Imaginary Worlds
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Imaginary Worlds
Imaginary Worlds sounds like what would happen if NPR went to ComicCon and decided that’s all they ever wanted to cover. Host Eric Molinsky spent over a decade working as a public radio reporter and producer, and he uses those skills to create thoughtful, sound-rich episodes about science fiction, f...
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293 epizod
Music of a Forbidden Planet
In the 1950s, the avant-garde music scene in New York and the movie studios of Los Angeles might have seemed like opposite ends of a cultural spectrum...
The Battle to Make Star Wars
Movies that change cinema often come from outsiders – whether it’s Orson Welles making Citizen Kane or George Lucas making Star Wars a.k.a. Episode IV...
Lifting the Curtain on Theatrical Effects
I’ve covered digital and practical effects in film and TV, but creating special effects for live theater is a whole other challenge. J&M Special Effec...
The Shark That Ate Hollywood
I didn't want the summer to end without joining in on the 50th anniversary celebrations of Jaws. I spent summers on Cape Cod as a kid, where I often h...
Dreaming of Coney Island's Dreamland
Coney Island still has the classic amusements you’d expect today like roller coasters, water slides, and carnival games. But over a century ago, it lo...
8-Bit to Orchestras: Video Game Music Scores
Creating a musical score for interactive video games is like trying to hit a moving target. Luckily, Hans Zimmer’s studio Bleeding Fingers has develop...
How Jack Kirby Made His Mark on Marvel
The production design of the film Fantastic Four: First Steps is an homage to the early ‘60s comics created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby. While Kirby is...
The Hitchhiker's Guide to Douglas Adams
When Arvind Ethan David was a student, he decided to adapt the Douglas Adams novel Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency into a play. Arvind didn’t...
Imagining the Digital Afterlife
The animated TV series Pantheon (streaming on Netflix) asks what if you could upload your mind to the Internet? Would still be human? Would we create...
Murderbot Is Ready for Its Close-Up (But Not Eye Contact)
Murderbot is a killing machine in the far future that would rather spend its time binging an intergalactic soap opera. Shooting bad guys with lasers i...
The Bright Legacy of Dark Shadows
Next year marks the 60th anniversary of Dark Shadows. The gothic soap opera wasn’t originally intended to include a vampire, but when creator Dan Curt...
Body Horror Gets Under My Skin
We all have that one thing we just can’t watch. For me, it’s body horror -- the kind of horror where grotesque and disturbing things happen to someone...
Bonus: Syd Mead Full Gallery Tour
Last week, we heard about a new exhibit in New York called Syd Mead: Future Pastime. The exhibit closes on May 21st, and I know most listeners won't b...
The Optimist Behind Blade Runner's Dystopia
The late Syd Mead was a visual futurist who was hired to imagine the worlds of Blade Runner, Tron, Aliens, Elysium and other sci-fi films. His work in...
Blueprints for Utopias
The golden age of sci-fi was filled with utopian visions the future. These days, when sci-fi creators project ahead several decades, the world is look...
Mary Blair: Coloring Outside the Lines at Disney
In honor of Women’s History Month we’re producing a two-part series about two artists who were visionaries and trailblazers. In part 2, we look at the...
Bonus: Superstar Stuntwoman of Silent Cinema
In the previous episode, I talked with author Mallory O'Meara about Milicent Patrick, but there wasn't room to include this bonus material about Mallo...
Milicent Patrick: Disney Magic to Monster Mayhem
In honor of Women’s History Month, we’re producing a two-part series about two visionary and trailblazing artists: Mary Blair and Milicent Patrick. Th...
Pokémon and The Art of Dubbing Anime
This week’s episode comes from our Patreon podcast Between Imaginary Worlds. It’s a more casual chat show that appears between ad-free episodes of Ima...
Filk Fusion: Where Sci-Fi Meets Folk Music
In the 1950s, an article about the popularity of folk music among science fiction fans had a typo where “folk” was written as “filk.” From then on, fi...
Dance With The Devil Under Wall St.
The writer Jon Ronson and producers of the immersive theatrical experience Sleep No More have teamed up to make a vast new immersive show that unfolds...
Rewriting the Script on Audio Fiction
Lauren Shippen is one of my favorite creators of audio dramas. In 2015, she burst on the scene with The Bright Sessions, which was about young people...
The Muppets Before The Muppets
In honor of Muppet*Vision 3D closing at Disney World, we look at the history of The Muppets before Kermit joined Miss Piggy and Fozzie Bear. Two decad...
Bond, Bond, and James Bond: An Audio Drama
There’s a fan theory that James Bond is a codename, and all of the Bond movies are in a single chronological order. In this original audio drama, Jame...
Making Up The Penguin
The Penguin series on HBO and Max has been one of the most critically acclaimed comic book-based TV shows in years. Much of the praise has gone toward...
There's No Place Like Oz
In honor of the release of Wicked, we’re hitching a ride on a tornado to hear three different stories about Oz. We hear how the “rainbow chaser” L. Fr...
Why The Future is (Doctor) Doom
All Hail Doom! The supreme ruler of Latveria has successfully defeated The Fantastic Four and The Avengers. Marvel Studios is bowing towards his will,...
Who Gets to Survive: The Final Girls of Horror
Horror movies are best known for their monsters and villains – but there’s another half to the equation. The Final Girls who survive horror films and...
To Seek Out New Life
For a long time, imagining what alien life could look like was mostly the job of science fiction creators. But in recent years, the field of astrobiol...
Introducing Between Imaginary Worlds
I'm excited to announce that we're starting a new Patreon-only ad-free show called Between Imaginary Worlds, which is a more casual chat show format....
Escaping Prison with Role-Playing Games
Role-playing games like Dungeons & Dragons and Pathfinder aren’t just played in game shops or living rooms. They’re also very popular in prisons – if...
10th Anniversary Special Part 2
In the second part of our retrospective on how Imaginary Worlds has covered sci-fi and fantasy since September 2014, we look at the world of gaming. I...
10th Anniversary Special Part 1
When I began my podcast in September 2014, I was mostly sticking with topics that I was familiar with like blockbuster movies and animation. I liked s...
Unlocking the Door Between Escape Rooms and Immersive Theater
I used to think escape rooms were gimmicky activities where everyone scrambled to solve puzzles while I stood around feeling useless. On the other han...
Narrating Audiobooks From Other Worlds
The field of audiobooks has exploded since the introduction of mp3 players, and it continues to expand. But it takes a unique set of skills to voice a...
Fantasy and Fascism Part II: When Democracy Fails
In the years since my 2020 episode Fantasy and Fascism, I knew that I had to make a follow-up episode. The political landscape was changing in ways I...
The Team Behind Hans Zimmer
Who really composed the scores of Dune, Interstellar, Blade Runner 2049, The Dark Knight, Man of Steel, Pirates of the Caribbean and The Lion King? We...
Swept Away by Romantasy
The hottest trend in fantasy novels – in fact the hottest trend in publishing overall – is fantasy romance or romantasy. These stories take place in w...
Books Under Fire
Book banning is hitting libraries across America, and many of the titles being banned or challenged are fantasy books or graphic novels – especially L...
The George Lucas Talk Show
Did you know that in retirement, George Lucas decided to host a live talk show with his sidekick Watto? That’s the conceit of The George Lucas Talk Sh...