Podcasts where it isn't stand up comedians talking and talking (and talking)

[Mothra]

Normal Gossip - Been getting a kick out of this after Oxi introduced me. The host and a guest just disguise the names in the juiciest gossip they can think of, and let it rip.

Dungeons & Daddies - I caved and agreed to listen to this at my brother's urging. It is incredibly good. I am a fool for thinking it would suck.

Hit Parade - Covers artists that have dominated the airwaves at one point or another.

Oh These, Those Stars of Space! - Pretty improv-heavy comedy tabletop campaign set in sort of a Star Trek world. From the makers of the equally-amazing Rude Tales of Magic.

LeVar Burton Reads - Very calming, very pleasant podcast where LeVar Burton reads a short story to you.

[Thad]

Dungeons & Daddies - I caved and agreed to listen to this at my brother's urging. It is incredibly good. I am a fool for thinking it would suck.

Ha, my brother keeps trying to get me to check that one out too.

[Büge]

Fall of Civilizations is a podcast about... well, fallen civilizations. The first episode is about Roman Britain.

I discovered that one a few months back. It's quite good. It reminds me of the kind of programming you'd see on TLC or the History Channel, before they became reality-TV sludge factories. I find it particularly interesting when the civilization doesn't leave behind much evidence of what brought about their collapse, so they have to piece together a hypothesis with factors like climate, geography, and anthropological influences. The most recent episode I listened to was about Rapa Nui (Easter Island), which is a pretty tragic tale.

[Mongrel]

I'm often blabbering on about extinct civilizations because they're the clearest proof we have that earth gives no fucks about us and that there's absolutely nothing that says we can't go extinct too.

Imagine being the last islander left on Rapa Nui, the last Norse settler in Greenland, the last Dorset Inuit, as the inevitable closes in, far, far too late for anyone living to have done much, if anything, about it, not knowing if you were perhaps not just the last of your kind, but possibly the last person... ever.

Speaking of Roman Britain, the final years of Rome was my senior thesis for my history major (I did art obv, but I had a double major). I've never been a devotee of the "It was just a transition period, not a "fall", that's just Burkean nonsense!" argument. Shit got real. Real BAD. It happens, and pretending you can't catastrophically fuck up on a civilizational scale is really fucking stupid.

EDIT: Which also reminded me of something else I saw, but I'll pick this back up in a thread more suited to it.

[Upthorn]

I've been really enjoying Kill James Bond.

Hosted by:

• Alice Caldwell Kelly of Trashfuture and Well There's Your Problem fame
• Abigail Thorne of Philosophy Tube fame
• And Devon, who is nonbinary and has twitter

It started as a podcast where a politically left transfeminine trio watch through the entirety of the James Bond series, review the movies as movies, and then also analyze them in terms of what they say about masculinity and politics.

Now that they've finished the whole James Bond series, they've entered phase 2, moved on to the more general topic of "movies that have something to say about masculinity" and are discussing changing their name to Assigned Movies At Birth

It is equal parts hilarious, debauched, and insightful.

[Thad]

Asha Rangappa and Renato Mariotti have started a legal podcast called It's Complicated. I've listened to a few episodes and it's still early days and they're still getting their sea legs, but they're already two of the best lawsplainers around, and if that's the sort of thing you're interested in then you should definitely give their show a shot.