the song "Tomcat Disposables," [laughs] it's a reference to the backstory of the song "Tomcat Disposables," but for fucking real, though. I don't- I mean, I think Crowley can, must, and should befriend- No! But... [C: Hm?] He's a snake.

C: [laughing] Aww! Yeah. Goddammit. [G: Yeah.] Instead of- okay, are we cutting this out, or should I explain?

G: Okay, let's put it at the end.

C: Okay, right. So the backstory behind "Tomcat Disposables," a song by Will Wood, was that he befriended a rat that was in his apartment and would like, leave food out for it and things for like, a few months, but then eventually, his landlord said that he had to kill it, so like, he set out rat poison for the rat, and then it died, and it was a very sad thing for him. So okay, yeah, so I think the Crowley equivalent is like, befriended the rat, had a great time, and then one day, [G laughing] while they were in snake form and weren't thinking as clearly, was like, "Oh, I'm hungry."

G: [laughing] Did you mean he ate the rat?

C: He fucking ate the rat! [both laughing] Yeah. Sorry, Crowley.

G: For fucking real! [laughing] Yeah. Yeah. Why not?

C: Yeah. Isn't that what love is sometimes? - [beep]

G: Oh, by the way, Rese said the legs make it that these are crows. [laughing]

C: Oh my god, I was right?? I was right??

G: [laughing] Fine! Fine.

C: Fuck yeah! [G laughing] I do nothing but win, day after day, night after night.

G: [laughing] You were right, you were right, [C laughing] I was wrong, you were right.

C: Yayyy!

G: What a stupid, fucking thing that they do. [C laughs] I still cannot get over it. What a fucking pervert, as you said.

C: Yeah, we were talking about this afterwards, and we were like, "If this was like, a fun-" Like, within any regular friendship, they would laugh at the end of it, 'cause it's like-

G: They would chuckle about it!

C: Yeah. It'd be like, "That's like, a stupid thing that we do, like, as friends. Tee-hee! That was fun." [G: Yeah.] But like, they don't! Like, what is that? Like, the way that the tension breaks, the way that it ends is Aziraphale going, "Very nice," like, in like, his like, pervert voice, [G laughs] so like, what- What was that? What was it?

G: Like, Aziraphale literally is the king of doing like, a happy little wriggle when he's amused [C: Exactly!], and he doesn't do it this time! Like, this is not the intention of this scene!

C: It's- yeah! It's not to- like, it's not like, amusing to them in like, a funny way. Like, what is it? What are they getting out of this? Like, spank bank material? What's happening? [G laughing]

G: What is this?

C: What is this?

#transcript #rubbishpod

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