Hey friends! Welcome back, and thank you for joining me again this week. This week has been pretty crazy here in Michigan, with the Governor ordering a 3-week stay-at-home order in response to COVID-19, effectively closing all businesses deemed “non-essential”. I won’t get too far in to that, because it has already been covered by every news station and on every media platform that exists, and has been covered extensively.
But what that means is that a lot of people are finding themselves with a lot of unexpected free time. A good way to pass that free time, in my opinion, is by finding a new podcast to listen to. What I wanted to do this week then, is to share some of my favorite podcasts with you all. I won’t go too in depth with any of them, just enough to give you an idea and hopefully pique some curiosity. Without further adieu, here are my current top 5 (in no particular order) favorite podcasts to listen to.
1. Time Sensitive
This podcast is not only one of my favorites, it’s also local to West Michigan! Time Sensitive is released every Friday, with the episodes alternating each week between “full” episodes and “mini” episodes. During the full episodes, the hosts break down a full-length feature film that had been released in the previous 18 months (generally they go for films that have flown under the radar for one reason or another), and talk about plot, visuals, soundtracks, actors/actresses, strengths and weaknesses of the film, favorite scenes, production background, box office statistics, critical reception, etc.
The “mini episode” weeks are a bit more of a free-for-all (but still generally movie related), with episodes like “Oscars 2020 Recap”, “Guilty Pleasure Movies”, “‘…And You’re Watching Disney Channel.'”, and, my personal favorite “What Are You Into?”
The hosts have outstanding chemistry with one another, and they each bring unique ‘specializations’ to the conversation each week. I’m not sure how much editing goes in to each episode before it’s ready to be released, but it’s seamless and the end product every week feels like it’s just three friends sitting in a room and casually talking about movies for an hour – it’s really refreshing and makes you feel like you’re in the room with them. All in all, I highly recommend this podcast. Even if you haven’t seen many (or any) of the movies they have reviewed, it’s a blast listening to these lovable doofuses and it makes you start viewing movies differently.
Find them: In the Apple Podcasts app; Spotify – https://open.spotify.com/show/298itqiCJU6ZbiopPHEumf ; Stitcher – https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/time-sensitive
2. The Adventure Zone
I know I’m very late to the party with this podcast, since it started back in December of 2014 and I didn’t start listening to it until May of 2019, but that just meant I had more content to binge!
The Adventure Zone is a spin-off of another podcast called My Brother, My Brother, and Me, which is hosted by the McElroy brothers. The Adventure Zone is a Dungeons and Dragons podcast (though they played other games in between seasons 1 and 2, and all of season 2) with the youngest brother playing the part of Dungeon Master, and the other two brothers, and their dad playing as the adventuring party.
Even if you have never played Dungeons and Dragons, and if the thought of it causes your ‘anti-nerd’ defenses to flare up, this podcast is highly enjoyable. The McElroys are absolutely hilarious but they also do a wonderful job of pouring a lot of heart into what they do. The stories crafted by these gentlemen (especially in Season 1) made me laugh, cry, yell, and shake my head in both awe and disbelief – sometimes all in one episode! They do a wonderful job of creating multi-layered characters that are believable, relatable, inclusive, and make you feel a real connection with them. If you want a podcast with great cooperative storytelling that has a pretty binge-able backlog of content, this is a great place to start!
Find them: Apple Podcasts App; Spotify – https://open.spotify.com/show/6OoAQesdLgYBOyfx8ji0bZ ; Stitcher – https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/sawbones-podcast/the-adventure-zone
3. Myths And Legends
I don’t know about you, but I have always been pretty fascinated with mythology, folklore, fairy tales, and legends, though I don’t consider myself anything even close to an expert in any of them. In this podcast, the host seems to share my fascination, but unlike me, has thankfully put in the time and effort to research the stories and ‘reworked’ them in a way that makes them more understandable and easy-to-follow than they were originally written. His topics cover a variety of time periods, cultures, and religions, and he also does a wonderful job of diving in to the original versions of some incredibly popular stories that have apparently been very stripped and polished to be more consumer-friendly (the original story of Robin Hood is a good example of this).
The reason I love this podcast is because it’s a good way to learn about history, other cultures and mythology, while still being incredibly entertaining. He does a good job of interjecting sarcasm, jokes, and pop-culture references in to centuries-old stories in ways that keep the story relatable to the listener without wholly breaking immersion in the story. This is another podcast that has been around for quite some time (episode 1 was in April 2015) and is a weekly podcast, so there’s plenty of backlog to binge through!
Find them: Apple Podcasts App; Spotify – https://open.spotify.com/show/6xqETOvGnSQHH0xdLtgcXU ; Stitcher – https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/jason-weiser/myths-and-legnen
4. More Perfect
If I’m being completely honest, this is a podcast that I would not have sought out and listened to on my own. I was talking with a friend a few years ago about podcasts, since I was just starting to get in to them and wanted some recommendations, and he told me about a podcast that was all about Supreme Court cases and the history behind them – it was called More Perfect (which is admittedly a great title for a podcast about the Supreme Court).
I’ve never really been huge in to politics (much to my late mother’s chagrin) so I smiled and nodded and told him I’d check it out, even though I had no intention of actually doing so. Later that night though, I was thinking about it and realized that I hated it when I told someone about a thing that I really enjoyed and they shrugged it off and didn’t take it seriously, and I didn’t want to feel like a hypocrite, so I decided to give it a listen.
Much to my surprise, the episodes were much more intriguing and easy-to-listen-to than I had anticipated! In my head, a podcast about the history of the Supreme Court and stories behind the major cases in its history was going to be akin to a lecture-hall history class taught by Ben Stein. Instead, I found young, high-energy hosts that did real and raw interviews with individuals (or their family members) involved in the Supreme Court cases. A good portion of the cases seemed to have had rather humble beginnings and it really makes you realize how big changes can come from small actions. I highly recommend this to anyone that wants to learn a bit more about American History without feeling like you’re back in class.
Find them: Apple Podcasts App; Spotify – https://open.spotify.com/show/6iVxbLoqDofkNpXYO4mt2W ; Stitcher – https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/wnyc/radiolab-presents-more-perfect
5. Wait Wait… Don’t Tell Me!
Last but not least, this is a podcast that my dad told me about, and I’m very happy that he did. It’s a weekly news-comedy podcast by NPR (National Public Radio). I know what you’re thinking . . . how can “NPR” and “comedy” be used to describe the same thing? Well, if I’m being honest, I’m not sure how they do it, but it definitely works!
The host and panel recount the previous weeks’ news stories in the form of fun games played by panel members and listener call-ins. They also do a bit each week with a different celebrity that joins them via phone call to play a game called “Not My Job”. This podcast is difficult to describe why I like it, but if you want to be able to keep up on the big news stories of the week without having to feel the fear associated with watching any of the TV news channels, and instead be entertained, this is the podcast for you!
Find them: Apple Podcasts App ; Spotify – https://open.spotify.com/show/0dWpNy3iA6Mm3xYaHB2Zi9 ; Stitcher – https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/national-public-radio/npr-programs-wait-wait-dont-tell-me-podcast
I hope that some of you found this entertaining and useful, and hopefully I’ve given you some content to help keep you occupied during this time of unexpected free time. Just remember to keep your heads up, we’ll make it through this. Even the darkest night is followed by the light of dawn.
Feel free to leave me a comment down below with some of YOUR favorite podcasts! Thank you for joining me again, and I’ll see you guys next week!
Musings Of A Struggling Creator 