“The Pediatric Oncologist” sets its stakes with two key scenes. First, we meet Matt’s new girlfriend Linda, played by the always-great Rebecca Hall. Elements of their incompatibility surface early as she reveals that she hasn’t seen any of the seven-film hit franchise MK Ultra, one of Matt’s greatest achievements, a series that has made $3.8 billion globally. They plan a marathon, complete with live commentary from Matt, which sounds like a special kind of torture. (The look that crosses Hall’s face at this suggestion is further proof of her excellent subtlety.) Even from the beginning, she’s putting him in a box with lines she thinks are compliments like “You don’t take yourself seriously at all.” She’s going to find out how wrong that is.
The second set-up scene takes place at Continental with a viewing of the trailer for Duhpocalypse!. A zombie takes its pants down and projectile shits on Hutcherson, dooming him. Is it too ridiculous to exist in the real world? Arguably. Most of the in-universe films in The Studio have felt like legit variations on actual projects like the Smile and Chinatown rip-offs in the last two episodes. But don’t forget how much the Jonze/Knoxville projects within the Jackass universe have revolutionized the poop joke.
While the gang at Continental tries to get the trailer ready by 10pm for the poopapalooza, Matt heads out to the gala with Linda, and things get testy with Linda’s doctor friends pretty quickly. They haven’t heard of Ari Aster, they haven’t been to the theater since Barbenheimer, they stream everything now. It’s a calibrated series of micro-aggressions for a Hollywood producer who takes himself very seriously. Before you know it, he’s shouting things like “We all have very high-pressure jobs!” As Matt compares what he does to people who literally save lives, he’s supposed to sound kind of like an idiot, but they are also undeniably ganging up on him. Listen, Matt’s not “right,” but Rogen and Goldberg avoid making him into too much of a caricature as he’s surrounded by people basically calling him king of the idiots. The episode is filled with great lines—“People die on movie sets all the time,” “Picasso’s Guernica and The Emoji Movie are both art”—that raise the tension at the gala to a boil.
It culminates in an auction in which the table of doctors is excitedly trying to bid on a golf vacation in Ireland. Of course, the extremely wealthy Matt is going to out-bid them at the last minute, and, honestly, they kind of deserve it. Linda talks him into gifting the trip to her colleagues, but he insists that they say that “what I do is as important as what you all do.” What follows is becoming a trademark of The Studio: an explosive, final-act, all-out, no-rules showdown. Several episodes have built conflict in a way that leads to chaos whether it’s hurled burritos on the Continental lot or Ron Howard throwing his hat at Matt. People in this world don’t back down. They push through.
This week’s showdown sends Matt fleeing down a hall, where he trips and breaks his finger. He goes back to the gala, kind of in a daze, and ends up crashing into a table. In a final act of generosity, Linda says that she will get him a private room at the hospital. He points out there will be a screen on the wall.
Stray observations
- • This is the first episode to directly reference the show that Rogen and Goldberg had to hear comparisons to during production. And it’s perfect because Matt uses the kind of non-compliment that Hollywood moguls are so good at tossing out: “Entourage was a show beloved by millions.” Not him. But millions.
- • Rogen and Goldberg are building a funny universe of made-up films. My favorite this episode is that Matt is proud enough to mention that he made Dumb Guys 1 and 2. Real top-of-the-resume stuff there.
- • Another great line: “It’s a very deep and complex film, but I want that diarrhea explosion.”
- • There’s a lot of talk about the many movies that have used the Wilshire Ebell Theatre, where the gala is taking place, as a set, including Oppenheimer and Gigli. That’s the first time those two films have ever been in a sentence. I was curious about the history of the place, and this is a great piece on it.
