How Did We Get Weird?

Saturday Night Live alum Vanessa Bayer specializes in weird. Her characters are at first mundane archetypes of American whiteness, but they often quickly reveal a bizarre underbelly that is at once neurotically confident, shocking, and dangerous.

In her new podcast, How Did We Get Weird?, she and her brother Jonah reminisce about their childhood, reveling with open hearted fondness in the peculiarities of both their family and the greater culture. 

“The podcast has been an excuse for Vanessa and I to reminisce about our childhood and growing up together, which is something we do a lot anyway,” says Jonah Bayer. “I feel like we are always sending each other Wikipedia links or asking if we remember certain places or pop culture moments, so ‘How Did We Get Weird’ came together very organically.”

Two of the five guests on the show so far have been taken aback by the utter sweetness in the relationship between these two siblings. They know they’re weird and they love and appreciate each other for it.

Discussing the current-day re-release of Doritos 3-D, there’s so much giggly charm as they pretend to take it seriously while quietly lampooning the banality.

They revel in the full ironic bliss of the verbose and empty press release penned by Rachel Ferdinando, Frito Lay’s North American senior vice president and marketing officer:

“What’s exciting is that we didn’t just bring back the original, we’ve evolved it to reflect the stacking trends of a new generation. We are thrilled to introduce a new version in a moment when we could all use a small amount of joy.”

The context of this show reveals this statement to be hilarious. It’s like being slap-happy with your best friend and getting the same absurdity in the way that only you two can.