Franks and Beans makes its glorious return with episode 19, “Is it Cold in Here?”, the first of what hopefully will be a long, universe-altering sting of episodes over the next few months.  As you might have noticed, we do tend to go through phases where certain blocks of episodes share a particular theme, and this is no different.  This is in no ways intentional – I guess I like to come up with different variations of similar topics.  Whereas previous episodes centered around singing and music, these new episodes have food as a main prop.  And where terrible violence plays an important role in episodes past, the current batch features…well, more violence.  I guess that says something about me and my writing style.  Or just about me.  Hey, did I mention that this episode has an oven in it?

Speaking of things that generate relative amounts of heat, we begin this episode with the image of a sleeping Jeff, only – and get this – I’m NOT sleeping: I’m only PRETENDING to sleep.  I only mention this because of my award-worthy performance as “guy sleeping on the couch”.  Did you see that sudden jerking as I fake-awake?  The sleep-induced rubbing of the face?  The stumbling throughout the living room, as if I was truly groggy from an impromptu nap?  That’s called acting, folks, and it’s not something you can learn.  You either have it or you don’t.

What I’m saying is, I tried.

Moving along, I’d like to take a moment and talk about the writing process on Franks and Beans for a few seconds, and what Larry and I each bring to the process.  I find, the longer that we work together on this project, that we are both comfortable with different aspects of the production as a whole, and that includes the writing portion.  I am the type of person who needs a quiet room with no distractions, time to prepare, think, write and rewrite.  This is when, I think, I am at my funniest.  I have my moments, but as a whole I’m not a spontaneously funny guy.  Larry, on the other hand, doesn’t add much to the initial scripting process, but he always manages to catch things during the filming process that I’d never think of, and this episode is a good example of that.

In any given episode – at least after we had gotten a few of them under our belts – you’ll find obvious and not-so-obvious nods to previous jokes.  I’m a fan of these, whether they work well in the context of the next episode or not, as long as they don’t ruin the show we’re working on at the moment.  Larry, as he enters the house after I’ve managed to crawl into the oven, takes his jacket off and throws it over the railing that leads downstairs, a fairly obvious reference to our very first episode, “High School”.  This gem of an easter egg was added at the last moment at the behest of Larry – it’s something that I’m often too absorbed to think of during filming, but it’s a testament to what Larry always seems to catch.

Larry can also be seen putting on a sweater as he comes to check on his ill-fated pizza a little later on – he thought that this would be “the obvious thing to do” if he were cold.  The distinction between this calm rationale and my character’s deadly impulsiveness is one of the factors that drives this episode, and was also a brainchild of Larry’s, for which I must respond…have more children, Larry.  In your brain.

In regards to the visual effect of me putting myself in a warm oven (one of my mother’s worst nightmares, let me tell you), I’m reminded of the DVD commentary on “The Weird Al Show”.  If you don’t remember this program, don’t worry – it was a one season, 13-episode bust, but as I am a collector of everything “Weird Al” Yankovic, I own it and love it (the commentary is, in all seriousness, worth buying the box set for, though).  During the commentary, Al and his various guests discuss the problems they had with CBS during filming, especially when it came down to “imitateable behavior” on the show.  That is, they were strongly discouraged from showing things like someone smashing plates on their head or shaving their eyebrows, as children watching the program (this was Saturday-morning fare) might be encouraged to duplicate the stunts.  This served as an endless headache for those working on the show, though they usually managed to find a way to sneak a few undesirable clips in during any given episode.

It is with this mindset that I watch “Is it Cold in Here?”.  Though Franks and Beans is listed under “clean comedy” in the Funny or Die rank and file, and I generally feel that it lives up to that billing, I don’t intend it for a younger audience – if nothing else, I can imagine my parents catching me watching sometime similar 15 years ago and taking away my internet privileges (did we have the internet back then?).  But even so, I still chuckle to imagine the reaction we’d get if this episode were played on television with children anywhere in a 50-foot radius.  I sometimes fret about playing the “Milkshake” song or wearing Steelers gear in an episode, but showing me willingly entering an oven would probably get us sued faster than either of those infringements.

This episode – 19 episodes in, at that – features a first here on Franks and Beans: we actually have our first production-inspired purchase on display.  If you couldn’t guess, it’s the sad-looking pizza that Larry so gracefully slides out onto the oven tray.  On my way to Larry’s house – er, the studio – in the morning, I get a call.  “You should go ahead and buy a pizza,” Larry suggested, as it was an integral prop for the upcoming episode.  If the pizza looks like it cost a dollar fifty, that’s because it did – I bought the cheapest pizza that I possibly could.  We ate the pizza (surprisingly good, all things considered) but saved the box, knowing that a moment such as that should be saved for posterity.  We’re thinking of putting it up on eBay.  Really.  Eventually.

Another exciting feature to this episode hasn’t actually been seen yet.  That’s because in just another week or so from this posting, we’ll release the special, extra-featureish EXTENDED EDITION for your viewing pleasure.  The ending you see here is exactly what we had in mind for “Is it Cold in Here?”, but this new addition just adds a little more oomph, I think.  Look for that soon.

Finally, we come to the ever-present “NO!” ending, in which we see Larry dressed up as a character from the best movie I’ve ever seen EVER, The Dark Knight.  Rest assured, Larry didn’t concoct this getup just for F&B, but it certainly serves its purpose.  Here’s a fun fact for you fans out there – Larry is a maniac when it comes to Halloween costumes and costume parties (hence the earlier Hulk Hogan ending), and this selection stacks up there with the best of them…though He-Man might still be my favorite.

Assuming that this blog gets posted on a Sunday, and assuming that you read it right away (which you do…you do), you’re in for a treat – you’ve only got to wait one more day (!) until the next episode of Franks and Beans hits the air.  So keep an eye out for it…and I’ll see you then!

- Jeff M.

One of the reasons that Franks and Beans was created was to air episode two, “Perfect”.  Its inception was born out of distance and a longing to reconnect with friends through visual expression, something that both Larry and I have been involved with, in different capacities, for much of the last decade.

This isn’t to say that either of us necessarily felt like we were missing something.  Sometimes the world looks perfect – nothing to rearrange.  But that doesn’t mean that Franks and Beans hasn’t become a welcome outlet for our creative energies.  It doesn’t mean that it hasn’t allowed us to take what we had and add something new to the mix.  I mean, after all, sometimes you just get a feeling like you need some kind of change.

The challenges of creating a new program are many in any circumstance, and Larry and I have our share – from having to do most everything ourselves to our obvious budgetary restraints – but I’m happy to say that we’ve taken these challenges and have made most of them work to our advantage.  It’s as if we looked at this daunting task and said that no matter what the odds are this time, nothing’s gonna stand in our way – and we’ve certainly reaped the rewards that have come as a result.  By this I’m not just talking about spreading our particular brand of humor to the far reaches of the globe (though that does have its own appeal to it) or in hearing from people who have seen the show and have enjoyed it.

No, the show has taken on its own life with the two of us, as if it is its own person.  And that’s encouraging, because we each have a great deal of passion for it – a flame in our hearts, if you will, like a long lost friend.  And because of this, we both can take solace in the fact that while we are of course the custodians behind this Internet program, Franks and Beans can resonate to people who have never met us – each vignette can mean something different to someone else, but even so, there’s interpretation, there’s understanding, there’s enjoyment at different levels with each view an episode of ours gets, and I’m comforted by that.  It’s like, from a metaphorical standpoint, every dark street has a light at the end!

…STANDING TAAAAAAALL!!!

A-hem.

While the above follows an obvious pattern, everything that I wrote it true – episode two, “Perfect”, IS one of the reasons that Franks and Beans was created.  In fact, it’s one of the first thoughts I had in mind when I contacted Larry with the idea of creating some skits for online viewing more than a year ago.  And if one of your friends (you have friends, right?) called you up and asked you, “I’ve been hearing a lot about this ‘Franks and Beans’ thing lately…what’s it all about?”, I think that this episode would be the perfect answer.

Larry and I were both born in the early years of the 1980s, and as anyone from that particular period can attest, one thing that connects us is the TGIF television lineup.  Regardless of race, gender or religious preferences, if you grew up in the 1980s you inevitably watched shows like Family Matters or Step-By-Step (which was Patrick Dufferific).  If you are anything like me, you not only watched shows such as these, but you also grew to hate them and their cookie-cutter plotlines and asinine humor over time.  But even with these obvious flaws, I still relate to them, still feel an attachment to Bob Sagat’s sugar-sweet “aw shucks” humor or Urkel’s litany of catch phrases.  One show, airing a little earlier than many of the TGIF mainstays, has stuck with me more than many, though, and that is without a doubt Perfect Strangers.

I don’t know what exactly did it for me, but Perfect Strangers has either enriched my upbringing or scarred me for the rest of my existence, because I couldn’t forget it’s particular brand of sitcom-ness if my life depended on it.  Looking back on the show, I wonder if the humor was as simple as it seems now – are we really just laughing at Balki because of his foreign, eastern European antics?  Is Perfect Strangers a reflection of American perception in the 1980s?  Surely, it had to be more than that, but at age seven, I was probably just taken in by lines like “Get out of the city!” even though I didn’t even understand that there was a proper phrase that the character just couldn’t grasp.

No matter what mark Perfect Strangers has left on society, it has indelibly left its mark on me, and episode two of Franks and Beans is nothing more than a love note in regards to that fact.  Yes, Larry catches me singing and I display embarrassment both for being caught and for being caught signing THAT song.  But the catch, the subtle nod, is that Larry remembers, Larry sings, Larry can’t escape Perfect Strangers any more than I can.  It’s something that we all have to live with.

Plus, Larry’s character was totally named after Larry Appleton, not Larry Franks, as he would lead you to believe.  How did he get his hair to curl like that?!

As you’ve noticed, there are some new episodes of Franks and Beans online.  You may be wondering why there aren’t any blogs for those particular episodes.  Firstly, get off my back!  Secondly, I’m working on them.  We’ll catch up in the next few days.  So keep an eye out for those, and check back next Monday for another new episode!  We’re hoping to put together a nice long run.

- Jeff M.

I know that times are tough.  The economy is in the tank, the doldrums of winter are fast approaching, and chances are that you’re alone and nobody loves you.  Oh, and Franks and Beans has been conspicuously absent from your Internet-viewing lineup for what seems like years.  But you’re strong – you can take a little hardship.  Just like in Communist Russia, you’ll wait out this long dry spell, huddling under blankets in your small, one-room house with only your picture of Joseph Stalin to keep you company and offer what consolation he can.

Just like a squirrel scavenging over the icy tundra, you’ll gleefully take a quick snack if you can get it – in this case, the squirrel is you and the tasty acorn is an impromptu blog about our surprisingly well loved and remembered third episode, “The Change”.

This episode is something of an anomaly not in the fact that it tells basically one single joke or that it employs a relatively simple storytelling style, but in that I never expected the overwhelmingly positive response it got from anyone who decided to tell Larry or me their thoughts.  I can usually gauge the type of reaction a particular episode will get while we’re still shooting – it’s not that I don’t like “The Change” (I do, by the way), but to me the whole thing plays out in a very straightforward manner.  You probably get the joke after Larry gets out of his beloved Jeep and walks inside, and that’s…what?  Ten seconds into it?  Naturally, the timing of the joke plays a part in it – the long pause between Larry sitting down and me finally saying a line of dialogue is, I think, funnier than the actual dialogue, but what people seemed to enjoy more than anything was the fact that Larry had a different outfit on in basically every shot.

And really, I just don’t get it.  I mean, something like this might be cute to, say, someone’s aunt or people who enjoyed naming all of the animals running across the screen in “Jumanji”, but is there really any inherent humor in the fact that Larry is wearing something different?  It leads up to the joke, yes, but are the clothes by themselves funny?  I guess they are, because people loved that part of it.  And you know what?  If that’s what gets them to laugh at one of our episodes, then so be it.  I’m just happy that people had an opinion.

This episode also highlights Larry’s incessant need to add some aspect of product placement into random scenes of Franks and Beans.  Larry the person is a big fan of lots of different properties.  This influences Larry the character to toss aspect of those properties into episodes for everyone to see.  I can understand the urge – in the first episode I wore my Thing “You Rock!” shirt and in “Mustache” I can be seen holding an issue of the Fantastic Four comic, but Larry does it with much more gusto than I could hope to.  Larry’s Rocky shorts (I believe these came with a box set of DVDs) made me cringe when he showed up in them for one of the shots, but again, people loved the cameo.  Was it funny?  Apparently so!

What I found funniest about this episode – so funny that we took the concept and turned it into a whole episode – was the sight of Larry without a shirt on.  I don’t know what it is that I find so amusing…perhaps Larry’s nipples is what gets me chuckling?  But regardless, seeing Larry with his mail (yet another aspect that unexpectedly finds its way into subsequent episodes) and nothing else always makes me laugh.  The future episode I’m referring to is, of course, “iChat”, where I took the concept further to (as far as anyone can tell) complete nudity.

Keeping with the wardrobe theme, you may notice that I’m wearing my faithful Pirates hat while sitting quietly on the chair.  This was obviously before I had decided to wear the hat only on the episodes in which Larry and I speak directly to the camera, so this is a little piece of continuity that doesn’t necessarily line up with the rest of the show.

To be honest, we tell a lot of jokes on Franks and Beans that are purely physical, and this episode is a good representation of that, from the shirtless Larry to the Rocky shorts to the strangely alluring Hawaiian shirt Larry sports on our “No!” ending.  For whatever reason, it seems to resonate with our audience on some level, and I’ll take that whenever I can get it.  For a 90-second episode, our third feature was, I think, pretty straightforward.

That wraps this fond remembrance of a 10-month episode up (wow, it’s really been that long?!).  I will do my best to take us all the way down to “High School” before Thanksgiving rolls around, because Thanksgiving means more than turkey and awkward conversations with family members – it also means a trip home and more Franks and Beans on the airwaves.  Or, uh, netwaves.  What do you call it when something is broadcast online?  Come on, English language, stop playing catch up!

See you next time!

- Jeff M.

Perhaps it’s because life is so fleeting – What is the point of existence?  Where do we go when we die?  Are you going to eat that? – but mankind is continually obsessed with the idea of immortality, of leaving a part of oneself behind for future generations to remember them by.  Different people go about trying to achieve this in different ways.  Some write the Great American Novel.  Some sing popular songs.  Some assassinate Archduke Ferdinand of Austria.  Larry, in his own inimitable fashion, would like nothing better than to be remembered for the ages with his very own action figure.  To this end, I can only respond in one way: welcome to those hallowed halls, my friend.

One thing that has become increasingly clear over the past months is that the world will not wait for Franks and Beans to become famous; Franks and Beans has to bring that fame to the world.  Here at Franks and Beans HQ (judge for yourself what secluded location that must be), we’re always thinking of new ways to impress our brand on the outside world, much like the cattle farmer sears his indelible mark into the resistant flesh of the herd.  One solution always springs to mind: marketing.  Neither Larry nor I really know what it means beyond the standard dictionary definition, but we both think that marketing is the key to wealth and fame the likes of which we’ve never seen, which is why we now so proudly introduce to you the official Franks and Beans series one action figures.

I can personally take no credit for these other than in my overwhelming presence in Larry’s everyday life.  No, it was Larry who created these prototypes and Larry who came up with the many inside references ALL BY HIMSELF.  I know what you’re saying – “but Jeff, some of these jokes are actually funny!”  Who knew that Larry had this in him?  Well, shame on you, distinguished reader, because I knew it all along.

First we have Larry in all his resplendent glory.  What may come as a surprise is that Larry’s muscular build is perfectly represented in molded plastic, a rarity for miniature (yet scale) figures.  We see him here wearing his trademark boots and with a casual yet confident pose, a really nice detail that fans of the show will surely pick up on.

The extra features in this set (besides the many points of articulation) are surely highlighted by the inclusion of the Action Door, complete with the Batman light switch cover that we’re so familiar with seeing in every episode.  Also featured to give Larry that true-to-life feel is a knife to help him interact with other figures and the very camera that brings Franks and Beans to life every so often.  Just think about all the things you could do in your lives if you only had two things, a camera and a knife.  I’m sure you’re as surprised as I was to find that you can actually live a fairly fulfilling life with just those two objects!

Next up we have Jeff’s figure, and once again we have to marvel at the level of detail shown in my very first molded likeness.  I’ll admit, I’ve watched a number of episodes and responded by saying “is my head really that freakishly disproportionate?” as I’m sure you, our many viewers have, too.  The answer to that question is a very solemn “yes”, which is why we’re fortunate that you’ll get a total of three Action Hats with my figure – only two of which are copyrighted!  As if my face isn’t scruffy enough in this great detailing job that also includes my favorite shirt and hand wrappings, you also get an attachable child molester-esque mustache to add to the mystique.  Larry’s iPod also accompanies this figure, which you can actually watch all of our videos on.  To create a prism-like infinity effect, pull up a picture of the figure on it and see if spacetime collapses!

No action figure set would be complete without a limited “chase” figure, and we certainly cater to the collector with our exclusive figure of “Hardcore Mark”, our favorite extra/stalker/guy who comments on every episode.  You may notice that the robe behind the extremely long-necked figure is extremely well formed – that’s because you get not only one, but TWO exclusive figures stuffed into one package, and each of the figures has just gotten a recent haircut – that’s how dedicated we are to realism and continuity.  Now they can both team up and try to kill Jeff and Larry – but watch out!  Larry’s figure has a knife.

Don’t forget to check out the other extras that come with this figure – both the Action Radio and Action Notepad will give you literally minutes of enjoyment if viewed from a safe distance.

You might be thinking, “These are great, but how will they all travel around the mythical land of Pennsylvania?”  That’s a great question, and it’s one that can only be answered by trying to absorb the incredible expensiveness that is our only series one vehicle, the Action Jeep.  As seen is such episodes as “High School” and “Mail Bag/Bloopers”, the Action Jeep has all of the real-world capabilities that regular sized Larry’s regular sized Jeep has.  Roll down your passenger side window – but only a little at a time, and never all the way down!  Play the same radio station you listened to in middle school and probably should have outgrown by now!  Park in the same spot for days, hoping to preserve its working lifespan and squeeze just a few more decades out of this devoted childhood friend!

It’s easy to see why both Larry and I are extremely excited about this new toy line, but here’s the real treat – series one lines always feature the boring, every day figures that everyone knows and expects.  It’s in further series that we’ll delve more deeply into our catalogue of characters.  Will the character known as “Larry’s Mom” finally get an action figure devoted to her wonderful talent of passing out mail?  Will we see what Larry and Jeff might look like in swimwear?  Will we have a glow-in-the-dark Hardcore Mark figure?  It’s possible – ANYTHING’S possible.

- Jeff M.

As I sit here and write this production blog, I realize that if someone would take the time and read all of these things back to back (I struggle to believe that anyone might give it a try, but hey, knock yourself out), it would take that person longer than if he or she decided to watch every episode of Franks and Beans in existence.   This thinking is probably the reason for the very creation of episode 8.1, “Commentary on You’ll Never See It Coming”.

Picture this scene: Tropical Storm/Hurricane Hanna is quickly barreling down on Wilmington, North Carolina, and the townspeople are worried enough that the classes I was scheduled to teach that day are canceled.  Seeing this as an opportunity to catch up on some other things, I take my car in to have two of the tires replaced – as much out of a good car care mentality as it is the desire to be able to outdrive a hurricane if necessary.  As I live probably one even mile from the shop, I drop the car off and walk home, and a couple hours later I leave to retrace my steps and pick up my newly treaded automobile.  On the way there, while facing gusting winds and stinging rain, my thoughts turn – as always – to Franks and Beans.

A few days earlier I had written a blog for the episode “Milkshake”, in which I talked about putting together a theoretical DVD release for the show.  I’m a bit picky when it comes to movies and shows being released on DVD – I’ll purposely put off buying a movie if I think there will be a special edition release a few months down the road, because even if I don’t watch many of the special features (depending on what it is), I at least want them to BE there.  I hate it when TV shows are released and there are just the episodes.  Where’re the commentaries?  The ‘behind-the-scenes’ featurettes?  The making of an episode?  The awkward and often not funny blooper reel?  I’m not asking for much – just an immersion into a fictional world that I’m probably not all that excited about in the first place.

I decided right there, as I crossed through the parking lot of some hobo cuisine restaurant, that if Franks and Beans ever would create a DVD for sale, I’d make sure that it was stocked with all of the extra features that could fit on the disc.  That’d start with commentaries on all of the episodes – but then I started thinking – what the hell would we talk about that would impart any kind of insight?  “Message Board” might be pushing seven minutes, sure, and a few others are around three minutes in length, but what about the rest of them?  What about “You’ll Never See It Coming”, which clocks in at a miniscule 30 seconds?  We’d have enough time, I thought, to introduce ourselves (for Larry and I would always offer joint commentary), cite the episode title, and then we’d be out of time.  There’d be no time to talk about anything!  It’d be the most worthless commentary ever!

And thus, the episode you see before you was born.

Although the above was enough justification to create our commentary, our newest addendum was a child of expediency.  As with the episode “iChat”, Larry and I were faced with living hundreds of miles apart and running on our stock of reserve episodes from my end-of-the-summer trip home.  As any long hiatus can never be good for viewership, we were once again forced to improvise and rely on technology to help us bridge the physical gap.  We knew that we didn’t want to rehash the past with another iChat-themed episode (not yet, anyway…okay, don’t hold me to this), so the commentary idea made sense.

To actually make the episode, Larry and I discussed the logistics of it together through the aforementioned video chat.  The most difficult thing was allowing for the inevitable transmission delay, but we also had to figure out how to keep the other from showing up on our own audio source – if you could hear Larry in the background of my recording and me in the background of Larry’s recording, it would be a disaster to try and clean up in post.  As it was, creating two audio tracks and lining them up during the editing process probably worked out better than either of us could have imagined.

I recorded my lines on the “Garage Band” program that came with my Macbook – it’s one of those programs that looks so cool but you can never figure out what to do with it – and Larry went with the old reliable “Sound Recorder” program on his PC.  Aside from the fact that Larry seems to be eating his microphone at one point, the audio turned out clear enough for us to use.  Success!

The reason why I think “Commentary of You’ll Never See It Coming” works so well, if you’ll agree that it works at all, is that we get not one but two opportunities to run out of time.  I begin to talk about wearing one of Larry’s spare shirts and then, all of a sudden, we’re out of time.  Being able to try – and fail – to regroup shortly after helps to accentuate the chaos that we tried to portray: “Oh no!  We didn’t accomplish ANYTHING!”  Larry’s “Aw, man!” really puts the finishing touches on what I think was an irreverent but fun episode.  A nice change of pace!

As you may have noticed, there is no original “No!” ending on this episode, and that is by design.  The way I look at it, it’s obvious that we put this together as a joke, but I’m still trying to get across the idea that if we would actually make ‘real’ commentaries for this show, this is what would happen.  Whether that works or not in the big scheme of things, I don’t know…but I have my hopes.

That wraps us up for this week, and takes us to the end of our stash of new Franks and Beans episodes.  When can you get your next fix?  Oh, it’ll happen, but I honestly don’t have a date to pass along.  In the meantime, I’m going to try and write production blogs for each of the remaining three episodes, culminating with our first, “High School”, and there’ll be a special one thrown in there where we introduce Larry’s own creation – Franks and Beans action figures!  Seriously, they’re great.  Keep checking back for updates, and thanks for watching!  Everyone involved with this (basically Larry and me) really appreciates it.

Take care!

                       
- Jeff M.

If you’re like me, there’s nothing quite like a well placed unexpected f-bomb to make you laugh.  That being said, being me’s not all it’s cracked up to be, so take that for what it’s worth.  Get out of my head!

This blog marks the release of the presidential eighteenth episode of Franks and Beans, “How To”.  For those of you who are math wizards, you’ll notice that eighteen is divisible by six, which means that you are in store for another of Jeff and Larry’s “episodes that no one watches because they feel burned by the ‘Commentary’” episodes.  It’s okay – Larry and I don’t take it personally.  Honestly, though, if you’ve abstained from watching “How To”, you’re missing out on some of our best stuff.  And like we’ve always said, Franks and Beans is firmly against abstinence of any kind.

This episode wrapped up a long shooting week for Larry and me, but it had been planned for quite a while.  I tend to imagine the episodes in no particular order, and though it’s true that Franks and Beans doesn’t employ any hard and fast continuity, sometimes an episode is too thematically similar to the previous one to air it right away, or sometimes we run into minor issues like wanting to introduce “Hardcore Mark” in one particular episode over all others.  This episode remained entrenched in this spot due more to math than anything else, but you get the point – we film neither scenes nor episodes in order, at least not always.

One thing that I wanted to avoid, and try to avoid in a more overall sense, is too much of an overlap with previous episodes where we speak directly to the camera.  Beyond the familiar opening of “Hi, I’m…”, I wanted to make this style of episode distinct from “Commentary” and “Mailbag/Bloopers”.  With this in mind, the early line about receiving questions from fans was something I wasn’t entirely sure about leaving in, as it is rather reminiscent of the scene in “Mailbag” where we get a letter from the mythical Josh in Ft. Wayne, Indiana (as good a place as any to get mail from).  The two episodes do begin rather similarly, mostly by design, and I didn’t want people to think that we were just repeating ourselves…though we probably do plenty of that as well.  Still, the decision was made to leave the line in, because frankly I couldn’t think of a substitute that was better.  Sometimes simple works.

The premise of this episode is fairly straightforward – we start out with me making apparently outrageous claims that Franks and Beans is a collaborative effort, and Larry (not too tactfully) tries to keep his indignation to himself.  I really don’t want anyone to look to far into any of this.  While many projects that whisk members off to superstardom may end in bitter feuds and acid-laced barbs about the creative participation of others involved, Franks and Beans is still a friendly venture between all who take part in it.  Well, maybe that’s not always the case.  Larry’s parents sometimes get annoyed when we film and they want to sit down to dinner.  But other than that, this episode is very much a farcical look at such rivalries.

I’d like to point out that while I do think that swearing can be funny in specific contexts, it usually has the propensity to lose some of the humor by taking on a life of its own.  I think that sometimes movies or comedians (or whatever) who are known to use strings of expletives can sometimes get caught up in that to the point where it all becomes about shock value and one-upmanship rather than the joke.  And swearing without humor is just that – swearing.  But swearing with humor?  That’s just effing funny.

Something you may be interested to know about: okay, so that paper I’m seen writing on during this episode?  We did a few takes, and I’m actually writing what I’m saying, so I would just trace the words for subsequent takes.  At the end of the day I took the piece of paper, folded it up, stuck it in my pocket, and completely forgot about it.  I have no idea where it is.  I’m hoping that this doesn’t happen, but there’s a chance that my parents will one day soon find the sheet of paper, open it up and find nothing but my profanity scribbled over and over again, one on top of the other, bold and for all to see.  If this becomes reality, I wonder what the chances are that I’ll be able to explain that it’s not mine to any level of believability?

Before filming this episode, I explained the main ideas to Larry and told him that, at some point, he would grab me by the throat in a fit of anger.  I told him to make it look real and to not be afraid to actually choke me, and Larry didn’t disappoint.  This was pretty fun the first time we filmed it, but the luster wore off quickly, even though Larry was being rather gentle when squeezing the life out of me.  As we fall back, we’re landing on the soft support of every cushion on Larry’s basement furniture, as neither of us really wanted to get hurt during this episode.  As it was, there were some near misses with desk corners and other projecting objects.

There are a few sound effects to take note of here, the first of which is directly at the end of our main feature.  Larry winds up to punch me and seems to connect, but what actually happens is more blind luck than anything else.  Though we tend to forgo the choreography in this and any episode, our struggle was about as real-looking as, honestly, it’s going to get, especially with the smack to the face.  Larry actually took that very realistic sounding punch noise from another point in the fight an overlaid it quite masterfully.

I truly do wonder what other people think of this episode and those others like it.  While I thoroughly enjoy the regular Franks and Beans fare, these little side projects are things I take great pride in as well.  I realize that “Commentary” might not have been everyone’s most revered show (to me, that in itself is funny), but I do hope that people will give this and “Mailbag” a genuine try before rejecting it out of hand.  I said this before, but I truly do think that these are some of our best.

Speaking of our best, how about the “No!” ending for this week’s episode?  As with many visionary ideas of mine, this one came to me while I was in the shower.  It’s as if I was asking just how we could spice up our cliffhanger endings, and lo, someone from on high answered, “put Jeff in it!”  Well, okay, I don’t want to be in all of these, or, really, many at all (that’s not the point of them), but this was one that I couldn’t pass up.  Even though you can’t see it, I’m actually sitting on a toilet in Larry’s house, and that is pretty funny on its own merits.  Larry again surprised me by digitally adding in the ‘call waiting’ sound that I react to, and it is Larry’s Dukes of Hazzard hat that actually looks pretty good on me here in this scene.  The split screen, Larry tells me, was a rather difficult effect to render here, but it does look rather effortless as a finished product.

This would have concluded our most recent run of back-to-back episodes, but Larry and I got together last week and put together one more effort in computer-mediated communication.  So there’s at least one more week between now and oblivion, and its name is episode 8.1: “Commentary on You’ll Never See It Coming”!  It’s exactly like it sounds, but it’s nothing like it sounds.  In one week, you’ll find out for yourself!  See you then!

- Jeff M.