"I have a story for you, and I promise you, it's true..."
— Alasdair Stuart, Pseudopod
Pseudopod
is a horror podcast founded by Mur Lafferty and Ben Phillips that airs a new short story every week. Despite the catchphrase at the top of the page that precedes each episode, the stories are fictional. The readings are sometimes read by the editors, and other times performed by professional voice actors. The stories themselves vary from subtly disquieting to gruesomely horrifying and are frequently NSFW.
This podcast has gone on hiatus a few times but it is under new management with the hopes of weekly casts.
Pseudopod provides examples of:
- An Arm and a Leg: A common trope; episode 203, "Flash on the Borderlands III," was themed on it.
- Body Horror: Is a popular trope to play with in many of the stories.
- Burger Fool: Played for Drama in episode 81, "It's Easy to Make a Sandwich," in which the protagonist's repetitive and depersonalizing fast-food job slowly drives him insane.
- Downer Ending: Quite a few stories have them, but episode 520 'Dermot' has a particularly grim one when it turns out that the London Police Force is feeding small children to a monstrous serial killer, for the greater good.
- Everything's Deader with Zombies: Episode 43, "Everything Is Better with Zombies," is a play off this.
- Eye Scream: In episode 146, "The Button Bin," this happens similarly to Coraline.
- The Fair Folk: In episode 129, "Bottle Babies," the fairies are not exactly good or evil.
- Fingore:
- Episode 9,
"Counting From Ten". - "Escape" on episode 220, "Flash On The Borderlands VI".
- Episode 9,
- Genre Anthology: Each story is a standalone piece.
- I'm a Humanitarian: Several stories have this.
- Immortality: The father and son in episode 221, "Lives," have the The Ageless variant.
- Insectoid Aliens: The horrible creatures in episode 224, "The Horror Of Their Deeds To View."
- Leprechaun: "Tales of the White Street Society".
- Midnight Snack: Is made horrifying in "Flash: Why I Hate Cake." Always turn on the light when you want a snack. Always.
- People Jars: "Bottle Babies" has a example of this (at least it ends with happy ending)
- Stepford Suburbia: In episode 180, "The Getalong Gang," the dad thinks that his family and to a larger extent the world is becoming one.
- Stuffed into a Trashcan: In "Flash: Garbage Day" the main character throws away everything. Everything
- Villain Protagonist: The narrator of Episode 1, "Bag Man", is an unapologetic racist, sexist, and one-time rapist.
- Well-Intentioned Extremist: The ghost in Episode 1, "Bag Man", kills people who harbor dark secrets, like rape, murder, homophobia, sexism, racism, and other less-than-desireable crimes or traits.
- You're Drinking Breast Milk: Episode 160, "Got Milk?" is a horrible example where the man begins to lactate black milk that is a drug.
