“Welcome to Night Vale” is a podcast production of Commonplace Books. A podcast is a broadcasted show that can be downloaded onto almost any MP3-capable device. Podcasts come in two forms: video and audio. Though podcasts have existed for some time now, they have only recently gained much popularity.
Like many podcasts, “Welcome to Night Vale” started out as a very small operation. Unlike many on the market today, however, after fewer than two years of production and with more than 150,000 downloads per show, “Welcome to Night Vale” has become the most-downloaded podcast in the world.
Hosted twice monthly, the 20- to 25-minute show is broadcast in the form of a community radio show. Public events, school programs, emergencies and, of course, the weather are described in each program. What makes this somewhat banal content popular, however, are the oddities that are broadcast as ordinary events.
In this conspiracy-ridden, authoritarian society that is both all-accepting and all-rejecting, there are absurdities and downright weird things going on. The Dog Park is avoided at all costs due to its apparently infinite quality and the chance that those who venture there may be lost forever. However, the residents are not allowed to know that the Dog Park exists, so it’s really not a problem.
Librarians in Night Vale are heinous, terrifying creatures whom no one approaches if they hope to live. Except, of course the young Tamika Flynn, who defeated the librarians during the annual children’s Summer Reading Program.
There was a fugitive, Hiram McDaniels, in one show. McDaniels was described as an 18-foot-tall, five-headed dragon weighing about 3,600 pounds. After the incident, however, he was rectified by his blog and soon began to run for mayor of Night Vale.
The Sheriff’s Secret Police are not at all concealed and are constantly in the news; in fact, they control what is and is not broadcast. They also patrol the skies in blue helicopters, not to be confused with the black or yellow helicopters, and roam the town in short capes.
Also at play are sightings of angels and the hooded figures with unknowable power that wander around the town and occasionally steal children.
Then there is, of course, the underground city plotting its eventual takeover of Night Vale beneath the pin retrieval area of lane five of the Desert Flower Bowling Alley and Arcade Fun Complex.
Night Vale Community Radio is orated by the fictional Cecil Palmer, voiced by Cecil Baldwin. Palmer constantly broadcasts news that becomes banned by the Sheriff’s Secret Police, or worse, the feared station managers. Station managers are not described except as the ever-moving shapes behind the office door and by unearthly noises they are known to make. When such slipups occur, Palmer simply instructs the residents to forget what he has told them. A subplot to the program is the long-standing crush Palmer has on the only person who apparently did not grow up in Night Vale: Carlos the scientist.
A constant in Night Vale Community Radio is the disappearance of interns and the ceaseless supply of interns to hire. Interns at Night Vale Community Radio have the unhappy habit of disappearing or being lost-forever-but-not-technically-dead. So far there have been nine interns lost, of which four are missing, three are confirmed dead, one is alive, and one is not dead but can never again be thought of as alive.
During climactic events Cecil often cuts directly to the weather. Instead of a broadcast of the conditions of Night Vale, however, the program then plays a single song. These songs are varying in style, genre and the capability to be heard by human ears.
Though the podcast is free to listeners, there is a donation link on the web page that rewards contributors with mentions on the next podcast or, for those who give substantial amounts, a personal thank you from Cecil Baldwin via video. Unlike many operations with far nobler causes, “Welcome to Night Vale” has ample funding and has progressed from producing solely through podcast to having live shows across the country. Each show has sold out within minutes of the tickets being released, in accordance with the huge fan base.
Perhaps, to some, Night Vale may seem like a strange place, but to its fictitious inhabitants, and thousands of listeners across the globe, it feels like home. The unanticipated rise in viewership is due to one undeniable, unexpected fact: “Welcome to Night Vale” is funny. As a sort of revival of the radio drama of the 1940s, the podcast gives listeners a simplistic experience that relies on imagination. A theory on the effectiveness of Night Vale is the thirst for human interaction in entertainment. “Welcome to Night Vale” relies on the listener to envision the community as it weaves the scene into being.
The popularity of the podcast has surpassed expectation and continues to provide its subscribers with the weird, the odd and the frightening stories they so desire.
