Showing posts with label Podcasts Youtube Series Radio Shows Etc. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Podcasts Youtube Series Radio Shows Etc. Show all posts

Thursday, May 28, 2026

*Sigh* I really didn't want to write this post, but I feel like I have to now.
In my (admittedly long and rambling) review of the Oldest Stories Podcast, I at one point briefly mentioned that I was uncomfortable with some of the views expressed on the Oldest Stories Podcast Twitter account, but since these views mostly tended to stay separate from the content of the podcast, I wasn't going to hold the politics of the podcaster against him.
At the time I said that, the Oldest Stories Podcast wasn't actively tweeting.  (He had gone on a Twitter hiatus since mid-January).  But in the past few days, he's been active on Twitter again, and some of what he has been tweeting is objectionable.  And (unless my memory is playing me false) what he is currently tweeting is more blatant and more objectionable than anything he had previously tweeted--at least within the last year.

Since I published my review back in February, I have continued to promote new episodes of the podcast on this blog (here, here, here, here, here, here and here).  But I'm now going to stop doing this, for fear that my promotion of the podcast could be taken as agreement with the views expressed on the Twitter account.

Now, I need to make a couple of important caveats here:
1). This guy is not a celebrity or public figure.  He's an ordinary Joe who is podcasting in his free time.  So for that reason, I am going to do my best to avoid putting him on blast.  I'm not going to link to the offensive tweets.  I'm not going to describe them. In fact, I wouldn't be writing this blog post at all, except for the fact that I have been recommending and promoting the Oldest Stories podcast on this blog, and I feel I need to make clear that I am not promoting the views expressed on the Oldest Stories Twitter account.  (For reasons that are mysterious to me, he is using the Oldest Stories Twitter account to post these views, which make it difficult to separate his personal views from his podcast.)

2). I believe that we can and should separate the art from the artist, and that we should also expose ourselves to people who have a variety of viewpoints.  So I'm not going to stop listening to the podcast myself.  I'm just no longer going to be promoting that podcast.  (I'm going to continue listening to it quietly, without linking to it from this blog.)
And again, the fact that he's using the Oldest Stories Twitter account to promote his personal political views makes it hard to promote one without feeling like you're endorsing the other.

I'm also not calling for him to be cancelled, or anything like that.  I'm just trying to put some distance between his views and my own endorsements.

(I had thought about continuing to link to his new episodes, but also including a disclaimer with each new blog post saying, "I don't approve of the views on his Twitter feed," but I decided against it.  I don't want to have to say that every single time, and he's not going to appreciate that kind of qualified support anyway.)

One last thing: I had mentioned in my original review of the Oldest Stories Podcast that I was seriously considering buying his books (based on the podcast) and reviewing those as well.  But I no longer have any plans to purchase or review his books.
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Tuesday, February 24, 2026

Oldest Stories Podcast: Review


Started: June 25, 2025





Links to things mentioned:
Oldest Stories Youtube channel: https://www.youtube.com/@entirelyalive/videos







Related Playlists:




My listening progress, for anyone who is interested, is chronicled on my started post and also listed below:
1st Listening
June 25, 2025--Episode 12 – Anunnaki 3 Enlil Lord of Wind
June 27, 2025--Episode 16 – Lagash 2 Reform and Corruption in Lagash
June 28, 2025--OS 17 - Sargon Rising
June 29, 2025--OS 19 - Sargon at War
June 30--OS 20 Sargon, the Next Generation
July 1--OS 22 - Slanderous Legends of Naram-Sin
July 2--OS 23 - The Fall of Akkad
July 3--OS 24 - The Rebirth of Sumer
July 4--OS 27 - The Study of Sumer and Ancient Aliens
July 5--OS 28 - The Chamorros of Saipan
July 6--OS 29 - The Enuma Elish
July 7--OS 33 - A Time of Ritual and Law
July 8--OS 39 - The Merchants and Families of Assyria
July 9--OS 41 - Shamshi-Adad and the Upper Mesopotamian Empire
July 10--Bonus 1 - The Slaying of Illuyanka
July 11--OS 50 - Hammurabi's Code of Laws
July 12--OS 51 - The New Order
July 13--OS 52 - Theogony of Dunnu and the Education of Scribes
July 14--Bonus 3 - Lament for Ur
July 15--OS 61 - The Conqueror's Triumph and Death
July 16--OS 66 Enter the Arena
July 17--OS 70 - Mighty Monsters of Mitanni
July 18--OS 73 - Corruption in Nuzi
July 20--OS 74 - A New Dawn for Babylon
July 21--OS 77 - Idrimi's Adventure and Tudhaliya's Invasion
July 22--OS 82 - Suppiluliuma Irritates Egypt
July 23--OS 86 The Battle of Kadesh
July 24--OS 91 A Muddy Mesopotamian Mess
July 25--OS 95 Hattusili Secures His Legacy
July 26--OS 96 Fall of the Hittite Empire
July 28--Elamite 4 - Elamite Religion
July 29--Canaan 3 - The City of Ugarit
July 30--Canaan 8 - The Feast of Baal
July 31--Industry 2 - The Stuff of Life
August 1--An Overview of Bronze Age Mesopotamia
August 2--OS 98 - Nabu-Kudurri-Usur
August 3--OS 99 - The Legend of Nebuchadnezzar
August 4--OS 100 - The Babylonian Theodicy
August 5--OS 102 - A Bit More About Tiglath Pileser
August 6--OS 103 - The Babylonian Aristotle, Esagil-Kin-Apli
August 9--OS 105 Four Legs Good, Two Legs Bad
August 11--OS 109 - Israel's Numbers Problem
August 12--OS 112 - Israel's Conquest and Integration in Canaan
August 13--OS 114 - Israel's Judges and Defeats
August 14--OS 115 - The Place of Faith in Biblical History
August 16--OS 117 - Israel's First King
August 18--OS 121 - Israel's Favorite King
August 19--OS 123 - Israel's Great High Priest
August 20--OS 125 - Israel's Divided Kingdoms
August 21--OS 127 - Israel's First Historical King
August 22--OS 129 - Israelite and Phoenician Prosperity
August 23--OS 130 Israel Runs Out of Names
August 24--Oldest Stories is Now a Book!
August 25--OS 132 Judah Ascends
August 26--The Book of Job in a Near Eastern Context
August 27--Isaiah 55
August 28--OS 134 - Poverty Pessimism, and Comedy in Ancient Mesopotamia
August 29--OS 135 - Middle Class Demons of Mesopotamia
September 1--OS 136 - The Fifty Shades of Marduk
September 2--OS 137 - The Oldest Dreams
September 3--OS 139- An Iron King for an Iron Age
September 4--OS 141- the Unintended Aramization of Assyria
September 5--OS 143 - Assurnasirpal Has Too Much Energy
September 8--Bonus: The Early History of New Eastern Cavalry
September 9--OS 148 - Shalmaneser Takes the Throne
September 10--OS 150 - The Battle of Qarqar
September 11--OS 152 - The Smothered Spark of Babylon's Dark Age
September 12--OS 154 - The Assyrian Civil War: Magnate Edition
September 15--OS 156 - The Mythical Semiramis in Ancient History
September 16--OS 158 - The Glorious Magnates of Assyria
September 17--OS 160 - Graham Hancock and the Philosophy of Archeology
September 18--OS 161 - A Kingdom of Honey and Blood: The Suhu Rebellion
September 19--OS 163 - The Birth of Urartu
September 20--OS 164 - The Rise of Urartu
September 22--OS 166 - The Forges of Urartu
September 23--The Assyrian Deep State
September 24--Establishing Assyrian Dominance
September 25--The Full Story of Ea-Nasir's Copper
September 26--The Four Failures of Tiglath-Pileser III
September 29--Mesopotamia and the Occult: The Passionate Woman in Depth
Finished First Listening:  Starting Second Listening
September 30--OS 2.5 - Before the Beginning
October 1--OS 05 - Gilgamesh has Adventures
October 2--OS 08 - Ishtar Gains Power
October October 3--OS 16 - Reform and Corruption in Lagash
October 6--OS 17 - Sargon Rising
October 7--OS 19 - Sargon at war
October 8--OS 21 - Surpassing Sargon with Naram-Sin
October 9--OS 23 - The Fall of Akkad
October 10--OS 24 - The Rebirth of Sumer
October 12--OS 25 - The Last Sumerian, Ibbi-Sin
October 13--OS 28 - The Chamorros of Saipan
October 14--OS 30 - The Tablet of Destinies
October 15--OS 33 - A Time of Ritual and Law
October 16--OS 35 Middle Bronze Age Warfare
October 17--OS 38 Rim-sin the Pretty Good
October 19--OS 39 The Merchants and Families of Assyria
October 21--OS 42 Hammurabi's Kingdom and Character
October 22--OS 44 - Hammurabi's Military and Elamite Rule
October 23--OS 44 - Hammurabi's Rebels and Oracles
October 24--OS 48 - Hammurabi's Women and Slaves
October 27--OS 50 - Hammurabi's Code of Laws
October 28--OS 51 - The New Order
October 29--OS 53 - Poem of the Righteous Sufferer
October 30--Bonus 2 - Fanciful Notions of Antiquity
October 31--OS 56 - Obscure Struggles in Assyria
November 3--OS 58 - Rise of the Hittites
November 5--OS 61 - The Conqueror's Triumph and Death
November 6--OS 64 - Village Economics
November 7--OS 66 - Enter the Arena
November 10--OS 67 - Late Bronze Age Warfare
November 11--OS 68 - The Song of Kumarbi
November 12--OS 69 - Kumarbi Strikes Back
November 14--OS 71 - Hurrian Wisdom
November 17--OS 73 - Corruption in Nuzi
November 18--OS 75 - Building Babylonia
November 19--OS 77 - Idrimi's Adventure and Tudhaliya's Invasion
November 20--OS 79 - Magic and Medicine in Hattusa
November 21--OS 81 - King Tushratta Begs and Runs Away
November 22--OS 82 - Suppiluliuma Irritates Egypt
November 24--OS 85 - New Cities and New Villians
November 25--OS 87 - Rebirth of an Old City
December 1--OS 90 - Tukulti-Ninurta's Victories
December 2--OS 92 - Nergal and Ereshkigal
December 3--OS 95 Hattusili Secures His Legacy
December 4--Elamite 1 - Back to the Beginning
December 5--The Oldest Games
December 6--Canaan 1 - Bronze Age Levant
December 7--Canaan 1 - The Amarna Age in Canaan
December 8-- Canaan 4 - Ugarit's Final Century
December 9--Canaan 7 - The Baal Cycle
December 10--Canaan 8 - The Feast of Baal
December 11--Canaan 9 - Baal and Mot
December 12--Sumer in Genesis
December 13--Listener Questions
December 15--Industry 2 - The Stuff of Life
December 16--Passionate Daughter Ishtar
December 17--Industry 4.5 - Last Century's Fashions (pt 2 of 2)
December 18--Industry 5 - The Bronze of the Age
December 19--OS 99 - The Legend of Nebuchadnezzar
December 21--OS 100 - The Babylonian Theodicy
December 22--OS 102 - A Bit More About Tiglath Pileser
December 23--OS 103 - The Babylonian Aristotle, Esagil-Kin-Apli
December 24--OS 104 - Arameans Everywhere
December 25--OS 105 Four Legs Good, Two Legs Bad
December 26--OS 106 The Fate of Anatolia
December 27--OS 107 - The Bible as History and Skeptical Views
December 29--OS 109 - Israel's Numbers Problem
December 30--OS 110 - Israel and the Hebrews
December 31--OS 111 - Israel's Wandering and Settlement
January 1, 2026--OS 113 - Israel's Settlements and Philistine Neighbors
January 2--OS 114 - Israel's Judges and Defeats
January 3--OS 115 - The Place of Faith in Biblical History
January 5--OS 117 - Israel's First King
January 6--OS 119 - Israel's Young Shepherd
January 7--OS 122 - Israel's King David
January 8--OS 124 - Israel's Wisdom and Wealth
January 9--OS 126 - Israel's Great Confusion
January 10--OS 127 - Israel's First Historical King
January 11--OS 129 - Israelite and Phoenician Prosperity
January 12--OS 131 - Israel's Brutal Judgement
January 13--OS 132 Judah Ascends
January 14--The Book of Job in a Near Eastern Context
January 15--Isaiah 55
January 16--OS 135 - Middle Class Demons of Mesopotamia
January 17--OS 136 - The Fifty Shades of Marduk
January 18--OS 137 - The Oldest Dreams
January 19--OS 139- An Iron King for an Iron Age
January 20--OS 141- the Unintended Aramization of Assyria
January 21--OS 145 - The Early Neo-Assyrian Army
January 23--OS 146 - How Assyria Operated
January 25--OS 148 - Shalmaneser Takes the Throne
January 26--OS 151 - The Glowing Embers of Babylon's Dark Age
January 27--OS 152 - The Smothered Spark of Babylon's Dark Age
January 28--OS 155 - The Angry Puppet: Shamshi-Adad V
January 29--OS 158 - The Glorious magnates of Assyria
January 30--OS 160 - Graham Hancock and the Philosophy of Archeology
January 31--OS 162 - The Rise of Phrygia
February 2--OS 166 - The Forges of Urartu
February 3--The Assyrian Deep State
February 4--Establishing Assyrian Dominance
February 5--Deportation, Castration, and Education-The Foundations of Neo-Assyria
February 6--Mesopotamia and the Occult: The Passionate Woman in Depth
February 7--Mesopotamia and the Occult: Dying and Rising in Depth
February 9--Mesopotamia and the Occult: The Mortal King in Depth
February 10--Mesopotamia and the Occult: Discussions on the Ancient World
February 11--Tiglath Pileser Defeats Israel - Oldest Stories Podcast
February 12--The Ill-Omened Origins of Sargon II
February 13--A Tour of Dur-Sharrukin
February 15--The Environment in which the Assyrian Army Emerged
February 16--The Composition of the Sargonid Army
February 17--The Great Invasion of Urartu

Addendum: May 28, 2026

*Sigh* I really didn't want to write this post, but I feel like I have to now.
In my (admittedly long and rambling) review of the Oldest Stories Podcast, I at one point briefly mentioned that I was uncomfortable with some of the views expressed on the Oldest Stories Podcast Twitter account, but since these views mostly tended to stay separate from the content of the podcast, I wasn't going to hold the politics of the podcaster against him.
At the time I said that, the Oldest Stories Podcast wasn't actively tweeting.  (He had gone on a Twitter hiatus since mid-January).  But in the past few days, he's been active on Twitter again, and some of what he has been tweeting is objectionable. And (unless my memory is playing me false) what he is currently tweeting is more blatant and more objectionable than anything he had previously tweeted--at least within the last year.

Now, since I published my review back in February, I have continued to promote new episodes of the podcast on this blog (here, here, here, here, here, here and here).  But I'm now going to stop doing this, for fear that my promotion of the podcast could be taken as agreement with the views expressed on the Twitter account.

Now, I need to make a couple of important caveats here:
1). This guy is not a celebrity or public figure.  He's an ordinary Joe who is podcasting in his free time.  So for that reason, I am going to do my best to avoid putting him on blast.  I'm not going to link to the offensive tweets.  I'm not going to describe them. In fact, I wouldn't be writing this blog post at all, except for the fact that I have been recommending and promoting the Oldest Stories podcast on this blog, and I feel I need to make clear that I am not promoting the views expressed on the Oldest Stories Twitter account.  (For reasons that are mysterious to me, he is using the Oldest Stories Twitter account to post these views, which make it difficult to separate his personal views from his podcast.)

2). I believe that we can and should separate the art from the artist, and that we should also expose ourselves to people who have a variety of viewpoints.  So I'm not going to stop listening to the podcast myself.  I'm just no longer going to be promoting that podcast.  (I'm going to continue listening to it quietly, without linking to it from this blog.)
And again, the fact that he's using the Oldest Stories Twitter account to promote his personal political views makes it hard to promote one without feeling like you're endorsing the other.

I'm also not calling for him to be cancelled, or anything like that.  I'm just trying to put some distance between his views and my own endorsements.

(I had thought about continuing to link to his new episodes, but also including a disclaimer with each new blog post saying, "I don't approve of the views on his Twitter feed," but I decided against it.  I don't want to have to say that every single time, and he's not going to appreciate that kind of qualified support anyway.)

One last thing: I had mentioned in my original review of the Oldest Stories Podcast that I was seriously considering buying his books (based on the podcast) and reviewing those as well.  But I no longer have any plans to purchase or review his books.
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Saturday, June 28, 2025

Revolutions Podcast by Mike Duncan: Review

(Podcasts--History) 

Started this project: November 9, 2021
Started my final runthrough of this podcast: September 19, 2024

(This is my first time reviewing this podcast on this blog. So, according to my new rules, I'm doing this as a video only review.)




See also:


Notes:
I've gone back and forth on whether or not I was going to do one or two listenings for my final run-through of the podcast.  But in the end, I decided one final listening was enough.  My listening progress, for anyone who is interested, is chronicled on my started post and also listed below:

Listening Progress
September 19, 2024--1.1- The Kingdoms of Charles Stuart
September 20--1.2- Personal Rule
September 21--1.5- Cavaliers and Roundheads
September 22--1.8- Checkmate
September 23--1.11- The Crowning Mercy
September 24--1.12- In The Name of God Go
September 25--1.15- The Good Old Cause
September 26--2.1- The Thirteen Colonies
September 27--2.2- The Stamp Act
September 29--2.4- The Boston Tea Party
September 30--2.5- The Guns of Ticonderoga
October 1--2.6- Independence
October 2--2.7- Crossing the Delaware
October 3--2.8- Saratoga
October 5--2.12- Yorktown
October 6--2.15- The Rising Sun
October 7--3.1- The Three Estates
October 8--3.4- Necker and the Necklace
October 9--3.7- The Séance Royale
October 10--3.9- What is the Third Estate?
October 11--3.10- The Tennis Court Oath
October 12--3.14- The Women's March on Versailles
October 13--3.17- A Temporary Summit
October 14--3.19- The Massacre of the Champ de Mars
October 15--3.21a Supplemental- Talleyrand
October 16--3.27- Advance and Retreat
October 18--3.29- The Purge of the Girondins
October 20--3.30- The 250th Episode
October 21--3.31- The Man of Blood Part Deux
October 22--3.33- The Geography of Terror
October 23--3.34- Saturn's Children
October 25--3.34a- The Republican Calendar
October 27--3.35- The Law of 14 Frimaire
October 28--3.37- The Republic of Virtue
October 29--3.38- Thermidor
October 31--3.41- Bread and the Constitution of 1793
November 2--3.43- The Conspiracy of Equals
November 5--3.47- The Directorial Terror
November 7--3.50- The Second Coalition
November 8--3.52- There is Your Man
November 9--3.55- The Retrospective
November 10--4.03- Free and Equal
November 11--4.05- The Citizens of April 4
November 13--4.07- The Citizens of June 20
November 14--4.12- Toussaint's Clause
November 15--4.15- The Leclerc Expedition
November 20--4.16- Dying Like Flies
November 21--4.17- Independence
November 23--4.19- The History of Haiti
November 25--5.01- The Conquest
November 26--5.03- The Precursors
November 27--5.06- The Abdications of Bayonne
November 28--5.07- The First Cry For Liberty
November 29--5.08- The Patriotic Society For The Development of Agriculture and Livestock
November 30--5.10- War To The Death
December 1--5.12- The Desired One
December 2--5.13- The Letter From Jamaica
December 3--5.15- The Centaur of the Plains
December 4--5.16- Over The Mountains
December 5--5.17- The Big Rock On The Side Of The Road
December 6--5.17a- Supplemental Gregor MacGregor
December 7--2016 Fundraiser!
December 8--5.18- Liberation
December 11--5.19- The Army of the Andes
December 12--5.22- The Guayaquil Conference
December 13--5.23- Ayacucho
December 14--5.24- The Republic of Bolivar
December 15--5.25- The Tangled Swords
December 16--6.02- Charles The Simple
December 17--6.03- Help Yourself And Heaven Will Help You
December 18--6.05- The Barricades
December 19--6.06- The Duc d'Orleans
December 21--6.07- The Last King of France
December 22--6.8a- The Fait Accompli of 1830
December 23--6.08c- Metternich
December 24--6.08e- The June Rebellion
December 25--The Storm Before The Storm: Chapter 1- The Beasts of Italy
December 26--7.03- The German Confederation
December 27--7.04- The Austrian Empire
December 28--7.06- The Kingdom of Hungary
December 29--7.07- The Hungry Forties
December 30--7.12- The Provisional Government
January 5, 2025--7.13- The Spectre of The French Revolution
January 9, 2025--The Calm Before the Storm Before the Storm
January 11--Politics & Prose Oct 28: The Storm Before the Storm Book Event
January 19--7.14- The Fall of Metternich
January 20--7.15- Slaves No More
January 21--7.16- We Crawled On Our Stomachs
January 22--7.17- The Five Days of Milan
January 25--7.18- Democracy In Action
January 26--7.19- The June Days
January 31--7.20- Where Do You Draw The Line?
February 12--7.21- Cracking Down and Backing Down
February 16--7.22- The April Laws
February 22--7.23- The First War of Italian Independence
February 23--7.24- The Turn of The Tide
February 24--7.25- The Parliament of Professors
February 25--7.27- The Flight of the Pope
February 26--7.28- Prince President Bonaparte
February 27--7.29- The New Emperor
February 28--7.30- The Crown From the Gutter
March 1--7.31- The Assembly of the Damned
March 2--7.32- The Bitter End
March 3--7.33- What the Heck Just Happened
March 4--8.2- The Franco-Prussian War
March 5--8.3- The Government of National Defence
March 6--8.5- The Cannons
March 7--8.6- The Commune
March 9--8.7- Year 79
March 10--8.8- The Bloody Week
March 11--9.02- The Cry of Dolores
March 12--9.04- The Porfiriato
March 13--9.06- The Presidential Succession of 1910
March 15--9.09- The Tiger
March 17--9.11- Not Quite President Madero
March 18--9.13- The Plan of Ayala
March 19--9.15- The Constitutionalists
March 20--9.16- The Legend of Pancho Villa
March 21--9.19- The Conventionists
March 24--9.21- Death To The Gringos
March 25--9.24- Swinging From A Tree
March 26--9.26- The Last Caudillo
March 27--9.27- The Institutional Revolution
March 28--10.1- The International Working Men's Association
March 29--10.3- The Three Pillars of Marxism.
March 30--10.4- Historical Materialism
March 31--10.7- Paris Commune Revisited
April 1--10.9- The Third Rome
April 2--10.12- The Decembrists
April 8--10.13- Orthodoxy, Autocracy, Nationality
April 9--10.14- The Tsar Liberator
April 11--10.15- The Tsar Must Die
April 12--10.16- The Russian Colony
April 13--10.17- The Emancipation of Labor Group
April 14--10.20- The Liberal Tradition (Such As It Is)
April 15--10.24- The Union of Struggle for The Emancipation of the Working Class
April 16--10.26- The Far East
April 17--10.28 The Spark
April 18--10.31 A Big Mistake
April 21--10.33- Bloody Sunday
April 22--10.35- Sinking Ships
April 23--10.37 The General Strike
April 24--10.39- The End of Part I
April 25--10.40- Relaunch and Recap
April 28--10.42- The Stolypin Reforms
April 29--10.44- Bolshevik Bank Heist
April 30--10.46- The Permanent Revolution
May 1--10.48- The Death of Reform
May 2--10.52- What You Already Know About The Origins of WWI
May 5--10.54- War or Revolution
May 6--10.55- Whatever Happened To The International?
May 7--10.58- Inflation and Scarcity
May 8--10.60- The Abyss That Lies Ahead
May 9--10.62- International Women's Day
June 3--Appendix 1- Coming Full Circle
June 4--Appendix 3- From Equilibrium to Disequilibrium
June 5--Appendix 7- The Entropy of Victory
June 6--Appendix 9- The Second Wave
June 7--Appendix 10- The Revolution Devours its Children
June 8--Appendix 11- Meet the New Boss
June 9--Appendix 12- Coming Full Circle One Last Time
June 10--11.1- The Colonization of Mars
June 12--11.2- In With the Old
June 15--11.4- The Election of 2244
June 17--11.5- The New Protocols
June 18--11.7- The Annulment of Contracts
June 19--11.10- Red Justice Red Freedom
June 20--11.11-The Three Days of Red
June 23--11.14-The Mutual Blocade
June 24--11.28-Bloody Sunset

Did you enjoy this review? Consider supporting me on Ko-fi: https://ko-fi.com/joelswagman

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Friday, June 27, 2025

Revolutions Season 11: The Martian Revolution by Mike Duncan: Review (plus other thoughts)

(Podcasts--History) 


(This is my first time reviewing this podcast on this blog. So, according to my new rules, I'm doing this as a video only review.)





Did you enjoy this review? Consider supporting me on Ko-fi: https://ko-fi.com/joelswagman

Support me on Patreon: https://patreon.com/JoelSwagman
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Thursday, October 31, 2024

Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Blog: Mini-Review


File this whole thing under "wasting time".

I waste a lot of time online reading Freddie Deboer's Substack.  (Freddie is a very entertaining writer.)

Recently, Freddie posted another subscriber writing, which I always find interesting.  (Turns out, a lot of very good writers are subscribed to Freddie.  You can always find a lot of interesting things in his subscriber writing post.)

On of the entries I happened to click on was called: Dr. Horrible or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Hate Nerd Culture and Myself.

I've never seen Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Blog, and I'm not entirely sure I've ever heard of it.  (It sounds vaguely familiar, I've probably heard references to it at some point on the Internet.  But I certainly couldn't have told you anything about it.)

The article then included a link to a Youtube video which included the 3 episodes of Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Blog edited together into one video.  


I told myself I shouldn't watch it.  (I'm trying to reduce the amount of time I waste on screens.)  But I was in the mood for some entertainment.  So I clicked it.  And I watched it.  And now, I suppose, I have to review it.  (One of the goals of this blog is, as much as possible, review everything I watch.  I'm counting this as a web series, and filing it under Podcasts, Youtube Series, Radio Shows, Etc)

Given the fact that this was just a web series, it's kind of impressive.  I mean, they don't have great special effects.  But they have some big name actors.  They have several different sets, and even one scene involving a moving car.  It's definitely recognizable as a something professionally done.
I don't know how the economics of web series work, but I'm surprised that they could afford to spend that much money on a web series.  (See more about the production details on the Wikipedia page HERE.)

And yet, if I had to sum this thing up in one word, it would be "forgettable".  I mean, it's okay.  Mildly entertaining.  The jokes are forgettable--they're passable, but not really funny.  Nothing you'd remember after a couple days.
The songs--oh boy, are the songs ever forgettable!  I can't imagine anyone singing any of these songs to themselves in the shower.
And the story is also pretty forgettable.

Now, when it comes to comedy and songs, I think it's hard to dissect it too much.  (Something is either funny, or it's not.  A tune is either catchy, or its not.)
But when it comes to the story, I think there are identifiable structural problems that we can point to in order to explain why the story is not engaging.

There's a couple of well-worn tropes being retread here.  The first is "the supervillain is actually the protagonist" trope.  This has been done a few times before--see, for example, Megamind or Despicable Me.  (Although, to be fair, Dr. Horrible came out in 2008, before Megamind or Despicable Me, so maybe this trope was a bit more fresh back in 2008?  I still feel like it was already an old gag even at the time, but I'm having trouble thinking of an example.  Help me out in the comments if you can think of an example of "the supervillain as a protagonist" before 2008).
Anyway, this story has a certain structure.  The supervillain starts out as evil, but likeable.  By the end of the story, he redeems himself, and are now he is on the side of good.
However, in Joss Whedon's version, there's no redemption.
Dr. Horrible starts out as sympathetic.  (He's an underdog, so we root for him.  Also he's in love, so that's an identifiable characteristic that makes him sympathetic.)  But besides being sympathetic, he has no good characteristics.  (Nothing that we see in the first episode shows him doing anything that is of benefit to society--it's all evil villain stuff.)   So the logical place for this character to go, in order to reward the audience investment in him, is for him to gain some virtue as the story goes on.  But this doesn't happen.

The other trope is "man sacrifices what's most important to him to achieve his dream, and then regrets it".  (I feel like this is also an old trope, but again, I'm having trouble thinking of examples.  Help me out in the comments.)
However, in Dr. Horrible, the story beats are a bit different.  And in a way that doesn't improve the story.

In the normal telling of this story, the protagonist starts out as a good person.  He has a goal he's trying to achieve.  Maybe it's a worthwhile goal in theory, but he becomes obsessed with it in a way that's not healthy.  The irony is, the character doesn't need his goal to be happy.  He already has happiness right in front of him, in the form of his true love, who is absolutely devoted to him at the start of the story.  
Somewhere along the line, he loses his true love.  Either he makes a deliberate choice to sacrifice the relationship for his goal, or else he loses her as a side effect of his devotion to the goal.  In the end, he achieves the goal, but discovers that his goal doesn't actually make him happy.

The problem with Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Blog is that the protagonist is already starting out as a supervillain, so he's already starting out as corrupted, and we don't get to see him being corrupted by the pursuit of his goal.
Plus, his goal is to get accepted in into the League, but what causes the girl to die is not him trying to get into the League, but him trying to get revenge on Captain Hammer.  So the set-up and the payoff are not aligned.
And, he never really had the girl in the first place.  The girl was in love with his nemesis, not him, so there was no great thing in his life that he had to sacrifice for his goal.

Now, I know it might seem that I'm being overly prescriptive in my analysis of the story.  Surely a great storyteller is allowed to change up the normal storybeats if it can produce a greater story, right?  But in this case, changing the story beats clearly did not improve the story. It's not a great story, is it?  It's a pretty forgettable story that lacks any emotional punch.

But to re-emphasize what I said above, it's not a bad little webseries.  Entertaining enough.  Watchable.  Neil Patrick Harris is good, and he's always fun to watch.
It's just completely forgetable.

...odd, then that this completely forgettable little series seemed to have spawned so much commentary on the Internet.  You don't have to look far to see a lot of opinion pieces on it.  (Again, see the Wikipedia page.) Perhaps a lot of this is because this story is part of the mythology of Joss Whedon.  (Once considered the greatest nerd storyteller ever, now a pariah.)

The article I linked to at the top is one such piece.  I'm not sure I agree with all of it.  For example, this quote:
Dr. Horrible has dated quite badly. Some of the gags are amusing, but the whole thing is smothered by the “well, that just happened” style of millennial/Gen X humor which Whedon helped make ubiquitous and is now treated with derision by zoomers. 
...I don't know, maybe I'm just out of it, but I didn't notice the humorstyle was particularly tied to Gen X/millennial.  I just thought it was a bit flat.  But maybe I'm missing something.
But anyway, I'm not sure I agree with the whole thing, but it's worth reading.

And then, I watched Sarah Z's video essay on it.


...again, I don't agree with all of  it.  But there is some insightful stuff here.
Sarah did a good job of highlighting the theme of male vulnerability that runs all the way through.  I'm ashamed to admit I didn't catch this theme myself on my first viewing of Dr. Horrible, but after Sarah walked me through it, it seems so obvious in retrospect.
Also, I thought Sarah made a good point about how the girl in the story is just purely presented as a plot device, and not as a real character in her own right.  (Sarah says this is typical of Joss Whedon, and I'll take her word for it.)
However, I disagree with Sarah when she claims that the narrative is trying to make the viewer feel that the girl should have ended up with Dr. Horrible, and that it is the girl's fault for choosing the wrong guy.  I think the narrative was making it pretty clear that Dr. Horrible was the one who was sabotaging his own romantic prospects, and I think that is what the viewer is intended to take away.
So, agree with some of it, disagree with some of it.

There's a lot more Internet commentary out there, but I'm stopping here.  I've wasted enough time on this already.
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Thursday, September 19, 2024

Revolutions Season 10: The Russian Revolution by Mike Duncan: Review

(Podcasts--History) 


(This is my first time reviewing this podcast on this blog--or at least, reviewing it as a whole. So, according to my new rules, I'm doing this as a video only review.)



Sorry, I know this video wasn't very good.  File this under:
1) The dangers of doing unscripted videos, and
2) I'm always sleepy when I film videos, because I have to wait for the kids to go to bed before I can film.
There were several things I had planned to talk about that I just forgot to mention.  And there were a few thins I mentioned that I wish I hadn't.  (e.g. My mentioning of Mike Duncan's mixing up of some of the names in the last few episodes--mentioning that was a pedantic nit-pick.)

Links to stuff mentioned:
* My review of Young Stalin by Simon Sebag Montefiore

As I mentioned in my started post, half of this series I had already reviewed on my blog.
For my thoughts on the first 8 episodes (the prologue about Marx and Bakunin), see HERE.

I also started reviewing this podcast episode by episode from episode 63 (partly as a way to alleviate boredom during the Covid lockdown).  The links to those min-reviews below

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Sunday, April 07, 2024

Revolutions Season 9: The Mexican Revolution by Mike Duncan: Review

(Podcasts--History) 

Finished: 1st Listening: March 2, 2024
2nd Listening: March 23, 2024
3rd Listening: April 07, 2024

(This is my first time listening through to this podcast, so according to my new rules, I'm doing this as a video only review.)



Links to stuff mentioned:
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Friday, February 23, 2024

Revolutions Season 8: The Paris Commune by Mike Duncan: Review

(Podcasts--History) 

Started: January 20, 2024
Finished: 1st Listening: January 25, 2024
2nd Listening: February 1, 2024
3rd Listening: February 18, 2024
4th Listening: February 23, 2024

(This is my first time listening through to this podcast, so according to my new rules, I'm doing this as a video only review.)



The other books I've read on the Paris Commune is below:

History Books that are Partially about the Paris Commune (but are also about other things as well):

Historical Fiction Dealing with the Paris Commune:


Other books mentioned in the video:
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Saturday, January 20, 2024

Revolutions Season 7: The Revolutions of 1848 by Mike Duncan: Review

(Podcasts--History) 

Started: August 17, 2023
Finished: 1st Listening: September 9, 2023
2nd Listening: October 25, 2023
3rd Listening: December 30, 2023
4th Listening: January 19, 2024

(This is my first time listening through to this podcast, so according to my new rules, I'm doing this as a video only review.)




My reviews of other Mike Duncan content:

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Saturday, December 02, 2023

Discourse of the Three Kingdoms Podcast: Mini-Review


Started: November 01, 2023
Finished: first listening on November 15, 2023
Finished second listening on November 24, 2023
Finished 3rd listening on December 2, 2023

(This is my first time listening through to this podcast, so according to my new rules, I'm doing this as a video only review.)



Listen to this podcast:




I briefly interacted with the podcast creators on Twitter here.
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Thursday, August 17, 2023

Revolutions Season 6: Revolution of 1830 (July Revolution) by Mike Duncan: Review

(Podcasts--History) 

Started: July 26, 2023
Finished: 1st Listening: August 2, 2023
2nd Listening: August 6, 2023
3rd Listening: August 17, 2023

(This is my first time listening through to this podcast, so according to my new rules, I'm doing this as a video only review.)



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Wednesday, July 26, 2023

Revolutions Season 5: Spanish American Wars of Independence by Mike Duncan: Review

(Podcasts--History) 

Started: May 20, 2023
Finished: 1st Listening: June 3, 2023
2nd Listening: July 6, 2023
3rd Listening: July 25, 2023

(This is my first time listening through to this podcast, so according to my new rules, I'm doing this as a video only review.)




For more information on the Revolutions of the 1820s, see HERE.
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Saturday, May 20, 2023

Revolutions Season 4: The Haitian Revolution by Mike Duncan: Review

(Podcasts--History) 

Started: October 14, 2022
Finished: 1st Listening: October 31, 2022
2nd Listening: March 12, 2023
3rd Listening: April 13, 2023
4th Listening: May 20, 2023

(This is my first time listening through to this podcast, so according to my new rules, I'm doing this as a video only review.)


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