Feather

The Weeping Cedars universe, findable at https://weepingcedars.com/, is a big, sprawling cosmic-y horror world that keeps a lot of its horror very low-key and around the edges; the creator lists Silent Hill and The King in Yellow as influences, and also has a brain that clearly loves building incredibly web-woven mystery stories.

A lot of them are told in investigative-podcast and found-audio format, which I also enjoy because they do have interactions with the meta-conversation about the media and art form, and how it interacts with the world and shapes narrative and knowledge.

I honestly recommend just jumping in at Welcome to Weeping Cedars but also not worrying too much if you're not 100% on what EXACTLY happened by the end of it - because neither are the characters who lived through it, which I like because people aren't necessarily sure of everything when they live through it, and while I think the show does reward obsessive red-threaders and note-takers, I also think it rewards a kind of patient waiting for more information, more records, more evidence to become available.

I think on that meta level I enjoy it because this is a lot like what history is, especially history of time periods with poor record-keeping or limited record-keeping, and it's also what investigating secrets is like. The podcast has a genuinely solid meta-relationship with the media and disciplines it's engaging with and much like I think it's possible (and indeed wise) to engage with history keeping in mind that we'll probably never know for sure what Caligula's reign was like, I think there's an enjoyable meta-discourse at the end of the first podcast where there is enough, I think, to have a satisfying narrative even if you are still a little "wait what happened?" yourself.

The story continues in three seasons of the podcast Samite, one season thus far of Wrought of Amber, various patreon extra materials, and a short side-series of youtube videos I haven't watched yet, but probably will this time around. There's also a several-episode actual-play prequel that is in fact part of the canonical Weeping Cedars history, and is both enjoyable for me itself and also enhances a number of moments of the podcast. All is findable either on the linked website, or at the creator's patreon.

There is technically a collaborative Figure Out Things set of spaces in the official Patreon and discord and so on, but I found the approach there when I checked it out was the kind that actually made me lose track of things etc, so I haven't participated significantly. But the itch to sort of sort though things has been extant for a while, and I'm currently antsy with anxious boredom due to recovering from a gnarly respiratory illness (not CoVID - I'm just asthmatic so any respiratory illness I get is a risk of getting gnarly) and midway thru my listen thru, so hey, why not.

The above is my reasonably spoiler-free rec; below the cut, there are both a lot of spoilers and the baseline assumption that a reader has also actually listened to the material, so not a lot of explanation, necessarily. There are also various thoughts, remarks and reflections on the narrative and the characters, which are of course entirely my own.

However, I wanted to note (in these days of increased creator-participation in this kind of fannish space) that I am doing this from the point of view of speaking with other listeners, rather than providing feedback to the creator. There is a significant difference in tone/courtesy/approach in terms of the two, which though it can be subtle, is definitely a thing. I think a failure to understand the difference between a conversation with a creator, as an audience member, vs a conversation between audience members, leads to a lot of the uglier emotional places. It can be fun and even useful to listen into audience-to-audience discussions as a creator, but it can also be unexpectedly gut-punchy and leave one feeling exposed, or with a desire to argue with the audience about something that is inherently about their experience (aka something you have no control over nor right to control) and so on.

So: the below is not feedback, or author-directed questioning (even when there is questioning) - it's for my own head as a listener, and also for the potential entertainment of any other listeners, should I share it with any. Caveat lector.

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NB: I apologize for the three pings, I did not realize they would be so loud! And I mislabelled the reward-level as Lovely rather than Wonderful. WILL BE BETTER NEXT TIME. XD

Audio journal/babble posts for the reward level "Wonderful", 20$ CAD+. The first two are public as a sample, but the rest are locked to that level. :)

July, 2017
Post #1

August, 2017
Post #2
Post #3

September, 2017
Post #4

I'm repurposing this journal to use as the place for reward-level stuff for my Patreon. Sorry to anyone who had stuff from here bookmarked, but all of the fanfic can be found at my AO3, lalaietha.