To be perfectly honest, I've heard about this podcast a lot from my sister a couple of years ago when she was completely obsessed with it. My sister never managed to convince me to check it out. And now that it's part of the syllabus I finally listened to the first episode and frankly I don't know why I haven't done it sooner. The narrator, Sarah Koening provided a brilliant commentary that felt very conversational and strangely compelling. I found myself completely attentive the entire way through watching the first episode.
Serial follows the episodic nature of a podcast, and season one chronicles a high-profile murder case in Baltimore County. The murder in question was of 18-year old girl Hae Min Lee, a senior at Woodlawn HS in Maryland. Soon thereafter, Adnan Syed, a popular senior and Hae’s ex-boyfriend was arrested and subsequently convicted of her murder. Koenig, unsure of Syed’s guilt, investigates the circumstances surrounding Hae’s death, taking the audience on an odyssey full of contradictory evidence and ambiguous answers.
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| Serial Season1 poster |
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| Adnan then vs. now |
For a story like this, I think a podcast is the best form of media. Listening to the actual voices of the people who are part of the case makes the story more real. You can feel the emotion in the people’s voices when they talk about their perspective on the case whether they think Syed was innocent or not. Normally, I wouldn’t expect this form of journalism to be presented in this format. However, it works. It works really well. Although I’m not in front of a television watching as Koenig discovers clues, performs interviews, I can still visualize everything, similarly to how I would if I was reading a novel. Additionally, I’m not sure if it’s the nature of podcasts, but I feel I took in most of the information with ease.
The podcast begins with Koenig attempting to explain how difficult it is to remember a day that happened weeks ago. This intrigued me. Initially, I thought it couldn’t be that hard, especially if something significant happened that day. Then, I tried thinking about what I did two weeks ago and I couldn't do it. I could only vaguely remember what I would have been doing but nothing exact. The fact that this case rests on knowing the whereabouts of this teenager for 20mins for a specific day is mindboggling.
To read more about this case: follow this link and this link to listen to the podcast click here.
narrative.” The Washington Post. WP Company, 08 Feb. 2016. Web.21 July 2017.
The podcast begins with Koenig attempting to explain how difficult it is to remember a day that happened weeks ago. This intrigued me. Initially, I thought it couldn’t be that hard, especially if something significant happened that day. Then, I tried thinking about what I did two weeks ago and I couldn't do it. I could only vaguely remember what I would have been doing but nothing exact. The fact that this case rests on knowing the whereabouts of this teenager for 20mins for a specific day is mindboggling.
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| Adnan and Hae |
Although Serial has blown up, with over 80 million downloads as of February 2016 (Hesse, 2016). There’s no doubt that fame has made a huge impact on the families, and Adnan and Hae's local community. I’m not exactly sure how Hae’s family is feeling. I would expect them to feel possibly aggravated, that the death of their daughter is being paraded around as an entertainment series. As for Adnan's family, I think it gives them hope that someone will come forward to prove that Adnan innocence.
Works Cited
Hesse, Monica. “‘Serial’ takes the stand: How a podcast became a character in its own narrative.” The Washington Post. WP Company, 08 Feb. 2016. Web.21 July 2017.
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