Dec 15, 2025
BRIAN. You're in public, and such a fan. Oh my god.
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BRIAN. You're in public, and such a fan. Oh my god.
sam had, at that point in time, been someone who listened exclusive to the entire unabridged discography of Lizzo on road trips. Toby is a listener of Eminem bardcore. They are ridiculous. I love them so bad.
Discovering the brian and sam dynamic rn. Fascinating. We're on a strong start with "a little hit moist-" he gets cut off by brian saykng "i'm also a little bit moist." A visible moment to calibrate about it. Brian turning for a moment to look at the cam, squinty in the rain, taking in the possible double meaning of what he said.
"You mean sweaty, right?". "Yes, sweaty." "Okay, just clarifying."
We are seven and a half minutes into episode one. Sam. The innuendos are. A pattern. As is the bad luck bc theyre eighteen minutes into the game and already. Oh man.
Tom. Were you about to call him a rascal. Kleptomaniac? Yeah i am one, sam says. And tom speaks "it was either that or rascal" god. The britishness.
"You know thered a gastrocolic reflex?" "Yeah?" "Yeah i'm going to the bathroom." "Okay bye" the confusion. The acceptance. Tom you nerd. Sam's ??? And i'm endeared by this shit so bad lmao.
Watching the outtakes from s13. The amount of innuendos that tom keeps making. The way he points "you keep saying things that outta context-" while sam is jusst -\^_^/- abt it . Its episode one outtakes. I cant. oh my god. "I don't care unless i put it in my mouth." STOP ITTTT.
so in episode two, where I find Sam singing that song again of "Back on the road again", judging by the tune and all, its "On The Road Again" by Willie Nelson, who happens to be an artist I really enjoy. It's also a very Sam sort of song.
Here is the first bit of that song's lyrics.
On the road again I just can't wait to get on the road again The life I love is making music with my friends And I can't wait to get on the road again On the road again Goin' places that I've never been Seein' things that I may never see again And I can't wait to get on the road again
I'm not sure if this has changed in the three years since this episode, but Sam here states that basically, the three of them do the big picture design together, and then the more operational stuff, like challenges and so on, are done by Ben and Adam while he's off handling the nerdy educational channels and shit.
Given his relatively increasing familiarity with the specific challenges especially in certain seasons, as well as the introduction of Amy into the operational work as their game design increases in scale and so on, I think it would reasonable to presume that Sam has gotten more into the operational design of their games these days, it may be in a mostly oversight role than anything, and of course there are overlaps I don't presume he's ever fully disconnected anyway.
There's also the consideration that nowadays for things like challenge decks, they have less to make from scratch as they're sixteen seasons in and have all the previous years of designed operations they can fit into the broader picture, so Sam has also just known by virtue of experience.
He also says he and his partner's underdog Strat and usual high risk high reward comes, in the preceding seasons (which has changed since to be a little less high risk high reward) was by virtue of wanting to compensate of Team Badam's inherent upper hand in knowing the game. However, as he's realising, that's allowed them(Badam) to play the strategy they're most comfortable with, which isn't great and allows them to nail it. Their goal inthe season, therefore, is to push them off that pre existing track a bit, per Toby.
Basically, so much of it comes down to these edge cases that make the game interesting, and this is one of those seasons that really marks a milestone of a really good, well designed thing, as well as being able to hit those spots and incentivise a dramatic, good gameshow. The realisations to follow, as this was made and in the aftermath, will be fascinating. This also means I need to watch their post season analysis on this season specifically for that breakdown, to see how much of these preliminary conclusions based off this testimony and me watching a fuck ton of other jet lag seasons in no particular order is validated or what and how it may be wrong/right re: any public discussion.