Ep 251: Twin Peaks, Survivor

denisedenis.jpg It’s so good to have Nelly Thomas back in the Nelly chair. We’ve all missed her but now she’s back and full of fight. She brings us a hilarious summary of the current season of Survivor. For the uninitiated, Nelly’s Survivor summaries are probably better than watching the show and it’s pretty damn good show.

Josh (me or I, depending on the context) went to the ACMI Twin Peaks special Live in the Studio. He (I) spoke to members of the audience about what makes Twin Peaks so special. You can read all the tweets from the day as well.

Brett doesn’t buy some bad screen ratio business and Toby Halligan has some very poignant Trotters.

This week’s question: Do you love Twin Peaks? Let us know by email.

Keep up to date with all the goings on at ACMI.

18 Comments

  1. David Boxcutter says:

    So, Brett. You claim that “a large proportion of the Australian public” would be denied access to the AFL Grand Final if it were to be shown only on Foxtel.

    Can you lease explain who these people are that don’t have access to a radio receiver or a computer that can stream radio stations?

    You can buy an AM/FM receiver at the $2 Shop. So, how would anybody lose access to the Grand Final by it being on Foxtel? Even the homeless can easily get $5 for a radio and batteries in half an hour’s begging.

  2. Nelly – I know Tina Wesson is your favourite Survivor contestant and you’ve mentioned her arm-in-the-air immunity win several times. Would it also be fair to say that a big part of why she won was because Coby Donaldson took her to the final two instead of Keith Famie (aka the chef who couldn’t cook rice)? She was a tough cookie, but also the beneficiary of Coby’s largesse/naivite.

    I’m conscious debating reality TV from 9 1/2 years ago is ridiculous, however it seems to be in the finest traditions of Boxcutters.

  3. Paul Boxcutter says:

    Toby/Josh/Anyone,
    Can you just stop letting Brett talk about anti-syphoning? I wanted to drive my car into a concrete barrier this morning just to make him stop talking at me.

    I still contend that I (yes, this is my opinion) would much rather pay for full/complete/good coverage of ALL sports (or culturally significant sporting events) than take in what is mostly pruned/incomplete/australian-centric/average coverage from FREE to air coverage.

    Brett fails repeatedly to consider the actual quality of the coverage that FTA shovel at us, you get what you pay for, and also very conveniently forgets (I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt that he might have researched / looked into this more) that in the case of the AFL they are pushing for being removed off of the list so that they can have a free an open bidding war to drive up the dollars they can earn from tv rights.

    I’m all for an anti-syphoning list if they government also legislates that the coverage is in full (anyone seen an early round Wimbledon match that doesn’t contain an Aussie on FTA lately?) and live.

  4. Paul Boxcutter says:

    Thanks Josh.

    I wonder then what the rules are then in terms of the rights?
    I’m *guessing* that for example Ch9 won’t be able to bid on the rights to just those games (quarter finals on and aussie games) so they’ll need to buy the entire rights and most likely only show what they want or what is on the list. They can then on-sell them to other broadcasters but if they try to charge over the odds (see Ch7 and the Aus Open last year) then no-one will actually get to see these other games. So in reality providing us worse/no coverage of a great sporting event.

    Of course Brett’s easy argument here is that the other matches in a grand slam aren’t culturally significant, so who cares? But this is another part of the problem, this arbitrary list decides what is culturally important sportswise and what is not.

    anyway, this whole thing irritates me, the government who deign what is important for me to see for ‘free’, the FTA channels who show poor/interrupted/partial versions of these live events, brett for making me more angry and posting here. I think I’ll do a rhetorical deal, I’ll stop posting about it, if Brett stops talking about it. /shakes hands

    🙂

  5. David Boxcutter says:

    Paul, what’s more infuriating to me is that every time this comes up, he ignores the responses and falsely claims that the responses are only about his “Muslims!” remark.

    He clearly doesn’t bother to actually read what is written in response. And this results in him repeatedly making the same arguments on air, without even bothering to address the valid criticisms.

    If it’s so important to him to make this argument, he could at least give the courtesy of acknowledging the opposing arguments.

  6. Well, I can certainly see why some people might not be completely ‘into’ the current season of Survivor – it’s been a real slow burn so far, and the usual editing hijinks means that those that have been shown early are never there at the end…

    However, knowing what I know from behind the scenes (ie a combination of ‘a little bird told me’, and ‘freely available spoilers from reliable sources’), expect the ending to be well worth the wait. Probably the most controversial ending in Survivor history.
    …of course, there’s no knowing how much will actually make it to air. (Real quote: Jeff Probst, “turn the cameras off and get the producers in here- NOW!”) The recap special is looking like it’ll need the sort of security that the Jerry Springer show usually requires.

    And then – stand by for series 22: for Jeff Probst’s last go-round, it is supposedly Team Boston Rob versus Team Russell Hantz.

    Currently filming. And I cannot wait…

  7. I have to applaud your dedication to that final joke. Unfortunately as I was riding to work at the time, I had to listen to the whole 4 minutes.

    Meanwhile…
    How great was it to hear about Twin Peaks after all this time? 20 years? How can that be?
    I didn’t even hear about this ACMI event. But since it sold out so quick, there wasn’t a lot of advertising needed obviously.
    So many great memorable moments:
    The introduction of Dale Cooper.
    The Black Lodge scenes
    Audrey Horne.
    Josie turns into a knob.
    By far the most memorable: The scene where Bob comes climbing over the couch and into the camera. Still freaks me out.

    Sherilyn Fenn went on to star in a show called “Rude Awakening” which was about as far from “Twin Peaks” as you could get. Terrible and watchable at the same time.

    • Josh Kinal says:

      Yeah, Rude Awakening was a) a bit before its time and b) not very well written. I remember it now.

      Also, Josie didn’t turn into a knob, she was trapped inside the door knob. There’s a difference!

  8. Gordon Boxcutter says:

    As a fan of Twin Peaks, I enjoyed the coverage from this weeks podcast. Just thought I’d let you know that Psych is paying homage to Twin Peaks with their most recent episode.

    The following TP alumni are in the episode. Ray Wise, Sherilynn Fenn, Sheryl Lee, Dana Ashbrook, Robyn Lively, Lenny Von Dohlen & Catherine Coulson.

  9. @mordwa If only the series had been as intriguing so far as your description of what’s to come! Now I’m going to have to actually watch this series (I haven’t watched since Ep4).

    @actualchad All I can remember about Rude Awakening is that Channel Ten screened it erratically late at night. I have a vague memory of Mario van Peebles being introduced as a love interest at some stage.

  10. Nelly Thomas says:

    Ben – debating Survivor from any season (9 years ago or not) is a worthy and noble thing to do! Thank you. You’re quite right that Tina benefited from “Mamma’s boy” (aka Colby Donaldson’s) front-foot play, but unlike some other coat-tail-riders, I believe she did it consciously and as a strategy. It’s a good a strategy as any – especially when you’re going up against young, fit guys. And I still marvel at that bloody arm and the endurance of a lot of the older women in particular.

    As for this season, I maintain that it’s ok and is at least better than Survivor Africa (which was AWFUL). Although, god knows I’m easily pleased in this particular arena. I’ll watch faithfully to the final, controversial end. MORDWA – I AM BEGGING YOU FOR MORE DETAIL! Who is your mole? Tell me you know Probst…. Plllleeeaaaseeee. How exciting.

    Nelly

  11. I think Survivor 21 was always going to feel like a let down just from the fact that it immediately follows and will be compared to Survivor 20. Having said that, it’s still far from the worst season ever.

    I must say that I’m struggling to engage with this season of TAR, however. Though that might be because I’ve watched it on normal TV with ads instead of sourcing it elsewhere…

    I never watched Twin Peaks, most likely because if my parents didn’t want to watch a show then I had to sit in the kitchen and watch the little black & white one and it just didn’t hold that much appeal at the time to warrant that. After hearing your discussions I think I’ll have to track it down and have a look.

    Oh, and welcome back Nelly!

  12. @Nell’Wa

    Well – I warn you, getting into spoilers and the behind the scenes stuff is a slippery slope; Think long and hard if you *really* want to know who wins the whole shebang, what week your favorite(s) get eliminated, who on the jury is drinking heavily during the day at the Ponderosa ranch… and how will that knowledge affect your enjoyment week to week. For myself, knowing who’s going to win has enhanced the show greatly seeing *this particular person* play the game with *this particular strategy*.

    Ahem.

    Buuut- if you still want to know more, try
    http://survivorsucks.com/topic/72389/t/Survivor-Nicaragua-40-and-over-vs-30-and-under.html?page=306

    – and start working back. Winner/ final three/ elimination order has been freely circulated since around page 234 of that forum (in realtime, from about 6weeks ago).

    As to Probst – “they’re real. And they’re spectacular-!”

  13. Nelly Thomas says:

    Mordwa, what a tempter/ess you are! The siren’s call of knowing what happens in advance, versus the spoiler effect. For now, I’ll abstain (mainly because I have a new ep ready to go). Can I hold off reading from you link above…who knows?

    Hang on a minute! I have just seen that the link is called “survivorsucks”!!!! Outrageous Mordwa! DO YOU MOCK ME? I shall never click on it. NNNEEEVVVERRR.

    🙂

    Nelly

  14. Muslims isn’t the body of my concerns and every time it comes up on the show there’s an opposing viewpoint put…

    It’s sounding a little like conservatives complaining about non-existent bias on ABC.

  15. David Boxcutter says:

    Muslims isn’t the body of my concerns and every time it comes up on the show there’s an opposing viewpoint put…

    So, why don’t you ever address the opposing concerns? Also, the arguments put forth by myself and others on the blog are quite different to the arguments put forth by Josh and Nelly.

    It’s sounding a little like conservatives complaining about non-existent bias on ABC.

    What the fuck are you talking about? Seriously, what the hell does this have to do with anything argued here?

    Are you just trolling when it comes to this topic?

  16. Paul Boxcutter says:

    Brett,
    I can’t speak for anyone else, but I’ll tell you what bothers me.

    When this came up probably a month or so ago, you said – and I paraphrase “I can’t succinctly discuss this now, so I’ll post a more definitive portrayal of my thoughts on the blog during the week”

    …. then you went on your now infamous Muslims ramble.

    I let that slide as I knew it was ill-conceived, but when you didn’t deliver on your rational thoughts/response, all we have to base your view on is your overly stupid Muslim rant. It is all we have to hang onto, until you either provide your well thought out analysis or admit that the Muslim rambling is your well thought out position.

    Every time the anti-siphoning issue comes up, I wait patiently for your considered opinion, and when you constantly fail to bother to have one and play up on your previous rambling it makes me respect you less and less, so when you try your ‘faux pas’ women need to be pre-selected earlier ‘honest tell it how it is, I’m not scared of the truth’ crap, you come off like a complete left wing lunatic saying stuff to get a rise more than actually thinking about anything you say……….. which therefore devalues EVERYTHING you say.

    What disappoints me most, is in that not bothering to give your actual account makes me think that you are simply Sam Newman, say or do anything to get a rise, bad publicity for you is better than none at all, and that sir frankly saddens me, reflects badly on Boxcutters as a whole and hopefully saddens you.

    also
    @Josh – looking at that list, the ashes for example are still on the ‘A’ list, so can’t be shown on the CH9 other channel, so we’d sitll miss stuff when they go to the News/ACA. ;(

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