-------------------------------START CLIP--------------------------------
STEPHANIE: Why are you smoking? 


ALICE: I don't know. Quentin did sometimes. 


STEPHANIE: Can I have one? 


ALICE: You know, you're the only person in the world who can smoke judgmentally.


STEPHANIE: I know where you're going through. When your father died, I was a wreck. I didn't know what to do. I wasn't ready to be alone. I didn't even know how to be alone. I did some pretty insane things just to get by. Insane even for me, but I’ll spare you the details.


ALICE: Doesn't sound like you. 


STEPHANIE: Well, I could tell you if you prefer. 


ALICE: What’s your point mom?  That everything's just going to get better. Eventually.


STEPHANIE: No one gets to tell you how to grieve Alice. You're on this journey by yourself. When you know where it's going take you. If you need to do something crazy to get through it, do something crazy. Okay.


--------------------------------END CLIP--------------------------------


CLARA: Welcome, welcome, welcome, back to Physical Kids Weekly, after what feels like the longest hiatus ever, but I think was actually the shortest one season five is finally here. I'm Clara.


DANI: I'm Dani.


CLARA: And we're here today to talk about Episode 501, “Do Something Crazy,” with the man who wrote the episode, Mr. Henry Alonso Myers. Henry, thank you for joining us.


HENRY: Yeah, you're welcome. Happy to be here.


CLARA: So, before we get too far into the episode itself, Henry, talk to me about how you approach a season like this following on such a huge loss. How do you answer the question? Where do we go from here?


HENRY: The you know, the operating philosophy of the magicians has always been everything gets -- we just kind of brush everything off the table at the end of the season, and every new season we restart. This is the episode of season where we kind of -- we carried over such a very clear emotional message. We knew what every character was going to be going through. Because the death of Quentin was such a big, overarching thing and it affected everybody. So, you know, we knew that, that was the kind of, at least as the as the season started, we knew that would be kind of emotional for everybody, and about, about how, how they're going to live with this loss. You know, and so we just kind of started thinking about it that way. You know, we also had left ourselves in a kind of a crazy plot place, which is pretty traditional for us, per usual we, we leave it without knowing how we're going to get out of it, because the feeling is if we don't know, then you don't know and then the first few weeks in the writers room are usually these intense, fruitful discussions, both about plot, because we're trying to figure out where we're going to go from here. And about emotion because we're trying to work through like what the characters are working through.


CLARA: Can you take us into some of those discussions a little bit. Just, like, tell us what that looks like?


HENRY: Well, I remember at the time thinking that this was the -- you know, in a weird way, the Magicians room became the best place to be if you were trying to deal with the loss of Quentin, because that is all we were thinking about. We were kind of thinking about it from every single perspective. We knew that some characters were closer to him, and some characters were not. We had more time to internalize it, but, you know, some people we wanted to see -- I mean, we knew Alice would take it especially hard, and we knew that, Kady, who was less close with Quentin, it would be kind of glancing. And that was one of -- there was a scene we ultimately had to cut for time, where she sees Julia (Julia also, we knew, was going to have the absolute hardest time). 


HENRY: The other thing that we were trying to do was -- it's pretty, it's normal for a season of “The Magicians” to try to figure out what's going on with magic. Like magic is kind of different at the beginning of every season. And it's usually as a result of what has happened. And so a lot of the discussions we have are about trying to figure out how to dovetail the kind of thematic ideas that we're talking about with magic, and the emotional ideas that we're trying to deal with, with people. Usually at the beginning of every season we -- I just took a photo of this so I want to remind myself of what it was. I put a couple of cards on the board as we talk, and usually, like, I put up three cards with a little framework to think about how we're going to discuss every story and one was, at the beginning, was how does every story reflect grief over Quentin's death? How does the state of magic change every story? And how does magic speak to a real human emotion or experience. And we try to put the storylines through that lens, every one of them. 


HENRY: The other thing we do is -- I don't know if I've talked about this before, but I do a thing with the writers of character -- a big character board. We put up all the different characters on one wall. And we have, across the top of the wall, we have all of the episode numbers. And it's like an emotional checkerboard, like, where they are on each scene in each episode and what they're dealing with. And so, we sort of just -- we do that to start, and then we're kind of discussing the season in broad strokes. That’s what we do for the first few weeks. We talk about big signposts that we're going to hit. And we kind of try to place them roughly, where we think they're going to fall in the season with regard to each of the characters so that we know kind of what their journeys are going to be. We try not to turn the screws too tightly because we want to leave it a little bit loose, so there’s some room for discovery. Because there's things that end up just happening as you're writing that sometimes end up being the big turn of the season, that you didn't expect. And then there's things that you know, you've been planning, this big plot stuff that we usually are planning from the very beginning. And that's a lot of what we spend the early parts of the season trying to work out.


DANI: Going into the season, I think a lot of people had questions about how you've managed to keep the gang together with Quentin gone, since he was the glue. But in this episode, at least, they aren't together. What was the thinking behind that choice?


HENRY: Part of it was just a plot reality because some of the characters are technically dead and died, like, 300 years ago, and that's a major plot problem that we're having to deal with. How do we get to them and the other ones who are stuck in Fillory? We kind of knew that some of them would have their own personal stories that they would be dealing with, like Alice, who we sort of thought was -- what was the least likely place to see her? The answer that we came up with was, you know, living with her mom.


CLARA: I wondered about that. 


HENRY: Yeah, well, you know, I was more like a what is the -- this is how bad it is for her.


CLARA:  Yeah. 


HENRY: She’s so bad that she doesn't know where else to go. And then the thing I am -- I love writing the mom character. She's one of my favorites and --


CLARA: Judith Hoag is amazing.


HENRY: Judith Hoag is amazing. And as always a delight to work with. The thing I was going for with this was that, you know, here's this person who you just expect kind of a general level of dismissiveness and negativity from throughout. And then she surprises you at the very end by having a weirdly understanding perspective on what Alice has gone through, because she's directly gone through that. She went through that in the earlier season. You know, I don't know that she gives her good advice. But she gives her very sympathetic advice. She gives her advice that shows that she really does understand where Alice’s heart is at. 


HENRY: So we knew that there would be a thematic connection with everyone while they are all in different places, meaning that that that all of them are dealing with Quentin's loss, and they're dealing with it in their own different ways. Like Margo was angry. Eliot is kind of in denial. Alice is -- kind of a wreck. Julia is a wreck who is trying to find her way forward. You know, she's someone who, at the end of last season, she inherited this thing. And it's like she didn't -- she got her powers back. It wasn't how she wanted it, it wasn't the way you know -- it wasn't the thing she wanted, and in the absolute worst way that it could possibly happen. But then she sort of started to see it as a gift. And ask herself, well, what can she do with this gift? That is, to honor the cost of it, to honor the fact that her friend effectively died to give it to her. And then along the way, as she's trying to figure out what to do with it, Julia ends up becoming the one who's kind of carrying the torch for the central quest in the season. She's the one who is searching for a thing to do, and it's funny because there was another scene that got --- like, the I mentioned the scene with Kady -- where Kady says to Julia, I forgot if I said this, “even I had a hard time moving on without Q, and I didn't know him well.” But it affected her. They had, in some ways, hardest time, and we -- I had written a scene that we ended up cutting, also for time, where she tries to, she sort of speaks to Quentin and she goes up to the roof and kind of speaks to him, and gets no response, and in a weird way it becomes -- it's almost like, that's the thing that calls him to her past, is this desire to reach into her past and make meaning from her loss. All which is a big theme that's gonna kind of run it runs. 


HENRY: This is the theme that we're playing with this season. Not to say the entire season is about grief. But it is a thing that we do deal with a lot. And I would say that the effort was to try to make a show that -- it felt like “The Magicians,” which means it's sad sometimes, but also funny, and also crazy, and also had some insane sort of plot moves. There's also some gut punches. They're kind of in there, you know. Margo, who is deeply angry. You know, that's kind of her. That's a lot of ways that she deals with things. You know, the scene I really wanted was the scene where she -- the scene at the end where she sees Josh's ghost and it's the moment you see her break down, and this is the scene a bunch of people kept trying to cut, and I didn't want to cut up, in the episode.


CLARA: I feel like -- you know, Josh is in a lot of ways -- like, he’s comic relief in various places. And so it's always nice to get to see Trevor do something a little bit different. He's so arresting in that scene. Like it's -- it's really upsetting to watch him because he is clearly so genuinely upset.


HENRY: It was also the -- you know, we presented their deaths in a way that could be seen almost as silly. And I just wanted a scene where she reckoned with the reality of what had happened, while still dangling the possibility that there's going to be like, a way to get them back so that you know, that was one of those. I'm very glad we shot it, because I think the acting and the scene is great. And the thing that we wanted in that moment was the deep emotion of it. I think that's what, you know -- in some ways, Margo is going through the episode driving, determined to get things back kind of angry at Eliot for being in denial, and, and this is builds to this moment where she's, she has all of her feels in one big scene.


CLARA: There was something you, you mentioned earlier about the scene that you cut with Kady talking about how she you know, she wasn't as close to Quentin, but it still affected her. And I think like, that really struck me.


HENRY: It was just for just for time, just for time. That was all. 


CLARA: Sure, sure. But that really struck me in part because like, I -- you may not know this about me, but I went through a lot of really big losses early on in my life. My best friend died in a plane crash when I was 12, and then a couple years later, another childhood friend was murdered in a national case. So that was kind of like a big thing in childhood. 


HENRY: So sorry. Wow. 


CLARA: But the -- I think I tend to react in a lot of ways like Eliot. The sort of denial of a lot of that, especially as an adult, right? It's just very hard to go into those places and to, to make anything of something that hit you when you were so young. But I've dealt with losses of people who I don't have that kind of relationship with at all. People who I, you know, was more of an acquaintance with, which I think is sort of like the Kady / Quentin thing. Sometimes they hit you harder. I think part of that is because those really big losses can be so hard to contend with. That, like, when someone who maybe you weren't as close to dies, like that's a loss that you can let in, and suddenly all these other things come along with it.


HENRY: Right? It's, I mean, the big ones are so destabilizing that you almost can't let them in at all sometimes, and then the little ones can kind of sneak up on you. Yeah, no, I'm, I am so sorry to hear about that. That's, that's really that's a lot to carry.


CLARA: It’s life. 


HENRY: I mean, it also yeah, unfortunately. Yeah, that's a that's a unfortunately been my, the end of the year for me, I just lost a old friend of mine, and so I’m -- 


CLARA: I’m so sorry. 


HENRY: Thanks. It's, it's been a, you know, I mean, these are the real human waters that we're swimming in.


CLARA: Yeah. 


HENRY: And you know, it's not this is not this is not an easy thing to talk about or to make, you know, essentially entertainment out of but like that's what kind of has drawn all of us on “The Magicians” to the subject matter, is that we're not looking for an easy answer. We're not looking to make something that's just purely fun. We're looking to make something about real human emotions. And these are all emotions that we have felt. We all kind of have a bullshit detector about it, and we know that there's a kind of -- sometimes entertainment will talk about these things in a way that is sort of slight. And I think all of us felt like that, that, that -- the truth is that there's no easy way through it except to go through it. And that's a little bit what we tried to explore through this. It's tough, because it's not always, you know -- you're doing entertainment, and it's not always easy to watch. So the challenge for us in doing the show is trying to find something that feels real to us, while also you know, being “The Magicians” which has all the -- 


CLARA: “Grow a clit already.”


HENRY: Yeah. Yeah, that those Margo lines are -- those come to me. I can't tell you how many times I've written something like that. I gotta give Hale credit because he came up with, “Bitch I would if I could.”


DANI: That's good. 


HENRY: But we liked it so much we kept it in the show.


CLARA: Well, before I take a hard turn into something less serious. I just want to give Dani an opportunity to see if she had anything that she wanted to add.


DANI: I mean, it's hard, like grief is hard to deal with. I've recently like lost a decent amount of family members over the last couple years. And one of our family dogs, which you know, some people think that's ridiculous, but that was really hard. 


HENRY: Those are the ones that hit you. I remember losing -- I lost a cat a couple of years ago, and I was just thinking that, you know, “it’s just silly cat,” and then I found myself just totally devastated by it. And sometimes that’s like the  -- you can't control what your body allows you to feel grief about. That's real.


DANI: Yeah, it's, it's been hard. And we actually had a really good discussion when we did the panel in Seattle recently, especially with Riann. Riann was really cool.


CLARA: Yeah. So Henry, we had a trained therapist on the panel with us, and they were somebody who sort of specialized in kind of intersectional identity and grief. I'll let Dani continue, I just wanted to give you some context.


DANI: Yeah. They were really awesome and kind of made us feel a little bit better about the whole thing. Like how everyone had very different reactions to, to Quentin dying. I feel like we had a good panel.


HENRY: That’s great. 


DANI: It went really well.


CLARA: Yeah, I agree. I think one of the things that I realized in the moment when we were up there that has kind of stuck with me and helped me a lot, is I think we're inclined to look at what happens in fandoms, when something divisive happens, and see that as -- like, a divisive death happens specifically -- and see that as unique to fandoms. But when you're going through grief when you're grieving someone who you've lost, so many fights break out, like, in families and among friends, just about the different ways that people do grieve. For me, making that connection, that this is just kind of how people grieve in general was very helpful.


HENRY: That's, that sounds great that you guys are able to do that. Dani, I'm really sorry for all your recent losses.


DANI: It's okay. Thank you.


HENRY: I mean, yeah, it's not an easy subject. And it's not an easy thing to try to make -- I hate to use this word, but to try to make art out of -- because it's not always...it's uncomfortable, and people have difficult, different reactions to it. And all of them are, you know, all the are okay with me. I mean, a lot of what we were doing this season is trying to show everyone, everyone dealing with the grief in a different way. And that is what you're going to see over the next few episodes as well, as well as some other crazy, insane stuff. I want to reiterate that that I do know this is a very fun year. It's not fun at the expense of the grief. It's fun as a companion to it, because you know in the world, something bad happens, something funny happens, something crazy happens/ In life, they all happen in quick succession. You don't have control of it. Sometimes you're laughing inappropriately, sometimes you're not. There was a moment in season three, I want to say when it was in the “Be the Penny” episode, where Quentin started laughing inappropriately. 


CLARA: (laughs)


HENRY: Yeah, exactly. 


DANI: And then he kind of starts crying too. 


HENRY: Yeah, he's like, and he can't help it. That was one of my favorite moments ever. It just felt very real.


CLARA: Well, on that note, hard left turn into something possibly a little more silly. I wanted to do something -- we never done this before. Dani and I have talked about the title cards, but we've never asked any of you about the title cards. And since we have a new title card this season, I just wanted to sort of go through the elements that I spotted. Right now the like main things I saw were the overgrown vines on the door, the hedgewitch tattoos, Margo's ice axes and the off-kilter graffitid library sign, a pocket watch, which I'm guessing has something timey-wimey going on about it, a kraken in in the middle of everything wrapping its tentacles around the moon. And my personal favorite as a book fan, two whales. So, without explaining -- without explaining what any of those things mean, Henry, which element excites you most about this season?


HENRY: Wow. Yeah, because everything you've mentioned is like a spoiler.


CLARA: They always are. 


HENRY: They are all Easter eggs.  You know, the moon stuff is probably my favorite thing in the season. And I won't say anything about what that means. I am delighted about the whales. I am delighted about pretty much all of them. I mean, a lot of things that we tried to talk about when we were coming up with the title card stuff is what is about trying to explore what Magic is like, the season. How that's different. Like last season, it was really, really clean, you know, because magic is regulated and this one is like magic is overgrown and crazy and dealing with these sort of like surges and the fact that there's too much of it and, and all those other elements are things that I really can't tell you about without spoiling it. But I will say that a lot of those will culminate in a couple of my favorite, favorite episodes we've ever done this season, like of all the five seasons, so I'm super excited for you to watch them and happy to talk to you afterwards.


CLARA: We’ll hold you to that. 


HENRY: Yeah, yeah. 


DANI: Alrighty, out of curiosity, how did these title cards get made? Do you and John and Sarah have any input in them?


HENRY: Yeah, no, we're -- they are. They put in the things that we asked them to put in. I would say this season, the you know, we have a like a larger discussion about in the, in the real about what the strengths that we want to put in. And David Reed kind of ran point, making sure that it will look the way that we wanted them to. 


CLARA: And there’s no bears. 


DANI: Right. 


HENRY: It's not about personal preference. It's about what's what's in season. There will be bears, you know, throughout the season, but yeah, no, no bears on the card. So he was he was really the taskmaster and kind of getting it into shape. But you know, with a lot, it's about, like, we're trying to figure out what the season is going to be or trying to find some funny, strange, weird, like unexpected elements that would, you know, that you can find in there if you look, I mean, we've had foxes, we've had bees, we've had, you know, there's a million keys in there periodically. I'm trying to get what they've had in past seasons. It's been -- there's always, there's always,  been different. But yes. 


DANI: I think it's like the busiest title card that we’ve had.


CLARA: Might be.  


HENRY: I mean part of that is because there's too much magic.


DANI: That would make sense. 


HENRY: Yeah. It's -- a lot of stuff happens this season.


DANI: Okay, it's time to move on to the episode. We'll start off with the recap. Take it away Clara.


CLARA:  Alright. In the aftermath of Quentin's death, his friends struggle to move on, each trying to find a purpose now that he's gone. For Julia, that means figuring out what's causing the surges. For Penny, it's teaching a new crop of travelers how to control their powers. For Kady and Pete, it's helping the hedges and undoing the damage wrought by the library. But some of our magicians are lost. Eliot and Margo are somewhat literally lost, having been thrust 300 years into Fillory's future, trying to figure out what happened to their friends and who this mysterious Dark King is who has taken over. Alice is lost a little more metaphorically. She's moved into her mother's house where she spends her days nearly catatonic with grief over Quentin. A conversation with her mother gives the episode its title: she tells Alice, “if you need to do something crazy to get through it, do something crazy.” Alice obliges, and when the episode ends, we see that she is the one who has stolen all the living clay from Brakebills, something Fogg alludes to early in the episode, which she appears to be using to try to create a golem of Quentin. So, Dani, what did you think of this episode?


DANI: I think it's a really good first episode back. Like it's just kind of a small little snapshot of how everyone is doing and coping. I really liked it and I like seeing all the different emotional things like I feel like if I were grieving someone that I had been dating, I would probably be just like Alice, sleeping in all day, not getting out of bed, not looking great. But of course, Olivia always looks great regardless. 


CLARA:  Yeah, I mean, there's so much to unpack in this episode. But what made it for me was the subtle ways that the relationships between some of the characters are starting to change. So, when I saw Alice and her mother interacting that was big, because they've always had such a difficult relationship, there's so much animosity between them. And Alice's mom is still Alice's mom, but she actually does know what her daughter is going through. And there's a caring there, even if it's a bit unorthodox, like, one of the things I really loved the most was, was that sort of beginning scene where she tells Alice it's an emergency and it's just this plant contest that she wants to win. But it's hard to look at that and not think like she's doing this to try to help, help Alice get out of her shell in and sort of, yeah, yeah, and like using Alice's perception of her as this like selfish person. And who blows everything out of proportion to do that? So yeah, tell us about that. Henry.


HENRY: I mean, you know, she’s a, she's a narcissist, and she's, you know, is hyper critical of her daughter, but, you know, everything is said with love. It's just sometimes a backhanded compliment or a you know, something kind of, she can't help but be a little bit cruel like when she's saying like, you know, I need you to just put on whatever fits and your it's your choice if you want to let yourself go. You know, and a lot of that was is to just because she's, been, that's who she is person and I you can't like she can't be. This is not a she's not a sweet person. But she's a genuine person. And I think deep in her core, she actually does love her daughter and everything she does is actually, I think in her mind to help her to try to get her through this difficult period. 


CLARA:  Yeah. 


HENRY: You know, and also part of it is just to be informed by the idea that like, I knew she would have this moment of connection at the very end, and I didn't want you to expect it. Because you are assuming that she's going to continue to say sort of, you know, passive aggressive jabs. But everything that she does, comes from a place of love in a weird way. And that's the thing I was always reminding myself of writing my scenes was it like, the mom loved her. She loves in her own way. This is how she expresses love. She's not always like, helpful that way. And, but for her, this is love. So everything she says, as awful as it might be, has to come from her heart. So like that, that was the that was kind of the that was the test pass when I was working on it. Also, I just thought that that was a they're a they're like an unusual pair. So I like to Like, one of the things that is fun about writing a season opener is it's like you're kind of picking a story in the middle of it. Everyone's, you know, we don't explain how she got there, but we kind of know, that like, after Quentin's death that she just broke down and didn't have a place to go. And so that's where she ended up. Each one of them kind of is, you know, has kind of been dealing with it in their own way. So, you know, Julia, and a lot of ways is also similar, but she has kind of, like, dealt with it by not dealing with it, she's dealt with it by like, kind of throwing herself into a relationship. And maybe it's not the, you know, it's, uh, I'm sure you've had friends who, like, have dealt with a tragedy and maybe they and they're ending this relationship that it was easier just to stay in it because it was comfortable and comforting. You know what I mean? And so that that's kind of where we find them at the beginning of the season. It's not you know, that in some ways that they haven't dealt with a lot of this stuff that led to them being together. But it was, it was a it was a comfort to both of them.


DANI: And you can only take so much loss at once, right? Like breakups are hard.


HENRY: Yep, yep, yep. Yep. And I'm not saying that they're that, they're, that they have a doomed relationship just like they're not facing, I think they're not facing the truth of where they have where they came from. In a big way.


DANI: We talked earlier about how everyone else is scattered. But by the end of this episode, we're starting to see the ways that people are coming together. Like when Julia goes to visit Alice, even though they've never really been friends before shed some light on that for us.


HENRY: I mean, they have this big, big thing in common. You know, that they, they both share this massive loss and like that's the you know, this is this is this is the way that kind of Quentin kind of carries through all the other characters. I mean that he and you know, and even in death, he kind of unites them and that they're both feeling the pain of missing him. You know, and, and in some ways, you know, I mean, it's just simple as that's what drives them together. Julia in this episode is contemplating a thing, which is a seance. Something that Alice has done research on, you know, I'm want to say in an earlier draft, we had a, we had talked about that her, it was something that her father had researched, you know, in, in, in trying to deal with his own loss of his daughter because he thought his daughter died. And then in fact, and then we ended up simplifying it for various reasons. I mean, this is for, for an episode that, you know, when you write a premiere, you gotta kind of tag everybody in a lot of ways, and you're also trying to kind of get the stories going. But you know, it's one of these. You'd be surprised at this is this is actually a long episode. You know, because you have a lot of have a lot of story ground to cover to get everything moving. So that's just one of the one of the little details that ran by the wayside. But we liked I liked the idea that that you know, the dad lost his daughter tried to figure out how to face his daughter realized that this was a you know, researched the idea of seances and then discovered that it was it was either energetically difficult, impossible, or, or, you know, there was some dark magic involved in it. And so, you know, the, the idea being that, you know, Alice tells you this is a dead end, only to discover kind of at the very end that, you know, Alice is perhaps planning her own bit of bad magic to to deal with her grief, which we get into in Episode Two.


CLARA:  So, the other coming together of sorts, is one that DANI: predicted when she saw the trailer which is when Fog goes to Penny to convince him to teach the new crop of travelers of brakebills. So I'm gonna ask DANI: first like what do you think of it now that you've seen it on the screen?


DANI: I mean, I kind of figured it would happen and I love Penny the Reluctant Professor like he's just not something he would want to do. He's very like, solo person. But I had a feeling like something like this would happen like we were talking about when we were talking about the trailer, with spooky, about how like, it reminded me a lot of The Legend of Corro which is the avatar sequel, and so in Harmonic Convergence happens in that I won’t spoil that. 


CLARA:  She’s winking, you can’t see that on the podcast but she’s winking. 


DANI: Basically all these people who didn't know how to bend, the elements could now do it. And so, there's a bunch of new airbenders, which there was only one left. Now that all these people have the bending ability, so one of Angs kids like asked to teach everyone how to airbend, and it's pretty hilarious.


CLARA:  Well, and I think it's really interesting that it's that it's Penny, who becomes the teacher because in the books, Quentin ends up back at Brakebills, as a professor, and he goes through this similar kind of adjustment and realizing that like being good at magic, and being a good teacher, are really different things. And there's a lot of ways -- 


DANI: His career as a professor doesn't last long.


CLARA:  No, it doesn't. But I mean, there's also, I think it's interesting to me, because there's a lot of ways which in both the books in the show, but I think especially in the books, Quentin and Penny are two sides of the, oh God, of the same coin. Can't believe I actually wrote that. But it's yeah, it does seem like you're really leaning that, leaning into that in the show. And, um, yeah, I think it's kind of interesting. I just think it's, I find it so interesting that like Penny is of course the one who ends up taking that role. And of course, it makes sense because like Penny is the person who has the most growing to do in that way. Like, like DANI: said, right? Like, he's such a loner, and it forces him to
be dependable for other people. 


HENRY: The part of just wanting to put the character who would have the hardest time where the thing into the thing, and you know that that is a thing we continue to explore as the season goes forward.
Is what I will say about it.


CLARA:  So he's not quitting halfway through the semester is what you're telling us?


HENRY: I, I mean, yeah, no. 


CLARA:  Okay. Um, but yeah, I mean, talk, talk about that a little more about like, what, what are the things that you saw, Penny struggling with, as he as he makes -- 


HENRY: Another, another part of it was like, you know, we're always trying to make sure to find ways to keep Brakebills involved in the show. We also were trying to find a way to jar characters growth as people and you know, one of the one of those things is to is the moment where you realize that you're, you have a mastery of a thing. He seemed like a natural born because he has such this specific unusual discipline. One which we have, you know, explained before, they're just very few people who could do it. And the idea being you know, that with the too much magic, some people who would have the proclivity you know, toward traveling would be revealed who would not have been revealed otherwise. It seemed like he seemed like a natural person to be like, well, you may not have graduated yet, but you do have this unique specific expertise that we do not have in other capacities. So, like, you're the guy we need for this particular, you know, adjunct course. So, you know, part of it was that part of it was like trying to Penny I feel like he's is great when he's like, back on his heels. He's great when he's just uncomfortable. And, you know, and, and, and doing something difficult or something that he doesn't want to. there's a there's a particular look that Arjun does when something like incredibly annoying happens that he gives a few times this season, which I'm always, always delighted by. And you know, part of that is just, the more you have to make a Penny deal with people that he perceived is stupid, the better his story is usually.


DANI: One thing CLARA: and I were talking about is how in the new comic books there are, that are coming out. There's this bleeding over between the world of the hedges and the world of Brakebills educated elite magicians. Fogg kind of alludes to it with his comment about how more people are passing the test now that there's so much more magic out there, can you tell us more about that? Like it kind of feels like a metaphor?


HENRY: I mean, I haven't read, the, the comics. So, I've read that I read I read Alice's story, which I quite enjoyed. I think it's I think it's really great. But I have not read the new comics. So and also we, I mean, we don't know. I don't know it's Lila Searches if I I’m reading her name, right. I don't know her do I think her writing is great, really enjoy the comics. And, you know, we're producing these totally separately. We also all of these stories have been written a long time ago. In the show, I mean, really was just a function of like, one of the things that we asked at the beginning of every season is how is magic different? And how would that change the way that we behave? How would that change the way that our magicians behave? and one of the ideas that that I really liked that we move forward was that you know, as as there is more magic, so there are more magicians and that would affect both the the magical world brakebills and it would affect the world the hedges the thing that would try to carry through is it's things are still not fair for the hedges you know and see that I've enjoyed a lot you know, he's fine it that you know, there's dealing with the residual stuff left over from the library having taken a lot of power away from them. You know, the we showed a guy with a reads mark, wanted so badly to get rid of it that he blew his arm off. And, you know, that was a that was literally like we were trying to figure out a dramatic scene that was also kind of funny that would show how desperate hedges are. And the moment that I thought was the was the best way to describe is the guy shows up holding his own arm and he says, “is Kady here?”


CLARA:  There's, I think one of the things that really struck me and it's kinda like what you said, right? Like, it's still unfair for the hedges. But you're, I mean, in some ways, the fact that more people are being led into brakebills. Now that there's more magic kind of amplifies that, right. Like, if these people are good enough, when there's a little more supply, why weren't they good enough before? It doesn't seem like it's really about them?


HENRY: Partly, it's about there's an inherent prejudice at brakebills against against people who learn stuff kind of on the street. There's also one of the things I always loved about the books was that there was is a kind of deep, fundamental unfairness to the whole thing that like some people got it, some people didn’t. And even when, you know, you could they were, he talks about how I mean love would talk about how there are people who do all the things right. And somehow for some reason, they still don't have the ability, like magic just doesn't come to them. And, you know, who knows why. And that, that, you know, in the case of Julia, you know, she was, maybe it's because she was non neurotypical, and you know, the, the tests ruled her out because they saw some form of danger or potential sociopathy in her or something. But like, you know, the, all the free traders were non neurotypical, and I think that that like, in some ways, it just kind of points to the I'm just gonna say the inherent patriarchal prejudice of like big, magical institutions, which are, you know, in some ways representing the kind of big institutions in our lives and in the real world that do this. Is it that it's, it's easier to kind of it's easy. It's, it's, it's always easier to say no. And so like, I had this notion this season that, you know, there were some base level magicians who might have had this fundamental ability that would not have kind of risen a risen to the level of being noticed by brakebills or hedges, who would the, you know, adding of a ton of magic in the world would suddenly, you know, it's like, these people suddenly find their magic working in a way that you know, that it wouldn't have before because there is So much you know that there will be surges means that the world is going to saturated with magic in a way that it wasn't for. You know, it just it just means that there's a lot more untrained people who really don't know what the hell they're doing. Yeah, you know.


DANI: It seemed like Fogg was saying that like they accepted more people because they just didn't want people to like, kind of accidentally kill themselves because of magic.


HENRY: It's partly that and partly that just the, the, with the sheer increasing numbers of applicants, there are more people who are able to pass the Brakebills entrance exam, expected. You know, they try to they, they, they would try to weed them out, but they that's not like the -- 


CLARA:  Sometimes your own meritocratic bullshit bites you in the butt.


HENRY: That’s right. Exactly. So that's what he's he's railing about it and --


DANI: I thought it was so funny when he called it his State school


HENRY: Well, he's a he's an elitist.


CLARA:   Well, it's funny because like in the books he's, and in the books he's described as pompous, and we don't get a ton of opportunities to really see him lean into that in the show, but this was one of them. And it was very gratifying for me. 


HENRY: I mean, in the Fog on our show is probably a little bit nicer than the Fog in the books. But he's, and he's also a much bigger fuckup.


DANI: He seems like he cares more, but I mean, Fog is just not as big in the books.


HENRY:  Yeah. This is true. And the only thing we want I really wanted to do with Fogg this season. There was different ways to deal with the drinking because I just felt like, yeah, we've made so many, so much. It just felt like we'd made so much. I mean, Rick does drunk really well, and it's really fun to write him drunk and it's really under-write those in it. But at a certain point, you're kind of like, there is a point where drinking just isn't funny. And and I felt like we were, I felt like we were doing a disservice if we didn't kind of get into that as well. Because I, I feel like there's, you know, there's a reason Fog drinks. And in some ways that was how we explored his reaction to Quentin. You know, and he doesn't make a big deal out of it, but it's a thing that he is dealing with. And he just suddenly drinking didn't work anymore. It didn't, you know, the, for him he's get the idea that he's this hyper smart guy who deals with a lot has a lot of painful memories, and he deals with it by telling his senses so that he doesn't have to feel it. And there's a point where that will work. And there's a point where that stops working. You know, for him, you know, the thing that we wanted to explore with it is just stop working. And he has to face reality and look, that's the That's the reality of dealing with substance abuse. 


CLARA:  Yeah. I want to make sure we have time to talk about the fillory storyline, and particularly the different ways that Eliot and Margo are dealing with their grief over Quentin and over Josh, because we've alluded to this a little bit, but Margo gets pretty mad with Eliot for how blosay he's being about everything. 


HENRY: Yeah. 


CLARA:  I know. It's kind of like it feels like a weird thing to be like where does Margot's anger come from? She's angry all the time. But yeah, I just wanted to ask you to speak to that scene.


HENRY: Well, okay, so the, one of the fun things about getting into this season again, was getting to write Eliot and Margo together, which was a thing that, you know, we haven't got to do for a whole season. You know, and it was kind of a delight, you know, to get them drinking and quipping and, you know, saying things like to our pretty corpses, which is a callback to episode two or three. They said that, right as they were sitting in embers temple and thinking that they were gonna die. They were saying “to our pretty corpses”, and then you know, so like, that was fun. And but like, here's what I'll say. So, when you are writing the premiere episode, you are not solving problems in some ways you're setting up problems. And a lot of what we're dealing with, with the two of them is like, what is their friendship like now and in some ways, they're, it's like they were never apart, you know what I mean? They're exactly the same picking up exactly as they were. But in other ways, you know, Margo found herself, lassies and she had this, you know, it was like, Eliot happened to be gone. She had this weird vulnerability. This strange thing happened where she left this other guy in, turned out to be a good guy, this guy Josh. And, and like it today. I think in a way that she did not expect. And you know, maybe it wouldn't have happened if Eliot was around. And I think that the feelings that she has about it are kind of deep and real intense. And it's frustrating when you have a friend who you think understands you, deep, deep level and like always gets you always read your mind as exactly what you're thinking exactly. And somehow suddenly doesn't get it. And, and, and it's not that he doesn't get it, it's that he's dealing with his own thing. I mean, you know, Eliot, was possessed by this monster for the bulk of last season and experienced a lot of terrible things. Things which he says he doesn't remember. So, you know, but like, you know, you get the idea that he's carrying a big weight. And, and it's also like, quite frankly, this is the way that you know, he's dealing with Quentin, he's dealing with Quentin by not dealing with Quentin He's dealing with Quentin, because I think on some level, you know what he says Margo is that he, he, I think he feels this debt that he can't pay that, like everyone sacrificed everything to get him back. Quentin gave his life so that he could come back. And you know, he didn't even get to say goodbye to him. And that is like, that's, you know, they have this obviously, this intense history and that's, it's terrible, but the thing that he's, it's like, he has to live with it. This is one way that people do live with it. And you know, all I would say is it. This is a thing that we are going to continue to explore with him. But like, really what this was, is about those, those two friends who know each other so deeply, but there's a thing that they are not sharing, and I think she's angry that he's not sharing it. And he's upset that she's not getting, how he's dealing with it. You know, that even as close as they are, there's this fundamental disconnect that they are having to face, which they will deal with, you know, in subsequent episodes in a big way.


CLARA:  Well, yeah, so I think, DANI: that leads well into your next question.


DANI: So are we going to get to see Eliot actually deal with his grief this season? 


HENRY: Oh, absolutely. Absolutely, in a big way. And and in multiple in different ways, in multiple episodes, including is my favorite episode of the season. You know, but yes, you will absolutely. And you’ll also like more and the big way, Margo and Eliot are back and there's also some, there’s a lot of fun Margo and Eliot stuff this season.


CLARA:  Good


HENRY: I’m delighted by it, and I'm delighted to share with you guys.


CLARA:  Well, I think on that note, we'll move into fashion and I was actually really excited about this episode because fashion is so character and plot forward in it. In a bunch of different ways, so like from, from the perspective, from that perspective, the first thing that I, the first of two really big moments that stood out for me is that opening scene with Julia trying to find an outfit for her day with Penny, because you can see just how hard it is for her to face doing something normal. So normal when she has all of this, these feelings about the death of her best friend, floating around in her brain. And I think the options that she rejects tell you something, too. So, like the first thing she picks up is this yellow dress. And I looked at that, and I was like, oh, yeah, that's way too happy and she tosses it on the bed. Like it's trying too hard. But some of the other dresses are too simple or too ordinary or there things that we've seen her wear before. And the thing that she ultimately settles on is something completely new, as far as I could tell. Like it's, it's not it's both not something she's worn before and it's also a little bit different style than we've normally seen from Julia. And for me, I got the impression that that's, that's very important. So, I want to ask you, Henry, because I, I, you know, we've talked a lot about, like the relationships between the writers and the costume department. But what does the script actually say in that scene about sort of her mindset and what she's doing?


HENRY: I mean, the have to go back and look, because everybody says, no, this is like, like, probably 10 months ago, and I wrote it. As I recall, I was looking for a kind of unexpected way to open the show, it was very different from what we would typically do. So that you'd see Julia, you know, because we're, we're going to see people in different states of grief dealing with things differently. And we're going to see the Julia is in some ways, in a little bit of a heads is where but we're drawing on kind of romantic comedy tropes with her that she's trying on all these different areas. It's the idea being that, you know, ultimately she chooses one that is kind of dressy, but utterly inappropriate for being on top of a mountain, which is where we shot the next session. You know, and that and that, like, we were trying to kind of show a playful misunderstanding with her and Penny that, you know, comes out of what their relationship is right now, the challenging thing we were trying to do was not just do like a makeover montage type thing. We wanted to do something that had a little bit of a depth and soul and sadness and carry a little bit of it was like, you know, one of the big questions that you're asking every character that you see is like, how are they? How are they dealing with their life right now without Quentin in it. And so that was kind of the spirit of the montage. I mean, you know, it was Chris Fisher, who shot it, who's our director and he did a beautiful job and still of course, I thought he had brought like a soulful reality. to it, but the I don't remember describing any specific outfit in that. I think, I what I like what I wrote was, you know, because this is the kind of thing where like I know modeling and trust modeling and I know that you'll find the things that are right and the goal is that she's trying out a bunch of faces you know, and and that's a another way that people deal with grief is trying to different faces, and none of them seem right. And then she finally picks one that she thinks is right, and then she discovers it's absolutely wrong for the occasion just because it's yeah, she's freezing your butt off. That's such a hard to say we actually shot it on top of this ski mountain. Like about a half hour outside of Vancouver, where you had to carry, you had to go on a gondola than a separate skilift just to get it there. I want to thank you don't use it as a giant like electric windmill right next to it.


CLARA:  Oh my gosh. 


HENRY: But we just didn't shoot it. Yeah. 


CLARA:  So the other sort of story driven fashion note for me is, of course, when we see Alice because she's depressing. It shows, right. She's wearing like oversized shirts and dresses. And I think she ends up in a bathrobe at one point. All very neutral colors not changing for days from the looks of it. And I mean, it's such a mood like, Dani, you were saying earlier that that's that, like, that's basically how you would be if you were in her situation. I thought that was a great way -- I think, especially looking at those two scenes together and those two people together, right, like it's a great way that what they're what they're wearing and how they look is expressing something about how they're going through this horrific thing.


HENRY: Right.


DANI: Yeah.


HENRY: I mean, there's it's, there's a tendency in TV to kind of glam up people and I just really desperately wanted her to look like a person who's having a hard time. You know, like wearing sweats and she's wearing what's comfortable. She doesn't want to she's not dressing for you to like how she looks. She's dressing cuz she doesn't want it. Yeah, she wants to be comfortable. 


Dannu: Yeah. 


HENRY: I think she has like a stain on her shirt. 


CLARA:  Yeah.


HENRY: Very happy about that.


CLARA:  Well, the last, the last fashion thing that I wanted to bring up is the cosplayers and fillory. So, I love that femme cosplayer. And I have to say, I looked at her and she reminds me so much of Cath Gilbert, who runs the Fillorians United podcast. I don't know if that was intentional, but I looked at that I was like, oh, wow, that's such a great self insert.


HENRY: That’s so funny. I mean, the and the idea was just that, you know, our, our characters can't be anyone but our characters. But wouldn't it be funny if someone came up to them and said, oh, you guys look just like, you guys are talking Eliot and Margo. They're like what!! You know, we were sort of a looking for crazy, but the insane way to tell the story of how, you know what happened 300 years ago. You know, and what what happened what happened to to Josh and fan and, you know, it was partly inspired by, like one of the fantasy trope of, you know, the the running into like the some players who are doing a play, and they tell you the story of what's going on there. They did send game of thrones it does a few other things. And, you know, we were wanting to do a version of that, essentially. And you know, I, I want to say that I that I don't even think we I think that was something I came up with in this script. I don't feel like we even talked about it in the room, but I just thought it would be I thought it'd be funny. They were leaving was in the room like literally can't remember it. Forgive me for not having perfect recall on this but you know we we just knew that they were that this day was the great unshackling and they weren't able to get into the castle because of all the terrible, all the bad security that was that was around it all that I'm sorry good security difficult security and and that suddenly there was one day where they were wearing the exact right outfit to get into the castle.


CLARA:  Well I really enjoyed it and DANI: are there any fashion notes you want to bring up before we move to MVPs?


DANI: I mean, Margo always looks great.


CLARA:  Yeah, I do love that dress. 


DANI: She has a really nice dress.


HENRY: I missing her in the Florian outfits. But that was a you know, and I and I and I always miss the eye patches. But But I it's fun to see her in or the fashion.


CLARA:  Well and that just reminds me of the dress that she wore in early in season one when they do the trials. And she had that like fur over it that little fur thing I don't know the same dress I'd have to go back and look, but it's similar. 


HENRY: I think it's a new dress because it has a it day, if I remember correctly, it has this. It's like a photo print on it a printed like these flowers. Yeah. And it's very, it's very distinctive when you see it, but like it look, it's brilliant. That's a fantastic piece made by Monalee. You know, and, and, and also the crazy purple jacket that she's wearing over it. 


CLARA:  On that note, I think it's, it's time for us to move to our first MVP of the season. And well I think everyone in this episode does a really incredible job like it was just so well acted. And I definitely want to like hearken back a tiny bit to that shout out of Trevor for that one scene in the jail. I cannot fathom giving my MVP in this episode to anyone other than Olivia, because there's just so many different pieces to her performance. It changes in all these lovely subtle ways. Depending on who her scene partner is at the time, but it's all very coherent and I just I like literally, I don't know if mesmerized is a word that can be taken literally, but like, every time I was watching a scene with her in it, whatever else I was doing like writing notes, messing with my phone, texting Dani, whatever, I just stopped doing it because you can't take your eyes off her. So yes, my MVP goes to Olivia. Dani, what about you? 


DANI: I chose Olivia as well. And I was just like thinking she's probably gonna get it a lot this season.


HENRY: I think that in some ways she is in this episode that the you know, she's all of us. She's like all a lot of what everyone feels about, you know about about Quentin. You know, she's, she's the just let it all hang out. And she's really good in the episode. I can't wait till you see Episode Two, which I will say nothing else about.


CLARA:  So we're now then oh, no, sorry, Henry, do you want to give an MVP? I just assumed that when you started talking that you were giving yours. 


HENRY: I, you know, I can’t choose one in particular I feel like everyone is great in this one. I mean, I think Olivia does a fantastic job. I totally agree. You know, I think that in some ways, Hale as a thank was, what he was doing was not emoting you know what I mean? So, like, I, all I can say is sometimes you get to write great material for people and sometimes the material will come later. And so, you know, the premiere is it is a tough one because not everyone gets the big scene. But you try to kind of come in and give a touchstone and explains where they're going to go. So for those people Who didn't have a big, amazing moment, I assure you that they will have one later this season. You know, they're all they're all coming. So, you know, I usually would pick as an MVP is I'm gonna pick my director, Chris Fisher, who's our director producer who shot this episode and episode two at the same time, and somehow kept it all straight. And, you know, kind of is, kind of the heart and soul of the show, and really is one of the reasons that that, that, that we're able to do what we do in Canada. Man, he's really he's really great. So, I always like to pick the director, and I'm gonna pick, I'm gonna pick Chris.


CLARA:  Good choice. So we're, we're now entering the episode rating portion of our show. And I have to say like, I feel really weird about it. And part of that I feel really weird about ratings. Part of that is because we've like completely fucked up our system pretty much every season. And part of it is just the DANI: and I were talking about a little bit last season and I Like, we have sort of hit a point where it almost feel it feels like ratings are inappropriate. Like they, they give this sort of shorthand of what we feel about the show, but it doesn't really tell you a ton. And so, I thought, I thought and Dani, you're welcome to give a rating.


HENRY: 10/10. That's what it is. 10/10


CLARA:  Well, Dani, I mean, if you wanna if you want to go ahead and give a rating, you're welcome to and I accept your 10 out of 10. Henry for your own episode. Very good.


HENRY:  I'm gonna give all 10 out of 10 every single one. 


CLARA:  I mean, that's been our philosophy in the past. But I think for me, I, I think it might be nice if we instead use this time to just kind of do a recap of our thoughts. And for me, I would want to share what I appreciated the things that I maybe had a hard time with and give us a chance to talk about that a little openly. How do you feel about that Henry?


HENRY: I’d feel fine. I think, I think ratings are silly. I also think that there's you know you a premier has a different, it has a different job than an episode two, Episode Three, Episode Five like they're all different and part of the job in the Premier is not necessarily to tell one single coherent like art story but like to kind of touch on everything and set up kind of what you're doing in the season. So, you don't always get to do the same thing you do like in an individual episode, you know, and so I think you know, they're all they're all treated differently. I worked on every single episode this season with the writers so like it's not for me, John and Sarah like it's all our show.


CLARA:  So let's dive in then I'm from for me, this was a really powerful episode and it made me way more emotional than I was really expecting it to. DANI: and I talked about this when we talked about the trailer is spooky but I don't think I've actually watched the season four finale since it aired so even like the recap at the beginning kind of hit me in the gut and then we go from that to this opening scene of Julia bracing herself in front of the closet and I just I felt what she was going through so hard. I love the way that Allison her mother interact and the way that Allison Julia interact I love seeing Penny in that teaching role. I love when Margot chewed Eliot out. And I think I talked about this on Twitter at some point, like relatively close to after the finale, but like that was kind of how my dad reacted when his father died. And I was 16 and like, felt like my job was to try to hold it together for everyone. So, it resonated with me a lot on a personal level. It just felt like such a true representation of grief. So far and again, first episode I'm not quite as excited about Kady storyline yet. I'm interested in the Hedges but I just don't feel like I know where it's going. The one thing that I found really hard and I want to say specifically like I don't think It was bad at all. It's just like it was a personal visceral reaction is that ending because Alice is trying to create a Gollum of Quentin. And I spent a lot of time like thinking about it and trying to process my reaction. And on final analysis, I think it's a really real and honest portrayal. Like Alice is so brilliant and she loves Quentin so much. Of course, she would try to find a way to bring him back in whatever form, but it also did kind of like sting a little the like, did she or didn't she cliff hanger? It just hit me. It surprised me. It hit me harder than I thought it would. Like, I don't know picking to the edges of a scab. Does that make sense?


HENRY: Yeah, of course, you know all feelings make sense. You know – 


CLARA:  Do they? 


HENRY: She's, she's, or they don't I mean, but there but the real.You know, she's doing something crazy. You know, one of the things about the magicians is that all of our characters at some point make terrible decisions. And I think people in a state of grief sometimes do that as well. I will just say that like the I that's a storyline where I'm, I hope you will enjoy. I don't know if enjoys the right word. I think that where it goes is very cathartic. And I really like it. And I really can't say anything else except to say, I think you're supposed to look at her and think, oh, god, what the fuck are you doing? Like that's a terrible idea.


DANI: That's how I felt.


CLARA:  Yes. 


HENRY: That’s how your supposed to feel I think that you know, that that's the idea. You know, she's really making a decision. 
But also I think it's a decision that she believes in emotionally when people, people do with grief by doing terrible things, sometimes they do drugs, they make bad life choices. They, you know, get in car accidents, they, you know, screw up their relationships, they have affairs, you know, a lot of it's because it's this, they blow up their lives and part of what we're trying to explore is how do people deal with grief, but we're doing it through, you know, the metaphor of magic. And so that's, that's, you know, Alice is making a bad choice. I don't think it's a smart choice. But I do think that it probably felt like the only choice for her. You know what I mean? And, you know, and we'll, we'll get into it more during Episode Two.


CLARA:  All right, Dani, then your turn. You want to give us your, your big thoughts, your summary analysis of the episode.


DANI:  I didn't notice that she's making a Golem at first like I think me while I thought she was trying to do the seance by yourself like an idiot.


CLARA:  there are a lot of candles involved Yeah,


HENRY: She actually it's hard to see especially if you're watching on like a computer but they pan past the box of the living clay.


DANI: I noticed that when I was watching it on my actual TV because I was watching I watched it first on my laptop but yeah, I didn't notice that at first until like CLARA: was like super mad about it. But yeah, I liked it. I liked like just seeing all of the different reactions or non reactions. Yeah, I feel like I feel like the same as you I don't think I'm necessarily that excited about Kady storyline yet. I'm sure it's gonna be great.


HENRY: I mean, in fairness, the the hedges get kind of a they get a little bit of short shrift in the Premier. We just kind of We just kind of tagged them we get more into Kady’s story in Episode Two and and Kady becomes a little more their stuff becomes a little bigger as the season moves on. So no fault of her own because we're, we're just trying to keep those. We're trying to keep a lot of threads alive.


DANI:  It makes sense. Like, there's a lot going on. There's the whole fillory futures storyline the different grief happening through the other characters. 


HENRY: Right. 


DANI: I don't know.I liked it.


HENRY: I like we haven't got time we were talking about the takers.


DANI: The takers? I don't think we've seen one yet. Right?


CLARA:   Well, we only saw them in the play. 


DANI: Yeah, yeah, that's, that's an interesting one. There's a lot going on. And I like it. I like that. There's just so many different threads that have been set up. So, we kind of know where we're going in the season. I like to see the whole Fog trying to get sober thing like I think that's great. Any I feel like he's more sassy. He's always asked me but I feel like he's a little bit more sassy.


HENRY: I think he's less willing to put up with stuff. He's like, you know that that's kind of he's, he's a little bit like, you know, I'm not doing this for your feelings. 


DANI: I also fell love when he was like, when he said to Penny like I've never met a Penny that would read the fine print.


CLARA:  That was a good like for sure. There’s a lot of good lines. 


DANI: I really liked the episode. I'm like I said, if I was gonna give it a rating, it would be a 10 out of 10. 


HENRY: Oh. Well, I will tell you that there are a few episodes coming up that I think are much, much, much better. So, I would save that for that.


CLARA:  You know, I think we should stop trying to do comparative ratings and just rate them on how we feel about them in the moment because it's just you can't compare things that you haven't seen yet. You can't so.


DANI: Yeah.


HENRY: 100 percent. 


CLARA:  Yeah. So Dani wants to give it a 10 out of 10. I ratify.


HENRY: Glad you enjoyed it. I, I'm excited for you to see the rest of the season because I feel like there's that you will, if you like that you're gonna love what come what's coming.


CLARA:  On that note, Henry, thank you so much for joining us today, which for our listeners, I should say it's three days before Christmas, the first day of Hanukkah, so we really owe you one for this. Thank you so much for making the time.


HENRY: You are welcome. Happy to do it.


CLARA:  And listeners. Thanks for joining us for Season Five. It's been quite a journey so far. We're really looking forward to this next season. And if you like our show, head over to iTunes, leave us your rating and review. Blah, blah, blah. The more we get, the easier it is for listeners to find us but you know, blah, blah blah. It's also real. And that's a wrap on Episode 501.Bye.


DANI: Bye. 
HENRY: By everyone.