Director's Notes: 276 - The Big Game

Spoilers ahead for episode 276...

I really enjoy doing the single story episode, where we can just tell a short little tale without the formatics of public radio. I also really enjoy football. That's not quite as on display here, at least not directly.

Taking a common sports trope of the outsider kicker who gets thrust into the Big Game and then hits the game-winning field goal is the entire sports plot of this episode. Not really a big deal. Still: go Scorpions! Way to win the district title!

The A-plot of this story is more of a (let's use this term again) tone poem about time travel as regret, as loss, as helplessness, as getting older. We're all time-travelers but without any possible way to change our speed or direction. Every one of us is moving at the constant rate of one second per second. And that sucks. At least on the surface of it.

We start with autumn, with football, with leaves falling. We start with a 15-year-old who truly loves being in his own head. He's old enough to start really understanding the impact of divorce. He's still only able to see his own experiences, but he's beginning to empathize with his little brother. Maybe one day he'll be able to understand what his mother, sister, or even father have gone through. But for now, he's starting to understand that you don't get any younger. And holy shit, bud, that won't change.

As a person who just entered his 50s this year, I am (of course!) spending a lot of time thinking about time travel. I'm done with regret though. I mean, yeah, I have regrets in a very normal way. But I also fully understand that I cannot change anything that has happened. I can only try to effect change moving forward. I can live in the nostalgia of what could have been or even old movies (shout out to Lee Marvin), and there is comfort to be found. But all I have is a perception of free will, a hallucination of choice. I am time traveling now. I can't undo what I'm already doing, so let's try to get it right. Right. Now.

And so while watching college football a few weeks back, I watched a 19 year old kid miss a brutally easy kick and then come back to kick the game winner. When he took off his helmet at the end of the game, I was like "oh shit, he's not a jock. he's just a kid. he looks like a nerd, like a person who watched every episode of Gravity Falls when he was 8 and maybe writes Star Trek: Strange New Worlds fanfic (slashfic?) under a burner account, lest his teammates find out he needs a wet willy.

I'm oversimplifying this kid's life. You don't make a major college team (even as a kicker) without being a dedicated athlete. And that doesn't mean you can't be a nerd too. Times are different than when I grew up. Still, I thought about the lonely life of a kicker, and how it's one of the scariest sports jobs in the world (besides hockey goalie and baseball closer). You're all alone out there. It's all on you. You have to get the points. No one else can do it for you. And you have to do it. Right. Now.

Extra Point: (pun intended) I really loved Al Olender's weather this episode. It feels youthful, painful, full of passionate love and longing. I thought Joseph picked a perfect song for the Halftime Show.

-Jeffrey Cranor
October 15, 2025