What The Frock

Every now and then an episode gets completely out of hand. This is one of those episodes.

It starts innocently enough. Rabbi Dave asks a perfectly reasonable question: Can you really trust any translation? Within minutes, the King James Bible is on trial, Greek is being dissected, Hebrew is getting dragged into the witness box, and Christopher Nolan somehow finds himself accused of translating Homer the way your uncle translates fishing stories after his third beer.

The funny thing is that Dave actually has a point.

Every translation is an interpretation. Every interpreter brings a little baggage along for the ride. Sometimes it’s harmless. Sometimes a “penny” ought to be a day’s wages. Sometimes “the other side of the road” turns out to be the other side of an entire canyon. Before you know it, what looked like a simple sentence has become a theological wrestling match.

Naturally, that leads directly to The Odyssey.

Well… naturally if you’re Rabbi Dave.

Christopher Nolan’s blockbuster gets the full What the Frock? treatment. Is it gorgeous? Absolutely. Is it entertaining? Mostly. Is it too long? Long enough that Dave thoughtfully identifies the official “bathroom break” scene so you can refill your popcorn without missing anything important. That’s public service broadcasting right there.

Along the way, the discussion wanders through Homer, Virgil, ancient Greece, Roman propaganda, questionable casting decisions, Oscar bait, PTSD, Battlestar Galactica, and why one particular character may accidentally undermine the very modern message the filmmakers appear to be making. Whether you agree with Dave or not, it is impossible to accuse him of reviewing movies the way everyone else does.

Then, because no episode of What the Frock? can remain intellectually respectable for very long, everything comes to a screeching halt over a fried apple pie.

Not just any fried apple pie.

The McDonald’s fried apple pie.

For a few glorious minutes, the conversation abandons Homer completely and becomes an emotional support group for Americans who still remember when fast food was served at temperatures capable of melting asphalt. There are stories of childhood, complaints about health-conscious menu changes, and a heartfelt plea that perhaps, just perhaps, civilization can still be saved one dangerously hot pastry at a time.

As if that were not enough, the episode somehow squeezes in the World Cup, cricket, Panda Express, airline lawyers arguing that a “window seat” does not actually require a window, and enough random detours to make Odysseus himself say, “You boys really need to stay on course.”

Then again, staying on course has never been the point.

The magic of What the Frock? is watching two friends begin with ancient literature and somehow arrive at fast food, international sports, airline contracts, and the strange ways modern culture manages to overcomplicate absolutely everything. If you’ve ever laughed at a conversation that took fifteen unexpected turns before somehow ending exactly where it needed to, you’ll feel right at home.

Just remember one thing before you press play.

Beware Greeks bearing gifts.

And if McDonald’s tells you they’re out of fried apple pies… you have every right to suspect another Trojan Horse.

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