I keep getting people who ask me what podcasts I listen to, what they’re about, and which I recommend, SO. Please note: these are solely my opinions, and your taste may differ from mine.
If you ever want more recommendations, check out Radio Drama Revival, which features all sorts of shows, singular and serial, and interviews with their writers and creators.
(This list is regularly updated. Last update 10/31/21.)
Top 3:
Archive 81: Dan is hired to organize some tapes about a very strange apartment building. Really ramps up in season 2. Horror. Good characters, interesting worldbuilding, intriguing plot, good voice acting, the best sound design of everything I’ve listened to so far. The whole package, really. (Ongoing.)
The Magnus Archives: An archivist for an institute of paranormal research reads aloud witness testimonials that turn out to be connected. The most tightly written podcast yet, perfectly paced, amazing use of framing device, fascinating world-building, wonderful slow-burn character development. Pay attention to the details in this one. (Completed.)
The Penumbra Podcast: There are a handful of stand-alone stories, but the two primary ones are a medieval-adjacent fantasy featuring knights facing monsters and a scifi detective noir story. Good breadth, and all the stories are fun and interesting, the characters endearing. Really excellent dialogue and genre play. (Ongoing.)
Great:
Alice Isn’t Dead: An anxious trucker is looking for her missing wife. Done by the Nightvale people but nothing like it. American Gothic variety horror. Lovely descriptions, a good protagonist, an interesting world, well-paced. (Completed.)
The Bunker: A black comedy about three guys who survived the apocalypse broadcasting a radio show to the wasteland. The episodes are long, but clearly and easily segmented for easy listening. Does an excellent job building up the world and characters and maintaining its bleak humor throughout, while going in depth on its themes and the chosen topics of each episode. (Completed.)
The Bright Sessions: People with powers in therapy to learn to cope with them. Contrary to what one might expect, this isn’t about superheroes, but the way it handles healing and growth and relationships are fantastic. A satisfying ending. Very character-driven. Sequel series are now available on the feed as well. (Completed.)
Caravan: Two best friends are on a camping trip together, when one falls into a midwestern fantasy world. So much fun, the characters are full of charm and heart, and the voice actors portray them well. Another heartwarming whisperforge work, funny too. Mildly NSFW. (Ongoing.)
The Deep Vault: In the near future, a small group escape the apocalypse by taking shelter in a legendary abandoned bunker, but they’re not alone. A 7-ep miniseries made by the same people who did Archive 81, and they’re able to develop their cast and the relationships in it quite effectively in the short span given. A fast paced adventure great for a long drive or quiet afternoon. (Completed.)
The Far Meridian: An agoraphobic young woman wakes up to discover her lighthouse is teleporting around. Gentle surrealism with a focus on story. Even the one-off characters are charming, and there are well-written latino characters everywhere. (Ongoing.)
Girl in Space: Just a girl, in space, taking care of a star with only a glitchy AI for company (for now). The girl’s very charming, and the AI is one of my favorites I’ve seen written. (Ongoing.)
Gone: A woman wakes up one day to discover she's the last person in the world. No apocalypse, everyone's just... gone. Very, very strong voice in the protagonist; she's rough and fascinating. Incorporates a mental health angle often neglected in these types of stories. Another season was promised, as season 1 ends on a cliffhanger, but it hasn’t yet materialized. (Abandoned.)
Greater Boston: In an alternate Boston, the Red Line railway becomes it's own city, and the ramifications of that. A story about community, with the focus on a group of people dealing with the aftermath of a single man's death. Both deeply emotional and very, very funny. There are cheese robots, Atlantis, and guinea pigs. A delightful and very well woven wild ride. (Ongoing.)
Kalila Stormfire’s Economical Magick Services: A pleasant slice-of-life record of a young witch’s attempt to start a business. It takes a little to get going; I didn’t get much invested until episode seven, but ever since then, it’s continually ramped up. The final season especially is a delight. The crossover specials are very fun. (Ongoing.)
Liberty: In a distant Earth colony colony, there is the city of Atrius ruled by the dictatorial Arkon, and outside are the cannibalistic Fringers. Three stories in one. Critical Research, the first and roughest, follows a crew of Atrians going out and studying the Fringers. Tales of the Tower are is an anthology of horror stories aired by the Atrian government. Vigilance is an Actual Play story where the players are Atrians trying to track down three missing persons for community service, and get stuck in a deeper conspiracy. All of them are excellent, amazing soundscaping, good VAs, and intense writing. Vigilance and Critical Research are over, but Tales from the Tower is still ongoing. (Ongoing, but has several completed stories.)
The London Necropolis Railway: A short listen about a railroad that ferries the souls of the dead. A ghost dodged their train and one of the ticketers needs to chase her down. Short episodes, exciting, funny and fun. (Ongoing.)
A Scottish Podcast: A self-absorbed asshole tries to get rich by starting his own supernatural podcast. A parody of The Black Tapes and its ilk. Hilarious and a solid plot. (Ongoing.)
Startripper!!: An alien office worker buys his dream car and quits his job to go have adventures and live his best life. Genuinely the happiest, most feel good podcast I’ve heard. An absolute pleasure. (Ongoing.)
Uncanny County: An anthology series about strange events happening in a backwater town. Mostly has a goofy, off-beat tone, so it’s all good fun. Stories range from a couple that moves into a a house with a bathtub that reduces aging to a couple trying to get over the husband’s fear of clowns by staying a clown hotel. The stories are connected by place, but there’s no overarching plot; it’s just good fun. (Anthology.)
Welcome to Nightvale: The community radio show for the small desert town of Nightvale, where every conspiracy theory is true. You probably know this. WTNV is credited with kickstarting the new age of audio dramas for good reason: it's weird and wonderful with expansive storylines and amazing characters. I first discovered it back in 2015, but dropped it and didn't revisit it until now, five years later. Even with every other show I've heard, even with its own massive backlog, it still holds up with the best of them, still evoking new emotions and unveiling new secrets. WTNV is still very much an amazing podcast worth listening to. (Ongoing.)
The White Vault: An international repair team goes up to a base in Svalbard and becomes trapped by a storm after making an amazing discovery. Arctic horror. Novel framing, excellent suspense, good sound design and voice acting, a well done show. Uses actually international VAs. (Ongoing.)
Within the Wires: Tales from another world told first through relaxation tapes, then museum guides, then a government official’s notes to his secretary. The delicate unveiling of the world, and the complex relationships depicted through these restricted forms is absolutely masterful, allowing a deep understanding in spite of hearing only one voice. It starts off very strange and surreal, but it’s worth listening through that initial bump to get to the meat. (Ongoing.)
Wolf-359: The crew of a deep-space outpost begins receiving a series of strange transmissions. A sci-fi classic in the podcast community for good reason: beautifully plotted, excellent emotional arcs, a cast of characters I loved in their entirety. (Completed.)
Wooden Overcoats: A comedy about two competing funeral homes in a tiny village. Absolutely hilarious. Each character has their trope, but they are never bound by it and all are allowed to grow and develop beyond it. (Ongoing.)
Good:
2298: In a dystopian future where human lives are guided and curated by the Network, resident 24 is haunted by a beautiful golden bird. A modern take on a Big Brother-style dystopia. Quite short, but fun. Connected to the canon of Girl in Space. (Completed.)
36 Questions: An estranged married couple attempts to reconnect by asking each other 36 questions that are supposed to help people fall in love. A musical, only 3 episodes long. Very good, excellent sound design, and this podcast would easily be in the great category if it weren’t for the ending, which I found unsatisfying. (Completed.)
Ars Paradoxica: A scientist accidentally sends herself back to the ‘40s and gets picked up by a military organization and tries to use their resources to get herself back to the present. One of the earlier audio dramas, so it’s a little tropey, but it existed before many of those tropes were established. I’m still listening through! (Completed.)
Beef and Dairy Network: A comedy podcast that made me laugh! The news from a fictitious network, like if Nightvale was about beef and dairy exclusively. Enough plot and fun to keep it fresh, that it really only wears down after 40 or so episodes. (Ongoing.)
The Bridge: The caretakers of Watchtower 10 on the largely abandoned Transatlantic Bridge are all there for a reason. There are frightening things in the water, and a wealth of stories. A little spooky, but not really horror. Big lovable cast, a good format, and several interesting plot threads to put together and follow. (Ongoing.)
Gal Pals Present Overkill: A ghost tries to figure out how she died and navigate the afterlife in a very haunted park. Sweet, does very interesting things with ghosts as a concept. All girls, everyone’s gay, that latina representation I always crave. (Ongoing.)
Kane and Feels: A pair of PIs (Paranormal Investigators) investigate a trail of subconscious strangeness. A very beautiful and surreal story that blurs the world of reality and dreams. Lovely prose and aesthetic. Episodes release extremely sporadically with no clear season breaks. (Ongoing?)
King Falls AM: Two guys host a radio show in a little town full of strange happenings. A similar premise to WTNV executed quite differently. Charming but underwhelming for the first 50-ish episodes, then ramps up sharply and becomes very intense and very good. (Ongoing.)
Lesser Gods: In a post-apocalyptic future after which humans lost the ability to reproduce, the final five youngest on earth attempt to cope with and solve a murder after one of their ranks dies. Like a YA novel in the best way. Very flawed and complex characters. Episodes stopped coming midseason. (Abandoned.)
L I M B O: A dead man meets people from his past. Manages to bring to life several interesting characters in a very short time, though it leaves questions. Connected to the canon of 2298. (Completed.)
Mabel: Live-in caretaker for an elderly woman won’t stop leaving voicemails for the woman’s estranged granddaughter and discovers many strange things in the strange house. Very narrowly got edged out of my top three, but still very good. Gothic horror. Great use of format, well-paced, mellifluous writing and good music that makes it a pleasure to listen to in sound alone. (Ongoing.)
Middle:Below: A man with the ability to travel to the spirit world helps ghosts move on. Very cute and quirky and sweet. The cast’s charming, and the ghosts they deal with are interesting, and there’s still quite a number of mysteries about the world. (Ongoing.)
Outliers: An anthology collection rather than a narrative, each story tells the tale of a lesser known British historical figure. Well-written, well-acted--mostly--with a bonus of some learning on the side. (Completed.)
Passage: Two skeletons on a lifeboat from a ship that supposedly vanished a century ago washes up on the shore of a small town. A mystery miniseries, only 7 episodes long. Half the reason I listened to this is because it takes place in the PNW. A good mystery, an enjoyable quick listen. (Completed.)
Pleasuretown: A western about a small desert town that got wiped out, and the stories of all the inhabitants who used to live there and the strange supernatural encounters they had. It weaves together beautifully with top notch sounds. Starts out very white/male/cishet, but the stories get more diverse and inclusive as the podcast goes on. It’s episodic enough that the stories are enjoyable on their own, but the large overarching story thread never got resolved. (Abandoned.)
Radiation World: A boat full of strangers on a quest discovers a bunker full of people who survived the apocalypse and they help each other out. Shenanigans ensure. Incredibly fun and funny with a great plot and series of twists. The ending implied another season was planned, but there are no major questions left, so it stand on its own. (Completed?)
Station to Station: A researcher is looking into the circumstances of the disappearance of a beloved coworker no one seems to remember. Sporadic update schedule has made this one a bit hard to keep track of. (Ongoing.)
Alright:
Bubble: A hipster human colony that lives in a bubble on a foreign planet occasionally deals with monster attacks. A comedy that knows its type very well: I have an intimate understanding of the people it’s poking fun at, and that made it at once incredibly fun and also hard to listen to. It implied there would be a second season, but one hasn’t yet happened. The first season stands alone well, however. (Completed?)
Big Data: Seven thieves steal the seven keys to the internet to try to take it down. Each individual heist is really interesting and fun with a great thief, but the frame narrative left me wanting. The ending implied there was going to be a sequel series, but one never materialized. (Completed?)
Congeria: A detective searching for a missing girl gets caught up with cults and murderers. A well produced podcast, well acted and well plotted, this is perfect if you love hardboiled detective stories. Honestly, this is only in alright because it’s not my usual genre. It was just a heavy listen. (Completed.)
The Dark Tome: A dark fantasy podcast where a troubled young teen reads a magic, potentially evil book that sucks her into another world and allows her to witness stories. Very much has the feel of a YA novel. Each stories within the frame are written by different authors, so episode quality varies. (Ongoing.)
Deadly Manners: A classic murder mystery at a grand house party. It was enjoyable, the characters reasonably fun (with one massive racist/homophobic/antisemitic exception), but the whole thing still felt very run-of-the-mill nevertheless. (Completed.)
Dreamboy: A depressed musician gets caught up in a conspiracy surrounding a dream and a killer zebra. Honestly, that synopsis isn’t even the half of it. This podcast is incredibly strange (and explicitly NSFW) but quite fascinating. Also, it has fabulous musical numbers. (Completed.)
Empty: Several humans and an AI wake up on a colony spaceship alone, with no memory. Interesting characters, a new favorite AI, but their season finale was more of a cliffhanger than a finale that wrapped up anything. (Abandoned.)
Hadron Gospel Hour: A comedy podcast about a scientist who broke the universe, his everyman sidekick, and the supercomputer helping them fix it. It’s episodic, and there are standalone shorts in it that are funny. Some jokes haven’t aged well, to put it kindly. At least one episode contains a racist joke. The seasons posted are complete, but the overarching plot never finished resolving. (Abandoned.)
The Infinite: The last surviving member of a deep space exploration mission receives a mysterious signal and contemplates if it’s worth chasing. It preceded many of the more popularized space operas and says many of the same things as them. (Completed.)
Janus Descending: A research team of two get killed while on an expedition to an alien planet. Told nonlinearly. There’s so much here that’s good, but the main characters are afflicted with a whole lot of stupid that diminishes the effect. (Completed.)
Joseph: The Revenge of Opus: A far future scifi story where some dude saves the world and the girl. I'm writing this about nine months after first listening, and honestly that's about all I retained. I remember it being fun, and having very excellent sound design, but the story was very predictable and thus forgettable. (Completed.)
LifeAfter/The Message: A pair of discrete podcasts on the same feed. The Message is about a team of scientists trying to decipher a sound that triggered a pandemic, and LifeAfter is about an FBI agent offered a chance to reconnect with his dead wife through an AI. They were both interesting, though The Message hit uncomfortably close to home, since this is being written in Nov 2020. LifeAfter had a stronger plot regardless, though the likability of its protagonist is questionable. (Completed.)
Magic King Dom: One of the few survivors of an apocalypse grows up alone in Disneyland. Cute and well produced, but the pacing is very fast, and Dom’s characterization stretched my suspension of disbelief. Connected to the canon of Girl In Space. (Completed.)
Misadventure by Death: A trope-aware person is hired to take care of an almost certainly haunted house. The writing feels a little amateur at points, but it’s enjoyable and had decent pacing so far. Updates stopped coming midseason. (Abandoned.)
Tides: A xenobiologist who has been stranded on an alien planet that’s regularly soaked by a large tidal wave. It’s acted well enough, the sound is good, and the premise is good along with the dialogue, but a bit too much time is spent on the visual descriptions of alien creatures and the pacing of the main plot has yet to catch up. (Ongoing.)
What’s the Frequency: Something strange is happening with the radio, and two detectives are on the case. Anyone who knows me knows I’m not a fan of avante guarde storytelling methods, and unfortunately, this podcast makes plentiful use of them. It took several episodes for me to grasp a basic idea of which characters were which and what the basic plot was, due to nonlinear narrative, unclear characterization, and similar sounding VAs. In spite of this, the charm of the characters I did grasp and the bits of plot I put together kept me interested and listening. (Ongoing.)
Not Recommended:
The Angel of Vine: A hardboiled PI attempts to solve a grisly murder. A very generic example of its genre, it doesn’t bring anything new or interesting to the table. Just boring.
The Black Tapes: Reporter looks into the unsolved cases of someone who disproves the paranormal for a living. Season one was fantastic, but they start to lose it in season two; the pacing and focus go astray. Season three is worse, and then the finale they put out was one of the most disappointing endings I’ve endured in years. It was bad enough I don’t intend on looking into their other productions, Rabbits and Tanis.
The Blood Crow Stories: S1 is about a malicious entity that haunts a ship, but each season is different. I listened only to s1. If you like villains who get away with all their plans perfectly and face no challenge from the protags whatsoever, then this podcast is for you. The villain is also incredibly overwrought to near laughability and relies on gore and shock value for its fearsomeness. The rest of the cast is alright, but nothing special. Uncomfortable interactions with the creators sealed my decision to not proceed with the other seasons.
Everlasting Beholders: Some aliens attempt to influence an alternate Earth. The changes made are uncomfortable, and it’s a bit hard to follow. Supposedly it connects to Empty, but not in a way I could figure out. It was never finished.
Organism: An alien of some sort learns about the world. Slow, simplistic, boring, with a very strange twist ending.
Ruby and the Galactic Gumshoe (2020): A scifi noir that's a new adventure in a series started in the 80s. Honestly, I loved the narrator and the soundscaping; the feel of this show was amazing. However, I don't recommend it solely because one of the characters is a deeply racist caricature. Ruby has a hi-tech car with an inbuilt AI described as a "big black genie", and whenever he speaks, it's with a thick Indian accent and "mystical" language.
Spines: Amnesiac survivor of a cult ritual tries to find out what happened and where her missing soul mate went by interrogating people with weird powers. Horror. The world is cool, the imagery is very cool, the story is reasonably interesting, but the voice acting is bad. Both voices we hear deliver all their lines, even ones that sound as if they should be deeply emotional, in the same flat, disinterested, apathetic, tired monotone. Not only that, but the pacing and narration destroy any sense of suspense this epic story should have.
Subject: Found: S1 was about a bigfoot hunter, and s2 was about a murderer who loved to kill women. The second story is very much not my thing--especially in light of how s1 treated its main female character--so I only listened to s1. As mentioned, the main female character, the protagonist’s wife, gets her needs constantly deferred or invalidated in favor of her husband’s as part of the story, but he’s the hero so of course he gets the girl. The plot choices that aside are very strange, a bit nonsensical, and the voice acting, main couple aside, is bad.
Dropped:
(Not bad! Just not to my specific tastes.)
Alba Salix, Royal Physician: A grumpy witch tries to keep a kingdom healthy with the help of a fairy and unwilling apprentice. Comedy. I loved Alba, but I’m extremely picky with comedies, and this one wasn’t enough for me to keep with it.
Aqua Marianas: I couldn’t finish the first episode thanks to poor audio quality. From what I heard, it also seemed a bit tropey.
Control Group: A historical fiction about a woman committed to a mental institution for a crime she didn’t commit. I can’t handle this sort of horror; it’s too dark for me.
Counter Worlds: An anthology told audio book style, with narration, which I simply can’t focus on.
Darkest Night: A horror anthology with the frame narrative of a mysterious, suspicious organization doing research into memory. Rather gruesome. Very mainstream sort of horror; some episodes were good, but others indulged too many misogynistic tropes for my taste.
Hector Vs The Future: There was a laugh track and I didn't like that. I didn't make it very far in.
Herbarium Podcasts: A collection of miniseries. Honestly, I can’t even provide an accurate synopsis. My audio processing issues made listening to more than five minutes of this impossible; the inconsistent audio quality was way too distracting and broke my immersion.
Inkwyrm: Intergalactic haute couture. Everything about the concept of this podcast spoke to me on a fundamental level, but I couldn’t even get through all of episode one. The characters didn’t appeal to me, and the sound quality isn’t great. I couldn’t understand the AI character they introduced. When I skipped ahead to see if the audio quality got better, it didn’t, and just like with Herbarium Podcasts above, poor audio is a dealbreaker.
Love and Luck: Two men in love discover they’re witches, told through voicemail. Really, my problem here was just that I wanted more angst. They’re very happy and loving and they work through every relationship problem they have very quickly, and I just plain wanted more conflict and struggle.
Otherverse: Broadcasts from another world where aliens are subjugating humanity. Enjoyable and interesting enough to keep me subscribed, but nothing special. It’s all a little basic, and the audio quality leaves something to be desired. Got bored and the update schedule got sporadic, so I dropped it.
Palimpsest: A girl moves into a haunted house and attempts to cope with the death of her sister. This podcast improved as I listened. The voice acting is solid, but the writing and audio editing in the first few episodes felt very overdone. They picked up as things progressed, and the ending downright surprised me. Season 2 switched protagonists, and the new protag had such a poorly done accent, I couldn’t tell if it was supposed to be Scottish, Irish, or Southern, and that bothered me too much to continue listening.
Poplar Cove: They made an asylum joke within the first five minutes of the first episode and that’s a hard no from me.
Sable: From the episode I listened to, this podcast appeared to be about urban legends and monsters, but admittedly I don’t know much. This podcast is told audiobook style, with a single narrator also performing the character voices and no sound effects. I have a very hard time focusing on those sorts of tales.
Saffron and Peri: Comedy podcast about a fairy godparent school. As mentioned previously, I’m extremely picky with comedies and none of the characters pulled me in, so I dropped it.
Tales of Thattown: Effectively, it’s Welcome to Nightvale in the south. Yet another comedy podcast that failed to strike a chord with me, though the creator’s a sweetheart.
Thrilling Adventure Hour: A series of standalone stories. No real complaints; the couple stories I tried just didn't catch my interest.
Tumanbay: A historical fiction podcast surrounding citizens of the imagined city Tumanbay, based on the Mamluk empire in Egypt. Honestly, I'm n the fence on if this should be in my outright "Not Recommended" category. Everything about the production quality was good; the voices and story were interesting. However, this podcast is written and produced by two British men who profess they invented Tumanbay as a separate place because they thought adhering to historical accuracy would be too restrictive and difficult. Little things like the escaped slave who used Slave as his preferred name, or the fact that the more intelligent/cerebral characters all had British accents, while the more brutish ones had Middle Eastern ones, when this is supposedly an entirely Middle Eastern area, got under my skin enough to make me drop it.
Tunnels: A mystery podcast inquiring about a mysterious series of tunnels under a town. The format and tone are rather closely modeled after The Black Tapes, and as I ultimately wasn’t a fan of that, I elected to drop this.
We're Alive: A surviving the zombie apocalypse story. Supposedly, another major pioneer in the rise of modern audio drama. But I didn't realize until I started that the protagonist was a soldier, and I don't care for soldier stories.
Violet Beach: Strange time shenanigans happen to teens when the sun sets purple. The monologues it’s told through tend to meander, and lackluster VAs and no sound design made it especially hard to focus, so I dropped this.
Zoo: An FBI agent attempts to solve the mystery of a traveling zoo home to a variety of cryptids. Lower production value than most other podcasts here and occasionally makes strange choices, but develops its plot steadily and does some interesting things with its premise. Unfortunately, the developments weren’t enough to keep my attention on the long term, so I made the tough choice to drop it.
