Single all the way – Sandy coated apples

Full transcript of Single all the way – Sandy coated apples.

0:01KT: Welcome, yuletide lovers, to another festive week in the For Your Reference household. And I'm starting off with a very real PSA. It can be a lovely time with our loved ones, but also mind your business. Let's get on with the show. Very happy friends and lovers. Welcome back to the For Your Reference podcast. You got your host, KT.

0:01Oti: And Oti.

0:01KT: Ding ding. Check your phone for notifications to avoid family meddling, romantic entanglements, and overcoming all obstacles because Christmas. Enter the final dress rehearsal with Netflix's Single All the Way this week. Woo hoo hoo.

1:08KT: And may I be so bold. Yes, yes, yes. Wow. Can we count this as the officially recognized queer Christmas film? No. We've seen better. We've seen, and that is some shade to Happiest Season, which I believe was last year that we covered. But welcome, welcome, welcome friends and lovers, one and all. For all of those that are unfortunately spending Christmas or this season alone, allow us to be your extended family. We promise to only meddle as much as we can. Whatever you allow on the interwebs,

1:48KT: friends and lovers. Let's get into general stats and information in regards to this film. It is a film. Come and fight me, film bros. This was released on Netflix in December 2021. Director Michael Mayer, writer Chad Hodge. In way of stars, we have Michael Urie, Philemon Chambers, Luke Macfarlane, and a little baby shout out to Jennifer Robertson because we are the Netflix family from Schitt's Creek. Let's get into first impressions, Oti. How did you feel watching this film?

2:22KT: Was this a Kelly Rowland Seat Filler stocking stuffer of a film or did it penetrate your heart chambers?

2:30Oti: It was a filler of sorts for me. Alright. It was very watchable, which is good. Mhmm. At at least at the end of the day, you wanna walk out of something and think, okay. That's watchable. It's alright. I love the characters. I think we've seen Michael Urie in Younger, in which I love. Mhmm. So it was good. You know? But I enjoyed myself. Not to the point of, oh, thinking that this is the best thing that I've watched because, like you said, Happiest Season.

3:02KT: You know what? The the more that time goes on, I absolutely understand Dan Levy and his decision to portray the characters in Schitt's Creek in particular, the queer storylines, because sometimes we can have queer love stories without all the fucking trauma. Happiness doesn't have all that much drama.

3:28Oti: But then we we did we then get burdened with we said this throughout the whole movie that they insisted on matching Nick with Peter was a bit too much.

3:42KT: Yeah. But that's even in the heteronormative world. People just don't mind their business. That's the fucking problem.

3:47Oti: Yeah. It felt weird. It felt like Nick was just hanging around waiting for Peter to, you know?

3:58KT: Yeah. Yeah. No, I absolutely agree. And I guess just capturing off first impressions, it's the stathamness of it all, right? You're gonna get into it, you know what you're getting into and that's what you receive my love. So again, possibly not penetrating the heart chambers, but for the season, for the festive lattes of it all, this definitely, it ticked all the boxes. I really enjoyed it. I really feel like we had characters that we could really bolster around. However, it does succumb to, I guess, having a goal of the couple that will be, you know, the Ethan Hawke, Sarah Snook Predestination

4:38KT: of it all. And we talk a lot about this in any sort of show and film we come across where there's literally nothing wrong with the third person in the love triangle, but it was always going to pivot a particular way because there was nothing wrong with James as a character. It wasn't. He was a good dude. He was. He was a great dude. Not The Best Man though. We need to cover that. Taye Diggs, Morris Chestnut, we definitely

4:38Oti: Well, Taye Diggs isn't the best. Easy.

5:10KT: Well,

5:11KT: well, we are not addressing that today. So Taye Diggs is safe for another day. But I really enjoyed. I really enjoyed this. You know, we've spoken a lot over the three years of the podcast. I love Christmas and the fanfare, but I don't necessarily get into Christmas films only until recently. So I really enjoyed this offering. I love that we had gay leads and we could have it wholeheartedly, unbridled with no pain and no shame.

5:40Oti: Like, even Harold was fucking great. Everyone in this film was great. I loved it.

5:55KT: Yeah. I love that they could just be without all the trauma as well. I think a lot of the times when we watch these movies, there's that sort of aspect It's of like, okay, we'll give you gay characters. We'll maybe let them fall in love, but we're going to remind you that this isn't a happy story. Right? Like, I'm glad we got to just enjoy this film. Okay, you touched on a theme that I wanted to get into. So before we even talk about characters, friends and lovers, the reason why films resonate is because unfortunately, we've been in that situation and because holidays happen annually, we continue to be in these situations. I wanna talk about family meddling. Cutesy,

6:32KT: run time of ninety minutes, but unfucking fortunately, every year for the rest of your life.

6:35Oti: That was intense though. I don't know. I don't know what families are like out there. Mine isn't that medley. There'll be some offhand comments here and there, but that's the extent of it.

6:51KT: No. I think our families are very different. Like, your family will never say anything to my face, but I am for darn sure they are saying shit when I'm not in the room.

6:51Oti: Well, they're saying when I'm there as well either.

6:51KT: Well, out of graces, I haven't learned Swahili just so you can privately discuss me in public. Yeah, I don't know because it really, I guess if we're being us and we're watching the film, it was a bit annoying having, well meaning, like I guess we can talk about the puns and how we felt about it, but

7:27KT: even with Carol and I think moms kinda get a pass and I don't know why that they can continue to meddle probably more than they should. There's like there's there's the world you live in and the family you grew up in, and then there are textbook conversations you have with other people. You can't apply that in the home that you grew up with, that you wet the bed in, that you snot nosed everywhere. You revert back to that in a child, if it's for your projection, friends and lovers. And Carol really felt entitled,

8:02KT: I guess because she was the mother to really But I guess I do need to give praise and credence to the fact that she read The title of the book kept changing LGTT, LGBDDT, but she is trying as much as she can, but it is to the point of, you know, there's a bit of preparation that needs to happen at family gatherings or where you're going to have extended family in particular.

8:31KT: And you're going to get the question of, do you have that special someone? When are you in that special someone gonna tie the knot? When are you going to procreate into the world? Those are, I don't know, just because it's normalized doesn't mean it's normal for everyone. Increde.

8:51Oti: It's it's one of those things that I really couldn't get my head around Carol's sort of insistence. The the one good thing that I found with Carol is she wasn't pushing Nick. I think the fact that she'd gone outside that we are told in the story that she had tried insinuating to to Peter that, you know what? Maybe Nick is the guy. And after it didn't take, she moved along and hooked him up with someone else.

9:08KT: Yeah. But if you were to establish that boundary, she wouldn't have even gotten that far. But it's because you acknowledge that you can't you can't necessarily draw that line in the sand. You're kind of giving as much as you can without giving too much. Right? Yeah.

9:33Oti: Yeah. I think part of it was and this is where it's weird because the surface level, I was like, yeah, cool. This is all entertainment value. But I couldn't dig diving deeper into thinking that, oh, how families and how the family dynamic is and how it all operates. Because quite recently we watched God's Honest Truth where they're talking about families

9:55Oti: hushing your mellow and all that, making you feel as if you can be yourself. You have to revert back to type for the person that they knew from a kid and you can't really grow past that.

10:08KT: Well, actually let's talk about it because a lot of the time, you know, especially when we were doing Taika Waititi's Reference Degustation, where we were going through his filmography and even most notably continue to receive my panties Mads Mikkelsen when we covered Riders of Justice. I talk a lot about people say unconditional love exists, but can you say that you love your parents and also acknowledge potentially the damage they did to you? There you go. Well, no, but those are some hard truths, right? Those are some hard truths that I guess if in the most ideal

10:46KT: sort of scenarios, it's not a comfortable conversation to have. And without being a parent, I would imagine that Carol's fear, it is meddling and it is annoying, but she probably does have that fear that she loves her son so much and she doesn't want Peter to be lonely for the rest of his life. But that manifests in very dubious sort of ways. And I guess in the context of the light fluffiness of this film, it's or a little bit of a sigh, Carol's meddling

11:23KT: again, right? But then it's like, can we get to a point where we actually hold the giggle gaggles and actually hold it and acknowledge it and nurture it or even heal for what it is?

11:23Oti: Yeah. I get that. But she wasn't even the worst instigator in this movie in that front.

11:23KT: She was the initial though. She was the expected and she was the initial.

11:44Oti: True, because the Lisa's daughters take that take that responsibility and run with it to the point where I felt a bit cringey. And I felt like for Nick, like, I don't know. It felt like they wanted to fucking save him for some shit. Yeah.

12:02KT: It felt like a I have a lot to say about Nick's character.

12:05Oti: This lonely black guy, you know, we gotta make him a project. Put him part of the family. I don't know. They wrote that shit too hard. The meddling was a problem.

12:18KT: I think from from Carol's point of view, it was understandable. From Harold's point of view, I'm sorry, but he was the cutest meddler. I kind of give him credences for all of his meddling. Before the daughters, they were very involved, but I guess maybe you can denote it to the fact that they're young women and they don't understand the consequences of their meddling. Yeah. I guess the only way this walked is if the teenage daughters do that.

12:49Oti: No. I think a lot of these films are centered around this. Right? I just felt like they they just upped the ante a bit. Yeah. They upped the ante in the meddling to the point where I felt sorry for Nick.

13:01KT: Yeah. It's like, did you even want this? Did you want this? Like,

13:05Oti: you've been together. You've been living together in what was it? New York for such a long time.

13:05KT: In LA.

13:05Oti: Yeah. I don't know. I don't know.

13:05KT: Without ever being Land of. Without ever being to The United States, they looked very LA to me.

13:05Oti: Okay. They've been there. They've been living together. Mhmm. And when Peter suggested that Nick goes to their family and they pretend to be boyfriends, pretend to be boyfriends. Yeah. He was like, no. You know? There wasn't any inkling

13:34Oti: Yeah. Up until the family brought it about that he thought like, oh, a cock has been raised in in Nick's mind that's turning that, oh, actually, do I love Peter? And I'm like

13:48KT: Yeah. I don't know. It just felt real it felt weird. It felt weird. It felt like a lot. I think if you're watching it just to watch it, super cool guy. But for those that stay at the the dinner table so they continue to eat the roast, here's where we are. Oti and I, this is where we meddle.

14:09Oti: Yeah. Because it didn't even feel as if because at that point, we get introduced to Nick. Nick's feeling for Peter, and there's like, oh. You know, he he didn't say anything against it. He was like, oh. As if he'd take it all on board. At first, I thought he was just being kind Yeah. Before that he just doesn't rub them the wrong way and be like, fuck off. Mind your own business. Yeah. Because you can't really Yeah. And then when it went on, he just looked like a lost puppy

14:36Oti: and he wanted to rehome him and they're shopping him around in the Christmas time. She's like Emmett. Yeah. Yeah.

14:42KT: Okay. Well, we're kind of already talking about Nick and Nick to me, I think he was one of the more interesting characters and I feel like he didn't really get his due. So let's give him let's put some respect on his name, essentially.

14:48Oti: I put some respect on his name when he wanted to leave because he realized that Peter didn't see him that way. Or even if Peter did see him that way, he there's too many feelings. There's too many complications. Yeah. But then at the end, when he It was Christmas. When he gifts Peter a store Yeah. Out of his fucking savings. I'm like, mate, dude. Dude.

15:20KT: Dude yourself. For three years, you've been telling me because Christmas, because Christmas.

15:25Oti: All of these complex sort of storylines all get tied into Wait, a beautiful want to be a store then. This Christmas, I want a store, darling.

15:25KT: I don't know who you're looking at.

15:25Oti: I'm looking at you.

15:38KT: I think both of our bank accounts fight each other. Look. I don't know who you're looking at, sir, unless you're looking at our greyhound who brings zero sponsorship at the moment. But let's talk about Nick. I wanna talk about Nick, and it's exactly what you're saying. So your justification for all of these years doesn't apply here because it frustrates you. You can piss right off, mate. I just don't understand.

16:03Oti: That's the problem. But I don't think you're supposed to understand because it's not anything beyond surface level. Maybe that's it. But when you write something and you say someone gifts their partner well, they've known each other for such a long time. He wants to move back home. That's Peter. But then is this a red flag that someone bought you? If all Peter and Arrows are receiving your store, I'd be like, Like, what what are we what are we reciprocating? What are you expecting? Are are you taking my August while I sleep?

16:37KT: See, this is

16:39KT: this is why you like Happiest Season because you wanna visibly see the trauma and the pain.

16:39Oti: I don't know. Just It just felt a bit too much. It felt Nick was being put on a shop window for the whole movie. And then to reciprocate over, he overshoots it and then gives them a him a store.

16:53KT: Can we establish the timeline? Can we establish the timeline? Because from the outset, it seemed like this was the first time that Nick was going back home with Peter. But as the film unfolded, it was made very clear that he's visited many times. He just hasn't been there during Christmas.

17:16KT: Right? That was a bit confusing because it felt like it was a big deal. It's like, why is he coming home as your boyfriend, but he's been there many times? That kind of took away from the initial, oh, I'm bringing him home as my boyfriend. Right? So that was a whole thing. It's not necessarily a misdirect, but it was initially set out as if potentially this is a serious thing because he's never brought him around before. However, it was established many times, especially through Harold doing stuff around the house and having a handyman

17:48KT: that Nick had been at the house before and they've known him for years. Right? It's just, he was officially, that doesn't even make sense why you would announce him as a boyfriend if he's always there. But anyway.

17:48Oti: The family always wanted them to be together.

17:48KT: Okay. Okay. Cool. So from what we understand, Nick is a successful writer. It was about their dog. We are very inclined to dog stories, especially if it's about beautiful adoption dog stories in the For Your Reference household. So he wrote a successful book. And Was it Yes. And

18:23KT: it was established very early that he had a big chunk of change. Right? And he was going to use it for a rainy day and very selfishly might I say, Peter was assuming that that would be for him to pay for a plane ticket. And it's like, bro, this money isn't entitled to you, at least not yet.

18:41Oti: He was selling he was incepting the seed to to get the store. He was like, oh, there's that. Me, Inception. That's why people shouldn't watch it. Christopher Nolan just made a redirect for, you know? Peter, oh, that book money you're sitting on? Oh, just wait. You can use it for your book ticket. Just planting the seed so that he he he'll be like, oh, I wanna move back home. I love my plants. I don't know what I'll do here. Maybe he walked him. He walked to Nick around the store

19:11Oti: up and down. Oh, this store is vacant.

19:15KT: Friends and lovers, you may listen to more than one TV film review podcast, but I hazard to believe that you would have another podcast that references Inception in Single All the Way. And I was happy to go on that adventure, would you believe? I've I wanted more for Nick. I absolutely wanted more for Nick. And I think I think the trepidation to dig deeper in his character, also James, but let's focus on Nick. I think the trepidation to dig deeper in Nick's character was to allow the potential calibration

19:54KT: between Nick and Peter. That felt very Avatar tentacles, but you understand what I'm saying? Like to give him more depth would make it harder to try and because it was already a stretch. We knew bare optics that these two were going to get together, but the way it was weaseled into the story felt very manipulative. And also at the same time, I didn't care for the way they as the film continued, it was as if Nick had always felt that way. I didn't care for that.

20:26Oti: One more thing though, add to this is Nick has a has a has a has some feelings during the holiday periods because I think his mother

20:39KT: Okay. Sorry. It seemed like her death was very abrupt, but you continue.

20:43Oti: His mother passed away and there was some level of depth and grief and darkness around Nick, especially during Christmas, but they did not want to even set foot even dip their toes in the at all. You'll lose your toe ring otherwise. And this is why I I wonder It's a Wonderful Life as much as you say, they did not shy away from the deep stuff. Because in essence, when you think of Christmas movies, this is this is the stereotypical Christmas movie that people think about, you know? Wow. Where you can't delve where they'll only measure, oh, there's this darkness. The Nick has been alone for Christmases

21:28Oti: all, you know, for the previous X number of years because his mother passed away during the holidays, maybe? I don't know. And he's always been alone to commemorate that. And you know there's a feeling to that Nick got pretty sad the first time Peter brought that about. Yeah. And then, swept under the rug, not to see the light of day. And that's why I felt weird him going back to Peter's

21:51Oti: and being pulled out as if he was some soggy dog on a on a shop window. Yeah. You know, you know, that song we used to sing in nursery where it was like, a wild, so a dog in the window. The wah with the long kalia.

22:08KT: I think you got a spicier version in Kenya. We did have a periphery, but I wish I had your version, Oti. No, I absolutely agree. And I think if love is going to conquer all, don't make him a sad, lonely person that has no love in his life at all. Yeah. Because is that really love? Like

22:37Oti: everything. All the tenterhooks were on him. He's lonely. Because he's lonely. Has And even no if Peter wanted to move to x region, it's fine because Nick is fucking available. Yeah. I don't know. Maybe I felt this strongly because Nick is black. I love how we're spending our most time on him. Yeah. I wanted wanted him to have more in his life rather than waiting around and being fully fucking available to do whatever. Yeah. It just felt really handouty.

23:13KT: No. I no. I agree. I agree. And I'm glad they only had to explain once why he came into money, not Our Kind of People where you had so many ABC Friends and Lovers, the ABC TV show where they had a lot of black people that were wealthy and every character had to explain how they came into that money. Yeah. Yeah. You can't just have rich black people without the background. It will confuse people. They won't be able to focus on the possible.

23:47Oti: Oh, you know what? Since I was a kid, used to toil the streets, man. I used to pick nickels until my nickels stand into into dollars and into millions. Yeah. I'm like, mate, we don't need that. Yeah. You're successful? Be in your success. We don't fucking need your backstory for that. If black people are rich and you're wondering why you're the fucking problem. Oh,

24:10Oti: dear lord. But at least we get to know why Nick has money. We get to know why Nick has money because he wrote a book.

24:21KT: No, I think I think from a writing point of view, they mentioned that because he bought a shop as you mentioned, and as you gestured wrongfully so in my direction, as to explain how and why he was able to buy that shop. But for such a non romantic,

24:39KT: I am romantic in the sense that you can still have a full life. You can still be a complete person and fall in love. I would prefer it that way. I would prefer that everyone is a whole complete person before they make someone else their other person. Yeah.

24:39Oti: Do you feel like Nick was his own complete person though?

24:39KT: I don't think he was allowed the realms to be a complete person. I think

24:39Oti: Dude, they killed off his mother. Every every

25:06Oti: every progressive step we took in his character development was down to Peter's family. Yeah. Every step that he took from his career was because of the bloody niece and nephews.

25:20KT: But no, but let's even talk about this. He was willing to uproot his whole life because that's a scary thing. Like friends and lovers, for those that have followed us along in this podcast, we've talked a couple of times how, at a certain point in time, we were long distance, right? So, it's within the same country of The United States, but like moving countries or moving where you're familiar and you know no one else except for your lover, hopefully friend, but also lover, it's a scary thing because

25:55KT: especially when you have your first fight, you'll realize very early that you only have the other person where you are. And that's a scary fucking thing to go through. Right? So it is a bit, I don't know. It is a bit of a reach to say Nick will drop everything, any sort of tenterhooks that made him uniquely himself to be with Peter and also buy him a shop.

25:55Oti: Yeah, man. I just wanted Nick to have his own independence of sorts.

25:55KT: I'm such an independent person, friends and lovers, that when Nick was explaining it,

26:30KT: I thought he bought it as a hardware shop for himself.

26:30Oti: Yeah. I thought that too.

26:30KT: Yeah. I really thought that. And then he was like, for your plants? I'm like

26:30Oti: It felt too much. He was giving too much. Just

26:43Oti: come on, man. Friends and lovers. I know we usually say because Christmas, but come on.

26:51KT: Because holy healed black man. That's what it should That's what it should be. Friends and lovers, it remains to be seen whether we will continue the Olivia Colman mini series.

27:07Oti: Landscapers.

27:09KT: However, there is a very resonating sentiment about relationships and how one person is the gardener and one person is the garden. I love that by the way. Yeah. It makes perfect sense. I need to find an Etsy. I wanna get that embroidered on a cushion. But Nick is definitely the gardener. Yeah.

27:30Oti: Because Peter is bloody messy.

27:33KT: Oh, he is so messy. If we can reference the ever eternal Taye Diggs again, when Taye Diggs, for some reason, talked about his cool Lester Smoove kiss on the head, forehead smooth. And then he wondered why, like he wondered why he got found Fucking signature for fucking hooking up with people.

27:58Oti: Yeah.

28:00KT: And and as Fabolous said, so I copped her one and copped you one two. That's dumb. Don't buy the same necklace for your side chick. Yeah. Again, friends and lovers, as you heard Oti's doggy in the window, we bring a particular spice on the podcast. But yeah, because Peter, I don't know when he decided to loop in James for the marketing campaign, fine, it's work, fine. But then that whole blow through your mouth because you're sexy. Yeah.

28:33Oti: That felt Especially when they had a moment with Nick during that. Yeah. I thought, oh, that was a special moment. Even when Nick saw the pictures saw the same moment, he was like, bitch, was this Yeah. Just man.

28:48KT: I don't know. He's just bloody messy. He is so messy. And I don't even, you know, everyone deserves love, but all of the love was in his direction in this film. Familial love, romantic love, and it's like, can Nick get some scraps or not?

29:06Oti: No, man. He couldn't. It's like in one of those Jesus' parables and shit, where the dog sits at the foot of a table and just gets all the scraps because the master doesn't give it anything. That's Nick. Nick, the foot of the table, looking at them, they're looking at Peter eat and feast like a bloody Jupiter god or some shit. Okay. I was gonna quote, but it felt too colorful for this board. I don't know. I think Peter has expectations.

29:43KT: He was kind of like Angela from The Office.

29:46Oti: I thought when he found out that his boyfriend at the start of the show or the movie was, you know, married and whatnot. He took a bit of time. Yeah. And maybe that's why Nick would come into the picture. But he was so quick to jump into even if it's Carol that set it all up Yep. He was just like, yeah. Jump right in. I don't know. It felt very, very, very fast.

30:11KT: Yeah. No. I because is it on us? Because we knew, especially even watching the trailer, like it was very clear that Peter and Nick were going to get together. I don't necessarily think it was written that way, but does that mean it's shame on us or shame on them?

30:11Oti: Shame on them, I reckon.

30:11KT: All the shame Oti. Have you healed from Game of Thrones by the way?

30:35Oti: No. Not really. I'm gonna take a break from anything Game of Thrones related even then you upcoming show. Just gonna skip it for a few months.

30:45KT: Although I will plug with our non official CV, Oti and I are available for intimacy consultants.

30:55Oti: Well How bloody annoying was that? I know that's for a lot of the rings in on Amazon Prime, but for such a long time, we'd wanted to substitute to Game of Thrones. And then when Will Wheel of Time or the fuck, something like that was Wow.

31:13Oti: I was like, what the fuck is this nonsense?

31:13KT: Oti's got some presents in his Grinch stocking friends and lovers

31:20Oti: It strap was bloody disappointing. It was it was the Peter of this.

31:26KT: Well, I must commend you for looping back to the film that we are discussing this week. Let's talk about James.

31:33Oti: There's literally nothing wrong with James. There's nothing wrong with James. He's too good. Even when he found out, I thought he'd throw a fit. I thought he'd throw a fit when he saw that Peter and Nick were all lovey dovey. I thought it'd be all that jealous stuff would just be like, Mate, what have I done wrong? What have I done to deserve this? You talk about Nick all the time. GL. Be present in the moment, mate. GL Cool J. Gays love Cool James. But no, man, he had to take it like a champ.

32:06KT: Yeah. And I think it's they didn't necessarily need to make him a victim, but it made it made Peter's messiness all the more clearer. Like we had twenty twenty vision on his fucking messiness. Because James was just out, you know, trying to be a trainer, have a good life, skiing and also in the gym, like he was really living his best life.

32:26Oti: And then Peter just came along spilling hot cocoa all over him. And it's not that I didn't even think that they were not meant to be together or they're not even compatible because I think they were. It's just that for some weird reason, when Peter was like, oh, why don't you go to LA? You love and ride the wave of your all the likes that you're getting. I'm like, oh, okay. But where where is that coming from? Quite literally.

32:58KT: Oti, you'd love Melbourne. Oti,

33:02Oti: like like you'd love Melbourne. You need to leave now. See that on the next minute, tomorrow morning, I'm already in Melbourne, mate. But Peter had just declared his love a few hours, minutes even ago. And he was like, nah. I don't wanna risk it. But now all of a sudden, he realizes,

33:24Oti: oh, Nick is the one just because James says it. Yeah. And this is why it doesn't even make think, like, if we had a sequel to this, they're separated because Peter is bloody messy, and he doesn't know what he wants. Yeah. It might have been Nick all along, but how do you not realize that? And it takes James to tell you that for you to think that, oh, because it's coming from a third person, from a third party,

33:49Oti: then, oh, I need to take that as gospel truth and go with my supposed feelings all along. He knew that he loved Nick all along anyway.

33:56KT: Well, that's exactly it. And let's talk about it because, you know, Peter is many things, but I do not believe he lacks self awareness. He knew what he was doing constantly talking about Nick to James. He knew what he was doing. You don't subconsciously just talk about someone else all the time.

34:11Oti: Yeah. Bloody hell. And he was on a date. Yeah. Most of those, you know,

34:19KT: it's all weird, awkward. He was doing that on the fucking first date. No. But I think just before they did the commercial and put him in the Instagram ad, Peter was like, you know, my family keep talking about me and Nick, but we're on our third date. And it's like, mate, you're talking about Nick. Just pure messiness. Let's move on to some other characters. We talked about Carol, let's talk about Harold.

34:44Oti: He seemed like a cool dad, you know? I thought he'd be then again, this is where I don't know. Maybe it's just my perception, but I was like uncomfortable a bit when he started telling Nick to fucking do handiwork. I'm like You mean like he's a guest sort of thing? Yeah. And it didn't help that Nick was fucking black. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. He's he keeps on coming back to this. It's just so weird.

35:14KT: I feel like you're projecting because every time we go to our parents' house, my dad always asks you to fix the TV and the computer and that sort of stuff. Are you desecrating the sanctity of this podcast to tell me something, Oti?

35:29Oti: No. That's I I don't know. I I think I was just putting too much into it, which was probably nothing. But

35:36KT: No. But it did feel weird because, you know, regardless of culture and race, when someone's a guest in your house, you shouldn't really be asking them to do anything.

35:49Oti: It was a first night. It was literally the first night though there. Yeah. And he comes all along and he's like, oh, I've been trying to fix this all this time. I'm a call a plumber.

35:59KT: Oh, woah, how terrible is that? He's not to the level of Abdul in Squid Game, but there was a subservience to Nick. No, because really, what if what if Nick just didn't he wasn't a handyman? What if he didn't help around the house? What if he wasn't good with the nieces? What if he wasn't good with the nephews? Does that make him less of a prospect? Yeah. It shouldn't. But from a story point of view, I guess it Yeah. Would

36:31Oti: He was literally perfect in every way. He had to bend backwards to do to do fucking everything so that nobody can love him. To just be seen. You just have to be fucking perfect Yeah. For you to be good enough for Peter. And Peter, as we all know Nothing. Is flawed as.

36:45Oti: He offers zero. And this is where we get the disparity, isn't it? Yeah. Peter has to do all those things. Fix the fix everything in the house. Be the bloody best handyman that they could be. Yeah. Take care of the nieces and nephews, read to them. Yeah. Babysit.

37:04KT: And then Peter's like, you're spending more time with my family than me. Well, it's like, it's your fault. Like, you can be spending You brought me here. You go on fucking dates all the time. You never hold. But let's also mention, it didn't even seem like he wanted to spend time with his family. So why is he making like it's a problem he hasn't spent time with them? And what what exactly in that journey made him realize that he wanted to actually be there around his family when he was not even with his family to begin with?

37:25Oti: Yeah. I don't know. I think we're reading too much into a movie that's made for super surface level shit, and I think that's what it is.

37:45KT: I think you win, Oti, because I think our most jovial, most happy Christmas review episode is It's a Fucking Wonderful Life. Get in, son. Even with open hand slapping children. Sometimes you gotta get the slap to get to the happy ending. You may be qualified friends and lovers, but don't worry about our childhoods. I really enjoyed It's a Wonderful Life. I just don't think it's a Christmas film. And apparently that is the conflict every year in the For Your Reference household. I

38:17KT: need to take some time friends and lovers. We have featured Jennifer Coolidge for the third time of our podcast in this fucking year. Oh. And I'm fucking fortunately, I was mad at both offerings that I didn't even get to sploosh at Jennifer Coolidge altar. Legally Blonde, if you wanna go and check out that episode, as well as The White Lotus by the white man. That's not racist. Go and see who wrote the show. So love splooshes accolades in Jennifer Coolidge's altar. This film was so aware, if not for anything else,

38:59KT: I just love the fact that it brought us Jennifer Coolidge. I think aside from Jennifer Coolidge, the only real campiness we got was like near the end of the film when he started dancing to Britney Spears. Also shout us to Netflix budget for being able to afford Britney Spears as well as

39:16Oti: A free Britney Spears of that. Thank you. Thank you, sir.

39:21KT: Whitney Houston's Joy to the World. Would you say Whitney Houston's Joy to the World is the best rendition of Joy to the World? Oh, did you hear Oti Waiting to Exhale? Friends and lovers. Get in the bin, mate. How dare you? I will get in the bin and I will mount a Bobby Brown. Don't you worry. Oh, of course, mate. Yeah. Right? But I love Jennifer Coolidge and obviously it was pure fan service. And I think if I may have more than one

39:53KT: card of fan service, I fucking loved it. She's like, the gays love me. I don't know why, but I like it. One of the best parts I love about The White Lotus was her spreading those ashes and crying. I just pure thespian level. There's Edi Gathegi, Jennifer Coolidge, Jennifer Tilly, and that's it. Like, those are the only thespian actors.

40:20Oti: Wow. Someone's forgotten the Kaluuya. You're welcome.

40:27KT: Am I? Yeah. You are. It has been a while since we covered Daniel Kaluuya.

40:33Oti: I'm just gonna say, I don't really get the Jennifer Coolidge love, man. Oh. Oh, is that the response it warrants? That's me backing away and allowing everyone to attack you. I don't know. Ever since I was a kid, I just didn't understand. I was like, why is it so over the top? Every single time? The point. No. I just I don't know. Maybe maybe that train to get on board just oh, that's not a train. That's more of a car.

41:07KT: If I may reference Netflix's Q-Force, you were too busy sniffing your own straight man fart.

41:10Oti: Wow.

41:11KT: Yeah, you're welcome. Okay. Shout out to Wanda Sykes, ever eternal international treasure. Is there anything else you wanna say about this film? Are you proud that the real estate was talking about the plight of the black man? Yeah.

41:26Oti: Italian's moment. I enjoyed aspects of it. I think when you look under the surface a bit, you could always find issues with anything. I I think I gravitated towards Nick more. Yes. I just didn't understand the path he took and the decisions he made. Mhmm. It just felt weird and subs you know, just servitude sort of stuff.

41:48KT: Yeah. Like you only exist to serve the main character.

41:53Oti: Yeah. Yeah. He really didn't have anything to do. He was just a duck, scrub it until, you know, he wasn't and he needed something else. Yeah. Exactly. But I think that's that's the that's the price you pay when you watch these sort of movies that don't wanna go deeper. And, you know, you can have a Christmas movie that's not just reindeers and snow

42:16Oti: and I don't know. And I think that's where you get people like KT who watch good interesting movies like It's a Wonderful Life and come back and be like, that's not a Christmas movie because it wasn't all Starface.

42:28KT: All I will say to that is if I said people like Oti, I would get in trouble. You would. Friends and lovers, For those that were looking to have a happy festive time, hopefully you can find that in other episodes. And for those that only experienced pain during this time, you're most welcome. Let's finish off in a segment we call, For Your Reference, Oti.

42:58Oti: I am gonna reference Happiest Season. Because I think it's one of the best Christmas movies I've watched of late.

43:07KT: I will reference, and if you've been listening in linear time, also in a festive linear time, I referenced Jay Baruchel last week, and I'm going to reference Jay Baruchel this week with the TV series, The Moodys.

43:25Oti: Season one though, maybe not season two.

43:25KT: Dare you?

43:25Oti: So I'm just saying, season two became about something else, not other other than Christmas.

43:25KT: Man, Nick didn't take up enough space and you're taking too much, sir.

43:25Oti: I'm overcompensating.

43:41KT: If you'd like to investigate how Oti attained his wealth on Twitter and Instagram, we're at ForYourRefPod. Write us an email at hello@fyrpodcast.com. We're also on Sound Off. If It's a Wonderful Life is a open hand slap to the Christmas genre podcast. If you like to leave a rating and review, and we'll see you guys at our Christmas special.

44:03Oti: See you. Yeehaw.