Overthinking It Podcast

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Peter Fenzel, Mark Lee, and Matthew Wrather salute Sir Patrick Stewart, who died this week at 86. For Matt, he was Space Daddy; for Mark, a steady hand at the rudder proving that the future was in good hands.

The crew overthink the Season 5 TNG episode “The Inner Light,” in which a mysterious beam from an alien probe causes Picard to live an entire life on a dying planet in a span of twenty-five minutes. Sir Patrick did the same week after week on Star Trek, giving us a slice of idealized life in an hour. Pete follows the episode’s title through George Harrison back to the Tao Te Ching and finds a captain who always looks outward compelled, for once, to look within.

Make it so.

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Episode 956: You’re Still The Captain… Invincible. originally appeared on Overthinking It, the site subjecting the popular culture to a level of scrutiny it probably doesn't deserve. [Latest Posts | Podcast (iTunes Link)]

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Matt Wrather and Pete Fenzel delve into their 40s and their Apple TV subscriptions to discuss The Dink, a comedy film about pickleball starring the alliterated (but never duplicated) Jake Johnson. Pete plays pickleball in real life; Matt does not. The Dink falls somewhere in between.

A genre-jumping waltz with greatly varied distance from reality, The Dink is sometimes a sports comedy, sometimes a romantic comedy, sometimes a coming of age drama, sometimes a comedy of manners – wildly absurd in content but far more subdued in style. Matt and Pete mark this shifting distance, and ask what, then, the movie is saying about midlife, and about crises, but maybe not about midlife crises.

The pair discuss as well their impressions of pickleball in the real world: a sport and hobby that is both very funny and also not a joke. They discuss injury, aging, psychological development through the lens of Martin Buber, rebuilding the self, change and reclamation over the course of life, and how deadly seriously pickleball organizers take the risks of slips and falls.

NB: The racket sport variant that is played outdoors in a cage mentioned early in this episode is called Padel. It was created in Mexico in 1969, popularized across Latin America and Iberia, and is now played worldwide. Pete did not imagine it in a dream.

Yes, this means that “Paddle tennis” and “Padel tennis” both exist and are different games.

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Episode 955: The, Pickleball, The originally appeared on Overthinking It, the site subjecting the popular culture to a level of scrutiny it probably doesn't deserve. [Latest Posts | Podcast (iTunes Link)]

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Peter Fenzel, Mark Lee, and Matt Wrather spread the good news of The Great Pumpkin (He has sprouted!), and settle down for a chilly autumn night’s vigil over It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown. Pete lays out the competing exegeses of Linus’s faith: absurdist satire of religion in the form of a half-remembered druidic vegetable cult, or just a boy who mixed up Halloween and Christmas. We’ll never know, because if the Pumpkin doesn’t come, we weren’t in the “sincerest pumpkin patch” to begin with.

The crew tackle Linus, who keeps faith with tradition, Lucy, whot reats the holdiay as a carnivealesque inversion, Charlie Brown, who is a mockery of mid-century gender roles, and finally Snoopy who, in a world where adults are absent or reduced to wah-wah-wah, manages to smuggle in the adult world. This means war, in the genuinely perilous Red Baron sequence and subsequent 1917-esque escape across France, ending of course at a halloween party where Schroeder’s World War I songs bring his shell-shock back to the surface.

Matt’s two-year-old has, of course, the last word: “Snoopy has long ears.”

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Episode 954: The Problem with Lucy Is That She’s Right originally appeared on Overthinking It, the site subjecting the popular culture to a level of scrutiny it probably doesn't deserve. [Latest Posts | Podcast (iTunes Link)]

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So the New York Times polled a bunch of entertainment people to produce a list of the “100 Best TV Shows of the 21st Century.” Sure, it’s bait, but we’re suckers for this sort of thing. More importantly, though, the timing of this seems to coincide with the end of a certain era of prestige TV, as legacy media players such as Warner Bros. and Paramount consolidate to gird themselves against upstart competitors ranging from Netflix to the legions of teenagers producing content on YouTube and TikTok for free. Matt, Mark, and Pete take stock of the list, this moment of change for the TV landscape, and their own histories of watching these shows from young adulthood into middle age and fatherhood. 

Combined, the three panelists had seen at least one episode of 80 out of 100 shows. But all three had only one show in common that they’d seen all the way through. If you’re thinking of a show that’s constantly referenced on the podcast, though, it’s probably not that!

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Episode 953: We Have Silo at Home originally appeared on Overthinking It, the site subjecting the popular culture to a level of scrutiny it probably doesn't deserve. [Latest Posts | Podcast (iTunes Link)]

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Mark Lee, Matt Wrather and Pete Fenzel begin with a reflexive logical identity. A horse is a horse. Of course! Of course. And no one can talk to a horse. Of course!

That is, of course, unless the horse…

The three ride back to 1961, to witness Mad Men-era psychological horror at its finest.

…is the famous Mister Ed!

Wilbur Post has an obstacle to happiness and connection in his life. And no matter how much his neighbor strives to convince him it’s their wives’ effort to purchase things they and their families need and want, it is in fact the petty, possessive Palomino in his suburban barn / home office. The horse talks only to Wilbur, you see, and every lip-flapping word drives Wilbur apart from his kind and reasonable wife Carol, to have the man all to himself.

By what hand do today’s overthinkers measure this chauvinistic chestnut? This horseworm of the post-cowboy mind? This braying, bad-faith brony? Does Mister Ed hold up, and if so, with what horsepower? When we look Mister Ed in the mouth, do we triage Wilbur’s marital problems? Impugn his wilting integrity? Mock his incompetence? Trace the horseheaded shadow of his unspent libido? All of them, and more!

Do you remember Mister Ed as giving good advice? I did, but no longer. Email [email protected] for an invite to our Discord to share your memories of TV Land and all its saddle baggage.

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Episode 952: Unbridled Shenanigans originally appeared on Overthinking It, the site subjecting the popular culture to a level of scrutiny it probably doesn't deserve. [Latest Posts | Podcast (iTunes Link)]

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Peter Fenzel, Mark Lee, and Matt Wrather are not quitting the podcast, but everything else is on the table. The crew overthink giving up on a long project, and Matt has hot take: people don’t quit things nearly enough. Book readers defer to a pretend adjudicating authority in their own heads, silencing the part of the psyche that is screaming “this book sucks, man.”

Pete, for example, tried to read Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell while pushing a newborn’s stroller on almost no sleep, and by refusing to quit the book, he effectively quit reading. Video games are another matter. Mark quits games that don’t respect his time, notably Star Wars Outlaws and one infernal puzzle in the Indiana Jones and the Great Circle DLC.

But nobody ever quits a haiku. And Tori Amos never played Lilith Fair.

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Episode 951: I’m Sorry, U. You’re Just Not Worth My Time. originally appeared on Overthinking It, the site subjecting the popular culture to a level of scrutiny it probably doesn't deserve. [Latest Posts | Podcast (iTunes Link)]

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Knock knock.

Who’s there?

The Overthinking It Podcast.

The Overthinking It Podcast Who?

The Overthinking It Podcast subjects jokes to a level of scrutiny they probably don’t deserve! Hahahahahahaha!

Mark Lee came to Pete Fenzel and Matt Wrather with a problem: his son got his hands on a 120+ page book of Halloween jokes, and he was having trouble explaining why some of them worked better than others. The panel starts by dissecting joke mechanics (puns, setups, punchlines, subversion of expectations, etc.), and from there goes on to explore the unspoken agreements of the joke-telling social contract, especially when it comes to the notorious shaggy dog story, joke-telling that requires membership in particular subcultures, and common frameworks for jokes such as “St. Peter at the Pearly Gates.”

Got a joke from your kid that defies analysis? Your go-to joke for breaking the tension in awkward social situations? Something groan-worthy, or perhaps knee-slap-inducing? Share it on the Discord? Email [email protected] for an invitation.

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Episode 950: Hey Dad! Knock Knock. originally appeared on Overthinking It, the site subjecting the popular culture to a level of scrutiny it probably doesn't deserve. [Latest Posts | Podcast (iTunes Link)]

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Matt Wrather, Mark Lee, and Pete Fenzel keep a promise by overthinking Dog Man. Dog Man is a bigger deal than you think. Year-end bestseller lists for novels overall have had at least one new Dog Man book in them for 7 of the last 8 years. And the composition, themes, and artistic mission of the enterprise deserves as deep a look as we can give it. Enter the Overthinkers.

Matt, Mark, and Pete start broad, cataloguing the series’ unusual modes of style and critique, including a catalogue of the “inadequate moral authorities” that serve as the targets for satire and social commentary across the series. They then zoom in on close readings of the books that redefined the series: A Tale of Two Kitties (the Charles Dickens one) and Dog Man and Cat Kid (the East of Eden one). They discuss the relationship between Dog Man and The Great Books, which is one of influence, reverence, and trenchant criticism. They frame the books as deliberate art objects of physical media. They explore the meta-narrative of Dog Man as an artistic project of the fictional elementary school children George Beard and Harold Hutchins. They delve into Dog Man’s unflinching moral sense, which is one of human connection through artistic and expressive freedom and forgiveness.

Such depth might not be expected from a series so generous with its diarrhea jokes, but Dog Man is a gift that keeps on giving. The three discuss its staggering inconvenient truths about parenthood hidden not-too-deeply amid chaotic and frantic action, its relationship with educational accommodation and neurodiversity (which it carries over from Captain Underpants), and writer Dav Pilkey’s vocabulary of reference from the cinema of the 1930s, from Our Gang to the Three Stooges to the landmark horror-comedy Freaks (Gooba gabba! Gooba gabba!). Also, Big Jim is Jesus.

“Oh boy this is gonna be GREAT!” —Chief

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Episode 949: Juvenile Phantasmagoria of Kid Logic originally appeared on Overthinking It, the site subjecting the popular culture to a level of scrutiny it probably doesn't deserve. [Latest Posts | Podcast (iTunes Link)]

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Peter Fenzel and Matthew Wrather report for the first day of school in sweatpants — a garment Matt wore religiously until the sixth grade. Matt has in fact just started a new job, an occasion his boss called “syllabus week”; the swag package waiting at his workstation included a backpack, which seemed somehow apropos.

For Pete, back to school became metaphorical upon college graduation and then stopped being metaphorical again when his kids started school. The carnivalesque revolt against the monthless calendar of adult life has given way to actual backpacks and a frank plea for a return to normalcy after a summer of camps, travel, and a schedule in tatters. What the school year supplies, he argues, is an end to summer wtihout a denial: we’re stopping because something else is happening now, rather than because a parent has said no for the fifteenth time.

If you buy a new notebook this month, establish first why you are filling it. Is it an obligation or an aspiration?

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Episode 948: The End and the Denial originally appeared on Overthinking It, the site subjecting the popular culture to a level of scrutiny it probably doesn't deserve. [Latest Posts | Podcast (iTunes Link)]

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Pete Fenzel and Mark Lee pay tribute to the artistic and cultural legacy of Dolly Parton on the occasion of her passing at the age of 80. They start with her humble origins as told through the similarly humble song “Coat of Many Colors,” noting that many of her big songs lack structural or harmonic complexity. The apparent simplicity of the compositions are of course just strong foundations upon which Parton layers her lyrical mastery, shimmering voice, and her larger-than-life persona.

Pete and Mark also celebrate Parton’s philanthropy, which, in fitting with her music, was often expressed in terms of human connection, rather than some sort of abstract manifesto. Mark also reminisces about the time he took his family to Dollywood, where everyone had a good time, except for when the soot from the massive steam train engine made his toddler daughter cough. Sorry, what were we talking about? Right. Dolly Parton was an amazing musician, a powerful cultural phenomenon, and a generous human being, and we hope this podcast provides you with some new ways to appreciate her legacy.

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Episode 947: Maximally Spangled originally appeared on Overthinking It, the site subjecting the popular culture to a level of scrutiny it probably doesn't deserve. [Latest Posts | Podcast (iTunes Link)]