Everyone is horny in an oddly optimistic The Franchise

Night shoots are a necessary part of the filmmaking process and, by definition, a total drag. They’re bad for your body, worse for your brain, and—naturally—perfect for the latest cinematic turkey from Maximum Studios’ Phase Whatever, Tecto: Eye Of The Storm. Were this any other week, the dismal prospects of a night shoot would be just another shitty hat teetering atop a stack of shitty hats. But as we discover during this week’s installment of The Franchise, that perilous stack toppled between episodes and claimed another faceless crew member. Pour one out for Monica, who nodded off on her early drive home and crashed into a herd of cows. 

Don’t worry: She’s expected to recover, and “on the plus side, she has a very full freezer!” That’s not my joke but Daniel’s (Hamish Patel), which is met by a sea of frowns from his miserable crew and this weary recapper alike. Mutiny is inevitable.  

As The Franchise has thoroughly (say again: thoroughly) established, Tecto morale is in the gutter. How best to bury it? A giant Jenga set as consolation for this overnight shoot, handed out by Bryson (Issac Powell), might do nicely. (“We’re developing a Jenga movie, though it might collapse,” he mentions to no one in particular.) Speaking of Bryson, you may have noticed he’s sporting an eyepatch, which gives the impression that HBO skipped an episode of its depleting superhero franchise satire. (Two days have passed in-show.) Much to Bryson’s chagrin, he is dubbed “Bry-Clops” by Pat (Darren Goldstein), that sentient block of executive producer concrete, triggering signs of interior disharmony from the reliably Stepfordian assistant. If we didn’t skip a week, what are we missing? 

Answers come in due course, but for now, storm clouds are gathering on this fine Fraturday (Daniel’s demonic portmanteau of “Friday night/Saturday morning”): Chaos auteur Eric (Daniel Brühl) has the hiccups, and as our genial script supervisor Steph (Jessica Hynes) points out, tonight features a full moon. “Libido raging, you know how it gets,” she says, feasting her eyes on extra extraordinaire Rufus (Justin Edwards). It’s likely that Eric’s night shoot, a fireball sequence, may wind up setting off a different set of fireworks [deep Norm Macdonald voice] if you know what I mean. (Hello? Is this Daniel’s microphone?)

Steph may be onto something. Dag (Lolly Adefope) broods due to being unable to attend a house party where she had hoped to get laid (“sex with a man” is how she puts it), and Peter (Richard E. Grant), that toxic thesp of stage and screen, appears randier than what is normally accepted on a film set: “I have an erection, and it won’t go down,” he informs Daniel. Even Adam (Billy Magnussen) is feeling frisky, requesting full use of the set’s sound system to have his band, Flightmode, perform for the glum crew during their 1 a.m. lunch break. In a crafty bit of editing, The Franchise jumps to an EPK session with Pat and Anita (Aya Cash), who sets the tone for this week’s shenanigans: “Sparks will fly.” It takes four thousand takes to get the point across, but he gets us there. 

So, what’s this about Eric’s big fireball scene? In the film, after a scuffle with Tecto (played by Adam), the hero’s former ally, The Eye (played by Peter), consumes the Sun through his head portal and is reborn as a villain. “A baptism. But of fire! Not water, like you normally use in a baptism,” Eric notes to the crew. Seems the prospect of blowing something up has lit a fire inside Eric; he’s in nerd powerhouse mode again, and nothing—not Dag’s house party, not Eric’s stiffy, and certainly not the wind threatening to blow out his set piece—can sap him of his creative juices. (I plead forgiveness; I’m stuck on innuendos this week.)

Spoke too soon. Rumors abound that Tecto’s fireball sequence will have a visitor, a certain Premiere Blockbuster Filmmaker whose imminent presence sends Eric spiraling into a hiccup-laden mull-sesh. As Eric’s row with Centurios 2 a couple of weeks back made abundantly clear, the German filmmaker is in a perpetual measuring contest with everyone he considers a rival. He had his meager Reality Crystal stolen by Centurios wunderkind Xan Van Dusen, so he ordered his art department to forge an even bigger one. This week, Eric prepares for his pen pal (and possible future boss), Christopher Nolan, by demanding an enormous fireball scene meant to eclipse the megaton blast of Oppenheimer, a bad idea Daniel attempts to talk down. “Everything looks small compared to nuclear Armageddon, mate,” he says as Eric works his teeth-bleaching apparatus like Maggie on her pacifier. The genius is mulling.

Now we pivot to Peter’s trailer, where Dag has been dispatched to deal with another messy dilemma involving a cast member. His pitched tent has decamped, which is a small relief, only now there’s an issue regarding Peter’s phone’s connection to his wife’s vibrator, located at his home in Surrey. “I’ve been phoning it in for years,” the actor begins with his patented lack of self-awareness, though Grant imbues a note of melancholy for what follows: “Just to keep her interested.” If Dag can’t be satisfied herself,  then surely she can aid in the remote satisfaction of someone else? Besides, Peter can’t be canceled on Tecto (his brand of sleaze is written into the contract), so perhaps it’s best for everyone that Dag gets her Bluetooth mojo working.  

This week, Dag isn’t just doing cleanup for Tecto but for The Franchise, as well. She has little infidelious pep talks with Steph—who is seconds away from pouncing on Rufus—and takes a moment to catch up with Bryson, someone she has so far had little dealings with and whom we discover has donned his eyepatch due to a work/life imbalance. (He forgot to remove his contact lens for four days.) It’s a common ailment on Tecto. (Just ask Monica—or Jim, for that matter.) 

As it happens, it is also Bryson’s birthday, and Dag has a whopper of a present for him: “This industry will be dead in two years, and we gave the best years of our lives for what? Fucking Tecto?” Dag can laugh this off because she doesn’t give a rip about, well, anything related to her job (despite advancing middle age and serious debt, a character note delivered far too late in this episode, say nothing of the season), but Bryson? Sick as it is, Maximum Studios has been his entire identity. What’s an eyeball measured against the grandeur of Hollywood success? Naturally, Bryson’s mask slips and Powell crushes the scene, letting his chortling at Dag’s dig devolve into ugly gulp-sobs. 

Crazy as it sounds, The Franchise ends this week on a slightly optimistic note, with a strange change of fortunes for a production well acquainted with failure and misery. Bryson gets another birthday present in the form of waffles with Nolan and Tom Cruise (???), and Dag stops complaining long enough to impress Nolan with a pitch (“[She’s] making up for lost time,” according to Daniel, which, huh?) While Eric mopes in his trailer, Daniel takes charge, averting the crew’s mutiny by knocking out a boffo fireball sequence that leaves everyone on set flustered. (That was fucking hot!” Anita says.) Is there hope yet for Tecto: Eye Of The Storm? Don’t count on it. As the episode’s final shot of Adam biffing his acoustic rendition of Firemode’s “Leather and Lace” reminds us, good vibes on The Franchise never last very long.  

Stray observations

• • We’re still discovering so much yet so little about Daniel, who now doodles under duress. (“Hot day in Hell, and I am the Devil” is grim, but at least it foreshadows something.) Also, he has a son?
• • There’s a subplot stashed deep within this episode that either will or will not play out in the two remaining installments: Pat amping up Anita’s role on set to make its seemingly inevitable failure look like her fault. Will this plot beat matter, or will it go the way of Dag’s doo? 
• • “Francis Ford Hiccups.” Not your best dig at Eric, Dan. I prefer Steph’s: “Poor Mr. Hiccups!” 
• • Peter: “Everyday is Saturday when you’re canceled,” we’re informed. “I’ve heard stories from some of the old gang. You should see their gardens!” 
• • We saw Anita and Daniel’s hungry eyes meet, The Franchise. Stop playing games and let these two find some kind of happiness. 
• • Did anyone catch Dag’s pitch to Nolan? “Two words: ___ dinosaurs” was all I got. 
• • Next stop: Armenia? Is The Franchise going to put us (and everyone else) through a location shoot episode? Prepare for a battery of customs jokes and potentially another international incident courtesy of Eric. 
• • Not Tom Cruise, who compliments Bryson’s eyepatch: “I had to wear one of those for a movie.” Valkyrie jokes!
• • More questions on the way out: Is Rufus about to risk it all for Steph? Are Anita and Daniel primed for some broom closet sex? Is Adam’s crappy band supposed to be a knock against Jared Leto, Russell Crowe, or Keanu Reeves? Go off in the comments.