Dear Sister

Pop-ups (30 · 1 fan pick from YouTube comments)

1. Sweet 16 vote and departures

   0:10

   Akiva references a Vulture-published Sweet 16 bracket and notes that the voters were only the staffers still at the show at that time, since he, Andy, and Jorma had left.

   Me, Andy, and Jorm had left the show at this point.

2. Podcast vs. episode naming argument

   1:04

   The hosts quibble over calling the show a podcast, a running dispute that recurs throughout the episode.

   Because podcasts are so bad as a medium.

3. O.C. origins of Dear Sister

   1:56

   The hosts were huge O.C. fans, and the sketch grew out of their love of the show's Season 2 finale.

   So we were huge OC heads. We watched every ep of the OC.

4. The O.C. slow-mo gunshot ending

   2:36

   The Season 2 O.C. finale ends with a slow-motion gunshot set to Imogen Heap's "Cranked Slow Mo," a moment that became the blueprint for Dear Sister.

   The end of that second season then ends with a moment.

5. Dear Sister's unfinished first pass

   3:24

   The trio had shot the opening beats years earlier with a different cast but never finished the bit, and revived it when they needed material.

   We didn't think of the ending, but we had the first few beats

6. Two-year turnaround to air

   3:54

   The hosts note the sketch was roughly two years from its earliest version to airing, which is a quick turnaround for pop-culture parody.

   So it was two years.

7. Keenan's Thursday night shoot story

   6:03

   Seth shares a Keenan anecdote about a 5 a.m. call time after a nightclub, tying into the late-night shoot vibe of Dear Sister.

   Keenan had a 5 a.m. call time to go do a short film.

8. The plastic pellet gun

   9:43

   The gun used on set was a personal plastic-pellet prop Akiva bought on a European trip at 17, reused from the original shoot.

   It's the same gun and it's not even one from SNL.

9. Network-TV gore level

   10:21

   The sketch keeps its blood minimal on purpose, aiming for emotion over gore so the joke is not a Tarantino spoof.

   It was not like we were doing like a Tarantino spoof or something.

10. Pulled after a real shooting

    11:06

    A real-world shooting the Monday after airing led SNL to scrub the sketch from reruns that year, making it one of the harder-to-find shorts for a long time.

    And it was a incredibly tragic, a lot of casualties.

11. Mona Lisa comparison

    12:11

    Jorma compares the scarcity of Dear Sister to the Mona Lisa theft, arguing that being hard to see made it spread.

    This is our Mona Lisa. Maybe.

12. Fan remixes become a meme

    13:03

    Fans re-cut the sketch with footage from other TV shows and films, making it a YouTube meme before it was an SNL classic.

    quote-unquote fan-made videos redoing it

13. Airbnb sponsor read

    13:31

    The episode includes a sponsored Airbnb ad read, placed between sketch segments.

    Saporat comes from Airbnb.

14. Rachel Bilson voice note

    13:55

    The O.C. star Rachel Bilson sends a voice note saying she only saw Dear Sister recently and prefers it to the original scene.

    I much prefer it to the actual scene of Trey shooting his brother.

15. Jorma defends the original scene

    14:51

    Jorma pushes back on Rachel Bilson's take, saying the original O.C. scene is still great and inspired the sketch.

    I only disagree with one thing, which is what she said

16. Sweet 16 seed for Dear Sister

    15:12

    Dear Sister was a six seed in the Final 64 of the hosts' cast-voted ranking and didn't make the Sweet 16.

    It was seed number six, Dear Sister, Japanese Office
    Criterion

17. Imogen Heap fandom

    17:24

    The hosts reveal their favorite Imogen Heap song is "Hide and Seek," and the group consensus lands there.

    Favorite Image and Heap song? Hide and Seek.

18. Sofa King sketch

    17:51

    Sofa King is an SNL sketch in which a sofa-shop pitch riffs on Higgins-style humor.

    Sofa King. Here at Sofa King, we have all kinds of sofas.

19. Inventing the Tuesday promo

    18:55

    The hosts claim they invented the Tuesday pre-taped promo after Lauren asked them to film promos that day.

    We invented the Tuesday promo.

20. Buying Beer sketch

    19:22

    Buying Beer, a Harper Steele-written sketch, has underage dudes faking ID with fake mustaches and business cards.

    Yeah. Buying beer.

21. Slice Co Knives sketch

    21:53

    Slice Co Knives features Blade P. Cutsworth and Bernard Throttlehunt trying to sell knives to a customer who already owns every knife.

    Blade P. Cutsworth. Shia, his protege, is Bernard Throttlehunt

22. Monkey Business and flying monkeys

    23:19

    Monkey Business is a sketch where Shia is told to stop monkey business, then finds flying monkeys upstairs; Jorma prayed it wouldn't air.

    Shia has been told by his parents to cut out the monkey business.

23. Vague SNL sketch titles

    24:24

    SNL writers kept titles deliberately vague so no joke was spoiled, which is why Roommate Meeting sounds nothing like its content.

    we always made the title super vague

24. Seth's Tulsa bon mot

    24:58

    Seth recounts a dinner party quip: asked where he lives, he says Tulsa to a 'between New York and L.A.' answer.

    I live between New York and L.A. And I said, Tulsa?

25. Fans point here

    28:00

    2 YouTube comments timestamp this moment, 21 likes.

    I would say it's called an obviously did it sketch. There you go. All right, now there's a YouTube video here called How Dear Sister Changed Comedy. Really? Oh, let's just run that. We didn't write it, guys. We did not… — Andy

26. How Dear Sister Changed Comedy

    28:03

    Karsten Runquist's 1.4-million-view YouTube video argues Dear Sister changed comedy, shown during the episode.

    How Dear Sister Changed Comedy.

27. Criterion vote for Dear Sister

    28:41

    The hosts vote Dear Sister into the Criterion collection, noting they are a little insulted it missed the Sweet 16.

    Dear Sister, Criterion? Yes.
    Criterion

28. Late-comment realization

    29:34

    A YouTube commenter says they finally got Dear Sister after watching the end of O.C. season two.

    Just watch the end of OC season two and it finally clicked

29. Lutz voice note callback

    30:56

    Lutz returns with a voice note after the hosts told him an earlier one was weak, a callback to the Peyton Manning episode.

    I gave him the bad news that Andy kind of thought they weren't good voice notes.

30. Commence and podcast romance

    32:33

    Andy jokes that 'commence' takes the romance out of podcasting, as a playful takedown of formal language.

    It felt to me, Seth, like if you're about to like have sex

31. Foggy London Town and Yanks

    33:20

    The hosts riff on the phrase 'Foggy London Town' and the term 'yanks' as an in-group joke about Americans in London.

    Foggy London Town. Yanks.
    Foggy London Town