Endings, Beginnings and a Whole Lot of May | Fable & Folly Monthly

Published: Wed, 05/13/26

Updated: Wed, 05/13/26

Text reading "Cheers to the new year from Fable and Folly" on a blue background with white fireworks and gold confetti

Check, check. Is this thing on?

May hit the ground running and didn't look back. Can't believe we're already over a week into it. Between a brand new series joining the network, multiple returning seasons, and one finale we owe you from April, this month's absolutely stacked. I've got some thoughts as well on why endings matter more in audio drama then one might expect. So headphones on. Or... wait... that doesn't work for a newsletter, does it? Let's just go with it.

-Damian Szydlo, Marketing Director for Fable & Folly

Get your friends to sign up for THIS newsletter and stay up to date with all things Fable and Folly!

What Does "Done" Even Mean?

World Gone Wrong is launching its final season this month and it got me thinking about endings. Not in a grand philosophical way or anything, just in a practical "how do you know when to stop" kind of way. Audio drama has this weird relationship with endings because we live next door to 'general' podcasting, and podcasting as a medium has trained everyone to expect shows to just keep going. Turning those wheels, bringing in ad revenue and holding onto a captured audience. Always one more new season, new episode, indefinitely, forever. But audio drama isn't that, even if we'd love it to be. It's storytelling. And stories need endings to actually be stories.

I've been on both sides of this so can speak to you from a point of experience. In my day to day, I'm a storyteller and showrunner first, F&F's marketing guy second. That's a common theme here as everyone who works behind the scenes comes from our pool of creators.

When I started writing Hannahpocalypse, I had an endpoint in mind. Even when the details were rough, I knew it was a three season arc with a beginning and an end. That clarity made every decision easier because the whole thing was building toward an end. Cybernautica was different. I was new to the space and that show was ambitious in a way that eventually outpaced what we could sustain. The cast, the production, all the moving parts started breaking down over time and I had a choice: find a way to end it big or watch it pod fade into nothing. So we ended it. Not because the story was done in the way I originally imagined, but because that was the version of "done" we had available, and it was better than the alternative.

Endings aren't always graceful and they're not always the ones you planned. Sometimes you land the plane exactly where you wanted and sometimes you find the nearest clearing to bring it down before you run out of fuel. Both count, I suppose... but there is always a pressure hanging over it. Your favorite audio drama is almost guaranteed to be held together by more tape than you might expect and we are always walking a line during production. Getting derailed can easily lead to a projects abandonment, and audiences can feel the difference between a hasty wrap even if they can't name it or haven't been let in on the behind the scenes termoil.

And I get it. Obviously. For independent creators who are self funded and self started, the idea of ending something that works is terrifying. Success is hard to come by in this space and there's no guarantee your audience follows you to the next thing. A lot of the time they don't, at least not at the rate you'd hope. But holding onto a story past its natural life doesn't protect it. It hollows it out. The best thing you can do for a story you love is let it end well. World Gone Wrong is doing that this month. I respect the hell out of that.

Text: "New Seasons" printed on a blue background

Anticrastination

Series Launch (May 25th)

From W. Keith Tims, the creator of The Book of Constellations, The Love Talker, and An Invisible Sun comes a comedy about two people trying to reinvent themselves by making a podcast about productivity. It goes about as well as you'd expect. Kip is a former radio newsman desperate to restart his career. DeeDee is a free spirit searching for purpose. Their sound engineer Magnus thinks he's wasting his life. And then a guest expert overstays their welcome. It's a train wreck in the best possible way. A comedy of desperation.

Listen Here!

The Road of Shadows

Season 5 (May 5th)

It's 1984 and Daniel Knox is still running. If you haven't caught up with this one yet, the premise is irresistible: a man who can see creatures disguised as ordinary people, hiding in plain sight. Season 5 picks up with Daniel in a remote mountain town where secrets are piling up fast and the Shadows aren't far behind. Five seasons deep and this show keeps tightening the screws.

Listen Here!

World Gone Wrong

Final Season (May 26th)

Malik and Jamie started a chat podcast to stay connected after the apocalypse. Acid rain, werewolves, aliens, dragon-related renters insurance claims... you know, the usual. This month they're back for their final season and we're genuinely sad to see them go. If you've never checked this one out, it's warm, weird, and surprisingly heartfelt for a show where kudzu hums. Go binge it before the finale hits.

Listen Here!

The Madness of Chartrulean

Volume 2 (May 28th)

A new technology could save a civilization or destroy it. The Madness of Chartrulean follows the people in power when a dangerous game of politics pits them against the gods themselves. Volume 2 premieres May 28th with the feature-length episode "Valuable Assets." If you're a Patreon supporter, you can listen early.

Listen Here!

How it Ends

Season 4 (April 24th)

This one slipped past last month's newsletter and we wanted to make sure it got its moment. How it Ends follows Micah, whose world collapsed one night in November 1993 when her father died in a car accident. What started as a way to process her loss and the night terrors that followed has turned into something much bigger. Season 4's finale landed on April 24th and if you've been following Micah's story, you already know you need to hear it. If you haven't started yet, now's a great time to catch up.

Listen Here!

Text: "4 for Your Ears" printed on a blue background

With 200+ shows on the network, picking what to listen to next can feel like its own quest. Here are four you might have missed that are worth your time this month.

Journey to the Heart

In a world where everyone shares a tattoo with their soulmate, you'd think love would be simple. It's not. Journey to the Heart follows three best friends, each unhappy with their soulmate tattoo (or lack of one) for very different reasons, as they set off on an adventure that changes everything. Oh, and it's a musical. Oh, and it's a choose-your-own-journey podcast where the audience decides where the story goes. Yeah, this one's doing a lot and pulling it off.

Listen here!

Greater Boston

A full-cast audio drama set in the Boston metro area that blends the real with the unreal, the historical with the fantastical. It starts with the death of Leon Stamatis, a man so devoted to predictability that the smallest hint of uncertainty made life unbearable. But by leaving the world, he's changed it in ways nobody saw coming. Multiple seasons of ensemble storytelling that keeps finding new threads to pull. If you like your drama layered and your city weird, start here.

Listen here!

We Fix Space Junk

Kilner is a seasoned smuggler. Samantha is a reluctant fugitive. Together they travel the galaxy carrying out odd jobs on the fringes of the law, dodging bullets and meeting the kind of beings you don't forget in a hurry. If Douglas Adams and a workplace sitcom had a kid and raised it in a dystopian future, this is what you'd get. Female-led, funny, and lovingly produced by Battle Bird Productions.

Listen here!

The Secret of St. Kilda

Lockie is an ex-con who left that life behind and fled to St Kilda, a remote island with its own rules and its own secrets. On the day he's supposed to be formally welcomed into the community, old sins start catching up. Murder accusations, an abandoned family, an ancient curse, and a priestess whose favor might not be enough to save him. It's a supernatural thriller about forgiveness, duty, and what happens when a fresh start refuses to stay clean.

Listen here!

An illustration of a silhouetted character looking out at a fantastical landscape made up of mountains, mythical creatures, skyscrapers and more!

Fable & Folly Plus

For only $6 a month or $48 a year, you can get access to ALL our

Fable and Folly shows AD-FREE.

You heard us.

Ad. Free. No ads.

Support your favourite creators for one price and get ad-free listening anytime, anywhere.

SPONSOR HIGHLIGHT

Mixtape

Mixtape from Annapurna Interactive

Some stories are best told through music, and Mixtape gets that.

From Annapurna Interactive and the team behind the BAFTA award-winning The Artful Escape, Mixtape is a new narrative game about the last night of high school. Three friends, one more adventure, and a playlist that pulls them back through their most formative memories. First kisses. Final dances. The moments that made them who they are.

It's a love letter to coming-of-age stories, the kind that hit differently years later. And the soundtrack is genuinely incredible: DEVO, Iggy Pop, Joy Division, Siouxsie and the Banshees, The Smashing Pumpkins.

Mixtape is out now on Steam, PlayStation, Xbox, and Epic Games Store.
Check it out at mixtape.game

Learn More at mixtape.game

Interested in advertising with Fable and Folly? Click here to learn more.

Follow Fable and Folly on Social!

Unsubscribe | Change Subscriber Options