Mystery Maniacs

🎙️ Episode:  https://share.transistor.fm/s/51f0e296
📓 Show Notes: https://midsomermaniacs.transistor.fm/226

Mystery Maniacs Episode! In Podcast 226, a murderer in Wigsville has to dodge loose lamb chops, styrofoam tombstones and fallen Mike. We need a Hughes/Frodo Road trip Buddy Cop Movie! 

Show Notes

Cahokia Mounds State Historic Site
https://whc.unesco.org/en/list/198/

Great Molasses Flood
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Molasses_Flood

Mike Midfall

Howick Historical Village
https://www.historicalvillage.org.nz/

Thanks again for listening!
 
Mark & Sarah

-----------------------------------
Upcoming Schedule
  • January 20 - The Brokenwood Mysteries S04E03 - "The Scarecrow"
  • January 27 - The Brokenwood Mysteries S04E04 - "As If Nothing Had Happened"
------------------------------------
NEWSLETTER: Keep up with all things Mystery Maniac through our newsletter!

Signup here for free: https://midsomermaniacs.transistor.fm/

------------------------------------
Maniac Merch: https://midsomer-maniacs-podcast.myspreadshop.com/
------------------------------------
Connect with the Maniacs:
Rate us on Spotify and Apple!
Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/MysteryManiacsPodcast
Twitter.com - https://twitter.com/mystery_maniacs
Sarah’s twitter -https://www.twitter.com/intellagirl
Mark’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/bell_typewriter
IG - https://www.instagram.com/mysterymaniacspodcast/
Email - mysterymaniacspodcast@gmail.com
Web - mysterymaniacspodcast.com

Creators & Guests

Host
Mark Bell
Co-host of Mystery Maniacs
Host
Sarah Smith-Robbins
Co-host of Mystery Maniacs

What is Mystery Maniacs?

Mystery Maniacs Podcast is a comedy recap podcast dedicated to British Mystery Television. Formerly, Midsomer Maniacs podcast.

Sarah:

Yeah. All 3 of them are dead. Hey, Maniacs.

Mark:

Hey, Maniacs. Mystery Maniacs is a comedy recap podcast dedicated to mystery TV. Each week, we dig into an episode of a show including the murders, the mayhem, the loonies, and everything else we love. This week, Broken Wood Mystery's Stone Cold Dead season 4 episode 2.

Sarah:

How you doing?

Mark:

Or is it Murdoch? It sort of feels like Murdoch

Sarah:

off the top. 18/61.

Mark:

We're a spoiler podcast.

Sarah:

We're gonna ruin it.

Mark:

We're gonna ruin it. It's Pat Postman. And if you let your kids go to these villages

Sarah:

They can handle this episode.

Mark:

Handle this episode. I'm doing okay considering I fell down yesterday while blowing snow in the driveway.

Sarah:

I think you you landed well. You didn't break a hip or anything.

Mark:

No. There was no breaking of hips or

Sarah:

You didn't bang your head or anything?

Mark:

Nope. Nope. It's pretty good.

Sarah:

Nope. I'm bracing for impact. School starts on Monday.

Mark:

Yes. School starts on Monday. So we have one returning to grad school and one returning to undergrad and one returning nowhere.

Sarah:

That sounds dark.

Mark:

It does.

Sarah:

I'm teaching a new class this semester that I've never taught before.

Mark:

Yes.

Sarah:

And that's a bit it's a lot.

Mark:

I'm kinda jealous though. I like to teach, but I'll go back to teaching in a few years. I'm not ready to go back to teaching right now.

Sarah:

But

Mark:

I got too much going on.

Sarah:

Yeah. I'm excited to talk about this episode because it happens at a historical reenactment site.

Mark:

This is a fantastic episode.

Sarah:

It is definitely one of those is there a character right off the bat who is annoying and who you'd like to slap? They're probably gonna die. Yep.

Mark:

And that's the little child.

Sarah:

Eevee? No. I'll talk about Evie. I pity Evie.

Mark:

I have some problems with Evie. But first, we have to clear up some things. First of all, everyone and their neighbor and their neighbor's neighbor and their auntie in New Zealand messaged me, including, it seems, Neil Finn to tell me

Sarah:

Nobody knows who that is but you.

Mark:

That that Neil Finn from crowded house is New Zealand born. And so, therefore, New Zealand claims Split Ends, the first band he was in with his brother Tim Finn, and claims half of Crowded House.

Sarah:

Because last week, you said they were Australian.

Mark:

I said they were Australian.

Sarah:

And you were via email from a lot of people. I did.

Mark:

Neil Finn didn't actually call me.

Sarah:

We also learned that, Fatty Mamas, the the food that Mike brings Sims in the last episode is a restaurant.

Mark:

It's a restaurant. Yep. Which is nice.

Sarah:

I couldn't find it anywhere online, but

Mark:

We have no fatty mamas here.

Sarah:

No. And then there was the big debacle about 47 versus 49.

Mark:

Yes. And we have a clear winner, which is 49, which was my choice.

Sarah:

I guess I have to sing you a you're so right song.

Mark:

You don't really have to sing me.

Sarah:

I said I was going to.

Mark:

Okay.

Sarah:

Here it is. Okay. Now that that's done, can we get on with the episode?

Mark:

Yes. Thank you. Stone Cold Dead.

Sarah:

Are you singing Stone Cold Crazy by Queen? Yes. Is that what you're trying

Mark:

to do? I'm trying to, but I'm mess messing it up quite a bit. Originally aired on the 5th November 2017, directed by Murray Keane and written by Tim Baum. Tim, we we know Tim. This is his 4th season of writing episodes.

Mark:

We know he never wrote detective before, but he has got the plot now. He's got a bunch of suspects. He's got a bunch of red herring motives. He's got a bunch of

Sarah:

No. Not red herring. Red whale.

Mark:

We've got a bunch of people near the crime scene moving in different directions. We got maps, and we have some spectacular stick figures on the board.

Sarah:

And mannequins.

Mark:

Yes. And mannequins.

Sarah:

And pits? Yes. Don't forget the pits.

Mark:

The episode begins like Murdoch. Right? We're back in 18/61. Yeah. And the vicar, at first, it looks like he has a toothache, but, actually, his

Sarah:

His lamb chop is loose.

Mark:

His lamb chop is loose.

Sarah:

Well, it's just it's like typical day at the reenactment village. Yes. Little Evie and her bonnet is skipping around. Do do do. Encounters the school mom who's awful.

Sarah:

Encounters the minister. Yep. And the lamb chop is loose. Encounters the postman. Morning.

Sarah:

You know? Like, sun shining. La la la.

Mark:

Can't find the blacksmith. He's nowhere to be seen.

Sarah:

Boom. Arrow to the head. Bang. Whammo.

Mark:

It's hardcore.

Sarah:

And down she goes. And nobody's sorry to see her go.

Mark:

No. But it's it is a modern arrow clearly. It's a metal arrow. So clearly, something is up.

Sarah:

So that's charity.

Mark:

Yes.

Sarah:

What makes somebody turn into somebody like that? Like, I I understand being really passionate about a period of history and wanting to bring that to life for people and preserve that period of history. I'm all about that. I love history. But she's not just into history.

Sarah:

She is, like, wound so tight

Mark:

Well

Sarah:

about everything.

Mark:

What we need is a diagnosis from doctor Breen, and doctor Breen would say, she's wiggy.

Sarah:

Wiggy. Wiggy. Wiggy? No. Seriously, though.

Sarah:

I just don't know. Like, it just seems like such an unhappy way to live, to be so judgmental of everything and everybody.

Mark:

She was a crazy lady who killed her husband.

Sarah:

Yeah. So Poor Evie. So initially, when I saw this, you wonder, like, do they all live there? And then we learn that really, they only have open days, like, every other Sunday or something like that. So the rest of the time, really, charity is the only one in this whole village because everybody else is off doing their modern lives.

Sarah:

They just show up to act, you know, on those Sundays. So I initially thought, oh, my gosh. They have to live there for a certain period of time. Like, maybe they just do it in the summers or something. Yeah.

Sarah:

Poor Evie's parents are committed to doing this reenactment, and so they've roped her in. Kid just wants a PlayStation, but instead she gets a bonnet and has to skip around. Turns out she's just an actor there, like, 2 Sundays a month or whatever. But What parents? Well, her mom is there all the time with her every time we well, she's always dressed modern.

Sarah:

She doesn't work there.

Mark:

Yeah. I Anna. The

Sarah:

the child The kid's got a job.

Mark:

The child is let run ripshod all over this place singing ding dong bell.

Sarah:

At least it's not ding dong, the witch is dead.

Mark:

No. No. Ding dong bell, pussy's in the well. Who put her in? Charity.

Mark:

Charity. Who pulled her out?

Sarah:

Mike.

Mark:

Mike.

Sarah:

Who fell on her?

Mark:

Mike. Yeah. Mike.

Sarah:

It's a him, but yeah. All the mannequins are freaky. I'm with Breen again. He doesn't like spiders. He doesn't like mannequins.

Sarah:

He doesn't like clowns. We are kin.

Mark:

So

Sarah:

They have the worst mannequins too. These wide eyed, like they almost look like hairdressers mannequins.

Mark:

Yeah.

Sarah:

But they have bodies.

Mark:

They're clearly dresser mannequins that they are using for this episode.

Sarah:

Yeah.

Mark:

First note I have about the scene of the crime is Mike pulls up right in front of the place, clear parking spot.

Sarah:

That's what you do. Okay. You make sure there's a spot for your boss.

Mark:

The governor has a spot.

Sarah:

Yeah. There should be a cone there holding it for him.

Mark:

So there's a reference here to dynamic duo.

Sarah:

Mhmm.

Mark:

And it's it's in reference to, 2 of the characters who we have seen before. They were the elf and the troll.

Sarah:

Yeah.

Mark:

And their character names

Sarah:

And the Lord of the Rings reenactment. And here they are playing, like, war reenactors with muskets and stuff. I would not trust those 2 doofuses with guns.

Mark:

Definitely not. And they're called the dynamic duo. And I my little comic book went off because dynamic duo usually is reference to Batman and Robin. Yeah. Do you know where it originally comes from?

Mark:

No. Batman and Robin.

Sarah:

Well, that doesn't surprise me.

Mark:

From Batman number 4

Sarah:

I can imagine it on the cover of the comics.

Mark:

Yep. Which would have been in the in the late twenties in the Batman comic written by Bill Finger and drawn by Bob Kane. Absolutely, like, the Joker calls them the dynamic duo.

Sarah:

So in preparation for this episode, I have listened to the rest is history episode about New Zealand, and it was incredibly interesting, and I learned nothing of use for this.

Mark:

Oh, should we announce now that where the rest is maniacs from now on? That show is getting so popular. If you're not

Sarah:

really good.

Mark:

If you're not listening to the rest is history.

Sarah:

If you like history, you gotta be, like, a history pedant. Yeah. But there are enough people out there who are.

Mark:

But you'll get into it.

Sarah:

It's awesome.

Mark:

And it's part of, the rest is blank network. Yeah. And we were gonna make a joke that the rest is maniacs now.

Sarah:

The rest is murder. Mysteries. Yeah. But I thought if I listened to it, maybe I would learn more about this period of history, and I didn't. So I mean, nothing useful in it.

Mark:

Brings up the next thing that is of interest to me that I can absolutely relate to, which is, did you notice the map in the school room? Yes. What is it? I don't know. I don't It's a map of the UK.

Sarah:

Oh, yeah. It would have been. It was colony.

Mark:

So you have this weird situation where you have colonial aggressors, which absolutely the white people were. I'm not saying they're not. Mhmm. Okay? They displaced tons of Maori people.

Sarah:

Yep.

Mark:

Okay? That happened, and that is horrible. But then those white people were then degraded again by saying, well, you're colonists. Mhmm. So you have to learn British history because you don't have any real history of your own.

Sarah:

Yeah.

Mark:

And that's what it was like in Canada.

Sarah:

I bet.

Mark:

We definitely like, we had picture of the queen in every classroom.

Sarah:

Did you have to say hello every morning? You're way better.

Mark:

In up until grade 8, we sang oh Canada and God save the queen every morning in school. Wow.

Sarah:

Yep. No. Thanks. I can't imagine if we had to sing a song about the president.

Mark:

It's bad enough to sing, like, to say

Sarah:

the pledge of the pledge of allegiance at least is to the country, not to a person.

Mark:

Well, somebody, a person, is going to take advantage of this open day, and that is

Sarah:

Frodo. 1 The return of Frodo.

Mark:

Frozen Frodo.

Sarah:

So He's managed to finagle an ice cream truck.

Mark:

He's bought himself an ice cream truck.

Sarah:

He's an entrepreneur.

Mark:

Yep. This is entrepreneurial Frodo. Like and this is what we see from the rest on now. Tilly gets the coffee truck, and then he's always in the car.

Sarah:

Kinda set. Yeah. He finds his thing. He takes over the the guy who missus Marlow loves to make get coffee from. She's like, ooga ooga.

Mark:

We'll talk about that later. So Frodo has painted the van. Mhmm. Mark it like he's branded himself. Mhmm.

Mark:

He's got a website. Frozenfrodo.co.nz. Yes. Which I can't buy. I'm not allowed to.

Sarah:

No. You're not allowed to buy that.

Mark:

But I tried.

Sarah:

But it's available.

Mark:

Yes. And when they go talk to Frodo, they cross the street to talk to Frodo. Who goes, it's part of my fleet. Yeah.

Sarah:

How many you got? Well, just this one so far, but he's thinking big.

Mark:

Frodo's always positive. He's got he's a he's got an optimistic outlook.

Sarah:

I really wanted all of the ice creams on the side of the truck to have names, but they don't. But when he's serving people, he's like, this is a frozen Frodo fudge surprise. Or

Mark:

Yeah. I I wanted them to have all, like, pretend Lord of the Rings names.

Sarah:

I just wanted them to have Frodo in everyone.

Mark:

Well, yes.

Sarah:

So what do you what what Frodo based ice cream do you think he should have?

Mark:

Well, because I like raspberries And because in high school

Sarah:

Frodo frambois?

Mark:

Framboisie is what we called them in high school because we were inundated with French being Canada, and we used to call raspberries framboisies because it looks like if you don't know that it's French. And so I would want a Frodo surprise.

Sarah:

I think he should have a pup cup.

Mark:

A pup cup? Yeah. Okay.

Sarah:

Called Frodo's Fro Yo for prize. Because you'd give the dog a frozen yogurt.

Mark:

Yes.

Sarah:

It's a fur prize. It's a fur prize.

Mark:

Yeah. I noticed, speaking of ice cream, at this point in time, how incredibly cold it is in this scene. Like, all of them have breath coming. Like Yeah. You could see their breath.

Sarah:

They're not dressed for cold No. But it's obviously cold.

Mark:

And Kristen is really cold.

Sarah:

It's gotta be hard to pretend you're not cold.

Mark:

She hides it, but there you catch glimpses of her being like, I'm going to put my hands in my pocket dancing now.

Sarah:

Why are you cuddling with that mannequin for warmth? The dead lady Charity, her sister is the is the red whale that I'm talking about.

Mark:

Her sister is a dumping ground for motive.

Sarah:

They could not give her more motive than she has. I mean, Charity is who she is, so she obviously deserves to die because she's a horrible human being. So first, Deborah's husband has had a stroke. Yes. Right?

Sarah:

Brought on by brought on by stress, created by Charity trying to stop them from starting a business that they had sunk all of their money into. So now they're broke. They have no business, and her husband has had a paralyzing stroke. Yes. There's that.

Mark:

Like, there's

Sarah:

that. That's enough right there.

Mark:

Yeah. Absolutely. What's your sister do for a hobby and for fun?

Sarah:

She's a former Olympian archer.

Mark:

Piling it on here.

Sarah:

Yes.

Mark:

So now she's got a bow, and she's angry. Yeah. But it's not like Charity made moral judgments about her.

Sarah:

No. About her having an affair since her husband is basically just needs to be cared for 247.

Mark:

Do did you think that they take him more places than he needs to go?

Sarah:

Well, you know, he's with it in his head. He it's just his body that isn't, you know, reactive. So I think it's good that he's out and about and doing things. I think it's kinda sad that they just park him in the waiting room sometimes at, like, the cop shop. That seems kind of, I don't know, disrespectful just to sit him over there.

Mark:

But I'm very glad. I put in my notes here, Chekhov's guy in a wheelchair, and they don't actually do that.

Sarah:

Right. He mumbles, and they don't end up making that meaningful. Like, he's not secretly going, she did it. She did it under his breath or something.

Mark:

Brie wants there to do it.

Sarah:

But, I mean, I'm I'm glad she's bringing him around. He could easily be home in bed, you know, so that's good. Yeah. But then when Mike is also in a wheelchair after breaking his leg, it's kinda like, how many wheelchairs do we need?

Mark:

It's a little rear window.

Sarah:

In this one episode. Yeah.

Mark:

And Breen gives him a little gun. I was

Sarah:

like, oh,

Mark:

they can't do the the rear window thing. And they don't. And

Sarah:

they don't.

Mark:

They don't do that, and they don't do the the husband in a wheelchair is just a sympathetic character.

Sarah:

Yeah. And a reminder of Charity Yeah. Being an awful person.

Mark:

Horrible. So her sister did it.

Sarah:

Justifiably, Deborah is a little bitter over all of it.

Mark:

So much so that okay. So postman's Pat shows up earlier. I'm like, oh, yeah. It's postman Pat who does it. And then I was like, wait a minute.

Mark:

Her sister clearly did it because she has every motive. No alibi.

Sarah:

And then her alibi falls apart, and it looks like she's lying. And she writes the wrong time on the register at the respite home, and, like, it's short of her fingerprints being on the arrow. Like, how much motive do you have to give this person?

Mark:

It's almost like and we're getting way ahead

Sarah:

of her. Means it's not her.

Mark:

Yeah. We're it's almost like we're getting ahead of ourselves here. But when the d gets done, it's almost like she runs in and goes, dope. I'll do it. Yeah.

Sarah:

Aw. You got her first. I was on my way. Man, been waiting all this time. Thanks.

Sarah:

So Charity's husband has disappeared 7 years ago Yeah. Has been declared dead and has got a nice Styrofoam tombstone.

Mark:

Wow. Is that a Styrofoam tombstone?

Sarah:

The effects in this in this season are so good. They should have put a little bit more time into that tombstone.

Mark:

That tombstone I watched I watched every scene with the tombstone to see if it fluttered.

Sarah:

See if it it wiggled in the wind or something. In the

Mark:

wind a bit.

Sarah:

When she touches it, does it, like, does it shrink, like, because she pushes it a little bit?

Mark:

I know I know that I love my wife, and I think she's super freaking amazing, but you have made so many better styrofoam tombstones than that styrofoam.

Sarah:

Needs a prop tombstone, you let me know. I can do it. Way better than that one. He disappeared Yes. 7 years ago.

Sarah:

He just left when I'm walkabout on the beach. Never came back. They found his clothes.

Mark:

Found his clothes.

Sarah:

But not him. Yep. Charity killed him. Yes. She poisoned him.

Mark:

Yes. She did. And then put a nail on his head to try to frame somebody else.

Sarah:

Just in case.

Mark:

Wow.

Sarah:

Just in case. You know? Who don't I like? Well, everybody. Well, specifically, who don't I like?

Sarah:

How about the blacksmith? Sure. I'll just put an this is somebody you loved and you can just put a nail in their head

Mark:

Yeah.

Sarah:

After taking their clothes off

Mark:

And so

Sarah:

that you can dump them on a beach at some point, I guess.

Mark:

And I think she probably hit him at least more than once with that hammer.

Sarah:

It would take more than months, I think.

Mark:

And then she hides a group. She plants evidence years ahead of thing. Oh.

Sarah:

She's a bad person. Bad person.

Mark:

Postman Pat reference here. If you are American and don't know what Postman Pat is, it was an eighties British television show for kids that was cute as all hell.

Sarah:

Well and if Charity is not nasty enough, speaking of Postman, she's period correct racist too.

Mark:

Because Kyle is there. Shows up. Yeah. And she calls him a native to his face. And he'd the fact that he doesn't punch her at that point in time.

Sarah:

I wanted to punch her.

Mark:

I definitely wanted to punch her.

Sarah:

She just the the Jacqueline Nairn, who plays her, does a great job of playing somebody you just wanna slap constantly. Even when she's crying over not having a baby, I'm not sorry for her.

Mark:

No. She's she's Well, she's replaced it with this scary one eyed doll.

Sarah:

That's that's what babies look like back then, Mark.

Mark:

They had one eye?

Sarah:

In 18/61.

Mark:

Yeah. All babies had

Sarah:

one. Historically accurate. Okay.

Mark:

You know who else is Colonial babies, Renai. Is a red herring whale, is the vicar. I was getting a chicken out of the house.

Sarah:

Wally. What? That's the worst excuse. I wasn't in here rummaging around for evidence at a crime scene. I was chasing a chicken that is nowhere to be seen now.

Sarah:

Nope. Evie's like, oh, can I help? I love chasing chickens. Really? If that's your favorite thing to do, no wonder you you work here.

Mark:

So they go to interview the vicar at what can only be ex ex sort of explained away as it's a gift shop that's attached to the village, and they have these. Right? Of course. But there's things in this scene that are weird.

Sarah:

Is it a gift shop or is it like a fake general store?

Mark:

Well, it's both because they have an old cash register right beside a brand new cash register. There's 2 cash

Sarah:

registers there, and there's a whole

Mark:

bunch of broken wood And

Sarah:

you're like, pick it up. Pick it up. Pick it up. No. They don't.

Sarah:

Look at it. And you're, like, pick it up. Pick it up. Pick it up. No.

Mark:

They don't.

Sarah:

So it seems surprisingly specific that they are reenacting 18/61. There's no battle that happened in Brokenwood or anything that they're reenacting. It's not a pivotal period in time for this location. I mean, it's a it's an important period in New Zealand history, but at this location, there's nothing that we know of that it's like, oh, we can't let people forget the battle of 18/61. No.

Sarah:

So I went I went looking for, like, other weirdly specific live reenactment places. I couldn't I mean, they're all exactly what you would predict.

Mark:

Like, everybody's been to one of these. Oh, so sorry. Everyone in in, like, America and Canada and New Zealand, Australia, places like that. I don't think they have many of them in England that are pioneer ones because they have, like, medieval ones.

Sarah:

You've we've been watching those, what is it? The Edwardian farm, the Victorian farm, the World War 2 farm

Mark:

Where the 3 archaeologists Tudor

Sarah:

farm

Mark:

pretend to be farmers

Sarah:

Yeah. In different periods of time.

Mark:

And all the last night, they totally blew up because they were like, these 2 guys stayed another place on the estate during the evenings, but Ruth has decided to stay in the house. I'm like, yeah.

Sarah:

You mean, you know, the 3 all sleep in that little trundle bed there? Nobody's gonna understand what we're talking about anyway unless they've watched any of them. Because it's always the question of where do they all sleep?

Mark:

Yes.

Sarah:

There's I mean, there's a lot of historically preserved places

Mark:

Yes.

Sarah:

But not with live reenactments or like everyday life going on. Yep. So if there was an historical event or a period of time that you wish there was a reenactment site for, what would it be?

Mark:

There's 2 fake 2 ones I know don't exist and one that exist, and I wanna go to it. So the 2 that I'd like to see that don't exist is I am absolutely obsessed with the notion of the Romans leaving England.

Sarah:

Mhmm.

Mark:

So I wanna I wanna reenactment of the the moment of the Romans leaving

Sarah:

England. And they just pack up their stuff and walk out.

Mark:

And I know it's not like that. It took 100 of years, and it had to do with money and all sorts of things.

Sarah:

And then, you know, the native Britons just rushed into their nice houses and said, I live here now.

Mark:

Yes. Oh, really? Well, we're gonna break it all up. So so there's that. The second one, which we'll never see a reenactment of, is the drunken Canadians and Native Americans going to Washington and burning down the White House.

Mark:

We could see that pretty soon. We we could It could happen. We could indeed see that.

Sarah:

It wouldn't be a reenactment.

Mark:

But that whole war of 18 12 Canada, US border skirmishes along with the Fenian raids, it's it's a That's a

Sarah:

big, like, cross border event you want them to reenact? Okay. So what's the one that does exist?

Mark:

So the one that does exist is roughly, I think, about 4 and a half hours from here, south of St. Louis, there is a village that was I think it was, like, maybe a a 1000 BCE, like that sort of time period, a 1000 to 1200 BCE. It was a city larger than what London was.

Sarah:

Wow.

Mark:

It was a native American colony. And there it's all mounds now, but that area is drivable for us. And You'd like to

Sarah:

go see it?

Mark:

I'd like to go see that.

Sarah:

So if I could have the historical reenactment of my imagination

Mark:

Okay.

Sarah:

Now mind you, what I'm talking about is, like, a repeated reenactment. Like, every day at 3 o'clock, this happens

Mark:

Yes. And you

Sarah:

can go and watch it.

Mark:

Well, we're off. That's that's my Roman line.

Sarah:

It's 5 o'clock on Friday. We're out

Mark:

of here.

Sarah:

Pointing at their watches. Yep. What I would like to see reenacted every day at 3 o'clock is the great maple syrup flood of Boston from 1919.

Mark:

Molasses, not maple syrup.

Sarah:

Is it? Yeah. It's molasses. Listed as as maple syrup everywhere.

Mark:

Thought it was may I thought it was molasses.

Sarah:

Maple syrup.

Mark:

Okay.

Sarah:

It was 2,300,000 gallons of maple syrup in a 25 foot wave

Mark:

Yeah. That went down the street, killed, like, 40 people. It killed 21 people.

Sarah:

Yeah. But I want them to reenact that

Mark:

every day.

Sarah:

You know, you're like you clear the streets. You have everybody stand, you know, and and little, like, observation towers to watch it. Yep. And every day, this big wave of stuff comes down the street, watches

Mark:

a bunch of people down. What that look like.

Sarah:

And then they just recycle it back up to the top for the next day.

Mark:

It just drains and then gets pumped back up Right.

Sarah:

They could just redo it every day. Somebody should do that. It'd be a big money spinner, I think.

Mark:

That's absolute so what happened, if you don't know, it got really, really hot. It was really hot in Boston, and they had this big vat of it, and I think it was on stilts.

Sarah:

It was like a water tower,

Mark:

but it was like a water syrup.

Sarah:

And What could go wrong? And

Mark:

it failed catastrophically. Yeah. And a wave of sticky gunk

Sarah:

Came barreling down the street. Like,

Mark:

you get home and you go, well, Ted died today. Yeah. And your kids at home are like, how did he die? And he's like You know, his house is gone. He got run over by people.

Sarah:

It's just a big slick now of sticky. Yeah. Imagine the bugs. Oh. See?

Sarah:

They have to reenact all of that. That would be great. Then the next day, they just reset and start over.

Mark:

That would be fantastic.

Sarah:

It would be awesome. They could do it in VR or something, except they'd have to, like, mist you while you had the VR goggles on with, like, maple scented sticky stuff so you could get the real experience.

Mark:

Oh my gosh.

Sarah:

I'm all about it.

Mark:

What year was that? 1919. Ugh. Gross.

Sarah:

I love when postman Pat we're just gonna call him that. Yep. Is sitting at the table with the mannequins and freaks Mike and Breen out. Yes. I mean, you don't get a whole lot of entertainment there.

Mark:

I don't think I don't think they told them that was going to happen. Really? Because they looked really surprised.

Sarah:

Or they did it, like, on the first take because they are authentically, like, woah. Yep. I would be if a mannequin started moving. Little do they know. They have just seen the solution to the puzzle.

Mark:

Little do they know.

Sarah:

So there's this keep out area. And Wally, the minister, he he shouldn't go into any field where he's got a life for a living. I don't know. He comes up with the dumbest excuse. Yeah.

Sarah:

There's a stinky cesspit back there. There's, a swamp. A crocodile lives back there. That's true. Charity just said we were we weren't allowed to go

Mark:

back there. So don't go back there. An awful pit.

Sarah:

Don't go back there. What are you trying to hide, Wally? To me, initially, it looks like like a big, you know, the spool they put we, wire on, like, those big spools. Yeah. Like, and some stumps.

Sarah:

Like, okay. This is where people hang out. That's what this is. This is and there happens to be a door in the ground.

Mark:

This is where Kahu goes in, has his

Sarah:

Talks on his cell phone.

Mark:

Yeah. Talks on his cell phone.

Sarah:

Smokes a joint before he has to put the feathers in his hair and be ashamed. Ugh. And Mike is dumb enough to stand on top of it. What is he thinking? Wow.

Sarah:

Why does he stand on top of it?

Mark:

I don't know, but that effect is really good. So they have somebody. I don't think it's Mike, but they have a stunt person.

Sarah:

Yeah. I don't think it's Neil Ray.

Mark:

Yeah. They have a stunt person on top of that. And at some point in time, they pull a a a probably a rope.

Sarah:

Yep. And The planks open and he falls up.

Mark:

And he falls. Now a stunned person would know how to fall.

Sarah:

Well, and they'd have a pad on that.

Mark:

They'd have a pad and all that good stuff.

Sarah:

And it could be 5 feet deep.

Mark:

But but that is beautiful.

Sarah:

Oh, we I've got a good screenshot. Mid fall? Yeah. It's great.

Mark:

It's beautiful.

Sarah:

It's not jumping out of a of a plane, but it's good.

Mark:

It's totally movie magic. It's fantastic.

Sarah:

Well, now Mike's on drugs, and he's gonna be line dancing with elephants. Everybody acts like this tramadol is gonna make him high as a kite, and he never seems high as a kite.

Mark:

He's just not in pain. In fact, he's low as a kite. He can't reach the top of the whiteboard.

Sarah:

What's wrong with the top of the whiteboard? That is

Mark:

such an awesome preline.

Sarah:

Like, I just don't believe in writing at the top of the whiteboard or or what. You know? Duh. You can't reach.

Mark:

So they find a human skeleton at the bottom of the awful pit, and it's clearly

Sarah:

Mike's lucky he didn't land on the antlers that are down there.

Mark:

What's amazing is that skeleton, the weathering on it and how it looked, even though you could clearly see a screw in one point

Sarah:

Yeah.

Mark:

It's better than that styrofoam grade marker.

Sarah:

It's good. And so Mike Bricks is like and here here you're like, oh, great. They're gonna do rear window.

Mark:

Well, first of all,

Sarah:

strapped to the chair

Mark:

and The most cartoonish cast on him possibly. It's like it's made of rubber.

Sarah:

Well, it's gotta be big enough that he can actually slide his foot and leg into it and take it on and off. So it's gonna be bigger than a regular cast. Yeah. I guess.

Mark:

I guess?

Sarah:

Have you ever had a cast?

Mark:

No. Me either. Never broken anything.

Sarah:

I always wanted one though when I was a kid because it was always so cool.

Mark:

You got writing on it. People would pay attention to you. Yeah.

Sarah:

But it must have sucked.

Mark:

Oh, I can only imagine how much it sucked.

Sarah:

I did have a friend who broke her arm, and after she had her cast off, her arm that had been broken looked like somebody else's arm. It was like When you had an arm transplant is what happened.

Mark:

When I was a kid, there was a a young girl in our neighborhood who was severely, had severe medical issues and she had to be in a body cast Oof. Which I can only imagine for an adult is horrible for for

Sarah:

a child. Body, it would suck.

Mark:

Would just and this was in the early late seventies, early eighties. Like, they probably it's it's as bad as you think it was.

Sarah:

She could just she she just couldn't wash. Yeah. Ugh. As long as you had it on, you couldn't wash.

Mark:

Yeah. You couldn't do I was obsessed with trying to figure out how

Sarah:

you did a lot of things. Wow. There's holes in it, Mark. Yeah. Well, yes.

Sarah:

I love that Gina puts a a sheet over the skeleton. Even skeletons deserve modesty. She's just messing with Sims because she did not wanna deal with Sims.

Mark:

And she says she's gonna make borscht for Mike and heat it up for him. What? And in the IMDB criticisms of the episode, they're like, borscht is always served cold. Yes. Borscht can be served cold, but I have eaten lots of hot borscht.

Sarah:

Really?

Mark:

Yeah. It's it's different people in different places in the country eat it differently. Like

Sarah:

It's Gina too. Yeah. Like, even if 99.9% of people eat it cold, she would probably eat it hot.

Mark:

Mike has such nice toes. Did you notice them?

Sarah:

No. Oh, they're very nice.

Mark:

They they line up really nice.

Sarah:

Are you sure it's actually his foot? Yeah. They're not prop toes?

Mark:

No. No. It was his other foot.

Sarah:

Oh, were you looking at his toes for you, Rico?

Mark:

I was like, there's his toes. I wonder if he has nice toes or horrible toes.

Sarah:

If I was Neil Ray, I would have absolutely had a pedicure before filming this episode. Can you imagine?

Mark:

Oh, but Mike's away, so Breen is in relaxation mode. He's got his feet up on the desk. He's like, what is it?

Sarah:

You know? I can do what I want now that Sims is in charge. Hughes keeps showing up though every once in a while.

Mark:

Is this the only time we have Hughes and Frodo in the same I

Sarah:

think so.

Mark:

I think I

Sarah:

don't remember any others. I could be wrong, but it's definitely the first time, and I think it's the only time.

Mark:

And it's a great bit of writing with Sims and Hughes where he gives her shit, but gives her the okay that she's doing the right job too at the same time. Like

Sarah:

He's just a good boss. He's like There's nothing you can complain about.

Mark:

You're in the club now. Yeah. And Breen, take your feet off the table. You notice he calls him Breen?

Sarah:

Yeah.

Mark:

Like, so that to me means every time he mistakes his name He's

Sarah:

doing it on purpose.

Mark:

Doing it on purpose.

Sarah:

He should call him. Frodo Breen. This whole thing with Gina, like, well, I'll just give the evidence to Mike. Only he will understand it. Like, only he will understand strychnine?

Mark:

Yeah.

Sarah:

Oh, okay.

Mark:

Did you notice

Sarah:

She just wants to go see him.

Mark:

I always love when they go to people's houses because I get to see what they

Sarah:

Imagine the character's home life is like. Yeah.

Mark:

So did you notice what was on Mike's walls? No. So he is a framed comic. I don't know where

Sarah:

it's from.

Mark:

It's not a comic book. It's a comic strip from a newspaper.

Sarah:

Okay.

Mark:

It's a framed one, though. But I didn't know

Sarah:

really like it if you do that.

Mark:

I didn't know what it was. There's a picture of a guy on a motorcycle. It looks like a Triumph motorcycle. And, of course, Holly Collins poster.

Sarah:

Mhmm. Well and now he's got the bull's eye because he's got Breen's little play gun.

Mark:

He also has a bunch of miniatures, which are little rugby players that are dressed in the color of the red blacks, which is a

Sarah:

I wonder if they're, like, collector thing.

Mark:

I don't know.

Sarah:

Like a not a chewing gum thing, but, you know, like a crackerjack Yeah. Collection kind of thing. I just think it's mean to give him, like, a dart gun when he can't go and get the the dirts back.

Mark:

I'm glad that there was a a Tupperware thing full of darts. Yeah. I was like, he's got one dart. He's gonna have to pick it up all

Sarah:

the time. Oh, no.

Mark:

He's got lots of darts.

Sarah:

That's cool. He's alright. Place is gonna be littered with him, but he's okay. It seems to me that it is mean even though Deborah doesn't really care about her sister. It's still kind of mean to ask her to come to where her sister was murdered and give them input on whether it was possible.

Sarah:

It seems kind of cruel.

Mark:

Yes. And it adds to the red herring ness

Sarah:

of her. Well, if she had said, well, I wouldn't even have shot her from out here. I would have pretended to be a mannequin and stood in there.

Mark:

Meanwhile, Wally's like, oh, wait. I have another motive. I was in love with her. Look. You found her own letters.

Sarah:

Yeah.

Mark:

Why did she keep the letters if she didn't like him? She would he burned her letters. Why did she not burn his letters?

Sarah:

I would think that she would just refuse to receive his letters. I She was so prim. Yeah. Yeah. I I can only imagine she kept them because she had some nefarious reason, like, to blackmail him later or something awful.

Mark:

Did you notice what was on Mike's desk? No. The white ferret from the

Sarah:

last episode. I did see that. Yeah. Because he says you in my office? Yep.

Sarah:

The ferret's looking at her. You are.

Mark:

We find out there was a team building exercise. First off the worst team building exercise.

Sarah:

A village committee Yep. Which is comprised of everyone who works there.

Mark:

Not Ellie. Ellie's not on the committee. I checked. I went back. I was like

Sarah:

Evie's not, but her mom is.

Mark:

Her mom is. Yes.

Sarah:

Yeah. Are you sure Evie's not there?

Mark:

I don't think so.

Sarah:

I think she is. I think she's sitting next to her mom. Anyway, it's the committee, but it's everybody.

Mark:

Yeah. They you can't have a committee with everybody. No. That doesn't work.

Sarah:

And, you know, we need to be more positive. Let's go shoot bows and arrows at your sister and your sister's archery range who you hate and who hates you.

Mark:

And they're all like, yeah. That's a good idea.

Sarah:

I think they're all just hoping to accidentally shoot Charity.

Mark:

I think so.

Sarah:

So she Charity stopped the development of the old bank that her sister and her husband had purchased to turn into, like, a fund center. Right? So Charity must have gone to, like, city council meetings and, you know, the planning office and all that stuff. And she wore that whole get up everywhere she went.

Mark:

Single time, and people didn't go, you're from Wiggsville.

Sarah:

Yeah. You're you're crazy.

Mark:

This is exile from Wiggsville.

Sarah:

Like, did she wear that to the grocery store?

Mark:

I guess.

Sarah:

How did she get there? Did she ride a horse? I can't imagine her driving like a Honda Civic in that get up with the big hoop and everything.

Mark:

I guess.

Sarah:

She's not getting around like that.

Mark:

Frodo has turned up in another spot.

Sarah:

That's the bonus of being in a truck. You can do business wherever you are.

Mark:

With him parking in front of the The police station? Police station. She's like, you know, it is p, infringes on police business.

Sarah:

Well, you know, that's the boss's spot. Right? Yes. Right out front?

Mark:

Yes. No. Mike Pikes Mike Parks beside joking because on the

Sarah:

first scene that they clearly have made a spot for him.

Mark:

So I have. So Frodo totally throws the sister under the bus, who's already like, she's buried under a fleet of buses at this point. And he goes, oh, yeah. Shiller and her were stupid and fixing the tire. And I was trying to sell them ice cream at 9:30 in the morning.

Sarah:

They didn't want any. I don't know why.

Mark:

And she doesn't even pay attention to Frodo.

Sarah:

Oh, she glares at him and goes

Mark:

Like, is she gonna kill Frodo?

Sarah:

No. But she's not about to let him reveal that she was with her lover when her husband was at the respite care. Yeah. Like, that's just cruel.

Mark:

Well, it it is cruel, but Deborah's had a hard life.

Sarah:

Yeah. Okay? And I realized need to find out about that from Frodo.

Mark:

I realized I realized that she had a life of abundance and wonderfulness where she could practice her archery and go to the Olympics. Definitely, you know, had privilege. But since then, it's been a bit rough on Deborah.

Sarah:

But, you know, the next things out of Frodo's mouth are probably gonna be, well, that's not the guy you were kissing on the side of the road the other day. Who's that guy in the wheelchair? Does he want some ice cream? Like, that's the kind of thing Frodo's gonna say. Missus Marlow does the same thing.

Mark:

Yes.

Sarah:

Here. I've brought you lasagna because Italian is healing. I don't know. That's about do you think she's a good cook?

Mark:

I can give you a spongebob. No. She's not.

Sarah:

Well, she makes the cheese rolls.

Mark:

She does make the cheese rolls,

Sarah:

and then

Mark:

drive them 1 guy to kill people.

Sarah:

That's all the bread.

Mark:

Yeah.

Sarah:

I mean, really but I bet you her lasagna's good. But then she's like, oh, here's a little bit of information that nobody knows except people who are as old as I am Yes. That I'm just gonna say in passing to you, to Sims, to whatever. You know? Yep.

Sarah:

That's just what she's there for. That and to say, animal attraction.

Mark:

Everybody's just shows up at Mike's house. Frodo, Hughes, missus m.

Sarah:

But only missus m offers him a sponge bath. Yes. He's like, no. I'm okay. I'm alright.

Sarah:

No. Thank you. I think he'd rather have Hughes sponge bath him than missus Marlowe.

Mark:

They show up at Mike's house to discuss the case because Mike wants to keep on top of things. Yeah. Mike has a guitar.

Sarah:

Well and and Gina has hooked him up with a dry erase board by Magic.

Mark:

Well, she has one in the car, I

Sarah:

guess. Obviously.

Mark:

Who doesn't? She's got a Vadaborsk and a whiteboard.

Sarah:

He's got a pretty guitar. It's like a burgundy purpley color.

Mark:

Yeah. It's out of tune. He plays a g chord. It's way out

Sarah:

of tune. So nerdy, but it's pretty.

Mark:

Way out of tune. It's pretty, but it's way out of tune. Poor Frodo

Sarah:

gives him an arrowed itch. So he's like, do you know how how Charity died? She was shot in the head with an arrow and Frodo's like, oh, shit. This looks bad, doesn't it?

Mark:

So he can't reach the top of the whiteboard, and Breen makes a great joke. But did you notice what he drew on the whiteboard?

Sarah:

Part? Just chaos.

Mark:

It's chaos and Charity is a circle with a cross under it and a big triangle for

Sarah:

her dress.

Mark:

Mike is no artist.

Sarah:

No. He's not he's not the one drawing the little houses in the village No. That Sims has.

Mark:

No. We find out that David was dyslexic, and we find that out from postman Pat, and then we know absolutely that postman Pat is the culprit. Because he he speaks he says, I wish they'd shown this to me years ago because, then we would have known the truth.

Sarah:

Yeah. Because clearly, it's not a convincing suicide letter from David. But you've skipped over Hughes threatening to shoot Frodo in the head.

Mark:

Hughes is in top foreigner

Sarah:

in the south itself. He really is.

Mark:

Fantastic. As is Frodo. And and the 2 of them together. I'm up for Hughes and Frodo adventures.

Sarah:

Oh, they need to have a road trip.

Mark:

They need to have a road trip.

Sarah:

They need to be isolated somewhere where a crime has happened, and it just happens to be they're the only 2 Yes. There.

Mark:

And they have to solve the problem.

Sarah:

And everybody else on the team has to, like, by phone, help them.

Mark:

Give them clues.

Sarah:

Yeah. Do what they're doing.

Mark:

That brings us to detective Sims needing a coffee. And she needs a coffee, so they go to the horse trailer coffee place.

Sarah:

Mhmm.

Mark:

We've seen in this show the following things that coffee has been sold out of vans. It's been sold out of old trucks. Remember, there was a coffee boat. Yep. And now we have coffee horse trailer.

Mark:

And no one could be more happy than mister smiley saw Catman behind Sims. Yes. Oh my gosh. She is so happy to be waiting for his costume.

Sarah:

I'm on broken with right now. I'm on broken with

Mark:

right now.

Sarah:

They told me to wear this hat. Hi, mom. I'm on broken with right now. He's really stoked. This is where missus m says, well that's what happens when you marry to acquire a fancy surname rather than for animal attraction.

Sarah:

She's got animal attraction for the barista.

Mark:

Yes. She does. He has that voice.

Sarah:

They didn't have rainbows in 18/61. Charity is not a scientist.

Mark:

No. I have Evie. Refraction happens, lady. Evie's a strange child. I have a note here.

Sarah:

I like the rainbow. So the mayor, the poor guy, he's like, I am not representative gay man.

Mark:

Like Okay. So we're gonna talk to you like representative.

Sarah:

I'm not in mental contact with everybody who's gay

Mark:

in Toronto. He was gay? Did your gaydar go off because of him?

Sarah:

Surely, he was at the gay person meeting that you called that everyone is required to go.

Mark:

To the gay person meeting.

Sarah:

Yeah. There's 4 people in Brokenwood going to that meeting. So we learned that David and Charity well, Charity desperately wanted a baby. Yes. And it wasn't happening.

Sarah:

And it probably wasn't happening because

Mark:

He was the gay.

Sarah:

David is. David was gay. Yes. And was in love with the postman. And so she poisoned him

Mark:

Yes.

Sarah:

And then stripped him Yes. And drove a nail in his head and dumped him in a hole. And now postman Pat knows about it and love David and has decided charity's gotta go.

Mark:

Yes. What is the inciting incident here?

Sarah:

I think it's the 7 years since David went missing that he's declared dead.

Mark:

But that was 3 weeks ago.

Sarah:

And the Styrofoam well, but this may be the next open day they have.

Mark:

But why would he do it during an open day?

Sarah:

Because he needs lots of other people to be there. If it's just him and her there, it's he did it.

Mark:

Maybe.

Sarah:

You know? And it may have taken him a little while to figure out how to put a a panel in the dummy's chest that will that will hold a crossbow. Maybe. That would take some time.

Mark:

Gotta order the crossbow from Amazon. Yeah. It's gonna take forever to get to New Zealand.

Sarah:

We gotta practice with it. Yeah. Make sure that the sides fall down right and they'll fit in there. You gotta practice swapping the mannequin out and changing clothes with it. Speaking of Dressing a mannequin is not easy, by the way.

Mark:

Speaking of the mannequin, did you notice they do a little reenactment of the crime with the vicar as the murderer?

Sarah:

Yeah.

Mark:

It's like this tiny little part, and and the vicar totally overplays it the way he should.

Sarah:

Broken Wood's not afraid to include flashback clips that never happened.

Mark:

Yes. And that's okay.

Sarah:

But but in most shows

Mark:

Yeah.

Sarah:

If you see a flashback, it's this is what actually happened. It's kinda misleading. Well, it's alright.

Mark:

What I wish is the the inciting incident needed some work here because it's almost like they do this out in the wrong order. Like, they should almost find David's body, and then he kills her.

Sarah:

Yeah. But I think it's okay because at the at the funeral for David, end quote

Mark:

Thank gosh. It wasn't a windy day.

Sarah:

She says he's dead. Yeah. Like, I know.

Mark:

And that and that's great.

Sarah:

And I think I think postman Pat has suspected her. Yep. And that seals the deal.

Mark:

And goes home, gets angry, gets his crossbow out, goes and kills her the next day, but there's that 3 week gap.

Sarah:

Like I said, he's gotta figure out how to do it I and get away with it. Yeah. And it's complicated.

Mark:

I guess. And then we come to the real reason we have this episode because somebody was at some place like this, and they had one of those sensors that played audio, which Hello? By it.

Sarah:

Morning.

Mark:

And from that, this entire plot has been created.

Sarah:

Yeah. I I think that's a when it it's it's convenient.

Mark:

Yes.

Sarah:

But Hello. It'd be kind of fun to have too. Like, every time you walk past it. Hello.

Mark:

Hello.

Sarah:

Morning. Morning. Morning. Like, what if you had to walk past it over and over again? Morning.

Sarah:

Morning. Morning. Morning.

Mark:

You'd learn to dodge it, I think. Jump over it.

Sarah:

Why does everybody who works here jump when they get to that point? Morning.

Mark:

They do a nice man on man kiss here, and he says Charity took away the thing that I loved.

Sarah:

I feel bad for Pat. I do feel bad. And I feel really bad for David. Man, did he screw up? Yeah.

Sarah:

Like, what did he think? What did he see in her?

Mark:

I don't know.

Sarah:

She's awful.

Mark:

But this is the point where Deborah should have stepped in front of postman Pat and said, no. No. I got this.

Sarah:

So I just had it in my head that, like okay. Because I remembered that Pat pretended to be the mannequin. As soon as you see the mannequin, you remember if you've seen it before, you remember, oh, creepy mannequin. Pat uses that. And I just think, like, he's there dressed as the school master, and he looks over in the other corner.

Sarah:

There's Deborah dressed as

Mark:

the school master. School master. He's like this giant compound.

Sarah:

But Yeah. He's like, wait a minute. This is my idea. And she's like, no. I had the idea first.

Mark:

Charity comes in. Thou shall not kill.

Sarah:

Yeah. All 3 of them are dead because they got caught in the crossfire. Or they find Charity, and she's got an arrow in one side and out the other of her head, and then they realize they're 2 different bows, 2 different arrows.

Mark:

So a couple of things about Charity

Sarah:

That's what should have happened.

Mark:

Yes. A couple of things about Charity being dead here. She does a really good dead body. Mhmm. And I was surprised that they showed the arrow in the head.

Mark:

Mhmm. That's surprisingly violent. There's a little blood and everything. Yeah. Now they don't show it going in or anything.

Sarah:

No. But That would be impressive.

Mark:

You get that arrow thlong Thlong.

Sarah:

Sound. And then it's just stuck on. Yes. It doesn't even have a suction cup on the end or anything. Nope.

Mark:

So this is Howick Historic Village. It gets thanked in the credits.

Sarah:

Oh, okay.

Mark:

It's in, near Auckland. It's a tourist place in Auckland, and you can go look at it at historical village.org.nz, that and you will notice if you look at the pictures, especially the schoolhouse, it's exactly like it is in the episode.

Sarah:

They didn't change anything.

Mark:

The pictures of the

Sarah:

But they wouldn't. I mean, you know, you can't go around messing with stuff.

Mark:

And all that stuff. They change the name of the blacksmith and what it says underneath where it says, you can get a lucky name. That is not in the in the museum.

Sarah:

Yeah. Because But

Mark:

those people do go great work. And if you're in New Zealand, go go help them out.

Sarah:

But in reality, they don't go around offering schoolchildren red hot nails No. As a souvenir.

Mark:

No. They do not. Because I

Sarah:

don't care if you quenched it in water. It's still freaking hot.

Mark:

Yeah. I wouldn't wanna touch that at all. And it's definitely right in the right area of broken wood. Like, they didn't have far to go to do this.

Sarah:

Yeah. It's a fun episode. They they set up this whole, like, timeline and map to make it seem like, well, it's impossible for anybody Like, it's puzzling. That we're suspecting to have done it. So there must have been something, you know, we're wrong about some.

Sarah:

So when you know that Deborah was not at the respite home at 9:30, you're like, uh-huh. Yep. An assumption has been broken. Yep. No.

Sarah:

That's not it either. Damn it.

Mark:

But they they do a great job with that, and they do a great job of Kahu Taylor is never suspected. Nope. But they bring in subtle racism really well there.

Sarah:

Well, there's a tension between realistic historical reenactment and accepting that the past and now were racist places and not pretending that it wasn't while understanding those things are not okay. Yep. And you shouldn't inflict them on modern people. Well, when Unless you're charity and you're a jerk.

Mark:

Rainbows weren't invented then. They didn't have rainbows then. Maori weren't invented then.

Sarah:

No. Next week.

Mark:

Oh, boy.

Sarah:

Definitely my favorite episode of season 4.

Mark:

We have a doozy next week. The scarecrow. It has confirmed stuff in it for us. It has an What do you

Sarah:

mean confirmed stuff? Oh, yeah. The the prop.

Mark:

Yep. Yeah. The prop, and it has it has probably one of the most gruesome deaths. Well, it's bad. It's bad.

Mark:

And it's got little kids at the beginning finding the body in a way that is gonna scar them for life, which is always fantastic.

Sarah:

It's a good way to start an episode. You know? If only Eevee had found Charity with the arrow. Darn. I really wanted Wally's sideburns to just shoot off his face when he found her.

Sarah:

Like, oh, okay. And then they just fly off.

Mark:

The arrow is still going. Yeah. In her head.

Sarah:

So until next week. Bye, maniacs.

Mark:

Bye, maniacs. Thanks for joining us on the Mystery Maniacs podcast. If you enjoyed our crazy podcast today, don't miss out on future episodes. Follow us on social media for updates, beyond the scenes content, and exclusive sneak peeks. Subscribe, like, and share to spread the word.

Mark:

Bye, maniacs.

Sarah:

5.

Mark:

4.

Sarah:

3. 2. Hate maniacs. Mystery

Mark:

I screwed that up. Let's try

Sarah:

that again. Yeah. What are you doing?

Mark:

I don't know.

Sarah:

You have to say hey first.

Mark:

Yes.

Sarah:

There's your outtake.

Mark:

5.