In The End

When you think about Pompeii, if you ever do, what do you think? Well, we're here to do some reality-testing on all those things you think you remember from your school days. Today we bring you the gruesomely impressive reality of Pompeii.

Deeply satisfying or deeply dismantling, movie deaths can really have an impact on the viewers. And, since Emma had a lot of feelings about Infinity Wars, this week we're talking about our personal top picks for movie death. So, right at the top: spoiler alerts on about 30 films (though, most of them are 15-60 years old).

You know what no one talks about? The Spanish Flu. You know what everyone should talk about? The Spanish Flu. In this episode, we manage to cram in human history, medical history, a biology lesson, a PSA, and some of the most gruesome depictions of flu symptoms you'll ever hear.   Some reference materials for further reading:   Arnold, Catharine. 2018. Pandemic 1918: Eyewitness Accounts from the Greatest Medical Holocaust in Modern History. New York: St. Martin’s Press. Spinney, Laura. 2017. Pale Rider: The Spanish Flu of 1918 and How it Changed the World. New York: Public Affairs.

For one reason or another, sometimes bodies go unclaimed. Actually, it happens more often than we'd like to think about. What happens after that is a little up in the air. So, this week, we're looking at some of the options of what can happen if no one calls dibs on you after you die.

Ever find yourself with a stack of bones thinking, 'Man, what am I going to do with all these things?' This week we discuss some historical creativity and pragmatism put to work on exactly this problem.   For further reading, you can check out: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/travel/paris-catacombs-180950160/http://catacombes.paris.fr/en/history/site-historyhttp://www.catacombedinapoli.it/enhttps://www.atlasobscura.com/lists/definitive-guide-to-ossuaries-crypts-and-catacombs Legacey, E.-M. 2017. The Paris Catacombs. Remains and Reunion beneath the Postrevolutionary City. French Historical Studies 40 (3): 509-536.

Why are the elves leaving for The Undying Lands when they're immortal? How is Aragorn so old in The Lord of the Rings when he's supposed to be human? What the heck are the things in The Dead Marshes? Well, hold onto your nerd glasses, my friends. This week we're diving into some of the intricacies, complications, and conceptualizations of death in J.R.R. Tolkien's Lord of the Rings. For more reading on the topic, as suggested in the episode, you might want to check out Amy Amendt-Raduege's book The Sweet and the Bitter: Death and Dying in J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings.

Watch any period piece and you know that a little blood on a handkerchief means death from tuberculosis. Well, it's not just for the movies and it's not just for the history books. So, let's talk about our old pal scrofula, er, tuberculosis.

When you look at superstitions, basically everything means you're going to die. We looked around for some of the more interesting ones to see if we could surprise each other with what we found. Buckle up. It's about to get silly.

We all get the news alert and feel a little sad. So, today we're looking at how celebrity death has worked historically, the mechanisms and rituals of public grieving, and the psychology behind it.

Our first morbid mystery! We talk through a case that's fascinated people ever since the body of a mysterious woman was discovered in the Isdal Valley in Norway in 1970. Missing labels, puffy jackets, secret codes, and way more about isotopic analysis than you ever knew you needed to know. Accident? Suicide? Murder? Where do you land?

Sometimes when the going got tough, the best way to make it better was to have a big party and sacrifice some children. Although far from the only culture to do so, in this episode we take a deep, deep dive into the Incan ritual sacrifices.

For our very first mini-episode, we wanted to give you an idea of who we are and what we're doing here. So, if you're confused, this is a good place to start.