This year's Listmania continues with a countdown of the best podcasts of 2017. It was a year of incredible highs and lows, and the fledgling medium was there to capture and comment on it all. With more shows coming out almost daily, it is impossible to boil it down to only a handful of shows that mattered. So while this is a "Top 20," certain entries were broken down into categories and themes. There's close to 40 between this two day extravaganza, so heat up that subscription button and prepare to have hours and hours of great (and mostly free) entertainment.
20. Stand By Your Band
The one thing that is and isn't universal is that everyone likes something that other people hate. In the ingenious series Stand By Your Band, the hosts attempt to discover the positive in "bad music" by having guests defend them. With a playlist of tunes, the average show is an entertaining (though a tad ribald and juvenile) look into the music that defines our lives and why it should matter. Even if you don't come away liking the band any more than when you walk in, there's an off chance that you'll enjoy the friendly and unassuming banter of any given episode. It may be too crass for some, but it's still a hilarious and heartfelt journey for those who can look past the odd remarks.
19. Retail Nightmares
As long as people need to buy food, there will always be people buying retail. This show may be over 100 episodes long by now, but the stories of people acting rude at retail stores has yet to dry up. The hosts revel in the great frustrations that unite us all as they invite guests new and old. The show has evolved to be about more, including various stories of band tours and watching True Blood while on vacation. The show is as lively as ever, and arguably more irreverent. With that said, the show is always entertaining and never strays too far from the joys of letting off steam about the world's frustrations in a way that anyone can understand. You don't have to be a cashier to enjoy this show, but it would help.
18. TV Recap Shows:
Animanicast, Engage: A Star Trek Podcast,
The West Wing Weekly
While the average interview show has become commonplace, it's also a golden age for fans of old TV series (and Engage's case, a special pass to the creation of a new one). In all three of these cases, the hosts recap every episode diligently with excellent use of research and audio examples. There's also special interviews with cast and crew from these series, who look back on the series with an incredible insight not often shared with the public. If the rehearsal audio for early Animaniacs episodes interests you, then it is encouragement for you to check out the ongoing interviews with senior producer Tom Ruegger. If you want to know what it's like for Joshua Malina to host a show where you review yourself on The West Wing, then now's the perfect time to jump on The West Wing Weekly. There's several hours of entertainment for those who want to enjoy the quality programs of yesteryear and find new fans who share similar interests.
17. The Cracked Family:
The Cracked Podcast, The Cracked Movie Podcast,
Kurt Vonneguys, Cracked Gets Personal, The Daily Zeitgeist
2017 wasn't the best year for the Cracked family. In most recent news, most of the website's best contributors were laid off. It didn't help that months prior, founder Jack O'Brien said goodbye and put power into Alex Schmidt's hands. While he expanded the brand with several shows, O'Brien's wide array of trivia was sorely missed and was welcomed when he returned with The Daily Zeitgeist. All of these shows delve into different aspects of what made the website enjoyable and worth checking out, even if some of them are likely now defunct. Still, for those who want a little bit of everything in the news, The Daily Zeitgeist returns O'Brien to the entertaining, informative subjects that made him such a wonderful presence on The Cracked Podcast. It's just a shame that some of the glory disappeared this year, though it only raises hopes of what's to come when they start new projects.
16. The Next Picture Show
The premise is simple: no film exists in a vacuum. Every other week, the hosts get together to compare a new movie to an older and similar release. The novelty has produced a lot of great work this year, producing interesting parallels between movies. It helps that this year produced a lot of great movies worthy of deeper dissection, which often carried over in fan letters for several additional episodes. If you want further insight into movies like Blade Runner 2049 and how it builds on Blade Runner, this is the perfect show for you. It is the perfectly distilled analysis of films in our culture by placing them in a larger context. In that way, films as divisive as mother! suddenly have a deeper poignancy thanks to deeper insight. It's a great show no matter what movie you like, as long as you're willing to look at it in a different way.
15. Extra Hot Great
Few podcast networks had a year as productive as Previously.TV. While not all of them are necessarily spin-offs of Extra Hot Great, they all share the same irreverent sense of humor when discussing the highs and lows of TV in any given week. The same is said for the flagship series, of which maintains the formula with an infectious mix of returning guests and hosts who never manage to run out of enthusiasm. If you need one show to summarize the week in TV while also being as fun as flipping through channels, then EHG is pretty far up there. Most of their other shows are just as fun (also check out Little Podcast on the Prairie) and help casual audiences realize that there's plenty of reason to love TV. Even the bad shows can be really, really fun to make fun of.
14. Blank Check with Griffin and David
For those who like to dissect films in close detail but still enjoy cracking jokes, then Griffin Newman and David Simms are likely familiar names by now. They have garnered plenty of acclaim over the past few years for looking closely at directors' filmographies. This past year provided an incredible mix of talent, including the end of their lengthy Steven Spielberg series, Kathryn Bigelow, Christopher Nolan, and the ongoing movies in the D.C.E.U. including Wonder Woman and Justice League. If any of those films interest you, then pop an episode on and discover the wonder of what friendly banter can sound like. It may be a deep dive of sorts, but it's far from pretentious. It's entirely entertaining.
13. Benview on Spielberg
This past year was an exciting time for this Steven Spielberg-based podcast. Over the past 12 months, they got through the final stretch of films from his career. What do they think of The Adventures of Tintin and The Terminal? It was all covered this year with surprising results as Emily and Nathan delved into their own personal fandom and disappointments with films like Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. It's always a good time, and odds are that there's plenty to uncover in the new year as they move into his producer credits, as well as his latest films The Post and Ready Player One. Who knows what lies ahead for them, but it's probably going to be just as surprising and fun as even the forgettable movies they covered.
12. Storm of Spoilers
In the world of TV podcasts, there are few as essential as this one. In its usual run, it is a Game of Thrones recap podcast that manages to go into great detail on each episode. During the rest of the time, they explore all of pop culture in order to understand the fandom as well as what makes it so appealing. This is a show for nerds who love their attention to detail, and who love to talk to friends about everything related to the show. What's more incredible is that they have enough time to consume all of the media and talk coherently about it. Now that's some serious dedication.
11. The Gimlet Media Empire
There are too many shows to list here, but Gimlet continues to be one of the great podcast networks out there. Whether it's flagship series Reply All or the audio drama Homecoming, there's plenty to enjoy from this expanding network. It features a mix of entertainment, such as the podcast Mogul; as well as information on shows like Science Vs. and DTR. No matter what your tastes, they are all present on this network and are sure to liven up your day. Gimlet has so many shows that it would be unfair to have each compete on this list. A quarter of this list would just be their shows. So get on over there and check out their great line-up, which is sure to expand in 2018 with more impressive shows.
Come back tomorrow for the Top 10 Podcasts of 2017.
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