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A Stroke of the Pen – An interview with Pat and Jan Harkin

We were lucky enough to speak to Drs Pat and Jan Harkin before the release of A Stroke of the Pen – a collection of very early short stories by Terry Pratchett. Pat and Jan played an integral role in unearthing these stories from the vast vault known of the British Library’s newspaper archives.

On top of that, Pat Harkin was part of Terry Pratchett’s “Greek chorus” – the small collection of experts who he’d call up (at all hours of the day or night) to ask disquieting questions about scientific or procedural intricacies.

Pat’s also the keeper of a vast collection of Discworld memorabilia and ephemera, a regular face (and gavel) at Discworld conventions, and target of “quacks” the world over.

You can listen to the interview here.

And read the whole transcript below:

Francine: Hello and welcome to a special bonus episode of The Truth Shall Make You Fret.

A couple of weeks ago, Joanna and I were delighted to be joined by Doctors Pat and Jan Harkin, the diligent researchers who combed through years of newspaper archives to collate the material for A Stroke of the Pen, a collection of 20 early short stories by Terry Pratchett, which is released on Tuesday. As well as this, Dr Pat Harkin was one of Pratchett’s trusted experts. He is a retired pathologist, a Discworld Uber fan, member of the Order of the Honeybee and guardian of a gigantic collection of Discworld memorabilia.

Dr Jan Harkin has, since retiring from her role as a nationally prominent physician, spent more time on the convention circuit herself and even shared a pointless Discworldian quiz. She is also the keeper of Pat’s extelligence. I’ll let them fill in the details. They are fantastic storytellers and I know you, dear little listeners, on your dear little legs, will enjoy their tales mightily. So, let’s make a podcast.

[INTRO MUSIC]

Joanna: Hello and welcome to The Truth Shall Make You Fret, a podcast in which we are usually reading and recapping every book from Terry Pratchett’s Discworld series, one at a time, in chronological order. I’m Joanna Hagan.

Francine: I’m Francine Carrel.

Joanna: And we have a couple of very special guests with us today.

Francine: We have Drs Harkin, Dr Pat Harkin and Dr Jan Harkin, who are Discworld superfans both, is that fair?

Pat: We’ve been called worse.

Jan: Yeah. I just tag along.

Pat: I think they call it, she’s my enabler, you know.

Jan: I’m his carer.

Pat: Yeah.

Francine: On the convention blurb, I’ve got you down as in Discworld circles, she is known as that poor, poor woman.

Jan: Yes. From Sir Terry himself.

Francine: And Pat Harkin, Maskerade MC (quack), which I may have found a clue to in some of the old Usenet groups, but I’m not entirely sure how it started.

Pat: It’s one of those things that you sort of can’t believe it happened, but it happened. It started out when I was compering the Maskerade, must have been about 2010. I’m not absolutely sure. And one of the acts was a chap who had made himself a set of dwarf seamstress armour with filigree mining axe and a little lantern on a pole and whatever.

This guy’s called Alex Carlton. He’s one of the Smoking Gnu. He is Saint Alex. The character is named after him. He’s got a beard that you could lose two badgers in. It’s very, very impressive. He makes a fantastic dwarf.

So he had also written for himself a little song that he sang as this dwarf seamstress, but he’d recorded it and then electronically manipulated it to shove it up an octave or two. So it was like he was on helium. And he danced around the stage, and because of the way the stage was set up, my podium was ahead of where the action was. So he was behind me. I’d seen the rehearsal, so I knew what was going on, but it was technically out of my sight. And it was a sight, I think is a good phrase to say.

When it ended– incidentally, he dies at the end of his dance because the next act was going to be CSI Morpork and he was going to be their corpse– but anyway, so it comes to the end of his section, the stage lights go down, my podium light comes up, and there is a stunned silence from the audience.

And I just looked out at them and said, “It’s all right for me. I can’t see a thing. You lot are sitting ducks.”

And somebody went, “quack”.

From the closing ceremony, the amateur dramatics crew had brought their duck quack that they had, and they started quacking. And since then, I’ve been quacked at in the street down in Abingdon waiting for one of Stephen’s play… anytime I end up on stage: quack, quack, quack, quack, quack.

The house is full of rubber ducks that people keep giving me. Small ones, large ones.

Jan: From every continent, I think. We had a Boston Redsocks rubber duck sent by a fan.

Pat: He’s in the bathroom, isn’t he? Yes.

Jan: And there’s all sorts of duck paraphernalia like a duck shower cap and a French toast mould in the shape of a duck. Amazing.

Pat: A snowball maker. A thing for making snowballs shaped like ducks.

Francine: Oh! I never would have imagined there was such a thing.

Joanna: It honestly hadn’t occurred to me there was that much duck merchandise in the world.

Francine: The world continues to surprise me. I love that. Sorry, Joanna, I’ve immediately taken this off topic.

Joanna: That’s the entire podcast is us going off topic.

Quick note on spoilers. We are a spoiler light podcast. We will mostly be talking today about A Stroke of the Pen. We will avoid spoiling any major future events in the Discworld series past Thud!, which is technically the book we’ll be on by the time this comes out. And of course, we will save any and all mention of The Shepherd’s Crown until we get there. So you, dear listener, can come on the journey with us.

Francine: And what a journey it’ll be.

Joanna: It will be.

Introductions – who are Pat and Jan Harkin?

Joanna: So, Pat and Jan, in the nicest possible way, who are you and how do you know Terry Pratchett?

Pat: Who am I? My name’s Pat Harkin. I’m now retired. But I got into Terry’s writings by accident sometime in the late 80s. I’m not sure exactly when. We went to visit a friend in London as we were packing the car to come home. He picked up a paperback and said, I’ve just finished this. You might like it. And he handed me The Colour of Magic. And I read The Colour of Magic, and I loved it. And I started reading everything I could find. And so it grew.

I missed the first convention, went to the second one. And down the years, got to know Terry, we became friends. He would occasionally ring me when he wanted advice on some technical aspect, usually to do with dead bodies, because my background was in pathology.

So he would ring up and say: “How much earwax do you produce in a lifetime?”

Or: “How strong would you have to be to rip somebody’s head off with your bare hands?”

Just the sort of questions that you can’t answer on the spot. You have to go away and do a bit of research. And I probably got a bit of reputation from the local university libraries for the books I was borrowing.

But anyway, so I helped Terry out and things like that. He named me in the intro to Slip of the Keyboard as Lord of the Uberfans. It was a lot cooler title before the taxi app came along.

Yeah, but it’s too late to go back now.

Francine: It’ll outlast the app. Don’t worry about it.

Pat: And when Terry died, he left instructions in his will for Rob to create an order to thank people who’d helped Terry during his life. The Venerable Order of the Honey Bee. This was announced at the memorial at the Barbican. And I have a beautiful golden bee lapel pin, which Rob had crafted. There’s about a dozen of us. Stephen Briggs, you’ll have met, he’s got one. Bernard Pearson, Colin Smythe, of course. And a small number of others.

So that’s who I am. Jan? Who are you?

Jan: Yeah, we got married just after we qualified. I went into hospital medicine. So I had a lot less free time than Pat, who is a university person. So I didn’t go to as many of the early conventions because I was on call and things like that. But we’ve since retired, both of us retired. And so it’s been great fun getting more into the conventions.

I was roped into chairing a Pointless quiz at the Irish Discworld Convention a year or two back, which was really interesting. We had no technology. We had people making boopy boop noises rather than the slick electronics. So, yes, it was good fun.

And I act as the sort of travel agent and general gopher whenever we’re sorting out cons, you know, I’m the travel agent for him. But yeah, it’s been great fun.

We’ve been privileged to meet up with Terry a lot. The fandom is just so great and funny. And it’s been amazing to visit people all over the world who are now our friends through Terry. That’s really lovely.

Francine: Brilliant. Have you been to many of the international conventions?

Jan: Yes. I mean, when I was working, I had a national role and in my specialty. So I was going to a lot of international conferences anyway. It was great that we could sometimes tag them together. So I went to a medical conference in Seattle and then flew down to Tempe for the American Discworld con. So we could sort of do it all in one trip.

Pat: We’ve been to all the American cons, missed the first Australian one. And we’ve been to all the German ones as well. So we’ve been to a few. One or two.

Jan: I’ve only been to one German one myself. It was the first one this year. It was great fun.

The Pratchett Uncertainty Principle

Francine: Cool. So part of the kind of meeting Pratchett origin story was online, was it not? As some kind of tech support, possibly?

Pat: Yes. Back in, it will have been the late 80s. Again, I didn’t know this was going to be important. So I didn’t make notes at the time. Oh no. Sorry. Sorry about that. I get told off because I will tell a tale and the next time I tell it, it’s slightly different. And it’s, well, I haven’t got any notes.

Francine: We fully endorse changing stories on this podcast.

Pat: Back in the late 80s, PCs were just becoming available for the domestic market, but really only sad nerds had a computer at home. So I had a computer at home and Terry had a computer at home.

And at this point I should switch into old fogey mood and say, you young people don’t know how good you got it these days with your computer equipment. You want two things to work together, you buy them, you put them down sort of vaguely side by side and press a button. And it all happens by magic.

In the olden days, if you wanted to add, as I did, a CD drive, this is cutting edge technology, a thing that could read CDs to your computer, you had to take the side off the case, stick in a circuit board, move some little dip switches around, get it all working.

And I had one of these gadgets and I’d got it working and Terry had got one as well and couldn’t get his working. So he posted a request for help on a bulletin board thing called Kix, which we could sort of talk to each other. Not in real time, you would sort of type something loaded up. It was a bit like email conversations, but public email conversations or Reddit, I suppose, something like that. And I was able to help Terry out.

And I also met Terry. So I met him online at some point. I don’t know exactly when. And I met him when he came to a book signing in my local bookstore, but I’m not sure when. So one of those was technically the first.

I didn’t realise he was Terry Pratchett online because of pseudonyms. And so I sort of realised afterwards, oh, I may or may not have met you already. I don’t know. I don’t know how I first met him.

Francine: I do like that.

Pat: It’s the opposite of the dedicated fans. They can tell you to the second and how many people were in the queue behind them.

Francine: Oh yes. “I met him in all kinds of places. Who can say when was the first? “I think that’s much better. “We were around.”

Pat: The Pratchett uncertainty principle.

Part of the Greek Chorus

Francine: Yeah. Oh, excellent. And then, obviously, your friendship grew with him over the years and you became one of the trusted experts – as Joanna’s put it here, the Greek chorus.

Pat: Yes. That was what Terry referred to us as. Well, I didn’t find that out until that BBC documentary.

Whenever Terry wanted you to answer a question, he would give you precisely what he thought was enough information to be going on and nothing else. It was really frustrating.

So in theory, I had sort of first sight into all these books. But in practice, I know what happened at the bottom of page 87 and that’s it. “I have no idea who these people are. Why do I care if they’re in a river?” He just wants to know what they’ll be like after they’ve been found three days later.

Francine: I love that you get to cut a random window into a universe and try and extrapolate from that.

Pat: Yeah. The how much earwax one was a good one. We were out one Sunday morning, our microwave had died and we were in Curry’s getting a new microwave. The phone rang and it said “number withheld”, which usually meant it was the university ringing. So I thought, I’ve got to take this.

I went outside, and I answered, and it was Terry. And he opened with: “This stays between us, or there will be trouble.” Which is not his normal opening gambit.

I said, “Okay, okay. What is it?”

He said, “How much earwax do you create in a lifetime?”

And I thought for a minute, and I said, “Do you know, Terry, I think I may have been absent for that lecture at medical school. I don’t remember them teaching us that. I’ll have to look into it.”

So I spent many a happy hour digging through ENT textbooks and papers and references and whatever. Till eventually I found some guys who, back in the seventies, had developed a technique for measuring earwax. They just filled your ear with alcohol and then slooshed it out and weighed the difference. But anyway, I was able to come up with an answer for him. We worked out it was about an egg cup full, which seems a very small amount, but that’s what these scientists said it was. So that’s what he went with.

Well, same thing happened with- he rang me one day: “I want you to imagine a magic door that you can walk through that takes you to another place – but you can’t take anything iron with you.”

I said, “Yeah, okay.”

He said, “But what about the iron in your blood?”

So we talked it through, and I was able to work out a mechanism that the iron in your blood is not metallic iron, it’s different, it’s not magnetic. So we can say whatever this magic door is doing, it won’t do it to magnetic or metallic iron. And you get away with it from that point of view.

But interestingly enough, if you were to swallow a bucket full of ball bearings and then walk through the door, you’d go through and all the ball bearings would fall to the ground behind you because they’re not going through the door. Your body goes away, they fall to the ground. And he quite liked that.

And I thought at the time, this is going to be another elves story, back to the land of the elves where they hate iron. But it was actually early research work for the Long Earth series.

Francine and Joanna: Oh, wow.

Pat: Did he give me a clue that it was for something other than Discworld? No. He told me what I needed to know to answer the question he wanted answered.

And that was such a privilege. I’m fine with that.

Francine: Oh, absolutely. Yeah.

Joanna: That’s wonderful. Oh, I love that.

A Stroke of the Pen – how did it happen?

Joanna: So we’re on the eve of, well, not quite the eve, of A Stroke of the Pen coming out, and you were both instrumental in putting the book together.

Francine:A Stroke of the Pen is collected works hitherto unseen. How has that happened?

Pat: One of the Discworld books starts, “Everything starts somewhere, though some physicists disagree.” And that’s very much this story. It’s got about three starts.

From Jan’s perspective and mine, it started when Colin rang us to say that a fan who had contacted him – a chap called Christopher Lawrence, I think – had, as a child, collected clippings from the local paper, which were a short story by Terry in, I think it’s 36 parts. And he had collected all these cuttings and still had them some 40, 50 years later, mounted, framed and mounted in a board.

But in doing this, he had cut off all the information as to which date or which paper each piece of clipping had come from. And then Colin had never heard of this story, didn’t know where to go for it. So he contacted us. Jan, you’d spoken to him before.

Jan: Yes, it was at a conference dinner. Again, I can’t quite remember the date. But Colin was normally going to Colindale to dig out the old newspapers that contained Terry’s early journalism. But he was getting news that Colindale was closing and the British Library were opening a new newspaper archive building out in a place called Boston Spa.

And he was generally asking, well, you know, where is this place and does anybody live nearby? And I said, well, we’re about 20 minutes’ drive from there. It’s just outside Weatherby, which is a small market town outside Leeds. And, you know, made the general connection that if he needed us to look for anything, we would.

And that died for years – years and years and years. And then I think just as we retired, again, I think Colin contacted us for a few confirmation issues he had with some of the early journalism.

And so we joined the British Library as readers and went over to have a look at Boston Spa, which is a lovely little library in itself. The reading room at Boston Spa is about the size of your district general library size. It’s not big at all. It has a couple of booths for private meetings and then a whole load of readers’ desks and an absolutely huge campus of buildings behind it, which contain more than three quarters of the British Library stock, including the newspaper library.

So, we ordered the stuff online. The lovely librarians, they were great, would pull the stuff out. We’d check out on these stories for Colin and, you know, we’d have a nice lunch there. There’s also a rather pleasant village, Boston Spa, where we could have a pub lunch, you know. So it was a nice day out, sort of half day, to check these things out.

And then along came this issue with The Quest for the Keys. So we then started to get a bit more systematic about it, didn’t we, Pat?

The Eureka Room

Pat: Yes. Not knowing where to start looking was a bit of a challenge. I think Christopher had said it was probably the Western Daily Press, but he couldn’t be sure. And he said, it’s about 50 years ago.

So we looked at… Colin had sent us a few pictures of some of the clippings. We had a look at those. We saw that the action took place, or at least starts, in the city of Morpork. Not Ankh Morpork, but Morpork.

And I reckoned that meant that the story was probably before The Colour of Magic. I didn’t think Terry would have reused the name after he’d sold the book. So that probably gave us one end of the timescale. And having been told “about 50 years before”, that took us back to 1972, which is just before Terry started working at the Western Daily Press. That’s where we started from.

And each week we would request a year’s worth or 18 months’ worth of newspapers, which would be delivered to the reading room. And we would sit down and go through them laboriously, page by page.

I’d been involved in some cataloguing projects at the university. And one thing I’d learned was, if you don’t know what you’re doing, it’s better to do too much than to miss something and then have to go back and start again. So we collected all sorts of information that we probably wouldn’t need.

So at one point we were collecting not only which page a piece of writing was on, but whereabouts on the page it was. Colin seems to regard that as very interesting. All sorts of stuff, volume numbers, dates, places and so on.

Jan and I would work separately but together. So we’d be working on the same year, but different months or different quarters. We’d go through them at the end of the day. We would get together to combine our two sets of findings into one spreadsheet. And that was the system that we worked for some weeks. That worked quite well.

Jan: Yeah, the library were really, really helpful. When they realised that we were working together, they gave us one of the private side rooms. So that, you know, if we did let out a little shriek of enthusiasm, having found a bit of television journalism, we didn’t disturb the other readers.

Francine: Oh, nice. The Eureka room.

Jan: Yes!

Pat: But although we’d found, when we were looking for the non-fiction material, we’d found something most weeks. When we started for this, there was nothing to see. It took us a while to find out where in the various newspapers the children’s stories were held. They were in a standard column. It was different in each paper, but we eventually got to know the structure.

Western Daily Press, I think all the stories were attributed to an Uncle Jim. And Terry was Uncle Jim at some point, but nobody knows when. Other journalists, I think it was something you probably gave to the new guy who came in and got all the rotten jobs, was writing the children’s column each week.

Jan: I think it was the Bucks Free Press where it was Uncle Jim. It was the Children’s Circle in Western Daily Press. And they, yeah, the children’s column had different authors, didn’t it?

Should we do that bit again? Because that’s a bit confusing.

Pat: No, because I’ll get it wrong again. I’ll just point out that, like War in the Discworld novels, I keep my memory in my wife.

Joanna: That makes sense. Francine was saying yesterday she uses me as a filing cabinet.

Francine: It’s very convenient for me. Thank you.

Pat: Of course, Jack and Ian refer to it as “extelligence”.

Francine and Joanna: Yes.

Pat: The fact that information lives outside individual people. And that’s what makes us what we are. But anyway, back to the plot. Yeah.

Jan: The Bucks Free Press had Children’s Circle, which was the pseudonym Uncle Jim.

Francine: Got it.

Pat: Whereas the Western Daily Press actually gave names to the writers. And as I said earlier, we decided we would collect more information that we needed. So although we had no interest in Colin Morningstar writing a story called The Haunted Lavatory or something, we would carefully write down all the titles, page numbers, dates and times, so that we could be quite sure we weren’t accidentally missing out a month’s newspapers. Because it would have been quite easy for me to do January and March, Jan to have done April and May, and poor old February get forgotten.

So we kept track of all the information.

Patrick Cairns

The end of one afternoon, we are combining our two sets of findings into one spreadsheet. Jan was reading out to me and I was typing. We could do this because we were in this nice shared room that we were allowed to talk in.

And she read out, first story today is the Blackberry Pie by Patrick Cairns. Second one, the Blackberry Thing. And the Blackbury Weather. Yeah.

And on that one, as I was typing it, Jan said, oh, the spelling’s unusual. It’s B-L-A-C-K-B-U-R-Y. It’s not Blackberry as in Blackberry Pie.

And I thought, oh, hang on. That sounds familiar. Blackbury, Johnny and the Dead, Johnny and the Bomb, Only You Can Save Mankind. They’re set in Blackbury. How can we check?

Well, Blackbury from the books was in the little county of Gritshire. And we had to look back through a couple of the stories and there was a reference to Gritshire. And at that point we thought, I’m not going to get excited yet. I’m reserving the right to get excited in a moment. Because it could just be a coincidence. It might just be that the journalists at that newspaper shared a common background that they wrote the stories against. And you moved on, somebody else came in and wrote a story in Blackbury. So it could have been there.

But we thought, right, well, we better tell Colin.

So we got in contact with Colin pretty quick and explained what had happened and sent him some photographs of the pages that we’d found. And he said, “Well, it’s certainly in Terry’s style.

“And what I know that you don’t know is that Cairns was Terry’s mother’s maiden name.”

So he was Terry Cairns in a way of speaking. And Colin reckons that Patrick and Pratchett are close enough together that Terry Pratchett became Patrick Cairns.

Francine: Fantastic.

Pat: And at that point, we then went back in time to stories that we had looked at and ignored. We’d made our notes that Patrick Cairns had written other things.

And then we went looking for other stuff. Jan found some non-children’s works by Patrick Cairns. And in Christmas specials of the various newspapers.

Jan: He did three or four Christmas specials. We actually found one page where we had a bit of journalism titled Terry Pratchett byline. And next to it was a Christmas story bylined Patrick Cairns on the same page.

Francine: Kept it separate. Love that.

Jan: Well, Terry already had a couple of pseudonyms, didn’t he? He had Marcus, which he used to put, again, more factual things that he did for the Bucks Free Press midweek editions later on. So he was known to use a pseudonym, but not Patrick Cairns.

So we sent all this stuff off to Colin. Interestingly, you can’t photocopy in the British Library. They expect you to take pictures or email or whatever, you know, if you’re using the readers. So yeah, we then waited for Colin’s phone call. It was exciting.

Pat: It certainly was. Yeah.

The Quest for The Quest for the Keys

Francine: And from there, it kind of evolved into a bigger project?

Pat: Well, how can I put this? It was very exciting to find this stuff by Terry. It’s not what we came here for. We were looking for the Quest for the Keys.

Francine: Yes, that’s right, sorry!

Pat: So we’d found all this new stuff by Terry, and we went backwards several years and we went forward several years. We found all that, but we still hadn’t found the Quest for the Keys.

So we thought, we looked through another couple of years and another couple of years. Eventually we thought, well, maybe it’s not actually in these newspapers. As far as I can tell, back in the 1970s, newspapers changed their names about two or three years. The Bucks Free Press would become the Bucks Daily Press, would become the Bucks Midweek Press, would become the, oh, I don’t know, made it really hard to keep track of stuff.

But we thought maybe we’ve been sent up a dead end. We’ll do one more year, one more year, and then we’ll have a look. So we started on 1984. We got all the way through to August with nothing. And then in July, there was part one of the quest for the keys, the byline of Terry Pratchett.

Francine: Fantastic.

Pat: And there it continued daily during the summer holidays. And then when the kids went back to school, it swapped to being a weekly story for 36 episodes. So it is unique in that it’s the longest serialised fiction that Terry wrote. His other kids’ stories tend to be at most five-parters. This was 36.

With an embedded map and competition. We could have won a tent to go to camping. I mean, we were 40 years late for the entry date. Such sticklers, some newspapers.

So we have actually found the Quest for the Keys and it is set in Morpork. And it is actually published after the use of Ankh Morpork. So I was wrong in my assumption. In fact, if I had stuck to my guns, stuck to my convictions, we would have never gone back to 1984. We would have thought, it’s got to be earlier than that.

But that was finding the Quest for the Keys.

Mr Brown’s Holiday Accident (spoiler free)

And then in the middle, somewhere along the way, we found one last little titbit, which is probably the least important thing to have found, but it’s my favourite.

Terry wrote a story called Mr Brown’s Holiday Accident, about a chap who sets off on holiday – without wishing to give any spoilers here – and has an accident. And takes another three pieces to get back together again. It’s quite a nice little story.

But it was known that it had been published, or at least written in five parts. Parts one to four were present in the library archive and Colin knew about them. But part five, the following week’s paper, was no paper for that date. There is no copy of this paper for the 2nd of January, that particular year.

Why not? Well, I’ve been given several hypotheses. One is that there was industrial action and nobody wrote anything, so nobody printed anything. I’ve also been told that losing newsprint due to industrial action at paper mill was not uncommon, or shortage in supply lines. So there are all sorts of reasons for this.

And in fact, if you go to the library archive and get that magazine out, the first parts are there, and then there’s a blank in the date. And then the very next issue of the paper has in pencil on the front, June 2nd, NP, not printed. So, you know, this had been accepted as that’s what happened. It wasn’t printed.

And this story is lost forever. But…

I had been going through newspapers and photographing everything. Remember I said, collect stuff even if you don’t need it. So the stories in the Bucks Free Press, the ones with Uncle Jim, were not given titles. When you look at Terry’s collections of children’s short stories that have recently been issued, there are titles in there. Those are titles that Colin made up because we had to call them something.

So the missing element of the Bucks Free Press was thought gone forever, but I had photographed everything. And at the end of the day, when I wanted to tie a piece of newsprint to a title, I would use Colin’s website. Because Colin would say, this was published on these dates in August 1972, under the title, Mr Flopsy Has an Adventure, or whatever.

So I was going through these and matching them all up. And I went to the website, and it went for Jan 2nd, and this story was never printed. I thought, it is, I’ve got it on the other computer screen. And I looked back to the other computer screen, and I hadn’t got it on the other computer screen. Not a trace of it.

I thought, odd.

Francine: We’re starting to get like lingering smell of bananas type mystery here, aren’t we?

Pat: Yeah. So I had accidentally closed one window too many, but I went back and sorted through the files again. In fact, there it was.

But it wasn’t in the newspaper that the other four parts were in. The missing newspaper, the June 2nd edition, had never gone on sale. It had been given away inside another newspaper.

Inside the, and again, Jan will correct me, the Midweek Free Press.

Jan: That’s right. Yeah.

Pat: Oh, a sweetie. Right. I get a reward for getting one right.

Jan: It’s complicated, this story.

Pat: The story had been misfiled for 40 years, 50 years.

Francine: Incredible.

Pat: And I’m kind of more proud of that one than the massive Quest for the Keys. When we started out, we knew The Quest for the Keys existed. We just didn’t know where. The Patrick Cairns stuff, nobody knew existed. So we weren’t looking for it.

But the little missing bit of Mr Brown’s adventure was known to have existed and been lost. And somehow to have lost a bit of Terry’s writing seemed so terrible. Somehow it seems worse than not knowing of it, but to know that you’ve lost it.

Francine: Yeah. And to find it where so many others had failed.

Jan: Yeah. The whole story’s in the book, isn’t it now?

Pat: It is.

Francine: Oh, super.

Pat: And the other thing I like about it is it uses a literary device that Terry reuses in one of the Discworld novels. And I won’t tell you what it is. You can find it out.

Francine: Fantastic. I look forward to that.

Pat: That’s not a sales pitch for the book. I don’t get commission.

Francine: No, no. I don’t think you really need to do the hard sell on our audience, to be honest.

Pat: No, no.

Pratchett was “one of the best authors from a fan’s perspective”

Pat: I did once ask Terry at a convention, “Do you ever look round and think, what have I done?”

He said, “Every bloody day.”

But I have to say, I think he was one of the best authors from the fan’s perspective that has ever been.

Again, I did once ask him, “If you didn’t spend so many hours at signings, just writing your name over and over and over again, how many more Discworld novels would there be?”

And he said, “I think there’d be about half as many.”

Francine: Oh, well, that’s wonderful.

Pat: He loved talking to his fans and he took inspiration from them.

Francine: That is lovely.

Yeah. In Rob’s book, A Life with Footnotes, I did enjoy the early stories of Pratchett going to a couple of conventions himself and speaking to the greats and that inspiring him. And it is wonderful how that carried on to his ethos with dealing with fans later. That’s fantastic.

Tying in slightly with what we were saying earlier about the news groups, the forums and everything. One of my favourite little random bits of research to do before we start covering a book is to find his comments in those news groups about that particular book. And I do enjoy how cantankerous he gets sometimes with the bad annotations.

Pat: Oh, yes, yes. There’s the public Terry Pratchett and the Neil Gaiman Terry Pratchett. Neil paints a more realistic picture. But kindly.

Francine: Yeah, no, absolutely. I mean, it was at the same time lovely. I think, yeah, it’s just funny when you pick out the “I’m sick of this” ones.

Outclassing Mr Flopsy and dismissing writer’s block

Francine: So all these stories then, you found these wonderful gems. And at what point did they coalesce into we’re going to make a book out of these? Was it Colin Smythe?

Pat: It was Colin. Yeah.

Jan: I mean, we had no inkling that they were going to go into a book or when it took some time before we found that out.

Francine: Cool. So you were saying you’d seen some kind of a literary device definitely used and we’ve had the name Morpork. Once you started reading these, these stories under the aliases or under Pratchett’s name, was it easy to see him in there or the beginnings of his style, his work?

Pat: I can definitely tell you that Terry style was very, very different to all the other children’s writers writing for those newspapers at that time. How he compares to the sort of the greater universe of children’s authors, I’m not sure I’m qualified to judge.

But you’ll know that in– have you got to The Amazing Maurice in your read through yet?

Francine: Yeah.

Pat: It’s not really a spoiler anyway, but the rats have a book: Mr Bunsy Has an Adventure.

And there are some extracts from Mr Bunsy Has an Adventure and they are written in the style of the other writers from the early newspapers. The terrible, “Mr Flopsy hopped down the bank. Hoppity hoppity hoppity”.

So I think he was letting it out at that point. “This is what they expected me to write, but I knew better.”

Francine: Oh, you love the idea of a child picking up that edition of the newspaper and not knowing what hit them.

Joanna: No stories could do that.

Francine: Superb. Obviously, you were massive Pratchett fans already, putting it very lightly there. Did it, did all this kind of give you a new appreciation of Pratchett’s writing or a new, new angle to look at it from, or just adding to the foundation?

Pat: We’re pretty much so deep in that… the wrecked oil tanker on the bottom of the ocean does not notice the ripples on the surface.

Francine: Oh, what a nice metaphor.

Jan: I think it’s nice to see, you know, the early, the early stuff and, as we’ve said, yeah, how he developed.

Pat: Yeah. We’d read a lot of his journalistic nonfiction a few years ago when we were helping Colin again and see how he would cope with stories that you might think were unsalvageable.

Like, there are some ducks nesting in the cooling pond of this power plant. Write 300 words on it. Or, the local amateur dramatic group are doing Iolanthe this week. Go and write a report.

He was forced to write in a hundred topics, which he had no personal interest in, but he had to be good. He had to get the numbers out. He had to get the words out. He had to get the word count right. He had to make it readable. And that was, that was interesting.

Francine: Yeah. See how he developed the discipline.

Pat: Yes. Yes. He was reputed to have said about writer’s block, “I have a way of dealing with writer’s block. I sit down and I write.”

Because you’re a journalist, a junior journalist particularly, you have no sympathy for writer’s block. Get out there and write it.

Francine: “Boo hoo. Anyway, this was due an hour ago.” Yeah, absolutely.

Upcoming events

Francine: So, A Stroke of the Pen is obviously coming out when this releases in just a couple of days, we’ve got the talk at the British Library coming up. Are you doing any more kind of promo, interesting events, that kind of thing?

Pat: Yes. We’re going to the Yeovil Literary Festival where we’ll be speaking, and being interviewed in Waterstones, and we’re going to an independent bookshop in Taunton a couple of days later.

Jan: Taunton.

Pat: Did I say Taunton?

Jan: Yeah. Yeah. No, it’s right.

Pat: Oh, good. Right. Me getting something right is so unusual that she has to come in.

Francine: Ah, super.

Pat: You know, and given that we are based in Yorkshire, this is the obvious place for us to be talking.

My local Waterstones? No, no interest at all. Taunton? Yeah, fine. Do come down.

Joanna: Nice excuse for a holiday in November.

Pat: Well, as luck would have it, I’m going to a convention in Plymouth the day before one of those tours. I can’t remember which one. So we actually can make it without it being too inconvenient.

Francine: Ah, super. Yeah. No, that’s not the easiest place to get to in the country, is it?

Joanna: Am I right in saying you’ll be at the Irish convention, Discworld convention in October as well?

Pat: Oh yes.

Joanna: Yes, you’ll be auctioning.

Pat: Take that for granted, yes.

Discworld memorabilia – the gargantuan collection

Francine: Moving on then from A Stroke of the Pen, if that’s all right. The thing you’re perhaps best known for within the Discworld circles is your incredibly impressive collection of oddities and ephemera and Discworldian miscellanea.

Pat: Yeah, I think that’s reasonably said. I never started collecting. It just happened.

Joanna: That’s what they all say.

Pat: I mean, if you, if you look around the house, you will find wardrobes crammed with convention programs, bars of chocolate from different conventions. It’s probably not edible anymore.

Francine: Well, everything’s edible once.

Pat: The Irish convention produced bars of chocolate.

All sorts of strange things. I have a shell casing from a nine millimetre Glock pistol that Terry fired.

Jan: You’ve still got the pickle somewhere.

Pat: I’ve still got the Holy Pickle.

The Holy Pickle

Francine: Yes, can you tell us about the pickle, please?

Pat: You wish to be initiated into The Order of the Pickle?

Francine: If that’s acceptable. Again, I found clues on the forums from many years ago.

Pat: Sometime around the, I don’t know, 2006, something like that. I’m not sure. There used to be biannual meetings in Wincanton where Bernard has the Discworld Emporium.

So every six months we would all bundle in the car and go down there.

And one of the events was always the charity auction. And this particular year, Terry had grown some onions in his own garden, pickled them and given them to Bernard as a Christmas present, since both Bernard and Terry are very fond of pickled things. Pickled walnuts, pickled eggs… you name it, they’ll have a go pickling it.

So Bernard ate the pickles, enjoyed all the pickles – all bar one, which he put back in the jar, sealed up and put in the auction as “a pickled onion grown by Terry Pratchett”. And I bought it. And the next time we were in Wincanton, I took it back and I put it back in the auction and I bought it again. And then I took it back and this time I let somebody else have it for a go. But when they brought it back the following year, I bought it again.

And I don’t know how many times I’ve bought it now, but it’s got to the point where you can’t tell there’s a pickle in there anymore. The liquor has gone opaque, or at least opalescent.

If the lighting is just right, if you happen to walk into the room at just the right time of day, you might glimpse the holy pickle. But basically, you will never see it. You have to believe in it.

Francine: It sounds like a ghost story. I love it. “…and on a quiet night, you can still hear the bells ringing.”

Pat: “On a quiet night, you can still hear Bernard burping over the last pickle.”

Francine: Much better.

The Luggage, the auctions, and the canoes

Joanna: Have you still got the prop luggage?

Pat: Oh, I do. Yes, he was out for his annual barbecue just a few weeks ago.

I went with Terry to one of his honorary degrees. I think it was Warwick, University of Warwick.

And over lunch, he said, “Would you like to have your own luggage?” This was shortly after Colour of Magic had been filmed.

And I thought for a moment, and I said, “Well, Terry, I would absolutely love to have my own luggage, but what could I do with it?

“It’s enormous. I can’t have it in the living room. I wouldn’t be able to see the television past it. It’s a lovely offer. Thank you very much. Thank you for thinking of me. But I have to say no.”

And he said, “Oh, well, never mind. I’ll think of something else.”

And he put it into the auction at the Birmingham Convention. So when it came to the auction, people were bidding, people were bidding. And then I suddenly realized who was bidding, or at least who one of the two bidding were.

And who might that have been?

Jan: Well, I just waved my paddle at the right time, you know. I knew he wanted it. It would go in the garden.

Pat: So we ended up paying 400 quid for something I could have been given for free. But anyway, we got it, and it’s for charity.

Now, the thing about film props – I have a couple of other ones as well – the thing about film props is they are designed to look good from a certain distance for a very short period of time. They tend to be fragile. They don’t look terribly good close up.

The luggage actually does look quite nice close up, but it was terribly fragile. He’s fibreglass.

I’m saying “he”– I think that’s canonical, isn’t it?

Francine: Yes.

Pat: It’s quite fragile, made of fibreglass. And I thought, well, I know what I’ll do. I’ll pop down to Halfords, get some of the kits you get for mending car wings that have taken a dent, little patches of fibreglass. And I went down to Halfords and I found that enough to make a repair a hole about the size of a teaspoon was a ridiculous amount of money.

Francine: Oh, no.

Pat: To try and do the whole luggage was going to probably double the price.

So I thought, oh, well, never mind. I’ll think of something else.

And then I had a sudden thought. I work at a university which has a lot of students and students have societies. One of those societies will be a canoeing club. They will be used to mending fibreglass and buying it in industrial quantities. I will get on to them.

So I abused my powers as the moderator of the students mailing list to send a message to all the medical students. I’m retired now, so I can’t get into trouble, It’s all right.

Francine: Oh, well, that’s a fairly low level abuse of power, isn’t it?

Joanna: I think you can get away with that one.

Pat: What’s the point of having power if you don’t abuse it, I always say.

Francine: Absolutely.

Pat: So I sent an email out saying, anybody here in the canoe club knows about mending boats.

And a couple of days later, I got a reply back from one of my students saying, I’m not in the canoe club, but my boyfriend has a business making fibreglass boats. So he’s got all the raw materials. He’s got all the equipment. He’s got the ovens. He’s got everything. He can do it.

I said, oh, that would be brilliant. So he came around and had a look at it and said, yeah, I can do that. Stuck it in his car, set off.

It’s a very slow process because he built a wooden frame and then coated the inside with fibreglass and then had to let it mature for a long time. So it was about two, three months before I got it back again.

And when he brought it back, he said, “I had it sitting out in the workshop, ready to bring back to you. One of my other customers came in and said, ‘Is that the luggage?’”

So the luggage had fans of its own. And now he lives in my garden under a barbecue cover. And then once or twice a year when we have a Discworld themed barbecue, he comes out and takes pride of place.

Discworld barbecues and quizzes

Francine: Oh, superb.

Joanna: That’s lovely.

Francine: What else happens at a Discworld themed barbecue?

Pat: We eat food, and we have a quiz.

The quiz is usually horribly, horribly difficult because people do this teams and can take time. So it’s not the sort of the Mastermind style, “What was the name of Twoflower’s child” or whatever. They do tend to be quite difficult.

For example, the Sedan Chair Challenge. If somebody wants to get from here to here, which of these routes?

“Sam Vimes wants to get home from the watch house to Ramkin Manor, what streets does he go down?”

Now that looks like an absolute git of a question, but it was written as multiple choice. There were four to choose from, and of course you look for one that starts in Pseudopolis Yard and ends in, is it Spoon Avenue?

Joanna: Scoone Avenue.

Pat: Scoone Avenue, yeah. So if you know where the Ramkins are, you can see that he has to end up there and he has to start somewhere where there’s a watch house. So it’s actually very easy.

And that’s the thing I most like about the quizzes. You hand them out and people go, “Oh, I hate you, hate you, hate you.”

And then I explain to them how easy they are, and they go, “I really, really hate you now.”

“We could have done that. We did know.”

Joanna: It’s not a barbecue without inducing some rage. An essential part of the gathering.

Francine: That’s why I enjoy your gatherings so much, Joanna.

Joanna: Thank you.

More jewels of the collection

Francine: So do you have any other bits in the collection that you’re particularly proud of that you’d like to mention in the roundup?

Pat: Um, it’s very, very difficult to say.

I suppose the nicest is the golden bee that Terry or Rob commissioned to have made for me, which is a beautiful work of art and an honour to have been given.

I tend to go for things because they’re odd rather than because there’s anything particularly special about them. So if you were at the last UK convention, you’ll have seen this item sold. I have a second one.

A few years ago, an American company called Hill House Press announced they were going to issue facsimiles of the Discworld novels. So I ordered the first three, which is as far ahead as you could order. And they delivered the first two and then went out of business. So there only are two facsimiles: The Colour of Magic and The Light Fantastic.

I found out about it in a slightly unusual way. I was at work and a parcel arrived for me and I opened it and I took out what appeared to be a pristine copy of the first edition of a Discworld novel.

And I thought, well, this is a really good copy. I’m going to give it a try. I opened it and I took out what appeared to be a pristine copy of the first edition of The Colour of Magic. The cover matched, the pages matched, the printer’s information on the inside matched, the ISBN matched.

Good grief.

And Terry had signed it just like the real thing and sent it to me. “Surely he’s not sending me a first edition Colour of Magic,” because even in those days, this was about 2000 quid, which is why I don’t have one.

And eventually I found a little disclaimer that said that this is a facsimile. So I had my facsimile signed by Terry for many years.

And then it occurred to me that Paul Kay, the actor, has sort of become the de facto Terry Pratchett. He played Terry in the Back in Black. And he’s also played various parts in Good Omens and The Watch, I think. But nonetheless, he has played Terry Pratchett.

So I got in contact with him through his agent saying, “If I was to send you a facsimile of The Colour of Magic, would you, as the facsimile Pratchett, sign it for me for the charity auction?

With lots of disclaimers about I am not some random nutter. I’m a very specific nutter.

Francine: Here are my nutter credentials.

Pat: Rob Wilkins, I hope, will vouch for me. What have you got back to me? Yeah, yeah, send them off. So I sent it off and he signed it: “Nothing like the real thing, Paul Kay”. So there is now a facsimile The Colour of Magic, signed by the facsimile Pratchett. There are only two – I’ve got one, Rob Wilkins has the other, which he bought at the charity auction.

Three Lifetimers

Francine: Amazing. Excellent. And I suppose a slightly background question on it is, what made you want to collect all these things? We’ve been talking a lot about collection instincts because we’ve been reading Going Postal and obviously Stanley and his pins and his stamps and everything like that.

This is a very vague question, but what is it that brings you joy about it?

Pat: I Really don’t know. I was never a collector of stamps, for example. I collect books, or rather I never let a book go. I buy a book, I read it, it goes on the shelf. You can call that collecting if you like. But somehow the Pratchett stuff just built up and up.

And some stuff, you know, you sort of can’t get rid of that. To my right is a lifetimer from Hogfather.

Joanna: Is that one of the film props?

Pat: Yes, a film prop.

And I ended up with that by accident in that I was giving Rob a hand shifting stuff to the auction. We ended up in a very dark car park. When I unloaded the boot, the black lifetimer got left behind in the badly lit car.

Francine: Oh no.

Pat: It wasn’t until the following day that I realised it was still there. So I acquired it semi-illicitly. I did pay the equivalent into the charity auction to account for it.

But a few years ago, it got broken. We were burgled. And the burglar alarm went off in the middle of the night. We rushed downstairs. There in the living room, the TV unit’s been pulled over. And there on the floor, surrounded by sand and broken glass, is the lifetimer.

Francine: Oh, very ominous.

Pat: And Jan looked at me as if he’s going to go librarian poo over this, isn’t he?

I just looked at it and said, 17 seconds. Which, the number may well be wrong. It’s what Death says when Albert drops his lifetimer and it breaks, he picks up the rest, 17 seconds. So anyway, I now have the wooden stands. I have the sand, and some broken glass, which is not all that useful.

I thought, oh well, somehow this got made. I will find out who made it and where he got the thing from. So I emailed Rod Brown, one of the producers who made Hogfather and Colour of Magic. And I said, “Do you know where you got this from?”.

He said, “Uh, no. We just asked props if they could get one. They did.”

Okay. So I then went on the internet and just looked for hourglasses and hunted and hunted and hunted. And eventually I found a company who actually make, among other things, little glass beads that go into fire extinguisher sprinkler systems that burst at a particular temperature and let the water through.

They do all sorts of specialist glassware, including an hourglass which was the right size to fit in the stand I had. I’d measured up what I had.

So I then contacted them and said, “I want one of these. Will it fit a stand this size?”

And they said, “Yes. Do you know, we sold an awful lot of these about a year ago to a film company.” So I had actually found the right company.

I was able to, to, to repair it, put it back together. In the interim, I mentioned to Rod Brown that it had got smashed and he said, “Oh, I’ve got a spare one. Next time you’re in London, drop by the office and pick it up.”

So the next time I was in London, I dropped by his office. He was out, but his assistant was there, who said, “Yes, he’s left it in his office. I’ll go get it.” And he went, he got it, and he brought back a God’s lifetimer, which is about twice the size.

A very impressive piece of piece of proppery. But far too big to go in the box I had brought to carry my lifetimer in. I spent some time wobbling gently down Oxford street, trying to not to drop this thing. Jan was in London at a meeting. The plan was I was just going to go shopping and have a nice time that afternoon and then meet her at the train.

But I thought, no, I can’t, I cannot carry this. I will drop it. So I went to the railway station and asked to be let into the first-class lounge, please. I haven’t got a ticket because my wife’s got them. And so they let me into the lounge, and I was able to sit with in isolation with this fragile object. It was brilliant. And then she arrived at the end of the afternoon to pick me up and said, we don’t have first class tickets.

Oh, well, yeah, these things happen.

Francine: You’ve got a lifetimer of a god, what more do they want?

That reminds me, I don’t know if you’ve seen it, but there was a thread on Twitter that got quite popular earlier in the week of one of the props department on Good Omens talking about– because they burnt the shop down at the end of series one and they really burnt it down. Everything was destroyed and they didn’t realise it was going to be a series two – and the struggles they’ve had putting back together the exact props for continuity and hand painting this antique sink in particular. I love all that stuff.

Jan: There was a similar thing about the Hobbit, wasn’t there, that they after the first Lord of the Rings film, the farmer had his farm cleared of all the props and then they decided we’re going to make some more. So then they set up a more permanent Hobbiton set and it’s still there. You can go visit.

Francine: Excellent.

Pat: Terry’s been in Bilbo’s burrow. We got to sit on the bench outside, we didn’t get to go in.

We weren’t there with Terry. Terry had been sometime before and recommended it.

Francine: That’s slightly less sad than being left outside then.

Joanna: “He’s allowed in, you have to wait here.”

Miscellaneous topics

Favourite Discworld books

Joanna: We’ve got one last question, I think, which is one of our most annoying ones, but we have to do it because we’re a Discworld podcast–

Pat: Where do you get your ideas from?

Francine: Yeah. How do you write?

Joanna: Your favourite/top three Discworld books – with the caveat that we fully understand this is only your answer today and it could change in five minutes.

Pat: Discworld books. I think Mort. I have a fairly black sense of humour and the Death novels in general, I love. And if I have to pick only one of the Death novels, it’s Mort.

I just, just so many wonderful visual images in it. There’s a boy constructed entirely of knees. I think that’s the phrase, isn’t it? Everybody went to school with somebody who’s constructed entirely of knees, but never realised it until Terry put the words together.

Jan, do you want to have one of these?

Jan: Oh, well, I like the Witches series and also I’m a sucker for a police procedural. So, you know, anything to do with the Watch. Guards! Guards!, I’ve just finished reading and it’s so funny in places as well.

Pat: Yeah, Guards! Guards! was going to be my second choice as well, particularly the Elucidated Brethren of the Ebon Knight.

Board games and Bernard

Joanna: I finally found a copy of the Guards! Guards! board game recently and it is very fun to constantly read out the nonsense about the Elucidated Brethren of the Ebon Knight in the board game.

Francine: Oh, my Thud arrived, Joanna. We need to sit down and play.

Pat: Oh, if we can go back to the collection for a moment, I have an unusual Thud set.

When Bernard was doing the Discworld buildings, the Unreal Estate, there were 250 of us collecting them. My collector number was 235. I found out about them very late on and only just got one. In fact, that was how I first talked to Bernard – I found out online that somebody was making a model of the Unseen University, but they were going fast, and here’s the phone number.

I thought, well, it’s 10 o’clock on a Friday night. They’ll be closed, but I’ll leave a message on the answer phone. So I rang the number.

And the voice on the other end went, “Hello, Bernard here! How can I help you? Do you have any money? Answer the second question first.”

And I went, “Oh! A human being. I was expecting an answer phone.”

“Oh, no filthy answer phones here.”

So that was the first time I ever spoke to Bernard. And it was putting my number down to have an Unseen University model.

However, roll forward some years. Bernard, when Thud came out, made the Thud game, Thud box set. They also did a limited edition one. It’s a limited of 100. But I made a special plea that since my collector’s number was 235, could I have number 235? So mine is number 235 of 100.

And the Thudstone is three-sided, as Thudstones are. And one side is signed by Terry, one side is signed by Bernard, and one side is signed by Trevor Truran, who designed the game.

Francine: Super. Oh, well, that’s fantastic. Are you any good? Do you play?

Pat: I’m absolutely useless. Wiped out in seconds every time I play.

Francine: I’ve only just opened the instructions and I’m worried already, you see.

Joanna: Yes, but you’ll be playing against me, darling. You’ll be fine.

Francine: Are there a lot of Discworld Board games?

Pat: Well, there’s the Witches, Ankh-Morpork,

Joanna: I’m looking at mine up there.

Pat: The Clacks one.

Joanna: Yeah, that had a reissue recently.

Pat: Yeah. I think that’s it.

There are some of them available in more than one edition. There are others that were sort of in small numbers.

There’s one called Watch Out, which was a nice idea, but it never took off. You have a set of, I think it’s eight watch officers and a set of eight thieves, and a board. The board is made up of which are shuffled and dealt at the start of the game to make a random playing surface. Each piece has a colour and a shape on it. And the rules of movement are, I can’t remember them in detail, to do with, you can move on to something of the same colour or something of the same shape, or under certain circumstances, you can jump over other people.

The underlying thesis of the game is that each army is trying to get to the other side of the board, ideally without interacting. The Watch want to get home without having to do paperwork. The thieves want to get home without ending up in the tanty.

So, there are rules about whether you can be next to a policeman or whatever. There were only a small number of those made. I don’t know how many.

Francine: Oh, fantastic. Sorry, tangenting again there.

Joanna: There was one that I don’t think ever got properly made, or got a proper printing called The Gods. I found one person selling it recently, who was selling it for very cheap, and being told by everyone in the comments, no, please sell that for more money. It goes for a lot more.

Francine: Oh, it’s lucky it’s a nice fandom, isn’t it?

Pat: Trevor Truran also wrote card game rules for a Discworld set of cards. They’re based on the Tarot set. So, there are four suits, each with eight values. And then, I think it’s 64 in the minor Arcana. And it never went into production. Some sets were made by getting blank cards and writing on them.

To play within Wincanton. But I haven’t seen a set for years.

Francine: Oh, I’ll have to look into that. Excellent.

Pat: I think I have the rules. You can always create cards.

Joanna: Yes, yeah, exactly. I’ve got some blank cards and a sharpie.

Francine: Let’s have a Saturday.

Pranks on Pratchett

Francine: Is there anything that we haven’t covered that you would like to talk about?

Pat: Hmm. Not football.

Francine: Absolutely fair. We wouldn’t know.

Joanna: We’re looking forward to doing Unseen Academicals.

Francine: I kind of am. Some of the history of the really early stuff, and the 300 people brawling in the street. It’ll be fine, don’t worry.

Pat: Pranks I have played on Terry?

Francine: Ooh, yeah.

Pat: Not exactly a prank. I got a headset for a mobile phone, but it was like an old style Bakelite phone that you hold in your hand. A big thing. The sort of phone you normally associate with a rotary dial.

So I changed the ringtone on my phone to be the classic “ring ring” of an old-style phone. Stuck it in a little knapsack I was carrying, went and stood next to Terry, and got somebody to ring me.

So my bag starts going, “ring ring, ring ring, ring ring”.

I reach in, take out the phone.

“Hello?”

And then gave it to Terry, saying, “It’s for you.”

“You bastard,” was the phrase.

My other good telephone story is I was in the office one day. We worked in a big open plan office. And the phone rang and it was Terry. And that was the time he wanted to know about how much force it would take to tear somebody’s head off. And I talked to him for about a minute saying, yeah, I will have to go and look this up. This is not the sort of thing I carry in my head.

And at that point I spotted there was a new member of staff walking down the corridor towards me, a person I knew was a great Discworld fan.

And I said, “Terry, we’ve got a new member of staff who’s a big Discworld fan. Would you have a quick word with her?”

And he said, “Yeah, certainly.”

So I just said, Gillian, “Somebody on the phone wants a word,” and handed the receiver over.

And she went, “Gillian!” And then – I can’t do this on a Zoom link – but she just froze in the face, looked suspiciously at the phone, looked furiously at me, and went pink, cherry, lobster… And then they had an absolutely wonderful conversation about archaeology. Because she had previously been an archaeologist.

When they hung up, she handed me the phone back and said, “You bastard.”

Francine: Do a lot of stories end with somebody saying that?

Pat: Yeah.

The Discworld fan community

Francine: I’ll tell you what, actually, something I did want to ask, because you were at a lot of the early conventions and you’re still at the later ones. How was it seeing that kind of that fan community evolve over the years like that? It must have changed a lot since, what was it, ‘97, you would have started going, I suppose?

Pat: ‘98 was the first one. ‘96 was the first one in Liverpool. No, sorry, in Manchester. And then 98 was in Liverpool. I went to that one. And then 2000 got cancelled.

So, I haven’t got much view of the very early years. I was only at ‘98. That was only one out of the first three supposed conventions.

And I don’t know that they’ve changed that much. They’re probably a bit better organised. I don’t mean that from the point of view of the convention organising committee. They’ve always done an excellent job. But the fans are bringing more and more elaborate costumes and setups and whatever.

And on the other hand, fans are improvising on the day and doing incredibly well. I’ve seen people win the Maskerade with a costume they made that morning. Out of bits lying around in… oh, there’s a “Chaos Costuming”, a room that’s just got lots of sewing equipment and glue guns and fabric and whatever.

Alex Carlton, the guy I mentioned earlier, who did the dwarf seamstress, went as “Mr Troll [Shine], him Diamond”, on a costume made entirely out of wrapping paper, holographic wrapping paper and CDs hung on a fishing line to sparkle and glint.

Joanna: Fantastic.

Pat: There was a group who– where did they get the blue dye from? Anyway, I think four people had come as feegles and then, never having met before, entered the masquerade as four feegles. They managed to make a fake sheep out of hotel sheets and chairs and stuff and take the sheep, lift it up and send it hurrying backwards out of the auditorium. Terry liked that one.

The Zone of Flaming Death

Francine: I bet. Oh, super. Right. I will keep asking random questions until the cows come home, if I’m allowed.

Pat: I’ll keep giving random answers.

Francine: But yeah. Yes, I suppose, again, is there anything we haven’t covered that you would like to, because there’s just this entire world of topics surrounding Discworld and everything, but I’m conscious that you’ve already given us quite a lot of your time.

Is there anything that springs to mind as just an anecdote you’d like to tell about the general world of?

Pat: Me? Tell anecdotes. The suggestion of such a thing.

What about the time they blew up the Drum?

Francine: Okay. Yes.

Pat: For filming The Colour of Magic. I was lucky enough to be an extra, which I found out as Terry phoned me up and said, “We’ve been doing a draw for the places of extras and I’m afraid your name keeps coming up.”

So yeah. So we did our filming for the day and we knew that the Drum was going to be blown up that night. Now the setup for the filming was basically, there was a sort of a small open space with a road leading off it, leading to a T-junction and there were side ways in and out. It meant as you stood in the middle of this open space in front of the Drum, everywhere you looked, all you could see was Ankh Morpork. There was no way of looking back out into reality. It was all nicely cut off.

And what that meant was that the best place to see the Drum blow up was from the top of the T-junction. And we thought that’s where we’ll go. So we went there, and the director and the cameraman had thought that was the best place to do it as well. So we weren’t allowed to go there.

So we had to go somewhere else. So there was a security fence around the set and we thought, well, if we go out there. We can actually get right next to the Drum, but on the other side of the security fence. So as sun was going down, we went, we stood in the carpark, and we waited and we waited and we waited.

And some security guards came wandering around and they came to us and said, “Hey lads, what are you doing?”

“Oh, we’re waiting to see them blow up the Drum.”

One of them said, “I wouldn’t stand there if I was you.”

And we said, “Why not?”

He said, “You’re in the secondary effects zone.”

And I looked at his mate, and his mate said, “The zone of flaming death.”

So we thought, right, we’ll take a step away out into the car park. So we walked back a little bit into the car park. I thought, this will do. Now maybe a little bit further. So we walked a little bit further back into the car park. This will do. Now maybe just– I mean, there’s cars here. They wouldn’t do anything that would damage the cars. Probably a little bit further.

We went back a little bit further and then – Jason Anthony from Discworld Monthly was with me, and he was saying, “Look, there’s a camera over there.”

It turned out the ‘making of’ documentary people were filming it from outside the fences. So there’s a camera over there. And I said, “Oh, right. Cameras are expensive. They won’t have put that anywhere dangerous. Let’s go stand by the camera. So we walked up to the camera, and somewhere the mob have a little bit of film of me going, “Hi, my name is Pat Harkin. You may have seen me in previous films such as–” my best Troy McClure impression.

Anyway, so Jason and I went and sat by the camera and then three things happened at once.

I said, “This camera is running.”

Jason said, “Is that the ‘making of’ crew hiding behind that van over there?”

And the Drum said, KABOOM.

We went deaf. All the car alarms in the car park went off from the blast. And the air was full of little bits of burning polystyrene coming down. I still have the shirt I was wearing that night. It is covered in little black burn marks.

Francine: Tertiary effect zone.

Pat: The thing was, the next day we came onto the set and we were filming in the Drum. They blew it up without doing any damage to it at all. It was impressive. Sheets of flame, blasts of this and the other.

We were talking to the special effects guys later. One of the things they had done was there were air cannons behind the windows. So you flick a switch on the air cannon, it puffs a great blast of air and all the light stuff you want thrown out, it just goes ‘BLAM’ out the window. It looks like an enormous explosion, but it’s just basically a man with a souped-up hairdryer.

Francine: Oh, incredible. I hadn’t thought about that. Love those practical effects.

Pat: Oh, he said kerosene gives you flame, but no heat.

Francine: Standing there in your pockmarked shirt.

Joanna: We need to have another watch of the Sky adaptation so we can actually look for Rob and Jason and you.

Francine: Do you happen to be in Going Postal anywhere? That’s our next one, isn’t it?

Pat: Yes. Yes. Oh, yeah.

Jan: Our son, Patrick, as well, is in it.

Francine: All right. We’ll be looking out then.

Pat: I don’t know if they’re still online, but when it came out, Sky TV did some little interviews with various people, including Patrick and me about what it was like to be a fan and an extra.

Joanna: Excellent. Oh, that’ll be great. They must be on the internet somewhere. Or on the DVD. I forget. Real DVDs are still a thing with featurette.

Pat: The Hogfather DVD on some of the discs I’m on and the extras. They did the Twelve Days of Hogswatch.

Francine: Oh, yes. I’ve got you interviewing Death.

Pat: Yeah. That was in the museum of the biology department at the university.

Francine: Ah, best place for it.

Pat: For which Mob Films paid a rental of one pound and they paid me a fee of one pound. Well, money had to change hands for it to be legal for the contract. And that was the smallest amount that they could do. I like that.

I’ve still got the quids, actually.

They should have given it to us as a cheque. I would have just framed it and never cashed it.

Cataloguing

Francine: Do you have a catalogue of all your collection?

Pat: No. No, I don’t.

Jan: I’ve been trying to get him to do that.

Francine: You suddenly look very panicked. I’m so sorry.

Pat: Yes. This is a question of some importance. I have a list of some of the books, but I don’t have a list of anything else.

Francine: Yeah. I wonder if– there must be a real niche profession of stock takers of collectors, maybe.

Pat: Quite possibly. Yeah.

Jan: We had the building contents insurance renewed recently. It took some time to explain to them about the collection.

Pat: “This is a really valuable pickle.”

Francine: “No, I know you can’t see it. That’s the point.”

Joanna: Well, I don’t think there’s a better anecdote to end on than a large explosion.

Francine: No, that is how I like to end every–

Joanna: We do like to end on explosions, then we walk away from them in slow motion.

Francine: Sunglasses on.

Pat: Of course, there is an anecdote about Jason and me running away from an explosion. Silently over gravel, but never mind.

Joanna: Feel free to tell it. I mean, now you’ve started.

Pat: I’ve told you it now. We were being directed by the second unit director, and we had to run behind Rincewind and Twoflower with flames going off and this, that and the other.

It was a gravel path. We ran across it and the director came back and said, “Run quieter.”

“On gravel?!”

So I don’t know if it shows up, but Jason and I are doing this sort of stylised hopping from one leg to another to try and get across the gravel with as little noise as possible.

Strange lot, film people.

Joanna: Thank you very much for joining us for this very special episode of The Tree Shall Make You Fred.

Pat: It’s been our pleasure.

Joanna: We really appreciate it.

Francine: Yeah, it’s been fantastic. We’ll try and run away silently over the gravel as we, uh-

Pat: If you find the secret, let me know.

Joanna: A Stroke of the Pen is out on October 10th and you’ll be at the British Library that day?

Jan: Yes, that’s right. I think there’s online access as well.

Francine: Oh, are there streaming tickets? Well, indeed, then I will put a link to those in the show notes listeners. And I think that would be something a lot of us would enjoy. Some kind of some kind of live chat in the Discord as we all watch, perhaps.

Joanna: Thank you very much for listening to this episode of The Tree Shall Make You Fred. We’ll be back on Monday with the first part of Thud!.

Until next time, dear listener, you can join our Discord link in the comments. You can follow us on Instagram at @thetruthshallmakeyfret, on Twitter @makeyfretpod, on BlueSky @makeyfretpod, on Facebook at The Truth Shall Make Ye Fret. Join our subreddit community /r/TTSMYF. Email us your thoughts, queries, castles and snacks, thetreeshallmakeyfredpod@gmail.com. And to support this nonsense financially, go to patreon.com/thetruthshallmakeyfret and exchange your hard-earned pennies for some of the silly things we do.

Until next time, dear listener:

Pat and Jan: Don’t let us detain you.

[OUTRO MUSIC]

Pat: I’m going to get badges made. “Authors annoyed to order.”

Transcript: 123: Good Omens Season 2 Wrap-Up (The Horbs)

Back to episode/show notes >>

Note: Transcripts are produced with Whisper AI and PyAnnote – we don’t have time to edit them extensively, so both wording and speaker labelling will be inaccurate in parts.

JOANNA 0:00:00
and they can be wild gesticulating.

FRANCINE 0:00:04
I’ll be watching Staged. I only ever watched the first season of it, and that was during lockdown. And then I got through my I want to watch lockdown content phase and into my I never want to see anything about lockdown again phase. Yeah. And so I missed season two and season three, which I didn’t realize came out really recently. And so I’ve now watched season two. Well, I rewatched season one, watched season two, now watching season three. I forgot what assholes they are, like the characters they’re playing. It caught me off guard because I’ve been watching loads of interviews with them.

JOANNA 0:00:33
And they’re so sweet.

FRANCINE 0:00:34
Yeah, they’re lovely. And absolutely adore each other. Like Michael Sheen staring at David Tennant in adoration as he speaks is very funny because it is very good omen. Except now Michael Sheen is heavily bearded and speaks in a heavy Welsh accent with a deep voice. But yeah, on stage, obviously, the the shtick is that they’re both incredibly cantankerous. And I haven’t watched season three yet.

JOANNA 0:00:57
I think I watched season two when it came out. Yeah, the lockdown content thing is weird, though. Like I was showing my partner Mythic Quest and I hadn’t rewatched it for ages. And we got to the lockdown episode and I just started crying.

FRANCINE 0:01:08
Oh, yeah.

JOANNA 0:01:10
It’s not even one of the good crying episodes in Mythic Quest.

FRANCINE 0:01:14
Oh, it is. Some of it is.

JOANNA 0:01:16
It is a little bit. It’s the bit where Poppy starts crying.

FRANCINE 0:01:18
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think that probably did make me cry as well, actually, because I remember it. That’s that’s how I remember things.

JOANNA 0:01:25
I mean, as lockdown content goes, that was a very clever, well-done episode of television.

FRANCINE 0:01:30
Yeah, it was. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:01:32
It just also gave me emotions.

FRANCINE 0:01:35
That’s probably meant to, innit? Yeah, probably what they were going for. Fucking people giving me emotions.

JOANNA 0:01:41
Coming in here, I finally am watching. And just like that, the Sex and the City reboot.

FRANCINE 0:01:47
Oh, how’s that?

JOANNA 0:01:50
Well, I’ve seen so many clips from it on TikTok and people bitching about it that I thought I should watch it for myself. So I know it’s coming to the end of the second season.

FRANCINE 0:01:56
I’m still on the first.

JOANNA 0:01:57
It is the criticisms are valid, I would say.

FRANCINE 0:02:01
Yeah, it is.

JOANNA 0:02:02
In trying to be progressive, it comes off as very

FRANCINE 0:02:06
how you doing, fellow kids? Eee. Also, my favourite one isn’t in it.

JOANNA 0:02:12
Yeah, same.

FRANCINE 0:02:14
Do you remember when? Samantha, the first woman I saw topless on the television.

JOANNA 0:02:18
Oh, that’s nice.

FRANCINE 0:02:20
I remember very clearly being far too young to be watching her riding a man in fairly explicit detail. Yeah, she’s topless. If she’s not, I’ve imagined she was.

JOANNA 0:02:30
I’m pretty sure that’s probably the first topless woman I saw on television as well.

FRANCINE 0:02:33
Yeah, I mean, it’s a good start. Yeah, it’s fine. But yeah, I did really like Sex and the City when I was a child, I guess, and young teenager. But it’s in the same way that Friends is difficult to revisit. I feel like that’s going to be times ten. So I just never have.

JOANNA 0:02:50
I actually didn’t watch like all of it when I was sort of child slash young teenager and it was on because my mother eventually realised it was inappropriate and to maybe not leave me alone with the DVDs. But I watched all of it as like an adult, like, I don’t know, five or six years ago, I was like, oh, this is a huge cultural phenomenon.

FRANCINE 0:03:08
I should get around to it.

JOANNA 0:03:10
And it does hold up like it’s of its time. It’s very of its time. Some of the politics are really weird, especially around things like bisexuality. But for all that, like it is an entertaining watch. It doesn’t suck as a show.

FRANCINE 0:03:24
That’s cool.

JOANNA 0:03:25
Do you remember the whole thing of like everyone had to sort of everyone would say if they were a Samantha or a Carrie or a Charlotte or a Miranda?

FRANCINE 0:03:33
Yeah. Yeah, that was a thing. I remember where I came down on that. Probably nowhere because I didn’t really have that kind of friend group at the time. But I certainly remember it being in Miz and Cosmo or whatever.

JOANNA 0:03:44
Yeah, I think I’d probably say I’m a Samantha based on now.

FRANCINE 0:03:48
Yeah. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:03:49
Yeah, I probably wasn’t saying that when I was 12 years old.

FRANCINE 0:03:53
I don’t think I can remember the difference between Charlotte and Miranda.

JOANNA 0:03:57
Miranda was the ginger one who’s a lawyer and who’s played by Cynthia Nixon,

FRANCINE 0:04:01
who’s a very well known out queer actress.

JOANNA 0:04:05
And Charlotte’s the like longer haired brunette one who’s a bit prissy.

FRANCINE 0:04:09
Yeah. But like personalities. Oh, I think that was it. Lawyer and prissy.

JOANNA 0:04:14
Wow. The two genders.

FRANCINE 0:04:15
You fucking feminist.

JOANNA 0:04:18
I’m trying to think if there’s any other news. Yeah. Board game tablecloth magnets don’t work. So I’ve decided to disavow all magnets ever.

FRANCINE 0:04:27
Fridge? Devoid of magnets?

JOANNA 0:04:30
No, I have like a big magnetic weekly schedule thing on my fridge.

FRANCINE 0:04:34
I never write on it. That’s issuing it. It’s fine. Yeah. In fact, that’s worse because you’re letting it know it should have a purpose and it doesn’t. That’s fine.

JOANNA 0:04:41
We’re talking absolute bollocks.

FRANCINE 0:04:42
So we absolutely are.

JOANNA 0:04:44
Do you want to make a podcast?

FRANCINE 0:04:45
Yeah, let’s make a podcast.

Intro and Big Thoughts

JOANNA 0:04:51
Hello and welcome to The True Shall Make You Fret, a podcast in which we’re usually reading and recapping every book from Terry Pratchett’s Discworld series in chronological order. But we’ve taken a break from that to talk about Good Omens Season Two. I’m Joanna Hagan.

FRANCINE 0:05:01
And I’m Francine Carrel. And what a break it has been. What a break. An emotional break as well as a physical one. Quite literally emotionally broken.

JOANNA 0:05:09
Now, this is our last episode for now on Good Omens Season Two. It’s our big wrap up episode before we go back to the disc. So notes on spoilers before we crack on. This episode will contain spoilers for all of Good Omens Season Two, as well as the book Good Omens and Season One of Good Omens. However, while we are usually a Discworld podcast, we will avoid spoiling any major events in the Discworld series. And of course, we’re saving any and all discussion of the final Discworld novel, The Shepherd’s Crown, until we get there. So if you’re new to the Discworld, you can safely come on the journey with us.

FRANCINE 0:05:42
Driving carefully in a yellow Bentley belonging to your beloved. Oh, I’m sorry.

JOANNA 0:05:48
So I start with the big thoughts.

FRANCINE 0:05:51
All right.

JOANNA 0:05:51
What do you think of Season Two of Good Omens?

FRANCINE 0:05:54
Well, Joanna, what do I think of Season Two of Good Omens? I enjoyed it, I think. I think I overall enjoyed it very much. I don’t know what to say overall. That’s that’s quite a big one to start with, isn’t it?

JOANNA 0:06:07
That is a big one to start with.

FRANCINE 0:06:09
I thought we’d go big and then shimmy down.

JOANNA 0:06:11
How do you feel it kind of compares to Season One of Good Omens?

FRANCINE 0:06:15
Very different. Yeah, just a very, very different way of telling the story. I think I still think Season One was better paced. Yeah, I agree. That is that was just the side effect of having, you know, a very tight, well-written book as the framework, as opposed to this where Neil Gaiman had all the time he needed to take to get us to, you know, it’s a bridge. And it was an enjoyable bridge to meander across.

JOANNA 0:06:45
I feel like this is a very distinct beast from the first series,

FRANCINE 0:06:50
and I think, like, fingers crossed we get a Season Three.

JOANNA 0:06:53
Looking back on it, it’ll be like Season One and then Season Two and Three, and they’ll be in a box, in two boxes, but very close to each other.

FRANCINE 0:07:01
I should think. And I’m imagining, and I know we’ll go over this later, I’m imagining Season Three to be a bit more like Season One. And it’s… In its pacing and build up.

JOANNA 0:07:12
I think it’s going to have a big thing it’s building towards,

FRANCINE 0:07:15
which I think will affect the pacing thing.

JOANNA 0:07:18
I think the pacing for this, like just thinking about this as a unique series of television, although it’s weirdly paced, I think that’s because it relies on having a very deep investment in the central couple

FRANCINE 0:07:30
to build towards the outcome. Yeah. And again, the only thing that bothered me about the pacing really was as I was watching it the first time going, well, we’re nowhere.

JOANNA 0:07:42
Yeah, I want to get to somewhere. I feel like a lot of the pacing issues would have been fixed if it had been a weekly drop rather than a binge drop. I think spacing it out into those six weekly chunks would have actually helped it.

FRANCINE 0:07:54
I mean, maybe, but we didn’t watch it all in one go.

JOANNA 0:07:57
No, but we did what we did, like blocks of one and two and three and four, and we were watching it kind of weird. I don’t know about how you watch it for doing the podcast, but I was like watching two episodes and then watching them again. And taking notes on them. And then pretty much since we were done recording, I was watching two episodes and then waiting for a few days. So I was sitting a lot with individual episodes. I think if it was more evenly paced out across six weeks, I would have felt differently about it.

FRANCINE 0:08:24
Yeah. I also think it’s possibly unfair for us to judge the pacing on that particular pattern of watching, though. Oh, yeah, absolutely. Yeah. As a unique series of television, I think I agree. If you weren’t invested already, it would be a very odd thing to watch. Oh, yeah. But the fact is that Crowley and Aziraphale, or honestly, more specifically, Sheen and Tenant, are such engaging, incredible characters to watch that I would have watched them in fucking anything. It was fantastic. I love the detail and the aesthetic and the weird little… I loved all the flashbacks and that shit. And any shortcomings I saw elsewhere was mainly just because it was put next to Sheen and Tenant, who I do think are absolutely stupendous actors.

JOANNA 0:09:12
Yeah, that’s absolutely fair. I mean, it did feel immediately like we were back in the world of Good Omens season one. It didn’t feel that distinctly different. You know, the music was there, they were there. The beautiful look of the whole thing was there.

FRANCINE 0:09:23
Which is interesting because it was very different the way they filmed it, wasn’t it? Because they built this whole bit of Soho in Edinburgh, whereas beforehand they’d been freezing their tits off somewhere. I can’t remember where, but certainly not…

JOANNA 0:09:33
They filmed a lot in South Africa for the first season.

FRANCINE 0:09:37
Yeah, obviously not the location I meant. They were freezing their tits off in… But no, I know what you mean.

JOANNA 0:09:42
There were some more locations that shoot. There was things like issues with getting into the Globe to do a location shoot was a big thing. They had burned down a whole bookshop that they then had to rebuild, I guess.

FRANCINE 0:09:53
Yeah, yeah. If you are going to burn your bookshops, as they say.

JOANNA 0:09:57
Don’t burn your bookshops before they’re hatched.

FRANCINE 0:09:59
Yep. Don’t put all your sets in one bonfire. Right, this analogy is going to destroy us. And the bookshop we’re in.

JOANNA 0:10:10
So we got a bit unhinged as we were talking through the series.

FRANCINE 0:10:16
We did, but I think that’s fine. I think on the scale of stuff I’ve read on the internet, we weren’t too bad. No, I think we were doing okay.

Predictions and Payoffs

JOANNA 0:10:27
So let’s start with stuff that we kind of got right and things that, you know, did come together in the end. So the fly.

FRANCINE 0:10:35
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:10:36
We spotted the fly. We thought it was an important fly. According to Neil Gaiman, all flies were CGI, even Rodney the stunt fly.

FRANCINE 0:10:43
Good to know. No flies eaten or drilled into an angel’s eye in the making of this series.

JOANNA 0:10:49
But good effort from Rodney anyway.

FRANCINE 0:10:51
Well done, Rodney.

JOANNA 0:10:52
So it was relevant.

FRANCINE 0:10:54
It was relevant.

JOANNA 0:10:56
Possibly not quite in the way I thought it was going to be. I thought it was going to be a Beelzebub spying on things situation.

FRANCINE 0:11:02
Well, I think one of my wild tangents was that there was going to be memory in the flies. So I’m feeling pretty fucking happy about that.

JOANNA 0:11:10
Yeah, you should be proud of that.

FRANCINE 0:11:11
However, I didn’t notice the fly until you pointed it out. So.

JOANNA 0:11:15
I’m a 50-50 win. Also, if you’d asked me to predict which heavenly person Beelzebub was having a secret affair with, I would have gone with Michael.

FRANCINE 0:11:25
You reckon? Well, I mean. Michael’s so uptight. Oh, I get it. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:11:30
Yeah, we saw Michael going through back channels in season one. So it’s not like Michael hadn’t interacted with hell before.

FRANCINE 0:11:39
What’s Michael’s motivation all about, actually? This is not the tangent we need to be on right now. But Michael is power hungry. Yeah, that’s it.

JOANNA 0:11:47
If you look at the very upstart, well, I’m looking after things for the Archangel. Well, the acting Archangel.

FRANCINE 0:11:54
Yeah, Michael’s middle management, well, upper middle management that found themselves in charge. And then a bit fucking weird with it.

JOANNA 0:12:01
Yeah, there’s a hint of Dwight Schrute about it.

FRANCINE 0:12:04
Yes. Yeah. Absolutely. Yeah, that’s it.

JOANNA 0:12:08
But God, imagine the Michael Beelzebub power couple vibes. I’m sure there’s a fanfic.

FRANCINE 0:12:14
I’m sure there is. Oh, yeah, absolutely. Wow, that’s something I haven’t even looked at yet. Looking at the fanfics.

JOANNA 0:12:21
I haven’t because there’s just there’s a rabbit hole that I don’t have time for. And as I’ll get to later, I read a 36-page Google Doc today. Sorry, spoilers for the letter of the episode. And I guess Beelzebub’s existential crisis kind of paid off as well.

FRANCINE 0:12:37
Tell me. Oh, yes, yes.

JOANNA 0:12:38
Episode three.

FRANCINE 0:12:39
Yes.

JOANNA 0:12:40
I want to be told I’m doing a good job. I feel like that was a hint of Beelzebub softening after their time with Gabriel.

FRANCINE 0:12:46
Yeah, because we were a bit conflicted about what that meant, weren’t we? Yeah. So I felt like… If they were still committed. I think you were saying that you weren’t sure if they were committed or whatever to the cause anymore. So yeah, I guess not.

JOANNA 0:12:58
There we go. So institutional problems.

FRANCINE 0:13:02
Institutional problems. I think we were not sure what the fuck Gabriel was on about with his very quick snippet. And turns out that the yes, it was. If it happened again, it would be seen as an institutional problem because they keep fucking losing and wiping the memories of high angels. Yep. Because that does seem like an institutional problem for me, to be honest. Yeah. Yeah, they’ve gone straight from like the head archangel to, yeah, we’re going to put him on earth and wipe his memory after one bickering incident.

JOANNA 0:13:35
I wasn’t even on earth. He was just going to be a really low level clerk. That reminds me, someone on our Patreon, I think it was Steve, but I can’t remember off the top of my head, or Steven, pointed out that Muriel is a clerk angel.

FRANCINE 0:13:48
She sounds like archangel. Ah, fuck. Yeah. All right. Love that.

JOANNA 0:13:55
So Aziraphale and Crowley, and what we were sort of thinking about them and that paying off.

FRANCINE 0:13:59
I have a couple thoughts. Please.

JOANNA 0:14:01
So right in the first episode, and when we were talking about it, I pointed out that you have this little interaction where Crowley talks about the life I’ve carved out for myself and Aziraphale says the life we’ve carved out for ourselves. And I feel like that’s a bit of an inciting incident.

FRANCINE 0:14:16
Okay, tell me.

JOANNA 0:14:18
Just in the, you know, Aziraphale’s the one that’s been thinking they’re an us already, and they don’t need to say it, and then realizes Crowley might not be thinking that way. And that might contribute to the poor communication that runs through the series

FRANCINE 0:14:31
and inevitably leads to sort of them walking out on each other. Yeah, I had some more thoughts about that kind of mismatch of commitment, actually. And I think it makes more sense the more I think about it, because, well, the more I think about the fact that Aziraphale still had that connection to heaven in his head. Because Aziraphale could maybe more afford to put his eggs in that basket with Crowley, because he had a couple eggs in the heaven basket still. Yeah. Whereas Crowley, if he put everything into this relationship, was, I mean, that was everything. Yeah, he didn’t have- If he didn’t maintain his independence, then once he lost to Aziraphale, that would have been absolutely fucked. And, you know, it kind of looks like it is.

JOANNA 0:15:18
Yeah, I mean, he does not really- I know Beelzebub offers a return to hell, but I don’t think it was a sincere offer.

FRANCINE 0:15:25
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:15:25
Especially it comes along with the threat.

FRANCINE 0:15:27
He killed another demon.

JOANNA 0:15:29
Like, I don’t think he’s- Even if after he got away with the holy water thing, I don’t think he’s encouraged to go back. He doesn’t have any eggs in the hell basket.

FRANCINE 0:15:36
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:15:36
And I don’t think he would want to have any eggs in the hell basket.

FRANCINE 0:15:39
Eggs in the hell basket.

JOANNA 0:15:40
Hell in a hand basket.

FRANCINE 0:15:41
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:15:43
I also thought it was interesting that a big part of the Job story is Crowley’s I’m a demon, I lie, considering the culmination of the whole series is Crowley’s, like, naked honesty.

FRANCINE 0:15:54
Yes.

JOANNA 0:15:56
Which I guess shows how far he’s come from just demon.

FRANCINE 0:16:01
Yeah. It’s- There’s character growth. I’m not sure if he ever really was just demon is the thing. That, honestly, the more I think about all of the things- The more I think back on it and come up with new headcanons and theories or whatever, the more I kind of focus on them as individuals rather than as a couple. Yeah. Like, Crowley’s- Like, fucking the trauma he must have gone through- Yeah. To go through that, from that sweet, the sweet being you see right at the beginning, to asking a question and being cast into hell. If you think about how those first few centuries must have been.

JOANNA 0:16:40
Yeah, absolutely.

FRANCINE 0:16:42
And that’s such, such trauma and Aziraphale never really quite seems to grasp that.

JOANNA 0:16:47
No, Aziraphale’s equivalent trauma is what happens with Job and all that really happens is he has to be sat on a beach for a minute.

FRANCINE 0:16:54
Yeah. Which, you know, none of us like to be sat on a beach for a minute, but he was sitting right next to David Tennant, so. Yeah, and it’s- I’ve never been traumatized by being sat on a beach. Yet. Give me time. Rose Tyler, sat on a beach next to David Tennant. Right? Never be on a beach with David Tennant. Well, that ruins my bank holiday plans.

JOANNA 0:17:15
Had a lovely little trip to the sea- I didn’t.

FRANCINE 0:17:17
Oh, sorry.

JOANNA 0:17:19
Oh, one last thing on Crowley and Aziraphale as well. This is directly from my notes on episode five, specifically talking about the Crowley and Jim conversation.

FRANCINE 0:17:27
Oh, yeah.

JOANNA 0:17:28
For Aziraphale, the side he’s on is right. They just go about things the wrong way. To Crowley, they’re all as bad as each other and he wants no part in it. The whole system is flawed. Aziraphale refuses to see that, applying his version of nice slash good to Crowley. And I’m not saying I’m really good at seeing where this was going to go. I just think the show set up incredibly well what that problem was between Aziraphale and Crowley before we got to episode six.

FRANCINE 0:17:51
I absolutely.

JOANNA 0:17:52
I thought that was a- looking back at my notes, the writing is now- this seems absolutely stunning to me in places.

FRANCINE 0:17:59
I mean, just the fact that Aziraphale was willing to shelter Gabriel like that. Yeah. I feel, yeah. Like, why didn’t- And Crowley was so fucking like, what the fuck are you doing? Right away.

JOANNA 0:18:10
It didn’t occur to Aziraphale to worry about Crowley’s feelings in that.

FRANCINE 0:18:14
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And like, it’s funny when he found out, like, Crowley go, what? Gabriel? kind of thing. And then, but you’re like, yeah, I mean, fuck. You just got- Your nightmares just appeared in Natoga. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:18:28
I’m just a giant tarantula in Natoga. Still terrifying to me.

FRANCINE 0:18:32
How does- now, I’m not going to make you think about that. Thank you.

JOANNA 0:18:36
Are you trying to work out whether it wrapped, like, a little bit around each leg? Yeah, no, me too. I’m trying not to picture it.

FRANCINE 0:18:42
How does the horse wear trousers? Why is it wrapped in, like, a writing desk? How do you put a tarantula in a zygote?

JOANNA 0:18:49
Anyway, so Nina and Maggie-

FRANCINE 0:18:51
Yeah, them. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:18:53
Obviously, I said, especially in the early episodes, it wasn’t working for me. I think it proved really well done and relevant at the end, though.

FRANCINE 0:19:03
I think so. I stick by- they did not seem as believable, but that is genuinely possibly because they were put next to the couple we most believe in.

JOANNA 0:19:15
And I think because the idea of them was so much that they seemed so story-like for the thunk at the end to be, hey, we’re not a story. Yeah. I think that really worked for me because the audience starts buying into them as a story before it buys into them as people as well. I felt that was part of why they were written so-

FRANCINE 0:19:32
Yeah, and why they were put as the focus of that weird- Yeah. Red herring, almost. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Hmm. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:19:41
Especially after Nina’s line in episode five of other people’s love lives are more interesting than our own, like the show was telling us.

FRANCINE 0:19:48
Very much, yes.

JOANNA 0:19:49
That their love life was a red herring.

FRANCINE 0:19:51
My love life is a red herring. That sounds like an exit. A sad memoir.

JOANNA 0:19:55
That sounds like the opening to like a very wanky spoken word piece that I want to write now. Doesn’t it? Yeah. Not related to Nina and Maggie, but something I forgot to put in the notes is that we didn’t get any more car queen.

FRANCINE 0:20:06
No, we didn’t. No, I was expecting to. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:20:10
We didn’t get any more Crowley driving until right at the end, which is when we get the sad angels thing playing instead.

FRANCINE 0:20:18
Yeah, I think I would have stuck with queen, but I understand why not, I guess. It was poignant in the moment.

JOANNA 0:20:23
It was poignant in the moment.

FRANCINE 0:20:25
Oh, right at the end. Right at the end. Absolutely. But I would have liked to see which queen songs Aziraphale provoke the car into.

JOANNA 0:20:32
Right. So things that we were completely off the wall about.

FRANCINE 0:20:36
Yeah. Many. Yeah, a lot.

JOANNA 0:20:39
I’m not going to list all of them. So Nina and Maggie secretly being angels or demons, we considered.

FRANCINE 0:20:46
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:20:48
I think in a particularly fevered moment.

FRANCINE 0:20:51
But I think. Well, we were very much in the mood that Aziraphale was doing some kind of fairy glamour and it wasn’t working on them. Yeah. And therefore. No, I get that. I still believe that they showed unrealistic resistance to his angelic charms, but fine.

JOANNA 0:21:13
It was a valid theory that was completely wrong.

FRANCINE 0:21:18
That’s very generous of us to ourselves.

JOANNA 0:21:21
Unless proved otherwise in season three.

FRANCINE 0:21:25
No, yeah, no. I think we were just hoping for a cool extra twist there, weren’t we? Yeah.

JOANNA 0:21:31
Gabriel lying.

FRANCINE 0:21:32
Yeah. I convinced myself that Gabriel could not be that fucking I’m about to walk out the window weird. Turns out, yeah, Gabriel heads empty no thoughts is just fully pliable.

JOANNA 0:21:45
And probably one of my favourite bits of the season.

FRANCINE 0:21:48
No one got hell fired or holy watered.

JOANNA 0:21:51
Yeah, that was just a random thought I had somewhere near the end of an episode,

FRANCINE 0:21:54
which I thought would be quite cool if one of them, if it looked like the end of the last season, except this time it really was Aziraphale getting hell fired or Crowley getting holy watered. But it didn’t hurt because it turns out there’s so much not like they were something, something, something which did not happen. And there’s no more. There’s no way I can spin that. There’s no way I can spin that.

JOANNA 0:22:19
Could happen in the next season.

FRANCINE 0:22:21
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:22:22
Crowley’s whole accent going posher towards the end of episode five, again, didn’t really,

FRANCINE 0:22:28
didn’t really pay off.

JOANNA 0:22:29
He does go to heaven, but he kind of goes back to not super posh once he’s in heaven.

FRANCINE 0:22:34
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:22:35
I think Aziraphale’s head being so buried in the sand about Gabriel I was theorising because he had some innate belief that Gabriel must be right. And I don’t think that really paid off. I think Aziraphale’s head was in the sand because Aziraphale’s head was in the sand.

FRANCINE 0:22:50
Yeah. Aziraphale’s just super good at burying his own head. Yeah. Turns out. Real good at that. Lovely hair this season though. Oh yes. Very tufty as I think someone in the Discord just put it. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:23:01
They said it was like little bits of feathers.

FRANCINE 0:23:04
It is, yes.

JOANNA 0:23:05
I thought this idea of kind of fairy food rules and being tied to humanity by eating was, maybe had more weight to it after I figured out that it related to fairy food rules than it did.

FRANCINE 0:23:18
No, disagree. I still think it was very relevant the whole time. Okay, cool. Maybe not exactly the fairy food rules, but let’s not pretend Neil Gaiman isn’t constantly aware of and vigilant about being tricked by the Fey folk. Even if it wasn’t deliberate, there’s no way that kind of constant thinking about the realm behind the veil does not seep into his work. Yeah, absolutely. I know. I think there was absolutely that kind of people or otherworldly beings being tied to various realms by the things they consume, even if it wasn’t as explicitly stated at the end.

JOANNA 0:23:55
And yeah, so Chekhov’s accoutrements, we had a few. I referred to the miracle blocker as…

FRANCINE 0:24:01
Sorry, for some reason my head immediately started trying to scan that into the I did it my way. Chekhov’s accoutrements, we had a few, but then again…

JOANNA 0:24:10
The miracle blocker, I think I called Chekhov’s stamp card during that episode,

FRANCINE 0:24:15
and it didn’t come back. It didn’t, no.

JOANNA 0:24:17
The zombies I thought would possibly come back.

FRANCINE 0:24:20
They didn’t.

JOANNA 0:24:20
Chekhov’s zombies.

FRANCINE 0:24:21
Oh yeah, we didn’t see them again at all. I agreed with you on that one.

JOANNA 0:24:24
The literal gun, the derringer in a hollowed out book kept in the bookshop.

FRANCINE 0:24:28
Fucking hell, yeah. Chekhov’s gun remains in the book.

JOANNA 0:24:31
And yeah, I spent ages getting really corkboard and string about the very mild anachronisms in the magician flashback and fucking nothing.

FRANCINE 0:24:42
I know. When I was editing it, I felt a little bad about how dismissive I’d been, but I stuck by it. No, you were totally fair. I had nothing there.

JOANNA 0:24:54
Because again, I’d read some episode descriptions, and I think I was aware that there was a magic shop in the next episode. So I was like, oh, I wonder if the magician’s going to pop up again, and he’s still working at the magic shop all these years later, and Aziraphale’s just not clocked it because he doesn’t care enough. And yeah, no.

FRANCINE 0:25:11
I can’t remember if you mentioned it on the podcast or whether you sent me a thing, but the fact that the amazing Mr. Fell wood of a poster had carried on to the…

JOANNA 0:25:20
Had ended up in the magic shop.

FRANCINE 0:25:21
To the modern day magic shop. I don’t think I said that on the podcast. Yeah, that was cool. That was gorgeous. But yeah, I mean, I think I had a similar attachment to the idea that they were focusing on the wrong things for some reason, other than just purely trying to self divert. Yeah. I was going full, no, surely, surely not. This is fucking mental. They are clever enough not to be focusing on the fucking dance when there’s a literal horde of demon, well, smallish horde, a hordette in the country, but in Soho, outside the window. I’m going back down that path again. I can see it. Right. Let’s go.

JOANNA 0:25:58
Quick listener thoughts as well. And we’ll talk about some listener theories and things a bit later on as well. Tanya sent us a really long message and then in the discord, apologized for sending it to us, which never, never apologized for that.

FRANCINE 0:26:10
We love a long unhinged message. It depends on the content, actually. Well, yeah. As of yet, our listeners have all been fine.

JOANNA 0:26:17
Anyway, I won’t read the whole point out, but there are a lot of nice thoughts in it. Terry Pratchett specifically writes comfortable, much married couples really well. Sam and Sybil, especially in The Fifth Elephant is a really good example. They’re not demonstrative, just really solid.

FRANCINE 0:26:32
Yes.

JOANNA 0:26:32
And there’s lots of bits of that in Get Home in Season Two. I think the one she pointed out that I love is Aziraphale and Crowley kind of sharing the chair while they’re talking to Muriel.

FRANCINE 0:26:40
Oh, that was fucking fantastic. I loved that scene.

JOANNA 0:26:44
Yeah, especially when you throw in the whole, why is it bisexuals can’t sit in chairs properly when Crowley’s sort of half leaning across the whole thing.

FRANCINE 0:26:52
Yeah. And yet he’s the only person who is sitting in a chair properly, if you think about it. Who else uses a chair to that potential? True. We’re all wasting chairs. Having seen that, I now realize, and I try and sprawl my limbs in as many directions as possible. I do it now. And I think I’m better for it.

JOANNA 0:27:12
As a bisexual, I do it naturally, unless I’ve become a pretzel, which sometimes also happens.

FRANCINE 0:27:19
Sorry, I’ve immediately taken a self-fire again. This is going well.

JOANNA 0:27:22
No, that’s fine. 10 years ago, I found out there’s this ongoing theme, especially looking back at the book and Good Omens Season One as well, of humans being like messed around by the celestial beings until

FRANCINE 0:27:31
they’re not happy about it.

JOANNA 0:27:32
So you have Aziraphale’s ball and how he’s tweaking how everyone’s thinking, and he’s doing it very blatantly. But if you look at Adam and Tadfield, it’s just a much less thattle version of it. And it’s Adam who eventually says, you know, let’s all stop mucking about.

FRANCINE 0:27:47
Yes. And I mean, Adam’s eventual rant at the end of something like that, isn’t it? Yeah.

JOANNA 0:27:53
Stop mucking about and let us get on with things. You’re all being silly. Stop trying to prove.

FRANCINE 0:27:59
I haven’t really thought about the parallel between what Aziraphale’s doing in the bookshop and what Helen and Hale are both doing. Yes, what Adam’s doing in Tadfield and then what they’re trying to do to his version of the book. Gosh, yes. It all gets a bit meta, doesn’t it?

JOANNA 0:28:11
It does a little bit. Thoughts on the kiss as well. The way Aziraphale’s hand kind of comes in like he almost wants to reciprocate, but he’s

FRANCINE 0:28:18
unable to. Yeah, I’m adding an asterisk to my previous he’s furious rant, which is he’s furious and he’s just fucking swallowing the yearning. Yeah, absolutely. Which does make one furious having to swallow yearning. It gives you terrible heartburn. It does.

JOANNA 0:28:39
I’ve heard that. And Tony pointed out that some of the desperation in those final moments comes from this complacency because they’ve had 6,000 years and they kind of assume they could just keep tooling on like that forever and suddenly they really fucking can’t and they’re faced

FRANCINE 0:28:51
with it. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:28:52
So I love that as an idea. Also, quickly, Molly on Twitter pointed out that Maggy standing up to the demons felt very Magrat versus the Queen of the Elves.

FRANCINE 0:29:00
Oh, it did a bit, didn’t it?

JOANNA 0:29:02
And I like Maggy a lot more thinking of her as just a little bit Magrat flavoured.

FRANCINE 0:29:06
She is a bit Magrat flavoured. Yeah. Her hair’s too nice, but apart from that, spot on.

JOANNA 0:29:12
I can imagine her trying to put flowers in and not quite working though.

FRANCINE 0:29:16
Yes, definitely. And I can imagine Magrat trying to run a record shop and somehow failing in Soho. Yeah. There we go. This would be the perfect place for it.

Series Awards

JOANNA 0:29:29
Before we start looking ahead and looking at some fun theories about what might be to come, let’s do some series awards.

FRANCINE 0:29:39
Series awards, series superlatives.

JOANNA 0:29:42
Series, whatever you want to call it.

FRANCINE 0:29:44
But what kind of award are we giving out? What does our golden statue look like?

JOANNA 0:29:48
A mysterious orb. I like a mysterious orb.

FRANCINE 0:29:51
Yeah, okay, cool. So it’s hovering.

JOANNA 0:29:53
Yeah, a hovering orb.

FRANCINE 0:29:54
Perfect. Love that.

JOANNA 0:29:55
So the hovering orb awards. First award is…

FRANCINE 0:30:01
Horb.

JOANNA 0:30:04
Horb. Sorry, the Horbs.

FRANCINE 0:30:06
I’m very sorry. The first one is for…

JOANNA 0:30:09
Best line read of the series.

FRANCINE 0:30:11
That fucking wasn’t mine. You go first. I’m going with episode six, obviously. And specifically the bit where Crowley’s voice cracks during the us conversation.

JOANNA 0:30:26
And he says, I would like to spend… Throat noise.

FRANCINE 0:30:29
Sorry, I just thought I’d bring the mood down. Yeah. Right there. How about you? I’ve got two because I’m cheating. I didn’t have time to write you a shorter letter type thing. First of all, a very short one is when Furfur is refusing or failing to pronounce Aziraphale’s name properly. And Aziraphale looks actually stern for the first time ever and has a little moustache drawn on. It’s good. Aziraphale. Perfect. And that has appeared in episode seven. Perfect. And that has appeared in all of the Aziraphale thirst trap TikTok edits, which I found so funny because of the little moustache. I’m like, guys, take a step back. And then a more serious one is that episode three, I think the Job one with David Tennant. But just to be able to ask the question. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:31:22
Yeah.

FRANCINE 0:31:22
Again with the trauma. That was good.

JOANNA 0:31:25
But that was episode two.

FRANCINE 0:31:26
That was episode two. You’re quite right. Yes. Three was resurrectionist. Yes. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:31:31
The award, the Horb for best little face. Are you giving yours to?

FRANCINE 0:31:36
Mine goes to Aziraphale as he does a journalism. Hat tip, knowing head wiggle. I am following clues. Perfect.

JOANNA 0:31:46
Absolutely perfect.

FRANCINE 0:31:47
And yours? Mine.

JOANNA 0:31:49
I’ve already said this in an episode, but it is Crowley watching the universe start up.

FRANCINE 0:31:53
Oh, such a gleeful little being. I thought as I was rewatching that bit, it occurred to me that David Tennant has very similar talent to Hugh Laurie and what he does with his face. Which is that when they’re looking harmless, cheerful, whatever, they tuck their chin in a way that they definitely do not when they’re going edgy, sexy character, where they’re very jutting. And I think that’s what makes quite a lot of the difference between how he just completely changes his face between Angel Crowley and Demon Crowley. Interesting. But he doesn’t do that when he’s Doctor Who or anything, but just the real, that look of absolute wonder as he does that. And I think he’s very innocent and very cool. And also a tiny bit trivia there. One of the interviews I was watching, they were talking about as they were doing that floaty up and down bit, they were strapped onto these gurneys going up and down, which made it very awkward and weird.

JOANNA 0:32:47
This is The Truth Shall Make Ye Fret, the only Good Omens podcast where you will hear

FRANCINE 0:32:49
deep analysis.

JOANNA 0:32:51
Deep analysis of David Tennant’s chin.

FRANCINE 0:32:53
And gurneys. And gurneys. Okay. But you know what I mean? With the Hugh Laurie thing specifically. Yeah, I know. I 100% am not mocking your point at all.

JOANNA 0:33:02
Mocking both of us.

FRANCINE 0:33:04
You watch him as Bertie Wooster and you can’t believe he is quite as attractive as he is in other things.

JOANNA 0:33:10
Look at him in Blackadder playing the Prince Regent.

FRANCINE 0:33:13
That’s a better example, actually, because he is sometimes a bit attractive as Bertie Wooster.

JOANNA 0:33:17
I was going to say, I have fancied Bertie Wooster before.

FRANCINE 0:33:21
Right.

JOANNA 0:33:21
Favourite Easter egg in the series?

FRANCINE 0:33:24
I couldn’t really think of one that we hadn’t already done, but as like my absolute favourite. But I found one that somebody else had put that I didn’t notice. When Gabriel and Beelzebub are in the pub, The Resurrectionists, the TV is playing the film The Spirit of St. Louis, which is about Charles Lindbergh’s solo flight across the Atlantic. In the movie, he was saved when he was woken up by a fly. Oh.

JOANNA 0:33:49
That’s a fucking detail.

FRANCINE 0:33:51
I found that in a fucking Radio Times article, something like that. I’ll link to it.

JOANNA 0:33:54
Excellent.

FRANCINE 0:33:55
How about you?

JOANNA 0:33:56
As a snooker snooker coupling, the seamstress conversation wins for me because I’m a big

FRANCINE 0:34:02
fan of Rosie Palm and the Seamstress’s Guild. And her five lovely daughters.

JOANNA 0:34:06
And her five lovely daughters. She’s a successful businesswoman and knows how to slogan a revolution.

FRANCINE 0:34:12
What was that fucking thing you sent me? Remind me again.

JOANNA 0:34:15
Oh, Dottie and Sadie.

FRANCINE 0:34:16
Yes, yes, yes.

JOANNA 0:34:17
Sorry. Totally not relevant to the to the horbs. Neil Gaiman has been getting around answering questions about what’s going to happen in Good Omens on Tumblr by just making up absolute bollocks involving Aziraphale and Crowley being married to Dottie and Sadie. And they all have jobs in a variety of factories. When he’s doing bollocks, he loves a factory. I’ll link in the show notes to someone on Twitter’s like very handily put all these Tumblr posts into a thread.

FRANCINE 0:34:42
But Dottie and Sadie are the agony aunts in… Yes. Yes. Yeah, that is. So that’s a related Easter egg. Excellent. Ish.

JOANNA 0:34:52
There’s also an Easter egg we kind of missed because they didn’t get a good shot of it, which is that there is a painting of Terry Bratchett, like a historical looking one in the Dirty Donkey pub.

FRANCINE 0:35:02
Is that so?

JOANNA 0:35:03
And if you look for it, you can see it in the background. Very blurry.

FRANCINE 0:35:07
You can see that the hat that is part of the painting. He’s in the hat, obviously.

JOANNA 0:35:13
And if you look in the behind the scenes stuff somewhere, they’ve got a proper image of it. But yeah, Douglas MacKinnon kind of forgot to get a proper shot.

FRANCINE 0:35:19
Oops.

JOANNA 0:35:21
Best outfit Horb, goes to…

FRANCINE 0:35:24
I think you’d better start us with that one.

JOANNA 0:35:26
Oh, it’s Jim’s suit and coat in episode five.

FRANCINE 0:35:29
Nice.

JOANNA 0:35:31
You can’t beat it.

FRANCINE 0:35:32
That is a coat. Gosh. I’ve gone a little, possibly completely the other end of the spectrum, which is Crowley in World War Two. That’s fair. That fucking hat. And the fact that I hadn’t noticed, Aziraphale had a matching beige one. Oh, did he? As they were walking down the street. Yeah, just those proper trilbies. Very, very cool.

JOANNA 0:35:57
They are. They are good trilbies. The best cameo slash small role of Horb. I’m going Paul Kaye coming back to do the Bratchett voice over the Speakers in Hell. But also, I don’t know if it even counts as a cameo slash small role, but Ritchie Smith

FRANCINE 0:36:14
is Furfur. Oh, yes.

JOANNA 0:36:16
Everything he’s doing in that.

FRANCINE 0:36:17
Big applause.

JOANNA 0:36:18
Fucking excellent. Big Furfur fans here at The Truth Shall Make Ye Fret.

FRANCINE 0:36:22
How about you? Yeah, fuck it. I thought Ty Tenant was just very funny. He was fucking tastic. And I worry that when I called him a Nepo baby in the episode we talked about, I was calling him a Nepo baby. What I meant was he plays Nepo baby spectacularly.

JOANNA 0:36:39
Yeah, he’s genuinely very fucking talented.

FRANCINE 0:36:42
Yes, and he appears in Staged Series 3, which is what reminded me. Yeah, that was fantastic. And it does. And also that bit reminded me that David Tennant in one of the interviews said that his favourite line in the whole series was, I’m Jemima, I made this pot.

JOANNA 0:36:59
I saw someone do a TikTok about it earlier saying it doesn’t matter who you are, Aziraphale, Crowley, heaven or hell. Aziraphale made the correct face that you make when a child shows you a thing they’ve

FRANCINE 0:37:07
made.

JOANNA 0:37:09
But yeah, Ty Tenant, fantastic. He plays a little shit so well. I’m sure he’s lovely.

FRANCINE 0:37:14
I’m sure he is. It’s just very funny.

JOANNA 0:37:16
He’s just really good at doing that. The Horb for best moment where we wanted to smash two characters heads together. Francine, what you got?

FRANCINE 0:37:24
I’ve got before the dance and I guess just during the dance, communicate the fucking danger properly, Crowley. Listen to Crowley, Aziraphale.

JOANNA 0:37:34
There’s a fucking horde of demons on the front lawn.

FRANCINE 0:37:37
My complete ranting and raving about how there must be some kind of fucking magic going on for them not to be paying attention to the point. I stand by because why the fuck weren’t you paying attention to the point? And I know why, whatever, whatever. That’s when I wanted to bang their heads together on a rewatch. Yeah, that’s fair.

JOANNA 0:37:54
I’m also giving it to Aziraphale and Crowley when they have a lovely little stroll through Edinburgh debating ethics while Elspeth is lugging a whole fucking corpse.

FRANCINE 0:38:06
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:38:07
Like guys, if you’re going to follow the body snatcher, help the body snatcher carry the corpse.

FRANCINE 0:38:15
It’s very them. It is very them.

JOANNA 0:38:20
Poor Elspeth.

FRANCINE 0:38:21
Of course we moan about that and then we moan when they do meddle in the affairs. Oh yeah, there’s no pleasing us. That’s what they say. And I would say there is a middle ground between helping someone with their admittedly criminal and disgusting luggage and trying to kind of cram two people together like Barbie dolls.

JOANNA 0:38:42
But they haven’t found it. The Horb for best retrospectively heartbreaking moment.

FRANCINE 0:38:49
Mine’s reasonably trivial, so I’ll go first. It’s rather easy to communicate. It’s just Crowley talking about the breezy breakfast just before it all kicked off. Just him being just so sure that that was what’s going to happen. And we’re just going to go for a boozy breakfast and just sinking back into the routine before he decides to break the routine and then it gets broken in a whole new way. Yeah. How about you?

JOANNA 0:39:14
Crowley and Aziraphale having their glass of wine together after the magic show. Partly because that shades of grey conversation was the closest we got to them coming to the understanding that they should have fucking come to by now. And partly because Crowley has already sat down with a drink before Aziraphale explains that he switched the evidence out. So Crowley was like expecting a whole fucking legion to come for him the next day and thought, well, yeah, obviously I’m going to go for a drink with my angel. What else would I do while I’m waiting for a legion to come?

FRANCINE 0:39:42
Oh. Yep.

JOANNA 0:39:46
Who’s your season MVP, Francine?

FRANCINE 0:39:49
Crowley. Specifically Crowley looking in through windows and smiling as Aziraphale does things. I feel like that’s a specific Crowley.

JOANNA 0:40:00
I feel like you could also add to that Crowley looking out of the window grinning as he’s trying to make the rain happen and the awnings happen.

FRANCINE 0:40:06
Oh yeah. I keep seeing screenshots of that because yeah, as people point out, that’s his one as a demon, his one big smile. Yeah. Then he does look like Doctor Who. Yeah. Yeah, he does. I’d say.

JOANNA 0:40:22
My season MVP is Build Out the Shoe Wipe.

FRANCINE 0:40:25
Yeah. Legend. Just the idea of being an expert cobbler and midwife in that time. It’s just incredible. Fantastic.

JOANNA 0:40:34
And by extension, the fucking wig department looking after David Tennant for the Medisites.

FRANCINE 0:40:41
Oh, I’m still not.

JOANNA 0:40:42
They were doing the Lord’s work.

FRANCINE 0:40:44
If it wasn’t for the mutton chops, I might have picked one of those outfits.

JOANNA 0:40:50
I mean, I do feel like an honourable mention to Crowley’s Victorian outfit.

FRANCINE 0:40:54
Yeah. And Aziraphale’s, they were just incredibly fancy coats. They were good. Goodness me, those two got into fancy coats for that century.

JOANNA 0:41:02
They absolutely did.

FRANCINE 0:41:04
Right.

Looking to the Future

JOANNA 0:41:04
Should we look forward to the future?

FRANCINE 0:41:06
I guess.

JOANNA 0:41:08
Hopes and predictions for season two, season three.

FRANCINE 0:41:11
Season three. Fucking hell. What do you mean by Gabriel’s moment?

JOANNA 0:41:18
Uh, specifically in episode three, it’s while Crowley’s doing the awning and makes the rain happen. And it’s the, there will come a tempest and darkness and great storms and the dead will leave their grave and walk the earth and there will be great lamentations every day. It’s getting

FRANCINE 0:41:32
closer. And that didn’t get a payoff within the season. So I’m assuming that’s there for the next

JOANNA 0:41:39
season.

FRANCINE 0:41:40
Yes.

JOANNA 0:41:41
Because the second coming is coming.

FRANCINE 0:41:46
Well, that’s unfortunate. So the second coming is my, my, my previously Catholic friend is, um.

JOANNA 0:41:56
So I got the Bible out.

FRANCINE 0:41:59
It’s not just Jesus turning up to go like, Oh, I’ve got some more fishes.

JOANNA 0:42:04
No, no, it is not.

FRANCINE 0:42:05
Okay. All right. Well, please elaborate.

JOANNA 0:42:10
First, I want to clarify that the second coming is not necessarily Jesus being born again, because Jesus did not die a second time. He died on the cross. He came back and then he ascended unto heaven. I remember doing feast of ascension at school. You know, we have like a really specific like mental image memory thing. Yeah, mine was reception doing Jesus ascending to heaven

FRANCINE 0:42:32
coloring page. Oh, cute.

JOANNA 0:42:34
Catholic skill guys.

FRANCINE 0:42:35
My big churchy one is putting the clothes into the orange for the thing. Yeah. What’s that called? Fuck knows something to do with that. The orange thing. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:42:45
Yeah. Anyway, so the second coming the book of Revelation, also sometimes known as the book of apocalypse as told to John does not specified which John who John is.

FRANCINE 0:42:54
Ham. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:42:55
Yeah. As told to Jon Hamm.

FRANCINE 0:42:57
Which is why he got the pot.

JOANNA 0:42:59
Yeah. And that makes a lot of sense, actually.

FRANCINE 0:43:01
Nepo, baby.

JOANNA 0:43:02
So I’m going to try and summarize the end of the world as quickly as possible. You’ve got the lamb and the lamb is obviously fucking Jesus. He’s the Lamb of God break seven seals, which sends forth the horsemen and all sorts of lamentations and people dying. Basically, everyone dies. This bit is very extensive. I’m trying to do this as quickly as possible. The lamb is doing a lot in chapter nine in Revelation, chapter 19. The beast and the false prophet are cast into the fiery lake of burning brimstone.

FRANCINE 0:43:27
Oh, no. Do we know who the false prophet is?

JOANNA 0:43:31
It’s just a false prophet.

FRANCINE 0:43:33
Just a false prophet.

JOANNA 0:43:34
It’s like a test for a lot of people.

FRANCINE 0:43:36
Cool.

JOANNA 0:43:37
Who does the casting of the beast and the false prophet into the fiery lake of burning brimstone? And I didn’t have time to go further down.

FRANCINE 0:43:43
I ask myself that every day.

JOANNA 0:43:44
Yeah. And I’m going to quote directly. He hath a name, a name written which no one knoweth save himself. He is clothed in a cloak dipped in blood and the name whereby he is called is the word of God.

FRANCINE 0:43:57
So that’s a bit Metatron around the ears. Uh, tell me if I was cast into a lake of brimstone, would I be breaking the act of strike? Uh, fuck, I tried to answer you seriously for a second there. I love that you tried to answer me seriously. That shows real commitment to our friendship. Thank you.

JOANNA 0:44:18
But no, because you’re English, so you’re not covered by SAG-AFTRA.

FRANCINE 0:44:21
Ah, okay. But I’d be in morally grey area. Yeah. Quite a popular fact, obviously. I’ve just been condemned to hell.

JOANNA 0:44:26
Yeah. I feel like I’ve been cast into a lake of brimstone. You’re past morally grey areas there.

FRANCINE 0:44:31
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:44:33
Anyway, Revelations chapter 20, Satan gets imprisoned in the bottomless pit for a thousand years and the souls of those…

FRANCINE 0:44:37
I love how you’re doing this like a fucking serious recap. Sorry.

JOANNA 0:44:42
How else would you want me to do this?

FRANCINE 0:44:43
A rag tag bunch of out of the worldly misfits.

JOANNA 0:44:47
Anyway, the rag tag bunch of souls who died for Jesus, uh, reign with him for a thousand years. This is the first resurrection. After a thousand years, Satan comes back to lead astray the nations in all four corners of the earth, including Gog and Magog. And fire comes down from heaven and devours them. And the devil is cast into the lake of fire and brimstone.

FRANCINE 0:45:04
I see. And then, uh, Is that not a bit of Br’er Rabbit, don’t throw me into that briar patch. Yeah, a little bit.

JOANNA 0:45:11
Chapter 20, verse 11. And I beheld a great white throne and him who sitteth upon it. And another book was opened, which is the book of life. And the dead were judged from the things written in the book, according to their works. And this is the second resurrection. Everyone who died in that big first apocalypse after the thousand years all gets brought back. And if they’re good enough, if they’ve been good enough to go to heaven, their names are written in the book of life. And so, you know, the book of life, I’m assuming we’re going to come back to that next season.

FRANCINE 0:45:41
I seem so too. Goodness.

JOANNA 0:45:43
And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death, the lake of fire. Whoever was not found written in the book of life, he was cast into the lake of fire. Which is a different nature of the book of life to what we had in Good Omens season two.

FRANCINE 0:45:56
True. Although so far, the only people in the, the only beings in the book of life being angels, perhaps it just works differently for them. Maybe. We don’t know. They’re in the preface.

JOANNA 0:46:07
Maybe it’s a red herring.

FRANCINE 0:46:09
Maybe my love life is a red herring, Joanna. God. Anyway.

JOANNA 0:46:14
So yeah, according to the Bible, the book of life is the names of those who shall be saved

FRANCINE 0:46:22
during the second coming. Right. Good to know.

JOANNA 0:46:25
Yeah. So just some context for that as we go towards a season that I’m assuming is going to be focused on the second coming. Also tiny batch at sidebar. So the end of Revelations ends with Christ’s promise to John that he is going to come back.

FRANCINE 0:46:40
Okay. Big. Honestly, it doesn’t sound like we want it at this point.

JOANNA 0:46:44
Yeah. The Bible has a fantastic cliffhanger ending. So I don’t think they’re actually going to probably depict Jesus as doing some second coming shit in season three.

FRANCINE 0:46:55
Yeah, that’d be.

JOANNA 0:46:56
If they do, it has kind of already been cast. They did cast Jesus in the crucifixion bit during the season one, episode three, long cold open. You see the crucifixion. I can’t remember the name of the actor off the top of my head.

FRANCINE 0:47:08
However, just for a second, it has been confirmed that Pedro Pascal has liked

JOANNA 0:47:13
some Good Omens fan art on Instagram.

FRANCINE 0:47:15
Fucking hell.

JOANNA 0:47:17
Can we just picture good Pedro Pascal as Jesus for like a fucking second? I know he’s the wrong nationality. I know it’s technically already cast and I’m probably not going to see him, but.

FRANCINE 0:47:27
I’m afraid, Joanna, that I did miss the Pedro Pascal train on account of I didn’t watch any of the stuff he was in. However, I’m quite amused that this has now come back again because it was like a tsunami. Yeah. Of Pedro Pascal thirst kind of crashed over the internet and the waters receded. Now we’re getting just a little aftershock there. Yeah, a little aftershock. Well, for everyone, for my sake, mainly, I hope that’s not going to happen.

JOANNA 0:47:56
Oh, I hope it’s not going to happen again. Wrong nationality.

FRANCINE 0:47:58
And you don’t say the sake of the people who, yeah, who actually care.

JOANNA 0:48:03
But just for a second, I just wanted to picture that.

FRANCINE 0:48:05
No, sure, absolutely. And the loincloth that it would entail. The loincloth you rode in on.

JOANNA 0:48:12
So quickly, before we go on to Aziraphale and Crowley as well, the jokes about hell being understaffed. Just a quick joke or set up? Especially if we think that heaven might be in the same state and there’s meant to be quite a big event coming and, you know, doing big events when you’re understaffed is a fucking nightmare.

FRANCINE 0:48:27
I’m not sure if I’m corkboarding and stringing a little bit here, but I think the fact that they flashback specifically to Beelzebub saying, do you know how hard it is to get tens of millions of demons to put down their weapons and go home? Yeah. While also in like the same episode, Shaxx had 60 of them following her. Yeah. Right. I feel like, yeah, probably a bit of a setup. Cool. My, my, my, my kind of speculation about the Cirque in the coming very much overlaps with Aziraphale and Crowley in that I am, I think, I think they’re gonna bring Aziraphale head to head with Crowley in this second coming thing. I’m not sure yet if he’s going to be fully committed and change his mind or fully committed. Crowley thinks he’s fully committed. We think he’s fully committed, but it turns out he’s got a plan capitalized in the same way as a clue. Ah, yeah. That’s my current speculation on that bit. Cool. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:49:26
So, so Aziraphale and Crowley in the future of them, I feel like it’s fair to say we all want their fight resolved and then back together eventually.

FRANCINE 0:49:33
I would like that very much immediately. Yes.

JOANNA 0:49:36
Um, I really want to see Aziraphale do the apology dance now, obviously.

FRANCINE 0:49:43
Yeah, I guess. I just want more gavotte. Well, we’d all like more gavotte flouncing, but I’m making my hopes realistic. Oh, yeah, that’s fair. All right. Yeah, I suppose I’ll settle for that. If we could have a gavotte share.

JOANNA 0:49:56
Well, if we could get a full apology gavotte, obviously that would be the ideal state of affairs. How do you imagine them back together, though? Like, do you imagine them back in their existing, they are sort of celestial, an angel and a demon and they’re dining at the Ritz? Some people have talked about what if they became human?

FRANCINE 0:50:15
I don’t like that idea. I like them going back to being angel and the demon at the Ritz, possibly with some changes. But I like the idea of them just being the guardian angels of humanity.

JOANNA 0:50:27
I do love that. I like the idea that they are the two that care about humanity above everything

FRANCINE 0:50:32
else. Yeah. And they are these like, you know, what we think of as like a mortal faith folk type things, you know?

JOANNA 0:50:40
Yeah, I do also. I don’t hate the idea of them as human.

FRANCINE 0:50:44
I just don’t like the idea of mortality as a whole. So I think that just puts me off.

JOANNA 0:50:48
Yeah, no, you are very like not pro mortality. And I respect that about you. You know, that’s what I appreciate about you.

FRANCINE 0:50:56
That’s what you appreciate about me.

JOANNA 0:50:59
But that’s, I don’t know, I think they’ve spent so long being involved in these grand celestial affairs and also interacting with humanity and influencing humanity, whether they like it or not, that I would kind of love to see a world where they are just totally free of that. They are two humans living out the rest of their lives in a little cottage with their wives, Dossie and Sadie. Working at the biscuit factory. All right. Not that bit, obviously.

FRANCINE 0:51:24
Yeah, I don’t know. I can see it. I can see it happening. I think I would be a little put out because of how I would imagine how traumatic that would be. True. You think of, as you were pointing out, the kind of, there was one of our listeners was this hysteria suddenly almost of the, oh, fuck, I’ve only got five minutes to talk to you about this 6000 year old conversation. Yeah. Going from being very long lived to very short lived all of a sudden, I think would be very tricky.

JOANNA 0:51:58
I think they just, they care so much about humanity that to become a part of it, I don’t think would be an unsatisfying ending for them.

FRANCINE 0:52:08
I don’t think it’d be unsatisfying. I wouldn’t like it. Yeah. I think, yeah, it’d be odd for them to become a part of something they’d shepherded for so long. You know? It would seem more to me like, yeah, like a shepherd becoming a sheep. Yeah. But yeah, I can see it being done well, I suppose. But yeah, I think as always, my perception on that is clouded by the fact that I want them to live forever.

JOANNA 0:52:37
Yeah, that’s fair. I respect that. So a couple of listener thoughts. We had two listeners in the Discord present fairly specific visions for season three. Tansey’s was roughly mirrors the book with a baby triggering end times and an angel and a demon trying to prevent it.

FRANCINE 0:52:54
Oh, oh.

JOANNA 0:52:55
Maybe. I don’t think I’d enjoy that. I have a lot of feelings about stories echoing and kind of being retold across seasons. And I think it can be done well and it can not. And I think Pratchett does it really well.

FRANCINE 0:53:06
I’d say that’s your favourite thing to talk about on this podcast, Joelle.

JOANNA 0:53:09
Yeah, because Pratchett does it really well. And every time he does it, he builds on it. But that doesn’t mean that’s what I want from a TV show.

FRANCINE 0:53:16
It’s a different beast. Absolutely fair.

JOANNA 0:53:18
My favourite part of Tansey’s theory, and I really hope that something is dived into about this, this small gods ish idea that God’s been reduced by people believing in institutions rather than the deity. And that’s why the Mestron’s power is so outsized. And I love that.

FRANCINE 0:53:34
Because it’s so bureaucracy.

JOANNA 0:53:37
Exactly. And we saw what happened in small gods when that happened. It was Pratchett’s big thing was talking about power of belief stuff. And Neil Gaiman does it so well. Fucking American gods.

FRANCINE 0:53:46
That is American gods, isn’t it? That would not be a bad joint theory to bring into this equation. Yeah, that would make it even more Pratchettian. And even more Gaiman-ian. Gaimian. Yep. Sorry. There are problems with Damian, it works. Oh, I’ve got to start thinking about my suffixes before I let them out.

JOANNA 0:54:06
It’s a common problem. And the last bit of Tansey’s sort of prediction slash hope was Aziraphale and Crowley back on the same page very early on. Brackett, probably wishful thinking.

FRANCINE 0:54:16
I would love that as well. I like it very much when a series or a book defies my expectations by sorting out miscommunications immediately. I think I’ve said it on the podcast about how that’s what I like so much about Rivers of London right from the beginning. There wasn’t this whole fucking half a book of magic, I don’t believe magic exists. The magic happens. And the main character like, oh, magic. Cool. Can I be a wizard? Let’s go along believing my eyes over this.

JOANNA 0:54:41
Yeah. One thought I have on that as well, I mean, obviously, I want it to I want to see them back together early, is thinking about this season as a bridge between book one and book two

FRANCINE 0:54:52
as book two was kind of roughly planned out. Which goes into another quick batch of prediction I have

JOANNA 0:54:59
is I can imagine this is set up because book wise book two would just be like, Aziraphale and Crowley aren’t talking. So the book opens with them fixing whatever they weren’t

FRANCINE 0:55:09
talking about. Yes. And like, it’s a lot easier when you have the narrator’s voice in a not even like the Francis McDormand thing. But when you have the omniscient third person, you can slot in a paragraph here and there to explain things.

JOANNA 0:55:25
Exactly. And you know, Aziraphale turning up on Crowley’s doorstep, presuming he’s got his flat back and saying, hey, I fucked up. Can you give me a hand?

FRANCINE 0:55:33
Yeah, absolutely.

JOANNA 0:55:34
It’s going to be some some legs of fire.

FRANCINE 0:55:38
Could we shift these yucca plants a little?

JOANNA 0:55:42
Which answer to my extra little bat shit theory that I may have, I’ve kept meaning to mention this in the podcast and I didn’t. Because there was some speculation in our discord over what the like, then the book was going to be called. And I double checked Mark Burrows’ book, which had it, which is 668, The Number of the Beast.

FRANCINE 0:55:58
Neighbour of the Beast. Neighbour of the Beast. Yeah, sorry. So the first two seasons are each six episodes. And it would

JOANNA 0:56:05
make sense for three seasons for six episodes, 666. But what if 668, we get an eight episode

FRANCINE 0:56:10
third season? Ooh, that’d be nice. I hope so. Yeah. Yeah. I was about to say if it’s 666, that would be nice, but also not that much of a coincidence because British shows traditionally have six, but if we had 668…

JOANNA 0:56:22
Yeah, exactly. There’s a fine line as well between theorising and just wishful thinking. And I think

FRANCINE 0:56:27
that is… I think we kick that line into oblivion every day, Joanna. I think that line in the sand has

JOANNA 0:56:34
been thoroughly stomped upon on purpose by this podcast. Jed’s slightly opposing prediction to Tansey’s is Aziraphale’s…

FRANCINE 0:56:43
Controversy in the discord. Controversy in the discord.

JOANNA 0:56:46
Well-natured controversy in the discord. Aziraphale being naive, thinking he can make the second coming something positive and he’s corrupted by power while thinking he’s doing good. And then Crowley directly opposing heaven while struggling with his feelings for Aziraphale and not wanting to bring harm on him. I like both of those.

FRANCINE 0:57:01
I like both of those. Yes. I think that’s kind of how I was thinking that if they actually come head to head, it would play out. They’re very much like a… Your loved one is in a cult thing.

JOANNA 0:57:17
But I also like the idea of Aziraphale figuring it out for himself. And like I said, just showing

FRANCINE 0:57:21
up on Crowley’s doorstep, say at the end of episode one and going, I fucked up. Or maybe he does that and we don’t even find out until the end of episode three. And it turns out they’ve both been working together. And then we get the flashback showing that. Like, you know, similarly to when they switch bodies. Yeah. Yeah. Neil Gaiman, hire us. No. I’m sure whatever his plan is. We would not be able to just talk in sentences at all. I’m sorry.

JOANNA 0:57:46
So do we want to talk about some batshit fan theories?

FRANCINE 0:57:50
Yes.

JOANNA 0:57:51
I’ve got to stop saying batshit. I think that’s unfair. But some fan theories…

FRANCINE 0:57:54
I think batshit can be a compliment, to be honest. It is batshit brackets affectionate. I’ve been listening to a lot of the We Can Be Weirdos podcast and the batshit list is a complimentary part of that podcast. So excellent.

JOANNA 0:58:07
So Luxa on Discord provided a couple. The drugged coffee slash Metatron mind control theory. I don’t love that because as I said in the last episode, I don’t get it wrong. I think the Metatron is manipulating Aziraphale. But I want the decision to have been Aziraphale and not be hypnotized Aziraphale because I think that’s more emotionally satisfying.

FRANCINE 0:58:30
I think the coffee is very suspicious. But I think it might be a herring coffee.

JOANNA 0:58:35
I think it’s a lulling into a false sense of security coffee.

FRANCINE 0:58:38
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:58:38
See, I’m just like you. I know how to buy a coffee.

FRANCINE 0:58:41
Yes. Yes. You can trust me. Yeah. Agreed. It is weird. But. I do. I, as I said before, I just think it’s a ballsy piece of writing. Yeah. This really is Aziraphale’s continued. It makes perfect sense for this character for this to be happening. It’s a horrible shock because we as Crowley deluded ourselves and think it wasn’t for a bit there. Yeah. But it makes it is very much him. So.

JOANNA 0:59:07
I do think there’s more to the conversation than we know because of the way it’s edited and

FRANCINE 0:59:11
cut and written. And I think that’s clever. Yeah. I didn’t notice that until you told me. But now I went back and watched and yeah, you’re quite right. There are definite. Uh. Potential. Reality TV cuts. Yeah. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:59:23
Another theory that also came from Luxor on Discord. Crowley had some of his memories of being an angel erased, which is why I didn’t remember Sarakel and also didn’t recognize Furfur. I kind of like that.

FRANCINE 0:59:35
I do. Because there was. Yeah, I think that was.

JOANNA 0:59:39
Because they talk about erasing Gabriel’s memories as a kindness.

FRANCINE 0:59:43
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:59:44
And so I wonder if maybe they tried erasing his memories a couple of times before he fell.

FRANCINE 0:59:49
And if we’ll get some more context for that in the next season of Crowley’s fall of,

JOANNA 0:59:54
you know, he asked questions and they take that away and then he asked more questions.

FRANCINE 0:59:58
And eventually. That’s a big thing. Actually, I would love to see in season three is it’s Crowley’s fall. Yeah.

JOANNA 1:00:04
Sort of vaguely downwards.

FRANCINE 1:00:06
Yeah. But the thing is, yeah, he makes like that was a song vaguely downwards, but I can’t see it being anything but really, really, really awful.

JOANNA 1:00:13
Yeah. Something else that I’ve seen talked about is what the Great War was referring to. And I always assumed that was war between heaven and hell when all the demons became demons. Like that was the Lucifer’s fall and the like aftermath of it. Like to the point where I just I assumed not like as a theory, I assumed like that’s exactly what they were getting at. But I’ve seen other people say like, does the Great War mean the First World War? Because that’s how that’s often referred to. And I don’t think it’s that. Now, if we’re going to talk about fan theories, there is something we need to talk about. And that is the Google Doc.

FRANCINE 1:00:48
The Google Doc, which was introduced to us very late in the game by by

JOANNA 1:00:53
it was someone in our discord.

FRANCINE 1:00:56
It was Nerys. Thank you, Nerys.

JOANNA 1:00:58
Thank you, Nerys for this. I had seen it floating around Twitter, but before we’d got to episode six, so I obviously hadn’t clicked through and I hadn’t realized that this is a 36 page Google Doc. So the title, The Magic Trick You Didn’t See, Being an Analysis of Good Omens Season Two. This doc is written by Alexandra Rowland. They are a fairly successful fantasy writer. They have about nine books published. They also teach writing. Also, I think they coined the term Hope Punk, which I think is pretty cool.

FRANCINE 1:01:27
What?

JOANNA 1:01:28
Hope Punk, which is sort of a genre name.

FRANCINE 1:01:31
Oh, is that like Solar Punk? Like optimistic fantasy books. Yeah, OK. This is 36 pages of Google Doc.

JOANNA 1:01:40
This is a very long, this is what I think was being done in season two. And this is what I think it means for season three Google Doc. This did not speak 36 pages long. There’s a joke in it about how editing is really important. This could have done with some fucking editing. Now, like I do get this isn’t like a professional piece of writing. This isn’t officially published. This is a fan having fun.

FRANCINE 1:02:02
Yeah.

JOANNA 1:02:02
But a lot of the doc very much centers on I am a writer. I know how writing works. I’m very clever about that. And that’s why I’m able to figure all this out. And I just think if that’s the case, that you should demonstrate that you’re a really good writer and edit your work a little bit because this could have been five to six pages.

FRANCINE 1:02:22
This could have been an email.

JOANNA 1:02:24
This could have been an email. The central thesis is basically that season two feels odd, which I don’t disagree with

FRANCINE 1:02:36
and badly written, which I do disagree with.

JOANNA 1:02:39
I don’t think season two is badly written. But Neil Gaiman is a very good writer and he knows how stories work very well. So the bad writing must be on purpose. So I did try and go in this with a very open mindedly. But I do disagree with that as a central thesis because I don’t think it’s particularly badly

FRANCINE 1:02:56
written.

JOANNA 1:02:57
And I don’t think Neil Gaiman is so clever that he would write a bad series of television so he can make a really good one.

FRANCINE 1:03:03
I was about to say, I think that’s a terrible idea. Yeah. I think Neil Gaiman knows enough about how everything works to not do that. Yeah.

JOANNA 1:03:11
This thesis uses the idea that a lot of setup was flatly paid off or not paid off at all. It uses the metaphor from The Prestige, this magic trick thing throughout the whole thing. So the idea of a magic trick is that you have the pledge, the turn and the prestige. And the idea is that season two, season one was the pledge, season two is the turn and season three is going to be the prestige.

FRANCINE 1:03:31
And again, I don’t really agree with that. It’s a turn.

JOANNA 1:03:33
When you make something disappear.

FRANCINE 1:03:35
Okay. And the prestige is? You come back.

JOANNA 1:03:38
It’s a turnip or whatever.

FRANCINE 1:03:40
Yes. Got it.

JOANNA 1:03:40
But you can stick with the idea of setup and payoff mostly. Now it runs through lots of… One of the ideas of setup being flatly paid off was Maggie and Nina getting an unsatisfying ending, which again, I don’t think that’s right. I think that was the point of Maggie and Nina. I think they were a good story and their ending being, hey, we’re not a fucking story.

FRANCINE 1:04:00
Hmm. I think that worked for me anyway.

JOANNA 1:04:03
Although obviously they weren’t working for me throughout the show, but I think that…

FRANCINE 1:04:08
You think the payoff kind of put them in a new light.

JOANNA 1:04:12
There’s also another example of disappearing Eccles cakes. You know, Aziraphale gets the Eccles cakes in episode one and he takes them to the shop and he puts them down and then they’re not there in the next shot and there’s no evidence

FRANCINE 1:04:24
of a plate or crumbs or anything on.

JOANNA 1:04:26
And the only reference to Eccles cakes again is seeing Nina erase Eccles cakes off the

FRANCINE 1:04:30
board. Imagine if you worked in continuity and that mistake got you a 36 page document. Right.

JOANNA 1:04:37
And it’s like, but they’re all too good to make continuity errors. It’s like, no one’s too good.

FRANCINE 1:04:40
Have you seen that fucking show? It’s full of fucking details. Yeah. There’s no way in hell that show escaped without some continuity errors. No way. No.

JOANNA 1:04:49
And there is a amusing section called Chekhov’s heavy artillery warehouse.

FRANCINE 1:04:52
Yeah.

JOANNA 1:04:53
So I’ve listed some of the Chekhov’s gun examples. So we have the ones that I do agree with the zombies, the literal gun, all the book of life stuff, the Gabriel prophecy. I think you could call those Chekhov’s guns.

FRANCINE 1:05:04
I don’t know. I mean, the gun. Yeah. The gun. Yeah. But stuff like the prophecy in the book of life stuff, that’s just foreshadowing. Yeah. Right. It’s not. Yeah.

JOANNA 1:05:16
I feel like, yeah, I feel like the term Chekhov’s gun is being used really fucking loosely here.

FRANCINE 1:05:21
And I mean, I’m saying that knowing that we do that all the time for fun. Yeah. But.

JOANNA 1:05:26
I think there’s a difference between.

FRANCINE 1:05:27
It’s fine.

JOANNA 1:05:29
We’re not professional writers. Oh, well, fuck I am.

FRANCINE 1:05:32
Fuck off. So we do. That’s literally been my job for many years. Yeah. I can’t say that. Anyway, the kind of maybe. I’m not a playwright. You are. Fuck.

JOANNA 1:05:46
The kind of, yeah, I never actually studied Chekhov though. I dropped out of A-level drama because they kept making me pretend to be a dung beetle.

FRANCINE 1:05:52
Fucking metamorphosis. Anyway. Yeah, no, same.

JOANNA 1:05:58
The kind of maybes like these are Chekhov’s guns or at least foreshadowing is the Crow road, the Ian Banks story more relevant.

FRANCINE 1:06:04
There is a whole sort of murder history plot detective thing. Oh, a mild note on that, by the way, I kept saying Ian Banks is friends with Neil Gaiman and then found out as I was editing the episode that Ian Banks very sadly died in 2013. And I’d somehow missed that. I’m sorry. Terrible at knowing these things.

JOANNA 1:06:26
Friends from beyond the grave.

FRANCINE 1:06:27
Friends from beyond the grave.

JOANNA 1:06:29
The Metatron coffee thing, the fact that we don’t see all of that.

FRANCINE 1:06:32
We’ve talked about that. When I tried to analyse the coffee thing myself after I read the thing, the only thing I can think of is almond is like the cyanide thing, isn’t it? That’s what cyanide smells like.

JOANNA 1:06:43
I don’t think the coffee was doctored.

FRANCINE 1:06:46
No.

JOANNA 1:06:47
Nor do I think Aziraphale was hypnotized.

FRANCINE 1:06:49
No, agreed.

JOANNA 1:06:50
No, these are not things that aren’t paid off that have been left dangling section. Why did we need to see all of that bullet catch stuff? And don’t get me wrong, that was not my favourite episode of the season, but it set up this relationship of trust between the two and how far they’re willing to go. It set up Hell’s interest in the two of them.

FRANCINE 1:07:08
Do you know what? It wasn’t my favourite episode, but going back and watching bits of it again, now I’m not constantly focused on the fact that I’m about to watch a disaster show.

JOANNA 1:07:18
Yeah.

FRANCINE 1:07:18
In my general just aversion to that kind of like, oh my God, I’m going to go wrong in front of an audience. It’s enjoyable.

JOANNA 1:07:24
It serves the purpose all three miniseries do, which is to explore the relationship between Aziraphale and Crowley compared to their relationships to Heaven and Hell.

FRANCINE 1:07:32
Yes.

JOANNA 1:07:32
The statue apparently is Jacob’s gun, but that joke was paid off. Aziraphale can draw. I don’t think that was a setting up for anything. I just think, of course, Aziraphale can draw. He draws Jim rather than taking a photo of him and then takes that drawing. I think that’s just Aziraphale’s old fashioned.

FRANCINE 1:07:49
He’s old fashioned and they’re both very good at stuff.

JOANNA 1:07:53
Crowley wearing sunglasses in the Job scenes where he’s not wearing sunglasses in some of the other scenes set BCE, but also…

FRANCINE 1:08:01
He’s directly in front of humans trying not to scare them. Thank you.

JOANNA 1:08:05
The quote on the matchbox being so important. It was a Job quote and then we had the whole Job story and it directly tied. It was the quote about the Leviathan, which ties into the Go Make a Whale and We’ll Talk.

FRANCINE 1:08:14
I loved the fact that Neil Gaiman replied to some criticism or question with Go Make a Whale and We’ll Talk. Yep. Way to have a God complex. 10 out of 10. Love that for you. Respect it. That sounded sarcastic, but you know me. I admire a God complex.

JOANNA 1:08:31
Oh yeah, 100%.

FRANCINE 1:08:32
I’m into it.

JOANNA 1:08:33
Anyway, so this in this Google Doc leads to the Metatron must be the bad guy and he is manipulating everything in the show, just as Neil is manipulating us. I don’t think anyone thinks that the Metatron isn’t a bad guy. This is the point where, and again, I do mean this is like constructive criticism. I don’t think this is all bad ideas.

FRANCINE 1:08:54
I just think it’s badly expressed. Seems that, yeah, it’s just there was… That’s such a long document. I feel a bit bad that we’re focusing on it for so long, considering the amount of unhinged fan theory and I suppose the differences.

JOANNA 1:09:10
It was all in one place. But this was the bit where it really lost me and we’re about page 11 or so.

FRANCINE 1:09:15
Oh my God.

JOANNA 1:09:17
Quick note before I do that. When you’re done with this essay, reread it. I’ve been doing the same trick Neil is doing, except I’m not a glorious flash bastard, brackets honorific, who’s going to make you wait a couple of years for the prestige. I’ll just tell you so you know what sort of thing to look for the second time through. If you’re doing something fucking clever in your writing, then you shouldn’t need to tell me you’re doing something fucking clever in your writing.

FRANCINE 1:09:37
Yeah.

JOANNA 1:09:38
Anyway, so the big theory is that the Metatron has access to the Book of Life and he’s using it to edit things the whole time. It’s not just people. You can tweak memories and shit. The clues, there’s a whole thing, which, yeah, that I don’t hate as an idea.

FRANCINE 1:09:50
Puppet master Metatron.

JOANNA 1:09:52
I don’t love it because I would hate to think that the flashbacks we’ve seen and not all of it and they’re tweaked memories, which is what this is implying. So the Metatron is apparently set up as a storyteller. He’s tweaking these flashback memories to drive a wedge between Aziraphale and Crowley. One of the examples is that because there are multiple moments where characters decline alcohol, Metatron disapproves and he’s editing Aziraphale’s memory to make it less appealing.

FRANCINE 1:10:15
I don’t really. I thought that was just the gradual Aziraphale becoming corruptible.

JOANNA 1:10:20
There’s a whole thing, a theory about Maggie isn’t real. The Metatron made her up and wrote her in and she’s unrealistic because he’s a bad writer, which is a cool idea that makes up for some of the weird writing around Maggie and Nina. I prefer my idea, but I wouldn’t totally discredit it. But also like the examples of things like she misspells something, she doesn’t drink, she has mood shifts, the whole locked in the coffee shop bit feels contrived. Again, I feel like that’s just the point. They’re meant to look like a cute coffee shop AU story until they turn around and say, hey, we’re not a fucking story.

FRANCINE 1:10:53
Yeah, that’s it. We are seeing it through. We are seeing it to an extent through their eyes. Yeah. And their eyes are very, look at the simple humans doing the dance.

JOANNA 1:11:03
Generally, the idea of Maggie not being real is behaves too much like a character rather than a fictional real person. And I think that’s because she’s written to be more of a character.

FRANCINE 1:11:11
I’m going to have an existential crisis, Joanna. Yeah.

JOANNA 1:11:14
And there’s lots of theories about how the Metatron’s manipulating things. And the theory of how to fix this in season three is this idea of restoring corrupted files from backups, the backups being Aziraphale’s journals. Now, I don’t think there’s a ton of… Ah, you found the existential crisis book.

FRANCINE 1:11:29
I did. It’s just got a smiley face on it now. And I think that’s how it’s going to live.

JOANNA 1:11:33
I don’t think there’s a ton of legs to this. But I do like the idea that Aziraphale’s journals might be relevant, especially with Muriel looking after the bookshop.

FRANCINE 1:11:41
Yeah, definitely.

JOANNA 1:11:42
Just because they’re all there and it would be fun if Muriel reads them and

FRANCINE 1:11:46
learns more of humanity. Oh, and we get some flashbacks through that. Yes. Yeah. That I like. And we get to hear Muriel… Oh, I don’t know. We maybe get to see Muriel not understanding bits of it because they’re very naive. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. No, that would be cute. I like that.

JOANNA 1:12:02
But yeah, so that’s the basic theory. The Metatron is manipulating stuff through the Book of Life. But it’s stretched in 36 pages.

FRANCINE 1:12:08
And the conclusion, the conclusion…

JOANNA 1:12:12
And I am going to read this word for word.

FRANCINE 1:12:13
And this frustrated me, this red smug to me. I know what you’re wondering now.

JOANNA 1:12:19
Do I have predictions for season three? Yes, and they’re extremely good. However, I feel vaguely unethical about saying them out loud in public for thousands of people to read, because after writing 15,000 words of this essay and laying out my evidence and arguments logically, I am more convinced than ever that I am onto something here. While I’m okay with pointing out textual clues lying out in the open in season two for anyone to see, or at least what I think are clues, and showing you how they fit together and what story structure suggests about them, I hesitate about going further than that and using my pretty good magician brain to speculate about season three, because it feels like stealing the sparkle off of Neil’s prestige, stealing his thunder.

FRANCINE 1:12:58
Well, I’m glad you’re so confident. Yeah.

JOANNA 1:13:02
And the thing is, like, they might have absolutely 100% perfectly predicted season three. They might not have done, just as they might be a very good writer. I haven’t read any of their proper writing. But that read is a very arrogant way to fan theorize about it.

FRANCINE 1:13:20
Yeah, I’m not.

JOANNA 1:13:22
And to the point, it made me kind of uncomfortable. So I like the theory. I do not like how the theory was delivered.

FRANCINE 1:13:29
And maybe I’ve been overly harsh about it.

JOANNA 1:13:30
But I gave up a lot of my life to sit and read through those 36 pages. I think I’ve earned the right to be a little bit harsh about it. If I was to come to a conclusion about using this 36 page Google Doc as one example, I do think there can sometimes be a sense of over-entitlement to a story within fandoms. And I don’t just mean in the Good Omens fandom, I mean in all fandoms. There’s a sense of, I think it’s exactly like this, and I’ve thought about it a lot.

FRANCINE 1:13:57
So I know best. What I thought was interesting, you pointed out that luckily I haven’t come across, was that there are already teenage superfans of this being told to calm the fuck down by much older superfans, i.e. from 2019.

JOANNA 1:14:11
And it’s a weird thing because for us we’ve loved this book for eight, and I’m not claiming we have fandom superiority.

FRANCINE 1:14:17
I am.

JOANNA 1:14:18
What I loved when the first season came out is that no one was like, oh, you’re not a proper fan, you haven’t read the book, you haven’t read any other Neil Gaiman, you haven’t read any Terry Prash. It’s just like, oh cool, you’re here.

FRANCINE 1:14:27
Why are you here?

JOANNA 1:14:28
I have these 41 books.

FRANCINE 1:14:31
Have you seen the flowcharts? It was encouraging.

JOANNA 1:14:35
It was, oh cool, new friends. Whereas with season two, there’s the people who have got into it, season two, that weren’t in it in season one, and also haven’t read any of the books. And I feel like some of those, now it feels in places gatekeeping, and it’s not everyone.

FRANCINE 1:14:49
I might be rose-tinted glassing a bit though, because there was quite a lot of criticism of the Good Omens TV series, specifically just by people, like the first series, just by people who did not want to see it done. Yeah. And I think, whereas within the Good Omens Enjoyers fan camp, there wasn’t much gatekeeping, I think there was definitely a lot of mainly, let’s be honest, practical rather than gaming fans, who were just cross that it had been made at all. Yeah. Yeah, I do think there were.

JOANNA 1:15:20
I think there are some fans, and again, I don’t think this is just this fandom, I think this is true across all fandom. There are some fans that any adaptation that isn’t literally exactly how they imagine their book put onto a screen will not be good enough for them, and they’d rather not have one.

FRANCINE 1:15:35
Yeah, I think we’ve talked about this at various junctures, with me probably being petulant about adaptations, but that’s life. By the way, before I completely forget, the thing about this writer accidentally stealing the sparkle of Neil Gaiman’s prestige and feeling like their magic tricks should preclude them from saying such things, I found out recently, I can’t remember where I read or heard it, this might be the We Can Be Weirdos podcast, but that Mark Twain believed in telepathy so surely that he thought George Bernard Shaw had just straight up stolen an idea from his brain. Incredible.

JOANNA 1:16:12
And on that note, so the last thing is, before we leave Good Omens 5 Forever, as we’ve mentioned a couple of times in this podcast, season three is not guaranteed yet. It has not been given a promise of renewal by Amazon. Now, season two was announced way after season one came out, so I don’t think we can hope for a renewal next week.

FRANCINE 1:16:31
Yeah.

JOANNA 1:16:32
We can hope for a renewal, sadly, especially because this was binge dropped and just the model of things, and I’m working on a piece about this that at some point will be out on my currently non-existent sub stack. The best way to guarantee a season three, as well as tweeting about it, is just to watch the show and keep watching it and also keep talking about it past this initial buzz around the release.

FRANCINE 1:16:54
Yeah.

JOANNA 1:16:55
And it sucks. I hate that as fans, we have to feel responsible for getting a show renewed.

FRANCINE 1:17:00
And frankly, I don’t. I’m afraid.

JOANNA 1:17:03
I feel like I don’t feel that responsibility. I do feel like this is an unfortunate side effect of how the television industry works at the moment.

FRANCINE 1:17:10
Yeah. I think each fan who hears this message is such a small part of the whole that it really makes no difference. I understand the compulsion from Neil Gaiman and from us, indeed, to say such things, but it’ll happen or it won’t, to be honest. Either people will keep watching it and talking about it or they won’t. I have never felt guilty enough about anything to watch six hours of TV over it.

JOANNA 1:17:33
I immediately feel guilty about everything all the time.

FRANCINE 1:17:36
Yeah. But do you do anything about it?

JOANNA 1:17:39
No, God no. I’m just adapted to the constant low level feeling of guilt. Anyway.

FRANCINE 1:17:44
Catholic. I don’t want to leave good omens on that note. That’s shit. Let’s talk about something nice.

JOANNA 1:17:49
If you watch one thing from the bonus content, there is an outtake. They kept making David do the apology dance over and over again, and they made it do it one last time,

FRANCINE 1:18:02
just so that Michael Sheen could hold up a score. I would also like to say that although I am extremely angry with Aziraphale in certain ways, obviously, I’ve also tried my best to come to terms with the fact that he’s obviously been in this incredibly abusive celestial relationship. I want to spare a thought for how much he must have suffered with his own weird internal rewrites if he’s been in love with a demon for quite a long time now. I’ve never been able to admit it. Although I was focusing more on how Crowley was trying to keep his independence for much the same reason, I think it was probably easier for him to come to terms with the fact that he rather liked someone he wasn’t meant to because that’s the point of him. He’s not meant to do what he does. I like that.

JOANNA 1:18:49
The thing is, we could keep talking about Good Omens season two for a really long time.

FRANCINE 1:18:52
Yeah, I’m clinging on by my fingernails, aren’t I? I just didn’t want to end on a sour note with the…

JOANNA 1:18:59
No, I’m sorry. I should have planned a better note for us to end on, but we’ve got some nice notes now, and I think we should pry your fingertips away from Good Omens season two for now. We can come back again if you want. And turn back towards the disc, which is after all what we normally podcast.

FRANCINE 1:19:13
Yay! Now we’re doing Going Postal! Finally, we reached this next cool arc in Discworld.

JOANNA 1:19:22
We like this. We do. So, just what’s coming up on the True Showman Key thread. We need a week off,

FRANCINE 1:19:28
and we’re going to have one because we can. So our first episode on Going Postal, and I haven’t

JOANNA 1:19:35
picked it up yet. I cannot tell you where that begins and ends.

FRANCINE 1:19:39
I know exactly where it begins, because I’ve read this book so many fucking times, I could almost almost recite the first scene.

JOANNA 1:19:47
Okay, I know where it begins. I don’t know how I’m splitting the sections up yet. On all of our socials, you’ll know when we know, but the first episode on Going Postal is going to come out on the 11th of September. Then in October, we will be talking about the book Thud. November, we will be bringing you a full three episodes on the Thud spin-off book, Where’s My Cow? No, we’re not doing that.

FRANCINE 1:20:10
We’ve rewritten it in iambic pentameter.

JOANNA 1:20:13
November is still to be announced. We’re planning some fun bonus stuff for you, because then in December, we really want to end the year on Wintersmith.

FRANCINE 1:20:22
Yes, and the spreadsheet needed for finagling.

JOANNA 1:20:25
As it always does. Heads up with Going Postal, I know we normally talk about an adaptation when we’re talking about the book, but we have decided we’re going to wait and talk about

FRANCINE 1:20:33
Going Postal at Christmas because that’d be a nice treat. Yeah, it’s nice. We usually do some kind of screen adaptation at Christmas and it’ll be a nice one.

JOANNA 1:20:40
I could not finagle the spreadsheet enough to make us land on Going Postal at Christmas. No, no, no.

FRANCINE 1:20:45
Yeah, no. I tried. I like Wintersmith at Christmas anyway, even though it’s not a Christmas book, it’s got snow in it. So whatever.

JOANNA 1:20:53
It’s a solstice book.

FRANCINE 1:20:54
Yeah.

JOANNA 1:20:56
So until we come back to your lovely years in September and go back to the Discworld.

FRANCINE 1:21:01
Your lovely years, listeners.

JOANNA 1:21:03
Dear little listeners with your dear little ears.

FRANCINE 1:21:05
We value each one.

JOANNA 1:21:08
You can follow us on Instagram at thetrueshowmakeythreat, on Twitter at makeythreatpod, same on Blue Sky, Facebook at thetrueshowmakeythreat, join our subreddit community r slash ttsnyf, join our Discord, there’s an invite link at the top of our show notes link section. Email us your thoughts, queries, castles and snacks to thetrueshowmakeythreatpod at gmail.com. Support this nonsense financially, go to patreon.com forward slash thetrueshowmakeythreat, where you can exchange your hard earned pennies for all sorts of bonus bollocks.

FRANCINE 1:21:33
Wow, you went full terms and conditions apply.

JOANNA 1:21:37
I was trying to get us out of the episode.

FRANCINE 1:21:39
Side effects may include.

JOANNA 1:21:41
And until next time, dear listener.

FRANCINE 1:21:44
To the world.

JOANNA 1:21:45
To the world.

FRANCINE 1:21:52
Sorry, I made you say horb. Are you kidding? I love it.

Transcript: 122: Good Omens Season 2 Episode 6 (Monkey’s Paw)

Episode 122: Good Omens TV Show, Season 2, Chapter 6. Recap and discussion.

Go back to episode and Show Notes >>

Note: Transcripts are produced with Whisper AI and PyAnnote – we don’t have time to edit them extensively, so both wording and speaker labelling will be inaccurate in parts.

JOANNA 0:00:00
It’ll be fine. We can’t start panicking yet. We haven’t got there yet. If you’re fringe adjacent, I meant to plug them last week, but go see Marc Burrow’s show, The Fringe, The Magic of Terry Pratchett and his non-discworld show, The Glom of Nit and go see Andrew O’Neill’s show, Gebra.

FRANCINE 0:00:17
Gebra. I’ve not tried to say that out loud. Google it. No, and I’m not gonna. Go see them. So yeah, it’s been a week of good omens, emotions. Yeah, we’ve had them. We’ve had them. We finally, so okay, so catch up listeners. We recorded the last episode and then the next day went and watched the final episode. What I shouldn’t have done was watch that episode before I edited the last episode because, but before I edited our last episode because I was going, oh, you innocent fools.

JOANNA 0:00:52
Yeah, it was very weird because I watched it and then I listened back to the one we did on episode

FRANCINE 0:00:59
five and I was just pointing and laughing at myself. I know, I know. I’m gonna have to have

JOANNA 0:01:03
a skim listen back through like all three of those episodes before we think about putting

FRANCINE 0:01:07
together a bonus thing full of our nonsense. I know, I was quite, I was quite happy that I managed to get one or two wild theories correct and I think you did as well, but on the whole,

JOANNA 0:01:16
I think we were fairly wrong. There is one wild theory of mine, not from the last episode, that I will bring up in this episode when we get there. Because it’s relevant, but we’re not there

FRANCINE 0:01:28
yet. We’re not there yet. We’re not. So yeah, in the meantime, anyway, to continue on the theme of heavy emotions, I’ve been watching, I’m very sorry to say fan edits of Good Omens on TikTok. Amazing. Yeah, it’s not been, it’s not been healthy, I would say. Once you watch one or two, then they just, they just feed them to you. And it’s real hard to, you know, to turn that off. Yeah. Are you gonna scroll past clips of David Tennant walking to good music or Michael Sheen looking good? Like Michael Sheen? Yeah.

JOANNA 0:02:03
Yeah. No, it’s not possible. We were talking about young Michael Sheen last week. And I think it was Stacey on Twitter reminded me of Michael Sheen in Underworld and I need to watch the Underworld

FRANCINE 0:02:14
movies again. Oh, I did see that. Yeah, I’m not into the long black hair thing. So no, that was very teenage me. Definitely not into to vampire look these days. But when I was kind of the combed hair and the clean shave and I was very into. Yeah, yeah. No, when I watch Underworld,

JOANNA 0:02:31
I become teenage me again. But my eyes are mostly for Kate Beckinsale. That’s fair. Because that crush has been running ever since my mum showed me the movie Serendipity starring Kate Beckinsale and John Cusack. One of my favourite rom coms of all time. Love that for you. But yeah, all the fan edits of David Tennant walking to music and also this episode of Good Omens made me realise that David Tennant is just so incredibly gender. Yeah, like, like I want that. I can’t have that. Not as in like, I want David Tennant. He’s very happily married and I’m very happy for him. I’m saying I want to be that. No, I want to be male. I just want to be whatever

FRANCINE 0:03:14
is happening there. Maybe it’s it maybe it’s been since 2019 that I have been unconsciously starting to dress a lot more like that. Yeah, I am making myself as tall and as dressed in

JOANNA 0:03:24
black as possible over the last few years. So the problem is, I just I can’t really do it in quite the same way. Like I can be described as a lot of things and have been. Lanky will never be one of them. I am I am of hearty peasant stock. I can haul a sack of potatoes like nobody’s business and in my life I’ve often had to. But I don’t think I’ll ever manage to be quite so limmy. No, I think I think you could get the strut. I think I could probably do the strut. You could

FRANCINE 0:03:54
pull off an Aziraphale look pretty well. Yeah, but it’s not quite me. It’s not quite you but it would

JOANNA 0:04:00
be an aesthetic version of that. Do you know what I mean? Yeah, I think I just I feel a bit more I’m a more more disheveled when I’m presenting mask than Aziraphale’s. Yeah, that’s true.

FRANCINE 0:04:14
All right, well, we’ll work on it. I think I need to get some Chelsea boots. It’s good. I

JOANNA 0:04:20
didn’t wish I’d been eyeing up Doc Martin do some really nice like kind of Chelsea style boots. But it’s not even the price like I don’t mind paying the price for a good pair of boots like justifying but they’re not that good anymore and I don’t want to break them in. They’re not worth

FRANCINE 0:04:35
the entry point. I have been recommended a couple of decent brands that like still made here. Yeah. That are similar. It’s still quite expensive. As you said, like if they’re gonna last fucking 15

JOANNA 0:04:46
years, whatever. Yeah, like my tendency to buy cheap boots. We don’t need to explain the boots

FRANCINE 0:04:51
theory of economics on the podcast again. This is exactly why neither of us have pulled ourselves up by our bootstraps. Every time we try they snap. We’re like, oh no, we should have bought better boots. Oh my god, I think that’s what the ragged trousers slants for this. Absolutely. No, so I am

JOANNA 0:05:11
you know, when you start like working on a project and it like kind of overtakes your brain a little bit and you decide like you really need to you can’t stop thinking about it, you’re gonna have to do it. Because you’ve got really involved with this idea of construction and then you start like actually properly planning or doing whatever you need to do to do this project. And you realize that you’re fully at the end of it going to come out like Ben Wyatt presenting cones of Dunshire and as he starts explaining it going, this is nothing. Like I’m almost there. I’m not there yet. I’m

FRANCINE 0:05:38
still gonna have to make the fucker. You very kindly quoted that to me when I tried to do hand drawn animation during the lockdown, by the way. Yeah, cool back there. Yeah, what are you

JOANNA 0:05:46
trying to do? I think I specifically quoted Ben Wyatt’s attempts at stop motion animation when you started doing the hand drawn one. That’s right. No, that’s right. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. He said

FRANCINE 0:05:55
what did a press man make this and I was like, wow, fine. You’re not wrong. So I can’t argue.

JOANNA 0:06:02
I meant it lovingly. The hand drawn animation. What in the cones have you produced? I haven’t yet. I’m still at the maths point, which is why I was nearly late to start recording today.

FRANCINE 0:06:11
Because oh, yeah, you did say I might be late because I got carried away doing maths. I assumed

JOANNA 0:06:15
you were doing some obscure Easter egg calculation. No, no, I was at one point was under my dining table to make sure I got the measurements right, but my hands still a bit too dodgy to just flip it upside down to do the measurements. So I’m designing a board game tablecloth. Because, okay, so the two reasons one is playing board games like straight on my wooden dining table is kind of annoying like stuff slips about. If you have slightly too long or too short nails, then picking up cards off a wooden table is really difficult. And between my partner and I were at the other both ends of the spectrum now. Yeah. So when we’re playing ballgames at a friend’s house, he gets around that by he just has a piece of felt he puts down on the table, which does help except the fabric can move around and rock up and oh yeah, I hate absolutely hate the feeling of it.

FRANCINE 0:07:00
Very similar fabric tastes when it comes to touching.

JOANNA 0:07:03
Like when you accidentally touch a sponge wrong and yeah, right. Okay, it’s not just me. Okay, genuinely like sets my teeth on edge anyway. So my so part of my logic was that like sensible piece of fabric that will help with those issues. But also I had a look at some cool board game tables while I was at UK Games Expo and I can’t afford them. They’re super expensive. Yeah. Don’t get like they’re really nice. They’re worth the money, especially the ones that kind of everything falls away and it can also just be a nice table. Like if I had the money,

FRANCINE 0:07:32
I would get one. Yeah, yeah. They’re not overpriced. They’re just expensive. That’s

JOANNA 0:07:36
yeah, there’s a difference. But I want to see if I could incorporate some of their functionality into this board game tablecloth. So what it’s gonna be well, it’s gonna be like big rectangle of fabric, obviously, and nicely with backed and stuff. So it’s not like raw reged or whatever, like lined, but with magnets sewn into the corners, and then there’s a corresponding magnet that goes over the table. So the fabric like the cloth itself like stays stretched out and taught. I got the idea from a dressmaker I follow on TikTok who had like magnets sewn into the shoulder cape thing she wore and then she had like another magnet that would go under the strap

FRANCINE 0:08:09
of the top and it would hold it all in place. Oh, yeah, really cool. Okay. I can love that.

JOANNA 0:08:14
Yeah, and then it’s gonna have like some top stitching to mark out like each player’s like player space because a lot of the big ballgames we play like has like an individual player board and then there’ll be like a central bit marked out for like a board space. Okay. And then each player space is also going to have a flap that comes down that has pockets that can hold like cards and coins and stuff. It’s gonna have a little pocket thing. So you don’t have like stuff clustering up your play space. But yeah, so I’ve been trying to figure out the dimensions so that the corners of it can go with the magnets under the table because obviously the table has like those diagonal bits. Yes. And so I was trying to work out what the dimensions would be taking those out so the corners match up for the magnets and shit. And then I was trying to work out how big those playmats would need to be. So I was looking at like the size of standard playing cards and there’s all like poker size and tarot size, which are the two most common in board games. And

FRANCINE 0:09:06
have you considered laying some of this stuff out on the computer?

JOANNA 0:09:10
Yeah, I considered and then I couldn’t figure out what would be the best program to use. And I thought if I started trying to do that, I would go down that rabbit hole. But I’ve got a flap designed, but I need to come up with a better name for it than the flap. But yeah, so you see where

FRANCINE 0:09:24
I’m at? Like I’m in Cones of Dunshire right now. Yep. No, yep. You’re in. Can’t see the cloth for

JOANNA 0:09:31
the cones. Exactly. Love that idea, though. That’s a great idea. It might be. It might be. Okay. Yeah.

FRANCINE 0:09:39
Or I’m having a breakdown. Well, you might be but so am I. That’s fine.

JOANNA 0:09:43
Yay. Speaking of… You are coming down with me. Speaking of having breakdowns, do you want to make a podcast? Yeah, I do want to make a podcast. Oh, there was something I forgot to mention in the soft open. Oh, no. Just that the TERFs have been TERFing a lot recently and we haven’t done a fuck off in a while. So just a reminder, this is a trans friendly, trans inclusive podcast. So TERFs, no, go away. Fuck off. You’re not welcome. Depressing week, isn’t it?

Intro

Hello, and welcome to The True Show May Key Threat, a podcast in which we’re usually reading and recapping every book from Terry Pratchett’s Discworld series one at a time in chronological order. But we’ve taken a break from that to talk about Good Omens Season Two. I’m Joanna Hagen. And I’m Francine Carroll. And it’s here. We’re finally here. We are talking about the finale,

FRANCINE 0:10:34
chapter six every day. It is getting closer, like like a roller coaster.

JOANNA 0:10:42
Note on spoilers before we crack on. We will be spoiling all of season two of Good Omens. Now that we’ve got to episode six, there will also be spoilers for the book Good Omens and season one of Good Omens. It would be very weird to be listening to this if you haven’t seen season one of Good Omens. Yes. However, while we are primarily a Discworld podcast, we will not be spoiling any major events in the Discworld series. And we’re saving any and all discussion of the final Discworld novel, The Shepherd’s Crown till we get there. So if you’re just joining us for this and want to try the Discworld, you can safely come on the journey with us. In a creepy celestial lift.

FRANCINE 0:11:17
I think we should say at the top of the episode, if we don’t seem like we’re touching on enough unhinged theories, don’t worry, it’s because we’re doing another episode. Oh, yeah, there’s there’s one more coming. This is the recap episode. And then we’re doing like a full series recap with

JOANNA 0:11:32
lots of madness. So yeah, if you think we’ve got hinges, don’t worry. Yeah, don’t worry. It’s fine. Yeah, we’re still masking tape. Yeah. So follow up, I actually have a couple of missives from the round world. Oh, missives, eh? This absolutely delighted me. We got an email from Negev, who has recently started listening to our podcast from the beginning. So probably won’t hear this for a while. So hi from the past. And they said that they had a fun fact for us about something we’ve definitely forgotten by now. And I had in episode 18, sorcery part two, the obscure reference finial was about the fact that in the book, a drink called aurach gets served with coffee and we couldn’t find an equivalent drink. But we talked about like the Italian shot plus coffee thing. Aurach has an equivalent round world drink called Arak. It’s very common in Israel.

FRANCINE 0:12:27
Well, fuck, why couldn’t I find that? And in the rest of the Levant, it’s made partly with anise,

JOANNA 0:12:33
tastes very licoricey. You mentioned in the episode that no Mediterranean alcohols were worth drinking and you were right. I’m sorry. I think enough English people have been on holiday to Greece or had friends have that we’ve all somewhere in our history got like horrible

FRANCINE 0:12:47
ouzo flashbacks. I’m going to put it slightly more diplomatically. It’s not worth us trying to drink, certainly not worth me trying to drink, not worth the English trying to drink. And we’ve

JOANNA 0:12:56
got a quick book recommendation from Raoul who heard about this literary event and thought we would like it. A book called Pleasure Beach by Helen Palmer. It’s a queer love story and a tribute to James Joyce’s Ulysses set in Blackpool in 1999. And I’ve read a little bit about it and it’s immediately gone on my reading list. So thank you Raoul. I do also have a few messages from like

FRANCINE 0:13:20
the discord and things about good omensy stuff, but I’m saving those for next week. So I haven’t forgotten you listeners. It’s just that I want we’re doing lots of fan theories and stuff like

JOANNA 0:13:30
next week and it’s just going to be less messy. Yes. And listeners if you want to send us your thoughts, we’ll tell you how at the end but please do send us your thoughts and deranged theories and any deranged theories you had during season two. As quickly as possible because we are recording on Wednesday. You have two days after this comes out. Cool. Right. Let’s get into good omens episode six every day. Big thoughts, overall thoughts. How do you feel?

FRANCINE 0:13:55
Well, Joanne, I feel… Yeah, me too. Yeah, I knew it. I knew there was emotional devastation coming up. I was surprised at the form it took. So the spoiler did not ruin it for me.

JOANNA 0:14:10
Something both of us have avoided acknowledging on the podcast because we wanted to give it spoiler free but we haven’t remained totally unspoilered that people weren’t happy about the ending. Yes. As in emotionally devastated that they thought Neil Gaiman got it wrong.

FRANCINE 0:14:25
Yeah. And there are a few that did think that there’s always going to be that. But yeah, and we had also been spoiled on one of the big events at the ending. I don’t know I’m skirting around it now but I will. But even that I think was was not what I was expecting. I was not. I was I was sufficiently emotionally wrenched apart. So I think that’s as planned from Mr. Gaiman. Thank you ever so much. Thank you Neil Gaiman for your plunging your fist into my chest

JOANNA 0:14:53
and ripping out my heart and I didn’t know I still had one. It made me feel again. Yeah. Yeah,

FRANCINE 0:14:59
yeah. That’s cool to know. We really sound mentally unhealthy. Do you know what? I feel it a little and it’s partly this. Can you imagine if this shit had come out when we were teenagers? They didn’t make media this good. I swear to God. Okay, see for me they did. But that’s just because

JOANNA 0:15:17
I formed a really deep emotional connection with Buffy early on. Yeah, I guess. But like,

FRANCINE 0:15:24
this plus. Oh, yeah, the TikToks in the Tumblr and the oh, yeah, no, I mean, I can see why a bunch of

JOANNA 0:15:31
teenagers are fully losing their minds. Yeah, no. And this kind of just overt queerness wasn’t a thing on shows I watched when I was a teenager. There was queerness but not like this flavor. Or not just accepted as a part of a natural part of the show. Yeah, no, I mean, even I wasn’t even thinking like, could I cope with it when I was a teenager? I was thinking what if this had been like, did lockdown this this season of television came out like we would all be imagine this plus that horrible feeling of climbing the walls.

FRANCINE 0:16:05
I’d probably likes it. I mean, I’d have loved it. Lockdown was peak. I feel nothing for me for a little while. I guess this would have maybe snapped me out of it. Yeah. Yeah. Okay, I think I

Chapter 6: Everyday

JOANNA 0:16:16
think we should dive into the episode. Yeah, let’s do it. Let’s do it. So every day, every day, we open with Shaxs and the demons snarling on the threshold of the bookshop. So Nina starts asking Aziraphale questions about what’s going on. And he does explain the ball and what he was trying to do and that he was trying to get them together. And says Jane Austen and when they question Jane Austen he’s like, Oh, yeah, you know, Clark and Will Diamond robbery. And it’s that fun thing where you know, someone learns a fact and then like, references it as if they knew it all along. Like, I felt very seen because I know I fucking knew that constantly and not in a like, Oh, I learned this fun fact. Like, yeah, of course, everyone knows Jane Austen did the diamond robbery.

FRANCINE 0:17:01
At least everybody who speaks Ficunda Crowley. I quite liked that he this had kind of snapped him out of it somewhere between, you know, the dancing and the this bit, he’s taking charge, he’s doing something. He’s clearly actually seeing the danger now. He’s kind of he’s not acknowledging that what he was doing with Nina and Maggie was stupid, but he’s just kind of explaining it to them like it didn’t really matter. And yeah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Like he’s back in the room with us.

JOANNA 0:17:28
Yes, we’re past trying to cover up the miracle. Yeah. We’re facing the actual danger. And he’s getting these candles ready, which are battery operated. Yeah, I did see that. And he says they’re battery operated. Yeah. And that combined with you know, the fire extinguishers, he’s not having another fire in the bookshop, is he?

FRANCINE 0:17:49
He is not. I was wondering if he was the one who bought all of the fire extinguishers or whether it was Crowley considering who bought them, he’d run to that trauma.

JOANNA 0:17:57
But I think he probably bought the electric, the electric candles. And then Crowley was like, okay, you need actual fire safety as well. Let’s get one through every time he dropped by. Yeah,

FRANCINE 0:18:09
just just pick up one of these. Don’t worry about it. Just nice to have around. I think they look

JOANNA 0:18:14
nice. Brighten the place up. And yeah, Shax is getting threatening. Meanwhile, meanwhile, Crowley is infiltrating heaven like a bee. And he wants Muriel to take him to see some records.

FRANCINE 0:18:29
He’s infiltrating heaven like a murder hornet. Yes. In a beehive. In a beehive. So, A, Crowley’s outfit. Yeah. I mean, that is a choice was made there. It’s

JOANNA 0:18:45
the curly headband. I thought. Oh, God, it’s like the one of those zigzag ones that we used to use.

FRANCINE 0:18:54
It wasn’t quite that. It was like it was it’s the area you’re thinking of, but it wasn’t the one that hurt that much. But I bet it would have hurt you actually because you had curly hair.

JOANNA 0:19:03
Yeah. Yeah. Those things were those things were traumatizing. Like I think you see footballers using them sometimes. I said that in such a horrible tone of derision. I’m not judging anyone who uses a zigzag hairband. And he did have 90s David Beckham hair. He did. Yeah,

FRANCINE 0:19:18
that might have been it. Yeah. What do you think of the outfit overall?

JOANNA 0:19:22
I love it. I’ve been very much enjoying now that I’ve seen the finale. I’ve been back on Twitter a bit more. Obviously, I was staying off Twitter. There’s been a weird fan side tangent of okay, but what about Crowley’s feet slash shoes? Because there’s a line in the book about their snake skin boots or maybe their boots because obviously Crowley’s a little bit snaky. The fact that he’s in sandals here is like, oh, he’s chosen to have have feet and sandals for a

FRANCINE 0:19:46
bit. I did not notice his feet. I wasn’t like looking for it. But I saw that conversation

JOANNA 0:19:51
between my first and second watch. So obviously then I clocked it. Also the walk he does.

FRANCINE 0:19:56
Little goat walk there.

JOANNA 0:19:58
Little goat walk as we get this very wide frame shot.

FRANCINE 0:20:02
And also he’s gone for beige. He couldn’t quite bring himself to do white.

JOANNA 0:20:05
Yeah. But then Muriel was a bit of beige and stuff. I wonder if it’s also like a demon ranking thing. Because, you know, Muriel’s on the lower ranks and he’s trying to look someone who just kind of blends in like Michael and Uriel walk past and just don’t clock him at all.

FRANCINE 0:20:22
Oh, follow up I missed by the way. I kept getting Muriel’s pronouns wrong. They are they them. Yes. And I was saying she had quite a lot last week. Sorry.

JOANNA 0:20:28
I think we’ve also been pronouncing some of the angel names wrong.

FRANCINE 0:20:31
Oh, I don’t care about that. We tried. Bible can suck it.

JOANNA 0:20:38
There’s the episode title.

FRANCINE 0:20:40
Yeah, let’s open ourself up to a whole new audience that hates us. I love that for us. We’ve been so lucky so far. Anyway, he’s blending in well.

JOANNA 0:20:48
He is. He gets away with it. The thing is, right. So again, something I haven’t mentioned because we were staying so spoiler free, but obviously I’d read ahead in the episode descriptions. And there’s a line in the episode description for this episode about Crowley infiltrating heaven as a bee. So I had this wild bat shit idea that he would somehow discover that like Beelzebub was hiding in the fly and spying on the bookshop and that’s gives him the idea and he goes to heaven hiding in a bee because bees would hang out in heaven because obviously bees are cool and not like it’s cool to hang out in heaven. But like, if we’re going to call heaven the good guys, like

FRANCINE 0:21:26
the bees are the good guys. Yeah, for sure. They’re part of God’s plan. Yeah, yeah. Unlike wasps.

JOANNA 0:21:32
Unlike wasps, no. Wasps can fuck off and as can murder hornets.

FRANCINE 0:21:36
Yeah, but I’m glad I’m glad that wasn’t the case. That would have been an unnecessary distracting subplot, I feel, to turn him into a bee.

JOANNA 0:21:43
And we wouldn’t have had David Tennant in this outfit doing that walk, which would be a travesty. Bee, ha. Sorry. Anyway, back in the bookshop, Maggie stands up to the demons and Shax starts getting harsh. I love Maggie in this bit.

FRANCINE 0:21:59
I had brothers. Oh, shut up.

JOANNA 0:22:01
Okay, I don’t like the I had brothers, but specifically in response to the fun, like the tongue against the window is like, okay, now I can kind of get that.

FRANCINE 0:22:09
I know, I know. Now it’s that it’s like, I have a visceral reaction to that line. But watching it the second time I was like, ah, now you’re cool. All right.

JOANNA 0:22:16
It was because it was specifically about the funny faces. It didn’t bother me. It wasn’t there. Like, oh, of course I know how to fight. I have seven brothers. Yeah, that’s true. I fixed this motorbike left handed. Yeah, it wasn’t that.

FRANCINE 0:22:26
Yeah. Yes, of course, I know how to deal with disgusting little boys. I have brothers is sensible. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:22:32
And what if what are demons if not? I just I always this is a trope bit I love where the shy one stands up for themselves, especially when they’re standing up for themselves against someone being like, oh, you’re nobody. We got a little this is this was a more satisfying version of it than we had in season one where

FRANCINE 0:22:52
Pepper stands up to war who’s calling her a silly little girl. It’s just I don’t tolerate everyday sexism, which was cringe. Was cringe. I don’t know. Do you know what? I rewatched that and I didn’t mind it.

JOANNA 0:23:03
No, it still made me cringe.

FRANCINE 0:23:04
They’re cute.

JOANNA 0:23:06
It’s cute, but it still made me cringe.

FRANCINE 0:23:08
Yeah. I guess my cringe threshold’s gone up a little bit. Yeah, mine hasn’t. And not when it comes to children anyway, but also when when, you know,

JOANNA 0:23:17
the shy one standing up for themself and it comes with that, oh, you’re a nobody. And then the other ones like actually, no, I do like them, though. So they’re not nobody like they’ve got me. Yeah.

FRANCINE 0:23:25
Yeah, yeah. That is that is a favorite of mine. Nina’s just standing there with a smirk developing. Nina does do a good smirk.

JOANNA 0:23:36
And yeah, then Maggie gets a bit too brave and accidentally invites the demons in. Another favorite trope of mine. Yeah, I have seen at least three different vampire TV shows where someone, usually a teenage girl, has accidentally invited the vampires in by going, why don’t you come here and say that?

FRANCINE 0:23:58
I want to see it with a football hooligan crowd accidentally invite something in. Come on over if you think you’re old enough. That kind of thing.

JOANNA 0:24:05
Yeah, that would be more fun. Reverse the trope.

FRANCINE 0:24:08
Yeah. I like also that the Eric demon was pushed in first. And got blown up again. Poor Eric. Poor disposable Eric. But not when we expected.

JOANNA 0:24:18
And yeah, Aziraphale opens up the heavenly circle and we get the titles. Speaking of, by the way, I still haven’t like fully dived deep into all of the background and bonus content stuff that’s available on Amazon Prime because there’s so much. But I did watch Peter Anderson. It’s his studio who did the titles. There’s a whole thing of him going through and putting out all of the Easter eggs in the title sequence. And it’s really worth watching.

FRANCINE 0:24:43
Because I haven’t watched that one. I watched the making of.

JOANNA 0:24:46
Yeah, no, it’s watch the Easter eggs one. I because there’s loads of fun stuff I didn’t notice in there. I’m not going to sit and list all of it. That’d be really boring. And B, he’s just got a gorgeous accent. Quite nice to sit and listen to him narrate something for a couple of minutes.

FRANCINE 0:24:59
Yeah, nice. Can you remember one to tell me?

JOANNA 0:25:02
Oh, so in the Dirty Duck pub scene and like the I think it was the first, maybe the second episode, we see someone reading a newspaper that has a headline about a duck playing an accordion. And in the title sequence, there’s a little duck playing the accordion as they like walk down into the movie theater bit.

FRANCINE 0:25:18
Oh, cute. I like that. My one making of fact that goes along with that actually is all the little characters are made from Crowley or Aziraphale heads. Like they take their faces and manipulate them to look like various people or things. Yeah. Cool.

JOANNA 0:25:35
So that’s how we did that. Fun. Anyway, back in heaven. Crowley continues unnoticed even by Michael, as we said, Muriel’s got the Gabriel file, but it’s confidential. And luckily, Crowley wasn’t always a demon.

FRANCINE 0:25:50
He was a powerful one. And another hint is creating the universe wasn’t it?

JOANNA 0:25:55
Yeah, yeah. They say it’s got to be this rank or higher and he’s like,

FRANCINE 0:25:58
A throne, a dominion or above? That’s the one. And then I’ve got a note here saying look that up and I didn’t.

JOANNA 0:26:05
Cool. I think we don’t need to get into angelic hierarchy. We’ve already figured out they’ve mixed up principalities and archangels.

FRANCINE 0:26:13
Mm hmm.

JOANNA 0:26:14
Oh, but Muriel when Crowley calls their office lonely and they say, Yeah, it is. That’s why I was so excited to go to earth.

FRANCINE 0:26:22
I’m helping you aren’t I? I’m helping a demon. I’m in trouble.

JOANNA 0:26:26
It’s all so sweet. But also I was kind of thinking about the bigger picture of how many angels are actually low ranking and lonely like Muriel who would, given the chance to go to earth, leap at it to just not be lonely and see all these wonderful things and would not be happy if it went away.

FRANCINE 0:26:46
Yeah, absolutely. Just put a pin in that. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:26:50
Sorry, we were saving the derangement for the bonus episode. Anyway.

FRANCINE 0:26:52
I have a little bit derangement sprinkled in as a treat. I liked the boring beige cardboard folder with just like markered. Yep. Title on I thought that was a nice touch. A little bit of boring bureaucracy.

JOANNA 0:27:04
And just not as neat and shiny as a lot of the heavenly screens that are done around the edges. Yeah, they’ve got the smartphone things and yeah. So demons are burning as they try and cross the Aziraphale circle. That’ll happen. In Oh, yeah. And Nina sort of asking, Okay, well, so you had a plan. It’s like Aziraphale’s like, Yeah, this was my plan.

FRANCINE 0:27:24
Yeah, this is. I mean, it’s pretty good plan. But I was expecting Crowley to be there by now.

JOANNA 0:27:29
Yeah. But after I was smug he was about Yeah, I’ve got a plan. And then his whole plan is like, Okay, well, burning circle and then fingers crossed that

FRANCINE 0:27:40
will do it. This was the moment I realized one of my mad theories was not correct, which was that, Oh, yeah, no. Aziraphale clearly has a proper plan.

JOANNA 0:27:50
Aziraphale did not have a proper plan. I just kind of heard that in sort of Ron Howard narrating Arrested Development voice. In heaven, we get the screens coming down and Crowley watches the angels talking about Armageddon 2.0 and Gabriel say, Nah, that’s not.

FRANCINE 0:28:10
I kind of love the celestial teams meeting vibe. That was a Oh, yeah. Nice way of showing that. Nice way of showing that.

JOANNA 0:28:18
I feel like that was probably partially inspired by the fact that a lot of the writing process and shit would have happened during the first lockdown.

FRANCINE 0:28:26
Yeah, that’s a good point. Yeah, definitely.

JOANNA 0:28:28
I think if that hadn’t happened, that scene would have been written in person, potentially.

FRANCINE 0:28:36
Yeah, I mean, I feel like it was like, showing them when they had been in a room or something. I don’t know. But whatever. I liked I liked how it was shown.

JOANNA 0:28:46
So the fire extinguishers come out.

FRANCINE 0:28:48
Yep. The good ones, the foam ones.

JOANNA 0:28:50
The good ones. Demons keep invading the bookshop. In heaven, Sarakel interrupts Crowley and Muriel and offers to actually show them Gabriel’s trial. And obviously, Sarakel has clocked Crowley. And says, well, yeah, obviously, we used to work together. We designed a horsehead nebula together and Crowley’s just like, nah.

FRANCINE 0:29:10
Which continues the theme with Furfur. Do we think it’s a power play yet? Or do we think it’s just Crowley going, eh?

JOANNA 0:29:18
Either power play, he’s genuinely just really forgetful, or he is like burned all memories of his time as an angel out of his mind.

FRANCINE 0:29:27
Possible.

JOANNA 0:29:28
Because when he and Furfur knew each other, that was like pre the big war.

FRANCINE 0:29:32
Yeah. I forgot to say the whole bit about Crowley was saying like, it’s not possible for a for a demon to be in heaven. So people don’t see it. I thought it was quite Pratchettian. Oh, yeah, absolutely. Talking dog, right?

JOANNA 0:29:49
Yeah, the mind sliding off things, which we were sort of talking about. We’ve had lots of conversations since we talked about it last week of places that’s come from. There’s a bit of Doctor Who. There’s a bit of Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. There’s some stuff in Pratchett books. And I think Gaspode’s a good example of that.

FRANCINE 0:30:04
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:30:05
Just not perceiving the talking dog. Occasionally, did that dog just say woof?

FRANCINE 0:30:11
Yes.

JOANNA 0:30:12
Shax gets judgmental, calls Aziraphale Crowley’s emotional support angel.

FRANCINE 0:30:19
Very cute.

JOANNA 0:30:20
And then she starts asking him, oh, do you want a big meal?

FRANCINE 0:30:25
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:30:26
And this idea of the denizens of heaven and hell ingesting human stuff comes up a lot through the episode. But I do think it’s interesting that it’s not normal for demons either.

FRANCINE 0:30:38
Yes. Yeah. Good point, actually. Yeah. Because Crowley seemed to think it was so normal by the time we saw it in the Jobe bit.

JOANNA 0:30:44
Yeah. So Crowley’s gotten used to it, but that doesn’t mean it’s standard among demons. So that temptation of Aziraphale giving him the, what was it, the ox rib?

FRANCINE 0:30:54
That was a special temptation just for him.

JOANNA 0:30:57
That was a temptation towards humanity, not towards demonicness.

FRANCINE 0:31:00
Yes. Which kind of fits with the theme of the episode.

JOANNA 0:31:03
I mean, the first time Shax did that bit, it’s so proper chalkboard up, the going my spine went up the wrong way kind of feeling, just because it sounds so inherently fat shamey. And I know that’s not what it was meant to be.

FRANCINE 0:31:18
I’m just very sensitive to that. I’m sure it was meant to give him the same feeling in a different direction. Yeah. And sushi. Sushi particularly, I thought, because it’s like, and she’s been watching him.

JOANNA 0:31:33
Yeah. And also there’s something so specifically like fastidious about eating sushi.

FRANCINE 0:31:39
Yeah. It’s like, yeah, calling him a fucking liberal elite nonsense. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:31:45
And it’s something you have to think about and seek out and go through a whole process of eating.

FRANCINE 0:31:50
Yeah. But yeah, good old fashioned ox rib. I could go an ox rib. I’m surprised we’re not getting ox ribs right now. I wonder if just eat. No.

JOANNA 0:32:03
Anyway, Gabriel, we see Gabriel’s trial on trial for refusing to sanction the second end of the

FRANCINE 0:32:08
world. Yeah. Yeah. And I’m Which kind of begs the question, why the fuck is he, you know, all of the kind of choice of being a higher rank calling angel is clearly bullshit.

JOANNA 0:32:20
Oh, absolutely. You’ve still got to do what God wants passed down by the Metatron. And yeah, there’s a when I first watched this, it just really bugged me because it all seems so out of character for Gabriel. And of course, you get all the context for exactly why he’s acting, why he is within minutes. It’s very cleverly done because it sets up this mystery of why is Gabriel being like that, especially when he says he’s happy to be cast down to hell.

FRANCINE 0:32:46
That’s it. Yeah. My thought at the time, the first time I was watching it was like, maybe he needs his Hera Phelan Crowley for something. Maybe that was the point all along because, you know, I was half convinced he was lying.

JOANNA 0:32:57
Yeah. And I think I said I had some hints that maybe there was something between Gabriel and Beelzebub, but I didn’t think it was that I thought it was a working together thing or at least conspiring because we’d seen heaven conspiring through back channels, although it was it was Michael doing it.

FRANCINE 0:33:13
Yeah. Anyway, he got naked.

JOANNA 0:33:15
Yeah. So the Metatron tells him that actually he’s getting demoted. He’s not being cast down to hell. And I was delighted to see the Metatron here because I predicted last week that when Aziraphale got the circle out, we were going to see the Metatron.

FRANCINE 0:33:26
That was not a very stretching prediction, but yes.

JOANNA 0:33:31
I was right, but I was also wrong. We do see the Metatron, but just not in at any point in Aziraphale’s circle that he got out that the Metatron floated in last time.

FRANCINE 0:33:42
Yes. Not in a special Metatron circle.

JOANNA 0:33:44
Yes. We let him out of the circle. That was a bad idea. Anyway, yeah, the Metatron tells Gabriel that he’s going to be demoted and specifically we can’t have him fall to hell because there’s already been one high angel that falls to hell. And this is where we get the context for the one angel being cast down to hell.

FRANCINE 0:34:06
On to an accident, two is an institutional problem.

JOANNA 0:34:09
Two will seem like an institutional problem, which is a it’s the thing from last week, but also it’s like the importance of being earnest thing. To lose one parent is something to lose two looks like carelessness.

FRANCINE 0:34:19
Absolutely. I wasn’t sure, by the way, if they were to I seen this as part of the math theories, but I wasn’t sure if they were talking about Satan or about Crowley.

JOANNA 0:34:26
Oh, it’s Lucifer.

FRANCINE 0:34:28
Because they said Prince of Heaven, didn’t they?

JOANNA 0:34:30
Yeah, they said Prince of Heaven, which was Lucifer Morningstar before he was cast down and became Satan. I thought it was Lucifer straight away. I assume that was who they were talking about because they said Prince of Hell.

FRANCINE 0:34:40
Yeah, I didn’t until I saw somebody ask about it. And then I was like, oh, wait, do I know?

JOANNA 0:34:45
Yeah. Yeah. I saw someone ask about it after I’d seen the whole episode. But yeah, I never thought it was Crowley. But then I was raised with all that Christian stuff, you know, poured into me. But Neil Gaiman also confirmed that that was meant to reference Lucifer on Twitter, on Tumblr, which then turned into some world fan theorizing that Crowley is Lucifer. No, no, because we met Satan.

FRANCINE 0:35:10
Yeah. Next week. Next week.

JOANNA 0:35:12
Sorry. Voiced by Bendit Cumberbatch. Anyway. So yes, so Gabriel’s getting demoted and he’s going to have his memory removed. So he says he agrees, but he’s not allowed to keep his lovely tailored clothes. So first he needs to take his clothes off and clear out his desk and he gets a box for the task.

FRANCINE 0:35:29
Cardboard box straight from heaven.

JOANNA 0:35:31
There was a little detail in this as well. They say what rank they’re going to demote Gabriel to and then Muriel points out, you know, it’s one rank below her and Crowley gives her this sort

FRANCINE 0:35:40
of little encouraging punch on the shoulder. Yeah. Like, go on you. I didn’t know there was one below me.

JOANNA 0:35:46
It’s so sweet how Crowley has decided to support this one specific clerk angel.

FRANCINE 0:35:51
Yeah, absolutely. Very cute.

JOANNA 0:35:54
Gabriel and his weird attachment to his outfits is, it’s kind of his version of earthly attachment as well. Like Aziraphale, you know, has his food and his good wine and Gabriel’s got his suits.

FRANCINE 0:36:07
They are tailored. Tailored. Because that’s the thing that you need, apparently. Yeah. Was that Aziraphale in series one actually, wasn’t it? I could miracle the stain off, but I’d know.

JOANNA 0:36:18
Don’t remind me of the bit where Crowley casually blows the stain off and Aziraphale looks delighted.

FRANCINE 0:36:23
I can’t, I can’t do that right now. I know. Oh, by the way, what do we think? Do we know what those symbols are all over the celestial zoom meeting? Oh, I didn’t look that up. No, I meant to. I’ll try to do that for next week.

JOANNA 0:36:37
Anyway, meanwhile, demons.

FRANCINE 0:36:39
Meanwhile, demons.

JOANNA 0:36:40
Nina has resorted to throwing encyclopedias because it’s all online anyway.

FRANCINE 0:36:44
That’s true. Actually, I say that it’s not, it’s not true. There’s lots of crap I’ve got in that old set of encyclopedias that aren’t online, but I don’t, in times of peril, I would accept them being used as a weapon.

JOANNA 0:36:54
Yeah. Also, there’s lots of stuff in your set of encyclopedias that isn’t online, but isn’t that because they’re historical encyclopedias and a lot, some of it’s been proven wrong?

FRANCINE 0:37:02
Well, yes. Yeah. But it’s interesting to know what people believed. Oh yeah, true.

JOANNA 0:37:08
Back in heaven, after Gabriel’s trial, he’s doing something interesting with a box. He’s naked and he drops a matchbox. And then when the heavenly host attempt to erase his memory, they can’t find it or him. The message tells the rest of the angels, they’re just going to have to find him.

FRANCINE 0:37:25
Yes. Interesting point there. Pin in that.

JOANNA 0:37:28
I like, he says to them, don’t be so wet. He’s quite harsh. And it’s a nice reminder early on in the episode that as much as he is sort of plays a bit sort of genial uncle, the Metatron is very capable of not being nice.

FRANCINE 0:37:42
Yeah. And I feel like at this point is being devious. Yeah. I also like at this point, Michael was scrolling through what looked like a celestial smartphone, that kind of transparent glass thing, which I quite like. And I wondered if their technology evolved to shape with whatever humans had done. And so if we’d looked at them 30 years earlier, would she have been going through a file of facts made of glass?

JOANNA 0:38:04
Michael and the glass file of facts, the spin off we all need. No, I really love that as a mental image. Anyway, so the bookshop invasion eventually calls for desperate measures and Aziraphale gets his halo out.

FRANCINE 0:38:16
For the lads, for the lads.

JOANNA 0:38:17
Who are the heavenly music and wires that are singing as he’s doing this with the halo.

FRANCINE 0:38:26
There’s got a big reminder that he is a soldier. Yeah. Like that was his role, wasn’t it?

JOANNA 0:38:33
Yeah. And he was the guy with the big flaming sword.

FRANCINE 0:38:35
Yeah, he’s the only one with a sword. Lost it fairly early. Perhaps he wasn’t the best soldier in the world, but still. And he fought in the Great War or whatever that was at the beginning. I’ve forgotten it.

JOANNA 0:38:46
That was the one between heaven and hell where the demons were cast out, I think.

FRANCINE 0:38:50
Yeah, that sounds right.

JOANNA 0:38:51
Yeah. So there’s a heavenly explosion, Shax gets knocked out, demons are taken care of. And it is possible that at this point, Aziraphale has started a war.

FRANCINE 0:39:02
The line where he says that, I watched an interview with Michael Sheen, where he was like, I knew when I read that line, that that line was going to be in the trailer, which it was, of course. And because like, you get the idea, sometimes this is a trailer line. And I kept fucking it out of his head. I just because I knew it was going to be I just couldn’t say it couldn’t get it out. So it took him loads of takes to do that, apparently. Oh bless.

JOANNA 0:39:24
So alarms start going off in heaven. And it is time for Crowley and the Angels to take the lifts down.

FRANCINE 0:39:30
Which of course, listeners, usually you shouldn’t do if there are alarms going off. You should try and take the stairs. But I understand that electronics work a little differently. But we’re all for fire safety on the Truth Shall Make You Threat.

JOANNA 0:39:41
We do support fire safety in the Truth Shall Make You Threat. Make sure you have a large number of fire extinguishers.

FRANCINE 0:39:46
And an encyclopedia. And an encyclopedia.

JOANNA 0:39:49
Did you notice Crowley gets his own lift?

FRANCINE 0:39:52
No.

JOANNA 0:39:53
All the so like Michael, Uriel, Saracel and Muriel are all crammed into one. And then Crowley is very relaxed in the own and switches his outfit on his way down.

FRANCINE 0:40:04
Crowley. I assessed himself funny old world, isn’t it? Which I didn’t. I don’t know what that was in reference to exactly. But I enjoyed it. I think he was just in general.

JOANNA 0:40:17
If it was, you know, the alarms are gone off when he says that, isn’t it?

FRANCINE 0:40:21
Yeah, I think he’s probably guessed what Aziraphale’s done. Oh, maybe. Because he didn’t seem shocked, did he? He was more like, piss takey. Yeah. You did what?

JOANNA 0:40:32
And also this idea of, you know, he likes rescuing me. He does like rescuing Aziraphale. He’s probably mildly delighted that he gets to go and get Aziraphale out of trouble now.

FRANCINE 0:40:41
Of course. Anyway. Let’s enjoy these last moments.

JOANNA 0:40:47
Crowley and the angels make it back to the bookshop. And Aziraphale’s look of relief when Crowley turns up. And it’s very, oh, it’s all going to be all right now, isn’t it?

FRANCINE 0:40:57
Yes. Even though he’s already dealt with the danger, the relief comes when, yeah.

JOANNA 0:41:02
And yeah, Dagon, Beelzebub and Furfur turn up and they revive Shax. Crowley asks for Gabriel’s box and explains to the group that Gabriel is hidden under a too successful miracle. The box tells them to look in the fly and with Beelzebub’s help, Gabriel finally gets his memories back, which, ew, by the way.

FRANCINE 0:41:23
Oh, yeah, no, ew, definitely. Yeah, the fly going in the eye. I’m so bad with eye stuff. I know. I liked the happy Crowley with the, you blew up your halo. He was fully season one joyful there, I think. Almost Doctor Who joyful, I would say, David Tennant there. You blew up your halo.

JOANNA 0:41:44
It reminded me of season one when Aziraphale turns up still possessing Madam Tracy.

FRANCINE 0:41:52
Yes, yes, yes, yes. Suits you, Angel. I like the dress. Oh, and we got here confirmation that it was the two of them trying to perform the miracle

JOANNA 0:42:01
together.

FRANCINE 0:42:01
That is what flared massively. Yes. Also, I have one nearly made it to my favorite quote quote here, which is Michael going, the mortals here, somebody turned them into pillars of salt. Oh, I loved that line. I’ve got to write that down.

JOANNA 0:42:16
That was so, I know, I think that’s a couple of scenes after the flashback.

FRANCINE 0:42:21
Oh, I’ve got that written down here. Sorry.

JOANNA 0:42:22
Yeah, but no, that was a great line. So we go to the flashbacks. We see the Gabriel and Beelzebub story.

FRANCINE 0:42:29
Nice physical effects of Gabriel flying through space time.

JOANNA 0:42:34
Yes, enjoyed that. So season one gave us a half hour cold open that told us a lot of Crowley and Aziraphale’s love story. Somehow we get an adorable love story here in what, four scenes?

FRANCINE 0:42:45
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:42:46
One of which is from season one and we’ve seen already with a different actor.

FRANCINE 0:42:50
Yeah. Yeah, very truncated relationship arc, I suppose. Yeah, I totally buy it.

JOANNA 0:42:58
Yeah, so we start with the scene from the end of season one where Gabriel and Beelzebub are discussing getting their armies to stand down, which I’d forgotten about that Gabriel outfit, the coat with the scarf.

FRANCINE 0:43:10
Oh, yeah, that was cute. And the slightly spiked up hair.

JOANNA 0:43:13
So then we see Gabriel meet Beelzebub’s new face in a Russian cafe. And of course, they’re both, both sides are ready for the next Armageddon and they never

FRANCINE 0:43:21
need to speak again. Absolutely.

JOANNA 0:43:24
And then they meet up in American Varna and Gabriel pitches this idea of no Armageddon and each side keeping to their respective status quos.

FRANCINE 0:43:34
It’d be static and quoey. Yeah, I like that. And it has to be, well, Beelzebub has to explain what music is, which is… I love it so much.

JOANNA 0:43:45
It’s so sweet. So every day is playing and this is where we kind of know why it’s important. And Beelzebub says that they like the song and then has to explain how music works and Gabriel does that.

FRANCINE 0:43:58
Oh, and then I like it too. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:44:01
It’s just the innocence of it and their non-human understanding of it as an art form combined with how like slightly sinister the song actually is.

FRANCINE 0:44:11
Yeah, and how slightly sinister they are.

JOANNA 0:44:14
And something I was reading about, and I think it was via Neil Gaiman’s Tumblr, but I honestly

FRANCINE 0:44:17
can’t remember now.

JOANNA 0:44:18
If I can find the source, I’ll link it, is that Terry Pratchett talked about using the song back when they were talking about adapting Good Omens into a movie. Like he really liked the idea of that song as a sinister Armageddon thing.

FRANCINE 0:44:30
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. With like tiptoe through the tulips vibes, that kind of… Yeah. Every day. Oh, has someone done a cover yet?

JOANNA 0:44:39
Oh, someone must have done a creepy cover.

FRANCINE 0:44:41
Listen to some of the creepy covers. Creepy everyday cover.

JOANNA 0:44:46
So yeah, then we see Gabriel taking Beelzebub to see his statue, which is a nice payoff

FRANCINE 0:44:51
to the joke of…

JOANNA 0:44:53
I bet he comes to just stare at it for hours, Gabriel.

FRANCINE 0:44:55
I sometimes come here to just stare at it for hours. My note is gazing at his own statue, LMAO. Whomst among us would not? And also two goblets of liquor and a packet of crisps. The spin off everybody wants. I’d watch it.

JOANNA 0:45:15
So yeah, they go to the pub, Gabriel miracles the jukebox. And in return, Beelzebub gifts him with a fly that’s bigger on the inside.

FRANCINE 0:45:25
Lovely. You put here, choose your own awful ship name. Do you have a…

JOANNA 0:45:30
Just quickly, obviously, it would be silly if we didn’t say bigger on the inside.

FRANCINE 0:45:34
Just like the TARDIS. Anyway. Oh, sorry. Yes, of course. Yeah, I’m going to get that in.

JOANNA 0:45:38
Pick your awful ship name. Well, I mean, there’s a few options, isn’t there? There’s Gabe’s above Beelzeal, but I’m going with Gub.

FRANCINE 0:45:45
Oh, nice. I’ve written down Galzabub, but I think Gub sums it up better. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:45:51
So we’re calling the ship Gub. It’s just so sweet that neither of them are really prepared for the idea of a gift. And they have gratitude, but they don’t know how to have gratitude. It’s so alien to them. And there’s something just…

FRANCINE 0:46:10
But it does come to them. Like, I’ve had a gift and now I feel like I should give a gift. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:46:18
And I’m delighted by this and I don’t know how to be sort of delighted by this, but I am. And I don’t know, just thinking about how Aziraphale and Crowley like had millennia and Gub managed to do all this in just a few years.

FRANCINE 0:46:32
Very annoying. Jesus, guys. Get it?

JOANNA 0:46:34
Get your shit together.

FRANCINE 0:46:35
Get your shit together, guys.

JOANNA 0:46:36
Put those ox ribs down.

FRANCINE 0:46:39
Put the ox ribs down. Go on a lovely date. They went on lots of lovely dates. It doesn’t fucking matter, does it? Yeah.

JOANNA 0:46:44
Fucking dining at the Ritz.

FRANCINE 0:46:46
Anyway. Anyway, they don’t eat. They don’t eat or drink. That’s worth noting. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:46:51
Again, like I said with the Shax thing, neither side is willing to eat or drink. And they don’t need, you know, we talked about this kind of idea of fae food rules. The eating and the drinking of the human food are somewhat tied, Aziraphale and Crowley, to humanity.

FRANCINE 0:47:05
Gabriel and Beelzebub or Gub did not need, I’m going to keep saying it,

JOANNA 0:47:10
did not need that tight humanity to fall in love with each other.

FRANCINE 0:47:14
No, but the lack of the, in fact, I would say the lack of the tight humanity was very helpful for them because they were able to just go, all right, let’s fuck off then. Yes. They were. But they’re wrenching whatever’s to their lives here or, you know, they weren’t fussed about what would happen to the world if they left or whatever. Like, okay, well, we’ve got each other now. Bye. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:47:36
Let’s maybe take the song with us.

FRANCINE 0:47:38
Twat.

JOANNA 0:47:41
So, yeah, so we go back to the bookshop and yeah, Gabriel is his old self and he’s reunited with Beelzebub. So yes, Michael notices the mortals. That’s when we get the pillar of soul joke.

FRANCINE 0:47:52
I must have added it in after I’d finished watching.

JOANNA 0:47:54
Um, Crowley escorts Maggie and Nina out and ask them to keep quiet. Nina’s running late and there is a queue at the coffee shop. And if I don’t know if you noticed, there’s Derek Jacoby’s in that queue.

FRANCINE 0:48:09
I did see him. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:48:12
I wonder if that’s going to be important. Why am I not, like, we know he’s there.

FRANCINE 0:48:15
Yeah, no, sure. Just in case anyone’s listening to us as they watch.

JOANNA 0:48:19
Um, sorry, I’ve jumped past it as well. But Beelzebub gets the great line that they found something that mattered more than choosing sides.

FRANCINE 0:48:27
And I ship gub. I do. Do you? Yeah. Then why do you give them such an awful syllable? Because it delights me. Oh, yeah, fair one, fair one. Yeah, Maggie, Maggie offers to help and Nina says yes, because they’ve grown as people. Yes, and Nina is able to accept help. Good on them.

JOANNA 0:48:54
On Crowley’s way back to the bookshop, he quickly resurrects Mr. Brown, which is nice, you know, that we’ve brought back our token heterosexual. We didn’t want him to be the only dead one. Don’t want to bury your straights.

FRANCINE 0:49:06
Only straight in the village. Yeah. Anyway, we go back to the bookshop.

JOANNA 0:49:11
Everyone’s arguing very loudly. Both sides want to punish Gabriel and Beelzebub. Furfur throws in the jobe protocol.

FRANCINE 0:49:20
Furfur is quite like, sweet in this bit, isn’t he? He’s like, oh, he’s a nice guy, this actually. Like he’s genuinely bringing up the bits of the bureaucracy of precedent that matter. He’s quite a good bureaucrat, is Furfur.

JOANNA 0:49:32
I’m a big fan of Furfur. I’ve noticed there is a side of the fandom that has decided to just deeply love Furfur,

FRANCINE 0:49:38
and I’m all for it. I can see how it happened.

JOANNA 0:49:42
So Aziraphale asks them what they would like.

FRANCINE 0:49:45
Well, first Aziraphale gets to do what we’ve all wanted to do in meetings where people talk over each other, which is to ring an obnoxiously loud bell. Yes. Go shut up! Or whatever he said, probably much nicer than that. And Crowley is looking in through the window at this point. Yeah. Smiling approvingly, like he did when he was taking the chandelier down. Oh, so much symbolic looking in through the window from Crowley.

JOANNA 0:50:06
Oh, he does like to look longingly through a window.

FRANCINE 0:50:12
Anyway. Anyway.

JOANNA 0:50:13
Um, all Gabriel wants is better clothes than Beelzebub.

FRANCINE 0:50:17
All Beelzebub wants is Gabriel.

JOANNA 0:50:19
And Crowley suggests Alpha Centauri, because I guess he’s not let that go.

FRANCINE 0:50:25
Nope. And he looks meaningfully at Aziraphale, who…

JOANNA 0:50:31
Because that’s where he wanted them to run away to last season.

FRANCINE 0:50:34
Yeah. Do you remember? Do you remember? Do you remember that? The father.

JOANNA 0:50:36
Oh, do you remember that fight they had in the bandstand?

FRANCINE 0:50:38
I do. Cool. The bandstand fight. Bandstand fight. And then the talking about Alpha Centauri outside the bookshop. Yeah. I’d go back and watch all that today.

JOANNA 0:50:48
And then somebody killed my best friend.

FRANCINE 0:50:50
Anyway. Oh my God. I didn’t watch that far because I was already suffering enough.

JOANNA 0:50:55
So Shax somehow gets promoted in this as well. And Crowley asks for his flat back. And there’s absolutely no acknowledgement from Aziraphale. So I guess Aziraphale is aware and is fine with the fact that Crowley’s been living in his car for a few years.

FRANCINE 0:51:11
Yeah, yeah. Yeah. The… Wait, where are we?

JOANNA 0:51:19
Have they…

FRANCINE 0:51:20
Have those two faded away yet?

JOANNA 0:51:23
Before they fade away. There’s a few things that happen.

FRANCINE 0:51:26
Okay. Yeah, yeah. I no longer trust the order of my bullet points. Meaning that Shax is asking…

JOANNA 0:51:35
Saying, you know, oh, we’re going to send all of these legions and legions of hell out and Beelzebub says like, mate, you know we’re understaffed.

FRANCINE 0:51:43
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:51:44
Which is a nice follow up from the conversation we were having last week about why isn’t there a legion.

FRANCINE 0:51:49
Just understaffed. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:51:52
Hell’s not pulling the crowds in the way it used to.

FRANCINE 0:51:56
No, no. Well, they all got pissed off after the last failed Armageddon, I bet. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:52:00
I wonder if there’s actually quite a few free floating agents not willing to be legions.

FRANCINE 0:52:07
Could be. Anyway, yeah.

JOANNA 0:52:11
And then Gabriel and Beelzebub sing as they fade away, I guess, to Alpha Centauri.

FRANCINE 0:52:18
And Aziraphale gets a little moment of, my clue has been confirmed.

JOANNA 0:52:23
He’s very pleased to have his clue, isn’t he?

FRANCINE 0:52:26
And then he starts looking very wistfully at Crowley. He does.

JOANNA 0:52:29
They look so wistful. And Shax’s and Furfur have just a very cute little moment as well. They sort of go up and do a little fist bump thing. So I totally misread what I thought was probably going on between them after the Nazi flesh eaters.

FRANCINE 0:52:44
Yeah, no, I think just because their mannerisms are meant to be quite abrasive and unpleasant. Yeah. I guess like, that’s just how they get along.

JOANNA 0:52:54
I thought Shax’s was screwing Furfur over, but I guess actually they’re kind of

FRANCINE 0:52:59
digging each other like a… Not in cahoots, exactly. But yeah, yeah, yeah. They’re not not cahooting. You know, we can ship…

JOANNA 0:53:05
We can ship them as well if we want to ship them.

FRANCINE 0:53:07
Sure, go ahead. Why not? The world’s gone mad. Let’s ship Fax. Yeah, actually. Sure. Yeah. Better than Gub. Gub and Fax. Going on a double date. Gub and Fax, the real shit version of Shadowfax.

JOANNA 0:53:26
How do you feel about Gabriel now?

FRANCINE 0:53:28
I mean, I feel like I’m meant to feel differently about Gabriel after this four minutes of looking lovingly into a demon’s eyes. But I don’t because he’s, you know, he’s not a gem anymore. He’s got all his memories back. And he’s still the same prick that tried to kill Aziraphale and do the whole thing. I don’t see why they’re suddenly redeemed just because two terrible beings have fallen in love. I don’t know.

JOANNA 0:53:56
I kind of do feel differently because yes, he was the archangel fucking Gabriel. And yes, he was shut your stupid fucking face and die. And that’s still very present in my mind. But he has, although we only see four minutes of it, the idea is that he has changed.

FRANCINE 0:54:12
Only because he wants something else now. He only said no to Armageddon because he wanted to be cast down.

JOANNA 0:54:18
I don’t think it was he wanted to be cast down. He wanted to keep trying to keep status quo and he assumed he had more power than he did. And when he realized he didn’t, it’s like, okay, well, how’s not a bad option B?

FRANCINE 0:54:27
I guess. It was all for selfish reasons. Not because he loved the world. He was just happy to be, he just wanted Beelzebub. And that’s nice. And I’m glad they’re happy, I guess. But I don’t feel like why should we, why should we fucking like Gabriel more for it? Bad people fall in love. That’s fine.

JOANNA 0:54:43
I think I like him more for it because he’s still willing to step away from power. He is not trying to fight to remain archangel.

FRANCINE 0:54:52
I guess.

JOANNA 0:54:54
I think if he was in love with Beelzebub, but also still determined to be top of the pack,

FRANCINE 0:54:59
I would just like him more. I guess it just kind of feels a little bit like a, you know, ex fascist politician living out the rest of their life in Argentina. Yeah, no, I definitely, I see your point.

JOANNA 0:55:11
But for me, I don’t know.

FRANCINE 0:55:12
I was just crossing out everything else.

JOANNA 0:55:15
I think honestly, it’s mostly because Jon Hamm’s so fucking charming.

FRANCINE 0:55:20
Oh, obviously. Yeah, like that, that did it a lot. And I do like the battle of the islands, but yeah, whatever. I guess I hope they’re happy with that lovely couple of little planets now for Centauri.

JOANNA 0:55:32
So we go to the coffee shop and we see the Metatron order a coffee. It was a really entertaining little conversation of Nina threatening to mock his coffee order. Him ordering something I think quite sensible. I ate my glass with some almond syrup, sounds lovely. And they have a quick conversation about the name of the coffee shop, Give Me Coffee or Give Me Death. And does anyone ever ask for death? I know, obviously, the Give Me Blank or Give Me Death bit is it’s a, God, it was the American Revolution. I think it was on Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death. But the does anyone ever ask for death felt a bit Suzy Yazzard, the Cake or Death bit.

FRANCINE 0:56:09
Oh, sure. Yeah, yeah.

JOANNA 0:56:10
Which gave me a nice excuse to go back and watch Cake or Death again.

FRANCINE 0:56:13
Okay.

JOANNA 0:56:15
Anyway, back in the bookshop, Michael’s threatening to get the Book of Life out. Give it a rest, Michael. And the Metatron enters the bookshop and proclaims Michael’s threats balderdash.

FRANCINE 0:56:28
Quite.

JOANNA 0:56:30
Curly’s the first one to recognize the Metatron.

FRANCINE 0:56:33
That was an interesting one. Finally, he recognizes somebody. Which made me think that’s something we should start like, yeah. I mean, it’s a real big face most of the time. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:56:43
And, you know, angels aren’t used to seeing it in human form. But I wonder if like, if it is a power play thing, and it’s just okay, there’s no point. There’s no point power playing with this one.

FRANCINE 0:56:52
And he sends all of the angels except for Muriel away. Yep.

JOANNA 0:56:57
Angels like, did we do anything wrong?

FRANCINE 0:57:00
No, but go. That remains to be seen. Off you drop.

JOANNA 0:57:04
And we get the conversation about the coffee itself and admits to ingesting things in his time, which is another interesting, maybe it’s not so black and white that ingesting ties you to humanity.

FRANCINE 0:57:14
Oh, yeah. I don’t know. I think that’s more about I’m religious. Hmm. I don’t know. I think that’s more about I’m relatable. You can trust me. Yeah. We don’t see him ingest anything.

JOANNA 0:57:27
Yeah, we don’t. There’s something about the way he’s talking in this as well. The exaggerated old hat speak he refers and hefty jigger of almond syrup.

FRANCINE 0:57:35
And yeah, boulder dash.

JOANNA 0:57:37
I love Derek Jacobi. He plays like kind villain so well.

FRANCINE 0:57:43
Yeah, yeah. And that’s it. That’s definitely coming across as kind villain, not kind.

JOANNA 0:57:49
Kind person.

FRANCINE 0:57:49
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I am.

JOANNA 0:57:52
The one disappointment I have with this episode is that we well, the one disappointment I have with this episode, I am slightly sad we don’t get more between David Tennant and Derek Jacobi just because there’s a fun thing of them being on Doctor Who together as the Doctor and the Master as well.

FRANCINE 0:58:06
Yeah, there’s a simmering tension they’re clearly used to playing on. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:58:11
So he. So the Metatron asks. Um, Aziraphale’s come for a little chat in a stroll. And as they walk out the glare, he glares at Crowley. He’s got this kind, genial face on and then gives Crowley the death stare on his way out.

FRANCINE 0:58:29
It’s very interesting and eventually painful that Crowley was just like, yeah, no, go for your chat, whatever. Clearly thinking that Aziraphale’s past being chatted up by the Metatron.

JOANNA 0:58:38
Yeah, he’s like almost got too much faith in Aziraphale. Uh, whereas Aziraphale’s got too much faith.

FRANCINE 0:58:45
Yep. Yep. Yep. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:58:49
Also, the Metatron calls Muriel the dim one, which I thought was very mean.

FRANCINE 0:58:53
Yeah, unkind. Unnecessary.

JOANNA 0:58:57
So then Nina and Maggie pop out of the coffee shop and we see Crowley tidying up the bookshop and there was something really relatable about that, you know, when you’re kind of tidying up to occupy yourself because you’re waiting for something and there’s not enough to tidy. So he keeps like moving the chair back and forth.

FRANCINE 0:59:13
I know. And like the first bit of tidying he’s doing as well is very like, I know this space and kind of underlines the fact that they’ve been spending a lot of time in the bookshop together. Like it’s like, right, put that back over there and that goes there.

JOANNA 0:59:25
And the chair goes in the sun.

FRANCINE 0:59:26
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:59:29
And then he moves the chair and he moves it back and then he moves it out and he sprawls in it.

FRANCINE 0:59:33
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:59:34
Um, so Nina and Maggie come in and sit down with Crowley for a chat. And this is the scene where I take back everything I’ve said about Nina and Maggie throughout the season because I love this for them.

FRANCINE 0:59:44
Yeah. Little emotional intervention. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:59:47
This explanation of, hey, why were you interfering with us? Maybe sort your own life out instead.

FRANCINE 0:59:54
Now, Mr Crowley, have you ever heard of projection?

JOANNA 1:00:00
And the way their not relationship ends in the series, they’re not together, but there’s hope for it for the future. And I said like last episode, if it ended up any other way, but like

FRANCINE 1:00:07
than that, I think I would have been a little bit disappointed. Yeah, no, absolutely. Like it’s very like, no, I’ll be here. Yeah. And then, oh, and then fucking stop Angel. The way she casually calls Maggie Angel.

JOANNA 1:00:22
And it’s exactly the way that Crowley calls Aziraphale Angel. And there’s this really obvious parallel of. But for Nina and Maggie, it’s these people, okay, they haven’t got it worked out now, but they’re probably going to work it out. And then we hope that Aziraphale and Crowley are going to work it out. But no, Neil Gaiman wanted to rip out our hearts and shred them.

FRANCINE 1:00:42
We’ve had the otherworldly parallel. We’ve now got the very worldly parallel. And as usual, we’ve got our two in the middle. Yeah.

JOANNA 1:00:49
Straddling the, no, that was horrible. Sorry, shouldn’t use the word straddling. Not on this podcast. So you see Aziraphale reacting to an offer from the Metatron and going to tell Crowley the good news. And the Metatron spots Muriel reading her book.

FRANCINE 1:01:08
He says, yes, it’s a very good thing to do.

JOANNA 1:01:10
It’s so politely sinister.

FRANCINE 1:01:13
And Muriel’s very, oh, good. Like, they’re really not sure. Like, yeah, they were expecting to be yelled at all the time, I feel like, if they’re always dealing with Michael and the rest of them.

JOANNA 1:01:25
They just kind of start with this low level, I’m in trouble for something.

FRANCINE 1:01:28
Yeah.

JOANNA 1:01:30
Especially as I guess they’re also kind of worried that they’re still going to get in trouble for bringing Crowley up to heaven.

FRANCINE 1:01:35
And yeah, exactly. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. When you’ve just done something ridiculously bad like that, and then the Metatron comes over and goes, oh, we’re reading very well. And I’m like, okay, yeah, yeah, it is. I know, it’s good. It’s good. It’s good. They’re like people. They’re like portable people.

JOANNA 1:01:51
The book in question is The Crow Road by Iain Banks, which is the same one that was referenced earlier in the season. It’s kind of part of the recommended reading list, which is the idea of all those It’s books

FRANCINE 1:02:02
on the shelf. And is that because Ian Banks and Neil Gaiman are friends collecting? Or was there more of a relevance to the series?

JOANNA 1:02:08
I think it’s because like, Ian Banks and Neil Gaiman are friends and also Neil Gaiman genuinely thinks it’s a very good book.

FRANCINE 1:02:14
Okay.

JOANNA 1:02:14
Like, if you think about the set of books they’re recommending, obviously Good Omens is on that

FRANCINE 1:02:17
shelf.

JOANNA 1:02:17
And it’s also like The Great Gatsby.

FRANCINE 1:02:21
One of the Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice. Pride and Prejudice.

JOANNA 1:02:24
Great Expectations. No, Tale of Two Cities.

FRANCINE 1:02:26
It was the worst of times.

JOANNA 1:02:28
Um, someone on Twitter has done like an in-depth look at the shelf and what all the books are. And I think I’m just confirmed like it’s kind of a recommended reading list, not to understand the show, but just books we think you’ll like.

FRANCINE 1:02:40
Um, so yeah, so. So. So we go into the bookshop.

JOANNA 1:02:48
I’ve tried to, I’ve tried to break this up a bit so we can talk about a bit at a time. Crowley wants to say something to Aziraphale. But Aziraphale asked him to hold that thought.

FRANCINE 1:02:59
Yeah, which, oh my fucking god.

JOANNA 1:03:01
And Aziraphale’s changed his mind on the Metatron. The Metatron’s not as bad as he thought. And we, we see some flashes of this conversation that Aziraphale had with the Metatron. Like the upshot of it is that Aziraphale’s been offered Gabriel’s job, the High Archangel,

FRANCINE 1:03:17
whatever.

JOANNA 1:03:18
Um, but we don’t see the whole conversation.

FRANCINE 1:03:21
No. And I feel like the, the, during the flashbacks, the point where the, his emotion changes isn’t when he’s offered that job, but when he’s offered the chance to redeem Crowley. Yeah. And so he’s come with this extremely exciting gift for Crowley.

JOANNA 1:03:36
And he sure is an exciting gift.

FRANCINE 1:03:39
I just want to start this conversation off on a good foot with them. I’ve got to tell you this first. But that’s incredibly annoying, obviously, because Crowley’s just said like, I’m not gonna get this out if you don’t let me. Yeah.

JOANNA 1:03:50
And it’s so frustrating to watch. Because there’s this just incredible, like palpable tension of them both trying to say this thing. Also in the bits of Metatron conversation that we do be, do see, there’s this question of like, is Aziraphale a good candidate? Does he have the qualities that the Metatron says he has that we see him saying to Aziraphale outside the restaurant? He says, you know, you’re a leader, you’re honest, and you don’t just tell people what

FRANCINE 1:04:15
they want to hear.

JOANNA 1:04:17
That doesn’t 100% sound like Aziraphale to me.

FRANCINE 1:04:20
No, we’ve seen him do a bit of leadership. But he’s not a big take charge guy. No, and he’s lies.

JOANNA 1:04:26
He’s very willing to lie. We saw him lying in the joke bit. And he does, he’s happy to tell people what they want to hear. Think about things like putting a sister thingy to sleep and saying you have a lovely dream about whatever you like best.

FRANCINE 1:04:40
Mm. Yeah, I guess. Yeah. Pretty much the opposite actually. And those opposite qualities are what the Metatron would want, I’m sure, in a, you know, a stooge that’s not going to go Gabriel. Yeah.

JOANNA 1:04:54
And yeah, so Aziraphale makes this offer to make Crowley an angel again. And Crowley’s not happy and they compare rejoining heaven to rejoining hell and Crowley is fucking incredulous about this.

FRANCINE 1:05:08
Just the shock. His glasses are off at this point. So you can see his full face doing all this stuff.

JOANNA 1:05:14
Dilated snake pupils, eyebrows akimbo. I’m allowed to say akimbo, right? If I can’t say straddling.

FRANCINE 1:05:21
Yeah, absolutely. Good. And yeah, just the, ugh. Just incredulity. Just fuck.

JOANNA 1:05:29
It is so hard to watch Aziraphale in this scene, especially when he says to, when he says, but you’re the bad guys, the way he includes Crowley in that and Crowley isn’t off hell, he’s just gone off and done his own thing.

FRANCINE 1:05:43
Yeah.

JOANNA 1:05:44
And worked with them because that was kind of his option, but has found this way to not even really do that.

FRANCINE 1:05:49
And it’s shocking. But then when you think about it, is it shocking? Because what Nina and Maggie have just said quite correctly is you guys don’t talk about this shit. Yeah. So why are we surprised that after six millennia of not addressing the elephant in the room properly, it’s still there?

JOANNA 1:06:04
And if we think right back to Job and the conversation they have at the end where Crowley tells Aziraphale that he hasn’t really fallen, they don’t take that conversation the step

FRANCINE 1:06:16
further.

JOANNA 1:06:17
And it’s really highlighted by the distance between them as they sit on that rock in that final shot of that minisode.

FRANCINE 1:06:23
Yeah.

JOANNA 1:06:24
Like, they’ve been dancing around this conversation.

FRANCINE 1:06:28
For a very long time. Yeah.

JOANNA 1:06:30
Buildad the Shuai was delivering babies. Sorry, I just wanted to remind us of something fun before we get to the next bit.

FRANCINE 1:06:36
Yeah. And so, yeah.

JOANNA 1:06:40
So Crowley says his piece, Crowley’s response, because Crowley cares about Earth as well as Aziraphale.

FRANCINE 1:06:48
Yeah. And Aziraphale cares about Earth.

JOANNA 1:06:51
He’s just not willing to look at this big picture that Crowley is looking at.

FRANCINE 1:06:56
Yeah. Not right now.

JOANNA 1:06:58
And I think this is partly why I find this really painful to watch is because, like, coming out of a religious space and having been around people who are so indoctrinated and Aziraphale is doing that. That I know it’s not perfect, but I can change it. It’s almost like watching someone go back to an abusive ex, which is exactly what Crowley is watching Aziraphale do.

FRANCINE 1:07:15
Yeah, no, that I would say is, yeah. Yeah. Exactly that. And he’s, yeah, he gets to, he’s trying to explain it’s us. We’ve been a group and we’ve not talked about it. And now it’s time to talk about it. And you can just see he can’t get the words out. And it’s never going to be enough because he has this one chance to explain it. And he knows he can’t because he’s got 6,000 years worth of talking to do in a minute. And Aziraphale’s already made his mind up on something. Yeah.

JOANNA 1:07:42
And he’s got to talk Aziraphale out of all of the millennia of indoctrination at the same time. And he’s desperately trying to convince him, you know, we’ve actually been in a relationship this whole time. Can we just acknowledge it?

FRANCINE 1:07:53
Can we just be us two? Yeah. And Aziraphale wants to bring him with him and just continue the status, almost dragging him up to heaven would be continuing the status quo more than having this conversation properly would. Yeah.

JOANNA 1:08:06
Like, to Aziraphale that’s safe.

FRANCINE 1:08:09
Yeah. He still wants heaven.

JOANNA 1:08:11
And then there’s this horrible moment where Crowley says, you can’t leave this bookshop.

FRANCINE 1:08:16
And he means me when he says bookshop. Yeah.

JOANNA 1:08:19
He’s saying you can’t leave me. And Aziraphale says nothing lasts forever.

FRANCINE 1:08:24
Yeah.

JOANNA 1:08:25
And that’s where I also start thinking, maybe Aziraphale’s not entirely himself in this moment.

FRANCINE 1:08:31
Yeah, I’m very torn on that question. But yeah. I don’t think it’s black and white.

JOANNA 1:08:37
I don’t think this is all Aziraphale being indoctrinated or maybe that’s wishful thinking.

FRANCINE 1:08:43
We’ve got this kind of, in season one, one of the arguments they have, it goes, you’re so clever. How can you be so stupid? And there’s obviously huge echoes this entire time to those scenes. But that one very strongly came back to me in this bit and just, and yeah, no, you’re right. Yeah, when he’s saying like, you can’t. Okay. I don’t know where to put some of these bits. I’ve just got a stream of emotions and bullet points here. So, okay. Okay. So you go.

JOANNA 1:09:12
Crowley starts to walk away from Aziraphale, but Aziraphale, you know, says that he still

FRANCINE 1:09:17
needs him.

JOANNA 1:09:18
And this is, we get with this absolutely heart-wrenching, bitter disappointment from Crowley.

FRANCINE 1:09:24
There’s no nightingales. Yeah. And he’s got his glasses back on now.

JOANNA 1:09:29
And he’s got his glasses back on. And the violins start doing some shit, don’t they?

FRANCINE 1:09:36
The violins, they’re violining.

JOANNA 1:09:39
The strings are swelling, as strings want to do. And Crowley goes in for the last ditch thing. And Crowley kisses Aziraphale.

FRANCINE 1:09:48
In a horrible, desperate, like, please feel something kiss. Yeah. The least romantic, but most emotional kiss. Yeah. All of the emotion is desperation and anger and the score suddenly does a thing. God, what? I don’t know. I don’t know enough music to describe that, but it did. The score scored.

JOANNA 1:10:14
If David Arnold doesn’t win some kind of award for this season, I’m gonna…

FRANCINE 1:10:18
Riot.

JOANNA 1:10:19
Write a strongly worded note.

FRANCINE 1:10:21
Okay, fine. With a torch and a pitchfork. There we go. Much better.

JOANNA 1:10:28
Is this, should we talk about the spoiler thing here?

FRANCINE 1:10:32
Yeah, sure.

JOANNA 1:10:32
Okay, so one thing we’ve also avoided mentioning is that there was, this kiss was spoiled accidentally, maybe, by Amazon Prime before the season even came out. It was a single, it was a screenshot of this kiss in a trailer that was meant to be like a Pride Month trailer, which meant because the way the trailer ran, it was this shot of them kissing with the word every over it and big letters. So the fandom’s been referring to the spoiler as every. And it was a very weird thing where I thought maybe some of the response, like, the fandom was really great about not sharing it and it got taken down by Amazon Prime within 24 hours because obviously it’s a huge spoiler. Um, Neil Gaiman was understandably now fucking furious, I think, is a direct quote from his Twitter, which I kind of thought was no reaction, but actually, um, I spoke to Marc Burrows about it briefly and he kind of gave me a bit more context of, yeah, it’s in the final episode. It’s the emotional culmination of the season. So, so I knew this was coming, which I didn’t mind because I had no idea, other than it was going to be a big climactic moment.

FRANCINE 1:11:38
I had no idea how we were going to get there.

JOANNA 1:11:40
Or I don’t think I could have imagined this. Um, and I think it’s amazing how impact, because loads of people will have been aware of this before they saw it. And I don’t think it takes anything away from the impact of it. I think it’s such a great moment.

FRANCINE 1:11:54
Yeah, absolutely. It was when I knew there was going to be a kiss and I knew there was going to be something that would tear my heart apart. And I assumed, as I think you probably did, that it would be a, the classic, um, the two characters finally get the romantic moment and then outside forces tear them apart. I guess they will entirely. Um, and before the next line, which is obviously when it all ends for everybody, we get Crowley, despite wearing his glasses, the eyebrows are the most plaintive thing I have ever seen. And the moment after that kiss, his last attempt to keep Aziraphale with him.

JOANNA 1:12:34
His pleading eyebrows and God, his fucking face.

FRANCINE 1:12:39
And then Aziraphale says, I forgive you. And I said, you prick, as I was watching it.

JOANNA 1:12:48
I said something else, but we agreed to keep one swear word off the podcast.

FRANCINE 1:12:52
And I don’t need to have to bleep anything. But yeah, no, it’s fine.

JOANNA 1:12:59
We’re fine.

FRANCINE 1:12:59
Everything’s fine.

JOANNA 1:13:00
It’s not fine. And he said it in such a horrible way.

FRANCINE 1:13:03
It was so patronising.

JOANNA 1:13:05
And he said it before. He said, may you be forgiven on the bandstand.

FRANCINE 1:13:09
And he said, I forgive you. And both of those times were just after Crowley’s asked him to run away with him. This is the third time Crowley has said, run away with me. And Aziraphale keeps saying no and then keeps forgiving him.

JOANNA 1:13:22
Because there’s still that bit of heaven in him that I want Crowley’s redemption. I can only imagine it in one very specific way.

FRANCINE 1:13:29
And it requires forgiveness.

JOANNA 1:13:32
And if no one else in heaven can forgive me, I’m not going to.

FRANCINE 1:13:34
If no one else in heaven can forgive him, then at least I can. Yeah. And he looks, Michael Sheen does the best conflicted face ever at this point. He’s furious. He’s furious because Crowley has broken the rules of their game. Their dance. And now it’s scary. And now it’s dangerous. And now you’ve ruined this game we’ve been playing for 6000 years and I’ve enjoyed it. And now we have to acknowledge it. Yeah.

JOANNA 1:14:01
And he’s furious. And then he touches his lips. And then he does this thing where he sort of chores himself up and smiles. And again, that’s where I’m feeling this. Maybe Aziraphale’s not… You know we were talking last week about the self-hypnosis thing?

FRANCINE 1:14:20
Yes. Yeah, it feels like it’s that. Yeah.

JOANNA 1:14:23
Except obviously, because we haven’t seen the full Metatron conversation, maybe the Metatron’s also done some fuckery.

FRANCINE 1:14:28
But I feel like… I feel like it would be more emotionally satisfying if Aziraphale was doing it to himself.

JOANNA 1:14:33
I agree. I agree.

FRANCINE 1:14:34
And that, yeah, again, we’ll talk about it more next week. But there are a lot of, you know, theories about why Aziraphale has done this out of character thing. And I just don’t think it’s out of character. And I think it’s more ballsy piece of writing if Aziraphale is genuinely just being an absolute dick at this point. Yeah. And, you know, I think it’s something he would do. It’s not… It’s not…

JOANNA 1:14:52
It’s not out of character because we’ve seen again and again his faith.

FRANCINE 1:14:56
His overwhelming faith and belief that heaven are the good guys has not been shaken.

JOANNA 1:15:01
Possibly because he was not the one who heard Gabriel say, shut your fucking stupid mouth and die. Yeah, possibly.

FRANCINE 1:15:08
Yeah. But he’s seen a lot of bad shit. He knows that God was… Yeah, he saw… No, he saw most of the Middle East drowned. Yeah. He was there at the flood. He knew that God had signed off on Crowley killing all the people. Signed off on Crowley killing all those poor little goats and the children. Children. And Crowley wouldn’t and didn’t. And I also…

JOANNA 1:15:37
So it’s, you know, biblical canon is that the Metatron is literally not just a presidential spokesman type representation. It is this angel is needed because if you had God’s voice, it would kill you.

FRANCINE 1:15:50
Yeah.

JOANNA 1:15:51
In Dogma, they do it very literally. Alanis Morissette speaks and people’s heads explode.

FRANCINE 1:15:57
Perfect casting for God, by the way. That is so, yeah. Yeah.

JOANNA 1:16:01
Not saying that I have a problem with Alanis Morissette’s voice is my very worn out copy of Jagged Little Pill kind of test too. So yeah, Crowley’s like just sure he’s effectively spoken to God. Even if he’s still got that like presidential spokesman idea, he’s gonna take Metatron’s word as the word of God.

FRANCINE 1:16:23
Oh, Aziraphale. Yeah, yeah.

JOANNA 1:16:25
Yeah. Sorry, Aziraphale, not Crowley.

FRANCINE 1:16:27
Yeah. And yeah, and I think Crowley isn’t or if he is, doesn’t care. He thinks God’s up to no good as well. And just, oh, it must be. It really must be just hurtful because Crowley, you know, Crowley’s aware that he’s fucked up as well because he’s gone along with this. He’s not. He’s known they’ve had this huge thing between them the whole time. Yeah. And he left. They went past the end of the world and then still didn’t do anything. When Crowley was in his rant, he goes, these last few years, we didn’t really, and he didn’t finish that. But I think it’s like we never really moved on or did anything differently after that ridiculous fucking thing. Oh, and he was so excited to go for a boozy breakfast with him.

JOANNA 1:17:09
He was so ready for that boozy breakfast at the Ritz. Like he wanted to go back to the status quo originally until Nina and Maggie suggested, you know, maybe have a fucking chat.

FRANCINE 1:17:17
Yeah.

JOANNA 1:17:19
Maybe they should have talked it over over champagne at the Ritz.

FRANCINE 1:17:25
Maybe they fucking should. Maybe they fucking should. And then, yeah, just don’t bother. God. And so, was it Ruffalo and the Metatron leave? They’re getting a lift. But before that, before that Joanna, come on. Because the Metatron goes, is there anything you want?

JOANNA 1:17:49
Oh, he returns to collect a Aziraphale.

FRANCINE 1:17:51
Yeah.

JOANNA 1:17:52
And says Muriel’s going to stay in charge of the shop.

FRANCINE 1:17:55
And and says, is there anything he wants? And Aziraphale looks around says no. And I mean, that’s, you know, two things there. No, because the one thing you want to take with Crowley. And no, because it’s all it’s all of it. How can you say I want all of it? I want this with me. And as he looked back, he hesitates for a second. And as he says, I think I the bit of the kiss score comes back just for one second. Yeah, it swells back up again. And then I think I and then no shakes himself out of it.

JOANNA 1:18:22
And he resets his face again. And he’s resetting his face into that smile that’s almost a grimace.

FRANCINE 1:18:29
And the bookshop looks so beautiful that morning is the thing. And the sunlight is shining through perfectly. And it’s this contrast between not just hell being awful, but heaven being awful and stark and boring and empty.

JOANNA 1:18:41
And the contrast of the gorgeousness of this bookshop that he built over the centuries

FRANCINE 1:18:46
and the scrolling letters. And it’s him. Yeah, he’s externalized his personality in this place. Yeah. Well, how can I take one part of that? I suppose he could have done something like taking the mug and that would have been pathetic. And so yeah, he was right not to take anything. But it’s so sad.

JOANNA 1:19:03
And it’s also like he is shaking off this life he built on earth to go and

FRANCINE 1:19:09
be a fucking archangel.

JOANNA 1:19:10
And he walks off and David Tennant’s leaning against his car. Oh, and Crowley’s watching and they get into the pub to get in the lift. And the Metatron casually mentions the second coming and believe me next week in the bonus

FRANCINE 1:19:23
episode, I’m going to get fucking biblical. Yes. The I feel at that point. I feel at that point. I feel at that point Aziraphale. His look back at Crowley look different from the other ones. And I wonder then if he realized he had fucked up. And at this point, there’s nothing you can do about it, but go along and try and make a difference. Yeah, I don’t know. Maybe I might just be reading what I want to read into it.

JOANNA 1:19:55
Also that. And yeah, and then Crowley gets in his car and a nightingale sang in Berkeley Square.

FRANCINE 1:20:02
Just for a second.

JOANNA 1:20:04
And it’s not just the song, it’s the Tori Amos version that played over the end of

FRANCINE 1:20:08
season one, which has lived on my wallowing playlist ever since. Oh, yeah, I have.

JOANNA 1:20:14
I have a deep emotional connection to that song. And we get this sad piano split screen over the final credits. Which I want to mention when we did our Good Omens season one, like recap episode and look to season two. I did say, I wonder if because they want to do a season three, we’re not going to get a happy, neatly tied up ending at the end of season two. And I think I actually said, I’m not sure that nightingales are going to be singing in Berkeley Square at the end of season two.

FRANCINE 1:20:47
And Neil Gaiman’s fucking little monkey paw. Oh, yeah, look what you did. Look what you did. I didn’t do this. This is Neil Gaiman. Okay, sure.

JOANNA 1:20:56
Sorry, I got really shouty there.

FRANCINE 1:20:58
Neil Gaiman’s little monkey paw. All right. Oh, I’m sorry. Let’s all hope Neil Gaiman never hears us.

JOANNA 1:21:05
I’m sorry, Neil Gaiman, we’re big fans. This was a very good episode of television, which is quite emotional.

FRANCINE 1:21:11
Jesus fucking Christ. It’s all just so tied together for them that it’s so, and Crowley’s driving away again in the same way that he drove away from the bookshop the first time with all the crying and the fire and the breakdown. But this time it’s just, you know, crying behind his sunglasses. You get the picture, but just much more given up face. Yeah. It’s like, now what?

JOANNA 1:21:39
Who’s he going to appreciate the world with?

FRANCINE 1:21:41
Yeah, the world’s not ending as it was in the first one. But he’s just left here now. Yeah. I don’t really know what to say.

Easter Eggs & Favourite Moments

JOANNA 1:21:51
We’re going from this into like our best bits from the episode, aren’t we?

FRANCINE 1:21:56
Yeah. Yeah, when we go into the whole recap, I think we can talk a bit more about just their general relationship as well, can’t we? Because we’ll look at the whole series. Yeah. As one. But yeah, just this. What do you think of Michael Sheen’s face?

JOANNA 1:22:11
Well, let’s, let’s do.

FRANCINE 1:22:12
Let’s go into the superlatives. Yeah, yeah. Yeah.

JOANNA 1:22:16
So quotes.

FRANCINE 1:22:17
Oh, sorry. That’s right. We do quotes first. I was trying to segue for you.

JOANNA 1:22:21
Let’s go into the face thing, actually, because it’s very relevant to that final shot. I’m giving my character does a face award to actual multiple things, which I’ve talked about is Michael Sheen doing the thing where Aziraphale goes from like distraught to kind of determined to doing that mad, almost grimacing grin. And you see him do it in the lift in that final split screenshot over the credits. You see him do it one last time.

FRANCINE 1:22:44
Yeah. And it’s, it’s haunting. And I don’t know what it means.

JOANNA 1:22:48
And we can speculate about it next week, but. Oh, it’s good.

FRANCINE 1:22:54
It is. And it’s so, the fucking range on that man, just in this one character. Yeah. Having gone from just this, this devoted love of Crowley to, you know, the, the fear and

JOANNA 1:23:05
the conflict over heaven.

FRANCINE 1:23:06
And yes, as you say, this, this internal rewriting of his.

JOANNA 1:23:10
This possible self-hypnosis.

FRANCINE 1:23:12
Whatever is happening. Yeah. Yeah. Whatever’s going on in there. And oh, fuck. So what’s your character? Yeah, a bit more overt. Just, just Crowley’s absolute horror and shock as Aziraphale says, but heaven are the good guys. We’re the good ones. And Crowley’s just like, fucking what? Sorry, did the last few years not happen? Yeah. It’s an angry shock. Yeah.

JOANNA 1:23:39
Just like, are you fucking kidding me?

FRANCINE 1:23:41
We’ve had this. We’ve had this exact conversation. We’ve, we’ve, we’ve been through this. We’ve been through the end of the fucking world. Yeah. Not the good guys. Yeah. And just, yeah, just the, the real, the realization that Aziraphale hadn’t gotten over it as he just assumed he had. I think as well, as well as them not having the conversation, Crowley is kind of blinkered.

JOANNA 1:24:06
Crowley, just as Aziraphale, is just, is just, is just, is just, is just, is just, is just not willing to see how bad heaven was. Crowley wasn’t willing to look at how bad Aziraphale was. Not bad as in bad, bad as in how much he was still stuck to it.

FRANCINE 1:24:22
Yeah, definitely. And, you know, we’ve talked a lot about the, the Gabriel trying to kill Aziraphale thing and how Crowley obviously feels about that. Yeah. But the, it’s also worth thinking about just that initial trauma that Crowley must have had. Now we, now we’ve seen him at the beginning of this and how different he was and just, he’s just fundamentally from almost the very beginning of time, a very different being. And they just don’t quite grasp that until this moment. And it’s, oh. It’s tough. So on that note, uh, quote, favorite quote from the episode. I think yours is just before mine. Yep. When heaven ends life on earth, it’ll be just as dead as if hell ended it. God, that was a good line. Yeah. And again, again, it’s Crowley with that face because we’ve talked about this. This is one that we have talked about. We went over this last time they tried to end the world. Remember the ending the world thing? Tch-tch-tch-tch. Bad thing. Because we like the world. Yeah. And yours? That’s the point. No Nightingales.

JOANNA 1:25:33
You idiot. We could have been us.

FRANCINE 1:25:38
He kisses it. It could have been us. God, it’s. I can’t just keep saying it’s gut-wrenching. It’s gut-wrenching.

JOANNA 1:25:47
We know it’s gut-wrenching. We haven’t even talked about the kiss really.

FRANCINE 1:25:50
In almost any other context, that kind of kiss would be, oh, I’m so sorry. That kind of kiss would be hard to watch in different ways. But with all of the background and all of the knowledge that fucking Michael Sheen, I’m sorry, Aziraphale’s constant like arguments with himself and just the desperation and just the.

JOANNA 1:26:16
It’s almost like a kiss of life moment.

FRANCINE 1:26:18
Yeah. And yeah, Aziraphale doesn’t like kiss him back, I suppose is the way to put it. But that’s not the kind of kiss where you could kiss him back.

JOANNA 1:26:26
It’s just kind of experiences it.

FRANCINE 1:26:28
Yes, it experiences it. That’s the word. Yeah. Fuck. Let’s go.

JOANNA 1:26:35
So let’s have a couple of slightly lighter moments before we come out of this episode,

FRANCINE 1:26:43
because this is not the note to end on.

JOANNA 1:26:45
I didn’t know a bunch of Easter eggs. This is not an Easter egg heavy episode, but there was one I spotted, which is when Crowley grabs Gabriel’s box and tips out what’s in it.

FRANCINE 1:26:56
Yes.

JOANNA 1:26:56
What’s in it is Shakespeare’s lost quartos.

FRANCINE 1:26:59
Can you tell me about those, Rana?

JOANNA 1:27:01
It’s a line in, actually, I meant to have this up, sorry. It is from book one of Good Omens. Sorry, book one of Good Omens, from the book Good Omens. And it’s talking about a particularly unlucky publishers that obtained one of the famed lost quartos, the three Shakespeare plays never reissued in folio, only their names have come down to us, the comedy of Robin Hood or the forest of Sherwood is the one that’s mentioned. And I think the other two names are mentioned in the book as well, but it’s on a different page.

FRANCINE 1:27:37
And I don’t want to spend ages scrolling.

JOANNA 1:27:40
But yes, those are the, that’s what’s in the box that Crowley tips out. That’s a really nice little detail.

FRANCINE 1:27:46
And what else is in the box? A letter from a John Gibson, who was a, as it says on the letter, a postmaster in America. In the 1800s, the date seemed a bit off, but he also had a fairly unfortunate and interesting life. I found a page on him, which I can link to, but in a kind of everyday, he was the son of Scottish immigrants over there. And also because of that, I then thought, I wonder if that’s got any link to the letter from America song by the Proclaimers that was playing before Gabriel switched it to everyday. Because that’s about Scottish immigrants to America. And this is about that. And it’s about the same timeframe they were singing about. And this is all about. So this is rabbit hole. I didn’t get to go very far down, but I’ll link to some information listeners. And if you don’t know already, then please feel free to follow the rabbit hole.

JOANNA 1:28:36
Amazing. So helicopter and loincloth watch.

FRANCINE 1:28:40
Oh, yeah, sure.

JOANNA 1:28:43
For helicopter, I’m going with all of our heart rates during the kiss. Slash our blood pressure during that entire conversation.

FRANCINE 1:28:50
Yes, it seems unlikely, but I’m pretty sure my heart was just spinning around as well like that. It didn’t feel healthy.

JOANNA 1:28:58
I was just amazed to discover I definitely still had one. And I’m doing this partly as a callback to the first episode because this should have been given

FRANCINE 1:29:06
the award at some point.

JOANNA 1:29:07
But Jim’s box is getting the loincloth.

FRANCINE 1:29:10
Did it not in the first episode?

JOANNA 1:29:12
No, it was the sheet he was wrapped in.

FRANCINE 1:29:15
Oh, yeah, because that was actual cloth.

JOANNA 1:29:18
See, I started realistic and Jim’s had a lot of loincloths this season, actually. I think he’s got the loincloth most episodes. Right. On Jon Hamm naked except for a cardboard box. I think that’s the best note we could possibly end on considering.

FRANCINE 1:29:37
Uh, yeah. Tune in next week.

JOANNA 1:29:41
So, yeah, we’re going to be giving you a bonus Good Omens wrap up episode. We are going to talk about all of the wild theories we had during the show. We’re going to talk about all the wild theories we’ve got going forward. Giving out some awards. Again, if you’ve got any thoughts and feelings about it, you can contact us about it. Remember, at the moment, season three is not confirmed. As well as rating reviewers and maybe telling people about us, make sure you’re talking about Good Omens, I guess.

FRANCINE 1:30:10
Talk about it, watch it again if you want to. Tell your friends to watch it. Say something nice to Neil Gaiman.

JOANNA 1:30:17
Yeah, go be nice to Neil Gaiman.

FRANCINE 1:30:18
He likes that.

JOANNA 1:30:20
Although it’s not up to him to renew it.

FRANCINE 1:30:21
But yeah. He made us a nice thing. Yes. Let’s not just yell at him about it.

JOANNA 1:30:28
The hashtags, I think, are renew Good Omens season two. Renew Good Omens, give me season three or give me death.

FRANCINE 1:30:35
Okay. Drama. I love it.

JOANNA 1:30:38
Well, I’m assuming it’s a reference to the coffee shop, but it confused me because I thought it was Nelflag means death thing for a second.

FRANCINE 1:30:43
Oh, sure. What can I say? I like my shows. Are we getting another one of those? I think soon. Anyway.

JOANNA 1:30:51
So yeah, send us your thoughts for the bonus episode. Rate and review us.

FRANCINE 1:30:54
Tell other people about us. Tell everyone about Good Omens and make sure they watch it.

JOANNA 1:30:58
You can, until we return, follow us on Instagram at thetreeshamakeyfrat. You can follow us on Twitter at Makeyfratpod. You can also do that on Blue Sky. You can go on Facebook at thetreeshamakeyfrat. Join our subreddit community r slash ttsmyf. Join our shiny new Discord.

FRANCINE 1:31:16
It’s fun over there.

JOANNA 1:31:17
The invite link will be in the show notes at the top of the list. You can, of course, email us your thoughts, queries, castle snacks, and heartbroken demons. Thetreeshamakeyfratpod at gmail.com. And if you want to support this financially and pay for our therapy, you can go to patreon.com forward slash thetreeshamakeyfrat.

FRANCINE 1:31:35
I am joking.

JOANNA 1:31:36
We don’t actually need therapy.

FRANCINE 1:31:40
Maybe. And until next time, dear listener.

JOANNA 1:31:45
To the world.

FRANCINE 1:31:46
To the world. Oh, that was a nice Aziraphale-Crowley moment as well there. Because you got the champagne, I’ve got the what looks like red wine. Diet Coke in a pink glass.

JOANNA 1:32:04
I don’t think we said a lot of bollocks that needs cutting out.

FRANCINE 1:32:06
Some dramatic pausing.

JOANNA 1:32:08
That might have been overly dramatic.

FRANCINE 1:32:10
Yeah, yeah, that’s fine. Incoherent kiss squawking. No, that stays. Cool. Yeah, no. That’s the whole bit.

JOANNA 1:32:18
We can’t start cutting out the incoherent squawking now.

FRANCINE 1:32:20
We won’t have a podcast. The statistics show 60% of our content is incoherent squawking. The numbers don’t lie.

Transcript: 121: Good Omens Season 2 Episode 5 (Travel Harpsichord)

Episode 121: Good Omens TV Show, Season 2, Chapter 5. Recap and discussion.

Go back to episode and Show Notes >>

Note: Transcripts are produced with Whisper AI and PyAnnote – we don’t have time to edit them extensively, so both wording and speaker labelling will be inaccurate in parts.

0:00:00
I don’t normally have coffee this late. Apparently it makes me hopeful. So my entertainment this week, because I’ve just been desperate to watch the last episode of Good Omens and haven’t, is I’ve been watching YouTube compilations of like David Tennant and Michael Sheen being the opposite of their actual characters in real life. Yeah, I need to watch the I know it’s not quite real life, but I need to watch the most recent series of Staged as well. I haven’t actually watched it yet. I love Staged. Some clips that came up. But yeah, turns out. Oh, wow. Have you seen like Michael Sheen in his young days? Oh, my God, right. He’s like, what a dashing smile. I mean, he’s still got like a good smile, but like he had like a maybe he still does when he’s not playing like a goody two shoes. Like a wicked smile,

0:00:48
you know?

0:00:49
Yeah. I mean, I first became aware of Michael Sheen in the Twilight movies, which is weirdly kind of also how we became friends with Neil Gaiman.

0:00:59
Oh, yeah.

0:01:00
Yeah. I can’t remember all of the context of the story now, but they ended up interacting because Neil Gaiman was defending like stuff like Twilight that is written for young adults. And Michael Sheen was like, yeah, obviously, I think it’s cool. I was in it because my daughters really wanted me to be and they loved that I was in it. And yeah, you know what? It was really fun. I was playing a super hammy villain.

0:01:23
Excellent.

0:01:24
And he is very funny in them because he is playing a super hammy villain with like a full on widow’s peak and slicked back hair. Oh, cute. Yeah, this must be the clips I saw must have been much earlier, I think.

0:01:34
Yeah. Yeah.

0:01:36
I don’t remember when Twilight came out. It came out after I was the ideal age for it. Yeah, because I was about the right age for the books. Like I read them because my friends

0:01:46
were reading them. But I am a year younger than you.

0:01:51
Yeah, I think literally that must be the year that divides us there because if everyone had been reading it at school, I would have read it.

0:01:58
Yeah.

0:01:59
I wasn’t like a not like other girls girl for sure. But it just never… Turned out I really fucking was. Just not when it came to that vampire romance. No, you’re not like you’re not a not like other girls being you are. Yes, I’m quite like girls in some way, but not a girl. Yeah, but that’s a bit of a mouthful.

0:02:20

It is. Yeah, no, that’s fair.

0:02:22
As the seamstress said to the bishop.

0:02:24
Sorry.

0:02:26
As the seamstress said to the angel. How is your stone carving going?

0:02:31
Better now I got a book. Oh good.

0:02:34
I just need to find a source of stone now. I need to work out where it because we live in the worst place for that. I’m not going to come across any random bits of sandstone here.

0:02:44
Nope.

0:02:45
Flint or clay, take your pick.

0:02:47
I imagine Flint not great for stone carving.

0:02:50
No, and clay is not really stone carving. It’s just drawing in the mud, isn’t it?

0:02:55
I mean fun in the same way.

0:02:57
Yeah, definitely. But not very hard wearing. You know full well if I had room for a kiln, I would have got really into pottery by now.

0:03:03
Oh, yeah, that’s what drawing in clay.

0:03:06
Pottery.

0:03:07
Good. Well done.

0:03:08
We were talking about pottery earlier today. We were talking about pottery earlier today. I just forgot it was made out of clay. It was in the context of people drama rather than mineral drama. Mineral drama is infinitely preferable. Yeah, it is. Well, if I hear of anyone getting rid of vast amounts of carvable stone, I will let you know. Oh, God, I forgot to tell you. Sorry, subject change. I had a very weird nostalgia trip last Sunday.

0:03:33
Oh, do tell.

0:03:34
So I dropped a bookcase off you and took some stuff from you to take to the charity shop, which I took and it was closed. Thank you for housing my clothes for a week. No, well, we went back on the Sunday. And the thing is that the place where this charity shop is used to be a curtain fabric shop that my mother worked in. And therefore I grew up in the back rooms of and the poor woman working. She said, we don’t take donations on Sundays. And I explained that we tried to come the day before and had a car full of clothes. And she very nicely said, yes, all right, we’ll take them. And I was very apologetic. And she got me to bring them straight into the back room. So I walked into these back offices I basically grew

0:04:10
up in. Oh, yeah.

0:04:12
But the thing is, we’d also decided to go for a walk and specifically go for a walk at Edgeshall Heath because I haven’t been over there for ages.

0:04:18
Oh, lovely.

0:04:19
But of course, haven’t been that way in ages. The road literally takes you past the house I grew up in. So you end up stopping and driving around the little cul-de-sac I grew up in and then going and walking around Edgeshall Heath. And coming back, we went through the Coney Weston and the pub that I pretty much grew up in.

0:04:37
Oh, lovely.

0:04:37
So we ended up stopping at the pub and they have not changed the carpet in 20 years since I was last there. So it even smelled the same.

0:04:46
Oh, wow. Which was…

0:04:48
Isn’t that a thing? One of those very, very surreal, you know, you go somewhere you haven’t seen as a kid and like, oh my god, it looks tiny now. It was also huge. This was a very specific flavour of that of I’ve never been able to see over this bar before.

0:05:03
Ah, was it nice though?

0:05:04
Oh, it was lovely.

0:05:05
Yeah, good.

0:05:06
It was a fun little bit of nostalgia.

0:05:08
I do like Neshell Heath.

0:05:10
It’s a very pretty place to go and walk. And we saw horses. Or they’re ponies, technically. They’re Exmoor ponies.

0:05:17
Ex…

0:05:18
Moor? Exmoor ponies. So they used to be moor ponies? No, no. Exmoor. One word. Not they used to be moor ponies and now they’re just… They got kidnapped and put on Neshell Heath for no good reason.

0:05:31
Fuck this is a heath, not a moor. Fuck am I doing here?

0:05:35
Why do you know the difference? You’re a horse. Just because I’m a horse doesn’t mean I can’t be educated about the subtleties of biomes.

0:05:42
So…

0:05:43
We are two rational, well adjusted human beings who are absolutely capable of recording a podcast.

0:05:48
So, do you want to make a podcast?

0:05:51
I admire your optimism. So yes, let’s make a podcast.

Intro

0:06:00

Hello, and welcome to The Two Shall Make You Fret, a podcast in which we’re usually reading and recapping every book from Terry Pratchett’s Discord series on time and chronological order, but we’ve taken a break from that to talk about Good Omens season two. I’m Hagen. And I’m Carroll. And today we’re talking about Good Omens season two, episode five, The Ball.

0:06:17
The penultimate episode.

0:06:19
The penultimate, which means we can nearly watch the finale.

0:06:22
Oh, thank fuck.

0:06:24
I should say actually, chapter five. We’ve been saying episode all this season,

0:06:27
but they’re all called chapter. Oh, are they?

0:06:30
On Amazon Prime. Yeah.

0:06:31
Well, whatever. Not a major issue. Fine. Fine, Neil, whatever you want.

JOANNA
Now on spoilers before we crack on. We are doing spoiler free discussion for Good Omens season two. So this episode will not contain any spoilers past episode five. It will, however, contain spoilers for Good Omens season one, the book Good Omens, but it will not contain any major spoilers for the Discworld series. So if you are just joining us for Good Omens, you’re new to Discworld and want to give it a go, you can come on the journey with us safely. This will be a very weird place to start your journey with us. Episode five, season two of Good Omens, which is not what our show is about. But welcome anyway. Welcome on. Welcome all. Yes, come on. Come on.

0:07:14
Have we got anything to follow up on?

0:07:16
If we do, I didn’t look. I’m sorry. I’ve worked right up until we started this today.

JOANNA

I had a quick look. I don’t think we’ve got anything to follow up on. Francine, do you want to tell us what happened previously on Good Omens?

FRANCINE

Certainly. Previously on Good Omens. Aziraphale races north at 30 miles an hour, while Crowley babysits the affable gentleman previously known as Gabriel. Speaking of the Archangel, Aziraphale finds out Gabriel’s a representative of the Masons and visits his Masonry representation. In the graveyard where Angel and Demon once meddled in the affairs of resurrectionists, Aziraphale does a favour for some humans once more. On his way home, he’s accosted by Shax, who also pays a visit to Crowley. Nina and Maggie fail to Vavavoom, and after a magical flashback, Aziraphale makes it home. Shax and Beelzebub are planning an attack, and our Angel starts planning a party. I’m not doing the flashbacks in the summary because it’s not important to the plot so much.

0:08:14
It might be, but I’m not doing it.

0:08:17
Representative of the Masons’ Masonic representation, by the way. Oh, Masonry representation, that was genius.

0:08:23
Oh, thank you.

0:08:26
Okay, so, episode five, The Ball. Big thoughts, overall thoughts, what do you think?

0:08:30
I liked it.

0:08:31
I liked the slightly more rapid switching of plots until it all came together again. Like, right near the end, I guess it all came together again, but because we’re not doing the little flashbacks, the big flashbacks, I mean. And kind of get that sense of momentum and things speeding up towards the climax of the episode. Yeah, the pacing’s better here. There’s now like a sense of urgency that I thought was kind of lacking in the last couple of episodes. Yeah, no, I’m enjoying, I really enjoyed this one. I think this is probably my favourite of the season so far. Have you looked at the bonus material? I looked at some of it, not all of it. The costume concept art, I was thinking was particularly you. I will be treating myself to a little scroll through later.

0:09:15
Oh, okay, little scroll.

0:09:16
Little scroll. Creaky scroll through some concept art. It’s nice, anyway.

0:09:20
Yeah, I only had very brief scrolls.

0:09:21
We haven’t watched the videos yet. That’ll be fun. I did have a quick look at the deleted scenes, which if you haven’t yet, listeners, do check out, especially Rob running away from some demons.

0:09:32
Okay. It’s nice to see.

0:09:34
I was surprised he didn’t get like a bigger cameo in this somewhere. Yeah, must have been cut for time. Yeah, he’s probably happier to have no cameo than when he was appearing as an extra in Color of Magic and had to lie on the ground with a sword through him for a very long time.

0:09:50
Yeah. Which is a story he does like to tell.

0:09:53
Anyway, but we’re not talking about Discworld, we’re talking about Good Omens, aren’t we?

0:09:56
Yeah. So…

0:09:57
Spoilers, someone’s on the floor with a sword through them. Spoilers for Discworld, that might happen more than once.

0:10:04
So where are we?

Chapter 5: The Ball

0:10:05
We are opening with Shax having a little stomp through hell, doing the little Shax walk. I love the little Shax walk.

0:10:12
The little Shax shuffle.

0:10:14
And she goes to Furfur to requisition her legion of 10,000 demons, which she finds quite funny. Little Doctor Evil moment there. Absolutely. Where are the demons, do we think? See, I’ve got a feeling A, there’s not that many demons to begin with. Like, maybe there’s like only 10,000 total. And B, if you think like Shax is kind of the London representative, they must be all around the world just doing their evil little jobs. They can’t get called back every time someone needs a legion. Yeah, but she must have a really distorted idea of how many exist. Quite possibly, or she’s just not thought… I mean, maybe the majority of demons have a distorted idea about it. Well, that’s a good point. Yeah, you’d kind of need the inflated confidence, wouldn’t you, for the… And I doubt they all gather in one place that often. Yeah, that would be noisy and bad. And they probably smell unpleasant. But we’ve negotiated down to 70. We’ve negotiated down to 70, but meanwhile up in the round world, Aziraphale’s off to invite the local traders to the monthly meeting. I’ve been looking forward to this. From the moment Aziraphale said the word cotillion, I’ve been looking forward to this.

0:11:24
He’s having a smile.

0:11:27
And Crowley wants to watch.

0:11:29
Of course.

0:11:30
So first they go to the music shop, Arnold’s, and Aziraphale promises Mr Arnold a 1965 Doctor Who annual in exchange for his attendance at avec harpsichord.

0:11:40
Avec harpsichord.

0:11:42
Avec harpsichord. So Mr Arnold is played by Rich Keeble, who’s one of those rich actors that’s been in lots of odd episodes of comedy stuff. I was gonna say, I don’t know where I know him from, but I know him from things. I think like recently, including Ted Lasso and Ghosts, and I think that’s probably where I’m most likely to recognise him from. He’s also been… He’s also a voice actor. He’s done a lot of video games. He was the mouth of Sauron in the new Gollum game.

0:12:07
Well. So well done him. Okay.

0:12:11
The name as well, Mr Arnold and the shop being called Arnold’s, is a reference to David Arnold, the composer for the series. Oh, nice. Yeah, because it’s music. Yeah, good.

0:12:20
Like that.

0:12:21
But yeah, I like this whole thing of Aziraphale giving a book away to get someone to come to this thing, and it’s like a payoff for that, him refusing to sell books, jokes. It makes it slightly less tired.

0:12:33
Yeah.

0:12:34
Yeah, we really built up what a big deal that was. Yeah, it still got tired, but at least we’ve got some payoff for it. Yeah, he really wants that party to go well.

0:12:44
Bless him.

0:12:45
So yeah, Back in Hell, Shax Bargains.

0:12:47
You can’t have a party without a harpsichord. Sorry.

0:12:50
Never have a party without a harpsichord. I never go anywhere without one.

0:12:54
My little travel harpsichord.

0:12:56
And I’ve got a lovely little harpsichord on the coast for the summer, you know. Little harpsichordette.

0:13:03
In the country. Sorry. I’ll start making jokes about virginals,

0:13:08
and we don’t need me judiciously using the word ing. Sorry, there’s no Discord spoilers. There’s just a bunch of Discord in-jokes.

0:13:17
Oh, we’re insufferable.

0:13:18
Anyway, yeah, Back in Hell, Shax bargains down to 70 demons with Furfur. I love Furfur in this scene, just because it’s that kind of really annoying bureaucracy. It’s like, it’s not so much that he’s intentionally getting in her way. He’s just really enjoying saying no.

0:13:34
Yeah, and he’s not going to try and help.

0:13:37
I really enjoyed the screen aesthetics. They’re horrible to look at, but very pleasing screen.

0:13:43
Oh, yeah, I did.

0:13:45
Not going to list everything from the trivia section on Amazon X-Ray, because you can just go look at it for yourself. But apparently that is based on the computer from Terry Gilliam’s movie, Brazil.

0:13:54
Oh, cool.

0:13:54
Or it’s like inspired by that, which is a nice detail.

0:13:57
Cool.

0:13:58
We all like a bit of Terry Gilliam. So yeah, next, Aziraphale heads to the magic shop to ask Mutt to attend the party. I found this magic shop scene less stressful to watch than last week’s.

0:14:10
There was less magic.

0:14:11
Yeah, there was less magic. Less objectionable magic shop owner. So Mutt just played… The dolls weren’t as creepy. The dolls weren’t as creepy. They were still creepy.

0:14:19
Yeah, but like the normal amount.

0:14:21
Dolls are inherently creepy.

0:14:23
Yeah, they can’t help it.

0:14:24
And I say this as someone who has a small doll of myself I keep on a shelf and proud display.

0:14:29
Oh, mini. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah.

0:14:32
Yeah, so Mutt’s already played by Jeff Alexander. And we’ll talk about Mutt’s spouse in a few scenes, but I do like the fact that it’s just automatically spouse and then automatically they them as well.

0:14:42
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

0:14:43
Like just really natural use of gender neutral terms. Like we haven’t really talked about it in depth, but this whole season has just been very casually queer and that brings me a lot of joy.

0:14:54
Yeah, yeah.

0:14:55
He’s not needing to like hammer the point in, which is much nicer for just general flow. And also for, you know, saying, you know, no, it’s normal.

0:15:07
Yeah.

0:15:08
People exist.

0:15:09
They do. Isn’t that nice?

0:15:12
The bit from the scene, I’m going to say from the Amazon X-ray, because it’s very relevant to our listeners, is the SW… Erdnase, whatever I can’t remember.

0:15:22
Erdnase. Thank you.

0:15:24
Sorry, is a real person, a real author and everyone thinks his name is probably… Something Andrews. Something Andrews, because he just spelt his name backwards. And I’m putting that in because Pratchett likes to make jokes about people not putting much effort into their co-names by just spelling their own name backwards. So yes, this book from Erdnase gets much promised attendance, and he’ll be bringing his spouse. And then in the street, Mrs. Cheng agrees to attend. And this is great fun fact, and I’m from Neil Gaiman on Twitter. So Michael Sheen actually learned how to have this conversation properly in Mandarin for the sake of filming this scene, just like he did with the Japanese in the first season. But like a couple scenes later, he speaks very bad French.

0:16:11
Yes.

0:16:12
Michael Sheen is actually fluent in French and found it very difficult to do the bad French. Which I think is why his accent is so good, even though his French isn’t very good.

0:16:23
Yeah.

0:16:23
There was, I looked up, by the way, he said he had lessons with Mr. Rossignol, something like that, in 1760. And there was a prominent Rossignol in the late 1700s, but I think this would be a bit early for him. But maybe there was another. But anyway, it’s nice because Césaire Ruffel would have been hanging out in France around that time. We know that because callback.

0:16:48
Yeah, revolution.

0:16:50
Almost beheaded.

0:16:51
Yeah.

0:16:52
Yeah, so then Shax addresses her 70 skeptic demons who have some questions. Shax’s outfit, her invading earth, dramatic, the black hair, the big feathers, I like it. It’s very. It is very. It is the most outfit. It is definitely outfit. I’m saying that in a very good outfit episode. And I love the awkward microphone struggle.

0:17:21
Yeah.

0:17:22
Because we’ve all been there and it’s sort of just the absolute slight limp sadness of attempting to do this dramatic address in this big, echoing, miserable warehouse.

0:17:33
Yeah.

0:17:34
Which is the most open space I think we’ve seen in Hell so far.

0:17:38
Yeah, definitely, actually.

0:17:39
And somehow it’s still just as upsetting. Yeah, absolutely. So the demon asking all the questions, although he never gets addressed by name, he is credited as Eric, which I thought was a nice detail.

0:17:49
Oh, yeah.

0:17:50
Assuming it might be a reference to another Eric. Played by Paul Adeyefa and he was also the disposable demons in season one.

0:17:58
Yeah, he’s got the bunny ears.

0:18:00
Yeah, he just reconstitutes, I guess.

0:18:02
Yeah.

0:18:03
I will say I’m calling them disposable demons. That is how they were credited.

0:18:07
Oh, okay.

0:18:08
Or he was credited. I’m sorry, I was about to get offended on the part of demons, but. I know, but it’s nice to establish I’m not calling them disposable.

0:18:17
Okay.

0:18:18
He’s also he was very good in the 2019 National Theatre Live Midsummer Night’s Dream,

0:18:23
which is available on the internet. Highly recommend a watch.

0:18:27
So yeah, so then Aziraphale uses his incredible French to extend an invite to Justine, the local

0:18:34
restauranteur.

0:18:36
So Justine played by Anna Marianne, who hasn’t done much before this. So this is very cool.

0:18:40
I liked her. I liked her haircut.

0:18:43
She did a very good French person who’s not going to bother trying to speak your bad French.

0:18:48
Yes.

0:18:50
And they’re very clear. I’ve lived here 10 years. Then Aziraphale’s wondering what happened to the pen of his aunt’s gardener.

0:19:00
Il y a un grand mi-don le bidet.

0:19:02
Il y a un grand mi-don le bidet. Such useful French that we know. So yeah, Shax makes a lot of promises to her not quite early. They’re scared of the angels. They do not want to get permanently discorporated, which I thought was a fun detail.

0:19:16
Yeah.

0:19:17
Interesting that one would be damned to all eternity, and yet the idea of not existing is worse.

0:19:24
Yeah.

0:19:25
Or they do exist, but in a void, right? Yeah, they discorporated just like they never existed. Even so, it sounds more peaceful.

0:19:34
The void.

0:19:34
You’d think. I’d quite happily be discorporated and sent to a void.

0:19:38
But sadly, here we are.

0:19:41
No one ever gives you the option. No one ever discorporates me and puts me in a void. We’re just gonna have to start a fight with heaven. Cool, all right. But after the podcast, sorry.

0:19:50
Oh, okay. Okay, cool. Where are we?

0:19:53
So yeah, after the French criticism, Aziraphale extends his invite to Nina, who has been enjoying the show between Aziraphale and Crowley. So Aziraphale heads back to the shop, and Nina asks Crowley about his relationship to Aziraphale.

0:20:09
Crowley does.

0:20:10
All kinds of stuttering. I think this is the episode of this season where I really start feeling invested in Crowley and Aziraphale’s relationship again, because I’ve kind of not been as much as the season’s gone on, just because I think we’ve spent so much time in the past.

0:20:26
Yes.

0:20:28
I’m not sure I quite agree, but I remember you saying. I’m not invested, but I’m more excited about the two of them after this. Him following Aziraphale around like a slightly annoyed spouse is very funny.

0:20:44
It is.

0:20:44
It’s brilliant. I did, it’s when Nina is talking to him about Aziraphale, and she says, other people’s love lives are more interesting to us than our own. And then Crowley has the sort of thought about Aziraphale. Obviously Aziraphale’s been taking far more interest in someone else’s love life.

0:21:02
Hmm.

0:21:05
I think before I was part of the reason I was struggling to invest, because it didn’t seem like they were super invested in each other. They’ve been like apart for so much of the season.

0:21:13
Yeah.

0:21:14
And not in like an interesting pining for each other way, just in a, we’re off doing our own thing and we’re kind of at cross purposes. True, but I think maybe that was just so it didn’t conflict too much with what we were learning about the relationship and the flashbacks.

0:21:28
True.

0:21:28
Like, I don’t know about you, but I’m very easily emotionally confused. I think it just wasn’t something I was- It wasn’t your brand of investment. Yeah, it wasn’t my brand of investment. People enjoy different ways of reading or viewing romances.

0:21:43
Yeah, yeah.

0:21:44
But now Crowley’s like thinking about their relationship in the context of Aziraphale being focused more on Maggie and Nina, I care a lot more.

0:21:51
Yeah.

0:21:52
And realising that people see them as a couple. Yeah, which I don’t think he’s thought about before. Whereas Aziraphale clearly has, for reference, please see the featured expression of last week’s episode.

0:22:06
Yeah, that was a good phrase.

0:22:09
Back in Hell, masks will be provided, which I thought was just a nice, oh hey, we have that. There’s an issue with the big transporter, the pedantic demon gets a shock, and the rest of the Legion will be taking the stairs. So then we go back to the restaurant and Crowley’s sat there having his bottle of wine.

0:22:29
Beautifully.

0:22:31
Very loosely sat with his bottle of wine and slightly legs akimbo sitting in a way I think only David Tennant can sit.

0:22:38
I know, it is.

0:22:40
Imagine having that much limb and being able to sit well.

0:22:46
It’s a gift.

0:22:47
Very jealous. So Aziraphale suggests that Crowley comes back to the shop, but Crowley isn’t comfortable being under the same roof as Gabriel. Aziraphale suggests that Crowley and Jim should chat, and then Crowley suddenly agrees, but he’s very much bringing his wine. So to speak. Yeah, and this is what I find interesting, because we know that for Crowley, being drunk is a choice. So the angel and the demon can sober up whenever they feel like it. And so he has decided to go in there with his ambitions lowered. Which is a good choice if you’re trying to be a dick. Yeah, and if I think Crowley knows deep down that he has the tendency to be nice, maybe.

0:23:32
No one will believe you.

0:23:36
And I think the wine, he knows he needs to be a dick to Gabriel, and the wine is the only way he can do that quite as well, I think. Yeah, and even so he can’t quite overcome that loss. I’m also trying to have this serious conversation, but you have put a giant Fight Club meme in the plan, and I’m getting very distracted by Ed Norton’s face. That’s your own fault, because one of the bullet points here is Aziraphale’s distinct lack of concern. And obviously, that made me think of the I am Jacks total lack of whatever meme, and total lack of surprise meme, and I had to quickly make… I had so few minutes to do my notes, and yet I spent two of them doing that. And that’s why you’re one of my favourite people and an incredible person to podcast with.

0:24:20
Oh, thank you. But not very good at show notes.

0:24:24
So anyway, Aziraphale just doesn’t seem very concerned about the amnesiac archangel, compared to Crowley. And we’re building up to a bit of why Crowley is so much more uncomfortable with Gabriel. And I’ll get to that when we talk about the Crowley and Gabriel conversation, which is like, by far my favourite whole scene of the episode. I think it was great. But it is… I think I’m finding Aziraphale frustrating this season.

0:24:53
He’s very much head in the sand. Yeah.

0:24:57
He’s very keen to follow the clues, but it’s a game. It’s fun.

0:25:00
Yeah.

0:25:02
I quite… like, not to get too ahead of ourselves in the episode, but I quite… I saw it reflected in the way he’s making everybody else act at the dance. It’s like he’s under his own spell. When Nina says, I know I’m upset. Why don’t I feel upset? Yeah. I feel like he’s kind of cast a glamour on himself this season. Maybe we’ll find that out. Or maybe he’s just head empty party today.

0:25:26
Yeah. He is in cotillion mode. Cotillion mode! Engage!

0:25:35
Pleats everywhere. Not pleats, what do I mean? Ruffles. Ruffles. Yes. Ruffles and bodices and bustles. Oh my. Before we get to Crowley confronting Jim, though, we have Nina, who’s cleaning the cafe and getting a final round of breakup texts from Lindsay. I really like the way they showed the messages in the scene, having them come up on the chalkboard and then her wiping them away.

0:25:59
Yeah, that was cool. That was a really clever detail.

0:26:02
He’s done his three, I think. Or maybe the… No, that episode with the papers, this is one. Maybe we’ll get another one. Possibly.

0:26:09
Or maybe I’ve missed one.

0:26:10
I don’t know if you spotted as well that there’s a C and an A and a heart together on the chalkboard. I didn’t. Oh, cute. So I’ve chosen to think that Nina is really shipping as a referral in Crowley. Oh, do you think she’s really into fan fiction? Yeah, 100%. She’s hoping that she can get them under an awning, if you know what I mean.

0:26:32
Ooh-wah.

0:26:33
Wink wink, nudge nudge, say no more, squire. There’s something I did notice, though. As the texts come up, you’ll hear them slightly being spoken at the same time. But the voice given to Lindsay, and I couldn’t see anything credited for that, but it is kind of a bit masculine. And I don’t know why, I just didn’t think of Lindsay as masculine. I assumed it was probably a girl. I did read Neil Gaiman somewhere saying that he had left Lindsay… Um, yeah, gender ambiguous on purpose, because Lindsay can be a boy or a girl’s name. Lindsay is a gender neutral name. And yeah, he was careful to leave the pronoun out so people can, yeah, whatever. Yeah, I thought it was meant to be gender ambiguous, too. That’s why I thought it was weird that there was a specifically masculine voice reading the text out. Yeah, makes sense. Because I thought it was meant to kind of be ambiguous. Well, some women have very masculine voices.

0:27:31
True, true, true.

0:27:33
Shouldn’t make assumptions.

0:27:35
Um, awning.

0:27:38
I’m trying to figure out how to pronounce that. And like the way that like people go in and find girly.

0:27:45
Awning, yeah, but awning. Yeah, right. There’s something there. Yeah.

0:27:49
A-W-W-W-hy-f-en-N-I-N-G. I’m glad we’ve established that. I put it in the plan now.

0:28:01
Cool, cool. I’m glad that’s there. I think that might be the only time I’ve added a retrospective bullet point to the plan. Because really, I can watch you doing it.

0:28:09
I was waiting to see what was going to come. It’s like writing a to do list and then going, oh, I’m going to put the things I’ve already done on the list so I can check them all. All right, but doing that is like really satisfying.

0:28:19
It is, yeah, absolutely.

0:28:21
So yeah, Crowley goes in to have a chat with Jim.

0:28:25
A little chat. Just a, you know, word in his shell like. Word in his shell like.

0:28:31
Jim, who is playing with the light switch until Crowley does a quick let there be light.

0:28:36
Yep.

0:28:38
There’s something I wanted to point out, actually, and I really started to notice it in this scene, but on second watch, I kind of clocked it from the beginning. Because originally I thought it was just because it’s drunk Crowley, but it’s not.

0:28:49
He’s doing it right from the start. His accent has gone like,

0:28:54
and it goes further and further through the episode, more into this like kind of posher,

0:28:58
like that posh drawl. Yes.

0:29:03
Like it’s shifting to the point where by the end of the episode, he’s starting to sound a lot like Angel Crowley starting up the universe. Is that so? Is this what he’s fighting against subconsciously?

0:29:14
Yeah.

0:29:14
With this foray back into demonise, demonish behaviour. Yeah, I think I pointed out back in the first episode we did on Good Omen season two, that there seemed to be like this kind of accent difference between heaven and hell.

0:29:29
Yeah.

0:29:30
So yeah, Crowley possibly slipping back into his angelic voice a bit, I thought was interesting. So Crowley recalls, even though Jim can’t, stepping into the burning hellfire on Aziraphale’s behalf at the end of the last season. So that was a conversation. Yeah, it’s interesting because it was played so lightly in that episode. It wasn’t, it wasn’t. So we have like Jim trying to make amends by jumping out the window, and I have a lot of thoughts and feelings.

0:29:59
Like a normal healthy human.

0:30:01
The way Crowley and Aziraphale though are holding on to those memories of what happened at the end of season one, you know, Aziraphale as Crowley, taking a bath in the holy water and asking for a rubber duck. Us all being blessed with the image of David Tennant in a bath. Versus Crowley as Aziraphale stepping into the hellfire. For Aziraphale it was funny. Like Aziraphale as Crowley, of course, and of course those demons all wanted to kill Crowley because they’re evil demons. And so Aziraphale, like Crowley’s thing is that he is not like other demons.

0:30:30
Yes.

0:30:32
Whereas for Crowley, like in that position of stepping into the hellfire, he knew that Aziraphale had like until recently, really still looked up to his side as it were. So Aziraphale’s boss saying, shut your stupid mouth and die, is like traumatizing Crowley on his friend’s behalf almost. Yeah, he’s like, I did not realize what a fucking abusive situation you were still in.

0:30:56
Maybe. Yeah.

0:30:57
He knows somewhat because, you know, he was part of it and got cast down himself. But yeah, this is a new level. And I went back and actually watched that scene again of like Aziraphale stepping into the hellfire and then we find out afterwards it was Crowley. And it’s again, the delivery of I’m the Archangel fucking Gabriel sunshine.

0:31:20
Beautiful.

0:31:21
But Crowley as Aziraphale is trying to get them to reconsider. And he does look genuinely really uncomfortable in a way that Aziraphale wasn’t when he was getting into the holy water.

0:31:32
Yes.

0:31:34
You know, he genuinely says, is there not another way? Could we not talk about this?

0:31:39
Yes.

0:31:40
And I know obviously some of that was in there because it hasn’t been revealed that they’re each other at the time. So yeah, and Aziraphale would be less blasé about.

0:31:49
Yeah.

0:31:50
Well, not that Crowley would be. I don’t know how Crowley would be about his death, but I’m sure he wouldn’t want to embarrass himself by pleading at a demon. Yeah, he’s got a particular vibe. Whereas Aziraphale is the sort of person who would ask if we could be reasonable and talk about this. And looks upset as he steps into the fire in a way that like the Crowley Aziraphale doesn’t when he steps into the holy water. And I think it’s because of how they review their respective sides that Crowley is the one kind of carrying the trauma for both of them. Because for Aziraphale, like the side he’s kind of on, not so much he’s more of an independent agent after what happened in season one, but he’s still kind of on heaven’s side. He’s just not necessarily on the angel side.

0:32:31
Yes.

0:32:32
Like that’s still right to Aziraphale. Like good and right and nice and kind are all this one lump of thing. Whereas to Crowley, I think both of these sides, the heaven and hell, are all as bad as each other. And he wants no part in it. He overall sees the whole system is just too flawed. And Aziraphale doesn’t look at it in quite the same way, which is why he keeps applying his definition of nice and good to Crowley, whether Crowley likes it or not.

0:33:00
Yeah.

0:33:02
See, he is aware of what heaven tried to do to him. But it’s just not experiencing it. Yeah, he hasn’t had to face it directly. Yeah, it’s a lot easier to play it off.

0:33:14
And kind of put it…

0:33:15
I’m sure if it was me, I’d have been able to persuade them out of it.

0:33:18
Yeah, yeah.

0:33:20
Yeah, anything that doesn’t sort of go as well for Crowley or that Crowley doesn’t see the same way as Aziraphale, Aziraphale just puts down to, oh, well, you’re a demon.

0:33:32
It reminded me a lot of…

0:33:34
It’s this idea of indoctrination. And obviously, because I grew up going to Catholic school and I was around a lot of people who were completely bought into it and their response to everything would be sort of eventually, it would be when I was, you know, dickhead argumentative atheist was, well, you just have to have faith. And, you know, I would be repeatedly going, but what if I don’t?

0:33:56
And why?

0:33:56
And eventually that’s how I figured out I didn’t really believe in God.

0:33:59
Yeah.

0:34:00
And Aziraphale really reminds me of that. Like it comes back to, well, you just have to have faith.

0:34:06
Good and yellow Bentleys. Yes. Yeah.

0:34:10
I think the thing is a lot of the time he’s proving himself right in a way, because if you’re nice to people and you’re nice to your little car, they like you. You are treated nicely. Good things happen if you are a pleasant person to be around. But he just so happens that that aligns with his idea of heaven.

0:34:31
Yeah.

0:34:32
And he comes from a base state of, I think, wanting to be liked in a way where I don’t think Crowley ever did. If you look at like the angel Crowley we see starting up the universe,

0:34:42
he doesn’t care that Aziraphale’s impressed.

0:34:45
He’s excited about what he’s made.

0:34:47
I don’t think he is.

0:34:48
His is less, I want to be liked and treated nicely and more like, I want to do stuff and be good at things.

0:34:55
Yeah.

0:34:56
And good as in like talented as much as morally good.

0:35:00
Yeah.

0:35:00
But he still does have that core of,

0:35:03
I’m not going to make someone walk out the fucking window. Yeah. Yeah.

0:35:07
Even if I’m really good at it. Yeah. So Crowley stops Jim from climbing out of the window. I’ve decided at this point that Jim’s faking it.

0:35:15
This was the scene. Ah, see, I’m still not there.

0:35:20
I still think there’s something genuine. Okay. I don’t know what it was exactly, but I just, something about the scene, I was like,

0:35:28
nah, I’ll buy it anymore.

0:35:30
It was just this scene. Just this scene. I didn’t think, didn’t really think at all until this. But yeah, I couldn’t tell you why. I think he knows more than he’s letting on, but I don’t think he’s totally faking it.

0:35:41
Okay. We’ll see. We’ll see real soon. Oh, we can finally fucking watch it. God, I’ve never done this much delayed gratification.

0:35:49
Listeners, please appreciate the lengths we’ve gone to here to be able to wildly speculate

0:35:55
without faking it. Yeah.

0:35:58
I am really glad we’ve done it this way because I love mystery book shows and I love wild speculation. I do wish this had been a weekly release rather than a binge drop so we could have kind of all gone on the journey together. Yeah, no, exactly. I understand why they do it, but it would have been cool to, you know, been on Discord

0:36:16
and Twitter and all sorts.

0:36:20
Yeah, I feel like we’re going to have a big sort of where our speculation wasn’t right next week and possibly also a look at the wild fan theories that have come out since the show, since the season ended.

0:36:30
Yeah, definitely.

0:36:31
Although even with weekly releases, when it’s like a mystery show like this, a lot of people are much cleverer than me and sometimes I’ll be like, oh, yeah.

0:36:42
Obviously.

0:36:44
A lot of shows I watch that are that kind of encourage that kind of speculation and are weekly releases are shows I also listen to podcasts about, which is why I’m really enjoying podcasting about this because I rarely get to be this side of the wild speculation. I listen to other people’s speculation and go, oh, yeah, that makes a lot more sense. This side of the wild speculation. Western movie. Anyway, Jim then explains this empty house metaphor and whether it’s fake or not, it’s a really great way of describing it. It is, yeah, especially when it’s like the memory palace as a whole thing.

0:37:18
Yeah.

0:37:20
Because it’s just like, tip it to anyone who didn’t watch too much Sherlock or didn’t know this from elsewhere. It’s a way of remembering things where you attach memories or parts of memories to items in this imaginary building you walk around. Yeah, it’s a visualisation tool.

0:37:38
Yeah, thank you.

0:37:41
Also to anyone who didn’t watch too much Sherlock, well done. How’s it like not needing so much therapy?

0:37:45
Not that we’ve been to therapy.

0:37:48
I know that’s another one of those shows where everyone decided retrospectively that they hated it, but I liked it.

0:37:55
I liked it.

0:37:55
And also it was a wild time to be on the Internet. Yeah, I wasn’t on Tumblr then, that probably helped.

0:38:01
I was on Tumblr then.

0:38:04
God, you think we’re getting weird and speculating here. Anyway, so Crowley tries to make Jim remember and he remembers that his memories were in a matchbox, but he took them out and put them in a box and brought them to the bookshop

0:38:17
and now they’re everywhere. And oh, I like this matchbox mystery. I like it.

0:38:24
I don’t know what it is, but I like it.

0:38:27
Yes.

0:38:30
It’s such a good small object to have it around. It’s good and curious and small, but it’s not as cliche as a key or a locket or something.

0:38:38
A little matchbox. Oh, a little matchbox from a pub.

0:38:42
That’s a nice bit of Arcana. The pub with a mysterious Arcana.

0:38:46
Arcana, thank you.

0:38:48
A pub with a mysterious jukebox. A matchbox and a jukebox. A matchbox and a jukebox, all the boxes, all the good pub boxes. And the dignity covering box. Surely next episode for the final pub related box, we’ll have one of those boxes of crisps.

0:39:04
You know?

0:39:04
Yes, big box of crisps.

0:39:06
50 packs of crisps in a box, yes. That’s it, that’s the set.

0:39:11
Um, oh yes, the classic pub boxes, juke, match, dignity covering and crisp. Also known as the four genders.

0:39:22
Four horsemen of the apocalypse.

0:39:25
The other thing that he says while he’s remembering is just this innocuous sentence out of nowhere that if it happens again, I can make it seem like it’s an institutional problem. Well, I heard it as if it happens again, people might think it’s an institutional problem. Oh, I’m sure he said I can make it seem like it’s an institutional problem. Okay, we’re gonna have to go back and check that because my theory is based on that.

0:39:49
Do you want to check now?

0:39:51
I kind of want to check now. The, oh, it’s a bit relevant. Neil Gaiman just posted that the closed captions have now been updated. Oh, cool, because yeah, I noticed there was definite, like, fur fur kept being referred to as faux faux.

0:40:03
Haha.

0:40:08
If it happens again, it will make it seem like it’s an institutional problem. It’s the closed captions. So in between. Yeah, so my theory, they didn’t want it to happen again, because it will seem like an institutional problem. Like it’ll say God will think they’re doing a shit job because another angels fucking memories have escaped or something. So that’s why they’re covering up the Gabriel thing. Also, I think the way it’s delivered is that we’re not 100% sure on what it is. Is it the memory thing? Or is it something else? Oh, yeah, no, we’re not sure. This is my speculation. Yeah, yeah, I like that. That’s a very good theory. But I also, I don’t really have a wild theory. But I feel like it, I just feel like it’s something else, because I want it to be something else, because I like it. That’s true. It’s a nice bit of ambiguity, because it’s, it’s delivered in this baffled way. Yeah, really can read it either way. So that’s cool.

0:40:58
I like that.

0:41:00
One theory is that it’s to do with Aziraphale and Crowley effectively defecting from their own size and becoming independent agents. Oh, yeah. So they’re sending, no, they didn’t send Gabriel down, but then they wanted to do something about it.

0:41:14
Something even though they’re meant to be immune. Yeah, yeah.

0:41:17
Or based on the fly buzzing around that, like, Gabriel and Beelzebub are working together.

0:41:22
Yeah. Oh, what if the memories are in the flies?

0:41:26
Well, I think the memories were, I feel like that was kind of establishing the memories were in that box he was carrying, and now they’re just out. But what if they were in the flies? That’s how the flies got in the memory in the fly. And I don’t think this is true, but what if?

0:41:38
No.

0:41:40
I mean, by the way, speaking of theories that are definitely wrong. My TV is fucky.

0:41:46
All my eyes are.

0:41:47
I noticed the same weird burning film effect while I was watching Taskmaster. Yeah, I think your TV’s fucked.

0:41:55
Update there.

0:41:56
Yeah, Jack doesn’t notice it, so it’s clearly not a big problem, but I was just looking so closely for anything.

0:42:02
Yeah. I’m going to say that’s your TV.

0:42:05
Anyway, so then we get a zoom in on the matchbox on this little podium in heaven. And then we see Michael and Uriel interviewing Muriel. There’s some confusion about an assistant bookseller because their minds are just sliding right off him. Yeah, I like that as a little moment of tension.

0:42:24
Like, are they gonna? No, they didn’t.

0:42:27
And I’ve seen that done something before where someone just can’t see or acknowledge something so clearly as the brain just slides off it. And I can’t remember what I’ve seen it. And I think it was it might have even been a Pratchett thing. I was going to say that’s very Pratchett-y. That sounds like soul music or something like that. Yeah, like a like this. It’s definitely in some of his books. I’m trying to think if you’ve seen it somewhere, it’ll be one of the adaptations. But oh, no, I just mean like the concept is familiar. It’s absolutely in a couple of his books. Yeah, it’s things like the fading into the foreground thing. But this this like no matter how much you blatantly wave it in someone’s face, they can’t remember it.

0:43:05
Yeah, no, it’s definitely in. Yeah.

0:43:08
And yes, I can’t remember exactly which one. Muriel mentions the secret meeting that she didn’t eavesdrop on because it was secret. And she’s a very polite angel.

0:43:16
Good. I love her. And she has a lovely skirt.

0:43:20
She does have a lovely skirt.

0:43:21
That was good.

0:43:22
That’s why I’ve got pleats on the brain.

0:43:23
I love all of Muriel’s outfits.

0:43:25
I’m not smooth brained, I’m pleated.

0:43:27
You’ve got a pleated brain today.

0:43:29
I forgot to say just the end of the Crowley and Gabriel scene. When that tension’s really built off, Crowley gives in and offers him a hot chocolate. And the score does a very nice little bit as Jim blinks when he agrees to it. And it’s a very nice little cheeky little moment.

0:43:50
Yeah.

0:43:52
So yes, Crowley delivers the cocoa but insists that he’s not nice.

0:43:55
Not nice.

0:43:56
Downstairs, Aziraphale is making space and Crowley is sent to fetch Maggie and Nina for the Wickbush Street Shopkeepers and Traders Association meeting. While Aziraphale lowers the chandelier.

0:44:10
He does.

0:44:11
In a little, I think, echo of the let there be light moment with Crowley there. As Crowley’s looking in through the window. As Aziraphale doesn’t say let there be light, but spreads his arms beautifully and brings down the chandelier in a grand. And the piano’s doing some beautiful stuff in the score at that moment.

0:44:30
It’s just a beautiful little bit. It is. I loved it.

0:44:34
Crowley looking in from the grim stream.

0:44:36
Yeah. Yeah.

0:44:38
So the guests begin to arrive for the Wickbush Street Shopkeepers. Traders Association monthly meeting.

0:44:42
It’s time for the party.

0:44:44
It’s time for the party. Mrs. Sandwich is vague and Mr. Brown is upset about the seats. Mrs. Sandwich, when Aziraphale asks what her girls do, she says stand on their own two feet like the government says. Is that like a reference to some specific horrible thing? Because our politicians say so many horrible things I lose track. Oh, I tried to look it up. But I might have been going down the wrong track now you say that. So I was trying to look if there was some old law that said that like there was a loophole that you could be a sex worker if you didn’t go to bed or something like that. And then I started looking into like the top and the upright thing.

0:45:22
And yeah, yeah, there we go.

0:45:24
Which is a type of jam donut.

0:45:25
Yes. Don’t worry.

0:45:29
But yeah, so I don’t know is the answer to that. Listeners, answers on an explicit postcard. Not too explicit. Not too explicit. Tastefully.

0:45:39
Is that a thing?

0:45:40
Something I noticed, Mrs. Sandwich’s outfit changes when she walks in.

0:45:45
Oh, yeah.

0:45:47
And I really like that part of this regency, this spell, whatever it is, Aziraphale has done to make the cotillion work and make them all a bit Pride and Prejudice, has put them all into their nicest outfits, but they’re not all in regency outfits. They’re all in like their version of their nicest outfits. Now Nina doesn’t change her outfit, does she? I think it changes like very subtly, but it’s subtle. Maggie, it’s just her shirt changes into like a nice shirt. And Maggie is the sort of one who’d wear like a nice shirt with jeans.

0:46:16
Yeah, yeah. Okay.

0:46:18
And Mrs. Sandwich has this gorgeous like sequined jumpsuit

0:46:21
and a bit of a hair thing going on, which I love.

0:46:24
Yes, the idea is, well, Aziraphale’s being a very good host. He’s making everybody happy.

0:46:29
Well, apart from, you know, the weird glamour stuff.

0:46:32
But he’s making everybody happy by being their idea of feeling beautiful, not by fitting his party theme.

0:46:40
Yeah.

0:46:41
And I love that as a detail. Anyway, so Nina is unhappy. Also that sequined dress.

0:46:46
Oh, that’s…

0:46:47
Was it a dress or a jumpsuit? I think it was a jumpsuit. I don’t know. There were so many sequins. I’m in awe of whatever it is. This is my point about Donna Preston just being really fucking stunning. Anyway, so Nina is unhappy. She does not want to go to the meeting. I love Christmas lights as this recurring theme, by the way. I love that she’s got strong opinions about Christmas lights.

0:47:08
Everybody does.

0:47:10
That honestly made me like her character more.

0:47:13
Yeah.

0:47:14
I find something very charming. I’ve got thoughts on that, actually. I find something very charming about someone who’s got thoughts on the Christmas lights. She does seem to, and I know part of it’s just that this is a bit more interesting plot for her, but she does seem to, as soon as Lindsay’s kind of disappeared,

0:47:29
she becomes a little more interesting,

0:47:32
because that’s not all she’s thinking about, maybe, or I don’t know. Yeah, I think taking that off and it’s done gives her more to do. But yes, there’s something weird coming and it’s coming in waves, and so Crowley convinces her to go to the shop.

0:47:46
Yes.

0:47:47
And the fog starts rolling in. I liked Crowley’s very subtle method of persuasion there,

0:47:55
which was something nice, like,

0:47:57
ha ha, come on, you’ve got to go to the shop now. Then, you know, you can trust me. And Nina’s like, you’re weird.

0:48:04
And Crowley goes, ah, do it!

0:48:07
He didn’t stay as a zero-file tactics for long, but it worked. Bless him.

0:48:12
He knows what works for him. Neck tendon standing out very well. Yeah. Ah, do it!

0:48:20
So yes, in the shop, everything has gone a little bit Austin, which is great. Jim is… Brandy snuggling and all. Brandy smuggling and all. Jim’s serving canapés. Jim’s suit. And going with this theory of a zero-file has got everyone in whatever they feel like prettiest and most comfortable in, I really, really enjoy that that’s that for Jim.

0:48:41
Absolutely.

0:48:42
I trust you in these tiny little dinners.

0:48:45
They’re free.

0:48:46
It’s a defamiliarization.

0:48:48
Yeah, yeah.

0:48:49
But delivered charmingly by Jon Hamm in a ridiculous suit.

0:48:52
With a vol au vent. With a vol au vent. Jon Hamm in a ridiculous suit with a vol au vent.

0:48:58
The most unusual combination in Cluedo. But if you do get it, you win all of Cluedo forever. So yeah, so Nina has this thing about she’s upset, but she doesn’t feel upset. Mr. Brown says that he’s looking forward to treading a measure later. He just would be that guy though in a Jane Austen book. That one that like everyone cringes around but politely has to dance with at some point. And he has no idea how cringy he is.

0:49:25
Yeah, absolutely. Yeah.

0:49:27
Maybe at some point the protagonist is threatened with an engagement to him.

0:49:32
Yes.

0:49:34
I feel bad for Tim Downey, but he’s very good at playing awful.

0:49:38
Yeah, absolutely.

0:49:39
In a way that I greatly enjoy. Yeah, it is a compliment how cringy we find this character. That’s clearly what he’s going for. We see some of the dancing in this scene and specifically we see Mutt Spouse played by friend of the pod, Andrew O’Neill.

0:49:53
Friend of a friend of a pod.

0:49:55
Friend of a friend of the pod, the only podcast. Friend of the pod once removed, Andrew O’Neill.

0:50:00
Second cousin.

0:50:00
Who is beautifully bedecked.

0:50:02
Beautifully bedecked.

0:50:03
So Andrew actually tweeted at some point that that dress actually does show quite a lot of leg and they actually filmed a lot more dancing scenes that end up getting cut. So if listeners could all get in on us with a petition.

0:50:16
That’s on a postcard.

0:50:18
Petition to Amazon Prime to release the extended cotillion cut.

0:50:21
We would all be very grateful. And there’s the episode title. Thank you.

0:50:29
But yeah, delighted to see Andrew there. Anyway, so in the back in the street, Crowley sends Maggie. Back on the streets. Back on the mean streets of Soho, just outside the bookshop. In the street, Crowley sends Maggie across to the shop and intercepts the demon hordes who shouldn’t be up here demoning about. They tell him they’ve come for Gabriel. Yeah, it’s just this weird mix of like low and high stakes here. So Crowley’s on this fucking errand for Aziraphale and then this fucking demonic hordes coming in and he’s dealing with it in the same tone of voice he was dealing with the rest. And it seems like because of like the fuzz we’re in about it as well, it kind of seems like he’s dealing with an admin problem for the party at the same time as this existential threat, you know? Yeah, this is what I mean about all the priorities have kind of felt weird across this season. The only time Aziraphale’s really prioritised the amnesiac archangel and there’s something terrible is when he went off to Edinburgh and that was a jaunt. That was so he could go and do something. I’m kind of starting to appreciate it now because I’m starting to feel like it’s very much on purpose.

0:51:39
Yeah.

0:51:41
But yeah, also I like, I’m not sure if it was this scene or the next time we see the demons, but I liked face melty demon. I thought that was a very nice bit of SFX. That was. Good effort face melty demon.

0:51:50
Yeah, good stuff.

0:51:51
Didn’t get your name, but well done.

0:51:53
Globular. Nice.

0:51:56
That’s not globular. Globular means like a globe. Globby is much worse though. You know what I mean, guys.

0:52:01
Yeah. Thanks. We all know. Anyway, meanwhile, back at the ball.

0:52:05
That’s globular.

0:52:06
Sorry. You’re globular. Wow.

0:52:14
All right, we are very professional podcasters. At the ball, Mrs Sandwich and Mrs Cheng discuss their professions. I’m not saving this for Easter eggs. This conversation made me so happy. The seamstress.

0:52:24
Yeah.

0:52:26
Not even a Discworld spoiler, but in Discworld, sex workers are called seamstresses. So it’s very funny.

0:52:32
Yes.

0:52:33
We’re taking quite a lot of time to explain this to, I imagine, our completely imaginary audience of people who’ve never read Discworld,

0:52:39
but are listening to this. But just in case. You never know. You never know.

0:52:44
And yeah, that moment brought me a lot of joy.

0:52:47
Yeah.

0:52:47
I did see on either Twitter or Blue Sky, someone kind of criticizing it and feeling like they shoehorned it in to get a Terry Pratchett reference, but it was so out of context.

0:52:55
And I was like, no, it’s fun.

0:52:57
Like, even if you haven’t read Discworld, like, that is an amusing conversation, especially the way they’re doing like full regency. And we’ve had them talk not like that. It’s amusing in the Discworld, even though it’s never explicitly explained why seamstress exactly, or maybe it is, but I can’t remember.

0:53:12
Yeah.

0:53:14
Donna Preston’s delivery of darning is excellent. I keep saying regency, by the way, and I’m not sure that’s quite technically the right time period.

0:53:24
Oh, I don’t care. It’s fine. It’s fine. It’s close enough. Let’s go for the thing of Bridgerton. Yeah.

0:53:28
There’s a hint of Bridgerton to this. Aziraphale loves Bridgerton, doesn’t he?

0:53:31
Oh, absolutely.

0:53:33
He loves it. Crowley pretends to hate it, but also gets annoyed with Aziraphale, which is awesome. It’s a surprisingly specific fact to refute Aziraphale’s fanboying. And points out all of the anachronisms.

0:53:48
Look at us fanficcing on the go. Anyway, Maggie invites Nina…

0:53:53
I’ve got a treble halter chord, sorry, Karen. Maggie invites Nina to dance. Crowley wants to talk, but Aziraphale fobs him off. So we get the lovely Nina and Maggie dancing scene. But Nina is the slightly more self-aware one who is confused and aware that what’s happening isn’t normal. Both of them are more immune to it than everyone else.

0:54:18
Yeah. Nina will say.

0:54:20
Probably because Nina isn’t wanting just to lean into it like Maggie is. Yeah, Maggie is willing to be swept up in it. I think actually Nina is somewhat the one anchoring her.

0:54:29
Mm-hmm.

0:54:31
Um, so yeah, Crowley looks out over the fog and the demons and Jim and his canapes experience some regency flirting. Again, A-plus performance specifically from Andrew O’Neill.

0:54:42
Yes.

0:54:43
Donna Preston was great in it as well. It was just very well done. I would be a hell of a group to stand in at a party.

0:54:51
Yeah, I would not leave.

0:54:55
Crowley tries to talk to Aziraphale again, but Aziraphale invites him to dance. And even with all my I’m not as invested and what I loved in Aziraphale inviting him to dance. And they have a little dance. And obviously Crowley’s not going to say no.

0:55:10
No.

0:55:10
And obviously he’s doing all the steps perfectly and he’s very good at it even as he’s getting very stressed out. Obviously. The only thing I had time to go back and re-watch from season one was that Aziraphale stepping into the hellfire scene. But I would like us all to take a minute to remember the demons dancing with pins scene from season one. And to your homework listeners is to go back and re-watch afterwards because I don’t think anything quite tops David Tennant 70s dancing with a pin.

0:55:38
I don’t know.

0:55:38
The very close proximity Aziraphale doing that weird dance. The one dance he could do.

0:55:46
Oh, the gavotte. Yeah.

0:55:48
Now that’s a happy, happy man.

0:55:50
Go and watch both, dear listeners. Okay. You won’t regret it.

0:55:53
And then tell us which one you think is more pleasing.

0:55:57
It’s the new way of deciding your horoscope. Yep.

0:56:00
Are you demons dancing with a pin guy or an angel doing a gavotte guy?

0:56:08
The two genders.

0:56:09
I’ve got to stop making that joke.

0:56:10
Anyway. I like that joke. Let’s make it always.

0:56:15
Shax arrives via the dirty donkey, which is doubling as a daughter.

0:56:18
Via the dirty donkey darling. The demonic dimensions.

0:56:22
Sorry, say that again. I ruined your alliteration. Shax arrives via the dirty donkey, which is doubling as a daughter demonic dimensions.

0:56:28
That was off the cuff.

0:56:29
I didn’t even write that down.

0:56:30
Delightful.

0:56:31
Nina and Maggie are having a little dance and Maggie learns about the breakup.

0:56:36
I have Nina and Maggie thoughts.

0:56:38
And I’ve been saying like I’m struggling to care about them getting together in the show. Part of it because like I feel like it’s the wrong thing for Aziraphale and Crowley to be focusing on.

0:56:51
Yes.

0:56:51
Like it’s very like they can’t see the forest for the trees. They’re focused on this one detail of getting away with the miracle when the problem is so much bigger and there’s a demon horde outside.

0:57:00
Yeah.

0:57:00
I did like it also like the fact that it felt very one-sided that Nina was so standoffish about it. I did love Nina say something about being hard work and Maggie’s little face when she says I don’t mind hard work.

0:57:13
I don’t mind hard work.

0:57:14
I don’t care about the two of them getting together but I care deeply about Maggie. But I am now of the firm belief that they should not get together.

0:57:24
Okay.

0:57:25
Because Maggie doesn’t really know Nina that well. She’s created like an idealized version of her in her head. It’s what we were saying last week.

0:57:32
Yeah. Yeah.

0:57:32
Which is you know which is what you do when you get a crush on someone.

0:57:35
Yeah.

0:57:36
But also Nina needs to like have that whole thing you know I don’t think Lindsay actually liked me. Nina needs to be single for a bit.

0:57:42
Yeah absolutely.

0:57:43
Yeah even if it ends with like the romance isn’t off the table but like should we just be friends for a bit.

0:57:50
Yeah I’m like shipping them but I’m not shipping them.

0:57:53
Yeah not immediate ship. You can dock on the pier for a bit you know.

0:57:58
Yeah yeah.

0:58:00
Maybe maybe just a punt.

0:58:02
Nice.

0:58:02
Anyway so Crowley tells the Aziraphale about the demons while they’re dancing. But Aziraphale is still not taking it seriously. I know again again it’s like Aziraphale’s quite a worrier generally. This is why I feel like his glamour is working on himself. My other theory is that when Jim first arrived at the bookshop he said you know something terrible wouldn’t happen if I came here and I knew that and I came here and I knew everything would be all right. And I think because Aziraphale whether consciously or not still has this sort of automatic I do what Gabriel says built into him somewhere. He’s just taken right that’s true if Jim’s here he’s okay. Everything’s okay. My only other theory is that a little later in the episode someone says to him something about plans making plans Crowley and that he says I am making my own plans. Yeah yeah. Maybe he’s being a bit duplicitous and we don’t know yet.

0:59:01
We’ll get there.

0:59:03
A rock flies through the window demanding that they surrender the angle. Now if people could do that without maybe breaking the window that’s exactly what I need to practice the lettering. Just leave them politely on the doorstep.

0:59:16
Yes. Excellent.

0:59:18
Okay do I have to so I don’t have to put surrender the angle on it before I bring it to you. It would be better if you didn’t in fact because I need the space on there. Okay but at some point if you get some spare rock can you do a surrender the angle rock?

0:59:29
Absolutely I can.

0:59:30
Yes that’s a great idea.

0:59:32
Excellent perfect.

0:59:34
So Shaz starts making threats to the humans at which point Jim gives himself up and puts on a fantastic coat while doing so. Which the contrast between that coat and like the three-day stubble.

0:59:47
Yes. I thought was beautiful.

0:59:50
Also like just the contrast between like again if we’re going with the costume theory that this is what Jim feels prettiest in compared to what Gabriel was wearing which were very very plain suits. Yeah but but this may use because Jim’s missing his wings subconsciously you know. It was incredibly angelic. Yeah it was a very big feather. Yeah but yeah like how we talk about Jim as if he’s a puppy or a small child. Oh a very big feather.

1:00:18
No look at your big coat.

1:00:20
Or your tiny little dick. Anyway the demons don’t recognize him. Their minds also slide completely off. The miracle was too good. It was too good a miracle. It’s like in that the job interview trope. I was like I’m just too hard working. Yeah oh that’s my biggest flaw. It’s this scene isn’t it that Aziraphale does the vague hypnotism bit right? Yeah there’s a couple of moments if you notice like from when Nina first comes in you actually hear the little hypnotized noisy makes when he’s trying to get Nina to relax and enjoy the party. And it doesn’t work on them. Not thoroughly no. Well at this point definitely not at all because Maggie goes are you trying to hypnotize us?

1:01:03
Yeah.

1:01:05
I wonder just how much is just they’re not susceptible. And how much is there maybe something else we’re going on I don’t know.

1:01:12
Yeah that’s it.

1:01:14
All right all right here’s a cork board. Here’s a string let’s go. They’re so f**king focused on these two people who don’t seem to matter at all.

1:01:23
Yeah.

1:01:24
These two people seem to be immune to the powers. One of these two people are very important supernatural beings or harboring supernatural beings and they didn’t realize it. Oh yeah I can definitely see that being the thing. Secret angels. Maybe it’s not even a recasting at all and they’ve still got some connection to the Chattering Order of St. Beryl.

1:01:43
Yeah yeah. F**k.

1:01:45
All right that’s a bit too cork. I feel like that might be too cork board and string. No no it’s fine we’ll just buy a bigger cork board.

1:01:51
Excellent.

1:01:51
We will find room for these theories. We’ll never run out of twine at the Drew Starmie key thread that’s our one guarantee. Endless twine. This is going to be so fun for the people listening who have seen all of it.

1:02:03
We’ll never know.

1:02:07
But have you seen the family tree I made up for Maggie and Nina?

1:02:12
The eagle. The eagle? Wake up people. Oh f**k.

1:02:21
Where am I?

1:02:22
I’m very sorry.

1:02:23
We’re at the threshold of the bookshop.

1:02:26
Oh yeah so we found out why this is.

1:02:28
It’s an independent embassy because it was connected to heaven and I went back and checked and the angels had to be invited in in episode two as well.

1:02:38
Oh well done. Oh and Muriel too right?

1:02:41
Yeah I don’t think we’ve seen anyone enter that hasn’t been invited in of the heaven slash hellish variety

1:02:49
Mm-hmm.

1:02:50
Because we don’t see him saying come in to everyone who comes into the the party which does mean maybe Nina and Maggie not so heavenly.

1:02:59
Oh yeah good point.

1:03:00
Because they can just walk in.

1:03:01
Yeah.

1:03:02
But yeah so this independent embassy threshold trash thing seems to work for angels as well as demons. Is ordering somebody to go inside the same as an invitation though?

1:03:14
Ah do it! Well no because I don’t know if Crowley can invite.

1:03:19
Oh that’s a good point yeah it’s not his house.

1:03:21
Yep.

1:03:21
Yeah again I’m not sure how closely this adheres to vampire rules and if it is vampire rules. Vampire rules from which thing? Oh yeah too many things for the rules. Anyway we got some remarkable spelling from Shax. Shax in this bit I just became very aware of the f**king beautiful accent that Miranda Richardson is indulging in I think would be the correct thing.

1:03:46
Everyone in the bookshop gets it!

1:03:49
It’s like almost proper BBC English. Yeah but just just really exaggerated and in slightly the wrong places in time. She’s she’s gone Moira Rose accent but the English version of it maybe. Yeah like it’s not transatlantic but it I could see her saying bebe.

1:04:06
Yeah. Everyone gets it bebe!

1:04:09
It’s like BBC English but kind of ragged around the edges. It’s like BBC English that’s been left in a puddle.

1:04:15
Yeah.

1:04:16
I have no idea if what I’m saying is making sense at this point. The unrecognizable Gabriel returns to the bookshop because the miracle was just too good. So Crowley intercedes with the demons and brings up the rules of engagement which leads to again one of my favourite little quote tropes which is using a clause in a subsection to someone you’re pretty sure isn’t going to check the clauses and subsections.

1:04:38
Yeah.

1:04:39
Yes and that he then quite slightly admits to it.

1:04:41
It’s like they’re all going to check it. It’s fine don’t worry about it. Yeah.

1:04:46
It’s a favourite thing and it should be in more things. It delights me.

1:04:50
Agreed. Agreed.

1:04:51
So Crowley is now in charge of getting all the humans out but Mr Brown thinks he can deal with things and he can’t. So f5 in the chat for Mr Brown.

1:05:01
Yeah.

1:05:02
As he’s going out or as they’re talking to Shax um there’s a one another one of those beautiful framed moments of Aziraphale and Crowley next to each other and David Tennant’s got his head tilted down and his eyebrow right up and uh that Michael Sheen’s next to him with his sweet little surprised face. That was just another beautiful frame I had to pause on for a second.

1:05:27
Amazing.

1:05:28
I don’t think I clocked that one I should go back and have a look. Yeah I’ll uh well you’ll find it you’ll know when you see it. Also this scene is the scene where we get um

1:05:36
I won’t leave you on your own I know

1:05:39
which I thought was particularly affecting because of the lack of drama behind it.

1:05:44
Yeah.

1:05:44
It’s just very casual.

1:05:45
I won’t leave you on your own. I know. Off you go.

1:05:48
It’s it’s such a given now and we’ve been talking about that a little bit over the last few episodes.

1:05:52
Yeah.

1:05:53
Well you have especially about how Aziraphale’s just like secure in this relationship now. Yeah the security and confidence especially because we had his slightly more fluttering needing to establish things especially in some of the flashbacks.

1:06:07
Yeah yeah definitely yeah.

1:06:08
And Crowley’s not doing a good job at pushing back. At this point he’s given up. Um well yeah I mean it’s starting to feel like this is really more Crowley’s story.

1:06:20
Actually you know what I’ll get there.

1:06:23
So Aziraphale is trying to keep things calm Nina and Maggie want to stay behind to help.

1:06:28
Which I’m looking forward to whatever they do. I hope they get swords.

1:06:32
Staying behind to help after a party I feel is the mark of a very good person. So now I like them especially. Yeah no I do support those choices. I’m not sure they’re offering to do the washing up but. No but it’s like the celestial equivalent.

1:06:44
Yeah.

1:06:46
We’re washing up those demons. Yeah putting them on the sink rack of eternal damnation.

1:06:53
Christ.

1:06:54
Sorry sorry carry on. Don’t mind me just going off on a simile spiral. Ah yes the draining board of dread.

1:07:00
This is how I have a breakdown.

1:07:02
I just keep doing similes until I’m curled up in the fetal position. Francie we can do this we can get to the end of the episode.

1:07:08
I’ve got faith in you. Okay.

1:07:11
Shax delivers Crowley’s mail and Crowley sends the humans home. And there’s a very nice little exchange between him and Mrs Sandwich. Who he’s got to head up this two by two procession with him.

1:07:21
Hmm.

1:07:22
I’m assuming you also were singing to yourself the animals went in two by two.

1:07:25
Hurrah.

1:07:26
I wasn’t but I will be now. And Mrs Sandwich says you’re a good lad and he says technically not either.

1:07:31
And uh yay relatable gender moment. Yep not quite.

1:07:36
But you tried. Yeah so then Aziraphale gets a familiar looking circle out in the bookshop. And um he says don’t worry Crowley will have a have a plan. Nina and Maggie say well why have you got to wait for him? He says no I’ve got a plan but but you know Crowley will come up with something. Uh what’s he say? Rescuing me makes him so happy. And he looks back like I really disliked Aziraphale in this moment.

1:08:01
Oh yeah.

1:08:02
This is what I mean about this idea of it being kind of more Crowley story. Is that I care more about how Crowley cares about Aziraphale than how Aziraphale cares about Crowley.

1:08:11
Yeah. And this this distance and this push back and independence.

1:08:17
I’m not saying that that you know if you’re talking about it just as a relationship that there shouldn’t be pushback and there shouldn’t be independence from each other. But Aziraphale has had this sort of smugness alongside it the whole season and that felt so like cringey and patronizing. Do you think it was do you think that’s its own thing or do you think it’s just taking what we were talking about a second ago a step too far? I think it’s a bit of both.

1:08:42
Okay.

1:08:43
I definitely think it’s been building this whole season but that’s why I feel like I’m more invested in Crowley’s story versus Crowley’s and Aziraphale’s story.

1:08:50
Yeah.

1:08:51
I’m invested in the emotional outcome for Crowley and I think Aziraphale has… He’s definitely having more of a crisis.

1:08:56
Yeah.

1:08:57
And Aziraphale has been kind of a dick.

1:09:01
Yeah.

1:09:02
Yeah absolutely. He’s not listening to really quite important information. Exactly. And I was thinking about the Nina and Lindsay relationship and how it felt like overly blatantly abusive relationship and I wondered if there was meant to be… Not that I think Aziraphale is abusing Crowley but that if there’s meant to be a kind of, hey look at what bad relationships look like and maybe it could look like this. If there’s meant to be some parallels drawn there of not listening or…

1:09:26
I don’t know.

1:09:27
I might be taking it. Yeah, it might be a bit of a reach. I like how that’s too much for my twine.

1:09:31
But the other shit.

1:09:34
I think I’m just looking for something to make the blatancy of Lindsay being a dickhead like work.

1:09:40
Yeah.

1:09:40
See to me that never really bothers me.

1:09:42
Yeah. Whereas for me it felt…

1:09:43
Some people just have shit relationships and it takes a while to get out of them.

1:09:47
Yeah, absolutely. I’ve been there.

1:09:49
But it felt overdone for TV. It felt like kind of mere writing.

1:09:53
Fair. We’ll find out whether it was on purpose soon. Yes.

1:09:57
But I have to finish some dress things before I can watch it.

1:10:00
Okay.

1:10:01
Anyway, so Crowley goes over to Inspector Constable, regular human police officer, to report a crime.

1:10:10
He wants to be arrested.

1:10:11
And at this point Muriel admits she’s actually an angel.

1:10:14
Oh, no.

1:10:15
Crowley insists on being arrested. He wants to be taken up to heaven.

1:10:20
And they take the lift in the dirty donkey up as Shax watches.

1:10:24
One thing I did notice is that… You know, I mentioned Crowley’s accent shifting throughout the episode. By here it’s like full on like the posh drool. Because he’s going back up to heaven, I guess.

1:10:36
Yeah.

1:10:36
I wonder if it’s like infectious. Even though it’s a completely different accent to Muriel’s accent, he’s somehow picking it up. Or it’s slipping into character.

1:10:44
Or yeah. Yeah.

1:10:45
I’m gonna have to go back and watch this accent thing. So I’m sure you’re right, but I didn’t pick up on it. Also, speaking of framing, the shot as Crowley and Muriel are in the lift, but there’s a bar in the door that comes down between them. So they’re in the same space, but there’s like a big black bar literally separating the screen in half. It’s a really beautifully framed, like,

1:11:05
Nice.

1:11:05
There is a clear divide here shot.

1:11:08
Yeah, nice.

1:11:08
And yeah, I don’t know what’s gonna happen. I’m very excited. And then the credits roll and we get a lovely harpsichord arrangement of Good Omen’s theme featuring every day. Oh, I’ve got an unhinged theory.

1:11:21
Oh, cool.

1:11:23
Someone, either Crowley gets splashed with holy water or Aziraphale gets hell fired. And it does nothing, even though they’re the right way around because they’re that far from their original selves.

1:11:32
Oh, I like that. Yeah. Oh, I like that.

1:11:35
If that doesn’t happen, it should.

1:11:36
I like that.

1:11:37
Oh, I said familiar looking circle, by the way, when Aziraphale’s in the bookshop. Did I point out why it’s familiar?

1:11:43
No.

1:11:44
Oh, it’s that circle that he uses to communicate with the Metatron in season one.

1:11:49
Yes.

1:11:49
So fingers crossed Derek Jaffa could be next week. Just an open phone line.

1:11:55
Yeah, a really big phone.

1:11:56
It’s like us digging the landline out when we need to call somebody overseas.

1:11:59
Yeah.

1:12:01
I don’t have a landline. I’ve got one on top of one of these bookcases that we plug in when we need it. I respect that.

1:12:09
Anyway, yeah.

1:12:09
So have you got any other unhinged theories or big thoughts before we go on to our bests?

1:12:14
Nope. You?

1:12:16
No, I think I’ve been unhinged enough for now. Yes, let’s start to try and re-hinge ourselves before carrying on with our evenings. Just wait till next week. The hinges have gone. It’s not unhinged anymore. It’s just a door falling out of a frame. That’s not even a door. It’s a frame. It’s just a void.

Easter eggs and favourite moments

1:12:34
Anyway, no, we like the void. Quotes, favourite quote.

1:12:38
Favourite quote slash line reading from you? He’s just an angel I know.

1:12:45
Oh, his little voice wobble.

1:12:47
Fucking Crowley’s voice cracking in that line. I don’t know if it was on purpose, but I bet he was very pleased it happened. Honestly, I was thinking about doing some season wide overall favourite superlatives, whatever, next week. But I just wanted to give a big honourable mention now to every time Crowley says the word angel in literally any capacity because…

1:13:08
Yeah, angel is… Especially is.

1:13:10
It’s a descriptive and it used to sound kind of dismissive and it sounds very much like a pet name.

1:13:15
Yeah, yeah. All right.

1:13:18
My favourite, I think, like line performance in the whole episode is Crowley to Jim. I remember the look on your face. Archangel Gabriel, when you told my only friend to shut up and die. The way he drags out the R in archangel. And again, we were talking about his elastic face, the way he proper screws up and spits that out at him.

1:13:41
He’s such a good actor.

1:13:43
By all accounts, a very nice fellow.

1:13:46
Apparently so. I’ve been watching things.

1:13:49
I was watching, and I know we’ve watched it before, but that, um, do you know the 2015 when he got that special recognition award?

1:13:56
Oh, yeah.

1:13:57
Yeah, and his face. His little face while he’s watching that.

1:13:59
His face. Easter eggs.

1:14:02
Have you got any favourite or any Easter eggs that you picked up?

1:14:06
Oh, yeah.

1:14:06
The Doctor Who thing is not really an Easter egg, but just the fact that there was a Doctor Who

1:14:13
annual. Yeah.

1:14:14
So David Tennant talked to comicbook.com about the potential implications of David Tennant playing Crowley in a world where Doctor Who exists. And just him having a little existential crisis is very good. And I’ll link the article in the show notes.

1:14:32
Oh, I love that.

1:14:33
A couple of other Doctor Who things, actually. One is if you listen closely while they’re talking about the Doctor Who annual in the music shop, you hear the TARDIS.

1:14:42
Oh, really? There’s a little TARDIS creak. Fucking hell.

1:14:45
What a good score. Yeah, it’s even credited as like TARDIS noise BBC in the x-ray thing. I thought that was a really nice detail. Also in that music shop scene, actually, when Mr. Arnold is explaining why he doesn’t like going to these meetings, he explains that last time they whitted on about Christmas lights and then had a debate about the improper use of apostrophes in shop signs. And that’s actually, I mean, it’s a very Pratchetty thing in general, but I know there’s a very specific joke about that in the next book we’re covering.

1:15:13
Oh, yeah?

1:15:13
Yeah, the bit about the apostrophes and shop signs in Going Postal.

1:15:17
Oh, cool. I really hope I’m not misremembering that.

1:15:18
It’s been fucking years since I read that book.

1:15:20
I’m really looking forward to that.

1:15:22
Not to get too ahead of ourselves. That’s not a major spoiler for the book, by the way.

1:15:27
No, no, no, no.

1:15:28
I just don’t want to get excited about Going Postal. I’m still unhinged about Good Omens. I can be unhinged about multiple things at once. It’s my specialty. And yes, speaking of Doctor Who references as well, in the magic shop, we do get David Tennant in a fez.

1:15:43
Oh, yeah.

1:15:44
Because fezzes are cool. Fezzes are cool. And Doctor Who-ish, although… The fez thing is the 11th Doctor as opposed to David Tennant. But there is a bit where he wears a fez as well in the 50th anniversary special. And it’s definitely an intentional reference.

1:15:58
Cool. Yeah, I mean, there was that shot of it, wasn’t there? Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Okay.

1:16:03
And him fucking about with the crystal ball was just entertaining.

1:16:06
Yeah.

1:16:07
Character Does a Little Face Award? Yeah, mine was pretty early on. For once, I’ve not done Crowley or Aziraphale. I’ve got Mr. Arnold accepting the offer of a Doctor Who annual with the look of somebody who is as scared as he is pleased by this ridiculous windfall. And did you spot he’s got it on his music stand when he’s playing his harpsichord later?

1:16:30
I didn’t.

1:16:31
I did notice he was clutching it as they left.

1:16:34
But I didn’t see that.

1:16:34
That’s very nice. My Little Face Award goes to when Aziraphale and Crowley are at the cafe and Crowley is trying to work out what the past tense of smite is and Aziraphale says smitten.

1:16:46
Smitten.

1:16:47
With a little face and then says, oh, you’re being silly.

1:16:50
And just his face.

1:16:51
He’s doing a lovely little face.

1:16:53
Yes.

1:16:54
Honourable mention though to Aziraphale inviting Crowley to dance as well. See, you’re very into, you’re in two minds about Aziraphale’s smug little face today. His smug little face is annoying me, but also it’s completely adorable because Michael Sheen is doing it.

1:17:09
Yeah, yeah.

1:17:10
I forgive a lot of smug little faces if they belong to Michael Sheen. The man of a thousand smug little faces, Michael Sheen. And finally, Helicopter and Loincloth Watch for Helicopter. I’ve gone with, you know, I pointed out in the opening titles that seem like different bits like from different episodes. I know it’s going to be tenuous when you have to start with an explanation.

1:17:33
Yes.

1:17:35
And the bit in the titles for this episode is Aziraphale and Crowley on the rooftops with hearts falling. So I’ve given Helicopter to those little hearts falling down.

1:17:43
Okay, that’s fair. I like that.

1:17:45
It was just an easy to talk about that. And for loincloth, I am giving the honour to Jim’s massive feathered coat. Jim’s massive feathered coat. In the library. There are so many loincloths we could have picked, but I agree.

1:18:00
That’s a good one.

1:18:01
Even though it doesn’t cover the loins at all.

1:18:03
No, it does.

1:18:04
Technically the loins are the back.

1:18:06
Shut up, Francine. Do you want me to chime back in at any point? No, no, it’s fine.

1:18:12
I’ll just continue.

1:18:14
No, yeah, I want to go eat.

1:18:16
So let’s wrap this shit up. I think that’s probably everything we are going to say about episode five of Good Omens.

1:18:23
It is.

1:18:23
My blood sugar is getting low and it’s becoming very apparent. Thank you very much for listening to this episode of the True Show Make You Frat. We will be back this time next week to talk about season six, the finale.

1:18:38
Yeah. Fuck yeah. God.

1:18:43
Until next time, dear listener, you can follow us on Instagram at thetrueshowmakeyoufrat, on Twitter at makeyoufratpod, on Blue Sky at makeyoufratpod, on Facebook at thetrueshowmakeyoufrat. Join our subreddit community r slash TGSNYF. Join our Discord, just message us for an invite because if we post one in the show notes, it’ll have expired by the time you get this.

1:19:01
Um, email us.

1:19:02
It lasts for a week.

1:19:03
Oh, does it? Yeah. Okay.

1:19:05
That’s why I’m saying you need to replace every week.

1:19:06
Yeah. Link down below.

1:19:09
Email us your thoughts, queries, castles, snacks, angels, demons, and big feather coats to thetrueshowmakeyoufratpod at gmail.com. If you want to support this bollocks financially, go to patreon.com forward slash trueshowmakeyoufrat where you can exchange your hard earned pennies for all sorts of bonus and nonsense. Please don’t forget to rate, review, subscribe, all that bollocks wherever you get your podcasts. It helps people find us. Sorry, that was two bollocks in the outro. And until next time, dear listener, to the world.

1:19:47
Well, that was fun. That was fun. What nonsense, but what fun. Right. Go eat. Cool. I will. Bye.

Transcript: 120: Good Omens Season 2 Episodes 3 & 4 (Sleight of Mouth)

Episode 120: Good Omens TV Show, Season 2, Chapter 3 and Chapter 4. Recap and discussion.

Go back to episode and Show Notes >>

Note: Transcripts are produced with Whisper AI and PyAnnote – we don’t have time to edit them extensively, so both wording and speaker labelling will be inaccurate in parts.

I’ve just started, because we’ve got so much honey, everybody Jack knows has bees.
What is your life?
I apologize if we get like background weather noises today, but I can’t do much about it
in this room because my house is made of windows.
If it sounds funny, I’ll just literally put proper background rain noise in, fuck it,
why not?
I just need to go stand under an awning and fall in love quickly and then we can get on.
Actual related news to what we podcast about, the Good Omens graphic novel Kickstarter went
live this week and broke lots of records and it’s fully funded and that’s exciting.
Have you gone on that?
Yeah, I got the early bird thing that’s just the graphic novel.
I might do some add-ons for some of the matchy stuff later, but I’m not thinking about it
rather than impulse doing it.
So I think just the graphic novel is like a 20 quid pledge and then it goes up quite
a lot.
I’m going to do a special number of the beast level that’s 666 pounds, which I’m obviously
not going to do.
What’s the artist?
Oh, Colleen Doran.
She does gorgeous artwork.
She’s done a few Neil Gaiman short stories before.
She did chivalry and I think she did snow glass apples, which is one of the fun fucked
up snow white ones he’s done.
That is familiar.
Yes.
Oh, lovely.
Look at all that.
Yes, lovely art.
I do think it’s kind of a weird choice to do this graphic novel on Kickstarter because
between Neil Gaiman and the Terry Pratchett estate, I can assume they’ve got access to
traditional publishing routes.
I wonder about that stuff sometimes as well, but I wonder.
It could just be like a community engagement thing, I suppose.
Yeah.
So I think the most sensible theory is just like it’s a community engagement and it means
they can do this specific run and that’ll be lovely.
And the Kickstarter pledges including bookshops being able to buy a certain amount of the
graphic novel and special bookshop pledges.
And then the wilder theories are that because Amazon Prime haven’t shown any interest in
doing Good Omens merch, this is the easiest way to do Good Omens merch.
And the completely batshit theory that I don’t think is actually accurate but would be very
fucking funny is that Neil Gaiman’s ex-wife did have a record for being one of the first
Kickstarters to reach a million dollars and so maybe he’s just trying to one-up his ex-wife
in some way.
I don’t think that’s actually it, but it would be incredibly funny if it was.
Which ex-wife?
Amanda Palmer.
Ah, yeah, that makes sense.
Amanda Palmer’s Kickstarter for her Theatres Evil album was the first Kickstarter to reach
a million dollars.
Very good.
So yeah.
Is this just Neil Gaiman trying to one-up his ex-wife?
Probably not.
Okay, final.
Yeah.
He’s not here to argue with us.
Exactly.
Right.
Anyway, before I say some horrible thing that gets me sued, do you want to make a podcast?
Yeah, let’s make a podcast.

Intro

00:02:55

Hello and welcome to The True Shall Make You Fret, a podcast in which we’re usually reading
and recapping every book from Terry Pratchett’s Discworld series in chronological order but
have taken a break to talk about Good Omens Season 2.
I’m Joanna Hagan.
And I’m Francine Carrel.
And today we’re talking about Episodes 3 and 4 of Good Omens Season 2.
The middle third.
The middle bit.
No spoilers before we crack on.
We are trying to keep this a spoiler-free Good Omens podcast, so this episode will contain
no spoilers past Episode 4 of Good Omens Season 2.
There will be spoilers for Good Omens Season 1 and the book Good Omens.
This podcast will also contain no spoilers for the Discworld series, so if you’re just
joining us for Good Omens and want to try the Discworld after, you are saved.
Try the Discworld after, join us, not a cult.
Not a cult.
Also, brief content warning, this episode will probably contain some discussions of
suicide.
Yes.
Based on what happened in Good Omens.
Yes.
So I hope you listened to that spoiler warning before you got to that.
Follow-up.
I’ve got a couple of brief bits of follow-up.
What you got?
Thank you to the many people, Francine especially, who caught it as soon as we finished recording,
that have reminded me that Miranda Richardson did indeed appear in the fourth season of
Blackadder as the German nurse.
Yep.
Slash spy.
The Queenie has become the nurse here.
I also had a couple of different people point out actually, including friend of the Pod Marc Burrows is something we didn’t acknowledge, which is kind of a plot hole to say a record
shop is not successful in Soho in this current day and age because record shops are popular.
I did say that to Jack as we were watching, but I wasn’t sure if I was saying something
stupid because of the rent in Soho or I don’t know.
I don’t fucking know how London works.
I mean, I’m not being funny.
If our tiny little town can support a record shop that you need to be able to find, I think
quite a lot of places could support it, especially Soho.
Maybe she’s just real bad at her business.
McCarrion in Discord did make an interesting point, which is that the whole street feels
a bit un-Soho-like and that they were originally thrown because vinyl shops being unpopular
is not a thing.
Vinyl is a booming market right now.
Yeah.
Aziraphale’s presence in the area for a while kind of shaped the nature of the area, having
a genius loci effect and making it all slightly more old-fashioned.
I really like that idea.
Yeah.
I’m going with that as a theory.
Whether it ever becomes canon or not is canon to me.
I have a couple of small bits to follow up.
I was wondering if Shax was a real demon and I saw that it was, but also I found, well,
I think we probably talked about it when we talked about Fowls, however long ago that
was for the Ars Goetica, it’s a grimoire which lists all of the various demons and things.
Shax is in there as a Marquis of Hell.
Marquis?
Marquis?
Marquis?
Marquis.
A Marquis of Hell.
I’m never sure, do you know?
I’m not sure if it’s Marquis, Marquis or Marquis.
Yeah.
She’s one of those things.
Can discover hidden things if they’re not kept by evil spirits.
I don’t know if it was just a cool name.
I mean, discovering hidden things if they’re not kept by evil spirits and the whole Gabriel
situation, that’s interesting.
And has power over legions, but I’m not sure, probably lots of them do, so that was cool.
The other bit was I finally started looking at some of the X-Ray content, because I was
watching on my iPad instead of the telly, so I could actually fuck about with it.
The text messages thing I was saying last week was mentioned in one of the bonus content
bits on one of these episodes.
So Peter Anderson was given the challenge of finding three ways to show the text on
screen, because he was the one who did like the cool Sherlock ones.
Oh, cool.
So yeah, this was something particularly given to him.
So I liked that.
Excellent.
Right.
Francine, do you want to tell us what happened previously on Good Omens Season 2?

Previously on Good Omens

00:07:19


Previously on Good Omens:
A naked archangel shocks Soho and seriously unsettles retired supernatural ambassadors
Aziraphale and Crowley.
Gabriel’s memories are gone, but the angel is not forgotten.
The forces of heaven and hell are scouring the earth, and their suspicions, correctly,
land upon our favourite angel and demon, who try to subtly conceal their fugitive.
Half a miracle later, the angelic bookshop lights up like a distress flare.
To cover up their cover-up, Aziraphale tells the heavenly hordes he’s been meddling in
affairs of the human heart, and now he’ll have to make his awkward tenant and vaguely
hostile local coffee shop owner fall in love.
Luckily, Crowley has seen a few Richard Curtis films.
I’m just trying to picture Crowley going to like see a Richard Curtis film in the
cinema.
I guess maybe like as a study of- no, no, wait, he’d say it was like a study of how
to manipulate humans, but really.
He’s like quietly crying in that funeral scene in Forwardings in a funeral.
He still can’t hear stop all the clocks without tearing up.
There’s the thing about wearing those sunglasses all the time, we don’t know when he’s having
a little cry.
Yeah, good point.
I should wear sunglasses more.
No, it’s fine, I’m dead inside.
Right, so, episode three or four?
Uh, three and four.
Three or four, just pick one.
It’s fine, don’t worry.
We just didn’t do one today.
Don’t worry about it.
Um, big thoughts, overall thoughts.
What do you think?
I liked three, mum, four.
Yeah.
I expected us to be further along in the plot by now, I guess?
Yeah, yeah, I’m feeling that a bit.
I enjoyed them, I enjoyed watching them, but I’m kind of becoming aware there’s only six
episodes.
Yeah, we’ve only got like two episodes of plot left.
But no, I didn’t enjoy watching them, the kind of abundance of tiny little references
and aesthetic things and details.
I just love watching it just for that, to be honest.
I mean, I’m never going to complain about David Tennant in a wig.
Is he wearing a wig?
I’m pretty sure.
I feel like he dignantly said he wasn’t wearing a wig.
Oh wait, when he flashback, obviously he’s wearing wigs, but like his main hair, like
his main hair has died, but yeah, the flashbacks, those are wigs.
Yeah, that’s fair.
Yeah.
How about the mutton chops?
I found them a bit upsetting.
I was very into the mutton chops.
I support them.
I think we should bring the mutton chops back.
Gives me something to hold on to.
What?
Sorry.
Yeah.
The tone can only go up from here.
No, it can’t.
I’ve got to say episode four is so far my least favourite episode of the season overall.
Some of that is also me really hating spiders and magicians.
Some of it’s me really hating cringe content, so yeah, this may be personal preference.
It is personal preference.
But yeah, I agree with you on like the pacing thing and the plot thing.
We’re out of the mini-sodes now.
These are the last episodes to have the big extended flashbacks as far as I know.
Okay, interesting.
There aren’t mini-sodes in the other episodes, whether that means there’s still no flashbacks,
I don’t know.
But yeah, I’ll go into that a bit more later, but the pace is very weird, I feel.
But overall, enjoyed.
But overall, yeah, still having fun.

Chapter 3 – I Know Where I’m Going (S2E3)

00:10:22

Should we dive in then?
Yeah, episode three.
I Know Where I’m Going, featuring the Resurrectionists.
So I Know Where I’m Going, the title is a reference to like a Scottish rom-com, Scottish
British rom-com from like the 1940s, which I read about.
And there’s a lot of stuff, if you read like the x-ray thing, which I’m not going to list
every reference in the show that’s just listed in the x-ray thing, but there is a lot of
stuff in the episode that is referencing this film.
It actually sounds pretty good.
I’m going to see if I can find a copy.
Okay, cool.
Yeah, let’s not look.
I’m sure some of it might be on YouTube, even if it’s 1940, some of that stuff’s just
uploaded and no one goes to Fox, though.
Oh yeah, good point.
So that’s cool.
That’s an interesting bit.
So yeah, straight in scene one, Jim’s drinking a hot chocolate while he watches the busy
Soho street.
He’s got his mug labeled and his hot chocolate’s labeled.
Very cute.
That’s nice.
I do wonder a bit because like, so Crowley’s clearly like somewhat residing in his car
with all his plants are there.
He moves out of the car and into the coffee shop so that Aziraphale can, into the bookshop,
so just so that Aziraphale can use the car.
He’s obviously not like been staying at the bookshop.
Jim immediately has got his own bedroom.
There’s a weird dynamic there.
Yeah, Crowley, I think, would not enjoy living in the bookshop, so.
Absolutely.
But I want him to get his own place at some point.
Yeah, kind of weird that he’s not, I don’t know.
I just feel like a Bentley is not going to be a comfortable place to sleep for someone
as lanky as David Tennant.
Does he sleep?
Oh, yeah.
Good point.
Anyway.
Meanwhile, in the coffee shop, a customer critiques Nina’s love life.
This is Mrs. Sandwich in the credits.
Mild spoiler that I’ve seen from IMDB stuff that she’s going to be in next week’s episode
as well, which is, I think, why she’s named, played by Donna Preston, who I love.
What else have we seen Donna Preston in?
She was in Sandman.
She played Despair, looking very different.
And she’s been in lots of British stuff.
She’s been on The Match Report a bunch.
She’s been in an episode of Inside No. 9, but I think at this point every British, even
slightly funny actor, has been in Inside No. 9 at this point.
Eventually, they’re going to have to start reusing actors.
Yeah, absolutely.
I wouldn’t be surprised if it turns out, like, the Inside No. 9 guys are doing some weird
magic plan where they’re getting the essence of all of the British comedians and they’re
going to, you know?
Yeah, probably.
There’s a plot there somewhere.
For context, actually, because we’re going to talk about them later, but Inside No. 9
is created by, like, Richard Smith and Steve Pemberton of The League of Gentlemen, who
are in episode four, along with Mark Gatiss, also, of The League of Gentlemen.
Yeah, what’s his name?
The actor’s name, sorry?
Steve Pemberton.
That’s Steve Pemberton, is it?
Yeah.
Yeah.
Anyway, he’s the most chameleon actor I’ve ever seen, like, from episode to episode on
Inside No. 9.
Like, it always, always, even though I know they’re coming up, it takes me a second to
recognise it’s him.
He’s fantastic.
Yeah.
But yeah, if you’ve not seen the show, listen, it’s highly recognised.
It’s kind of, like, a bit Black Mirror-ish in that it’s, like, an anthology series with
a different story, but less, like, all tech, all scary, what if this happened and more
just, like, hey, look at fucked up shit.
It makes me physically uncomfortable to watch and I really enjoy it.
Yeah, it’s not bingeable.
No.
No.
Don’t try it.
Do not binge the show.
Anyway.
Anyway, but yeah.
But yeah, I love Donna Preston.
I just think she is stunning.
I thought it was very impressive in Stamman that as despair, they managed to make her
look not stunning because she’s got just, like, an incredibly charismatic face.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And then a distracting police officer passes by.
I noticed we both made the same note, a real human person.
Regular.
Inspector Constable, regular human police officer.
In bright white.
It’s possible.
Yeah.
So she knocks on the door, Rosara Fell answers, it’s the police, and she wants to come and
do her in an unobtrusive monitoring inside where it’s warmer.
And I think we can all say at this point that we really love Muriel.
Very cute.
She’s adorable.
So yeah, so Crowley comes in and asks for a private word, Azura Fell gets the car keys,
doesn’t stay to listen to Crowley’s plan, but Muriel’s here to obviously check up on
whether Nina and Maggie are fallen in love.
I think we very clearly heard her say she was here to look at a cup of tea.
Or a cup of tea.
A cup of tea.
A cup of tea.
Which I thought was a nice little call back to the whole don’t eat or drink any human
stuff because corruption there, she’s staring at it like it’s on fire.
And actually that made me think, I don’t think we really talked about it because it’s just
such a trope we’re both soaked in with all the stuff we read.
The fairy food rules.
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, I made the exact same note.
Don’t eat anything of the wrong realm.
Because you might get kind of trapped there, which is what happened to Azura Fell.
He’s eaten of the human food and drink and now he loves humanity and wants to stay there.
Yeah.
But yeah, some other stuff I found about Muriel being there, I mean, I could only say cup
of tea that way now.
Yeah.
A cup of tea.
A cup of tea.
It’s like humanity.
She’s immediately really excited by Earth.
She thinks it’s really wonderful.
Like, she’s not very good at this.
No.
This pretending to be a regular human police officer, Inspector Constable.
Did Heaven intentionally send someone incompetent or, because she’s very low ranking as well,
like we’ve seen her in the previous episodes in the heavenly scenes that she is not like
up in the ranks there, or is Heaven just so disconnected from humanity that they, because
we saw that with like Gabriel the previous episode that he doesn’t seem to really care
about humans, previous season I mean, not previous episode.
So yeah, is Heaven just so disconnected and kind of arrogant that they don’t think they
need to send someone who might have a clue what’s going on, because they’re all kind
of like that and Michael wouldn’t do any better.
Might be a bit of both, in that there might be one of the angels is kind of masterminding
everything and the rest of them are too disconnected to notice that Muriel would do a bad job
or I would if it’s either or I would lean towards the latter though that they just don’t
realize.
Yeah.
Yeah.
From that scene, my favorite little framing, but by the way, they had Iserafell and Crowley
perched together on the on the armchair, or rather Iserafell sitting down and Crowley
perched and it’s just very nicely framed, it looked like one of the posters.
And the sort of both of them leaning in together to very gently rib Muriel.
Yeah.
Like you can tell they kind of feel sorry for her in a way.
Oh yeah, especially Iserafell.
Yeah.
Like a human police officer would usually accept a cup of tea, yes.
Then so shall I.
Oh yeah, so I’d die for her.
And then where do we go?
Oh yeah, so Crowley warns Muriel that it takes humans a few days to admit they’re in love
so they can give him, he and Iserafell some breathing room.
Muriel pops into the coffee shop to ask Nina about her love life.
And Nina is not amused.
No.
Get out.
I am wondering if we will see Nina smile again by the end of this season.
I think so.
I think it’ll be a moment.
And there’ll possibly be a moment.
And then Iserafell sets off for Edinburgh and we get the titles.
Did the Bentley always have bullet holes in the car window?
Yeah, I actually, I had this noted for Easter eggs later, but I think they did do it last
season, but this is one of the first times we’ve been able to see it clearly, which is
not real bullet holes.
There’s a line in the book, Good Omens, Crowley had bought pretzels exactly once in 1967 to
get the free bullet hole transfer stickers that were, I think it was like a James Bond
film thing.
And that’s why the Bentley has bullet holes.
Incredible.
Okay, so after the titles were into the mini-sode, The Resurrectionists, written by Cat Clarke,
who I think this is actually her first bit of TV writing.
She’s normally like a young adult author.
And I looked up some of her books, they look really good, so I’m going to check those out.
So yes, Iserafell is writing a diary entry.
And something I’d seen Neil Gaiman post about on, I think on Tumblr, is that he was asked
to come up with like a previous diary entry, so that they could have it in there and then
ended up not being in the shot at all.
But he shared it on Tumblr back on Valentine’s Day, which is really annoying.
I spent ages finding the Tumblr post and then I was looking for Trivia Romus and the Amazon
Prime X-ray thing in there.
It’s right there.
Yeah, but so the previous diary entry in Iserafell’s diary.
Madam, I said, I do believe you’ve entirely misunderstood me.
The Countess drew herself to a full height, which I would believe would have been about
five feet and seven inches, and stared at me, quite puzzled.
No, she said, I believe it is you who are mistaken, Mr. Fell, for never have I met a
man of any kind who could resist my blandishments.
And then, replacing her garments, which took much longer than shedding them, she added,
I do not know what manner of man you are, Mr. Fell.
I trust you will still help my brother with his little problem.
I’m still there for him, I assured her.
He is as good as freed from his Durrance file.
You are an angel, said the Countess.
And so we left the matter.
This morning, her brother rejoined her, released by me from debtor’s jail.
She was by all accounts delighted to see him.
Postscript.
It appears that she was not a Countess, he was not her brother, and they fled together
for France, leaving many debts behind them.
I told Crowley all about the matter over a glass of claret, but he did not appear to
be as surprised as I had expected.
Oh, I love that.
So, thank you.
Thank you, Neil Gaiman, for providing that to us.
The picture of Aziraphale’s kind of blank astonishment at a woman disrobing is wonderful.
I wish they had shot some of that.
I don’t want to see a woman disrobing, I just want to see Michael Sheen do the face.
So yeah, Aziraphale writes this diary entry, and we go to the Edinburgh Cemetery that Crowley
has invited him to because they found a statue of Gabriel.
Yes, one of the behind the scenes bits I haven’t looked at yet.
There’s a bit of a construction of that statue.
Yeah, I watched a little bit of it and it made me want to get really into sculpture,
which I’m not going to do because I know full well it would be a terrible idea.
But for a second, I thought, yeah, I could do that.
Our toxic trait.
My homosexual audacity.
So they get distracted by a grave robber.
This is Elizabeth, played by Abigail Lorry, who I don’t think I’ve seen much of things.
She’s done, they’ve used a lot of good Scottish actors in this, which means all of them above a
certain age have been in Taggart, which is sort of the Scottish equivalent of doing Hobie City in
England or possibly the Bill.
Even we know someone who’s been in Taggart.
We do.
Although he was sort of pretending to be Scottish.
So Elizabeth acquires her corpse and Aziraphale and Crowley decide to join as she drags her
corpse along and Aziraphale moralises.
Yeah, he is annoying in this.
He really is.
This is like stolen.
I guess he’s just learning because it’s yeah, he’s very irritating missionary.
He is.
And I having been to Catholic school, I’ve met some people like Aziraphale is in this.
And I’ve learned that kind of there’s no arguing with them.
No.
So yeah, it put my back up a little bit.
And Elizabeth stops to share her food with me.
We morag.
We morag.
Yay, lesbians.
Are they?
Yeah, they are intentionally meant to be a queer couple.
Yeah, I wasn’t sure because of like the kind of immediately looking like she got over it type
thing.
I read it as some kind of queer relationship immediately.
But that’s me always looking for the gay.
But no one has like tweeted and sort of said, yeah, lots of people have talked about other
things and kind of missed that super obvious queer couple I put in.
Which maybe could have made it more obvious.
Yes, we morag is much more concerned about immortal souls than Elizabeth is.
As this is played by Julie McClellan.
I’m just apologizing now if I get names wrong.
Yeah.
So this is the bit that kind of annoyed me with Aziraphale when he immediately kind of
like saw that we morag was concerned with immortal souls and like picked his character.
He’s like, yes, you’re the good one.
You’re the good poor.
Oh, and the idea of the good poor.
I love when Aziraphale suggesting other career opportunities to Elspeth and she’s doing that.
Oh, no, I don’t know where I put my loom.
It’s probably on your farm.
I can’t remember if I’ve noticed this somewhere, by the way, but the accents David Tennant does
in this in this extended flashback.
Yeah, one of the trivia bits was that Gaiman suggested that David Tennant do as many Scottish
accents as he could in the chapter because people might complain if he wasn’t allowed to
do his Scottish accent anywhere in the series.
Like, go nuts with it.
And yes, it was quite the journey.
I don’t know, like, regional Scottish accents as well as I know regional English accents,
obviously, but I could hear we were visiting many different places in Scotland.
My favorite being the sort of what I assume is very Edinburgh,
if Mary Poppins was Scottish, Scottish accent.
Yeah, it was McGonagall.
Yeah, bit McGonagall.
At one point, it was a bit Mrs. Doubtfire.
Please don’t tell us off if we got this wrong.
I don’t.
No, guys, we don’t.
We don’t know.
I expect an email detailing the Scottish accents with a graph.
But yeah, this whole bit is a nice.
Well, there’s all the mini so it seemed to be a nice opportunity to
work out some of the morality background.
Um, so we go into Aziraphale and Crowley following Elspeth and her pickled herring
to the surgeon’s place.
The shot of the two Aziraphale and Crowley with a woman and a
large barrel of pickled herring is like one of the early onset photos to be released.
So I think pickled herring itself has kind of become a meme within the fandom.
Oh, interesting.
Yeah, I noticed it was in the intro, but I don’t think I’d seen that.
Yeah.
But I think the fandom just from context clues had all guessed that there was going
to be a dead body in the pickled herring then because it looks like body snatchers era.
I see.
I didn’t do a ton of research into body snatching for scientific purposes because
I feel like we’ve talked about that on the podcast before.
What I’ve reminded myself or remembered somebody told me I read about it.
I don’t remember since last week because the Burke and Herb weren’t
resurrectionists, were they?
They were just murderers.
Yeah.
Yeah, pretending to be resurrectionists.
Yeah, they were murdering people rather than just going and doing some honest grave robbing.
Yeah, because the rest was a bad name.
So yeah, so they’re following us along and they argue about morality and this stupid idea of
starting, you know, you need to start everyone off equal for that to work,
which is not the stupid idea, Azir Afal is being silly in this bit.
Saying that you get more opportunity to be good if you start poorer.
Yes, she got all the opportunities because she’s so poor.
But again, this argument kind of comes back down to the free will thing,
which again seems to be much more what Crowley chose when he sauntered vaguely downwards rather
than direct evil.
I imagine the fall is quite disappointing for those who are now kind of stuck in demonic
hierarchy and still don’t get a lot of free will.
Yeah, absolutely.
And Azir Afal is arguing that, you know, the free will is entirely what allows people to be good
and ignoring the fact that he’s almost like, he’s like, it’s something between like,
naive and just fully indoctrinated.
Like, heaven is good and the ineffable things I’ve been taught are good.
That’s clearly all there is.
Like we talked about with a lot of practice stuff.
If the person is starting from the certainty that they’re right,
then the logic from there is never going to work very well.
Yeah, that bit is very brachy.
And yeah, then back in the present, Azir Afal is driving the Bentley very happily
listening to his classical music.
Yeah, Crowley contacts through the radio, very annoyed at what Azir Afal has done to the car,
which including the cheerful horns while turning it yellow.
Yes.
Yes.
So I did, when I got to briefly meet Rob Wilkins, like last year, I think,
he mentioned he got to keep a lot of the cars and bikes from making good omens.
Yes.
So I did wonder for a second if the yellow car was just Rob can get a new car.
He did get to keep them, keep them, did he?
Because in the book, it says something like I’m currently in possession of them all.
And I was wondering if that meant like he was looking after them.
I know he is a huge like car and bike head.
So I think he has kept as many as he can.
Incredible.
But it’s not, it’s a reference.
Obviously, John Fennimore, like co-exec produced this season.
And one of the things John Fennimore is known for is his radio sitcom Cabin Pressure,
which is very funny.
And this whole bit of Cabin Pressure that gets shared around a lot.
And it’s sort of a famous, very funny bit about yellow cars.
So I think that was in there as like a Cabin Pressure reference.
Cool. Cool. Good.
Which if I can find the clip of the yellow car conversation,
I will link that in the show notes.
Excellent.
But yes, the Zerophil changes the car back.
Did you notice as he drives into the hills of Scotland, that amazing background?
Yeah, I love that.
That’s very, that was very last season of Good Omens.
Yeah.
Like just taking us into the surreal into it.
Yeah.
Yeah, so you’ve got like the Tartan Hills and the Loch Ness Monster.
Official Good Omens Tartan.
Yes. I didn’t know.
No, I didn’t know that was the thing.
Yeah, I’m going to have a look in the Tartan Registry
because I’ve got a lot of links and things now.
Yeah.
And then where do we go after that?
Oh, yeah, we go to Hell.
We’re going to Hell.
Wow, I haven’t had that song in a long time.
Yes, we’re going to Hell.
Tiger Lilies.
Very catchy.
Yeah, Beelzebub wants to know what’s happening with Gabriel.
Yep.
We meet Deewin Josh, played by Murray Hunter,
who again done lots of Scottish things, including Taggart.
And it was nice to have like a Scottish actor in this bit as well,
not just in the Scotland bits.
Yeah, absolutely.
That was a nice extra little detail.
Beelzebub’s having like a bit of an existential crisis
along with wanting to know what’s going on with Gabriel.
Yeah, they’re not feeling the evil as much as usual, I think.
They want to be told that they’re doing a good job.
Yeah.
And I kind of feel for them a little bit.
A little bit.
A little bit.
Obviously, they’re not like the most sympathetic character in the show.
No, for all the obvious reasons,
but also just because I hate the fucking noise of the flies.
Yeah, no, I respect that.
There is, speaking of, after that we go back to the bookshop
where Jim’s testing out gravity,
and there is still a fly buzzing about, which I have questions.
I’m going to get to those closer to the end.
This must be really fun for our listeners who are listening
and have seen all of it to just hear me wildly speculate.
Yeah, no, fuck it.
We don’t know.
We don’t know.
We’re trying our best not to watch ahead.
We don’t know.
We’re trying our best not to know.
We’ve been told our first episode was fairly prescient.
Oh, good, have we?
That’s nice.
I liked when Crowley was talking about gravity with Jim,
and I was just like,
do you know, I don’t remember.
It seemed like a good idea when we were all talking about it,
and he just kind of reminded that he came up
with a lot of the mechanics of the universe.
Yeah, Crowley helped him invent the universe.
Which, something I saw pointed out online I didn’t notice, actually,
in episode one went the crank that starts up.
That’s the Bentley starter crank.
Oh, cool.
That’s a fun little detail.
So yeah, Crowley explains his rain and awning plan to a,
not fully getting it, Jim, but he’s trying his best,
and says that we’re going to get a fa-voom, which, fa-voom.
He does seem to be using Jim as just like a sounding board.
Yeah, it’s the same way I, he’s using Jim as a rubber duck.
Yes, he is, yeah.
Yeah, as a coding duck.
So yeah, so back into the mini-sode,
and Elspeth arrives at Mr. Dalrymple’s with her corpse in Aziraphale and Crowley.
Yes, I love that name because that’s Kate Dalrymple.
As a really cool song I like.
Ah, cool.
It’s a good name.
Which I’m not going to try and sing because it’s far too fast for me,
but I’ll link it, I really enjoy it.
This is another, also trying to get all my notes written up for the plan before you see it,
so you can’t see me live misspelling things in real time.
Dalrymple was one of them.
Hitchhiker was another.
The double H feels weird when I do hitchhiker.
Yeah.
Yeah, so Dalrymple is played by Sean Biggastaff,
who’s name I’ve never giggled at in my life.
Listeners cannot see my eyebrows.
Some people watching might recognise Sean Biggastaff.
He was Oliver Wood in the Harry Potter films, captain of the Quidditch team.
Was he indeed, I say.
He’s also a voice to one of the Doctor Who big finish audio things,
which means he’s technically now shared three separate cinematic universes with David Tennant.
Superb.
Superb.
Looking around his house doctor surgery, both I guess,
I was a bit annoyed I couldn’t focus on some of the posters on the wall.
Like there was one that looked like a dissected mermaid or something.
I might go back and see if I can get a bit more info on that.
Gorgeous set dressing and set design on these, especially in these flashback episodes.
There’s so many things.
Like I’ll look into the x-ray stuff,
because they’re quite good at not giving the spoilers,
but I can’t Google as much as I’d want to right now.
Yeah, I think when we do the final episode,
we’ll probably end up doing a big round up.
Yeah.
Or even just a set for a half hour episode
where we just talk about everything we got wrong slash right slash weighted to Google.
So Aziraphale does a little miracle and renders the corpse unusable.
I put that delicately.
Same.
So Elspeth leaves, she’s very pissed off,
but Aziraphale and Crowley stay so that they can talk about Dalrymple and why he does what he does.
Aziraphale’s still struggling with the whiskey, I noticed.
Yeah, he’s not quite there yet.
So they learn the beneficial side of body snatching.
So I put it out Aziraphale is sort of naive about these ideas of good and evil,
which does mean he gets very persuaded into body snatching is good actually, like very quickly.
It does not take a lot to convince him.
No, no, it’s literally just pointing it out.
Yeah, he just needs shit explained to him.
Not that Dalrymple’s argument wasn’t a good argument, it was fairly obvious already.
Yes.
But yes, Aziraphale.
Even though he is indoctrinated, he’s no longer under the constant influence of heaven.
No.
For all that he talks about shades of grey in the next episode,
he does need things to be a bit black and white.
It’s almost like a comfort mechanism.
Yeah, as long as he explained to him why it’s good.
So he’d probably be quite easily manipulated in bad directions like that, I imagine.
Yeah.
After you pointed out the score last time we spoke,
I was enjoying it in this scene particularly because there were violins and then little
breaks for thunder every time death was mentioned, I noticed.
Yes.
Very good.
Very good.
I still want the horsemen to show up, just pop through.
Yeah.
Especially Brian Cox’s death.
And then we go back to the present day,
and Aziraphale makes it to Edinburgh and goes to the resurrectionist.
As an inkslinger.
As an inkslinger.
So yeah, having been really smug at Muriel about how sort of incompetently
she’s doing this regular human police office a bit, he’s not amazing as a reporter.
It’s definitely one of these…
Oh, you know that Tumblr thing a little while ago where they’re like,
if a vampire lived for 400 years, they’d just be mixing up all of their pop culture references
or whatever.
Yeah.
It’s a bit like that, isn’t it?
He’s got it down for maybe the 20s, 30s, 40s.
He’s got his little…
Oh, I know the press pass he’s got on his hat, which used to be a thing.
You’d put it in your hat to keep both your hands free basically.
And then the lanyards.
But it has a 66 on it.
And so did the resurrectionist has a 66 goat gate.
That was on the thing.
I don’t know if 66 is a thing.
I’m assuming it’s sort of because actually just putting 666 everywhere would be too obvious.
That’s what I thought.
I also looked into, you know, that whole thing that the letters are meant to correspond
in Latin, something like that, the numbers.
It would be FF.
That would be the only thing I could think that would be perfect,
but no, that doesn’t seem…
That’s tenuous.
Yeah, that does feel a bit tenuous.
I was getting a bit caught bored, so I put that idea away for a minute.
We’ll come back to that, though.
66 is repeating.
It is.
So yeah, the barman that Aziraphale speaks to is played by Alex Norton,
who’s another guy who’s been on Taggart.
I think we should mention as well, actually, I keep talking about Taggart,
because this is the Scottish episode, that Douglas MacKinnon,
who directed most of this season, did also direct the final episodes of Taggart.
What is Taggart, actually, for our listeners, who?
It’s a Scottish TV show.
It’s like murders and shit, right?
Yeah, yeah.
I’ve never actually watched it.
I’ve just heard a ton about it from that one dude I know who was in an episode.
I think he’s probably making more on residuals from that one episode
than a lot of people who’ve been on Netflix shows are making.
Because it does get repeated a lot.
Yeah, so he learns that the jukebox began changing its tune about a year ago.
Gabriel was spotted in the pub and he’s presumed a mason,
because there’s a masonic lodge next door.
So he’s clearly been interfering in Edinburgh for some time.
There’s a statue of him.
He’s like head of the masons or something.
Yeah, well, I think he’s only been seen in there once, though.
He’s only been seen in the pub once.
They’ve just assumed mason because he was with one of the masons, I’m guessing.
True, but I’m putting that together with the statue thing.
Yeah.
I think he’s been meddling in the affairs of humanity in Edinburgh rather than Scotland.
Rather than London.
In the book, there’s a bit where talking about Crowley and Aziraphale’s truce
is where we get the Milton Keynes joke.
So Aziraphale was able to freely develop Edinburgh
while Crowley developed somewhere nasty.
So that’s the angelic city.
Yeah, so there’s an Aziraphale link as well as a Gabriel link there.
I wonder if that’s going to come up in the show.
Yes, neither of them took responsibility for Milton Keynes.
What a place.
So yeah, so Gabriel was spotted in the pub with someone, but we don’t know who yet.
And yeah, Aziraphale grabs a pamphlet on the way out and we see both sides of the pub sign.
I think we see it going in as well, which is a very cool thing that it’s the Resurrectionist
on one side.
I think it’s meant to be like Jesus bringing Lazarus specifically back from the dead.
Yeah, it is, yeah.
Which is nice because I forgot to mention in the early Crowley and Aziraphale chat
when they’re in the bookshop, Crowley explains what Lazarai means
for those viewers who may not have got the joke in the last episode.
And yeah, then the other side we have, Dalrymple.
You can tell when something’s made for a wider audience
when there’s so many more explained jokes, I must say.
And repeated jokes, I’ll be a bitch about that later.
So back into the past.
And Aziraphale’s decided that body snatching is good actually and wants to give Elspeth a hand.
Reasoning his way into a new morality.
As you do.
So they go to the graveyard and we get these security devices that are around rich graves
to stop them from being robbed, which again points out another big inequality thing,
which is the rich can theoretically protect their bodies while the poor have to lump
whatever because they can’t afford grave guns after they’re dead.
Yeah, coincidentally, one of the facts on No Such Thing As A Fish this week was about
rich people getting around burial rules.
At one point in the 17th century, I think, you had to be buried in wool to protect the
wool industry and that was like a fine if you didn’t, but if you dogged somebody in,
you got half of the fine and so what rich people would do would just bury their loved
ones in whatever they wanted to, dob themselves in and then only pay half the fine.
Incredible.
Wow.
Anyway, yeah, so a grave gun, someone trips, there’s a gasp at a corpse and
Morag gets hit with a grave gun, which alerts the watch who cruelly sends down a hole.
A hell of a hole.
Quite literally a hell of a hole.
Bye bye.
I might have overdone it there.
Yeah.
They hide in a crypt, but Aziraphale can’t save Morag in time and she dies, which, yeah,
he’s talking about doing the miracle and then doesn’t get the chance to actually do the miracle.
Yeah, I had a moment where I was wondering whether Crowley had helped her go peacefully.
I think probably not.
I think you’re probably right that the point there was he was just talking about it so long,
he didn’t actually do any good.
Yeah.
Because he’s, he dithers.
Yeah, yeah.
I think because I was thinking maybe a bit Pratchett-y, just the idea of, yeah.
Helping someone.
If someone’s going to go helping them is the right thing to do, yeah.
Yeah.
But yeah.
I think it’s kind of a precursor to what we get later in the episode where Crowley needs to be the
one to talk else without hurting herself because Aziraphale’s not confident enough to do it.
Yeah, he’s just stuttering his way through.
Yeah.
Which compared to the newly very confident Aziraphale we’ve got in present-day Good Omens,
it’s an interesting contrast.
It is, yeah.
He’s done a lot of character development in only a couple of centuries.
Good effort.
But the moment after Morag dies where Elizabeth goes from sad to pragmatic and does that really
quick face switch, I thought that was fantastic acting.
It was, yeah.
It was, and obviously took Aziraphale back massively.
Yeah.
Because, again, as somebody who’s never, you do wonder what he’s been doing,
but as somebody who, I guess, has never had to do the whole,
all right, we’ve got to shove that emotion down for a minute and do something else.
Yeah.
Because he’s, you know, I mean, he’s privileged.
You know, he’s an angel.
He’s fairly privileged.
Yeah, I would say that is pretty up there.
Yeah.
And, yeah, he hasn’t had to, and he, to a certain extent,
has just never been in a position to experience these sorts of human emotions
because the only person around him he even slightly considers an equal is Crowley.
So, yeah, so they’re going to take Morag’s body to Dalrymple,
which they do, and Elizabeth sells wee Morag’s body, bless her, for some money for wine, apparently.
Yeah, I forgot to work out the exchange rate here,
but I feel like five pounds is more than some wine, but maybe not.
I did not look into that.
Well, I mean, she doesn’t spend all the money on wine.
No, that’s right.
She was saving some back, yeah, yeah, for some burial, yeah.
Yeah, she goes back to the crypt.
She steals the Lordenum.
She pulls herself Dibbler’s Lordenum.
Oh, I’m sorry.
You wanted to list all the things at the end.
It’s more natural sometimes.
Yes, the Lordenum does come from C.M.O.T. Dibbler,
and I don’t know about you, I did Leo pointing meme at the screen when that happened.
Drink me own poison, Dibbler.
So Aziraphale and Crowley arrive and she tells them that she’s going to drink the Lordenum
and ask them to use the rest of the money to bury her somewhere where
she’s not going to be dug back up.
Which is interesting, because it shows she believes in that more than we thought,
and considering her, you know, love has just been
Sold.
Sold.
I don’t even think she believes in it in an immortal soul sense,
especially because Aziraphale does say that’s not entirely how it works.
I think it’s more the dignity aspect of it.
She’s seen what happens to them.
Yeah, and I think maybe she just wants to be left in peace,
because it’s not going to benefit anyone she cares about to sell her body,
like they don’t need the money.
Yes, that’s true.
Whereas, you know, if she had died and Morag had lived,
she would have wanted her body sold so that Morag could be safe.
That makes sense.
So Crowley downs the Lordenum.
Yep, not a little bit.
That’s a bit, isn’t it?
Immediate action.
And in the process of being high, small, and gigantic.
Very Alice in Wonderlandy.
Very Alice in Wonderlandy.
I loved the high Crowley bit.
I thought it was fantastic.
I love especially the bit where he’s tiny.
No matter how much of a budget a show has,
British special effects will just always look a bit shit.
Like, I don’t think we can help it.
It didn’t look noticeably shit.
It just looked a bit silly.
Yeah, well it’s meant to.
And yeah, he starts singing Flower of Scotland,
which wasn’t composed until the 1960s,
so obviously Crowley invented Flower of Scotland.
I think that’s now canon.
Apparently that bit was improvised.
It was not scripted that he starts singing
Flower of Scotland over ten and just sort of did it.
Because of course.
We get a rapid fire accent to her in that bit as well.
So he convinces Elspeth to live a good life
in exchange for the contents of Aziraphale’s purse.
Yeah, and like a really good life too,
which is interesting because that didn’t seem necessary.
Yeah, like he insists she’s got to actually be properly,
morally good from now on.
And this is, as with Aziraphale not being able to help Morag in time,
he can’t convince Elspeth not to kill herself.
He gets stuck on this idea of poverty as a virtue
and can’t get past it.
So Crowley has to do it,
and partly because Crowley is frustrated
about how God apparently works and is like,
no, okay, fine, I’m right.
If you start off in poverty, it’s a lot harder to be good.
So here you go, prove me right by proving that
if you take a vast amount of money, you can be properly good.
Yep, and it’s just, I like that as a little kind of lesson bit,
is that, you know what, the best fucking way
to help someone who’s struggling and in poverty
and like thinking of killing themselves
because it’s so fucking hopeless that they’re in the situation
is to give them enough money to get out of that fucking situation.
Everyone’s like, oh, I need to, you know,
you can’t help some people.
Like you fucking can.
Fucking the studies, the statistics, everything shows it,
just giving people the means to get out of that situation
without all the fucking strings attached.
That is the…
It’s boots theory, not bootstraps.
Yep.
Thank you, Terry Pratchett for writing our economic theories for us.
Much easier than reading the Prophelons.
But yeah, so this good deed that Crowley has done
doesn’t go unpunished and he seems to disappear into hell.
And Aziraphale concludes his diary entry
and it’s the sort of end of the mini-soge with that.
And that was the last time I saw Crowley for quite some time.
Yeah.
So, this is the 1820s.
The flashback episode, the season one episode three,
the half hour cold open with all the flashbacks.
Crowley and Aziraphale have an argument about Crowley
wanting to get some holy water, which takes place in 1862.
So that quite some time is theoretically 40 odd years.
We don’t know if that conversation between Aziraphale and Crowley
is the first conversation they’ve had in quite some time.
It seemed like it might’ve been.
Yeah.
So, was Crowley in hell being punished all that time or just some of it?
I think at least the majority of it would be my guess.
I think a chunk of it.
Because he’s coming up and they’re not very friendly
in that first conversation.
About the holy water.
Yeah. And I wonder if Crowley is now motivated to acquire the holy water
because he’s just been punished in hell.
Yes.
And this is something I noticed with the next episode as well
and the flashback centers around hell kind of trying to catch Crowley and Aziraphale out.
This interest in what Crowley’s up to, to me, feels like it’s a bit of a retcon,
especially from the book where a lot of the vibe of the book is just,
and stuff Crowley says, even in this series of this show,
hell’s just not really interested as long as stuff’s happening.
He gets the commendation for the Spanish Inquisition
and then realizes he should probably go have a look at the Spanish Inquisition.
Hell interfering and punishing Crowley, I don’t know.
The vibe seems off for me.
Does that make sense?
It does. I guess it makes sense to make it chime with the plot point
of the miracle showing up as this flare kind of thing though.
Like there’s clearly some kind of good bad censor thing going on.
And they are, like we need some peril for present-day good omens to know that like
hell and heaven are willing to get punishy more than just having seen it in the last season.
Yeah. Also this particular graveyard does have some kind of resonance for the
unearthly powers because it’s got, it’s the one with Gabriel in it,
so maybe it’s just a bit more under surveillance than…
Yeah, quite possibly.
Also he just threw those two watchmen down there, so…
Oh, he did, yeah.
Yeah, he did.
He didn’t do any favors for himself there.
No, but yeah, I want to come back because something, I don’t know,
some timeline stuff just feels slightly off to me and the punishment stuff feels a bit off,
so I will come back to that when we talk about the next episode.
But before that, back in the present day, Aziraphale pays a visit to the Gabriel statue
and approaches some charming skinheads to borrow a mobile phone.
No regards.
Played by Douglas Russell and Mark McDonald.
Yes, no regards, which wasn’t that a thing in the book?
The Other Horseman of the Apocalypse,
which was the thing I was most disappointed got cut from the TV show.
I think so.
One of them had a no regards tattoo.
Yeah, probably.
I don’t love the Grindr joke.
No?
Ah, it’s just, I feel like it’s really old hat now to do the hair.
Look at this person who doesn’t look like a gay person have Grindr hair.
Is that the joke?
I thought the joke was just like he was admitting stuff he’d never usually admit
because he’d been hypnotized.
Yeah, I think it was a bit of that as well, but I still think it was also a bit of her.
This person’s got Grindr.
Okay.
I don’t know.
It bugged me.
Those jokes often do.
So yes, he calls Crowley, falls him in on the proper clue he’s found.
Proper clue, a real one?
A proper clue.
Which, during the phone call Crowley threatens to actually sell some of the books,
which is another thing that’s been kind of bugging me.
Like that joke is getting really dragged out now.
Like it was a throwaway joke in the book.
Like Aziraphale tries to avoid selling books and it was sort of a haha.
Those weird old bookshops, they are like that.
And they are, although I’ve been in some lovely ones,
the one in Stratford upon Avon where the nice man stopped reading the book he was
reading so that he could sell it to me.
It was a disquad book.
That was a particular highlight.
He was a very sweet man.
Then I realized it was near the end so I just came back after his lunch break to buy it.
Friendliness all around.
But yeah, in the show it’s like a joke that at least once an episode it feels dragged out.
It’s diminishing returns on that one.
So yeah, Crowley gets distracted because it’s the awning of a new age.
It’s time to do the thing.
Grown.
I did chuckle at that one.
Me too.
So Nina and Maggie are chatting because Maggie’s worried she’s somehow upset Nina.
Yeah.
I’m a bit confused with the level they’re meant to know each other.
Yeah.
With the whole like, oh, we’re meant to, oh, look, can we talk about the other night?
Whatever.
It all feels very like they’re all very personal.
And I know they spent that evening together,
but it doesn’t seem like they really talked about much during that.
And like, she knew her as a regular at a coffee shop,
but not like as a look, can we talk about the other night type thing?
You know?
Yeah.
We see Maggie introduce herself as Maggie and Nina respect them with, yeah, you’re skinny latte.
Yeah.
Again, I’m not invested in the two of them beyond, hopefully, helping out Aziraphale and Crowley.
But when the rain begins to pour under the awning, the score swells.
And the score is doing the Lord’s work there.
Because I only care about the romance between them in that moment
because of what David Arnold has done with some violins.
The man and his violins are very powerful.
But yes, before anyone can vervoom, the awning splits,
which is something that happened in originally Kurtis’ film.
I was going to say that seemed very, like Crowley was like, oh, gosh darn it, or something like that.
But I was like, that seems very romcom, actually.
It does feel very romcom.
And yeah, then Gabriel remembers a tempest coming.
Oh, yeah, I forgot to Google out.
Is that part of the Bible?
No, it’s not from the Bible.
I did look it up in various, what’s it?
There will come a tempest and darkness and great storms.
And the dead will leave their grave and walk the earth once more.
And there will be great lamentations every day.
It’s getting closer.
That quote, as it exists, as far as I could find, is not in the Bible.
But bits of it, great lamentations, dead leaving their grave.
It’s very revelations.
Yeah, that’s what I thought it probably was.
Yeah.
So it’s not a direct quote, but it’s there.
So yeah, ominous Gabriel moment before he goes back to gym
and is confused and doesn’t have a clue what’s going on again.
Yeah.
Why have I got this?
I’ve got faux nonchalant stroll by David Tennant, very limbs.
What was he being put off by?
Oh, this is, I think, when Shaxe turns up.
Oh, yes, that’s the same.
So Shaxe turns up and appears as various people
and pushes Crowley for Gabriel’s location.
She’s sure Gabriel’s in the bookshop, but she can’t come in,
which is a new thing being established, this bookshop threshold idea.
Yes.
We’ve not had that before, but apparently demons have got vampire rules in the bookshop
and can’t come in unless they’re invited.
I guess it makes sense.
It does, but so again, having not seen past episode four,
I was obviously thinking the fly is potentially some kind of Beelzebub type spy thing.
But if the fly is part of Beelzebub’s demonic aspect,
then it shouldn’t be able to get into the shop.
Right, but the fly thing.
As we find out next episode, they might not be the demon.
True.
Anyway, after briefly she checks in about the boiler,
she threatens to wage war on Aziraphale.
Do you know what, I was slightly worried about her there
because she was like, oh, I’ll find it.
But I don’t think, I think what Tenet was trying to tell,
Crowley was trying to tell her was about getting the pressure back up.
And that’s not something you’re like, oh, I’ll find this thing.
You need to look at the manual for that.
Yeah.
I hope she’s all right.
I don’t know if she’s all right, but you know, spoilers.
I do.
I think she’s my favorite character this season so far.
Crowley a close second and Jim a very close third.
Anyway, yeah, Crowley has a word with Jim slash Gabriel.
It gets quite threatening.
If anything ever happens to Aziraphale, because of you,
I’ll never mind, it’s probably too late.
It’s always too late.
Which probably the most invested I’ve been in
Crowley and Aziraphale’s present day relationship so far this season.
Oh, yeah.
Yeah, because we haven’t seen them together as such.
They’ve been fighting and then they’ve gone off and separated for these Edinburgh trips.
But seeing Crowley, it’s reminiscent of the someone killed my best friend from season one.
Obviously not quite as big as dramatic and intense.
Nothing’s on fire in this scene.
But yeah, that has me reinvested in Aziraphale and Crowley.
And that’s that episode.
It is that episode.
Let’s get the next one up.
Shall we have a little break?
Yes.

Chapter 4 – The Hitchhiker (S2E4)

00:56:21

So onto episode four, The Hitchhiker, featuring Nazi zombie flesh eaters.
Hooray.
I’ve got to say, Nazi zombie flesh eaters,
which the minisode is written by Jeremy Dyson and Andy Nyman.
But it sounds like something Neil Gaiman would write in a collaboration with Terry Pratchett.
Oh, yeah.
I was thinking it just sounds like an incredible B-movie.
It does also sound like an incredible B-movie.
Just a bit of context, though, for the two guys that co-wrote this.
So Jeremy Dyson wrote a lot on League of Gentlemen.
Okay.
And this is obviously the episode where we get like a little League of Gentlemen cast reunion.
Andy Nyman has written on, among other things,
a lot of Derren Brown specials and things to do with magic.
So I’m assuming his writing on this had something to do with the magic aspects.
Quite possible.
Quite possible.
Nazis of magic, oh my.
Be prepared.
I will talk about the magic aspects.
Okay.
So we open on a Aziraphale driving back from Edinburgh, and it’s dark,
and at one point the fog’s going backwards.
He picks up a disturbing hitchhiker.
He does.
Who turns out to be-
The fog going backwards, by the way, because they let the car go backwards down a hill for a bit.
Yeah.
Cool.
So yeah, the hitchhiker turns out to be a disguised Shax,
who obviously wants to know where Gabriel is,
and tells the Aziraphale about the rumours around 80 to 90 years ago that he and Crowley are an item.
Yeah, the line, poor little Furfur.
I didn’t know that that demon was called Furfur somehow by this point,
and I could not work out what the fuck she was there.
I rewound it like three times, and I just put the captions on in the end.
I was like, what is she saying?
I did manage to twig that the demon we then meet is Furfur.
But it took me a second to work out that’s what she was talking about.
I paused the episode and was going to look stuff up,
and then I was like, wait, I’m going to see if the episode tells me.
But it took me a minute.
The music that Aziraphale puts on in the car before he picks up the hitchhiker
and he wants something with a bit of swing, but not bebop,
which is another one of those jokes that’s starting to feel dragged out of it.
But I feel like it’s meant to be in there because it was a joke from the book,
and that’s why some of those jokes are getting dragged out a little bit,
is because so it can keep referencing those nice little jokes that we liked
in the first season because they were jokes from the book.
Yeah, did we get bebop specifically or just the fact he doesn’t like modern music?
Yeah, it’s him referring to Crowley saying he won’t like the Velvet Underground,
and his response, oh, bebop.
Oh, right, yeah.
But yes, the piece of music is Glenn Miller’s Moonlight Serenade,
which is a lovely piece of music that I love.
And I always forget that’s what it’s called when I want to find it,
because in my head it’s that nice romantic jazzy song
that plays in certain movies when people have a little dance on a balcony.
Well, maybe you’ll remember now.
I’ve got it written down now.
I still won’t remember.
But yeah, so this idea of Aziraphale and Crowley actually calling them an item,
which I think is the first time we sort of had that.
That’s a more solid relationship you turn than enemy who’s been around so long,
he’s become a frightened.
Yeah.
And yeah, Hal was definitely interested.
So yeah, after their conversation,
she is absolutely certain that Gabriel is in the bookshop.
Yep.
And then we get Aziraphale’s, that’s not a very good liar still.
No, bless him, he tries.
He does, he’s doing better than he did.
Duplicitousness does not come naturally to an angel,
unless he’s pretending to be a demon and hanging around in a bathtub.
Yes.
I asked Michael for a rubber duck.
Yeah, and then we get the title.
So I think this is the shortest cold open we’ve had so far.
Yeah, definitely.
And then we go into Nazi zombie flash eaters.
Yeah, back into the bomb to church.
So this is I think the longest, like the most of this episode is the minisode.
Yes.
Almost all of it takes place in 1941.
Yeah.
Yeah, so we see the end of, it’s the scene,
end of the scene that was in season one, episode three,
but with some added shots of the Nazis under the rubble.
Yeah, which gave it a very, I liked the kind of weirdly grim new light that gave it,
because those two are like quipping and having their little moment.
And it’s just little bits of the like corpse shots, like, oh,
obviously the Nazis and I’m glad that died.
But at the same time, it’s like those two having their little,
oh, you’re so nice to me moment with this like crushed person next to them.
Yeah, especially Aziraphale’s little fluttering eyelashes.
And yeah, we go down into hell where Shax is merrily stamping away and we meet Furfur.
We meet Furfur and his terrible hair.
And his terrible hair.
Played by Reese Shearsmith, who again,
part of the League of Gentlemen group and was Shakespeare in the previous season.
Yeah, that’s right.
So I love that they got him back again.
And we get Shax, specifically Shax in that outfit,
which seems to be her specific red satin one.
Yeah, it’s like an orange kind of, I think it’s like a,
it’s like a deep orange, like silk jupion with like a belted moment.
And yeah, I’m absolutely going to make this.
I’m really annoyed actually, because I had the perfect fabric for it,
but I used it on a different outfit last year.
So I’m going to have to get some more to make it.
If I ever see anything in that color, I’ll try and get it for you.
Thank you. I appreciate it.
But yeah, I love that outfit.
It was amazing. Interesting fringe.
I thought, pointy.
A choice was made, but I do, I like it.
Again, I’m really just enjoying Shax this season.
That’s one of my faves.
Oh yeah, she’s great.
It’s lovely to have her in such a polar opposite role from last season as well.
Yeah. The voice on the intercom in Hell as well,
that sort of sounds a bit Terry Pratchett-y.
They got Paul Kay to do it,
who is the guy who played Terry Pratchett in the documentary about his life.
Oh, Back in Black?
Oh yeah, no, it is Back in Black.
Yeah, amazing. Okay, cool.
He was also in season one of Good Omens
when they have the phone conversation with the press officer for the nuclear board
after the sherbet lemon thing happens.
Oh yeah, I knew that.
I couldn’t remember if we mentioned that in the podcast,
but I did rework, obviously, because we did an episode on it.
We reworked those series.
And I said to Jack, as that was happening, I was like,
that’s a very Terry Pratchett-y speech impediment.
And I know he worked for the nuclear press office.
That’s got to be on purpose.
Yeah, they did do that on purpose,
and they specifically got Paul Kay to do it,
and they’ve done it again here.
They’ve got Paul Kay to do it, which is such a sweet touch.
I love that.
It’s annoying because we know so much more about Terry Pratchett lore
since we did those first episodes.
It’s like, we must have missed out so many annoyingly obvious things.
I mean, I would love to go back and do a full Good Omens watch,
but we don’t have time this year.
No, we’ll do it one day, though.
Yeah, we will, maybe after season three,
which we will get on Amazon.
If you’re listening.
And yeah, the whole corporate hell aesthetic.
Oh, I love it, love it, love it.
This is what made me actually dive into the behind-the-scenes stuff
because I’ve been kind of putting it off
in case there were any accidental spoilers,
but I was like, oh, I need to see what those fucking,
like, the signs I can quite see said.
Yeah, and that was brilliant.
I love it.
What have I got?
Did I write down a bit about that specifically?
I think I did.
Oh, yeah, just the whole,
your mother won’t clean up after you.
You don’t have a mother.
And if you’ve got better customer service,
how about ripping your throat out with a stapler?
That kind of thing.
Apparently, Neil Gaiman made, like, too many posters.
They couldn’t film them all.
He just had so much fun writing all these horrible corporate posters.
And I love that.
You know how much I fucking love corporate nonsense.
Fuck yes.
So into this.
Yeah, I think there was one that was something like,
it has been zero days since someone said the road to hell
has paved with good intentions.
Oh, yeah.
Which is my second favorite road to hell
has paved with good intentions joke
because that was one of the funniest bits in Eric.
Yeah, and Shax has this conversation about the corporate ladder with Furfur.
They go and get their cuppers, which is, I don’t know,
looks like they’re doing lava shots.
Yeah, absolutely.
That was a nice bit of SFX as well.
They did some, like, I think they called it interactive lighting.
So the cup, as she took it away, could, like,
can, like, had the light in it.
And then they added the fire afterwards, obviously.
But because Neil Gaiman wasn’t sure what he wanted to do with it yet.
He just knew it was some kind of fire thing,
like whether it was going to be lava or flames or, yeah.
I like that.
It was a cool moment.
It is.
But yeah, even the fact you managed to fuck up drinking a bit of fire,
like Furfur is clearly an unfortunate.
He is, poor thing.
But he’s one of those, he’s that annoying office dude
that isn’t unfortunate and doesn’t see it.
Yeah.
And enjoys any tiny little bit of power he can get.
Yeah.
And Shax is clearly all over that.
Yeah.
Hence the offering him help up the corporate ladder.
Yeah, the fact Furfur doesn’t even question that as, like,
why would you help me?
Yeah.
What I like as well is that Shax obviously doesn’t have, like,
an in-depth every step thought out plan.
She’s just assumed that Furfur is going to fuck up
because what happens with the switch with the evidence at the end?
Shax didn’t really do that.
That was Aziraphale doing a sleight of hand.
Yes.
So she was just like,
all I need to do is get him in front of the dark council
and he’ll cock up somehow.
Was that on purpose?
To make him cock up?
I think the idea was not that he would be successful.
So that she can slide into this role type thing.
Yeah, which obviously it’s taken her a minute to get there.
I wasn’t sure if that was like,
oh, actually now this is happening thing.
Because my thought was that if she helped him up the ladder,
she could use it.
But yeah, that doesn’t make any sense, actually.
It could be any number of things.
It could be.
Office politics are difficult.
They are.
I’m glad I don’t work in one.
Let’s have a nice cup of burning.
Shax’s teeth, by the way, I thought were an interesting, yeah.
Yeah.
Needle teeth are always scary.
Love needle teeth.
It’s the sharkness.
Yeah, yeah.
It’s not even shark because it’s deep undersea creature teeth.
That’s what that is.
Yeah, fucked up things.
Anyway, so after briefly seeing Crowley and Aziraphale
have a little drive through a blitzed out London to drop off some booze.
We go back to hell and the newly bombed Nazis arguing with fur fur
because they’re not very pleased about being dead
because there wasn’t supposed to be a bomb on the church that night.
No, it does seem like they made some kind of deal with the devil in the past,
doesn’t it?
They’re not surprised that this exists.
No, or I don’t know if they’ve just come to terms with it very quickly.
They don’t think they’ve gone to the wrong place.
They just think they shouldn’t have gone there yet.
Yes, yeah.
So the Nazis in question.
Mark Gatiss is playing Mr Harmony.
Steve Pemberton playing Mr Glowsier.
They’re both League of Gentlemen people.
And Mark Gatiss is also in Sherlock and all sorts.
He’s been in multiple.
Everyone’s in everything.
Everyone’s in.
Britain has like 10 actors.
Yeah.
We just kind of throw them on a ferris wheel and then pick one off as needed.
That’s true, that’s true.
And the woman Greta Kleinschmidt is played by Niamh Walsh,
which is another Sandman overlap.
She was in Sandman as well.
Everyone’s been in Sandman.
And yeah, so the bomb wasn’t used to drop in the church
and fur fur kind of realizes that Crowley and Mr Fell had something to do with this.
Yes.
Um, which again, the sort of fur fur like
taking any power I can can overly confident bit.
I love the moment where he licks the tip of his pen
and you see his like weird fucked up tongue thing.
It’s super gross, but it’s such like a natural movement alongside it.
It’s that.
Whoever did that made it really good.
Yeah.
Yeah, weird next to ordinary thing that’s always really fun.
So we get to the theater.
The whiskey bottle’s broken and Mrs Henderson’s not happy.
She is not.
Is this a real theater?
Yeah, so some context.
So first of all, Mrs Henderson played by Sean Phillips,
who is a very, very well established Welsh actress.
She’s been in lots of things.
She’s been around for years and years.
She’s probably most famous for I Claudius,
which was a huge BBC mini series.
And she was also in the eighties, June.
She was very good in that.
She was also married to Peter Rotul from Lawrence of Arabia.
The theater itself.
So the theater was originally set up as the windmill by Laura Henderson.
There was existed before that.
It was sort of a silent film place.
So Laura Henderson converted into the windmill theater.
It wasn’t very successful as a theater,
so it sort of reverted to a cinema for a bit until
Laura Henderson and hired Vivian Van Dam as the theater manager
who created the reviewed film, which was a sort of Ford film review.
That ran from the afternoon until late night, every day.
Slightly later, they started doing nude performances.
And this is really fun.
I just got this from the Wikipedia page.
I didn’t do a huge deep dive.
There was there was like a theater sensor at Lord Chamberlain at the time
and nude performances shouldn’t have been allowed.
They got away with it by doing the nude performances
with living statues, tableaux vivants.
Because if you couldn’t object to nude statues in an art gallery,
why would you object to nude statues in a theater?
Okay.
So they do these like fan dance things with fans concealing the dancer.
And then the moment the dance was unconcealed,
they would then be a living statue.
Like fucking grandmother’s footsteps type thing.
Amazing.
Fucking incredible loophole.
Later on, obviously some rules and things loosened a bit.
And their slogan famously became We Never Closed.
They stayed open throughout World War II.
They had like two underground theater levels
so they could even stay open during like bombing raids and stuff.
The nickname obviously was also jokingly,
they were referred to as We Never Closed
because they did nude performances.
And then post-war it briefly became the first place
that a lot of comedians got their big great.
Like just a couple of names, Spike Milligan, Bruce Forsythe, Peter Sellers.
Huh.
Yeah. And it still exists.
It’s been a cinema again since then.
It’s been a cabaret club.
It was a sort of nice table dance-y strip club more recently closed in 2017.
There was sort of a gas issue, fire issue that then led to,
it turned out they didn’t have all the right licenses
for the sort of performances that were being done.
But it’s recently reopened, I think,
or is reopening as like a cabaret dinner theater type place.
Okay.
So yeah, this is a very cool thing to have in there.
I’ll try and make a little stop next time we’re in London.
Yeah. And Ladies of Camelot is a thing that they did there.
That was one of the many sorts of performances they did.
So it’s all a real thing.
Nice. Very cool.
Anyway, yes, but Mrs. Edison is unhappy in Good Over Season 2.
It’s freezing cold and they’re lacking a magician.
So Aziraphale volunteers his press to digitation services.
He’s trying to do Crowley a favor.
That’s the idea there, isn’t it?
Yeah, he’s trying to help.
He’s just done exactly the opposite.
And then he gets caught up in the magic thing itself
rather than the favor he’s doing.
I thought it’s like miracles and bottles together or something,
but I guess that’s sin, isn’t it?
And they’re also, I think I’m getting the impression
they’re not meant to be doing miracles willy-nilly.
That’s true.
These things are being kept an eye on.
Anyway, so we go back to hell and Furfur offers to reincarnate
Nazis as zombies for 24 hours so they can collect proof
of this Aziraphale and Crowley relationship.
And if they succeed, they can continue to live on earth.
So they’re sort of saying couldn’t, you know,
Aziraphale and Crowley Milica all the way out of it
and Furfur is qualified as a miracle blocker.
Originally, when I first watched this episode,
because I’ve watched it a couple of times before recording,
the miracle blocker thing bugged me.
It felt very like too convenient.
Like just this is such,
we’ve never heard of any kind of miracle blocking thing
that can be done before.
And now suddenly there’s this very convenient thing
that creates another obstacle for Aziraphale and Crowley.
So miracle blocker, data sex machina,
or is this check off stamp card and this idea
of a miracle blocker is going to turn up again
in the next couple of episodes?
I think the latter.
And I also think it kind of fits with some of the new stuff
we’re learning like the,
I’ve got a license to be doing stuff from God type thing.
Just part of the like bureaucracy and admin type stuff.
I think, yeah, it didn’t bug me particularly.
Was this the bit, by the way,
that you had to close your eyes for?
Sorry.
Oh yeah, sorry.
I didn’t even put this in the-
Yeah, no, that’s it.
I didn’t see it in the plan.
I was like, yeah.
So at this point Joanna had to close her eyes
because there was a spider.
But basically part of the incentive
to make the Nazis go back up and be zombies is,
otherwise we’re going to make you be eaten by a spider
and shat out into flies.
And then the spider-
Over and over again, yeah.
So they’re like, okay, yeah, zombies, fine.
I’m not proud of how much I can’t look at a TV screen
while there’s a spider happening, but it’s just a thing.
Apparently they did put a lot of effort
into designing the spider’s anus though.
So really, yeah.
See, I wasn’t looking very closely.
So we go to the streets of London
as an old drunk is singing a song about a farting contest.
Yeah.
So the guy playing the trump is Benny Young,
who’s been all sorts of things.
I assumed originally that this song was written for the show
and maybe Neil Gaiman had a bit of fun
writing something like this.
In the Amazon Prime x-ray, it’s just credited to a non.
And I was just going to make a joke like,
no one writing for the show wanted to admit coming up with this.
Then I looked it up.
It sounds very much like an old English song.
It is a thing.
I found, I’ll link in the show notes,
the full lyrics to the song.
But the thing is, I can’t find a full origin for it.
All I really found of it was old websites listening to the lyrics.
And a lot of forum posts of other people saying like,
my granddad used to be able to sing this whole song every Christmas.
Has anyone got the lyrics to it?
It’s about a farting contest in Stockton on Tees or Burton on Tees.
Okay.
So yeah, I would assume it’s probably,
and I spent a bit of time Googling,
I would assume it’s probably like an old music hall number
that became just one of those songs
that everyone’s granddad knows the words to.
I assume they had luck before they credited it to a non, so.
Yeah. So yeah.
If anyone knows, if anyone’s got a granddad
who knows all the words to the farting contest song, do let us know.
But so new goal in life is to learn all the words to it
and sing it drunk at Christmas until my family fondly remembers me
as that mad aunt that knows all the words to the farting contest song.
Superb.
Yeah, so the zombies rise and eat the poor tramps’ brains.
Yeah, they didn’t seem too fussed about it.
No, tastes like chicken.
Yep, having evil Nazis do this bit saves a lot of,
oh, but can we give in to our hungers type stuff.
Yeah, we’ll be glad.
Like, yeah, sure, whatever.
Made it efficient.
So they find a spot at the Dirty Donkey
to spy on Aziraphale and Crowley in the bookshop.
Yes, back to that pub.
Back to that pub.
We thought we’d see it again.
So in the bookshop, Aziraphale and Crowley talk magic.
Aziraphale demonstrates some tricks.
Crowley demonstrates an incredible American accent.
I mean, fuck it.
Oh, I loved it.
I loved it so much.
Creepy fucking magic show.
Yes, yeah, so the zombies lip read some apparent nonsense from Aziraphale,
which is I think probably my favourite set up and payoff of a silly joke.
Yeah, that was nice.
And yeah, Crowley says they need to,
the magic tricks need to be bigger, so they go to the magic shop.
This is my least favourite scene in the episode.
Why?
I don’t want to be mean.
So they go, the magic stop specifically is William Goldstone’s magic shop.
The zombies follow.
The guy playing William Goldstone is Pete Furman,
who I don’t want to be mean about.
By all accounts, he’s absolutely lovely.
He’s a comedy magician.
He’s quite famous in the UK.
If there has been a TV show on UK telly that has needed magicians in some way,
Pete Furman has probably been on it.
I just find him incredibly fucking irritating.
Because I find magicians irritating in general,
and he has that particular comedy voice, comedy schtick that I find irksome.
It’s a bit of a Jack Whitehall vibe.
Not that I think he’s anything like Jack Whitehall,
but the same way I find Jack Whitehall’s face unfairly irritating.
You know you’re being unreasonable.
Yeah, I’m fully aware.
So he demonstrates specifically a rope trick,
and the fact that he’s done that trick I thought was kind of a weird choice.
Why?
So, I mean, I’ve seen that trick a lot.
It’s just really, really simple.
Yeah, that’s the point.
I know, but you’d think if you’re going to have this very talented,
like he is a very skilled magician, on,
you get him to do a slightly more sleight of hand cleverer trick.
Like still something that, like a less commonplace one.
I guess, but I guess the point was he was like trying to,
it was showing how bad Aziraphale was, not how good this guy was.
Yeah, true.
I just think it’s weird to, like I said, get such a professional magician and not have him,
like have him do the rope trick,
and then also maybe get him to do something else cool in the episode.
I guess.
Yeah, but yeah, so Aziraphale, this is the bullet catch.
What the fuck, kind of fucking, don’t sell it.
I feel at this point, it’s not a magic trick.
Okay, so again, I wanted to go into some further context with this, if that’s all right.
Sure.
First up, William Goldstone himself,
and we’re going to get another court board and string theory here within all my context.
William Goldstone himself was a well-known magician,
who also became a portrayer of like stuff for performing magic and everything.
Pavea.
Yes, he sold shit.
Born in 1877, died in 1948.
So he would have been 63 in 1941.
So either he’s a vampire or there’s a bit of an anachronism there.
I think that’s probably fine because of the context of the whole fucking episode, Joanna.
Yes, I know.
I’m building to something here.
My point is basically there’s multiple anachronisms in this episode.
The bullet catch thing, so Gladstone mentions he sold it to a Chinese fella who died.
Again, this is based on a real story.
This was Chung Ling Su, who died performing the bullet.
He was one of the most famous deaths,
and probably one of the earliest recorded deaths from a bullet catch gone wrong in 1918.
So a while again before this has taken place, which is getting a bit anachronistic.
Also, obviously, Chung Ling Su was not actually Chinese.
It was a guy called William Robinson doing very, very intensive yellow face.
Sure.
So only other friends and other magicians knew that he wasn’t Chinese.
The public, it came out after he died and the public was shocked.
Which when I read that, my brain immediately did that.
A white man?
No!
No!
The thing is, the trick itself goes back to at least the 18th century, possibly earlier.
It fell out of favor for quite a while after Chung Ling Su died, obviously,
and really wasn’t performed much at all,
like to the point where I think it would be weird that a shop would be selling it.
The method used, there’s lots of different ways of doing the trick,
but the method used in this, which is you use a stooge who is holding an actual loaded gun
and they’ve just got to try and miss you,
was really out of favor because that was the method that caused the most deaths.
And again, I feel like that’s not a magic trick in that case.
That’s just a stunt, right?
Well, the magic trick is producing the bullet in his teeth.
That’s the sleight of hand, or sleight of mouth, I suppose.
Sure.
That’s a horrible phrase that I’m never using again.
And the whole reason I started looking into the bullet catch thing is my awareness of the trick
comes from the movie The Prestige, which is one of my favorite movies.
I absolutely love it, highly recommend you watch that.
Which involves, the bullet catch in that goes wrong,
but the bullet catch in that is supposed to be anyone from the audience can be the one with the gun.
The idea is that the gun is not properly loaded.
It’s risky because it can go long if the person from the audience decides to be a dick and puts
a something else in the barrel of the gun, which is what happens.
Because the person from the audience is actually an enemy of the magician
performing the trick in a disguise.
Okay.
Again, it’s a great movie.
David Bowie plays Nikola Tesla.
That alone should make it worth watching.
So yeah, this method was really out of place.
It’s a weird choice and obviously they’ve done it this way
because then they can do this whole trust thing between Aziraphale and Crowley.
Yeah.
So is this twisting history in multiple ways to fit the plot?
Which again, the fact that they’ve got Andy Neiman writing on this,
who would have known a lot of this stuff because of what his experience is in writing.
So it’s not just like poorly researched,
it’s intentionally not being completely historically accurate or at least twisting it a little bit.
Or is, you know, there’s another anachronistic bit which is
for using a Polaroid camera which wouldn’t have been invented by this point.
Are these anachronisms intentional?
Is something weird going on?
Else weird going on with these extended flashbacks?
I think because this is something you know a lot about,
you’re focusing on this as a huge anachronism
where there are going to be hundreds of them throughout to make the plot run smoothly.
Yeah, totally.
I am overthinking this.
I’m fully aware.
That doesn’t mean I don’t have a cork-worn tons of red screen
on my webcam.
The Polaroid thing, I don’t know, he did say it was like state of the art,
so I think they were acknowledging the fact it was an anachronism
and that they got the tech before other people.
Yeah, maybe Hal invented the Polaroid camera.
Could be.
And I think, you know, I might be proven wrong.
I wouldn’t be that surprised if I was, but my gut instinct is that
they made it that way to make it run smoother.
It’s not so much of an anachronism that anybody apart from you would care.
True.
But I still think it’s weird.
Anyway.
Do you? Do you, though?
Like, take a step back for a second.
No, I think I’ve just overthought this.
I think I have overthought this.
But I’m still going to put a little pin
and maybe something weird’s going on with the flashbacks.
Might sign up.
Maybe.
Anyway, so Aziraphale begs for Crowley’s help to perform this bullet catch thing
and Crowley reluctantly agrees.
And the zombies struggle to call Furfur because they’re zombie-ing.
So they just eat.
Got a trick ring.
I thought that was quite funny.
I did like the trick ring bit.
And yeah, so they eat Goldstone.
Yep.
And little puppet falls to the ground with the brain coming out.
Yeah. So I wasn’t too sad about that.
Anyway, at the theatre, the amazing-
You sound kind.
I know. I’m horrible.
The amazing Mr. Fel makes his debut.
Oh, yes.
Notably, Crowley does not raise his hands when Fel asks for firearm handlers,
but he’s called up to help anyway.
Also, I love how quickly they got the posters up for Mr. Fel considering
he’d only volunteered to be the magician at the theatre,
presumably a few hours before.
Well, you know, they’ve got to be able to change stuff on late notice,
especially during World War II.
Yeah, you’ve got some decent artists there, haven’t you?
Yeah. You keep on trapped in the basement.
So the zombies call Furfur, who blocks miracles.
And the turnip trick then fails.
We’ve all been there.
We’ve all had a turnip trick fail on us, haven’t we?
Yeah.
Sorry, I know you hate this so much.
Oh, yeah. No, I mean, I’m not watching it now.
It’s not like a phobia.
It’s just I can’t fucking like I will.
I have straight up stopped watching TV shows forever because of like a cringe moment.
Like, I can’t stand secondhand embarrassment stuff.
I really struggle with it.
So this whole episode made me far more anxious than any of the real like end of the world stuff did.
This is why I’ve fully given up on you ever watching Marvelous Mrs. Maisel
because there is too much of that in there for you.
Yep. I gave up halfway through an episode, having previously enjoyed the show.
So Crowley comes on stage for the billet catch
and somehow succeeds in not shooting Aziraphale in the face.
Well, then him.
Despite the miracles being blocked.
I love Aziraphale’s little magician mustache, by the way.
I said this back when we talked about Aziraphale’s little magician mustache in season one.
Yeah, it’s, yep.
Well, especially because if he really wanted to,
he could probably miracle up a quick mustache.
But now he draws a neat little mustache on.
He’s seen them on the posters, I suppose, hasn’t he?
It’s a deliberate aesthetic choice and I respect it.
My slight confusion is that, oh no,
because I guess they were expecting the miracle to work, weren’t they?
Because I was like, why didn’t they set up a safe zone?
Because the lady who ran the theater almost got shot.
But yes, I guess they were expecting not to have to worry about that.
Slash just not thinking about it too much.
And Furfur gets a photo.
Furfur gets a photo.
It does.
Triumphant transfer of a rifle.
Yeah.
And this is this big trust moment between Aziraphale and Crowley.
You know, Aziraphale literally trusts Crowley with a loaded rifle pointed at his face.
Oh, there’s a good twee pun somewhere about trust fall and fallen angels and, you know.
Yeah, let’s just take that one as read.
I forgot to mention, actually, I was busy going on about bullet catches back in the Magic Shop scene
that Aziraphale admits to keeping a derringer inside a hollowed out book just in case.
Yeah, that seems like that’s a that’s a Chekhov’s gun.
Yeah, that’s a literal Chekhov’s gun.
I really hope it’s in a Russian book.
Oh my god, it’s got to be, isn’t it?
Like it’s a copy of one of Chekhov’s plays.
Absolutely gonna be.
Okay, but if they shoehorn in a gloomy trousers of Uncle Vanya reference within that,
I will forgive it.
Oh no, absolutely.
I mean, I’d forgive it anyway.
It’s a fun one.
I’m not coming in here looking to be grumpy.
I’m not coming in here looking to be grumpy.
It’s just unfortunately who I am as a person.
Aziraphale celebrates in his dressing room, which is a little moment I love when he’s
prassing about with the little feather scarf and things.
I’m a star.
I’m a star.
Furfur turns up and makes his accusations and
he’s quite pissed off that Crowley doesn’t recognize him.
I know that was…
That was secondhand embarrassment.
I do wonder for a second if Crowley genuinely doesn’t remember, which is more likely,
or if he’s trying to put Furfur on the back foot.
Yeah.
Because he’s too cool to remember, especially as this was pre-fall and he doesn’t really
want to remember his fall days.
Yeah.
And either way, I feel like obviously the relationship was pretty one-sided.
Very much so.
Which made me feel, again, sorry for Furfur and his sad little officey way.
Like the little clung on your back…
What was it?
He said clung on your back like a monkey, didn’t he?
Yeah.
And then obviously monkey on your back’s a phrase.
I thought that was a nice, clever bit of wordplay.
So he says he’s going to send a legion after Crowley the next day,
and Crowley’s playing it cool with his hat over his eyes.
And the Nazis learn that they’re permanently stuck as zombies.
Yes.
And then the arm falls off.
This is the last we see of the Nazis in this episode, so again,
we’re overusing the Chekhov thing.
Do you reckon the Nazis might come back in the next couple of episodes?
Oh, my sadness.
They’re zombies, yeah.
So I’m looking forward to seeing them again.
Yeah.
And yeah, so Furfur goes in front of the dark council to present his evidence
at Ask After Vacancies in Temptations,
and the picture’s been switched for the Ladies of Camelot flyer.
Oops.
And Furfur is going nowhere.
And Shax is looking very smug in the background.
So yeah, to come full circle on the Shax thing,
I think what I’m enjoying so much about the character
is it’s the most devilish demon we’ve had so far.
Yeah.
And in a competent way.
You know how I feel about competence.
Yeah.
Obviously, Crowley is very competent,
but also entirely on his own side and no one else is.
Yes.
But of the actual denizens representing Hell, wanting Hell to be successful,
I mean, Beelzebub, yes, but we haven’t seen Beelzebub active.
We’ve seen Beelzebub sitting on a chair and telling others what to do.
Yes.
But Haster and Liger had this kind of built-in bumbling incompetence to them,
like we see Furfur fuck up.
God, I’m glad I got that out in one go.
I know.
So yeah, there’s something really fun about Shax just being very evil and very good at it.
Yes, I’d be interested.
I’d like to find out how she fell.
Yes.
I’m really hoping as well that we get some kind of Shax and Michael scene.
Yes.
Just I want to see those two.
Yeah, they’re definitely the sort of equivalents.
Yes.
Yeah, not in the bureaucracy, but in the personality.
Yeah.
The same flavor of competent.
So yeah, my vibe with Shax is Shax could have been a horse person.
She also has a weird walk when she’s in Hell.
This very upright little creature determined.
Yeah, she plays like…
Excellent audio content.
Hell demonic versus human world demonic differently.
And I do like how she’s varying those characters.
Definitely.
Especially with the little spiky fringe.
I like the spiky fringe.
Good.
One of the singers I like at the moment, Sophia Isella, does that with her eyebrows,
which I find fun.
Oh, yeah.
So yeah, so we go to Crowley and Aziraphale having a drink together.
And Crowley asks how Aziraphale manages it and Aziraphale explains the trick.
And they talk about retiring the act and they talk about trust.
I mean, this is obviously supposed to be a pivotal scene for their relationship.
Nothing establishes trust like pointing a loaded rifle at your best friend’s face.
I’m not suggesting we do that.
Good.
Because both of us are very clumsy and have bad hand-eye coordination.
This is, yeah.
My thought really is that obviously it is trust and it’s nice, but whatever.
But I’m not sure…
I wouldn’t want that to be like a test of my trust as to whether I’m good at something.
Yeah.
I will do everything I can.
That doesn’t mean I’m only good at aiming a gun.
I would not want to be in this position.
Exactly.
Oh, fuck.
But like on the other hand, I can’t believe they haven’t got to anything like this by now.
I mean, by this point, they’ve known each other for like four, five thousand years.
They’ve had their deal going for a while.
It’s definitely like a rush at the end of the world, I guess.
Yeah, they’re getting closer to the end, but I don’t know how much they’re thinking about that.
Probably more because they are mid-blitz.
Yeah, it’s got to be at least back of the mind, doesn’t it?
Yeah.
And you know, as the world gets smaller, there’s going to be more times where they’re bumping into each other.
And as Aziraphale starts seeing things more in shades of grey over those centuries,
there’s going to be more times where he’s willing to work with instead of in parallel.
Yeah, and the shades of grey thing comes from Aziraphale making the point that Crowley would
have not stayed if he would have walked away and not helped if he was truly evil, which…
Yes.
And Crowley makes the point that it’s Aziraphale’s side who are the ones that see things in black
and white, which is true. And that was what I said near the beginning of the episode.
But yeah, so going kind of back to what I was saying in the overall thoughts thing
about wanting to get back to the present day and the pacing feeling weird.
Because the last three episodes have had these extended flashbacks that fit in
amongst the set of short flashbacks we had last season, I’m less invested in their present day
relationship because the show is keeping them odds and has kept them mostly separated.
But there’s not enough fun angst for the apart. This isn’t like the bandstand breakup, which was
a fun bit of angst in the last season. They’re just apart because they’re not communicating
very well and they sort of have slightly different aims. Yeah, I mean, I think there’s
a decent bit of angst, but it’s slightly more one sided. So Crowley is obviously extremely
worried about what’s going to happen to Aziraphale and Aziraphale is just being the kind of cock-eyed
optimist. Yeah. But yeah, I just I don’t feel as invested in it because the show’s not spent time
with it. The show’s been spending time in the past and I’m invested in their past relationship.
I thought I liked I liked this scene as they’re the kind of Aziraphale testing the waters.
He’s obviously saying it in this way that he thinks is quite coy and clever.
Yeah. Just the good thing you did kind of thing and I knew you’d come through and you trust me
and it’s all said in this very not very effectively coy way and Crowley is just not
giving it back. But he isn’t. Yeah, like he’s clearly not he’s not pushing back,
but he’s also not like joining in with the vibe. But I think yeah, it’s definitely it’s the start
of Aziraphale giving that kind of oh, we’re actually friends now vibe. Yeah. And Crowley,
I think, takes a lot as red. Yes, that’s true. And doesn’t feel the need to say it. Yeah. And
probably that makes sense because Aziraphale wears his heart on his sleeve a little bit more.
Crowley knows what Aziraphale it’s not hard to tell what Aziraphale’s thinking so he doesn’t
need to do the whole testing the waters. But they have a total wanker. They have different
love languages. Yes, we’re not doing that. So my love language is fire and brimstone and your
love language is tea and echoes cakes. I was thinking like some of the moments between them
that I really loved in the first season. And I think the one that we all felt a bit far out
about which is when Aziraphale is upset about the paint hitting his jacket and Crowley very
casually sort of blows it off. And Aziraphale is very blushy and thank you. Yes. And really gets
slammed off against a wall by David and not long after. But yes, compared to that this feels
Crowley just does the nice things and that’s his way of them being close friends. Whereas Aziraphale
does like to talk about it in his coy way. Yeah, definitely. Yeah, I think that’s definitely like
relatable with people as well, isn’t it? There are some people who are definitely just more like
I will never talk about this, but I will just do the good thing now. Yeah. But yeah, as much
as I’ve enjoyed these long flashbacks and stuff like compared to what I said at the beginning,
I’m missing that like sense of pace and urgency because the first season was very much like
X amount of days to the apocalypse. That’s it. There’s definitely that we’re going towards
something but we don’t know. Yeah, there’s no like what? Yeah, but we know the stakes are high. We
know the stakes are high, but they don’t seem to be anchored to anything. Yeah, which takes us
quite helpful, like neatly into the present day stuff that’s at the end of this episode.
So you have Shaq’s looking very purposeful and striding through hell and going to Beelzebub. So
they establish that neither of them know why Aziraphale went to Edinburgh.
Yes. Which means they don’t know about Gabriel having been in Edinburgh, I guess. Yes. Like the
show is taking the time to establish that they don’t know what the deal is with Edinburgh.
So keeping an eye on that. So yeah, Shaq’s wants to take a Legion to storm the bookshop.
We’re going to Helm’s Deep that fucker. We are. And Beelzebub commands it and really says like,
I want you leading that Legion, Shaq’s. Yes. Which considering the threshold issue,
again, is something else afoot. Yes. How clever is Beelzebub being?
Yeah. Are they just taking their out of the ball a bit?
Yeah, quite possibly. Let’s find out. Is Shaq’s a stage?
Yeah. Is Shaq’s seemingly too competent and Beelzebub doesn’t and is starting to view
Shaq’s competition and wants to take Shaq’s out of the way? Yeah. Because if you put Shaq’s
confidence next to Crowley’s ability to sort of do shit, if they team up properly.
If only he’d given him more help with the boiler. Exactly. So Aziraphale makes it home safely,
stops for a chat with Nina, who unfortunately gets another text from Lindsay.
Crowley puts his plants back, but doesn’t mention the Shaq’s thing.
Oh yeah. And this is, so this is again, this sense of urgency. Crowley and Aziraphale are focusing on
let’s get Maggie and Nina to fall in love so we can get Heaven and Hell off our backs about that
one really big miracle. And kind of ignoring the bigger like, what the fuck happened to Gabriel
and why does he think something awful is going to happen if he doesn’t have that thing that’s in
the box that we do not have? Did Aziraphale mention Shaq’s?
I don’t think Aziraphale mentions Shaq’s in the bar either. Neither of them. Yeah.
Yeah. So. Poor communication.
Makes us all look a bit silly. Oh, and the car is like following Aziraphale like a puppy.
Oh, he loves him. I love how much personality that is
present in just a car moving slowly. Yeah, yeah. It makes sense. Oh, I’m sure it missed you,
don’t worry. That’s very sweet. So yes, it’s Aziraphale’s turn to try and v-voom the couple.
And he says that the monthly meeting of the Wicber Street Shopkeepers Association will be
a night to remember. I’m quite looking forward to the
Shopkeepers Association Cotillion Ball, which I assume is happening next episode.
I cannot wait for the next episode. And I will be watching that tonight.
Same. I’ve just remembered,
we’re doing two fucking episodes. Does that mean I can’t watch the last one?
That is your choice. Okay. Are you going to try?
I’m going to try not to watch it for the sake of.
All right. But that’s why we’re, I mean,
we can record earlier next week so that you can watch the next one sooner.
Before we start planning next week, one last thing I want to say about this actually.
I mentioned last week that the closing titles music is doing this cool thing of these different
themed arrangements and incorporating every day as well as the Good Omens theme.
This episode is by far my favorite one. Oh.
Because he’s done like this jazzy swing, but not bebop thing.
And so he’s even changed the time signature of it.
Oh. And it works so well.
And it’s still got the every day incorporated into it. It’s really clever.
And it’s a nice lesson. So yeah, if you haven’t,
go back to episode four and listening to the closing titles music.
Episode three had bagpipes. Episode three did have bagpipes.
Well done. I noticed that one.

Easter eggs and favourite moments

01:39:54

So should we do some superlatives?
Yes. Favorite quotes.
Do you mind if I go first because yours leads me nicely into Easter eggs?
Sure, go for it. Excellent.
I mean, mine is vaffa-vooming was not the end result of that particular Tempest.
And again, David Tennant is doing the Lord’s work on line delivery.
Although honorable mention quickly does go to banana fish gorilla shoelace with a dash of nutmeg
because with a dash of nutmeg is an excellently funny thing for no reason.
It is. It is.
And yes, as you say, mine is somewhat of an Easter egg quote, which is when they’re talking
about the, you know, the good have the poor have more opportunities to be good.
Crowley goes, that’s lunatic.
And Aziraphale goes, no, that’s ineffable.
That is, that is from the book.
They actually have the conversation in the book in around 1020.
Okay.
It’s, it’s, it’s early in the book.
It’s as Crowley sort of thinking about Aziraphale as he’s off to drop the baby off to the nuns.
I got it.
Yeah.
And it gives us context and their little agreement and arguments they’ve had, including this one.
Interesting.
Yeah.
I’m surprised they didn’t manage to put it in the first series, but it was nice to see it here.
It was nice to see it here.
So any other Easter eggs you really liked?
I’ve just kind of put them in as we’ve, as we’ve got to them.
So you feel free to list the rest of them you hold back on.
I don’t know.
I don’t think I’ve spotted everything that was in there.
There’s probably a lot more, but the Bentley, we already mentioned the bullet holes.
The number play is curtain backwards.
Which is a reference to the suicidal leaves animated scene in Monty Python’s meaning of life.
We already talked about the Laudanum sold by C.M.O.T. Dibbler or drink my own poison Dibbler.
And in, as they enter, they’re going through the windmill theater and you see various
women in various states of undress getting ready.
There are some nuns playing table tennis.
Oh, cute.
Which is referenced from the book.
They talk about the chattering order of St. Beryl when they must talk all the time,
apart from on Tuesdays where they’re permitted to shut up for an afternoon and play table tennis.
Jesus, that’s a deep cut reference.
Very good.
I know.
Character does a face award.
So I’ve got, when Shax is in the car on the way back from Edinburgh and says,
you don’t seem as type at all to Aziraphale and Aziraphale’s tiny smug eyebrow raise.
Thank you.
We’ve gone for a subtle and then on the other side.
Yeah, my award goes to everything David Tennant does with his face while Crowley’s high.
And it is so many things.
So many things that he does with his face.
Finally, helicopter and loincloth watch.
I mean, we’re in the Blitz, so there are plenty of planes.
I feel like that can fulfill Helicopter for the week.
Loincloths, I’m going with the Ladies of Camelot costumes.
Okay, yeah.
Yeah, because they’ve got clothes covering their loins and not much else.
They surely do.
Honorable mention to the fans at the Windmill Theatre.
And the women stood very still behind them.
What a fucking ridiculous loophole.
So much joy, so much joy.
Right, I think that’s everything we have time to say about episode three and four
of Good Omens season two.
I think that’s probably accurate.
We’ll be back next week to talk about just episode five,
because we’re giving episode five and six each their own episodes,
as I feel there’ll probably be plenty to talk about.
Yeah, I hope so.
Until then, thank you very much for listening to this episode of The True Share Make You Fret.
Please do rate, review and subscribe and what have you,
because other people find us and we like that.
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Good job.
Now I can breathe again.
And until next time, dear listener.
To the world.
To the world.
I might, I might get a champagne flute and some,
and some bubbly for the final episode just to do the to the world, but.
Next, yeah, I’ll try and get something else in a Diet Coke can.

Transcript: 119: Good Omens Season 2 Episodes 1 & 2 (Carefully Placed Box)

Episode 119: Good Omens TV Show, Season 2, Chapter 1 and Chapter 2. Recap and discussion.

Go back to episode and Show Notes >>

Note: Transcripts are produced with Whisper AI and PyAnnote – we don’t have time to edit them extensively, so both wording and speaker labelling will be inaccurate in parts.

JOANNA 0:00:00
My bookshelves are a source of stress to me right now.

FRANCINE 0:00:02
Oh yeah?

JOANNA 0:00:03
Well I was trying to be harsh and get rid of books that I’m just definitely not going to read again and have no sentimental value and I’ve been good about that, yet somehow there’s still no more space than there was. Is that because you keep buying books? Yeah, I think so. I’ve taken a very large, I took a very large book off the shelf yesterday and you’ll find out why later in the podcast episode. Foreshadowing, love it. But I left it on the desk and then I was organising some stuff today and decided, oh I could put all of my notebooks that I’m keeping because they’ve got like poetry and bits of writing and all my notes on coding in and they’ll fit really nicely on that shelf. And now I’ve realised the large book I took off the shelf will not fit back on the shelf. Yeah, I’ve also got the piles of books which I’d prefer not to have. I think the main problem apart from, you know, the buying of books has been that my ratio of non-fiction to fiction has changed massively and I now have many more non-fiction books than I used to, proportionately.

FRANCINE 0:00:56
But we only put aside one bookcase for reference.

JOANNA 0:01:00
And that’s just not working anymore because it includes like cookbooks, gardening books.

FRANCINE 0:01:05
Oh, I have a separate shelf just for cookbooks.

JOANNA 0:01:07
I have one separate half a shelf for like art and that kind of thing because they’re all big weird sized books. Yeah, all the rest, yeah. Yeah, I have a weird little art and sewing shelf on my like fancy books shelf in my living room because it’s the only shelf that’s deep enough to fit all of these massive art and sewing books. So I briefly mentioned last week that the Secret Invasion show sucked. The finale was somehow worse than the rest of the show. So it’s the Marvel one. Yeah, that was painfully bad.

FRANCINE 0:01:37
Sorry about that.

JOANNA 0:01:38
But I finished watching season two of The Baron. It was amazing and it made me very happy. There was a beautiful Taylor Swift moment in it.

FRANCINE 0:01:44
Oh, good. Yeah, very beautiful Taylor Swift moment.

JOANNA 0:01:47
All things should have beautiful Taylor Swift moments in them. And Apple TV just released a trailer for season three of The Morning Show, which I’m really excited for. I love that show. What’s that show about? It’s Jennifer Aniston and Reese Witherspoon working like a morning news program in New York. And like the show, this isn’t a spoiler, it’s literally in the opening minutes of the first episode. It was Jennifer Aniston hosting with this guy played by Steve Carell, but he gets like

FRANCINE 0:02:12
meat toothed.

JOANNA 0:02:12
And so it’s all the fallout from that and Reese Witherspoon coming on board. And it’s got lots of very talented people in it. It’s an amazing show. Or I think it’s amazing. Some people think it’s quite trash. I don’t know how good my taste is, but I like it. No such thing as good taste really. God no. And if you think there is, wait till you hear us talk about Good Omens. No, Jon Hamm’s gonna be in the new series.

FRANCINE 0:02:32
Oh, cool.

JOANNA 0:02:33
I’m very excited about that because this looks like he’ll be playing business suit wearing dickhead Jon Hamm, which is equally delightful.

FRANCINE 0:02:40
It’s a nice contrast.

JOANNA 0:02:41
Yes, I’ll be over two very different flavors of Jon Hamm in one month. Flavors of Hamm, the worst biography title ever. I’m gonna write to Jon Hamm and ask if I can write his biography now. It’s gonna be quite a long podcast, isn’t it? Yeah, I think this is gonna go above our standard length. I think that may be true of a lot of Good Omens episodes.

FRANCINE 0:03:03
I think so.

JOANNA 0:03:04
But that’s okay. That just means we love it. It’s all right. Yes, fine. I’m playing it cool. I’m playing it cool. Do you want to like very chill, cool, whatever, make a podcast?

FRANCINE 0:03:15
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:03:16
Yeah, no, I mean, I guess, yeah, I guess we could.

FRANCINE 0:03:18
Yeah, let’s make a podcast.

JOANNA 0:03:20
Let’s make a podcast, yes.

FRANCINE 0:03:21
Let’s make a podcast.

Intro

JOANNA 0:03:27
Hello, and welcome to The Truth Shall Make Ye Fret, a podcast in which we are usually reading and recapping every book from Terry Pratchett’s Discworld series in chronological order.

FRANCINE 0:03:34
But we have taken a break to talk about Good Omens season two.

JOANNA 0:03:37
I’m Joanna Hagen. And I’m Francine Carrel, making excited e-noises. Before it’s time.

FRANCINE 0:03:42
I’m sorry.

JOANNA 0:03:43
It’s always time for excited e-noises, Francine. Today we’re talking about episodes one and two of Good Omens season two.

FRANCINE 0:03:49
We are.

We watched it last night. It came out just last night and we’re already recording. Look at us on the fucking ball.

JOANNA 0:03:54
I watched it twice yesterday.

FRANCINE 0:03:56
We’ve got hot takes. They are piping hot takes. Now, see, this is the thing. Sorry, immediately tangent. Hot take to you. Does that mean like spicy take, like a bit out there? Or does it just mean like your initial thought on it? Because I always thought it was the latter, but I’m starting to realize that people are using it as like, this is my controversial take. Yeah, I always thought a hot take was like either was meant to be some kind of like controversial take or spicy take. Yeah, I think I just misinterpreted it and I’m just now realizing I’ve been. Or like big, like poignant thoughts on it.

FRANCINE 0:04:24
Yeah. All right.

JOANNA 0:04:25
Well, we have takes. You can decide on that. Note on spoilers before we crack on. We will not be spoiling any events in the Discworld books while we talk about Good Omens. So if you are just joining us for Good Omens, but you might try Discworld afterwards, join us. Not a cult.

FRANCINE 0:04:45
Yet.

JOANNA 0:04:46
You are safe to listen. This will, however, contain spoilers for episodes one and two of Good Omens season two, as well as all of Good Omens season one and the book Good Omens.

FRANCINE 0:04:55
Yes.

JOANNA 0:04:56
But we will not be spoiling any future episodes of Good Omens season two,

FRANCINE 0:05:00
especially at the moment as we haven’t watched it yet. This is true.

And that is even the case in our new Discord, which yes, I fucking chewed on the segue in there. We just finally started a Discord, by the way. I’ll put a link in the show notes and you can come and discuss all this with us. And we’re just like making sure there’s no spoilers for any past ones

we’ve already talked about. Yay.

Introducing Good Omens

JOANNA 0:05:19
So we don’t have a previously on as such, but Francine, what happened before Good Omens season two?

FRANCINE 0:05:24
Well, in the beginning.

JOANNA 0:05:27
Actually, no, fuck, that’s the beginning of season two, isn’t it?

FRANCINE 0:05:29
No.

JOANNA 0:05:30
But season two is before the beginning. So in this timeline.

FRANCINE 0:05:34
Yeah. Good Omens was first a book.

JOANNA 0:05:38
It was written by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman, who corresponded via long phone calls and posted floppy disks to each other and all kinds of wonderful late 80s things like that. It was very sought after even before its release, the rights sold at auction for £150,150. Is that how you say that? I think so. I get really weird reading out numbers sometimes. Anyway, it was released by Corgi in 1990. And the idea of a movie kind of ricocheted around Hollywood for many years. It was kind of largely driven by Terry Gilliam. His dreams, which had sputtered along for about a decade in the kind of mire of Hollywood nonsense.

FRANCINE 0:06:15
Were killed by 9-11 pretty much,

JOANNA 0:06:18
because after that, no studio really felt like financing an apocalypse comedy.

FRANCINE 0:06:22
Pratchett and Gaiman decided though, about another decade on, that Good Omens would become a television program. In 2010, it was adapted and staged at the National Theatre. In 2014, it was adapted for radio.

FRANCINE 0:06:35
But…

JOANNA 0:06:36
It’s a good radio play, by the way. I don’t think I’ve ever listened to it. I think they cameo in it, don’t they? Yeah, they recorded it like sat in the back of a car as well. Their cameo was like police cops, I think. Amazing. I’ll try and find a link to it and then listen to it myself. But Terry, unfortunately, obviously died very young in 2015. And Neil was not willing to continue the television idea. He said, everything that was ever written, bookmarks and tiny little things, we would always collaborate. Everything was a collaboration.

FRANCINE 0:07:03
So obviously, no, he said at the time.

JOANNA 0:07:06
However, at Pratchett’s memorial event in 2016, Gaiman revealed that he had received a letter from Terry intended to be delivered after he died, requesting that his co-author write the adaptation alone. Quoting from Neil Gaiman at the event, at that point, I think I said, You bastard.

FRANCINE 0:07:24
Yes.

JOANNA 0:07:25
He did say that. We were there. So the first season of Good Omens was released on Amazon Prime in full in May 2019. Despite that fact, some 20,000 people signed a petition calling for Netflix to cancel it.

FRANCINE 0:07:40
Good effort.

JOANNA 0:07:41
And apart from the religious objectors, it did receive some mixed reviews, which is hardly a surprise because it kind of invited ire from both the do not touch the sacred text of Good Omens camp and the well, this is a bit silly, isn’t it camp? But a lot of people loved it, including Joanna and I, and it brought a whole new readership to Good Omens and I imagine to other books in the Terry and Neil verse. So we covered both the book and the first season of Good Omens in the very early days of this podcast, back when we still recorded in person for the pandemic made us weird and hermitish. I’ll link to the episodes of all that in the show notes. And one note, a small bit of media that came out between our first coverage of Good Omens and today is the three minutes and 40 seconds, Good Omens lockdown short available on YouTube. Which is a lovely little lesson, isn’t it? And now season two. So we’re in uncharted waters.

FRANCINE 0:08:34
Yep.

JOANNA 0:08:34
However, it’s not untouched by Pratchett, who discussed plot ideas with Gaiman well before his death.

FRANCINE 0:08:40
So we’ll see how it goes. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:08:42
So we’ve only seen episode one and two so far. That’s what we’re talking about today. Overall thoughts. What do you think?

FRANCINE 0:08:48
I liked it. Yep. Cool.

JOANNA 0:08:50
I know it’s different.

FRANCINE 0:08:51
I know it’s not as obviously linear, I guess. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:08:58
It’s hard to say the other one was linear because there was lots of flashbacks. But this one, I feel like we’re, we’re building a very wide foundation before we get into the plot.

FRANCINE 0:09:06
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:09:07
The first one had like such a ticking time bomb on it, because it starts, you know, really a week before the end of the world is the majority of the story.

FRANCINE 0:09:15
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:09:16
And there’s a lot less bouncing around from A plot to B plot to C plot that were all A plots.

FRANCINE 0:09:21
Yeah. And I kind of, I’m enjoying it.

JOANNA 0:09:24
A lot of what I liked about the first one is still here. Just kind of the vibes.

FRANCINE 0:09:28
The vibes are good. I’m very much enjoying the vibes.

JOANNA 0:09:31
It does feel like definitely very, not very, it feels separate from like the original Good Omens and the first season of Good Omens.

FRANCINE 0:09:38
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:09:39
I’m missing like the lack of narration a bit because that brought so much Pratchett-iness into it. And also I just, I liked Frances McDormand as a narrator.

FRANCINE 0:09:47
Yes.

JOANNA 0:09:47
Was she the one speaking Asgard at one point? Yeah, that was her Asgard in that Job scene.

FRANCINE 0:09:53
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:09:54
I, I wasn’t missing it as I was watching it, actually.

FRANCINE 0:09:58
But afterwards, when I was going back on my, what did I expect notes, I did kind of think,

JOANNA 0:10:04
yeah, no, I guess some of it could have been pretty enhanced by that. But it might have been a bit harder as well because there’s not, it’s not as classic a story structure so far. No, it’s definitely not. I think this is fleshing out a lot more and building, like you said, this wider foundation

FRANCINE 0:10:22
for it.

JOANNA 0:10:23
Something Neil Gaiman said on Twitter is, so he and Terry Pratchett had like a sequel book that they planned out, I think, while slightly drunk in a hotel room at Leigh, but they had like planned the whole sequel. This is not that sequel. This is setting up the events for that sequel. And if season three does happen, that will be kind of the story that he and Terry planned together.

FRANCINE 0:10:44
I see.

JOANNA 0:10:45
Yes, because when this season was first announced, it was kind of implied that it was that story.

FRANCINE 0:10:50
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:10:51
So since then, we’ve kind of learned a bit more.

FRANCINE 0:10:54
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:10:54
And Neil Gaiman has been very vocal about really wanting there to be a season three and that if he wasn’t striking, it would be written by now. I’ll try and find a, well, actually, can you send me the Twitter link to that? Sondra Vogel just sent that in our Discord, actually.

FRANCINE 0:11:05
Oh, sweet.

JOANNA 0:11:06
Thank you, Sondra.

FRANCINE 0:11:07
Thank you, Sondra Vogel.

JOANNA 0:11:09
Doing so much of our work for us for over a year now. But yeah, no, I’ve been trying really hard to stay off good omens Twitter. I’ve already seen some spoilers for the rest of the season, but we won’t talk about them here.

FRANCINE 0:11:19
No, no.

JOANNA 0:11:20
And realistically, I’m still, I, being slightly spoiled on something really doesn’t bother me. That’s it. We’re on that end of the spectrum. I’m weird about spoilers. I don’t mind knowing like that something happens. I don’t like knowing how it happens. And I don’t like seeing stuff before it happens. Yes. Yeah. Same. Yeah. If I know something, then I can enjoy the build up.

FRANCINE 0:11:39
Yeah.

Chapter 1: The Arrival

JOANNA 0:11:40
Yeah. Obviously, we realize that most people are less on that side, and we will. We will respect that. Absolutely. As we go along. So let’s dive into talking about the episodes themselves, starting with episode one, The Arrival.

FRANCINE 0:11:52
The Arrival.

JOANNA 0:11:53
It begins before the beginning. And we see Crowley and Aziraphale meet for the first time when Crowley, Angel Crowley, with his hair and his white robes, cranks up the universe with Aziraphale’s help. Yeah. Unwitting help. Even better. It’s so nice to see Aziraphale and Crowley together and to see Angel Crowley. Yeah, that was interesting. I wasn’t expecting that. I can’t, I didn’t think of the fact that they probably met before the, um… The Garden of Eden.

FRANCINE 0:12:18
Yeah, but obviously they would have. Yeah. Cross paths or flights, however you call it.

JOANNA 0:12:25
Flight paths. But yeah, it’s um, Crowley’s definitely still got that manic energy that he’s putting into it. But I think he’s done a good job of altering his character to be pre-Fallen. There’s something I noticed, actually, one of the things he does in altering his character to like the angel version is he sounds a bit like, posher. And I noticed that’s the thing between the angels and demons in general, like the angel, the angels tend to have these like, posher British accents, whereas the demons have a lot more like sort of East London-y accents apart from Shax. And sometimes quite put on East London-y accents. But yeah, that’s just, I’m afraid that is just the reality, isn’t it? I’ve never known someone who sounds like us do a decent job of an East

FRANCINE 0:13:05
End accent.

JOANNA 0:13:06
So I’m not going to try.

FRANCINE 0:13:08
No, no, it’s best we don’t.

JOANNA 0:13:09
So yeah, I wonder how much is some sort of weird and like, Heaven and Hell aren’t strictly good and bad guys. That’s a lot of what Good Omens is diving into. But I do think there’s like a bit of

FRANCINE 0:13:19
a weird class thing there.

JOANNA 0:13:21
Yeah, definitely. Definitely. So when I was watching those two, my first thought was this is like two different types of scientists having a conversation. David Tennant being the engineer, and Michael Sheen being the anthropologist or the sociologist. They’re just incredibly interested in very different parts of this budding universe. Yeah, I love how he describes it as basically a star factory. That’s more or less, isn’t it? I thought like before they even cranked up the universe, just the fact it was kind of this like neural networks looking thing, which is obviously very cool. It’s that, you know, the base of the universe, that kind of thing as above, so below. And then, yeah, the very cool aesthetic of like the old looking parchment and the It’s gorgeous. I’m so hyped. So yeah, so Aziraphale tells Crowley that he said this whole thing is getting knocked down in about 6,000 years, which Crowley’s not too happy about. No. And it’s interesting that they know different amounts of what’s going on, I guess. You get the feeling that maybe Crowley’s just not paid attention. Oh, yeah. Like he’s one of those people who’s got so hyper focused on the details of this cool project he’s working on. He’s not listened to much about the bigger picture of why he’s working on this project. Yeah. And it’s like before he’s even got to know any humans, so it’s not like he’s wanting to save the humans for the sake of it. But he’s like, if these guys are going to be the ones appreciating all of this, can we not give them time to see it properly and give them a decent view?

FRANCINE 0:14:40
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:14:41
Why have I done this then? It’s like someone who’s been tasked with making a particular part of the video game, and they’ve worked really intensely on a mechanic to say, pick up certain things in a certain way, and then they find out it’s going to be used in maybe two scenes total.

FRANCINE 0:14:55
Yeah, yeah.

JOANNA 0:14:56
And then it gets cut from the game. Yeah. And then straight away, we’re into the kind of what I assume is going to be the main, one of the main underlying themes of here, which is, how much trouble can I get in for just asking a few questions? I love the idea of a suggestion box as the beginning of his downfall.

FRANCINE 0:15:12
The divine suggestion box. This felt very Pratchetty to me. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:15:18
The whole bit about just asking a few questions, that kind of problem with authority. Yeah. And this is a running theme through both of the episodes. I think it’s a running theme through the season is Crowley and Free Will versus Aziraphale and Free Will and how they just come at it from such completely different angles.

FRANCINE 0:15:36
Yes.

JOANNA 0:15:37
So then we go into London and the present day. Oh, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. We just have to, we have to mention the wing umbrella,

FRANCINE 0:15:43
don’t we? Oh, the wing umbrella.

JOANNA 0:15:46
Yeah. A little throwback to the last season, being sheltered from stardust. Yeah. And sort of knocking off a little bouncing comet or meteor or whatever it is. Also, the way Aziraphale looks at Crowley in those scenes and this sort of very clear beginning of like

FRANCINE 0:16:03
a burgeoning crush. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:16:05
Oh, and it’s a particularly relatable sort of, wow, this person is, they’ve got no idea because they’re busy with their thing. But wow, this person.

FRANCINE 0:16:14
Yeah. And like massively relate. When somebody’s like so hyper focused on something they’re really

JOANNA 0:16:20
good at and just into it and you’re just like, oh, that’s attractive. It is one of the most attractive things in the world. So sorry, rocketing forwards, 6000 and a bit years, I guess. So in London in the present day, and this is us catching up with Aziraphale and Crowley and where they’ve been since the end of season one, barring the lockdown short. And yeah, so Aziraphale goes to visit Maggie at the record shop across the road and forgives her rent in exchange for some Shostakovich records. I practice saying Shostakovich and I’m still not sure I said it right. Well, it’s entirely my fault for not collecting the rent. He’s so sweet in that scene. He’s like trying to do a nice thing and he’s actually very awkward when he directly tries to do a nice thing. Yeah, absolutely. And at the same time, I think he does because he doesn’t understand the magnitude of the nice thing he’s doing. Yeah, it’s kind of like on the same as I’ve got this round. Don’t worry about it. Yeah, that’s all right. I know I’m just going to get rid of this financial burden that’s been worrying you for weeks. Especially the way he kind of does that and 75 pence.

FRANCINE 0:17:19
And 75 pence.

JOANNA 0:17:20
So this is Maggie played by Maggie Service, who played sister Teresa Garelis in season one of Good Omens. Her and Nina Sassania were both nuns who’ve been brought back to play new parts. But I like she mentions part of the reason she struggled with rent is the lockdowns. And we talked about like, I think back in 2020, when TV gets made post COVID, do we want it to address that COVID happened or not? Yeah. And here’s where the timeline splits again. Yeah. And in Good Omens, it makes sense. They did that lockdown short. So you know, if you consider that like a canon event, then, of course, now here, we’re going to acknowledge it in some way.

FRANCINE 0:17:54
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:17:54
So I like that shows are like allowing it to exist in a way where it doesn’t need to be a plot, but it can be there in the background and a fact of life. I think that that worked well. So we go to Crowley, who is experiencing a misunderstanding at St. James’s Park on the bench. I absolutely love that one. The clarinet makes beautiful music. Do you remember Trigger Happy TV? Vaguely, yeah. There’s a scene in that that Jack reminded me of while we were watching this, where a spy sits next to somebody on the bench and says something similar. And then like, Oh, are you not the grey squirrel? And he goes, No, I was like, sorry, wrong bench. And then the end of the scene is this giant squirrel costume walking in and sitting down on a very silliness. But I like how deep this trope goes into our national consciousness.

FRANCINE 0:18:43
Well, there’s a little bit of it in

JOANNA 0:18:46
Guards, Guards, the Pratchett book as well, where they’re mixing up the secret code phrases. Oh, you want the hallucinated brethren of the Brotherhood of Night.

FRANCINE 0:18:53
Two doors down, mate.

JOANNA 0:18:55
Yeah, and we get a little what’s the point of it all as well on the bench, which is… Crowley gets existential again. I thought about starting a tally, but I think it’ll just run off the end of the notebook

FRANCINE 0:19:03
by the time we finish.

JOANNA 0:19:05
It’ll go about as well as our days since the Existential Crisis Board did.

FRANCINE 0:19:09
It’s somewhere.

JOANNA 0:19:12
The board itself had an existential crisis and had to be sent on holiday.

FRANCINE 0:19:15
Exactly so.

JOANNA 0:19:17
So Crowley’s meeting up with Shaxs, his replacement, Hell’s New Representative in London.

FRANCINE 0:19:22
Which is an interesting system.

JOANNA 0:19:26
Yeah, we’re getting a bit of the bureaucracy here. It was sort of Crowley just hangs around Earth and does the things that, you know, Hell expects, which is tempt people and what have you. Makes you wonder if there’s more representatives. Yeah, do you think like, is it just major cities? Do small towns get like shitty little demon representatives? Or do the ones who operate in cities like also do towns and villages surrounding?

FRANCINE 0:19:50
Maybe we’ll find out.

JOANNA 0:19:52
As we had hoped, we are seeing quite a lot of the bureaucracy.

FRANCINE 0:19:55
Yay!

JOANNA 0:19:56
Shaxs is played by Miranda Richardson, who again was in the first season as Madam Tracy and is doing a very different character here. And I’m very happy she’s here. Yeah, as we mentioned in our last episode, it’s a very British TV thing to bring an actor back for a new season, just in a different role. Yeah, and Miranda Richardson, like she played Queenie in season two of Blackadder. She appeared in one episode as a highwayman in the third season of Blackadder and then appeared in the fourth season as… Actually, was she in the fourth season?

FRANCINE 0:20:24
I don’t remember.

JOANNA 0:20:24
She was definitely in back and forth.

FRANCINE 0:20:26
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:20:27
Anyway, sorry, IMDb page notwithstanding. So next we see Maggie going over to Give Me Coffee or Give Me Death, Nina’s coffee place around over the road for her skinny latte.

FRANCINE 0:20:39
Skinny latte.

JOANNA 0:20:41
So this is Nina, it’s Nina Sasanya, who was Sister Mary Garrelus.

FRANCINE 0:20:47
Yes.

JOANNA 0:20:48
Obviously, we immediately start shipping the two of them as soon as we see them interact in the coffee shop. It’s not subtle. No, not even a little bit. But they get interrupted because there’s a naked man with a box wandering down the street. I thought that this naked man with a box wouldn’t attract quite as much attention as he did in the episode there. I feel like something would happen to maybe stop the naked man other than just a huge crowd forming around the naked man. We’re in Soho. That’s it. That’s it in this particular part of London. However, maybe not people like TikTok. We did get to see Jon Hamm’s full arse, which I’m not sure I expected in the first episode. But no, yeah, it was not upset about it. It’s gone straight for it.

FRANCINE 0:21:31
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:21:32
So he’s got this carefully placed box.

FRANCINE 0:21:34
And I have a question here.

JOANNA 0:21:35
So he goes to Aziraphale’s door, asked to be let in, puts the box down. And then when Aziraphale says no, he turns around and everyone’s very shocked.

FRANCINE 0:21:43
So, angelic genital question.

JOANNA 0:21:47
Because it’s established less so in the TV show, but at least in the book, that angels are somewhat sexless. And this is fairly common around stories about angels that they are sexless in some way. Is there a penis or is he smooth down there like a ken doll? Because I feel like the crowd’s reaction would have been very different if he was smooth

FRANCINE 0:22:04
like a Kendall.

JOANNA 0:22:05
Does Gabriel have a visible penis?

FRANCINE 0:22:08
I don’t know.

JOANNA 0:22:09
I would have expected smooth like a Ken doll, but perhaps whatever has cast him down to earth. Because the thing is, they’ve taken on corporeal forms, haven’t they?

FRANCINE 0:22:17
True. So I don’t know.

JOANNA 0:22:20
I mean, my basis for questioning this is entirely Alan Rickman in Dogma, who pulls down his trousers to reveal smooth like a Kendall and announces angels are ill-equipped. Great film.

FRANCINE 0:22:30
More people should watch Dogma.

JOANNA 0:22:32
But nobody can quite do that like Alan Rickman, can they?

FRANCINE 0:22:35
So I don’t know. Maybe we’ll find out.

JOANNA 0:22:37
Maybe we’ll find out if Gabriel has a visible penis. But I feel like we all needed to at least have the question on our minds as we go forward.

FRANCINE 0:22:45
Yes.

JOANNA 0:22:46
Listeners, do not doubt for a second that we did wonder about it. I will say, so in the second episode when he sort of has that one memory and then goes, oh no, there’s not room for that in my head anymore. I feel like that implies that maybe he’s been put into some kind of human form as opposed to angel appearing humanoid. Yeah, this is what I’m thinking.

FRANCINE 0:23:04
Yeah. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:23:05
So maybe that. He got the purple flicker in his eyes, but I don’t know.

FRANCINE 0:23:08
I don’t know.

JOANNA 0:23:10
I was thinking of flicker actually. That’s a note I’ve got just here. Did you notice a bunch of old style film flickering every now and then? It’s very subtle if it was like Jack didn’t catch it. But I caught it a few times and it’s either my eyes are going weird or

FRANCINE 0:23:26
there’s like a little effect there.

JOANNA 0:23:29
Or your TV is playing up. I don’t think it’s my TV. I’d be very odd for it to play up in an old film way. Anyway, so then we go, we briefly see Michael in heaven, the Archangel Michael played by

FRANCINE 0:23:43
Duma Kitchen, who I fucking love in the show. Yes.

JOANNA 0:23:47
Who I love in general. She’s very funny and she tends to play these sort of somewhat looking down on you type characters. She was in Plebs, which is a great little comedy show I highly recommend.

FRANCINE 0:23:58
I don’t know if I’ve watched that.

JOANNA 0:24:00
It’s like a very, it’s kind of like the Inbetweeners, but set in ancient Rome and also not as gross as the Inbetweeners.

FRANCINE 0:24:07
Oh, cute. Okay.

JOANNA 0:24:09
It’s a fun little watch. I think it’s on ITV. But yes, she’s threatening extreme sanctions on the phone, which is a fun setup that gets paid off later on.

FRANCINE 0:24:17
Yes. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:24:18
Again, very diplomatic, bureaucratic, whatever.

FRANCINE 0:24:21
But then you learn, of course, that the stakes are much higher for these kind of people. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:24:27
Then we go back to the bookshop. Aziraphale realizes just how empty Gabriel’s brain is right now. He has a lovely time with his hot chocolate though. I know. I like that he’s done the whole, these are my first memories thing. Terrible things have happened to me.

FRANCINE 0:24:42
My arm ached and I put them down and I was cold.

JOANNA 0:24:44
Now I have this neat blanket.

FRANCINE 0:24:46
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:24:46
It’s that whole thing we’ve talked about before, haven’t we? Like the idea of like two toddlers, this happening to them is the worst thing ever because it is the worst thing they’ve ever experienced. And then getting a blanket and a hot chocolate and it’s doing one thing here and one thing here and another thing here.

FRANCINE 0:24:59
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:24:59
Oh, that’s the best thing ever. But he explains he’s come to the bookshop because he just knew if he was there, everything would be all right.

FRANCINE 0:25:07
Yes.

JOANNA 0:25:08
And you get that great line of, do you ever feel like everything would be better if you were just near one particular person? And the look on Aziraphale’s face before he says no. Get the old stutter.

FRANCINE 0:25:18
Bit wistful. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:25:20
A hint of wist. And Gabriel says that something is terrible coming and the thing that he had in the box is the only hope, but the box is now empty.

FRANCINE 0:25:29
Yes.

JOANNA 0:25:30
And was it always? Was it always? Who stole it off the doorstep if not?

FRANCINE 0:25:34
Gosh.

JOANNA 0:25:35
If you’re going to steal it, why would you open the box and take the, well, I suppose if you had nefarious intentions, that’s what you do. If you were just randomly stealing it, you’d just take the box, wouldn’t you? Not that I’d steal boxes off doorsteps. See, I thought maybe that he’d forgotten whatever it was because like, there was the material object thing. But then I thought, no, because his arms were aching.

FRANCINE 0:25:55
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:25:55
So it must have been heavy. Side note, how embarrassed do you think Jon Hamm is? Or do you think he is at all walking through a street like that with everyone looking at

FRANCINE 0:26:05
him?

JOANNA 0:26:06
I feel like not much at all. I imagine he’s quite a confident man. I wonder if we’ll find an interview with him. We should keep an eye out for that. And yeah, then Shaxx visits Crowley’s car, which appears to be where Crowley is also living. Did we look into the name Shaxx, by the way?

FRANCINE 0:26:22
I meant to and I didn’t. Did you?

JOANNA 0:26:24
No, I didn’t look up the name Shaxx.

FRANCINE 0:26:26
Okay. It might just be a cool.

JOANNA 0:26:29
It’s got nex in it. It makes it cool. Powerful upper level demon with wind-based abilities. Might, yeah, might be canon then.

FRANCINE 0:26:35
Cool. And yeah, Shaxx updates Crowley.

JOANNA 0:26:38
Gabriel’s missing. She already mentioned back in the bench scene that something is up. Downstep? No, something is going down upstairs. And it’s up downstairs. I need a chart. I need a visual depiction. I can’t cope with this. I might literally make you on that. Might be fun. So we go back to the bookshop with Aziraphale and Gabriel and the box is empty. And Gabriel takes the name Jim, which is quite nice because there’s the book by someone called Jim, but right next to it is Treasure Island on the shelf.

FRANCINE 0:27:11
Oh.

JOANNA 0:27:12
Whose main character name is also Jim.

FRANCINE 0:27:15
Oh, nice.

JOANNA 0:27:15
There you go. So you get two Jims for your money there.

FRANCINE 0:27:19
Fantastic.

JOANNA 0:27:20
Which is short for James, which is short for Gabriel, as we all know. And as Aziraphale calls Crowley and asks them to go for coffee. Also, we see Gabriel swatting a fly that’s buzzing around the bookshop. And I want to put a pin in that.

FRANCINE 0:27:33
Oh, ooh. Beelzebubby.

JOANNA 0:27:36
I think, because there’s another scene with him swatting a fly with not just a Bible, but it’s the, I can’t remember what it’s called. It was a great little Easter egg. There’s a Bible mentioned in book one of Good Omens that was something like the unholy Bible, because thou shalt commit adultery was in there. And it seems to be that Bible that he’s swatting the fly with. Because he collects them, doesn’t he?

FRANCINE 0:28:00
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:28:00
I do wonder if the flies buzzing around the bookshop are some hint of like Beelzebub spying or something.

FRANCINE 0:28:07
Interesting. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:28:08
Because otherwise, why have that as a detail?

FRANCINE 0:28:11
Exactly.

JOANNA 0:28:11
Hmm.

FRANCINE 0:28:12
Okay. We don’t know.

JOANNA 0:28:15
And then we briefly get the scene in Heaven of the Angel. We later find out her name is Muriel finding the matchbox.

FRANCINE 0:28:21
Yes, the Scrivener. Yes.

JOANNA 0:28:24
So the matchbox itself, obviously, you’ve got that Job quote there.

FRANCINE 0:28:28
And handily. Oh, you have the Bible with you.

JOANNA 0:28:33
Good. Yes. I’ve got a rather large Bible, which I just hit myself in the face with. I was about to say, that’s possibly the least handy Bible I’ve ever seen. That’s huge. And I was resentful about keeping it because it wouldn’t come in handy. But look at me now. This is one of many Bibles I have in the house. I was going to say, why don’t you just Google it?

FRANCINE 0:28:50
But there we go. Yep.

JOANNA 0:28:52
The actual quote is in a slightly different position in my Bible.

FRANCINE 0:28:56
It’s verse 10.

JOANNA 0:28:58
Out of his mouth go forth lamps like torches of lighted fire, according to this Bible. But it’s to do with God describing Lafayette. It’s part of this poetic discourse in the story of Job, which we see a bit of in the next episode.

FRANCINE 0:29:11
Lafayette and the whale in this case. Yes. Okay, right. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:29:14
Some kind of large sea monster-y situation. But did you notice where the matchbox is from?

FRANCINE 0:29:20
Resurrectionist. Yes. Yes.

JOANNA 0:29:22
Okay, so then Aziraphale and Crowley go for coffee and Nina asks about the naked man. And they go back to the shop. But before we get to see them continuing on, we see Maggie popping in and giving Nina the Nina Simone LP and it’s suddenly very weird and tense and awkward between them. I’m finding it difficult to watch.

FRANCINE 0:29:40
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:29:40
Because it’s coming across… they’re not doing the acting badly, but it feels like that because they’re playing awkward people so well.

FRANCINE 0:29:47
Yes.

JOANNA 0:29:48
And I think maybe I just feel personally attacked and that’s my problem.

FRANCINE 0:29:51
Not theirs.

JOANNA 0:29:53
But trying to flirt by giving an awkward gift that the person wouldn’t want, much like a toddler presenting you with a favourite rock. I’ve got absolutely really clear memories of that as well.

FRANCINE 0:30:03
Yeah, same.

JOANNA 0:30:04
I made a lot of people mix CDs. Anyways, we go into the bookshop and Crowley meets Jim and he’s fucking furious. It’s great.

FRANCINE 0:30:16
Yes.

JOANNA 0:30:17
Yeah, you don’t often see him like that angry just directly at Aziraphale, I think. It took like three or four episodes of the first season of Good Omens to get angry Crowley and angry Aziraphale Crowley and here we’re getting it like right in the first episode. And David Tennant does it so well.

FRANCINE 0:30:32
He does.

JOANNA 0:30:33
He’s just got a face born for drama.

FRANCINE 0:30:36
He does. His stature as well.

JOANNA 0:30:37
He’s just, yeah, he always looks like David Tennant, but always in this slightly different character way.

FRANCINE 0:30:44
I love it.

JOANNA 0:30:44
Yeah, actually, when you pause on Prime, you know, you get that magnifying glass, whatever. It shows you pictures of their IMDb.

FRANCINE 0:30:51
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:30:52
And I paused it at some point and I noticed that like Michael Sheen’s headshot was quite different, obviously, from Aziraphale. And there was like a full length picture of David Tennant standing on some fucking

FRANCINE 0:31:02
cliff top with his coat going behind him.

JOANNA 0:31:05
I was like, literally, you look like Aziraphale and Doctor Who and he’s got such a silhouette. He’s got like a really elastic face is the only way I can describe it. He can kind of ping pong between these incredible expressions. But not in a Jim Carrey way. Yeah, like not in a creepy way.

FRANCINE 0:31:21
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:31:21
I also really love the score. I love the score across the whole thing is so great. And it’s really nice to watch something fully scored because not a lot of the stuff I watch is like that these days.

FRANCINE 0:31:31
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:31:32
And I just think the score in this it’s David G Arnold. He does some incredible stuff, but they’re just little moments like when Crowley really furiously shouts, What are you doing here at Gabriel? And he does that I’m dusting and there’s an accompanying little tinkle as he demonstrates

FRANCINE 0:31:47
dusting.

JOANNA 0:31:49
Oh, I’m gonna try and pay more attention to that in the next episode. Yeah, I just know I like the music.

FRANCINE 0:31:54
But I should I should try and listen to the proper stuff.

JOANNA 0:31:56
I like the music. And like I said, I’m just really enjoying listening to something that has such a like cared for score because I don’t think a lot of shows really get that like, it’s not the only show that has a score.

FRANCINE 0:32:06
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:32:08
But a score that’s clearly sort of being made by someone who cares about the content and is doing it in such a really, really specific way. But yes, Crowley wants to get rid of Gabriel, but as as if I wants to help him and says, Crowley, you know, leave if you’re not going to help me. And like actually seeing them fight properly is brilliant. It’s definitely yeah, a it’s seeing them fight properly and it’s kind of heart wrenching. But B it’s like I feel like Aziraphale is a lot more confident in their relationship now that he can be like, okay, fine, go.

FRANCINE 0:32:38
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:32:39
And like, even if he does, he doesn’t think he’ll never see Crowley again, like in the last thing when they argued. Well, the thing is, as well, I think we’ve seen we saw their relationship change from the beginning to the end of Good Omens. Like, obviously, we see their whole relationship through history in Good Omens, but in Good Omens season one, and the book talks about it a bit. But in the show, you really see them kind of become tied together by what they’ve done to prevent the apocalypse.

FRANCINE 0:33:03
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:33:04
And before that, I think they were friends who did favours for each other and hung out a bit because that was fun.

FRANCINE 0:33:09
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:33:10
And now, yeah, and now they’re kind of in this thing where they’re both separated from the sides that they were ostensibly working for up to the end of Good Omens.

FRANCINE 0:33:18
Yeah. There’s a great moment. They’re on their own side together. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:33:22
And there’s a great moment where Crowley says something about the fragile life he’s carved out for himself. And Azaraphile’s like, I thought it was what we had carved out for ourselves.

FRANCINE 0:33:30
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:33:32
This kind of imbalance between them and how they’re looking at whatever their relationship

FRANCINE 0:33:35
is.

JOANNA 0:33:37
Yeah, I think possibly it’s more Crowley not admitting it than not feeling it, though. Does that make sense? Yeah, I think Crowley is, I don’t mean self absorbed in a bad way, but he’s lived as it somewhat independent for longer because he already did the falling from heaven bit.

FRANCINE 0:33:56
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:33:56
And he’s already been hugely betrayed by his side.

FRANCINE 0:34:00
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:34:00
And yeah, there’s going to be more of a fortress up there. And then he was never like super in it with Hel, he just kind of went along and did his own thing.

FRANCINE 0:34:08
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:34:09
Because he could most of the time because humans were doing all the nasty stuff for themselves, which Shaxs points out as well. Got to have a bit of fun with the M25 and then.

FRANCINE 0:34:16
Generally, all doing stuff like tying up the mobile phone lines.

JOANNA 0:34:20
Yeah. Yeah, he was acting more like a mischief god than a agent of Satan.

FRANCINE 0:34:24
Yeah, sort of a Loki-ish-ness to him.

JOANNA 0:34:26
Yeah. Whereas Irofale is kind of readjusting to a different life where now Crowley, he’s not welcome among heaven and Crowley is the one person he’s got on his side. Yeah.

FRANCINE 0:34:36
He’s doing good, but he’s not part of the higher plan. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:34:39
And Crowley kind of early on when you see Maggie like thanking Irofale in front of Crowley, and Crowley sort of teases him for doing good deeds. Mm.

FRANCINE 0:34:48
Yeah. So yeah, I thought the fight between them was really great.

JOANNA 0:34:52
And then Crowley storms off and he’s furious and strikes lightning in the street and that

FRANCINE 0:34:56
leads to the coffee shop lock-in.

JOANNA 0:34:58
Yeah.

FRANCINE 0:34:59
He’s smoking in the street.

JOANNA 0:35:00
It’s fine. It’s not illegal. Yeah, it’s all right.

FRANCINE 0:35:03
Terrible fun moment.

JOANNA 0:35:04
Yeah. Before we get to the coffee shop, though, we get going back to heaven.

FRANCINE 0:35:08
Oh, yeah.

JOANNA 0:35:08
And there’s really great conversation between Michael and Uriel about this sort of power structure thing and this power vacuum because Gabriel’s missing. But yeah, I love this idea of Michael, that infuriating thing that someone does where they’re like, actually, I’m being very reasonable and I don’t see why you need to argue with me. Yeah. And sort of claiming the power that’s happening in this power vacuum, trying to sort of take the top spot while very politely explaining that they’re just doing their duty.

FRANCINE 0:35:36
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:35:37
It’s another bit that felt very Pratchett-y to me, this whole like, yeah, we’re all equal,

FRANCINE 0:35:41
but I’m in charge.

JOANNA 0:35:41
Yeah.

FRANCINE 0:35:42
That felt like a Pratchett-y thing.

JOANNA 0:35:44
And we’ve talked a lot as well about, especially with Michael, but Pratchett using bureaucracy as like, as a villain. Yes. And Neil Gaiman does it a bit too. Like, if you look at stuff like in American Gods, the kind of dirty earthiness of the old gods compared to the really clean and shiny like, gods of media and things. Mm. Yeah, definitely.

FRANCINE 0:36:04
And then how they regress into their kind of true base natures when under stress, yeah,

JOANNA 0:36:10
which is similar here. So we also, yeah, we meet Muriel properly in this scene, who’s played by Cailin Sepulveda.

FRANCINE 0:36:19
Okay. I hope I’ve got that right.

JOANNA 0:36:22
And Sarakel played by Liz Carr. Yeah, new character. Yes, both new. Both new?

FRANCINE 0:36:27
Did we not have…

JOANNA 0:36:28
We had Uriel before, we didn’t have Muriel before. Oh yes, of course, sorry. Muriel is the…

FRANCINE 0:36:32
Muriel and Uriel. Yes.

JOANNA 0:36:34
Great couple of names to have in a group of five. We’ll definitely not fuck those up at any point while talking about good omens. So while they’re discussing the matchbox, you get Beelzebub playing a visit to Crowley, which is why, again, I’ve got my fly-related suspicions, because this very handily reminds everyone that Beelzebub is lord of the flies and likes to appear in a cloud of flies, which was a horrible, gross, that felt very Neil Gaiman scene. Another bit, the resurrectionists, I’m sure you know this, but were body snatchers as well.

FRANCINE 0:37:05
Yes.

JOANNA 0:37:06
So they were like Birkenhair, I think, were known as resurrectionists.

FRANCINE 0:37:09
That’s another little horror game mini moment.

JOANNA 0:37:13
Briefly spent a long time…

FRANCINE 0:37:15
Briefly spent a long time?

JOANNA 0:37:18
At one point, I spent a long time researching Victorian body snatchers for the Mary Shelley fights zombies story I was playing with. Oh yeah, fun. That was disgusting, but a local band that we like has a good song called Resurrection Man.

FRANCINE 0:37:31
Oh yeah. Anyway, so yeah, Beelzebub visiting Crowley.

JOANNA 0:37:34
New Beelzebub.

FRANCINE 0:37:35
New Beelzebub.

JOANNA 0:37:37
Shelley Conn, last season it was Anna Maxwell Martin. And I do like they acknowledged, like, it’s that new face.

FRANCINE 0:37:44
Yeah, that’s right, just don’t worry about it. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:37:47
I think there wasn’t any drama, it was just like Anna Maxwell Martin wasn’t available, but they didn’t want to not have Beelzebub. Yeah, fair.

FRANCINE 0:37:54
Shelley Conn, you might know from Bridgerton.

JOANNA 0:37:55
Oh.

FRANCINE 0:37:57
It’s Lady Mary Sharma.

JOANNA 0:37:58
It’s Lady Mary Sharma. So in the last season of Bridgerton, she was the mother of the two girls.

FRANCINE 0:38:08
Sorry. Oh, didn’t recognise her at all.

JOANNA 0:38:12
No, I wouldn’t have known if I hadn’t looked at the IMDB page. Weird how a face full of flies can change a person. Compared to Regency Dress, yeah. Two very different flavours. Ah, the two genders, Regency Dress, flies.

FRANCINE 0:38:24
Yes.

JOANNA 0:38:25
So Beelzebub’s offering all this stuff to Crowley in exchange for him sort of getting a hold of Gabriel, offering him a Duke to let him be a Duke of Hell. They’re really showing their kind of weak hand on it though, aren’t they? Or possibly bluffing, double bluffing with it. But they seem to be like, yeah, we’ll give you whatever you want, which is very not Hell, as we knew it.

FRANCINE 0:38:44
She does, he does get threatened as well.

JOANNA 0:38:47
Because he gets warned of extreme sanctions. And this is where we learn what the extreme sanctions are.

FRANCINE 0:38:52
Which is erasure from the Book of Life.

JOANNA 0:38:54
You are not and never have been.

FRANCINE 0:38:57
Yeah, which is great because it got established at the end of the first season

JOANNA 0:39:02
how Crowley and Aziraphale could get a, you know, outwit their various kryptonites

FRANCINE 0:39:08
by pretending to be each other. Yes. So this sets a, all right, well, you can’t pretend to be each other to get out of the Book of Life

JOANNA 0:39:16
threat. It puts a more tangible threat over you.

FRANCINE 0:39:19
Threat.

JOANNA 0:39:20
It puts a more tangible threat over their head.

FRANCINE 0:39:22
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:39:23
I’m thinking where else have I seen, like, the punishment be you don’t exist and never have. And I’m now thinking, is that a Doctor Who thing? I’m sure it’s been used many times, but it’s just, it’s really a bell of something. No, it’s not Doctor Who. Doctor Who is with the Weeping Angels. They send you back in time and you live yourself to death and they live off the displaced time

FRANCINE 0:39:42
energy. Yeah. So you don’t exist and you never have existed.

JOANNA 0:39:46
I know that’s like a thing in some bit of popular media. Listeners, answers on a postcard before I ceased to have existed. No, oh no, it’s not a Terry Pratchett thing, but it’s, it’s, it’s sort of feels like something

FRANCINE 0:39:59
the auditors.

JOANNA 0:40:00
It feels like it’s got something to do with the auditors.

FRANCINE 0:40:02
Yeah. Um, what happens after that?

JOANNA 0:40:04
Oh yeah, we’ve got the coffee shop lock in and the awkward conversation.

FRANCINE 0:40:09
Yes.

JOANNA 0:40:10
I, the one, but the main note I’ve got from this is I really liked the text display technique. So I always noticed, um, in any modern-ish thing where they have to show a text from somebody on screen, I was making note of how they do it. Some ways it just very obviously age very quickly in some ways are nice and clean.

FRANCINE 0:40:27
I thought this was very interesting and cool, actually just having it up on paper. Yeah. Looking like handwritten notes.

JOANNA 0:40:34
I thought that was a good detail and I like that because it is more ageless. You’re right. Some of them do age very quickly.

FRANCINE 0:40:38
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:40:39
Also, if you’re going to do a thing where you show someone’s phone screen and see them getting a text from someone they clearly talk to all the time, there needs to be previous messages there.

FRANCINE 0:40:47
Yes. Yes. That drives me mad for no real reason.

JOANNA 0:40:52
It’s fine.

FRANCINE 0:40:53
Like, but it really irks me. Yeah. It’s a little detail.

JOANNA 0:40:55
Come on guys, you text. But I think this scene is where I realised like the Maggie and Nina characters aren’t super working for me in this and it’s not just the awkwardness between them. And it’s no shade on the actors. I really like them both and I think they’re both doing a really good job. I think the issue I found, especially in the first episode, is it felt like this is a B plot and it’s not really tying to the A plot. And obviously the second episode brings them in to the main plot, which is, you know, Crowley and Azura Fel need to get them together.

FRANCINE 0:41:26
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:41:27
The thing is in the book Good Omens, in the first season Good Omens, all the B plot characters, so you’re Newton and Athma and you’re Shadwell and you’re Madame Trey, they all had something to do for the end goal. They had to actively participate in getting to the ending, whether they knew it or not.

FRANCINE 0:41:41
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:41:42
I’m wondering if that is going to be the case soon. I am, but even through the second episode, they don’t feel like active participants in the plot.

FRANCINE 0:41:50
No.

JOANNA 0:41:50
They feel like characters that exist for something to happen to and I’m not enjoying them.

FRANCINE 0:41:54
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:41:54
And they don’t, I know the whole point of the kids, the them, was that they had quite normal little lives, but they were living in this fantasy land and that’s quite fun. And these two, especially in comparison to the only other two main characters, have incredibly boring lives. And also I think a little bit this whole setup of Nina’s in clearly an abusive relationship, like Lindsay is clearly a dickhead.

FRANCINE 0:42:18
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:42:19
And that feels so, so obvious that I’m waiting for a big plot twist there.

FRANCINE 0:42:25
Yeah. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:42:26
Or maybe not. It just feels a bit too blatant, especially for it to be in the first episode. I mean, is it, does it need to be anything but this is just showing that she’s in a bad

FRANCINE 0:42:36
relationship?

JOANNA 0:42:37
I just feel like you could be more subtle about she’s in a bad relationship than immediately saying, yeah, my partner is really fucking horrible to me.

FRANCINE 0:42:45
Yeah, I guess.

JOANNA 0:42:47
I don’t know. For me, it was, it was sort of a, it seems like an obvious, ah, look, here we have an obstacle, but also no one will be upset if that relationship ends because clearly she needs to not be with this person.

FRANCINE 0:42:56
Yeah. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:42:58
Could have been a bit more subtle than look at all these abusive texts from this person. That’s true. That was, yeah, plastered all over the screen.

FRANCINE 0:43:06
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:43:06
Yeah. Especially with a character that like, we haven’t spent enough time with to really decide if we like, and I do like her as a character. I love her doing the gestures to herself to remember the coffees and things, but I don’t care about her that much yet because she’s not been on screen very long and she’s not been incredibly compelling. Yes. No, I definitely see what you mean. We’ll have to see how that evolves. Yeah. Anyway, back to the bookshop. Crowley does an apology dance. Yeah. What the fuck was that about? I don’t know, but it made me very happy and I liked it. I want to know how that came up into the script. I want to know whether that was done, especially just to make Crow, to make David Tennant do a little dance. I want it to be that him and Michael Sheen were fucking about and then it became a thing. This is, yeah. Yeah. Not, no shade on the writers. Not everything needs to be improvised. Writers do lovely work, but just for that. Yeah. Because it just the fact it doesn’t seem to tie into anything else at all. No. Although he, there’s a list of times as Aerofell’s done the apology dance. And obviously I think we’re going to get more flashbacks. So I’m wondering if we’ll. Yeah, that’s true. See Michael Sheen do the same dance. I really hope we get to see Michael Sheen do the apology dance. New TikTok trend. So they do the half a miracle each to hide Gabriel from the occult forces and it seems to work. Yes. I like the phrase half a miracle for like a song name or a book name, by the way.

FRANCINE 0:44:34
Oh yeah. That’d be a good book name. Anyway, I’m not going to start writing fiction live

JOANNA 0:44:39
on the podcast.

FRANCINE 0:44:40
Good. Thank you.

JOANNA 0:44:41
Gabriel’s little moment when he’s sort of like, oh, I know things now. I know no outside. And I have two friends. Two friends. He’s got two friends and he’s really excited about his two friends. And he’s very sweet when he’s this Gabriel. So the final scene, alarms start going off in heaven because there’s been a massive miracle on earth. Which I’m speculating Gabriel contributed to the half a miracle each without really intending to, which is why there’s this archangel sized miracle. Well, it’s going to be one of those things, isn’t it? Gabriel has contributed. It takes a lot more than they thought to hide an archangel.

FRANCINE 0:45:17
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:45:18
Or there’s some very sweet and twee thing about when those two work together, it makes amazing miracles. Or like because one’s a devil and one’s an angel, they’re somehow acting on each other exponentially.

FRANCINE 0:45:28
Yeah, that’s what I mean. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:45:29
Yeah. And yeah, then we get the closing credits, which did you… I didn’t and I saw your text about it too late. So what… So you know how in the closing credits for each episode, just like with last episode, last season, David G Arnold has done like a slightly different arrangement of the theme. I didn’t know that because Prime just skips it automatically. Yeah, it was only the, I think the second time I watched that I decided to watch the credits in case there was anything. So David G Arnold does like a slightly different arrangement of the Good Omens theme that kind of fits somehow with the tone of the episode. But what he’s done with this is that theme goes into some bits from Every Day by Buddy Holly.

FRANCINE 0:46:05
Oh, nice.

JOANNA 0:46:06
It’s a little detail. It’s not like a huge plot thing. But listen, if you haven’t actually listened to the full credits yet, go and do so.

FRANCINE 0:46:14
Okay, I will.

Chapter 2: The Clue

JOANNA 0:46:16
So on to episode two, The Clue featuring the Minisoad, a companion to Owls. Yes, these are titled episodes, are they? Yeah, this is a weird thing. So they… I saw Neil Gaiman on like Twitter and Tumblr talking a little bit about these Minisoads and how they’re sort of episodes within episodes and written by different people. So this was Jon Finamore. He’s also a co executive producer

FRANCINE 0:46:42
this season and been working on it. But I don’t know. I didn’t… if it hadn’t been

JOANNA 0:46:49
referred to as a Minisoad, a companion of Owls, even after I watched the episode, I was a bit sort of, I’m going to check on Google which bit was meant to be the Minisoad.

FRANCINE 0:46:58
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:46:59
And I realised it was, you know, going into the story and coming out the story. And that makes sense. But it feels like if Neil Gaiman wasn’t on strike, this would have been like more of the marketing and how the season was talked about.

FRANCINE 0:47:12
Yeah. Yeah, maybe so. Yeah, it hadn’t crossed my awareness at all.

JOANNA 0:47:17
Yeah. So it felt, I don’t know, it sat a little bit weirdly for me. Still, I didn’t know about it. So it didn’t bother me. Okay, so we open in 2500 BC. And Crowley’s sacrificing goats, as you do. Yes. Oh, poor little goat.

FRANCINE 0:47:36
Poor little goats. I love baby goats so much. Land of Us.

JOANNA 0:47:40
Yes, we’re in the land of Us. And Aziraphale interrupts, but Crowley has a permit. He does. And he’s also got incredible glasses. He does have incredible glasses. Loving Crowley’s sunglasses throughout this as always. But these ones are my favourite so far. So this is the first time they’ve seen each other since Noah, which was one of the flashbacks we saw in that half hour cold open.

FRANCINE 0:48:01
Yes.

JOANNA 0:48:01
In season one of Good Omens, episode three. And I feel like the Noah bit’s relevant, because one of the things Crowley says in that Noah scene, when Aziraphale’s explaining that there’s going to be a flood, is even the little kids, not the kids. Not the kids. That’s going to come back as they debate the ethics of killing children in this episode. Yeah. And like, yes, it’s Michael Sheen, isn’t it? He goes, the children. But yeah, but it was Crowley in the Noah bit. Yes. So that was one of Crowley’s moments of, right, so God’s a dick then. I did also love the Michael Sheen shouting Avant repeatedly at Crowley, which is, that’s a Pratchett thing. It’s an Eric thing. That’s an Eric thing. Of all the Terry Pratchett books to reference. Well, I believe when we talked about Eric, I was wondering if Avant was actually a thing or not. And I don’t think we ever bothered finding out.

FRANCINE 0:49:00
Let’s say yes.

JOANNA 0:49:01
We didn’t chase up on a lot from Eric. And yeah, then still in this 2500 BC timeline, we go to heaven and Muriel sort of goes over the contract, the Job contract. Yeah. And explains the bet that Satan and God have got going about Job.

FRANCINE 0:49:18
Yeah. It’s another bit of bureaucracy evil. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:49:21
On top of just straight up evil. Yeah. And Gabriel does this whole explanation that Job’s going to get everything back double, including the seven new children. And it’s nice as much as I was talking about, you know, really looking forward to dumb Jon Hamm this season. It’s also nice to see him playing dickhead Gabriel. Yeah, but definitely still with the naivety around the edges though.

FRANCINE 0:49:44
Yes. Yeah, they can.

JOANNA 0:49:46
They can run at any size. Ribs, ribs are. Yeah, ribs are a normal part of this. Don’t worry about it. That I’m not going to admit I might not know everything.

FRANCINE 0:49:54
Yeah, yeah.

JOANNA 0:49:56
Just one of my favourite methods of dickishness. I enjoyed the fact the scroll back on earth, they unwound itself all around the mountains and everything like that. So it was a nice little. Yeah, that was a really fun little detail. So, yeah, so back to present day and Gabriel explains his new filing system of filing every book by the first letter of the first sentence, which makes perfect sense. Yeah, Jack and I were trying to work out like where everything would be like how things would be proportionalised. So you got A, T and I obviously, I think would be the main ones. Yeah, that’s sort of the running joke through is that the it shelf has gotten. Yeah, that’s spread around half the bookshop. Yeah, just trying to work out apart from those I wonder what are the most common words book

FRANCINE 0:50:39
starts with.

JOANNA 0:50:40
I expect somebody’s done something about that.

FRANCINE 0:50:42
Maybe I’ll look it up.

JOANNA 0:50:44
Listeners, send us graphs, send us spreadsheets. Francine, don’t make a spreadsheet.

FRANCINE 0:50:49
Okay, putting my pen down there.

JOANNA 0:50:53
Can we do it just the Terry Pratchett?

FRANCINE 0:50:54
No, no. Maybe at the end.

JOANNA 0:50:57
We’ll go back and just discuss the first word of each book. We put all the first words together of each Pratchett book in order. See what kind of horrific sentence we get. It’s at this point that Gabriel singing every day, right? Yeah, this is, as if I’ll ask him to make some kind of noise because he’s being too creepy and quiet and after making some wonderful creaking and groaning noises, he starts singing every day.

FRANCINE 0:51:20
Things get better.

JOANNA 0:51:22
That’s yeah, that’s that’s in my head now. Forever. It’s been on and off in my head since the trailers. It’s a lovely song. I love that they’re using it in the series, but they couldn’t have picked something more fucking earwormy could they?

FRANCINE 0:51:37
No.

JOANNA 0:51:37
Fun fact, by the way, the song has a Celeste or something, a Celestine, something like

FRANCINE 0:51:45
that in it, which is like a glockenspiel x-ray type x-ray xylophone type thing.

JOANNA 0:51:52
Wow, my brain is just fucking playing crossword with itself today. One of the things in that is a heavenly instrument. Excellent. I’m going to start a band called glockenspiel x-ray.

FRANCINE 0:52:04
Love that.

JOANNA 0:52:06
So we get a brief Shaxs popping in to threaten, attempt to threaten Crowley and asking about this big miracle because everyone’s clocked it. And then we get Aziraphale going to see Maggie, who is not crying over Nina. Not happening. So she explains that it’s Every Day by Buddy Holly and Norman Petty, and she gives him a copy of the single and explains that there’s a pub in Edinburgh with a jukebox that turns every record into every day.

FRANCINE 0:52:31
Yes.

JOANNA 0:52:32
Little Queen moment. Yeah, so for people who’ve watched the show and not read the book, there’s a joke in the book that every tape, because it’s tapes in 1992, but obviously become CDs, left in a car for more than two weeks turns into Queen’s greatest hits. And that’s why in the first season you have Queen playing as Crowley drives. Well, same in this season, actually, I did notice that. We’ve only had one so far.

FRANCINE 0:52:55
Yeah, but it was Queen. Old fashioned lover boy.

JOANNA 0:52:58
A couple of scenes from now. So yeah, that’s extent. I’m wondering if we’re going to get more in the car or not, whether they’re going to move the concept up to the jukebox in Edinburgh, all the records turning into Every Day by

FRANCINE 0:53:10
Buddy Holly.

JOANNA 0:53:11
I do also like in the background of that scene, playing in the record shop is You Don’t Have to Say You Love Me by Dusty Springfield. Oh, because it’s a song I really love. And the history of the song is quite weird.

FRANCINE 0:53:24
She heard it in Italian and couldn’t sing in Italian.

JOANNA 0:53:28
I didn’t really speak Italian. And so this song got written, which isn’t really a direct translation of the Italian version at all.

FRANCINE 0:53:34
Oh, nice. I like that.

JOANNA 0:53:36
It has been used in a Richard Curtis film.

FRANCINE 0:53:39
Has it now?

JOANNA 0:53:40
But not in a romantic scene. It was used in The Boat That Rocked, which is a fun movie.

FRANCINE 0:53:45
I highly recommend it.

JOANNA 0:53:46
It’s a good watch. Really good cast in it. Lots of the Richard Curtis standards. I think Bill Nighy’s in it. But yeah, so I was wondering if that was meant to be like a reference to a particular Richard Curtis film, because I could have sworn it was in Four Weddings and a Funeral somewhere.

FRANCINE 0:54:01
But Boat That Rocked.

JOANNA 0:54:03
Is it around here that we get, this is where it is in my notes. Sorry, as I say, I lost track of the scenes eventually. But I’ve got Lazarus being one unit of Miracle. Yeah, that’s the next scene. The angels show up to visit Aziraphale. And somehow completely oblivious to Gabriel being there and talking to them. And yeah, they use Lazarus as a measurement for Miracles, which is one of my favourite

FRANCINE 0:54:26
little bits in this.

JOANNA 0:54:28
I would say in that scene, actually, and one of the scenes before, it’s quite nice how they’ve done a disabled angel and how they’ve, I was, because I was saying to Jack, what’s her name?

FRANCINE 0:54:37
Sorry.

JOANNA 0:54:38
Liz Carr. Sarah Kell’s the character.

FRANCINE 0:54:40
Sarah Kell. Sarah Kell. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:54:42
I was like, oh man, imagine going from having your cool hovering chair in heaven to go to London where all these buildings like grandfathered in with no ramps. And then she just like magic. And I was like, oh, there we go. I did like the detail of her just miracleing herself an excess ramp. I like the character as well. It wasn’t specifically written for a disabled actor or anything. They just love what Liz Carr did and incorporated into the character. It’s really nicely done. And it is always nice to see a disabled actor and not have their character focused on their disability.

FRANCINE 0:55:11
Yeah, no, exactly. Anyway.

JOANNA 0:55:13
Oh, yeah, this is also where we get the flyswat with the big heavy Bible. And then Aziraphale and Crowley go to the pub. The Dirty Donkey. The Dirty Donkey.

FRANCINE 0:55:22
What is that a real pub name? I don’t know.

JOANNA 0:55:24
I didn’t think to check.

FRANCINE 0:55:26
Okay.

JOANNA 0:55:27
The Resurrectionist is not. It was because that was one of the tweets or something from months and months ago when somebody realized the whatever pub it was had been renamed The Resurrectionist for the sake

FRANCINE 0:55:39
of a shoot. Let’s have a look. Dirty Donkey Pub. There’s one in Hereford.

JOANNA 0:55:46
Probably not that one. Not that one.

FRANCINE 0:55:47
No. I think I think we can assume this is a fictional pub. Yes, I know.

JOANNA 0:55:52
But it’s Neil Gaiman.

FRANCINE 0:55:53
So it might be a cool reference. Yeah, we’ll keep an eye out.

JOANNA 0:55:56
Dirty Donkey may come back. No, that sounds ominous.

FRANCINE 0:55:59
Anyway, they go to the pub.

JOANNA 0:56:00
We meet Mr. Brown, chairman of the Wickham Street Shopkeepers and Street Traders Association. God, that was uncomfortable. This is Tim Downey, who is a, is a funny actor. He’s in lots of British comedy things. He’s in Toast of London and he’s also in Plebs at one point. And he’s done lots of bits like that. And he is very funny. And I, it’s incredibly uncomfortable and unpleasant. And I also love this sort of character.

FRANCINE 0:56:26
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:56:27
This is like Bill Patterson.

FRANCINE 0:56:29
I can’t remember.

JOANNA 0:56:30
R.A. something. His character in the first season, the one that is in the Neighbourhood Watch. Yeah, just like the low stakes force of nature.

FRANCINE 0:56:39
Yes. Yeah.

JOANNA 0:56:40
Everyone in the community, like, knows him and doesn’t like him type guy.

FRANCINE 0:56:44
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:56:46
The tailored do-si for our Gilmore Girls fans. And we live in a town that has a few of these sorts as well.

FRANCINE 0:56:54
We do.

JOANNA 0:56:54
So it’s, it’s relatable. So yeah, he wants Aziraphale to host this get together of the association to talk about bins. Which is the sort of thing that a Mr. Brown would enjoy. So Aziraphale explains to Crowley that they’ve got to get Maggie and Nina together because he’s used them as the excuse for this miracle that happened.

FRANCINE 0:57:13
Yes.

JOANNA 0:57:15
So they’re debating their ideas of romance.

FRANCINE 0:57:18
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:57:19
Rainstorm, canopy, wet staring into each other’s eyes. That’s how relationships start, right?

FRANCINE 0:57:24
Yeah, 100%.

JOANNA 0:57:26
So Crowley’s got it entirely from Richard Curtis films. Which I wanted.

FRANCINE 0:57:31
No, yes, that way around. Sorry, no, yes.

JOANNA 0:57:33
Cotillion is Michael Sheen, is it?

FRANCINE 0:57:34
Yes.

JOANNA 0:57:35
Yeah, Michael Sheen’s doing Jane Austen, Crowley’s doing Richard Curtis. Oh, that’s right. Because Crowley’s like, what, Jane Austen?

FRANCINE 0:57:40
With the brandy smuggler.

JOANNA 0:57:42
Yeah, the brandy smuggler, diamond thief, super spy.

FRANCINE 0:57:44
I love that bit.

JOANNA 0:57:46
I was slightly tempted. I had a little Google just in case. And it does look like she was associated with some smugglers, certainly.

FRANCINE 0:57:52
Of course she was.

JOANNA 0:57:54
Good old Jane Austen. She danced with a couple of times and wrote some letters about Captain Corvée James Dauvigny, who was a Jersey born, which is why I like him. Smuggler extraordinaire.

FRANCINE 0:58:06
Marvellous.

JOANNA 0:58:06
But I think did not probably smuggle brandy herself. I would like to take a moment as well, with Crowley, having mentioned Richard Curtis using rainstorms to create love in films. The ridiculous moment from the end of Four Weddings and a Funeral, where she says, is it still raining? I hadn’t noticed while standing in a torrential downpour, having just confessed her love to Hugh Grant. Because this is one of the saddest, cringiest, most wonderful moments in any romantic comedy. So you get humans wet and have a staring at each other’s eyes. That’s just how it goes.

FRANCINE 0:58:41
Yep.

JOANNA 0:58:43
I want to rewatch that now.

FRANCINE 0:58:45
God, I love it.

JOANNA 0:58:46
I cry so much in Four Weddings and a Funeral, because I am incredibly original. Also, Aziraphale saying that Maggie has a pash for Nina. Oh my God, yeah, I read it as well. I was like, wow, I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone use that outside of Ms Magazine in 2003. I mean, I’ve heard it, it’s like Irish saying, pashing means snooking.

FRANCINE 0:59:08
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:59:08
So I’ve heard it in that context.

FRANCINE 0:59:10
Yeah.

JOANNA 0:59:11
But not in having a pash on someone. I might bring it back.

FRANCINE 0:59:17
Yeah, I like it.

JOANNA 0:59:21
But do it anyway, it’ll be funny. So anyway, so they go back to the bookshop because Aziraphale wants to show Crowley a clue.

FRANCINE 0:59:27
The clue.

JOANNA 0:59:28
The clue, the Buddy Holly song. But Crowley starts getting aggressive, and this is where he pushes Gabriel into remembering. He says, I remember when the morning stars sang together, and you get this flash of purple eyes before he struggles.

FRANCINE 0:59:41
Aziraphale’s…

JOANNA 0:59:41
We’ve just seen earlier in the episode, Gabriel with the butterflies. It’s kind of a… Nice reminder. Remember, this is what the angel looks like.

FRANCINE 0:59:48
Yeah, so that’s him.

JOANNA 0:59:49
So you mentioned the x-ray thing you can do on Amazon Prime. There’s also in the x-ray thing, a bunch of trivia for all the episodes.

FRANCINE 0:59:55
Okay.

JOANNA 0:59:55
So I’m not listing off everything that was in there because that would get really boring. But one detail is that the sort of purple eye color for Gabriel is partly inspired by Liz Taylor.

FRANCINE 1:00:05
Okay.

JOANNA 1:00:06
Because she had these incredible, almost violet eyes.

FRANCINE 1:00:10
Okay.

JOANNA 1:00:11
So I like that.

FRANCINE 1:00:12
Cool.

JOANNA 1:00:12
Yeah.

FRANCINE 1:00:13
Why don’t… How do I get to that trivia bit? That’s a few…

JOANNA 1:00:16
I can’t… I was using the Prime app on my smart TV was very temperamental, but on my computer, you can just click on it and yeah.

FRANCINE 1:00:23
Okay.

JOANNA 1:00:23
I was doing that as I went through. So yes, Jim remembers when the Morningstar sang together. And yeah, Aziraphale’s so gentle with him after he struggles with this remembering moment and says, you know, you’ve done awfully well and go and take a rest.

FRANCINE 1:00:36
Yeah.

JOANNA 1:00:39
And this is where you get Crowley and Aziraphale then remembering Job. And we go into the mini episode, the Minisoad.

FRANCINE 1:00:45
Minisoad.

JOANNA 1:00:45
I don’t know how much the Minisoad concept just doesn’t work for me because the portmanteau word Minisoad makes me want to set fire to things. It’s horrible to say. I feel like if nobody had told you it was a Minisoad, you’d be absolutely fine as I am. So it’s a flashback. It’s fine. I don’t like Minisoad. But yeah, so the Morningstar sang together bit. That is, again, that’s a biblical thing and I’ll go into it a little bit.

FRANCINE 1:01:06
But Lucifer is also referred to in a lot of biblical things as Lucifer Morningstar because

JOANNA 1:01:15
he was the brightest of the angels. So I think there’s a… That’s an interesting bit.

FRANCINE 1:01:19
Very good. I like that.

JOANNA 1:01:21
Anyway, so yeah, so we get Crowley visiting Job and Cytus with his excuses. I’m sorry, I think you mean Buildad the Shuite. Sorry, Buildad the Shuite. A hero to us all. Someone I’ve got a bit of a passion for. Cobbler and obstetrician. I gave up halfway through that word. Cobbler and midwife extraordinaire. Absolutely. So Job is played by Peter Davison, who you may know of as the fifth doctor. His daughter is Georgia Moffat, who happens to be married to David Tennant. So that would be David Tennant’s father. David Tennant, the doctor, with his father-in-law, the doctor.

FRANCINE 1:02:07
Playing.

JOANNA 1:02:08
Georgia Moffat, who also played the doctor’s daughter. That’s kind of weird when you say it like that. Let’s not get into that family tree. It goes across far too many dimensions we don’t have access to. And we should not have access to. And Cytus is played by Andy Osho, who was also in The Sandman. Which, if you’ve seen yet, you should watch that.

FRANCINE 1:02:27
Sorry. Francine.

JOANNA 1:02:29
I watched the first episode, it’s good. Of course, just watch the rest now. It’s long and depressing. All right, yeah, it is quite long and depressing. Anyway, so Crowley goes to the mansion, and they’re outside, and Iserfell’s trying to intercede and stop Crowley from killing Job’s children. Tell you what, it says that Crowley didn’t kill the goats, he just turned them into crows.

FRANCINE 1:02:48
Crotes. Crotes!

JOANNA 1:02:51
But like in a crow way. I can’t do a crow-goat noise. I’m not gonna try.

FRANCINE 1:02:55
Okay, that’s for the best.

JOANNA 1:02:57
You wrote crotes, spelt crow-T-S in the plan, and I was staring at it for a while trying to work out, did I try and write Crowley and get distracted? I was just trying to make a portmanteau. And yeah, we start getting this whole Minnesota thing kind of centers on this argument about free will, or this idea of free will between Iserfell and Crowley, and this tension between them. Because for Crowley, you know, he chose to fall, or sort of vaguely downwards, and in doing so, embraced this idea of having free will and choosing for himself. And Iserfell, like, especially at this point, still feels like he doesn’t need it. He just needs to do what God wants.

FRANCINE 1:03:36
Yeah.

JOANNA 1:03:37
And it’s never really resolved between them, like, up to the present day stuff. Even as he’s intimidated by Gabriel, and, you know, heaven tried to kill him, Iserfell can’t help but think of, like, heaven slash God slash upstairs as the good guys. He never really resolved the whole thing where he didn’t get to speak to God, he only got to speak to the Metatron. And so I think in his head, somehow he’s just like, it’s ineffable. It’s ineffable. She’s got a good reason, we just don’t know it. He still thinks she’s all right. And then, yeah, we go into the mansion itself and meet Job’s dickhead children. That was good. I liked that. So along with David Tennant’s father-in-law, Peter Davison, we have Enon, played by Ty Tennant, David Tennant’s son.

FRANCINE 1:04:17
Oh, Jesus.

JOANNA 1:04:19
This was sort of known already. They’d, like, shared not full pictures of them in costume. They didn’t want people to know which episode it was, but, like, some little pictures and said, like, the three of them are in an episode together. And it was some really fun moments of them, all three working together. I think it’s very sweet. And also, like, Ty Tennant is good. Yeah, I know who he was. Neffe baby extraordinaire.

FRANCINE 1:04:39
Love it.

JOANNA 1:04:40
He plays, like, little shit really well here. He’s also great. He’s in House of the Dragon, and he was really great in that as well, playing a little shit.

FRANCINE 1:04:47
Nice.

JOANNA 1:04:49
I haven’t seen Ty Tennant- Maybe when he grows up, he’ll be less tight-cast. Yeah, I haven’t seen him in anything where he’s not playing an entitled little shit. And the other two kids, we have Kezia, played by Sienna Arif Knights, who, one of the only other things she’s done is a Mallory Towers TV series. I didn’t know there was a Mallory Towers TV series. Absolutely gonna go and watch that. I fucking loved those books.

FRANCINE 1:05:09
Excellent. And don’t want to reread them,

JOANNA 1:05:11
because I’m sure I’ll discover that they were horribly racist in some ways. Yeah, probably. Happy to leave reading in a blight in my past, but I’ll watch an adaptation. And the youngest one, Jemima, is Cherry Mitra, and this is her first major acting role. She made a pot. She made a pot. I loved her. I thought she was great.

FRANCINE 1:05:28
I made a pot.

JOANNA 1:05:29
Also daughter of Jove. And yeah, Crowley threatens them with all sorts of burning hellfire, and then takes them down into the cellar and turns them into lizards. I like the revelation that the way that God favours Jove is like proper, proper weird favouritism stuff. Not just like it’s granted in prosperity or whatever, but it’s like the angels will go and fetch them wine for the party and things like that. How much do you think that the angels have kind of goaded God into this, because they resent being used as errant beings.

FRANCINE 1:06:01
Absolutely.

JOANNA 1:06:02
And they got really sick of the kids demanding wine. I quite like the detail that they made these kids little shits and they still like got saved. Like, it’s been sweet little innocent babies. Like, they might have been a bit more heartstring-pully at that moment, but it wouldn’t have been as like, obviously you can save the cute little innocent baby goats and nice children, but the horrible spoiled children. Yeah. You can, there’s the sense of, you sure you want me to save these? Yeah. Although Jemima seems sweet. She didn’t even annoy Crowley enough to be turned into a lizard until she asked. Yeah. But you start also getting Crowley saying over and again,

FRANCINE 1:06:35
I’m a demon, I lie.

JOANNA 1:06:38
Which is a good detail. And yeah, then we go into the cellar.

FRANCINE 1:06:43
Yes.

JOANNA 1:06:44
And while the kids are busy lizarding, Crowley tempts Aziraphale into trying human food for the first time.

FRANCINE 1:06:51
Yep. Love that. I love this. He gets, yeah, just the moment of corruption,

JOANNA 1:06:58
very visceral, tearing meat off the bone type stuff. That’s extremely…

FRANCINE 1:07:03
Yeah, it’s not delicate.

JOANNA 1:07:04
And normally Aziraphale is so delicate and fastidious. Like, there’s the scene of him like eating sushi in season one. Yeah. You could have made it like him having a sip of wine for the first time or like, yeah, just this delicate little like a grape off the plate thing. But no, it was like tearing into ox ribs. Yeah. Like it was, it was uncomfortable to watch. Yeah, exactly. I love that.

FRANCINE 1:07:23
Because it really showed that corruption.

JOANNA 1:07:25
Yeah, absolutely. In a way that like a delicate sip or a bite of something wouldn’t in quite the same way.

FRANCINE 1:07:31
Yeah, exactly.

JOANNA 1:07:31
And you get this kind of continuation of this like free will and side discussion.

FRANCINE 1:07:37
Yeah.

JOANNA 1:07:38
With the two of them and Crowley saying, you know, it’s not lonely doing what he does. I think that’s in the scene. And Aziraphale still insisting, even as he’s being tempted for the first time, that no, the heavenly way is the right way.

FRANCINE 1:07:48
Yeah, of course. And yet. And yet.

JOANNA 1:07:52
And so we go into the next scene, as the hellish storm was abated. We see Job talking to God, who mentions Wales a lot, which I think is, is, is like, again, if you read the story of Job and the stuff in the Bible,

FRANCINE 1:08:06
there’s all this stuff about the Leviathan.

JOANNA 1:08:08
And it’s part of this poetic discourse. And it’s also Job’s friends arguing with God of why are you doing this to him? And then it is this thing of, who are you to ask me what I’m doing? Did you make the Morningstar sing?

FRANCINE 1:08:18
Yeah. And then we finally tie the flashback into the where we’d left.

JOANNA 1:08:22
Yeah, this coming. But I like the whales as well as a callback from season one, when they’re having this sort of drunk conversation about why the earth should be saved. And Crowley uses the argument of, you know, whales, full of brains, whole ocean full of brains.

FRANCINE 1:08:35
Yeah.

JOANNA 1:08:36
And then the whale is getting. And then the whale is getting fucked. Crackened is a better verb than fucked. It’s more specific, certainly. So yeah, so the angels appear on to Job and Citus, who are obviously not happy, especially when they realise that even as this is over, and they’re getting everything back to full, their children are still dead. Yeah. And that’s such a, I love that as a demonstration of how inhuman the angels are.

FRANCINE 1:09:03
And that the, what’s the matter?

JOANNA 1:09:05
We’re giving you children back, we’re giving you seven children instead of three. And they can’t understand that the fact they’re not the same children is important. They don’t understand the human concept of love. And I feel like that’s going to come back throughout the season. But Aziraphale gets it without it being explained to him, I think, which shows that he’s on this different level already.

FRANCINE 1:09:25
Because, like, before we get to, like, when they’re discussing it, Aziraphale gets it. Yeah.

JOANNA 1:09:32
Like, he knows it’s not the same. Aziraphale is the one of the representatives on earth. He’s spent a lot more time around humans. So he’s learned the empathy that the higher up angels never have.

FRANCINE 1:09:42
Yeah.

JOANNA 1:09:43
They’re too busy looking at the big picture to remember the individuals. Whereas Aziraphale is all about the individuals. Yeah. He’s primed at this point for the moment of corruption, I think.

FRANCINE 1:09:52
And then…

JOANNA 1:09:52
Yeah. And it’s a very unique form of corruption. Not so much the, you know, chowing down on an ox, but corruption by being too empathetic.

FRANCINE 1:10:02
Yeah. By caring too much. Yeah.

JOANNA 1:10:05
So yes, you have Crowley as Bildad, the Shuwait, coming in to help out with childbirth. And this… I didn’t clock until my second watch, the ribs were the ox ribs.

FRANCINE 1:10:16
Oh! Yeah. Okay. They’ve not just done a miracle.

JOANNA 1:10:19
I thought they’d done some weird little miracle there.

FRANCINE 1:10:21
Yeah, right. That’s what I thought the first time I watched it.

JOANNA 1:10:23
And then I realized the second time that he’s kept the ribs from the ox. And they were huge ribs. Yeah. That makes sense. Okay. Yeah. And yeah, and they bring the original three children back. Yeah. Yes. And Job is not a smart man. No, but he gets there. We get there eventually. I think we’re underlining Michael as the cleverest of the archangels as well.

FRANCINE 1:10:43
They seem like his old children. But yeah, that was good. So yeah.

JOANNA 1:10:50
Aziraphale lying. He lies. That’s the point.

FRANCINE 1:10:53
Yeah.

JOANNA 1:10:53
That’s his moment of now I’ve been… now he’s been corrupted and he steps out of the black and white into the grey.

FRANCINE 1:10:59
Yes. We love a grey area. We do love a grey area.

JOANNA 1:11:02
Little white line making him grey. So that’s sort of the end of the minisode and we go back into… back to the present day in the bookshop. And I love the moment where Aziraphale says to Gabriel, you really used to be quite awful. Especially because we’ve… if you think about how much time has actually passed, obviously we’ve just watched this whole Job thing. Not much time has actually passed in the bookshop. So we’ve just had Aziraphale being really caring towards Gabriel and you’ve done enough. And then he’s remembered this and he’s like, you’re a prick.

FRANCINE 1:11:32
Yeah. Yeah. It’s a little… yeah.

JOANNA 1:11:35
As long as this moment of, again, sort of corruption of

FRANCINE 1:11:39
why am I helping this guy and caring for him?

JOANNA 1:11:43
And yeah, realising you don’t… you don’t have a reason, you just do. You’re doing it because it’s the right thing, not because you want to do it.

FRANCINE 1:11:49
Yeah. And the right thing by your own personal morality, not by a preset morality.

JOANNA 1:11:54
And also because something horrible is apparently going to happen. Yeah. Well, something horrible. True. Yeah. So Aziraphale tells Gabriel that he used to be a dick and then Crowley has wandered off and gone to chat to Nina about awnings. Just to check. So Aziraphale finishes telling Crowley about the record and then asks for the use of the Bentley to pop up to Edinburgh and investigate this. Which is, yeah, it’s interesting. That was an interesting scene. I wasn’t really sure what I was being shown. Well, it’s this, again, slightly uneven way they view their relationship.

FRANCINE 1:12:33
Yeah.

JOANNA 1:12:34
It’s going back to that thing from the first episode of I’ve carved out versus we’ve carved out. Aziraphale, I think, genuinely does think of the bookshop as Crowley’s as much as his.

FRANCINE 1:12:46
Yeah.

JOANNA 1:12:46
And, you know, assumes Crowley’s not staying there because he’s got something better. Yeah. If you look back at the first season, I feel like that was almost reversed at one point during the bit where David Tennant was trying to persuade Aziraphale to run away with him.

FRANCINE 1:13:01
Yeah.

JOANNA 1:13:01
And Aziraphale kept underlining, we are separate. Yeah. And even before that as well, when, you know, David Tennant wants the holy water and eventually Crowley gives it to him and he won’t accept a lift in the car. You go too fast for me.

FRANCINE 1:13:15
Oh, yeah.

JOANNA 1:13:17
So I think stepping out from under Heaven’s yoke has kind of made Aziraphale more confident and in that just has assumed that this is more shared than Crowley sees it.

FRANCINE 1:13:27
Although he still doesn’t want Crowley driving.

JOANNA 1:13:30
Well, someone needs to keep an eye on Gabriel.

FRANCINE 1:13:31
Yes.

JOANNA 1:13:32
Yeah. It’s interesting. Yeah. Aziraphale being the one to go up rather than sending Crowley. I think he’s more trust Crowley with Gabriel than trust Crowley trying to solve the Gabriel problem. Yeah, there are fewer ways he can go off on a weird tangent.

FRANCINE 1:13:49
Yeah.

JOANNA 1:13:49
If he’s given this task, which I’m sure there are plenty of ways he will go off on a weird tangent. But in theory. We’ll find out in the next episode. But it might just be Aziraphale wants to go and do something

FRANCINE 1:14:01
for himself.

JOANNA 1:14:02
Yeah, he does seem like he has a very cloistered life still. Yeah, he’s still very in his bookshop. And obviously, they’ve both traveled around a fair bit as we’ve seen.

FRANCINE 1:14:13
Yeah.

JOANNA 1:14:14
But yeah, I think having the opportunity to just go off and do something and having a bit of purpose is obviously really important to Aziraphale.

FRANCINE 1:14:20
Yeah.

JOANNA 1:14:21
And it feels like he doesn’t- It’s his clue. He found it. He’s not stupid. I think he knows that Crowley does not think of the Bentley as shared.

FRANCINE 1:14:29
Yeah.

JOANNA 1:14:30
He’s just pretty sure if he establishes, I think of it as shared, and I think you should think of it as shared, that Crowley will probably go along with it.

FRANCINE 1:14:38
Yeah.

JOANNA 1:14:39
And he’s almost like testing his newfound independence and how far he can push that sort of thing.

FRANCINE 1:14:44
Yeah.

JOANNA 1:14:45
I find it really fascinating, like the relationship between the two of them.

FRANCINE 1:14:48
That’s an interesting dynamic.

JOANNA 1:14:51
Something I want to talk about having like watched the Job bit specifically. So we like the opening title sequence in the first season was slightly different in each episode and had different stuff in it. This season, it’s the same for both episodes. And we’d seen the opening title sequence already. It got released on Twitter and stuff like I think at least a month ago, possibly longer. So after watching the second episode and then looking at the title sequence again, I realized that there’s a big chunk of the title sequence that is the Job thing. You see that the goat’s being burned and yeah. So then watching the title sequence in mind that like, hey, this might be like

FRANCINE 1:15:25
episodes of the show.

JOANNA 1:15:27
Some fucked up shit’s gonna happen. I feel like things are gonna get a bit weird. Yeah, yeah, for sure. So anyways, we go to the final season of the episode before I wildly take us off on tangents. And we’re back in 2500 BC and Aziraphale meets Crowley on a beach and Aziraphale thinks he’s got to go to hell and become a demon. Now he thinks he’s fallen because he’s lied and he didn’t follow God’s will. But Crowley’s like, well, I’m not going to tell anyone.

FRANCINE 1:15:51
Yeah, it’s fine. Don’t worry about it.

JOANNA 1:15:53
He has to keep this secret forever, which is a huge punishment for him. I think he knows it’s going to be a huge burden.

FRANCINE 1:15:59
But yeah, you know, he thinks it’s so bad that he’s automatically damned forever.

JOANNA 1:16:05
But this is his first taste of not just blindly following God’s will. And it’s huge and it’s really scary for him. Although he did give his sword away. He did give his sword away. But he wasn’t explicitly told not to. There’s no loophole here. You straight up lied.

FRANCINE 1:16:21
Yeah.

JOANNA 1:16:22
And he knows he lied. And this is where Crowley admits to actually being quite lonely and again, brings back that motif. I’m a demon.

FRANCINE 1:16:31
I lie. Yeah.

JOANNA 1:16:33
And in that, there’s Aziraphale learning. I’m always going to feel a little bit lonely because I’m not going to feel like one of them anymore.

FRANCINE 1:16:39
Yeah.

JOANNA 1:16:40
And it’s a few, you know, it’s a good millennia or millennia and a bit until they reach the deal where they become in regular contact.

FRANCINE 1:16:47
And it’s more than a millennia, like three or four. Oh, yeah.

JOANNA 1:16:53
Sorry, we’re in BC, aren’t we?

FRANCINE 1:16:54
Yeah. So it’s Shakespeare, isn’t it? Shakespeare Day. If they make the first deal. Yes. Yeah.

JOANNA 1:17:01
I think it was like the sort of medieval one where they realized that they’re cancelling each other out and could go home and do nothing.

FRANCINE 1:17:07
That’s it.

JOANNA 1:17:07
Yes.

FRANCINE 1:17:08
The knights thing. Yeah.

JOANNA 1:17:09
And then the Shakespeare thing is where they, I think, make slightly more of a deal.

FRANCINE 1:17:13
Yeah.

JOANNA 1:17:14
And that final shot before I go to the credits, the two of them on the rock and one in black, one in white and a space between them. That was gorgeously shot.

FRANCINE 1:17:25
That’s really, really beautiful.

JOANNA 1:17:28
I think we’ve seen so many images of them, like interlocked with each other. And I’m not talking about like the fan art. There’s plenty of fan art of them interlocked with each other. Yeah, my Twitter algorithm went down that far for a little while. Like, no, stop it. I’m not that kind of fan. No shade on those who are. It’s just I’m not a teenager anymore. But imagery like within the show, we see them, you know, we see wings folding over each other and we see them clinking glasses. There’s a sense of togetherness. So seeing them in black and white with that space between them.

FRANCINE 1:18:07
Yes.

JOANNA 1:18:08
Especially in an episode where Aziraphale is literally about to go drive to the other end

FRANCINE 1:18:12
of the landmass. And it’s this black and white against that hugely saturated background as well.

JOANNA 1:18:19
Yeah, the blue sea and the blue sky and the yellow rocks in there.

FRANCINE 1:18:22
Yeah. Yeah.

JOANNA 1:18:24
They’re black and white and in a world of colour.

FRANCINE 1:18:26
And yeah.

Easter Eggs and Favourite Moments

JOANNA 1:18:30
What nice episodes. So we have some bestos. Some little awards for the episode. So favourite quote slash line delivery. When Aziraphale’s on about, come on, you have to come and see the clue. And David Tennant says, don’t pronounce the capital letter.

FRANCINE 1:18:49
That was very Pratchett, I thought. That was a very Pratchetty moment.

JOANNA 1:18:53
I’m going with I long to kill the blameless children of blameless Job and I’m not going to try and do it. But the way David Tennant delivers that line.

FRANCINE 1:19:02
The kind of furious sarcasm. Yeah, definitely.

JOANNA 1:19:07
Really like stop thinking well of me.

FRANCINE 1:19:09
Yeah.

JOANNA 1:19:10
And then immediately undone by the. And highlighting within the sentence how unfair it would be to kill these kids because they’re blameless and Job’s blameless.

FRANCINE 1:19:20
And yeah. Yeah.

JOANNA 1:19:22
I’m an evil demon. Easter eggs. So go with yours. And I’ve got a little list because there’s a ton.

FRANCINE 1:19:30
And yeah, sure. Yeah.

JOANNA 1:19:33
So I went, it was a nice day. It’s one of the first lines of books that Jon Hamm read out. And obviously that is the first one from Good Omens. The other two, we’ve got Jane Austen and Ian Banks. And yeah, obviously just a nice little one there. Rule of three, the last one at the end there. Kind of also giving it the nice overly poetic to thudding. You have the day my grandmother exploded. Little thuddy there. Is a truth universally acknowledged. Oh, lovely and floral. And then it was a nice day.

FRANCINE 1:20:03
Very Pratchett. It was beautiful.

JOANNA 1:20:06
And yeah, it was nice because you see the front page of Good Omens. So it’s very like, if you know, you know, and you can see all the days have been nice so far.

FRANCINE 1:20:12
And yeah.

JOANNA 1:20:13
And the score does a really beautiful little moment. Sort of like Gabriel sort of looks at it and says, oh, that’s better. And shelves it. And the score just does a very nice soft strings moment. That’s almost like the score going, oh, this nice thing we care about.

FRANCINE 1:20:26
Yeah. Yeah.

JOANNA 1:20:29
The day my grandmother exploded is Crow Road by Iain Banks, who is a friend of Neil Gaiman’s, I believe.

FRANCINE 1:20:32
Oh, cool.

JOANNA 1:20:33
And then obviously we get the nice Pride and Prejudice reference from Brandy smuggler extraordinaire Jane Austen.

FRANCINE 1:20:39
Absolutely.

JOANNA 1:20:40
My new favourite criminal. A couple of other Easter eggs I noticed that I really liked in the coffee shop during the scene where Crowley’s ordering the six espressos. There’s a classic version, strings version of Bohemian Rhapsody playing. Oh, cute. Love that. The newspaper that Crowley is reading in St James’s Park has the headline, Is Tadfield the best village in Britain?

FRANCINE 1:21:00
Well, there you go.

JOANNA 1:21:01
As I was saying, I love the little looks at rather than cuts to, do you know what I mean? I want it referenced in Easter eggs, not in how are they now?

FRANCINE 1:21:11
Yeah.

JOANNA 1:21:12
And my favourite moment in the bookshop scene where the angels are visiting Aziraphale and Gabriel is demonstrating the wonderful things you can do with books, such as using them as a fly

FRANCINE 1:21:22
swat.

JOANNA 1:21:23
The book he uses to demonstrate using them as a fan is The Colour of Magic.

FRANCINE 1:21:27
Oh, super. Well done.

JOANNA 1:21:29
So that and the Bible. The two important books. The two most important books. The old Easter egg is still in there. The Pratchett’s hat is still in the bookshop.

FRANCINE 1:21:38
It is.

JOANNA 1:21:40
And new award for this visual medium we are discussing, the Character Does a Little Face Award.

FRANCINE 1:21:46
Oh, yes.

JOANNA 1:21:46
Yours is right at the beginning. So I’m sneaking in an extra award here, but both go to David Tennant as Crowley, first for his look of wonder as the universe starts and then his crestfallen face when Aziraphale tells him it’s getting shut down in 6,000 years.

FRANCINE 1:22:02
David Tennant’s little face. Oh, yes.

JOANNA 1:22:05
For me, I’ve got the when the coffee shop lady mentions the naked man in your bookshop and Crowley’s eyebrow, just one of them, shoots all the way up into his hairline. Kudoman’s giving us what we truly want, which is gayer and with more eyebrows. Exactly. That is the gayest with most eyebrow award of the… Also, surely we’ve got a special mention because you said you were looking forward specifically to Michael Sheen’s poor little face when he’s sad, when he goes, not the children. Yeah, no, he does get a special bonus award for that. I feel like Michael Sheen’s little face doing something sad always gets this award. We just can also give it to some other characters.

FRANCINE 1:22:45
Yeah, yeah.

JOANNA 1:22:46
Or Michael Sheen for other facial expressions.

FRANCINE 1:22:48
Yes.

JOANNA 1:22:49
I better announce Michael Sheen and his little face. Lifetime achievement award to Michael Sheen’s little face. It wouldn’t be an episode of the true show make you fret without helicopter and loincloth watch.

FRANCINE 1:23:03
Go on.

JOANNA 1:23:04
So for helicopters, I am awarding to geese, big angry ducks.

FRANCINE 1:23:08
Oh, sure. That’s good.

JOANNA 1:23:10
And of course, loincloth goes to Gabriel’s fabulous blanket toga. Yes, eventually upgraded to a suit, but I think we’re all sad. I’m not a suit sweater vest type thing. Yeah, we all miss Gabriel’s blanket toga. Yeah, costume wise. I was enjoying the evolving robes of the angelic hordes, by the way. Oh, yeah, the different and the evolving Gabriel hairstyles. Yeah. That was a fun detail.

FRANCINE 1:23:34
I love that they eventually upgraded the suits. Yeah. Did you just say Hevel? I did.

JOANNA 1:23:38
And I was wondering whether to correct myself. Just brought it up for you.

FRANCINE 1:23:43
No, no, it’s good. It’s fine. I’m a good friend. And they’ve got fashion in heaven.

JOANNA 1:23:46
I mean, that is probably not everything we could say about episode one and two of Good Omens. Definitely not. It’s only so many hours in the day that you dear listeners get to listen, have to listen to this.

FRANCINE 1:23:58
Yeah.

JOANNA 1:23:59
And we’ve still got four episodes of the show to talk about. So we are going to be back next week. So on the 7th, to talk about episodes three and four of Good Omens season two. All the wrong windows open. So we won’t be spoiling anything past three and four in case you are watching along with us. Until next week, dear listener, you can follow us on Instagram at the true sham make he fret. Join us on Twitter. I’m not calling it X at make he fret pod. We’re also on blue sky now at make he fret pod. We’re on Facebook at the true sham make he fret. You can join our subreddit community r slash TTSNYF. Join our new discord link will be in the show notes for that as well. You can email us your thoughts, queries, castles, snacks, angels, demons and big angry ducks. The true sham make he fret pod at gmail.com. And if you want to support any of this financially slash help us get therapy, you can go to patreon.com forward slash the true sham make he fret and exchange your hard earned pennies for all sorts of bonus nonsense. So much nonsense. Until next time, dear listener. To the world.

FRANCINE 1:25:09
Please feel free to use the video clip of me hitting myself in the head with a giant bible

JOANNA 1:25:13
as the promotional clip for this episode.

Transcript – 60: Maskerade Pt 1 (Chekhov’s Chandelier)

Francine: [00:00:00] and I’m wearing pyjama bottoms, one of the few perks of living in the end times. 

Francine: So your eyes are working as, uh, God did not intend now 

Joanna: Exactly. I can see. It’s amazing.

Francine: you’ve got lasers in them. Is that how

Joanna: Yes. That’s how it works. Laser eye surgery is weird, very surreal. This is also, I’m only just allowed to wear makeup again. So I’ve gone overkill today.

Francine: No, it’s good. Your wings look, whatever the correct compliment is. Sharp, is sharp correct?

Joanna: Yes. Yes. On fleek. 

Francine: Yeah. No, I can’t say that

Joanna: there are very few complimentary things I can say without sounding sarcastic. 

Francine: anyway. Yes. You can see properly now and light sensitivity is gone and all that?

Joanna: Mostly. It’s still a bit rah, and too many hours staring at a screen is not great for me. 

Francine: Have you got some orange lenses?

Joanna: uh, no I haven’t, but um, I’ve got the blue light filter on, on the laptop, which helps.

Francine: Oh, that’s the same thing. Pretty much. Yeah.

Joanna: Yeah. And I’ve got, um, my TV, I’ve just set the brightness way down for now. 

A, it’s at a distance and B it’s so rare I’m actually fully paying attention to anything I’m watching ever. 

Francine: speaking of TV. Fuck Downton. Jesus. 

Joanna: Oh God. 

Francine: if, if this goes in the show: listeners, I, a decade after it finished, I think, was persuaded to watch Downton. And I just got to a bit with a scene that I hate and now I don’t feel like watching the rest of it, so…

Joanna: I meant to warn you when you were talking about, uh, like content warnings and things. And then I thought… I can’t remember why I didn’t now.

Francine: probably because it would have needed spoilers by that, at that point. To give you a background on our conversation, listeners, we both kind of disliked Netflix’s – and I guess other stream services’ – default of putting all the trigger warnings for the entire programme at the start of each episode, which means that if I, for instance, really don’t like watching sexual assault or rape scenes– 

Joanna: You don’t know which episode that’s in, because it says it for every single episode. And obviously not every episode of Downton Abbey contains a rape scene. 

Francine: The trigger warning [00:02:00] for it is sexual violence. And because we got to like season four with nothing – pretty much nothing – I was like, oh, was that the kind of like coerced consent thing right at the beginning? Is that what they meant?

I think we’re probably fine now…. And then no. 

Joanna: Yeah. no, I read binged Trueblood recently, because my tastes in TV are ridiculously trashy, and that has a content warning – a vocal one, admittedly, which isn’t always helpful – at the beginning of every episode.

And it’s a specific for the episode content warning, 

Francine: Yeah. I feel like there are definitely websites that do this where you can look it up without too many spoilers.

Joanna: Yeah. There are websites that will give you heads up of triggers for specific episodes. 

Francine: There’s like one called doesthedogdie.com or something? Which I’ve got to start checking. I can’t cope with that. Oh my God. That’s like instant in tears.

Joanna: My old head chef had kids and there were a couple of really good for heads ups of things you’re thinking about watching with kids that might be borderline 

Francine: oh, that’s cool. Yeah. 

Especially as kids, like, all have different thresholds.

Joanna: exactly, and every parent has like a different threshold of what they’re comfortable with their kids seeing like some really don’t mind if there’s some swearing. 

Francine: Yes.

Other things we watched recently!

Joanna: Last night, I went to see, Brooklyn Heights and Nicky Doll, of Drag Race season 11 and 12 respectively, perform songs from the musical Chicago. 

Francine: Goodness. And how was that? 

Joanna: Amazing. I mean, 

Francine: I thought you didn’t like Chicago.

Joanna: I, well, I used to, it used to be one of my favorite musicals and then obviously some events kind of put me off it. So this was a very nice way to get over that issue. Nothing will make me love Velma Kelly again like seeing her portrayed by a six-foot-four Canadian drag queen.

The whole show was great, cause it was built as that, but they obviously had other stuff going on as well. Um, including Harvey rose, who I’d never heard of before, an incredible drag performer. So, full goatee, full, beautifully applied face of makeup, skin type jumpsuit with a skin waist and the arse cut out. 

Six inch [00:04:00] stilettos, dancing and lip-syncing to an electro swing remix of the Real Slim Shady. 

Francine: Huh.

Joanna: It was amazing. 

Francine: Pretty good. 

Joanna: I had a really great time. But it was also really nice– I went with my sister and we got to the theatre and obviously there’s all these people waiting to go into the show, just looking around and realise like I’m in a room full of almost entirely queer people.

And it’s been so long since I’ve done that, because I’ve barely been to anything since the pandemic’s ended – and specifically being in a room full of queer people is its own very calming thing. 

Francine: That’s nice.

Joanna: Also, I got to make fun of my sister for being the token hetero all night. 

Francine: That’ll be me if we go, won’t it, although I don’t think I’m quite as straight as your sister

Joanna: No, one’s quite as straight as my sister.

Francine: There’s a spectrum and I’m a few notches along. 

Joanna: Whereas I have wandered completely off the spectrum because I got bored, saw something shiny and  ran off chasing it.

Francine: You got lost in the woods somewhere.

Joanna: What’s your gender and sexuality? Kidnapped by the Fe…? 

Francine: Yeah, no, that, that scans for you. I’m going to say.

Sorry, I do want to hear about that more when I see you, but…

Joanna: Phantom of the Opera.

Francine: Yes. Um, I quite enjoyed it. I can’t believe I’d not seen it to this point and I’m glad you made me 

watch it because there are definitely references I wouldn’t have gotten. 

Joanna: Charlie (Hi, Charlie!), one of our regular listeners, uh, put it out, actually, not really seen fund from the opera before reading the book either. And it’s when you don’t really need to, because Phantom of the Opera is one of those things that just kind of vaguely lives in the back of your brain via cultural osmosis. 

Francine: Yes. Cultural osmosis.

Joanna: Yeah. Everyone’s aware that it’s a musical about a haunted opera house and the Phantom’s got a mask and there’s a big dramatic song. 

Francine: Yeah. What I didn’t realise is all of the songs I knew were in the first hour.

Joanna: Yeah. Pretty much. I mean, I love Masquerade, the big song, the big number that opens the second act, because costumes. That’s always like such a big, ridiculous spectacle of costumes.

Francine: Yeah. [00:06:00] I can see why it’s not well known outside of the performance though. Like you wouldn’t bring that up on a sing-along musicals  playlist. 

Joanna: Whereas, like, Phantom of the Opera is epic.

Francine: Yes.

Joanna: And Think of Me is really fun, even though I can’t do that because I’m not a soprano anymore. 

Francine: I’ve been, um, trying to explore my Alto range, more kind of learning how to sing in the lower registers, which I always struggled with when I was younger. And honestly, I’m kind of, I’m happy with swapping my extremely high soprano capabilities that I had when I was younger for some lower registers, because it does give you a lot more choice.

Joanna: Yeah. I struggled to belt as well in the lower register. My belting is somewhere like either sort of top of Alto, bottom of mezzo soprano.

Francine: Yeah. I’ve always been shit at belting. I think it’s largely psychological for me, I must say, because I can do it okay in the car, on my own, but even in the house I can’t – I live in terraced housing, and I know somebody might hear.

Joanna: I struggle to do it when I’m doing it in front of people. And I can’t sing with a microphone very well, I think because I learned to sing, you know, we, you and I both grew up doing sort of choir and things, so we never learned to sing with amplification. So I never got the hang of singing into a microphone and how loud that needed to be.

Francine: Yeah. Do you remember the open mic days that we briefly partook in?  My stagefright really was quite horrendous.

Joanna: We also really both struggled with nerves. I got better at speaking into a microphone when I was performing poetry regularly. Like, I got the hang of it and, uh, projecting into a room with a microphone. Um, ’cause nerves used to really get the best of me with that as well. 

Francine: Yeah. Now you are– you come across very confident now, anyway.

Joanna: Yeah. I managed to get over, like, theatrey stage fright. Because I think I was doing it often enough. 

Francine: Hm. And it is, I think we’ve talked about it before, it is different as well because in theatre you are being [00:08:00] somebody 

Joanna: Yeah. so it doesn’t matter how nervous you are. If your character is not nervous, you’re not going to appear nervous. 

Francine: Exactly. Yeah.

Joanna: So, poetry kind of worked around by the character of poet is not nervous. 

Francine: Yes.

Joanna: Now, now we’re in September. I am going through this sort of dilemma of do I do Inktober and do my 32 poems in 31 days again this year.

Francine: I always love it when you do. I will understand if you don’t.

Joanna: I’m, I’m kind of leaning towards no right now, because I feel like I’ve got other work I should really be focusing on. But at the same time, I’ve done it for about five years in a row now. And I’ll miss it if I don’t do it 

Francine: it’ll be the first time you’ve, you’ll be able to do it without having the chef job, because even last year we were off lockdown for October. Weren’t we?

Joanna: Yeah, no, I was working full time and what have you. It’s not even the writing the poems, that’s the tiring bit – it’s the writing the poem and then recording it and then uploading it to everywhere I upload it to.

Francine: I suppose you could just let yourself off the hook there. Maybe just record and upload one a week, and write and post the rest of them. 

Joanna: Yeah. Quite possibly I’ll figure something out. I’ll decide what I’m in the mood for when I get to October 

Francine: Yes. As always, I’m going to assume we will magically be energetic and productive by next month. Obviously, by next month, we’ll be fine.

Joanna: Francine. 

Francine: It’s fine. Future Me can deal with everything.

Joanna: As the days get shorter and I start just mainlining vitamin D in the hope that I don’t fall into a deep seasonal depression and do nothing for six months. 

Francine: The walking helps a lot. Now I have a dog.

Joanna: I should probably, if you don’t mind, make an effort to tag along with you for a few walks,

Francine: Oh, sure. Yeah. I’ll start inviting you again. I stopped once we went back to work. 

Joanna: Yes, because now we’re allowed to socialise by doing things like sitting down and drinking coffee, which is very civilised. 

Francine: It is. Or usual coffee date has been postponed because the third member of our crew 

Joanna: Has buggered off to a different part of the country. How dare he. [00:10:00] 

Francine: It’s disgusting.

Um, speaking of disgusting

[laughter]


Francine: I was going to try and segue from The Phantom of the Opera, but we got distracted. Yes. Let’s make a podcast. 

Intro

Joanna: Hello and welcome to The Truth Shall Make Ye Fret, a podcast in which we are reading and recapping every book from Terry Pratchett’s Discworld series one at a time, in chronological order.

I’m Joanna Hagan.

Francine: And I’m Francine Carrel.

Joanna: And today is part one of our discussion of Maskerade. 

Francine: Maskerade!

Joanna: This the 18th Discworld novel.

Note on spoilers: this is a spoiler-light podcast. Obviously, heavy spoilers for the book we’re on, but we will avoid spoiling any major future events in the Discworld series; and we are saving any and all discussion of the final Discworld book, The Shepherd’s Crown, until we get there, so you, Dear Listener, can come on the journey with us.

Francine: Swinging on the chandelier. 

Joanna: Marvellous. 

Francine: Marvellous. 

Joanna: We’ve got some missives from the Roundworld, don’t we? 

Francine: Several! First of all, relevant to this episode, was an email from Leanne C., who recommended a short TikTok series on why people should hate Wagner. I do remember he’s a Nazi and we hate him, but now we have more reason.

Basically, Leanne says, it talks about how opera was fun and not at all elitist, and that Wagner changed the whole layout of the theatre to force people to sit still and appreciate his music for seven hours rather than talking and eating while the music was happening. And that’s how it started to become thought of as elitist.

And that’s such a narcissist thing to do, which I guess Nazis generally have personality issues. So that makes sense. 

You know, what the worst thing is about Nazis?

[laughter]

Joanna: Just so up themselves. 

Francine: Yeah, so that’s very cool. And I will put the links to that in the show notes, so, thank you, Leanne.

We also have a book recommendation – I’m getting so many recommendations from people at the moment, I love it – from a Jordy H. He recommended a book about the excavation of the Terracotta Army.

Joanna: Ooh. Cool. 

Francine: The [00:12:00] book was For the Time Being by Amy Dillard. Jordy said:

Dillard is one of the most awe-inspiring writers I’ve found, and this book is a kind of experimental nonfiction split into ten different themes: birth, sand, encounters, clouds, China, etc. In the first “China” section she describes visiting the dig while on some kind of writers’ tour of the country, and her profound shock and almost existential horror at what she saw there.

Joanna: Oh, interesting. 

Francine: I will be tracking down that book now. We also have an email from – I love our listeners, by the way, I’m getting so many good recommendations–

Joanna: Yeah. Thank you, guys. You are awesome. 

Francine: From Helen C., on cool maps and a breakfast one in particular.

Joanna: Oh, I remember this email and yes, I’m excited. 

Francine: So, when we were talking about maps in Moving Pictures part three, the subject of the wonderful quirks of cartography had come up. So, Helen saw an exhibition on maps few years ago, and had a favorite by far called Breakfast Island, which she’s linked to [https://www.bl.uk/collection-items/breakfast-island].

And it’s basically an insight into the work, sleep and leisure activities of early  1950s Britain. And you can see this kind of oddly shaped land mass in the middle and then it has place names referencing traditional foods, such as Cereal County, and then surrounding it are lands like The Land Of Sleep…
and it’s all very silly and fun. And I like it. And I will also link to that because the British library very kindly has it on the website. Yes.

And Helen says,

I spent a long time giggling over the minutiae of Breakfast Island. I hope you enjoy it too.

And we did.

Joanna: We very much did. 

Francine: and I will be looking into even more funny maps, actually, because I have a book – no, wait, no, I don’t have that book. I have The Madman’s Library, which I think I also got you. 

Joanna: You got me The Madman’s Library for Christmas. 

Francine: And that author also has one about maps, which I’m going to get. [The Phantom Atlas, Edward Brooke-Hitching].

Joanna: [00:14:00] Excellent. I do love obscure cartography. 

Francine: Yes, absolutely. I’d love to be able to draw maps and things. I’ve had a little go every now and then, but obviously my complete inability to read maps kind of hurt me a little bit there. I find it incredibly difficult to visualise points, like even if I’ve got a map in front of me.

When I’m navigating a new walk, for instance, with the dog, which I’ve started doing more of lately, I will have a map, and written instructions if possible. And like my app open showing me where I am on a point. If I’m using that, I can usually only go about a mile out of my way.

Joanna: I’m not amazing at following maps. I think I’m better than you. 

Francine: Yes, you are. Jack, luckily, my husband, has a fantastic sense of direction, really quite amazing. And so if he’s ever off work and coming with us walking, I can print him out a terrible low res map and he’ll be able to navigate us wherever.

Joanna: Excellent. 

Francine: He just has a sense of direction.

Joanna: Yeah. I have something of a sense of direction. It’s not perfect, but it does exist. 

Francine: Yes. Yeah. Apparently it’s quite, um, common with ADHD that you can’t really position yourself on a map very well. 

Joanna: Yeah.

I’m kind of working on designing a map at the moment. So I’m obviously working on designing a board game and it takes place across the board, which is a landmass because different players control different areas of the landmass. And it is very challenging. 

Francine: Have you checked out the various cartography subreddits? 

Joanna: Yeah, I’ve been looking at them, but I’m trying not to fall deep into the minutia of it because obviously what I’m designing is a play board that happens to have a map on it.

So I think what I really need to be studying is games like Risk. 

Francine: Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. 

Joanna: We should have a Risk night at some point, that’ll help.

Francine: We absolutely should. I know we’ve been saying that forever. 

I am bad at it and I love it.

Joanna: As I’ve never played it, I will probably be worse. It’ll be great fun. 

Francine: Yeah. You always say that and then you come [00:16:00] and thrash me at whatever you’ve said it about. So…

Joanna: Yeah. No, I am. I am secretly good at things.

Francine: You’re obnoxiously good at things generally. 

Joanna: Thank you?

Francine: Yes, no, it’s a compliment, just with a side helping of anger at my own incompetence. 

Joanna: Okay, I’ll take it.

Thank you to the people who emailed us. We do read them all. We’re just sometimes slow to reply.

Thank you to Miguel, who sent us the Lords and Ladies DVD, which we haven’t had a chance to watch yet, as I’m waiting till Francine and I can watch it together. But yes, we’ve now got a DVD of a very, very low budget fan-made production of Lords and Ladies. So, we are absolutely looking forward to watching that.

Speaking of listeners recommending things, if any listeners can recommend a tattooist that does Discworld stuff and knows Discworld, give me a shout. 

Francine: Oh, you’re back on that!

Joanna: Yeah. I really want to get that done by the end of the year. In fact, if any of our listeners are tattooists, then definitely give me a shout. 

Francine: Yeah, for sure. I’m looking forward to seeing your tattoo, which has been planned for so very long… And then the apocalypse started happening.

Joanna: Yes. Which is very rude.

Right. Should we, uh, start actually talking about the book? 

Francine: Oh yeah. Sorry. Yeah. I forgot what we do. It’s been a while. 

Joanna: It has been a while.

Francine: So shall I try and introduce the book? 

Joanna: Yes. Introduce us to Maskerade, please. 

Francine: Cool. So, as you said some time ago now, it is the 18th Discworld novel. What we haven’t done in a while is read the blurb. 

I keep forgetting about that. So:

The Opera House, Ankh-Morpork… a huge, rambling building, where innocent young sopranos are lured to their destiny by a strangely-familiar evil mastermind in a hideously-deformed evening dress…

At least, he hopes so. But Granny Weatherwax, Discworld’s most famous witch, is in the audience. And she doesn’t hold with that sort of thing.

So there’s going to be trouble (but nevertheless a good evening’s entertainment with murders you can really hum…)

[00:18:00] 

Joanna: That’s a good blurb 

Francine: It is a good blurb. I think whoever writes his blurbs is 

Joanna: improved. 

Francine: Yes. Um, I also found a review that I particularly enjoyed, on Colin Smythe’s website as usual, from SFX at the time. And I’ve forgotten what the time is exactly.

Joanna: He finished writing it around the end of 1994, I believe. So. I think we are in the mid nineties. 

Francine: Uh, 95 it was published. So yes. Well done. Um, anyway:

It’s a measure of Terry Pratchett’s skill as a writer that a book like Maskerade, which from any other author would elicit a review of justified hyperbole, can be dismissed as merely ‘well up to his usual standard’ …. The book is dedicated to ‘The people who showed me that opera was stranger than I could imagine’, so it’s fairly obvious how it came about. What is remarkable is that while it lampoons opera for the ridiculous, elitist, over-priced, over-hyped and pretentious rubbish that it is, it also simultaneously celebrates opera for the glorious elitist, over-priced, over-hyped, pretentious splendour that it is!

Joanna: That is an excellent review.

Francine: It is.

Have you ever watched an opera?

Joanna: No, I was going to ask you the same thing. Have you ever really gotten into opera?

Francine: No, I’ve not, I, but that’s not for… I’ve just never tried, because you know me and long things.

Joanna: Yeah. This is the thing. I love theatre. I love musicals. I love ballet, so I don’t need to understand with words everything that’s going on on-stage. And I think the reason I haven’t gotten into opera, I mean – ballet is sort of in the same boat in that It’s not very accessible, but I, that it was sort of brought up in a young age, I did ballet for a little bit, although we didn’t stick to it beause, we couldn’t afford it, ballet is expensive–

Francine: Yeah. Luckily I was terrible.

Joanna: but my mother took me to live ballets and things, but she wasn’t particularly into opera. Um, so my, probably my earliest introduction to opera is the cartoons. I’ve mentioned a lot, which the Loony Toons Opera parodies. What’s Opera Doc. And the, I can’t remember the other one, but the one where they do the Barber of Seville. 

Francine: That was a crossword clue the other day. What’s Opera Doc. [00:20:00] 

Joanna: Yes, it was. I got that one. 

Francine: Took me ages to get it.

Joanna: But I’ve, I’ve got a friend who really loves opera, who is someone I know through sort of theatre things. And she’s really encouraged me to try and engage in it more. But it’s, it’s really hard– like, with musicals and musical theatre, you know, you can listen to a soundtrack and there’s like movie adaptations of a lot of the most popular ones.

With things like Shakespeare, you’re brought up to learning it in school, and with a lot of theatre stuff, there’s like low-budget productions that you can go to. If you want to get into theatre, you can go and find good theatre for like a tenner. It still has its issues with a elitism – very much so– 

Francine: But there are accessible performances. 

Joanna: Exactly. With opera, there aren’t really lower-budget performances.

You don’t get a lot of cheap opera performances. I’m not saying things need to be super cheap. I understand it’s expensive to put productions on, believe me, but it is hard to see live opera or to get into live opera in the way that you can with theatre and musical theatre, because it’s just not there in the same way. 

Francine: Yeah. 

The difference between opera musical theatre– it must have kind of split off at about the same time that our listener said, 

Joanna: With the Wagner stuff. Well, yeah, so I was going to look more into the history of this, and then I realised that there’s only so many things we can cram into a single episode. 

Francine: Yeah. We can have a look next week, maybe.

Joanna: Yeah. This may end up as a rabbit hole at some point, where I’ll go into the entire history of theatre. 

Francine: Oh God. 

Joanna: The definition I’ve always sort of understood is the difference between an opera and a musical.

It’s something I’ve heard a lot of people say, is that – and I could be completely wrong and listeners please feel free to correct me – opera is sung all the way through, whereas a musical is a play where people are also bursting into song. 

Francine: So, Hamilton would be an opera?

Joanna: Technically, 

Francine: Hmm!

Joanna: Obviously it’s not the only definition, but it’s one I’ve seen used a lot. So the Phantom of the Opera is an opera. [00:22:00] 

Francine: Yes. There’s a tiny bit of speaking, but only reading the letters aloud and things, isn’t it? 

Joanna: Exactly. 

So I’ve never really super got into opera, which means there are a lot of references in this one that have definitely gone over my head. 

Francine: Yeah. But the general atmosphere I think is definitely knowable from just having done theatre stuff. For both of us, you more than me, but having done musicals and things, I definitely recognise some of the atmosphere. 

Joanna: I definitely recognise some of the atmosphere, the superstition stuff we can talk about later as well, and even like some of the things like the plays or names of opera… I am aware a lot of them because it’s parodied often enough. Like, I think most people have heard of La traviata, even if they don’t know what it’s about or, Don Juan. 

Francine: Yeah. And there are even some Arias that like, we basically recognise.

Joanna: Oh yeah, like you sent a message, a voice message to our group chat the other day, humming something, saying “what’s this from?” because it’s annoying with classical music–

Francine: How do I Google that?

Joanna: And luckily I recognised it was from Carmen.

Francine: Yes, yes, yes. You are my musical Google. Thank you.

Joanna: I have many uses.

Francine: Anyway, so yeah, let’s do the podcast and stuff. 

Joanna: Let’s talk about the book.

Summary

Francine: do you want to summarise the first part, which goes up to page 125?

Joanna: It does go up to page 125. You are correct. Let me have a sip of coffee and then I shall tell us what happened.

When shall these…two meet again? Nanny asks the burning question and burns the toast as herself and Granny meet on the mountain top and miss Magrat. Meanwhile, in Ankh-Morpork, a Mr Goatberger receives a mysterious manuscript.

As Nanny contemplates extending an invitation to surely-still-a-maiden Agnes, our would-be witch confronts the Ankh-Morpork opera house, before entering to audition with an impressive rendition of the infamous hedgehog song (check out our tiktok).

The opera house selection committee, including new opera house owner Mr Bucket, meet to discuss the auditions. Both Agnes, going by Perdita, and the glittering (if unskilled) [00:24:00] Christine are cast in the chorus. Meanwhile, Granny gets itchy feet and Nanny visits Mrs Nitt, Agnes mother, and spots something shocking at the bottom of the teapot.

As Agnes and Christine take a look at their new digs, Agnes begins to tell Christine all about the meddling local witches in her home village.

The meddling witches in Agnes’s home village discuss the mysterious face in the tea leaves before discussion turns to Agnes, off on her operatic adventures. As Agnes complains to Christine of women who know what’s best, a letter interrupts Nanny’s speculations and Granny learns of the hot new cookbook penned by a Lancre Witch. A moment of mental maths with a side of embarrassment has Granny concluding that a trip to the Big city might just be for the best.

Meanwhile, back at the opera, Agnes learns of a Ghost that haunts the house, selfishly holding onto box 8 on opening nights. An accident with the big organ and the smell of turpentine has the house in a panic, with Tommy and Mr Pounder the rat-catcher both claiming to have caught sight of the ghost as Agnes keeps her head. As Mr Bucket tries to balance the books, he learns of the smashed organ and Mr Salzella provides a handy bit of ghostly exposition.

As Death coaxes out a Swan Song, Granny and Nanny catch the coach to Ankh Morpork, with Greebo in tow. The wizardly-proportioned and mostly-snoring Henry Slugg briefly wakes to take part in a pork pie, before receiving a fawning reception at the local coaching inn under the name of Enrico Basilica.

That night, as Greebo briefly revisits his human form, Granny and Nanny listen to Slugg practice as both a vocalist and a polyglot. The brief bathtub performance is interrupted, however, as the inn’s owner asks for Grannys assistance with an ailing child. Granny stays up late to make a deal with Death, and the child lives thanks to four ones.

Agnes stays up late for the novelty, and bumps into a suspicious Andre. Christine panics at a talking mirror and swaps rooms with Agnes, who spends the night receiving reflective singing lessons.

The next day, Granny and Nanny meet Enrico Basilicas translator before learning of Henry Sluggs humble origins. He thanks them for their silence with a handy pair of opera tickets.

Meanwhile, Agnes eats breakfast and Walter Plinge isn’t quite where he should be. Mrs Plinge, his mother, learns that Mr Pounder [00:26:00] might just have found something marvellous. The rat catcher’s joy is short-lived as he meets his untimely end at the hands of the ghost, and more missives from the operatic phantom arrive with a rag-tag bunch of exclamation marks. Salzella wants to flush the house out, and the ghost would like Christine to sing the part of Iodine in tonight’s performance, thank you very much.

Francine: Iodine is a lovely name for a girl.

Joanna: It really is. 

Francine: Very nice. Very nice. Loving the connective clauses, getting right in there. 

Joanna: Onto the helicopter and loincloth watch! 

Francine: …Okay.

Joanna: The witches have decided to take the coach rather than using broomsticks. And, as broomsticks normally sub in for helicopters, the coach is now doing the duty.

Francine: Okay. Sure. 

Joanna: Look, we have to just go through the layers here. 

Francine: N, no, it’s fine. It’s fine.

Joanna: Uh, we have a copper jelly mould on loincloth duty. 

Francine: That one I can see more. 

Yep. 

Joanna: It’s clothing a loin. 

Francine: Cor, you don’t see that every day.

Joanna: We used to have one on the wall in the kitchen when I was growing up, it was the shape of a fish.

Francine: I was worried about how that sentence was going to end.

Joanna: I very, very rarely used it as a loincloth.

Onto the other things we’re keeping track of. We have not only no turtle opening, but no description of the Disc in the opening pages at all. 

Francine: We are expected to know, 

Joanna: Yes. 

Death’s here, obviously, we still haven’t had a book without Death, and we are in Ankh Morpork, we still haven’t visited or at least mentioned Ankh Morpork in a book yet. 

Quotes

Joanna: Quotes. I believe I’m first.

Francine: You are.

Joanna: There were so many lines I could pick because honestly, this is one of my favorite books for the sheer giggle moments.

Nanny wandered the summer hayfields regularly, and had a sharp if compassionate eye and damn’ good over-the-horizon hearing. Violet Frottidge was walking out with young Deviousness Carter, or at least doing something within ninety degrees of walking out. Bonnie Quarney had been gathering nuts in May with William Simple, and it was only because she’d thought ahead and taken a little advice from Nanny that she wouldn’t be bearing fruit in February. And pretty soon now young Mildred Tinker’s mother would have a quiet word with Mildred Tinker’s father, and he’d have a word with his friend Thatcher and he’d have a word with his son [00:28:00] Hob, and then there’d be a wedding, all done in a properly civilized way except for maybe a black eye or two.

Francine: That is a beautiful paragraph of innuendo. Not innuendo. Euphemism!

Joanna: Yup. Euphemism.

And classic Lancre renaming all the way down. 

Francine: Absolutely.

Joanna: The excellent thud of the joke at the end. 

Francine: And good to know, also, that Nanny’s still dispensing advice for those who need it.

Joanna: Also, I mean, fairly accurate. There is very little to do when you live in the countryside in the summer. 

Francine: Yeah, luckily I’ve never been quite that rural.

Joanna: That’s not what I heard– uh, no, sorry. 

Francine: I say!

Joanna: What’s your quote, Francine? 

Francine:

Granny looked out at the dull gray sky and the dying leaves and felt, amazingly enough, her sap rising. A day ago, the future had looked aching and desolate, and now it looked full of surprises and terror and bad things happening to people…

If she had anything to do with it, anyway.

Characters

Joanna: So, characters, and we’re going to start with Granny Weatherwax. 

Francine: Excellent. How’s she doing? 

Joanna: Uh, well, she’s got a little bit of ennui, unfortunately.

Francine: Oh, no.

Joanna: I’ve heard there’s a cream for that. Sorry.

Francine: It’s a loose end kind of an ennui, isn’t it?

Joanna: It is. They’re sort of– they’re missing Magrat as the third member of their trio, because she’s gone off to queen, as one does.

They needed to be three again. Things got exciting, when there were three of you. There were rows, and adventures, and things for Granny to get angry about, and she was only happy when she was angry. In fact, it seemed to Nanny, she was only Granny Weatherwax when she was angry.

Francine: And you’ve noted here that Black Aliss was mentioned again. She’s been – she came up in Witches Abroad, didn’t she?

Joanna: Yeah. This sort of proper evil fairy tale witch that sort of went bad because she had nothing else to do with all of her power, I suppose. 

Francine: And the idea being, I think, that because Granny Weatherwax has so much power, she could also become an evil, powerful witch. And it seems like Nanny’s duty to try and prevent that if possible for the good of everybody.

Joanna: And give Nanny something to do. But I like the pointing out that Granny sort of needs a bit of anger to keep her going. 

Francine: [00:30:00] Yes. Which is interesting, isn’t it? Because if you look back before Wyrd Sisters, there’s not really a suggestion that all of these adventures were going on, but I suppose she’s used to it now? But she’s, yes, she’s definitely missing it now it’s gone.

Joanna: And I think the sort of having the three of them work together, you see that relationship because Wyrd Sisters, Witches Abroad, and Lords and Ladies sort of work as a trilogy.  And those are the three witches books with the trios. And now we start moving on from that to the more witches books… But not as that trio. 

Francine: Yeah. And we even get, like, another go at the intro from the first. 

Joanna: Yes. Because it’s now when shall we two meet again. 

Francine: Yes.

Joanna: And so it’s nice to see sort of–  and this is nothing like Wyrd Sisters, really, apart from the fact that it’s Granny, Nanny and a theatre parody. 

Francine: And then speaking of Nanny, of course, she’s the… What’s the word, starting things going… catalyst. She’s the catalyst!

[laughter]

Francine: You know, the starting things going whatsit in an engine! 

Joanna: Nanny wants to recruit Agnes as the third member of their little coven, but unfortunately Agnes has gone off to Ankh Morpork to seek her fortune. 

Francine: And Nanny’s accidentally made a fortune that she is not in possession of.

Joanna: Yes. Uh, she must be in want of a wife. Sorry. Little Jane Austen joke for you there. 

Francine: Oh, I’m sorry.

Joanna: And Granny gets involved in this whole thing and, your quote about “looking out and now the future is full of surprises” – the line after that is, “in the scullery, Nanny Ogg grinned to herself.” 

Francine: Again, demonstrating her more sly than she appears nature. 

Joanna: A lot more clever than she appears. 

Francine: Yes. And, and again, a lovely touching moment where she’s genuinely worried that, uh, Esme has flown off with the geese, 

Joanna: Yes. 

And then, obviously, we have Agnes, 

Francine: Who is the protagonist, I would say?

Joanna: I would say she is– well, Agnes slash Perdita I suppose. 

Francine: Yes. 

Joanna: And this is our main problematic thing to talk about in the episode. 

Francine: Yes. Do you have the purple purple post-it note?[00:32:00] 

Joanna: I mean, yes, but that’s because I’m using purple as one of my four colors  this week. ‘Cause I’m trying to mix them up since I was left with purple leftovers from my packs of post-its. 

Francine: That’s a good sign. Probably. 

Joanna: I’m not using purple for feminist rants in this copy, is my point. 

Francine: But as a shorthand for rants, let’s still use it.

Joanna: As a shorthand. Yes.

We get a bit purple post-it with Agnes, who was described as:

There was a lot of Agnes, it took some time for outlying regions to come to rest. 

Agnes is fat. This is a key part of her character and it takes it’s set in. Irritating ways. Her fatness is very much a part of her character and she obviously isn’t happy with her fatness.

And there’s a lot of fat jokes in the book. I think I’ve already had my rant, when Sybil was introduced, that I didn’t like how she was described some of the time. 

Francine: Yes. And I must say, this is much worse than that.

Joanna: This is much worse than that. It’s frustrating because… it’s very difficult to put my thoughts on this into words, because on the one hand, I really love Agnes slash Perdita as a character. I think she’s one of the better-written Pratchett protagonists. I think he’s getting better at writing young women. 

Francine: Yes.

Joanna: I think a lot of aspects of her character are very, very human and not parody-ish. That overwhelming need to reinvent yourself. Also something I like about her as a fat character, who is not totally happy with her appearance, obviously, she is not trying to starve herself or lose weight. She eats normally. 

Francine: Yes, because she is sensible. That’s, like, part of her personality as well. 

Joanna: There’s an interaction with her and Christine, it’s near the end of this section, when they’re having breakfast and Christine has a single stick of celery and sort of makes the comment of, “oh, I can’t eat more than that or I’d blow up like a balloon, you’re so lucky, you can eat whatever you want,” and you can see Agnes sort of… hmmm…

Francine: Eye twitch. 

Joanna: Yeah. 

Francine: Uh, yeah, that was what I was going to bring up actually. It’s almost more frustrating because you can see that he’s been so thoughtful in [00:34:00] places, and he’s taken experiences like being put in a box like this, you know, you’re going to be thoughtful and write on pink note paper, and he’s taken things like thoughtless comments that people would make, like Christine, and like, he’s thought about those, but then he’s just felt the need to put in “ha, fat”.

Joanna: Something else I’ve found interesting, actually, is that Agnes is described, like I said, on page 17, is outlying regions taking a while to come to rest because there’s a lot of her. 

Francine: Hmm

Joanna: When Nanny Ogg thinks about Agnes on page 36, it’s, “You needed quite large thoughts to fit all of Agnes in… she was quite good looking in an expansive kind of way…. approximately two womenhoods from anywhere else.” 

And it’s not till page 43, when Nanny brings up Agnes to Granny and Granny says, “Fat girl, big hair.” And that’s the first time she’s described as fat in the book. And it’s by Granny, which is a very good character thing. Granny is the only one who would call a spade a spade in quite that way. 

Francine: Yes. And it is less offensive.

Joanna: Yeah. It is less offensive than her outlying regions taking a while to come to rest. And that’s what– it’s that line that really irks me about it.

Francine: Yeah.

Joanna: There’s nothing wrong with the fact that there is a fat character. And I liked that there is a fat character that is not trying to become thin, whose ultimate outcome does not rely on her becoming thin, and very realistically is treated differently because of her size. 

Francine: Yeah.

Joanna: You could have this character without making the lazy fat jokes. That’s what’s frustrating about it. 

Something I completely forgot to look up and I will look up for next week is how Agnes slash Perdita is– because we met this character before in Lords and Ladies. She’s part of Diamanda’s little group. And she’s one of the ones walking around with the black lacy gloves as one of the goth girls. I want to go back and have a look at the description. I don’t know if her size is mentioned or not.

Francine: She was definitely [00:36:00] described in terms of like, not looking like Diamanda. 

Joanna: Yeah.

Francine: And she, she was again the sensible one. Wasn’t she? 

Joanna: there’s a line about Nanny picking up that she’s actually got some magical potential. She’s got some witchy potential.

Francine: Yes. Yes. I wonder if Pratchett knew then that he was going to pick back up on her.

Joanna: Or if he was just planting a seed, so we’d have something to come back to. 

Francine: Hmm.

Joanna: But yeah, I think she’s interesting. And I like the idea of the Perdita thing, you know, I love, I absolutely respect someone’s urge to want to change their name or change things about their personality. 

Francine: Hmm.

Joanna: But something I did notice is that Agnes is inner monologue, not her sort of Perdita inner monologue, but her’s,is quite bitchy. 

Francine: Yes.

Joanna: Understandably, because she’s really frustrated with the fact that she’s become someone who’s got a lovely personality and great hair. 

Francine: Yes. 

Joanna: I, I, I’m not, I’m never going to complain at someone for being bitchy, because I am a raging bitch. 

Francine: I was going to say, I didn’t pick up on it as something grating. I must say I, um,

Joanna: No, I don’t find it grating. I like it as an aspect of her character because it’s, it’s her that’s bitchy. It’s not her Perdita thoughts that are bitchy. 

Francine: yes. And it’s her that’s bitchy and she still is capable of acting politely and sensibly and yeah, it’s a lot more realistic than having an angelic character or a bitch character.

Joanna: And I do enjoy it. I think it’s good writing because quite often, when you have fat characters, especially in media, they can fall into these kind of lazy stereotypes. You have Sybil is fat and is endlessly polite and charming, 

Francine: Hmm.

Joanna: Or you get the characters that are fat as a sort of horrible metaphor for evil and they’re also horrible people.

But Agnes thinking about Christin, it’s sort of realizing “the question had been asked not because Christine in any way wanted to know the answer, but for something to say . . . And my father is the emperor of Klatch and my mother is a small tray of raspberry puddings.” 

Francine: Yes.

Joanna: But she has, especially about Christine, a lot of bitchy thoughts that sort of come down to “well, would I quite like to be the [00:38:00] sparkly one?” 

Francine: Yes. Also quite fair, of course, ’cause Christine is not listening. Um, 

Joanna: Oh, yeah, 

Francine: and um, and, and again, I like that we’ve got a female character here who was quite realistically thinking, “oh my God, you are quite irritating. And I wish I wasn’t being passed over because I don’t look like you.” And yet who’s being perfectly pleasant to Christine is, 

Joanna: And also, kind of understands that yes she is, but it’s not really Christine’s fault. 

Francine: Yes. 

Joanna: Who else have we got? We’ve got Walter Plinge.

Francine: We do have Walter Plinge.

Joanna: We have got Walter Plinge who– thank you to Marc [Burrows] for pointing out a connection I didn’t make, which is that the name Walter Plinge being used as a sort of joke name in theatre programmes is a real thing, but he’s also somewhat with the beret and the clumsiness based on a character, Frank Spencer, from Some Mothers Do ‘Ave ‘Em. 

Francine: Yeah. Which I didn’t connect either, even though I love that programme.

Joanna: I haven’t watched it for many, many years, but obviously the extra fun layer of connection here is that that was played by Michael Crawford, who then went on to play the Phantom in the original [musical], so well done, Terry Pratchett. That’s a good one. 

Francine: Walter, I think we’ll see more of him next section.

Joanna: Yeah. We’ll talk about him a lot more because we only really meet him 

Francine: We have Mr. Bucket, 

Joanna: Mr Bucket, the– 

Francine: Who is Mr. Bouquet in the, in the, in the play, in he musical,

Joanna: That’s a reference. 

Francine: Another reference to old television. We’ve talked about the Bouquets before and, um, Keeping Up Appearances.

Joanna: yes. Hyacinth Bouquet. 

Francine: And he’s the, the, new owner.

Joanna: Yes. He’s the new owner.

Self-made man, in the wholesale cheese business before buying the opera house, 

Francine: Yeah. What do you think of him? I quite like him.

Joanna: I have got a soft spot for these sort of call a spade a spade, judge a man by his handshake characters that haven’t got a clue what’s going on 

Francine: Yeah. Feeling bad for him while also finding it quite funny.

Joanna: Yeah. And I loved that he’s just very willing to relate everything to the wholesale cheese business. 

Francine: Yes, of [00:40:00] course. It can be applied to anything. 

Joanna: And then we’ve also got Mr. Salzella who is interesting as a character. 

Francine: What’s his job title again? 

Joanna: He’s the director of music and musical director. Yes. And then Dr. Undershaft, is the choir master. 

Francine: Yes. 

Joanna: Salzella is an interesting one because he’s a sarcastic asshole who thinks he’s better than everyone else, but he’s well-written enough that you can totally get it and not dislike him for it. 

Francine: Yes. He’s the opera elitist, but he’s doing kind of the wry, Yes, Minister type. If we’re going to be constantly referencing old TV.

Joanna: I like that we get so much of his inner monologue, which just allows for Pratchett to continue being really funny. And we’ve got this bit of a,

“I’ve been through the mill, I have,” Bucket began, “And I made myself what I am today.”

Self-raising flour, thought Salzella. 

Francine: Did you look up whether Salzella’s name is a reference to anything? I didn’t.

Joanna: Uh, no I didn’t but it wasn’t mentioned in Annotated Pratchett, which is usually my first port of call for those sorts of things. I do highly recommend it. I’m going to bring up some fun anecdotes for the next episode, but have a look at Annotated Pratchett for this one. ‘Cause there’s lots of good stuff. 

Francine: I’ll link it at the top.

Joanna: And then who else do we have?

We have Andre, of course, the mysterious musician, organist. 

Francine: With a very heavy-handed “look out for this guy” near the end.

Joanna: Oh yeah. It is not subtle. I love it. 

And then obviously, yeah, we have Christine. 

Francine: You didn’t put exclamation marks on her name.

Joanna: I’m also not going to try and squeak. I’ve got a bit of a sore throat after I was screaming at drag queens last night. 

Francine: Yes. Um, Christine. Nice. I like her.

Joanna: I really like, uh, I, I like her very specific cleverness of knowing that she’s very pretty and that certain things sort of happen to her.

Christine has wanted to be in the opera for a very long time. She may have absolutely no talent, but she did go and study it because she has a, obviously a wealthy father and what have you, and has gone and studied a conservatory. And she wants to be a famous opera singer. She is passionate about it. She’s really excited to be working to the opera. It’s a dream come true for her.

Whereas for Agnes, [00:42:00] it was a job advertised, Agnes wants to be a singer. Yes. She wants to go to Ankh Morpork, but she had, she didn’t know the opera house existed. She didn’t know opera existed.

And there’s something really lovely about that dynamic between the two of them. When you find Agnes living a bit of Christine’s life and Christine just constantly excited to be here, even if she has to nibble her ideas into very little bits. 

Um, and then who else we got Mr. Goatberger, the publisher, 

Francine: Oh, yes. Sorry. Yes. Yes. Again, we’ll see more of him.

Joanna: But I wanted to point out because this will become relevant in… where are we on, this is the 18th book… in seven books time!

His chief printer entered, clutching a sheaf of proofs. “We’re going to have to get Mr. Cripslock to engrave page eleven again.”

Along with the line at the publishers, explaining that the printing press doesn’t really exist in Moorpark because wizards don’t approve. 

Francine: Yes. Yeah. 

Joanna: Put a pin in that.

And then Henry Slugg slash Enrico Basilica. 

Francine: Yes, our good friend. 

Joanna: Something I do want to point out on the topic of him, quickly going back to the fat jokes: he is obviously a very large man. And he is described as “a man of almost wizardly proportions”. It is nowhere near as snigger snigger as some of the, uh, jokes about Agnes.

And I think it’s going to be quite interesting as we go along to look at how his size is discussed, compared to how Agnes’s size is discussed. 

Francine: Yeah. I think Nanny makes a couple of mean remarks, but I mean, it’s not, it’s not handled in the same way. It never is. Is it?

Joanna: No, fat man and fat women are two very different things.

Francine: Hmm. 

Locations

Joanna: Yes. Locations. Obviously we start in Lancre, with the witches. I’ve only really bothered mentioning this in, uh, as a location because– do you ever have a line in a book or from a TV show or something that just lives in your brain which isn’t on its own, even that funny, but you sort of find yourself wanting to reference it all the time. For some reason, there’s [00:44:00] something about the way Mrs. Nitt says, “And there’s the fair, every Soul Cake Tuesday, regular,”  that just lives in my brain, 

Francine: It’s the one thing to do!

Joanna: Especially because of the sort of town we live in and where there’s, you know, there’s the Whitsun fair and the Christmas Fayre and the food and drink festival. 

Obviously these haven’t all happened recently because of COVID, but there is something where you can point to it to.

Francine: Every Soul Cake Tuesday, regular, (pandemic excepting).

Joanna: I don’t know why. I just, I really love that line. It’s one of the funniest in the book for me. And it, it is not that funny. So I really wanted to fit that in. 

Francine: I think I’ve definitely had a few that I brought up, so I, uh, I’m not going to judge you for loving that one so much.

Joanna: And then yeah, obviously Ankh Morpork and the opera house, “A big rectangle that someone’s glued some architecture to,”

Sorry, I can’t, because I only read the whole book like last week I keep, I think I’m referencing some things that are from part two, but it’s not a major spoiler that that’s a joke that was made.

Francine: I might look up some of the more interesting opera houses’ architecture actually, because it is a playground of a genre for an architect, isn’t it?

Joanna: and it’s sort of massive and goes over about three acres and has some elephants stabled in the cellar just in case.

Obviously not an opera house, but you’ve wandered back around backstage at theatres and things, haven’t you? It is fun seeing the absolute chaos and bits of things compared to the massive what have you of the stage. 

Francine: Yes. It’s I’d say it’s comparable for anyone who’s worked in retail, to back of house in retail.

Joanna: There’s a place in town that’s sort of like a member’s bar, that’s got huge rooms. And one of the rooms we’ve used as a theatre, there’s a stage that can be kind of assembled that lives in pieces in the cellar, along with lots of other stuff that’s stored. And it’s how you get to some of the beers as well. And I’ve occasionally helped out with other things there. So I’ve helped get things in and out of the cellar. And every time I wander down there, it’s like, oh, that’s the captain’s wheel from when we did Robinson Crusoe at Christmas…

Francine: Oh, I love that.[00:46:00] 

Joanna: That’s a bit of the Shakespeare set…

Francine: Oh yeah. Gosh. Back of house hospitality mixed with back of house for theatre.

Joanna: The really lovely women who did costume for all of those shows is an amazing seamstress. And she’d always go overboard and make beautiful new things for everything. But what was great is once I’ve done a couple of shows with her, she’d turn up and “I’ve seen that before I wore those trousers when I was pretending to be a boy to sneak onto a pirate ship! I’ve worn that doublet!” 

Francine: The opera house also has a cellar that is flooded, that we’ve now learned about, which I expect we’ll revisit. Foreshadowing. 

Joanna: I wonder how a flooded cellar could be relevant in a parody of Phantom of the Opera… Get me my floating coffin slash chaise longue….

Uh, Genua, the apparent home of 

Enrico Basilica. 

Francine: Genua? I hardly knew her! Sorry. 

[laughter]

Joanna: So we have been to Genua. Genua was, uh, was the home of Witches Abroad, wasn’t it? 

Yeah. 

Francine: main city.

Joanna: So Genua in Witches Abroad was New Orleans, basically. And now is apparently Italy. 

So Enrico Basilica is from Genua and keeps getting fed pasta and squid, and they keep giving him olive oil and tomatoes all the time. 

Francine: You can imagine it can’t you like, it’s that whole thing about once you become known for liking something, that’s what you get given as a gift, but.

Joanna: Yeah, which is why no one knows my favorite animal.

I don’t have anything else to say about Genua other than New Orleans is, apparently, now in Italy 

Francine: Hooray!

Joanna: or Italy has now been, I don’t know. Maybe they’ve got like a little Italy and that’s the very specific part that Enrico Basilica’s from. 

Francine: the idea of being served fried pasta, wherever you go is a…

Joanna: I mean, fried pasta is quite nice.

Francine: is it?

Joanna: Yeah, you can do like sort of pasta chip type things. I mean, it’s dough, it’s flour and water. 

Also think about how the best bit of lasagna is those crispy bits at [00:48:00] the edges with the sauce on.

Francine: Okay. All right. Fine. 

Okay. 

Joanna: I’m not suggesting you just take a handful of dried pasta and throw it in some hot oil. 

Francine: That’s what I was imagining.

Joanna: And you can do like crispy angel hair, pasta nests, and 

Francine: Yeah. So we’re okay. Okay. I’ll take some of it back because I was definitely imagining just frying dried pasta.

Joanna: Yeah. Although if you’ve ever had a chance to try deep fried gnocchi. 

Francine: Uh, I have, and yes, 

No, wait, no. I’m thinking of the little bulls, um, 

Joanna: That’s gnocchi. 

Oh, arancini?

Francine: Yes. Yes. 

Joanna: Okay. Right. We need to stop talking about food on this podcast. 

Francine: Balls! 

Joanna: A Maskerade ball. 

Francine: Oh, well done. We’ll talk about that. After this short break. 

Don’t worry. We haven’t got ads. 

Joanna: we are not going to start advertising. 

Francine: No, we are not.

Little bits we liked

Joanna: Little bits we liked 

Francine: folk hokum. 

Joanna: That’s so fun to say.

Francine: Isn’t it?

It’s when Granny is curing, um, what’s-his-chops, Mr. Joe, John Weaver, Jarge Weaver, like George, I suppose, with his, with her suckrose and akwa solution.

And put a pine board under your mattress, obviously, so he has a harder surface to sleep on, which is good for his back, but he’s like, “oh, so’s the knots in me back end up in the pine?” And Granny was impressed. “It was an outrageously ingenious bit of folk hokum.” 

And I love it. Just the little leap of kind of almost logic and it, and the fact that Granny is like pouncing on it. Like, yes, that is exactly what it is.

Joanna: I also really liked the whole, she can see people coming because the cottage neatly overlooks a bend. She wasn’t looking that way, but that’s not the point. 

Francine: And the little left thread on the latch trick. If I ever live in a house where that’s possible…

Joanna: On the one hand, I’d love to live in a witch’s cottage. On the other hand, imagine the dusting. [00:50:00] 

Francine: And the heating bill.

Joanna: And the fact that I really like having vast amounts of natural light in my home. And that’s not really a thing when your house is covered in ivy. 

Francine: Yes. As much as we would like to be, I really don’t think we have the kind of hardiness of a Granny Weatherwax

Joanna: I am not as cottage core as I would like to be 

Let’s talk about autumn. 

Francine: let’s talk about autumn. And now this a, I think, more important than it seems to be part of Discworld, especially around Lancre. Pratchett really enjoys describing the seasons and the weather and the natural landscape in little snippets through his books.

Joanna: Yes, Pratchett really does write beautifully about the turning of the seasons. He manages to make it thematic in books where it isn’t relevantly thematic. 

Francine: Yeah. There were a couple of, lines like, uh, “And this was the worst time of the year, with the geese honking and rushing across the sky every night, and the autumn air crisp and inviting.” And, “the wind had died away, leaving the sky wide and clear for the first frost of the season, a petal-nipping, fruit-withering little scorcher that showed you why they called nature a mother.”

And I wonder if it was autumn as he wrote it, because it’s all very, very vivid. And I love autumn, autumn is the one season that really inspires me to write about nature for a start. 

Joanna: There’s a real beauty to it. And there’s something really lovely about a cold, sunny autumn day.

Francine: Yes.

Joanna: And that sort of wind, that’s just brisk and nice when you’ve been on a walk and you come home all chilly. 

Francine: Yeah. And it’s, I, I’m not sure what it… It is hard to describe, isn’t it, which I suppose is why so many poets have a crack at it, and it’s harder for me to go for it.

And it’s also, it’s kind of tied into new beginnings in a way that’s quite odd because it is the death of summer. And that, um, I wonder if partly it’s just because it’s tied into the school year.

Joanna: There’s school starting in September.

Francine: And then obviously you’ve got harvest, so it’s the start of a new cycle in that way. Isn’t it? It’s before you sow, and…[00:52:00] 

Joanna: Yeah, it’s not, it’s not my favorite time of the year because– I was joking earlier about, you know, seasonal depression. So I love spring. Spring is my favorite time of the year, because it’s that real transitional season.

Francine: I also get seasonal depression quite badly – spring is worse for me, almost, because it takes so long to get going and I get the frustration of it. One day, finally, when it is sunny and everything’s in a million shades of green, it’s almost worth it.

But you’ve got the vitamin D thing, haven’t you? So mine doesn’t kick in as quickly as yours does.

Joanna: My body just does not make vitamin D. I have to take huge supplements in the summer, let alone in the winter. Uh, but there is still something I do really love about autumn, about crunchy leaves. And…

Francine: it’s very aesthetic. 

Joanna: the, the bluster, when you, when you’ve had a hot summer, which 

Francine: Yes. Bluster. Perfect.

Joanna: when you’ve had a hot summer, there’s something about the chilly winds and the leaves blowing. 

Francine: Yeah. It’s very, it’s not… it’s nearly ennui.

Joanna: Yes, 

Francine: You can, you can walk with your hands shoved in your pockets and the wind slightly stinging your face, but not so much that you’re desperate to get back home.

Joanna: And there’s something I was talking about earlier. I can’t remember if this was in the soft open or kind of before we got going, but one of the things I always look forward to is when it gets to October and it really gets chilly, I make a beef stew and I make very, very good beef stew, and it’s a very all-day, meditative process.

Francine: You do. You do make good beef stew. 

Joanna: And there’s something satisfying says, this says the vegetarian 

Francine: was really no good vegetarian alternative, I’m afraid. 

Joanna: No. 

Francine: I love a mushroom stew and it’s got similar kind of umami tastes, but you really can’t do the same things with mushrooms. However.

Joanna: Piles of mashed potatoes, basically. That’s what I look forward to about. Awesome. 

Oh, and bonfire night and baked potatoes and sausages and things. 

Francine: Yeah.

Joanna: I’m mostly just thinking about food. I’m not even that hungry. I had a really good breakfast.

Francine: I’m actually not for once, luckily, yeah.

Um, yeah. Sorry. Sorry. What was I? Oh yes. The, the podcast. That’s right.

Um, yes. I like the description of autumn. [00:54:00] What’s your, what’s your first little bit?

Joanna: Uh, well obviously the great joy that is, The Joye Of Snacks, Nanny Ogg’s, new cookbook. 

Francine: Oh yes.

Joanna: Um, I do actually have, see if I can reach it without slinging my microphone across the room…

I have Nanny Ogg’s Cookbook.

Francine: Oh, fantastic.

Joanna: Which was gifted to me in a, I think it was an Amanda Palmer gift exchange awhile ago. And it’s, it’s very silly, but it includes recipes for things like chocolate delight with special secret sauce. 

Francine: Have you tried making any of them?

Joanna: I’ve actually never tried any of the recipes. And I think for this month, I really ought to.

Francine: Yeah, that would be fun. 

Joanna: Actually the chocolate, the recipe with the special secret sauce does sound pretty nice. I might try that at some point. 

Francine: Awesome.

Joanna: Um, but also I like the name, The Joye Of Snacks. There was a sort of quite a famous book, I think from the eighties called The Joy Of Sex. 

Francine: Oh 

Joanna: that itself, the name was a parody on a very famous cookbook called The Joy Of Cooking. 

Francine: Yes. I was going to say, “from the eighties?”, but yes. it’s like the classic, classic, isn’t it. And then, um,

Joanna: The Joy Of Sex was a play that, and that was a classic. And so The Joye Of Snacks is obviously playing on both and it makes me giggle. 

Francine: yeah, 1930s was The Joy Of Cooking.

Joanna: I love the idea that Nanny was so proud of all these recipes that she’s come up with scribbled on the back of things, and she’s ended up sending them off to a publisher because other people might like it. 

Francine: Yeah. It is lovely. Isn’t it?

Joanna: And Granny’s incredulity as Nanny’s explaining  the book to her, and eventually says, “Is there anything in this book that doesn’t relate to goings-on?” 

Francine: Goings on! She is a lot less, uh, shocked then she used to be, isn’t she? I think she’s spent enough time with Nanny now.

Joanna: Yes. She’s not shocked. She’s just sort of slowly resigned herself to  Nanny. 

Francine: “I’m not going to say this,” but she isn’t just randomly calling her a harlot anymore.

Joanna: What about maids of honor? Well, they start as maids of honor, but they end up as tarts. [00:56:00] 

Francine: I love it. Do you know, just the word tarts always reminds me of this time that my grandma, when, when I was a teenager, I think, we went clothes shopping a couple of times and she looked at a top or something and said, “oh, I don’t know about this, it’s a bit [whispers]tarty.” Like that was too much of a swear word for my grandmother.

Joanna: I’ve met her. I can absolutely picture this. Your grandmother is marvelous. 

Francine: She is.

Joanna: I love describing someone as a tart or calling things tarty. I don’t know why. 

Francine: It’s such a, well nowadays, certainly, harmless.

Joanna: Yeah. I would never calling someone a tart as an actual insult, it just makes you sound very old fashioned and quite prudish, but there’s something about a friendly calling someone a tart. 

Francine: Actually, I wouldn’t be surprised if we saw that at some point, a tart as a compliment, kind of language evolution thing. 

Joanna: It is almost a compliment now, isn’t it?

Francine: Yeah.

Anyway, anyway. So, names, yes, just a brief interlude.

Uh, I think I’ve talked before, about just how much I love Pratchett’s talent for coming up with nonsensical names that roll off the tongue, or that have, what was it? “Rotational capability.” So, as mentioned in your quote, actually, was Violet Frottage and Deviousness Carter, I particularly enjoyed. Agnes’s father and uncles: Primal, Medial and Terminal Nitt, I particularly liked and, uh, Seldom Bucket. 

Joanna: Seldom Bucket is marvelous. 

Francine: my picks of this part of the book for silly little names 

Joanna: I also enjoy Mr. Goatberger, which was the main reason he was listed in characters. Goatberger’s quite a fun name. And I know I mentioned, you know, this is a “Ooh pin in this for seven books later,” but Cripslock is just a great name. [00:58:00] 

Francine: Cripslock is a lovely name. 

Joanna: We do like a clicky word.

Uh, exclamation points.

Francine: Exclamation points!

Joanna: Exclamation points!! 

Francine: You’ve got your squeak back!

Joanna: I’m slowly waking up on my fifth cup of coffee.

This is not the first time this has come up because it’s uh, I say an argument, considering some of the arguments I see on Terry private Facebook groups it’s a very innocuous one, but when someone brings up the quote about exclamation points, as a sign of madness, someone will say it’s Reaper Man; and then someone says, no, actually it’s from Maskerade. And then someone else comes in and says, no, actually it’s both.

Francine: And another one on top of it, isn’t it? I think we’ve already come across it twice. Didn’t we?

Joanna: I think it was in another one, uh, it might have even been Wyrd Sisters. I feel like the duke probably was a five exclamation point sort of man. But here we really see it in action and, uh, listeners, I will tweet the marvellous calligraphy Francine has done in preparation for the episode.

Francine: Well, I try and get some handwriting practice in every now and then, and when you’ve got something so…

Joanna: Dramatic. Yes.

“What sort of person,” said Salzella patiently, “sits down and writes a maniacal laugh? And all those exclamation marks, you notice? Five? A sure sign of someone who wears his underpants on his head.”

And:

‘I don’t understand! Is this man mad?’

Salzella put an arm around his shoulders and led him away from the crowd. ‘Well, now,’ he said, as kindly as he could. ‘A man who wears evening dress all the time, lurks in the shadows and occasionally kills people. Then he sends little notes, writing maniacal laughter. Five exclamation marks again, I notice. We have to ask ourselves: is this the career of a sane man?’

I think it’s just because I’m also a sarcastic arsehole. 

Francine: Yeah. He is a beautifully written arsehole.

Joanna: And I love a beautifully written arsehole. 

Francine: Yep. 

Joanna: Please put that on my gravestone. 

Francine: oh yes. And yes. Even the fact that Christine’s double exclamation marks throughout do kind of [01:00:00] keep you in mind that she’s always talking like this!! 

Joanna: Yes. And she’s always, 

Francine: And it’s not annoying somehow that he’s done that!! 

Joanna: no, it just works. 

Francine: and the interrobang?!

Joanna: God, I love the word interrobang 

Francine: Yeah. It’s um, oh God, Nope. I’m not going down this route, but… there’s a whole load of really like similar, odd punctuation. I had about on a podcast recently and, uh… I’ll tell you about it another time.

Joanna: Don’t, ’cause I’ll get out my PowerPoint presentation on the ampersand. 

Francine: Oh God. I kind of want to see that.

Joanna: I originally learnt about it from your husband, actually, he was the one who first explained to me how it came about. 

Francine: That does not surprise me.

Joanna: Um, but yes, the exclamation points thing is one of those funny Pratchetty things that comes up over and over– not over and over again, but it’s a running joke throughout the books. And it’s one of the ones that’s, it’s one of the not-annoying ones that stuck with the fandom.

Francine: yeah. For sure. 

Joanna: I could live with without ever hearing a joke about a duck at all.

But I don’t mind if a Pratchett fan says, oh, I feel a bit five exclamation points today. 

Francine: Yes.

Joanna: oh, and the last one, theatre superstitions, so on page 85 it’s Salzella explaining to Bucket, and he’s talking about the superstitions that largely exist because actors is very paranoid that it would become their time and they won’t be relevant anymore. Um, and everyone’s on edge. Everyone worries about luck.

Uh, live flowers are unlucky, green, real jewellery worn on stage, real mirrors on stage, whistling on stage, peeking at the audience through the main curtains, using new makeup on a first night, knitting on stage even at rehearsals, a yellow clarinet in the orchestra is very unlucky – don’t ask me why – and you never stop a performance before its proper ending. 

Francine: The show must go on.

Joanna: Exactly, the show must go on. One of my favourite bits from Moulin Rouge. 

Francine: Oh God. Yeah. 

Oh, we should rewatch that scene. 

Joanna: We should definitely, we should have a musical night. 

Francine: Yeah.

Joanna: Anyway. What did you find out? We both looked up some fun little, uh, [01:02:00] theatre superstition things. 

Francine: Oh yeah. So, I went down the route of looking at the dancers stuff because I figured the, um, you’d, you’d have a better idea of what theatre ones were. So, I looked at somebody else’s research. So, ballet dancers, themselves, uh, are part of the opera and are a very superstitious and obsessive lot.

I found a 2013 thesis by Maria Aranzazu Baselga about her observations of, and others’ observations of, ballet dancers, like ritualistic checking of shoes, tying retying, tying, retying, uh, using a specific hair elastic each time. Cause they had a great performance last time. So, use this hair elastic again, or this pair of tights again. They must always practice on a certain spot in the barre…

And this becoming defined as a superstition academically because it also comes along with a feeling of dread that things would go wrong if they weren’t adhered to.

Joanna: Yeah, There’s a big overlap between superstition, confirmation bias and OCD. 

Francine: Yeah, I was, yeah, it does sound very much like kind of compulsive things. And that doesn’t surprise me, because from what I understand, the world of the ballet dancer is extremely stressful and kind of the, the idea of being in control of certain parts of their life, 

Joanna: And compulsive tendencies do very much come about from an overwhelming need for control. And if you think about the fact that being a ballet dancer comes with an automatic side of eating disorder, you’re going to find those compulsive tendencies. And a lot of speaking to someone who has some compulsive tendencies, 

Francine: Yes, 

Joanna: That doesn’t surprise me, that there’s so much superstition slash reading into every little bit of confirmation bias in things like the ballet.

Francine: Yeah. Um, so yeah, I’ll link to that, uh, study, ‘cause it’s quite interesting in itself. 

Did you find some more theatre-relevant things?

Joanna: Yeah. One thing I found interesting, I looked at some of the ones that are actually mentioned in the book. Uh, one thing I found interesting that I hadn’t read before or ever heard was that peacock feathers shouldn’t be worn on stage.

Francine: I knew they were unlucky somewhere.

Joanna: It’s the eye. apparently, it’s an [01:04:00] evil eye that brings bad luck. 

Francine: Would that go for the rest is kind of evil eye amulets, I wonder. In Turkey and Greece, for instance, you’ll often have evil eye amulets-

Joanna: Yeah. 

Francine: And they’re good luck.

Joanna: Yeah. I wouldn’t, I, that was one. I couldn’t find any origin things other than peacock feather evil eye. I I’m sure there is more if I’d have more time to research,

Uh, green costumes, green and blue costumes, both considered unlucky for different reasons. The green costume thing, superstition that they’re bad luck, partly came from- So, you know, the phrase “the limelight” comes from spotlights that were made with quicklimes, so they would have like a greenish tinge?

Francine: I did not know that.

Joanna: Yeah. Uh, so if you wear green under the limelight, you’re somewhat rendering yourself invisible because you’re wearing green under a green light, so that’s part of green being unlucky, because you’re rendering yourself invisible in the spotlight.

Francine: Isn’t that interesting. And nowadays, like you wouldn’t wear it if you were about to go on TV in case there was a green screen 

Joanna: Exactly. That I found interesting, but there’s also, in 1673 Molière, a French playwright performing in one of his own plays, uh, had a coughing fit during the play, brought about by tuberculosis, and started to haemorrhage while onstage.

Finished the performance still, but died a few hours later, still in his costume, which was green. 

Francine: Yeah. That’ll put you off.

Joanna: Yeah. Uh, blue costumes were, there was a rumour spread that they were very unlucky. That was actually because blue dye was really fucking expensive. 

Francine: Ah, 

Joanna: So, it’s a bit of a double-edged sword of, uh, the rumour of them being unlucky because they were so expensive, but also blue costumes along with silver considered very lucky, because it means that it’s a very rich production.

Uh, whistling on stage is considered unlucky and that’s because quite often stagehands would use whistle cues moving scenery and things around backstage. If anyone was whistling on the stage, it could confuse things. And obviously when lots of heavy stuff is being moved around, that means accidents could happen.

Real jewellery and real money on stage are considered bad luck. And that is because, um, it was encouraged not to use real jewellery and real money because obviously then there’s higher risk of robbery. [01:06:00] 

Francine: Sure.

Joanna: And one last one I really enjoy is the ghost light, which is the superstition that there must always be a light left on onstage.

So, there are ghost lights left on in a theatre whenever the theatre is dark.

There’s often a single light on stage and one of the theories- no-one’s really sure of exactly how this came about – one of the theories is that obviously originally it would have been gas lamps and a single gas lamp was left running to stop any gas build-up because there was something for it to run through.

Francine: Oooh I was gonna say, ‘cause it seems dangerous with gas lamps, but that makes sense. Yeah.

Joanna: Uh, another theory is, um, uh, no-one’s quite sure how true this story is, but there’s a story of a robber attempting to rob a theatre, which was dark, and falling into the opera pitch because he couldn’t see it, and then successfully suing the theatre. Because he fell into the opera pit. And so now it’s always lit so that can’t happen.

It became popular from about the 1920s, but it’s still very much done today. Theatres always have a light left on a stage – so, even during the pandemic there was a ghost light in every theatre when all the theatres had to close. 

Francine: Oh, that’s quite romantic.

Joanna: Yeah. There’s something quite sweet about that one that I enjoyed.

I couldn’t find anything about yellow clarinets though. 

Francine: No, 

Joanna: Oh, 

Francine: No, that might’ve just been one he threw in there. He does that.

Joanna: Mirrors on stage were also sort of considered bad luck, but it’s really just, obviously they reflect light awkwardly. 

Francine: Yeah. That just seems like a common sense one, doesn’t it?

Joanna: A lot of the bad luck things are common sense, like the green costumes and the not having real jewellery and real money.

Francine: Yeah. Cool. 

Joanna: But I liked the real jewellery and real money one because it reminds me of back in Wyrd Sisters, where the pretend crown that’s all paste and plastic looks so much more real than the real crown.

Francine: Oh, yeah. Yes. Yeah. The theatre versions of things are more those things.

Joanna: And things like- with drag and burlesque performers always say, like, cheap Swarovski, crystals and rhinestones sparkle much better than diamonds do, especially under stage lights. 

 [01:08:00] 

Joanna: Shall we get on to the bigger bits? 

Francine: Yes, all right. 

Talking points

Joanna: My big talking point first is honestly, this is just so good. 

[laughter]

Francine: I like that.

Joanna: I always forget how good this one is. Part of it is, honestly, I mean, there’s loads of different aspects to why it’s so good, but it’s so funny. There’s so many little moments that make me snort out loud, and it’s not even like, I’m not a huge fan of The Phantom of the Opera, or a huge fan of opera, but I really enjoy it as parody.

But there’s so many little details like the foreshadowing. And obviously, I’m not going to talk about everything that’s being foreshadowed, because we’re in section one. But as always, we do allow for spoilers for the rest of the book.

But things like the placebo effect, Jarge and his placebo effect, right at the beginning with Granny, and how she ends up playing on the placebo effect right near the end of the book in the big climax of it.

Francine: yeah.

Joanna: Little moments like Greebo’s human switch flipping 

Francine: Yes.

Joanna: Happening early on because obviously spoiler, but we’ll get human Greebo properly near the end of the book. And I always love a bit of human Greebo, and there’s one little moment – and I’m going to point this out now so I remember to mention it again in a lovely moment right at the end that Mr. Slugg is talking about where he grew up in the Shades, that they shared a drain with two other families and a man who juggled eels.

Francine: Right.

Joanna: And of course, the Chekhov’s chandelier in the whole thing, because everyone reading this book has some awareness of Phantom of the Opera.

And the other thing he does so deftly that it’s really quite beautiful is the tonal whiplash of that scene with Granny and Death in the stable. Um, you have really good- You need a really good writer to pull this off, and obviously Pratchett’s an amazing writer, but in a very funny book and a very pacy [01:10:00] book, it, there’s not a dull moment.

It ticks along from point to point, especially if you look at the structure of it compared to the structure of, say, an opera or to the structure of The Phantom of the Opera and where it’s building up towards an end of act one moment, 

Francine: Yes.

Joanna: which obviously we haven’t had the chandelier crashing, but we somewhat are getting to that point of the, the ghost ramping up his threats. 

Francine: Yeah. Actually, let’s make a note of that when we get there, see if it is about halfway that that happens. I wonder.

Joanna: Yes, I think we probably will, but it takes such a clever writer to, in a book this pacy and this clever, and this funny to put that scene in that doesn’t need to be there. Um, 

it doesn’t 

Francine: If you’d asked me to recount the plot points of this book, I wouldn’t have remembered it to be there, to be honest

Joanna: no, in fact, the two Death scenes in this section don’t need to be there. The swan bit is just funny 

Francine: yeah, 

Joanna: and throws a few more opera bits in, but it doesn’t feel jarring or “why are we doing this when we could be getting on with the book?” because it’s just written in as a really fun aside. 

And then to get to the bit where we stop at the coaching inn and in the midst of all the fun and the chaos and the silly coach journey and the silliness of the ghost, because really the ghost thing is quite silly. Although obviously we have a horrible death at the end of this section, or near the end of this section. 

Francine: I think, yeah, that’s a really good point. And it makes me think of the kind of moment of seriousness of Nanny when she sees the thing in the, in the tea leaves and like runs up to Granny as well, it is this kind of minute of something very serious is happening. And Nanny, who’s always making the jokes, is the one delivering this news, and she’s scared that Esme will have died, and, and the kind of seriousness of the moment is broken when Nanny nearly throws water over Weatherwax and, and she’s caught.

Yes. Um, but no, you’re right. It’s these little injections of, and don’t forget the things at stake and these witches are powerful and [01:12:00] moral and- the four ones bit, by the way, is something that went over my head every other time I’ve read it. 

And I think I might’ve seen someone point it out since we started this podcast. 

Joanna: I love that moment. It’s one of my favourite Death moments. This is for the listeners: Granny offers a single hand of cards against Death for the baby’s life to save this baby that’s in a coma, draws-

Francine: For the baby’s life and her own, I think.

Joanna: – for the baby’s life and her own because they’re playing double or quits – draws four Kings and Death says he can’t beat that, he only has four ones – four ones, of course, being four aces, which would beat Kings, aces are higher. 

Francine: yeah.

Joanna: and he chooses.

Francine: Yes. He has the little wink moment. See, in my head beforehand, I’m pretty sure what I thought was he knew and swapped the hands deliberately, so that he’d lose, but no, he chose to interpret that-

Joanna: He chose to interpret that as a loss to let the baby live 

Francine: Yeah. 

Joanna: Somewhat intimidated by Granny. 

Francine: Yes. And then fixed his shoulder, so they’re kind of back into his comedy.

Joanna: Yeah. The healthy respect that Death and Granny have for each other almost as one professional to another.

Francine: Yeah. This does seem like the first time they’ve met, doesn’t it almost? Or talked at length. They must have met briefly before if Granny can see him and help people in and out of the world. 

Joanna: I think they were aware of each other as professionals. And I think-

Francine: and the moment with the candle!

Joanna: yes. When she blows the candle out and Death’s like, “Yeah, all right, you made your point, can you put the light back on?”

Francine: “Okay. Fine.”

Joanna: Yeah.

I just think it’s this book is amazingly well-written to manage that pace, to put that tonal whiplash in without it feeling jarring, and to plant so many seeds for the final act and, and to be as well-structured as to kind of somewhat much the structure of the [01:14:00] musical. Cause if you think about it, the sort of the death of Mr. Pounder, the wrap capture is that moment where someone was hanged in The Phantom of the Opera, two thirds of the way into act one. 

Francine: Yeah, it is another little jarring moment. Isn’t it? In a, I, the bit that jarred me more actually was a bit afterwards where Agnes is kneeling on the stage and, uh, Salzella, I think, looks up and sees something spinning up there. 

Joanna: Yeah. 

Francine: Yikes. 

Joanna: It’s the little moments of horror that are written in without making it horror

Francine: Yes, 

Joanna: Um, 

Francine: yes. Very good 

Joanna: Alternate personalities, Francine. 

Francine: Yeah, speaking of themes that run throughout, actually, the one I particularly like, in, in this first part and it’s all kind of introduced and obviously we’ll, we’ll, we’ll see it evolve, is the dual personalities, the chosen alternate personalities, of so many of the characters. 

So, so many that I’m quite comfortable calling it a theme, not just a thing I noted.

Um, so obviously you’ve got Agnes and Perdita:

She was a good repository for all those thoughts that Agnes couldn’t think, on account of her wonderful personality.

Perdita would use black writing paper, if she could get away with it, and would be beautifully pale, instead of embarrassingly flushed. Perdita wanted to be an interestingly lost soul in plum-coloured lipstick.

Francine: Highly relate or did, certainly, as a teenager or a kid. Did you kind of have this alternate version of yourself that you wanted to be?

Joanna: I still, I don’t have it now, I’m a lot more comfortable in myself now. I like who I am, but I definitely do still have moments of trying to channel this cooler version of myself I’ve got in-

There’s a book I really love – The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern – and the main character in that, whenever I sort of want to feel a bit more calm and in control, I sort of find myself channelling her because just by every, all the sort of mishegoss that happens around her, she’s always very poised. And I am not naturally [01:16:00] like that. I am, like I said, I like who I am as a person, but who I am as a person is chins akimbo, wildly, manically gesturing, and accidentally got out a PowerPoint presentation on the nature of the ampersand. 

Francine: That’s very important. 

Joanna: And I like that about myself, but sometimes I want to be very cool and very poised.

Francine: Yeah. I’ve told you about this before, I can’t remember if I’ve said on the podcast, but when I went from middle school to upper school, I made a very concerted decision to  – age 13, for anyone who didn’t grow up in the ridiculous three tier system – um, I made a very concerted decision that I was going to be a different person now. I, I’d been bullied quite badly throughout middle school, and I was like, you know what, I’m done with that now, I’m going to be this person. I had this vague idea of who it was in my head. And I did it. I absolutely channelled this new person, which I’m going to say is just a very direct way of growing as a person.

Like I didn’t do it in a very normal gradual way. Before that, I think I definitely had some of the as well, uh, I even had like a name for the person I’d wanted to be. It was Sasha. I always really liked the name Sasha as a kid. 

Um, yeah, I still do like it, not so much that I’d want to change my name to it now. 

But yeah, no, the idea of the very cool and coordinated, importantly, and I kind of gave up on that idea, but I wanted to be… 

Joanna: Unfortunately, you have got quite a lot of limb and not a lot of control over said limbs.

Francine: Yes. 

Joanna: Not to Walter Plinge levels, but… 

Francine: no. Yeah. I did have a massive growth spurt at about 11 and just never really regained control of my centre of gravity again, unfortunately.

Um, yes. Anyway, so that’s very relatable for teenage girl kind of stuff. And then the other ones, I mean, you’ve got, uh, Nanny’s Gnome de Plum

Joanna: The Lancre Witch.

Francine: and then the kind of aside that Nanny respected anyone’s right to recreate themselves, which I rather liked.

Um, and interestingly was not [01:18:00] one of the quotes brought up in the recent unpleasantness. 

Joanna: No.

Francine: You’ve got Henry Slugg and Enrico Bas- Basi-

Joanna: Basilica.

Francine: Basilica. Thank you. Um, oh, like the building?

Joanna: Yeah.

Francine: And then you’ve got, as you mentioned, Greebo and the human. Two sides, and he’s the only one who’s not decided to have the alternate personality, which is interesting.

Joanna: no, he’s just sort of got it in his back pocket 

Francine: Yeah. 

Joanna: when he needs to- and it’s not even really an alternate personality. It’s an alternate physical form, but the personality is very much the same. It just manifests very differently. And that’s, that’s a fun kind of subversion of the rest of the alternate personalities. 

Francine: Yes. Anyway, I liked that there’s so many of them, they were all for slightly different reasons, but kind of the same, 

Joanna: And I love that Granny’s just self-important enough to worry that people might think she is the Lancre Witch.

Francine: She’d probably be right. But not many people would just say so.

Joanna: I think actually, Granny is a really good counterpoint to all of this because Granny went through all of this – you know, we see some of teenage Granny, especially in Lords and Ladies, and Witches Abroad when we talk about her sister. 

Francine: Yes. When we see what she could have been in physical form.

Joanna: And Granny is now just incredibly confident in herself and who she is.

She is, although she’s got her ennui and her itchy feet and wants to be doing more, obviously she loves borrowing and being in the, in the other bodies,

Francine: Hmm.

Joanna: she is, through all of that, very solidly Granny Weatherwax and that is all she needs to be. 

Francine: I suppose there’s a kind of connected point in that having the third member of the coven would cement their identities further. 

Joanna: Yes. And this kind of brings me onto all the different bits of witchiness in this, because we are in a witches book. I like how Pratchett writes the witches, and I like how he writes the shifting dynamics. And this is the thing Nanny is hinting on, right at the beginning of the book, is this maiden, mother, and crone thing that I’ve talked about a lot before. I love that dynamic, [01:20:00] And Nanny sort of, not to put too fine a point on it. She is one, she fits into one of those roles well, and Granny fits into one of those roles well, whether she likes it or not, 

Francine: Yeah.

Joanna: And Nanny is not just a mother in that she has had children, but she is a mother in that she is, you know, she’s described in other places that she had a way of making people feel at home in their own homes. She adopts everybody on the coach and gets to know their families as soon as she sat down. 

Francine: Yeah. She is maternal.

Joanna: Yeah.

Francine: Nurturing in her own way.

Joanna: Granny is the crone. And they need a maiden to round out the trio or it doesn’t really work.

Francine: Yeah. And really, you need somebody to cut the bread.

Joanna: exactly. And toast the marshmallows.

Francine: I don’t know about you, I cannot cut bread in a straight line.

Joanna: The trick is I don’t like bread knives. I just use a very sharp kitchen knife to cut bread. And that works quite well.

Francine: I might try that,

Joanna: Also, if you’ve baked bread, let it cool down for at least an hour. 

Francine: But I like it when it’s hot!

Joanna: I know, but then you crush the crumb, and it comes out funny. 

Francine: Well, it’s all right if you’re going to eat the whole life in that sitting though, isn’t it?

Joanna: which is honestly what happens a lot when I make bread.

One of the other bits I like on the, on the witchy things, is Granny’s frustration at the fact that people don’t think properly. 

Francine: Yes. 

Joanna: And this goes on to the running thing throughout the book of “what’s the first thing you’d try to take out if your house was on fire?” And when Nanny says that she’d take Greebo because it shows she’s got a warm and considerate nature, Granny says it shows you’re the kind of person who tries to work out what the right answer is supposed to be. That’s a witch’s answer. 

Francine: Do you know what yours is?

Joanna: [sigh] Probably my phone…

Francine: That’s gonna be in your pocket. Let’s assume that’s already on you. 

Joanna: My laptop?

Look, a lot of my life is attached to technology. Like, I can replace… photos are fine. They’ll go, or they won’t, uh, I couldn’t carry all of my fabric stocks or pick some of the fabric I like, but all of my writing is- and a lot of works in progress [01:22:00] are – on my laptop and I use it. 

Francine: Do you not have it backed up to the cloud? 

Joanna: Oh no, I do have a backup.

Francine: Okay, good. Right. Sorry. I didn’t want to interrupt the podcast to lecture you on the importance of that, but I would.

Joanna: One is none. I am fully aware of that, but still 

Francine: Yes, no, absolutely, it’s a massive inconvenience, yes.

Joanna: I could function as long as I have my laptop. 

Francine: Yes. 

Joanna: What about you?

Francine: Opposite end of the spectrum, actually, I assume I can just replace the technology with insurance or whatever. And, but I want my teddy bear. Thank you. Oh, the dog, obviously.

Joanna: Yeah, I feel-

Francine: yeah, assuming the dog is fine. 

Joanna: yeah. 

Francine: then my Teddy bear, which I’ve had since I was a one-year-old, and a piece of jewellery that Jack got me as a wedding present 

Joanna: Aw. I do have a lot of those sentimental things in the house. Like I’ve- 

Francine: Oh, my passport. 

Joanna: yeah, 

Francine: That’s a fucker to get replaced.

Joanna: I need to replace my passport. Um, I’ve got like Bunny Bunbun who I’ve had since I was a baby and Tico the cat who I’ve had since I was two, named after the Tico Tico song from the whiskers advert. 

But I’m just not that attached to things anymore. I think when you end up acquire- Because I’ve obviously had to clear out my mother’s house and she was very sentimental, so we ended up with all these things, and my sister and I constantly had to go through this, “Oh, but we shouldn’t get rid of-”, and eventually saying, we’re just going to put it in attics until somebody else goes through, “Oh, but we shouldn’t get rid of-”, and if that’s the case, then let’s get rid of it now. 

Francine: yeah,

Joanna: And it’s made me a lot less, although I love all of the things I have, it’s made me a lot less attached to them. 

Francine: yeah. It’s a quality I should probably work on, I do get very sentimentally attached to silly things… and it’s more than sentimental attachment, it’s kind of a panic that one day I will miss them more than I want them now. It’s uh, “but what, what if one day this person is gone, and I wish I had this.”

Joanna: I am still very sentimental, and I have lots of things. I have a whole board in my room that’s just gig tickets, and little cards from people, and [01:24:00] posters from plays that I’ve been to, and plays that I’m in. And I’ve got like boxes of theatre programmes and things like I’m not not someone who holds onto those things.

I’ve just, I’m willing to accept that I may not always have those things 

Francine: Yeah, that’s good. That’s healthy. I think.

Joanna: Anyway. sorry. That was a tangent.

Yeah, the other, the other sort of, witchy thing I like is the pull of the edges. 

Francine: Oh yes. 

Joanna: And this is-

Francine: Like the half moon.

Joanna: like the half moon. Sort of liminal spaces.

Witches are drawn to the edges of things, where two states collide. They feel the pull of doors, circumferences, boundaries, gates, mirrors, masks, and stages.

It’s nice because this is bringing back the theme from Wyrd Sisters but now with an understanding of it. In Wyrd Sisters, theatre was new, somewhat, to Granny and Nanny.  Whereas now obviously they, they do understand it. 

Francine: Yeah. And they get the traveling theatre through occasionally, like as he’s mentioned. Yeah,

Joanna: And obviously, you know, they, they know TomJohn and his fairly successful theatre company he’s involved in. 

Francine: And although it’s not a stage, the same thing was said about the ring. Wasn’t it? The Dancers.

Joanna: yes, it’s, it’s the edge of something. It’s a space.

And I like that idea of, because it’s such a classic part of Gothic literature, is this idea of the liminal and the edges and that’s- And so to have this be a theme specifically with the witches in the Pratchett book, and there’s probably people listening who’ve got more interest in things like Neo-paganism who can tell me more about how it’s still a thing today. Um, it’s not something I know much about at all, being an overwhelmingly atheistic cynic…

Francine: yep.

[laughter]

Joanna: But I do kind of understand that pull of things like mirrors and edges. And I love that mirrors come back as a theme, having done Witches Abroad and the mirror magic there. 

And obviously then the theme of it in The Phantom of the Opera with him teaching her from behind the mirror. 

Francine: Which is always a terrifying prospect, isn’t it? 

Joanna: Yeah, I don’t-

Francine: Mirrors are scary. 

Joanna: Yep. Mirrors terrify me, even though I quite like looking at myself. 

Francine: Oh [01:26:00] yes. I’m a massive narcissist when the time arises, but, uh, in the middle of the night, a mirror is “But what if something else is there?” kind of prospect. 

Joanna: Anyway, that was all I had to say. I just love the way he’s got all of these lovely, witchiness in the witches book.

Francine: Hmm. Yeah. He brought it back in and brought in the kind of narrative, but without being so explicit about it, but he’s like, he’s having his characters point out that they know they belong in this trope or that trope and they don’t want to be in.

Joanna: I think there’s something very comforting about being on what’s now the fourth/fifth witches book If we count Equal Rites is that he- it’s like settling back into a comfortable hoodie. 

Francine: Yeah.

Joanna: Um, we know these characters and we know what tropes he’s going to play with so well that it’s, it’s a very comforting read because- we’re familiar with the rhythms and it’s still new and fresh and exciting and clever, but it’s very nice to revisit these characters and sort of be, “Oh, we’re in a witches book!” not in a, not in a dull way, but in a, “Oh, so we’re going to have liminal, and we’re going to have edges, and we’re going to have the maiden and the mother and the crone.” 

Francine: Yeah. And how’s he going to make those fit in this completely new setting? 

Joanna: Exactly. And especially with witches in Ankh Morpork. I always love it when there’s a witch in Ankh Morpork. 

Francine: Yeah! 

Joanna: We’ll talk about that next episode. 

However, on this episode, Francine, do you have an obscure reference finial for me? 

Obscure Reference Finial

Francine: I do. I found another physics one, you’ll be appalled to learn. 

Joanna: Yeah, no, I nearly looked this up, but I literally hit Wikipedia, saw physics and yeeted myself out again. 

Francine: I nearly did that and then went to an encyclopaedia instead, which had far fewer mathematical terms. 

Um, anyway, a catastrophe curve is what I’ve looked at, uh, from page 79:

A catastrophe curve, Mr Bucket, is what opera runs along. Opera happens because a large number of things amazingly fail to go wrong, Mr Bucket. It works because of hatred and love and nerves.

Actually, I’m going to point this out now: this is the first time I’ve noticed something that Pratchett starts doing more and more, which is to have a character, as he [01:28:00] monologues, put the other character’s name several times in the speech, as a kind of punctuation mark. Just a writing device that I noticed.

Um, but point is, catastrophe curves. A catastrophe curve in itself isn’t a term I could find a lot on but searching for it brings up catastrophe theory in mathematics. A quote from the Britannica is:

A simple example of the behaviour studied by catastrophe theory is the change in shape of an arched bridge as the load on it is gradually increased. The bridge deforms in a relatively uniform manner until the load reaches a critical value, at which point the shape of the bridge changes suddenly—it collapses.

And that kind of process is something that can be applied to things like aeroplane accidents, for instance, generally what you’re looking at is a lot of things being neglected or not done so well, and a lot of little things going wrong, and everything kind of degrades in a similar fashion until suddenly one little thing goes and then…

Joanna: catastrophe. 

Francine: An aeroplane crashes with 200 people in, you know. And I’m guessing same thing with opera and theatre. It’s fine until suddenly it’s really not. And it is a concept that I enjoy and have read about before and hadn’t read about in this kind of context before, so.

Joanna: excellent. Cool. 

Francine: And I was pleased to be able to avoid the terrifying looking graphs.

Joanna: Yes, I, they intimidated me. I’m not built for that sort of thing.

Outro

Thank you very much for listening to this episode of The Truth Shall Make Ye Fret. We will be back next Monday with part two of Maskerade, which begins on page 125 with the line:

The stagecoach rolled to a halt in Sator Square

and ends on page 254 with the line:

“Do you think I might just have a few hours without something awful happening?”

“In an opera house?”

In the meantime, you can follow us on:

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You can join our subreddit community /r/TTSMYF

You can email us your thoughts, queries, castles, snacks, and arias on thetruthshallmakeyefretpod@gmail.com

And if you’d like to support us financially, you can head on over to patreon.com/thetruthshallmakeyefret and exchange your hard- or not-so-hard-earned pennies for all sorts of bonus goodies.

We have had some good bonus goodies recently. 

The next Down The Rabbit Hole that we do is going to be epic because I’ve already gone down five tangential rabbit holes. 

Francine: I’m very much looking forward to it.

Joanna: I can’t wait to talk about it.

So, we shall see you next week.

And in the meantime, dear listener, don’t let us detain you. 

—Outro music—

Francine: I can’t remember if this was on record, but Joanna has a black hat on a tripod in the background and it really is like a side character in this podcast for me. So, I just thought I’d mention that.

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