'Serial' podcast: real-life-murder-mystery **With Spoilers**
Discussion
Couldn't find a thread on this....
Been listening to the first few episodes of the podcast 'Serial' this week and have to say i am massively hooked already.
http://serialpodcast.org
A journalist named Sarah Koenig has re-investigated the murder in Baltimore of a teenager in 1999. Her boyfriend was convicted of strangling her in an open-and-shut case and is serving life imprisonment. Each episode re-examines an aspect of the case, but its obvious from the first episode that many aspects of the case are very strange.
I can't say much without spoilers, but many of the witnesses contradicted themselves, motives and alibis were not properly investigated, the defense lawyer seems to have been criminally incompetent and key evidence was never even checked by police.
The real genius of the way this is all presented is that it plays out more like a drama with cliffhangers, with Koenig narrating and recorded conversations with the cast of characters (including crucially phone calls with the man convicted from prison), plus court and police interview tapes from 1999.
Episode 3 about 'Mr S in the Park' (major WTF! moment) had me riveted in the car this morning.
Highly recommended!
Been listening to the first few episodes of the podcast 'Serial' this week and have to say i am massively hooked already.
http://serialpodcast.org
A journalist named Sarah Koenig has re-investigated the murder in Baltimore of a teenager in 1999. Her boyfriend was convicted of strangling her in an open-and-shut case and is serving life imprisonment. Each episode re-examines an aspect of the case, but its obvious from the first episode that many aspects of the case are very strange.
I can't say much without spoilers, but many of the witnesses contradicted themselves, motives and alibis were not properly investigated, the defense lawyer seems to have been criminally incompetent and key evidence was never even checked by police.
The real genius of the way this is all presented is that it plays out more like a drama with cliffhangers, with Koenig narrating and recorded conversations with the cast of characters (including crucially phone calls with the man convicted from prison), plus court and police interview tapes from 1999.
Episode 3 about 'Mr S in the Park' (major WTF! moment) had me riveted in the car this morning.
Highly recommended!
Well i'm fully up to date with Episode 8 having been released yesterday. Anyone else?
Its definitely 'gone viral' this week with a lot of the papers writing about it.
Absolutely fascinating stuff...but hard to discuss it without spoilers!
Been having some fairly lively discussions on the social medias about whether there could be a hitherto unknown '3rd man' that they're saving for some massive reveal towards the end....or, well, Don anybody?
Its definitely 'gone viral' this week with a lot of the papers writing about it.
Absolutely fascinating stuff...but hard to discuss it without spoilers!
Been having some fairly lively discussions on the social medias about whether there could be a hitherto unknown '3rd man' that they're saving for some massive reveal towards the end....or, well, Don anybody?
Might be worth getting a mod to put one of those 'spoilers' alert on front of the thread title to allow for guilty free discussions?!
I love how I have already changed my mind nearly every week in terms of who did it. It really excels in leaving space around the evidence presented which allows your brain to quickly fill in the gaps with your own impressions.
Third man? Potentially, but who and why? I was also thinking it could have been a zealous family member who killed in the name of honour/religious 'pride' at some point too but that looks unlikely now. Don has not received much investigation yet...
I love how I have already changed my mind nearly every week in terms of who did it. It really excels in leaving space around the evidence presented which allows your brain to quickly fill in the gaps with your own impressions.
Third man? Potentially, but who and why? I was also thinking it could have been a zealous family member who killed in the name of honour/religious 'pride' at some point too but that looks unlikely now. Don has not received much investigation yet...
This whole thing about the library parking lot still seems sus to me. We have 3 unconnected witnesses that put both lee and adnon at the library/library parking lot at the supposed time if the murder, or just before.
We also have a witness that says adnon asked for a lift from lee that afternoon after school.
Sure the narrator says it would have been too busy to kill her there, but all these things add up to put them together at the right time, even if it doesn't match jay's exact timeline.
So far, all the other testimonies from interested parties are from slightly unreliable witnesses;
Jay-billy bulls
tter & stonerAdnon-stoner with strict Muslim parents
Mr S-sexual deviant with previous sex crimes past.
Then there's the girl who disputes the phone box at best buy, reliable witness because she was a shoplifter?!
I'm not convinced of adnons innocence simply by picking holes in a bunch of stoners stories!
I'm not completely convinced of his guilt either just yet I suppose which us why it's so interesting!
At the moment I'm leaning towards him being guilty, but not beyond reasonable doubt. It does seem surprising that the jury were willing to convict so easily given what we've heard.
This thread just reminded me to donate and in doing so I see that season two is confirmed!
This thread just reminded me to donate and in doing so I see that season two is confirmed!
Edited by theaxe on Friday 28th November 11:20
LaurasOtherHalf said:
Anyone listening to the serial spoilers podcast?
An interesting discussion for those waiting for their next fix and some interesting snippets of info from the huge reddit threads on the case
Me!An interesting discussion for those waiting for their next fix and some interesting snippets of info from the huge reddit threads on the case
Not listening to this weeks due to them discussing info from future episodes of the series so saving up for after the last episode
It's a podcast about a podcast!
Certainly worth the wait!
I think the most enjoyable thing is how each week twists my interpretation of the case and leaves me both certain of it and mystified too.
And to think this is one case, from one court, from one district. It is disheartening to think how many 'lower' priority cases must exist whereby the conviction is as questionable.
I think the most enjoyable thing is how each week twists my interpretation of the case and leaves me both certain of it and mystified too.
And to think this is one case, from one court, from one district. It is disheartening to think how many 'lower' priority cases must exist whereby the conviction is as questionable.
Very interesting episode, especially in light of what the spoiler podcast has been saying the last couple of weeks. Two points raised by posters above- yes I agree, it really does twist your view on the case each episode, before listening to this weeks I was again back to the "guilty" verdict of adnan but now I'm not so sure. Also, yes it's just one little story from what little courthouse, though a bit disheartening to hear that adnan now recommends people to "take the deal" rather than protest their innocence like he did.
I was very interested to hear that his lawyer Christina Gutierez tried to implicate Mr S, and tried to establish something I thought of earlier-did he frequent the Porno Store Jay worked at? I'm surprised no one picked up on this earlier, or the fact that the 19 year old star witness worked in such a place.
There again, in the bad for adnan side of the story, the coroners report did say that there was no evidence of rape prior to murder.
Gutierez does at least make one thing plane in her questioning of Jay at the trial, if adnan didn't do it Jay must have. It's a simple case of one or the other.
I was very interested to hear that his lawyer Christina Gutierez tried to implicate Mr S, and tried to establish something I thought of earlier-did he frequent the Porno Store Jay worked at? I'm surprised no one picked up on this earlier, or the fact that the 19 year old star witness worked in such a place.
There again, in the bad for adnan side of the story, the coroners report did say that there was no evidence of rape prior to murder.
Gutierez does at least make one thing plane in her questioning of Jay at the trial, if adnan didn't do it Jay must have. It's a simple case of one or the other.
The format is great, to put across such a case using only audio and to keep us this hooked...
You can understand why any lawyer would go after Mr. S given the somewhat strange/improbably way he found the body and his previous rap sheet too. Something still doesn't strike me as right about him either.
I am still not sure how Jay got out of this so lightly, aside from his face-to-face charms, he is such a shonky part of it all.
Episode 10 has basically nailed down my opinion that whether guilty or not, Adnan should never have been convicted and given life purely on how the case got to/was presented in court.
Maybe next week will change all that with a massive twist and damning piece of evidence though
You can understand why any lawyer would go after Mr. S given the somewhat strange/improbably way he found the body and his previous rap sheet too. Something still doesn't strike me as right about him either.
I am still not sure how Jay got out of this so lightly, aside from his face-to-face charms, he is such a shonky part of it all.
Episode 10 has basically nailed down my opinion that whether guilty or not, Adnan should never have been convicted and given life purely on how the case got to/was presented in court.
Maybe next week will change all that with a massive twist and damning piece of evidence though
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