Analyze Scripts

Welcome back to Analyze Scripts, where a psychiatrist and a therapist analyze what Hollywood gets right and wrong about mental health. Today, we are joined by Dr. Jessi Gold (@drjessigold) to discuss the first season of "Yellowjackets" on Showtime. We break down the show's depiction of various forms of posttraumatic stress disorder and how the characters' pre-trauma backgrounds contribute to the different symptoms they experience in adulthood. We also explore the show's depiction of adolescent, teenage girl group dynamics, and the blurriness between psychosis and mysticism. We hope you enjoy!

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Dr. Katrina Furey: Hi. Welcome back to another episode of Analyze Scripts. My name is Dr. Katrina Fury and I'm A psychiatrist. And I'm joined by my friend and co host Portia Pendleton, a licensed clinical social worker. And today we are super excited because we also have Dr. Jesse Gold joining us to discuss season one of Yellow Jackets, the hit show on Showtime. A couple of episodes of season two have already started rolling out, but we're going to focus on season one today because there's a lot to talk about before we welcome our guests. I just wanted to give a little bio. I feel very strongly about reading people's full biographies, especially women, so I'm going to read the whole thing and I love it. Jesse Gold is an assistant professor and the Director of Wellness, Engagement and Outreach in the Department of Psychiatry at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. She's a nationally recognized expert on healthcare worker mental health and burnout, particularly during the Pandemic college mental health using social media and media for mental health advocacy and the overlap between pop culture and mental health, including celebrity self disclosure. She works clinically as an outpatient psychiatrist and sees faculty, staff, hospital employees and their dependents, particularly their college age kids. Dr. Gold also writes for the popular press and has been featured in, among others, the New York Times, the Atlantic, InStyle, the Washington Post, Time and Self. So, like, no big deal. She is on the Rare Beauty Mental Health Council and the Mental Health Storytelling Initiative and a co author of The Mental Health Media Guide, which can be [email protected]. Dr. Gold is a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania with a BA. And a master's in anthropology, the Yale School of Medicine, and completed her residency training in adult psychiatry at Stanford University, where she served as chief resident. Again, no big deal. Her website is Dr. Jessegold.com, and she can be found at Dr. Jessegold Drjessigold on Twitter, Instagram and TikTok. Cool. Well, thank you so much for joining us, Jesse. This is so super cool.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Thanks for reading that thing. I was really hoping everybody would get to hear that also.

Dr. Katrina Furey: I know, I know. If you want to tell us your favorite color or your deepest, darkest fears, we got all the time in the world.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Can't wait.

Dr. Katrina Furey: So speaking of deepest, darkest fears, this is probably one of mine. Plane crash in the middle of the mountains of Canada. In adolescence, I cannot imagine a more frightening, terrifying experience. And Portia here, we're learning that she likes more of, like, the light hearted things. And I really like the dark and twisty nasty things.

Dr. Jessi Gold: So I was like, really worried for you.

Dr. Katrina Furey: I know.

Portia Pendleton: You gave me some. You were like, episode six, trigger warning this. And I was like, okay. I watched some things on. I skipped over a couple of scenes.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah. I was like, you got to watch it in the day with the lights on, hold all your pets. It's a lot, right?

Portia Pendleton: It didn't help my plane anxiety, but.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Oh, yeah, I forgot you have plane anxiety, too. You got to take a beta blocker before you watch these.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Who.

Portia Pendleton: You're just fine.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Oh, gee, sorry about that. It's a really interesting show in that when you try to tell people about it, one minor is just horrible. You're like, hey, it's a really great show. I swear. It's about teenagers who crashed in an airplane and may or may not become cannibals. And also they see them as adults, too. And people are like, what? And I don't like horror and really dark stuff. I like psychological thrillers. That bother me. I thought you guys said you kind of have boundaries on what it's going to show, and you can choose not to watch some of the stuff.

Dr. Katrina Furey: And I think it's just such a fascinating portrayal of how one trauma affects so many people in a different way and then how you sort of simultaneously see the depiction of their back stories and their future stories and how they all weave in. And it's like at the beginning, the things you think are going to happen don't happen.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Yeah.

Portia Pendleton: I think Vanessa the goalie. I liked that we saw a little bit of her backstory with, like it seems like mom is an alcoholic. She was kind of like a caregiver. And then the trauma of the plane crash, and then she was left in the plane almost like, died via fire. And then comes out and is really mad at Jackie and Shauna for kind of like leaving her there. So I think even that initial, it's like she had a double trauma right at the crash scene, like the crash, and then had her friends leave her for dead. And then she survives. And then I think that she does not like Jackie.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right? Yeah. So Vanessa, again, to remind everyone, because there are a lot of characters, is the redhead on the goalie team, and she's ties love interest van oh, yeah.

Dr. Jessi Gold: People knowing kids.

Dr. Katrina Furey: And even like you're saying there we see those traumas right back to back, but also we see her backstory of her mom and how she's kind of been left by her mom in that way. And now here she is strapped in a plane that's exploding or catching fire, and now she's kind of left again but somehow gets out. So I think maybe we'll start with a rundown of the main characters.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Sure.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Probably just to orient ourselves a bit. So Jackie is on the team. She's kind of like the it girl, right? Like, she's the pretty one. She's the popular one. She has the boyfriend. And I thought she was the one we saw running naked through the woods originally. Who they sacrifice or something. Something. Now I don't know. I don't know who anyone is anymore. And then Shauna, played by Melanie Linsky, is her best friendfriend. Of me, maybe unclear. She's the one who ended up having sex with her boyfriend, with Jackie's boyfriend and getting pregnant. Oh, my God.

Portia Pendleton: Ends off right. She is still pregnant.

Dr. Katrina Furey: She's still pregnant, yeah. At some point. The trigger warning I gave you, Portia, was she tried to have an abortion in the woods. I thought that was really heart wrenching. I can't even find a word strong enough. What do you think? What did you think about all that part? Yeah, that part. That little part.

Dr. Jessi Gold: I think I get it in a lot of ways. If you don't have food and you are a kid anyway, like, what would have your choice been? A choice in the normal kind of setting, let alone setting where you're starving, everyone else is starving. You know nothing about babies or how to have a baby, and you are a baby. And I mean, I get and it's almost like you saw something on TV and that's what you do and so that's what you try to do. That's what it felt like.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right.

Dr. Jessi Gold: This is what I thought be a thing. And it's almost like just sort of the influence of restrictions and what people learn from that. But it's heart wrenching and it also just shows how scary it must be to be in that position as a kid anyway, let alone after a flame crash in the wilderness.

Dr. Katrina Furey: I know.

Dr. Jessi Gold: I think it's a lot of trauma and a lot of vulnerability and it comes to ahead of it there. But I think it shows also how they support each other.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Introduce Taisa, but she's there.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right, exactly. And that dynamic between Taisa and Shauna, I feel like again, in their adolescence and now in adulthood, as they're coming back together, just thinking that they were there together through these awful, horrible things. And when Ty, like, really is showing up for her in that way, I just thought was really intense and just really interesting way to see how the characters relationships develop over time. And with Ty, like, keeping that secret for as long as she could about the pregnancy and things like that, tyisse is another main character. Yeah.

Portia Pendleton: I was kind of shocked, I guess, at the end, which I don't want to just skip all over her other.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Scenes, but how it really did in.

Portia Pendleton: Fact impact her, like eating the dirt, her sleepwalking, her family situation, kind of like after the crash, her son, so we think is like the problem.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right.

Portia Pendleton: Or having some reaction to his mom, clearly. And then her political run, and then all of a sudden trying to jump back into the media. And it seems like all the other characters are like, we planned and we promised that we wouldn't do this, we were going to stay kind of under the radar. And here you are doing like a Senate run.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right.

Portia Pendleton: But I feel like I like her character a lot as a teen, I feel like she's really strong. I just saw a lot of resilience with her through everything, like trying to go out and lead them to find help, knowing that it was probably like a death sentence, but she was going to risk it before the animal attack. And then her relationship with Van is really sweet. I feel like there's some sweet moments that come out with her and her family and then with Van kind of back and forth, which is nice in kind of the whole conflict within the trauma, and it being really terrifying.

Dr. Katrina Furey: I don't feel like we got a lot of her backstory. Pre crash?

Portia Pendleton: I don't think so.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Did we hear a lot of I don't think we really got a lot.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Remember correctly, her parents were kind of supportive. They were there, they said, Bye. There wasn't anything that we saw that was particularly traumatic in a Natalie kind of way. I think some of the backstories are there to show that sometimes the resilience comes from previous history, previous trauma, or you never know what people are coming in with that's important. We can have the same trauma affect everybody, but whatever your history is, it.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Might affect you differently 100%. And we see a lot of her family in the present day, like with her wife and their son. And I think touching on her sexuality with Van being a teen in the an all girls soccer team, how she was very reluctant to be open at first and then got more comfortable. I thought that was a really interesting storyline, too, and how she, again really showed up for Shauna when she really, really needed her. And, yeah, I think with her character in particular, all the snippets along the way of, like, she's running for politics, for Senate, I think state senate. And then the stuff with her son, at first I thought, like, oh, something's up with her son. And then as things unfolded, it was like, oh, she's the lady in the tree. He's not seeing. I thought, does he have some sort of early onset psychosis or is he stressed or what's? Like his full story? And then I thought the show's depiction of his evaluation with the two way mirror, that was him. Right. Was really good. I think overall, I think the two way mirrors and stuff, I don't know about. At Wash, you like, at Yale, we didn't have that, but I know at Duke, when I interviewed, they did stuff like that for family therapy, so I know they do that, and I think it was actually a pretty good depiction of that. And I always love when I see accurate and well rounded and positive depictions of therapy in the media, because so many times they are terrible.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Yeah, I mean, it's sort of like you're concerned about your kid, you come together to figure it out. It's important enough to you. You can see that there's some tension about who it's more important to, which I'm sure comes out. At Stanford, when we learned outpatient, we even did it behind, and the patients knew we'd, like, come out and talk to people and go back in. It's interesting from the family side to also have the family behind and giving feedback. We're allowed because I think people tell their own stories and kids tell their own stories, and it helps to have context or see even family reactions to things when people are talking. But I think in a lot of ways, too, it wouldn't be surprising if their kid had issues and the mom was like, there's all this data even, like, let's say extreme example comes to my head. Like, Holocaust parents, like parents who survive the Holocaust. There's a lot of restriction and limits and trauma exposed to the next generation 100%. That doesn't surprise me. If you had something like that, that a kid could struggle 100%, it makes a lot of sense.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right.

Dr. Jessi Gold: So you're kind of like, okay, I get where that's it wasn't, like, surprising that the kid could be dark and struggled 100%.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right?

Portia Pendleton: Yeah.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Look what happened to the mom.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Of course there's something there, and, like.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Actually, it still is the mom. Yeah. We had a fellow Yale psych grad, Christine Aradondo, on a couple of episodes back to talk about Encounter and, like, the very different movie from this show.

Dr. Jessi Gold: But.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Totally different vibe, but talking about that intergenerational trauma, like how the first trauma kind of trickles down in Generations. At first, as we were watching Taisa and her family in present day, I was thinking, is that just like, you're saying, jesse, of course he might have some stuff going on, and she's, like, running for Senate, and he comes from a home with two moms. It sounds like maybe he had switched schools. Now he's in public school. There's a lot going on. I didn't see coming that it was going to be like, Taisa doing all these things sleepwalking. But then as they connected that to what happened to her in the woods sleepwalking, and when Van and her would tie themselves together and she would bite her and all these things, I was like, oh, okay, now I see it. But it's really sad to see that kind of unraveling of her family. The moment where she asked Simone to go stay with her mom, and she was really pleading with her, like, you don't understand. I could really hurt you. That really broke my heart, but I thought was really genuine and authentic. And I don't even think she's aware of everything she's capable of. I don't think she remembers that place in the basement with the dog head and all this stuff. Right. I would say I don't often see things like that with PTSD. I feel like that's a very severe depiction of it. I guess it could happen. Right.

Portia Pendleton: Or almost just like how much it impacted their brain. Their trauma is just so severe, and it seems like they have not really talked about it with people because everyone wants something from them.

Dr. Katrina Furey: They just want to know, did you eat each other?

Dr. Jessi Gold: Right.

Portia Pendleton: And it seems when we meet them as adults, they're not really close. I think some of them talk or I know that Tyesa had paid for Natalie's rehabs, but it sounds like they're not like, friends and they so desperately need to I mean, Shauna finally tells her husband some of the details, and it's just like he has no idea. So, I mean, I think gosh, it's not even like they processed at all.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right?

Dr. Jessi Gold: Yeah. I think it's like an extreme dissociation. I suppose sleep does all sorts of weird things with trauma and safety and not wanting to be asleep because they're not safe and all of that. So I guess some of that is possible. There's, like, a mystical aspect of the show too, but I think inherently the not processing is going to be a reason for the dissociation. The portrayal is, like, super extreme, which it is. Like, I've never had a patient, like, killer dog.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right. And create, like, a shrine.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Also never had a patient who was surviving in the wilderness and eating people. So I don't know what that really does to someone from a patient, from having heard a story that was similar. So I guess it's definitely extreme, but there's some elements of possibility in there. I'm hoping at some point they show us that they forced them into therapy at least a little, and that they all just didn't say anything because they didn't want to get in trouble. Probably what they thought was like, a crime. At some point, they actually hunt people, and so at some point, they kill people. That's a crime. I sort of wonder if you find them, you're going to probably get them into you would hope, right? I don't know. Maybe that wasn't a thing, and you wouldn't have forced them, but it seems weird you wouldn't have had them go to, like, one session or even in the hospital.

Portia Pendleton: I'm assuming that when they were they were all evaluated, all taken to a thing, all given IV fluids and kind of checked out. And also I would hope that there was a psychiatrist coming in and being like, hey.

Dr. Jessi Gold: You'Ve had a lot going on.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Tell me. Great. But I would think, how do they trust anyone? I don't even know. I think it'd be really hard for any of them to do therapy. I feel like the one who I would think would maybe jump on is Misty, who I find I don't know. Well, I think she'd do it for attention. Okay. I think she would, like, feeling connected to someone who wants to listen to her and cares about her.

Portia Pendleton: It's so funny.

Dr. Katrina Furey: She's one of my favorite characters.

Portia Pendleton: Both absolutely. Oh, she terrifies me.

Dr. Katrina Furey: I love Christina Ricci. Like hello, Casper. Hello. Now and then. I love anything. I want to watch her all the time. But she destroyed that box thing, the signal thing.

Portia Pendleton: She watches the rat in the pool or the mouse struggling.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah.

Portia Pendleton: That's pre crash.

Dr. Katrina Furey: I know. Portia what do you think, Jesse? Are you terrified?

Dr. Jessi Gold: I mean, I wonder if anyone ever figures out she destroys a boxing. Never. Because they talked to her.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Again, people died because of her, so there's no way right.

Portia Pendleton: They can't have and I was confused about that folder thing that she has all the information in in the woods. She keeps it in the trunk.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah. She, like, doesn't want them to be discovered.

Portia Pendleton: And why do you have that?

Dr. Katrina Furey: I don't know.

Dr. Jessi Gold: It's because she's, like, popular there.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Exactly. That's what I mean.

Dr. Jessi Gold: She has skills that people want there.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right.

Dr. Jessi Gold: On the team. She's like the water girl manager, water girl person who's there. Whereas in the wilderness, she can help. And I think feeling needed and wanted is something important to her. Whether there's some kind of actual severe pathology there that's dangerous is one thing, but I also think it's just like a desire to be liked and making rash decisions as a result, including destroying the box, because maybe she thought people would find them eventually and it would just give them a couple more days together or something. Like, I doubt she was like, I bet we're screwed forever now. But I think in the moment, she was like, I like this, and I like being needed, and I'd like to keep being needed, so let's just totally have that. Stay.

Dr. Katrina Furey: But then she tries to poison the guy who loses his leg. I just think she might be a sociopath.

Portia Pendleton: She definitely is demonstrating some traits.

Dr. Katrina Furey: At least two traits, and then she kidnaps the reporter lady and ties her up. Right? Yeah.

Dr. Jessi Gold: She's also really defending her own. Right. So it's again, she's protective of her people and their story and what she reporters kidnapped to help them. In her mind. I'm not saying it's, like, healthy, but the decision to do that was to protect her friends. She wants to protect Natalie, and I think that she sees where she's stronger in some aspects than they have been, and I think their story she tries really hard to protect. So I don't know. I think that there's definitely some problems going on up there and that she definitely kills kind of easily or chops legs easily and things like that.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right.

Dr. Jessi Gold: But in the same respect, she has a defense of people she cares about. That's nice. In that setting, I want someone to kill for me. But it's nice to know if you.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Needed it, you could call her.

Dr. Jessi Gold: I guess she means that she'd be there, right? I don't know.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah, she's there through Thick anthony yeah.

Portia Pendleton: And the setting is so unusual.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right.

Portia Pendleton: It's so not a societal norm that it's like, it's interesting, like, who does well in that setting, right?

Dr. Katrina Furey: Exactly.

Portia Pendleton: Jackie feels very normal teen and she has like a really hard time. She's popular in like a traditional high school setting, falls apart in the woods. And Misty is not popular in high school setting. And then kind of like really need really helpful and shows up for people in the woods. It obviously still does some questionable things, but I think that's just interesting because in our society, some of these people don't fit in and have these antisocial.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Traits, but then it turns out really useful when you're starving in the woods.

Dr. Jessi Gold: I do agree, though, that the social hierarchy of ending is interesting. Right. And I think it's one of the things that makes it kind of cool that it's that population of like, roles, because you're like, teen girls are mean girls and there's bullying and there's reasons people are cool. Like they're dating the popular guy and they're pretty and they put out I don't know. Right. It's like things that are admired as characteristics in a person who's popular, but then when they go to the wilderness, that person has zero skill set and actually annoys them.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Because they can't do anything. Right. They're like, you're obviously useless here. We don't need a cheerleader. And at times that helps them right. To have the support and care. But a team captain for a soccer team is not the same as a team captain for a soccer team that needs to survive.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right.

Dr. Jessi Gold: That upending, I think is really cool.

Portia Pendleton: I think it's just like, of course that she goes for Ben and then he turns out he's gay and he.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Kind of is so afraid of her.

Portia Pendleton: It seems like that he's willing to.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Go to the prom. Yeah.

Portia Pendleton: That they're in this secret relationship or that he plays into this vanity.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Well, yes, he did chop off, kill him, poison him. Again and again. It's the think about again, both we see Ty and Ben with their sexuality and struggling, like how open to be. And again, maybe the wilderness when you're starving isn't the time to come out. For Ben it's hard, but I feel.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Like for Ty it's like safe and protective altogether. And she wants to be loved by someone and loving someone is protective against all of the bad stuff. I don't know, I think that that story, like the Van and Ty thing is sort of like really bad things happen, but you can together dance with somebody. Emotions are weird and mixed and don't all have to be bad at once. And sometimes you need those little moments of wind keep going.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right.

Dr. Jessi Gold: I don't know. I think that for them it was like, whatever and we love each other, might as well. This is the last time we see each other, we might as well. And I think it was safe, right? That stuff ends up being kind of like a safe place for them.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah. And again, it's interesting how they depict that being a safe place and, like, a really sweet storyline and theme to carry through when there's so little sweet storylines. Right. But then for Ben, the coach, how it didn't feel safe for a really long time until it kind of felt like he had no other choice.

Portia Pendleton: He discloses to Natalie, which I think.

Dr. Katrina Furey: They have a nice bond, I thought.

Dr. Jessi Gold: I wonder if it's just like, in a way, he's an assistant coach, too, right?

Dr. Katrina Furey: I think so.

Dr. Jessi Gold: I think it's like he was left to take care of all of them. And he's not that old.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right. He's probably, like, 19 or something.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Just graduated college, are still in college kind of age. He's not supposed to be the one helping people survive while he's barely surviving himself. I can't imagine how pain that would be.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right. Yeah.

Portia Pendleton: I think we want to talk about Natalie and her character.

Dr. Katrina Furey: There's a lot to talk about with her. First, how did her hair stay blonde in the wilderness for 19 months?

Portia Pendleton: It starts to grow out, I think, towards the end, it's like, this much.

Dr. Katrina Furey: I thought about that, too. There were some things like that. I don't think Van would have survived that wolf attack. Like, she totally, unfortunately, would have gotten septic, I think. Right. There are just some plot holes, we'll call them, but we can have some.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Creative life fantasy in it.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah, I would like that fantasy. Right.

Dr. Jessi Gold: I don't think they were, like, thinking so much about the hair or I don't know. I mean, lottie's off medicine.

Dr. Katrina Furey: I know the location decision about what.

Dr. Jessi Gold: That is something I haven't talked about Lottie, but yeah, I think Nat's backstory is the most interesting. I think Natalie probably coaxed in the way most people don't think they will, but will.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right. I totally agree.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Using alcohol, being aggressive, like, using drugs, like, not really wanting connection because they go away.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right.

Dr. Jessi Gold: It's a really common reaction, though. Like, most people, I think, would be like, well, of course they won't turn to that. That's not me. But it is if it makes the feelings go away.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah. I mean, look at COVID and how high the alcohol rates went up. This totally happens.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Yeah.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Natalie was a really fascinating character, I think, all around, and she just got more and more complex, I think, like, as the yeah. As the season went on, almost, to.

Portia Pendleton: Me, the most, like, typical reaction. Like, not I feel like I wasn't surprised about how she was handling things.

Dr. Katrina Furey: At all after yeah.

Portia Pendleton: Her teen prior crash traumas, and then obviously the crash. But I was kind of interested to see where she learned how to shoot the gun.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Right.

Portia Pendleton: So then it kind of flashes forward to her and her dad, who seems abusive, and then she is pointing the gun at him and clicks the trigger. He must be very abusive. That's a pretty far place to go, and then it doesn't go. And I'm like, now he knows that you are going to shoot him, and.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Then we see how abusive he is, that he's so insulting, and then he.

Portia Pendleton: Falls and shoots his head. And I was like, wow, that is traumatic to see, like, gory and wow.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah. Trauma.

Dr. Jessi Gold: And I also think it's like the things she doesn't I'm sure none of them know that. It would be shocking to me. They probably know her dad's dead. Right. And that's it. I doubt any of them know that. They just were like, oh, she knows how to shoot a gun because they went hunting or something. I don't know. I mean, I think maybe that guy who's, like, he's a cop now. Maybe he was there and kind of had more of a relationship with her.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right.

Dr. Jessi Gold: I don't know that she would have told that. He has the people in the wilderness.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah, no, I don't think so.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Like, hey, soccer team talk is not like that. Probably. I don't know.

Dr. Katrina Furey: I was surprised she was on the soccer team, I have to say.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Yeah, she's edgy for it, which is actually good. Right. I think that could be part of it. She actually was decent at the game, and so for her about the stuff that comes with it, as much as she actually liked the sport, and it's.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Probably a great way to get out some aggression as a teenage girl going through that and probably so much more at home. And then when she was at the soccer game with that guy from high school and his kid, and she was, like, telling him, you do this move and you do that move, and then he won. I thought that was really sweet, but I wasn't surprised that she didn't sort of continue with that connection. I think, like you said, Jesse, connections and closeness feel really scary to her. So I think she's someone who, I think, craves it but avoids it, given everything she's gone through. And I really am interested to continue seeing and learning more about her relationship with Travis when they're in the woods, and then what happens, like, when they all get back. Yeah.

Portia Pendleton: Because that was just also, like, another person leaving, right. When he's, like, we think killed the police. Don't think so, but we think so.

Dr. Katrina Furey: That he was murdered.

Portia Pendleton: That's another huge loss for her.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Oh, 100%. And she has this feeling like that he wouldn't commit suicide. And then we get into that symbol, and I think that kind of brings us also into talking about Lottie, who was, like, a surprise. Big deal at the end. I was really fascinated at the beginning when they showed that she was on a typical antipsychotic, and I was like, oh, no. What is going to happen to her in the wilderness without this? This is not good. And then when she started having these visions. And stuff. It was really interesting to me. How do you frame it? Is it more mystical or is it psychosis? And it's interesting to see how the whole team reacts to it while they're all under duress and desperate for some sort of leader and some help and.

Portia Pendleton: On mushrooms, that's when she kind of becomes this leader in this attempt to.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Sacrifice kill the Travis. Yeah.

Dr. Jessi Gold: I think it's like when people ask us if cult leaders have mental illness. Right. And I think probably there are some people that do and some people that don't. And people who follow cults are not necessarily psychotic either. But I think that there's this gray line that very blurry with that stuff, where diagnostically, they don't necessarily have that, or they have more insight than we would consider someone with psychosis having or something. But it kind of shows that blurred lines and cult leaders and psychosis that I think is super interesting, this desire for something bigger than them, almost like religion, is also where cult comes in, which is, like, I need to believe in something to keep going. And the thing that they're starting to believe in is, like, the power of nature and the relationship with nature and nature saving them. And what Lottie can do is because she could talk to animals, whatever it is. And it's just sort of like, I need to have a higher power. The higher power just happens to be based in this world of someone who might not be in touch with reality. But I also don't think that they know that. They're like, I bet Lottie's off her med, right?

Dr. Katrina Furey: 100%.

Dr. Jessi Gold: No, that's a secret.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right?

Dr. Jessi Gold: Because she just, like, ran out.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah. NBD.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Doesn'T she take medication? Maybe we should listen to her. Which I think would happen in the real like, as bad as that is. Right. Like, in sort of stigmatizing, to sort of assume that that person is having some sort of mental illness related thing. I think that in the world, if someone knew you were on antipsychotics and then we're in the wilderness and not on antipsychotics, they'd say, Where's that coming from? Her head should be you scared and worried about her as opposed to following her. And that saying is true. But they just wanted something to believe in.

Dr. Katrina Furey: I know. And so I think it just totally speaks to how desperate they are, just like you're saying.

Portia Pendleton: And Cam is one of the first ones I'm sorry, not Cam. Van is one of the first ones to really take an interest in it and kind of also want the seance, and then when they're back, she just kind of wants to pray over their meal. And I think it's interesting that Tyisa.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Is really opposed to it.

Portia Pendleton: Does it then, kind of for Van, but even with just their backgrounds and this is really, like, making big assumptions here, but based on Van's backstory, I feel like it's less surprising that she really needs something to kind of anchor her and ground her. And TYSA is more able to, at this point, kind of have an inner self. Yeah, but then she does it for Van, which is sweet, but I think.

Dr. Katrina Furey: That'S a nice thing.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Van also survives in multiple times. She shouldn't. When that happens, people get weird.

Dr. Katrina Furey: They do.

Dr. Jessi Gold: I don't know, people turn to weird mystical stuff or there must be some reason I'm alive, right?

Dr. Katrina Furey: Like, the laws of probability become magical and mystical. I see this even with people with, I want to say, run of the mill PTSD, like, not related to something super severe, like the Holocaust or a plane crash like this, but someone who's maybe had, like, complex childhood dynamics, maybe a parent with an addiction. They're in an abusive relationship and they got a car accident or something, like just sort of like a series of things, and they keep surviving or they don't. And it does start to feel like it has this, like, you're saying mystical or religious meaning to it. And I think that's part of the way humans try to process trauma and things that are hard to make sense of, especially when so many of them happen to you. You start to think like, well, I must be cursed, or, there must be someone looking out, or something like that does make a lot of sense.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Look for a meeting. You were saying at the beginning, too. She almost was in the plane when the plane was on fire. Too right. So in a lot of ways, there are a lot of things with fire for her, a lot of things with animals. And I think that also goes with the symbolism. What Lottie 100% very much prey on the things that she survived to do that she would be probably the most vulnerable to it.

Portia Pendleton: The other.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Lee. And so the religious person also wants to believe in stuff. It might be different stuff, but she doesn't say anything weird about the experience of what Lottie is talking about because she believes in religion pretty strongly herself. So I don't know. To me, it's like a logical person to be most convinced from crazy stuff multiple times. And, like, someone stitching her face in your house. I know.

Dr. Katrina Furey: She's got, like, barely a scar.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Am I here? Also? I am. And we know from season two spoilers that someone was cast as older Van. So we know Van makes it. So I think that's also important.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right. There were a couple of people near the end who we found out made it that I didn't think would have the whole season. I thought it was like, this core group of, like, four or five girls, and then we learn, like, oh, no, more of them.

Portia Pendleton: Last scene, I see them calling a couple more survivors.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Wow.

Portia Pendleton: Okay, here we go.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Also, you guys are mentioning they separate. Something happens where they don't want to be around each other anymore. And, like, Tyson band clearly break up. Right. I think that it's not surprising we don't see them all in the same stuff. And that core group was kind of a core group during anyway. They're kind of clicky a little. They were like friends before. They supported each other through it. They pull in some others, but some of the other ones, they're there and they get in the wilderness and maybe just not otherwise.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right? Yeah. And I wonder in season two if we'll see more and more of those other girls. I know we see more of Lottie, who's given me, like, Teal Swan vibes. We'll talk about it more next time. Have you watched that yet, Portia?

Dr. Jessi Gold: Yeah.

Portia Pendleton: Okay.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Have you seen that, Jesse?

Dr. Jessi Gold: Oh, yeah.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Or the Teal Swan documentary?

Dr. Jessi Gold: Oh, no, I don't think so.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Oh, you got to watch it. You'll love it.

Dr. Jessi Gold: What cult is that?

Dr. Katrina Furey: It's hers. She's called Teal Swan. It's on, hulu. I had a patient way back in the day come to a session in distress because they had a sibling who was, like, getting all involved in it. And I was like, I don't know who that is. And then fast forward, like last year, there was this documentary out, and I was like, but it's very similar to this dynamic. And you can see how not to spoil the documentary for you, but I will. Basically, Teal Swan hires this private investigator who is a very nice elderly woman. Interesting choice for a private investigator to follow them around and investigate and prove they're not a cult. And it turns out her findings are that they are indeed a cult. And then you see all of Til Swan's rage and all these reactions and just so many interesting dynamics. It just reminds me a lot of what we might see in season two.

Portia Pendleton: It reminds me of the show also on Hulu with Nicole Kidman based on.

Dr. Katrina Furey: That big little nine perfect stranger.

Portia Pendleton: It's very similar to that. Like a cult leader.

Dr. Jessi Gold: They're all on Shrooms, too, which is also relevant to this.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Yes.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Which is like the weird mystical aspect. Shrooms mixed with psychosis, mixed with not sleeping and not eating and not having normal body temperature regulation.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right. All of it.

Dr. Jessi Gold: It's like a permanent state of mania. Right?

Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah. And again, I think in the Teal Swan documentary, which is reminding me of this show, you do see certain types of people are more vulnerable to these types of people like Lottie or that influence like we're talking about. And I feel like in the show, showing that it was Van and Laura Lee really tracks, I think, in the real world. And it's interesting to me how Natalie is so against it. And again right. Like, AA. And a lot of the treatment we sort of recommend for addiction also has this reliance on a higher power. And I wonder how Natalie feels about that probably not great, is my assumption.

Dr. Jessi Gold: You kind of see that right at the beginning. It's almost like she's going through the motions to get out of there.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Exactly.

Dr. Jessi Gold: She wasn't using or whatever, but she kind of feels like, to me, the kind of patient that would go once and be like, this stuff's ridiculous.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right?

Dr. Jessi Gold: Also figure out a way to quit themselves that has enough internal whatever where you're like, you did what? And they're like, completely cold turkey. Did I see that? But I also could see that probably AA and even group therapy in general might feel like that to her, right?

Dr. Katrina Furey: Especially after this whole experience.

Dr. Jessi Gold: And because the biggest complaint people have with AA is like, the higher power part 100%, people are always like, it doesn't have to be a spiritual thing. Like, it can be whatever a higher power is for you to try to not scare people away. And there's so much evidence that it works. And it's I also think, like here's, supporting group support is not going to work in a group that had to survive that and doesn't trust anybody. Ultimately, the normalization of experience, et cetera, would be helpful, but unless the group is them, I can't right imagine that you go to a group like that and you're like, Well, I survived the plane crash. Everyone stares at you. Then you're like, I lived there for however many months.

Dr. Katrina Furey: 19 months.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Yeah, I lived there for 19 months. They're like, well, what did you do? Well, we had to curiosity, like voyeurism support. It's like this voyeuristic interest in what happened and why. And that's why journalists are interested, too, but it's not in healing them. And I think sometimes people think therapists do that too, right? Where your story is so unique and original that when you're telling your therapist, people watch the reaction, and the reaction or the questions feel like you're like, wait, what? Tell me more about that in a way that feels incredulous or feels like you're asking for education on it. People don't want to go back to therapy either, right? Because they feel like they're telling their story in the way that you said, maybe Misty would like it for the attention, for the interest, not for support. And I think it will be hard to find somebody I mean, there are therapists who specialize in quotes and things like that, but who knows what they did back then? But I do think that it would be hard to find somebody in a support group with people who are there doing other stuff in that sense, because it also ends up like grief Olympic thing. And you're not going to beat the person for 19 months. You're just not, right? So it makes it a weird dynamic for a group where the group's then like, can I talk about how I'm fighting with my husband? And of course you can, because your trauma is your trauma, and is valid and your feelings are valid. Right. But if you're that person who turned to substances to hide how ashamed they were to begin with, and then the person next to you is like, I survived 19 months in the wilderness. You'd be like, I don't think I would be able to be like, school is hard. I don't like med school. I don't like this, and things that have really stressed me out in my life next to someone, it's just really impossible.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right.

Dr. Jessi Gold: It's human nature to sort of compare in that sense. And it would make for a weird.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Group that it would. Right. Like you said, I feel like the group would have to be them. And like an expert therapist, I said skilled.

Portia Pendleton: If they're going to see someone, I feel like skilled is not even the right word. Used to be someone who's not reactive. Okay, so what emotion was that? Not like, oh, and then what happened?

Dr. Jessi Gold: I think anything you could say could be very easy, even if you're just trying to support them. And I'm more animated as a human. I didn't go to psychoanalytic school of thinking and I self disclosed and stuff like that. So for me, I wouldn't necessarily be doing that because I wanted more interestingly, but I think it could come off like that, or I would do the opposite, which is try really hard not to come off like I was like, flat or something, not interested or what they were saying wasn't important or something. I don't know that I could handle the middle ground as well. I think people probably don't realize that we can say that about why we don't see certain reasons and why we like certain things, because I can see what it would be like to tell someone from the other side that stuff. And if I don't feel like I can handle that appropriately, you shouldn't waste your story on me 100%.

Dr. Katrina Furey: It's really important.

Dr. Jessi Gold: It would scare them away from therapy, right? I don't know. I can't imagine that there's a safe place to land for most people in those circumstances. And probably a lot of them, the place that they land if they do get care is not the right one. And then what? I know they don't want to get help again. And then it's all weirdly repressed and coming out and killing rabbits and stuff. Right. I think it's a mental health. We're not perfect at what we do, but I think when you come in with stigma and beliefs about what it's going to be like and then we eat into it because that's not great in your head or whatever, I think it just makes it worse. So I'm hoping they show a lot of that stuff.

Dr. Katrina Furey: I am too.

Dr. Jessi Gold: I don't know that they will, but that stuff, at least for me, is like, super fascinating, which is like, how the heck do you get back to life at all? When that happened. And what does that look like for someone? I really hope they get into that because it's a weird time frame. Like, it's not the time frames they're showing right in between, but I hope they do, because at least from a psych perspective, that's super interesting to me. I don't even know what I would do as a psychiatrist in that situation.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right. I totally agree. I really hope we do see some of that, because they are at least like, Ty, Shauna, Misty, Lottie. I feel like I'm forgetting one. Natalie. They're all functioning in different ways. And it's like how like how how.

Portia Pendleton: Shauna seems like and I wrote this as a question mark. I don't know if it was true. Was she at the first episode in her daughter's bedroom masturbating to her daughter's boyfriend's picture?

Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah, it blocked.

Portia Pendleton: I think that she feels very stuck in her teen. Right. She came back and married her best friend's boyfriend, who she had been hooking up with. She is attracted to this young boy.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Survive. I don't think that baby is her daughter because the ages don't match up. But what happened?

Dr. Jessi Gold: She marries the guy no matter what that trauma was.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right.

Dr. Jessi Gold: You said we talked about the beginning, like her wanting to get rid of it, but on top of it, maybe it doesn't survive, maybe it does. Who knows? But what happens with that conversation that leads you to stay with the person too? Interesting. Your babies as a person too. And then the whole she feels like we always say people are stuck when their trauma happens. She feels like that definitely evolved beyond that, even beyond the weird daughter's boyfriend thing. When she's dating Adam, the things that she's doing are, like, rebellious, jumping off, like having a beer at a party.

Dr. Katrina Furey: In the parking lot of a gas station.

Dr. Jessi Gold: She's really excited about it, and it feels so exciting and new and whatever.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Because she never got to do it.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Normal childhood in teenage years. So she does feel to me very stuck in that. But at the same time, my role is to be mom and housewife, and so I shall make dinner and kind of go through the motions, but then.

Dr. Katrina Furey: I'm going to feed you. All rabbits do at the same time.

Dr. Jessi Gold: I'm very much the same age as my daughter, which is why my daughter doesn't buy my stuff. My daughter doesn't think that I should be able to mother her because I can't.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah. I will say it was touching when Shaun is talking to Jeff and they're all coming clean to each other and she realizes that he knew this stuff all along and he stayed. I just thought that was really touching and really spoke to however dysfunctional their relationship is, I think anyone who goes through a trauma, huge, small, medium, whatever size, however you want to quantify it, just wants to feel held and accepted and not shunned. I think you were sort of touching on that, Jesse, about how would they ever function in group therapy with this being their trauma. I don't know. I thought that was a really sweet moment that she felt like he knew all this about her and yet he didn't run away.

Dr. Jessi Gold: It's very different than Taisa's relationship. He's somebody different that she met later in life. We don't know a lot about that part, but my guess is she doesn't know as much as she should, because when stuff starts to come up, it's really scary to her, as opposed to being like, remember when you used to do that? You're doing that would feel like she told her any of that. So I feel like their relationship was built on like, that didn't happen, where there's some component of the Shauna jeff thing that was like, we were bonded long before. We are bonded by this stuff. We're bonded by jack.

Dr. Katrina Furey: I know. The whole birthday lunch thing with her parents.

Dr. Jessi Gold: We're bonded by Jackie. I don't know. And so I think maybe she thought he knew some stuff, but not as much. But they didn't really talk about it, but the unspoken stuff was, like, enough to help that relationship sort of survive, where tyes is just never discussed or something very different.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right. And as we're talking, I'm just thinking, like, jeff was probably traumatized, too. He was still in school, but he probably has his own stuff that we haven't even seen. Maybe we will someday, but be curious to hear.

Dr. Jessi Gold: No way. He doesn't have some. They have to, at some point, basically throw them funerals. 19 months, you say, we lost the plant. They're not coming home. Don't you think that at some point somebody calls it and they have some kind of ritual for them?

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right.

Dr. Jessi Gold: I can't imagine that they don't even.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Like, at a school wide memorial or something.

Dr. Jessi Gold: They have to have something. And I'm sure the school is not a good situation to be in, let alone when you date two of the people that are there.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right.

Dr. Jessi Gold: He was such a kid. Right? Yeah. There's no way that was fine for the people at home. And it makes you wonder if he's supporting jackie's parents while also in love with shauna and then not able to say that because it's were they even.

Dr. Katrina Furey: In love, or did they just bone him and shauna? Right. They were like teenagers. Stay tuned. Yeah. It is complicated, jesse.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Right?

Dr. Katrina Furey: No, not at all. All of them. Oh, my gosh. And then the whole twist the show takes with, like, is adam somehow involved and manipulating shauna? I was like, yep. Yes, he is. I knew it. And I was like, oh, turns out he is not. Turns out that was a red herring. And now when natalie gets kidnapped at the end, I was like, what is going on? Where did this show go? It just really took a turn.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Yeah.

Portia Pendleton: I need to watch season one or season two, episode one after this really kind of dark.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Some of that is like, this impermanence of safety or something, where no matter who's in their life, even if they're happy, it's hard to be happy. So technically, Shannon was happy with Adam, but the second she thought there was something bad about what he was doing or he was hurting her, it was like completely 180 being bad and dangerous and no, I have to protect myself. And I think that, again, was very much a trauma reaction, as is the rest of dealing with Adam afterwards.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Call your girl.

Portia Pendleton: I just think so much is so interesting and how she seems to be taking medications regularly from where she works. It seems like it's her specific tracks.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Though, that she would be a PCA but not rise to a higher level. I think just with her personality type, without the crash, I think that tracks and then add in the crash. Right. Don't you think?

Dr. Jessi Gold: Yeah, I mean, I think she's just doing a job to do a job, and she likes that people are dependent.

Portia Pendleton: On, and she's, like, powerful there for.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Men, and they need her, and she can make them in pain and not in pain and also lackness those situations. Older people sometimes don't have support. And so you're in this situation where you kind of have more power than you should because there's not enough accountability in those places. And so, yeah, it doesn't surprise me she found her way to a place like that at all.

Portia Pendleton: And is this, like, expert online of.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Detectives, like the detective and her bird yeah, I forget the bird's name, but it was great.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Yeah.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Oh, gosh.

Portia Pendleton: So you have started season two. Not really, I guess, talking about what you've seen. But what do you want from season two? Like, where do you want to see it go? What are you interested to see happen? What do you want more of?

Dr. Jessi Gold: I don't know. So you're watching a show about cannibals. So at some point, you wonder where that comes from and what happens to change that and how they get there. You wonder who the person they're chasing is.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Yes.

Dr. Jessi Gold: At the end of their first season, we also know somebody prominent dies. So you're also curious how they all react around that. And so I think you want to know that. I think you want to know. I don't know that I want to watch. It's so weird because it's like you're watching a show where you know that's the premise, but it's like, do you really want to watch that? And it's, like, not really. It's super uncomfortable to think about. But you do want to know how they get there and what happens. I think that is something I'm interested in psychologically. I think that how they get home and stuff like that. I hope we see eventually, but I would assume it's not this season because they already renewed for three. So at some point, they're not going to do that. Right. Rescuing seems very end of show to me. Or close to end of show, how that happens.

Dr. Katrina Furey: We could have a whole season with them trying to do group therapy.

Portia Pendleton: I think it could take forever.

Dr. Katrina Furey: It could, yeah. I think it's going to take, like, a darker, mystical turn in, like, Travis's Murder. But I would like to see season three just devoted to therapy.

Dr. Jessi Gold: From a mental health perspective. There's a lot they could do if they wanted. Right? You hope that some of it's there, because for me, watching, I'm, like, I think it's really helpful for people to feel seen by these different characters and there's different reactions to the same thing, because we all have that. No matter what, the same thing is, like, families reacting to family trauma, all of us reacting to COVID, whatever it is, we all react differently. And I think it helps that the portrayals of PTSD are not just like the same sexual assault and military and flashbacks and hyper vigilance, and there's more to it, and that helps people go like, oh, maybe that's what I'm dealing with. But at the same time, from our side of things, it'd be really nice if someone actually got treatment. Very dysfunctional, and that's part of it. But maybe one of the people on the team isn't maybe Van. We don't know what Van is doing. We don't know if there's anybody else. Right. Where's the coach? There's these people that you wonder people are, and you're like, did somebody get help? And can they model? That would have been a way to come back from this, right?

Dr. Katrina Furey: A healthy way right away.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Because I think people get super scared about trauma therapy. Like, I can't relive that whole thing. I just got out of there. You absolutely can't make me keep saying that over and over. Like, they don't want to go to trauma therapy for that reason. And I think that's also important as like a resistance thing to talk about. But you'd hope that from our side things somewhere they at least discuss why they didn't or right. What was going on with people from resistance side and why that's valid, that sort of thing.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right. I would love to see that when.

Dr. Jessi Gold: You watch TV as a psychic. I know.

Dr. Katrina Furey: It's so true. It's so true. Yeah. And I also think it's important to put out there that there are forms of trauma therapy where you don't have to rehash the event over and over and over and over. I think you're spot on. A lot of people are really scared to come to therapy because they think that's what they're going to be expected to do. And a lot of times, as people are kind of getting more comfortable in therapy, I try to gently talk about how they are reliving it over and over and over just when they're not wanting to, and somehow that's how the therapy can help. But just to put it out there, you don't always have to go through your trauma narrative every time.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Wow.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Jesse, I don't know if I should thank you for having us watch this show. I mean, it's very dark, but really enjoyable.

Dr. Jessi Gold: What do you want to talk about? I was like, this is the most mental health, interesting show I've watched in a while. And for better or worse, right? There's always good and bad things, and there's always things that could be better. And I'd love people to consult people.

Dr. Katrina Furey: More so that they were I know.

Dr. Jessi Gold: And we are a lot of things and lived experience, and I get it. And we have that same conflict all the time on social media. I get it. But I do think that when you're like, what do you want to talk about? For me, has been the most interesting show in a long time to think about from our perspective, the person that we are mutually friends with. And I talk about the show a lot, and so I think that was, like, an obvious suggestion from.

Dr. Katrina Furey: I have to say I was surprised. I was like, oh, Dr. Wilkins.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Yeah. I mean, don't be confused by the.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Exterior.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Bubbliness and the heels and the necklaces. She watches some good stuff.

Dr. Katrina Furey: We all do. We all do. Well, again, we are so grateful that you spent your time with us today talking about the show. I agree. It was really a good watch. I inhaled it.

Portia Pendleton: Excellent acting, excellent cast.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Yeah. There really isn't a better cast, which is also true. They did this thing where they're like, pulling on your own nostalgia. Yes. Christina region.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Yes.

Dr. Jessi Gold: We're just amazing. And then on top of it, they look exactly I know the casting was sick. There's not a lot of sometimes you're like, I mean, I see it from but you're like, oh. And they practice mimicking each other's perfect. And think about what would be different in the future versus now. And they do. That part is, like, phenomenal.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Wouldn't you love? Yeah, I know. I was just thinking, like, I want to be involved in that. Like, if anyone wants to consult us for season two or three, give us a call or I guess DM or whatever the kids do these days.

Portia Pendleton: Phenomenal.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Just do reach. Send me a carrier pigeon or a smoke signal. Like, here you go. Well, thank you so much, Jesse. Again, we so appreciate your time. Is there anything else you want to add before we wrap up?

Dr. Jessi Gold: I don't think so. I look forward to coming back to talk.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah. Oh, my God.

Portia Pendleton: Please.

Dr. Katrina Furey: We would love that.

Dr. Jessi Gold: Season two, steady, quick on the intensity. If anyone who's listening is already started.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah, I know. Seriously, we would love to have you back. We would love to have you be like our yellow jackets field. Correspondent. It's cool to know that there's other psychiatrists and mental health professionals out there who share our love of the media and wanting to just put out factual info based on these depictions, good and bad.

Portia Pendleton: Yeah, well, thanks again and make sure that you also follow Jesse on Instagram and TikTok at Dr. Jesse. Dr. Jesse.

Dr. Katrina Furey: And then follow us at Analyze scripts. I think we have a TikTok now.

Portia Pendleton: Yeah, we did yesterday. All right, well, thank you and thanks for tuning in and we'll see you next Sunday.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Bye bye. This podcast and its contents are a copyright of Analyzed Scripts. All rights reserved. Any redistribution or reproduction of part or all of the contents in any form is prohibited. Unless you want to share it with your friends and rate review and subscribe, that's fine. All stories and characters discussed are fictional in nature. No identification with actual persons, living or deceased places, buildings or products is intended or should be inferred. This podcast is for entertainment purposes only. The podcast and its contents do not constitute professional mental health or medical advice. Listeners might consider consulting a mental health provider if they need assistance with any mental health problems or concerns. As always, please call 911 or go directly to your nearest emergency room for any psychiatric emergencies. Thanks for listening and see you next time. Bye.

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Welcome back to Analyze Scripts, where a psychiatrist and a therapist analyze what Hollywood gets right and wrong about mental health. Today, we are analyzing the Oscar-winning film "The Whale" starring Brendan Fraser. This one's a doozy! This emotional film stirred up a lot of different, conflicting emotions for Dr. Furey and Portia. While exploring our own sadness and rage, we also discuss the masterful portrayal of depression, binge-eating disorder, childhood abandonment, and end-of-life care. We hope you enjoy!

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Portia Pendleton: Hi.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Welcome back to another episode of Analyze Scripts. I'm Dr. Katrina Fury, a psychiatrist, and I'm joined, as always, by my friend and colleague, Portia Pendleton, a licensed clinical social worker. Thanks for joining us. Once again, or if it's your first time, welcome. Today we are going to be talking about the film by Darren Aranovsky. I think I'm saying that right. The Whale, which recently Brendan Fraser, who stars in this movie, won an Oscar for best actor. So we're pretty excited to talk about it.

Portia Pendleton: Yeah.

Portia Pendleton: Brendan Fraser is, like, all over the place. He just seems so precious. And that's a perfect word to describe.

Dr. Katrina Furey: And precious.

Portia Pendleton: I like that it means, like I don't know. I want him to be I want.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Good taking care of him. I know. I want him to have, like, a serenity garden with a little quiet waterfall and some butterflies. Yeah, that's what I want.

Portia Pendleton: And all the awards and accolades that he deserves. So I think a lot of people remember him from Georgia the Jungle, the big shirtless man. And then he was in the Mummy trilogy, and then he kind of stalled for a bird.

Dr. Katrina Furey: I thought maybe he just was like, all right, I'm done now.

Portia Pendleton: Yes. I think we've learned more recently I don't think that this really came out of the time, but he did report a sexual assault in 2003 by Philip Burke, who was the then Hollywood Foreign Press Association president. So I think this kind of piggybacked on what we've seen before with the MeToo movement and what's the guy's name?

Dr. Katrina Furey: Harvey Weinstein.

Portia Pendleton: Like a Harvey Weinstein kind of situation. And I think Brendan Fraser can be added and welcomed into the Me, too. He put himself out there as a young man, 30s, back in the day, and what happened is really normal then, right. It kind of got brushed in the rug. He was blackballed by the industry. His name was not brought up for things. And I think it's just such, like, a beautiful story that now he got this opportunity and he just, like, knocked out of the park. I mean, he got, I think, an eleven minute standing ovation when this film was shown at the Sundance Film Festival. People are just loving him and his performance.

Dr. Katrina Furey: And I think it's kind of shocking, right, to see someone who was like George of the Jungle or in these other shore roles that weren't so deep and emotional to really perform in that way.

Portia Pendleton: Yeah.

Dr. Katrina Furey: I think there was also some sort of I don't know about controversy. I don't think that's the word I'm looking for. But I don't think he went to the Golden Globes specifically because I don't think he felt supported when all this happened and he continued to take a stand. I was really proud of him for that. Really proud of him for that.

Portia Pendleton: Yeah.

Portia Pendleton: I think he just is. I hope that he's being welcomed back with kind of open arms into a supportive and getting the credit that he.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Deserves, and I hope he has some good therapy along the way.

Portia Pendleton: So The Whale has kind of, like a little bit of an interesting story. I don't have the details exactly in front of me, so I'm kind of just going to recall it, but it was based on, like, a play, and it was forever. Like, the script has been floating around for, I think, the past 1510 to 15 years. And there's been, like, different directors, different producers, different actors kind of floated around with it at some point. I think that oh, he's the host of the Late Late Night Show.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Seth Meyers? No.

Portia Pendleton: Steven Colbert. England.

Dr. Katrina Furey: The redhead?

Portia Pendleton: Yes.

Dr. Katrina Furey: No. James Corgan?

Portia Pendleton: Yes. Okay.

Portia Pendleton: As a potential he was going to play not a good he didn't yeah.

Dr. Katrina Furey: I'm really glad I didn't know he was an actor.

Portia Pendleton: I don't know.

Dr. Katrina Furey: That's what I saw, according to the Internet.

Portia Pendleton: So I just think it's an interesting path that both The Whale, in one sense has had and then Brendan Fraser and I feel like they both kind.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Of came together like it was meant to be. Wow.

Portia Pendleton: Yeah.

Dr. Katrina Furey: That is nice.

Portia Pendleton: So why don't we do, like, a little brief, brief, brief rundown about the premise of the movie?

Portia Pendleton: Okay.

Portia Pendleton: So if you haven't seen it, but you want to kind of just, like, hear the podcast episode, we'll try to give you some context.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah. But also I think we wanted to include a trigger warning with this episode because The Whale is a really emotional film and we will be talking about some pretty intense themes today, including disordered eating patterns, strained parent, child relationships, abandonment, trauma, and suicide. So we did just want to give that little warning because it is intense. And even if you haven't watched the film yet, again, do so, but just be aware it's intense.

Portia Pendleton: Yeah, I definitely was feeling a lot of emotions throughout the movie.

Portia Pendleton: Yeah.

Dr. Katrina Furey: And it's really interesting that we both left the movie feeling very different, but very strong feelings. So we'll talk about that. So the premise I recall from this movie, again, I feel like I was so angry at the end, I've blocked some things out, which is interesting. But basically we see this very obese man and I don't know, we wanted to talk about even what terminology we wanted to use to talk about his character.

Portia Pendleton: Yeah.

Portia Pendleton: So, I mean, there is, like, kind of, I guess a split field with just, like, how to refer to someone who's in, like, a much larger body. I think some people would prefer just to be called fat. This is a fat man. Other people, I think, prefer to use more, like, just medical terminology. And it's like, with non judgment, but just kind of stating more facts most.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Likely meet medical criteria for morbid obesity.

Portia Pendleton: Yeah.

Portia Pendleton: So I think maybe we will use interchangeable language throughout the podcast, whether we are referring to him as fat and a large body or morbidly obese, we'd.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Be curious to hear your thoughts about what you think about these words and terminology as we talk about these tough issues. So, anyway, Brendan Fraser plays Charlie, who it looks like is a teacher for like, an online college writing course. And he also appears to be somewhat of a hermit. The whole film takes place in his apartment. My husband, he's so witty. He kept saying, like, wow, they really saved money on the budget there.

Portia Pendleton: I had that thought after. And again, such a quote unquote low budget film. There's not really per se, like these crazy special effects and all of these sets. It's like they built this set, this home, and we really don't see anything outside of it besides this one flashback. So totally like a beach. But yes, it's like around the apartment. It's in the apartment. It's right outside his apartment door. The parking lot of the apartment, right.

Dr. Katrina Furey: And we didn't know for a while was it an apartment or a house. We just start off right in the house and in the home. And then as the film moves on, we see the different rooms and like the one room he's kept locked and things like that. And then at some point, I don't remember exactly how far into the movie, but not right away, we see that he's actually on the second floor. And so, again, that sort of was like, well, okay, now I see why he really doesn't leave because he has a lot of mobility trouble. But so basically, it seems like this film is sort of capturing the last week of his life, right, that he is morbidly obese and dealing with all of the medical consequences that unfortunately come with that. As a physician, I thought they did a really good job accurately depicting that. They depicted hypertensive emergency with his blood pressure being I wrote it down. Actually, I was going to ask you. I wrote it down in my notes. My first note was while he's masturbating. That was a surprise, just real quick. And then the next one's. Blood pressure was 238 over 134. And I have three exclamation points because that is so scary high. Normal blood pressure is around 120 over 80. So that is really high. In us physicians, we really worry about the bottom number, the diastolic number. I mean, we worry about both, but especially the diastolic number. We worry about it when it's between 91 hundred. So 134 is like, really scary high. Like, he could have a stroke.

Portia Pendleton: He could have heart attack.

Dr. Katrina Furey: He could all the things. And then you see him, like, I.

Portia Pendleton: Think.

Dr. Katrina Furey: As he ********** or something I thought was having a heart attack. He's wheezing, he's sweating, he's grabbing his chest like he's having chest pain. He's like moving his left arm, indicating it's radiating down there. And I was like, oh, my God, he's having a heart attack. He's not going to die because then the movie will be over. But this is, like, really accurate. And then with his wheezing and his friend who comes over to listen to him, immediately, I thought he's probably in heart failure and his legs are swollen. All of it was really accurate.

Portia Pendleton: Right.

Dr. Katrina Furey: So, again, from a medical perspective, I thought they did a really good job portraying that. And the struggles of living in such a large body, like with the walker, with the wheelchair, with all the assistive devices, like the four year lift to get in and out of the bed, things to grab things from up high or down low. He alludes at some point to having bed sores and things like that, which is probably true if you're not able to work around too much. So I did think that was spot on.

Portia Pendleton: Yeah.

Portia Pendleton: And I think kind of right away, we are introduced to a couple. Again, not a big cast.

Dr. Katrina Furey: There's like five characters.

Portia Pendleton: So there's Brendan Fraser, who's Charlie, and then there is his friend, it seems like a longtime friend who is a nurse, I believe, or some kind of medically trained she looks like a nurse.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Liz, I think was her name.

Portia Pendleton: She was nominated, I believe, played by Hong Chow. And then Thomas, who is this, like, traveling missionary, seems like. But then there's a little bit of a twist at the end. His daughter, who's played by Sadie Singh, Ellie. And then we briefly see Charlie's ex wife and Sadie Singh's. Or Lily's, Ellie's mom, Mary, who was.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Played by Samantha Morton. And then we also have Dan, I believe was the name of his partner.

Portia Pendleton: Right.

Portia Pendleton: And then a little brief character of the delivery person.

Dr. Katrina Furey: The delivery person, that's right.

Portia Pendleton: Yeah.

Dr. Katrina Furey: So I got kind of sidetracked summarizing the plot. Did you have anything you wanted to.

Portia Pendleton: Add before we dive into we kind of get the feeling that he is a little bit of a hermit. His apartment is really dark, like, windows, shades are drawn, a lot of clutter.

Portia Pendleton: Yep, yep.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Maybe kind of hoarding, but not like kind of hoarding.

Portia Pendleton: And then we see him teaching. He doesn't have his camera off. So I'm kind of getting the feeling that he has some shame about his appearance because it's kind of demonstrated to us the camera does work. It's just kind of like a choice that he's not putting it on.

Dr. Katrina Furey: I at first thought, Is this during COVID I did, too.

Portia Pendleton: Yeah. So my first thoughts were like, Whoa, there's masturbating. Is this during COVID And then I was like, wow, like, really interesting. Those were, like, my kind of back and forth.

Dr. Katrina Furey: So, anyway, intense feelings right away.

Portia Pendleton: Yeah.

Portia Pendleton: We start to see his health seriously decline. It seems like he appears at first to not want to get to medical help because of worries for cost. We learn later, like some other information around that. But that's what he's telling Liz to not go to the hospital. She's encouraging him.

Portia Pendleton: Right.

Dr. Katrina Furey: So Liz, who at first we think of as his friend, she's always showing up in scrubs. She has a stethoscope. She seems to be a nurse. She works night shifts, things like that. She's sort of like being his nurse and medical caretaker. Which I kept thinking, like, what a hard position for her, to be sure. But I know, like, toward the end, they were like, oh, wait, you do have this money. You could go to the hospital.

Portia Pendleton: Let's be real.

Dr. Katrina Furey: The level of care he would need is, like, ICU level of care that is crazy expensive. Like, his bill would be astronomical. Like, the 140 grand or something that he has would not cover it.

Portia Pendleton: Maybe like two days is you can afford health insurance. Okay, there we go.

Portia Pendleton: Yeah.

Portia Pendleton: I feel like that's also something that I wanted to spend a little bit.

Portia Pendleton: Of time talking about.

Portia Pendleton: It's just, like, health insurance and kind of, from our perspectives, his potential barriers, or just like, potential systemic barriers. But my thought was really, like, he might not qualify for Medicaid. Maybe he does make too much. But then I would assume that there is some kind of supplemental insurance or that he would be paying into something. And again, even if he was paying into a high deductible and his deductible was, like, $15,000, that's way less than hundreds of thousands and millions of dollars of his bill.

Dr. Katrina Furey: So it's so true.

Portia Pendleton: That's where I was a little angry. Kind of like it felt like a little bit of misinformation. While I'm very aware that health insurance can be wildly costly and there's a lot of people who need better care, and that's a barrier. So I think I'm trying to balance both sides of the coin.

Dr. Katrina Furey: But I think that is sort of the mixed feelings Charlie stirs up in you, at least for me, is like, you get so frustrated with him that he's not getting help or taking the help that's being offered. And I think that's actually a really good example of that. You do have the funds to get health insurance. Like he said, his expenses are very minimal at that point at somewhere along the way, he could have gotten some help and he hasn't. And so that stirs up some really kind of icky feelings, at least in me. I was feeling really angry with him for a lot of the movie.

Portia Pendleton: Yeah.

Portia Pendleton: And I think that anger is magnified because, again, a part of the storyline is that he is kind of choosing to step back into his daughter's life, which appears that he abandoned her when she was eight, I believe, and kind of left that family to have a partner.

Dr. Katrina Furey: It appears that he is gay and.

Portia Pendleton: Maybe was in that relationship, as his ex wife discusses, because you just wanted a child. She says that at one point in.

Dr. Katrina Furey: The movie, but again, or maybe hadn't really even come out to himself yet. We see. This totally happened, right? So again, it's like, gosh, this movie really stirs up a lot of big feelings because it's like you understand the wife's perspective because they were married, they had this daughter, and all of a sudden he leaves to be with a man. And I couldn't tell if the wife didn't want him in the daughter's life. And that's why he stayed away, because he kept trying to say, like, I sent you letters, I send you money. I would ask about you. Your mom didn't want me around. I couldn't tell how true that was.

Portia Pendleton: Right.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Or if he's sort of saying that. I don't know. What were your thoughts about that?

Portia Pendleton: I wonder if initially she was so angry, rightfully so, and maybe just based on the time where they live, and embarrassed and anger and then embarrassment, kind of, because I guess he tried to get custody, shared custody, whatever, and she fought him for that.

Dr. Katrina Furey: She had full custody.

Portia Pendleton: So I don't know if he then interpreted some of those things as I'm.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Out, or if she did keep the daughter away. And I couldn't tell. I can't remember where they all lived. I couldn't tell how was being gay viewed in their town and their culture and their religion. It sounded like Charlie was part of this what was it called? New Life Religion, or at least his partner was. So was that like, the religion everyone is sort of a part of in their area? And are they against homosexuality? That was unclear. But for whatever reason, he wasn't in his daughter's life, effectively. And then he makes contact again at the end of his life, and and.

Portia Pendleton: It seems like it is behind, like, the mom's back and and I do remember actually, there was some, like, alluding to that. It was I don't want to say, like, illegal is not the right word.

Dr. Katrina Furey: But, like, not part of the custody.

Portia Pendleton: Agreement or should not be reaching out. She could call the police on him for doing that.

Dr. Katrina Furey: That was the sense I got, too. So that was where I was like something went down. It seemed like it was more severe than just like, he left. It seemed like there was a really firm line drawn. Unclear exactly why, but it was drawn.

Portia Pendleton: Yeah. And then so we learned a little bit that he had left this family to be with a student. And so at first, right, immediately I.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Was like, oh, is that why is.

Portia Pendleton: He now a sexual predator?

Portia Pendleton: Right.

Portia Pendleton: I wondered how long it seems like he was teaching adult classes. So it was more of like an ethical issue that he was maybe let go for than, like a legal issue. You're in a position of power, but you're both adults.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right, but I had that thought too. I was like, Is that why the line was so firm with the custody or something like that. But I think he said that Dan was in grad school and it was like night classes, if I remember correctly.

Portia Pendleton: And he wasn't currently in his classes at the time when they got together. I don't know. I mean, so he's telling all this to his daughter.

Dr. Katrina Furey: So, by the way, who he hasn't spoken to since she was eight, and now she's a senior and, like, just, hey, let me lay all this on you.

Portia Pendleton: Then kind of the second part of the film appears to just be around his interactions with his daughter, Ellie, and then occasionally with Thomas, who is like this traveling again, we believe, to be missionary, and Liz his nurse. That's it. And then it gets very emotionally intense.

Portia Pendleton: Yeah.

Portia Pendleton: So why don't you want to start talking about his daughter a little bit?

Dr. Katrina Furey: Fine.

Portia Pendleton: I have a lot of angry feelings.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Toward Charlie for the way he interacts with his daughter. So Ellie, I thought, was, like, really angry, really feisty. It seemed like she was at risk of failing out of school, and he wanted to help her. So I can't remember now exactly how he got her to come over that first time. Did he send her a message or something saying he had money for her, or do you remember?

Portia Pendleton: I don't think he initially said that he had money for her because he then says, I'll pay you. And then that's where she kind of chooses appearingly, so on the surface to stay or to keep coming back. But it sounds like that was new information to her.

Portia Pendleton: Yeah.

Dr. Katrina Furey: And it sounds like he is an English teacher. And throughout the film, there is a lot of significance to this paragraph about the whale from Moby ****. Right. And thomas the traveling.

Portia Pendleton: Yeah.

Dr. Katrina Furey: I keep wanting to say traveling salesman, but that's not what he was traveling. Like, missionary comes in while he's masturbating and then having seems like a mini heart attack or something. And he asks him to read this paragraph to sort of ground him and bring him back and everything. And it's not till the very end of the movie that we learn that Ellie wrote that when she was much younger, and he's always kept it and read it. And I think it really resonates with him, again, being what some people would call a whale, just based on his large size. I think in a lot of ways, it resonated with him. And he sort of starts to say that he will help Ellie rewrite her essays so that she doesn't fail her English class. And then Ellie wants him to write them for her. And he kind of agrees, I think, in an effort to keep seeing her. And there's this tension or thought, I think, in his mind throughout the whole film about, is Ellie a good person or a bad person? And even her mom toward the end is like, she's terrible. I've had a really hard time raising her. You left me with her all on my own and now you're coming in and going behind my back and you told her about the money, she's going to spend it all and blah, blah, blah, blah. But she's very provocative. She really gets under everyone's skin, especially Thomas. And I'm curious what your thoughts were about the final thing they talk about with her. Like sort of telling Thomas's family if that was like a good thing or a bad thing or we don't really know.

Portia Pendleton: Yeah, I think she did a really good job in the role. And I know her from Taylor Swift's ten minute version. She's in it all too well. Like the movie with Bill O'Brien and also Stranger Things. But I really like Z. No, I recognized her name, so I thought that some of the things that she was saying to Charlie, her dad, you could feel how hurtful they were. It sounds like she really knows where to hit you.

Portia Pendleton: Yes.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Like lying and disgusting and even if you weren't fat.

Portia Pendleton: And that made me feel really sad. But kind of throughout that, I feel like Ellie was just so sad.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right.

Portia Pendleton: And abandoned. I think on paper she almost feels a little bit, like, odd and then maybe like moving into some conduct disorder with dead animal stuff. Yeah, I forgot. So on her Instagram page, she has, like, pictures of a dead dog and then she has this knife at one point and it almost feels like she's going to kill the bird that's outside his window. And so again, I think just like, on paper, it feels like a little bit.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Where is this going to go? Does she have antisocial personality disorder? Is she growing into that? Or is this like trauma?

Portia Pendleton: Right.

Portia Pendleton: So I feel like it's trauma.

Dr. Katrina Furey: It could also be both.

Portia Pendleton: Right. I think at this point, I have a really big heart for teens.

Dr. Katrina Furey: I've worked with many.

Portia Pendleton: And my heart breaks for her because she keeps coming back. She's so mean and trying to push him away, but then she keeps coming back.

Dr. Katrina Furey: She doesn't leave.

Portia Pendleton: At one point, I think she's going to leave, but then she goes back and sits in the chair and does what he says.

Dr. Katrina Furey: She writes him.

Portia Pendleton: She's like, I'm going to make you a sandwich. No, it's not going to be big. But then she's like, doing these things for him. So, again, it's like she wants so badly, deep down to be like, parented.

Dr. Katrina Furey: And loved and supported and all children want. Right. 100%. I thought it was like, such a chilling since you get goosebumps everywhere. Such a good portrayal of just a really difficult parent child relationship. And I think with her coming in and confronting the person, she feels like abandoned her. Who did you see why she feels that way? Right. Whatever the reasons are, he wasn't there, right? Period. And now coming back and of course, I feel like she's just all her anger and yelling and acting out is just, like, externalizing all of her pain rather than internalizing it, which it seems like Charlie internalizes his pain by binge eating. And we'll get into that in a minute. I think what made me so angry about this movie, and maybe it's supposed to, is that he comes into her life when he knows he's dying.

Portia Pendleton: Yeah.

Portia Pendleton: Right.

Portia Pendleton: For him to see her, that she is okay, it's like, you don't want to make her okay. You are just, like, checking back into her life to make sure you did one thing right. And it's like, for you. So selfish.

Dr. Katrina Furey: I was going to read my final notes here on my notes app. At the very end I wrote ended movie feeling really, really angry. Didn't cry at all. Is he the most selfish person ever?

Portia Pendleton: Help.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Seeking help, rejecting reconnecting with his daughter to die in front of her. I was so angry. I remember, like, furiously typing this in my notes app because I was just like, God, that is you abandoned her all over again. And she sees him die. Like, he has the final heart attack in front of her while she's reading the Whale to him.

Portia Pendleton: And let's just talk about so mad. I don't know if there's a name for it. We could probably call it something. But he is openly rejecting help at the cost of then traumatizing people around him, literally. To watch someone die, even if it's, you know, like a an uncomplicated death. You know, you're you're in the hospital. You're saying goodbyes to your grandparent who's 100 years old.

Dr. Katrina Furey: They're on hospital.

Portia Pendleton: It's still so traumatic and really hard to watch. So watching your father who 100 years old and who's refusing, don't call them. Don't call them. Even in that moment, don't call them. Just read me this letter instead. It's like, I just feel so abusive.

Dr. Katrina Furey: It does, right? That's why I was so mad that I was like, I don't like Charlie.

Portia Pendleton: Even within the traumatic end and his apparent rejection of her and abandonment of.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Her, it's like he should have asked her to leave.

Portia Pendleton: Don't let her watch you literally die. Literally die and force her to read this.

Portia Pendleton: Yeah. Right?

Dr. Katrina Furey: Yes. I was so angry. I don't know. This movie stirred up so much anger in me. I know. Portia after you watched it, you texted me like, oh, my God, I'm crying. I'm so glad I watched this during the day so I can decompress and blah, blah, blah. And I was like, I did not shed one tear. I am so full of rage over here.

Portia Pendleton: I was like, sad for everyone. Obviously, I'm angry at what he did, but it felt a little bit like an assisted suicide. He knew he was going to die any day, and I think he was kind of just waiting for his heart to give out.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right. But also, I think if we replaced obesity and binge eating with drugs yes.

Portia Pendleton: That'S exactly the example I was thinking.

Dr. Katrina Furey: I kept feeling for Liz. And then I'm like, and you're enabling him. You're bringing these huge subs by listening to him when he says, don't call for help and putting yourself in that role. You're part of the problem. But I understand why you keep coming. It's so complicated. So I was really just fascinated by whoever's choice it was to use obesity or binge eating as the diagnosis, if you will. And I was curious, Porsche, about your thoughts as someone who does a lot of work with patients with disordered eating, about the depiction of his eating habits and things like that.

Portia Pendleton: I guess I would start off with, like, everyone, to a degree, has a different presentation with eating disorders, period. Like what it's used for, whether it's coping or almost like a little bit of self harm. This felt a little bit like self harm versus avoidance. Yeah. And then at times, I think in the bridge it was coping. So I thought we saw kind of two parts with use of kind of food being what we're supposed to be kind of watching and thinking about. So one was him eating like a large you see, like a pair of fried chicken, right. And Liz eating a lot of it. And that feels like, to me, almost a little bit more like self harm. Like, you're kind of intentional at this point. You're kind of dying. It's almost like I was getting the feeling like he was hoping that by doing this, he might speed it up or speed it up, die. And then in the other part of the binge so it seems like it was triggered by which this, to me, feels very common.

Dr. Katrina Furey: I thought this was like an amazing depiction.

Portia Pendleton: So throughout the movie, we see this almost like, relationship build between him and the delivery driver. So the delivery driver seems like, at times concerned.

Portia Pendleton: Right.

Portia Pendleton: There's this person in this house. I never see them. I would imagine the person is maybe thinking the person inside is depressed, maybe a hoarder, maybe elderly, like unable to get up, something like that, when you.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Were like, but is this COVID?

Portia Pendleton: I was like, but if this is.

Dr. Katrina Furey: COVID, then we wouldn't think it was weird not to open your door for the delivery man. Right. Interesting.

Portia Pendleton: And it was just little fact this was pre COVID. And it seems like it was around the time of the 2016 election. We see some of the news clippings between Hillary and Donald Trump.

Dr. Katrina Furey: You're right.

Portia Pendleton: I saw an article about like, they chose that intentionally. It was supposed to be like, in 2009, they wanted the movie placed in, but then they moved it up that it impacted it too much. That wasn't like something I was paying attention to. But anyway. So over time, the delivery driver is kind of, like, talking to him more. They get his name. And so it seems like at one point, Charlie feels comfortable enough to go to the door, open it and see him.

Dr. Katrina Furey: I don't think it was that he felt comfortable enough. I thought he would be like, oh, the money's out there. Take it. He leaves it, and then he waits a certain number of minutes and then goes to get it. I thought the delivery driver stayed back.

Portia Pendleton: Oh, you do?

Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah. Who was that's?

Portia Pendleton: Interesting.

Dr. Katrina Furey: I don't know if there's a right or wrong. It's just how we interpret the film. Right.

Portia Pendleton: So he goes to the door and the delivery driver sees him and appears to be really disgusted and does not engage. Charlie sees that. He sees him and appears to be disgusted and not engaged. And he kind of, like, runs away. And so Charlie goes back inside and starts to binge.

Portia Pendleton: Yeah.

Portia Pendleton: And this, I feel like, is a pretty typical binge episode. Like, there's a trigger of something that's emotional associated typically with negative emotion, shame or guilt. And then you proceed to start coping, quote, unquote, by eating a really large amount of food, right? And, yes, there are all different kinds of binges, sometimes people, large or small.

Dr. Katrina Furey: But this really is like a clinically defined binge episode. And I think, for me, I found myself feeling really uncomfortable and sick, almost, like physically sick, watching him eat. And I'm like, I'm sure they did this on purpose, but just like, the way he was eating so fast he could barely breathe, he starts to get sweaty and red, and he's, like, drooling. And there's that really intense scene where he's choking the meatball and just all of it, I felt like. And I'm just getting chills. Again, like, talking about it, I think just speaks to the intense emotions driving that behavior that I just thought, again, was really accurately depicted and really stirs up those feelings in the viewer.

Portia Pendleton: Yeah.

Portia Pendleton: So he is eating really rapidly. He's eating multiple kind of pizza, an odd mix of food, right? So going into the fridge, putting on different condiments, like the things that don't.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Belong together, like jelly mayonnaise. And that is binge eating, right? You're not eating, like, third helping a cake, right? You're eating, like, a whole loaf of bread or just sort of kind of odd things.

Portia Pendleton: So it's rapid, and we see it kind of end with he unintentionally throws up. And again, that is a difference between a self induced purge where trying to kind of get rid of it. That would be more along the lines of bulimia. But you can end a binge with something like throwing up. And that's not considered bulimia because it's not intentional. And it's kind of all over him. Again, it does bring up feelings of disgust. And I think that's kind of intentional. Intentional for the movie. They really want you to see that he is just, like, suffering. The thing that I took away, and I think he'll.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Empathy as you talk.

Portia Pendleton: Is that I just felt like his death almost to me, felt like a suicide. And that is where I think a lot of my empathy came from. I think what he did to Ellie is horrible, and I think that's why I really cried. I think I cried the last ten minutes. I could feel it, like, building.

Dr. Katrina Furey: I was, like, dissociating from my body from rage. Like, I was just, like, watching it. I was so angry that I was like, I can't get too close to this. Honestly, it was wild.

Portia Pendleton: Like, the pain you could feel, I had to get. So I think that's why it was very impactful.

Dr. Katrina Furey: And I think, too, the whole story with Dan, his partner, is so tragic. So it sounds like at some point I knew this was coming. And this is where sometimes I feel like a genius when I'm like, I can anticipate the storyline where I was like, oh, my God, Dan is Liz's brother.

Portia Pendleton: I didn't get that at all.

Dr. Katrina Furey: And then he was but so anyway, because I was like, how does he know Liz? He hasn't gone to a healthcare setting. It's not like she was his nurse and has this inappropriate bond to him or continued trying to help him out of the hospital or something like that. It's not like she was a student of his. How does he know her? It doesn't seem like she's his neighbor. But maybe. But so it turns out that Liz was Dan's sister and she was adopted into the family. And we sort of start to learn about this when the Thomas, the traveling missionary person, says, he's from this church. And she was like, I hate that church. And we learned that the beliefs of that church, it sounds like when Dan and Charlie fell in love, dan was so wracked with guilt, was my understanding, because that wasn't okay in the eyes of the church, that he ended up committing suicide. And so then you're like, that's why they're so bonded, because that was Liz's brother and that was his partner. And you do see some photos of him around his apartment. And Charlie wasn't thin, thin as you would think. Like, he was always maybe living in a larger body, but not morbidly obese. And so to me, I then also started looking at his relationship with food as his grief, like a depiction of grief and his guilt and shame and almost like, taking on literally the weight of Dan's death and in that way kind of like paralleling Dan's suicide, like you were saying, right? It was just so intense. So intense.

Portia Pendleton: I know. And I think I don't want to say it's just classic, but it's like, such a common presentation with binge eating disorder. There's so deeply rooted emotions, typically, of guilt and shame grief, rejection, out of control.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right. I don't know. That's just kind of my guiding it can spiral.

Portia Pendleton: Right.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Like, he didn't put on that weight overnight. It took years and years and years and years. And you imagine as that's happening, his world was probably getting smaller and smaller and smaller and smaller. Like, he was staying more and more in the house. And that's just sort of like you feel depressed watching the movie. It's dark. His apartment is cluttered. He, like, showers to see his daughter. But otherwise you imagine he's not really keeping up with his hygiene and all the things. And because it's hard to physically challenging.

Portia Pendleton: It's a production to get up and even use the bathroom.

Dr. Katrina Furey: I know. And it was so sad to me when Ellie was like, get up and walk over here.

Portia Pendleton: I got teary watching that.

Portia Pendleton: Yeah.

Dr. Katrina Furey: That made me and then he felt I mean, it just made me so uncomfortable. Like, that was another feeling I had throughout most of the movie, was just like, discomfort in so many different ways.

Portia Pendleton: Yeah. And he repeatedly throughout the movie says, I'm sorry.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right?

Portia Pendleton: Like, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, like, over and over again and gets, like, so mad about him because, like, you're not sorry.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Like, that's the thing, right?

Portia Pendleton: You can be both. But it's like he needs some DBT, right? Because you're saying you're sorry, but you're not doing anything to make it better for others, even not even just for yourself.

Dr. Katrina Furey: But I didn't get the sense again, I was so angry with him by the end, but I also look at him as being so traumatized. And I didn't get the sense it was malicious.

Portia Pendleton: No.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right. I just got the sense he was so hopeless and depressed. But then I would be so frustrated with him to not take people up on the offer to help or get the insurance or have sought help earlier on or anything. But I'm just like, maybe he just felt like he didn't deserve that.

Portia Pendleton: Yeah, I think that's absolutely part of it. And I think I just frame the entire thing as a suicide. And I think all of these feelings that we're talking about right now, you feel when someone takes their life suicide.

Portia Pendleton: Right?

Portia Pendleton: You're like, how could you do that? How could you leave your family, your kids? And there's really natural reactions that come up, like, you're selfish.

Dr. Katrina Furey: How could you choose that?

Portia Pendleton: Why wouldn't you reach out? Why wouldn't you go to the hospital? Why would you embark on a really planned and follow through event that leaves everyone just wrecked?

Portia Pendleton: Right.

Dr. Katrina Furey: I don't think Ellie is going to be better.

Portia Pendleton: Right.

Dr. Katrina Furey: I don't think this is going to help her. And I think I was also so angry because another sort of storyline throughout the movie was between Ellie and Thomas. We get the sense at first that Thomas is this, like, goody two shoes, new life missionary who doesn't swear, doesn't drink, blah, blah, blah, blah. And that Ellie's, like, being provocative and trying to poke him and trying to get him to smoke pot, or she's going to call the police and say he raped her. She has all of these really provocative things and keeps taking his picture, which I thought was so weird.

Portia Pendleton: And she takes her dad's picture and posts it and has a really in common.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right. Just a lot of boundary violations on her part. At first I was like, she's giving me a lot of cluster b vibes, like you were saying. And then it turns out that this guy was part of the church, but then stole their money, so he ran away. And now he's like, ran out of the money so he can't get back. And he's kind of lost. He's full of guilt and shame and worried that his parents will reject him because of what he did. And so somehow she sends the photos or something to his parents and they welcome him back. They surprise him and actually say, we don't care about the money, we just want you back. And he shows up near the end of Charlie's life to tell him about this and that Ellie was responsible for it. And Charlie internalizes it or interprets it as like, see, Ellie is good. But I was like, I don't think that that was good. Right. I don't think she was doing that in hopes that would be the outcome. I think she was, like, trying to hurt it. Right?

Portia Pendleton: Yeah, totally. No, that's what I got from that. And I thought that Ellie is just such a good example of how for some people, events that happen in childhood can lead to, you know, and a later in life presentation.

Portia Pendleton: Right.

Portia Pendleton: Like, and I I think at this point and I'm I'm very hopeful with.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Kids and teens that like a chef. If you listen to our episode about.

Portia Pendleton: Choke Open, that's my what is it called? So I think in a perfect world, if she could have worked, if her father had stayed alive and healed his mental health and health, and she was able to get really good therapy and.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Family therapy, like go to residential.

Portia Pendleton: Exactly.

Portia Pendleton: I think that there is a path for her, but I feel like her watching him die is not going to having no closure. And now it sounds like no guidance from mom. It seems like mom is now checked out because she said to Charlie, I raised her and you gave her the money. That's the best that we could do.

Dr. Katrina Furey: It seems like mom really also gave up on her. She was like, duly abandoned.

Portia Pendleton: I just don't see a great outlook for her.

Dr. Katrina Furey: I don't either. And I don't think that was an act of good for Thomas. I think she's always trying to hurt people.

Portia Pendleton: Right. And I think what's scary and concerning is it gets worse when you're an adult. Right. There's more consequences. You often as an adult are not referred to justice system like a residential instead of jail. You're 18 and if you do something I mean, she's threatening. She's literally threatening Thomas. Like you can't tell someone that you have to smoke pot or I'm going to tell people that you raped me. Provocative is a great word. Like aggressive.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Provocative. It is threatening. Right, exactly. So I think you're right on the nose about her totally being this odd presentation. Odd. By that we mean oppositional defiant disorder, which is something that's diagnosed, I think, in teenagers. Right?

Portia Pendleton: Yeah.

Portia Pendleton: It's kind of like the prerequisite to then conduct disorder, which is like a little bit worse. It's like children specifically and teens who are very hurtful of others intentionally and typically there's a little extra layer there like you're setting fires or you have killed like a small animal. So I mean, it's very concerning.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Know the difference. This is the important thing we talked about again back in you if you haven't listened yet, please go back and listen. But this is the flavor of the type of personality that unfortunately will become antisocial personality disorder with a lot of criminality. Like, you know the difference between right and wrong and you want to do right. You want to hurt other people. And a lot of times kids who meet this criteria do have a trauma history and you're like, you were so hurt, now you want to hurt others. It was interesting that it was a daughter. I feel like oftentimes we see this in boys, right? Like boys are more often diagnosed with that girls are more often diagnosed with like borderline personality disorder. So it's interesting to see a depiction in a girl.

Portia Pendleton: Yeah, that's a good point.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Oh God, I need a shower.

Portia Pendleton: Yeah, I mean, the movie is just like I think it just made me sad because it just made me feel really like everyone was suffering so deeply and no one even Liz.

Portia Pendleton: Right.

Portia Pendleton: So she finds out at the end because Mary raised by his ex wife.

Dr. Katrina Furey: I think, so something like that.

Portia Pendleton: Because she kind of does bring up the fact that he has, I think, like around $120,000, which again he's planning to leave to Ellie and Liz is.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Just like, why you were able to get insurance this whole time.

Portia Pendleton: And she talks about her car.

Portia Pendleton: Right.

Portia Pendleton: At some point she was walking in the snow and rain to him to bring him things. And you could see so hurt that he a was not helping himself, but also like her.

Dr. Katrina Furey: And I think that the Charlie Liz relationship is a really good depiction of a codependent relationship right. Because they're each enabling each other and getting their own kind of psychological need met.

Portia Pendleton: I don't know.

Dr. Katrina Furey: What do you think?

Portia Pendleton: And have a shared I think yeah, they have all shared shared trauma that they're both like, using each other to cope with. And again, it's not I feel like that sounds bad, but it's just like we also just do that. We find ways to cope, and they're using and coping with each other in an unhealthy way. What did you think about the moment when Charlie was sitting he was sitting down and Mary kind of came over and was putting her head on his chest, and they were just kind of like, having that moment?

Dr. Katrina Furey: I honestly don't remember it because I think I was so angry by the end, I blocked out a lot of I guess I thought it was like.

Portia Pendleton: She was kind of saying goodbye, probably.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah, I could see. I mean, I think they all knew who I don't know if Ellie understood he was dying.

Portia Pendleton: Oh, we didn't talk about her giving him the ambien. Again.

Dr. Katrina Furey: These are the things that cross over from being a rebellious teen and not listening to mom and Dad's rules and breaking curfew to egregious behavior. Right.

Portia Pendleton: Like, literally drugging someone.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Like, you could have killed him. Yeah. And then it also gave a sense that mom is maybe taking a lot of pills or something at home and I think drinks a lot. She said so. Also not really checked in. Oh, God. It was just so sad. I think I just really get sad when kids are abandoned by their parents. I think that's hard for me to watch. All right, well, any other final thoughts about this movie?

Portia Pendleton: So when we were talking about Charlie's size and it definitely does take time to get into this position, and I wanted to point out in always, right? Mentally, physically, it's like, this isn't something that a large size of chicken wings does.

Portia Pendleton: Right.

Portia Pendleton: It's repetitive behaviors over and over and over again, kind of in Always with also a lot of health care avoidance.

Portia Pendleton: Yes.

Portia Pendleton: And I think there's a double edged sword to that. So I think a lot of people in larger bodies feel a lot of shame and can experience, like, fat phobia medical professionals. So there's a lot of avoidance, which is really too bad, because if you were with a provider who was really offering support and guidance in a non judgmental and shameful way, but maybe even just like the same information, you would feel more comfortable going if you get to your healthcare setting. And it was a challenge to write, walk into the building, get up, take up the elevator, walk into the door, and then you find that there's no chair that you can sit in because it's not big enough for you. It's like all of these little, small kind of micro aggression, oppression really kind of sets the effect and makes people not go. So I think I just wanted to talk about having fatty food does not necessarily lead to this. It's a really significant mental health part and kind of a multifaceted place that a person is in to get here.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Right. And I think, again, I kept wondering about why did they pick morbid obesity over drug use, cutting, drinking, these other things we think about as self harming types of behaviors that you think you could develop in response to a tragic loss like this. We see that depicted a lot more in the media than something like this. So I think maybe that is why it all struck a nerve for everyone. And I thought overall, they did a remarkable job portraying binge eating the medical consequences that would come from living in a morbidly obese body and all the big feelings that he was probably feeling is what gets stirred up in us for watching, which was really fascinating, something we talk about a lot. And I think it's important, and I hope we keep reiterating with our show, is bodies come in all different shapes and sizes, and unfortunately, the medical field can be inherently fat shaming if you adhere too much to the BMI standards, which, as it turns out, aren't really predictive of overall health and longevity. I think there is some evidence that people with on the lower end of, like, the overweight BMI are sometimes healthier. They might not have high cholesterol or high blood pressure and things like that. A lot of people with a lot of muscle mass weigh more. So BMI is really not that accurate, but it's something a lot of people use.

Portia Pendleton: I think it's some of the advice that I give is really just kind of following what, to a degree, like.

Dr. Katrina Furey: What your lab work says.

Portia Pendleton: And if you are eating, in general, a balanced diet, and you're moving your body in a way that feels good to you, and you're living kind of a lifestyle that feels good, and your lab work is good and you're not having health issues, it's like you're probably okay. Right. And I think that's so true. People who appear and are in many.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Other ways very physically healthy can have.

Portia Pendleton: Really high cholesterol because it's genetic and there's parts to all of this.

Portia Pendleton: Exactly.

Portia Pendleton: I find that very interesting.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah, that's the other thing is, even if you do all those things, if you have a family history, you still might develop it. You could be thin and still get diabetes because you're genetically predisposed. It's not only like a quote unquote, fat person disease.

Portia Pendleton: Yeah.

Dr. Katrina Furey: So I don't know. I think we feel really strongly about that.

Portia Pendleton: But this movie was intense.

Dr. Katrina Furey: How would you rate it?

Portia Pendleton: One to five? Like five stars? Four stars? Four, I think.

Dr. Katrina Furey: For sure. Five stars. I mean, I don't know that I want to watch it again because it was intense.

Portia Pendleton: I don't know if I could. Not for any near future.

Dr. Katrina Furey: I feel like I've been anticipating recording this all week. I feel legit, like a weight is off my back. Which, again, is just really interesting.

Portia Pendleton: Yes.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Remarkable. I'm glad he won the oscar really well deserved, and I hope he keeps acting.

Portia Pendleton: I hope to see more.

Dr. Katrina Furey: And if he wants to come on the podcast, you're invited. Yeah, we'd love that.

Portia Pendleton: Well, thanks so much for listening to this episode. We hope you enjoyed it. If you would like, we would love for you to follow us on Instagram at Analyze Scripts. And if you could rate, review and subscribe and share with five people. Yeah, our channels on Spotify it seems like it's pretty active, as well as Apple Music, the most out of kind.

Dr. Katrina Furey: Of all the other places.

Portia Pendleton: But we are everywhere.

Portia Pendleton: Yes, we are everywhere.

Dr. Katrina Furey: If you wanted to go subscribe literally everywhere, feel free. All right, we'll see you next time.

Portia Pendleton: Bye.

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Welcome back to Analyze Scripts, where a psychiatrist and a therapist analyze what Hollywood gets right and wrong about mental health. Today, we wrap up our analysis of season 1 of "Shrinking" on AppleTV+. We are THRILLED this show has been renewed for a second season! In this episode, we chat about various character arcs, including the cliffhanger at the end. We also share a tender friendship moment and demonstrate how to sit with big, vulnerable feelings. Much like "Shrinking," this episode is full of tears and laughter! We hope you enjoy!

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[00:17] Dr. Katrina Furey: Welcome back to another episode of Analyze Scripts. This is Dr. Katrina Fury, a psychiatrist, and I'm joined, as always, by my friend colleague Portia Pendleton, a licensed clinical social worker. And today we are going to dive into the last four episodes of the first season of the show on Apple TV, plus shrinking. So this is episode seven to ten. And fun fact, we actually just watched episode ten together, so that was kind of fun.

[00:45] Portia Pendleton: I cried in front of you.

[00:47] Dr. Katrina Furey: That's okay. I cried at home when I watched it the first time. And then I watched you cry as you watch. So it was really interesting. I thought about, like, is this what content is? Like, should I be filming you cry? And then we put that we probably.

[01:03] Portia Pendleton: Should have, only the setting was a little awkward because I can't figure out how to put Apple TV on my living room TV. So we watched it from a bedroom.

[01:13] Dr. Katrina Furey: I'm really cool with.

[01:15] Portia Pendleton: I don't know if I'd want to put that out in the ether.

[01:19] Dr. Katrina Furey: This show is about crossing boundaries.

[01:26] Portia Pendleton: Funny.

[01:26] Dr. Katrina Furey: Oh, my gosh. So there's a lot to talk about. We pick up where, turns out Gabby and what's his name?

[01:34] Portia Pendleton: Jimmy.

[01:35] Dr. Katrina Furey: Jimmy. They went all the way.

[01:36] Portia Pendleton: They did.

[01:37] Dr. Katrina Furey: They went to fourth base. Fourth base. Home run. They sure did. Out of the park. And then a lot has transpired. Yes, a lot.

[01:51] Portia Pendleton: I feel like every single person in the show had emotional growth.

[01:56] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yes.

[01:56] Portia Pendleton: In many ways.

[01:57] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah, they totally did. Yeah.

[01:59] Portia Pendleton: So we see the aftermath of the party. Jimmy's on his apology tour. He's apologizing to everyone. He has to apologize to Brian, but Brian's like, I'm not sorry.

[02:08] Dr. Katrina Furey: We're engaged. Yeah.

[02:11] Portia Pendleton: He apologizes and has a conversation with Gabby where Gabby's like, it's fine.

[02:15] Dr. Katrina Furey: I don't regret it.

[02:15] Portia Pendleton: And then Jimmy's like, I do, and.

[02:17] Dr. Katrina Furey: You'Re like, I know, but then Gabby's like, you're safe, ****. And then that sort of comes up over and over. And spoiler alert, turns out he's not. At the very end, when they're all gathered at Brian's wedding, and he's giving this really moving speech, which I thought was actually really touching. You see Gabby kind of having the feels, and I think Liz, like, pops over her shoulder and is like, I hear your ****** humming.

[02:42] Portia Pendleton: She's like, It is not safe, ****.

[02:43] Dr. Katrina Furey: It's not safe, ****. So we'll see what happens in season two since it got renewed. Yes.

[02:49] Portia Pendleton: Very excited.

[02:49] Dr. Katrina Furey: Very excited.

[02:50] Portia Pendleton: So I don't even know who to focus on first. Maybe we should just focus on Jimmy, like, his curve. So he seems like he kind of just falls apart at the party. Right. He's reminded constantly by Tia.

[03:05] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah, I know.

[03:06] Portia Pendleton: It feels like he has gone up since then, so that would make sense. I wrote down a couple of things that I was still a little bit, like, annoyed with, with his patience. Like, I feel like in those episodes, or in his sessions after the party, like, he's still, like, over sharing. And I'm like, Wally.

[03:25] Dr. Katrina Furey: But then I was so glad when she called him out and said something. I didn't write down the exact sentence she used, but she was like, you're making it about you. Or she called it out that he has a tendency to do this. I think he knew that, but it helped that being brought to his attention. And also I noticed that one of the writers of the show is named Wally. Oh, wow. Okay. I know wally, if you want to come on the podcast yeah, I was going to say holler at us, but we don't say that anymore.

[03:53] Portia Pendleton: Just like DM us.

[03:54] Dr. Katrina Furey: DM us.

[03:56] Portia Pendleton: That's more cool.

[03:58] Dr. Katrina Furey: Okay.

[03:58] Portia Pendleton: So, yeah, I think Wally's the OCD patient. Yeah. So I thought it was funny. I wrote down, like, her eyes are closed in the session. She won't look at him because of the kiss. Like, she's really embarrassed.

[04:10] Dr. Katrina Furey: At least she came.

[04:11] Portia Pendleton: Yeah, that was a big step. And he's kind of, like, trying to make her feel better by over sharing. Like, he shares a way that he is embarrassed, and again, that helps her, but I'm like, stop doing that.

[04:24] Dr. Katrina Furey: And then eventually again, I didn't write down exactly what she said, but she basically draws it to his attention. Like, dude, you're over sharing too much. Good for you.

[04:32] Portia Pendleton: Yes. So we also see Jimmy and Paul and Brian in the episode track down Alice at the college. I'm kind of, like, rescue her from this college boy. So Jimmy, through these last couple of episodes, is becoming stepping back into his parent role.

[04:54] Dr. Katrina Furey: Thank God. Finally. Thank God.

[04:57] Portia Pendleton: It sounds like you're finding that attractive.

[05:01] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah, I know. I was telling Portia by the end, I was, like, really attracted to Jimmy, maybe.

[05:05] Portia Pendleton: And in the beginning you were not. No, I didn't.

[05:07] Dr. Katrina Furey: Like because he's, like, being a parent now.

[05:11] Portia Pendleton: You're fulfilling your role in your duties. You're stepping up. And again, we know why. That he had kind of a breakdown and wasn't able to be there and still right.

[05:24] Dr. Katrina Furey: There's no exceptions. I'm a very harsh judge when it.

[05:29] Portia Pendleton: Comes to this, to parenting. We want what's best for the kids.

[05:33] Dr. Katrina Furey: Right. And we were so worried about Alice and is she going to rebel? Is she not? And she kind of did. I love they're like, no, not a guy in a vest. But I felt like she did enough maybe to finally get his attention, which sometimes teens act out, right? All teens act out right. Like, to push buttons and stuff. But I felt like she did it enough to get his attention, not so much for this show to take a different turn.

[06:02] Portia Pendleton: And I feel like it was within her character. Like, I don't see her as a big risk taker. I don't see her.

[06:10] Dr. Katrina Furey: But yeah, I.

[06:11] Portia Pendleton: Just feel like she's very risky.

[06:12] Dr. Katrina Furey: She told a friend. She told a friend where she was going. I loved when they barged in on that what did they call it? The garden party.

[06:23] Portia Pendleton: Party I've ever seen in my life.

[06:25] Dr. Katrina Furey: But they're all their food. Oh, my God, it's so funny. But I loved how it was so similar to drinks under the bridge, and Paul had said something like, oh, so and so is really good at coming.

[06:34] Portia Pendleton: Up with the name Summer.

[06:35] Dr. Katrina Furey: Summer. But then when Paul's leaving and he tells so and so, like, stop trying to get with your English. Yes.

[06:42] Portia Pendleton: And everyone's like, what?

[06:43] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah. I thought it was just so funny.

[06:45] Portia Pendleton: That these are the parties, right? I'm expecting to raise your house party. Or again, like a garden party where you're in a garden, but everyone's trash and there's balls everywhere. And I was just like, all these.

[06:55] Dr. Katrina Furey: People are just like, you're drinking like.

[06:56] Portia Pendleton: An insultzer and you're smoking marijuana and you're on your phone, like, not playing music. I mean, hey, this is a relatively speaking safe party, so that's great.

[07:08] Dr. Katrina Furey: I will fingers crossed that's the party my kids go to someday. That's the extent of it. But I thought that was just, like.

[07:15] Portia Pendleton: A funny little I don't know, it made me laugh.

[07:19] Dr. Katrina Furey: Are we millennials? Yeah. I am Millennials. You are older than you are. You not? No, we both are.

[07:24] Portia Pendleton: Yeah. We're in the middle.

[07:26] Dr. Katrina Furey: We're in the middle. Okay. And then whoever wrote the show maybe is a millennial or older, I'm assuming. I feel like it was, like, a funny commentary on that generation.

[07:36] Portia Pendleton: Gen Z.

[07:37] Dr. Katrina Furey: Is Gen Z the young one. Okay.

[07:39] Portia Pendleton: I think they got a lot, right?

[07:40] Dr. Katrina Furey: Like Alice's Style.

[07:42] Portia Pendleton: I just think it was funny.

[07:44] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah, but even the party, I feel like they're just like, oh, the kids are on their phones now. Maybe they are. I don't know. So I don't know. I thought that was pretty funny.

[07:52] Portia Pendleton: I liked when the college guy opens the door and he's like, alice, your two dads and grandpa here.

[08:01] Dr. Katrina Furey: I love that.

[08:02] Portia Pendleton: And then so mortifying. And then Paul is, like, saying we as they're walking in, and Brian's like, don't. We're not peers. Stop comparing me to you.

[08:10] Dr. Katrina Furey: I loved it. And I love that they had to use Brian's car because Alice took his car and Paul can't drive, and that they make Brian sit in the back.

[08:18] Portia Pendleton: Yeah. He's like, I think this is about my self esteem.

[08:20] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah, but all these details are so perfect. I just loved it. And I love how Harrison Ford, I guess we'll call him, paul is so protective of Alice, and even then, when she's so mad that they were there, you could tell she appreciates. And that is so true of teenagers, Toddlers. All children appreciate when their parents set boundaries. And then I love that he finally grounded her. Although it looks like maybe the sentence didn't last long. I don't know. I guess she wasn't really like, going out and about. But he did ground her. And even though she was mad, that's, like, the appropriate step. Yeah.

[08:55] Portia Pendleton: And I think in that moment, it was a little bit I could see a parent having a hard time setting that boundary, because, again, I feel like Alice at the time, and that's the reason you set boundaries, is a really good kid.

[09:08] Dr. Katrina Furey: Right.

[09:09] Portia Pendleton: I don't think she would maybe do.

[09:11] Dr. Katrina Furey: That again, but you still have to set the limit.

[09:14] Portia Pendleton: Setting the limit. And initially, she's really mad and upset, and she still says, mom wouldn't do this. And he's like she would exactly.

[09:21] Dr. Katrina Furey: And I thought that was so powerful.

[09:23] Portia Pendleton: And then she says, I ******* hate you.

[09:26] Dr. Katrina Furey: And he goes, I ******* love you. And I started crying. I cried a lot in these episodes. I was like, whoa.

[09:35] Portia Pendleton: It was like, I'm crying. My eyes are watering. A tear falls. And then the next scene, there's a comedic relief, and it's from Liz or Gabby.

[09:46] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah.

[09:46] Portia Pendleton: And that was a really I think the balance was really nice.

[09:50] Dr. Katrina Furey: I know we kept saying as we again watched episode ten together, and I kind of watched you watch episode Ten, which was like a fascinating anthropological adventure. Do you have no, I sketched you. No. I was like, I want to work with them. I want to be friends with my neighbors. Like this.

[10:09] Portia Pendleton: I know.

[10:10] Dr. Katrina Furey: Put rocks in that thing, make it.

[10:12] Portia Pendleton: Really smooth and give it to someone.

[10:15] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah. I don't know. I'm so glad this show is coming back.

[10:20] Portia Pendleton: So, like, Jimmy is on this arc. He's stepping up as a parent. He's being such a good dad. He is having tough conversations with Alice. He's having tough conversations with himself.

[10:28] Dr. Katrina Furey: Oh, my God. But we have to talk about them sitting her down to tell her that they have I love when she's like, alice has never called me Auntie Gabby. Like, do you want to make this worse? It's just so funny. I have to say again, this is like a comedy. We want it all to end up fine. But I was like, I don't know if Alice will get over that easily.

[10:49] Portia Pendleton: Yeah.

[10:49] Dr. Katrina Furey: I don't know. I feel like they kind of blew through it.

[10:52] Portia Pendleton: Do you think it's like a little bit of almost like a stereotypical? Like, a therapist as a parent, psychiatrist as a parent, like thing to do, sitting her down and talking about it? I feel like another parent would just be like, yeah, this is really uncomfortable.

[11:07] Dr. Katrina Furey: We're not going to talk about or, like, avoided.

[11:09] Portia Pendleton: Right. And the therapist parents are like, let's.

[11:12] Dr. Katrina Furey: Talk about it a lot. Yeah.

[11:15] Portia Pendleton: There's got to be a medium. There's got to be a middle ground.

[11:18] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah, I have no comment on that. Okay.

[11:23] Portia Pendleton: I'll ask you a couple of years.

[11:30] Dr. Katrina Furey: I think Jimmy was talking about how he's, like, starting to slip up at work to Paul, and it's like, starting, like, you know, he's been sort of acting silly and he was like, yeah, I told the patient to like, ********** for, you know, anxiety relief instead of meditate. And Paul was like, well, they both work. I feel like their banter is so funny. I just love it.

[11:50] Portia Pendleton: I mean, I know we say this every time, but I really, really give like 100 out of 100 stars to the writing. They get things, the smallest details, so right.

[12:02] Dr. Katrina Furey: How'd you do it? I don't know.

[12:04] Portia Pendleton: I could never come up with that. This is not my strong suit. The things that they think about because.

[12:11] Dr. Katrina Furey: We want them to someday call us to consult. This is our strong suit.

[12:14] Portia Pendleton: Let me rephrase that.

[12:16] Dr. Katrina Furey: We are so witty and we're mental health experts, so give us a call, guys. I know exactly what you mean, though. I don't know how to do it. Yeah, because the writing is so funny. Like that tongue in cheek, the part how it makes you cry and laugh sometimes at the same time. So you don't know which way should my mouth be happy or sad? But then also the mental health layers that are pretty accurate. I'm just like how'd you do it.

[12:43] Portia Pendleton: Totally how'd you do it. I 100% agree. And I do feel like it's worth kind of bringing up and laughing at. So when Brian, Paul and Jimmy are again rescuing Alice from the college guys dorm, I love that Brian interjects and he's like, Well, I'm a lawyer and.

[12:59] Dr. Katrina Furey: Did you know that she's twelve? I know. She's like, I'm not twelve.

[13:04] Portia Pendleton: Because she is underage, by the way.

[13:07] Dr. Katrina Furey: But I just think it's like they.

[13:08] Portia Pendleton: Are just so funny in that way. They're all playing this role. And I was like, oh, I want that.

[13:13] Dr. Katrina Furey: I know. I want them to be my dad's and cranky grandpa. And Alice is probably like, I'm so glad she has them now. He's getting better. Yeah. I wish he'd go to his own therapy. Maybe season two writers.

[13:30] Portia Pendleton: That would be good.

[13:31] Dr. Katrina Furey: I like that idea.

[13:32] Portia Pendleton: If it's in there, I'm going to say that they stole credit.

[13:35] Dr. Katrina Furey: We could sue. Yeah. Oh, my God. What did you think about Gabby at Nico's art show and Liz with the laser pointer? I just feel like, again, that's such.

[13:48] Portia Pendleton: A small detail that I know.

[13:51] Dr. Katrina Furey: Of course it has a laser pointer.

[13:53] Portia Pendleton: And she uses it because, again, she's overbearing and judgy. She likes to be involved with things per her.

[13:59] Dr. Katrina Furey: And I was like, of course you.

[14:00] Portia Pendleton: Carry one and you're pointing it at people in public.

[14:04] Dr. Katrina Furey: You could shop for that. And she's a white woman pointing it at black women for a long half time. I'm really surprised they didn't notice. I know.

[14:16] Portia Pendleton: I feel like I didn't know what to I was like, really? And I feel like sick.

[14:21] Dr. Katrina Furey: Do you think that was intentional? Sort of like that commentary on white privilege and stuff?

[14:26] Portia Pendleton: And I think to an extent. Like, Liz very much so owns it. Even the white guilt catering.

[14:33] Dr. Katrina Furey: Oh, my God. I know. Please call it that. I know. And then when Gabby was like, are you worried later? Are you worried it's going to be like Sandra bullockIn? Oh, God, I love the show so much. I do have to say I love seeing Liz and Gabby's like, evolution as friends and stuff. What do you think about that?

[14:53] Portia Pendleton: I think their friendship is beautiful. I noted that when they're at the art show. I loved how Gabby and it's obviously, like, silly, but it's also serious. Gabby is not happy with how Liz is responding to something, and she tells her, like, in the moment, it's not awkward. She's directive. It's not three months later after you're holding a grudge. She's just like, I really need you to do this for me tonight and not do this. And then Liz says it.

[15:22] Dr. Katrina Furey: And then later on, Liz can say that to her husband. Remember when she's sitting down with Sean, which is, like, one of my favorite scenes of all time. And I love just them getting closer. And I also love their age difference. And it kind of reminded me of us, even though I don't think which one do you think I am? Which one do you think I think you are.

[15:38] Portia Pendleton: First of all, for our listeners, the age difference is very small.

[15:42] Dr. Katrina Furey: Like, four years.

[15:43] Portia Pendleton: Yeah, it's not a lot, but okay.

[15:48] Dr. Katrina Furey: I thought I was Gabby.

[15:50] Portia Pendleton: I want to be Liz.

[15:52] Dr. Katrina Furey: I was Liz. I'm like older.

[15:54] Portia Pendleton: I just like Liz. I like them both, but I feel like I am a Liz. I would like to be a Liz.

[16:01] Dr. Katrina Furey: Really?

[16:03] Portia Pendleton: I want to be a fun neighbor. I want to be, like, a fun, alter, middle aged woman. I want to be fashionable. I want to be self care.

[16:11] Dr. Katrina Furey: White cardigan, and it's always white ironed.

[16:16] Portia Pendleton: I want to buy an $8,000 toilet that has a heated seat.

[16:19] Dr. Katrina Furey: I know I thought of myself more as Liz because I'm older, and I thought of you as Gabby because I feel like you wear, like, cool clothes and you're like, hip and.

[16:34] Portia Pendleton: Either one. I like them both. I'm happy.

[16:37] Dr. Katrina Furey: I loved near the end as Liz is, like, giving out rocks to people. There's this theme of the little funny, shiny rocks. What did you think of that? How that keeps carrying over? I thought that it was such, like.

[16:52] Portia Pendleton: A little tiny detail that had such a big storyline. It's not like there was a lot of time spent on it, but you see it throughout all the episodes and then you learn all this meaning associated with it. I was laughing at we find out that two of her three sons, she has given Rock and Alice, and that's it.

[17:14] Dr. Katrina Furey: And then she gives one to Gabby. But only after Gabby officially confides that she has, in fact, slept with Jimmy. And they kind of talk about it. I loved Gabby being like it's like Mariah Carey. Yes. Well, in honor of that portia, I do have a small gift for you to celebrate our friendship, our partnership. And we've reached 5000 downloads and it is a tiny rock. Wow. It's beautiful.

[17:43] Portia Pendleton: It's very smooth. I'm going to try to describe it to you listening out there. It is like a dark deep purple, which I love purple. It is smooth. The bottom is kind of circular. The top is a little bit pointy.

[17:58] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah. Wow. It's kind of like a fingernail.

[18:02] Portia Pendleton: Fingernail?

[18:03] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah. I've been carrying it in my pocket all day. Wow. Just waiting for this moment. I did find it outside of a grocery store parking lot on my way here. But that's to symbolize how I feel about you as Liz feels toward the people she cares about.

[18:20] Portia Pendleton: That's beautiful and very touching.

[18:23] Dr. Katrina Furey: And it might be a little dirty.

[18:25] Portia Pendleton: I might tear and I don't know why that is. Maybe it's from oh, are you really going to yes.

[18:34] Dr. Katrina Furey: No, I didn't really care about you.

[18:39] Portia Pendleton: I don't like being vulnerable guys.

[18:41] Dr. Katrina Furey: So I think it's because I watch.

[18:42] Portia Pendleton: Drinking and not because of this moment.

[18:45] Dr. Katrina Furey: Not it's not. I know we hate real feelings, just as Liz says. You remember? I know. Oh, maybe someday we'll have merch of little rocks. Yeah. Porsche, do you want to take a break? No. Okay. We'll just maybe cut out.

[19:01] Portia Pendleton: Now this current part that I'm talking about during commercial.

[19:06] Dr. Katrina Furey: Now a word from our sponsors. Listeners, it's really important to learn how to sit with your big feelings. So right now we're going to show you how it's done. Ready? Sit.

[19:21] Portia Pendleton: Okay, that's enough.

[19:25] Dr. Katrina Furey: Sometimes we think we're so funny and I'm just curious if it translates. Yeah, if it's just us.

[19:32] Portia Pendleton: I think it does.

[19:33] Dr. Katrina Furey: Well, I actually don't know because the.

[19:35] Portia Pendleton: Person who thinks it's also funny is my mom. So I think she's a little biased.

[19:40] Dr. Katrina Furey: So anyway, send us a DM. Let us know what you think.

[19:42] Portia Pendleton: Yeah.

[19:43] Dr. Katrina Furey: Okay. So let's see.

[19:45] Portia Pendleton: We were talking about Jimmy's Arc. So let's kind of dive into Gabby. So we see her she has sexual relations with Jimmy and his safe ****. We see her and Liz's budding relationship. We see her kind of wanting to pursue this goal of professorship after she attends her ex's art show.

[20:06] Dr. Katrina Furey: And I think honestly, as a black female therapist, that is so important. And again, this is like how do these writers know about this? Right. That she said to Paul, it's so important for more of me to see.

[20:20] Portia Pendleton: Me in this role.

[20:21] Dr. Katrina Furey: And it's so it is true. Yeah. I really, really like that arc. And I love the whole letter of recommendation thing. I've had mentors do that. You write it and I'll sign it and that's always so awkward. Right. So again, even them knowing that, how do they know?

[20:40] Portia Pendleton: Right? So I liked the anecdote of her patient, who is a black woman who.

[20:45] Dr. Katrina Furey: Is like, you just get me.

[20:47] Portia Pendleton: I don't mind the 90 minutes drive. And Gabby's like, what 90 minutes drive?

[20:50] Dr. Katrina Furey: She's like to see a black therapist. And that's so true. And I think that there's a couple of points in these episodes that really speak to the special bond between a therapist and patient when it's a really good match like that, and then when Grace thanks, Jimmy. And he has actually a really nice reply that always makes me tear up. Because every now and then I feel like I don't know about you, but I feel like there's not a ton of thanks or appreciation in our line of work, nor should there be. That's not like why I go to work every day to be told, like, thank you. But when it happens and it's genuine, it always knocks me off. I always feel kind of, like, taken off guard and like, oh, and I.

[21:34] Portia Pendleton: Have to work really hard to and cry not to cry. Again, sometimes you can't hold it back, but you have to be a professional. And then again, being in the role for the patient than anything you say or do. But also sometimes that can be really.

[21:52] Dr. Katrina Furey: Powerful because they can see how much. Yeah. So I thought again, at first, I thought her patient was the new girlfriend of Nico. Oh, yeah. Because they were kind of wearing a.

[22:08] Portia Pendleton: Similar outfit that was like a reddish tone, long jumpsuit.

[22:14] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah, it was like two piece that matches. And she really likes the girlfriend, too. I loved her outburst at Nico's show. And I was just like, you know what, Gabby? Don't be so hard on yourself. You're allowed to have an outburst. It sounds like you've been there and born witness and cleaned up a lot of Nico stuff.

[22:30] Portia Pendleton: And she was right. She was right. She was the muse who loved it.

[22:34] Dr. Katrina Furey: And she was like, Muse on the couch. Where did therapist sit? On couches? And I got a freckle, and I was shocked.

[22:43] Portia Pendleton: So then she has lunch with him, and he's like, we were really good. And then you see her in bed, and I was like, oh, it's going to be getting back together with him. And then it was Jimmy.

[22:53] Dr. Katrina Furey: I know.

[22:53] Portia Pendleton: And I was like, wow, they did it again.

[22:55] Dr. Katrina Furey: But I thought, like, good for her to not fall back into it, because I could imagine how tempting now he's finally got it together, he's sober, and.

[23:06] Portia Pendleton: Again, he's what you knew he could be.

[23:08] Dr. Katrina Furey: I know. And again, it's like you really felt her frustration. Like, I put in all the work. Yes. And now you reap the reward. And I think that's where she had her outburst, like, no, you are not the muse. It's me. And I was like, you're allowed to say that. Yeah. And then but then when she's talking about the butt stuff leaving, I was like, well, yeah, I was like, this.

[23:30] Portia Pendleton: Has maybe crossed the line, but funny and sometimes again, therapists are human, as we've seen throughout this whole show, and make mistakes and are silly and sometimes don't know how to handle our emotions.

[23:43] Dr. Katrina Furey: I know you would think we're experts, but sometimes we're not.

[23:46] Portia Pendleton: No.

[23:48] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah, I loved again, we're like jumping all over the place, but I loved at the end as Jimmy is like, trying to reconnect with Alice and be a parent and he talks to her when she's like, sitting in the dark and having that memory of her mom. That really was touching. In a tear darker moment when she starts talking about forgetting parts of her mom, I just feel like that rings so true. Like anyone who's lost, anyone they care about, I think can resonate with that. It's really beautiful. Finally, his replies are good, where he's like, you were being a normal kid, that's what you're supposed to do. And then sort of introducing a little humor, like, do you want to talk about it? Apparently I'm good at it. I'm going to use that. I'm putting that away in my memory file cabinet to use on my own children at some point. And then when she said no and he said, okay, but when you're ready, I'm here. Perfect. Yeah, that's what you say, guys, to anyone grieving, that's exactly what you say. But then when he goes to Paul and he says, I wrote this down, I have all this training and experience, but I feel so helpless. And Paul says, you should put that on your business card. I love that.

[24:57] Portia Pendleton: Way to reel them in.

[24:59] Dr. Katrina Furey: Way to just yeah, it was so funny. But yeah.

[25:02] Portia Pendleton: The healing that we see take place with the grief, I think is just like so beautiful because again, they're not healed right.

[25:11] Dr. Katrina Furey: I don't think you ever really are, but you've changed.

[25:14] Portia Pendleton: They're getting better at communicating and tolerating thinking about it. We see him kind of remove the wedding band. We see him going through the stuff. We see him talking to her. We see him visiting her grave. We see Alice kind of going there and wearing her things. We just see all these changes start to help. It's really showing that they're moving forward through it instead of avoiding it, instead of holding it in.

[25:37] Dr. Katrina Furey: Right. Again, I feel so much less angry with him and I think this is why. Because he's, like, showing up, doing some of the work himself, and then by doing that, can really be there more for Alice, even if it's in a more, like not super overt in your face way, but just like there he's not like I don't know. I'm like should he have talked to her about taking off his ring? Should given her a heads up or not. But he can tolerate her reaction, which I think is important.

[26:11] Portia Pendleton: I feel like that does come up. It's such a symbol.

[26:16] Dr. Katrina Furey: Right.

[26:16] Portia Pendleton: And I think I just was thinking, kind of reflecting on the episode, grief is such a different timeline for everyone. So it's like, for him, he's like taking the ring off. Like she's not ready for him to do that. But it's just interesting to think about.

[26:34] Dr. Katrina Furey: It is. It so is. And I thought that again, I feel like maybe in real life, alice might rebel a little more, maybe not, I don't know. But I thought them writing it so that he asked her if she wanted to go to the cemetery. She said no and then later realized it was her mom's birthday and forgot. Starting to forget certain pieces about her. I feel like all of this is so true to what it can feel like to be grieving and like, what a hard thing to go through as a teenager, trying to still be a teenager, but going through this major thing. And I just thought Jimmy really validated how hard that is for her. Really? In a real nice, simple way. Yeah.

[27:16] Portia Pendleton: And he wasn't shame or guilt by missing the birthday, but he did not put it on her at all. And he just said, I did remember, and I just thought that you maybe wanted some space. I think he gave her the out. She did forget, but that's also what happens.

[27:33] Dr. Katrina Furey: Exactly.

[27:34] Portia Pendleton: Forward.

[27:34] Dr. Katrina Furey: Right. And he didn't shame her. And I think that was probably really honest of him. And those are the things that are gosh just so hard, I would imagine, to navigate. Right. These are like the split second decisions you're making when these things are coming up. Right. She probably says no, and he probably has to make a quick decision, like, do I remind her? Do I not? And that's the road he took. But I mean, just to verbalize it, I don't know. It's great. Yeah. I feel a lot better about him as a parent now.

[28:09] Portia Pendleton: What happens, because, you know, there has to be shenanigans in season two. Like, I'm just curious to see what turns it takes.

[28:15] Dr. Katrina Furey: I know. I mean, I feel like Gabby and Jimmy will be together or trying to be, or maybe they were, then they broke up or like something. I really hope Sean's food truck business takes off. I loved the scene with Liz and her husband as like her Hype man and D man. I just really like him. I really like him. Derek.

[28:41] Portia Pendleton: Yeah.

[28:42] Dr. Katrina Furey: They're so sweet together.

[28:45] Portia Pendleton: I feel like he's just, like, so kind. And yes, I'm sure he's a spouse, so he can be annoying. And we know he is per Liz, but he's just so sweet and supportive and knows when she needs him. Seems like he listens to her request when she's like, please move over a little bit. You're squishing me.

[29:05] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah. And it was really nice, right. Because she was all nervous about when he retires, he's always going to be around. And now. She's like, naturally found this thing she can do to take up her time. And I wonder how Sean's parents will feel about it. I wonder if we'd ever see that or not.

[29:21] Portia Pendleton: Yeah, that's interesting. So we don't get a lot of Sean in the patient role these past couple of episodes, which I appreciated.

[29:33] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah. Except one of my favorite early, like maybe episode seven or eight when he's got a job now with his dad. That's what he was going to do before he got the investment money from Liz and D man to start this catering business. He was going to do some administrative work, it sounds like, which still okay, good. You're with your dad. But again, I'm like, I wonder how his parents feel about all this. But again, gives Jimmy a check for rent, again at the office in the lunchroom. And Paul walks in and sees this happening. And the line was so funny. He's like, there's no prouder moment for a therapist than when their patient pays the rent. Yes. I was like, I wonder how long it took them to just perfect that line.

[30:20] Portia Pendleton: Because Sean is like, well, just be happy for me, separate from this whole thing, this really bad situation. So, I mean, again, it's a show. And I felt like as the consumer and not wearing my therapist hat, I liked where it's going. I want Sean to be friends with them. I like that he has all these supports, but can we just cut off the therapy? Stay with it. That still shouldn't really be happening, but refer out, stay with the friends. You got this family now.

[30:53] Dr. Katrina Furey: Great. Refer to another therapist. And then I do have to say, though, putting my therapist hat on at the end, I was really glad when as they're like dancing at the wedding and it's so great. Alice looks so beautiful in that dress. Everyone's dance, everyone's happy. And they're like cutting to his patience from the beginning, sort of like being better. And I was like, okay, but he's really not doing great. And then the very end, I was kind of glad they included that. Right. Where spoiler alert. Like, Grace is on a hike with her emotionally abusive at best husband. And earlier in a session, she had said, like, I'm starting to stand up for myself. I'm noticing how abusive he is. And he's really lucky we're not on a cliff somewhere when he's criticizing me because I push him right off. And at first you're like, oh, and Jimmy's kind of like, yeah, push him off. Bash his skull, ease brains or like something silly, you think. But then at the end, they are hiking on a cliff. He's really emotionally abusive to her and she does push him off. And I have to say again, I don't want anyone to die. But I was glad as a therapist they showed like, some of these techniques are not working. Yeah, I don't know what were your thoughts? Yeah.

[32:14] Portia Pendleton: No, I totally agree. I feel like, in a way, him telling her initially that he won't see her unless she breaks up with him has created almost this role where Jimmy is like, God, he's in charge. He tells her what to do versus offers potential solutions or encourages her. What do you think? He's now kind of giving these things, these suggestions almost, that she had to follow, and then she did. So I think that's a seed almost like a little bit planted there that now to me connects to the present because they joked about this. And then again, what are the odds?

[32:57] Dr. Katrina Furey: But they do hike.

[32:58] Portia Pendleton: They do hike. So that's the thing. He's seen them hike, right. Because they had that beautiful moment at the end of that session where she thanks him and then he says, It's my pleasure. And I was like, oh, that's exactly.

[33:10] Dr. Katrina Furey: And then I was glad they didn't just cut to all the patients, like, doing great with this out of the box therapy.

[33:18] Portia Pendleton: Because I'm just now thinking, too, like.

[33:20] Dr. Katrina Furey: What'S that going to mean in season two?

[33:22] Portia Pendleton: Yeah. Does she get arrested? Does she blame him? Does she recall this being said in therapy? What's his liability? What did he write down in that session?

[33:33] Dr. Katrina Furey: What's his risk assessment right in the moment? It doesn't sound like a legitimate threat. I would not have thought that was going to happen until they showed it happening. Even as she's, like, walking up, I really wasn't sure. Is she going to push him or just stand there? But yeah, it's like, what is his liability? Yeah.

[33:53] Portia Pendleton: So I had kind of commented while we were watching it that I guess this is some information for you. Never push someone off a cliff for two reasons, you guys know, one, because it's bad. And the other reason is because they can tell where the body lands is further out than if someone fell or even jumped. They can tell. How? I don't know how. Obviously, it's math and science and like.

[34:20] Dr. Katrina Furey: Forensic, probably you need one of those protractors do the arc and physics and math. Yes.

[34:30] Portia Pendleton: Because, for example, if someone wanted to die by jumping off a cliff, you would probably step off.

[34:38] Dr. Katrina Furey: You might land feet first or something.

[34:40] Portia Pendleton: Not that far away from the cliff. If you were maybe, like, running from something, you would see, like, footsteps pushing, propelling you off dirt in the back, and then versus being pushed, like you're landing further with none of the evidence on top.

[34:55] Dr. Katrina Furey: How do you know this?

[34:56] Portia Pendleton: I learned this in a docuseries. Like some kind of true crime true crime thing.

[35:04] Dr. Katrina Furey: Wow.

[35:04] Portia Pendleton: Yeah.

[35:05] Dr. Katrina Furey: It's not because you're looking into pushing anyone off no cliff.

[35:08] Portia Pendleton: Right. Something that crosses my mind.

[35:13] Dr. Katrina Furey: That's really interesting, though, and I wonder, like, did he survive? We don't know.

[35:18] Portia Pendleton: Cliffhanger.

[35:19] Dr. Katrina Furey: Literally.

[35:20] Portia Pendleton: Literally a cliffhanger.

[35:22] Dr. Katrina Furey: They're so witty.

[35:23] Portia Pendleton: So we see angry man talking to that barista.

[35:26] Dr. Katrina Furey: And they're laughing.

[35:29] Portia Pendleton: Wally, she goes down in the park.

[35:32] Dr. Katrina Furey: And you're like, she's going to go home and sit on her bed.

[35:34] Portia Pendleton: What did she say to that woman?

[35:36] Dr. Katrina Furey: She's like, first time.

[35:39] Portia Pendleton: I love that.

[35:41] Dr. Katrina Furey: We are totally skipping over Harrison Ford.

[35:46] Portia Pendleton: Oh, yeah.

[35:48] Dr. Katrina Furey: I think that's because at least for me, that was like the most emotional part.

[35:52] Portia Pendleton: So season seven starts with, like, the aftermath of him getting high. So he wakes up on the couch. He starts eating the doritos again.

[36:00] Dr. Katrina Furey: Sean makes everyone pancakes, has a ties.

[36:03] Portia Pendleton: In his he picks up a pancake, pours syrup in it and folds it like a taco.

[36:08] Dr. Katrina Furey: And I was like, that's clever.

[36:10] Portia Pendleton: That sounds like a great idea.

[36:12] Dr. Katrina Furey: Try that. Or like Taco Bell. Yeah, get on that. Good idea. Yeah. Taco Bell. You want sponsor us? Shout out.

[36:19] Portia Pendleton: And then his daughter comes and they go to the doctor's appointment. She's like, oh, you're vibing with her. It's really sweet. They're having a good time. And then she does this kind of grand gesture, which I think is a really big deal of inviting him to come stay with them, like live with them in their guest house. And I think what's hard is I'm not surprised his response and not like.

[36:46] Dr. Katrina Furey: Because he's obsessed with work, but more.

[36:48] Portia Pendleton: Like just like that would signal that he is done almost. He's going to retire. It means so many more things because I think of course he wants to see her. Of course he wants to be with his grandson, but that means so much more and she so hurt.

[37:06] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah, because she rightfully suffered.

[37:08] Portia Pendleton: It's another rejection. So I really do see both sides.

[37:13] Dr. Katrina Furey: Right.

[37:13] Portia Pendleton: And I understand kind of where they both land. At the end of that episode, she's really upset her. It leaves and he's like kind of spinning, doesn't know what to do.

[37:22] Dr. Katrina Furey: And you see him, like, trying to call her. She's not answering. The grandson answers. I loved when her husband's on the phone and he's like, you tell her that this is very childish. Yeah. And the husband's like, I'm not going to do that. Hangs out like, good boundary. And then again okay, so this whole time we thought Paul had like, really stringent boundaries, which I think is interesting because I read somewhere his character is based off of the real psychiatrist Stuts. Who? There's that whole Netflix documentary about with Jonah Hill. Have you seen that yet?

[37:51] Portia Pendleton: No, I saw it.

[37:52] Dr. Katrina Furey: I have thoughts, but we'll save that for another time. But it's interesting because I don't know if it's a secret, but like, in the documentary, there's a lot of boundaries. Yeah, that's what I boundaries that aren't typical of a therapist patient relationship. So I thought it was interesting that they wrote Paul to be so boundaried until he gets in a relationship with his neurologist. Yeah. But again, they're like, well, that's kind of cute, though. I don't know it doesn't feel as icky.

[38:22] Portia Pendleton: It almost seems like they have a relationship before she they know. It seems like they know each other, like, for a while and are very comfortable. It doesn't seem like that's his first neurologist.

[38:36] Dr. Katrina Furey: And then oh, maybe.

[38:37] Portia Pendleton: I don't know.

[38:38] Dr. Katrina Furey: Maybe. But then it was so sweet. When he shows up, he's being honored with an award at Las Vegas.

[38:43] Portia Pendleton: We think he's going to Las Vegas. He invites his daughter. She says no, she can't because she.

[38:48] Dr. Katrina Furey: Has her son's play. And then he shows up at the neurologist door trying to whisk her away. She says, yes, it's really cute.

[38:56] Portia Pendleton: Tell everybody that. I thought about it for a week and I was unsure. But she's like, yes, I'll get rid of it.

[39:02] Dr. Katrina Furey: I think there's also just something about seeing older folks finding love. I like that. And I like older folks, like having a really active life. Like, I really fantasize my retirement years in my mind, so it gives me hope. But then he shows up at the pool.

[39:21] Portia Pendleton: You see him walking down. You still think that he's like, right at the conference, going to find a seat to accept his award. And it wasn't until and then you see the daughter. And I was like, did they surprise him?

[39:35] Dr. Katrina Furey: That's what I thought too. He did. I was like I started bawling. I was, like, watching. I know. It was just like, he's showing up for his daughter. Jimmy's showing up for his daughter. We're all showing up for the daughters. Like, finally justice for the daughters. It was just really sweet. I don't know. And then to start wrapping up. Also, like, shout out to the fun dip reference.

[40:03] Portia Pendleton: Seems like Paul's a little, like, addicted.

[40:06] Dr. Katrina Furey: But it's so true. He's like, this is sugar, and then I can eat the stick. And you're like, well, that is innovative, isn't it?

[40:16] Portia Pendleton: It depends on the flavor. I have had fun before. I like, I think maybe like the.

[40:20] Dr. Katrina Furey: Blue raspberry or, like the cherry. Which one of them? But it's literally just sugar powder.

[40:26] Portia Pendleton: And then the stick is sugar.

[40:27] Dr. Katrina Furey: Sugar. Yeah. Who thought of it? I would love I wonder if I could Wikipedia this later. Legit. Who had this idea and pitched it to investors? Like, how'd you pitch this idea? You just go around and ask kids, like, you want sugar? They're like, yes. And it's like in solid form and granular form. I don't know. So cute. Yeah.

[40:48] Portia Pendleton: So we see Paul really come around. He's being a supportive dad. He's also showing up to Gabby. He comes to her internship in her interview and is really just great. I loved Liz kind of like directly calling him out. That seems like it kind of opened his eyes to be like, you're right. He owns that. He has a problem with women he cares about. Gabby was like, I'm one of them.

[41:14] Dr. Katrina Furey: I know when he finally compliments her and I loved he slammed that water bottle down on the desk, and you see him, like, using it more and more. It was just so cute. I don't know. It's really sweet. I loved that.

[41:26] Portia Pendleton: I loved that. And then the wedding is the last episode. We already talked about it, but Jimmy's speech is lovely. We see Brian's dad coming through and being supportive to him. I really liked the speech he gave. I liked that he incorporated all the friends and family.

[41:42] Dr. Katrina Furey: There this really sweet ending. It's like everyone's in a good spot. And then Grace pushes her abusive husband. So we'll we'll see. Yeah. What comes next? The last thing I wanted to make sure we talked about was I loved also the depiction of academia with Paul and Gabby, how Paul was like, Why do you want to be a professor? And he was like, Academia is one of the five circles of hell, or something. And he said, the five circles are babies, musical magic, kale, and academia. And I was curious what your five circles would be.

[42:18] Portia Pendleton: Oh, my gosh, that's a great question.

[42:19] Dr. Katrina Furey: Put you on the spot. Okay. What are the five circles of hell? It's hard.

[42:30] Portia Pendleton: Okay. One of them would be forced to sit and watch old, sad Disney movies.

[42:36] Dr. Katrina Furey: So, like, bambi.

[42:37] Portia Pendleton: Dumbo. Like hell.

[42:39] Dr. Katrina Furey: Okay, so I have to keep that in mind.

[42:41] Portia Pendleton: I don't like those.

[42:42] Dr. Katrina Furey: Okay.

[42:42] Portia Pendleton: They're very sad. I think moving to Antarctica, like, a really frigid place, like North Russia is hell. I don't like being cold, okay? I don't mind, like, snow.

[42:56] Dr. Katrina Furey: Wow.

[42:56] Portia Pendleton: It's a beautiful Christmas. I'm skiing, but besides that, hate it.

[43:00] Dr. Katrina Furey: I don't know why.

[43:01] Portia Pendleton: I live in the Northeast, but that's fine.

[43:04] Dr. Katrina Furey: What else? Cheese.

[43:08] Portia Pendleton: Well, I love cheese, but you know what? My GI system doesn't.

[43:12] Dr. Katrina Furey: Well, maybe that's how that tension between your heart and your stomach. Yeah. Tarn.

[43:19] Portia Pendleton: Oh, this is such a good question.

[43:21] Dr. Katrina Furey: Interacting with insurance companies, hell and all.

[43:25] Portia Pendleton: The like, anything to do with billing with insurance, hell. And then I'm trying to think of.

[43:31] Dr. Katrina Furey: Just, like, a slam dunk one, like a Zenpic.

[43:35] Portia Pendleton: Yeah, I think that's just bad.

[43:37] Dr. Katrina Furey: Maybe not hell. Maybe that's a little hard.

[43:39] Portia Pendleton: I mean, I think all those people like big Pharma.

[43:43] Dr. Katrina Furey: Big Pharma. What else?

[43:45] Portia Pendleton: Big Pharma. Sponsor us.

[43:46] Dr. Katrina Furey: Just kidding. We don't want your dirty we don't want your dirty money.

[43:51] Portia Pendleton: I can't think of another one. But here's a fun fact. If you go to our Instagram page at Analyze Scripts, we will circle back and create a video each of our five circles of Hell.

[44:02] Dr. Katrina Furey: OOH, I like that idea that way.

[44:04] Portia Pendleton: Check us out and comment yours.

[44:07] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah. Does it include kale? I didn't think babies and musicals needed to be on it. Like, I like babies, I like musicals. Kale's. Okay, sometimes.

[44:16] Portia Pendleton: But for Paul, it was funny.

[44:19] Dr. Katrina Furey: And then he went to his grandson's.

[44:21] Portia Pendleton: Musical of the elephant or mouse or whatever.

[44:25] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah. All right, Portia, any final thoughts? No, just the end of thinking.

[44:30] Portia Pendleton: I love the show. I feel like I didn't I really got Apple Plus to watch it, and then I was like, oh, I'm probably going to cancel it now. I love this show.

[44:39] Dr. Katrina Furey: I'm so excited for season two.

[44:40] Portia Pendleton: I'm also like discovering little other cool.

[44:42] Dr. Katrina Furey: Shows, like Ted Lasso is a big hit. I know. I never watched it.

[44:45] Portia Pendleton: Ted Blaster. And then I'm watching Eugene Levy.

[44:48] Dr. Katrina Furey: He's like the traveling or something, right?

[44:50] Portia Pendleton: But he's the what traveler. He doesn't really want to. Oh, it's so good. I watched a couple of those episodes. He's good.

[44:58] Dr. Katrina Furey: So shout out Apple Plus. Shout out if you want to sponsor us. We've had 500 downloads. So anyway. All right, guys. Well, thank you for listening once again, please don't forget to rate, review and subscribe. Follow us at Analyze scripts on Instagram. Send us a DM, send us an email. Analyze [email protected]. We have not yet gotten a listener email, so will you be the first? We'll let you know next time. Okay, bye.

[45:30] Dr. Katrina Furey: This podcast and its contents are a copyright of Analyzed Scripts.

[45:34] Dr. Katrina Furey: All rights reserved.

[45:35] Dr. Katrina Furey: Any redistribution or reproduction of part or all of the contents in any form is prohibited. Unless you want to share it with your friends and rate, review and subscribe, that's fine. All stories and characters discussed are fictional in nature. No identification with actual persons, living or deceased places, buildings, or products is intended.

[45:54] Dr. Katrina Furey: Or should be inferred.

[45:56] Dr. Katrina Furey: This podcast is for entertainment purposes only. The podcast and its contents do not constitute professional mental health or medical advice. Listeners might consider consulting a mental health provider if they need assistance with any mental health problems or concerns. As always, please call 911 or go directly to your nearest emergency room for any psychiatric emergencies. Thanks for listening and see you next time.

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Welcome back to Analyze Scripts, where a psychiatrist and a therapist analyze what Hollywood gets right and wrong about mental health. Today, we are thrilled to recap the end of the fourth season of "You." We touch on topics ranging from ketamine to ideas of reference and - of course! - erotomanic delusions. But mostly we spend time analyzing all of the twists and turns. Do YOU think Joe Goldberg is a psychopath? Listen to hear our take and if it's changed over four seasons. This episode is brought to you by our first sponsor, Therapeutic Bodywork, out of Cape Cod, Massachusetts. Check them out at www.therapeutic-bodywork.com if you need a "calm" box after listening to this episode! We hope you enjoy!

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[00:17] Portia Pendleton: So today we have a sponsor for our kind of wrap up of season four of you.

[00:23] Dr. Katrina Furey: And guys, this isn't a fake sponsor or like our previous fake sponsor. For real? Yeah.

[00:28] Portia Pendleton: So we're really, really excited, really grateful yes. To kind of share with you therapeutic body work. They are kind of a do it all wellness center in the Cape in Massachusetts. They do ship nationally. So I am going to kind of talk about briefly just what we received from them, which is the calm box.

[00:51] Dr. Katrina Furey: Perfect for winding down after this episode or finishing season four of you or just like a normal Wednesday.

[01:00] Portia Pendleton: So we received four products in it. They're all kind of to promote calming, relaxing. So one of the first products that I was really excited to get is their magnesium mineral magic cream. So this is something that I have tried before. You basically rub this cream on your wrists or the bottoms of your feet before bed. And the intention is that it's supposed to kind of help you have a restful sleep and also to reduce some of that anticipatory anxiety that you get pre bedtime if you just watched something.

[01:37] Dr. Katrina Furey: Stressful looping in your mind.

[01:39] Portia Pendleton: Yes, exactly. So we also received this let me just get it out here. The Sleep Easy Oil, which is again, to promote deep restful sleep. You can put it on different parts of your body. The directions are on it. It's very clear. Head temple, solar plexus, soles of feet for a night of sound sleep. Putting it on 20 minutes before I have not tried this. I'm really looking forward.

[02:02] Dr. Katrina Furey: I can't wait. And those two products pair really nicely with the other things that they were kind enough to send us. A lavender eye pillow, which I might just wear for our whole next episode as we talk about you. But this is the kind of thing where you can either heat it up or keep it cold and you just place it on your eyes and inhale the lavender. I cannot wait for this. I love lavender. And then the last thing they gave us was this awesome tea called Zen AF. Quit freaking out already. Herbal tea to calm stress and anxiety. Has no caffeine, which is great. Has a lot of natural ingredients that have been shown to help soothe anxiety, provide some calm and relaxation. As always, whenever using over the counter supplements, please check in with your provider if you are taking any prescribed medication to make sure there's no drug drug interactions. But overall, I can't wait to try all of these things.

[02:54] Portia Pendleton: Yeah, I'm super excited.

[02:56] Dr. Katrina Furey: And I'm also just like, how did.

[02:57] Portia Pendleton: You know I needed something calming?

[02:59] Dr. Katrina Furey: Well, over therapist. Thank you.

[03:02] Portia Pendleton: Exactly. So they have other boxes that are for sale. Again, they ship nationally so you can get a detox box. Immunity. Calm love. Yeah, that one looks cool and very fitting for you. They are located on cape Cod, Massachusetts, where they do provide in person services.

[03:17] Dr. Katrina Furey: Like reflexology, acupuncture, massage, body work, really nice things like that. And then I believe they also ship nationwide at no charge.

[03:27] Portia Pendleton: Yes, they ship some nationwide at no extra charge. And you can find all of these boxes for sale at their website, which is therapeutic.com. Again, that's therapeutic.com.

[03:41] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah. So check them out. And thank you so much to Therapeuticbodywork for being our first sponsor. I feel like we're in the big league now. Yeah.

[03:51] Portia Pendleton: So grateful.

[03:52] Dr. Katrina Furey: So grateful. Super cool. All right, I hope you enjoyed this episode. Hi, welcome back to another episode of Analyze Scripts. I'm Dr. Katrina Fury, and I am here with my friend and colleague Portia Pendleton, a licensed clinical social worker. We are thrilled you're joining us today to dissect the second half of season four of you. There's so much to talk about. So before we dive in, Portia, I just wanted to give you some updates because I don't know if you can believe this. Not only have we gotten our first sponsor, but we've also gone international. Okay, so someone in New Zealand and someone in Canada is listening. Hi, there. Hey, what's up? What time is it there? That's so cool. I have no idea who you are, but thank you. Please feel free to spread widely and send us a DM or an email or something. Introducing yourself. That's so cool. And then I had a couple of thoughts in between the last time we recorded for part One, as we were waiting for part two to be released. The first is, do you know about Anna Delvey? Yes, of course. Right. Doesn't she belong at Sundry House? Oh, yeah. Isn't that, like, what she was trying to do? Right.

[05:12] Portia Pendleton: I feel like she belongs 100%.

[05:15] Dr. Katrina Furey: Like, not just as, like, a scam artist, but that's her kind of place. And then my other thought was, and I can't take full credit for this, my husband kind of had this thought, too. He's been really into watching Yellowstone, which I haven't gotten into yet. Have you? I haven't.

[05:29] Portia Pendleton: I've heard great things.

[05:30] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah, it looks really intense. It would probably be a good thing for us to discuss at some point. But anyway, why doesn't Joe find himself in a Yellowstone situation? He always ends up with this new crew. That's the same, right? Like these really wealthy, egotistical narcissistic people. But what if in season five, he's, like, in Yellowstone or something, right? Like in the Wild West with cowboys.

[05:55] Portia Pendleton: Like, I wonder how he'd do that's a good thought. Because it's like he's attracting a type of person or purposely, intentionally bringing them into his circle. I don't know. I don't think he would ever maybe even put himself in that position.

[06:11] Dr. Katrina Furey: Right. I don't think he'd go to Montana to him.

[06:14] Portia Pendleton: Or more unsafe. I know that maybe doesn't make sense, but it's like he doesn't know if he would understand them enough or he wouldn't feel like he could manipulate them or I don't know.

[06:24] Dr. Katrina Furey: I think you're totally right. It's so funny. He's like this interesting character where on the one hand, he really looks down on the very people he's surrounding himself with almost as a way to make himself feel better. But anyway, that's not where we find joe.

[06:39] Portia Pendleton: No, we don't. We find him kind of back after almost being killed at the estate in the country. So we kind of see him back with all these people. We're like, what's going to happen? Is he going to get in trouble? What's going on with reese? Are him and reese friends? Is reese going to kill him? It's just like, what's going on?

[07:03] Dr. Katrina Furey: And I do have to say, after we recorded our first episode, without having watched the second part, I was, like, a little down with the first half, right? Because I was like, oh, where's marianne? Where's the cage? Where's the plot? I'm used to what is going on? And this yeah, we both said that. Right? And then this, I was like, all right, you redeemed yourself. Like, very good. A plus. Like this all track. And I was like, whoa, I didn't see a lot of these coming at all. I feel like I was just getting.

[07:31] Portia Pendleton: Like, slapped in the face left and right.

[07:33] Dr. Katrina Furey: Like, whoa, whoa.

[07:35] Portia Pendleton: So we kind of see right away, marianne get on the train again.

[07:40] Dr. Katrina Furey: As soon as we did, I was like, okay, good. We are going to see what happened to mary.

[07:44] Portia Pendleton: They didn't just, like, write her off exactly. But then he says something that's, like, he's really trying to heal his heart after letting her go, and I was like, okay, we talked about this last episode. This does not fit the profile of a psychopath. Does not fit his profile of letting things go.

[07:59] Dr. Katrina Furey: And you had the ingenious idea, and it's like you were on the money, where you're like, something had to have happened to Mary Anne for him to move on.

[08:06] Portia Pendleton: And lo and behold, plot twist of the century. Yeah. So we see kind of joe watching reese. He's at, like, a press conference of his. He's just listening.

[08:21] Dr. Katrina Furey: And at this point, we think that reese is the eat the rich killer and that he's trying to frame joe to sort of make himself look good for catching the real killer as he's trying to become mayor. And remember, we left last time being like, how did reese figure all this stuff out about joe?

[08:40] Portia Pendleton: Right?

[08:41] Dr. Katrina Furey: Turns out he did it. Oh, my god. That was the plot twist of the century for me.

[08:46] Portia Pendleton: Yeah. So reese, it seems like he wants a friend, and then it seems like he's kind of pressuring joe to kill because all these other people are now, like, a liability.

[08:56] Dr. Katrina Furey: Right.

[08:56] Portia Pendleton: Like, all these rich people at the sundry house, they know too much. Reese is like, maybe risky sides, and he needs them to die a mayor and great, clean guy.

[09:09] Dr. Katrina Furey: Right. And Reese kept basically being like, okay, Joe, this is the last time I need you to do this. Plant Simon's ear on someone. Just anyone. I don't care who it is, but plant it on someone, and I promise that's it. And then you'll be left let out scot free. I can become mayor all as well in the world. And he kept saying, like, we're doing this to do good. We're killing to do good, which I feel like just spoke to Joe's inner views of himself. Yeah, it was fascinating.

[09:41] Portia Pendleton: So he kind of decides to frame Connie at first, and he meets with him, and then Connie appeals right to this ego of Joe that Connie is like, you know, you make me want to change. I'm going to go to rehab. Really just seeing everything, like, you've made me into this better person. And then Joe is, of course, his narcissistic traits being like, oh, I'm helping him so much, and I've impacted his life, so he chooses not to. Connie and again, reminded me of when.

[10:15] Dr. Katrina Furey: We were talking about PTSD back in our shrinking episodes. I think it was episode nine, like the fight, flight freeze or fawn response. This is an example. Connie's not doing it on purpose. Right. He doesn't know Joe's trying to frame him. But of like, that fawn response, which we've seen in the show before, mostly when people are locked in cages and really afraid they're going to die. So, yeah, here it is again.

[10:35] Portia Pendleton: And it seems like that one does really work on Joe. If he feels like it's genuine, it is. Connie wants to make a change. So Reese wants Joe to kill Kate's father or find out what he has on him.

[10:53] Dr. Katrina Furey: That part got a little confusing to me, but it sounds like I was like, oh, is Tom Lockwood running for mayor too? Is that his opponent, or does he have something on him?

[11:02] Portia Pendleton: Or is Reese's, one of his policies, going to damage something of Lockwood's business who's super powerful?

[11:10] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah. So somehow it became like that was Joe's final act of service to Reese, was going to be to kill Tom Lockwood.

[11:19] Portia Pendleton: So he brings him into his office at school, and remember, there's the tarp down on the floor.

[11:24] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yes.

[11:24] Portia Pendleton: And I'm just like, this is so obvious, especially, I feel like, in Lockwood's world. And he knows. He calls him Joe, first of all, at that lunch when he takes the bathroom, he knows who Joe is, I believe, and knows what he's capable of. And so he's like, oh, why is there a tarp on the floor? And she's like, oh, you know, there's 3 miles.

[11:45] Dr. Katrina Furey: He's like, okay. You could give the sense also like, hey, what's up, Greg Canier? Nice to see you.

[11:51] Portia Pendleton: He did a really good job in.

[11:52] Dr. Katrina Furey: This role, but you got the sense, like, Joe felt uncomfortable around him because what he was doing was predictable to Tom Lockwood. Tom Lockwood was like, a step ahead almost every step of the way.

[12:06] Portia Pendleton: And Joe is not used to that.

[12:07] Dr. Katrina Furey: He's not used to that, and it really throws him off his game. And then I don't know when we start talking about the major twist, but at some point I started wondering, is this happening at all? Like, what parts of this actually happened? What parts of it are delusion that we're kind of seeing play out? Right.

[12:26] Portia Pendleton: Yeah. That's interesting to kind of think, like, hindsight wise.

[12:29] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah.

[12:29] Portia Pendleton: Because Lockwood convinces, at that moment, Joe to kill Reese.

[12:35] Dr. Katrina Furey: Reese. Right. And before we get into that, we have to talk about the blonde lady. Yes. Remember in our last episode, I was like, we were so blonde lady. Like, why do they keep showing her? Is it Reese's? Mom.

[12:49] Portia Pendleton: What does she have to do? Is it someone from Joe's past?

[12:53] Dr. Katrina Furey: My God, Porsche. Can I tell you how titillated I was when that became a whole storyline?

[12:58] Portia Pendleton: I was like, oh, my God. And it was like a Rotomania everywhere. It was all over the headlines. And I was like, from you to you to boop.

[13:05] Dr. Katrina Furey: Oh, my God. I was like, this is the you I love.

[13:09] Portia Pendleton: Finally, it's back.

[13:10] Dr. Katrina Furey: So basically, it turned out don who's like this server or waitress as Sundry.

[13:16] Portia Pendleton: Gets hired for that event.

[13:18] Dr. Katrina Furey: For that event. She's been seen in the earlier episodes as, like, a paparazzi photographer. She was in the very first episode following Joe at the art show in.

[13:29] Portia Pendleton: London, which didn't really make sense.

[13:30] Dr. Katrina Furey: That didn't make me quite on there.

[13:32] Portia Pendleton: Because he had not met at that crew. Yeah, that crew.

[13:36] Dr. Katrina Furey: Right.

[13:37] Portia Pendleton: I don't know. Maybe we're missing something.

[13:38] Dr. Katrina Furey: Maybe.

[13:39] Portia Pendleton: I know.

[13:39] Dr. Katrina Furey: I feel like I want to rewatch it now, like, with a fine tooth comb. Kind of like, I'm rewatching Vanderpump rule since the scandal broke. But anyway, so finally it turns out she's like, oh, Lady Phoebe, security is here. Lady Phoebe is, like, in the throes of an acute stress reaction, maybe PTSD, which we'll get into coupled with drug use. Exactly.

[14:03] Portia Pendleton: Everything's elevated. Paranoia and maybe some delusions because of the drug use interacting with her stress reaction.

[14:09] Dr. Katrina Furey: Exactly. She's probably not sleeping. She looks, like, really troubled and disheveled, and she ends up later on having it sounds like a psychotic break with everything going on. She's making really risky choices, like getting married so quickly, and Kate's really worried about her and tries to get her into treatment, which I thought was, like, a really good plotline. And eventually she does get into treatment, and we see her at the end sort of in a better place, a better frame of mind, but we don't see that yet.

[14:39] Portia Pendleton: So tell me when you me started to feel like dawn was off. So I got a kind of a weird vibe when she wouldn't let Nadia take a picture with Phoebe. And she was like, no, we have to go into the I was just like, something's up, something's up. And I didn't know then that Don was like, the stalker Phoebe, but I thought, Don is something she involved, something she's either going to tell Phoebe all about Joe and then he's going to kill Phoebe. I was like, something's off, something's off. This is weird. What's going to happen?

[15:11] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yes.

[15:12] Portia Pendleton: How were you following those couple?

[15:13] Dr. Katrina Furey: I was kind of the same way. Like, seeing that she was there working, I was like, oh, she is involved. I'm so excited. We're going to see what her role is. I didn't expect what happened. I agreed, like, when she wouldn't let Nadia take a picture, when she was ushering Phoebe to, quote unquote, safety, but all by herself, that seemed off to me. And then when they got to the hotel room and she started talking to her, I was like, oh, my God.

[15:38] Portia Pendleton: Wheels spinning and being like, so scared. Why are we just in here? Even after the lock click, I feel like Phoebe was still kind of like, okay, I'm safe. And then all of a sudden, Don started talking, and Phoebe was like, what?

[15:52] Dr. Katrina Furey: And she started talking in such a delusional way. And I thought this was a great depiction of a psychotic symptom called ideas of Reference, where she references the pictures that Phoebe has posted on Instagram, remember? And she's like, I knew you were posting that for me and saying that I was your sunshine. And that is a classic symptom of psychosis where people who are in a delusional frame of mind whether it's a one time psychotic break or schizophrenia they can have these ideas of reference where they interpret things in their reality as some sort of special message being sent to them by whoever aliens, God, the person of their erotic obsession. I thought that was actually, like, a really good depiction of that. I got so scared when she took out the knife and was like, where's your tattoo?

[16:45] Portia Pendleton: I know.

[16:46] Dr. Katrina Furey: Getting really scared for her.

[16:48] Portia Pendleton: And then Phoebe, which I just thought was kick ***, like, went into this mode where she was like, I'm going to say or do whatever again to figure out how I can get out of here. I'm going to lean into this. I'm going to make all of her dreams come true and hopefully at some point be around people and help.

[17:10] Dr. Katrina Furey: Exactly.

[17:10] Portia Pendleton: And we saw that then play out with Joe, like, when he kind of enters the room. Phoebe's like, yeah, at first like, oh, yeah, this is my friend dawn, and Dawn's saying this, and then Joe's getting obviously he heard too, because somehow so.

[17:24] Dr. Katrina Furey: Like, Nadia ended up there because she's dating that guy who has a rich, fancy dad or something, so he could get her in there. And then she was so excited to meet Lady Phoebe. And then Nadia saw joe there. And so that's how they're all there. And they kind of figure out Nadia.

[17:38] Portia Pendleton: Is like, she just starts putting all these pieces together. Joe being in all these circles and pieces. That's not the moment that she thinks Joe is bad.

[17:48] Dr. Katrina Furey: Right.

[17:48] Portia Pendleton: But it's just like, that's interesting that you're here.

[17:51] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah, exactly. Her wheels kind of start turning too. But then they all work together to find Lady Phoebe. Joe comes in as, again, like, the.

[17:59] Portia Pendleton: Hero of the day.

[18:00] Dr. Katrina Furey: But I loved this sequence of scenes, again, where Joe's met his match. Right?

[18:05] Portia Pendleton: Yeah.

[18:06] Dr. Katrina Furey: We're like, he someone with erotomanic delusions is talking to Don. A person with erotic delusions. Right. And so I just love when they.

[18:15] Portia Pendleton: Depict and Joe has no awareness of his own, and he's like he's probably thinking that Don is nuts. How could you ever think that? And it's like, you do this.

[18:23] Dr. Katrina Furey: I do this literally. So fascinating to me why I love this show is they do such a good job of like, he can hit the nail on the head but has no insight into himself but, like, enough where he can talk to her in the way, like she needs and somehow eventually disarms her and she gets arrested.

[18:42] Portia Pendleton: And taken away the ear with her.

[18:45] Dr. Katrina Furey: Exactly. So now she's framed as the Eat the Rich killer. And again, it's like, what a level of sociopathy and psychopathy right. To be, like, trying to save your friend and thinking about your own motive here in such, like, a heightened emotional state.

[19:03] Portia Pendleton: Oh, my God. This is kind of the storyline that then takes off with Lady Phoebe and her beau. I always get Adam.

[19:12] Dr. Katrina Furey: He's not spaker. Pratt.

[19:14] Portia Pendleton: Adam Pratt.

[19:15] Dr. Katrina Furey: So Adam Pratt is his fake name? Yeah.

[19:18] Portia Pendleton: The act of character.

[19:19] Dr. Katrina Furey: Lucas Cage. Okay.

[19:21] Portia Pendleton: So Adam comes in and is like, oh, of course, Joe, you're saving the day again. And immediately kind of is then trying to get Phoebe. We hear all this backstory of him not having money, and then he takes that bet with that friend about the ring and his car collection. And to me, Adam, until that, just seemed kind of like a dumb rich guy who was just, like, making poorly have any deaths to him.

[19:45] Dr. Katrina Furey: Right? Didn't have a lot of death, but Brad, wow.

[19:47] Portia Pendleton: I was like, I hate you. You're a jerk. You're conniving, you are hurtful and just as bad.

[19:54] Dr. Katrina Furey: You're not killing people, but you're basically, like, killing her.

[19:57] Portia Pendleton: I really was so mad at him, and then he kept coming in between her and Kate. So he kept trying to talk to her about not going through with the wedding, at least having a prena, I.

[20:08] Dr. Katrina Furey: Mean, all of these days.

[20:09] Portia Pendleton: And he kept appearing and being like, oh, Kate, how come you keep every time you see Phoebe, she's upset. Like, he's manipulating and gaslighting.

[20:17] Dr. Katrina Furey: Just like Joe would do, like, in early seasons, right? Like Peach and Beck again, they try to distance themselves. Like, she tried to break up with Adam over and over and was like, I don't want to be with you, blah, blah, blah, blah. And then he just gets her when she's vulnerable and keeps weaseling his way.

[20:33] Portia Pendleton: In and then is doing things like the artist.

[20:36] Dr. Katrina Furey: What?

[20:36] Portia Pendleton: Like he's drugging her? He's, like, making drugs available. He is.

[20:40] Dr. Katrina Furey: Right.

[20:41] Portia Pendleton: He's making her do all these things, not allowing her to get psychiatric help.

[20:46] Dr. Katrina Furey: He's just doing whatever he can. Like rushing the wedding to get married to her and have access to her money.

[20:52] Portia Pendleton: Starts, like knowing that, but then I think she's such an kind of, like, walk back out of it. And I'm just like, phoebe, you are so powerful. You're the most powerful person here.

[21:01] Dr. Katrina Furey: Poor thing. But she is, like, so traumatized after everything that happened.

[21:05] Portia Pendleton: Of course she is paranoid.

[21:07] Dr. Katrina Furey: Right? And then turns out she actually does have a stalker. Not just Joe or maybe Reese or whoever. Yeah, she actually does have this other stalker. So she had all the trauma at the Castle place, all the trauma of being stalked and feeling really uneasy, and then the trauma of the whole thing that happened with Don, her stalker. And she's just, like, distraught. She's abusing drugs and alcohol, which she was doing beforehand anyway, but now that's, like, really escalating. And he just, like, weasels his way in and is doing anything he can to get her to marry him, to take her money, basically. It's awful. Yeah. I was like, would the marriage even be valid?

[21:46] Portia Pendleton: I think if she then a week later was like, what the heck? Or like she was mad because then he spent all her money on all of the other sundry houses. I think that she could get it.

[21:57] Dr. Katrina Furey: Annulled, but then she might have lost her money by then. It's so risky. I think she sort of started to realize it when her parents weren't coming.

[22:04] Portia Pendleton: I know.

[22:04] Dr. Katrina Furey: And I was like and Kate was.

[22:06] Portia Pendleton: Like, reminding her of, like, this is not the wedding that you've dreamed of your whole life.

[22:09] Dr. Katrina Furey: What are you doing?

[22:10] Portia Pendleton: And she got very upset with Kate, got very defensive. Was probably internally, like, having a really internal with herself.

[22:19] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah. And Kate kept referring to her as being, like, in a manic state. And I think that's, like, a pretty good depiction. I think it's induced by all the substances in the stress. I'm not so sure this is indicative she has a bipolar disorder. But she was probably not sleeping, probably not eating on all sorts of substances, behaving very irrationally, impulsively. Her speech was off, and her thought process was a little disjointed.

[22:48] Portia Pendleton: Her pupils were really and obviously substances, but she just looked like she was off. Right.

[22:53] Dr. Katrina Furey: She was off. Right. So I thought it actually did make a lot of sense when she finally was found wandering. It was so sad when Kate said people took pictures of her and all these things and not helping her. Yeah, just like and I think that unfortunately does happen.

[23:11] Portia Pendleton: We've seen that with celebrities, especially female celebrities, time and time and time and time again.

[23:16] Dr. Katrina Furey: I know, it's really sad, but then in the end, I was glad that she got help and kind of, like, escaped that world.

[23:22] Portia Pendleton: That was, I think, the only for me, positive thing to come out of this episode season. Yeah, I just wanted to talk about Adam Pratt's demise.

[23:34] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yes, I agree.

[23:36] Portia Pendleton: So he is a purveyor of prostitution, and he has, like, a dominatrix kind of coming in to get his needs met, and then it goes really wrong.

[23:49] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah, it does go really wrong. But also, again, such witty writing when as they're, like, tying him to the bedpost, he's like, I'm so relieved my wife is finally getting the help she needs. They've been married for 12 hours, and he's like, I'm so relieved, and, oh, you're making this really tight burp. And then she's like, can we bring in the boys? And he's like.

[24:12] Portia Pendleton: And then he says the safe word over and over again. I can't remember what it was.

[24:16] Dr. Katrina Furey: What was it? It was like butterfly something really silly.

[24:18] Portia Pendleton: And then don't stop. And then we learned that that's all because Kate told her father that she was really worried about Phoebe and so on and so forth. And then Lockwood took care of it for her, and Kate's very upset.

[24:30] Dr. Katrina Furey: That was so manipulative of her dad to be like, well, you know what was going to happen if you talk about it in front of me, it's like, no.

[24:37] Portia Pendleton: Yeah. So you can't say anything about anyone.

[24:40] Dr. Katrina Furey: Apparently going to die.

[24:42] Portia Pendleton: I got an A minus, not an A on this essay. Does that mean that my professor is going to get killed?

[24:48] Dr. Katrina Furey: Potentially.

[24:49] Portia Pendleton: Right.

[24:49] Dr. Katrina Furey: And I was kind of confused about why did her dad come into the picture here?

[24:54] Portia Pendleton: Well, we find out. But that he was kind of pursuing her this whole time, or like, she was never free. Right. So he had made all of these internships happen.

[25:03] Dr. Katrina Furey: So kind of like he was stalking her. Oh, my gosh. This show gets so meta by, like, all the layers of he had that.

[25:09] Portia Pendleton: File on her, which she talks about.

[25:10] Dr. Katrina Furey: At the end in the last season.

[25:12] Portia Pendleton: With Joe, where my father knew the person I gave a blow job to, and then my menstrual cycle and all these things. And then when Joe does kill Lockwood, Lockwood's like, you're no better than me, so you're like taking care of her.

[25:29] Dr. Katrina Furey: By doing these things in the same way he was.

[25:31] Portia Pendleton: Yeah. Also, I think Blockwood was trying to not die, but that was just, like a really interesting storyline. But anyway, getting Adam, he was just I was, like, kind of laughing. What do I know?

[25:44] Dr. Katrina Furey: I didn't know he was going to die. I thought maybe torture him a little bit or something. Yeah. Or make him sign an annulment paper. I did not expect him to die.

[25:54] Portia Pendleton: I was surprised that it was death.

[25:56] Dr. Katrina Furey: But at that point it was like, okay, this is when everyone dies.

[25:59] Portia Pendleton: You die.

[25:59] Dr. Katrina Furey: Everyone. It's like oprah, like giving out cars. It's like, you die, you die, you die. You know, like at this point in the season, that's how it goes. Twist.

[26:05] Portia Pendleton: Twist. Yeah.

[26:06] Dr. Katrina Furey: Oh, my God. Oh my God. I think that brings us to the ultimate twist of all.

[26:17] Portia Pendleton: Oh, my God.

[26:18] Dr. Katrina Furey: My God. So basically, right, we think that Reese is like in on Joe basically manipulating and using Joe's history to his advantage to get Joe to kill these people. So Reese looks good to be mayor. Right. That's what we thought was happening.

[26:32] Portia Pendleton: And then Lockwood comes in and.

[26:36] Dr. Katrina Furey: That he can kill Reese.

[26:37] Portia Pendleton: And that then Lockwood will take care of Joe and give him his identity back.

[26:42] Dr. Katrina Furey: All he's got to do is kill Reese. And then Joe's like, okay. And he was trying to figure out, what does he have on you, Reese? What's going on? And then finally he's going to take Lockwood up on that offer. Right.

[26:52] Portia Pendleton: He goes to Reese's it sounds like his ex wife's country home.

[26:56] Dr. Katrina Furey: And where he sees argument because there was like bad press coming out about his book being fake and all these things, which we kind of predicted, right? Yeah. Joe witnesses the argument and then holy ****, I'm going to let you talk.

[27:12] Portia Pendleton: Because I can't so we see him go up to the door, knock on the door, and Reese again, this seems like I'm not surprised. We see Reese not know him. And I was like, okay, like Reese is just pretending to not know Joe. And then Reese then Joe barges in. And I'm like, okay, it's going to go down. It's going to go down.

[27:30] Dr. Katrina Furey: Still.

[27:30] Portia Pendleton: Nothing's really crossing my mind at that point.

[27:33] Dr. Katrina Furey: Me either.

[27:34] Portia Pendleton: Yeah. And then we see Reese tied up and nude.

[27:38] Dr. Katrina Furey: Basically. I wasn't upset.

[27:41] Portia Pendleton: A little like loincloth.

[27:44] Dr. Katrina Furey: I think he's like beautiful, man. That's fine with me.

[27:47] Portia Pendleton: And Reese is still which I'm like now denying everything. This is weird. Is there a camera here? Does Reese know that someone else is home? So again, he's like playing this role. And then we see Reese walking in the two walking.

[28:04] Dr. Katrina Furey: And then my first thought was like, oh, God. Not an evil twin story. I was 100% like, I was like, come on, guys. Come on.

[28:13] Portia Pendleton: Really?

[28:13] Dr. Katrina Furey: You're going to go with like that old trope?

[28:18] Portia Pendleton: It was not a twin.

[28:20] Dr. Katrina Furey: Not an evil twin.

[28:21] Portia Pendleton: It was a projection.

[28:22] Dr. Katrina Furey: I know. Okay, so it's a projection of Joe's bad side, like the good and evil.

[28:30] Portia Pendleton: You're like watching it and even their clothing, right?

[28:33] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yes.

[28:34] Portia Pendleton: Is in this black suit, real suave.

[28:37] Dr. Katrina Furey: Charming, like all the everybody. Yeah. He's like really in tune with his sexual urges and who. Cares about other people and just, like, do it, and then, like, real Reese, like, naked views dead. And then you're like, Holy ****. Reese hasn't been real this whole yeah, I said so.

[29:00] Portia Pendleton: I was watching this in my living room. My husband didn't watch it because I had to get through it too fast, and he kept hearing me gasp.

[29:08] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yes.

[29:08] Portia Pendleton: So from this point on, I think I gasped, like, every ten minutes. I was like, what?

[29:15] Dr. Katrina Furey: And I was like, the show is crazy. I know. All the things we were anticipating, I was not anticipating that, and I loved it. Did you ever see the series Bates Motel from a couple of years back?

[29:26] Portia Pendleton: I haven't.

[29:27] Dr. Katrina Furey: It is so good, and it's kind of similar.

[29:29] Portia Pendleton: Okay.

[29:29] Dr. Katrina Furey: But I just loved this on your screen projection like depiction of his projection I thought was so good.

[29:40] Portia Pendleton: And it's like he was learning about it while we were you know what I mean? All of this coming out and all of this confusion and all this uncertainty and this shock, it's like we were feeling the same thing that Joe was.

[29:54] Dr. Katrina Furey: I know. And it's like, since when did we identify with Joe feelings? That feels a little icky, but, oh, my God, it was so good. And when they would, like, roll back the footage, so to speak, when he's.

[30:05] Portia Pendleton: Like, oh, no, I can check the.

[30:06] Dr. Katrina Furey: Camera because you came over. And then he checks it, and he's.

[30:09] Portia Pendleton: Like, talking to him.

[30:09] Dr. Katrina Furey: I know. I thought it was so good. Portia and also, I think, really in line with the way he'd be unraveling, like, at this point in time. Remember last time we recapped the first part? I was like, he's too it didn't make sense.

[30:26] Portia Pendleton: Marianne didn't make sense. His his healing himself and moving on.

[30:31] Dr. Katrina Furey: And the fact that he had more empathy. It wasn't tracking. Remember we kept saying, like, the wheels are kind of falling off, guys, the writing is not as good. And now I'm like, Holy ****, it's so good.

[30:42] Portia Pendleton: I was like, you set us up, writers.

[30:44] Dr. Katrina Furey: Oh, my God.

[30:45] Portia Pendleton: Applause. Like, round of applause.

[30:47] Dr. Katrina Furey: I would give you an award if I had one. It's so good.

[30:51] Portia Pendleton: Then you're thinking back, right, of the whole first half. And then I loved how they took reese took Joe. Joe took Joe, but Reese took Joe through all of the times that he thought he was there, and he was like, but did I ever did you? Anyone else? Right?

[31:08] Dr. Katrina Furey: And of course, I wanted to go back and rewatch it myself to see and I probably will at some point when I have a little more time. Oh, my God, it was so good.

[31:17] Portia Pendleton: It was so good. Yeah.

[31:19] Dr. Katrina Furey: So good. Angeles.

[31:20] Portia Pendleton: And that, to me, was like, okay, I was 100% right, because obviously, I like being right. Who does this about Marianne? So it's like, Marianne, he did not let go.

[31:31] Dr. Katrina Furey: And that was the thing, right? That's what it was. Where? He kept asking, where's Marianne? Where's Marianne? And real Reese was like, I don't know, Marianne. And he's like, Where is she? Where is she? And he loses it to the point of choking him and killing him. And that tracks, right. With his, erotomatic, delusions and everything and just sort of losing your cool and now you really don't know where she is. Right. And then we get into that whole storyline, which was so fascinating.

[31:56] Portia Pendleton: And Reese won't tell Joe, right? Because he's like, no, you know, you have to figure it out. You have to figure out so I know. Jumping a little bit, but the other moment for me, that was like, was when Joe is in front of the cage with Marianne and he says, I'm not Joe.

[32:17] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah, I know. Because he was like, Reese. Yes, but also you see it in his eyes. Like, his eyes are dead. There's nothing there. I do have to say, when we finally saw the cage again and Mary Ann in it, like, again, I don't want to be putting people in cages. I don't want any part of that. But as a consumer of this type of entertainment, I was thrilled to see it back.

[32:40] Portia Pendleton: Yeah, I'm glad we didn't like that.

[32:43] Dr. Katrina Furey: I was like, Where's the cage?

[32:44] Portia Pendleton: We said, that all part one time.

[32:47] Dr. Katrina Furey: And again, it made me wonder, like, you asked Portia, like, how do you get it there? Can you ship it? Does he have to buy it from someone? How is he putting it together? What is going on?

[32:56] Portia Pendleton: And so Reese, right, was like, from now on, we're going to be referring to Joe's alter ego, Reese.

[33:03] Dr. Katrina Furey: Right. Okay.

[33:04] Portia Pendleton: So Reese doesn't care, like you said, about people. So he leaves Marianne starving. Right.

[33:11] Dr. Katrina Furey: Because he becomes obsessed with Kate.

[33:13] Portia Pendleton: He wants Joe to just move on and be with Kate. Joe, I think this is what's interesting, and I'm curious to get your take, like, the inner Joe that maybe even like the one you feel like you've.

[33:26] Dr. Katrina Furey: Always seen, the one Portia you've always seen is desperate.

[33:31] Portia Pendleton: I mean, it's still yes, he has severe issues still. But he would never starve Marianne.

[33:39] Dr. Katrina Furey: Right.

[33:41] Portia Pendleton: He does sick and twist things as well. But he is so mortified, so horrified that he did this to Marianne.

[33:48] Dr. Katrina Furey: Right.

[33:48] Portia Pendleton: Like, when he's learning that, quote, unquote, reese left her here and he will not let her go.

[33:54] Dr. Katrina Furey: Right.

[33:54] Portia Pendleton: Like, he wants to figure it out. He's going to set the timer. Right. He's trying to figure out a way Joe is to let Marianne go. Well, Reese is like, no, with the passports, or let them go off together.

[34:08] Dr. Katrina Furey: Right, exactly.

[34:09] Portia Pendleton: Yeah.

[34:10] Dr. Katrina Furey: I don't think he's going to let her go like, she's free. I think he wants to be with.

[34:14] Portia Pendleton: Her and have her move on. And Reese wants her dead. The gun, the pills, he's just like, be done, let's move on.

[34:23] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah, exactly. It was such a good depiction of the good versus evil part of Joe and his psyche. And it was so good. There's nothing else to say.

[34:35] Portia Pendleton: Mary Ann, when her face such a good actress.

[34:38] Dr. Katrina Furey: Oh, my God, she is just like, oh. Whoa.

[34:43] Portia Pendleton: Like, when she sees that it's not Joe, she that is happening. Her eyes and she's like, I don't know how to manipulate this anymore. You know what I mean? Like, she fawning isn't going to work.

[34:53] Dr. Katrina Furey: Right. Because I don't know who this is anymore. And I thought the way that they talked about what was going on with Mary Anne through the story and the poem with her daughter was, like, really heart wrenching. And then was Nadia getting involved? That was like another twist. Kind of like this stuff with dawn that I didn't see coming. It was a whole other layer to the story.

[35:13] Portia Pendleton: And it was such a good layer to the story.

[35:16] Dr. Katrina Furey: Right? Because so at first, we have, like, jock my memory portia because so much happened in these five episodes.

[35:22] Portia Pendleton: How did Marion get in the cage, Reese? Joe never let her get on the.

[35:28] Dr. Katrina Furey: Train because he drugged her. Coffee. That's what it was.

[35:31] Portia Pendleton: And then he took her to that house. That was weird. And he kept her drugged, feeding her, like she's sitting at the table with him. That's first. And then he drugs her, puts her in the box and takes her to that abandoned building in the cage. And that's her where the cage is. But she fights back in that moment and then hits Joe, hits his head, which is kind of like where so there's two almost like, storylines here or there's two ways to think about it.

[35:57] Dr. Katrina Furey: Right.

[35:57] Portia Pendleton: It's like, yes, the trauma of the season three and all of that. And obviously Joe's lifelong trauma and brain kind of not working well. And then there's like a head injury. So it's like does the head injury kind of initiate this?

[36:12] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah. Is that like the last strain to psychosis?

[36:15] Portia Pendleton: Right. Because it's like after that, you kind of see him for a moment, almost like waking up and then kind of starting to change and time slipping. All of the having two really different parts of self being present totally split off.

[36:29] Dr. Katrina Furey: Right. And he's been interacting with this Reese Hallucination all this time. And I'm like all the people around.

[36:37] Portia Pendleton: Him notice or maybe they were all.

[36:38] Dr. Katrina Furey: Too strung out to pay attention.

[36:40] Portia Pendleton: I wanted to ask you, so you picked up on some erotic tension between Reese and Joe, part one. What do you think about that? Now?

[36:50] Dr. Katrina Furey: I know I thought about that because even when the other Reese came back and there were two Reese's, and I was, like, so confused. So again, I think it wasn't what I thought, where Reese was going to become the love interest, but I do think there's like this erotic code love between the two parts of himself, right?

[37:08] Portia Pendleton: It's both him and he is such.

[37:11] Dr. Katrina Furey: A narcissist that he ultimately loves himself above all. And I think the part that Reese is depicting, the quote, unquote bad parts, are the parts he loves the most. And he can't get away from it, right? Like, he just loves it.

[37:26] Portia Pendleton: And so Penn Bagley directed the second to last episode, which was so good.

[37:34] Dr. Katrina Furey: And I knew we were going to see Love again, remember?

[37:36] Portia Pendleton: And you were really hoping she was.

[37:38] Dr. Katrina Furey: Real, but I'm sorry, Portia, she really did die. But I love that we saw Beck again, that we saw Love. And I love that they were, like, leading him to the ultimate, like, where's the key? Where's the key? How do you get to Mary Anne's stuff? And that Love was trying to tell him the only way out is if you kill yourself, right? Yes. And then I was like, Is he going to I never thought he was actually going to.

[38:02] Portia Pendleton: No.

[38:02] Dr. Katrina Furey: I was surprised when he jumped.

[38:04] Portia Pendleton: Yeah, me too. Yeah, that was a twist that I also didn't see coming.

[38:09] Dr. Katrina Furey: And then when he woke up in the hospital, I was like, he's going to be so upset he was found. Then it's like, are those the ways where his quote unquote good side is like, trying to crawl up and overpower.

[38:21] Portia Pendleton: The bad side because he throws Reese over the bridge first?

[38:24] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yes, exactly. All of that is so good. It's just such good depictions, isn't it?

[38:31] Portia Pendleton: Yeah, I think I was speechless or going, like, for 5 hours.

[38:36] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah, exactly. I totally agree.

[38:38] Portia Pendleton: So what kind of stood out we'll get into Nadia in a minute, but what kind of stood out for you as I don't know. Where were your emotions during this? Were you just kind of like, heightened and excited? Were you sad? Were you frustrated? How did you feel? Watching it in disbelief, literally on the.

[38:58] Dr. Katrina Furey: Edge of my seat, just massively consuming it as quickly as possible. Because I just was like, what happens next? What happens next? Really sad with the whole Mary Ann storyline, I think because she has a daughter and we always hoped that would be like the saving grace, remember?

[39:18] Portia Pendleton: Just really seems like she was almost, like, dissociating in a way to help her survive.

[39:24] Dr. Katrina Furey: Right.

[39:27] Portia Pendleton: Thirsty.

[39:28] Dr. Katrina Furey: And Joe gives her narcotics, right? Because he breaks her arm or something, knowing her history.

[39:33] Portia Pendleton: And I think that's Reese would you think what do you think?

[39:37] Dr. Katrina Furey: Probably, yeah. Wanting her to overdose or die or he's not, like, doing it, like, here's some pain relief because he gave her ibupro.

[39:44] Portia Pendleton: Would have given her ibuprofen or something. Or ibuprofen. You're right. But I thought that was really interesting just to get the full bottle of pills that was so manipulative and calculative and horrible, disgusting.

[39:57] Dr. Katrina Furey: And it was like, are you trying to tempt her to off herself here? And at what point is she going to right.

[40:03] Portia Pendleton: Because he did want her dead.

[40:05] Dr. Katrina Furey: Right.

[40:05] Portia Pendleton: So I think that kind of tracked, and I think that he was hoping.

[40:08] Dr. Katrina Furey: That that would just be, like, the easy way out.

[40:10] Portia Pendleton: Yeah.

[40:11] Dr. Katrina Furey: I think at some point, you really see her getting so hopeless, and I.

[40:15] Portia Pendleton: Was, like, making all of the little figurines out of the food bag.

[40:21] Dr. Katrina Furey: I know. Is that cold? I forget origami origami yeah, but just, like, being so hopeless about just thinking about her daughter, being, like, wondering where she is, if she relapsed again. It just broke my heart, and it was just so sad. It was so sad. And then somehow Nadia finds her.

[40:42] Portia Pendleton: I know, right?

[40:43] Dr. Katrina Furey: Somehow I think after the party, Nadia's wheels start turning, and she starts to be like, why is he the hero every time? And starts to think about the mysteries that he so looks down on and starts piecing it together. And again, I was always like, do we need Nadia? Like, what's the point of this story? And then I loved this storyline because I think at the very end right, just, again, nail in the coffin. He's a psychopath, right? So I want to hear your thoughts, Portia.

[41:10] Portia Pendleton: So we see Nadia kind of pulling some threads together, and then we see that she's in his home and gets the key, right? And then she kind of tracks where he is based on pictures of him and figures out and just tries that empty, abandoned building, goes in, then comes across the cage.

[41:29] Dr. Katrina Furey: Oh, my God. With Mary. Can you imagine? What do you do when you come across a poor woman starving in the cage?

[41:35] Portia Pendleton: You want to go to the police? But Marianne is like, no, you cannot. I will still somehow end up here again.

[41:42] Dr. Katrina Furey: And she's raped. Yes, we've seen this happen. He is so scary.

[41:46] Portia Pendleton: Danger so has powerful friends at this point, and I think that he is just, like, the master manipulator to get out of situations. So Marianne knows that. So she and Nadia kind of come up with a couple plans, like plan.

[41:59] Dr. Katrina Furey: A and plan B, and that's where.

[42:00] Portia Pendleton: We see more of Nadia's boyfriend kind of enter the storyline.

[42:04] Dr. Katrina Furey: And again, she just, like, uses him for guys.

[42:08] Portia Pendleton: He seems really cute and sweet to me. I really like him. And then I'm obviously really sad at the end. So Nadia asks him to get her.

[42:18] Dr. Katrina Furey: Drug, So Ketamine, which, again, you can use it as, like, a date rape kind of drug. You can also abuse it as, like, a party drug, and it does have some antidepressant properties, which are being explored now in clinical trials in certain centers. But, yeah, she was trying to get that and then a knife, because Marianne wanted the knife. I think she wanted to kill drove herself. And she was so close. She was so close, right? Nadia was so close. And then she got stuck on, like, trying to get on the subway, everything fell out of her back.

[42:49] Portia Pendleton: That Nadia was down there. Right. She was down there talking to Marianne. And Joe comes.

[42:55] Dr. Katrina Furey: My heart was racing. And then Marian's like, there's something over there. I thought, he's going to pick up that there is something going on, and maybe somewhere he did. Right. I don't know. But then eventually so that plan gets.

[43:09] Portia Pendleton: Foiled because Nadia can't get out of the police station soon enough because they find her bag.

[43:15] Dr. Katrina Furey: Right.

[43:15] Portia Pendleton: She goes through the turntable turnstile thing, and her bag gets caught, and they see the syringe. So she finally kind of gets bailed out. Her boyfriend is there or I guess it's not technically her boyfriend, a boy who wants to be her boyfriend is there.

[43:31] Dr. Katrina Furey: Also interesting because she's a brown girl in England getting detained, and then her white boyfriend can kind of get her off. Right. So I think that's interesting. Yeah.

[43:40] Portia Pendleton: So I definitely was thinking that there's no way that Marianne died when she collapsed in the cage. I was like, okay, I think there's probably something else going on here. We did not know about the planet. Yeah. I don't know why I feel like I actually knew what happened because I had some sense of what was going to happen with Nadia and Marianne and, like, Marianne dying in the cage. I was like, there's no way she's dead. She's no way she's dead. So back to Nadia's kind of plan A and plan B. It sounded like plan A was to get him, shoot him with the ketamine so he's, like, can't move or passed out. And then Marianne would stab him or kill him, and he would be dead.

[44:28] Dr. Katrina Furey: Right.

[44:28] Portia Pendleton: And then plan B we never hear until we then kind of see it. So it sounds like plan B was that Marianne would take propranolol, a beta.

[44:38] Dr. Katrina Furey: Blocker, which does slow down your heart rate, used for high blood pressure, things like that. We also use it for performance anxiety. So, like, oh, I get nervous giving a speech. You could take some perennial as long as we can tolerate it, like, 30 minutes before. And they did a good job with that, too, saying, like, well, again, how does Nadia know how to titrate? I don't know.

[44:56] Portia Pendleton: And I think she didn't because she was afraid it was a crazy idea that you could die from. I think the rest of the give.

[45:04] Dr. Katrina Furey: Her enough to slow down her heart rate so Joe doesn't know that she's still alive.

[45:09] Portia Pendleton: And then she shot Marianne in the park bench with, I'm assuming, some kind of like an adrenaline. Yeah, probably to kind of wake her back up. That whole series of events was wild, and I think we really saw a lot of it after it had already happened, like the flashback.

[45:26] Dr. Katrina Furey: Because, you see, Mary Anne is with her daughter, and she's reading that news article about Joe and so angry about it. Right.

[45:34] Portia Pendleton: And then you're like, oh, she survives. Hooray. Were you so upset? Because I was when Joe uses Marianne's phone to text the person her daughter is staying with, and she's like, we're done. You have no more custody. It's over. And then Marianne again, when you don't know that this is all planned and it's really Nadia answering the text right. That this is when Marianne falls apart. This is why she overdoses and dies.

[46:03] Dr. Katrina Furey: For sure. I thought she did it for sure. I was like, okay, so now that's going to happen. How do you she's hopeless.

[46:09] Portia Pendleton: The only thing that's been keeping her alive is the hope of reuniting with her daughter.

[46:13] Dr. Katrina Furey: Right. And just again, you imagine the shame in her daughter knowing this about her and then knowing this happened again when you promised you'd come back and now you're stuck in a cage, starving to death. At some point I was like, she's going to overdose. It right there. What else are you going to do?

[46:28] Portia Pendleton: Or just to take some of the pain. I think it would have been so easy for her to just start with one pill.

[46:38] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah.

[46:38] Portia Pendleton: I mean, I was so happy that Marianne is alive.

[46:41] Dr. Katrina Furey: Me too. But now still worry for her.

[46:44] Portia Pendleton: Upset about Nadia.

[46:46] Dr. Katrina Furey: Oh, my God. So then it's like, you think it can't get any worse, right. I thought that was Nadia's storyline, like, helping to get Marianne out, right?

[46:54] Portia Pendleton: Yep.

[46:55] Dr. Katrina Furey: And then it's like Nadia and her boyfriend really want to get Joe caught, and rightfully so, bearing witness to all the destruction. Joe is like now with Kate.

[47:06] Portia Pendleton: And after the suicide attempt.

[47:09] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah, after the suicide attempt. And they both sort of tell each other like, they've done these horrible things, people have died. I don't think Kate is getting it.

[47:17] Portia Pendleton: And they're going to think they're good. I think Kate believes that Joe has killed maybe lovely and just that kind of storyline, because that was national news, people were aware of it. And I think he comes clean about that and maybe having a really horrible childhood and trauma. I think that's what he discloses.

[47:35] Dr. Katrina Furey: And I think she's probably like, well, but love was like, crazy, so I can see where you had to kind of exactly.

[47:43] Portia Pendleton: I don't think he disclosed that he's the rich killer, you know what I mean?

[47:47] Dr. Katrina Furey: Oh, no.

[47:47] Portia Pendleton: So and then I think that Kate does have a lot of shame and guilt about the cancer trial patients dying that her dad kind of talked to about and that she talked about. And I think she is afraid of herself having a lot of power like.

[48:02] Dr. Katrina Furey: That she sees that part of her dad in her. And I was surprised when she revealed, like, no, I did that and intentionally. It wasn't like I didn't realize what I was doing. I did it.

[48:12] Portia Pendleton: Yeah.

[48:13] Dr. Katrina Furey: So they both have that power hungry sociopathic nature. So in that way, they are a good match. For each other. Right. And I'm, like, terrified.

[48:23] Portia Pendleton: I know that now they're like, with all of these resources, all of these.

[48:26] Dr. Katrina Furey: Resources, all of this power, but they're.

[48:28] Portia Pendleton: Going to keep each other good. Yeah, sure.

[48:31] Dr. Katrina Furey: We've seen how that goes.

[48:32] Portia Pendleton: We've seen how Joe immediately does not stay good because he kills Nadia's Beau and then frames Nadia, offers her the money. So that's how you know that he's already with Kate, because he's like, I have all these resources now. And there's like, kind of a moment of him being like, what? You work all these three jobs. I could offer you to this. But then she sees, oh, my God, portia on the ground. And it's like I think Joe just then knows that he can't let her get away.

[49:02] Dr. Katrina Furey: I think he planned this whole thing. Oh, my God. Yes. Portia god, he's a psychopath. Portia there is no shred of empathy. I think he somehow knew they were in his place, probably. And then right, she's like, having her boyfriend be, like, the lookout, and then she's trying to find him at the car. She can't find him. She turns around. There's Joe. So cool, calm, collected. He seems, like, less psychotic now. He seems like both of his parts are now one. Those parts have his self have combined against he's fully mentally there. And then you see him talking to her, offering her the money. She's terrified. She's backing up. I think the whole time he knew he was going to frame her. He had that knife somewhere. He was, like, walking her back to show her her boyfriend, who he killed. And then he hands her the knife. I know.

[49:57] Portia Pendleton: What is she going to do? She knows she's done. But I was just like, don't take.

[50:01] Dr. Katrina Furey: I don't even think she knew what he was handing her.

[50:03] Portia Pendleton: No, because he handed it to her kind of like back end, like handle first, almost.

[50:07] Dr. Katrina Furey: And it was, like, covered in a cloth. I don't remember what he said he was going to hand her. Obviously, it wasn't the weapon, but then she's holding it now. Her fingerprints are all over it. And the way he spoke to her was chilling.

[50:20] Portia Pendleton: I know. It made me so chilling him.

[50:24] Dr. Katrina Furey: You haven't yet.

[50:28] Portia Pendleton: I hated him in this season the most part, too, so I feel like a lot of the stuff that he did, he really held out hope.

[50:39] Dr. Katrina Furey: Portia a long time.

[50:40] Portia Pendleton: I don't even know if it was hope. I think it's just one of those things that's, like, you you understand why people are the way they are. That doesn't mean that they're they're what they've done is good.

[50:49] Dr. Katrina Furey: Right.

[50:49] Portia Pendleton: It's not an excuse, but like, I feel like the explanation for his behavior just made me be like, oh, like, a lot of people watch all of these kinds of shows and somehow align with the villain. So I felt like I was kind of on that train but then I was like, no, you should die. You should be lethal injection. I hate you. There's no rehabilitation.

[51:10] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah.

[51:12] Portia Pendleton: Nadia to me sealed the deal. Like, you're done 100%.

[51:16] Dr. Katrina Furey: I totally agree. And it was like, again, the show did such a good job with the Reese of it all, like, depicting these two parts of himself, him really losing touch with reality, like really unraveling. Then he's back, right. And now he has all this money, all this power. I loved when they showed him looking out the window and you see Reese's reflection and I'm just like, oh, my God, I'm so scared. And when they were doing those interviews, they so reminded me of Meghan Markle and Prince Harry doing interviews. Not that I think there's any similarities in any way. I don't think of that. But it was just weird that they're doing all these interviews and he was, like, making a coffee for her and schmoozing and so performative, which is what.

[51:59] Portia Pendleton: I get from Megan and Harry performance.

[52:01] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah.

[52:03] Portia Pendleton: It's not a mental disorder or anything like that. I just feel like it's very performative.

[52:08] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah. Putting on the show and I'm just, like, really terrified for him. And I feel so bad for Nadia.

[52:15] Portia Pendleton: She is in jail forever and he.

[52:18] Dr. Katrina Furey: Said that she hasn't spoken a word. Probably because she's so traumatized and who's going to believe her? Again, a young brown girl compared to this white man I know with this redemption story and like, oh, my God. I don't know if it's been renewed yet for season five. I thought it was. And then I googled it after all this and it says, like, it hasn't been they're not sure if it'll come back. I hope so. I know.

[52:44] Portia Pendleton: I feel like there's such an easy and I'm not saying like, I have a storyline in my head, but I feel like there's such an easy, like, so many directions to go with this.

[52:52] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yes. And it's like, who's going to finally take down Joe? Is anyone? Can you take him down?

[52:59] Portia Pendleton: And is that how it ends or does not? Or does it end here where it's like no, people like this do exist. People like this absolutely do get won over on other people. I'm not going to say win, but are fine, like, compared to Nadia, that they get some horrible illness that takes them out at some point because sometimes that's like the karmic end. But there's people like this who do exist who are horrible and who do horrible things and there's no check for them. There's no checks and balances.

[53:29] Dr. Katrina Furey: Right. And then to see I was glad Marianne made it out alive. I feel so sad for Nadia. I feel so sad for her. I know.

[53:38] Portia Pendleton: Because she risked her life knowingly this whole time that she was trying to save Marian for this person that she didn't know, which is just like, a wonderful thing and really believed her. Right. Away and I was like, I'm going to get you out of here. I don't care how dangerous it is that this is wrong. And then now she is framed different from not Dr. Nikki because Dr. Nikki did terrible things.

[54:01] Dr. Katrina Furey: Right. But she hasn't done a terrible thing as far as we know. Oh, it would be so cool if, like, somehow Nadia Marianne teamed up and took him down somehow.

[54:10] Portia Pendleton: Let me ask you this, okay? If you're going to ask me what.

[54:14] Dr. Katrina Furey: Kind of treatment I would give Joe Goldberg, I will just death.

[54:17] Portia Pendleton: No, sorry. Maybe that's a little, you know, not very therapeutic, but that's just how it is. I don't regret what I said. So I don't think that Joe without and I think there was always Reese in his head just because there's always that part. But obviously Reese came out more. I don't think that Joe when Joe's.

[54:47] Dr. Katrina Furey: Joe would have framed Nadia nadia. Oh, I totally think so.

[54:53] Portia Pendleton: You do? She doesn't fit his but she's gone.

[55:03] Dr. Katrina Furey: In jail.

[55:05] Portia Pendleton: But she's not free.

[55:06] Dr. Katrina Furey: Ellie's not in jail, but she's not free.

[55:08] Portia Pendleton: I know, but same thing. But that's what I mean. I feel like that's where I'm like I'm a little bit I think that this is now because Reese is now getting bigger.

[55:23] Dr. Katrina Furey: Okay.

[55:23] Portia Pendleton: I don't think it's like empathy or anything like that.

[55:25] Dr. Katrina Furey: I just think that it's like because.

[55:27] Portia Pendleton: Reese is now kind of showing stronger and stronger, joe is leaning in to that real, authentic I'm just this person and now I can get away with anything. I think that that's why he can do that he did that I'm on board with. I don't know, just threatened her and was like, I'm keeping the knife forever in your fingerprints.

[55:45] Dr. Katrina Furey: And I think that's why we thought he was just going to give her the money and let her go like he did with Ellie and stuff. I can see that. I think he is unraveling and that part of him is growing and taking over and like, please come back for season five. I want more.

[56:02] Portia Pendleton: I know what happens. You don't have to do love scenes.

[56:05] Dr. Katrina Furey: But, like, please bring back the cage.

[56:07] Portia Pendleton: Oh, and okay, obviously the you writers, producers, whoever, are t swift fans because another song.

[56:14] Dr. Katrina Furey: I know. I wanted to mention that, too.

[56:16] Portia Pendleton: And it was like the perfect one they picked, right?

[56:18] Dr. Katrina Furey: My covert narcissism disguises altruism. It's so perfect. Oh, my God. So perfect.

[56:27] Portia Pendleton: Like, Joe, you are the problems.

[56:29] Dr. Katrina Furey: Another Taylor Smith. I loved that touch, too. And I thought of you immediately. It was so good. I'm so sad it's over. I know. But I do think it's a nice segue into the next series we're going to be talking about, which is succession.

[56:42] Portia Pendleton: Yes.

[56:43] Dr. Katrina Furey: I had no idea what's sort of going to end up with Joe and Kate teaming up and being these, like, business tycoons, but I have a feeling succession is going to. Have some similar dark and twisty themes.

[56:54] Portia Pendleton: And people do have maybe are already up to date on Succession. I know that season four is what's coming out this spring, so neither of us have seen Succession at all. I think we both first watched the first episode so far of season one.

[57:08] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah, that's right, guys, we are super professional. You're going to watch all of it to recap for you. Can you believe we have so much.

[57:15] Portia Pendleton: They'Re definitely I'm getting like, similar vibes.

[57:17] Dr. Katrina Furey: But I will say I feel like.

[57:19] Portia Pendleton: Succession and I won't spend a lot of time talking about this, but I feel like Succession is going to be like just dark and one of those shows that I probably shouldn't watch right.

[57:29] Dr. Katrina Furey: Before I go to bed because he's.

[57:30] Portia Pendleton: Thinking about it a lot.

[57:31] Dr. Katrina Furey: Use your stuff from Therapeutic Body Work to unwind because I think it's almost.

[57:36] Portia Pendleton: Just going to be a little bit of like a mind because it's about.

[57:39] Dr. Katrina Furey: A parent, his kids. I feel like they're all going to be ******** each other over, but that always makes me so sad when it's a parenting, your kids and you pick that up right away and just like.

[57:49] Portia Pendleton: People with too much money, too much power and power doing horrible things and not being checked for it. That's just like the vibe. And I'm sure I think that's just what the show is about.

[58:00] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah, we have no idea because we haven't seen it before, but that's the vibe we're getting.

[58:05] Portia Pendleton: So back to you. It sounds like Joe has nationally come.

[58:09] Dr. Katrina Furey: Out about internationally in Europe come out.

[58:13] Portia Pendleton: That he has survived.

[58:15] Dr. Katrina Furey: And I'm like, how did they spend that?

[58:17] Portia Pendleton: I don't know. Money and media and a PR team can do magical things.

[58:23] Dr. Katrina Furey: Oh, my gosh. Raquel from Phantom Pump rules needs his PR team.

[58:27] Portia Pendleton: Well, I was going to say Haley Bieber needs his PR team. Selena, haley of it all.

[58:33] Dr. Katrina Furey: Yeah. The eyebrows scandal heard around the world.

[58:37] Portia Pendleton: Also, we'd love a PR team, so if anyone wants to be our PR and marketing team, feel free to reach out.

[58:44] Dr. Katrina Furey: All right, well, thank you all very much for listening in. Please don't forget to rate, review and subscribe. Please share our show with loved ones near and far. It's doing really well so far, but we'd love to reach even more people.

[58:59] Portia Pendleton: Yeah.

[59:00] Dr. Katrina Furey: So visit us on Instagram at Analyze Scripts, email us at Analyze [email protected] and visit our website, www.analyzcripts.com and we'll see you next time. Thanks.

[59:10] Portia Pendleton: Bye.

[59:16] Dr. Katrina Furey: This podcast and its contents are a copyright of analyzed scripts. All rights reserved. Any redistribution or reproduction of part or all of the contents in any form is prohibited. Unless you want to share it with your friends and rate, review and subscribe, that's fine. All stories and characters discussed are fictional in nature. No identification with actual persons, living or deceased places, buildings or products is intended or should be inferred. This podcast is for entertainment purposes only. The podcast and its contents do not constitute professional mental health or medical advice. Listeners might consider consulting a mental health provider if they need assistance with any mental health problems or concerns. As always, please call 911 or go directly to your nearest emergency room for any psychiatric emergencies. Thanks for listening and see you next time our sand close.

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Welcome back to Analyze Scripts, where a psychiatrist and a therapist analyze what Hollywood gets right and wrong about mental health. Today, Portia and Katrina continue exploring "Shrinking" episodes 4-6 on AppleTV+. We decided to split this analysis into two parts because HARRISON. FORD. GETS. STONED, which deserves all the attention it can get! We discuss turning on Liz when she emotionally blackmails her son and being shocked when Gaby hooks up with Jimmy! UGH WHO IS WATCHING OUT FOR ALICE?! We hope you enjoy!

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[00:17] Portia Pendleton & Dr. Katrina Furey: Welcome back to kind of, I guess, part two of Shrinking, episodes four through six. Turns out there's a lot of content cover. Yeah, we wanted to kind of break it up a little bit to give listeners a little break and not make like a two hour episode. So I'm Portia Pendleton. I'm a licensed clinical social worker, and I'm here with Dr. Katrina Fury, a psychiatrist. And we're breaking down. Currently, the show shrinking on Apple TV. Plus last episode, if you didn't listen to part one of this, we are talking about or we spent a lot of time talking about Sean PTSD. Again, kind of inappropriate boundaries. We talk about OCD and the kiss or the attempted kiss between Wally and Jimmy, his patient. So I think we're just kind of going to move right into more thoughts and feelings about these episodes. It's kind of funny because these episodes are like 30 minutes long. So I kept thinking, like, gosh, I don't know if you're going to fill the time. And then turns out it's so rich. There's so much to talk about. So where do we start? I think you wanted to spend a little bit of time talking about marijuana. Oh, my God. Cannabis. Seeing Harrison Ford, like, high as a kite, I felt like we needed a whole episode just about that. I mean, I really didn't see that coming. I was surprised that Liz was the one who had these gummies. And I'm also, like, not surprised, but also not surprised. Right. They are in Pasadena, and Liz seems like kind of bored. Yeah. But I loved that she was like I don't know exactly what she said, but she was like, my yoga teacher's cousin got these from their nephew who said this has, like, totally been proven scientifically to help, and it cured him. And I have to say, as a psychiatrist, I get so many questions about CBD gummies, cannabis, marijuana. And of course I do, because it's everywhere right now. It's being legalized and everything like that. So of course people have questions. But I just loved that that's where she got it, because I just feel like that's always what I hear. Well, I got it from this person who got from that person who got from this person who said it helped their dog. I hear that a lot about diets of work. Like, oh, my hairdresser aunt did this diet and it cured her of this. And it's just like, what? Yeah, well, it probably won't work for you for these reasons. Why? Right. Again, knowing that you treat a lot of patients who struggle with eating disorders, that makes a lot of sense. So, yeah, I mean, what did you think about I wanted more. I feel like I just loved when he kind of showed up and she is removing his sunglasses and he's like, oh, wow, it's so much better. He has cotton mouth. His mouth is really dry. So to sort of rewind a little bit and set the stage. So eventually, the lawyer, whoops brian. Brian decides to propose finally sounds like he's really been hesitating about commitment. And he had that touching, like, faux therapy session with Gabby, which I thought was nice, but also kind of predictable. It wasn't earth shattering, but it was nice. And so he finally wants to propose. So he plans his party to invite his partner over. He's, like, super nervous. He's buzzing around it's. At Jimmy's house. Jimmy was really hesitant about the party, I think. Right. A lot of stuff was coming up for him, like, pre party that I think he should have maybe been really forceful with a no. Like, I want to host this. Right. Again. Boundaries, Jimmy. But it sounds like he and his wife used to throw parties, and this was the first party he was throwing since she passed. And that maybe that fight they were sort of flashing back to was happening around a party or something. And he started we again start to see that their relationship wasn't perfect. When the wife died, they were fighting. She seemed kind of unhappy, and he was really struggling with that. So they're having the party. Initially, Paul is like, I can't come. I'm busy being alone. He doesn't want to go, which, again, kind of inappropriate boundary when you're, like, the boss of all these people. And then he shows up high as a kite. And I think he took the gummy because he'd told his daughter about his Parkinson's diagnosis, and she was about to fly out, and he was feeling really nervous and for his character. Right. Paul is so a little bit kind of tightly wound. I feel like he's very cautious by the book. It seemed like it was just, like, super impulsive, kind of like an effort moment. Do it. And then it was like and they took a couple more. Yeah. And then all of a sudden, he shows up at the door, and everyone's like, oh, my God, you're here. And he's got this funny little hat on his glasses, and he's like, you poisoned me. He's, like, pointing at Liz. He's like you poisoned me. I was like, God, I hope he didn't drive there. Maybe he got an Uber. Well, it seems like he's not driving right now. Hopefully he didn't impair. And then just like, the banter when Liz is like, I took one too, and we need Popsicles. And then her husband is like, which ones? And she's like, the special ones, apparently, for when their mouths are dry, when they're hot. Oh, I didn't catch that. And he was like, okay, I guess I'll go get them. It's so funny. Oh, my God. And then my favorite part was when the proposal goes awry, because Jimmy's supposed to play you are so beautiful, and they start throwing up every projectile again. I cannot tolerate seeing puke like that. And I was like, gagging to myself while laughing, while being like, it was so funny. This episode was so good. Like, from an entertainment perspective and also from a psychology perspective, I thought there were some really nice moments. Like, I thought Gabby and Liz's relationship going. They had like a repair. They both kind of owned their lie or their kind of mean spirited comment. And then they got really close and we're connecting. I thought there was a nice moment between Gabby and Jimmy when she shows him the picture of yes. His wife looking at him. But as soon as she came in that bedroom, I think you blocked that out. I did block it out. You're just remembering it right now. Oh my gosh. I was so I knew it was going to happen. I know. As soon as she came in, I just knew they were going to make out. I can't believe I know. I totally blocked it out. I did, because it's painful. I was disappointed about the trauma. I was so disappointed because I thought it was such a beautiful moment. And I think you seems like you picked it up like a couple of seconds before maybe like 2 seconds before they did it. I was like, oh no. Yeah, you can feel the tension. There was maybe music. I was just like, I know. Oh my God, it was so nice. I wish they had just left it at that hug. Right? Give each other a hug. Pat on the back, go your bed. Right? But I think she was drunk and she was saying, Remember partner? And she was like trying to get back out there, remember? And she was like, I can't get a lady *****. What do we call it? All that stuff is really funny. Oh my gosh. So Jimmy throws up everywhere. Projectile vomiting, like a lot. Too much. Don't show that. But it was so funny. And I'm always like, how do they do that? Yeah. Is there like a hose behind him that someone's like under the piano? Like funneling vomit looking liquid through? Is it like a sprinkler? I'm always so curious about Hollywood, especially. I don't think it is. Yeah, it looks like can you imagine, like, if your job was to create the vomit? No, but so he ruins the proposal and then Brian is all flustered, like, oh, forget it. Forget it. Jimmy starts singing. Brian's like, trying to sing. This isn't a duet. It's so funny. But then finally Brian and his partner outside, and the partner says yes, and that was so sweet. And then you hear Harrison Ford eating doritos. And I just died. You just think of like, hi as a kite eating doritos. Of course it's doritos. It was just so doritos amazing. It was so funny that you hear the crunch and then oh my God, I just love it. Just like the camera pans and you're like, again, because that's so out of character for paul. He would never wander outside with his turn and then just being a part of this special moment. But I thought it was kind of sweet because Brian, it turns out, is doing like the life planning for him. And in that way, he is seeing a very vulnerable side of Paul that no one else has seen. So in that way, it was kind of touching to me that now he gets to witness this really vulnerable again. We got such poor boundaries in this whole group. But I thought that was really sweet. And I feel like Paul used the gummies to begin with because he's so nervous that his daughter, now that he's finally told her, is like, flying in. She's like, we're going to go see all the specialists tomorrow. We're going to come up with a plan. She's like, really on it. And I think that's why he was hesitating, because he doesn't want to feel dependent yet. And I think that's like, again, a nice depiction of something super common when people get diagnosed with things like Parkinson's. Yeah. It totally changes the relationship. I think it just automatically launches people into caregiver roles to some degree. And so now kind of like, he's the father, he's the caregiver, but he feels so guilty because he really wasn't there. There's so much there. I think his emotions about it feel really authentic, like the hesitancy and then they're not wanting to be a burden and wanting to be close to its grands. I mean, all of that, I would say, is really spot on. Yeah. And I think Mr. Ford is doing a really nice job depicting all of that comedy. I saw online that they approached him kind of as like a lol. He'll never say yes, he did. And they said he's so great at it. He's having so much fun, his sense of humor that he is able to portray really dryly at times. I love the role. I do, too. I love it. I know. Now that you say that, I feel like I only remember him from Indiana Jones, star Wars, Fugitive. Did you ever see that movie? Oh, so good. We watched it as a kid. So good. Air Force One. Is that a movie? Like Action? For sure. But I love him in this role and he can bring that grittiness and the comedy element to it. Seems like it's perfect for him. I know. Can't picture anyone else playing. And can you imagine everyone else acting with him? Like they are just like over the moon, right? All right, portia. Well, we don't have sponsors or anything like that yet, but maybe someday we will. And if we did, this is where they would go. So what kind of sponsor would you like to see? I think really anything that is like I want to use, like spindrift, sparkling water. I would love for that to sponsor us. You love that you have them all the time. All the time. So what else would I like? I feel like I don't wear a lot of makeup daily, but I am like a makeup. Get ready with me, girly. I love watching that stuff. So any makeup brand want to send me something? Even though you can't see us, that maybe is problematic. What else? Again, on the delusions of all grandiose delusions on our vision board is an airline with the lay flat seat. I really want to take a flight and lay down. I mean, if you're going to go big, maybe you should just do Emirates and you don't actually have to take me anywhere. We'll just lay down, go up in the air, circle around a couple of times and we can come down. But that's my ultimate sponsor dream. So this is where you'd hear a commercial. If we had them so far, we don't, but keep subscribing if you don't. I just love the whole cast. I love everyone from Liz's husband who just makes these appearances. I think he's so silly. I like Alice. I like, obviously all the therapists. Like, it's just Brian. Yeah. I think all of the casting is just so good. It's so good. It's so, so good. It's such a good show. Like, I'm really enjoying watching it, even though I am so mad at Jimmy. I'm so disappointed in him. I am so mad. We talked last time about again, how I just feel like he's hurting everyone around him with his patience, for sure, but also Alice. And we really see that continue to develop. He gets so uncomfortable and angry when she reveals that she lost her virginity to Connor, who's Liz's son. And it sounds like it was like a nice way to lose your virginity, right? Of all the ways it could possibly happen, it was consensual. They knew each other really well. They were friends. They used protection. Right. They were safe. And he just flips out. And there's a part of me that's like, dude, you don't get to be mad. You've been like Mia. Even especially within that context. Her losing her virginity in that way, I feel like is a very nice way. There is a thing from a father about her age which I could see. You never want to think about your children, but Jimmy, you were absent and she saw others, those young girls, in many different ways. You don't get to be mad at this at all. You don't also like her reaction. Remember the first scene ever those young girls in the pool who we think are like hookers and he's doing drugs and it's like, you haven't exactly like she says, or her comeback is like, well, I cleaned cocaine off the picture of Mima. Right? Like when he got mad at her for cutting school to go hang out with Sean again, it's like he's trying to be like, I'm the dad and we're going to have rules now you really have to repair first. Totally do. Not going to work. It's not going to work. And he was, like, so mad at Liz, and I'm just like, you're mad at yourself, dude. That's what it is. But you're not looking inward or like, doing any of the work. You're just acting out externalizing and hurting everyone around you. I know. Drives me nuts. Yeah. I think he apologized to Liz later, which I appreciated just for his kind of outburst about it. Again, it's funny. Like, it's funny part of the show. He's having a temper tantrum. It's funny and everything, but it just makes me, like, angry at it. Well, and then Connor keeps reaching out to Alice, and she's, like, not responding because she's so caught up with Sean. Grown man in the house. So I was just kind of like I think it's like that's, like but again, like, appropriate, like sweet. Like, they seem like they're an age apart. Like, yeah, you know, that's who she should be interested in. And now she's also just, like, setting a boundary and seems really, in some ways, like like positively mature. Right. She didn't really want to go to that party under the bridge. I love that too. That's like, such a typical high school. We're going to have a party under the bridge. We're going to be a wine cooler. In so many ways, she was neglected 100%, and she's still really I feel like she has a good moral compass. I know. And these are the things, too, that, you know, she wishes she had her mom to talk about, like losing her virginity. How do you interact with people who are interested in you? Are you interested in them or not? These are all the things that I think a girl wants to talk to her mom about. So it is nice for Liz to be there, for Gabby to be there, but it's really sad that her dad hasn't been there. And now when they're trying to start mending that relationship, he has such big temper tantrums about her behavior, when really, again, when you're comparing her behavior to his behavior, there's no comparison. So I'm really interested to see how their relationship continues playing out, especially now as they're leaving it with this tension between her and Sean. I bet she feels just so embarrassed and rejected. And I just so felt for her as, like, a teenage girl. I know. It's just like, oh, no. And then I'm always thinking, like, what are you going to do now? Right. Especially in movies, it's like, well, now you run away. Now you do go to you hang out with another older guy who will cross that line. And that's always where I feel nervous. Bad things happen. Yes. And this happens. Right. For vulnerable kids who have faced such a big loss, in some ways, Alice has lost both parents. She lost her mom, and her dad isn't there. And thank God she has Liz. And thank God she has Gabby. But it's really I wonder if you and I prickle up more about this, given our line of work and all the different cases we've seen, because it's like, this is like the perfect storm brewing for her to run away. I don't think she will, like, in this show, but it's scary. No, I agree. I did catch something that I did not like that Liz was talking about. I think it's called kind of like emotional blackmail. And it's like when parents, because they did all of these things for you while you were a child, then have this expectation that you are supposed to fill their need, whatever that may be, emotionally, financially. When she called her son, that's what you're going to talk about. I hated that. Yeah. So she texted her son, I think, to show Paul about children being there for you. He was really again, he's having this kind of dilemma about his daughter's involvement with his Parkinson's and this new kind of relationship dynamic between them. And then Liz proceeds to text her son something along the lines of, like, I'm not doing well right now. I need you to call me. And then he calls her immediately. And then she like, ignores, declines. I know. And she's like, see, like, we were there. I wiped their butts. Like, so they should be there for me. Right. That's not so unhealthy. That's played out a lot. Not a lot, but that is played out by parents and it's so conditioned. It's not good. No. Yeah. Thank you for bringing that up. That's so true, because I think Paul is really grappling with he knew his daughter was going to want to run in and save him and really take charge, and he's not there yet. He wants to be independent. He's already given up the driving, which it's got to be hard. He doesn't really want that guy and he doesn't want her to feel like she has to swoop in and save him, I think, because he feels so guilty that he really wasn't there for her in the way he wishes he should have been. And Liz, like, misses the mark. I think she's also high. Yeah. But yeah, I thought that was she's just, like she's like, just doing a really poor job of learning how to cope. And this is a challenge, but having an empty nest, which, again, is really appropriate and helpful to Alice. She steps in. She's like this new parent for Alice and that's great and everything, but I think it's more than just being helpful for Liz. I think she has this void that she thinks it's filling her need, too. Right, exactly. So in those ways, Liz and Jimmy are kind of similar, right? They're a little selfish. Yeah. Like, kind of quote unquote helping, but to make themselves feel better. And that's really dangerous. So that's a really interesting parallel I wonder how that'll keep playing out. Yeah. And then I'm like, how is episode seven going to open? Is it going to be like, Gabby and Jimmy in bed? Like, holy ****. Yeah. Like next morning, regurts, did Alice no, she's in the house. She probably gabby's still there. You know what I mean? And also she's still there. Yeah. I don't know. I'm really nervous about that in some ways, I feel like. And what a violation that was. Alice's mom's best friend. So I could see Alice becoming very upset because maybe I feel like the hookers were bad. Right. But they were meaningless to her. So now it's like this person who she knows was best friends with her mom and who is there for her on this deeper level, has now been with her dad. If she finds out, like, that is a big violation, I would assume, for Alice. That would make me feel horrible. Horrible. Not trust, not want to talk to Gabby. I think that's just like a termination of that relationship, which is unfortunate. And Alice has already lost so many important people. I assumed they went all the way, but I wonder if they'll pull away from the kissing. I feel like that would be good, right? But I don't know. And again, if we took out them both, being intoxicated this happening for both of them, when they're both emotionally charged about, you know, Gabby's ex husband and the demise of that marriage and Jimmy losing his wife and Alice. Like, right there and and all of that. Like, if this had been like they gradually grew closer and they were like, you know what? Maybe this would be good for both of us, and I feel safe with you. Or if you develop communication, authentic feelings. Right. And, like, Alice wasn't next door. Like all these things. I could see how that might actually be really nice, but the context is so not that. And I'm so upset. No one's watching out for Alice. I know you just want to run in all these adults are just not acting like adults. No, they're not. But again, it's like not all adults act like adults. So in that way, it's nice to see some flawed characters. Yeah. What were you going to say you did talk about before, which I really wanted to bring up because I thought it was just, like, a beautiful statement. When Paul is eating doritos while Brian and his now fiance are having kind of their moment, the advice that he gives them is, like, two vulnerable people will always find a way to connect. So stay open. I thought that was just, like such so true, so meaningful. Such a nice way to say that. Because I think ultimately it's just a simple it's so real good advice. I feel like I'm not giving it the justice that I wanted to say about it. But if you're vulnerable, if you're open, if you can listen and hear and be just kind of in like a receiving position for your partner. Not defensive, right? Not defensive. You're not closed off. You're not kind of pivoting almost. I'm picturing, like, you're back to them. The relationship can work. Right. There's going to be problems, there's going to be bumps. But if you can try of course no one does it perfectly. No, but I think a lot of problems that arise in partnerships are often because of poor communication or someone not sharing how they really feel or it's as simple as I'm fine. It's like, well, you're not 100% share how this small thing hurt you so that it can be addressed and you can move on. Instead of it building and building and building. Right. And learning that it's a safe relationship to share that stuff and that the other person does want to hear it because oftentimes they didn't mean it that way. They didn't know it was landing for you that way based on your own experiences. And then when they realize that, hopefully they can internalize it and move forward differently, and then that's how you feel more and more attached. I feel like Paul was really speaking from experience, which I feel like he did not stay open. I know. Of course. That just gave me chills. I know. I'm really excited to see what happens. We want to see, and I'm sure we will, like what happens with Gabby and Jimmy. I don't want Alice to run away. What happens with Alice. I want to see, of course, what happens with Sean. I want to see, like, Liz. I want Sean to fire Jimmy. Yeah. I want him to again, learn somewhere because he's not learning it from Jimmy or anyone else. But to be able to be like, I deserve better than this. So I'm going to find a different therapist. Yeah. What else do you want to see? I would like to see Harrison Fort hike. Yeah. I liked I would like to see him get high and do a little dance or some kind, maybe with a top hat and a cane. I don't know. I want him to have more. I feel like his talks with Alice are really good. I liked when they were on the bench and she wouldn't sit down because she was mad. And he was like, well, I'm sitting and I'm always mad. He's so funny. And then she sits down. He's like, see, you can be mad while you sit. And I love all the commentary about his little hat. He keeps wearing all these little things. I really do enjoy this show. I think it's really funny. It's really entertaining. I hope there's a season, too. I already want that. And it is bringing up a lot of interesting stuff about mental health. Again, we were thinking, like, we'd have a hard time talking about these three episodes because they were short and we had to split our recap into two episodes. So hopefully we will probably the next time we recap shrinking, it will be over. It'll be over. So I'm really curious to see. I think that'll come out. Yeah, the end of March, probably. All right, well, thanks for joining us for this two parter. Next time you hear our voices, we will be finishing up you season four and we can't wait to see what happens. So excited. I I don't know what to expect. I know. On the edges of our seat. Yeah. Will we hear any more about Marianne or is that it? What happens with Reese? What's going on? And then as we move into the month of April, we are going to start making our way through the hit HBO show succession. A lot of our followers and listeners keep requesting that, so we can't wait. And neither of us have seen it, so we're going to be watching it ferociously and then recapping it together for the first time. And then we're also going to throw in some cool movies from the past, like Black Swan, The Hangover. I'm excited for the hangover. Me too. Yeah. So you guys know the drill. Please rate review and subscribe and share to all your friends. Follow us on Instagram at Analyze Scripts. Send us an email, analyze [email protected] and we'll see you next time. Yeah, thanks. All right. Bye bye. This podcast and its contents are a copyright of analyzed scripts, all rights reserved. Any redistribution or reproduction of part or all of the contents in any form is prohibited. Unless you want to share it with your friends and rate, review and subscribe, that's fine. All stories and characters discussed are fictional in nature. No identification with actual persons, living or deceased places, buildings, or products is intended or should be inferred. This podcast is for entertainment purposes only. The podcast and its contents do not constitute professional mental health or medical advice. Listeners might consider consulting a mental health provider if they need assistance with any mental health problems or concerns. As always, please call 911 or go directly to your nearest emergency room for any psychiatric emergencies. Thanks for listening and see you next time. Our.

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Welcome back to Analyze Scripts, where a psychiatrist and a therapist analyze what Hollywood gets right and wrong about mental health. Today, we are joined by our very first guest, Christina Arredondo, MD, who completed psychiatry residency at Yale University alongside Dr. Furey. Dr. Arredondo currently works as a medical director of several opiate treatment programs and as director of Behavioral Health at a federally qualified healthcare center (FQHC) in Tucson, AZ, where she is raising three daughters amongst an extensive family unit. She provides thought-provoking insights based on personal and professional experiences as we explore themes of intergenerational trauma, displacement, and toxic familial expectations. We hope you enjoy!

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Welcome back to Analyze Scripts, where a psychiatrist and a therapist analyze what Hollywood gets right and wrong about mental health. Today, we analyze the psychoanalytic classic "What About Bob." Bill Murray and Richard Dreyfuss portray a larger than life characters allowing for a rich discussion about the therapist-patient relationship. We discuss everything from our diagnostic impressions to our critiques about Dr. Marvin's office decor and...bizarre family puppets?!? We hope you enjoy!

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Welcome back to Analyze Scripts, where a psychiatrist and a therapist analyze what Hollywoods gets right and wrong about mental health. Today, the hunter becomes prey when we revisit Joe Goldberg in "You" Season 4, Part 1 from Netflix. We wrap our heads around a new cast of disgustingly narcissistic characters while trying to figure out - who's stalking Joe? Along the way, we discuss everything from benzodiazepines to Spencer Pratt. We hope you enjoy!

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Welcome back to Analyze Scripts, where a psychiatrist and a therapist analyze what Hollywoods gets right and wrong about mental health. On this episode we are breaking down three psychologists in "Shrinking," a new show on Apple TV Plus. The characters are everything and their boundaries are questionable, but that makes for great TV, right? Listen to us discuss their grief, hijinks and water consumption. Who would you want as your therapist, Paul? Gaby? Jimmy?

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