Mandatory Media

About Mandatory Media

Mandatory Media is supposedly about all the media you should have studied, but is actually just an excuse for its three hosts to talk about the media they love. Join hosts David (a pop culture lover), Seth (a theatre kid), and Bret (a scholar and poet) every two weeks as they take you through a variety of topics and conversations that range from Keats to Studio Ghibli, and even a video game about Frogs.

Publisher

Three Glasses Productions

Category

arts

Language

en

Explicit

No

First episode

5 Aug 2023

Latest episode

20 Jul 2026

Latest episodes

46 episodes in the feed.

1. 

   20 Jul 2026

   John Donne's Batter my heart, three-person'd God

   Bret takes us through John Donne's spectacular sonnet Batter my heart, three-person'd God. We talk the wonderful language of sonnets, Donne's rebellious nature, and old-timey ways to say things.

2. 

   8 Jun 2026

   Ted Chiang's Story of Your Life & Others (and Arrival, 2016)

   This week we take a look at Ted Chiang's novella Stories of Your Life and Others, the inspiration for the 2016 film Arrival. We talk linguistics, Paradise Lost, and Calvinism (for some reason).

3. 

   27 Apr 2026

   John Carpenter's They Live

   John Carpenter's They Live is a remarkable film from years gone by that remains eerily prescient to our modern society. Join us as we talk aliens, Reaganomics, Doctor Who, and the 15 minute fight scene in an alley way.

Reach and audience

Public platform figures. Ratings count people who left a rating, not total listeners.

YouTube views

32,339,970

Score snapshot 15 Sept 2025

Apple Podcasts (US)

5.0 / 5

1 ratings

Spotify

5.0 / 5

4 ratings

Podcast Authority Score: 63 / 100

A composite of feed quality, social presence, YouTube performance and engagement. Read the methodology.

Quality

64

Social presence

0

YouTube

93

Engagement

60

Contact Mandatory Media

Guest appearances

Books guests

Based on episode analysis; this does not confirm that the show is currently accepting guests.