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Leverage Season 3, Episode 16, The San Lorenzo Job, Audio Commentary Transcript

Marc: Hi I'm Marc Roskin, director of the season finale.

John: John Rogers, executive producer and co-writer of this part of the season finale.

Scott: Scott Veach, the co-writer of this part of the season finale.

Aldis: Aldis Hodge, actor, Hardison, yeah that guy.

Christian: I'm Christian Kane, I play Eliot Spencer.

Chris: Chris Downey, executive producer. And this is part two of our season three season finale, The San Lorenzo Job.

John: Starting with the brief flashforward, which I think has become the kind of signature of the season finale.

Christian: I like it.

John: The little jump forward, the little ‘this is what you're gonna see.’

Aldis: Yup, yup.

John: And this is the reset scene, this is the last time you guys are in the bar for the year.

Christian: Yup.

John: And just to remind everyone - cause we didn't know if they were gonna show them back to back - exactly what we're doing, what the stakes are, and why they're going.

Chris: Now the origin of this one was Scott, you came in with the one liner, where they steal a country?

John: Well it was two, because I had that saint story, remember when I was a kid?

Chris: Oh, right.

John: And Scott had come in nicely enough with the exact same he wanted to do, which was-?

Scott: Yeah, when I was a computer scientist, I had a friend from Nigeria, who told me that in Nigeria, when they were kids, one of the things they do is they sit around and argue about who could coup the country if it came to it.

[Laughter]

Scott: And they used twinkies, and they'd put twinkies down and argue over what the right pathways are. And I was telling John this and we were saying it would be great for Leverage to coup a country, and that dovetailed with something you'd already been thinking of.

John: That dovetailed with the saint story, the Simon Tepler story about The Revolution Racket, which I read when I was 12. And the whole idea of somebody taking over a country just because somebody pissed them off just stuck with me for 30 years.

Christian: Right, yeah.

Aldis: Yeah.

John: And so that was- alright, well that's insanely ambitious and impossible to write, let’s bang that out in a week.

[Laughter]

Marc: And you believe it!

Christian: Yeah, you do.

John: And that's the fun of having, you know, Scott is experienced in computer science and technology and I'm a conspiracy geek, you know there’s- we don't do anything in this episode that you couldn't really do.

Christian: So let me ask you a question, you're saying that someone actually stole a country before?

[Laughter]

John: It’s come close.

Christian: There you go, exactly that’s what I'm- yeah.

John: And then- it was picking the country, making sure we found it. What was great was we found- like, don't want to go Africa, can't shoot in Africa, can’t duplicate it. Can't go to Latin America, can't shoot the geography. So finding a European country, and it turns out I knew somebody who specialized in journalism of small countries. She had written about the smallest countries in the world, and so I knew there were some countries kicking around that were this small.

[Ice rattling in a glass]

Chris: And there was another source- piece of source material for this that was very helpful, which was a documentary called Our Brand Is Crisis. Which was a great- if you get a chance, a great documentary about how James Carville's team went down to Bolivia, I guess in 2002?

John: I think so.

Chris: And basically won the Bolivian election for an ousted president, and there were kind of horrible consequences that followed from it.

Scott: Yeah.

[Laughter]

Chris: And we got a lot of great stuff from that.

John: Yeah. And that's the trick is to just, you know, you don't really have to make stuff up, the real stuff out there, you just gotta dig deep enough. This actually is great- this is digitally treated, you just shot the footage.

Marc: Yeah. I mean every time you're in this room and you see these screens, it’s always green screen, so the visual effects department having to labor.

Christian: But it's great, it really shows the distance between us and him right there, you know.

Aldis: Yeah.

Marc: Yeah, we gave it that glitchy techno feel.

John: It was also nice how you dropped in, “At ease.”

Christian: Yeah.

John: That was I just-

Christian: Thanks man.

John: No, I noticed that, my brother would do that when-

Christian: You know, I used- I was talking to you, I used kinda a little bit of George Clooney in The Peacemaker for this scene. I just kinda-

John: You know what? Underrated movie, by the way.

Scott: Very true, very true.

Chris: That is, it’s true, it’s a really good movie.

Christian: Absolutely, absolutely, it's one of my all time favorites.

John: I love that flick.

Christian: And I just used the fact that it doesn't make any sense to- anyway.

Chris: It’s one of the first times we saw somebody from Eliot's past, and I thought- and we’ll get to it later-

John: Who's not dead.

Christian: Right.

[Laughter]

Chris: But the camaraderie, it was like it opened up the character in a lot of ways. I thought it was great.

John: Yeah, this guy met bad guys and good guys. It’s interesting, cause we wanted to crack open Eliot for this season, but the character doesn't lend himself to long bits of exposition.

Christian: Right.

John: So we had to do it through indirect means. And then we find out Hardison was a ninja next season.

[Laughter]

Christian: That's right.

Aldis: Yes we do.

John: Raised by his nana, his nana was like a shogun. No, that was all a nice beat. And considering you guys were all acting to a green screen that was very emotional, very nicely done. This staging was a bitch, by the way, cause you had three and two.

Marc: Three and two, and a lot of page count.

John: Yeah.

Marc: A lot of page count.

John: And it's tough because page count- shooting a lot of pages in here means it's not a place you have to go to that you have to light, that you have to shoot in a different way than you're used to, you know the set. But this set requires you to have five humans in it.

Marc: Right.

John: And so there's this sort of cancellation of the advantages. No, nice beat by Tim there, just “Oh, we fucked up.”

Christian: And by the way, Goran was nice enough to come in that day and sit over to the side; he's actually in the room with us reading.

John: That was his first day!

Chris: Yeah, I think that was his first day.

Marc: It was his first day during his wardrobe fitting.

Christian: Yeah.

John: Yeah, and we had not met him, and he came in and sat off to this side and did the mocking speech, and I remember thinking, “Ah that’s it! That’s it right there!”

[Laughter]

Christian: No, it was perfect.

John: You could actually see the whole cast like, “Oh, I get who this guy is.”

Aldis: Ahhh.

John: No, he's fantastic in this.

Scott: Yeah, he looks the part.

John: Absolutely you could do him with Saint.

Scott: Oh yeah.

John: Yeah, you could [unintelligible mumbling] absolutely.

Chris: Yeah, he hasn't really played bad guys. I mean the most-

John: No, this was his first real bad guy.

Chris: First real bad guy.

John: He said it was why he took it, so he could get a chance to do it. It's also nice why he said, “You used to,” to Eliot, just a reminder again to the audience of some history there, some past there. And, you know, kind of a center of gravity of emotion there.

Christian: Yeah. This was actually really tough.

John: Yeah, cause he’s not- he’s holding it in.

Marc: Yeah, cause you feel at fault.

John: No, it was a- Hardison kind of playing straight ahead, Parker not dealing with emotion well, and then straight to the “ciao.” And then the hatred. The hatred.

Chris: And we did it a bunch of times, too, cause I remember we did it a number of times.

Christian: Yeah, it was tough.

Marc: Beautiful San Lorenzo.

Christian: I didn’t want to screw it up.

John: Beautiful scenic San Lorenzo.

Christian: That was actually before the first episode- that was one of the first scenes up, it was like we just had-

Chris: Yeah.

John: It was a cold start.

Marc: See the digital background there, beautiful stuff.

Chris: And great music here, that we’re not listening to.

John: Yes.

Marc: Oh yeah.

Chris: But I've been hearing it in my head from Joe LoDuca.

John: What was really fun was that Joe LoDuca, because I said this was the Mission Impossible episode I always wanted to write-

Chris: Yeah.

John: He put a little Schiffer in the score here. It was really- he put a little 1960’s Mission Impossible in the score.

Scott: Yeah.

Christian: I gotta be honest with you though, her in that dress, I don't think people are gonna be listening to the music.

[Laughter]

John: You know the people who care are. And this is the Schnitzer Theater.

Marc: Schnitzer Auditorium.

Aldis: Yeah.

Marc: Downtown Portland.

Chris: Oh boy, does that look great.

John: And this was the location that kept on giving.

Christian: Yup.

John: We walked in here on scout and at this point the finale- this part of the finale was not yet written, because I knew- we'd done the rough draft, but I was up in Portland scouting locations. And I knew we had to do it- we had to rewrite based on what we could get, and that was the layout of the original script.

Scott: Yeah.

John: We were just so lucky to get that auditorium. And this was great, James Draper from Mad Men, kind of the vibe there, that was the name check.

Chris: Sure, and the suit is very much Our Man In Havana.

Scott: Yes, it really sells it.

John: Our Man In Havana is definitely- that's one of the movies we talk about that nobody ever has seen. Alec Guinness, Our Man In Havana is a great flick.

Christian: Again Nadien Haders, but I gotta believe Tim had a lot to do with this as well.

John: Yeah, Tim likes a hat.

Scott: He does.

Aldis: Likes a hat.

Marc: And this guy was great. Humberto.

Scott: He was amazing.

Aldis: Yeah, he was.

Marc: He was just fantastic. Again another tall guy between Alistar, Humberto, and Goran, Nadine went through every extra large dress shirt and coat in Portland.

Christian: Big and tall.

Aldis: Big and tall store.

John: About two days in I was like “Humberto, with 8 months and 2 million dollars, I could make you governor of Oregon.”

Christian: Yeah, right, exactly.

[Laughter]

John: He's got that- and he's a local Portland actor, he showed up for auditions it’s like, wow this guy has got it!

Chris: Well I think Lana had been sitting on him for a while, she was waiting for the right part.

John: And this was a ton of fun, this is of course, all the people who work on the show we’re taking photos of.

Aldis: Yup.

John: And also again, the two of them as peers, you know, planning it. We don’t show you what's on the screen, it’s horrible. Assume it involves half of a clown outfit.

[Laughter]

Chris: The wrong half.

John: What's the right half?

[Laughter]

John: And this was great cause when we were shooting this Tim was like, “What is this?” And we said “The Music Man” and he said, “Ahh, The Music Man.” And he got it, he really laid into exactly how to play this. Because it’s not mocking, he’s not joking.

Christian: Right, right.

John: He's gotta sell this guy on this.

Chris: Come along with me, I'm gonna take you.

John: Absolutely The Music Man in this scene, and Girl Friday in the later one.

Chris: Yeah.

John: When they're trying to get rid of Ralph Bellamy.

Scott: And it’s this guy's reaction that really sells it, too. He believes it so we believe it.

Aldis: Yeah.

John: No, and then the sort of pitying looks from Aldis and Gina are lovely.

Aldis: The sparkle in his eye.

John: There you go, now we make a dream in order to betray people. This is the most deeply cynical episode we've ever done.

[Laughter]

John: Even I was morally troubled by this episode.

[Laughter]

John: Because I realized about three quarters of the way through, I said, “Wait, we took the only decent man in the country and we corrupted him in order to get- to win this election.”

Christian: Right, right.

Chris: Watch the documentary, man.

[Laughter]

Christian: You know what, don't forget, though, we're still criminals. That's the whole thing.

Aldis: We do.

John: I know. I'm always the first to say the Leverage crew are not good guys, they are protagonists. But there are times even I am like, “Wow, I found this amusing, there's something wrong with me.”

Christian: Yeah. [Laughs]

Marc: This is the lovely library room in the Governor Hotel.

Aldis: Yup.

John: Beautiful ceiling.

Marc: Beautiful ceiling.

John: Comes dressed with books, nice.

Marc: And Alastair Duncan is just fantastic.

John: Oh man, and that was- we were really lucky, cause we were so focused on Vittori, and so focused on Moreau. This isn't a big character role, and he anchors it, he really nails it.

Chris: And I always love the “Just sign it.” That’s my favorite bit.

Scott: Oh yeah.

Marc: This was- if you remember John, this was a ten page day.

John: Yes.

Scott: Oh my god.

John: Yes, this was a ten page day. Other shows do not shoot ten pages. Movies shoot three.

Christian: Yeah.

John: But average on other shows is five, six?

Marc: This was just a bear. But these guys were all just so prepared.

Christian: You know, it was just one of those things where we said, “Ok look, we got the two scripts came together, we got the first- the first and second part of the season finale,” and everyone said, “Let’s just buckle down and knock this out of the park.” And everyone ran full speed ahead the whole time, nobody fell, nobody slowed up. For three weeks straight.

John: You guys absolutely proved yourself. And that's the thing the boys, Goran, Tim, and Alastair showed up with the blocking kind of in their heads, cause we had that room-

Marc: When you get to that moment I said, “How do you want to do this? Tim, do you want to do this in pieces?” And he said, “Let's do all five pages.”

John: Yeah, so we shot like a play.

Christian: Yeah.

Marc: Yeah, so each take was five pages.

John: And just shot from different coverage. Yeah, incredible.

Marc: It was brilliant.

John: No, great local actors. By the way, I like to say, this is some of the best extra acting work I've seen in a television show.

Aldis: Yeah.

John: All the extras are fantastic.

Chris: And here's a pairing I always enjoy.

John: You love a good Parker and Eliot.

Chris: You guys together.

Christian: Yeah, it's fun.

Marc: Another high angle on the tombs, another great set that we built.

Christian: Like Hardison just makes me mad, but she actually, like, annoys me.

[Laughter]

Marc: This is the Frankenstein set reconstructed.

Aldis: Oh, yeah.

John: And she enjoys annoying him. Actively.

Christian: Yeah, that's it.

John: Hardison doesn’t, Hardison doesn't realize what he's doing to piss you off, she actively enjoys annoying you.

[Laughter]

Chris: And you'll tease her, that's what I like, too.

John: And the funny thing is the off screen thing is reversed. No one makes Beth crack up like you do, because I was there when you shot that god damn fashion thing.

Christian: It’s true, it’s tough for us to do a scene together, we always end up laughing.

John: And that was the little frustration bit where she doesn't understand humans can't crawl through steam.

Christian: Right, right.

John: Very nice beat. I forget where the bit that she can tell how deep she is by echo came from, but-

Scott: Right here, oh yeah.

John: It's one of those bits that I think we threw as a joke in the room and then it wouldn't go away.

[Laughter]

John: Like no, no, that's how she works. She's not totally human. She's got some manticore DNA in there. Exactly.

Scott: Echolocation.

John: She's got some echolocation going on.

Marc: This is a great scene. I loved how you guys wrote Sophie just getting more involved and involved in playing a part.

John: Watching someone-

Christian: Sophie always gets over involved in everything!

John: But this is unique in- we talked about when we were plotting out the scene, it wasn't just the rescue. It was the idea that this actor and this character had to be super sympathetic, but also when you're someone who can win strangers over, watching someone do it this badly is like watching someone play solitaire and not seeing the red ten.

Christian: Right.

John: You know, it's like how can anyone suck this much, and that’s what really sucks her in.

Christian: Right, and that's why everyone loves Sophie, is the simple fact-

Aldis: She has a heart.

Christian: That like- it's like Angel, it’s the vampire with a heart. She's the world's best grifter, you can't be a grifter and have any sort of a heart, and she has a heart. And it's a beautiful character.

Aldis: Yeah.

John: Goran plays this perfectly. This is a great pairing, Alastair doing the comedic sort of classic British character actor thing.

Marc: Right.

John: And Goran starting to play the chess game. Starting to realize something’s wrong. This was lovely. Just this little- and we tried to figure out what would she do that isn't overly intimate, that's just right?

Marc: Enough to give you a sense.

Chris: And they have really nice chemistry together.

John: They have great chemistry together, great chemistry. When he calls her “dear” later in the script you totally buy it, that he’s just sucked into the con.

Chris: Yeah.

Marc: And this is, of course, Moreau-

John: Nice crane up there.

Marc: Yeah, realizing that something’s up.

John: And it's interesting, cause we'd originally put them way farther back in the room, remember? So you had to pick them out. But that close up actually works better, cause it just announces to the audience that the game is on. And this again, this is our fable, okay? This is us taking every element of real elections that we don't like and exaggerating them that little bit more. But the idea that they would fixate on the beautiful girl touching him? Absolutely believable.

Christian: Right.

Chris: Oh, yeah.

John: And the fact that you could sweep up a media by announcing, sort of, a glorious engagement? Absolutely believable.

Aldis: Yeah.

John: You know, it’s all about controlling news cycles.

Marc: That’s my first toilet shot.

[Laughter]

Christian: Nice.

John: First one?

Marc: Yeah, very clean toilet.

Aldis: Is that a first for Leverage as well?

Marc: Yeah, I think so.

Aldis: Congratulations, Roskin. Boom.

John: That was also a lot of fun, is we designed the tombs, and then realized we hadn't figured out any way to get stuff back and forth.

Christian: Right.

John: So yeah. But that's always the better way to start, write backwards. He's great, by the way, absolutely fantastic.

Christian: He's great.

John: And believable as a military man, and somebody that he could have known.

Marc: There's just a subtle moment here that's just so great. You know, when the general says, “Would you leave your people behind?” And this exchange between you and Beth, it just- my eyes always well up, right here. Just, she has no idea what's being said, but it’s just so effective.

Christian: Wow.

John: Yeah, you should do this for a living.

[Laughter]

Christian: I know.

Aldis: You awed yourself, didn't you?

Christian: I did, a little bit, yeah.

Aldis: Do it again, dammit.

Christian: I hadn't seen this yet, and then she comes in.

John: And also you've forgotten. I mean that’s the thing, these things ran at ten pages a day, sixteen hours, it's blinding.

Christian: Yeah, that's exactly it.

John: And her play there, that- the little scene out on her, just she’s bugged.

Christian: Yeah.

John: That is not the Parker from first season.

Christian: No, it’s not.

John: Beth’s done a really great job of modulating Parker forward through all three years.

Scott: Without losing the core, which is always tricky.

Aldis: She has some of the best facial reactions, too, to express her character.

John: Yeah. It's never not Parker, but you can see Parker evolving.

Scott: Evolving, yeah.

John: This is fantastic, he's so hapless.

Marc: And Gina did a great job here.

John: With the accent and just dropping it in.

Marc: Yeah. “We're getting married!”

John: And look how delighted-

[Laughter]

John: And the extras sell it. They really do, like, “Everyone loves a wedding!”

Christian: That's so great.

John: “It’s so delightful, that nice boy is getting married.” You know, it absolutely works. Love the smiles, love those people.

Marc: What I love about a lot of this episode is the pairing between Tim and Aldis, and not having him in a van.

Aldis: Thank god!

Christian: Yeah, absolutely.

Chris: Yeah, there was no van here.

Aldis: Thank god.

Marc: There are so many great moments-

John: You're in a suit looking fine.

Scott: Yeah, yeah.

Aldis: That van, boy.

Scott: An expensive suit.

Aldis: Rented it out for the day.

John: And this was a lot of fun, too, was the controlling information through the phones, through the screens people got their information from.

Aldis: Yeah.

John: And it actually was started because Bill Cosby had been announced dead on Twitter for like the third time. And for, like, four hours I was going, “Oh god, Bill Cosby's dead!”

[Laughter]

John: And I realized like, “Wait no, Bill Cosby’s not dead.”

Christian: Right.

John: But he is actually, for all intents and purposes, dead to everyone who's reading those.

Scott: For those four hours.

Christian: Yeah, wow.

John: For those four hours, until he makes the announcement.

Christian: Wow.

Aldis: Yeah.

John: And that's really what bore part of- the birth of part of this episode.

Scott: Well he even has that line: “I only need them to believe it for a few hours,” or something.

John: Yeah, exactly, that's why we threw it in. We only need it for ten minutes. And this speech is fantastic, and this is- Goran did a lot of work on this speech.

Marc: Yes.

John: And this is also one of the reasons I love you guys is, this is not fancy directing. This is just park on the actors, and let them work.

Marc: But of course we had to have a crane to reach them.

[Laughter]

John: Well, that's not my problem.

Aldis: Oh that's right, you guys were downstairs while we’re upstairs.

Chris: Well there's the crane, that's right, that’s right.

John: Yeah, because you had the crane up from that shot up to him, and then you shot it with that, oh wow.

Marc: We got it.

John: And just Nate running an enormous bluff here.

Marc: Yes.

Chris: And also, this is a rare episode because it’s two adversaries in the show; usually we’re in the shadows, we’re undercover, we’re playing somebody. Here it's just out in the open a chess match.

Marc: Yup

Chris: Between these two people. Which is not something we’d done before.

John: Yeah, the first one, they stayed under until they could get the Davids. The second one, he got busted by Shepard, but he was playing from an underhand.

Chris: Right.

John: Yeah, this is the first time it’s like, yeah this guy could serve us our lunch.

Christian: That's what I was saying; it was very strange for me, because I came up to John I was like, “Dude, what am I gonna- how do I play it?” Cause he knows Eliot’s in town. He knows what I do ‘cause I used to do it for him. He's gotta be scared a little bit, and that's what- Goran was and his character was not. And he knows we’re there, and it's very much out in the open and we've never done that before.

Scott: And we always called it a chess match, but what's kinda cool about it is that when it's out in the open it kinda has the flavor of a slug fest, too.

Christian: It does, exactly.

Scott: Toe to toe, just taking swings.

Christian: That’s exactly what it is, a street fight.

Chris: But the great thing is we had a political campaign. So we had rules, we had a clock, I mean, it gave us a structure for the whole con.

John: Yeah, I love that acting beat there. Just the little look away, the down- also I like that hat a lot, I'm not gonna lie.

Christian: Yeah.

Marc: And the campaign’s growing, we have more posters and people.

John: We had a very specific timeline on the campaign room. We had three phases: the despair phase, the growing phase, and the triumph phase. And we had to make sure- because we have ADs, first ADs work hard. They have to pack that room to make it look different each time. Yes, and this is Girl Friday. He's Ralph Bellamy, and he's just gonna be pushed around and manipulated.

Chris: That's a great line.

Christian: Wow.

John: And again, the campaign promise: “How is a campaign promise not like a lie?” “It's complicated!”

Aldis: Yeah.

[Laughter]

John: Deeply cynical, deeply cynical stuff.

Chris: Great comic timing on that.

John: Yeah well, Tim’s a funny guy, That’s why we’re very blessed, all you guys can land a joke. You know, that's- you don't get that lucky all the time. And then the little snarky look from her. And again, that attitude that character would not have had first or second year. Really both the characters, and the actors have driven the characters. This is what- by the way, what he's- the rough estimation he’s doing is called the Fermi Problem, something that I was taught back in my physics days, is you just do order of magnitude guesses.

Scott: Right.

John: And it allows you to just make good, order of magnitude guesses without having to grind out the actual math and boring the audience. Like I am right- now!

[Laughter]

Marc: Yeah, exactly.

Chris: And now you've hit stop, and now you're back in it.

John: There's some physicists out there in their underwear just freaking out because I said Fermi Problem.

[Laughter]

John: This was a ton of fun. That was a street in Portland!

Marc: This is all exterior Portland, yes.

John: Yeah that's done on Ankeny. That's fantastic! That's done on cobblestone! That's fantastic, yeah. And just putting up posters. And we got a lot of photos of the Italian elections actually, and used those as the models for the poster style and density and stuff. And this was Aldis working hard, second unit.

Aldis: Yes, indeed.

John: “Now loosen the tie, it's later!”

Aldis: Yeah, small little room, dig it.

Chris: And there's his- what's in his cabinet? Incoming cabinet?

Marc: Yes, incoming cabinet.

John: Yup, doing the JFK short sleeve thing. It was great, it was a ton of fun.

Christian: Was that supposed to be me putting that poster up?

John: No, no, no, that is the locals who are so filled with joy at the chance to be liberated.

[Laughter]

John: It also had a really pretty light cause we ran out of light and blew it out from the side.

Marc: This is a great graphic that Derek built for-

[Laughter]

Marc: For the campaign.

Aldis: Light it on fire!

John: What's crazy is it should be over the top, but if you looked at this year's election, it wasn't!

Scott: Yeah!

Marc: It wasn't as bad!

Chris: No, not at all.

Christian: I was just gonna say it's totally, exactly what's going on.

Scott: Not even this year’s election-

Chris: This is very restrained.

Scott: Yeah, like even the 60’s there were the nuke- the kid- the little girl with the flower ad.

John: The daisy ad, only aired once.

Scott: Yeah, and then the nuclear bomb explodes, it’s crazy.

Chris: Oh, and child labor!

John: By the way, that was great casting, that kid. “Alright now look sad, now look like they beat you! Alright, that's perfect.”

[Laughter]

John: No, we're not gonna beat him, no, sorry.

Christian: Such a beautiful shot, by the way, Roskin.

Marc: Thank you.

Christian: And again were back in that-

Chris: Oh, that made me laugh.

John: That's a great joke.

Chris: That made me laugh very hard.

Aldis: That kid had fun that day.

John: That's a lovely joke.

Marc: And Alastair plays that well.

John: And this was a ton of fun, figuring out exactly what Parker and Eliot were up to, their two cons.

Christian: Yeah.

John: And I'll give Chris- Chris was the one who came up with the scandal, this scandal right here. Cause we couldn't figure out what this scandal could be.

Scott: Yeah.

John: The conversation between Vittori and Nate is basically the conversation we had in the room. And then Chris said, “I got what’s worse than sex.”

Chris: What’s worse than money or sex?

John: Yeah, the only thing that America can't forgive.

[Laughter]

Scott: That's right.

John: And this puppy was found on the street, right?

Christian: Yup, yup,

John: And then was - rubber glass by the way - and then was adopted-

[Laughter]

Chris: You don't see it bouncing.

John: Yeah, you don't- yeah.

Christian: Yeah.

John: This is a great scene. Goran is- what I love is Goran-

Marc: The Canadian accent is really nice.

John: [Doing a Canadian accent] It was really nice, oh jeez.

Scott: This got a huge reaction in the screening.

Christian: Did it really?

John: Yes.

Marc: Huge.

John: Well because it’s-

Christian: Such a good little puppy!

[Laughter]

John: Just the boldness of it, just the sheer stones of it, yeah.

Marc: And the reactions of either of the guys playing on the other side.

Chris: When you put the glasses on, I always have fun playing with the glasses.

John: Well, what I love is Goran is playing it actually kind of amused at the move that's being made.

Christian: Yeah, cause he's well he's looking at Eliot!

John: While Alastair is freaking out. Yeah, he's like this is actually-

[Laughter]

Scott: This is great, that's great.

John: Yeah. “I think I hate you.” “I'm ok with that.” No Nate is- Nate Ford is not a good man. We've said this. And this was actually Goran’s favorite piece.

Marc: Yeah, this was like great. This was like ok, it's a game of chess match, but here are the questions to all the- yeah, this was great.

Christian: You gotta feel like he’s- you gotta feel like Moreau’s like, “Wow, after all these years, an adversary that's worth the fight.”

Scott: Yeah.

John: That’s kind of it, you know.

Christian: You know, like how many times he's just run over people, all of sudden: hey, we get to fight.

John: That's what he says to Nate, he says, “Make it interesting.” He's kinda looking for this.

Christian: Yeah, yeah.

John: It's not until it starts to go against him.

Christian: Out of sheer boredom of the other people he's just rolled over.

John: I adore this scene.

Chris: I love this scene between these two so much.

John: They play it so well. You could do a series with these two, absolutely.

Marc: Yes.

John: You could do a series of the American con woman who helps the guy get elected and then helps him run his tiny European country.

Scott: Oh yeah, let's go sell that!

John: We’ll sell that, done!

Chris: And John where did the whole handshake bit come from? Cause I know I had written it a bit differently, that opening- but the handshake paid off so well. Where'd you come up with that? The western gesture and all that.

John: I had read a book by an FBI- this is what you do on Leverage. I had read a book by an FBI profiler, and he also did some hostage negotiation. And it- in the book it talks about always gesturing with an open right hand. Because you just trust it, you know, and it always just stuck with me.

Chris: It plays so well here as a, you know, getting the guy up scene. And it paid off so well at the end.

John: Yeah, it really- big applause when he does it at the end. We did a live screening, which is when we talk about applause.

Chris: And this obviously is our homage to the Kennedy-Nixon debate of 1960.

[Laughter]

Scott: Yeah, right.

Chris: Which was famous.

John: If we could've had him sweat, we would've.

Marc: Again in the Schnitzer Auditorium, same building.

Christian: Yup, late night.

John: Yeah that was the last night of shooting, right?

Aldis: Yeah, it was.

Marc: And Alastair again, is just fantastic with this.

John: Bailing this.

Marc: And so is Humberto. But him playing the- taking the effect of the nicotine cream was just classic.

John: And the list of ways to kill people, don't do that. If you ever think about doing that, the nicotine thing, don't. That’s very dangerous.

Christian: Yeah, very dangerous.

John: Leave it up to people who are very good at almost killing people like Eliot Spencer.

Chris: Would it kill you?

Christian: Oh god, yeah.

Chris: Too much- the nicotine?

John: Oh yeah, fuck yeah.

Aldis: Oh, yeah.

Chris: Wow.

John: Absolutely. This- we probably should have changed this a little more.

[Laughter]

John: We usually change it in the show. This one we were kinda moving kinda fast, we should've done-

Marc: Look at that crowd there.

John: How many people are in that crowd?

Marc: About 80.

[Laughter]

John: And we turned them into 2,000; that’s Mark Franco, doing visual effects.

Marc: Doing some tiling.

Christian: That's not our biggest one, our biggest one was the baseball game.

John: Yup. Biggest one, we filled it with like 30,000 people.

Aldis: Oh, yeah.

Christian: Baseball game in season two.

Marc: “Vote for me!”

[Laughter]

John: So delightfully cheesy.

Christian: Parker.

John: And then the match cut over, that’s nice.

Marc: Yeah.

Aldis: Eliot almost killing a guy with nicotine.

Marc: He's got rubber gloves on, though.

John: He does, because he's careful.

Chris: That's right.

Marc: This is my favorite look.

Scott: He plays this perfectly.

John: And again it's one of those, one of the reasons doing the television is, you're moving so fast the actors have to create a lot, and there you go!

[Laughter]

Chris: “Wait who's that? I wanna talk to you later.”

Christian: Hey c'mon man, that's my move!

John: He’s charming, you know, but that’s- having a charming bad guy, ‘cause you need to like him for the end.

Christian: Oh, yeah.

John: No the- and this local, again local- almost all local actors in this one.

Aldis: Yeah.

John: That’s fantastic.

Chris: And they had to make up an accent for a non-existent country. Which folks, for an actor, is not the easiest thing in the world.

John: Yeah we actually wound up- I'll say it, we wound up basing it on Malta, which was a British colony until the 60’s, and really filled- the government structure filled a lot of requirements for us. But we made it Italian, because it's kind of a good European accent. So we made it close to Italy.

Chris: Oh, this is great.

John: Yeah, this is great. Huge- tell me you couldn't make that guy governor.

Christian: Oh absolutely.

John: Absolutely, maybe that'll be my hiatus project.

[Laughter]

Scott: Why do I think you're not kidding?

Christian: “Listen, we've got another job for you.”

John: No, this- and him storming over. Now it’s not fun anymore, now he's gonna kill you people.

Marc: Yes.

Aldis: Ah, he's breaking the rules

Scott: Yup.

John: And wow, without that staircase? What a great set.

Aldis: It was all right there.

Marc: Chandelier, staircase.

John: That looks like Europe. And then it had the matching mini balconies here to shoot across, it was great.

Marc: Yeah, it just gave us so much. This was just the- I love this, just the unspoken-

John: He's not gonna threaten them.

Marc: Just “I'm here.”

John: Just- and that's what also is kinda fun is when we talk about Hardison wanting to run his own crew sometimes, he's still being schooled; these are the rules we play by.

Christian: “Hey, how's it going.”

John: “How's it going? Sup!” Now these are the rules you play under. Nate is trying to tell him if you're gonna run a crew, these are the stakes.

Aldis: Yeah.

Christian: Look at how beautiful that is.

Aldis: That is. Where are those actually captured from?

John: I dunno, that's stock- from Stocksylvania.

[Laughter]

Scott: Stocktopia.

John: Sanstockington. Yeah, no, and this was a ton of fun. And of course the UN is always this effective when they monitor elections. They are pretty tight, actually, when they do it; they're pretty effective.

Marc: Yeah.

John: And this sort of walk by. Yeah, that's not a friendly look.

Aldis: “I'm still gonna kill you.”

Marc: Campaign’s growing.

John: Yeah, phase three, this was great. And this was also kinda the- we had to show that Sophie was genuinely interested, she wasn't just game invested.

Scott: Right, yeah.

John: She's actually come to like the country and really believe in this guy. Cause he- and we lucked out, the actor was really super charming; Humberto was fantastic.

Scott: And this fits perfectly with her ambition; she easily could've been a princess of a country in an alternate life.

John: And then we establish in the backstory.

Chris: Well we play her, we play aliases of her as princesses, so yeah.

John: Backstory explained she was married to royalty at one point; she knows this world better than he certainly did. That's the first time you see Moreau pissed off. And the president actually, he's a results-oriented guy.

Chris: Oh I love this shot. This is just great, the two of them, the expanse of the office.

John: This looks like West Wing.

Scott: Yeah, it really does.

John: It's gorgeous.

Christian: People have to understand- and this is the scariest moment because if he starts losing it, he starts pulling triggers. It’s a very, you know, Moreau doesn't lose it. He's losing it.

Aldis: Yeah.

John: And that's when he realizes, “Oh, I know how to handle this.”

Marc: Dave Connell did this beautifully.

John: Yeah, the- and this was a lot of fun. Also tracking exactly what information Hardison leaked at any given time. We had a whole timeline of who knew what, and when the people of San Lorenzo knew, when Nate knew it. Not quite as complicated as some of the other ones, but pretty brutal. And here we go, I love the starting gun.

Marc: That's a oner! Pressed for time.

John: Just the- we stuff on the TV, we see the reaction, and then Nate steps in the foreground.

Marc: Boom, we told that story.

John: Yup, that's all the information you need to know. And peek around, and just- and again, it was important in the writing - reset to the audience what every character's goal is, and where you see them next so you don't have to do the math.

Christian: Right.

John: And “age of the geek.”

Chris: In the story development process, at one time they won the election, and part of the episode was them governing. And John, I think what you struggled with in kinda figuring it out, was making the election the ultimate end.

John: Yeah, the election was a big enough story and that's something we hit every now and then in the writers room. You don't know how big the story actually is until you actually outline it. And then you have eight acts worth of cards up there and then you go, “Oh, alright.” The story has told you how long it needs to be. This was a ton of fun, the idea that he'd be doing press conferences from in prison - that delighted me to no end.

Marc: Right.

Chris: And very Mission Impossible.

John: Very Mission Impossible.

Chris: All the scenes with him, every time I see that, it takes me back to Mission Impossible.

John: I'm not gonna lie, this is our Mission Impossible episode, absolutely. And yeah, he's venal, this- Alastair is great.

Marc: Alastair, yeah, this is the bad side of Alastair, really bad, you know, take them all out.

John: And this was part of the fun was figuring out how the ending unrolled, was the chess match of what would a bad guy do to control information? And how would you use control of information against them? Using your opponent's strength against them is great. And by the way, big ups to these actors who were working background here, because the little look he throws, just a reminder this is not a good thing. It's a nice choice, nice choice picking up the single on that.

Marc: Yeah.

John: Oh and this was a ton of fun. Whenever you have- I think a lot of the Leverage audience knows at this point, whenever you see people and you can't see their faces? We’re in there somewhere.

Scott: I think we need to do a double reverse reverse, just to reset the clock.

Chris: We may need to go the other way on it.

John: Yeah, maybe in season four.

Chris: Oh and once he brings Nate in here, this- the scenes with the three of them coming up are some of my favorites in the whole two part finale.

John: Well again, that was right there when he says, “We're not gonna release the results.” You have to set up each time, you know, exactly how the mechanism of the con is gonna work.

Marc: Here Sophie's first instinct is to call for Eliot for help.

Aldis: Boom, ting!

[Laughter]

John: There you go, I've actually seen somebody knock the top champagne glass off a stack of champagne glasses with the champagne like that.

Christian: Oh, yeah.

Aldis: Wow.

John: And we had a big discussion that day of exactly how this would happen, exactly how she would do it. And we were like, “We'll just put the cork in the dude's eye and swing to him.” And it looks great!

Christian: It does look great, absolutely.

John: And then she just brains the dude, no elegance on the second one.

Marc: And now we're back to our opening scene.

John: Yup, which is- you know, there was a time we talked about doing every episode like that.

Chris: I- you know I like it when it’s the finale, I like when we make it special.

John: Yeah, for a while we kinda did that jump.

Chris: You see it a lot, it's in The Hangover, it’s in, you know what I mean? It's done a lot now.

John: Yeah, but you know there is something for promises.

Christian: I enjoy it, like John says, it’s become a signature for the finale.

Chris: Yeah, I think so too.

Marc: This was a great speech. The writing on this was great, and she really delivered it.

John: That was Scott, that was the writing- he was the one who really dug in on who her character was, you know, while I was mucking around with plotting.

Scott: And taking over Oregon?

John: Oh, yes.

Scott: I mean San Lorenzo.

John: San Lorenzo. While I was doing my how you would actually take over a government thing. He was doing the- well you were the one who came up with the whole idea of she's Avita.

Scott: Yeah, right.

John: And that's exactly how she would go about winning their hearts, and what speeches she should make.

Scott: Yeah, cause having the chance to be Avita, that seems like the one thing that would be a true draw for her.

John: The one thing she wouldn't be able to resist.

Scott: Yeah, right.

John: And this is- now of course the audience knows she's not dead, but the fun of it is playing it out.

Marc: And these three just killed this scene.

Chris: So you said- you did all- all of this- all five pages?

John: We pretty much did the entire half act in one take, every setup.

Marc: Every set up. They went through five pages of dialogue each take.

Chris: Wow.

Scott: That’s crazy.

John: Just- and that's why you have such great coverage of this. You just kept parking the camera, moving it around and parking it. And they found this, I mean we got in there at lunch that day, and just walked the scene.

Christian: Oh this is the one you were talking about where they had their blocking down when you got there?

John: Well they had a good idea, and then they saw the room.

Marc: But it was really- you know, instead of- we do so many bits where we break things up in our show, cause we’re always cutting away to somewhere else, but you know, Tim said, Let's go through all five,” and these guys were like, “Alright, I'm in.” And they just fell into stride.

John: That was kinda those great actor- cause actors are all a little competitive. So when Tim said, “Let's do all five pages,” you saw Goran and Alastair look at each other like, “Alright yeah, yeah, we’ll do all five pages, yeah we’re prepped.”

[Laughter]

John: “We don't need sides, I'll see your five.” It’s great, and it really comes across in this scene. And that little smile.

Scott: Isn't that the speech that got a huge spontaneous applause in the screening?

Marc: Yes.

Scott: Yeah, that was awesome.

John: The- oh no it's coming up, the “I have the guns, I have the government, I have the-”

Scott: No, “I bought an election.” Isn't that coming up?

Marc: Yeah.

John: The- yeah, the “I have the guns, I have the government.”

Marc: Right here.

John: It’s like “No, no, I have a 24 year old genius with a smartphone and a problem with authority.”

Scott: That’s it! That’s it.

John: That got a giant applause break.

Aldis: That guy! This guy!

Scott: Who is that? Oh it's you.

Christian: Nice.

John: And I'll say actually, it's heavily influenced by Cory Doctorow's book, Little Brother.

Aldis: Oh.

John: About teenagers in a near future America who are oppressed by Homeland Security and strike back by using teenage geek culture and technology.

Christian: Wow.

Marc: It’s like our own little book club here.

[Laughter]

John: What do you guys think I do?

Chris: Read books.

John: What do you guys think I do? While you’re off touring the fucking world with your guitar, meeting beatiful girls. And you’re off doing your own thing?

Christian: Yeah, I get real quiet when all that stuff comes up.

John: I fucking read all the time, that’s my job.

[Laughter]

John: Some of us have homework forever, that's our job, that's our life.

Christian: I read two books, which is Call Of The Wild by Jack London and The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho.

[Laughter]

John: That was it.

Aldis: Everybody’s read The Alchemist, it's a great book.

John: Well there you go, there's your books from them.

Aldis: I'm rereading it for like the third time!

Scott: Marc, what did you think of The Alchemist?

Marc: I loved it.

John: No, this was a ton of fun.

Aldis: Age of the geek!

John: Age of the geek. You know, as we established, there's only, you know, X number of people in the country; it's not that hard to email all of them.

Chris: Right.

Aldis: Yeah, no.

John: Particularly since these small countries have controlled ISPs. Or governmental ISPs. This is a great show down. And sitting Tim here is actually great staging, cause it gives you three levels, three eye lines. Playing with information, playing with access to information is a crucial part of this. Alastair’s turn here, by the way, as he starts to slowly panic is kind of what anchors the scene.

Christian: Yes, he did such a great job.

Marc: Now it's like, “Where the hell did he come from?”

John: Yeah “Oh hey, yeah I fucked you.”

Marc: “Oh, and we stole your security.”

John: Now this was tricky, cause this was a series of nested flashbacks, and the first time we did post, we put the flashback process on the big Guillermo scene.

Christian: Oh yeah?

John: When he does the speech after Sophie’s been assassinated.

Christian: Oh, right.

John: But it made- it took all the emotional weight out of it.

Chris: Right, cause it felt like it already happened.

John: So it's actually one of the few times we do a flashback without this filter on it.

Chris: Yeah, that's true. And it works.

John: Yeah, it absolutely works. And also the line from season one: “We be the cavalry.” You're giving it, like, an Eliot signature here.

Christian: Yeah, yeah.

John: Something that Eliot says all the time. That's the fun of season three is you get to start to fill out the previous lives of these guys that they've had in the past.

Chris: And down.

Christian: That’s awesome.

Aldis: If you're asking, we hit them really hard.

Christian: Yeah, we did, we hit them really hard.

John: Yeah, you beat the hell out of the stunties.

Chris: You hit them hard?

Christian: We hit them hard.

John: Well they were wearing those things!

Christian: They were wearing helmets, and if you hit them softly you couldn't see the movement. So I said alright- they can't see it coming, so I was like, “I'm gonna have to hit ya.” And they were like, “Alright.”

John: Oh and this is Gina, by the way, wearing the pack.

Christian: Yeah.

John: Gina took the squibs.

Scott: Oh really?

John: Yeah, that's why she has the dress on, and that's why we could do it in closeup. Cause if it was a stuntie, we could do it with just the dress, but with Gina we could put the packs under the sweater, and we just ruin the sweater.

Christian: Yeah, she did the stunt, I was very very proud of her.

Scott: And those hurt, right?

Christian: Oh yeah.

John: Yeah those things are scary.

Marc: This was a great speech.

Christian: You turn them around, you’re dead. People don't realize that, that's actually a bullet coming out.

John: No, Gina was a fucking trooper. Yeah, this was a great speech, he nailed it. The slow push in on him. We were joking the night we were shooting this, like, “This scene will be recreated on San Lorenzo television, like, 20 years from now.”

[Laughter]

John: With actors when they do the documentary. And there will be people like, “You know Rebecca Ibanez wasn't alive.” “Oh you're one of those people are you?” “She wasn't a real person!”

Chris: This guy has a real arc in this show.

John: Yeah, he does.

Chris: This is not something we typically do.

John: This was the thing, it's like and now he is complicit in our crime. We’ve taken the only-

Chris: No, no, but it takes the fact that he has this arc, that he's become worthy of the office that we've manipulated. I think it really takes away from the fact that the mark in this episode are the people of San Lorenzo. That's the difference!

[Laughter]

John: But we’re doing it for them!

Chris: It's not right, but we've given them a worthy leader.

John: We were actually joking about the fact that after he did that scene, I said, “Michael Vittori’s reign of genocide began that night.”

[Laughter]

John: “Oh, oh we didn't think this out at all.”

[Laughter]

John: “20 years of terror.” “Oh, that was a bad move on our part.”

Chris: Well, watch the documentary.

Scott: Yeah, exactly.

John: This is great, this was the chess match.

Marc: Yeah.

John: Where it literally became Alastair is the chessboard, and the two of them squaring up on him.

Scott: Yeah.

John: And the two windows behind them.

Chris: And there you go! there’s the shot, what's he gonna do? Who’s he gonna go with?

Scott: Bachelor number one or bachelor number two?

[Laughter]

Marc: “How big of an estate?”

John: “How big of an estate?” No really, I've been watching a lot of noir lately and he's just doing it perfectly, he's just doing a throwback to a 40’s character actor here. Just playing- really underplaying it.

Chris: Yeah the, “I'm shocked! Shocked that there's gambling in this going on here!”

John: “Gambling in this establishment!” He's absolutely playing Casablanca.

[Laughter]

John: He could not be more Claude Rains at this moment. No, and then the flashback to the very beginning of the episode to set it up. This law was in place in the United States up until the 1830s, by the way.

Marc: There you have it.

John: James Madison actually considered using it at one point. Seizing the assets of his political opponents.

Scott: Really?

John: Yes, absolutely.

Scott: Very useful law.

John: Not one we have now, thank goodness. Very useful law for us.

[Laughter]

John: And that moment kinda blows by, actually.

Christian: Yeah, wow.

John: “The guys coming in are honest, so I need a corrupt man.” The entire plan depends on using the most corrupt man.

Marc: Bye!

Chris: Waving goodbye.

John: This is great. And what I love also here is they're playing it like, “We will gun your ass down if you don't give up the desk.”

Christian: Yup, it’s strong arm, it is.

John: What I also love here is the moment, like, “Wait, did we just spring a war criminal in order to win?”

[Laughter]

John: Yeah, kinda. But he's our war criminal.

Scott: Yeah, he's a good war criminal.

John: Yeah, exactly. The blood on the shirt is a nice touch. Nadine really killed that.

Marc: Yeah.

John: And the reveal. And now the gloat, the crucial gloat.

Marc: Bad guy has to suffer.

John: Bad guy must suffer, our guys must gloat, we must see the victims rewarded. She looks great in that shot, that’s again, very classic 1960’s.

Aldis: When does she not look great?

Scott: I was about to say, unlike usually?

John: Well just, you know, she looks very exactly that 60’s spy vibe there, you know.

Aldis: Yeah.

John: Also fun, we stumbled across that last line of, “Damien Moreau will never leave San Lorenzo.” I think we actually wrote it on the set.

Chris: Well she says it in the garage.

John: Yeah she says it earlier, and I think we were on set going, “Oh wait.” And we tossed it out, yeah.

Marc: This is our first scene we shot with Goran, and that's what we see.

John: We locked him in a cell.

Christian: For some reason I'm just unconvinced that a little cage like that is gonna hold Damien Moreau, I'm just saying.

Chris: Nooo.

John: What? No. By the way, this- I love this. This is just so over the top and perfect and right.

[Laughter]

John: I was actually in New York when Princess Di died, and I remember going-

Chris: But look how much information you pack in one shot here.

John: Yeah, exactly. You know she's been sainted.

Chris: You have a shrine to her, everyone knows she's dead, you have what's happening in San Lorenzo, we pan up and-

Aldis: Yet again, she's at her own funeral.

Scott: Yeah that's a great one.

Chris: And we begin our scene. I mean that is a great shot.

John: That is a great shot.

[Laughter]

John: And there she is, in the ridiculous hat.

Christian: Wow.

[Laughter]

Christian: Really a great shot.

John: That’s- well that's the trick, we expect the audience to keep up on these episodes.

Aldis: Yeah.

Christian: She has a habit of showing up at her own funerals, doesn’t she?

Aldis: Yeah she does, bad habit.

John: It’s a character trait now; it's a feature, not a bug. No, and it's a lovely speech.

Christian: It's the actress, it's the old off broadway actors. “Do they like me? Do they love me? Who showed up?”

John: Exactly. This was great, by the way, was finally take the sting out of the relationship, only to utterly subvert it 30 seconds later. But the two of them are such good friends, and the characters had come to a new parity this season, they really acted the hell out of this. She's wonderful in this.

Aldis: By the way, in case you haven’t noticed, there goes Tim's hat again. Another hat.

Marc: And again a oner.

John: And a oner.

Scott: Yeah, that's right.

Marc: Gary Camp walking backwards.

Aldis: Yeah, the work that Gary Camp actually does.

John: Yeah, we should pay him more than you, is that what you're saying?

Aldis: Nah, I'm saying the audience-

Christian: I'm pretty sure he does.

Marc: This is a great line.

John: The “I don't travel with luggage.”

Marc: “I don't travel with luggage.”

John: All right-thinking men don't travel with luggage. Luggage is for women. Men buy shit when they get there, I'm just saying.

Christian: Oh Parker does.

John: Yeah this was a ton of fun, figuring out what everyone's tie up for the season was.

Aldis: Yeah.

John: Of course Parker stole shit, she's Parker! Not gonna leave the country and not-

Aldis: Kinda a shame that Hardison didn't steal gold bars.

John: Actually in the original version of this we were at the estate.

Chris: Yeah.

John: When we originally broke it, we wound up going to the estate, and then we realized we couldn't find an Italian estate in Portland, that was a little tricky. Ton of fun, was this just a random room? This was a meeting room we made a bedroom.

Marc: Yes.

John: And at one point we had Gina outside the window.

Marc: Yeah.

John: That was not such a good idea.

Marc: Well.

John: Well there's a tiny ledge out there.

Aldis: Ahaha, and wait for it, wait for it!

Chris: Oh this is a classic.

Aldis: Boom! Knocking the boots! [Sing-songy] Bow chicka bow bow.

John: The little zoom in there you go.

Christian: Bwooooo!

Aldis: Bwooo!

[Laughter]

John: And fans across America scream.

Scott: Yeah.

John: That’s great. No, they didn’t have sex, they just cuddled.

Christian: Right.

Aldis: Oh yeah, for sure, for sure.

Scott: Didn't you tell me she read that and she thought it was a joke, she didn't think it was real?

John: Yeah she thought we were giving her a fake ending.

Chris: Oh c’mon.

John: Like nope, you guys did it!

Aldis: You did it!

Chris: Season three, we’re moving on.

Christian: Season three! Thank you so much guys, some of the best writing, the best directing I've ever had man, it's just unbelievable.

Aldis: Thank y’all for staying until the finish.

John: Marc, you directed the hell out of those, that was fantastic.

Chris: Yeah, these are-

Christian: Awesome!

Marc: Had a lot of help.

Aldis: Roskooni!

Chris: These are -

John: Alright, season four coming up.

Christian: Come on!

Aldis: Peace, people!!

Marc: Stay tuned.

#Leverage #Leverage TNT #Leverage Audio Commentary Transcripts #Audio Commentary #Transcripts #Parker #Alec Hardison #Elliot Spencer #Nate Ford #Sophie Devereaux #Season 3 #Episode 16 #Season 3 Episode 16 #The San Lorenzo Job

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dr3amofagame · 6 months

Text

honestly, there's probably a lot you can say abt c!dream in terms of losing even when he wins. because, tbh, this is...consistent.

c!dream is very intelligent and very good at PVP and these are well-established traits from the beginning of the server. he is skilled at thinking strategically and therefore is often able to navigate unfavorable situations to him in order to successfully achieve some goal of his. in terms of achieving goals, c!Dream isn't half bad in the slightest! but how do these goals actually work out for him?

in the revolution, c!dream successfully leads his side to victory while minimizing damage to his own people (and, sometimes, minimizing damage across the board: see him telling his men to hold fire to allow lmanburgians to retrieve their items.) the most amount of risk to anyone on his side is during the duel, where he ended up on half a heart to determine the end result of the war. and it's quite undeniable that c!dream wins the war--he gets to set the terms of the peace, gives them "technical" independence as he planned to from the start but says that he and the rest of the Dream SMP will view them as constituents of the greater server and gets both discs after c!tommy offers them willingly. by all means, on paper, a glowing success.

only time passes and as others treat l'manburg as independent, he is forced to do the same. "suck it green boy" becomes one of the most common catchphrases of the server when the independence that was granted them in the book that this statement was written was. literally given to them out of c!dream's mercy? and not out of their victory? he loses both discs AND significant leverage against himself due to various conflicts that involved people stealing from him and/or blackmailing him when he literally wasn't doing anything. l'manburg's ranks have swelled and the story established by it and its independence has long since drowned out any other perspective on the war.

then, in manberg/pogtopia, c!dream enters into the conflict from the perspective of wanting c!schlatt out of power. later on, remaining loyal to c!wilbur, he helps him to successfully pull off the plot to blow up L'manburg and also manages to obtain the revive book through a brief alliance with c!Schlatt. once again, his goals were successfully pulled off in no small part due to his strategizing.

and yet, in the long run, what does c!dream really gain? the revive book is something he evidently didn't know about until the trade with c!Schlatt, and the knowledge of it fucking destroys him. with both c!Schlatt and c!Wilbur dead, he immediately ends up as enemy number one, something c!Wilbur himself states later on. c!Dream, who had never really had any particularly stable alliances pre-manberg anyway, comes out the other side of November 16th even more alone than he had been before, publicly distrusted (not that he was ever really trusted, even by Pogtopia before he officially starts working against them because of the revive book, something that the content creator himself has stated was created purely to explain why c!Dream would switch sides.) the destruction of L'manburg is merely temporary. the plan to blow up L'manburg was c!wilbur's in creation, and considering how open c!Dream is about disliking c!Schlatt, I really hesitate to think that he was going out of his way to ally with guy unless he himself intentionally revealed the revive book to this end (like. c!schlatt is a smart guy, bro.)

c!dream is "secretive" about just about nothing at this time, besides I guess his actually helping Pogtopia (if you can call this guy telling the fucking Manberg cabinet that it's L'manburg, not Manberg, being secretive el em ay oh)--he's open about helping c!Wilbur with the TNT (and c!Wilbur you know, makes a point of doing it in front of an audience both times he asks c!Dream for TNT as well) in Vassal and then on November 6th, and that exact stream is also where he literally walks in the middle of Pogtopia to say hey guys. I'm Betraying You Now. like ???

everything he gains at this time culminates to 1) he helps c!Wilbur successfully pull off a plan that c!Wilbur himself came up with and wanted to pull off and does, to some degree, pressure c!Dream into agreeing with him about--even if c!Dream was going to give him the TNT no matter what, he does display a measure of resistance during Vassal Speech (whether or not you believe this resistance was genuine) and c!Wilbur responds to that by kinda threatening him. So. and 2) he gets the revive book by acting in service to a guy that was clearly established as someone he disliked and feared, and that book is also something that we KNOW scared the shit out of him and like ended up prompting a paranoid spiral that ends with him creating a whole goddamn prison to put himself inside. soooooooo. you know. and all of this is happening at the same time that his losses end up turning into "by the time november 16th rolls around and is over and done with most people either want him dead or are very very close to wanting him dead, cheers!"

then obviously, there's everything from november 16th to the staged disc finale. again, we see c!Dream pulling strategic plays left and right and achieving the goals he has--at this point, often through, uh, less than savory means. through political bullshit with NLM and well, exile, he manages to get the disc during green festival; through helping c!Techno against the butcher army, he manages to obtain a favor; through stuff involving the enderwalk and some kinda deal that im p sure has remained unspecified, he manages to get Cat from c!Skeppy; through experiments with c!Punz, he gets information on the revive book; through green festival, obtaining both discs (and therefore no longer needing to act in terms of political interests with NLM), and establishing common ground with c!Techno, he's able to destroy L'manburg through Doomsday; through having the discs + everyone hating his guts because of Green Festival, Doomsday, and to be fair everyone literally just hating his guts from the outset, he is able to ensure the security of c!Punz, the revive book, and himself by locking himself in prison. A lot of different moving parts, a lot of different goals, a lot of running around the server to get what he needs to get done done at the right times in the right ways, and he manages to con the server and put himself exactly where he wanted to be.

and yet?? and yet??? sure, he pulls off what he wants to pull off, sure he achieves his goals, but in terms of actually winning? he's paranoid and the paranoia just keeps getting worse. the threats to his life and the amount of enemies that want him dead just keep growing in numbers. he finally gets lmanburg blown up for good but you know there's going to be like 4 more factions on this server by the time he gets imprisoned. his friends ditch him and then try to kill him when he clumsily tries to communicate that he's trying to protect them because of the paranoia he has about everyone hating his guts, he explicitly identifies the reasons for people's hatred as having a lot to do with manberg/pogtopia arc where he ends up helping two dead men that aren't around for people to hate anymore, he pulls off staged finale and puts himself in a prison that ends up shattering himself.

like he achieves his goals--even if we're talking about the prison, even if we're talking about the time where things most thoroughly go awry for him because of c!sam's betrayal, you can't say that he didn't achieve what he intended. c!sam kept him alive, and would do anything to keep him alive--he might've been wrong about a lot, but he wasn't wrong about that. and yet. AND YET.

c!dream achieves his goals but where does he end up? miserable and afraid of literally damn near everything and losing his whole mind in the exact prison that he constructed to keep himself safe when in a paranoid spiral about a hostile world that suddenly made so much less sense than he was used to--alone.

like. wdym doesn't lose all he does is lose literally everything he ever had like 😭😭😭😭😭

#c!dreamisms #it's alllll fear all the way down #i have Strong Feelings about manberg/pogtopia too #but that'll have to go into a different post #i feel like. regardless of what you feel like c!dream's /goals/ were in manberg/pogtopia tho #it's kinda undeniable that he loses more than he gains?#i mean unless you're going from the perspective of 'well he kinda lost all of that anyway from the beginning by just being dream'#because to be fair how much of the hatred is even in direct consequence of what he does #even with the inclusion of the revive book it's like. all that did was make him more paranoid #when the ENTIRETY of manberg/pogtopia and how it ended up working out #really did nothing but make him . more of The Enemy and give him more reason to fear for his life #and meanwhile like what did he even gain from blowing up lmanburg fr it remained blown up for like a week #not even #but yeah like. even when he does what he wants. even when he wins? he's not really winning is he

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