Catching Up

[Jonathan]

Got a question for people still listening to the show. Here's the deal; when the club came out, I was decidedly not happy about it. My car has a CD player, I wanted to buy albums and listen that way. What I didn't want to do was pay a monthly subscription fee. Didn't take me long to break down though and get a membership and listened for a while. Then later I cancelled my membership for two reasons. The first was time; I wasn't listening much because boy was I busy.

The second reason is a bigger deal. The show's new episodes--and by new, I mean starting with ep 734 and onwards--weren't grabbing me. The first reason the show wasn't keeping my attention was a lot of the club episodes--and some of the non-club episodes--felt contrived. Examples include The Launch, The Cure, The Dropbox, the few episodes with Wilson that I heard, The Boat People, etc. To be fair, other episodes in the club were really good, such as Pinocchio, and Hidden Gems. My other problem with the show was with the non-club shows. Everything was part of a storyline. Albums had all six episodes as a part of just one plot line. Slice of life episodes with the kids, or anyone else, felt few and far between, and the few of those we got had very few kids. The kid roster just felt small in general. And maybe this is because, where I started listening once I was already past the target age range, now I'm really, really past that age. To be fair a second time, non-club episodes still had some good ones scattered in--for example, David and Absalom was an absolute instant classic. Which might be the last new episodes I listened to, actually.

All that to say, I haven't really heard anything new from 2017 on. Before I spend money on a membership again and get all caught up--and I'm happy to see that the price dropped--I want to know; are the above issues still present? Were they ever (nice of asking if I'm just nuts)? Or did Odyssey find its feet again and adjust to the new club format/schedule?

[Catspaw]

Hey Jonathan! Great to see you around.

I'm not that much help because I have a Club subscription (though like you, I also have a CD player in my car and prefer to listen that way), and I have always meant to listen to the Club episodes but still haven't.

I can say that there have been some good albums and episodes, and I think there would be some stuff you like, but can't comment on some of your questions. Hopefully someone else can!

[chadagonye]

This is a super hard question! I personally feel like some of the show's best and worse episodes have come out since then. I don't particularly care for most of the club episodes, but every once in a while there are great ones / series. I feel the same way about non-club episodes, although I agree (if I understand you right) that the 6-episode albums are a major step down for many reasons.

So I would guess, even if we have radically different tastes, you might feel the same way, except about different episodes.

It also seems to me that there are fewer kids, and most of the kids are played by adults, which adds some dimension of quality but probably loses an equal amount of charm (no offence to the talented actors).

I don't like paying for the club because (1) it's pretty dang expensive, (2) I also prefer CDs, and I prefer them for my kids as well, (3) it irks me to have to pay for access to all the albums I/my parents already bought (some on tape, which I don't currently have access to), and (4) biggest of all, and a personal reason that I know doesn't apply to everyone here, I have extremely mixed feelings about giving money to FotF.

But Odyssey is basically my soap opera that I have been listening to since I was 8 or 9, and I am super invested in the characters at this point, so what I do is pay for a month every so often, when I know I'll have time to listen, get caught up, and then cancel again. And I let my kids listen along after I've screened the episodes and/or I introduce them to my favourite classics.

[Jonathan]

Thanks for the input all, I think I'll do the idea of getting a one month subscription once a year and catch up. In any case I've been bitten by the bug again, so to speak.

[Catspaw]

That's a great idea. A month won't break the bank and that way you can get some favourites and new episodes in and see what you think!

[PinkIsNotMyColor]

My family has the AIO club, and I love it! It lets me listen to adventures in odyssey anywhere I go, and I like being able to listen to all of the past albums. I don’t think that the club episodes are the best, but they can be ok! Some of the newer albums, such as 28 Hours, were really good!

We have some of the albums, but we don’t own all of them so having the club is a must!