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The network that brought you "Come in 81 Kilo: A Forever Knight Podcast" brings you an episode by episode rewatch of the Canadian sci-fi classic - Lexx. Listen to Matt and Rachel's unique blend of wit and wisdom as we tackle this delightfully weird TV show.
I am Kai, last of the Brumundji. Millennia ago, the Brunnen G led humanity to victory in the war against the insect civilization. The time prophet predicted that I would be the one to destroy the divine order in the league of 20,000 planets. Someday, that will happen, but not today. As today is my day of death, the day our story begins.
Rachel:Welcome back, friends.
Matt:Welcome back. Or, I guess, welcome.
Rachel:Welcome. I worship his shadow. I wonder if each shadow is different. Like, this is merciful shadow. This is divine shadow, the dark zone shadow.
Rachel:Hi. I'm Rachel.
Matt:And I'm Matt.
Rachel:Welcome to the Dead Do Not podcast.
Matt:Alexa watch.
Song:Accident, or maybe it was fate. What a cast of characters all on the spacecraft traveling. I want the names of who escaped from her programming. A disembodied robot
Rachel:We watched Lex season 1 episode 1, I worship his shadow.
Matt:May his shadow fall upon you.
Rachel:Well, no. It's called I worship his shadow. That's the title of the episode. Sorry. It's okay.
Matt:I was just following along with the call and response from the episode.
Rachel:Like, I love Lex, but this was a long fucking episode, and I think I watched it, like, 4 times because we'd watch it. And then I'd be like, okay. We're gonna record, and then a bunch of shit would happen. We couldn't record. Then I was like, well, we always do better when it's fresh, so let's watch it again.
Rachel:And then shit would happen, and we wouldn't record. And then, yeah, 4 times later, here we are. Are you excited about watching Lex?
Matt:I am so excited.
Rachel:I feel like you have more experience with Lex than you did with Forever Night.
Matt:Yes. Absolutely. I did.
Rachel:Yeah. Even though I regularly put on Forever Night, I feel like this is one that you watched, like, on your own semi voluntarily.
Matt:Yeah. Me watching Lex as a teenager was a voluntary thing.
Rachel:Was it because of Zev? Probably. Probably. Yeah. Let's all be honest.
Rachel:It was Zev. I don't think I've watched anything past season 1, so this is gonna be really fun.
Matt:I know they changed the actress
Rachel:Yeah.
Matt:For Zev after season 2, I think. Yeah. Scheduling conflicts. And I don't remember
Rachel:She becomes Zev with an x.
Matt:I I vaguely recall maybe seeing episodes with Zev as a different actress and being confused because I didn't get to watch them in order.
Rachel:Like, those aren't the same boobs.
Matt:Like, I didn't
Rachel:watch this now. It's a face too. Oh oh, okay. Yeah. There's also a face.
Matt:The the actors and actresses have faces.
Song:Get a
Rachel:hold of the German version so we can actually see the nudity?
Matt:Right.
Rachel:Yeah. I think that'd be really
Matt:I'm I'm on board.
Rachel:Let's get the German DVDs. Yeah. I wanna watch all of Leck's subtitle just so you can see tits. No. Thank you.
Rachel:Not that I have any problem with subtitles, but, also, it's available in English. It's originally in English. And if I feel like half of the charm of Lex is the delightfully Canadian accents if you're Canadian, this might not hit the same. But if you're American, Canadians always sound really hyper and, like, peppy. And so to hear lines that are supposed to be really dramatic delivered in this, like, round, upbeat accent is, it's a real treat, and I would I'd be sad to lose that.
Rachel:We are not gonna harp on the Canadian accents much much. But
Matt:I promise.
Rachel:Oh, yeah. Sorry. What did you say? But they are thick and fast in this, and I love it so much. I
Matt:love it. Kai.
Rachel:I feel like they're thicker in this than they are in Forever Night. Like, this is I mean, Forever Night is a Canadian product made in in Canada. But Lex just feels I don't know. It just anyway, I guess we'll get into it. Are you ready?
Matt:Let's go.
Rachel:Okay. Because we start I love how this starts with, like, a musical number because it's Kai, our last of the Bruin and g. And this is his, like, voice over at the beginning, which usually I'm mad about a voice over, but I'm not mad about this voice over because he's like, millennial ago, the Brunin g led the universe to victory against the insect civilization. So good to know they got it together and created the civilization, kinda like planet of the apes, but it'd be like planet of the wasps or something.
Matt:Planet of the dragonflies?
Rachel:Yeah. Because that's what they're flying, and they're, like, standing up, and they have these jaunty colorful outfits, and he has, like, a brooch directly on his chest.
Matt:Oh, yeah. And fancy hairdo?
Rachel:Everyone is quite padded in this too. He's quite padded.
Matt:It's probably cold. Well and
Rachel:is it cold in space? Thanks. I really love it.
Matt:It's very cold in space, Rachel.
Rachel:It's just, I don't know, except for Zev. Zev wears, like, 2 handkerchiefs and some plastic, and then Kai is wearing, like, a quilted bed coat. Don't know what he's wearing, but he's wearing, like, a quilted onesie thing the whole time. Anyway, just putting that out there.
Matt:He's got layers.
Rachel:Literally and figuratively. He keeps going. He's like, the time prophet predicted that, the Brunin g, specifically me, the Brunin g, would be the one to destroy the divine order and the league of the 20,000 planets.
Matt:20,000 is a lot.
Rachel:It kinda reminds me of in Babylon 5 where they have the league of non aligned worlds.
Matt:Yeah.
Rachel:Like, we are the group of people who don't wanna be in a group, but this is the 20,000 planets. And he goes, someday that will happen, but this is not that day as today is my day of death. And then, like, the day our story begins. And then we get our as the captions titled it, non English singing, where they're, like, gianti singing their way into battle.
Matt:Yeah. They're they're singing a a battle song
Rachel:And it's
Matt:as they fly in against, I don't know, his shadow's worship.
Rachel:Yeah. His divine shadows webship thing, which they say the Lex is the most They keep saying that the Lex is the most powerful ship ever created, but this one seems pretty this one seems pretty powerful.
Matt:Just scorches the surface.
Rachel:Oh. But Lex blows up the whole planet. Planet. You're right. Okay.
Rachel:You're right. And when you're right, you're right. And you?
Matt:I'm You're all things are right. I'm
Rachel:Okay. So we have a new PodLab, and Pippen has now rejoined us. And so he is very insistent. Okay. Fine.
Rachel:You can get on my lap. Oh, you can't be on my notes though. Pippen.
Matt:I'll get you an arm for your laptop.
Rachel:Okay. Thanks. I'm gonna need it clearly because he was like, oh, opportunity knocks. So as the non English singing progresses, we see the like space quilted colorful outfits that they are flying around with these real jaunty beehive hairstyles, which it's not just
Matt:keeps the hair out of their eyes except for the one lock that is deliberately in front of his eyes.
Rachel:Right. He has the, like, the forelock thing, I guess, so he can tug it when he's anxious. I don't know. He's reading too many fantasy novels. Who is that?
Rachel:Robert Jordan. They're constantly tugging their forelock?
Matt:Yeah.
Rachel:Yeah. Or their braid, which he also has. He's got options. If he's really angry, he could pull his braid, or he could tug his forelock, or he could stroke his
Matt:It's flexible.
Rachel:His lofty beehive because he's got a beehive, and then he has his, like, thing in the front. And then he has a tail, like a a a braided tail that comes down the bottom Right. In his bed. Yeah. Okay.
Rachel:Anyway, we have to cover it. It's, choices were made. Lots and lots of choices were made. And my sister thought he was, like, the hottest man who had ever been on television, and we had to watch this specifically because she thought he was so handsome. He's not not handsome.
Rachel:But it's like they looked at him and they were like, you know what you really need? Height. Just height. How can we get that? Heels?
Rachel:No. This is the nineties. We can't have a man wear heels on television. Dear. Tease that hair, motherfuckers.
Rachel:The closer you are to the was the higher your hair, the closer to God.
Matt:Surprise. This is actually, like, an early ancestor of the cone heads. Their head is actually that tall.
Rachel:Oh, it's not his hair. He's literally just pulled it up into a ponytail on the top of
Matt:his His hair is not that long. It's just his head goes real, real high.
Rachel:I would believe you, but everybody in this in the 20 all 20,000 planets are peopled by humans as far as I can tell, except the cluster worms, the cluster lizards. So regardless of whether or not his hair is, because he wants to be closer to God or because that's literally the shape of his head.
Matt:It's just how he was raised.
Rachel:Yeah. They're standing up in these ships, which are actually dragonflies, and they're flying at this giant web, which is piloted by slash commanded by slash serving, his shadow. And I would like to point out that Matt and I tried to make a drinking game out of this episode and to drink every time they say shadow, and we made it 31 minutes, during which time they said it approximately 39 times, and, we almost died. So we're not gonna do that again. But if you want to, might I suggest, you just sip.
Rachel:Just sip a drink every time they say Yes. Shadow. Matt made it through half a bottle of margarita margarita mix. So when
Matt:like half a liter of 14%.
Rachel:Yeah. And it's really interesting, this show, because I know it's considered like a dark comedy. But the parts of it that are dark are really fucking dark. Because as they're flying at this ship, it is firing on the planet behind them and killing their entire race.
Matt:Right. And so at a certain point Bruningy society
Rachel:Yes.
Matt:Is getting, immolated.
Rachel:Yeah. And we hear screaming.
Matt:Yeah.
Rachel:Yeah. Voices crying out and then suddenly silenced as this web is firing at the planet, and they're trying to defeat the shadow Armada or army or whatever. And, eventually, they realized, like, shit. We failed. Our entire planet is dead.
Rachel:And so they tried to ram the control tower, but it just closes. And the only one who gets through is Kai, and his ship gets destroyed, and it just closes, and it doesn't actually do any damage.
Matt:Right. And then his divine shadow walks up because they didn't even hurt.
Rachel:Yeah. And he's like, oh, oh, shadow. We are gonna defeat you. And he's like, that's a divine shadow. Actually, I'm gonna go ahead and, correct you there.
Rachel:And Kai is like, the Brun and G will defeat you. And he's like, sorry, son. There are no more Brun and G. You're it. And Kai goes, no.
Rachel:I talked to the time prophet, and she was like, no. You're you guys you specifically are totally gonna destroy the shadow. And he's like, whatever. Time prophet's full of shit. Then he stabs him, And that's the end of the opening sequence, except for when they show up and they're like, okay.
Rachel:So we'll just go burn the body, and his divine shadow's like, nah.
Song:Nah. Nah.
Rachel:Nah. This guy is the last what did he call him? This is the last of his the the last specimen of a culture of romantic dreamers. They were like the artsy culture, the, like, romantic,
Matt:the Which explains the hair and the outfits.
Rachel:Yeah. And they're all gone now, except for Kai who apparently merits punishment beyond the death.
Matt:Right. They were so horrible, that he doesn't deserve to die.
Rachel:Well, I think it was more of like a, this guy specifically is prophesied to be the one who will destroy me, and so I'm gonna prove that I'm more powerful than prophecy by keeping this guy specifically alive.
Matt:Right. Which is
Rachel:classic villain?
Matt:Yeah. Like, classic, villain mistake.
Rachel:Yeah. Besides starting a land war in Asia.
Matt:Well, there's the whole, like, villain handbook.
Song:Yeah.
Matt:And there's a whole bunch of rules. Like, you don't monologue until after your, like, conquest is actually finished.
Rachel:Yeah. Well, he didn't get the memo. You also don't get into a battle of wits with the Sicilian when death is on the line?
Matt:Right.
Rachel:Yeah. Just throwing in some princess bride there. Anyway, so they take Kai to the, quote, bio sculptors. I also love a sci fi that's not afraid
Matt:to scholars.
Rachel:Sculptors, I think, is what he says.
Song:Oh, I
Matt:thought it was scholars.
Rachel:It didn't matter. K. It didn't matter. You know why? Because I love a sci fi that is not afraid to explain fucking nothing.
Matt:Right. And we have no context.
Rachel:How are these insects flying in space? You don't know. We don't know. You don't care. We don't care.
Rachel:Look at that. We're all on the same page already. Just fly the fucking insects. And that's, I mean, that's yeah. Right?
Rachel:Like, we don't know. We we he we know later he has protoblood. We don't know what protoblood is. I think, actually, we actually figured that out eventually. But, yeah.
Rachel:No no one cares. No one needs to know.
Matt:At the end of the episode, he tells everyone, like, the proto blood won't keep me animated for much longer.
Rachel:Yeah.
Matt:So I'm I'm gonna go take a nap.
Rachel:Yeah. Wake me up only when you need me. I mean, anytime we get into a situation where you maybe might want explanation, they're just like, oh, look. A min a multicolored miniskirt. Oh.
Matt:Right.
Rachel:So shiny. Oh. Don't look over here. Don't ask any questions. Just look look at Barry Bostwick's package.
Rachel:Our guest star for this episode of television, of course, is Barry Bostwick, who plays Thoden. We haven't met him yet. We're getting there. So then the shadow picks up a piece of the insect ship, and he's like, insect, curious, which I guess is how we got the idea for the Lex. Right.
Rachel:Yeah. And then very specifically, 2,008 years later, 2,008 years later, we find ourselves in the cluster, which is just this giant complex on this planet.
Matt:Yeah. It's one giant interconnected structure on this what looks like a very dead planet.
Rachel:Yeah. Except for the cluster
Matt:Right.
Rachel:Which is the capital of the league of 20,000 planets. And then we pick up with, one of our main characters, Stanley Tweedle.
Matt:Wake up call.
Rachel:I love that name. I love that they were like, should he be named some kind of sci fi name? And they were like, no. He's Stanley Tweedle. Just part of the comedy, so it works.
Rachel:And he's in his bunk. And I love this info dump, which is just an info dump. Like, there's literally no reason to put this in here except to catch you up.
Matt:It also establishes that living in the cluster, living in this empire, whatever, you are subjected to, like, involuntary propaganda.
Rachel:Oh, programming all the time?
Matt:All programming all the time.
Rachel:Oh, I wonder if they could pay 2.99 to make the programming go away.
Matt:Yeah. Like, you you have to pay to turn you off your screen in your room?
Rachel:Yeah. I was specifically referring to Amazon, but, yeah. That too. And this is the, like, dark zone info dump where they're like, only a thin dimensional barrier separates us from the chaos of the dark zone. And the dark zone actually coexists.
Rachel:And we have this whole, like, hand waving with balls, and then the balls overlap. And it's the same place, same time as our universe, and we give thanks to his divine shadow for protecting us from the horror and disorder of the dark zone.
Matt:The dark zone. Zone.
Rachel:We promised. I'm trying. I love this creepy face. I kinda want this creepy face to be my phone screen. Like, when I talk to Alexa, I want this to be the face that talks back to me.
Rachel:Can we make that happen? Does there any
Matt:There are several open source virtual assistants.
Rachel:Yeah. This needs to be one
Matt:of them. A plug in Yeah. For a version with a screen that uses this face and has, like, just the static eyes and nose, and only the mouth moves Yeah. When it talks and only a little bit Yeah. And not at all like a human mouth moves.
Rachel:I love this face so much. And I love this part where the face is looking at Stanley, and Stanley looks at the face, and the face keeps looking at him, and then it's like, get the fuck up. I can't sleep.
Matt:Get out of
Rachel:bed. The bed. It's trying to wake him up or he'll get 7 demerits, and he already has 991 demerits.
Matt:At what point, like, from a from a systems design perspective, I'm trying to incentivize, human beings to behave in a certain way. At what point in this system do you not realize that maybe the demerit system doesn't work. Isn't working. Yeah. If you're getting demerits in increments of, like, 7, and this guy has almost a 1,000.
Rachel:Well, I think this is specifically Stanley Tweedle, because look at what the punishment for his minor infraction later is is death or the loss of 1 to 3 organs. So they're probably hoping that the severity of the final punishment Stanley. But remember, Stanley thinks he has an exception because he's a designated data coordinator.
Matt:Which means, he betrayed his
Rachel:Yeah.
Matt:Yeah. They
Rachel:The Austin BTS. Yeah.
Matt:And, give them critical information.
Rachel:Right.
Matt:It'd be interesting to have a prequel of, like, here's Stanley Tweedle before he was, like, completely neurotic after years of living under the tyranny
Rachel:Of the Shadow.
Matt:Of the Shadow, like, as a cooperator. Yeah. Like, what was Stanley like as a high level member of the resistance?
Rachel:He wasn't a high level. He was like an assistant to a courier.
Matt:Well but he had teeth with secret information.
Rachel:Yeah. But that's because he was a courier.
Matt:Oh, okay. That's okay.
Rachel:Yeah. He wasn't, like, a high up, and he was literally just and he's not even, like, the courier. He was, like, the 2nd assistant courier. He says it later. He's like, all I was was, like, a second assistant courier.
Rachel:Like, I don't know what everybody's so mad at me because he gave up. But he was curringer, curring, carrying crucial information. Anyway, so he has 991 demerits, and this is when the face stares at him, like, really creepily.
Matt:And he finally crawls out of bed.
Rachel:And finally, he's like, which I hate his mesh blanket. Can you imagine you're sleeping in this, like, cubby? Because it it's sort of like a Japanese capsule hotel Right. That everybody stays in. And his only blanket looks like a mesh shirt from the eighties, and that's it.
Rachel:Maybe they're all temperature controlled. It's fine. So we cut to the ship in space, and this is where I feel like I need to comment on how much I love the music in this show. Because you'll be like, we're just having this cool moment where Stanley's waking up, and we're learning about the dark zone. And then it's like, boom.
Rachel:Dude, this looks like shit is like
Matt:this thing. Very it's a very recognizable, like, style of this boom. Yeah. And it happens after, like, any transition where you end up in space and you're seeing, like, CG.
Rachel:Yeah.
Matt:You get this, like, percussion Yeah. Like, sequence.
Rachel:Except when the Lex finally takes off at the end, and it's like.
Matt:Oh. Oh. Maybe. Yeah. Maybe the sound that you're hearing is the ship's propulsion.
Rachel:Let's go with that.
Matt:And all Sure. And you're hearing the boom. Yeah.
Rachel:They bought all of their 4th. Their propulsion just has
Matt:a and tires.
Rachel:Yeah.
Matt:Got it. But then the Lex has a different style because it's it's a different, like, technology.
Rachel:Yeah.
Matt:The engines work differently.
Rachel:Yeah. Okay. Well, they're commencing the revival sequence because they've made it through the frontier, and this is a prison transport. And so the face pops up again, and it's like, you're going you're going to be diverted to another gate because there's a bulkhead malfunction.
Matt:Right.
Rachel:Which, okay. It just means they're gonna go to Stanley's Gate, so it's fine. And then the guy walks down and, like, the first prisoner in line is, dead. And he goes, number 11 freeze dried again.
Matt:Like, oops.
Rachel:And then we go past the
Matt:woman a ticket to get that fixed.
Rachel:We go past the woman wearing a people suit, who we find out later is Chigorata.
Matt:Yeah.
Rachel:And she played in 2 episodes of forever night, actually. She played in, trophy girl. She's the lady who runs the escort agency.
Kai:Mhmm.
Rachel:And she plays in false witness where she is the dominatrix who has the videotape hidden in her flower pot. Yes. Yeah. Yep. Those are very specific references.
Rachel:If you don't know what I'm talking about, go watch Forever Night and then listen to Come in Any 1 kilo. And then we get this poor woman, which I always feel bad for actresses who have to play the ugly, the, I hate saying that word, the unattractive, less attractive, less traditionally attractive version of a character that's going to be the, like, sex symbol for the show. I just feel so because then she has to sit there while this guy tells her, I've seen a lot of women in my time, but you're the ugliest.
Matt:Right. And then she she responds probably in, like, the most the way that she expects would, like, avoid any punishment.
Rachel:Right. Because he says, does that mean anything to you? And she goes, nothing means anything to me. Handsome. I don't know why she has to eat.
Rachel:He shocks her and she passes out. And this whole exchange is not the best moment in this episode. And then we go on to, like a bug in the back, this weird bug transport pod thing. And they look in the slot, and we just see Barry Bostwick's eyes looking back out at us, and he's like the really, really evil guy in the prison transport. Ton of ton of prisoner transports.
Matt:Yeah. There's just, like, a dozen of them all
Rachel:coming in. Dozens of them all coming in all at the same time. And then as they fly by the stadium thing, the Lex is up on the hill. Oh.
Matt:1st first look. Yeah.
Rachel:And then we come back to Stanley. And Stanley is throwing pieces of metal at this robot's ass and trying to get them to bounce off into this grate.
Matt:Right. There's like a waste disposal
Rachel:or something.
Matt:This is
Rachel:a really good way for us to sort of introduce the Stanley character and how just sort of a waste of space for Stanley. Not only does he have 991 demerits
Matt:In a bureaucratic nightmare Yeah. Stanley Tweedle is the monkey wrench in the gears.
Rachel:Yeah. But not actively so. Just it's like weaponized incompetence.
Song:Yes.
Rachel:That's what Stanley is.
Matt:I would say that's a good good description of his role in this this whole system.
Rachel:Yeah. In every system, really. Yeah. And then the ship from earlier requests a docking beam. And And he's like, cool.
Rachel:Can you give me the code? And they're like, nobody asked for the code anymore. He's like, okay. Well, you need to give me the code, which in his defense, that could be a trick. Nobody asked for the code anymore.
Rachel:I mean, it could be a trick if someone's
Song:trying to
Rachel:get him, but it could also be like a is he gonna push it? Is he gonna ask for the code? And so they end up giving him the code, and it's incorrect. And she's like, he
Matt:She just, like, bashes some numbers on the keyboard.
Rachel:Yeah. And Stanley's like, well, wrong code. She's like, I can't remember the code. And he's like, well, then I guess I can't turn on the docking beam.
Matt:Right. And so here's here's another glimpse into the kind of systems that are operating
Rachel:Yeah.
Matt:In this empire. They've gotten complacent. They've everything's been conquered for a 1000 years, 2000 years. You don't need to follow tight security protocols when
Rachel:Everyone works for you.
Matt:Of or the the probability of someone actually trying to sneak in
Rachel:to
Matt:your capital city planet thing is so low, you know, you just don't worry about it.
Rachel:Yeah. So don't worry about it. I don't care. You don't care. It's fine.
Rachel:But Stanley, in this one instance, is actually concerned with doing his job probably because it gives him satisfaction to not let this person in.
Matt:Right. And I think in general, he follows the letter of the rules that he's agreed to.
Rachel:Yeah. He just didn't go above and beyond them. Exactly. Yeah. And he does actually get a piece of metal in the gray
Matt:because he quitting.
Rachel:Yeah. He's he's quiet quit a long time ago. So he turns the screen off because this woman doesn't have the right code to fuck her. And then he finally gets a piece of metal in the grate, and it, like, explodes and fire shooting out of it just as another person shows up. And they turn to the screen with the prison transport lady on it, and they're like, you know, I am so sorry that this guy is an idiot.
Rachel:Actually, he goes, I worship his shadow. To which the response is, may his shadow fall upon you. In case you wanna use that in everyday life, Let's practice right now. I worship his shadow.
Matt:May his shadow fall upon you.
Rachel:Thank you. And he's like, don't worry. I'm gonna I'm gonna make sure this guy is punished for not letting you in. You'll have to go. And she's like, I want him to be demoted.
Rachel:And they're like, oh, he's already as low as you can go. Sorry. Class 4 is the lowest. And he has a 4 on his hat. Everybody has their rank on their hat.
Matt:Yeah.
Rachel:And so the guy's like, cool cool. You have to go at the end of the shift and report to, like, corrections to be punished. And Stanley's like, great. Because the guy goes, may his merciful shadow fall upon you. And then he walks off, and Stanley goes, may his merciful shadow fall upon me preferably.
Matt:So I felt like that was kind of a a dig at Stanley by only saying the response part. And so so Stanley's kind of just left hanging.
Rachel:Yeah.
Matt:So this guy's like, it's not even worth me going through the motions of
Rachel:Interacting with you.
Matt:Standard the standard, like, salutation Yeah. Because, like, you're so so far below me
Rachel:Yeah.
Matt:And I don't like you.
Rachel:And then we rushed we cut to them rushing an unconscious shadow into this big spooky building.
Matt:Right. So this is like the priests, I
Rachel:guess,
Matt:of his divine shadow, like, the top tier of his The undermites. Of bureaucracy. Yes. They they fucked up.
Rachel:Yeah. They fucked up because they let the first shadow get real, real bad before they started prepping for the sec the next shadow body. And so they're rushing him into this building, and they're like, oh, shit. We need to, like, cleanse this dude who we've tried to make look real, real tough by giving him, like, a tattoo on like, shaving his head and giving him a tattoo on his head. And he's, like, struggling, and he he knocks one of the little priests over, and they die.
Rachel:Oh, they're on the ground for, like, the rest of the season.
Matt:Oh, because, they get electrocuted. Yeah.
Rachel:And so that's supposed to be wiping his brain, but they only do it once and they don't sedate him. And they're like, okay. We gotta do it again. And they're like, nah. No.
Rachel:We don't
Matt:have time. We don't have time.
Rachel:We don't have time.
Matt:So either the priests fucked up or the shadow fucked up because he deliberately told them to, like, keep going. Like, we don't need to hurry back. Yeah. I'll be fine. Stop coddling me or I'll kill you.
Matt:Yeah. And then he collapses, and they're like, shit. Now we gotta rush.
Rachel:Right. I hate it when this happens.
Matt:I hate it when his divine shadow doesn't follow procedures.
Rachel:They're like, what if we didn't get it all? And they're like, no. It's fine. He's strong. He'll make a good host.
Rachel:And so they get this they put this thing in his mouth, this, like, funnel thing and, like, lean him over the unconscious previous shadow.
Matt:We saw with Kai when he killed Kai.
Rachel:Yeah.
Matt:He sucked up some Memories. Energy thing from Kai, and we saw some flashes of memories.
Rachel:Yeah. So he performs the kiss. They're like shadow, divine shadow, perform the kiss, and he sends all of his memories, his essence, one might say, his purity of essence, into the other guy.
Matt:Yeah. And he wakes up.
Rachel:Yeah. And he, like, wakes up, opens his eyes, and then we get this cool transition to, like, these nice black sclera contacts. It's a cool moment. And they're like, oh, phew. Oh, good.
Rachel:We made it made it in time. And then they, like, slightly wheel the old guy off, And then we just hear, like, as they cut the brain out of the old shadow.
Matt:Right. And then they put it into this little They had
Rachel:to make so many fake brains for this. Do you think there was one intern that were like, make fake brains? And he was like, how many? And they were like, yes.
Matt:Just keep cranking them out.
Rachel:However many you can get. However many you can get. You just do it, man. And he was like, I mean, okay. Do you want them to look bloody?
Rachel:They're like bloody, juicy, slick, all the things. I want these gross. And he was like, cool. I can do that. And then they had another guy working on fake organs.
Rachel:It was a whole thing. It was like a nonunion sweatshop of organ production. And then they cut his brain out with this, like, scoop, which looks like a kitchen implement of some kind. It's like a serrated scoop on one end and then, like
Matt:You have to cut the connections, like, to the spinal cord.
Rachel:And they even make like
Matt:a and stuff.
Rachel:Like a Oh, yeah.
Matt:Yeah. The sound guys had a great time. I honestly forgot how much body horror was in this. I don't know. I must have blocked it out.
Matt:It's real heavy in this episode. I don't think
Rachel:I don't think it goes back to this.
Matt:There's there's an episode
Rachel:like, actually.
Matt:Kai gets sliced into, like, a 100 slices of his entire body and, like, spread out.
Rachel:Of course, he does.
Matt:Yeah. Anyway, the body horror horror continues.
Rachel:The body horror.
Matt:Just at a slower pace.
Rachel:Yeah. I think. They packed in a lot.
Matt:They were like intensity,
Rachel:lower temperature. Start here. And then when we come back here, it'll feel alright. It'll feel alright.
Matt:It'll feel like
Rachel:we do that. So that we don't have to go hard later. Sound good to everybody? And they were like, yeah. That's fine.
Rachel:Okay. Fine. Well, tell Steve we need more brains. So now this thing gets put in the brain. The thing.
Rachel:The brain gets put in this little container.
Matt:A brain container.
Rachel:A brain a brain box. And they, like, put a little plastic cover on it that has a little face, and then they plug this thing in it and it lights up and now it gets to talk. So isn't that lovely? And they put it on this pillar and it rises up where all the other brains and boxes are, and now it becomes a divine predecessor. And it gets to live on all the big pillars with all of its divine predecessor friends.
Rachel:And then they unhook our new host after his eyes go fully black, so he has become the shadow. And then his cloak just disappears off one body and puts it on the other one, which is like, is his cloak also him? Is his cloak some form of nanotechnology?
Matt:Yeah. And they'd no context.
Rachel:They're like, I'm sorry, but we will explain nothing.
Matt:So this is a cool idea of having, like, a continuous ruler, and they just body swap when
Rachel:Oh, it kinda reminds me of The New Year's Born.
Matt:I was thinking, where have I seen this style done before? And there's, like, there's Ginyu in Dragon Ball z, who's the head of the Ginyu force, who works for Freeza. And he has this body swap technique, energy technique. And he's like, they mentioned it eventually that, oh, yeah. He that big purple body, yeah, that's not his original body.
Matt:He's been body swapping for a while, and he always body swaps into a more powerful body.
Rachel:I feel like body swapping is a thing. It happens. Yeah.
Matt:Yeah. And but I'm trying to I recall something's ringing a bell of another series, another story, probably a book where the ruler just body swapped.
Rachel:He's born.
Matt:Well, he didn't body swap. He the the emperor.
Rachel:Oh, he just took over a body.
Matt:I thought he body swapped. No. He there's, there's the 2 powers.
Rachel:Yeah. And It it's happened somewhere before
Matt:I guarantee you. Metal.
Rachel:Yeah.
Matt:And one of them, you can store life energy in a metal. Yeah. And the other one, you can burn that metal and, like, restore your body, heal. And so he and you get more out of it when you burn the metal. And so he can store his own life energy into, like, a gold ring, and then he can, like, shave down the gold ring and burn it and get back, like, 10 times more life energy.
Rachel:Uh-huh.
Matt:And so he's just infinite, regeneration.
Rachel:Gotcha.
Matt:And it keeps him young for a 1000 years or 2000 years, whatever.
Rachel:I mean, this is done, so it's fine. But he rises up on this pillar.
Matt:But the the stagnation of an empire with a single continuous ruler
Rachel:Yeah.
Matt:Over eons
Rachel:Like foundation.
Matt:Like foundation is, is established. There's lots of precedents for if you have a single ruler for a really, really, really long time, things go bad.
Rachel:Yeah. They must not transfer memories though because later, we find the one guy who saved Kai. He's the only one that knows that Kai is burning g.
Matt:Right.
Rachel:So they must just transfer essence and then kind of allow the new ruler to learn from the predecessors and not be the predecessor.
Matt:Memories, but it's just like a selection. Oh, yeah. Highlights. Highlights real.
Rachel:So the new host puts on his old cloak, which looks very, layered. Describe that. And he ends up rising up on the pillar, and he's like, divine predecessors. And they're like, oh, yay. Our new friend.
Rachel:May your reign be long and orderly. And he's like, yes. Yes. I will serve order. I will serve you, and I will serve myself.
Rachel:And they're all like Collective
Matt:gasp of electronic voices. You son of
Rachel:a bitch. And he's like, yeah. Okay. So I didn't get fully cleansed, so I'm a little bit shadow, but I'm also a little bit human. And that means that I'm better than everybody, and they're like
Matt:Specifically, a psychopathic human.
Rachel:Yeah. And they're like, why didn't we equip our brain boxes with, like, offensive weapons? They could, like, fly up and become independent independently operating miniature flying drone machines, or they could, like, pew pew pew.
Matt:Maybe because they each knew that the the whole group, the swarm of divine predecessors Yeah. Was always a potential threat to their rule.
Rachel:What do you call a group of shadows? A reckoning. I don't know. So then he's like, the Lex will be fully grown soon, and then we can hit the enemies of the league of 20,000 planets, and we can, like, selectively destroy the opposition. And the divine predecessors are like, okay.
Rachel:But how will I how will you know what planets to strike? Well, that's what the guy says, actually. The new shadow guy is like, how will I know what planets to strike? And they're like, well, that's where your wisdom comes in.
Matt:That's literally your job.
Rachel:That's where the thinking part comes in. Maybe we can follow some clues. And he's like, oh, okay. Cool. Well, then I'll just kill them all.
Rachel:Let's see. Survey says everybody's bad. Let's just kill a lot of them.
Matt:They can't rise up against me if I kill all of them.
Rachel:If I kill all of them. It kinda reminds me of in Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy where we meet that race of people.
Matt:Oh, the, crickets.
Rachel:Yeah. Where their entire planet is surrounded by, like, an impenetrable fog. And when they finally rise out of it and they see the stars and they realize that every one of those stars has the potential to have a planet like theirs and that there are literally more sentient races in the universe than there are grains of sand on the beach, and they go, yeah. That's all got to go. Yep.
Rachel:And they just a a spaceship crash lands on their planet. That's what happens. And then they reverse engineer it. And within, like, a couple of months, they have a, like, a spaceship on it. Yeah.
Rachel:And the new shadow was like, I'm gonna command the Lex, and I'm gonna go out and punish the enemies that being all of them, all of everyone, everywhere. The enemies of order, and because my host brain wasn't fully cleansed, like, I'm ready for destruction. You know what I'm saying? And the brains are like, no. You can't leave the cluster.
Rachel:And he's like, fuck prophecy, man. Like, who cares? I don't care. I haven't died yet. It's It's been 2000 years.
Rachel:I think I'm gonna be okay. And they're like, no. If you ever leave the cluster, you will die. And he's like, yeah. Bullshit.
Rachel:The Brune and g have been extinct for 2,008 years. I think I'm good. And then he leaves.
Matt:Well, he's like, he's like, it's not that I can't leave the cluster. Yeah. The biggest problem with leaving the cluster is not having access to your collective wisdom Yes.
Rachel:Of the divine presence. Coming with me.
Matt:Road trip.
Rachel:Yeah. He's like, they're like, no. You can't leave. What will you do without us? And he's like, without you, oh my god.
Rachel:Who said I was gonna leave you behind? And so he puts them in this, like, brain shit, a larger brain box, one might say. And then they fly off and they're like, we are doomed. No. We're all gonna die.
Matt:It's like when you put your smaller Tupperware into a bigger Tupperware.
Rachel:Yeah. The brain ception. Because the one brain is like you know, they're like, oh, no. We're gonna be fine. The prophecy is definitely like, I'm pretty sure we're gonna be okay because the prophecy did say the bird and g and, like, they've been gone for a while, and then the one brain is like, oh, sorry, guys, actually.
Matt:I I kept 1.
Rachel:I kinda kept 1, and they're like, what? No. They're like, the prophecy is upon us. We'll we will all go extinct. And this is when we see the memories of Kai talking to the prophet.
Rachel:This I love this section so much. Because we finally meet the time prophet because he mentions the time prophet at the beginning. And then when we actually see the memories of Kai, we see the time profit, and the time profit is like, I have the strength to answer one question. And I want that on a t shirt. Like, you get one.
Rachel:One question.
Matt:Yeah. That'll be on our Lex merch.
Rachel:Right. Because I feel like as a parent, you totally understand that vibe of, like, okay. I I know that you're confused and you have clarifying questions, and I'm happy for you. Pick your best one and hit me with it. And this is when Kai is like, will the forces of his shadow destroy us?
Rachel:And the time prophet is like, well, you know, time had a beginning and an end, and then it kinda just begins all over again. And in an age yet to come, in an age long past, For there are no beginnings or endings
Matt:phrased. In
Rachel:the wheel of time. When the shadow leaves the cluster, the Bruningi will destroy them. This will happen. It has happened. Yeah.
Rachel:Yeah. No. We're gonna get defeated today, but then don't worry. You're gonna get revenge eventually. And then the brains are continue there.
Rachel:No. And then we go back to Stanley. And Stanley is just sitting there while prisoners are being wheeled past on every time we watched him, Matt was like, that's Unistrut. I've bought that. That's how I made my desk.
Rachel:And then he was like, okay. So wait. Could they have bought that at Lowe's, like, in the Lex Universe? Could not not the prop guys, but, like, the people who built the cluster.
Matt:Right.
Rachel:Anyway, these people are being wheeled by. And one of them recognizes Stanley. He's like, Stanley Tweedle? You son of a bitch. You're the traitor.
Matt:The arch traitor.
Rachel:The arch traitor Stanley Tweedle. And this is our first hit that Stanley Tweedle is anything other than just our mild mannered security guard. I mean, he still is just a mild mannered security guard.
Matt:Yeah.
Rachel:But at a certain point in his life, he made poor choices. But this guy falls off the track, like, the bolt on his thing comes undone, and he falls off the track, and it just goes
Matt:We get a nice slash.
Rachel:Kinda like when you step on a ketchup packet.
Matt:Yes.
Rachel:And it squirts up.
Matt:Very much like that.
Rachel:Yeah. And then we come to another one of my favorite scenes, which is the trial scene. And it's where they reel the prisoners up and then, like, a hologram of a judge and a hologram of 2 lawyers appear, and then they have, quote, court.
Matt:They hold court snippets.
Rachel:Yeah. Prerecorded court for these people. And then every time they have to fill in information unique unique to that individual, it freezes, and then it just does, like, a computer voice.
Matt:Yes.
Rachel:It's like, you are charged with and then it's like
Matt:It hits the vibe so hard.
Rachel:It does. It's so good. This this is, like, post consumer capitalism, communism, like, all packaged in this awful
Matt:just like the funeral process in enemy mind.
Rachel:Yes. Yes. It is just that is exactly what it's like where we in enemy mind, there's a scene where we're panning up to the space station, and we see a wreath come by. And we hear, like, an organ, and this guy is giving a service. And then as we it starts to skip, and then we go to the room where they're actually disposing of bodies.
Matt:There's literally belt with bodies. And as each body gets up to the end of the conveyor belt, there's an operator there, and they're like, oh, this one's Christian or this one's Catholic.
Rachel:Yeah. It is. This guy's an atheist. We don't have to play anything. And they just send him out, and then they push a button, and it shoots a a a wreath out after them.
Rachel:And there's just like a there's a dispenser for wreaths
Matt:Yeah.
Rachel:Filled with wreaths. That's exactly what it feels like. The cheapness of human life sort of thing. Yes. So the first guy is someone who stopped paying the temple, and this is really just to show us that the situation is serious.
Rachel:Like, we have to have somebody who gets convicted and gets punished so that we know what typical punishment looks like, and that's this guy. So they end up doing, like, a memory search where they stick this probe in his brain or at least on his head, and then we see his memories, which start with, like, a sex scene.
Matt:Of course.
Rachel:And then cut to people trying to get him to donate to the temple, and he's like, no. No. I'm not gonna pay anymore. And they're like, okay. Guilty.
Rachel:Sentenced to have his individual life terminated, but, his organs will live on in the making of robotic drones. So all of those robots have people parts, and the rest will go to the protein bank to be recycled for purposes that serve his shadow.
Matt:And We never talk about where the stuff in the protein bank goes. What the fuck? Probably Soylent Green is people.
Rachel:Yeah.
Matt:But
Rachel:Well, it goes to the giant thing that's eating all of the
Matt:I don't know if that's like an so they fought the insect civilization. Yeah. The obviously, like, made use of something
Rachel:Is that what's going on the Lex?
Matt:That's that was my first suspicion. Yeah. Is this machine
Rachel:This is another thing where they were like, do you really want
Matt:it now? Conveyor belt full of bags of human organs and meat and whatever.
Rachel:Yeah.
Matt:And it's all going, like, dozens of conveyor belts into this giant opening with a bunch of robotic hands.
Rachel:Yeah.
Matt:That's like, I don't know, sorting it, whatever. We don't
Rachel:It's not robotic hands. It's like tentacles at the end of a beast.
Matt:Well, they look metallic. It looks like a giant mouth.
Rachel:This is another situation where it's like, do you guys really wanna know? You don't really wanna fucking know, do you? Let's just leave it. And I love that they leave it because it just leaves us with this, what the shit is happening?
Matt:Yeah. Like, how much of their technology is, like, semiconductors and stuff? Yeah. And how much of it is, like, we we defeated this insect civilization, and they had obviously done some things so that they could travel in space. Yeah.
Matt:The had these little fighters that look like dragonflies.
Rachel:Yeah.
Matt:Like, are are we growing insect like bodies without brains, or do we, like, scoop the brains out afterward?
Rachel:They don't explain it, and I love that they don't explain it. But he gets tracked over to an organ remover, and it's literally
Matt:That's an outline for the organ.
Rachel:All the organs, and then there's, like, these little saws going around the outline. It's like, and the whole thing is covered in blood. Yeah. And it just looks gross, and there's even a little cut out. There's, like, his his lungs and his liver and his heart and his kidneys and his testicles down at the bottom.
Rachel:And I was like, did you catch that? And that goes, what? And I rewound it, and he was like, like, oh my god. And then all of it falls into an eyewash bowl. Like, this is just an eyewash bowl, and it falls in there, And then it gets kinda carted off.
Matt:Well And then Right before it gets carted off, a brain falls on top.
Rachel:Yes. Oh. And then then, like, the rest of it falls down, and it gets bagged in this plastic. We watch it get bagged in this plastic bag and then go down the chute to, a conveyor belt, and then we pan out, and there's, like, a 100 conveyor belts. And they are all packed full with bags full of human flesh, and they are all heading towards the whatever.
Rachel:And we even committed to the meaty, gross, like, thump into the eye wash bowl. This Foley artist was either grossed out the entire time or having the time of their lives. And then we cut back to Stanley because what do we need in this moment but a break? And so we go back to Stanley, and he goes to the desk, and he's like, oh my god. So there's this guy, Stanley Tweedle, and he's supposed to be reporting today, but he's refusing to turn himself in.
Matt:He just won't cooperate with me. Ugh. I I need some leverage.
Rachel:Yeah. Maybe you could tell me what the punishment will be, and then I could convince him to come. And the guy's like, oh, okay. Let me look it up. And he goes, oh, yeah.
Rachel:If he's not here at watch change, termination order immediately. And he's like, termination? Like, we're gonna tell him that he's a designated data cooperator. And the guy goes, oh, DDC, And then he's like, oh, no. That expired 6 months ago.
Rachel:Because Stanley goes, he might be needed some time for vital information. He's like, nah. No. It's not that vital anymore. Nope.
Rachel:Nope. Maybe because they caught Thoden.
Matt:Maybe because they caught Thoden. Yeah. Maybe because they were finished. Like, the Lex was almost finished growing. Yeah.
Matt:They didn't need anything else.
Rachel:Yeah. But he's like, well, you know, if it was just this offense, then he makes a snip notion. He goes cauterization. Cauterization. He goes, but with 991 demerits, it's, 1 to 3 organs.
Rachel:And Stanley's like, 3 organs? What 3 organs? And he's like, oh, standard combo. Eye, kidney, testicle, depending on demand, and demand is high. So probably we'll do 3.
Rachel:And Stanley goes, but it was just a mix up. And the guy goes, life's a mix up. And he goes, you know, triple organ is better than termination. Right? And Stanley's like, well, I guess.
Rachel:And so he wanders off sadly as all these robots are whizzing by, and he ends up kicking 1.
Matt:Yeah.
Rachel:And then we come back to Zev's trial, and she is being accused of failing to do her wifely duties and embarrassing her husband in the temple, which feels like something I could literally be charged for in the state of North Carolina.
Matt:Yeah.
Rachel:Yeah. I'm pretty sure it could be. And then we see her we see her memories, and I love her husband. It is like if you opened any 19 nineties teen girl magazine, and you had, like, heartthrob models.
Matt:They have this haircut.
Rachel:This is the guy, The mushroom cut with the middle part. This haircut is back. He's a child. And he's like, oh my god. You guys are trying to marry me off to this cow.
Rachel:And she's like, but I love you, and I'll serve you forever. And he's like, gross. And so she punches him in the face, which might be why Zev is my favorite character because even when Zev is not part cluster lizard, even when Zeb does not have all of the advantages she eventually gets, Zeb's already feisty, which I love.
Matt:And so,
Rachel:of course, she's found guilty because she punched him straight in the face. And she's sentenced to be transformed into a love slave and given to a seminary to be used for their pleasure. And she's like, actually, could we give my voice?
Matt:Volunteer for the protein bank. She's
Rachel:like, that's what she's doing. For the protein bank. It would just kill me, please. I don't want this terrible life anymore. And then we cut back to the walking bug thing because this is when we really start, like, snip, snip, snip.
Rachel:This is our setup episode.
Matt:Yeah. There's so much
Rachel:to set up.
Matt:Text here.
Rachel:And we have to get it all in an hour and a half, and it is rapid fire from this point on. Because we go to the walking bug thing, and it's headed to trial. And our holographic guys appear, and they're like, okay. Thode enough austral b pair who's in there. Oops.
Rachel:Yeah. Your trial is actually going to be transferred to the stadium where you will be tried and punished for entertainment purposes. So we get deferred from fig figuring out who this guy is one more time. And we go back to Zev, and Zev gets, like, laid down under what I assume is, like, the bio sculptor. And they put this eye thing over her eye, like a tanning bed eye thing.
Matt:Yes. To protect her eyes from the radiation.
Song:And then
Rachel:he she gets a little video that's like, my, as soon as this sentence is carried out, you'll be cleansed of your crime. You're good to go. And then we go back to the stadium because this is our rapid fire change moment, and we get the music, the, like, opera synth combo, the, like, synthesizer music with operatic singing in the background. I kinda like it. I kinda like it a lot.
Rachel:And then we find out that in this pod thing is the pirate, heretic, rebel of the astral b pair, Thoden. And then the bug opens for the reveal of the big evil bad guy who's been in this pod the whole time, and it's Barry Bostwick in a leather vest and a loincloth, A rainbow loincloth.
Matt:Should I recognize who Barry Bostwick is?
Rachel:He played in Rocky Horror Picture Show. Oh, okay. I'm we're gonna watch something with him in it, and we'll put it on Strange and Beautiful Book Club. And you'll be like, oh, that
Matt:guy. Gotcha.
Rachel:Yeah. And he's like, yes. My moment has come, not only to show off my like, it's not even a rainbow loincloth. It's like plastic chunks all sort of, like, connected together. So we get, like, a it's got good movement.
Rachel:You know what I'm saying? And we get, like, all of his inner thigh because he's sitting there with his, like he's man spreading in a loincloth. A breedclout breachclout, one might say. And he ends up pushing this bug bomb out of his nose, which it's like a little
Matt:It's an interesting practical
Rachel:effect. Why.
Matt:Yeah. And so we rewatched it a couple times to try to figure out how they did it, but he he had to have something in his nose. Anyway, they pull this thing out of his nose.
Rachel:No disrespect to any other character, but Bug Bomb is my favorite character in this whole episode because his voice is so cute. Bug bomb searching, Boden. Like, is and he was like, bug bomb malfunction, and he falls off. It's so cute, and he's like a little stop motion guy.
Matt:Flicked by
Rachel:Stanley dweedle. Yeah.
Matt:Which just starts the malfunctions.
Rachel:Yeah. Because we get a long POV of bug bomb, and he's like, bug bomb searching, building, because he's trying to find the, you know, the sensor that goes to the things holding his hands, so it'll free him. And as he's flying through the flying through the corridor looking for it, Stanley swats it and knocks it down. And then we we cut to a view of, like, the worms, and these are the the cluster lizards who are gonna be our main antagonist for the whole second half of this episode because they eat literally everybody, and they get everywhere. But they're, like, attacking the bars and fighting each other, and everyone in the, auditorium or stadium is cheering.
Rachel:And, yeah, we covered that Stanley is now running away. Like, he turns around because he's like, no. No. I'm just gonna face termination. I don't wanna lose a testicle.
Rachel:And he's like, you know what? Better than dying. And so he turns around to run back, and that's when he spots the bug bomb because he's rushing to try to get back. And he ends up getting there too short. Like, he shorted it.
Matt:Door slams right in front of him. I know.
Rachel:And then we come back, and I wrote down all of the things that Thoden is charged with. So are you ready?
Matt:Yeah. I'm ready.
Rachel:26 counts of piracy, influencing the minds of believers, doubting his shadow, destroying 231 vessels loyal to his shadow, training people to stand up to his shadow, slandering clerics on 11 planets, and 6 counts of bluff blasphemous self aggrandizement.
Song:Oh, it's
Rachel:hard to say after that whole list. Six counts of blasphemous self ag please say
Matt:Aggrandizement.
Rachel:Aggrandizement. Thank you. I want that like, if I ever get charged to something, I want it to be self aggrandizement. Like, I thought I was better than I was. And then Stan, yeah, he misses his thing.
Rachel:And then the bug bomb reactivates. It's like,
Matt:Searching Thoden.
Rachel:Yeah. Bug bomb restarted Thoden, and he, like, flies off. And then he locates the target conduit, kinda misses it, and then comes back.
Matt:Locates it. Oh, wee wee wee wee wee. He's like, okay. We and we see this little, like, diagram, like, a schematic of the restraints. And it's like, okay.
Matt:I'm gonna blow this up or interfere with this, whatever I need to do.
Rachel:Yeah.
Matt:And and then it falls off. Yeah. But then each Mel Boonstein. It says, it says something about activating the
Rachel:Yeah.
Matt:The explosive. And then each time it shows that we see, like, the bug bombs perspective POV, there's this little clock in the top right corner.
Rachel:That's counting down.
Matt:Counting down.
Rachel:Yeah.
Matt:And by the time it explodes, it's on the wrong
Rachel:I love it. I love it when falls down, and it goes, bug mom lost head because
Matt:its head falls down.
Rachel:And then we cut to these families, and it's kind of like, Girl Guides. It's a bunch of kids with, like, hatches and hats, and they're showing up because they're there to, receive an award for their youthful devotion, which is the greatest in the 20,000 planets. And they're arriving in the hangar, and, of course, they only get a holographic priest guy. And he's like, you are the youngest 50 of the most loyal of his shadow subjects, and we're gonna give you medals. And then you're gonna go back and dedicate your life to the shadow.
Rachel:And then we cut back to Thoden in the arena, and is like, sheep will wake up. He's like, you're being manipulated. Can't you tell him? They're like, we don't care. Kill him graphically.
Rachel:And then bug bomb. Bug bomb has such a small part, but it has so much impact because then he locates the signal again and falls off again, And then it's like, I'm gonna blow up. Like, I I can't help it. It's like explosion imminent, and then it ends
Matt:up exploding. Signals between the all the stuff controlling the stadium and the stuff controlling the, like, award ceremony. Yeah. So the holograms start to switch. Yeah.
Matt:And I feel like this is the result of a, like, stagnant bureaucratic monstrosity where each individual has so little autonomy or independence or influence over how the system operates. Everybody just has to trust the system because the system's been operating for 100 of years without issues. But then when there's a malfunction in the system, there's no, like, big off button. Nobody can go in and override
Rachel:Right. Because they've never needed it before.
Matt:Because all the control signals that are, like, telling everything connected to the stadium that this individual, Boden, is the target. He's being punished. Like, we're submitting transactions to his official record.
Rachel:Yeah.
Matt:When that gets diverted and the punishment, like, transaction gets sent to the the award ceremony, now it actually gets applied just all automatically. Automatically
Rachel:to the little children
Matt:who are the right
Rachel:to get medals because they're getting like, oh, you guys are the best. We're giving you medals. And then it switches, and it's like, you have been condemned to be consumed by cluster lizard until dead.
Matt:And then the the transaction to update all the kids' records with this, like, merit merit badge, I don't know, award goes to Thoden. Like, wow. That's
Rachel:Yeah. And then the cluster lizards get released into
Matt:the to themselves.
Rachel:And then the cluster lizards eat all the chips.
Matt:Right. And it even opens all the
Rachel:doors quickly. Great.
Matt:For the cluster lizards to get to the kids.
Rachel:We're the cluster lizards. We only ever see them attacking the bars. We never get a location on where they are.
Matt:They can see Thoden, and Thoden looks at them.
Rachel:Okay.
Matt:So that means the kids are, like, right underneath the stadium.
Rachel:Go from being in the stadium, which feels like it should be self contained, to being in literally every room of the entire place. And there's only, like, 10 of them. Unless Yeah. Unless they had a whole bunch of cluster lizards. And when the bug bomb broke down everything, it just released all
Matt:the cluster lizards. When it punished every single kid to be consumed by cluster lizards, it's like, oh, this one cage of cluster lizards is not sufficient, because the cluster lizards are gonna get full be before they eat everybody.
Rachel:Just open everything up.
Matt:Well, just we need more cluster lizards.
Rachel:Right. I mean, it is the cluster, and they are cluster lizards. So they would have an excessive number of cluster lizards, I would say. And then we get the image of the bloody metal, like the merit metal on the floor. And then Thoden's, they're like, adjust as the cluster lizards get free and they're coming into the stadium because they get into the crowd and start eating people in the crowd, and then Thoden's little pod closes, and he's like.
Matt:No. Now he's the only one protected.
Rachel:I know. And then we go back to Zev because remember Zev? She's still getting transformed into a love slave, and we'd be like, boop boop boop chosen her hair, which will be baby blue. And, apparently, at the time, like, baby blue hair dye was not available, so they used the same dye that they used to make blue colored marshmallows. And they would dye her hair every day because they thought a wig would look too fake.
Matt:Wow.
Rachel:Anyway, remember how we joke about forever night how part of the budget was cocaine? I feel like everybody in this show is actually just working for cocaine instead of pay except the guy who plays Kai. He gets paid money, but all of his money gets donated to charity.
Matt:Yeah.
Rachel:Yeah. That's the vibe. That's the vibe of the show. How did a cluster lizard get in here? How it doesn't matter.
Matt:Well, we know that this punish this particular punishment line is directly below the stadium because gets delivered there, and then he gets brought straight up into the
Rachel:You're correct.
Matt:Stadium. And then when he goes back straight down, he ends up in this
Rachel:room again. That's true. That is true. So after they've decided she's gonna be blue and they have, like, boop, boop, boop on her hair and on her crotch. Yes.
Rachel:So they changed the color of boat anyway. And then they, like, electrocute her crot her yoni, one might say.
Matt:Charge up her yoni?
Rachel:To charge her up sexually, And then we see the, like, boop boop boop. The, like, line form scan shrink. Okay. And then Stan's on the run, and he, like, looks over because as soon as the gate closes, they're like, fugitive on the loose. Stanley Tweedle, and it puts up a picture of him.
Rachel:And then it's like, beware of disguises, and it just
Song:shows a bunch of beateries.
Matt:A bad, like Sideburns, beard, mustache.
Rachel:I know. And then Thoden is finally free. And we finally
Matt:get interesting that the only disguises that they prepared people to recognize for Stanley Tweedle was bad facial hair.
Rachel:Yeah. Not any other part of his uniform, which I think he wears that uniform the entire show. So it did. Yeah. And then we get the, like, Thoden finally like, the thing opens, and he just rips his hands free.
Rachel:Like, I love how when they need to get free, they're just like, meh, and they just pull them free. Zeb does the same thing. And then when he's freeing all of his friends, they just pull them off. Okay. It's fine.
Rachel:It's another moment of this is a complacent system. Yeah. So we'll go with it. And then we get the full shiny loincloth. And, luckily, because of the mix up, the robots think he won the award, so they just let him be.
Matt:Yeah.
Rachel:Yeah. And right when he gets down there to themselves. I know. Right when he gets down there, Jigurata, the person in a person suit
Matt:The cannibal.
Rachel:The cannibal. Jigurata, the wicked, of Boron 7 who is charged with the cannibalism of men, women, children, and clerics of 62 temples. And she goes, more like a 162. And so Thoden runs behind her and frees his little I'm sorry. There's no better word for this guy, his twink bro.
Rachel:It's like little buddy with the with the rubber, shirt that actually just leaves his nipples uncovered and then rejoins the choices.
Matt:Costume choices were made.
Rachel:I mean, is there a better description for him? I don't think so. I feel like he just kind of checks all the boxes, and so calling him the twink bro just feels right. And then they start freeing the others together, and Jugurata is like, hello? Free me.
Rachel:Don't I look innocent, says the woman wearing a people suit. Like
Matt:A yes.
Rachel:Like a pole
Matt:person suit with a hood.
Rachel:With a hood that is somebody's face and hair and scalp all in one. And she's like, free me. I'll help you. And so he pulls her loose, and then she's like, hey. Fuck you.
Rachel:And she just jumps down a hole. She's like, jigarata out, and she just leaves. And this is when we see the head hood on her hoodie or people hoodie. She's wearing all skin. When I say a people suit, I mean, she has a man's nipples on the outside of her outfit because she is wearing skin skin.
Rachel:And Thoden's like, well, I don't have time to deal with that. So she start continues freeing all the other prisoners. And then we go back to Zev, and this is like if it feels like I'm talking really fast, it's because this part's really fast. We go really fast, and then we slow down. So we just gotta get through the fast part.
Rachel:So we go back to Zev, and she can't see because of the eye covers, but the worm rolls in like the cluster lizard.
Matt:Yeah.
Rachel:And it eats the robot guy because the robot guy is made of people parts. And then, like, gets incorporated into her bio resculpting thing because it gets squished inside
Matt:of it. Brainwasher, or is that after?
Rachel:This is after. So the cluster worm's head goes to eat Zev just as it closes, and it ends up cutting the head off. And so she gets to be part cluster does
Matt:her whole body recomposition rebuilding thing.
Rachel:So this is why she has superpowers later, and she can pull herself free of her restraints.
Matt:Yeah.
Rachel:And then she sits up, and it's like, like, look how pretty she is now. Heart music that plays when she sits up. And then the, like, reprogramming thing comes down, and this is when she picks up the robot head, and she puts it what's his name? 790 or 690? He has a name, and we're gonna find it out later.
Rachel:But she puts the robot head into the reprogrammer, and this is when it wakes up and it does the, like, brown chicka wow wow, like, once over of Zeb, and it's like, I will love you forever. And she's like,
Matt:So now all the the sex slave or love slave programming Yeah. Is now in this robot head. Yes.
Rachel:And she's like, I don't need this dress no more because now, of course, the top fits perfectly. Look how that works. But she still has this really long train, so she rip rips it off. And now, it's a perfect little miniskirt. Oh my god.
Rachel:How did that happen? And then she just dips. And the robot head's like, don't leave me. No one will ever worship you like I do. And this is when
Matt:it's like still talk to all the systems. Yeah.
Rachel:So it just brings one of the little robot carts over and hops on it and follows after her. And this is when Zeb and Stanley meet officially for the first time because they're running down the hallway and they're passing each other, and she just goes, nice picture.
Matt:Oh, yeah. Because he's all over the
Rachel:walls. Everywhere. Yeah. Yeah. And they're not immediately friends, and both of them are immediately selfish characters, which I kinda love.
Matt:Right.
Rachel:I get a little tired of the, I'm a hero, and I'm selfless, and I'm selfless immediately. No. No. No.
Matt:We're we're both fugitives at the same time. Yeah. The enemy of my enemy is my
Rachel:My toy to my pawn my pawn to use to gain favor with my other enemy because, the giant robots, which I love these giant robot costumes, the they almost look like cicada heads with the long legs. They're chasing them, and Zev first tries to go by them. And this is when the robot head comes up behind her and is like, oh my god, Zev. I'm gonna love you forever. And they're like, oh, Zev.
Rachel:Yeah. You're still a fugitive, so we're gonna capture you. So she flees with Stanley, and then she holds him in front of her when the robots are going to shoot.
Matt:Yeah.
Rachel:Like, no. Shoot him. Not me. And then we cut to the divine shadow because the divine shadow is just sitting in a in a dark room. I mean, if my name was divine shadow You'd
Matt:spend a lot of time sitting in dark rooms.
Rachel:Yeah. I mean, that'd be, like, my thing. And I feel like it is his thing, and it it's fair.
Matt:Except if if he's in a dark room, if there's no lights
Rachel:And he's is he still the shadow? I mean, it's a good question, but he is the shadow, so it's fine. And they tell him, we have a level 3 security break. 100 have already been killed. I mean, cluster lizards are loose and eating everyone.
Rachel:And the divine shadow is like, general, you have disturbed my meditation, 1. And, when it is completed, I will deal with you and this minor matter. 100? Okay. I mean, that's how many people die a minute in our prison block.
Rachel:Look at our conveyor belts.
Matt:We'll just sanitize what the cluster lizards left behind and add it to the protein bank.
Rachel:It's gonna be fine.
Matt:Yeah. Don't worry about it.
Rachel:Don't worry about it.
Matt:Just don't worry about it.
Rachel:Yeah. And so they end up using the robot head conveniently because we cut back to Stan and Zev, and they can't open this door. And so she just picks up the robot head, and she's like, open the door. And he's like, oh, yeah. Anything you say, baby.
Rachel:And, of course, they immediately run into some cluster lizards, but Zev just screams at them.
Matt:With a cluster lizard scream?
Rachel:Yeah. And then they go past her, and they eat the robots. Sure. Yeah. And Stanley's like, sorry.
Rachel:What the fuck? And she goes, I guess I have some cluster lizard in me because she's very German. Yeah. And Stanley goes, I could get past that. I love this so much.
Rachel:And then we come back to Thoden on the run with all of his his friends who I I know there are other people, but I'm only ever looking at the twink guy because it, like, his outfit, like, pinches his, pecs. And so they're, like Yes. It is. Prominent.
Matt:It's weird. It's striking, I guess.
Rachel:Yes. It's strikingly prominent. His nipples are striking like prominent. So I'm just like, look at them. Just look at them, like, looking back at me.
Rachel:And then they run into some giant robots, and, of course, they congratulate Thoden on, earning the medal. And so he's like, great. Thanks. And he takes their guns.
Matt:And they don't do anything.
Rachel:They don't do anything. And then just as they're walking away, they're like, oh, I'm sorry. Update. Your medal is rescinded, and we need to apprehend you. Can you give us back our guns?
Rachel:And he's like, no. And then we
Matt:How about
Rachel:not? Go to the divine shadow, and he is contemplating this, wireframe holographic image of Lex, the Lex, which is definitely just a dick floating in the air.
Matt:It's a dragonfly with no wings.
Rachel:Okay. And for some reason, he's questioning these Because he's like he's not asking them questions about, like, where are the fugitives? What do they want? Why did you let them go? He just goes, do you think time flows in a line or in a circle?
Matt:Which is the right question to ask Which is the right in this moment. Right?
Rachel:It feels like having a conversation with our son. We were out blowing bubbles, and he goes, what would happen if a bubble was inside a bubble? And I was like, well, that would be fine because you can have a bubble inside a bubble. They might pop each other or they might merge into one bubble. And he was like, oh, what would happen if you had a rock inside a bubble?
Rachel:It's like, can we just blow bubbles? Do we do I have to talk about mass and all of this right now? Can we just blow these bubbles? And he's like, if a bubble collapsed in on itself, would it create a black hole?
Song:I was like, I don't fucking
Rachel:so the shadow is like, do you think time flows in a line or in a circle? And the one guy's like, a line? And the shadow goes, yeah. Yeah. I thought so.
Rachel:Straight line. Just beginning all the way to the end. Just straight. And that's why prophecy is bullshit. And they're like, yeah.
Rachel:That's, yeah, that's why prophecy is bullshit. And the shadow says, alright. Well, I'm gonna let these fugitives get to the special projects area uncontested. And I think this is another, like, I'm gonna prove prophecy isn't real by letting this play out.
Matt:I'm going to give them every chance, but then, I mean, they're not gonna be able to take the Lex or anything. So Yeah.
Rachel:It'll be fine. Like, the prophecy is bullshit. I'm gonna prove it to you by letting the prophecy play out. And then he tells one person to kill the other person, and they do. And then he's like, great.
Rachel:Now kill yourself. And this is a really unhinged moment. It's yeah. Because they start praying, and then she, like, shoots herself in the head and dies. And so you get the idea of why characters like are rebelling against this this complacent communist capitalist hellscape apocalypse that everybody lives in.
Matt:Communist?
Rachel:I don't know. I'm just combining shit right now.
Matt:Maybe fascist?
Rachel:Fascist. Yeah.
Matt:Authoritarian
Rachel:This is the future Republican spot. Despotic tyranny? Yes. And so, yeah, we cut back to Thoden, and they are climbing up these struts, assuming lead to the leks, which they're wearing mini skirts. And they are now okay.
Rachel:It's fine. As long as you're not beneath them and you don't look up, it should be okay. And they start getting shot at, and one of them dies. And then they're like, actually, you know what? Oops.
Rachel:Sorry. We're not gonna shoot at you anymore, and they pack their shit up and leave. And Thoden's like, well, I'm not gonna question that. And so they climb up
Matt:So far, they have handled this horribly. So, I mean, it's not it's not unprecedented.
Rachel:This feels on brand. This feels on brand. And we find out that the reason they're doing this is because the shadow didn't want just anyone to stop Thoden and his band. He wanted Kai to stop Thoden and his band because using the Brunin g to stop the people that would destroy the Lex feels poetic. Like, I'm gonna use the creature that was supposed to destroy me as the thing that will destroy you because I ultimately enjoy.
Matt:He wants to win
Rachel:With style.
Matt:In a way that he can gloat about
Rachel:With style.
Matt:In multiple ways Yeah. With style.
Rachel:Yeah. And it did take me, like, 2 watchings to figure out what the fuck was going on because there's a lot happening because we're not Yeah.
Song:There was
Matt:a lot of fast transitions.
Rachel:Until we bring all of our characters together, there is a lot of whip whip whip around. And he wakes up Kai, and Kai's like, who do you need me to kill? And he goes, you will show my misguided predecessors that I make my own destiny. Okay. And then we cut to Stanley and Zev again, and they're trying to open doors.
Rachel:And so they're holding the robot up because that worked before. And then the robot goes, all access denied except to the gates of my heart.
Matt:Which I really like the way they use this robot head Yeah. Because it's it's a character. Like, this is the main character for the whole show. It's an unusual character, but it's also a really elegant plot device for them to be able to navigate this, like, fully automated, bureaucratic control system
Rachel:Yeah.
Matt:Of this empire because, oh, like, this robot this robot has, like, a a secured device identifier. And it's in all the official records that this robot has the default level of permissions for you know, automatons in the Empire. And this one has been subverted and is under the control of Zev. Yeah. But it still has all of its permissions and access.
Matt:Yeah. And so Zev and Stanley, they don't have the, like, the permissions in the system to be able to open doors, much less, like, the technology. Yeah. Because there's not we don't really see buttons. There's probably just some wireless communication going on between the robot head and the computer systems.
Matt:So this allow this facilitates Stanley and Zev being able to just run around and open, like, the regular access doors without having to get all hand wavy about, oh, why why are the shadow's computer systems allowing them to open the doors? Oh, it's because the robot head that already has the secure permissions
Rachel:Is doing it for them.
Matt:Doing it for them.
Rachel:Every time I see this, all I can think is when this became a show on the sci fi channel, when it went into syndication on the sci fi channel, they put out a whole bunch of magazine ads, and one of them was Zev, like the x EV Zev, the next Zev, licking 7 nineties head and, like, in profile, and then the caption said, great head in every episode.
Matt:Yeah. Which
Rachel:I'm a leave it at that.
Matt:Encapsulates the vibe.
Rachel:Yeah. So the only door that will open besides the gates of 7 nineties heart is the door to the special projects area because So
Matt:would would you call this show a Canadian sex comedy?
Rachel:Yeah. A Canadian sci fi, dark horror sci fi comedy. It's got a lot of shoes to fill. Okay? Luckily, one of the main characters is a dragonfly, which, economically, would have 6 legs.
Rachel:Canadian, sci fi, dark, horror, comedy, sex. Yeah. There you go. 6. Six words.
Rachel:Six shoes. So the door opens to a special project area because the shadow was like, yeah. Make sure they get to the special project area uncontested, including Gigorata, who pops back up. Thank god. Like, we missed her, of course.
Song:Yeah.
Rachel:And the lift that Stanley, Tweedle, and Zev are in is hysterical because they get in this elevator and they're taking it up to the special projects area. And it's like, oh, yeah. I don't recognize you guys. It's the face. The face pops back up, and the face is like, yeah.
Rachel:I don't know who you guys are. So you will be disposed of to become useful organic material for the protein bank or for other uses. Snacks. And then it, like, opens a snack drawer. And just as Stanley goes to eat snacks, it closes it.
Rachel:And it's like, no. You are not authorized personnel. No snacks for you. The snacks were a lie. And just as they get to the top snacks
Matt:weren't a lie. The first notification was like, hey. Just so you know, I'm going to scan your faces.
Rachel:Yeah.
Matt:And if they're not in our systems, then you're gonna die. Yeah. Here's a snack while we wait for the authorization requests Yeah. To go through.
Rachel:And then, boop, never mind. You don't get them.
Matt:But and they were very efficient at Yeah. The facial recognition.
Rachel:How long have those snacks been in there? Do the snacks get refreshed?
Matt:I I bet they have a whole automated system to refresh those because you wouldn't want some high level bureaucrat to get in there, going up to the special projects area
Rachel:And get eaten by the custard worm.
Matt:And then this snack drawer opens, and it goes to grab 1 and they're moldy. Yeah. And then he gets mad at a bunch of people and, like, has them executed or whatever. Yeah. They they're gonna design the system to not offend the people with the, like, whim level power.
Matt:They can just command things, and that happens to their underlings. Right. The underlings would protect themselves with automated systems to keep the upper level people happy.
Rachel:Yeah. Well, they end up getting to the top. I don't remember how they get out. I watched this four times, and, honestly, there were a couple parts where
Matt:I don't remember. Get to the top of the elevator and waiting for them.
Rachel:Yeah. But how do they get out of it? How do they not get killed? Oh, I guess they would have gotten apprehended at the top. Yes.
Rachel:Yeah. Okay. Thank you for clarifying that.
Matt:Mhmm.
Rachel:And Thoden is there because, of course, they've climbed all the way up, and they're getting ready to grab Stanley. And he's like, no. No. I'm astral b. Like, I'm with you guys.
Rachel:I'm one of the cool kids. And they're like, Stanley fucking Tweedle? He's like, yeah.
Matt:We thought you died. Sweet.
Rachel:And they're like, oh my god.
Matt:Stanley Thoden? Long time no see.
Rachel:The arch trader, Stanley Tweedle, and he's like, mommy. Yeah. That that's me. And they're all getting ramped up, and then Zev is like, hey. Has anybody noticed how hot I am?
Rachel:And they're all like, you make a compelling argument.
Matt:Let's go. Let's go. There are higher priorities here. Let's get to a place where we can,
Rachel:But nothing higher than that push up bra. Like, it's got lift. And then, Stanley Tweedle is like, oh my god. Is that the Lex? Can you believe they grew that from some amino acids in my tooth?
Rachel:How many teeth does he has he given up to his courier business? A lot. Yeah.
Matt:Look. Luckily luckily, all the food in the cluster is liquid, so he doesn't have to chew anything.
Rachel:How do you know all the food in the cluster
Matt:is liquid? Because he's missing a lot of teeth. Teeth, it would be
Rachel:extremely convenient. I was like, did
Matt:I miss a scene? If he was able to just drink all of his sustenance with
Song:a straw.
Rachel:Please don't.
Matt:Meat shake.
Rachel:No. Stop. Stop.
Matt:Stop. Protein diet milkshake.
Rachel:But Thoden is not done yelling at Stanley, he needs to unload a little bit. I mean, Zev is hot, and that sort of kept him from wanting to kill Stanley right now. But, also, he's like, do you remember Erika? I think it's Erika
Matt:6 too.
Rachel:Erika. Erika.
Matt:Erika was the plan.
Rachel:Yeah. He's like, millions died on Erika's that I could have the key to the Lex. And I always they're bioprogrammers. He's like, they're bioprogrammers, you know, gave me the key to the Lex or whatever. And I always feel so much respect for for actors when they have to deliver these really dramatic lines that have these really ridiculous words in them.
Rachel:Yeah. Like, I stand for astral b. Okay.
Matt:Why do you mean He delivers.
Rachel:He does. No. No. I'm not saying he doesn't. I just mad it's like in Star Trek when they have to have a sentence that is composed almost completely of made up technology words.
Rachel:Yeah. And they have to say them with conviction, that would be hard. And they're getting ready to run into the Lex because we he holds up his hand, and it's like
Matt:It's shimmery.
Rachel:Color shimmers across it. And he's like, I think he's with a Lex. And they're getting ready to go in, and then we hear. Which I would want somebody to make a fan of it, where every time he uses his little, like, projectile weapon, Kai's projectile weapon, it makes like an eagle sound and always says eagle screech in the subtitles. I want somebody to change that all to a chicken clucking.
Rachel:It's like, and then it like, comes back to him. Yeah. It can do the eggs on. If you have chickens, you know, they they they have a call that they make when they've laid an egg and it's like, the, like Yeah. Standard barnyard chicken sound that's like, oh, everybody, I looked I laid an egg.
Rachel:And if there's a whole bunch of them and they're close, they'll all do it together. Like, she laid an egg. Y'all look. This is so crazy. That's what we need.
Rachel:And instead of the, the, like, eagle sound, I don't know. It's such a choice. But he appears and he immediately kills somebody. He, like, hits them with his eagle laser retractable metal claw arm thing. And so they start shooting at him, and he does this, like, momentary side stumble like, and they're like, oh, no.
Rachel:He's been decarbonized. And I would like to point out that earlier, they shot a door, and the door melted.
Matt:It was carbonized steel. Okay.
Song:Okay.
Rachel:So it's not just inanimate objects that can't be shot. It's you literally have to be free of garbage. They're like, is anyone gonna care? And they're like, no, man. A dude with a beehive, a braid, and framing bangs is walking at them and shooting them with an they're like, eagle sound weapon.
Rachel:No. No one cares that when you shoot him, he doesn't die. Okay. I'm just checking. Because it's weird that he doesn't die, though.
Rachel:Like, shout. He's been decarbonized. It's fine. And they just accept it. They're like, oh, shit.
Rachel:Decarbonized. Damn it. What is he made of now?
Matt:Just don't worry about it.
Rachel:Okay. It's fine. It's fine. So he transfers the key. He, like, swipes his thumb across his his forehead?
Matt:Maybe it's one of those terms that someone just threw out. Like, when something is carbonized, it's this. When something is decarbonized, it's this. And then later, they're like, guys, it actually has nothing to do with the carbon.
Rachel:It's fine.
Matt:But the term sticks.
Rachel:Yeah. It it it's fine. It doesn't matter. Thoden, like, swipes his thumb across his forehead, and he's like, it's more than my life that matters. And he, like, holds his hand out, and then his little twink bro, like, holds his hand up, and it's supposed to be this dramatic moment.
Rachel:But, also, this guy is, like, 12 inches shorter, so it's a very, like, bare twink bro moment. And he's just like, take my light from my hand, and he's like, okay. And so it, like, transfers the key to the he probably has a name, but Tibi. To Tibi. And he's like, save Zev because she's hot.
Rachel:So he, like, takes grabs her, and he's like, beauty such as yours must live on. He, like, makes out with her for a second and then shoves her through
Matt:the door.
Rachel:He's like, yikes. Takes her through the door.
Matt:I know. And then she's like, wait.
Rachel:I know. The the door shuts, and she's like, Thoden. And Thoden's like, I definitely probably could have gone in directly behind them, and Kai doesn't have a key. He can't get in. He could just follow-up.
Matt:Probably does have a way to open the
Rachel:door. So decarbonized. So, anyway, he stays behind to fight Kai. He's like, yeah. I'm a I'm gonna I'm gonna do this.
Rachel:And Zev is like, everyone always leaves me. Earlier, we got her saying life's not fair, and then she's like, everyone always leaves me. And then 790, which is that's his name. The little robot head is like, I won't leave you. I like 790.
Rachel:And then Thoden tells Kai that he's Bruning g. He's like, what are you doing, Bruning g?
Matt:Like 790. Why? Because all the things that 790 says to Zev are things that I say to you.
Rachel:Are you like my little pre programmed robot? Hey. You also have lots of permissions you should not have on many technological spaces.
Matt:Oh, no. No. No. Those are totally legitimate permissions.
Rachel:Science. Science. Science. So Thoden is like, dude, did you know you're Bruning g? And Kai's like, the shit?
Rachel:What? No. No.
Matt:No. Yeah. Makes him pause for a second.
Rachel:Makes him pause for a second. Just long enough for Thonan to pull out his own eye. He, like, you know so he had a bug bomb up his nose.
Matt:So extra.
Rachel:He had a bug bomb up his nose. One of his eyes is an invisibility potion because he throws it down and he becomes invisible.
Matt:I'm just imagining Thoden.
Rachel:Under the miniskirt.
Matt:I'm just imagining Thoden, like, with his, you know, at like like, when double o seven goes to q Yeah. Like, his device wizard. And they're like, okay. We're just going to give you these little capsules. They'll be inserted, like, under the skin or, like, the bee implanted alongside your ribs or, like, under your skin or something.
Matt:It'll be super easy to just pop them out. And, like, this one's you'll have a couple of them. There'll be invisibility potions. You'll have a couple of them. There'll be whatever.
Matt:And he's like, no. I want it in my eye.
Rachel:The whole eye? Yes, sir. The whole eye.
Matt:Want to be able to pull out my whole eye and have that be an invisibility potion. It's poetic that the thing that sees generates my invisibility.
Rachel:Yeah. I feel like they wouldn't have that exact conversation. Yeah. It it's But then you
Matt:could only have one of them because you need a real eye.
Rachel:Yeah. It's fine.
Matt:It's like I kinda will only need 1.
Rachel:I kinda wish they hadn't rushed this, and we would just have him slowly losing body part by body part as he's just, like, he takes off his hand and his hand starts running around like cousin or no. Like, thing Yeah. From the Addams Family. And then, like, he takes his leg off below the knee.
Matt:Soft an ear to generate a silence bubble.
Rachel:Right. And then, like, he ends up completely deconstructing himself, and he's just laying on the floor and Kai just walks over him because he's taken everything. Like, he reaches under his, miniskirt and you just hear zzzz, like a zipper sound,
Song:and then he
Rachel:pulls out 2 bombs and he, like, throws the bombs. Like, I just I wanted it to keep going, but now it ends up it ends pretty quickly because he cuts the top off Kai's head, which this is a really cool effect where they have the actor clearly below the
Matt:Right.
Rachel:Floor.
Matt:Yeah. There's a hole in the floor. Yeah. And it's very form fitted around his head.
Rachel:It looks really cool because he cuts off, like, just the top half of his head, but it's cool. He's decarbonized. He's gonna be fine. And so then Stanley and Zev, we cut back to them, and they're following TB through the hallways. And I don't have to think about what to call him anymore because he immediately gets eaten by a cluster lizard.
Rachel:And they go around the corner, and just his hand is sticking out of this cluster lizard's mouth. And so Stanley does, like, a whoop whoop wave, like a. Bye, buddy. And his little wave is enough to get him the key to the Lex. It, like, shoots over his hand.
Matt:I think TB just shoots it out blindly.
Rachel:Yeah.
Matt:Maybe he maybe he knows Zev is there. I don't know. But it hits Stanley's hand.
Rachel:Yeah. And Stanley gets it. And then we go back out, and Kai is using his hawk weapon. So, call call, motherfuckers. Or.
Rachel:And then Stanley, back to Stanley. Stanley runs off and hides in a bug transport. They have, like
Matt:Yeah. Like like the used when they when they fought 2008 years ago.
Rachel:Right. And Zeb is getting ready to get in, and then Gigi Rada pops up and get how did she get in the Lex? How did Jigarata get in the Lex?
Matt:I think they just opened all the doors
Rachel:It's fine. It doesn't matter.
Matt:So that anybody could get through. The more people get into the Lex, the more impressive it will be when They defeat everybody. This divine shadow defeats all of them.
Rachel:I mean, the cluster lizards got in. So however the cluster lizards got in, she got in. Yep. And then Jigarata gets in the ship with Stanley and tries to push him out, and then they end up falling on the gear shift, which the gear shift looks like a ball sack. It's like fleshy, and it has hair.
Song:Yeah.
Rachel:It's the grossest thing.
Matt:They commit to the bit.
Rachel:There were tons of very moist looking fake brains in this, and yet this hairy gear shift is the grossest thing of this episode. And Zev ends up riding on the leg of the transport as they fly off because they have to fly this thing all the way to the bridge of the legs because the
Matt:legs are so big. The long dragonfly body
Rachel:Yeah.
Matt:They get on at the end of the tail.
Rachel:And they have to go all the way to the front.
Matt:And it's like in Event Horizon where they have this long bridge that's just, like, a hallway Yeah. Between the back end, the engineering section of the ship and the, like, control and living space of the ship.
Rachel:Yeah. And the best part about this for 790 is that she has to hug him to her chest to keep him with her as they're flying. And he's like, yes. And this is when Thoden actually cuts Kai's head off, but he's already dead, so that doesn't work. And then they come back and land on the bridge of the Lex, and Zeb and Jigarata battle it out for a minute.
Rachel:And I'm kinda mad that Zeb couldn't just beat Jigarata. Like, did eating other people let her absorb their power or something?
Matt:I think Zev hasn't realized
Rachel:How strong she is yet?
Matt:Yeah. Like Yeah. At this point, in Zev's head, she's been this, like, spunky, like, sarcastic, I don't know, unattractive lady who's just trying been trying to get by. Yeah. And and now she like, why is everyone so nice to her all of a sudden?
Matt:And, like, she's still getting used to her new body.
Rachel:Yeah.
Matt:And and then this lady in a man suit, grabs her, and she she's, you know, still kind of in shock Yeah. Probably about the whole body transformation thing. So it's not till later that she really realizes, oh, wow. I'm actually, like, kind of strong, and and I I can have this effect on men and whatever. Yeah.
Rachel:I mean, it ends up being a draw. Nobody wins. And then Zev is just like, later. Like, she does the point at her eyes, point at Jagerata.
Matt:Right. There's nothing personal between them. They're both just trying to to survive.
Rachel:Right. And Jagerata, I mean, Jagerata is just chaos. But yeah. The wicked. She's wicked.
Matt:Right.
Rachel:And then Thoden ends up getting killed by Kai. We go back, and Kai does his, like, which that's gonna get really annoying if I keep doing it. But guess what I'm gonna do? I'm gonna keep doing it. And then Kai reassembles himself.
Rachel:He, like, stumbles around, finds his head, and we do this, like, pan around his feet thing
Song:Mhmm.
Rachel:Where we transition to not the actor's head so that he can lift
Matt:up the keys. One continuous shot going from his feet to his head. Yeah. And by the time we get to his head, he has his hands on his actual head.
Rachel:Yeah. It was really cool.
Matt:Yeah. It works. Yeah.
Rachel:It works really cool. And then is like, today, I, and he, like, falls over dead. That's the end of Thoden.
Matt:He's so extra. He goes out trying to
Rachel:self aggrandizement was one of his crimes, and he committed it to being
Matt:Being extra.
Rachel:Being extra. Guilty. Guilty of being extra. And so now Zev, Gigurata, and Stanley are all in the Lacks, and Kai is after them. And that is, like, the first part setup of the episode.
Rachel:So I think we're gonna leave it here, and then we'll do the second half for the second part because, this is our only, like, long movie length episode. This isn't over 90 minutes long, this first episode.
Matt:Yeah.
Rachel:So I feel like this is a good place to leave it so we don't end up with a mammoth call.
Matt:At over 90 minutes.
Rachel:I know. I know. And we're getting to the, like, the good part, like, the part where we're gonna talk about, like, Kai's gonna figure out who he is and all that stuff. So we'll leave it here, and then we will come back and do part 2 next week. And I think we're gonna release these on Mondays just like we did for come in 81 kilo, which if you are missing us in the meantime and you haven't listened, we have already done all of forever night, and it is on come in 81 kilo.
Rachel:Just A Forever Night podcast. A Forever Night podcast available anywhere you listen to podcasts. And we're hoping to do a couple more bonus episodes on that eventually. So if you follow us or subscribe to us there, you'll get a notification when we post new episodes.
Matt:Because there are some books.
Rachel:There's books, and there's still some actors that maybe would do an interview. I don't know. We just have to see how that goes. So in the meantime, I worship his shadow.
Matt:May his shadow fall upon you.
Rachel:Until next time, friends.
Song:Bye. Bye.
Matt:1 to 3 organs? Yeah. He'll have to donate 1 to 3 organs depending on demand.