Mystery Maniacs

The Arbour

Freaky Hat!

The Scoreboard

The Guy with The Book

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 in February before anyone else. Mystery Maniacs listeners get first access.

Thanks again for listening!
 
Mark & Sarah

-----------------------------------
Upcoming Tentative  Schedule
  • January 26 - Midsomer S25E04
------------------------------------
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 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:

Booga aruga.

Sarah:

And says dollar signs.

Mark:

It's changing changing.

Sarah:

Hey, maniacs.

Mark:

Hey, Midsummer maniacs. Midsummer maniacs is a comedy recap podcast dedicated to Midsummer TV. Each week, we dig into an episode of the show including the murders, the mayhem, the loonies, and everything else we love. And boy, this is stock loony town.

Sarah:

We're dedicated to Midsummer TV.

Mark:

Yep. This week. I'm Sarah. That's Mark. I'm Mark.

Sarah:

Season twenty five episode three, death strikes

Mark:

three. We got a bunch of stuff at the beginning. We're just gonna get through it as fast as possible. First of all, we're late because and I know no one listening will be shocked. Sarah had emergency oral surgery last week.

Sarah:

Yeah. Oh, boy.

Mark:

Oh. It was the worst. Oh, I don't recommend sinus lifts to anybody. You must all think we have the worst teeth ever. I everything beyond my canines,

Sarah:

all my molars are the worst teeth ever. I'm almost fully implanted back there. But wow, when you break a crown under the gum line on the farthest back tooth at the top, not only do they have to basically flip your head open like some kind of Lego figure or something, but the roots can go into your sinus and that creates problems. And that's what mine did. And now I've got all these stitches and it's bad, folks.

Mark:

I took the day off to take care

Sarah:

of her. I took naps. Yep. Several days

Mark:

in a That's a rare occurrence.

Sarah:

That makes Mark worried about me if I take a Absolutely.

Sarah:

Getting better though.

Mark:

Yes. So we're a day late here and it doesn't really matter because it's MLK day here today in The US, so we have the day off from work anyway. So we get to record leisurely and release it on Tuesday.

Sarah:

Let hope you don't mind.

Mark:

I'm sure

Sarah:

everybody talk with an ice pack on your face.

Mark:

Everybody will understand. Second of all, why why, Sarah, do things have to change? Things are going along perfectly well and now they have to change. What I'm referring to is we do our newsletter through Mailchimp. We have almost 500 subscribers to this newsletter and we've been using the free Mailchimp account for years and it's been going along swimmingly.

Sarah:

But now they're changing.

Mark:

But now they're changing.

Sarah:

So we're migrating to a new service.

Mark:

Yes. So you can't have more than two fifty people on a free newsletter now, so that means we have to move or start paying money. Now, I had already thought about making move anyway, so this just comes along at a time where I make that move seem natural. So where we're moving is a place called Substack. It's still 100% free.

Mark:

There will never be a charge for the mailing list but it offers more social interaction than what we had in the past. For example, you will now be able to comment on the newsletter posts at the bottom just like you would on any other post on any other thing and other people can see that and refer to it and we could ask questions and all that good stuff. We can have polls and other ways to communicate with you but the thing I'm most excited about is we can host an online chat through Substack.

Sarah:

Yeah, So

Mark:

what that'd be that means is if we have a premiere that we know about and we want to basically do a watch along with you guys when we can say at 08:00 we're going to watch the new Brokenwood.

Sarah:

Yeah, let's all watch

Mark:

it together and Let's have all watch it together and have a chat. So the timeline for this is very simple. The January 30, you're going to get an email from Mailchimp, which is the last email I'm gonna send through Mailchimp that's gonna explain everything in detail. This is the good part. You don't have to do anything.

Mark:

You don't even have to read that email. On the February 2, I'm gonna take everybody's email and put them in Substack. Mhmm. What that means is you're gonna get an email from Substack that says, some crazy person put your email on Substack for this Substack. For this newsletter.

Mark:

Yep. You agree? Do you agree? You don't even have to agree. You don't?

Mark:

No. You can There's all sorts of buttons in that email, but you don't even have to agree because the idea is that I am saying, I've talked to all these people and they agree already. You can opt out at any time and any of this, it's all free and you don't have to do anything. And if you don't have to do, don't do anything on the February 4 when you get your regular Mailchimp newsletter instead, it will be from Substack. It'll probably look almost exactly the same.

Sarah:

Yeah. It'll just be a different from address. If you whitelist email addresses, you know,

Mark:

you Yeah. Can And all those instructions about where it shows up in your Gmail and all that will all be in the email. It's all standard. So you don't have to do anything. It's totally free.

Mark:

I have to do a bunch of stuff.

Sarah:

But it is a good opportunity to sign up for the newsletter if you haven't already. It only comes out once a month. It's not a bunch of spam. So when we get the new one set up on Substack Yes. We hope more of you will subscribe.

Sarah:

Yep. Does a really good job with the newsletter. I It's really fun.

Mark:

The newsletter includes a kind of little information about what's what we're covering in the podcast, our schedule for the next month, there's a cute picture of our dog, what we've been watching, all sorts of things like that is in the newsletter.

Sarah:

Speaking of what we've been watching,

Mark:

we've been watching a lot since

Sarah:

I I've been almost said decapitated, not decapitated, since I've been debilitated.

Mark:

Debilitated, Wow.

Sarah:

I'm not even on painkillers today.

Mark:

Yeah.

Sarah:

My brain is Anyway, we watched The Seven Dials.

Mark:

Yes, on Netflix. The new three part

Sarah:

one?

Mark:

It's Agatha Christie's Seven Dials mystery. It's the second of the chimney mysteries. So there two chimney mysteries, which include Bundle and Battle. Bundle and Battle.

Sarah:

Yes. Bundle is the young woman who is kind of the protagonist in battle is the detective superintendent. Yes. I give it eight out of 10.

Mark:

I thought it was good. I wish they had done some things that were more like the book, but I thought it was good.

Sarah:

Yeah. We also watched the first episode of Bookish, which is Mark Gaddis' new show.

Mark:

Which was really Mark Gaddis y. Yeah. It was like, we found a body in the rubble from the bombings of World War two. In World War two. Oh, this guy's shown up.

Mark:

Oh, this guy's shown up.

Sarah:

It's a yeah. It's a parade of actors you've seen in every British mystery show. Yes. Mark Gaddis gets to play an eccentric character that he wrote himself. Book.

Sarah:

Yeah. His name is Book. It's really fun. It's on PBS. Is that right?

Mark:

Yes. It's on PBS.

Sarah:

Speaking of PBS, we also watched the new episode of All Creatures Great and Small.

Mark:

And we're we're gonna spoil it here. The war is over.

Sarah:

Yeah. So

Mark:

A war from nearly a hundred years ago.

Sarah:

The whole the whole tense, like, will people live or die kind of happened between seasons, I guess.

Mark:

Yes. It's kind of

Sarah:

Tristan goes away and is safe the whole time and comes back and yeah.

Mark:

I I have a feeling this is going to be rationing and postwar. Because that postwar story isn't told as much.

Sarah:

Rationing goes on for a long time.

Mark:

It's interesting that bookish and All Creatures Great and Small are kind of exactly the same time period.

Sarah:

Yeah. Yeah, they are. We also have been watching the new season of Shetland. Yes. I wasn't sure if I was going to like the new detective, but I do like her.

Sarah:

It's grown on me.

Mark:

She was Agatha Raisin. Yeah. And like really cozy. Like, cozy to the point of

Sarah:

So it is.

Mark:

There's a tea shop and a cat in it. Yeah.

Sarah:

And Shutland is not like that. No. But it's good. I like her.

Mark:

I like that Billy is is doing more.

Sarah:

Yeah. Because

Mark:

I look like him.

Sarah:

We also finished the three episode show Quiz Yes. Which is about the famous case of somebody trying to cheat in the early days of who wants to be a millionaire in The UK.

Mark:

And what I liked is they kept it ambiguous.

Sarah:

Yeah. Like the case was. You you're really not sure whether they really cheated or not, But they did a really good job telling that story.

Mark:

And, of course, there's new traitor. And where traitor relates to this episode is, boy, were are the costumes in traitors more wild or the costumes in this episode?

Sarah:

Alan Cumming's wardrobe or the Bruce's. I'm not sure. Alright. Are you ready to dive in?

Mark:

I am indeed.

Sarah:

We'll hit the how to watch like a maniac questions as we go through that we gave you in the mini.

Mark:

Yes. So this was originally aired on the 12/22/2025, directed by Darcia Martin and written by Jeff Povey. I have a number of problems with the beginning of this episode.

Sarah:

It takes place in Godly Buzzard.

Mark:

Yes. That is not the real name of a place.

Sarah:

No. Why would it be called Buzzard?

Mark:

There there are two writing things in this episode that I do not like. I do not like Godly Buzzard. It does not sound like a real place name. And second of all, I do not like Noah's Park. It's a reach beyond belief.

Sarah:

Yeah. That's the name of the woodworking traveling festival thing. Thing? My biggest problem with this episode is that I think two of the three murders are impossible.

Mark:

Yes. We'll get there. We will get there. So a couple of things that you might not have noticed off the top is the festival. They don't make mention of this, but the flower festival that they're all upset about is called the war of the roses.

Mark:

I like that. That's clever.

Sarah:

I yeah. I do like that.

Mark:

Second of all, the strange pillory thing that we think might be a Victorian gas jet thing maybe, whatever it is. There's a picture of it in the pub. Wow. I did not recognize that at

Sarah:

first. So apparently it's famous locally.

Mark:

It's famous local place. Then there are a fantastic amount of people in this episode. So there's three people outside the pub who are like, woo. There are also three different people outside the pub later who go, but the best is when the bookmobile tries to escape, there is a guy with a book and they do a full body shot of him turning around, looking at the bookmobile, escaping as he has his book, and he goes, what? Is the town of what?

Sarah:

And by what, you mean, like, people like slack jawed?

Mark:

Like, they're like, what is going on in our town?

Sarah:

This is not godly buzzard behavior. So the flower show is expensive. We noted that the first time you see a poster, it's like, wow, it's really pricey. And that's what kind of the argument is over between the village and the manor is that they've hiked up the prices. And boy, did they.

Mark:

Did you notice that the prices for the flower show are exactly the same as the prices for Noah's Bark?

Sarah:

No. Yes.

Mark:

That is a clever little detail. No one makes reference to it. Only maniacs would ever notice that, but I did.

Sarah:

What I noticed is the marketing tactics for the flower show are weird. Yes. Like, okay. Put a poster in in the case where they put the village notices. That makes sense to me.

Sarah:

But then there are these posters that are just, like, on a stick stuck randomly placed

Mark:

In a line on the green.

Sarah:

Yeah. I I I don't I don't know what that marketing it's like guerrilla marketing. Marketing.

Mark:

No. Know for sure that that green is actually a cricket green and I'll talk about that later. I did lots of stuff in this episode. But then the people against them, instead of just picking up the signs, are painting black x's.

Sarah:

Yeah. Which is not very attractive around town.

Mark:

It there's all sorts of problems with it. I did notice the royal mail guys on a bike. This is a nice little bike. It's got a little red bike.

Sarah:

The pub and inn is called the Raging Stag. Yes. And Godly Buzzard. It should be a buzzard. It should be the Raging Buzzard.

Sarah:

The Raging Buzzard.

Mark:

Now Sarah, I do I do like shorts. My favorite time of year is I call it sweater and shorts time.

Sarah:

You mean knee length pants?

Mark:

It's it's in the fall and in the spring where you can wear a sweater outside in shorts. Mhmm. That's the best outfit. According to Mark.

Sarah:

Other people may disagree.

Mark:

The shorts at the beginning of this episode are not only purple, but are bad. Let's just

Sarah:

talk about the Bruce family.

Mark:

Yes.

Sarah:

Okay. They're the local aristocrats who host the flower show at Godly Manor where they live. They are Alan, Myrtle, and their two daughters, Frankie and Sylvia.

Mark:

All of these people are criminally insane.

Sarah:

Yes. They are not new money. No. They're hereditary aristocrats. I do not understand why they are so flamboyant, I guess is the only way to describe how they

Mark:

dress. Unbelievably flamboyant.

Sarah:

Like, really over the top. At one point, sir Allen has on a shirt that is covered in shrimp.

Mark:

Yes. So the introduction to them. The introduction. Allen has a purple shirt, a cravat, purple shorts. He's at least mono like Monochrome?

Mark:

I guess. She has on the super pirate ish pirate shirt that's bright pink

Sarah:

Yeah.

Mark:

With giant flowers in her hair, giant sunglasses. And it's over oh, she has a handbag too. It's just she's got giant jewelry, leads to a problem later on.

Sarah:

It's like everything on her is like scaled up.

Mark:

Yes.

Sarah:

You know? And typically in a country house mystery, it would be a family that has new money, who's earned their money through industry, who now want to insinuate themselves into the aristocratic set, who are so over the top and kind of obnoxious. But that's what kind of stumps me about this family because they're not new money, and yet they're super flamboyant. Sylvia isn't. She's a mouse.

Sarah:

Yes. But even Frankie, like, she's wearing like

Mark:

animal They're not animal prints. No. She wears embroidered animals

Sarah:

on A fish around her neck. Yeah. Crossed with, like, nineteen eighties gunny sacks Yep. Was the name of the brand that had, like, the Victorian ruffle throwback shirts and stuff. My sister really liked that stuff when we were kids.

Mark:

It's all purposeful, and it's all over the the top, and I love it.

Sarah:

Oh, it's so fun to look at. I mean, Rebecca Front, who plays Myrtle Bruce, the wife, we've seen her in so many things. Lewis is probably the one that we know her best for. She plays superintendent innocent. Is that right?

Sarah:

Lewis' boss?

Mark:

Yes.

Sarah:

Like, the muumuus are beyond anything.

Mark:

And then there's there's a plot point that comes out and I, like everyone in the village went,

Sarah:

You mean the earring?

Mark:

The fact The earring that

Sarah:

is the least Myrtle earring ever?

Mark:

The least Myrtle earring ever shows that Myrtle is bonking the soon to be son-in-law Yeah. Which I don't buy for a million dollars. No.

Sarah:

Reminder, No. Spoiler podcast. We're going to ruin it. We're going to tell you who did it. If you haven't watched it, stop right now.

Sarah:

We're about to ruin it. So the Bruces are a criminal family all over the place. Okay? We've got a hidden Deal. We've got

Mark:

a triple.

Sarah:

We've got an adulterer who let his son die. I mean, just it's just a mess. They're a mess.

Mark:

Yes.

Sarah:

Maybe their fashion sense is supposed to be as chaotic as they are.

Mark:

Don't know. I want to make this clear. He is not an adulterer. He is a rapist.

Sarah:

Yeah. That's true. Yeah. You're right. Played by Kevin McNally, who has been in two other Midsommers before.

Sarah:

Yes. He was in season two episode four, Blood Will Out. Yes. Where he plays the leader of the travelers who come and set up in the village green. Then he's in season thirteen episode two, The Noble Art.

Mark:

I think when we covered that episode, we what season was the first one in again? Season two. Yeah. We were just hitting our stride as Midsommar Maniacs because we did the first couple episodes and we're like, we're funny crazy people. But we talked about juggalos in that episode.

Mark:

Well, there's

Sarah:

a kid who looks

Sarah:

like one. And what's funny is that when I saw Kevin McNally in this episode, even though he's in the purple getup at the big country house, I was like, isn't he the guy who was who was the lead in the Travelers? And you have to kinda set that aside in Midsommar when you see an actor who's been in another episode. They're probably not playing the same character. But when Noah and his band of traveling woodworkers come up the way and Sir Allen is happy to see them, I'm like, wait a minute.

Mark:

Maybe he is the traveler guy.

Sarah:

Is he the like, has like traveler made good and like become an aristocrat?

Mark:

No. If you recall in that episode, he finds his daughter and loves his daughter as opposed to this episode. That's right. He's like a good person kinda in that one, but not in this one. No.

Sarah:

Oh boy. Yeah, Noah's bark is, I mean come on.

Mark:

It's just, woah.

Sarah:

I just don't understand the idea of a traveling woodworking fair either.

Mark:

No, I don't either, especially with Angel.

Sarah:

The axe guy?

Mark:

Yes. Yeah. Angel, the mushroom axe guy.

Sarah:

I just don't I I I don't see the point in it. Now if it was a traveling group of heritage craftsmen and they all did heritage crafts like wheelwrights and coopers and woodworkers and, you know, Willow Weavers, that would make sense to me, but they are overly special.

Mark:

Know the people on the repair shop go to those things, and they're all over the place in England. Yeah. And that there's a whole sort of Even It would be the king's trust.

Sarah:

Yeah. King Charles supports those heritage crafts.

Mark:

He's really into that stuff.

Sarah:

These people are, like, just whitlers. They just whittle.

Mark:

They just do some whittling. Did you notice that there was a advertisement for carved spoons?

Sarah:

Yes.

Mark:

So I have to tell you, ladies and gentlemen, I tried to make Sarah carve spoons

Sarah:

I love

Mark:

this. One year for Christmas. We saw this show about Finland. It was some Nordic noir. They talked about love spoons.

Mark:

I was like, okay. So I ordered a love spoon kit.

Sarah:

It was a block of wood and a very

Mark:

sharp knife in a box, wasn't it? It was so instructions.

Sarah:

It was a sweet idea.

Mark:

I did this in the office.

Sarah:

You had to do it where I wasn't so you could do it in secret.

Mark:

And I was so worried about cutting myself.

Sarah:

You have

Mark:

to you have to understand.

Sarah:

He was a closet whittler.

Mark:

In the middle of all this stuff with Sarah, with the teeth and everything last week, I had to replace the innards of a toilet. Okay?

Sarah:

You did a good job.

Mark:

I did a good job, to which my friend Danish said the question that was on everybody's mind, which was, did you hurt yourself? And I said, no. I didn't hurt myself.

Sarah:

For once. You did something handy and

Mark:

didn't hurt There was no blood and no water on the floor. I did a good job.

Sarah:

But had you cut yourself with that very sharp knife whittling that spoon, I would have been like, what happened at work? You use a computer. How did you cut yourself So so

Mark:

I really I tried. I I used a jigsaw when Sarah wasn't here. Yeah. I noticed that one though. It was Charlie Brown's love spoon.

Sarah:

It's it's not a spoon. It's a chunk of

Mark:

wood with some marks on it at one end

Sarah:

and some very rough cuts from a jigsaw. It's very hard.

Mark:

That you

Sarah:

shouldn't have tried to use.

Mark:

Hard to carve a spoon.

Sarah:

These people, I'm sure, could make spoons out the wazoo.

Mark:

I'm sure they could.

Sarah:

Though Nessie. She of the horrible pants.

Mark:

No no one, no one, no one calls Agnes Nessie.

Sarah:

She's in hiding. Yes. If her name is Agnes, and she'd already gone by Aggie and was trying to disassociate herself from that life. Maybe. And she wanted to stay Aggie, Agnes.

Mark:

Would suggest

Sarah:

Jessie is her only other choice.

Mark:

I would suggest if you're in hiding.

Sarah:

Just go with a different name. Don't walk around

Mark:

on stilts.

Sarah:

Yeah. So the stilts are kinda like made out like two by fours. Yeah. Actual lumber, which is kinda weird because everything else is like whittled.

Mark:

The problem I have is this. Okay? When they met, when Noah and Nessie met, she told him she was from Buzzard and he said, I'm from there too.

Sarah:

Mhmm.

Mark:

Okay? Apparently, was incredibly stupid because he didn't know about the death of the baby which would be front page news all over town.

Sarah:

I would think, yeah.

Mark:

Then she says, I don't wanna go back there. And he says, I think we're going to go back. What kind of relationship is this? Like like how did he

Sarah:

Money. He's he says we need the money and my half brother is lord of the manor and we're gonna get some money and we'll only be there for a few days and she sucks it up. That's what

Mark:

But then she realizes it's where she was assaulted. Yeah. I mean, she

Sarah:

doesn't realize that. She knows that all along. Yes. She doesn't wanna go back there for that reason.

Mark:

Yes.

Sarah:

Okay. So we can't we can't not talk about the first murder.

Mark:

Okay. Notice folks, and this is by design, we have yet to mention the Barnabas. Yeah. Yeah. Because we'll get there.

Sarah:

Yeah. So Frankie, the older daughter, actually the second born of the aristocratic Bruce family

Mark:

Yes. Because

Sarah:

her older brother Francis died when he was a baby, is engaged to Brad. Brad. Who as soon as you meet him, you know is a dick. He's horrible. He's a money grubbing jerk.

Sarah:

Yes. And then, so they're having the engagement party. Frankie's hair is weird for that party. It's like all slicked back. It's like the worst way for her to wear her hair.

Mark:

And he's upset that they're throwing doing champagne and apparently, she's looking around for a murder weapon. Yeah. Because suddenly, her dad's half brother appears with a cuckoo clock and she goes, Yeah.

Sarah:

Perfect.

Mark:

Now I can kill him. Yeah.

Sarah:

So Noah's bark shows up and because that's what you want at your daughter's engagement party is your long lost half brother who nobody knows about but Sir Allen.

Mark:

And he doesn't tell his wife and children No. That his half brother is coming.

Sarah:

And bringing his whole whittling fare with him. Nothing.

Mark:

He's totally like, isn't this a great surprise? And I'm

Sarah:

like, no. No. And Noah presents them with

Mark:

a cuckoo clock. Now, we're led to believe that Brad sees this cuckoo clock and does the cartoonish eyeballs

Sarah:

And sees dollar signs.

Mark:

It's changing, changing, and there are emeralds in the eyes.

Sarah:

Now wait a minute. One part of the bird has gold leaf on it. Yes. And it has tiny tiny green stones as eyes. If they're emeralds, they're worth

Mark:

$20. And if Brad looked at Noah for two minutes

Sarah:

He would know.

Mark:

He would go, no.

Sarah:

Not not worth anything. Not valuable.

Mark:

But no. Brad is like, He's stupid, obviously. So that that's the other problem I have with this episode. But he's And I love this episode.

Sarah:

He's a Bitcoin millionaire, Mark.

Mark:

Is he's been there for a year, and they haven't found out about him. Mhmm. And we see him for thirty seconds and are like, oh, he's bad news.

Sarah:

Yeah. He's a lying money grubber. Yeah. Obviously. He's just he he needs a little bit more redeeming quality.

Mark:

Or he needs to be there two months.

Sarah:

Maybe. But like, he's not even nice to Frankie. No. So you don't know why she would be willing to If marry he was genuinely sweet to her, but only because he's good at faking it because he's just there for money, we might at least think, well, she fell for him. But he's nasty to her.

Sarah:

Yes. He's mean.

Mark:

Yes.

Sarah:

So I don't I don't know why anybody let him in the door.

Mark:

I don't know. Some stuff happens with Kim and E. We'll get to that later.

Sarah:

Kim Marie?

Mark:

Kim Marie. He comes back in the middle of the night, looks at the cuckoo clock, and gets stabbed three times in the eye. Now

Sarah:

Is it three times?

Mark:

The clock strikes three.

Sarah:

Oh, he just stands there?

Mark:

I and it pulls

Sarah:

I thought death strikes three is because there's three bodies. There's three murders.

Mark:

There is all sorts of problems with murder number one.

Sarah:

Okay. So Frankie has put a dibbler Yep. Which is a metal conical point that you use to make a divot in the ground.

Mark:

Which is dull.

Sarah:

They're pretty pointy if you were to put some force behind it. Okay. I don't think the spring that makes a cuckoo bird come out of a clock would have the force to even like bruise you with a dibbler point.

Mark:

She wouldn't have time or the knowledge to do it.

Sarah:

And even if you held the back of his head to the clock

Mark:

Yep. Like you're forcing it to the clock,

Sarah:

when the bird comes out, it might put his eyeball out. Maybe. Maybe If he didn't close his eye. So now you're holding his eye open, shoving his head into the clock.

Mark:

But she's nowhere to be seen.

Sarah:

But we're supposed to think it think it comes out with such force that it penetrates his head without knocking him over first.

Mark:

And then he falls backwards down the stairs. And screams. Well, he doesn't scream.

Sarah:

One of our Watch Like a Maniac question is, who screams for Brad? And the answer is Wilhelm. Wilhelm Scream. It's the Wilhelm Scream. Yes.

Sarah:

Which when you hear it, it sounds like you've heard that scream everywhere. Yes. We've talked about the Wilhelm Scream before in a past episode. It's a commonly used scream. It's almost like a trope now.

Sarah:

Yep. And that's Brad's scream is the Wilhelm scream.

Mark:

Yes.

Sarah:

Yeah. He goes tumbling down the stairs. If you said he broke his neck falling down the stairs, I could buy it. But if you say he dies because of the penetrating moon from the bird, I don't buy it. Nope.

Sarah:

I'm putting it down as an impossible murder. Yep. It's fun. I'll give you that. It's really fun.

Sarah:

And if she was holding the back of his head there, I might buy it a little bit more. Maybe. But I don't buy it.

Mark:

No. Several times, Sarah has mentioned that the test of a relationship is assembling an object.

Sarah:

Flat pack furniture. Like IKEA furniture.

Mark:

The Barnabas fail miserably at this item.

Sarah:

Oh, boy. The trellis?

Mark:

Yes. It is the cashmere arbor from Rollinson Garden Products.

Sarah:

Mark really looked into

Mark:

this. I know far too much about this.

Sarah:

Ashmir Arbor?

Mark:

Yes. How much do you think this baby is?

Sarah:

Two fifty.

Mark:

Two hundred and nineteen pounds.

Sarah:

I was close.

Mark:

Yep. It's a beautiful little arbor. You can get one in two to seven working days. The specs, downloads, and delivery, and product facts are on their website. I will put a link in the show notes.

Sarah:

In case anybody wants the Barnaby's arbor in their own yard.

Mark:

Now I clicked on product facts hoping to find out how long it would take to assemble this item.

Sarah:

Because most flat pack stuff does have an estimate of, like, you'll need two people, a drill, and three hours or something. It

Mark:

did not have that. I will also include a link to the instructions online, the exact instructions that the Barnabas look at. So by the way, even if you rip them and spill coffee off them, you could get new instructions.

Sarah:

And not in a woodworking book that you get from the library that has nothing to do with the arbor you are assembling.

Mark:

That is a made up woodworking book. God, I searched for that woodworking. It says under product facts, contact us about any questions you might have about this product. So I did. They put a phone number on the instructions.

Mark:

Of course. So I called them. Of course you did. I called them one morning and spoke to a very nice lady there who had no idea that had had been featured on the Midsommar episode. Sure.

Mark:

It was the talk of The Office afterwards. And I said, how long would it take two people? Because it clearly states in the instructions that this should not be attempted by anything less than two people. Yeah. Well, you need somebody to hold

Sarah:

it while somebody else puts a screw

Mark:

in or whatever. Two people to do this. So it is not a one person's job.

Sarah:

And how long?

Mark:

They said at most, with two people, it should not take longer than three hours to assemble. So three weeks. Right?

Sarah:

If you're a

Mark:

Barnaby? Apparently, if you're a Barnaby.

Sarah:

Well, maybe if you try to do it with one person, it's nearly impossible.

Mark:

And I'm gonna put all the Arbor stuff together from this episode because the last final moment of the Arbor It

Sarah:

grosses me out. I don't know why they did this.

Mark:

With winter nipples. He has such tiny little nipples.

Sarah:

Winter doesn't have to be topless at the end. It's skeezy.

Mark:

But if you notice in the background, there is another arbor. What?

Sarah:

They have one already?

Mark:

They have an arbor already.

Sarah:

I just don't like the way Sarah and Fleur are looking at him. It's I mean, he's Barnaby's subordinate. Like, it's just it's not right.

Mark:

It it is And I don't find it funny.

Sarah:

I just find it gross.

Mark:

Gross. And he could've they could've absolutely done that without his shirt being off.

Sarah:

Yeah. If he'd had a t shirt on, they could still be impressed with his handiness. Yep. And I would've been alright with that.

Mark:

Yes. But instead, we It's get ruined

Sarah:

it's not good. I'm glad we got that out of the way. Can we move on now?

Mark:

Yes. Okay.

Sarah:

So what is your takeaway about the Barnabees knowing what you know about Arbor?

Mark:

They are a failed marriage about to happen. Well, How they don't could you not put this together accidentally in the

Sarah:

do it together.

Mark:

Yeah. They don't do it together.

Sarah:

If they'd done it together, then we

Mark:

really That have shown some character growth, that they work together instead of doing the silliness that they do. It's just ugh.

Sarah:

Well, you know, Mark, life isn't a rehearsal.

Mark:

Life is not a dress rehearsal, which is another answer to our watch like a maniac question.

Sarah:

The bruce's have a big stone that is obviously something the production company put there, the set dressers put there, right inside their front gate.

Mark:

So they have a gate. It has two giant lions.

Sarah:

Yeah. And then a rock over to the side that says, life is not a rehearsal.

Mark:

Not a dress rehearsal.

Sarah:

I don't I don't understand why that's there. They're not theater people. They're not actors. No. What is this supposed to mean?

Mark:

Well, I understand what it means. I have no idea what it means to this story other than the fact that it's not just rehearsal, so wear your craziest costumes. I

Sarah:

just mean, like, they put it there on purpose for the show. What are they trying to say about the Bruces?

Mark:

I don't know.

Sarah:

That there will be consequences for their actions.

Mark:

And I noticed that, and I thought about that. But then I'm sorry. Why why is there crime scene tape in the yard? The killing doesn't happen in the yard. They've moved their cuckoo clock.

Mark:

There's a cop car on the front lawn. There's with tape behind it. There's no reason for that tape to be there. It's like

Sarah:

they just said, make it look crimy.

Mark:

Make it look crimy.

Sarah:

Barnaby and Winter approach the house because they've been called there because of the cuckoo murder. Yes. And Winter sees Nessie from a distance.

Mark:

And at first you think, is this the girlfriend he was just talking about?

Sarah:

Well, what I so I'm glad you picked up on that because I was worried there was like a love connection going on with that eye contact that they were making.

Mark:

Because Bartimaeus had just talked to him about an ex girlfriend.

Sarah:

Yeah. About an ex girlfriend who dumped him because he didn't know how to plant plants, whatever. She sounds awful. In reality, he's looking at her so intently because she's incredibly tall

Mark:

Yes.

Sarah:

Because she's on stilts.

Mark:

And that is not

Sarah:

And he realizes he shouldn't be able to see her. But that's not clear to us when they're making their eye contact love connection weirdness. And I'm like, she's old enough to be your mother, number one. Number two, no. Have you seen her pants yet?

Sarah:

And obviously not.

Mark:

She likes men with larger nipples.

Sarah:

Do you think Noah has bigger nipples? Wait a minute. I don't wanna know what you think.

Mark:

No.

Sarah:

Never mind. Nope. I'm just glad that it wasn't like a love at first sight moment because that's what I was afraid it was when I first saw it.

Mark:

How could you let a human being into your house named Brad Furbank? His name is Furbank. No. I'm sorry. Oh, look, Sarah.

Sarah:

He is very much a Brad.

Mark:

We have a midsummer trope which is the nerdy sister. Mhmm. Oh, boy. Now, the woman who plays

Sarah:

Sylvia. She's not nerdy. She's mousy.

Mark:

But but she isn't there is an archetypal woman for this part.

Sarah:

Yes.

Mark:

She

Sarah:

is The cardigan wearing.

Mark:

The cardigan wearing. Glasses having Yeah.

Sarah:

Mousy sister.

Mark:

Yep. In the in the episode where her brother fell accidentally in the river, that woman is Yeah. The archetype.

Sarah:

Yep. She turns out to be the killer.

Mark:

Yes. But this woman killer too. So sorry. So this woman is like Sylvia. You're like, Midsummer.

Sarah:

She's the little sister that everybody ignores. So obviously, she's evil.

Mark:

She's a frumpy evil woman. Yeah. Yep. Yeah. Oh, wait a minute.

Mark:

If only she was a librarian, she is. You think she

Sarah:

and Collie ever ran into each other driving the library mobiles?

Mark:

I'm a little worried who she ran into.

Sarah:

Kimorie's husband, for sure.

Mark:

Funk, sunk. You set that up, and I just Who brought that one

Sarah:

speeds in a library mobile? I always worry about things falling over and those things anyway. I know they're on shelves with like little bars in front of them and stuff to help,

Mark:

but Poor Cordelia gets referenced in the episode three times, does not get a line, and is all the reason why Kim and E died.

Sarah:

Kimmery. Yeah. Cordelia is the friend

Mark:

who's drives the Midsummer Midsummer 25 car. So her license plate is a direct reference to this season. Yes.

Sarah:

The Bruce's also have the midsummer trope of a stuffed badger

Mark:

Yes.

Sarah:

In their lounge.

Mark:

Which is another question that we ask, where is the badger?

Sarah:

Yeah. Stuffed in the lounge. Yes. Sylvia is just I don't feel bad for Frankie. I know she has her little sob story about how they never loved her and they only wanted to replace her brother and all that stuff.

Sarah:

I feel a little bit bad for Sylvia because if Frankie is ignored, I can only imagine Sylvia was even more ignored.

Mark:

Yes. But it still doesn't let her get away with drunk driving. Well, no. Obviously not. Leaving the scene.

Mark:

Sorry of an accident. Yeah. We don't know if she was drunk. Drunk on letters. On words?

Sarah:

On words. She's drunk on the power of the bookmobile. Decide whether you can return that book or not.

Mark:

I I have

Sarah:

a stamp.

Mark:

I left the blue stamp ink. Okay. Libraries have not worked like that since I was in high school. Like, you made reference to it. The library mobile that Cully drives probably used barcodes on the books and that was twenty years ago.

Mark:

Yeah. Yeah. It's called a Dibler. I love how Barnaby totally is like, like, that's a good subtle joke. He gets the information from Fleur, and then he talks to Winter like everybody knows what a dibbler is.

Sarah:

Yeah. Like he's always known that. Yeah. When I hear dibbler, all I can think of is a character in the Terry Pratchett books called Cut Me Own Throat Dibbler. Yes.

Sarah:

Who sells dubious sausages. Yes. If you're a Pratchett fan, you thought that too.

Mark:

This episode is full of weird clothes, strange rocks, giantesses And bad pants. But it may have the stupidest pub owner of all time. First of all, the pub is owned by what is his name? Salanky. Salanky.

Mark:

Saj. That's his first name. Right? He's clearly in love with his sister. Mhmm.

Mark:

Okay? That is Sylvia. That's an easy one. That's like that's an easy punt. Right?

Mark:

Mhmm.

Sarah:

And had they just hooked up and been the pub library mobile couple, they would have both been fine. But no no.

Mark:

No no. No no. He has decided that because he runs an inn and a pub, he's going to blackmail people who come to his pub.

Sarah:

It's like the murder hotel or something like, how many you know, small time affairs can you blackmail people over, really?

Mark:

Really. It's it's the hotel that the the woman who meets her lover at in the episode with the investment club. What is that called? The flowers or

Sarah:

the The feathers.

Mark:

The feathers. That is a hotel where you go to meet your mistress.

Sarah:

Yes. And where you might exchange like espionage. Yes. Because it's a swanky hotel.

Mark:

Saj's pub o rama? No. No. The raging stash. I did like that they had more than Saj just working there.

Mark:

Though he is an alcoholic. So Sag has put cameras in every room.

Sarah:

I would have liked the couple who run the trout in the Mudlarkers episode to show up and be like pub running consultants

Mark:

Yes.

Sarah:

To give him advice.

Mark:

Because they at least were marketing their merch in the They knew

Sarah:

what they were doing.

Mark:

Okay. So he has put cameras in every room. Okay. Multiple. Okay.

Sarah:

And hidden them all behind mirrors that aren't suspicious at all.

Mark:

Now, let us look at this timeline. Saj is at the engagement party.

Sarah:

Mhmm.

Mark:

He goes back to the pub. Mhmm. Okay. They find out that Brad has been killed. Mhmm.

Mark:

The first thing I would do as a blackmailer is go to his room and remove the cameras. He does. No. He But

Sarah:

leaves the wires behind.

Mark:

He does not remove the evidence enough. No. Okay. So they come and they look in his room and they go away. Leaving him at least, I counted, twenty four to forty eight hours before they return to the room to

Sarah:

The look at the cameras. Yeah.

Mark:

He had more than ample time to sober up and remove the evidence from that room.

Sarah:

Well, and Brad's been staying there for a year rent free.

Mark:

Yeah.

Sarah:

And nobody wondered, like, that big old manor, they couldn't put him up at Godfrey Hall.

Mark:

There are just so many problems.

Sarah:

Godly halls. Godfrey.

Mark:

Meanwhile have been a sale in the murder in the mirror shop.

Sarah:

Meanwhile, Frankie is sad because she's just a replacement child because her older brother died as a baby, and Myrtle and Alan blame the babysitter for the baby's death.

Mark:

Okay. Alan is the cause of his son's death because he was busy his alibi for the son's death is that he was busy raping

Sarah:

The babysitter.

Mark:

I was raping the babysitter, so I couldn't have killed my son. It's not a sentence that you wanna have

Sarah:

to say. I heard him fall out of the cot and cry, but I was occupied.

Mark:

I was occupied.

Sarah:

What a horrible person.

Mark:

I don't like that he is then played for comedy or sympathy. Is horrific.

Sarah:

Yeah. And poor Aggie slash Nessie must have been so traumatized. Not only was she attacked.

Mark:

Yes.

Sarah:

But if you're a good babysitter, you care about the kid that you're looking after.

Mark:

She clearly cared about the babysitter.

Sarah:

About the baby.

Mark:

About the baby. Sorry.

Sarah:

It's just it's so sad for her.

Mark:

It is. And then they blame Why she has to die? What?

Sarah:

Yeah. Kinda. I guess.

Mark:

Okay. So Frankie learns

Sarah:

Frankie needs any reason to kill anybody.

Mark:

I think she's nutsy Bobo.

Sarah:

She wears a fish around her neck. She's nuts.

Mark:

Frankie learns Nessie's true identity

Sarah:

Mhmm.

Mark:

And then waits for Nessie to go to the house, which it's a manor house. There's gonna be somebody there all the time.

Sarah:

Well, she runs into Alan.

Mark:

She runs into Alan. Confronts him. She takes the teddy bear.

Sarah:

Shoves him and runs, and Frankie's waiting in the woods with a bill hook. The only logic is Frankie is like, this is the person who allowed my older brother to die. Hence, my life has been miserable. So I blame her for my misery.

Mark:

Which I can understand.

Sarah:

It's nuts.

Mark:

I can understand the motive. I cannot understand the opportunity Yeah. Or the means because she is a ninja. Yep. She is nowhere to be seen.

Sarah:

Well, Nessie's taught her how to walk on stilts.

Mark:

Nessie's looking around. She's looking around. We get signs of trees. She's looking around, and then suddenly out of nowhere, ninja billhook.

Sarah:

Frankie's quite the murderer. At least it's not an impossible murder. I don't know how she happened to be in the woods, but No.

Mark:

Number three is we will get there.

Sarah:

It's right out. Yes. Kimrie's whole job here is to be really upset about her husband's death.

Mark:

Yes.

Sarah:

To be a one woman police force with a speed gun. Yes. And to get pressured by Noah because she's on the council.

Mark:

Yes. She also plants like there are six plots for flowers and she plants all the flowers in one of them. Yeah. Why is that?

Sarah:

I I just don't understand her character and I I don't understand how Noah goes from being, I mean, guess kind of an opportunist because he's seeking out his half brother and he does, I think, deserve something of that estate, even though he is an illegitimate child of Alan's dad. He is an heir. Maybe. But the pressure he puts on Kimmery is so aggressive. Like, oh, that's who you are, you know?

Sarah:

Because the way he grieves over Nessie, it's sweet, and you actually feel bad for him. But then when he pressures Kimmery, like, no, no, no, no. You're just a jerk like everybody else.

Mark:

It's an attempt to make an interesting character, but it the motives are cross purpose.

Sarah:

I just wanna like somebody Yes. In this episode, and there's not there's not anybody to really like.

Mark:

You don't like Angel?

Sarah:

The guy wearing the mushroom hat and carrying an axe?

Mark:

Did you see One of our maniac questions. Did you see Angel's girlfriend? The person he's comforting? Yes.

Sarah:

I don't remember.

Mark:

Do you remember her hat? There's so many freaky clothes in in Noah's bark. She has literally a pile of leaves and sticks on her.

Sarah:

They're all weird in there. I I wanted to think that, oh, these are like people who are really into something and kinda true to themselves, but they're so strange. Who lives next door to Kim Marie? That was one of our questions.

Mark:

Kim Marie is next door to Sophie Jane.

Sarah:

Salon and Spa.

Mark:

Yes. The house of Sophie Jane Salon and Spa. And what

Sarah:

These people all just needed a makeover. Yeah. They would have been happier.

Mark:

So when Winter is looking for Kim and

Sarah:

E Kim Marie.

Mark:

Sorry. When Winter is looking for Kim Marie, he goes to her shop. Now her shop is interesting because on one side you have Sophie Jane, on the other side you have a tea shop and that tea shop is full of people who go, But above the tea shop is a scoreboard. Not that sorry. Above her flower shop is a scoreboard.

Mark:

For the cricket pitch? For the cricket pitch and it says on it the name of the town.

Sarah:

Which is?

Mark:

Does it say Godly Buzzard? It says Godly Buzzard. Okay. Why did they go to the effort of putting Godly Buzzard on the sign?

Sarah:

Because it was already there and it says something else.

Mark:

It is in one shot.

Sarah:

It seems like it would be kind of far away from the pitch. Like, wouldn't you want it on the cricket pitch?

Mark:

It's across the street from the cricket pitch. Yeah. Yeah. It's it's very weird. So Winter is going to try to find her.

Sarah:

Kimmery.

Mark:

And when he goes to look for

Sarah:

her I have to say her name every time because you say it wrong.

Mark:

He goes to look for her and he finds her at the thing. What is the thing?

Sarah:

At the circle of pillars.

Mark:

The circle of pillars that now has chairs at it?

Sarah:

Okay. So The chairs aren't usually there. Okay. So So Kim Marie gets a message and is going to the the circle to meet someone. Right?

Mark:

Because Francis has realized that Frankie. Frankie has realized that Cassandra, not Cassandra, whatever her name is, car that says 25MsMy friend. Bar Mhmm. On the license plate. That she's gonna report her as driving in the middle of the night and that was her not her friend.

Mark:

Mhmm. So she's gotta die. And you think how could

Sarah:

Frankie doesn't need a lot of reason.

Mark:

How could I kill this person?

Sarah:

Mhmm.

Mark:

Alone in her shop?

Sarah:

No. That would

Mark:

I be too need to drag two chairs. Two giant Giant

Sarah:

wooden chair. Heavy chairs Heavy chairs. To the top of a hill that Kimrie has trouble getting up without losing her breath. But Frankie, who is apparently Frankenstein's monster or something, she's like the Hulk.

Mark:

Must climb hill with chairs. Carry same time. Keep glue in my mouth.

Sarah:

You think she carries both chairs at once?

Mark:

Don't know.

Sarah:

She just has like rage strength and nobody sees her walking carrying these giant wooden chairs.

Mark:

In the middle of town.

Sarah:

In the middle of the day.

Mark:

In the middle of the day.

Sarah:

Then she waits. I don't know where she

Mark:

hides. She hides inside one of the pillars. Just behind it.

Sarah:

Like, it's like in a cartoon where you stand behind something nobody can see you. Yep. She hides behind a pillar with, what, a nail gun and two cot guns full of carpenter's glue?

Mark:

No. No. There's no nail gun. It's all the glue.

Sarah:

It's all she glues her to the arm of the chair. She glues

Mark:

her to the arm of the chair. Oh, boy.

Sarah:

Does she steal the chairs from Noah's bark?

Mark:

I guess to allay suspicion, maybe.

Sarah:

She's trying to make it look like somebody from Noah's bark killed Kimmery?

Mark:

I don't know, but they wouldn't use that glue.

Sarah:

No. They wouldn't use that glue. So They'd use, like, resin from an eeyore.

Mark:

Kimmery sits in the chair, which I get. It's up a hill.

Sarah:

It's comfy.

Mark:

She's tired.

Sarah:

She closes her eyes.

Mark:

She closes her eyes and suddenly is attached to the chair with the glue by her arms and can't get up. Have you used wood glue before? Yes.

Sarah:

It is not instantly gripping like that.

Mark:

Not. It's this is

Sarah:

It's like really strong Elmer's glue.

Mark:

Yeah.

Sarah:

I mean, it's strong once it dries, but it has to dry. It's not instant tack. Not even super glue would do this.

Mark:

The thrill and the art of everyone's favorite murder, which is the catapult of wine, is that you look at that and go, this is improbable But totally possible. But totally would kill that person.

Sarah:

Yes. And I do think having wood glue injected into your nose and your throat would kill you.

Mark:

You would have to be knocked out or something first.

Sarah:

You you you could probably you would probably throw up and spit it out. Yes. And it might poison you. It's not not toxic. But my biggest problem is that it she's instantly glued to the chair so much so that she can't slip her arms out of her jacket or her shirt and that we're supposed to believe Frankie carried those chairs up there.

Mark:

What I wanna know is okay. The bill hook was the right idea. Yeah. Okay? The bill hook's a good weapon.

Mark:

It's easy to carry. You can move it silently as

Sarah:

an inch Slip it in your jacket.

Mark:

Slip it in your jacket.

Sarah:

Wear it around your neck like jewelry. People won't notice because because you're part of the Bruce family.

Mark:

She leaves that weapon and then chooses glue. Well,

Sarah:

because she wants somebody from Noah's Park to be framed for the murder because, you know, the police are that stupid.

Mark:

The guy with the bookmobile goes, what?

Sarah:

Maybe she knows about the arbor and their difficulty with the arbor and thinks, oh, well, they're completely flummoxed by anything to do with wood. So this will throw the police completely off. They'll see the wood glue and they won't.

Mark:

They'll be like, I don't

Sarah:

know what to do with that. It would be a horrible way to die.

Mark:

I've just checked the plans and you don't need wood glue for the arbor.

Sarah:

No, I assume that you don't. You just

Mark:

need a drill and a hammer. Thanks. And two people.

Sarah:

You're the expert in But three she is trying to throw, I think, suspicion off. Do you think she thinks that Noah will be blamed for the bird killing Brad? Guess.

Mark:

Because he wouldn't. But why is she framing Noah?

Sarah:

I don't know. Why she's Frankie. Fishneck. I don't know. She's nuts.

Mark:

Frankie crazy fishneck.

Sarah:

And that's her. She's clearly crazy. I mean, when she's confronted by the police at the end, she's just like, yeah, I did

Mark:

all that.

Sarah:

What do you wanna know?

Mark:

So winter figures out. Okay.

Sarah:

Before that, we need to talk about a newspaper that the that Barnaby or Winter is reading.

Mark:

Yeah. It's Barnaby is reading the newspaper and hiding the book.

Sarah:

Yes. And it's the local newspaper, and the headline the second headline on the front is police admit serial killer fear. I mean, I guess three people have been killed. So but that in midsummer would be like, police fear new serial killer this week.

Mark:

I just kept looking at this picture when I took it and said, he is the police. I guess it's an interview with Barnaby. It's pretending to hide the why does he have to hide the book and why? Why? Why?

Mark:

Because

Sarah:

he's a secret woodworker.

Mark:

Why? No. No. No. No.

Mark:

No. I don't know if you caught this, But the name of the book, did you did you catch the name of the book?

Sarah:

I guess not.

Mark:

The name of the book is Best Woodwork Manual. Not woodworking. No. No. No.

Mark:

There are a number of books called The Best Woodworking Manual.

Sarah:

Manual?

Mark:

Manual. It is the best woodwork manual.

Sarah:

Okay.

Mark:

That's not right.

Sarah:

No. And it's not gonna help you build that arbor that came in a kit. No. You know what's gonna help you build that? Another person and three hours in the instructions.

Mark:

And if she saw the book, what would it I

Sarah:

don't know, honey. I don't know. I don't know. It's fun.

Mark:

It is. See, they have lot of competitiveness. I love this episode but wow. Okay. The thing we have to do, Sarah.

Mark:

There's two things we gotta do before we clear up and get to the end of this episode. The first thing we have to do is have the slowest slow speed chase of all time because

Sarah:

What does she think she's gonna do in that library? Like does she think that like it's like tag? Like, if I get if I get home, I'm safe? Like, you can't get me here, hon.

Mark:

And I will put the picture in the the show notes. The guy with the book is, by definition, mom, mom, I got a part.

Sarah:

You know what he's thinking? My book's gonna be late now. You're gonna charge me. Like At least he doesn't go running after it. Take my book.

Mark:

I am serious. He he literally looks

Sarah:

What face would you make if the library mobile suddenly peeled out and started racing off down the road with cops chasing it?

Mark:

It just

Sarah:

When you go, what?

Mark:

What? That that is exactly what he does.

Sarah:

Then he's a good actor.

Mark:

So she escapes. I better not get fined for this book being late because I can't exactly turn it in now. Back to the house. And did you see where they all end up? Under

Sarah:

plants and like on a gazebo.

Mark:

Oh, there's a particular plant there. I know, but I block it out. Okay. Because it is

Sarah:

I don't see Wisteria anymore.

Mark:

The Wisteria Pergola of Confessions.

Sarah:

It's the traitor plant. It belongs where the confessions happen because it is a traitorous plant. Sorry.

Mark:

Everyone in this scene, except for Barnaby and Winter and the cops that show up are all the worst. Yep. We find out the following. Let's get the easy stuff out of the way. The rapist was raping while his son fell out of the crib and died.

Sarah:

And has allowed his wife to think for twenty some years that the babysitter killed their son.

Mark:

The woman he was raping. Yeah. Off to jail. I don't even wanna deal with him anymore. Nope.

Mark:

Okay. We find out that Mousy Mc's sister

Sarah:

Mhmm. Is Killing. Kimorie's husband.

Mark:

Kimorie's husband.

Sarah:

And has been lying about it all this time.

Mark:

Straight to jail.

Sarah:

Yep. Frankie's like, yeah, I killed my fiance and that stilt wearing babysitter lady and the florist, whatever. You guys were mean to me when I was a kid because you didn't like me as much as you like my dead brother. So it's all your fault I'm like this. I got a fish neck.

Mark:

That is the reasoning for her killing.

Sarah:

Yeah. If Noah's bark hadn't come back to town, would she have done it?

Mark:

She was at that at that party looking for a murder weapon.

Sarah:

But then only Brad Furbank would have died.

Mark:

I guess? He was a jerk. Meanwhile, Winter's find sorry. Meanwhile, Winter finds a phone. At this point

Sarah:

Because he's psychic. He's like, that dirt is disturbed.

Mark:

Yep. And those plants don't belong together.

Sarah:

There must be a phone under there. I would still be like going, did you really just race off in the library mobile?

Mark:

I did love how Frankie says, basically, he was even banging my mother.

Sarah:

And Myrtle's like, mwah. Me well, yeah.

Mark:

The least horribleness of these people, these four people

Sarah:

The least worst person in the family is Myrtle.

Mark:

Is Myrtle who was sleeping with her soon to be son-in-law, which okay. Brad had some issues. He's blackmailer. I don't see them together. I don't either.

Mark:

I don't I like, if she

Sarah:

I think if he wanted to blackmail her, he had lots of other ways to do it. It wouldn't be, don't make me tell somebody I slept with you. Yeah. Because that's gonna be bad for

Mark:

him too. I think she's gonna tell everybody

Sarah:

Wait a minute.

Mark:

That she's sleeping with Brad.

Sarah:

Does the guy who owns the pub have footage of that?

Mark:

The guy who owns the pub 100% has footage of Myrtle and Brad together. Oh.

Sarah:

Oh. No. No. No. No.

Sarah:

Like, nobody in town would have noticed her showing up at the pub and going up to Brad's room.

Mark:

This episode has so many good titles that I can't use, like the Brad and Myrtle sex tape. Oh my god. That is chef's kiss name for the episode,

Sarah:

but we

Mark:

cannot use it.

Sarah:

Most effective non pharmaceutical emetic around. Yeah. People definitely throw up

Mark:

if you watch it.

Sarah:

And apparently, she dressed in some kind of costume to go there undercover because she wore dainty, classy diamond earrings when she went instead of the giant monstrosities that she usually wears.

Mark:

I know. Get the image out. Get it out. It was so much.

Sarah:

Get it out. How does that even happen?

Mark:

And just when you think everybody is horrible, poor Winter has to parade around without a shirt on.

Sarah:

So after the credits, all the Bruces are going to jail. Maybe Myrtle isn't, though

Mark:

I got to think she was up to some other stuff.

Sarah:

I think she's an accessory

Mark:

At the very in

Sarah:

some way.

Mark:

At the very least.

Sarah:

Does Noah get godly manner?

Mark:

Let's

Sarah:

see. I mean, they're not dead, so I guess he doesn't inherit it.

Mark:

And, okay. The Lord and the manor is guilty of rape, but there's it's not

Sarah:

And the victim's dead.

Mark:

And the victim's dead.

Sarah:

He's probably He

Mark:

didn't gonna directly cause his

Sarah:

He's gonna get away with it,

Mark:

isn't He's gonna get away with it.

Sarah:

But he'll have to pay the legal bills for Frankie.

Mark:

Well, his daughters are up the river.

Sarah:

Yeah, so he and his wife are gonna rattle around dysfunctional in that big house until they go broke.

Mark:

And say that they'd never loved their daughter. That's the entire

Sarah:

point. Who's the best corpse? Brad, Nessie, or Kimmery? I'm going with Kimmery because she's Yeah. In broad daylight with the goop and everything.

Mark:

Yeah. She's got some sort of thing in her mouth. It's gotta be hard to not breathe through your nose really noticeably. Yeah. She does.

Mark:

Yeah. It has to be her.

Sarah:

The the stunt person who goes down the stairs for Brad does a really good job. Yes. But corpse wise, it's got I think it's Kimrey.

Mark:

Yes.

Sarah:

And that is Death Strikes three.

Mark:

It's bonkers.

Sarah:

I loved it.

Sarah:

It was so fun.

Mark:

It is an episode at eleven.

Sarah:

I know we poke holes in it and say that things are impossible, but that's But I

Mark:

love that.

Sarah:

That's the beauty of Midsommar is that it's so crack a tacular sometimes.

Mark:

It is. Wow. Do

Sarah:

you have a recommendation for this week

Mark:

to help folks get through the doldrums of Okay.

Sarah:

The dark cold times. The high today here is 16 Fahrenheit, by the way.

Mark:

Yes. I have two recommendations. Well, one recommendation. I'm still looking for x The Mudman. I can't find a good copy of it.

Sarah:

Oh, okay.

Mark:

So somebody asked if I had seen it yet. I haven't seen it yet.

Sarah:

That was the horrible movie from last week.

Mark:

Yes. My recommendation is that you close loops. Closed loops are loops are things that you have wanted to do or have been putting off doing that are sapping your energy.

Sarah:

Things you've started to do

Mark:

Started to.

Sarah:

Meant to do

Mark:

meant to do.

Sarah:

And that hang over you because you haven't done them.

Mark:

Yep. Close those loops. Just find the scariest one and go close it. Why? You'll get energy back and you'll get confidence back.

Sarah:

Oh, okay.

Mark:

I think that that doing that helps. And then I was like, what loops do I have? And I'm like, all I do all day is close loops.

Sarah:

And open loops.

Mark:

That's kinda well, okay. Life is kinda closing and opening loops. Yes. So that's okay, but some everybody's got loops that they leave open. They're sapping their energy.

Mark:

Mhmm. Close some of those loops. That pile of clothes that you keep walking past that

Sarah:

you know you should go through. Yep. Just do it.

Mark:

Just do

Sarah:

it. Mine is the opposite of that.

Mark:

Okay. Excellent.

Sarah:

Take a nap.

Mark:

Oh, I love naps. Nappy, nap, nap.

Sarah:

I'm really bad at napping.

Mark:

Sarah is is not on the Olympic nap time.

Sarah:

I find it very difficult to nap. As soon as I lay down for a nap, I just start thinking immediately of all the things I should be doing instead. But in the last few days, because of this surgery that I had, I didn't really have a choice but to lay down for a little while. And the dog cuddled up with me. And everybody in the house went quiet to be nice to me.

Sarah:

Yep. And thirty minutes or so is all it took. And I'm like, wow, I feel a lot better now having just laid down for thirty minutes. Maybe I should do this more often.

Mark:

I'm a big fan of naps. I totally agree. Your eyes are heavy

Sarah:

right now Yep. And you don't have anything to do for the next hour

Mark:

Just go have a nap. Go right now. Yep. Now Cuddle with an animal. What Sarah is not telling you is that I am a world champion at getting into naps without even I don't need to lay down.

Sarah:

Sometimes you look like your neck has broken while you're sitting on the

Mark:

not narcoleptic, but I have fallen asleep in the middle of conversations and I do the most irritating thing for Sarah which is Sarah doesn't like to fly. I have regularly fallen asleep On the after getting in the airplane only to wake up as the airplane leaves lands. Lands.

Sarah:

Yeah. You sleep the whole flight.

Mark:

I it's a comfy chair.

Sarah:

No. It's not. It's not. But we often joke about, are you gonna watch on TV with your eyes closed?

Mark:

Yes. Yeah.

Sarah:

Yep. I suggest if you have the opportunity and you have the inclination, do it.

Mark:

I would say that having a nap when your eyes are tired is closing a loop. It's nice. I would say so.

Sarah:

A long time. No. Just a little while. It's a treat.

Mark:

Sarah, they're not gonna have to wait long for the next episode which will be top of the class.

Sarah:

Season twenty five episode four.

Mark:

We will release.

Sarah:

We have Mel Goodrich. We have sister Boniface. It's fun.

Mark:

Yes. That will be released on the January 26. We have a football game to watch today because Go IU. Go IU. And keep if you have any questions about the newsletter migration, just feel free to ask me.

Mark:

You don't have to do anything.

Sarah:

It'll be seamless.

Mark:

It is not gonna cost any money.

Sarah:

Nope. Alright. Till then. Go go take a nap.

Mark:

Go take a nap.

Sarah:

People listen to this while they sleep.

Mark:

Yes.

Sarah:

Hope you're having fun.

Mark:

Be maniacs. Send us more merch money.

Sarah:

Ding ding ding.

Mark:

No. You you don't have to send us any money. Bye, maniacs. Bye. Thanks for joining us on the mystery maniacs podcast.

Mark:

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. Bye, Maniacs. Midsummer Maniacs is a mystery recap show.

Mark:

Sorry. Mystery Maniacs is a comedy recap Do you

Sarah:

wanna say mystery or Midsommar? My name's Angel and I wear a mushroom hat and carry an axe.