JOY: Here's the thing: why make an episode of television made mostly out of the worst thing that can happen to you, as a citizen of the United States?
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JOY: Have I told you that my mom used to save birds in the freezer? If a bird would fly into one of our windows and die, she would save it in the freezer for some reason.
HZ: Was she hoping that they would be reborn after three days?
JOY: Possibly? When I was quite small our dog killed a baby raccoon and I was really upset about it, and so then, as a response, my mom had the raccoon taxidermied.
HZ: No!
JOY: For my birthday.
HZ: She's angry at Logan as well for carrying a gun, because she's scared that he's gonna get killed. He's in a reckless mood. He was like, "It's all right, the gun's not loaded, and it was a present from Dick's dad." Like, what a comfort.
JOY: First of all, why is Mr Casablancas running around just doling out guns? He's like, "Oh, it's Halloween, trick or treat, here’s a fucking firearm."
HZ: Well he was probably like, "Logan, you're like an extra son to me. Have one of my precious guns." They had a good time at the range. Also maybe he was like, "This is not going to fit through the shredder, you'd better have it."
JENNY OWEN YOUNGS: But if you had to choose a favourite Ninja Turtle...
HELEN ZALTZMAN: I don't know what their different personalities are, Jenny.
JENNY OWEN YOUNGS: OK, let me just run it down for you really quick.
HELEN ZALTZMAN: Which one's the Logan and which one's the Duncan?
JENNY OWEN YOUNGS: Right. Exactly. Well, Duncan is sort of the Leonardo. Michelangelo is like Dick. He's like, "Wazzup?" And then Raphael is like Logan because he has a lot of anger issues. And then Donatello, do we have like a recurring super smart person on this show? I guess Mac would be the closest? Mac is Donatello. Cool. Nailed it. And then Keith is like Splinter. And then Mr Echolls is like Shredder. And then all the one episode 09ers are the foot soldiers, the Foot Clan. Cool. Thanks for listening.
HELEN ZALTZMAN: Are all shows truly the same?
JENNY OWEN YOUNGS: All shows are one show.
HELEN ZALTZMAN: It's the same characters, but different shells.
JOY: What is it about people and twins and threesomes? You ever think about that, Helen?
HZ: Not in a desirous way. I feel like it's a bit disrespectful of the family relationship between them.
JOY: The family relationship, the autonomy… The mystery of twins, and the pain and struggles that we shall never know as two non-twins.
HZ: I have nieces who are twins, but they are ten, so it feels like not the time to talk to them about it.
JOY: For 40 percent of my grade, I am going to attempt to tell you what happened in Pride and Prejudice.
HZ: I'm so excited to finally learn what happens in Pride and Prejudice...
JOY: Well, I mean...
HZ: …through the prism of Jenny Owen Youngs's mind.
JOY: You've never seen Pride and Prejudice quite like this. And content note, this episode of Veronica Mars Investigations contains heavy themes and bonnets.
JOY: I just googled ‘Celebrity Boners and Gaffes’ -
HZ: No, no — no Jenny! Delete all the cookies!
JOY:There is a seemingly endless list of articles from mostly BuzzFeed, In Touch, some other websites and news outlets. Here are some sample article titles: "Celebrities who've had erections during sex scenes". "31 celebrity bulges that went hard in 2015". "The 21 most important celebrity bulges of all time". "Boner alert! Nine celebrities who have had boners in public". "Boner alert! Make America bulge again".
HZ: Argh.
JOY: "13 celebrity dudes who aren't afraid to show off their goods". I've googled it, so you don't have to.
HZ: Thanks, Jenny.
JOY: Ugh. You're welcome.
HZ: How do you know I hadn't already? (I hadn't.) So no gaffes, just boners?
JOY: No gaffes, just boners.
HZ: Gaffes are less popular than boners, I guess.
VERONICA on phone: Have you had dinner?
DUNCAN: No, I'm tired of room service. [Opens door: it’s Veronica, holding up a bag of food.]
VERONICA: Then may I suggest dim sum, and then some?
JOY: Ew. Ew, ew, ew, ew, ew, ew, ew, ew, ew, ew. Ew. OK, I'm going to say this, and then I need to go get some Listerine. "Dim sum and then some"?
HZ: It gets worse. It gets worse, Jenny.
DUNCAN: What if we start the evening with ‘and then some’ and work our way back to the dim sum?
VERONICA: It's officially under consideration. May I ask you something first?
DUNCAN: Yes to costumes, no to props. Does that cover it?
JOY: Helennnnn!
HZ: Veronica does have a lot of costumes, but her props are bugs and tasers. So I can understand why he didn't want to use those.
JOY: Yeah, I guess. I guess that makes sense.
HZ: Then Veronica ruins the dim sum and then some, or the then some and then dim sum that Duncan's angling for, by saying, "Why didn't you tell me how often you'd been visiting Meg since the accident?" And it's hard to carry on the sexy chat after that kind of line.
JOY: Yeah. It's not great.
HZ: She's really done the roleplay badly there.
JOY: Yeah.
HZ: “I'm roleplaying as one of the Manning parents.”
JOY: Ugh. Sick.
HZ: I have two other reasons that I think account for Veronica's hostility. One is: I think she senses that Jackie is a sexperson. She has already said in the previous episode that she hasn't dated a high school guy since eighth grade. She makes reference to actors she's been out with. She's a sexperson. But I think the true reason she dislikes Jackie is because Jackie also wears tiny jackets.
JOY: Tiny jacket competition. They have to have a tiny jacket-off.
HZ: Who's got the tiniest jacket? And also, Jackie's name is so close to ‘jacket’.
JOY: Wow. Yes. Also really regretting saying 'tiny jacket-off'.
HZ: It's interesting seeing Tessa Thompson in this, given that her career is now stellar.
JOY: Yeah, another person who was in Veronica Mars who is now incredibly successful.
HZ: And I'm happy for her; she's very charismatic, I think, on screen even in this but I feel like she's done a bit of a disservice with the character in this. I think they're not quite sure who Jackie is, because they have just piled all of the styles on her at once. She's wearing elements of five very different outfits at most times.
JOY: She's like a girl group. But like all five of them at a time. Sporty, Ginger, Scary, Baby -
HZ: And Belts.
JOY: Do you think that in this context, pantsing refers to just Butters's pants coming down or him getting fully exposed?
HZ: I'm trying to remember what we would have called it in England; it would have had a different name; pants would definitely unambiguously be undergarments in British English.
JOY: Oh right, so you'd be like, "Oh, he got troused" or something. Sorry if I've offended anyone.
HZ: When you've pantsed people in the past, Jenny, which I'm sure actually I'm sure you've never done because you're a kind person.
JOY: Honestly, I'm not a pantser, but Jess pantses me on the daily.
HZ: She romantically pantses you? And when she does it, is it overpants and underpants?
JOY: Just overpants, and then an impish scurrying away.
HZ: So we should clarify: Jess is your girlfriend.
JOY: Yes.
HZ: She's not your high school bully.
JOY: Or a ghost.
A long time ago - well, 2003 - the Dandy Warhols released the song ‘We Used To Be Friends’, and we hadn’t thought of it lately at all, except for it being the theme tune to Veronica Mars.
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HZ: It was funny to me how watching it before, just the only things that stuck were kind of the long arcs and the emotional relationships between like Veronica and Keith, and Wallace and stuff. None of the mysteries of the week stuck. And I also didn't really notice some of the things where you're like "hmm" now that I'm watching it multiple times and taking copious notes on it for a podcast.
JOY: I didn't watch it until right before we started making this podcast. I watched the whole series.
HZ: Not even suspecting what was about to crash into your life?
JOY: Having no idea what kind of havoc was about to be brought down upon me, Helen.
HZ: Veronica's not avoiding Logan today.
JOY: No, even though she's supposed to be I think steering clear from him she can't resist going in for a little no-costume undercover work pretending to still be into it so that she can see what he has to say for himself.
HZ: Yeah, right. We know that she's shitting him, for some reason.
JOY: I'm sorry - "shitting him"?
HZ: Yeah, do you not say that in America?
JOY: Oh, like like she's like lying to them or playing him or something? Like "you gotta be shitting me."
HZ: Right. Exactly. She's shittting him. But he doesn't know he's being shat.
JOY: See, this really starts to fall apart once you start conjugating.
HZ: Does it? You knew what I meant! He is beshat.
HZ: In Vegas, Keith's guest Cheyenne arrives wearing a black dress with charm chains draped over the shoulders. Keith's hotel is quite beige and drab, and also, the TV is angled so you can't watch it in bed. What the fuck? What piece of shit hotel would do this to you? What is the point?
JOY: Yeah, that is cruel and unusual punishment.
HZ: Keith's still kind of in caring dad mode, asking Cheyenne if she's hungry.
KEITH: Are you hungry or anything?
CHEYENNE: I think not having to buy me dinner first is kind of the point. Why don’t you come sit over here with me and relax, okay?
KEITH: Well, maybe we could go sit out on the balcony.
CHEYENNE: You’re still gonna be married on the balcony. Now. I want you to tell me exactly what you want. That one thing you can never get the little woman to do. And we’ll start there.
KEITH: Actually, I’d like to start by talking about Abel Koontz.
HZ: Wow, Keith, that is one hell of a kink. Bet she doesn't get that request often.
JOY: “The little woman just won't discuss Abel Koontz and the Lilly Kane murder with me the way I'd like.”
HZ: In the background of the Echolls living room, there's a cabinet containing many framed photos of Aaron. We're used to that from the set dressing, but also a bunch of awards, including two Oscars.
JOY: Damn, I missed that. What do you think those are for?
HZ: I don't know, because I thought they'd built up Aaron to be quite a shit actor, just doing these crappy action films and sequels.
JOY: I was wondering if - when they they said that when Veronica later says that she got caught making out by the star of Breaking Point and Breaking Point 2, I was wondering if that was supposed to be a Point Break reference, if Aaron was supposed to be a Patrick Swayze type.
HZ: Maybe one of the awards is for Dance Dirty and Dance Dirty 2 then.
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JOY: Logan is like a box of chocolates. You never know what you're gonna get.
HZ: Yeah, although you do assume that the chocolates will be brownish green and a bit out of date. What what? But still delicious. Delicious, but bad for you.
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HZ: Veronica visits the website killemall. Jenny, please describe what you see, because we watched the episode together and she screamed for minutes upon sight of this thing.
JR: Tell me all about it.
JOY: Oh my god, it's like a ticking countdown clock, and I think there's like a demonic laugh that happens right when the page loads and it's like, “Hahahahaha," it's counting down. I also think there's like a some kind of demonic visage somewhere on the page. It’s like “Something demonic is gonna happen in 48 hours and 15 minutes and 22 seconds, suckers.”
JR: It's great. It's great stuff. Beautiful design, I love the red, it really pops.
JOY: It really pops.
JR: Love that font, it is like borderline Papyrus, I think.
JOY: Like evil Papyrus.
JR: Yeah, Demonic Papyrus.
HZ: I used that on my wedding invitations.
JOY: Helen! Helen!! Veronica - Veronica cracks open her… was this the laptop that she specifically only uses for her personal Lilly Kane murder investigation, with her Lilly Kane murder investigation desktop wallpaper?
HZ: That would explain why she uses the school computers for things that really should be done in private rather than a busy classroom. There's big yellow letters across the top of the screen that say “Lilly Kane murder investigation." Which, you would think she would call it something else.
JOY: Yeah, taxes, you know, what do people call porn folders on their computer? Something that will make someone who sees it over your shoulder be like, “Oh, boring. Gotta go." But no, it's ‘Lilly Kane murder investigation’, and then there are folders all over the desktop, clearly labelled each of the Kanes, Eli ‘Weevil' Navarro, etc, etc. I was watching this episode, and I had to screenshot this desktop situation. And I sent it to Helen, who immediately responded - because the photo is from prom, that fateful, almost Skinny Dip night when Lilly was really stoked about going braless - and Helen said, “I too like to remember my dead loved ones at their most busty."
HZ: It's what they would have wanted.
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HZ: In Wallace's locker, there's a gift - an offering!
JOY: A spirit box! Do you guys have spirit boxes in the UK?
HZ: Of course not, sports players are privileged enough.
JOY: Do you guys have spirit of any kind in the UK?
HZ: We have spirits, as in the booze kind.
JOY: Ah yes, now that's a box I'd like to receive in my locker.
HZ: It’d probably get you into trouble, Jenny. This box is is green with yellow frills and it's got a big green frog in it and “Go Wallace, we love you, you rock” somewhere involved. And in it there's a load of snickerdoodles. Which is not a cookie we have in Britain either. Is it worth bothering with?
JOY: I mean, I love a snickerdoodle - I'm an equal opportunity employer of cookies.
HZ: That's very thoughtful.
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