Slow Burn
Hosted by Willa Paskin and Susan Matthews and Evan Chung and Max Freedman and Merritt Jacob · Slate Podcasts
4.6from 23,836 ratings
- 243
- Episodes
- 84
- Transcribed
- 23,836
- Ratings
- Bi-weekly
- Cadence
- 2017
- First episode
About Slow Burn
Slow Burn illuminates America’s most consequential moments, making sense of the past to better understand the present. Through archival tape and first-person interviews, the series uncovers the surprising events and little-known characters lurking within the biggest stories of our time. Join Slate Plus to unlock full, ad-free access to Slow Burn and your other favorite Slate podcasts. You can subscribe from the Slow Burn show page on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Or visit slate.com/slowburnplus to get access wherever you listen. Season 11: Becoming Justice Gorsuch How Neil Gorsuch laid the foundation for a SCOTUS supermajority and then became its most unexpected wild card. Season 10: The Rise of Fox News How a cable news channel became a cultural and political force—and how a whole bunch of people rose up to try and stop it. Season 9: Gays Against Briggs A nationwide moral panic, a California legislator who rode the anti-gay wave, and the LGBTQ+ people who stepped up and came out to try and stop him. Season 8: Becoming Justice Thomas Where Clarence Thomas came from, how he rose to power, and how he’s brought the rest of us along with him, whether we like it or not. Winner of the Podcast of the Year at the 2024 Ambies Awards. Season 7: Roe v. Wade The women who fought for legal abortion, the activists who pushed back, and the justices who thought they could solve the issue for good. Winner of Apple Podcasts Show of the Year in 2022. Season 6: The L.A. Riots How decades of police brutality, a broken justice system, and a video tape set off six days of unrest in Los Angeles. Season 5: The Road to the Iraq War Eighteen months after 9/11, the United States invaded a country that had nothing to do with the attacks. Who’s to blame? And was there any way to stop it? Season 4: David Duke America’s most famous white supremacist came within a runoff of controlling Louisiana. How did David Duke rise to power? And what did it take to stop him? Season 3: Biggie and Tupac How is it that two of the most famous performers in the world were murdered within a year of each other—and their killings were never solved? Season 2: The Clinton Impeachment A reexamination of the scandals that nearly destroyed the 42nd president and forever changed the life of a former White House intern. Season 1: Watergate What did it feel like to live through the scandal that brought down President Nixon? Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy (https://acast.com/privacy) for more information.
- Publisher
- Slate Podcasts
- Category
- history · news · society & culture
- Language
- en
- Explicit
- No
- First episode
- 17 Nov 2017
- Latest episode
- 4 Nov 2026
Latest episodes
84 of 243 episodes have a transcript.
4 Nov 2026TRANSCRIPT
Presenting: The Sporkful | Does The World Need A Better Tomato?
29 Oct 2026TRANSCRIPT
Decoder Ring | The Spooky Saga of the Icelandic Dracula
21 Oct 2026TRANSCRIPT
Decoder Ring | Clown Panic (Encore)
Inside a recent episode
Presenting: The Sporkful | Does The World Need A Better Tomato?
Published 4 Nov 2026 · Transcript excerpt
[…] That's because they made the mistake of naming the plant variety itself Honeycrisp. So once that became the generic name for this type of apple, they couldn't trademark it because you can't trademark a generic term. Like you can trademark the brand name Kleenex, but you cannot trademark the word tissue, you know? […]
Read the full transcript with a Pod Engine plan.
See plansWho has been a guest on Slow Burn
Names identified in recent episode analyses. Showing up to five guests.
- Ásgeir Jónsson
- Helen Zaltzman
- Kristján B Jónasson
- Rickard Berghorn
- Benjamin Mier-Cruz
Reach and audience
Public platform figures. Ratings count people who left a rating, not total listeners.
- Apple Podcasts (US)
- 4.6 / 5
- 23,836 ratings
Podcast Authority Score: 54 / 100
A composite of feed quality, social presence, YouTube performance and engagement. Read the methodology.
- Quality
- 69
- Social presence
- 0
- YouTube
- 0
- Engagement
- 100
Contact Slow Burn
- Guest appearances
- Does not typically book guests
Based on episode analysis; this does not confirm that the show is currently accepting guests.
Shows with a similar audience
Questions about Slow Burn
Who hosts Slow Burn?
Willa Paskin and Susan Matthews and Evan Chung and Max Freedman and Merritt Jacob host the show. Published by Slate Podcasts.
How often do new episodes come out?
The show publishes bi-weekly, based on its RSS feed.
Does Slow Burn take guests?
The show does not typically feature guests, based on episode analyses.
Where can I read transcripts?
84 of 243 episodes have a transcript on Pod Engine. Full transcripts are available with a Pod Engine plan.
Host of Slow Burn?
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