Three horror-ish podcasts.
The Magnus Archives
Because apparently books and television and movies and video games and music and so on aren't quite enough media for me to consume, I also have a serious Podcast Problem?
The problem is two-fold: I will never have enough time to listen to all of the shows I want to listen to AND my phone is constantly giving me YOU'RE ALMOST OUT OF SPACE messages. Sigh.
I do especially love horror stories, and I make a point of listening to them during my night hours at the library... and yes, there has been shrieking on my part, both due to being startled by a patron AND due to the jerk furnace kicking on unexpectedly. Because I'm not just an ass at home, I'm an ass at work, too. Wheeeeeee!!
Anyway, the three that I'm most into at the moment are:
The Magnus Archives: Anthology show in which the new Head Archivist of the Magnus Institute—devoted to researching claims of unexplained phenomena or paranormal occurrences—sifts through the extremely disorganized files, reads the testimonies aloud, and then fact-checks what he can.
The first bunch of episodes make it seem like they're all unconnected, but then there's one that directly relates to the previous Head Archivist AND the last few I've listened to have had a few asides about the ins and outs of the Magnus Institute itself. In other words, it's gone from short stories to CONNECTED short stories all within the same larger world, and I AM HERE FOR IT.
The Alexandria Archives: Another anthology show, this one in the format of a late-night college radio show. In the first third, students and faculty/employees from Alexandria University—the tagline of the show is The South's Answer to Miskatonic University, which should give you an idea about the sort of things that go on there—call in to chat with the host, Morning Wood, and then she plays a story from the Archives.
As in The Magnus Archives, the world-building has happened slowly, with information from the callers and from the Archives gradually building a bigger—and yet more detailed—picture with every episode. (Some of the voice acting is a little dodgy—especially in regards to accents—which can be a little distracting, but not so distracting that I don't immediately listen to each new episode.)
Tanis: This one is a NPR-sounding mockumentary about the host's search for the truth behind the myth of Tanis, a maybe-place-maybe-being-whatever-it-is-it's-definitely-mysterious... SOMETHING.
Like the rest of the podcasts from this production company, there are a lot of Dramatic Pauses, a lot of cliffhangers, a lot of I'm Going To Introduce Something REALLLLLLY Interesting Oh WAIT Now I'm Going To Talk About Something Else For Three Episodes. In a good way. Or, well, it works for ME. Based on chatter I've seen, I've gathered that this one is somewhat divisive, so your mileage may vary.
Others I should know about?