11 Insane Psy-Ops Real Governments Tried To Pull Off

EMilitary history: it’s supposedly just battles between armies. But what about the countries who launched elaborate assaults on other nations’ minds? Or beseiged their own citizens’ sanity? On this episode of The Cracked Podcast, Alex Schmidt is joined by comedians/podcasters Adam Tod Brown (Unpopular Opinion) and Jeff May (Sideshow’s Side Show) for the strangest, silliest, oddest psychological warfare ever plotted by national governments. Discover tales of elected officials and professional militaries dreaming up pranks, toys, holograms, and more bizarre tools for crushing their enemies...even if the execution of those plots would boggle the mind. Footnotes: https://www.cracked.com/podcast/13-insane-psy-ops-real-governments-tried-to-pull-off/

11 Little-Known Dumb Details Of Big Historical Events

EHistory is a lot more than BIG SPEECHES and GRAND ACHIEVEMENTS and THINGS WE ARE ALL PROUD OF. So on this episode of The Cracked Podcast, Alex Schmidt is joined by Billy Wayne Davis (Conan, Adult Swim) and Kandice Martellaro (Stan Against Evil, Femmebot PhD) for the minutiae that slips through the cracks. Listen for surprisingly wacky elements of World War 2, human spaceflight #1, the Battle of Agincourt, and more events nobody remembers as embarrassing and awkward (even though they should). Footnotes: https://www.cracked.com/podcast/11-little-known-dumb-details-big-historical-events/

11 TV Shows That Secretly Gave Themselves Insane Canon

EHow did we remember anything before the Internet? If it wasn’t in a library book, a file cabinet, or a computer database the size of a living room, it wasn’t easy to hang onto a piece of information. So here’s one way being alive is more interesting than people think it is: pre-Internet television writers took their show universes into insane directions, whenever they felt like it, with the hope nobody would remember the insanity by next week. So on this episode of The Cracked Podcast, Alex Schmidt is joined by Siobhan Thompson (Rick and Morty, Dimension 20) and Andrew Ti (Mixed-ish, Yo Is This Racist?) for a trip through the strangest canon ever grafted onto a TV show. They’ll turn up late-season canon decisions that broke entire television universes. Also be sure to listen for strange network promos and a stranger talk show appearance that make your favorite science fiction worlds too bizarre to comprehend. Footnotes: https://www.cracked.com/podcast/11-tv-shows-that-secretly-g...

8 Famous Movie & TV Locations (Ruined By The Fans)

EThere’s something magical about a pilgrimage. It combines a journey, a quest, and a vacation into one experience. So keep trekking to your favorite things, you wonderful people you. Just make sure you’re avoiding the mistakes in this podcast's stories. Because on this week’s episode of The Cracked Podcast, Alex Schmidt is joined by Dan Hopper (Ranker, CollegeHumor, The Washington Post) for a look at movie & TV locations that fans are pilgrimaging into oblivion. Discover the most neighborhood-snarling, pizza-chucking, monastery-crumbling behaviors in the whole world of fandom. Find out how one monkey's paw-style studio deal turned part of Spain blue forever. And find out how Viewers Like You can be more thoughtful toward Hollywood locations than the average 'Joker' Instagrammer. Footnotes: https://www.cracked.com/podcast/8-famous-movie-tv-locations-ruined-by-fans/

7 Weird Jobs The Children Of Rich Maniacs Bought Themselves

EWealth inequality is more than an injustice. Because here’s one way being alive is more interesting than people think it is: wealth inequality created a world of rich kids with infinite capital and finite skills. So on this week’s episode of The Cracked Podcast, Alex Schmidt is joined by comedians/podcasters Kate Willett (The Late Show, ‘Reply Guys’) and Eli Yudin (‘What A Time To Be Alive’) for a look at the weirdest ways our world’s failsons bought themselves professional careers. Listen for pop stardom, sports glory, and more careers you can try on like a hat if your dad is a dictator/mafioso/Bond villain inspiration. Footnotes: https://www.cracked.com/podcast/7-weird-jobs-children-rich-maniacs-bought-themselves

10 Regular Things We Should All Stop Mistaking For Aliens

EWe may find evidence of alien life someday. That would be amazing right? It'd be great and exciting and maybe terrifying. But here’s the thing about that: you won’t properly appreciate that evidence if your head is full of Area 51 junk and Roswell nonsense and a ludicrous belief that octopuses come from outer space. So on this week’s episode of The Cracked Podcast, Alex Schmidt is joined by comedians & alien comedy experts David Christopher Bell (Gamefully Unemployed, "Fox Mulder Is A Maniac") and Moujan Zolfaghari (Mission To Zyxx, 'At Home With Amy Sedaris'). They’re digging into the most common lazy media tropes, frustrating hoaxes, and generally confusing myths about aliens. So throw on some headphones, increase your media literacy, and be ready to spot the REAL signs of extraterrestrials, if and when we ever get them. Footnotes: https://www.cracked.com/podcast/10-regular-things-we-should-all-stop-mistaking-aliens/

9 Bizarre & Surprising Stories Of Famous People Hanging Out

EHow nervous are you to meet someone? Do you get more anxious, more sweaty, more heart rate-y? Now here’s a thought experiment for you: how much would those feelings increase if you were meeting a famous person? And how weird would BOTH of you get if both of you were a famous person, thrown into each others' fame-auras? On this episode of The Cracked Podcast, Alex Schmidt is exploring real-life tales of that situation. He's aided by special guest Jesse Thorn (Bullseye, Jordan Jesse Go, Judge John Hodgman, THE LIST GOES ON). They’ll explore the surprisingly common phenomenon of two famous people meeting up, hanging out, and (often) having an extremely weird time together. So throw on your headphones for tales of everyone from Elvis to Amelia Earhart to The Artist Formerly Known As Prince having an odd hang with a fellow world-famous awkward person. Footnotes: https://www.cracked.com/podcast/9-bizarre-surprising-stories-famous-people-hanging-out

11 Major Recent Movies (With Secretly Bizarre Productions)

EFilmmaking is complicated. There are a thousand steps between “I have an idea” and “I have a completed film for your theater to screen.” And sure, most people know all that. But here’s one way being alive is more interesting than people think it is: every one of those moviemaking steps can get extremely weird, without the audience having any idea...unless they listen to podcasts like ours. On this episode of The Cracked Podcast, Alex Schmidt is joined by comedy writers Gonzalo Cordova and Alan Denton. They’ll explore the biggest recent movies, and the extraordinarily strange work that went into making them. Find out which Oscar movie got patched like a video game, several days after it was in theaters. Discover which animal overran the set of your favorite action movie franchise. And keep listening for the set of international financial crimes that built Hollywood’s hottest production company. Footnotes: https://www.cracked.com/podcast/11-major-recent-movies-with-secretly-biz...

9 Infamous Scandals (With Crazy Details Everybody Forgot)

EIn the court of public opinion, Richard Nixon got off easy. Seriously! If you lived Richard Nixon’s life, and did Richard Nixon’s crimes, you would be THRILLED if your Famous Crime was a minor hotel burglary. On this episode of The Cracked Podcast, Alex Schmidt is joined by the incredible Dana Gould for a trip through world-famous scandals that somehow never get a closer look. With each story, they’ll dig into the forgotten and astonishing details of those scandals that were apparently too mind-blowing for the public to remember. So throw on some headphones, and discover the ways Elizabeth Holmes, O.J. Simpson, the Enron fellas, and more infamous maniacs are much more bizarre than you realized. Footnotes: https://www.cracked.com/podcast/9-infamous-scandals-with-crazy-details-everybody-forgot/

Why Fear-Based Democracies Aren’t Free (with Jason Pargin)

EFreedom sucks...and that is why we have to defend it. Because our democracy involves doing a lot of stuff that takes energy, takes time, and lacks that Michael Bay Quality that only a surprise missile launch can provide. So on this episode of The Cracked Podcast, Alex Schmidt and special guest Jason Pargin (who writes for Cracked as David Wong) are exploring the ways being afraid of everything (an easy action) can stop us from being free. Discover the decades-long tradition of some Americans wanting to give up everything in exchange for not needing to think, the centuries-long tradition of people inciting fake panics, and the reasonable ways you can help change things for the better. Footnotes: https://www.cracked.com/podcast/why-fear-based-democracies-arenE28099t-free-with-jason-pargin/