Shows
Cult FavoriteShiny Happy People: Duggar Family Secrets (Amazon, 2023).2025-05-191h 07
Cult FavoriteCHAOS: The Manson Murders (Netflix, 2025)This week, we’re talking about Chaos: The Manson Murders (Netflix, 2025). Most stories about Charles Manson depict him as a special brand of villain: a personification of evil incarnate, a manipulative mastermind who lured vulnerable hippies to their murderous doom, a sociopath who looked for hidden meanings in Beatles’ lyrics and foretold an apocalyptic race war. In this documentary’s treatment, investigative reporter Tom O’Neill presents Manson as a CIA pawn who learned his mind-control techniques from his own ostensible time in the covert MKUltra program. Our conversation doesn’t try to get to the truth of the matter. In...2025-05-051h 06
Cult FavoriteThe Hatchet Wielding Hitchhiker (Netflix, 2023)If the ingredients of something called a “cult” include a charismatic figure and unquestioning followers, the phenomenon of “Kai the Hitchhiker” helps us think about what happens when the power dynamic between those elements is inverted. Famous for the local news interview that launched a thousand memes, Kai was an unlikely hero whose lowkey charm saw people clamoring to make him a late-night and reality tv star. What do people offer and, alternatively, ignore when we want to see a particular story play out in a way that satisfies us? How do we respond when someone doesn’t follow our social...2025-04-211h 03
Cult FavoriteCult of Fear: Asaram Bapu (Max, 2025)We’ve made it to our 25th episode! In all the excitement, Merinda forgets her computer, and Mike swoons over his latest thrift store find. But we do manage to talk about new Max documentary Cult of Fear: Asaram Bapu. The story of a guru-turned-prisoner is also a story about evolutions in the Indian legal system and about the relationships between religious and political power. As ever, questions abound. How does the “cult” label morph when applied to a group of 40 million people? How does its functionality as an othering/familiarizing device hold up? What about cult discourse might get lo...2025-04-061h 11
Cult FavoriteWaco: American Apocalypse (Netflix, 2023)This week, we’re staying in the 90s and are still talking about abuses of power that turned into tv spectacle. Performances of masculinity continue to abound, but gone are WWE’s costumes and Springer’s staged fights. The skirmishes in this case appear within federal agencies and their approaches to an insulated religious group. Join us as we discuss Waco: American Apocalypse (2023), which details the 51-day standoff between the Branch Davidians and the US government. Negotiators, snipers, the ATF, the FBI, armored tanks, desperate parents, a frenzied media, and Timothy McVeigh all make appearances in a story that sees c...2025-03-241h 13
Cult FavoriteMr. McMahon (Netflix, 2024)This week is a treat for Mike, a feat for Merinda. We’re extending our stay in the ‘90s, taking a day trip to the entertainment world o’ wrestling. But, not unlike enlightenment, entertainment can cozy up to exploitation pretty quickly. This is what happens in Netflix’s Mr. McMahon, which tells the story of a lonely billionaire’s quest to gain approval from his father by building the WWE empire. We talk scripts and performances, heroes and villains, masculinity and national identity. Instead of trying to distinguish between illusion and what’s reality or figure out who the real Vince M...2025-03-101h 25
Cult FavoriteJerry Springer: Fights, Camera, Action (Netflix, 2025)Once upon a time, a young reporter named Jerry Springer made his way to Chicago with the dream of launching a talk show that allowed regular people to tell their stories. On his journey, he met a tabloid-trained producer, who turned the hopeful tv host into the Ratings King and staged increasingly dramatic antics at court through a daytime talk show that was called brilliant by some and an abomination by others. These included a fist-fight involving a klansman and a man who married his horse, but then one day, there was a murder. Some decades later, two intrepid...2025-02-241h 02
Cult FavoriteOrgasm Inc.: The Story of OneTaste (Netflix, 2022)Delving into the term “cult” means looking at unlikely case studies. This week we talk about Netflix documentary OneTaste: Orgasm, Inc. —the story of boss babe Nicole Daedone, who made big business out of personal pleasure. Hers is a love story between capitalism and heteropatriarchy, with supporting roles from yoga, meditation, sexual awakening, exploitative profiteering, and coercion. Questions abound, including but not limited to: What happens to a cultural narrative when it’s rendered “religious”? When do scholars get interviewed, and when do they not? What kinds of conditions would foreclose a company like OneTaste from succeeding in the first place...2025-02-101h 03
Cult FavoriteBreath of Fire (Max, 2024)Mike and Merinda are back in 2025 to discuss one of the most popular cult documentaries of 2024. Breath of Fire, streaming on Max, tells the story of Kundalini yoga, Yogi Bhajan and Guru Jagat. It's a story of an American counter-cultural movement that turned into a conspiritualist wellness business. Along the way we discuss toner scams, millennial audiences, and Robin Hood. It's good to be back!
Follow us on socials at @cultfavoritepod.
Production assistance from the Department of Religious Studies at the University of Alabama.
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Cult FavoriteHow To Become a Cult Leader (Netflix, 2023)Happy merry holly jolly, everyone! It’s our season finale, and we have a dubious gift for you! Holiday movies already have the magic market cornered, so we’re here to offer balance by demystifying some things that might otherwise seem to fly around in the ethers with Santa’s sleigh. Spoiler alert: they’re to do with religion! While Merinda’s taste in holiday horror tracks toward the 1974 Black Christmas movie, Mike serves up some this year with How to Become a Cult Leader—the 2023 Netflix series that greets religious minority groups with snark and disdain. Sit back and listen t...2024-12-231h 15
Cult FavoriteRaël: The Alien ProphetWhile Merinda was too bored with heteronormative relational projections and too busy with conferencing to write a description for our conversation about Escaping Twin Flames (sorrrryyyyyy! But go listen anyway, folx—it's a doozy), here’s wishing your ears a happy Monday with our latest episode on Raël: The Alien Prophet (2024). Spreading the message of the Elohim—an extraterrestrial species they believe to be responsible for creating human life on Earth—Raëlians got their start in France in the 1970s, started a lab called Clonaid, spoke before the U.S. Congress, and now boast an international movement. Vehicular...2024-12-091h 01
Cult FavoriteEscaping Twin FlamesLinks:
Interview with the co-creators: https://awardsradar.com/2024/06/24/interview-escaping-twin-flames-co-creators-can-attest-to-the-courage-of-cult-survivors/
Follow us on all the socials at @cultfavoritepod.
Production assistance from the Department of Religious Studies at the University of Alabama.
Theme music produced with Udio.2024-11-251h 03
Cult FavoriteLuLa RichWhat can possibly make sense of company founders’ forgetting their own address in a deposition, doling out sex advice for retailers, and reading from the Book of Mormon at leadership retreats? This week, we’re going shopping! Don’t get distracted by the racks of leggings and maxi skirts, though: we’re looking for answers, using the promo code offered by LuLaRich. LuLaRoe is the store, but the proverbial mall is MLMs, and that mall is shaped like a pyramid. It’s easy to get lost in there, so we’ll take you through it, highlighting corporate appeals to individualis...2024-11-111h 09Cult FavoriteHell's Bells: The Dangers of Rock 'N' RollWhat’s that...? You thought Led Zeppelin’s appeal was to do with Robert Plant’s soaring vocals and bodacious hair? Well. You clearly haven’t listened to their lyrics backwards. Come with us—if you dare—into the Haunted House of Rock Music [cue thunder crashes and villain laughter]. We’re piling into Marty McFly’s DeLorean time machine and traveling back to 1989 to watch Hell’s Bells: The Dangers of Rock ‘n’ Roll. It’s what’s playing in the background at a Halloween party thrown by the Satanic Panic, a new moral majority, parental advisory labels on “porn rock,” and genera...2024-10-281h 06Cult FavoriteThe Way Down: God, Greed, and the Cult of Gwen ShamblinWhy would Tarzan leave Manhattan for Brentwood, TN? Find out as we take a tour of the Remnant Fellowship Church by way of the HBO/Max documentary The Way Down: God, Greed, and the Cult of Gwen Shamblin. Conversational topics include but are not limited to: 1980s diet culture, patriarchy in conservative American Protestantism, gender politics and anti-fat bias, and what gets normalized when religious groups are said to warp/twist/exploit a certain text or tradition. Mike drops some personal lore about parenting workshops, Merinda explains why she doesn’t like an exceptionalism narrative, and both agree that it...2024-10-211h 13Cult FavoriteHoly Hell: 22 Years Inside a Modern CultThis week, we get a first-person account of the Buddhafield from someone who had been a member of the group for 22 years. Ballet, speedos, fruit carving, 80s-era disillusionment, and Rosemary’s Baby all make appearances. Mike questions reality, Merinda gets mad at the filmmaker’s mother, and we both think about different kinds/degrees of performance. Is confrontation a passable substitute for closure? Is “charisma” just patriarchy with a facelift? Join us as we discuss Holy Hell. And keep sending us feedback and film recs! We love hearing from you.
Links:
Christopher Breu, In...2024-10-141h 08Cult FavoriteGoing Clear: Scientology & the Prison of BeliefWhat can possibly make sense of a billion-year contract or a billion-page menu? We're on the case, with a conversation that ranges from Scientology’s Sea Org to The Cheesecake Factory’s dizzying array of food options. This week, we’re talking about Going Clear: Scientology and the Prison of Belief. Cameos include (but are not limited to): Rock Hudson, Majorie Cameron, John Travolta, Aleister Crowley, and (most importantly, as far as Merinda’s concerned) Kate Bornstein. When does the relationship between religion and money seem fine v. not-fine and why? What makes makeshift military pastiche different from time-honored religiou...2024-10-061h 09Cult FavoriteThe Garden: Commune or CultThis week, we go online and off the grid to The Garden, where video posts began a debate over whether the group is a commune or a cult. But who ultimately decides? What criteria do they use? And what (if anything) is gained by the question in the first place? We discuss these matters and more, learning along the way a few things about how subsistence and social formation converge/collide. So come burn a fear tower with us as we intrepid explorers trek boldly into analysis! While the dynamics of holding a community together are legion and complex...2024-09-301h 02Cult FavoriteThe Secret Lives of Mormon WivesThis week, Mike convinced Merinda to watch Secret Lives of Mormon Wives! Luckily, docu-soaps offer a neato middle ground between documentaries and reality tv. We talk genre, gender, sexuality, power, audiences, tradwives, the capital of “cute,” and Mormon media. Merinda quotes people she admires. She also describes her Very Strong Feelings about the tendency to reduce/oversimplify complex worlds inhabited by women creating media content. Inasmuch as we should #believewomen, we should also pay serious attention to pop culture by and about women, even (especially?) when it cuts against our comfort zones. We should also, it turns out, make sure...2024-09-231h 12Cult FavoriteWild, Wild, Country Part 2This week, the long and winding road to Oregon presents
even more paths. We make pit stops in Germany, Australia, and India, ultimately landing on a back road in the Deep South for some boiled peanuts. Along the way, we talk about relationships and betrayals—big hopes, broken hearts, and new beginnings. In the end, the Rajneeshees lose their leader but not their cause, a few people spend some years in prison, and the townspeople of Antelope put a plaque near their post office. Perspectives abound, as do our conversational bloopers. Have a laugh and think a thought with us...2024-09-161h 05Cult FavoriteWild, Wild, Country Part 1The Netflix documentary Wild, Wild, Country tells the story of Rajneeshpuram, a commune founded by the Indian guru Shri Bhagwan Rajneesh in Oregon in 1981. The followers turned a 60,000 acre ranch in central Oregon into their own spiritual commune. Led by Bhagwan's personal secretary, Ma Anand Sheela, the Rajneeshees eventually took over the government of nearby town of Antelope, Oregon and its population of 40 residents. As more and more Rajneeshees moved to Oregon, tensions between the spiritual seeker newcomers and the conservative locals turned dangerous. In part 1 of 2, we discuss the first three episodes of the documentary series. It's an...2024-09-091h 01Cult FavoriteBrandy Hellville & the Cult of Fast FashionOn one level, the HBO documentary Brandy Hellville & the Cult of Fast Fashion is about the Brandy Melville brand, the messed-up social norms it relies on and perpetuates, and the teenage girls it harms. On another level, though, it’s also about fast fashion as a phenomenon—with Brandy Melville as just one example of a much bigger machine and structural reality. In exploring Brandy Melville, the film examines how fast fashion is built on racist, colonial, and exploitative practices that disproportionately affect women of color around the world.
The doc goes back and forth between the teen...2024-09-0257 minCult FavoriteCult Massacre: One Day in JonestownA new three-episode documentary series from National Geographic and Hulu focuses on the last day of The Peoples Temple. Why are we fascinated with these stories of trauma, violence, and horror? Why can't we look away from Jonestown?
Links:
You’re Wrong About episode, “The Jonestown Massacre”: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-jonestown-massacre/id1380008439?i=1000465289969
J.Z. Smith chapter on Jonestown: http://faculty.trinity.edu/mbrown/whatisreligion/PDF%20readings/Smith-Devil%20in%20Mr%20Jones-Imagining%20Religion.pdf
Nora Stone’s book How Documentaries Went Mainstream https://global...2024-08-261h 05Cult FavoriteHeaven's Gate: The Cult of Cults Part 2It's part 2 of our discussion of Heaven's Gate: The Cult of Cults on Hulu. Let's talk about Heaven's Gate and Star Trek!
Links:
Interview with director Clay Tweel: https://www.increativecompany.com/watch/v/z75zx742kghz982dff7nndjp5435xz
The Author Clock https://www.authorclock.com/
Follow us on Instagram, TikTok, and X at @cultfavoritepod.
Production assistance from the Department of Religious
Studies at the University of Alabama. Theme music produced with Udio.2024-08-191h 15Cult FavoriteHeaven's Gate: The Cult of Cults Part 1What if Heaven's Gate wasn't as weird as it appears at first glance? And how do we make the strange more familiar?
Links:
Mark Muesse "Religious Studies and 'Heaven's Gate'" https://www.chronicle.com/article/religious-studies-andheavens-gate/
Our Cult Favorites:
Mike: Druid City Brewing Company https://www.instagram.com/druidcitybrewingco/?hl=en
Merinda: Sleater-Kinney album "Little Rope" https://sleaterkinney.bandcamp.com/album/little-rope
and diagraming sentences https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sentence_diagram
Follow us on Instagram, TikTok, and X...2024-08-121h 06
Cult FavoriteDancing for the Devil: The 7M TikTok CultIn June, Netflix released Dancing for the Devil: The 7M TikTok Cult and in this episode Mike and Merinda talk about the role of performance in social media and cult documentaries. What makes something "real" or "genuine"? Why would a cult recruit TikTok dancers? What sort of stories do we tell about families and cult members?
Content warning: this episode includes discussions of sexual
assault.
Links:
The Cut article about Wilkings and 7m: https://www.thecut.com/2024/06/wilking-sisters-7m-allegations.html
Our Cult Favorites:
Mike: S...2024-08-051h 10Cult FavoriteThe Secrets of Hillsong Part 2The second half of The Secrets of Hillsong explores the dark past of Hillsong’s early history and the eventual downfall of the global church. It details Frank Houston’s repeated sexual abuse of children and Brian Houston’s sexual harassment allegations and financial abuses. Mike and Merinda discuss these stories but also what these stories tell us about the structures that make a megachurch like Hillsong possible.
Content warning: this episode includes discussions of child sexual abuse.
Links:
Blessed: A History of the American Prosperity Gospel by Kate Bowler
Australian Royal...2024-07-291h 13Cult FavoriteThe Secrets of Hillsong Part 1In our first episode we discuss the first two episodes of the FX/Hulu docu-series The Secrets of Hillsong about the rise and fall of one of the world's most famous megachurches. What is unique about Hillsong? What makes a celebrity pastor famous? And why can't American evangelicalism understand and deal with desire?
Show notes:
The Rise and Fall of Mars Hill
Janice Lagata's open letter
Our Cult Favorites:
Mike- Hell is a World Without You by Jason Kirk
Merinda- Sexuality Beyond Consent: Risk, Race, Traumatophilia by...2024-07-221h 18