#this musical broke me long before epic

[madbard]

“You said that you would stay with me…”

As much as I love the 2019 original broadway cast recording of Hadestown, I will always miss the 2017 original cast recording for one major reason: the song “Promises.”

This song comes right after “Epic lll.” At this point, Orpheus has just made his greatest gambit, singing the song he’s been working on for years in the hopes of restoring balance to the world, now in a desperate plea to free Eurydice. After years of bitterness, of loneliness, rejection and pain, Hades and Persephone have finally embraced each other. They are dancing, and as they dance, Orpheus and Eurydice realize that they did it. They can go home.

In the 2019 recording, this moment is pure sweetness as Eurydice immediately reaches out to her exhausted lover, asking him to take her home. After the emotional hurricane that was the rest of the musical, there is a sense of joy and relief. The lovers are reunited. The story is almost over, and they are so glad to see each other again. It’s romantic, certainly… but something is missing.

In the 2017 recording, Eurydice still sings first. But she doesn’t ask Orpheus to take her home. Instead, she reminds him of the promises he made to her. She reminds him of his sweet words, of how those sweet words were torn apart by the winter winds, the pangs of hunger. She doesn’t absolve herself of blame, either. The music is soft and sad as she admits to breaking her vows, to flying away when times got rough. Orpheus replies in kind. We can hear the strain in his voice as he reminds Eurydice of the promises she made him, the future he had dreamed of - the future she may have destroyed. This conversation is quiet and heavy. Both blame the other; both accept blame. In the quiet, they admit to the pain and suffering they put each other through. They lay each broken promise bare. And then - they make a new promise. They choose to walk together.

Hadestown is such a multifaceted musical, intersecting with environmentalism, capitalism, greed, and so many other themes. For me though, the core of the musical will always be its story about failure and forgiveness, about the ways the people we love can hurt us. For me, Hadestown is a story about the risks we take when we forgive those people, and about that shining, quiet hope that maybe, just maybe, they won’t turn around this time. Maybe, we can find our way back home.

The 2019 version might be sweeter, more romantic. But it is the 2017 version that resonates because it shows, in the moment of calm after catastrophe, exactly how painful forgiveness can be.

[chaoschaos1]

Initial breakdown over, now it’s time to start bouncing off the fucking walls.

(incredibly incoherent and long rant incoming lmao)

FIRST OF ALL. THE UNDERWORLD. JAY WHAT, IN THE NICEST WAY POSSIBLE, THE FUCK??

I WAS EXPECTING POLITES. AND IT STILL HAD ME ON THE VERGE OF A BREAKDOWN. YOU CAN’T DO THIS TO ME JAY YOU CAN’T HIT ME WITH THE OPEN ARMS CHORUS WITH SO MUCH ECHO TO IT THAT IT SOUNDS EMPTY. POLITES IS THE LAST MF THAT SHOULD SOUND EMPTY STOP IT.

THEN YOU HIT ME WITH ANTICLEA? THE WAITING MOTIF WITH PENELOPE?? THE LITTLE “mum?” FROM ODY STOPPP. “I'M RIGHT HERE, MUM, CAN'T YOU SEE”??!?!? Jay. Sir you already broke my heart you didn't need to blend it as well wtf??

“I took too long” POLITES GET OVER HERE YOUR BESTIE NEEDS A HUG. LIKE BADLY.

AND THEN THE LAST CHORUS??? THE YELLING??? THE EMOTION???? JAY IS YOUR VOICE OKAY?? MY DUDE. MY PAL. MY GOOD FRIEND. WHAT.

AND THEN NO LONGER YOU?? BRO. BRO YOU CAN’T DO THIS TO MEEE. MASON ABSOLUTELY FUCKING KILLED IT. THOSE HIGH NOTES?? BRO IM LITERALLY A GIRL WITH A FAIRLY HIGH RANGE AND I CAN'T HIT THOSE WITHOUT GOING SQUEAKY??? LIKE DUDE BRAV-THE-FUCK-O

THEN THE “WHO”. JAY I WOULD LIKE TO REPEAT IS YOUR VOICE OKAY??? I'VE HAD THIS SHIT ON LOOP FOR HOURS NOW AND IT ALWAYS CATCHES ME OFF GUARD BECAUSE OF HOW ENRAGED IT SOUNDS??

AND MONSTER. HOOOO BOY MONSTER. YEOWCHIES. YIKES FOREVER. MMM NOTHANKYOU. OKAY FIRST OFF THAT FIRST NOTE REMINDED ME SO MUCH OF HORSE AND THE INFANT AND FRANKLY I’M NOT OKAY.

CAN WE JUST TALK ABT HOW. JUST. EMPTY IT SOUNDS?? BROO. BROOOO. THIS IS A FEDERAL OFFENCE. THIS LEVEL OF EMOTIONAL BLUDGEONING SHOULD BE ILLEGAL.

“I’ll become the monster” [intermission starts] THAT DESERVES JAIL TIME. ILLEGAL. YOU DON’T GET TO DO THAT TO ME. I’D BE SOBBING IN THE THEATRE SO HARD MFS ACROSS THE STREET WOULD HEAR ME

Ok listen I've cried because of Epic before. Several times. But never have I had a full on mental breakdown and had to start beating the everloving shit out of my pillow to cope with it. Jay, level with me here, how much crack did you put into this saga? JAY, WHAT THE FUCK???

Listening to this musical isn’t enough. I need it injected directly into my bloodstream.

[cosmicangst]

ok ok ok i just got home and as always here are my thoughts

really enjoyed colin lemoine's take. in terms of just pure vibes hes a step closer to damon daunno than reeve carney. he's not as boyish comic relief as nicholas barasch and he feels like the most.... grounded?? orpheus i've seen. he acts out the "touched" aspect without flanderizing orpheus into just his naivete and rendering him foolish and infantilized. the best way i can describe it is that he just seems like an optimistic but ultimately ordinary guy you could meet at a grocery store line who also happens to be plagued w Unfortunately Blessed with Musical Visions by the Gods Against His Will Syndrome

amaya braganza!!!!! jesus what a vocal powerhouse. her flowers killed me. something about her vocal inflection or acting choices really made her grief over losing her life and her love so visceral. she would be right at home at the obc recording because her voice was pitch perfect. she has a terrific belt but it's during the quiet moments where she's the most effective. like at the end of all i've ever known you can really feel she's already mourning her loss before she's even lost anything which is why flowers was more heartbreaking than normal

will mann is the most intriguing part of this cast to me. hermes actors have the choice of landing on the spectrum of objective narrator to a guardian figure. will feels like the most paternal. you get the sense that not only did he observe orpheus grow up he also had an active hand in raising him. when orpheus nervously stops during epic iii will says "go on, baby" with "baby" obviously ad-libbed 😭 like yes that is his baby

my only real critique of this performance is that the show doesn't actually pick up until way down hadestown. not sure if the cast just wasn't feeling the crowd or themselves until that point (it was a sunday night so i get it). i just make note of this bc livin it up on top is this high energy number that felt strangely middle energy for some reason lol anyone who was experiencing the show for the first time and had no frame of reference wouldn't notice anything amiss but bc im abnormal and pedantic i definitely noticed

and this is by no means a critique of lana gordon's persephone whose lady of the underground is one of the top highlights of the show. she brought the roof down during "there's a crack in the wall".

which brings me to my favorite part of the show: matthew patrick quinn. i didn't think anyone could replace patrick page in my heart but i was just in love with everything matthew brought to this character. he manages to combine facets of patrick and kevyn morrow's hades that i love together. matthew has kevyn's slick charisma and anger but he has patrick's power and world-weariness. he's this incredibly tall, serpentine, and long limbed figure that towers over everyone. patrick as an intimidating and antagonistic force felt like an ancient old god who can break your house by inducing an earthquake but matthew's vibe is more like he could literally be the snake that could tempt you out of a garden of eternal paradise

he and lana are also 🔥🔥🔥 like you can simultaneously feel the millenia of history between them but they also have the chemistry of two hot people going on a date for the first time after a long period of slowburn. the resentment, the familiarity, he way he's obviously repressing his desperation to keep her and both trying to look unaffected and turning to their vices when they reject each other's touch i could absolutely scream

which is why i was sobbing by the end of epic iii. i think the catharsis was just a lot lol and they were so playful during their dance too! like actual lovers who have the most absolute fun during good times. matthew does this little wiggle for her when they're sidestepping and im 100% sure lana broke character and they both started laughing it was so sweet

anyway the fates, the ensemble, everyone was astounding and im gonna see if i can grab another cheap balcony seat before they leave in a week to see if i can catch j antonio rodriguez as orpheus

[thestellargoblin]

Okay, so lately I fell in love with "Before the coffee gets cold" books, currently reading "Tales from the cafe" (The Best Friends chaper broke me :) ) and I've been thinking a lot about and came up with an idea:

Before the coffee gets cold au Epic The Musical (and Odyssey a lil bit) fic

Here's the general concept, haven't figured out all the details yet, but it's been eating my brain so I decided to share it here:

Basically the cafe is called Ithaca (duh), it allows to travel in time. It works the same as in the book, same rules - like not being able to change the present or being able to meet only people who visited the cafe. Owners of it are Odysseus and Ctimene (my girl is here because let me have the nice things), who inherited it from their parents. Also Penelope and Eurylochus also work there, helping their partners.

Seven years (number may change) ago Odysseus and his best friend Polites went missing. Poli's body was found but nobody have seen Ody since he disappeared. He's considered dead by most of the people (not his family tho!!!)

Currently cafe is run by Ctimene, Penelope and Eurylochus (who is there and doesn't die because I say so, tho that might change), Ctimene taking the role of Kazu, pouring the coffee to the ones who want to time-travel. Telemachus, who was ten (or maybe younger? still figuring out timeline) when Ody went missing, is also there. Athena too, I imagine her being like maybe some sort of detective and family friend. Telemachus is trying to covince her to pick up searching for Ody again. Maybe Athena and Ody had their massive fallout soon before his disappearance?

Story would be probably heavely centered around Odysseus being missing. I imagine Telemachus traveling back in time to meet his father again. Like him going back in time with camera or something like that, probably like lying to past Ody and Pen that it's anniversary gift for future them or something like that. And Penelope traveling to the future because she want to believe he will come back but just it's been so hard for her lately that she desperately needs a proof for some comfort (but he's not the one she'll meet there :)). Also maybe future Odysseus traveling long back in time to Polites because he blames himself for his death? Something like that, not sure yet. I also kinda want Athena to time travel, maybe to the day of the argument? Again, still thinking. Also I want to somehow incomporate suitors, not sure how tho yet. Probably more timetravels, but these ones are the ones I have in my head right now.

Also. ALSO. The ghost lady on the chair (who didn't drink the coffee before it got cold while time traveling). Yeah, its Anticlea :). Yeah it happened while Ody was away :))).

That's probably all I have for now, but might elaborate on this soon!

[theoceanoasis]

I've been listening to a song from Epic the Musical and I got an idea for a request.

Human Hot Rod and Siren Soundwave, but it's not Soundwave, but rather a siren posing as Soundwave who is Dead. I've just had the song stuck in my head for like days now.

Hearing singing outside his window. He rushed outside. It was raining heavily and he didn't bother to grab his shoes or a jacket.

Reaching Soundwave was more important. He looked around searching the shore as he called his name letting the music guide him.

He could feel his feet brush the water as he shouted.

"Soundwave!"

After not hearing back from him. He'd been worried the past few days because Soundwave usually visited him every night.

Seeing the siren approach he smiled walking further into the ocean. Ignoring the waves that tried to knock him down.

"You're back!? What happened?! I was worried about you!"

The mer swam closer and he frowned because something didn't seem right. Although it was hard to see with the wind and rain in his face.

"Soundwave are you okay? Are you injured?"

He felt his spark pound inside his chest when the siren revealed himself. He gasped because it wasn't Soundwave at all but a copycat.

"Who are you?"

The siren hissed and jumped at him. He blocked him with his arms as he was knocked into the ocean. He tried to drown him but he managed to get free.

He ran to land falling when the creature grabbed his leg. He harshly tugged wincing when his claws cut up his feet.

"Let me go!"

He kicked the siren and then ran as fast as he could into the light house. Outside he could hear the creature growl in anger. It's song no longer the soothing melody of his mate but something darker and more sinister.

He grabbed a nearby gun and stepped outside. The siren was watching him from the water and he shot the beast. Who snarled as he dived back underwater.

Spark racing he carefully walked down to the beach. Looking around for the siren. He could barely see him and the siren was a dark blackish blue color even darker than Soundwave.

He still scanned the area weapon in hand. His heart was racing and then the siren attacked. He jumped out of the water grabbed his arm and flipped him into the water. The two fought and being in water he had the advantage.

"Who are you? Where's Soundwave?"

The siren knocked the weapon out of his hand. Leaning down he snarled.

"Dead."

"You're lying."

The siren grabbed something and he gasped. It was his wedding ring which he wore around his neck covered in blood.

"He tried so hard to get back to you but he was no match for us."

In his shock the siren fatally wounded him not that he noticed. Overcome with grief. He let out an animalistic scream, as he hit his head against the siren. He viciously attacked ignoring the bites and claw marks. He was already dead. Both of their blood created a pool around them as they fought.

His gun had been knocked away but pulling out his knife he cut his head off. Standing up he kicked him into the water so the animals could eat him.

Stumbling back to shore he pressed a hand against his wound. He knew it was fatal but he didn't care. He was already dead the moment Soundwave had been killed.

His eyes rolled to the back of his head and he collapsed. His blood stained the sand and his body was pelted with rain not that he felt it. Holding Soundwave's ring close he felt a tear fall before he was gone.

He was found the next morning when he didn't call like he was supposed to after a storm and when the lighthouse was still on.

In the after life. Hot Rod walked along a pretty hallway that had pictures of his life and favorite memories. Most of them were of Soundwave and he would have cried if he could. In his hand he was still clutching his ring when he heard someone call his name.

Looking over he gasped and the two ran into each other's arms and held each other. He broke down sobbing and Soundwave held him for a long time. Until he took his hand and led him to the afterlife, where they could be together forever.

[rgr-pop]

i gave the new islands another listen too. i feel like this is the first album in a long time where he has given us a lot of clues for how we should think about it. i’m unraveling it. he said it was the last islands album and then he took it back, said he just gave that blurb to the publicist for fun. it’s a more different album than he’s put out in a long time, which i expected. there’s something primally him about it (quite a lot of critter songs), which was supposed to be the case. he recorded it at his home (vancouver island, origin of the unicorns/islands cosmology). there’s a comedy here that’s been in his other work but not his music. and he says it’s a lot about canadian singer-songwriters.

he’s been so profoundly impacted by what is going on in gaza. this is an artist who put out an anti-war fantasy pop record when he was like, 22, and it was one of the most beloved indie records of its moment, but nobody took it seriously as a political record, and that made him mad so he broke up the band (ok other factors also broke up the unicorns lol) and he started a new project and put out an on-the-nose ecocrit (islands) epic album, which also was beloved til it was sort of forsaken. and then they put out many more albums about basically this same problem: the self absorption of crying the end of the world and nobody caring, making pop music as a death fetish, the joke of being a narrator at the end of the world, other sagittarius things. the first three were well liked. after that they’d only sometimes get reviewed. just a bunch of insane women catching them (in my humble opinion), sort of political music kind of adrift between two eras of political music. in there somewhere there’s this album where he is adrift in the sea and thinking about how we never loved him enough! til eventually a modest podcast left redemption. he’s always thinking about the same thing (islands: being a character in a caspar david friedrich painting reversed; death as a symbol of the end of the world and vice versa). and now there’s this happening again. so another album: he must have recorded most of this thing since october 7. i should try to nail the timeline down. he just goes online and talks about gaza. i’m always donating to enter his little giveaways lol

he made all this to do about “the end” as the last song on this “last” album, but i love how it starts best, and this really just his whole project repeated (again —i can’t possibly overstate how many songs he has made that are like “well this is what my music has been about”): left behind and they want you to believe, but what occurs was always meant to be, a taste of melancholy that brings you to your knees. (“everybody’s bracing for a real armageddon.”)

i don’t like it as much as the last album, (and that’s why dolphins lost their legs, which is a clowncore album about melodrama and my favorite song on it offers giving your body-car up to a forest car crash like a mix between the end of the haunting of hill house and that story where the lady drove her car into lake huron because her gps said to), but it’s helped me put the pieces together (the long slow process of ranking and explaining all the islands albums as one of the few people that listens to all of them.) i like it more than the album before that (islomania). before that album, in 2016, he put out two albums—well, two albums and a 10 year anniversary rerelease of the first album, return to the sea. one of these albums, taste, is, i think, the second best islands record (after return to the sea). the other album, should i remain here at sea? is a concept album about having put out this misunderstood ecocritic epic a decade earlier, and being adrift between two historical moments of political music. imo lol. (i still don’t totally know what to make of it).

i put taste on halfway through drafting this post. one of my favorite lines, in the first song: “like time, like one long line, folded into 8 or 9.” it’s one of the least climate apocalypse islands albums (it’s really low concept, about a breakup), but it does have a song whose chorus is “melt melt melt my body, melt melt melt my body / there’s gonna be a reckoning, it’s gonna cover everything.” and that’s basically it!

(my favorite line on taste: a turned off machine, it’s never been much use to me, i come to, i rose again, but it feels off, like the wheel’s off.)

[eriquin]

The Prophetic D&D Game, Part 16

Start of the 5th session. Time marches on.

(master post)

Part 16

It felt like the home stretch for Eddie’s third and final senior year. He was determined to graduate this time, and putting all his effort into getting his grades up. Well, almost all his effort. He still spared time for his band, his lucrative sales job, and his two epic Dungeons and Dragons games. The Cult of Vecna was going great, and he expected that they would wrap up the Tales of the Cursed after it was done. But other than that, he was focused. 

He was going over his notes for what to do next with Vecna when Grant tapped him on the shoulder. “Jeff can’t make it today,” he said. “He broke an arch wire and has to go to the orthodontist. Emergency and all.” 

Eddie sighed. “Well, guess I won’t be needing these notes, then,” he said, shoving the Vecna notes into his bag. Grant raised his eyebrows and tried to get a look, but Eddie snapped his fingers in his face and shook his head. “Don’t even try it, Grantham.”

“Just keeping you on your toes, Edwin,” Grant said. “So this means we’re going to find out what happens to Natalia, then?”

“In theory,” Eddie said. He flashed Grant a wicked grin. “I might just kill her off and skip to the next bit of plot.”

Grant pouted. “Don’t be an ass,” he said. “At least give me a chance to save her. It’s been bugging me since the last session.”

“Yeah? You’re enjoying the story, huh?” Eddie shuffled through his notes to make sure he had everything for the Cursed run. “Did you give Jeff something sticky to eat just so he’d break his braces and we’d get to play?”

“No, but I was thinking about it,” Grant said. “We need more hours in the day, man. I want to know what happens with the cult, too.”

“Here, here,” Eddie said. He produced his Cursed notes and rearranged his stuff before heading to the drama room. Grant followed him. “Oh, did you pick up the new Metallica album? I have been listening to it over and over since I got it. It’s mind blowing.”

The rest of the club was running late, and Eddie and Grant got the whole table set up before anyone else showed. Gareth was the first of them to arrive, and he looked confused when he saw the layout that Eddie had put on the battlemap. He quickly figured out that they were playing the Cursed, and rubbed his hands together in excitement. He and Grant started discussing theories about the demon and how Natalia had ended up cursed. Eddie sat back and kept his face neutral as he listened in. 

The three freshmen arrived together, arguing about something science related. They dropped it almost as soon as they got in the room and saw Eddie holding up their character sheets. Lucas let out a whoop. He had clearly missed playing Sadie. 

As they settled down to play the game, Eddie gave them a quick recap of what had happened so far. It hadn’t been that long, but it was useful to set the stage and get back into character. “So now that you’re all ready to escape the demon realm, Natalia has frozen and gone into a trance. Before I take Grant aside and tell him what’s going on in his character’s head, what are you all doing?”

“We need music, right? Do any of us know her favorite song?” Gareth asked. 

Dustin leaned forward. “We’re in Quinn’s house, right? He’s a bard. He probably has plenty of music and instruments around. Either he or I should be able to play something for her.”

“Yeah, sure, but that doesn’t tell us what song to play,” Gareth said. “Mike, wouldn’t Joe know her favorite song?” 

Mike snapped his fingers. “Yeah! Sure, definitely.” He looked at Eddie.

Eddie shrugged. “I don’t know, man. You guys broke up a long time ago. Maybe it was for a good reason.” He held his hands out helplessly. “Make me a good intelligence check there, sparky.”

Mike picked up his die and blew on it for luck. He rolled, and got a pathetically bad number. Everyone groaned and started yelling at Mike, who complained about his dice hating him. 

Eddie stood and leaned over the table to look at them all, waiting until they quieted down. “Grant, I think it’s time you and I adjourned to my office. Shall we?” 

His office was the corner of the drama room, behind a folding screen. Grant brought his dice. He ran through a scenario of Natalia witnessing a young family moving into a sprawling mansion from the point of view of the only son. Grant quickly figured out that this was the Englund mansion that they’d explored, and the boy was the dead son. Grant was great for this, because he loved to sit and gather information before acting. He had Natalia watch as the young boy narrated the events of his life, and developed a twisted set of powers. It quickly became clear that he was responsible for his family’s deaths, and that his father had been unjustly blamed. He showed Natalia the way he had been made into a pawn for the wizard’s guild, just like their psychic sorceress friend. 

“Still as a young boy, he is confined to a chair and imbued with a mystical tattoo. It looks much like Millie’s, but while hers a lambda, his is an alpha,” Eddie said. 

“The first one,” Grant said. 

“Indeed. He was the first psychic they found, and because of him, they started looking for more. But he was just biding his time, and they could not control him.”

“Oh, damn,” Grant said. He grabbed his dice. “Okay, I need to get the hell out of here. Can I run?” 

“You can try.”

They went through a short combat, and Natalia ended up with psychic damage, but ultimately, the villain let her go. “He tells you to tell Millie that he’s coming for her, and that he’ll see her again soon,” Eddie said, clapping his hand on Grant’s shoulder. “Now, let’s go let the rest of them know that you survived.”

Taglist: @weirdandabsurd42, @10moonymhrivertam, @blueskiesandstarrynights

[juniperusashei]

Homer’s Iliad translated by Emily Wilson - 3/5

I think I must have been assigned to read Homer’s Iliad on at least three separate occasions throughout my youth, and Sparknotesed it every time. Which I feel bad about, because I always did want to read it, or maybe I wanted the clout that came with being a person who reads Greek epic poetry. In any case, when Emily Wilson’s new translation was released last year, I finally went for it. I had read selections from her Odyssey and found her approach to translation very accessible and easy to read. There was a lot of media hype about “the first woman to translate Homer” which led to some reviewers claiming this was a feminist reinterpretation of The Iliad. My pet theory is that they had her confused for Maria Dahvana Headley, whose translation of Beowulf was intentionally transformative. In any case, Wilson’s Iliad is meant to be fairly traditional and accurate to the original text, including some metrical craft I could not pick up on. Compared to all the other times I tried to finish the Iliad, I found Wilson’s version a much easier read, so I would recommend it for that reason. The supplemental materials are also way more impressive than most editions and justify the extra cost over just a Project Gutenberg download. Wilson’s introduction is hefty to say the least, at around 75 pages, and was often more moving than the poem itself (She even defends the infamous third chapter, the Catalogue of Ships, imploring the reader to “read them out loud: in mouth and ear, the long list of names become music.” I find comparisons of superhero movies to mythology mostly kind of dumb, but I could see Homer’s audience going crazy each time their guy’s name is called in this chapter the same way people soyface about the Avengers or whatever.) She provides all the context for a beginner like me to understand the poem, but also includes an extensive glossary and notes for each chapter for those who want to dive deeper. The hardcover edition is around $40, so whether or not this masterful editing justifies the high price honestly depends on how much you like reading about guys getting stabbed over and over again. I just got it from the library.

The poem itself was not as impressive. A lot of armchair critics (NOT Wilson) love to claim The Iliad as an anti-war piece to make it palatable to modern audiences. This was not my impression in the slightest. Sure, the epic deals with the horrors of war, often brutally (as I said before, pages upon pages of vivid gory disembowelments) but it seems the product of a society which obsessively fetishized war. I’m not condemning the text based on this, but I do think it’s harder to understand without unpacking the very different set of values that were held back then, so it’s a lot easier to attempt to update the text in a really sloppy way. Wilson does give a really cogent explanation of these ethical differences which helped me understand the text more fully, but that doesn’t mean I agree with it. Every time the equivalent of a Star Trek redshirt got killed off, Homer would expound on his ancestry and life, and then conclude with something like

…Menelaus stabbed his forehead above his nose, right at the bridge, and broke his skull, and popped his eyeballs out.

I literally opened to a random page and found something disgusting on my first try. It’s incessant. But I can see how telling each person’s life story dignifies their death. Still, it is hard to feel any sympathy for men who did not see women as people, but as property, as goes the inciting incident of The Iliad.

[certifiedplayerhater]

3/54: EPIC the Musical

disclaimer: i know nothing of Greek mythology or music, but i have strong opinions.

i caught up to EPIC and have some thoughts:

overall, the musical was a lot of fun! i throughly enjoyed the experience listening to it and thought the music direction and production was its strongest point. i think that’s what makes this a strong musical as opposed to a stage production—it is very bold in its direction and executes the vision quite well! while listening you can tell that this was what the creator was envisioning for each track which is quite exciting.

this is at the expense of the subtlety of the story. the lyrics were basic but at times the callbacks were clumsily done and a little hamfisted. this is also in addition to the show-off effect that happens in a lot of amateur musical productions — where the actors are all so talented and they really want to convince the audience of that. it broke me out of the musical when you’d have the tension be broken by an impromptu vocal showcase that didn’t really feel deserved. (Survive’s “push forward” line, Athena’s final verse in My Goodbye, and the “you’re alone” line are the best examples of this)

the Troy saga is shockingly underwhelming in the context of the rest of the musical? like it’s a good set up to everything and Odysseus as a character but it seems so tame compared to the direction of the later sagas. i think the opening line is probably the most important line in a musical, and i understand what it does for Odysseus but the story itself still leaves something to be desired. i think if just a man had stronger elements in the initial story then it would have felt more deserved, because it was just kinda like Odysseus and the boys are here.

however! Odysseus’ character development moments are pretty strong. it’s a little frustrating because the callbacks later on are a little clumsily done (especially the Just A Man callback, it was set up so well but kind of fell flat), but overall the delivery of these moments are pretty solid.

the Cyclops saga is where the story picks up quite a bit and it’s consistently very high? like there’s not nearly as many tender moments as there are in Troy, but it makes sense because this is the start of his journey! I think the dynamic between Athena and Odysseus was very strong (much stronger than his and Polite’s). the tension between Odysseus’ humanity and Athena’s teachings were very palpable throughout the entire remaining sagas, even when she abandoned him.

this saga was when you really start to hear them using production for their advantage. yes the cyclops sounded like a vocal effect, but it was such an interesting take on a monster. i haven’t heard this more electronic approach to monsters before and tbh i think it would’ve been interesting to incorporate some kind of trap or edm elements to break from the established motifs in the story, especially because you have this triumphant moment for Odysseus on top of an electric guitar. it’s not a necessity, but if the creators want to explore more of these unconventional music styles i think they’d do it pretty well!

by the Storm saga you can kind of tell the pattern of each four part story. Storm was a brilliant beginning to the saga, which is why i found the Horse and the Infant to be underwhelming in comparison. i also really enjoyed the use of setting in this song? like setting was always very strong, but the chanting of the crew mates really added to this almost sea-shanty effect. it was also a great transition from the string-heavy section from the Cyclops to the electronic rock feel of the Ocean saga.

overall, for how long it is, it’s pretty good! obviously i would like for it to be longer, especially drawing out some of the key confrontations a bit more (like Poseidon only having one song felt criminal, especially since it is so strong) but i understand producing something this big is taxing in itself so what can you do. that being said, Poseidon stole the show completely. i found the casting for the gods to be the most compelling, like they have the biggest moments and characters so it makes sense that their songs are the most intense and stick with you the most. i only wished that this intensity carried with the human characters, who tended to rely on the melodies to carry them through the songs as opposed to the other way around.

it’s stronger in its parts than as a whole because it can feel so formulaic at moments. the transitions between the sagas were choppy, like while recording the last song they were like “oh yeah we have another saga to do”. i understand it’s hard to make something complete as a body and it’s parts, but listening to them all back to back reveals how disjointed the sagas feel most of the time. like thematically yes Odysseus has grown, but musically it’s just not quite there (for example, finishing Cyclops with the drum-heavy choral singing of Athena and her delicate leitmotif when Odysseus JUST had an electronic rock moment in Remember Them that ties much cleaner into Storm — maybe if there was some build up to Odysseus’ defiance and new character development in the end it would have been stronger? especially since the last time we heard from him he was just yelling you’re alone)

im excited for the next saga! its Circe so i don’t think we’ll deviate from the strings, but maybe it’ll have a bit more edge to it? i was imagining some interesting uses of the harp but idk.

depending on my opinions i might edit this to include Circe or just make a new post.

[aratakigang]

HC: Kanabo

Despite being Arataki Itto's last caught Pokemon, this rare and elusive Pokemon is his ace. The story behind Itto and his ace dates back to his tour of the Hoenn region. While searching for answers about who he was and why he had horns, his small tour came to an end at the oceanic museum. With no clues, Itto sat in despair at a churro stand, wondering where to head next for his answers, but just as he was about to finish his churro, an old lady approached him with the intent of selling a map leading to an ancient part of Hoenn's history.

The map itself was questionable, but for a man who believes in fate and destiny, this was all very reasonable to Itto. He had to scrape out the money he was saving for a new boombox, but the map was now his. The instructions were strange, but that didn't stop the modern-day giant from renting a relicanth and wailord, surfing down the southern current of pacifidlog town, diving to an underwater cavern, deciphering brail, using dig, and going to a desert where he'd go to the center of a cave where he would take two steps to the left and two steps back to finally use rock smash on thin air.

At long last, the map's instructions were finished, and one final cavern appeared before Itto. He was broke, tired, and more confused than anything but every single step of his journey led him to this... a rock statue. The statue refused to move. It was unresponsive. No more text, no clue as to what was next. All that work was seemingly for nothing; worst of all, he no longer had the money for an epic sound system.

He dwelled in that cave for a bit, contemplating his losses and where he would head to next. But as he wallowed in self-pity his phone went off, a call from one of his friends caused the 8-bit rendition of Qilin's prance to echo throughout the cave. The magnificent melody, in turn, stirred something in the statue, causing it to beep. Was music really the answer? Itto thought to himself before playing some more of the songs he had on his phone, and sure enough, the statue would match the tone with a robotic beat. This wasn't a statue but a Pokemon, a Pokemon with insanely good taste in music.

With a smile, he stood up and approached the Pokemon with a Pokeball in hand, saying, "Hey, if cool jams are what ya like, why not follow me around for a bit? We'd make some seriously cool songs with my singing and your bass." The rock monster replied with a certain UN UN UN to agree, and just like that, the dynamic duo was formed.

The regirock, now known as Kanabo, often assists Itto in his musical performances by providing a regi-beat with its voice and even pounds the ground with its club-like arms for some heavy bass. In battle, The regi will adapt its speed and attack pattern to whatever song Itto plays.

Arataki Itto considers Kanabo to be one of his greatest treasure because whenever he feels down or alone he can always count on it to cheer him up by doing this

[bustyasianbeautiespod]

Episode 66 Transcript: Exploring Bobby's Personal Color Analysis for a More Robust Trucker Hat Collection

[intro guitar music]

G: Hello! My name is Grey.

C: And my name is Crystal.

G: And this is Busty Asian Beauties, the Supernatural commentary podcast where I, someone who has seen this show several times...

C: And I, someone who only knows the show through social media, discuss every single episode of Supernatural from start to finish. Also, we are both Asian.

G: Both Asian!

Yeah, today, we are discussing Season 4, Episode 6: “Yellow Fever,” written by Andrew Dabb and Daniel Laughlin, directed by Phil Sgriccia. You know what?

C: Yeah. This was not that bad. Like, Dabb did an okay job the first time.

G: Okay, here's my take. Like, many times this episode, I was laughing out loud, with the episode, right? Like, I was enjoying what they were doing. They were putting things on the table, and I was like, “Yeah, that's funny. Yeah, that's amusing.”

C: Yeah, yeah.

G: And then, towards the end when I realized-

C: What the plan was?

G: - This is the episode [laughs] where they do the thing that they do to the ghost that they're trying to get rid of.

C: Yeah. Yup.

G: I was like, “Oh, okay. [screams]”

C: That's where the Dabb-ness comes in.

G: Suddenly, I was like, laughing, but in a like, “I can't believe they're doing this!”

C: In a "Dream a Little Dream of Me" way.

G: Yeah, a "I can't believe they're doing this" kind of way. Although I would say, like, you know, Dabb era, I would say, is characterized a lot by its comedy. It's a very- like, that's where Supernatural really does become like a sitcom, you know? So I understand that Andrew Dabb in his introductory episode- Is it? Is it? We said that last episode, but I'm not sure if that's true.

C: We did say that. I can check.

G: It is.

C: Yep.

G: “Yellow Fever” is his first episode. So like, for his first episode to be a funny episode-

C: He wrote your favorite Sam episode.

G: Really?

C: He wrote “After School Special.”

G: Wow! And he was partners with Daniel Laughlin for a really long time. [laughs]

C: Yeah, but then they broke up in Season 8.

G: Damn. He also wrote "Hunteri Heroici."

C: Yeah. Which I guess-

G: Sure is an episode.

C: Yeah, definitely is one. Sad to see an epic writing partnership broken, just like Sera Gamble and Raelle Tucker.

G: Yes. C: They hate to see the LGBTs win. [C laughs] What is the implication in that statement?

C: That- that they were fucking? That Sera Gamble and Raelle Tucker were fucking, and so were Dabb and Laughlin. Is that the implication?

G: You know, we never know. [both laughing] I'll probably delete this part from the episode.

C: I'm pretty sure we know.

G: Well, anyway, yeah, that's our thoughts for this episode. It's- it's really juicy. I think this episode is really juicy, and I am excited to get into it. So, you. What did you know about the episode before going and watching it?

C: What I knew about this episode before going in and watching it was that it is like, basically one of the only Supernatural episodes that Kripke felt he needed to release an apology statement after [G laughs], and I'm gonna read that out loud to all of you right now, okay?

G: [laughing] Okay.

C: So this article, it goes:

"In response to last night’s episode of Supernatural, showrunner Eric Kripke wanted to pass along this message to the show’s fans:

'So I’ve never before responded directly to the fandom’s comments about an episode, and I don’t plan to make a habit of it, but I couldn’t resist dropping in a thought about the episode “Yellow Fever.”

Which is this:'"

Linebreak, linebreak.

"'Dean is not a dick. [G screams]

None of the writers, or anyone on the creative team of Supernatural, think Dean’s ever been a dick, past, present, or future. He’s a hero. Dean did NOT contract the ghost sickness because he’s a dick. Victims contract the illness because they use “fear as a weapon.” Dean asks Lilith at the episode’s end, “Why did I get infected?” And she cryptically responds, “you know why. Listen to your heart.” We, as the writers, probably should have emphasized this mystery more, I take responsibility for that omission. But the point is: the reason he was infected is because of a secret he’s keeping. A dark secret that will be revealed in Episode 10. And not at all because of any dickishness, implied or otherwise.'"

G: It's so funny!

C: "Bugs"? Fine. Racist truck? Fine. Misogyny up the wazoo? Fine. But it is my fault for implying for a second that [fake-teary] Dean might be a dick when he is a hero!

G: Oh my god. I actually- I didn't read the full statement, but I did go through the “Yellow Fever,” like, Superwiki page, and like, reading that, that like, Eric Kripke was like- wait, where is it? "For the first time ever, Eric Kripke made a statement after the episode, clarifying that Dean wasn't a dick." [C screams]

C: Jensen Ackles is not gonna fuck you! [G screams]

G: And it's so funny to me because I know what they were trying to do, right? Like, I know what the reveal is, etc etc. But even then, I was like-

C: Yeah, whatever.

G: - “Yeah, maybe he just was a dick for real." Like, who even give a shit?

C: Maybe he is just a dick! That's fine. He is a dick. So it's fine.

G: Yeah. Like, they are not mutually exclusive. Like, being a hero, and being a dick occasionally, they are not mutually exclusive. So for them to come out and be like, “We, the writers, but especially me, Eric Kripke, [C laughs] believe that Dean will never be a dick.” It's like, what are we doing here? What are- Was there an uproar? Were people rioting in the streets? What's happening?

C: I think they were rioting in the streets! It seems like the fan response was strong enough that he felt like he needed to come out and say something. [G laughs] Which, you know, I'm actually really curious to see if this reflects on the IMDb reviews at the end of the episode. If people are like, screaming and crying, going [fake-teary], "Dean's not a dick!"

Oh, and the other thing I knew about this episode was the screencaps of the scene where Dean sees the words “Baby gonna cry” and starts panicking.

G: Yeah! God. Many times this episode I really was just - and that includes that scene. “Baby gonna cry?” [C laughs] He should have. He literally should have.

C: Literally. "Baby gonna cry?"

G: Okay, so-

C: Should we just mention the title of this episode. Like, it isn't what it is, but it could be, but it isn't.

G: Yeah, yellow fever- Actually, you know what I don't- I didn't know what yellow fever was in terms of the disease because it's not- like, it doesn't affect Southeast Asian countries.

C: I also didn't know what it was in terms of the disease until I looked it up. I was like, "Maybe there's a disease for it, but I only know it as like, another term for Asian fetishization."

G: I've heard about the Yellow Plague, which I think is different. It's not the Yellow Disease. Yellow Plague, that's different from yellow fever, which is different from yellow fever.

C: Other yellow fever, yeah. [laughs]

G: Yeah, yellow fever is like, a disease. Is it an infection? It's a viral infection, I think. You know, let's not spread misinformation. [laughs]

C: Wikipedia says it's a viral disease, I have the page open. [G laughs]

G: Yellow fever can also be used as a term for [overlapping] sexual fetishization of Asian people, yeah.

C: Interestingly enough, one time that it was used- like, a famous time it was used, it was used in the afterword to the play M. Butterfly by David Henry Hwang, and he meant it in a derogatory way, right, like, he was like, "People who have Asian fetishes are basically infected with a disease," but I feel like people use it as a self-descriptor now unironically sometimes. So that's that's fun. Good job. Good job you did that. But yeah, the pun of the episode title is that "yellow" also means cowardly. So like, that's what they were going for.

G: Yeah. [laughing] Wait, I remember this one- [laughing]

C: Yeah?

G: This one video, it's like- I don't even know what it is. It's like a game show. [laughs]

C: A game show?

G: [laughing] Yeah, like, there's an Asian kid and like, a white kid-

C: Oh, shit I remember this! Yeah, go ahead.

G: [laughing] And then the question is, “If a person is yellow, it means that they are…” and then, like, the white kid buzzed in, and he goes completely silent, and then after like, five seconds, he goes, “Chinese?” [both laughing] Yeah.

C: God.

G: And then the Asian kid buzzes in and goes, “Cowardly?” [both laugh] And the white kid was like, "Oh, dammit." Like, you can see his face's reaction be like, "Oh, I should have known that." [laughs]

C: Yeah. God. Good for both of them. Hope both of them are doing well.

But yeah. Also, if you're curious, people can't- like, I couldn't find like, a strict etymology of  why yellow means cowardly, but yellow being a descriptor for East Asians seems to be from Carl Linnaeus, who was like, a Swedish scientist who like, decided to separate humans into racial groups arbitrarily. And he used "luridus," which means pale yellow, lurid, or sallow, to describe Asian people. And according to the book Becoming Yellow: A Short History of Racial Thinking, this was because, like, he used the same term to characterize plants that were unhealthy or toxic. And, like, the point, was like, exoticization/demonization of Asian people. So that's fun.

G: As in- wait. Linnaeus as in the Linnaeus? The nomenclature?

C: I think? Carl Linnaeus- He's considered the father of modern taxonomy. Is that the one you're talking about?

G: Yeah, like-

C: That one.

G: Yeah, okay. [laughs] Fun!

C: Yeah, I definitely learned about him in like, “he was a cool scientist” way in school.

G: Yeah. And you know what?

C: Now you know!

G: Well, he was a cool scientist. In association with everything. [laughs] Yeah.

C: Yeah, alright.

G: Anyway, let's get into the episode.

C: Let's get into the episode.

-

G: The episode starts with the-

C: Oh, "Then" sequence?

G: Oh, yeah, the “Then” sequence. It's fun. It's good!

C: Well.

G: We get some Cas. We get some Lilith. They show Sam killing-

C: - killing Gordon again. It's in every single "Then" sequence, and it's like, over him going like, “I've got demon blood in me. I'm a whole new level of racist.”

G: [overlapping] "I'm a whole new level of freak." [both laugh]

C: Like, implying that he only killed Gordon because of the demon blood? Like, okay.

G: Which is fundamentally untrue.

C: What a fascinating take.

G: Untrue.

C: Right. Why did they have Cas in here if he's not even in the episode?

G: No, it's like, because Dean gets threatened that he's gonna get thrown back in Hell, and they're reminding us that by putting in the line of Cas saying, “I can throw you back to Hell.”

C: Oh, yeah, that makes sense. [G laughs] See, my only feelings about that line are like, “Oh, hi, he's hot.” I forgot that there were like, words that meant things in there.

G: So let's finally start with the episode.

It's just Dean. [laughs] Just his usual self. [C laughs]

C: He's just being regular.

C: No, but we see Dean interspersed- Well, actually the “Before” sequence itself was interspersed with Dean running in the road, right? So that's like, kind of how they tie it into the teaser portion of the episode where he is in fact running, but now it's night. And we hear like, a bit of growling, a bit of dog noises in the back, and he is super scared, and he gets to a point where he sees like, some guy. He stops in the middle of the road, and then he tells the guy, like, “It'll kill you. Run, run!” [C laughs] And then we see what he's pointing at, which is this little Yorkie!

C: With a pink bow on his head.

G: Yeah. And I was thinking, “This dog is probably not a street dog, so like, where's its-"

C: Yeah, why is it out here?

G: Yeah, where's its pet mommy? Where is it?

C: Aw.

G: Poor little- poor little dog. That's the end of our introduction. We go to 43 hours earlier, where Sam and Dean are going to a morgue in Colorado, right?

C: Yeah. Rock Ridge, Colorado.

G: Yeah. And as they enter the coroner tells them, like, “Agent Tyler, Agent Perry, meet Frank O'Brien.” And Tyler and Perry is an Aerosmith reference, which they do actually ref- like, they say in the episode like, “Oh, just like in Aerosmith.” Which, do you find it funny or cheap when they do that?

C: I think as long as it's not too often-

G: Yeah.

C: Because it's like, their names are stupid, and they should be caught out more for them, or at least like, people should mention, "Oh, band." So I think a little bit is fine.

G: The last time we had this was like, when Dean was talking to some guy and the guy was like, “Oh, just like in Led Zeppelin,” right? So it's not that often.

C: Yeah, that was in "Scarecrow" or some shit.

G: Yeah. Frank O'Brien died of a heart attack three days ago-

C: Good.

G: - but apparently, he was an athletic guy, marathon runner, 44, so like, why did he die? And the coroner says, “Well, everybody dies. Like, that's why I have job security.” [C laughs] Honestly, I love this coroner. I am quite taken aback by the lack of protective gear [laughs] later on. But yeah, he's funny. And apparently, not just Frank died these past few days. Like, two other men died from heart attacks. And the coroner's like, “Okay, sure. But like, why does the FBI give a shit?” And Dean says like, “We just want to see the autopsy." Which obviously hasn't been done to this man who died of a heart attack. So the coroner is like, "There's no autopsy? What autopsy?" And Dean goes, "The one you're gonna do."

-

C: The next thing is the autopsy happening, and I feel like the vibe is like, the coroner's not happy that he's being forced to do an autopsy, so he's like, trying to make it as unpleasant for Sam and Dean as possible, and honestly, like, slay.

G: I'm pretty sure you wear a mask during an autopsy, no matter what. Whether the person died of whatever.

C: I'm pretty sure too.

G: You wear a mask. And you know what? This could have all been avoided if they just wore masks. [laughs] Probably not. I don't know

C: Well, but freedom. Their freedom as Americans. [both laugh]

G: Yeah, so I've heard. I have heard about the Americans' freedoms. [C laughs]

C: So the coroner’s like, “Okay, I've gotta do the autopsy right in front of you, and I'm going to make it as gross as possible.” So, you know, we see him cut the skin open, and then he has Sam and Dean assist, so like, there's like, rib cutters that Dean hands over, and we get to like, hear the snap.

G: Also, the way he picked up the heart-

C: Oh, yeah, that is- yeah.

G: He didn't cut it off the body. He like, ripped it out.

C: He just fucking yoinked it out. Yeah.

G: You know what? I support it.

C: There's like, scratches on this guy’s knuckles and arms, and there's also like, this white band on his left hand, which implies that he was married.

G: Yeah.

C: So he finds that the heart seems perfectly healthy. No blockages. I didn't know there were physical signs of a heart attack that were left behind on the heart. Maybe there aren't. This is Supernatural. I'll never know. Yeah, he yanks it out, tells Dean to hold it. And then, like, as he's cutting something else out, like, an organ like, bursts and splashes like, blood all over Sam’s face. You know, the coroner goes, like, “Oh, sorry, spleen juice.” Good for him.

G: This reminded me so much of that episode in House, where like, an intestine explodes on that guy's face. [laughs]

C: I don't know-

G: "That guy." Love that. Foreman's face. You don't know this? Foreman.

C: I don't remember. Aw, Foreman! Poor guy.

G: We should get back to being a semi-House MD podcast.

C: No, we shouldn't. [G laughs] No one should ever think about that show ever again.

G: Ah, all right.

C: It's making its comeback for like, I don't really know why, and I feel like more people are watching it than like, the economic equilibrium deems is good, you know?

G: You know what's fascinating is someone that I follow for Supernatural on the tumbles is now posting The Great Ace Attorney fanart-

C: Nice.

G: - and that's really fucking up with my head. Like, I'm not here on Tumblr for that. [C laughs] Like, it's elsewhere, you know? Like, why are you doing here? What are you doing here?

C: Right.

G: Also, they ship- I mean, I don't think it's like, morally reprehensible to ship that ship. But, like, personally, I don't enjoy it, and I'm like, “Oh, I'm sad you enjoy it.” [laughs]

C: Everyone ships Narumitsu!

G: Not Narumitsu.

C: Oh.

G: In The Great Ace Attorney, you're Asian, you're Japanese, that's your guy.

C: Oh, the racist? Wait, the racist? The Barok racist guy?

G: And then like- yeah, ship them with the Barok racist guy. [laughs]

C: Oh, that's insane. Okay.

G: I mean, okay, fine, it's okay, I don't give a shit, like, do whatever you want. [C laughs] But like, personally, I'm like, "I don't like that." [laughs]

C: Yeah.

G: I'm a hater. I am a hater.

-

C: So we're in the cop station, and like, there's a deputy there who's like, young and fresh-faced. And, like, is this gay?

G: Everybody knows this guy. Like, you've seen this guy, I've seen this guy-

C: I've seen this guy in all, like, the Dean bisexual compilations. But like, is this guy gay?

G: I hope so. He's very cute.

C: Good for him. He's- he's something.

Is the implication that he has a thing for Dean. Like, I can't tell. I feel like if Supernatural actually meant to do it, they would make it a lot more clear, and then have Dean make a gay joke about it. So I guess not.

G: Yeah, because they do do that with like, Aaron, right? They were like, “Oh, he's into Dean,” and then he's not, and it's a whole thing. But like, I don't know. If this was literally any other show, I would be like, “Yeah, that's probably their intention." But because this is Supernatural-

C: Yeah, it sure is Supernatural. So, right. This is Deputy Linus, and then the sheriff shows up, and he takes them into his office. But he tells them to take their shoes off first, which is supposed to like, show that he's like, really fastidious about his office being clean or like, is it germaphobe? But like, maybe he's just Asian.

G: I know! I'm literally- like, he made them take off his shoes, and I was like, "Go, Asian king!" Go, white Asian king! [both laugh]

C: Yeah. Diversity win! This white man is also an Asian man, and also did so many terrible things as a cop. [G laughs]

G: Yeah.

C: So he like, starts really scrubbing his hands down with hand sanitizer. He tells them a bit about the case. He says that he and Frank were friends. “Hell, we were Gamecocks.” And [both laugh] Dean does laugh at this, and so do I.

G: Later- I mean, we'll get into it later.

C: Oh, the Gamecocks/Cornjerkers thing?

G: [laughing] Yeah.

C: [laughing] Yeah, that shit was really funny.

G: Like, the rest of that scene I did not hear at all because I was too busy hearing my laughter.

C: Yeah. Yeah. So this turns out to be their softball team.

G: They are- diversity-!

C: Do you think- do you have a name for John's softball team in 2.20?

G: [laughing] Diversity win! This man who is white is also Asian and a lesbian. [both laugh]

C: And a cop. Good for him.

G: And also did some truly atrocious things.

C: Yep!

So yeah, remember how John was on a softball team in 2.20?

G: Yeah, I sure do.

C: What if that softball team was called the Gamecocks or the Cornjerkers? What if?

G: Well, what this like, a Kansas-y name? Because I feel like Cornjerkers is like if you're in a corn- cornish-

C: They're in Colorado, though. They don't have to do anything.

G: I don't know what any of these places are.

C: Yeah- Colorado is- I don't know. There are mountains. And everyone called it like, a den of iniquity for a few years when it was like- when weed was legal there before other states. I don't know that much else about it.

G: Oh, they have Boulder, Colorado, which Dean says was his college in- 1.02? I think. The second episode of the show.

C: 1.03, right? Oh, 1.02? No, yeah, it was 1.02. Okay. Yeah.

G: That's all I know.

C: And also at Dean's laugh, he goes like, [seriously] “They're majestic animals.” So-

G: Love that.

C: Yeah. He says that he was a good man, and Dean makes like, a shitty joke about like, “Oh, yeah, he had a big heart.” I just- like, following “Monster Movie,” [laughs] this is an odd episode. Like, first, because they already did like, their “haha funny” episode. But at least this one's actually funny. And also, second, because, like, despite everything in “Monster Movie” going against it, the thesis statement was like, “Oh, hunting is good because we save people or whatever the fuck, and it feels good to do.” And like, Dean just here, being a dick to this victim. And now, after we learn more things about him. I'm like, “Go ahead.” But like, right now, it just seems really rude.

G: This is probably a common joke, but it was common for my group of friends - because, you know, I am, in fact, a busty Asian beauty - and it's common for my friends to make like, “you have a big heart” joke towards me.

C: Oh, yeah.

G: Because I have big... heart. [both laugh] Yeah. So when he said this, that's all I was thinking about.

C: Like, wow. He had giant badonkers. Huge hongalongalongs. Yeah.

G: Exactly

C: Such things were wasted on such a terrible man.

Yeah, apparently in the few days before he died, he was like, really scared of everything. Dean is like, "Yeah, you know what? This is probably just a heart attack." And then he goes outside and immediately goes, “No way that was a heart attack” to Sam.

-

G: Yeah. Sam, like, continue on that like, "There's no way it's a heart attack because everyone has the same scratches, and everyone was like, mortified 48 hours before their death," etc etc. They start talking about how it's very difficult to narrow shit down. Because, like, every supernatural creature is pretty much scary.

C: Yeah. [laughs]

G: So they just go to some guy’s place to- who's like, Frank O'Brien's neighbor and is also the last person to see him alive.

C: But before that, Dean says- he sees-

G: - a group of teenagers, yeah.

C: Four 15-year-olds with bikes who just look like they're talking to each other and hanging out after school. [laughing] And he goes, “I don't like the looks of those teenagers down there,” and crosses the street to avoid them.

G: He's just like me for real.

C: I know that's supposed to be a hint- that's supposed to be a hint about something later, but like, at the time it was just like, “Alright, Dean. I guess he's like, way more classist than I thought.” [G laughs]

G: You know what? Teenagers, they're kind of terrible. I am willing to admit that.

C: Sometimes. Sometimes. But like, Sam and Dean could take them. [G laughs]

G: This reminded me of like, Yakuza, for some reason, because, like-

C: Oh, right.

G: - teenagers are portrayed as super duper terrible in that game.

C: When your guy gets totally beat half to death by a group of teens.

G: Yeah, yeah. They should have done that to Dean. I retract my statement. I think teenagers are perfectly fine. [both laughing] And they should do that to Dean Winchester. [C laughing]

Yeah, they enter this guy's house, and the guy’s like, “Oh, you're named just like Aerosmith.” And Sam handles this better than Dean did in the past, where he just says, “Yeah, it's a small world.” And then this guy is a lizard guy, he's a reptile guy. He has a lot of snakes. An alligator?

C: Yeah, or a crocodile. I didn't pause to check.

G: In a shockingly small terrarium, or whatever that's called. An aquarium?

C: Yeah, that is not how you should be keeping an alligator or a crocodile, I'm pretty sure.

G: Yeah. There used to be a person in my life - which is such a vague way to put that - who like, is into like, reptiles as well. And so I looked up, like, "What kind of equipment do you need for that?" or whatever. And you need so much equipment. And also, like, a small animal needs so much space. But throughout this scene I was just like, “That is such a small aquarium! What are you doing?” But you know.

C: Yeah. Sorry to that creature.

G: Apparently, Frank O'Brien was very jittery, freaking out a lot. And throughout this scene, Dean is looking very scared of all the animals. And Mark, the guy that they're talking to, is like, “He was afraid of witches.” And Sam's like, “What?” And he clarifies that- I don't know. He was afraid of the lady from the Wizard of Oz?

C: Yeah, like he freaked when he saw Elphaba.

G: Yeah, he was afraid of- and I listed- "Al Qaeda, ferrets, artificial sweetener, PEZ dispenser. Lots of stuff."

C: Yeah.

G: Yeah. I mean, good for him. [laughs] What is your most irrational fear?

C: Huh. I can't come up with anything. I mean, I guess-

G: Yeah. You're the person who's like, [mocking voice] “All my fears are rational! What are you talking about?”

C: I'm sure there's something. I just can't think of anything. I don't know. I don't eat the heads of fish or shrimp because I don't like the idea of their brains going into my mouth. Is that something?

G: I mean, probably. Do they have brains? Isn't it just like, nerve systems?

C: It is probably just nerve systems. [laughs]

G: Love that. I think I've said this before in the podcast, but I'm very afraid of the trunk of a car beheading me.

C: Oh, yeah.

G: Yeah. Love that.

Anyway, they ask what Frank is like, and Mark basically says that like, “Well, he was- He got better.” And they press, and he says that when he was in high school, when he was younger, he was a dick. He was a bully. But he did get better, and like, after his- after "What happened to his wife," and they were like, “Oh, whoa, he was married?” And apparently, he was married 20 years ago, and his wife died. And that's all they say at this point. But- and then the snakes really start freaking Dean out. And Mark was like, “Hey, don't worry. This one’s a sweetie. You should be worried about the one behind you.” And then it shows a little snake crawling on the couch. Fun stuff.

C: Not little

G: Yeah, it's a big snake.

C: Yeah. It can smell fear, supposedly.

Okay, so the timeline- what we know. Okay, he does a horrific murder.

G: 20 years ago.

C: And then he finds that his wife killed herself. And then that's what makes him nice?

G: Yeah. Because the way the brother later makes it so is that everyone knew that he killed that guy. So like, maybe Mark didn't- maybe Mark was like, new in town. But like, how would he know that his his wife killed herself if he was new in town?

C: I don't know. No, wait, he's not new in town, because he said that he was one of the ones who got bullied by Frank in high school.

G: Oh, yeah. I don't know. Maybe- Yeah, it's a bit unclear. Maybe Mark is a bit out of it. Who knows?

C: Yeah, who knows? I feel like he and Andy would get along. They have similar vibes.

G: Yeah. I think Andy would be very scared of the snakes, though.

C: Oh, true, especially if he was like, on a bad trip.

G: Yeah. [laughs]

-

C: So we're at the Impala, and Dean's starting to scratch his arm.

G: Love that! [laughs] Skin disease representation.

C: Real. So he says to Sam that his research has taught him that Frank's wife Jessie had, like, bipolar disorder, and then, she vanished. And then two weeks later, they found her, and, like, she'd killed herself in a motel room. But there's no way that Frank could have killed her, because when she disappeared, he was like, at work.

So meanwhile, Sam has checked out Frank's house, and there was no EMF, no hex bags, and no sulfur. And then he notices that Dean is driving at the speed limit, at 20 miles per hour, and then he drives past their motel - or I think it's a hotel this time, because we see it, and it's very nice. Sam’s like, “Huh!” And Dean goes, “Sam, I'm not gonna make a left hand turn into oncoming traffic. I'm not suicidal!” And then Dean goes, “Did I just say that? That was kind of weird.” [G laughs] And it is kind of weird. Because he is suicidal.

But anyway, the EMF starts going off, and it's like, detecting something off of Dean. And Dean starts going, “Am I haunted?” God. So fun. I've revised my “put him back in the ground” wish. If you could just give him chronic like, ghost illness-

G: Ghost sickness-

C: - that doesn't kill him but like, just sort of like, keeps him around here, maybe like, a little further. Like, this is the most likeable he's ever been in the entire show.

G: That's true.

-

G: So Sam is like, on the phone with Bobby or something. And he walks towards the Impala, and Dean is lying down in the backseat or in the front seat.

C: Front.

G: There's no divider in the Impala, which I find so fascinating. Can they bring that back? Like, in cars? Or, I mean there's probably a reason why they took it away.

C: There's probably a safety thing or something.

G: Yeah, but it looks so cool. “Eye of the Tiger” is playing really, really, really loudly, and Dean is air-drumming. And then Sam, just like, scares him a little bit by banging on the roof of the car.

C: Also, Sam's holding a box of doughnuts.

G: Yeah!

C: I love when Sam gets to have food in his life. Good for him.

G: He did not eat it, though. He didn't eat it.

C: That's true. He just bought it for Dean or some shit.

G: Dean looked at it and also didn't eat it. So I don't know who consumed the donuts.

C: Yeah, he's probably getting afraid of artificial sweetener like Frank did.

G: Yeah. And Dean shows Sam some scratches on his arm. And he keeps on itching it pretty much all throughout the scene. Apparently, Sam reveals that Dean has ghost sickness. And [laughs] this one's pretty funny. Like, Dean is like, "Oh my god. God, no." And Sam's like, "Yeah." And then they go silent for a while, and Dean goes, “I don't even know what that is.” [both laugh] And it's incredibly effective, it's incredibly funny. And I think, honestly, like, not to be like “Jensen Ackles is a good actor,” but like, I find that a lot of times, people compliment Jensen for his crying, for his single man tear, blah blah blah.

C: Wait, that's the main thing I complain about.

G: Yeah, exactly. Like, I find his crying so, like, "who even give a shit?" But he is actually very good at like, physical comedy.

C: Yeah.

G: Like, the reason why Dean is so funny and charismatic-

C: Eh.

G: - is because he is acted well when he is being funny.

C: Yeah.

G: Yeah. Sam says, “Some cultures-”

C: "Some cultures-"

G: Love that! They're going against the "all cultures." "Some cultures believe that certain spirits infect the living with a deceased that acts exactly like a disease." And, like, he says that this is the reason why "they" [C laughs] stopped displaying bodies in houses and started taking them off to funeral homes, which is so fascinating to me. Because I am pretty sure that the funeral industrial complex [C laughs] is a very American thing.

C: Yeah. Right. Yeah, so as soon as this happened, I was like, “Well, that wasn't in A Mortician's Tale, so I don't think it's true.”

G: Exactly.

C: So I did a quick factcheck, and okay, so like, if we're looking at just the phrase “ghost sickness,” it seems like it's a phrase or a term used for beliefs that are most common amongst like, Navajo and Muscogee groups. Like, Native American groups in the US. And also some Polynesian islanders. But it is not about how the body or whatever can infect the living with a disease or whatever. It's like, specifically about like, how grief can cause physical symptoms like loss of appetite, hallucinations of or dreams about the dead, and anxiety. So like, that's not really what this episode is. But it ends up like, a Japanese thing anyway, one that I could not find that many sources on. So I guess it's fine that they got ghost sickness wrong. Sure.

G: Yeah. Yeah. The whole like, death industry is- Ever since we played over The Mortician’s Talel, which we in fact did, and we posted it on our Ko-Fi

C: Yeah, [annoying voice] and if you wanna give us $3, you can like, totally see it!

G: Yeah. And like, we're doing that now. We're doing it every month.

C: We're let's-play-ers now. Like, cat ears and growing out of my ears as we speak.

G: Exactly. But like, ever since we played A Mortician's Tale, I've actually been like, reading and like, watching YouTube videos, you know, of like, the typical people to watch. Like Ask A Mortician, blah blah blah. And, I don't know. I think it's a very fascinating thing. And, you know, maybe one day, we can get into it.

Earlier in this podcast. I did ask you if pyring- like, funeral by pyre, is legal, and it's not. And we did read that pamphlet from the Department of Health. So it's a long time coming.

C: Oh, with cremains?

G: Yeah! [laughs] The cremains one! Which is the most amazing thing that has ever happened in this podcast. [C laughs]

C: And we didn't come up with it.

G: Yeah. It's literally- cremated remains are literally called cremains. Love that.

The symptoms are you get anxious, and then really, really, really scared, and then you die of a heart attack from all that scaredness. And Dean is like, “Well, we haven't seen a ghost,” and Sam informs him that this spreads "pretty much just like any sickness," which is so funny to me. [C laughs] What? What? What?

C: I don't fucking know.

G: The argument here is like, it spreads like "any sickness" in quotation works, which is, well, as we know, sicknesses come in different shapes and sizes. So like, the way this spreads is like, "a cough, a handshake," whatever. So like, is it airborne? Is it like the particles in your saliva, whatever? Is this blood?

C: Sam says some cultures but every illness. [G laughs]

G: It's so funny. How does ghost sickness spread?

C: I don't know.

G: Is there a flea in the air that bites the body and then bites you, and then you die 48 hours later like the bubonic plague? What's happening?

C: [laughs] I don't know. Whatever.

G: Like, who give a shit, but also, it's so funny to me.

C: It is.

G: It's so funny. Anyway.

C: It's definitely a really weird writing choice. Yeah.

G: [laughs] Yeah. Anyway, Frank was- [both laugh] Frank was in a game over the weekend for a softball tournament, which is apparently where he has infected the other victims. And then Dean asks - and also, throughout this scene, there's like, a flashback sequence-

C: Of just their jerseys.

G: Just their jerseys. And then Dean goes like, “Were they the Gamecocks?” and then the camera is like panning over at the jersey with the word “gamecocks” on it. [C laughing] And Sam goes, “No, the Cornjerkers,” and it pans to the Cornjerkers. Why?

C: [laughing] Oh, god, it's so good. I think this is the first scene in the show that was in like, one of the videos that got me into Supernatural, which was like-

G: Yeah, I know what you're talking about.

C: Caspig420's like, "Supernatural lines I still think about" or-

G: Funny line deliveries or something? Yeah. It is so funny. I literally- like, the entire rest of this scene I was just laughing so hard. It's not- It's everything. Like, Sam's delivery. The camerawork. The like, the way they zoom in on the word "cornjerkers." It's really something. It's not even that funny. Like, Gamecocks and Cornjerkers-

C: [laughing] It is that funny.

G: - but it is very funny. Yeah.

C: Yeah, it's just that it's delivered completely seriously.

G: Yeah, like, Sam does not find this amusing at all. 

C: Yeah, if they were like "tee-hee!" about it, I'd be like, “You're so annoying. You're not that funny.” But like, because they aren't doing that, I'm like, “You are so funny. Good job”

G: This remind me of, like, I think it was Katya from- well, from everything, but she's a Drag Race queen. And in like, one of their episodes, Trixie and her, they mentioned that real comedians don't laugh at their jokes. They say something funny and then don't laugh.

C: Oh no.

G: And then it reminded me of this podcast, [C laughs] and I was like, “Me and Crystal are so bad at this. We laugh at every single thing we say to each other, even if they're not funny." [laughs]

C: Yeah. yeah. I laugh while delivering my own jokes because I think I'm so clever. [G laughs] I'm not.

G: Multiple times in this podcast, I was unable to deliver a joke at a prompt manner [C laughs], because I was laughing too hard, so. We are very professionally.

C: Yeah. Do you remember that time we were joking with Danica, like, “Oh, maybe you can like, come on the podcast, but only as the laugh track.” [both laughing] And she was like, “You don't fucking need a laugh track.”

G: We really don't. We really don't. We are laughing at our own jokes.

C: Yeah.

G: Anyway, they evaluate that Dean has around 24 hours to live. And Dean asks, like, “Why me? Like, you are the one who got sprayed by the spleen juice.” And Sam says, “Well, Bobby and me [C laughing] had a theory that the three victims shared a personality type. And Frank was a bully. The other two victims, one was a vice principal, and the other was a bouncer. So basically, they were all dicks.”

C: So true!

G: Which is fascinating to me.

C: Being a vice principal is as bad as murdering someone.

G: Yeah. But, you know. And also, like, is the look at teachers and stuff still that they're terrible people?

C: Eh, I'd say that vice principals get a sort of bad reputation for- I don't know. Because they're admin, they're not teachers.

G: That's true.

C: And like, if you get sent to the principal's office, or whatever, like, sometimes-

G: Yeah. Matilda still fresh in the brain.

C: Yeah. Exactly.

G: [laughs] My little sister, she's 7 years old, super sweet, and she watched Matilda when it was released- the new one, the musical.

C: And she was really scared to go to school after that, or?

G: Well, not really. So she had a classmate who, like, would go to the principal's office after classes, and she was like, she told my mom once, very like, afraid, and she was like, telling it- like, you know how when kids are telling an adult about something bad, like, that kind of vibe? She was like, “Yeah, I have a classmate who went to the principal's office, and then the next day he was absent. I think our principal sent him to chokey!" [both laughing] And yeah. Apparently, the kid was the principal's kid. [both laugh]

C: Oh. [laughs] So they're just hanging out.

G: [laughing] He's just going to his mom's, like, office-

C: God bless.

G: - and my little sister thought that he was being tortured in the chokey. So that's fun.

Anyway, Dean was like, “I'm not a dick.” And Sam’s like, “No, I mean, I know you're not a dick. [C laughing] But you know, like, the victims also used fear as a weapon. And now this disease is returning the favor." Which is so weak.

C: Yeah.

G: I love the "because you're a dick" explanation more.

C: It's literally just because they're dicks.

G: Yeah. Yeah! And Dean was like, "I don't scare people," and Sam says, “All we do is scare people.”

C: So true!

G: And Dean says that "If all we do is scare people, then that means you're also a dick." And Sam just goes like, “Apparently not! Apparently I'm not a dick!”

C: So fucking real.

G: Good for him.

C: Yeah. Your brother was dead for 4 months, and it was the darkest period of your life, [G laughs] but yeah, it is funny now that he's gonna die in 24 hours. You're right. And I mean this unironically.

G: Yeah. And Sam says, "Well, I suppose we need to kill the ghost." They theorize whether it's Frank’s wife, so they go and investigate whether it's Frank's wife. And before that, Sam goes, “Why are you here?" Like, downstairs in the car. And Dean, “Yeah, our room is in the fourth floor, and I'm scared of heights.”

C: He's so cute like this! Keep him like this!

G: Keep him like this, please. And Dean was actually very- Sam was actually very nice about this.

C: Yeah.

G: He was like, “Yeah, okay, I'll see what we can do to move you to the first floor,” which is nice! I like that. I like that he doesn't make fun of Dean.

C: It's really nice. There are parts later where he gets fed up or like, makes fun of Dean. But like, he is like, quite accommodating right now. And I thought it was really sweet!

Wait, okay, question about this "Eye of the Tiger" scene.

G: Yeah.

C: Is it just "This is what Dean does in his car," or is it like, he's like, trying to like, hype himself up to like, go up to the fourth floor by listening to loud music or something? [G laughs]

G: I love that idea. He was like, “Let's get some inspo music right now so I can go up the stairs."

C: Right. Yeah. Well, I feel like later we see his main coping mechanism is drinking heavily, which is really sad to see. So like, I feel like this is a healthier way to do it.

G: Yeah.

C: Yeah.

Oh, also I liked the line “Dean, all we do is scare people,” because even though they didn't mean it like that, "all we do" could imply "and we don't even save them," you know what I mean? G: Yeah.

C: Like, the only thing we do is scare people, due to hunting being bad, and how both of them should quit hunting. So yeah.

-

C: We're inside a hotel room, and it is a nice room. Like, there's a separate living room from the bedroom.

G: That's true. Very bougie-looking.

G: Like, whaddahell. Good job. So there's like, an artistic clock on the wall that's like, spiky looking, or whatever. And Dean's reading a book about ghost sickness and also like, really freaked out by the clock. And, you know, there are illustrations of like, people with blood pouring out of them that he gets really freaked about.

G: Yeah.

C: And then we zoom in on the text, and there seems to be like, text like, popping out that's bold that's like, speaking to him specifically. And it goes, “You're dying. Again. [both] Loser. You gonna cry? [both] Baby gonna cry?” [both laugh] And Dean starts hyperventilating, like, "oh- oh- aah," and like, I don't know. I want to disparage people with like, actual anxiety disorders or whatever. But like, I guess since this is ghost sickness, it feels removed enough that I can find it so funny that this man is suffering. [laughs]

G: Yeah. I just think the “baby gonna cry?” is the one that really took me out.

C: It's so good. [both] Literally, baby is gonna cry.

G: Yeah.

C: But he didn't. And that was so sad. Also, below "baby gonna cry," there's a line about Japan, which I guess is foreshadowing for later. But yeah, I couldn't really find anything for Japan and ghost sickness specifically, but I guess the monster that they decided it is not really a ghost sickness thing.

So we cut to like, a teeny bit later, and Sam comes in and sees that Dean has like, smashed the clock on the floor. And he's like, drinking on the sofa and telling Sam that everything's good. So what Sam got from research was that Jessie O'Brien was cremated, so she's not the ghost. Dean says something about how like, “Oh, it's nice to have my head on the chopping block again. I almost forgot what that feels like.” Which is like, basically the only time in this episode that they acknowledge that this is like, a bad situation and Dean's about to die. The rest of it's just all like, "It's so funny." And it is. It is so funny.

And then Dean starts choking and coughing, and he spits up a wood chip. And Sam goes like, “Oh my god! We've been like, totally ignoring the fact that, like, you're a really good source of information for the research. Like, whatever is happening to you is going to be clues to the identity of the ghost." And Dean's like, "What? Tell us what? Like, wood chips?" And Sam says, “Exactly.”

-

G: So they go to a place with wood chips, I suppose. I'm pretty unclear on what this place is.

C: It's a lumber mill.

G: And you think I know [laughs] what the fuck a lumber mill is? I know that a lumber is a piece of wood.

C: Yeah.

G: And a mill is- a process site?

C: One of those spinny things.

G: Yea.

C: There's a mill in Pentiment, right?

G: In Pentiment. Yeah! I love that game.

C: But lumber mills are specifically like, places where they cut like, raw logs into like, usable [both] lumber.

G: Okay. So this is a wood chippy area, and Dean is quite terrified. And Sam’s like, “Well, I need backup, and you're the only person here.”

C: Yeah. He says specifically, “You're all I've got,” which, in that moment I was like, “Oh, this feels sort of like Sam manipulating Dean’s brother instincts.” And that's spicy. I like it. Do it more. [G laughs]

G: Yeah. Dean takes a huge gulp of alcohol, and then they go to the back of the car where Sam picks up a gun, hands it to Dean, and Dean goes, “I'm not holding that. It might go off!" [C laughs] Then he gets the flashlight and goes, “I’ll man the flashlight!”

C: [laughing] And he looks so proud of himself. He's like, “I'm being such a brave, strong boy,” and he gives Sam like, a quick little nervous smile after too, and I think it's so fun. Keep him like this, please!

G: This is a very popular like, screenshot/gif from this episode because he does look adorable.

C: Yeah. As you said in “In the Beginning,” we need to consider the appeal of men who are just little guys!

G: Yeah, exactly. They go in. And the EMF is going crazy, but it is going to be because Dean is there, so they just- I don't know. They turn off the EMF. And then Sam finds a ring on the ground, and like, much fanfare. Like, throughout this entire scene, Dean is scared of everything. Sam finds a ring that says “To Frank, Love Jessie.” So it's Frank's ring.

C: So the implication is that he dropped this while doing a murder 20 years ago?

G: Exactly.

C: It's not even dusty!

G: Here's my question. If he dropped this 20 years ago, how does he still have a ring tan?

C: I guess he could have gotten a replacement? Like a mourning thing? But yeah.

G: It's just a very weird thing to put there, and I do not understand. This could have not been there.

C: I feel like they just think we're stupid. Like, there's the pictures of Jesse like, in the office. Like, we didn't need this part. And we also learned from his brother later, anyway, that he did do this murder. And the fact that, like, the ring, says, “To Frank, Love Jessie.” It's just- they think we're stupid, and they want to handhold us through this mystery or whatever

G: Yeah, it could be their initials together or something. I don't know.

C: Yeah, this seems like- it probably cost a lot to engrave that many words on a ring.

G: Anyway, they walk around some more. There's a scene where there's a locker, and they hear rustling inside, and they go over to it, and Dean is pointing a flashlight at it, and Sam is mouthing some words that I did not quite catch.

C: It seemed like he was going like, “3, 2, 1, open!” or something.

G: Ahh. Okay, he was doing that, and as he opens it, there's a cat!

C: Yeah.

G: And Dean lets out the most goofy scream of all time.

C: Yeah. No, it was really good.

G: Yeah.

C: No one has ever screamed like that in Supernatural before.

G: Is the implication here, because later on we see the guy, the ghost-

C: Luther.

G: - and you see in a flashback that he is holding a tiny baby kitten.

C: Oh, so it could be like a- one of the children of that original cat?

G: Cats can live for 5ever, I'm pretty sure it's still this cat. It looks the exact same.

C: It doesn't look like an old cat. It's been 20-

G: Okay. fine.

C: Let me look up cat life span. Cats live about 15 years-

G: That's a lie.

C: But some can be in their twenties.

G: Yea.

C: Alright. Fine. It could be the same cat with a good skincare routine.

G: Yeah. [laughs] Unlike, your guy from Doctor Who.

C: Oh, yeah, Peter Capaldi was 58? when he started playing the Twelfth Doctor, and I like, thought for sure he was like, 70 or some shit.

G: I mean, I don't want to make fun of people for aging, you know-

C: That's true.

G: But when you showed a picture of your father at the same age that this man was [both laugh] during the recording of Doctor Who I did scream and cry.

C: Yeah, but I- it's just that a white people wrinkle more thing. Isn't that a thing? That white people age worse?

G: I think so. No, like, Asians don't wrinkle. That's like, a thing, right? Asians specifically. And your father is in fact Asian.

C: I think a lot of groups that aren't white have like, a thing where they say that they age better than white people. Like, there's like, “Black Don't Crack” and stuff. I think it's just white people who are the minority. [G laughs]

G: No, but like, why? Is it because of the sun?

C: I don't know.

G: Because they have less melanin?

C: Oh, yeah, so they get all sun-damaged?

G: Yeah. But like, a lot of Asian people are also pale, so.

C: Yeah. No clue, man.

G: Yeah. We don't know. We never know.

They look at the ID card in the locker, and it says "Luther Garland." And then Dean goes over to the table, where do we see many, many, drawings. Well, is it many, many at this point, or just one?

C: I think two or something?

G: But we see a drawing. We see a drawing of Frank's wife, Jessie. And Sam says, "The plot thickens." And Dean goes, "Yeah, but like, into what?" Which I love that. I love that exchange.

Suddenly, the machines start going. Specifically, the machines start going after Dean rips out the drawing from the table, so like, there's a piece of the drawing that gets ripped out from the side, and the machine starts going. And the machinery looks very intimidating. But another thing that also looks very intimidating is there is a guy standing on the side of the room. He has his back turned to them, so he's just like, looking at the corner, I guess. And [laughs] the way they do this scene is incredibly funny. Like, we go to Sam’s face, and he turns around to look at Dean, [C laughs] and we see Dean just running in the background. He is just running away. And I love this because, like, Dean doesn’t even scream, we don't even hear. Like, it's not like, comedic in terms of like, audio. It's just purely visual. And Sam's like, "Ugh. Ugh." Like, he's just like, like, he's just thinking like, “Oh, Jesus Christ.”

C: Yeah.

G: And then the guy goes towards Sam, and Sam shoots the guy, who disappears. So we know it's a ghost. The whole time, when we see the guy, I was like, “Yeah, he must be a real guy.” [C laughs] Like, I did not comprehend that this was a ghost at all. So when Sam shoots him, I was like, “Why is he just shooting this random guy?” And then he disintegrates, and I was like, “Okay, that is a ghost.”

C: Yeah. I mean, it seems like, this place has been abandoned for 20 years, so it's not like there would be employees around.

G: Yeah, I suppose.

C: I also guess an important detail is that his face is really scratched up. Like, the ghost’s face.

G: Mm. Yea.

Anyway, Sam goes back to Dean, who is like, outside of the Impala like, sitting on the ground, and he is drinking yet again.

C: Yeah. Sorry, Dean.

Yeah. This would be a way less funny if they treated things with like, the gravity that they deserve. But like, I do- I don't know. This could have been a good Sam episode, you know? But like, he just does not care that his brother's gonna die? [G laughs] And I feel like they don't give Sam's opportunities to have emotions a lot of the time. So yeah, RIP to this.

G: RIP.

C: And like, yeah, I guess in a different version of this episode, Dean like, has a monologue where he's like, beating himself up for not being a good big brother and protecting Sam. So thank god we don't have that shit. So yeah.

-

C: So we're back to the cops. And, you know, Linus is giving Sam a file on Luther Garland's death, and he notices that Dean is swaying, so he's like, “Is he drunk?” And Sam goes, “No.” And so the file says that Luther died of physical trauma, but Linus doesn't have the details on what that means exactly. And Sam’s like, “Okay, can we talk to the sheriff?” But Linus is like, “No, he's out sick today,” which is a lie. He is in his office. And yeah, Sam’s like, “Okay. Tell him to call us.” And he gives their motel to him.

G: Which is an important detail. Yea.

C: So they're about to head out, and Dean drunkenly tells Linus, "You know what? You're awesome." And Linus like, does like, a little smile with half of his face, and looks like- Like, I feel like they were going just for like, “He doesn't know what's going on and he feels awkward,” but it does just seem like a crush situation. [G laughs]

G: It really does.

C: He just seems flustered. Yeah, and he goes like, “Thanks. I- you- you, too, I guess.” And like, Dean, like, sort of nervously, like, wipes his hands on his pants, and then Sam has to like, drag him away.

G: It's cute.

C: Yeah. It's cute. And then the sheriff asks, like, “Who was that?” And Linus is like, “It was those FBI guys, and they wanted Luther Garland's file.” And then we cut to the inside of the sheriff's office, and he's freaking out. There's like- it's a pretty graphic scene where he's like, scrubbing his arms with like, it looks like tinfoil, or something. Like, something that is like, sharp. And like, he's bleeding really badly.

G: Yea.

C: And then there's like, a voice over of him going like, “They know. They know what you did. And they're gonna make you pay.” And he's like, swinging his gun around at his own reflection and all his trophies and shit. So yeah.

G: Yeah, I hope everyone who commits this kind of violence- [laughs] does feel this guilty.

C: Yeah, is haunted forever.

G: But I don't- yeah.

-

C: We go to like, a nursing home where Sam and Dean are going to interview Luther Garland's brother. And before they go in, Dean starts freaking out, and he's like, “This isn't gonna work! These badges are fake! What if we get busted? We could go to jail!” God bless.

G: He's so real.

C: And this is also like, a fun scene, I think, where like, Sam tells him like, “Okay, hey, hey, hey, calm down. Let's take a deep breath together.” And then after Dean does, Sam's like, “There. Do you feel any better?” and Dean's like, "No," and Sam says, "Okay, let's just go. Whatever."

And, like, I don't know. That feels so Sam to me. Like, he literally like, is a psych major. [laughing] You know what I mean? Like, he's like, such the friend who went to therapy like, 3 times on like, the college’s dime and then like, learned the most generic tricks of like, “Name 5 things you can see” and deep breaths, and shit-

G: Yeah.

C: - and then was like, “Okay, I'm fixed now, and I'm going to bring this wisdom to all of my friends,” you know?

G: Sam is definitely the guy who went to therapy 3 times, and the therapist mentioned Buddhism, and suddenly he's into Buddhism. [both laugh]

C: Yeah. Yeah. God. Right. It's just fun to see him, like, trying to be accommodating of Dean and like, trying to be nice, but like, also like, having not that much patience for this situation. Because it's very like, “Sam wants to be a nice guy, and he wants to do the nice, normal thing. But like, he is kind of a little freak.” So yeah.

G: No, like, I mean, if they don't do this, Dean is gonna die, so like, they you have to do it. And I think, you know, later on, when he's trying to comfort Dean, he lies to him in a way. You know, he is trying to be accommodating. It's just like, “This is a thing that needs to be done. So let's do it.” Like, that's kind of the vibe.

C: Dean doesn't have to be here for the interview.

G: Yeah, maybe let him stay home.

C: This guy in a nursing home isn't like, a threat or whatever. Yeah.

G: I suppose. They're just doing this for- you're right. Why is he here? You're right. Why is he here? I was gonna say they're just doing it for the comedy, but this scene is not funny.

C: Yeah, this scene's awful! In like, not in a bad writing way, just in a “Fuck!” way.

G: Yeah. Like, the way my mood immediately like, went from like, 100 to 0 in this scene was truly astounding.

C: Yeah. Yeah.

So they go in and talk to Mr. Garland. He doesn't get a first name. So that is Luther Garland's brother. He asks for their IDs, and Dean starts freaking out, being like, “These are real, obviously. Like, who would even pretend to be an FBI agent?” But somehow, Mr. Garland, is still willing to talk to them after that. So he like, is a little reluctant to talk at first, and then he tells them what happened to his brother. So he starts out by saying that, like, everyone was scared of him and called him a monster because he was, quote, “too big, too mean-looking, just too different.” I just need to- like, if you look at a picture of this guy, he does not look big or mean-looking.

G: But the way they do- I don't think he looks mean-looking, but the way they do like, the camerawork when he's there is like, they tilt it up so he looks really big and tall.

C: I guess.

G: So I think, like, that's the implication. That he was like, towering over everyone.

C: Yeah, okay, sure, right. And like, I'm not really sure about this, but like, the whole- when he says “too different,” and he says later about how he feels like he failed him, like, are they like, trying to like, imply that he has, like, an intellectual disability, or like, some kind of neurodivergency going on, and that's like, part of why people hated him so much?

G: Interesting.

C: Like, that is like, very strongly the vibe that I got, but it was never explicitly said.

G: Yes, it was never explicitly said. But I can see, like, now that you mention it, like, yeah. There is that vibe.

C: Yeah, which is part of why the rest of the episode made me so so miserable.

G: Yeah. And also this is like, in the 80s, right?

C: Yeah, 20 years ago.

G: Did they even know? Like, they didn't even know anything about neurodivergence of any kind in the 80s.

C: They knew some things, I'm pretty sure. Or at least they had some version of the DSM that was shit just like the current version of the DSM is shit. I'll look up history of the DSM.

Versions to it that were similar started in 1840, and then, like, the first DSM was in 1952. So, I mean, they probably had incorrect info, but, like, people were aware-

G: And we probably do still have incorrect info right now.

C: - yeah, and we still do have incorrect info, but I think people were aware of neurodivergency in ways, and there were labels that existed.

G: Yeah.

C: Yeah, I also don't know what the history- Also, like, didn't the shitty Nazi scientist-

G: Oh yeah!

C: - or whatever who originated the term for [both] Asperger's, like, in the forties. So like, yeah, there was definitely awareness in the eighties.

G: Some, yeah.

C: And then he says, like, “Well, he was actually like, a really nice guy,” and to show that he was a really nice guy, they show him petting a kitten. [laughs] Which is really funny as shorthand for “He's a really nice guy.” [G laughs]

G: Yeah.

C: Are they trying to do like a Of Mice and Men Lennie thing? Does he have a thing with a cat as well in that book? Like, isn't he a gentle giant-

G: I have no idea what you're talking about. [both] Of Mice and Men?

C: Like, one of the characters, Lennie, is like, a gentle giant figure where people are afraid of him because he's like, big and tall, and he's also got like, a neurodivergency thing going on- [G laughs]

G: The way you said that, I thought you were saying, "And he was goth," and I was like, "Wow. He was goth." [C laughing]

C: Literally was goth. Okay, nevermind. His thing is that he likes to pet rabbits, but because he's so big he keeps accidentally killing them. Ouch! That sucks. Sorry, dude.

Anyway, yeah, that was rabbits, that wasn't cats. I don't think they're doing a parallel here. They're just doing a-

G: What's fascinating to me- It's fascinating to me because, like, you know, when somebody wants to portray a person as bad, like, as in like, serial killer material-

C: They kill a dog.

G: - They have to kill like, a cat or a dog or something. And if you want to show that someone is kind, they're, you know, holding a cat or whatever.

C: Yeah, yeah.

G: Maybe cats are the moral compass of the world. [C laughs]

C: Yeah.

G: Probably not, though. [laughs]

C: Wasn't there this stupidass post going around like, a few years ago that was like, “If you want to see like, how a man treats women, you should see how he treats cats because they're like, creatures that, like, don't really give you anything or blah blah blah blah. So like, if they feel entitled to a cat's time or like, act like they hate cats, that means that they're gonna be mean to women who reject them, or something.” Like, that doesn't sound right. Like, what if you just saw how they treated women? Anyway. [G laughs]

G: Yeah. Better.

C: So Mr. Garland says that he feels that he failed Luther and like, couldn't do anything to take care of him because he had three kids, and his wife had died. Which does imply that, like, he had like, high support needs maybe related to disability. Yeah. So, right. So Sam shows the the drawing of Jessie, and Mr. Garland immediately was like, “Oh, yeah, that's Jessie O'Brien. Her husband killed Luther.” And apparently, like, everyone fucking knows that he did it. They just like, keep schtum about it. So we got some flashbacks, and it turns out that Jessie worked at the mill as a receptionist, and she was nice to Luther, and he had a crush on her. And then, when Jessie went missing, Frank thought that Luther had, like, kidnapped her, done something. So he like, showed up to the mill and murdered him. And like, we get-

G: Yeah.

C: I feel like we see too much of this flashback where we see him being killed. Like, what happened is that he- I think they call it "road-hauled" him. They, like, tied a chain around his neck, attached it to his car, and then, like, dragged him like, up and down the road for like, a while, until, like, his head fell off, and like, he was dashed to bits. Like, eugh. Eugh. Right.

G: It was- I don't know.

C: I felt physically ill when I saw that. That was not good. Like, we don't see all of it. We see the chain and him being dragged and him like, in pain and screaming. And the actor did a really good job of making me believe that he was in pain and screaming.

G: They show like, the chain being wrapped around his neck.

C: Yeah.

G: And that one really was like, the one that that got to me. I was like, “Oh my god!”

C: Yeah. Yeah, like, fuck, that must've sucked!

G: They showed the pile of chain get shorter and shorter as he was starting to get dragged down the road. Damn.

C: Yeah, Jesus Christ.

Yeah. And when people later are like, “Oh, he was just worried about his wife, and he wasn't in his right mind-”

G: It's wild!

C: Like, like, okay, if he was worried out of his mind about his wife, he would not have had time to prep all of this shit, you know?

G: YYeah.

C: This is very like, premeditated, like, calm, rational, like, “What's the way to make him feel the most pain?” Like, I feel like if you're panicked, you like, show up with like, one gun and like, shaking, you know what I mean?

G: Yeah.

C: Yeah. And then Dean’s like, “And he was never arrested?” And apparently, Mr. Garland like, went to every cop in town and was like, “He fucking did it,” but all of them refused to investigate because "Frank was a pillar of the community, and his brother was just the town freak." And Sam immediately is like, “Oh, well, I don't give a shit about this. I'm just trying to solve this.” So he goes like, “Oh, you must have hated Frank O'Brien. Maybe you wanted to infect him with a ghost?” Or at least that's how I read Sam saying that. Like, trying to find incentive for Mr. Garland doing something.

G: Yeah.

C: But, you know, he's like, “You know, I did for a long time. But life is too short for hate. And, you know, like, this guy, he was just really scared-"

G: Yeah, this one-

C: "He was just really scawed because his wife had vanished! Like, it sucked that he did that to Luther. But, like, you know." Like, god. If I got murdered, and my sister ever found peace about it in this way, I would be so mad at her. [laughs]

G: Like, because it wasn't even just like, “He accidentally shot the guy during a fight”-

C: Or an interrogation or something.

G: It wasn't like, you know, maybe, I can contextualize like, him getting into a brawl, and then accidentally like, getting a stab in or something.

C: Yeah.

G: But even then, I feel like- like- You should like, be guilty in a way, right? Like, in some way. Even if it's just an accidental death. Much more this. He caused so much pain to that man in his death.

C: Yeah.

G: And it's just like, there was no remorse? There was no like, willingness to go and, like, I don't know-

C: Turn himself in? Especially after he found out that his wife had just killed herself, and that it had nothing to do with this guy?

G: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's just-

C: Yeah, I get not turning yourself in because, like, prison system bad, but like- Maybe we're supposed to read him like, being nice after his wife died as like, his way of like-

G: Repentance?

C: Yeah. And like, you know, like, I believe that people who do terrible things can like, bounce back and become better, but I feel like you still have to like, fucking apologize to his brother and offer to like, financially, support his kids. Like, do something, you know?

G: Yeah.

C: Or like, leave town, so that his brother doesn't see you every day at the grocery store or something.

G: Yeah, do a- do a Logan Roy. I mean do a Kendall Roy. You know, leave an envelope of money in the house.

C: Oh, did he leave his family? Because he felt guilty- was that the Nazi thing? [G laughs]

G: Kendall killed someone.

C: Oh, yeah, I forgot! That was pretty important. [G laughs]

G: They visited the family of the guy he killed, and then he left an envelope of cash.

C: Huh. [both] Yeah.

G: Season 2 of Succession was truly something. Anyway.

C: Yeah. And you know his ending line is supposed to be like, "ooh..."

G: "Dean..." yeah.

C: - but it's whatever. He says, “That's fear. It spreads and spreads.”

-

G: Yeah. Anyway, Dean is now complaining outside of this facility.

C: Keep him like this forever, please!

G: Yeah. They realize that he's getting so many rashes because it's road rash and the wood chips are because Luther probably swallowed wood chips, which is just so- it's so visceral!

C: Yeah.

G: Anyway, Dean is like, "Yeah, let's just get his bones and burn them," and Sam says, “Well, we probably can't do that, because his remains are probably everywhere, because he was ripped to pieces. No way we're gonna find all the remains.” And Dean has like, a freakout about this, and he's like, “What are we doing? Who hunts a ghost?” And he goes like, “It's so horrible. Our life sucks. We hunt monsters. Like, normal people see a monster, they run. Us, we run to it.” And he's like, “We’re insane.” [C laughs] Yeah. And then he says that "When there's bad diner food, and skeevy hotel rooms, and the truck stop waitress with the bizarre rash," and he goes like, “Who wants this life? Do you even like being stuck in a car with me for 8 hours?” I don't think it's just 8 hours. But okay. [C laughs] And he says, like, “I drive too fast. I listen to the same five albums, and I sing along. I know I'm annoying. [C laughs] And you're gassy. Like, you eat half a burrito, and you just- you get toxic.” And then he tosses Sam the keys, and he goes, “I'm leaving. I don't want this life anymore. Stay away from me. Ghost sickness, hellhounds, apocalypse, I don't want it. I'm done.”

C: I think it's so funny when they mention the apocalypse offhand in a Season 4 episode because they haven't done anything about it since 4.02, but like, they're like, “Oh, we just want to remind you that there is an apocalypse happening.”

G: Yeah.

C: Yeah, Dean's literally correct, and both of them should quit hunting, and his delivery of all this is so funny. Good for him.

G: Yeah. Dean like, is walking down the street. He hears growling. We see the little Yorkie!

C: Yeah!

G: And then we go back to the scene from the teaser. But yeah.

We end up back in the motel room. Sam is in there. He enters. He sees Dean, and he's like, "Where the fuck did you go?" And Dean says, “I mean, I ran. I ran to this motel, [C laughs] and I have 4 hours before I die.” And then Sam sits down beside him on the other bed and goes, “Yeah, you're going back!” [C laughing] And Dean goes like, "Back?"

C: This is soo “Sam's not looking for you.” energy.

G: Yeah. And Sam says, like, “Yeah, you're going back to Hell.” [C laughs] And he says, like, “The truth is, Dean, you've been a real pain in my ass.” And then his eyes turn yellow-

C: So hot.

G: - and he like, raises his hand, and tosses Dean to the wall. And Dean is like, “You evil bastard! You're possessing my brother.” And Sam’s like, “No one's possessing me. This is just who I am, it's what I'm gonna become. There's nothing you can do about it.” And then, like, Sam starts choking Dean. Ad then we cut to like, Sam Sam. Like, the actual Sam, holding Dean by the shoulder, going like, “Hey, Dean. Are you okay? Are you okay?” And then Dean like, recovers from this.

C: Yeah. God. So fucking fun.

G: Yeah.

C: Anyway, I guess this gives us a little more insight for why he was the worst guy ever in “Metamorphosis,” but like, how do you get from “I can exorcise demons with my mind” to “I want to become Azazel?” Whatever. Dean's just a slippery slope bastard.

G: Yeah. Also, like, he says here that he has 4 hours to live.

C: Yeah.

G: I feel like the rest of this episode is more than 4 hours.

C: Yeah. Oh, well.

G: Oh, well.

-

C: So we see that Sam is meeting Bobby outside of the lumber mill. Meanwhile, Dean's like, in the hotel watching TV. He's watching like, what is it called? It's not called- Pokey and- who's the other- Gumby. Pokey and Gumby.

G: Is this something you watched in your childhood?

C: No, it's- he references it in “The Kids Are Alright” where he calls Lisa "really bendy-"

G: Oh! [laughing]

C: - because, like, these characters are like, all made of gummies and shit, basically.

G: Yeah.

C: So he's watching this cartoon, and like, the character, gets like, lassoed and dragged around by a horse cart, and he goes- and he's so scared, and he's like, “Well, this isn't helping.” [laughs] God. He's such a little guy.

So Sam and Bobby are chatting. And yeah, so the hallucinations are a normal part of this disease. And Bobby says that he found something, an encyclopedia of spirits from the Edo period. And everything in there is Japanese. And Sam asks, “You can read Japanese?” And while he answers something which- I used to the Google Translate like, audio thing and turned up the volume on my computer really high. So what he says, I think, translates to like, “I've had it since before you were born.”

G: Yeah.

C: Yeah.

G: That's also in the Wiki page. [laughs]

C: What? Well.

G: Yeah, it's in the- [laughing]

C: Oh, well, I didn't go to the Wiki page, I didn't want spoilers for the rest of the episode, I was worried that I would scroll down too hard.

G: Yeah, I suppose. Good effort.

C: Yeah. And also, he delivers it like, really, dramatically. And this is also in the compilation of Supernatural line deliveries that are fun.

G: Yeah. But, as explained in his MySpace page, [C laughs] Bobby speaking Japanese was Jim Beaver's idea, as Jim is fluent in Japanese.

C: Oh, neat.

G: Good for him, Love a multilingual man. [C laughs]

C: So Bobby says that there is a type of ghost in the book that infects people with fear called a buruburu. And I was not really able to find much on this. Or at least every website that it was on didn't seem like a reputable source. But so, yeah, let's just go with whatever Supernatural says about it, I guess. And yeah, one way to kill it is to burn the remains. And another way to kill it is to scare the ghost to death. Which, ouch. Well, this is gonna cause something to happen. [sighs]

So we cut to like, the hotel room, and Sam calls Dean. Dean's ringtone is like, some guitar riff thing, like, an electric guitar sort of vibe. And Sam's like, “Hey, like, you're gonna be fine. We have a plan, and it's good. Don't worry about it!” And as soon as he hangs up, Bobby says, “This is a terrible plan,” and it is.

G: And Sam goes, "Tell me about it." [laughs] Love that.

C: Yeah. Bobby says, "I know I said scare that ghost to death, but this?" which- does that mean he has moral objections to this? Because I have moral objections.

G: I have moral objections to this as well.

C: And this is honestly quite similar to “Dream a Little Dream of Me,” and, like, whatever they did there was pretty morally objectionable too, but like, it definitely feels worse here, because this man has never done anything wrong.

G: Yeah.

C: So yeah. Ouch. And they're like, "Okay, let's just commit to this shit," and they go inside the mill.

-

G: Yeah. Anyway, Dean is at the hotel.

C: By the way, did you predict that this is what they were going to do as soon as Bobby said they should scare the ghost to death?

G: I figured it out because, I mean, I have watched this episode before.

C: True.

G: I remembered what's gonna happen next during the reveal with the brother that that's how he dies.

C: Oh, okay, got it.

G: I was like, “Oh, yeah, this is the episode where they do the exact same thing to the ghost.”

C: Yeah. Jesus fuck.

G: And I was like, "Oh my god, Jesus Christ."

C: Yeah, yeah. When Bobby said "scare the ghost to death," I was like, “Well, I know one way they could do it, but I sure fucking hope they don't do that one.” [G laughs] But they do. They do do that one.

G: They, in fact, do that one.

C: I guess I get it. Dean has like, 4 hours left to live. He has less than 4 hours, he has like 2 hours left to live. But like, Jesus Christ.

G: Anyway, Dean is in the motel, and somebody breaks into the room. And it's the sheriff who is holding a gun. And the sheriff is very anxious, very afraid. He's very pale and clammy. And he says, like, “Why are you looking into Luther Garland's death?” And Dean realizes that the guy's also sick because he sees like, a rash on the guy's arm, and the sheriff continues on saying, “Frank O'Brien was my friend. So he made a mistake. [C laughs] So I didn't bust him. So what? And you're gonna bring me down over that? No, sir." And then he points a gun at Dean. Wild! "He made a mistake"?

C: "He made a mistake, and I didn't bust him. So what? He's so sowwy about it! He's so so sowwy." Oh, Jesus fuck

G: I mean, it's just- I understand that people can change, blah blah blah! [C laughs] I find it difficult to think that one can continue playing softball and hanging out with someone that they know did such a brutal act.

C: Yeah. But like, everyone in the town apparently called Luther a monster for being tall and probably autistic, anyway, right? So like, yeah, I think he already didn't view this guy as fully a person-

G: Human, yeah.

C: So it was like, fine that he got murdered.

G: Yeah. Anyway.

C: Also, like, this guy is a cop.

G: That's true.

C: Every day, he goes to work with people who have done worse things than this, and like, has coffee with them, probably, you know?

G:  I've been thinking about that in regards with pursuing law. [laughs] Like, what if I would have to throw my morals away?

C: Right.

G: I don't want to do that, and like, I'm second-guessing myself. But let's see. You know, I still have two years to decide. Anyway.

C: Yeah. Your brother could still show up in your last year of school and tell you that your dad's missing. [both laugh]

G: My non-existent brother. Yeah.

C: One of your sisters could be trans! [G laughs]

G: Yeah, exactly. Anyway, the sheriff, like, they have a fight, and then the sheriff falls to the ground like, on a coffee table. And then he starts hyperventilating, and Dean is like, “Relax, relax.” But the guy dies. RIP, but not really.

C: Yeah.

G: Rest in atrocious hell.

C: Yeah. He's gonna really like torturing people. [G laughs] Like, he's not even gonna get tortured. Like, they're gonna show up with like, the first scalpel, and he'll be like, “Can I do that to other people, pleaase?”

G: They're not gonna offer it to him, he's gonna request it. [C laughs]

C: Yeah.

Anyway, so yeah. At the lumber mill, like, they aren't able to like, draw Luther out yet. So Sam, he's like, “Okay, well, to do this, let's make him angry.” So he puts down his gun, and then he starts to tear up all the drawings that Luther made of Jessie, and start like, yelling to him to come and get him, blah blah blah. And then- and then! We cut back to Dean, and like, he's remembering what yellow-eyed Sam said about how he's gonna go back to Hell, and-

G: Also, is the implication here that the cop’s body is just on the floor?

C: Yeah. [laughs] Yeah.

G: Love that. Love that.

C: Love that. Yeah, they don't talk at all about how they like, managed to leave town without like, getting caught.

G: Yeah.

C: Like, Linus is gonna be upset for the rest of his life that his crush like, murdered his boss or whatever. [G laughs] But also, Linus is a cop, so whatever.

He sees a Bible on the floor and starts like, like, holding it to himself, like, to his face.

G: Aww.

C: Which yeah, is nice. It is nice to see him like, reaching for comfort in places that he n- Okay, speaking of, like, Cas was in the "Then" sequence. They don't- like, did Dean not bother trying to contact Cas about this? Like, if Cas saved his life, he probably wants him to not die in 4 hours.

G: Yeah.

C: Cas probably has the healing powers to deal with this.

G: Yeah.

C: Whatever.

G: The Bible thing was quite fascinating to me.

C: Yeah, yeah.

G: Yeah. But maybe that's like, leaning in that direction? Like, he's praying-

C: Right, that's true.

G: - to Cas? Maybe. I don't know. But-

C: Yeah. And then our favorite character of all time, ever-

G: Oh my god!

C: - I was screaming and cheering when she showed up! Lilith, in the form of the little girl from Season 3-

G: And this little girl is having the time of her life. This actor, she's slaying it, she's having fun. Love that for her.

C: Yeah. I hope she has a really good career. Should we- when we do our IMDb section, I'm gonna-

G: Yeah, let's check her- yeah.

C: Yeah. Okay. So it's Lilith, and she's sooo cute. And she's like, “Hi Dean! It's me, Lilith!” And she like, hugs him and goes like, “Oh, I missed you so much! It's time to go back now!” God, I love her soo much!

And Dean starts freaking out, obviously, and telling her that she's not real. And she's like, “Oh, like, don't you remember all the fun you had back down in Hell?” And this is where we learned that 4 months in Hell or- sorry, 4 months on Earth is like 40 years in Hell. She says, “Like doggy years.” Love that. And she's like, “And you remember all of it.”

G: Ooh.

C: Ooh! Reveals and things. And Dean asks, like, “Why me? Why did I get infected?” Which means that he has spent the last 20 hours stewing over the idea that he might be a dick.

G: Like, at that point, I would just be like, "Yeah, probably. I have done something."

C: Especially if he remembers, if he knows he tortured people down in Hell-

G: Yeah!

C: I would be like, "That's probably why. Like, that guy murdered a guy, and I tortured people.”

G: Yeah.

C: Yeah. And right, Lilith goes like, “Silly goose. You know why, Dean. Listen to your heart!” And she starts going, “Ba-boom. Ba-boom. Ba-boom.” And this continues to be a voice over throughout the mill where Sam and Luther are like, doing a fight scene. And then it- [sighs] okay, yeah, Sam gets a chain around Luther's neck, and then it's attached to the Impala, and then Bobby-

G: Yeah, he screams like, “Bobby, punch it!” And then Bobby punches it. The accelerator. And yeah. Luther gets dragged across the dirt road.

C: Yup. God, this fucking sucks. [laughs]

G: What? What?

C: I just hate that this is how the world is formulated in Supernatural, right? Like, a lot of the ghosts that exist, they're like, vengeance ghosts because they died of unjust causes. And there's no justice for these ghosts. It's just like, “Yeah, something bad happened to them, but they're evil now, so let's kill them.” And like, they don't even focus on like- If they cared, there'd be a way to get rid of ghosts in a way that was like, peaceful or like, nice-looking, right?

G: I mean, that-

C: That happened in “Roadkill,” I guess

G: Yeah, that lady in "Roadkill." They made her go into the light.

C: Yeah, yeah.

G: In a very funny scene.

C: In a very funny scene. And also, the Mary ghost ended up being like, nice, or whatever, even though she died unjustly because she's like, their precious like, woman in a white nightgown, virginal, blah blah blah.

G: Yeah.

C: But yeah, like, this guy doesn't get that. And yeah, there's just no focus on like, “Oh, like, maybe we're putting them to peace now.” Like, “Maybe like, they're going to go to Heaven now” or whatever.

G: Yeah.

C: It's just like, “Yeah, it's pretty bad what happened to them, but like, right now, like, they're like, biologically evil. So we just have to kill them in a way that's terrible.”

G: He became this spirit because he died with so much fear and violence. And like, just, I don't know. You know, he was probably very afraid when he died, and that's what made him into this. And to be like, “Yeah, let's just do the exact same thing that turned him quote unquote ‘evil,’” even though, I mean, if somebody kills you like that, I feel like you are within your right [C laughing] to do even worse to them.

C: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

G: And it's like. “Let's do the exact same thing that caused him this much trauma, pain, suffering, so that he could be gone." And it's just, the episode present this as, "There's no other alternative." But they could have-

C: But they barely even say that. They barely even say that there's no other alternative. Like, there's very little moral dilemma and like, yeah.

G: Like, this is a TV show. You can write whatever. [C laughs] You already made up a bunch of shit. Just make up more. I don't know.

C: Yeah, like, in like, “Red Sky at Morning,” like, you had like, the brother like, come back or something, right? [G laughs] And then collapsed into him and turn into water. Yeah, like, there's gotta be like, "Let's summon back Frank and have Luther punch him in the face, and then he'll be at peace." [laughing] Like, you know? They can do anything that they want. But they were like, [bro voice] “You know what would be really messed up, bro?” or something? Yeah.

And then, obviously, Lilith disappears, Dean is fine, and the scratches on his arm are gone. Even though, like, he physically was scratching his arm with his like, hands. So I don't see how that happened. I don't see how those went away. But okay.

-

G: Anyway, we go to the end of the episode. Dean is fine now, by the way. He like, became fine immediately after Luther died.

C: Yeah. He's no longer a fun little guy. What are your thoughts on the outfits in the epilogue. [G laughs]

G: Well, I don't remember anything other than Dean wearing a gray shirt.

C: Oh, yeah, he's wearing a gray henley. Sam has like, his sort of like, jean shirt situation going on. Bobby’s wearing like a tan jacket that's like, I don't know. I just don't really think it's his color. [G laughs]

G: You're doing like, those like, color theory bullshit bullshit with Bobby? [C laughs] I love that.

C: Yeah, I I sent you the the screenshots that I put on my Google Doc via Discord so you can sort of see the outfit situation.

G: We need to do like, what is it called? The color thing? Color... like, the one where they like, put you in front of a mirror, and then a person has pieces of cloth? It's like, very famous one on YouTube Shorts, which which is I where I watch TikToks.

C: I don't know. I don't know what this is. I was told that the way that you decide whether you're like, a winter or an autumn, or whatever is based off of the color of your veins.

G: Oh! It's called personal color analysis. And like, it's very famous in like, Korea and stuff. Honestly, I think it's a grift. Honestly, I think it's a fucking grift. I'll send you a TikTok.

[background video sounds]

It's basically like, there's a bunch of colors-

C: And then they put them on you?

G: Yeah, and then you're like, “Oh my god, it's my color!”

C: This is nothing. This means nothing.

G: I remember, like, the people who are conducting it are quote unquote “experts.” [C laughs] So-

C: Uh-huh.

G: I remember- I remember this one video, I think it's a. K-pop idol. Like, he was like, sitted on the chair, and the person was doing the like, color reveals. And then, like, he was like, “I don't like-" like, the the person was like, “This is your color.” And then he goes like, “I don't like it.” [C laughs] And the woman goes, like, “It's your color! Like, it looks great on you!” And he was like, “I don't think so.” And she was like, "You have to trust me," and I was like, [laughing] "What is happening? I sincerely think this is a grift."

C: God bless. Yeah. Yeah, it probably is.

G: Like, I understand that there's color- Like, for example, I wear makeup, right?

C: Yeah.

G: And like, I can't wear cool-toned make up because it looks bad on me, so the kinds of pink I wear tend to be more on the orangey side. Like, stuff like that. But this entire endeavor looks stupid to me. Like, what's going on?

C: Yeah.

G: Anyway, we should do that to Bobby. We should get Bobby in Japan, where he would thrive because he speaks the language, and make him take a personal color analysis session.

C: Yeah, I agree.

G: So he can like, have a more robust hat- trucker hat collection. [C laughs]

C: Yeah. It's so sad that Bobby will never wear the whole, like, you know, “Fish fear me, women want me”-type hats. Like, I feel like I haven't seen words on any of his hats of that effect.

G: He should.

C: Yeah.

G: Women should want him, and fish should fear him.

C: Yeah.

G: "Women want me, demons fear me," etc etc.

-

G: Yeah, they're standing at the side of the road. They're drinking. And Dean is informed by how they did, what they did. Sam says that the chain was iron, and it had spellwork etched on it.

C: Sure.

G: And he was like, “It was brutal.” And Dean was like, “Yeah, but at least I'm alive,” which I feel like it was the-

C: The writers trying to-

G: They realized at some point, "Oh, this is like, very very viscerally bad."

C: "Kinda bad."

G: And this is them trying to be like, “But it's okay.”

C: "This is kinda problematties."

G: Yeah. [laughs] Maybe they're codependies. [both laugh]

C: For context, my roommate really likes saying codependies, and I think that's become part of both of our vocabularies.

G: And mine! You have to count me.

C: Oh, by "both," I mean like, you and me.

G: The two of us, okay. [laughs]

C: Yeah. My roommate's not on this podcast!

G: Yeah. Anyway, they ask Dean how he's feeling, and Dean was like, “Oh, I'm fine.” And they start making fun of him a little bit. [C laughs] And Dean like, "Yeah, I'm fine. You want to go hunting? I'll hunt- I'll kill anything!" And I was like, "Yeah, for sure."

C: Yeah, he would kill anything.

G: And Bobby goes like, “Aw, he's adorable. Anyway, getting the fuck out of here.” And then he drives off.

C: It was nice that, like, Bobby and Sam like, clearly, had some bonding moments off-camera where Sam was like, “And then Dean said this.” You know? 'Cause Bobby always prefers Dean over Sam, so at least there's one episode where Sam gets to be the favored son.

G: Yeah. Anyway, Sam asks Dean what he saw near the end, and Dean tries to deflect by saying that he saw howler monkey, which- what is that?

C: Like, just a type of monkey. Are they scary-looking? I'll look them up.

G: I think they were in the 1995 film Outbreak.

C: What's that?

G: Which Dean references earlier, right? Outbreak monkey?

C: Oh. He does?

G: Well, whatevs. Anyway- by the way, during this scene. Dean sees a glint of yellow in Sam's eyes.

C: So hot.

G: Yeah. And yeah, they continue drinking, and that's the end of the episode, but not really! Because- [C laughs]

C: Well, specifically, Dean says, "I just saw the usual stuff. Nothing I can't handle." And the camera like, focuses on him a lot against the white sky, blah blah blah blah.

-

G: I mean, we have to talk about it. There's a seat after the episode where it's Jensen Ackles-

C: Submitting his Drag Race audition tape.

G: Yeah. And it's like, that scene earlier where Sam interrupts him air-drumming to “Eye of the Tiger.” But now, he's not interrupted, and he does a whole performance.

C: Yeah. He's lipsyncing.

G: I watched this- I was already on call with Crystal, because, like, I forgot to watch it during the actual watching of the episode, so I was like, "Okay, hold on, I have to watch the bonus stuff," and I continuously said, “He thinks he's so funny.” [C laughs] So that's that's what I think about the scene. He really thinks he's so funny.

C: Yeah. He does an air guitar on his leg thing, and I was like, “You can't do that. That is reserved for David Tennant in his role as Benedick in Much Ado About Nothing.” But yeah, I guess Jensen Ackles did it first, and also everyone in the world did it first. Sad!

G: Yeah. Anyway, let's talk about what we think about this episode

C: I had- this is like better- like, I had a way better time with this one than with “Monster Movie” or “Metamorphosis.”

G: Yep.

C: Yeah, this is like, we're coming off of a streak of like, bad ones, so I feel like I appreciated this more than I normally would. It was funny. It was- Dean's a lot more likeable as a little guy. And the way that they concluded it was pretty atrocious. All things that we've said in the episode.

G: Yeah, I think- I don't know, like, about to talk more about the morality of this episode, because I feel like what we said is already it, but also like, I want to emphasize that it's horrifying what they did.

C: Yeah.

G: But like how am I gonna do that? Just say it again? You know. So like, I feel like the degree at which I was horrified does not equate to how I spoke about it, but I really was very horrified. But, you know, otherwise the episode is actually very funny. It's just- I don't know. It's just so brutal, and the brutality is so- unjustified? I don't know.

C: And I love that afterwards, Eric Kripke was like, “I need to apologize for something in this episode,” and we're like, “Oh, that thing?” [G laughs] “No! The idea that I implied that Dean might be a dick!” [screams]

G: Yeah.

Well, anyway, what's our next segment? Best Line/Worst Line.

C: Best line is when Dean says, “I'm annoying, I know that.” He literally is annoying. [laughs]

G: Yeah, my best line is when Dean was like- when Sam- because I didn't know that he was gonna be hallucinated as Yellow-Eyes, or as yellow-eyed Sam. So when he was like, “Yeah, you are. [C laughs] You're going back. Going back to Hell, Dean. It's time. You're going back.” I thought that was so funny. And I was like, the effect that they were going for, like, the shock, I did experience it. So I think that was well-done.

C: Yeah, yeah, I agree.

G: What's your worst line?

C: I guess none of the terrible things in this episode were lines. I guess “Bobby, punch it” is a line.

G: [mocking] "Bobby, punch it!"

C: Also, the fact that they show shots of the Impala rushing forward, and it's very much like, a car porno shot of like, oh, the light glinting off of the Impala, like, while they're doing like, this? I was like, "Is now the fucking time?"

G: I don't have a worst line. [both] Wow!

C: Wait, what about like, the whole like? “So what? He made a mistake.”

G: Yeah, I didn't like that. I didn't like the whole- but not that. Not that.

C: Yeah, we're supposed to find him despicable for that, at least.

G: I didn't like what the brother said.

C: Oh, yeah where he was like, "He was just so about his wifeee."

G: It was like, “The fear got the best of him,” which is a reference to something that I will not declare.

C: What?

G: But if you get it, you get it. [dramatically] "It looks like fear got the best of you." You don't know it?

C: No? What?

G: [laughs] Never mind. Who even give a shit.

C: Well, now, I really do give a shit. I give many shits. You can cut it out.

G: No, it's just like, in Trixie & Katya-

C: Oh. Nice.

G: - one time they're talking about something, and then like, somebody off screen, like, the camera director, or something goes, "Looks like fear got the best of you!" And Trixie and Katya was like, "What is happening? You never speak!" And then they were like, "What are you? Mother Goose?" And I think it's a very funny segment in the show.

C: Good.

G: Anyway, well, I'm trying to find the exact thing that the brother said. Oh- I don't like Frank- the justification that “I hated it for a long time, but life’s too short for hate. Frank wasn't thinking straight. His wife vanished. He was terrified.” I don't know. I just- You can use that as justification for a lot of things-

C: But not that one!

G: Yeah. Anyway, we have to do the spreadsheets.

C: Are we good?

G: Yeah, I think it's 0 all the way.

C: On an Andrew Dabb episode. We're good.

G: Yeah. Who would have thought?

C: Yeah, like, they got lore stuff wrong, which I would say is like, racism-adjacent, but I feel like they do that all the time, so I wouldn't actually give points for that.

G: [laughs] Yeah.

C: So, yeah, wow. In an episode called “Yellow Fever,” we made it 0s across the board. [G laughs]

G: We sure did.

C: Yeah.

G: Anyway, IMDb. I would rate this, actually, pretty high.

C: Yeah.

G: 8.7. Although I'm not too sure about that. I would not be surprised if it's lower.

C: Yeah, see, this is a tough one, because I feel like some people would be very amused, but apparently, some people, there was apparently so much backlash about the implication that Dean's a dick that Eric had to apologize for it.

G: Yeah.

C: I'm just gonna go safe with an 8.5?

G: Okay. Well, let's see.

Oh!

C: What?

G: It's a 9.1!

C: Oh. Damn okay. Well-

G: Hell yeah.

C: I've been doing pretty bad this season at guessing shit.

G: Yeah, which means I'm doing pretty good

C: Good job.

Oh, in the trivia, it says that the credits thing is that Jared thought it would be funny to not tap on the car to see how long Jensen Ackles would go with the like, "Eye of the Tiger" thing, and then he just did the rest of that unprompted. Because he thinks he's so funny.

G: Yeah. But that's pretty decent. That's pretty funny.

C: Yeah. It is pretty funny.

G: Anyway, all the reviews are saying, "It's funny. It's funny." [C laughs] "Reminds me why I watch the show." "One of the series's gems."

C: Oh, one of these ends with “What did Lilith mean when she told Dean, ‘You know why?’ Because Dean is certainly not a dick.” And that review? By Eric Kripke.

G: Well, we need to look at Lilith's actor.

C: Oh, yea.

G: Her name is Sierra McCormick. Is this the one?

C: Yeah.

G: She is 5'1"!

C: Good for her.

G: Good for her!

C: I don't know. She was on 3 episodes of American Horror Stories. Anything else?

G: She has short hair and colored hair now. Good for her.

C: Yeah, it does look pretty good.

G: Yeah.

C: I'm not really seeing anything I recognize on her credits. But she has been working. Good for her.

G: Yeah! I think she-

Yeah, that's it for this episode of Busty Asian Beauties. Next week, we’ll be discussing Season 4, Episode 7: “It's the Great Pumpkin, Sam Winchester.”

C: Oh my god, Sastiel ep?

G: I think so!

C: Yeah!

G: But first of all, Castiel ep. [laughs]

C: Yeah, you're right, sorry. My priorities are wrong.

G: Leave us a rating or review wherever you get your podcasts.

C: Follow us on social media! We are on twitter at twitter.com/BeautiesPodcast and on Tumblr at bustyasianbeautiespod.tumblr.com, and our official tag is #BABPod, B-A-B-POD. Thanks to everyone who's donated to our Ko-Fi at ko-fi.com/bustyasianbeautiespod, where we’re gonna be Let’s Play-ers now, I guess. And you can check out our merch at babpod.redbubble.com.

G: Uh, I don't know.

C: You can email-

G: Email us. [laughs] I think this is the second time in a row I had no idea what to say, but you can email us at bustyasianbeauties@gmail.com. See you guys next time. [both] Bye!

[guitar music]

[stuckinapatriarchalbullshitland]

Hi, I read your thread about ally on Twitter and agree with you on most of the things that u said. Even before this, it would annoy me so much that after 5H ended Ally was the only fucking one to go out of Sony??

I don't wanna be mean but she was the least known of 5h but went to Atlantic/Warner basically out of the grasp of Sony and Simon.

I mean, Normani went to RCA Records and launched so many cool singles, especially Motivation and then kind of just "died"... The whole disregard for her career is just insane. Just to not mention the stupid feud that they created with Camila.

Dinah went to HitCo which is the label of LA Reid the CEO of Epic Records was fired from it because he was accused by a female employee of unlawful behaviour. I don't even have to talk about her "inexistent" career after 5h do I?

About Lauren, she went to Colombia Records and got 0 promotion even though her voice is unique in this industry and I'm never tired of saying it. Well, her relationship with ty dollar sign was a complete disregard for her as a person and her career and I don't think I even need to explain why. It was the worst years of her career and I bet life to be stuck with that dipshit. She even said so indirectly that after they "broke up" she just got so much better and grew a lot as a person in general. Being with AWAL is still directly tied to Sony at least she could launch her music even if it was out of her pocket.

Camila was the only one tied to Epic until recently and I believe she was the money maker on that dip shit of a label. A reminder that this record label owns the rights to Michael Jackson's songs and he was actively against Sony/Epic. She had to fight to produce the 1st album and I think it still was produced with 300 Entertainment which is a company of el ratón Roger. Romance and Família were a fucking mess and we all damn know how her public life is even more of a fucking mess. And how they publicly destroyed her image by leaking fake screenshots of her being racist on Tumblr and Facebook, something that isn't as easy to prove as fake and the internet will always hold over her head.

After this whole ass text how come Ally the least famous out of the group was the ONLY ONE that got to be free to do whatever the hell she wanted to do with her career and out of fucking Sony for all that matters. I do believe that this is a control of the 5H narrative. All the other 4 girls can't talk about it, especially Camila and they need to have someone to say the shit they want us to hear.

Remember that all 4/5 of them are under a bunch of contracts to not say shit about what the hell went down in that damn band. Lauren said it so that we would hear the story about a few years down. I really hope so.

Basically, this was what I thought before reading your thread and this is just to complement everything :)

Thanks for the long ass comment buddy.

The truth is that there is much about this that we do not know and we only have one version of the truth. Of what happened to one of them, which according to her is true, but there is nothing really there.

Ally is in the industry, according to her, her industry and of course she could tell there were pigs in the industry, but she didn't even touch Simon Cowell. She and her manager boyfriend practically deified him

Gosh I need to write a post about my thread 🙈

[ash-and-books]

Rating: 1/5

Book Blurb: A music critic stuck in a spiral of epic proportions targets her teenage crush for a career comeback and a chance at revenge. What could possibly go wrong? Sammy Espinoza’s life is a raging dumpster fire. Her desperate attempt to win back her singer ex-girlfriend has landed her in hot water at work, and she has one last chance before her editor cuts her column. Luckily, Sammy has a plan to redeem herself, but it won’t be easy. Rumor has it that Max Ryan, the former rock god, is secretly recording his first-ever solo album years after he dramatically quit performing. And it just so happens that he and Sammy have history: Right before Max got his big break, he and Sammy spent an unforgettable night together. Exclusive access to Max’s new music would guarantee Sammy’s professional comeback and, even better, give her the opportunity to serve some long-awaited revenge for his traumatic ghosting. But Max lives in Ridley Falls, Washington, and Sammy has history there as well: a family that never wanted her and a million unanswered questions. Going back would mean confronting it all—but what else does she have to lose?

Review:

A music critic finds her career and heart in jeopardy after a horrible break up with her musician girlfriend, to try and get both back she hopes to not only snag an exclusive story from her teenage crush who broke her heart but get some revenge on him. Sammy Espinoza has had a rough life, her entire childhood has been scarred by the fact that she feels like she’s constantly being abandoned and it doesn’t help that her first real crush who later turned out to be a famous rockstar, completely abandoned and ghosted her. Now she’s been dumped by her musician girlfriend and her career is under fire because as a music critic she’s been trying to fix her love life by writing favorable reviews hyping up her then girlfriend’s mediocre band and now her fans have turned from her. In order to get her career back, Sammy hopes to run into former rockstar Max Ryan who is said to be recording his first ever solo album after his dramatic exit from music.  Sammy might also have a super complicated history with Max and this would be her chance to get revenge against the guy who broke her heart. When she does run into Max, he doesn’t remember her hat all and soon she finds herself going on dates with him. But their complicated history and what Sammy’s entire motivation for getting access to Ryan’s music could derail what is starting to look like a second chance at a relationship. Can they make it work the second time around? Honestly this one was not for me, I didn’t like Sammy or Max and for people who are in their late 20s they acted more like teenagers. The romance wasn’t really working for me and I just was not having a great time with this book. It started off a bit interesting but then lost me. I wasn’t invested in seeing them get back together after everything and unfortunately, I was just looking forward to the book ending. Overall, if you are interested in second chance romances give this one a go, maybe it’ll be a better time for you than it was for me.

*Thanks Netgalley and Random House Publishing Group - Ballantine, Dell for sending me an arc in exchange for an honest review*

[greensparty]

Concert Review: Janes's Addiction

Friday 9/13/24 @ Leader Bank Pavilion (Boston, MA)

Remember that old joke "Besides that Mrs. Lincoln, how was the play?", well that's kind of how I feel writing this review. I set out to cover a concert and write a review and then the show ended abruptly and made national news, before I even had a chance to begin processing my thoughts!?! So I'm going to begin this review as I would a normal concert review with everything up until that ending that everyone is talking about.

Navarro, Farrell, Perkins and Avery onstage

In August 1991, I attended the MA stop of the very first Lollapalooza Festival, headlined by Jane's Addiction and created by singer Perry Farrell. I had been hearing some of JA's stuff and really dug what I heard, so prior to the festival, I picked up their 1990 album Ritual de lo Habitual. It was unlike anything at that time, a combination of hard rock, psychedelia, funk, art rock, and even raga sounds. That performance at Lollapalooza was epic, they did a ton of songs from Ritual and their 1988 studio debut Nothing's Shocking. Just as the band was breaking through to the mainstream and Lollapalooza was a success, JA broke up. Side note: about a month after Lollapalooza '91, I began high school. In english class we had to do an assignment about famous people who have the same name as us. I mentioned Eric Clapton, Eric Stoltz and JA bassist Eric Avery. My classmate Scott was the only one to respond to Eric Avery. From then on he and I bonded over bands we both liked like JA and Red Hot Chili Peppers and I'm happy to say we have remained good friends since then. Scott has brought his photography skills to a number of film projects I've done over the years and I've helped him out on some of his as well. When the opportunity came for me to cover this JA concert, I was thrilled to get Scott a photo pass, where he could photograph the first few songs. Truly a full circle moment for both of us to see JA together after all these years!

Navarro

We arrived mid-way through Love and Rockets' set, but enough for me to see them do all the hits like their cover of The Temptations' "Ball of Confusion", "No New Tale to Tell" and of course their biggest hit "So Alive". I am no expert, but I was impressed. After seeing them and The Church a few months ago, I'm starting to wish I could time travel to be a college radio DJ in the 1980s!

Navarro and Avery

Back the headliners: After JA ended in 1991, they reunited briefly in 1997 and again in 2003 in a number of different lineups. But this classic lineup of Farrell, guitarist Dave Navarro, Avery, and drummer Stephen Perkins has not toured since they were all together circa 2008-2010. In 1997, I did see Farrell and Perkins' post-JA band Porno for Pyros at the WBCN River Rave and with the exception of "Pets" it wasn't particularly memorable. There is just a magic of the JA lineup, four distinct personalities who come together and are bigger than the sum of their parts. Navarro just re-joined this year after long COVID sidelined him for the last few tours. Prior to this show there had been some music press complaining about some of the recent concerts, but I went in hopeful. This show also happened to be Perkins' birthday and Love and Rockets made a birthday dedication to him.

Avery

The show kicked off with "Kettle Whistle", a song that goes back to their 80s live shows and was recorded for the 1997 compilation of the same name. Then they went into some deep cuts like "Whores" and "Pigs in Zen". Farrell mumbled something about how the one thing we can all agree on is that it's "football season mother***ers". Farrell is truly a great singer, but at this show, he seemed quite off (wrong lyrics, coming in at the wrong time in songs, etc). Musically the band was tight. Navarro especially is one of the great guitarists to emerge from the 90s Alternative Nation and he seemed to be on fire during certain songs. The highlights of the show for me were "Summertime Rolls", "Jane Says" and "Three Days". There had been some tension within the band between Farrell and Navarro during a few songs, but it seemed like the show was going on.

Farrell

And then as they were doing "Ocean Size" things fell apart. Literally! During the song, I looked away for a nano-second and Scott said "Dude, are you watching this?!", I looked up and Farrell apparently went up to Navarro in the middle of the song and shoulder-bumped Navarro and then he actually took a swing at him as the band and crew had to restrain him and Navarro, while holding a guitar, looked like a deer in headlights as they removed Farrell from the stage. Navarro, Avery and Perkins waved goodnight and then the lights came on. At other shows on this tour there were a good three or four more songs. We did not get "Stop", "Been Caught Stealing" (possibly their biggest hit) or my all-time favorite JA song "Classic Girl".

Navarro

As we walked from the venue to the car, Scott and I pondered if we had actually witnessed the last JA show ever. By the time I got home, social media had already blown up about this concert. A pic I had posted on my FB of Scott and I garnered tons of comments asking what happened. By the next morning national and international press was now reporting this incident. Fans were dissecting the fan-made videos like it was the Zapruder film. Farrell's wife took to social media to explain that he had lost it due to tinnitus and a sore throat and that the loudness of the music caused him to not hear be able to hear the music properly and that he went from anger to sadness for what had happened. She singled out Avery, who tried to hold him back, for getting in some cheap shots at Farrell. Then JA issued a statement apologizing for what had happened and that they would be canceling the next show in CT. Earlier today, the band announced the cancellation of the remaining tour dates. All of this before I even had a chance to write a review!?!

Avery

My hot take: If this was, as Scott and I wondered the final JA show before they break up again, that's sad because they are ending on a sad rock cliche of inter-band tension. It wasn't a deranged fan or someone in another band that attempted to hurt Navarro, it was a bandmate!?! I get it - it takes a lot to be in a band especially one with larger-than-life personalities. But when they ended in 1991, they went out at the top of their game with the end of the Lollapalooza tour that was now a success. Violence is wrong but to go after Navarro (who just overcame some health issues of his own) onstage during a concert due to sound issues that had nothing to do with him is wrong. That's something I expect of a hack unprofessional not a singer that has been doing this for almost 40 years. You have issues with the sound or how the songs are being played deal with the band and the crew during soundcheck. This is also sad because we're talking about a band that have made two of the greatest albums of all time (don't just take my word for it, both Nothing's Shocking and Ritual de lo Habitual are in Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums of All Time list) and there was an opportunity to put on a great show filled with classics and deep cuts. Musically the band sounded good, but Farrell (whether it was tinnitus or him getting in his own way) was way off. I'm glad that I got to see this band in 1991. I'm glad I got to cover this as a member of the press because if I had paid I would've been disappointed.

Farrell

But in the end, it was exciting to have my friend Scott, who I talked JA with in high school, and 33 years later we got to see that lineup together...even if we wished it had gone differently.

Photos by Scott Patrick Wiener

For info on Jane's Addiction

[the-faramir]

Midori's Backstory: TL;DR

One afternoon, Midori called an emergency meeting of the Circus of Wayward Wonders. Once everybody was present, Midori began, "It has come to my attention that some of you who didn't start out in the Celestial Menagerie didn't read my memoirs to get up-to-date with my backstory." She pulled out a huge binder filled with hundreds of pages of paper, shook it at the group, and let it fall to the ground with a resounding thump. "Granted, I haven't even finished chapter five or started chapter six, but still!" She gave looks of mock disapproval throughout the tent.

Protests erupted from the group:

"That's a lot of story to get through!"

"I had too much work to do!"

"I CAN'T READ!"

Midori held up her hands. "No matter," she continued, "You know I love you all! So I have prepared a summary, which I will now present to you. Maestro, if you please!"

The band struck up a tune heavy on the bass and percussion. Midori swayed her hips in rhythm to the music and hopped from one foot to the other. She called this music style "Hip-Hop."

Midori began her spoken-word performance:

Now this is a story all about how My life got flipped, turned upside down And I'd like to take a minute, just for this purpose I'll tell you how I became the ringmaster of this circus

In West Minkai Empire born and raised With my siblings was where I spent most of my days Travelin' with our parents to places quite random And one day we found ourselves traveling to Absalom

When a group of terrorists, up to no good Started making trouble in the neighborhood They had beef with my parents, blew up the embassy I was the only one left to carry on our legacy

That night when the search party left me for dead Dusklight and her creepy clowns found me instead She pulled me from the rubble and wiped off my char And said, "You're movin' with your new circus family to Escadar"

I begged and pleaded with her day after day But she whipped me and beat me and said I must stay She cast spells on me to make me comply I put my uniform on and said, "I'll stay till I die"

Carnie life, yo this is bad. But Dusklight's boyfriend Myron, I made him my dad "Papa Thunder" saved me from bad guys givin' me a fright Hmm, this might be all right

But wait, Dusklight got pissy at Myron and all that So he packed up and left that mean old cat I tried to go with him, but she stopped me. Why? She said, "Midori, just try it and I'll make you die."

Nine years of my life I spent at that place Learnin' the circus biz at a breakneck pace I grew to adulthood in the Celestial Menagerie And got promoted to barker, it suits me, don't you agree?

But then one night, I remember it well I saw Dusklight kill my friend and it broke her spell I stood up to her, sayin' "Why I oughtta" But her guards woulda killed me if I had fought her

So instead I challenged her skills An epic song battle, a skirmish of wills My kitsune magic worked into my song And broke Dusklight's spell over my friends before long

We all stood together, a unified front But her goons outnumbered us, so we pulled a stunt Bufurug the druid knew the spell Ferocious Shape He broke us out of there and we made our escape

Now runnin' thirty miles to Abberton To get to Myron's circus, we'd all be done We had no food, we were unarmed But Bufurug got us to a safe town unharmed

We called for a cart and when it came near The driver was Myron, Papa Thunder was here! The druid had sent word to him that we had arrived So Myron came to get us, it was just a short drive

We pulled up to the circus about seven or eight Saw everyone settin' up and I said "This is great!" Looked at my new home, I was finally there The Circus of Wayward Wonders, my new family, I declare!

Well, uh, opening night came and when we got ready Axel ran backstage lookin' really unsteady He found Myron dead, killed by a snake bite And we started to think we'd have to cancel tonight

But the Professor said "Now hold it a beat! The audience is packed and we still need to eat We can't afford refunds, gotta please the town So put on your makeup and send in the clowns!"

He covered poor Myron with a black silk cape I fell down crying like my poor heart would break But I wiped off my tears, hopin' no more would spawn And I put on Myron's hat and said, "The show must go on!"

So now this is my circus and these are my monkeys And I've recruited new talent that's really quite funky So look at my kingdom, it's kind of a disaster But I sit on my throne, the new circus ringmaster

The song's outro played and the music ended. Midori asked the group, "Any questions?"

[khelinski]

Black Hole Sun

An \m/  story.

Bleed Together

I woke up this morning with the biggest headache in the world. We’ve been in the studio for the past six months, attempting to record an album. Nothing would come out. Nothing. After the \m/ album, we haven’t been able to find the magic. We took a break for a while after that tour, everyone in the band going their separate ways. Then when Axl Rose and Slash decided to tour together, reforming Guns N’ Roses, we got inspired to get our band, Outsider’s Vengeance, back together. Kelly, Tim, Ellie, and I walked into the studio, anticipating that we were going to make the be-all, end-all album of all albums. The epicest epic of epic epicness that would make the band, Epica, proud! But nothing would come out. It was like being in Andrew’s studio as a kid, glancing at each other, dreaming of rock 'n’ roll dreams with no clear direction on how to get there.

           We stared at each other with our instruments in our hands. I would start strumming a note, then be reluctant about it, then look down. Everyone else in the band would be guilty of doing the same thing. Six months, we’ve locked ourselves in the studio for eight hours, staring at each other. Maybe Arjen Anthony Lucassen was right - every song had been sung before, every chord had been overplayed.

           It was very discouraging. On top of that, we were depressed with the daily news of our new President (or, at least, I was). What the fuck was America smoking in November? From March on, I deactivated my Facebook and turned off my radar to anything that didn’t involve our new album; we were unable to get out. At first, I thought maybe - just maybe - that would create a new muse for me. Shut off the world while enhancing my senses to create. But. Nothing. Nothing. Nothing.

I lay there in bed, looking out the window as the sunrays produced light in my room. Ellie was already up, making coffee. Tim Hortons ground coffee, to be exact. We might be Florida residents, sure. But you can’t take the North away from us. I could smell the coffee brewing. I got up, got dressed, and walked into the kitchen. Ellie already had a cup ready for me. She walked toward me, gave me a kiss, and headed to the bathroom. A few moments later, the shower could be heard.  

           I couldn’t say that we were in a rut. I’ve been so damn happy since we’ve gotten married. She’s the love of my life…a bright light, dare I say. But we haven’t really talked much since we’ve been pushing to get out a masterpiece album. We have our quiet, content moments. That was the beauty of us - we could enjoy each other’s company without feeling the need to entertain each other. Still, there had been something missing between us.

Outshined

As we got to the studio, and I could hear Soundgarden’s Superunknown album real loud. There hasn’t been music played in our studio in a good, long while. It actually sounded great. Chris Cornell was screaming “SPOOOOONNNNNNNMANNNNNN” as I approached Kelly and Tim, sitting at a computer desk, eyeballing the lighted screen. That was also a little odd. It was agreed that we all shut out the world, and the computer was part of the world. Then I thought, 'shit, our new President finally started WW3, over a Tweet!’ My mind was trailing off to anything and everything he could’ve done/said (and lately, anything/everything is quite possible).

           Kelly looked up, nudged Tim in the arm. They both blinked at Ellie and me. No words were said, except for the hard rock rage of Soundgarden blasting through the speakers. Kelly looked like she was crying. After a few moments of what could possibly be the worst staring contest in the sad, long history of staring contests, Ellie broke the tension and asked, simply:

           “What’s up, guys?”  

           Tim and Kelly couldn’t speak. So I walked around them and looked at what they were looking at. It was a news story from WDIV, a news station from Detroit. The headline read:

“Chris Cornell ended the last performance of his life with a song about death”

The only thing I could say was:

           “WHAT THE FUCK!?!”

           After I finished saying what Kelly and Tim must’ve been thinking all morning, Ellie walked over and read the same article I was reading. 

Pretty Noose

Soundgarden played a gig at the Fox Theater in our home state that night. We’ve never played there, but I did go there as a kid to see the band Yes in concert. All I recall was it was an old, beautiful building.

           Chris Cornell closed the show with a cover of Led Zeppelin’s “In My Time of Dying.” After the show, he went to his hotel room and hanged himself, echoing the death of Kurt Cobain, and Robin Williams, and our very own Andrew Carter.

           I collapsed at the nearest chair and stared at our unoccupied instruments. They were making great dust collectors as of late. No one in the room said anything for what seemed like forever. Even once the Soundgarden album ended, we just sat there - shuffling (and reshuffling) our thoughts.  

           Tim finally piped up and said:

           “Sara called Kelly this morning and told her about it. I didn’t find out until I met Kelly in the studio. I didn’t want to believe her until I pulled up the story. Unfucking real, man.”  

           Kelly took a Kleenex and blew her nose. Even Ellie was sniffling a little bit. Right there and then, a heavy amount of emotion took over me. I started welling up. I broke down. I cried. I screamed. I was a wreck. I got up faster than my body demanded, and raced out of the studio. My head was feeling lightheaded, but that didn’t stop me. I was on a mission: to get the fuck out of there any way possible.

           I ran out of the building and kept running. I wasn’t athletic at all and never jogged a day in my life. But this seemed like a great time to pick it up. 

The Day I Tried to Live

I had no destination. I just ran. I found a bench a few miles away from the studio and sat. A combination of snot and tears was all over my face. I was all kinds of fucked up! Was I distraught over Chris Cornell’s death, or was there something else? I guess what crept into my mind wasn’t so much Cornell, but rather his bandmates. Soundgarden was in the middle of a tour, and their front singer died on them.  

           Brought back memories of our 2008 Untitled tour, when our dear friend Andrew died.  

           I still remember discovering his body in his hotel room the morning after playing the Hard Rock Park. I still remember seeing the empty bottle of pills next to him. I still remember the headphones attached to his cold, dead ears. I still remember the headphones that were connected to his MP3 player. I still remember the two songs that were looped, Black Sabbath 'Solitude’ and our song, ’Dreaming.’ I still remember the paramedics that kicked us out of the room. I still remember the rest of the band approaching us outside the room, asking what happened. I still remember Andrew’s lifeless body being carried out of the room on a gurney. I still remember the funeral back home in Michigan days after. I still remember feeling numbed by then. And I am still numb about it.

           It is something you can’t get out of your head. I’ve thought about it less and less as the years went by, but it still lingered within. Andrew was always on the mind. His influence in the band was there, as it always had been. It’s just…I haven’t deeply thought about Andrew’s death until that moment. Chris Cornell’s death resurfaced those raw, painful feelings and memories.

Nothing to Say

I sat at that bench for a few hours. I figured the rest of the band was back at the studio, grieving in their own way. Didn’t think they would come to find me. Lo and behold, there they were - driving the old and busted La Grange. I got in without saying a word. We ended up having our typical band meal - IHOP, despite not having any appetites. We ate in silence.

           Tim drove us back to the studio in the same old van we had toured all throughout Michigan over a decade ago. The drive was peaceful. No one said a thing. There wasn’t any music in the car. Everyone was in their deep thoughts. When we arrived at the studio, walked through the door inside, and sat in the chairs in the middle of the recording room surrounded by our instruments, we still didn’t say one word to each other. The emotion was high, but what was understood need not to be discussed. We all sensed it. It was obvious. We were still grieving over Andrew’s death. Even Ellie felt it. She knew she came into the band under shitty circumstances. Sure, it had been great. I mean, I did marry her. But. There was still a loss: Andrew Carter. Our bandmate, drummer, friend, brother. He was the one that came up with the band name because we were all Outsiders in this world.  

           I felt for Soundgarden right then. We’ve been there. I think just about every band in the history of rock ‘n’ roll had been there.

           Night came. We all turned in. I stayed in the studio, lying on the couch in the sound booth. I haven’t slept in there since before Ellie joined the band. I dozed on and off. One bad dream after another. I then got up, went to the stereo, and put on one of my favorite Soundgarden songs. I went back to the couch and caught some z’s with a net as Chris Cornell’s flawless voice started narrating my dream.

Black Hole Sun

“I don’t know if I was dreaming, hallucinating, or what - but I just watched one of the greatest supergroup bands that never existed. They were all in our studio, playing our instruments. Andrew was behind Ellie’s drum kit. Keith Emerson was on keyboard. Chris Squire was on bass. And B.B. King. Can you all believe it?!? B.B. fucking King. He was playing my fucking guitar. And they were playing 'Black Hole Sun.’ Except, it was a different version. It was like a metal, folk, proggy, mellow version. It was combined with different rock genres and sub-genres. It was expanded, but still had the sheer essence of Soundgarden’s edge. And best of all, it was something we could do,” I said to the band the next day in the studio.

           Everyone was trying to understand what I was saying. Even I didn’t fully get it. I dreamt it last night - this supergroup band of dead legends, performing a Soundgarden cover. But if there was one thing I was certain about over the years - anytime I dreamed of something absolutely nuts - it turned into one of the best albums we had done. I had a feeling, a stirring, a 'loud love’ 'hands all over’ 'blow up the outside world’ idea of our next album. And it lay somewhere within the confines of Soundgarden’s 'Black Hole Sun.’

           “So, what are you suggesting? Because it sounds like some crazy shite to me!” Ellie said with sarcasm. And she was right. They all looked at me like I was fucking crazy. And maybe I was. But that was rock 'n’ roll, man. 99% fucking crazy. 1% fucking sanity. Funny how the 99% crazy is what made us 100% sane.

           “Ever since we started this band - back with Andrew, we’ve always pushed boundaries - broke new ground. We never sold millions - but we sold enough to have a following. And that following grew. Anytime we did something new, we always pushed ourselves to do something different. What I think we should do is make an album in honor of Soundgarden. In honor of Chris Cornell. In honor of Andrew,” I said.

           “So will this be a cover album?” Kelly asked. She looked interested, but a little skeptical. One thing we all agreed upon: to not make another cover album. We’ve already done two in our career.  

           Instead of explaining what I was getting at, I walked toward my guitar, strapped it around my body, and started playing. I was remembering what the great fucking B.B. King was playing in my dream. It started out as the opening of 'Black Hole Sun.’ But it went into another direction. A direction none of us had heard before. 

Everyone got excited. Tim went to his bass, following my lead. Kelly went to her keyboards, adding the necessary notes. Ellie was already on her drums the moment I started strumming my guitar. She slowly picked up the pace of the music following me, and then led us where we needed to be. There were no vocals. Like the …and the beat goes on…album, this was an instrumental piece. And like that album, it was somber. There was grief in the mix. The grief of Chris Cornell’s passing (and all the other legends that have passed away the last couple of years). Most of all, there was the grief of our beloved Andrew. I got emotional as we kept on playing.  

           We played for a good sixty minutes. We all felt inspired again. The band was back! We replayed the music, recording it all. The tail-end of our creation - I added some vocals that just seemed right.

           “Won’t you come…won’t you come."

           Once we listened to what we played, we were all proud. It took six months to produce something we recorded in less than a day. The album name was a natural choice.  

           Black Hole Sun.  

           But I didn’t want to dissect the tracks. It was one long track. I also didn’t want to call the song 'Black Hole Sun.’ Kelly piped up and said it should be called, ’…and so the beat still goes on…’

           Very fitting.

 Numb

Two months later, as we were mastering the sound levels of the album we recorded, news circulated to us that Chester Bennington of Linkin Park committed suicide. What made it eerie was he committed suicide right on Chris Cornell’s birthday. We were all stunned in the studio, and that numbness inspired us to record a bonus addition to the Black Hole Sun album.

           We all listed our favorite Linkin Park songs and recorded a 45-minute Linkin Park medley (adding a few blips of some Stone Temple Pilots, honoring Chester’s moment in that band). Because this was a heavier contrast to “…and so the beat still goes on” recording, our Linkin Park medley, in which we were calling it appropriately, “With You,” would be on a second-disc of a two-CD set.

           We set out NOT to record a cover album, but, I suppose, we had ‘one more light,’ and it flickered…flickered...

Stop Draggin' My Heart Around

A month and a half later, as we were mastering the sound levels of the “With You” portion of the album, Hurricane Irma impolitely interrupted our work. Luckily, there was no heavy damage around our studio, just a few trees down. Can’t say the same about some of the houses a few blocks from us, with a tree completely collapsed onto a house.

           We continued our work once the storm passed. 

A few weeks later, news circulated to us that Tom Petty passed away.

           My favorite all-time Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers tune will always be “Breakdown.” That was one of the first songs I learned how to play guitar. And I didn’t learn from the studio version of the song. I would attempt to duplicate Petty’s live version.

           Like Steve Miller, Eric Clapton, and David Gilmour – Tom Petty was a maestro guitar great that would often jam on stage, turning a simplistic single you would know by heart (pun glory there) to an unpredictable arrangement of blissful sound.

           No mistake about it, we had to include a Tom Petty tune. But we couldn’t agree with what song to chose. I obviously wanted to do “Breakdown.” Kelly wanted to cover “Wildflowers,” for she felt she was a wildflower and the song always spoke to her. Tim wanted to tackle “Don't Come Around Here No More,” as he phrased it, “it’s a great fucking video, man! You can’t deny that.” I can’t, man. It was a great fucking video.

           Ellie piped up and said:

           “How about we have a dance with Mary Jane, oh hell yes?!?”

           She took her hand toward her mouth and imitated that she was tokin up a joint. We all burst out laughing. Tasteless or not, considering the amount of sadness that plagued our studio as of late, it was a much-needed comedy relief. After our shared chuckles, Ellie suggested one of two things. Either we could record a medley of our favorites like “With You,” or we could pick a unique Petty gem none of us thought of yet. 

“When was the last time any of us talked with Sara?” Kelly asked.  

           That was a random question, out of the blue and all. She then continued to say:

           “We could ask her to a record a duet with us. “Stop Draggin’ My Heart Around.” And instead of Mike singing, we could have Tim sing.”

           Everyone in the studio looked at her and then looked at Tim.

           “I can’t fuckin’ sing, Kelly,” Tim blurted out.

           “Prove it. On cue, sing ‘Free Fallin’” Kelly said.

           Tim’s face flushed a little, but he started mumbling the lyrics to a song everyone and their grandmother knew because Tom Cruise slaughtered the song in a movie once. At first, it was awkward to hear. I am sure it was a lot more awkward for him to sing on the spot. Almost made me think of the time Andrew put me on the spot to sing in front of Kelly and Andrew in Andrew’s studio. Andrew. Our brother, Andrew Carter. A lifetime ago, back when he was still alive, and we were just kids. My mind wandered to a time and place long ago but came back immediately to the present.

           Tim gulped between lyrics and became a little more comfortable. His voice progressed to a more reasonable tone, and it actually wasn’t half bad. In fact, he almost sounded a bit like Tom Petty. I saw why Kelly thought of Tim. My voice didn’t fit Petty’s tone. And with Sara being a former bassist, it would make perfect sense to have the two pair up together.

           We called Sara. She responded with her typical ‘DUDEEEE, FUCK YEAH.’ She flew down. We recorded our cover of Tom Petty/Stevie Nicks gem: “Stop Draggin’ My Heart Around.”

           Sara stayed in town for a bit. It was nice to have her around the studio, like old times. It was the first time Ellie got to spend time with her. They got along great.

About a month later, as we were mastering the sound levels of “Stop Draggin’ My Heart Around,” we learned about the passing of Malcolm Young, bassist for AC/DC. None of us were real avid AC/DC fans. And our album was already jammed packed with material. But thinking about AC/DC got us reminiscing about the early days of the band (back when we were just The Outsiders), outperforming that shitty AC/DC cover band at Buenafest.

In the End

Tragedy happens all the time. Unexpected deaths occur at any given moment, rock greats were no exception (considering we lost our own Andrew Carter). But music would always be played. Be heard. Be remembered.

           And so the beat still goes on…

K.H.; May 18, 2017 - June 10, 2018.

Rock In Peace to Chris Cornell, Chester Bennington, Tom Petty, and Malcolm Young.