My Review of the "Serial" Podcast

As a hopeless podcast addict, I’ve been inevitably sucked into the phenomenon that is Serial, the spin-off podcast from This American Life that is currently examining the 1999 murder of a 17-year old high school student in Baltimore. A part of me is very uncomfortable with the feverish obsession that Serial has spawned in its audience. A promising young girl was senselessly murdered, and it’s likely that more than one person is lying about what they know. It’s disturbing and a little distasteful to me that so many people on Reddit and other forums are treating this like a fictional murder mystery rather than a tragedy that involves real human beings whose lives are still being affected by it. But I also understand why so many are held helplessly in its grip. It’s utterly compelling, because there are so many facets to the story and so many different ways that the storytelling itself messes with our sense of how good our instincts about people really are. Then there are the myriad clues, questions, cell phone records, court documents, timelines—perfect fodder for the naturally obsessive. Evidence maps and detailed timeline charts and cell tower ping maps are being created by fans of the show and shared online, as listeners play detective and try to determine the true course of events on the day of the murder.

I don’t have the time, patience or stamina to participate at that level, and the evidence isn’t what interests me most about the case. Personally, my fascination lies with the motivations and psychological make-up of the people producer Sarah Koenig interviews.  To summarize the story, Hae Lee Min was strangled on January 13^th, 1999. Her ex-boyfriend, Adnan Syed, was arrested and convicted of her murder, based largely on the inconsistent testimony of Adnan’s casual friend and pot-smoking buddy, Jay (who is almost universally described as “shady”.) To this day, Adnan claims that he is innocent. “Serial” sets out to find the truth, and in doing so, wades into an ungodly mess of conflicting testimony, contradictions, intrigue, and seeming cover-ups. Week to week, the podcast yanks it’s listeners from one perspective to another, so you are convinced of Anan’s innocence one week and just as convinced of his guilt the following week. It is brilliant storytelling that has me constantly wondering about Jay’s motives, if Adnan is really the victim he claims to be, and the nature of memory. Finally, I wonder about producer Sarah herself, and how much her own feelings about this case are influencing what and how she chooses to report.

The show is also a meditation on the good person/bad person binary. I think that some of what its listeners find so alluring is the compulsion to categorize Adnan as all good or all bad, because the thought that we can carry both light and darkness within us is frightening. The idea that a basically good kid could snap and carry out a strangulation is psychologically destabilizing and an affront to our sense of predictability. Much is made of the fact that Adnan was a popular and well-regarded in high school, and now after fifteen years in prison, comes across as intelligent, kind, calm, and accepting of his fate, hardly the markers of an out-of-control killer. There are rabid believers on both sides of the spectrum. Those who believe he is innocent stand behind him with fierce loyalty. Those who think he is guilty believe that he is a brilliant sociopath who is manipulating Sarah Koenig and using “Serial” to his advantage. He is a perfect mirror for our projections of fear, and our need to believe in purity of character.

However, in all of my addictive fascination with Serial, I try to remember the words of victim Hae Lee Min’s brother, who posted a single plea on Reddit recently before vanishing back into the ether: (Quoted in part with no corrections —the full quote can be found here.)

"I won't be answering any questions because... TO ME ITS REAL LIFE. To you listeners, its another murder mystery, crime drama, another episode of CSI. You weren't there to see your mom crying every night, having a heartattck when she got the new that the body was found, and going to court almost everyday for a year seeing your mom weeping,crying and fainting. You don't know what we went through. Especially to those who are demanding our family response and having a meetup... you guys are disgusting. SHame on you. I pray that you don't have to go through what we went through and have your story blasted to 5mil listeners.”

--Kristen McHenry

Book Launch Party, Economic Boondoggle, The Joys of “Thor” and Actually Leaving the House on a Saturday Night

First, to get the book updates out of the way: After a series of cover-art related delays, “The Acme Employee Handbook” has a launch date! It will be released on December 14th, with a book launch party in Australia! If all works out as planned, I will be Skyping in to do a live reading. More details coming soon.

“Cheesehead” will be up at Fiction on the Web on Wednesday. I’ll post the link here when it’s live.

Being a rabid fan of storytelling and podcasts, and therefore storytelling podcasts, I recently stumbled across “Risk”, a show very similar to NPR’s The Moth, but with a darker bent. One of the stories really struck me. It was about a true mountain man who lived for many years in the extreme outback of Alaska, and survived by hunting, fishing, trapping and skinning. Money was useless to him—he truly lived completely off the land, and described a number of close calls that made me sweat with anxiety just hearing them. The whole time I was listening to his story, all I could think was that he was crazy. “You can’t live your life like that!” I kept silently shouting at him in my mind. “That’s absurd! We have civilization so that we don’t have to spend our entire lives focused on base survival! Stop being an idiot and move to a city where it’s safe for God’s sake!”

But the more I listened to his story, while sitting on the Metro on my way to my harried, civilized job in the metropolis, the more I was struck with the utter, arcane senselessness of the modern way of surviving. I go to a job to get “dollars” so I can then spend those dollars on units of nutrition, shelter and clothing. Mountain Man didn’t require an intercessory. He bypassed the middle man and went straight to the source. Our entire economic system is a huge scam, and because I’m completely useless outdoors and a total wimp with no aim, I have to participate in it if I’m to survive. What does it all mean? Isn’t there a better way? What am I doing with my life???!!! This seems all wrong suddenly--terribly, terribly wrong-- and I just want to move to Montana and homestead and live close to the earth and…oh, who am I kidding. I don’t know even know how to pluck a chicken. I’m doomed to a pale gray drone-like existence in the Great Machine. C'est la vie.

I, The One Who Never Leaveth the House on Weekends, went out not once, but twice on Saturday! Mr. Typist and I whiled away two hours of our lives at “Thor: The Dark World.” I don’t know how I have come so far from extreme film snobbery to genuine affection for the “Thor” movies, but damn, I love me some Thor! And it’s not just because Chris Hemsworth is total eye-candy, although that helps. I think it’s because I find comfort in the highly stylized look of the films, I like the mythology, and I love the push-pull relationship between chaotic, morally questionable Loki and his long-suffering, noble brother Thor. Loki is awesome. Loki exists in all of our lives in some way, shape, or form, fucking up our well-laid plans, bringing our moral strictures into question, and generally sowing bedlam where we most want order and stability. Without Loki, we would be complacent creatures. Our brains would have no flexibility, our hearts no mettle.

Then, I met some friends for dinner and drinks, and went to a concert at the Tractor Tavern—shamefully, the first time I have been to the Tractor despite having lived in this neighborhood for, oh, about 12 years now. I’d forgotten how powerful it can be to hear live music, to mind-meld with the sound and the audience’s energy. I had great time, and I didn’t fall asleep at 11:00 p.m. as I feared I would. See, I’m still young and vital! I went to a concert! I stayed awake! I even rocked out a little. In your face, 44!

Here’s who I saw perform: Amy Cook and Alejandro Escovedo!

--Kristen McHenry

Poets and Comedians, Part Two: Podcasts I Have Loved

Poets and Comedians, Part Two: Podcasts I Have Loved

In Part One of "Poets and Comedians", I stated that I would list some of my favorite comedy podcasts...here are some highlights! Check them out if any of them sound interesting. (You don't need an I-pod to listen to a podcast.)

Wiretap with Jonathan Goldstein

I know it’s become trendy to call everything “quirky”, but the CBC’s Wiretap with Jonathan Goldstein truly is. It’s a brilliantly scripted show that follows the exploits of Jonathan and his assortment of eccentric, moody friends. It usually opens either with a monologue or short story from Jonathan, or, to his perpetual exasperation, a badly-timed phone call from one of his buddies who are either in need in advice, or just plain bored. Some of the conversations are hilarious, (like when the hyper-Type-A Josh calls to rant about his new job at a peace-loving, hippy-dippy Yoga magazine), some are highly silly, (two words: Howard Chackowicz), and a few have actually been intense enough to make me cry. Wiretap is never just one shtick; it’s collection of conversations, weird snippets, stories, and deeply affecting moments that come together in a lovely sound collage that has become an integral part of my inner world. For a great read, check out Jonathan’s book, “Ladies and Gentlemen: The Bible”, a collection of short stories re-telling famous tales from the Bible. And, a special shout-out to frequent guest Heather O'Neill, author of "Lullabies for Little Criminals", and a writer who I am sick with envy over.

WTF? with Marc Maron

How do you solve a problem like Marc Maron? This man is smart, a gifted interviewer, and a talented performer. He’s also an angry, neurotic, self-destructive mess of a human being, which is what really what makes me like him so much. Just when I start to think I should put my shrink on speed-dial, Marc says something like, (and I paraphrase) “You know, at age 45, I’m just beginning to realize that I don’t have to walk around all day waiting for other people to confirm my worst fears about myself”--and I’m so familiar with that way of being that it suddenly becomes absurd and loses its power, because I can laugh about it. Thanks, Marc, for being faster and cheaper than therapy! (And for regularly assuring your fans that you’re not about to become a normal, happy person and abandon us). The New York Times recently wrote a great article about Marc that describes him and his work very accurately.

The Adam Corolla Show

Dear NPR: I’m breaking up with you. When I’m driving to work through the 520 gridlock on yet another oppressive, gloom-ridden Seattle Monday—I’m sorry, but I can no longer emotionally cope with your earnest, in-depth stories about the untenable plight of mole farmers in outer Sandlovia. All that gets me through this commute nowadays is Adam-- dear, loud, cranky, foul-mouthed, hot-tempered Adam, with his endless, petty gripes, verbal diarrhea, and hilarious vitriol. Also, his guests are generally awesome (when Adam lets them talk), and although he comes across as Joe Six-Pack on the surface, he actually possesses a shrewd, analytical intelligence, and a Renaissance man’s mentality. He can give you smart, in-depth advice about love, house repairs, cars purchases, food preparation, and child-raising (he has four-year-old twins). Plus, he invented the “mangria”—a combination of wine and vodka--and, according to his book, he hates spiders almost as much as I do. What’s not to love?

Larry Miller

Larry Miller, a recurring guest on Adam Corolla’s show, is a wonderful, laid-back contrast to Adam’s intensity, and a fine podcaster in his own right. I cherish those thirty minutes a week I get to spend listening to Larry natter on about soap chips and the five levels of drinking, or about nothing in particular. He’s a warm, amiable, calming presence, funny, with great stories and a happy-go-lucky outlook that never descends into sentimentality or vapidity. I kind of wish he were my best friend and next-door neighbor, but for now, just listening to his podcast will have to do.

Too Beautiful to Live (TBTL)

Technically, Luke Burbank is more of a part-time stand-up comic, and full-time radio and podcasting personality. But that doesn’t make him any less engaging and funny. I’ve been a huge fan of his show ever since I started catching it by chance on KIRO (before they stupidly canceled it), when I drove to a volunteer gig in the evenings. Since cancellation, TBTL has reached new heights as a podcast, and I find myself embarrassingly over-involved (in my head, at least), in the lives of him, producer Jen Andrews, and regular Sean DeTore, whose on-air chemistry is truly special. I’m not making that up—radio god Ira Glass gave TBTL an amazing shout-out last year, saying that the show was changing the face of radio. Me and the other “tens” (TBTL fans) agree. The show is really less about Luke, Jen and Sean, and more about forming a community of caring people and bringing a positive, hopeful and uplifting spin to the Gen X plight. Not that it’s a generational thing—TBTL has listeners as young as four and as old as ninety-three. Luke, Jen, Sean…you barely know me, but…*sniff* I love you guys!

These are just the highlights of the podcasts I listen to and love; however, true to the pattern here, none of them have female leads and few have a strong female presence. Part Three of “Poets and Comedians” will explore the question of why, with so many amazing and talented female comedians thriving in the biz now, there is still a dearth of female-led podcasts. In the meantime, if you do know of any kick-ass, funny, lady-podcasts, please let me know about them in the comments section! (Because God knows, I don’t have enough to listen to!)


--Kristen McHenry