PRODUCTION/CULTURAL REFERENCES (written 5/11/20-5/12/20)

5/11/20

-I wasn't planning on taking last week off, but I was procrastinating again. I also took some time to rethink the series finale. I only have a few episodes left, but I realized that I'm not 100% on what I want to do with the finale yet, so I pushed it back to June 21. Unless anything changes, there will be two more episodes this month and then one last four-week break before the finale.

-Last year, I wrote an episode called "The Heavenly Tapes." The concept was inspired by Nas' 2002 compilation album The Lost Tapes, which consisted entirely of unreleased songs. I was uninterested in doing another Super Bowl episode but I still wanted to make an episode similar to it, and there have been many episodes throughout my time doing this that haven't been made for one reason or another. I thought the episode turned out well, but I felt like I could do better and take the concept further.

-The plan was to always make "The Heavenly Tapes II" for season eight, but it became mandatory after Nas released The Lost Tapes II last July. In addition to using songs from The Lost Tapes II, this episode also features Nas songs that aren't widely known ("The Black Bond," "Street's Disciple"). With this episode, I wanted to make it feel even more "lost" than the first one was, so along with the three segments, I included commercials that I thought of to break up the segments, instead of just having one segment right after the other like last season.

-The episode ideas here were all from the fourth season (2015-2016) of the show. Unlike the first "Heavenly Tapes," all of the segments featured were supposed to be episodes at some point. But I decided to go in another direction or I just didn't have enough interest in the ideas to develop them any more than what they were.

-This episode was delayed multiple times, more than any other episode this season. When I first started planning out season eight, I thought about releasing this one in October. I quickly realized that this wasn't going to work and moved it to February 23. This was the release date for a long time. Then February hit and my procrastination was at a high level. It was similar to the procrastination that I had at the beginning of the season. I decided to move the episode to April 5, the day of WrestleMania 36. It was going to be the post-WrestleMania episode.

-I changed my mind and decided to pair this episode with another one so there would be two post-WrestleMania episodes this year. However, after the COVID-19 pandemic forced WrestleMania to become a taped two-day event, I moved this episode to April 4 instead. The plan was to have "A Long Walk to Washington" on April 3, "The Heavenly Tapes II" on April 4, and the third episode on April 5. But, of course, that didn't work, so I moved the episode again to May 1. I realized I needed more time to work on it while I focused on other episodes. May 1 soon became May 3, and then May 8, and finally, May 10.

-Besides my procrastination, I thought this episode was much harder to write than the first "Heavenly Tapes." The reason for this is because two segments were on-location, and those are always hard because you have to incorporate the location into the story. I had the same problem with "I Lost My Mind in San Diego" and "A Long Walk to Washington." The kids could go to Atlanta or Chicago, and they could go through a certain experience, but if that experience has nothing to do with where they are, why bother having them go to Atlanta or Chicago?

-Another problem I had, at least in the beginning, was picking the music for the episode. Last year, it was simple. I just needed a Lost Tapes song for the intro and a Lost Tapes song for the end credits. I also wasn't as familiar with the album as I am now, so I was more hesitant to pick songs. With this episode, I could only use songs from The Lost Tapes II, and some of them just didn't work. I also couldn't use any of the songs in the segments (since none of them were released at the time these episodes would have been written), so that was another challenge.

-In the end, I went with music that captured the mood of each segment. "Bienvenue à Paris" was about the kids going to France, so I used "Adult Film" and "The Black Bond" because they both had an international feeling to them. "Everybody Hates Anja" was about RK's crush on Anja, so I used "You Mean the World to Me," a storytelling song about relationships. And honestly, I decided to have a wolf appear in "Weekend at Mount Rainier" just so I could use "Queens Wolf."

-I had guest appearances planned for this episode: Emma Lahana as Katie and Jes Macallan as Laura, the two tour guides. Lynne (Kira Kosarin) was also going to show up, but I got rid of all the guest spots because I had no time to incorporate any of them.

*cold open*

-I used "Lost Freestyle" in the intro because it was used in a trailer for The Lost Tapes II. It was the only song that could introduce the episode. Originally, I thought about having a longer, more ambitious intro. While "Lost Freestyle" was playing in the background, these two guys were cutting through blocks of ice and they end up discovering the film reel for "The Heavenly Tapes II." But I didn't like the way it played out, so I just used the same one from last season.

"Bienvenue à Paris"

-Out of all the episodes that never became episodes, "Bienvenue à Paris" is the one that had the most potential. The segment is based off of a spring break trip that I took during the eighth grade. In a little over a week, I went to London, England, then to Paris, and then to Barcelona, Spain. To this day, it still feels like I never went because of how surreal the experience was. In the earlier seasons of Thank You, Heavenly, my plan was to take the whole Europe trip and turn it into a movie, most likely after season three. But then I was worried I didn't have enough material, so I chose Paris (my favorite city of the three) and decided to have the guys go there for the two-part season four premiere.

-I had all the plots figured out. I started writing the episode in July, but stopped before the guys even made it to Paris. I didn't realize how much work it would be, so I decided to scrap the episode entirely. Looking back, I definitely could have finished the episode, but at the time, I just didn't want to. I might have psyched myself out by thinking it was too big of an idea.

-The title cards were also a way to help separate this episode from the first "Heavenly Tapes." A lot of classic cartoons used title cards, but they went out of style. More recently, Butch Hartman used title cards for his animated shows like The Fairly OddParents (2001-2017) and Danny Phantom (2004-2007). The Loud House (2016-) also uses them.

5/12/20

-Katie and Laura were originally going to have bigger roles, both in the episode and the segment. But I didn't give myself enough time to figure out what they were supposed to do, so I left it at them just having generic lines in the Louvre. They were based off the two female tour guides I had for the Europe trip, which was also going to be reflected in their voices.

-RK references the Dogs Playing Poker series of paintings by Cassius Marcellus Coolidge.

-The name of the restaurant the kids go to means "It comes chef recommended" in French. It is a reference to a line from the Nas song "Bonjour" where he says "Over creamy polenta, it comes chef recommended."

-Jaylynn's use of the phrase "Voulez-vous coucher àvec moi (ce soir)?" is taken directly from the 1974 hit single "Lady Marmalade" by Labelle.

-At the police station, Buster makes a direct reference to the 1998 film Rush Hour when he asks the cops, "Do you understand the words that are coming out of my mouth?"

-RK incorrectly refers to Harry and Jerry as Heckle and Jeckle, the cartoon characters created by Paul Terry.

-RK screaming "ATTICA!" repeatedly is a direct reference to the 1975 crime drama film Dog Day Afternoon.

*in between segments one and two*

-I came up with the Butterfinger commercial as a cutaway for an episode that I planned for this season. I decided to scrap the episode, but I still liked the idea of the commercial so I transferred it to this episode and framed it as a commercial meant for Super Bowl 50. The commercial is a parody of a 1991 Butterfinger commercial starring Homer and Bart Simpson.

-Originally, the commercial would have just been RK shooting KG in the arm as he is about to steal the Butterfinger, but I decided to make it more over-the-top and not have RK himself be the one to shoot KG.

"Everybody Hates Anja"

-This segment was originally meant to be a two-part short. The first part was written alongside "S-P-A-R-K-Y the Letter Man," but I never got around to finishing the story. I was considering turning it into an entire episode, but I guess I just didn't have enough interest in the idea to go back to it.

-In the original short, I was paying homage to the UPN/CW sitcom Everybody Hates Chris (2005-2009). It featured a guest appearance by Chris Rock as he was RK's narrator. However, I dropped that aspect from the segment because it would have been too confusing if you had never heard of the short before. The segment was meant to be a continuation of the short, which is why RK is using exposition in the beginning.

-When I first came up with the short, part two was going to show RK and Anja becoming friends until RK tells everyone about Anja's dyscalculia, which causes her to dislike him. I just decided to go in a different direction with this segment because I thought RK having feelings for Anja was more interesting, and made sense given the interactions they had back in season three.

*in between segments two and three*

-I came up with the idea of the season four commercial back in 2015, but I didn't have any way of writing it that made sense until this episode. I used "A Sunday Kind of Love" because it was used in a commercial for NFL RedZone around that same time.

-The episodes referenced in the commercial include "The Fourteenth Year" (KG's voice begins changing due to puberty), "To Be or Not to Be a Role Model" (Jaylynn becomes a viral sensation due to her "Mornings Be Like" meme, Uncle Carmine dies), and "The Halloween from Hell" (Sanna's Halloween party turns into a murder mystery).

"Weekend at Mount Rainier"

-This segment was originally an episode scheduled for November 2015. It was meant to be like a sequel to "The Field Day from Hell," with TSE being at odds with the Masters of the Universe. But unlike the segment, the episode was going to focus more on Jaylynn and her desire to play both sides so she can keep everybody happy. I was in the middle of procrastinating, so I never even started writing the script.

-RK's joke about the Rainier Wolf is a reference to Simpsons character Rainier Wolfcastle.

-RK realizing the hotel has no television is a reference to the 1977 ABC miniseries Roots, specifically the scene where Kunta Kinte emerges from the bottom of the slaveship with everyone else that was captured and discovers that there's no riverbank he can swim to for freedom.

-Jaylynn references the Aesop fable "The Boy Who Cried Wolf."

*end credits*

-The episode is dedicated to legendary singer/songwriter/musician Little Richard, who died on May 9, 2020 at his home in Tullahoma, Tennessee from bone cancer. Little Richard was widely known as one of the most influential and innovative artists in the history of music, specifically rock and roll. He earned nicknames such as "The Originator" and "The Architect of Rock and Roll" through his performances, vocal stylings, musical techniques, and public persona. Many elements of rock music that the world knows today can be traced back to Richard, and he ended up becoming an inspiration for several legendary artists and bands such as James Brown, Bob Dylan, Freddie Mercury, Otis Redding, Sam Cooke, Jimi Hendrix, Michael Jackson, Elvis Presley, the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, Elton John, Lou Reed, David Bowie, Motörhead, and AC/DC.