Last Podcast on the Left 36: Sandwiches in the Matrix
Haunted MTL‘s weekly review of the series as a whole.
Welcome back! This week we’re tackling episode 36 of Last Podcast titled “Sandwiches in the Matrix”. This is obviously well before the outline phase of the series. It seems to be before the “discussing topics” phase of the series as well because this one is all over the place like a body dropped from a skyscraper. With that dire warning and mental image, let’s dive in!
A Big Bunch of Nothing
INTRO:
We start this episode off with Ben being tormented by Marcus and Henry repeatedly singing Tom Petty’s “Don’t Do Me Like That” to the point of him screaming. Even working with the mentally challenged wasn’t this annoying. Once these shenanigans are over, they explain that Henry had a fascinating topic all week and came downstairs that morning to tell them it was all bullshit. The idea was glitching in the Matrix as popular on Reddit at the time. Henry’s example here is a young man making a sandwich, leaving the room, and coming back to find the meat and bread back in their packaging. In reality, this is thinking you were going to make a sandwich and then NOT making a sandwich.
EPISODE:
While some discussion does happen on these glitches. Henry’s personal experience was finding his Communion ring while cleaning his apartment. He should have had it and decided to call his mother. When she found it had vanished from her file cabinet she said it was a sign from God that he was still there and watching him. Henry’s response? “COME AT ME GOD!!”
Some form of astral projection is discussed before Marcus talks about magic manipulating reality and reveals he has been using masturbation sigils.
This is important for the broader scope of the series because both he and Henry would eventually begin practicing Chaos Magick. Ben, on the other hand, can’t wrap his head around cumming while staring at a piece of paper.
After a massive derailment about Marcus’ sexuality and the acceptance of using a “fuck-burrito,” Henry begins discussing a study that found that our brains process information in chunks and that it buffers that, then catches up to current reality. He theorizes that these gaps in perception could be the entry point for UFO’s, aliens, and the paranormal. Or maybe it’s people from the future pretending to be aliens? I don’t know. You go listen to this rambling madness. I’ll wait. Ben’s fascination with mayo infused coffee at this point is almost a welcome change if it weren’t so gross.
Here we get to what may be Henry’s favorite subject of the episode. Philip K. Dick. His stories tend to deal with a character learning that reality isn’t what they thought it was. In 1974, Dick answered the door to a dark-haired woman who shot a beam of information into his brain showing him that time is all happening at once and that his books are all real events happening in alternate dimensions. I’m sure it had nothing to do with painkillers, speed, and the blood clot in his brain that killed him. At any rate, this experience terrified him and he spent his life crusading all of these facts.
Henry had a similar experience in college involving The Dude coming to him on mushrooms to explain reality. That explanation is so bizarre I’m not even going to try and cover it here. It’s stoner logic man. Groovy.
OUTRO:
The boys acknowledge the fractured nature of this episode but think they had a fascinating topic. They all agree to turn the lights out and trip on shrooms until they realize no one has any shrooms and Marcus has to shit anyway.
THOUGHTS
This episode is the auditory equivalent of being mugged in the subway. It’s loud, confusing, unpleasant for the most part, and blessedly over soon. I see Henry as a fairly intelligent person but he is absolutely all over the place in this one. If you’ve ever tried to seriously find meaning in the film version of “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas” then you may be prepared for this one. I’m not saying skip this one, but I am saying don’t try to understand it. Like the greatest mysteries in life, it just is and can not be known.
Listen Here:
Episode 36 on Spotify
More from Ted Neatherwood
I just wanted to post a brief shoutout to Linda Gould of the Kaidenkai to say thank you for including my Around the Campfire story. Feel free to follow this link and give it a listen. I especially love how Ed’s voice is conveyed. You really feel as if you are on the camping trip with everyone.
Around the Campfire sets the tone for the month of August wherein authors are invited to participate in telling tales as part of a whole campfire series, kind of like it did here originally on Haunted MTL in 2022.
I am among the authors who read their own works as well, with The Fur Coat. You can listen to my own reading on the Kaidenkai here. You can also read along with the original as posted here to Haunted MTL in 2020.
We have reached the last episode of the podcast, Dolores Roach. No, this really is the end. There are no more episodes unless they’re hidden away on some Patreon page I don’t have access to.
The reason I’m being clear upfront about this is because, after you listen to this episode, the fact that there are no more episodes is going to be both confusing and infuriating.
The story
This episode begins with Dolores in a tunnel, being chased down by a train. She barely manages to escape, jumping onto a subway platform and then boarding the train that almost hit her.
Dolores is in a state of panic. She just escaped the tunnels. She just saw Mother Cleats killed. Now, she’s on a subway train, surrounded by people she doesn’t know. And she is a mess. She hasn’t showered since going down in the tunnel, after all. She probably doesn’t smell great.
Dolores rides the train to Coney Island and gets off. She walks to the ocean and gets in the water to wash herself. And when she comes out, she’s recognized by an old friend, Georgie.
And it is then that we realize that it’s been Georgie she’s been telling this whole story to.
Seeing the state Dolores is in, Georgie insists that she come home with her. She gets Dolores some clothes and something to eat and makes her tell her everything that happened down in the tunnels.
And then, Georgie’s son comes home. A seventeen-year-old son who looks exactly like Dominic.
That’s where the story ends.
What worked
I had a hard time finding much to like about this finale. If it hadn’t been the last episode it would have been great, but it was.
However, I did like the shift in perspective that takes place when it’s revealed that Dolores has been telling this whole story to Georgie this season. Because of course, up until now, it’s felt like she was talking to us and only us.
What didn’t work
This episode had a lot of problems. For one thing, I didn’t trust Georgie from the start. And that distrust just got worse the more we saw of her. She’s a true crime writer who just happens to find Dolores when she comes out of the tunnels after two months. No, Dolores isn’t buying it and neither am I. And inviting a woman you have reason to believe is dangerous into your home is stupid. No one in their right mind would have done that. No parent would have allowed Dolores within the same block as their child. The whole thing was unbelievable.
But that complaint pales to the largest issue I have for this season finale. For this episode that is, as far as I can tell, a series finale.
I say that because I cannot find another episode listed anywhere. If I were to have just listened to this episode without knowing that, I would have assumed this was just a mid-season twist.
Because that’s what this feels like, a mid-season twist. It answers nothing. It wraps up nothing. It gives us no satisfaction at all. And that is more than frustrating. It is infuriating. It ruins any joy we might have gotten from the rest of the season.
The ending of Dolores Roach was, in short, not an ending. It stopped in the middle of the story, there’s just no way around it. And this episode came out in October of 2019, almost five years ago! I know that podcasts are rather notorious for having long periods between seasons. Mine is no exception, season three of AA will likely not see the light of day until 2025 at the earliest. But after five years I think we can all safely assume that we’re not getting any more episodes. And so Dolores is always going to be in limbo. We are never going to know whether or not Georgie was telling her the truth. We’ll never know what happened to Ginger or Ephraim. We’ll never know what Dolores does, standing in her old friend’s house with what appears to be Dominic’s seventeen-year-old son standing in front of her.
We will never know, because the show is taking an entirely different turn. And so, I’m afraid I have to add Dolores Roach to the same infamous list as Lime Town or The Black Tapes. This podcast was great until they decided to just not end it.
If you’ve waited this long to see if you should listen to Dolores Roach, here’s my advice. Listen to season one, it had a reliable and satisfying ending. But season two should be left in obscurity where all half-finished stories belong.
(1 / 5)
If you’re a fan of my work, please check out my latest story, Nova, on Paper Beats World. New chapters every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.
We’ve reached not only the second to last episode of this Dolores Roach season but the series as a whole. If you’ll recall, last episode we were riding the high of a great new villain. We had an unexpected and shocking story arc.
Now, after listening to this second-to-last episode, that high is gone. And we are left with disappointment, lamenting what might have been.
The story
We begin our story with Dolores being shown to her new home. The home she’s to share with Ephraim is considerably smaller than the home they were sharing before.
Ephraim is thrilled. He’s read Mother Cleats’ treatment and is all in.
This doesn’t make sense to Dolores. To her, this place seems like a downgrade. But for Ephraim, it’s a chance to belong. A chance to feel safe, to not fear hunger or violence.
Dolores has no illusions of being safe from that, though. And she’s not thrilled with being drafted as the Chain’s new killer and cook.
She tries to get Ephraim to run with her. Even prison would be better than what she’s facing. But he doesn’t intend to go anywhere.
Next, Dolores tries to get Ginger to go with her. She points out that having a baby in a tunnel instead of a hospital is probably not her ideal birth plan. But Ginger has some sort of strange fit and screams at her.
Dolores is lost, unsure how she’ll ever fight her way through all of these people to get out of the tunnels. But at the last moment, she gets unexpected help from a very unexpected source.
What worked
Let me begin by saying that it’s honestly hard to say that anything worked in this episode. Which isn’t to say that it was bad. The acting was as wonderful as it’s been the whole series. The sound editing was wonderful.
But everything that did work suffered from the pacing. We’ll discuss that more later.
This episode was full of sudden yet inevitable betrayals that I love. I don’t want to ruin the fun for you. But it’s safe to say that no one is on good terms with anyone at the end of this. At least, the people still alive.
I also appreciated the setup for a pivotal death. Early in the season, Ephraim told us that the middle rail was certain death to touch. I think we all knew that this was going to come up eventually. That we would, sooner or later, see someone’s eyes melt out of their sockets. And yes, I’m pleased to say that did happen.
What didn’t work
If the podcast Dolores Roach has a flaw it is in its pacing. And that flaw came very much to light in this episode. Because this should have been at least two episodes.
It was not as fun to see the ending of this episode as it would have been if there had been more build-up. An important character betrayal didn’t mean as much as if there had been more of a build-up.
Overall, this story would have felt so much richer if there had been more room to breathe and experience them. It was as if we were to be served a wonderful meal. And instead of savoring it, we shoveled it down without truly tasting it. And that’s a shame. This seemed like a delicious story. I wish we could have tasted more of it.
Even though there should be more, there is only one episode left of Dolores Roach. And I don’t know how to feel about that. They’ve done everything they set up to do already. So, what’s left for Dolores now? That’s the only question we have left to answer.
(3 / 5)
If you’re a fan of my work, please check out my latest story, Nova, on Paper Beats World. New chapters every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.
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