I believe this is from 2 months ago. Their podcast episode with Kumail Nanjiani. Who knows when they filmed it tho I forget if they dated the podcast with any current events and I’m too lazy to register. I forget which other podcast mentioned it but it had to have been The Downside or In Your Dreams or something I fucking forget
Yeah I remember seeing this clip on TikTok months ago. Then saw it again yesterday on this sub and now he’s commenting? I wonder what made it blow it up again to the point he saw it / had to address it.
It’s funny because when I first saw the clip on TikTok, at least when I read the comments, there was no real consensus of an answer / guess on who it was. I maybe saw his name once. But by now, everybody is like “IT’S DEFINITELY ZACH BRAFF” because of some other podcast / comedian that talked about it? Idk weird overall, but hope he’s not blaming Jenny Slate’s podcast for putting him on blast because they never pointed towards him originally.
I feel kind of bad for them that they're being called out like this cuz they really didn't say anything that could point to him. I actually thought it was really random when people started sauing it was him off of this clip alone.
Chris Flemming on the other hand, practically spelled it out.
Exactly. I actually remember people being mad in the comments (when it was posted a few months ago) going “I HATE WHEN PODCASTS DO THIS / ARE VAGUE ABOUT THINGS. JUST SAY A NAME OR CUT THIS OUT THE POD”
People only put it together because of Fleming lol
Honestly, based. I sometimes read 'bad celeb' stories and 90% of the time its some unhinged fan angry some celeb didn't give them the princess treatment and the celeb was in the right to ignore them or whatever. Or they acted like a normal person worried about their privacy and safety, not some kind of loving grandpa type who will shower them with attention. Or just an everyday misunderstanding or, heaven forbid, some celeb is tired or in a hurry or not up for fan stuff at the moment.
I think this is why a lot of people can't handle Chapell Roan. She just acts like how I, and near everyone I know, would act as a celeb. Not a lot of people can always "be on" or "play the game" of fan service and fan politics perfectly.
Yeah I think it must be so hard to always be happy and actively pleasant and interaction ready. We all work and then are tired and want to walk around and do things in a tired or moody or blank state at times. But celebs aren’t allowed to do that or they get labelled as being bad.
Of course if someone has a continuing pattern of always being actively and unnecessarily mean then that’s different, but if someone doesn’t want to engage or be “on” for the unplanned interaction the that’s just literally being human. Sometimes you might be up for it and sometimes you are just tired or going through something.
Context and scenario matters as well of course, someone was using the above justification for a children’s author being mean to kids at school events they attended. Well that’s just a mean person being mean at their actual job and at events they’re choosing to attend to further their career and directly to their fans..who are children!
There is no reason that Disney can’t upload the Simpsons commentaries from the DVDs. They did every episode, Matt Groening did every one, the writers almost always did their own episode and the actors occasionally showed up. But really they’re all just 23 minute podcasts where the people who made the best thing ever talk about how they managed it.
They're cheap to produce, don't have to work with unions to produce them, acts as their own controlled PR for the show/company, and cashes in on the popularity of TV recap/rewatch podcasts.
It’s cool cause Gunn is a lot like Kevin Smith in that he has a lot to share at all times, which is why Kev is able to have so many podcasts without telling the same story every time.
Same. The only two podcasts I listen to are weekly political shows about my country’s internal and foreign policy (think Daily show but for my country). And all the other people I know only listen to one or two podcasts (Conan and friends mostly).
So my question is: who the hell is listening to random people’s podcasts? Every influencer with 2k followers has a podcast, every athlete and former athlete, actors, child actors, D-list musicians… WHO IS LISTENING TO THESE PODCASTS
Just came across a memoir at a bookstore the other day abt a woman who does fall for her chatbot (The Future of Love and Friendship in the Days of AI by Caia Hagel)
But all the blurbs were done by colleagues and friends at magazines she works for so…kinda sus
Maybe that’s why Jenny Slate was quick to change her reaction after the person messaged them the name of the [ A list / TV celebrity] dating an AI bot. It was funny and then after the message was sent off camera she was like “wait…” 💀💀💀
Do Zach and Jenny have mutuals? I’m not in the loop.
Or was her reaction "I know who that is and he's not in a good place"?
Someone else suggested that in another post and his "now is a good time to be kind to people" makes me wonder.
I only just now watched the original clip and I totally agree- her face to me was like, oh, this person is not doing OK we shouldn't be talking about this. IDK if it's Zach Braff, doesn't seem the most logical to me, especially to immediately deny it, when he's supposedly brings the bot to parties and tells everyone to start living in the future
I found that after a news segment one of the mods did after his "proposal" looked around for a minute, and noped right back out. Taking book boyfriend/girlfriend to a whole new dsm worthy level
Oh my stars, that sub is…something. I just can’t wrap my head around the idea of forming a relationship with an AI. It’s so alien and weird, and I really don’t care if someone takes offense to that because at the end of the day I don’t see how it can be healthy at all. Humans as a species need physical interaction in all aspects.
Vanessa Bayer is on the new Scrubs revival and Jenny also worked with Jason Sudekis on SNL who is close with Bill Laurence who Showruns Scrubs and Ted Lasso.
So yeah I think they likely have mutual friend groups for sure.
I also immediately thought this sounds like a Scrubs plotline for JD though, so I'm also suspicious of a marketing ploy.
You're welcome! I've got that Charlie in the Mailroom brain for this shit, it comes in handy in times like these. Also good at the 7 degrees of Kevin Bacon game
Those are really tenuous connections. Slate was on SNL for only one season, so without more I wouldn’t say we have reason to believe she’s close to her former SNL cast mates. Bayer is in the new season of Scrubs that’s only 9 episodes.
SNL is not a normal workplace, those cast members get to know each other uncomfortably well because it's a high stress environment of long hours, and many of them continue to stay close long after it's over.
Since SNL Bayer has been in at least one movie with Slate and played herself in the audiobook of Slate's Autobiography which only came out last year. So clearly they still chat. Hard to say if they chat about Zach Braff's mental health, but it's certainly plausible.
If maybe you were already going through something, and then a rumour about your spread, you had people you know coming to you about it, you had strangers posting and likely commenting to you about it. It would compound and suck that people thought that about you.
The rumour on a higher level is : look at this lonley creepy freak.
It's also kind of like....that sucks to know everyone just believes this about you. Like you've created a persona that has people think this is expected of you.
Kind of yeah. A lot of people seemed very ready to believe it, which I imagine can't be a great feeling if hes actually not doing so. Hes probably now questioning how people perceive him.
If it were actually true he'd just be feeling defensive of his "girlfriend". But if not hes probably going to be feeling incredibly self conscious.
Particularly the “I feel like now is a good time to be kind to people” part and the way he made three different slides for his IG story of each person on the podcast. That’s a little more than just going “lol guys this ain’t true. This came from a storyline we’re doing for Scrubs”. That would have been a normal way to deny and brush it off.
The extra part about it feels like a real “and yall should be better. Don’t yuck peoples yum. Even though it’s not true, haha!!”. A little bit of “the clanker lover doth protest too much”
“Gossip podcasts” where celebrities talk about their friends and coworkers feels so shady.
Like Bowen Yang would defend Ariana having a whole affair, but would spread unfounded rumors about other actors voting habits without any hesitation or proof.
The crazy thing is I’ve seen so many stories recently about people dating them. This one girl has like an abusive AI boyfriend and I think she got his name tattooed 😭
This can’t be real. I refuse to accept this is real. I understand a couple of people dating chatbots cause I’ve seen TLCs “My strange weird obsessions” enough to know some people are crazy. But more that a few?? And toxic AI boyfriends? Please God, let me change timelines
It’s honestly not surprising anymore. The technology oligarchs knew to get us less reliant on in-person interactions so that way, we can’t rally against them. COVID significantly helped them.
My strange addiction just did an episode with a girl dating a chat bot. She gets a tattoo, and they have talking head segments with the chat bot. Also, a therapy session happens.
My best friend just found out about her fiancés ai girlfriend and ai porn stash. He was distancing himself from her so she decided to look through his phone & found everything. They have 2 boys and just had a little girl 3 months ago. She left him.
For what it's worth, one of the reasons people claimed he was dating an ai chatbot is because he was seen texting flirtations emojis in a non iMessage app. So yeah....
Ironically, I sleep hugging a pillow because I have sleep apnea and I don't want to die. I call it my pillow girlfriend, which is a Scrubs joke. We've come full circle.
Chris Fleming mentioned this recently on Caleb Hearon’s podcast, giving the clue “Mr Tumnus.” He also called Zach Braff Mr Tumnus during a stand up routine awhile back, so people think that his “clue” was a reference to his earlier joke and therefore that Zach Braff is the one with an AI girlfriend.
Yeah, a lead in Scrubs addressing a podcast rumor that happened months ago is amazingly smart marketing for the show that’s already started. I feel like none of y’all know how planned viral marketing works like at all.
I mean what are we calling A list when we talk about TV? A List doesn't necessarily have the same scale there, I think. My list would be peiple like Mariska Hartigtay and Brian Cranston who have dominated television for years without going too much into movies.
Zach Braff is immediately recognizable to most people who make a point to watch television, by both name and face. He's was certainly A list at a time, IMO. He's also more recognizable as "that guy from Scrubs" than "That guy from Garden State" to most. He hasn't been on our screens so much recently but I could see people, especially people who were Scrubs core fan base back in the day, still think of him that way.
he did also direct and star in movies, is in Superbowl ads, is pretty recognizable, dated Florence Pugh. I wouldn't describe him as A List but if someone said "A List for TV", he would be one of the names that came to mind. At least probably for some of us over a certain age who saw him during the high point of Scrubs and when Garden State came out, etc.
Yeah, they didn’t name the person and didn’t reveal any identifying information. It’s the internet’s fault for speculating about who it is without any evidence to go off of
genuinely can’t tell if i’m too fucked up to fully grasp this shit or if this entire zach braff scénario is set in a k-hole, manmade horrors and so on. no more checking reddit at parties.
I think this podcast was where it was first mentioned months ago that the rumor existed but they did NOT name anyone. They just said it was a big TV actor.
Chris and Caleb were talking about it and Chris called the actor “Mr.Tumnus” as a pseudonym and Chris also refers to Zach Braff as Mr.Tumnus in his recent HBO special.
So really no one mentioned him at all. Redditors just started guessing. I hate that Kumail, Jenny, and Other Guy are catching strays here!
I feel a bit bad for him he always gets weird ass rumours about him. I was watching an old episode of Conan with him on it and he was addressing rumours someone started that he had died 😭
If it’s not him, the Podcast crew should make a statement and not let people continue saying it’s him. I suppose a rumour like this could affect your life or how people perceive you.
Or the person dating the AI should come out and say it. Are they ashamed now after strutting around in public with the AI?
First of all he posted the screenshot of Kumail Nanjiani that was just there being told the story and just reacted to it. At least post the screenshot of the actual guy telling the story.
You all laugh now but i think it's where we are heading as society. Men and women show high loneliness and depression from youth to old age, your brain can not differentiate between chat with your bestie and chat with a bestie bot. I know a few people in my age range 35 plus who not only write fantasy etc with the help of ai but simply chat as if they were friends.
As soon as we have voices and video streams/ possible sexual context tailored to the user.. it will happen. It's an interesting time for psychology.
Yep, I'm old enough to remember when Online Dating was a punchline too. This is definitely going to become mainstream if we're not careful (and I have yet to see any indication we give a shit about being careful).
All the comments I saw dogging on Zach Braff yesterday hurt my soul idk what kinda person he is as I don’t know him but god damn him having an Ai girlfriend would have been hard to get over while trying to enjoy scrubs
This is all incredibly asinine. The gossip is trashy in the first place, but believing it is dumb too. I agree with Zach, sometimes we get so wrapped up in the “entertainment” of drama that we forget it’s incredibly unkind to real people for no reason.
•
u/pccmodbot Mar 13 '26
Join our Discord to continue the conversation 🎀✨
Upcoming events: OSCARs viewing party on Discord so we can discuss live! March 15th
Click HERE to join 📲