Quite the week for bingers and lovers of serialized podcasts. Have you heard Serial’s back? Also, Last Seen is finally here and Dr. Death is almost finished. Five of the top six pods on the iTunes charts today are deep-dive narratives.
The intruder: The Joe Rogan Experience (No. 5). Though his three-hour episodes qualify as binges, amirite?
7 Pod Takes
1) “When I’m feeling optimistic, I appreciate that an elevator car in a government building is one of the few places left in our country where different kinds of people are forced into proximity.”
Listen: Serial: A Bar Fight Walks into the Justice Center (1:59)
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A taste of Sarah Koenig’s opening thoughts during the first episode of the much-anticipated third season of Serial.
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Koenig and her colleagues spent a year riding elevators in a Cleveland courthouse, during a deep dive into the U.S. criminal justice system.
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The first ep focuses on a bar fight that offers a window into some of the system’s intricacies and warped ways.
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Says defense attorney Russ Bensing: “In this county, innocence is a misdemeanor.”
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My take: So far, so great.
2) “These are works of the civilization that are so important, to remove them is to remove a piece of our civilization.”
Listen: Last Seen: Episode 1: ‘81 Minutes’ (30:19)
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That’s Anne Hawley, former director of the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, talking about the 13 pieces of art still missing in the wake of the world’s greatest unsolved art theft.
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That theft is the subject of this new pod that not only probes the crime, but explores the anguish among those who saw five Degas works, two Rembrandts, a Vermeer and other artworks disappear from their care.
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My take: Refreshing to have a great true-crime pod without a corpse.
3) “The first bite of that apple, I guess revealed the truth / That’s when Eve got smart, and that’s why Adam don’t like fruit.”
Listen: More Perfect: The Most Perfect Album: ”19th Amendment” by Dolly Parton
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That’s Parton, in her song about the constitutional amendment that gave women in the U.S. the right to vote.
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Parton’s song’s part of an ambitious and very fun project from the More Perfect pod: It features stories about the 27 amendments, accompanied by 27 original songs, including Parton’s jaunty, Schoolhouse Rock-y tune.
4) “There’s this American neurosis, this fear that the human body is being outstripped by our technology.”
Listen: Stay Tuned With Preet: Fair Play (with Sally Jenkins) (45:01)
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That’s Jenkins, adding that, because of this, Americans “get a little funny about our sports.”
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Jenkins and host Preet Bharara probe some of the fault lines of American society brought to the surface by sports, including the controversial penalization of Serena Williams at the U.S. Open and the ongoing issues surrounding protests and the NFL.
5) “I felt like he would hear that I didn’t have pants on.”
Listen: Origins: SNL / To Trump or Not to Trump (:12)
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That’s cast member Chris Redd, recalling his fear upon talking to SNL honcho Lorne Michaels when he learned he’d be joining the show.
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Redd and many other cast members, as well as Michaels, talk to Origins’ pod maker James Andrew Miller in this kickoff ep of the show’s fourth season, which takes a deep dive into SNL as it heads into its 44th season.
6) “The Pizza Hut lunch buffet is the most concentrated, fully realized manifestation of the free market.”
Listen: The Sporkful: Life Lessons From The Pizza Hut Lunch Buffet (25:24)
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That’s host Dan Pashman, distilling the POV of comedian Tim Dillon on the free-for-all experience that is the Pizza Hut lunch buffet.
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Another hot take, this one from Dillon: “Rich people don’t care about food.”
7) “Would you ever wipe Dame Judy Dench’s butt?”
Listen: Anna Faris is Unqualified: Adam Rippon (9:09)
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That how Faris breaks the ice with Olympic figure skater Rippon.
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Spoiler: He would.
Go Deep
1) National Parks
Listen: American History Tellers
- A six-part deep dive into the creation and preservation of the U.S. national parks.
- Binge time: 4 hours, 8 minutes.
2) Perfect Pop Songs
Listen: Rockin’ the Suburbs
- The RTS guys go deep with a five-part series that covers seven pop songs, including tunes from the killer Bs: Bowie, Badfinger, and the English Beat.
- My take: “Save It for Later” is a correct pick.
- Binge time: 1 hour, 15 minutes.
3) The Trans-Siberian Train Experience
Listen: Deviate with Rolf Potts
- Potts and guest Jonathan Arlan talk over a two-part pod about the iconic train trip.
- Binge time: 2 hours, 17 minutes.
4) King Crimson
Listen: Political Beats
- Prog rock nerdiness abounds in this convo with Dave Weigel, political reporter and author of “The Show That Never Ends: The Rise and Fall of Prog Rock.”
- Binge time: 2 hours, 21 minutes.
Guest Appearances By…
Alley, Kirstie The Dan Wootton Interview
Andrés, José Pod Save America
Attenborough, David The New Yorker Radio Hour
Barinholtz, Ike Armchair Expert with Dax Shepard
Batiste, Jon I Think You’re Interesting
Bell, Kristen The Good Place: The Podcast, WTF with Marc Maron
- Eleanor!
Bergen, Candice Remote Controlled
Biskind, Peter Public Intellectual
- The author of “The Sky is Falling: How Vampires, Zombies, Androids, and Superheroes Made America Great for Extremism” talks about Americans’ love of disaster and revenge.
Branson, Sir Richard Kickass News
Brown, Bobbi How I Built This with Guy Raz
Carden, D’Arcy Comedy Bang! Bang!
Coyne, Wayne This Must Be the Gig
Dessa Sound Opinions
English, Diane Remote Controlled
Fogelman, Dan Curious with Josh Peck, The Bill Simmons Podcast
Fonda, Jane Death, Sex + Money, Oprah’s Master Class
Godin, Seth On Being
Gyllenhaal, Maggie Fresh Air
Haidt, Jonathan I Have to Ask
- An interview with the author of “The Coddling of the American Mind” by host Isaac Chotiner. Chotiner got some Twitter love this week for his “masterclass” interviews.
Harari, Yuval Noah Waking Up With Sam Harris
Hawke, Ethan The Gist with Mike Pesca, The Big Picture
- He’s still making the pod rounds this week to promote his new movie, “Blaze.”
Henderson, Lacey Forked Up
- Talking food with the paralympian.
Hirono, Mazie Off Message
Holofcener, Nicole The Moment with Brian Koppelman, Bullseye, Recode Media with Peter Kafka
Kerry, John Pod Save America, Pod Save the World
Killam, Taran Off Book
- He helps improvise a musical called “Poetry: 1959.”
Klein, Linda Kay Fresh Air
- Convo with the author of “Pure: Inside the Evangelical Movement That Shamed a Generation of Young Women and How I Broke Free.”
Koy, Jo The Adam Carolla Show
Kreischer, Bert The Gist with Mike Pesca
Lauren, Ralph Oprah’s SuperSoul Conversations
- Two-part pod with the design icon.
Lyne, Susan Skimm’d From the Couch
Mantzoukas, Jason Comedy Bang! Bang!
Nash, Steve The Bill Simmons Podcast
Nussbaum, Martha C. The Ezra Klein Show
Nye, Naomi Shihab On Being
O’Donnell, Lawrence The West Wing Weekly
Olsen, Angel Talkhouse
Patrick, Deval The Axe Files
Saslow, Eli Longform Podcast
Schatz, Brian Lovett or Leave It
- Convo with “the best senator on Twitter.”
Schur, Michael The Good Place: The Podcast, The Bill Simmons Podcast
Shaffir, Ari Lost in America
Shrum, Bob The Axe Files
Slash WTF With Marc Maron
Stevenson, Bryan The Goop Podcast
Tosi, Christina The Dave Chang Show
- A two-parter with the Milk Bar founder.
Witherspoon, Reese Getting Curious With Jonathan Van Ness
Notable New Podcasts
1) Serial
- The pod’s much anticipated season 3 goes to Cleveland for a deep dive into the U.S. justice system.
2) Last Seen
- The pod probes the 1990 theft of 13 pieces of art from the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum.
- Wayne Federman and Andrew Steven dissect the evolution of standup comedy, “from Vaudeville to Netflix.”
- New pod from Wondery dives “into the heart of America’s dark side to look at what drives someone to break the rules and what happens when they’re caught.” First up: BALCO.
- The pod tells Honor Eastly’s “story of difference, identity, and why we should stay alive.”
6) More Perfect
- Season 3 of Radiolab’s series about the supreme court turns to the amendments to the U.S. constitution, and it does so with music.
- The Newport Beach Police Department in California is getting into podcasts with a six-part series about an unsolved murder. They’re hoping the pod can turn up leads.
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