Australia’s Best: Finalists revealed and Alex’s LOTR parody

Oh, okay, the plot thickens here. The plot thickens.

What?

They all know why she's getting as far from the crime scene as possible.

Hello, hello, all righty.

Your microphone is not on.

Click on the button with the picture of the microphone.

Yes, a Monday morning scraping ourselves out of the gutter.

I am Alex, that is Matt.

You survive a big weekend, Matthew.

Oh, yeah, I mean, I had such a great Friday night watching the battle of Brisbane.

Dolphins vs Broncos, although, you know, the team that I was sprucing the dolphins they went down.

But we watched it from one of Brisbane's oldest Chinese restaurants.

They were playing the footy in the Chinese restaurant.

Yeah, which, let's get real here.

But this needs to happen more often.

If there's not a little television in the corner of my restaurant, it ain't happening.

Well, remember, back in the Triple J days, we listened to Tinder date myself

and Amelia Marshall, newsreader, were both single at the time.

We swiped left and right on callers, and then I took them to, well, we took them to one of the most romantic restaurants

that I always wanted to be, go to, never be to.

And it was, it was Michael's Chinese and Malaysian restaurant

and it was attached to the petrol station on the way to the airport in Sydney.

And they were playing Deal on No Deal on the TV on the corner.

That set the M.B. Olf's very nicely.

Yeah, it's quite fitting, really, because they were playing Deal on No Deal on the TV

and later that evening.

You were playing in the bedroom. No deal.

All right.

That was, that night I sealed the No Deal.

I guess you could say.

Oh, my God. That was, when was that 12 years ago now?

Where are old?

Much like the chicken in the bay Marie at that restaurant, we are old.

We're past our prime. I'll just say that.

I'll tell you what, there's people who are suggesting that our age

is somehow swinging the results of Australia's best.

Australia has our Australia's best poll of our most wonderful non-human

live-action media personalities.

Has it been hit with controversy, Matt?

There's a bit of controversy in the comments section, which we'll get to.

And also, I feel like the dear listeners of Matt and Alex

made a very notable emission when it came to putting forward their nominees.

And we're going to have to chat about a couple of a bit of injustice

that I think has happened.

But it doesn't matter, we're going to be revealing the finals.

The top four.

The finalists, the top four, which you can vote on now.

All of that will be revealed very later on.

As well as that, we're going to see where the Alex Dyson can keep up.

His parody hot streak.

How's he going back to the well?

And is it dry?

You'll be finding out later on.

Let's do this about Alex all day reckless.

Let's get this show on the road.

Let's go.

Here we go, here we go, here we go.

Well, I'll tell you what, it was quite the event in the new glass house

theater at QPAC, Alex Dyson, the Queensland Performing Arts Centre,

in which the Queensland Ballet put on a performance of Messer Direct Quium.

I don't know what that translates to, Messer Direct Quium.

Requium, yeah, no idea, Messer.

I'm going to Google it and then you tell me what you think it is.

Give me your actual guess.

All right.

I reckon it is the state your house is in after you've had quite a big night out on the town.

But like me, a comedy festival over the weekend, you come in, pants are off, you know,

jumpers off on the ground, take the socks off onto the couch, cut our little icy pole,

the wrappers on the floor the next morning when you wake up,

and you come out and you go, that is one hell of a Messer Direct Quium.

Well, I, to be, can I be completely honest?

I don't even know what a Requium is.

Oh, actually, it's a Catholic funeral mass.

Ah!

Which I did not know.

Who says you don't learn anything less than about Alex?

This had 114 singers, 35 ballet dancers, 67 orchestral musicians.

It was quite the feast on the eyeballs, the ears, and the nose.

Oh, really?

Well, that was just me.

I'd been wearing my shirt all day.

So, apologies to everyone who's sitting around me.

But no, it was great.

What's your policy if you're worried about that?

Do you like head down to the shoulder, take a little sniff and like see how you do like that?

Oh, I'm always smelling myself.

Always smelling myself.

Are you used to be very big on the, your breath, like breathing to your hand and just checking it?

Yes, I still do that.

Licking the back of my hand and then smelling that.

I do that quite often still.

That's never going to taste good or smell good.

No, that's where you're wrong.

Because there's sometimes where you go, okay, that's clean.

Other times you're like, cool, you're tongue-lead discreet.

Anyways, enough about my secrets.

My Budwa habits.

Well, you sort of like the only people who I know lick the back of their hands

and then bring it up to their head.

Are you and cats?

You know, cats wash their head.

They lick their paw and like put it up on their head.

Also another great musical.

So this was great.

But here's what happened.

Belinda and I sitting at the restaurant before the show.

And the lady next to us was going to see a show.

We struck up a small conversation with her.

She was going to see another show, a different show.

And she'd ordered a half-carap of wine.

A half-carap.

Yeah.

Like a carap of, which is basically...

No, sorry, a carap of, it equates to half a bottle based on that.

Yeah.

So she's half the half there.

At what point do you order a glass?

No, no, no.

So I should say, she got a, she got a carap with it was half a bottle.

All right.

So she got a whole carap, not a half-carap.

Well, isn't, a carap is just the instrument that it can be.

Usually a carap is half a bottle of wine itself.

A carap is the vessel.

Okay?

Yes, usually at a restaurant, you can get a carap, yeah.

Okay, look, anyways.

The point is she gets a carap.

No, no, no.

I want to make this point.

No, no, please continue.

That equates to what I, what I saw as being maybe half, you know, half bottle of wine,

maybe two or three glasses of wine.

So she's having a dinner, dining, dining solo, which respect to the solo diner.

I love it.

And I think more people need to do it.

And it's, you know, props to her.

So me and Bella sitting there, and there's another couple on our other side.

Okay, so a sandwich between a couple who looked like a guy around my age and his mum.

Right?

Then me and Belinda and then this lady by herself.

And we're chatting away, and eventually the lady was dining by herself.

Walks over to the other couple on the other side of us, right?

The bypasses us, goes around to them with her craft of like a little bit of wine left in the craft.

Probably what would have equated to a glass of wine.

Oh, yeah.

Puts it down, says, look.

I'm not going to finish it.

The show starts soon.

My eyes were bigger than my stomach.

Yeah.

And you know, don't, don't waste it's perfectly good.

Haven't touched it.

There you go.

And she's been decanting the craft into her own glass.

So it's just to sit in there ready for someone else to do the same.

Yes, right?

So then.

So then they were like, oh, okay, cool.

Thanks.

And you can tell they didn't know what to like, what to do about this because.

Yeah.

Well, I mean.

I know exactly because they probably saw the look on your face, Matt.

Because I know exactly what was going on here.

The fact this woman had to get up from her chair.

Walk past you with the free alcohol.

We've been chatting as well.

We've been talking.

I'm complete strangers.

I know.

I reckon the smoke would have been covered out of your ears.

You would have been planning her Requiem.

I reckon.

I was looking for her funeral as a result of this.

So anyways, I'm like, I did actually think I didn't say anything.

I just thought what the hell is going on here.

But I thought, I wonder if they'll have it.

Yeah.

Or if they were just being polite and going, oh, yeah.

But then I said to Belinda, I said, oh, you know, that's, that's,

that's pretty reason, I guess, that they've, she's done that and, you know,

I asked Belinda, would you have it?

Would you have it?

Would you have the, you know, that crap?

And Belinda, keeping her voice free low, said, oh, no, probably not.

And I said, oh, really?

I mean, I think it's quite a good thing to not wasted.

Yeah.

Belinda said, you know, I would.

It's just I saw her tip that from her glass back into the correct.

Oh, okay.

The plot thickens here.

The plot thickens.

What?

She's like, no, no.

She's getting as far from the crime scene as possible.

I'm not giving it to the table.

She nubled into spotteder and needed to go to some unsuspecting victims.

I just wonder like I'm like, because I agree with her, right?

You don't want to waste it.

Yeah.

So heart is absolutely in the right place.

Oh, the cost of a glass of wine at a restaurant these days.

Oh, it'd be $18 or something, you know?

You'd need more than a bloody lobster sometimes in these places.

Easily.

Easily, right?

I mean, I know, you know, part of a wine shop and trust me,

it's that stuff's expensive.

So you don't want to waste it.

Yeah.

But I mean, what do you think?

Once it goes past the lip of the craft into your cup,

that's yours.

You can't gift it to anyone.

No.

You know, we were mentioning baymaris before.

Let's say the food is in the baymaris.

They put it on to your plates.

You don't touch it.

It's fine.

You just don't touch it.

You're not hungry.

But that's you scraping it back into the baymarine ready to be served again.

It doesn't cure it.

It doesn't sanitize it.

It is.

No.

Once it's out, I think it's out.

The horse has half bolted.

Right.

So anyways, I just found it a really interesting.

That said, I don't necessarily know that I wouldn't have taken it last.

Well, there's a lot of things.

You know, it's wine in general.

It'd be the alcohol in there, probably sanitize anything.

You could be all right.

I mean, what's a few cold sauce between friends?

Now, we have got...

Shall we talk about the controversy up next?

Oh, yeah, let's do it.

I tell you what, these poles, MatoKine, have been going off like some corked wine

as to who is Australia's greatest live-action non-human media personality.

We asked you who are your favourites.

We compiled them into a short list.

They've been going head-to-head throughout the week.

And some of the most controversial close calls between...

We're talking aggro, we're talking Mr. Squiggle, we're talking pluck a duck,

we're talking Dorothy, the dinosaur, all of them heavyweights crashing into each other,

the immovable force, the unspeakable objects.

People were quite angry to start with.

I mean, we put healthy Harold vs. Humphrey B. Bear up first.

And people are then going like, OK, here we are in round one of the Australian Open

and we've got Nadal vs. Federer.

Are you kidding me?

We've got to wait for the final for these two to play off.

Yes.

It's deliberately done that way.

And then here we are first up having two of the big boys of non-human live-action media personalities.

Yes.

It's been huge MatoKine.

Deep in the comments, I've been watching your work.

It's been quite miraculous.

Tell us what's it like there in the trenches.

Well, let's just start off by thanking everyone who voted.

We have had upwards of a thousand votes every single day that we've done this.

And what I've found shocking, here's let's start with the first pairing,

Harriet Healthy, Harold, Humphrey B. Bear.

What I've found quite remarkable is that people seem to think that healthy Harold

was only a new South Wales thing.

No.

A lot of people were saying, who's healthy Harold?

And I was not going to buy into that ragebait because I had to think

that they could say, oh, who's healthy Harold, are you kidding me?

Yeah.

I, having run my own sort of race for votes recently, MatoKine,

I know that this is clear as day Humphrey B. Bear's mere campaign.

This is the big poster.

Alex is a weak, woke, dangerous joke level of who's healthy Harold is their campaign

to try and sow seeds of doubt in the mind of the voter.

Yes.

That is it.

They want people to think that healthy Harold could not win this competition.

Because healthy Harold, unlike a lot of these actual people,

I have sat and seen healthy Harold in person in the back of that van in my primary school.

Exactly same.

Agro did it bother turning up to warnable primary school.

Old Jamison Street Primary didn't copper visit from Agro.

So sure, he can sit there in his ivory tower, cracking jokes on cartoon connection.

But if you're actually on the ground visiting the Australian kids,

that's going to be the door knocking that you need to get up in a competition like this MatoKine.

And they're going to remember you 30 years later.

Exactly.

And they're going to put their vote forward.

So I think I voted for healthy Harold.

I wanted healthy Harold to win.

Healthy Harold is like that band that does, you know, that does the clubs,

that does the gigs day in day out.

In the back of the bloody Tarago.

Hidden rounds.

None of this.

We're going to do one night at the opera house and call it a tour.

No, thank you.

All right.

Yeah.

The small gigs.

Thank you.

You got the orange juice, sticky carpet in the back of these there.

He's out there.

Old healthy Harold.

And did it get him the win, win Matt.

Healthy Harold took a 59% of the votes to 41%.

All right.

A cent through to the semis.

Set through to the semis.

All right.

Let's see who came up next.

We've actually got audio when asked for comment of his loss.

This is what Humphrey Bebeer had to say.

Thank you, Humphrey.

I'm obviously devastated by that.

All right.

Now, Braun back to the next winner here, around two was Dorothy, the dinosaur verse.

The horrifying little bundle of cotton wool that is the EC doll.

EC from liftoff.

Now, this is the thing.

When you're doing Australia's best, you know, obviously Dorothy,

if this was an Australia's most beloved, maybe, it could go.

But when it comes to who's had the biggest impact on the psyche and culture of a generation,

you know, the haunting nightmares that EC provided may have actually been

but mean that EC is the one of the most influential, if not in the most positive sense.

So out of 1069 votes, Dorothy, the dinosaur, took it up 75% to a pretty impressive 25% from EC though.

That's what it was going to be expected.

Way more than I expected.

And also shout out to Dorothy as Braun pointed out the only female lead personality in this pool.

Well, EC, you know, it's, at this stage, deliberately every child, every gender represented.

Yes, true.

All right.

Round three, this was a big one as well.

Agro versus bananas and pajamas.

Who?

Controversially, people were like, should be one and B2 actually have been facing off against each other.

Rather than a double tick.

No, they're no.

Of course, the bananas there are one.

It's like that, Alex.

Exactly.

You know.

So Agro, I thought had this in the bag.

There were people in the comments saying just give Agro the title in general.

Right.

Just call it a win from here.

And what do you know?

The bananas won.

They got up.

Yep.

What was the vote score?

What was the percentage?

48% Agro 52% was so close.

Don't you dare say that your vote doesn't make a difference.

Don't you dare say your vote doesn't make a difference.

More than a thousand votes.

But as the Geozenator commented on the Instagram says, rare earth metals are valuable.

And we know who brings more potassium to the table.

Okay.

So.

Very nicely done, taking it out.

Third semi spot.

What about the final battle there, Matt O'Conn?

Final battle was pluckerdark versus Mr. Squiggle.

Oh, yeah.

Just shy of a thousand votes.

And I was shocked to see this as well.

I thought pluckerdark had it.

I thought pluckerdark had the hey, hey, fans.

But alas, Mr. Squiggle brings it home with the biggest win of the round.

So about 76%.

Wow.

I mean, that's, what do you put the win like that down to?

I think Mr. Squiggle, and I think potentially the people voting on this Matt O'Conn, we grew up with Mr. Squiggle.

You know, I think the concept itself was so clever.

It was so, it was so beloved.

And I think the fact pluckerdark was probably one.

Hey, hey, it's that idea.

Kids didn't watch that as much, I guess, in the day.

And you're up against Aussie ostrich.

You're up against Dikini.

You know, there's probably votes splits going on between the many.

Yeah.

And I think it's one human life action character media personalities that were a part of Australia television for some reason.

Yes.

It really was a time, wasn't it?

It was an error.

But I think it's time that we bring up just a few of the notable emissions from our finalists.

And don't forget, we assemble this from you, your nominations.

Yeah.

Right?

So I just want us to mention a couple of people.

Can we get some...

Some in-memorium music.

For those in-memorium star music plays.

For those we've lost along the way as we try to find Australia's best.

Thank you.

A few seconds, think about your Dikinis, your Aussie ostriches.

Just think about those guys.

Think about your cash cows.

Okay, the cash cow did miss out.

I think that was unfortunate.

And here's ones that I really just...

I really feel for.

I want to give a shout out to...

Sorry, I'm just getting a bit emotional.

That's okay, take your time.

Our friends Big Ted and Jemima.

Oh, gosh, yeah.

I just think that we forgot.

I think I don't know what happened.

Yeah, how...

How the Big Boy Big Ted missed his list.

I feel like Big Ted's probably feeling really small right now.

Yeah.

I'm sorry, Big Ted.

I'm sorry, Jemima.

You will always in our hearts.

I mean, if you open an up-play school, you're opening up Pandora's Box, aren't you?

That's where the bananas have got there.

You know, I think that's where they got their live-action start, I believe.

Play school.

I mean, so I just want to let everyone there know that you're not forgotten.

Okay?

This was a vote and next time maybe Australia can do better.

But onwards and upwards, guys, vote now.

That's it.

We've got the two finalists.

The two semi-finals happen over the next two days.

Well, I think what's going to happen from here is we just do the one four.

Are you talking all in...

Yeah, and four in the jungle?

Yeah, this is it.

You've only got one vote out of those four.

Yeah, you've got two days to do the next four.

Oh my god.

Do we have the technology to do that?

Yeah, I'm pretty sure we can do that on Instagram, right?

You can do a poll with a person.

Oh my god, this is just...

This is Wrestlemania, 2026.

I think friendships that we lost families will be broken if we open it up to the absolute squabble

that we're pretentious.

No.

We need to do this.

You have got...

Two days back.

Are you calling it?

2PM tomorrow.

That's 2PM Tuesday.

Tuesday, the 31st of March.

Oh!

Get your votes in right now.

Let's see who takes this.

Winner takes all.

Australia's best.

At mat.n.allet.

Vote, vote, vote.

Vote.

Madokai, do you like watching Stephen Colbert?

I got a lot of my American news by watching Stephen Colbert's monologue on the Late Show.

I see clips of it on the web, but I don't really watch it, watch it.

Yeah.

It's amazing.

And it's pretty devastating that they're wrapping up that show very, very soon.

These parent company, there's all sorts of controversy around the governments installing heads

of these companies and to appease the people because he doesn't.

He doesn't go soft on Donald Trump, Colbert, but it's a bit of an end of an era.

And I saw a new story about what he's doing next and I laughed because I assumed,

well, that's not happening, but multiple people and news organizations have confirmed

that Stephen Colbert and his son are a development of a new Lord of the Rings movie.

What?

The pair of them are writing a new Lord of the Rings film together.

This was not on my bingo card for 2026.

The announcement came recently.

The studio's various social media accounts.

And yeah, I'm reading variety here.

So this is big stuff.

This is reputable.

It opened with Lord of the Rings director, Peter Jackson, giving a quick update about the next film in the fantasy franchise.

Andy circuses the hunt for Gollum Jackson set of the project, which is set for release in 2027.

Andy's doing a terrific job.

It's looking amazing.

The script is coming together really well.

I think it's going to be a really good film.

Then he teased a very special partner will help develop it.

That partner is none other than the late show host Colbert,

who Jackson patched through in a video call.

Wow.

And this is amazing.

And if you've watched Stephen Colbert talk about Lord of the Rings before,

he has one of those cyclopedic knowledges of the back stories.

And like all of the J.R.R. Tolkien's like side quests and different characters.

And you know, Aragorn son of Araghorne.

And he knows the parents of everyone.

And he knows the different characters.

He is the biggest super fan.

And I just cannot wait to see what he does with this.

I mean, I haven't seen the first ones.

So I'm coming in fresh for this one.

You've got a lot of catching up to do, Matt,

because they're now starting to do these, you know,

the hobbits and the hunt for Gollum's and these sort of things.

And you haven't even scratched it.

Why, unlike a lot of people, did you not get caught up in the Lord of the Rings hype?

I went into the movies and saw every single one.

No, I just never liked fantasy, okay?

You want the truth?

I just never got into it.

As soon as there's wizards and gems and things to get and blah, blah, blah.

I'm always just like, yawn.

As soon as something gets set on a spaceship, it's the same.

Pairing.

Anything got a spaceship.

It's the thing for better code.

But if you set it in a depressed Australian family's backyard at Christmas.

Oh, I'm there.

Oh, yes.

Watching it.

The characters just take out the, you know, the, the after burners of the spaceship

and do it the four burners of the barbecue.

And then suddenly Matt's interested.

All right.

Well, I want you to be as excited about this, because I was such a fan of the films.

Love what Peter Jackson did with them that I want you to be as excited as I am Adokine.

But they are quite long.

You know, the fellowship of the ring first film eats like three hours long to watch.

And I know you're very time poor.

So what better way to catch you up on the happenings of Lord of the Rings,

Matt O'Conn, then providing you with a summary with the help of Mr. Paul Kelly.

Here we go.

And Bilbo had a party to celebrate his birthday.

Then he left the shire and gave Frodo his ring.

Turns out the ring was evil.

So Gandalf told some people.

And they realized they need to get rid of this thing.

He said head to Rivendale.

And careful who you tell.

But luckily they find.

Aragon.

Aragon.

Aragon.

And he said, come on boys, we're getting out of the prancing pony.

Let's go.

So they said a good pace.

Hiding from the ring rates.

Make it to the L-Rond.

And start a fellowship.

Mount Doom's pretty far from here.

Then they lose Borum here.

The fellowship gets cleared up.

Oh baby, what a trip.

Sam says no use being solemn.

Let's just follow Gollum out of Rohan.

Two more door.

Two more door.

Two more door.

Two more door.

So there you go, Matt, you're caught up.

You know where we're at.

You know where it goes from here.

And to think J.R.

Tolkien spent how long writing that book when he could have just written a Paul Kelly parody.

Peter Jackson, ten years in NZ with everyone filming those movies.

And it only takes Alex started one week.

So well done, mate.

Well done. Bravo.

Thanks, bro.

And thank you for listening to All Day Breakfast today.

Always a pleasure.

She's for hanging out.

Good luck to Steven Colbert.

We're with his new film.

And we'll catch you tomorrow.

Bye-bye.