May 14th, 2018
THE LIST
1. We Came to Win - "How the 1990 World Cup Saved English Soccer"
If you are familiar with the Hillsborough disaster, this episode may not be as shocking as it was to me. Regardless of any prior familiarity with this tragic event in the history of English football, this episode canvases the trials and eventual resurrection of a national past time now internationally integral to sports culture.
2. Track Changes - "Put Your Phone Down"
The episode title might elicit a skittish reaction from those fearing a 'get off the lawn' type epithet from crotchety old men. Originally released the day of the 2016 US presidential election, this conversation is the most impressively earnest dialogue on the extent to which technology affects being present in a physical space.
3. Broadway Backstory - "Deaf West's Spring Awakening"
I am sad to say I have never once thought about how voices in the deaf community are captured on podcasts. That is, not until I listened to this episode capturing an acclaimed production's journey across the country to mount an incredibly unique Broadway revival.
HONORABLE MENTION
Scene On Radio - "White Affirmative Action"
99% Invisible - "Breaking Bad News"
SOMETHING NEW
I've had podcast listening commitment issues for as long as I can remember queuing episodes in my iPod/Kindle/phone. The thing is, my problem is cutting myself off after taking the plunge into a show. I really want to write a column about my process as both a fan and critic some day, but right now I'm going to focus on my time with one particularly fraught listening experience. We're talking Panoply's episodic drama The Walk.
This show was heralded by a couple critics as one of 2018's most anticipated new offerings, grounded in part in it's supposedly experimental format. The Walk casts the listener as a character, cheekily referred to as "Walker," in a story that follows a band of wandering civilians on a quest to thwart a diabolic threat to human existence. This faux-participatory element is novel in the context of other audio dramas, but it wasn't enough to keep me hooked for 31 episodes. That's right, this epic unfolded via bi-weekly installments over the course of three months. Compare that to the compact binge-ready six and seven episode seasons of Gimlet's Homecoming and Sandra, and The Walk seems much more improbable than enjoyable from the outset.
The dialogue is more than serviceable and the characters are voiced quite befitting of the best UK-based thespians. Unfortunately the plot doesn't manage to keep a consistent pace across the duration of the show. We are introduced to subplot after subplot as the world of the story traverses genres of spy drama, science fiction, and terrorist thriller, meeting characters that are sometimes thoughtlessly discarded. Placing a serialized drama in my ears amidst 20-30 other podcast episodes each week may have made it difficult for me to remember and care about all the characters. But this isn't as difficult for me to do with a lengthy novel read across the course of 3-plus months, and so it's hard to determine whether this is a problem of an unfamiliar format or simply a bi-product of the show structure.
Despite all this, I kept listening. I had an odd compulsion to instantly queue each new episode as it hit my feed. It's a bit embarrassing to admit, but this readiness to get through the series evolved into a bit of an exercise in hate-listening. That could well be symptomatic of a shortened attention span conditioned by the Netflixization of media, ramping up ready access to a full series on an unprecedented level. The amount of time needed to take this all in, an estimated 10.333 hours if you figure 31 episodes clocking in around 20 minutes a pop, is akin to getting through a sizable audio book. The difference is that an audio book has a lot of helpful narration to reorient the wandering ears of listeners, a feature sorely missing in The Walk due to it's very nature of being an audio drama. One possible way to combat this would have been to break this lengthy journey into two or three different parts, something that could have easily been crafted to maintain suspense and keep listeners on the hook to eagerly return with the drop of a new set of episodes.
I'm sure a lot of listeners tapered as a result of being ill-prepared for the length of commitment it would take to go the distance. It's a real shame, because there are a lot of salient messages about artificial intelligence, protecting the environment, and the mental state of a nation amidst apocalyptic uncertainty. I must've scanned social media on three or four separate occasions as I listened to see if there was any indication of just how many episodes were going to come out. No such information was forthcoming, and so I gritted my teeth and just kept going as I lost faith that the story would ever conclude. This caused me to listen through the final episode without a real sense of closure, which does not appear to have been the intention of the storytellers.
Ultimately the intrigue of this show is born out in the rather careless distribution structure, which sadly detracts from the massive amount of creative power from everyone involved. It certainly provides an opportunity for creators and theorists to hash out the ways context creates meaning, but it obscures a satisfactory experience of a compelling character for the majority of consumers. So where does that leave us? I guess with a cautionary recommendation for potential listeners to approach The Walk as an audio book. Now that all 31 episodes have been released, listeners are free to self-pace. If I had to do it all over again, I'd probably binge in chunks. There's a lot of room to marathon-listen in spurts, and so in lieu of specific episode demarcation I might suggest taking a breather whenever you find your attention drifting. If you're like me, it's really not because the content is sub-par but rather because your ears and mind are not accustomed to consuming this particular format of cultural material.
This show was heralded by a couple critics as one of 2018's most anticipated new offerings, grounded in part in it's supposedly experimental format. The Walk casts the listener as a character, cheekily referred to as "Walker," in a story that follows a band of wandering civilians on a quest to thwart a diabolic threat to human existence. This faux-participatory element is novel in the context of other audio dramas, but it wasn't enough to keep me hooked for 31 episodes. That's right, this epic unfolded via bi-weekly installments over the course of three months. Compare that to the compact binge-ready six and seven episode seasons of Gimlet's Homecoming and Sandra, and The Walk seems much more improbable than enjoyable from the outset.
The dialogue is more than serviceable and the characters are voiced quite befitting of the best UK-based thespians. Unfortunately the plot doesn't manage to keep a consistent pace across the duration of the show. We are introduced to subplot after subplot as the world of the story traverses genres of spy drama, science fiction, and terrorist thriller, meeting characters that are sometimes thoughtlessly discarded. Placing a serialized drama in my ears amidst 20-30 other podcast episodes each week may have made it difficult for me to remember and care about all the characters. But this isn't as difficult for me to do with a lengthy novel read across the course of 3-plus months, and so it's hard to determine whether this is a problem of an unfamiliar format or simply a bi-product of the show structure.
Despite all this, I kept listening. I had an odd compulsion to instantly queue each new episode as it hit my feed. It's a bit embarrassing to admit, but this readiness to get through the series evolved into a bit of an exercise in hate-listening. That could well be symptomatic of a shortened attention span conditioned by the Netflixization of media, ramping up ready access to a full series on an unprecedented level. The amount of time needed to take this all in, an estimated 10.333 hours if you figure 31 episodes clocking in around 20 minutes a pop, is akin to getting through a sizable audio book. The difference is that an audio book has a lot of helpful narration to reorient the wandering ears of listeners, a feature sorely missing in The Walk due to it's very nature of being an audio drama. One possible way to combat this would have been to break this lengthy journey into two or three different parts, something that could have easily been crafted to maintain suspense and keep listeners on the hook to eagerly return with the drop of a new set of episodes.
I'm sure a lot of listeners tapered as a result of being ill-prepared for the length of commitment it would take to go the distance. It's a real shame, because there are a lot of salient messages about artificial intelligence, protecting the environment, and the mental state of a nation amidst apocalyptic uncertainty. I must've scanned social media on three or four separate occasions as I listened to see if there was any indication of just how many episodes were going to come out. No such information was forthcoming, and so I gritted my teeth and just kept going as I lost faith that the story would ever conclude. This caused me to listen through the final episode without a real sense of closure, which does not appear to have been the intention of the storytellers.
Ultimately the intrigue of this show is born out in the rather careless distribution structure, which sadly detracts from the massive amount of creative power from everyone involved. It certainly provides an opportunity for creators and theorists to hash out the ways context creates meaning, but it obscures a satisfactory experience of a compelling character for the majority of consumers. So where does that leave us? I guess with a cautionary recommendation for potential listeners to approach The Walk as an audio book. Now that all 31 episodes have been released, listeners are free to self-pace. If I had to do it all over again, I'd probably binge in chunks. There's a lot of room to marathon-listen in spurts, and so in lieu of specific episode demarcation I might suggest taking a breather whenever you find your attention drifting. If you're like me, it's really not because the content is sub-par but rather because your ears and mind are not accustomed to consuming this particular format of cultural material.
From: Panoply
Recommended for: People who have better attention spans than I.
Drop Schedule: Seasonal:Bi-weekly (all episodes now available)
Average episode length: 20 minutes
Rating: Make It Work
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