Ryn and Sam finish out Network Effect and boy howdy is Murderbot having a Bad Time! And so are the other SecUnits. Wait, other SecUnits? We have commentary on such topics as naming conventions, queer generations, suspension bondage, ART's total and complete lack of chill, and the ethics of murdering your digital baby. Is it murder if the digital baby was essentially a bomb in the first place? Covers chapters 14-end of The Murderbot Diaries: Network Effect by Martha Wells (2020)

ART is alive and Murderbot gets to stop running through the stages of grief! Problem is it stopped on Anger, which it has every right to tbh. Ryn and Sam talk ART and Murderbot's relationship (and relationships in general), trusting kids to handle difficult topics, modern "AI" vs sci-fi AI, and statistics!   Covers chapters 8-13 of The Murderbot Diaries: Networt Effect by Martha Wells (2020)

Step inside (your best friend's corpse), it's a fucked up ride (through the wormhole)! Amena wishes this was a normal field trip, but with SecUnit? No way! Take your second right past Mars and join us while we talk about knees, gravity, faster than light travel, anxiety, and potential future cinematic choices for the show! Covers Chapters 4-7 of The Murderbot Diaries: Network Effect by Martha Wells (2020)

Not all is well with Murderbot, but when is it ever? Ryn and Sam follow our favorite rogue SecUnit through the first three chapters of Network Effect, the first novel in the Murderbot Diaries! Topics include the gender politics of aunts, cis discomfort with trans presentation, intense feelings in platonic relationships, puppy eyes as a weapon of war, and Murderbot murdering on a murderboat.  Covers Chapters 1-3 of The Murderbot Diaries: Network Effect (2020) by Martha Wells, winner of the 2021 Hugo Award for Best Novel, the  2020 Nebula Award for Best Novel, and the 2021 Locus Award for Best  Science Fiction Novel

here's been a murder! And despite what you might expect, it wasn't Murderbot's fault. It promises. And we promise topics including sleeper agents, queer assimilation, translation, and things that go blorp in the night.   Covers The Murderbot Diaries: Fugitive Telemetry by Martha Wells (2021)

So, as it turns out, there are there are also some short stories in the Murderbot Universe! We get to dig into the minds of some side characters, learn more about the origins of constructs, and talk about queerplatonic relationships, coming out, and non-human personhood!  If our audio quality is a wee bit sharper on this one, it's because we had some issues with our primary recordings and were working from our backups, and Sam worked her wizardry as best she could. Bear with us.  Timestamps for potential/light Network Effect spoilers: 0:40:04-1:04:08 This can be listened to in any order with the Fugitive Telemetry episode that you will see right above this in your feed! Your fate is your own! Choose your own adventure! Although I recommend this one first.  Covers the following short stories/novelettes in the following timeline order, all of which are available for free online: 1. "Obsolescence", written for the anthology Take Us To A Better Place (2020) 2. "The Future of Work: Compulsory" written for Wired magazine (2018) 3. "Home: Habitat, Range, Niche, Territory" released in Reactor magazine (2021) 4. "Rapport: Friendship, Solidarity, Communion, Empathy" written for Reactor magazine (2025)

Murderbot has to go find some old friends! We're entirely normal about it acknowledging PresAux as friends. Other topics include consent, gender presentation/human-passing, the self and the body as separate but connected entities, and finally, as all folks hitchhiking on bot-driven transports across the galaxy must, we grapple with towels.    Covers The Murderbot Diaries Vol IV: Exit Strategy by Martha Wells

Ryn and Sam are wildly unfocused, probably because we are simultaneously monitoring two dozen intel drones, HubSystem, and Episode 372 of The Rise and Fall of Sanctuary Moon! And also being slightly horny on main, giving mini-reviews of horror movies and a romance novel, discussing Murderbot's D&D class, and once again providing evidence that capitalism is the worst villain! All before we get betrayed by our mysterious augmented human security team or before the terraforming station breaks up and falls out of orbit, whichever happens first... Anyway, come join us! Covers The Murderbot Diaries Vol. 3: Rogue Protocol by Martha Wells

Murderbot travels to RaviHyral to investigate... well, murder. That it may or may not have been responsible for. Join us as we grapple with concepts of non-human personhood, gender, terrible bosses, queerplatonic relationships formed on threats of terrible violence, and murder! So much murder. Covers The Murderbot Diaries Vol. 2: Artificial Condition by Martha Wells

Welcome to season 2! We begin with everyone's favorite heartless killing machine that just wants to watch Space Netflix and unfortunately keeps having emotions! Join Ryn and Sam as we discuss aliens, why capitalism is always the problem, international law in space, and sci-fi horror!    Covers The Murderbot Diaries Book 1: All Systems Red by Martha Wells (2017)

Hello everyone, and welcome to the next phase of the Fandom Apprentice! If you're new to the pod, this is a great place to start- get (re)introduced to us as the hosts, our background with sci-fi, and our plans for season 2, focused on Martha Wells' Murderbot Diaries! If you're a regular, come on in and get cozy with some new media!

Ryn and Sam know absolutely nothing about poetry. Neither of us took a single college-level English course. That will not, of course, stop us from having opinions on Tolkien's poetry and songs. This is what Bilbo Baggins hates. And/or what the Man in the Moon himself came down to listen to. You be the judge!     There is also An Announcement: This Is The End. Of Tolkien commentary anyway. For now. An announcement on what media comes next can be found in the last few minutes of this episode, so stay tuned! We promise it will be an excellent time. Featuring music and voices from Maury Laws, Glenn Yarborough, A.R. Rahman, Donald Swann, William Elvin, The Tolkien Ensemble, Sir Christopher Lee, J.R.R. Tolkien, and Howard Shore!

A gift to the foes of Mordor. Why not listen? Long have Ryn and Sam, the hosts of this podcast, overanalyzed the Lord of The Rings series. We come to the last of the movies today, so join us as we ride for ruin and the story's ending through discussions of gravity-defying snakes, mutilated tomatoes, the neverending road to cavalry tactics, music, and much more!  Covers The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (Extended Edition) (2003)

We move on to the second film in the trilogy, The Two Towers! Ryn provides more commentary on music, Sam continues to hate Gollum, and we are confused about some story choices! Join us for discussions on tragically cishet immortals, incredibly hot Numenoreans, Shakespearean actors, and Skyrim! Do you get to the Cloud District very often? Listeners of our podcast do!   Covers The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (Extended Edition) (2002)

We finally dive into the movies with an emphasis on our special interests of soundtrack, costume design, and Aragorn! Join us as we ask the big questions: what's a leitmotif? How many hugs are in the movie? And why is Aragorn so hot? Covers The Lord of The Rings: Fellowship of the Ring (Extended Edition) (2001)

We get our appendixes out! That is, we talk about the Lord of the Rings appendices. That's right, there's still more text to read! Join us as we pour over Arwen and Aragorn's romance, family trees, and the Book of Numbers, Tolkien Edition! aka a detailed timeline history of Numenor and the Second and Third Ages of Middle Earth.   Covers Appendices A-F, published at the end of Return of the King

Having reached the end of the books, we take a minute to reflect on this journey and its stages, check in to see if our Definitely Universal Rules Of Fantasy hold up, talk about Sam Gamgee as The Everyman, and dig into our remaining lingering questions! 

All good things must come to an end, a last stage, if you will. Join us as we discuss the very end of Return of the King, prison abolition, authoritarianism, Sam Gamgee's knowledge of buns, hobbit reproduction, and our feelings here at the end of this stage of our wonderful journey!    Covers Return of the King Book VI, Chapter VIII: The Scouring of the Shire (Part B) and Chapter IX: The Grey Havens   Some reading/watching/listening from our discussion this week- Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra Podcast (2023-2024) Hiding in Plain Sight: The Invention of Donald Trump and the Erosion of America by Sarah Kendzior (2020) They Knew: How a Culture of Conspiracy Keeps America Complacent by Sarah Kendzior (2022)   No One Is Disposable: Everyday Practices of Prison Abolition video series by Reina Gossett, Dean Spade, and Hope Dector (2014)   Are Prisons Obsolete? by Angela Y. Davis (2003) Abolition Democracy: Beyond Prisons, Torture, and Empire by Angela Y. Davis (2005)   They Can't Kill Us All by Apes of The State (2023)

The Hobbits have returned home, but it has not escaped the ravages of time- we finally come to Ryn's favorite chapter in all of Lord of the Rings, The Scouring of the Shire, which definitely has absolutely no relevance to the current political climate, none whatsoever. Anyway, for no reason at all it's a really good time to get to know your neighbors and local communities.     Covers most of Book VI, Chapter VIII: The Scouring of the Shire- We had quite a bit to say, so we'll finish the chapter next episode!

Another travel episode! Ryn and Sam talk about their book club, immortality, what Legolas and Gimli get up to in the Glittering Caves of Aglarond, and compulsory heterosexuality! Join us for the last stage of the journey (again)! Covers Return of the King Book VI Chapter VI Many Partings and Chapter VII Homeward Bound