Episode 04: The Guilty Alibi

Police Squad in Color, starring Leslie Nielsen, also starring Alan North and Rex Hamilton as Abraham Lincoln. The night's special guest starter William Shatner. Ay you the night's episode The Guilty Allaby, Welcome to from the files of Police Squad in Color. I'm your host. Mike White joined me, of course.

Is mister Chris Stashue. I went to the movies on the Waterfront. Also with us, is mister Mark Begley. Is this some kind of bust? Yes?

Very impressive. On this episode we are talking about revenge and remorse. It was the fourth episode shot. The fourth episode aired, though it aired before the third episode. We could just go crazy with house, just like the Prisoner, Just like the Prisoner.

The Prisoner was gladly those two that are swapped, though, because I would have a real hard time keeping track of things if anymore had been swapped. Special guest star William Shatner, who avoids getting shot, but then he ends up either choking or getting poisoned. I imagine it's poison but I kind of wish that he had just like taken a bite and then he chokes on the food. But it was a drink that he drinks and then he is that great thing in slow motion for you as well. Yeah, yeah, oh okay, all right, the post production slow motion which I absolutely hate.

Yeah that was weird drink poisoned by Leonard Nimoy. Coincidentally, Oh okay makes sense, you know, yeah, it definitely makes sense. Directed by Paul Krasny, written again by Nancy Stein and Neil Thompson. I'm not sure if Pat Proft was involved with this one or not, but yes, this is the fourth episode, and this one is all about a mad bomber who is going around killing all of the people involved in a particular court case. And I think it is the core case of mister Casalis, whose name really rings a bell.

I wanted to mention something that I don't think we've talked about. Part of the credits that confuse me as a kid and confuses me to this day is the Abraham Lincoln it And I think Mike early on you mistakenly said Rex Harrison, who is who I always thought it was because I knew that name, And then I'm like, well, wait, no, who's Rex Hamilton because I don't I'm not familiar with this guy. What's the joke here? And so I looked finally looked him up, and he'd never done anything except be Abraham Lincoln and the opening credits of Police Squad. Shouldn't it be someone familiar like Rex Harrison?

I don't know. Well, that's the gag. That guy is an Abraham Lincoln impersonator in real life. That the whole that makes sense. I guess it'd be if they were like and how Holbrook has Mark Twain, but how Holbrook has the whole career apart from Mark Twain.

Yeahs fdr. Yeah, that's a deeper cut. Yeah. I thought it was Alan Rickman as Richard Nixon? Or is it who he plays in that movie?

Or does he play j was that w or something else? No, it's that Forrest Whittaker movie where he plays the butler in the White House. Oh okay, gosh, man, I remember when that was supposed to be a big deal. Is that Lee Daniels directing that? I think so.

I don't even know who Lee Daniels is, but it was all over like Lee Daniels the Butler. Okay, a movie to change the time, Yes, all right, I don't know what I'm getting confused with. But there's this whole gag in here of these walking feet, and we start off the episode with these walking feet, and we get the walking feet three times. I think again the law of threes when it comes to comedy. I kept writing in my notes hop scotch, like I kept waiting for those walking feet to hit a hot scotch thing and then do hop scotch.

I don't know if that's an in another episode or if it's in the movie. It's going to be in the movie. Okay, that's it's the whole and Where the Hell was I? It's that whole thing where it's like he's voice over ring and it shows him walking and then shows him doing hopscotch, and it shows him walking off the end of the sidewalk, which is one of my favorite gags the whole movies, like and Where the Hell was I? And he's like essentially overlooking la at the Hollywood side.

But yeah, that's no, you're remembering it from the movie. I was expecting it in the episode too. Yeah. I wasn't expecting it, but I did like what we got going over the chair, yes, inexplicably, then over the table, and that was pretty good. Replacing the gavel with the exploding gavel.

That was good. And we've got Frank back in his car. At the beginning of this he was getting his car washed. So we've got the guy in the back still washing his car that he got pulled away from goes to headquarters. My boss was already on the scene, and this whole thing of coffee Frank don't have Frank.

And then the way that they walk through that commissary line and they just pick out prime rib and all that sitting there eating a slice of prime rib Leslie Nielsen is throughout the entire scene. Yes, he is just muncheon down on that slice of prime rib the whole scene. I appreciate because again we've talked about the lack of continuity, and there's a there's a continuity gag in this episode where it's check your jacket and you know, check your jacket, but and that disappears immediately. But I appreciate that they leave it with them eating food and he's just sitting eating a slice of prime rib for like damn near two or three minutes. They go through all the suspects and they're listening off all of these names until they get to Salis Salus and Nam rings a bell in all of the different bells that are going off typewriter.

Such a stupid gag, but I fucking love it. It's like the on the Waterfront gag. It's like it's that literal interpretation thing, but done in the right way. There's no movie theaters down at the waterfront. I liked early on when that we see those feet and then we see the gloved hands, and again cop show type stuff.

You're you're scrolling down the directory to find what you want to find, but the person's like dragging all the letters and numbers off. That was good. You don't usually see stuff like that. I like that. I appreciated that you can see some of these jokes coming a mile away.

He was a model prisoner. And then yes, yeah, or the whole thing of his wife, La Lana Casalis, the way that she's boxing up all the stuff for the widows and orphans and then taking all of their clothes and then they cut to them walking out and they're just in their shirts and underwear. That stuff works. I actually really like the gag where they're in the dressing room of his wife. She's like, let me go change.

She goes behind the thing and comes out, it's a different actress. The rest of the episode. The rest of the entire episode, it's somebody else. Well. It was weird because when she starts to talk, I was like, that doesn't sound like her voice.

So I think they adyard the original actress, you know, the second actress over the first actress. Her voice doesn't change when she comes out from behind that changing panel. Even that's a really good gag though, like it just that one is a and it stays throughout the entire episode. They don't walk it back, which again, for all the continuity problems that they do on purpose, there are some things that they don't walk back. Oh yeah, I was expecting a third actress when they met up with her again.

Yeah, I kind of was expecting there to be a further twisting of the dial and there wasn't, which I don't know. That's showing some restraint maybe or maybe they just couldn't come up with another funny gag. I don't know, maybe a little bit of both. I think it would have with a completely different actress. Again, maybe not going back to the original gal That's what I was expecting and hope.

Yeah, I think I think it could have worked pretty well. I mean, her name is Mimi de Jour, but now she goes by Mimi Coffee, isn't What does do your mean of the day of the day. I think it's just to get to the coffee gag. So it's maybe now it's Mimi coffee, coffee, no thank you. It's kind of like the cigarette gag.

That's how I saw it. Yeah, I mean that is as far as it ends up going. We've got another coffee gag in this one, which is talking about coffee commercials. My doctor says, I have to switch to decaf, and this is I think maybe somebody was referring to him lugging in the next episode. Yes, yeah, this coffee commercial bit when they bring it back is part of that mugging that And I don't know if it'll continue into five and six, but you know, definitely we get there eventually in the movies for sure, pretty quickly into that second one, and probably in the first one a lot as well.

Even there's a lot of mugget for the cameras. Again, there are a few people who do the mugging as well as Leslie Nielsen funny Face as they would call him. That's not what makes this comedy funny for me at least, it's the fact that he has to be the straight man while delivering the jokes. That's the thing, Like he's the straight man and he's the comedian, and that's what's always worked for me with Leslie Nielsen. And there are very few, if any, other actors who can do it as well as him.

Hey, it's a very unique expectation as your lead for what he does in this show and a naked gun and an airplane. Frankly, it's kind of Leslie Nielsen's I would say, claim to fame for how his comedy worked. I think is if you knew how to write for him, this is how you right for him. It's just don't sell the jokes, Yea, you don't sell them either. Yeah, even if you're writing jokes, it's like you can't laugh, dude, it's not funny, like this is sell it straight, do not break.

Even when it's in the first movie and Nordberg is you know, he's essentially killing Nordberg over and over again by accident. It's not funny. He's not laughing like it's but it is funny what he's doing. And that when the show taps into that idea, and the show, I think is doing a very good job of tapping into it. It really works.

We already mentioned the on the waterfront thing. I do really appreciate that Cassalis's joke joke that his coat says Penn State and then on the back it's a state pen, which is nice. Well, and I like that they do on the waterfront gag three times in the movie at least, and they already made an on the waterfront gag in the second episode. Well, I'm just talking about in this episode itself that they do it towards the end, right right, because he's like, where were you? And he's like, well, that's not what your wife said.

But I guess they don't stay on the waterfront at that point though he wasn't seeing the movies. He was over watching a baseball game, breaking his parole. Guess that makes sense. I want to know what the hell Olsen is doing to that cat. He is talking about gills and lungs and the difference and how it is he's trying to show how cats can't breathe underwater.

Yes, that's what it seems like. Yes, would you like to keep them next week, I'll show you why women can't play professional football. Oddly consistently misogynistic, yes, but not pervy this time. No, not pervy, just misogynist. They got some angry letters, might get angry letters about the pasties on Mimi's door.

There were some good visual gags in this episode. That was one of them, for sure, Yes, which I don't think at twelve years old I probably got so. Also, like the gag at the end of all right, We've caught her now runner in Yeah, that was one of those, like the Model prisoner one where you know, joke is going as soon as he says it's like, oh well they're gonna run nice edition of the starter blocks. But still oh yeah. But that's I mean, that's what makes it a good gag.

That in The gag of the guy in the tree is another good which is just you know that I like that again, they're not like, oh my god, there's a guy in the tree, there's his watch. It's just he just checks the watch in his face. That that for me, that kind of joke, that kind of approach to telling that joke is the za Z way of doing it. Oh yeah, it's just it's just part of the world. There's no lantern hanging.

We're not knowledging that this is a gag or a joke. And that's when these kinds of projects that they work on work the best is when they don't acknowledge that it's a gag. Like an airplane, they weren't like, holy shit, it's an inflatable autopilot. It's just an autopilot and you got to blow it up, and it's blowtube happens to be right where it's dick is, because of course it is. Other telegraph jokes, the radio announcer choking out the smoke from the car bomb.

I was like, okay, yeah, I knew that was going to happen. But then you get some great visual gags like the tow truck is one of my favorites. And then the other one is the club Flamingo, which it took me a few minutes to figure out that the man was clubbing the Flamingo. A club Flamingo joke is fucking great. And what do you say, like, she told me to come to the club tonight or something, but right away, come to the club right away.

Yeah, but there was no clubway, there was no glob right away. Toe truck was a groner for me. I was like, Oh, it's gonna be a big toe. Yeah, yeah, there it is. And it wasn't even really a truck, No, it was more of a car, the toe vehicle.

It was a golf Kurt. You don't know how hard it is ratting out the guy that you love. And I was waiting for him to just be like, hell, you know, and start telling that whole next story about how he had to do that once. I was expecting an actual rat to factor into it somehow, just given this show's literalism. Yeah.

Yeah, there was a repeat gag from the last episode in this one where they do the let's say bit oh boy a lot. Yeah, And they did it two or three times in the last episode and two or three times in this one. And I was like, hmmm, you know, like you say, Mike watching stuff back to back, Yeah, with intent. It probably wouldn't strike you if you're just watching it on a weekly basis, or you want to start watching the show on March and you have to return to it in July. Bad breaks and all that.

But I was like, oh, that's the exact same gag. We didn't mention in the last episode when he's talking about what a cesspool the city is, and the one guy's like, Frank, I'm trying to eat a fish sandwich. I'm talking to my mom. The club Famingo comes up again with Al wearing the shirt. I loved that little bit too.

I never picked that up. Yeah, because he's like a lot of guys from the Force go there and then he just like walks into frame, stands there and then just walks back out. That's the only gag. That's the only Al gag in this entire episode. I thought this was the long hair This is the long hair one.

Yeah, it's trying something new, guys. It's against regulations. You were talking about the eating gag. Yeah, the eating gag with how loud though, Yeah, smack their lips and everything. It's hilarious.

So gross. Yeah. I have a thing about eating noises though, so that kind of drove me nuts. But I did appreciate the humor of it. It made me laugh really hard because they again, they don't draw any attention to it other than the fact that they're doing it right and the fact that the cart is really loud too.

That's it. It's just them. I want they're eating like it sounds like they're drinking putting from a cup, is what it sounds like. Yeah, yeah, it's real, is that they're eating donuts and drinking coffee. But it sounds like they're just I don't know what the hell they're doing, but it's it's so exaggerated in the I think, yeah, other than maybe you know it triggering you.

I mean, the jokes are coming very fast and furious in this one, the old mug file and then the phone cord that's super long, and then I think the eating gag comes up, and I think right before that we had Johnny and we have of course he's right right on top of everything, and then doctor Joyce brothers right because why not. I remember more celebrity cameos for the Johnny gags, and I'm like, oh, this is our first one. Yeah, I know there's at least one more, because I know who it is. I can think of it. But I'm curious if there's if we go back to a normal person or the last three?

Will these celebrities or the last two? I should say, if I had to guess right offhand, I would say mel Tourmey. I know Tommy Lasorda is one, and I don't know who the other one was, and I could mention Mel Tormey. Yes, Dick Clark shows up at one point. Oh god, maybe it's Dick Clark.

Then is it Dick Clark and the Johnny gag? I think it might be. The Johnny gag goes on for quite some time this time around. You alast got to explain the cinema, I know. I mean I apprecated that it was.

I appreciated that it just kept going. She was another mainstay on daytime TV back in the day, on every talk show and whatever else. What I think she would show up even on like Happy Days and stuff, make weird random cameo appearances whenever anybody needed to help. Yeah, which doesn't really make sense. Was she doing it in the fifties and early sixties?

I don't know. Maybe she was. I just remember her from my childhood. Yeah, I know, to your point, she's an anachronism. Wasn't there a show at some point or was that after this The Doctor Joyce Brothers show is a thing.

Oh, I don't know. I think it came after this show though. I just think it's funny that she shows up. It's just so goddamn nonchalant. I needed to tell me about the Cinderella complex.

He just goes rattles it all off, Johnny the Alleyway expert. Women are afraid of their own success. Well, let's see, she was doctor Joyce Brothers in Taxi. She was Doctor Joyce Brothers and this of course, Oh she wasn't Doctor Joyce Brothers to w KRP in Cincinnati, I mean wow. Yeah, her philmography.

Yes, Spunkless Spunky. The episode of Happy Days, she was in that as doctor Joyce Brothers Spunkless Spunky. Yes, I don't know what that means. Think that one through. Yeah, friends try to dig up what's depressing his faithful canine companions, Spunky, while Howard saddles marrying with a hundred pounds of potatoes to peel for his Leopard Lodges picnic potato salad.

Oh Howard, Hey, we're going to be seeing Doctor Joyce Brothers again in the original Naked Gun. That makes sense, it does, Like it's fucking wild. She was in Loaded Weapon one earlier this time. Oh yeah, yeah, She's in so much stuff in the nineties, in the eighties, Like that's you mentioned She's an anachronism, but not an anachronism enough, I don't think. And she was also in Spy Hard.

I mean she shows up in all these things. This is crazy. Here's something I never knew existed, police Academy in the series. Who wants that? I mean?

How many police academies are there? Is it just twenty minutes of Michael Winslow going for twenty minutes? Because I would watch that in a heartbeat, I would not watch Who wouldn't even be Steve Gutenberg. It'd be like what bobcat golfweight that he is? He in it?

Who plays the Gutenberg character in the show. It's not Steve Gutenberg. David McNaughton. What was his character's name? Maybe he's not in the show.

Yeah, wasn't it like Steve Steve? Steve make it easy for me? Just call me my name, Carrie Mahoney. There is a brand new class of screwups at the police Academy. They faced danger and trying not to let their stupidity get in the way as a fight crime.

It sounds like police squad. Yeah, Joe Flaherty is in this, Michael Winslow is in it. Shocking shocking. Yeah, not saying Michael Winslow needs to get paid. But this show was in nineteen ninety seven.

Tim Kazarinsky even shows up for one appearance. Who in nineteen ninety seven was like, yes, the characters of Police Academy. I mean, Paul mes Lansky still trying to get a reboot off the ground. There were twenty five episodes. This thing ran an hour an episode show.

No, Oh, you'res god. Neil Israel and Pat Proft were two of the big writers. Yeah, there's the next limited series, right said, sign up guys today at nine. And the fact that it came out of ninety seven because the first Police Academy came out in what the late eighties? Oh boy, I mean there's a reason.

I will say that there is kind of a reason the Naked Gun movies work. They are of a certain time and of a certain place. I've only seen the first of Police Academy, and it kind of works because it's a mid eighties movie. I can't imagine that formula working, just like I really can't imagine to bring it back to Naked Gun, and I kind of mentioned it last couple of times. I can't really imagine a new version of Naked Gun working at all, even though I'm interested because it's Liam Neeson who could have that energy, and I've seen him do in the in the What's the What's the War with?

Ye Oh my god, he's so good at it. He's a lists he's really funny. But that style of humor I think was of a certain time and place, the mid mid eighties to mid nineties. Like Mafia is kind of the tail end of that scary movie kind of reboots it a little bit. I don't see the need for Naked Gun anymore the way it was.

Maybe they'd do something different, But this kind of comedy kind of only worked when you could look at the show that it was referencing and be like, all right, enough people know what this is, that we can parody this and people will get it. Well. The original Police Academy was nineteen eighty four, by the way, so I think that this kind of paved the way for that even earlier. Yeah, yeah, would that be under the category of boner comedy? I get a boner while watching it?

But the go is it the first one at John Hughes movie? No, No, am I crazy? No, it's not right? No, no, no, I know miss Lanski was behind the whole thing. I can't remember who directed that that first one.

Man, Why did I think it was a John Hughes movie. I'm not sure. I'm trying to think if he's done anything in a similar vein, but I don't. I can't. Yeah, it was Hugh Wilson that directed it, and it was Pat Proft and Neil Israel that wrote it.

Were they responsible for Bachelor Party? I believe yes, yes, they were, as well as at least one of the look Who's talking movies? And you mentioned Real Genius as well, because I actually listened to that episode of your show and then watched Bachelor Party later that day, totally by coincidence. I haven't seen Bachelor Party since it was out originally, and I remember not liking it, but that was I was twelve years old. It's not my favorite.

That's the one that has Tom Hanks in Aaron. Yes, he's playing a heel which, oh, okay, Tom Hanks work even now it doesn't work. He was in the Elvis movie as Colonel Tom Parker and he's fucking atrocious. It's like, Tom Hanks, you're too lovable, man, You're just you're too much of a nice guy, like I'm sorry. I mean he was a pretty good murderer in Road to Perdition.

That's mob stuff. You could always be sympathetic for the for the mobsters. I know, all your life, all you ever wanted to be able as a gangster shookie lumps shinookie loves. Yeah. Now I'm just a schnookie lumps.

So do you guys recognize the guy that plays is it Eddie Kassalis? Are that name? Herrings a Bell? I was like, I know this actor, and so I had to look him up. He was the dad character in Land of the Lost is a fucking Alzheimer for me back then, back in the seventies, Oh yeah, I used to watch that pretty religiously.

I want you talking about the two thousand and nine Will Farrell film. No, there was a TV show in the second remember that movie? Holy just watch part of it on an airplane. Airplane viewing. I saw it in theaters.

Oh boy, yeah, man, another joke that I think they reuse. And maybe it's one of the naked guns and might be in a scary movie as the whole there's nothing to see here. Please disperse where it's just two people in Norberg using the loudspeaker right at their faces in the crowd of two. Right. I think that might be the second one.

I guess that makes sense because that's also where the is this some kind of a bust. I think that's in the second movie as well. Yeah, because the first movie is the one with the nice beaver, right and thanks, I just had it stuffed, which is like, that's an all time gag. Oh god, Yes, and I'd like this one too, when the captain is chasing all the people out onto the street because there's the bomb, and then you hear the car crash and all of the Detroit this coming back up will that leads to a great gag with the discovery of who the mad bomber is. Yes, the gag isn't who it is, but how they're dressed.

Because every time prior to this you see the suit legs and the dress shoes, the suit arms as well, and she has that's Lanta, the ex wife has that over her dress. I love the sleep. I had to say that was an LOL for me. That is when this show for me, really hits it out of the park, because when it does stuff like that, where it's like, we're going to do it throughout the entire episode and pay it off in the end in the most ridiculous way possible, because that is the most ridiculous outcome for her to have. Just yeah, exactly what it looks like, exactly what it looks like, suit, sleeves and legs, so good dress shoes men, stress shoes.

Right, another gag. It's a literalism gag, but I think it kind of works here, is all right, let the bomber take off right. Stupid. It's so fucking stupid when they don't do it. Every other gag is a literalism gag.

They work. But if they do the Robert Wools school of writing where it's every other or every single gag, you gotta space it out even more than every other gag. It's got to be like every couple gags. You can't just do literalism every time. Like then you'll get episode two of the show where it was a literalism buffet.

Well, the best jokes for you are the ones that are plays on word, you know, oh piece of cake for lieutenant, Oh no thanks, I just eight, or like a mug file like stuff like that, where it's it's a word gag, but it's not even front and center in the scene. Like I appreciate where there's stuff going on and there are word based gags or the things going on in the background, it's I appreciate that more than and dad, and then cut to the thing or shift to pan the camera to the ride and well there it is, like, can't do that every gag, because even the movie doesn't do I mean, that's what makes the movie like Airplane so good, is it's not just they're on instruments that gag over and over. They break it up with some different styles of jokes.

I do like that the mug file is just a strip of paper on the one cabinet. Nothing else has label top notch set design, guys. And in this one, you know, this picks up like I was saying in the very first episode. Now we've got the references to Sally Decker to Martin from I think the second or third movie or episode, and then Gunderson. So we hear about the criminals.

We're in the fourth episode and we hear about the first three criminals all up at Statesville Prison. You mentioned that, and that was one of the confusing things about the order that they aired, and have they done that in each log because I don't remember. Obviously they wouldn't have done it on the first episode, it wasn't in the third episode, but it was definitely in the Gunderson Was that was that's fake Blowfield? Yeah? That was Dutch gun.

His name was Gunderson. Okay, I think I assumed he was Italian. I'm sorry, So I think that's the joke is that he looks so Italian, talks so Italian, but his name is Dutch Gunderson. It's a good name. It's a good fake name.

And I missed that gag completely. Well. I like how they had those little reoccurring gags at the end of the episode. They don't really go anywhere. Well, that whole thing of she's gonna have to build her bombs up at the Statesville prison or he's gonna have to run his crime ring from Statesville Prison.

This one was another freeze frame gag that I so remembered of Norberg coming in and realizing that he's in the freeze frame and then trying to pose with them. The whole posing with the cup of coffee is one of my favorite gags. Was this the one that had a noticeable cut right before they did the freeze frame. They all do. They all have like a little like brit Oh, okay, it cuts because they do the freeze frame and then they cut and then they pick it back up with them freeze framing.

Again. I hadn't noticed it before this. It's really pronounced in this one. Yeah, I haven't noticed it before this one either or not. Gonna have to go back and watch all the other ones.

The one thing that jumped out at me was similar to the what's on first or who's on first type of gag that they did in the first episode where Norberg brings in the lunch order and you've got them interrogating Eddie, but it's matching up with his lunch order. That was pretty good. Out. I'll eat it, but I don't think I should be expected to pay for it. Fine, I'll cover the coffees.

I never picked up on this, which is the line they got ran out of town like common pigmies. Yeah, fucking wild episode. Yeah, I guess, Yeah that's what I said. I mean said, what a wild callback? Right?

Yeah. See that's the kind of thing I appreciate, where like I'm not even really cognizant of it being a gag. Unlike the cigarette gag, it's going to be the phone. On my side of this whole thing is that it's like, oh, every time, we got to have the fucking cigarette gag. Well, the thing is it's the cigarette gag, but it's not the cigarette gag like the owl gag where it's transformed even a little bit.

It's just it's just the cigarette gag. That's I think that's the problem. If if it's like the owl gag, at least they're trying stuff and maybe it doesn't work. But the cigarette gag is just the same thing every time. Was it part of the style bible?

You gotta do it once? Well that's why I'm like, I guess that's the gag though it's the exact same gag every time, and it's always him too, a female either witness or in a suspect and bad wigs again and all we didn't talk about her outfit and the last episode where it looks like she's dressed like a show girl would be flousy. Yeah, the flousy with the red stella. Was that her name? Yeah?

Of course another on the waterfront reference. Yeah, yeah, well that one's actually street Car was that episode? No, that was this episode? This episode? Wasn't it on the Waterfront was?

Yeah, but they said Stella in the last episode that street right right wrong? Brando movie, yeah, Brando movie. Nonetheless, though exactly, I know that we like the act to brute joke, but act to Richard the third is also a very funny title. Gag I like to act to bless you quite a bit is a good one. I read.

Look, that's the kind of joke that I am a fan of, I know, and like I'm a huge homer for that kind of ship. But it always makes me laugh harder than most everything else. All those gags and the Simpsons the same thing, like any of the visual word play or like word driven gags are always the things in the Simpsons that stand out to me that I remember over everything else. Well, I'm always looking at the signs and the backgrounds and stuff, like in the last episode, at one point it says an abandoned locksmith, right, yeah, yeah yeah. Also in that one, like the first guy to get shaken down was a butcher, and so I'm looking at all the things on the butcher shop seeing if some of those were jokes.

I didn't notice any jokes, but I'm just like, I think there were any. Are there jokes back there? Like the mug file thing, right, like, oh yeah, mug file and yeah he's got the four coffee cups like that. You know, again it's a little on the nose, but that don't see any other show doing that. Even again, it's a different kind of comedy.

This is exhaustive comedy. To pack every scene with something, because otherwise you're not doing your job. That's what it feels like, Honest to god. I think if the three of us sat down and try to write one of these movies, we would fucking lose our minds. Oh yeah, yeah I could.

It would be fun to try to write one of these movies to see if you could hack it like za Z. But I just don't know is if audiences are receptive to this kind of comedy anymore, because it's when it's done right, it's done really well, but it's done so poorly so frequently that at this point it's kind of you could parody the movies that are parading those movies, You could, you know, you could really met a textually parody how bad those movies are at paroting the other movies that they're paroting. I almost want to go back and try to watch sledge Hammer from eighty six, because that was another police farce. But I don't think I ever watched an episode sledge Hammer. Huh oh, like Mike Hammer like that.

Yeah, it was Alan Spencer I think did that one. And I can't remember who was the titular Sledgehammer David Rash. I think it is Harrison Pagees and that he was in a Carnosaur. That's super weird. Do you know that movie?

Do you know what what we're talking about? Wasn't that a Corman movie? Yeah? I saw that theatrically Thank You Carnosaurs has birthed out of them, I think is what happened at one point. That came out like two weeks before Jurassic Park.

Wow, I mean, I can tell you which of the two is better. He did that as an episode on the Culture Cast in the first year of the show. I remember enjoying how fucking weird it was there. It is a bunch of John Carl Beekler puppets. Oh yeah, those puppets are amazing.

Those puppets wild. I think Clint Howard. Isn't that he is? So is Raphael sparge Nice. I will tell you that the kind of parody that this does, I can't even think of a contemporary example anymore.

That's how like weird it is to think about. These things were so popular for a while and then like the woman in the window who was wearing white or whatever, like does the most recent one it was a show like, oh my god, I'm gonna watch because we talked about that on that episode of the Culture Cast, Like Jesus Christ, they had a show parody, but it wasn't funny. That's what I heard kept hearing, Like even when I watched a trailer, I was like, wait a minute, are these jokes? Yes, by the title, it's apparent that they're spoofing those the movie you had to watch for that episode with Amy Adams, they're doing those rear window gas lighting the main character thing, and it's on my watch list to watch.

But that's what I kept hearing, was like, it's hard to tell if they're jokes. I kept waiting, and in this you know you can't wait twenty seconds. You can't turn away, or you'll miss five jokes greatly, Like that's almost a negative even for the show. I mean again, it's the show hasn't let it's foot off the gas. Not all the jokes land, but they haven't stopped bombarding us with the jokes.

So apparently the garbage cans that he hits are supposed to relate to the episode number. Really, so I was paying attention to that on that out of order episode, the third, and they don't show the cans in that one, You're right, they just have the audio. Yeah, and they do in this one, and it's four cans. It's four cans. Yeah, I distinctly remember how many cans there are.

That's I'm assuming they cut it or cropped it, so we didn't see how many cans he hit in the third episode that was aired fifth, I'm assuming, so we'll see what happens with the rest of the episodes. Interesting. It's kind of weird that they were so particular that they made sure to crop that out. That's what I'm assuming happened. I mean, that's must have been what happened.

I mean, it was very odd that they just had him hit the cans and you just hear the cans. Yeah, why would you do that? That makes sense now, never picked up on that before. There's a lot of weird little things hidden in this show. I mean again, there's a lot of jokes hidden in each scene.

But oh yeah, that alone is just bizarre. That makes sense though, makes sense. Now. I'm curious to read that seventh episode script and see if they even say, like, he hits seventh Yeah, we will see if it continues, because they'll probably have to change it for the other one that was out of order as well. Yeah, it'll just be him hitting the cans again.

Just the sound, right, Frank hits cans. He hits these cans in certain number dependent on what episode this shows up him. Well, we'll find out how many garbage cans that is when we come back next. We can talk about the butler did it, which was the fifth episode shot but the third episode shown. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, Stanford Brown went immediately from the cameo seat into the director's seat.

We saw it later on. Yeah, however that goes until then, Chris, do you want to tell us where we're all at right now? In Hell? Yes, I do know. We the three of us are all on weird Ingwaymedia dot Com, Mike Show, the Projection Booth, Mark show Wake Up Heavy, and my show, The Culture Cast can be found there, along with this show, the show that we're all collaborating on that you're listening to right now, along with a whole host of other shows, with new shows being added well seemingly monthly, so that's where you can find this show and more shows weirdingwaymedia dot com.

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