We are in an era of remakes and reboots and revivals and retellings of stories that were just remade and rebooted and revived and retold less than a decade ago. An era of cinematic universes whose stories sometimes don’t feel like they go together, characters that seem to suddenly change in power and personality. Sometimes it can be enough to make even the most chill movie goer wonder where all the new ideas are.     But, this isn’t anything new in storytelling. The greek myths are pretty...

Ryan La Sala is a bestselling, award winning author of multiple queer books. His horror novel, The Honeys, is a love letter to queer folks who thought Clueless and The Craft should have had a crossover film. It was named the best book of 2022 by NPR, New York, public library, school library, journal Barnes & Noble, and publishers weekly. He’s currently serving as executive producer on the film adaptation, but he took time out of his busy schedule to have a chat with me about writing in...

The Writer's Guild of America is currently on strike in a union negotiation that has implications far beyond the city limits of Hollywood. Screenwriter Joshua Conkel (A Series of Unfortunate Events, Chilling Adventures of Sabrina, Dead Boy Detectives) returns to discuss how streaming services are attempting to turn screenwriting into a gig economy job, why in the new "golden age of television" isn't so golden, and how AI became a central talking point. Social links: Instagram:...

Charles Lu is a Canadian fashion designer whose work has been seen in London, Dubai, and on the hit Netflix show Next In Fashion with Tan France. The child of Vietnamese refugees, he knew his entire life he was going to be a fashion designer. He will make you rethink your relationship to hoodies, and he is my guest today.  Social links: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/headonfirepod/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/headonfirepod TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@headonfirepod Support my work...

96% of Americans claim to love cheese, according to one survey. The same survey said our love of cheese outranks our love of coffee, social media, national pride, and even our beloved cell phones. Americans’ favorite dish? Mac & cheese. Almost every type of cuisine on the planet features at least one type of cheese. But what do we really know about this most beloved of foods? Emilia D’Albero calls herself the CEO of Cheesetok, and for good reason. Her educational videos showcasing the...

Clarkesworld magazine is a publisher of short form science fiction with the distinction of providing its prospective authors a quick turnaround on submissions. This uniqueness is compounded by the fact that, unlike most other similar publications, the magazine is always open to submissions. All of that changed earlier this year when the Neil Clarke, the founder of Clarkesworld, made international headlines for closing submissions down for the first time in the magazine's decades-long history....

Chances are if you have a racist aunt with access to social media, you've come across the term DEI a lot lately. It's the new conservative boogeyman. It's the reason why SVB closed. The reason why drag queens read books to kids. And it's what happens when big companies get dragged on social media for being run almost exclusively by cisgender, heterosexual white men making 7-figures a year. But what is DEI - Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion - education? Why has it become so synonymous with...

The internet allows all sorts of people to come together to share their love of musicians, actors, tv shows and movies, and...anything. Everything. There are communities who share a love even specific characters from a book series, and I've even recently come across a diehard community of people who share a specific love of Uncrustables - a frozen peanut butter and jelly sandwich snack.  But what happens when fandoms go too far? What happens when a group of people with a lot of big feelings,...

Voice acting brings life to everything from corporate training videos to tearjerker holiday commercials to your favorite characters in animated movies or video games. But the daily grind isn't as easy as sitting down and reading a few lines. Tawny Platis is a lifelong actress who has found recent success behind the microphone, and she guides us through what it takes to make it in the cutthroat world of microphone jockeys.  Social links: Instagram:...

I think you should confront the things you fear. Not me, of course, but you definitely should. I hear it's great therapy. Me? I talk to experts about the things that I fear, and I cannot think of a creature that inspires for fear, misunderstanding, and general "icky" feelings than bats. But, maybe that's because I don't know enough about them. Alyson Brokaw is a behavioral ecologist and bat scientist who earned her PhD from Texas A&M University. She's a passionate advocate for not only...

What's the difference between myths, legends, and folklore? Or...is there a difference?  The winter holiday season is chock full of magic and monsters and bits of folklore abounding in everything from the colors of the season to the foods that we eat. Folklore itself - as a topic of study and discussion - has had a bit of a moment this year. Plenty of voices have made a bit of a name for themselves bringing folklore to the masses via social media, but there's a lot of nuance when you scratch...

We know Christmas today as a time of Santa in a red suit flying around delivering presents. We know it as a festive holiday filled with plenty of food and gift-giving and light. However, throughout history, this time of year was a pretty dark time filled with mischievous spirits and ghost stories. On this throwback episode that originally aired in 2019 I speak with art historian Susan Owens, author of The Ghost: a cultural history, about how ghosts were seen throughout the centuries and how...

"Didn't he just put out an episode about quantum physics?" you might be asking yourself. First of all, shut up. Second of all, yes. Yes I did, BUT when you come across an expert who can correct Hank Green on quantum entanglement and help me understand basic tenets of quantum physics using a pair of socks, YOU DO ANOTHER SHOW ABOUT QUANTUM PHYSICS.  Caroline R.Z. is a multitalented educator who uses her platform to discuss issues of culture, finance, physics, and gaming. (Just don't give her...

Everyone is scared of "The Talk". We avoid it by using phrases like "the birds and the bees" instead of proper names for our bodies. Parents hope the schools do it but don't want the schools to do it and if the schools do it anyway they want to teach kids not to do..."it". And I get it. The intersection of sex education and children is uncomfortable, especially these days when children are being used as footballs by people who are more interested in scoring political points than making their...

By now you're probably aware there's a new Ant-Man movie on the way in the Marvel Cinematic Universe called Quantumania. In the MCU and other science fiction media, the word "quantum" gets thrown around quite a bit.  Why can you teleport? Quantum physics. Why can you shrink to the size of an atom? Quantum mechanics. Why can you walk through walls or travel the multiverse or bring someone back from the dead? Quantum entanglement. Quantum computing. Quantum. Quantum. Quantum.  At this point...

Everyone has those stories from their childhood that are a mix of things that happened and things that didn't happen. This is one of mine.  It is a story of death and grief and loss and how a child processes those things.  But, it is also a story of an imaginary friend, a mostly forgotten Greek myth, and the stories families tell about themselves.  Social links: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/headonfirepod/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/headonfirepod TikTok:...

Dr. Eva Burke returns to provide an education on the value and cultural significance of horror movies.

Poetry has a weird reputation in literature. I cannot think of a time when it felt cool to like poetry. All sorts of other genres and styles of writing have had their heyday - seriously who would've thought that "dinosaur smut" would bring in such big bucks? - but poetry seems continually relegated to being that thing you had to get through back in school. Taylor Mali has been on a mission to transform the way we think about, read, listen to, and consider poetry. He has been featured in...

Yinan Wang is a geologist and children’s book writer. He is currently studying potential uses of new technology to aid the field of paleontology. He stopped by to have a conversation about the science and salesmanship behind pretty rocks.

Ola Ojewumi gives us a look at disability advocacy, the lyrical dust up involving Beyonce and Lizzo, and choosing our words more thoughtfully.

A conversation about parasocial relationships, convention culture, and who owns an author's work with Meg Elison, author of the new book Number One Fan.

We love talking about food, but we have a tough time talking about eating. For some reason we are allowed to almost fetishize food, salivating over perfectly aesthetic photos of food but the moment that food touches our lips we are judged for it. And, naturally, the more layers of intersectional oppression you experience, the more you are judged for your food choices.   Dr. Psyche Williams-Forson is Professor and Chair of the Department of American Studies at the University of Maryland...

Writing is a special kind of solitary torture. The only thing about it anyone ever sees is the end result, the finished, published work resting on shelves. In today's booktok culture, books are consumed at lightning speed and reviewers rush to deliver the most controversial hot take they can think of for engagement. Years of a person's life are spent writing the stories that become our blockbuster movies or our summer beach reads. Years spent alone in a room somewhere with a pen and paper or...

Would you make a good cult leader? If not you, then you probably know someone who would. We're fascinated by cults. It seems like every day a new docuseries is dropped on some streaming service or podcast platform about yet another cult out there in the world taking people's time, energy, or money.  Jennings Brown is an investigative journalist with a penchant for investigating cults. He's reported on Teal Swan, the Fellowship of Friends, as well as a number of conspiracy theories, algorithm...

Pre-K pause. If you’ve been online in any capacity in the last year, that phrase probably conjures up the face of Tell Williams. He was a pre-K teacher for 9 years before resigning to pursue a Master’s in social work. Along the way he accidentally found viral fame when a video he posted about the realities of being a teacher hit the algorithm jackpot. He’s gone on to try his hand at stand-up comedy, being the face of a nail polish brand, and even act in the new show The Book of Queer that...