10 - ALF with Jordan Morris: was Alf a nightmare to work with?

Famed raconteur Jordan Morris joins Andy and Sean to discuss the seminal show from his childhood, Alf! The 1986 pilot is available for free on Youtube (Link).

That's also where you can view episode 2, which Jordan and the guys discuss live over on our Patreon.

Jordan's new graphic novel, Bubble, comes out this July. For more on Jordan visit here.

Transcript

Jordan: 0:00

Uh, I am using a program, the unfortunately named Hindenburg, to record. Nice. And I will getcha, getcha a wav file. That

Sean: 0:09

program was way popular before the disaster in 1939.

Jordan: 0:14

ha ha ha! They really We're not changing the name! Yeah, they did not want to change the name. Everybody knows it as this!

Sean: 0:20

Bob, we gotta do something. No, we're not a we're not a

Jordan: 0:24

dad, Jonathan dad, Jonathan Hindenburg, started this recording software company,

Sean: 0:31

Hey everybody, welcome to Co Pilots. I am Sean Conroy and I'm Andy Secunda. On this podcast, we talk about TV pilots, the first episodes of television shows. Sometimes pilots become long running series. Others don't make it past that first episode.

Andy: 0:47

We're going to talk about all of them. The great pilots, the bad pilots, weird pilots, the forgotten pilots. We are TV writers, but it should be noted that we are the dumbest TV writers, you know, so all of these are just our dumb opinions.

Sean: 0:59

So dumb.

Andy: 1:02

Jordan Morris, a podcaster extraordinaire, comedy writer, performer. What are your other list of, uh, of just amazing accomplishments? Friend of mine in a, in a, in a dinner group, a recurring dinner group.

Jordan: 1:17

It's somehow

Andy: 1:18

formed.

Jordan: 1:18

On one of Andy's text chains. Uh, Sean and I are not on any text chains together, but maybe that'll change. We have

Sean: 1:26

a, we do have a dinner duo, though. We go to the Ivy once a week.

Andy: 1:31

I think

Jordan: 1:31

that's just a date, guys. Right. Yeah, we call it a dinner duo. Yeah, we call it a dinner duo. And we don't, we don't have a text chain, but we are, um, pen pals. So I'll send Sean a postcard from wherever I go.

Sean: 1:44

I always write in lavender ink.

Jordan: 1:47

put some, stick some little stickers in the envelope. I always appreciate that. That's fun.

Andy: 1:53

Um, so question really number one, cause I think Alf is a great choice, Alf is the show we'll be talking about today. but you're a, you're a man of many different interests, and, uh, many of them, uh, Actually,

Jordan: 2:07

just Alf, Andy.

Andy: 2:09

That kind of, that answers more of my question, which is why Alf, and it's like, well, that's, that's uh, you have that under, you have

Sean: 2:16

We've been We've been trying to get him for a bunch of other and he just wouldn't do it. you know,

Jordan: 2:21

Not interested in Battlestar Galactica, not in the Sopranos.

Andy: 2:25

I do. Now I remember every time I have brought up paddle sarica, you have related back to Alf in some way. And, uh, I've always found that odd. so why ALF is really what I'm, what I'm winding way down to what, what strikes you Cause we'd like to. You know, we will force a pilot on a guest, but we like to see if there's something that, that they caught to,

Jordan: 2:45

Yeah. Um, I was Alf crazy as a kid. Uh, we like, VCR taped them every week so we could, you know, rewatch them through the week. We had a pretty big VHS collection of Alf episodes. my childhood cat's name was Lucky after the Tanner family cat lucky. Uh, our cat was also a black cat, so it kind of had a double, you another, another little meaning, uh, kind of an ironic, uh, you know, uh, twist, but, um,

Andy: 3:15

I think I family black cat was named Salem. So that was, uh, it was, It was, you know, it was, it was sort of a gimme. It was, It was like, well, yeah, that would be what you call it. So Lucky's much more clever.

Jordan: 3:26

Another, uh, famous cat, uh, the one that belongs to Sabrina the Teenage

Andy: 3:30

Witch. That's right. Post, when we had Salem.

Jordan: 3:33

Oh,

Sean: 3:33

You think she named her cat after

Andy: 3:36

after yours? Yes, I think she. ironically, I

Sean: 3:39

name this cat? It's a witch's cat. What do we name

Jordan: 3:41

it? Um,

Andy: 3:43

I interrupted your flow.

Jordan: 3:45

that's okay. Um, so, so it's, it was a cherished part of my childhood and one of those things that kind of just like became a punchline, a cultural punchline. You know, you need a joke about like an 80s sitcom or, you know, dumb TV show from the like Alf's always a good pull. and it didn't do that thing like the Simpsons or the Seinfeld where it hung around and reruns Alf kind of just disappeared after it went off air. I'm sure it's rerunning somewhere. I think it's on like me TV or something like But like Alf, Alf didn't, didn't age like some of those other shows. And I know there's been a couple of, like attempted Alf comebacks. I think he had a talk show on like IFC for a hot second. Um,

Andy: 4:29

he did, I kept do like looking into it and like being like, wait, it, it couldn't have had Ed McMahon on it at that point

Jordan: 4:40

cause it was like 2004. But it did. Yeah. And he was very, he was still cognizant and you know,

Andy: 4:46

exactly. the Ed McMahon you've always remembered. Um, it it was pretty shocking.

Jordan: 4:52

Yeah. Um, so, so, you know, Alf was still still in my brain, but it occurred to me that I didn't remember much about the actual show. Like I kind of remembered who the family was and I remembered no problem because, you know, that's one of the great catchphrases. I think we can all agree, but I didn't remember too much else about the actual show. You didn't invade the

Andy: 5:12

phraseology, no problem. Maybe popularize it certain delivery.

Jordan: 5:18

That was like his, his thing. He says no problem a lot. It was on the t shirts.

Sean: 5:22

People had problems before that, but nobody thought to put together like, is that a problem for you? And people would go, I guess, I guess we'll see. And

Jordan: 5:30

a problem. Yeah. And Alf was like,

Andy: 5:33

it's possible it's a problem, but he was just a definitive no problem.

Sean: 5:37

Only one way to find out.

Jordan: 5:40

Mm hmm. Um, so yeah, I thought this would just be a fun excuse to like, go back and actually see what Alf was all about.

Andy: 5:48

Well, then this will be really, interesting to hear what all of our takes are, because I will say that my experience of ALF was the way you described it, that it was just like, that's, you know, a joke. That's a punchline. That's not a good show. That's a hacky show. It's at best just for kids, but I think. They're trying to do a show for everyone. And of, particularly as on a, on a podcast that covers pilots, we run the gamut of things where it's like, it could turn into a fantastic show later. and it might be a horrible pilot they haven't figured out the rhythms of any of the characters, or they haven't figured out the dynamics, or the, you know, the internal, like, story engine, and it's, to me, it's shocking how much the show is just there and ready to go and pretty soon. Perfect for what it is for like the intention of what alpha is to me is there in the first episode. So I will be curious to hear what you guys think I might my question I do have one question right at the top Which is do you feel like the pilot is indicative from your memory of what the show became?

Jordan: 7:00

Sure, cards on the table, I thought the pilot fucking sucked. Oh, this uh, I thought it was not

Sean: 7:07

No problem.

Jordan: 7:09

Listen, did I laugh when he said no problem? Yeah, I did. Um, and there's a couple other funny things. This has been very difficult for a person whose entire reference point is Elf in every situation. I've burned all my t shirts. Um, I'm gonna have to find a new character to go as when I go to fuck. Furry conventions, um, you know, that elf suit cost me a couple thou, especially to get the, erection installed, but, uh, you

Andy: 7:35

know, it's really a lot of money.

Jordan: 7:37

Yeah. I really sunk a lot of money into that elf costume, but, uh, the pilot's just too bad. No, you know, is it still

Andy: 7:44

no problem when you're in the act of intercourse in that outfit or is it just, is it more like, you know, I kill me like, or do you vary it up?

Jordan: 7:54

Like, do I yell different Alf catchphrases when I make it up in the Alf outfit? You're in an Alf outfit. It would be very disappointing if you didn't yell at least one. Right. And, you know, and there's a fun eating cats, eating, eating pussy entendre you can do. Like, I normally eat cats, but now I'm gonna munch on a little, you know, you can kind of tell where that goes. No

Sean: 8:16

problem.

Jordan: 8:17

Yeah. Um, so yeah, so, you know, my sexuality has been upended by this revelation that ALF pilot is bad. I, and it, I absolutely see what from watching this pilot, why this became for like eighties hack sitcom, right?'cause it is just like the most generic sitcom family. And they just added an alien and like the, the like world building of it is so fucking lazy. It is just like, we have this puppet and we have this guy who does a funny voice and the voice is funny and the puppet is funny, but like they've just done jack shit other than throw him into a generic sitcom family. And then like snorted some blow and went over to, I don't where, where, where are you going after you snort some blow in your Hollywood writing room in the eighties? Uh, the Ivy. Probably the

Andy: 9:17

IV. Yeah, sure. Uh, they, they actually shot it, uh, in Culver city. I realized not at, uh, what's now Sony, but, uh, somewhere nearby. Um, so father's office, maybe one of the places

Jordan: 9:31

that, uh, all the people that I worked with,

Andy: 9:33

uh, frequented, uh, you know, after doing a bunch of blow. Backstage

Jordan: 9:37

bar and grill. Maybe it could have been karaoke night at backstage bar and grill. If you're ganked out of your mind on blow and had invented Carol Burnett, that's where you want to go. Um,

Andy: 9:49

I feel like we really missed the good blow years. Boy,

Jordan: 9:52

we sure did. Boy, we sure did.

Andy: 9:54

Never, never once did anyone ever offer me blow in a room. Yeah,

Sean: 9:59

So I'm going to lay all my

Jordan: 10:01

sure. the table

Sean: 10:02

and disagree with both you and split the difference.

Jordan: 10:05

So you didn't watch it.

Sean: 10:08

I think Andy made some good points. I think Jordan made some good points. So I'm done. No, I,

Andy: 10:14

uh, I don't know. Falling in the middle is a hard disagree with both of us. Sean.

Sean: 10:19

Yes. Uh, I thought the pilot did what a pilot is supposed to do in terms of establishing who these people are and what the fun of the show is going to be. I just didn't like it because I thought A lot of this stuff was not funny, but I, but I understand that that is sometimes just a matter of taste. You know, there are people who I'm sure ate this shit up with a spoon, which is why it stayed on for As long as it

Jordan: 10:56

I mean, young, young, young Jordan in the Morris family, or Right. We, we were, were, shit slurpers back then. we were just snacking on spoonfuls of the Alf shit. household. We were watching every week, we were taping the damn thing. Um, but I wonder, I wonder if I would, was to text my mom now, Did you like Alf? I wonder if, if, if she actually was enjoying it, or if she was just like, my kids love this. I'll tolerate Alf for, you know, 30 minutes a week. But I mean, what

Andy: 11:27

was their taste? What were the Morris's tastes? Were they like? Were they people who would have sat down and watched kind of a dumb sitcom or would they have been like, we could, yeah,

Jordan: 11:37

we sure watched a lot of them. We watched a lot of like full house. The TGIF lineup was big for my but again, I don't know how much Gail and Thad were actually enjoying those or if it was just like, at the time, these were the equivalent of like a racist idiot playing Minecraft. Now, you know, it's just like, just what kids watch. Um,

Sean: 11:57

But they would, they would sit and watch with

Jordan: 12:00

you. Yeah, for the mo my mom would. Um, uh, yeah, she definitely would. But I think the, like, stuff they would turn on would be like Jeopardy and Wheel, Big Jeopardy and Wheelhouse, Uh, 60 Minutes, Um, a little bit of PBS, and my mom was like a big ER person. My mom loved ER. Sure. Although I guess that probably came later. I don't know that you we were Rolling from ALF into ER, but, um, these were just some, some of, some of their favorite shows.

Andy: 12:27

And when you were watching ALF, you, were you

Jordan: 12:30

like,

Andy: 12:31

how,

Jordan: 12:31

how old are you at this point? Boy, so I was looking back and I think ALF debuted in 86. So I was four. I think I probably caught ALF. In its like last seasons. I don't think I was like, I don't think I was there watching the first season, but I think Alf would, you know, ran for four. So I was probably into it in the, you know, um, when I was like six or seven.

Andy: 12:54

And

Jordan: 12:54

And I would

Sean: 12:55

you were six, you had an Alf tattoo.

Jordan: 12:57

Right. Ha ha ha ha ha. Yeah.

Andy: 13:00

You're

Jordan: 13:00

An early in. Ha ha ha ha ha. It's

Andy: 13:03

it's always

Jordan: 13:04

sexual, even as a child. Yeah, I know. He imprinted on me early. Ha ha ha ha ha. So that, so that He was my Fox Robin Hood, you know, people are so horny for that Robin Hood Fox. I

Andy: 13:16

mean, that was for me. I mean, it wasn't my, uh, mine was, mine was, uh, made Marion, but, uh, but I definitely, uh, I wanted to pattern myself on, on Fox. I was a,

Sean: 13:25

I was a steamboat Willie fella.

Andy: 13:28

Sure. Well, that was

Jordan: 13:29

your air action. Right. Now he's everywhere because he's in public domain. You must be jacking off 24 7, dude.

Andy: 13:35

I have I mean, were just mostly surprised that you were seeing a non human, you know, animated character

Sean: 13:40

around. I didn't even understand what I was looking

Jordan: 13:42

at.

Andy: 13:43

You would just a week

Jordan: 13:45

runaway from, is that a

Sean: 13:45

shadow?

Andy: 13:47

You would just the week before run away from the train coming at you on

Jordan: 13:50

the screen. Right? Right.

Andy: 13:51

Um,

Jordan: 13:52

probably a sexual feeling for you too. Running away from the train.

Andy: 13:56

Um,

Jordan: 13:57

I

Sean: 13:57

go to train stations all the time just to run

Andy: 13:59

But why

Jordan: 14:01

Um,

Andy: 14:01

we stack this just marginally back on track, uh, why don't we stack the, uh, the overview on Alf. Um, just because, just even lightly dipping into the, into the past from it, uh, into the behind the scenes stuff. found it very, uh, interesting,

Jordan: 14:21

um, ruined lives.

Andy: 14:24

yeah, it's just shocking. Let's start from the beginning. It was a sitcom that aired on NBC from, uh, September 22nd, 1986 to March 24th, 1990. Um, just several seasons, it was written and directed by Tom Patchett, uh, the pilot was, who started on Bob Newhart, rose to executive producer, he was a co creator of Buffalo Bill, and he was a partner with Jay Tarsus, who was, uh, you know, an actor and a writer. One thing that was sort of, uh, and I wondered if it played in to his doing this show or being sort of they thought of is he, he wrote the great Muppet caper, which I might argue is the best of them. The Muppet one of the writers. And then he wrote the story. I think what Jay Taurus is for Muppets take Manhattan. Um,

Sean: 15:14

why Kermit keeps saying no problem in that.

Andy: 15:17

I mean there's a lot of, there's a lot of crossovers. Very inexplicably Kermit is trying to eat cats in that movie. It's Very odd. Um,

Jordan: 15:25

The guy had a bag of tricks. I think we all do. As writers, you know, we all have stuff we come back to.

Andy: 15:32

Uh, he also was the creator in EP on a working girl, uh, which is a show that I think we should cover at some point, which had Sandra Bullock. Uh, as working girl as don't know the name of the character, sorry, Melanie Griffith, um, came out and only ran 12 episodes and also, uh, Sean, uh, with George Newbern, uh, who you may remember, yeah, that's right. From

Sean: 15:56

From Puchinski,

Andy: 15:57

Yeah, he did that the same year as Pachinksi.

Sean: 16:01

That was the best year of his life.

Andy: 16:04

uh, yeah,

Jordan: 16:04

so he had, he was a

Andy: 16:06

sitcom as, as a lot of the people, for some reason, keep falling into when we get to the weirder one that we're interested in, they are already like a Mary Tyler Moore, Bob Newhart, like person who is like, You know, just a, a total pro by the time they get

Sean: 16:21

Right. came up old school and now they're branching out a little bit,

Andy: 16:25

right? And so I, what I didn't understand was even looking at the credits, uh, Patchett wrote the pilot, which usually means you're the creator, but it's co created by him and puppeteer, Paul Fusco, who was out, if he was the puppeteer for Alf. And, uh, the story is that he, Paul Fusco went in to meet with Bernie Brillstein, you know, he was auditioning with this puppet character, and Bernie Brillstein, who was, you know, a hilarious, you know, classic, old school, Hollywood personality that I only met once in an elevator when I was meeting it at, uh, at Brillstein Gray, and didn't know who he was, and he was just a Santa Claus figure in an undershirt talking about how the, uh, In a very charming way about how the, the, uh, the air conditioning was out. and how much it was, uh, bothering him, but he was being very friendly. And I was like, that guy has to be Bernie Brillstein or somebody's dad. That is, that is one of those two options. but anyway, he went in, you auditioned for him. He was, uh, Bernie Brillstein was kind of uninterested because he managed Jim Henson, which is another thing that I didn't know that Bernie Brillstein handled him, um, and regarded appropriately. Henson is like the best puppeteer, uh, who ever lived and, uh, But then, you know, his, he did a performance as Alf and Brillstein was like, you know, this is a hilarious, strong character. It could be a series. I don't know how that led to Patchett getting involved. If it is like, well, he, he wrote on the Muppet shows or what happened,

Sean: 17:55

Which came first?

Andy: 17:57

I believe Great Muppet Caper came first. I don't know, I guess we'll get into

Jordan: 18:01

whether it was a perfect

Andy: 18:03

matchup, but I mean, the, the person who creates the perfect housing for this character. Certainly is, you know, it's undeniable in terms of the success of the the show. and we'll get into the cast and everything, but, as Jordan referenced, To me, what is interesting, and to me the argument for the strength of this show and why I say was surprised, and maybe it's just that my expectation was so low for it that I was like, oh, this is not offensively bad to me right off the top in terms of the character, the rhythm of the the delivery system of, like, his command of of the puppet as a puppeteer. his sort of rhythm, the sensibility, the way that he plays off of the family and the family almost immediately, the parents becoming irritated and the child, you know, the, the boy becoming charmed and the daughter sort of being in the middle is kind of there. Immediately. The jokes are all generally softball jokes, but to me, it's sort of like, well, they set up the, the character kind of as a. Um, vaudevillian comic, almost intentionally cheesy, laughing at his own jokes, doing the hawk, you know, like hitting the table kind of thing. So it's sort of like, well, you're sort of setting it up. So he's supposed to be kind of like, not that funny, I think. Um, and I think it's, you could argue it either way that we're supposed to think hilarious, but, um, whatever the case, I feel like you watch a lot of pilots. And it's just like all these people seem like they're at sea, like none of like, and I can't, we watched Dear John as one of our recent episodes. And it's just kind of like, it just feels like everybody is just muscling jokes and has no idea kind of what they're doing or what the purpose of this is. Um, and I feel like this is like the dynamics all work. But, as Jordan referenced, it was, was apparently

Jordan: 20:09

a technical nightmare

Andy: 20:11

for

Jordan: 20:12

all

Andy: 20:12

concerned immediately. They had to build it on a platform, you had to do an endless amount of

Jordan: 20:18

takes to get it right for the, to,

Andy: 20:20

to get the puppet right, to reshoot stuff. They would have to dig holes, not dig holes, but like, have certain holes the platform for, For, uh, Fusco to, you know, sort of appear and then move it fully even to get in a different

Jordan: 20:34

shot. And it It is, it is like, it is technically interesting way for like, puppet character to interact with a, with human right? Cause I think usually when you see these kinds of things, the puppet has a little home base they just always pop up from. It would be like, if Alf was always in that kitchen window, it would be like, okay, that's where the puppeteer's set up and, know, they don't move around a lot. But like, Alf Moves throughout the house and so they have the the puppet which talks and then you have a guy in a suit For when Alf is like running around and and it is integrated pretty well into the show like it is pretty seamless when you're getting the talking puppet Alf and when you're getting the guy in suit it moves pretty seamlessly so I guess in that way like what they're doing is kind of ambitious impressive right it's like it yeah they do want to give the illusion that Alf can just go anywhere and he's everywhere in the house as opposed to just like you He pops up in his little Alf zone, so, you know, I will, I will give it some points for that, and also, yeah, I totally understand why that just totally fucks up the ease of the multicam sitcom, which is built to be simply shot and reproduced, and like, oh, if you have this little guy who's moving all over the place, and you have to hide, probably, I I mean, how many puppeteers do we think it took operate Alf? Probably more than one.

Andy: 22:01

They definitely had at least two and I think one, the, uh, Fusco handled, I think the mouth and the right hand and then he had at least one helper who handled the left hand. Um, and then there was obviously a different, uh, you know, a Hungarian. a little person, uh, named Michu Mizaros, who, uh, was in the pilot and a few episodes after that, who was the, the full body Alf. and, uh, they decided, you know, Mizarro's services were too costly and time consuming. So they, I guess departed from it, but I guess it's interesting. I agree with you in terms of being seamless when they cut to the full body elf, but my Overall take. Is it is like Kermit on the, on the bicycle in, uh, the original Muppet movie it's, I find it disturbing every time you, you

Jordan: 22:55

see

Andy: 22:55

him running around and I feel like it was. It was like the right move to phase that out. Anyway, I'm

Sean: 23:01

Well, and I and I will say Watching the pilot. I was shocked to see that aspect of the show because I never watched the show But I always presumed that it was just stationary puppet all the time so the fact that they even made that effort to me was kind of like Admirable in a sense, although, like you said, it's one thing to have, or you didn't say this, I'm putting words in your mouth, but, um, you know, it's one thing to have a puppet that is a puppet and it's another one to have that same puppet doing physical human actions where you go, how the, what the fuck is going on right now? Like he's running through the backyard or when Kermit's riding the bike, it's just, it's disconcerting in terms of. The reality of what you see most of the the time

Andy: 23:53

I don't

Jordan: 23:53

know. It's interesting. I really want to, I

Andy: 23:56

do want to, uh, uh, as we get into the show, dig into what bumped you so much and didn't bump me. Because part of the reason I think it doesn't bother me is that often when there's a puppet, or Muppet more accurately. uh, not the brand Muppet, but the type of, of puppet. It kind of bumps me because it's like, well, this is obviously some hacky, terrible. Um, you know, person who didn't have the, didn't have the craft or ability of anyone that worked with Henson. And And so it looks kind of crappy, and it reads kind of crappy, and it's shot

Jordan: 24:32

kind of crappy. Alf looks dirty. The puppet looks dirty. I don't know if that was like a character choice, the puppet always looks gross. While I I was watching this, I'm like, Alf's fur gross. I bet Alf smells.

Andy: 24:46

And

Jordan: 24:47

you're

Andy: 24:47

right. That is something that could fit his

Jordan: 24:49

Persona. Sure. Yeah, exactly. But you

Andy: 24:52

feel like it's not. It's just like somebody just rushed into this

Jordan: 24:56

Yeah, it just looks like a bad puppet. It looks like the puppet is bad. But, but right. Yeah, I guess you could play that up of like, you know, Willie could walk in. It's like, Alf, what smells in here? Like,

Andy: 25:08

but

Jordan: 25:08

putting that aside to roll in garbage.

Andy: 25:11

a

Jordan: 25:12

Um, weird.

Andy: 25:13

guy's really gut gut al. I guess it makes sense. You're going to conventions. you're

Jordan: 25:18

yeah, yeah. Big Alf guy.

Andy: 25:21

It

Jordan: 25:21

really would be

Andy: 25:21

awful if you're in a furry costume. And then, you know, at the end, you know, whoever you were with was like, That was the worst elf he was doing the whole

Jordan: 25:29

Yeah, You no, you got to nail the voice That's, I worked, I worked to get the voice right. And then I spent, uh, tens of thousands dollars on the

Sean: 25:37

I appreciate that you have the costume, but could you do the voice as Kermit the Frog?

Jordan: 25:43

ha ha. Oh man, these, these chicks I pick up at furry conventions and they're impossible to get off.

Andy: 25:49

Hey Jordan, I hear it didn't work

Jordan: 25:50

out with you and that lady. What happened? Yeah, I mean, she wanted Alf's body, but Kermit's voice. I just, I just can't keep up with the game. What a freak. Yeah. Um,

Andy: 26:02

so

Jordan: 26:03

When I'm in the elf costume, I'm talking like elf, I'm sorry, I'm old fashioned.

Andy: 26:10

I gotta be

Jordan: 26:10

me, and by me, I mean

Andy: 26:12

elf. Um, so, so

Jordan: 26:15

for you, the puppet itself,

Andy: 26:17

doesn't work.

Jordan: 26:19

I, I like, I like the, I mean, I I will admit that like, I did like things about this. Um. And the theme song in particular, the theme song fucking rocks. The theme song is very funky. A lot of, uh, uh, prominent slap bass. I liked the theme song. Um, but yeah, I mean, I liked Alf, but, It's like going on a ride at Universal Studios. You're like, this is fun. If this was a Disney ride, this would fucking rule. And I think it is the, you know, there's the off brand Henson ness of Like, like, yeah, Alf's alright, but like, if this was a Henson character, it would, it would, you would Love it immediately upon seeing it. It would be so much more lifelike. It would look like it was properly cleaned and cared for. Unlike this puppet, which seems like it was like pulled out of an ant's closet.

Andy: 27:14

Part of your critique

Sean: 27:16

that's an

Andy: 27:17

not Taking

Jordan: 27:18

of the puppet. I thought

Andy: 27:20

They're not cleaning the puppet.

Sean: 27:22

think you're making an interesting point. First of all, I'm going to disagree with you about the theme song. To me, that felt like a missed opportunity because we were still in the time then of like lyrics to the theme song and. It felt like they could just, like, do some kind of comic backstory or something there,

Jordan: 27:39

Alan, Thicke could have sang the theme song. yeah.

Andy: 27:42

mean, I, I agree with Sean that, and I will also say, like, even if you, even if you're just going if you compare it to, uh, uh, another show that was, that's name checked in this, uh, in the pilot, uh, which is Mork and Mindy Like that's such a joyful kind of yeah great upbeat thing and this is very similar to synthy It kind of ironically even though it's in the future of when the show was made feels more like a 90s Kind of you it

Jordan: 28:08

does a little bit. Yeah. Yeah

Sean: 28:09

um, but but uh also, I was going to say your point about the muppets I think is a great one because You know, the Muppets have some odd looking characters, but you look at, you just look at them and you immediately like them. And with Alf, you look at that character and you're not like. Aw, I really like that guy, you know, you're like, Ugh, this seems weird.

Andy: 28:31

Well, this is where it's interesting sort of to Jordan's point, because I feel like it's just saying the puppet bothered him is what I'm getting, is the subjects, which is fascinating because you were, I assume, drawn to it as a

Jordan: 28:43

child. Yeah, I was. we were. The house was full of Alf shit. I, uh, I, I loved it and it didn't, did not, uh, and yeah, and I felt like some nostalgic feelings watching this, but it, it, it, it did not take me back in the way that like watching the Muppet movie does. I mean, if you watch the movie now as a, know, 40 year old, it's like, still like, Oh my God, there's all my buddies. And this still so funny, but like, this was just Ooh, boy, kids are I was dumb.

Andy: 29:15

Maybe you're looking at Al more like Willie, the father character. And you're just like, look, this guy is, uh, he's, he's, uh, he's. He's hindering

Jordan: 29:24

efficiency of the house. He's not keeping on my wife in the shower. Uh, Uh, a line, I don't, I, I, I, you know, not a lot of Alf has stayed in my brain, but a line that I do remember loving as a kid that came up in one of the other episodes was Alf going, nice underwear, Kate. Cause he was was always trying to like peep to peep on the wife. Oh, so he was a full on creep. Yeah. I think he did like, he did like. Wanna wanna fuck willie Oh, he wanted to fuck Willie. Uh, no, he wanted to cuck Willie. Cuck Willie. To turn, make him make, to make a cuckold of him.

Sean: 30:01

Any chance he wanted to suck Willy? Because I feel like we're on a a roll.

Jordan: 30:04

Maybe. Was that part of your role play

Andy: 30:07

when you

Jordan: 30:07

were in the cast too? Yeah, what I'll do is I'll find a, I'll find a couple. And I'll say, okay, a little bit like Max Wright, optimally, but not necessarily. And I give him glasses, if he doesn't have them, and I say, you're Willie Tanner. And then I say to the woman, you're Kate Tanner, and I will be Alf. And I'll be like, I'm about to go back to my home planet. Let's, uh, let's, let's make this a night to remember.

Andy: 30:34

so we can get to to this whenever. the most delightful aspect of the behind scenes thing is just how much this cast over time was driven insane by the production process with this puppet, that the puppet, which was just a puppet. And it doesn't sound like, even though he had some weird things, like he, I don't know, you could argue that he's just, it's just commitment to the character that Fusco would just like not want, you know, Alf referred to as a puppet outside, you in press or whatever, he would always have be referred to as a space alien, which you could argue is protecting the brand

Jordan: 31:10

yeah, I, uh, I, did a little bit with Fozzie Bear one time and you can't call him a puppet. You call him a bear or you can call him a comedian, but you can't call him a puppet and you can't

Andy: 31:20

call him a comedian. Yeah, sure. Um, so that's fantastic. Uh, but that like Max, right. Who played the father. Like the publicly was, you know, uh, you know, he was irritated that that this puppet got all the good lines. He was quoted as saying he was

Jordan: 31:40

hugely eager to have Alf over with. The second, the last scene was shot. He walked off the set and like there was no, the ocean

Andy: 31:50

just left. uh, Shadeen who, uh, plays the, uh, Kate Tanner. said there, Said there was no joy on the set. It was a technical nightmare, extremely slow, hot, tedious. A 30 minute show took 20 25 25 hours to shoot. No point. Shadeen said some some the adults had difficult personalities. The whole thing was a big dysfunctional family. And it's astonishing that Alpha's

Sean: 32:14

Can I just say, like Go ahead. Doing a multicam sitcom And, you know, cause we've done that, and it's like a two and a a half hour shoot

Andy: 32:24

right, Or, you know, it can

Jordan: 32:26

go to like some crazy

Andy: 32:27

six hours, like

Sean: 32:28

Yeah, but I'm just, no, no, no. My point is a two and a half hour shoot is still a a fucking nightmare. Oh, sure. Absolutely. Like it's still way too long and the audience doesn't understand that they're allowed to leave anytime they want. They're all being held hostage there by the DJ or whatever. So to be there for 25 hours while they do this, it just feels like that would drive anybody crazy.

Andy: 32:52

Now I have to assume because they say that because of all the technical problems, they didn't shoot it with an audience. So all of the laughter, which it really sounds like it is, are all laugh track stuff. And it's always, it's always, to me, it's always weird that I think, as I may have mentioned on the show, there's usually complaint is, ah, you're really boosting all those laughs. And to me, it's always. Even weirder when it's this ghostly little quiet tittery like there's an audience somewhere like i'm Like I don't know either go for it or don't go

Sean: 33:22

put in the part where the audience reluctantly chuckles slightly Yeah.

Jordan: 33:29

many like, non jokes. Put in the sound that communicates, Is

Andy: 33:32

the audience sure they're supposed to be

Jordan: 33:34

there? Uh, there's so many non jokes in this that get that little titter. Yeah, yeah. There's this run of like, the kid going like, He's hairy! And he's heavy! And he's hairy and heavy! And it's like, that's, that's nothing. That's just no And they do add those little titters. It is like,

Sean: 33:55

I, I wrote all of that down in my notes because I found it so weird. Like, that exact thing, that the kid was just repeating words that everybody had already said, and repeating the same words. And the audience was so on board. I didn't realize it was not shot in front of a live audience. I was like, why are those people, you know, what's wrong with those people? Um, they're so gung ho for this kid to just say heavy and hairy.

Jordan: 34:19

yeah, the kid, the kid sucks, the kid's annoying. I mean, they don't, you know, I think the only, the only human character who I, know, know, whose performance I kind of liked was, I do think Willie is kind of giving something interesting and maybe that like, it's that contempt coming through. Maybe it's his natural He does seem like a weirdo version of a sitcom dad. Like. we kind of see him in the beginning in that cold open which has clearly been cut in a weird place and had some voiceover added so like that whatever that cold open was there's some information we didn't get but like you see him and he has space monitoring he's like a ufo nut and he also has a model train which i think is a good detail because the mind that gravitates towards space ham radio probably also gravitates towards model trains right And I think he, there's an interesting idea of like, this guy is a conspiracy nut who finally contacted the alien that he'd always been looking for, and like, maybe that is something they play with later in the series, maybe he, you know, I don't know, like, wants to search for Bigfoot or whatever, but like, there's a, they at least did a a little bit of interesting work Adding some color to the classic sitcom And I I think that is not work they did with any other human character. There's just like the annoying neighbor and her mean husband and the two kids. One's a kid and one's a teen and a mom who, who doesn't want you to soda. No soda, Alf. Don't drink soda, Alf. You better don't give him soda, Alf. Are you drinking soda? It's just like, this sucks. This is, no, no one thought about this for more than four fucking seconds. Yeah, so I mean, I think that like, by virtue of being a pretty good performer and maybe being a little bit more interesting than the typical stock character, I do think Willie comes out of this looking okay.

Andy: 36:21

I have have a lot of opinions many which disagree with with just in

Jordan: 36:25

this'll will get spicy.

Andy: 36:26

Let's do it But uh, but do you want to pipe off first or should I go

Sean: 36:31

No, please By all means,

Jordan: 36:33

let's hear your opinions so that I can disagree with them. First of all, I think

Andy: 36:37

the mu do you know how much sugar is in soda? Uh, Jordan, I mean that mother

Jordan: 36:42

is just I'm not advocating for soda use. I don't think kids

Andy: 36:46

This guy's in Big

Jordan: 36:47

in Big Soda's pocket! Yeah.

Andy: 36:51

Uh, yeah, I mean, I certainly can't

Jordan: 36:52

disagree with it in terms of the character. Excuse me while I crack a delicious diet slice.

Andy: 36:57

Uh, I can't disagree with the general, the general characterizations are all just like, we got the alien puppet, the rest of it is just down the middle. To me, you can kind of argue almost, Putting a show revolving around a Muppet puppet, it's not even Mork and Mindy where it's a human alien, is such a big swing. Um, the rest of it has to be something that the audience understands. Now, I'm not saying over time they couldn't kind of refine the characters, and maybe they did, or, you know, maybe, I assume they didn't, but, to me, like, one

Jordan: 37:29

thing is, I thought,

Andy: 37:30

like, the kid, even though, yes, he's definitely a kid actor, I was

Jordan: 37:34

like, oh, that's, of the

Andy: 37:36

annoying, blank faced, I am saying a line and I am unconnected to a line kid actors that they possibly could have, I thought that

Jordan: 37:44

kid was okay.

Sean: 37:45

Well, you really, you really high standards, Andy.

Jordan: 37:49

Did you think the kid was bad or good, Sean? I thought he was

Sean: 37:53

terrible, I, and feeling about it, see I'm not, I, I never watched TV during this era, so I only know all of it from,

Andy: 38:00

Sean is a Mormon.

Sean: 38:01

what, what,

Jordan: 38:02

You read Encyclopedia Britannica. Yes, yes. You had finished your homework and said your prayers. Mother, someone moved my bookmark in the Britannica.

Andy: 38:12

Uh

Sean: 38:16

Aardvark. Yes,

Jordan: 38:19

I was researching fjords and the bookmark was moved to fauna.

Sean: 38:23

um,

Jordan: 38:23

Um, I've already read about the fauna mother.

Sean: 38:27

I feel like all these shows from what I have seen and I have not dug deep into it. But this is one of the shows that I feel like. I feel like they were just getting away with like having that kid as a kid in that show, they were tricking people into thinking that was something that deserved to be on TV and not just the kid, but in general, it was like, well, we got away with that one. you know

Andy: 38:55

Well, that was certainly not having watched it at the time. That was certainly my external thought at the time, which is why part of the reason why I never watch it is just like, this is a, a shitty product. They're clearly trying to sneak by. it's an interesting question of like, in it, would it take it to watch the sea or more of series to evaluate it?

Jordan: 39:15

I guess I just, I'm judging

Andy: 39:17

it against how poorly functioning most pilots are. and how much you're trying to figure out in a pilot and if

Jordan: 39:26

you're like, it's

Andy: 39:27

all there. And this kind of goes to my larger point and I appreciate what you're saying about the, the father that he is like a slightly more interesting, but to me,

Jordan: 39:35

Max, right,

Andy: 39:36

is the, the heart of this show on the level of Dean Martin to, to Jerry Lewis, like that,

Jordan: 39:43

that his attitude

Andy: 39:45

toward ALF, Which is it's like, they have a few moments of him, like, kind of like alpha's talking to him. I don't remember what he's talking about that. He's excited to talk about. Um, uh, uh, maybe it's just about how it crashes on the roof and that, you know, maybe you could, you know, fix this or that. And he's like, you know, I try to, but it's sometimes it's hard to, you know, make the time or whatever was. But then, he's in the slot, he's in the zone of like, he's the irritated father, this is the classic, whether it's Mr. Belvedere or whoever the character is, that's the outsider

Jordan: 40:18

character that's irritating the father, and he's I think quintessential

Andy: 40:24

in an impressive way, and it's funny that maybe the reason is because he was constantly filled with rage the entire time he was on show

Jordan: 40:34

to the point that I think Artie Lange

Andy: 40:36

told a story that at some point he snapped and literally attacked himself. I think The puppet itself, which I hope that that's

Jordan: 40:44

true because that's the funniest thing ever. Yeah, I think

Sean: 40:48

of the difficult things with a show like this, and this is, one of the difficulties with any kind of comedy pairing is like, the straight guy doesn't get to be like, this was Alf's show. It was Alf, right? And he is supposed to be the one who lets, just let Alf be Alf. And. What I, what I appreciated about him is that he is still able,'cause I find him as an actor and in his delivery, I find him amusing, and so he was able to make me interested in what he was saying and make me laugh on stuff that was mostly just setting up Alf. I get why a guy like that. Would be like, fuck Alf, give me a fucking joke, you know, um, but I thought he was the thing in the entire pilot that I was like, oh, he, he, I get why he's there, you know,

Andy: 41:38

also just cover the rest of the cast and Shadeen, I'm pronouncing that correctly, uh, Kate, the mother, Andrea Elson is the daughter, Benji Gregory is the fantastic virtuoso performance as, uh, As Brian Tanner. Um,

Sean: 41:56

think about virtuoso performances as far as what can you do that takes the least effort and the least ability and the least execution on that scale, he is a true virtuoso,

Jordan: 42:09

right?

Andy: 42:10

uh, uh, uh, appropriately with the, the opening and Sean, and Sean, do you want to just start taking us through it?

Sean: 42:15

Yeah. Yeah. okay. So we open. We open on a freeze frame of the two of them in, I guess, the garage or the man cave or the, I'm not quite sure where they were. It's

Jordan: 42:28

a little workshop. He's got all his, cam radios. His oscilloscope and his, yeah. Space radios and his

Andy: 42:35

You feel like, You feel like, uh, Jordan, he's specifically trying to receive messages from space. That's his intention. That's what

Jordan: 42:43

I thought. And they, you, you're right. They don't explicitly say what he's doing out there. I guess I this is a a longer scene that there, there was cut. I think you're right. And where he's maybe explaining like, I've always thought there was something more out there. want to feel so alone or something, Because

Andy: 43:00

later in, Later in the pilot, he does say, so you could kind of infer what saying, I've been waiting for this my whole life. And now it's finally come true, which would imply that maybe you saw that earlier.

Sean: 43:11

I also just, you know, whether or not they cut that part, I came in on it going. Oh, he's trying to, they're trying to fuck in this moment, you know, like, like that was my, that was my interpretation of what was going on. Like, can I show you my ham radio, that kind of thing, you know?

Jordan: 43:29

Right. You know, the kids, kids are are inside screaming, not doing their homework. to bring the the wife out to the shed. Show her your ham radio.

Sean: 43:39

I was like, what are are they doing there? And it never got explained, you know? then, uh, he, he picks up something on his infrared radio band. which is hard to get away from. Uh, it's a pulsar or a satellite, He

Jordan: 43:56

I noticed that too, a pulsar, they just like, took two space words. Technical terms, yeah. They're like, here are two words we know, let's do these bumps

Sean: 44:07

It could be a quasar or a a neutron.

Andy: 44:10

And he immediately tries to talk to the quasar.

Jordan: 44:13

It's either, uh, it's either an asteroid or a Neil Armstrong.

Sean: 44:17

yeah.

Jordan: 44:19

Okay, let's head to the backstage bar and grill.

Sean: 44:22

Um, he can't understand, he can't understand the language. And like, at that point I really enjoyed the attempt to create some kind of crisis in the sky. By having everyone look up and flashing the lights on and off. Like, I just thought that was such a, such a game try, you know, of like, we don't have money for special effects, so let's just. Execute it the best we can,

Jordan: 44:49

and the kids read it and saying, what's that in the sky? So the kids were like looking at the sky and don't and I've seen and none of the neighbors seem to have seen this thing that they were so alarmed by that. They ran anyway, whatever.

Andy: 45:04

Let me ask you guys a

Jordan: 45:05

question

Andy: 45:05

now, because I obviously you're correct. And even as a child, I probably would would wanted. To have seen the worst version of the spaceship, you know, crashing on the roof in miniatures. Yeah. Um, like that's what I would have wanted. It would have been a little bit more world building. Do you feel like, obviously it's a budgetary reason that they're just like, no, there's something outside we can't see. Do you feel like they needed it story wise?

Sean: 45:33

I did feel like they didn't need it. I was fine with it. You know, I thought like, yeah, I

Jordan: 45:38

the that the little that you see in Alf, Alf in a little pod, Coming through the roof and I thought that looked kind of That was a That was a nice little, you know, piece of practical set building so yeah, I I I the amount of ship you see is the problem

Sean: 45:53

I did I was surprised that they had so much dirt on the roof of their garage that came through when the hole was punched

Jordan: 46:00

Yeah I

Andy: 46:02

think the same person that was, uh, assigned to clean the dirt off Alf was assigned to clean the dirt. off the roof

Jordan: 46:10

the teamster, he was on his break, you gotta pay me golden time if you you want me to clean the elf,

Sean: 46:17

come on Larry, just do it. Um, so so they have a visitor. They're, they're, they're, you know, all of a sudden they're, they're, they're in this position where they have this, this creature and they have to figure out what to do. And then we go into what, the thing that Jordan loved and that I did not care for, which was the, uh, the theme song. and we learn a little bit about where things might go in the the future.

Jordan: 46:44

do we think, do we think the tone of

Andy: 46:45

the show is sweet? Or do we think the tone of the show is cynical? Or it's a little bit of both? Because the, the, the credits are very sweet. And it kind of does almost counterbalance what the rest of the thing is. There's also a lot of stuff in it. That, that, uh, having been on Goldberg's for so long really feels the vibe of Goldberg's in a way that I never processed before because I was not familiar with the show. I don't know if it's in the credits, there's definitely recurring images of the, the main kid on Goldberg's, Adam, uh, looking at himself in a mirror with a video camera. That seems like it's right out of this.

Sean: 47:25

yeah, so Alf is filming with a video camera in the. In the opening credits. So we know that he's basically an auteur who's going to go on to dominate Hollywood as a, as a filmmaker.

Andy: 47:37

Is that what they're saying?

Jordan: 47:38

Yeah. This is, yeah, Alf, Alf is kind of like, you know, know, in a lot of ways, it's the same story as the Fablemans.

Andy: 47:45

Yes. Can't wait until the scene with David Lynch at the end.

Jordan: 47:50

Right.

Sean: 47:51

Um, so then they're, they're, they're in the living room and and Alf is passed out or or asleep. Uh, I did, this is where I noted down that they said he was hairy. They didn't want to put him on the couch. They said he was heavy and the kid goes heavy and hairy. And that's really the first. Hard joke of the episode. yes. And then, you know, he wants Alf to stay in his room. Oh, that's where the dad says. It's an alf, an alien life force. Which

Andy: 48:21

life

Jordan: 48:21

form? Alien life form. I believe not. Sorry. Life. Say

Sean: 48:24

No, no, no. Of

Jordan: 48:25

I'm just, I'm not saving you, Sean. I'm just saving you the mentions. I'm just saving you. All the ALF guys in your, in your reply

Sean: 48:31

again. I did not actually watch the show. Let's just be clear,

Andy: 48:35

Sean, it wasn't just a, a breakdown of an acronym that they reverse engineered from the name alf, it's Alien life form.

Jordan: 48:42

Uh, this is, this is interesting. So I think it's something. Something kind of funny about, the show is that like when Alf is sending messages to other aliens, it's like. Brian, Donna, I'm on Earth, come find me! And Alf's name, Alf's name is not Alf, it's Gordon Shumway. Right. So, which, I'm like, that's kinda funny. That that's the, that's the alien's name, it's Gordon Shumway, he just has this normal man name. And I think that the comic Dan Telfer has a bit about so, find, find Dan's bit about this on YouTube if it actually exists. But But it's pretty up that that name is Gordon Shumway and they just call him Al. Right? Like he has a normal man's name. Call him Gordon. Why do you call him Alf? It's like, yeah, mean.

Andy: 49:35

Is

Sean: 49:35

could

Jordan: 49:36

naming

Sean: 49:36

could never get away with with that You just couldn't. You know,

Andy: 49:39

you couldn't.

Jordan: 49:39

Yeah,

Andy: 49:41

that's true. And

Jordan: 49:42

an alien. you Can't call an an alien or a, if you can't tell female co workers they look nice. Yeah. Woke mob is coming for us. Again, the woke mob can't elf a back rub

Andy: 49:55

Um, yeah,

Jordan: 49:57

I. Even when I

Andy: 49:58

read that, I was like, wait, what? And then if you watch that scene in the pilot, it's like, you're just calling him something

Jordan: 50:05

else. Yeah, I don't understand. He has a name. I don't understand. You didn't even ask. Here's the other thing. That's not even a weird name. Just call him the name.

Andy: 50:13

it's also interesting in comparison to Mork and Mindy, which immediately has more world building in kind of an interesting way. But, am I, am I, am I

Jordan: 50:21

wrong that the mythology

Andy: 50:22

is that the planet he's from exploded? Or

Sean: 50:27

Correct.

Jordan: 50:28

He does say exploded, yes. And so is

Andy: 50:30

idea that

Jordan: 50:31

everyone

Andy: 50:32

on his planet left? And so when he's talking to Donna and all these people that it's These are other aliens from his planet that, that have kind of, you know, are out there in the universe. They've been scattered.

Jordan: 50:46

unclear.

Sean: 50:47

My sense was he was not sure either like he was we don't know what happened. It was a, it was an emergency, whatever blew up, which I think we learned later what the cause of the planet blowing up was, I'm saying later in in the, in the series.

Andy: 51:05

and I do I will say as an example because I don't disagree with you I think that it is there's certainly joke wise I understand you got a lot of other stuff on your plate the technical aspects of this Of this, uh puppet and everything it another give it another alt pass. Come on

Sean: 51:21

Well, and I will

Jordan: 51:22

say these are placeholder jokes

Sean: 51:24

It, it, it's weird to me and we'll get into this, I think later, but the second episode, the joke writing was real joke writing. Like there was just no real jokes in the first episode. So I don't understand how that got through the way it did, uh, because there are obvious punchline lines in the dialogue that were not punchlines, and it's clear that they are capable of doing that in the second episode.

Jordan: 51:52

Yeah, the the second episode quite a a bit funnier than this one, and yeah, and I, and I realize I'm, I'm, throwing, throwing bows at a pilot and pilots are bad for many reasons, and they're, they're noted to death, and I'm sure there was something going on here where it was like, this is. Uh, NBC show at eight o'clock, probably, you know, probably on a Thursday, like it couldn't be Like, and and I'm sure they were just fighting against like, I don't know, an alien show. So I'm sure that like so much stuff had to be safe because they have kind kind of a weird premise on their head. But I mean it, it, yeah, it seems so generic and joke free.

Andy: 52:33

Well, one of the things that did, seem to be happening over time on the series was there were a lot of, the network, as to your point, was always pushing in the direction of, like, Alf can't drink beer. Alf can't, you know, because then a kid's going to drink beer. There was an episode later where Alf, uh, is, I don't know if he's electrocuted in a bath. And like, you don't want to do that because then a kid might do it, it gets amnesia. Imitatable

Jordan: 52:57

behavior, they

Andy: 52:58

call it. Right. So, you know, they were operating inside of some, some restrictions of certain things that they could do. And that might have softened some of their, you know, some of the jokes that they might have wanted to go for. Um, although frankly, I kind of feel like for the

Jordan: 53:14

time, this is another thing. For the time,

Andy: 53:17

I

Jordan: 53:17

feel like the fact that Alf, he wants to eat the cat, that he doesn't. He is selfish. He doesn't, there's no, there's no

Andy: 53:26

real point of him in the episode or the second episode of him being like, Oh, but I. I consciously helped this family, or I consciously am there for this family,

Sean: 53:38

by my my little brother, when we were kids, ate a cat because of this show, So

Andy: 53:43

there you go. So then maybe the network was right. Yeah. How did

Jordan: 53:47

he prepare it

Sean: 53:48

over easy?

Andy: 53:51

Let's not explore that further. uh, the thing I was going to say, just in terms of the jokes was, uh, yeah. I did enjoy the idea about his sort of planet exploding and him sort of leaving that when he's like, you have to fix my, you know, my spaceship. And for some reason, Willie thinks he can it was like, all right, let me get in there. fix that. I don't know why that's such a basic thing that like any later. He's even like, yeah, they did. I need different parts. It's sort of like, well, I don't are you a mechanical genius? I don't understand. But independent of that, the thing that I loved is the detail, like, alpha is just like, when he's asking him questions, but I was just like, I don't know. I went in, got into it. I pushed the button and it went like, I don't. I don't know how it works in the same way. That's like, I know vaguely how a car works. I couldn't, you know, repair it or do anything to it. Um, so I just liked that as a general kind of,

Jordan: 54:46

right. He's not

Andy: 54:46

not a,

Jordan: 54:47

he's not a sophisticated, he's just a normal guy. He's, you know, on on his planet, he's just Gordon Shumway.

Andy: 54:53

Yeah. it's a funny reversal on. On what our expectations

Sean: 54:58

usually are. Sci fi, he's a fighter pilot who knows everything about, yeah, yeah. Exactly. not to bring up Battlestar Galactic at Jordan, I'm sorry. Um,

Jordan: 55:07

never seen it. I've Only seen Alf, which I hate. I only watch this one show, which I hate.

Sean: 55:15

But they did do a a thing in scene which I liked in a weird way, which is they finally referenced E. T. Because it's clearly a very specific reaction to E. T. Obviously the blowing up the planet thing is Is very Superman, but the, you know, even like

Jordan: 55:33

Al son of Melmac,

Sean: 55:36

but you know, in this world, ET is a movie that exists. That is a reference point for these people who now have an ET type character living with them. Yes, I appreciated that too. Not as high tech as E. T.,

Andy: 55:52

And that it's, uh, E. T. is also an acronym. It's clearly was, is built on the back of E. T. in a, in an appropriate way, in a way where it is one more step parody.

Sean: 56:01

Yeah. here, here's an an example of, like, this feels like it's setting up a joke and it never came. Was the father going, he could be dangerous. He could be diseased. He could be hostile. He could have hostile friends or acquaintances. And there was no laugh on that. There was no finish to that. It was just a run of set up that didn't pay off in any way. And that's why I say, like, I I was in a good way, surprised by the second episode being so much funnier than the first episode.

Jordan: 56:36

Yeah. It's like, I wonder if there was a, yeah. A harder joke with Alpha's. Like, you know, there are some bookies I owe money to, you know? Yeah. And they're like, take that out. He can't camp. You know,

Sean: 56:45

are gonna be bookies

Jordan: 56:47

well, since you, they're gonna become bookies so they can meet out He He he he.

Andy: 56:53

But on that, on that note of even the, even the idea of the bookie joke, which 100 percent seems like something that Alf. either might do or actually did do in the series. this is, this is another element of the world building that I'm curious where you guys land on in terms of a lot of it is some things he's confused by, like in the second episode of the puzzle, and some things he's. Like making deep cut references to human culture.

Jordan: 57:20

Yeah, Yeah, what Alf does and doesn't know about is so Like there's a thing later where he's like calling into a radio contest so he can win a Ferrari. Right. But he doesn't know the name of the song. And so like the daughter tells him what the song was. And then he makes a joke about the song like he knew it all along. It is very confusing. Like you can can have Alf make all of the human pop culture jokes. You want, have them say like, yeah, we up your radio signals on our planet. So I, you know, I, I know about tutti frutti, like that's, you know, and then you could just have Alf make jokes, but the fact that no one does that, but he still makes earth is so fucking weird and confusing.

Sean: 58:08

And see, I think that comes out of fear of establishing rules, because once you establish a rule, you have to follow that rule, so it's kind of a mechanism to go, like, we can make whatever joke we want to whenever we want, we don't have to have any explanation for it. But I I found that frustrating that there was, like you said, nothing that indicated why he knew certain things.

Andy: 58:34

Right. The only thing that I kind of do, I do have the sense, I think it's established later in the series, if not the pilot, is that he has been listening to sort of signals from Earth. Um, maybe I'm just headcanoning that, I'm making up my own for what the series is

Jordan: 58:52

I've read your

Andy: 58:53

read

Jordan: 58:53

your ALF fanfiction.

Andy: 58:54

Uh,

Jordan: 58:55

I love it, it, it's nasty.

Andy: 58:57

It's mostly about Jordan's experiences. Right. But yes, even if it's that it's kind of like, I guess I kind of buy that, but it feels like you need to address that at some point, you know, he looks at the toilet, he's sort of like, oh, it's interesting concept just at the toilet, but it's like, you know, you don't know what the toilet is, but you're, so I don't know. It didn't bump me in a major way. Uh, I think it only bumped me on the level of I like world building. And I was like, I feel like you, and maybe over time they really did build up stuff about Melmac and everything else. But it was like, I feel like, there was a cartoon

Jordan: 59:37

prequel about Elf on Melmac. Yes. Have you ever seen that? I loved the cartoon too. So I loved Alf and Alf tales where Alf like reenacted popular movies. That was a separate cartoon? It was a separate cartoon. Yeah. So there was, you remember chipmunks and then chipmunks go to the movies? No. Ah, well, okay. This was kind of a, this was a template, uh, uh, back So So yeah, you had the, the Alf Melmac show, Alf on Melmac, which is actually pretty cool. Has kind of cool animation and other good theme song. And And they do call him Gordon. They call him Gordon on Melmac. So they like stick to that. Um,

Sean: 1:00:14

cause he's not an alien. He's still, still a life force or life form, whatever term of of art is, but he's not an alien.

Jordan: 1:00:21

but then there there was Alf Tales where it was Alf doing Alf versions of you know, Robin Hood and, uh, you you know, King Kong and stuff.

Andy: 1:00:31

Was that the structure of, uh, Muppet Babies?

Jordan: 1:00:35

Muppet Babies, I they they did do like full parody episodes. They did like a Star Wars episode. So I think that was like a kind of episode they could do in Muppet Babies. And also they could open the closet to reveal clips from movies, which I always liked. But um, Muppet Babies weren't necessarily doing parodies.

Sean: 1:00:57

And, and I, and I feel like it like it sense that you were like, I, I liked Alf Tales, I I liked Alf Melmac, because when you're a kid, you're like, I like this thing, I want to see more of this thing. What else can there be of this thing? I

Jordan: 1:01:12

like Mr. T, I want to eat his cereal. Yes,

Andy: 1:01:15

correct.

Sean: 1:01:16

Uh, Okay, so we're we're in the living room and this is where they really do some great, POV stuff. Because we see the family as Alf slowly starts to regain consciousness. And they're all peering down at at him. it just struck me as so funny because. There's no way anybody would ever get their heads that close to anybody else in real life unless they were trying to cram themselves a camera shot,

Jordan: 1:01:45

right? And they're they're in like a fisheye lens. So it looks like they're in a 90s skateboard video. I'm like, shouldn't they play suicidal tendencies in the background of this. Um, yeah, right. And, and yeah, the family all has their heads. Rest against everyone head so that so that everyone can fit in that fisheye shot. It is

Sean: 1:02:06

um, And that's where where Alf for the first time and we realize that he can communicate with these people. And it's, it's very exciting as a viewer. It's really exciting. Oh, my gosh, he's not just going to fly back to his planet. He's going to stay and with these

Jordan: 1:02:19

and we're going to watch a a regular family who met an alien one time.

Andy: 1:02:25

I only,

Jordan: 1:02:25

They always just talk talk about it constantly.

Andy: 1:02:27

I only put the alien puppet in this show because you need a hook. I don't this is really about this family.

Jordan: 1:02:33

This

Sean: 1:02:33

is Bob. We got it. We a a note the network. They want to keep the puppet on the show.

Andy: 1:02:38

This is, I don't, I haven't built the series Bible

Jordan: 1:02:41

around that. I can't do this.

Sean: 1:02:43

Uh, on. Bible Schmeibel, just do

Jordan: 1:02:45

it.

Sean: 1:02:46

so he's staying, he's staying and then we cut to the the next morning. and again, I love the 90s ness of the alarm clock that is just not like anything anybody Has any more of just the digital alarm clock that goes. and so Alf is in bed which

Jordan: 1:03:10

this is, this is actually my one legit laugh of the episode. Uh, so they do do that thing where, you know, they're both in bed and they look at each other and they both start screaming. And then Willie goes, what's going on in there? And Alphys is oh, Oh, nothing, just some screaming. And I'm like, that's pretty funny. And then I I did not laugh for the remainder of the but but I'm like, all right, that was, that

Sean: 1:03:34

Well, I would add one more laugh in this. scene for me, which was when he said, I don't remember the sentence, but whatever it was, it was about the next door neighbor. Whose name is Mrs. Ocmonick. And he says, sounds like a typo.

Jordan: 1:03:50

Oh yeah. that That is kind of, now I had

Andy: 1:03:51

that written down a funny joke. Is that what

Sean: 1:03:53

That's what I'm saying. Yeah, Yeah. I said, thought that was funny, but it also speaks to what we were talking about, which is like, so Alf knows that there's such a thing as typos, but he doesn't understand what a jigsaw puzzle is.

Jordan: 1:04:05

Right. I think he eats a puzzle in the second episode. In the second episode. Which actually, that's kind of funny too. It's

Sean: 1:04:12

so he's learning all sorts of things In the bathroom and it, it sets up the thing of, I'm going to take a shower. Do not let Mrs. Zachmanek see you because that will be trouble. And so of course, Alf, uh, pulls the shades up and dances around. To expose himself to Mrs. Zucmanek. And you can

Andy: 1:04:34

see in that moment why kids would like Alf. He's a rascal. He's trying to cause trouble. He's a person. Yeah. So she is very

Jordan: 1:04:42

much, she is just the kind of like boilerplate nosy neighbor. Yeah. We see her husband for like one second, and I do like how the husband is in like silk pajamas and smoking a cigar.

Andy: 1:04:55

It's amazing. And then in the next episode, he's in a, he's in an undershirt smoking It's like, it's just like

Jordan: 1:05:00

Yeah, I'm this is who who the show should be It should be about this guy and Alf. Running a strip club together.

Andy: 1:05:09

I don't

Jordan: 1:05:10

know, maybe you get your reboot pitch. Yeah,

Andy: 1:05:12

maybe. It's L. I. P. The mom is obviously played by

Jordan: 1:05:16

Paul Fusco's email. I'm getting in touch with Paul

Andy: 1:05:19

Fusco. Uh, uh, the mom is played, uh, Mrs. Achmanek is played by Liz Sheridan, who played, uh, Jerry's mother in Seinfeld. Yeah. and, uh, is great in this,

Jordan: 1:05:31

Yeah. She's a, she's a good, like, reliable sitcom actor and doing, doing, doing good with the material.

Andy: 1:05:38

A bit better than the husband is take. I think the husband is really playing it like down the middle. And she's, you know, she's asked to be asked asked to do something very specific and cliche, but she's doing it well, in my opinion.

Sean: 1:05:49

I'm gonna, I'm gonna triple down on my, there was actually some good jokes in this sequence. Or I don't know. This isn't even really a joke, but I did like that the husband says, yeah, and I'm Sean Penn. Like, that just felt like such a weird, specific, of like, this is the hottest guy I I can think of. you know? I'm not a,

Jordan: 1:06:17

guy got to marry Madonna.

Sean: 1:06:19

I'm not a beautiful man like Sean

Jordan: 1:06:21

Penn. Who we will learn later was very problematic. But in this period,

Andy: 1:06:30

Just

Jordan: 1:06:30

a hunk you could mention to get a laugh. Do you think it's like that they thought, well, we gotta,

Andy: 1:06:38

we gotta pick a guy that this guy would like. He's kind of a tough guy, you know, you know, De Niro isn't enough of a hunk at this point. So,

Jordan: 1:06:49

the hunks? Who are the hunks of 1986? I guess, I mean, Swayze,

Sean: 1:06:53

Yeah, and I'm Lorenzo Lamas.

Jordan: 1:06:56

Sure.

Andy: 1:06:57

that might be a good one.

Jordan: 1:06:58

And I'm Wallace Shawn over here. No, Jordan, that's the reverse of I'm the

Sean: 1:07:04

and I'm Errol Flynn.

Jordan: 1:07:07

Um, that train that comes at the the screen. Ooh,

Sean: 1:07:13

Uh, It just felt like such a a weird specific reference that I was like, I don't know. It made me laugh, I guess, probably for the wrong reasons. Cause I was like, why would he ever say Sean Penn? Like, that just seems like such a, that they were sitting in the writer's room and go going. Yes. Yes. That's the one. Thank you, you,

Andy: 1:07:33

Bob. You know, the

Jordan: 1:07:34

guy from Falcon and the snowman. Yeah. What's the, what what is Sean Penn in at this point?

Andy: 1:07:42

This is a fantastic

Sean: 1:07:44

question. talking about the guy from Bad Boys where he was in the little, uh, the little prison

Jordan: 1:07:49

there,

Sean: 1:07:51

that was

Jordan: 1:07:51

was

Andy: 1:07:51

earlier. The guy from TAPS with

Jordan: 1:07:55

that new up and

Andy: 1:07:56

comer Tom

Jordan: 1:07:57

Cruise.

Sean: 1:07:59

all right. So he's now he's he's engaged in this relationship with the neighbor. He's not supposed to be seen by her. She's very suspicious. Her husband disbelieves her. and, and we're out of that scene and then we're into the garage where. The dad is trying to to fix the spaceship and he's having a real hard time. And this is where we we get to the radio where the song, and again, this to me was like looking up in the sky instead of the special effects is she listens to the song on the phone and goes, it's born in the USA as opposed to being able to get. An actual song that they could use and listen to on the radio, right? So this

Jordan: 1:08:39

is interesting in the second episode, uh, which we'll we'll be discussing over there on Patreon, um, Oh, well, Sean, you

Andy: 1:08:47

know, if you want to bring that up, Jordan, then you can bring it up.

Jordan: 1:08:49

um. They use the audio from Psycho. It's like

Andy: 1:08:54

It is actually, that is the audio from

Jordan: 1:08:56

I I think it is. I think it's actually behind the music.

Sean: 1:08:58

But only the same little over and over and over again, it felt like to me. Like,

Jordan: 1:09:03

interesting. Did

Andy: 1:09:03

you look that up, Because I felt like that was a recreation

Jordan: 1:09:06

Oh, Oh, interesting. I assumed that it And I was kind of impressed. I'm like, oh, this is kind of cool that they, like, actually went to the trouble to get this. The second episode is like, kind of a It's so funny to, like We have have this down the middle sitcom. Episode 2, slasher We're going to totally change the genre for the second episode, so people don't know what the fuck they're watching.

Andy: 1:09:29

It's kind of

Jordan: 1:09:30

admirable. Yeah, it is a little bit. It's a

Andy: 1:09:32

weird swing. It also is based on the amount of pressure. Also, I mean, we're going to get into it, uh, over on the Patrion, that they, they pick a plot the bulk of the show is just Mrs. Ockmonick. And not the other family the family members. It's very

Jordan: 1:09:50

odd. You got Not to talk too much about the weirdness of the second episode on this discussion of the pilot episode, but also they start with a pretty down the middle premise, which is Alf has to babysit. I'm like, great. That's episode two. That is episode two ass shit. If I I

Sean: 1:10:08

get to know the kid.

Jordan: 1:10:10

Yeah, exactly. And their relationship and they'll do, it's like, no, we're setting up complicated thing where the neighbor is babysitting the kid, but she's watching psycho and alpha is hiding from her. And also someone is breaking into the house and it's mimicking psycho. It's like, so it's so, it's so complicated.

Andy: 1:10:31

It

Jordan: 1:10:31

does feel

Andy: 1:10:32

like it's and often, I feel like can see the, the threads of what the discussion was. Uh, in, in, in an episode of television of like, Oh, they introduced this idea that would be a fine idea for this show. And then they shifted to something else. And I don't know if they shifted in that episode it was like, well, we want it to be more about Alf trying to prove that he could take care of the kid or. Whatever it was interesting, you know, but it's like it totally was a discussion that they had in writer's room of like all right What's episode two? How about Alf babysits? Great. We're done. No, wait

Jordan: 1:11:08

Yeah. And I, And I know

Sean: 1:11:10

gotta be locked in a room. Otherwise, why would he eat the jigsaw puzzle?

Jordan: 1:11:15

We all laughed at the puzzle eating thing. So let's back up. Our jokes were soft in the pilots.

Andy: 1:11:20

We were doing too much

Jordan: 1:11:21

coke. yeah. And I And I know I'm kind of talking out of both sides of my mouth here. What I'm saying, I'm complaining about the clichedness of it. And then I'm also complaining that the second episode is like this weird left turn, but I don't know. It is indicative of how, like, it does not seem like anyone knows what they're doing.

Sean: 1:11:41

I feel like the thing you always get in or this was always conventional wisdom before everything became serialized is like, just repeat the beats of the pilot a number of episodes so that people get on board and they know who the characters are and we can all figure out. So yeah, that second episode was a huge left turn in that sense.

Andy: 1:12:04

But it, I don't know, it still worked for me.

Sean: 1:12:06

Oh, it was great. It was great. I can't wait to go on Patreon. Um, okay. So, so we're in the workshop. The dad is not able to, fix the spaceship. Alf does a speech about how he's all alone. He's not able to go back to his planet. He undercuts it by turning to the daughter and saying, was I being too dramatic? And then he, for the second time, goes after. the cat. He's getting a snack on the the cat.

Andy: 1:12:33

I think it's an impressively dark trait to build into your main character. And maybe, maybe it's sort of built on the fact that unlike me, many people are not cat lovers. But uh,

Jordan: 1:12:45

Yeah, The the eating cats thing has like endured, Alf became a a punchline and it's like, what do you remember about Alf? It's, you know, that he lived with a human family and he ate cats. And I think that like, there are glimpses of a, like, more interesting, weirder show, and maybe that's where it like, maybe it did start as something a little more like counterculture a parody of sitcoms or something like that, but, yeah, and I, and I think The Eating Cats is like a little glimpse Maybe where where the show started or maybe wanted it it to be because it is weird and funny and it is super memorable. Like, I mean, you could walk into into any comedy club and make an Alphs eating cats joke and it would kill.

Andy: 1:13:28

Yeah, I mean, it's also funny to think that, I would assume it's all built on the idea he's never gonna get to eat the cat. If he actually eats a cat. Then you, you know, you lose the audience

Sean: 1:13:40

End of

Andy: 1:13:41

they're serious.

Jordan: 1:13:41

Sure.

Andy: 1:13:43

It's all built on him wanting to eat a cat, but if he gets that cat,

Jordan: 1:13:47

that's it. It's been a long time I've read save the Is that that a reaction to Alf? Is that a reaction?

Andy: 1:13:53

That post dated, uh, Alf, but that is a hilarious reversal. What about Alf? I

Jordan: 1:13:59

want to read the cat.

Sean: 1:14:02

saved himself. Nobody saved that cat. All right. Well, we're in the next scene. They're watching Sesame Street, which is like, again, there's so many, like, specific references that you would reference if you were making a show about puppets in, in, in this episode, cause they immediately about puppets from outer space. They immediately referenced Sesame Street and then then more. From work Yeah. Um, so at least they're not blind to how much they are taking from other sources. you

Andy: 1:14:33

You know, there is another, uh, I think it's around this area where the good joke, And it's not a fantastic joke, but it's a slight bit of, it's a tiny bit of world building also, which is whatever prompts him to all Alf Alf promises to do something and says, cross my heart, and he crosses his head instead.

Jordan: 1:14:50

Oh,

Andy: 1:14:50

Oh, I missed that. It's sort of an off handed thing. I missed that. That's funny. It's like, oh, the heart is in his head.

Sean: 1:14:54

Yeah. I thought that was just a blooper. I thought that that was, you a cross wire between the puppeteer and and the

Jordan: 1:15:00

The hand doesn't reach that far down the body. It's like the hand can can only go.

Andy: 1:15:04

to, he was Trying to cross his heart. And then the, ed, the Genius editor was like, wait a minute,

Jordan: 1:15:09

Uh, I, it in Yeah. What a puppet can and can't do is really interesting. I, I, I worked on a based TV show for a bit and like, you you could do so many things with them, but you, but having them touch another puppet was a huge deal, and having them pick something up was a huge like that. will add two hours to your day and like, anytime we pitched anything where it was like, Oh, these characters hug or they high five or something. The like puppeteers would come back and go, there any way way around this? Can we not have them high five any, is there anything? Can they give each other a thumbs up? Can they, you know. and in general. Wave in a non

Andy: 1:15:49

specific way

Jordan: 1:15:49

toward the other side of the room.

Andy: 1:15:52

Right.

Jordan: 1:15:53

I'll mention the show. It's called Earth to Net. It was on Disney It got taken down. It was really funny. Uh, find it it on your local BitTorrent, I But yeah, they were, they were so, on that show, so like Open to ideas. and And we pitched a lot of crazy stuff that they actually did, but it was just, there were just these little things that you wouldn't know unless you were a puppeteer that would just be the biggest pains in the ass

Andy: 1:16:18

in the world. Now, I assume those were more classic, uh, of Kermit style, arms on strings or sticks kind of.

Jordan: 1:16:27

Uh, there were.

Andy: 1:16:28

as opposed to the out style, which like an actual hand through the,

Jordan: 1:16:32

Uh, uh, we had some characters on sticks, but there was, was also a lot of different kinds of puppets. There was a, there was an ALF like puppet. And And then the main puppet Ned was a like four armed alien that that was controlled by nine people at once and had a, you know, voice actor working the face with a glove off stage. Fascinating. I, It, yeah, that was, it it was so much fun to watch that stuff up

Sean: 1:16:56

close. I would like it if you guys, if you guys would totally destroy my sense of what's real and what's not not

Jordan: 1:17:01

real. Oh, sorry. Sorry, Sean. Uh, Ned was real. Alf was real. Thank And, uh, uh, your dad's coming home any second now, slugger. I

Sean: 1:17:09

a childlike sense of wonder.

Andy: 1:17:11

on Earth to Ned, did the, uh, cast, uh, slowly descend descend into madness the way that the Elf cast did? Uh,

Jordan: 1:17:20

no, you know, Earth to Ned was a very happy, fun job, um, and everybody was a was a real pro. I mean, it was a Henson production, so I think that, like, everybody fucking knew knew what they were doing. So, like, competency. On that, on that show was like off the charts. I just felt like, oh great. Everyone here knows what they're doing in this really like nice way. Um, yeah, I don't know. It was fun and efficient. they shot a lot of of episodes in, in a short amount of time. Um, yeah, I don't know.

Sean: 1:17:51

It feels to me like Alf. Which came along after the Muppets were well established. Right. Ignored all the lessons that they learned from the Muppets and took the wrong thing. Which is, people love puppets, let's make it really interesting. As opposed to, I'm sure Jim Henson tried some of the stuff that they did on ALF and was like, This is inefficient, it doesn't work, it's not, it's not adding anything, It's not valuable to the show, here's what's valuable. And it feels like they kind of were were like reinventing the genre in a sense with ALF and doing it in a in a way that was cumbersome and and difficult.

Andy: 1:18:29

Well, I actually, I do, have friends who on, the most recent reboot of the Muppets. And I believe that it, it was, and maybe that just in comparison to them working with, you know, live action. Single cam uh, half hours, but, uh, it sounded like was just like a huge nightmare to like, turn the camera in the opposite direction and get coverage. And it was just like a huge procedure. And if you ever like, oh, we want to, you know, actually pick up this shot. It's just like, we're not going to do That's going to take hours and hours. So, So I think that is sort of to a certain built into the process.

Sean: 1:19:07

could be totally wrong. And I'm basing my judgment of the Muppets on the fact that we've never heard stories about Jim Henson driving people crazy or any or any of the people show going crazy. Like it's always been described as such a great atmosphere and a great place to work. So maybe that's, maybe they all had to sign NDAs or something about what was going on there in

Andy: 1:19:25

reality. It is a very interesting question. Maybe it's just because most of the people working on the Muppet, the Muppet, uh, properties are not, they're puppeteers. They know what they're getting in for at the beginning. Whereas, um, you know, Max Wright, was just a long journeyman actor. who was suddenly like, Hey, you know how hard regular acting is? This is going to be seven times as hard, and take seven times as long. And this is your job for the next four years. And

Jordan: 1:19:54

And the puppet will peep on your wife in the shower. That's also

Andy: 1:19:58

true. Yeah. You're going to be constantly cuckolded in

Jordan: 1:20:01

TV wife and your real wife.

Andy: 1:20:03

Yeah. That was a weird thing that was built into Fusco's contract.

Jordan: 1:20:09

I get to see all all wives in showers. Any wife I want. If a wife is showering, I get to look. What? All right, man.

Sean: 1:20:19

so we're we're to figure out what to do with Alf and the kid. They can't have soda, as we discussed earlier. So Alf has them come out of the kitchen with beers. They each have a beer. the The mom gets, very upset. But this is where we find out that, Melmac was the name of his planet. And it exploded. And he has a piece of the street he grew up up on with So it's

Andy: 1:20:42

to to address that. the, the beer, uh, thing. Doesn't that kind of work a little bit, like, give the show a little bit? Uh, yes. It undermines the mom character because she's such a drip that won't even let them drink soda. But doesn't it, for the purposes of the show, make it a little bit hipper that it's like, actually puppet giving a child beer

Jordan: 1:21:01

Yeah. yeah, I Yeah. I mean, I'll, I'll, I'll, I'll give it a that. And I'm, and and that, that. You know, I'm sure was edgy for the time and edgy for edgy for primetime on NBC for sure. Yeah.

Andy: 1:21:13

by the end, you'll have to give it a 10. our alpha rating system. And and this where get to the

Sean: 1:21:19

the

Jordan: 1:21:20

scale of no to 10 problems.

Sean: 1:21:24

This is where we get to the big problem in the the episode, is there's a knock at the door and guess who it is. It's fucking, what's his name? Darnell Valentine. Is that the,

Jordan: 1:21:37

I I don't, I don't know the name of the actor and I did clock the name name of

Sean: 1:21:41

the character. I the character's name is Darnell Valentine, which is kind of incredible.

Jordan: 1:21:46

Some good names. I mean, Gordon Shumway is a good name. Like there's, you know, some good

Andy: 1:21:50

good classic TV

Jordan: 1:21:52

names. Good names. Um,

Sean: 1:21:53

They, they, they've gotten a tip that they may be harboring an alien. So they want to know know what's going

Andy: 1:21:59

on. And I do like the little side note that there is an alien force that's already out there.

Jordan: 1:22:05

And he's

Andy: 1:22:05

And he's

Jordan: 1:22:06

okay with just saying it to people. Like it's not, it's not a secret. He's, not trying to to be covert at all. He's just like, I'm from the alien task I have worn my, I I have worn my military outfit. To this investigation, so there's, yeah, so I

Sean: 1:22:22

on top of of which on top of what she's flying solo, like he's just

Jordan: 1:22:26

I'm

Sean: 1:22:26

him alone

Jordan: 1:22:28

in a neighborhood telling everyone that aliens exist, government knows about it, and we're looking for one here, and

Sean: 1:22:34

yeah, whatever happens, I can handle it by myself,

Jordan: 1:22:37

right, Oh, and that's just one of the things about like the logic show, right? And it's like, is this a a world where aliens exist and are normal? Because everyone's being really blasé about And this guy who is part part of some sort of alien investigation just says who he is very casually. So it is, you do have the sense of like, what am I watching? Like, what's the logic here? And you,

Andy: 1:23:02

you don't remember from the series, whether like, Oh, yes. Aliens. Like, if that's sort of the general take of the outsider, the regular civilians on the show, Jordan.

Jordan: 1:23:13

so so much like trying to hide Alf, trying to like hide Alf.

Andy: 1:23:17

So they're just, re they're, they're acting like regular humans would if they had an alien in

Jordan: 1:23:22

think

Andy: 1:23:22

think so, yeah. It's not like, oh, well, this is a world where aliens are more Well, this kind of brings me to my know, I never would have predicted that on a show covering Alf that I would be the one who is defending it. it. Because I certainly in my time have, uh, have used it as the hacky reference point for, for bad television, uh, as much as anybody. but. I guess in my head, one thing I liked about this scene is that when, as soon as, as they go through the, the Sturm and Drang of the, you know, the, well, are they going to reveal him? Are going to tell the military guy about him? Is the mother going to? Then the guy goes through the very heavy handed thing of like, well, I, you know, well, first we're going to do this. Then we're going to electrify Then we're going to dissect him. Um, uh, obviously putting them, the family position of like, okay, well, we're going to protect them instead. Yeah. But one thing I like is the moment that that decision is made and they're like, no, we don't have an here. The military is kind of like, I was just like, all right. great.

Jordan: 1:24:25

Ha ha ha. See

Sean: 1:24:26

This happens with anonymous tips all the time. That's why why they're anonymous.

Andy: 1:24:31

But I also, to me, the headcanon was this guy doesn't believe there's aliens. He's just, this is his department. was sent out to do do this. He

Jordan: 1:24:38

goes and goes through

Andy: 1:24:39

fucking rigmarole. And then he, it's like when the person says, no, there are no aliens. He goes, great. I'm great.

Jordan: 1:24:45

I got, I got shot in NAMM. They gave me a desk job. I'm

Andy: 1:24:49

just waiting for my pension waiting for. Yeah. so I kind of liked that.

Jordan: 1:24:54

Yeah. And I think there's a world where like. Everything is is very and that's kind of the joke of it is just that like everything's cartoony and not really real but it doesn't seem to like commit to that in in the the whole thing. It just seems like sometimes this is the real world and sometimes this is a crazy world and doesn't really make sense when it's one and when it's the other. Right.

Sean: 1:25:18

they also do a thing in in this scene, one of my, I guess I'd call it a it a bugaboo. It's I really don't enjoy. Uh, which is, she says, where did you get this tip? And he goes, I'm sorry. That information is strictly akmonic. I mean, anonymous, you know, the, the comedic Freudian slip that gives us the information we need. And yet. Sure. covers up, You know, that, that he shouldn't have said that I just, it's like, that is a thing that makes that takes me outside the show every time it happens and goes, come on, there's a better way to do that. You know,

Andy: 1:25:53

I really can't dispute anything you guys are saying in the, in the uh, on balance this show. The jokes are non existent to setups without punchlines, you know, to soft, um, with a few examples that we've, pointed out along the way of like, Oh, well, that's a solid joke. And that's a solid joke. I think it just seemed, I think my expectations this were so. Low, That the fact that I'm watching a show that is functional, that the father character and the dynamic between him and even then the mother just sort of being like, she's afraid for her Children and her family

Jordan: 1:26:29

is

Andy: 1:26:30

like a good motivation for that character. Um, the father just being immediately of, you get to him being antagonized in a, in a, in a really effective way immediately. And that the, the Alf character itself Outside of the fact that he's filthy for no reason, like, why is character, that character's fur so dirty? And I just don't understand, right? Um, outside of that, uh, that it's, he's competent puppeteer and he's got a That's pretty nailed down. And the rhythm is, it's just like, this a successful housing to have a show go as long as it went. whereas I just wasn't even expecting that I was expecting it to be. Patently offensive, in its lack of, um, good qualities and its lack of, of professional sort of structure to have a show around. That being said, I totally agree that in terms of jokes, it's just what, are you doing? But to me, like, the style is. successful enough that it gets me over it.

Sean: 1:27:29

Fair enough. fair Fair enough. uh okay. Then Alf is out in the garage. He's calling his friends on the radio. He wants them them to respond in some way. His friends, Skip, Larry, and Buffy, I believe, were the names of the people he was reaching out out to. Pretty funny. Yeah. Um, and then he he does the thing. Is

Andy: 1:27:49

that a throw forward to Buffy the Vampire Slayer?

Jordan: 1:27:51

Oh, maybe, or

Sean: 1:27:54

to, skip

Jordan: 1:27:55

friend Buffy in

Sean: 1:27:57

sonny Dale sports center, or Larry from hello, Larry. It could be be any of those things. A lot of great Larry's

Jordan: 1:28:04

out there. Yeah.

Sean: 1:28:05

Um, and then he does that thing where you give a speech about people when the people are there and you don't realize that they're there. And he says some very touching things about how much he likes this. This family, how nice they they are. it's very sweet. And then he, again, undercuts it at the end by saying he's going to eat their cat.

Jordan: 1:28:26

I thought that was all right. As As we're going through this, I'm like finding more things about it where I'm like, yeah, it was all right. Okay. That was, well, that's the other thing is like,

Andy: 1:28:34

I feel like you would have gotten pressure from the network to just end sweet and there is the undermining it at the very end that it's like, Elf's still going to be elf, and I kind of appreciate that in a, yeah. In a kid centric family sitcom.

Jordan: 1:28:48

Alf's, Alf's going to gonna

Sean: 1:28:49

Alf. I think that you, make a good point, Andy, which is like, as far as setting up a pilot, this does a serviceable job. The difficulty I would have watching it, and you know, I'm watching it now with the jaded eyes of of a guy who loves Steamboat Willie, but had I had I watched it when I was a kid, I might be in a position to go, Oh, I'd like to see more of this. I don't have any interest in seeing more of this based on this pilot, you know,

Andy: 1:29:18

and yet you're going to Sean because I already did.

Sean: 1:29:21

already did.

Jordan: 1:29:22

That's what the podcast is now. It's an Alf recap show.

Sean: 1:29:26

And that's ironic because that's what made me feel even more strongly that the pilot should have been better because I thought the second episode was so so much better in of just in terms of comedy, not in terms of like not even talking about story or character. Cause obviously the character stuff is all different, but just in terms of, Oh, This is actually funny in places, you

Jordan: 1:29:51

Yeah. I, and, and, you you know, I, I, do I do wonder like what it would be like. We've watched the first two just just to do like, I don't know, just go on the, you know, ALF playlist that is inexplicably on YouTube, they're all there for free, uh, that's how I how I watched it, uh, and just like, you know, click into Season 3, Episode and see what what it's like, to do the, you know, weird sci fi things, and, know, are those those more prevalent? Are the characters a little more fleshed I didn't did notice when I was just kind of scrolling through. Find the

Andy: 1:30:24

that have a little bit more of the world building aspect. Yeah,

Jordan: 1:30:27

I did. I did see that there's an episode in one of the future seasons where Alf fills in for Johnny Carson. Um. Crazy. Yeah.

Andy: 1:30:35

Is that a backdoor pilot for the other thing? No, I guess the other thing would have been like

Jordan: 1:30:39

Eve. Yeah, but I mean, obviously it was like on their minds. I wonder, do you think we could guess who his guests are? Who else guests are when he fills in for Johnny Carson?

Andy: 1:30:51

Oh, do you

Jordan: 1:30:52

know what I is? I don't, uh, but maybe I can look actually. Why don't we? Yeah,

Andy: 1:30:56

I assume that would have been somewhere in the middle of the run. So, so yeah,

Jordan: 1:31:00

like 86, 87, maybe Sean Penn. Got to That'd be Sean Penn.

Andy: 1:31:05

been Sean Penn.

Jordan: 1:31:07

And he's

Andy: 1:31:08

I was surprised that in the, the Ed McMahon later one, they already had like. Joe Mantegna and, uh, and, uh, Brian Cranston, I don't if, I guess he must've been on Malcolm in the in the Middle at the time, and, and Joan Rivers. So, I don't know, mid, mid eighties. It feels like Patrick Swayze would've been too big then. I'm gonna

Jordan: 1:31:27

say, I, I think, I mean, it's gotta be Burt Reynolds, right?

Andy: 1:31:30

Is that Donna Summers time? Or Lionel Richie? could be.

Sean: 1:31:35

I mean we could name mid eighties stars forever. you

Andy: 1:31:38

Larry Hagman.

Jordan: 1:31:41

I don't, don't, I'm sorry. This is not going to pay off in any kind of reasonable way. Because I cannot find a list. I thought this would be fun. I'm sorry. Okay? Right.

Sean: 1:31:51

this was fun and I'm Lyle Wagner.

Andy: 1:31:56

By the way, this might be the appropriate time to say, uh, we're on zoom, but, uh, Jordan has been in an costume the whole time.

Jordan: 1:32:03

I have, yeah, yeah, I'm committed

Sean: 1:32:05

and you can just just see the tip of his erection.

Andy: 1:32:09

That's the kind of joke they eventually would have gotten to on Elf, because Elf gotta be

Jordan: 1:32:12

Elf. hmm. Uh, Dr. Joyce Brothers. I'm looking at the Wikipedia Dr. Joyce Brothers.

Andy: 1:32:17

do I not

Jordan: 1:32:18

know Dr. Joyce Brothers as the obvious one? Because I did, uh, bits with her as a

Andy: 1:32:25

mainstay on Late Night when I was there.

Jordan: 1:32:28

And, uh, Joan Embry. Joan Embry. Comes out with a cat at some point and Elf wants to eat it. So, there you go. Joan Embry. We solved it, guys.

Sean: 1:32:36

Is Joan Embry the wildlife person?

Jordan: 1:32:38

Uh,

Andy: 1:32:39

Uh, yes, yeah. this, this is dumb. Because I was just thinking of celebrities at the time. And what I should have been thinking of is who are the quintessential Carson guests.

Sean: 1:32:46

rickles, huh? No rickles?

Jordan: 1:32:48

No rickles. Hey Elf. What are what are you, a little Puerto Rican? Oh,

Andy: 1:32:54

we gotta, we gotta cut

Sean: 1:32:55

Hey, look over there, the elf in the back is eating a cat, huh?

Jordan: 1:33:00

I'm a nice guy.

Andy: 1:33:04

Uh, alright guys. as, uh, has been, uh, referenced, uh, many times, Jordan, uh, us to, cover episode two in a Commentary, that should be up on the Patreon already, want to thank you, uh, Jordan, for joining us. Uh, you've been a delight. Uh, Is there anything you want to point? Our, you know, a

Jordan: 1:33:24

reasonable, fan base too. Yes. I love talking to reasonable people who, don't just fly off off the handle when you plug your upcoming graphic novel. And that's all I is that you consider, pre ordering a new graphic novel written by me, art by the great Bowen McGurdy. It is called Youth Group. It is a YA horror comedy about teenage exorcists. It is, uh, yeah, a little bit funny, a little bit spooky, a little bit romantic. Uh, we've, you know, we tried to give it Buffy the Vampire Slayer vibes and, uh, Shaun of the Dead vibes. Uh, you know, some of some of those, of those good, good horror comedies. Yeah, it is available for pre order now. It'll be out this summer, but ooh boy, we love those pre orders. They really help books and they make sure you get it ASAP. So you can do can do that uh, Barnes Noble. You can You can do that at amazon. com. Better yet, your local indie bookstore. Give them a call. Tell them you want order Youth Group or do it on their it on their websites. Uh, yeah, yeah, Youth Group. It's coming out. It'll be a lot of fun.

Andy: 1:34:25

That's nice. And I I haven't read that yet. I look forward to it. I have read uh, Bubble, uh, your previous work, which was fantastic and funny and, genre satisfying. So, uh, I'm sure this one be too. Um, also, do you want to. Plug your uh, is it free with ads is the new pod

Jordan: 1:34:43

you're oh, yeah, there's a new pot I had not to not to overload the folks with plugs, while we're here, we might as well talk about it Uh, yeah, yeah, I do a couple of podcasts. One of them is jordan. Jesse go. It is a chat show with jesse thorn We have guest on on every week. We shit and the newest one is called free with ads Uh, That is me and the the great comic emily fleming and we a weird movie from From the free with ads section of, you know, YouTube or to be, or Pluto or whatever. Uh, yeah, we we watch stuff like, uh, you know, time cop and the birds, the birds is on there. That's a, that's a, that's weirdly up there. Uh, he's just not that that

Sean: 1:35:20

into you. I heard I heard the birds was good.

Jordan: 1:35:24

is good. The birds is great. Um, yeah. So we occasionally will watch a good movie for this pod. How are the bird puppets in that? They're weird looking. they're weird. They're weird looking. Yeah,

Sean: 1:35:34

sure. I heard they they a circus performer for a lot of the of the birds. Yeah.

Andy: 1:35:39

it's, uh, yeah. Are the birds, are the bird clean? I know you having clean

Jordan: 1:35:43

filthy

Andy: 1:35:44

Birds.

Jordan: 1:35:44

Filthy birds. Someone clean these these

Andy: 1:35:46

birds. Well, uh, Jordan, thank you so much Yeah. For joining us. Yeah, thanks for having me. Wonderful. knew you'd be a fun guest, uh, being both a writer and uh, comedy personality. Uh,

Jordan: 1:35:58

did we say that? Yes,

Andy: 1:35:59

you may. A raconteur. Sean, do we have anything else to say?

Sean: 1:36:03

I think we're good. I think we got to roll right into our Patreon so people can do that and listen to us talk about episode two. Which we've, we've teased quite a bit in a bit in this episode. So,

Jordan: 1:36:14

you know. And hey guys, being on this show was no problem! Hehehehe.

Andy: 1:36:20

Right?

Kevin: 1:36:22

all right then. Thank you everybody. That's our show. please remember to, uh, rate, review, subscribe. If you, uh, leave a five star review. On any platform, iTunes, Spotify. Remember you get your pilot's wings, your fake pilot's

Sean: 1:36:39

wings. Obviously the big thing for people leaving reviews is that they get their pilot's wings, but it's also very helpful to us in a variety of ways. Right.

Kevin: 1:36:48

Uh, yes, it is very helpful to us. Um, just in terms of

Sean: 1:36:53

self esteem,

Kevin: 1:36:54

self esteem, feeling good about ourselves, uh, raising the profile of the show, uh, bragging to our parents that we got another five star review. Uh, it's all very helpful. Uh, also, uh, feel free to follow up and check out our Patreon. patreon. com forward slash co pilots TV, where, as we have mentioned, you will find episode two of ALF with Jordan, um, and all our other social media also at co pilots TV.

Sean: 1:37:24

And I just, I just want to say, I think episode two is a real humdinger. So I agree with you.

Kevin: 1:37:30

it's maybe our best episode behind the pay wall.

Sean: 1:37:33

I don't know about that, but sure. Yeah.

Kevin: 1:37:37

There's only one way to find out who's right. I mean, you can vote in our poll. Anyway, thank you guys for joining us. Eh, wheels. Down.

Sean: 1:37:50

Hooray! I like when people applaud when the plane

Kevin: 1:37:54

lands.