Mystery Maniacs

🎙️ Episode: https://share.transistor.fm/s/5f4b50df
📓 Show Notes: https://midsomermaniacs.transistor.fm/262

Mystery Maniacs Episode! In Podcast 262, a killer uses Russian poetry, barre chords and the pizza phone to throw us off the track. MC Mike Shepard!

Show Notes
Giant Door

The Concrete Matryoshka By Svelana Plotze 
The radiator is a ribcage, rusted and dry,
It clanks a rhythm for the Politburo ghosts.
I have eaten the rationed plum; it tasted of iron and salt.
Outside, the sky is the color of a wet wool coat,
Drying against the Siberian wind.

I am a nesting doll of grievances.
Crack me open—there is a smaller, sadder girl.
Crack her—there is a turnip, white and blind.
Crack the turnip—there is only the secret police,
Taking notes on the way I exhale.

The bread line is a black snake in the snow,
Moving with the glacial grace of a dying empire.
I wear my fur hat like a crown of thorns,
Muffled against the gossip of the sparrows—
Are they informers? Their eyes are too bright.

The moon is a Sputnik, a cold, mechanical eye,
Beeping its indifference to my unwashed borscht bowl.
I lay my head in the oven, but the gas is out—
A five-year plan for silence,
And I am ahead of schedule.

My poems are hidden in loaves of black bread,
The censor is sniffing my laundry for spite.
I’d tell you the secrets that live in my head,
But the radiator is recording tonight.

Mark's Mystery Novels: I'm launching two cozy mystery series this spring! Subscribe to my author newsletter at https://markbellauthor.substack.com/ to get free preview chapters. Patreon opens this week. 

Thanks again for listening!
 
Mark & Sarah

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Upcoming Tentative  Schedule
  • April 1 - April Newsletter 
  • April 6 - Brokenwood S10E05 - “The House of Screams”
  • Week of April 6 - Brokenwoon S12E01 Mini - They’re Out There Alright

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Creators and 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.

Mark:

Yeah.

Sarah:

Hey, Maniacs. Hey,

Mark:

Mystery Maniacs. Mystery Maniacs is a recap podcast dedicated to mystery TV. Each week, we dig into an episode of the show including the murders, the mayhem, the loonies, and everything else we love.

Sarah:

This week, season ten, episode four of the Brokenwood Mysteries, Love You To Death. I'm Mark. I'm Sarah.

Mark:

This is our three hundred and first podcast.

Sarah:

Hey.

Mark:

Including all the minis and everything. How many podcasts do you think get to that level?

Sarah:

10%.

Mark:

1.4%. Shabam. Shabam o.

Sarah:

You know, it's been fun every time.

Mark:

It has been fun every time. Thank you all for sticking with us. It's Even when we have

Sarah:

to randomly take two weeks off here and there.

Mark:

It's weird because after the late winter and early spring that we've had, I'm about to announce to you that we're now entering the busy season.

Sarah:

No. You know, if somebody out there has a drinking game, whenever Mark and Sarah say they're busy, drink, they're drunk all the time.

Mark:

They're they're very drunk It doesn't matter. All the time.

Sarah:

Before we get started

Mark:

Yes.

Sarah:

Couple new shows have come out.

Mark:

Yes. First of all, the big announcement was that Brokenwood Mysteries would be dropping on Acorn starting the April 6.

Sarah:

So we'll be doing mini episodes in April for those new episodes of Brokenwood.

Mark:

So first episode, they're out there alright. That's an alien. It's aliens. Episode number two, angels and demons. I like this.

Mark:

Yep. Number three, midnight in the garden. Oh. Which is obviously a reference to midnight in the garden evil. Number four, no return ticket.

Mark:

Could we get a train episode? Gotta be. Number five, Death has four strings. What has four strings? Basses have four strings.

Mark:

Cellos have four strings.

Sarah:

It's definitely gonna be musical.

Mark:

Musical. And then finally, diamonds are girl's best friend. It's it's cut off here. I would think that they would change that slightly. They tend to do that, but So it this is diamond episode.

Sarah:

So is it cut off because of spacing on the announcement?

Mark:

Yes. On on what I got here.

Sarah:

So you don't think that it actually is for No. You think it's friend? Yes. But it could be something else.

Mark:

Could be something else.

Sarah:

I can't think of any other words. Start with FRE right now.

Mark:

I don't know. April, twentieth, twenty seventh, May 4.

Sarah:

Diamonds are a girl's best fright. Freight? No. There's an e.

Mark:

It's f r I e. Maybe freight. May 11

Sarah:

Isn't that e I?

Mark:

Yes. Yeah. 05/11/2026. Six episodes.

Sarah:

Diamonds are a girl's best fried?

Mark:

Fry fried. It's fried. It is. Fries. Clearly.

Mark:

Diamonds are a girl's best fries.

Sarah:

Sorry. You're talking. My brain's working.

Mark:

Now people when I posted this, people wondered if we would finish season ten and eleven before doing this that you're new to us. Okay? What happens is we will continue on finishing season ten and eleven. We have eight more episodes to go. Right?

Mark:

Diamonds are a girl's best fried rice. Yes. That's it. But during the week where these drop, if we're able to, we will do because we're gonna watch these. Right?

Mark:

We're gonna

Sarah:

do normal episodes and the minis is We what he's trying to

Mark:

do minis right now. We're not gonna do full episodes till we get to them in the order. Yeah. Right? But the minis are how to watch it like a maniac.

Mark:

Right? So it is a way for you to get a window into our craziness and we usually have five or six questions of things that we noticed that made So you can

Sarah:

watch like a maniac.

Mark:

Sort of like, didn't you think it was weird that the diamonds were stored in fried rice?

Sarah:

More like, what kind of dish were the diamonds hidden in? Fried rice. You know the answer if you watched Like a Maniac.

Mark:

Yes. Season twos of two shows have also dropped. First of all, Deadlock, which is wow. So if you haven't watched Deadlock season one, first of all, watch

Sarah:

Deadlock Yeah. Season Or season two won't make any sense.

Mark:

I totally agree with the woman on the Brokenwood subreddit who said, I started Deadlock, and after thirty minutes, my husband and I turned it off. It wasn't for us. If it's not for you, you will know right away. Mhmm. It is incredibly fast talking Mhmm.

Mark:

Australian foul mouth lesbians Mhmm. Who are also cops. It it it does an amazing job.

Sarah:

A bit of northern exposure to it because the place that they live is so wacky.

Mark:

It does a great job of mixing comedy and detective. Mhmm. And does both really well.

Sarah:

And good guys win in the end.

Mark:

And you will learn swear words.

Sarah:

Or at least Swear idioms.

Mark:

Kate Box and Madeleine Sammy are the the leads of this, and they are fantastic. The They're real. I don't know how they it is the Letterkenny of Australian detective shows.

Sarah:

Yeah. Yeah. It is. You're right. If you've ever seen Letterkenny,

Mark:

a lot

Sarah:

of people won't get that joke, but that's yeah. But that's it. If you get it, you get it. The other show that's come out with a second season is called Last One Laughing, and it is not a mystery show. It's a game show.

Mark:

It's a reality show.

Sarah:

Yeah. Where a dozen comedians get closed in a room for six hours, and they cannot laugh.

Mark:

They can't even smile.

Sarah:

No. And yet, that's all they try to do is just snipe at each other

Mark:

So this is

Sarah:

with their comedy and try to get each other to crack up.

Mark:

A brilliant idea. First of all, they get, like, 12 episodes out of this.

Sarah:

Yeah. They film it in a day.

Mark:

A one day's work. Jimmy Carr is the host. It has fantastic people on

Sarah:

it. Right? They're great.

Mark:

Bob Mortimer won the first season Yeah. With domination. Yeah.

Sarah:

It was so funny.

Mark:

The things that Bob did to make other people laugh had have you crying. Yeah. Right? Because you're allowed to laugh.

Sarah:

Yeah. It's very funny. Yes. It's called Last One Laughing. It's on Prime.

Sarah:

Check it out.

Mark:

People who are on it this year are David Mitchell, Maisie, you know, just amazing people.

Sarah:

If you've ever watched British Taskmaster, you'll recognize a lot of these people. Yes. A lot of them have been on Taskmaster.

Mark:

Yes. I don't think they have Greg on this show because he might be Greg Davis. Davis from Taskmaster because he might be physically imposing.

Sarah:

Yeah. He's awfully big.

Mark:

He's a very big guy and it's it's not a big room.

Sarah:

No. Take up too much space. He would

Mark:

take he would take up too much.

Sarah:

But it's really funny. So if you just wanna laugh, it's like thirty minutes of stand up comedy almost. But but they're vicious to each other. And if to crack each other up.

Mark:

And if you've ever tried to crack your friend up, you you will get lots of things here.

Sarah:

Yeah. Absolutely.

Mark:

And you get to see comedians stand up and walk away

Sarah:

Run away from each other so they don't laugh. Alright. Let's talk Love You to Death.

Mark:

Okay. This is originally aired on the 05/20/2024, which is like five minutes ago. Mhmm. Katie Wolf and Tim Baum Katie Wolf directed Tim Baum wrote this. This is the exact opposite of what we said the other episode in this season was where there was good detective story, but they didn't use the whimsy.

Mark:

Mhmm. This has lots of whimsy and a good detective story. And I think it's because Tim Baum knows these people.

Sarah:

Yeah. Lots of recurring characters.

Mark:

The fact that Frodo has a unicycle is a tiny bit of this episode, and it's just over.

Sarah:

But we never see him on it. I was disappointed that we never see him

Mark:

on it.

Sarah:

Brilliant piece of work. So as a reminder, we're a spoiler podcast. We are going to spoil it. We're gonna talk right away about who the killer is and all that. So if you've not watched it, stop right now.

Sarah:

Go away. Watch it. Come back.

Mark:

It's two years ago. Like, go watch it, man.

Sarah:

I have two theories about this that I will refer to as we discuss this episode.

Mark:

Yes.

Sarah:

Number one, if Laura had a job, she wouldn't be dead. Yes. And two, the moon made her do it.

Mark:

The moon is the evil in this episode. Yep. Clearly, it is referenced in the I

Sarah:

will provide evidence for these two theories as we go along.

Mark:

We will also be visiting when we talk about the moon, we'll also later on be visiting Mark's esoteric music corner. Oh.

Sarah:

Yes. Okay. We have a lot of corners,

Mark:

don't we? We do have a lot of corners.

Sarah:

We must have a podcast in like an octagonal room. Lots of corners. So we've got Charles Wadsworth, the former rich guy whose grandmother was so weird

Mark:

in the big house. His mom, his dad, his grandmother. It was all Sisters. So the the way it goes, if you're following, is there's the episode about the clue game that goes wrong. Mhmm.

Mark:

That's at the Wadworth's house.

Sarah:

But they're

Mark:

not there. Way, then they come back and they have a big party and at the party somebody dies.

Sarah:

Yep.

Mark:

And it that party is when we find out that Jules and Charles are engaged. Yes. But they've had the wedding now. And Charles, not content with being a rich guy.

Sarah:

I don't think he got all the money.

Mark:

I don't think so.

Sarah:

So now he's a real estate broker. He's a real estate well Property broker.

Mark:

He's attempting to be a property broker.

Sarah:

If his wife wasn't absolutely Looney Tunes, he might have a chance.

Mark:

I don't think she's Looney Tunes. I think

Sarah:

she's horrible. What?

Mark:

Okay. I don't think she's crazy. I think she's horrible.

Sarah:

You don't think Jules Wait. Wait.

Mark:

Wait. Oh, I get all confused. Jules is crazy. Jules is Nazi Bobo.

Sarah:

Okay? Jules Jules needs an I love myself jacket. What are you talking about?

Mark:

I'm sorry. I got confused.

Sarah:

Okay. Laura Yes. Lyman, the victim Yeah. Is not crazy.

Mark:

She's not crazy.

Sarah:

She's just horrible.

Mark:

She's just horrible. Horrible.

Sarah:

Yes. And if she had a job, she'd actually learn because other people would tell her Yes. You're horrible. Yes. And maybe she'd change.

Sarah:

But she doesn't.

Mark:

By the way, the children don't have jobs yet.

Sarah:

So she just inflicts it on her family.

Mark:

Yes. So they find poor Laura, head in the oven. Mhmm. And at this point, there's a note in my notes that says M. C.

Mark:

Shepard. Is there a wiki reference or?

Sarah:

Yeah. Because he says something that rhymes.

Mark:

Oh, that's right.

Sarah:

And Chalmers And

Mark:

Chalmers calls him MC Shepard.

Sarah:

Makes a joke about Mike being a rapper while standing over a dead body. It's inappropriate.

Mark:

Yeah. That that's that's inappropriate.

Sarah:

The death is too new to be making jokes about it.

Mark:

Yes.

Sarah:

Well, mean not for us, but for them.

Mark:

Boy, they have a lot of ovens.

Sarah:

Four. Four. One propane, one steam, and two convection. Yes. I don't Do you like that house?

Mark:

The problem I have with that house is a couple of things.

Sarah:

One The problem is a couple of things?

Mark:

Yes. Okay. The problems are a couple of things. First of all, when we get the money, like beyond the YouTube money that we already get.

Sarah:

Oh, okay.

Mark:

When we get the the the money.

Sarah:

When your stripper career really takes

Mark:

When the stripper career

Sarah:

Okay.

Mark:

Takes off.

Sarah:

Mhmm.

Mark:

When I sell billions of novels. Right? When I walk out of the house, I would like to walk directly to the outdoor pool and dump jump in the pool. Dump in the pool.

Sarah:

Not dump in the pool. Don't do that in our pool.

Mark:

Jump in the pool.

Sarah:

You don't want clear acrylic sensor. No. That's for safety.

Mark:

I realize we can't have dogs and the safety and all that

Sarah:

sort of

Mark:

Kids and Kids and raccoons and green lights. Kangaroos. All of that. Yeah. But I don't like that.

Mark:

And I don't like how many pillows and cushions are outside.

Sarah:

That's not part of the house. Yes. Is. Else's furnishings.

Mark:

Okay.

Sarah:

So those go away when they move out. What I don't like is why is the front door so dang massive?

Mark:

The door is Lord of the Rings door.

Sarah:

It's like three stories high.

Mark:

It is three stories high. Did a

Sarah:

giant live there?

Mark:

It takes four people to open It's the huge. You you have to do special dwarven runes to get the door open.

Sarah:

It's the kind of door that needs a regular sized door in it.

Mark:

Yeah. Exactly.

Sarah:

Like a castle gate.

Mark:

Are they are they do they think somebody's coming to get them? I just couldn't believe how big that door

Sarah:

was. The people who live there now, who are selling the house, like to ride on each other's shoulders and go through doors. Okay. So they need great big doors.

Mark:

I Like, Charles is a big He's thin. He's not as thin as Jules, but he's thin. But I thought maybe if the wind caught it, that door would Slim open

Sarah:

shut on him and kill him.

Mark:

Boy, that's a big door.

Sarah:

That's a special occasion door. Yeah. Everyday door.

Mark:

Like, okay. We're going on about this. Go through all the traffic to get home from your law office.

Sarah:

Truth is you park your car in the garage and come in through that way.

Mark:

Yeah. Because Where there's probably

Sarah:

a pork callus or something. After a pork callus?

Mark:

No. A pork callus. Out of pork. No. It's like sausages.

Sarah:

One of those big gates with the spikes at the bottom. Okay. Yes. And you have to open that to get in through the kitchen.

Mark:

Oh, okay.

Sarah:

Or you have to climb through an oven. Don't turn the knob. No. Of course, we immediately get the Sylvia Plath jokes. Yes.

Sarah:

Because Laura's head was in the oven.

Mark:

Now we're not gonna go into Sylvia Plath because it's all sad and all depressing.

Sarah:

No. None of that.

Mark:

It's a great poet.

Sarah:

If you wanna know more about

Mark:

it Yep.

Sarah:

You got the Googles. Yep. But Gina brings up something really important.

Mark:

Yes. She does.

Sarah:

She compares Sylvia Plath to Svetlana Platz.

Mark:

Oh, the author of the Ding Dong Box.

Sarah:

Yes. Not the bell jar, the Ding Dong Box.

Mark:

The Ding Dong Box.

Sarah:

A Russian poet who took her own life in the nineteen sixties. Yes. So she is a Russian Cold War poet. Yes. Behind the Iron Curtain.

Mark:

I remember hearing about her when I was in Russia.

Sarah:

You might think We

Mark:

went we saw the statue.

Sarah:

You might think that Svetlana Platz is not a real person. No. And if you Google her, the Internet will probably tell you that she's not a

Mark:

real person. They're wrong. The Internet is wrong.

Sarah:

They're wrong because I happen to have Yep. Her one remaining poem.

Mark:

Sarah has it. It's typed on old yellowed paper.

Sarah:

It's communist paper.

Mark:

It's communist paper on a communist

Sarah:

Slip down from behind the iron curtain by one brave soul who knew that Svetlana Platz's work must live on. Would you like to hear part of it?

Mark:

I would love to hear part of it. What is the name of this opus?

Sarah:

It is called the concrete matryoshka.

Mark:

The concrete matryoshka.

Sarah:

Do you know what a matryoshka is? No. It's a Russian nesting doll.

Mark:

Okay. Yes. Russian nesting.

Sarah:

But this one is concrete. The concrete. This is a five stanza poem. I will read you but two for now. Okay.

Sarah:

I want to

Mark:

Now I've never heard this.

Sarah:

Wanna sprinkle it throughout the episode because if you heard all of it at once, the majesty of it would be more than you could handle.

Mark:

And, of course, we will put this with all literary citations in the The show notes? Show notes because my show notes have citations.

Sarah:

Yes. Okay. Now you have to remember, Svetlana Platz living behind the iron curtain during the Cold War in Russia Yes. In the sixties. The concrete matryoshka.

Sarah:

The radiator is a rib cage rusted and dry. It clinks a rhythm for the Politburo ghosts. I have eaten the rationed plum. It tasted of iron and salt. Outside the sky is the color of a wet wool coat drying against the Siberian wind.

Sarah:

I am a nesting doll of grievances. Crack me open. There is a smaller, sadder girl. Crack her. There is a turnip, white and blind.

Sarah:

Crack the turnip. There is only the secret police taking notes on the way I exhale.

Mark:

It's like now, okay. I know many of you. Did you

Sarah:

get the William Carlos Williams

Mark:

reference there? The plums?

Sarah:

Yes.

Mark:

Yet many of you listeners, I I if you've been listening for a long time know that in the eighties, I went to The Soviet Union Mhmm. For a high school trip

Sarah:

Safe. Totally safe.

Mark:

During Chernobyl. Totally safe. Totally safe. It it really reminded me of seeing Cold War.

Sarah:

Was the sky the color of a wet wool coat

Mark:

when you were there? It was. Every single day I looked up, and I said wet wool coat.

Sarah:

Did the secret police hide in a turnip? No. That you know of.

Mark:

That I know of.

Sarah:

I'll read some But

Mark:

we did eat Later. We we did eat lots of beet soup. Beets. Borscht.

Sarah:

Yes. We'll get to more later. I'm sorry that I can't read it in Gina's accent. I wish I could. That would really do Sylvia.

Sarah:

I'm sorry. Svetlana Platz Yes. The honor that she deserves. Yes. But I can't

Mark:

do that. Okay. I think that that's understandable.

Sarah:

So the lady who's dead is the wife of the dentist. Yes. Sunny Lyman.

Mark:

What is that thing on his face?

Sarah:

A mole.

Mark:

No. It's bum.

Sarah:

He can't help that.

Mark:

Okay. He can't help it, but everyone in this episode is like dripping with love for him. It's repressed shame Okay.

Sarah:

From every time Laura speaks.

Mark:

Okay. Do you think he's attractive?

Sarah:

I don't think he's unattractive. He's not my type, but he's not ugly. Every single first see him, his hair is brushed down on his forehead and it looks like Vulcan bangs.

Mark:

Yeah. It does.

Sarah:

It's very unattractive. No. But then for the rest of the episode, it's away, and he's much better.

Mark:

And I just I wanna reach out and just

Sarah:

Touch it.

Mark:

That thing on

Sarah:

the scene. Austin Powers movie where he goes, morally, morally, morally. Yeah. Does that lady has a big hairy mole on her face?

Mark:

Like that. I kinda wanna do that. And he's a dentist. He has a wife who is dead. He has a daughter named Eva, and he has a practice.

Sarah:

What is up with Eva's style? Okay. What era is she from?

Mark:

Eva has many, many problems, None of which involve the ability to play guitar.

Sarah:

But she dresses like a nineteen fifties Bobby Soxer or something. She does? Or like somebody training to be a nun.

Mark:

And she all like, I don't know. Is it weird to you that there were scenes in her bedroom with her parents?

Sarah:

That her parents were in her room? Yeah. No. But it was weird that she was wearing a nightgown that my grandma would have liked.

Mark:

Yeah. The whole bedroom She's

Sarah:

an old lady in a 17 year old's body or something.

Mark:

Young fogey. Yeah. We are familiar with this because we have a young fogey. We do. Tegan is 24 going on twenty ninety four.

Sarah:

'94.

Mark:

Yes.

Sarah:

Yeah. But that's her thing.

Mark:

That's her thing.

Sarah:

There's also a PA in the office named Harper who we've seen before. She was run with the carnival with

Mark:

the codes before. Codes before.

Sarah:

Good for her getting away from them.

Mark:

She has the unfortunate Lisa. Lisa is unfortunate because Lisa appears in this episode, Lisa is mentioned in this episode, but Lisa does not speak in this episode.

Sarah:

Who's Lisa?

Mark:

The dental assistant who is away.

Sarah:

Away. That's right.

Mark:

So she, okay, either got cut or something happened there because she appears in the flashbacks But

Sarah:

has a face mask on.

Mark:

But then is like gone. Yeah. Disappeared. And she doesn't speak. So I think there was probably scenes with Lisa that just got cut for time or something.

Sarah:

Or they realized it was unrealistic for him not to have a dental assistant, but she had no purpose of being there. Yeah. So they had to say, he does have one. But she's away. He doesn't do everything by himself like Gina does.

Sarah:

She does her own dental work.

Mark:

Yes. As a recipient

Sarah:

She says you need

Mark:

a

Sarah:

mirror, something, and high speed rail.

Mark:

High speed drill. High speed drill. The sub subtitles are wrong.

Sarah:

I thought she said high speed rail.

Mark:

I went over it a couple of times.

Sarah:

Not even when you have a loose tooth, would you use high speed rail? No. I think she's pulling Kristen's chain when she's I think she is too. Flexibility or something. Something.

Sarah:

She says like a mirror Yep. Flexib no. A tongue that stays out of the way

Mark:

The tongue

Sarah:

dexterous tongue and Yep. A high speed drill.

Mark:

Did you notice what was on the desk at the dentist's office?

Sarah:

There are lots of things.

Mark:

Did you notice the fun thing? The world's largest tooth.

Sarah:

Oh, yeah. There's a tooth shaped mirror on the wall too. It's clear that they just said, accessorize this in teeth stuff.

Mark:

Yes. The giant tooth is probably two feet tall. It's plastic. It's fun.

Sarah:

And the clitoris plant.

Mark:

Yeah. Wow. Jules. How did Jules like Jules, they would have had to do her lines and then she had to stop laughing. And then she had to do her lines and the crew had to stop laughing.

Mark:

And then they did the lines again.

Sarah:

Mhmm.

Mark:

Because she is fantastically nutsy Bobo here.

Sarah:

And between her scenes, somebody just said, please eat a sandwich. Will you just eat the sandwich? You're so thin. Eat a sandwich. Jules.

Sarah:

Jules. It's good. Yep. Eat a sandwich.

Mark:

Yes. They definitely need to eat.

Sarah:

Laura has a note on her on her body that says, no husband, no kids, no house, no future equals no point.

Mark:

Did you notice

Sarah:

A note that she wrote for her daughter. Yes. Because she's awful.

Mark:

How so the idea is that she does not like her daughter's lesbianism, feels it's a phase. Mostly I think she'd probably worry about her daughter's psychotic behavior, but She wouldn't recognize that because she's also A bit psychotic. Mhmm. No husband. I understand that.

Sarah:

If you're a lesbian, you're not gonna have a husband.

Mark:

Gonna have a husband.

Sarah:

That's fine.

Mark:

No kids. That's not true. It's a little less tenuous. Mhmm. Right?

Mark:

No house.

Sarah:

You can't buy a house if you're a lesbian, Mark. They won't let you.

Mark:

Is there some rule in

Sarah:

New Zealand? Yes. Lesbians can't own homes.

Mark:

Okay. Did you know that? Then we need to send the ladies from deadlock over there because they will set them straight.

Sarah:

Laura thinks you're not allowed to buy a house if you're gay.

Mark:

Yes.

Sarah:

No future. No

Mark:

no no future. I don't think she's quoting the dead the Sex Pistols there. No. No. Equals no point.

Mark:

Now, I have no husband. I do have kids.

Sarah:

You do have a house?

Mark:

Have a house. And I do have a future. So I guess I have a point, but there were times in my life where I didn't have any of those things and I still had a point to my life.

Sarah:

All this says is that this is what Laura thinks. Yes. Is that if you don't have those things, there's no point.

Mark:

So this is a clever bit of work here because this appears to be a suicide note because it's written in Laura's hand. Everybody recognizes it. Hey. Do you want this? Mike offers it to the dentist.

Mark:

Why would you want that?

Sarah:

He says something like, might your daughter want this? People people often want, like, a keepsake or something. Like, that?

Mark:

That. No. Okay. But what it is is a note that she wrote to her daughter, and her leaving it on her body is a clever bit of misdirection.

Sarah:

Mhmm.

Mark:

I thought that was really good writing.

Sarah:

I don't think the note works as a suicide note at all. Because she does have a husband. She does have a child. She does have a house. It doesn't it doesn't refer to Laura's

Mark:

life at all. That's what the dentist says. Like, he goes, we have a child. Yeah. And one never was enough, but like

Sarah:

It doesn't work as a suicide now.

Mark:

No. No. But then it's in her hand. So that's why

Sarah:

No. It's in her shirt.

Mark:

No. No. But it's written in her Close.

Sarah:

Yeah. It's in her handwriting.

Mark:

It's in her handwriting.

Sarah:

Okay. So let's back up. Okay. So the big plot here in addition to the murder is that Jules Fahey wakes up from anesthetic after having her wisdom teeth pulled

Mark:

Now when and

Sarah:

thinks she's in love with the dentist, and he's in love with her.

Mark:

We see Jules version of the flashback first.

Sarah:

She wakes up all beautiful and

Mark:

Like wind blowing her.

Sarah:

The light is like spring Sarah. You know Sarah. Flickering on her eyes.

Mark:

Also, a recipient of dental surgery was like, that's not what you look like. You've got stuff in your mouth.

Sarah:

I said, no gauze, no blood, no drool, what? That's what my notes say before I knew that it was just her flashback.

Mark:

So then later on, we see the flashback from the doctor's perspective.

Sarah:

She's got the bloody gauze packed in her face, and he's like, rinse.

Mark:

And she's like, la la la. Yeah.

Sarah:

But she is have you ever known somebody like her who is so endlessly positive that they just lie to themselves about everything to make everything seem all right? Not somebody who has erotomania like she does, but somebody who just never thinks anything's bad

Mark:

Yeah.

Sarah:

Who just makes excuses about everything. Yep. Like, oh, she'll change her mind, or they didn't mean to do that, or it'll all work out. Everything happens for a reason.

Mark:

I've seen that person, and then I've seen that person turn on me. Like, when you present a piece of evidence in front of them that

Sarah:

When you break that

Mark:

Yeah. Facade Yeah.

Sarah:

They snap? Yes. That would be different jewels, wouldn't it? If she went like, what do you mean he doesn't love me?

Mark:

Yeah. I I worked with a woman and I got a job instead of her, and she accused me of saying in the interview when I interviewed with them that she was pregnant.

Sarah:

What? Why would you say that?

Mark:

She did not come up in the interview. I know. I had no idea she was even applying for the same job.

Sarah:

So Never mind what her baby status was. Yes. Wow.

Mark:

And then I just became the worst person in the world.

Sarah:

The script here is so good with Jules, though, because just when you think, like, well, can't spin this. Yeah. She does.

Mark:

She

Sarah:

And with a smile every single time.

Mark:

Like, and completely in love with the dentist.

Sarah:

Even though her husband is right there.

Mark:

Some people say things, but they don't mean them.

Sarah:

Yeah. But she just you know, he slammed the door in my face. He was busy. I I got He kicked me out of his house. He was tired.

Mark:

The husband needs to Charles? Charles needs to have put his foot down long before this. And I don't like that they kinda imply now they show what actually happened, but they kinda imply that Charles is abusive to her. And that's not the case. No.

Mark:

No. I think Charles actually loves her.

Sarah:

I think that's why he's putting up with it because he thinks it's temporary and that she's mentally ill. Now why he's not getting her more help? I realize they can't afford it and that's why, But there's gotta be some kind of support system.

Mark:

When when Dennis shows up, because of course Dennis shows up, he should have a box of cocoa puffs because he's well aware that Jules is cocoa for cocoa puffs.

Sarah:

Yeah. But she's just on the edge of being criminal.

Mark:

And this episode Because of Eva.

Sarah:

Yep. Right? So she does things and you're like, oh, that that is crossing the line. She's in their house Yep. Cooking.

Sarah:

Yeah. But then you find out that Eva has sent her a picture of the house key and where it's So she's though she's crazy, it makes sense that she would think that he was inviting her.

Mark:

She's being manipulated.

Sarah:

She's mentally ill, and By a Eva teenager. Is manipulating her. Yeah. Telling her to come to the house, the house where Laura dies, showing her where the key is, like really taking advantage of somebody who's not well. Yeah.

Sarah:

Really taking advantage. But I feel bad for Charles. He's doing his best. He's trying to be as understanding as he can be, but not only is she nuts and in love with another man, but she's ruining his career. Like, it seems like she's trying to sabotage his entire life, and all he's trying to do is stick by her thinking that she's gonna get through this.

Mark:

He already and clearly this is what happened. Charles wanted to go into real estate. And Jules is like, well, what am I gonna do? And the answer of course is you're going to hire Todd and have a garden business.

Sarah:

Right. The Garden of Jewels.

Mark:

The Garden of Jewels.

Sarah:

Who spells Jewels is short for what?

Mark:

Julius or Julie sometimes.

Sarah:

But it's not j o o l. No. But That's like drool.

Mark:

But Jules Holland goes by j o o l, but he's a he.

Sarah:

So I guess you can spell it that way

Mark:

if you Maybe.

Sarah:

I mean, you can if you want to, of course, obviously.

Mark:

Todd and her husband are more in the garden than she is.

Sarah:

Well, yeah, because she's just stalking people. She's too busy being crazy.

Mark:

And okay. So this episode plays on this is Timbomb and okay. So we go to New Zealand. Okay. First of all, everything's better.

Mark:

We go to New Zealand.

Sarah:

When when it's safe to travel again.

Mark:

We go to New Zealand and we meet with Tim Baum because they've asked us to come to the show. I have quite Is

Sarah:

this after you get your stripper money?

Mark:

Yes.

Sarah:

Okay. This

Mark:

is after we get the stripper money.

Sarah:

Okay.

Mark:

Mister Baum, you have played with our emotions and the way you have played with our emotions is because of the Trudy card. Trudy?

Sarah:

Yes. Yes.

Mark:

The Trudy card was played when Trudy first appeared and killed a man.

Sarah:

And strung him up like a scarecrow. Don't forget that part.

Mark:

Then went to prison. Yes. This is a reoccurring character. Yep. She is Ray's sister.

Sarah:

Yep. And now We get to see her softer side.

Mark:

And we'll know in these episodes, we think, well, it can't be Jules because Jules is a re no. At this point, Dennis Buchanan could go crazy and start killing him.

Sarah:

Oh, you mean he played with our emotions because Trudy was a reoccurring character and then wound up being the killer? Yes. And and that that's breaking the rules?

Mark:

We can't depend on reoccurring characters.

Sarah:

No. Jules could be the murderer.

Mark:

Jules could be the murderer. Absolutely. Now

Sarah:

okay. I thought you were saying that this is the this is one of those times when we see Trudy, like, actually be a good person and

Mark:

like No. Trudy's a great person from now on. Like, from

Sarah:

really But but on the secret.

Mark:

On the secret. From this episode on, she's face.

Sarah:

If you said that to her face, she'd deny it.

Mark:

Yes. Am not. I agree. Okay. But we don't know who could be an actual murderer.

Mark:

And this episode is full of old people. Oh, sorry. Full of reoccurring characters.

Sarah:

Including Rev Green, Doctor Plummer, Jules, Charles.

Mark:

And a secret mention. Did you hear Todd. Did you hear the secret mention?

Sarah:

I don't know.

Mark:

Okay. It's on the telephone. She's booking a dental appointment. Do you remember this?

Sarah:

No. Oh. I mean, I remember being on the phone,

Mark:

but who was it? You must have what? It's missus Marlowe booking an appointment.

Sarah:

Oh, yeah.

Mark:

I was like, missus Marlowe.

Sarah:

She comes from far away to get her dental work done.

Mark:

I I guess. So missus Marlow is alive.

Sarah:

That's good.

Mark:

She's getting dental appointments.

Sarah:

Okay. Didn't OD on the nangs. She didn't

Mark:

she didn't OD nothing.

Sarah:

Which is what they call whippets. I Nangs.

Mark:

I'm like, did they say to Chalmers, you need to be more street? So he's like, okay.

Sarah:

Well Nangs. Whippets.

Mark:

Hippie crack. Whippets. Hippie crack.

Sarah:

I like hippie crack. MC Mike Shepherd. Like Yo. Yo. He's down with the streets.

Sarah:

Hippie crack. I like when he and Kristen are talking about, well, what if because we find out that Laura had nitrous oxide in her system. Right? And they're trying to figure out where it would have come from if it didn't come from the dentist because the dentist denies having any. Right?

Mark:

Which is totally so they describe what WIPETs are and how you would use them and how possible it would be.

Sarah:

Yeah. Like, because it only lasts like a minute. So they would have to keep giving her one over and over again.

Mark:

Which is clearly a conversation that Tim Baum had with somebody about making WIPETs the possible. It couldn't be WIPETs. Be WIPETs because of this, this,

Sarah:

and Because if I was writing this, I would immediately think, well, nitrous oxide is going to lead right back to the dentist. But what if it's not Yes. In a tank? What if it's whippets?

Mark:

What if it's whippets?

Sarah:

And then he thought about it and thought, that's impractical because you'd have to be like, and another one. What

Mark:

if it's whippets?

Sarah:

More hippie crack. Hippie crack.

Mark:

More nines. And I actually really like that about this show. I kind of wish Broken that Midsommar did more of this Mhmm. Where they had reoccurring characters who possibly could be the murderer. Mhmm.

Mark:

Because, like, I know Frodo and Todd are never gonna commit a murder.

Sarah:

Not on purpose.

Mark:

No. And I know

Sarah:

Though Frodo constantly thinks he did.

Mark:

I know Kristen is never going to, and and Chalmers is never

Sarah:

gonna commit.

Mark:

Is never then but I could see definitely Dennis Buchanan going up the river.

Sarah:

Or doctor Plummer. Doctor Plummer? I don't think the rev would ever kill anybody.

Mark:

That bike drives them nuts.

Sarah:

The mayor. So The hit and run on the tandem bikes.

Mark:

Strangely enough, there's a tandem bike sequence and a unicycle sequence

Sarah:

I see.

Mark:

Which has nothing to do with the plot, and I am obsessed with the unicycle sequence because I know what's coming. Why I'm obsessed with the unicycle sequence and I know it's coming is because Frodo has the unicycle in the front of his cart. Right? How does he move the cart with the unicycle?

Sarah:

He puts it inside.

Mark:

No. No.

Sarah:

Okay. It's just leaning against

Mark:

At the end of the day, when he needs to move his cart to his house.

Sarah:

I don't think he does. I think it's parked there. But does he ride home on the unicycle?

Mark:

I I guess.

Sarah:

Or does he just hop on it when he doesn't have any customers and ride around in the circle?

Mark:

But there is a blackboard there. Mhmm. Now we know we know that that blackboard has secret messages in the future.

Sarah:

In the future, but not now.

Mark:

Not now. Time it's not a muffin special on it. It's just the same muffin special. Yeah. But now I am glued to that blackboard.

Mark:

Right?

Sarah:

That's what they want I you to

Mark:

wanna see the first time the message appears.

Sarah:

Because we know later there are funny messages on that blackboard. Absolutely. One of them says, Mark, look over here.

Mark:

Fact that

Sarah:

you look, Mark.

Mark:

The fact that we know people in this show would not support.

Sarah:

Know them. We they will respond to an email. They they They messaged us. They're kind enough to do that, mostly to correct us.

Mark:

Yes. Never mind the fact that though Trudy is nice now, she could kill again.

Sarah:

Oh, she could. Absolutely. Easily. I didn't tell you anything. No.

Sarah:

I'm no narc. I love when

Mark:

She needs to go on deadlock.

Sarah:

When Todd is talking to Kristen about, I think it's Kristen, about the nitrous and says that the doctor does have it. Yes. The dentist does have it.

Mark:

But he needs a password.

Sarah:

But you gotta know the password. And the password is, I'm really freaking out right now. I'm gonna try that next time I go to the dentist.

Mark:

Kristen does so good at at the the what? Now, Todd works at Jules' garden. Todd gets his coffee at Frodo's hut. Todd needs to go to the cemetery

Sarah:

And mow the grass.

Mark:

And mow the grass. Like, Frodo's dad works there.

Sarah:

You don't know that it's the same cemetery.

Mark:

Okay.

Sarah:

It may not be the church cemetery.

Mark:

It might not.

Sarah:

That tree is almost as big as the door on that house, though. The tree that Eva is sitting by.

Mark:

The door wasn't metal, it would it would be Made from that tree? From that from that tree.

Sarah:

Maybe it's one of those natural cemeteries where they let wildflowers grow and stuff so they don't over manicure.

Mark:

Chalmers sits down in the grass. I'm like, dude, you're gonna lose yourself and check yourself for ticks afterwards.

Sarah:

Eva kills her mother. Yes. And then spends the whole episode throwing every other woman in Brokenwood under the bus. Except for the woman she loves. So she has a crush On Harper.

Sarah:

On Harper. But she sends fake texts Yep. To Jules to frame her. Yep. She tells the police that Nancy Jacks, the patient, is hitting on her dad That's Moving in on him.

Mark:

To be honest, that's the most unbelievably thing about the episode. Because the idea is that she uses her dad's phone. He never messages

Sarah:

because No. He does. She doesn't use his phone. She uses her own phone to somehow send messages from his phone.

Mark:

No. No. She uses his phone because she says

Sarah:

He's sitting right next to her when she's doing it.

Mark:

And she does it right next

Sarah:

to his That's why I don't think it's his phone.

Mark:

No. No. It's his phone because she says she says something like, well I was ordering pizza or something. That's that's that's the thing that's unbelievable because no child in the universe has ever ordered pizza.

Sarah:

Even if you hand them the phone with the credit card information already in there?

Mark:

I arrived in Indiana, my first family in Indiana. Literally, one of the first things out of their mouth was now someone can order the pizza.

Sarah:

No. See, you're misunderstanding it. She was ordering it online via the phone, not calling. Nobody calls and orders pizza.

Mark:

No, I know that.

Sarah:

She wasn't doing But

Mark:

that's when she said the message.

Sarah:

And none of our children would call and order pizza either.

Mark:

No. Speak to a person? No. No. No.

Mark:

No. No. Okay.

Sarah:

The other thing we find out from Frodo and Todd is that every Friday, Jules comes to the coffee cart and has coffee with her imaginary friend.

Mark:

Yes.

Sarah:

I realize that Charles is hoping that this infatuation with Sunny is a passing thing, but she goes every Friday and has coffee in public and talks to an imaginary friend, and he doesn't think that that's serious enough to get her help. Well, he wants to get her

Mark:

help but he can't afford it

Sarah:

anymore. Okay. You can have somebody committed.

Mark:

I also think I also think that doctor Plummer would be like, okay, Jules really needs help, so I'm gonna help her.

Sarah:

Yeah. Half price. Pay me back later.

Mark:

Pay me back later.

Sarah:

She's a danger. Yeah. She's having coffee with an imaginary friend.

Mark:

Chalmers at one point is like, should we let her wander? Yeah.

Sarah:

So does Kristen. They both think that she shouldn't be on the loose. Yeah. Who do you think she thinks she's having coffee with?

Mark:

Well, there's lots of possibilities including her first husband who died in the boat. Remember? While she was bonking

Sarah:

Somebody else.

Mark:

The the lawyer. Dennis. Dennis Buchanan.

Sarah:

So it could be the ghost of her first husband?

Mark:

Could be the ghost of her

Sarah:

She wouldn't think that he would drink coffee. No. Ghosts don't drink coffee.

Mark:

No. I I think maybe she's practicing being with the dentist.

Sarah:

But she says she needs privacy. They're gonna sit over there. Yeah. And then acts weirded out when Kristen sits down in the chair like, you're gonna sit on it.

Mark:

It no. Okay. What I love is that Frodo completely plays along.

Sarah:

Did you were you ever around a kid who had an imaginary friend that they like legitimately believed in?

Mark:

Not really legitimately believed in.

Sarah:

I babysat a kid who had an imaginary friend. He was an only child, and he had an imaginary friend, who I had to totally acknowledge. Yeah. And make like two peanut butter and jelly sandwiches because how dare I only make one? Oh Like that come kid

Mark:

was playing you man.

Sarah:

No, because he didn't eat the second one. I would end up eating it because then he would go off and play and he would leave it. But I I had to consider the other kid all the time. I had to ask them both what they wanted and hold the door for both of them and

Mark:

No. Push

Sarah:

both of them on a swing. That was weird. Did any

Mark:

of you have an imaginary friend out there?

Sarah:

Tell us. Yeah. I didn't. I did imagine my sister didn't exist. Woah.

Mark:

Okay. We've gone over this.

Sarah:

That's the opposite. I wish her now.

Mark:

I also spent many hours fantasizing about how I was not related to any of the people in my life and that some couple from New York City would suddenly show up and say, you're our child. Let's go back to Manhattan.

Sarah:

It was a mix up at the hospital. That poor kid they're bringing back to the farm to trade in for you.

Mark:

Could we could go back to the farm.

Sarah:

Would you like to hear another stanza of the poem?

Mark:

Yes. Yes, please.

Sarah:

Back to the concrete matryoshka. Yes. Remember, this is Svetlana Platz. Yes. The breadline is a black snake in the snow moving with the grace the glacial grace of the dying empire.

Sarah:

I wear my fur hat like a crown of thorns muffled against the gossip of the sparrows. Are they informers? Their eyes are too bright. There

Mark:

is an esoteric bit here that I harp on far too much in these episodes. So they did it right here, so I wanna harp on them doing it right.

Sarah:

Mhmm.

Mark:

When Eva plays

Sarah:

At the funeral?

Mark:

At the funeral. Wow. We've had some bad funerals in this show.

Sarah:

No. There's never been a normal wedding or funeral in Brokenwood.

Mark:

Eva can sing.

Sarah:

Mhmm.

Mark:

The lyrics Eva sings are good because they're written by the woman who does all the music for the show.

Sarah:

Mhmm.

Mark:

They are about the blood moon which then again reinforces your idea.

Sarah:

The moon made her do it.

Mark:

They're all werewolves. The moon made them do it. Okay? Not only is that guitar making that noise

Sarah:

But she's actually playing it.

Mark:

She's actually playing and she bar chords correctly.

Sarah:

What does that mean?

Mark:

So there is a there are regular chords at the bottom of the neck which most people who play guitar call cowboy chords. Right? They they're usually all six strings, they're easy fingerings.

Sarah:

Right? They're like beginner

Mark:

chords. They're beginner chords.

Sarah:

Okay.

Mark:

But the rest of the neck has other notes on it that you want to play but sometimes you can't play all the notes the way you want to play, so you have to use your index finger as a bar.

Sarah:

To lay again to lay across all the strings?

Mark:

All the strings. It moves the bar, it moves the nut Gotcha. Up. These are hard to

Sarah:

do. Okay.

Mark:

Takes a long time to

Sarah:

So she's clearly an experienced guitar player.

Mark:

Experienced guitar player.

Sarah:

But she sings

Mark:

It's a Fender Telecaster and probably just a little amp.

Sarah:

But she sings about the moon turning iodine red.

Mark:

Yeah. Iodine's brown. Uh-huh.

Sarah:

I think she's obsessed with blood.

Mark:

But what I love, and this is totally them goofing on us, when Jules goes to the house and recounts going to the house, there's a moment where she stands outside the house looking the height of crazy. Yeah. And behind her is the red moon. Yeah.

Sarah:

They're totally playing. Because that's after she's been shoved in the pool. And so she looks like a drowned rat with her mascara running all over the place.

Mark:

And then she goes in and touches his clothes.

Sarah:

So creepy. So creepy.

Mark:

Okay. We're gonna have you touch his clothes here. Soon. Okay.

Sarah:

Soon he'll realize he loves me. Yep. Until then, I'll just huff his sweater. Never mind that she climbs in his window. She climbs into Eva's bedroom.

Mark:

Yeah. So then, now they never say this, but because she climbs in Eva's bedroom because she can't use the key, it gives us information that makes us know that Eva is the killer.

Sarah:

Because she's supposed to be there.

Mark:

She's supposed to be there. Yeah. So we know that Eva's not there then.

Sarah:

So she must be

Mark:

the killer. That's never mentioned, but it's good work.

Sarah:

But when Mike confronts Sunny about Eva being the killer, Sunny tries to say, well, maybe maybe Eva didn't maybe Jules didn't know that Eva was home. But he's like, yeah. But if if Eva was home, don't you think she would have said something about Jules being in the house? Yeah. Of course, she would have.

Mark:

She would have. There's a weird plot with a birthday, which is strange because it's Harper's birthday.

Sarah:

And yet her friends go off to Riverstone to keep partying, and she doesn't go.

Mark:

And she doesn't go and she doesn't want the doctor there. It's

Sarah:

I just kinda feel bad for her. Yeah. It must suck that your boss's wife hates you that much and is, like, willing to confront you in public and just condemn you as a human being all the time.

Mark:

And the biggest but Trudy moment, by but Trudy moment, I mean, Trudy killed somebody, so anybody else could kill somebody. The wife of the man killed in the hotel who had the kids who got shot in the crotch. Nancy Jacks. Nancy Jacks shows up and giving them lasagna like, but Trudy.

Sarah:

But Eve Eve is so clever. Yeah. Because she's like, but that's so insensitive, dad. She bakes something in the oven and mom died with her head in the oven. She just

Mark:

Then you put her in. Yeah.

Sarah:

And she knows the whole time she did it. Yeah. Eva is horrible. And that's on the spot evil thinking. That's impromptu evil thinking.

Mark:

It is indeed.

Sarah:

It's her bangs. But I'm making her crazy. I have a problem with her children. With Nancy's children?

Mark:

Yes. Because one child is a good child. He puts their bike up against the pole outside in the backyard.

Sarah:

And the other one tosses it in the ground.

Mark:

Tosses it on the ground.

Sarah:

I think that's accurate. I think 50% of all kids just drop their bike wherever outside the house.

Mark:

Never allowed to do that.

Sarah:

That's what kickstands are for.

Mark:

That's that's

Sarah:

And there's a place for your bike and it's not in the middle of the yard. Yes. No. Where I grew up, somebody would steal it if you left it in the yard.

Mark:

We had separate bedrooms.

Sarah:

Cows not gonna take your bike.

Mark:

We had separate bedrooms because of insomnia. No. She was just really annoyed.

Sarah:

Would you wanna share a bed with her? No. She was horrible.

Mark:

Oh my gosh.

Sarah:

So Eva's being questioned for the murder. She's 17. And she's so evil and so broken that she's thought this through.

Mark:

Yeah.

Sarah:

She's I'm I'm not 18, so I won't get a long sentence. And when I get out, Harper and I can finally be together. She's almost as bad as Jules. Poor. Like, many times does Harper say no?

Mark:

At that point in time when she says, then I can be with Harper, you get the whole point in the episode, which is she is Jules. Yeah. Her and Jules are that same person. Yeah. Which is why the but Trudy rule works because Jules could have killed her.

Sarah:

What would it be like if Eva and Jules were put in the same cell? How many imaginary people would there be in there with them?

Mark:

Now, okay. Jules is loony toony. Jules needs lots of help. Jules scares everybody at the end. Right?

Sarah:

But Mike's right about her. He says she's honest to a fault. Yeah. She doesn't lie. If she killed somebody, she'd say so and smile like, but he wanted me to.

Mark:

Yeah.

Sarah:

She's that kind of crazy. Eva's a different kind of crazy. Yeah. She's conniving. If her mom is like that to her when she was 17, imagine what Laura would have been like when she was five.

Sarah:

Oh. It's really no surprise.

Mark:

No one deserves to die, but Lauren should have got.

Sarah:

Sonny should have done something a long time ago

Mark:

Yeah.

Sarah:

To get her away from Eva.

Mark:

I have a note yet another worst funeral ever.

Sarah:

She does some good dead body acting when she rolls out of the casket.

Mark:

She does some amazing dead body acting when she rolls out of the casket. I'm like, that's the second time we've had rolling caskets at this church.

Sarah:

They have to do with the Wadsworths.

Mark:

Okay. The priest needs to say no more funerals.

Sarah:

Or is that screwed down? Yeah. That lid needs to be screwed down because it's a fifty fifty chance that thing's gonna come off that stand. I wanted the remember the the two undertakers who were trying to be hip and cool? Yeah.

Sarah:

I wanted them to come up and, like, try to put her back in while playing the saxophone or something.

Mark:

Ugh. Just can't be a lesbian. What? Ugh. And that makes everyone in the audience hate her too.

Mark:

Yeah. Right? So Kristen figures this out. Kristen is the one that figures it out because she gets the the all the information.

Sarah:

Right.

Mark:

And she does the little thing with the magnets.

Sarah:

Checks

Mark:

me. That's good.

Sarah:

The visuals Good whiteboard management.

Mark:

Yeah. Because we have all the information that she has. Yeah. Right? And they confront Eva and

Sarah:

Eva's like, yep. I did it. Yep. I'm only 17.

Mark:

Yeah. So

Sarah:

I'll get away with it. Yeah. But then there's the dentist scene where they're like, oh, well, first of all, they hypnotize Jules to get her to talk, which is totally unethical. Yeah. They say, it's off the books.

Sarah:

It's off the books.

Mark:

Yeah. Mike should be like, this is not ethical. It's idea. Frodo would say that was unethical.

Sarah:

It's his idea.

Mark:

Yeah. Frodo's dad would say that's unethical.

Sarah:

But then what's really unethical is to anesthetize someone unnecessarily. Again. Well, no. They hypnotized her before.

Mark:

No. No. But like

Sarah:

But that was for a reason. She was having her wisdom teeth out. Yeah. Now they're just anesthetizing her for no reason. The new dentist who's come into town must be like, you want me to what?

Sarah:

Yeah. People die on her anesthetic. No. I'm not doing that. No.

Sarah:

But stupid Charles takes a phone call, so she sees Dennis. And he's like, oh, no. That's the end of the episode. Would you like to hear the end of the poem?

Mark:

Yes, please.

Sarah:

I think I'm a Svetlana Platz fan now. And I think

Mark:

This is quite the poem.

Sarah:

For my judgment, the last two stanzas are the best. So here we go. I'll wrap it up for you. The moon is a Sputnik, a cold mechanical eye beeping its indifference to my unwashed borscht bowl. I lay my head in the oven, but the gas is out.

Sarah:

A five year plan for silence, and I am ahead of schedule. Beep. Beep. That's enough of that. My poems are hidden in loaves of black bread.

Sarah:

The censor is sniffing the laundry for spite. I'd tell you the secrets that live in my head, but the radiator is recording tonight.

Mark:

Oh, that's it's brilliant. That's brilliant. That is Cold War paranoia to its height.

Sarah:

I'll tell you a secret. What? I wrote that.

Mark:

Yo. What? You did not.

Sarah:

There is no Svetlana plots.

Mark:

No. We were kidding.

Sarah:

They knew that. Sarah? Best corpse is Laura. She's the only corpse after the credits. What happens?

Mark:

Okay. First of all, the dentist, rightly so, gets the heck out of Dodge.

Sarah:

Yeah. His daughter's locked up, and he's like, I'm leaving. Yeah. He's gone. I love sorry.

Sarah:

When Mike says, do you wanna go in and talk to her? And he says, that may be the most difficult question anybody's ever asked me. Yeah. That is such a good line.

Mark:

That's a good line, and he delivers it really well.

Sarah:

Even with the thing on his face? Yes. Okay. Eva's going to go away. Yep.

Sarah:

Sunny has moved out of town. Yep. A new dentist has moved in. Is Charles still trying to sell real estate?

Mark:

I think so. Harper gets a job at the new place. Right? Mhmm. I think she gets yeah.

Mark:

She gets a job at the new place.

Sarah:

Who knows about Lisa? Lisa may come back from being away Away. And very confused. She's missed so much.

Mark:

She's gonna come back and be like, what the what? You can't do that.

Sarah:

It's not even the same dentist anymore. I told Gina she could borrow our drill tonight.

Mark:

Where's the giant tooth? What

Sarah:

about Jules?

Mark:

Well, we don't see Jules again.

Sarah:

But we do see Dennis again.

Mark:

We do see Dennis again. We we may see Jules in twelve.

Sarah:

So he maybe

Mark:

he's not in eleven. She's not in eleven. Okay. But we may see her in twelve.

Sarah:

Maybe she died under anesthetic when they put her under again. Okay. And duct taped Charles to a chair, put visors on her so he's the only thing she can see like a baby duck. Oh. Mama.

Mark:

Choose. Mama. Okay. So next week, April 6. So so first of all, we have the newsletter with our poem in it Mhmm.

Mark:

And whatever else I put in it coming out Wednesday, April 1. I got I gotta I gotta tell you folks, it's the April 1. It's April. There may be a little giggly at the first.

Sarah:

What are you giving it away for? I was gonna write another Svetlana Platz poem. The radiator is listening.

Mark:

The second thing is, and I'm gonna put this in the newsletter, is we're asking for people to send us particular moments in the show, our show, the podcast, that they really like and are really funny. Mhmm. What I'm trying to do is is create reels that have these in them. Yeah. Right?

Sarah:

Best of.

Mark:

So and there are 300 episodes. I don't wanna search through them all No. To find funny.

Sarah:

What jokes suck with you?

Mark:

Yes.

Sarah:

That's all?

Mark:

Yep. Then on the April 6, we will drop the next episode of Brokenwood.

Sarah:

Season ten episode five.

Mark:

Which, Sarah, what is our favorite holiday?

Sarah:

Halloween.

Mark:

The House of Screams, the Halloween episode. Yes. Yes. Yay. Where we will critique their Halloween decorations because ladies and gentlemen, it has begun.

Sarah:

Mhmm. Already.

Mark:

But we have purchased mechanical things already Yeah. For Halloween twenty twenty six.

Sarah:

We have.

Mark:

That week, we will also probably have a mini. Now, the idea is to have a mini and a real episode in every week for the next basically six weeks.

Sarah:

Mhmm.

Mark:

Will that happen?

Sarah:

Yes. Yes.

Mark:

I hope so. Yes. We will do our best, but it is the busy season.

Sarah:

Every season is the

Mark:

busy season. Every season is the busy season.

Sarah:

We've gone on

Mark:

long enough. I can't believe that this run of mid of Brokenwood ends after your birthday.

Sarah:

I know. Lots of fun in the near future, folks. Mini episodes are so much fun. Yes. They are so much fun.

Mark:

Those those are so much fun. So we will be with you all through April for all sorts of fun stuff. Thank you, Maniacs.

Sarah:

Until then, 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:

Hence, Svetlana Platz.

Mark:

Yes. We will talk about her.

Sarah:

I mean, she had quite the life. We don't know a lot about her because, you know Yeah. Communism. Yeah.