When “Welcome to Night Vale” entered the podcasting scene in 2012, it changed how people thought of the medium.
Long dominated by nonfiction pieces such as “This American Life” and “Stuff You Should Know,” the ongoing show ushered in a still-growing collection of fictional, serialized stories available on podcasting platforms. And now Joseph Fink, one of the co-creators of “Welcome to Night Vale,” has unveiled his latest creation to add to this growing market, “Alice Isn’t Dead.”
The show’s first episode, “Omelet” — much more sinister than it first sounds — aired Tuesday. In its roughly 16-minute debut, the narrator, an as-yet unnamed female truck driver (performed by Jasika Nicole) is searching for her wife, whom she long thought was dead — hence the title of the podcast.
In this episode, the narrator, who is currently carting a load of miniature deodorant across the country, meets the Thistle Man, a truly horrible humanoid who stalks her throughout the drive. Her tale of this being, who callously and gorily murders others while he follows her around, is fragmented by her mind wandering as she talks through her truck’s radio at her wife, who may or may not be listening.
It is in these digressions, though not as attention-grabbing as the Thistle Man narrative, that the audience gets their first taste of the big questions of this podcast: Where did her wife go? Why did our narrator think Alice was dead?
Filled with vivid descriptions such as “his voice sounded like the accidental hollowing of the wind,” fans of “Welcome to Night Vale” will recognize the telltale writing of Fink in this show. Add to that the supernatural elements set in America’s most isolated locations and the fact the leading role is a lesbian, and it is obvious Fink is taking the most successful elements of his previous show and reinventing them for “Alice Isn’t Dead.”
But while the general style and creepy tone are relatively the same as his previous show, “Alice Isn’t Dead” is decidedly more adult. Not only are there slightly more swear words than ever appear on Fink’s first podcast, but the creep factor is decidedly gorier, lacking the irreverent humor on “Welcome to Night Vale” that worked to undercut the most serious and disturbing of the earlier show’s episodes.
Rather than having random episodes with an overarching plot tying them all together, this series is presented more like a novel with a distinct beginning, middle and end.
This series will air a new episode every other week until July 12 and is free on iTunes and other podcasting platforms.